E4: Politicizing the pandemic, Police reform, Biden's ideal VP, Twitter vs. Facebook on free speech & more with David Sacks & David Friedberg

From June 2020 onward, no national government anywhere will be able to re‑impose broad Covid-style lockdowns or shelter-in-place orders with high public compliance; instead, for the foreseeable future, countries and large companies (e.g., Apple) will operate in a recurring 'start and stop' pattern where localized closures and re-openings occur as cases flare up, rather than returning to sustained, population-wide lockdowns.

“No, no, no, we're out, we're out, we're out. The genie is out of the bottle. Look, the reality is, um, there is not a single country government, um, that can tolerate future lockdowns because I think the populations will revolt. Um, and so we're going to have to deal with, um, cases as they crop up, and we're going to have to deal with infection rates popping up. And, you know, we'll have to deal with this bursty economic landscape today. Apple just announced they're closing a bunch of stores and a few in a few states. They'll I'm sure they'll reopen them in a few weeks. Um, but we're gonna be in this sort of start and stop mode now for the foreseeable future. Um, but it's just not possible to ask people now to go back into any form of quarantine or shelter in place. I just don't think they'll do it right.” View on YouTube

Over the coming period following June 2020, many of the discussed police-reform measures (e.g., changes to union contracts, training, use-of-force rules, and related legislation at multiple levels of government) will in fact be enacted in at least some U.S. jurisdictions, because the needed reforms are so obvious that different political ideologies will converge on similar policy changes for their own reasons.

“there's a lot of reasons where you could have bipartisan agreement on a bunch of these things. But again, I think we're we're we kind of like get caught up and we refuse to see the forest from the trees and want to fix these things. But, um, I suspect that a lot of these changes will happen just because they're so bloody obvious. And depending on your ideology, you can frame the same reason for completely different motives and get to the same answer.” View on YouTube

Going forward from 2020, user bases of major social platforms will continue to self-segregate ideologically, with Facebook skewing more toward 'middle America' and right-leaning content while Twitter skews more toward affluent coastal, left-leaning users; people will increasingly choose platforms that reinforce their existing political views.

“So it just kind of tells you like, and if you break down the issues and, you know, there's a there's a couple of people who tweet out, um, the most popular, uh, tweets on Twitter versus the most popular content on Facebook. What you see is the left and right distribution. Um, and so I think that the audiences are, are segregating themselves into, uh, into, into using products that basically feed them what they want to hear.” View on YouTube

In the future (following 2020), the largest U.S. tech companies (e.g., Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon) will face significantly increased government action: at minimum, heavier regulation, higher taxation, and constraints that slow their operations, and at maximum, antitrust breakups of one or more of these firms.

“what you've seen over the last 5 or 6 years is that there is an increasing regulatory headwind. Um, and if you basically play the game theory out, um, you know, these companies are going to get regulated and they're going to get overtaxed and they're going to get kind of slowed down at a minimum and broken up at the maximum.” View on YouTube

A staged release of COVID-19 vaccines will begin in Q4 2020, with doses available for distribution to healthcare workers and frontline personnel by the end of the year, based on production being ramped up in parallel with clinical testing.

“there's gonna be a staged release of vaccines that'll probably believe it or not starting q4 of this year” View on YouTube

The COVID-19 vaccine will inevitably become politicized in the US, leading to significant vaccine hesitancy similar to the measles vaccine (where roughly 30% of some populations opt out), undermining uptake once available.

“what are the odds that somebody politicizes the vaccine and America doesn't get it... a 100%” View on YouTube

The political situation for Donald Trump in the 2020 election will look significantly different (more favorable) by roughly five to six months from June 2020, as the economy recovers and civil unrest subsides.

“Right now it looks pretty bleak, because I do think that his reaction to the crisis was seen as very inflammatory. Um, but I think six months from now could be a very different story. Five months.” View on YouTube

As of June 20, 2020, if the U.S. presidential election were held immediately, Donald Trump would lose to Joe Biden.

“if the election were today, he would lose.” View on YouTube

While Trump currently trails Biden roughly 25-75 in the odds of winning the November 2020 election, that gap will narrow to about 45-55 by election day, with the outcome hinging on Biden's VP pick and voter-turnout efforts.

“right now it's sort of 75 25 he loses okay I think that's gonna get closer to 55 45 as the date comes close” View on YouTube

Trump has roughly a 70% chance of winning reelection in November 2020, because blue-collar and rural voters who feel left behind will again respond to his message of being an agent of change against the establishment.

“I still think Chrome's gonna win I'd say 70% chance Trump wins” View on YouTube

As of June 20, 2020, Jason predicts Joe Biden will win the November 2020 U.S. presidential election and that Donald Trump has effectively lost his ability to win due to his mishandling of COVID‑19 masks/leadership and the response to social unrest.

“I believe Biden wins. I believe Trump is absolutely lost his ability to win this because he made two critical errors” View on YouTube