April 24, 2024 • 32 mins
Jordan Klepper and Ronny Chieng tackle Jesse Watters labeling Trump being forced to sit in a courtroom for eight hours a day as cruel and unusual punishment and Joe Biden's controversial claim that his uncle was eaten by "cannibals" in New Guinea. Plus, Desi Lydic gives live updates on Trump's endless string of gag order hearings. In today's world, you need a car where you can sit in the front seat and record yourself going on an unhinged rant. That's where Rant-A-Car comes in. You provide the rant, we'll provide the car. Also, Stephanie Kelton, bestselling author of “The Deficit Myth” and professor of economics and public policy, talks to Jordan and Ronny about changing our understanding of government spending through MMT, or Modern Money Theory. She also explains how the national deficit is not a number to be fearful of, but can be put to good use, and how government finance is far more flexible than you might think.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
You're listening to Comedy Central, from the most trusted journalists.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
At Comedy Central, It's America's only source for news.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
It's a daily tune when.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Your host's storting supper and Roddie Jane.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Welcome to the job. I'm going to clapp and he.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Is Rodny Change. Hey, Hey, I can speak for myself.
Can you help me say this?
Speaker 1 (00:43):
Next?
Speaker 4 (00:43):
Bote?
Speaker 5 (00:44):
Definitely can. We got so much to talk about Tonight,
Joe Biden gets into a fight with Papua New Guinea.
TikTok might be banned forever, and we find out why
people are yelling at your car.
Speaker 6 (00:54):
But first, Donald Trump is being gag and tortured. So
let's watching, you puverts and I'll ongo coverage of America's
most tremendously wanted.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
The whole thing is a scammed.
Speaker 5 (01:12):
Today it was the second day of Trump's hush money trial,
and the first witness was the editor of the National Inquirer.
He testified that to help Trump win the twenty sixteen election,
he would buy scandalous stories about Trump and then bury them.
And what a great job he did. I can't think
of a single Trump scammer, or they could even get
(01:32):
into that they had to hold a separate hearing to
find out if Trump violated a gag order when he
threatened jurors and witnesses, and that hearing did not go
well for Trump.
Speaker 7 (01:43):
It was a pretty wild and intense hearing on Donald
Trump's gag order. It all turned into a very heated
exchange between the judge and Trump lawyer Todd Blanche, who
argued that Trump is being very careful well a clearly
frustrating judge. Mrshawn responded mister Blanche, using all credibility with
this court.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
Minutes after the hearing ended, Trump attacked the judge on
social media, calling him a kangaroo court.
Speaker 5 (02:10):
Wow, this guy is incapable of keeping his mouth shut
for two minutes. Has Trump ever considered paying himself hush money?
Speaker 3 (02:19):
But think about it.
Speaker 5 (02:21):
But this is a complicated issue about balancing rights. Basically,
the prosecution's argument is that a juror has the right
to feel safe while serving on Donald Trump's jury, while
Donald Trump's argument is that that juror lives at thirty
four West fifty second Street, and maybe someone should pay
that juror visit and straighten him out. This gag order
(02:42):
is serious. Trump might have to pay up to one
thousand dollars per violation.
Speaker 6 (02:47):
Yeah, one thousand dollars. That's not gonna stop Trump from talking. Okay,
you gotta deal with this like any other tantrump. You
gotta give Trump an iPad with cocomelon on it and
let him zone out.
Speaker 5 (02:57):
Okay, that he's gonna back Coco Mello and whenever he's upset.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
Okay, Well we'll do that later, all right, We just
need him to stop now. It's all noise. I can't
even think in this house.
Speaker 5 (03:09):
Not what doctor Becky would want anyway. For more on
the results of the gag order herring, let's go to
Desi Leidich. No, now that the gag order Harry is over,
they can get back to focusing on the actual trial.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
Right.
Speaker 8 (03:28):
Unfortunately, no, because during the gag order hearing, Donald Trump
made a jerk off motion, so they needed a gag
order hearing to see if that violated the gag order
before they could get back to the first gag order.
Speaker 5 (03:40):
Oh oh, but then after that it's all set.
Speaker 8 (03:44):
Uh No, because during that gag order hearing, the judge
heard Trump saying I'm judge peepeehead. And when the judge asked,
did you just call me Judge Peepehead. Trump said he
was just rehearsing for a community theater production where he
plays a judge named pepe Head. So then they had
to have a hearing about that.
Speaker 5 (04:03):
But once that's done, the actual case.
Speaker 8 (04:06):
Yes, but no, because during that hearing, Trump made another
jerk off motion. But then he said it wasn't a
jerk off motion. So they need a quick hearing to
determine how he jerks off, then a hearing about whether
he made the jerk off motion, then Judge peep Head,
then the first jerk off hearing, then.
Speaker 5 (04:25):
The gag order, and then the actual case.
Speaker 3 (04:28):
What case, the.
Speaker 5 (04:29):
Hush the hush money case.
Speaker 8 (04:32):
Oh nobody remembers that.
Speaker 5 (04:35):
Keep up with a news.
Speaker 8 (04:36):
Cycle, Jordan, you're at the desk, for god's sake.
Speaker 5 (04:39):
Thank you, Desi. We'll check back in with you later.
Speaker 6 (04:46):
Clearly Trump thinks he's being treated unfairly in.
Speaker 3 (04:50):
This trial, and he's not the only one. Something.
Speaker 6 (04:52):
The gag order is just the start of the oppression
Trump is facing.
Speaker 9 (04:57):
Okay, Jesse, let me start with you.
Speaker 8 (04:59):
The prosecute says this is election fraud, and they say,
pure and simple is it?
Speaker 9 (05:04):
I call it pure evil.
Speaker 10 (05:06):
So they've taken away his freedom of speech, and now
they've taken away his.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
Freedom of movement.
Speaker 10 (05:12):
I mean they had more allowances for college sake.
Speaker 1 (05:15):
Muhammadad Oh.
Speaker 5 (05:17):
Okay, that sounds wild, But I think Jesse Waters is
a reasonable man because I was kicked in the head
by a horse last week. So let's hear him out.
How is Trump being treated worse than the mastermind of
nine to eleven?
Speaker 10 (05:33):
The guy needs exercise. He's usually golfing, and so you're
gonna put a man who's almost steady sitting in a
room like this on his butt for all that time.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
It's not healthy. He needs sunlight, and he needs activity.
He needs to be walking.
Speaker 10 (05:45):
Around, he needs action. It's really cruel and unusual punishment
to make a man do that.
Speaker 5 (05:55):
Are we talking about Donald Trump or an old English
sheep dog. You can't give him grouped up all day.
He needs time outside or'll pee on the couch.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
Look, we all.
Speaker 6 (06:04):
Know how Donald Trump loves exercise. Because of this trial,
he's been mobile obese for the last forty years.
Speaker 5 (06:10):
Yeah, I mean, though, would Trump even want fresh air
and exercise? These actually sound like the punishments the judge
would give Trump if he's convicted.
Speaker 3 (06:18):
Yeah, no, he's a fresh air and exercises. Give me
the death penalty. But listen, I'll give.
Speaker 6 (06:23):
Jesse Waters the benefit of the doubt because I was
also kicking the head by the same horse, So let's
let him continue.
Speaker 3 (06:31):
This isn't law fair.
Speaker 10 (06:32):
It's torture. They're making a seventy seven year old man
sit inside a dingy room for eight hours straight, four
days a week.
Speaker 5 (06:40):
Wow, eight hours a day, four days a week. It's
literally a torture, or, as the rest of the world
calls it, a job, a part time job.
Speaker 6 (06:53):
To be fair, I mean, this is the same guy
who's asking to be president of the United States.
Speaker 3 (06:58):
I mean that's gotta be at least a forty hour
week gig. I mean yes again, over time.
Speaker 5 (07:02):
Also, I thought Trump was supposed to be the young,
vigorous candidate in the race. Now what he needs sympathy.
Suddenly he's a poor, elderly man, crippled by the weight
of his own body, pulverizing his bones into dust against
the chair. You know what, get that horseback out here,
because I want to give Jesse one more chance.
Speaker 10 (07:21):
They're telling the entire world all the whack goes this
is where the former president's going to be at this date,
at this time, surrounded by high rise buildings.
Speaker 6 (07:30):
Yes, it's very dangerous for people to know Trump's exact location,
which is why he lives in a nondescript building with
his name on the front.
Speaker 5 (07:39):
The Trump campaign also tells us where he's going to
be and exactly when. They're called Trump rallies, and it's
how I know where to go to get yelled at.
Speaker 6 (07:48):
And you know the worst part about him being on
trial is that they're just treating him by something. He's
some kind of criminal defendant.
Speaker 10 (07:55):
Today, the former president of the United States. If he
leaves court to go to the rest room, jail, if
he calls the prosecutor, corrupt jail. If Trump moves or
says anything, they scream jail.
Speaker 6 (08:09):
If he makes us recycling jail, if he scratches as crotch, jail.
Speaker 5 (08:15):
Yeah, he gets a high score on the SAT jail.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
His favorite batman, Christian Bail.
Speaker 5 (08:21):
Yeah, his favorite vegetable, Fred Froz.
Speaker 6 (08:25):
Yeah, definitely not kailled. But he is going to jail.
He's gonna He's gonna go Joe. Meanwhile, we've done Trump
trapped in the courthouse. It was a perfect opportunity for
Joe Biden to seize the initiative and uh, hey man,
you got the campaign all to yourself, mister president, time
to press your advantage.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
The Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea has angrily denied
a false claim by President Biden that his uncle was
eaten by cannibals during World War Two.
Speaker 11 (08:51):
Those single engine planes as reconnaissance over war zones. He
got shot down in New Guinea and they never found
the body because there used to be there a lot
of cannibals for real. In that part of the GUIDEA.
Speaker 3 (09:09):
You're gonna lose the election.
Speaker 5 (09:10):
Yeah, Look, at some point we all get to an
age where we confuse our own life story with the
plot of Indiana Jones. It happened, it happens.
Speaker 3 (09:20):
No, it's true. I mean the man's eighty. Okay.
Speaker 6 (09:22):
We all have grandparents who tell crazy stories like my
grandfather told me that you once wrestled a mountain lion
with his bare hands.
Speaker 5 (09:29):
Yeah, And my grandfather told me that she did on
my grandmother through their entire marriage and had a second family.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
Her grandma. You goof full.
Speaker 6 (09:42):
And can I just say, even if this story was
true Americans, I no position to criticize how anyone else eats. Okay,
these cannibals eat people? Yeah, well you know what we
eat some ways angry just to lose weight.
Speaker 5 (09:55):
Right would a cannibal even eat people out of a wreckage?
I mean that's their version of eating roadkill.
Speaker 6 (10:01):
Yeah, I know you want you want to eat. I
passed your raise grass fed humans. And by the way,
I know the Prime Minister was upset understandably, but hey,
if someone accused my country of being cannibals, I.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
Just run with it. Like, don't with us. We'll put
your dick on a Kaiser room down.
Speaker 5 (10:20):
That's fair, that's fair. Anyway. Biden apologized to the papuno
getting Prime Minister by inviting him to a dinner with
Pete BOODA judge will be served over rights for the
balsamic reduction.
Speaker 6 (10:30):
So yeah, before we go, let's shut back in with
you at the courthouse.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
DESI okay, So any update from the gag order hearing?
Speaker 8 (10:45):
Actually, yes, the Democrats are now asking for a new
gag order.
Speaker 6 (10:49):
Oh what what did Trump do this time?
Speaker 8 (10:52):
No, they're asking the judge to issue a gag order
on Joe Biden. It's really the only way to stop
him telling Uncle Cannibal's story.
Speaker 6 (11:01):
Wait, the true Democrats are asking Biden. Biden has a
gag or the one that affect his ability to a campaign.
Speaker 8 (11:07):
Yes, At this point, the DNC feels strongly that that's
his best shot at winning. Otherwise his strongest supporters will
be Cannibals and that's a dwindling voting block for obvious reasons.
Speaker 4 (11:21):
All right, does he lie like everybody?
Speaker 3 (11:25):
When we come.
Speaker 4 (11:25):
Back, we'll find out the best way to yell in
your post go away.
Speaker 5 (11:48):
Welcome back to the Dana Show.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
Is a little bill making its.
Speaker 5 (11:51):
Way through Congress this week that could ban TikTok in
the US.
Speaker 6 (11:55):
And that would be a big loss for a lot
of people. TikTok isn't just the dancing app anymore. It's
also one of the main places people go to share
opinions about the news and culture, opinions like this.
Speaker 12 (12:07):
So little did I know that Taylor Swift was literally
going to prove the point that I was making in
the videos that made a few weeks ago.
Speaker 9 (12:11):
So let's talk about the eighteen thirties line in her
latest song.
Speaker 12 (12:14):
And I also want to do well talking about the
abortion law in Arizona from eighteen sixty four.
Speaker 6 (12:19):
Yeah, she really just jumped from Taylor Swift to abortion law,
which means the first two seconds of that video has
more tonal variety than Taylor's entire new album.
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Am I right, Jordan?
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Swift way to go. By the way, if you watch
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Do you understand what China is going to.
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Go up with this shit going on in the border?
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The evidence we're gonna drive respect and.
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Manners of common courtesy and even common sense and all
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What's next?
Speaker 2 (13:29):
People are gonna start identifying as Hamburgers. Well, hold the
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Speaker 3 (13:38):
Good morning, miss Webb.
Speaker 10 (13:40):
Looks like you preserved a Suzan to go ape shitt
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They got t shirts with sprainbows on themsel CD my
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Worships the devil.
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Great, Great, let's take a look at what we have available.
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Thank you so much.
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All we come back, Jephanie could will be joining us
on the show, so don't go away.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Oh, welcome back to the DEBI Show.
Speaker 6 (15:09):
Our guest Tonight's a professor of economics and public policy
and the author of the best selling book The Deficit Myth.
She's featuring a new documentary, Finding the Money. Please welcome
Stephanie Calton.
Speaker 5 (15:39):
Dephane welcome, Thank you. It's a fascinating documentary. I will say,
you are you are setting out correct me if I'm wrong,
to fundamentally change how people see money. Yeah, that's a
big ask. And we got about seven minutes.
Speaker 9 (15:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (15:57):
I think a place to start is with right MMT.
If you can help us defile what MMT is, and
I think what the narrative the narrative you're hoping to
get across with MMT. What what is the new economic narrative?
It's no longer pull yourself up by your bootstraps. What
is MMT telling us?
Speaker 12 (16:13):
So in economics is widely known as the dismal science, right,
because well, that's what MMT is trying to do better branding,
because you know, in the dismal science, it's all about
scarcity and we can never have the things that we
want because there's always this really intrusive problem, which is
(16:34):
how are you going to pay for it? Where is
the money going to come from? And the problem is
that we treat money like just any other scarce good
or service.
Speaker 9 (16:42):
In the economy.
Speaker 12 (16:42):
And what MMT is doing is saying, hold on a second,
we're not on a gold standard anymore. We have this
thing called a fiat currency. And it does make people
nervous because a fiat currency sort of opens up space
and it's kind of like, wait, is money real after all?
And so MMT is an economic framework that tries to
(17:03):
have an honest conversation that talks to people like grown ups,
not insulting people by telling them that you have to
treat the government's budget like a household budget and speaking
down to people, we want to be honest about the
monetary system we have today, the capacities of the government
to spend when you have a fiat currency and you're
not tying your currency to gold and promising to convert
(17:24):
into something that you could run out of, like physical gold.
So we're opening up a conversation where there are still
limits and you still have to make choices, but we
can have an adult conversation about how the government can
actually operate its budget when it doesn't face the same
kinds of constraints that a household or a business face.
Speaker 5 (17:44):
By that, I think that the big headline with this
as well is the way we look at what the
deficit means. Correct.
Speaker 3 (17:50):
Yeah, Like I hear deficit.
Speaker 5 (17:51):
You're here in the news. You hear every politician talking
about a deficit equals bad yep. And the major narrative
of MMT monetary modern monetary theory is deficit good. Correct.
Speaker 12 (18:05):
Every deficit is good for someone in purely financial terms.
And I'll tell you why, because you're right.
Speaker 9 (18:11):
We use this.
Speaker 12 (18:12):
Word and it sounds inherently like something's gone wrong. If
somebody is in deficit, there's a problem.
Speaker 9 (18:17):
Right.
Speaker 12 (18:17):
You don't want to turn on the sporting game and
find the announcer saying that your team is going to
have to come back and overcome a seven run deficit.
Speaker 9 (18:25):
If they're going to win the game.
Speaker 12 (18:26):
It's always a bad thing, right, But actually, if you
think about what the government deficit is, it's just the
difference between two numbers, that's all it is.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
So yeah, RELI, well, I guess we'll find that.
Speaker 1 (18:40):
Fine.
Speaker 12 (18:42):
Fine, it's fine in the sense that it's just a
benign mathematical like, it's the difference between two numbers. It's
not even higher order math, right, It's just how many
dollars the government spends into the economy each year versus
how many they take back out, mostly through taxation. So
simple math. If they spend one hundred dollars into the
(19:02):
economy and they only take ninety dollars back out, we
label it a government deficit, and somebody records it as
a minus ten on the government's ledger. What we forget
to do is to recognize if they put one hundred
in and only take ninety out, somebody gets ten. So
the government's deficit is matched or mirrored by a financial surplus.
Speaker 9 (19:23):
In some other part of the economy is.
Speaker 3 (19:26):
Wait, hang on, so did you guys meet backstage or something?
Because what the hell? What is MMT? What what's MT is?
What does MT stand for? You hand it?
Speaker 12 (19:35):
So it's modern monetary theory. And so again the currency,
we're not under the old standard. We're in the modern
fiat age we have.
Speaker 3 (19:43):
Yeah, what's well is a good car? Thats you get?
Speaker 12 (19:48):
What you're walking around with if you've got some of
this stuff in your wallet is a tax credit. So
those dollar bills that we're walking around with, we think
of that as money, right, and we can use it
to transact, We can use buy and sell thing. You
can use it to make purchases of goods.
Speaker 3 (20:01):
And money is good.
Speaker 12 (20:04):
It's good to have generally, and it's really good to
have when you got to pay your taxes because this
is what the government expects us to hand over at
the end of the day.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
Okay, okay, money is good. I'm with you so far.
Speaker 9 (20:16):
But let's do this.
Speaker 12 (20:18):
What about that government deficit that you just mentioned, right,
And I said every government deficit is good for someone?
Why because it's just a financial deposit into some other
part of the economy. The question is good for whom
and good for what. The government can increase its deficit
to do things like feed hungry kids, tackle the climate crisis,
fixed crumbling infrastructure. All of those things are ways to
(20:41):
use a government deficit that might have desirable results for
people and for the economy.
Speaker 6 (20:47):
So money is good, deficit is good. I'm with your sofar.
So what's what's the bad? What's the problem?
Speaker 1 (20:54):
You have?
Speaker 12 (20:55):
A big part of the problem is the way that
we've been taught to think about these things, to try
to stamp out deficits, to reduce them, to view them
as inherently dangerous. They're not inherently dangerous, and as I
just said, they can be used to help us accomplish
important goals in the economy.
Speaker 6 (21:11):
So, for example, if I go to Caesar's Palace and
I borrow like twenty dollars in my credit card, I
put it on red and I lose everything that's good.
Speaker 3 (21:19):
That's bad. Wait, why is that bad?
Speaker 9 (21:21):
Then?
Speaker 3 (21:22):
But doesn't the casino?
Speaker 9 (21:25):
It's good for the casino.
Speaker 5 (21:27):
And also, don't go to Caesar's Palace. That's a little
ghost person. It's bad. Maybe go to MGM or this
is something, But financially that's bad for.
Speaker 9 (21:35):
Him, but that's bad for you.
Speaker 12 (21:36):
But the point is to try to figure out and
to wrap our heads around what it is we're actually
capable of doing. Because we're always told that we can't
tackle big problems that we face. We can't deal with
housing problems, or education, or climate, infrastructure, social security, and
medicare always come up, and everybody always says the same thing,
we can't afford it. We have this deficit or we
(21:58):
have this national debt. Where are you going to find
the money to do these things? And so MMT comes
in and says, look, it's not about finding the money.
The money is created when the government spends, Congress authorizes
the spending, and if the votes are there, the money
is there. The thing you have to watch out for
is inflation. So it isn't as if it's a free lunch.
There are no constraints, there are no limits. There are limits,
(22:21):
and the limit is inflation. You can't run out of money,
but you can run out of things to buy.
Speaker 5 (22:26):
I mean, so this is correct me if I'm wrong,
But if I'm going nutshell here, your essential argument is
we're not bartering back and forth like this is an
avatar for gold in our pocket. The government makes money, exactly,
they can decide how much money goes out there. Right,
you pay taxes. They don't need our taxes to fix
big problems. They can make big money. It's on them
to figure out how to spend it and put it
(22:47):
into the economy in a way they can get big
things done. And then the private businesses, they're the ones
who have the money. The government just has created that situation,
and inflation becomes the boundary that they have to act underneath. Correct,
well done, well done.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
You.
Speaker 5 (23:07):
Yeah, she's a published author and created a movie and
still assholes won't do the research. But here here, here's
the pushback.
Speaker 3 (23:18):
Here's the pushback, memorizing the Wikipedia pitch. But here's the argument.
Speaker 5 (23:24):
Here's what's so compelling. And Ronnie is a great he's
a useful idiot in this, and people are scared. I
don't know a lot about money, and I think the
narratives are our money. Teach me to be afraid of it.
It's something that we shouldn't talk about because I don't
understand the underpinnings of it. And I think what it's
compelling about your argument is we can and have like
World War two, have figured out ways in which to
(23:45):
create money and fix big problems. It's it's we almost
need a giant We need a big thing to focus
on to get those problems done correct, to get the
narrative around it. Like I think it.
Speaker 12 (23:57):
Helps in COVID was that big thing for a period
of time. We're governments around the world suddenly stopped asking
the question how are we going to pay for it?
Speaker 9 (24:04):
And what are we going to do about this deficit?
Speaker 12 (24:05):
And they just pulled out, I'll use the phrase the
money bazooka, right. Countries realized that they were going to
have to spend a lot of money to shore up
people's lives and livelihoods through the pandemic, and so we
spent some five trillion dollars just in the first twelve
months or so of the pandemic. And I wish that
climate was going to be that catalyzing event that kind
(24:27):
of forces everybody to have that wake up moment and
realize that we've been focusing on the wrong sorts of problems,
that we really can tackle the problem of climate change.
Speaker 9 (24:37):
We can afford it. We got to watch out for inflation.
Speaker 6 (24:40):
Sure, okay, sure, So you'll say that MMT can be
used to solve issues that we claim that we have
no money for by basically the government making money, because
that's where money comes from, right, And you're saying, but
doesn't that increase inflation inherently if you just keep making money.
Speaker 12 (24:55):
Well no, I mean the government has run deficits most
of my life, with the exception of four years during
the Clinton administration, the government's budget has been in deficit.
Look at a country like Japan. They've had large deficits
every single year for the last thirty years or so
and no inflation to show for it. And we hardly
had any inflation. Inflation didn't really become a problem until
COVID came along and started breaking supply chains, and then
(25:18):
wars in Ukraine and food and energy prices and so forth.
But you can have large and persistent deficits without having
an inflation problem. It's when those deficits collide against the
backdrop of constraints in the real economy, where the economy
can't resource, can't keep up and satisfy that demand. That's
(25:38):
what happened in the COVID pandemic and in World War two.
Speaker 6 (25:42):
So if it happened in World War two and it
happened in a COVID pandemic where inflation got out of control,
where we had you had basically a limited spending on
one single issue World War two. Well, COVID then helping you. Well,
you know what's evidence that MT you will work? Then
if we had two real examples, I'm yeah, no, no,
because someone just briefed me on that, and I'll just
repeat it.
Speaker 12 (26:03):
So the evidence that it works is that MMT is
a description of how government finance always operates, whether you
have a budget deficit, a budget surplus, or a balanced budget.
MT is at work providing the explanation. So it isn't
about ramping up deficits and running large chronic deficits. You
can have a good, healthy economy in some cases, whether
(26:24):
a relatively small deficit or maybe even with a balanced budget.
Speaker 9 (26:27):
It depends on a lot of other things.
Speaker 12 (26:29):
So the evidence that it works is that it's a description,
and we think a more honest and accurate description of
the monetary system we have and how governments actually pay
their bills.
Speaker 5 (26:39):
Now, as a I guess in theory how this takes
greater effect and affects our lives, and it's big things done,
Green New deal that was a big part of the
way in which we be funded. We need to start
looking at money like through an MMT lens. Correct. That's
also presupposes that you do have this paradigm shift that
we start to see as a as a country, as
(27:00):
a collective, we start to see the usage of money differently.
But getting people to have a cohesive change of mind
and the way they see the world seems like impossibility
from the experiences I've had out on the road and
at Thanksgiving, Well, look like, how much of like, do
we live in a culture where we can experience a
(27:21):
paradigm shift or is that in and of itself an
impossible I hope?
Speaker 9 (27:25):
So, I mean, TikTok is there. I'm kidding. I'm kidding.
We're gonna get better, noe.
Speaker 12 (27:32):
But it's stuff like this, right, It's conversations like these
that allow people to hear a different perspective. And also
I think, you know, look what the last couple of years,
what we've done, in some cases on a bipartisan basis
and in some cases just with Democrats. But you had
the Inflation Reduction Act, which is the largest climate bill
we've ever had in the history of our country. We
(27:52):
have the Chips and Sciences Act, which big investments in
actual productive capacity here in the US, and the Bipartisan
infrastruct Bill, which is repairing roads and bridges and you know,
taking care of our infrastructure. So those are three big
packages which I would argue are just an extension in
many ways of what the administration started doing with the
(28:13):
COVID spending. And it's just another example of the government
being able to mobilize the financial wherewithal to commit to
spending money that it doesn't have, because the money comes
from the willingness of Congress to say yes. When Congress
says yes and writes those bills, the legislation is the
set of instructions that goes to the government's bank, the
(28:34):
Federal Reserve, and it says we've committed to making these payments.
Your job is our fiscal agent, is to carry out
all of the payments we've authorized on behalf of the
US Treasury. And that is just how government finance works.
It's no more complicated than that. But we complicate it
with stories about taxes and borrowing and debt and all
the rest of it. But at the end of the day,
(28:54):
the spending is really easy to carry out.
Speaker 3 (28:57):
Well, you see, you're a very smart person. You're saying
things like calmly.
Speaker 6 (29:02):
Work here, and everything seems like it's fine. So how
do we get to what would you what can people
walk away with like if they.
Speaker 3 (29:09):
Want to like not be sad when they look at
the when they look at the deficit? Is always his question,
How do I not be sad?
Speaker 6 (29:18):
What's the what's the what's like the practical application? Because
you'll you'll, I guess we just the three of us
sat down here and we decided that the deficit is fine,
and we can well okay, then so okay, so what's
the next step? Why would you actually, let's say we
believe in MMT or yeah MT? What what what's the
(29:40):
next thing? That I mean is belief enough? Do I
just have to pray to MT and then it?
Speaker 3 (29:45):
What? What has to happen next? Who else?
Speaker 12 (29:47):
What has to happen next is that the people that
we elect to represent us have to go in there
and and take decisions using the incredible power that they
have called the power of the purse that they've got
to take decisions about whether to fund programs, whether to
cut programs, not on the belief that they ought to
be operating their budget like a household. But when these
(30:09):
decisions come up about social security and Medicare, or continuing
with the Inflation Reduction Act and staying you know, in
the game on climate change and going even beyond what
that legislation did. What I think gives me hope anyway,
is that we've demonstrated what we're capable of and that
we can build on it and not revert back to
(30:31):
old ways of thinking about austerity and the need to
reduce deficits, because that's when you hammer your economy. That's
when people have a lost decade. That's when all of
a sudden, you know, the prosperity that is within reach
starts to slip through our fingers.
Speaker 6 (30:46):
So when the irs comes from my taxes, I just
got to tell them, like, y'all, deficit is good, don't.
Speaker 3 (30:51):
Worry about that. Don't worry about it. You need to
you know what you need to do.
Speaker 5 (30:55):
You need to take some THC or some d MT
and let the MMT just watch over you, let the
paradigm shift come to you.
Speaker 3 (31:05):
Ronnie Jack, Yeah, I think I'm in it right now.
Speaker 5 (31:07):
I think, well, finding the money will be released in
select theaters nationwide and on demand May third. For more information,
go to Finding Moneyfilm dot com. Seventy Keelton, We're gonna
take a quick break, right.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
That's how Oh that's your line.
Speaker 10 (31:37):
I think everybody has made their own assessment of President
Trump's character, and so far as I know, you don't
pay someone one hundred and thirty thousand dollars not to
have sex with you.
Speaker 9 (31:48):
Wow, that was Republican Senator Mitt Romney. What a SoundBite.
Speaker 11 (31:55):
Explore more shows from the Daily Show podcast universe by
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Speaker 1 (32:01):
Watch The Daily Show weeknights at eleven.
Speaker 2 (32:03):
Tenth Central on Comedy Central and streamful episodes anytime on
Paramount Plus.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
This has been a Comedy Central podcast
You're listening to Comedy Central, from the most trusted journalists.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
At Comedy Central, It's America's only source for news.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
It's a daily tune when.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Your host's storting supper and Roddie Jane.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Welcome to the job. I'm going to clapp and he.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Is Rodny Change. Hey, Hey, I can speak for myself.
Can you help me say this?
Speaker 1 (00:43):
Next?
Speaker 4 (00:43):
Bote?
Speaker 5 (00:44):
Definitely can. We got so much to talk about Tonight,
Joe Biden gets into a fight with Papua New Guinea.
TikTok might be banned forever, and we find out why
people are yelling at your car.
Speaker 6 (00:54):
But first, Donald Trump is being gag and tortured. So
let's watching, you puverts and I'll ongo coverage of America's
most tremendously wanted.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
The whole thing is a scammed.
Speaker 5 (01:12):
Today it was the second day of Trump's hush money trial,
and the first witness was the editor of the National Inquirer.
He testified that to help Trump win the twenty sixteen election,
he would buy scandalous stories about Trump and then bury them.
And what a great job he did. I can't think
of a single Trump scammer, or they could even get
(01:32):
into that they had to hold a separate hearing to
find out if Trump violated a gag order when he
threatened jurors and witnesses, and that hearing did not go
well for Trump.
Speaker 7 (01:43):
It was a pretty wild and intense hearing on Donald
Trump's gag order. It all turned into a very heated
exchange between the judge and Trump lawyer Todd Blanche, who
argued that Trump is being very careful well a clearly
frustrating judge. Mrshawn responded mister Blanche, using all credibility with
this court.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
Minutes after the hearing ended, Trump attacked the judge on
social media, calling him a kangaroo court.
Speaker 5 (02:10):
Wow, this guy is incapable of keeping his mouth shut
for two minutes. Has Trump ever considered paying himself hush money?
Speaker 3 (02:19):
But think about it.
Speaker 5 (02:21):
But this is a complicated issue about balancing rights. Basically,
the prosecution's argument is that a juror has the right
to feel safe while serving on Donald Trump's jury, while
Donald Trump's argument is that that juror lives at thirty
four West fifty second Street, and maybe someone should pay
that juror visit and straighten him out. This gag order
(02:42):
is serious. Trump might have to pay up to one
thousand dollars per violation.
Speaker 6 (02:47):
Yeah, one thousand dollars. That's not gonna stop Trump from talking. Okay,
you gotta deal with this like any other tantrump. You
gotta give Trump an iPad with cocomelon on it and
let him zone out.
Speaker 5 (02:57):
Okay, that he's gonna back Coco Mello and whenever he's upset.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
Okay, Well we'll do that later, all right, We just
need him to stop now. It's all noise. I can't
even think in this house.
Speaker 5 (03:09):
Not what doctor Becky would want anyway. For more on
the results of the gag order herring, let's go to
Desi Leidich. No, now that the gag order Harry is over,
they can get back to focusing on the actual trial.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
Right.
Speaker 8 (03:28):
Unfortunately, no, because during the gag order hearing, Donald Trump
made a jerk off motion, so they needed a gag
order hearing to see if that violated the gag order
before they could get back to the first gag order.
Speaker 5 (03:40):
Oh oh, but then after that it's all set.
Speaker 8 (03:44):
Uh No, because during that gag order hearing, the judge
heard Trump saying I'm judge peepeehead. And when the judge asked,
did you just call me Judge Peepehead. Trump said he
was just rehearsing for a community theater production where he
plays a judge named pepe Head. So then they had
to have a hearing about that.
Speaker 5 (04:03):
But once that's done, the actual case.
Speaker 8 (04:06):
Yes, but no, because during that hearing, Trump made another
jerk off motion. But then he said it wasn't a
jerk off motion. So they need a quick hearing to
determine how he jerks off, then a hearing about whether
he made the jerk off motion, then Judge peep Head,
then the first jerk off hearing, then.
Speaker 5 (04:25):
The gag order, and then the actual case.
Speaker 3 (04:28):
What case, the.
Speaker 5 (04:29):
Hush the hush money case.
Speaker 8 (04:32):
Oh nobody remembers that.
Speaker 5 (04:35):
Keep up with a news.
Speaker 8 (04:36):
Cycle, Jordan, you're at the desk, for god's sake.
Speaker 5 (04:39):
Thank you, Desi. We'll check back in with you later.
Speaker 6 (04:46):
Clearly Trump thinks he's being treated unfairly in.
Speaker 3 (04:50):
This trial, and he's not the only one. Something.
Speaker 6 (04:52):
The gag order is just the start of the oppression
Trump is facing.
Speaker 9 (04:57):
Okay, Jesse, let me start with you.
Speaker 8 (04:59):
The prosecute says this is election fraud, and they say,
pure and simple is it?
Speaker 9 (05:04):
I call it pure evil.
Speaker 10 (05:06):
So they've taken away his freedom of speech, and now
they've taken away his.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
Freedom of movement.
Speaker 10 (05:12):
I mean they had more allowances for college sake.
Speaker 1 (05:15):
Muhammadad Oh.
Speaker 5 (05:17):
Okay, that sounds wild, But I think Jesse Waters is
a reasonable man because I was kicked in the head
by a horse last week. So let's hear him out.
How is Trump being treated worse than the mastermind of
nine to eleven?
Speaker 10 (05:33):
The guy needs exercise. He's usually golfing, and so you're
gonna put a man who's almost steady sitting in a
room like this on his butt for all that time.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
It's not healthy. He needs sunlight, and he needs activity.
He needs to be walking.
Speaker 10 (05:45):
Around, he needs action. It's really cruel and unusual punishment
to make a man do that.
Speaker 5 (05:55):
Are we talking about Donald Trump or an old English
sheep dog. You can't give him grouped up all day.
He needs time outside or'll pee on the couch.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
Look, we all.
Speaker 6 (06:04):
Know how Donald Trump loves exercise. Because of this trial,
he's been mobile obese for the last forty years.
Speaker 5 (06:10):
Yeah, I mean, though, would Trump even want fresh air
and exercise? These actually sound like the punishments the judge
would give Trump if he's convicted.
Speaker 3 (06:18):
Yeah, no, he's a fresh air and exercises. Give me
the death penalty. But listen, I'll give.
Speaker 6 (06:23):
Jesse Waters the benefit of the doubt because I was
also kicking the head by the same horse, So let's
let him continue.
Speaker 3 (06:31):
This isn't law fair.
Speaker 10 (06:32):
It's torture. They're making a seventy seven year old man
sit inside a dingy room for eight hours straight, four
days a week.
Speaker 5 (06:40):
Wow, eight hours a day, four days a week. It's
literally a torture, or, as the rest of the world
calls it, a job, a part time job.
Speaker 6 (06:53):
To be fair, I mean, this is the same guy
who's asking to be president of the United States.
Speaker 3 (06:58):
I mean that's gotta be at least a forty hour
week gig. I mean yes again, over time.
Speaker 5 (07:02):
Also, I thought Trump was supposed to be the young,
vigorous candidate in the race. Now what he needs sympathy.
Suddenly he's a poor, elderly man, crippled by the weight
of his own body, pulverizing his bones into dust against
the chair. You know what, get that horseback out here,
because I want to give Jesse one more chance.
Speaker 10 (07:21):
They're telling the entire world all the whack goes this
is where the former president's going to be at this date,
at this time, surrounded by high rise buildings.
Speaker 6 (07:30):
Yes, it's very dangerous for people to know Trump's exact location,
which is why he lives in a nondescript building with
his name on the front.
Speaker 5 (07:39):
The Trump campaign also tells us where he's going to
be and exactly when. They're called Trump rallies, and it's
how I know where to go to get yelled at.
Speaker 6 (07:48):
And you know the worst part about him being on
trial is that they're just treating him by something. He's
some kind of criminal defendant.
Speaker 10 (07:55):
Today, the former president of the United States. If he
leaves court to go to the rest room, jail, if
he calls the prosecutor, corrupt jail. If Trump moves or
says anything, they scream jail.
Speaker 6 (08:09):
If he makes us recycling jail, if he scratches as crotch, jail.
Speaker 5 (08:15):
Yeah, he gets a high score on the SAT jail.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
His favorite batman, Christian Bail.
Speaker 5 (08:21):
Yeah, his favorite vegetable, Fred Froz.
Speaker 6 (08:25):
Yeah, definitely not kailled. But he is going to jail.
He's gonna He's gonna go Joe. Meanwhile, we've done Trump
trapped in the courthouse. It was a perfect opportunity for
Joe Biden to seize the initiative and uh, hey man,
you got the campaign all to yourself, mister president, time
to press your advantage.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
The Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea has angrily denied
a false claim by President Biden that his uncle was
eaten by cannibals during World War Two.
Speaker 11 (08:51):
Those single engine planes as reconnaissance over war zones. He
got shot down in New Guinea and they never found
the body because there used to be there a lot
of cannibals for real. In that part of the GUIDEA.
Speaker 3 (09:09):
You're gonna lose the election.
Speaker 5 (09:10):
Yeah, Look, at some point we all get to an
age where we confuse our own life story with the
plot of Indiana Jones. It happened, it happens.
Speaker 3 (09:20):
No, it's true. I mean the man's eighty. Okay.
Speaker 6 (09:22):
We all have grandparents who tell crazy stories like my
grandfather told me that you once wrestled a mountain lion
with his bare hands.
Speaker 5 (09:29):
Yeah, And my grandfather told me that she did on
my grandmother through their entire marriage and had a second family.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
Her grandma. You goof full.
Speaker 6 (09:42):
And can I just say, even if this story was
true Americans, I no position to criticize how anyone else eats. Okay,
these cannibals eat people? Yeah, well you know what we
eat some ways angry just to lose weight.
Speaker 5 (09:55):
Right would a cannibal even eat people out of a wreckage?
I mean that's their version of eating roadkill.
Speaker 6 (10:01):
Yeah, I know you want you want to eat. I
passed your raise grass fed humans. And by the way,
I know the Prime Minister was upset understandably, but hey,
if someone accused my country of being cannibals, I.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
Just run with it. Like, don't with us. We'll put
your dick on a Kaiser room down.
Speaker 5 (10:20):
That's fair, that's fair. Anyway. Biden apologized to the papuno
getting Prime Minister by inviting him to a dinner with
Pete BOODA judge will be served over rights for the
balsamic reduction.
Speaker 6 (10:30):
So yeah, before we go, let's shut back in with
you at the courthouse.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
DESI okay, So any update from the gag order hearing?
Speaker 8 (10:45):
Actually, yes, the Democrats are now asking for a new
gag order.
Speaker 6 (10:49):
Oh what what did Trump do this time?
Speaker 8 (10:52):
No, they're asking the judge to issue a gag order
on Joe Biden. It's really the only way to stop
him telling Uncle Cannibal's story.
Speaker 6 (11:01):
Wait, the true Democrats are asking Biden. Biden has a
gag or the one that affect his ability to a campaign.
Speaker 8 (11:07):
Yes, At this point, the DNC feels strongly that that's
his best shot at winning. Otherwise his strongest supporters will
be Cannibals and that's a dwindling voting block for obvious reasons.
Speaker 4 (11:21):
All right, does he lie like everybody?
Speaker 3 (11:25):
When we come.
Speaker 4 (11:25):
Back, we'll find out the best way to yell in
your post go away.
Speaker 5 (11:48):
Welcome back to the Dana Show.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
Is a little bill making its.
Speaker 5 (11:51):
Way through Congress this week that could ban TikTok in
the US.
Speaker 6 (11:55):
And that would be a big loss for a lot
of people. TikTok isn't just the dancing app anymore. It's
also one of the main places people go to share
opinions about the news and culture, opinions like this.
Speaker 12 (12:07):
So little did I know that Taylor Swift was literally
going to prove the point that I was making in
the videos that made a few weeks ago.
Speaker 9 (12:11):
So let's talk about the eighteen thirties line in her
latest song.
Speaker 12 (12:14):
And I also want to do well talking about the
abortion law in Arizona from eighteen sixty four.
Speaker 6 (12:19):
Yeah, she really just jumped from Taylor Swift to abortion law,
which means the first two seconds of that video has
more tonal variety than Taylor's entire new album.
Speaker 3 (12:30):
Am I right, Jordan?
Speaker 5 (12:33):
Don't get me involved in this two times up Taylor
Swift way to go. By the way, if you watch
a lot of videos like that, you've probably noticed how
many of them are filmed inside of cars. It gives
them that extra I'm on the move and my disapproving
spouse is at home energy. And if you're wondering, do
I need a car to sound off on TikTok, well
(12:54):
not anymore. In today's worlds, you need a card that
can do more than just get you to your destination.
You need a car where you can sit in the
front seat and record yourself going on an unhinged rate.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
Do you understand what China is going to.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
Go up with this shit going on in the border?
Speaker 1 (13:09):
The evidence we're gonna drive respect and.
Speaker 6 (13:12):
Manners of common courtesy and even common sense and all
that shit Golet Stint might.
Speaker 1 (13:17):
Just crazy blah blah blah blah blah blah.
Speaker 5 (13:20):
Bitch that's why we hear at rant A Car are
dedicated to finding the perfect rental car for you to
make a video of yourself calling Nancy Pelosi Hitler.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
What's next?
Speaker 2 (13:29):
People are gonna start identifying as Hamburgers. Well, hold the
pickles because this guy's Oh.
Speaker 3 (13:38):
Good morning, miss Webb.
Speaker 10 (13:40):
Looks like you preserved a Suzan to go ape shitt
on Target for pushing the transagenda on children.
Speaker 8 (13:44):
They got t shirts with sprainbows on themsel CD my
little Nazex who.
Speaker 9 (13:48):
Worships the devil.
Speaker 3 (13:50):
Great, Great, let's take a look at what we have available.
Speaker 8 (13:53):
Thank you so much.
Speaker 5 (13:53):
Our cars are the perfect place to voice your opinions
no matter what lane you drive in.
Speaker 8 (13:58):
Shove a big Mac up you're ask Trump Because they
don't got any Burgers in prison, I'm gonna try in
a hybrid actually, of course.
Speaker 5 (14:07):
In fact, we have vehicles for all of your lifestyle needs.
Speaker 9 (14:10):
Sundaea was literally sent from God to teach us about skincare.
Speaker 3 (14:13):
That's how they're targeting you.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
Ranto Car has everything you'll need for your deranged rambling monologue.
Speaker 3 (14:19):
When I picked up my Ranto Car, I forgot to
bring my phone.
Speaker 1 (14:22):
I was so fixated on doing a TikTok about how
the vaccines made my cousin's nipples fall off?
Speaker 9 (14:26):
Want the route?
Speaker 1 (14:27):
Rent?
Speaker 10 (14:27):
The car had a phone I could rent, and an
extra pair of sunglasses and an extra goatee.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
So wake up, America. I'm over it. I'm sick and
tired of it.
Speaker 3 (14:35):
So come into Ranta car today. You have the rant. Well,
love the cars, go drink the photo the target.
Speaker 4 (14:40):
They got those five G tracking devices.
Speaker 6 (14:48):
All we come back, Jephanie could will be joining us
on the show, so don't go away.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Oh, welcome back to the DEBI Show.
Speaker 6 (15:09):
Our guest Tonight's a professor of economics and public policy
and the author of the best selling book The Deficit Myth.
She's featuring a new documentary, Finding the Money. Please welcome
Stephanie Calton.
Speaker 5 (15:39):
Dephane welcome, Thank you. It's a fascinating documentary. I will say,
you are you are setting out correct me if I'm wrong,
to fundamentally change how people see money. Yeah, that's a
big ask. And we got about seven minutes.
Speaker 9 (15:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (15:57):
I think a place to start is with right MMT.
If you can help us defile what MMT is, and
I think what the narrative the narrative you're hoping to
get across with MMT. What what is the new economic narrative?
It's no longer pull yourself up by your bootstraps. What
is MMT telling us?
Speaker 12 (16:13):
So in economics is widely known as the dismal science, right,
because well, that's what MMT is trying to do better branding,
because you know, in the dismal science, it's all about
scarcity and we can never have the things that we
want because there's always this really intrusive problem, which is
(16:34):
how are you going to pay for it? Where is
the money going to come from? And the problem is
that we treat money like just any other scarce good
or service.
Speaker 9 (16:42):
In the economy.
Speaker 12 (16:42):
And what MMT is doing is saying, hold on a second,
we're not on a gold standard anymore. We have this
thing called a fiat currency. And it does make people
nervous because a fiat currency sort of opens up space
and it's kind of like, wait, is money real after all?
And so MMT is an economic framework that tries to
(17:03):
have an honest conversation that talks to people like grown ups,
not insulting people by telling them that you have to
treat the government's budget like a household budget and speaking
down to people, we want to be honest about the
monetary system we have today, the capacities of the government
to spend when you have a fiat currency and you're
not tying your currency to gold and promising to convert
(17:24):
into something that you could run out of, like physical gold.
So we're opening up a conversation where there are still
limits and you still have to make choices, but we
can have an adult conversation about how the government can
actually operate its budget when it doesn't face the same
kinds of constraints that a household or a business face.
Speaker 5 (17:44):
By that, I think that the big headline with this
as well is the way we look at what the
deficit means. Correct.
Speaker 3 (17:50):
Yeah, Like I hear deficit.
Speaker 5 (17:51):
You're here in the news. You hear every politician talking
about a deficit equals bad yep. And the major narrative
of MMT monetary modern monetary theory is deficit good. Correct.
Speaker 12 (18:05):
Every deficit is good for someone in purely financial terms.
And I'll tell you why, because you're right.
Speaker 9 (18:11):
We use this.
Speaker 12 (18:12):
Word and it sounds inherently like something's gone wrong. If
somebody is in deficit, there's a problem.
Speaker 9 (18:17):
Right.
Speaker 12 (18:17):
You don't want to turn on the sporting game and
find the announcer saying that your team is going to
have to come back and overcome a seven run deficit.
Speaker 9 (18:25):
If they're going to win the game.
Speaker 12 (18:26):
It's always a bad thing, right, But actually, if you
think about what the government deficit is, it's just the
difference between two numbers, that's all it is.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
So yeah, RELI, well, I guess we'll find that.
Speaker 1 (18:40):
Fine.
Speaker 12 (18:42):
Fine, it's fine in the sense that it's just a
benign mathematical like, it's the difference between two numbers. It's
not even higher order math, right, It's just how many
dollars the government spends into the economy each year versus
how many they take back out, mostly through taxation. So
simple math. If they spend one hundred dollars into the
(19:02):
economy and they only take ninety dollars back out, we
label it a government deficit, and somebody records it as
a minus ten on the government's ledger. What we forget
to do is to recognize if they put one hundred
in and only take ninety out, somebody gets ten. So
the government's deficit is matched or mirrored by a financial surplus.
Speaker 9 (19:23):
In some other part of the economy is.
Speaker 3 (19:26):
Wait, hang on, so did you guys meet backstage or something?
Because what the hell? What is MMT? What what's MT is?
What does MT stand for? You hand it?
Speaker 12 (19:35):
So it's modern monetary theory. And so again the currency,
we're not under the old standard. We're in the modern
fiat age we have.
Speaker 3 (19:43):
Yeah, what's well is a good car? Thats you get?
Speaker 12 (19:48):
What you're walking around with if you've got some of
this stuff in your wallet is a tax credit. So
those dollar bills that we're walking around with, we think
of that as money, right, and we can use it
to transact, We can use buy and sell thing. You
can use it to make purchases of goods.
Speaker 3 (20:01):
And money is good.
Speaker 12 (20:04):
It's good to have generally, and it's really good to
have when you got to pay your taxes because this
is what the government expects us to hand over at
the end of the day.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
Okay, okay, money is good. I'm with you so far.
Speaker 9 (20:16):
But let's do this.
Speaker 12 (20:18):
What about that government deficit that you just mentioned, right,
And I said every government deficit is good for someone?
Why because it's just a financial deposit into some other
part of the economy. The question is good for whom
and good for what. The government can increase its deficit
to do things like feed hungry kids, tackle the climate crisis,
fixed crumbling infrastructure. All of those things are ways to
(20:41):
use a government deficit that might have desirable results for
people and for the economy.
Speaker 6 (20:47):
So money is good, deficit is good. I'm with your sofar.
So what's what's the bad? What's the problem?
Speaker 1 (20:54):
You have?
Speaker 12 (20:55):
A big part of the problem is the way that
we've been taught to think about these things, to try
to stamp out deficits, to reduce them, to view them
as inherently dangerous. They're not inherently dangerous, and as I
just said, they can be used to help us accomplish
important goals in the economy.
Speaker 6 (21:11):
So, for example, if I go to Caesar's Palace and
I borrow like twenty dollars in my credit card, I
put it on red and I lose everything that's good.
Speaker 3 (21:19):
That's bad. Wait, why is that bad?
Speaker 9 (21:21):
Then?
Speaker 3 (21:22):
But doesn't the casino?
Speaker 9 (21:25):
It's good for the casino.
Speaker 5 (21:27):
And also, don't go to Caesar's Palace. That's a little
ghost person. It's bad. Maybe go to MGM or this
is something, But financially that's bad for.
Speaker 9 (21:35):
Him, but that's bad for you.
Speaker 12 (21:36):
But the point is to try to figure out and
to wrap our heads around what it is we're actually
capable of doing. Because we're always told that we can't
tackle big problems that we face. We can't deal with
housing problems, or education, or climate, infrastructure, social security, and
medicare always come up, and everybody always says the same thing,
we can't afford it. We have this deficit or we
(21:58):
have this national debt. Where are you going to find
the money to do these things? And so MMT comes
in and says, look, it's not about finding the money.
The money is created when the government spends, Congress authorizes
the spending, and if the votes are there, the money
is there. The thing you have to watch out for
is inflation. So it isn't as if it's a free lunch.
There are no constraints, there are no limits. There are limits,
(22:21):
and the limit is inflation. You can't run out of money,
but you can run out of things to buy.
Speaker 5 (22:26):
I mean, so this is correct me if I'm wrong,
But if I'm going nutshell here, your essential argument is
we're not bartering back and forth like this is an
avatar for gold in our pocket. The government makes money, exactly,
they can decide how much money goes out there. Right,
you pay taxes. They don't need our taxes to fix
big problems. They can make big money. It's on them
to figure out how to spend it and put it
(22:47):
into the economy in a way they can get big
things done. And then the private businesses, they're the ones
who have the money. The government just has created that situation,
and inflation becomes the boundary that they have to act underneath. Correct,
well done, well done.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
You.
Speaker 5 (23:07):
Yeah, she's a published author and created a movie and
still assholes won't do the research. But here here, here's
the pushback.
Speaker 3 (23:18):
Here's the pushback, memorizing the Wikipedia pitch. But here's the argument.
Speaker 5 (23:24):
Here's what's so compelling. And Ronnie is a great he's
a useful idiot in this, and people are scared. I
don't know a lot about money, and I think the
narratives are our money. Teach me to be afraid of it.
It's something that we shouldn't talk about because I don't
understand the underpinnings of it. And I think what it's
compelling about your argument is we can and have like
World War two, have figured out ways in which to
(23:45):
create money and fix big problems. It's it's we almost
need a giant We need a big thing to focus
on to get those problems done correct, to get the
narrative around it. Like I think it.
Speaker 12 (23:57):
Helps in COVID was that big thing for a period
of time. We're governments around the world suddenly stopped asking
the question how are we going to pay for it?
Speaker 9 (24:04):
And what are we going to do about this deficit?
Speaker 12 (24:05):
And they just pulled out, I'll use the phrase the
money bazooka, right. Countries realized that they were going to
have to spend a lot of money to shore up
people's lives and livelihoods through the pandemic, and so we
spent some five trillion dollars just in the first twelve
months or so of the pandemic. And I wish that
climate was going to be that catalyzing event that kind
(24:27):
of forces everybody to have that wake up moment and
realize that we've been focusing on the wrong sorts of problems,
that we really can tackle the problem of climate change.
Speaker 9 (24:37):
We can afford it. We got to watch out for inflation.
Speaker 6 (24:40):
Sure, okay, sure, So you'll say that MMT can be
used to solve issues that we claim that we have
no money for by basically the government making money, because
that's where money comes from, right, And you're saying, but
doesn't that increase inflation inherently if you just keep making money.
Speaker 12 (24:55):
Well no, I mean the government has run deficits most
of my life, with the exception of four years during
the Clinton administration, the government's budget has been in deficit.
Look at a country like Japan. They've had large deficits
every single year for the last thirty years or so
and no inflation to show for it. And we hardly
had any inflation. Inflation didn't really become a problem until
COVID came along and started breaking supply chains, and then
(25:18):
wars in Ukraine and food and energy prices and so forth.
But you can have large and persistent deficits without having
an inflation problem. It's when those deficits collide against the
backdrop of constraints in the real economy, where the economy
can't resource, can't keep up and satisfy that demand. That's
(25:38):
what happened in the COVID pandemic and in World War two.
Speaker 6 (25:42):
So if it happened in World War two and it
happened in a COVID pandemic where inflation got out of control,
where we had you had basically a limited spending on
one single issue World War two. Well, COVID then helping you. Well,
you know what's evidence that MT you will work? Then
if we had two real examples, I'm yeah, no, no,
because someone just briefed me on that, and I'll just
repeat it.
Speaker 12 (26:03):
So the evidence that it works is that MMT is
a description of how government finance always operates, whether you
have a budget deficit, a budget surplus, or a balanced budget.
MT is at work providing the explanation. So it isn't
about ramping up deficits and running large chronic deficits. You
can have a good, healthy economy in some cases, whether
(26:24):
a relatively small deficit or maybe even with a balanced budget.
Speaker 9 (26:27):
It depends on a lot of other things.
Speaker 12 (26:29):
So the evidence that it works is that it's a description,
and we think a more honest and accurate description of
the monetary system we have and how governments actually pay
their bills.
Speaker 5 (26:39):
Now, as a I guess in theory how this takes
greater effect and affects our lives, and it's big things done,
Green New deal that was a big part of the
way in which we be funded. We need to start
looking at money like through an MMT lens. Correct. That's
also presupposes that you do have this paradigm shift that
we start to see as a as a country, as
(27:00):
a collective, we start to see the usage of money differently.
But getting people to have a cohesive change of mind
and the way they see the world seems like impossibility
from the experiences I've had out on the road and
at Thanksgiving, Well, look like, how much of like, do
we live in a culture where we can experience a
(27:21):
paradigm shift or is that in and of itself an
impossible I hope?
Speaker 9 (27:25):
So, I mean, TikTok is there. I'm kidding. I'm kidding.
We're gonna get better, noe.
Speaker 12 (27:32):
But it's stuff like this, right, It's conversations like these
that allow people to hear a different perspective. And also
I think, you know, look what the last couple of years,
what we've done, in some cases on a bipartisan basis
and in some cases just with Democrats. But you had
the Inflation Reduction Act, which is the largest climate bill
we've ever had in the history of our country. We
(27:52):
have the Chips and Sciences Act, which big investments in
actual productive capacity here in the US, and the Bipartisan
infrastruct Bill, which is repairing roads and bridges and you know,
taking care of our infrastructure. So those are three big
packages which I would argue are just an extension in
many ways of what the administration started doing with the
(28:13):
COVID spending. And it's just another example of the government
being able to mobilize the financial wherewithal to commit to
spending money that it doesn't have, because the money comes
from the willingness of Congress to say yes. When Congress
says yes and writes those bills, the legislation is the
set of instructions that goes to the government's bank, the
(28:34):
Federal Reserve, and it says we've committed to making these payments.
Your job is our fiscal agent, is to carry out
all of the payments we've authorized on behalf of the
US Treasury. And that is just how government finance works.
It's no more complicated than that. But we complicate it
with stories about taxes and borrowing and debt and all
the rest of it. But at the end of the day,
(28:54):
the spending is really easy to carry out.
Speaker 3 (28:57):
Well, you see, you're a very smart person. You're saying
things like calmly.
Speaker 6 (29:02):
Work here, and everything seems like it's fine. So how
do we get to what would you what can people
walk away with like if they.
Speaker 3 (29:09):
Want to like not be sad when they look at
the when they look at the deficit? Is always his question,
How do I not be sad?
Speaker 6 (29:18):
What's the what's the what's like the practical application? Because
you'll you'll, I guess we just the three of us
sat down here and we decided that the deficit is fine,
and we can well okay, then so okay, so what's
the next step? Why would you actually, let's say we
believe in MMT or yeah MT? What what what's the
(29:40):
next thing? That I mean is belief enough? Do I
just have to pray to MT and then it?
Speaker 3 (29:45):
What? What has to happen next? Who else?
Speaker 12 (29:47):
What has to happen next is that the people that
we elect to represent us have to go in there
and and take decisions using the incredible power that they
have called the power of the purse that they've got
to take decisions about whether to fund programs, whether to
cut programs, not on the belief that they ought to
be operating their budget like a household. But when these
(30:09):
decisions come up about social security and Medicare, or continuing
with the Inflation Reduction Act and staying you know, in
the game on climate change and going even beyond what
that legislation did. What I think gives me hope anyway,
is that we've demonstrated what we're capable of and that
we can build on it and not revert back to
(30:31):
old ways of thinking about austerity and the need to
reduce deficits, because that's when you hammer your economy. That's
when people have a lost decade. That's when all of
a sudden, you know, the prosperity that is within reach
starts to slip through our fingers.
Speaker 6 (30:46):
So when the irs comes from my taxes, I just
got to tell them, like, y'all, deficit is good, don't.
Speaker 3 (30:51):
Worry about that. Don't worry about it. You need to
you know what you need to do.
Speaker 5 (30:55):
You need to take some THC or some d MT
and let the MMT just watch over you, let the
paradigm shift come to you.
Speaker 3 (31:05):
Ronnie Jack, Yeah, I think I'm in it right now.
Speaker 5 (31:07):
I think, well, finding the money will be released in
select theaters nationwide and on demand May third. For more information,
go to Finding Moneyfilm dot com. Seventy Keelton, We're gonna
take a quick break, right.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
That's how Oh that's your line.
Speaker 10 (31:37):
I think everybody has made their own assessment of President
Trump's character, and so far as I know, you don't
pay someone one hundred and thirty thousand dollars not to
have sex with you.
Speaker 9 (31:48):
Wow, that was Republican Senator Mitt Romney. What a SoundBite.
Speaker 11 (31:55):
Explore more shows from the Daily Show podcast universe by
searching The Daily Show wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
Watch The Daily Show weeknights at eleven.
Speaker 2 (32:03):
Tenth Central on Comedy Central and streamful episodes anytime on
Paramount Plus.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
This has been a Comedy Central podcast
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