February 24, 2025 • 29 mins
Ukraine-Russia War 3 Year Anniversary. California rules will require more fire-resistant homes in Palisades and Altadena. Can’t find your size in-store? How e-commerce affected the in-person shopping experience. Elon Musk can’t stop talking about penises.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're listening to Bill Handle on demand from kf I
am six forty. It's just announced ROBERTA. Flack has died.
Ironically enough, she was killed softly. I thought that was
kind of interesting. Eighty eight years old. Eighty eight years
old for those of us that were around when the
(00:23):
song first came out.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Kno, I know you ConA didn't even know who ROBERTA.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
Flack was.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
No.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
I thought the Fuji sampled this with Lauren Hill, and
I thought that's where it came from. YEA have no
idea what that means, but that's where my generation knows.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
I know what sampling is. I go to Costco a
whole lot. So, okay, So ROBERTA. Flack dead at eighty eight.
Lovely song, by the way, this kind of song she sang.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
Really nice, these ballads. Okay. It's now three years at
the war and you Krane has gone on.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
And Donald Trump last week said of Zelensky, I've been
watching for years. I've been watching him negotiate with no cards.
He has no cards, and you get sick of it.
And that is one of the big issues. One of
the things the United States does is get sick of wars.
(01:27):
We were certainly, we as sick of the Vietnam War.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
We were pretty sick of the Korean War. World War
two was different.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
That was clearly the good guys versus the bad guys,
and democracy was truly at stake. Not so much the
war in Vietnam, not so much the Korean War, and
frankly not so much the.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
War in Ukraine. It's that part of the world, and
we can stay well away from it.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
And it's a question of interventionists versus those who are isolationists,
and Donald Trump is clearly isolationist, which, by the way,
both sites have an argument here. What did he say
about Zelensky's popular support that he has none?
Speaker 1 (02:13):
Not true?
Speaker 2 (02:15):
What did he say about the levels of US funding
for Ukraine that's true, The extent of European funding that's true.
The status of previous negotiations not true. But the bottom
line is he just is genuinely bored of it and
he wants over.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
For Donald Trump. And this I think is true.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
The only real cards are money, big money, and real power,
and everybody else doesn't really count except dictators.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Well, they have real power, that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
So Zelensky, even though he argued that he is a dictator.
What he does is have a society that organized itself.
It's like weit. We did in World War Two. The
entire country mobilized.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
For that war. That's what's happening in Ukraine.
Speaker 2 (03:09):
Local leaders have legitimacy, the tech sector dedicated to victory.
The largest army standing army in Europe at a million
service members, and Ukraine is dedicated.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
They know.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
They don't win this thing. If they don't come out
with some kind of a durable peace, that country is over.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
It is done. That democracy is finished now.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
When Russia invaded, everyone expected Kiev to fall within three days.
Speaker 1 (03:40):
I certainly did. Nope. Ukraine is still fighting.
Speaker 2 (03:45):
The civil society is still volunteering, still raising money for
the troops. The defense industry transformed itself completely.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
That's what we did during World War Two.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Cars stop being manufactured, appliance has stopped being manufactured. All
went to the war effort, every one of them. Every
factory out there was switched over. There was no proprietary anything.
Technology that one company had was used by another. Boeing,
for example, had to be seventeen, one of the most
(04:17):
successful bombers. It was built by car plants all over
the country. There was nothing that was propriety. Teams of
people in underground control centers in Ukraine use old software
to hit thousands of targets every month, and they keep
on building drones like crazy. So what happens with Trump.
(04:42):
He wins by cutting off Ukraine.
Speaker 1 (04:46):
He wins. Putin wins by excuse me, Putin wins by.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
Persading Trump to cut off Ukraine, by convincing Europeans they
can't win. And what's happening is Putin's propaganda, because that's
really what he has. Doesn't have a lot of military might.
It's being cannibalized like crazy. Inflation is huge in Russia.
This war has cost Russia a huge hole. And so
(05:12):
what he is going to do is win via propaganda and.
Speaker 1 (05:15):
Win by Donald Trump.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
And the point is he not only wants Ukraine as
a buffer as against the Western world invading Russia.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
I don't know why he thinks that's going to happen,
but that's what he thinks.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
But also by convincing and particularly Donald Trump get out
of NATO. He wants to either desabilize or completely eliminate NATO.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
We're talking about Putin. Trump is not far off his
first term. He told NATO allies.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
And I think he was legitimate in this one. I
agreed with him. You guys don't pay your fair share.
We're out of NATO now they're paying all their fair share. However,
the argument now is we want out of NATO. We
don't want foreign wars.
Speaker 1 (06:04):
That's how.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
FDR got elected his second time out stay out or
third time out, we stay out of war. We don't
want American boys going into this fight a foreign war.
By the way, he wanted to go desperately, but he
couldn't because the electorate didn't want foreign wars. And that
seems to be the issue. Even Biden said, we're not
(06:29):
going to put troops on the ground. That's never going
to happen. It's a question of funding the war, and
Putin wants that to stop. Because the second the United
States and in conjunction with Europe, stops funding the war
in Ukraine, that three day time limit happens, it's over
(06:50):
in a matter of days.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
So what's going to happen.
Speaker 2 (06:55):
Well, at this point, Putin has won because he has
his best friend, Donald Trump, and not necessarily because Donald
Trump loves Putin. I mean he does, but that's almost
ancillary it's that Donald Trump wants the United States to
go back in an isolationist view and say we have
(07:15):
to take care of ourselves. That's what immigration is about.
Does he hate immigrants coming in, Well, he might, but
it's more we have to protect our borders. I believe
that he believes that, There's no question about it. So
we're moving into a new world. We're going into a
world of pre World War two where America Firsters were
(07:39):
a huge influence. By the way, led by Charles Lindberg,
he was one of the big leaders right wing governments
all over the continent.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
Germany it's far right.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
Government doubled its vote in statewide elections. It is now
the super right wing party has just won the second
biggest number of seats in parliament.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
It's crazy times.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
It really is a story out of the Orange County Register.
There's a guy man named Michael Kovac, and he was
in the middle of the Palisades and he describes the
fire approaching him as an absolute blizzard of embers, not flames.
His thirty five hundred square foot home was the only house.
Speaker 1 (08:30):
On the block that survived, and that wasn't by chance.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
He's an architect and he designed and built his home
on top of the ridge, which were the victims of
the fire more so than anybody, because that's almost an automatic,
and so he designed his home with fire in mind.
The outer walls were a fiber cement impervious to fire.
(08:56):
The roof had an ignition proof membrane once section covered
by vegetation with four inches of soil on top of
the roof. Decks were made out of Brazilian hardwood, probably
the most flame resistant wood that's out there. There was
a fire suppression system that sprays fascheck over the yard.
(09:17):
That's the stuff you see that orange stuff that comes
out of airplanes, that's Foschek when they're fighting a fire.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
No overhangs where embers can be.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Trapped, the garden of cacti, and instead of the area
around it, instead of mulch on the ground.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
It was rock lava rock.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
So now you've got thousands of residents in Altadena and
the Palisades are preparing to rebuild their homes right and
the authorities are saying, look at Kovac's home. It's a
fire hardened home. By the way, that's the building code.
Now these folks are going to have to build with
fire safety in mind and.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
Rules now in place.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
All new homes and areas designated as very high risk
areas or abudding wilderness they have to meet these new codes,
probably the nation's most stringent set of fire resistance codes
that exist. This was adopted in two thousand and five
and strengthened over the past seventeen years.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
So now the code requires.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
New homes to include fame flame repellent designs and materials.
Speaker 1 (10:29):
And so here's the question.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
You've got thousands, ten thousand people have to rebuild their homes.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
How much more will it cost us to rebuild?
Speaker 2 (10:39):
By the way, the code includes things like exterior walls
that can withstand fire for up to an hour. That's
like a safe dual pain windows with shatterproof glass, attic
vents that block the embers and seal off when exposed
to heat, roof in deck materials hard to ignite, landscaping
designed to homes from fire more so.
Speaker 1 (11:03):
Than even look beautiful.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
Though I've got my new house, it's all cactus and
all of that in front, or a lot of it.
So five days after the firestorms, Newsome order state officials
to recommend by March thirteenth, which parts of the building
code should be suspended now because of the need for
(11:26):
and speeding up reconstruction. Sixteen thousand homes, businesses, other structures.
Seven's thirty three seven hundred insurance claim have been filed.
Almost seven billion dollars in checks have been written on
these claims. Insured losses estimated a total of thirty five
(11:49):
to forty five billion dollars.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
It is crazy.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
So California updates is building code every eighteen months by law,
and there've.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
Been a lot of changes.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Nine percent of all the homes and altadeen in Pacific
Palisades were built before two thousand and nine. Most fire
victims are going to include upgrades for roofs, rain gutters
at events, windows, doors, siding.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
And landscaping.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
They have to do it. And after twenty eleven you
have to have indoor fire sprinklers. That's now the code
if you're building a new house. Plus solar systems have
to go installed. So it's fairly easy to build a
(12:35):
house to standards. I mean it's going to cost more,
a lot more, not a whole lot more. I mean
to have fire retardant or you know, landscaping is not
as a matter of fact, it may even be cheaper,
and to build a house with no eves, big deal.
(12:55):
Retrofitting a house is a whole lot different. So the
homes that were partially destroyed, how.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
Much money is going to be spent on those?
Speaker 2 (13:09):
So the authorities are looking at Kovac's home and saying,
you know, it really is within the reach of the
rebuilders of homes. And at this point the observers doubt
the governor is going to suspend fire safety standards. It's
more likely he's going to suspend the solar power requirement.
(13:34):
Solar power is expensive and it has nothing to do
with fire, and so that issue, I can see the
suspension of installing solar panels, which is now part of
the building code.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
You got to do it. Now.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Here is a really interesting statistics homes built after twenty
ten in that area when the full standards were enforced.
Speaker 1 (14:02):
The full building.
Speaker 2 (14:02):
Codes were enforced after twenty ten is when they took
the big jump in fire safety also seismic safety. They
accounted for seven to nine percent of the buildings in
those fire average those fire areas that were burnt. That's it,
seven to nine percent of the homes that were fire
(14:25):
resistant and less than one percent of those homes experienced
property loss versus entire blocks of older homes. So the
bottom line is we're moving into an area, we're moving
into a system of fire retardant homes. Now here's the problem.
(14:52):
For example, in La I think all of La County.
You can't put wooden shingles on roofs anymore.
Speaker 1 (14:58):
You can't. It's illegal.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
The average roof lasts thirty years. And this was passed
maybe forty forty five years ago. There isn't I have
not seen wooden shingles on a.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
House in years.
Speaker 2 (15:13):
But wooden shingles or any shingles have to be replaced
after thirty years, so they're all gone.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
Cars with catalytic converters.
Speaker 2 (15:23):
Remember when they first passed alof catalytic converters, we argued,
you know it's only a few. Well you take a
generation and cars are all gone. You know, there are
very few cars that are around thirty years later, so
they have to be replaced. Houses they don't have to
be replaced. They're not going to be replaced. And if
(15:43):
you have an older home that doesn't meet these standards,
it's going to be it's not going to be fire resistant.
Look what happened in Altadena, where the vast majority of
homes were not built in the last twenty years or
the last fourteen years when and building cokes really cos
really kicked in. So that's going to be more difficult,
(16:05):
a lot more difficult, and you're going to see homes
really going up. It's gonna be a different kind of home,
that's for sure. If you're building your remodeling, But if
you're repairing, I don't know. And a lot of those
homes do not have.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
To be replaced.
Speaker 2 (16:21):
We talk about the ones that have to be replaced,
or a lot of that were just damaged, for example,
smoke damage. That's not fire damage, but so smoke damage.
You have to bring the house down to the studs
because the dry wall sucks up the smoke and it
stays there forever. Well, all you do is replace the
(16:42):
dry wall or replace flooring, but you're not going to
replace outer walls or roofs or eaves. Something that I
didn't pay very much attention to on the life of
the Internet, and that's trolling.
Speaker 1 (16:58):
Trolling being put something else up just for a reaction.
That's it.
Speaker 2 (17:04):
You put something outrageous up online and you just want
to get reaction.
Speaker 1 (17:09):
And you want.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
People to respond and hopefully it goes viral and whatever
you're saying doesn't matter. He just you really want to
either hurt people or really affect people. And for the
most part that was not mainstream. Now not only is
it mainstream, it goes right to the White House.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
And I'll tell you who one of the real.
Speaker 2 (17:31):
Experts of trolling is is Elon Musk. The guy is
the expert of experts. It is completely crazy about how
that works. So last week he posts photos of himself
(17:52):
as he's slashing the federal bureaucracy.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
But he certainly found the time to make some penis
jokes meth kind of would like about him.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
He changed is display name, for example on X to
Harry Bowles, as in bowls. And he then learned that
us AID had spent millions of dollars on circumcision in
developing countries, and so he trolls.
Speaker 1 (18:18):
He puts up circumcision.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
At a discount now fifty percent off. Judicial dictatorship is
wrong spelled dick tatorship.
Speaker 1 (18:32):
Well, he didn't mention why USAID.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Had paid for circumcisions, because they were part of a
program to reduce the spread of HIV.
Speaker 1 (18:42):
Which it seems to work.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
A nineteen year old hired at doge by Musk. He's
gone by the pseudonym big Balls online. By the way,
it's reported he's now a senior advisor in the Department
of Homeland Security. Don't know if that's true or not,
but that's what it is. And by the way, these
(19:06):
kind of jokes, juvenile humor is what Musk is known for.
Speaker 1 (19:10):
And believe me, I'm known.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
For that too, because I always go to the lowest
common denominator and if I can either make a sexual
or statological joke, I'm there. The problem is I'm not
being tasked with taking the federal government slashing slashing people
people's wages, work environment jobs. On the other hand, as
(19:36):
the reaction is spreading to what's going on, you know,
I saw something on Bill Maher actually a couple of
weeks ago, and Bill Maher pointed this out. And you
can't get much more liberal than Bill Maher, And he said,
let's look.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
At the Department of Education.
Speaker 2 (19:51):
That Elon Musk certainly, and Donald Trump wants to eliminate
completely an entire department.
Speaker 1 (19:58):
He goes, what has it actually done?
Speaker 2 (20:02):
It was created in nineteen seventy seven, and now what
testing scores among fourth graders eighth graders. I think they
tested the eighth and the eleventh grade is where testing
is done. Math skills are below what they were, reading
skills below what they were, Literacy skills below what they were.
Speaker 1 (20:27):
And so you're arguing, what is this about? And they
are finding real.
Speaker 2 (20:31):
Waste and real fraud going on. Of course, the baby
now is being thrown out with the bathwater. My favorite
case is the nuclear security personnel. The group people that
guarded our country's nuclear facilities are actually nuclear weaponry plants,
(20:51):
were all fired. The next day it was a whoops,
you're all rehired and they couldn't find some of them.
So what's going on? Well, it's going on full blasts
some of it, is it?
Speaker 1 (21:10):
Right? Yeah? But you know, I mean you look.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
At the ridiculous of circumcision on its face. Well yeah,
I mean, come on, you know what is must want
to do? Convert everybody to Judaism? Not quite, but are
there reasons for it? Let's look, let's look. Now, you
can argue USA should be eliminated completely.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
Okay, I'll buy that, there's an argument for it. I
see that although I disagree with that.
Speaker 2 (21:37):
I think that USA feeds people in a big way
all over the world, and as a matter of fact,
USA it is probably the organization that gives people the
best feeling about the United States overseas. It's the best
propaganda value that we have. So, okay, you want to
get rid of it. I disagree. But if you're looking
(21:57):
within the Department for Waste and Fraud, and you okay,
look at these circumcisions, look at the amount of money
we're spending.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
Well, let's look at the underlying reasons.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
Really, all right, we're gonna finish it up with shopping,
which we all do.
Speaker 1 (22:16):
And when e commerce came into being, it didn't kill
the bricks.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
And mortar stores. There are still a few out there, fewer.
But I'll tell you what it did do, is it
killed the experience of going to the brick and mortar
store in a way that heretofore never happened. Here's why
physical stores are understaffed, full of inconveniences like locked shelves,
(22:42):
self checkout lines. I mean, I love that you want
to deodorant, you go to CVS. It's locked behind a
glass case. Give me a break. As a matter of fact,
if you ever go to a store and said, oh no,
we don't have that item, it's out of stock, but
you ordered online. That practice is so common that retailers
(23:04):
have a name for it. We call it SOS. They
say save our sale. The consulting firm of alex Partner
studied thirty retailers. Nine percent of their online women's clothing
assortment was available physical stores only nine percent.
Speaker 1 (23:22):
Department stores.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
The percentage that of goods that are available in the
store seven percent. At mass merchants, big time retailers it
is two percent. Now, what ended happening with the online
sales is so weird unintended consequences. First of all, let's
(23:46):
talk about how great it is right you shipped to
your house, it's delivered.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
Amazon can deliver in a couple of hours. I mean,
it's pretty incredible.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
And it used to be that if you really didn't
know your size or color, you'd order five.
Speaker 1 (23:59):
Of them and you reach and four of them.
Speaker 2 (24:01):
Although that's harder and harder to do. But the downside.
For example, I'm looking for some furniture. I'm looking for
some out there with some furniture, So I go to
Costco and I go online at Costco and they have
a selection of out door furniture, don't have it in
the stores, which is fine, Or any furniture store you know,
(24:24):
you look at their catalog and there's a bunch of furniture.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
How do you buy furniture without sitting in it? Explain
that to me.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
How do you buy a chair without sitting in the chair.
How do you know what's comfortable? How do you buy
let's say, if you're a size seven.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
In some piece of clothing.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
This is for women, and do you order size five, seven, eight, ten?
Speaker 1 (24:55):
How do you know how clothes are cut? How do
you know what fits? How you know what looks good
for on you without putting it on?
Speaker 2 (25:06):
Nearly three quarters of consumers, and this was done studied
by the IBM Institute of Business Value. We're talking twenty
thousand people in twenty six countries, so this is a
big study. Nine percent are satisfied with their store experience.
Chief among the complaints lack of product variety availability in stores.
Speaker 1 (25:28):
They're just not available in stores.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
Don Hendrix, whose chief executive of the chain BILK It's
a department store Chaine. Retailers have pivoted too hard to
e commerce and neglected the in store experience, and we
know that in store experience have become miserable.
Speaker 1 (25:47):
I'll tell you where they're really good.
Speaker 2 (25:52):
When I go to Low's, for example, to buy hardware
stuff and I'm in my new house, I'm buying a
lot of hardware store stuff, everything in stock, and the
staff they have is really good. They know what they're doing,
they give me good advice, and for some reason that
(26:18):
becomes a decent experience.
Speaker 1 (26:20):
And it just so happens at Low's. That's where that works.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
And have you ever noticed And it's kind of hard
to buy food in the stores if you're not in
the stores. Although Instacart I do some shopping at instacart
or on Instacart.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
One of the things that.
Speaker 2 (26:35):
I've noticed, I'll go to my local rafts or pavilions
and I'll ask where is a certain item? I'm actually
led to that item. I don't know if that's policy
or just happen to run some good people. The other
day I was I don't know, I was looking for
some kind of an herb to use on my stakes
(26:58):
and it's a new store. I hadn't goten there before.
I just happened to stop by and I walked in there,
didn't know where the hell I was, and so I
asked the clerk where are the spices?
Speaker 1 (27:07):
Because I'm too lazy.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
To go up and down the aisles and check it out.
And the clerk said, over there, Aisle thirteen.
Speaker 1 (27:13):
Come with me and led me to the spice isle.
Pretty neat.
Speaker 2 (27:23):
So we've gotten great service. Now, there's some stores that
still believe in service. Nordstrom's still believes in big service.
Other store saying, oh no, we don't have that in stock.
You're gonna have to go on the internet. And I
don't know how you do it. My big deal right
now is buying furniture. I don't have any idea how
people buy furniture online.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
None. All right, we're done, guys. That's it.
Speaker 2 (27:46):
Another day, another eighty cents because we work at iHeart,
Michael Monks, you are done today.
Speaker 1 (27:53):
I think Amy's coming back, right she is? But wait,
how much do we get paid?
Speaker 2 (27:58):
And instead of a day, instead of never mind, eighty cents,
instead of a dollar?
Speaker 1 (28:04):
Another day? Another dollar. It's a joke. It's a joke, Michael.
This is why, this is why you're not here full time. Okay,
you have source I am here full time. First of all,
well you're not here. I have health insurance. I'm in
the Union. Why fight fight fight, fight, fight fight. I'm
a real person.
Speaker 2 (28:20):
I okay, all right, feelings okay with not on this show.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
You don't you don't have feelings on this show. All right, Michael.
Speaker 2 (28:31):
Thanks, We're back again tomorrow and that's with Amy and
she starts at five.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
O'clock with wake up Call.
Speaker 2 (28:38):
Of course, Cono and Ann are here producing the show
and technically doing whatever the hell happens, and Neil and
I come aboard at six o'clock in the morning, right
up until now, until now, Gary and Shannon up next.
Catch in the Morning, kf I am sixty. You've been
listening to the Bill Handle Show. Catch My Show Monday
(28:58):
through Friday, six am to nine am, and anytime on
demand on the iHeartRadio app.
You're listening to Bill Handle on demand from kf I
am six forty. It's just announced ROBERTA. Flack has died.
Ironically enough, she was killed softly. I thought that was
kind of interesting. Eighty eight years old. Eighty eight years
old for those of us that were around when the
(00:23):
song first came out.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Kno, I know you ConA didn't even know who ROBERTA.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
Flack was.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
No.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
I thought the Fuji sampled this with Lauren Hill, and
I thought that's where it came from. YEA have no
idea what that means, but that's where my generation knows.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
I know what sampling is. I go to Costco a
whole lot. So, okay, So ROBERTA. Flack dead at eighty eight.
Lovely song, by the way, this kind of song she sang.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
Really nice, these ballads. Okay. It's now three years at
the war and you Krane has gone on.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
And Donald Trump last week said of Zelensky, I've been
watching for years. I've been watching him negotiate with no cards.
He has no cards, and you get sick of it.
And that is one of the big issues. One of
the things the United States does is get sick of wars.
(01:27):
We were certainly, we as sick of the Vietnam War.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
We were pretty sick of the Korean War. World War
two was different.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
That was clearly the good guys versus the bad guys,
and democracy was truly at stake. Not so much the
war in Vietnam, not so much the Korean War, and
frankly not so much the.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
War in Ukraine. It's that part of the world, and
we can stay well away from it.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
And it's a question of interventionists versus those who are isolationists,
and Donald Trump is clearly isolationist, which, by the way,
both sites have an argument here. What did he say
about Zelensky's popular support that he has none?
Speaker 1 (02:13):
Not true?
Speaker 2 (02:15):
What did he say about the levels of US funding
for Ukraine that's true, The extent of European funding that's true.
The status of previous negotiations not true. But the bottom
line is he just is genuinely bored of it and
he wants over.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
For Donald Trump. And this I think is true.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
The only real cards are money, big money, and real power,
and everybody else doesn't really count except dictators.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Well, they have real power, that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
So Zelensky, even though he argued that he is a dictator.
What he does is have a society that organized itself.
It's like weit. We did in World War Two. The
entire country mobilized.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
For that war. That's what's happening in Ukraine.
Speaker 2 (03:09):
Local leaders have legitimacy, the tech sector dedicated to victory.
The largest army standing army in Europe at a million
service members, and Ukraine is dedicated.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
They know.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
They don't win this thing. If they don't come out
with some kind of a durable peace, that country is over.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
It is done. That democracy is finished now.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
When Russia invaded, everyone expected Kiev to fall within three days.
Speaker 1 (03:40):
I certainly did. Nope. Ukraine is still fighting.
Speaker 2 (03:45):
The civil society is still volunteering, still raising money for
the troops. The defense industry transformed itself completely.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
That's what we did during World War Two.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Cars stop being manufactured, appliance has stopped being manufactured. All
went to the war effort, every one of them. Every
factory out there was switched over. There was no proprietary anything.
Technology that one company had was used by another. Boeing,
for example, had to be seventeen, one of the most
(04:17):
successful bombers. It was built by car plants all over
the country. There was nothing that was propriety. Teams of
people in underground control centers in Ukraine use old software
to hit thousands of targets every month, and they keep
on building drones like crazy. So what happens with Trump.
(04:42):
He wins by cutting off Ukraine.
Speaker 1 (04:46):
He wins. Putin wins by excuse me, Putin wins by.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
Persading Trump to cut off Ukraine, by convincing Europeans they
can't win. And what's happening is Putin's propaganda, because that's
really what he has. Doesn't have a lot of military might.
It's being cannibalized like crazy. Inflation is huge in Russia.
This war has cost Russia a huge hole. And so
(05:12):
what he is going to do is win via propaganda and.
Speaker 1 (05:15):
Win by Donald Trump.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
And the point is he not only wants Ukraine as
a buffer as against the Western world invading Russia.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
I don't know why he thinks that's going to happen,
but that's what he thinks.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
But also by convincing and particularly Donald Trump get out
of NATO. He wants to either desabilize or completely eliminate NATO.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
We're talking about Putin. Trump is not far off his
first term. He told NATO allies.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
And I think he was legitimate in this one. I
agreed with him. You guys don't pay your fair share.
We're out of NATO now they're paying all their fair share. However,
the argument now is we want out of NATO. We
don't want foreign wars.
Speaker 1 (06:04):
That's how.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
FDR got elected his second time out stay out or
third time out, we stay out of war. We don't
want American boys going into this fight a foreign war.
By the way, he wanted to go desperately, but he
couldn't because the electorate didn't want foreign wars. And that
seems to be the issue. Even Biden said, we're not
(06:29):
going to put troops on the ground. That's never going
to happen. It's a question of funding the war, and
Putin wants that to stop. Because the second the United
States and in conjunction with Europe, stops funding the war
in Ukraine, that three day time limit happens, it's over
(06:50):
in a matter of days.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
So what's going to happen.
Speaker 2 (06:55):
Well, at this point, Putin has won because he has
his best friend, Donald Trump, and not necessarily because Donald
Trump loves Putin. I mean he does, but that's almost
ancillary it's that Donald Trump wants the United States to
go back in an isolationist view and say we have
(07:15):
to take care of ourselves. That's what immigration is about.
Does he hate immigrants coming in, Well, he might, but
it's more we have to protect our borders. I believe
that he believes that, There's no question about it. So
we're moving into a new world. We're going into a
world of pre World War two where America Firsters were
(07:39):
a huge influence. By the way, led by Charles Lindberg,
he was one of the big leaders right wing governments
all over the continent.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
Germany it's far right.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
Government doubled its vote in statewide elections. It is now
the super right wing party has just won the second
biggest number of seats in parliament.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
It's crazy times.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
It really is a story out of the Orange County Register.
There's a guy man named Michael Kovac, and he was
in the middle of the Palisades and he describes the
fire approaching him as an absolute blizzard of embers, not flames.
His thirty five hundred square foot home was the only house.
Speaker 1 (08:30):
On the block that survived, and that wasn't by chance.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
He's an architect and he designed and built his home
on top of the ridge, which were the victims of
the fire more so than anybody, because that's almost an automatic,
and so he designed his home with fire in mind.
The outer walls were a fiber cement impervious to fire.
(08:56):
The roof had an ignition proof membrane once section covered
by vegetation with four inches of soil on top of
the roof. Decks were made out of Brazilian hardwood, probably
the most flame resistant wood that's out there. There was
a fire suppression system that sprays fascheck over the yard.
(09:17):
That's the stuff you see that orange stuff that comes
out of airplanes, that's Foschek when they're fighting a fire.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
No overhangs where embers can be.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Trapped, the garden of cacti, and instead of the area
around it, instead of mulch on the ground.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
It was rock lava rock.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
So now you've got thousands of residents in Altadena and
the Palisades are preparing to rebuild their homes right and
the authorities are saying, look at Kovac's home. It's a
fire hardened home. By the way, that's the building code.
Now these folks are going to have to build with
fire safety in mind and.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
Rules now in place.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
All new homes and areas designated as very high risk
areas or abudding wilderness they have to meet these new codes,
probably the nation's most stringent set of fire resistance codes
that exist. This was adopted in two thousand and five
and strengthened over the past seventeen years.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
So now the code requires.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
New homes to include fame flame repellent designs and materials.
Speaker 1 (10:29):
And so here's the question.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
You've got thousands, ten thousand people have to rebuild their homes.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
How much more will it cost us to rebuild?
Speaker 2 (10:39):
By the way, the code includes things like exterior walls
that can withstand fire for up to an hour. That's
like a safe dual pain windows with shatterproof glass, attic
vents that block the embers and seal off when exposed
to heat, roof in deck materials hard to ignite, landscaping
designed to homes from fire more so.
Speaker 1 (11:03):
Than even look beautiful.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
Though I've got my new house, it's all cactus and
all of that in front, or a lot of it.
So five days after the firestorms, Newsome order state officials
to recommend by March thirteenth, which parts of the building
code should be suspended now because of the need for
(11:26):
and speeding up reconstruction. Sixteen thousand homes, businesses, other structures.
Seven's thirty three seven hundred insurance claim have been filed.
Almost seven billion dollars in checks have been written on
these claims. Insured losses estimated a total of thirty five
(11:49):
to forty five billion dollars.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
It is crazy.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
So California updates is building code every eighteen months by law,
and there've.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
Been a lot of changes.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Nine percent of all the homes and altadeen in Pacific
Palisades were built before two thousand and nine. Most fire
victims are going to include upgrades for roofs, rain gutters
at events, windows, doors, siding.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
And landscaping.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
They have to do it. And after twenty eleven you
have to have indoor fire sprinklers. That's now the code
if you're building a new house. Plus solar systems have
to go installed. So it's fairly easy to build a
(12:35):
house to standards. I mean it's going to cost more,
a lot more, not a whole lot more. I mean
to have fire retardant or you know, landscaping is not
as a matter of fact, it may even be cheaper,
and to build a house with no eves, big deal.
(12:55):
Retrofitting a house is a whole lot different. So the
homes that were partially destroyed, how.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
Much money is going to be spent on those?
Speaker 2 (13:09):
So the authorities are looking at Kovac's home and saying,
you know, it really is within the reach of the
rebuilders of homes. And at this point the observers doubt
the governor is going to suspend fire safety standards. It's
more likely he's going to suspend the solar power requirement.
(13:34):
Solar power is expensive and it has nothing to do
with fire, and so that issue, I can see the
suspension of installing solar panels, which is now part of
the building code.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
You got to do it. Now.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Here is a really interesting statistics homes built after twenty
ten in that area when the full standards were enforced.
Speaker 1 (14:02):
The full building.
Speaker 2 (14:02):
Codes were enforced after twenty ten is when they took
the big jump in fire safety also seismic safety. They
accounted for seven to nine percent of the buildings in
those fire average those fire areas that were burnt. That's it,
seven to nine percent of the homes that were fire
(14:25):
resistant and less than one percent of those homes experienced
property loss versus entire blocks of older homes. So the
bottom line is we're moving into an area, we're moving
into a system of fire retardant homes. Now here's the problem.
(14:52):
For example, in La I think all of La County.
You can't put wooden shingles on roofs anymore.
Speaker 1 (14:58):
You can't. It's illegal.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
The average roof lasts thirty years. And this was passed
maybe forty forty five years ago. There isn't I have
not seen wooden shingles on a.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
House in years.
Speaker 2 (15:13):
But wooden shingles or any shingles have to be replaced
after thirty years, so they're all gone.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
Cars with catalytic converters.
Speaker 2 (15:23):
Remember when they first passed alof catalytic converters, we argued,
you know it's only a few. Well you take a
generation and cars are all gone. You know, there are
very few cars that are around thirty years later, so
they have to be replaced. Houses they don't have to
be replaced. They're not going to be replaced. And if
(15:43):
you have an older home that doesn't meet these standards,
it's going to be it's not going to be fire resistant.
Look what happened in Altadena, where the vast majority of
homes were not built in the last twenty years or
the last fourteen years when and building cokes really cos
really kicked in. So that's going to be more difficult,
(16:05):
a lot more difficult, and you're going to see homes
really going up. It's gonna be a different kind of home,
that's for sure. If you're building your remodeling, But if
you're repairing, I don't know. And a lot of those
homes do not have.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
To be replaced.
Speaker 2 (16:21):
We talk about the ones that have to be replaced,
or a lot of that were just damaged, for example,
smoke damage. That's not fire damage, but so smoke damage.
You have to bring the house down to the studs
because the dry wall sucks up the smoke and it
stays there forever. Well, all you do is replace the
(16:42):
dry wall or replace flooring, but you're not going to
replace outer walls or roofs or eaves. Something that I
didn't pay very much attention to on the life of
the Internet, and that's trolling.
Speaker 1 (16:58):
Trolling being put something else up just for a reaction.
That's it.
Speaker 2 (17:04):
You put something outrageous up online and you just want
to get reaction.
Speaker 1 (17:09):
And you want.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
People to respond and hopefully it goes viral and whatever
you're saying doesn't matter. He just you really want to
either hurt people or really affect people. And for the
most part that was not mainstream. Now not only is
it mainstream, it goes right to the White House.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
And I'll tell you who one of the real.
Speaker 2 (17:31):
Experts of trolling is is Elon Musk. The guy is
the expert of experts. It is completely crazy about how
that works. So last week he posts photos of himself
(17:52):
as he's slashing the federal bureaucracy.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
But he certainly found the time to make some penis
jokes meth kind of would like about him.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
He changed is display name, for example on X to
Harry Bowles, as in bowls. And he then learned that
us AID had spent millions of dollars on circumcision in
developing countries, and so he trolls.
Speaker 1 (18:18):
He puts up circumcision.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
At a discount now fifty percent off. Judicial dictatorship is
wrong spelled dick tatorship.
Speaker 1 (18:32):
Well, he didn't mention why USAID.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Had paid for circumcisions, because they were part of a
program to reduce the spread of HIV.
Speaker 1 (18:42):
Which it seems to work.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
A nineteen year old hired at doge by Musk. He's
gone by the pseudonym big Balls online. By the way,
it's reported he's now a senior advisor in the Department
of Homeland Security. Don't know if that's true or not,
but that's what it is. And by the way, these
(19:06):
kind of jokes, juvenile humor is what Musk is known for.
Speaker 1 (19:10):
And believe me, I'm known.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
For that too, because I always go to the lowest
common denominator and if I can either make a sexual
or statological joke, I'm there. The problem is I'm not
being tasked with taking the federal government slashing slashing people
people's wages, work environment jobs. On the other hand, as
(19:36):
the reaction is spreading to what's going on, you know,
I saw something on Bill Maher actually a couple of
weeks ago, and Bill Maher pointed this out. And you
can't get much more liberal than Bill Maher, And he said,
let's look.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
At the Department of Education.
Speaker 2 (19:51):
That Elon Musk certainly, and Donald Trump wants to eliminate
completely an entire department.
Speaker 1 (19:58):
He goes, what has it actually done?
Speaker 2 (20:02):
It was created in nineteen seventy seven, and now what
testing scores among fourth graders eighth graders. I think they
tested the eighth and the eleventh grade is where testing
is done. Math skills are below what they were, reading
skills below what they were, Literacy skills below what they were.
Speaker 1 (20:27):
And so you're arguing, what is this about? And they
are finding real.
Speaker 2 (20:31):
Waste and real fraud going on. Of course, the baby
now is being thrown out with the bathwater. My favorite
case is the nuclear security personnel. The group people that
guarded our country's nuclear facilities are actually nuclear weaponry plants,
(20:51):
were all fired. The next day it was a whoops,
you're all rehired and they couldn't find some of them.
So what's going on? Well, it's going on full blasts
some of it, is it?
Speaker 1 (21:10):
Right? Yeah? But you know, I mean you look.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
At the ridiculous of circumcision on its face. Well yeah,
I mean, come on, you know what is must want
to do? Convert everybody to Judaism? Not quite, but are
there reasons for it? Let's look, let's look. Now, you
can argue USA should be eliminated completely.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
Okay, I'll buy that, there's an argument for it. I
see that although I disagree with that.
Speaker 2 (21:37):
I think that USA feeds people in a big way
all over the world, and as a matter of fact,
USA it is probably the organization that gives people the
best feeling about the United States overseas. It's the best
propaganda value that we have. So, okay, you want to
get rid of it. I disagree. But if you're looking
(21:57):
within the Department for Waste and Fraud, and you okay,
look at these circumcisions, look at the amount of money
we're spending.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
Well, let's look at the underlying reasons.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
Really, all right, we're gonna finish it up with shopping,
which we all do.
Speaker 1 (22:16):
And when e commerce came into being, it didn't kill
the bricks.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
And mortar stores. There are still a few out there, fewer.
But I'll tell you what it did do, is it
killed the experience of going to the brick and mortar
store in a way that heretofore never happened. Here's why
physical stores are understaffed, full of inconveniences like locked shelves,
(22:42):
self checkout lines. I mean, I love that you want
to deodorant, you go to CVS. It's locked behind a
glass case. Give me a break. As a matter of fact,
if you ever go to a store and said, oh no,
we don't have that item, it's out of stock, but
you ordered online. That practice is so common that retailers
(23:04):
have a name for it. We call it SOS. They
say save our sale. The consulting firm of alex Partner
studied thirty retailers. Nine percent of their online women's clothing
assortment was available physical stores only nine percent.
Speaker 1 (23:22):
Department stores.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
The percentage that of goods that are available in the
store seven percent. At mass merchants, big time retailers it
is two percent. Now, what ended happening with the online
sales is so weird unintended consequences. First of all, let's
(23:46):
talk about how great it is right you shipped to
your house, it's delivered.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
Amazon can deliver in a couple of hours. I mean,
it's pretty incredible.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
And it used to be that if you really didn't
know your size or color, you'd order five.
Speaker 1 (23:59):
Of them and you reach and four of them.
Speaker 2 (24:01):
Although that's harder and harder to do. But the downside.
For example, I'm looking for some furniture. I'm looking for
some out there with some furniture, So I go to
Costco and I go online at Costco and they have
a selection of out door furniture, don't have it in
the stores, which is fine, Or any furniture store you know,
(24:24):
you look at their catalog and there's a bunch of furniture.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
How do you buy furniture without sitting in it? Explain
that to me.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
How do you buy a chair without sitting in the chair.
How do you know what's comfortable? How do you buy
let's say, if you're a size seven.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
In some piece of clothing.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
This is for women, and do you order size five, seven, eight, ten?
Speaker 1 (24:55):
How do you know how clothes are cut? How do
you know what fits? How you know what looks good
for on you without putting it on?
Speaker 2 (25:06):
Nearly three quarters of consumers, and this was done studied
by the IBM Institute of Business Value. We're talking twenty
thousand people in twenty six countries, so this is a
big study. Nine percent are satisfied with their store experience.
Chief among the complaints lack of product variety availability in stores.
Speaker 1 (25:28):
They're just not available in stores.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
Don Hendrix, whose chief executive of the chain BILK It's
a department store Chaine. Retailers have pivoted too hard to
e commerce and neglected the in store experience, and we
know that in store experience have become miserable.
Speaker 1 (25:47):
I'll tell you where they're really good.
Speaker 2 (25:52):
When I go to Low's, for example, to buy hardware
stuff and I'm in my new house, I'm buying a
lot of hardware store stuff, everything in stock, and the
staff they have is really good. They know what they're doing,
they give me good advice, and for some reason that
(26:18):
becomes a decent experience.
Speaker 1 (26:20):
And it just so happens at Low's. That's where that works.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
And have you ever noticed And it's kind of hard
to buy food in the stores if you're not in
the stores. Although Instacart I do some shopping at instacart
or on Instacart.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
One of the things that.
Speaker 2 (26:35):
I've noticed, I'll go to my local rafts or pavilions
and I'll ask where is a certain item? I'm actually
led to that item. I don't know if that's policy
or just happen to run some good people. The other
day I was I don't know, I was looking for
some kind of an herb to use on my stakes
(26:58):
and it's a new store. I hadn't goten there before.
I just happened to stop by and I walked in there,
didn't know where the hell I was, and so I
asked the clerk where are the spices?
Speaker 1 (27:07):
Because I'm too lazy.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
To go up and down the aisles and check it out.
And the clerk said, over there, Aisle thirteen.
Speaker 1 (27:13):
Come with me and led me to the spice isle.
Pretty neat.
Speaker 2 (27:23):
So we've gotten great service. Now, there's some stores that
still believe in service. Nordstrom's still believes in big service.
Other store saying, oh no, we don't have that in stock.
You're gonna have to go on the internet. And I
don't know how you do it. My big deal right
now is buying furniture. I don't have any idea how
people buy furniture online.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
None. All right, we're done, guys. That's it.
Speaker 2 (27:46):
Another day, another eighty cents because we work at iHeart,
Michael Monks, you are done today.
Speaker 1 (27:53):
I think Amy's coming back, right she is? But wait,
how much do we get paid?
Speaker 2 (27:58):
And instead of a day, instead of never mind, eighty cents,
instead of a dollar?
Speaker 1 (28:04):
Another day? Another dollar. It's a joke. It's a joke, Michael.
This is why, this is why you're not here full time. Okay,
you have source I am here full time. First of all,
well you're not here. I have health insurance. I'm in
the Union. Why fight fight fight, fight, fight fight. I'm
a real person.
Speaker 2 (28:20):
I okay, all right, feelings okay with not on this show.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
You don't you don't have feelings on this show. All right, Michael.
Speaker 2 (28:31):
Thanks, We're back again tomorrow and that's with Amy and
she starts at five.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
O'clock with wake up Call.
Speaker 2 (28:38):
Of course, Cono and Ann are here producing the show
and technically doing whatever the hell happens, and Neil and
I come aboard at six o'clock in the morning, right
up until now, until now, Gary and Shannon up next.
Catch in the Morning, kf I am sixty. You've been
listening to the Bill Handle Show. Catch My Show Monday
(28:58):
through Friday, six am to nine am, and anytime on
demand on the iHeartRadio app.
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