Insanely Generative
Paul Henry Smith
Podcast
Episodes
Listen, download, subscribe
Signal Intelligence Failure
If you’ve ever accidentally texted “I hate this woman” to this woman, you’re halfway to understanding today’s episode. The other half involves a sitting U.S. administration, several high-ranking officials, and enough classified war planning to make the Pentagon clutch its pearls and retire early. This week, I sat down with my dear friend and occasional co-conspirator Tallulah Braxton-Davenport—a woman so Southern she refrigerates her church hats in the summer—to talk about the Trump administration’s truly exquisite act of digital malpractice: adding a journalist to a secret Signal chat detailing airstrikes in Yemen. Yes, that journalist. Yes, those airstrikes. From Pete Hegseth’s all-caps grunts to JD Vance’s sudden interest in nuance, from emojis replacing military briefings to Stephen Miller crashing in like the least charismatic stage manager at a high school production of Julius Caesar—this episode is less foreign policy and more community theater with global consequences. We discuss: – How secure messaging apps become very insecure when used by very dumb people – The etiquette of emoji use in wartime – Why Stephen Miller is the human equivalent of a filing cabinet that screams – The underappreciated geopolitical role of grocery store parking lots Also, we ask the question no one else is brave enough to: if Signal is encrypted, but the minds behind it are made of Play-Doh, does it matter? By the end, you’ll agree with Tallulah’s grandmother’s most cherished saying: “If you see a turtle on a fence post, you can be sure it didn’t get there on its own—and it damn sure can’t explain foreign policy.” Listen now, before the next war gets accidentally live-blogged via Yelp reviews. Get full access to The Generative Gazette at generativegazette.substack.com/subscribe
Insanely Generative RSS Feed
