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0:31

guess who visited me in the frozen north

0:34

this past weekend? Not you two

0:36

because you're never really not good enough

0:38

friends. There's approximately 60

0:40

day windows where I'm willing to visit the state of

0:42

Minnesota. We'll

0:45

get you here. No, it was the Whittesses. It was

0:47

Ben Whittess and the

0:49

best Whittess, as we say, Tammy Whittess.

0:52

Oh, the Whittess-isms. I like it. The

0:54

Whittess-isms, that's good. That's good. Yeah,

0:56

no, it was great. They came to visit the new baby and

1:00

see the old baby. I got to say,

1:02

Ben Whittess is remarkably good with little children.

1:04

He's like a savant. He's a baby whisper. He's

1:06

like a savant. He really, honestly, he really was. There

1:09

was a point in the

1:11

weekend where it was just Ben,

1:13

me, and the young one, Sam,

1:16

our newborn, in the house. Sam was

1:18

just not wanting to take a bottle.

1:21

I don't know. I somehow, Ben, through

1:23

some combination of wearing him and bouncing and

1:25

singing some song, managed to get some milk

1:28

in him. It was really, it

1:30

was an impressive performance. Ben's a nurturer.

1:33

I do wonder what impact

1:35

the dog shirt has had

1:37

on child receptiveness. Some

1:39

children probably find it terrifying because they're like,

1:41

here is this crayon-like maw coming at me

1:43

every time he tries to hold me up.

1:46

But other ones, maybe it makes him more

1:48

cuddly. I don't know. Maybe a shirt-to-shirt sort

1:50

of thing. I mean, my understanding is that

1:52

Natalie's kid loves the dog shirt. Ben,

1:55

I think Ben is trying to incept

1:58

dog shirt love. in the

2:01

next generation of lawfare

2:04

progeny. I don't know how I feel about it. I'm

2:07

still resisting. Yeah. I

2:09

think maybe we'll get to the point where he wears

2:12

a full fuzzy dog outfit, and then maybe I could

2:14

get on board. I think that's what I'm waiting for.

2:16

Ben just becomes a furry. That's the logical outgrowth of

2:18

all of that. That's basically right. I mean, we don't

2:20

know what he's doing in his off hours. That might

2:22

be right. I mean, we had

2:24

that Brookings Bunny outfit for a while. That

2:26

was hanging around the office. Yeah. Yeah.

2:36

Hello, everyone, and welcome back to

2:38

Rational Security. I am one of

2:40

your regular co-host, Scott R. Anderson,

2:42

back here in the virtual studio

2:44

with my two other regular co-host,

2:46

Alan Rosenstein. Hello. And

2:48

Quintet Rasek. Hello. Well,

2:51

I am thrilled to be back here with both

2:53

of you for what we're sure calling the Fast

2:55

and the Furry Us edition in honor of some

2:58

of the extracurriculars and possibly some of our colleagues

3:00

that we speculated on in our B-roll at the

3:02

top of the episode. We have

3:04

some big national security news to talk over

3:06

this week, a couple of major developments on a

3:08

couple of stories we've been following, a couple of

3:11

very serious developments, and of

3:13

course, some things happening on Capitol Hill that are

3:15

up our alley that we are going to revisit

3:17

on the legislative front. So let us get into

3:19

it. Our first topic for today, is

3:21

revanchism a dish of best served cold? Russia

3:24

boosters seem to be feeling bullish for the first

3:26

time in a long time. This

3:28

week, its forces captured the strategic town

3:30

of Adzika from Ukrainian forces who have

3:32

been weakened by bickering among their Western

3:34

allies and imprisoned Russian dissident, Alexei Navalny,

3:36

met with a tragic and highly suspicious

3:38

end just as Western governments came together

3:40

at the annual Munich Security Conference. Is

3:43

Russia right to be feeling its oats? Topic

3:46

two, B-B steps. As

3:49

Israel prepares to mount a controversial military operation

3:51

against Rafah, the last refuge for many displaced

3:53

civilians in Gaza, there are cracks between the

3:56

government of Prime Minister B.B. Netanyahu and the

3:58

Biden administration. have shown

4:00

an increased willingness to target settler violence in

4:02

the West Bank with sanctions, to impose some

4:05

conditionality on U.S. security assistance, and to turn

4:07

to the U.S. Security Council for possible support

4:09

for a temporary ceasefire even over Israeli objections.

4:12

Are these signs of a bigger divide to come, and

4:14

what will the impact be on the trajectory of the

4:16

Gaza conflict? And topic

4:18

three, won't somebody please

4:22

think of the children? That was

4:25

good. That

4:27

was, that was, that was, that was Shane

4:29

Harris level rat sack. Well I think we've

4:31

used, I think we've used a version of

4:33

this title every time we've talked about this

4:35

legislation. I intend to keep using it and

4:38

just getting more dramatic every time we do.

4:40

But I'm hoping it has a long life

4:42

ahead of us to see how I can

4:44

continue to chew the scenery around this

4:46

particular line. Because the

4:48

Kids Online Safety Act, or COSA, is back,

4:50

this time in somewhat modified form, promising

4:52

to introduce new regulations into how

4:54

our children engage with online platforms,

4:57

this time with broad bipartisan support, including

4:59

from the Biden administration. But

5:01

will it actually help protect children online or

5:03

only put vulnerable communities more at risk? For

5:06

our first topic, Alan, let me hand it over to you to get

5:08

us started. So let's start

5:10

with the fall of, of Abduka.

5:13

So last week the Ukrainian military announced its

5:15

retreat from the city, which is

5:18

in the center of the Donetsk Oblast in

5:20

eastern Ukraine. The Ukraine

5:22

military's rationale for the retreat was to avoid

5:24

imminent encirclement by Russian forces, so they were

5:26

trying to cut their losses. Although

5:29

it does appear that several hundred Ukrainian soldiers may

5:31

have been captured in the retreat, which would both

5:34

be kind of a major embarrassment for Ukraine

5:36

and a pretty serious blow to, to morale.

5:38

There's obviously a lot to talk about, but let's

5:40

just start with the, the immediate

5:43

military implications. And I'll start

5:45

with you, Scott. Do

5:47

you think that the Russia's capture of Adjifka

5:50

is a, a, a important

5:52

military turning point? And,

5:54

you know, both in the, in the short term and

5:57

also in the long term, in the sense of, you

5:59

know, what this is, suggest for what the endgame of

6:01

this war is. I mean,

6:03

if Evivka is just the first in what

6:06

might be a slow moving Russian

6:08

advance that's going to capture even more territory,

6:11

are we seeing what the endgame is going to look

6:13

like which is some negotiated settlement where unfortunately

6:16

Ukraine is not going to be

6:18

able to get back to the

6:20

status quo ante of its territory

6:22

before Russia invaded two years ago?

6:25

So it's a good question. And

6:28

I hesitate to speak on it

6:30

with too much confidence simply because

6:32

I'm not deeply versed enough in

6:34

the strategic significance of this particular

6:37

capture. My sense

6:39

from looking at what other people who

6:42

do follow the nitty gritty and strategic

6:44

implications of the conflict have said

6:46

is that this is not necessarily itself

6:48

a major development but it is

6:51

a major step by the Russians towards what

6:53

could be an assault on

6:55

much more critical supply lines

6:57

for Ukrainian forces, particularly those

6:59

defending Donetsk or

7:01

defending the parts of Donetsk that they've taken back from

7:03

the Russians. And so in

7:06

that sense, it is a notable development,

7:08

a concerning one. I think

7:10

a lot of it's significant at this point

7:12

might be more psychological or might be more

7:14

about kind of reading the momentum. I mean,

7:17

this really was much more part of the

7:19

reason this is so notable is because this is

7:21

kind of the first significant advance we've seen Russian

7:23

forces make in a while. There's

7:26

been a little back and forth around different

7:28

parts of the borders, but the overall story

7:30

has been of Ukrainian forces pushing back, taking

7:32

territory back from the Russians that they took

7:34

in their initial advance more or less, including

7:36

into Donetsk and Lhansk, the kind of two

7:39

republics that were declared to

7:41

be independent or recognized to be independent by Russia

7:43

and provided the pretext for this conflict. And

7:46

then kind of ground to a halt, we thought

7:48

maybe the offensive, the Ukrainians

7:50

for planning was going to break

7:52

through that kind of frozen line

7:54

and perhaps take some more territory

7:57

back that didn't really manifest. We've

8:00

had fairly static lines and this is the first time the

8:02

Russians have pushed through it That the

8:04

part of the story that gets overlooked and the

8:06

parts the Russians are not acknowledging or playing up

8:09

is the cost Linus of it. This

8:11

is a big reason why It

8:14

seems like the Russians were able to do

8:16

this is because they have a significant advantage

8:18

both in arms and personnel They're essentially launching

8:21

five times as many artillery shells as the

8:23

Ukrainians are in part because the Ukrainians are

8:25

short on artillery shelves because of Production

8:28

slowdown and because of assistance slowdown

8:30

by Western governments backing them including in Europe

8:32

and the United States So

8:35

that is a problem a potentially longer-term

8:37

problem for the Ukrainians But it's also

8:39

one that might have a little bit

8:41

of a limited time frame We know

8:43

we're in this big negotiation at

8:45

least in front of us assistance That

8:47

is that has held up US assistance that a

8:49

logjam could break on that in the coming weeks

8:51

that Could alleviate some of the pressure on the

8:54

Ukrainians the Russians have also suffered

8:56

a huge number of casualties I mean over

8:59

in the conflict overall and including in taking this

9:01

particular target again where we see in

9:03

advances by Russian forces it has

9:05

been at immense cost in terms of personnel Russia

9:08

has a pipeline in place one that appears

9:10

a little more stable now than back when

9:12

it was using conscript ease and Wagner

9:15

mercenaries to kind of fill out its

9:18

lines of forces But

9:20

that is still a difficult task

9:22

can only kill tens of thousands of your

9:24

own nationals and soldiers so often To

9:27

take strategic targets like this and you're gonna

9:29

have a lot more target between this and

9:31

getting anywhere Near what Russia wanted to accomplish

9:33

in the original conflict or even into just

9:35

securing domestic and lahansk So, you

9:37

know I don't think this is a game a

9:40

sign of a game changer but it is a

9:42

sign a little bit of a change in momentum

9:44

or perhaps a a sign that momentum

9:46

really has kind of ground down to a halt and

9:48

is now kind of bouncing back and forth to induce

9:50

these two sides and The real

9:53

concerning part of this is that it does

9:55

underscore perhaps Russia's long-term advantages, which is that

9:58

it's a major economy with an

10:00

authoritarian government that seems dead set on doing

10:02

this. And so if they can get their

10:04

industrial base up, and if they

10:06

are simply willing to throw bodies and

10:08

money, blood and treasure, against an objective,

10:11

it's going to be harder for smaller governments

10:13

to stand up against that without substantial amounts

10:15

of support, which right now has been on

10:17

hold. And I think that's the bigger concerning

10:19

part of the story. Scott,

10:22

one thing that you touched on and then I want

10:24

to expand on is how this is going to play

10:26

not just sort of within the

10:28

actual conflict on the ground. But

10:31

in the West, in Europe, and again, particularly

10:33

in the United States, we do have this

10:35

ongoing negotiation. So let me throw

10:37

it out to Quinta, because I know you share some

10:39

thoughts on this. How should we

10:41

think about both how this will play

10:43

into that negotiation and also whether that

10:45

negotiation itself may have contributed to this

10:48

Ukrainian defeat? And certainly, some

10:51

folks in the Biden administration are pointing

10:54

to the fall of of Tivka as an

10:56

example of, what happens

10:58

when Congress in particular Republicans dither

11:00

on providing more aid to Ukraine?

11:04

I think it does drive home.

11:06

I should say I'm not, I

11:09

don't know enough to draw a straight

11:11

line between sort of US

11:14

dithering and what happened here. I'd

11:16

be interested to know our colleague, Eric

11:18

Charmella's thoughts, but we had a

11:21

very good conversation with a lot of her podcast

11:23

with Eric and our colleagues, Molly Reynolds and Ben

11:25

Wittes, where the point was made that you

11:27

know, this

11:30

is going to be kind of a slow grind,

11:32

if the US doesn't help, and that

11:34

there may be, it

11:36

may be hard to kind of kick

11:39

Congress into gear, given that there might

11:41

not be, you know, a single moment

11:43

where it becomes clear what is happening,

11:46

and that the Ukrainians

11:49

are struggling because of a lack of

11:51

US support. I'm not optimistic

11:53

enough to think that this defeat for

11:55

Ukraine might represent that kind of come

11:58

to Jesus moment. But, But

12:00

I do think it does

12:03

give the Biden administration the

12:05

ability to say, look, this happened and

12:07

it didn't need to have happened. And

12:11

perhaps if the US had been more able to provide

12:16

the support that Ukraine needs, it

12:18

wouldn't have occurred. And I think it also

12:20

just makes really clear that contra

12:23

what a lot of Republicans in Congress

12:25

seem to want to present this as,

12:27

it's not a game, it's not something

12:30

to be played with politically for

12:34

something that's completely theoretical. There

12:36

are actual stakes here. And

12:39

frankly, I think the death of

12:41

Alexei Navalny in

12:43

a Siberian prison makes pretty clear what

12:45

the stakes are here, and

12:48

that this is not a power that

12:50

you particularly want to allow to sort

12:52

of run roughshod and do whatever it

12:54

likes. Again, will this

12:56

actually have an effect on

12:59

Congress? I don't know, I hope so. I

13:01

kind of doubt it personally, but I

13:04

do think it, it makes

13:07

it pretty clear the world into

13:10

which we might be stepping if

13:13

Republicans can't get things together. Yeah,

13:15

I may be a little rosier on the

13:18

prospect that this does shake a little bit

13:20

loose on the political scheme, because

13:23

we're seeing some interesting movement even

13:25

in the kind of hub of

13:27

the anti-Ukraine support right on

13:32

this, some weird things. To the point that,

13:34

particularly after the Navalny killing, because I think we can call

13:37

it a killing, even though it hasn't been publicly acknowledged, it

13:39

seems pretty clear that's what happened, or

13:41

at least something bad happened. I don't think

13:43

that's true. I think, look, he's been in

13:45

custody for several years. He had, I believe,

13:48

kidney problems that went untreated and

13:50

he died. So whether or

13:52

not he was murdered by someone pushing

13:55

him out a window, the Russian state killed

13:57

him. I think that's right. That's

14:00

what I mean. And that's how I'm gonna scrap.

14:02

I mean, this is a killing, even if it

14:04

was a slow motion murder, as opposed to an

14:06

actual life practice murder. Although there were some weird

14:08

reports about Russian intelligence activity cutting

14:10

out surveillance mechanisms and security measures at the prison

14:12

in the days leading up to this. I

14:15

don't know if I've seen confirmed reporting somewhere, but

14:17

those are out there. So it might've been something

14:19

more dramatic as well. The key

14:21

point though, is that it is a really

14:24

symbolic moment. I mean, I think Navalny was

14:26

one of these rare figures that did capture

14:28

a lot of public attention in

14:30

the international media among a lot of

14:32

international political figures. I mean, we even

14:34

had Tucker Carlson, who just got off

14:36

an interview with Vladimir Putin and an

14:38

apology tour of Russian grocery stores and

14:40

subways, come

14:43

out and say like- Beyond grotesque. It

14:45

was extremely grotesque for the parts I've captured. I

14:47

avoided watching a lot of it. But really driving

14:49

the point that even he said like, this is

14:52

horrible, what's happened to Navalny, no one can defend

14:54

us. Now, even though that's kind of what he

14:56

was effectively doing before Navalny was actually killed, we've

14:59

seen Trump do the weirdest thing, but

15:01

nonetheless, a sign about how this is a vulnerable

15:03

talking point for them, where he starts comparing himself

15:06

to Navalny and trying to free ride off the

15:08

Navalny idea, saying that I am like a similarly

15:10

beleaguered political figure that is absurd to be clear.

15:13

But it is, does I think underscore how even

15:15

in populations that

15:17

are not sympathetic to support

15:19

for Ukraine and maybe more

15:21

sympathetic to Russia generally, but Navalny

15:23

was one of these figure, the way he was treated as one of

15:26

these issues that is a

15:28

point that has vulnerability for them. So

15:30

I think this might help knock things loose. I also

15:32

think, frankly, the shift in momentum and the fact that

15:34

the Russian government does not seem to be shy about

15:36

kind of trumpeting it and essentially saying this is the

15:39

beginning of, there are

15:41

resurgence in Ukraine, might knock things

15:43

loose as well. I mean, like remember that the

15:45

talking point we're getting from JD

15:47

Vance and other folks is this idea that

15:49

you need to force the Ukrainians and the

15:52

Russians to the negotiating table. It's not actually,

15:54

nobody's arguing that you should force the Ukrainians

15:56

to capitulate generally. Well, if

15:58

Russia is on the offensive and... and doing

16:00

this sort of things and showing no interest in the

16:02

negotiating table. And it looks like

16:04

Ukraine is not mounting a counter-impensive, but instead

16:06

of trying to hold territory, that

16:09

undermines that argument a bit. It means that the route to

16:11

the peace table might be actually having to push back on

16:13

Russia a little bit. So I think

16:16

these dynamics may be shifting a little bit in

16:18

a way that this helps not Ukraine assistance loose this

16:20

time. Question how big a difference

16:22

it'll make, or question how fast it will get there. And

16:24

there's a question whether it can fundamentally change the

16:26

dynamics of this conflict. Russia seems to

16:29

have the political well and institutional capacity to hurl

16:31

hundreds of thousands, we know hundreds of thousands of

16:33

people have been killed in the Russian military in

16:35

this war so far. They seem to not be

16:38

feeling any pressure to stop. And

16:40

they seem to be able to have an industrial

16:42

base to produce the basic arms they need, even

16:45

though we are effectively degrading their high-end technology, which

16:47

is just artillery shells and things like that. They

16:49

seem to be able to produce that and have an industrial

16:51

base that's ramped up that competes

16:53

with what the West can provide to Ukraine

16:56

so far, at least under current political conditions.

16:59

I don't know what changes those dynamics. And

17:01

those are the challenging dynamics that, frankly, we

17:04

always knew were going to be a major

17:06

constraint on what Ukraine could accomplish in pushing

17:08

back on the Russian offensive. And

17:10

now we're just feeling that rubber really

17:13

hit the road. And it does change the dynamics

17:15

around how we approach this conflict both from a

17:17

US policy perspective and how Ukrainians who are still

17:19

in the driver's seat as they should be have

17:21

to think about their strategic goals as well, I

17:24

suspect. So look, I appreciate

17:26

your optimism, Scott. I will admit I'm

17:28

a little more pessimistic about what it

17:30

would mean for Western support

17:32

and particular US support, but perhaps even

17:35

EU support. Though perhaps we

17:37

should talk about that because I think we

17:39

underrate how much support the EU actually provides

17:41

the Ukrainians, both in absolute

17:44

and also on a per capita basis. But

17:47

I mean, let me

17:49

phrase the question this way. What

17:52

would it take for you

17:54

to conclude that Ukraine has,

17:57

quote unquote, lost this war? And

18:00

of course, at this point, Russian

18:03

tanks riding into Kiev is not

18:05

on the table. No one thinks that

18:07

that's going to be the lost condition, which is itself quite an achievement

18:09

given what the three of us were

18:11

worried about back in February, two

18:13

years ago actually when this war started, almost exactly two years

18:15

ago. I think you're right

18:18

to say that look, one town has fallen. Let's

18:21

not over rotate on this too much. But

18:24

I think it's still useful, especially for those

18:26

of us, and I think all three of

18:28

us would associate ourselves with the kind of

18:30

pro-Ukraine camp to kind of

18:33

steal me on the other side a little bit or

18:35

to figure out what is the failure condition, right? Because

18:37

I do think that while I have

18:40

extremely little sympathy for the JD Vanses and

18:42

Tucker Carlson's of the world, I

18:44

do think one point

18:47

that they or the

18:50

more sober-minded Ukraine skeptics do bring up that is

18:52

worth it is what is your failure condition? What

18:54

would it take for a Ukraine supporter

18:56

to say, this did not go our way, it is

18:58

time to

19:00

end this, right? Because I do think that

19:02

if one can't answer that question, that's

19:05

a problem, right? And again, I'm not saying that

19:07

this should change our priors all that much. I mean, it should

19:10

change them a little bit, right? But maybe only a little bit.

19:12

But what would it take to

19:14

say, yeah, I think this

19:16

one was lost and you have to just try

19:20

to maintain as much Ukrainian territory as

19:22

possible and end this. So

19:24

I don't think that's the right way to think about this is sort

19:26

of lost and won. Ukraine has

19:28

won this war period. Remember,

19:30

Russia's goal was to take the entirety of

19:33

the country. That was a

19:35

strategic objective from the outcome and Ukraine has

19:37

now pushed it to the point where it

19:39

cannot even maintain full control of the two

19:42

separatists, you know, oblast that

19:44

originally they tried to recognize as separate countries

19:46

when they started that war. But wait a

19:48

second. So I'll grant you that

19:50

Ukraine has not lost this war, but that's very

19:52

different than Ukraine has won this war. I mean,

19:54

to be clear, like there is

19:57

Ukrainian territory durably under Russian control. There is

19:59

no... Russian territory durable in Ukrainian control. I

20:01

don't see how you can call it. Ukraine

20:03

was never trying to take Russian territory. No,

20:05

no, no, but that's what I mean. That's

20:07

kind of the point. It's just a weird

20:09

definition of one, a war when you're smaller

20:11

than when you were. I mean, I that's

20:13

why winning and losing wars is not

20:16

a smart way to think about this,

20:18

if I'm being honest, like it has

20:20

Ukraine met or exceeded its strategic goals,

20:23

or what frankly could realistically have been expected of

20:25

it in February 2022. Yeah, by miles.

20:29

It's incredibly impressive. And

20:31

they are in a much better position than

20:33

we all feared they would be when facing

20:35

what is in the end still a nuclear

20:37

superpower enemy, very intent and willing to throw

20:40

immense resources at accomplishing the strategic

20:42

goal of taking them over. That's

20:44

a point of pride is something that, you

20:46

know, Ukrainians and Ukrainian leadership should be celebrated

20:48

for, and should continue to

20:51

be celebrated for historically, that makes them historic

20:53

figures, right? We shouldn't lose sight of that. But

20:56

this idea that somehow we are going that we are

20:58

going to kick Russians entirely out of the country with

21:00

that was kind of the underlying idea of the counter

21:02

offensive. Maybe you had to try it

21:04

for political reasons. Maybe there was a real reason to think

21:07

it might be successful. But I think

21:09

that is a hard narrative to buy into now.

21:11

And something what I which I have been saying for a while, and

21:14

I still remain convinced of this, and I fear that this

21:16

is a sign that this is right, even though it's not

21:18

a bitter pill to swallow is that strategically

21:21

right now when you're facing a

21:23

Russia that still seems to, you

21:26

know, not be domestically constrained from throwing

21:28

all the resources it has, which are

21:30

substantial, at continuing

21:32

to press on this line of this conflict, you've

21:35

got to think less about how do

21:37

we, you know, reclaim

21:40

militarily, our lost territory

21:42

at this point, and more

21:44

about how do we hold what we have and make

21:46

it too costly for Russia to either continue this war,

21:48

or to at least continue to advance in this way.

21:51

And that's a different set of armaments is a different way

21:53

to play troops is a different way you harden your position.

21:56

These are all what I think we need to

21:58

think about now. And it does mean that

22:00

you're accepting Russia, is

22:02

it de facto in control of parts of Ukrainian territory? I don't

22:04

think you have to accept it as legitimate. I don't think you

22:06

should. I think you have to say

22:08

that this is militarily occupied territory in a conflict

22:10

that's still ongoing. But it does mean in terms

22:13

of where you commit your resources, maybe

22:15

you need to take a little bit more of a humble goal

22:18

and then say, okay, and the rest of reclaiming

22:20

this, we're not giving up on that mission, but

22:23

it is going to be a long-term political mission,

22:25

not just a short-term or medium-term military

22:27

objective. Well, so let me – no,

22:29

that's helpful. So let me ask you this question maybe a slightly

22:32

different way, which is, what would it

22:34

take to be able

22:36

to credibly say that Ukraine has won this

22:38

conflict? Because again, I think

22:40

that as long as Russia is in

22:43

de facto control of a non-trivial part of

22:46

Ukrainian territory, I just don't think you can

22:48

say – I think it's

22:50

very hard to say that Ukraine has necessarily

22:52

won this conflict. And so what

22:54

else could we do short of just

22:56

focusing on the military situation? So for example,

22:58

I'm not saying this is necessarily a good

23:00

idea, but what if the answer

23:02

was you sue for

23:05

peace, maybe Ukraine gives

23:07

up that territory to Russia, but

23:09

Ukraine gets EU membership and

23:11

a massive Marshall

23:14

Plan-esque reconstruction, and you turn it

23:16

into a new Poland? Is

23:19

that something? Is that a different approach that we have to

23:21

take to this conflict? And the reason I ask is that

23:24

if your conclusion is this is

23:27

a stalemate where Russia maintains this

23:29

territory under de facto control, but

23:32

no one recognizes that as legitimate, because of course it's

23:35

illegitimate, does that prevent

23:38

a settlement that

23:40

would be ultimately more advantageous to the Ukrainians? Now

23:42

again, I just want to emphasize because

23:44

I really am worried about my words

23:46

being misinterpreted here. This is for the Ukrainians to decide.

23:48

If they want to continue this war, they should continue

23:50

this war for as long as they want to. But

23:55

if there's just no realistic

23:58

chance of Russia being dislodged from the – this

24:00

territory. At what point does

24:02

that have to just be accepted as the

24:05

status quo for the foreseeable future where foreseeable

24:07

future is not measured in months or years

24:10

or potentially in decades? So

24:12

for what it's worth, I can't

24:14

speak to the internal Ukrainian politics

24:17

here. I just don't know

24:19

it particularly well. But I

24:21

do think that part of the problem here

24:23

is that in order to have some kind

24:25

of arrangement along those lines, Russia also needs

24:28

to agree to it. And that's

24:30

kind of the problem here, because

24:34

Putin has really

24:36

staked his political

24:38

legitimacy on this war, you

24:40

know, in terms of framing it as like

24:43

a war against fascism,

24:45

which, you know,

24:47

has a very particular historical

24:50

weight in Russia, given the

24:52

Eastern Front in World War II, that

24:55

that just makes it really, really hard

24:58

for him to be perceived as

25:00

backing down. And likewise,

25:02

that any kind of agreement, you know, you

25:04

would have to be sure that Russia would

25:06

abide by it. And

25:10

this is a situation where they obviously

25:12

blew right through the agreements that were

25:14

reached in Minsk after the 2014 war.

25:16

It kind of reminds me

25:19

of, I don't know why this

25:21

is what I go back to. But I think this is something that

25:24

David Platz of this late political gab fest said

25:26

during one of the government shutdowns in like

25:28

2012 or 2013. A wise man, if ever

25:30

there was one. A very wise man. And

25:33

obviously, the circumstances are different. But Obama attempting

25:36

to negotiate with House Republicans over a government

25:38

shutdown was like a game of chicken, except

25:40

that the two players were a responsible father

25:43

driving a school bus full of children and

25:46

a car full of crazy

25:48

people out of their minds on meth. An

25:51

actual chicken in the other car. On

25:54

meth. And so, again, the

25:56

dynamics here are very different. But I

25:58

do think that I've been thinking of

26:00

that comparison because it just points to

26:02

kind of the impossibility of negotiating with

26:05

someone who is just not

26:07

on the same planet, which

26:09

is something that we already

26:11

know because Putin already made

26:14

the insane destructive decision to

26:16

invade Ukraine in the first place, thereby starting

26:18

a war that got him into this situation

26:20

when everyone who had been following Russian politics

26:22

said, oh, of course, he would never do

26:24

that. That would be insane. So

26:26

it just strikes me that it's, you know, if

26:30

the Kremlin were behaving rationally,

26:34

I do think that there is an

26:36

argument for what you propose, Alan. The

26:38

problem is just that there's a crazy

26:41

person in charge who has staked everything

26:43

on winning this, even though I don't

26:45

know what winning-winning looks like,

26:48

other than, you know, taking over all of

26:50

Ukraine, which is obviously impossible. Yeah,

26:53

I mean, I think this really gets at the

26:55

difference between some sort of negotiated settlement, which I

26:57

don't think is in the cards at the moment,

27:00

and accepting what your changing

27:02

what your strategic objectives might be, or accepting a difference

27:05

as a strategic objective. And again, talking about the winning

27:07

or losing is not useful. People should abandon that language.

27:09

No one wins in a war like this. It's

27:12

about, you know, your strategic objective and

27:15

how close you get to it. And again,

27:17

Ukraine's accomplished a lot of amazing strategic objectives

27:19

throughout this war, and its leaders and military

27:21

and otherwise should be celebrated for that. But

27:24

at this point, I think the objective

27:26

has to be to hold what you have,

27:28

and prepare yourself as best as possible to,

27:31

in the long term, defend yourself against what

27:33

is essentially a Russian siege. It's a war

27:35

of attrition, right? And Russia has a lot

27:37

of foundational factors, a larger economy, a larger

27:39

military industrial base, larger population, that

27:41

give it a big advantage in a war of

27:44

attrition. And there needs to be some sort of

27:46

model, whether it's security assurances, whether it's long term

27:48

security assistance commitments, although those things are all hard

27:50

for the West to reliably commit itself to over

27:52

a multi-year span because of domestic politics. But

27:55

those are the factors that will go

27:57

into securing what Ukraine holds.

28:00

And at a certain point, maybe if you show

28:02

that you are dug in enough that it's going

28:04

to be too expensive to Russia to progress or

28:06

other things change, then Russia proves willing

28:09

to go to the negotiating table. And

28:11

then Ukraine has to decide, well, is it worth it or

28:13

not? Are we willing to make any sort of concessions or

28:15

are we not? And the international

28:17

community can up its leverage by, although at this point

28:19

it might be kind of hard, by increasing sanctions

28:22

further, making Donetsk

28:24

and Lhansk like Crimea complete drains

28:26

on the Russian economy. Those

28:29

are the longer term political tools that you can bring

28:31

to bear here. But in terms of the

28:33

military objective, I think this might

28:35

be the pivot point if we hadn't already hit

28:38

one already with the end of the offensive to

28:40

say, like, we need to accept a little bit

28:42

more constrained military short term objectives to hold our

28:44

territory, prepare ourselves for an ongoing

28:47

Russian siege, keep what we

28:49

have, get our allies focused

28:51

on that and Ukrainian forces focused on that, and

28:54

leave for the reclaiming of additional territory for

28:56

diplomatic political tools and maybe military tools in

28:59

the future. But for the moment, you know, focus

29:02

on keeping what you have, because Russia

29:05

has proven itself to be, while not very

29:07

effective in this conflict, resilient in terms of

29:09

what it's willing to and the amount of

29:11

pain it's willing to suffer and

29:13

still keep going. And that is

29:15

what a war of attrition boils down to. And that's where we're at

29:17

in this conflict. And so in

29:19

light of that, you've got to prepare yourself

29:21

for a longer onslaught. And I

29:23

think maybe move past the idea that you're going to be able to bring

29:25

it to a quick end. From

29:28

one intractable and depressing international

29:30

conflict to another. So

29:33

things have continued to get

29:35

worse. What else in

29:37

the Israel-Gaza war right now, the latest

29:39

slate of news has to do with

29:41

a planned operation

29:43

by Israel into the city of

29:45

Rafah in southern Gaza, which has

29:47

raised a fair amount of alarm

29:49

among countries around the world, including

29:51

for what it's worth the United

29:53

States, particularly because

29:57

Rafah currently, according

29:59

to the New York times is sheltering over

30:01

half of the population of

30:03

the Gaza Strip. Many

30:05

of them are in tents. They've

30:08

sort of been pushed there because of

30:10

Israeli operations in the north of the

30:12

Strip. There's been some indication that Egypt

30:15

on the other side of the border

30:17

is perhaps preparing for

30:19

civilians in Gaza to move

30:21

out into the Sinai during

30:23

a potential operation there. That,

30:26

of course, is worrying for a

30:29

number of reasons from a number

30:31

of perspectives. And

30:33

we also have indications that the United

30:36

States, again, what else

30:38

is new, may be losing patience

30:40

a bit with Israeli Prime Minister

30:42

Benjamin Netanyahu, not only over this

30:44

operation in Rafa, but

30:46

of course we've had some indications

30:48

in terms of an executive order

30:51

from the Biden administration allowing sanctions

30:53

against far-right settlers and

30:55

some other indications about constraints on

30:57

aid to Israel. So Scott,

31:01

there's a lot going on here. I'll

31:03

leave it to you where you'd

31:05

like to start, but what's

31:08

your take on where things stand right

31:10

now? Sure. I think

31:12

it's worth starting with Rafa and understanding

31:14

why Rafa is such a pressure point

31:18

and a point of contention with

31:21

the West and between Israel and frankly just about

31:23

everyone else at this point, even countries that traditionally

31:25

backed it. It is the

31:28

city that's kind of closest to the southern border,

31:30

to the border crossing with Egypt. And

31:32

it is a place where, as Quinta

31:34

noted, a lot of Gazans civilians have

31:36

been kind of guided as Israel has

31:38

moved south and pushed them back in.

31:41

But a underlying anxiety, a suspicion among,

31:43

certainly among Palestinian leadership, among Arab governments

31:45

in the region is that part

31:48

of the drive of this military

31:50

campaign hasn't been strictly defensive. Part

31:52

of the drive is to push

31:54

Palestinians out of Gaza and to

31:57

resettle Gaza with Israelis, which there

31:59

were as well. Israeli settlements in Gaza prior to

32:01

2006, 2007 withdrawal by

32:04

then Prime Minister Sharon, kind

32:06

of like the West Bank is today. There

32:09

are sort of contention they were withdrawn when

32:11

they kind of handed it when US Israeli

32:13

forces withdrew, they kind of shut down the

32:16

settlements in a pretty dramatic fashion that has

32:18

continued to be controversial in certain circles in

32:20

Israel and national community. It is

32:22

concerned that essentially they have been building

32:24

this pressure by kettling, to a phrase

32:26

that Joel Braunhold, who I had

32:28

a great conversation about all this with for the Law

32:30

Firm podcast this week, used kettling people

32:32

into the south, building this pressure in, and

32:34

then you're going to use the conflict to

32:36

push them eventually, ultimately to the other side

32:39

of the Egyptian border and into the Sinai

32:41

Peninsula, where the Egyptian government has

32:43

been setting up facilities to

32:45

house Palestinian refugees in anticipation of something

32:47

like this happening. It's not clear exactly

32:49

what it's going to be. It's not

32:51

of the scale you would need to

32:53

house millions of Palestinians being evicted from

32:56

Gaza, but people have taken that

32:58

as a sign like, oh no, this is actually what's going

33:00

to happen. Maybe the Egyptian government has

33:02

even kind of gone in on it somehow, or at

33:04

least has kind of accepted the writings on the wall

33:06

from the Israelis that all of a sudden Gazans

33:08

are going to be kicked out of Gaza entirely

33:11

and forced to just resettle in the

33:13

Sinai. Who knows if

33:15

this is true or not, right? A

33:17

lot of Israeli officials have very clearly said

33:20

this is not true. We're really only aimed

33:22

at trying to uproot Hamas, but that's incredibly

33:24

difficult and complicated and requires a

33:26

lot of violence and a lot of

33:28

civilian deaths because they're so rooted in

33:30

to the Gaza Strip. But

33:32

the Israeli government has never really presented

33:35

a clear counter narrative about saying here's

33:37

what our end state is. Here's what

33:39

we're working towards that very

33:41

clearly says like Palestinians stay

33:43

in Gaza, that they've

33:45

never hinted that they're going to allow self-government. They never

33:47

to describe what sort of authority is going to govern

33:50

Gaza in their future vision. And

33:52

you have prominent figures in the current

33:54

Israeli government, not people who are leading

33:56

the war effort, but nonetheless fairly significant

33:58

who are pro settlement. in the West

34:00

Bank have attended conferences about potentially resettling

34:03

Gaza. And you do have a

34:05

big part of the Israeli population that says this is

34:07

desirable and appropriate. I mean, famously,

34:09

there were flyers circulating you saw

34:11

copies of online laying out plans

34:13

for luxury beach villas superimposed

34:15

over the decimated buildings of the

34:18

Gaza Strip. It's pretty horrendous stuff,

34:20

in my view. And

34:22

the Israeli government, frankly, just has not completely

34:24

denounced it as firmly or as persuasively as

34:27

they could have. And that's making the United

34:29

States, the Biden administration, very nervous. A

34:31

lot of governments very nervous. And they have kind of softly

34:35

drawn a line around a

34:37

possibly rough offensive saying like,

34:40

this is something you really can't do

34:42

this way, Israel. You can't treat this like the rest

34:44

of the Gaza Strip. But if

34:46

Israeli government, well, listen, it's not clear. Prime

34:49

Minister Netanyahu's signal he's not because he says this is

34:51

necessary for us to complete our military operation and truly

34:54

uproot Hamas. But they

34:56

also haven't fully leaned in to actually do this

34:58

yet. So that's kind of the

35:00

holding pattern to see what happens next. Yeah,

35:03

I mean, I'm not sure I

35:05

have anything to add to Scott's

35:07

astute and deeply depressing description of

35:09

what is going on. I mean,

35:12

just to emphasize again, that wars

35:14

need to have purposes. That's what

35:16

makes them just, right? There's

35:18

a very interesting article by

35:20

Zach Beecham at Fox. He's

35:23

been doing really, really interesting kind of big

35:25

picture and thinking about the

35:28

war and his latest on

35:30

this. He talked to a bunch of

35:32

folks, including Michael Walzer, the famous just war theorists,

35:34

I mean, literally kind of

35:36

resuscitated the theory of just war for

35:38

the 20th century. And

35:40

he notes that Walter, who actually been a longtime

35:42

pretty staunch supporter of Israel, because

35:45

he recognizes the sort of real

35:47

security issues that Israel has, even

35:49

he is getting extremely

35:51

fed up with the war in Gaza,

35:54

because the Israeli government in particular Netanyahu

35:57

and those affiliated with

35:59

him. refuse to articulate what an

36:01

end stage can be like. And

36:04

I would just note that it's not

36:06

just the prosecution of

36:08

the war on Gaza that has this problem.

36:11

You know, Netanyahu is not showing any

36:16

willingness to engage on the much bigger issue,

36:18

right, which is the path

36:20

to two states, or just generally

36:22

the treatment of Palestinians in Israel.

36:25

I mean, you know, while

36:27

this is going on, while Israel prepares to attack

36:30

Rafah, right, you have Itamar

36:32

Ben-Gveer, the sort of far right, truly far

36:34

right. I don't know what's farther right than

36:36

right, extreme far right,

36:39

national security minister, yet

36:41

again trying to block access by Palestinians of

36:44

the West Bank from the

36:46

Temple Mount, right? Yeah,

36:48

just as Ramadan is about to

36:50

start. You know, yet another indication

36:53

that, you know, not only is

36:56

large parts of the Israeli government not interested

36:58

in any sort of solution, but parts of

37:00

them are actually accelerationist. And

37:02

it just makes it increasingly difficult to understand

37:04

what the point of all of this is.

37:07

The question in my mind is

37:10

kind of, well, two questions that

37:12

are interrelated. One is, at what

37:15

point does the US start to lose patience

37:17

with the Israeli government? And

37:20

second, what does that

37:22

look like? And what effect does it

37:24

have when it does? I can't

37:27

find this article right now, but there's

37:29

a very darkly amusing chronicle that someone

37:31

put together of basically every anonymously

37:34

sourced story since October 7th about

37:36

Biden, how Biden was, you know,

37:38

on the cusp of breaking with

37:40

Netanyahu and just month after month

37:43

after month, there's this

37:45

reporting about, you know, sources close to the

37:47

White House say that, you know, the Biden

37:49

administration is close to voicing frustration, you know,

37:52

again and again and again and again. And

37:55

it does seem to me like the

37:57

US response to this planned

37:59

Operation And Rafa is potentially a

38:01

breaking point. There was some

38:03

information circulated about a proposed

38:06

resolution that the

38:08

US was thinking about introducing at the

38:10

UN, calling for, I believe,

38:12

a ceasefire with a specific language, which is sort

38:14

of, I think you can fairly read as an

38:16

indication that the US is saying, like, you need

38:19

to cool it. But will we

38:21

ever actually get there? I mean, we've been waiting

38:23

for this for months and months and months. Well,

38:26

I mean, I think it depends on which

38:28

we mean by breaking point, right? I mean,

38:30

I think we've reached many breaking points. I

38:32

mean, I think the Overton window has shifted

38:35

actually quite dramatically. The Biden

38:37

administration has imposed sanctions on a

38:39

small number of West Bank settlers. And

38:42

I think this was, to me, the most interesting

38:44

part of the recent podcast you had, Scott. The

38:47

effects of this, if scaled up, could be just

38:49

absolutely tectonic, right? I mean, if you get to

38:51

a point where it's not four settlers, it's 10,

38:53

it's 100, it's 1,000, it's some

38:56

organizations in the West Bank. That

38:59

could really cripple, that could

39:01

put Israel in a position

39:03

of having to either choose whether to provide

39:05

any support whatsoever to

39:08

legal settlements in the West Bank or bring

39:11

the Israeli financial system to its knees, given

39:13

how enmeshed it is in the US financial

39:15

systems. That's a huge deal. Talks

39:19

about the US-led ceasefire resolution. UN

39:21

is a big deal. Even rumors

39:24

about the US unilaterally recognizing a

39:26

Palestinian state probably won't happen, but

39:28

even rumors about this, right?

39:31

Given where those rumors are almost certainly coming from

39:34

is a big deal. I think we just have

39:36

to be somewhat realistic about what a breaking point

39:38

means. Look, Israel is simultaneously,

39:41

and this has always been the paradox,

39:43

an incredibly weak and beleaguered nation, given

39:45

where it is, and an incredibly strong

39:47

nation, right? Given just how much more

39:49

powerful its military economy and technology is

39:51

relative to its neighbors, right? It

39:54

does not, well, it

39:57

needs the United States in one sense, but in a sense, it doesn't

39:59

need the United States. The United States cannot

40:01

stop what the Israeli political and military

40:03

establishment want to do, not in the

40:05

short term. It cannot

40:08

stop that because Israel is

40:10

an extremely strong power relative to

40:12

its current military objectives. And

40:15

also because the Israeli political leadership, not

40:17

all of it obviously, but a

40:20

bunch of it, including the prime minister, is

40:22

some combination of true believers in

40:25

a maximalist right-wing Israeli cause and

40:28

just for Netanyahu in particular, have

40:30

these just horrible political

40:33

self-interest incentives to

40:35

prolong this war because,

40:38

again, as we mentioned many times,

40:40

Netanyahu is still amazingly

40:43

under indictment, right? And the moment he stops

40:45

being prime minister, which most polls suggest he

40:47

will be as soon as this war ends,

40:49

he will no longer be immune from that.

40:51

So again, I'm

40:54

not sure what breaking point necessarily

40:57

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42:37

I think it's right to say we've hit a couple of

42:39

breaking points. We've seen a kind of gradual move here. But I

42:42

do think there's a point which the United States has to,

42:44

if it feels the Israeli government is

42:46

not moving in a direction that it

42:49

thinks is really important, to say we

42:51

will publicly oppose this openly,

42:53

not through leaks to the media, which has been

42:55

like the main mechanism of doing this. And

42:58

that is kind of what these tools we're

43:00

seeing. We see the economic sanctions around West

43:02

Bank, settler violence. We see a memorandum that

43:04

doesn't do a lot new, but does kind

43:06

of bring out to the open the

43:08

fact that Israel needs to make

43:11

positive assertions that it's complying with various international

43:13

law principles that the United States can push

43:15

back on and start more dialogue around for

43:17

U.S. security assistance, which is important for Israel,

43:19

although perhaps not like critical, but highly important,

43:22

I think, generally. And then

43:24

we have this U.N. Security Council resolution, which is a notable

43:26

political step, like is it going to make a difference in

43:28

the end? No, but it's

43:30

always been a touchstone of the

43:32

U.S.-Israeli relationship that U.S. helps shield

43:35

Israel from Security Council criticism, and

43:37

a weakening of that is going to be a real sign.

43:40

The difficult line the Biden administration has always

43:42

walked on this, which I think is

43:44

maybe perhaps an overlearned lesson from the

43:46

Obama days, is that, look, if we

43:48

come out too openly hostile to Israel,

43:50

then that actually plays to the advantage

43:52

of the far right in the Israeli

43:54

government, in the Israeli political scene, because

43:56

then they run against us. They run

43:58

against the idea that the

44:00

international community and now the United

44:03

States, our ally, is somehow forcing

44:05

us to act contrary to our

44:07

interests. And so they need to

44:09

find a way to divide the idea

44:12

that these policies are

44:15

detrimental and tie

44:17

it to one particular Israeli

44:20

faction and make it more of an Israeli political

44:22

issue. You essentially need the Israeli political scene to

44:24

change. And that's a tall order.

44:26

The conflict in Gaza is not unpopular with Israelis.

44:28

It is not a product of Bibi Netanyahu. It

44:31

is something that the Israeli government, a

44:33

coalition government that includes opposition figures in

44:35

the War Cabinet, is behind. Even the

44:38

opposition figures not in the current government,

44:40

not in the War Cabinet, are supportive

44:42

of the general conflict. And

44:44

that conflict is the root cause

44:46

of all these problems. Now maybe they would

44:48

not be supportive of pushing Palestinians into Gaza

44:50

or every into the Sinai. That is a

44:52

big line, right? That's a breaking point. And

44:54

maybe that's one where you can

44:56

get enough different views among Israelis,

44:58

something to split out, where you begin to put

45:01

political pressure and either Netanyahu begins to leave or

45:03

you begin to see a shift in the political

45:05

scene to say, here are the actual limits about

45:07

what we're willing to do. The

45:09

other one is the hostage crisis.

45:11

There's a big Israeli political divide

45:13

now about whether the Israeli military

45:15

offensive should accept ceasefires, temporary or not,

45:17

in exchange for hostages or whether it just needs

45:19

to write off the hostages, accept the tragedy of

45:22

their loss, and complete

45:24

its military objectives. And as my discussion with Joel revealed,

45:26

which I highly recommend to folks, that's

45:28

unfortunately cleaving in Israeli domestic politics along familiar

45:30

lines with the kind of right-wing group that's

45:32

currently in charge of the current faction saying,

45:34

we need to

45:38

complete our military objectives completely eviscerating Hamas no

45:40

matter the cost of our hostages. And others

45:42

saying, well, we at least should take steps

45:44

to try and save our hostages. And

45:47

maybe at a certain point, we need to accept that this

45:49

conflict has gone on far enough. That divide's not big enough

45:51

yet. It's going to get there. It's going to get there

45:53

naturally. It's not artificial. It's a real policy divide. The United

45:55

States has been hesitant to get there. to,

46:00

I think, put themselves in a position to

46:03

come out too strongly against Israel and constrain

46:05

its options in this kind of tragic post-October

46:07

7th moment because they're worried

46:09

about the domestic political scene will be, how effective

46:11

that kind of pushback will be in the medium

46:13

term. But at

46:16

a certain point, when you don't pushback, when you don't set those

46:18

constraints, you also face a problem in that you

46:21

have a set of savvy political actors that are

46:23

perhaps doing things and pushing things in a direction

46:25

that are really problematic for you and your long-term

46:27

strategic objectives. And they don't take these subtle

46:29

hints, or at least they haven't as of yet, that, oh,

46:32

the United States may do something in the future. So

46:34

every step, every movement

46:37

towards setting up real points of

46:39

leverage over Israeli officials is important.

46:42

And you can do those quietly, which is what the

46:44

Biden administration has been doing, signaling them subtly without expressly stating,

46:46

here's 100% what we're going to do. We're going to

46:48

put pressure on you for fear of what that will

46:50

do. But you're going to hit that point eventually. And I

46:52

think it's sooner rather than later. And I kind of

46:54

think Rafa may be that

46:56

point in the next few weeks, where

46:58

we're going to see a real pivot point. It's not

47:00

going to fundamentally change the relationship or the dynamics

47:03

around the conflict, but it's going to set a,

47:05

once you cross that line, once you accept, no,

47:07

we are putting actual real pressure on the Israelis

47:09

to do something now, then you

47:12

are a little more in the driver's seat. And

47:14

I think you've kind of broken the seal and you're

47:16

saying, okay, then we are going to start steering this

47:18

conflict towards a position that's more

47:21

comfortable for us from a policy perspective. That

47:23

frankly, at this point means winding it down.

47:26

I think the Israelis know this. I think that's why they're pushing as

47:28

hard as they can to get as much done on the ground with

47:30

the window they have left. But long story short, from

47:33

the heart of this conflict, we knew there was a month-long

47:35

window, not a year's long window, a month-long window where the

47:37

Israelis were going to be able to do the sort of

47:39

things that they were going to want to do, which

47:42

were very damaging, disfilling and damaging to Gaza before

47:44

the international community would put pressure on them and

47:46

end it. The Israelis knew that too. And I

47:48

think that's the window we're beginning to see close.

47:50

And the real question is how far the Israeli

47:53

government's willing to push it, particularly around Rafah

47:55

and what their actual objectives are, although I

47:57

tend to be skeptical. They're actually trying to

48:00

push people in the Sinai, but who knows?

48:03

Like then, before they get that window, how

48:05

far they're willing to push really international relationships

48:07

before they get that far. And how much

48:09

their domestic political system can withstand. And we

48:11

don't know. Now, the truth is, Bibi is

48:13

just a much – and his faction is a much more resilient

48:15

group than a lot of people accept. And we like to think

48:17

of them as – they're this extremist government, but they're a government

48:20

that's won popular elections multiple times in the last couple of years.

48:22

And they're not isolated views. They're like a view

48:25

that's bought into by a lot of the Israeli

48:27

public. So how much is that going to change

48:29

in the medium term? I'm not sure.

48:32

And that really casts a lot of cold water on, I

48:34

think, on a lot of long-term ambitious plans that

48:36

hinge on there being a change in the Israeli

48:39

political preferences. Because that just

48:41

is asking a lot for

48:43

a political change within

48:45

Israel that I'm not sure there's a reason

48:47

to think is actually on the cusp of happening. Well,

48:51

let us turn from overseas to the home front. To

48:54

another controversial issue that

48:56

is working its

48:58

way up Capitol Hill as we speak. And

49:00

that is, of course, the Kids Online Safety

49:03

Act. This legislation we have talked about before.

49:06

It is a response to social

49:08

science studies, public health studies

49:11

that suggest a variety of

49:13

types of engagement between teenagers

49:15

and children and different types

49:17

of online activities. Social media

49:19

engagement in particular has detrimental

49:22

effects on their health, mental

49:24

health education development, particularly

49:26

mental health concerns. And

49:28

Congress has been kind of wrestling with

49:30

ways in a bipartisan way, but

49:33

in a way that may ultimately prove problematic about how to

49:35

best tackle that. And we are

49:37

now at this latest version of the law that

49:40

would provide a mechanism and

49:42

an obligation on social media

49:44

platforms to install some

49:47

sort of protection or at least take to

49:49

account certain interests and set

49:51

up certain gateways, but not quite as

49:53

tight gateways about how underage people can

49:56

access the internet. And in

49:58

particular, it empowers both the... the

50:00

FTC and potentially state attorney general

50:02

to probably the most controversial aspect of

50:04

the law to enforce certain parts

50:06

of these measures. Quinta,

50:09

I know you have been following this law

50:11

really closely. Let me turn it over to

50:13

you first to kind of

50:15

lay out how this version of the law

50:17

differs from earlier versions and what exactly it

50:19

does. And then I want to get

50:21

into how we feel about it. But let's first lay out the

50:23

kind of more technical aspects that I think you grasp better than

50:25

I do. Yeah,

50:28

well, what this law does is actually

50:30

somewhat complicated because it's been significantly

50:34

watered down from initial versions

50:36

that listeners might have heard

50:38

about. So as

50:40

you mentioned, there are initially a lot of what was

50:42

going on here had to do with age

50:44

verification requirements for users under at least

50:47

13 and 18. That

50:50

is now watered down. So the

50:52

bill actually explicitly says it's not

50:54

implementing an age verification requirement. But

50:57

it does say that platforms have a responsibility

50:59

to sort of be more

51:01

careful in terms of how their

51:03

products are designed if they have

51:05

actual knowledge that a user is

51:08

under age. What

51:10

does that actually mean in terms of

51:12

how platforms will design their services and how

51:15

they will sort of respond to this? I

51:17

have been looking into this and I don't

51:19

know. There are also so there's

51:21

this idea of a duty of

51:23

care. So sort of responsibility that platforms have

51:26

to again take that care with regard to

51:28

minor users, particularly for content that

51:31

could have potentially negative mental health

51:33

effects. So depression,

51:35

anxiety, sort of patterns of use

51:38

that might indicate addiction, physical violence,

51:41

sexual exploitation, etc. There

51:43

are also a number of requirements in

51:45

terms of how platforms are designed.

51:48

So in terms of like algorithmic amplification

51:50

and infinite scrolling, for example, and disclosure

51:52

requirements about how the platforms work. And

51:56

as you say, this is

51:58

to be enforced both by state attorneys

52:00

general through parents, patria law suits,

52:02

but also by the FTC. One

52:05

of the big changes in this latest draft of

52:07

the bill is that the duty of care requirement,

52:09

which was in some ways the most sweeping, is

52:12

now no longer enforceable by state

52:14

attorneys general. It's only by the

52:16

FTC. And I can talk

52:19

a little bit about why that change

52:21

was made. And it was something that

52:23

LGBTQ groups felt very strongly about. There's

52:26

also a fair amount of stuff in here

52:28

about research that will be required. Previously,

52:30

there were provisions allowing independent researcher

52:32

access to data. That's been rolled

52:35

back for reasons I don't fully understand. Now

52:37

there are requirements at the National Academies of

52:39

Sciences. Take a look

52:41

and conduct some studies about the effects of

52:44

internet use on children's mental health. And

52:47

there is more, but I

52:50

won't get into all of it

52:52

here. I think the short line

52:54

is that it is significantly watered

52:56

down from initial versions that some

52:58

internet freedom groups and LGBTQ groups

53:00

were alarmed about. But I don't,

53:03

after taking a look through, personally I

53:05

will say that watering down doesn't to

53:07

me completely mitigate those concerns. And frankly,

53:09

it also leaves me kind of puzzled

53:11

about what the point of the bill

53:13

is if it's so watered down to

53:15

begin with. Yeah, I

53:17

mean, look, I don't think anything could

53:19

completely mitigate those concerns that would still be

53:23

remotely responsive to the problem.

53:26

Well, let me be fair. I think it's a problem,

53:28

but I know some people don't think it's a problem.

53:30

So let's just say to the problem as the sponsors

53:32

of the Bill C, the problem being. I

53:35

will also note that although the bill

53:37

is still coming under a lot of

53:39

fire, I think it actually has mollified

53:41

quite a number of people. I mean,

53:43

I'm looking at a verge piece on

53:45

it. And it

53:47

does look like a lot of major LGBT

53:50

groups, GLAAD, Human Rights Campaign, the Trevor Project,

53:52

I mean, have said that they

53:54

are ultimately OK with the

53:56

bill in its current form. Again, I'm

53:59

sure they still have their objectives. and problems with it. But

54:01

I think it's kind of a big deal if you

54:03

can get all those groups to say, you know,

54:05

you've largely accepted or you've largely

54:07

dealt with our concerns.

54:10

You know, I think kind of zooming out, right?

54:15

There is on the one hand an element of a Congress

54:18

needs to do something, this is something, therefore, Congress

54:20

needs to do it. That's always kind of a

54:22

problem with bills of this sort. In

54:24

part because the problem is just so difficult

54:26

to solve, the problem is still

54:29

relatively new. There's still not,

54:31

I'd say, total consensus on

54:33

the nature of the problem. On the

54:35

other hand, maybe this is someone

54:37

who's always been a bit skeptical of the kind

54:40

of big tech, west coast,

54:43

deregulatory fever. And

54:45

also just personally, as you know, a

54:48

parent, I just feel

54:50

this more viscerally. I mean, I really do.

54:52

Like I live in fear of, you know, 10 years

54:56

from now when I have to give my children

54:58

a smartphone, or at that point, a neural link

55:00

implant, which I suspect is going to be the

55:02

new thing. I

55:04

am largely convinced that on

55:07

net social media has been

55:10

a net negative for children. I

55:12

just, you know, I find

55:14

the evidence to the extent that I am

55:16

qualified to analyze it and not

55:18

being a statistician or an empiricist. I'm obviously at

55:21

a disadvantage here. That's frankly, I think, are many

55:23

people on both sides of this debate. You know,

55:25

but I find the work of people like Jonathan

55:27

Haidt, you know, pretty convincing on

55:30

this point. And although I

55:32

recognize that, look, we've never been able

55:34

to eliminate any sort of social harm

55:36

to children, right? We've never been able

55:38

to drive teen drinking to zero,

55:40

teen smoking to zero. That

55:43

is just not the level,

55:45

that should not be the

55:47

goal here. And we have,

55:49

I think, been able to make a lot of parts

55:51

of life safer

55:54

for children. And, you know, if I

55:56

had to then choose between a bill

55:59

that was quite but moved us in

56:01

that direction, allowed

56:03

for frankly, a bunch of

56:06

litigation and regulation that

56:09

will messy and will have a lot of false starts,

56:12

will move us in that direction. And just

56:14

the status quo, which again is to be

56:16

clear, nothing, right? It's just nothing, the status

56:19

quo. I'm going

56:21

to vote for the legislative

56:23

action I think every time. Although

56:26

I have no, without any illusions that this

56:28

is some perfect bill that doesn't have real

56:30

problems to it, that hasn't made compromises with

56:33

some bad faith folks on the right.

56:36

I get all of that, right? I'm not going to like

56:38

blow smoke up anyone's butt and say it's a perfect bill,

56:41

but you work with the Congress you got, right?

56:43

And it's all matter trade offs. So

56:45

look, I think it's probably helpful to actually clarify what

56:47

we think that the problems with the bill are since

56:50

I didn't actually state that out

56:52

front. Sorry. Let's rewind record

56:54

scratch freeze frame. So to

56:56

be clear, the concerns

56:59

about this bill coming from internet

57:02

freedom groups and

57:04

from I think, importantly,

57:06

LGBTQ groups, which include not only

57:09

like GLAAD and HRC, but other

57:11

groups like Fight for the Future,

57:13

which is a kind of combination,

57:16

queer advocacy, internet freedom group, and

57:19

plenty of others. The concern

57:21

is that the way

57:23

the bill defines harm

57:26

to children is

57:28

sufficiently broad that

57:31

it could allow state attorneys general

57:33

in red states and potentially it's

57:36

worth saying, you know, an FTC

57:38

under a future Trump administration to

57:42

use this legislation as a

57:44

way to restrict

57:47

access to potentially

57:49

important resources. For

57:52

example, kids who are

57:54

figuring out their sexualities or gender

57:56

identities. And this is

57:59

important in particular. because we are at

58:01

a moment where on the right, there

58:03

is this kind of obsessive focus on

58:06

trans and

58:08

queer kids. And so this

58:11

isn't sort of a hypothetical that people are

58:13

spinning out. This is something that is very

58:15

present. Senator Marsha Blackburn, who is

58:17

the Republican co-sponsor of the bill, made a comment

58:19

over the summer that the bill would help, I

58:21

think her specific words were protect children

58:23

from the transgender. The

58:26

Heritage Foundation has made similar comments.

58:28

The White House Foreign Office did walk back that comment, but she

58:30

did make it. And

58:32

we've seen plenty of actions in

58:35

red states that I think indicate

58:39

that state attorneys generally

58:41

will be only too happy to try to

58:43

limit access to this. And I think this

58:45

is also important because I think,

58:48

Alan, I take a different view than you do of

58:50

the sort of the link between mental

58:52

health and access to the internet. I

58:55

agree there's some indication that indicates

58:57

that it's harmful for kids. There's also

59:00

some indication that it's helpful. And a lot

59:02

of the problem here is that we just don't know.

59:04

We need more information. I

59:06

do think that it's good for that reason that the

59:08

bill does include these requirements for national academy study. I'm

59:10

not crazy about the fact that that happens, you

59:13

know, that's going to happen after the actual

59:15

legislation is passed. And

59:17

it's also true that, you know, people point a lot to

59:20

the Surgeon General's report on teen's

59:22

mental health and the internet. That

59:24

report, I think, was a lot more incolate than it

59:26

was sort of played as in terms of, you know, yes,

59:28

some harms, maybe some good things also. But

59:31

for what it's worth, one of the things

59:33

that it did note that I think was

59:35

underplayed was that there's a particular group of

59:37

kids for whom social media and the internet

59:39

was associated with better mental health, and that

59:41

is LGBTQ kids.

59:44

And so that is important in particular,

59:46

given everything that I just said. And

59:49

so I think that this goes back to a point that I've

59:51

made previously, you know, when you say like, think of the children,

59:53

right, or like children's mental health, I think it's very easy to

59:55

abstract that. And it's important to think about, you know, which

59:58

children and what are their children. situations.

1:00:01

The most recent draft of the bill I think does mitigate

1:00:03

some of those concerns by taking the duty

1:00:05

of care enforcement away from state attorneys general

1:00:08

that said it does give it to

1:00:11

the FTC which under a term administration might

1:00:13

not get the result that Democrats are looking

1:00:15

for. There's also state

1:00:17

attorneys general do have this ability to

1:00:20

enforce these provisions on

1:00:22

a design of platforms which you

1:00:25

can you can imagine a way in which that could

1:00:27

be used to kind of restrict this kind of content.

1:00:29

There are there's a language in there that says

1:00:31

I don't have it right in front of

1:00:34

me at the moment but something along the lines of you

1:00:36

know like resources that are helpful to mental health or something

1:00:38

like that shouldn't be restricted. Senator

1:00:40

Blumenthal who's a Democratic co-sponsor of

1:00:42

the bill has sort of presented

1:00:45

that as explicitly saying like so you

1:00:47

know information like the Trevor Project wouldn't

1:00:50

be restricted but there's nothing in the

1:00:52

bill that says you know LGBTQ resources

1:00:54

are fine which makes

1:00:56

me a little nervous. There's also this

1:00:58

very weird bit at the very end

1:01:01

that is new in in this version

1:01:04

that says it's a that has

1:01:06

to do with preemption and says

1:01:09

that nothing in this act shall be

1:01:11

construed to prohibit a state from enacting

1:01:13

a law etc etc that provides greater

1:01:15

protection to minors and then the protection

1:01:17

provided by provisions of this act. As

1:01:20

far as I can tell based on the markup

1:01:22

from the Senate Commerce Committee over the summer

1:01:24

I think that was Senator

1:01:27

Cruz suggested the importance of

1:01:29

including that preemption language that

1:01:31

is worrying to me because it suggests

1:01:33

and I'll give a shout out to Blake

1:01:35

Reid here who pointed this out

1:01:37

to me on social media that you

1:01:39

know you could basically have a red state

1:01:42

legislature pass similar legislation and say we're

1:01:44

very concerned about children's access to you know

1:01:46

information about gender identity look

1:01:48

this is more protective of children than COSA

1:01:51

now we can go out there and enforce

1:01:53

that and so I kind

1:01:55

of worry that you know the the Democratic

1:01:57

co-sponsors of this bill have kind of

1:02:00

tried to patch up all of these problems that

1:02:04

groups have identified and then basically opened a door,

1:02:06

basically shunted all of those problems through this preemption

1:02:08

thing at the very end, which is going to

1:02:10

lead to a ton of problems. But

1:02:13

under the status quo, nothing would prevent a state legislature

1:02:15

from doing that now, right? No,

1:02:18

that's correct. But I mean,

1:02:20

you could not have the preemption clause at the end

1:02:22

and then it would be preempted. Right.

1:02:25

Yeah, exactly. If the goal of this was

1:02:27

to prevent, I mean, like that

1:02:30

very clearly seems to be a

1:02:32

bargain to say we are not

1:02:34

restricting states existing authority to legislate

1:02:36

in this space through this federal

1:02:38

legislation. And in the silence

1:02:41

of that, you would like actually have a judicial argument,

1:02:43

you'd have a legal argument to say like, is this

1:02:45

preempted or not? Because it doesn't expressly preempt it either.

1:02:47

Right. Unless an earlier version did

1:02:49

that. But I don't think that was ever part of

1:02:51

the calculus was that we're going to have a one

1:02:53

national standard of this stuff. Well,

1:02:56

so look, I mean, this is where we're getting

1:02:58

pretty, we're getting pretty deep into the weeds now.

1:03:00

But I mean, look, part of

1:03:02

the problem that we have seen with

1:03:04

tech legislation that we saw with FOSTA

1:03:06

in 2018 is that if

1:03:09

you say, oh, yeah, state

1:03:11

attorney attorneys general are going to be

1:03:13

able to enforce this on their own,

1:03:15

potentially on the basis of state law,

1:03:17

you end up with a patchwork and

1:03:19

then tech companies are incentivized to basically

1:03:21

take the lowest common denominator and restrict

1:03:24

everything. So and we know that

1:03:26

that's what that's what could happen because that's

1:03:28

what happened with FOSTA. So I'm sort of,

1:03:30

I think the particular dynamics

1:03:32

of that make this particularly worrying

1:03:35

to me here given the political context.

1:03:38

Well, you know, I was thinking

1:03:40

about this preemption, I think it's kind of interesting. I

1:03:42

don't know if that that alarms me in this case,

1:03:44

I don't think that's how we would think about preemption.

1:03:47

It seems pretty clearly to say this is a preemption

1:03:49

rule that says essentially

1:03:51

like, we're not preempting the

1:03:54

existing ability of state legislatures to do all this,

1:03:56

but it doesn't strike me that those state laws

1:03:58

would somehow channel into these enforcement mechanisms. mechanisms that

1:04:00

are created here. In fact, quite clearly, it seems

1:04:02

that they do not, right? Because it's treating them

1:04:05

as outside the scope. And it's, it's useful between

1:04:07

that and eliminating the duty of care that this

1:04:09

does constrain the role of the state

1:04:11

to train generals, which does strike me as the most

1:04:13

concerning part of this framework, because state attorney generals are,

1:04:17

I think there's a good reason to think they're not

1:04:19

always the most reliable legal actors, like they do lots

1:04:21

of politically driven stuff. They embrace lots

1:04:23

of different, different views that people might not agree with.

1:04:26

I guess the question here is like in the parts

1:04:28

left to the state attorney generals, what

1:04:30

are the ones that provide

1:04:33

the risk factor? And they're

1:04:35

like the big parts are left to them

1:04:37

are transparency and reporting requirements, which like nothing

1:04:39

jumps out to me of those of being

1:04:42

highly concerned, maybe from an industry perspective, like

1:04:44

their tools by which state attorney generals could

1:04:46

put pressure on industry, but like, not necessarily

1:04:48

what we want, if the if the reporting requirements

1:04:50

are out there. And then there's the age access

1:04:52

issue, like this idea that if

1:04:54

a platform knows somebody under ages on here, I

1:04:56

don't know whether there's no or reasonably knows, which

1:04:58

is like a big difference in this sort of

1:05:01

context. And I think that was like

1:05:03

something that changed in early in recent versions of the law.

1:05:06

But this question of like knowledge of saying, okay,

1:05:08

we can hammer down on

1:05:11

platforms for failing to identify or for

1:05:13

failing to adequately account for age differences,

1:05:15

like, that's a point of concern, I

1:05:17

guess maybe, but I'm wondering

1:05:20

how much wiggle room state attorney generals have to

1:05:23

do with what what hey, they can

1:05:25

make of that, like what trouble they can do with

1:05:27

that mischief, I can say see some, but I don't

1:05:29

know if it strikes me as like, as

1:05:31

concerning as a duty of care standard, that is

1:05:33

fairly broadly worded, like, like, I'm not sure you

1:05:35

get to the same outcome here. So

1:05:38

I don't know, I do think this is actually

1:05:40

like a substantially watered down version from that angle,

1:05:42

the angle of state attorney generals causing mischief. FTC,

1:05:45

federal regulation always takes angle that federal regs will

1:05:48

be applied badly, and we do have elections and

1:05:50

they have consequences. And that's unfortunate, but I think

1:05:52

that's kind of baked into the nature of any

1:05:54

sort of regulation. But on the

1:05:56

state level, which is a weird thing this law

1:05:58

does, this does seem to like take a

1:06:00

lot of the problems out of it? Am I misreading that?

1:06:03

Or is there some part of what the states can still

1:06:05

do that is the biggest loophole

1:06:08

people worry about state AGs abusing? I

1:06:11

mean I think yeah for me it's

1:06:13

more just that we know that states

1:06:15

are interested in passing these kinds of

1:06:18

really restrictive laws because we have seen

1:06:20

them do that. For example in Utah

1:06:23

where I think it's you're not allowed, kids aren't allowed to go

1:06:25

on the internet after 10 30 p.m. or

1:06:28

something like that. Which I think gets to

1:06:30

another point. Game in. Please

1:06:33

block me from the internet to Utah. I support

1:06:35

that 100%. But no

1:06:37

look I mean I think that gets to another really important point

1:06:39

which is that a lot of those state laws have run

1:06:41

smack into First Amendment litigation brought

1:06:44

by Net Choice, this industry

1:06:46

group, which I think is

1:06:48

another really complicated issue because

1:06:50

I do like I don't really

1:06:53

particularly like this bill I actually think it

1:06:55

were better if it were not to

1:06:57

pass but I also

1:06:59

worry for reasons that Alan has written about

1:07:01

in the past in a slightly different context

1:07:04

that there if

1:07:06

this does pass I suspect there will

1:07:08

be First Amendment litigation and I worry

1:07:11

that the tech companies are going to

1:07:13

basically argue all of this is completely

1:07:15

off-limits because of the First Amendment and

1:07:18

then you kind of end up saying you

1:07:20

know and therefore no regulation

1:07:22

is possible at all and I don't

1:07:24

like that either right

1:07:26

I feel very weird that I might sort of I

1:07:30

would like for there to be tech regulation and

1:07:32

I have somehow ended up in this position of

1:07:34

arguing against all of the regulation that is on

1:07:36

the table because I think that it's bad but

1:07:38

that doesn't mean that I think it should be

1:07:40

you know constitutionally prohibited and I'm I'm

1:07:43

worried that that is kind of the direction

1:07:45

that we're heading. Alan I don't know do

1:07:47

you think that's fair? Yeah I mean

1:07:49

I do I mean look what on Monday

1:07:51

the court is going to be hearing argument in

1:07:53

in the other there's so many net choice cases

1:07:56

in the other net choice cases the ones about

1:07:58

the Texas and Florida social media moderation laws which

1:08:00

I'm sure we will talk about the argument on next week's

1:08:02

rat sec. And so I think we'll actually get a bit

1:08:04

of a sense of where the court's head is there.

1:08:07

I mean, you know, I- What

1:08:09

would the First Amendment, I can't, I have trouble

1:08:11

speaking my eyes. I don't wanna first amendment like-

1:08:13

Okay, okay. The credible one would be here. Like,

1:08:16

tell them- Oh no, there are a bunch. No, there are

1:08:18

a bunch. There's a ton. Yeah, there are a bunch, right?

1:08:20

So two in particular, right? Well, three,

1:08:23

two of which are credible. So the

1:08:25

one that's not credible, I think, is

1:08:27

tech companies have a First Amendment right

1:08:29

to communicate with children in any way that they want.

1:08:32

And then that, yeah, I'm not sure this can get

1:08:35

anywhere. Then there are two other ones that are much

1:08:37

more credible. One is that children themselves have First Amendment

1:08:39

rights. They do. They have fewer First

1:08:41

Amendment rights because they're children, but

1:08:43

they don't have zero. And the doctrine

1:08:46

about children, First Amendment rights is

1:08:48

actually pretty complicated. And

1:08:51

so I think that it's complicated, it's

1:08:53

unsettled. It is true that

1:08:56

some of these laws are being challenged on those

1:08:58

grounds successfully but that's one. The

1:09:00

other is kind of, we think of it as

1:09:02

a spillover argument where even if the children themselves

1:09:04

don't have a First Amendment right that's being unconstitutionally

1:09:07

abridged, adults do. And if you

1:09:09

pass a law, and this

1:09:11

often comes up in the age verification context,

1:09:13

where if you pass a law for age

1:09:16

verification that in the end causes platforms

1:09:18

to so lock down their platforms that adults

1:09:21

can no longer access material because we don't

1:09:23

have, let's say, necessarily a good age verification

1:09:26

system, then that can be

1:09:28

its own First Amendment problem. Now, look, I

1:09:30

am at the end of the day

1:09:33

somewhat skeptical of these arguments because I

1:09:35

think that just as we figured out

1:09:37

a reasonable age verification system for alcohol,

1:09:40

it's not perfect, but it's pretty okay,

1:09:42

right? Or tobacco. I mean,

1:09:44

I suspect we can figure this thing out

1:09:46

that will assuage the First Amendment

1:09:48

issues. But there's no question that these

1:09:50

First Amendment challenges, they're not frivolous. They're

1:09:53

not frivolous at all. And

1:09:55

they will have to be a work through. I

1:09:58

count myself highly dubious that there's serious. for the first

1:10:00

moment issues for this, given that especially because it's like

1:10:02

an age knowledge requirement. But I'm going to say that

1:10:04

and then I'm going to end the conversations. We're out

1:10:06

of time today and we will be have the opportunity

1:10:08

to revisit this next week, or some related issues next

1:10:10

week. When we talk about the net

1:10:12

choice cases hint a sneak preview of next week.

1:10:15

Because that brings us to the end of this time of our

1:10:17

time together for this week. But this would not be rational security

1:10:19

if we did not leave you with some object lessons to ponder

1:10:21

over in the weeks to come. Alan, what do you have for

1:10:23

us this week? I have one

1:10:27

of the best movies I've seen in a long

1:10:29

time. American fiction, it's a new

1:10:31

film. It's not that new anymore. But

1:10:34

because I have two small children, I don't get to watch new

1:10:36

films. So I only watch them once they're streaming and I can

1:10:38

watch them over three days at night with my

1:10:40

wife because otherwise you're very tired. So

1:10:43

it's written and directed by Cora

1:10:45

Jefferson and it stars

1:10:47

Jeffrey Wright, Sterling Brown, some

1:10:49

other great actors. Basically

1:10:51

the premise that is based on a

1:10:53

book from the 90s called Erasure. And

1:10:56

the premise is the main

1:10:59

character, this guy Thelonious Monk Ellison,

1:11:01

who's a black author who writes

1:11:03

really kind of highbrow, super intellectual

1:11:05

books. His career has stalled because

1:11:08

basically no one wants to publish his work.

1:11:10

They want quote unquote black fiction. And

1:11:13

so in rage and desperation he

1:11:15

writes as basically a satirical joke.

1:11:18

This book that initially he calls My

1:11:21

Pathology and then renames just to

1:11:23

kind of screw people even more

1:11:25

fuck. And it's just the

1:11:28

most cringy, like poverty,

1:11:30

it's just awful. But

1:11:32

of course the joke is that if you come to

1:11:34

this runaway bestseller with all these awards and

1:11:36

he's just driven like more and

1:11:38

more towards madness. And as this is happening,

1:11:42

in addition to this really interesting and actually nuanced

1:11:44

story about his and his sort of upper middle

1:11:46

class black family and all their travails, it's an

1:11:49

incredible movie. It is incredibly funny.

1:11:51

It's kind of brutal to watch, to

1:11:53

be honest. It does this wonderful inversion

1:11:55

where it's the white characters who are

1:11:57

like cookie cutters. It's fabulous. And

1:12:00

there's also this really affecting family story. It's

1:12:02

gotten total rave reviews. It's up for a bunch

1:12:04

of Oscar nominations, both for

1:12:07

Best Picture and Best Actor. And

1:12:09

I will say it's the universal acclaim that

1:12:11

it has gotten, right? I mean,

1:12:13

just universal acclaim. On

1:12:15

the left, on the right, everywhere gives

1:12:18

me a lot of hope for American civilization going forward.

1:12:20

But more than that, it is just a spectacular

1:12:24

movie. I just highly,

1:12:26

highly recommend it. Have either

1:12:28

of you seen it? No, I've really, really wanted to. And

1:12:30

I've heard it was good. And now I want to even

1:12:33

more. Oh, I'm putting it on

1:12:35

my list. It looks great. Yeah, it's recommended to

1:12:37

have an alcoholic beverage in hand

1:12:39

while watching it. I will

1:12:41

say I've also heard that the book that it's based on

1:12:43

erasure is very good, although I haven't read it. I need

1:12:45

to read the book, yeah. Quinto, what do you have for us this

1:12:47

week? I have a work

1:12:50

of fiction. They're not a movie based on a work

1:12:52

of fiction. It is a

1:12:54

novel called The Book of Love by Kelly Link, who

1:12:56

is a very highly regarded, I

1:12:58

don't really know how to describe her, kind

1:13:00

of like magical realist, weird

1:13:02

fiction, short story writer. She's

1:13:05

very good. She won a MacArthur in 2018, I think. And

1:13:08

this is her first novel. And

1:13:11

I basically inhaled it over the course

1:13:13

of two days. I

1:13:16

don't even really know fully how to describe

1:13:18

it. I think it's kind of

1:13:20

like a riff on a Tamlin

1:13:22

Thomas the Rimer sort of English

1:13:24

ballads from that period. It reminds

1:13:26

me a lot of the wonderful

1:13:28

Diana Winjones novel Fire and Hemlock,

1:13:30

if anyone has read that. I'm

1:13:33

not getting any of these references. You're way too highbrow

1:13:36

for me. Diana Winjones is

1:13:38

a kids fantasy writer. That's not

1:13:40

highbrow at all. I bet she's

1:13:42

like a highbrow because you were

1:13:44

a highbrow kid. Oh, no. Oh,

1:13:47

no, no, no, no. But

1:13:49

anyway, it's delightful. It's extremely

1:13:51

well written, but not in a showy way,

1:13:53

which I always appreciate. And the plot kind

1:13:56

of takes a lot to it takes a

1:13:58

while to get moving. moving,

1:14:00

it runs off like a freight train.

1:14:02

So I highly, highly recommend it. Just

1:14:05

like an excellent read on many levels

1:14:07

and also something where if you're just

1:14:10

kind of like looking for something with

1:14:12

a plot to kind of carry you

1:14:14

off to another world, it is extremely

1:14:16

enjoyable. I also recommend everything else that

1:14:18

Kelly Link has ever written because she

1:14:20

is just generally great. Well,

1:14:22

wonderful. Well, for my object lesson

1:14:24

this week, I'm sharing a local

1:14:26

tip, but also a, I'm

1:14:29

going to mix in a national vaguely

1:14:31

related one just for folks who are

1:14:33

in the DC area. I had the

1:14:35

great joy of taking my young son

1:14:37

on a pre-baby sister trip to Baltimore,

1:14:39

Maryland to visit the aquarium, National

1:14:41

Aquarium there this past weekend. It's phenomenal. I have

1:14:43

not been, I have not been like 25 years.

1:14:45

I can't recommend it enough. It is stupidly expensive,

1:14:48

but little kids get so much joy out of

1:14:50

the sheer amazing animals you get to see there.

1:14:52

And the thing I did that was kind of expensive,

1:14:54

but was 100% worth it is that they have

1:14:56

for like a dozen people every day, a

1:14:59

before the museum opens this sunrise tour where

1:15:01

you go in an hour early and get

1:15:03

an hour kind of personalized tour of the

1:15:05

whole aquarium where it's just

1:15:08

you in the space. And it was just so

1:15:10

phenomenal to get to see these animals that have

1:15:12

been pointed out by an informed tour guide without

1:15:14

the chaos of the aquarium because aquariums turns out

1:15:16

are very expensive to maintain. And so they pack

1:15:18

a lot of people in there during the day.

1:15:20

My three year old found it pretty overwhelming when it

1:15:22

got at full capacity, but when it was just

1:15:24

us and the animals, he was just so intensely

1:15:27

focused on just learning about and looking at these

1:15:29

fish and sharks and things. No octopus was which

1:15:31

I found very disappointing, but other than that, all

1:15:33

sorts of other animals. It was just phenomenal. I

1:15:35

can't recommend it enough if you're in the DC

1:15:37

area and Baltimore, great train museum as well. Check

1:15:39

that out. It is like the perfect city to

1:15:41

take a three year old on

1:15:43

a getaway vacation on because it's

1:15:45

just kind of got all the things you need to check and

1:15:47

you're in bed by eight and it's great. That

1:15:50

said, because this is a Mid-Atlantic

1:15:52

only tip, I'm going to supplement it with

1:15:54

a national object lesson. And that is

1:15:56

the lovely interesting podcast by our friends at

1:15:59

Goat Rodeo. Birds are cool. cool, which I

1:16:01

just tuned into earlier today for the first time,

1:16:03

featuring none other than our occasional producer Kara Shailen.

1:16:06

It is a podcast all about birding,

1:16:08

a hobby I find very

1:16:10

strange, but I see a lot of people

1:16:12

out doing while I hike around on the

1:16:14

weekends with my family. And it's very interesting

1:16:16

and very kind of peaceful and cool and

1:16:18

check and has me intrigued. So if you're

1:16:21

a nature lover, not of the aquatic variety,

1:16:23

but of the aerial variety, check that out.

1:16:25

And all around, check out some of our

1:16:27

animal fauna friends, one via

1:16:29

venue or another in the week to

1:16:31

come until we are back in your podcatcher. Well

1:16:35

that brings us to the end of this week's

1:16:37

episode. Rational Security is of course a production of

1:16:39

Lawfare, so be sure to visit us on lawfirmedia.org

1:16:41

for our show page, for links to past episodes,

1:16:43

for our written work and the written work of

1:16:45

other lawfare contributors, and for information

1:16:47

on Lawfare's other phenomenal podcast series, including

1:16:49

the Aftermath now out in season two.

1:16:52

And be sure to follow us on Twitter at

1:16:54

RATL Security and be sure to leave a rating

1:16:56

or view wherever you might be listening. Also, sign

1:16:58

up to become a material supporter of Lawfare on

1:17:01

Patreon for an ad-free version of this podcast and

1:17:03

other special benefits. For more information, visit lawfirmedia.org slash

1:17:05

support. Our audio engineer and

1:17:07

producer this week was Noam Ozband of Go Rodeo

1:17:09

and her music as always was performed by Sophia

1:17:12

Yan. And we are once again edited by the

1:17:14

wonderful Jen Patchehowell. On behalf of

1:17:16

my co-host, Alan and Quinta, I am Scott R.

1:17:18

Anderson and we will talk to you next week.

1:17:20

Until then, goodbye. Have

1:17:30

you ever Googled your own name? Prepare

1:17:33

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