May 19, 2025 • 32 mins
A Democratic influencer got a home visit from the Secret Service and is now crying foul. What really happened here? I break it down in this episode of the Brad vs Everyone podcast. Plus, Democratic TikTok stars exploit Biden's cancer diagnosis to shut down debate, a woke author gets cancelled by his own side, and Trump's tariff war with Walmart gets... weird.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Trump administration just had a US Secret Service come
to my house.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
This is fascism at its finest.
Speaker 3 (00:06):
A liberal influencer trolled Trump in an intentionally antagonistic way
and it backfired spectacularly. We're going to break this down,
plus so much more from Democrat TikTok stars exploiting a
health tragedy, to a bizarre cancel culture story on Instagram,
(00:31):
and a Trump tweet that involves some interesting map. All
this and so much more is coming up on today's
episode of The Bread Versus Everyone podcast, my daily show
where we take on the craziest ideas across the Internet,
our media, and our politics from an independent perspect up. First,
we got to check in with a very liberal Democratic
(00:51):
influencer named Ed Crassensteign. You may have heard of him
and his brother before. They're both pretty popular on the internet.
Very typical kind of Team Blue guys who engage a
lot on Twitter particularly, but also TikTok, Substack and other platforms.
Speaker 4 (01:08):
Well.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
Ed Krasenstein just ended up with the Secret Service knocking
on his door because he trolled the Trump administration in
a obviously inflammatory way and they interpreted it as a threat.
Let's take a list into the first part of his
video that since gone viral, explaining what happened so moments ago.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
The Trump administration just had the US Secret Service come
to my house. You might be wondering why, because yesterday
I made a post that said eight six four seven,
which means, if you look it up, get rid of Trump,
as in impeach Donald Trump, as in twenty fifth Amendment
Donald Trump, as in vote Trump out of all.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
Why you may ask, because.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
Last night on the news, Donald Trump made the claim
that eighty six forty seven means assassinate him, which it doesn't.
I would absolutely never ever call of violence against anyone,
let alone the president of the United States. So the
seper Serves agents were extremely friendly.
Speaker 2 (02:06):
They were like, yeah, we understand.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
It's just something we have to do because Washington told
us to Washington told them to come give me a visit.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
That's what he says.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
So, guys, the context here is a big story in
the news right now where the former director of the FBI,
James Comey, who is an interesting individual, shall we say,
with a long partisan past, posted something on Instagram that
he came across on his walk along the beach some
shells that said eighty six forty seven, eighty six being slang,
(02:38):
and then forty seven referring to Trump, the forty seventh
president of the United States, And this prompted this huge
scandal over whether this was a call for the death
of Trump, because, depending on the context, the phrase eighty
seven something can be used to refer to getting rid
of something, like in a kitchen or a restaurant, they'll say,
(02:58):
eighty six the pie off the menu, you were out
of pie, or like you might say, if somebody gets
kicked out of a club, oh, the bouncer eighty six
to him. That's one form of this slang, but it's
also used in like a mafia setting at times to
be like eighty six, like take him out. So it's
kind of inflammatory rhetoric that is at least ambiguous in
(03:19):
its implications. And look, I think at a time when
political violence, support for political violence is on the rise,
and at a time when the president President Trump faced
two assassination attempts, it is not responsible to use your
public platform like that, especially as a former high level
government official. And I think we all know what Ed
(03:40):
was doing when he was trying to hop in on
this game for Internet attention and say this edgy thing
that people were interpreting as a call for violence. He
knew that it would get him the attention that he ordered,
and it did. The Secret Service showed up at his house,
interviewed him, asked him some questions, realized he wasn't a threat,
and then left. So now let's look at the second
(04:02):
part of Ed's videos about this saga, where he explains
the ramifications of this visit from the Secret Service that
he got and spoiler alert, it's incredibly dramatic.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
Trump wants to be a dictator and I will not
be intimidated into not voicing my opinions or my dissent
against him. Ever, this is what happens in fastest governments.
It's what dictators do in order to intimidate dissenters into
keeping quiet.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
This is fascism at his finest.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
They redefine the terms and then use those new definitions
to go after dissenters and squash anybody that has an
opinion different from Trump. They interrogate them, intimidate them, and
hope that that intimidation stops them from making posts on
social media. We need to vote out fascism in twenty
twenty six.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
Not him putting up Hitler and putin as the background. Dude,
the drama is off the charts. You are not the
new A Frank. Okay, look, they did not squash your voice.
They came to your house and asked you a few questions.
So the mellow drama here is a little bit out
(05:08):
of control for me. That said, I actually do think
it was wrong for the Secret Service to go to
his house and investigate him for this, And I'll explain why.
When Ed posted his tweet eighty six forty seven with
pool balls is spelling out that message, he followed it
up very shortly after with a second tweet that said,
for the record, I am one hundred percent against violence
(05:30):
in any form. Stopped creating bogus meanings to try and
investigate your political opponents. Eighty six forty seven means remove
Trump from office. If you are creating any other meaning,
you are the ones who are going to end up
inciting the violence. Now, I still do think that Ed
knew what he was doing when he posted this, and
knew that it was going to upset people, and I
think that's why he posted it. I also think, as
(05:52):
outraged as he sounds, He also is kind of happy
the Secret Service came to his house over this, because
it gives him, you know, a chance to go viral
and talk about it, and his TikTok got tons of views,
his tweets about to have millions of views and all
of that. If your content creator is good stuff, I'll set.
But I actually do fundamentally agree that it is inappropriate
for the Secret Service to follow up to his house
(06:14):
like this, because they came almost a day after he
posted that tweet, explaining that his tweet was not a
call for violence, was not a threat against the Trump presidency,
and that he simply wanted to say get rid of Trump,
remove him, impeach him. And whether you agree with that
or not, that's totally free speech. He's well within his
right to say it, and Secret Service should not be
doing house calls over that kind of boiler plate political speech.
(06:39):
It is inappropriate, and obviously we can't confirm this, but
if Washington ordered this, then I think that's an overstep,
and I do think it is a little bit chilling.
It could have a chilling effect on people feeling free
to speak out online if the Secret Service may show
up at their door for something they posted that they
clarified was not meant in a violent way. While well,
(07:00):
I certainly think ed here is being incredibly dramatic, He's
not entirely wrong that this is inappropriate from the Trump
administration if it all played out how he said it
played out. And I have to point out some hypocrisy
here and some clear confusions about the law from the
Trump administration. For example, Director of National Intelligence Telsey Gabbert,
(07:20):
a very high ranking Trump official, said this on television
about James Comy's original eight six four seven posts.
Speaker 5 (07:27):
This is the guy who's issuing a hit on President Trump,
the president that the American people voted for. Do believe
Komy should be in jail. I do any other person
with the position of influence that he has, people who
take very seriously what a guy of his stature, his experience,
(07:47):
and what the propaganda media has built him up to be.
I'm very concerned for the President's life. We've already seen
assassination attempts. I'm very concerned for his life, and James Comy,
in my view, should be held accountable and put behind
bars for this.
Speaker 3 (08:03):
This is really wrong. James Comey's post is not calling
a hit out on the President, and he can't be
prosecuted or jealed over a First Amendment protected thing that
he posted on Instagram. We can criticize him for it,
we can say it's reckless, it's irresponsible, it's inflammatory, and
I absolutely do say all of that. But even if
(08:24):
you look at the Dictionary definition of eighty six the
slang from Miriam Webster, it says that it originates in
the food service industry and is slang meaning to throw out,
get rid of, or refuse service to, although they do
note that it's sometimes used to mean to kill or
they do say that it's a pretty rare usage of
the term. So you can't prosecute someone for speech that
(08:46):
has a pretty plausible and clear, totally legal, not at
all violent implication. And Republicans themselves have used this exact
kind of language many times. In February of twenty twenty four,
former Congressman Matt Gates, for example, tweeted, we've now eighty
six McCarthy McDaniel McConnell. Better days are ahead for the
(09:06):
Republican Party, and he was referring to politicians that they
had removed from their positions or gotten to step down
obviously not referring to violence in any way. Meanwhile, this
might be the most glaring hypocrisy I've ever seen. The
far right influencer Jack Pisibiak tweeted after this thing happened
with Comy, the former director of the FBI is calling
(09:26):
for left wing assassins to target our president and kill him.
Have no idea why he hasn't been arrested yet. Now
what makes this hypocritical and ironic beyond belief is that
Jack Pisibiac himself in twenty twenty two, when Biden was president,
wrote in a tweet eighty six forty six, referring to
Joe Biden, Notably he was not arrested at the time.
(09:48):
Secret Service did not go to his house, and by
his own standards, apparently he should have been jailed. Now,
in reality, nothing should have happened to him, because, like
I said, as inflammatory as this rhetoric may be, and
I have called time and time again for us to
take down the temperature, it is First Amendment protected free speech.
You don't just have to take my word for it.
The nonpartisan Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression FIRE, the
(10:11):
nation's premier free speech legal organization, which disclaimer I do
a little bit of freelance work for said this in
a statement Former FBI director James Comy is now deleted
eighty six forty seven social media post is political speech
protected by the First Amendment. It neither constitutes a true
threat nor merits federal investigation, and there is Supreme Court
precedent to prove it. So this is like a basic
(10:32):
thing that seems to get lost in so much of
our political discourse these days. But two things can be
true at the same time, that trolling and inflammatory rhetoric
should be called out and really should be stopped on
both sides of the aisle. But also unless it meets
a very very high bar and crosses some bright red
lines that were not crossed in any of these cases
(10:53):
we're talking about, it's not a criminal matter, and like
it or not, it's protected by the free First Amendment,
and it's protected free speech, which means federal law enforcement
should not be getting involved. That's my take. But what
do you guys think. Do you feel sympathy for Ed
Krasenstein here or do you think he kind of brought
this on himself. Let me know in the comments, and
please do hit that like button and make sure you're subscribed.
(11:15):
While you're at it, remember guys to send in voice
notes for my Friday episodes where I react to your
woke horror stories and your personal situations and give you
my advice. Remember to also subscribe to my new second channel,
where I'm uploading tons of bonus content up next Today's
Day that ends in why so Democrat TikTokers are exploiting
a tragedy. We just got the very sad news that
(11:37):
former President Biden has advanced prostate cancer, and of course,
like me and basically every all good natured people just
wish him the best, wish him a good recovery. I
will say this, a few people on x I saw
like basically happy that he's sick or something. And if
you ever find yourself rooting for cancer partisan politics, tribalism
(12:00):
may have broken your brain. But also if you start
exploiting a cancer diagnosis to achieve political ends or shut
down inconvenient political narratives like several prominent Democratic tic dookers did,
that's also not good and not going to work. For example,
here's a video from the Democratic strategist and influencer Olivia Juliana.
Speaker 6 (12:19):
It's every single one of those democratic figures who has
spent the last few weeks going after Biden. I hope
that you feel the weight of how much of a
piece of trash you actually are, because now you haven't
just been going after someone who is no longer an
elected office, who no longer has power. You've been going
after a grandfather who has an extremely aggressive form of cancer,
(12:41):
who is probably trying to live out the rest of
his days with his family. And instead of spending your
time and using your platforms to talk about the guy
who is cutting research funding to kids with cancer and
deporting children with cancer, you're going after the guy who
is no longer in the White House. And that's why
(13:02):
I have no tolerance for this bullshit anymore. Leave Joe
by no loan, move on past twenty twenty four, and
focus on the shit that we're dealing with right now
in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
So this is wild to me because this influencer, who
is clearly a Biden fangirl, is suggesting that people should
feel bad for having criticized the Biden administration and their
cover up of his clear cognitive decline because it turns
out he has cancer. But of course I don't even
agree with that logic. But even if you did, well,
no one knew he had cancer until he just revealed it.
(13:34):
So how are they supposed to account for that in
their criticisms and commentary when they didn't even know about
this fact? That doesn't even make sense. And more importantly,
as much as I wish him the best and hope
that he can recover from this, and my heart goes
out to his family, you don't get a pass on
a massive scandal and abuse of power that I think
(13:54):
imperiled our national security, the fact that our president was
in severe cognitive decline, and theyvered it up and worked
to push false narratives and official after official and media
personality after media personality came on TV or on air
or in front of reporters and insisted that nothing to
see here, it's all just Republican misinformation. Well, guess what
(14:15):
when you have a president who's not up to the job,
who forgets lifelong friends and gets confused about basic facts
that imperilsl our national security because at any moment, he
could be called into the situation room and have to
make even at four in the morning, have to make
a decision that affects literally the fate of the human
race when it comes to nuclear weapons or something like that. So, no,
(14:37):
it's very sad that Biden has cancer, but we're not
going to just shut up and never criticize his administration
or the lies and the deceit again because he's sick.
That's not a get out of jail free card for
everything that you did wrong in your life, nor should
it be. But another Democratic TikTok star Harry Sisson, had
a similar argument in a video he put out, let's
(14:58):
take a look at that.
Speaker 7 (14:59):
So Biden was just diagnosed with an aggressive form of
prostate cancer. It's also metastasized into his bones, which is
incredibly concerning and incredibly heartbreaking. So I wanted to take
this opportunity to say shame on anyone, and I mean
anyone who continues to beat up on Joe Biden. This
man is no longer an elected official. He has dedicated
(15:21):
his life to public service, whether you agree with him
or not, and he is a father, a grandfather, and
a man with cancer who wants to live out the
rest of his life with his family. But right now
we have conservatives and people in the media profiting off
of writing books about commentating on this man's health, and
(15:42):
to anybody doing that, shame on you.
Speaker 3 (15:45):
So I really just reject this framing entirely. I mean,
Democrats never had the same energy, nor should they have
to be clear about just moving on and no longer
discussing former President Trump's alleged misdeeds and alleged crimes after
his first term. Even oh, he's a father and a grandfather,
that's just kind of irrelevant. I mean, well, he's no
longer in power. Just move on and talk about what's
(16:07):
happening now. I mean, none of y'all had that energy
in twenty twenty one, twenty twenty two, twenty twenty three
when you continue to go after Trump for the things
that he did or didn't, I mean, depending how you
view the different allegations did wrong in his first term
as president. And to be clear, I don't think you should.
I don't think like a term ends in. Just everything's
the past, let it all go. But by your own
logic you should have see how that doesn't make sense.
(16:29):
And again, you don't get to just negate this whole
very serious controversy and cover up just because he's sick. Now,
in fact, this actually raises even more questions about this
cover up, because according to medical experts, it is unlikely
that they really just discovered this cancer. Now, he certainly
(16:51):
had this cancer already when he was president, and if
they somehow didn't know about it, then that's a scandal
in and of itself because he has the best medical
care there is. He's supposed to have the best medical
care and a whole team of doctors and nurses attending
to him, and they should have caught it. And then
if he did know and they just covered it up,
that's another issue that should be raised. So if Harry
thinks that this means we're going to move on from
(17:14):
discussing Biden's health, no, no, no, it means the opposite.
And I want to be clear, I'm not a doctor,
I'm not an oncologist. But the questions I'm raising about
the cancer and the timeline here are being raised by
many serious, nonpartisan, non ideological medical professionals. Just listen to
this clip of a doctor on News Nation.
Speaker 4 (17:31):
It's very unusual to hear that someone has prossy cancer
where they're annually being followed up, and the fact that
we just find it at a glease of nine is
just pretty much unheard of in this day and age
of medicine, even in the you know, even in an
inner city populations, right, And you're saying, even.
Speaker 8 (17:54):
In a medically neglected population, it would be surprising to
have a surprise diagnosim diagnosis with a Gleason score of nine.
So you're saying that, certainly, as you're serving in the
Oval office, you believe that he knew that he had
prostate cancer, and even potentially as he was running in
twenty twenty before he assumed office.
Speaker 4 (18:14):
Well, most likely he had prostate cancer for a long time,
and the aggressive prostate cancers such as this at age
eighty grows over a long period of time. I mean
usually it takes from the first diagnosis of prostate cancer
to spread would take five to ten years.
Speaker 8 (18:34):
So to be very clear, you believe he was silently
secretly battling this for at least five years.
Speaker 4 (18:41):
Well, I think that's yet to be seen. I mean,
it would be very surprising, like I said earlier, for
him to have prostate cancer at least in nine spread
to bone without without being neglected medically. So the fact
that he was seen medically every year, I think there's
there's definitely evidence that he probably knew about this for
(19:03):
a while.
Speaker 3 (19:03):
So no, we are not going to be moving on
from discussing Biden's health after this, and you're not going
to emotionally blackmail or shame us into doing so. I
understand that for Democratic partisans like Harry and like Olivia,
it would be very convenient if nobody talked about the
massive scandals that they may have even participated in in
terms of denying Biden's clear cognitive decline. But we are
(19:25):
not going to move on so quickly. There's still a
lot of reckoning and accountability that needs to happen. And
while Biden's cancer diagnosis is really sad and I genuinely
do wish him all the best, I'm not going to
cave to the emotional blackmail of that meaning we can
no longer criticize what happened while he was president or
his scandals. And I don't think most Americans are going
(19:46):
to buy that narrative either. What do you guys think?
Let me know in the comments. Up next, we're going
to check in on the woke world of Instagram, in
particular threads the kind of Twitter clone that Instagram created
that I personally don't really use very much. But I
heard about this crazy story from Katie Hertzog on the
Blocked and Reported podcast, one of my favorite podcasts that
(20:07):
you guys have to subscribe to if you don't already,
because the famous author Stephen King is facing tons of
backlash right now on Instagram threads in one of the
most absurd and farcical sagas I've seen in a minute.
For context, guys, I've always really liked Stephen King's books.
I like fantasy, I like science fiction, so I've read
a bunch of his books over the years. But he,
(20:28):
politically speaking, has been very outspoken, and I have always
found him to be very simplistic and trite and partisan
and kind of hysterical because he is a hardcore like
resistance lib like Trump is evil, just kind of a
reliable team blue commentator who I've never found particularly interesting
and has just you know, always just bashed Trump, just
(20:50):
adopted the typical liberal position and what have you. But
now he is getting canceled by his own side, because
you can never ever ever be woken off. So people,
especially very online progressives, what did he do that was
so horrible? Well, he dared to write this very lame
joke on Instagram threads. Why did Donald Trump cross the
(21:11):
road to see Haitians eating pets on the other side?
So this is not really funny, but it's clearly supposed
to be a joke about Trump, Trump being the butt
of the joke, and how Trump claimed that there were
Haitians eating dogs and pets in Springfield, Ohio, even though
there was no evidence of that. So like a very
lame joke, but clearly one intended to mock Donald Trump,
(21:34):
not Haitian immigrants. But of course the wokes goolds on
Instagram threads acted like he just did a hate crime
against Haitian immigrants. The replies to his original post are
something to be whole. Why are you making racist jokes? Welp,
that's the end of you. And this is why this
generation of Haitians really need to reach back into our
(21:56):
ancestral voodoo bag. Because Stephen King should be choking on
his own tongue right now. Oh well, that woman seems
lovely and stable. Another person wrote, leave Haitians alone, sir,
go write a book on the real villain, white supremacy.
Another person wrote in a comment replying to Stephen it's
disappointing to see Stephen King using immature humor instead of
(22:19):
thoughtful political discussion. His words fuel harmful stereotypes rather than
encouraging understanding. A voice like his could be used more constructively.
Fame does not equate to wisdom, integrity, or thoughtful discourse.
A well known name doesn't automatically make someone insightful or
responsible in how they use their platform. Is it just
me or was that last reply giving Ai wrote that,
(22:41):
and I even agree with parts of it, But I
just don't agree that Stephen King was fueling harmful stereotypes.
If anything, he was trying to highlight what he sees
as the absurdity of these untrue stereotypes to attack Trump.
I just don't know how anyone can look at that
post and think it's meant to mock hatians. To his credit,
Stephen King defended himself and said the joke was about Trump.
If you don't get that, you should see a doctor
(23:02):
and get your sense of humor checked. To me, that's
indicative of maybe a little bit of a vibe shift.
I can imagine in twenty twenty, in the old era
of like woke Twitter mobs, Stephen King like groveling and
apologizing when he's accused of racism rather than defending himself,
and to the extent of the culture has shifted in
that sense where people no longer instantly caved to outrageous
and ridiculous accusations of racism. That's a good thing, but
(23:23):
still the backlash and Katie covered this on the podcast,
so I went and looked into it, and really it
was even worse than I expected. On Instagram threads, the
discourse about Stephen King was just absolutely unhinged that emerged
all because of this one little innocent post. One person
named the leftist Lawyer wrote, what Stephen King said was
(23:43):
racist and wrong, full stop. Defending it is wrong, full stop.
No one is forcing you to defend him, just don't.
And no one is canceling him by saying he did
something wrong and gross and should apologize. It's called accountability.
If he won't take accountability for his act, he's canceling himself.
This woman helpfully added at this point, if you're white
(24:05):
and defending Stephen King's joke in my mentions, I'm blocking you.
My page is a safe space for marginalized people. Broh. Seriously,
we're still doing safe spaces in twenty twenty five, and
how do people not realize how incredibly condescending this is
to your minority followers, saying they need to be protected
(24:25):
from anybody arguing that this obvious joke wasn't racist, as
if what you think the racial minorities that follow you
are like mentally toddlers who need their emotions protected by you,
the bold, brave, stunning white savior. Gosh, the cringe and
condescension is off the charts. Another person wrote, y'all if
Stephen King put on blackface to make fun of Trump,
(24:46):
would you get why it's anti black racism? A white
man telling a shitty joke that relies on anti black content,
no matter the context or intention, always fuels anti blackness.
Telling Black people they are for not getting it only
exposes your racism. I am so tired. I can't believe
that people still actually speak and think this way in
(25:09):
the Year of Our Lord twenty twenty five. Joking about
the Haitians eating pets meme is not, in fact equivalent
to doing blackface. That's absurd. And when your argument relies
on the statement, regardless of any context or intention, this
thing is bad and harmful you've just revealed that you're
(25:29):
just looking to be offended for its own sake, because actually,
context and intent are incredibly important when we're determining whether
something is actually harmful or shouldn't be said. And I
love this idea that you can't disagree with black people
without you being racist, and this absurd idea that all
black people must be offended and outraged by Stephen King's posts.
(25:50):
I mean, maybe a lot on Instagram threads are, but
that is not a representative sample. That is a tiny,
tiny liberal bubble of a slice of people who are
probably journalists or or something like that. So you're speaking
for a black community that would largely not agree with you,
and then weaponizing race to just smear anybody who questions you.
Are we back in twenty twenty, y'all? Another crazy post
(26:13):
reads Stephen King is another example of what happens when
white liberals are more concerned with dunking on bigots than
helping racialized communities. They engage in bigotry themselves and end
up hurting the racialized communities they profess to care for.
Figure out your shit and your goals already, I would
really love to know. Please explain to me in depth.
(26:35):
Walk me through from point A to point B to
point C how Stephen King's joke on Instagram threads harms
racialized communities. Please take me to one of these communities.
I will pay our travel both ways, ma'am. Take me
to one of these communities and show me how it
was harmed by this joke. Show me on the doll
where the joke harmed you, babe, Like this is absurd,
(26:57):
It's just not true. And ah, I just over and
over again, I keep encountering these stories that really prove
to me that the progressive online left, at least we've
heard noises from leading figures in the Democratic Party, but
the actual online base has not moved on from the
unhinged identitarian and cancel culture and woke politics that hamstrung
(27:21):
the Democratic Party for years that most Americans find insufferable.
They're still engaging in this kind of circular firing squad
of constantly trying to cancel each other and play victim
oppression Olympics, and to normal people, even to radical liberals
like Stephen King, it comes off as incredibly unhinged and unpleasant.
(27:42):
But other than that, though, things are going amazing over
on Instagram threads. Gee, I wonder why their users and
view numbers and traffic is plummeting. I'm just shocked by that, y'all,
absolutely shocked. What do you guys think. Are you surprised
to see progressive still acting like this on the internet
or are you not act shocked at all? Let me
know in the comments. Up next, we got to talk
(28:03):
about this because Trump is fighting with Walmart and it's
getting weird. Let's take a listen to some reporting from CNN.
Speaker 9 (28:09):
President Trump a short time ago telling Walmart that the
company should quoting now eat the cost end quote of
higher tariffs. The comments come after the retail giants said
this week that it would raise prices because of Trump's
tariffs being too high. Walmart has more than forty six
hundred stores in the US. It's also the biggest private
(28:30):
employer in the country, with one point six million workers.
Several countries that supply Walmart include China, and they're facing
terriffs between ten and thirty percent right now.
Speaker 3 (28:41):
So it's funny to me to see Trump telling Walmart
to eat the tariffs. What he means is that they
should absorb the cost of their tariffs and just take
the loss from their profits not raise prices for consumers.
But what's so funny about that to me is that
Trump told us over and over and over again that
there are no costs for America because foreign countries pay
(29:04):
the tariffs. But now he's telling Walmart to eat the
costs rather than passing them on to consumers. Do you guys,
see how those two things can't be true all at once.
Either all the costs are born by foreign countries like
you said, which I've always thought was not true, or
there are costs and American companies have to figure out
how to deal with them. Now, that second scenario has
always been true, but the Trump administration has suggested otherwise,
(29:26):
and now his own comments are acknowledging the truth of
the matter. But more importantly, it's actually not possible for
Walmart to just eat the tariffs and absorb all the costs.
They run on very slim profit margins of just two
to three percent, and the total cost of the tariffs
would potentially eat up all of the profit that they
do run. They go. Listen to this explanation from an
(29:47):
expert in supply chain logistics on CNN.
Speaker 10 (29:50):
About third of Walmart's products are subject to tariffs. Tariffs
used to be about one percent on the average of
all the countries is probably going to go out with
the dots to fifteen percent. Their net profit margin is
less than three percent, so if they eat these tariffs,
they will actually lose money. So Walmart will figure it out.
Companies like Amazon will figure it out. It's some of
(30:12):
those other retailers that are really going to struggle. But
even a giant and efficient giant like Walmart has a
very difficult time absorbing these tariffs.
Speaker 3 (30:21):
So, like the math is not even really mathematically possible
that they could just absorb these huge costs and just
take it out of their profits without passing anything on
to consumers. But even if they were to do that,
there would still be tremendous downsides because when people hear profits,
they think that, oh, that's just the money that the
big wigs are stuffing into their pockets and paying themselves
(30:42):
in bonuses and all that, And of course some of
that is what it is, but profits at a place
like Walmart are also used to reinvest in expansions, building
new stores, hiring new people, growing the company, expanding the
brand into new lanes and new areas. Sometimes profits are
reinvested into rap seeing employee wages and benefits to attract
(31:02):
new workers and competitive hiring times. And then even when
the money is just sent out in different forms of
shareholder returns, that's then money that they go spend and
invest somewhere else. So even if they were to absorb
all the costs of the tariffs, there would still be
significant economic harm that's being lost out on and of
course they can't even mathematically do it. The truth is
(31:23):
that maybe you support President Trump's tariffs. I'm a free
trade person. I've been against it from the start. But
if you do support it, you at least have to
acknowledge that there are serious costs and trade offs. Maybe
you think it will be worth it in the end,
but you cannot pretend. And President Trump has tried to
pretend this, but it's quickly falling apart before his eyes,
(31:43):
to the point where he's basically admitting it that there
are real downsides and real costs associated with these policies,
and some of it is going to be born by Americans.
There's just no escaping that. Inconvenient fact, what do you
guys think to agree with Trump on this? Do let
me know in the comments. All right, guys, that'll be
in for this episode of the Brad Versus Everyone Podcast.
(32:04):
Thank you all so much for tuning in. Please do
make sure you're subscribe. If you aren't yet, do it
that leg button before you go comm with your thoughts.
YadA YadA yah. Make sure to send me some voice
notes for my Friday episode. Subscribe to my second channel
all that linked in the description, and with that we'll
talk again real soon.
Speaker 9 (32:20):
Alright,
The Trump administration just had a US Secret Service come
to my house.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
This is fascism at its finest.
Speaker 3 (00:06):
A liberal influencer trolled Trump in an intentionally antagonistic way
and it backfired spectacularly. We're going to break this down,
plus so much more from Democrat TikTok stars exploiting a
health tragedy, to a bizarre cancel culture story on Instagram,
(00:31):
and a Trump tweet that involves some interesting map. All
this and so much more is coming up on today's
episode of The Bread Versus Everyone podcast, my daily show
where we take on the craziest ideas across the Internet,
our media, and our politics from an independent perspect up. First,
we got to check in with a very liberal Democratic
(00:51):
influencer named Ed Crassensteign. You may have heard of him
and his brother before. They're both pretty popular on the internet.
Very typical kind of Team Blue guys who engage a
lot on Twitter particularly, but also TikTok, Substack and other platforms.
Speaker 4 (01:08):
Well.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
Ed Krasenstein just ended up with the Secret Service knocking
on his door because he trolled the Trump administration in
a obviously inflammatory way and they interpreted it as a threat.
Let's take a list into the first part of his
video that since gone viral, explaining what happened so moments ago.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
The Trump administration just had the US Secret Service come
to my house. You might be wondering why, because yesterday
I made a post that said eight six four seven,
which means, if you look it up, get rid of Trump,
as in impeach Donald Trump, as in twenty fifth Amendment
Donald Trump, as in vote Trump out of all.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
Why you may ask, because.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
Last night on the news, Donald Trump made the claim
that eighty six forty seven means assassinate him, which it doesn't.
I would absolutely never ever call of violence against anyone,
let alone the president of the United States. So the
seper Serves agents were extremely friendly.
Speaker 2 (02:06):
They were like, yeah, we understand.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
It's just something we have to do because Washington told
us to Washington told them to come give me a visit.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
That's what he says.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
So, guys, the context here is a big story in
the news right now where the former director of the FBI,
James Comey, who is an interesting individual, shall we say,
with a long partisan past, posted something on Instagram that
he came across on his walk along the beach some
shells that said eighty six forty seven, eighty six being slang,
(02:38):
and then forty seven referring to Trump, the forty seventh
president of the United States, And this prompted this huge
scandal over whether this was a call for the death
of Trump, because, depending on the context, the phrase eighty
seven something can be used to refer to getting rid
of something, like in a kitchen or a restaurant, they'll say,
(02:58):
eighty six the pie off the menu, you were out
of pie, or like you might say, if somebody gets
kicked out of a club, oh, the bouncer eighty six
to him. That's one form of this slang, but it's
also used in like a mafia setting at times to
be like eighty six, like take him out. So it's
kind of inflammatory rhetoric that is at least ambiguous in
(03:19):
its implications. And look, I think at a time when
political violence, support for political violence is on the rise,
and at a time when the president President Trump faced
two assassination attempts, it is not responsible to use your
public platform like that, especially as a former high level
government official. And I think we all know what Ed
(03:40):
was doing when he was trying to hop in on
this game for Internet attention and say this edgy thing
that people were interpreting as a call for violence. He
knew that it would get him the attention that he ordered,
and it did. The Secret Service showed up at his house,
interviewed him, asked him some questions, realized he wasn't a threat,
and then left. So now let's look at the second
(04:02):
part of Ed's videos about this saga, where he explains
the ramifications of this visit from the Secret Service that
he got and spoiler alert, it's incredibly dramatic.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
Trump wants to be a dictator and I will not
be intimidated into not voicing my opinions or my dissent
against him. Ever, this is what happens in fastest governments.
It's what dictators do in order to intimidate dissenters into
keeping quiet.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
This is fascism at his finest.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
They redefine the terms and then use those new definitions
to go after dissenters and squash anybody that has an
opinion different from Trump. They interrogate them, intimidate them, and
hope that that intimidation stops them from making posts on
social media. We need to vote out fascism in twenty
twenty six.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
Not him putting up Hitler and putin as the background. Dude,
the drama is off the charts. You are not the
new A Frank. Okay, look, they did not squash your voice.
They came to your house and asked you a few questions.
So the mellow drama here is a little bit out
(05:08):
of control for me. That said, I actually do think
it was wrong for the Secret Service to go to
his house and investigate him for this, And I'll explain why.
When Ed posted his tweet eighty six forty seven with
pool balls is spelling out that message, he followed it
up very shortly after with a second tweet that said,
for the record, I am one hundred percent against violence
(05:30):
in any form. Stopped creating bogus meanings to try and
investigate your political opponents. Eighty six forty seven means remove
Trump from office. If you are creating any other meaning,
you are the ones who are going to end up
inciting the violence. Now, I still do think that Ed
knew what he was doing when he posted this, and
knew that it was going to upset people, and I
think that's why he posted it. I also think, as
(05:52):
outraged as he sounds, He also is kind of happy
the Secret Service came to his house over this, because
it gives him, you know, a chance to go viral
and talk about it, and his TikTok got tons of views,
his tweets about to have millions of views and all
of that. If your content creator is good stuff, I'll set.
But I actually do fundamentally agree that it is inappropriate
for the Secret Service to follow up to his house
(06:14):
like this, because they came almost a day after he
posted that tweet, explaining that his tweet was not a
call for violence, was not a threat against the Trump presidency,
and that he simply wanted to say get rid of Trump,
remove him, impeach him. And whether you agree with that
or not, that's totally free speech. He's well within his
right to say it, and Secret Service should not be
doing house calls over that kind of boiler plate political speech.
(06:39):
It is inappropriate, and obviously we can't confirm this, but
if Washington ordered this, then I think that's an overstep,
and I do think it is a little bit chilling.
It could have a chilling effect on people feeling free
to speak out online if the Secret Service may show
up at their door for something they posted that they
clarified was not meant in a violent way. While well,
(07:00):
I certainly think ed here is being incredibly dramatic, He's
not entirely wrong that this is inappropriate from the Trump
administration if it all played out how he said it
played out. And I have to point out some hypocrisy
here and some clear confusions about the law from the
Trump administration. For example, Director of National Intelligence Telsey Gabbert,
(07:20):
a very high ranking Trump official, said this on television
about James Comy's original eight six four seven posts.
Speaker 5 (07:27):
This is the guy who's issuing a hit on President Trump,
the president that the American people voted for. Do believe
Komy should be in jail. I do any other person
with the position of influence that he has, people who
take very seriously what a guy of his stature, his experience,
(07:47):
and what the propaganda media has built him up to be.
I'm very concerned for the President's life. We've already seen
assassination attempts. I'm very concerned for his life, and James Comy,
in my view, should be held accountable and put behind
bars for this.
Speaker 3 (08:03):
This is really wrong. James Comey's post is not calling
a hit out on the President, and he can't be
prosecuted or jealed over a First Amendment protected thing that
he posted on Instagram. We can criticize him for it,
we can say it's reckless, it's irresponsible, it's inflammatory, and
I absolutely do say all of that. But even if
(08:24):
you look at the Dictionary definition of eighty six the
slang from Miriam Webster, it says that it originates in
the food service industry and is slang meaning to throw out,
get rid of, or refuse service to, although they do
note that it's sometimes used to mean to kill or
they do say that it's a pretty rare usage of
the term. So you can't prosecute someone for speech that
(08:46):
has a pretty plausible and clear, totally legal, not at
all violent implication. And Republicans themselves have used this exact
kind of language many times. In February of twenty twenty four,
former Congressman Matt Gates, for example, tweeted, we've now eighty
six McCarthy McDaniel McConnell. Better days are ahead for the
(09:06):
Republican Party, and he was referring to politicians that they
had removed from their positions or gotten to step down
obviously not referring to violence in any way. Meanwhile, this
might be the most glaring hypocrisy I've ever seen. The
far right influencer Jack Pisibiak tweeted after this thing happened
with Comy, the former director of the FBI is calling
(09:26):
for left wing assassins to target our president and kill him.
Have no idea why he hasn't been arrested yet. Now
what makes this hypocritical and ironic beyond belief is that
Jack Pisibiac himself in twenty twenty two, when Biden was president,
wrote in a tweet eighty six forty six, referring to
Joe Biden, Notably he was not arrested at the time.
(09:48):
Secret Service did not go to his house, and by
his own standards, apparently he should have been jailed. Now,
in reality, nothing should have happened to him, because, like
I said, as inflammatory as this rhetoric may be, and
I have called time and time again for us to
take down the temperature, it is First Amendment protected free speech.
You don't just have to take my word for it.
The nonpartisan Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression FIRE, the
(10:11):
nation's premier free speech legal organization, which disclaimer I do
a little bit of freelance work for said this in
a statement Former FBI director James Comy is now deleted
eighty six forty seven social media post is political speech
protected by the First Amendment. It neither constitutes a true
threat nor merits federal investigation, and there is Supreme Court
precedent to prove it. So this is like a basic
(10:32):
thing that seems to get lost in so much of
our political discourse these days. But two things can be
true at the same time, that trolling and inflammatory rhetoric
should be called out and really should be stopped on
both sides of the aisle. But also unless it meets
a very very high bar and crosses some bright red
lines that were not crossed in any of these cases
(10:53):
we're talking about, it's not a criminal matter, and like
it or not, it's protected by the free First Amendment,
and it's protected free speech, which means federal law enforcement
should not be getting involved. That's my take. But what
do you guys think. Do you feel sympathy for Ed
Krasenstein here or do you think he kind of brought
this on himself. Let me know in the comments, and
please do hit that like button and make sure you're subscribed.
(11:15):
While you're at it, remember guys to send in voice
notes for my Friday episodes where I react to your
woke horror stories and your personal situations and give you
my advice. Remember to also subscribe to my new second channel,
where I'm uploading tons of bonus content up next Today's
Day that ends in why so Democrat TikTokers are exploiting
a tragedy. We just got the very sad news that
(11:37):
former President Biden has advanced prostate cancer, and of course,
like me and basically every all good natured people just
wish him the best, wish him a good recovery. I
will say this, a few people on x I saw
like basically happy that he's sick or something. And if
you ever find yourself rooting for cancer partisan politics, tribalism
(12:00):
may have broken your brain. But also if you start
exploiting a cancer diagnosis to achieve political ends or shut
down inconvenient political narratives like several prominent Democratic tic dookers did,
that's also not good and not going to work. For example,
here's a video from the Democratic strategist and influencer Olivia Juliana.
Speaker 6 (12:19):
It's every single one of those democratic figures who has
spent the last few weeks going after Biden. I hope
that you feel the weight of how much of a
piece of trash you actually are, because now you haven't
just been going after someone who is no longer an
elected office, who no longer has power. You've been going
after a grandfather who has an extremely aggressive form of cancer,
(12:41):
who is probably trying to live out the rest of
his days with his family. And instead of spending your
time and using your platforms to talk about the guy
who is cutting research funding to kids with cancer and
deporting children with cancer, you're going after the guy who
is no longer in the White House. And that's why
(13:02):
I have no tolerance for this bullshit anymore. Leave Joe
by no loan, move on past twenty twenty four, and
focus on the shit that we're dealing with right now
in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
So this is wild to me because this influencer, who
is clearly a Biden fangirl, is suggesting that people should
feel bad for having criticized the Biden administration and their
cover up of his clear cognitive decline because it turns
out he has cancer. But of course I don't even
agree with that logic. But even if you did, well,
no one knew he had cancer until he just revealed it.
(13:34):
So how are they supposed to account for that in
their criticisms and commentary when they didn't even know about
this fact? That doesn't even make sense. And more importantly,
as much as I wish him the best and hope
that he can recover from this, and my heart goes
out to his family, you don't get a pass on
a massive scandal and abuse of power that I think
(13:54):
imperiled our national security, the fact that our president was
in severe cognitive decline, and theyvered it up and worked
to push false narratives and official after official and media
personality after media personality came on TV or on air
or in front of reporters and insisted that nothing to
see here, it's all just Republican misinformation. Well, guess what
(14:15):
when you have a president who's not up to the job,
who forgets lifelong friends and gets confused about basic facts
that imperilsl our national security because at any moment, he
could be called into the situation room and have to
make even at four in the morning, have to make
a decision that affects literally the fate of the human
race when it comes to nuclear weapons or something like that. So, no,
(14:37):
it's very sad that Biden has cancer, but we're not
going to just shut up and never criticize his administration
or the lies and the deceit again because he's sick.
That's not a get out of jail free card for
everything that you did wrong in your life, nor should
it be. But another Democratic TikTok star Harry Sisson, had
a similar argument in a video he put out, let's
(14:58):
take a look at that.
Speaker 7 (14:59):
So Biden was just diagnosed with an aggressive form of
prostate cancer. It's also metastasized into his bones, which is
incredibly concerning and incredibly heartbreaking. So I wanted to take
this opportunity to say shame on anyone, and I mean
anyone who continues to beat up on Joe Biden. This
man is no longer an elected official. He has dedicated
(15:21):
his life to public service, whether you agree with him
or not, and he is a father, a grandfather, and
a man with cancer who wants to live out the
rest of his life with his family. But right now
we have conservatives and people in the media profiting off
of writing books about commentating on this man's health, and
(15:42):
to anybody doing that, shame on you.
Speaker 3 (15:45):
So I really just reject this framing entirely. I mean,
Democrats never had the same energy, nor should they have
to be clear about just moving on and no longer
discussing former President Trump's alleged misdeeds and alleged crimes after
his first term. Even oh, he's a father and a grandfather,
that's just kind of irrelevant. I mean, well, he's no
longer in power. Just move on and talk about what's
(16:07):
happening now. I mean, none of y'all had that energy
in twenty twenty one, twenty twenty two, twenty twenty three
when you continue to go after Trump for the things
that he did or didn't, I mean, depending how you
view the different allegations did wrong in his first term
as president. And to be clear, I don't think you should.
I don't think like a term ends in. Just everything's
the past, let it all go. But by your own
logic you should have see how that doesn't make sense.
(16:29):
And again, you don't get to just negate this whole
very serious controversy and cover up just because he's sick. Now,
in fact, this actually raises even more questions about this
cover up, because according to medical experts, it is unlikely
that they really just discovered this cancer. Now, he certainly
(16:51):
had this cancer already when he was president, and if
they somehow didn't know about it, then that's a scandal
in and of itself because he has the best medical
care there is. He's supposed to have the best medical
care and a whole team of doctors and nurses attending
to him, and they should have caught it. And then
if he did know and they just covered it up,
that's another issue that should be raised. So if Harry
thinks that this means we're going to move on from
(17:14):
discussing Biden's health, no, no, no, it means the opposite.
And I want to be clear, I'm not a doctor,
I'm not an oncologist. But the questions I'm raising about
the cancer and the timeline here are being raised by
many serious, nonpartisan, non ideological medical professionals. Just listen to
this clip of a doctor on News Nation.
Speaker 4 (17:31):
It's very unusual to hear that someone has prossy cancer
where they're annually being followed up, and the fact that
we just find it at a glease of nine is
just pretty much unheard of in this day and age
of medicine, even in the you know, even in an
inner city populations, right, And you're saying, even.
Speaker 8 (17:54):
In a medically neglected population, it would be surprising to
have a surprise diagnosim diagnosis with a Gleason score of nine.
So you're saying that, certainly, as you're serving in the
Oval office, you believe that he knew that he had
prostate cancer, and even potentially as he was running in
twenty twenty before he assumed office.
Speaker 4 (18:14):
Well, most likely he had prostate cancer for a long time,
and the aggressive prostate cancers such as this at age
eighty grows over a long period of time. I mean
usually it takes from the first diagnosis of prostate cancer
to spread would take five to ten years.
Speaker 8 (18:34):
So to be very clear, you believe he was silently
secretly battling this for at least five years.
Speaker 4 (18:41):
Well, I think that's yet to be seen. I mean,
it would be very surprising, like I said earlier, for
him to have prostate cancer at least in nine spread
to bone without without being neglected medically. So the fact
that he was seen medically every year, I think there's
there's definitely evidence that he probably knew about this for
(19:03):
a while.
Speaker 3 (19:03):
So no, we are not going to be moving on
from discussing Biden's health after this, and you're not going
to emotionally blackmail or shame us into doing so. I
understand that for Democratic partisans like Harry and like Olivia,
it would be very convenient if nobody talked about the
massive scandals that they may have even participated in in
terms of denying Biden's clear cognitive decline. But we are
(19:25):
not going to move on so quickly. There's still a
lot of reckoning and accountability that needs to happen. And
while Biden's cancer diagnosis is really sad and I genuinely
do wish him all the best, I'm not going to
cave to the emotional blackmail of that meaning we can
no longer criticize what happened while he was president or
his scandals. And I don't think most Americans are going
(19:46):
to buy that narrative either. What do you guys think?
Let me know in the comments. Up next, we're going
to check in on the woke world of Instagram, in
particular threads the kind of Twitter clone that Instagram created
that I personally don't really use very much. But I
heard about this crazy story from Katie Hertzog on the
Blocked and Reported podcast, one of my favorite podcasts that
(20:07):
you guys have to subscribe to if you don't already,
because the famous author Stephen King is facing tons of
backlash right now on Instagram threads in one of the
most absurd and farcical sagas I've seen in a minute.
For context, guys, I've always really liked Stephen King's books.
I like fantasy, I like science fiction, so I've read
a bunch of his books over the years. But he,
(20:28):
politically speaking, has been very outspoken, and I have always
found him to be very simplistic and trite and partisan
and kind of hysterical because he is a hardcore like
resistance lib like Trump is evil, just kind of a
reliable team blue commentator who I've never found particularly interesting
and has just you know, always just bashed Trump, just
(20:50):
adopted the typical liberal position and what have you. But
now he is getting canceled by his own side, because
you can never ever ever be woken off. So people,
especially very online progressives, what did he do that was
so horrible? Well, he dared to write this very lame
joke on Instagram threads. Why did Donald Trump cross the
(21:11):
road to see Haitians eating pets on the other side?
So this is not really funny, but it's clearly supposed
to be a joke about Trump, Trump being the butt
of the joke, and how Trump claimed that there were
Haitians eating dogs and pets in Springfield, Ohio, even though
there was no evidence of that. So like a very
lame joke, but clearly one intended to mock Donald Trump,
(21:34):
not Haitian immigrants. But of course the wokes goolds on
Instagram threads acted like he just did a hate crime
against Haitian immigrants. The replies to his original post are
something to be whole. Why are you making racist jokes? Welp,
that's the end of you. And this is why this
generation of Haitians really need to reach back into our
(21:56):
ancestral voodoo bag. Because Stephen King should be choking on
his own tongue right now. Oh well, that woman seems
lovely and stable. Another person wrote, leave Haitians alone, sir,
go write a book on the real villain, white supremacy.
Another person wrote in a comment replying to Stephen it's
disappointing to see Stephen King using immature humor instead of
(22:19):
thoughtful political discussion. His words fuel harmful stereotypes rather than
encouraging understanding. A voice like his could be used more constructively.
Fame does not equate to wisdom, integrity, or thoughtful discourse.
A well known name doesn't automatically make someone insightful or
responsible in how they use their platform. Is it just
me or was that last reply giving Ai wrote that,
(22:41):
and I even agree with parts of it, But I
just don't agree that Stephen King was fueling harmful stereotypes.
If anything, he was trying to highlight what he sees
as the absurdity of these untrue stereotypes to attack Trump.
I just don't know how anyone can look at that
post and think it's meant to mock hatians. To his credit,
Stephen King defended himself and said the joke was about Trump.
If you don't get that, you should see a doctor
(23:02):
and get your sense of humor checked. To me, that's
indicative of maybe a little bit of a vibe shift.
I can imagine in twenty twenty, in the old era
of like woke Twitter mobs, Stephen King like groveling and
apologizing when he's accused of racism rather than defending himself,
and to the extent of the culture has shifted in
that sense where people no longer instantly caved to outrageous
and ridiculous accusations of racism. That's a good thing, but
(23:23):
still the backlash and Katie covered this on the podcast,
so I went and looked into it, and really it
was even worse than I expected. On Instagram threads, the
discourse about Stephen King was just absolutely unhinged that emerged
all because of this one little innocent post. One person
named the leftist Lawyer wrote, what Stephen King said was
(23:43):
racist and wrong, full stop. Defending it is wrong, full stop.
No one is forcing you to defend him, just don't.
And no one is canceling him by saying he did
something wrong and gross and should apologize. It's called accountability.
If he won't take accountability for his act, he's canceling himself.
This woman helpfully added at this point, if you're white
(24:05):
and defending Stephen King's joke in my mentions, I'm blocking you.
My page is a safe space for marginalized people. Broh. Seriously,
we're still doing safe spaces in twenty twenty five, and
how do people not realize how incredibly condescending this is
to your minority followers, saying they need to be protected
(24:25):
from anybody arguing that this obvious joke wasn't racist, as
if what you think the racial minorities that follow you
are like mentally toddlers who need their emotions protected by you,
the bold, brave, stunning white savior. Gosh, the cringe and
condescension is off the charts. Another person wrote, y'all if
Stephen King put on blackface to make fun of Trump,
(24:46):
would you get why it's anti black racism? A white
man telling a shitty joke that relies on anti black content,
no matter the context or intention, always fuels anti blackness.
Telling Black people they are for not getting it only
exposes your racism. I am so tired. I can't believe
that people still actually speak and think this way in
(25:09):
the Year of Our Lord twenty twenty five. Joking about
the Haitians eating pets meme is not, in fact equivalent
to doing blackface. That's absurd. And when your argument relies
on the statement, regardless of any context or intention, this
thing is bad and harmful you've just revealed that you're
(25:29):
just looking to be offended for its own sake, because actually,
context and intent are incredibly important when we're determining whether
something is actually harmful or shouldn't be said. And I
love this idea that you can't disagree with black people
without you being racist, and this absurd idea that all
black people must be offended and outraged by Stephen King's posts.
(25:50):
I mean, maybe a lot on Instagram threads are, but
that is not a representative sample. That is a tiny,
tiny liberal bubble of a slice of people who are
probably journalists or or something like that. So you're speaking
for a black community that would largely not agree with you,
and then weaponizing race to just smear anybody who questions you.
Are we back in twenty twenty, y'all? Another crazy post
(26:13):
reads Stephen King is another example of what happens when
white liberals are more concerned with dunking on bigots than
helping racialized communities. They engage in bigotry themselves and end
up hurting the racialized communities they profess to care for.
Figure out your shit and your goals already, I would
really love to know. Please explain to me in depth.
(26:35):
Walk me through from point A to point B to
point C how Stephen King's joke on Instagram threads harms
racialized communities. Please take me to one of these communities.
I will pay our travel both ways, ma'am. Take me
to one of these communities and show me how it
was harmed by this joke. Show me on the doll
where the joke harmed you, babe, Like this is absurd,
(26:57):
It's just not true. And ah, I just over and
over again, I keep encountering these stories that really prove
to me that the progressive online left, at least we've
heard noises from leading figures in the Democratic Party, but
the actual online base has not moved on from the
unhinged identitarian and cancel culture and woke politics that hamstrung
(27:21):
the Democratic Party for years that most Americans find insufferable.
They're still engaging in this kind of circular firing squad
of constantly trying to cancel each other and play victim
oppression Olympics, and to normal people, even to radical liberals
like Stephen King, it comes off as incredibly unhinged and unpleasant.
(27:42):
But other than that, though, things are going amazing over
on Instagram threads. Gee, I wonder why their users and
view numbers and traffic is plummeting. I'm just shocked by that, y'all,
absolutely shocked. What do you guys think. Are you surprised
to see progressive still acting like this on the internet
or are you not act shocked at all? Let me
know in the comments. Up next, we got to talk
(28:03):
about this because Trump is fighting with Walmart and it's
getting weird. Let's take a listen to some reporting from CNN.
Speaker 9 (28:09):
President Trump a short time ago telling Walmart that the
company should quoting now eat the cost end quote of
higher tariffs. The comments come after the retail giants said
this week that it would raise prices because of Trump's
tariffs being too high. Walmart has more than forty six
hundred stores in the US. It's also the biggest private
(28:30):
employer in the country, with one point six million workers.
Several countries that supply Walmart include China, and they're facing
terriffs between ten and thirty percent right now.
Speaker 3 (28:41):
So it's funny to me to see Trump telling Walmart
to eat the tariffs. What he means is that they
should absorb the cost of their tariffs and just take
the loss from their profits not raise prices for consumers.
But what's so funny about that to me is that
Trump told us over and over and over again that
there are no costs for America because foreign countries pay
(29:04):
the tariffs. But now he's telling Walmart to eat the
costs rather than passing them on to consumers. Do you guys,
see how those two things can't be true all at once.
Either all the costs are born by foreign countries like
you said, which I've always thought was not true, or
there are costs and American companies have to figure out
how to deal with them. Now, that second scenario has
always been true, but the Trump administration has suggested otherwise,
(29:26):
and now his own comments are acknowledging the truth of
the matter. But more importantly, it's actually not possible for
Walmart to just eat the tariffs and absorb all the costs.
They run on very slim profit margins of just two
to three percent, and the total cost of the tariffs
would potentially eat up all of the profit that they
do run. They go. Listen to this explanation from an
(29:47):
expert in supply chain logistics on CNN.
Speaker 10 (29:50):
About third of Walmart's products are subject to tariffs. Tariffs
used to be about one percent on the average of
all the countries is probably going to go out with
the dots to fifteen percent. Their net profit margin is
less than three percent, so if they eat these tariffs,
they will actually lose money. So Walmart will figure it out.
Companies like Amazon will figure it out. It's some of
(30:12):
those other retailers that are really going to struggle. But
even a giant and efficient giant like Walmart has a
very difficult time absorbing these tariffs.
Speaker 3 (30:21):
So, like the math is not even really mathematically possible
that they could just absorb these huge costs and just
take it out of their profits without passing anything on
to consumers. But even if they were to do that,
there would still be tremendous downsides because when people hear profits,
they think that, oh, that's just the money that the
big wigs are stuffing into their pockets and paying themselves
(30:42):
in bonuses and all that, And of course some of
that is what it is, but profits at a place
like Walmart are also used to reinvest in expansions, building
new stores, hiring new people, growing the company, expanding the
brand into new lanes and new areas. Sometimes profits are
reinvested into rap seeing employee wages and benefits to attract
(31:02):
new workers and competitive hiring times. And then even when
the money is just sent out in different forms of
shareholder returns, that's then money that they go spend and
invest somewhere else. So even if they were to absorb
all the costs of the tariffs, there would still be
significant economic harm that's being lost out on and of
course they can't even mathematically do it. The truth is
(31:23):
that maybe you support President Trump's tariffs. I'm a free
trade person. I've been against it from the start. But
if you do support it, you at least have to
acknowledge that there are serious costs and trade offs. Maybe
you think it will be worth it in the end,
but you cannot pretend. And President Trump has tried to
pretend this, but it's quickly falling apart before his eyes,
(31:43):
to the point where he's basically admitting it that there
are real downsides and real costs associated with these policies,
and some of it is going to be born by Americans.
There's just no escaping that. Inconvenient fact, what do you
guys think to agree with Trump on this? Do let
me know in the comments. All right, guys, that'll be
in for this episode of the Brad Versus Everyone Podcast.
(32:04):
Thank you all so much for tuning in. Please do
make sure you're subscribe. If you aren't yet, do it
that leg button before you go comm with your thoughts.
YadA YadA yah. Make sure to send me some voice
notes for my Friday episode. Subscribe to my second channel
all that linked in the description, and with that we'll
talk again real soon.
Speaker 9 (32:20):
Alright,
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