Pod Insights The Prof G Pod with Scott Galloway Raging Moderates: Trump’s Iran War Plan Falls Apart as Allies Walk Away About this episode Trump is facing pressure on all fronts — and the cracks are starting to show. Abroad, tensions with Iran are escalating fast after a reported strike near Tehran killed a top Iranian leader. As the situation spirals, Donald Trump is pushing U. S. allies to help secure the Strait of Hormuz — but so far, key partners are refusing, raising questions about America’s influence and the risk of a wider conflict.
Back home, reality is setting in. After promising mass deportations and a “100 percent American workforce,” the administration is now expanding migrant farmworker visas as labor shortages hit — a stark reversal that exposes the limits of Trump’s immigration agenda.
Meanwhile, Republicans are advancing the SAVE Act, a controversial voting bill critics warn could tilt elections toward the GOP. Scott Galloway and Jessica Tarlov break it all down — from growing global pushback to the economic fallout at home, and whether the administration is losing control of its own agenda.
Plus, Scott recaps his night at the Vanity Fair Oscars party.
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Transcript 5,930 words · 12 speakers
Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
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1:48 Scott Galloway? Thanks for listening to Raging Moderates on the Prof G feed. We'll be soon leaving this feed, so you're going to want to subscribe to Raging Moderates on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and everywhere else. You'll get new episodes every weekday evening, including the episode that you're about to hear. That's right, Raging Moderate subscribers get Jess and me five days a week. Subscribe now on YouTube or Substack for ad-free, if you're into that. Now, here's today's show.
2:13 Jessica Tarlov? The administration is completely off-base and out of sync with the 330 million Americans who are invested in not only where American lives may end up, not only, you have 50,000 troops in the region, but potentially perishing, what their costs are as a result, and what this says about American power writ large and our allies.
2:42 Scott Galloway? Welcome to Raging Moderates, I'm Scott Galloway.
2:43 Jessica Tarlov? And I'm Jessica Tarlov.
2:45 Scott Galloway? Jessica, I went to the Oscar party at Vanity Fair, the Vanity Fair Oscar Party. I don't know if you knew that.
2:53 Jessica Tarlov? I did know it, but I want to know more. I want to know everything. You sent me one great text.
2:58 Scott Galloway? I did.
2:58 Jessica Tarlov? And then, nothing. So, tell me everything. And that was before all the winners started showing up.
3:05 Scott Galloway? Yeah, it was, um, I'm not exaggerating. I, at one point, I started Googling actors with last name Galloway, because I think they screwed up. I don't know, I literally have no idea how I got them. Someone said, "Oh, podcasts are important," and some 19-year-old intern went, "What about that crazy professor?" It was incredible. I thought, I mean, they just did an amazing job. And then, standing in between, you know, Jacob Elordi and Jon Hamm ordering drinks, it's just, it felt...
3:33 Jessica Tarlov? Did you talk to them?
3:34 Scott Galloway? I did. I talked to a bunch of people. Everyone was very friendly.
3:37 Jessica Tarlov? These people know who you are. They at least love what you're doing. For young men, I'm sure a lot of them are Pivot listeners, you've seen that. I mean, you guys have become, you know, you're celebs.
3:47 Scott Galloway? Anyway, so I didn't want to go there. I really wasn't finished with your compliments. It was amazing.
3:50 Jessica Tarlov? No, that's honest.
3:51 Scott Galloway? It was.
3:52 Jessica Tarlov? That wasn't even when I'm trying to make you feel better. I genuinely think that's the case. I don't know about Jacob Elordi, but...
3:57 Scott Galloway? It was amazing. I had an amazing time. Thank you for asking. What did you do this weekend?
4:03 Jessica Tarlov? I was at South by Southwest with you.
4:04 Scott Galloway? Oh, I knew that and we had a great time.
4:06 Jessica Tarlov? I was literally sitting next to you.
4:07 Scott Galloway? Oh, and it was wonderful.
4:09 Jessica Tarlov? James Talarico was the Jacob Elordi of South by Southwest.
4:12 Scott Galloway? That was actually, I'll go as far as to say that was a close second in terms of my weekend was our interview with Representative Talarico. He's so good. Anyways, all right, enough of that. Today, we're going to be discussing Trump's demands to allies to step up on Iran and his immigration policy colliding with reality. If you aren't already, please make sure to subscribe to our YouTube page to stay in the loop on all the political news. And if you're really motivated, please subscribe to our Substack where you'll get exclusive content and these podcasts ad-free amongst other things. All right, let's get into it. Trump is facing mounting pressure on multiple fronts, abroad and home. Overseas tensions are escalating fast. Israel said it killed a top Iranian leader, Ali Larajani, in a
4:56 Scott Galloway? strike near Tehran. The latest blow to Iran's leadership, that comes as Trump tries to rally allies to help reopen the Straits of Hormuz, but so far, no one's committing warships and he's openly frustrated. Back at home, there's a reality check on immigration. After promising mass deportations would create 100% American workforce, the administration is now expanding visas for migrant farmworkers because farmworkers can't find enough labor. Meanwhile, the Supreme Court is weighing whether Trump can end protections for hundreds of thousands of Haitian and Syrian immigrants. Inside the government, there's also turmoil at DHS where Border Control hardliner Greg Bavino is stepping down after extreme controversies, clashes, and a federal judge accusing him of misleading the court. And Republicans
5:40 Scott Galloway? are pushing the SAVE Act, a voting bill requiring proof of citizenship and ID, which critics say could tilt elections toward the GOP. So the bigger question is, are the administration's biggest promises on immigration and global leadership colliding with reality? Still,
5:56 Scott Galloway? That hasn't stopped officials from saying the quiet part out loud. Let's watch Kevin Hassett this morning on CNBC talking about the economic impact of the Iran conflict.
6:05 Speaker 04 The fact is that the US economy is fundamentally sound and that if it were to be extended, it wouldn't really disrupt the US economy very much at all. It would hurt consumers and we'd have to think about, you know, if that continued, what we would have to do about that. But that's like really the last of our concerns right now because we're very confident that this thing is going ahead of schedule.
6:26 Jessica Tarlov? Haven't you heard that US consumers being hurt is not part of the general health of the economy?
6:33 Scott Galloway? An economy that's two-thirds a consumer.
6:35 Jessica Tarlov? It's so weird. Like, I know I've said this a million times, why do you not learn lessons from our defeat? This is like exactly the same thing that Democrats went out there and said, actually, a little less callous than, we don't really care what happens to the average person. But we went out there with our GDP growth and our job growth and said, you know, you can basically deal with the prices because we have the fastest recovery in the G7. And everyone was like, guess what? You lose, we're picking the other guys. And then they show up, do everything wrong, and then use the same talking point.
7:10 Scott Galloway? Yeah, his, the tenor of his voice reminds me, this is one of my favorite moments with my youngest. When he was five, he drew on the wall with a marker and he started denying it. In the middle of his denial, he realized that he had written his name. And that's what his voice sounds like. He sounds like, okay, there's no way anyone's going to believe I'm not lying here, what I'm saying is true. You know, all of these guys, J.D. Vance, Scott Bessent are like, no, I'll pass on that meet the press interview. I think I'm, I think I'm just going to take a little vacation here and not have to defend any of this nonsense. Do you think that, what do you think? Do you think things are getting cheaper here? What's, what's our data, Jess?
7:52 Jessica Tarlov? Oh, no, the data does not indicate that's the case. Certainly, gas is not getting any cheaper.
7:57 Scott Galloway? Yeah, 40%.
7:59 Jessica Tarlov? Right. And diesel went over $5 a gallon for the first time since 2022. Without diesel, you've got no trucking business, agriculture, housing, all of it relies on diesel. People still report that the grocery store is tougher for them. Over 70% say that Trump is not paying attention to what matters most to them, which is cost of living. Energy prices in general continue to spike. They seem to just not be taking it seriously. This affordability is a hoax thing. They think it's just a buzzword. And I get it. It's, you know, funny when you hear everyone from Donnie to Abigail Spanberger using the same lines, right? Because
8:39 Jessica Tarlov? it's affordability, affordability, affordability. But that's what wins you elections, to show people that you actually care about their experience on the ground. And I think that, you know, it's still a long way until the midterms. And people might not be paying attention to the everyday flow of this. You know, what did Kevin Hassett say on CNBC today? But their feelings are not changing because there has been no indication that the administration is taking the realities on the ground seriously. And if you want to run a midterm election around, I'm the peace president, and I stopped eight wars, or whatever ridiculous claim he's going to make, and you don't feel like you can take a vacation to Disney and go out to
9:20 Jessica Tarlov? dinner once a week and maybe catch a movie, if that's something that appeals to you and your family, then why would you entrust the keys to the car to the Republicans, certainly for the Senate, the House, and the White House? I mean, I think there are going to be a lot of people out there hankering for at least divided government.
9:39 Scott Galloway? Yeah, according to Calci, there's a 53% chance gas prices exceed $4 this week. You had referenced farmers who are getting especially hard hit. I think the combination of the surge in diesel prices, what will be a huge increase in the price of fertilizer, and also their inability to find workers. Has led to bankruptcies rose 46% in 2025, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation. And you're probably going to see even greater increase in 2026.
10:07 Jessica Tarlov? And fertilizer prices up 77%.
10:09 Scott Galloway? Which is, it's funny, it's the stuff you're not expecting. I wouldn't have thought like fertilizer would be.
10:14 Jessica Tarlov? Well, 30% of the world's fertilizer comes through the Strait of Hormuz.
10:17 Scott Galloway? Yeah, Qatar, right?
10:18 Jessica Tarlov? Yeah, I think so.
10:20 Scott Galloway? Anyways, it's, that's a word we're going to hear more about. A January Pew survey found that 92% of Americans were concerned about the cost of food and consumer goods. And the level of consumer prices has increased 24% since March of 2021. So in about five years, it's up 24%. I'm interested to know what inflation, inflation's probably up 12 or 14% since then. Anyways, this is a big deal. If I think about, well, if you think about his three big pillars or the three legs of the Trump stool that were so effective in 2024, it was immigration, affordability, and quite frankly, no forever wars. And let's use this to segue into the Strait of Hormuz.
11:02 Scott Galloway? It appears that with their approach to the war in Iran, he's immediately got a twofer and not in a good way. He's gone back on affordability and on what potentially could be, or what people are worried about could be a forever war. And US allies don't want to commit to ships. What do you think are ships to help, to help escort tankers through the Gulf of, or the Straits of Hormuz? What do you think that means for the war and the US, Jess?
11:30 Jessica Tarlov? Well, if you're going by the original war plan, there's about three weeks left with the amount of strikes that they want to carry out, where they'll quote unquote, feel like they've finished the job. The question is, can we hold on through those three weeks? He seems pretty dug in about it. There are obviously reports of various off-ramps that they've been trying, conflicting reports about Whitkoff trying to talk to the negotiators, like get back on good terms with the Omanis and the Iranians to get back to the table. Then there are counter reports to say the Iranians want to talk to us. I'm not sure what's true there. What I do know is that.
12:13 Jessica Tarlov? Attitudinally, the administration is completely off-base and out of sync with the 330 million Americans who are invested in not only where American lives may end up, not only, you have 50,000 troops in the region, but potentially perishing, what their costs are as a result, and what this says about American power writ large and our allies. I mean, Donald Trump just posted a Truth Social before we got on here, basically saying, you know, "We never wanted your help," when he openly wanted the help of the NATO countries. And they've all basically said, like, "I can't pick up your call at this moment. This is
12:55 Jessica Tarlov? not our war. We weren't consulted. No one was given a heads-up." And when you consider the fact that there is, for lack of a better term, another war going on in Lebanon right now that the Israelis are waging, I mean, there are 800,000 people that have been evacuated out of Lebanon because of what Israel is doing there, which was clearly part of the plan, but not something that we were necessarily signing up to be a de facto part of. So I think that the administration is doing themselves no favors. I was really stuck on, and I know, you know, I live in a bubble to some degree, and these clips, and once the algorithm knows that I like these clips of Donald Trump saying stupid stuff, I just get more and more and more. But I'm sure you saw this exchange with Peter Doocy.
13:38 Speaker 05 Thank you. You were talking about Iran a couple times today, and what they did after "African Fury" began. You said they hit Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait. Nobody expected that. We were shocked. Are you surprised that nobody briefed you ahead of time that that might be their retaliation?
13:54 Donald Trump? Nobody, nobody, no, no, no. The greatest experts, nobody thought they were going to hit. They were, I wouldn't say friendly countries. They were like neutral. They were, they lived with them for years.
14:04 Jessica Tarlov? Iran publicly warned nine days before the US Israeli sneak attack that this is what they were going to do. They said all bases, facilities and assets of the hostile force in the region would constitute legitimate targets. They sent that letter to the UN on February 19th. There's also this guy, an Iranian specialist Nate Swanson, who was on the National Security Council under Biden and then was actually on Trump's negotiating team for this new nuclear deal that they were trying to get through. And he wrote a piece in Foreign Affairs called Why Iran Will Escalate, and that came out four days before the attack. So Donald Trump is trying to sell us this idea that no one could have seen this coming, that they would shut down the Strait of Hormuz, when it seems like not
14:45 Jessica Tarlov? only did Iran tell us that that's what was going to come, but people who worked on his own negotiating team said it out loud.
14:53 Scott Galloway? Yeah, I just feel obligated to insert that Israel moving into Lebanon is after Hezbollah fired hundreds of projectiles into Israel. So it wasn't to say that-
15:00 Jessica Tarlov? Oh, no, I wasn't, yeah, I wasn't trying to make it like, nothing had happened. And I wanted to say as well that more rockets are getting through the Iron Dome than we've seen in a really long time. And it is a very dangerous situation on the ground in Israel. I just meant that this is not just about what's going on in Iran anymore. 14 countries are involved.
15:18 Scott Galloway? Yeah, look, the, the statement that is one of the most, I don't know, one of the statements I carry in my back pocket of one of my board members, Larry Bond from General Catalyst, said something that always struck me, where it stuck with me, and that is greatness is in the agency of others. And I think, I mean, it would be hard, it's a pretty stiff competition for Trump's biggest flaw, but right up there is an arrogance and belief that with 30% of the world's GDP, we can, we can muscle around the world, not recognizing that that control came from cooperation amongst 60 or 70% of the world's GDP. That generally speaking, the world saw us as obnoxious, but the good guys, or at least the Western
15:58 Scott Galloway? world, and would follow us into conflicts even when they were a bit unsure to maintain this alliance, recognizing they benefited from a kind of an American-led operating system. And just some history here around Gulf Wars and the coalitions. In 1991, under Herbert Walker Bush, 35 nations, it was UN authorized and allies paid the bill. In 2003, W, 40 nations claimed, or were claimed as part of the coalition. It was mostly symbolic. There was no UN authorization and the US paid the bill. This for two nations, US and Israel, no UN authorization and the US is paying 100% of
16:40 Scott Galloway? the bill and absorbs all of the blowback. And so Bush Senior built a 35 nation coalition for Desert Storm, got the UN on board and made allies pay 54 billion of the $61 billion tab. You know, that's real leadership. Bush Junior claimed that 40 countries were for Iraq, but it was really the US, UK and a few thousand Australians. Trump started a war with Iran with basically, you know, check notes, Israel. That's it. No coalition, no UN, no allies paying, just two countries bombing a nation of, you know, 93 million people while the rest of the world, including the Arab states whose military bases were operating from, are getting hit with retaliatory strikes that they never agreed to.
17:23 Scott Galloway? You could argue this isn't a coalition, right? It's an attempt to distract from domestic political disasters. I mean, they just so badly blew it here. If they'd gone to Congress for an authorization for the use of military force, if they'd limited the scope in terms of objectives, if they'd got, they probably could have a couple, at least cooperation from a couple Gulf states, a couple European nations, it would have been just such a different complexion of the war. And on a very basic human level, it's like, I didn't consult with you. I've created problems for you. Now I expect you to help me. And people are like, go fuck yourself, boss. You broke it, you own it. And we're sort of out there alone right now.
18:03 Scott Galloway? So this again, I think the lesson, the takeaway here is that no, no matter how powerful you are, no one nation is able to dominate without a coalition, without cooperation, which is our species' superpower. And I believe this is Trump's Achilles heel, is he believes he can muscle around Congress, muscle around the courts and muscle, quite frankly, muscle around the West. And I think that this is their moment where they're happy to say, sorry, boss, this one's on you. Okay, let's take a quick break. Stay with us.
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21:56 Scott Galloway? Welcome back.
21:57 Jessica Tarlov? Like, I'm sure you've seen this AI slop that they're posting from the official White House account.
22:01 Scott Galloway? I hate that.
22:02 Jessica Tarlov? Actually, we have a clip of John Ossoff responding to the video games.
22:06 Scott Galloway? Let's play that.
22:07 Speaker 07 Last night, the White House put a video on social media that depicted this war as a video game. Did you all see that?
22:28 Speaker 07 When American service members killed in action are returning to the United States in flag-draped coffins.
22:38 Speaker 07 And even more Americans have lost limbs, or suffered terrible brain injuries, or are fighting for their lives. This White House treats war like a game.
22:50 Jessica Tarlov? Jon Ossoff having a moment also, but he's completely right. And I've seen online a lot of veterans, Gold Star families responding to these posts from the White House saying, how dare you do this? And then Trump is also fundraising off of using a picture of him wearing the white USA cap at the dignified transfer. Remember, they didn't want anyone to know that he wore a baseball cap to it, but now they're making money off of it. You just can't take these people seriously. And not only that, you can't think that they're good human beings. It's so depraved.
23:26 Scott Galloway? Yeah, the word in there is serious. I think of when Logan Roy says to his children, who act like the entitled jerks that they are, he says, you are not serious people. The US government should never be putting out memes. Anything that comes out from the president is essentially an official communication from the US government. The US government should never be. I'm not even sure the US government should ever be tweeting or on social media. They need to ensure that what they said is taken seriously. And it just erodes our reputation as a serious people when we start putting out memes and we don't know what to. We don't know when they actually mean something and when they don't. It's just, again, a further erosion in our brand equity.
24:10 Scott Galloway? And the result is all of these things, mocking people not being, taking this seriously, we're now more isolated than we were in Iraq. And that war cost us $2 trillion and 4,500 American lives and created ISIS. And the scary part here is that, you know, and I need to, I need to have an asterisk here is that I've gotten this information from a lot of geopolitical creators I follow on TikTok who follow troop movements. There are amphibious vessels and combat troops circling the island or getting in a position to go after Karg. And one of the other observations that was really interesting to me is they said, look, going after. Iran's oil infrastructure means that the administration has given up on the notion
24:53 Scott Galloway? of regime change because if you had regime change, you'd want the new regime to have the benefit of economic support of an intact oil infrastructure. And so attacking the oil infrastructure kind of acknowledges, we're not gonna, we're not gonna have regime change. But this is, the chickens are coming home to roost. He went at it alone, made no effort to even nod to any sort of a coalition. And the, you know, who should be logical allies have said, I'm sorry, you didn't check with us. And now you want our help? Yeah, pound sand.
25:23 Jessica Tarlov? Just on the, the big takeout of their intel head, essentially, the guy who they took Ali, Lara Johnny, he was Iran's Supreme National Security Council head. It's a big deal. It shows, you know, great infiltration of the Iranian leadership coalition. We knew that they had infiltrated, obviously, to that level. But how this war is being executed makes it very hard, and I think you've put it in these terms before, to look for the good in it, right? To see what's going right. And, you know, we are being sold this idea that, you know, their missile capabilities are way down, which is objectively true, right? They're sending up 10 to 14 a day compared to, what was it, like 900 on day one?
26:06 Jessica Tarlov? But we also had complete obliteration of Fordo, and it was the end of the nuclear program. And then within a few months, it was up and running. And so if we are not taking out their capabilities on a permanent basis, I worry that we're going to, it's gonna come back again in five years to say, we have to go do this again. And it's gonna become like a ritual, right? That we do this. And I'm not sure that the American people are going to be up for something like that.
26:34 Scott Galloway? Yeah, and just, just to put a fine point on the notion that there, it's always important to ask what could go right here? And to your point-
26:40 Jessica Tarlov? That's how you said it. What could go right?
26:42 Scott Galloway? I've found that the best description of the war so far is operational excellence and strategic incompetence. And to the point of operational excellence, the US has damaged more than 30 Iranian mine laying vessels. So there is, in terms of military objectives, the US is performing and Israel are performing. Really well. Thoughts on the SAVE Act?
27:03 Jessica Tarlov? Yeah, so the Republicans are going forward with this, even though John Thune didn't want to. He's not open to nuking the filibuster to get this passed. It is being marketed as a voter ID bill, and it is not a voter ID bill. And they come out with the stat, I think it's 87% of Americans or something, believe that you should have to show voter ID when you go to the polls. Jim Clyburn agrees with that. Not that you should have to show proof of citizenship in order to be able to register to vote. That is only a passport or a birth certificate. 50% of Americans don't have a passport, majority of whom are Republicans, by the way. As for the birth certificate, who has access, ready to access to that, first of all? Like, think of the kid who just went off to college. Do you think he took his birth certificate with him?
27:47 Scott Galloway? Or got married, or changed your name.
27:50 Jessica Tarlov? Got adopted, changed your name because you wanted to. I went to get a real ID on maternity leave, and it took me three trips to the DMV to be able to show them the proper documentation in order to get my real ID, because I have two middle names, and I have some IDs that have both of my middle names. Some have one of them, and some have none of them. And I didn't even change my last name. When I got married, this will hurt the young and the old. It will hurt married women, people who have been in the foster care system or been adopted. There are some people who own that, like Senator Ron Johnson has said, you know, I'm conscious of the fact that this could hurt us. I think it's worth it to stop illegals from voting when there's evidence
28:33 Jessica Tarlov? that, like, 30 people illegally voted in the 2024 election. I mean, sure, go ahead with it then, but Democrats have to get smart about this. Sorry, it's a bit of a diatribe. I would love to see us go on offense with this and say, okay, let's talk about a good voter ID bill. Voter ID can encompass this range of IDs. You should be able to show a student ID to do it. We should have automatic registration. We should have a national holiday to go and vote. Also, Native Americans, they require a date for the ID that would be valid at the polls, and tribal IDs don't have that on them. So we should make it... Possible for everybody who needs one. And this would take several years to do. Obviously, you can't say it's for 2026 or 2028. To have valid ID to go to vote, to push back on them.
29:18 Jessica Tarlov? Like, if you can get, you know, a gun with something, you should certainly be able to vote with it.
29:22 Scott Galloway? Great point.
29:23 Jessica Tarlov? We should own this issue more. There is an opportunity to do that because what they're talking about will disenfranchise people, probably majority of whom would vote for the Republicans.
29:32 Scott Galloway? But I think what you just outlined is a key strategy and the key flaw for Democrats. And that is we need to move from indignance to ideas. And rather than just complaining and correctly pointing out that-
29:43 Jessica Tarlov? You're saying Jim Crow 2.0. I don't want to hear that again.
29:46 Scott Galloway? Or saying correctly pointing out that a passport costs $160. That, all right, what if you have global entry? Right? There should be, or student ID, I love that. Or biometrics that they should facilitate. Come up, I love a response, I think that's a great idea, to an alternative voter ID law that puts them on their heels as opposed to us just giving indignant speeches.
30:10 Jessica Tarlov? And no access to the voter rolls because we know what you're trying to do with that, who you're trying to purge from those roles. We saw Tulsi Gabbard lurking around Fulton County. And no doing away with mail-in voting. Conservative states use it. It is very effective. There is not fraud with it. Go talk to Governor Cox in Utah about mail-in voting.
30:29 Scott Galloway? All right. Any thoughts on the last of Greg Bavino?
30:34 Jessica Tarlov? Yeah.
30:35 Scott Galloway? Yeah.
30:35 Jessica Tarlov? I don't miss you. I mean, let's see how immigration enforcement really plays out. But now that they're giving visas to migrant workers because they realize, like, holy shit, we don't have anyone to do these jobs. It seems like we're being proved in left, right, and center, which is a good thing, but how we capitalize on it, I don't know. And hopefully, things stay calmer and we don't see, like, Minnesota, what happened in Minneapolis again.
31:00 Scott Galloway? There you go. All right, let's leave it there. Before we go, a reminder that not only is Raging Moderates now five days a week, we're now available on Substack. Subscribers will get ad-free episodes, live streams, and a place to engage with Jess and me and other listeners. Find us at ragingmoderates.prophgmedia.com. Again, that's ragingmoderates.prophgmedia.com. That's all for this episode. Thanks so much for joining us today. Have a good one, Jess.
31:24 Jessica Tarlov? You too. I'll see you later.
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