E240: August 22 2025
- Sacks Jason bulldog adoption - Moose
- Eric Schmitt interview recap
- Government censorship
- AIS 2025
- Alex Karp
- Vlad Tenev
- Chris Wright
- Uber CEO
- Circle CEO
- Diplo performing
- Sponsors: Solana, OKX, Google Cloud ($350K again, mini campus), Athletic Brewing, etc
- AI bubble pop?
- MIT report on 95% failure of AI pilots
- Sam Altman bubble claim
- People are discovering difference between probabilistic software and deterministic software
- Back office software is a good target - can get high accuracy
- Sacks vindicated in his stance from earlier that AI is not going to become a be-all end-all all-powerful fantastical utopia
- We’re not in a recursive loop of self improvement
- We are in a normal technology race and not some single winner outcome
- So we can apply a more normal investment and policy mindset to it - so its healthy
- Different models have different specializations - this belies the idea of 1 model becoming all knowing and all powerful
- So all the doomers were crazy
- We’re still learning how to pair humans and AI - and how to integrate AI into business
- Lots of partner models are also being developed
- Sora + Unity for example
- ROIC will increase with AI deployment - leading to higher token production
- We might be in the trough of disillusionment
- Huge pushback when AI solutions percolate down (8090 got fired after their first big deal)
- Zuck spending freeze
- Maybe some of the big hiring targets should have taken the lucrative offers before the bust cycle
- OpenAI $500B valuation might work out and they will do really well
- 2028 election
- Newsom leading Dems for primary
- He is mimicking Trump - Dems are responding positively
- He comes across as synthetic and plastic - not as authentic as Trump
- Current polling is non-Trump aligned market’s response to Trump
- Dems will likely prop up a socialist - AOC will do well there
- Dem moderates might pick Newsom over outward socialists
- If the people who lead never win applies here (like it did with DeSantis) then he might not win
- Do voters want a replay of California on an American 50 state scale? Hard for him to explain it away
- But in the land of the blind, the 1 eyed man is King - so it could work for him
- Dem process might elect a socialist - but Republicans and moderates won’t back a socialist so socialist might win the primary but lose the general election
- CA record under Newsom
- Highest taxes in the country with worst public services
- $75B surplus to $20B deficit
- None of that money went to reservoirs and fire hydrants - neighborhoods burnt down and not rebuilt due to permitting
- 4th largest economy in the world but highest rates of poverty, inequality, wage stagnation, homelessness, illiteracy
- 3rd highest unemployment in 50 states
- Second to Hawaii in housing cost
- Worst in energy costs
- Highest rate of retail crime and frivolous lawsuits - businesses leaving the state
- Bed Bath and Beyond leaving CA and still opening new stores (some 300) outside
- Dems lost to Trump because of policies and record
- Russia Ukraine
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Trump Putin meeting in Alaska
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Trump Zelenskyy EU heads of state meeting in the White House
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First meeting between US and Russian presidents since 2021 and first since war
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Even Ukrainians want peace but Dem media was hysterical in their opposition to end the war
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Complicating factors are ceasefire vs war end (if you’re losing a war you don’t get to call a timeout)
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Ukraine can’t be joining NATO which is the key source of friction for this war
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There will be some concessions
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Trump has actually increased sanctions
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India tariff is bold issue - even if it might backfire
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- Besties kids growing up
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