STDWYTK Live: Secrets of The Federal Reserve

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to a special episode of Stuff. They don't want
you to know that we made it back from our
time on the road. Yeah. We went all over the place, Boston,
we were in Arlington, right over by d C, Philly, Brooklyn,
and even here in Atlanta. Yeah, we met so many
amazing people. We want to thank everyone who came to

(00:22):
check out the show. Uh, don't be strangers. Feel free
to write to us. Yeah, especially those of you. We
actually hung out with some people after shows. Yeah, I
got to meet some people. It was great. Great. Uh
it was a grilled cheese. Yeah, it was a grilled cheese,
tomato and bacon. Online. So we we had a ton

(00:42):
of adventures and we recorded the show. What you're about
to hear, folks, is the let's see, this is us
in Atlanta, right, does our hometown show? Absolutely this this
one just it turned out really well. It's that home
field advantage. I think we'll see, well, no spoilers, but

(01:04):
here we have it, Uh, the Atlanta version of our Stuff.
Then once you know live tour, let us know what
you think. Hello, Hello, Hello, welcome. Oh my gosh, you guys,

(01:32):
we did it. We came to our hometown and and
and the crowd showed up to see us live. How
are you doing. Yeah, it's Sunday. It is all right.
We had to check earlier. We have no idea what
day it is. At this point. It's been a bit
of a blur. It's been a bit of a it's
been a bit of a blur. But we want to
thank you so much for coming out. Is astonishing to

(01:56):
us to record in our hometown live. Now we this
is this is the last show of our tour and
we saved it for you for Atlanta. I like your
hat by the way. Uh. And we went We went
to a bunch of places really yeah, we did. Um.
My favorite highlight of the tour was having a lobster

(02:17):
roll at a dive bar in Boston, because that's the thing.
They're just lousy with lobsters there and they're all particularly Yeah.
And then yesterday I I almost died. I choked on
a bone from a fish um at a tire restaurant
and had a panic attack. But these guys got me
through it. And now here I am to be with
you find people. Yeah. We we played a show in
Arlington at this old theater and it was beautiful because

(02:39):
all of the seats were like old office chairs that
have been just discarded by someone, but they just purchased
them all or found them on the side of the
road and just filled the entire theater with them. And
then they were remnants, like they were weird piles of
them just in the corners, and they were weird tables.
It looked like we were going to do a meeting
for the United Nations or something. Yeah, and it was

(03:00):
like one of those like the Buckhead Theater, I forget,
not the theater. It's one of the old or something,
one of the newer movie theaters that actually has food
there too, so you're sitting in these seats and ordering food.
It was just an odd experience, was it was it
as odd as the one in um Boston where there
was a kid's park core class going on outside of
our which it was fantastic. Those kids have moves. We

(03:24):
we tried to hang with them. Yeah, they weren't having it.
They were having but it was literally open the door
to the dressing room and there's just like these little
tiny midget people just zooming by, like like tires and
like you know, bars and stuff. It was pretty wild.
But they did actually say park Core while they were things.
But now we're in a place called Terminal West, which

(03:46):
rules do you do? You? Guys ever come out here
to see shows like music? Awesome live shows. We're on
that stage right now. Oh boy, Oh, and we're supposed
to do a show. That's why we're here, right, So
let's le's get started. Yeah, welcome back to the show.
My name is Matt, my name isn't all and they

(04:07):
called me Ben. Most importantly, you are you. You are
here and that makes this the stuff they don't want
you to know. We're joined also by our super producer,
Paul Decade. Hey, will you stand please? Let us embarrass
you guy. This guy makes our show happen. He uh.

(04:27):
We continually cajole him to get on microphone with us.
He continually refuses. I know, I know, I know, but
but then he surrounded by a lot of other house
stuff works. Oh, I see you, I see some celebrities
in the crowd. Can I get your autograph later? Guys,
I don't want to make it weird, but I made

(04:48):
it weird, made it weird all right? Well? Well, yes,
Paul mission Control Decade, we're finally back. And we were
on the road for a while and we had these
bizarre our adventures roaming through New England, roaming through historic places.
Every city we have been to, including Atlanta, has has

(05:11):
a few things in common. Right, There's a there's a
bunch of graffiti everywhere. Oddly enough, there's a regional Federal
Reserve Bank, which in every city we went to, in
every single one. And when we were thinking about our show,
we we started we started brainstorming, and we were we
were thinking about hidden things, signs, symbols, secret languages, and

(05:36):
we were wondering how they came to be and why
and what they mean and uh more so, why do
some of the world's most powerful, influential institutions use secret science, codes, signals,
languages every year, every month, every week, every day? Then
are you talking about the shadowy organization that operates out

(05:58):
of that five I did buildings over near Arlington, Virginia,
where we were that has absolutely nothing to do with pentagrams.
I mean, I mean there are a lot of a a
buildings with five sides. I here it has a subway
and a best Buy. Um, it's true. They're the branding
as part of it as well, right, right, It's true. Well,
you know, Matt the Pentagon is arguably involved, but that

(06:23):
comes later, I think, right, I will wait, do we
want to call it foreshadowy? Yes, okay, then we'll call
it foreshadowy. So we're hoping that you join us today
as we dive into the strange stories of these signs, languages, signals,
and symbols that allegedly influence us everywhere we go. And
the institutions are one of them anyway that just loves them. Yes, yes, absolutely,

(06:48):
so Okay, So this is a modern city. Atlanta is
a pretty big city, and every time you walk through
any modern city in the US or abroad, we are
in in aided with literally millions of images of messages, right,
and they're non consensual. You don't wake up in the
morning and agreed to see twelve thousand billboards. You just

(07:11):
have to go do something. And we had a time
a while back, Matt, you and I years ago, had
had a fool's errand where we said, you know what,
we're gonna wake up tomorrow. We're going to count every
single advertisement that we see during the day. We we
really did it, and we got to about two hundred
or so. I think both of us maxed out around

(07:31):
that range two hundred range I gave up am Yeah,
it was rough. Um and and it's just crazy. And
a lot of its logos that are kind of unassuming
that you just notice on the side or on somebody's
shirt or a hat, sir, awesome shirt. Um. And it
could just be as simple as a letter or something
like that, or like if it's a logo, you look
at something like we all know this, the FedEx logo

(07:53):
that has that secret arrow in there, or the Amazon
logo that also has a not so secret arrow. It's
gotta it's gott a smile that starts at where it
starts at, like a yeah, and it goes to Z.
Lets you know you can get everything online, right that
All all you need is a tiny little symbol that
lets you know exactly what something is. You don't have

(08:15):
to communicate with words beyond that, and the smile just
lets you know that everything is cool. Amazon is a
completely innocuous organization, and story Goods and Service doesn't be
able to buy your laundy in Tergon with a push
of a button. It's a fantastic company. I'm a fan.
We're getting those drones for you, says Jeff Bezos. But
but this, this is weird because it goes beyond advertisements.

(08:36):
There is a great deal of money and time spent
to create logos that you know, FedEx has letters of it, right,
Amazon also has letters in it. But the parts of
our brain that are being engaged when we see these
logos are non verbal things. They're not they're not the
language part of our brain, you know. What they are

(08:57):
instead are imagistic, embolic things we're meant to connect with you,
like on almost an emotional kind of primorial level. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
it's absolutely primal level. And we thought, how far does
this go? Right, right, We've all seen Madmen or read
the Wikipedia entries about it, I'm sure so. So we
know that advertising is historically huge industry, but the idea

(09:21):
of secret symbols, secret signs, secret languages goes far beyond advertising.
It predates it. We wanted to find an example for you,
and we wanted to start with something that used to
be alarmingly cartoonishly common. It's something you may not have
heard of in the modern day. The name sounds a

(09:41):
bit silly, but here we go. It's hobo code. Hobo code.
Here you go. You got to enunciate it because we
had a couple of shows where people didn't know what
we were saying. Yeah, so here's the thing. The it
does sound kind of like it could be like the
name of like some kind of prog band, the concept
album or so kind of like concept EP or something

(10:05):
hobo code. Yeah, but no, it's not. It's actually an
entire kind of cryptographic language. Um. And it surrounds the
world of of the hobo, which you may know today
as being a bit of a pejorative or something you
might say to your you know, significant other if they're
not dressed well or like it's weird. It's an anachronistic,
Like some of us are here with our significant others.

(10:26):
If you're ever in a fight with him and you
call him a hobo, then they're just like out of
the argument. They don't understand what's going on. Why would
say that? Yeah, They're like, what year is it? Tim?
I apologize if anyone here is named Tim. But the
the idea of this goes back to a part of
American history that we don't often talk about outside of

(10:48):
maybe middle school, high school, the Great Depression, The world
of the hobo I tenerant workers without homes who had
to leave their communities due to the fact that there
were no means of sustainable employment. This world is often
romanticized nowadays, right you got that, You got the guy
with the bendle, then the stick with the bag and

(11:09):
like the crumpled hat, maybe a pipe or something, trusty
dog riding the rails, and not a care in the world.
Only kind of a lot of cares in the world,
because the world, as it turns out, it was a terrifying,
terrifying place um and they find themselves in that position,
not of any real action that they took. Perhaps it's
something that was kind of forced on them. If you
don't have a home, then this is this is kind

(11:29):
of what you do, and it's a it's a brutal
and demanding existence. And the problem with this is we
don't know too much about this community because it was
largely an oral tradition. These people weren't buying wings of museums,
they weren't financing some sort of scholarship program. You can

(11:50):
find some interviews, you can find a couple of books
by some intrepid journalists, and you can hear some i'll
say it creepy songs. The stayed in the American Songbook.
They might actually know Rock Candy Mountain. Oh yeah, yeah,
no one up north does. Nobody knows this song. People
in this audience know Rock Candy Mountain. Yeah, okay, so

(12:14):
there's uh the song, the version of it you hear
has one verse exercised from from what will typically play
on on a you know, blue bluegrass kind of station.
The last verse is it turns out the entire song
is a message from a hobo to a young runaway child,

(12:37):
and the last verse is the child saying, I am
not going to let you take what you call it,
no hobo hobo heaven. Yeah. Yeah, that's the Big Rock
Candy Mountain. Yeah, yeah, exactly. But now that way, now,
now you're making it makes it sound like hoboes were
like evil or something. That's not true. There were just
they were just people, which is but this is this
is the story of an evil hobo. But um yeah. So,

(12:58):
but the idea is really at the Big Rock Candy
Mountain is sort of like the thing you have to
look forward to in this you know, hard fought life
is basically the afterlife, because that's about the best you're
gonna get. But in the meantime, before this happens. There
were some pretty powerful symbols that were created to help
communicate conditions in this community that was known as the

(13:19):
Brotherhood of Yeah, the Brotherhood of the freight, right exactly.
So you can google Big Rock, Candy Mountain full lyrics
just by the way, We're not gonna recite them. But this,
this message, the system of symbols existed for uh, five

(13:39):
hundred thousand people in the early nineteen hundreds, and its
spiked a seven hundred thousand by nineteen eleven. By the
Great Depression, the number exploded and we reached we reached
something called peak hobo. That's the official term. That's that's
the scientific term. And while these people were on the rails,
living on the fringes of a society that did not

(14:00):
want them around, they devised a system that that we
would not recognize to communicate with one another. And this
this system, uh, this system was meant to warn other travelers,
other people in this brotherhood that you mentioned nol about

(14:22):
the conditions of the town they would find, or about
things that would be beneficial or to be a system
of warnings, right, And it didn't use words. Yeah, that's
this is highly important because a lot of this population
was either illiterate or they were speaking different languages, so
there wasn't a whole lot of common from a language perspective.

(14:44):
So it like, did you call it hoboglyphs already like
hieroglyphics in a way, because it is. It's it's um
you've you've likened it before to the IKEA, Yeah, the
IKEA instruction manual. Right, we've all bought disappointing furniture, Like
we know what that is. You know they're there are
no words. Those same manuals are printed and distributed across

(15:07):
the globe because everyone can get that that awkward humanoid
figure in their awkward buddy, Yeah you don't. You don't
need words for it, right, That's the whole point of this,
and that is the one indisputable, concrete remnant of this community,
this thing called hobo code. Let's do you guys want
to do some examples what hobo code Islets, so, let's

(15:31):
say you're going into a new town and you're looking
for food as you may want to do, as we
all usually want to do, and they're somebody has come
along and found a good free food source from some
building or some group of people that lives in an area,
So you'll you'd note this to anyone else who comes
after you by making a T. Except it's not just
any t. It's like a box and then another box.

(15:53):
It looks similar to tetris and the good pieces you know,
the law, the important ones you know. Um, but that's
kind of cool. So if you if you note that
somewhere in your town, perhaps this means there's a good
source of free food there. Well. There is even like
a variation of it where I believe it had a
cross up on the side, which implied that if you
talk religion or like kind of act like your end
to Jesus, that they will give you free food. So

(16:15):
that's another important little tip. Um. We have another one
that would warn people about the state of like natural resources,
like a water supply that may have been like tainted.
So that would be a squiggly line with like another
line on top and another line on the bottom. And
now will let him know to like avoid this well
because it will make you intensely ill. Right, good stuff

(16:35):
to know, Yeah, need food, need water. I'm gonna give
you some warnings just so you know. And the people
who lived in these communities would have no idea what
these symbols were. I mean a capital T. You would
just be like, wow, that guy's name must be Tim again,
I hope no one. And they also like, it's not
like it was alarmingly large or like printed in some

(16:56):
super central place. It would be in a place that
these folks would maybe know where to look for them. Yeah,
and kind of temporary with like chalk or coal or
something that was readily available. And there was there was
a darker side to this as well, because in many cases,
perhaps a preponderance of cases this these symbols were meant
to warn uh, to warn other travelers of danger. There

(17:19):
would be something that looks like a square, but it's
turned on a corner, so it's sort of a diamond
and it has one line going up and that meant
be out of this town by sundown, be ready to
defend yourself. There's no way someone could guess that, right,
I mean no. And that's the thing too about this language,
in the way it evolves. It was experiential, so you know,

(17:39):
these folks would have to um have these experiences enough
to the point where it would spread and they would
know to look for these symbols. Because it wouldn't just
happen overnight, because some of them you could kind of
I kea and figure out, oh, I think this is
what this means. But ones like this we're a little
bit more um shrouded and kind of mystery, and law
enforcement plays a big role. Series of interlocking circles mean

(18:02):
handcuffs or law enforcement will put you in a chain gang.
I like the point that you bring up here, Nol,
because although the term hobo code is very fun to say,
tried it at home, the reality of this is that
this was a language built on tragedy and suffering and blood.
And it sounds like a neat historical footnote. But here's

(18:24):
the thing. These secret messages exist today. People are still alive.
Thousands and thousands of people are riding the rails, are
living on the fringes of society and using new iterations
of this code to communicate. So Atlanta has got a
pretty decent train hopping community. If you've ever been to
a little Five Points, like you see the folks with

(18:45):
like the dogs, with the bandanas and stuff. I mean,
that's sort of that's like a modern hobo. I'm not kidding.
And I grew up with kids like that that would
hop trains and made a whole way of life around it,
and they kind of carry on some of these traditions. Yeah,
So does this mean that the word old of secret
symbols and languages is relegated to people who are maybe
burnouts or on the lamb or living on the fringes

(19:07):
of society. And we solved it is that, Yes, we
have And that concludes the show. So coming, thank you,
thank you. It's disappointing. Oh We're we gonna keep going. Yeah, yeah,
we should, We probably should. But it's true, it's not
that simple. Secret symbols also exist in the world of art, right.
We we explored things in the past, like the toy

(19:29):
be tiles. What are those meant? There are these weird
linonium art pieces that get pushed into the ground in
in asphalt on streets in mostly Philadelphia and New York
and other places like that. And it says toyb idea
in movie two thousand one resurrect dead on Jupiter. Cool, right,

(19:50):
really cool. There's a couple other flavors of them as
well as far as the text. But I mean, but
this is the main idea that the idea, I mean yeah,
I mean it's we don't know, we don't know who
makes them. It's it's in English, it's using the alphabet. Well,
it doesn't mean that toy and Bee felt like he
was plagiarized by Stanley Kubrick in two thousand one Space
Odyssey was there resurrecting of dead on Jupiter and Space

(20:13):
really really not in the interpretation theatrical release. But then
there are other works of art like the Codex Saraphinus
or the Yeah. Yeah, they're purposely created to have some
sort of inscrutable language, and they are known to be
works of fiction. So does that mean then that the

(20:35):
world of secret signs and symbols is relegated to uh,
relatively cerebral works of art or the fringes of mainstream culture.
I'm gonna say no this time because I feel like
that's probably a better answer. Yeah, we can move on,
we can move forward to the next thing that they're relegated. Yeah. Yeah,
So the world of secret symbols actually goes much much, much,

(20:56):
much much deeper. In fact, as we all came to
Terminal West tonight, we may well have carried some of
the world's most famous agglomerations of secret symbols with us
in our pockets, in our wallets and our purses, in
our Fannie packs. I hear those are making a come back.
I'm a fan of the Fannie pack. I mean it's
a utilitarian yet stylish accessory. I have no problem with

(21:21):
the Fanti pack. You can wear it on the side,
right on the back, wear it on the front. What. Yeah, So,
according to numerous critics, the most powerful secret symbols anti
Fanni pac man. What's your problem? Because we already we
already got you a present. Are you gonna? Are you serious?
It's a Gucci bag, Fanni pac man it. We'll just

(21:45):
please really really good. Yeah, please make surprise. Oh my gosh,
you got Okay, no, when we get the Fanti pack.
But but it does go much deeper, because these secret
symbols that people will argue are are most powerful in
our world today, are on something we and you and

(22:06):
your fellow Americans carry with you every single moment theoretically,
and it's a weird thing. It's a really dirty thing
about it carries traces of fecal matter. Yeah yeah yeah.
But as we are recording this right now, statistically speaking,
people are literally murdering one another for a chance to
touch it. Hight percent of it carries traces of cocaine.

(22:33):
These are both conservative estimates, by the way, despite the
fact that possession of this drug carries very harsh consequences
conspiracy realists. We're talking about by far the most ubiquitous
medium for hidden symbols in the Western world. It is
the US dollar. Feel free to take one out after
you heard the statistics about ship and uh, and if

(22:54):
you have it, check the designs as it. You don't
have to. Oh my god, dude, did you not hear
the stats doesn't continue? Okay, well, I mean it's better
than that. I heard was like a d feces and
cocaine out, But I'm gonna yeah. So if you've if

(23:15):
you've seen the back of one dollar bill, if you have,
your odds are pretty good as far as not touching
coop on balance, if you want to hold this with
us uh. If you've ever seen the back of this bill,
one thing will immediately stick out. It's engraved with a
gigantic stone pyramid similar to what you would see in Egypt.

(23:35):
There's a desert the whole nine that's weird and just
a giant pyramid it's fine, it's fine. Yeah. Pyramids are
like a classic move architecturally speaking, right, yes, but there's
something different about this pyramid. Right. Instead of a normal capstone,
there's a floating capstone suspended in mid air with this

(23:56):
all seeing I just sort of staring out at you,
kind of like the the eye of Sauron and Lord
of the Rings mystical ship. Yeah, I mean it's weird.
It's not quite on brand with the US. It really
does stare right right at you and like it follows
you when you move around the room, which is weird
considering how small it is. Right right, And this symbol, uh,

(24:18):
this symbol has several names. One of the most popular
names comes from Christian mythology. It's called the eye of Providence.
And usually when we are looking into early Christian mythology
and folklore, we defer to Matt. So Matt, not to
put you on the spot, but to put you on
the spot in front of a bunch of people. What
what's the eye of providence? Oh? Well, in this case,

(24:40):
we're we're talking about the symbol of a triangle. Right,
triangle has three angles to it, three sides. What could
that mean? It's probably the three aspects of God, right,
father son, you can say with me, holy Spirit? Why
does Holy Spirit get too? They said that to say,
it's not, it's not. It's good. Thanks, there's there's this.

(25:06):
One of the first known appearances of this comes in
a painting called The Supper of Maus, created by a
guy named Caravaggio for the Carthusians in like fifteen twenty five.
But it's not it's not super blatant. This is the
one though, that contains that there's rays of light that
we talked about A Yeah, I mentioned exactly the emanating
from this this triangle, and this painting is what first

(25:28):
featured that in Like, I think it's a reflection through
a glass or something. It's pretty subtle, but it's meant
to be like this divine light of Christ. Somewhat cool. Yeah,
So if you go even further back in history, you
will see that this wasn't always called the Eye of Providence.
It does have some sort of folkloreic precedents, let's say

(25:54):
in Egypt. Oh, yeah, you're talking about the Eye of Horace,
a different odd horse of a sky god um that
was represented by that. I you've probably seen it before.
It looks like it has some really killer eyeshadow going on. Yeah,
you probably see like a smoky eye. It is really

(26:16):
learned a lot from my wife about eyeshadow. It's important.
It's important stuff. Um. But this, this horse, this god
horse is also sometimes often depicted as a falcon. You're alive, well,
and you may you may notice on the other side
of the bill that we're going to talk about a

(26:36):
little later. Uh, there's a big old eagle hanging out.
You think he's got a name, like an official name
in the parlance of this this symbolism and imagery. What
he looks Gregory Gregory. Okay, Yeah, that checks out. Yeah, okay,
so Gregory the Eagle, Gregory the Eagle. Let's fast forward
to the United States. How did this weird symbol end

(26:59):
up on the dollars that we're trading and apparently pooping
on every day? Uh, it's it's a weird story. It
wasn't always there. The eye itself was not originally on
the dollar. The pyramid and the eye are both part
of a much older thing called the Great Seal. Way
back in seventeen seventy six, around July four, Surprise, Benjamin

(27:21):
Franklin and John Adams and a few others were thinking
to each other, how do we make these thirteen states
look more like more legit? Yeah, yeah, like, how do
we we want to make an impression? You know what
we should bring? We need branding, we should get a stamp,
you guys, like, let's stamp some stuff, you know. And
so they came up with this great seal. It's approved

(27:43):
on what June two correct, And these symbols themselves are
supposed to reflect the beliefs of the founding fathers, some
pretty standard I would say, beliefs when you're creating a
new country. Uh what what are these beliefs? Independent enlightenment? Right,
these are these are important things. But those two ideas

(28:06):
have something in common with a lot of movements or
a big movement that was occurring around that same time. Yeah.
Someone in the audience right now is like, Freemason's I
know it. I know they were free icy. Yeah, thanks
for coming. Do we have any Freemasons? Is it your
grandpapa Freemason? There was some association with my family. Is that?

(28:28):
Is that all you can say? That's saying we asked
him this question every show. I'm cool though, I'm cool. Yeah,
because is it like cop rules. Do you have to
tell us that you're a mason if we ask? Alright?
Moving on, Moving on. So the front of the seal,
as you said, not to picks a bald eagle holding
and olive branch and one claw and uh and arrows

(28:51):
and the other right piece of war cool, I get it,
dichotomys that's tight. But the but the reverse side, the
back of this heal is what shows the pyramid and
the eye. And the founding fathers said, oh, this represents
strength and durability. And they're like, why is the capstone floating?
That's weird And they're like, ah, it's because the pyramids unfinished,

(29:13):
because you guys, the nation's unfinished, and they were in
Benjamin Franklin is probably like, oh, think about it, because
he's totally that type, you know what I mean. Yeah,
he was kind of an actually kind of dude. He
was so actually that's like his thing. So if you
go to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, those are
the people who make these coupons today. If you go

(29:35):
to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, you'll find it's
not on the official tour. You're taking this tour, Yeah,
is it? Is it cool? Yeah? It's dope, man, Okay,
should yeah, you still go take a date or something.
But what what what question do I ask to get?
Like the real line, not not just the official party line?
Who do I talk to you? And what do I say? Yeah, well,

(29:56):
if you find one of the employees just sort of
hanging out off the record, they're like, I don't know,
subway or five guys because they're underpaid and they're just
willing to dish. So okay, so yeah, what are they saying?
And then probably you're really really good with strangers, they
probably want to talk to And that's very kind of
that's true, It's true. What's what's the unofficial? Okay? So
the unofficial stuff is pretty much the party line we

(30:16):
discussed earlier. The pyramids met in some way to symbolize
the lasting power of the US, similar to the way
the Pyramids of Old with the test of time. Times. Yeah,
you know, you know what I found out today. If
you go to the Federal Reserve in Atlanta and you
take a tour, it's the monet National Monetary Museum. You
actually will they'll give you a bag of money when
you leave. Shredd up. Shredded though. That kind of sucks.

(30:39):
But that's kind of interesting, right You can't like you
can't like tape it back together. You would, but you
have to be very it's probably really thin shreds. They
probably have really solid industrial shredders there. They would have
to let us know if you do tape back a
dollar and tell us where to bring them. Just by
the way, sue the actual dollar, the actual dollar one.

(31:03):
You saw a pyramid eagle, all the weird stuff. There's
a hidden owl or spider in there as well. Uh,
it didn't come about until nine. There's a guy named
Henry Wallace and he is the Secretary of Agriculture, which
has nothing to do with anything under President Roosevelt. And
he sees a pamphlet on the Great Seal, and we

(31:23):
have a factually accurate historical reenactment of this. He walks
up to the President and he's like, Rusie boy, you know,
it's this thing about the Great Seal. It's a get
the motto. It's Novas Ordos aclora new Order of the Ages.
That's kind of like your think you know what it
was like in the mafia. Yeah, yeah, yeah, in this version. Yeah,

(31:45):
And he's like, it's like new Deal of the Ages.
This is perfect. And then Roosevelt says, never call me
Rosie boy ever again. And then he punches him. But
he's like a cool idea. I like this, let's go
for him. Yeah, And Wallace is like, you know, we
should put that on a coin or something. That would
be dope. People love that kind of thing, you know.
And then Roosevelt they're collectible. They're collectable, you know, they're

(32:05):
like the original POGs. But no, Roosevelt says, I will
do you one better, my good sir, and he says,
we're gonna put it on the most circulated piece of
American currency that exists, which is the dollar. Yes, in
this case, the one dollar silver certificate, right, which means
that in five when this thing came out, theoretically on

(32:26):
paper and hopefully in practice, you could walk to someone
and you could be like, here's the thing, give me
this much silver, and they would be like, well, he's
got the certificate or she's got the certificate. They would
give you silver, which was a big deal. I guess. Yeah.
You could. You could kill a lot of werewolves if
you had enough dollars. Huge problems. There was a werewolf epidemic,

(32:47):
and it was it was hard time. True. There's a
documentary about that properly. But so so now the question
is there are no more silver certificates right at least
actionable silver certificates. So what does this dollar that we've
been discussing stand for, like in the real world, what
is its value based on? It's a fiat currency. I

(33:09):
know everybody in this room knows this, but we're gonna
talk about it because it's really we really got to
hit at home for the rest of this episode. Okay,
currency is not an automobile. No, no, it's not beautiful,
cute little automobiles. You'll you'll often hear people talk about this,
how the US dollar is a fiad currency, and that
just means that the what this is worth, it's not

(33:32):
backed up by any kind of metal or anything like that.
It's just it has value because some authority figure in
this case, a government, says that it has value. It's
literally a faith rectangle. That's what this is. It's an
article of faith. We all agreed, and I don't want
to call anybody out, so I'll call all of us out.

(33:53):
We all agree to continue to do agree that this
thing is worth a thing, and we're like to everybody
wants to be cool, everybody wants to fit in. Someone's like, hey,
I have like twenty of these, and we're all like, oh, nice,
good job. That's way better than a bed bath and
beyond coupon. You know what it means if some really

(34:13):
cool stuff. They do have some steals, they have some boys.
If you're like my friend Alex over there, you can
gather up like a hundred thousands of these and they
will give you a house. Isn't that crazy? But if
you paid in singles? Can you imagine paying for a
house with dollars like in a big giant sack would
be a baller move. I have to say they'd have
to take it, but they would probably be like, oh,

(34:35):
so what drugs do you say? They'd make a face. Yeah, yeah,
those dollars will probably be like cocaine. But but it's
imperative and crucial to remember that despite the symbols this
bears US currency itself is a symbol of something else,
the power behind the paper, if you will, it's it's
something that is a bookieyman in so many conspiracy theories

(34:58):
ever since its creation. It's something we call the US
Federal Reserve. Oh and we're going to talk about the
Federal Reserve. Right after a quick word from our sponsor,
we're live. Okay, jeez, I keep okay. It's really hard

(35:22):
to break these habits, you know. We usually we usually
do this show like in a in like a weird
shipping container with no windows. I don't really even know
what time of day it is, and we get an
electric shock delivered to us by Paul to have to break.
So we're kind of like Pavlovian dogs of podcasting behaviorism,
Like we're so trained when we're just hanging out, we

(35:43):
take commercial breaks. But we're back, but we're back. We're back. Okay.
So here's how it started. The U S has a
incredibly muddy history with the idea of central banks. That's
what the Federal Reserve is. A central bank is just
a financial institution that's supposed to make sure the coupons
the country uses will retain the same value they had

(36:05):
yesterday and have it in the present day and have
something like that tomorrow. Mat you made a face, But
that's that was the train. There's a train like right
up there and occasionally goes, well, I was trying to
focus on what Ben was saying. But yeah, the train
freaked me out there a little bit. We'll go, we'll
go look for hobo code later, Okay. Yes. So so
the FED, it turns out, is not not the first

(36:26):
central bank. In fact, it is the third. It's the
third try that our country has made at this end.
The the first one dates all the way back to
Alexander Hamilton's. Alexander Hamilton's. You know, I think I figured
out why lin Manuel Miranda decided to write a musical
about Alexander Hamilton's because it's just the cadence of saying

(36:47):
that name. It's just perfect. It's beautiful, you know, it's
just it's a perfect name for for a musical. Alien
things I haven't done. And you know, we all record
eyes Alexander Hamilton's from his recent renaissance in the world
of musicals. Uh, it turns out as a real person
actually did some stuff. Was a It was the first

(37:11):
Secretary of the Treasury and was super was was super
perplexed and worried. After the Revolutionary War, which on the
other side of the pond they call the American War
of Independence, somebody asked us that earlier it wasn't the
peasants uprisings, but I still referred to that probably in

(37:34):
some circles, Oh sure, sure. And and so Hambleton's believed
that the US needed some sort of banking authority because
otherwise he thought the country would be doomed. It turns
out that wars are crazy expensive, you know. And he
envisioned this bank as quote, a profit making institution with

(37:58):
private shareholder is holding full it's it's stock at dilecting
four fits of its directors. Was it was this ways
like Oliver Twist or something. Yeah, and this in this
version is it's pretty much twist. This is highly important though,
Let's not lose any of this a profit making institution
first of all, and four fives of its directors it's

(38:18):
stock and directors would be private shareholders for fifths. That's
a lot of private interest in this giant profit making bank.
And that that means, I mean that is important. That
that means that only twenty percent of the steering wheel
and they would have no idea what a steering wheel is.
Let's just be clear. It means like of the steering

(38:39):
wheel belongs to the country affected by this concept, and
so we would imagine that Hamilton and Co. Had to
come up with a really good pitch for this, right.
They were like, we need a name, like a real
banger name. It's the it's the first. Uh, it's the
first central Bank of the US. It's the first bank,
first bank, first bank. How about the first bank? Oh ship,

(39:01):
great idea, right, and and so they were like, that's
the best, that's the best. A burst of creativity. Well,
I mean it's descriptive, you know. I mean they were
just trying to be utilitarian with their naming conventions. And
we'll see this carry on throughout the story. But there
were people who opposed this idea. We've had Thomas Jefferson,
James Madison, they were super against it. But despite their outrage, uh,

(39:25):
it was past. It was created in Congress granted the
Bank of the United States, the first Bank, a twenty
year charter and to try it out, just to try
it out, just give it a go, just twenty that's
that's twenty that's not a commitment. Right, So then the
bank's charter comes up, right, Yeah, in eighteen eleven, but
this time James Madison is president. This guy knows how

(39:48):
to hold a grudge. He says, no way, not happening.
I'm in charge now. I don't know what a steering
wheel is, but I'm probably at it. And we're not
going to extend this bank. We are firing the bank.
Critics were on his side. They said this was, uh,
this was injurious to economic growth. It was holding the
nation back. But there's something else that's crazy that you

(40:11):
won't find with a lot unless you dig into it
a little bit. Remember how we talked earlier about four
fifths of the first Bank being held by private interests.
Of that, of that, two thirds of the bank was
owned by private British and British interest Yeah. Like I'm
stuttering a little because it's weird, right, It's like that's crazy.

(40:32):
Like imagine it's like imagine you get divorced with from
someone and you're like, you know, we've we've gotten divorced.
Uh we should get a credit card, Yeah, joint bank account. Here,
here's the keys to my house and uh and you can,
you know, have like three fifths of my cat let's
do it. What a plan? Right? Uh? And that's mind
blowing to me. I had never known that ever before. Um,

(40:54):
And it makes sense because a lot of the money
was was in British hands at this time, right, but
still to allow it to occur seems atrocious. Well, that's
just me, and discontinues for about a year. In eighteen twelve,
something occurs with another very creative name, now the War

(41:15):
of eighteen twelve. Yeah, it was a war, and they
were like, what do we call it? Uh So in
eighteen twelve, President Madison changes his mind and he says,
I might not fully agree with this thing, but we
need something. We need something. Well, it's because things have
been relatively chill and you know, the there was a
peace time and I was like, you know, we don't

(41:35):
need this bank. We're fine without it. And then, almost
as though there were a pattern, war flares up again.
It's like ah shah, we gotta figure out how to
finance this. It's almost though we need some kind of
central bank. So we'll make another one right right exactly,
And that's that's what they do. And they say, we
can only imagine. They say, well, that was kind of
that was kind of dry the first run. That was

(41:56):
kind of It's weird that war turns out to be expensive.
You don't really to get a price break. Who knew
and uh, they're like, we need a better name, though,
we need a name that will inspire creativity, ambition, entrepreneurship.
The Second Bank, that's it. That's it. So in a
burst of creativity, they're like, let's call the Second Bank

(42:17):
and you know what you're getting, you know, it's yeah,
that's right. This last eighteen thirty two branch. President Andrew
Jackson is in office and he's like, no, this is malarkey.
I'm done with it. We're out of this. As a result,
the US had no central bank from the mid eighteen
thirties to nineteen thirteen, and during this time numerous terrible,

(42:42):
terrible things occurred. Yeah, they're just crashes all over the place.
We don't have to ramble them off. But it's like
eighteen seventy three h three. And then this thing happens
in nineteen o seven, called the Panic of nineteen o seven,
which would lead to um some series serious problems. Yeah,
it was the It was sort of the feather on

(43:04):
the financial camel's back and the government, the people in
the government looked round at each other and they were like,
rump for um parumph, something must be done or own
forum for umph. And as so often happens in American politics.
Everyone could agree there was a problem, no one could
agree how to solve it, and they all hated each other.

(43:27):
That doesn't sound familiar at all, right, Right, So it
was even a matter of calling one party corrupt or
one group corrupt, It wasn't. It was a matter of
which pocket you were in, and well, you're in the
pocket of special interest. Well you're in the pocket of
those fat cats at Wall Street. Well I don't know
which pocket you're in, but screw that pocket, you know. Yeah,

(43:48):
And this also trickled down to, like, you know, the citizenship.
I mean, people distrusted these fat cat bankers as you
refer to them, um a lot, and it was just
there was no support for this kind of situation. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
The years leading up to this, like we've we've seen
political satire cartoons in the New Yorker and stuff. Back then,

(44:10):
they were insane. They were not subtle. There was again
like this this top hat, monocled king, sword wielding banker
guy coming out to Midwest America putting his hand wrist
deep in a baby's mouth, pulling out food, and people
were like, what could be done? Yeah, don't google those

(44:32):
propaganda campaigns. Okay, they're just they're pretty racist, and there
were there were also there were also um crazy protest
public outcry, what are we going to do? You know
what I mean? The nineteen thirties sees the rise of
a very serious progressive movement and so often ignored in
history books today. But even more importantly, the same captains

(44:56):
of industry, the same political titans who in public hated
and vilified one another, we're meeting behind the scenes, away
from the public eye, and just a little bit, just
a little bit of a quieter pitch they were going
around for for all, something must be done around for fun.
We should maybe like do it so that it lines

(45:19):
our pockets and our our political cronies pockets and our
banking bro buddy pockets. Because we're all in a pocket, right,
everyone in a pocket. So a guy named us, this
is an important character in the story, guy named Senator
Nelson Aldrich in UM. He gathered a group of said
banking bros and political cronies, uh, and he called it

(45:41):
the National Monetary Commission. And the idea was to study
um potential economic reforms, reforms to the financial system. And
there's nothing wrong with that right, something must be done. Okay,
let's take some action. Let's let's bring private and public
interest together and figure out what needs to be done.
A noble A noble pursuit. There we go. Oh yeah,
chin up right. And so for two years, the National

(46:03):
Monetary Commission UH investigates this idea of central banks in
another country. How do you replicate that? How do I
don't want to be too divisive yet and say, I
think they were like, how do you make money off this?
As Nol was saying in November of two years later. Uh,
Senator Nelson. We'll just call him by his first name

(46:24):
for now and it'll come into play later. Nelson. Uh
Nelson is in the midst of financial disaster. People are
literally starving, and uh, he says, you know what, I know,
it's a I'm a senator and it's my job to
take care of the American public. But I'm gonna take
some me time, you know, Like I'm gonna like, when's

(46:45):
the last time he just traveled for fun? I'm gonna
take a field trip. And this wasn't widely reported in
the papers of the time. The few reporters who did
bother to ask were told that he was going on
a duck hunt, not the Nintendo game that wasn't around.
He was going. He was like, yeah, the country's they're
like the country's burning down. And he's like yeah, but

(47:06):
you know, like mallards, they just get to me. As
long as you have that dog, I mean, that's fine, right,
that dog wasn't That dog was an asshole man, that guy.
You can control it with the second player controller. How
is you can control the ducks? The dog just shows
up like Clippy and Microsoft. The dogs just a dick.
Don't about the ducks with the second controller. Yes, we

(47:28):
should do a show about this. We should do a
Nintendo conspiracy. We should play it. But for now, we're
talking about an actual duck hunt, or you know, at
least the notion of an actual duct. So where is
he conducting this stuff? So you guys have heard of
a place called Jekyll Island. Have you guys heard of
this place is? Anyway? Then I went once you went, well,
I didn't hang out there, right, I can't get in
and hang out. What do you mean you just like

(47:49):
we're doing like recon. You were just like checking it out,
like peeking through the I was in the area hedge Maze,
like I was in the area. This is a different show.
But Jackill Island, what's that If you're not from the
jack Alan it is still and certainly was even more
so than um an incredibly opulent getaway for the super
super super one percent of the one percent of the

(48:10):
one percent rich. Uh to you know, go do their
things and maybe have secret meetings and pretend duck hunts. Well, Okay,
so in their defense, by the way, Nelson takes five
of his buddies, which we'll get to. In their defense, Uh,
this was not an obviously fake cover story. There is
a duck hunting season. It starts in November around this time,

(48:31):
stops for a little bit, it resumes from December to January.
So maybe they were, Maybe they were hunting ducks. Maybe
they were Like in the end, it doesn't matter, right, right,
So these his five buddies. It turns out, surprise, surprise,
I hope this is not a shamala move for everybody.
It turns out that they were very prominent in the

(48:51):
world of private banking, and they were very active. The
thing Nole mentioned earlier, the National Monetary Commission. And despite
the fact that these fellows had enormous power here in
the US and abroad. They were afree to be seen
hanging out with each other. So one by so, Nelson
Aldrich hooks up this really sick customized rail car, like

(49:15):
it's it's got mahogany, it's got chrome, it's very uh,
it's flashy and uh heuh. He decides the best way
to hide it is to hook it up to a
train in New Jersey, and one by one, these prominent
titans and captains of industry sneak onto the train, not
not using their names, and because I think they had

(49:37):
they had to have at least like one servant. I
think they definitely paired down the staff, which was that
was huge for them, right, But the whole thing they
had to use only their first name because they wanted
to maintain some level of anonymity. So who's in there? Yeah,
So under cover of night, one at a time, these
guys sneak into this rail car. We've got Frank Vanderlip
of National City Bank, Henry Davison of Morgan Bank. We've
got Paul Warburg of the coon Low Investment House. These

(50:01):
are all names that stick around to this day and
companies that have gone through various name changes, but are
still basically doing the same thing. We've got a P. R.
Andrews from earlier who was then the Assistant Secretary of
the Treasury Department. And we also have Arthur B. Shelton,
who was the Secretary of that National Monetary Commission that
was kind of doing some of the legwork that led
up to this meeting. And they, you know, they may

(50:23):
have actually hunted ducks, but on the way they by
the time they were done, they had discussed and formulated
a plan in secret to create another central bank. And
they were like the two times that's a gaming But hey,
lucky number three, right right, And uh, we've got a question.

(50:43):
Why why was this meeting held in secret? Well, the
biggest thing is that they knew and we've kind of
just touched on it, but they knew that if the
word got out that they were trying to present this
kind of idea from both the private and public side,
the House of Representatives of the People that actually represented
the public of the United States would absolutely shut this
thing down before it even became a thing, right, So

(51:07):
they had to keep it as secret as possible. And
then we're gonna find out a little later because it
does happen the spoiler alert. Uh, the way they got
it past was a little right right, Well, I mean
it makes sense it was associated any anything associated with
fact way Okay, I gotta stop, all right, So I've
been using the phrase fat cat a lot tonight. I

(51:30):
want to apologize. I do have a fat cat at home. Uh,
and I don't want to be disrespectful. His name is
Mr Jack Potts. I will show you pictures on Instagram
after the show if you wish. So you should come
up with a new word then, so you're kind of
like not throwing your your sweet boys under the bus. Yeah,
big feeline, I don't know. We just we invested your

(51:51):
much time, just like uh, anti fat cat prejudice. Right
here we are. So it's true though, Matt, like, they
knew that this would immediately be dead in the water,
and that is why they held this meeting in secret.
But holding this meeting in secret in nten uh, this
results in a breeding ground for speculation, right rumor metastasizes

(52:17):
it becomes conspiracy theory because no one knows what's going on.
But since we have decided to be here tonight, we
won't be conspiracy theorists. Let's be conspiracy realists. And that
means that we can't believe were accept a bunch of
speculation without fact. So here's a fact for you. There's
a fact we found. Uh. These guys did not admit

(52:41):
that this meeting ever happened for years and years and years.
It was not until the nineteen thirties in the depression
where we like, well one or two of them said, uh, yeah,
I mean this thing happened. We didn't really hunt ducks.
That was just we thought it sounded cool. And they
called themselves the First Names Club, like we mentioned. So

(53:03):
by the end of that time on Jackal Island, Aldrich
and all his his guys had developed this plan for
a Reserve Association of America, which would be a single
central bank with branches across the country. And then on
December twenty three, nineteen thirteen, Woodrow Wilson agreed, he signed
the Federal Reserve into existence. Yeah. Yeah, and this was

(53:24):
December twenty three. Tricky thing. A lot of a lot
of legislators at home with their families, are back in
their home state, and there's a tricky thing here. So
they said, the Federal Reserve banks, the regional reserve banks
like the one that's here, would be owned not by
individuals but by commercial banks. So this this means that

(53:47):
there's not like, um, like, you look responsible, but you
can't go by a regional reserve bank. And I'm sorry
that you have to learn it here, but neither can I.
So I feel bad. But the the thing is these
banks would be coordinated by a committee that's kind of
sort of appointed by the president. But yeah, they get
a list, right, that's kind of the idea. Just slide

(54:09):
a list across the table, be like, just pick like
seven cool alright, cool? Yeah. So so then it goes
to who really owns this thing? Who owns this gargage?
Wan thing? Uh? The officials governing parts of the system
can own interest in particular commercial banks, but no one
officially actually owns those ship riddled dollars that we all

(54:30):
just robbed at the beginning of the show. In fact,
the f considers itself independent. Oh yeah, this is this
is important. Uh, and this it's mind blowing, Okay, And
I'm truly trying really hard not to just be infuriated
throughout this entire show. I have been during every show
that we've done so far in this. Okay, the Federal
Reserve says the terms of the members of the Board

(54:52):
of Governors span multiple presidential and congressional terms. Now, when
you hear this at face value, you would say, oh,
this is very reassuring. This means that no matter who's
in the White House, no matter how much I like
him or her, no matter how long they are in
the White House, no matter which Senator or House of
Representatives of person gets elected, my money is safe with

(55:14):
the Federal Reserve. That sounds lovely. Yeah, yeah, I hate
to you here, but that's also kind of terrifying, isn't it,
because what they're old. You know. Another way to look
at it is they're saying, no matter who you vote for,
no matter who's in charge, we're in charge of the money. Yeah,

(55:35):
they like, you know, you could vote. That's cute. There
was a quote from Alan Greenspan, who was the Chairman
of the FED, and you've heard of um. He said
something to the effect of there is no government body,
there is no elected official that can do anything about
any of the decisions we make. He just very brazenly
said that out loud and like, yeah, so that's that's

(55:57):
the vibe that we're working with with the Fed here,
there's been to be reassuring. So officially this system is
a bulwark, right, That's what it provides. It stabilizes these
faith rectangles. I love that phrase, thank you for me
that Matt made that one. That was great. And it
stabilizes the dollar against the ups and downs of the uncarrying, chaotic, ridiculous,

(56:22):
horrible place that we live in. And the thing is,
it doesn't matter why you believe. It was created without
the consent of the American public. No one voted on it,
no one can vote on it. It is also arguably
one of the most powerful financial institutions in the world. Pyramid,
lidless eye, creepy Latin catch phrases, the whole nine yeah,

(56:45):
and ah oh man, I'm just gonna I'm gonna bring
it back to this. In the more than a hundred
years following its creation, more and more people are asking
is there more to this story? Is it just this
organism station that exists outside of the control of the
voting people of the United States, or is it more sinister?

(57:15):
Here's where it gets crazy. I love it when he
does that. I love it. Well, it's true, It's true
we're going into crazy territory now. So I hope you're comfortable,
because maybe you'll be uncomfortable at the end of this.
The the most popular and most prevalent, most prominent conspiracy
theory about the Federal Reserve is that rather than mitigating

(57:39):
or preventing financial disaster, the Fed creates financial catastrophe to
manipulates the money supply for the benefit of member banks
and most importantly, the shareholders or the owners of those
member banks. So no one can own a regional reserve bank,

(57:59):
but anyone can buy shares in a commercial bank. It's
just a question of how many you own. And and
this this argument, uh, this argument proposes that we the
public are taught that financial disasters occur through two things,
accident or incompetence subprime loans, right right, And the the

(58:20):
argument is that the opposite is the case. And this
is a really weird one to us because it unites
people across a political divide. Yeah, it really does. By
the way, we've been on the road a lot. Has
something been happening with the stock market. We haven't exactly
been keeping up, but I just noticed all the lines
were read when I looked at my phone, earlier. Everything's okay,
We're all okay. We still my mom sent me a

(58:41):
text about it and said that my inheritance was dwindling
away as he speaks. So yeah, I'm gonna have to
make this podcast. Came with it. Yeah, it's it's weird though,
because this is um this is a conspiratorial belief that
unites people on either side of the sort of circusy
political techotomy. And you will find people who consider themselves

(59:05):
libertarians and they're like, yeah, I read in the FED
that's messed up. But then there are people on the
far left who are like, you know, eat the rich,
screw the Fed, let's just get rid of it. And
they're like, you know what, You're right. Once again, everyone
can agree that there is a problem, no one can
agree how to solve it. Harrumph, harrumph, harrumph, harrumph. The

(59:28):
most famous stories are conspiratorial beliefs about the Federal Reserve
come from a specific book. Yes, it's called The Creature
from Jekyl Island by this author named G. Edward Griffin.
Like a like a black lagoon kind of situation, or
what's the creature? Is the Fed? I get it? I
gotta got creaking in that meeting, and it emerged, and

(59:50):
then it got on that rail car and it headed
back towards New York. I'm just I'm making all that up,
but I can imagine into it. I can imagine it.
So he considers the Federal Reserve more than just this
simple tool to control Americans via debt. We're not controlled
by debt. We're fine. Nobody has any student loans or
mortgages here. We're good. We're good. Oh, Matt, my my

(01:00:15):
my girlfriend is here tonight. Hey Brandy. Can everybody say
hey Brandy, Hey Brandy? Hey, uh and uh. And we've
had some tension because my my primary girlfriend is Sally May.
It was accustomed to a certain light. Oh I'm gonna
pay for that's Sally May anymore. It's something called navyant.
Came out of nowhere, and all of a sudden, it's

(01:00:36):
like it's not Sally anymore. Now, it's now it's navyant.
And I guess I have no choice but to pay
a navyant now. But you know, right, And the idea
with Creature from Jack o'l Island is that this this
practice has been expanded and franchised out to other countries
and that the Federal Reserve is using the practice of

(01:01:00):
deceiving people through chicanery, which we looked up earlier. It's
a new word for us. Yeah, is deceiving people or
is state actors to fall into debt and then using
that to using that debt to control the actions of
those countries. But he's got a lot of critics. Griffin
has a ton of credits. Well, and wouldn't that kind
of be the way, um that the British interests that

(01:01:26):
you know, we're part of the original First Bank or whatever,
could have potentially exercised that kind of control back over
the colonies right by having that much of a steak
in the First Bank. Yeah, I mean it's possible. The
problem that we're running into here is that g Everard
Griffin took that train. Sorry, go ahead, I gotta make

(01:01:48):
a t There's some delicious food here, or there was.
I guess they stopped serving it. Wait, what's the what's
what's the beef though? Oh yeah, the beef is Let
me just recalibrate here. Boo boo. He took he took
the pearl that's at the center of the oyster of
that secret meeting and then he created a whole bunch

(01:02:11):
of stuff around it. Um that he kind of it's
not necessarily pulling out a thin air, but he's creating
a conspiracy from that real thing he's engaging. Yeah, it's dangerous,
it's it's dangerous. I'm gonna get off my soapbox. Let's
keep going with the show. No, no, it's fine. It's
just a soapbox. Is a segment that we will happen.

(01:02:33):
It just happens a lot these days where there is
this one little grain of truth which is on this show.
It's what we try and do we find that grain
of truth, Right, that's the most interesting thing for me personally,
And this guy did that. But then he just kept
going down a rabbit hole and he wrote this book
that is fascinating, but a lot of it probably is,
and it's just not factual. And the most one of

(01:02:55):
the most salient questions that you get from this book
if you if you read it, is the essential thing
the gist boils down to this, could someone actively purposefully
and successfully manipulate something as gargantuan as the US economy
and therefore, you know, the international economy. The answer to

(01:03:17):
that is yeah, yeah, yeah, no, absolutely to a scary degree.
Like think of Warren Buffett. He could he could tweet
today and sink a company's true. Yeah. Or you got
like Jeff Bezos or Carlos slim Halou or any of
these other profoundly disgustingly rich human people that can, like
you said, just by communicating their intent to do something,

(01:03:40):
or you know, they're some kind of diversification that might happen.
It can change the entire course of at least segments
of the economy. Yeah, And that's the question that The
question then is does it mean that the FED could
do the same thing. The FED is a group of people,
and there are multiple avenues of over site. And I'm

(01:04:00):
not going to presume to know about your friends, but
have you ever tried to order pizza with a group
of eight or more people? It gets really nasty, really quickly.
And and that's just pizza. That's just like the argument
over whether or not someone likes pepperoni or is gluten free.
And this is this is talking about one of the
most important financial instruments in the world. So it's it's

(01:04:24):
kinda I don't know, it's it's kind of difficult to
digest it but but we found another, we found another
conspiracy theory. This is I A would say this is
like my second favorite. Oh yeah, yeah, this is a
this is a great one. We've done an episode that
kind of touched on this before in the past. Um.
But again, it kind of goes back to where you
were talking about all the whether or not there's British

(01:04:47):
control over their former colonies. Still, yeah, the idea is that. Okay,
So in this one, the Federal Reserve is now a
foreign banking institution, is control old by the British, and
the British are still super piste about the Revolutionary War.
It's like their main thing. They're like, we have a

(01:05:08):
lot of problems, but damn it, w it's time to
go back, you know. And someone's like, hey, maybe we
should fix unemployment. Hey maybe we should look at immigration.
And then like the Queen turns around in a swivel chair.
It's like, no, let's be weird, butting me back my colonies.
And in this, in this idea, it goes a step

(01:05:30):
further and they'll say, oh no, no, no, no, no,
no no no, Matt's nol ben Michian control. This is
not a matter of the Queen. It's a matter of
the true power behind the throne in the in the
world of the United Kingdom. It is the Rothschild family.
You knew they were going to be here at some point.
It's yeah, there are a lot of just the the

(01:05:53):
targets that are aimed at with a lot of these conspiracies,
the Federal Reserve, the Rothschild's Britain, we're hitting them all
to it's a real just doing the hits. Folks. We
had a Rothschild actually, or somebody said they were Rothschild
in a few cities ago. But but but who are
the Rothschilds. Yeah, so it was a huge influential family
that is the very old family as well, founded by

(01:06:16):
Mayor Armshell Rothschild, and they amassed enormous amounts of wealth
in multiple areas segments including finance of course, but also
over the generations. They've diversified in a in a very
big way. They're active and wine and like technology, mining,
the bond market, arms trade, just about anything you can

(01:06:37):
think of. They probably got their hands in it in
one I mean, it's a huge family as well, and
they're so diversified and spread out with the various members
of the family. It's almost tough to kind of trace
the money and understand exactly how much the entire family
is worth and how much influence they wield exactly. And
this is this is a huge deal. My dad is
in the audience tonight and he was an accountant at

(01:06:59):
this private club for a while, and he can tell
you the difference between old money and new money. And
with with old money, it's all of these It's just
a tiered uh succession of of inheriting fortunes, and each
one just then becomes another fortune. And then the fortune
just spreads out to this point where you go, oh, yeah,
I'll join that club for fifty dollars, no problem. And

(01:07:22):
that kind of wealth is it's intense. And then but
this goes back to the same question. This presumes that
this family, this large influential family, somehow cooperates and moves
in unison like what happens today. You get together once
a year and they're like, Oh, what's our what's our
weird thing gonna be this time? You know, I, I

(01:07:45):
doubt I don't know your relatives, but I have never
been that cooperative with my own. Again, that pizza example
comes from like utter financial control of an entire country's
monetary system on the table for you and your family.
I mean, you figure we can maybe swing Tennessee, but

(01:08:06):
that's it, you know. But but this, this is interesting
because there's a paradox in this idea. There's a bit
of double thing, right. The same people who say, oh,
the UK wants to control the US because they are still,
again for some reason, cartoonishly pissed about the Revolutionary War,
they will also say, but the United Kingdom doesn't really
control itself. It's owned by this elite banking cabal, and

(01:08:29):
they're the ones who are really who are really making
the decisions. And that sort of invalidates the beginning of
their idea. That means that this, in this conspiracy, it's
really an economic proxy war between like one family and
then maybe a couple of families here in the US.
It doesn't make sense, but the Rothchild family shows up
in so many of the stories, so many pieces of

(01:08:52):
this folklore tradition. We have a we have one that
we found that we we really enjoy and it doesn't
take place sun Land. It does feature the rothchilds Uh.
It takes place at c barbershop Quartet. This one conspiracy
at CC, conspiracy at CSP mats. You have a beautiful

(01:09:17):
singing voice. I was not prepared. I did not prepare
them for that. Just totally pull that out, and you
guys really did a good job. Thank you for humor
trot to be. That's conspiracy with it s e a
at the end, by the way, and we're not talking
about the conspiracy Cruise, which is apparently a thing we
we've never been invited to participate on that, but we're

(01:09:38):
talking about something else entirely. So there's this even more bonkers,
in my opinion, conspiracy theory that the Rothchild family, in
league with their banking crony and Federal Reserve cheerleader JP Morrigan,
was directly responsible for sinking a supposedly unsinkable ship. You
may have seen a film about with the Heart of

(01:10:00):
the Ocean and the hands on the steamy window and
the new drawings that well, I I've really in this
tour come to realize that I saw that movie like
ten times when it came out in theaters, when I
was like, you know, eleven or something, and I was like,
why did I Why did the eleven year old me
like that movie so much? And we've traced it back

(01:10:20):
to to the new drawings. It was the painting scene.
Somebody called called you out. Yeah, somebody in the audience
call me out, and it's like, you know what that's
that's pretty much accurate. Although it is a beautiful love story.
Although it doesn't make sense though, why didn't she make
room for dude? Okay, I said that like a million times.
That's my main It's just, you know, she's hogging the door.

(01:10:41):
She let's Leonardo DiCaprio go, And let's be honest, he's
not a super big guy. He could have fit on there.
And uh, I feel like she was just looking for
a convenient into a romance. But I'm gonna say it,
she ghosted. She ghosted on him or James Cameron was
looking for a convenient plot device, is my argument there.
I mean, how well did wars flow? What about that
old couple? Though? Remember now it's been a while, okay,

(01:11:05):
so hey know what ship are we talking about? You know,
this had the Titanic, the RMS Titanic, that's the full
proper name. So, um, if proved to be be true,
this thing, we're about to enter the realm of wild speculation.
That's what this segment of the show is called. It's
called the Realm of Wild Speculation a k a. Conspiracy
at c UM. So it proved to be true, this
would surely go down in history as like one of

(01:11:27):
the most batshit, heavy handed or possibly genius assassinations in
the history of the world. So let's let's jump. Let's
jump right in. Let's do it, um, let's wade into
these icy waters. Yeah, exactly. So, JP Morgan and co.
Financed the International Mercantile Marine Company UM, which was an
Atlantic shipping company that kind of strong armed its way

(01:11:49):
into dominance in this industry by you know, doing what
these kind of companies do, absorbing some smaller, weaker shipping
companies from America and Britain. UM. One of the I
m c C subsidiaries was a company called the White
Star Line, which owned the RMS Titanic. So Morgan himself
was actually booked to be on this doomed Maiden voyage,

(01:12:14):
but he canceled at the last minute, citing like tummy
troubles or something. He wasn't feeling well, he was unwell. Yes,
it's really sad, UM. But you know, fortunately or unfortunately
for them, UM, there were plenty of captains of industry
and that your fat cats been on this ship. Because Matt,

(01:12:36):
you did a good job of describing this in the
kind of context of this particular idea, you could look
at this thing is like a giant honey trap for
the affluent. Let's get them all here, get them all
in one place, and then we'll take them out. Yeah,
if we're gonna go along with this conspiracy theory, which
is kind of ridiculous on the face of it, But

(01:12:57):
if we go along with it, uh what, We're already
there in the speculation part. But if we go along
with it, this kind of could be a perfect trap
because you're gonna have a lot of the people that
you may want to target that don't hold the same
beliefs about financial systems. You might get them on this ship.
And you actually have a pretty good chance of doing that,
just because it was such a spectacle at the time,

(01:13:19):
and the people that you're targeting are some of the
most opulent and they want to do things like be
on a Titanic. Oh, let's just put that out there.
It could be a good trap. But okay, okay, So
so I'm I'm sensing some sinisters stuff here, nol Uh.
Who who were they targeting? Were they targeting specific people? Well,

(01:13:41):
I mean there there are the three main ones that
are mentioned and the stuff that I've read about this story.
But like you said, Matt, I mean it was an
absolute playground of of the rich and powerful. So I
think if there is any truth through this at all,
it would be include people outside of this set. But
we have Benjamin Gouggenheim, who made a fortune in mining
and smelting operations, is it or Strauss who was the

(01:14:03):
co owner of Macy's and also a powerful politician and
a businessman. And then John Jacob Astor, the fourth of
the Astor family, which is one of the most powerful
and wealthy families of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He
was a builder, a real estate tycoon, and investor, you
name it. Um, So these are the three that are cited.
One thing that they have in common and everything we

(01:14:24):
read about this is that they were against the Federal Reserve.
They did not want this to happen, and they had
enough clout um and street cred to possibly further weight
around and maybe stand in the way of this happening. Yeah,
and then um, all Morgan had to do is just
strategically placed that iceberg and it was all ahead, right ahead.

(01:14:47):
So so what how does this all shake out? Well?
Speculated wildly, mind you that one of the things that
these guys had in common, like we said, was opposition
the Federal Reserve. I've also seen it as opposition to
income tax, but those things are kind of conflated in
this story. Um. But the ship sank uh in April
of nineteen twelve, and the FED was formed the very

(01:15:09):
next year. So this here's the thing that this proved
to be financially disastrous for Morgan's company, the I M
c c UM the company file for bankruptcy protection in
nineteen fifteen. Um, So why would JP Morgan ruin his
own company by sinking this unsingable ship? And how would
he even do it? Because the arguments that I've seen
were like he had to have influenced the captain of

(01:15:30):
the ship to like mess up, and um, you know,
there's also stories about how there weren't enough lifeboats that
this thing was doomed to begin with. There were issues
with like the technology where the compartments like magnetically sealed,
like trapping people in all of this, I mean it
was a whole There's all kinds of things just about
the Titanic seeking in general, um that are a little off.
But why would he actively do this, uh and cause

(01:15:53):
the ruin of his own company and and something that
he would cause him to lose a lot of money?
Does this mean that he Opts really had nothing to
do with it or was it maybe like the perfect alibi?
I think more likely the first one. But it's fun
to think about, and like you were saying, Matt, with
these seeds of truth in these grains, this is one
of those. I think there's some um. It points to

(01:16:14):
this idea of incredibly rich and powerful people going to
any length that they need to to get their way.
And this would, again, if proven to be true, would
be a pretty elaborate Rube Goldberg esque example of that. Um,
because you're making the evidence fit your narrative can do.
It's just so it's so weird because there were more

(01:16:34):
than people on the Titanic, and then if they're just
killing they're just seeking this ship to kill three people?
That what is that the cost of doing business? It's
called collateral damage, my man. Okay, So the same way
that a bank makes several billion dollars and they're like,
we gotta find two two hundred million dollars. She's because
given what we know about these how these like shadowy

(01:16:55):
banking brows are able to rake in the profits off
of the backs of American expayers. Maybe the loss of
a little shipping company might be worth the exchange of
utter control and dominance and lifelong profits that no one
can ever vote you out of making. So who knows.
Maybe it is just the cost of doing business. Two questions,
two questions. Okay, so, um, doesn't it sound a little overcomplicated,

(01:17:22):
Like couldn't they just poison someone or have like a
horse accident or something. Well, it's like I said, I mean,
these are the three that are named, But I mean that,
you know, maybe they just wanted to like bump off,
like all of these these fat cats. It's not about
the money, it's about sending a message that's probably true.
I don't know. Now, this is definitely most likely completely bunk,

(01:17:44):
but it's a lot of fun to talk about. And
and when when you were you were doing this research,
you you found some unanswered questions, like about these three
guys stances to right, Like, yeah, I mean, there was
nothing like really out there that was them, just like
totally soap boxing about how they hated the Fed. There
were just some things about like their business practices and

(01:18:05):
their politics that were slightly anti Fed leaning. But it
was a little unclear as to why these three guys
in particular would have been the most problematic. But but
they did actually die on the boat. They did, in
fact die on the boat. It's true. Let's move on
to the next one. Boys, let's do it. Isn't here. Yeah,
I'm gonna talk to you about this. Before we mentioned
that five sided building called the Pentagon. Well, guess what,

(01:18:27):
here's a conspiracy theory that perhaps the Federal Reserve exists
in some way as an extension of the United States military.
Oh okay, all right, now this is a little like
a noodle, but let's get into it. There's some compelling
evidence that in several cases, this country has fought wars

(01:18:48):
specifically to preserve the ascendancy of the US dollar. A
lot of times we refer to it as the petro
dollar because it's it's it's tied to oil in a
lot of ways. We've gone over that before in an episode,
or check it out if you if you want to
learn more about that. But in this case, we're talking
about evidence that's been provided by a gentleman and author

(01:19:10):
named John Perkins. Yeah, yeah, right, you're talking about Confessions
of an Economic hit Man. Uh. It's I would describe
it as a book, you know, like it's it's he
wrote it. It's there, but he makes some interesting observations.
For years and years and years, Perkins worked in the

(01:19:33):
quasi government quasi uh private sector as ostensibly an economists,
but according to his recounts of the events, his real
job was to travel to developing countries and to broker
huge loans for infrastructure repairs and to uh to beguile

(01:19:54):
the people and lie to them essentially about about how
effective or not effective this a structure would be, in
about how affordable or not affordable it would be. So
just imagine you're in a place where the lights don't
always work. You sometimes get the bad water, right with
the hobocode thing earlier, and then someone says, hey, not
only can we give you clean water all the time,

(01:20:15):
not only could give you power all the time, but
it will be a steal. It will be so great
for your country. You will make so much money, and
there's just like one small detail. We only accept payments
in US dollars and just by the way, right, like you,
you might have your own currency, that's very endearing, good hustle,
but we are a dollar business. And through the power

(01:20:40):
of this economic influence, the argument goes, or his story goes,
they brought other countries to heal and force them into
deals with multinational US based conglomerates, you know what. And
the whole point is that they're loaning you an ungodly
amount of money that you will never pay back. It
sounds familiar, right, a lot of money that you'll never
pay maybe thirty years maybe if you're lucky, mortgage, but yeah, anyway,

(01:21:07):
if your giant company, you're getting, you know, perhaps billions
of dollars and this in these U s dollars that
you don't have that you're supposed to pay back somehow,
and ultimately you just end up doing the bidding of
whatever this lender wants you to do, at least within
this the realm of this conspiracy theory. So it's actually
not that implausible if you think about it. We don't

(01:21:27):
have to agree with Perkins, like forty thousand foot view,
as they say, a corporate America. We don't have to
agree with his big picture. The very disturbing thing about
this is that several of the cases he recounts are true.
They're absolutely true. Indonesia is a fantastic slash frightening example.

(01:21:49):
And read the book if you want, read the Wikipedia.
I'm not gonna believe about it. Just let us know
what you think and think about how the actions of
the FED and the actions of the US dollar affect
countries abroad. The world is an increasingly smaller place. But
speaking of fantastic segues, it turns out that we are

(01:22:11):
headed toward the most wonderful time of the year. Yeah,
we only have a few days right right now. Oh
my gosh, what's your costume going to be? I'm buzz
My wife is going to be Jesse, and my three
year old son is going to be Woody. Oh man, Yes,
we're adorable. That is the that's right for us. The

(01:22:32):
most wonderful time of the year is Halloween. So we
wanted to save our last crazy notion, the craziest one
we heard for the very end, and it's this. Okay,
go with me here, Pretend we're we're all at the
same bar and it's like two am right, Okay? So
uh so what if? What if? What if? What if
the Federal Reserve, instead of a financial institution, is an

(01:22:55):
occult institution. Ship They're the people really believe this. We
didn't make this up. Uh. The idea is that what
if every single dollar spent treated from one party to
another is actually a spell. I'm not gonna get this
poop on it, man, I'm not gonna so. So for

(01:23:19):
some fringe researchers, this means that the FED is way
more Slytherin than systemic. It's been way more like Warlocky
than White House, you know. And if the dollar is
is a spell cast by some strange cabal, then the
following assumptions have to exist. Well, it's like this idea

(01:23:39):
of exchanging energy or or somehow boarding energy through the
exchange of currency, which again has this imaginary value, and
the one of the proponents of this theory talks about
how it's all about like a dollar represents energy because
when you are spending it, you are paying for a
service or something that would require time to do, or

(01:24:01):
actual physical energy. So somehow this system they can harness
this and kind of hoard it somewhere and use it
for some purpose. But here here the assumptions that are required.
What's the first one is that magic, at least this
type of magic is real. That's cool. We've got the
reproducible reproducible, right, Yeah, We've got this idea of a
secret group of people not only exists but cooperates. And

(01:24:22):
we've talked about how hard cooperation can be. UM. But
to work this magic and accrew this energy from billions
of other people, um, and that some portion of this
um can actually be stored and used in some nefarious way.
You mean, like stored up in giant bank vaults in
places where you could store all your energy, or maybe

(01:24:44):
in the stock market, or in the Illuminatous trilogy, that
kind of energy is stored in the Pentagon from traffic
dost exactly. Look a different book, right, and a work
of fiction as far as we know. But it's it's
a tall order. This is spooky stuff, right to people
who believe that the FED is actively some kind of

(01:25:06):
evil Harry Potter thing voldemortine its way through the uh
international financial system. The symbols on the dollar represents something else, entirely,
something that the Bureau of Engraving does not mention in
this idea that all seeing I on the floating capstone

(01:25:27):
is not the eye of Providence. Instead, it is the
eye of Satan. Sorry I watched you. I'm so sorry.
It's yeah, it's the eye of Lucifer morning Star. And
the light represents a different sort of illumination. Yeah, exactly
in this case, it's um, it's Lucifer's light, right, the

(01:25:50):
illuminated one, just like that illumination global unlimited. That which,
by the way, thanks you for all for joining us tonight. Um,
there is there is kind of a little ritual we
have to do as we exit for them. Um, well,
we'll talk about it later. Yeah, you'll notice you. It'll
be fun. Yeah, okay. But but this also, this light,

(01:26:11):
this light is meant to symbolize in this idea, the
light of the illuminated ones those who are aware of
this mechanism. But the light has a double meaning of
this idea, and it's the idea that you and us
and your cousin that you probably should call check in
on them after the show, that we are ourselves transparent

(01:26:34):
to this gaze and incapable of holding secrets and then
there's this whole other thing with the eagle. Right. Well, well,
first of all, before we get to the eagle, just
that whole idea that we can't hide anything from this
organization or the most powerful people, can we just one
more time we talked about all the time, we're all
walking around with a syrie in our pockets. We get home,

(01:26:57):
there's a Google Home hanging out there, and Alexa just
chilling on. What's that you said? Oh, just keep talking,
It's fine, just keep talking. I'm listening. I am listening.
Or you know, we've got a camera that I've got
covered up. By the way, Ben has covered up Nolan's,
You're just covered up. I don't care you're going for
They can have my precious data as long as I
can play Pokemon Go. I'm just saying, we don't need

(01:27:20):
we don't need this to be an all seeing eye
and actuality. We're already doing it to ourselves. Bros. Okay,
all right, are you good? I'm fine. Let's just do
what it keeps keep going, good keeping doing a commercial breaker.
Now it's way so the eagle. Then in this idea,

(01:27:42):
there's a colt idea is not the bald eagle what
do we call him Gregory? It's not it's not your
pal greg Instead, it's it's taken from ancient pagan symbolism.
And people who believe this will say, well, well, you
know Nol, you know Matt that uh, That eagle was
also used to sit in the Roman Empire, and again
it was used as an icon for a certain German

(01:28:05):
regime during World War Two. Is Benjamin Franklin talking here?
This is this is a historically accurate Benjamin Franklin somehow
aware of the nineteen forties. I told you guys the
hits the Nazis made in appearance. They of course all
the hits, uh, and the Nazis were weird, just show
up in everything, dude. The full society was a real thing,

(01:28:26):
and there was some occult stuff going on there. Look up,
ridiculous thing. But this this also leads to uh differing
more esoteric mentions of numbers, because the lies people believe
in numerology as well. So it doesn't matter what you
care about. Just aesthetically, there's a there's a ship ton

(01:28:49):
of groupings of thirteen on the dollar, like they went
all in, what are what are some examples we got
the thirteen stars, thirteen stripes in the flag, thirteen arrows
that Greg is clutching and his little little egal talents.
We got thirteen leaves and berries in the olive branch,
thirteen letters in the phrase, um give it to me

(01:29:10):
an equiptus, Thank you, Ben. And then we have we
have us at thirteen layers in that creepy pyramid. Yeah,
what else do we have thirteen of when we founded
this country? Colonies? So totally makes sense. It's fine, it's
just thirteen colonies, right, Yeah, but we're we're really like
going down this numerological rabbitle. Maybe the founding fathers like,
it's got to be thirteen. You've gotta have thirteen because

(01:29:32):
that's how we're gonna make the spell work. Yeah, And
so I was like, why are you freaking out? We
got nine? That's solid, And they were like, no, man,
we've got a thing we're gonna do later. But but
to be absolutely clear, the off chance that someone is
frightened about this, uh, the there is none of this
stuff has been proven. None of this stuff has been
proven in a way that people accept or at least

(01:29:55):
when we say that, we mean that no one has
come to us and said, ah, ship. You guys figured
it out. Was it we had a good run? Was
it thirteen? Were there too many? Thirteen? We were worried
about the thirteens? But my god, you guys. Uh so,
no one, no one has proven this. But it is

(01:30:15):
true that the Federal Reserve was conceived and founded as
the result of a genuine conspiracy, not a conspiracy theory.
These people conspired to create this thing, and then they
covered it up effectively for years, and even today many
of its operations are conducted in secret. So it's no

(01:30:37):
wonder that the story here inevitably ends on some vital questions.
Does the FED prevent disasters or does it create them?
You know? And if it does create them, does it
do so through honest mistakes, through incompetence, or through design?

(01:30:59):
That's it. I don't know. I mean, Matt, dude, it's crazy.
We can't do anything about this. Seriously, none of us
sitting in this room could do anything about this. It's
a fun show, you guys. Sorry, I'm sorry. Really just

(01:31:20):
frustrates me to well. It is true, Matt, I mean,
either way, there's some just we don't need magic to
be real to know that there are problematic things here.
There is a disturbing truth at the heart of these conspiracies.
There's a bit of historical fact hidden in that fiduciary fiction.
And the next time you pull out a dollar, think

(01:31:41):
about it, ask yourself what it may or may not represent,
and how it impacts the world in which we live.
As a matter of fact, the next time you walk
by a strange bit of odd graffiti scrawled and sharpie
or chalk or spray paint along a busy street, ask
yourself whether it's a work of art hidden message. If so,
who is it meant for? And what does it say?

(01:32:03):
Is it something they don't want you to know? Okay, alright, Matt,
So that's mostly the show, right, Yeah, it was pretty good.
I enjoyed it. I enjoyed that both being on it
and listening to it. Job, good job, good job everybody. Also,
we were probably doing a better job in that episode

(01:32:25):
because Paul Mission Control Decond was at the show, and
that's the whole reason. He just gave all the vibes
And it was the fifth iteration, the fifth time we
had done it, so we had ironed it out a
little bit. Oh but there's one other thing, ye that
we maybe we should have mentioned this at the top.
We like to do sort of a Q and anything

(01:32:46):
at the end of the show, and we had a
Q and A that took place not in Atlanta but
earlier in Philadelphia, and we really enjoyed, uh this q
A at least we enjoyed doing it at the time.
I haven't listened back yet. Oh, it's great, just so
many good questions and passionate people. Um, probably it was
my favorite QA as well. So we're gonna listen to

(01:33:08):
it now. Hey, hey guys, Hey man Trevor. Hey, how's
it going in Oh, it's going well. Um, going back
to the beginning of the podcast, you guys were talking
about the hobo symbols. So if stuff they don't want

(01:33:30):
you to know how to hobo symbol, and you guys
were going to post on on the outside of World
Cafe Live after we leave here with that spray paint
didn't bring. What would it look like? I can tell
you what it would be. Yeah, we cannot officially tell
you it would be the first officially, if we cannot
officially tell you that, it would definitely be the first

(01:33:54):
three alpha numeric letters from our phone number. Well, that's
t d We cannot we cannot officially tell you that
that that it would be something involving an eye in
a triangle. Again, we cannot officially tell you that it

(01:34:17):
would be something involving a triangle, right or maybe maybe Trevor,
maybe it would be yeah there you go. Yeah, hey go,
that's the thing. Okay, yea redo, redo. We cannot officially
tell you would be a six fingered tap. Thanks for

(01:34:40):
coming true. Thanks, Trevor. It was um Hi, my name
is Chris, Chris, I'm listener. I just wanted to like
with this uh theme of like Federal Reserve, you know,
like control, like if this like have you ever thought
a out like student loans as a way of like

(01:35:03):
controlling I think about it every day. Yeah yeah, student
loans just like just like a metal condition like where
it's like a form of control. But here's how you do. Yeah,
I'm working on it. But because I've got, uh, I've
got I've got one long term relationship in my life.
Uh it's my main girlfriend, Sally May. Yeah, mine got

(01:35:27):
sold Mine's not even Sally anymore. I don't even know
what it's called. Yeah, but yeah, that's that's the one.
Navy and yeah, Navy. Yeah, but that's that's I mean,
that's an important question, and it is. It's strange because
it will occasionally get reported, but it's crippling the growth
of future generations. You know, Have you ever had somebody

(01:35:49):
who's older in your family, maybe a little stagy, and
they're like, well, when I was, when I was twenty eight,
I had you know, like I had my job at
the paint store, and I sold my for to house
and made it a rental, and then I bought a
car and I just you know, pooped everywhere. I don't know,
I don't know, I don't know, but but it's it's

(01:36:11):
true if yours, but if it's interesting in the US
this night, because I looked into it, and for that
situation in post World War two and the boom of
the economy to exist, for someone making minimum wage to
buy a house, have two point five kids, all that
other uh census bullshit, the minimum wage would have to

(01:36:35):
be slightly over forty five an hour. That's how I'm
phrase has worked out right now. Yeah, Um, I don't
make that. Does anybody make that out of here? They're
not gonna say, of course, yeah, that's what they bill
me for they don't pay me that. But yeah, that's

(01:36:59):
actually that's that's something that we've been putting a lot
of digging into and we're we're hoping to do an
episode on that pretty soon. So thank you for asking
this question. Um, As far as the implications of it,
I would say, yes, it is. It is not a
conspiracy theory. It is a conspiracy people are conspiring to

(01:37:21):
to privatize education. Like at the same time that student
loans boomed and I'll get off my soapbox in a second,
I hope you don't regret asking this. But at the
same time that student loans began booming as an increasingly
privatized industry, there also occurred this change in the zeitgeist

(01:37:41):
wherein you were told, we were all told that the
only way you can have a life worth living in
this country is if you can sign yourself to college,
if you can sign yourself to grad school, if you
don't go to trade school, if you like we we
were taught to look down on people for that reason.
And that's yeah, and that's that's insidious, and it's like

(01:38:04):
it's going to affect us. It's straight up, Edward bernais obvious.
Thank you I'm Lindsay. I'm here with Lindsay. I've been
listening for a couple of years. How do you guys
stay optimistic? You dive into some of the things they
bore on ridiculous or esoteric. But tonight you talked about

(01:38:26):
a lot of things that affect us as citizens or
just people. So how do you keep the optimism with
the show and you seem optimistic, you have you misreading? No,
I don't know. It's hard. It's hard. I mean, I
have a Me and Matt have kids, and that makes
it extra hard because it's all filtered through this notion

(01:38:49):
of like what's it going to be like for my
nine year old? And I'm constantly living in fear and dread.
But you know, one day at a time. UM, And
I just I just I just have that my kid
is smarter than me and it's gonna be like pluckier
than me, and just figure that ship out and just
like navigate whatever life throws at her. Um. And that's
that's my optimism there. So I honestly have to say

(01:39:12):
that it requires cognitive dissonance to continue. I'm being completely
honest to know the things that we all in this room. No,
and continue on as though everything is okay. We just can't.
We kind of have to not look at it. And
I think that's the way it's been for a long
time for a lot of humans. But it's literally our
job to look at it. So but we in particular, Yes, um,

(01:39:36):
but that is that not a head in the sand.
For me, it's video games, alcohol, uh in nicotine. So
I have about three feelings a year. Optimism is not
one anybody else videos. Thank you so much for past Yes,
thank you, way fun connecting us all. Hey guys, hey man,

(01:40:00):
I mean the construction industry. So to the student loan thing,
we're now seeing a dip in available labor because because
of that idea. But going back to the beginning, there's
a great UM documentary about the toy and be Talles
called Resurrect Dead. We can find online it's everything from that. Yeah,

(01:40:21):
it's a great film. It's really good film, a ridiculous history.
Wait show everybody, everybody, thanks man, thanks so much. You
know they didn't give us free T shirts? Can you
believe that we had? Because they print them on demand? Yes. Hello,

(01:40:47):
oh there it's a switch on the bottom. Hello. Hello,
my name's Kelsey. Um I have a question in regards
to our conversation earlier about the Federal Reserve, So the
errors that it makes, do you think there's any possibility
that good algorithms could offer a level of accountability for

(01:41:10):
what they do? You want to bring AI into this.
It's slippery slope, my friends, It's already there. It's really
it's that's a that's a wonderful question, because, um, regardless
of how someone feels ethically about the concept of machine consciousness,
which is not really where we're at now, machine consciousness

(01:41:31):
would be everybody thinking to some degree the way that
we do. But what we have now when we say
artificial intelligence, is we have things that are very good
at solving specific problems. So like we can make the
mind of something that could go through a maze, or
compare columns of data and answer questions in those parameters.

(01:41:52):
We don't have anything that can do something like ask why, right,
are you a data scientist? Yeah right, I'm sorry, I'm
a science, Technology and society major. Okay, yea. So so
the question, so to your question directly, the the truth

(01:42:14):
is that this sort of technology is inevitable, and in
certain spheres it's much further along than some people might imagine.
In the stock market, in the trading industry, a lot
of a lot of very quick calculations are made, but
they're not made for a greater good. They're made for
a profit margin for a specific group or in some

(01:42:36):
cases an individual, And there has to be a philosophy
behind how you use the algorithms to and that's sort
of what the FED does. In some ways. It's like,
what is the economic philosophy that we're chasing, and so
how do we put these algorithms to work to that end?
But it's it's kind of like the trolley problem with
autonomous vehicles. Right. So there's a study that came out

(01:42:58):
recently about autonomous self driving vehicles. The big question is
if they have to hit someone, how do they decide
who to hit? Right? Is it? Is it? Do they
do they hit like an average person walking on the street,
or do they hit right? Or do they hit do
they have a child? Well, it's funny you mentioned that

(01:43:18):
because I think I think who never said that realized
that there was a massive poll done recently and our
species agreed overwhelmingly hit the elderly. Yeah, which is really
cool for us right now. But keep in mind, we're
gonna be old when that stuff is everywhere. So so
that same question applies to the Federal Reserve. Um who

(01:43:43):
like who profits from a certain area of stability? Right?
If if we can do if if we have an
algorithm that tells us uh uptick and interest here is
very good for this specific part of the economy or
this specific demograph think they're in, but very bad for
another demographic, then who who programs it to value that question?

(01:44:07):
Because again, we're a long way off from building an
artificial mind that can ask why it's solving a problem.
And so if that, if we have something steering the
Federal Reserve before it can ask why it's doing something,
then we are setting ourselves up for a very very

(01:44:29):
interesting times, I believe is the euphemism. I would say
the pattern recognition of machine learning could definitely have some
help there to try and predict when financial institutions may
be weak or be ready to crash, or then you know,
how much should the interests wory you go up or
how little And you actually have just a machine that's
doing that and looking at the patterns and not actually

(01:44:49):
making decisions, but giving you feedback. I think that's a
really good thing. Also, any any AI algorithm run on
the student loan problem would come to the same conclusions
that we came to tonight. I'm just saying that is true.
Anybody else, anybody else? I see a hand over here? Cool? Oh,
I see one over here too. We got we let's

(01:45:12):
do we're We've got one question here first, and then
you are next, sir, if you want to hang out
a big fan. Um. Thanks, man didn't finish college, so
no loans. Um. But so I love everything conspiracy, everything
from aliens, do they exist? What are they really doing
on Plumb Island? Blah blah. But this one is the

(01:45:35):
real one, if I think you know, it affects us
in our everyday life. And so I've like dove pretty
deep on this. And there's all these theories about and
I don't know if you guys came across this in
your research, but um, there were three presidents who made
a really really hard push to get off the federal Reserve.
Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy And they all

(01:45:57):
have something in common like Executive Order eleven eleven zero.
I believe, yeah, that's right, right, And we're actually are
sitting president, has made some pretty forward comments about getting
off the reserve and makes forward comments that all class
he has the decorum of. But it's just it's just
kind of Yeah. It makes you scratch your head a

(01:46:20):
little bit, and it makes you curious, you know, like
maybe there would be a pattern forming if three isn't
enough of a pattern. Well, yeah, I would say that
some of that executive order stuff in the theories, depending
on where you're reading it, it isn't really based on
the stuff that it says it's based on. There has

(01:46:41):
more to do with what was it. The whole silver
standard thing is a little more murky than what a
lot of these websites claim it to be. Um specifically
with Kennedy. Well also Kennedy had very few friends, uh
in the halls of power. It's kind of a situation
and where it's like, well, if he wasn't shot for

(01:47:02):
one thing here or the other other reasons, other multitudes
of reasons that people decided it would be cool if
he had a hole in his head. Um, which I
know is graphics, but that's what happened. That's what happens, harsh,
that's what happens. But the um But to your question,
what's really interesting is Abraham Lincoln actually was, especially during
the Civil War, very opposed to the interest rate that

(01:47:26):
the nation was getting saddled with through banking. And it's
kind of weird when we read when it's kind of
weird what parts of historical anecdotes are specified and what
parts what characters are left blank or vague, because it's
always like Lincoln was pissed that the US was gonna
be broke, Camelton was pissed that the US owed money

(01:47:47):
to whom. You know, those people aren't often named in
specific or in particular. And I'm going to keep this
thought you sent in my head. Uh if, if, if
something happens, and then I think we have a lot
of dicking to do. But obviously I don't. I don't
personally want just anyone in the world to get shot,

(01:48:09):
although statistically many people did. What we were recording this
show too dark. Sorry, guys, there are a lot of
the guns. They have to hang out with me all
the time. So then here, yeah, I need another one
of Yeah, let's let's let's let's take one more question,
more question, one more question? Are we doings? Hey? Hey,

(01:48:29):
what's up? Man? So first time, first time, so yes,
this was pretty awesome. This was a birthday gift from
my friend Aaron. How did my birthday? So? Okay, birthday,
let's do it. Hey, what's your what's your name? Mike okay?
On the counter of three, can everybody say, happy birthday,
Mike okay. One to my wife's birthday the same day too,

(01:48:53):
and her name's Kim, so Kim and so on the
counter three Happy birthday, Mike and Kim sir one too,
three Happy birthday? And kill that was did we didn't
ask you to How that's good? Yeah, thank you, thank
you Mike. That was recorded by the way we reported.
That's going to come out. It's being recorded by the

(01:49:16):
girl that bought the ticket. All right, what's up? What's
our birthday? Man? So here's my question? And I have
like seven hundred thousand questions after like being introduced to
the world. That are you guys? But all right, it's
gonna be a softball or it's going to be a curveball.
So let's see, let's go. We're we started about toynbee tiles,

(01:49:39):
we started about hobo code. How difficult is it to
articulate the difference between Hobo code and Hoda Cobe. That's
it question. So thanks guys. You guys wanted a birthday wish. Seriously,

(01:50:05):
the whole time you were talking, I thought it was
Hoda Cope work. Uh is there is there a burning question?
Oh it's John. What's up John? It's John without an age,
John without an age? Thank you? Okay, So about two

(01:50:25):
days ago, three years ago, somebody won one point five
billion dollars right yeah, personally, yeah, I wish it was made,
but I think I could do more more good with
more money than more power. Do you guys think that
you could do more good with one point five billion

(01:50:47):
in in dollars? Or do you guys think you could
do more good running a country, running a city, or
more power? Well, I'll just start and then you guys
build really fast. I think the money is the power
in this instance, because we've said this before, Ben has

(01:51:08):
uh this phrase, Um, what is one of the biggest superpowers,
the actual real superpower you can have? Oh yeah, money, money,
like it's one of the real superpowers that exists because
cut yeah, go ahead, go ahead? Can I And I said,
all right? So I feel this is one of my
three feelings. Done. Uh, it's that Batman is often build

(01:51:29):
I mean, I mean, I get it, I'll make it quick.
I know we have to pay and stuff. But Batman
is often build as this amazing superhero because he's the
world's greatest detective. Because he doesn't have superpowers, he has
ingenuity that is utter as an utter line of horseshit.
Because Bruce Wayne is a billionaire. He didn't build the
suit himself, he didn't build the Batmobile. Instead, he paid

(01:51:53):
someone to do it, which means that if you look
at the way it functions, the use of money is
just value over time. So he's functioning as a time traveler.
He's doing things through the use of money that would
have taken decades, decades and decades to do. So. Money
may not equate one on one with power in all situations. However,

(01:52:14):
money does equate to taking the hours of someone else's labor,
which I'm not I'm not going in a socialist direction
with this. That's just the way. That's just the way
it is. If somebody is paid five dollars an hour
or forty five dollars an hour, then that is just
the price of an hour. Do you know what I mean?
A billionaires you guys say, I will say you guys

(01:52:38):
do say that money corrupts, right, So if you guys
were one point five billion dollars rich, would that not
corrupt you? Of course, the lottery is terrible for people
when they will ever, like, I think it would corrupt me,
to be honest, I don't know. You seem like a
pretty cool dude. But here here's here's my reasoning behind

(01:53:00):
this and why I wanted to reference that, because if
you're the leader of a country, there are so many
constraints on you on what you can and can't do,
because there's so many interests that you have to look
out for. And that's everything that's economic, that's the people
who live in your country, that's medical. I mean, it's
just it's literally all the things right that you have
to deal with. If you just independently get several billion

(01:53:22):
dollars one point five billion dollars, you can use that
however you want. Really you can jump. Well, I'm gonna
I gonna end on one thing, John, I think your question.
I think the more I think about it, I would

(01:53:42):
I would go for I would go for power because
if money is an idea, then a good idea can
be money, so I would go. I would go for
a movement or an idea, not to start a cult.
I don't know what about you, and all you want
the last word, I'll start a call. All right, let's start. Hey,
you guys see, gonna be thank you so much

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}STDWYTK Live: Secrets of The Federal Reserve