From the Summary Podcast - Would You Willingly Watch Someone Die?

So this dates back to 2009, where Hasan was an Army major as well as a psychiatrist on a base in Texas called Fort Hood, and essentially there were reports that he was sort of radicalized by a group out of Yemen, uh, sort of very sort of Islamic, uh, radical, uh, leanings, and essentially aimed to take out soldiers that he knew were going to get deployed to Afghanistan, and he wanted to sort of help the Taliban out by doing that.

And what happened was that 13 people were killed, more than 30 were injured.

The US government were really hesitant to call it a terrorist attack, but essentially in 2013 he got found guilty as well as charged to death.

And what about on the ground i- in America? Is there backlash among Americans to the live streaming aspect of all of this?

Uh, well, definitely in the political class, um, and you're seeing it on both sides of the political aisle.

Like, obviously Democrats are probably a lot more prone to be against it, but you're even seeing Republicans come out against it.

They sort of agree that Hasan should be executed, particularly on the Republican side, that they agree that he should be executed.

What they don't like is the live streaming because they say that, one, practically it could be used as propaganda to incite more violence and, and create more Hasans.

Um, but then there's also this idea of, like, human dignity and not making a public spectacle about that, and there's been lo- lots of comparisons about how, you know, that's something that would happen in Iran or in, in Saudi Arabia, whereas, like, this is something that would be very unusual here.

And you're even seeing that come across politically, where there's reporting that President Donald Trump is thinking about reconsidering this idea of it going live or, or the idea that they might live stream it to a portion, but just before the actual shooting takes place, that they will actually cut off the live stream.

And you mentioned there that the, the execution is rubber-stamped, but there is still wiggle room for the Trump administration to change tack and, and not live stream before December, isn't there?

Exactly.

So Trump has personally approved the execution itself, but we have until December 3 when it's scheduled to take place at Fort Hood, the site of this massacre.

There's been public pressure mounting.

I mean, the idea, too, that this is happening in a country, yes, that is very used to executions, but is also a lot more religious than Australia, for example.

So you had House Speaker Mike Johnson come out today and sort of say... or, or this week and say that he is, you know, against it and that he's actually wanting to speak to the White House about it.

You also had, uh, Vice President JD Vance come out.

Again, uh, Speaker Johnson is more sort of Evangelical Christian.

Um, Vance is Catholic, but this idea that, you know, he wouldn't watch it even if it were, uh, streaming live, and then, you know, that there's obviously political connotations for him because they, because the War Secretary, Pete Hegseth, and Vance could be 2028 presidential candidates.

But this idea that there's a religious undertone, too.

So all of this pressure is mounting.

We still have, like, y- you know, at least sort of a bit more than a month before this takes place, and I think this could be an example where the administration, uh, changes course and also, um, creates sort of political ramifications for Hegseth and whether he has the administration's confidence going forward.