Sam:
[0:00]
| Hello.
|
Ivan:
[0:01]
| Hi.
|
Sam:
[0:02]
| Hi. Let's get rid of my extra things. Okay, turn off your sound, Alex.
|
Ivan:
[0:12]
| Your shirt has a logo of... What is that?
|
Sam:
[0:17]
| Whatever brand of shirt it is.
|
Ivan:
[0:19]
| Is it?
|
Sam:
[0:21]
| Yeah.
|
Ivan:
[0:22]
| It's not something from a movie or TV show?
|
Sam:
[0:25]
| No.
|
Ivan:
[0:26]
| It looks like something from a movie or TV show.
|
Sam:
[0:30]
| I'll read that. No. No. I'll find it. Hold on.
|
Ivan:
[0:37]
| I think you're wrong.
|
Sam:
[0:38]
| No, I am right. It is a generic, like, shirt thing.
|
Ivan:
[0:46]
| Yeah, yeah, yeah.
|
Sam:
[0:47]
| That I got one time when I was like, maybe I'll actually exercise. Which, of course, I've never done. but I am all completely sweaty because I did ugh okay here you go let's see here I'll actually use the, chat inside the where is the maybe I won't there's a chat the chat inside Riverside? Wow yeah Riverside the studio chat here we go there are multiple chats there you go um and meanwhile let's make sure the live stream is going hello live stream people that is going although our my signal is sucky but okay let's see did it do this yes and ah blah blah blah of course i was gonna do an image search.
|
Ivan:
[1:53]
| But as I started, as I went to take a screenshot, your image turned completely fuzzy on my end.
|
Sam:
[2:00]
| Yeah.
|
Ivan:
[2:01]
| I, I.
|
Sam:
[2:02]
| I was noticing that on the the youtube thingy maybe it'll get better maybe it won't who knows shall we start.
|
Ivan:
[2:10]
| Yeah okay.
|
Sam:
[2:11]
| Did you look at the amazon link is that.
|
Ivan:
[2:14]
| Not yet hold on uh i was i was seeing what what new came on the slack okay here we go all right let's see of course it's not clickable okay let's not use this chat ever again okay all right shall we it's a stupid thing i'll.
|
Sam:
[2:31]
| I'll text it to you instead.
|
Ivan:
[2:33]
| No, no, no. I copied and pasted it now.
|
Sam:
[2:36]
| Okay.
|
Ivan:
[2:38]
| Nellius Men's Dry Fit Mesh Athletic Shirt. One word that we know that we shouldn't mix together with Sam is the word athletic.
|
Sam:
[2:50]
| I think when I bought these, like...
|
Ivan:
[2:53]
| You were under the delusion.
|
Sam:
[2:54]
| Well, it was May 2018, the last time I bought these. I did buy it a couple times. So I have like six of these shirts or something. But I did actually go to the gym like a handful of times.
|
Ivan:
[3:10]
| Oh, okay. Okay.
|
Sam:
[3:12]
| And then I didn't.
|
Ivan:
[3:13]
| And then you.
|
Sam:
[3:15]
| But I have worn them when I was out of regular t-shirts.
|
Ivan:
[3:20]
| Ah, I see.
|
Sam:
[3:22]
| So anyway, shall we go?
|
Ivan:
[3:25]
| Yes.
|
Sam:
[3:26]
| Okay, here we go. Blah, blah, blah, blah.
|
Ivan:
[3:29]
| Blah, blah, blah. blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
|
Sam:
[3:33]
| I'll see you next time. welcome to curmudgeon's corner for saturday june 7th 2025 it is 1740 utc as we're starting to record this show so here we are here we are together again together together again isn't there a song we're together yeah there is but i can't come up with it right now yeah i don't know you know, and everyone should be glad that we can't. So, yes, I guess we'll do our usual. We'll start out like with non-newsy stuff and then we'll get more newsy as the day progresses. So I don't know. It's it's a day. I'm, You know, I could just go back to sleep right now. I'd be fine with that. You know, it's just a thing.
|
Ivan:
[4:56]
| I mean, nothing's happened this week.
|
Sam:
[4:59]
| Of course, nothing at all. Are we going to go into our usual joke of how nothing has happened when something has happened?
|
Ivan:
[5:05]
| It's calm and relaxed. I mean, what joke? What are you talking about? You know, what happened? You know, it's one of those standard, substandard weeks.
|
Sam:
[5:18]
| Right. Okay. So, I don't know.
|
Ivan:
[5:22]
| You know, my week, let me put it this way. Not just the stuff that happened. Look, I should have known Monday how this week was going to be insane. Okay? Because my week started off with insanity. okay because i had a business trip i oh.
|
Sam:
[5:45]
| I believe i heard a little bit about this.
|
Ivan:
[5:47]
| I dutifully prepared for this business trip i got to the airport on time and as i am sitting there waiting to board the flight i i look at my at my phone at my emails i hadn't looked at them because i was i was taking care of a whole bunch of other things and whatnot i remember i i i was like you know, getting chats about this and that, stuff going on, blah, blah, blah. I look at my work emails and I see that the people I'm meeting with tomorrow have sent me a thing saying that, oh, we're canceling the meeting. This is as I am at the boarding area for the flight. Okay. And so now I had some other business to tend to, but that was the key part of my trip. Okay. But there were other things. Okay. So I'm like, look, Well, I'm about the board. You know, the other things weren't as cooked as this. This was very important. I'm like, let me just, whatever. We'll go anyway. All right. Our aircraft that is supposed to take us gets there. Okay. And soon after it gets there, a big cluster of thunderstorms rolls in to Miami. Okay.
|
Sam:
[7:13]
| Okay. Yeah. And as happens sometimes in that part of the world.
|
Ivan:
[7:16]
| You know, you get some passing thunderstorms on a regular basis. This is the more, not the normal one. This was like far heavier, broader, and more intense. As a matter of fact, that system later was seen as possibility for tropical development, like later. Okay?
|
Sam:
[7:40]
| I remember seeing an NHC map that had like a little yellow blob in that area.
|
Ivan:
[7:46]
| And it was that thunderstorm system, okay, that developed very swiftly, okay? And so thunderstorms roll in a couple of things. What things happen? Number one, well, all takeoffs and landings were stopped because this was that bad that they had to stop all traffic, okay? The ramp gets closed, so all the employees have to shelter in place. I mean, you can see the thunder and lightning, like, rolling in really bad. Okay, so flight's delayed. I've had this happen before. I mean, you know, this has happened. It's caused a delay, and we're usually, you know, on our way late or whatever. So I wait. We wait, wait. One of the annoying things, and I've seen this with other airlines, not just American, that the updates that they put on departure time are not helpful, okay? Because the system keeps automatically saying, oh, we didn't leave at 2.30. Oh, we'll leave at 2.45. 2.45 for a sign. Oh, no, we'll leave at 3. Oh, the computer, uh-uh. No, 3.15. I'm like, look.
|
Sam:
[9:01]
| It's being optimistic, Yvonne.
|
Ivan:
[9:03]
| I mean, we haven't even boarded the fucking plane. How the fuck are we leaving in 15 minutes, okay? All right, this is not happening, okay, in any way, stretch, or form. So updates keep rolling around. At some point, I'm hungry. Thankfully, right across from the gate, there was a nice restaurant. So I went over to the nice restaurant to have a meal, okay, got something, whatever. And then as I finish my meal and I walk back to the gate at around five o'clock, they cancel the flight. Okay. And this is as I saw people actually in the ramp working because the storms had stopped. But they they they cancel the flight. Now, I must admit, I had not looked at how bad the situation was in terms of diversions. I realized later that, holy shit, I mean, they diverted everything to like, I mean, all the international flights coming from Europe got sent to Orlando.
|
Sam:
[10:08]
| Okay.
|
Ivan:
[10:09]
| I spoke to someone I know over there that works at the airport and they told me, listen, we got all of a sudden, I had to work an 18, she had to work an 18 hour shift. Okay. At Orlando, because so many flights from Europe that they didn't expect came in. that they had to handle all of a sudden, okay? And they sent them to Palm Beach and they sent them to everywhere. And so when they canceled the flight, I'm like, look, my meeting got canceled, okay? You know, my flight gets canceled. So I call, you know, so I call our travel agency and I just said, listen, just cancel the hotel. Don't even try to rebook me. I saw the next flight to San Juan also got canceled. There was a line at the airport that I'm not exaggerating, probably was almost a mile long of people trying to get assistance. OK, all right. Which is particularly insane. I think I'm like, guys, I'm like at this point getting into that stupid line.
|
Sam:
[11:16]
| Right.
|
Ivan:
[11:17]
| It's just there is no point. Just just just whatever. you know just don't get a dislike call up do something whatever so which is what i did i mean i called our travel agency i told just cancel everything cancel it's okay as a little car you want me to rebook you nah listen i gotta figure out what the fuck's going on you canceled my meeting whatever so then i go back down to get baggage claim because i i check my bags i i hate carrying my bag so like let me try to get my bag well no bags listen it's gonna take eight hours to unsnarl the bag mess that has been created right now.
|
Ivan:
[11:55]
| And I'm like, ah, fuck that. Look, I'll put a claim. And I don't know, some of the people don't understand how this process works, even the employees. And I was just like, okay just they'll send me the bag oh no no they won't do that i'm like look whatever i know they'll send me the back to the house whatever so i pulled in the claim whatever put it in the system got in my car i went home and unfortunately at rush hour which basically with the storms the rain even though the the the thunderstorm part itself was passed the rain had not ceased okay for hours and hours all the way driving home it was pouring rain it took me two hours to drive home okay all right.
|
Ivan:
[12:36]
| How bad the the weather was so i go to check you know i i didn't expect to find out anything on my about my bag that night and i'm like okay next day let me see where the hell the bag is and i track the the the track it with the with the little tracking number should now now they all have this air tag tracking thing i'm gonna get a fucking air tag to track the bag because all the airlines now support it as well in order to find your backpack right well i checked the next day my my flight's in puerto rico they put it on the first flight in the morning to puerto rico because your back still went yeah my back still went because and actually the airline was trying to be helpful because they figured hey this guy needed to get there i'm sure he'll get on another flight let's just send him the bag over there let's get get his bag over there so he's got his luggage when he gets there well no i i didn't and so then i call american and i'm like guys.
|
Ivan:
[13:32]
| You sent my bag well we were trying to get it for you to get because they get there and i'm like yeah oh no you're right okay well can you bring it back yes we'll bring the back back so this was the bag i checked it in on monday i did not get the bag back until thursday now they did deliver it like as i expected to my house i did not have to go to the airport to go get it i don't understand why well you actually it's they do have this very nice service you know whatever you put in your information and some guy just came in and brought it all the way to my house so i didn't have to do that but basically i i should have known as my with all the shit that went wrong in the week and a whole bunch of other things that work where all of a sudden And we had just things that I had planned in one way and everything went sideways. I'm like, you know, this is just an omen to all how our week as a nation has gone.
|
Sam:
[14:37]
| Oh, an omen. Yes.
|
Ivan:
[14:39]
| Yes. It just, I mean, you know, I don't think that as a country we have ever had a spectacle between our president and a key advisor. In the way that it happened this week in public. This has never happened, right? I'm not wrong. I mean, has this ever happened like this? With a key advisor.
|
Sam:
[15:03]
| Well, like this. With threats.
|
Ivan:
[15:06]
| Probably not. With threats and insults and threats and, you know, just, I mean, vicious attacks. attacks, including attacks of accusing the other guy of pedophilia, of participating in a pedophilia ring, which apparently is a thing for Elon.
|
Sam:
[15:28]
| Well, he just said he was in the files. He didn't say in what capacity.
|
Ivan:
[15:32]
| Oh, yes. He just meant it in a good way. It was in a positive way. Yes. It's going to come out that he's in the files in a positive way. He was the savior of the children. Well, that's why.
|
Sam:
[15:43]
| Yes.
|
Ivan:
[15:44]
| That's why that's why Elon mentioned him, you know, prominently, of course, he's the savior. Sam, I forgot. Yes. I mean, he's you know, that's right. He's such a kind man.
|
Sam:
[15:54]
| Yes. So undoubtedly, Trump versus Musk will be one of our main topics as we proceed on this show. I can't imagine avoiding it.
|
Ivan:
[16:02]
| It's just that what the fuck? I mean, everything is, Sam, you know, look, if we scripted a movie of this shit, listen, we've said this before, but even more today, if we had written a script 15 years ago, describing the situation for a movie about the presidency, we would have been laughed out of the, you know, out of the studio. I was like, you guys are out of your minds. It's ridiculous. They're never going to happen.
|
Sam:
[16:38]
| Yes. I mean, we have mocked before sort of how off the rails the later seasons of House of Cards went.
|
Ivan:
[16:49]
| Yeah.
|
Sam:
[16:49]
| And we're getting in that zone, you know?
|
Ivan:
[16:53]
| Yes.
|
Sam:
[16:53]
| And we certainly are well past, like, things that happened in West Wing, you know?
|
Ivan:
[16:58]
| Oh!
|
Sam:
[17:00]
| Yes, anyway. Ah, so I have one thought that's just a riff off what you said on your travel situation before I get to my movie, which is this. You mentioned your rush hour escape from the airport back home.
|
Ivan:
[17:15]
| Yeah.
|
Sam:
[17:18]
| As our loyal listeners know, I have for a long time now, we have been required at my employer to go back into the office five days a week. It was three days a week for a while, and then now it's five days.
|
Ivan:
[17:33]
| Let me ask you a question. Have you gotten used to it now?
|
Sam:
[17:36]
| Hell no.
|
Ivan:
[17:37]
| No?
|
Sam:
[17:38]
| No. Okay. Every single time I do it, I'm swearing at myself the whole damn trip back and forth.
|
Ivan:
[17:46]
| Okay. You know, because I went through, the reason I say that is because I went through this. Now, what happened is that I changed, not that my employer changed their minds. I changed jobs.
|
Sam:
[17:57]
| Right.
|
Ivan:
[17:57]
| Back in 2010. And I went from HP, where I worked from home for several years, back to an office environment that not only did I have to go to the office five days a week, I had to be there at 8 a.m.
|
Sam:
[18:14]
| Well, thank God I don't have that, at least. I have been attempting recently to try to be there closer to nine. And here's where I say, like, whatever has been going on, the last two to three weeks, traffic has gotten significantly worse. And I don't know what changed, okay?
|
Ivan:
[18:41]
| Some other companies started mandating people to go back to the office?
|
Sam:
[18:45]
| Probably. I hadn't read that news story, but probably something like that. I, you know, but here's the deal. Like, prior to maybe three weeks ago, the trip in... I'd say, like I've said on a show before, if I go at like two in the morning when there's no traffic, it's about a 35 minute door to door drive. Okay. You know, if I was Yvonne, I could make it in less.
|
Ivan:
[19:17]
| How many miles is it?
|
Sam:
[19:19]
| About 25.
|
Ivan:
[19:20]
| Oh shit. Yeah. I'd make it in less.
|
Sam:
[19:22]
| Now, now the beginning and end of that is not highway, but like the bulk of it doesn't matter.
|
Ivan:
[19:29]
| I'm, shit, I could tear it a lot less than that.
|
Sam:
[19:32]
| Yes, now, with me meticulously following speed limits and traffic laws, takes about 35, okay?
|
Ivan:
[19:41]
| Okay.
|
Sam:
[19:41]
| With no traffic. Now, the actual, like, my morning experience going in was probably typically between 45 minutes and an hour, okay?
|
Ivan:
[19:55]
| Not terrible.
|
Sam:
[19:55]
| Unless, you could be guaranteed, If it was raining or otherwise bad weather, it would instantly add at least 20 minutes to it, maybe more. Okay? And if there were accidents along the way, even more. So, like, it could spike up to as high as two hours. But that was rare under certain conditions. And my trip back would typically be around an hour. Because my trip back would typically... And part of this was the morning, like, I would go in a little bit later, and there'd be a little bit less traffic in the morning. But anyway, the last three weeks, consistently, both morning and evening commutes, closer to 90 minutes and sometimes longer in, in both directions.
|
Ivan:
[20:50]
| Wow.
|
Sam:
[20:51]
| Even when there's like good weather, no obvious accidents, you know, whatever. And that has been, and, and, you know, part of it, I mentioned, I was trying to get in a little bit earlier that undoubtedly is part of it because I am closer to the, the big bulk of the traffic going through the snake's digestive system. But it's not all that. Because even when I've gone in a little bit later, it's still...
|
Ivan:
[21:20]
| At 90 minutes, has it not made you reconsider taking the rail option to go into the city?
|
Sam:
[21:26]
| No. Because every... I have tried this. Here's the thing. First of all, for me to get from where I am to the closest rail option is already like 40 minutes out of that commute.
|
Ivan:
[21:41]
| It's 40 minutes? That far?
|
Sam:
[21:44]
| Well, during the traffic, it would be a lot faster if it wasn't. But I would have to get past a chunk of that traffic to get to the rail.
|
Ivan:
[21:55]
| Okay.
|
Sam:
[21:57]
| Second, I tried the light rail when they opened the closest stations to me.
|
Ivan:
[22:05]
| Okay.
|
Sam:
[22:06]
| Right after it opened, within two to three weeks of it opening. Okay. Parking was no problem whatsoever. I have subsequently heard that the parking garage there fills up by like 7 a.m., maybe even earlier.
|
Ivan:
[22:22]
| No.
|
Sam:
[22:22]
| Okay.
|
Ivan:
[22:23]
| Okay.
|
Sam:
[22:23]
| Well, that makes it not. So I can't park and ride there either. I would have to find some other way. But even when I did that, once I got to the platform, my time into the city was still at least that hour and a half. And I've already burned 30 minutes plus to get there. And once I get to the train station in the city, I then have to walk to my office, which is another 20 minute walk.
|
Ivan:
[22:51]
| It's not even really, you know, I would have, I would have assumed it's more every convenient. I've done, because the reason I mentioned it, I've gotten, you know, so like we've got, there is a, there are two rail options now to go from Boca Raton into, into Miami downtown. Okay. Both of them during rush hour, if I went, if I had to go regularly, basically would be meet or beat the time it would take me by driving.
|
Sam:
[23:20]
| Every, I have over the years, I have tried the light rail. I have tried buses. I have, I have tried every combination of the above that I can try, have figured out. Every time it seems like a new option is available, I have tried it. And the, the, every single one, the door to door time is significantly longer than the drive time. the one advantage there is one advantage which is i can sit there and i can go back to sleep right i can sit there and read i can do something else i'm not going to sit there and work, but i i'm i can potentially relax if you had.
|
Ivan:
[24:04]
| To you could.
|
Sam:
[24:06]
| If i had to i could but i'm not going to i'll be honest with myself but you.
|
Ivan:
[24:11]
| Know what i'm saying Okay, no, but you could have something that all of a sudden requires you to do something, and you could do it.
|
Sam:
[24:17]
| You could conceivably. There is also a company shuttle option that could be taken. But from what I—and I have never actually tried that one, but I have listened to people who have. It has very restrictive schedules, you know, and you have to sign up in advance for, I am going to be on this bus at this time. And that just doesn't work for me. And so I've explored all those options. Driving is the, is still the best option for me, but it's, it's killing three hours a day right now. And that is a lot of time. out of the schedule, you know, and it, and yeah, I'm a, I listen to podcasts or whatever, but you know, it, it, it is, and it has increased over the last few weeks. Like, and could I potentially alleviate some of this by adjusting my hours further? Maybe like, you know, take, take morning meetings at home but it yes i can and i've experimented with some of that but it it helps some but then it it kills your momentum in the middle of the day like i kind of want to like once i'm working yeah i don't yeah i'm working i'm with you i.
|
Ivan:
[25:42]
| Yeah yeah yeah i i'm with you on that one i don't like the oh yeah like take a meeting and then go thing unless unless there's a 7 a.m. meeting that has to happen.
|
Sam:
[25:53]
| Yeah yeah i mean i've done that in those kinds of situations and and i you know and i have done that when the calendar works out for it but you lose that momentum but i'll say even with even without that even if the commute is at the very beginning, look i'm already getting up earlier than i want to get up in order to do work anyway right like Right. If I had my druthers, I would not be up before 10, 11 a.m. any day ever, you know, and I'd stay up two or three.
|
Ivan:
[26:26]
| I don't know what the fuck is going on with me now, but I have been having problems sleeping past 730. And this has not been an issue to me in the past.
|
Sam:
[26:39]
| I've gone through periods where that has been true where like my schedule my work schedule was consistent enough for long enough that I started sort of waking up on my own yeah.
|
Ivan:
[26:50]
| And this is what's been happening I've been setting the alarm for later.
|
Sam:
[26:53]
| And I keep waking up before it goes off well.
|
Ivan:
[26:57]
| Before the damn alarm goes off.
|
Sam:
[27:00]
| Yeah I'm.
|
Ivan:
[27:01]
| So angry at myself about this I.
|
Sam:
[27:03]
| Gotta be honest but anyway what I was saying though is like, then I'm not a morning person anyway. I struggle with mornings. Afternoon is much more productive for me regardless. But if you start my day by a waking up before my body is ready to wake up and then a 90 minute drive, I arrive at the office like already wiped and like not like, So it makes it even harder for me to get into the groove and get going once I'm there. And it's just, it all sucks. It all sucks. Now, I'm hoping, like what you said may be true. It may be somebody new is requiring people to come into the office, and that's why the traffic is bad, and therefore it's going to be permanent. i'm kind of hoping it's something temporary and it'll get back to how it was which wasn't great but it was better than what it is right now better than this yeah you know or or maybe i will have to like really investigate you know screw it completely change my schedule like get up really freaking early and beat the morning rush and be at work at like seven or some crap and then leave early too I don't know. Leave it three. Yeah. Although traffic is already bad at three. I've done that, but I've.
|
Ivan:
[28:32]
| Noticed that too. You know, the traffic coming from Miami, whenever I have to go, I mean, I can't remember the hell it was that I arrived at a flight. Oh, I arrived at two 30. I will get stuck in traffic at three o'clock. And I was like, ha ha, you idiot. Very funny. You're such an ad. You're such a dumb ass. Yeah. You're stuck in traffic anyway. Yeah.
|
Sam:
[28:54]
| Yeah, I've joked before, what I need is a catapult.
|
Ivan:
[28:59]
| That would be interesting.
|
Sam:
[29:00]
| Yeah.
|
Ivan:
[29:01]
| You know, I mean, that would be an interesting way to get to work, you know, as people see you. I would suggest that to make it an easier landing, that you wear a parachute. So you will be catapulted very high distance. And then as you're approaching, like your destination, you pull chute and then you make a nice soft landing. It would just impress the hell out of everybody.
|
Sam:
[29:28]
| In my head, I wasn't catapulting sort of out in the open. I was in like a giant hamster ball. So the hamster ball could have a parachute.
|
Ivan:
[29:37]
| The hamster ball could have a parachute. Yeah. The hamster ball has a parachute, and you click a button, and then you gently descend to your destination. It's not a bad idea, actually.
|
Sam:
[29:49]
| You know, I'm sure we could make it work. There wouldn't be any liability issues.
|
Ivan:
[29:53]
| Hey, maybe we could talk to Elon now. I think he's got more spare time.
|
Sam:
[29:57]
| You know, I believe it was just on last week's show that we said we should not dismiss the stupid ideas out of hand. We should go all in.
|
Ivan:
[30:08]
| Yes.
|
Sam:
[30:09]
| So catapult-based hamster ball commute.
|
Ivan:
[30:13]
| Yes.
|
Sam:
[30:14]
| We will be billionaires any day now. Yes. I'm sure everybody will be signing up.
|
Ivan:
[30:22]
| We'll be mocking all these people that are only centimillionaires, you know, very soon.
|
Ivan:
[30:29]
| As as i tried to watch another one of these shows about billionaires like because i i think i mentioned in the slack that i tried to watch this succession okay right one of our listeners also said he had the same problem after watching three or four shows i get so sick of these people i'm just like i can't watch this fucking show i fucking want to punch these people in the face i can't i fuck them all i i can't i i can't do it okay so i also they said that they they had published this movie on hbo as well called mountain head which is about a set of billionaires and some kind of like it's some takes a lot of things that are happening right now changes in some way it's fictional okay as to how these billionaires deal with some you know chaos that's happening in the world, you know, spawned by AI in some way and some of the stuff or whatever and how they're talking about how all billionaires now want their own, like, independent, like.
|
Ivan:
[31:29]
| Fiefdom in the middle of the ocean or country or they want to take over a country or something i started watching like first 20 30 minutes of this this thing and i i i'm like okay fuck this i can't i can't watch i i want to punch these guys i can't i can't deal with these assholes i can't do it fuck i i so i i so i i quit that one but the one thing that was in the movie was that uh there were a couple of guys that were billionaires and they were friends with this guy that only was a centimillionaire. So he only had, he only had hundreds of millions and how they mocked them for.
|
Sam:
[32:02]
| Right.
|
Ivan:
[32:04]
| He called them soups, like a soup kitchen because, you know, he's only got a hundred million dollars. So, you know, he's the soup kitchen guy. He has to get food at the soup, you know, the food bank.
|
Sam:
[32:16]
| Yeah. He might actually have to think about it a little bit before self-funding an independent nation.
|
Ivan:
[32:22]
| Yes. Yeah, he has to. That's just so sad. These poor people.
|
Sam:
[32:28]
| Okay. We've got on long enough that I will not get my movie, even though I'm falling further and further behind on the movie list. I will mention what the movie is for next week. Which is? It will be Judas and the Black Messiah, which was a 2021 American biographical historical drama film.
|
Ivan:
[32:49]
| I didn't even, I must totally admit that I never even knew that a movie with that title existed.
|
Sam:
[32:56]
| Of the cast list, there's only one you would probably recognize. Martin Sheehan was in it.
|
Ivan:
[33:03]
| Okay, so, I mean, it's got somebody with some name recognition. I have no idea this movie even existed. But, you know, as my pop, listen, as my pop culture surveys that I've done recently have shown, I know nothing. to be fair this is more.
|
Sam:
[33:22]
| A film festival movie than like a mass pop culture movie.
|
Ivan:
[33:27]
| Still doesn't matter you know whatever I have known nothing of this I mean like I grabbed the top 100 songs again recently to try to see who I do on that list I think I went 0 for 100 if I do any of those people so you haven't been.
|
Sam:
[33:44]
| Following the new Sabrina Carpenter song that came out like yesterday and the.
|
Ivan:
[33:48]
| Controversy over whether.
|
Sam:
[33:49]
| She was doing it to step on some other artist's new album.
|
Ivan:
[33:52]
| Okay i i i have to say i look at i'm not making this up i have no idea who the hell sabrina carpenter is i have no idea not i mean i listen if you put you put her in a listen you told me you told me listen i'll give you 10 million dollars identify this person right now i'll put four people in front of you, I mean, I would fail. If you gave me a picture array of 20 people, you told me, hey, pick for the only way I would win is random chance.
|
Sam:
[34:27]
| Okay, I sent you a link. Do you recognize the girl?
|
Ivan:
[34:30]
| Okay, let me see.
|
Sam:
[34:32]
| I'll check.
|
Ivan:
[34:33]
| Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. No. No. Not a clue. No. Not a clue. I have no idea who this person is.
|
Sam:
[34:45]
| Okay, cool.
|
Ivan:
[34:46]
| But look, Bloomberg has this really cool news quiz lately every week.
|
Sam:
[34:53]
| And you do well or not?
|
Ivan:
[34:54]
| See, I, man, the last couple of weeks, I've been at the top 5% of the news quiz.
|
Sam:
[35:00]
| Oh, nice.
|
Ivan:
[35:01]
| So I've been, I've been, I've been really hitting that news quiz really good. But I have no idea, not one clue who Sabrina Carpenter is. I mean, I, listen, you can.
|
Sam:
[35:11]
| Is this the pointed news quiz?
|
Ivan:
[35:14]
| Yes. Yes. Yes. I just Googled it. Yeah. Yeah. It's a pointed news quiz. Do you have to be a subscriber? There is, I don't know. It's a good question. I'm.
|
Sam:
[35:25]
| Looking got it you have to wager and.
|
Ivan:
[35:31]
| Stuff yes you also have to do some wagering it's too complicated you have to do some wagering.
|
Sam:
[35:37]
| Here we go.
|
Ivan:
[35:38]
| We're going to do this I'm.
|
Sam:
[35:41]
| Going to play this thing live.
|
Ivan:
[35:42]
| I haven't played this week hold on let me see I'm going to make my wagers I just left mine on.
|
Sam:
[35:54]
| The default all even.
|
Ivan:
[35:55]
| Okay well you can use it you could by the way there's one thing important to use there's the multipliers that are available so if you're very sure about an answer make sure to use your multiplier okay all right that helps you this.
|
Sam:
[36:07]
| Is too complicated i'm just going to try.
|
Ivan:
[36:09]
| No no complicated no okay.
|
Sam:
[36:14]
| So once you click it does it go away.
|
Ivan:
[36:18]
| What do you mean it goes away?
|
Sam:
[36:20]
| Like, does it go straight to the next question once you quick the answer? Because I want to read the question aloud to people. Okay, so go ahead and make your wager on the first one. Then I will read it and make it.
|
Ivan:
[36:29]
| Okay, hold on. Then I got, I got, okay, hold on, hold on.
|
Sam:
[36:32]
| How many questions are in this thing? Like 10, 10 questions?
|
Ivan:
[36:34]
| 10, 10, 10 questions. Okay, so let's go to our first question. Okay. All right, here we go.
|
Sam:
[36:39]
| Okay. President Donald Trump issued a full ban on entry into the U.S. for citizens of 12 countries. 10 of them are in Africa and the Middle East, but which two countries are elsewhere? One is recovering from a major earthquake, and the other is, according to the United Nations, one of the five places in the world with catastrophic levels of hunger. Okay. And the choices are A, Laos and Venezuela, B, Myanmar and Haiti, C, Afghanistan and Equatorial Guinea, D, Nicaragua and Ukraine. We shall both make our choices. Have you made your choice?
|
Ivan:
[37:14]
| I did.
|
Sam:
[37:15]
| Okay. I'm making my choice.
|
Ivan:
[37:17]
| Myanmar. Yeah.
|
Sam:
[37:19]
| I went for the one with Venezuela in it.
|
Ivan:
[37:22]
| What? How did you fail that one? Myanmar and A, what the hell? You already for the last one?
|
Sam:
[37:33]
| My first instinct was the Afghanistan one.
|
Ivan:
[37:36]
| The earthquake! The Myanmar earthquake, remember when we pulled out the fucking relief workers?
|
Sam:
[37:43]
| No.
|
Ivan:
[37:44]
| Fuck!
|
Sam:
[37:45]
| 69% of people got it right, so I suck. Okay.
|
Ivan:
[37:49]
| Yes!
|
Sam:
[37:49]
| Next!
|
Ivan:
[37:50]
| What is the layup?
|
Sam:
[37:52]
| Your wager, blah, blah, blah. Okay. Geet Wilders, a far-right lawmaker, pulled his freedom party, party woer de vr, out of his nation's... Oh, come on.
|
Ivan:
[38:03]
| You know the answer to this question.
|
Sam:
[38:06]
| Out of his four party... Okay. Have you made yours? The choices are Poland, Germany, the Netherlands, or Denmark. Okay.
|
Ivan:
[38:15]
| Shit, I'm not sure. Okay, I kept thinking this was about the Polish election, and it's not. But based on that name, I'm going to make a choice. I think I know which one it is. You ready?
|
Sam:
[38:25]
| Ready.
|
Ivan:
[38:25]
| You made your choice? Okay, all right, made my choice.
|
Sam:
[38:28]
| Netherlands.
|
Ivan:
[38:29]
| Yeah, it's the Netherlands, yes.
|
Sam:
[38:32]
| Okay, next.
|
Ivan:
[38:33]
| Yeah, with a name like Geert Wilders, that is such a Dutch name. You know, that was a giveaway, just the Dutch name. I didn't realize that that happened.
|
Sam:
[38:43]
| Okay. Huawei's Pura X is a new foldable phone sold only in China. The device is an opportunity for the company to showcase its recently launched operating system. A competitor on iOS and Android called what? The word that appears in the name derives from the Greek meaning joint. And I say because I don't know the Greek alphabet well enough to pronounce that. And are you ready? I'm ready.
|
Ivan:
[39:12]
| Okay. Okay. Well, hang on. I haven't chosen yet. I will choose now. Okay.
|
Sam:
[39:17]
| I chose hinge, but it's harmony.
|
Ivan:
[39:19]
| Yeah. I chose unison, but it's harmony. Yeah.
|
Sam:
[39:23]
| I figured joint is a hinge, but no.
|
Ivan:
[39:26]
| I mean, unison, joint. No, well.
|
Sam:
[39:30]
| Okay. Next.
|
Ivan:
[39:32]
| Yeah.
|
Sam:
[39:33]
| We got to get this going because we're. Yeah.
|
Ivan:
[39:36]
| Come on. Come on. Come on. Hey, we're going through it, but we're going through the news.
|
Sam:
[39:39]
| There you go. Yale University is finalizing a sale of as much as $2.5 billion of its private equity and venture capital assets. What is the code name of the project? It references a fictional character who is ostentatiously wealthy and loves someone named Daisy. This one's an easy one. At least for me. You got it, Yvonne?
|
Ivan:
[40:00]
| Fuck, I'm not totally sure. But I think I know it. I think it's, yeah. Okay.
|
Sam:
[40:05]
| Have you chosen? Oh, the choices are Project Gatsby. Project Clampett, Project Warbucks, or Project Scrooge.
|
Ivan:
[40:14]
| I got it wrong.
|
Sam:
[40:16]
| It's Gatsby.
|
Ivan:
[40:17]
| Yeah, I knew that.
|
Sam:
[40:20]
| It's from the great Gatsby, which I was supposed to read in high school and didn't. Okay. Next. Sotheby's will soon auction off a black Hermes bag with gold hardware. It was commissioned in 1984 for which fashion icon? A, Jackie Kennedy. B, Princess Diana. C, Grace Kelly. D. Jane Birkin.
|
Ivan:
[40:46]
| I'm going to guess it's Princess.
|
Sam:
[40:48]
| You know, you should say it before I say it, but I was going to make the same guess, Princess Diana, which was wrong. It was Birkin.
|
Ivan:
[40:54]
| Fuck. Follow me both. Okay. Well, that's one that I put down to five points because I knew I had no idea.
|
Sam:
[41:00]
| I did know the Birkin was a kind of bag, and I thought about that. No, I know the Birkin's a bag.
|
Ivan:
[41:05]
| But I didn't know who the fuck they made it for. I have no idea. The hell am I supposed to know?
|
Sam:
[41:09]
| Okay. The newly elected president of a certain country said his first task would be to avoid imposing martial law again.
|
Ivan:
[41:17]
| Okay, I know which one.
|
Sam:
[41:18]
| Which country is it? The Philippines, South Korea, Thailand, or Malaysia?
|
Ivan:
[41:22]
| Okay.
|
Sam:
[41:23]
| Okay, I'm ready. One, two, three. South Korea.
|
Ivan:
[41:27]
| South Korea.
|
Sam:
[41:27]
| Yes. Next. Taylor Swift acquired the rights to her first six albums from a private equity firm. In her announcement, Swift wrote, This was a business deal to them, but I really felt like they saw it for what it was for me. My first tattoo might just be a huge blank in the middle of my forehead. Which symbol, both the name and the logo of the firm, fills the blank?
|
Ivan:
[41:53]
| Fuck. I don't know.
|
Sam:
[41:55]
| Okay.
|
Ivan:
[41:56]
| You do?
|
Sam:
[41:57]
| Pick one. Pick one.
|
Ivan:
[41:58]
| Okay, I picked one.
|
Sam:
[41:59]
| The choices are Anchor, Cerebus, Shamrock, or Scooter. I am picking Shamrock, and I am right.
|
Ivan:
[42:08]
| Yes, you're right.
|
Sam:
[42:09]
| Did you get it wrong?
|
Ivan:
[42:10]
| No, I got it wrong. Man, this is the worst I've done in this thing in the last three weeks. This is ridiculous.
|
Sam:
[42:17]
| Okay, here we go. You know, I started out missing a few I should have gotten. Okay, Carol Narrocki, a nationalist backed by Trump, won a presidential election in a European country. After the victory, the president-elect said, we will not allow blank to hold all the power and have a monopoly of evil power that does not care about public finances. The name of which prime minister who wields the majority of the political influence in Narwaki's country fills the blank? A. Nikusir Dan. B. Alexander Lukashenko. C. Donald Tusk. D. Viktor Orban.
|
Ivan:
[42:55]
| Well, I know it's not C and D. But I'm not sure.
|
Sam:
[42:58]
| You know, you shouldn't give me hints before I've chosen.
|
Ivan:
[43:02]
| Fuck.
|
Sam:
[43:03]
| Okay.
|
Ivan:
[43:04]
| I'm going to make a choice.
|
Sam:
[43:05]
| I'm going for A. It was Donald Tusk. It was one of the ones you said it wasn't.
|
Ivan:
[43:11]
| What? How could it be Donald Tusk?
|
Sam:
[43:15]
| Ah. Okay. I was going to pick Tusk until you said something.
|
Ivan:
[43:22]
| Donald Tusk was a fake fucking character from goddamn House of Cards.
|
Sam:
[43:29]
| Next. Okay. Sanofi agreed to buy a U.S. biopharma group for at least $9.1 billion. What type of drawing made with ferric ferocyanide appears in the name of the company?
|
Ivan:
[43:45]
| Jesus Christ. Obviously, I've paid no attention to the news this week with Elon and Donald going at it, okay? I have no idea what the fuck this is. I'm going to take a guess at one of these, but I have no idea.
|
Sam:
[44:00]
| I'm going now, and I am picking—oh, the choices were tattoo, stipple, lithograph, and blueprint, by the way.
|
Ivan:
[44:07]
| All right, I'm going to pick a choice.
|
Sam:
[44:09]
| Okay.
|
Ivan:
[44:09]
| No, and I got that one wrong, too.
|
Sam:
[44:11]
| I picked lithograph because I thought— My God. I thought blueprint was too obvious and also ferric would be reddish.
|
Ivan:
[44:18]
| So did I!
|
Sam:
[44:19]
| Not blue. We're not doing well.
|
Ivan:
[44:22]
| We are not doing well. We're not. We're doing terrible.
|
Sam:
[44:24]
| After 16 years, comedian Mark Maron's pioneering podcast that helped define the medium is coming to an end. Which abbreviation is used in the title of the show? WTF? TTYL? OMG? Or TLDR?
|
Ivan:
[44:39]
| I have no idea either.
|
Sam:
[44:41]
| This one's an easy one. It's WTF. done. Okay. Oh, I shouldn't have said that before you had indicated you had chosen.
|
Ivan:
[44:51]
| That's the one I was going to choose, but you know. Okay. So we did poorly.
|
Sam:
[44:55]
| See results.
|
Ivan:
[44:56]
| Actually, you know what? Many people did poorly this week.
|
Sam:
[44:59]
| My final score was zero.
|
Ivan:
[45:02]
| Okay. My final score was 32.5. I scored better than 38% of the other players so i did not i was not this this was not a colossal total failure but this is about the worst i've done in this quiz in the in the last few weeks okay.
|
Sam:
[45:21]
| Well we have wasted a good deal of time on that i could have.
|
Ivan:
[45:25]
| Done my movie a lot of the news a.
|
Sam:
[45:27]
| Lot of the news that we probably would not have talked about.
|
Ivan:
[45:31]
| Otherwise we would not have talked these are things that we would not have talked about and so we just covered it so there you go.
|
Sam:
[45:36]
| Yes there you go okay let's take Take a break and then I guess we'll probably just start off on Musk versus Trump. Everyone's eager.
|
Ivan:
[45:45]
| Yes.
|
Sam:
[45:46]
| Everyone's eager. Okay, here we go. Here's a break. Breaky, breaky, breaky.
|
Ivan:
[45:54]
| Do, do, do. This podcast is sponsored by AlexMzilla.com.
|
Sam:
[46:46]
| Youtube channel is a l e x m x e l a dot com Yes. Do, do, do. Do, do, do. Okay.
|
Ivan:
[47:02]
| Do, do, do, do, do.
|
Sam:
[47:04]
| Very exciting. I will note that for, we have had a viewer on our live stream for the most of the show so far, but it was my son Alex on one of, logged in as me on like my iPad or something. And so he's been commenting things like, oh, no, that's unfortunate. And a frowny face on things we were saying earlier in the show.
|
Ivan:
[47:33]
| There you go. Perfect.
|
Sam:
[47:36]
| And it shows up as comments from me because he was logged in as me.
|
Ivan:
[47:39]
| But you're upset at yourself.
|
Sam:
[47:44]
| I am. I am. Anyway, there was one brief moment with two people watching, but that didn't last very long. Anyway. Anyway. Anyway, so Elon and Donald having a good old time this week.
|
Ivan:
[48:00]
| They, they, they are just, they're, they're, they're getting along really well. I think that they are. It's, it's just amazing how you see titans of industry in our nation, our world getting along well. in such a great way, publicly, with the leaders, the president of our nation, solving through the nation's problems, Sam. It's just, it's wonderful to see. It's amazing. And also the respect that our president showed to the visiting chancellor of Germany. It's just so, so great as he was asking him whether he was disappointed that, you know, that the Nazis were defeated.
|
Sam:
[48:48]
| Right. Yes. He couldn't possibly understand why that wouldn't be a sad thing for the German chancellor.
|
Ivan:
[48:55]
| Oh, Jesus Christ.
|
Sam:
[48:58]
| Okay.
|
Ivan:
[48:59]
| So this whole thing started, as far as I can tell, between—well, if you go through the background story, there was obviously a lot of tension.
|
Sam:
[49:12]
| Yeah, as we talked about last week, you know, the fact that Elon was leaving was not exactly unwelcome for the rest of the Trump team.
|
Ivan:
[49:24]
| Right. It is very clear that they were very, very, very ready for him to be gone. great for him to be gone you know there is this guy who has come to the fore as apparently one of the key guys that was driving this and one of the, biggest things that he pushed against was the nomination of the NASA administrator, okay? All of a sudden, right after the farewell meeting at the White House, the guy who was Elon's guy to head NASA was withdrawn. Jared Isigman was the guy that was nominated there. And this guy that I guess I not really paid attention to before, this advisor named the last name Gore, G-O-R.
|
Sam:
[50:23]
| Oh, not Al Gore.
|
Ivan:
[50:24]
| Not G-O-R, not G-O-R-E, okay? He apparently, Sergio Gore, okay?
|
Sam:
[50:32]
| Okay, yep.
|
Ivan:
[50:33]
| Sergio apparently had a very close relationship with Trump, and it seemed to have been rooted from right after January 6th where he apparently was a guy that helped them publish books and many books from allies of Trump after that. So he seemed to have been a key supporter of Trump right at the moment when a lot of people seemed to have walked away from him. It says here that he co-founded Winning Team Publishing with Donald Trump Jr., The imprint publishes books by Trump and his allies and put much-needed cash in Trump's pocket during his isolation after the January 6th riot at the Capitol. So this guy was very close in with him. He was a frequent guest at Mar-a-Lago. He was a tough fundraiser in the pack. And this guy despised Elon. And he was very hell-bent against Isaacman, in large part because there were records to show that this guy was a big Democratic donor.
|
Ivan:
[51:46]
| Jared isaac man okay yeah he had been a very big democratic donor okay by the way which by the way donald trump also was but okay let's not get into those details but you know there's something that's happened with a lot of these people with money but so he was as a big democratic donor and he was like coming up to trump saying hey just get this guy out but but wait wait because this is by the way they're saying that this is the biggest root of how this tension started okay, Gore was the one that was going to Trump and basically just saying, you need to get rid of Isaac. You need to get rid of Isaac. And he kept showing him how he had donated to the Democrats. And he kept showing him that and that and that. And by the way, so this got to and and in the meeting that happened at the White House, where we heard that Marco Rubio had gone toe to toe with with Musk, it went unreported that this guy also did. big time, okay? And so that went unreported. So the role that this guy had in terms of fomenting this Musk Trump schism.
|
Ivan:
[52:58]
| Was far more significant than was previously known, okay? And so, look, to Elon Musk, what the fuck could be more important than having the NASA administrator be a key ally of his? Given the, if you look at his holdings right now, number one holding that he has is SpaceX, okay that his his the value his net worth depends a lot more on spacex than it does on tesla stock okay according to reports that i've seen so all of a sudden this guy yanking that guy out was what was a brutal blow and then you know a lot of other people that you know musk is out The knives have come out like left and right and precipitated that, you know, with this big, beautiful bill, Doge not bringing in the savings that were expected. But not just that, the fact that they the big, beautiful bill, you know, it goes totally the opposite way of where they had come in three months ago and will add to the deficit like crazy. And so, you know, Elon just started railing into this.
|
Sam:
[54:18]
| Although Republicans, by the way, are still denying that and saying the CBO is full of it. It's not accurate. Ignore them. There will be so much growth.
|
Ivan:
[54:27]
| Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever. Yeah, whatever. Right. That was the same bullshit that they said back when they passed the last tax cut in 2018 and the deficit went through the roof. right because the cbo is full of shit but but so so you know and and the startup it escalated quite quickly i understand that by the way trump fired all the doge people uh he cleared them all out as of yesterday i.
|
Sam:
[54:57]
| Hadn't heard that is that new today.
|
Ivan:
[54:58]
| No that was yesterday yesterday trump ordered everybody at doge fired everybody all of them okay.
|
Sam:
[55:07]
| I hadn't seen that yet.
|
Ivan:
[55:08]
| Yeah i mean i i shared that on the slack let me find it but there was but there was a story specifically that that, literally everybody that they told everybody at doge to clear out get the fuck out what.
|
Sam:
[55:24]
| I saw is that they had cleared out their desks in anticipation of that, but that it hadn't actually happened yet.
|
Ivan:
[55:33]
| No, no. But what I got is that there was an order that they got there and saw that their desks had been cleared out. So I guess we've got conflicting reports on that.
|
Sam:
[55:43]
| Find the link.
|
Ivan:
[55:44]
| I gotta find... Ah, fuck. Jesus Christ, so much shit. Da-da. Da-da-da-da. Da-da-da. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Fair, no. Art Fizer, no. No. No. No. Let's see. Okay. Well, I can't find it right now. Okay. I cannot find it right now, but I had one report that I got that basically they had told everybody to clear out. Okay? Okay.
|
Sam:
[56:21]
| And look, it would not be surprising.
|
Ivan:
[56:23]
| All the staffers. Right. That was a retaliation that was said to have happened yesterday.
|
Sam:
[56:30]
| I will say conflicting reports, like you said, because I have also heard that.
|
Ivan:
[56:36]
| Oh, here it is. Here it is. It's a Midas touch. Reported it. Doge staffers also had their desks cleaned out and packed last night in case they were all fired by Trump. Oh, in case they were all fired by Trump. Okay. So I misread that. You read that correctly. I just got the Doge HQ. I'm the last man here. The place cleared out as a precaution. Okay.
|
Sam:
[56:54]
| Right. Because I have also read that many of these are still in place and actually still taking action as of yesterday. And even with Elon gone, the team he put in place is still going forward, but under somebody else.
|
Ivan:
[57:13]
| Yeah, but that's all bullshit. All the agencies are now rebelling to this. As a matter of fact.
|
Sam:
[57:17]
| There's a story that— Yes, they can now push back more effectively.
|
Ivan:
[57:20]
| But it's not just push back. They're actively undoing a whole bunch of the things that were done. There was a story.
|
Sam:
[57:26]
| They were rehiring people because they fired too many people, et cetera.
|
Ivan:
[57:30]
| They were rehiring people at agencies across the board where they had been fired that they just realized that we just can't continue without them. And they were actively hiring them all back. Aside from there was a bill that's advancing in Congress, like right now with bipartisan support also, to restore all the cuts that were made to. The weather service.
|
Sam:
[57:54]
| Right. Okay.
|
Ivan:
[57:55]
| And that one's also advancing as well, because basically people realize that we are right now, Doge has made us, created significant blind spots in our monitoring of major weather events.
|
Sam:
[58:09]
| Right. And I suspect, like, all it'll take is like one major event to do the same kind of stuff for FEMA, because they've also gutted FEMA. Yeah.
|
Ivan:
[58:21]
| Yeah, I mean, FEMA is in the same, in the same.
|
Sam:
[58:24]
| Although so far, like we've got things like Donald Trump denying emergency relief to various places that have had issues, you know.
|
Ivan:
[58:33]
| And these are places that are that are with Republicans.
|
Sam:
[58:37]
| Yeah, red state.
|
Ivan:
[58:38]
| I mean, you have Republican government. You've had Republican governors asking for for help from FEMA. And they basically tell, fuck you, like right now. So so that's that's been going on. But listen, the way that the bottom line... You know, Elon yesterday went, basically said that Trump's a pedo. He said that he's all over the Epstein files, and that's why they're not being released. Okay? He also said he's starting a third party. He also said— Yes.
|
Sam:
[59:08]
| He did say that as well.
|
Ivan:
[59:10]
| He threatened to decommission Dragon as well, which he apparently backed off of. Okay. What else?
|
Sam:
[59:17]
| Because Donald was threatening to remove all the federal contracts from SpaceX as well.
|
Ivan:
[59:22]
| Oh, yeah, right. Donald threatened to cancel all federal contracts with Elon Musk. What the fuck else? I mean, there was like so many things that they threw at each other.
|
Sam:
[59:32]
| Here are a few things to keep in mind for both of these people. First of all, neither one of these people has any affinity or care about the truth. It's just not part of their... So, like, if they say something, it is not because the thing is true. It is because they think saying it will have the effect that they want or will lead things in the direction that they want. So, you know, start with Elon and tying Trump to the Epstein files. So, first of all, Trump has been tied to the Epstein files for years. This has been published in things that have already been released. Okay.
|
Ivan:
[1:00:17]
| True. But.
|
Sam:
[1:00:20]
| Let me just say this. You know, they're, you know, And there's video of him and Epstein together. There's video of him talking about Epstein's predilection for young girls. All of this exists. All of this has been out there for years. It's known that he'd made trips to a stupid island or whatever. All of this is out there. The rumor mongering is, of course, there's something more substantial that directly ties Donald Trump to nefarious activities. So let's be clear. Wait, wait, wait. Okay, so let me finish this point.
|
Ivan:
[1:00:53]
| Well, no, but I want to be clear about what that is, about the extra stuff. The extra stuff that's been talked about and that there was controversy yesterday because Kash Patel went on Rogan and said one thing, and Pam Bondi said something different. It's about videos, specifically about videos with underage girls and who the hell's appearing on them. Kash Patel went and said, oh, no, there's no such videos that are bad. Pam Bondi said, well, we can't release these videos because they show all these underage girls, and we don't want to victimize them again.
|
Sam:
[1:01:23]
| Yes so the point i was making about musk is that the fact that he tweeted that does not indicate that he actually knows anything one way or the other true maybe he does maybe he doesn't it just indicates that he thinks saying that would have an effect like okay now the truth of what may or may not exist is an entirely separate question i'm just saying that to to elon musk that's irrelevant. What's relevant is that saying that would have an impact.
|
Ivan:
[1:01:53]
| But here is the thing, right? Three months ago, in February, right, Pam Bondi invited all these people that she supposedly gave the Epstein files to. And what did she hand them? You remember? Okay, I remember. Empty binders.
|
Sam:
[1:02:10]
| Oh, yes, I do remember that.
|
Ivan:
[1:02:11]
| And they marched out of the White House with these binders that had nothing in them. Nothing. Then you get this report that the New York office, I think of the, I can't remember which agency, I can't remember it was the attorney general, basically had an entire crew of people scouring through these files. Okay? Scouring and scouring and scouring to supposedly to to redact to do whatever in order to publish the files and nothing still has been released okay now now remember they promised promised we are going to release these and then all of a sudden three months later we've got dick nothing and.
|
Sam:
[1:02:56]
| I will also remind people of the lawsuit that was about to go forward right before the 2016 election with the person who claims that Donald Trump and Epstein did something with her when she was 13.
|
Ivan:
[1:03:11]
| Right.
|
Sam:
[1:03:11]
| And that was squashed.
|
Ivan:
[1:03:13]
| That's probably another cat, one of these catch and kill things.
|
Sam:
[1:03:16]
| Yeah. And that was withdrawn like weeks before the election.
|
Ivan:
[1:03:21]
| The election.
|
Sam:
[1:03:22]
| And under sort of, the person in question backed off, didn't want to do it anymore, blah, blah, blah. And she could have been scared. She could have been bribed. there's all kinds of reasons or or maybe she realized that she was lying and there was nothing to it and she better get off we don't know but but yeah like look this all this kind of stuff has been out there for years the musk's point in doing this was just just to sort of turn the screwdriver for donald trump and and and ratchet up this now i saw i have not confirmed myself but I saw somebody post something this morning that says, Musk has now removed that post.
|
Ivan:
[1:04:10]
| Well, I'm not on X, so I don't know.
|
Sam:
[1:04:12]
| Yeah, I'm not on X either.
|
Ivan:
[1:04:14]
| Oh, yeah, remove that post. Like, yeah, nobody saw it, Sam. That solves the problem. Nobody saw that.
|
Sam:
[1:04:20]
| Well, the question on all of this is, are they going to de-escalate and make friends again?
|
Ivan:
[1:04:26]
| Well, listen, I saw Donald Trump, like, on Air Force One, I guess he was coming back fucking Mar-a-Lago again, basically saying something like he refused to engage reporters' questions about the... Tiff kept saying, oh, I wish him well. Oh, I wish him well.
|
Sam:
[1:04:49]
| Right. Whereas 24 hours previously, he had been going...
|
Ivan:
[1:04:53]
| I'm fucking canceling all of you. Go fuck yourself. Fuck you. And all of a sudden, I wish him well.
|
Sam:
[1:04:57]
| And he'd been going through the rounds calling every cable news anchor he could think of to trash musk some of them yeah so he's pushing.
|
Ivan:
[1:05:08]
| Him well 24 hours later what the fuck is going what what the fuck happened behind the scenes sam.
|
Sam:
[1:05:14]
| So that is bizarre well there are a couple things that i think first of all i think musk was hoping that a significant portion of sort of the MAGA base would take his side. And it looks like that portion is relatively small. Like, all of the congressional Republicans are like, yeah, we hope this goes away, but if Bush comes to shove, we're on Trump. We're on Team Trump. There was a poll that came out that showed, like, Musk's support was relatively small amongst Republicans.
|
Ivan:
[1:05:51]
| It was, I mean, it was, like, Republicans, the poll, But, but, but, but, but this poll seemed to have not been like yesterday or this week. Okay.
|
Sam:
[1:06:01]
| I understood it was a.
|
Ivan:
[1:06:03]
| Let me double check. Let me see. Let me double check because I'm looking at, I'm looking it up right now. The number that came up was 6%. Okay. According to this versus 71 for Trump and 12, which basically neither. Yesterday at 10, 12 a.m. Let me double check to make sure that this poll was a, cat turns lined up with the president apparently prompting must to unfollow him but he's not alone full release by you govern the wake of conflagration so yes it was actually time um yes so they they it showed that must get six percent and also.
|
Sam:
[1:06:39]
| I think when push comes to shove on the threats they were making against each other yeah to use trump's own terminology trump has the cards points. You know, Trump has more leverage against Musk than the other way around.
|
Ivan:
[1:06:56]
| Oh, totally. Because Trump has the force of the federal government. But this is the problem that Musk created for himself, okay?
|
Sam:
[1:07:06]
| Well, yeah, but look, I will point out, I will point out just for the record, that many of the things Trump and Trump's team are threatening are questionably legal and would undoubtedly end up for years in court. But we know this administration doesn't care about that, so it wouldn't matter. So we've got the threat of the unilateral cancellation of all the SpaceX contracts. Okay, well, these are contracts. They have been signed. There are provisions in them for how and where you cancel. There's also federal government regulations on how things have to follow processes and can't just be arbitrary decisions by the president. Now, as I said, Donald Trump clearly doesn't care about any of that. He could try to cancel it anyway. And of course, it'll end up in court. But the point is, he could cause extreme disruption right now. We've also got a number of Trump's advisors saying, hey, you should investigate Elon Musk's initial visa into the United States and whether there were irregularities into him overstaying the visa or lying on the visa or anything else like that.
|
Ivan:
[1:08:24]
| Can we revoke bus citizenship?
|
Sam:
[1:08:26]
| Yeah, because while he is a naturalized citizenship, now if it turned out that that was predicated on fraud, you can revoke his citizenship and deport him. You know, there are also Trump advisers suggesting that skip canceling the contracts, just nationalize.
|
Ivan:
[1:08:45]
| Nationalize SpaceX. Well, fuck, we've said that a year before. I ain't agreeing with any of these assholes.
|
Sam:
[1:08:53]
| But again, questionable legality. Although for the nationalizing SpaceX, there is apparently, and people were talking about this earlier in the Ukraine war. There are laws where the president can basically take U.S. manufacturing capability that is significant to national security and take over in one way or another, or at least mandate what it does.
|
Ivan:
[1:09:20]
| A news story in the Washington Post, okay, summarizing some of the stuff that's been going on. Summarizing some, because I mentioned a lot of things that Musk said about Trump. Trump said, rattled in the wake of Elon Musk's public attacks, this is inside the battles that shattered Trump and Musk's alliance, okay, is a news story there. And a parent called for his impeachment, because by the way, Musk called for Trump's impeachment as well, for God's sakes, okay? Trump worked the phones, the briefing, close confidence, and casual acquaintances alike. His former ally was a big-time drug addict, he called him.
|
Sam:
[1:09:55]
| Yes, yeah.
|
Ivan:
[1:09:55]
| Trump said at one point, as he tried to make sense of must behavior, according to a person with knowledge to call, who liked other interviews for his story on the condition of anonymity. But he called him, man, he called him a fucking big-time drug addict. And by the way.
|
Sam:
[1:10:09]
| Trump has— And we talked about the New York Times article from last week, last week. Yeah.
|
Ivan:
[1:10:13]
| Yeah, but Trump has a big issue with addiction, okay? Yes, because of his brother. His brother died, you know, with a huge alcohol addiction. It's the reason why Trump doesn't drink. So this for him isn't some, you know, it's something that is a...
|
Sam:
[1:10:34]
| Is actually personal to him.
|
Ivan:
[1:10:36]
| Yes, totally, okay?
|
Sam:
[1:10:38]
| Well, almost everything is personal to Donald Trump. That's how he lives his life. But this specifically, he cares about this issue because of the personal experience in his family.
|
Ivan:
[1:10:51]
| Yes. So, I mean, yes, Trump definitely has far a lot more ammunition that he could hurt Musk with. And the reality is that even if he can't cancel immediately a SpaceX contract.
|
Sam:
[1:11:12]
| Musk can make some noise on X. Musk could make some mischief with SpaceX, but if he does... the feds have all kinds of ways to retaliate and deal with that.
|
Ivan:
[1:11:23]
| Um let me give you one example right now look let me tell you something you've had all these starship launches that have been, chaotic okay that all of a sudden with what he did going into the administration he had basically despite the investigations.
|
Sam:
[1:11:40]
| Of those and killed any.
|
Ivan:
[1:11:42]
| Yes like there was movement to.
|
Sam:
[1:11:44]
| Further regulate and those died. But they can come back.
|
Ivan:
[1:11:48]
| Guess. Take a wild guess. You think that now after he called for his impeachment or whatever, do you think that these people are going to back off on him? I'll tell you something. I'm going to say this right now. I bet you there isn't another Starship launch anytime soon. They're going to stop him from launches now. They're going to say, fuck you, no. You've blown up five of these. we need to do a thorough investigation.
|
Sam:
[1:12:16]
| I could easily see that I mean honestly that's the prudent thing to do anyway that would have been the prudent.
|
Ivan:
[1:12:22]
| Thing to do but the point is that they.
|
Sam:
[1:12:24]
| Had if he was still in the good graces of the administration they would have just gone full speed ahead, or let SpaceX do whatever they wanted to yeah look and this is why I think you're going to get some sort of truce, but it'll be a truce under, it will be Trump winning this debate. Or at the very least, like this truce may be just Elon decides to be quiet for a while. Rather, you know, because he realizes he's lost.
|
Ivan:
[1:13:01]
| Yeah. I mean, you're right. I mean, I don't see, the problem that Musk has right now is that there is no winning scenario here. in any direction. Here's a fucking problem that Musk's got. The people that used to be his biggest supporters in the past were all these people that were all in on him because, hey, electric cars, solar power, you know, you're helping the future, blah, blah, blah.
|
Sam:
[1:13:32]
| Hey, those don't sound like maggots.
|
Ivan:
[1:13:33]
| And he went to all those people. Exactly. And he went and gave the middle finger to all those fucking people across the world. Okay? He gave him the fucking middle finger to back this shit. Now, as everybody that goes and tries to make a deal with Donald winds up getting fucked, as I totally expected and predicted, okay? He was going to get fucked.
|
Sam:
[1:14:04]
| Almost everybody did. It wasn't your unique prediction. No. The question was what the time frame would be. like no but i.
|
Ivan:
[1:14:12]
| I i did give it 90 days okay.
|
Sam:
[1:14:15]
| No i know you said it was going to be right on there were a few people that gave it like short time frames i believe on our prediction show you said like like around this time i said i thought he would make it to the second half of the year he almost did almost but not quite uh you know so you know but like there were a lot of people said there is no way this relationship can last for the long term. And there was a betting market on how long it would take before they fell apart. But, you know, there weren't a lot of people saying they'll still be buddy buddies in four years. Now, who knows? They may make up. They may all be like shaking hands again.
|
Ivan:
[1:14:57]
| I mean, Trump has made up with Trump has made up with people that he was publicly feuded like crazy. I mean, look at Marco Rubio in the fucking State Department, for God's sakes.
|
Sam:
[1:15:12]
| Yes.
|
Ivan:
[1:15:13]
| So, you know, it's possible. But I think in the short term right now, all of these, you know, Musk played this hand, played it heavily, and economically, all it's done is give him loss after loss.
|
Sam:
[1:15:33]
| Yeah, I think that's your key. And I don't know, he may fight on, he may do more stuff, But I kind of suspect that at a certain point, he realizes that he thought he had a play that he didn't. He thought there'd be all kinds of people rallying to his defense, that he'd be able to split the Republican caucus, that he might be able to kill the big, beautiful bill. Now, the big, beautiful bill has issues in the Senate anyway. It may die regardless.
|
Ivan:
[1:16:04]
| Listen, I don't know if he's killing the big, beautiful bill. I think the problem with the big, beautiful bill is a problem that is built into the big, beautiful bill. OK, all right.
|
Sam:
[1:16:13]
| That's what I say. It has a problem. It may die anyway, but I don't think it's Elon.
|
Ivan:
[1:16:16]
| Right. It's not Elon killing it. OK. But again, but here's the one thing about this. OK. And how these coalitions are and how the hell it is. Despite the fact that we're saying, hey, OK, the Republicans have stood by Donald. OK. But here's the reality. in the political environment we are in, when it's only 71%, that's not good. That's not good. It's only 71% of them. That's, that's, that's, that's, I mean, you lost 30, you lost 29% of them in this fight. So, while 71% of Republicans is strong enough to maintain, you know, all these people that you need, like the House or whatever, align nominally in terms of like, well, you're not getting impeached or whatever. Losing that percentage is enough to derail a bill like this.
|
Sam:
[1:17:13]
| Well, especially the bill was in trouble anyway. Like it barely passed in the House. And well, of course, it barely passed in the House. That's what the margin is like, you know, but right. But in the Senate, right off of day one, there were people, there were Republican senators saying they couldn't vote for it. it needed to change. They needed to adjust X, Y, Z. And the problem with that is the things that need to be adjusted to get one set of people loses another set of people. And so now I kind of feel like in the end, they'll pull out something. Now, what that something will be, I don't know. But like, I feel like whatever it is.
|
Ivan:
[1:17:56]
| It's not going to be a big, beautiful bill. Let me tell you something, whatever it is, not going to be a big, beautiful bill. And it's precisely because of what you said. Okay. The biggest problem with the big, beautiful bill is that, Any of the concessions that you need to make on this bill to get it passed lose you way too many people. You can see to the hawks more, you lose a whole bunch of moderates. They're like, look, we can't vote for this. Okay?
|
Sam:
[1:18:24]
| Right.
|
Ivan:
[1:18:25]
| You go and you try to raise taxes, that's another fucking group of people big that you lose. Any way you go and you push this damn bill because it's so big and so weirdly, you wind up losing large swats of people that say, fuck you, we can't do this.
|
Sam:
[1:18:43]
| Well, and this is also why congressional people were trying to tell Donald Trump, don't do one big, beautiful bill, do a series of smaller bills.
|
Ivan:
[1:18:53]
| Do a series of smaller bills.
|
Sam:
[1:18:54]
| Because then you can get different coalitions for these different things and maybe pass them independently. Whereas if you roll it up together, there's always something that is a breaker for somebody. Now, you know, again.
|
Ivan:
[1:19:12]
| I'll tell you one thing that I just saw this week, a group of of of I believe I don't think it was just House people. I think it was senators and House congressmen basically were making a big push to strip from the bill all these cuts that were being done to for things that were from the IRA. because they knew that their districts were going to get destroyed by these, okay?
|
Sam:
[1:19:42]
| Right.
|
Ivan:
[1:19:42]
| So there is a big push to strip all that shit out because they're like, damn it, what are we fucking doing?
|
Sam:
[1:19:50]
| Yeah, there were specifically reports of House members who had voted for the bill asking their Senate colleagues to please take this stuff out that they voted for.
|
Ivan:
[1:20:00]
| That they voted for! Fucking idiots!
|
Sam:
[1:20:03]
| For exactly the reason you're talking about. Well, they needed to get on record as supporting Trump's policies, but then they want to make sure that it doesn't actually take it to effect.
|
Ivan:
[1:20:16]
| There's one provision that would basically make it that no foreign person would want to buy any U.S. investments because of the tax implications that they added to it. It was nuts. They they put so much shit that is toxic in this bill. OK, it's this bill is it's just ridiculously bad. And, you know, the funny thing is when you get somebody, of course, not surprising, like Marjorie Taylor Greene saying, oh, this thing was in there. And then she says, oh, I never saw that. I'm like, so you didn't read the bill.
|
Sam:
[1:20:58]
| To be fair, both sides have yelled at the other side for decades about not reading the bill because that is a legislative reality in how these things are constructed.
|
Ivan:
[1:21:12]
| Come on, man. You've got a fucking staff of people to go and like parse and summarize and go through this fucking thing in order to make sure you know what the fuck is in there or not. You're not sitting. I mean, I understand how difficult it is for one person to read it. But that's why you have the staff.
|
Sam:
[1:21:31]
| You split up the 1,800 pages. Everybody gets 100 pages and you make sure to flag to your principal the things that matter.
|
Ivan:
[1:21:39]
| Exactly. But these people don't even do that anymore, Sam. They don't do that anymore.
|
Sam:
[1:21:45]
| Well, I would also say...
|
Ivan:
[1:21:48]
| Some of them.
|
Sam:
[1:21:49]
| Some of them, yeah. But I would also say there's an issue that I don't necessarily believe the protestations that they didn't know. I'm sure in some cases they don't know. I'm sure in some cases they actually didn't know because Marjorie Taylor Greene is an idiot. And so I'm sure I'm sure she didn't. OK, but I'm sure there are plenty of other people who protest. Oh, I had no idea.
|
Ivan:
[1:22:15]
| Oh, and they knew. Yeah. No, no, no. I'm with you. No, I'm with you. Yeah.
|
Sam:
[1:22:19]
| I mean, just like all of these Congress people who are like, oh, did Donald Trump tweet something? I had no idea. You know, he didn't tweet something, a truth, a truth. Well, now he truths it, but like, you know.
|
Ivan:
[1:22:33]
| Well, well, let's call it a tweet anyway, because that he was, what is a, what is something that you post on X supposed to be called?
|
Sam:
[1:22:40]
| A shit?
|
Ivan:
[1:22:42]
| Yes.
|
Sam:
[1:22:44]
| I don't know.
|
Ivan:
[1:22:45]
| Sounds perfect to me.
|
Sam:
[1:22:47]
| No, the, but yeah, that was another interesting part of this whole thing is like people are talking about how they were going at each other on their respective social media platforms. You know? You have the two billionaires each with their own captured social media that, undoubtedly are rigged to boost their own posts, etc, etc.
|
Ivan:
[1:23:14]
| No! No way! Nah! Come on! Nah!
|
Sam:
[1:23:19]
| Elon would never do that. Donald would never do that. No, no, no, but OK, here one more one more Elon related thing before we take a break and move on. I don't even know what else. Like, well, we'll see about the last segment. But there was a lot of reaction and then counter reaction to a certain group of I'm going to say Democrats, but it also included never Trumpers and such. to this whole feud going, enemy of my enemy is my friend. Let's figure out how to make nice with Elon and bring him back into the fold and figure out how to use him.
|
Ivan:
[1:24:03]
| On video, I am showing me like giving both my middle fingers to this idea. I mean, fuck Elon. I don't care. I mean, well, listen, I hated Elon before he tied himself to MAGA. So I hated him as a MAGA. I still hate him now. Fuck him.
|
Sam:
[1:24:23]
| And look, here's the thing. He is, it is one thing to cheer on and say, hey, it's great that they're fighting amongst themselves. Sure. Stand back and let them do it. It is quite another thing to say, oh, okay, in that case, let's work with Elon and see how we can make it so that he will like us and support us instead. And I think this ties to the more general question. There's been a more general debate amongst Democrats that we've touched on here before about whether the right way forward is to try to change Democratic positions to try to convert marginal Trump voters and try to bring over, you bring back the white middle class, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Like, let's let's, you know, let's throw the trans people under the bus. Let's moderate on immigration.
|
Ivan:
[1:25:26]
| Like I said before, the problem with all of these is not the it's not it's not the Democratic positions. The problem is that the Democrats never had an effective way of how to counter the straw man that that that Republicans made. Because when when when when the Republicans went anti-trans, what the Democrats did and mostly did was nothing. They didn't say they said, but they didn't go and combat the misinformation that they were giving on all of this. Well, instead of like going, I'm like, oh, my God, men, women's, you know, women's courts are being invaded by men. You should have gone and had an ad that said, guys, they're talking about five athletes out of 80,000. OK, because that's the reality. This isn't real. OK, well, true. And how they just ignored it. The same thing with abortion rights.
|
Sam:
[1:26:22]
| Yeah, we've had this.
|
Ivan:
[1:26:23]
| Again, they go, oh, the Democrats are pro-abortion. And they're like, no, idiots, we're not pro-abortion. We're pro-women's rights. But they don't scream it at the top of the lungs to oppose this misinformation.
|
Sam:
[1:26:35]
| And so the problem.
|
Ivan:
[1:26:37]
| Again, is not opposition. The problem is that the Democrats sit there and like, you know what? Oh, we're going to pass a great bill, okay? We're going to do this, and we're going to legislate, and we're going to do this or whatever. And, you know, with this walkie bill, which, by the way, has many benefits, it's going to be great. But the reality is that, unfortunately, the human reality is that most people don't see that shit that is the real shit that actually helps them live their lives, that is done behind the scenes. They don't really have the appreciation for it.
|
Sam:
[1:27:10]
| We've talked about this before. I think part of it, you're absolutely right, combat the misinformation. But I think it's fundamentally more than that. And I thought there was a brief window where I thought the Democrats were past this and were going to do this right, and then they sort of retreated to their old ways, which is... You can't retreat from these culture war issues and be like, you know, oh, like, they're talking about trans people, so we want to hide and not talk about.
|
Ivan:
[1:27:42]
| Like, this issue. No, no, no, you combat the misinformation head on.
|
Sam:
[1:27:47]
| But not only do you combat the misinformation, you vigorously defend your own position.
|
Ivan:
[1:27:53]
| And why?
|
Sam:
[1:27:54]
| You talk about why you are right and they are wrong, you know, because for years and years and years, and this goes back, I'd say, all the way to, like, I want to say the 70s on lots of issues where the Democrats sort of decided that the general, or maybe it's the 80s, maybe it's after Ronald Reagan, where the Democrats were beaten so badly by Ronald Reagan. that they decided, oh, hell, the conservative positions, the Americans really are conservative. So we have to hide our liberal positions, pretend to be more moderate, and that's the only way we can win. Like there's Bill Clinton's triangulation strategy to try to capture the middle. And you've still got a lot of people in the Democratic Party who came up in that era. Whereas, look, if you do the polling on an individual by individual basis, individual issue by individual basis, they, you know, the Democrat, the liberal position is the majority position on immigration. Immigration is questionable. It's very.
|
Ivan:
[1:29:11]
| No, no, no. On immigration. No, no, no. In immigration, you're right. I mean, immigration are against the mass deportations. Well, right, right.
|
Sam:
[1:29:19]
| Yeah. Yes. There's some question on how you word it and what kinds of things you're talking about. But yeah, on immigration, people don't want this. On gay rights, people are for gay rights now. People are for gay marriage. The trans is a little bit behind that. But getting there, you know, on social issues, on like what the safety net should look like. Marijuana, abortion. Abortion. All of these issues.
|
Ivan:
[1:29:45]
| Healthcare, social security.
|
Sam:
[1:29:46]
| All of these issues are majority positions. So occasionally you get people like Matt Iglesias and people like that saying, Democrats should just poll things and then go after the popular issues, avoid the issues that aren't. And you can see that a little bit. But the problem is that, Voters and the public at large detect inauthenticity instinctually. And so if you've got.
|
Ivan:
[1:30:10]
| People who are— One thing that you can say for sure is that Donald Trump is an authentic racist and he shows it every day. So that's why his people love him. It's true. They know he is one of theirs. They know he is one of theirs in that way.
|
Sam:
[1:30:29]
| Right. So for all of these issues, when the Democrat hides from the issue and says, oh, they're attacking me on trans issues, so I'll just be quiet about that. Or, oh, they're really aggressive on immigration, so I have to become more aggressive on immigration, too. Or all of these things, they lose respect right off the bat. First of all, one of the things that Donald Trump also showed is you can win by just going for your base. Donald Trump makes no effort whatsoever to go after the center.
|
Ivan:
[1:31:03]
| To go to the middle. Yeah, not at all.
|
Sam:
[1:31:05]
| And how has he won? He has not won by converting people in the middle. He has won by getting people out to vote who don't normally vote. And the Democrats instead are constantly going back to, ooh, how do we get this squishy voter in the middle who doesn't pay attention to anything, as opposed to energize your fucking base instead of alienating them. So, like, when there's an issue... Like any of those that we just listed, don't hide from it. Defend your goddamn position and talk about why you are right and they are wrong. I keep coming back to the weird thing and stuff like that. This is why that was working for the short period of time the Harris folks were using it.
|
Ivan:
[1:31:50]
| It was working.
|
Sam:
[1:31:50]
| Because it's like, no, we're not the ones that are out of the mainstream. They're the ones that are out of the mainstream. They're the ones that are weird. They are the ones who like are advocating for cruel and unusual things that nobody supports. That strategy was working. Now, on the other hand, with this Elon thing, you all of a sudden get all these people saying, oh, what can we do to change our positions to get Elon solidly on our side? Because that would help so much. No, no. No.
|
Ivan:
[1:32:26]
| Rule number one, tell Elon to go fuck himself. And if you forget rule number two, if you forget about that, please go back and read rule number one. That's it.
|
Sam:
[1:32:36]
| And, you know, and the Democrats also have to be willing to alienate some supporters also. Like, you know, if you listen.
|
Ivan:
[1:32:47]
| Here's one thing. Fifteen years ago, the Bernie Sanders approach was not the right approach.
|
Sam:
[1:32:53]
| Yeah okay.
|
Ivan:
[1:32:54]
| But right now it is when obama won it wasn't.
|
Sam:
[1:32:59]
| Yeah but.
|
Ivan:
[1:33:00]
| Right now that's the approach we need it needs to be combative it can't be appeasing it has to be aggressive period.
|
Sam:
[1:33:10]
| And part of that is being is having the hundred percent loss of all the governmental institutions when you were like you don't have you don't have the house you don't have the senate you don't have the presidency, you don't have the courts. In that situation, you can't act like a governing party. And I look, if you are in charge, there's certain things you have to do to govern well. But if you are.
|
Ivan:
[1:33:34]
| You have to obstruct, you have to stop, you have to, you have to always be just, listen, whatever the fuck they're doing, you do not, do not, do not. Under any circumstances, give them anything. Do not, even if it's something that you want, okay?
|
Sam:
[1:33:55]
| And frankly, even if they're going to win in the end anyway, because they have the numbers, you have to write. Even more so in that situation, you have to be the opposition.
|
Ivan:
[1:34:05]
| Yes.
|
Sam:
[1:34:06]
| Anyway.
|
Ivan:
[1:34:07]
| Yes.
|
Sam:
[1:34:08]
| That was drifting a little bit from Elon, but the reason is there is such a resurgence this last week of these people going like, yay, now Elon's our friend. Bullshit. He's not your friend. He will never be your friend.
|
Ivan:
[1:34:22]
| He wasn't your friend. He's never been your friend. Never been your friend. This guy has never been anybody's friend at all.
|
Sam:
[1:34:31]
| Okay.
|
Ivan:
[1:34:32]
| All right. I need to wrap it up.
|
Sam:
[1:34:34]
| Okay. Yeah, let's... I was going to say let's take...
|
Ivan:
[1:34:39]
| A little bit short.
|
Sam:
[1:34:40]
| Yeah, we don't need a break in a second thing. We can just wrap it. Because even if we did take a break, I'd be like, well, what are we going to talk about? There are a couple of small things.
|
Ivan:
[1:34:50]
| Yeah, there's a couple of small things, but I think we've...
|
Sam:
[1:34:53]
| I'm just going to hit...
|
Ivan:
[1:34:54]
| We covered all the... Listen, that news quiz did help us cover all the news. We got to see if we do better next time.
|
Sam:
[1:34:58]
| I'm just going to hit bullet points. Like...
|
Ivan:
[1:35:01]
| Hit the bullet points.
|
Sam:
[1:35:01]
| Hit the bullet points. If you have any quick reactions. We have Ukraine taking out a significant portion of the Russian bomber fleet.
|
Ivan:
[1:35:09]
| We forgot this happened this week! So the Ukrainians are not so dumb after all, huh?
|
Sam:
[1:35:15]
| It turns out they have some cards.
|
Ivan:
[1:35:17]
| It turns out they have some cards. By the way, one of the things that happened, and I also checked traffic maps about this, Russian traffic is in a complete snarl like crazy.
|
Sam:
[1:35:28]
| Because they're checking all the trucks now.
|
Ivan:
[1:35:30]
| Every fucking truck everywhere now is getting checked.
|
Sam:
[1:35:32]
| What happened? The Ukrainians loaded up some trucks full of drones.
|
Ivan:
[1:35:38]
| And they hired Russian truckers.
|
Sam:
[1:35:39]
| Yeah, essentially, by the way, what they're doing here that is extremely clever, that they have been really innovating on dramatically over the last few years, they essentially take commercial drones and modify them to weaponize them. So we're talking about like drones that are on the order of $1,500 to $2,000 a pop, as opposed to like, you know, these mega drones that.
|
Ivan:
[1:36:04]
| Yeah, like a Reaper or something. A Reaper, right. I was going to say Rapier. No, Reaper.
|
Sam:
[1:36:09]
| That costs like billions of dollars or however the hell much they cost.
|
Ivan:
[1:36:13]
| Well, they're not billions. They're expensive.
|
Sam:
[1:36:16]
| Trillions.
|
Ivan:
[1:36:16]
| They're way more expensive.
|
Sam:
[1:36:17]
| Trillions.
|
Ivan:
[1:36:19]
| Trillions. Yes, as our Secretary of Education said this week, yes.
|
Sam:
[1:36:22]
| Anyway.
|
Ivan:
[1:36:22]
| She's cutting $1.5 trillion.
|
Sam:
[1:36:24]
| Anyway, these are relatively inexpensive drones. And the ones they use for this are sort of on the high end of what they're using in the field all over Ukraine as well. But they modify these things. They put weapons on them, whatever. They put a whole bunch of them in specially modified trucks. They hired Russian truckers to transport them that had no idea what they were transporting them. And then they had them leave them like a couple of miles from military bases and then remote control, launch all the drones, blow up a whole bunch of planes. You know, they take off from close enough that there's not a lot of time to respond. And boom. And, you know, people have pointed out the biggest.
|
Ivan:
[1:37:07]
| The biggest issue Russia has right now, they can't replace those planes.
|
Sam:
[1:37:11]
| Yeah.
|
Ivan:
[1:37:12]
| They, they're, they, they have no way of replacing those planes.
|
Sam:
[1:37:16]
| At least on any term of reasonable time frame. Yes.
|
Ivan:
[1:37:19]
| Yeah, right. Yeah. Actually, they don't have a, I mean, they don't have, they don't have factories or churning them out. They can't just, you know, it would take like.
|
Sam:
[1:37:28]
| Years, years and years.
|
Ivan:
[1:37:30]
| Yes, years and years.
|
Sam:
[1:37:31]
| Yeah. So anyway, yeah, Ukraine did this and people are talking about how, look, the whole world has to adapt to this new reality of how things work. because defenses were set up against like you're sending fighters and.
|
Ivan:
[1:37:46]
| Bombers from another country and you.
|
Sam:
[1:37:50]
| See them on radar and you set up your your counter fighters and you use anti-aircraft guns and blah blah blah blah blah none of that works against.
|
Ivan:
[1:38:00]
| Small drones launched some of it works i know that the navy has been adapting because they've been getting hit by drones at see they've had them and there are certain weapon systems that were designed there are ways to.
|
Sam:
[1:38:13]
| Adapt the point is.
|
Ivan:
[1:38:14]
| There you have to they have to adapt you have to adapt you cannot you cannot depend the old way of doing.
|
Sam:
[1:38:20]
| Things is dead.
|
Ivan:
[1:38:21]
| Yeah so so there are certain systems that are being adapted in order to be able to and another thing is that in the past in any times when you detected things like this right and this is something that's happened to that you you consider that oh that's noise, which is not, we're not paying attention to that. Now you can't, now you can't say that's noise. Now you got to go and like, your sensors, your whatever that you're using, you got to like, no, that's not noise anymore.
|
Sam:
[1:38:48]
| And your decision-making process, because instead of having, you know, 20 minutes notice or something, you may have 20 seconds notice.
|
Ivan:
[1:38:55]
| Seconds to decide. Yeah.
|
Sam:
[1:38:57]
| Yeah. So, okay, we got Ukraine. We got the new travel ban. We did have a question on that on the quiz.
|
Ivan:
[1:39:02]
| We did have a question on the travel ban and we answered it. You answered it incorrectly.
|
Sam:
[1:39:05]
| I did. I was wrong. Donald has instigated a new investigation of Biden's use of Autopan.
|
Ivan:
[1:39:14]
| Uh-huh.
|
Sam:
[1:39:15]
| Yep. There was an escalation in ICE versus anti-ICE protesters in L.A., like last night.
|
Ivan:
[1:39:25]
| A lot of places, actually. But yeah, in L.A.
|
Sam:
[1:39:27]
| It got biggest in L.A. yesterday. But it's been growing over the last few weeks anyway, where there have been groups that have come out to try to get in the way of ICE when they're doing enforcement actions. and there are starting to be conflicts between.
|
Ivan:
[1:39:49]
| Listen, I have said, and, you know, we talked about non-aggressive Democrats not being aggressive. If I'm the mayor, I'm the governor of the state. I'm like right now, my thing is right now I'm looking out for human rights. I'm looking for violations of due process by ICE. And I'm starting to I'm starting to I'm starting to arrest ICE agents. You're not following due process here. You know, I'm dragging you to jail. And that's how and you're you're you're you. Oh, you think you don't have the because they don't have the authority. They don't. Listen, I know by law, because this is this is a question that came to to to an issue in Puerto Rico. They don't have the authority to question U.S. citizens. You don't have it. So there was a thing that for years they tried to do when you exited Puerto Rico, where they kept asking people whether you were a U.S. citizen or not. And they were taking people who refused to answer the question and bringing them in for questioning. That went to the courts. The courts determined, you know what? ICE agents don't have that right. Immigration agents do not have that right. And the problem right now is that we're letting them get away with way too much.
|
Sam:
[1:40:51]
| Well, and there are also a lot of situations where they are relying on people not knowing that for certain things they are actually required to have warrants. And so, like, people can say, no, I'm not letting you in unless you can show me a warrant or whatever.
|
Ivan:
[1:41:08]
| Show me a warrant or whatever. You've got no right to come in here, period.
|
Sam:
[1:41:12]
| Yeah.
|
Ivan:
[1:41:12]
| But this is a big problem. But my problem is that if I'm a mayor and I'm a sheriff of a city and I've got immigration agents breaking the law left and right, you know what I'm doing? I'm fucking arresting these assholes. That's what I would be doing. They want to start with this shit. You want to start breaking the law left and right? You think that you've got the right to just break the law in my city? Fuck you, no. Okay?
|
Sam:
[1:41:35]
| Yeah, I think we are seeing escalation of this situation. And we're seeing, yeah, in LA, they were using, you know, the non-lethal force.
|
Ivan:
[1:41:47]
| Flashbang.
|
Sam:
[1:41:48]
| Flashbang.
|
Ivan:
[1:41:48]
| Whatever, but it's ridiculous. It's ridiculous for an immigration raid.
|
Sam:
[1:41:52]
| Well, and I think it's only a matter of time till we get like the equivalent of what happened in Kent State in the 60s. And some protester gets killed and then you'll start seeing reaction to that. This is going to escalate. I see no way.
|
Ivan:
[1:42:08]
| It's going to escalate. Yeah.
|
Sam:
[1:42:10]
| Okay. Along those lines, last item I'm going to mention here is Garcia has been returned from El Salvador. Yeah. Now they have indicted him.
|
Ivan:
[1:42:20]
| Now they have made up these charges against him.
|
Sam:
[1:42:23]
| Well, here's the thing. I've seen a few legal reviews of the indictment that say it's really weak. There might be something, but it's really weak. There are all kinds of holes I can put in this. But the fundamental thing, I've seen a lot of the Republicans say things along the, essentially boiling down to, okay, fine. Are you happy now? And the answer is, well, kind of, because now he will go through the proper process. You say you have charges against him. We were never saying necessarily that this guy was pure as the driven snow.
|
Ivan:
[1:43:00]
| But by the way, there is something that, no, no, no, here's something. Okay, listen, there is significant evidence that the U.S. attorney for Tennessee resigned the moment that he was coming back. And the main reason why in the background they said is because he basically said that this entire chart is made up and political.
|
Sam:
[1:43:15]
| Yes. But here's the thing. They now have to prove it. You know? And so this will go to court. It will, you know, it'll go through the standard process. Either the guy will be convicted or he won't be. Now, they're trying to keep him in pretrial detention the whole time. We'll see if that flies. And if it is completely made up and he gets exonerated, we'll see what happens then. I mean, the guy shouldn't have, assuming this stuff is fairly flimsy, then he shouldn't be going through any of this at all, of course. But at least now, the basic principle at play here is there has to be a process. The government can't just say, you're bad. And send you to El Salvador.
|
Ivan:
[1:44:03]
| El Salvador.
|
Sam:
[1:44:04]
| They have to prove their case. They have to have a case and they have to prove the case. And, you know, and we'll see what happens in this case. But that's the important principle. And so many people on the MAGA side are like, well, that's bullshit. He's a bad guy. He shouldn't have due process. But the problem is, if you don't have that.
|
Ivan:
[1:44:25]
| Everybody has due process.
|
Sam:
[1:44:27]
| If you don't have that process for. everyone, then there's nothing stopping you from abusing that power for everyone.
|
Ivan:
[1:44:38]
| Right.
|
Sam:
[1:44:39]
| You know, and whether or not this individual guy is guilty or not is not actually the point. Now, if they're completely railroading an innocent man, there should be consequences for that. There may or may not actually be in the end. But even if he, if he turned, let's say he turns out to be guilty. He did all the stuff they said. well you still need to prove it and that right that's what they're doing okay that was the last thing i had.
|
Ivan:
[1:45:05]
| All right so we're done.
|
Sam:
[1:45:07]
| We're done okay everybody uh curmudgeon-corner.com you can find our archives you can find all the ways to contact us you can find transcripts you can find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow you can find all the good stuff you could possibly want right Yvonne.
|
Ivan:
[1:45:28]
| Absolutely everything everything the whole time everything.
|
Sam:
[1:45:31]
| Everything yes and if you don't find everything all the time if you don't find any of that on curmudgeon-corner.com that is your fault for it is not ours you know it's your problem that's.
|
Ivan:
[1:45:45]
| Your problem you know I sorry but you know.
|
Sam:
[1:45:48]
| Do better please anyway one of the things is a link to our patreon where you can give us money we would like more money And at various levels, we'll send you a postcard, we'll send you a mug, blah, blah, blah. I still owe postcards. Sorry. I wrote them. I just haven't sent them to Yvonne to send to whatever. I'll get to it eventually. And yeah, we'll send you all that. And importantly, at $2 a month or more, or if you just ask, we'll invite you to the we will invite you to the Curmudgeon's Corner Slack, where Yvonne and I and a bunch of other folks are hanging out, chatting, sharing links, et cetera. So Yvonne, one thing from the chat that will make people really, really, really wish to join our Slack and be on there all the time.
|
Ivan:
[1:46:35]
| From the LA Times, an AI startup back Mike Marcusoff revealed to be 700 Indian employees pretending to be chatbots.
|
Sam:
[1:46:44]
| Is that a problem, Yvonne?
|
Ivan:
[1:46:46]
| As long as it works, no. Look, I did, for full disclosure, when I was at Kodak, I did release a product called the Kodak Scan Cloud.
|
Sam:
[1:46:55]
| Uh-huh.
|
Ivan:
[1:46:56]
| All right. Now, the Kodak Scan Cloud.
|
Sam:
[1:46:58]
| Are you going to get in trouble for revealing this, Yvonne?
|
Ivan:
[1:47:00]
| Not really. I mean, you know, I don't think so. You know, look, I launched this. The one thing is that I didn't, look, the whole thing was that we would scan capture data on your documents, okay? We had an SLA. that we would meet and that you would get this information fed into your system. Now, I didn't say how that happened. It made it sound like it was technology. But the reality is that I had this place staffed with people 24-7 that basically when the documents came in, there was some technology involved, but there was humans that had to really do the last mile of it in order for your document to be processed. But I didn't say that anyway. So I'm not surprised that somebody... And the reason, the reason why I did that is because there was software that could automatically do this, but the licenses were so expensive that the reality is that the people were cheaper.
|
Sam:
[1:47:54]
| Yeah.
|
Ivan:
[1:47:54]
| And by the way, more accurate as well. The people were cheaper and more accurate.
|
Sam:
[1:47:58]
| There you go.
|
Ivan:
[1:47:59]
| So I was like, well, what the hell, you know?
|
Sam:
[1:48:03]
| Well, I, so, so yeah.
|
Ivan:
[1:48:04]
| So I'm sure that that's what the, what they figured out with the 700 guys. They're like, wait, the technology will say stupid shit that we don't want it to say. It'll give you wrong answers. What the hell? You know, we'll just put 700 people back there. We won't tell everybody that's.
|
Sam:
[1:48:20]
| Well, didn't you mention last week that Tesla was hiring a team of.
|
Ivan:
[1:48:25]
| Yes.
|
Sam:
[1:48:26]
| For drivers. For their self-driver.
|
Ivan:
[1:48:28]
| For their self-driving. Yes. For the driverless taxis. Yes. Well, hiring drivers.
|
Sam:
[1:48:33]
| Which, by the way, is apparently typical of all of these self-driving taxi folks.
|
Ivan:
[1:48:42]
| Yes, I mean, Waymo has people that can take over remotely in case the vehicle gets into it.
|
Sam:
[1:48:48]
| The question, of course, is how often is the human having to do something versus how often it really is automated.
|
Ivan:
[1:48:54]
| Right. If it's basically driving the full time.
|
Sam:
[1:48:56]
| And that's not always disclosed.
|
Ivan:
[1:48:58]
| Right. Yes, that is true.
|
Sam:
[1:49:01]
| One of these companies that had to i forget which one that had to pull out of some marketplace after an accident or whatever ended up revealing that they had like two drivers on staff for every car or whatever and yes um and so and i believe there's even one company out there who doesn't try to fake it. And it's just like, this isn't, this isn't a self-driving car. It's just that your chauffeur happens to be in Mumbai. we're driving the car by remote control from wherever.
|
Ivan:
[1:49:37]
| I mean honestly look there is an advantage to not having to be with another human being in the car right i mean i really you know for the most part i don't i don't i one reason i like to drive myself i don't want to be in the car with some other person i have no idea who the hell they are fuck this shit right, Yeah, let him be 5,000, 7,000 miles away. The hell with this shit.
|
Sam:
[1:50:03]
| Yeah, well, okay. Anyway, we are done. Thank you, everybody. Have a nice week. We'll be back next week. Stay safe. Have a good time, etc., etc., etc., etc. Goodbye.
|
Ivan:
[1:50:17]
| Bye.
|
Sam:
[1:50:47]
| Do-do-do-do-do-do-do. Okay, later, Yvonne. Have a good weekend.
|
Ivan:
[1:50:52]
| Okay. All right, let's do this.
|
