PM 'proud to be a houso' + Why Elizabeth Holmes is going viral again

0:00A LISTENER PRODUCTION Hello, Happy Monday and welcome to the briefing, Sasha Barbergat with you. The first clip of a documentary we didn't know was coming has gone absolutely gangbusters viral. It's an unsettling conversation between convicted fraudster Elizabeth Holmes and Nathan Fielder. The director of this docko called, you can see everything. It's so creepy and there's like so much lingering silence, so many sticky questions. You kind of see her almost bobbing around in the frame and then at the end of the trailer, it's revealed that she's soothing her baby with her leg. A chat about Elizabeth Holmes and why we're obsessed with her and this new docko is coming up in the second half of this episode. But first, let's get into the headlines with Chris Spirru on Monday, the 14th of September. Morning, Sasha. We start the week with more calls for Pauline Hansen to apologise. This time over comments she's made about Anthony Albanese's mum.

1:02In a resurface clip from her appearance on Karl Stefanovic's podcast, the one nation leader said this about the late Mary Ann Albanese living in housing commission. He said his mother lived in the same one sheet. She was born in for 65 years. Sorry, that's not on to me. It should be limited time. Hansen also appeared to mock the Prime Minister for talking about his time growing up in social housing. I've actually grew up in a housing commission. You have no idea how hard it is to grow up in a housing commission house. Oh my God. An emotional PM hit back yesterday saying he was proud to be a house. Tell you what's weakness, nastiness, nastiness and spitefulness. And I am stunned at these comments. If Pauline Hansen wants to criticise me, then that's fine. But my mother was way out of Pauline Hansen's league. Way out of him. So the PM's mum died at the age of 65 back in 2002 after suffering with debilitating rheumatoid arthritis,

2:03which meant she relied on the disability pension. But Albo shared this story of how when he was first born, she'd look after him during the day and then go on clean at night to keep food on the table and a roof over their heads. Criticism of Hansen has come from across the political spectrum. Trade Minister Don Farrell has slammed her comments as appalling and unAustralian. Liberal back bench Andrew Hastie too has weighed in, which maybe isn't surprising, given he's our vendetta at the moment against one nation. But he said that Pauline Hansen is not fit to be Prime Minister and mothers should be left out of politics. While former political rival and XPM Scott Morrison has also spoken out saying, bringing a politician's family members in whatever guys into our political or policy debate betrays a fundamental lack of decency, civility and judgment. Now, interesting to hear from Skomo, given that he lost to Anthony Albanese back in 2022 for the Prime Minister's ship. And we don't really hear from him that much out of politics. And it's interesting that he's kind of come forward.

3:03He spoke to the financial review and made those comments. But yeah, he clearly has an opinion on that and Pauline Hansen. Look, Barnaby Joyce was approached by the Daily Telegraph, which is a news court paper, and was asked whether he thinks that Hansen should apologize. And he kind of made these strange cryptic comments saying that he was deeply concerned that politics is quite going a little Hollywood. He accused Albanese of being all log cabin stories, which I take to mean like maybe being sentimental or sharing like emotional or personal stories as part of his Prime Minister ship. And he continued saying, politics is not a beauty pageant nor a reality TV show. And we seem to be hearing more and more of that. So I guess I will say, I think a politician, no matter where they sit, sharing personal stories of their life and how that's come to shape their beliefs and how they want to approach politics. I think is fine to hear from. I like hearing about the people who are in those positions.

4:07How did you come to have that viewpoint on a certain policy or what shaped your worldview? So I think Barnaby Joyce referring to Albo talking about growing up in social housing as a log cabin story is a bit of a stretch. Yeah, to be honest, I don't really understand how to make sense of anything of what he said in the interview. But I will say this Paul Inhenson has long been making fun of Albo because of this. And she says that, you need to get on with it. You need to, you were a child of social housing, but you can't keep reminding us and can't keep bringing it up because you have accumulated all this wealth and you've done all these things. And that seems to resonate with a particular portion of one nation voters that I've spoken to. They're like on with the sob story, you have investment, you're fine to carry on. It's just, his mum's passed away. It's just not. It's a bit nasty. It's really nasty. And you mentioned Scott Morrison there. And I do remember when he was running against Albo, yes, all the political points growing and stuff, but it didn't get this personal. And is that really weird turning point that we have been talking about?

5:08It is this post Trump world that we're living in and it's this post Trump world that's now been brought to Australia through politicians like this. So yeah, not a great development, I would say. I will say though, I think the majority of Australians don't want that sort of politics here. So I don't know if it will actually be as popular, that kind of rhetoric here as it has been in the US. Sticking with politics and fewer voters, one Anthony Albanese running the country and your resolve poll out today has him down three points to 29% as preferred Prime Minister. The survey of more than 2,200 voters put Pauline Hansen's second on 25% down a point while Angus Taylor is up two points to 21% in third. As to most popular party, Labour is still the most popular party in Australia holding steady, but one nation and the coalition have each gained a point sitting second and third. Voters saying the coalition is better place to handle the economy and government finances while Labour and the Prime Minister is losing ground over broken budget promises and lost trust.

6:09Meanwhile, the government is spending this week trying to win support for its digital duty of care laws. So if passed, tech companies could be fined more than $100 million for failing to stop harmful content reaching under 18s. Now, this bill would let the communications minister decide what counts as harmful, so things like content that might push eating disorders or misogyny or bullying. But the coalition says that power could be used for political censorship. There are many things wrong with this bill, including the minister giving herself unfettered powers to decide categories of online harm. So she needs to do a lot better than this bill that she has brought forward. Shadow Communications Minister Sarah Henderson on the ABC there. The government says this bill is all about protecting kids with the communications minister Annika Wells telling the ABC yesterday she is open to changes. I would be prepared to work with the coalition on the wording to make that work that meets the urgency requirement of the intent of that measure. So that's a lot of jargon there, but essentially the question was put to her about how the definitions will, you know, how they'll arrive to these definitions.

7:16And there were a bunch of different ideas floated. The fact that it could go to a vote, the fact that it could be done in consultation. She was like, I'm open to all of these things. The point that she was trying to make is that the coalition has been out and about talking about it in the media and no one's come directly to her. She says no one's come directly to her and go. She says, look, we're absolutely willing to negotiate here. Now, interestingly, Labor doesn't really want to pass this as a matter of urgency. There's no real ticking time on this one. They're saying maybe by the end of the year, maybe early next year. But it's interesting timing that we're talking about digital duty of care laws, the algorithm, all this stuff as we've got a pretty grim warning over the weekend, right? Yes. So three AI bosses have kind of made this red. And it wasn't like a joint statement that didn't come out together, but it started with the boss of Anthropic and then open AI's boss and then Grox boss. Elon Musk. Elon Musk. They all came out over the weekend one by one to call for a slowdown in the pace of AI development. So in effect, they were warning that AI could become capable of taking over the entire internet within a year and that that would just be absolute dire consequences for humanity.

8:24And it does come after warnings from researchers last week. So we're kind of seeing more and more of these high level AI workers, engineers, researchers, CEO is coming out to say, hey guys. Slow down. But also like they're telling us, but I'm like, you're the bosses. Yeah, you slow it down. You slow it down, man. I got it for it. Stop making the tech available. Stop funding all this massive research that then becomes accessible. Like all these tools are accessible to the public very quickly. Yeah. But Donald Trump's kind of playing it down. He said that very negative forces were bringing up things that won't happen. Then he made this comment, which stood out to me. He said, we're leading China in AI. We're the most sophisticated country in the world. And frankly, I want to keep it that way because whoever wins AI wins. So having someone like Trump who you could argue is driven by ego and winning. When we're having conversations about existential threats to humanity, you know, he might not be the person we want in charge. But I will say it's not a consensus that AI is going to destroy the world.

9:25There are critics of these people and the things they've said and rival tech executives who say that this end of humanity kind of warning can also double as core threat. And also double as corporate hype like, oh, guys, what we've got it just behind me. Oh boy, it could take over the world, which is essentially trying to make it sound more powerful and drive up the share price and kind of create this divine sense around their company and their product. And what the critics say is that it distracts from the immediate issues, things like algorithmic bias, copyright infringement, massive energy consumption. So it's all a distraction. Okay. Interesting that I read today because I've been pretty freaked out by all of this commentary around AI. And then I read that. I'm like, okay, all right. And you know I love a conspiracy theory. So that's one I can get on board with. Overseas now, a Queensland woman has now been identified after falling to her death from a cliff near Bali. 29-year-old Browne Kronin had been walking a rock track above killing King Beach on Nusa Panida when she slipped.

10:26She was initially spotted by a lifeguard and the alarm was raised, but she fell before help could get to her. Premier David Christopher Lee, sharing his thoughts on the tragedy. A young woman on the trip of a lifetime, active, enjoying herself, and to have a life taken away in a heartbeat like that. It's just incredibly, incredibly sad. Her family is now asking for privacy while the Department of Foreign Affairs is providing them with consular assistance. Kling King Beach is about 25k's east of mainland Bali and there are steep cliffs that overlook a massive rock formation which is nicknamed T-Rex Bay. The only way to get up and down is a narrow path that is usually extremely busy and clogged with tourists. Rescuers and some good Samaritans carried Browne back up to the top taking about an hour and a half. It's the same beach where an 182 meter elevator was being built down to the sand. The work on that was suspended at the end of last year after opposition from tourists and local politicians. Back home now to South Australia where an Australian sea lion has tested positive to bird flu.

11:31It is the first confirmed case of the H5 strain of the virus in the species and was found in a dead animal that had been recovering from a shark attack. Now the state's environment minister says the sea lion may have been more susceptible to the illness because it was injured. This is a devastating blow for the population at Seal Bay on Kangaroo Island which is home to 85% of the country's sea lions. It's also already seen decline in numbers of about 2% each year. Globally the H5 strain of bird flu has had devastating impacts on populations of seals and sea lions with 13,000 baby seals dying from the disease on herd island in the southern ocean. This is the fourth mammal to test positive to bird flu in Australia since the first case in a long-nosed first seal last month with a dolphin and a number of little penguins also among the confirmed cases. Hundreds of thousands of public school students in one Aussie state will have limits on how much time they can spend on screens in class in a bid to combat falling literacy and numeracy rates.

12:33Now this is happening in New South Wales. The government wants kids from kindergarten to year two on screens for as little as 15 minutes a day. That climbs to 30 minutes for years three and four and then 45 minutes for years five and six. High schoolers get more time for years 7 to 10 screens can make up a quarter of class time in a subject for years 11 and 12. It's half now these limits start rolling out next year and become mandatory in 2028. New South Wales education Minister Prukha says it's about getting kids off devices and back to basics. We want to make sure that at school it's not the default that the default is pen and paper. So this builds already on a state ban on phones being in classrooms and a recent announcement that HSC students or year 12 students can only take around like one task home to do it as an assignment. So they're trying to bid the rise of AI and students like handing in AI generated work. I think this is a really interesting move and I really I think it's one that a lot of states will follow given that we are seeing literacy and numeracy rates fall.

13:37We reported on the international testing last week and there's also a recommendation here for parents from next year that they should put a limit on screen time for homework and that students younger than year five should not be using devices for homework. So it's also something that schools are going to have to pivot to. Yeah, and I'd be interested to see what other countries are doing because we have and it's not just those international assessments that our numeracy and literacy rates are falling. It's across the board. It's in Appland data. It's everywhere. I'd be interested to know if other countries have taken a similar approach who have better results than we do. Because I think there's this desperate kind of desire to address why our students are seeing these declining rates of success in in you know the most basic of subjects. Because if it's screen time and that's what's having an impact then yeah, I'd expect other states to follow suit. And the one and only Celine Dion has kicked off her long awaited comeback show in Paris.

14:46It's been six years since the 58 year olds performed a full live show after being diagnosed with a rare neurological disorder called stiff person syndrome back in 2022. Yeah, so over the weekend she kicked off her sold out residency at the Paris La Defense arena. And it was pretty emotional. She was choked up as she started singing the first song, but the whole of Paris was getting around her Chris. Paracity Hall organized a massive karaoke night the Friday before her first performance. So Friday just gone thousands of people gathered to sing some of her greatest hits like this one. Maybe they should leave it to Celine. But yeah, I mean she performed at the Paris Olympics. I'm you're really excited by this. I'm not that excited. I icon icon. Yes. I can. I can. I can. I can. I can. I can. Okay. Cool. She did a show. Okay. Listen. Yeah. I watched her. What's the Titanic song? My heart will go on.

15:46And there's a big moment there where she where she's singing and she kind of like her vocal ability isn't what it used to be. And she's like, I want to say Devo, but she's disappointed in herself after she's hit the note. She hit the note well. Maybe very clear hit the note well, not as good as she used to be. And it reminded me of her docker that she dropped when you know this revelation of the stiff person syndrome came out. And she was referring to herself as an apple tree. Now I often bring this up in my personal life and people don't get it. But she says, you know, I feel like an apple tree and people are lining up for the apples. And I have no apples left to give because she doesn't have her singing ability. And one of her fans like turned her world upside down when they said, then we come to see the tree. We don't come for the fruit. And I'm like, yes, Celine, we come for the tree, not the fruit. But even then we've got the tree and the fruit guys. So I'm pumped. Love it, love it, love it. I welcome all the clips. And if anyone, if anyone goes to see Celine, please send us a clip of you watching her live in concert.

16:46I would love to be there by proxy by living by curiously. Living by curiously through you proxy sort of works. Yeah. Okay. Great. Congrats, Celine. And that is it for headlines today. Next up, we're getting to another iconic woman, but she's iconic for a different reason. Elizabeth Holmes, you might be aware of her. She is now a convicted fraudster. At one point though, she was a billionaire and she was raking in investors and excitement because she was pioneering this amazing new blood test turns out. It was all kind of based on lies. Now, a new dock, oh, is coming out about her. And that is what we're talking about because it set the internet on fire last week. We're talking about why and everything you need to know about. You can see everything next. A 72nd clip of a man and woman speaking on a couch has set the internet on fire. I don't have anything to deceive you on. Of course, I'm not deceiving you. I'm engaging with you as a human being. Why would I deceive you?

17:55There's no. There's no reason for me to do that. Okay. All right. Okay, good chat. What you heard there was start up founder and now convicted fraudster Elizabeth Holmes speaking to Canadian comedian and director Nathan Fielder. It's from the first taste of upcoming documentary you can see everything, which follows Holmes in the 34 days before she reported to prison for a 10 years sentence back in 2023. Now, if you need a refresher, Elizabeth Holmes was the founder of a tech startup company called Theranos, which pioneer need a test she claimed could detect diseases and medical conditions with just a single drop of blood. She moved up quickly in Silicon Valley and was even named the world's youngest self-made woman billionaire by Forbes in 2014. In the company's 11 years, Holmes raised almost a billion dollars from investors. The only problem was the test and a bunch of the company's data was based on lies.

18:55In October 2015, a reporter from the Wall Street Journal exposed the company's cover up with the help of whistleblowers who formally worked there. John Kerry Rooz article revealed that Elizabeth's machines, which were sitting in wargreens stores, didn't work. The tests also led to some pretty inaccurate results. One woman was incorrectly told she had HIV. Another's tests showed she had miscarried when in actual fact, she was still pregnant. And a man filed a lawsuit against Theranos in 2016 after he suffered a heart attack and had two stents put in less than a month after his blood test showed normal results. He did later drop the claims as part of a broader class action. Elizabeth Holmes was indicted on federal fraud charges in 2018 and convicted on four counts of defrauding investors in 2022. A year later, she was reporting to serve her 10-year sentence, and that's when this incredible exchange, which has gone viral, was filmed. So why are we so captivated by Holmes and this clip?

19:55And why was this docko kept so under wraps? Writer and culture critic for Triple J's The Slop Michael Sun is here with me to discuss it. Michael, welcome to the briefing. Look, Elizabeth Holmes was a massive name in Silicon Valley. She was worth $4.5 billion at the height of her success before that incredible downfall. How did the world react when it was revealed that she was a fraud? Look, I feel like this was pretty much the biggest story at its time, right? So Holmes was the founder of a company called Theranos, and Theranos was a medical tech company which basically claimed that they were able to do a large range of diagnostic tests with just one pinprick of the finger with just one drop of blood that was kind of her claim to fame and how she got a lot of investment in her company. In 2015, it was the Wall Street Journal kind of publishes this massive expose claiming that she's defrauded her investors that she's really lied about these claims and that instead of being able to do these tests with a pinprick of blood, her company is actually relying on existing technology and basically like it's saying that the company was founded on a lie.

21:11So to me, this really was one of the first instances where a scam really took over the world. I remember being so invested in this story and it just kind of captured the public imagination. The several reasons I would say number one because I think we're always fixated on a scammer, right? There's the lack of a better word. It kind of captivates our endless need for drama. It was kind of juicy story about a bunch of billionaires and billionaire investors being defrauded as well. The second shade of it was Elizabeth Holmes own public presentation. She was always kind of considered an odd duck. One of her idols was Steve Jobs growing up, she said. And as a result, she really tried to mirror his presentation in public down to she was always seen in this kind of quite austere black total neck. There was the iconic red lip blonde side friends, you know, parts of her public persona are still like lingering in the public imagination.

22:14And more than anything, there was that voice, right? I think like every time she made an appearance in public or on the news or anything like that, she spoke in this. What became quite an iconic baritone. People were saying that she was putting the voice on, you know, she was already very leaning into the performativity of being a founder. The performativity of being like, perhaps a woman in tech playing in a very male dominated field. Yeah, she's a fascinating specimen to inspect. I think the world is kind of really enjoyed like you just explained so well picking apart her story and even down to the clothes she was wearing. I noticed like her posture was always like really kind of almost hunched over. She's a really fascinating person. Let's talk about this trailer. Now the movie, it was kept top secret. It was filmed three years ago and it was actually revealed to a group at a film festival. And apparently the cinema was full of gasps and oh my goodness is in, you know, during the documentary.

23:17So then this trailer drops right and it goes absolutely viral so quickly. Why do you think there's been such a strong reaction to this clip? What is it about the clip that's got people talking? I think because Elizabeth Holmes is just still capturing our attention and our imagination. And I think being able to see this very, very uneasy, very creepy glimpse of her in this trailer. It really is kind of masterful teaser trailer in the sense that there are just so many questions, right? First of all, the question of how was this even filmed? I think that's kind of a question that people have about so much of Nathan Field has worked. The documentary is co-directed by Nathan Field and Lance Oppenheim. Nathan Field of course, one of our most prolific and most successful kind of like weird documentarian. So already you have this like documentarian slash comedian who's working at the peak of his powers,

24:20talking about fact and fiction, the blurred lines there. And then you match that with someone who is kind of a natural foil. Elizabeth Holmes is someone who has also been blurring the lines between fact and fiction and reality and artifice since the very beginning of her career. In this trailer, like you see Nathan Field are questioned, Elizabeth Holmes being like, you know, are you finally going to be real? And she goes, I'm always real. You're being real right now. You're always being real. It's just so creepy and there's like so much lingering silence, so many sticky questions. You kind of see her like almost bobbing around in the frame and then at the end of the trailer, it's revealed that she's you know soothing her baby with her leg in the like kind of just out of frame. Like it's really, I would say a trailer that shows just how much Elizabeth Holmes is still such a strange character in the public consciousness.

25:21So we know that Field and Oppenheim went into film this with Elizabeth in the days before she reported to prison to serve a 10 year sentence. Do we know how he came to be filming this story? Why did she even say yes to it? Do we know any of those details? I think this is something that is only going to bite more questions rather than answers, but the only top line detail I've read so far is that Elizabeth Holmes of self actually invited, um, Field and Oppenheim into her rented home in Southern California just before serving her prison centers. So it was purportedly at her imitation that they came in. It really has ignited questions in my mind at least about what was she hoping to gain from this? Was she a fan of Field as work already perhaps? Was she aware you know someone like Lance Oppenheim, another kind of indie documentarian who's been gaining buzz around the scene for a few years? Was she trying to repatriate her image? Was she trying to you know deepen her own legacy?

26:23I guess we'll find out in the film itself. Also there have been so many details floating around on the internet from people who attended the screening at Telly Royate Film Festival, which are very quickly ascended to the status almost of myth, you know, there are these like little details that have come out like the fact that Field was visiting those of the Holmes in prison throughout the course of the documentary. And because they obviously couldn't film those sequences, they've actually staged recreations with quote-unquote an a-list actress. Wow. So we'll see who that is. And I think the documentary also goes into Holmes's new marriage. To her husband Billy Holmes, who it's suspected might have perhaps an undue influence over the way that this documentary is taking place and over his wife's public persona currently. So based on all of that, what do you think viewers of the Docko can expect to get out of it once it is released, which I believe is happening next month?

27:24Pure shock value. Like I think I'm just so excited to sit down at the cinema and just gasp. The project was kept under wraps as well for three years. So this started filming in 2023. As you said, they were also filming during, you know, I suppose it would be the early years of Elizabeth's incarceration. She is still behind bars. She can't be released until at least 2031. Why do you think viewers were kept in the dark on this project? Because even the screening at the film festival was top-secret people who were invited didn't know what they were going to say. Why the conspiracy? I guess my own conspiracy theory is that conspiracy itself is a conduit to attention, right? And I think that had this project been rumored earlier or had details of this project come out earlier, I do think that perhaps it would have almost compromised the integrity of the project itself. Because so much of this film, it seems relies on the fact that there was this top secret interaction between field and homes.

28:27You know, Nathan filter is someone who can really get under the skin of his subjects and make them reveal parts of themselves not previously known to the world. I suspect that Nathan filter would have also wanted this project to be kept under wraps in order to be able to get a more revealing portrait of who Elizabeth Holmes is and the circumstances surrounding her persona. You know, finally enough, Elizabeth Holmes still maintains a very public image, right? But her Twitter is constantly posting, it's responding now to take about the film. Her Twitter account posted about the film trailer when it came out, although she's obviously not running the Twitter account. She's currently in custody. It's suspected that perhaps her husband is running the Twitter account. I think all of that contributes to the mystique behind Elizabeth Holmes as well, having this project under wraps. Before we let you go, Michael, what is the public's perception of Elizabeth now and how do you think that might shift in the wake of this viral trailer and eventually the dock oh I think she's really ascended to something like folk legend.

29:35And this documentary is only going to fuel that fire. There are so many scammers in the public consciousness. I'm thinking people like Anna Delvie, people like Carolyn Calloway. I think that there is just a massive public appetite for this level of like juicy reporting, a juicy scam and Elizabeth Holmes lover or hate her. I think she's an incredibly canny media personality. And that's why this documentary is only going to further that image and is going to be so successful, I think. Thank you so much for joining us on the briefing today. Thank you for having me. That was culture critic Michael Sun speaking with me there. And that is all for this episode of the briefing. Thanks so much for listening. Can you know if you'll be watching this documentary. It's certainly got the internet talking. Lots of people are very keen to see what it reveals. So why don't you hit us up on Instagram at the briefing podcast, send us a DM and we'll get to your comments on our take on Saturday.

30:37But for now, I'm Sasha Bobbigette. Have a great rest of your day.