November 28th • 3h 19m
Shownotes
Every new episode of No Agenda is accompanied by a comprehensive list of shownotes curated by Adam while preparing for the show. Clips played by the hosts during the show can also be found here.
Thanksgiving
Let's think of the WNC and Florida hurricane victims this year
Be quick to Listen, slow to speak and even slower to get angry
Text groups have gone silent, nothing to talk about now dumb Dems are done
Een uitgestlede hoop leidt to een verrot hart
Hope delayed leads to a sick heart
New Media
Consistency is NA
When people complain about consistency they're not talking about your
views
on abortion or foreign policy or whatever. They're talking about how on
Sunday you'll spend an hour passionately arguing that anyone that went to
Yale law school and was a CFR fellow is a deeply corrupted spook that
should be tossed from a rooftop....and then on Thursday viciously mock
anyone that questions the background of a political appointee.
Personally, I find the wild inconsistency to be amusing and part of what
makes the show interesting. But the complainers do have a point.
Dan Breakup letter TDS Classic BOTG
Sir Dan the Homeless of Fredericksburg, VA
The Ukraine flags are out on X again
Nu-TDS and Trump’s “Broad Tent”
Hi John and Adam,
Adam's observation about "new TDS" in your recent episode (1716) was very interesting and I agreed with most of the observations the two of you made. I think this infighting is an almost inevitable result of victory for what has been described as Trump’s "broad coalition". Now that Trump has won, the various factions within MAGA no longer have any external enemy to fight - so their enemies become each other. The Christians will only want Christian nominees, the anti-Zionists will hate all Zionist/Jewish/Israeli nominees, the people who aren't anti-vaxx will hate RFK Jr, etc. Obviously, people should be happy with what they've got.
Something I have wondered, as a relatively young (28) Australian, is if these nominations are normally covered in the media so extensively - or is it part of the Trump news cycle? Here in Australia, our ABC has run multiple articles discussing the nominations, which they also did in 2020 for Joe Biden's nominees.
Great show, as always.
Best
Denis
Trump Podcasters and YouTubers in press briefings - DC Gir
One of the largest government contractors bought a social network
It's not about the censorship, it's about the influence operations
Maybe using heating algo's
Censorship Industrial Complex is just a cover to legitimize the practices and divert attention
Angry Email About John (joking) Reiki Princess
Dear Adam,
After listening to the show for almost a decade, it’s finally come time for me to write one of those infamous “Angry John” letters.
I was shocked to hear on Sunday’s show John describe a 31 year old as a “MATURE WOMAN bordering on MIDDLE-AGED.”
He might as well have thrown in that we’re “OVER THE HILL” at 45!
I’ll make sure to add it to my resume for Linda Lupatkin!
Happy Thanksgiving!
In Love, Light and Jest,
RP
Politics Podcasters Sound Off on Media, the 'Manoverse' and Donald Trump's Win - WSJ
The Wall Street
Journal spoke with hosts of several popular political and cultural
podcasts—several of which are left-leaning, or anti-Trump—including “Pod
Save America,” “The Bulwark,” “Vibe Check,” “The Young Turks” and
more.
They
discussed audiences’ new expectations and what they learned from the
“manoverse”—which includes podcasts such as “The Joe Rogan Experience”
and “This Past Weekend w/ Theo Von” whose entertaining style has proved
appealing, especially to young men.
Edited excerpts follow:
How do you reach people who aren’t obsessed with politics?
TIM MILLER, host, “The Bulwark Podcast”:
Trump did well with people that don’t follow the news closely. How do
you communicate with people that don’t follow the day-to-day of
political news? One old school way was political ads; a deeper way is to
engage with podcasters and streamers and other media platforms whose sole mission is something else, like culture or sports.
SAM SANDERS, co-host, “Vibe Check”:
We talk about politics a lot, but we talk about everything else—that is
not abnormal for our listeners’ lives. The way we talk about the world
and politics can’t be segmented anymore because news and media consumers
aren’t living that way. If the person who resonates with them in
politics is a hair influencer on TikTok, fine. They’re not waiting to
hear a conversation about politics in a political podcast.
SAMI SAGE, co-host, “American Fever Dream”:
It’s an incredibly intimate relationship between the listener and
podcaster. [Podcasts] presented almost a Trojan horse for political
and/or cultural ideas to reach people’s ears in a way that felt
extremely authentic and real and not message-tested or not intended to
court controversy for the sake of courting controversy.
SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS
Which
podcasts did you listen to during this year’s election cycle, and what
do you think they should change for next time? Join the conversation
below.
Is the left’s media strategy missing something?
TOMMY VIETOR, co-host, “Pod Save America”: [Trump]
views conservative media as an asset to be nurtured. He went on Dan
Bongino’s show over and over again. It’s these symbiotic relationships
where he gives them access and helps build their audience and then
during the election he gets to reach more people. It’s this thing
Republicans do with conservative media that’s smart and not replicated
on the left.
MILLER:
There are right-wing political pods that it doesn’t make a ton of sense
for Democrats to engage with, but a lot of times people mix that up
with Theo Von or Joe Rogan, who are not partisan really. They might have
views liberals don’t agree with, but they’re not political actors;
they’re long-form interview shows and comedians. It’s malpractice to not engage with them because you don’t like some of their views.
ADAM CONOVER, host, “Factually!”: We
should be straight up about which folks are right wing. But we should
go on their f—ing shows anyway. Why not show you can hang and be there
and mix it up a bit and be present in the dialogue.
CENK UYGUR, co-host, “The Young Turks”:
If other left-wing and independent online media had united in a way
that’s similar to right-wing media and said, ‘We’re demanding better of
the Democratic Party, we’re demanding a primary, we’re demanding a
strong candidate,’ we could have made a gigantic difference. Instead a
great majority of them went to the old mainstream media playbook.
What do audiences seem to crave from podcasts?
ZACH STAFFORD, co-host, “Vibe Check”:
People just want authenticity and want to hear people ask questions who
are like them. Young people are like, ‘Why am I listening to a random
person on MSNBC who makes $20M a year and lives in the Hamptons?’
VIETOR,
on “Pod Save America” being quick to advocate that President Biden step
down from the ticket after the first debate: We were honest about what
we saw, and our numbers doubled and held. The lesson there for us was
authenticity and honesty is rewarded. We learned to let rip a little
bit.
EZRA KLEIN, host, “The Ezra Klein Show”: It’s
one of the last places people can sit and speak in a way that ends up
surprising you. One of my jokes is, Twitter makes me dislike people I
like. Podcasts make me like people I’m inclined to dislike.
What are some lessons from the success of the ‘manoverse’?
MILLER: One
thing they get right that I try to do and fail at sometimes is create a
more chill vibe for the interview and get the politician comfortable
enough to let them be more natural and more conversational. On political
podcasts, politician interviews do the worst. Our numbers go down
because it’s boring. We have to make the politician interview more
interesting. Those guys did a great job with that.
SANDERS:
On the left a lot of the adherence to legacy media has been a search
for perfection when what you can pursue instead is resonance, reach,
depth and connection. The right found all kinds of imperfect allies. You
cannot look down on any space of the internet or media if you want to
reach people. There are spaces the left deems below itself. There are
spaces they won’t go that Donald Trump, to his credit, he went.
Do you have any regrets? And where do news and culture podcasts go from here?
UYGUR: I’m
super happy with what we did, and I’m not going to change a thing. We
criticized both sides as actual journalists, and I criticized Trump more
because he deserved more criticism. I debated a dozen conservatives on
our air. I went on a half a dozen right-wing shows.
SAGE:
My learning for the future is just being less hesitant to take on
certain conversations even if they are not the conversation I am
personally interested in having, if that is really what people seem to
be really concerned about. [For example] with the debate—they’re eating
the cats and the dogs—that to me was just such a ridiculous moment, but
what it really revealed was a bigger issue that people were feeling
really deeply about immigration.
VIETOR: We’re
thinking about how to cover four more years of Trump that feels new and
different. A lot of things are going to happen, and it can’t be like
last time where everyone is outraged all the time—it’s
counterproductive.
DAVID PLOTZ, co-host, “Political Gabfest”: It’s
not that existing [left-leaning] podcasts are going to suddenly go
MAGA. More, there will be a new crop of podcasts that will serve a new
audience that wants to be curious about it. It’s hard to change what
your podcast is. It’s not hard to start a new podcast that has a
different take on the world, that has more of that curiosity around
conservative America than a lot of left-leaning podcasts.
Write to Anne Steele at anne.steele@wsj.com and Alexandra Bruell at alexandra.bruell@wsj.com
No fault divorce hoax
Big Tech AI and the Socials
BlueCry
I just tried the new Grok website analyzation on bingit.io. It expired 2 days ago!
Omegle A WARNING FOR THE KIDS BOTG
Hey Adam
Another Gen Z’er here with some info on Omegle.
I recently went to a eSafety event for my college job and learnt about all sorts of online scams. One of my favourite I learnt about is the Omegle scam.
Basically a young bloke 13-16 will be going through chat rooms and then will come across a good looking lady. They wil proceed to chat for 5-10 minutes getting seemingly inconsequential info from the kid. Where do you live, what do your parents do etc. they then find out who the kid is using socials and find their parents/school/ friends.
What they then proceed to do is enter a little game of I’ll show you mine if you show me yours. This naturally proceeds to gear out in screen. Screenshots/videos taken and blackmail ensues. The lady will blackmail the kid saying if you don’t pay me now I’ll send this to your parents. Take the kid for all the money they can get a hold of. Then upload all the images and videos to pornography sites.
These places are run heavily out of Asia and Northern Europe and get 100’s of victims a year. Usually lonely bored boarding school students with a card from their parents for expenses.
Anyway, love the show.
Cheers
Patrick
Trump
Politics Podcasters Sound Off on Media, the 'Manoverse' and Donald Trump's Win - WSJ
The Wall Street
Journal spoke with hosts of several popular political and cultural
podcasts—several of which are left-leaning, or anti-Trump—including “Pod
Save America,” “The Bulwark,” “Vibe Check,” “The Young Turks” and
more.
They
discussed audiences’ new expectations and what they learned from the
“manoverse”—which includes podcasts such as “The Joe Rogan Experience”
and “This Past Weekend w/ Theo Von” whose entertaining style has proved
appealing, especially to young men.
Edited excerpts follow:
How do you reach people who aren’t obsessed with politics?
TIM MILLER, host, “The Bulwark Podcast”:
Trump did well with people that don’t follow the news closely. How do
you communicate with people that don’t follow the day-to-day of
political news? One old school way was political ads; a deeper way is to
engage with podcasters and streamers and other media platforms whose sole mission is something else, like culture or sports.
SAM SANDERS, co-host, “Vibe Check”:
We talk about politics a lot, but we talk about everything else—that is
not abnormal for our listeners’ lives. The way we talk about the world
and politics can’t be segmented anymore because news and media consumers
aren’t living that way. If the person who resonates with them in
politics is a hair influencer on TikTok, fine. They’re not waiting to
hear a conversation about politics in a political podcast.
SAMI SAGE, co-host, “American Fever Dream”:
It’s an incredibly intimate relationship between the listener and
podcaster. [Podcasts] presented almost a Trojan horse for political
and/or cultural ideas to reach people’s ears in a way that felt
extremely authentic and real and not message-tested or not intended to
court controversy for the sake of courting controversy.
SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS
Which
podcasts did you listen to during this year’s election cycle, and what
do you think they should change for next time? Join the conversation
below.
Is the left’s media strategy missing something?
TOMMY VIETOR, co-host, “Pod Save America”: [Trump]
views conservative media as an asset to be nurtured. He went on Dan
Bongino’s show over and over again. It’s these symbiotic relationships
where he gives them access and helps build their audience and then
during the election he gets to reach more people. It’s this thing
Republicans do with conservative media that’s smart and not replicated
on the left.
MILLER:
There are right-wing political pods that it doesn’t make a ton of sense
for Democrats to engage with, but a lot of times people mix that up
with Theo Von or Joe Rogan, who are not partisan really. They might have
views liberals don’t agree with, but they’re not political actors;
they’re long-form interview shows and comedians. It’s malpractice to not engage with them because you don’t like some of their views.
ADAM CONOVER, host, “Factually!”: We
should be straight up about which folks are right wing. But we should
go on their f—ing shows anyway. Why not show you can hang and be there
and mix it up a bit and be present in the dialogue.
CENK UYGUR, co-host, “The Young Turks”:
If other left-wing and independent online media had united in a way
that’s similar to right-wing media and said, ‘We’re demanding better of
the Democratic Party, we’re demanding a primary, we’re demanding a
strong candidate,’ we could have made a gigantic difference. Instead a
great majority of them went to the old mainstream media playbook.
What do audiences seem to crave from podcasts?
ZACH STAFFORD, co-host, “Vibe Check”:
People just want authenticity and want to hear people ask questions who
are like them. Young people are like, ‘Why am I listening to a random
person on MSNBC who makes $20M a year and lives in the Hamptons?’
VIETOR,
on “Pod Save America” being quick to advocate that President Biden step
down from the ticket after the first debate: We were honest about what
we saw, and our numbers doubled and held. The lesson there for us was
authenticity and honesty is rewarded. We learned to let rip a little
bit.
EZRA KLEIN, host, “The Ezra Klein Show”: It’s
one of the last places people can sit and speak in a way that ends up
surprising you. One of my jokes is, Twitter makes me dislike people I
like. Podcasts make me like people I’m inclined to dislike.
What are some lessons from the success of the ‘manoverse’?
MILLER: One
thing they get right that I try to do and fail at sometimes is create a
more chill vibe for the interview and get the politician comfortable
enough to let them be more natural and more conversational. On political
podcasts, politician interviews do the worst. Our numbers go down
because it’s boring. We have to make the politician interview more
interesting. Those guys did a great job with that.
SANDERS:
On the left a lot of the adherence to legacy media has been a search
for perfection when what you can pursue instead is resonance, reach,
depth and connection. The right found all kinds of imperfect allies. You
cannot look down on any space of the internet or media if you want to
reach people. There are spaces the left deems below itself. There are
spaces they won’t go that Donald Trump, to his credit, he went.
Do you have any regrets? And where do news and culture podcasts go from here?
UYGUR: I’m
super happy with what we did, and I’m not going to change a thing. We
criticized both sides as actual journalists, and I criticized Trump more
because he deserved more criticism. I debated a dozen conservatives on
our air. I went on a half a dozen right-wing shows.
SAGE:
My learning for the future is just being less hesitant to take on
certain conversations even if they are not the conversation I am
personally interested in having, if that is really what people seem to
be really concerned about. [For example] with the debate—they’re eating
the cats and the dogs—that to me was just such a ridiculous moment, but
what it really revealed was a bigger issue that people were feeling
really deeply about immigration.
VIETOR: We’re
thinking about how to cover four more years of Trump that feels new and
different. A lot of things are going to happen, and it can’t be like
last time where everyone is outraged all the time—it’s
counterproductive.
DAVID PLOTZ, co-host, “Political Gabfest”: It’s
not that existing [left-leaning] podcasts are going to suddenly go
MAGA. More, there will be a new crop of podcasts that will serve a new
audience that wants to be curious about it. It’s hard to change what
your podcast is. It’s not hard to start a new podcast that has a
different take on the world, that has more of that curiosity around
conservative America than a lot of left-leaning podcasts.
Write to Anne Steele at anne.steele@wsj.com and Alexandra Bruell at alexandra.bruell@wsj.com
No fault divorce hoax
Transmaoism
Climate Change
Israel vs Everyone
ICC vs ICJ Redux
In recent [NA shows](https://noagenda.podcax.com/search?q=icc) you (both JCD and yourself) seemed somewhat confused by the ICC vs ICJ.
I certainty don't want to get into a lecture but those are two different beasts. In a very few words:
- The [**International Court of Justice**](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Court_of_Justice) (ICJ) was established in 1945 and is relevant only to disputes between countries. Then there is the [genocide convention](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocide_Convention) (yet another concept) that should be enforced by the ICJ. Note that the word [genocide](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocide) itself is a recent construct (ie 1947, post WW2). The US / Israel are part of the ICC and genocide convention.
- The **[International Criminal Court](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Criminal_Court)** (ICC) is a much more recent construct (2002) and is about individuals committing major crimes. The US / Israel are not part of the ICC (the US was initially but left under Bush).
