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- [00:00]
A
And welcome back to the Dinoby dollar Show. Joining me right now is award winning journalist Jim Acosta. You know him from years on cnn, author of the New York Times bestseller the Enemy of the People. And of course, he has the wildly popular substack show, the Jim Acosta Show. Jim, good to see you. Thanks for making some time. It's been a few months. I'm glad to catch up.
- [00:18]
B
Yeah, it's great to be back with you, man. Good to see you.
- [00:20]
A
So, my friend, I, I, whenever you come on, it's every few months I ask you a lot of media related questions because, yeah, I look at differently and sometimes things don't make sense. And maybe you can give us some insight from the inside or formally on the inside there, but through years of journalism or you see it as bad as we do. So my big question is, look, when Trump lies about everything, is it different when we're at war? I mean, there's life and death involved and is there a different way media should be covering it? Should they be challenging him more or at this point, do you give up on the idea of corporate media challenging Donald Trump for fear of losing access or having executive orders signed against their parent companies?
- [00:59]
B
Yeah, I mean, I will say I've been pretty disappointed in the coverage. I think there should be a lot more scrutiny applied to Donald Trump. I mean, he obviously is going to speak to the nation this evening and he's going to try to present his rationale and whatnot, but it's like a month too late. He should have done this on the front side and he didn't do it. Um, and it's, he's only doing it now because things are blowing up in his face. And my sense of it is, is that no, the, the press really should be challenging him on a daily basis. Why are we there? What are we doing? What are the goals of this? And you know, he seems to change his, his answer to all of these questions just about every single day, I mean, multiple times a day. And I, I think he was just speaking with Reuters this morning and he was telling Reuters, oh, it's okay if, if we leave the, you know, if we leave their new nuclear capabilities there. That, that's not what the, the White House was saying. That's not what the administration was saying for weeks now. And so, you know, he's been lying throughout this whole thing. And, you know, the press just has to be doing a much better job of calling him out on this. And it seems to me they're just not.
- [02:10]
A
How much do you hope tonight in his speech he talks about the ballroom. Wouldn't that be fun? Like he's giving a national.
- [02:15]
B
I assume, I assume. I mean, this is, this is one of the perils of giving him network airtime. I mean, I am of the mindset that, you know, if I were running one of these networks and I would say to the White House, he is just not reliable enough to put on national television without any kind of editing or fact checking in real time. And he is probably going to complain about the Supreme Court. He's probably going to complain about the ballroom. He's, I would imagine he will almost certainly ad lib something nutty about mail in voting and all of his conspiracy theories about voting because this is, you know, all he's left with really are these race baiting cards to play. And I assume that that's what we're going to see from here on out until the midterms. You know, he went over to the Supreme Court and scowled at the justices today to try. He thought that that might put pressure on them to rule in his favor in the Birthright citizenship case. And really all he's doing is just playing to his base. And I, you know, in terms of the, the televised address to the nation, I wouldn't give it to him. I would not give him the airtime because he is just lie. And you know, we're at a place now where, you know, the networks, the major news outlets, they have to ask themselves the question, are you going to be a part of this? We know he's going to gaslight the American people, but he is, I mean, he is essentially brainwashing along with his allies in conservative media, they're essentially brainwashing, you know, a sizable chunk of the American people. And it just doesn't help to have a fact checker come on after a speech and say, well, he lied about these eight things. Here you go. Just doesn't get the job done when he's doing it in real time.
- [03:53]
A
No, and we should just have truth checkers is just say everything you're going to see is a lie unless noted otherwise. And after that's right, they go, hey, two things he said were true. His name and good night. You know that whatever it is, this is what we're living through. Now. Look, if you're gimmick casa, you're the head of a network. Let me be, let me ask you honestly. You're the head of a network, publicly traded company, you say to Donald Trump, we're not giving you airtime and you Know, he'll whine about it, you know, he'll slam it. You know, he get an executive order signed to go after your network. And I'm not, I'm saying this is the real world that they live in. We've never had.
- [04:27]
B
Yeah.
- [04:28]
A
Any kind of companies really fear a DOJ investigation, you know, see, investigation. He has weaponized government to ways we've never seen. So what do you mean? You still stand up like that?
- [04:39]
B
No, I think the television executives at each of these networks, they get each other on the phone. I mean, obviously, Fox is not a reliable player in all of this. They're. They're part of the propaganda machine. But the, the other ones that are not, the television executives call each other and they say, hey, are you going to do this? No. Are you going to do this? No. Okay, let's band together. We're not going to do this. And when they call and complain, you pick up the phone and you say, go yourselves. That is what you. And in the old days, that is what, you know, real news executives and TV executives would do when the White House would call and complain about stuff. I mean, maybe not go yourselves, but like, hey, thanks for your input. We'll take it under advisement. We'll see you later. Goodbye. And you hang up the phone. We, we have freedom of the press in this country. They are the public's airwaves. They're not the, they're not the President's airwaves. They're not the Republican Party's airwaves. They're not Brendan Carr's airwaves. They're the public's airwaves. And so the, the public should be able to say to Donald Trump, go screw yourself. And we're not going to, you know, platform your lies and racist distractions. And, and it seems to me that's what they should be doing. And I. Unfortunately, what we've seen up until this point is just a lot of cowtowing and bending the knee and, you know, just, you know, bending over for this guy. And it, to me, it's got to stop. Because at some point, these executives, they just have to ask themselves, are, are you a part of this? Do you want to be a part of this? And, like, look at yourself in the mirror, where do you want to be 10 years from now? Do you want to look back and say, well, I just rolled over every time Donald Trump wanted something? Or do you want to be like a real big boy or big girl and stand up for yourselves and for the American people? And I just I think that's, that's what it comes down to.
- [06:28]
A
And I wish they had the courage to do that. And some of them, they don't. And you have FCC chair Brendan Carr touting and, and part of the town and I'll read what he said. And Jim's name was actually mentions one of the people. Somehow they got you on there. That's their point. But the messaging of that is not just take a victory lap in their mind even though they didn't earn it. It's to scare media executives. The scare yes work. So Brendan Carr at cpac, everyone ocpac, he's FC chair. He's the guy who pressured to get Jimmy Kimmel fired and only because of our grassroots reaction. Jimmy Kimmel did get fired and he gets extended now. But this is what Brendan Carr said at cpac that Trump is winning his feud against quote fake news media. He added, look at the results so far. PBS the funded NPR defunded. Joy Reid gone from msnbc. Sleepy Eyed Chuck Todd gone. Jim Acosta gone. John Dickerson gone. Stephen Colbert is leaving CBS under new ownership and soon enough CNN is going to have new ownership as well. And that ownership is the right wing affinity of people who like Trump C from the Ellison that are going to own CNN if everything goes well with that deal. I mean they mention you by name. What's your reaction when you hear this garbage?
- [07:37]
B
I mean I think Brennan Carr is a scumbag and I have the God given American right under the first Amendment to tell him that. Brendan Carr, if you're watching this, if this clip makes the rounds, you are a scumbag. What you're doing to the American people, what you're doing to the free press in this country is disgraceful. And you are a disgraceful human being. And I suspect years from now your children will be ashamed of you if you have any. And you should be ashamed of yourself. And you will be ashamed of yourself because what you are doing is, you are just, you know, doing the bidding of a mad king, a mad wannabe king. And you know, to go out there at cpac, I mean how is he supposed to be viewed as any kind of reliable independent head of the fcc? He's obviously just a hack and a shameful one at that. And, and he just should be ashamed of himself and his family, his, his, his extended family to the, to the seventh and eighth cousin level. They should all be tremendously ashamed of what a scumbag he is because what he's done is do real damage to the freedom of the press in this country. And it seems to me the only way we're going to get this back is if the FCC is made independent again, made an independent agency again. And so you need new, a new administration to come in, you need a new Congress to come in, and probably some laws put in place that can firewall the fcc because, I mean, they should not be able to. Well, Jimmy Kimmel, he hurt Donald Trump's feelings. We got to get him off the air. And you know, the other thing, Dean, that we haven't been talking about enough as a country about all of this is that the networks, they explained all of these moves, having these anchors go here and there and leaving their, their jobs as programming decisions.
- [09:28]
A
Right.
- [09:28]
B
And what I would like to know, and this is a sincere question, is are there documents, are there emails, are there texts that could establish whether or not Donald Trump or people close to him reached out to these networks and forced the removal of these individual anchors and hosts? And I, you know, to me, it's sort of an untold story there. Somebody should get to the bot bottom of this. You know, I, I would love to see the, the paper trail.
- [09:56]
A
Yeah.
- [09:56]
B
Involved in any of that, because it seems to me what, what has happened here is that a, you know, a political attack was unleashed on major hosts and anchors and, and whatnot, journalists at these various networks, you know, and, and for them to, for Brendan Carr to swan around like, hey, look at me, I'm this big, bad tough guy, you know, if, you know, put us in the ring together. Yeah, put us, Put us in the ring together. I'll put on some boxing gloves and.
- [10:26]
A
You mean the real ring? You mean the real boxing?
- [10:28]
B
I thought you meant, why not? And then Jim goes, I'll debate him. I'll debate him, I guess, you know, with words. But if he wanted to, if he really wants to go at it, I'll get in. I'll get in a real boxing ring with him. I think he's, I think he's got about 10 years on me, but he looks about 10 years older than me.
- [10:44]
A
He does. I did. I thought you were younger than him.
- [10:46]
B
Yeah, actually, when you're, when you're evil and rotten, it ages you. And that's the problem with Brennan Carr. You know, he, it, it's like Stephen Miller. They've been aged by the evil things that they do.
- [10:59]
A
I never saw this side that. Jim, are you part Sicilian? I'm half Sicilian. Instantly, I get this. I'm like, let's get the baseball bat and talk to this guy.
- [11:06]
B
Cuban, half Cuban and my mom's a part Irish. So I don't know, you probably shouldn't put those things together, but you've got.
- [11:12]
A
Well, I'm half Palestinian, half Sicilian. So let's talk about combinations here.
- [11:15]
B
Y. Yeah.
- [11:16]
A
Jim, what I read to you what Brennan Carr saying the FCC chair at a CPAC event and it gets a lot of applause. You imagine a Democratic president or AG saying we're going to shut down newsmags and Fox News and get rid of Barry Weiss and all that and then when these things happen, take a victory lap at the dnc. Republicans would go ballistic. Look, they're weaponizing government. Look what they're doing. They are literally doing this. And on the right you hear applause and that is concerning to me. There's no pushback. There's no Ted Cruz a teeny bit under Jimmy Kimmel because he wants to run for president. He understood this is not popular.
- [11:50]
B
Yeah, he wants to be able to go announce on Jimmy Kimmel or something like that.
- [11:55]
A
But I'm saying like the Republicans told us that the government you got rid of, the Hunter Biden stole, like we've done all these evil things and in reality it wasn't us. But now you have the FCC chair openly saying we get rid of these people and now we're going to give CNN to the Ellison's Stephen B. Moore right wing garbage on the air that CPAC always going to like.
- [12:17]
B
No, I totally agree with you. And you know, I don't think that obviously that if the shoe were on the other foot, I don't think the Democratic Party would do what the Republicans are doing right now. They wouldn't deplatform, you know, conservative media outlets. And you know, you know, to me it's just un American to, to engage in, you know, discrimination, a viewpoint discrimination in the way that they have. And I will tell you a story. I mean I, I remember when there was a front seat that opened up in the White House briefing room and the networks got together and said fox should have this front seat in the White House briefing room. And there were a lot of people at the time who said, oh no, no, it's Roger Ailes, it's Rupert Murdoch, you know, they can't be trusted, blah, blah, blah. And the network said, no, no, it's the right thing to do. Fox should have a seat in the front room of the briefing room. And so, I mean, this is the courtesy that was extended to conservative media when the opportunity arose. There were other instances when I was at the White House and you know, the Obama administration would try to, you know, get under Ed Henry's skin and you know, the networks and the journalists in the White House press corps would stand up for Ed Henry and stand up for Fox. And it just doesn't, it's just amazing to me. And I will say, when I lost my press pass during the first Trump administration, Fox was one of the outlets that said, no, no, no, give Jim his press pass back. What's happened now in the second Trump administration is that Trump has taken this so far that it's really, it's the authoritarian project that, that project 2012, 2025 has unleashed. And he, you know, they're just going for it. And it, you know, to me, maybe the answer is what Norm Eisen is doing and that is that you just have to keep filing lawsuits and all of these things and just get judges to look at all of these things. And it's basically the only recourse that we have at this point.
- [14:11]
A
Yeah, I mean, just yesterday, Trump signs an executive order because he understands how unpopular he is. I don't know what level of dementia he has, but he has some level. But it breaks through that his polling's awful. And the only way the Republicans know the House and the Senate. The House definitely, but maybe even the Senate lose it is to rig the election. Yes, you have executive order and I know there's gonna be lawsuits. Literally directed the post office not to deliver mail to people unless Trump approves you getting the mail.
- [14:38]
B
That's literally sick.
- [14:40]
A
The post office deliver ballots unless we put you on an approved list. If a Democratic president ever signed anything like that, the Republicans might actually get in the street and protest. But this was one of the most heavy handed things I've ever seen. And AG Bondi is supposed to criminally prosecute someone who goes around the post office and delivers.
- [14:57]
B
Yeah, no, I seem to. Okay, and I'm glad you brought this up, because here's my view on this. Donald Trump has done a lot of horrible things and he probably has committed impeachable offenses up until this point. But if Donald Trump and his aides and associates engage in another conspiracy to criminally meddle in the upcoming midterm elections, to me that that's all bets are off. And what needs to occur after that point is, and I assume that, you know, Mike Johnson and some of the Republicans in the House will, will probably attempt to not cede a new House if they lose the majority and. And so on, is that the Democratic Party needs to get together with the pro democracy people on both sides of the aisle and state very clearly that crimes have been committed and that when a new administration comes in, there will be prosecutions. And if Donald Trump is going to break the law by meddling in the upcoming midterms, he should be held criminally accountable. And to me, that is a crime that is engaging in voter fraud. And, yes, it's a little strange and unusual to see it conducted by the people in the executive branch. But the executive branch of the federal government has no involvement in our elections. Our elections, by virtue of the Constitution, are conducted at a state level, and they are then, those results are then recognized by the legislative branch. But they don't have the ability to just say, we're going to have federal elections in this country to determine, you know, what the 11th district in the state of California wants for their representative. That's not how it works. We don't do that in this country because there's obviously, there's so much room for mischief. And Donald Trump is the mischief maker in chief. I mean, you know, any vulnerability he's going to try to exploit. And so it just has to be made very clear to me, I think that if they're going to engage in a conspiracy to criminally defraud the American people in the upcoming midterms, that it should just be announced that they're engaging in criminal behavior and that that criminal behavior would have to be prosecuted by, obviously, when there is a legitimate Justice Department back in Washington.
- [17:11]
A
Yeah. And the good part is, from a legal point of view, the statute of limitations for most federal crimes are five years. So we're within that. So if a Democrat were to win, it's not an empty threat. And you could do what Republicans, if the Democrats. Save your papers. And some Democrats have used that term and say, Pam Bondi, save your papers. Brendan Carr, sit. Preserve your papers, my friend, because we're going to investigate all of you for what you may have done.
- [17:35]
B
Right. And these things can be conducted on the state level. State prosecutors can do this. And so, you know, I mean, we have to recognize as a country that what Trump is doing is taking us down a dark path. You know, the latest polls show that he's around, what, 35% approval? And so he's running scared right now. Republicans on Capitol Hill are screaming into their pillows every night, why did we go along with this guy again? They're all going to get their clocks clean in these upcoming midterms. And I think it's not to, to echo what others have said, but I'll echo what others have said, that the, you know, folks need to get out there and vote in a way that it's too big to rig and that, that the cheaters aren't going to win because there's just going to be such an outpouring of, of people showing up at the polls. And so, you know, we'll see how all this plays out. But it seems to me, you know, folks are going to have to get creative in terms of how to hold these folks accountable. You know, I saw somebody say, well, couldn't he just pardon people? Yes. I mean, I, I think that possible, too. I was talking to Ty Cobb about this yesterday on my show. The former White House lawyer Trump is going to try to pardon everybody under the sun. He's going to try to pardon himself. He's going to try to pardon everybody. I assume there'll be blanket pardons on his way out of office. And, you know, that just raises the, the specter that perhaps, you know, things will have to be conducted at the state level as, as we saw during Joe Biden's administration. It's only because the Supreme Court, which, you know, of course, we saw the Supreme Court holding the birthright citizenship case today. You know, they gave Donald Trump this immunity decision. And I've been saying this, I've been writing about this. I know you have, too, Dean. Ever since that decision came down, everybody said, you have unleashed, you know, Pandora's box. You have sprung the genie out of the bottle. You have all of those cliches. You have unleashed something on this country that the founders never intended. And that is a king like president with no accountability. And that's just not how we do things in this country. And it seems to me that, you know, and I gotten, you know, Jen Welch and I did a podcast recently and we talked about this and Elon Musk, his head had just about popped off on X. You know, maybe the Democrats have to explore the idea of expanding the Supreme Court pledge to the Supreme Court, putting term limits on justices. I mean, I think the American people are ready for all of this. I think Donald Trump is going to break everything into a million pieces, and he is going to basically set the table for new democratic reforms in this country. You need term limits on Supreme Court justices. You probably need a bigger Supreme Court. You need term limits on members of Congress. I mean, we can't have, why do we have members of Congress serving for 20 or 30 or 40 years? I mean, Jesus Christ, Chuck Grassley's in his 90s. Enough, enough. Susan Collins shouldn't even be running. I mean, what is her fourth or fifth term or something? Why? You know, like, it's just the power of the incumbency that has been made, like, like a holy sacred thing in Washington. And it, it's just the most anti democratic thing in the world. And so it just, you know, we just, we need major Democratic reforms to some extent. Donald Trump has exposed all these vulnerabilities and what we probably need to reform the pardon power, we need new anti corruption laws that are up to date. What is going on with the crazy betting markets where people can just bet on stuff. And of course, you know that people inside the Trump administration are calling their buddies and saying, hey, set up a couple of accounts where we can dump our winnings in. I just heard Trump's going to do this or I heard Trump's going to do that. You know that those suckers are doing it.
- [21:29]
A
Look what happened. Look what happened last week, right, with the spike in this S and P futures. Fifteen minutes before he posts. There's no explanation. Common sense tells you what happened. Someone in the small circle leaked it to their friends enough for them to cause a spike in future buys. But it sounds like you're running for president. I got to be honest.
- [21:48]
B
No, no, you got a platform.
- [21:50]
A
Jima Costa 2028, folks. Here's it right here. The exploratory committee is being formed.
- [21:55]
B
I don't want to blow up the world. No, I know, but I just think that it's gotten so bad that people were talking about the oligarchs, too. I mean, Elon Musk is about to become the first trillionaire. I mean, could there be a worse person to be the first trillionaire? And he's made it very clear that he's going to also attempt to meddle in the upcoming midterms on Donald Trump's behalf. And so Citizens United has to go. There's just a whole host of Democratic reforms that are needed in this country. And by the way, I mean, to me, like, if you're a conservative and a Republican, I mean, like Judge, Judge Ludig, the great Judge Ludig, I would assume he would be in favor of a lot of these things because, you know, he has also been trying to shout it from the mountaintops that our democracy is in terrible danger. I mean, look at, look at, you know, what Trump is trying to do with the ballroom, you know, and my thing to the, to the, on the ballroom is, you know, a judge said that, you know, they can't do this thing. Unilaterally that Trump can't just knock down a ballroom or knock down part of the White House and build a ballroom. So the thing that needs to be communicated is you need to say not to Trump, but to the construction company, excuse me, Acme Construction Company. Are you going to violate a judge's order? Donald Trump can act crazy, let him go out there with a goddamn shovel and start to build this thing on himself. But construction companies are should not be violating judges orders.
- [23:21]
A
No.
- [23:21]
B
And so it just seems to me like it just, I would love to see the Democratic messaging be a whole lot sharper on a lot of this stuff. People just need to start saying you do, you keep violating the law, you violate judges orders, it doesn't matter if you're going along with Donald Trump, you are going to jail. Jail is awaiting you. And who's, we have the cell right here. You're going to be living in it.
- [23:43]
A
And you know to whose credit who said that? The DA from Philadelphia county, from Philadelphia, Larry Krasner goes to the airport in Philadelphia, says point blank to ICE officials, ICE agents in the airport. If you do what you did in Minneapolis, here in Philadelphia, I'm going to charge you, I'm going to prosecute, you're going to go to jail. And there's no pardon from Donald Trump because it's state law. Prosecutions, we need more of that. I wish every Democratic AG would say the same things when ICE comes through state if you break our laws, I'm watching you, I'm going to put you in jail. Your no pardon is going to be effective. That's so vitally important. We all play that. And I can tell you, as someone who was a lawyer who did some prosecution in municipal court but still dealt with the law, when people think they might get charged, even Trump might pardon them one day if they think they might get charged and they don't know if the state law is going to apply or not, it affects their conduct because they have to think about, I got to hire a lawyer, are they going to get reimbursed for a lawyer? I'm going to be, am I going to lose my job? Am I going to go to jail? That's how you affect conduct. That's why our criminal justice is about punish and deter. The deterrent is a big part. If you don't punish anyone, you don't deter anybody. Everyone goes, I can do whatever I want. Trump's got my back. So that's so important what Krasner said.
- [24:52]
B
No, I agree with you and ICE is a perfect example of that. I mean, I think they finally got the message in Minnesota that this, you know, that this was not going to work. But I honestly think part of this is because, you know, Trump and his team have seen the poll numbers and you know, Donald Trump is about as popular as Jeffrey Epstein and you know, Susie Wiles, they're looking at the poll numbers and they're saying that this ICE stuff does not work. I don't think it's any surprise that ICE people are saying, oh, ICE was showing up at the airports without the masks on and everything because it's a dry, it's a dry run for the, for the elections in the fall. That may be the case. But I also think that they put ICE at the airports, handing out water bottles and stuff just to try to repair, help start repairing the image of this dog agency that everybody now, everybody wants abolished.
- [25:41]
A
Did you see, quick thing, did you see Pete Hexith yesterday, his press conference?
- [25:44]
B
I saw that, like reading literature and
- [25:47]
A
his heart was as big as Texas and the wind came over and the sunset. I'm like, they're trying to make him nicer. It didn't yell at the reporters yet because I said before. Going back to your point, you might have interrupted, but I think you're onto something. I think it's a bigger. They're trying to do. It's like a reality show. Like they're trying to re. Envision it right now. Like, let's do a makeover of the Trump administration.
- [26:07]
B
I think they are.
- [26:08]
A
I really think so. I agree with you.
- [26:10]
B
Yeah, no, I, I think so too. And, but the, the thing is, is that Donald Trump is his own worst enemy. And so Susie Wiles and the political people inside Trump's team can say, oh, we got to soften our image a little bit. We look like a bunch of scumbags, which they do. But Trump can't help himself, which is why he had to go down to the Supreme Court today, which is why he' race baiting games with birthright citizenship. And you know, now we're gonna have federal voter rolls and all this stuff. This is all to chum the waters with the racist elements of his base, to try to energize them because they are so freaking pissed off right now about gas prices and Trump breaking his promise on the wars. I mean, the thing that Trump breaking his promise on no new wars, that is as bad as read my lips, no new taxes. Dean, you and I are old enough to remember this. George H.W. bush saying, Read my lips, no New taxes. That that was one of the most disastrous things a politician has ever said to and then broken his promise on it helped Bill Clinton become president of the United States. But Donald Trump saying no new wars. A lot of those young podcast bros are really pissed about that. And there's some anecdotal evidence coming out of that recent cpac, which apparently was pretty lightly attended. But if you look at some of the sound soundbites that were coming out of that thing, there were some of those young dudes going up to cameras and talking into podcasts and all this stuff saying that they're pissed about this no new wars thing that Trump broke, that he violated. And so I really think that they're in major political trouble right now. I mean, people need to understand for folks, hopefully the no Kings events over the weekend really gave people a shot in their arm and that they feel a whole lot better about things, but they need to. People need to understand we are not screwed. Donald Trump is screwed. There's MAGA is screwed. The Republicans who enabled all of this are screwed. They're in big trouble. They have about six or seven months to try to limit the damage, but the tidal wave is building, make no mistake.
- [28:13]
A
I agree. And last thing, Jim, and we've gone a little long, but it's great chat. The big thing about we're seeing the ascendancy of independent media. You're part of it. I am part. Even though I do series xm, which is arguably corporate media, the freedom we have is ridiculous. But I do a lot of independent media as well. How do we be effective? There's more corporate media consolidation. The Ellisons are about to own half the cable networks. It's unbelievable. But we're going to see more of that. How do you think we can be effective? Is it working with others? Is it whatever it is I want to get from you. You've worked on the inside of corporate media. Now you're an independent media for a few years. How do we become really effective independent media where we can start shaping the narratives, like making the news ourselves, Cutting through that way.
- [28:55]
B
Yeah, I mean, I think that a couple of things. One is, you know, obviously, anytime folks can help support independent media, you know, take some of those dollars that maybe you. You stop spending on a subscription to a newspaper or whatever that you got fed up with, you know, you know, use that money to support and prop up independent media, because it does make a difference. I may, I try to send that message on my show every day and I'll. I'll spread the message on yours, too. I think at some point we're going to combine resources. They're going to be some of us who are just going to have to band together and form new independent networks. And I think once that happens, once we have a larger voice collectively, that's going to put pressure on a lot of these compromised legacy and corporate media outlets to change their ways. I do think that the hemorrhaging that has taken place over at CBS has gotten their attention. Apparently, Barry Weiss is already reaching out to my old boss, Jeff Zucker, to see if they can try to fix what's happening over at cbs. And, you know, I don't know. I read that in a report. I don't know how much of that is true, but I read that in a report. But, you know, people are leaving cbs. You know, they're, they're, they're not watching CBS the way that they used to. I mean, and as I tell people all the time, when 60 Minutes is in trouble, we're all in trouble. But I think what needs to occur is, first of all, the people need to rise up. I think state attorneys general need to rise up, and they need to do everything in their power to shut down these mergers. The merger of Paramount and wbd, it should not happen. It runs the risk of creating this propaganda conglomerate outlet that has no business operating in the United States. And same thing with Tegna and nexstar, another local media merger that could give one company influence over TV stations in what, like 80% of America? Something like that. Households in 80% of America. And that's, that is not right. And we've always had sort of a decentralized media system in this country because you, you can't have. We don't want to have what, what's taken place in Russia and Hungary and other places where a bunch of oligarchs buy up the media and then they're working in cahoots with the people in power. That's just, that is not, that's not the American way. And it runs the risk of creating, you know, a propaganda outlet that, to me, you know, what, what's stopping a cbs, CNN merged company from buying ABC and then buying NBC? I mean, we're talking about something that would be far worse than what Fox is right now. Imagine having another Fox in our country. We already have one Fox in the hen house. We don't need two. And so it seems to me, you know, now is the time to stop this, put the kibosh on this, make sure people understand that you Know, if you get too big, we're gonna. We're gonna have to break you up. And just like in the old days of busting up the monopolies and the old trusts of the late 19th century, early 20th century, you know, Teddy Roosevelt, somebody needs to go out there and start busting these big tech, big media companies. They're getting too big. The Ellisons are going to own CNN, CBS and TikTok. People forget about TikTok too.
- [32:08]
A
I know, Larry.
- [32:10]
B
All of our kids are. A lot of our kids are on TikTok. And so this scares me a great deal. And it has to be resisted with everything we got.
- [32:20]
A
I couldn't agree more. And that's so interesting. You put up Teddy Roosevelt. I'm reading a book on Teddy Roosevelt fighting J. P. Port Morgan, J.P. morgan. People know him as trust busting. And I'm reading about it to try to get more ideas for the time we're living through. Because it is a new gilded age. The oligarchs then. We have the oligarchs now and they're rising. It was great seeing you, my friend. It's been too long. Yeah.
- [32:40]
B
Good to see you.
- [32:41]
A
Of course, the Jim Acosta show on Sub Psych. Everybody knows that. If not, go sign up for it. Anything else you want to plug before I let you go, my friend?
- [32:47]
B
No, Anytime any anybody wants to tune in, I'm on 4 o' clock daily on substack. We air the show later on YouTube. You can find it on Apple Podcasts. And great being on with you, Dean. Let's do it again. Let me get you on my show.
- [33:00]
A
We'll do that. I'd love to you whenever you invite me, I'm there. Jim. Thanks, my friend. Thanks. Thanks everyone for joining. It was great to have a great crowd today in the middle afternoon. Have a great day everybody.
- [33:09]
B
Good to see you.
- [33:10]
A
Take care. Mark.