Doug and I recorded this one from Istanbul, fresh off a trip through Azerbaijan — one of the strangest, most revealing countries either of us has seen.
Fifty years ago, it was a Soviet backwater. Now it’s a country of ten million people with Lamborghini dealerships, spotless highways, and construction projects on a scale I’ve never seen before. They’re building 3,400 kilometers of new highways, 45 tunnels, 447 bridges, 16 viaducts, and three airports and more— all for $12 billion total. The U.S. spends $250 billion a year on “infrastructure” and can’t even fix a bridge. The contrast is obscene.
Azerbaijan’s roads, airports, and even its optimism stand in brutal contrast to the U.S. — which feels like it’s falling apart. Their secret? Minimal regulation, cheap graft, and maybe a dictatorship that actually builds instead of talks. It’s not “free,” but it works. The place runs a budget surplus, while Americans drown in potholes and debt.
We spent time in the formerly occupied territories, where landmines still get detonated daily and new cities are rising from rubble. The propaganda is thick — every park and monument celebrates victory over the Armenians — but the progress is real. You can see why the people believe in their future.
And that’s the core of what hit both of us: people here see visible improvement. They believe things are getting better. In America, everything gets worse — slower, uglier, more expensive, more corrupt.
We were in Azerbaijan partly with the Extreme Traveler International Congress, a club of lunatics who’ve been to every country on Earth. We saw firsthand how this obscure crossroads between Iran, Russia, and Turkey is positioning itself as a major trade corridor from Shanghai to Berlin — what some call the “Trump Corridor.” The West is asleep, but this region is waking up.
Doug got mobbed by students at the new Garabagh University. The kids were polite, smart, and proud — everything missing from American universities today.
Throughout the trip we were being tailed by a half-dozen state media crews, clearly part of a propaganda tour. But the irony is, they didn’t need to fake much. Azerbaijan actually builds. America just spends.
00:00 Welcome to Istanbul
00:30 Luxury Stay at Kempinski Hotel
02:12 Journey to Azerbaijan
03:33 Exploring Baku and Occupied Territories
04:10 Extreme Traveler International Congress
06:03 Adventures in Former War Zones
09:41 Azerbaijan’s Rapid Development
15:46 Comparing Infrastructure: Azerbaijan vs. USA
18:50 Homogenization of Cultures
23:01 Authoritarianism and Optimism in Azerbaijan
23:52 Visit to Garba University
25:43 Impressive Students and Propaganda Awareness
26:54 Azerbaijan-Armenia Conflict and Personal Stories
28:40 Nation States and Historical Conflicts
29:37 US Cultural and Infrastructure Decline
30:45 Azerbaijan’s Reconstruction and Symbolism
34:55 Observations on Islam in Azerbaijan
37:14 Media Coverage and Propaganda
42:04 Geopolitical Importance of Azerbaijan
44:36 Travel Experiences and Reflections
