Episode 5 - The Algorithm of Erasure_ Truth in the Age of 'Google Zero

Description: In an era where "news" is often a byproduct of algorithmic outrage and synthetic fabrication, veteran journalists Richard Schreiber and Tom Martin return to the bedrock of reality. In this edition, we dismantle the "Digital Mask" of 2026, where unauthorized deepfakes move markets and government briefings are replaced by "feelings." From the strategic purging of institutional knowledge in D.C. to the corporate restructuring of legacy newsrooms under figures like Barry Weiss, we apply the traditional discipline of verification to a world dominated by spin. We don’t give you what you want to hear; we give you what you need to know to remain a citizen, not a target. 

Topics Covered

I. The Lead: Synthetic War Clouds

• The Propaganda: A White House briefing alleging an imminent Iranian "Tomahawk" strike.
• The Fact: Iran does not own Tomahawks; the administration swapped verified intel for a "feeling" to justify kinetic action.

II. The Wire: Rapid-Fire Truth

• National Security Purge: A 22-year-old intern appointed to lead a major DHS center—replacing institutional knowledge with total loyalty.
• Federal Student Aid Crisis: Analyzing the GAO report on the "illegal" firing of 50% of student aid staff under the guise of "streamlining."
• The CBS Shift: Barry Weiss’s arrival at CBS News and the potential "neutering" of 60 Minutes’ investigative core.

III. The Feature: Access vs. Integrity

• The Wiles Tapes: How journalist Chris Whipple used 11 months of recordings with Trump’s Chief of Staff to protect the truth against "hit job" allegations.
• The Journalist's Tool: Verification and the "receipts"—why recording every second is the only defense in 2026.

IV. The AI & Information War

• Dystopian Noise vs. Reality: Contrasting AI "fearmongering" with its actual breakthroughs in autism research and education.
• Battlefield Deception: How recycled footage from old wars is being digitally altered to manipulate public perception of the current Iranian conflict.

About the Hosts

Richard Schreiber

Richard Schreiber is a strategic AI consultant, journalist, autism advocate, and fiction writer based in New York City. With a background spanning investigative reporting, technology consulting, and over 25 years in legal technology and procurement, Richard brings a rare combination of real-world experience and analytical depth to every conversation. He is the founder of a growing autism advocacy foundation and the author of multiple books, including Autism Care Revolution. His journalism is guided by one principle: facts first, always.

Tom Martin

Tom Martin is a veteran television news producer with more than 20 years at some of the most respected names in broadcasting. He got his start at the CBS News Washington Bureau in 1982 — where he witnessed history firsthand, including being in the room when Nixon delivered his infamous "I am not a crook" statement. The son of a legendary newspaper editor who helped launch USA Today, Tom grew up believing journalism is a sacred public trust. He carries that belief into every story he tells.

Our Mission

True Journalism exists because facts still matter. The press is a watchdog — not a lapdog — and the American public deserves reporting that shines a light rather than throws a shadow. This is not a political show. We do not have a party. We have one principle: if it is not a verified fact, we will say so.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome everybody and welcome to the True Journalism Podcast. It's Wednesday morning on March 11th, just earlier this week, and the president just stood before the press announcing a feeling, not a briefing, that Iran was on the verge of a Tomahawk missile strike. Now, there's one glaring problem with that, and that is Iran does not possess tomahawk missiles. They are US made weapons. When the Commander of Chiefs swaps verified intelligence for a vibe or a feeling to provide a potential kinetic just to can justify a potential kinetic action, that isn't really in the news cycle. Now we're in total breakdown of the verification chain. And while the White House spins feelings, social media is erupting over the death of Charlie Kirk, Candace Owens, who has over six million followers and a raging podcast, just released her documentary series today, The Bride of Charlie, which alleges a massive financial conspiracy involving Kirk's widow Erica and secret diversions to Israel. In essence, Erica was diverting money from his company to the Israelis. But our job is to dissect the difference between knowing someone and knowing the truth. I'm Richard Schreiber, and my co-host is the esteemed Tom Martin. Over 20 years of news production for CBS, CNN, and just a remarkable story career, Tom. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 1:39

Yeah, thanks, Richard. No, it's great to be with you. I'm enjoying these conversations. And this has been quite a week in the news media. I enjoy following the inner workings of the news media, my old home at CBS News and ABC News and so on, as much as I enjoy the minutia of what's happening in politics. And there's certainly a lot happening in politics. I noticed, for example, just earlier today, we're recording this, Defense Secretary, or should we call him Secretary of War, Pete Hegaseth, said, I can't wait till Damon Ellison takes over CNN. Whatever happened to distancing between our elected representatives, not that he's elected, by the way, but those running running the show and those who are, you know, their mission is to shine a light and bring out the truth. So we're really committed to that truth, and I love that we have this platform to share these thoughts. So thanks, Richard. Let's go to it.

SPEAKER_01 2:29

Yeah. So the mission of true journalism in this podcast is to seek the truths and the facts around journalism. We're here to shine a light on the current journalism standards, as you alluded to, Tom, and when they divert into misinformation, propaganda, and false truths. In an age of algorithms, demagoguery, we try to serve as the advocate for the public's right to the bedrock of reality, which is what true journalism is, largely what investigative journalism was back in the day. So let's take a look at some of the critical stories. So a pro-public uh investigation this week confirmed that the administration has appointed a 22-year-old former intern with zero national security experience to lead the DHS Center for Prevention Programs and Partnerships. So, how is this represented? Fresh perspectives and a youthful energy in national security was obviously one perspective. I don't know about that, Tom. What's your take on that?

SPEAKER_02 3:35

The kid next door is in kindergarten. I don't know if there's a flavor for him in warm. He's good in the sandbox. I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 3:42

Yeah. So this one could say is represents the systematic purging of institutional knowledge, replacing seasoned investigators with loyalists in the administration so that they ensure perhaps the facts never contradict the feelings of the Oval Office, which is not a good thing.

SPEAKER_02 4:10

There's nothing wrong with institutional change and evolution, as far as I'm concerned. Progress, hopefully, but uh rampant destruction, I'm not in favor of that.

SPEAKER_01 4:19

I think the whole thing with Doge, and there's many side, many sides and many facets to that. But essentially, if you and certainly the federal government was bloated, I think no one disagrees with that. That's the that has real consequences. But the other side of that is most of the accumulation of our national debt has been a consequence of the two wars that the Bush administration got us into, COVID and the wars that we're now engaged in, and the tax cuts to wealthy people. So it's been a concomitation of different elements that has that's gotten us into the fiscal challenge that we're currently in right now. Here's another area I wanted to discuss too, and that's the new GAO report commissioned by Bernie Sanders that was released today, finds the administration has illegally fired nearly half of the federal student aid staff. Wow. And that was positioned as streamlining government and cutting wasteful bureaucracy. And again, this kind of harkens back to this whole and you mentioned Doge, and that some of the actions taken by the administration have skirted the law, skirted the Constitution. And from a journalistic standpoint, that puts us that puts a journalist on either side of the fence in trying to report that. What are your feelings on that?

SPEAKER_02 5:47

Yeah, no, I think I mean that it's certainly an appealing campaign issue. And I think what Bernie Sanders ran with that the last time he was a Democratic nominee, or not a nominee, a candidate for the nomination. And there's, I don't know how many millions of individuals out there have student loans hanging over their head. But again, we need there's no room for irresponsibility and kind of recklessness. It reminds me if you don't mind me saying so, it reminds me of when Donald Trump took the black Sharpie and drew the other hurricane territory. It's like we what are we changing here? Can we maintain a sense of responsibility and accuracy? I'm confirmed. That's all I can say.

SPEAKER_01 6:25

You're right about that. Another story that hit the news wires today was with CBS News, your old employer stopping grounds, officially announced that Gail King has signed a new contract to remain at C CBS Mornings after months of speculation. So the noise on that was evolving the morning show for a new era of streaming. The truth was following Anderson Cooper's exit and the arrival of Barry Weiss as the new editor-chief at CBS, was the network desperate for a familiar face to mask the softening of their investigative core, which some say was neutered, in instance, by appointing someone like Barry Weiss, who is obviously sympathetic, I guess would be the word to the Trump administration.

SPEAKER_02 7:18

And when 60 Minutes did an interview with Donald Trump recently, she was there which they were setting up the cameras and she gave him a kiss. That was reported among the news camera crew that filmed it. I don't remember that kind of thing happening in the past, but I could be wrong.

SPEAKER_01 7:32

Yeah. Would Ben Bradley have kissed John Ehrlichman? I don't think so. Can't picture it. Yeah. So I know that uh Tom, you and your friend Chris Wickley has written who wrote that 11-part interview with Susie Wiles, a high-end up higher close advisor to Donald Trump for both his first term and now to a lesser degree in the second term. For staff, man. Exactly. But it was interesting that despite Wiles claiming that the published piece ultimately was a hit job, Chris Whipple had recorded every second to prove everything was, as he said, scrupulous in content.

SPEAKER_02 8:15

Yeah. No, it's it's always interesting to me why politicians, and this includes Donald Trump and other presidents as well, of course, feel drawn. You'd like to think they feel drawn to do interviews with respected journalists. And Chris Whipple is has certainly established his credentials as an respected journalist, maybe in the kind of the Woodward and Bernstein camp, although that has some connotations, of course. But she agreed to do interviews with him. It was about a year ago that he released a book about the Biden Harris Trump campaign. And he had act because he'd written other books about the number of chiefs of staff. Susie Waddle is Trump's chief of staff now. He's also written books about our book about the CIA chiefs, different chiefs. And he has the credibility and respect that he's a fairer reporter and so on. So she agreed to basically speak with him, do a one-hour interview with him once a month for 11 months for his book and for posterity. And Vanity Fairer commissioned him to do a long-form article about what he learned from Susie Weil. And she learned he learned that to some degree that as I learn about this and hear what she had to say, I respect her and appreciate that she is in the Trump camp. She's surprised she didn't get kicked out of the Trump camp after being so open like that. But she said she questioned him on a blanket pardon for the January 6th insurrectionists and protesters. Of course, he did what he wanted. Various other examples, maybe scaling back the immigration and fierce enforcement. And she lost on this. So she's lost on a number of points, but she did men with one of the things that she said, and she knew it was being recorded. She said, I I hadn't realized this kind of little bit of trivia, but her father was Pat Summerall, the well-known sportscaster. Apparently, Mr. Summerall was an alcoholic.

SPEAKER_00 10:13

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 10:13

At some point in his life. And working with Donald Trump is, I can do it because I'm kind of like working with an alcoholic, and I've done that all my life. I was born into that. Of course, Donald Trump famously does not drink because I think one of his brothers did have a drinking problem in that.

SPEAKER_01 10:29

Yes, that's correct.

SPEAKER_02 10:32

It's all about me. It's about the care and maintenance of me. So I can imagine that from all we see about Donald Trump. I can imagine that being chief of staff for this particular president is very much like that.

SPEAKER_01 10:42

So yeah. You're right. It was interesting that she was very forthright and almost critical of the president and some of his moves. And yet she hasn't been blacklisted to it, if that's the word that others fall victim to by being critical. But this is true journalism, what Chris Whipple did in in that interview. And access is a tool, not a passion.

SPEAKER_02 11:06

There's some politicians or something who want to go on the record. Trump did a series of interviews with Bob Woodward. I didn't read that book, but he knew they were being recorded also, and he just quit.

SPEAKER_01 11:16

There are video, there are audio recordings that were very defamatory towards Trump because it would there, those were his words, and many people have said that Trump often refutes even what there is video or audio confirmation of what he said. Don't believe your eyes are ears.

SPEAKER_02 11:36

Come on.

SPEAKER_01 11:37

Exactly. And you also we talked a little bit about offline that I think one of his next projects might be interviewing Ivanka and Jared.

SPEAKER_02 11:46

No, I actually what I was saying was that, and this was over dinner, went to one of Chris's book events again almost a year ago now. And he was just sharing with some college buddies and whatnot. I was hanging on on the table sitting there with these guys. And he was saying how Ivanka and asked him to come meet with them at their home. I think they were living in the Calorama district of D.C. at that time, and because they were just intrigued that he could get access to all the top Trump people and all the top Biden people. Again, he did not interview Donald Trump himself. He did not interview Joe Biden himself. We know we now know what condition Mr. Biden was in from that famous debate. But I think Ivanka and Jared liked how he got entree because of this credibility. And that's again why credibility is so important. He didn't want to continue to have a relationship with them and sign a contract to be coached, but it spoke to the fact that whatever side you're on, or whenever however you approach politics in government, there's still a lot to be said for journalists who do their work with integrity, and they're not going to leak. Again, again, he didn't leak anything that Susie Weil said. He was, hey, we're going to be recording this.

SPEAKER_01 13:02

Yeah, which brings up an interesting point. And that is why do and we were talking offline about how off-light about how succinct Barbara Walters was as an interviewer. Because if you were being interviewed by Barbara Walters, you pretty much knew at some point you would get asked the difficult questions. Because there's a distinction in we draw the distinction between Barbara Walters and someone who's a marvelous interviewer in her own white, Oprah Winfrey. But Oprah's not a journalist, you know, which is not to say she doesn't ask good questions. She does, but it's a different type of interviewer. Barbara Walters, we know she grilled Donald Trump, Tom Cruise, a lot of famous people, she got them to say things that they didn't want to say, which is really what true journalism is about. It's letting, as Bob Woodward did with the tapes of Donald Trump and all the late night calls, he just let the tape run. And if he but it begs the question, if you know this, and if you are one of these people that may say something that you'll regret, why do you agree to do an interview with uh Bob Woodward or I think yeah, I mean this is I was gonna say this is speculation on my part, but most people I think I hallucinate would probably agree with me.

SPEAKER_02 14:20

I think there's a couple ingredients at work here. One is ego, and the other on the part of somebody like Oprah is because they've been granted this stage, they're not an elected representative in that sense, but they have the trust of the public, as Walter Cronkite did in his day. And again, I often think of the work that my father did as a newspaper advert, whether it was Miami or Atlanta and what have you, it's a sense of responsibility. Either you have it or you don't. If you're somebody like Rupert Murdoch or uh maybe even Jeff Masos, you see it as a vehicle to like fine-tune it, what kind of money can we bring in here? What can we cut? I don't feel much sense of civic responsibility, but thankfully I think there's still a lot of journal, if I may say so. And this is like a controversial statement as we hear about fake news. Again, Hegseth brought up fake news, fake news all the time. But I think there's the ego on the part of the representative wanting to put things on the historical record and they have a sense of their own self-importance. Biden did, you know, I think all press to run for president, even Obama happens very much. But I think even he takes himself seriously and thinks it's appropriate for me to comment on global issues. I think. But then again, thankfully, there's some journalists who still have that sense of ethics and integrity and responsibility. They will not distort, they hopefully will not leak. But again, it's feeling a sense of civic duty.

SPEAKER_01 15:46

Yeah, and you bring up a good point. And the question I think that's on everyone's mind is, especially with Barry Weiss now running CBS, is how long will 60 Minutes be able to essentially go unfettered without restrictions? Although we did see there was one episode, I think, that was polled recently because of a controversial interview. And we've talked uh uh about the Stephen Colbert interview with the uh the Texas Democratic senatorial candidate that he eventually did on YouTube. But uh yeah, that this a concern remains a concern because yeah, 60 Minutes, I think, is an institution. I've been watching it for 50 years or more, and we've we've seen some curious things happen. There was a story that Dan Rather did on Westmoreland that got him in trouble and ultimately led to his dismissal from the network. But they've also broken so many stories over the years.

SPEAKER_02 16:44

Well, I'd be curious your thoughts on this. Again, I've been watching 60 Minutes probably since the 70s. I used to see Mike Wallace coming into the office, and I love the reports that uh Ed Bradley did with figures like Bob Dillon and so many great reporters, Botch Simon and uh and Dan Ray. Early on, I noticed that the stories I wouldn't say were propaganda. I have great respect for them. I knew a number of 60 Minutes producers. In fact, one was a lady by the name of Suzanne St. Pierre. Her older husband was Eric Severod, the famous commentator from the Christian. It was quite a thrill to have him come in, or even answering the phone in her office. Like, there's a voice that was quite fun. But I think in telling a long-form story or being a storyteller of any kind, you pick and choose what are you going to put into the mix? How are you going to evolve the sequence of events? Who are the people that you're going to interview? And I think for the most part, 60 Minutes and their evolving cast of correspondents do a very good job with integrity, not just what kind of propaganda can we lather on here. But for decades I've noticed that they're making choices. I sometimes ask myself, what else could they have put in this story? Anderson Cooper likes Anderson Cooper recently left 60 Minutes or said he'd not be continuing because he didn't like the tone that Barry Weiss was setting. But he had done a number of stories about AI recently. I know you're very active in AI and how it can be a constructive ethical force in people's lives and business. And so he did say a story about the role of AI in education. He didn't go out of his way to point all the flaws and how we're going down a dangerous path. It was all very constructive. It was curious, it was inquisitive, but there were choices being made.

SPEAKER_01 18:31

So yeah, we could talk an hour and a day on AI. And the one thing I will say is I was watching a podcast by the visionary Peter Diamondas. And right now there's a lot of in the AI space, there's a lot of fear-mongering. They're talking about autonomous agents that are going to do things behind the back. We saw what happened with the federal government with the Department of War, as you like to call it, and anthropic. And is Donald Trump maybe he registered the trademark, so he gets a nice little check in the mail every time it's mentioned. So Donald, I'll send you a check. But yeah, but no, seriously, there's yeah, where I'm where it is going with this, but there's it's a serious concern. But back to 60 minutes. I think 60 minutes goes some at various intervals, went a little bit beyond just stating the facts. There was an investigative narrative to it. And where they did get some criticism over the years was where they stepped over the line in some cases and ruffled the feathers of their subject. But in a lot of cases, they were reporting on stories of people that were doing some pretty horrible things. So it's challenging as an investigative reporter to do that from a neutral perspective when who or what you're reporting on is very is distressing you. We're all human.

SPEAKER_02 19:57

Maybe we could use Mike Wallace again as reference to Epstein saga.

SPEAKER_01 20:02

But back to AI and this whole notion of all of the fear-mongering that's going out there and the misinformation, a lot of it is definitely what we need to focus on. I'm of the mindset that we should really be focusing on AI and the impact to our society, to our jobs, to the safe, ethical, compassionate, and really that's the best way to use AI really to further us as a peoples. But all we're hearing about are 100 million robots entering the workforce, that Jeff Bezos is going to fire every Amazon employee and replace them with a robot, or that AI is going to replace every customer service agent on the planet. And that creative people who are under siege, because there still are no definable laws. There's plenty of lawsuits, and some of that may resolve in 2026, but there still are no discern, no definable laws protecting original content for creatives. And my daughter being one, she has a very negative perception of AI, even though, and I actually had created a website around this for creatives. It's interesting that many creatives who are using like Acrobat or Adobe and all these different programs are already using AI. My daughter is one example. But it's not that they don't like AI, it's that they don't like how it's being characterized. And that it because it's being characterized as leading us down this dystopian path. And then, of course, when you read about Anthropic and their uh their situation with the Department of War and basically walking away from the $200 billion contract because they didn't want their AI used to surveil American citizens, right? Or to be used for autonomous weaponry discharges through with drones or missiles. without human in the loop, which really delve into values and morality, but also very scientific like, science fiction-like rather. And so you can understand what that perspective has a lot of people up in arms. And as a journalist, we don't really have a lot of guardrails and guide guidelines in place to control these billion-dollar AI companies. Other than Anthropic who has volunteered to impose at least some values and some restrictions and bully for them. They're a billion dollar company, so I'm sure they have their skeletons in the closet too. But it's yes very difficult, I would say, to report on AI unless you to your point, like Anderson Cooper likely did, stick in a narrow swim laning. Clearly AI can make incredible inroads in e-learning, while also autism research, it's assisted many nonverbal kids by engaging them and learning about their their eye content, their physicality to be able to communicate with them. AI has extraordinary capabilities for good, but we're not hearing very much of that really in either side of the press. And again part of that is we have a federal government made up of primarily older generation people that really just don't understand AI. And that's a big question. How do we get fair reporting on AI? Because it's so easy to go down the dark dystopian path.

SPEAKER_02 23:38

Yeah no that's a good point. And also with reference to artistic expression it was interesting what you were saying about your daughter and her feelings about AI as an artist, as a young artist. And you and I both know people in the acting profession. One of the big stories that surfaced in recent months was some AI creator who created a totally AI actress who they would send out quote unquote on auditions for movie roles and people who've been acting as an art for decades, centuries, eons to say, hey, wait a minute, where's this thing going? I heard a recent interview with Matthew McConaughey, who's an actor a while he's not necessarily a Shakespearean actor, but I like the guy. And he was saying again we can't put the genie back in the bottle we can't turn back the clock. So we need to start thinking how can we make ourselves our own unique human qualities so desirable and in demand that even as this proceeds it's going to be okay.

SPEAKER_01 24:36

Yeah. And I think last point on this before we move on this misinformation, dystopian led barrage of reporting on AI that people in that space have have indicated people like Peter Diamondis, Elon Musk, and whatnot, is really all a consequence, I think, of the overarching journalism space that we're in right now. And we're I'd like to talk a little bit about the Iranian war in a second. There's that certainly fits into that category but most things in the news these days, it's hard to get to the truth and the facts because you have to look at the motivations or on both sides of the aisle, political aisle, and you can't really say one is right and one is wrong because it really depends. And again talking about the war in Iran right now Daniel Dale from CNN recently dismissed some viral live footage of missiles over Tel Aviv and captured so soldiers that were actually recycled news years old clips digitally ordered altered training exercises to throw us off for what's really happening. So they don't want reporting they don't want reporting of any kind because yeah you have an authoritarian figure running the government and Benjamin Netanyahu and he's wants to control the narrative much as we've seen in this country. And then you have AI platforms like Elon Musk's Groc, which categorizes a lot of these deep fakes that we're seeing crop up as trending news, not making the distinction or not choosing to make the distinction between what is fake and real news and providing that proving that the algorithm of what's really true is often just high volume deception. Say it loud enough long enough often enough people begin to believe it. And interesting that I found this tool called Magnet Verify, which is a forensic shield that companies and organizations can use to filter out and find and to fact check the information that's being spread about not only VAM and protect their reputation. And I think we're going to see more and more of that. And at some point I had considered creating an app that would do that for followers of the news media but then I realized people don't really want that. And that's another question that I want to throw in your court do people really want to know the facts or do they want to just simply gravitate towards the narrative that supports their beliefs that are being served up by either side of the aisle? This is not an attack on one particular news agency. What are your thoughts on that?

SPEAKER_02 27:42

That's a great question that is certainly one we could talk about for an hour or two. But what comes to mind as you were speaking there was that I think there's also an exhaustion factor. There's polarization and there's exhaustion and I think that even the well informed individual whatever their political affiliation it can be tiring they're asking themselves do I really need to the I see this representative speaking I see his lips moving. He's saying things that are outrageous I can't believe he's he or she is saying this it could be a deep fake video am I going to spend the time to investigate that again that Daniel Dale I thought his reporting recently on those fake videos coming out of the the newly unleashed Iran war were very helpful he said look the people like fleeing the train station you notice some of the bags moved by themselves it's it's a sign that was created. The people look very realistic but people get exhausted and polarization has been a factor for a number of years now. I find myself I know some friends I'm actually getting tired of a few friends who are just constantly bashing again one of the latest things was did you notice that Donald Trump wore a baseball cap that you can buy for $55 as she's honoring the transfer of the fallen soldiers in Delaware. It's like he should have had his hat on in the larger scheme of things we're talking about unleashing nuclear weapons. I'm not going to get that up about a baseball business that's where we are right now.

SPEAKER_01 29:11

Because because it symbolically to some represented disrespect for the fallen yeah and I don't know is it that that's I guess there's some validity to that depending on how you look at it.

SPEAKER_02 29:25

I agree there is certainly validity to it. I think again maybe that's what I mean by exhaustion because people disengaged I don't have time to scrutinize every little detail and again let's remember that for a number of years I think America's intelligence agencies have determined the Russian experts have planted seeds in our media polarizing black versus white and things like nothing to do with Russian politics but just they know how to press our buttons.

SPEAKER_01 29:52

Right. And we knew that played out in the 2016 election when Russia interfered in our election by creating all these bogus Facebook accounts and using Cambridge analytics to spew anti-rhetoric towards Hillary Clinton and Hurt and some of the swing states. And there there was a lot of questions over that the same way Cambridge Analytics of course influenced Brexit using similar tactics.

SPEAKER_02 30:17

So as we I just want to throw this in again we were talking recently you and I about propaganda and it's like I was thinking back a number of years you probably remember the documentaries made by Michael Moore gun and various things like that. I did not like those films. You'd think hey Tom your politics are generally pretty liberal and you vote democratic most of the time all that and that is true but I don't like anyone BSing me if that is propaganda. Right propaganda.

SPEAKER_01 30:45

And he was a filmmaker just like a similar scenario was Oliver Stone when he did these documentaries on JFK and other things. No, that's move that's movie making so let's keep that where that needs to be so all right as we move towards we talked a bit about the war and where it's going is very interesting. On the next show I want to pick up on on that that one of the challenges from a journalistic standpoint that we're facing unilaterally really on both sides of the aisle is a a dearth of direct concrete information about a why we got into the war, what's the rationale behind that there's all speculation that it was a prid quote quid pro quo for Donald Trump to reward some high profile donors in Israel that gave him hundreds of millions of dollars towards his campaign contribution. There's other people making other statements or misstatements about that. But we really don't know what's going on in this war because we get the feeling that the imagery that we're seeing in the news is not all necessarily what's happening. We're getting I don't want to say made up things but in some cases we're seeing videos from other wars and from other situations. And I understand that you know war is the kind of thing where you can't show stuff on television that your enemy's going to see and modify their tactics. So there has to be a veil a closed veil around wartime communications and I totally get that.

SPEAKER_02 32:18

But if if the reports are accurate which again I've heard this in the news Secretary Hegsev said there will be no more photography in Pentagon briefings because you know while I he didn't I'm phrased it like this because some people are posting photos designed to make him look bad, gives him an awkward moment, stuff like this like crazy.

SPEAKER_01 32:39

Yeah, and we know that from President Trump's old press secretary un undressed a reporter as Caitlin Collins as we discussed a week or so ago simply because from the sec press secretary standpoint CNN persistently reported on things that made the president look bad as if that's a journalistic criteria that should be monitored and followed. For this administration perhaps it it could be. So anyway just wanted to say thank you everyone for attending again this week and thank you to my top co-horse Tom's truth is not a preference it's a foundation if you cannot distinguish between a feeling and a fact you are a target not a citizen. So build your week on the facts and we'll see you on the next wire Tom great thanks Richard thanks everyone it was great meeting Randy Alright have a blessed week all right thank you thank you Tom Yeah no I was happy with how that went how about you Yeah yeah I one of the things I have to I didn't get quite as much time. I think we what we need to do stop the recording is settle on the agenda probably by Wednesday. I just have to come up with a better way I think what I need to do is not continue to feed it into Gemini because it has a tendency to rewrite the whole damn thing other than just big tweaks. So that that's something for me.

SPEAKER_02 34:17

Okay well and actually and actually you raise the question again in doing any podcast in so how quickly will the episodes be posted and when are people likely to see them and then if you have a list of 10 episodes and they go to look at episode number one will it still be fresh and relevant and we're we've been focusing a lot on and because we're talking about the news obviously it's like current news but it's just something to think about.

SPEAKER_01 34:43

Yeah you know I I'll have a conversation to try to think about and please give me your input too maybe we need to look at instead of structuring it around the current news I think we can include that. And like I said I'd like to divert into the five misinformation elements of the week yeah but maybe what we need to do is pick a predominant topic that's a little bit more timeless and zero in on that and then just speak to some of the more topical immediate things. So why don't we m why don't we move in that direction so I'll begin to think about that in the next weeks. And of course if we have guests on that makes it easier because then we just focus on what they're doing.

SPEAKER_02 35:25

Yeah I think I think with some I love how things are going. I think it's feeling really well I think when we do if an episode does feature like 80% an interview by its very I'm just guessing but by its very nature that'll make it a little more uppergreen yes that's my expectation too so yeah so if you want to try doing that episode with the former Fox News Shelly Ross thank you.

SPEAKER_01 35:53

Yeah if you want to look to do that next week. Yeah I'll send her a follow-up I have a list I've suggested a couple other people so I'll run it by you by email before I send anything out but yeah you go you could take the lead on that because obviously you guys know each other work together and yeah the questions I might have for her are more of you worked at Fox News under Roger Hells which was obviously a very challenging environment and we know of other similar kind of environment but what was that like and what were you there to do at Fox News? Were you there to follow the propaganda crowd or were you there to try to uh react like a responsible news I wouldn't of course couch it that way but you understand the curiosity about my curiosity about anyone working for Fox News is do you check your your morals your integrity and your viewpoint out the door and then just follow the especially under Roger Ayles who championed the propaganda.

SPEAKER_02 36:57

I never saw that movie that came out a few years ago was it John Lithgau as Roger Ayles and it's I think Shelley Ross has said that if Roger Ayles really did say give us a spear or something sexist. Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:11

Sexist and we do know that they conspired with the Trump administration to defra to to attempt to defame those those election machine manufacturers. Tucker Carlson was leading the charge on that and that's ultimately what got him fired. And now he's one of Trump's staunchest oppositionists on the war and on Israel.

SPEAKER_02 37:32

It is and that's a good question that's something we think we can talk about is how did some of these thought quote unquote thought leaders rise to their power Sean Hannity I just came across an article that Barry Weiss again I document Barry Weiss is trying to bring in Joe Rogan because he's so popular.

SPEAKER_01 37:51

They don't always agree with Trump of course and who is the most he mostly agrees with Trump but I don't particularly like Joe Rogan I know a lot of conservatives do. Because again the problem I have with most podcasters is it's all about them right they're not journalists and people confuse that. Even though I believe Michael Wolfe is a journalist because he's written books Candace Owen I wouldn't constitute her as a journalist but she's a dangerous voice because she has so much access to the facts and to the and to the and to the evidence but but she's going down some pretty controversial paths right now accusing not accusing but where's and and apparently she's writing a book too on Charlie Kirk's assassination that is sure to be controversial.

SPEAKER_02 38:39

Wow but she has a good security team is where I what you got to do these days if you're in wave weiss of airline has a six man security team herself can you believe that we've never needed a security team for the head of CBS news now we do.

SPEAKER_01 38:56

It's like Jesus you're aware of course that practically everybody in Trump's inner circle from Stephen Miller to Hegzeth to to the two win the two questionable women they were all living on an army base for their own safety. They can't live in normal housing. I'm interested I guess I didn't know that very gnome as well as the other one the blonde hair Pam Bondy Pam Bondi yeah they I guess I all live they all love they live under lock and key under federal protection because they must get threats all over the place. Are you surprised I wouldn't be I would be Pam Bondi and Christine they're just what they've done is just in insubstantiable. It's just horrible and throw in cash patel who's another member of that lovely community. They're in the crosshairs there's a reason my friend yeah alrighty organizing this I appreciate it. Yeah always my pleasure and such a thrill to do this with you my friend thank you you know I enjoyed it appreciate it all right all right God bless have a nice week and I appreciate you too many bye