The Tucker Carlson Problem (with Naomi Klein)

The fascist job is to take that anger, acknowledge it, and redirect it, right? Redirect it at the scapegoats and at the left. That's why Tucker's never going to be our friend. But, you know, I think that this is the vision that he represents, and it's a really bleak vision. It's a really grim vision. And, you know, I think people can make short-term alliances that will end up backfiring on them very, very badly. Hello, hello, and welcome back to A Bit Fruity. I'm Matt Bernstein. I'm so happy that you're here. I was at a talk the other night about Palestine and the art world when, during the Q&A section, someone asked the panelists what they thought about Tucker Carlson. Most people in the room nervously laughed and shifted in their chairs. Tucker Carlson, who, when I started this podcast three years ago, was on Fox News complaining about how the green M&M's. The green M&M is no longer sexy. Simpler times, right? Take me back. I guess. I don't know. I never thought I'd yearn for that time. Anyway. The green M&M, you will notice, is no longer wearing sexy boots. Now she's wearing sensible sneakers. Leading women do not wear sexy boots. Leading women wear frumpy shoes. The frumpier, the better. That's the rule. The other big change is that the brown M&M has, quote, transitioned from high stilettos to lower block heels. Also less sexy. That's prime. Progress. M&M's will not be satisfied until every last cartoon character is deeply unappealing and totally androgynous. Until the moment you wouldn't want to have a drink with any one of them. That's the goal. When you're totally turned off, we've achieved equity. They've won. Tucker has emerged as one of the most prominent critics of the U.S. relationship with Israel. Though not of Israel in and of itself. But let's put a pin in that. Why does this tiny country have so much control over our government? How do you break the stranglehold? Of the Israeli lobby on the U.S. government? Why is a country of 9 million people able to dictate terms to a country of 350 million people? The government of Israel is promoting the largest pride event in the history of the region this June in the Dead Sea. Very close to, by the way, Sodom and Gomorrah. He's broken with Donald Trump, who he's campaigned for three separate times over this issue. And his opposition to the U.S. aid for Israel has made him a temptation. He's a tempting and contentious and confusing figure on the left, where we've been attempting for long before I was born, frankly, to build power around the Palestinian cause. And to find something that looks like power in Tucker Carlson, one of the conservative movement's most formidable figures, is, at least to me, confusing on the surface. You know, I'm an anti-Zionist because Israel is a state founded upon an ethno-religious hierarchy. Which is enshrined in their legal system at every level. The genocide in Gaza and now bombardment of Lebanon are downstream consequences of a state held together by these values. And my values are that all human beings are equal. All humans of all races, religions, genders, sexualities, etc. For decades, Tucker Carlson and his ilk have demonstrated that they do not share this view about human beings and equality. So, their seemingly sudden and very strong stance against Israel are, sure, politically useful, but if it's not coming from a human rights-based framework, then where exactly is it coming from? And where might it lead? To disentangle all of this today, which many of you have asked me to do, I am joined by the one and only Naomi Klein, author of many books, including Doppelganger and The Shock Doctrine, as well as her forthcoming book, End Times. And I am joined by the one and only Naomi Klein, author of many books, including Doppelganger and The Shock Doctrine, as well as her forthcoming book, End Times. you pull out the phone and use the google it's in genesis but so you're quoting a bible phrase you don't have context for it you don't know where in the bible it is but that's like your theology i'm confused what does that even mean tucker i'm a christian i want to know what you're talking about like he got him on record on some really important things that nobody had gotten him on record before same thing with mike huckabee where it was like if we're using the bible as the real estate deed where does that stop you've appealed to genesis genesis 15 says it's abram receives from god the news that his descendants will inherit the land and you tell me as the as the theologian if i'm getting this wrong but from the euphrates to the nile and that would include like basically the entire middle east christian zionism i want to go back because that's where we started i'm not going to let you off on this because you have said it three times that god gave this land to this people what does that mean does israel have the right to that land because you're appealing to genesis yeah you're saying that's the original deed it would be fine if they took it all you know for this book that astra taylor and i have been working on for a year now on end times fascism you know we use those quotes because nobody else got these guys on record right i want to acknowledge that he's doing like he's doing some journalism that's really important but what's the broader end goal for tucker carlson as a political figure which is where this gets really complicated and he he his name comes up as a possible presidential candidate right and i think that the the goal is to break the judeo-christian fusion right this idea that the us is a judeo-christian nation no he says it's a christian nation right and this idea that the sort of theological duty is linked to creating a greater israel he's trying to break that and basically throwing his lot in with the idea that the new jerusalem is the united states and that you want to bunker down with your christian nation so it's very tied to fortress borders and also the kind of cleansing that we're seeing you know on the streets of u.s cities um that's that's part of the project i mean he thinks there should be more deportations yes yeah i mean that's who he is it's complicated and i think that within the context of the movements that you and i have both been a part of and are a part of i think that the people who are going like hey maybe he's our great friend you know and maybe maybe he's a great gift to these movements or whatever i think that's really a story of a failure of solidarity that i think when when you get to the point where you're like oh when solidarity fails when multiracial democracy fails when internationalism fails as a promise of security and we're you know almost three years into a genocide that is ongoing i think people start looking for strong men they start looking for for the for their own bully right and i think that that's what what tucker maybe represents to some people so i think it's a sad story right i think it's a really sad story about the failure of solidarity and the vacuum that gets created and that happens and it's it's it's a pattern that's repeated in history you just covered so many amazing bases that we're going to get into in a little bit more depth but i first wanted to show you a very bizarre clip that was my first exposure to right-wing in heavy air quotes anti-zionism and this came from uh jubilee are you familiar with jubilee yeah oh you are well i saw the one medhi did the gang up thing you you have been in the weeds with political slop content it's nice to know that we're all there together jubilee for those who don't know it's a youtube content farm that purports to foster honest dialogue and inspire human connection but in practice makes videos like this one called is being fat a choice fit men versus fat men in it myron gaines a far-right podcaster who's representing the fit men side says the following unfortunately some people have emotional stuff that happened um traumatic stuff that's happened so you can't discount and just say oh because they're fat boohoo man like there's way worse stuff going out in the world people saying oh my god i'm sad i'm gonna eat some ice cream it's like no dude it's like you're fat you made that decision you live in the best country ever if you live in a civilized first world country of electricity internet power etc you deserve to be bullied it's ridiculous to me that we have all these fat people running around meanwhile people are being bombed in gaza it's ridiculous yeah it's so interesting it is so interesting and the first time i heard that i was like wait okay so this is like this this guy is just like straightforwardly like bullying a fat person okay like dime a dozen we've seen this and then at the end where he's like boohoo people are being bombed in gaza i'm like wait a minute well look this is this is where i think the democrats liberalism generally left a texas-sized vacuum that now the far right is moving into and it's intersecting with kind of edgelord culture troll culture whatever you want to call it right where you create a taboo you create an unspeakable thing right and maybe that's just saying fat people deserve to be bullied or maybe it's you know using the r word or whatever it is i mean we know that we're in this sort of festival of saying unsayable things and getting lots of views and monetizing it world right that's where we are and i think that's one of the things that i think is really important to me is that i think a lot of those taboos is also uh talking about the genocide in gaza which is bonkers but they have absolutely fused and you see that i mean i i'm not really steeped in manosphere culture right okay nice to know that you have a line i have a line but i did watch that that netflix documentary and that was that was all over it like all these guys were like they they would just suddenly all of a sudden at the same sort of time they all just started doing this a similar line crossing you know it was like using the genocide and that's when i realized we were well and truly doomed yes okay listen i don't think that's why you had me on the show you probably wanted hope from me we'll find hope i promise we'll find hope at least i'll find hope by the end but you're so right and the way something that looks like anti-zionism has infiltrated these manosphere spaces and you saw it bizarrely at the end of the show it's like i don't know i don't know if it's true or not but i don't know if it's true but i don't know if it's true or not but i don't know if it's true or not but i don't know if it's true or not but i don't know if it's true or not but i don't know if it's true or not but i don't know if it's true or not but i don't know if it's true or not but i don't know if it's true or not about the man to be honest but he called out chelsea handler for being a zionist chelsea is a zionist i'm not saying that's good or bad speaking of dead kids she's a big fan of abortions now if that came from like a left-wing figure i'd be like yes i i as a celebrity political person would love to talk about chelsea handler being a zionist but shane gillis is like his whole thing is that he's a racist and so it just seemed like such a thing but also i think something that we're going to get into here is that the far right has a long history of sort of ping-ponging around between scapegoats and i think what they are doing while again on the surface can look helpful it can look like yeah call out chelsea handler is uh in this and you see someone like nick fuentes doing this very explicitly they are man it's like fucking the adl has made it like impossible for me to like talk about anti-semitism in this way well it's brutal right because you find yourself as you pointed out i'm significantly older than you and i have been getting called a self-hating jew and and facing people who equate criticism of the state of israel criticism of zionism with anti-semitism and accusing me of being an anti therefore an anti-semite for since i was in college which was a really long time ago you know and now when you actually see far-right figures doing the thing that you've been accused of you're like you're speechless right you don't there's like the language that you need to describe reality is now has been so degraded that is no longer useful right and this has been going on with a lot of words right i mean i wrote about it in doppelganger just that feeling of speechlessness when steve bannon is talking about fascism and othering right you're like well what words are left right i think that's what you're talking about i want to tell the story of tucker carlson arriving at this moment which involves a lot of other people and i think inherent to that story is the maga civil war naomi for those out of the loop can you explain this sort of conservative civil war eruption that i think has accelerated a lot in the wake of charlie couric's death i know you also wrote about this in your book well i think it has a lot to do with what with this sort of economy that we're talking about because it is an economy the influencer economy is a huge one and it's part of broader economy that is sort of feeding off of instability and crisis and it accelerated during the pandemic when people were everything was mediated through screens lost their in-person communities were frightened you know are finding their parasocial relationship i'm not going to explain the internet to you and so you could explain anything to me i would be very excited about it but i do i i think that trump came back to power really using the right-wing influencer sphere to his benefit as we know i mean he he sidestepped a lot of of mainstream media and did the podcast tour and it all worked fantastically well for him then it started to fall apart because for them for for the people you know who are making a living off of this and are building empires around it it actually is not a good business model just to echo the president i mean that's what fox news is doing but that can't be what tucker carlson and candace owen are doing now that they don't have a boss right i mean they're running their own companies so i think that there are that there were some real issues where people had splits over including israel but i also think there's this broader issue where they're all competing with each other when they fight they get clicks and i mean i thought the left was brutal matt but would you really oh my god right because my whole life i've heard especially from like the center liberals who are like why don't we especially recently where it's like why don't we just fall in line why don't we just fall in line behind this candidate or that candidate vote blue no matter who yada yada yada yada leftist purity testing you never stop hearing about leftist purity testing which okay a separate conversation but the adage right for everybody has been like the the republicans they just fall in line naomi klein i don't think so i don't think so and this is one of the like i mean there's so many things that social media has given us that are terrible but when it comes but they have also destroyed the right and it has also destroyed the right and it is and i love it like i i love the mega civil war um i think it is it is a tremendous gift they have created a vacuum that if there was a functioning left party in the united states it would be having a field day right now because they as you know i mean they are so messy they are accusing each other of being feds they're accusing each other being trans they're accusing each other of all kinds of things look tucker that's why i'm sitting here you know right i mean because we had a contentious dialogue well i thought you were a fed i was and i thought you were a fed yeah i'm not a fed you mentioned charlie kirk i mean charlie kirk was very much sort of a part of this things got very ugly between him and nick fuentes and it was really like who is going to be the most powerful influencer on the right and to get your piece of the action you've got to attack each other then you have to have a collab come back together make peace you know they're just playing the game i think that when kirk died it's it's worth remembering that the drum administration thought that they were going to be able to use that to actually fix some of this because it predated the fact that they were going to be able it was it was happening before it was happening over israel kirk had taken a lot of flack for inviting tucker to speak at the big turning point conference he was getting pressure from donors he was starting to talk about it publicly it was starting to come out it was it was splintering then he's murdered and jd vance is guest hosting his podcast remember that then they have the huge memorial and the unified message from the entire cabinet who's are all speaking is now we come together and kill the left this was not one assassin it was the entire left that killed charlie kirk because it's a violent ideology and that lasted for about five seconds i remember that they were all like the left killed charlie kirk which was very scary yeah it was very scary and also like whether or not the left even killed charlie kirk whether the individual shooter i mean jury's still out we haven't even gotten a trial yet but it was it was very scary i was like oh no like i mean people were genuinely concerned there could be like a broader civil war over some of the rhetoric that the trump administration was using over charlie kirk's death and it wasn't just rhetoric they were also saying we're going to go after the funders we're gonna i mean they were using it yeah as a political tool to try to destroy the the funding infrastructure for the left and to try to criminalize specific groups and they were starting to arrest people over it i mean it was not and people were losing their jobs it was a very serious campaign and if this mega civil war had not happened i think we'd be in a different world so i i actually think it's very good that the right is splintering it's always good when the right is splintering let's not lose sight of the big picture that whole i remember like charlie's murderers.com it was like anyone who posted like anything less than sympathetic about charlie kirk in the wake of his death had was doxed on this website yeah that lasted all of two days and then the right started to eat itself ideologically where we are now with the mega civil war for those who uh aren't super tuned in the right is splintering there are basically these two major warring factions there is maga right trump vance people like ben shapiro erica kirk the sort of like turning point establishment basically the entirety of fox news these are traditional neoconservatives they are very loyal to trump and they are very pro israel then there is the america first faction which is made up of people like tucker carlson candace owens marjorie taylor green though she's no longer in government uh nick fuentes and i think talking about the america first faction will lead us into what exactly does tucker carlson believe to understand tucker carlson's belief which i think we can boil down more efficiently than the new york times did in that interview i think it's helpful to first explain the groipers but first i would love to take a quick break from the show to give a shout out to helix for sponsoring today's episode you spend a third of your life in bed and if you're like me and you work from home or maybe you're just a very sleepy individual you might spend a lot more than a third of your life in bed so 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is currently running their memorial day sale so if you would like to check it out you can go to helix sleep.com slash fruity for 27 off that is helix sleep.com slash fruity and now let's get back to the show naomi klein what do you know about the grapers i mean i think that they are the the ground zero of the transgression culture that we were talking about earlier the name itself speaks to the the kind of rebranding of what used to just be called the helix sleep.com neo-nazi culture with something that maybe it's a joke maybe it's not a joke can we take any of it seriously is it all said with a wink so it's it's a little bit harder to pin down but i think you'd probably explain it way better than me the gropers are i mean first and foremost they're fans of the influencer streamer nick fuentes but they're much more than that uh the the gropers the ideological backbone of the group is ultra ultra ultra nativist they are very explicitly white christian nationalists they want to build in a that is full of white christians and only white christians the gropers hate donald trump they really hate donald trump because he in their eyes has not gone far enough they view him as a sort of fake authoritarian who doesn't have the balls to be a real authoritarian the gropers are highly motivated by the great replacement theory which says that jews are conspiring to undermine white power in the united states by importing immigrants and of course wokeness and you know who has been the greatest purveyor of the great replacement theory in u.s media tucker carlson tucker carlson and so while the gropers they are first and foremost fans of nick fuentes i think they are also sort of ground zero and perhaps the most extreme version of this emerging america first movement that seeks to go a lot further than maga so i just want to say thank you so much for joining us today and i hope you just want to add here that like while i love to see that ben shapiro's media company is currently falling apart fired potentially half of its employees his youtube numbers despite having like 18 million times more subscribers than i do are lower than mine good job guys you know i worry that the faction of the right that will succeed the maga movement is scarier yeah well absolutely absolutely i mean this is a movement that is going to succeed the maga movement is scarier why i said you know i love when the when the right splinters because it's an opportunity for the left to put forward a vision that explains some of the main issues that there are being tapped into but with an actual systemic analysis that talks about capitalism that talks about how we ended up with what's being called the epstein class how we ended up with the billionaire class that provides that systemic analysis and also real solutions real policies that are going to make people's lives better i would be remiss if i didn't say that i think the the politician who has shown how to do this right is oran mamdani who you know talked to trump voters the day after the election and basically said, OK, so you voted for him because the economy is busted and your life sucks and you're mad about U.S. wars and your tax dollars going to maybe bomb your relatives somewhere else. How do you feel about a rent freeze? And how do you feel about free public transit? And enough people said yes. And 10 percent of people who voted for Trump voted for Mamdani. You know, that's part of the reason why he won. So I'm not saying that all those people should be written off or that there isn't any overlap. The question is how you build those coalitions. Right. So I think there is an opportunity here for the left. We know what it looks like. We know how to do it. Problem is, people in power in the Democratic Party don't want to do it. And you're absolutely right that what comes after Trump, if the right wins, is clearly a much worse version of Trumpism. And it's a truer form of fascism. And I think that that's both Fuentes and Tucker Carlson are teeing up. Yeah. And Tucker can articulate sort of a more polite version of this, whereas Nick Fuentes is more bombastic. Nick Fuentes has said of his movement, quote, there are basically two things going on, white genocide and Jewish subversion. So it doesn't really get more bald faced than that. He's also said, quote, my problem with Trump is not that he's Hitler. My problem with Trump, is that he is not Hitler. Right. And I think a lot of the people who are angry at Trump are angry because he hasn't deported enough people or that he's just kind of making a show of it and not the numbers aren't there. They want the numbers because this is their economic policy. This is, you know, if you are willing to almost go there in terms of diagnosing the problem, it is genuinely very dangerous, right? If you're willing to talk about the Epstein class, but you're not willing to talk about capitalism, that's what the Nazis did, essentially, right? They talked about Jewish capitalism, which was, you know, this idea that capitalism had been perverted by the Jewish bankers or the, you know, that there was like, if you could just purge this poison within the otherwise healthy body of capitalism, then things would be fine. And that's what the project was. And they understood, you know, this, these dynamics always emerge, when the system itself is in crisis, when people are hurting, right? That was the case in the 1930s, after the First World War, after the punishing sanctions on Germany, the wreckage, and then the market crash of 1929, and people are really, really hurting. And socialism is rising, right? You have the Russian Revolution, you have a socialist worldview that says, this has to spread to every country. You have elites who are terrified that it is going to happen in Germany, in Italy. And that's why they go after the communists. And they go after the scapegoats, right? The vulnerable scapegoats. It's always a twin project, right? Of going after the left, going after the possibility of an alternative. And it harnesses that ball of anger that is going to go somewhere, right? And the left's job is to make sure that the anger goes up at the system itself. And the fascist's job is to take that anger, acknowledge it, and redirect it, right? Redirect it at the scapegoats and also at the left. And the other thing that I think is really important to remember is that, okay, say he is running or he's going to back somebody who he believes will do a better job. He sometimes says he's too lazy to be president. Maybe true, may not be true. As we're seeing, you don't even have to be awake to be president. So, you know. I just, not to interrupt you, I just kind of think that Tucker Carlson is happy because he's going to be president. He's going to be president. He's a rich podcaster. That is my reason why I don't right now think he's going to run for president, but I am very willing to be wrong. I don't know. I really don't know. I mean, you could have said the same thing about Trump. That's true. But he will certainly play a role in U.S. politics that is pushing this ideology, whether it's him or some surrogate. I mean, it could be Vance, right? I mean, they're pretty close and it remains to be seen. Something that you talked about in Doppelganger that really stayed with me, which I would tell people to go read that book, and they should, also recommended that book, like, in six different episodes of this podcast. So, you know. Get the new one. It's almost done. So get the new one. It's the sequel. I was so excited to see you were writing a book because I was like, A, I'm excited to read another Naomi Klein book, and B, when people are releasing their books, they are more susceptible to taking the bait on podcast invitations. We'll be back with Astra in September. But one thing that you wrote about in Doppelganger is, how fascists are very good at taking large groups of people, correctly helping them identify the problem, and then giving them the wrong solution. And in the context of that book, you were talking about how it's like, we don't have guaranteed healthcare in this country, among a lot of other things. And so it's very tempting to then buy into what, like, a Nazi wellness influencer is selling you in making your healthcare not, like, a community-oriented healthcare, but a community-oriented thing where we all take care of each other, but where, like, you just, like, lift as heavy as you can and have as much, like, protein and creatine and no vaccines and be the strongest soldier and it's all up to you and individual, individual, individual. And of course, a lot of people did take that bait and then buy into this, like, Maha movement. But this strikes me as a similar thing where people are like, yeah, it is fucked up that Donald Trump facilitated a cover-up of the Epstein files. Yeah, it is fucked up that they're gutting food stamps and sending our tax dollars overseas to kill people in the name of another foreign country. I think the left could seize, and the broader left is seizing on this moment and saying, you know, the issue of all of this is capitalism. The issue is this sort of, like, global elite class protecting each other at the expense of all the rest of us. But the Democrats and sort of, like, this center establishment left that is funded by all the same people as the Republican Party, they can't do that. Because it threatens their whole structure. And so in place of that, you have these right-wing figures coming in and saying, you know, what the problem is and why this is all happening. It's a global jewelry of which Epstein was a part of. Yeah, I mean, I just, because of you, I listened to Tucker's episode with Thomas Massey, which was really an interesting episode. And what's happening to Thomas Massey is extraordinary. For those who don't know, he's a Republican congressperson who did help unite with Ro Khanna, who's a Democrat. To force the release of half of the Epstein files. I'm fully back that that kind of bipartisanship, they got the Epstein files released. And now he is facing how much money is being spent against him? $10 million. It's a lot for this race. And he said the same people that are in the Epstein files are funding the campaign against him, are funding the ballroom, are funding the arch, right? And it's like almost there, right? But it's dangerous to be almost there. And it's dangerous to be almost there. And it's dangerous to be almost there and not go all the way there. But at the same time, you know, Thomas Massey supports, you know, he calls himself a libertarian, he supports all the tax cuts, he supports all the deregulation that created the billionaire class that is now coming for him, right? So, you know, it's less to me about whether Thomas Massey and Tucker Carlson are willing to go all the way there and explain the system than whether the Democrats will, whether, whether we have an organized left that is powerful enough to take over that party, and win. That's what Bernie tried to do, right? And I guess this, this is where, you know, I think one of the more dispiriting things that happened was a kind of pile on on AOC for criticizing Marjorie Taylor Greene. I can, we'll circle back to that. Okay. Okay. We'll come back. Sorry. I got ahead of the plan. No, please, please, please, please. But I guess just, just that point, right? That going almost there, but not going all the, all the way there is, is a pretty dangerous place to be, especially if you're Jewish. And it's also, I mean, if you're someone like Tucker, if you're someone like Thomas Massey, and you are looking for a way to accrue power and tap into people's real desires and real disillusionment without actually challenging power, then this sort of, as you say, making it almost all the way there. And then at the last minute, like pivoting right is a great way to do that. Because the hard thing about being on the left, is that at the end of the day, you have to be like, yeah, the problem is, for example, billionaires. Billionaires are really hard to topple. But what if you're Tucker Carlson or Nick Fuentes, who does it like sort of, I think, more nakedly, and he goes all the way there. And then at the last second, he's like, and the problem is transgender people and the Jews. That is, it's just a lot easier to punch down. Well, let's talk about the Epstein files for a were abused by Epstein and refused to be silenced and came together and, you know, built this movement and the journalists who covered it when nobody else would. We don't have all the Epstein files, but we have some of them, including after the Brexit referendum. This was actually an email from Epstein to Peter Thiel. The most evil gay guy. Where he said, as we were saying in your office, pivot to tribalism. Basically, they saw the Brexit referendum as the beginning of an age of collapse, right? This is why Astra and I call it end times fascism, because they're sort of celebrating that this is all going down and they're all going to, whether they're going to colonize Mars or have the AI singularity or just have their sort of corporate city-states, you know, there's this sort of buffet of options. Peter Thiel is investing in all of them, right? And Epstein and Thiel were talking about it and the way he articulated it was return to tribalism, right? It's interesting because Carlson has more in common with that worldview than he would like us to think, right? I mean, he's sort of standing up against the Epstein class, but they agree that this is what this era is about. Return to what they call tribalism, which means everybody gets their little micro ethnostate. And this is Carlson's great grievance. Everybody gets their identity politics, but white men. This is what he's always complaining about. And this is, you know, where the great replacement ideology comes in, but this is also what Fuentes represents to all of them. He's the white guy who gets to have the identity politics that everybody else gets, but but right. According to them, according to them. But what, how do you answer this? You answer this with a vision of the world of the future rooted in solidarity, which where everybody, everybody has a place, right? Everybody's included. Nobody gets sacrificed or thrown out. But I, you know, I think that this is the vision that he, that he represents. And it's a, it's a really bleak vision. Short-term alliance. That is a, is something that I think should stay with everyone. The New Yorker published a great piece about the Groypers called How the Internet Fringe Infiltrated Republican Politics, where they interviewed a young female Groyper. They exist. She encapsulated the Groyper ideology well, when she said, quote, the administration will post TikTok videos of ice raids, but it's performative cruelty. Not enough. I think that's a really good point. about an economic model that is screwing them over on a profound level like i don't think it's just going to be left at well let's just let israel be israel i think it will go beyond that because it's too useful in terms of protecting like the other thing on your chart right that it's a pretty pro-billionaire movement right and you know think about tucker's relationship with elon musk you know when he lost his fox show elon was his lifeline he let him broadcast from x he was just quoting him the other day on the show about how elon says that the u.s is i think it was him or maybe it was his guest that the i think but i actually think it was i think it was carlson saying that the u.s was turning into south africa and tucker talked about people being necklist which is a reference in south africa to the during apartheid people would get burning tires put around their neck as a form of torture and um murder so he was raising that prospect and invoking elon so the richest man in the world i mean this is a populist right i mean he also somebody who who will talk about how much of a libertarian he is and how like during covid how opposed he was to to vaccine you know talking about vaccine mandates being authoritarianism and vaccine verification apps being authoritarianism i haven't heard him say anything against what palantir is doing what his friend elon did when he was running doge and sent in people to hoover up americans personal uh data and use it to train ai or whatever they're doing i mean these are the most extreme violations of the most basic civil liberties including you know what happened in minneapolis he may have been critical what happened to alex preddy but i didn't hear him say anything about people being stopped on the street because of the accent they had or how they looked and then having you know their doors kicked in down right so simply to say he has said very little about peter teal elon musk it's it's very dangerous it's a very dangerous person to make an alliance with and like tucker carlson among a lot of other things he supported gutting usaid which elon did with doge and he supported gutting usaid usaid for the same reason i would argue that he is broadly anti-israel which is that he just doesn't know what he's doing he just doesn't understand what he's doing he just doesn't know what he's doing he just doesn't know what he's doing he just doesn't know what he's doing he just doesn't know what he's doing he just doesn't know what he's doing he just doesn't know what he's doing why is one of the united states most prominent critics of israel not organizing for palestine not raising money for palestine not doing anything for palestine except sort of the occasional opining against israel with increasingly fringe members of the american far right and it's because he's not an anti-zionist and i know and i'm not trying to be like pedantic by saying that anti-zionism is a decolonial movement centered around the human rights of palestinians tucker carlson is a nativist and a white christian supremacist who thinks that american zionist support for israel threatens their allegiance to the united states which is the only allegiance they should have the reality of a multi-ethnic country requires you to sort of set aside community or group interests in favor of the anti-zionist movement and i think that's a matter of national interests and you have to do that or else it doesn't work i don't think i'll speak for myself i don't feel like i'm at war with the neocons or israel it's much bigger than that it's like you want to restore america to a place where your grandchildren would enjoy growing up that's it yeah he might be you know slightly concerned about the genocide in gaza but not enough to like do anything material about it or like advocate for palestinians which he doesn't i mean he got he started to get concerned when churches were targeted and that tells you everything everything that he only started caring about like the genocide really and talking about it when churches in gaza were targeted on sunday one of the weirdest images of recent times and there are a lot of weird images appeared on the internet it appeared to show an israeli soldier an idf soldier using a sledgehammer to smash the face of a statue of jesus so then you think well this just doesn't make sense and then you think well this just doesn't be real and of course that's what they told you right off the bat this is not real but very quickly it emerged no this actually was real why would an israeli soldier want to smash the face of jesus this is a country we're often told that is a safe haven for christians in the region how free are christians to practice christianity in israel american christians need to reassess their support for israel and and like so the genocide it might be a secondary concern of tucker's or even a tertiary concern but his main concern is the opposite of humanitarian yeah when i just was making before i got distracted around you know whether or not he's running for president or whether what role he's going to play in the next electoral cycle the next few electoral cycles is simply that people should remember that when that when politicians are cobbling together an electoral coalition they say all kinds of things they don't believe or signal all kinds of things they don't believe trump did that with latino voters he did that with sort of maha moms right he put together the coalition that it would take to win and i think that the kinds of little uh signals that people on the left are starting to get and like from tucker carlson should be viewed with a similar skepticism that they are trying to cobble together some kind of of an electoral coalition and believe that maybe he's really you know anti-war in the same way that they convince themselves that trump was anti-war or pro-palestine as you're saying another thing that tucker says a lot is that trump is controlled by israel this is sort of one of his central critiques of israel and i wonder what you make of that yeah i mean i think it's a story that exonerates u.s power right i think anybody on the left who's aligning themselves with an ideology of american firstism should think hard about the role of u.s foreign policy in the future and i think it's a story that we're going to have to deal with in the future and i think it's a story that we're going to have to deal with in the future and i think it's a story that we're going to have to deal with in the future to say that actually it's been you know israel all along that is responsible for everything violent and immiserating that u.s policy has done you know the left response to this has to be internationalism that's what the left is supposed to be supposed to believe which is the antithesis of america you know any kind of exclusionary nationalism whether it's calling itself america first or christian nationalism or but especially america nationalism because of the blood on the hands of u.s foreign policy so yeah it's a kind of a cleansing it's a you know i think he's kind of cleansing capitalism and he's cleansing the united states of all of its misdeeds that's the project that is underway a hundred percent and you know i was just explaining like one of tucker carlson's big critiques of israel is that it's like people who have like american zionists who have dual loyalty to israel they're like sort of breaking apart the american nationalist project and i want to mention here where someone like nick fuentes takes that a step further or at least is more explicit is nick fuentes will say this is a jewish problem because he believes that jews represent a unique threat to american christian nationalism because they have an ethno-religious obligation to israel they nick someone like nick fuentes believes that jews because they are jews are allegiant to israel therefore they are if they're in the diaspora if they're in the united states they are undermining sort of the american nationalism that should exist totally and completely within the united states and so he does that sort of sleight of hand where this is actually a jewish problem the idea that neoconservatism and israel has nothing to do with jewishness jewish identity the jewish religion because clearly the state of israel and the neocons are deeply motivated by that ethnic identity and their allegiance to israel proceeds from that there's like a natural affinity that jews have for israel and he will say that to someone like tucker carlson virtually unchallenged i want to also mention insofar as tucker carlson is tactically useful in the short term i was talking i was talking with my palestinian friend about this and he mentioned you know like the largest pro-israel coalition in the united states is the christian zionist base there are more christian zionists in the u.s than there are jews anywhere and so like the the one sprinkle of credit i can give to tucker carlson again only on a tactical level is that he is probably breaking apart that coalition yeah and i think coming back to what we were talking about earlier this could be good like it just depends on whether there is a left that can take advantage of that splintering right um it's it's very important to break apart that coalition i mean it's something else that he's done very well on the show you know some people want to argue that this just it's just anti-semitic to even talk about this is that there there's an increasingly powerful block um inside israel that really wants to rebuild the third temple where alexa is and he had as i said avram berg former speaker of the house on the show talking about how powerful this block is you know represented by ben gevier and smotrich sort of like the greater israel people i mean there'll be beyond greater israel they want greater israel is only a piece of it what they're they're messianic zionists this is where christian zionism and jewish messianic zionism come together in their own strategic alliance right because in the christian version of this story you need all the jews to go back to israel to occupy the biblical lands that was promised by god to abraham in the covenant and this is what tucker carlson was talking about with ted cruz right like this is all part of breaking apart this story so you sub in the promise to abraham and then you say well that's a promise to the israelites and then you say that's a promise to modern day israel once we start getting into the bible of it all i like have such a heart god is a real estate agent i listen i have been studying this now for more than a year and i i always say to my friends like i i'm getting stupid like the more i learn the dumber i get like i used to feel smart when i did research and now i'm just like what it's so hocus pocus i need to continue so once you yeah did you ever watch any of the left behind movies the what the left behind movies no this is the rapture this is the story of the rapture okay you know a little bit about this i know a little bit about like did christian zionists want the jews to go to israel so that like they can be saved and all the jews can like burn in hell or something yeah that's basically the story so but certain things need to happen in order for those conditions to be messed you have to jews have to go to israel and then they have to rebuild the third temple and and then there's a whole battle with the antichrist etc some jews will convert and they'll also be saved faithful christians will be saved everybody else will burn in hell this is why i say it's it's a real strategic alliance because you're making alliance with people who want you to burn in hell um because the jewish messianic version of this story is that you rebuild the temple and the messianic age begins so it's not jesus's return they're both messianic stories one group thinks it's a return the other group thinks it's happening for the first time but they are agreeing to collaborate on the basics and they are deferring the big question about who burns in hell um until later okay so that's the alliance and and and it's an incredibly damaging alliance and this group is not the dominant group in israel but they don't have to be dominant in order to do some very very destructive things you know october 7th the name of the operation was was operation al-aqsa flood and the reason why it was named that is because there had been so much so many aggressive incursions onto al-aqsa and so many things had happened to try to bring them closer to the fulfilling of this prophecy then we get into things like red heifers importing them from texas to the united to israel it's very this is what i'm saying like my brain has deteriorated i was literally about to say your your poor brain oh my goodness okay but the thing is it's like you know i have a line in doppelganger um quoting philip roth saying it's too ridiculous to take seriously and too serious to be ridiculous and i feel like that is the slogan of our age because it is it is so ridiculous that you want to ignore it but it's too serious to be ridiculous because there are people with power who used to be quite marginal now you know they have positions in the police like ben kevir this is why it matters that he that that carlson will interview mike huckabee who is the ambassador u.s ambassador to israel who says i basically agree with this story and he's a christian zionist so it is important to break apart this coalition it is an incredibly damaging and dangerous coalition between u.s evangelicals and um messianic zionists and settlers there's a church in the united states to go walk in jesus's footsteps and go to illegal settlements develop relationships volunteer give money it's a huge industry and it does matter that people are trying to break it apart they're breaking it apart so that everybody can have their own fortress ethno-nationalist states and they can do their own ethnic cleansing in the united states so we should not lose sight of that but if there was a functional organized strategic left in this country they would use this opportunity we would use this opportunity to say okay we actually want to build a different kind of world rooted in universal rights and international law and solidarity and things like universal health care and a higher minimum wage and things that are going to make people's lives and abolish billionaires i mean there's a lot of things that we know we need to do um and this is can we talk about aoc for a minute yeah yes yes yes do it do it all right you you you set it up the way you want to do it i know i went on for a long time and i got to the red heifers which i shouldn't have you know but look there are people who go on podcasts shaking little bits of ash of burned red cows in america you know huge podcasts with millions of listeners next time we do this you have to tell me which like religious props to bring because i've started doing props you have to bring a to me why okay i'd like to take a quick break from the show to give a shout out to blueland for sponsoring today's episode plastic as you might be aware doesn't just disappear it breaks down into smaller and smaller and smaller pieces of what you might know as microplastics that stay in our environments in our homes all around us blueland is a home cleaning company that is taking the microplastics out of the products you use every day to clean your home blueland makes dish laundry and basically every home cleaning product that you can think of or need designed with eliminating single-use plastic in mind and blueland is used in over a million homes including mine the idea is simple you buy one of their forever bottles beautifully designed beautiful to look at unlike most cleaning products dare i say you pop in a tablet and some water to make whatever cleaning solution it is that you're going for whether it's a cleaning product or a cleaning product it's a cleaning product or it's mirror cleaner multi-purpose cleaner you name it and you're all set and once you get to the bottom of that bottle you can just refill it with water and pop in a new tablet and those refill tablets start at just two dollars and 25 cents a pop so not only better for the planet but also better for your wallet if you would like to try blueland today you can get 15 off your first order at blueland.com slash fruity that is blueland.com slash fruity thank you so much to blueland as always for sponsoring this show and now let's get back to the episode in preparing for this episode naomi was like i really want to talk about the aoc marjorie taylor green beef and so here it is this is the aoc mtg interlude aoc was recently speaking at an event where she was asked about working across the aisle with political adversaries where she said this i care about results now there are certain places where certain areas where i don't think that we should ignore some folks record on some of these issues right it's about where we we trust intent where we trust where those outcomes are going i personally do not trust someone like marjorie taylor green a proven bigot and anti-semite on the issues of what is good for gazans and israelis i know i don't think that it benefits our movement in that instance to align the left with white nationalists i don't think it serves us and so i think it's about looking at the context the place the results the outcomes intentions and where we think that train would go now this comment and the discourse that ensued will keep the lights on at blue sky for some time marjorie taylor green is if you're out of the loop someone who's going to be in the blue sky for some time and i think that's going to be a big problem and i think that's going to be a big problem and i think that's going to be a big problem who was elected to the house of representatives in 2021 as sort of a trump sycophant and perhaps his strongest soldier and over the last year became vocally disillusioned with trump's cover-up of the epstein files and unwavering support for israel which she repeatedly called miga or make israel great again that's kind of their anti-maga slur wow i did not yeah miga she was like that's not maga uh marjorie taylor green resigned from government in january after trump began lashing out at her saying that she didn't want to make her family endure the abuse this led to a lot of hot takes and naomi klein let's hear yours just kidding it doesn't have to be a hot take it doesn't have to be a take yeah yeah yeah i mean i don't particularly want to weigh in on the whether or not to trust marjorie taylor green or not you know i think i've said before she's been on a journey i don't know her i don't know exactly what she believes it's also just like a moot point in the way that she's been on a journey i don't know her i don't in my opinion because it's like she's not in the government anymore but sorry continue yeah and i think she wanted to run for the senate in georgia i you know i don't know but i do do know that unlike some of the people we've been talking about she does talk about the corruption within the trump administration like that just the unbelievable level of self-enrichment and donors and so on um she occasionally gets it right no i think the thing that really bothered me about the reaction was all were all these people saying like marjorie taylor green is so much more courageous than aoc and Yeah. And she sacrificed her whole political career for her beliefs. Yeah. Sorry, I don't mean to cut you off. I'm with you. I'm with you. That was the line, right? Like Marjorie Taylor Greene sacrificed her political career to like stand up for what she thought was right. I just want to say Marjorie Taylor Greene did not sacrifice her political career. She quit as soon as her views shifted and she would have had any leverage to actually enact change according to her new views. Yeah. And I think it's politically smart within MAGA to see that the sort of Trump train is crashing and there's going to be another wave and we'll see what she does. Right. But being able to be like I was one of the courageous ones, you know, if you're running in kind of a purple state is not a bad thing to be. So we'll see. No, I think what bothered me about it is even though I think that AOC has made some big mistakes on Israel, you know, everybody was quoting, the convention speech and the working tirelessly for a ceasefire was bad. Yeah. She she carried water for Kamala's line about like we're working tirelessly for a ceasefire. In Kamala Harris, we have a chance to elect a president who is for the middle class because she is from the middle class and she is working tirelessly to secure a ceasefire in Gaza. That was not true. I think she was she was in her mode, you know, which is a mode that Bernie gets into as well of just like doing everything we need to stop Trump, you know, and looking at the way the world works now, you can see why people get into that mode. But it doesn't forgive a line like that in the middle of a genocide and in the context of a convention where Palestinians were being blocked from from even having a speaker. So not to say that that things like that haven't happened, but, you know, AOC added her name to the. The first ceasefire resolution that was introduced by Cori Bush and Rashida Tlaib, she signed it on October 18th. So this idea that she's taken no risks, that was a big political risk at the time. That was when Marjorie Taylor Greene was standing with Israel. And, you know, and and it was I mean, I was in Washington for that JVP rally. I don't know if you were there. Were you there in 2023? Yeah. Naomi, I honestly wasn't. Not only was I not there, like I wasn't there yet. OK. Yeah. I mean, yeah. Which I think is important to name. Like my political evolution happened in the wake of October 7th. And I was not there yet. No. And, you know, Bernie wasn't there yet. I mean, it would be six months before Ro Khanna called for a ceasefire. She was early. So I'm just saying that. I just want to say because a lot of people have been lying. She was early and she did take some risks. And she also was the voice of the Green New Deal in Congress. And that is the kind of a vision that. We actually need to get us out of this fascist House of Mirrors that we're in right now. And she has been on the road with Bernie calling out oligarchy and she has been taking on the tech giants. And I said, I think she's made mistakes over the years. You know, I don't think she should have gone through the Met Ball, you know, things like that. Right. Yeah. And I think people have a right to be critical and hold her accountable. But the idea that the left is in a better situation, tearing down someone like AOC and trying to obliterate her entire record, you know, I think is doing the right work for them. And so that's what bothered me about the exchange. You know, I have been opposed to Zionism for, you know, most of my life, not all of my life, because I did. I was exposed as a as as a kid and a teenager to the indoctrination. And, you know, I went to a Jewish day school. And it's important to know the story, to know the appeal. And the appeal is we were weak. Now we are strong. The story is a hideous story. You know, and my friend Molly Crabapple has been so eloquent in her, you know, when she talks about the Jewish labor bond and in her marvelous book about about the bond here where we live as our country, about the grotesque ways that Zionists have blamed European Jews, for their own genocide in this language of like lambs to the slaughter or even when Netanyahu spoke to Congress, I forget. And he's done it so many times. But it was a couple of years ago, I think it was still the Biden administration, where he said, you know, we'll never be walk like lambs to the slaughter again. Or, you know, it was a clip like that. Maybe you can find it. Far from being lambs led to the slaughter. Israel's soldiers have fought back with incredible courage. You know, they've fought back with incredible courage. And, you know, it's it's a it's a it's a story about blaming the victims. And the story that that Molly tells in the book is really that it was a failure of solidarity on every level. It was a failure of, you know, multiracial movements to stick together and also failures of solidarity in the United States and Canada and all the countries that shut their doors to Jews. So that Palestine seemed to be the only safe place, you know, in the United States. And it's part of what justified alliances, Zionist alliances with anti-Semitic fascists in the interest of the Israeli state. So this story, I mean, I was saying before, this is an old story of like, when solidarity fails, you find your bully, right? I mean, you even think about it in a kind of schoolyard context. How do you protect yourself when you're vulnerable? You find your your tough guy, you know. And so it really is solidarity, where all you know, we all keep each other safe, or a world of warring ethnostates where everybody finds their finds their fascists finds their bully. And these are the choices ahead of us. Or with us now, in this moment, it's not ahead. It's now. I also, with respect to Marjorie Taylor Greene, just want to point out that like, it's not even really a transformation. Marjorie Taylor Greene isn't necessarily a groiper. I think she's like, too old for that. But she's groiper adjacent in her politics, and even in her opposition to Israel. I mean, she, she's a little better than some of the others. She does seem to have a genuine humanitarian concern for the genocide on Gaza. She's, you know, and the fact that the liberal establishment has left, as you said, the lane wide open for her to be the person talking about that on CNN is insane, horrifying. But she's still extremely anti-immigrant. She's still anti-vaccine. I think she's on Twitter right now recommending like ivermectin for the hantavirus. She is very anti-abortion, very anti-trans. In her resignation letter, she was like, I joined this to get the men out of women's sports. You know, it's like, she's also very proud of her work with Doge and says that, you know, that things started to go bad when they didn't go far enough with Doge. Mm hmm. So I think we're sensing a pattern among these people that it's like, these beliefs, that have the aesthetic of some sort of thing that looks like some of what we practice on the left are not. And, you know, as recently as last summer, when Zoran won the primary, Marjorie Taylor Greene posted, did you see this? She posted an AI generated image of the Statue of Liberty covered in like a burqa. Yeah, I think you're right. What you said before that, why are we talking about her? She's not, she's not in politics right now. She's now an influencer. We can't read her mind. You know, she said some good stuff. She said some absolutely atrocious stuff. Why would we speculate about whether she's really changed or not changed? It's a waste of time. One thing that I think, I think is clear is that there's going to be something after Trump, there are going to be people who are going to try to fill this vacuum. And they're going to try to fill it by saying, we are not going to do the things that hurt you that Donald Trump did, right? Because that's, that's just smart politics. So it will be a kind of an anti Epstein class post MAGA MAGA. And I think that we can anticipate that they will be talking much more specifically about being anti-corruption because there has been so much corruption in this administration. It's absolutely unprecedented, the looting that's going on. So they will have to be claimed to be anti-corruption. And I think that the other thing that's really struck me is, you know, Astra and I, as we've been doing this research about what makes this fascism different than, it's like a Passover question, why is this fascism different than other fascisms? And one of the things is that it has not offered really anything but vicarious cruelty to its base, right? And not to get nostalgic for Mussolini, but that's the part they'll clip. That's the part they'll clip. There is no nostalgia for 20th century fascism, but it was a kind of a Fordist fascism that had an offer to its base. If you were part of the in-group, you got material benefits, right? It wasn't all memes. You got like a nice home that they stole from the Jews or the Slavs, right? You got social programs, you got big public works, whether we're talking about Franco, Mussolini, or Hitler. I mean, look at even what Israel by their land theft has given Israelis. is mad about, right? That's what made me think about it, right? me realize that i think that the next stage of this will make more serious social welfare offers right and that will be called a bipartisan coalition because we'll all agree right it'll seem like we can agree we agree that israel is a genocidal state and we also agree that people should have health care social security and it's going to be really important to understand this history um that that is not the coalition that we need to make what we need is actually to have a genuine left offer that doesn't throw anyone out um and that's what what mamdani has showed can work you know in the context of a city and it can also work in the context of a country that's where where marjorie taylor green and tucker carlson and nick fuentes are headed and we should be ready for it because people are going to try to tell us it's progressive and it's not it's fascist could i play you one more video to react to yes please i just want to really make sense of something that we've mentioned which is the way that like liberal zionist institutions have paved the way for tucker's rise and nick fuentes's rise and marjorie taylor green to look like a reasonable person and i think nothing represents that better than this viral clip from an interview that tucker did with the editor-in-chief of the economist wherein she asks him the following you are critical of the government of israel do you believe in the israel's right to exist would you consider yourself a zionist in that narrow definition what does that mean a right to exist the existence of the political state of israel as it has a right what does that mean that you don't you think it should continue in its existence as a state right now so you you are the you do not agree with iran for example let me just ask since you asked me the question it's fair for me to get you to define the term so i can answer it you've asked two questions the first was do you believe israel has a right to exist and the second question was do you believe israel should continue to go on as a nation-state and those are very different questions so i often hear having been created as a political entity in 1948 does it have a right to exist is that what you're asking we i don't want to get hung up on the right no no no no no should it continue to exist that's what that's how i define narrowly because because the phrase you used was devised by the israeli government of course does it have a right to exist and so my question to you would be what does that mean why don't you answer my question it's a very simple question is are you asking does it have a right to exist or do i want it to exist do i seek its destruction fine answer it that way well of course i don't seek its destruction i've already said as you know because i said it to you i don't want israel to be destroyed or have to use nuclear weapons we've we've established that you are in that narrow terms of zionist if that's i'm in no sense a zionist i don't want any country to be destroyed and i at all and i don't want people to die particularly ones who committed no crime because i don't believe in killing innocents period that's the basis of western civilization eastern civilization it's a whole different view they believe in collective punishment i don't so you're in no sense a zionist i don't even know what that means why don't you ask define the the term and then i'll tell you whether i find it a zionist in my narrow term this definition is that the state of israel the political state of israel has the right to continue existing the right where does that right come from what do you mean these are like i'm not being a lawyer about it i just want to know what you're asking me to answer the question it's because i don't know what you're asking me let's go to this wait no no you don't want to define your question and i don't know why i mean insane tucker carlson laugh aside he's running laps around this person she can't be honest what she means about things like zionism or the right to exist or whatever yeah and he said that's what western civilization stands for but that was one of the things that stood out to me that western civilization stands for that i mean there's i'm not so sure it does like i'm not so sure that that's what the history of western civilization shows us um because genocide has been committed in the name of western civilization many times and what he's actually describing is is universal human rights and international law and i would like to ask tucker carlson if he believes they have a right to exist i want to ask him if he thinks the un has a right to exist you know the genocide convention is a product of that post-second world war ii infrastructure that was a response to genocide committed in the name of western civilization in the name of west india in the name of western values against pollutants so yeah he can run laps around her and everybody can be thrilled with it but i liked mamdani's answer to that question better when he said i believe in international law and every state should abide by it and if they abide by it then they should exist um which was a a better way of getting around that gotcha question and there's lots of different ways but i think people are so sick and tired of it that any time anyone stands up to it um it's gonna go viral and you know that's yeah that's that's a good question that's what happens yeah and and i don't say that he's running laps around her to like do some crazy tucker carlson praise i think it's very easy like you said to just get around this question with like a normal answer of like i believe in international law states don't have rights and there's lots of ways to get around it yes francesca albanese almanese has also done an incredible an incredible answer to this so has ta-nehisi coates ones that are based in human rights frameworks but we're going to have to wait and see if we can come up with an answer to that we're going to have to wait and see if we can come up with an answer to that but we're going to have to wait and see if we can come up with an answer to that but we're going to have to wait and see if we can come up with an answer to that but we're going to have to wait and see if we can come up with an answer to that but what kills me what but what kills me what but what kills me what drives me crazy as someone on the left drives me crazy as someone on the left drives me crazy as someone on the left is that the dishonesty is that the dishonesty is that the dishonesty of these institutions that are like sort of these institutions that are like sort of these institutions that are like sort of like zionist first because they are of like zionist first because they are of like zionist first because they are whatever allegiant to these systems and whatever allegiant to these systems and whatever allegiant to these systems and capital and all of that other stuff capital and all of that other stuff capital and all of that other stuff they have left the lane wide open for they have left the lane wide open for they have left the lane wide open for these people to swoop in and look like these people to swoop in and look like these people to swoop in and look like the rational ones in the situation when the rational ones in the situation when the rational ones in the situation when as we've described over this episode as we've described over this episode as we've described over this episode they are leading people to a much worse they are leading people to a much worse they are leading people to a much worse place you know if you look at what place you know if you look at what place you know if you look at what someone like mcfuentes believes which as someone like mcfuentes believes which as someone like mcfuentes believes which as i've explained is that like jews are i've explained is that like jews are i've explained is that like jews are israel jews support for israel is israel jews support for israel jews support for israel jews support for israel israel jews support for israel jews support for israel is downstream of their ethnicity it is downstream of their ethnicity it is downstream of their ethnicity it is inherent and it is therefore a danger to inherent and it is therefore a danger to inherent and it is therefore a danger to the the the uh american nationalism because they uh american nationalism because they uh american nationalism because they have dual loyalty whatever whatever have dual loyalty whatever whatever have dual loyalty whatever whatever whatever whatever whatever when he says that this is a jewish issue when he says that this is a jewish issue when he says that this is a jewish issue and that zionism is a jewish issue he's and that zionism is a jewish issue he's and that zionism is a jewish issue he's speaking speaking speaking the same language as all of these the same language as all of these the same language as all of these sort of like ardent staunch zionist sort of like ardent staunch zionist sort of like ardent staunch zionist defenders at these institutions defenders at these institutions defenders at these institutions zionists like those at the adl jonathan zionists like those at the adl jonathan zionists like those at the adl jonathan greenblatt who i've covered on this greenblatt who i've covered on this greenblatt who i've covered on this podcast or at the new york times or jake podcast or at the new york times or jake podcast or at the new york times or jake tapper and dana bash at cnn who i would tapper and dana bash at cnn who i would tapper and dana bash at cnn who i would argue have done more than almost anyone argue have done more than almost anyone argue have done more than almost anyone to assist the rise of figures like to assist the rise of figures like to assist the rise of figures like fuentes tucker candace and the like fuentes tucker candace and the like fuentes tucker candace and the like by insisting on these falsehoods and by insisting on these falsehoods and by insisting on these falsehoods and these conflations and their sort of these conflations and their sort of these conflations and their sort of undemocratic attempts to silence any undemocratic attempts to silence any undemocratic attempts to silence any dissent especially within liberal dissent especially within liberal dissent especially within liberal circles and like this is what drives me circles and like this is what drives me circles and like this is what drives me crazy is i feel like these people crazy is i feel like these people crazy is i feel like these people have made the rise of a fuentes or a have made the rise of a fuentes or a have made the rise of a fuentes or a tucker inevitable you know i think they tucker inevitable you know i think they tucker inevitable you know i think they have i think this has been a group have i think this has been a group have i think this has been a group project and you know we like we are project and you know we like we are project and you know we like we are more than two and a half years into a more than two and a half years into a more than two and a half years into a genocide genocide genocide that coalitions of the left that coalitions of the left that coalitions of the left have failed to stop and i think we are have failed to stop and i think we are have failed to stop and i think we are now in a moment now in a moment now in a moment where people are looking around going where people are looking around going where people are looking around going are there other alliances we can make are there other alliances we can make are there other alliances we can make that might be and and i think from the that might be and and i think from the that might be and and i think from the beginning there have been people who beginning there have been people who beginning there have been people who who have had that perspective um that who have had that perspective um that who have had that perspective um that it's really about just finding strength it's really about just finding strength it's really about just finding strength and like i said israel itself is a and like i said israel itself is a and like i said israel itself is a product of that kind of of thinking product of that kind of of thinking product of that kind of of thinking right and this is what molly gets at in right and this is what molly gets at in right and this is what molly gets at in her book so well her book so well her book so well that the zionists and the bundes were at that the zionists and the bundes were at that the zionists and the bundes were at war war war because they had radically different because they had radically different because they had radically different visions of safety right the bundes idea visions of safety right the bundes idea visions of safety right the bundes idea of safety of safety of safety was the safety and solidarity and was the safety and solidarity and was the safety and solidarity and transforming the world transforming the world transforming the world wherever we live in multi-racial wherever we live in multi-racial wherever we live in multi-racial alliance with other working people with alliance with other working people with alliance with other working people with other working class people other working class people other working class people and the zionist vision was a was a and the zionist vision was a was a and the zionist vision was a was a fortress fortress fortress vision in alliance with powerful imperial vision in alliance with powerful imperial vision in alliance with powerful imperial actors so yeah we've been brought to actors so yeah we've been brought to actors so yeah we've been brought to a really bleak place i think that a really bleak place i think that a really bleak place i think that we need to double down in our work as we need to double down in our work as we need to double down in our work as anti-zionist jews in and that that work anti-zionist jews in and that that work anti-zionist jews in and that that work is disentangling judaism from zionism is disentangling judaism from zionism is disentangling judaism from zionism because that fusion of faith and because that fusion of faith and because that fusion of faith and nationalism is incredibly dangerous nationalism is incredibly dangerous nationalism is incredibly dangerous it's also dangerous in the united states it's also dangerous in the united states it's also dangerous in the united states which is what tucker carlson is doing which is what tucker carlson is doing which is what tucker carlson is doing it's a fusion of christianity it's a fusion of christianity it's a fusion of christianity and an americanness nuclear powered and an americanness nuclear powered and an americanness nuclear powered you know by any means necessary so you know by any means necessary so you know by any means necessary so there are alliances to be made with there are alliances to be made with there are alliances to be made with people of faith who are christian who people of faith who are christian who people of faith who are christian who are trying to disentangle their faith are trying to disentangle their faith are trying to disentangle their faith from what jd vance is trying to do with from what jd vance is trying to do with from what jd vance is trying to do with it right it right it right i think the pope is trying to do it you i think the pope is trying to do it you You know, I think there are interesting alliances that we should be making. Some of them are tricky and unexpected. Like, I don't think we should be just looking for people who agree with us on everything. Yeah. But I don't think we should be making alliance. Like, I don't think we should be trying to take on one form of supremacist ethno-nationalism by making alliances with people who believe in another one. Because I don't think that's going to end well. But you're absolutely right to point out that we would not be here if that vacuum wasn't created by the Democrats, if Zionism hadn't failed. fused Judaism with an ethno-state, and then people like Nick Fuentes and Tucker Carlson say, well, you're the ones who said, you know, you're the ones who said Judaism is Israel. So we have a lot of work to do. And I think what worries me is that, you know, when people make alliances with anti-Semites, you know, I worry that people who have been, you know, part of the anti-Zionist Jewish organizing world will sort of start to turn away. And I think that that would be a mistake, because I think that there are lots of people who are trying to do politics differently. And like Abdullah Saeed in Michigan, the campaign he's building, I think there are a lot of candidates who are trying to forge another kind of politics. I think we should, you know, get out there and support them. It's not all bleak. It's not all bleak. It's not all bleak. And, you know, just to conclude, a lot of people do ask me, you know, because the adage has always gone in these like mainstream Jewish institutions like the ADL, where they're like, the best way that you can, you know, stand up against anti-Semitism is like, be louder about your support for Israel and like, wear like more necklaces about it or whatever. But I think, like, I would really just like to argue again, that like, the best thing that, in my opinion, you can do is stand up against anti-Semitism. And I think that's the best thing that you can do. to fight anti-Semitism is continue to fight this conflation. Because this conflation that people like, again, like Dana Bash continue to insist on every night on CNN is the same conflation that Nick Fuentes is making when he's sitting down with Tucker Carlson. And it is that conflation that they are then using to justify what could be an extraordinarily anti-Semitic future for the Republican Party. That's like the most, you know, the most, you know, the most, you know, coherent I think I've ever felt in my entire life. It was really good. It was really good. No, I mean, I, you know, I was just thinking, I was just thinking about how to say this, because it's so fucking complicated. But thinking about the 1930s in the United States, you know, fascism was rising and figures like the ones we've been talking to, America first-ism was rising. And it was, you know, a moment when the U.S. could have gone, could have gone fascist itself, right? And the U.S. has gone fascist itself, right? I mean, it's like this thing of, could it happen here? It did happen. I mean, the Nazis learned, studied the Jim Crow laws to write the Nuremberg laws. They didn't invent fascism, even if they gave it a proper name. It existed in the colonies. It existed under settler colonialism. But that kind of capital F fascism could have come to the United States. And there were lots of people who wanted it to, and they called themselves America first. And the only thing that really succeeded in defeating it were programs that actually made people, Americans' lives better. And the reason why I hesitate to like lift it up is that those, like the New Deal, you know, those policies were white supremacist. I mean, they, they were segregated in the South. They discriminated against black people systematically. There were all kinds of professions that were excluded from New Deal protections because they were predominantly black sectors. But the huge numbers of jobs that were created under public works programs under FDR and the social protections that were created in the New Deal era are what kept the United States from turning into a fascist country. And that is the only thing that will stop this tide that we've been talking about, which is why we shouldn't be tearing down left politicians. We should be challenging them and holding them accountable and holding them to high standards, but we should be building the left that would be capable of winning that and more because it's the only thing. That will stop it. There's the optimism. All right. Naomi Klein. We did it. Thank you so, so much for being here today. It really, it really is a dream and an honor. So thank you for allowing me to help you promote your book. Where can people- We're going to be back and talking about end times fascism with Astra because my brain is still a little bit, the book is still in its final stages. So there's this thing that happens before it comes out where we get really organized with our- We're talking points and I'm not there yet. So forgive me for being a little ramblier than usual. And please have me in Astrobac to really blow your mind with this stuff. I can't wait. For now, where can people find more of you? Oh, no, actually, this is the only interview I've done because we've been so locked down with the book. No, I am. I don't know. I'm not really anywhere. I stopped posting on X. Don't really understand Instagram, as you know. You're the first person who's answered this question with nowhere. You can find Naomi at the bookstore. I'm platformless. So it's really good to talk. Well, I'm so grateful that you came here for this episode. I know it was like, sort of like more advanced, complicated, like political unpacking of what's going on. But you know, sometimes we just have to do episodes like this. We can't always talk about celebrities. But in two weeks, we probably will again. I love you so much. Thank you for listening today. And until next time, stay fruity. That's my little outro.