December 21, 2017 • 64 mins
In episode 53, Jack & Miles are joined by comedian Ify Nwadiwe to discuss Wyatt Koch, Apple slowing down iPhones, The Office re-boot, Netflix's Bright, plus Pod Save The People's Deray McKesson calls in to talk staying motivated in the fight & more.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello the Internet, and welcome to season eleven, episode four
of Dos Daly's Eight Guys for December twenty one, two
thousand seventeen. My name is Jack O'Brien, a K Jack
to the Future, and I'm joined by my co host,
Mr Miles Gray. Right, it's your boy, Miles Gravest. Whoa
I'd never I can't believe I didn't think of that.
Thank you to Simon work Davis. Yeah, who that's my
(00:21):
namesakes is once again courtesy of Trevor Uh and Trevors
like your ak writer now you ghost writers? Yeah, well
you just pop us those two, right and row uh
And we are thrilled to be joined once again by
the hilarious comedian and performer if what's up boy? If
(00:42):
Daz always staying breezy? I think I already said them,
but I don't worry. We were well, y'all had a
new one. And also today we have also another guest
happening later on that up front. Yeah, we have Drey
McKesson coming on later on. It is a great conversation
that'll be our mid chunk as we call it. But
(01:05):
up first, let's talk to if he about who he is? Uh,
if he what's something that you searched in the not
too distant past that is revealing about who you are
as a human being? Oh man, I think that would
have to be airline cards, an airline airline credit cards.
I'm always I'm always in the air. I'm fli as
fuck and ready to land somewhere. Yeah, we're gonna have
(01:28):
to just keep you grounded. You've got to fly away.
And also right out the bat, I want to give
a quick show, you know, because I don't know if
y'all know, it would be going down and the DZ
Instagram and it was getting popping, and you know, there's
there's some Yeah, there's something I gotta address. First thing
I want to talk about Calvin Lee Joseph. He asked
for a shout out, So what's up, Calvin. Thanks for
(01:49):
getting your co workers to listen to the show. You're
greatly appreciated. Uh yeah, Havin le Johns. I hope you're
going nuts. Send a video of your everyone's going nuts
for that shout out. Thank you for being a fan
of our podcast and not a presidential assassin like your
name makes you sound like you should be. Uh So, wait,
with flight cards or with with airline cards, Like I
(02:11):
always feel like I'm missing out on something because I
don't really use my Frequent Flyer miles as much as
I should. Yeah, because so with every dollar is a mile,
and when you use the airline, that's double the miles.
And I was real hyped for it because last year
my mother in law flew me to Argentina with miles
and wow, you racking them up like that. And so
(02:32):
I've always been a Delta sky Miles member because you know,
you know, I fly Delta. Delta got good first, Like
there was this like sudden increase of like the airlines
were suddenly like ship, we have to be nice now
and like give people movies for free. And Delta was
the first one to take that leap. So yeah, you
bet on the right horse. I am an American airline
(02:54):
and that ship took a while. You guys, there were
like two years where American Airlines was still like no,
you just get a barf bag. That's it. Like that's
still how we're how we're working on this side. Um, so,
what what's something that you think is overrated? Okay right now? Yeah,
Mega Mark, Prince Harry very overrated, Like people are super
(03:15):
hype about it. People are like, oh my gosh, oh oh,
let's bound to this. This this British dude for realizing
a black queen as fine as hell, Like, no, dude, no,
And I think it's a conspiracy. I think I feel
like I hear way more Americans talking about this royal
wedding than we did back when it was Katon whoever
(03:36):
the fuck? Okay, yeah, Prince William because we've got an
American in the game exactly. So this is all just
a power play to get us to give a funk
about their whole Like, oh, they're getting married, I don't care.
There's only one royal family and that's the Western Kardashians.
Y'all get on board. Get on board, get on board,
(03:58):
or get off under Oh no what Look he was
he could have been royalty, but he was assassinated by
Nazir so he never recovered from that. I mean he did.
I mean like, if you look at like the careers
in Family Life, yeah, I guess jay Z one, but
(04:19):
West Kardashian family get on board. Um, so you're still
taking sides in the jay Z nasby like they hopped
off a time machine. Question, you're gonna believe what I
just saw. Well, I remembered it again when Remy Mad
did the sheet and I was like, oh, yeah, that
was a beef. But like you would have never guessed that,
like nas body jay Z if you like look at
(04:41):
them now. I feel bad for Naz, I mean not,
I mean Calise did not re anyway. If he was
something that's underrated, underrated, I was gonna say, uh t
s A pre check just signed up right before I
got here. It was super easy. So I went on
a trip with the has A Donut Media week. Are
you like shilling for the travel industry? Check man? You
(05:07):
guys love this look. I'm gonna be doing a lot
of traveling next year because you know, I've been flying
to a lot of shows and stuff, and I'm like,
I need to get some incentive for all this money
I'm spending on flying. And so I was like, all right,
I gotta get an airline credit card and I gotta
get that pre check because it is um. I did
this thing with Donut Media there. Uh they're like this
(05:29):
YouTube channel and for no for cars actually uh. And
so we did this thing called the Gamble of five
hundred where we go to Oregon, get a car under
five hundred, so they flew me up. But whoever bought
the tickets had NASA pre check. I mean t s
a pre check, guys. I'm in two thousand seven ye
(05:53):
not not not a pre check too, I'm in two
thousand seventy. We go onto space. When I went to what,
I was like, Oh, this is way easier. Why why
what's going on? And I and I always thought that
you it was an annual fee and they're like, no,
it's five years. I was like, oh, then it's probably
like a million dollars. They're like, no, it's eighty five bucks.
They're like, but that's like I feel like the black
(06:14):
experience in the nutshell, Like anything you see like white
people doing. You're like, oh, that's probably too expensive for me.
I'm not gonna funk with it. Uh, And they're like, no,
it's actually very easy. Why haven't you signed up for
your free healthcare yet? What it's like that. It's also
nice because it gives you a taste of what it
must be like to be in first class. When you
get to like look at other people who aren't in
(06:36):
first class and feel superior to them, but like you
don't have to pay that much because you just get
to like go line up in the t s A
the first class of the security lines, and like kind
of look down on the people are in the regular line.
It's you guys are discussing it. Just to listen out there.
I don't have t S A pre check because I'm
trying to I'm trying to stay connected to the people.
(06:56):
I like to wait for people's coughing, babies and screaming
and whatever. It's it's it's taking where you had. You're
a real funny story about your girlfriend's t S A privilege. Yeah. See,
that's what's crazy because people get who have t S
A pre check, they pre check privilege, which is like
when you know, you're so used to not waiting, Like
there will be like a couple of people and it's like,
oh man, like what what's the point now? You know,
(07:18):
we'll just be waiting with the with the lepers. All right,
We're trying to take a sample of the ideas that
are out there changing in the world. We talked about
pop culture, the news, the president. We sometimes talk about
supermarket tabloids because those are still out there telling people
what's what. So, yeah, we're trying to take a temperature
of the global shared consciousness of our human species. Miles,
(07:42):
what's our temperature today? Temperature? I mean, god, I'm not
to say it's still getting hot to you know what
it is. It's like a ninety nine, so you don't
think it's a fever, but it's it's hotter than normal. Yeah,
I feel like it's like we are. Temperature could be
ninety eight point six. We've got like one of those
things that like we're about get really sick. We just
don't realize that. But so we usually like start out
(08:04):
by asking our guest for a myth, something that the
global share consciousness believes to be true that you know
to be false based on your personal experience. Oh a myth.
That's that's real, Uh, real, chill. I think it's it's
just straight up that like the hood is filled with gangbangers.
(08:26):
Like I grew up in Compton, right, Yeah, just watch
the music video. Yea, that's exactly what my right. That
bright music video is so bad. Check it out and
laugh and know that it's not like that. We'll get
to that later, but yeah, I've grown up in Compton.
I was in Compton probably untill about my sophomore year,
but I started going to school and Downey h at
(08:48):
eighth grade, which is like, for those who don't know,
Downey's more of a suburb, a kind of like white
Latino area, pretty much nicer um. But you know, I
go there and when people would hear him from Compton,
they're like, oh, you're from Compton. I'd probably get shot
if I went there, right, And like it was funny
because like, you know, you're not at that age yet
(09:09):
to be like bit what you know, You're more like no,
like like what It's that kind of information growing up.
That knowing that myth kind of fueled everything in my
worldview to kind of help me understand how people can
be naive sometime, Like I remember, uh, there was a
really good town hall segment after the Trayvon Martin shooting
(09:30):
where the guy came up and he was like, I
don't blame George Zimmerman and people are like and he
was like, well, because everything he's watched on TV about
black people, everything he's experienced, he had every reason to
think that Trayvon Martin was this criminal thug for being
in this place. I don't think he was writing what
he's did I don't forgive him, but I will say
(09:52):
that that fueled it. It wasn't just his own idea.
And I think that's true. Like the idea that someone
hears I'm from Compton. I was like, oh, and you
must do it, and like, you know, Compton, we're getting
a lot of love right now because you know Strata
Compton Bomb Mass movie. But still that kind of reinforces
that idea of like, yeah, it's the it's the struggle,
and there's a lot of good people who live in Compton.
(10:14):
Also there's a lot of just like every hood you
got to nowhere to go. Like I had a friend
um who's like Kendrick Lamar is doing a show at
Nickerson Garden, like very very white, and I was like
you should go check it out. And it's like, uh now,
just let that be for black people one because you know,
just becausein two because Nickerson Gardens like the Marcy projects
(10:34):
of Compton's. Yeah people don't know, yeah, like don't Like
my step mom used to work in Nickerson Gardens and
like you just felt it. It It was like like when
you would go beyond the wall, he'd be like okay, yeah, okay,
well it's interesting you say that because there was even
a study that came out recently that was saying that
news media just essentially, I mean, we knew this sort
(10:55):
of inalia. It offers consistently worked portrayals of black fail. Yes,
And I think people fail to realize is how much
the media does inform these kind of really bizarre uh
ideas of especially black people in America. I mean it's
kind of hard to ignore when you get like juries
filled with human people voting that it was okay for
(11:15):
a cop to murder someone for no reason, like you
really have to. It's it's not even just like racism
at that point. That's just like a level of indoctrination
where you're like, he must have had a reason to
do it. He's a police and that person was a black, Yeah,
just a presumption of you know, non humanity. Yeah. Yeah.
(11:36):
Is there is there any like pop culture depiction that
you think gets Compton right or like something that you
were like, oh, that's actually somewhat accurate. Um, I feel
like a lot of like insecures, like depiction of not
necessarily Compton, but Los Angeles is good. But that's also
because she grew up in l A. So she's able
to do it right. And I do feel like um
(12:00):
Strato Coomptent did get it right in the sense that
one thing that people won't realize is like, yeah, the
in the opening scene, easy that was a drug house
or whatever, but they legit drove a tank through the
hood and destroyed this house. Like it's like, I feel
like that's the nuanced problem we we deal with in
everyday discussions of the militarization of police and police brutality
(12:21):
is that like we're not saying all black people are innocent.
We're saying that we should go to jail and not
just be killed in the street like dogs, and or
like if you like are going to breach a house,
maybe kick down the door and not destroy the whole
front side of the house. And this is those small,
systematic ways that black people are put down because if
(12:42):
for any reason, say your son is selling drugs out
of your house and you don't know they ripped the
front of your house, you don't have the money to
pay for that, and now you're out of a home,
you know, and then you get displaced to a project.
Some sawty Prince comes and builds up a a big
ten story apartment complex raises the rent and that's how
(13:04):
gentrification happens. Yeah, that's I think one of the best
mess we've ever had on the dailies. Like guys, uh,
because I'm charged up on that de Ray energy. It's
so funny. It's deray but like just I always want
to Davis. Yeah, alright, let's get into the stories of
(13:27):
the day. Uh. We are going to just start out
real quick by running through Uh one of the Koch
brothers sons is in the news right now, young man
named Wyatt Coke, who is our nominee for Person of
the Years. We're actually doing uh some episodes, some many
episodes next week that will drop where we actually give
(13:50):
out Person of the Year. But this guy is a
immediate from the rent for that award because short list
is so he's one of the Koch Brothers, uh large
adults ones. He makes just the ugliest shirts you've ever
seen and sells them online. And there are these incredible
videos of him where like it's sort of like a
(14:10):
a music video highlight reel of this dude and how
he sees himself. But it's just it's just amazing. So
we're gonna play some audio from one of these My
father said to me, whyatt you can do whatever you
want to in life, to just make sure you do
it well and you do it with passion um. And
then you see his shirt. Day I go to the office.
(14:32):
I enjoy creating the clothes. The bold means to me,
be authentic, be real, be yourself, be confident, and always
be a gentleman, but still have that tenacity that no
one can take away from you. I want my shirts
(14:53):
to be able to be worn in the boardroom, or
in a discotheca, or a nightclub, or on a yacht
the disco teccha. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Can't we just
stop that? I really, what the fuck a disco tech?
This dude just turned into like a fucking Spanish language
learning tape for seventh grade from sudden the disco teca
(15:13):
or a yacht like this guy, he's clearly I mean,
when you look at this young man, he is the
manifestation of late stage capitalism in a human body, and
he's been gas lit by privilege to the point that
he doesn't understand that he looks like a total asshole.
This guy's shirt, he's wearing a shirt with literal money
bags on tune. Money bags. That made me makes me mad.
(15:37):
It's like if little Yaddi wore that ship, it'd be hot.
And so you don't even have the business mind to
like be like, let me get like fashionable wrap people
who can pull off wearing money bags. I'm sorry, um I.
He instead, he was like, I am the human embodiment
of not cool, and I am going to put myself
(16:01):
front and center in an attempt to sell this ship.
You just just like google this do because he's just
draped in like attractive women in every scene of this video.
And he at the part where he's like, I just
like going into work and designing the clothes it shows.
It shows him sketching like a human form with like
(16:21):
clothes on it, and it is what I would have
drawn in sixth grade, fifth grade. It's like, yeah, the
proportions are all off, like well I wasn't a good
drawing miles. Uh. The proportions are all off. He's like
coloring it in and it just it looks like a
bad elementary school art project. Uh. And I think this
is getting a lot of attention because this dude is also,
(16:45):
you know, the human embodiment of this new tax plan,
and that he stands to make more money than just
about anyone in the country because he's you know, inheriting
a shiploadle money from one of the Koch brothers, which
is well because his dad is like obviously we know
Charles and David Coke. They're like the evil part of
the Evil Empire. But like his dad has the most
(17:06):
like privileged problems I've ever read about. Like he's a
wine collector and he sued a guy for selling him
fake knockoff wine that was supposedly owned by Thomas Jefferson.
This is this a kind of dude who buys Thomas
Jefferson wine and he's like, oh, how much is like
like two million or something? So that's how much he
paid for like some wine. Oh No, two million was
(17:28):
what he paid for a hundred thirty year old picture
of Billy the Kid. Right, So this is the kind
of guys like I biled. I mean, this family is wild, dude.
I mean, bless y'all for having so much money that
you can just this kid's dreams are all coming true. Also,
if you don't have time to look up the video,
I'll describe it for you. Like think of like a
nineties comedy and think of like some overweight dude getting
(17:50):
hit over the head and then he has some fantasy
of him being successful. Like that's what it looks like.
It looks like it's a parody of itself. Yeah, my
favorite Bob Dylan lyric ever is helpless like a rich
man's child and like that. That's this dude just seems
like he's just completely been destroyed by his upbringing, if privilege.
(18:12):
If you google guy who buys friends, his face will
come up, right, Yeah, hit me up. I mean, I'm
I'm kind of feeling these all over print graphic dress
shirts that no one fucking asked for. Smash cut to
next year where you see me and Miles next to
why just yeah chucking and driving. Dude, that's like two
(18:35):
people of color friends. Like his price will go out?
Oh yeah, oh yeah, come on right, all right, we're
gonna take a quick break and when we come back,
we will have Day McKesson. And we're back, and we're
thrilled to be joined by the American civil rights activist
(18:59):
and host of the truly must listen podcast pod Save
the People, Deray McKesson. Derey thanks for joining us, Yeah,
thank you, Yeah, no, it's great. To be here. It's
an I'm excited for his conversation. So one thing I
really love about Pod Save the People on the Daily
Ze case we feel like the news a lot of
the time encourages cynicism by focusing sort of only on
(19:23):
the bottom line and giving us like the highlights of
you know, when something bad happens. Uh, you know, we'll
get the death toll after a hurricane. But uh, Pod
Save the People does a good job of, you know,
sometimes highlighting the small victories that happened that might get overlooked. Like,
for instance, you had a recent news rundown where I think, Brittany,
(19:45):
by the way your news rundowns at the beginning of
the episodes, they're just so good. Those conversations are indispensable.
But Brittany talked about the fact that the death penalty
executions are down over the last set a number of years,
and uh that it was the work of you know,
just hard working defense attorneys that that got that done.
(20:07):
Are there other stories of small but some like substantial
victories that kind of come to mind that you wish
were told more widely in the mainstream media. Yeah, you know,
when I was putting together to the podcast, it's important
to me that we did just focus on the sort
of cycle of Trump and what is on cable news,
so that we had a conversation about all the other
(20:29):
things that we happened in the country or in the
world that like people just didn't know about. So because
like one episode that we clent, one of his pieces
of news was about the relationship between climate change and
child mayriagies, which was like fascinating. We just talked about
recently the incredible work that's happening in Austin around the
policing in contracts, so organized as an activists and citizens
have gotten together to push and they and they were
(20:51):
successful in getting the Austin City Council to unanimously not
support the latest round of negotiations with the policing contracts.
So that we really interesting and we try to bring
these stories and these issues that are really important but
aren't Trump and aren't sort of the chaos that's happening
every day and people's on people like seeing an MSNBC.
(21:12):
So that's been a real focus because we know that
like the trauma that you see on TV isn't the
only thing, and the joy that you see on TV
the only thing. So like one in eight federal cases
heard in a one in eight cases heard in federal
court next year will be heard by a judge at
Trump appoint It will be the single largest expansion of
the judiciary in the last fifty years. So it's those
(21:35):
sort of things that like I didn't know until we
had to, you know, we started talking about in the
pod that like broad it to our attention and uh,
and it's been helpful for people to think about different
ways that they can push and challenge and and sort
of make this system better. Yeah, the police shooting contract
thing that you you did down in Austin was really cool.
(21:57):
Is that something that is sort of saan wide. Uh,
like something that's up for discussion, I guess. And can
you just like talk a little bit about how the
nuts and bolts of that work, like how the how
the law can be changed to you know, hold police
accountable when when they do shoot somebody. Two years ago,
(22:20):
a stead of us got together and we created this
organization called Campaing Geral. There's a platform around ending police violence.
And one of the things that we did was we
did the first ever public database around police using contracts.
Because what we found was that there are literally just
two different systems of accountability. There's wonder force citizens and
there's a completely different one for police, and the one
(22:41):
for police is negotiated and managed the contract. So would
you find into these like Austin. Austin have causes where
the police get access to all investigation materials before they
can be interrogated. It's like that is that is something
that no private citizen gets to benefit from their Cities
across the country where says their clause is like, you know,
(23:01):
the officer has to be disciplined in the least embarrassing
way for the officer in the department. You're like, I
don't even know what that. Place like Chicago have clauses
to say that the discipline records get destroyed after five years.
You're like, well, it doesn't make sense, right. So one
of the things that we believe is that systems and
structure should be right and they should be fair, and
that they shouldn't be the publis shouldn't beholden to like
(23:24):
the benevolence of a really good person in office or
in a role. And in Austin, you know, we made
all of the findings public. We did it for about
I think it's like sixty semi cities and my first
day to set and they saw it, like activists in
Austin saw it, and they started organizing and they called
us for support and we came and supported. But they
did the work, you know, they put it in. They
got people testified at the city council from three pm
(23:47):
to eleven pm. It was incredible. Hey, j this is
Miles Um. Just how to question just from like an
organizing just a question in general. UM. In the early
days and the build up to Obama's election in short after,
I was doing a lot of organizing, UM. And one
of the biggest things that I feel that you know,
you are just you have really figured out how to
(24:08):
just connect people to issues and overcome apathy, which is
usually like the hardest thing for anyone organizing. Just in
terms of like the last year, and I feel like
there's so many things to to be uh insensed about
and outraised and take to the streets. What what do
you suggest for people who you know might start to
feel a little bit of apathy coming on, because I
(24:29):
know a lot of people just are starting to feel
exhausted in a way. But there's still definitely a lot
of fight left. How do you kind of see the
role of overcoming apathy or or tactics to to overcome it,
to sort of to go into this next year. Yeah,
you know, I hope has gotten a bad rep recently,
and I worry about the way that we talked about
hope in the public space. I think about hope as
(24:50):
a belief that our tomorrow's can be better than that today's.
And I think about hope is is work not magic?
I think a lot of people think about hope is
magic that like, to be hopeful means that you believe
in some sort of fairy that's going to come around
and like change the course of history. You know when
King talks about the the arc bends towards justice, you
know it bends because people bend it. It doesn't just
(25:11):
bend on its own. So when I think about what
keep saying hopeful is I've been all around the country
and around the world, and I see all these people
like realize that they can do something, They realize that
they are going to be heard, that they have power
in a different way. When we think about what they
mean to stand power people, it's like, I can't give
you power, right like we can't give each other power.
We can do though, it's help people find the power
(25:32):
that they have. We can help restore structural power to
people that they they should have. And like I've seen
people realize that we never think about the the voiceless.
We've always thought about the unheard and all across the country,
like you see people and like that gives me that
feels is understanding that like tomorrow can be better, Like
we can make this better. There are some people who
(25:52):
believe like God created you know, earth man and white supremacy,
and I'll never can see that this is like an
original creation, right, Like when people say the system is
working how it was designed, it's like that to me,
isn't actually hopeless? Like that to me is a reminder
that like people made this, and because people made it,
we can make it something different. That's cool. That's a
(26:13):
really good point. Yeah, you guys met with Agit Pie.
I think I heard you say before he repealed net neutrality, Uh,
what were you hoping to accomplish with that meeting? And
like what what did you accomplish? Yeah? So we did.
We met that he the chairman of the FCC, UH
probably a week before the vote a little bit less
(26:34):
than a week before the vote. You know, I met
as he at a conference. We sat next to each other.
We're both speaking at a conference and we sat next
each other and he was nice and we had a
great conversation, and we have been trying to schedule a
meeting in person, and it's just like the calendars in Morgan. Finally,
you know, I wish we'd been able to have the
conversation not so close to the vote. But I proposed
(26:56):
to day in October, and he could do it and
I couldn't do it. So it ended up being what
it is. But you know, me, me, Brittany and Sam
were there, and I think it was like wanted to
hear him out right. I wanted to understand like what
the philosophical positions were and wanted to tell him my perspective.
You know, so much of this is about showing up,
and we can't influence people we don't talk to. We can't, uh,
(27:19):
we can't sort of change the conversation at the table
if we're not at the table. We know that the
work doesn't only happen at the table, that it happens
in the streets, that happens in the bar rooms, that
happens at the dinner table. Is there many places that
we need to make sure we bring the conversation, but
one is bringing it to the people who have uh
structural power, knowing that like the people who have political
power always the people themselves. Right, So we have this conversation.
(27:42):
I think it was interesting because I hadn't ever thought
about one of their big points, or his big points,
is this idea that like the true censorship comes from
the platforms, not from the internet service providers. Right, So
what he will say, well he's written about is like,
you know, the fact that Twitter fans people and isn't
transparent about it, or the fact that the Facebook algorithm,
which decides what you see and how you see it
(28:04):
as a secret is actually a bigger threat to insert here, right,
like freedom, transparency, safety than repealing that neutrality. And like,
you know, while I disagree fundamentally, I never thought about
that as like like that wasn't one of the things
I was that I was thinking about sort of pushing back,
Like I didn't think about that as like a big lever.
(28:25):
So that was one. You know, he had a lot
of faith in the FTC and like one of the
things you see from the Republicans in general was this
idea that like de regulation just like makes things better.
And what we know to be true is that without
any regulation, like without standards and accountability, there'd be no
equity and justice that unfettered. Letting the people with the
(28:45):
most structural power and the most money decide how they
work always leads to a system that benefits the wealthiest people,
you know, like that doesn't work. So it was it
was good to listen and hear from him directly. It
was disappointed that the votes still happened the way that
they did. Yeah, I mean, I totally agree that Facebook
and all the different platforms are are threats in and
(29:09):
of themselves. But I don't see how giving you know,
the I s p s access to you know, the
ability to also have some determination on that does anything
but add an additional threat to the mix. Like, I
don't see how that's going to help us, uh, you know,
fend off Facebook. But yeah, I am totally having run
(29:32):
a website I ran Cracked for like ten years, and
you know that site kind of got killed by Facebook
tweaking the algorithm and you know, us not knowing why
or you know, them like bending things just basically towards
whoever was paying them. So yeah, that that's disappointing. Is
there is there something that you're looking forward to kind
(29:53):
of see whether they're going to like funk us uh
like the I s P S. Is there's something based
on that conversation that you think we should all be
looking for as a canary in the coal mine. Yeah,
I think that. Um, you know, I had to. I
had the former chairman of the FCC on the podcast
right after we met with a Z then and one
(30:14):
of the things that he said is that the row
won't end right now, right, so we're fine that this
will be tied up in the courts for a while,
and that we should be looking forward to what happened
in like a year or so, like that will be
when this the rubber really hits the row with this.
So so we'll see, you know, I am I'm mindful,
like there's a lot that there's a lot of stake here. Um,
(30:35):
I'm hopeful that the Trump administration doesn't last, you know
till build like something has to happen to get the
few body here. So we'll see. Yeah, right, this is
iffy and I have two part of question one is
going to be a little harder than the other. The
first one is, uh, you know, I'm l A born
and raight, so I grew up out here, and you know, once,
you know, I think, once the police start shooting and
(30:58):
started getting more visible when ramping up, even though it
was kind of known to people of color, it kind
of sparks something in me I had, you know, I
put in I was I was starting to put on
my like vest and get ready to do my thing.
But you know, I started trying to speak to people
and lawyers about like what we can do about the
l a p D and like places like out here
(31:18):
where the l a p D has a separate bill
of rights that protect individual cops from being held accountable.
It felt like we hit a real wall and I
wouldn't know what to do with that, and that kind
of discouraged me. So in that, what do you think
we can do about things like bill of rights that
protect cops and what can activists do to not be
(31:40):
discouraged while fighting the fight? Yes, so the bill of
rights actually like part and parcel with the policing in contract.
So if you got to check the police dot org,
you can see all of the villa rights across the
country for police officers combined with the policing contracts are
they're like the same, essentially the same thing. So you're right,
there's one. There's the one that protects l A p
D and the other police departments in California. Uh, they
(32:02):
shouldn't be discouraging the people and the sense that like,
you know, people did it, and because people didn't, people
can do something different. So like we can, Bobby, we
can become the state legislatures legislators and change, and we
can become the city council. Like so that's like a
path that is real. The other thing is that people
just don't know. So I think that if people knew,
they would, like it's hard to find the idea that
(32:23):
the police just get access to all the investigation materials
before they get interrogated. Like, I don't know, that's a
hard thing to desfend what the police have always says
for decades that like any attempt to make them accountable
will like somehow damp in public safety, and like that's
a shame that that's a deflection. You know, third of
all the people killed in this country about strangers actually
killed my police officer, which is wild, right, Like that's
(32:46):
like a wild thing, so doesn't discourage me. I think
what is hard is that their eighteen dollars and police departments. Right,
So when we think about the six a lot of
these sixes will happen at the local and state level.
The structural changes, if it's not addition to funding by
the d o J, will just be harder at the
part level, especially if it doesn't come from legislation. So
(33:07):
for now, it's working at the local level, and like,
people have been done incredible work. I think that people
need to remember that it's possible to win right in America.
Does seem so often like yeah, people do things and
then people can undo them. But it does seem like, um,
the more well funded side or the side that stands
to make more money tends to win out over time.
(33:29):
Like uh, I'm asking a question that's already been asked,
which is like, how do you avoid getting cynical based
on that? But yeah, it does just seem like money,
the side that stands to make money has such an
advantage in our country. Yeah, I'm like we should tease, like,
you know, money helps amplify and like changes the way
(33:50):
the pace of the way information spreads, and it also
helps people make different choices about their time and energy. Right,
So money allows like for advertising and air time work
for people to just own the like Fox News is
a great example, or like you can just pay a
gazillion people to canvas or whatever because you have the money.
The things that money allows to happen, like we can
(34:12):
figure out a way to organize around it doesn't require money,
but still as the same impact. It's just harder, right,
And I think what is different about this moment is
that there are infinitely more people who are ready and
willing to do something. Then there's like a structure to
sort of point them to what to do. And you
don't really need a structure where you're paying people, right
because like you can just pay them. It's a little
bit harder when you have eighty volunteers and you're like,
(34:34):
let's go do this. So I'm hopeful that in twenty
that we will figure that out a little better. I
think that the movement the protest of the past few
years have provided some structure. I think the Indivisible folks
have provided another set of structure. But I think an
a team will see sort of a superstructure that just
like helps people figure out where to go, what to do.
The committig era offset the impact of those with money
(34:55):
to be as dangerous as they have been. Yeah, I
mean that's incredibly uh hopeful and admirable. And yeah, I mean,
you guys are fighting against some interests that have more
money than a lot of the nations that you read
about in history books that people had to fight against.
So it's it's pretty incredible what you what you're managing
(35:15):
to do. And so I wanted to shift over too.
There was a recent report about how Obama's presidency economically
hurt black families more than just about anyone in America. Uh,
and it was also just generally bad for equality in
the country. Um, I'd love to get your thoughts on
sort of the legacy of the Obama presidency as it
(35:38):
relates to you know, those stories and and just in
general and you know, from a symbolic and energy level,
like how you deal with stuff like that. Yeah, I
think that I think that the critiques of Obama with
regard to race, especially the beginning of his term, his
first term, make a lot of sense. You know, the
report talks about black unemployment and an equity and I
think it is true the Abouma sort of happy this
(36:00):
idea that if we change the game for everybody, people
of color will do better to write and and I
think the data in some ways it didn't actually bear
that out. I also think that like we can't take
for granted things like healthcare right that like people call
a marginal people disproportionately benefit from that, and that's not inconsequential,
and that in some ways one of the critiques of
(36:20):
Obama that perhaps is the most sort of fairs that
they didn't push even more through when they had Congress, right,
that like you look at what Trump's going now, is
that he should have ran everything through in the first
you know, three and six five days. That like what
would it have looked like if Obama was was even
more aggressive around some of the bigger systemic issues when
yet Congress and then you look at the rest of
(36:42):
the presidency and there was no Congress, right, so it
was really just an administration trying to use its administrative power.
I think that the protests really forced Obama to think
about race differently and to publicly talk about race differently,
because it was race right. It was all these black
kids getting killed, about the police, and he had to
do something. You know. I was hopefully at the end
of the administration because it seemed like there was progress
(37:03):
and I think that they were trying to do a
setup for a Hillary and that it just didn't you know,
she didn't win, and I think a lot of energy
was lost there and that was sad. Yes, it was. Wait,
you're saying Hillary didn't win the election. That's crazy. Uh,
you know, I have to have to say it really calmly.
Just oh yeah, just to go along with kind of
(37:27):
like the Obama legacy, because that is something that has
been you know, it's it's talked about a lot. And
I think especially in the wake of that Cornell west
op ed and the Guardian about Tana easy Coats. Uh,
you know, it seemed like he was even alluding to
the fact that there were like levels to the struggle
or this movement. Um, you know, what did you make
of that? Like, did you do you think Cornell is
expressing a valid point the wrong way? Is he completely off?
(37:49):
I'm just curious to sort of hear your thoughts on that.
To me, one of the biggest thingaways from the entire
debate between the two of them was this was the
idea of progress and would it looked like and hope?
And I think that you know, Cornell's pushed to Tona
Hesse was sort of like, your fatalism is either unearned
or wrong for all of these reasons and in tones.
He didn't really respond to to Cornell's UH statements as
(38:13):
much as he sort of just hilided at Cornell hadn't
read his pieces. But I think a fair critique of
the Cornell position is sort of like, where has the
prophetic tradition taken us? Right? That like, did the legacy
of the prophetic tradition in this country that didn't achieve
the freedom that it purported to achieve to right? And
I think that that, like along that Folcrum, I think
that's fair. I think there is a fatalism that that
(38:35):
Tana Hesse has made UH sort of mainstream. And while
that is not and I like that doesn't resonate with me,
I understand how it resonates with some people. I think
there's also this prophetic tradition that like people let you
into because it is the backbone of the civil rights movement,
and and I think it's fair to question sort of
when that came from. I do think that, you know,
I'm always interested at how much space the public intellectuals
(38:58):
take up in the perspective, they're so different than the
people who have been in the rooms or have been
in the streets and have been sort of have been
on the grind with these issues. So it's it still
feels very theoretical when I read some of this writing,
and you know, I don't live in theory. I live
in practice. Right, So the theory is helpful even so
far that helps us think about the practice differently. And
(39:19):
I'm not sure that that debate helped me think about
the practice of this work any differently, right? Right? Is
there something about activism and that that people kind of
get wrong or or misunderstand? Like I know, I've heard
it center a podcast of the Founding Fathers were activists. Um,
can you are are there like things that when people
(39:42):
who aren't involved on a day to day level like
you are, when they picture in their mind activism that
they just get totally wrong. You know, I'm less interested
in like how you identify like you should? You know,
It's it's interesting it's only people of color that have
to like choose between sort of profession and being in
a deivist. And I think about activist as people who
like think the world should be better and are willing
(40:03):
to fight for it. So you look at Colin the
column has to choose between being like a football player,
an athlete, or like somebody who believes that the police
didn't kill people. White people always get to live in
a world where they can be, like they can be
like a dope accountant, an ape team. I'm like, they
don't have to, but people of color always have to
make a choice, and like that, I think that's a
false choice. So when I think about being an activist,
(40:26):
it is it is as much of an identity as
it is an approach, right, And like when you think that,
like I don't know anything from the school should be
better to like people shouldn't have to work a hundred
hours a week to have basic food or a house
right there, Like I think that that is, like that
is what it means to be a citizen or a person.
(40:46):
And I don't care how you identify as an activist,
as long as you're committed to the work. So when
we think about social justice, it's like even that is redundant, right, Like,
what does the justice look like that isn't social? I
don't know. Yeah, that is uh when when you say
social justice like as somebody who's been on the internet
like that that is just a that's like a bad
word now like s jws Um. Yeah, I had a
(41:10):
question for you, and this is more just on a
social level, because you know, I've noticed sometimes on the
left there's been a lot of infighting and I felt
like you've dealt with other another activists lashing out at you. Uh,
and you know that caused some stuff and a lot
of that. Uh, what do how do you feel about that?
Because for me, you know, the thing that I I'm
(41:32):
always worried about is being public with calling out and
being pedantic about people's quote unquote wokeness and then some
like alt right or someone on the right using that
to kind of try and bury that person. Yeah, it's
like a hard mom. You know, as much as we
fight the system and the people we disagree with, to
(41:52):
be honest, it is hard to see people not keep
this thing in their own work, right. So that's like one.
The second is I'm mindful of like what it what
it looks like when we say publicly. You know, I
will say that any any disagreement I've ever been in
that has resulted in a public disagreement, we've tried to
resolve offline. So me and the people around we never
(42:14):
bring the battle to the internet because I'm sensitive of
what it means to have a big platform, and people
think that this is the way we disagree. But sometimes,
like you call people, you text them and they will
tell you one thing in person and then so do
something different. So we've never brought the battle to the internet,
you know. And the third is it is real that
(42:34):
like there are people who want us to to like
lose right and they take any moment of disagreement as
a way to like divide and divide and divide, and
like that is true. That shouldn't change our condemic to
being honest. And I think that for some people, that
people inside the movement who are like they know things
aren't real or dishonest or shaking. They're just like, you know,
(42:54):
for the good of the whole, just like don't talk
about it, and like I don't know what a freedom,
what a politics of freedom eflected to read it in
live like that doesn't to me look like liberation. Right,
So those are the things that I like try to
guide myself with. And again, the things that you've ever
found about online publicly have been things that people have
brought to us, not things that we have brought to them. Definitely,
(43:15):
I just I think it's we're running out of time.
But I just want to ask one last question on
a lighter note, Deray, what is the greatest TV show
of all time? In your parents? X Men? For sure?
I love the X Men. The X Men cartoon was
like storm changed my life, everything, the hole, everything was great.
I never ever if I never ever see the Phoenix
(43:35):
Saga ever again. I feel like there was like this
weird pier where it was just like reruns of the
Phoenix Saga. But so I'm exhausted with the PHOENICX side up.
But I love the X Men. No, no, no, no, no, no. Yes,
that was the most That was one of the best
things I've ever heard. Yes, I had, I had the
piece of VHS that they gave you with the episodes,
(43:56):
and it was and it wasn't only like five minutes
of yeah, it wasn't anyway. So I just want you know,
I had to had to get let people in on
you know, the the just the lighter side of the
one last light thing. So you took your best to
Patagonia so it could get like touched up. Was that
like a de Ray special? Or can anyone take their
(44:17):
Patagonia best? And anybody can take their clothes to Patagonia
repair side, it's called Warner where they I've never not
had the best overnight, so they will all fix it
the same day for me, um and I appreciate that.
So that is like a they. I had to get
a new a new zipper because the zipper broke that
a little bandy because the downads coming out, and so
they take care of me. They're great. When I was
(44:38):
arrested Batonaries, the beverage police stole my book bag. They
still have and they said they can't find it in Patagonia,
send me a new one. So they've been very kind
to Patagonia. Seriously, now, is that a branding thing or
is that a comfort thing or all the above? No?
So you know in the beginning, uh, you know, we
were the street for four hundred days, right, so we
were actually in the initial we were that's through all
(45:00):
four seasons, and I needed something that I could where
that I never had to pack, that I could wear whenever, right,
so if I got too cold, I put a hoodie
on underhafter. It was just okay, and I'd like where
it is. And it became a thing for other people
way before it became a thing for me. But my apartment,
like I used to live in Minneapolis, in my apartment
is literally to this day still in stories like I
need to figure out who I'm to give my back
to you and books and all that stuff, but it's
(45:22):
still there. So the Best is like the heaviest thing
that I wore. So it's sort of like a it's
like a safety blanket. I'm used to it. It keeps
me like grounded and humble. You know. It's like I
can't I'm not wearing real design or anything because I'm
wearing the same thing every day. It's simple. It's like
not a lot of decisions to make. And I've always
like had a thing so like when I was in
college there where it's like one hoodie every single day,
(45:43):
it was simple, and it was great when I was
in middle school where the steam jacket every day. So
the best is just like a simple, like easy to do.
Got it and not a lot of that. It means
something to me. I've been in it, uh like through
Dickens then through a lot of situations. You know, if
I can be with the President Obama and the best
I could be anybody in again a good friend. All Right,
(46:04):
I think that's all the time we have you for.
But this has been a real pleasure. Deray McKesson, thank
you so much for talking to us. Thanks for appearing
on our stupid podcast. You guys are great. Thanks so
much for having me and I be forward to our
seeing you get too. All right, thanks Ray, uh and
we're going to take a quick break. We will be
(46:25):
back after this. And we're back. Yeah, we just talked
to one of the great leaders of our time and
we still can't stop talking about why Coke because that
(46:45):
that dude. We've just been Google image searching him and
I highly suggest that you guys do the same. But
also shout out to Deray for saying X Men animated series.
I mean, as if I didn't admire this person enough
as a black nerded like lit me up, like I'm
ready to go right right right. I didn't even know
there was an X Men TV show. What yeah, wait,
(47:08):
how mad a version. No, no, no, you had to
have seen. That's not an excuse you didn't know there
were I just feel like it's impossible, like it was
like inescapable. Yeah. Would you like growing up nineties? Yeah,
like they're really nineties? Would you like growing up like
in their early nineties? I was, you know, teenager, so yeah,
(47:28):
what were you doing? You know, exce movies and stuff.
He sounds like me when I talk about why I
haven't read Harry Potter, like the guy, although you've read
Harry Potter, so I don't have to read the first
three Harry Potters. Okay, Yeah, Well he does have a
favorite Bob Dylan quotes you guys. Yeah, they're they're laser
(47:50):
engraved on his Sperris. Uh. Yeah, no, I'm just kidding.
I totally knew there was. Alright, we're gonna blow through.
All right, let's go through some some news items. Uh.
Apple has admitted that it does slow down old iPhones.
(48:14):
Uh was not a figment of your imagination or just
seeing the faster, newer version and making you think that
your old phone was slower. It's actually that they admit
that they make the phones slower with new updates. Uh.
They make old phones slower with new updates because they
say the battery on old phones is deteriorating and so
(48:38):
they need to make it slower or else it'll I
don't know, like melt your pocket or some ship. Makes sense.
I mean I understand the like the technological logic of it,
but I guess the other thing we're talking about is like,
well then if you can, then you should just be
able to replace your battery to keep your ship running peak.
But it's like prohibitively expensive. No, it's just there's no
(49:00):
reason to do it. Well, yeah, because they use an
obtainium and so we'd have to go up and see
the nabby and that. Yeah. No, I mean they yeah,
there there have been smartphones that have replacedable batteries, but
it's just they say it like makes makes it too
big and too like clunky or whatever, so it makes
(49:21):
more sense for them just to just to buy you know,
I I experienced disposable iPhones. Experienced this firsthand because I
just upgraded to the iPhone Tin. Yeah, and so you know,
the my old phone was deteriorating the money in my wallet,
so I had to spend it, So I spent it
on this and now everything's safe. Although and it just
(49:42):
slid me a note that said that I feel battery
costs se really, so maybe it's not too bad. I
imagine that installation is probably the other part because they
have to take it apart with a welding. Well that's
if you go to the Genius bar, dude, you gotta
find one. So the Office is coming back. Yeah, look,
I'm so excited five years ago. Uh yeah, so NBC,
(50:06):
I guess because Will and Grace was such a hit,
they're like, oh, hey, I guess we would start bringing
back Oh there's great beloved shows. So there, it looks
like there's a plan to bring back the Office. But
here's the thing. It's still very early on and like
they're still trying to see who's down. But Steve Carell,
according to most people, is not going to be in it.
So I don't understand the reason of bringing it back.
The reason why Will and Grace, I imagine, was able
(50:26):
to capture more people was because at least the core
cast was returned. Although I know some people were saying
some people were missing blah blah blah, but it'll be
hard to say that The Office is going to perform
the same way. Because also, even at its peaked, the
Office was never as big as Will and Grace. So
is that true the Office was never I think maybe
just for in terms of like the actual ratings. I
think as a cultural phenomena, it's probably debatable, but I
(50:48):
think in terms of like what the numbers did as time,
like Will and Grace was like a phenomen and also, like,
if you think about it too, the ending of the
series was pretty satisfying, like there weren't any sends to
tie up, Like I don't feel like I need anymore.
It would just be a cash grab, yeah, exactly. And
also it only ended four years ago, right, so that
by the end the last like two seasons, I felt
(51:11):
like the only thing I heard from people who are
still watching it is like that somebody needed to put
it out of its misery, and like the guy who
created it has gone on to make you know, Parks
and rec was great and if you've already watched all that,
he's making the good Place now, which is also pretty solid.
One of the good things is it gave us Ellie
kemper Okay, you know, but I did. I went to
(51:32):
look up some of the nineties NBC shows, and I
got some I got some banger pitches that would I
think be more successful than uh if they were to
bring back the Office. Okay, so what do you got?
So I got fresh Prince? Oh my god, I got
but Uncle Phil died? Make a cannon? Saved by the bell?
(51:52):
Uh without screech m A different world, Oh, a different world.
I'll be interesting. Uh. And freaks and geeks. I would
love to see Jasmine guy again. Yeah, where is she anyway?
Saved by the Bell is what I was watching. You guys,
did you watch The College Years two? You know? That
was a real that was that was hard to watch too,
(52:13):
although I did watch it, but I have fans, you know,
say by the bell happened inside Zack's head. It was like, oh, yes,
this theory, Yes, tell you about the the theme song.
So the theme song, alright and being constantly undermined. Uh.
So the theme song when you hear it, it goes
(52:35):
from like the beginning of his day, waking up in
the morning, you hear the bell, right, and then he
goes into school and has a shitty day at school. Now,
the Zach Morris we know has never had a shitty
day at Bayside, but in the song, he has a
shitty day at school, gets home and says it's all
right because I'm saved by the bell. And then the
(52:57):
theme song that starts every episode is a school day,
and then the once the show starts, we're actually entering
Zack's dreams. So the theme song is his waking life
where he's just like a shitty sea student, which is
what the first season of the show was. Zach was
like lived in Indiana and he was just a shitty
sea student who had a teacher named Miss Bliss. And
(53:19):
then second season we enter his dream world where he
lives in like some California suburb and like he's the
coolest guy in school and he can freeze time with
his hands and ship. Uh So that's that's my fan
theory that we wrote about. It correct interesting. Yeah, I look,
it's it's something to think about. That's what I was
doing instead of watching X. Yeah, you're coming up you
(53:41):
analyzing and what the real meaning of and that's actually
probably more meaningful than me just my mouth agape watching
Sentinels yea eat. And and finally, the Netflix has released
its first blockbuster movie, The Movie They Spent I believe
eighty million, nine million on a single feature length film.
(54:06):
They got the writer of Victor Frankenstein, Max Landis, uh
famous douche Max Landis, and this director of End of Watch.
So that's cool, but also suicide Squad less cool. Uh,
and it's if you've seen the trailer, it's a bizarre
sort of weird racial allegory where Will Smith like is
(54:30):
an l a cop who's like racist against like magical
creatures or species. Yeah, he's species ist. Um and it is.
We're we're going to watch it over the weekend, so
we'll report back to you. But as of right now, uh,
it's getting just killed straight up zeros. Right, it's get
It's getting like actual zero from like reviews on metacritics
(54:54):
just just slam dunked into the trash can except for one, right, Yeah,
except for I Itty was like Max Landis is a
true genius. It's like, yo, Max, like, don't like tone
it down a little bit with your review of your
own movie, dadd you have to come through and be like, hey,
you better talk nice about now. Yeah, Max Landis. Back
when I was at Cracked, we had to kick him
(55:16):
out of the Cracked forum because it was such an asshole.
It's like, we didn't kick many people out of the
Cracked forum, but that dude was such a dick. What
was he? What do you have to do to get
kicked out of a fucking forum? Just be super obnoxious?
Really was he? Like? Just flaming? He's like, you guys
don't know ship, Like my stories are fucking dope. I
forget I I don't remember the specifics of the conversation.
I just remember that we were like, oh, remember this asshole,
(55:40):
this guy he just released a movie called what was
that movie called Chronicle Chronicle? Yeah, yeah, that's one of
the kids fire around and yeah, uh not that kid,
not solid guy who wrote it. Not that I tried
to make money with Cracked. You doing, you know, submitting
those pictures for the list never got picked once I
(56:03):
got to look, that's why I'm here. If he keeps
inching his chair closer to Jet, about to press him over, uh,
and that's gonna do it for today, I think, rick Us, Yeah,
I think. Well, lastly, let's just shout out to Nick
for uncovering a musical conspiracy. You know ed Shearing song
(56:24):
The Shape of You. It really took the charts by Yeah,
so next week you'll hear our conversation about the song
of the year. Uh, and we skip over. We're like,
you know, our songs of the year weren't the most played,
because the most played was this bullshit The Shape of
You by Ed Cheron, which could have come out in
any year, and it turns out it had already come
out in a different year. Because so there's there's this
(56:47):
New York Times article where they're talking about, like the
Shape of You the most played song on Spotify, and
as super producer Nick Stump put it, Ed Sharon and
his producers are just standing there jerking each other off
about like how great the writing process was. And Nick
was watching this video and he was like, holy shit,
it's it's just scrubs, Like I've heard this progression before,
(57:10):
this note sequence before. So I guess let's do a
little side by side and let's hear edge sheering first,
and then we'll hear scrubs. Do you know you love
what's sending me for somebody? Like I don't want to know,
you know, no, scrub scrub is that kind of getting
(57:30):
from me? I mean, but really, when the inspiration hit,
I was just like I don't know. Yeah, he liked
that was just talking about it like they're talking about
it like it was the invention of the light bulb.
It's I don't know, man, but yeah, so that that
is the most played song of the year, and that
proves nothing but that this was but it kind of
(57:53):
sounds similar. And also it's it's hard to even argue
that because they changed the progression just enough, right, that
is not a total rip off. But that's what most
music is, he stays. Anyway, So the whole story is
like and Ed Sheeron didn't even know he had magic
when it's like when he first wrote it, he wrote
it in only ninety minutes. It's like, yeah, that's about
how long I would take to rip off TLC. But
(58:15):
all right, sorry a cheering uh if he It's been
a pleasure as always to have you. Where can people
follow you? Oh you can catch me at if you
waway on Twitter, I f y in w A d
I w E on Instagram same one and on twitch
at A few of you have been coming on my
twitch stream talking about I'm here from the Daily Night Guy. Yeah.
(58:37):
I was like, wow, I didn't know. I got a
few twitch heads listeners sent The Zight Gang is large
like gangs, so if you're coming to my Twitch stream,
make sure you use hashtag night Gang so he knows
because we get a one cent for each miles. Where
can people follow you? You can follow me on Twitter
and Instagram at Miles of Grade. You can follow me
(59:00):
at Jack Underscore O'Brien. You can follow us at the
Daily Zikis on Instagram, Daily Ziegeist on Twitter. We have
Facebook fan page. We have a website, Daily Zeitgeist dot
com and where you can find episodes and our footnotes
notes where we link off two sources that prove the
stuff we're talking about is actually real and written by
(59:22):
actual journalists. Uh. And finally, we have a new show,
our first new show from the West Coast, how Stuff Works,
Uh Studios and the comedy imprint that we're starting up
out here. Uh. It's called Culture Kings. Its stars Jack,
kiss Edgar and Carl and Uh. They're all guys who
(59:44):
we've had on before. They are all super super funny dudes.
And the first episode comes out on January ten. Look
out for that. It's make sure you listen to it.
It's gonna be good. Trash. That was just came for
Carl oh Man, you know. Now I'm sad as hell.
(01:00:08):
You know, check my artsie post and you got something
for Jakissa. I think I think that that's I think
that's you, and I'm believing. I like although this man
has the smoothest fucking voice. Just wait, man, anybody who
listen to I'm telling you Jakis's voice is going to
melt it pregnant, pregnant just by listening to it. Yes, yes, uh,
(01:00:29):
And that's gonna do it. For today's episode, Miles, what
are we going to write out on? We're gonna write
out on a song by an artist called John Bapp.
It's called let It Happen. It's a very h's it's
a live band but with a very j dilla feel
like he's like this really dope, low fun I don't know,
I mean, just check it out. When's it from? Is
it like new? Yeah, it's new? This is uh. This
song actually came out in this year. So check out
(01:00:50):
John Bap. And this song is called let It Happen.
What's the genre? Man? I don't even want to put
this man in the box. Yes he does, he does
it all, but he has a hip hop He definitely
comes from that tradition, but it's like there's all the guitars,
it's biby. You'll feel like it's cool. We're gonna write
out on that we will be back tomorrow for one
final episode before the new year, and then we have
(01:01:12):
a bunch of kind of many episodes that we're gonna
drop on you guys over next week. Be warm cheap,
You're warm over the holiday. But we'll be back tomorrow
for another episode because it is a daily podcast, talk
to you guys. Then by ease back can really pay you.
(01:02:40):
The water so good to work. All the pat contempting
(01:03:13):
to paint can come back, and that can contempt and
the cont
Hello the Internet, and welcome to season eleven, episode four
of Dos Daly's Eight Guys for December twenty one, two
thousand seventeen. My name is Jack O'Brien, a K Jack
to the Future, and I'm joined by my co host,
Mr Miles Gray. Right, it's your boy, Miles Gravest. Whoa
I'd never I can't believe I didn't think of that.
Thank you to Simon work Davis. Yeah, who that's my
(00:21):
namesakes is once again courtesy of Trevor Uh and Trevors
like your ak writer now you ghost writers? Yeah, well
you just pop us those two, right and row uh
And we are thrilled to be joined once again by
the hilarious comedian and performer if what's up boy? If
(00:42):
Daz always staying breezy? I think I already said them,
but I don't worry. We were well, y'all had a
new one. And also today we have also another guest
happening later on that up front. Yeah, we have Drey
McKesson coming on later on. It is a great conversation
that'll be our mid chunk as we call it. But
(01:05):
up first, let's talk to if he about who he is? Uh,
if he what's something that you searched in the not
too distant past that is revealing about who you are
as a human being? Oh man, I think that would
have to be airline cards, an airline airline credit cards.
I'm always I'm always in the air. I'm fli as
fuck and ready to land somewhere. Yeah, we're gonna have
(01:28):
to just keep you grounded. You've got to fly away.
And also right out the bat, I want to give
a quick show, you know, because I don't know if
y'all know, it would be going down and the DZ
Instagram and it was getting popping, and you know, there's
there's some Yeah, there's something I gotta address. First thing
I want to talk about Calvin Lee Joseph. He asked
for a shout out, So what's up, Calvin. Thanks for
(01:49):
getting your co workers to listen to the show. You're
greatly appreciated. Uh yeah, Havin le Johns. I hope you're
going nuts. Send a video of your everyone's going nuts
for that shout out. Thank you for being a fan
of our podcast and not a presidential assassin like your
name makes you sound like you should be. Uh So, wait,
with flight cards or with with airline cards, Like I
(02:11):
always feel like I'm missing out on something because I
don't really use my Frequent Flyer miles as much as
I should. Yeah, because so with every dollar is a mile,
and when you use the airline, that's double the miles.
And I was real hyped for it because last year
my mother in law flew me to Argentina with miles
and wow, you racking them up like that. And so
(02:32):
I've always been a Delta sky Miles member because you know,
you know, I fly Delta. Delta got good first, Like
there was this like sudden increase of like the airlines
were suddenly like ship, we have to be nice now
and like give people movies for free. And Delta was
the first one to take that leap. So yeah, you
bet on the right horse. I am an American airline
(02:54):
and that ship took a while. You guys, there were
like two years where American Airlines was still like no,
you just get a barf bag. That's it. Like that's
still how we're how we're working on this side. Um, so,
what what's something that you think is overrated? Okay right now? Yeah,
Mega Mark, Prince Harry very overrated, Like people are super
(03:15):
hype about it. People are like, oh my gosh, oh oh,
let's bound to this. This this British dude for realizing
a black queen as fine as hell, Like, no, dude, no,
And I think it's a conspiracy. I think I feel
like I hear way more Americans talking about this royal
wedding than we did back when it was Katon whoever
(03:36):
the fuck? Okay, yeah, Prince William because we've got an
American in the game exactly. So this is all just
a power play to get us to give a funk
about their whole Like, oh, they're getting married, I don't care.
There's only one royal family and that's the Western Kardashians.
Y'all get on board. Get on board, get on board,
(03:58):
or get off under Oh no what Look he was
he could have been royalty, but he was assassinated by
Nazir so he never recovered from that. I mean he did.
I mean like, if you look at like the careers
in Family Life, yeah, I guess jay Z one, but
(04:19):
West Kardashian family get on board. Um, so you're still
taking sides in the jay Z nasby like they hopped
off a time machine. Question, you're gonna believe what I
just saw. Well, I remembered it again when Remy Mad
did the sheet and I was like, oh, yeah, that
was a beef. But like you would have never guessed that,
like nas body jay Z if you like look at
(04:41):
them now. I feel bad for Naz, I mean not,
I mean Calise did not re anyway. If he was
something that's underrated, underrated, I was gonna say, uh t
s A pre check just signed up right before I
got here. It was super easy. So I went on
a trip with the has A Donut Media week. Are
you like shilling for the travel industry? Check man? You
(05:07):
guys love this look. I'm gonna be doing a lot
of traveling next year because you know, I've been flying
to a lot of shows and stuff, and I'm like,
I need to get some incentive for all this money
I'm spending on flying. And so I was like, all right,
I gotta get an airline credit card and I gotta
get that pre check because it is um. I did
this thing with Donut Media there. Uh they're like this
(05:29):
YouTube channel and for no for cars actually uh. And
so we did this thing called the Gamble of five
hundred where we go to Oregon, get a car under
five hundred, so they flew me up. But whoever bought
the tickets had NASA pre check. I mean t s
a pre check, guys. I'm in two thousand seven ye
(05:53):
not not not a pre check too, I'm in two
thousand seventy. We go onto space. When I went to what,
I was like, Oh, this is way easier. Why why
what's going on? And I and I always thought that
you it was an annual fee and they're like, no,
it's five years. I was like, oh, then it's probably
like a million dollars. They're like, no, it's eighty five bucks.
They're like, but that's like I feel like the black
(06:14):
experience in the nutshell, Like anything you see like white
people doing. You're like, oh, that's probably too expensive for me.
I'm not gonna funk with it. Uh, And they're like, no,
it's actually very easy. Why haven't you signed up for
your free healthcare yet? What it's like that. It's also
nice because it gives you a taste of what it
must be like to be in first class. When you
get to like look at other people who aren't in
(06:36):
first class and feel superior to them, but like you
don't have to pay that much because you just get
to like go line up in the t s A
the first class of the security lines, and like kind
of look down on the people are in the regular line.
It's you guys are discussing it. Just to listen out there.
I don't have t S A pre check because I'm
trying to I'm trying to stay connected to the people.
(06:56):
I like to wait for people's coughing, babies and screaming
and whatever. It's it's it's taking where you had. You're
a real funny story about your girlfriend's t S A privilege. Yeah. See,
that's what's crazy because people get who have t S
A pre check, they pre check privilege, which is like
when you know, you're so used to not waiting, Like
there will be like a couple of people and it's like,
oh man, like what what's the point now? You know,
(07:18):
we'll just be waiting with the with the lepers. All right,
We're trying to take a sample of the ideas that
are out there changing in the world. We talked about
pop culture, the news, the president. We sometimes talk about
supermarket tabloids because those are still out there telling people
what's what. So, yeah, we're trying to take a temperature
of the global shared consciousness of our human species. Miles,
(07:42):
what's our temperature today? Temperature? I mean, god, I'm not
to say it's still getting hot to you know what
it is. It's like a ninety nine, so you don't
think it's a fever, but it's it's hotter than normal. Yeah,
I feel like it's like we are. Temperature could be
ninety eight point six. We've got like one of those
things that like we're about get really sick. We just
don't realize that. But so we usually like start out
(08:04):
by asking our guest for a myth, something that the
global share consciousness believes to be true that you know
to be false based on your personal experience. Oh a myth.
That's that's real, Uh, real, chill. I think it's it's
just straight up that like the hood is filled with gangbangers.
(08:26):
Like I grew up in Compton, right, Yeah, just watch
the music video. Yea, that's exactly what my right. That
bright music video is so bad. Check it out and
laugh and know that it's not like that. We'll get
to that later, but yeah, I've grown up in Compton.
I was in Compton probably untill about my sophomore year,
but I started going to school and Downey h at
(08:48):
eighth grade, which is like, for those who don't know,
Downey's more of a suburb, a kind of like white
Latino area, pretty much nicer um. But you know, I
go there and when people would hear him from Compton,
they're like, oh, you're from Compton. I'd probably get shot
if I went there, right, And like it was funny
because like, you know, you're not at that age yet
(09:09):
to be like bit what you know, You're more like no,
like like what It's that kind of information growing up.
That knowing that myth kind of fueled everything in my
worldview to kind of help me understand how people can
be naive sometime, Like I remember, uh, there was a
really good town hall segment after the Trayvon Martin shooting
(09:30):
where the guy came up and he was like, I
don't blame George Zimmerman and people are like and he
was like, well, because everything he's watched on TV about
black people, everything he's experienced, he had every reason to
think that Trayvon Martin was this criminal thug for being
in this place. I don't think he was writing what
he's did I don't forgive him, but I will say
(09:52):
that that fueled it. It wasn't just his own idea.
And I think that's true. Like the idea that someone
hears I'm from Compton. I was like, oh, and you
must do it, and like, you know, Compton, we're getting
a lot of love right now because you know Strata
Compton Bomb Mass movie. But still that kind of reinforces
that idea of like, yeah, it's the it's the struggle,
and there's a lot of good people who live in Compton.
(10:14):
Also there's a lot of just like every hood you
got to nowhere to go. Like I had a friend
um who's like Kendrick Lamar is doing a show at
Nickerson Garden, like very very white, and I was like
you should go check it out. And it's like, uh now,
just let that be for black people one because you know,
just becausein two because Nickerson Gardens like the Marcy projects
(10:34):
of Compton's. Yeah people don't know, yeah, like don't Like
my step mom used to work in Nickerson Gardens and
like you just felt it. It It was like like when
you would go beyond the wall, he'd be like okay, yeah, okay,
well it's interesting you say that because there was even
a study that came out recently that was saying that
news media just essentially, I mean, we knew this sort
(10:55):
of inalia. It offers consistently worked portrayals of black fail. Yes,
And I think people fail to realize is how much
the media does inform these kind of really bizarre uh
ideas of especially black people in America. I mean it's
kind of hard to ignore when you get like juries
filled with human people voting that it was okay for
(11:15):
a cop to murder someone for no reason, like you
really have to. It's it's not even just like racism
at that point. That's just like a level of indoctrination
where you're like, he must have had a reason to
do it. He's a police and that person was a black, Yeah,
just a presumption of you know, non humanity. Yeah. Yeah.
(11:36):
Is there is there any like pop culture depiction that
you think gets Compton right or like something that you
were like, oh, that's actually somewhat accurate. Um, I feel
like a lot of like insecures, like depiction of not
necessarily Compton, but Los Angeles is good. But that's also
because she grew up in l A. So she's able
to do it right. And I do feel like um
(12:00):
Strato Coomptent did get it right in the sense that
one thing that people won't realize is like, yeah, the
in the opening scene, easy that was a drug house
or whatever, but they legit drove a tank through the
hood and destroyed this house. Like it's like, I feel
like that's the nuanced problem we we deal with in
everyday discussions of the militarization of police and police brutality
(12:21):
is that like we're not saying all black people are innocent.
We're saying that we should go to jail and not
just be killed in the street like dogs, and or
like if you like are going to breach a house,
maybe kick down the door and not destroy the whole
front side of the house. And this is those small,
systematic ways that black people are put down because if
(12:42):
for any reason, say your son is selling drugs out
of your house and you don't know they ripped the
front of your house, you don't have the money to
pay for that, and now you're out of a home,
you know, and then you get displaced to a project.
Some sawty Prince comes and builds up a a big
ten story apartment complex raises the rent and that's how
(13:04):
gentrification happens. Yeah, that's I think one of the best
mess we've ever had on the dailies. Like guys, uh,
because I'm charged up on that de Ray energy. It's
so funny. It's deray but like just I always want
to Davis. Yeah, alright, let's get into the stories of
(13:27):
the day. Uh. We are going to just start out
real quick by running through Uh one of the Koch
brothers sons is in the news right now, young man
named Wyatt Coke, who is our nominee for Person of
the Years. We're actually doing uh some episodes, some many
episodes next week that will drop where we actually give
(13:50):
out Person of the Year. But this guy is a
immediate from the rent for that award because short list
is so he's one of the Koch Brothers, uh large
adults ones. He makes just the ugliest shirts you've ever
seen and sells them online. And there are these incredible
videos of him where like it's sort of like a
(14:10):
a music video highlight reel of this dude and how
he sees himself. But it's just it's just amazing. So
we're gonna play some audio from one of these My
father said to me, whyatt you can do whatever you
want to in life, to just make sure you do
it well and you do it with passion um. And
then you see his shirt. Day I go to the office.
(14:32):
I enjoy creating the clothes. The bold means to me,
be authentic, be real, be yourself, be confident, and always
be a gentleman, but still have that tenacity that no
one can take away from you. I want my shirts
(14:53):
to be able to be worn in the boardroom, or
in a discotheca, or a nightclub, or on a yacht
the disco teccha. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Can't we just
stop that? I really, what the fuck a disco tech?
This dude just turned into like a fucking Spanish language
learning tape for seventh grade from sudden the disco teca
(15:13):
or a yacht like this guy, he's clearly I mean,
when you look at this young man, he is the
manifestation of late stage capitalism in a human body, and
he's been gas lit by privilege to the point that
he doesn't understand that he looks like a total asshole.
This guy's shirt, he's wearing a shirt with literal money
bags on tune. Money bags. That made me makes me mad.
(15:37):
It's like if little Yaddi wore that ship, it'd be hot.
And so you don't even have the business mind to
like be like, let me get like fashionable wrap people
who can pull off wearing money bags. I'm sorry, um I.
He instead, he was like, I am the human embodiment
of not cool, and I am going to put myself
(16:01):
front and center in an attempt to sell this ship.
You just just like google this do because he's just
draped in like attractive women in every scene of this video.
And he at the part where he's like, I just
like going into work and designing the clothes it shows.
It shows him sketching like a human form with like
(16:21):
clothes on it, and it is what I would have
drawn in sixth grade, fifth grade. It's like, yeah, the
proportions are all off, like well I wasn't a good
drawing miles. Uh. The proportions are all off. He's like
coloring it in and it just it looks like a
bad elementary school art project. Uh. And I think this
is getting a lot of attention because this dude is also,
(16:45):
you know, the human embodiment of this new tax plan,
and that he stands to make more money than just
about anyone in the country because he's you know, inheriting
a shiploadle money from one of the Koch brothers, which
is well because his dad is like obviously we know
Charles and David Coke. They're like the evil part of
the Evil Empire. But like his dad has the most
(17:06):
like privileged problems I've ever read about. Like he's a
wine collector and he sued a guy for selling him
fake knockoff wine that was supposedly owned by Thomas Jefferson.
This is this a kind of dude who buys Thomas
Jefferson wine and he's like, oh, how much is like
like two million or something? So that's how much he
paid for like some wine. Oh No, two million was
(17:28):
what he paid for a hundred thirty year old picture
of Billy the Kid. Right, So this is the kind
of guys like I biled. I mean, this family is wild, dude.
I mean, bless y'all for having so much money that
you can just this kid's dreams are all coming true. Also,
if you don't have time to look up the video,
I'll describe it for you. Like think of like a
nineties comedy and think of like some overweight dude getting
(17:50):
hit over the head and then he has some fantasy
of him being successful. Like that's what it looks like.
It looks like it's a parody of itself. Yeah, my
favorite Bob Dylan lyric ever is helpless like a rich
man's child and like that. That's this dude just seems
like he's just completely been destroyed by his upbringing, if privilege.
(18:12):
If you google guy who buys friends, his face will
come up, right, Yeah, hit me up. I mean, I'm
I'm kind of feeling these all over print graphic dress
shirts that no one fucking asked for. Smash cut to
next year where you see me and Miles next to
why just yeah chucking and driving. Dude, that's like two
(18:35):
people of color friends. Like his price will go out?
Oh yeah, oh yeah, come on right, all right, we're
gonna take a quick break and when we come back,
we will have Day McKesson. And we're back, and we're
thrilled to be joined by the American civil rights activist
(18:59):
and host of the truly must listen podcast pod Save
the People, Deray McKesson. Derey thanks for joining us, Yeah,
thank you, Yeah, no, it's great. To be here. It's
an I'm excited for his conversation. So one thing I
really love about Pod Save the People on the Daily
Ze case we feel like the news a lot of
the time encourages cynicism by focusing sort of only on
(19:23):
the bottom line and giving us like the highlights of
you know, when something bad happens. Uh, you know, we'll
get the death toll after a hurricane. But uh, Pod
Save the People does a good job of, you know,
sometimes highlighting the small victories that happened that might get overlooked. Like,
for instance, you had a recent news rundown where I think, Brittany,
(19:45):
by the way your news rundowns at the beginning of
the episodes, they're just so good. Those conversations are indispensable.
But Brittany talked about the fact that the death penalty
executions are down over the last set a number of years,
and uh that it was the work of you know,
just hard working defense attorneys that that got that done.
(20:07):
Are there other stories of small but some like substantial
victories that kind of come to mind that you wish
were told more widely in the mainstream media. Yeah, you know,
when I was putting together to the podcast, it's important
to me that we did just focus on the sort
of cycle of Trump and what is on cable news,
so that we had a conversation about all the other
(20:29):
things that we happened in the country or in the
world that like people just didn't know about. So because
like one episode that we clent, one of his pieces
of news was about the relationship between climate change and
child mayriagies, which was like fascinating. We just talked about
recently the incredible work that's happening in Austin around the
policing in contracts, so organized as an activists and citizens
have gotten together to push and they and they were
(20:51):
successful in getting the Austin City Council to unanimously not
support the latest round of negotiations with the policing contracts.
So that we really interesting and we try to bring
these stories and these issues that are really important but
aren't Trump and aren't sort of the chaos that's happening
every day and people's on people like seeing an MSNBC.
(21:12):
So that's been a real focus because we know that
like the trauma that you see on TV isn't the
only thing, and the joy that you see on TV
the only thing. So like one in eight federal cases
heard in a one in eight cases heard in federal
court next year will be heard by a judge at
Trump appoint It will be the single largest expansion of
the judiciary in the last fifty years. So it's those
(21:35):
sort of things that like I didn't know until we
had to, you know, we started talking about in the
pod that like broad it to our attention and uh,
and it's been helpful for people to think about different
ways that they can push and challenge and and sort
of make this system better. Yeah, the police shooting contract
thing that you you did down in Austin was really cool.
(21:57):
Is that something that is sort of saan wide. Uh,
like something that's up for discussion, I guess. And can
you just like talk a little bit about how the
nuts and bolts of that work, like how the how
the law can be changed to you know, hold police
accountable when when they do shoot somebody. Two years ago,
(22:20):
a stead of us got together and we created this
organization called Campaing Geral. There's a platform around ending police violence.
And one of the things that we did was we
did the first ever public database around police using contracts.
Because what we found was that there are literally just
two different systems of accountability. There's wonder force citizens and
there's a completely different one for police, and the one
(22:41):
for police is negotiated and managed the contract. So would
you find into these like Austin. Austin have causes where
the police get access to all investigation materials before they
can be interrogated. It's like that is that is something
that no private citizen gets to benefit from their Cities
across the country where says their clause is like, you know,
(23:01):
the officer has to be disciplined in the least embarrassing
way for the officer in the department. You're like, I
don't even know what that. Place like Chicago have clauses
to say that the discipline records get destroyed after five years.
You're like, well, it doesn't make sense, right. So one
of the things that we believe is that systems and
structure should be right and they should be fair, and
that they shouldn't be the publis shouldn't beholden to like
(23:24):
the benevolence of a really good person in office or
in a role. And in Austin, you know, we made
all of the findings public. We did it for about
I think it's like sixty semi cities and my first
day to set and they saw it, like activists in
Austin saw it, and they started organizing and they called
us for support and we came and supported. But they
did the work, you know, they put it in. They
got people testified at the city council from three pm
(23:47):
to eleven pm. It was incredible. Hey, j this is
Miles Um. Just how to question just from like an
organizing just a question in general. UM. In the early
days and the build up to Obama's election in short after,
I was doing a lot of organizing, UM. And one
of the biggest things that I feel that you know,
you are just you have really figured out how to
(24:08):
just connect people to issues and overcome apathy, which is
usually like the hardest thing for anyone organizing. Just in
terms of like the last year, and I feel like
there's so many things to to be uh insensed about
and outraised and take to the streets. What what do
you suggest for people who you know might start to
feel a little bit of apathy coming on, because I
(24:29):
know a lot of people just are starting to feel
exhausted in a way. But there's still definitely a lot
of fight left. How do you kind of see the
role of overcoming apathy or or tactics to to overcome it,
to sort of to go into this next year. Yeah,
you know, I hope has gotten a bad rep recently,
and I worry about the way that we talked about
hope in the public space. I think about hope as
(24:50):
a belief that our tomorrow's can be better than that today's.
And I think about hope is is work not magic?
I think a lot of people think about hope is
magic that like, to be hopeful means that you believe
in some sort of fairy that's going to come around
and like change the course of history. You know when
King talks about the the arc bends towards justice, you
know it bends because people bend it. It doesn't just
(25:11):
bend on its own. So when I think about what
keep saying hopeful is I've been all around the country
and around the world, and I see all these people
like realize that they can do something, They realize that
they are going to be heard, that they have power
in a different way. When we think about what they
mean to stand power people, it's like, I can't give
you power, right like we can't give each other power.
We can do though, it's help people find the power
(25:32):
that they have. We can help restore structural power to
people that they they should have. And like I've seen
people realize that we never think about the the voiceless.
We've always thought about the unheard and all across the country,
like you see people and like that gives me that
feels is understanding that like tomorrow can be better, Like
we can make this better. There are some people who
(25:52):
believe like God created you know, earth man and white supremacy,
and I'll never can see that this is like an
original creation, right, Like when people say the system is
working how it was designed, it's like that to me,
isn't actually hopeless? Like that to me is a reminder
that like people made this, and because people made it,
we can make it something different. That's cool. That's a
(26:13):
really good point. Yeah, you guys met with Agit Pie.
I think I heard you say before he repealed net neutrality, Uh,
what were you hoping to accomplish with that meeting? And
like what what did you accomplish? Yeah? So we did.
We met that he the chairman of the FCC, UH
probably a week before the vote a little bit less
(26:34):
than a week before the vote. You know, I met
as he at a conference. We sat next to each other.
We're both speaking at a conference and we sat next
each other and he was nice and we had a
great conversation, and we have been trying to schedule a
meeting in person, and it's just like the calendars in Morgan. Finally,
you know, I wish we'd been able to have the
conversation not so close to the vote. But I proposed
(26:56):
to day in October, and he could do it and
I couldn't do it. So it ended up being what
it is. But you know, me, me, Brittany and Sam
were there, and I think it was like wanted to
hear him out right. I wanted to understand like what
the philosophical positions were and wanted to tell him my perspective.
You know, so much of this is about showing up,
and we can't influence people we don't talk to. We can't, uh,
(27:19):
we can't sort of change the conversation at the table
if we're not at the table. We know that the
work doesn't only happen at the table, that it happens
in the streets, that happens in the bar rooms, that
happens at the dinner table. Is there many places that
we need to make sure we bring the conversation, but
one is bringing it to the people who have uh
structural power, knowing that like the people who have political
power always the people themselves. Right, So we have this conversation.
(27:42):
I think it was interesting because I hadn't ever thought
about one of their big points, or his big points,
is this idea that like the true censorship comes from
the platforms, not from the internet service providers. Right, So
what he will say, well he's written about is like,
you know, the fact that Twitter fans people and isn't
transparent about it, or the fact that the Facebook algorithm,
which decides what you see and how you see it
(28:04):
as a secret is actually a bigger threat to insert here, right,
like freedom, transparency, safety than repealing that neutrality. And like,
you know, while I disagree fundamentally, I never thought about
that as like like that wasn't one of the things
I was that I was thinking about sort of pushing back,
Like I didn't think about that as like a big lever.
(28:25):
So that was one. You know, he had a lot
of faith in the FTC and like one of the
things you see from the Republicans in general was this
idea that like de regulation just like makes things better.
And what we know to be true is that without
any regulation, like without standards and accountability, there'd be no
equity and justice that unfettered. Letting the people with the
(28:45):
most structural power and the most money decide how they
work always leads to a system that benefits the wealthiest people,
you know, like that doesn't work. So it was it
was good to listen and hear from him directly. It
was disappointed that the votes still happened the way that
they did. Yeah, I mean, I totally agree that Facebook
and all the different platforms are are threats in and
(29:09):
of themselves. But I don't see how giving you know,
the I s p s access to you know, the
ability to also have some determination on that does anything
but add an additional threat to the mix. Like, I
don't see how that's going to help us, uh, you know,
fend off Facebook. But yeah, I am totally having run
(29:32):
a website I ran Cracked for like ten years, and
you know that site kind of got killed by Facebook
tweaking the algorithm and you know, us not knowing why
or you know, them like bending things just basically towards
whoever was paying them. So yeah, that that's disappointing. Is
there is there something that you're looking forward to kind
(29:53):
of see whether they're going to like funk us uh
like the I s P S. Is there's something based
on that conversation that you think we should all be
looking for as a canary in the coal mine. Yeah,
I think that. Um, you know, I had to. I
had the former chairman of the FCC on the podcast
right after we met with a Z then and one
(30:14):
of the things that he said is that the row
won't end right now, right, so we're fine that this
will be tied up in the courts for a while,
and that we should be looking forward to what happened
in like a year or so, like that will be
when this the rubber really hits the row with this.
So so we'll see, you know, I am I'm mindful,
like there's a lot that there's a lot of stake here. Um,
(30:35):
I'm hopeful that the Trump administration doesn't last, you know
till build like something has to happen to get the
few body here. So we'll see. Yeah, right, this is
iffy and I have two part of question one is
going to be a little harder than the other. The
first one is, uh, you know, I'm l A born
and raight, so I grew up out here, and you know, once,
you know, I think, once the police start shooting and
(30:58):
started getting more visible when ramping up, even though it
was kind of known to people of color, it kind
of sparks something in me I had, you know, I
put in I was I was starting to put on
my like vest and get ready to do my thing.
But you know, I started trying to speak to people
and lawyers about like what we can do about the
l a p D and like places like out here
(31:18):
where the l a p D has a separate bill
of rights that protect individual cops from being held accountable.
It felt like we hit a real wall and I
wouldn't know what to do with that, and that kind
of discouraged me. So in that, what do you think
we can do about things like bill of rights that
protect cops and what can activists do to not be
(31:40):
discouraged while fighting the fight? Yes, so the bill of
rights actually like part and parcel with the policing in contract.
So if you got to check the police dot org,
you can see all of the villa rights across the
country for police officers combined with the policing contracts are
they're like the same, essentially the same thing. So you're right,
there's one. There's the one that protects l A p
D and the other police departments in California. Uh, they
(32:02):
shouldn't be discouraging the people and the sense that like,
you know, people did it, and because people didn't, people
can do something different. So like we can, Bobby, we
can become the state legislatures legislators and change, and we
can become the city council. Like so that's like a
path that is real. The other thing is that people
just don't know. So I think that if people knew,
they would, like it's hard to find the idea that
(32:23):
the police just get access to all the investigation materials
before they get interrogated. Like, I don't know, that's a
hard thing to desfend what the police have always says
for decades that like any attempt to make them accountable
will like somehow damp in public safety, and like that's
a shame that that's a deflection. You know, third of
all the people killed in this country about strangers actually
killed my police officer, which is wild, right, Like that's
(32:46):
like a wild thing, so doesn't discourage me. I think
what is hard is that their eighteen dollars and police departments. Right,
So when we think about the six a lot of
these sixes will happen at the local and state level.
The structural changes, if it's not addition to funding by
the d o J, will just be harder at the
part level, especially if it doesn't come from legislation. So
(33:07):
for now, it's working at the local level, and like,
people have been done incredible work. I think that people
need to remember that it's possible to win right in America.
Does seem so often like yeah, people do things and
then people can undo them. But it does seem like, um,
the more well funded side or the side that stands
to make more money tends to win out over time.
(33:29):
Like uh, I'm asking a question that's already been asked,
which is like, how do you avoid getting cynical based
on that? But yeah, it does just seem like money,
the side that stands to make money has such an
advantage in our country. Yeah, I'm like we should tease, like,
you know, money helps amplify and like changes the way
(33:50):
the pace of the way information spreads, and it also
helps people make different choices about their time and energy. Right,
So money allows like for advertising and air time work
for people to just own the like Fox News is
a great example, or like you can just pay a
gazillion people to canvas or whatever because you have the money.
The things that money allows to happen, like we can
(34:12):
figure out a way to organize around it doesn't require money,
but still as the same impact. It's just harder, right,
And I think what is different about this moment is
that there are infinitely more people who are ready and
willing to do something. Then there's like a structure to
sort of point them to what to do. And you
don't really need a structure where you're paying people, right
because like you can just pay them. It's a little
bit harder when you have eighty volunteers and you're like,
(34:34):
let's go do this. So I'm hopeful that in twenty
that we will figure that out a little better. I
think that the movement the protest of the past few
years have provided some structure. I think the Indivisible folks
have provided another set of structure. But I think an
a team will see sort of a superstructure that just
like helps people figure out where to go, what to do.
The committig era offset the impact of those with money
(34:55):
to be as dangerous as they have been. Yeah, I
mean that's incredibly uh hopeful and admirable. And yeah, I mean,
you guys are fighting against some interests that have more
money than a lot of the nations that you read
about in history books that people had to fight against.
So it's it's pretty incredible what you what you're managing
(35:15):
to do. And so I wanted to shift over too.
There was a recent report about how Obama's presidency economically
hurt black families more than just about anyone in America. Uh,
and it was also just generally bad for equality in
the country. Um, I'd love to get your thoughts on
sort of the legacy of the Obama presidency as it
(35:38):
relates to you know, those stories and and just in
general and you know, from a symbolic and energy level,
like how you deal with stuff like that. Yeah, I
think that I think that the critiques of Obama with
regard to race, especially the beginning of his term, his
first term, make a lot of sense. You know, the
report talks about black unemployment and an equity and I
think it is true the Abouma sort of happy this
(36:00):
idea that if we change the game for everybody, people
of color will do better to write and and I
think the data in some ways it didn't actually bear
that out. I also think that like we can't take
for granted things like healthcare right that like people call
a marginal people disproportionately benefit from that, and that's not inconsequential,
and that in some ways one of the critiques of
(36:20):
Obama that perhaps is the most sort of fairs that
they didn't push even more through when they had Congress, right,
that like you look at what Trump's going now, is
that he should have ran everything through in the first
you know, three and six five days. That like what
would it have looked like if Obama was was even
more aggressive around some of the bigger systemic issues when
yet Congress and then you look at the rest of
(36:42):
the presidency and there was no Congress, right, so it
was really just an administration trying to use its administrative power.
I think that the protests really forced Obama to think
about race differently and to publicly talk about race differently,
because it was race right. It was all these black
kids getting killed, about the police, and he had to
do something. You know. I was hopefully at the end
of the administration because it seemed like there was progress
(37:03):
and I think that they were trying to do a
setup for a Hillary and that it just didn't you know,
she didn't win, and I think a lot of energy
was lost there and that was sad. Yes, it was. Wait,
you're saying Hillary didn't win the election. That's crazy. Uh,
you know, I have to have to say it really calmly.
Just oh yeah, just to go along with kind of
(37:27):
like the Obama legacy, because that is something that has
been you know, it's it's talked about a lot. And
I think especially in the wake of that Cornell west
op ed and the Guardian about Tana easy Coats. Uh,
you know, it seemed like he was even alluding to
the fact that there were like levels to the struggle
or this movement. Um, you know, what did you make
of that? Like, did you do you think Cornell is
expressing a valid point the wrong way? Is he completely off?
(37:49):
I'm just curious to sort of hear your thoughts on that.
To me, one of the biggest thingaways from the entire
debate between the two of them was this was the
idea of progress and would it looked like and hope?
And I think that you know, Cornell's pushed to Tona
Hesse was sort of like, your fatalism is either unearned
or wrong for all of these reasons and in tones.
He didn't really respond to to Cornell's UH statements as
(38:13):
much as he sort of just hilided at Cornell hadn't
read his pieces. But I think a fair critique of
the Cornell position is sort of like, where has the
prophetic tradition taken us? Right? That like, did the legacy
of the prophetic tradition in this country that didn't achieve
the freedom that it purported to achieve to right? And
I think that that, like along that Folcrum, I think
that's fair. I think there is a fatalism that that
(38:35):
Tana Hesse has made UH sort of mainstream. And while
that is not and I like that doesn't resonate with me,
I understand how it resonates with some people. I think
there's also this prophetic tradition that like people let you
into because it is the backbone of the civil rights movement,
and and I think it's fair to question sort of
when that came from. I do think that, you know,
I'm always interested at how much space the public intellectuals
(38:58):
take up in the perspective, they're so different than the
people who have been in the rooms or have been
in the streets and have been sort of have been
on the grind with these issues. So it's it still
feels very theoretical when I read some of this writing,
and you know, I don't live in theory. I live
in practice. Right, So the theory is helpful even so
far that helps us think about the practice differently. And
(39:19):
I'm not sure that that debate helped me think about
the practice of this work any differently, right? Right? Is
there something about activism and that that people kind of
get wrong or or misunderstand? Like I know, I've heard
it center a podcast of the Founding Fathers were activists. Um,
can you are are there like things that when people
(39:42):
who aren't involved on a day to day level like
you are, when they picture in their mind activism that
they just get totally wrong. You know, I'm less interested
in like how you identify like you should? You know,
It's it's interesting it's only people of color that have
to like choose between sort of profession and being in
a deivist. And I think about activist as people who
like think the world should be better and are willing
(40:03):
to fight for it. So you look at Colin the
column has to choose between being like a football player,
an athlete, or like somebody who believes that the police
didn't kill people. White people always get to live in
a world where they can be, like they can be
like a dope accountant, an ape team. I'm like, they
don't have to, but people of color always have to
make a choice, and like that, I think that's a
false choice. So when I think about being an activist,
(40:26):
it is it is as much of an identity as
it is an approach, right, And like when you think that,
like I don't know anything from the school should be
better to like people shouldn't have to work a hundred
hours a week to have basic food or a house
right there, Like I think that that is, like that
is what it means to be a citizen or a person.
(40:46):
And I don't care how you identify as an activist,
as long as you're committed to the work. So when
we think about social justice, it's like even that is redundant, right, Like,
what does the justice look like that isn't social? I
don't know. Yeah, that is uh when when you say
social justice like as somebody who's been on the internet
like that that is just a that's like a bad
word now like s jws Um. Yeah, I had a
(41:10):
question for you, and this is more just on a
social level, because you know, I've noticed sometimes on the
left there's been a lot of infighting and I felt
like you've dealt with other another activists lashing out at you. Uh,
and you know that caused some stuff and a lot
of that. Uh, what do how do you feel about that?
Because for me, you know, the thing that I I'm
(41:32):
always worried about is being public with calling out and
being pedantic about people's quote unquote wokeness and then some
like alt right or someone on the right using that
to kind of try and bury that person. Yeah, it's
like a hard mom. You know, as much as we
fight the system and the people we disagree with, to
(41:52):
be honest, it is hard to see people not keep
this thing in their own work, right. So that's like one.
The second is I'm mindful of like what it what
it looks like when we say publicly. You know, I
will say that any any disagreement I've ever been in
that has resulted in a public disagreement, we've tried to
resolve offline. So me and the people around we never
(42:14):
bring the battle to the internet because I'm sensitive of
what it means to have a big platform, and people
think that this is the way we disagree. But sometimes,
like you call people, you text them and they will
tell you one thing in person and then so do
something different. So we've never brought the battle to the internet,
you know. And the third is it is real that
(42:34):
like there are people who want us to to like
lose right and they take any moment of disagreement as
a way to like divide and divide and divide, and
like that is true. That shouldn't change our condemic to
being honest. And I think that for some people, that
people inside the movement who are like they know things
aren't real or dishonest or shaking. They're just like, you know,
(42:54):
for the good of the whole, just like don't talk
about it, and like I don't know what a freedom,
what a politics of freedom eflected to read it in
live like that doesn't to me look like liberation. Right,
So those are the things that I like try to
guide myself with. And again, the things that you've ever
found about online publicly have been things that people have
brought to us, not things that we have brought to them. Definitely,
(43:15):
I just I think it's we're running out of time.
But I just want to ask one last question on
a lighter note, Deray, what is the greatest TV show
of all time? In your parents? X Men? For sure?
I love the X Men. The X Men cartoon was
like storm changed my life, everything, the hole, everything was great.
I never ever if I never ever see the Phoenix
(43:35):
Saga ever again. I feel like there was like this
weird pier where it was just like reruns of the
Phoenix Saga. But so I'm exhausted with the PHOENICX side up.
But I love the X Men. No, no, no, no, no, no. Yes,
that was the most That was one of the best
things I've ever heard. Yes, I had, I had the
piece of VHS that they gave you with the episodes,
(43:56):
and it was and it wasn't only like five minutes
of yeah, it wasn't anyway. So I just want you know,
I had to had to get let people in on
you know, the the just the lighter side of the
one last light thing. So you took your best to
Patagonia so it could get like touched up. Was that
like a de Ray special? Or can anyone take their
(44:17):
Patagonia best? And anybody can take their clothes to Patagonia
repair side, it's called Warner where they I've never not
had the best overnight, so they will all fix it
the same day for me, um and I appreciate that.
So that is like a they. I had to get
a new a new zipper because the zipper broke that
a little bandy because the downads coming out, and so
they take care of me. They're great. When I was
(44:38):
arrested Batonaries, the beverage police stole my book bag. They
still have and they said they can't find it in Patagonia,
send me a new one. So they've been very kind
to Patagonia. Seriously, now, is that a branding thing or
is that a comfort thing or all the above? No?
So you know in the beginning, uh, you know, we
were the street for four hundred days, right, so we
were actually in the initial we were that's through all
(45:00):
four seasons, and I needed something that I could where
that I never had to pack, that I could wear whenever, right,
so if I got too cold, I put a hoodie
on underhafter. It was just okay, and I'd like where
it is. And it became a thing for other people
way before it became a thing for me. But my apartment,
like I used to live in Minneapolis, in my apartment
is literally to this day still in stories like I
need to figure out who I'm to give my back
to you and books and all that stuff, but it's
(45:22):
still there. So the Best is like the heaviest thing
that I wore. So it's sort of like a it's
like a safety blanket. I'm used to it. It keeps
me like grounded and humble. You know. It's like I
can't I'm not wearing real design or anything because I'm
wearing the same thing every day. It's simple. It's like
not a lot of decisions to make. And I've always
like had a thing so like when I was in
college there where it's like one hoodie every single day,
(45:43):
it was simple, and it was great when I was
in middle school where the steam jacket every day. So
the best is just like a simple, like easy to do.
Got it and not a lot of that. It means
something to me. I've been in it, uh like through
Dickens then through a lot of situations. You know, if
I can be with the President Obama and the best
I could be anybody in again a good friend. All Right,
(46:04):
I think that's all the time we have you for.
But this has been a real pleasure. Deray McKesson, thank
you so much for talking to us. Thanks for appearing
on our stupid podcast. You guys are great. Thanks so
much for having me and I be forward to our
seeing you get too. All right, thanks Ray, uh and
we're going to take a quick break. We will be
(46:25):
back after this. And we're back. Yeah, we just talked
to one of the great leaders of our time and
we still can't stop talking about why Coke because that
(46:45):
that dude. We've just been Google image searching him and
I highly suggest that you guys do the same. But
also shout out to Deray for saying X Men animated series.
I mean, as if I didn't admire this person enough
as a black nerded like lit me up, like I'm
ready to go right right right. I didn't even know
there was an X Men TV show. What yeah, wait,
(47:08):
how mad a version. No, no, no, you had to
have seen. That's not an excuse you didn't know there
were I just feel like it's impossible, like it was
like inescapable. Yeah. Would you like growing up nineties? Yeah,
like they're really nineties? Would you like growing up like
in their early nineties? I was, you know, teenager, so yeah,
(47:28):
what were you doing? You know, exce movies and stuff.
He sounds like me when I talk about why I
haven't read Harry Potter, like the guy, although you've read
Harry Potter, so I don't have to read the first
three Harry Potters. Okay, Yeah, Well he does have a
favorite Bob Dylan quotes you guys. Yeah, they're they're laser
(47:50):
engraved on his Sperris. Uh. Yeah, no, I'm just kidding.
I totally knew there was. Alright, we're gonna blow through.
All right, let's go through some some news items. Uh.
Apple has admitted that it does slow down old iPhones.
(48:14):
Uh was not a figment of your imagination or just
seeing the faster, newer version and making you think that
your old phone was slower. It's actually that they admit
that they make the phones slower with new updates. Uh.
They make old phones slower with new updates because they
say the battery on old phones is deteriorating and so
(48:38):
they need to make it slower or else it'll I
don't know, like melt your pocket or some ship. Makes sense.
I mean I understand the like the technological logic of it,
but I guess the other thing we're talking about is like,
well then if you can, then you should just be
able to replace your battery to keep your ship running peak.
But it's like prohibitively expensive. No, it's just there's no
(49:00):
reason to do it. Well, yeah, because they use an
obtainium and so we'd have to go up and see
the nabby and that. Yeah. No, I mean they yeah,
there there have been smartphones that have replacedable batteries, but
it's just they say it like makes makes it too
big and too like clunky or whatever, so it makes
(49:21):
more sense for them just to just to buy you know,
I I experienced disposable iPhones. Experienced this firsthand because I
just upgraded to the iPhone Tin. Yeah, and so you know,
the my old phone was deteriorating the money in my wallet,
so I had to spend it, So I spent it
on this and now everything's safe. Although and it just
(49:42):
slid me a note that said that I feel battery
costs se really, so maybe it's not too bad. I
imagine that installation is probably the other part because they
have to take it apart with a welding. Well that's
if you go to the Genius bar, dude, you gotta
find one. So the Office is coming back. Yeah, look,
I'm so excited five years ago. Uh yeah, so NBC,
(50:06):
I guess because Will and Grace was such a hit,
they're like, oh, hey, I guess we would start bringing
back Oh there's great beloved shows. So there, it looks
like there's a plan to bring back the Office. But
here's the thing. It's still very early on and like
they're still trying to see who's down. But Steve Carell,
according to most people, is not going to be in it.
So I don't understand the reason of bringing it back.
The reason why Will and Grace, I imagine, was able
(50:26):
to capture more people was because at least the core
cast was returned. Although I know some people were saying
some people were missing blah blah blah, but it'll be
hard to say that The Office is going to perform
the same way. Because also, even at its peaked, the
Office was never as big as Will and Grace. So
is that true the Office was never I think maybe
just for in terms of like the actual ratings. I
think as a cultural phenomena, it's probably debatable, but I
(50:48):
think in terms of like what the numbers did as time,
like Will and Grace was like a phenomen and also, like,
if you think about it too, the ending of the
series was pretty satisfying, like there weren't any sends to
tie up, Like I don't feel like I need anymore.
It would just be a cash grab, yeah, exactly. And
also it only ended four years ago, right, so that
by the end the last like two seasons, I felt
(51:11):
like the only thing I heard from people who are
still watching it is like that somebody needed to put
it out of its misery, and like the guy who
created it has gone on to make you know, Parks
and rec was great and if you've already watched all that,
he's making the good Place now, which is also pretty solid.
One of the good things is it gave us Ellie
kemper Okay, you know, but I did. I went to
(51:32):
look up some of the nineties NBC shows, and I
got some I got some banger pitches that would I
think be more successful than uh if they were to
bring back the Office. Okay, so what do you got?
So I got fresh Prince? Oh my god, I got
but Uncle Phil died? Make a cannon? Saved by the bell?
(51:52):
Uh without screech m A different world, Oh, a different world.
I'll be interesting. Uh. And freaks and geeks. I would
love to see Jasmine guy again. Yeah, where is she anyway?
Saved by the Bell is what I was watching. You guys,
did you watch The College Years two? You know? That
was a real that was that was hard to watch too,
(52:13):
although I did watch it, but I have fans, you know,
say by the bell happened inside Zack's head. It was like, oh, yes,
this theory, Yes, tell you about the the theme song.
So the theme song, alright and being constantly undermined. Uh.
So the theme song when you hear it, it goes
(52:35):
from like the beginning of his day, waking up in
the morning, you hear the bell, right, and then he
goes into school and has a shitty day at school. Now,
the Zach Morris we know has never had a shitty
day at Bayside, but in the song, he has a
shitty day at school, gets home and says it's all
right because I'm saved by the bell. And then the
(52:57):
theme song that starts every episode is a school day,
and then the once the show starts, we're actually entering
Zack's dreams. So the theme song is his waking life
where he's just like a shitty sea student, which is
what the first season of the show was. Zach was
like lived in Indiana and he was just a shitty
sea student who had a teacher named Miss Bliss. And
(53:19):
then second season we enter his dream world where he
lives in like some California suburb and like he's the
coolest guy in school and he can freeze time with
his hands and ship. Uh So that's that's my fan
theory that we wrote about. It correct interesting. Yeah, I look,
it's it's something to think about. That's what I was
doing instead of watching X. Yeah, you're coming up you
(53:41):
analyzing and what the real meaning of and that's actually
probably more meaningful than me just my mouth agape watching
Sentinels yea eat. And and finally, the Netflix has released
its first blockbuster movie, The Movie They Spent I believe
eighty million, nine million on a single feature length film.
(54:06):
They got the writer of Victor Frankenstein, Max Landis, uh
famous douche Max Landis, and this director of End of Watch.
So that's cool, but also suicide Squad less cool. Uh,
and it's if you've seen the trailer, it's a bizarre
sort of weird racial allegory where Will Smith like is
(54:30):
an l a cop who's like racist against like magical
creatures or species. Yeah, he's species ist. Um and it is.
We're we're going to watch it over the weekend, so
we'll report back to you. But as of right now, uh,
it's getting just killed straight up zeros. Right, it's get
It's getting like actual zero from like reviews on metacritics
(54:54):
just just slam dunked into the trash can except for one, right, Yeah,
except for I Itty was like Max Landis is a
true genius. It's like, yo, Max, like, don't like tone
it down a little bit with your review of your
own movie, dadd you have to come through and be like, hey,
you better talk nice about now. Yeah, Max Landis. Back
when I was at Cracked, we had to kick him
(55:16):
out of the Cracked forum because it was such an asshole.
It's like, we didn't kick many people out of the
Cracked forum, but that dude was such a dick. What
was he? What do you have to do to get
kicked out of a fucking forum? Just be super obnoxious?
Really was he? Like? Just flaming? He's like, you guys
don't know ship, Like my stories are fucking dope. I
forget I I don't remember the specifics of the conversation.
I just remember that we were like, oh, remember this asshole,
(55:40):
this guy he just released a movie called what was
that movie called Chronicle Chronicle? Yeah, yeah, that's one of
the kids fire around and yeah, uh not that kid,
not solid guy who wrote it. Not that I tried
to make money with Cracked. You doing, you know, submitting
those pictures for the list never got picked once I
(56:03):
got to look, that's why I'm here. If he keeps
inching his chair closer to Jet, about to press him over, uh,
and that's gonna do it for today, I think, rick Us, Yeah,
I think. Well, lastly, let's just shout out to Nick
for uncovering a musical conspiracy. You know ed Shearing song
(56:24):
The Shape of You. It really took the charts by Yeah,
so next week you'll hear our conversation about the song
of the year. Uh, and we skip over. We're like,
you know, our songs of the year weren't the most played,
because the most played was this bullshit The Shape of
You by Ed Cheron, which could have come out in
any year, and it turns out it had already come
out in a different year. Because so there's there's this
(56:47):
New York Times article where they're talking about, like the
Shape of You the most played song on Spotify, and
as super producer Nick Stump put it, Ed Sharon and
his producers are just standing there jerking each other off
about like how great the writing process was. And Nick
was watching this video and he was like, holy shit,
it's it's just scrubs, Like I've heard this progression before,
(57:10):
this note sequence before. So I guess let's do a
little side by side and let's hear edge sheering first,
and then we'll hear scrubs. Do you know you love
what's sending me for somebody? Like I don't want to know,
you know, no, scrub scrub is that kind of getting
(57:30):
from me? I mean, but really, when the inspiration hit,
I was just like I don't know. Yeah, he liked
that was just talking about it like they're talking about
it like it was the invention of the light bulb.
It's I don't know, man, but yeah, so that that
is the most played song of the year, and that
proves nothing but that this was but it kind of
(57:53):
sounds similar. And also it's it's hard to even argue
that because they changed the progression just enough, right, that
is not a total rip off. But that's what most
music is, he stays. Anyway, So the whole story is
like and Ed Sheeron didn't even know he had magic
when it's like when he first wrote it, he wrote
it in only ninety minutes. It's like, yeah, that's about
how long I would take to rip off TLC. But
(58:15):
all right, sorry a cheering uh if he It's been
a pleasure as always to have you. Where can people
follow you? Oh you can catch me at if you
waway on Twitter, I f y in w A d
I w E on Instagram same one and on twitch
at A few of you have been coming on my
twitch stream talking about I'm here from the Daily Night Guy. Yeah.
(58:37):
I was like, wow, I didn't know. I got a
few twitch heads listeners sent The Zight Gang is large
like gangs, so if you're coming to my Twitch stream,
make sure you use hashtag night Gang so he knows
because we get a one cent for each miles. Where
can people follow you? You can follow me on Twitter
and Instagram at Miles of Grade. You can follow me
(59:00):
at Jack Underscore O'Brien. You can follow us at the
Daily Zikis on Instagram, Daily Ziegeist on Twitter. We have
Facebook fan page. We have a website, Daily Zeitgeist dot
com and where you can find episodes and our footnotes
notes where we link off two sources that prove the
stuff we're talking about is actually real and written by
(59:22):
actual journalists. Uh. And finally, we have a new show,
our first new show from the West Coast, how Stuff Works,
Uh Studios and the comedy imprint that we're starting up
out here. Uh. It's called Culture Kings. Its stars Jack,
kiss Edgar and Carl and Uh. They're all guys who
(59:44):
we've had on before. They are all super super funny dudes.
And the first episode comes out on January ten. Look
out for that. It's make sure you listen to it.
It's gonna be good. Trash. That was just came for
Carl oh Man, you know. Now I'm sad as hell.
(01:00:08):
You know, check my artsie post and you got something
for Jakissa. I think I think that that's I think
that's you, and I'm believing. I like although this man
has the smoothest fucking voice. Just wait, man, anybody who
listen to I'm telling you Jakis's voice is going to
melt it pregnant, pregnant just by listening to it. Yes, yes, uh,
(01:00:29):
And that's gonna do it. For today's episode, Miles, what
are we going to write out on? We're gonna write
out on a song by an artist called John Bapp.
It's called let It Happen. It's a very h's it's
a live band but with a very j dilla feel
like he's like this really dope, low fun I don't know,
I mean, just check it out. When's it from? Is
it like new? Yeah, it's new? This is uh. This
song actually came out in this year. So check out
(01:00:50):
John Bap. And this song is called let It Happen.
What's the genre? Man? I don't even want to put
this man in the box. Yes he does, he does
it all, but he has a hip hop He definitely
comes from that tradition, but it's like there's all the guitars,
it's biby. You'll feel like it's cool. We're gonna write
out on that we will be back tomorrow for one
final episode before the new year, and then we have
(01:01:12):
a bunch of kind of many episodes that we're gonna
drop on you guys over next week. Be warm cheap,
You're warm over the holiday. But we'll be back tomorrow
for another episode because it is a daily podcast, talk
to you guys. Then by ease back can really pay you.
(01:02:40):
The water so good to work. All the pat contempting
(01:03:13):
to paint can come back, and that can contempt and
the cont
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