Transcript: The Trump Counterrevolution

October 23, 2025, The Savvy Street Show

Host: Vinay Kolhatkar. Guests: Ruth Papazian, Ed Mazlish, David Harriman, Roger Bissell

 

For those who prefer to watch the video, it is here.

Editor’s Note: The Savvy Street Show’s AI-generated transcripts are edited for removal of repetitions and pause terms, and for grammar and clarity. Explanatory references are added in parentheses. Material edits are advised to the reader as edits [in square brackets].

Host Vinay Kolhatkar and a panel of experts delve into the intricate dynamics of political strategy in the US.

In this engaging episode of The Savvy Street Show, host Vinay Kolhatkar and a panel of experts delve into the intricate dynamics of political strategy in the US. Join political consultant Ruth Papazian, political observer and Ted Cruz delegate Ed Mazlish, physicist David Harriman (editor of The Journals of Ayn Rand), and musician-philosopher Roger Bissell (editor of The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies) as they explore the implications of “domestic terrorism” terminology, and the controversial nature of ranked-choice voting. Discover how Trump’s direct confrontation of climate change as a “scam” marks a significant shift in his approach and gain insights into the broader cultural and political shifts shaping America today. Tune in for a thought-provoking discussion that challenges conventional narratives and offers fresh perspectives on the current political landscape.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Hello and good evening. Welcome back to The Savvy Street Show, and back again is our US presidential panel. First up, we have Ruth Papazian who is a political consultant, and she helps moderate democrats overcome extremist democrats. We’ll be talking more about that today. Welcome to the show, Ruth.

 

Ruth Papazian

Thank you.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

And we have Ed Mazlish who previously was a delegate in 2016 for Ted Cruz, also another very sharp, savvy, political observer. Welcome to the show, Ed.

 

Ed Mazlish

Hello, I’m glad to be here.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Hi. And we have David Harriman who is a physicist and a specialist in Ayn Rand’s philosophy. Welcome to the show, David.

 

David Harriman

Thank you for having me on.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

And Roger Bissell who is a musician, sometimes co-host, and another expert in Ayn Rand’s philosophy. Welcome to the show, Roger.

 

Roger Bissell

Good to be here.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Okay, we will be jumping onto domestic terrorism first up, and I think I first encountered that phrase in 2021 after January 6. I think that bill [passed in 2022] in the Biden administration, seemingly targeting white supremacists, but in fact, we’re targeting political opinions now. That term is being used by Steve Miller (White House Deputy Chief of Staff), and there have been extremely contentious riots, ICE being blocked.

I’ll turn to Ed first. What is your view of this Miller strategy of using the term “domestic terrorism” against them, [and of] Trump’s strategy to deport illegals being blocked, and his being obstructed at every junction?

 

Ed Mazlish

I have not heard of the Trump administration identifying this as domestic terrorism. I’ve heard a few times the threat of the Insurrection Act being invoked and maybe that they’re insurrectionists, but I think that these are people that have a Primacy of Consciousness mentality, meaning that they think that fact comes from what they have in their head rather than what is actual, external to their consciousness…what’s actually in the real world. For instance, they think that a man can identify as a woman, a woman can identify as a man. And most importantly, to the purpose of this discussion, they can identify Trump as Hitler. The problem for them is every single day Trump demonstrates that he’s not Hitler. Whatever flaws he may have, he’s not Hitler. He’s transparent. He has restraint. He keeps saying he’s going to send the National Guard in. To the extent that he does, it’s in a very limited force. The left is going crazy because their self-esteem is being attacked. They have identified as anti-Hitlerians or anti-Nazis. To the extent that Trump demonstrates on a daily basis that he’s not Hitler and he’s not a Nazi, their whole worldview is colliding with reality. They’re realizing that they’re the “baddies,” if you’ve seen that video. I think that’s where it’s coming from.

Whatever flaws he may have, he’s not Hitler. He’s transparent. He has restraint.

I don’t think that this is a Deep State issue. I think that the protestors are too grungy and unkempt. The Deep State is more professional. I just don’t see this as a Deep State issue. It might be related. The Left and the Deep State are not the same. They’re allies, but they’re not the same. I see the Deep State as something that the Left created, and it’s sort of a Frankenstein for them now. But I think that the real issue with these Blue City and Blue State riots and protests against ICE is that their self-esteem is being attacked by Trump refuting their view of reality and their identification of him as Hitler.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

What’s your view, Ruth? Are these the foot soldiers of the Deep State being deployed or just people who don’t know what they’re doing?

 

Ruth Papazian

Illegal immigration is central to the Deep State.

I do see the resistance movement against Trump and his policies and those who carry out his policies as being an effort to protect the Deep State. I do. So, whether it’s [against] Musk or ICE, Antifa, Indivisible, and other radical Left groups are organizing violent rioting that includes vandalism, improvised weaponry, physical assaults, and even the inadvertent murder of an illegal alien. But these people are being trained in paramilitary tactics, in how to make improvised weapons. I mean, they learned how to make leaf blowers into Molotov cocktail launchers. Somebody had to fund all that. And what I think is going on here is illegal immigration is central to the Deep State, because Democrats cannot control the House without the help of the embedded leftist bureaucrats in the government who are funneling money to all these non-government organizations that, among other things, bring in the illegal aliens and provide them with food, clothing, shelter, and medical care. So, since the census counts residents and not citizens, all the sanctuary states, California chief among them, have many more seats in the house than they are otherwise entitled to. This is what they’re trying to protect at all costs, I believe.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Okay. Roger, isn’t law and order a critical issue in the Objectivist philosophy?

 

Roger Bissell

Well, it is. I think that an objective Objectivist would look at the situation and say that our ultimate political problem in the country are the reptiles in the Deep State, and their ultimate problem is Donald Trump. We’ve already seen this with DOGE, and this is round two, kind of a messy round two. The Democrat Party is the political firebreak for the Deep State, kind of the guard for the Deep State. And when you look at all the opposition in the Blue Cities and Blue States to the efforts to clean up crime and illegal immigration, it’s a dead giveaway that electoral politics is the issue. They know, in the Deep State and the Democrat Party, that if Trump succeeds with all of this, then his and his supporters’ stock is going to rise even higher than it did in November [2024], and the swamp draining is going to keep going.

They’re fighting on all levels, local, state and federal.

They can’t allow this to happen, of course, so they’re fighting on all levels, local, state and federal. They’re trying to use the courts. They’re trying to use the Antifa thugs—I’m sorry, “mostly peaceful protestors”—to shut down the National Guard and hobble ICE, maybe even to maim or kill its officers. And there’s a steady stream of propaganda and smears from the media and from Congress about how tyrannical and undemocratic this is. But I think ordinary people are more and more catching on that [there is nothing democratic or anti-fascist about] this violent opposition to ICE and to the cleanup of big city crime. That opposition is anti-law and order and anti-federalism. The Supremacy Clause [of the US Constitution] says that the states and localities should not interfere with the federal government enforcing federal law. I think we’re going to see some miniature civil wars here and there before this is all said and done. I think the American people, though, more and more are coming to see that this is what they voted for in November, and I hope it continues.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Okay. David?

 

David Harriman

The Left in this country…they are the movement of violence, assassination.

Yeah, Roger’s exactly right. I think that the Left in this country…they are the movement of violence, assassination. They’ll stop at nothing. They’re also the movement of fascists, fascism. And they accuse Trump of exactly what they are. Trump is none of those things. He’s trying to restore law and order. In regard to the National Guard, I think you should use it more, not less. These democratic cities have just been handed over to the criminals. When Trump first used the National Guard in DC, crime levels went down by 50 % in the first two weeks. Who can complain about that except somebody that’s for crime? And the Democrats are for crime. Now, in regard to the protests, follow the money, and the money leads back to people like George Soros. He funds Antifa. I think there are people funding these protests. There are professional protesters inciting violence. So, this is the essence of the Left in this country today, and Trump is fighting it, and more power to him. I support him more than ever right now. I think he’s doing a great job.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Thank you. Let’s move over to what is seemingly a peaceful election. Under the surface, a lot is brewing there. This is the New York mayoral election. And I’ll turn to Ruth first. You mentioned “ranked choice”—what we call “preference voting” in the Commonwealth—which doesn’t seem to be present in this election. [It’s] where you can just [pick number] one Republican to the moderate Democrat as two, and then if your one gets knocked out, your two still stands as a vote. It goes down until you have two left. So, tell us more about what’s going on in New York.

 

Ruth Papazian

Well, in our primaries, we have ranked-choice voting, what you call preference voting. As a campaign professional, this is of particular concern to me. In the Democratic primary, there were 11 candidates and nine of them were basically ranging from very liberal to very progressive. In other words, they were like nine different shades of Mamdani. And they ran a one-and-done strategy, which meant that they asked their voters to only vote for Mamdani and nobody else. Okay. So, you can rank up to five [candidates]. Like, [with Brad] Lander, for example, he was the number one choice, obviously, and then Mamdani would be number two, and then the other three spots were left blank. That was the strategy. So, after the first round, when the votes that the candidates actually earned were counted, only eight points separated Cuomo and Mamdani. Then in a process that was performed behind closed doors, votes were reallocated to Mamdani [from other candidates’ number two], and he won with a 13-point margin over Cuomo. Now, I believe that the other far-Left candidates ran to create a pool of votes that could be reallocated to Mamdani to ensure his victory. So, as far as I’m concerned, ranked-choice voting is legalized election fraud because the system can be easily gamed as we just saw.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Okay. Roger, could it have been gamed in the current election? You know, there are only three candidates, not 13, and the Republicans could do the same thing [here, if it was ranked choice]. They could throw six candidates into the mix, but you can’t in the final count [general election].

 

Ruth Papazian

I should just say this is only for the primary. The general election does not have ranked-choice voting.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Yes, I know. I can’t see how it can be gamed in the general election [too, but Republicans could also have done it in the primary].

 

Roger Bissell

Right. I think that might be helpful in the general election or even [in] a runoff election between the top two vote getters if neither of them got a majority. But this is the real world, and I think in a few short days, it’s likely that New York City is going to have its first openly avowed democratic socialist mayor—or communist mayor, if you like, although he denies that. I don’t think there’s any scenario that’s going to change this. Not even if we discover that Mamdani took part in some kind of satanic ritual sacrifices, and the New York Times talked about it. Even if [New York City] had preference voting [for the general election], though, the only other conceivable winner would be Andrew Cuomo, and just setting aside his accusations of sexual harassment, he caused in my opinion thousands of nursing home deaths during COVID. So, do you want a commie or a murderer? Not a very good choice.

I admire and I love New York City. I have to underscore that because it sounds like I’m down on New York City, but its politics are really swampy a lot of the time. And they say politics is just the tail, and the dog is culture, so I don’t know how to fix that. I don’t know a legal or constitutional way to impose preferential culture on places like New York City or Chicago or LA. [If you had] preferential voting [not for candidates, but for culture or ideology], that [might] give you some sense of satisfaction about your view actually making a difference, but the culture is where the change has to start. That requires a lot more deep thinking, [not just now in the election season]. I don’t think it’s going to come out well, and I’m really sorry for you folks up there.

 

Ruth Papazian

Can I jump in for one second? I just want to say that it took a combined total of 20 years for Giuliani and Bloomberg to get New York back on track as a safe and prosperous city after Dinkins essentially handed over running the city to Al Sharpton. And in those 20 years, we had a lot of nepo baby hipster socialists moving to the city who didn’t live through the bad old days. They have no idea what it was like, and they are a dominant demographic now. There [is] just a lot of them, and they’re actually overwhelming the votes of the older outer boroughs’ voters, many of whom escaped socialist and communist countries. So, when people say things like, you guys deserve Mamdani, this kind of upsets me because this was a huge cultural shift with all these hipsters and stuff moving into the city, and they changed our politics. Everybody says, “don’t California my [whatever other state it is].” We got everybody’s hipsters, basically. They all came to New York.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Yes, nobody deserves him. Mamdani wants to reintroduce rent control. He refuses to unequivocally condemn Hamas. Can anything be done, David? Will the Republicans step up? Would that help?

 

David Harriman

Well, no, a Republican is not going to win in New York City.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

If [Sliwa] steps out, can Cuomo win?

 

David Harriman

As I read the polls, Mamdani has it in the bag, basically. I mean, he’s going to win. Rand said that civilization is dead when the lights go out in New York City, and electing a communist mayor is a pretty big step in that direction. I think if this happens, a lot of people are going to leave New York. It’s already started to happen, the exodus. The same in California. People are leaving California. The states that are gaining population are states like Tennessee, Florida. People are running away from New York and California for obvious reasons. That is going to keep happening. When Mamdani gets in, a lot of people are going to leave. Last one out, turn off the lights.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Is that a good thing, Ed? People leaving New York and LA? Is that going to be good for the Republican movement in the long run?

 

Ed Mazlish

Do I think that’s a good thing? Yes, I think separation is a good thing. I think that separating, living amongst people that you want to live with…a homogeneous population is better than a heterogeneous one, especially when it comes to philosophy and ideology. I don’t think that free market capitalists should be living with socialists. I don’t think they should be trying to convince each other to live together. Or I don’t think that the free marketer should be trying to convince the socialists. I don’t think the socialists should be trying to convince the free marketers. I think they should separate and be left to their own devices. And David referenced Ayn Rand. That was one of the whole points of Atlas Shrugged. Separation is the answer.

With respect to some of the other points that have been raised, I’m totally against preference voting or ranked-choice voting. I think that by making it a binary choice, where you either vote for candidate A or candidate B, it pushes the candidates to be more broad-based in their appeals, and I think that’s a good thing long-term for the body politic.

With respect to Cuomo and Mamdani, I don’t see a dime’s worth of difference between them. There’s only one thing that I can see Cuomo doing differently than Mamdani, and that’s [that] Mamdani would meet with a jihadist or an imam openly and gloat about it, and Cuomo would meet with him privately and keep it to himself. But otherwise, Cuomo is just as communist and just as socialist as Mamdani. Cuomo, as Roger said, killed people in the nursing homes. He was a COVID fascist. He’s a sexual predator. He told conservatives to get out of New York. “We don’t want you. You’re not wanted here. Go move to Texas or go move to Florida.” I don’t think that he would govern any differently than Mamdani would. I think that there’s not a dime’s worth of difference between them.

Now, is Sliwa gonna win? No, I don’t think he will win. But at the very least, I think that it’s important that there’s some candidate out there who is not Cuomo and not Mamdani. If Sliwa disappeared from the race and all the votes went to one of those two candidates, there’s no historical record of people opposing the socialism- and communism- and Islam-loving that those two candidates both support. Even on crime, Cuomo says he’s going to hire more police, but the reality is he eliminated cash bail when he was governor. He governed left, he’s talked left. Even just this past weekend, he criticized and jabbed at Trump over the no-kings rallies. Cuomo is not going to govern right, he’s not even going to govern center, he’s going to govern left, just like Mamdani. I don’t think there’s any reason to choose one or the other.

A final thought. Ayn Rand mentioned that there’s a limit to the principle of lesser of two evils. I frankly can’t decide which of the two of them is less evil, but even if I were to stipulate that Cuomo is less evil, I couldn’t support him any more than I could support Mamdani.

 

Ruth Papazian

Can I just jump in again? I’m sorry. Sliwa is not all that conservative. For example, he believes in universal basic income, which I believe is a socialist idea. He excoriated Trump on the debate stage the other day for the ICE raids. He actually loves gun control. What we have is three somewhat progressive candidates running for mayor.

 

Ed Mazlish

Sliwa is objectionable, Mamdani and Cuomo are unacceptable. That’s the difference.

 

Ruth Papazian

Okay, I’ll go with that, but Sliwa can’t win, so this is a Hobson’s choice. We have to pick one flavor of evil versus another flavor of objectionable versus what? Our backs are against the wall, and the gun is to our head.

 

Ed Mazlish

I mean, if it’s Hitler versus Stalin or Stalin against Mao, you don’t vote for either one of them.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Yes, I see a point here. At least, have on record someone objected to both.

 

Ruth Papazian

But you’re going to get one of them, so…

 

Ed Mazlish

Right, so you should treat this election as Dunkirk, and you should understand that we need to hunker down, we need to defeat Hochul in the governor’s race next year, we need to have Trump do what he can to control whichever of those two miscreants wins, and it’s going to take a year to try and start digging out of it. The voters in the Democratic primary have put us in a hole. That’s where we are.

 

Ruth Papazian

The Republican Party has completely failed in New York City and New York State as an effective oppositional party.

I can’t blame the Democratic Party solely for this. The Republican Party has completely failed in New York City and New York State as an effective oppositional party. All these years, they have seen Democratic Socialists of America and Working Families Party recruit candidates, train them, provide them with campaign professionals, fund them, and this playbook has in just three, four election cycles, gotten so many radical leftists elected that our city council is dominated, our state senate is dominated, our state assembly is dominated. The Republicans: all they have been doing all this time, not copying the playbook and effectively running candidates that are ready for prime time, well-funded, have good campaign professionals, [but] instead are fundraising off of our misery. That’s all they want to do. I got a fundraising letter from some guy running for reelection in a state hundreds of miles away from here promising to deport Mamdani, as though he had the power to do that—and what the hell does Mamdani have to do with his race all the way in another state? It started when AOC got elected. AOC, Jasmine Crockett, Mamdani, these are the big fundraising stars of the Republican Party, and they are not going to be defeating socialists. Socialism is very lucrative for the Republican Party. So, I’m sorry, I cannot blame the Democrats for this. If the Republicans had been an effective oppositional party, the Democrats could not have moved so far to the left so quickly as they did.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Let’s move to another theme which is persecution or prosecution. I read in the Government Gangsters book written by Kash Patel [that] he pretty much blames both James Comey and [John] Brennan, the FBI head and the CIA head at the time [respectively], for starting the Russia hoax. If I recall correctly they were the foot soldiers who carried it out, or were the accomplices. I don’t know whether the order came from Obama or Hillary. Turning to Roger, do you see that as the mainstream media persecution or a necessary prosecution?

 

Roger Bissell

Well, what was done to Trump for eight, nine years has been persecution. And what is now being done is some much-needed prosecution. That’s my short answer. When Trump jumped in the race 10 years ago, the Democrats and the Deep State saw him as a disruptor. They saw him as a threat to their power, so they have tried to take him down any way they could. I think it all tracks back to Obama, if you want to know my opinion. They used everything in the book, illegitimate FISA warrants, wiretapping, phony investigations, impeachments, election fraud. They tried to deny him ballot access. They used a bunch of phony trumped-up (pardon the expression) indictments and court cases. They tried to strip him of his wealth and property, made an unannounced raid on his home and multiple assassination attempts. They weaponized everything they could, including actual weapons. And he’s still standing. So now he’s turning the Justice Department to go after the obvious culprits, the low-hanging fruit. and sometimes for the same crimes they tried to convict him for. My favorite is Letitia James, obviously with her mortgage fraud. I hope she gets a nice striped suit or orange pantsuit or whatever they give her. But these are actual felonies with sufficient evidence for indictments. These are not persecutions, these are prosecutions.

Let me make a simple example. If somebody sees you as a threat to their wealth and power and they get a gun and they fire it at you and they miss. Then, in self-defense, you fire back. Are you persecuting them when you retaliate? No, it’s just simple justice. It’s self-defense basically. That same thing is true of what Trump is doing to those who attacked him and committed one crime or another in doing so, or they were even guilty of the same crime, and somebody blew the whistle on them, which is good for them.

My favorite libertarian, Ron Paul, just a couple of days ago posted an article called “It Didn’t Begin with Trump.” There have been numerous past presidents who sicced the IRS on people who criticized them. But that’s not what Trump is doing. Half the country is criticizing him, and he’s got a lot of political opponents, but he’s just targeting the tiny handful who unjustly persecuted and, I think, illegally prosecuted him and committed actual crimes themselves.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Yes. David, does it make sense that Russia invaded Ukraine after Biden got into the White House? Would it have made any sense for them to put Trump in there and then wait for him to get out? So, what’s your view, David? What is the motive, even if the Russia thing was true?

 

David Harriman

First, I want to say I agree with everything Roger just said. Yes, in regard to Russia, Ukraine, it never made any sense at all to me that people believed that Putin would rather have Trump in than Hillary or Biden. Biden was great for him. Biden was a puppet, easily pushed around. Trump is tough to deal with from Putin’s point of view. And I’m disappointed in Europe right now for not doing more along the lines of what Trump has said. In other words, stop buying Russian natural gas. If you stop, if you cut off their revenue from fossil fuels, that in itself would kill the war against Ukraine because he couldn’t afford to wage it. Europe is funding Russia’s war against Ukraine and Europe says they’re against it, but I mean, what Germany does is they close all of their fossil fuel plants because they want to appear to be green energy and so on. And then they import all the fossil fuels from Russia. So, they’re just pumping all their money to Russia. Russia takes it and attacks Ukraine with it. I mean, the hypocrisy is just over the top. So, no, from Putin’s point of view, Trump in the White House is his worst nightmare. So why would he ever have colluded to get Trump to be president?

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Ed, [regarding] the farce of the Russia Hoax. I don’t know if you’ve read the proceedings, but is there enough evidence to convict either Brennan or Comey and would they do a deal then and admit it was whoever it was, Clinton or Obama, who really pushed them? Sometimes the Department of Justice would do a deal if they’re willing to give up the bigger boss.

 

Ed Mazlish

I don’t think that either of those defendants is going to be willing to make a deal.

I don’t think that either of those defendants is going to be willing to make a deal. I think they’re both going to want to go to trial, and they think that they’re to get a friendly jury that’s not going to convict them. I haven’t seen the evidence against Brennan. I have seen a tape of the testimony that Comey gave to the Senate that is the subject of his indictment. He used some weasel words that his lawyer’s going to try and use to get him out of the charge. I don’t remember the exact words right now, so I can’t cite them, and I can’t opine on them. I just remember reading it or hearing it, and I think it’s going to be a contested case. As far as the indictments are concerned, I agree with Roger, and I agree with David. This is a reckoning. This is accountability. It’s not persecution, period.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Okay. Ruth, anything to add to that?

 

Ruth Papazian

Well, I agree with everybody, and I think there is definitely a difference between revenge and accountability. I would like to point out that as far as evidence goes, you recall that recently Kash Patel said he stumbled upon the existence of a burn room at the FBI that contained documents that could be material evidence against I don’t even know how many Obama and Biden officials. All that stuff is going to have to be looked through and declassified. And DNI Tulsi Gabbard is declassifying things as fast as she can. The criminal referral to the DOJ that was made by Jim Jordan is based on newly classified information that the House Judiciary Committee on Intelligence had. It was part of their report, but it was classified at the time. Now it’s declassified. So, with all this new evidence coming out, declassified documents, burn rooms, all this stuff, there are going to be prosecutions, and it’s going to be a reckoning, as Ed said.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Brilliant. Now David, you mentioned fossil fuels in relation to Russia. But let’s talk about fossil fuels in relation to the United States and generally around the world. In his first term, Donald Trump, and even in the first nine months of his second term, was generally just, let’s get out of Paris, drill-baby-drill, but was not engaging [with], was not confronting the net-zero scam. But on September 23^rd to the UN General Assembly, he confronted it directly. Instead of just debating the topic, he said it is a scam. He called it a con job and a green scam. Is that a welcome change of direction?

 

David Harriman

I loved seeing that. Now, he has been consistent with that from the beginning as far as I can tell. One of the first executive orders that he signed was to repeal some of the Democratic executive orders against fossil fuels, so he has been pretty consistent on that issue. But coming out and just blasting this whole green energy business and the global warming thing as a con job…I loved it.

There’s no way to run civilization on windmills.

I think there are two issues here. One is, even if it was the case that man-made CO2 was warming the earth in a way that would ultimately be detrimental, the fact is that we have no alternative right now. There’s no way to run civilization on windmills, and people promoting windmills and solar energy, they all know that. Anybody who isn’t a complete ignoramus on the issue knows that. Everybody knows that there’s only two sources of energy that are strong enough to fuel civilization, fossil fuels and nuclear power. The Left is against both. Now, that immediately tips you off that the issue is not just CO2 and it’s not global warming because nuclear power doesn’t release any CO2, and it doesn’t lead to any global warming. So, what you’re really against is civilization. Right now, we’re not even in a position to run the country on nuclear power. I think we could get in that position, but it’s been basically shut down by the government. But right now, fossil fuels are it, so if you close them down, you close down the country.

Now, [as to] the second issue. I don’t want to go on too long here, but the second issue is scientific. How strong is the argument that man-made CO2 really does cause global warming? I think those scientific arguments are weak. I think they’ve been proven to be weak. Every government model of global warming has been proven wrong. It has overestimated the warming…every single model. And weather is an extremely complicated thing, and there isn’t a huge amount of evidence that climatologists do understand it, and they are vastly overestimating the effects of man-made CO2.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Thank you. Ed, is that a good thing? I think the change in Trump is that he is now confronting the scientific issue rather than saying, China doesn’t play ball, India doesn’t play ball, Russia doesn’t, so let’s not do it. That’s a very different argument. I think that he’s actually confronting the scientific issue.

 

Ed Mazlish

I think that he’s doing something even better, which is mocking and ridiculing the proponents of climate change. And I think that’s better because while there’s a place for refuting their science, their bogus science, I think that exclusively focusing on refuting their science bolsters their argument. It gives them a credibility that they don’t deserve. And I think that that’s the genius of what Trump was doing. By mocking them, I mean, he took a page out of Alinsky’s playbook, right? That’s what Alinsky says, mock them and use ridicule, and I think that’s what he did.

I think that other people have done a great job at debunking the science. Not only is the science questionable, as David mentioned, but even if it were true that carbon emissions increase global warming, there’s a separate issue as to whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing. Most people prefer warm weather to cold weather, right? Vegetation and animals do better in warmer weather than cold weather. There’s not a whole lot living at the poles. So, I think that’s a separate scientific issue. But I don’t want to get too far into scientific issues because the pro-climate-change side is so replete with dishonesty and fraud that I don’t think they’re worthy of a scientific debate. And I don’t think that we should do much more than mock them. I think that there are some people that are providing scientific justification against them, and that’s fine. There’s a role for those people, but I think that Trump’s mocking is exactly what is called for. Well, I’d also like to see Trump defund them.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

I guess mock them and defund them. Ruth, is that a good strategy?

 

Ruth Papazian

Yes, well, I think that it’s not just climate change. Broadly, science is debauched and a lot of fraud and a lot of research doesn’t stand up to scrutiny. I think that before climate change became a thing, we had real science. But since then, to prop up this false narrative, we’ve had “science,” and that kind of infected all of science. I think that what Trump did with respect to climate change is part of a broader evidence-based approach to public health and environmental issues. This all really began with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. heading up HHS, and then Martin Makary as the FDA commissioner and NIH Director, Jay Bhattacharya, and CDC Director, James O’Neill, and of course, Lee Zeldin at EPA. They are now looking at everything. They are questioning all the conventional wisdom, all the scientific consensus that has never been subjected to either rigorous testing or never been reexamined when new methodologies and tools were available.

So, I think this is a full court press against “science,” and climate change is just part of it. I think what he did at the UN was throw down a gauntlet and let the UN know that the globalists are not going to be running our country and we are not going to be accepting any international treaties or edicts that do not hold up under rigorous scientific scrutiny, real scientific scrutiny.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

I’d love an amendment which forbids the government from funding science. Yes, David. You want to do it?

 

David Harriman

I was just going to add that Ayn Rand once said that government science is a contradiction in terms. That’s exactly true. What government does when they give contracts to scientists is they basically predetermine the conclusion. They say, “We’re paying you to reach this conclusion, and if you don’t reach that conclusion, your funding is cut off.”

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Yes, he who pays the piper calls the tune. Speaking of tunes, [let’s hear from] Roger, the musician.

 

Roger Bissell

I think we benefit from a two-pronged approach on this. What Ruth was talking about, what RFK Jr. has done and in other agencies, I think the more challenge to “settled science” there is, is great. If we’re finally opening up to real inquiry and scientific debate in those agencies and in hearings and things, I think that’s good. But really, to me, the real John Galt moment or the real Atlas Shrugged moments have been happening in the UN. Javier Milei went in there in 2023 and ’24, and he said, you people have been advocating socialism and collectivism and that’s bad, and then in ’24, he said, you’ve been overreaching about energy and environmental stuff. And then Trump comes in, and he does another John Galt moment, and he says, this is a scam, this is terrible. It’s not just inappropriate. It’s a fraud, and it’s exploiting people. These guys are telling the truth, and I really hope that it’s not too little and too late, or we may end up having to turn off the lights anyway, like David said earlier, like in Atlas Shrugged.

The market forces have always determined in the past the transitions we make in the economy. In the 1800s, we transitioned to petroleum, and it was not central planners in Washington or Brussels that did it. And that’s how we should make any future transitions. If wind, solar or geothermal is going to play any substantial role, the market will determine it. Otherwise, like David said, it’s got to be nuclear and fossil fuels, until we discover something else. I think that if we aggressively pursue fossil fuels and fracking and anything we can—and nuclear power, get that ramped up—we’re going to be okay for decades, if not centuries to come.

 

David Harriman

Centuries.

 

A whole new frontier I think has opened up with drone strikes on the supposedly drug carrying boats, and at Savvy Street we just published an essay by libertarian legend Walter Block who says why not just legalize those drugs, and without any bloodshed you would get rid of the problem. Well, yes and no. I wanted to ask you, Ed, what do you think about those drone strikes, and is legalization of narcotics a potential solution at the cost of health of youth who get addicted? Youth and adults, for that matter?

 

Ed Mazlish

I think that drug legalization is a complex issue. I’m mostly against it, but I’m willing to listen to it. I see what marijuana legalization has done, and I don’t like culturally what it does to the neighborhoods that I see in New York and in New Jersey. Even when I was living in North Carolina and Michigan, I don’t think that marijuana dispensaries are improvements to the neighborhood. But as far as the war or Trump’s action in shooting at these terrorist boats, I don’t think there’s anything to legalize on that. I think that they are completely legal. I know that this is a controversial issue for libertarians, and Rand Paul thinks that the strikes are illegal.

I think that the president as commander in chief has the power to use military assets outside the U.S. without seeking any permission or making any requests either to the judiciary or to Congress. Congress does have oversight. They can cut funding. And in an extreme case, they can impeach. But the Article 1 Section 8 power to declare war is not a restriction on the commander in chief’s power. The president is commander in chief, at least outside the U.S. borders, I think he has unqualified power to use the military where he sees fit. Those foreign entities do not have rights under the U.S. Constitution. Rand Paul is simply wrong that we need to give them their rights and get their names and know who they are and what their crimes are.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Is it unqualified power or power qualified by an assessed security risk to the nation? I mean, he can say I assessed it as a security risk.

 

Ed Mazlish

I think no. I think that if the president makes the decision that it’s a security risk, there’s no way that anybody has the power to challenge him. I don’t think it’s challengeable in court. I don’t think it’s challengeable in Congress, other than to cut funding for military action or to impeach him.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Okay. Ruth?

 

Ruth Papazian

Well, in January, Trump issued an executive order that designated drug cartels as Foreign Terrorist Organizations or Specially Designated Global Terrorists. These are almost interchangeable, but they have two terms, FTOs and SDGTs. Then the State Department applied these designations to eight cartels and gangs. That actually created this legal framework that it’s illegal to knowingly provide material support to them. Financial institutions have to block and report transactions involving them. Cartel members and gang members cannot immigrate to the United States, and those who are found here can be deported, and the US can impose sanctions on Venezuela and other countries. So, there is a legal framework. Now, the next thing Trump did was to inform Congress that he considers this FTO designation to allow an armed response against these narco-terrorists, and that doesn’t mean just interdiction. It means actually making lethal strikes on them. The administration also considers these to be what they call a non-international armed conflict, so it’s limited only to these narco-terrorists.

Now, Trump had already set the stage for this. Everybody laughed, but when he renamed the Gulf of Mexico “the Gulf of America,” what he did was create an invisible border in the water between international waters and US territorial waters. That just strengthened the EO in January. So, I don’t think this is going to lead to a wider war for two reasons, one on Trump’s end and one on Maduro’s end. On Trump’s end, he wants his legacy to be a president who ends wars, not starts them, so I don’t think he’s going to start a war with Venezuela. On Venezuela’s end, they’re making billions of dollars off this drug trade, and a war would impede that revenue flow. So, Maduro is going to bitch and moan to the UN and other entities and complain about Trump and complain about these boats getting blown up, but I don’t think he’s going to go beyond that.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Okay. Roger, there a risk…one of the youngsters who was killed on a boat, his mother claimed that he was completely innocent. Is there a risk when the military just has the authority to drop a drone? How did they know for sure? And is there a risk that some innocents get killed and they might have been just on a boat out fishing?

 

Roger Bissell

Well, I think the intelligence was probably adequate in this case. And I think that we’re getting disinformation, but, you know, there’s an old saying, if you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas and you don’t want to hang out anywhere near these people. You don’t, you simply don’t. I agree with what Ed said and with Ruth said, and as far as [whether there’s going to be a] war, I don’t think so either. Like we said, [Venezuela] will complain to the UN or whoever will listen, but they don’t have much room to talk. They have engaged in thousands of extra judicial killings in the last 10 years, and in my opinion, it looks like they’ve been targeting the wrong people. They’ve been shooting dissidents against their regime when they should have been going after criminals, but they’re in bed with the criminals, so I don’t think a war is going to happen. I just think there’s going to be a lot of hate about it and a lot of controversy in the Congress and in the media, but I think nothing much is going to happen.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Yes, I must admit that I read it in CNN, this plea that this young man was innocent, that qualifies it. Communist News Network. Anything to add about the narco-war, David?

 

David Harriman

On the issue of drug legalization, that’s always been a big issue for [libertarians], and I think it’s a complete misapplication of the proper principles of a free society.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

And the drone strikes?

 

David Harriman

If you look at the fentanyl that’s been coming into this country for the last decade, as far as I know, it’s the leading cause of death among teenagers. They’re selling this stuff to minors, and this drug is poison. I heard, in an interview, somebody say to Charlie Sheen, who has a lot of experience with drugs, that taking fentanyl is like playing Russian roulette, and his response was, “Yeah, with five bullets in the gun.” That’s what’s been going on. I think Trump looks at that, and he sees hundreds of thousands of deaths among young people in this country due to these gangsters selling this poison to young people, and he’s saying, “No, this is unacceptable. I’m going to stop it.” So good for him. Now, in terms of Venezuela, you know, he can go as far as he wants. I mean, it’s an illegitimate government. I don’t think it was ever really elected. The people don’t want it. The only people that do want it are the gangsters and the cartels. So, if there were a way to get rid of that government and put in a better one in Venezuela, I would be all for it, and so would the good people in Venezuela, I think.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Yes, definitely. We’re almost at the end of the show, and I’m going to do something different for the final question. It’s not a question but an observation. Some of you know Victor Davis Hanson, Senior Fellow at Hoover [Institute], and he said this is not a revolution by Trump, but a counter-revolution to undo all the neo-Marxist damage that has already occurred…funding science and the bureaucracy and the media and the academe. It’s a huge monster. Do we have any final comments? I know Ed perhaps wants to talk about the government shutdown, and Roger maybe the ballroom. I’ll start with you, Ruth. Any final comment from you?

 

Ruth Papazian

Well, I am a big fan of the government shutdown, I have to say. I think that electeds in both parties had a vested interest in convincing the people that a government shutdown is the end of all civilization as we know it. And of course, they were aided and abetted by co-conspirators in the media and their pontificating pundits.

Basically, it’s a big yawn for most Americans because their lives go on as usual. Social Security and other government checks are in the mail and essential services do continue. I think what makes this shutdown different is DOGE, which uncovered a staggering number of government workers who were doing no work, were redundant or actually undermining our economy and our national security. We heard story after story about all this malfeasance going on, and I think it sort of pulled the rug out from under the Democrats who always used to use sob stories of government workers not getting their checks and starving and stuff like that. I don’t think Americans care anymore because they see all the fraud, waste, and abuse.

So, Democrats can’t beat Republicans over the head anymore with these sob stories and force them to pass humongous omnibus bills or continuing resolutions. With the stage set like that, Trump is doing something different. Now the Republicans are holding firm, so far, so he is actually using this shutdown to fire some more of these redundant or useless workers, not furlough them and then pay them later like a paid vacation, but to fire them. I think this is like proof of concept. Something like 4,200 employees already have been fired as of October 1st when the new fiscal year began without funding. There were like 2 million government employees, so this is a drop in the bucket, but it is a proof of concept. I don’t think any other government shutdown is going to have the same effect again. This is a paradigm shift.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Great. Roger?

 

Roger Bissell

I did want to comment on the big fuss about the ballroom in the East Wing.

Well, I did want to comment on the big fuss about the ballroom in the East Wing. The whole thing is a textbook case of Trump Derangement Syndrome, right? Whatever he does, they just can’t help themselves. No matter what you point out, they always have “Yes, but,” and they’re angry. If you say presidents have historically made renovations like bowling alleys, tennis and basketball courts, rose gardens, they say, yes, but the East Wing is historical, and you ought to get approval from Congress or from a historical committee. And if you say it will add a place of beauty and elegance to the East Wing that’s historically important, they say, yes, but it’s being demolished and it’s ugly and horrifying and hateful. And if you say its parts have been demolished before to make it safer or more functional, like when Truman demolished it and rebuilt it because it was falling apart, they say, yes, but this isn’t for safety. It’s just to have a fancy place for rich people to feel important. And if you say we need a special place to have state dinners, so people aren’t crowded elbow to elbow or sitting in a tent outside, they say, yes, but what about the starving children? And then you say, the taxpayers aren’t paying for it, private donors are, and they say yes, but won’t those donors expect special favors from Trump? So, you can’t win. It’s like one of these Moebius strips where you meet yourself coming and going.

I think another thing the Dems are doing that is really destructive, especially to the younger people, is something I call Halloween scare tactics, which is very appropriate for the time of the year. Most people 30 and younger really don’t have a historical context of previous deportations by presidents or renovations of the White House or actions against terrorists, and for them, it’s like the world began yesterday and the only scary and ugly things ever done were by Orange Man Bad, and everything he does is bad and scary and ugly. If you don’t have any historical context and calm thought, it looks like we’re living in a nightmare. I wish something could be done about this because we have millions of young people who are being propagandized and molded and conditioned by essentially historical lies or historical evasions.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

David, any final comments from you?

 

David Harriman

Well, the last thing that Roger said is really important. The first thing that the public school system did is eliminate history from the curriculum, basically replacing it with something that they called “social studies.” The idea of chronologically presenting history as a logical story, a causal story, with one thing leading to another—that stopped generations ago. We’re seeing the payoff now. Not even just kids, but people 40 years old can’t even think about these issues because they have no context for it. And Roger’s right about all the lies that they’re fed all the time by the media. You know, one way of lying is omitting the truth. You can say things that are technically true, but if you’re cherry picking a few little things to say that might be true while dropping the whole context, that’s a lie.

 

Ed Mazlish

Like saying that I have one leg right now.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

That’s a good one. Very good point by both Roger and David. Ed, any final comments from you?

 

Ed Mazlish

Yes. Let me make a couple of quick comments about what was said, and then I have a couple of my own. I think that the ballroom should be called “the Trump Ballroom,” period.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

That’ll get some heads exploding.

 

Ed Mazlish

I think with respect to the government shutdown that Ruth brought up, I think that the battle that’s below the surface is the firing of the government workers and the cutting of the programs that Democrats like. I think the Democrats see that as a way to get a campaign issue, and I think that’s their calculation, that the public is going to rally around them if and when Trump makes those cuts. I don’t think that’s going to be the case. I think Trump is a good enough salesman that he’s going to explain why the cuts have to be made. But I think that’s the battle. Wars have been fought historically in large part because one or both sides miscalculated. I think both sides think that they can win that war, and I think that’s what the government shutdown is really about.

As far as my own two cents about issues that I think are important that we didn’t discuss, I have two quick hits. I think that it’s laudable that Trump is trying to bring peace to the Middle East and Gaza. I don’t want to criticize him for it, but I think that he’s mistaken about the nature of Islam. More fundamentally, I think Trump shares a libertarian delusion—which is funny, since Trump is not a libertarian—the libertarian delusion, frankly, that everybody is motivated by the desire to create wealth and make money. I don’t think that’s the case. I don’t think that the Gazans and Hamas care one iota about creating a Riviera on the Mediterranean. I think they care about killing Jews and ending Israel, and I think Trump is just mistaken about that. I hope I’m wrong, but that’s what I think.

Relatedly, one other thing that I wanted to say about the whole Gaza peace process, I think it’s very noteworthy when the announcement of the ceasefire was made and Trump brought all those world leaders on stage. First of all, he showed that the UN is totally useless and totally unnecessary. He did all the diplomacy. He did all the financing, all the funding. There’s no International Monetary Fund. There’s no World Bank loan. The UN is completely useless, and he showed that. He also showed that he’s trying to isolate Xi of China and Putin of Russia because those two guys weren’t invited onto the stage while all those useless European leaders were brought on the stage. Those are my parting thoughts.

 

Vinay Kolhatkar

Thank you. We will never run out of topics. Especially Gaza would be very well worth discussing. The next time we meet is probably going to be around the end of January 2026, when there has been one full year in office and the Trump peace plan would have either failed or succeeded or, more than likely, been amended because Hamas doesn’t keep their end of the bargain.

But thank you all for being here. We had a lovely and fruitful evening, and we shall see you all again in about three months. And thank you to the viewers for staying with us. That’s the way to become savvy. Good night and good luck.