June 20, 2026 • 45 mins
ERIC EPSTEIN AND MILLENNIAL BRIAN TALK ABOUT THE KNICKS WINNING IT ALL, MEASLES IN LANCASTER, SCREW WORMS IN THE USA, OBAMACARE, NORHT KOREA, AND MORE.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Well, happy June twentieth. I guess the day before Father's Day? Yes,
you planning anything?
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Actually, my dad is not gonna be run, so I'm
gonna have something form on Monday.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Okay, that sounds good. I mean, if you need a
surrogate person to take out for dinner. Now, but I
said this before Father's Day is kind of like an
afterthought to Mother's Day.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
We're Rock the Capital. We're a good government, anti corruption
group founded in nineteen or two thousand and five, sorry
after the illegal pay raise. We're non partisan. We don't
care what party you're from. We care who's throwing the party.
We don't take sides, we take aim. And so I
want to just get into the well. First of all,
(00:44):
it'd be hard not to talk about the New York Knicks.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Yeah. One championship, first time in fifty three years. Yeah,
I think this is arguably the most at least since
twenty eleven with Dirtovinsky. The most surprising championship was no
one had picked. Right, I'm going to do with a
guy that's six feet tall, six feet tall, not a
freak athlete, and just and just dominate, and not just
(01:09):
dominate the NBA in a way that we haven't seen
in the line that.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
Look, it was exciting. I'm happy for the Knicks. I
think it was fifty three years. What's sad as I
remember that? And look the series was exciting. Coming back
from twenty nine points down was breathtaking.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
You know.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
On the other end, san Antonio is gonna have to
undergo a lot of counseling.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Yeah, I think I think the big thing is to
be Webin Yama because you you know, we were seeing
him just go through the playoffs and even at Oklahoma
City Series. Right, this guy is gonna be on soptable
for years and years to come.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
What is he like? Six seven foot five?
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Yes, seven for five.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
Is it true that his mom smoke crack or is
that natural?
Speaker 2 (01:50):
I'm I'm assuming it's just a natural. But he's just
a freak. And he's been basically trained to become a
professional best player, yeah, his whole life because Europe they
had the academy, see you right in there. The question
is like he is again to develop the offensive game
and Kenny gets conditioning because when his conditioning suffers, his
defense stuffers is the same impacted offensively, he settles for
(02:12):
these kind of like off balance shots, which is not
his game. Usually he's rim running and he's dominating.
Speaker 3 (02:18):
What is rim running me?
Speaker 2 (02:20):
So he's sets a peck and he's runs to the rim.
He's so big you have to collapse and open up
shooters or he gets last.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
Seven five.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
That's a big man, Holly, I remember, well, I remember
when six feet was big. But anyway, I'm going to
get into the Ask Bryant segment for the first part
of the first segment and then hopefully a little part
of the second pegment second segment. So there's a couple
ominous signs that aren't on the horizon, there actually happening.
(02:48):
So you have the European Central Bank raising interest rates.
The Fed kept it at where it was, which is
interesting because they just had a new chair who I
thought was going and to reduce the interest rates, producer
prices up six point five percent from a year ago.
Speaker 3 (03:08):
Bank at Japan, now this.
Speaker 1 (03:10):
Doesn't sound like a lot, but they raised the QRate
to one percent. There were times when they were actually negative.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Yeah they were. Japan has been a deflationary cycle for
like thirty years right in which the consumer spending is
going down, but the prices are also going down with it,
you know. It's it's one of those weird things where
we look at Japan on economic balance sheet and we say, oh,
they've been unsuccessful or staging it for thirty years. When
we ask people how they feel, a lot of them
are very happy because you know, they might not be
(03:36):
getting big income increases, but the stuff's not prices aren't
going up. That's changing now and this is this is
a huge supply shock and energy that we haven't seen
for a while.
Speaker 3 (03:47):
Right.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
Look, the last part is and I don't know if
this matters. The World Bank as has a lot of
entities have really downgraded what they think growth will be
coming up this year. So as you're looking at it,
I mean these are real numbers and they matter. And
also a lot has really an after effect or direct
(04:10):
impact from the war.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
Yeah, so in a supply side shock.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
Just explain that to the listeners.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
So you know, in basic economics, the price of a
point or anything and the amount that is produced is
where demand to supply meet. That's essentially what happens when
you have a supply side shock and you move a
lot of supplies offline. You have potential shortages, but you
also have huge increases in prices because now you're competing
not where the price is supposed to meet on a
(04:38):
market level, but now you're like an artificially deficient market
where the prices get bid up. Think about with tickets,
if you if I essentially said I'm going to take
away half the tickets, So if there's fifty thousand people
that want to go to the stadium, now there's only
twenty five thousand, but there's tickets, but there's still the
same fifty thousand. The price point they could sell it
at is much higher. And so with energy, which is
(04:59):
such a an important commodity in every part of the economy,
and it doesn't it doesn't just hit at the gas puppet,
hits every single sector, rent, food, all that, because all
that is such a good sadd on. So that's that's
the main problem. And us to a certain degree is
protected from the shortages of shock where like we're not
(05:21):
going to run out, we produce more than we need
with the actual price. Because it's in a global market
we are affected by.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
All right, So on that upbeat note FISA, which was
apparently not extended. What is FIZA And I thought this
would be something that mister Trump would push through.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
So FIZA is the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, and that's
it's I'm sorry for Intelligent Surveillance Act, and it's basically
a way to just essentially spy on people that we
considered after nine to eleven terrorist threats. You couldn't go
to a normal court and put out like, hey, we're
gonna spy on this guy, because the would obvious, you know,
and that could essentially work them. The problem is that
(06:03):
if you have essentially a secret court that proves these warrants,
are they following the wall? We found is that there
was huge abuses over here. So people were getting put
on that list with essentially things that would never hold
up in a normal court.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
And so we can surveil foreign people, we.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
But but also Americans connected to foreign right. Yeah. So yeah,
so it's been pushed through since nine eleven. Everyone always
approves it. You typically see civil libertarians and something I
would say the old school left that would push against it,
But no one would really push against it up until recently.
And the reason is that there's been belief that politicians
(06:42):
on both sides have used it to essentially target opponents,
spying on your poitical.
Speaker 1 (06:47):
Yeah, I think they're right in the left are together
on the far right, far left, you know, being more evasive,
and the information is being used for neofarious.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Right findings.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
But apparently there the replacement, I guess it would be
for I can't think we're in Galbert. Uh was going
to be this guy Clayton from New York, and so
it appeared that that was going to smooth the way.
He was a former US coterunity for Southern New York.
But then his confirmation was actually pulled by Trump.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Right because he wants us to get renewed. And I
think that the problem is this is.
Speaker 3 (07:24):
But he didn't push for it before though.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
I mean, yes, well, because remember he wanted reforms because
in his when he first came in or when he
came in again, I should say, he believed the fight.
The court was used against him in his campaign and
it's such a despy on him and it was abused.
And this is why we can't have this court. The
problem is that once everyone comes into power, their position changes.
It's it's similar, it's different. The free speech thing. The
(07:47):
only free speech that you could defend, it's stuff you
disagree with because Obviously, everyone wants free speech for stuff
they agree with. The stuff you disagree with you have
to defend. And it's sort of if you want to
do civil liberties, you have to defend ceviberties for people
you don't like or are essentially bad people. Otherwise, if
you obviously you defend it for yourself. But that just
goes without saying, and then when you're out of power,
(08:08):
your opponent could use the same things against you.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
The chances of this being extended or what.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
I would say that they are going to get extended
very high because they almost never. They never follow through,
They raise complaints, they bring it up, but then when
the budget comes through, when all the dealers are made,
and there'll be some reforms. There was one perform called
r I s AA reforms that are suentially supposed to
put supervisors above in roles that essentially you have to
(08:35):
warn through a supervisor. They're trying to do other reforms
with the courts, I think have an independent arbiter. The
problem is that the court's secret, and that's it's fundamental
of the program because you if you're obviously looking at
terrorist cases, you can't publicize the names and say, hey,
we're going to spy on such and such or And
then with America, the question is, you know, how do
(08:56):
you keep that court private and then have reforms and accountability.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
It doesn't work. It's private. I don't care who they
put there. You know, an arbiter, you know, a statue
of Thomas Jefferson, a white unicorn. It doesn't matter. Their
secret and there's a reason why they're secret is they
don't want people to know what the information is before
we go to break. Measles is drawing national attention in Lancaster.
(09:22):
There have been thirty two cases. It's the end of
April forty in total. Why are measles so prominent in Lancaster?
Speaker 2 (09:31):
Is it so? I mean, language is obviously a huge
amash population. There's been a push since COVID, and what
I would say is was the overreaction and kind of
misin foreign policies during that period that essentially pushed people
away from vaccines. So what's happening now is they're looking
in saying are there side effects? Are we essentially missing them?
(09:54):
What do other countries do? And then you know, are
these pharmaceutical companies is there too much? Buddy buddy with
the regulators or the regulators promoters, essentially saying are the
people that are supposed to regulate and look at the
vaccines and set the protocols, are they also promoters? Or
is this just kind of.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
The government government is now deformed where the people that
regulate oftentimes do promote. This is not anything new. But
the deal is if you don't get the injection, it
really doesn't matter. That conspiracy doesn't matter.
Speaker 2 (10:29):
But here's the thing is that if you if you
have too many people without the vaccine, obviously there's a
chance of you you miss that kind of immunity. Our community, ye,
her community target. And so that's that's the wordy And
this is the is that what you make when the
medical union makes mistakes? I think actually going back to
the fentanyl and opiate thing, which I think really kind
of devastate people. Then don't trust them.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Let's take a break. We got to get to our sponsors.
We're going to pick up after the break. We're going
to move from uh measles to screw Worms. I'm America
cap Stign, I'm with Millennial Brian. We're from Rock to Capital.
The show is Thunderdome. We're being produced by Art Selby.
You know, it seems like there's a lot more commercials
(11:11):
regarding digestion and bowel movements, you know. And my observation
is this, When I was younger, every morning I had
black coffee and a non filtered camel cigarette. I was
never constipated. So I mean, we're gonna have.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
To that'll send stuff right through. I think. I think
what we're seeing is that we're clearly preparing for the
July fourth barbecue.
Speaker 1 (11:37):
All right, So going back, Yeah, we were talking about
measles and the reluctance of people to get inoculated. Obviously
COVID had an impact, but you think the precursor event.
Speaker 2 (11:45):
Was opioys because it was such a horrible and clear
conflict of interest situation. So you essentially had both both
pharmaceutical companies essentially paying doctors to give recommendations for very
like oxycotton, very hardcore opiates, and then people were getting
addicted to women and getting on heroin and fentanyl and
(12:06):
dying and people were getting huge kickbacks. It's the clear
conflict of interests. We're essentially, you know, people making the
recommendations are now financially incentivized to give the most extreme
like if you get a gunshot wound, that's when you
would have an op to deal with. It would not
be like knee pain or back stiffness, because that's how
(12:28):
you can get that. That's why you get people addicted.
And then once you get that rush and that feeling,
it's real hard to get off.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
You have a problem in America where the regulators have
become the promoters. Department of Agriculture is a good example.
The nuclear industry is an example. It's very hard to
regulate when you're promoting. It's also it's more challenging when
the same people basically occupy Yes, one day a promoter,
the next day a regulator.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
And they use their experience either as a regulator or
an industry person should get jobs in either side. So
if you're andustry person to say well, i've experienced I
should be a regulator, they're regularly saying why it should
be in the industry I have experienced, which is which
is is a self fulfilling prophecy. And the problem is, yeah,
the problem is that I think that it's most ridiculous
with gambling, because we know gambling is essentially you know,
(13:19):
you're such all these trying to promote bad behavior. You're
trying to grow. It's not even like cigarettes. It's like
you're actually trying to form a cigarettes was.
Speaker 1 (13:27):
Cool when there'd be a nice looking woman in a
race car smoking a Virginia Slim and it would say,
you've come a long way, baby. Man, I would snort
those cigarettes. But you know, the image is always positive
and uh and I would allege that in all the
sin drugs, gaming, tobacco, alcohol, the marketing.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
Is it's fun.
Speaker 1 (13:49):
Yeah, it's trying to advance that behavior. So let me
skip because we're a little behind and get to an
interesting topic. And that's just which I never heard of.
Nor this will be the first time on our show
that we're saying a word like screw worm, which is
a double phallic symbol. But however, screw worm is this
(14:12):
like flesh eating?
Speaker 2 (14:13):
Yeah, it's great.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
So yeah, but let me do this is this is
what this is, This is America.
Speaker 3 (14:19):
It's great.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
So we're going to try and defeat the screw worm
by introducing I don't know what is it, like eight.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
Million sterile male flies.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
Steril male flies to breed with the.
Speaker 2 (14:32):
The essentially the female egg layers that and then essentially
be unsuccessful in laying eggs and mutating. And so this
this problem is it's like it's especially as a virus,
very contagious virus, if you think of it like that.
And so once you get to a certain area, unless
you quarantine it right away, it can get out and
can destroy huge amounts of live stuff. And so this
(14:53):
this came from Latin America.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
How does it so what does it do? Does it
just sit on the cattle and eat their flesh?
Speaker 2 (14:59):
Yeah, So upon hatching, the magatue's sharp mouth hooks to
burrow into and eat the living flesh, which can call
cause fatal tissue damage within a week. And then and
then they multiply though that's the key thing is that
it's not just one, it's they multiply, multiply and multiply. Yes,
drop I have here four million, but they're going to
(15:20):
keep drop four million male sterile male flies, which sounds
ridiculous that we even were able to access that.
Speaker 1 (15:27):
They said it could get up to six hundred million
flies if we need them. If yeah, But I mean
this is getting to be like what if one of
these flies escapes invites a human and they get super
human powers. I mean, this thing could get could go
south really quickly. So my question to you is that
(15:47):
has there been a screw worm in America or has
it been contained to south.
Speaker 3 (15:52):
Of the border.
Speaker 2 (15:52):
No, so they are in America, so there's there was
you know, I believe seven counties in America have it.
So it's the southern part of the United States. So
it's kind in Texas to Valla Something Edwards, Tom Green, Gillespie,
and LaSalle and then Mexican New Mexico, Lee County all has.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
All right, So the reality is so we've successfully combatd
illegal immigration except when it comes to screw that's right.
Speaker 2 (16:19):
So we were letting in such a bad meat from
Latin America and that's.
Speaker 1 (16:26):
So human eats it. Do they die or is it?
I mean you probably know when your hamburger comes out
and there's flies buzzing around. But I mean it just
seems to me to we don't have an answer, and
I know.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
Well, it's mainly in meat that goes directed to animals,
so that's not there's I think there's more standards to
get to humans, so you would be unok for a
human to get that far. But it destroys the livestock,
so it's going to increase the cost of our food.
And that's that's the big thing. If you if you
take let's say you take twenty percent of the livestock
off the you know that food's going to go off.
(17:01):
It's gonna be the same prom it's the same supply
shot from you have you know, lower quality, higher prices.
Speaker 1 (17:06):
All right, let me just give you a couple of numbers.
So the American whatever it was, the Affordability Act Obamacare,
which has saves insurance for about thirty one million, Affordable
Care Act, Sorry about that. In twenty twenty one, the
Supreme Court, despite a Republican challenge, reinstated it. However, you
(17:29):
now have the Affordable Care Act, which had an extension
which wasn't if I understand, wasn't initially attended after COVID
during COVID, So you now have the number of people
that are insured dramatically dropping. Some of the premiums have
gone up one hundred and two percent. Now, my sense
(17:51):
was the Senate Democrats wanted to extend it, but that's
been defeated. So that if I'm reading this number right,
and it seems like a big number to me, the
amount of money you need to subsidize this program, and
I'm assuming this is nationally is a trillion.
Speaker 2 (18:07):
It is a trillion over ten years in fairness, So
but that's yeah. So are the.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
Costs transferred onto uh, poor health and emergency room visits
or is this not a big deal?
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Well, it's definitely a big deal. I mean, you know,
when people people are going to go uninsured and stuff
like that, and there will be costs where people just
have to use the emergency room as a last resort.
I think the question is the problem the fundamental problem
with any healthcare reform, whether it's OBAMACA or anything, is
that you're not dealing with the cost of the care,
and so everything becomes either a subsidy or a loophole
(18:43):
or all to deal with the fact that the cost
of the care is going up and we have an
aging population and so unless you so, if you look
at what they did, they didn't really they didn't tenchnically
end the program, but they basically took away a lot
of the subsidy.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
But that was under the impression though if you were
older and on the insurance urrance, you are less likely
to come off the program because there was some other
something you could age in to.
Speaker 2 (19:08):
Maybe you have all of renewed policies and but if
you're but also you have with older people, you have
essentially different medicare options or in different states even more
extensive medicare option. But the thing with is that the
people that were getting the essentially buying the insurance premiums
is that they were getting a subsidized market rate from
(19:30):
the government. So the insurance was to say charged two fifty,
and the government would say, based on your income, we're
gonna give you a subsidy of one hundred and fifty.
So now it's one hundred dollars a month. If that
substy goes away, it becomes two to fifty a month,
So that's why you're seeing all these huge increase. They
would also put regulations on things like deductibleses, such as say,
if you're an insurance company that wants to operate in
the United States, you have to cover these things. You
(19:50):
have to have a max seductible at a certain rate there,
and those rules are being lifted. So that's the two
ways they control the cost. The problem is the cost
of the care didn't change, so it's that you're either going
to have especially private markups and which is what we're
gonna have now, or you're gonna have expanded government subsidies.
The key is that you'd have to get lower costs.
(20:12):
You have to do with other countries to which is
either at a market rate, use such a competition and
negotiations to lower prices, or in a government rate, or
use the government as a purchaser to lower prices and
get better deals.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
All right, well in English, what did you just say?
Speaker 2 (20:26):
Well, I would say that basically our healthcare system is
the worst of both worlds that we do not negotiate
with from the government to get lower prices for treatments.
That's why, for example, is epic is cheap everywhere else
but super expensive in the United States. They know they
can kind of rake our our our Yeah, I thought
he did. He did to some degree. He did. He
(20:47):
put those those in place, but it's not across the
board because we go But then on the market side,
we have essentially government protections that allow them to operate
with the cartel, so you don't get the competition if
you'll get it. A good example was in the plastic
surgery cosmetic field, where you have those big surgeries. They're
all getting way less expensive and way better. Why because
(21:08):
you don't have the cartel that can essentially US economics, the.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
Most pernicious cartel, or the American pharmaceuticals.
Speaker 2 (21:17):
Yeah, I would say pharmaceuticals insurance companies because they know
that they.
Speaker 1 (21:22):
You have to have that collusion for it to be
to be effective. So that being the case, I mean,
somebody like me who's a school board member is likely
to see a higher increase of students that are ill.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
I mean, it's going to be a cost shift, but
also well, and.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
They're going to do what you said. So if let's say,
for example, the people who are in between health care
coverages or they lose their healthcare, they're gonna use like,
oh my kid goes to school, I'll use the kind
of nurse there, or we'll go to the hospital or
patient first. Like, you're going to see other parts of
the healthcare industry pushed, and you're gonna see areas that
rely on essentially government usion, like rural hospitals to meet
(22:02):
their bills.
Speaker 1 (22:03):
I also think you'll see a lot of people, and
I've seen this in the past, moving out of the
country to get healthcare. Uh, it's it's not it's not common.
It's unusual, but it does happen. So I'm Eric Epstein.
We're in with Millennial Brian. We're from Rock to Capitol.
The show is Thunderdome. We're being produced by Art Selby,
and we'll be back after the news. Hey also wanted
(22:25):
to wish get well to Jimmy, who is Larry's dog,
and to Nancy who had a what do you call
that in your tooth? A no no, no no, the
when they trill your.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Cavity, not a cavity root.
Speaker 3 (22:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
God, she explained it to me. It was like, you
know what I'd rather lose. She's got another one coming up.
And then also we're Genie, you know, a happy recovery.
So I wanted to stay away with it. But you
just heard Vice President Brandt Vance say America wins either way.
(23:07):
I got to tell you I thought the invasion of
Iran was not only ill advised. It's hard for me
to see anything positive coming from this.
Speaker 3 (23:15):
What I've learned.
Speaker 1 (23:18):
This is non political for a while, is when people
don't want to tell you what's in the agreement, it's
usually not a good size. So they're not going to
be dealing with ballistic missiles which you know, leaves Israel
in the cold and they're not going to deal with
a network of proxies. Yet Iran wants America to curb Lebanon.
(23:38):
And you know, if you're this is what staggered me
is that there's been a lot of criticism and I
understand of Obama, who turned over one point seven billion
in cash, which is actually the ir audience cash in
their agreement. He's looking now to n freeze up to
twenty four billion.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
Yeah, and then potentially all essentially allowing investment fun of
up to three hundred billion.
Speaker 1 (24:02):
So you have that on top of the fact that
Iran has basically sold their oil on the black market.
This agreement would allow the Americans, like they did with
the Russians, to unfreeze the boycott and allow them to
transact business.
Speaker 3 (24:18):
So this is an.
Speaker 1 (24:20):
Economic boom for Iran. I'm not I can't see a
lot that was favorable for America or Israel. And it
seems that mister Trump is perturbed with mister met Nyaho.
But as you talked about this earlier, I just wanted
to point this out. The price of fertilizer has gone
(24:43):
up seventy percent according to the American Farm Bureau, the
cost to buy a home is now at six point
five to two percent for a thirty year home. And
so what that means for a four hundred thousand dollars
home is you're paying one hundred and ten dollars more
a month. I didn't realize that US motorists used between
three hundred and sixty and three hundred and eighty million
(25:05):
gallons of gasoline yep, centric Yeah, every day, so that
the war surcharge is about three hundred and sixty million
a day. So what I did find interesting in Saudi Arabia,
and we talked about this before, had another pipeline option
and they reported a twenty six percent increase in their oil.
(25:26):
But all that being said, even if it's an MoU,
it's not a treaty. They it looks like Iran would
be allowed to keep their nuclear option. It's hard to
square this with what mister Trump's reason for going to
war was, which was regime changed. Now he actually said, ah,
there's a couple of nice guys over there.
Speaker 2 (25:46):
Right, So there's an argument is get we did kill
their leaders, we have better people, and then we're going
to get a new crew deal. And that they'll be
incentivized to behavial because look at these economic benefits. The
problem is, obviously, you know, is that you know want
you to start a war. So I don't know if
they're they're suchually super happy to make deals with you
(26:07):
or keep their deals. I think they're gonna look at
this and say this is why we have to have
a nuclear weapon and potentially be at least its sprint
capacity to a nuclear weapon if this ever happens again.
And then on the economics, the main problem is they
control or not control, but they can influence the strait
of hormuse. And because they're a dictatorship, it doesn't matter
(26:28):
if their economy is doing terrible in their commy right
now they have fifty or it's like it's destroyed. But
remember it doesn't matter as long as they can stay
in power. Whereas the reverse is true the United States,
a dollar increase. If I proposed a dollar tax on gas,
I was gonna spend that tax money building a pit.
Everyone would vote against it, but essentially that's the cost,
(26:49):
and do you want that to go on forever? So
I think the thing that's gonna help the United States,
or what he's gonna argue is the straight uparmos is
gonna open, inflation is gonna come down. Those numbers that
were essentially slow the economy that's gonna go away, and
we're gonna get back to better growth.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
And say, I don't think any of that's going to happen.
But in the event it did happen. What we lost
here was prestige. You lost here was influenced. What we
lost here was the ability to govern with a big stick.
And you know, militarily there was a lot of successes. Economically,
(27:30):
the ripple effect across the world can't automatically be rearranged.
Speaker 3 (27:35):
And I think normally what happens.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
In a situation like this you find alternative ways to
transport the commodity that that you're boycotting. But this comes
back to something we've talked about in your head of
the game is the superpowers need to understand that asymmetric
warfare is now the norm, so that you may have
(27:57):
a warship, but it doesn't take a lot to take
that right if what happened in Russia.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
Yeah, and if you look at the geography of it,
the main advantage they have is they're close to the
straight uparmouse and all they have to do is threaten
civilian transport there to where you can't go through. Remember,
it's harder to it's much harder to defend civilian transport
than to attack it. Think of it in just like
a normal public mall. You know, if I said I'm
going to go out day after day and we're gonna
(28:26):
just attack random people go in the mall, and you
have to go out and you have to defend it,
that's way harder. It's way hard because you have the
one essentially stop me from even getting close. That's the
situation there. And now with drones being so cheaply able
to produce, well, you don't need, you know, a Navy,
air force air defense. You just need to be able
to essentially threaten drones.
Speaker 3 (28:48):
You know.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
The issue is Russia failed and that we failed out. Actually,
most people fail at it. Germany and World War two
failed at it. You can have overwhelming force and you
can inflict lot of pain and suffering on your adversary.
That's why diplomatic political solutions are more advantageous. But this
also is a challenge for the American first because he
(29:12):
said no more wars, So this is a war that
being said this is also maybe to shed a positive
light on Trump's strategy. If there is a strategy, it
demonstrates again that we're interdependent and there can't just be
a fortress America where we close our doors.
Speaker 2 (29:29):
Yeah. Yes, But I think the real thing is what
Jade Vance is selling is they will be incentivized to
change their behavior. But if they're not, what's your stick?
If your stick is only economic and they shown they
can withstand that, or you're going to constantly restore kinetic options.
I think the problem is that we're coming at this
negotiation from a bad spot.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
We made the same mistake that all powers make. We
don't understand our adversary. For God's sake, they've been saying
for forty seven years, death to America. We're the great Satan.
They're not Trump. They can't do a U turn and survive.
I mean, they have to stay ideologically pure, and you know,
and kind of what you were saying before. They don't
(30:12):
care about their people. You know, you know, their people
could be starving, they could care less. Our people charge
them and dollar more for a big mac and they're
rioting in the streets.
Speaker 2 (30:22):
Right And that's that's that's it's an economic thing, it's
not a military thing. We could we could destroy even
more parts of their military. We have destroyed tons of
their infrastructure. The other thing is we clearly have the
aligns with the Gulf states and they're vulnerable. We talk
about the East West pipeline with Saudi Arabia. You know
where that goes. It goes out the other straight which
right there is the hugees in Yemen. And so once
(30:43):
again they don't have to have this super sophisticated navy
or military. They just have to be able to create
drones and essentially move around so you can't get them.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
So you look at Iran and you look at Hamas,
who basically have created cities underground. And I tried to
try to figure out what our technological adaptation has been.
I mean, we get bigger, we build more, we have
a presence. We don't I understand, we don't want to
use civilians. We don't rather, we don't want to use
(31:13):
soldiers footmen, So how do we I mean, Look, this
was not.
Speaker 3 (31:18):
A good deal.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
I think I really do believe that net pushed him
Trump into it, can't get out of it. He was
also seduced by his success in Venezuela. But now you're
in war with Iran, which is the great Satan for
God's sake, and other people are.
Speaker 3 (31:37):
Going to profit.
Speaker 2 (31:38):
Yeah, this is going to put us in a in
a much worse situation. I think military military we just
had to switch to. Everything now is cheap munitions like
drone warfare and the drone defense. So everything should be
how do we create effective adaptable drone defense and how
do we create effective official drone production of use? And
(32:01):
that's everything else is second.
Speaker 1 (32:03):
Let me put this on the table, whether it was
the capture of Obama or not Obama, Sama bin Laden
or the capture of Madeiro. You know, American has elite
technological skills. And so the question that I would put forward,
and I'm sure nobody really wants to ask, is Israel
has always been efficient at peremptory assassinations. So you know,
(32:29):
this would be the bad old days for America. But
things change when the head of state knows that, you know,
he could have a PEPSI and be dead the next day.
Speaker 3 (32:39):
Whatever it is.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
I don't know that our country. I think we've done
that stealth, not in the open, but.
Speaker 2 (32:47):
We did in this warm very much. We killed leader in.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
His first term when he knocked out Solima. So yes,
I agree we have to have more I guess adaptical,
technologically cheap war components. But you start looking around and
we have the biggest navy and we still want to
upgrade it. I think England is down to fifty ships, right, Yeah,
(33:14):
China doesn't have a presence and Gali Russia couldn't get
out of the of the what was it the Capsian see.
Speaker 2 (33:22):
Yeah, But that's my point is that anything that's like
a standard target. We saw whether their bases or bases
got hit consistently by iron And the question is, you know,
it's much harder if you have Patriot missiles that are
great air defense, but they're designed for other missiles. If
using on a drone and they send in ten, you
(33:42):
take down eight. You know they get too through and
that they can produce over and over it.
Speaker 3 (33:47):
Yeah, and it's expensive. I get that.
Speaker 1 (33:49):
You know, I had innovative military strategy that nobody wants
to adopt. You know, remember when the North Koreans sent
trash over to South.
Speaker 3 (33:57):
Korea the balloons. You put crystal.
Speaker 1 (34:00):
Meth on the ground an Iran, and you got a
chance that things may shake out differently.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
You got you gottahide them in a carpus or something otherwise.
Speaker 1 (34:08):
All right, Eric Epstein in with Mani O Brian. We're
Rock the Capital. The show is Thunderdome. We're being produced
by Art Selby.
Speaker 3 (34:15):
Again.
Speaker 1 (34:15):
Congratulations into your recent induction into the broadcast for Hall
of Fame.
Speaker 2 (34:19):
Art.
Speaker 1 (34:21):
So I heard this trivia question Art, I'm sure this
will stump you too. What is the only band that
played in Antarctica?
Speaker 2 (34:28):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
Metallica played on all seven continents? Really, yeah, yeah, I
mean they play they apparently they did the concert in
the Argentine station. Apparently there's a lot of stations. Yeah. Yeah, Well,
I mean it's interesting and weird. I mean, try getting
a ticket for that. Yeah, I mean it just seems
(34:51):
to me that I'm not trying to be disrespectful listening
to our show. And then also on TV there's these
new advanced there's diseases. I never heard of geographical atrophy
yeah before that and some of the other stuff. So
I don't know if it always existed and we didn't
know it, or.
Speaker 2 (35:11):
I think it's as we get better technology and diagnosis,
and as people also get older, was the body is
dealing with different problems because we essentially fix other problems.
You know, someone died of polio when they're like twenty five,
They're not going to have heart failure at seventy five, right, So.
Speaker 1 (35:28):
Yeah, it kind of takes that off the table. Yeah,
I got you. But again, you know, I'm always concerned
that some of this, again not to not take seriously
people's ailments, but some of the things that are used
as defense. Attorney says defense. I mean, now you can
(35:50):
use as defense some video game malady that he was
playing video games so long that he didn't realize when
he was slashing or to death there be consequences.
Speaker 2 (36:01):
Well, I forget who was having this conversation with it.
Someone's like, you know, people talk about mentally ill, but
you know, I never see a mentally other person attack
a six or five tattooed guy.
Speaker 3 (36:11):
That's absolute.
Speaker 2 (36:12):
It's always like, you know, you know a grandma or
something that you know that's it.
Speaker 1 (36:17):
And when you hear voices, why does anybody hear voice?
It tells you something good to do, walk the old
lady across the street, give some money. It's always like,
you know, hacked the nipples off baby harpsiels, you know,
stuff like that.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
It's just once people also forget you know, the first
the first benefit of prison is to keep repeat violent
offenders off the streets. It's not I mean, that's that's
the main benefit. People don't want to talk to this.
You obviously want to have the rehab and second chances, understandably,
but like repeat violent offenders, you just have to keep
them all out.
Speaker 1 (36:47):
Look, I taught in prison for seven eight years. There's
some people that never get better. They're just a bad machine.
There's other people just gonna learn new ways to abuse
and exploit people. So I don't know if this matters.
We talked about it before. Again, not a lot of
people covering this, but North Korea had last year was
(37:07):
hosted a lot of high profile folks. Head of the
Chinese government, the head of the Vietnamese government, the head
of the Belarusian government.
Speaker 3 (37:17):
You know what's going on. And this is what I like.
Speaker 1 (37:19):
This is how it's described orderly crowds of Flagway being
North Koreans lining the streets. Yeah yeah, I don't know
that the word demonstrate even translates into that culture.
Speaker 2 (37:34):
Yeah, oh, I mean it was obviously they have to clap.
I think they're they're inviting their communists friends. I think
the communist China, Vietnam, Belarus are all still there identify
as a communist goverment. Obviously China. China is such a
communist and name only. They're like a state run capitalists.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
And Russia's using North Korean troops in the rewards. Unfortunately
they were introduced to two new concepts, food and porn.
So none of the North Korean troops want to come
I want to come back, but I would. I would
probably throw Iran in there too, because Iran uses North
Korean so as George Bush the second used to talk about,
(38:14):
you know, the three citadels of terror back then, Iran, Iraq.
Speaker 3 (38:19):
I think the other was Afghanistan.
Speaker 2 (38:21):
Yeah, well I think North Korea. Yeah, I think it was.
Speaker 3 (38:24):
North North Korea.
Speaker 1 (38:25):
I mean, it's like you don't want to leave anybody
out of that club. But bring it back to politics,
and this is going to be interesting. You have a
Senate candidate in Maine, Senator Planteer, who's a former veteran
helicopter pilot, oyster farmer who has said some and done
(38:46):
some pretty outrageous things, and he's now feuding with fellow
Democrat John Fetterman.
Speaker 3 (38:52):
Yes, okay.
Speaker 1 (38:53):
And then in uh Texas the attorney general is just
has has a criminal history.
Speaker 2 (39:02):
Yes, So is it.
Speaker 1 (39:04):
Possible in America to do this that each side gets
a mulligan and would just say for one seat, we're
gonna we're gonna have our douchebag against your douche Yes,
I mean to knock it out. But both candidates are phenomenal,
are flawed. He won what did he get like eighty
one percent of the vote?
Speaker 2 (39:24):
And man, well, here's the thing. When you have like
a polarized society, and even within the parties, you have
polarize where people want either more left or more right,
confidence and character get thrown out the window. Confidence of
character work. When people say I will change my vote
based on the way you're behaving to someone I might
agree with less but I think is a better person
(39:45):
or a higher level, that's going out the window. If
you put a D next to someone's name, or you
put or someone's name and you run them and say
California and Alabama, no matter what they did or how
smart they are, they will win. And that's essentially what
we're taking They're taking advantage of se in the primary
where people are now now because they don't have any competition,
advocate for strong, you know, stronger and more extreme hands
(40:07):
you have.
Speaker 1 (40:08):
Like in the case of Harry Truman, where he had
confidence and character, but he left with an approval rating
lesson Nixon. They developed an attachment to him afterwards.
Speaker 2 (40:18):
Right.
Speaker 1 (40:18):
You had that same experience with Gerald Ford. I think
we told the story before where he represented the Grand
Rapids and a constituent he had a rule, if you
drove to my office, I'm going to see you. So
this guy drives to the office and then his car
breaks down and Ford drives him home.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
Really.
Speaker 1 (40:39):
Yeah, So actually George Bush the first was like that
a lot. Uh you know, he was a blue uh
well blue I don't want to say blue dog, but
he was very moderate Republican.
Speaker 2 (40:51):
Like the New England liberal Republicans.
Speaker 1 (40:53):
Yeah, came down to Texas and a lot of people
just said and he stood by Nixon and even though
he knew it would not turn out or likely new
it wouldn't turn out.
Speaker 3 (41:05):
Well.
Speaker 1 (41:06):
So you have those rare individuals that have character. It's
becoming less unless the commodity is less and less available.
Speaker 2 (41:16):
Yeah, yeah, well, and it's not because it's not rewarded,
and ideological priority is rewarded. I mean essentially that's what
we're looking for, and entertainment's rewarding that could make a
name for themselves.
Speaker 1 (41:25):
What happens then Trump has been very successful in the primary.
I mean he's knocked off or attimidated Tom Tillis, Bill
Cassidy in Louisiana recently was it Cronin in Texas? Yeah?
And his I guess what I'm seeing as a strategist
(41:48):
is that North Carolina will probably turn D.
Speaker 3 (41:50):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (41:50):
About Texas is always tough.
Speaker 1 (41:53):
But now you're going to have to spend money on
a campaign that should be a cake.
Speaker 2 (41:57):
Walk, right you should. You should listen won times by
fourteen points. But now we've seen and this is all
based down to also governing in Cannis selection, that's gonna
be fifty to fifty race. And this is is you
can do one thing in the primary, but the general
elections are different, right people. That's why we've always advocated
for open primaries. Essentially everyone can vote and then you
(42:17):
get Cannas people to a wider base. But that's of course,
you know, that's not that's well.
Speaker 1 (42:22):
Look, I mean I it starts at the local level,
which is probably the most important form of government, because
there are your emergency service providers in the sense they
provide education for what or trash things of that nature.
And I've always thought to be a really good or
responsive politician, you have to work your way up, uh,
and not just you know, start at the top.
Speaker 3 (42:46):
What have we got three minutes?
Speaker 2 (42:48):
Yeah, boat three?
Speaker 1 (42:49):
So last night I watched part one of a documentary
on George Bush the first and we were talking about
that on the car ride over, how he and Reagan
didn't get along. And you're not going to like someone
who calls your economics of voodoo. But what was interesting
is that Reagan had this aura of strength, and you know,
(43:10):
people looked at him for guidance. And the commentator said,
Bush flew fifty combat missions.
Speaker 3 (43:18):
I thought of him as a whimp. You know.
Speaker 1 (43:20):
Reagan, you know, played a pilot, you know, he played
a football player.
Speaker 3 (43:25):
Bush was captain of his team.
Speaker 1 (43:27):
And it was interesting that he was never able to
shake that moniker. Uh. And he won the election against
dou Concas. But this was interesting when you talk about character,
it really was hard to get him to do negative ads,
and then when he did the yeah the ads on
dou Caucus, Oh my god, pardoning.
Speaker 2 (43:49):
A murder, the helmet on the table, the.
Speaker 3 (43:52):
Helmet on the tank.
Speaker 1 (43:54):
We would talk about the Massachusetts miracle and they would
show that the bay was a sludge right pond.
Speaker 2 (44:01):
Well, Willison, people say they don't want negative ads, but
they responded to love that other way. They wouldn't put
him out.
Speaker 1 (44:06):
All right, Art this weekend, are you going down to
visit your dad?
Speaker 2 (44:10):
My dad has his birthday coming up midweek, so I'll
see him towards the middle of the week.
Speaker 1 (44:14):
Okay, Well please tell them we said, Hi, Becky's doing Okay.
Speaker 3 (44:18):
She's doing great.
Speaker 1 (44:18):
Yep, all right, Well you're not well tomorrow. I guess
you're probably watching World Cup.
Speaker 3 (44:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (44:25):
I've probably watched as much World Cup as I can.
Speaker 1 (44:27):
Yeah, I'm just gonna say this publicly. I think soccer
in America was the demise of America. I mean, you know,
in football, you get crunched, it's a crunch. These guys
trip over a blade of grass, so it's like they
had a coma. They come out, you know, and get them.
Speaker 2 (44:45):
But to be honest, soccer is big it's huge. It's
beyond anything you can I don't even know. I think
there's any even entertainment form that's as big. I think
the main promise soccer is it's slow pacers, too many trolls.
So I switch to a win only format. You have
way more So.
Speaker 1 (45:01):
What if you did this one minute at the end,
you can pick the ball up with your hands, and
at one minute at the end you put spikes on
the ball, pick it up with your hands and you
could throw.
Speaker 3 (45:12):
That would be.
Speaker 2 (45:12):
Exciting, usually exciting, and this would they don't get. This
is what I need to bring it to America.
Speaker 1 (45:16):
We can update it again, Ahead of the ahead of
the times. Eric kep standing with Money O'Brian will rock
the Capitol the show's Thunderdome. We were produced by Art Selby.
Have a great weekend, Do not drink and drive.
Well, happy June twentieth. I guess the day before Father's Day? Yes,
you planning anything?
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Actually, my dad is not gonna be run, so I'm
gonna have something form on Monday.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Okay, that sounds good. I mean, if you need a
surrogate person to take out for dinner. Now, but I
said this before Father's Day is kind of like an
afterthought to Mother's Day.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
We're Rock the Capital. We're a good government, anti corruption
group founded in nineteen or two thousand and five, sorry
after the illegal pay raise. We're non partisan. We don't
care what party you're from. We care who's throwing the party.
We don't take sides, we take aim. And so I
want to just get into the well. First of all,
(00:44):
it'd be hard not to talk about the New York Knicks.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Yeah. One championship, first time in fifty three years. Yeah,
I think this is arguably the most at least since
twenty eleven with Dirtovinsky. The most surprising championship was no
one had picked. Right, I'm going to do with a
guy that's six feet tall, six feet tall, not a
freak athlete, and just and just dominate, and not just
(01:09):
dominate the NBA in a way that we haven't seen
in the line that.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
Look, it was exciting. I'm happy for the Knicks. I
think it was fifty three years. What's sad as I
remember that? And look the series was exciting. Coming back
from twenty nine points down was breathtaking.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
You know.
Speaker 1 (01:26):
On the other end, san Antonio is gonna have to
undergo a lot of counseling.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Yeah, I think I think the big thing is to
be Webin Yama because you you know, we were seeing
him just go through the playoffs and even at Oklahoma
City Series. Right, this guy is gonna be on soptable
for years and years to come.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
What is he like? Six seven foot five?
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Yes, seven for five.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
Is it true that his mom smoke crack or is
that natural?
Speaker 2 (01:50):
I'm I'm assuming it's just a natural. But he's just
a freak. And he's been basically trained to become a
professional best player, yeah, his whole life because Europe they
had the academy, see you right in there. The question
is like he is again to develop the offensive game
and Kenny gets conditioning because when his conditioning suffers, his
defense stuffers is the same impacted offensively, he settles for
(02:12):
these kind of like off balance shots, which is not
his game. Usually he's rim running and he's dominating.
Speaker 3 (02:18):
What is rim running me?
Speaker 2 (02:20):
So he's sets a peck and he's runs to the rim.
He's so big you have to collapse and open up
shooters or he gets last.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
Seven five.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
That's a big man, Holly, I remember, well, I remember
when six feet was big. But anyway, I'm going to
get into the Ask Bryant segment for the first part
of the first segment and then hopefully a little part
of the second pegment second segment. So there's a couple
ominous signs that aren't on the horizon, there actually happening.
(02:48):
So you have the European Central Bank raising interest rates.
The Fed kept it at where it was, which is
interesting because they just had a new chair who I
thought was going and to reduce the interest rates, producer
prices up six point five percent from a year ago.
Speaker 3 (03:08):
Bank at Japan, now this.
Speaker 1 (03:10):
Doesn't sound like a lot, but they raised the QRate
to one percent. There were times when they were actually negative.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Yeah they were. Japan has been a deflationary cycle for
like thirty years right in which the consumer spending is
going down, but the prices are also going down with it,
you know. It's it's one of those weird things where
we look at Japan on economic balance sheet and we say, oh,
they've been unsuccessful or staging it for thirty years. When
we ask people how they feel, a lot of them
are very happy because you know, they might not be
(03:36):
getting big income increases, but the stuff's not prices aren't
going up. That's changing now and this is this is
a huge supply shock and energy that we haven't seen
for a while.
Speaker 3 (03:47):
Right.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
Look, the last part is and I don't know if
this matters. The World Bank as has a lot of
entities have really downgraded what they think growth will be
coming up this year. So as you're looking at it,
I mean these are real numbers and they matter. And
also a lot has really an after effect or direct
(04:10):
impact from the war.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
Yeah, so in a supply side shock.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
Just explain that to the listeners.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
So you know, in basic economics, the price of a
point or anything and the amount that is produced is
where demand to supply meet. That's essentially what happens when
you have a supply side shock and you move a
lot of supplies offline. You have potential shortages, but you
also have huge increases in prices because now you're competing
not where the price is supposed to meet on a
(04:38):
market level, but now you're like an artificially deficient market
where the prices get bid up. Think about with tickets,
if you if I essentially said I'm going to take
away half the tickets, So if there's fifty thousand people
that want to go to the stadium, now there's only
twenty five thousand, but there's tickets, but there's still the
same fifty thousand. The price point they could sell it
at is much higher. And so with energy, which is
(04:59):
such a an important commodity in every part of the economy,
and it doesn't it doesn't just hit at the gas puppet,
hits every single sector, rent, food, all that, because all
that is such a good sadd on. So that's that's
the main problem. And us to a certain degree is
protected from the shortages of shock where like we're not
(05:21):
going to run out, we produce more than we need
with the actual price. Because it's in a global market
we are affected by.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
All right, So on that upbeat note FISA, which was
apparently not extended. What is FIZA And I thought this
would be something that mister Trump would push through.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
So FIZA is the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, and that's
it's I'm sorry for Intelligent Surveillance Act, and it's basically
a way to just essentially spy on people that we
considered after nine to eleven terrorist threats. You couldn't go
to a normal court and put out like, hey, we're
gonna spy on this guy, because the would obvious, you know,
and that could essentially work them. The problem is that
(06:03):
if you have essentially a secret court that proves these warrants,
are they following the wall? We found is that there
was huge abuses over here. So people were getting put
on that list with essentially things that would never hold
up in a normal court.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
And so we can surveil foreign people, we.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
But but also Americans connected to foreign right. Yeah. So yeah,
so it's been pushed through since nine eleven. Everyone always
approves it. You typically see civil libertarians and something I
would say the old school left that would push against it,
But no one would really push against it up until recently.
And the reason is that there's been belief that politicians
(06:42):
on both sides have used it to essentially target opponents,
spying on your poitical.
Speaker 1 (06:47):
Yeah, I think they're right in the left are together
on the far right, far left, you know, being more evasive,
and the information is being used for neofarious.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Right findings.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
But apparently there the replacement, I guess it would be
for I can't think we're in Galbert. Uh was going
to be this guy Clayton from New York, and so
it appeared that that was going to smooth the way.
He was a former US coterunity for Southern New York.
But then his confirmation was actually pulled by Trump.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Right because he wants us to get renewed. And I
think that the problem is this is.
Speaker 3 (07:24):
But he didn't push for it before though.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
I mean, yes, well, because remember he wanted reforms because
in his when he first came in or when he
came in again, I should say, he believed the fight.
The court was used against him in his campaign and
it's such a despy on him and it was abused.
And this is why we can't have this court. The
problem is that once everyone comes into power, their position changes.
It's it's similar, it's different. The free speech thing. The
(07:47):
only free speech that you could defend, it's stuff you
disagree with because Obviously, everyone wants free speech for stuff
they agree with. The stuff you disagree with you have
to defend. And it's sort of if you want to
do civil liberties, you have to defend ceviberties for people
you don't like or are essentially bad people. Otherwise, if
you obviously you defend it for yourself. But that just
goes without saying, and then when you're out of power,
(08:08):
your opponent could use the same things against you.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
The chances of this being extended or what.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
I would say that they are going to get extended
very high because they almost never. They never follow through,
They raise complaints, they bring it up, but then when
the budget comes through, when all the dealers are made,
and there'll be some reforms. There was one perform called
r I s AA reforms that are suentially supposed to
put supervisors above in roles that essentially you have to
(08:35):
warn through a supervisor. They're trying to do other reforms
with the courts, I think have an independent arbiter. The
problem is that the court's secret, and that's it's fundamental
of the program because you if you're obviously looking at
terrorist cases, you can't publicize the names and say, hey,
we're going to spy on such and such or And
then with America, the question is, you know, how do
(08:56):
you keep that court private and then have reforms and accountability.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
It doesn't work. It's private. I don't care who they
put there. You know, an arbiter, you know, a statue
of Thomas Jefferson, a white unicorn. It doesn't matter. Their
secret and there's a reason why they're secret is they
don't want people to know what the information is before
we go to break. Measles is drawing national attention in Lancaster.
(09:22):
There have been thirty two cases. It's the end of
April forty in total. Why are measles so prominent in Lancaster?
Speaker 2 (09:31):
Is it so? I mean, language is obviously a huge
amash population. There's been a push since COVID, and what
I would say is was the overreaction and kind of
misin foreign policies during that period that essentially pushed people
away from vaccines. So what's happening now is they're looking
in saying are there side effects? Are we essentially missing them?
(09:54):
What do other countries do? And then you know, are
these pharmaceutical companies is there too much? Buddy buddy with
the regulators or the regulators promoters, essentially saying are the
people that are supposed to regulate and look at the
vaccines and set the protocols, are they also promoters? Or
is this just kind of.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
The government government is now deformed where the people that
regulate oftentimes do promote. This is not anything new. But
the deal is if you don't get the injection, it
really doesn't matter. That conspiracy doesn't matter.
Speaker 2 (10:29):
But here's the thing is that if you if you
have too many people without the vaccine, obviously there's a
chance of you you miss that kind of immunity. Our community, ye,
her community target. And so that's that's the wordy And
this is the is that what you make when the
medical union makes mistakes? I think actually going back to
the fentanyl and opiate thing, which I think really kind
of devastate people. Then don't trust them.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Let's take a break. We got to get to our sponsors.
We're going to pick up after the break. We're going
to move from uh measles to screw Worms. I'm America
cap Stign, I'm with Millennial Brian. We're from Rock to Capital.
The show is Thunderdome. We're being produced by Art Selby.
You know, it seems like there's a lot more commercials
(11:11):
regarding digestion and bowel movements, you know. And my observation
is this, When I was younger, every morning I had
black coffee and a non filtered camel cigarette. I was
never constipated. So I mean, we're gonna have.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
To that'll send stuff right through. I think. I think
what we're seeing is that we're clearly preparing for the
July fourth barbecue.
Speaker 1 (11:37):
All right, So going back, Yeah, we were talking about
measles and the reluctance of people to get inoculated. Obviously
COVID had an impact, but you think the precursor event.
Speaker 2 (11:45):
Was opioys because it was such a horrible and clear
conflict of interest situation. So you essentially had both both
pharmaceutical companies essentially paying doctors to give recommendations for very
like oxycotton, very hardcore opiates, and then people were getting
addicted to women and getting on heroin and fentanyl and
(12:06):
dying and people were getting huge kickbacks. It's the clear
conflict of interests. We're essentially, you know, people making the
recommendations are now financially incentivized to give the most extreme
like if you get a gunshot wound, that's when you
would have an op to deal with. It would not
be like knee pain or back stiffness, because that's how
(12:28):
you can get that. That's why you get people addicted.
And then once you get that rush and that feeling,
it's real hard to get off.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
You have a problem in America where the regulators have
become the promoters. Department of Agriculture is a good example.
The nuclear industry is an example. It's very hard to
regulate when you're promoting. It's also it's more challenging when
the same people basically occupy Yes, one day a promoter,
the next day a regulator.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
And they use their experience either as a regulator or
an industry person should get jobs in either side. So
if you're andustry person to say well, i've experienced I
should be a regulator, they're regularly saying why it should
be in the industry I have experienced, which is which
is is a self fulfilling prophecy. And the problem is, yeah,
the problem is that I think that it's most ridiculous
with gambling, because we know gambling is essentially you know,
(13:19):
you're such all these trying to promote bad behavior. You're
trying to grow. It's not even like cigarettes. It's like
you're actually trying to form a cigarettes was.
Speaker 1 (13:27):
Cool when there'd be a nice looking woman in a
race car smoking a Virginia Slim and it would say,
you've come a long way, baby. Man, I would snort
those cigarettes. But you know, the image is always positive
and uh and I would allege that in all the
sin drugs, gaming, tobacco, alcohol, the marketing.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
Is it's fun.
Speaker 1 (13:49):
Yeah, it's trying to advance that behavior. So let me
skip because we're a little behind and get to an
interesting topic. And that's just which I never heard of.
Nor this will be the first time on our show
that we're saying a word like screw worm, which is
a double phallic symbol. But however, screw worm is this
(14:12):
like flesh eating?
Speaker 2 (14:13):
Yeah, it's great.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
So yeah, but let me do this is this is
what this is, This is America.
Speaker 3 (14:19):
It's great.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
So we're going to try and defeat the screw worm
by introducing I don't know what is it, like eight.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
Million sterile male flies.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
Steril male flies to breed with the.
Speaker 2 (14:32):
The essentially the female egg layers that and then essentially
be unsuccessful in laying eggs and mutating. And so this
this problem is it's like it's especially as a virus,
very contagious virus, if you think of it like that.
And so once you get to a certain area, unless
you quarantine it right away, it can get out and
can destroy huge amounts of live stuff. And so this
(14:53):
this came from Latin America.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
How does it so what does it do? Does it
just sit on the cattle and eat their flesh?
Speaker 2 (14:59):
Yeah, So upon hatching, the magatue's sharp mouth hooks to
burrow into and eat the living flesh, which can call
cause fatal tissue damage within a week. And then and
then they multiply though that's the key thing is that
it's not just one, it's they multiply, multiply and multiply. Yes,
drop I have here four million, but they're going to
(15:20):
keep drop four million male sterile male flies, which sounds
ridiculous that we even were able to access that.
Speaker 1 (15:27):
They said it could get up to six hundred million
flies if we need them. If yeah, But I mean
this is getting to be like what if one of
these flies escapes invites a human and they get super
human powers. I mean, this thing could get could go
south really quickly. So my question to you is that
(15:47):
has there been a screw worm in America or has
it been contained to south.
Speaker 3 (15:52):
Of the border.
Speaker 2 (15:52):
No, so they are in America, so there's there was
you know, I believe seven counties in America have it.
So it's the southern part of the United States. So
it's kind in Texas to Valla Something Edwards, Tom Green, Gillespie,
and LaSalle and then Mexican New Mexico, Lee County all has.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
All right, So the reality is so we've successfully combatd
illegal immigration except when it comes to screw that's right.
Speaker 2 (16:19):
So we were letting in such a bad meat from
Latin America and that's.
Speaker 1 (16:26):
So human eats it. Do they die or is it?
I mean you probably know when your hamburger comes out
and there's flies buzzing around. But I mean it just
seems to me to we don't have an answer, and
I know.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
Well, it's mainly in meat that goes directed to animals,
so that's not there's I think there's more standards to
get to humans, so you would be unok for a
human to get that far. But it destroys the livestock,
so it's going to increase the cost of our food.
And that's that's the big thing. If you if you
take let's say you take twenty percent of the livestock
off the you know that food's going to go off.
(17:01):
It's gonna be the same prom it's the same supply
shot from you have you know, lower quality, higher prices.
Speaker 1 (17:06):
All right, let me just give you a couple of numbers.
So the American whatever it was, the Affordability Act Obamacare,
which has saves insurance for about thirty one million, Affordable
Care Act, Sorry about that. In twenty twenty one, the
Supreme Court, despite a Republican challenge, reinstated it. However, you
(17:29):
now have the Affordable Care Act, which had an extension
which wasn't if I understand, wasn't initially attended after COVID
during COVID, So you now have the number of people
that are insured dramatically dropping. Some of the premiums have
gone up one hundred and two percent. Now, my sense
(17:51):
was the Senate Democrats wanted to extend it, but that's
been defeated. So that if I'm reading this number right,
and it seems like a big number to me, the
amount of money you need to subsidize this program, and
I'm assuming this is nationally is a trillion.
Speaker 2 (18:07):
It is a trillion over ten years in fairness, So
but that's yeah. So are the.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
Costs transferred onto uh, poor health and emergency room visits
or is this not a big deal?
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Well, it's definitely a big deal. I mean, you know,
when people people are going to go uninsured and stuff
like that, and there will be costs where people just
have to use the emergency room as a last resort.
I think the question is the problem the fundamental problem
with any healthcare reform, whether it's OBAMACA or anything, is
that you're not dealing with the cost of the care,
and so everything becomes either a subsidy or a loophole
(18:43):
or all to deal with the fact that the cost
of the care is going up and we have an
aging population and so unless you so, if you look
at what they did, they didn't really they didn't tenchnically
end the program, but they basically took away a lot
of the subsidy.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
But that was under the impression though if you were
older and on the insurance urrance, you are less likely
to come off the program because there was some other
something you could age in to.
Speaker 2 (19:08):
Maybe you have all of renewed policies and but if
you're but also you have with older people, you have
essentially different medicare options or in different states even more
extensive medicare option. But the thing with is that the
people that were getting the essentially buying the insurance premiums
is that they were getting a subsidized market rate from
(19:30):
the government. So the insurance was to say charged two fifty,
and the government would say, based on your income, we're
gonna give you a subsidy of one hundred and fifty.
So now it's one hundred dollars a month. If that
substy goes away, it becomes two to fifty a month,
So that's why you're seeing all these huge increase. They
would also put regulations on things like deductibleses, such as say,
if you're an insurance company that wants to operate in
the United States, you have to cover these things. You
(19:50):
have to have a max seductible at a certain rate there,
and those rules are being lifted. So that's the two
ways they control the cost. The problem is the cost
of the care didn't change, so it's that you're either going
to have especially private markups and which is what we're
gonna have now, or you're gonna have expanded government subsidies.
The key is that you'd have to get lower costs.
(20:12):
You have to do with other countries to which is
either at a market rate, use such a competition and
negotiations to lower prices, or in a government rate, or
use the government as a purchaser to lower prices and
get better deals.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
All right, well in English, what did you just say?
Speaker 2 (20:26):
Well, I would say that basically our healthcare system is
the worst of both worlds that we do not negotiate
with from the government to get lower prices for treatments.
That's why, for example, is epic is cheap everywhere else
but super expensive in the United States. They know they
can kind of rake our our our Yeah, I thought
he did. He did to some degree. He did. He
(20:47):
put those those in place, but it's not across the
board because we go But then on the market side,
we have essentially government protections that allow them to operate
with the cartel, so you don't get the competition if
you'll get it. A good example was in the plastic
surgery cosmetic field, where you have those big surgeries. They're
all getting way less expensive and way better. Why because
(21:08):
you don't have the cartel that can essentially US economics, the.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
Most pernicious cartel, or the American pharmaceuticals.
Speaker 2 (21:17):
Yeah, I would say pharmaceuticals insurance companies because they know
that they.
Speaker 1 (21:22):
You have to have that collusion for it to be
to be effective. So that being the case, I mean,
somebody like me who's a school board member is likely
to see a higher increase of students that are ill.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
I mean, it's going to be a cost shift, but
also well, and.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
They're going to do what you said. So if let's say,
for example, the people who are in between health care
coverages or they lose their healthcare, they're gonna use like,
oh my kid goes to school, I'll use the kind
of nurse there, or we'll go to the hospital or
patient first. Like, you're going to see other parts of
the healthcare industry pushed, and you're gonna see areas that
rely on essentially government usion, like rural hospitals to meet
(22:02):
their bills.
Speaker 1 (22:03):
I also think you'll see a lot of people, and
I've seen this in the past, moving out of the
country to get healthcare. Uh, it's it's not it's not common.
It's unusual, but it does happen. So I'm Eric Epstein.
We're in with Millennial Brian. We're from Rock to Capitol.
The show is Thunderdome. We're being produced by Art Selby,
and we'll be back after the news. Hey also wanted
(22:25):
to wish get well to Jimmy, who is Larry's dog,
and to Nancy who had a what do you call
that in your tooth? A no no, no no, the
when they trill your.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Cavity, not a cavity root.
Speaker 3 (22:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
God, she explained it to me. It was like, you
know what I'd rather lose. She's got another one coming up.
And then also we're Genie, you know, a happy recovery.
So I wanted to stay away with it. But you
just heard Vice President Brandt Vance say America wins either way.
(23:07):
I got to tell you I thought the invasion of
Iran was not only ill advised. It's hard for me
to see anything positive coming from this.
Speaker 3 (23:15):
What I've learned.
Speaker 1 (23:18):
This is non political for a while, is when people
don't want to tell you what's in the agreement, it's
usually not a good size. So they're not going to
be dealing with ballistic missiles which you know, leaves Israel
in the cold and they're not going to deal with
a network of proxies. Yet Iran wants America to curb Lebanon.
(23:38):
And you know, if you're this is what staggered me
is that there's been a lot of criticism and I
understand of Obama, who turned over one point seven billion
in cash, which is actually the ir audience cash in
their agreement. He's looking now to n freeze up to
twenty four billion.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
Yeah, and then potentially all essentially allowing investment fun of
up to three hundred billion.
Speaker 1 (24:02):
So you have that on top of the fact that
Iran has basically sold their oil on the black market.
This agreement would allow the Americans, like they did with
the Russians, to unfreeze the boycott and allow them to
transact business.
Speaker 3 (24:18):
So this is an.
Speaker 1 (24:20):
Economic boom for Iran. I'm not I can't see a
lot that was favorable for America or Israel. And it
seems that mister Trump is perturbed with mister met Nyaho.
But as you talked about this earlier, I just wanted
to point this out. The price of fertilizer has gone
(24:43):
up seventy percent according to the American Farm Bureau, the
cost to buy a home is now at six point
five to two percent for a thirty year home. And
so what that means for a four hundred thousand dollars
home is you're paying one hundred and ten dollars more
a month. I didn't realize that US motorists used between
three hundred and sixty and three hundred and eighty million
(25:05):
gallons of gasoline yep, centric Yeah, every day, so that
the war surcharge is about three hundred and sixty million
a day. So what I did find interesting in Saudi Arabia,
and we talked about this before, had another pipeline option
and they reported a twenty six percent increase in their oil.
(25:26):
But all that being said, even if it's an MoU,
it's not a treaty. They it looks like Iran would
be allowed to keep their nuclear option. It's hard to
square this with what mister Trump's reason for going to
war was, which was regime changed. Now he actually said, ah,
there's a couple of nice guys over there.
Speaker 2 (25:46):
Right, So there's an argument is get we did kill
their leaders, we have better people, and then we're going
to get a new crew deal. And that they'll be
incentivized to behavial because look at these economic benefits. The
problem is, obviously, you know, is that you know want
you to start a war. So I don't know if
they're they're suchually super happy to make deals with you
(26:07):
or keep their deals. I think they're gonna look at
this and say this is why we have to have
a nuclear weapon and potentially be at least its sprint
capacity to a nuclear weapon if this ever happens again.
And then on the economics, the main problem is they
control or not control, but they can influence the strait
of hormuse. And because they're a dictatorship, it doesn't matter
(26:28):
if their economy is doing terrible in their commy right
now they have fifty or it's like it's destroyed. But
remember it doesn't matter as long as they can stay
in power. Whereas the reverse is true the United States,
a dollar increase. If I proposed a dollar tax on gas,
I was gonna spend that tax money building a pit.
Everyone would vote against it, but essentially that's the cost,
(26:49):
and do you want that to go on forever? So
I think the thing that's gonna help the United States,
or what he's gonna argue is the straight uparmos is
gonna open, inflation is gonna come down. Those numbers that
were essentially slow the economy that's gonna go away, and
we're gonna get back to better growth.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
And say, I don't think any of that's going to happen.
But in the event it did happen. What we lost
here was prestige. You lost here was influenced. What we
lost here was the ability to govern with a big stick.
And you know, militarily there was a lot of successes. Economically,
(27:30):
the ripple effect across the world can't automatically be rearranged.
Speaker 3 (27:35):
And I think normally what happens.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
In a situation like this you find alternative ways to
transport the commodity that that you're boycotting. But this comes
back to something we've talked about in your head of
the game is the superpowers need to understand that asymmetric
warfare is now the norm, so that you may have
(27:57):
a warship, but it doesn't take a lot to take
that right if what happened in Russia.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
Yeah, and if you look at the geography of it,
the main advantage they have is they're close to the
straight uparmouse and all they have to do is threaten
civilian transport there to where you can't go through. Remember,
it's harder to it's much harder to defend civilian transport
than to attack it. Think of it in just like
a normal public mall. You know, if I said I'm
going to go out day after day and we're gonna
(28:26):
just attack random people go in the mall, and you
have to go out and you have to defend it,
that's way harder. It's way hard because you have the
one essentially stop me from even getting close. That's the
situation there. And now with drones being so cheaply able
to produce, well, you don't need, you know, a Navy,
air force air defense. You just need to be able
to essentially threaten drones.
Speaker 3 (28:48):
You know.
Speaker 1 (28:49):
The issue is Russia failed and that we failed out. Actually,
most people fail at it. Germany and World War two
failed at it. You can have overwhelming force and you
can inflict lot of pain and suffering on your adversary.
That's why diplomatic political solutions are more advantageous. But this
also is a challenge for the American first because he
(29:12):
said no more wars, So this is a war that
being said this is also maybe to shed a positive
light on Trump's strategy. If there is a strategy, it
demonstrates again that we're interdependent and there can't just be
a fortress America where we close our doors.
Speaker 2 (29:29):
Yeah. Yes, But I think the real thing is what
Jade Vance is selling is they will be incentivized to
change their behavior. But if they're not, what's your stick?
If your stick is only economic and they shown they
can withstand that, or you're going to constantly restore kinetic options.
I think the problem is that we're coming at this
negotiation from a bad spot.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
We made the same mistake that all powers make. We
don't understand our adversary. For God's sake, they've been saying
for forty seven years, death to America. We're the great Satan.
They're not Trump. They can't do a U turn and survive.
I mean, they have to stay ideologically pure, and you know,
and kind of what you were saying before. They don't
(30:12):
care about their people. You know, you know, their people
could be starving, they could care less. Our people charge
them and dollar more for a big mac and they're
rioting in the streets.
Speaker 2 (30:22):
Right And that's that's that's it's an economic thing, it's
not a military thing. We could we could destroy even
more parts of their military. We have destroyed tons of
their infrastructure. The other thing is we clearly have the
aligns with the Gulf states and they're vulnerable. We talk
about the East West pipeline with Saudi Arabia. You know
where that goes. It goes out the other straight which
right there is the hugees in Yemen. And so once
(30:43):
again they don't have to have this super sophisticated navy
or military. They just have to be able to create
drones and essentially move around so you can't get them.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
So you look at Iran and you look at Hamas,
who basically have created cities underground. And I tried to
try to figure out what our technological adaptation has been.
I mean, we get bigger, we build more, we have
a presence. We don't I understand, we don't want to
use civilians. We don't rather, we don't want to use
(31:13):
soldiers footmen, So how do we I mean, Look, this
was not.
Speaker 3 (31:18):
A good deal.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
I think I really do believe that net pushed him
Trump into it, can't get out of it. He was
also seduced by his success in Venezuela. But now you're
in war with Iran, which is the great Satan for
God's sake, and other people are.
Speaker 3 (31:37):
Going to profit.
Speaker 2 (31:38):
Yeah, this is going to put us in a in
a much worse situation. I think military military we just
had to switch to. Everything now is cheap munitions like
drone warfare and the drone defense. So everything should be
how do we create effective adaptable drone defense and how
do we create effective official drone production of use? And
(32:01):
that's everything else is second.
Speaker 1 (32:03):
Let me put this on the table, whether it was
the capture of Obama or not Obama, Sama bin Laden
or the capture of Madeiro. You know, American has elite
technological skills. And so the question that I would put forward,
and I'm sure nobody really wants to ask, is Israel
has always been efficient at peremptory assassinations. So you know,
(32:29):
this would be the bad old days for America. But
things change when the head of state knows that, you know,
he could have a PEPSI and be dead the next day.
Speaker 3 (32:39):
Whatever it is.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
I don't know that our country. I think we've done
that stealth, not in the open, but.
Speaker 2 (32:47):
We did in this warm very much. We killed leader in.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
His first term when he knocked out Solima. So yes,
I agree we have to have more I guess adaptical,
technologically cheap war components. But you start looking around and
we have the biggest navy and we still want to
upgrade it. I think England is down to fifty ships, right, Yeah,
(33:14):
China doesn't have a presence and Gali Russia couldn't get
out of the of the what was it the Capsian see.
Speaker 2 (33:22):
Yeah, But that's my point is that anything that's like
a standard target. We saw whether their bases or bases
got hit consistently by iron And the question is, you know,
it's much harder if you have Patriot missiles that are
great air defense, but they're designed for other missiles. If
using on a drone and they send in ten, you
(33:42):
take down eight. You know they get too through and
that they can produce over and over it.
Speaker 3 (33:47):
Yeah, and it's expensive. I get that.
Speaker 1 (33:49):
You know, I had innovative military strategy that nobody wants
to adopt. You know, remember when the North Koreans sent
trash over to South.
Speaker 3 (33:57):
Korea the balloons. You put crystal.
Speaker 1 (34:00):
Meth on the ground an Iran, and you got a
chance that things may shake out differently.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
You got you gottahide them in a carpus or something otherwise.
Speaker 1 (34:08):
All right, Eric Epstein in with Mani O Brian. We're
Rock the Capital. The show is Thunderdome. We're being produced
by Art Selby.
Speaker 3 (34:15):
Again.
Speaker 1 (34:15):
Congratulations into your recent induction into the broadcast for Hall
of Fame.
Speaker 2 (34:19):
Art.
Speaker 1 (34:21):
So I heard this trivia question Art, I'm sure this
will stump you too. What is the only band that
played in Antarctica?
Speaker 2 (34:28):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
Metallica played on all seven continents? Really, yeah, yeah, I
mean they play they apparently they did the concert in
the Argentine station. Apparently there's a lot of stations. Yeah. Yeah, Well,
I mean it's interesting and weird. I mean, try getting
a ticket for that. Yeah, I mean it just seems
(34:51):
to me that I'm not trying to be disrespectful listening
to our show. And then also on TV there's these
new advanced there's diseases. I never heard of geographical atrophy
yeah before that and some of the other stuff. So
I don't know if it always existed and we didn't
know it, or.
Speaker 2 (35:11):
I think it's as we get better technology and diagnosis,
and as people also get older, was the body is
dealing with different problems because we essentially fix other problems.
You know, someone died of polio when they're like twenty five,
They're not going to have heart failure at seventy five, right, So.
Speaker 1 (35:28):
Yeah, it kind of takes that off the table. Yeah,
I got you. But again, you know, I'm always concerned
that some of this, again not to not take seriously
people's ailments, but some of the things that are used
as defense. Attorney says defense. I mean, now you can
(35:50):
use as defense some video game malady that he was
playing video games so long that he didn't realize when
he was slashing or to death there be consequences.
Speaker 2 (36:01):
Well, I forget who was having this conversation with it.
Someone's like, you know, people talk about mentally ill, but
you know, I never see a mentally other person attack
a six or five tattooed guy.
Speaker 3 (36:11):
That's absolute.
Speaker 2 (36:12):
It's always like, you know, you know a grandma or
something that you know that's it.
Speaker 1 (36:17):
And when you hear voices, why does anybody hear voice?
It tells you something good to do, walk the old
lady across the street, give some money. It's always like,
you know, hacked the nipples off baby harpsiels, you know,
stuff like that.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
It's just once people also forget you know, the first
the first benefit of prison is to keep repeat violent
offenders off the streets. It's not I mean, that's that's
the main benefit. People don't want to talk to this.
You obviously want to have the rehab and second chances, understandably,
but like repeat violent offenders, you just have to keep
them all out.
Speaker 1 (36:47):
Look, I taught in prison for seven eight years. There's
some people that never get better. They're just a bad machine.
There's other people just gonna learn new ways to abuse
and exploit people. So I don't know if this matters.
We talked about it before. Again, not a lot of
people covering this, but North Korea had last year was
(37:07):
hosted a lot of high profile folks. Head of the
Chinese government, the head of the Vietnamese government, the head
of the Belarusian government.
Speaker 3 (37:17):
You know what's going on. And this is what I like.
Speaker 1 (37:19):
This is how it's described orderly crowds of Flagway being
North Koreans lining the streets. Yeah yeah, I don't know
that the word demonstrate even translates into that culture.
Speaker 2 (37:34):
Yeah, oh, I mean it was obviously they have to clap.
I think they're they're inviting their communists friends. I think
the communist China, Vietnam, Belarus are all still there identify
as a communist goverment. Obviously China. China is such a
communist and name only. They're like a state run capitalists.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
And Russia's using North Korean troops in the rewards. Unfortunately
they were introduced to two new concepts, food and porn.
So none of the North Korean troops want to come
I want to come back, but I would. I would
probably throw Iran in there too, because Iran uses North
Korean so as George Bush the second used to talk about,
(38:14):
you know, the three citadels of terror back then, Iran, Iraq.
Speaker 3 (38:19):
I think the other was Afghanistan.
Speaker 2 (38:21):
Yeah, well I think North Korea. Yeah, I think it was.
Speaker 3 (38:24):
North North Korea.
Speaker 1 (38:25):
I mean, it's like you don't want to leave anybody
out of that club. But bring it back to politics,
and this is going to be interesting. You have a
Senate candidate in Maine, Senator Planteer, who's a former veteran
helicopter pilot, oyster farmer who has said some and done
(38:46):
some pretty outrageous things, and he's now feuding with fellow
Democrat John Fetterman.
Speaker 3 (38:52):
Yes, okay.
Speaker 1 (38:53):
And then in uh Texas the attorney general is just
has has a criminal history.
Speaker 2 (39:02):
Yes, So is it.
Speaker 1 (39:04):
Possible in America to do this that each side gets
a mulligan and would just say for one seat, we're
gonna we're gonna have our douchebag against your douche Yes,
I mean to knock it out. But both candidates are phenomenal,
are flawed. He won what did he get like eighty
one percent of the vote?
Speaker 2 (39:24):
And man, well, here's the thing. When you have like
a polarized society, and even within the parties, you have
polarize where people want either more left or more right,
confidence and character get thrown out the window. Confidence of
character work. When people say I will change my vote
based on the way you're behaving to someone I might
agree with less but I think is a better person
(39:45):
or a higher level, that's going out the window. If
you put a D next to someone's name, or you
put or someone's name and you run them and say
California and Alabama, no matter what they did or how
smart they are, they will win. And that's essentially what
we're taking They're taking advantage of se in the primary
where people are now now because they don't have any competition,
advocate for strong, you know, stronger and more extreme hands
(40:07):
you have.
Speaker 1 (40:08):
Like in the case of Harry Truman, where he had
confidence and character, but he left with an approval rating
lesson Nixon. They developed an attachment to him afterwards.
Speaker 2 (40:18):
Right.
Speaker 1 (40:18):
You had that same experience with Gerald Ford. I think
we told the story before where he represented the Grand
Rapids and a constituent he had a rule, if you
drove to my office, I'm going to see you. So
this guy drives to the office and then his car
breaks down and Ford drives him home.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
Really.
Speaker 1 (40:39):
Yeah, So actually George Bush the first was like that
a lot. Uh you know, he was a blue uh
well blue I don't want to say blue dog, but
he was very moderate Republican.
Speaker 2 (40:51):
Like the New England liberal Republicans.
Speaker 1 (40:53):
Yeah, came down to Texas and a lot of people
just said and he stood by Nixon and even though
he knew it would not turn out or likely new
it wouldn't turn out.
Speaker 3 (41:05):
Well.
Speaker 1 (41:06):
So you have those rare individuals that have character. It's
becoming less unless the commodity is less and less available.
Speaker 2 (41:16):
Yeah, yeah, well, and it's not because it's not rewarded,
and ideological priority is rewarded. I mean essentially that's what
we're looking for, and entertainment's rewarding that could make a
name for themselves.
Speaker 1 (41:25):
What happens then Trump has been very successful in the primary.
I mean he's knocked off or attimidated Tom Tillis, Bill
Cassidy in Louisiana recently was it Cronin in Texas? Yeah?
And his I guess what I'm seeing as a strategist
(41:48):
is that North Carolina will probably turn D.
Speaker 3 (41:50):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (41:50):
About Texas is always tough.
Speaker 1 (41:53):
But now you're going to have to spend money on
a campaign that should be a cake.
Speaker 2 (41:57):
Walk, right you should. You should listen won times by
fourteen points. But now we've seen and this is all
based down to also governing in Cannis selection, that's gonna
be fifty to fifty race. And this is is you
can do one thing in the primary, but the general
elections are different, right people. That's why we've always advocated
for open primaries. Essentially everyone can vote and then you
(42:17):
get Cannas people to a wider base. But that's of course,
you know, that's not that's well.
Speaker 1 (42:22):
Look, I mean I it starts at the local level,
which is probably the most important form of government, because
there are your emergency service providers in the sense they
provide education for what or trash things of that nature.
And I've always thought to be a really good or
responsive politician, you have to work your way up, uh,
and not just you know, start at the top.
Speaker 3 (42:46):
What have we got three minutes?
Speaker 2 (42:48):
Yeah, boat three?
Speaker 1 (42:49):
So last night I watched part one of a documentary
on George Bush the first and we were talking about
that on the car ride over, how he and Reagan
didn't get along. And you're not going to like someone
who calls your economics of voodoo. But what was interesting
is that Reagan had this aura of strength, and you know,
(43:10):
people looked at him for guidance. And the commentator said,
Bush flew fifty combat missions.
Speaker 3 (43:18):
I thought of him as a whimp. You know.
Speaker 1 (43:20):
Reagan, you know, played a pilot, you know, he played
a football player.
Speaker 3 (43:25):
Bush was captain of his team.
Speaker 1 (43:27):
And it was interesting that he was never able to
shake that moniker. Uh. And he won the election against
dou Concas. But this was interesting when you talk about character,
it really was hard to get him to do negative ads,
and then when he did the yeah the ads on
dou Caucus, Oh my god, pardoning.
Speaker 2 (43:49):
A murder, the helmet on the table, the.
Speaker 3 (43:52):
Helmet on the tank.
Speaker 1 (43:54):
We would talk about the Massachusetts miracle and they would
show that the bay was a sludge right pond.
Speaker 2 (44:01):
Well, Willison, people say they don't want negative ads, but
they responded to love that other way. They wouldn't put
him out.
Speaker 1 (44:06):
All right, Art this weekend, are you going down to
visit your dad?
Speaker 2 (44:10):
My dad has his birthday coming up midweek, so I'll
see him towards the middle of the week.
Speaker 1 (44:14):
Okay, Well please tell them we said, Hi, Becky's doing Okay.
Speaker 3 (44:18):
She's doing great.
Speaker 1 (44:18):
Yep, all right, Well you're not well tomorrow. I guess
you're probably watching World Cup.
Speaker 3 (44:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (44:25):
I've probably watched as much World Cup as I can.
Speaker 1 (44:27):
Yeah, I'm just gonna say this publicly. I think soccer
in America was the demise of America. I mean, you know,
in football, you get crunched, it's a crunch. These guys
trip over a blade of grass, so it's like they
had a coma. They come out, you know, and get them.
Speaker 2 (44:45):
But to be honest, soccer is big it's huge. It's
beyond anything you can I don't even know. I think
there's any even entertainment form that's as big. I think
the main promise soccer is it's slow pacers, too many trolls.
So I switch to a win only format. You have
way more So.
Speaker 1 (45:01):
What if you did this one minute at the end,
you can pick the ball up with your hands, and
at one minute at the end you put spikes on
the ball, pick it up with your hands and you
could throw.
Speaker 3 (45:12):
That would be.
Speaker 2 (45:12):
Exciting, usually exciting, and this would they don't get. This
is what I need to bring it to America.
Speaker 1 (45:16):
We can update it again, Ahead of the ahead of
the times. Eric kep standing with Money O'Brian will rock
the Capitol the show's Thunderdome. We were produced by Art Selby.
Have a great weekend, Do not drink and drive.
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