Mike Pesca (37:10)
Hi, it's Ashpiel and it's an Antwin Tig, our name for recurring bad breath not due to illness. No that is of course simple chronic halitosis. The real Antoine Tig is a three week period. And that's why every three weeks like clockwork oh damn my clock stop working. We join you and talk about the things you wrote in about so recently I was saying one of the reasons why I'm not a huge believer in conspiracy theories is that no conspiracy theory that I'm aware of came true or paid off during my lifetime like the conspiracists would have had. And I asked you, my listeners, am I wrong about any things? And so am I wrong about any things? Just anything at all? And if you wrote in and you guys offered examples and a popular example, Drew Peterson was one who said this is perfect example Catholic Church child sex abuse conspiracy. The church conspired to hide from the public and move priests around different parishes. You know the details. Yes. So I have to make this clear. A conspiracy theory is different from a conspiracy. There was a conspiracy within the Catholic Church to hide their abuse just like there was a conspiracy within the Nixon White House to hide Watergate. But before Watergate was exposed to, no one was going around saying I think Richard Nixon is spying on the Democrats. I mean maybe someone was, but it wasn't a conspiracy theory that was out in the ether and the Catholic Church scandal. And listen, maybe I'm going overboard to try to prove my point and if you really agree or disagree also write in write into the gist@mike pesco.com but it is my more than recollection, I looked it up that there were instances of abuse of youngsters in the church here and there and often, though not very often, a priest would be either defrocked, moved out. Very few but some were prosecuted. But before the Boston Globe and the Spotlight series and others broke this wide open, I do not recall there being a conspiracy theory around Catholic Church abuse. I know that many were saying the Catholic Church is abusing or members of the Catholic Church are abusing our kids and something like they must know about it. I wonder how high it goes. But that's not exactly a conspiracy theory. A conspiracy theory would be some phenomenon either connected or unconnected to the church, is explained by all of these Catholic priests engaging in abuse and all of their superiors allowing it. But maybe I'm wrong, maybe it was a conspiracy theory. But a conspiracy is not the same as a conspiracy theory. And here are a couple others that were suggested by Sonia Saturday. The invasion of Iraq and subsequent Tampa toppling of Saddam Hussein under false pretenses was a conspiracy by senior members of the Bush administration. And there were plenty of people who said I don't believe this evidence. If it turns out that you shouldn't have believed the evidence, that's not a conspiracy theory. A conspiracy theory would have been something like the CIA purposefully planted false information against Saddam Hussein in order to, I don't know, some bank shot invasion of a rival country. It was a conspiracy, but it was not a conspiracy theory. Like the Enron scandal because the Enron executives were conspiring in the Wells Fargo scandal, which is people signing customers up with out their knowledge to credit cards for additional fees. These were all conspiracies, but they're not the conspiracy theory that explains other phenomenon, maybe unrelated phenomenon. Chemtrails is a conspiracy theory. Right? You see these things in the sky, oh, it's really poisonous gas or I don't even know what the conspiracy is. And I'm. You're going to thank me for not burdening you with it. A couple more people wrote in, it was rumored that Bonds, McGuire and Sosa were juicing that is taking steroids. It turns out they were again, not a conspiracy theory. Little bit of a conspiracy, but any time there was a wide rumor and the question was I think they're doing it, I think they're not. It's not a conspiracy theory. Someone else wrote in with Michael Jackson, long rumored to be a little weird, maybe a pedophile, not a conspiracy theory. Was he a pedophile? Well, during his lifetime he was acquitted of that. And after his lifetime, a pretty good HBO documentary. I interviewed the documentarians came out saying, and I think convincingly so, that he did it. But anytime anyone is accused of something and that person's in the public eye and there are debates about whether he did it or didn't do it and if you could prove it, that's not a conspiracy theory. Doesn't fit the definition of a conspiracy theory and Kerry writes in saying, isn't Hunter Biden's laptop a conspiracy that turned out to be kind of true? No, it would have been. Well, I don't know which part of it you think is true, Kerry, but the truth is that he really did have a laptop and it really was his and it had embarrassing information that was exactly what Bannon and Giuliani said it was. The conspiracy would have been if the alternative explanation were true, which that all the intelligence officials were right saying it was a Russian conspiracy. I'm not sure it would have been a conspiracy theory because that was so out in the open and maybe it fits in more with people arguing about things. So tell me what you think. If you want to tell me if any of these things are or are conspiracy theories by the correct definition. And they would be the Catholic Church, sex abuse scandal, Michael Jackson, sex abuse, Hunter Button laptop, juicing in baseball, invasion of Iraq. Do so the gist@mikepaska.com Tell me if you think they count as conspiracy theories. Two more things. Last one's big, but in the meantime I'll stop by someone on Blue sky one of many Brunos writes in to say, mike, I've loved your brand of truth talking for at least 10 years. Well, I've been doing it 12, so I think it's the last two that you take issue with. I prefer your funny but accurate takes on things over these podcasts any day. Listen one of many Bruno's don't take issue. You could listen to whatever you want, why ever you want and however you want. And the point where you said I was funny, really, I really like that. But you misunderstand what it is I do and how I think of the show, or how I think of just my orientation through life. The idea of punching left or not punching left is as foreign to me as if you were to say you should do more commercials for Chris Murphy for Senator or you should air some more ads arguing for Joni Ernst to retain her Senate seat. This is very, very separate from what I do. I don't look at if I am punching left, I don't look at if I am punching right. I just look at the phenomenon that comes across my radar and I say, is this accurate or not? Do I have something interesting to say about it? Do I think perhaps many of my listeners or people out there might be under a false impression or would at least benefit from a reorientation based on what my opinion is or just the points I have to raise so I would never, ever stop myself from criticizing someone or something that I think is wrong or worthy of critique because it is left or because it is right. I think the day after this Blue Sky Blue skeeted me. I did a critique of Matt Taibbi because I was just listening to the Matt Taibi YouTube and saying, I can't believe this is going on. Is he left? Am I punching left? Is he right? I have no idea. I've never thought about those things. I mean, I'm aware when I critique someone who's affiliated with progressives, I know I'm not stupid. But thinking about, I got to stop punching left because there is a burgeoning autocrat in the White House. Just not what I do. Just not how I think. And this is how I think I retain credibility. Although I've been thinking a lot about credibility lately, I used to think it was extrinsic, that it was this thing with qualities, and that if you behaved in a credible way and comported yourself with credibility, you would have credibility in the eyes of a third person. But now I think credibility is much more closely aligned to the subjective. So really, what we seek out in media is things that align with our worldview. So that's the definition of credibility. It doesn't matter. What I do is always to say, hey, this thing I noticed or came across that's wrong. You might be seeing. You might be seeing this, too. Maybe I can help you. Or maybe you'll want to stop listening. I understand. All right, here's the last section, and it is the most frequent comment I get. And I do not engage with it so often because it becomes tedious. In fact, many a Reddit page had been ruined by this becoming just the only subject of debate. But I was going to read a long email, one of many from a listener, but I'll just give you the sentence, Mike, you take Israel's side too much. So, on my substack on Pesca profundities, I recorded a video that addresses this at length. Here I will address this at less length. And it is this or I will just tell you, give you a hint of what I say in the video. One is there's something called what about ism? It's a propaganda tool, but it's also very human and very legitimate to sometimes say, wait, I'm getting criticized on this score. Or there is flack to be taken about this. This one issue is definitely a third rail. And yet there are other issues that are so similar to it that don't seem to bother anyone that much. It's hard not to note that when that occurs. So there's what about ism? I know that there are two ways to look at it, probably more than two. And another is the very prominent, I don't think the best definition of antisemitism, which is when Israel or Jews are held to a different standard than whoever else or whatever else you're talking about. I'm not sure that that is going on. I don't love that definition as the only definition. To me, it is just a warning against double standards. And yeah, if you use a double standard against women, you're probably sexist. If you use a double standard against black people, you might be racist. And if you use a double standard against Jews, there might be anti Semitism going on. So in my video I talk all about the standards used against Israel against the standards used against the rest of the world. I also say over and over again that what Israel is doing in terms of the starvation in Gaza is horrible. The Netanyahu government is very much to blame. When I had Haviv Retigger on the show, I said, how can this be happening? How they've bungled this response? We talked about it at depth, even if many critics did not like Haviv Rigger's overall perception. I've had many critics of Israel on the show. I've had humanitarian workers on the show. I don't want to get defensive and tell you everything that I have done on the show, but I don't always take Israel's side. I think I've been extremely critical. I know I have. Personally, I don't know how much I've said it on the show. Whenever it comes up in a warranted context, I will always talk about the horrors, the civilian horrors, how the civilians of Gaza don't deserve this. And I'll also acknowledge that Israel has made many, many mistakes in the war. But what I do and why I brought up the point of not wanting to engage in what about ism? It is very hard for me on the show. I've done this show since 2014 and the following wars have taken place. Ukraine talked a lot about Ukraine. Let's cabin that off now. The war in Tigray took place entirely during the course of the gist and there were at least 160,000 killed in Tigray, including fighters, but including tens of thousands of civilians. That's three times and upper bounds or 10 times the death toll of Gaza. The war in Yemen has taken place entirely within the gist's lifespan. I've done many segments on that. I talk a lot about it in the video. I summarize the segments I've done with Senator Chris Murphy with experts on counting civilian casualties. It's very similar the war in Yemen and the war in Gaza. There you have two very rich US allies, Saudi Arabia and Israel, each finding it unacceptable to have an Iranian backed proxy right next door sharing a border causing havoc. And as a result these two rich, well resourced countries have inflicted a lot of harm, a lot of civilian deaths. And the third huge conflict that has taken place is in Sudan and we don't even talk about Sudan. But Sudan, which is ongoing also has a much higher death toll than Gaza. Yemen by the way as a 377,000 death toll according to the United Nations. And 80,000 Yemeni children starved although that's according to an organization we don't really credit that much. The death toll in Yemen, the death toll in Tigray, the death toll in Sudan at least three times as deadly as Gaza. And the only reason I mentioned them is not to say and maybe you thought where I was going with this was what about those three worst conflicts? But it is to say I have tried to do segments on them with Yemen, I've done a lot with Tigray, I've only done two. When I searched the archives, you know, New York Times, the Daily only did one and part a fundamental part of my doing these segments to say why is no one else paying attention or why isn't the world paying attention? Well in Israel it is paying attention but that's a somewhat curious thing no one has ever written in saying, Mike, you're taking it easy on Ethiopia. Mike, you're taking it easy on Saudi Arabia. Mike, you're not doing enough segments on all these other places which we have chronicled are far more deadly than Gaza. I mean integray, it's not even just the deadliness, it's the horrors of the war. Here I'll read you a headline. Mass Rape, Forced Pregnancy and Sexual Torture Integray Amount to crimes against Humanity report. So maybe you're saying I didn't even know about that. That was 2022 when that war ended. How did I miss that? Let me tell you. That report was from a couple of weeks ago. That headline was from The Guardian of July 31 research documents horrific and extreme attacks by Ethiopian and Eritrean forces and warn that impunity has meant such atrocities are expanding to new regions. We do not pay attention to any of these wars except for the war in Gaza and So maybe you could argue that it's a good thing we're paying attention to the war in Gaza. We should be paying attention to these horrors. But a consequence of us not having paid attention to these other much more deadly wars is what's happening in Gaza seems shocking new sui generis, and of a category outside of war. The horrors of war, the omnipresent, familiar but horrific costs of war. And even we as Americans, Afghanistan, who went to war did not really pay attention because, you know, when we withdrew from Afghanistan and we withdrew from Iraq, all of the argument was framed as what it cost us, the United States in blood and treasure. How many civilians died in Afghanistan? I have the number from Watson Institute of Brown University, 46,319. And as of this estimate, in Iraq, 186,000 to 210,000 civilian died, not including the US military, not including the Iraqi National Police, not including the 40,000 36,000 to 43,000 opposition fighters, 200,000 civilians. So three or four times the death toll of Gaza. Well, civilians. Five times the civilian death toll of Gaza. And we were in these wars. And the United States did not hold themselves nearly as accountable as some people who have overtaken my Reddit demand I become accountable with Israel. So that's if not an answer, fully an explanation. And I know that answers with statistics or even reasoning are not enough to rebut two types of thought. And one is the legitimate. This is so anguishing. No amount of statistics will allay the anguish and horror that I see when I pay attention. And that is true. And I can't do anything about that. And the other, no amount of explanation, maybe those who criticize from a less consistent and less humanely motivated place or not. It's not for me to talk about the motivations of my critics. Now, I also know that I'm not going to be able to answer them, but I could just put this out there and share my thoughts with you. That's why we do the Antoine take. And one other reason we do the Antoine Tig is to reward the best listener, the best person I interacted with, maybe on social media. And there is a clear winner. This Antoine Tig. And I met her in Seattle and she knitted a pouch for me. I need a pouch. Turns out I'm an aspiring marsupial. Her name is Jennifer Hutch. She wrote such a nice note. The pouch was part peach and part fish. And so you give me pouch, I give you Lop Star Jennifer Hutch, you are the lob star of the Antoine Tig and that's it for today's show. Cory Wara produces the Gist and Astrid Green is our social media manager, though we are looking for a new one. Cory Wara produces the Gist. I mentioned that already. Ashley Khan is our production coordinator. Leo Baum. He's doing a big research project for me. Kathleen Sykes helps me write the Gist list. More than helps, really. I don't want to get too much under the hood. Truly essential to the Gist list. To subscribe, go to Mike pesca.substack.com check it out. Just check it out. See if you like it. We're talking about the mucus of the Native Americans today. You won't get that anywhere but us and the scientific community. Michelle Pasca is there, seeing all things, holding it together, much like the mucus of an indigenous American do. Peru and thanks for listening.
