November 25, 2025 • 21 mins
(November 25,2025)
ABC News tech reporter Mike Dobuski joins the show for ‘Tech Tuesday.’ Today, Mike talks about President Trump signing an executive order on artificial intelligence and… where’s YOUR X account from? Everyone agrees drunk plane passengers are a problem but nobody can agree on how to fix it. Most Americans say raising children is unaffordable, survey says.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're listening to Bill Handle on demand from KFI AM
six forty KFI AM six forty. Bill Handle here on
a Tuesday morning, November twenty five, day after tomorrow Thanksgiving,
the holiday that is by far the most favorite holiday
in the United States. Everybody loves it being with family.
(00:23):
And I'm going with my kids and I'm responsible for
Thanksgiving Day and it's going to be at a deli
and I'm not kidding you. It's just easier, and I'll
walk into a deli and it happens to be We're
going to a deli out in the valley. And you know,
(00:44):
we don't have to do the dishes. They do the turkey,
They do it all and it's terrific. All right. Mike Dubuski,
it is Tech Tuesday, ABC Technology Reporter and he's at
Michael Dobuski. That's the the Uski. Mike, thank you for
joining us. Always appreciated.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Thanks for having me. Great to be here.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Yes, it is Okay Trump, I love this EO on AI. Okay,
you want to explain that because there's actually a story.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
There there there is.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
Yes, EO is executive order and AI is of course
artificial intelligence, which we just can't seem to get away
from in the tech sector at this point. Two major
executive orders kind of in the mix here in the
Trump administration this week. Yesterday, on Monday, the Trump administration
signed what they call Project Genesis, which is basically an
(01:40):
executive order designed to spur the use of generative artificial
intelligence in scientific research. In fact, it directs the Department
of Energy to actually build its own AI platform fed
by data collected by the federal government that academics can
use in their research. So it's another tool in their
toolbox that was signed by the President on Monday, but
(02:01):
the bigger executive order could very well come later this week,
and this has been generating a lot of conversation in
Washington to the Trump administrations reportedly considering this EO that
would put a halt to AI legislation at the state level.
The Trump administration the goal here, says, the goal here
is to make it easier for AI companies to develop
(02:22):
this technology a mid what they see as a global
race for AI supremacy. They say that clearing the field
of a patchwork of AI legislation at the state level
and in favor of sort of forthcoming AI legislation at
the federal level will make it a lot easier for
companies like open AI and Google and Anthropic to navigate
as they build large language models to be competitive with
(02:45):
specifically China.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
Okay, so let me let me ask this. Okay, we
know that the denial of money to universities for medical research,
et cetera, that is a political move. I mean, no
one disagrees, whether you're one side or the other, no
one disagrees that that the basis of that policy is political.
Moving over to this executive order, can this is this political?
(03:12):
Does it have any political overtones?
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Which one are we talking about? The one that's already
been signed or the one that has not been signed
yet both both?
Speaker 3 (03:21):
Well, I mean, I think you know, anything that comes
from really any presidential administration is by nature political. The
one to sort of spur scientific research, you know, seems
pretty standard. It doesn't seem to be generating a ton
of controversy out there. But certainly the one that you
know is forthcoming that reportedly, you know, the Trump administration
(03:42):
is working on to curtail state level AI legislation is
really generating some some heated political back and forth, and
interestingly enough, it comes from both sides of the aisle.
It's kind of the Trump administration against state governments. For example,
we've seen Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, the Republican, of course,
ran again to President Trump in the Republican primary last cycle.
(04:03):
He called this move federal government overreach that would stop
state's ability to protect against what he calls predatory applications
the target children. And of course Democratic Senator Ed Marky
says this move would amount to President Trump siding with
his billionaire buddies.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
In Silicon Valley. There have also been.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
Several high profile letters to Congress aimed at raising the
alarm about this forthcoming executive order. The Leadership Conference Center
for Civil Rights and Technology says this gives corporations a
free pass rather than protecting the people it's meant to serve.
And of course, there is some reporting out there, namely
from Reuters, which indicates that this might actually be working
on the Trump administration, then reporting that they might be
(04:43):
adjusting their timeline. We originally thought that this order was
going to be signed this week. That might be sliding somewhat.
And of course, Bill, let's not forget earlier this year
during the passage of the defenble to some of the
risks associated with AI. It's going to be really interesting
to see how this plays out because the Trump administration
needs bound both the sort of national and global race
for AI with a lot of the Satan concerns inherent
(05:06):
to this technology.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
Mike, we're talking about what the Trump administration. What Donald
Trump did was sign on to well sign an executive
order on taking AI and wants to take it federally
in terms of the laws. Now, having been in reproductive law,
my entire legal career was third party reproductive law. The
(05:29):
technology was always miles ahead of the law. The law
never keeps up with the technology. How aggressive are the
states and the federal government and going after controlling this.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
Again, it really does seem to be a state effort.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
At this point.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
There is no federal regulation governing the use or deployment
of AI. That is really what spurred a lot of
these states, among them California, Colorado, Utah, Texas to pass
legis at their level. So, yeah, you're absolutely right to
say that the pace of technological development does outpace the
(06:08):
level at which we can pass you know, substantive laws.
But it does seem like we're at a stage now
where there's this real consideration among lawmakers as to who's
going to go about this, right, if not Congress, Well,
certain states want some protections in place, And just to
give you a little overview of what those laws look like,
you know, in California, you guys have passed laws AI
(06:31):
legislation aimed at limiting the collection of personal data from
AI companies, forcing AI companies to be more transparent with
the data they do collect. Of course, that's very relevant
given how many tech companies are based in California, but
we've also seen that, as we said, in Colorado, Utah,
Texas other states beyond that have passed regulations around using
AI to generate deep fakes of political figures and using
(06:54):
AI to create non consensual pornography. So it really does
cover a broad remit. But if this executive order does
go into effect, this would be basically clean the slate
white table in uh, you know, anticipation of some future
federal regulation to come.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Right.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
And one last question about that, and that is is
this front front burner stuff for the states that they're
viewing this as absolutely critical and we have to do
it now, I would say increasingly.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
So, Yeah, absolutely given.
Speaker 3 (07:25):
You know how many stories have been emerging about you know,
AI going wrong for people. You know this it's an
unfortunate story, but you know many people have you know,
become obsessed with many of these chatbots. They are in
some small way designed to you know, uh, support your
thinking and to keep you using them. That is true
of not to this DAI platforms, many tech platforms as well.
(07:46):
People have even you know, cut off communication with their families,
gone missing and in some extreme cases actually taken their
own lives and the lives of others. And that really
does get the attention of lawmakers, you know, who say, hey,
we got to do something. You know, the federal government's
not going to we at state level will all right?
Speaker 1 (08:02):
Switching gears. Story about the genesis of an X account,
where's your ex account coming from? This broke? And this
actually turns out to be a huge political issue on
top of everything else.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Yeah, it does.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
And this new feature that X rolled out over the weekend,
the company said, is designed to provide more transparency into
people's accounts basically, so you know who you're interacting with online.
They've gone about this in a couple different ways. You've
already been able to see when someone signed up for
the platform. It tells you kind of what date they
joined or the general time period in which they joined.
(08:37):
You can now see how many times a given account
has changed their username, which could be interesting. But the
big example is that it will now show where that
account is based. And the really big thing that's been
happening as a result of this feature is that some
people have been discovering that the accounts they've been following,
specifically the ones that cover politics, actually originate from outside
of the United States. Just some examples here. There's one
(09:00):
coount with over two hundred thousand followers last week called
American Voice. It posted, you know, updates about the news
and you know, various sort of you know, tweets and
posts about what was going on in American politics. After
this update rolled out, followers found it was being run
from somewhere in South Asia, and now that account has
been deleted. There was another account that posted about President
Trump's daughter, just news items about Avanka Trump that according
(09:23):
to this feature, that account is actually based in Nigeria,
and an account called Abujama Gaza that, according to this
account's profile, is a Gaza based journalist covering the war.
According to this feature, it's actually based in Poland. So
it really does underscore how the information environment on access
maybe a little bit more complex than we initially thought.
Speaker 1 (09:43):
Okay, so one quick question before I bail. In terms
of the political side of this, are these X accounts
more conservative, more liberal, more conspiracy theorists, or is across
the board.
Speaker 3 (09:58):
So we don't have a ton of hard numbers on this,
but it is worth saying that these accounts do come
from both sides of the aisle. They are not exclusively
political accounts. Sometimes they're just accounts to post sort of
viral content or content that goes wide on that platform.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
The bigger picture here really.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
Is that since Elon Musk took over the platform, there's
been really an intense effort to monetize viral posts. So
if you post something that a lot of people like
or reshare, you can make a couple bucks off that,
And to you or me, that's just a couple bucks,
it's not really that much, but in developing countries specifically,
that can actually amount to quite a lot of money.
So there's this incentive structure at X to create viral content.
(10:39):
I think the reason that we're talking about in the
context of politics, is that when you post something about
politics on social media, generally speaking, that does get a
lot of engagement, not always get good engagement, but any
engagement does equal dollars. And I think that's exactly why
you're seeing this happen right now.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
Is Musk making money on X? I know you overpaid
for it ridiculously, but has it turned out and monetize
enough to where at least is not burning through money.
Speaker 3 (11:04):
It's an interesting question. Again, we don't have a ton
of insight into his personal finances when it comes to
this company, although you're correct to say that he did
overpay by quite a hefty margin the tens of billions
when it comes to purchasing this platform back in twenty
twenty three.
Speaker 2 (11:19):
But another sort.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
Of interesting data point that people might not be paying
attention to is that despite the fact that we talked
about how the changes that Elon Musk made to X
drove this exodus from the platform, a lot of people stopping,
you know, using that platform because they didn't agree with
the policies of Elon Musk, a lot of advertisers leaving,
a lot of those advertisers have actually come back in
the years since, and a recent Pew survey found that
(11:41):
more than one in five Americans still use x formerly Twitter,
while the competitors that we talk about a lot, things
like Threads and Blue Sky, they remain comparatively bit.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
Players in this space.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
So despite all the talk about it, they do remain
a pretty hefty, you know, force in the world of
social media.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
Mike, thank you, We'll talk again. Always great stuff. I
have a good day YouTube.
Speaker 2 (12:05):
Take it.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
Yeah, Happy Thanksgiving. That's what you're supposed to say, isn't it.
That's what they tell me now. Drunk airline passengers, Right,
We've all experienced someone drunk on an airplane, every one
of us. And I've always wondered why no one takes
(12:25):
it that seriously. University of Texas at Dallas criminality professor
A Lynn Vieriitis analyze year's worth of in flight passenger
incidents and here's what she found. She went through sixteen
hundred complaints by the way file with the Aviation Safety
(12:46):
Reporting System and broke down reports about passengers and in
different categories verbal abuse, physical abuse, physical violence, sexual harassment.
So here's what she gets into. People getting into fights,
are aging with each other, not putting luggage away, not
listening to directions. Alcohol, sexual assault, and the harassment. Alcohol
(13:11):
the overwhelming thing reported in all of these narratives. Alcohol.
People get drunk on airplanes and these flight attendants have
to deal with it. Now, I have a question, you
know what they do. Have you ever seen have you
ever been on an airplane when someone has taken off
the plane and I have who is drunk? And you
(13:31):
see this all the time on the news, So someone
is plastered right the plane diverts because someone is unruly,
local police pick them up and then take haul them
away and do whatever they can. You know, it is
a federal crime to interfere with the flight crew. It's
a federal offense up to twenty years in prison and
(13:54):
a two hundred and fifty thousand dollars fine, and they
never use that. You want a safe airplane when the
flight crew goes, here's how the seat belt works, as
if we're all completing morons and we don't know how
a seat belt works. And you click it here and
you unhook it there, and then uh, you know, they
(14:15):
point out the exits always with two fingers and both arms.
You ever noticed that and telling you where the exits
are well, and they tell you you can't smoke in
the lavatories. Why wouldn't they add? And by the way,
if you interfere with the flight crew, it's twenty years
(14:38):
in prison and two hundred and fifty thousand dollars and
have the FBI haul them off? Have the federal authorities
have It's not like they're gonna run, No, they're they're
on the airplane, the plane lands, and as a matter
of fact, I've been there where the pilot has said everybody,
please remain seated while we deal with an unruly PA.
(15:03):
They don't do that. But is it just about the
effect that they're making money from here?
Speaker 3 (15:08):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (15:09):
It is. No, there's no question they're making a ton
of money with alcohol, but so do restaurants. Certainly bars do.
The problem is you're at thirty thousand feet, so how
do you kick someone off an airplane? The point is
that is dangerous for these people to interfere with the
flight crew. I mean the flight crew primarily is there
(15:29):
while they serve drinks and they serve food, and you know,
they sell you watches over priced watches and stuff. They're
there where they're trained is for safety. That's what it's
about and interfering with them under any circumstances. I've never
understood why local police haul people off. I just don't
get it. And there I don't know if anybody has
(15:51):
been hit with a and maybe we can look this up.
Has there ever been a drunk passenger hit with the
maximum of twenty years in prison in a two hundred
and fifty thousand dollars fine for interfering with a flight crew.
I mean, it has to be a pretty serious interference.
But you know, there are people that have to be
zip tied now, trying to open the door mid flight,
(16:14):
assaulting people, you know, getting into fights, getting into fights,
kicking steward eye around. Okay, we're done with that now.
There is a survey survey says it was a survey
according to the American Family Survey, the moving this for
(16:35):
eleven years already. And one of the questions asked is
what do you think raising children is about financially? And
most Americans think it's unaffordable, that's all. That's it. Finances
the major factor in determining family size or even having
(16:56):
a family. Seven to ten responds they believe raising kids
is too expensive, which is a thirteen point percentage point
jump from last year. Yeah, and as the first time
in the eleven year run that finances were the top
reason they capped or planned to cap the size of
their family twice as often as any other factor. And
(17:20):
why is that? What simply mirrors the cost of living?
It is just so expensive to live. How many people
have had kids and diapers? The cost of pampers or
something close to that. Look it up, thousands and thousands
of dollars just for the pampers, much less everything else,
(17:44):
cost of babysitters over the years. I mean, it's just
insanely expensive, and it's costing us. It's costing us in
terms of the number of people we have, in terms
of our demographics, in terms of our population increase. And
the only reason that our population in the United States
(18:04):
is either flat or increasing by a hair is immigration.
Let's it straight out, immigration, both legal and illegal. And
why Well, because people aren't women aren't having kids. The
average now is one point six kids per woman. You
need two point one kids to maintain the population. It
(18:29):
just isn't making any sense. The numbers just don't go
in the right direction. Now, there is something called a
natalist philosophy which simply says more kids. JD. Fans is
a big one on this. We need more kids, I
guess to an extent, he's right. The problem is we
have to afford more kids. And how do you do that? Well,
(18:53):
for example, New Mexico, there's a pilot program it offers
free childcare regardless of income. Oh and how much is childcare?
How many people where one of the spouses simply doesn't
work gives up a career to stay home with the child,
not because they love being at home parents or love
(19:16):
at home learning at home schooling. It's because childcare is
so expensive they simply can't afford it. And you know
my kids, I mean, God bless them. Do I love
my kids? Yeah? Absolutely? Would I have them again? Yeah?
(19:38):
I would because I really love my kids. Although I
have to tell you, as you know, I am pro
choice and have been fanatically so for many, many years.
And when my kids were born, I had people in
my life say, Bill, you're gonna think very differently about
your position of being pro choice when your kids are
(20:00):
were born or are to be born. And I said, yep,
and I became more pro choice, But that was only
for the money part of it. Okay, the rest of it.
Love my kids, love the credit cards. They love my
credit cards being used by my kids, Love taking them
(20:20):
on vacation, Love them to death. What if pro choice
was the choice of everybody else, Like we looked at
the parents and go, nah, we don't want them to
We don't want them to spawn. Oh yes, spawn, thank
you very much. You know there actually should be of course,
never going to happen, because you're talking fundamental constitutional rights.
(20:41):
But I would love to see licensing that you go
in front of a board to get a license to
raise kids, to have kids. You know how many of
us would just go, ah, ain't gonna happen. You know,
it's like getting a what do you call it, a
barber's license? A haircutting license? Right, you need fifteen hundred
hours to be able to cut hair. That's licensing, not
(21:02):
for having kids. I don't get it. All right, We're done, guys.
You've been listening to The Bill Handle Show. Catch My
Show Monday through Friday six am to nine am, and
anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app.
You're listening to Bill Handle on demand from KFI AM
six forty KFI AM six forty. Bill Handle here on
a Tuesday morning, November twenty five, day after tomorrow Thanksgiving,
the holiday that is by far the most favorite holiday
in the United States. Everybody loves it being with family.
(00:23):
And I'm going with my kids and I'm responsible for
Thanksgiving Day and it's going to be at a deli
and I'm not kidding you. It's just easier, and I'll
walk into a deli and it happens to be We're
going to a deli out in the valley. And you know,
(00:44):
we don't have to do the dishes. They do the turkey,
They do it all and it's terrific. All right. Mike Dubuski,
it is Tech Tuesday, ABC Technology Reporter and he's at
Michael Dobuski. That's the the Uski. Mike, thank you for
joining us. Always appreciated.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Thanks for having me. Great to be here.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Yes, it is Okay Trump, I love this EO on AI. Okay,
you want to explain that because there's actually a story.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
There there there is.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
Yes, EO is executive order and AI is of course
artificial intelligence, which we just can't seem to get away
from in the tech sector at this point. Two major
executive orders kind of in the mix here in the
Trump administration this week. Yesterday, on Monday, the Trump administration
signed what they call Project Genesis, which is basically an
(01:40):
executive order designed to spur the use of generative artificial
intelligence in scientific research. In fact, it directs the Department
of Energy to actually build its own AI platform fed
by data collected by the federal government that academics can
use in their research. So it's another tool in their
toolbox that was signed by the President on Monday, but
(02:01):
the bigger executive order could very well come later this week,
and this has been generating a lot of conversation in
Washington to the Trump administrations reportedly considering this EO that
would put a halt to AI legislation at the state level.
The Trump administration the goal here, says, the goal here
is to make it easier for AI companies to develop
(02:22):
this technology a mid what they see as a global
race for AI supremacy. They say that clearing the field
of a patchwork of AI legislation at the state level
and in favor of sort of forthcoming AI legislation at
the federal level will make it a lot easier for
companies like open AI and Google and Anthropic to navigate
as they build large language models to be competitive with
(02:45):
specifically China.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
Okay, so let me let me ask this. Okay, we
know that the denial of money to universities for medical research,
et cetera, that is a political move. I mean, no
one disagrees, whether you're one side or the other, no
one disagrees that that the basis of that policy is political.
Moving over to this executive order, can this is this political?
(03:12):
Does it have any political overtones?
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Which one are we talking about? The one that's already
been signed or the one that has not been signed
yet both both?
Speaker 3 (03:21):
Well, I mean, I think you know, anything that comes
from really any presidential administration is by nature political. The
one to sort of spur scientific research, you know, seems
pretty standard. It doesn't seem to be generating a ton
of controversy out there. But certainly the one that you
know is forthcoming that reportedly, you know, the Trump administration
(03:42):
is working on to curtail state level AI legislation is
really generating some some heated political back and forth, and
interestingly enough, it comes from both sides of the aisle.
It's kind of the Trump administration against state governments. For example,
we've seen Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, the Republican, of course,
ran again to President Trump in the Republican primary last cycle.
(04:03):
He called this move federal government overreach that would stop
state's ability to protect against what he calls predatory applications
the target children. And of course Democratic Senator Ed Marky
says this move would amount to President Trump siding with
his billionaire buddies.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
In Silicon Valley. There have also been.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
Several high profile letters to Congress aimed at raising the
alarm about this forthcoming executive order. The Leadership Conference Center
for Civil Rights and Technology says this gives corporations a
free pass rather than protecting the people it's meant to serve.
And of course, there is some reporting out there, namely
from Reuters, which indicates that this might actually be working
on the Trump administration, then reporting that they might be
(04:43):
adjusting their timeline. We originally thought that this order was
going to be signed this week. That might be sliding somewhat.
And of course, Bill, let's not forget earlier this year
during the passage of the defenble to some of the
risks associated with AI. It's going to be really interesting
to see how this plays out because the Trump administration
needs bound both the sort of national and global race
for AI with a lot of the Satan concerns inherent
(05:06):
to this technology.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
Mike, we're talking about what the Trump administration. What Donald
Trump did was sign on to well sign an executive
order on taking AI and wants to take it federally
in terms of the laws. Now, having been in reproductive law,
my entire legal career was third party reproductive law. The
(05:29):
technology was always miles ahead of the law. The law
never keeps up with the technology. How aggressive are the
states and the federal government and going after controlling this.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
Again, it really does seem to be a state effort.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
At this point.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
There is no federal regulation governing the use or deployment
of AI. That is really what spurred a lot of
these states, among them California, Colorado, Utah, Texas to pass
legis at their level. So, yeah, you're absolutely right to
say that the pace of technological development does outpace the
(06:08):
level at which we can pass you know, substantive laws.
But it does seem like we're at a stage now
where there's this real consideration among lawmakers as to who's
going to go about this, right, if not Congress, Well,
certain states want some protections in place, And just to
give you a little overview of what those laws look like,
you know, in California, you guys have passed laws AI
(06:31):
legislation aimed at limiting the collection of personal data from
AI companies, forcing AI companies to be more transparent with
the data they do collect. Of course, that's very relevant
given how many tech companies are based in California, but
we've also seen that, as we said, in Colorado, Utah,
Texas other states beyond that have passed regulations around using
AI to generate deep fakes of political figures and using
(06:54):
AI to create non consensual pornography. So it really does
cover a broad remit. But if this executive order does
go into effect, this would be basically clean the slate
white table in uh, you know, anticipation of some future
federal regulation to come.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Right.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
And one last question about that, and that is is
this front front burner stuff for the states that they're
viewing this as absolutely critical and we have to do
it now, I would say increasingly.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
So, Yeah, absolutely given.
Speaker 3 (07:25):
You know how many stories have been emerging about you know,
AI going wrong for people. You know this it's an
unfortunate story, but you know many people have you know,
become obsessed with many of these chatbots. They are in
some small way designed to you know, uh, support your
thinking and to keep you using them. That is true
of not to this DAI platforms, many tech platforms as well.
(07:46):
People have even you know, cut off communication with their families,
gone missing and in some extreme cases actually taken their
own lives and the lives of others. And that really
does get the attention of lawmakers, you know, who say, hey,
we got to do something. You know, the federal government's
not going to we at state level will all right?
Speaker 1 (08:02):
Switching gears. Story about the genesis of an X account,
where's your ex account coming from? This broke? And this
actually turns out to be a huge political issue on
top of everything else.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Yeah, it does.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
And this new feature that X rolled out over the weekend,
the company said, is designed to provide more transparency into
people's accounts basically, so you know who you're interacting with online.
They've gone about this in a couple different ways. You've
already been able to see when someone signed up for
the platform. It tells you kind of what date they
joined or the general time period in which they joined.
(08:37):
You can now see how many times a given account
has changed their username, which could be interesting. But the
big example is that it will now show where that
account is based. And the really big thing that's been
happening as a result of this feature is that some
people have been discovering that the accounts they've been following,
specifically the ones that cover politics, actually originate from outside
of the United States. Just some examples here. There's one
(09:00):
coount with over two hundred thousand followers last week called
American Voice. It posted, you know, updates about the news
and you know, various sort of you know, tweets and
posts about what was going on in American politics. After
this update rolled out, followers found it was being run
from somewhere in South Asia, and now that account has
been deleted. There was another account that posted about President
Trump's daughter, just news items about Avanka Trump that according
(09:23):
to this feature, that account is actually based in Nigeria,
and an account called Abujama Gaza that, according to this
account's profile, is a Gaza based journalist covering the war.
According to this feature, it's actually based in Poland. So
it really does underscore how the information environment on access
maybe a little bit more complex than we initially thought.
Speaker 1 (09:43):
Okay, so one quick question before I bail. In terms
of the political side of this, are these X accounts
more conservative, more liberal, more conspiracy theorists, or is across
the board.
Speaker 3 (09:58):
So we don't have a ton of hard numbers on this,
but it is worth saying that these accounts do come
from both sides of the aisle. They are not exclusively
political accounts. Sometimes they're just accounts to post sort of
viral content or content that goes wide on that platform.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
The bigger picture here really.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
Is that since Elon Musk took over the platform, there's
been really an intense effort to monetize viral posts. So
if you post something that a lot of people like
or reshare, you can make a couple bucks off that,
And to you or me, that's just a couple bucks,
it's not really that much, but in developing countries specifically,
that can actually amount to quite a lot of money.
So there's this incentive structure at X to create viral content.
(10:39):
I think the reason that we're talking about in the
context of politics, is that when you post something about
politics on social media, generally speaking, that does get a
lot of engagement, not always get good engagement, but any
engagement does equal dollars. And I think that's exactly why
you're seeing this happen right now.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
Is Musk making money on X? I know you overpaid
for it ridiculously, but has it turned out and monetize
enough to where at least is not burning through money.
Speaker 3 (11:04):
It's an interesting question. Again, we don't have a ton
of insight into his personal finances when it comes to
this company, although you're correct to say that he did
overpay by quite a hefty margin the tens of billions
when it comes to purchasing this platform back in twenty
twenty three.
Speaker 2 (11:19):
But another sort.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
Of interesting data point that people might not be paying
attention to is that despite the fact that we talked
about how the changes that Elon Musk made to X
drove this exodus from the platform, a lot of people stopping,
you know, using that platform because they didn't agree with
the policies of Elon Musk, a lot of advertisers leaving,
a lot of those advertisers have actually come back in
the years since, and a recent Pew survey found that
(11:41):
more than one in five Americans still use x formerly Twitter,
while the competitors that we talk about a lot, things
like Threads and Blue Sky, they remain comparatively bit.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
Players in this space.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
So despite all the talk about it, they do remain
a pretty hefty, you know, force in the world of
social media.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
Mike, thank you, We'll talk again. Always great stuff. I
have a good day YouTube.
Speaker 2 (12:05):
Take it.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
Yeah, Happy Thanksgiving. That's what you're supposed to say, isn't it.
That's what they tell me now. Drunk airline passengers, Right,
We've all experienced someone drunk on an airplane, every one
of us. And I've always wondered why no one takes
(12:25):
it that seriously. University of Texas at Dallas criminality professor
A Lynn Vieriitis analyze year's worth of in flight passenger
incidents and here's what she found. She went through sixteen
hundred complaints by the way file with the Aviation Safety
(12:46):
Reporting System and broke down reports about passengers and in
different categories verbal abuse, physical abuse, physical violence, sexual harassment.
So here's what she gets into. People getting into fights,
are aging with each other, not putting luggage away, not
listening to directions. Alcohol, sexual assault, and the harassment. Alcohol
(13:11):
the overwhelming thing reported in all of these narratives. Alcohol.
People get drunk on airplanes and these flight attendants have
to deal with it. Now, I have a question, you
know what they do. Have you ever seen have you
ever been on an airplane when someone has taken off
the plane and I have who is drunk? And you
(13:31):
see this all the time on the news, So someone
is plastered right the plane diverts because someone is unruly,
local police pick them up and then take haul them
away and do whatever they can. You know, it is
a federal crime to interfere with the flight crew. It's
a federal offense up to twenty years in prison and
(13:54):
a two hundred and fifty thousand dollars fine, and they
never use that. You want a safe airplane when the
flight crew goes, here's how the seat belt works, as
if we're all completing morons and we don't know how
a seat belt works. And you click it here and
you unhook it there, and then uh, you know, they
(14:15):
point out the exits always with two fingers and both arms.
You ever noticed that and telling you where the exits
are well, and they tell you you can't smoke in
the lavatories. Why wouldn't they add? And by the way,
if you interfere with the flight crew, it's twenty years
(14:38):
in prison and two hundred and fifty thousand dollars and
have the FBI haul them off? Have the federal authorities
have It's not like they're gonna run, No, they're they're
on the airplane, the plane lands, and as a matter
of fact, I've been there where the pilot has said everybody,
please remain seated while we deal with an unruly PA.
(15:03):
They don't do that. But is it just about the
effect that they're making money from here?
Speaker 3 (15:08):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (15:09):
It is. No, there's no question they're making a ton
of money with alcohol, but so do restaurants. Certainly bars do.
The problem is you're at thirty thousand feet, so how
do you kick someone off an airplane? The point is
that is dangerous for these people to interfere with the
flight crew. I mean the flight crew primarily is there
(15:29):
while they serve drinks and they serve food, and you know,
they sell you watches over priced watches and stuff. They're
there where they're trained is for safety. That's what it's
about and interfering with them under any circumstances. I've never
understood why local police haul people off. I just don't
get it. And there I don't know if anybody has
(15:51):
been hit with a and maybe we can look this up.
Has there ever been a drunk passenger hit with the
maximum of twenty years in prison in a two hundred
and fifty thousand dollars fine for interfering with a flight crew.
I mean, it has to be a pretty serious interference.
But you know, there are people that have to be
zip tied now, trying to open the door mid flight,
(16:14):
assaulting people, you know, getting into fights, getting into fights,
kicking steward eye around. Okay, we're done with that now.
There is a survey survey says it was a survey
according to the American Family Survey, the moving this for
(16:35):
eleven years already. And one of the questions asked is
what do you think raising children is about financially? And
most Americans think it's unaffordable, that's all. That's it. Finances
the major factor in determining family size or even having
(16:56):
a family. Seven to ten responds they believe raising kids
is too expensive, which is a thirteen point percentage point
jump from last year. Yeah, and as the first time
in the eleven year run that finances were the top
reason they capped or planned to cap the size of
their family twice as often as any other factor. And
(17:20):
why is that? What simply mirrors the cost of living?
It is just so expensive to live. How many people
have had kids and diapers? The cost of pampers or
something close to that. Look it up, thousands and thousands
of dollars just for the pampers, much less everything else,
(17:44):
cost of babysitters over the years. I mean, it's just
insanely expensive, and it's costing us. It's costing us in
terms of the number of people we have, in terms
of our demographics, in terms of our population increase. And
the only reason that our population in the United States
(18:04):
is either flat or increasing by a hair is immigration.
Let's it straight out, immigration, both legal and illegal. And
why Well, because people aren't women aren't having kids. The
average now is one point six kids per woman. You
need two point one kids to maintain the population. It
(18:29):
just isn't making any sense. The numbers just don't go
in the right direction. Now, there is something called a
natalist philosophy which simply says more kids. JD. Fans is
a big one on this. We need more kids, I
guess to an extent, he's right. The problem is we
have to afford more kids. And how do you do that? Well,
(18:53):
for example, New Mexico, there's a pilot program it offers
free childcare regardless of income. Oh and how much is childcare?
How many people where one of the spouses simply doesn't
work gives up a career to stay home with the child,
not because they love being at home parents or love
(19:16):
at home learning at home schooling. It's because childcare is
so expensive they simply can't afford it. And you know
my kids, I mean, God bless them. Do I love
my kids? Yeah? Absolutely? Would I have them again? Yeah?
(19:38):
I would because I really love my kids. Although I
have to tell you, as you know, I am pro
choice and have been fanatically so for many, many years.
And when my kids were born, I had people in
my life say, Bill, you're gonna think very differently about
your position of being pro choice when your kids are
(20:00):
were born or are to be born. And I said, yep,
and I became more pro choice, But that was only
for the money part of it. Okay, the rest of it.
Love my kids, love the credit cards. They love my
credit cards being used by my kids, Love taking them
(20:20):
on vacation, Love them to death. What if pro choice
was the choice of everybody else, Like we looked at
the parents and go, nah, we don't want them to
We don't want them to spawn. Oh yes, spawn, thank
you very much. You know there actually should be of course,
never going to happen, because you're talking fundamental constitutional rights.
(20:41):
But I would love to see licensing that you go
in front of a board to get a license to
raise kids, to have kids. You know how many of
us would just go, ah, ain't gonna happen. You know,
it's like getting a what do you call it, a
barber's license? A haircutting license? Right, you need fifteen hundred
hours to be able to cut hair. That's licensing, not
(21:02):
for having kids. I don't get it. All right, We're done, guys.
You've been listening to The Bill Handle Show. Catch My
Show Monday through Friday six am to nine am, and
anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app.
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