May 21, 2025 • 35 mins
Hour 3 of A&G features...
- AI speech translators & everyone is cheating
- Students using AI to cheat
- The Big Beautiful Bill
- Phones in school
Stupid Should Hurt: https://www.armstrongandgetty.com/
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio, the George
Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong, Joe Getty.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Armstrong and Jetty, and he Armstrong and Yetty.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
He gotta be kind of old to know who Cat
Stevens is. He is like a soft rock guy from
back in the seventies and changed his name to something
or other as a mother sef Islam.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
He just he just announced a book tour.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
The only reason I bring it up is I am
reading the Salmon Rushdie memoir, in which he mentions that
Cat Stevens was among those calling for Salmon Rushdie's death
after he put out the satantic verses book Peace Train.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
Indeed, one more reason not to listen to guitar players
talking about politics or.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
The sometimes depending on who it is, the religion of peace. Uh,
that was not my point.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
What was my point? Oh?
Speaker 3 (01:05):
So the house meaning all night long? The rules committee
started at one am, and now there's more wrangling going
on over the big beautiful bill, and stuff keeps coming
in and out of it. We could have the very
latest on that this hour. There's been some interesting wranglings.
I can tell you what the net result will be, though,
is we're going to go further and further into debt.
I just came across this quote that I really like.
(01:27):
The arc of democracy is long, but it bends toward insolvency.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
That seems to beautiful. That is beautiful.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
I was trying to find the email from one of
our beloved listeners who called the big beautiful Bill. I
can't remember what he called him, but it's a big
beautiful horror and disappointment and betrayal of ourselves and our kids.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
Anyway, don't get me started too late.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
I thought this was very, very interesting in a moment
or two, a discussion, a digest of you will, if
you will, of various thoughts about why kids cheat using AI.
They're lazy, ah, and you brought them up poorly.
Speaker 3 (02:05):
As I said last week, dipping my toe into AI
for the first time, I thought, how would you not?
It is so easy, It would be so easy to
get a boost. I mean, not just flat out write
the paper for me, but like some easy, serious help.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
That would be a hell of a shortcut.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
Yes, yeah, and I will plan in advance on being
unsatisfied with this segment when it ends, because this ought
to be this discussion. Why are kids cheating with it?
How can we stop them from cheating with it? And indeed,
should we even try to stop them from cheating with it?
Could be like a series of four three hour podcasts,
(02:46):
and even then it would probably leave people scratching their heads. Anyway,
Having said that, I thought this was crazy. I saw
this video today. This is an illustration of one of
Google's AI products, and I was reading about how they
actually have some pretty interesting stuff coming. They feel like
they're behind the chat GPT and that sort of thing.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
Evil company. You got to keep that in mind. Oh yeah,
terribly evil.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
But they are a little behind the mass market for
AI tools for the consumer, but they're way behind among
the tools young people choose.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
Well, have they rolled out their best I remember when
I was talking about this like two years ago, because
I knew some people in that world that Google was
pouring more money in it to than anybody, but holding
their fire to like really release the takeover the world.
You know, the way Google dominated search engines. They wanted
(03:40):
to land with such a everybody was using. It becomes
the Xerox or Kleenex of AI.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
But did they release theirs and fail or Uh No,
it's just all developing so fast. I think that, you know,
check back in a week, that'll be a new headline.
And I don't I'm not qualified to answer that question
because all of these services and you know, apps and all,
they have clever sounding names like Gemini and Perplexity and
(04:10):
the rest of it, and I have trouble remembering who's this.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
Who's I'm not an expert by anybody, but it's the
Google guy.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
Though that said AI was going to be as big
to mankind as fire right.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
So for instance, this is from Google Meat, which we
use now and again they have launched their real time translator.
Et pardon me, m et, yes, yes, meeting. We use
the platform ourselves as opposed to Google Meat. I don't
want to eat anything Google makes anyway. So it's a
(04:41):
real time speech translator. What you're going to hear is
a gentleman asking a question and the gal starts to
answer him, but he, you know, presumably is more comfortable
with Spanish or whatever, and he clicks on his screen
that he wants to hear her in Spanish instead. Uh,
(05:01):
and and then we'll we'll interpret in a moment, Go
ahead and roll at.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
Michael, where would you like to go? On your next vacation. Oh,
where would I like to go on my next vacation?
Speaker 4 (05:16):
Well, I can tell you about an upcoming just pain
to Majorca, Rapos, Sacramento, Semana.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
Okay, So not only is it simultaneously with just like
a half second delay, simultaneously translating what she's saying, it's
doing it in her voice.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
It's emulating her voice. Right, I didn't catch that, but yes, obviously, yeah, yeah,
so I mean a tool.
Speaker 1 (05:54):
I mean because those of us who've traveled a bit
and used Google Translate, like a year and a half ago.
So when we were in like Bavaria, I would look
at a sign on a truck and put it in
the camera and say, honey, that's a sausage truck, and
trying to read signs, you know, to figure out where
we were going, and it was super cool. And occasionally
(06:15):
you'd have a conversation with you know, say a German
speaker because I tried like hell to learn language. It's
too hard and I'm too dumb. But so somebody would
talk into it and you'd look at it and say, oh,
the restaurant opens at five pm, muchas Gracias, which would
be a weird thing to say in Germany, but you know,
you then move on with your life.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
Now you simultaneously translate it in their language. I needed
that so bad voice. I needed that so bad.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
When I was in Russia one particular day one I
wanted coffee so bad because I'm a coffee addict, and
I spent like an hour and a half trying to
figure out how I could find a coffee place, order
the coffee once I was there, pay for it. It
was just impossible. It would have been effortless with that, Katie.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
You guys are talking about all of these beautiful countries.
I'm thinking, oh, my gosh, I have a nail appointment later. Yes,
oh to find out what they're actually saying. You know
what that will dream?
Speaker 3 (07:11):
There's that or the gardener guy who in my landlord hired,
who kept letting my dog out and I wanted to
talk to about it.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
I didn't speak Spanish. I should have used this for
that stop letting my dog out?
Speaker 1 (07:25):
You can just play him who let the dogs out?
He probably knows that song anyway, moving along, So I
thought that was amazing in a cool tool, and you
know the future is now blah blah, blah. So getting
to the topic of students cheating. I came across a
really interesting Twitter thread and this guy's writing about has
(07:45):
anyone asked to stop.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
To ask why students cheat? I heard, Yes, I heard
the dumbest story the other day. This is typical of
mainstream media about AI and cheating.
Speaker 2 (07:55):
The lead being.
Speaker 3 (08:00):
Instructors are telling students not to cheat. But it turns
out some in college. I think it was Stanford. Turns
out Stanford crafted the questions for their latest test using AI. What, Gibbs,
I thought, that makes perfect sense to use AI to
craft the questions for the test.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
What is that to your question?
Speaker 3 (08:23):
Right?
Speaker 2 (08:24):
The article?
Speaker 1 (08:25):
Yeah, So this guy's premise is everyone's cheating their way
through college chat, GPT and others have unraveled the entire
academic project. And I thought this was really interesting and
somewhat troubling. And he delves into the article and interprets it.
Interprets it by revealed preference. Students must think the work
they do in class is a waste of time. Fake
(08:47):
bonding activities and hippie gardening clearly aren't worth their time.
They're talking about some of the classes they take, so
they outsource it to AI anything fun or interesting. They
still do by hand, hm, but this the profile is Sarah's,
a freshman at the university, said she first used chat
ept to chat during the spring semester of her final
(09:07):
year of high school. After getting acquainted with the chatbot,
she used it for all her classes, Indigenous studies, law, English,
and hippie farming classes called green Industries. My grades were amazing,
she said, it changed my life. She continued to use
AI when she started college this past fall.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
Why wouldn't she?
Speaker 3 (09:25):
Then the phrase cheating changed my life?
Speaker 1 (09:30):
So and then they quote this professor, a philosophy professor
across the country at the University of Arkansas, Little Rock
caught students in her ethics and Technology class using AI
to respond to the prompt briefly introduce yourself and say
what you're hoping to get out of this class?
Speaker 3 (09:47):
Wow? Yeah, yeah, So I think I know where you're
going with the Is it even a good idea to
try to stop them? Because the future might be just
learning how to use AI as a tool, right to
answer any question or to do anything at an enormous
and horrifying cost, stay with us.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
So then I found this really interesting too. And as
I said at the beginning of the segment, this is
going to be unsatisfying and just scratch the surface, and
I wish we had unlimited time for it. But this
author then gets into a student who wants to write
by hand. I really like writing, she said, sounding strangely
nostalgic for a high school commerce class, which was last
(10:33):
time she wrote an essay unassisted. Honestly, she continued, I
think there's beauty and trying to plan your essay you
learn a lot. You have to think, oh, what can
I write in this paragraph? Or what should my wife scheem?
But she'd rather get good grades an essay with chatch EVT.
It's like it just gives you straight up what you
have to follow. You just don't really have to think
that much. And so because the curriculum is designed not
(10:58):
to learn but to check boxes, you're much better off
using chat GPT, for instance, than trying to think it through.
Speaker 3 (11:05):
I'm thinking out louder, So don't beat me with both
fists before I've finished myself. I can't wait if you
will never have to write because you've got a tool
that will write for you.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
Do you need to.
Speaker 3 (11:17):
Learn to write?
Speaker 2 (11:19):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (11:20):
Why I will explain in a moment. It's a great question.
It's probably the question. And then the final thing that
he gets into is college as liberal arts education and
college's jobs program are fundamentally incompatible goals. The way we
evaluate students has terrible incentives and isn't predictive anyway. The
learning done on colleges has a very weak relationship to
(11:43):
real world goals.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
You're there to.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
Network and meet people, notice it. Yeah, and you don't
learn a damn thing anyway. So then we can get
into how to stop kids from cheating or students from
cheating and this you want to come.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
Back and do that because I want to hear that.
Speaker 3 (12:01):
I would actually like to hear that the any any
any ideas or efforts, because I can't imagine what they
would be.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
Well, and your your excellent, excellent question about what does
it matter anyway?
Speaker 2 (12:15):
Well, I'll answer that when we come back.
Speaker 3 (12:16):
Okay, Wow, my kids are headed out into a world
that I'm just we're all just guessing at as parents.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
Oh yeah, the people developing this stuff are guessing.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
Yeah. No, it's a good point. Okay, all that's on
the waist.
Speaker 3 (12:31):
He here, the Didny jury was just shown pictures of
when they broke into his house. Remember that guns, Ammo, stilettos, lube,
and sex toys, among other things from his Miami Beach mansion.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
More on the Didny trial.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
Yes, uh so, a couple of articles we're gonna quote
here as we continue our discussion of AI and cheating
in schools, and ones from Tyler Cowen who wrote for
The Free everyone's using AI to cheat at school.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
That's a good thing. And he goes into the description of.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
The uproar over cheating and how one study suggests up
to ninety percent of college students have used chat GPT
to do their homework, and how the state of affairs
has set off a crisis among educators' parents and students.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
Blah blah blah. He says, I think this.
Speaker 1 (13:19):
Crisis is ultimately good news, and not just because I
believe American education was already in a profound crisis AMEN
the result of ideological capture, among other things. These models
are such great cheating AIGs because they are also such
great teachers. Often they are better than the human teachers
we put before our kids, and they're far cheaper at
that they will not unionize or attend pro Hamas protests,
(13:40):
that's pretty good.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
Yeah, you know, that's funny. You mentioned that at the beginning.
Speaker 3 (13:43):
I'm way more worried about the wokeness in schools than
figuring out the AI cheating stuff.
Speaker 2 (13:49):
Yeah, and then.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
He he says a couple of interesting things. But if
the current AI can cheat effectively for you, the current
AI and also write better than you. In other words,
our universities are not teaching our citizens sufficiently valuable skills. Rather,
we are teaching them that that which can be cloned
at low cost. The AIS are already very good at
(14:11):
those tasks, and they will only get better at a
rapid pace. Whatever you think of the intrinsic merits of
the proposed solutions can are tougher on our code really work.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
They're missing the point.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
The trouble with all the remedies is that they implicitly
insist that we must do everything possible to keep wasteful
instruction in place. The current system is misleading students about
the skills they'll need to succeed in the future, and
providing all the wrong incentives and rankings of student quality.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
And then this goes on for a number of more.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
Paragraphs of really interesting philosophizing about you know, education and
work skills and the relationship there and the future and
technology and a bunch of different stuff.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
We'll post the link. You'll probably get paywalled.
Speaker 1 (14:52):
I don't know, steal somebody's password at Armstrong and getty
dot com under hotlinks. I'll send it to the crew
in a couple of seconds. But then I came across
this how we doing for time?
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Pretty good?
Speaker 1 (15:04):
John Goyette, who is a vice president dean emeritis of
Thomas Aquinas College, and he describes the situation similar fashion
as mister Cowan about how cheating is rampant. We're still
in the early stages of the AI era, but the
future of higher education looks bleak. Early research suggests what
(15:25):
educators know intuitively. AI assistants can boost students' short term performance,
but it enervates long term meaning deadens long term comprehension,
especially after the digital crutches are taken away. A student
who aiss a quiz without studying the material has learned nothing.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
The same is true.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
The same is true for a student who completes an
essay without performing research, contemplating the subject matter, refining and
ordering arguments, or painstakingly choosing the exact words to express
the right idea. These students fail not only to retain knowledge,
but also to develop their capacities for creative and critical thinking.
Even where AI usage doesn't cross obvious ethical lines, it
(16:06):
usually undermines learning. And his point is that when you
are learning a skill, you're not just learning the skill.
Speaker 2 (16:17):
When you learn to write, you're not just learning to write.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
You are developing and strengthening your brain in a way
that you will use for the rest of your life,
no matter what tools are at your disposal.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
That's all interesting, and I'm not going to argue against that,
but I am a nihilist on this AI stuff. Whatever.
That's what people are going to do. That's what everybody's
gonna do. There's no stopping it. And what that leaves us,
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (16:49):
Yeah, well, he says, just a finish.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
Collegies should institute a more personal and in person approach
to assessment.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
Good band take home exams.
Speaker 3 (16:58):
Yeah, the idea of you have to do anything style, Yeah,
you have to write it in class.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
That might be, not might be it's the only way.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
And socratic discussion that sort of thing, Yeah, interesting, which
I like Anyway, where's the big beautiful bill? Man?
Speaker 2 (17:13):
There have been some agreements overnight you might not.
Speaker 3 (17:15):
Like Armstrong and Getty.
Speaker 5 (17:18):
There is nothing that Donald Trump cares more about getting
done at this point than passing this bill. And he's
willing to get up at eight thirty in the morning
and go to Capitol Hill to try and convince these
members to do so. They believe, again, this is his legacy.
The economy is his legacy.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
We're going to give you a real time update and
where we are on the big beautiful bill that will
affect everyone's life today. And freaking whooping cough. So I
sing it down because my son has whooping cough.
Speaker 3 (17:48):
I said to the doctor, my son just got his
t DAP update like six months ago, and he said,
did you know anybody who got the covid bat seene
who then got covid Ah.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
So it makes it much less likely that you'll.
Speaker 3 (18:05):
Get whooping cough or TETN, but it doesn't keep you
from getting it. We all have that or I've always
had that belief that a vaccine means I'm never going
to get it, but apparently that's not true. Anyho, back
to the Big Beautiful Bill. It affects every one of
us and our children probably, so it's a big deal.
(18:27):
This is a member of the Freedom Couckers, who I
have at various times agreed with wholeheartedly. In various times
thought they were crazy hostage takers, but in this case
they're mostly just trying to keep the debt from exploding. Anyway,
here's the latest from one of their members.
Speaker 6 (18:41):
We are working within the goalposts you voted for. You
can I answer the question or you just want to
You want.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
To fill a us You can.
Speaker 7 (18:52):
Not accurate, You're not very we are. We are working.
We're working within the goalposts. I'm not saying we need
to we need to move the.
Speaker 6 (19:02):
Amount of cuts up, because goodness knows, we moved them
ount of spending yesterday with the Salt agreement. We're saying,
work within the goalposts. Rearrange it within the gold hosts.
In accordance, we'll what the President wants. End waste frawden
abuse in medicaid, which is wasting dollars that should be
spent on the truly vulnerable, and then end as much
(19:24):
of the green new scam as possible, Right.
Speaker 3 (19:27):
Mister, Chet's a man called Andy Harris, So from the
Wall Street Journal. Let me set the table, as they
say in the table setting business. First, of all, the
Republicans have one of the slimmest majorities in the history
of our country. Speaker Johnson can afford to lose free,
free Republican votes to pass what he wants to pass. Now,
(19:48):
in the olden times, which isn't that long ago, when
you passed a big, giant budget bill like this, you
had mostly people in your party, but a whole bunch
of people from the other party, And then you had
the fringes of both parties that were unhappy with it,
the socialists on the left, like the fiscal arts on
the right, or whichever. But it was mostly your party
(20:09):
and a whole bunch of people. Now, no, only your
party votes for it and the other party votes for
it exclusively every time.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
And it used to be if you have a decent majority,
you could say, all right, eleven people in swing districts
who aren't going to like this very much, we'll take
your application for voting against this, and we won't hold
it against you. And thirteen people raise their hands, and
you say, all right, we can only take eleven york
it out in conference. But this majority is so slim.
Well got to have completed aherentes practically.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
Right, and then just this era of everybody from the
other party has to vote against it or you'd get
primary to lose. Right for everything is a dumb way
to run a country, But anyway, Wall Street Drummer rights broadly,
the proposal would boost spending on defense and border security,
reducing spending on medicaid and food assistance. Hiring tax cuts
(21:00):
would be extended permanently, so the Trump tax cuts of
twenty seventeen would become permanent under this, and the bill
would create new tax cuts that implement temporary versions of
Trump's plans to eliminate taxes on tips, overtime pay, and
social security benefits. The proposals projected to increase budget deficits
by nearly three trillion dollars through twenty thirty four.
Speaker 1 (21:26):
Man I wish the Conservative Party had won the last
election the fiscally responsive responsible party.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
The House Rules Committee started debating the bill at one
a m. The morning, trying to tee up the measure
for a full vote in the House because Johnson was
really hoping to get it voted on today. So they
started at one o'clock in the morning. They're in their
suits and ties and dresses and heels to get this
all going, hoping that they could vote for it today.
It still remains to be seen if that can actually
happen or not. Let me read some more. And this
(21:55):
is like hot off the presses. This is the very
latest House Republican struggled to lock down enough votes to
pass the big beautiful bill. Likely today they're still hoping
that they can to find the right combination of spending
and tax changes to please the two warring wings. I'm
gonna call the warring wings. This isn't the Wall Street Journal.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
This is me.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
The whatever Trump wants wing I'll vote for. And the
holy crap, we're gonna ruin our country we spend too
much money wing. Those are the two wings in my mind. Yeah,
passage would mark a major win for Trump and a
step toward extending the tax cuts, cementing other consumative conservative priorities,
but the fate of the measure was expected to go
(22:35):
down to the wire, with the final text yet to
be released. Party dealers struck a deal late last night
with blue state moderates who have fought for a higher
cap on the state and local tax the salt deduction.
So that looks like it's gonna happen at a fairly
high level. At least this bill that's going to go
to the Senate is going to have that in there.
(22:55):
But they still have problems on the other side of
the gap with conservative a GOP, with conservative hard liners
demanding faster spending reductions in Medicaid and quicker phase outs
of clean energy tax breaks. Who are Republicans who want
to hold on to this clean energy tax breaks? Well,
that would be the whatever Trump wants crowd. Well, I
(23:15):
guess no, I would disagree.
Speaker 1 (23:17):
No, it's the I'm getting ten million dollars every six
months in my district from federal handouts that were signed
in law by Biden. Biden, it's the old old story.
We don't need these tanks anymore. Yeah, you're gonna keep
making them because the plant is in my district. We
(23:38):
don't need these fake windmills anymore. Yeah, Well, you're gonna
keep giving us money in my district.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
That we just heard from Andy Harris, he's the chair
of the House Freedom of Caucus who is trying to
hold the line on fiscal conservatives somewhat. He said to
the Wall Street Journal. We actually stopped negotiating before midnight
because we actually had a deal that was then pulled
off the table. So this bill actually got worse overnight.
There's no way it passes today, he said. And again,
(24:07):
when you can only lose three, he's got a lot
of leverage.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
Right.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
The salt deductions are indefensible morally, absolutely triotically. The rest
of it there nears cost me zillions of dollars the
removing of them.
Speaker 3 (24:23):
But the moderates in the high tax states argued for
a more generous cap on state local tax deductions. They
were nearing a deal to boost the cap to forty
thousand dollars from the thirty thousand dollars at the House
and Means Ways and Means Committee approved, so forty thousand dollars.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:40):
Well, I'm horrified by the fact that Trump said, don't
f with medicaid, because medicaid is so bloated and horrible
and full of fraud, and it's exploded beyond any resemblance
to its original purpose. It could be I stand ready
to be convinced that Trump, with his his highly practical,
transactionictional view of politics as opposed to highly principle would
(25:03):
say to me, Joseph, listen, there's no appetite in the
country for that sort of reform. If we insist on that,
we're going to lose our opportunity to.
Speaker 2 (25:11):
Do X, Y and Z. Is it stupid? Yes?
Speaker 1 (25:13):
Are we mortgaging our children's future in a way that
they can't possibly pay back? Yes, we are. But it's
the best we can get, so shut up. Maybe that's
the cold reality. I don't know, but I hate it.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
There are seventy million people un medicaid currently under the
new work requirements that would be imposed by this bill,
most childless adults without disabilities between nineteen and sixty four
with what, oping, God, that's my disability? Why I can't
we ought to be on Medicaid.
Speaker 2 (25:42):
Get on it.
Speaker 3 (25:43):
So working age males who don't have anything wrong with
them would have to provide documentation that they worked eighty
hours a month prior to applying.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
Well, good luck with that making that work.
Speaker 1 (25:56):
Last I heard it's worked or volunteered, Yeah, exactly, studied
or tried to work.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
Or have a family friend who will sign off on
a thing claiming you work. I personally have known plenty
of people who jobbed that whole system and currently do
I like when I'm listening to NPR or any mainstream
media how they always talk about the number of people
that would be kicked off under some Republican proposals, never
(26:22):
with the idea that there might be some people that
should be kicked off. They presented as it's every single
person deserves every single one of these seventy million people
getting taxpayer funded healthcare deserves it right.
Speaker 2 (26:40):
And to ask them to pay for it the air
damn cells is a horror.
Speaker 1 (26:44):
How dare he is like the rest of the heartless
heartless conservative We'll see where this goes.
Speaker 3 (26:51):
The threats have only begun, I'm sure from Trump and
his allies against the Freedom Caucus members who might be
old and it's up today about being primaried or or worse.
Speaker 2 (27:06):
The sort of phone calls you get, tweets you get.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
Yeah, I guess, I don't know. You call it the
Big Beautiful Bill. I'm calling it the huge horrendous horror.
It's unless I come up with something better. It's literally
called the Big Beautiful Bill. They changed the name of
it yesterday. That's the actual name of the legislation now,
kind of like the and you can name. As we
all learn, you can name a bill anything.
Speaker 3 (27:31):
You could call it Freddy the Bill if you want,
or you can call it the Inflation Reduction Act when
it's got nothing to do with that.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
So as we all an, the late Great Abraham Lincoln
taughtis how many dogs?
Speaker 2 (27:42):
How many can I have? A second takes, Michael? Do
we have enough? Tastes good? All right? As the late
do I need to do the intro again? Or just
the punchline? Do the whole whole thing?
Speaker 1 (27:55):
As the as the late Great Abraham Lincoln taughtis, how
many legs does a dog have? If you call its
tail a leg? The answer is four. You can call
it's tail a leg. That doesn't make it a leg.
You could call it the big beautiful bill. You can
name it the big beautiful bill. It's the huge horrendous horror.
(28:17):
That's a good quote right there. It's the big what's
another good B word? Big? I can't think of like
a derogatory adjective with a bee, because betrayal will be
the third word. More like the big bitchy betrayal, except
bitchy doesn't really work.
Speaker 2 (28:38):
Bulls would be pretty good. Oh that is good, but
we can't say that on the air. We can, my jehad.
Speaker 3 (28:43):
Can you imagine if we said that on the air,
what would happen? Children would be crying, oh please, Pregnant
women would be you know, their water would break?
Speaker 2 (28:52):
Oh yeah yeah, the sighted would go blind. Then blind
would go death. I mean if somebody said bulls on
the air, blind would go death.
Speaker 3 (29:03):
Norm from Cheers died. We got a little tribute to him,
among other things on the way. Stay tuned, everybody, what
do you know?
Speaker 5 (29:15):
Not enough?
Speaker 2 (29:18):
Haven't done? Anybody? Better give me a tall one cause
I like it, need anybody. I was life drinking your Norm.
I just ran over its dog my nipples. It's freezy
out there.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
How can I laving on?
Speaker 3 (29:37):
Well, I ain't gonna need something to kill time before
my second beer.
Speaker 2 (29:42):
How about the first one?
Speaker 3 (29:44):
George Way, who played Norm on Cheers, died yesterday, not
very old. I didn't know any six. I think I
didn't know.
Speaker 2 (29:51):
Jason Sudacas was his nephew. His sister.
Speaker 3 (29:56):
Is Jason Sakas's. But I was just looking up at
the TV. In Boston. If you've ever been there, they
got a Cheers bar that calls itself Cheers and looks
a lot like Cheers, and people go there to buy
t shirts and hats and get their picture taken.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Anyway, it was full of people this morning. Looking at
the crowd.
Speaker 3 (30:11):
It's mostly people who don't need much of a reason
to drink in the morning.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
Looking at that crowd, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (30:17):
Wow, judge him, Judgerson. Well, he was a beloved character
and he'll be missed. He actually had a pretty good
career on Broadway after that. I guess, partially trading on
his fame and Cheers. But why wouldn't you. I mean,
there's a zillion good actors. Somebody's got to get the job.
Speaker 2 (30:35):
He's also famous for dull bears all right.
Speaker 1 (30:39):
Yeah on Saturday. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right. So here
is something entirely good. I think after bringing you down
for most of the show today, have just I just
I've had it. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna blow
sunshine up.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
Your hind end or whatever. Thank you.
Speaker 3 (30:55):
I did the reality. You need to be slacked in
the side of the head with reality. That's gotta feel refreshing.
It's like a sunshine but day.
Speaker 1 (31:04):
Anyway, I came across this, uh, written by a feller
my school banned phones for the year. Here's what happened.
I can cut to the end. It was a struggle
at first, right, They went with the pouches first, and
(31:27):
the kids with their phone in the sealed pouch still
felt the dopamine burst whenever the vibration went off.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
Naha, I had to know. Somebody texted me, I'll but
it's a very very important right, I just got a
social media alert. They had to see. It drove the mad.
Speaker 1 (31:42):
Students started taking pens and stabbing them through the fake
kevlar pouches. Other kids started using their keys to saw
the locking mechanism off. Others would bring two phones to school.
They'd let the dean watch them pop their old phone
into the pouch and entry and keeps their main phone
in their backpack until the coast was clear.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Kids.
Speaker 1 (31:58):
Well, one kid even got intro entrepreneurial about it. He
went on Amazon and bought the magnet that unlocked the
phone pouches for fifty bucks. Then he charged kids at
dollar every time they wanted to unlock their phone. Yes,
kid made a tidy prophet. By the time we confiscated
the magnet. You just got to admire that kid. Sure,
But then the school which kept on trying this year.
(32:19):
Students must hand in their phones at entry or we
immediately call their parents. The phones are plugged into safe
boxes that the students are not allowed to access until
the final bell is wrung. There are no constant vibrations
reminding you you're missing out on something, and there are
no pouches to rip, and they instituted and this is
going to take a little spine, which is in short
supply in modern America. Consequences for smuggling your phone past
(32:42):
entry are high, immediate attention calling parents. That's next personal
visit from the dean mid class. There were some pushback,
but we teachers stuck to our guns because they got
the backing of the administration.
Speaker 3 (32:56):
Here's my prediction, we won't be doing this news story
in five years because it will not be unique in
that everybody is going to be doing it at every school.
And we're going to look back on the era where
they allowed phones like, what the hell were we thinking?
Speaker 2 (33:12):
Right?
Speaker 1 (33:13):
Like they were letting the kids have sex in class,
I mean just utterly unthinkable. Well, like you know, back
in our day, it would have been a you know,
a thirty six inch TV screen in class wait a minute,
you let Joe bring a big screen TV into class.
Speaker 3 (33:27):
Well, I only get three channels and there's nothing on
during the day, so it wouldn't have been that helpful.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
But anyway, so they get to the point they are
now where they've figured out how to actually keep the
phones away from the kids, and I read on the
results have been spectacular. Teachers don't have to fight an
impossible battle against tech. Students talk to each other between classes.
The cafeteria has the sound of conversation. Teachers cover material faster.
(33:51):
Cyber bullying has fallen a lot. When a fight happens,
half the school doesn't immediately run out of the classroom
to watch mindless doom. Scrolling happens on their time, not
school time. Boys can't watch porn in the bathroom or
the cafeteria. I don't have to fight an impossible war
against the greatest human behavioral psychologist Silicon Valley has ever employed.
Let me read that again, a teacher saying, I don't
(34:13):
have to fight an impossible war against the greatest human
behavioral psychologists Silicon Valley has ever employed. Seriously, here's a
typical scenario in my gym. Well, and then he talks
about in gym class how the kids go along with
it and they end up having fun and having a laugh.
And last year I was battling the greatest entertainment system
(34:34):
the world ever unleashed student would listen to my plays,
please say, They would get up and then immediately f
off on their phone again. Why would you play in
the gym when you could sit against a wall and
watch endless entertainment personally curated for your tastes. Now I
battle boredom and that's a winnable fight, personally curated for
(34:55):
your taste. So I want to talk about that inn
Hour four it.
Speaker 3 (35:00):
Man, you gotta be careful of what you click on
because then the algorithm will think you like it and
feed you in endlessly.
Speaker 2 (35:06):
And I'm not this into it, hey, algorithm, I was
a one mistake. I'm not this into this.
Speaker 1 (35:12):
Well, ban all smartphones now, got a great hour four
coming up. If you don't get our four you're busy,
grab it later via podcast Follow us Armstrong and Getty
on demand wherever you like to get podcasts. Armstrong and
Getty
Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio, the George
Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong, Joe Getty.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Armstrong and Jetty, and he Armstrong and Yetty.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
He gotta be kind of old to know who Cat
Stevens is. He is like a soft rock guy from
back in the seventies and changed his name to something
or other as a mother sef Islam.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
He just he just announced a book tour.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
The only reason I bring it up is I am
reading the Salmon Rushdie memoir, in which he mentions that
Cat Stevens was among those calling for Salmon Rushdie's death
after he put out the satantic verses book Peace Train.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
Indeed, one more reason not to listen to guitar players
talking about politics or.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
The sometimes depending on who it is, the religion of peace. Uh,
that was not my point.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
What was my point? Oh?
Speaker 3 (01:05):
So the house meaning all night long? The rules committee
started at one am, and now there's more wrangling going
on over the big beautiful bill, and stuff keeps coming
in and out of it. We could have the very
latest on that this hour. There's been some interesting wranglings.
I can tell you what the net result will be, though,
is we're going to go further and further into debt.
I just came across this quote that I really like.
(01:27):
The arc of democracy is long, but it bends toward insolvency.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
That seems to beautiful. That is beautiful.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
I was trying to find the email from one of
our beloved listeners who called the big beautiful Bill. I
can't remember what he called him, but it's a big
beautiful horror and disappointment and betrayal of ourselves and our kids.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
Anyway, don't get me started too late.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
I thought this was very, very interesting in a moment
or two, a discussion, a digest of you will, if
you will, of various thoughts about why kids cheat using AI.
They're lazy, ah, and you brought them up poorly.
Speaker 3 (02:05):
As I said last week, dipping my toe into AI
for the first time, I thought, how would you not?
It is so easy, It would be so easy to
get a boost. I mean, not just flat out write
the paper for me, but like some easy, serious help.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
That would be a hell of a shortcut.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
Yes, yeah, and I will plan in advance on being
unsatisfied with this segment when it ends, because this ought
to be this discussion. Why are kids cheating with it?
How can we stop them from cheating with it? And indeed,
should we even try to stop them from cheating with it?
Could be like a series of four three hour podcasts,
(02:46):
and even then it would probably leave people scratching their heads. Anyway,
Having said that, I thought this was crazy. I saw
this video today. This is an illustration of one of
Google's AI products, and I was reading about how they
actually have some pretty interesting stuff coming. They feel like
they're behind the chat GPT and that sort of thing.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
Evil company. You got to keep that in mind. Oh yeah,
terribly evil.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
But they are a little behind the mass market for
AI tools for the consumer, but they're way behind among
the tools young people choose.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
Well, have they rolled out their best I remember when
I was talking about this like two years ago, because
I knew some people in that world that Google was
pouring more money in it to than anybody, but holding
their fire to like really release the takeover the world.
You know, the way Google dominated search engines. They wanted
(03:40):
to land with such a everybody was using. It becomes
the Xerox or Kleenex of AI.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
But did they release theirs and fail or Uh No,
it's just all developing so fast. I think that, you know,
check back in a week, that'll be a new headline.
And I don't I'm not qualified to answer that question
because all of these services and you know, apps and all,
they have clever sounding names like Gemini and Perplexity and
(04:10):
the rest of it, and I have trouble remembering who's this.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
Who's I'm not an expert by anybody, but it's the
Google guy.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
Though that said AI was going to be as big
to mankind as fire right.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
So for instance, this is from Google Meat, which we
use now and again they have launched their real time translator.
Et pardon me, m et, yes, yes, meeting. We use
the platform ourselves as opposed to Google Meat. I don't
want to eat anything Google makes anyway. So it's a
(04:41):
real time speech translator. What you're going to hear is
a gentleman asking a question and the gal starts to
answer him, but he, you know, presumably is more comfortable
with Spanish or whatever, and he clicks on his screen
that he wants to hear her in Spanish instead. Uh,
(05:01):
and and then we'll we'll interpret in a moment, Go
ahead and roll at.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
Michael, where would you like to go? On your next vacation. Oh,
where would I like to go on my next vacation?
Speaker 4 (05:16):
Well, I can tell you about an upcoming just pain
to Majorca, Rapos, Sacramento, Semana.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
Okay, So not only is it simultaneously with just like
a half second delay, simultaneously translating what she's saying, it's
doing it in her voice.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
It's emulating her voice. Right, I didn't catch that, but yes, obviously, yeah, yeah,
so I mean a tool.
Speaker 1 (05:54):
I mean because those of us who've traveled a bit
and used Google Translate, like a year and a half ago.
So when we were in like Bavaria, I would look
at a sign on a truck and put it in
the camera and say, honey, that's a sausage truck, and
trying to read signs, you know, to figure out where
we were going, and it was super cool. And occasionally
(06:15):
you'd have a conversation with you know, say a German
speaker because I tried like hell to learn language. It's
too hard and I'm too dumb. But so somebody would
talk into it and you'd look at it and say, oh,
the restaurant opens at five pm, muchas Gracias, which would
be a weird thing to say in Germany, but you know,
you then move on with your life.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
Now you simultaneously translate it in their language. I needed
that so bad voice. I needed that so bad.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
When I was in Russia one particular day one I
wanted coffee so bad because I'm a coffee addict, and
I spent like an hour and a half trying to
figure out how I could find a coffee place, order
the coffee once I was there, pay for it. It
was just impossible. It would have been effortless with that, Katie.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
You guys are talking about all of these beautiful countries.
I'm thinking, oh, my gosh, I have a nail appointment later. Yes,
oh to find out what they're actually saying. You know
what that will dream?
Speaker 3 (07:11):
There's that or the gardener guy who in my landlord hired,
who kept letting my dog out and I wanted to
talk to about it.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
I didn't speak Spanish. I should have used this for
that stop letting my dog out?
Speaker 1 (07:25):
You can just play him who let the dogs out?
He probably knows that song anyway, moving along, So I
thought that was amazing in a cool tool, and you
know the future is now blah blah, blah. So getting
to the topic of students cheating. I came across a
really interesting Twitter thread and this guy's writing about has
(07:45):
anyone asked to stop.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
To ask why students cheat? I heard, Yes, I heard
the dumbest story the other day. This is typical of
mainstream media about AI and cheating.
Speaker 2 (07:55):
The lead being.
Speaker 3 (08:00):
Instructors are telling students not to cheat. But it turns
out some in college. I think it was Stanford. Turns
out Stanford crafted the questions for their latest test using AI. What, Gibbs,
I thought, that makes perfect sense to use AI to
craft the questions for the test.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
What is that to your question?
Speaker 3 (08:23):
Right?
Speaker 2 (08:24):
The article?
Speaker 1 (08:25):
Yeah, So this guy's premise is everyone's cheating their way
through college chat, GPT and others have unraveled the entire
academic project. And I thought this was really interesting and
somewhat troubling. And he delves into the article and interprets it.
Interprets it by revealed preference. Students must think the work
they do in class is a waste of time. Fake
(08:47):
bonding activities and hippie gardening clearly aren't worth their time.
They're talking about some of the classes they take, so
they outsource it to AI anything fun or interesting. They
still do by hand, hm, but this the profile is Sarah's,
a freshman at the university, said she first used chat
ept to chat during the spring semester of her final
(09:07):
year of high school. After getting acquainted with the chatbot,
she used it for all her classes, Indigenous studies, law, English,
and hippie farming classes called green Industries. My grades were amazing,
she said, it changed my life. She continued to use
AI when she started college this past fall.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
Why wouldn't she?
Speaker 3 (09:25):
Then the phrase cheating changed my life?
Speaker 1 (09:30):
So and then they quote this professor, a philosophy professor
across the country at the University of Arkansas, Little Rock
caught students in her ethics and Technology class using AI
to respond to the prompt briefly introduce yourself and say
what you're hoping to get out of this class?
Speaker 3 (09:47):
Wow? Yeah, yeah, So I think I know where you're
going with the Is it even a good idea to
try to stop them? Because the future might be just
learning how to use AI as a tool, right to
answer any question or to do anything at an enormous
and horrifying cost, stay with us.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
So then I found this really interesting too. And as
I said at the beginning of the segment, this is
going to be unsatisfying and just scratch the surface, and
I wish we had unlimited time for it. But this
author then gets into a student who wants to write
by hand. I really like writing, she said, sounding strangely
nostalgic for a high school commerce class, which was last
(10:33):
time she wrote an essay unassisted. Honestly, she continued, I
think there's beauty and trying to plan your essay you
learn a lot. You have to think, oh, what can
I write in this paragraph? Or what should my wife scheem?
But she'd rather get good grades an essay with chatch EVT.
It's like it just gives you straight up what you
have to follow. You just don't really have to think
that much. And so because the curriculum is designed not
(10:58):
to learn but to check boxes, you're much better off
using chat GPT, for instance, than trying to think it through.
Speaker 3 (11:05):
I'm thinking out louder, So don't beat me with both
fists before I've finished myself. I can't wait if you
will never have to write because you've got a tool
that will write for you.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
Do you need to.
Speaker 3 (11:17):
Learn to write?
Speaker 2 (11:19):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (11:20):
Why I will explain in a moment. It's a great question.
It's probably the question. And then the final thing that
he gets into is college as liberal arts education and
college's jobs program are fundamentally incompatible goals. The way we
evaluate students has terrible incentives and isn't predictive anyway. The
learning done on colleges has a very weak relationship to
(11:43):
real world goals.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
You're there to.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
Network and meet people, notice it. Yeah, and you don't
learn a damn thing anyway. So then we can get
into how to stop kids from cheating or students from
cheating and this you want to come.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
Back and do that because I want to hear that.
Speaker 3 (12:01):
I would actually like to hear that the any any
any ideas or efforts, because I can't imagine what they
would be.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
Well, and your your excellent, excellent question about what does
it matter anyway?
Speaker 2 (12:15):
Well, I'll answer that when we come back.
Speaker 3 (12:16):
Okay, Wow, my kids are headed out into a world
that I'm just we're all just guessing at as parents.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
Oh yeah, the people developing this stuff are guessing.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
Yeah. No, it's a good point. Okay, all that's on
the waist.
Speaker 3 (12:31):
He here, the Didny jury was just shown pictures of
when they broke into his house. Remember that guns, Ammo, stilettos, lube,
and sex toys, among other things from his Miami Beach mansion.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
More on the Didny trial.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
Yes, uh so, a couple of articles we're gonna quote
here as we continue our discussion of AI and cheating
in schools, and ones from Tyler Cowen who wrote for
The Free everyone's using AI to cheat at school.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
That's a good thing. And he goes into the description of.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
The uproar over cheating and how one study suggests up
to ninety percent of college students have used chat GPT
to do their homework, and how the state of affairs
has set off a crisis among educators' parents and students.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
Blah blah blah. He says, I think this.
Speaker 1 (13:19):
Crisis is ultimately good news, and not just because I
believe American education was already in a profound crisis AMEN
the result of ideological capture, among other things. These models
are such great cheating AIGs because they are also such
great teachers. Often they are better than the human teachers
we put before our kids, and they're far cheaper at
that they will not unionize or attend pro Hamas protests,
(13:40):
that's pretty good.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
Yeah, you know, that's funny. You mentioned that at the beginning.
Speaker 3 (13:43):
I'm way more worried about the wokeness in schools than
figuring out the AI cheating stuff.
Speaker 2 (13:49):
Yeah, and then.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
He he says a couple of interesting things. But if
the current AI can cheat effectively for you, the current
AI and also write better than you. In other words,
our universities are not teaching our citizens sufficiently valuable skills. Rather,
we are teaching them that that which can be cloned
at low cost. The AIS are already very good at
(14:11):
those tasks, and they will only get better at a
rapid pace. Whatever you think of the intrinsic merits of
the proposed solutions can are tougher on our code really work.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
They're missing the point.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
The trouble with all the remedies is that they implicitly
insist that we must do everything possible to keep wasteful
instruction in place. The current system is misleading students about
the skills they'll need to succeed in the future, and
providing all the wrong incentives and rankings of student quality.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
And then this goes on for a number of more.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
Paragraphs of really interesting philosophizing about you know, education and
work skills and the relationship there and the future and
technology and a bunch of different stuff.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
We'll post the link. You'll probably get paywalled.
Speaker 1 (14:52):
I don't know, steal somebody's password at Armstrong and getty
dot com under hotlinks. I'll send it to the crew
in a couple of seconds. But then I came across
this how we doing for time?
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Pretty good?
Speaker 1 (15:04):
John Goyette, who is a vice president dean emeritis of
Thomas Aquinas College, and he describes the situation similar fashion
as mister Cowan about how cheating is rampant. We're still
in the early stages of the AI era, but the
future of higher education looks bleak. Early research suggests what
(15:25):
educators know intuitively. AI assistants can boost students' short term performance,
but it enervates long term meaning deadens long term comprehension,
especially after the digital crutches are taken away. A student
who aiss a quiz without studying the material has learned nothing.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
The same is true.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
The same is true for a student who completes an
essay without performing research, contemplating the subject matter, refining and
ordering arguments, or painstakingly choosing the exact words to express
the right idea. These students fail not only to retain knowledge,
but also to develop their capacities for creative and critical thinking.
Even where AI usage doesn't cross obvious ethical lines, it
(16:06):
usually undermines learning. And his point is that when you
are learning a skill, you're not just learning the skill.
Speaker 2 (16:17):
When you learn to write, you're not just learning to write.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
You are developing and strengthening your brain in a way
that you will use for the rest of your life,
no matter what tools are at your disposal.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
That's all interesting, and I'm not going to argue against that,
but I am a nihilist on this AI stuff. Whatever.
That's what people are going to do. That's what everybody's
gonna do. There's no stopping it. And what that leaves us,
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (16:49):
Yeah, well, he says, just a finish.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
Collegies should institute a more personal and in person approach
to assessment.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
Good band take home exams.
Speaker 3 (16:58):
Yeah, the idea of you have to do anything style, Yeah,
you have to write it in class.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
That might be, not might be it's the only way.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
And socratic discussion that sort of thing, Yeah, interesting, which
I like Anyway, where's the big beautiful bill? Man?
Speaker 2 (17:13):
There have been some agreements overnight you might not.
Speaker 3 (17:15):
Like Armstrong and Getty.
Speaker 5 (17:18):
There is nothing that Donald Trump cares more about getting
done at this point than passing this bill. And he's
willing to get up at eight thirty in the morning
and go to Capitol Hill to try and convince these
members to do so. They believe, again, this is his legacy.
The economy is his legacy.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
We're going to give you a real time update and
where we are on the big beautiful bill that will
affect everyone's life today. And freaking whooping cough. So I
sing it down because my son has whooping cough.
Speaker 3 (17:48):
I said to the doctor, my son just got his
t DAP update like six months ago, and he said,
did you know anybody who got the covid bat seene
who then got covid Ah.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
So it makes it much less likely that you'll.
Speaker 3 (18:05):
Get whooping cough or TETN, but it doesn't keep you
from getting it. We all have that or I've always
had that belief that a vaccine means I'm never going
to get it, but apparently that's not true. Anyho, back
to the Big Beautiful Bill. It affects every one of
us and our children probably, so it's a big deal.
(18:27):
This is a member of the Freedom Couckers, who I
have at various times agreed with wholeheartedly. In various times
thought they were crazy hostage takers, but in this case
they're mostly just trying to keep the debt from exploding. Anyway,
here's the latest from one of their members.
Speaker 6 (18:41):
We are working within the goalposts you voted for. You
can I answer the question or you just want to
You want.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
To fill a us You can.
Speaker 7 (18:52):
Not accurate, You're not very we are. We are working.
We're working within the goalposts. I'm not saying we need
to we need to move the.
Speaker 6 (19:02):
Amount of cuts up, because goodness knows, we moved them
ount of spending yesterday with the Salt agreement. We're saying,
work within the goalposts. Rearrange it within the gold hosts.
In accordance, we'll what the President wants. End waste frawden
abuse in medicaid, which is wasting dollars that should be
spent on the truly vulnerable, and then end as much
(19:24):
of the green new scam as possible, Right.
Speaker 3 (19:27):
Mister, Chet's a man called Andy Harris, So from the
Wall Street Journal. Let me set the table, as they
say in the table setting business. First, of all, the
Republicans have one of the slimmest majorities in the history
of our country. Speaker Johnson can afford to lose free,
free Republican votes to pass what he wants to pass. Now,
(19:48):
in the olden times, which isn't that long ago, when
you passed a big, giant budget bill like this, you
had mostly people in your party, but a whole bunch
of people from the other party, And then you had
the fringes of both parties that were unhappy with it,
the socialists on the left, like the fiscal arts on
the right, or whichever. But it was mostly your party
(20:09):
and a whole bunch of people. Now, no, only your
party votes for it and the other party votes for
it exclusively every time.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
And it used to be if you have a decent majority,
you could say, all right, eleven people in swing districts
who aren't going to like this very much, we'll take
your application for voting against this, and we won't hold
it against you. And thirteen people raise their hands, and
you say, all right, we can only take eleven york
it out in conference. But this majority is so slim.
Well got to have completed aherentes practically.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
Right, and then just this era of everybody from the
other party has to vote against it or you'd get
primary to lose. Right for everything is a dumb way
to run a country, But anyway, Wall Street Drummer rights broadly,
the proposal would boost spending on defense and border security,
reducing spending on medicaid and food assistance. Hiring tax cuts
(21:00):
would be extended permanently, so the Trump tax cuts of
twenty seventeen would become permanent under this, and the bill
would create new tax cuts that implement temporary versions of
Trump's plans to eliminate taxes on tips, overtime pay, and
social security benefits. The proposals projected to increase budget deficits
by nearly three trillion dollars through twenty thirty four.
Speaker 1 (21:26):
Man I wish the Conservative Party had won the last
election the fiscally responsive responsible party.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
The House Rules Committee started debating the bill at one
a m. The morning, trying to tee up the measure
for a full vote in the House because Johnson was
really hoping to get it voted on today. So they
started at one o'clock in the morning. They're in their
suits and ties and dresses and heels to get this
all going, hoping that they could vote for it today.
It still remains to be seen if that can actually
happen or not. Let me read some more. And this
(21:55):
is like hot off the presses. This is the very
latest House Republican struggled to lock down enough votes to
pass the big beautiful bill. Likely today they're still hoping
that they can to find the right combination of spending
and tax changes to please the two warring wings. I'm
gonna call the warring wings. This isn't the Wall Street Journal.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
This is me.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
The whatever Trump wants wing I'll vote for. And the
holy crap, we're gonna ruin our country we spend too
much money wing. Those are the two wings in my mind. Yeah,
passage would mark a major win for Trump and a
step toward extending the tax cuts, cementing other consumative conservative priorities,
but the fate of the measure was expected to go
(22:35):
down to the wire, with the final text yet to
be released. Party dealers struck a deal late last night
with blue state moderates who have fought for a higher
cap on the state and local tax the salt deduction.
So that looks like it's gonna happen at a fairly
high level. At least this bill that's going to go
to the Senate is going to have that in there.
(22:55):
But they still have problems on the other side of
the gap with conservative a GOP, with conservative hard liners
demanding faster spending reductions in Medicaid and quicker phase outs
of clean energy tax breaks. Who are Republicans who want
to hold on to this clean energy tax breaks? Well,
that would be the whatever Trump wants crowd. Well, I
(23:15):
guess no, I would disagree.
Speaker 1 (23:17):
No, it's the I'm getting ten million dollars every six
months in my district from federal handouts that were signed
in law by Biden. Biden, it's the old old story.
We don't need these tanks anymore. Yeah, you're gonna keep
making them because the plant is in my district. We
(23:38):
don't need these fake windmills anymore. Yeah, Well, you're gonna
keep giving us money in my district.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
That we just heard from Andy Harris, he's the chair
of the House Freedom of Caucus who is trying to
hold the line on fiscal conservatives somewhat. He said to
the Wall Street Journal. We actually stopped negotiating before midnight
because we actually had a deal that was then pulled
off the table. So this bill actually got worse overnight.
There's no way it passes today, he said. And again,
(24:07):
when you can only lose three, he's got a lot
of leverage.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
Right.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
The salt deductions are indefensible morally, absolutely triotically. The rest
of it there nears cost me zillions of dollars the
removing of them.
Speaker 3 (24:23):
But the moderates in the high tax states argued for
a more generous cap on state local tax deductions. They
were nearing a deal to boost the cap to forty
thousand dollars from the thirty thousand dollars at the House
and Means Ways and Means Committee approved, so forty thousand dollars.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:40):
Well, I'm horrified by the fact that Trump said, don't
f with medicaid, because medicaid is so bloated and horrible
and full of fraud, and it's exploded beyond any resemblance
to its original purpose. It could be I stand ready
to be convinced that Trump, with his his highly practical,
transactionictional view of politics as opposed to highly principle would
(25:03):
say to me, Joseph, listen, there's no appetite in the
country for that sort of reform. If we insist on that,
we're going to lose our opportunity to.
Speaker 2 (25:11):
Do X, Y and Z. Is it stupid? Yes?
Speaker 1 (25:13):
Are we mortgaging our children's future in a way that
they can't possibly pay back? Yes, we are. But it's
the best we can get, so shut up. Maybe that's
the cold reality. I don't know, but I hate it.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
There are seventy million people un medicaid currently under the
new work requirements that would be imposed by this bill,
most childless adults without disabilities between nineteen and sixty four
with what, oping, God, that's my disability? Why I can't
we ought to be on Medicaid.
Speaker 2 (25:42):
Get on it.
Speaker 3 (25:43):
So working age males who don't have anything wrong with
them would have to provide documentation that they worked eighty
hours a month prior to applying.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
Well, good luck with that making that work.
Speaker 1 (25:56):
Last I heard it's worked or volunteered, Yeah, exactly, studied
or tried to work.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
Or have a family friend who will sign off on
a thing claiming you work. I personally have known plenty
of people who jobbed that whole system and currently do
I like when I'm listening to NPR or any mainstream
media how they always talk about the number of people
that would be kicked off under some Republican proposals, never
(26:22):
with the idea that there might be some people that
should be kicked off. They presented as it's every single
person deserves every single one of these seventy million people
getting taxpayer funded healthcare deserves it right.
Speaker 2 (26:40):
And to ask them to pay for it the air
damn cells is a horror.
Speaker 1 (26:44):
How dare he is like the rest of the heartless
heartless conservative We'll see where this goes.
Speaker 3 (26:51):
The threats have only begun, I'm sure from Trump and
his allies against the Freedom Caucus members who might be
old and it's up today about being primaried or or worse.
Speaker 2 (27:06):
The sort of phone calls you get, tweets you get.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
Yeah, I guess, I don't know. You call it the
Big Beautiful Bill. I'm calling it the huge horrendous horror.
It's unless I come up with something better. It's literally
called the Big Beautiful Bill. They changed the name of
it yesterday. That's the actual name of the legislation now,
kind of like the and you can name. As we
all learn, you can name a bill anything.
Speaker 3 (27:31):
You could call it Freddy the Bill if you want,
or you can call it the Inflation Reduction Act when
it's got nothing to do with that.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
So as we all an, the late Great Abraham Lincoln
taughtis how many dogs?
Speaker 2 (27:42):
How many can I have? A second takes, Michael? Do
we have enough? Tastes good? All right? As the late
do I need to do the intro again? Or just
the punchline? Do the whole whole thing?
Speaker 1 (27:55):
As the as the late Great Abraham Lincoln taughtis, how
many legs does a dog have? If you call its
tail a leg? The answer is four. You can call
it's tail a leg. That doesn't make it a leg.
You could call it the big beautiful bill. You can
name it the big beautiful bill. It's the huge horrendous horror.
(28:17):
That's a good quote right there. It's the big what's
another good B word? Big? I can't think of like
a derogatory adjective with a bee, because betrayal will be
the third word. More like the big bitchy betrayal, except
bitchy doesn't really work.
Speaker 2 (28:38):
Bulls would be pretty good. Oh that is good, but
we can't say that on the air. We can, my jehad.
Speaker 3 (28:43):
Can you imagine if we said that on the air,
what would happen? Children would be crying, oh please, Pregnant
women would be you know, their water would break?
Speaker 2 (28:52):
Oh yeah yeah, the sighted would go blind. Then blind
would go death. I mean if somebody said bulls on
the air, blind would go death.
Speaker 3 (29:03):
Norm from Cheers died. We got a little tribute to him,
among other things on the way. Stay tuned, everybody, what
do you know?
Speaker 5 (29:15):
Not enough?
Speaker 2 (29:18):
Haven't done? Anybody? Better give me a tall one cause
I like it, need anybody. I was life drinking your Norm.
I just ran over its dog my nipples. It's freezy
out there.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
How can I laving on?
Speaker 3 (29:37):
Well, I ain't gonna need something to kill time before
my second beer.
Speaker 2 (29:42):
How about the first one?
Speaker 3 (29:44):
George Way, who played Norm on Cheers, died yesterday, not
very old. I didn't know any six. I think I
didn't know.
Speaker 2 (29:51):
Jason Sudacas was his nephew. His sister.
Speaker 3 (29:56):
Is Jason Sakas's. But I was just looking up at
the TV. In Boston. If you've ever been there, they
got a Cheers bar that calls itself Cheers and looks
a lot like Cheers, and people go there to buy
t shirts and hats and get their picture taken.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Anyway, it was full of people this morning. Looking at
the crowd.
Speaker 3 (30:11):
It's mostly people who don't need much of a reason
to drink in the morning.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
Looking at that crowd, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (30:17):
Wow, judge him, Judgerson. Well, he was a beloved character
and he'll be missed. He actually had a pretty good
career on Broadway after that. I guess, partially trading on
his fame and Cheers. But why wouldn't you. I mean,
there's a zillion good actors. Somebody's got to get the job.
Speaker 2 (30:35):
He's also famous for dull bears all right.
Speaker 1 (30:39):
Yeah on Saturday. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right. So here
is something entirely good. I think after bringing you down
for most of the show today, have just I just
I've had it. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna blow
sunshine up.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
Your hind end or whatever. Thank you.
Speaker 3 (30:55):
I did the reality. You need to be slacked in
the side of the head with reality. That's gotta feel refreshing.
It's like a sunshine but day.
Speaker 1 (31:04):
Anyway, I came across this, uh, written by a feller
my school banned phones for the year. Here's what happened.
I can cut to the end. It was a struggle
at first, right, They went with the pouches first, and
(31:27):
the kids with their phone in the sealed pouch still
felt the dopamine burst whenever the vibration went off.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
Naha, I had to know. Somebody texted me, I'll but
it's a very very important right, I just got a
social media alert. They had to see. It drove the mad.
Speaker 1 (31:42):
Students started taking pens and stabbing them through the fake
kevlar pouches. Other kids started using their keys to saw
the locking mechanism off. Others would bring two phones to school.
They'd let the dean watch them pop their old phone
into the pouch and entry and keeps their main phone
in their backpack until the coast was clear.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Kids.
Speaker 1 (31:58):
Well, one kid even got intro entrepreneurial about it. He
went on Amazon and bought the magnet that unlocked the
phone pouches for fifty bucks. Then he charged kids at
dollar every time they wanted to unlock their phone. Yes,
kid made a tidy prophet. By the time we confiscated
the magnet. You just got to admire that kid. Sure,
But then the school which kept on trying this year.
(32:19):
Students must hand in their phones at entry or we
immediately call their parents. The phones are plugged into safe
boxes that the students are not allowed to access until
the final bell is wrung. There are no constant vibrations
reminding you you're missing out on something, and there are
no pouches to rip, and they instituted and this is
going to take a little spine, which is in short
supply in modern America. Consequences for smuggling your phone past
(32:42):
entry are high, immediate attention calling parents. That's next personal
visit from the dean mid class. There were some pushback,
but we teachers stuck to our guns because they got
the backing of the administration.
Speaker 3 (32:56):
Here's my prediction, we won't be doing this news story
in five years because it will not be unique in
that everybody is going to be doing it at every school.
And we're going to look back on the era where
they allowed phones like, what the hell were we thinking?
Speaker 2 (33:12):
Right?
Speaker 1 (33:13):
Like they were letting the kids have sex in class,
I mean just utterly unthinkable. Well, like you know, back
in our day, it would have been a you know,
a thirty six inch TV screen in class wait a minute,
you let Joe bring a big screen TV into class.
Speaker 3 (33:27):
Well, I only get three channels and there's nothing on
during the day, so it wouldn't have been that helpful.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
But anyway, so they get to the point they are
now where they've figured out how to actually keep the
phones away from the kids, and I read on the
results have been spectacular. Teachers don't have to fight an
impossible battle against tech. Students talk to each other between classes.
The cafeteria has the sound of conversation. Teachers cover material faster.
(33:51):
Cyber bullying has fallen a lot. When a fight happens,
half the school doesn't immediately run out of the classroom
to watch mindless doom. Scrolling happens on their time, not
school time. Boys can't watch porn in the bathroom or
the cafeteria. I don't have to fight an impossible war
against the greatest human behavioral psychologist Silicon Valley has ever employed.
Let me read that again, a teacher saying, I don't
(34:13):
have to fight an impossible war against the greatest human
behavioral psychologists Silicon Valley has ever employed. Seriously, here's a
typical scenario in my gym. Well, and then he talks
about in gym class how the kids go along with
it and they end up having fun and having a laugh.
And last year I was battling the greatest entertainment system
(34:34):
the world ever unleashed student would listen to my plays,
please say, They would get up and then immediately f
off on their phone again. Why would you play in
the gym when you could sit against a wall and
watch endless entertainment personally curated for your tastes. Now I
battle boredom and that's a winnable fight, personally curated for
(34:55):
your taste. So I want to talk about that inn
Hour four it.
Speaker 3 (35:00):
Man, you gotta be careful of what you click on
because then the algorithm will think you like it and
feed you in endlessly.
Speaker 2 (35:06):
And I'm not this into it, hey, algorithm, I was
a one mistake. I'm not this into this.
Speaker 1 (35:12):
Well, ban all smartphones now, got a great hour four
coming up. If you don't get our four you're busy,
grab it later via podcast Follow us Armstrong and Getty
on demand wherever you like to get podcasts. Armstrong and
Getty
Hosts And Creators
Joe Getty
Jack Armstrong
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