Amanda Montel

Honestly, whoa. Massive dub. What a weird PR strategy.

OK, so this is my question. Like just sort of nervous system wise, I can't relate at all to these motherfuckers because.

For sure. But even if I'm like at my most empathetic and I'm like, let me get into the mind and body of an arty type just to see what's what's making him tick. I can't I can't I still can't understand how one could reconcile wanting love. wartime and wanting conflict because it will be good for your wallet. But like, we're not, yeah, I just don't get it how it works.

And justify the means philosophy.

Like it's just kind of- No, that's so true.

I, it just keeps reminding me of, I mean, obviously we have like cultural lessons and axioms and proverbs that try to convince us to resist those impulses. And the one I always think of is that Edward Abbey quote. That's like growth for growth sake is the ideology of a cancer cell.

It's so hard to internalize messaging like that.

It's like Pavlov's dog. It's like if money comes because of war, let's do more war.

Yeah, Murdoch situation.

Shurl also ran a series of small- Robert, were you always this good at reading and pronouncing German words or has the podcast- I am not good at all.

Oh, I mean, it sounds like super confident. You're not even like fumbling.

That's fascinating.

Is that like chump change to him?

Oh, my God. Yeah. They're poisoning wells in so many ways.

Yeah, that's a really bad Kaiser. I got the fuck out of that Kaiser.

Oh my God.

Is this what's happening in conservative media right now? Because, yes, I don't know.

Yeah. Yeah.

Oh, my God. Did you see that infographic or like some?

I mean, I saw it in the form of an infographic talking about how like. Yeah. The like biggest thought leaders and pundits right now, like podcasters are all conservatives, except for like one exception, that being Trevor Noah. And I was just like, this feels like a conspiracy.

conservative, like bitterness.

Loss aversion, conspiratorialism.

Exactly, exactly.

You are. You're keeping its memory alive right now.

Oh, my God. So he's back to his roots.

Like –

He's been at this for a while.

I'm just thinking, like, he must be experiencing back pain by now.

It's a lot of sitting, though.

Oh, I was already considering taking the stairs more.

I don't like those roots. I'm taking those stairs.

I don't get that either. OK, I want to hear what impressed him most. Let's hear that first.

It is. I do not get it. It's yelly. It's one note. He doesn't follow the rules of classical dynamics. It's like a bad pop song that's just fortissimo the whole way through. Sure. It's like, where did mezzo piano go? People say that about Trump.

The populist yelling.

True. It's cathartic.

Yeah. There's so much of that happening in Germany throughout these years.

A lot of nose holding.

Oh, my God. OK, so you said like way, way earlier in this recording that Hugenberg was not necessarily the most introspective motherfucker.

Right. So what do you think he thinks is the justification for all of this at this point? Like, how is he not feeling cognitive dissonance or guilt or like... How is he? I'm just curious.

Okay. Yeah. Clearly.

But does Hugenberg not understand the exactly. But like, does Hugenberg not understand the power of youthful cool? Because no.

And is that just – was it really just like Hitler's personality? Like everyone underestimated him and then just got fucking clobbered by the guy.

I guess, too, one of the reasons why people call Trump stupid is because of data that will come out from time to time saying that he, like, speaks at a third-grade reading level, whereas, like, the average presidential candidate speaks at a 10th-grade reading level or whatever.

Seriously.

How do I get like just the tiniest little bit of that energy?

I can't think of a worse mediator in all of human history than Adolf Hitler.

Hitler's like meeting gently with Alfie, meeting gently with everyone else.

Hey, buddy, nobody is angry, you know?

What that moment, that moment when you become your podcast.

He's really old by then.

Oh, my God.

Oh, my. Did he ever have a family? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah. Oh, I'm sure they hated his guts. He sounds awful.

Whoa. Wow. What a random piece of shit.

Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, it is true that like a major difference between him and Elon is that he came from not nothing, but nothing compared to Elon. And so no rich dad eyes. Exactly. And so like his rise is a little scary because there was like no warning. He was just like bobbing and weaving, bobbing and weaving his way to this like opportunistic position.

And it kind of inspires two feelings like, holy shit, like who's going to be the next this guy? And wow, I'm kind of... like soothed that more people like this aren't are not coming up already.

Or like get involved with weapons manufacturing and like selling weapons. Really?

But I guess define weapon in the digital age is tricky.

Yeah, yeah. Damn. Okay. Fuck.

Oh, and it's always a dude who has weird, weird face.

Yeah. Wow. Thank you for regaling me with that tale. It was a roller coaster. I keep thinking back on this art exhibit I went to in Zurich where, was his name Klumpt? Gloop?

Oh, not Gustav Klumpt. I'm talking about the weapons manufacturer, the arms manufacturer. Klumpt.

Krupp?

Yeah, Krupp. Oh, Krupp.

Yes, yes.

Yeah, that's that's wild. I was just like pondering the how weird how weird it was. And this was like the point of the exhibition to like admire this these beautiful artworks. I mean, there were like Monet's in there and Degas in there.

Yeah, and, like, he was, like, celebrated as an art collector, like, this amazing taste or whatever, and, like, the reason he was able to acquire that artwork was because he was, like, making weapons that ended World War II or made World War II possible and...

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. Thank you so much for having me. This was awesome. I love, I love, well, I love and I hate and I feel, I feel icky and I feel great about knowing stories like the one you just told me. And if people want to know stories that will make them happy,

chortle and also feel a little disturbed um they can find me at uh sounds like a cult pod wherever you you stream podcasts i have another podcast called magical overthinkers and i got a bunch of books cultish the age of magical overthinking i love talking about social science in a cheeky way

Oh, my God. It's it is a it's a genocide.

Where do you end? And it begins subject verb agreement. I don't know.

OK, wait, I have a question. So one of the like mind blow moments for me from our part one was the context that so much of German nationalism hinged on them being jealous of Britain's colonization of various territories.

Still, though, Germany's attitude seems especially belligerent. Were there other nations that had newly embraced nationalism around this time that aspired to the level of colonization and brutality that Germany was executing? Sure.

The overconfidence, man.

As an Italian, I thought your number one enemy was not eating lunch.

So many enemies.

Oh, yes. Oh, yeah. The Italians, they're everywhere and they're doing all sorts of things.

Oh my God, is that true?

No, no way. I feel like Luigi has even overtaken the Luigi from Mario.