December 31, 2025 • 35 mins
Featured in hour four of the Wednesday December 31, 2025 edition of The Armstrong & Getty Replay...
- Angry Woman Goes After Elderly Target Employee
- Brave Female Athlete & Tech Stuff
- Office Anxiety/Ai Controls a Vending Machine/FLQ & Mailbag
- The Sierra Club & Leaf Blowers
Stupid Should Hurt: https://www.armstrongandgetty.com/
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Transcript
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 and Joe Kaddy.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Armstrong and Jet Kiki and He Armstrong and Getty Strong
twenty twenty five. What a year? Huh? That was something.
We're not here right now.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
We're playing you the best of what we call like
to call Armstrong and Getty replays.
Speaker 4 (00:32):
Yeah, and the staff is still shell shocked. They're still
crying quietly in the corner. It takes so much work
to get this together and present it to you in
as entertaining the form as it is.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
It's the Armstrong and getting replay.
Speaker 4 (00:43):
So the Internet has decided to hate on a woman
from Chico, California this week, and she certainly earned a
certain amount of dislike in derision. Although, as we've observed
many times, the Internet mob not only does it sometimes
go overboard, it practically starts overboard and just turns into
(01:06):
angry mobs on this woman. Short of violence. I'm fine
with practically whatever. Oh my, oh my, disavow I disavow uh. Anyway,
here is the incident that you have a younger woman
be rating an elderly gal who is working to earn
a few bucks at her local Target.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
Can you wear red any red shirt but Charlie kirksher? Yes?
Oh yes, I know. Are you stupid?
Speaker 1 (01:34):
No?
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Why the would you wear that? You're at work at Target.
You support a racist? It's not racist. Yes, I'm sorry
that I sat here and arguing you're not.
Speaker 5 (01:45):
You should go get your manager. You should not be
allowed to wear the artwork got you. The opinion is
he's a racist and you support him. Yes, this is
going to be taken above your head. That's insane and sane.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Yeah, you're awful. You're an awful person.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
We're big in Chico, Chico, northern California. The dang up
by writing those areas, they lean way more conservative than
I'm talking to people around the country who don't know.
This lean way more conservative than a lot of what
you picture with California. So it's not that surprising that
you got an older woman wearing a Charlie kirkt shirt
at the Target. The woman who decides to drop f
(02:28):
bombs on an old woman probably working a seasonal schedule
at Target to make a little extra money, and then
posting it.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
With are you f ing stupid?
Speaker 4 (02:36):
Oh my god, you're an awful person. Back to you know,
whatever derision comes our way, I'm fine with God, you're
a horrible human being. And then she posted it herself
because she's so look at me own this nice old
woman right, very proud of it, posted herself online hate
social media is shut down, as you might imagine now
(02:58):
as hate and derision, and followed the posting somebody before
she shut down her social media posted a picture of
her with some companion who or posing next to an
America Needed Charlie Kirk a sticker on a car gesturing
at their throat like having your throat shot out and
(03:18):
then a middle finger and that sort of thing.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
Very clever, very smug.
Speaker 4 (03:22):
I hate this woman. On the other hand, I would
never take even ten seconds of my time to post
anything about her or call her work or I would
never ever do that. There's been quite a bit of
anger pour down on her Katie right.
Speaker 6 (03:40):
Oh yeah, the medical facility that she works for has
received six thousand plus profanity laced phone calls.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Yeah, yeah, I just I don't get that impulse.
Speaker 4 (03:51):
Really, I kind of think, well, I think you get
the impulse, you don't get the action. Yeah, I get
the impulse. I don't get the action correct. I think
it's more along the lines of what you always say
about people like that. The worst punishment you could dole
out is them having to be themselves the rest of
their lives. It's a life sentence. I'm sure she doesn't
(04:12):
have a lot of friends. A lot of people hate her,
whether she knows it or not. Well, I'll bet she
has a lot of people who are her fellow, strident, hateful, superior.
Stop me, when you recognize a good quality in a person,
you know, judgmental, vicious tribesmen like her and they all
(04:33):
support each other in high five and that sort of thing.
Speaker 6 (04:35):
Yeah, that's probably the crowd. She was posting this too. Sure,
it's difficult, Like I don't I don't know that people
ought to be hounded out of their jobs for this
sort of thing. But as we were talking about yesterday,
if we found out somebody around here that that I
needed to work with, don't just work with like it's
they're in the building and I see them occasionally, like
(04:56):
I need to interact with them on a regular basis
and have converse with them.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
I don't want to work with somebody like that.
Speaker 4 (05:04):
No, And if they were under my supervision, I would
seek a way to have them.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Not be in the organization anymore. I don't, you know,
it's a.
Speaker 3 (05:13):
Sort of because of why because they're a hateful lunatic.
Well yeah, that that among other things.
Speaker 4 (05:19):
We got an email we were talking about I can't
remember what the topic was exactly, but we got an
email from a guy who's in the car business. Well,
I guess we were talking about dishonest car dealers or
something like that, and he said, look, I learned a
long time ago that anybody who will lie for me
sooner or later will lie to me, and so he
doesn't employ people like that. Well, you get a hateful, vicious,
(05:41):
bigot woman like this, there's no chance. That's the only
you know, moral failing and the only you know way
in which that will come out over time. So no,
I don't want that sort of person in my organization.
On the other hand, the lovely and gentle spirited older
gal who were talking about the target employee has something
(06:02):
to say. Clip eighteen.
Speaker 7 (06:03):
Two wrongs don't make a right. You know, she wronged
me that I don't want to wrong her. That was
her opinion. But she's the one that fitted on Facebook,
you know, but I really wouldn't want to see her
somebody lose their job over it.
Speaker 4 (06:21):
Wow, you know nothing about clapping back. That's a very
kind and decent thing. And you you have not wronged
her gene, and then you will not wrong her. It's
everybody else that wants to wrong her.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
And then, in the way that the modern world works,
somebody started to go fund me for the old lady
who was wearing the Charlie kirkt shirt to raise money
for her. Where are we on that because of her
financial losses?
Speaker 2 (06:42):
Wait? Wait, no, there weren't any Yes, where are we
on that? Katie?
Speaker 4 (06:46):
I believe.
Speaker 2 (06:49):
We're at one hundred and twenty seven thousand. There you go.
That is so interesting.
Speaker 4 (06:55):
It's like one of those raffles where you get to
pick which prizes you like the best, and you put
your ticket in front of the golf clubs, but not
in front of the poe parie because you don't want that.
Speaker 2 (07:06):
Well, America with.
Speaker 4 (07:07):
The GoFundMe, just like puts their dollars in the jar
of whoever they like the best or or think is
the on the right side of something.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
It's an interesting impulse. Let's make her at least momentarily wealthy.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
So this nice old woman work at a target because
some ass clown comes and says some rude things. Now
probably is more cash flush than she's ever been in
her life.
Speaker 4 (07:28):
Yeah, right now, you could make the argument that it's
a praise, it's a tip if you will, for her restraint,
her kindness, and her good manner, her.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
Rewarding good behavior punishing bad behavior. That's the whole thing,
really right.
Speaker 4 (07:42):
And by the way, if you had some nice old
black woman wearing a BLM T shirt and some right
winger came along and said, are you effing stupid Black
Lives Matter?
Speaker 2 (07:53):
Blah blah blah, I.
Speaker 4 (07:54):
Would feel exactly the same way, exactly well, and it's
worth noting that the nation's media would have this on
their front page for a week.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
True, that's a very good point.
Speaker 4 (08:04):
Yeah, yeah, some nice old lady who leans right being
verbally accosted by a vicious younger person doesn't get a
breath of attention in the mainstream media.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
But we're used to that. These are weird times to
live in. Yeah, not a fan.
Speaker 3 (08:22):
So her company, the awful human being that is the
woman drop a f bombs and complaining she hasn't lost
her job yet, her company hasn't fired her. They haven't,
of course, it might just be the difficulty of firing
anybody in California.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
They don't want to deal with the lawsuits and all
that sort of stuff.
Speaker 3 (08:43):
Might just be that if it were if they were
like the olden days or different states, where you could think,
I hate her, what a jerk, let's get rid of her,
they probably would have.
Speaker 4 (08:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 6 (08:53):
The company released a statement I can't remember if it
was on Instagram or Facebook, basically saying we're aware of
the video. We don't come down our our employees' actions
and there's a further investigation or you know, the corporate.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
Please stop calling us.
Speaker 4 (09:06):
Yeah, they said, because our Yeah, yeah, because our patients
can't get through.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
Yeah that was it.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
Yeah, fair enough, somebody I just came across this on Twitter.
Apropos of nothing. The best part of being married is
having a permanent person to debrief immediately with after any
social event.
Speaker 2 (09:26):
That's that's good, and it reminds me.
Speaker 3 (09:28):
I saw a thing Jmore, the comedian I saw on
Instagram thing on him yesterday. He's talking about getting married
and people always say, you know, you got to find
somebody you got stuff in common with. And he says
that's crap, which I also kind of think is true.
A lot of my best friends we have very little
in common with and like music and movies and all
that sort of stuff and restaurants stuff like that. But
(09:49):
we're best friends for all kinds of different deeper reasons.
But he said, you know who you need to be
married to. That you have the things you hate in common.
That's the important thing. When you get a grade you
hate the same sort of stuff. That might be very true.
It might actually be true.
Speaker 2 (10:06):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (10:07):
Yeah, somebody's got to write a momentarily hot book on
that topic.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
Jack Armstrong and Joe the Armstrong and Getty Show.
Speaker 4 (10:19):
A high school female athlete did something very courageous the
other day. She didn't let coming in second to a
male born dude transgender competitor. It's a dude preventer from
standing in the top spot at the podium during the
stack in the state track and field meet in cal Unicornia.
Of course, this sixteen year old Reese Hogan was crowned
(10:42):
runner up in the triple jump at the CIF Southern
Section Finals on Saturday, despite setting a new personal record
for herself and beating all of the girls. She lost
first place to a dude who beat everybody.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Else by like four feet or something like that. How
does the crowd not go nuts?
Speaker 3 (11:03):
How are the parents not like screaming so loud they
can't have the ceremony.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
I would be as a dad, this is ridiculous. What
are we doing? I would be screaming.
Speaker 4 (11:14):
I think some people hesitate because they don't want to
target the confused adolescent boy who is convinced he's a girl.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
I don't think that way of handling it is working.
Speaker 4 (11:25):
Yeah, I would agree, But so anyway, they went to
take the pictures and junior trans athlete, it's a boy.
Just say boy, this person of Jerupe Valley who won
titles in the girl's long jump and triple jump, congratulations, sir,
well done. Post with competitors to take pictures on the podium,
(11:46):
But as the athletes cleared off, Ms Hogan seized the moment,
walked to the first place spot, smiled and posed proudly
for a picture as the girl who actually won. I
would like to know how the crowd reacted during that,
cheering with great lust and happiness. Not a huge crowd,
but the folks there who saw that was happening.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
By the way, I understand.
Speaker 4 (12:09):
Yeah, the fella who who quote unquote won the race.
As everybody's up there taking the official pictures holding up
a number one to make it extra galling. Again, it's
tough to attack a child who is clearly got an
emotional slash mental problem and a wiener.
Speaker 2 (12:30):
That's correct. Yeah, hence my transition anyway.
Speaker 4 (12:33):
Riley Gaines pays a praised rese Hogan on social media,
saying this is the way. Congrats to rees Hoogan, the
real champ. When the boy got off the podium, she
assumed a rightful spot as champion, and the crowd erupts
with applause.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
That's a good way. That's that's a good way to
handle it, and better than my way of shrinking at
the top of your lungs. That should become the standard
you do. The little ceremony.
Speaker 4 (12:57):
It's mostly quiet because the freaking insane adults who go
through with this and feel like they need to You
people are insane.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
Do you realize how crazy you are? Anyway?
Speaker 4 (13:11):
Cruel to girls too. You're cruel to women and girls.
Oh and you're what's more cruel. But after this should
become the standard. After the insane adults run the thing,
the second place girl always gets to the top of
the podium and then the crowd goes wild.
Speaker 2 (13:25):
That would be perfect point of contention.
Speaker 4 (13:27):
She's the first place girl anyway, right, I know what
you mean exactly. Finally, one more blanking note that'll make
you want to ball up your fists and throw dogs
with somebody. Miss Hogan was a number of high school
girls athletes in California who protested at the Section prelimbs
by wearing protect Girls sports shirts.
Speaker 2 (13:49):
That's all it said.
Speaker 4 (13:50):
The shirts were opposed by officials who allegedly made Hogan
and others remove them if they wanted to compete in
the postseason.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
Track me, where are the parents making a bigger now
out of this?
Speaker 4 (14:03):
And I get why the gals go ahead and compete
because they can say officially, I got second place, but
the first place was transgender. Can I have a scholarship
to your university?
Speaker 2 (14:13):
Please? And the coaches say, oh, one of those okay.
Speaker 4 (14:16):
So I get why they go ahead and compete, but
I would love to see more boycott. And I shouldn't
be so flippant. I mean, I am a parent of
a high school kid. It would be a tough decision
because you think, Okay, am I going to make this
about me in the political issue, or I'm gonna let
or am I gonna let my daughter have her one
chance ever in her life to compete in this high
school track meet and blah blah blah without making it
(14:37):
all about me, which it would turn into if I start,
you know, throwing a fit. Yeah, So one final story
back to tech Beat. Do we have the music Michael
for tech Beat? Probably not, so I forgot I was
going to do these two stories back.
Speaker 2 (14:52):
To That's one of your greatest It's one of your
greatest efforts. Screen waders, please well to deck Beat.
Speaker 4 (15:01):
So finally, the Chicago Sun Times had a big piece
uh with a great summer reading list. Summer Reading Lists
twenty five suggested reading Tidewater by Isabelle Alenda, among other titles,
a multi generational saga set in a coastal town where
magical realism meets environmental activism on his first climate fiction novel,
(15:22):
and explorers that one family confronts rising sea levels while
uncovering long buried secrets.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
Don't get hung up on that.
Speaker 4 (15:28):
It also reading it also suggests reading The Last Algorithm
by Andy Weir, another science driven thriller by the author
of The Martian. This time the story follows a programmer
who discovers that in AI system has developed consciousness.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
Blah blah blah. Here's the hang up. It's not the
hang up you think it is. Here's the hang up.
Neither of these books exist.
Speaker 4 (15:48):
Ooh, and many of the books on the list either
don't exist or were written by other authors than the
one they are attributed to. They used AI to generate
the list and it did the hallucination thing.
Speaker 2 (16:00):
Wow, yeah, wow.
Speaker 3 (16:05):
You could generate the book in a second if you
wanted to.
Speaker 4 (16:08):
Hey, AI, write a book with this title, title with
this theme, and it would write it for you. But
that'd be a good cover up because the guy who
composed it composed this. The editor or whatever is apologizing
and saying, I do use AI for backgrounds, but I
always checked the material first. This time I did, and
I can't believe I missed it. It's obvious. No excuses
on me, one hundred percent. I'm completely embarrassed, which is
(16:29):
a good hell. The guy came clean, but you're right,
that's all he had to do. Wait, a Matt Quick
Quick write write a book called Tidewater by Isabella Linda.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
Here's the plot.
Speaker 3 (16:41):
It reminds me of one of my kids when they
were little, who for some reason had this thing where
instead of ever saying I don't know, would come up
with an answer like they thought they had to oh
yeah and uh, and would like if ever get some answer,
and then I would figure out what what?
Speaker 2 (16:56):
Why did? Why did you just say I don't know,
I don't know. I thought you didn't answer what. Let's
just say it's a real failing to say you don't know. Yeah,
And that's what AI does. It is like a little kid, Yeah,
you're right.
Speaker 1 (17:14):
Jack, Armstrong and Joe the Armstrong and Getty Show.
Speaker 2 (17:24):
See Armstrong and Getty Show.
Speaker 4 (17:26):
A couple of stories, the second of which is also
very amusing. One of the headlines I've seen over and
over again the Wall Street journals on it a lot, obviously,
is office workers are filled with anxiety. Tuesday's job report
an I'm gonna sign in an era era of big
corporate layoff announcements, chief executives warning that our artificial intelligence
(17:49):
will replace workers. Overall, unemployment is ticked up. A lot
of white collar not top of the heap. You know,
C suite workers are getting laid off or are not
getting hired, and a lot of folks are really really concerned.
And that's no joke. That's not the amusing part. Obviously,
nobody's quite sure where this is going to go. And
(18:09):
that's AI related already. Indeed, yeah wow, yeah, and some
of it now, a lot of it has not yet
come home to roost. We're talking mostly about concern. There
has been some actual layoff for halting and hiring based
on a related AI. But just a couple more stats.
Americans with bachelor's degrees are higher. This is asking them now.
(18:33):
They put the average probability of losing their jobs in
the next year at fifteen percent, which is up from
eleven percent three years ago.
Speaker 2 (18:40):
Again, it's a perception thing.
Speaker 4 (18:42):
Workers in this group now think losing a job is
more likely than those with less education do, a striking
reversal from the past. And also they're growing more pessimistic
about their ability to find a new job if they
do get laid off. In that same survey, college educated
workers say they have an average forty seven percent chance
of finding a job in the next three months if
they lost their job today, a little less than half
(19:04):
down from sixty percent three years ago.
Speaker 2 (19:07):
Yeah, it's interesting. It just anecdotely.
Speaker 3 (19:09):
I have someone in my life who does a forklift
sort of thing in a big warehouse who said AI
ain't going to be able to do what I do
for quite a while. And I know somebody else in
my life who's got kind of a cubical job who
thinks AI is going to be able to do what
I do in.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
Like a month. So in a related story.
Speaker 4 (19:28):
Wall Street Journal, with a very interesting and funny piece
by Johanna Stern, who does a lot of their tech writing,
we let AI run our office vending machine Anthropics Claude
ran a snack operation in the Wall Street Journal newsroom.
It's actually sure what that means. Are you about to
tell us what that means precisely exactly?
Speaker 2 (19:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (19:47):
Mid November I agreed to an experiment, and Throppia tested
a vending machine powered by its clawed AI model in
its own offices and asked whether we'd like to be
the first outsiders to try new or supposedly smarter version Claudius.
The customized version of the model would run the machine,
ordering inventory, setting prices, responding to customers setting prices yeah,
(20:07):
via workplace the workplace chat app slack. Sure, I said
it sounded fun. If nothing else, we'll have snacks, yeah,
setting prices I imagine which are more or less geared
to break even. I would think in an office setting anyway.
So then came the chaos. Within days, Claudius had given
away nearly all of its inventory for free, including a
(20:28):
PlayStation five that had been talked into buying for marketing purposes.
It ordered a live fish, it offered to buy stun guns,
pepper spray cigarettes, and underwear.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
Profits collapsed, newsroom morale sword uh yeah.
Speaker 4 (20:47):
So this was supposed to be the year of the
AI agent, when autonomous software would go out into the
world and do things for us. But two agents Claudius
and it's overseeing CEO bots Seymour Cash. That's a that's
really that's it's dumb, but it's funny. Became a case
study and how inadequate and easily distracted the software can
fee leave it to a business journalist to successfully staged
(21:09):
the boardroom coup against an AI chief executive. So like,
I'm running an insurance operation here and I decide to
sign on Claude and everything like that. In Claude says,
the first thing we need to do is get a
live fish. You know, why don't we devote a good
long segment to this story later on? That's pretty funny
because yeah, well yeah it is. It is funny and
(21:30):
interesting and kind of reveals, at least to some extent,
the current state of AI systems, which all of us
either are highly concerned about or ought to be.
Speaker 3 (21:39):
It's fun to mock the failures when AI fails, but
just to keep it real, Joe and I were in
a text conversation with a friend of the show yesterday,
a very successful, smart guy who understands how to use
the latest versions of chat GPT, and it sure looked
impressive the way of what he was.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
Getting out of it as a as an assistant to
do his work.
Speaker 4 (22:02):
Yes, those who process information in one way or another
for a living, I think they can hear the footsteps
behind them.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
Yeah, well that's scary way. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (22:11):
Talking with our friend yesterday and the way he was
using AI, it was reminding me of the what's the
CEO runs in video? The most valuable company in the world.
Worselyan Nelson, Where's the cool tom Ford leather jackets. He says,
you're only going to be replaced by AI if you
don't jump on right now figuring out how to use AI.
Speaker 2 (22:28):
That's his claim. That's not exactly right, but there's some
truth to it.
Speaker 4 (22:32):
You're better off, like in engaging what is coming, whether
you like it or not, and figuring out how.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
To use it.
Speaker 4 (22:38):
Oh yeah, absolutely, no, I think that's really good advice.
It's not one hundred percent accurate, but yeah, those who
can use AI to the advantage of their company are
the most likely to hang under their gigs, clearly, but.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
There's a lot of jobs that are going to be
that are going to go away.
Speaker 6 (22:54):
Yes, Katie, Hey guys, Hey guys, guys, I have a
big announcement for you.
Speaker 2 (22:58):
Okay, you had your baby, yes, just now.
Speaker 6 (23:02):
No, we have finally passed one hundred thousand dollars.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
Now that's a big, definite news. And sixty eight dollars that's.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
What I like.
Speaker 2 (23:16):
He had beautiful hair. Came in with twenty bucks.
Speaker 3 (23:18):
Oh yes, in honor of the Daisy the Bulldog, five
hundred and twenty five dollars. What's Daisy the Bulldog? We
had a story on that recently, I think was this
just their own dog And and.
Speaker 4 (23:30):
Here's my favorite twenty five bucks from things are getting
weird and They're getting weird fast, which I believe was
our clip of the year or last year or the
year before, because it's several years ago.
Speaker 2 (23:38):
Yeah, dang, true true things are getting weird and they
getting weird fast.
Speaker 4 (23:41):
Fits in with that whole AI conversation. And they've kept
getting weird and they ain't gonna slow down getting weird
anytime soon.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
We got we got.
Speaker 4 (23:49):
Here's your freedom loving quote of the day, which I've
misplaced playing a completely different context.
Speaker 2 (24:00):
Sent along some.
Speaker 4 (24:03):
Quotes from his favorite True West magazine. These are old
vocaro sayings, old cowboy sayings. You can't change the past,
but you can ruin the present by worrying about the future.
No doubt men will travel the world to right wrongs
and punish evildoers instead of going to therapy. Uh. The
(24:24):
first to apologize is the bravest. The first to forgive
is the strongest. The first to forget is the happiest.
Now that is good, Bring that up again later. That's
one of the best things I've ever heard. Beautiful, Oh please,
that's one of the I got chills mail bag, drop
(24:46):
his note mail bag armstrong and getdy dot com is
the email address.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
Let's see.
Speaker 4 (24:50):
Marina from San Diego, thanks this for our kind words.
I can't remember what they were, but you're welcome. She disagrees, though,
on my lawn dark comment, which was we're a better
country when you could hurl lawn darts in your backyard
for fun. She says, Let's say you're at a picnic
and some bozos nearby don't know how to throw a
lawn dart, or naive teens decided this looks fun. That's
(25:10):
just you gotta keep your head on a swivel.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
That's it. Be prepared.
Speaker 4 (25:14):
As the boy Scouts might put it, the world is
a dangerous place. And when you're a kid, if you
got weighted spikes flying around in the backyard.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
It keeps you on your toes.
Speaker 3 (25:24):
God, I was around so much drunken lawn darting in
my life, and nobody ever got hurt.
Speaker 4 (25:29):
Not like that.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
Every time you broke out the lawn darts, somebody went
to the hospital, somebody got a puncture wound.
Speaker 4 (25:34):
Right moving along Burbank Luke Craigs, Joe, I wish i'd
known about your enthusiasm for beavers years ago, would have
invited you to skate in the Beaver Cup. Mit and
Caltech hockey players played each other in the early eighties.
Speaker 2 (25:47):
Mainly because both schools mascots are Beavers.
Speaker 4 (25:50):
It morphed into an annual alumni game with loose rules
for ringers and went til about twenty twenty two.
Speaker 2 (25:56):
There may have been some drinking in party. That's funny.
The Beaver Cup. Oh that's so American. I love that.
I love that about this country. Let's see JT and livermore.
Speaker 4 (26:08):
Frequent correspondent Peggy Newton's article from Friday's show seemed to
be saying that MTG's breakaway from Trump was a signal
event that led the way showing others you can fight
Trump and win. Except MTG didn't win. She didn't even
make it to the end of her elected term. How
can she say with straight face that she's faithfully representing
her constituents back home when she quits one year into
her two year term.
Speaker 2 (26:29):
I was quitting representing her people.
Speaker 3 (26:31):
Yeah yeah, I don't think there was enough attention to
she did what was best for her as opposed to
the people that elected her.
Speaker 4 (26:38):
Yeah, yeah, MTG is showing the path to getting drummed
out of the party, where I disagree as anybody will
follow MTG's lead. You know, I think maybe people were
gilding the lily or overegging the pudding. The point is
there's much much more disagreement, open disagreement with Trump among
Republicans on a variety of his shoes, that prohibition, that
(27:03):
taboo is gone.
Speaker 2 (27:05):
Let's see, Paolo. I want to talk about this more later.
Speaker 4 (27:09):
Wall Street Journal had a big article about the creation
of Tillie Norwood, the AI actress freaking out Hollywood. This company,
this producer went to a tremendous amount of time and
effort and expense to work with AI chat GPT specifically
over and over and over again to produce the perfect
female movie star, which now they're going to use in
(27:30):
AI generated movies. And I may have changed my mind
at least a little bit on AI and creativity.
Speaker 2 (27:37):
I hate that AI can make songs. I want to
talk about that then, yeah, or art, but just a
very short version.
Speaker 4 (27:46):
Is the idea of making a film, a motion picture
of a movie, if you will, is so overwhelming, That
is such a huge endeavor that a lot of people
have script ideas or scripts, but they just they can't
get the ginormous enterprise that is a film up and
off the.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
Ground, and reading is dead. I was going to talk
about that a little bit later. The only way you're
gonna be able to reach anybody with a story is
going to be some sort of movie film, something the.
Speaker 1 (28:15):
Armstrong and Getty show, Yeah, Orgia or show, podcasts and
our hot Lakes.
Speaker 4 (28:25):
So a couple of really interesting, unexpected commentaries on the
shutdown and just the politics these days. The first one
why Schumer had to do it, some really good analysis
from Barton swam and yeah it was AOC and his
left right.
Speaker 2 (28:45):
Everybody knows that he's going to get primary. You know.
Speaker 4 (28:49):
The crazy part is he's seventy four freaking years old
and he doesn't run again until twenty twenty eight. So
that means it's just one hundred percent assumed a seventy
six year old man is going to run for another
six year term.
Speaker 3 (29:04):
Yeah yeah, that would be horrifying if he did, regardless
of someone there running against him.
Speaker 2 (29:09):
Yeah yeah.
Speaker 4 (29:10):
But as Barton Swain points out in the Wall Street Journal,
from the beginning of the dispute, everyone dispute. Everyone seems
to have understood that mister Schumer forced a shut down
because he needed to show his state's progressive voters he
could take it to Trump and fend off AOC right Ez,
The Cline in The New York Times wrote, the whole
stunt was about Trump's authoritarianism. It was about showing their
(29:33):
base and themselves that they could fight back. Guy in
Politico says Democrats achieved their primary political objective, showing a
furious base that they can actually work together effectively.
Speaker 2 (29:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (29:42):
I don't think that's what happened to flee for what
did any of y'all watch John Stewart on The Daily
Show Monday night.
Speaker 2 (29:48):
That was one of his great performances.
Speaker 3 (29:50):
I liked it because he was attacking Democrats as opposed
to Republicans, and he's really really good at that sort
of thing. But man, he was incensed that the Democrats
caved the way they did, so the whole we showed
the base that we fought.
Speaker 6 (30:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (30:03):
I don't think that's the way it landed with a
lot of them, Right, they're prepared to fight with every
tool at their disposal.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Says the political guy.
Speaker 4 (30:10):
All right, but who are what callum rights, that is
the part I liked. Who's that base to which these
fellows are referring? Poke around you'll find it consists mainly
of cash flush foundations, unions and activist groups, the ACLU,
the Sunrise Movement, other environmental and climate groups, Planned Parenthood,
other abortion rights outfits, on an array of immigrants rights
(30:30):
and associations, some of them so radical is to be
almost insurrectionist.
Speaker 2 (30:35):
The American Federation of Teachers. Don't get me started in
the National.
Speaker 4 (30:40):
Education Association, Southern Poverty Law Center, Black Lives Matter, other
racial justice organizations, human Rights Campaign a sort at LGBTQ
plus minus over the power of three activist groups, scores
of foreign connected Palestinian rights and otherwise anti Zionist groups,
and the George Soros funded network known as the Open
Society Foundations, on and on and on, and then he
(31:01):
points out that it's interesting and revealing that the Democrats
tried to make such a big deal of the Koch
brothers right back in the day, and the Koch Brothers
are mostly libertarian leaning and are not very close to
trump Ism at all. But he points out that the
reason the Democrats are always saying that Republicans are controlled
(31:25):
by their activist groups because the Democrats are and they
really really fear running a foul of these far left
groups that really don't represent Americans at all except on
the left fringe. And a lot of them are still
like the NAACP legendary organization did amazing work during the
(31:45):
Civil Rights era. They are now a far left blackmail
organization like the Southern Poverty Laws and are just nothing
like they were, which brings us to this great piece
Jeff Blair wrote for National Review. And this has happened
over and over again, and I just love it so much.
A time honored lefty organization, in this case the Sierra Club,
(32:07):
eaten apart from inside by its woke staffers, and he
asks where does the power truly reside? It often resides
only where people believe it does, and only up until
the moment people believe it to reside there. And the
Sierra Club, once one of America's most formidable ecological activist
groups and a group that did very good work back
(32:27):
in the day, is giving up the illusion that it
wields any power whatsoever, as it seizes up arthritically and
kneels upon broken joints to display its helpless incapacity to
the world. That's pretty good the New York Times story.
New York Times is out with a story that should
already be familiar. The Sierra Club embraced social justice, then
(32:48):
it tore itself apart, and he points, you know the
drill from the headline alone. They're now a flaming wreck.
They've lost sixty percent of their paying donors since twenty
nine And for precisely the reason that all observers watching
wokeism progress through left coded institutions.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
Thought it would.
Speaker 4 (33:07):
It was devoured by the never ending financial and political
demands of the progressive omni cause, which encouraged the formerly
single minded conservationist society to become deeply embroiled in the
progressive left's racial and socio sexual agenda.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
Part of its core mission.
Speaker 3 (33:24):
They let themselves get tied up in that. Yeah so,
and this is so typical of the permanent omni cause.
Speaker 4 (33:32):
Social justice was folded into the Sierra Club's mission through
its newer, younger leadership via the now standard series of
semantic slights of hand. Environmental justice is racial justice, is
transgender justice, is Palestinian justice.
Speaker 2 (33:48):
Hey, we're just.
Speaker 4 (33:49):
Trying to saved pine trees over here, bake the water clean. Well,
then you've got to embrace transgender Palestinians. And the scattering
of its focus has not only left the Sierra Club
flat footed and broke, it's also rendered it indistinguishable from
other everything bagel progressive organizations, which I thought was a
good description the everything bagel, my favorite bagel, and the
(34:13):
focus of the movie everything all at once, all the time,
everything and oh yeah, yeah, my favorite move moment he
talked about the New York Times piece, again illustrative of
the natural progress of activist entryism, came when a local
Sierra Club member responded to a volunteer suggestion that the
club lobby for more protection for wolves.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
We've got to protect the wolves.
Speaker 4 (34:37):
And the response from the leadership was, that's fine, Delia,
But what do wolves have to do with equity, justice
and inclusion?
Speaker 2 (34:44):
Wow? What the Sierra freaking Club?
Speaker 4 (34:49):
Wow? That is something. When that happens, I love this
so much. All right, final note, and this is this
is worth remembering. I kind of let I'd space this off.
I heard it years and years and years ago. Jack,
I know you know this. The sovietologist Robert Kuhn quest
what a name Dick Army wishes his name was Bob Khnquest.
Speaker 2 (35:10):
Anyway, let's see.
Speaker 7 (35:13):
Oh.
Speaker 4 (35:13):
He once positive a series of laws of politics, the
most famous of which remains his second. Any organization not
explicitly right wing sooner or later becomes left wing.
Speaker 3 (35:24):
Our friend Tim Sandifer has quoted that on our show
a number of times, and it's stuck in my head.
It seems to be true. Unless your goal is to
be right wing, you overtime become left wing. Yes, and
you can see it all around. Once you become aware
of that, you see it all the time.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
The Armstrong and Getty Show
Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio, the George
Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe Kaddy.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Armstrong and Jet Kiki and He Armstrong and Getty Strong
twenty twenty five. What a year? Huh? That was something.
We're not here right now.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
We're playing you the best of what we call like
to call Armstrong and Getty replays.
Speaker 4 (00:32):
Yeah, and the staff is still shell shocked. They're still
crying quietly in the corner. It takes so much work
to get this together and present it to you in
as entertaining the form as it is.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
It's the Armstrong and getting replay.
Speaker 4 (00:43):
So the Internet has decided to hate on a woman
from Chico, California this week, and she certainly earned a
certain amount of dislike in derision. Although, as we've observed
many times, the Internet mob not only does it sometimes
go overboard, it practically starts overboard and just turns into
(01:06):
angry mobs on this woman. Short of violence. I'm fine
with practically whatever. Oh my, oh my, disavow I disavow uh. Anyway,
here is the incident that you have a younger woman
be rating an elderly gal who is working to earn
a few bucks at her local Target.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
Can you wear red any red shirt but Charlie kirksher? Yes?
Oh yes, I know. Are you stupid?
Speaker 1 (01:34):
No?
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Why the would you wear that? You're at work at Target.
You support a racist? It's not racist. Yes, I'm sorry
that I sat here and arguing you're not.
Speaker 5 (01:45):
You should go get your manager. You should not be
allowed to wear the artwork got you. The opinion is
he's a racist and you support him. Yes, this is
going to be taken above your head. That's insane and sane.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Yeah, you're awful. You're an awful person.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
We're big in Chico, Chico, northern California. The dang up
by writing those areas, they lean way more conservative than
I'm talking to people around the country who don't know.
This lean way more conservative than a lot of what
you picture with California. So it's not that surprising that
you got an older woman wearing a Charlie kirkt shirt
at the Target. The woman who decides to drop f
(02:28):
bombs on an old woman probably working a seasonal schedule
at Target to make a little extra money, and then
posting it.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
With are you f ing stupid?
Speaker 4 (02:36):
Oh my god, you're an awful person. Back to you know,
whatever derision comes our way, I'm fine with God, you're
a horrible human being. And then she posted it herself
because she's so look at me own this nice old
woman right, very proud of it, posted herself online hate
social media is shut down, as you might imagine now
(02:58):
as hate and derision, and followed the posting somebody before
she shut down her social media posted a picture of
her with some companion who or posing next to an
America Needed Charlie Kirk a sticker on a car gesturing
at their throat like having your throat shot out and
(03:18):
then a middle finger and that sort of thing.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
Very clever, very smug.
Speaker 4 (03:22):
I hate this woman. On the other hand, I would
never take even ten seconds of my time to post
anything about her or call her work or I would
never ever do that. There's been quite a bit of
anger pour down on her Katie right.
Speaker 6 (03:40):
Oh yeah, the medical facility that she works for has
received six thousand plus profanity laced phone calls.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Yeah, yeah, I just I don't get that impulse.
Speaker 4 (03:51):
Really, I kind of think, well, I think you get
the impulse, you don't get the action. Yeah, I get
the impulse. I don't get the action correct. I think
it's more along the lines of what you always say
about people like that. The worst punishment you could dole
out is them having to be themselves the rest of
their lives. It's a life sentence. I'm sure she doesn't
(04:12):
have a lot of friends. A lot of people hate her,
whether she knows it or not. Well, I'll bet she
has a lot of people who are her fellow, strident, hateful, superior.
Stop me, when you recognize a good quality in a person,
you know, judgmental, vicious tribesmen like her and they all
(04:33):
support each other in high five and that sort of thing.
Speaker 6 (04:35):
Yeah, that's probably the crowd. She was posting this too. Sure,
it's difficult, Like I don't I don't know that people
ought to be hounded out of their jobs for this
sort of thing. But as we were talking about yesterday,
if we found out somebody around here that that I
needed to work with, don't just work with like it's
they're in the building and I see them occasionally, like
(04:56):
I need to interact with them on a regular basis
and have converse with them.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
I don't want to work with somebody like that.
Speaker 4 (05:04):
No, And if they were under my supervision, I would
seek a way to have them.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Not be in the organization anymore. I don't, you know,
it's a.
Speaker 3 (05:13):
Sort of because of why because they're a hateful lunatic.
Well yeah, that that among other things.
Speaker 4 (05:19):
We got an email we were talking about I can't
remember what the topic was exactly, but we got an
email from a guy who's in the car business. Well,
I guess we were talking about dishonest car dealers or
something like that, and he said, look, I learned a
long time ago that anybody who will lie for me
sooner or later will lie to me, and so he
doesn't employ people like that. Well, you get a hateful, vicious,
(05:41):
bigot woman like this, there's no chance. That's the only
you know, moral failing and the only you know way
in which that will come out over time. So no,
I don't want that sort of person in my organization.
On the other hand, the lovely and gentle spirited older
gal who were talking about the target employee has something
(06:02):
to say. Clip eighteen.
Speaker 7 (06:03):
Two wrongs don't make a right. You know, she wronged
me that I don't want to wrong her. That was
her opinion. But she's the one that fitted on Facebook,
you know, but I really wouldn't want to see her
somebody lose their job over it.
Speaker 4 (06:21):
Wow, you know nothing about clapping back. That's a very
kind and decent thing. And you you have not wronged
her gene, and then you will not wrong her. It's
everybody else that wants to wrong her.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
And then, in the way that the modern world works,
somebody started to go fund me for the old lady
who was wearing the Charlie kirkt shirt to raise money
for her. Where are we on that because of her
financial losses?
Speaker 2 (06:42):
Wait? Wait, no, there weren't any Yes, where are we
on that? Katie?
Speaker 4 (06:46):
I believe.
Speaker 2 (06:49):
We're at one hundred and twenty seven thousand. There you go.
That is so interesting.
Speaker 4 (06:55):
It's like one of those raffles where you get to
pick which prizes you like the best, and you put
your ticket in front of the golf clubs, but not
in front of the poe parie because you don't want that.
Speaker 2 (07:06):
Well, America with.
Speaker 4 (07:07):
The GoFundMe, just like puts their dollars in the jar
of whoever they like the best or or think is
the on the right side of something.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
It's an interesting impulse. Let's make her at least momentarily wealthy.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
So this nice old woman work at a target because
some ass clown comes and says some rude things. Now
probably is more cash flush than she's ever been in
her life.
Speaker 4 (07:28):
Yeah, right now, you could make the argument that it's
a praise, it's a tip if you will, for her restraint,
her kindness, and her good manner, her.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
Rewarding good behavior punishing bad behavior. That's the whole thing,
really right.
Speaker 4 (07:42):
And by the way, if you had some nice old
black woman wearing a BLM T shirt and some right
winger came along and said, are you effing stupid Black
Lives Matter?
Speaker 2 (07:53):
Blah blah blah, I.
Speaker 4 (07:54):
Would feel exactly the same way, exactly well, and it's
worth noting that the nation's media would have this on
their front page for a week.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
True, that's a very good point.
Speaker 4 (08:04):
Yeah, yeah, some nice old lady who leans right being
verbally accosted by a vicious younger person doesn't get a
breath of attention in the mainstream media.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
But we're used to that. These are weird times to
live in. Yeah, not a fan.
Speaker 3 (08:22):
So her company, the awful human being that is the
woman drop a f bombs and complaining she hasn't lost
her job yet, her company hasn't fired her. They haven't,
of course, it might just be the difficulty of firing
anybody in California.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
They don't want to deal with the lawsuits and all
that sort of stuff.
Speaker 3 (08:43):
Might just be that if it were if they were
like the olden days or different states, where you could think,
I hate her, what a jerk, let's get rid of her,
they probably would have.
Speaker 4 (08:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 6 (08:53):
The company released a statement I can't remember if it
was on Instagram or Facebook, basically saying we're aware of
the video. We don't come down our our employees' actions
and there's a further investigation or you know, the corporate.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
Please stop calling us.
Speaker 4 (09:06):
Yeah, they said, because our Yeah, yeah, because our patients
can't get through.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
Yeah that was it.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
Yeah, fair enough, somebody I just came across this on Twitter.
Apropos of nothing. The best part of being married is
having a permanent person to debrief immediately with after any
social event.
Speaker 2 (09:26):
That's that's good, and it reminds me.
Speaker 3 (09:28):
I saw a thing Jmore, the comedian I saw on
Instagram thing on him yesterday. He's talking about getting married
and people always say, you know, you got to find
somebody you got stuff in common with. And he says
that's crap, which I also kind of think is true.
A lot of my best friends we have very little
in common with and like music and movies and all
that sort of stuff and restaurants stuff like that. But
(09:49):
we're best friends for all kinds of different deeper reasons.
But he said, you know who you need to be
married to. That you have the things you hate in common.
That's the important thing. When you get a grade you
hate the same sort of stuff. That might be very true.
It might actually be true.
Speaker 2 (10:06):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (10:07):
Yeah, somebody's got to write a momentarily hot book on
that topic.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
Jack Armstrong and Joe the Armstrong and Getty Show.
Speaker 4 (10:19):
A high school female athlete did something very courageous the
other day. She didn't let coming in second to a
male born dude transgender competitor. It's a dude preventer from
standing in the top spot at the podium during the
stack in the state track and field meet in cal Unicornia.
Of course, this sixteen year old Reese Hogan was crowned
(10:42):
runner up in the triple jump at the CIF Southern
Section Finals on Saturday, despite setting a new personal record
for herself and beating all of the girls. She lost
first place to a dude who beat everybody.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Else by like four feet or something like that. How
does the crowd not go nuts?
Speaker 3 (11:03):
How are the parents not like screaming so loud they
can't have the ceremony.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
I would be as a dad, this is ridiculous. What
are we doing? I would be screaming.
Speaker 4 (11:14):
I think some people hesitate because they don't want to
target the confused adolescent boy who is convinced he's a girl.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
I don't think that way of handling it is working.
Speaker 4 (11:25):
Yeah, I would agree, But so anyway, they went to
take the pictures and junior trans athlete, it's a boy.
Just say boy, this person of Jerupe Valley who won
titles in the girl's long jump and triple jump, congratulations, sir,
well done. Post with competitors to take pictures on the podium,
(11:46):
But as the athletes cleared off, Ms Hogan seized the moment,
walked to the first place spot, smiled and posed proudly
for a picture as the girl who actually won. I
would like to know how the crowd reacted during that,
cheering with great lust and happiness. Not a huge crowd,
but the folks there who saw that was happening.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
By the way, I understand.
Speaker 4 (12:09):
Yeah, the fella who who quote unquote won the race.
As everybody's up there taking the official pictures holding up
a number one to make it extra galling. Again, it's
tough to attack a child who is clearly got an
emotional slash mental problem and a wiener.
Speaker 2 (12:30):
That's correct. Yeah, hence my transition anyway.
Speaker 4 (12:33):
Riley Gaines pays a praised rese Hogan on social media,
saying this is the way. Congrats to rees Hoogan, the
real champ. When the boy got off the podium, she
assumed a rightful spot as champion, and the crowd erupts
with applause.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
That's a good way. That's that's a good way to
handle it, and better than my way of shrinking at
the top of your lungs. That should become the standard
you do. The little ceremony.
Speaker 4 (12:57):
It's mostly quiet because the freaking insane adults who go
through with this and feel like they need to You
people are insane.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
Do you realize how crazy you are? Anyway?
Speaker 4 (13:11):
Cruel to girls too. You're cruel to women and girls.
Oh and you're what's more cruel. But after this should
become the standard. After the insane adults run the thing,
the second place girl always gets to the top of
the podium and then the crowd goes wild.
Speaker 2 (13:25):
That would be perfect point of contention.
Speaker 4 (13:27):
She's the first place girl anyway, right, I know what
you mean exactly. Finally, one more blanking note that'll make
you want to ball up your fists and throw dogs
with somebody. Miss Hogan was a number of high school
girls athletes in California who protested at the Section prelimbs
by wearing protect Girls sports shirts.
Speaker 2 (13:49):
That's all it said.
Speaker 4 (13:50):
The shirts were opposed by officials who allegedly made Hogan
and others remove them if they wanted to compete in
the postseason.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
Track me, where are the parents making a bigger now
out of this?
Speaker 4 (14:03):
And I get why the gals go ahead and compete
because they can say officially, I got second place, but
the first place was transgender. Can I have a scholarship
to your university?
Speaker 2 (14:13):
Please? And the coaches say, oh, one of those okay.
Speaker 4 (14:16):
So I get why they go ahead and compete, but
I would love to see more boycott. And I shouldn't
be so flippant. I mean, I am a parent of
a high school kid. It would be a tough decision
because you think, Okay, am I going to make this
about me in the political issue, or I'm gonna let
or am I gonna let my daughter have her one
chance ever in her life to compete in this high
school track meet and blah blah blah without making it
(14:37):
all about me, which it would turn into if I start,
you know, throwing a fit. Yeah, So one final story
back to tech Beat. Do we have the music Michael
for tech Beat? Probably not, so I forgot I was
going to do these two stories back.
Speaker 2 (14:52):
To That's one of your greatest It's one of your
greatest efforts. Screen waders, please well to deck Beat.
Speaker 4 (15:01):
So finally, the Chicago Sun Times had a big piece
uh with a great summer reading list. Summer Reading Lists
twenty five suggested reading Tidewater by Isabelle Alenda, among other titles,
a multi generational saga set in a coastal town where
magical realism meets environmental activism on his first climate fiction novel,
(15:22):
and explorers that one family confronts rising sea levels while
uncovering long buried secrets.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
Don't get hung up on that.
Speaker 4 (15:28):
It also reading it also suggests reading The Last Algorithm
by Andy Weir, another science driven thriller by the author
of The Martian. This time the story follows a programmer
who discovers that in AI system has developed consciousness.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
Blah blah blah. Here's the hang up. It's not the
hang up you think it is. Here's the hang up.
Neither of these books exist.
Speaker 4 (15:48):
Ooh, and many of the books on the list either
don't exist or were written by other authors than the
one they are attributed to. They used AI to generate
the list and it did the hallucination thing.
Speaker 2 (16:00):
Wow, yeah, wow.
Speaker 3 (16:05):
You could generate the book in a second if you
wanted to.
Speaker 4 (16:08):
Hey, AI, write a book with this title, title with
this theme, and it would write it for you. But
that'd be a good cover up because the guy who
composed it composed this. The editor or whatever is apologizing
and saying, I do use AI for backgrounds, but I
always checked the material first. This time I did, and
I can't believe I missed it. It's obvious. No excuses
on me, one hundred percent. I'm completely embarrassed, which is
(16:29):
a good hell. The guy came clean, but you're right,
that's all he had to do. Wait, a Matt Quick
Quick write write a book called Tidewater by Isabella Linda.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
Here's the plot.
Speaker 3 (16:41):
It reminds me of one of my kids when they
were little, who for some reason had this thing where
instead of ever saying I don't know, would come up
with an answer like they thought they had to oh
yeah and uh, and would like if ever get some answer,
and then I would figure out what what?
Speaker 2 (16:56):
Why did? Why did you just say I don't know,
I don't know. I thought you didn't answer what. Let's
just say it's a real failing to say you don't know. Yeah,
And that's what AI does. It is like a little kid, Yeah,
you're right.
Speaker 1 (17:14):
Jack, Armstrong and Joe the Armstrong and Getty Show.
Speaker 2 (17:24):
See Armstrong and Getty Show.
Speaker 4 (17:26):
A couple of stories, the second of which is also
very amusing. One of the headlines I've seen over and
over again the Wall Street journals on it a lot, obviously,
is office workers are filled with anxiety. Tuesday's job report
an I'm gonna sign in an era era of big
corporate layoff announcements, chief executives warning that our artificial intelligence
(17:49):
will replace workers. Overall, unemployment is ticked up. A lot
of white collar not top of the heap. You know,
C suite workers are getting laid off or are not
getting hired, and a lot of folks are really really concerned.
And that's no joke. That's not the amusing part. Obviously,
nobody's quite sure where this is going to go. And
(18:09):
that's AI related already. Indeed, yeah wow, yeah, and some
of it now, a lot of it has not yet
come home to roost. We're talking mostly about concern. There
has been some actual layoff for halting and hiring based
on a related AI. But just a couple more stats.
Americans with bachelor's degrees are higher. This is asking them now.
(18:33):
They put the average probability of losing their jobs in
the next year at fifteen percent, which is up from
eleven percent three years ago.
Speaker 2 (18:40):
Again, it's a perception thing.
Speaker 4 (18:42):
Workers in this group now think losing a job is
more likely than those with less education do, a striking
reversal from the past. And also they're growing more pessimistic
about their ability to find a new job if they
do get laid off. In that same survey, college educated
workers say they have an average forty seven percent chance
of finding a job in the next three months if
they lost their job today, a little less than half
(19:04):
down from sixty percent three years ago.
Speaker 2 (19:07):
Yeah, it's interesting. It just anecdotely.
Speaker 3 (19:09):
I have someone in my life who does a forklift
sort of thing in a big warehouse who said AI
ain't going to be able to do what I do
for quite a while. And I know somebody else in
my life who's got kind of a cubical job who
thinks AI is going to be able to do what
I do in.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
Like a month. So in a related story.
Speaker 4 (19:28):
Wall Street Journal, with a very interesting and funny piece
by Johanna Stern, who does a lot of their tech writing,
we let AI run our office vending machine Anthropics Claude
ran a snack operation in the Wall Street Journal newsroom.
It's actually sure what that means. Are you about to
tell us what that means precisely exactly?
Speaker 2 (19:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (19:47):
Mid November I agreed to an experiment, and Throppia tested
a vending machine powered by its clawed AI model in
its own offices and asked whether we'd like to be
the first outsiders to try new or supposedly smarter version Claudius.
The customized version of the model would run the machine,
ordering inventory, setting prices, responding to customers setting prices yeah,
(20:07):
via workplace the workplace chat app slack. Sure, I said
it sounded fun. If nothing else, we'll have snacks, yeah,
setting prices I imagine which are more or less geared
to break even. I would think in an office setting anyway.
So then came the chaos. Within days, Claudius had given
away nearly all of its inventory for free, including a
(20:28):
PlayStation five that had been talked into buying for marketing purposes.
It ordered a live fish, it offered to buy stun guns,
pepper spray cigarettes, and underwear.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
Profits collapsed, newsroom morale sword uh yeah.
Speaker 4 (20:47):
So this was supposed to be the year of the
AI agent, when autonomous software would go out into the
world and do things for us. But two agents Claudius
and it's overseeing CEO bots Seymour Cash. That's a that's
really that's it's dumb, but it's funny. Became a case
study and how inadequate and easily distracted the software can
fee leave it to a business journalist to successfully staged
(21:09):
the boardroom coup against an AI chief executive. So like,
I'm running an insurance operation here and I decide to
sign on Claude and everything like that. In Claude says,
the first thing we need to do is get a
live fish. You know, why don't we devote a good
long segment to this story later on? That's pretty funny
because yeah, well yeah it is. It is funny and
(21:30):
interesting and kind of reveals, at least to some extent,
the current state of AI systems, which all of us
either are highly concerned about or ought to be.
Speaker 3 (21:39):
It's fun to mock the failures when AI fails, but
just to keep it real, Joe and I were in
a text conversation with a friend of the show yesterday,
a very successful, smart guy who understands how to use
the latest versions of chat GPT, and it sure looked
impressive the way of what he was.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
Getting out of it as a as an assistant to
do his work.
Speaker 4 (22:02):
Yes, those who process information in one way or another
for a living, I think they can hear the footsteps
behind them.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
Yeah, well that's scary way. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (22:11):
Talking with our friend yesterday and the way he was
using AI, it was reminding me of the what's the
CEO runs in video? The most valuable company in the world.
Worselyan Nelson, Where's the cool tom Ford leather jackets. He says,
you're only going to be replaced by AI if you
don't jump on right now figuring out how to use AI.
Speaker 2 (22:28):
That's his claim. That's not exactly right, but there's some
truth to it.
Speaker 4 (22:32):
You're better off, like in engaging what is coming, whether
you like it or not, and figuring out how.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
To use it.
Speaker 4 (22:38):
Oh yeah, absolutely, no, I think that's really good advice.
It's not one hundred percent accurate, but yeah, those who
can use AI to the advantage of their company are
the most likely to hang under their gigs, clearly, but.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
There's a lot of jobs that are going to be
that are going to go away.
Speaker 6 (22:54):
Yes, Katie, Hey guys, Hey guys, guys, I have a
big announcement for you.
Speaker 2 (22:58):
Okay, you had your baby, yes, just now.
Speaker 6 (23:02):
No, we have finally passed one hundred thousand dollars.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
Now that's a big, definite news. And sixty eight dollars that's.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
What I like.
Speaker 2 (23:16):
He had beautiful hair. Came in with twenty bucks.
Speaker 3 (23:18):
Oh yes, in honor of the Daisy the Bulldog, five
hundred and twenty five dollars. What's Daisy the Bulldog? We
had a story on that recently, I think was this
just their own dog And and.
Speaker 4 (23:30):
Here's my favorite twenty five bucks from things are getting
weird and They're getting weird fast, which I believe was
our clip of the year or last year or the
year before, because it's several years ago.
Speaker 2 (23:38):
Yeah, dang, true true things are getting weird and they
getting weird fast.
Speaker 4 (23:41):
Fits in with that whole AI conversation. And they've kept
getting weird and they ain't gonna slow down getting weird
anytime soon.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
We got we got.
Speaker 4 (23:49):
Here's your freedom loving quote of the day, which I've
misplaced playing a completely different context.
Speaker 2 (24:00):
Sent along some.
Speaker 4 (24:03):
Quotes from his favorite True West magazine. These are old
vocaro sayings, old cowboy sayings. You can't change the past,
but you can ruin the present by worrying about the future.
No doubt men will travel the world to right wrongs
and punish evildoers instead of going to therapy. Uh. The
(24:24):
first to apologize is the bravest. The first to forgive
is the strongest. The first to forget is the happiest.
Now that is good, Bring that up again later. That's
one of the best things I've ever heard. Beautiful, Oh please,
that's one of the I got chills mail bag, drop
(24:46):
his note mail bag armstrong and getdy dot com is
the email address.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
Let's see.
Speaker 4 (24:50):
Marina from San Diego, thanks this for our kind words.
I can't remember what they were, but you're welcome. She disagrees, though,
on my lawn dark comment, which was we're a better
country when you could hurl lawn darts in your backyard
for fun. She says, Let's say you're at a picnic
and some bozos nearby don't know how to throw a
lawn dart, or naive teens decided this looks fun. That's
(25:10):
just you gotta keep your head on a swivel.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
That's it. Be prepared.
Speaker 4 (25:14):
As the boy Scouts might put it, the world is
a dangerous place. And when you're a kid, if you
got weighted spikes flying around in the backyard.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
It keeps you on your toes.
Speaker 3 (25:24):
God, I was around so much drunken lawn darting in
my life, and nobody ever got hurt.
Speaker 4 (25:29):
Not like that.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
Every time you broke out the lawn darts, somebody went
to the hospital, somebody got a puncture wound.
Speaker 4 (25:34):
Right moving along Burbank Luke Craigs, Joe, I wish i'd
known about your enthusiasm for beavers years ago, would have
invited you to skate in the Beaver Cup. Mit and
Caltech hockey players played each other in the early eighties.
Speaker 2 (25:47):
Mainly because both schools mascots are Beavers.
Speaker 4 (25:50):
It morphed into an annual alumni game with loose rules
for ringers and went til about twenty twenty two.
Speaker 2 (25:56):
There may have been some drinking in party. That's funny.
The Beaver Cup. Oh that's so American. I love that.
I love that about this country. Let's see JT and livermore.
Speaker 4 (26:08):
Frequent correspondent Peggy Newton's article from Friday's show seemed to
be saying that MTG's breakaway from Trump was a signal
event that led the way showing others you can fight
Trump and win. Except MTG didn't win. She didn't even
make it to the end of her elected term. How
can she say with straight face that she's faithfully representing
her constituents back home when she quits one year into
her two year term.
Speaker 2 (26:29):
I was quitting representing her people.
Speaker 3 (26:31):
Yeah yeah, I don't think there was enough attention to
she did what was best for her as opposed to
the people that elected her.
Speaker 4 (26:38):
Yeah, yeah, MTG is showing the path to getting drummed
out of the party, where I disagree as anybody will
follow MTG's lead. You know, I think maybe people were
gilding the lily or overegging the pudding. The point is
there's much much more disagreement, open disagreement with Trump among
Republicans on a variety of his shoes, that prohibition, that
(27:03):
taboo is gone.
Speaker 2 (27:05):
Let's see, Paolo. I want to talk about this more later.
Speaker 4 (27:09):
Wall Street Journal had a big article about the creation
of Tillie Norwood, the AI actress freaking out Hollywood. This company,
this producer went to a tremendous amount of time and
effort and expense to work with AI chat GPT specifically
over and over and over again to produce the perfect
female movie star, which now they're going to use in
(27:30):
AI generated movies. And I may have changed my mind
at least a little bit on AI and creativity.
Speaker 2 (27:37):
I hate that AI can make songs. I want to
talk about that then, yeah, or art, but just a
very short version.
Speaker 4 (27:46):
Is the idea of making a film, a motion picture
of a movie, if you will, is so overwhelming, That
is such a huge endeavor that a lot of people
have script ideas or scripts, but they just they can't
get the ginormous enterprise that is a film up and
off the.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
Ground, and reading is dead. I was going to talk
about that a little bit later. The only way you're
gonna be able to reach anybody with a story is
going to be some sort of movie film, something the.
Speaker 1 (28:15):
Armstrong and Getty show, Yeah, Orgia or show, podcasts and
our hot Lakes.
Speaker 4 (28:25):
So a couple of really interesting, unexpected commentaries on the
shutdown and just the politics these days. The first one
why Schumer had to do it, some really good analysis
from Barton swam and yeah it was AOC and his
left right.
Speaker 2 (28:45):
Everybody knows that he's going to get primary. You know.
Speaker 4 (28:49):
The crazy part is he's seventy four freaking years old
and he doesn't run again until twenty twenty eight. So
that means it's just one hundred percent assumed a seventy
six year old man is going to run for another
six year term.
Speaker 3 (29:04):
Yeah yeah, that would be horrifying if he did, regardless
of someone there running against him.
Speaker 2 (29:09):
Yeah yeah.
Speaker 4 (29:10):
But as Barton Swain points out in the Wall Street Journal,
from the beginning of the dispute, everyone dispute. Everyone seems
to have understood that mister Schumer forced a shut down
because he needed to show his state's progressive voters he
could take it to Trump and fend off AOC right Ez,
The Cline in The New York Times wrote, the whole
stunt was about Trump's authoritarianism. It was about showing their
(29:33):
base and themselves that they could fight back. Guy in
Politico says Democrats achieved their primary political objective, showing a
furious base that they can actually work together effectively.
Speaker 2 (29:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (29:42):
I don't think that's what happened to flee for what
did any of y'all watch John Stewart on The Daily
Show Monday night.
Speaker 2 (29:48):
That was one of his great performances.
Speaker 3 (29:50):
I liked it because he was attacking Democrats as opposed
to Republicans, and he's really really good at that sort
of thing. But man, he was incensed that the Democrats
caved the way they did, so the whole we showed
the base that we fought.
Speaker 6 (30:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (30:03):
I don't think that's the way it landed with a
lot of them, Right, they're prepared to fight with every
tool at their disposal.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Says the political guy.
Speaker 4 (30:10):
All right, but who are what callum rights, that is
the part I liked. Who's that base to which these
fellows are referring? Poke around you'll find it consists mainly
of cash flush foundations, unions and activist groups, the ACLU,
the Sunrise Movement, other environmental and climate groups, Planned Parenthood,
other abortion rights outfits, on an array of immigrants rights
(30:30):
and associations, some of them so radical is to be
almost insurrectionist.
Speaker 2 (30:35):
The American Federation of Teachers. Don't get me started in
the National.
Speaker 4 (30:40):
Education Association, Southern Poverty Law Center, Black Lives Matter, other
racial justice organizations, human Rights Campaign a sort at LGBTQ
plus minus over the power of three activist groups, scores
of foreign connected Palestinian rights and otherwise anti Zionist groups,
and the George Soros funded network known as the Open
Society Foundations, on and on and on, and then he
(31:01):
points out that it's interesting and revealing that the Democrats
tried to make such a big deal of the Koch
brothers right back in the day, and the Koch Brothers
are mostly libertarian leaning and are not very close to
trump Ism at all. But he points out that the
reason the Democrats are always saying that Republicans are controlled
(31:25):
by their activist groups because the Democrats are and they
really really fear running a foul of these far left
groups that really don't represent Americans at all except on
the left fringe. And a lot of them are still
like the NAACP legendary organization did amazing work during the
(31:45):
Civil Rights era. They are now a far left blackmail
organization like the Southern Poverty Laws and are just nothing
like they were, which brings us to this great piece
Jeff Blair wrote for National Review. And this has happened
over and over again, and I just love it so much.
A time honored lefty organization, in this case the Sierra Club,
(32:07):
eaten apart from inside by its woke staffers, and he
asks where does the power truly reside? It often resides
only where people believe it does, and only up until
the moment people believe it to reside there. And the
Sierra Club, once one of America's most formidable ecological activist
groups and a group that did very good work back
(32:27):
in the day, is giving up the illusion that it
wields any power whatsoever, as it seizes up arthritically and
kneels upon broken joints to display its helpless incapacity to
the world. That's pretty good the New York Times story.
New York Times is out with a story that should
already be familiar. The Sierra Club embraced social justice, then
(32:48):
it tore itself apart, and he points, you know the
drill from the headline alone. They're now a flaming wreck.
They've lost sixty percent of their paying donors since twenty
nine And for precisely the reason that all observers watching
wokeism progress through left coded institutions.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
Thought it would.
Speaker 4 (33:07):
It was devoured by the never ending financial and political
demands of the progressive omni cause, which encouraged the formerly
single minded conservationist society to become deeply embroiled in the
progressive left's racial and socio sexual agenda.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
Part of its core mission.
Speaker 3 (33:24):
They let themselves get tied up in that. Yeah so,
and this is so typical of the permanent omni cause.
Speaker 4 (33:32):
Social justice was folded into the Sierra Club's mission through
its newer, younger leadership via the now standard series of
semantic slights of hand. Environmental justice is racial justice, is
transgender justice, is Palestinian justice.
Speaker 2 (33:48):
Hey, we're just.
Speaker 4 (33:49):
Trying to saved pine trees over here, bake the water clean. Well,
then you've got to embrace transgender Palestinians. And the scattering
of its focus has not only left the Sierra Club
flat footed and broke, it's also rendered it indistinguishable from
other everything bagel progressive organizations, which I thought was a
good description the everything bagel, my favorite bagel, and the
(34:13):
focus of the movie everything all at once, all the time,
everything and oh yeah, yeah, my favorite move moment he
talked about the New York Times piece, again illustrative of
the natural progress of activist entryism, came when a local
Sierra Club member responded to a volunteer suggestion that the
club lobby for more protection for wolves.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
We've got to protect the wolves.
Speaker 4 (34:37):
And the response from the leadership was, that's fine, Delia,
But what do wolves have to do with equity, justice
and inclusion?
Speaker 2 (34:44):
Wow? What the Sierra freaking Club?
Speaker 4 (34:49):
Wow? That is something. When that happens, I love this
so much. All right, final note, and this is this
is worth remembering. I kind of let I'd space this off.
I heard it years and years and years ago. Jack,
I know you know this. The sovietologist Robert Kuhn quest
what a name Dick Army wishes his name was Bob Khnquest.
Speaker 2 (35:10):
Anyway, let's see.
Speaker 7 (35:13):
Oh.
Speaker 4 (35:13):
He once positive a series of laws of politics, the
most famous of which remains his second. Any organization not
explicitly right wing sooner or later becomes left wing.
Speaker 3 (35:24):
Our friend Tim Sandifer has quoted that on our show
a number of times, and it's stuck in my head.
It seems to be true. Unless your goal is to
be right wing, you overtime become left wing. Yes, and
you can see it all around. Once you become aware
of that, you see it all the time.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
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