Watch the full episode here:
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[NOTE: Due to the length of the show, the transcript will be in two parts, PT 1 of 2]
Good evening. It's Thursday, November 9.
Tonight: The Republican Party held its third presidential debate last night, now reduced to five participants after Mike Pence dropped out and none of the other candidates qualified. Donald Trump yet again did not show up. And who can blame him? Each time he makes that choice, he seems to rise in the polls. The consensus of the corporate media is that the clear winner of last night's debate was Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor who spent 18 months as the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., which is a largely ceremonial post where she raised her hand very elegantly, in fairness, to vote in accordance with Trump administration policy. That corporate media – not exactly in step with the sentiments and priorities of Republican Party primary voters – views Haley in such a positive light should tell you most of what you need to know about her candidacy: she exists to serve establishment interests and to rescue the Republican Party from the anti-corporate, anti-militarist and anti-establishment sentiments that have driven it since the emergence of Donald Trump.
The requirement for being seen as a serious national security expert in the eyes of the corporate press is clear and obvious: you must cheer U.S. wars every time one is proposed, and certainly every time one is being fought. By that metric, there is no greater foreign policy sage in the United States than Nikki Haley, with the possible exception of Lindsey Graham. That's why the U.S. media adored John McCain so much: he cheered every U.S. war. Last night, Haley let her warmongering and neocon colors fly more proudly than ever and that's why she got such universally high marks from the GOP establishment and the corporate media that ordinarily has nothing but scorn to keep on Republican candidates. They want Nikki Haley to be the nominee for Americans to have no choice on foreign policy when they go to the polls next year to vote: two candidates, two parties that represent the warmongering neocon ideology. We’ll show you the lowlights of Nikki Haley's performance and the attacks that she sustained on these issues from Vivek Ramaswamy in particular.
Then: Over the past several weeks, we have welcomed to the show numerous guests to speak about the war between Israel and Gaza, most of them, for reasons we have explained on several occasions, have been pro-Palestinian or critics of Israel. Namely, we were having a hard time booking pro-Israel voices to come on – but it wasn't for lack of effort. That changed last night when we devoted most of our show to our discussion with Batya Unger-Sargon, and then again tonight when we spoke with Tablet magazine's Jacob Siegel, both Israel's supporters. Over the last several weeks, we have heard criticisms both from our viewers and from other media outlets about our alleged failure to “push back” sufficiently against our pro-Palestinian guest. And then, we heard the same thing from some of you during last night's discussion with Batya. Indeed, the interview we conducted with Roger Waters last week was particularly controversial as it received ample media attention in the United States and then in Europe and even in Brazil, where Jair Bolsonaro's wife, Michelle, attacked Roger Waters and the statements he made on her show as demented.
Given these critiques, I wanted to say a few words about how I see interviews with the guests we invite onto our show and specifically what our objectives are and what they're not when we have such interviews. We understand the questions and critiques our audience has – and we should note that they’re by no means unanimous, they come from just a few people, but we do understand the root of them. So, I want to take a little time to explain my philosophy and approach to how we speak to the people we invite on our show and what the goals of such discussions are.
Then finally, as I mentioned, we’ll welcome to the show, Jacob Siegel. He was last on our show in March, after he wrote in Tablet what I regard as the definitive account, the emergence of the fraudulent disinformation industry and how it now has become the principal weapon to censor the Internet and control the flow of information online.
Jacob, I think it's fair to say is a supporter of Israel and a basic supporter of their war effort in Gaza ever since the Hamas attack on October 7, and I have no doubts our conversation will be illuminating and worthwhile.
For now, welcome to a new episode of System Update, starting right now.