October 11, 2025 • 45 mins
ERIC EPSTEIN AND MILLENNIAL BRIAN TALK ABOUT LEGISLATORS GOING TO IRELAND, PRESIDENT TRUMP NOT WINNING THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE, THE PEACE AGREEMENT IN THE MIDDLE EAST, AND MORE.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, Saturday, October eleventh. It is as I predicted fall.
I think I predicted that. Last week. We were driving
Millennia and I wasn't driving, he was driving, and I said,
it feels like fall. The next day, poambo baby.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Which temper is down, is coming, It's coming. This is
the good temperatures though, where it's like it's not too hot,
it's not too cold. It's in the middle because you
know eventually it's just gonna come out. It's gonna be freezing.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Yeah. I mean, look, it has been halloweens since I
think September first, and as soon as Halloween's over, bam,
you know, we go right past Thanksgiving into christs Yeah.
The whole country is predicated on holidays. After that is
Valentine's Day, Saint Patrick's Day, Easter.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
That's how That's how we run on a calendar. Let's
be honest. Like, I still think New Year for America
is the start of football season. Kids go back to school,
summer's starting to end, you know, and then it's football season.
And you know, for men or our weekend is taken
up by more important things.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
Right now, I got you. I mean, look, this is fall.
I like the Change the Seasons. I'm Eric Capstine with
a millennial Brian. The show is Thunderdome. The organization is
Rocked the Capital. We are a good government anti corruption
organization founded twenty years ago. Our website done by Rebecca.
(01:17):
If you go to the website, check it out. She
did an excellent job. I can personally refer her. And
just also want to say shout out to my dinner
buddies Brian and Tom, especially Tom since he picks up
the tab all the time. And to my lunch buddies
Nancy and Larry. And if I missed anybody, I know
(01:37):
I did, We'll get you. So was this little nugget here?
I mean, there is absolutely no sense of urgency for
the legislature to get the budget done in Harrisburg, and
they went backwards. So after the House had an amended
budget that they sent to the Senate, they sent them
(01:57):
the same budget back. So what's interesting is during this time,
and I didn't know this, a couple of legislators went
to Ireland and the trip, you know, apparently involved the
Pennsylvania Ireland Trade Commission. So there was Senator langer Halt,
(02:19):
and you may remember him. He was a guy who
got elected and said he wouldn't take a pension and
took a pension, and Jim Rigby, so you know, it's
interesting and some of the people from the Shapiro administration,
because those guys are already going anywhere. Look, the optics
are bad, the reality is worse. And now you've got
federal employees not getting paid.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
School districts are working to potentially taking loans. Oh yeah,
so essentially run day day operations because they were why
especially on state funding. Right, so you have you know,
Pittsburgh Steelers versus the Vikings. You got to go out
there apparently for a trade mission. You know, it's always
funny when these politicians go out for NFL games and
they're like, this is the exact perfose for time to
discuss straight, It's like you just want to watch the end.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
Well, the NFL is an economic juggernaut, I mean, and
everybody wants a piece of it. But it's it's to
me again, it's an acute sense of not knowing what
time it is. The budget's not done them, you know,
and they're like saying, well, you know, if we would
have stayed around that much, you get done.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Which is even bigger indictment of them. It's like, well,
we don't do anything anyway, so it's like we believe
it don't even matter. It's like, well, hold on, I mean,
you've brought this up. There's no punishment for just doing
a late budget. I mean, and that's why it happens
all the time. And now that we have a divide legislator,
it's almost incentivized because you look better to your own
base if you're fighting the fight, fighting a good fight,
(03:39):
and that hurts everyone because this type of misspending is
the worst type because we lose the higher interest rates,
more loan spending. So you're not even making the argument,
like let's say the left wing argument of investing in
schools and bridges or the right wing argument of lower taxes,
you're doing you're doing both. You have higher taxes and
no investment, which is the worst type.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
Yeah, there's some other variables here that aren't good. You know,
if you're a school district, you're not hiring new people
as you're slowing or ending or halting building projects. Uh.
You know, there's a lot of social services entities and
we'll get that rather into that in the second quarter.
But the thing with Ireland is just reinforces in my
(04:19):
mind how out of touch and insensitive you are. So
you're going to a football game in Ireland and you're
justifying it as a part of the Ireland Trade Mission. Now,
apparently they're the sixth largest investor in Pennsylvania. But you know,
in the past, we've had a really high level elected
(04:40):
people take trips, take junkets. I mean, should I be concerned?
Should people be concerned? Or well?
Speaker 2 (04:49):
I think it's just this is sort of the what
we talk about is kind of the business as usual type,
maybe not even corruption, but just conplacency and competency failure
that we're you know, you're you have a budget in past,
you should be at less every day. You should be
talking about compromise. You're on this junket. And then also
to say, like, do we really think that Ireland is
(05:10):
the sixth biggest investor in Pennsylvania because these people went
out to watch an NFL game? I mean, come on,
I mean this is ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
We have healthy trade relationships with Canada and Mexico and
Ireland I think probably is the sixth largest trade partner,
which has nothing to do with this. Yes, and so
just wanted to touch on something other real quickly before
we get into our second segment. It looks to me that,
(05:38):
you know, you may see it differently, that the budget,
either federal or state is at an impass. And for
the federal what that means is that workers don't get paid. Now.
I think in the last shutdown in Trump administration, there
was about one hundred and fifteen thousand people dismissed. I
(05:58):
don't know how many people would be dismissed his time,
and Trump is saying that, you know, he may not
pay him back pay, which they actually have to do. Apparently.
Also they hired a lot of people that they laid off. Yes, so,
and the Congress still gets paid.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
Yeah, the Congress still gets paid, which is something we
could we should obviously correct. You know, if the federal
workers are gonna pay, Congress will get paid. That would
help almost all the time they get back pay because
just because of the legal situation dealing with unions all that,
and it's very very hard to fire federal workers, which
I actually you know, in this case, it might be
a good scenario, but I think in general it is
(06:32):
a bad because you want performance based hiring. I think
The problem is we're all hiding the issue. The issue
is not these independent individual departments or these little The
big issue is that we have entitlement programs and healthcare
and pension, and with an Asian society, so we have
less people working paying into the system, where people taking out,
and that makes everything harder to spend. If you want
(06:52):
to spend on left planing priorities like investing in infrastructure, education,
there's a bigger portion of the budget that you can't
spend on that. And then if you want to cut taxes,
the budget sort of automatically increases every Well, how would
you make.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
The argument on the other side spending on right wing priorities.
I mean, military and ice are doing pretty well.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
Yeah, that's right, and they are spending a ton on that.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
And then both parties response, oh, I know.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
And I think for the military. You know, both parties
will bring up the issue when they're either out of
power or with an alliance that like so for the Democrats,
the Israel Alliance will said we shouldn't be giving money
in Israel. For the Republicans is the European Alliance, so
we should be giving money Ukraine. But no one ever
actually reduces the money we spend on the military. No
one says, you know, we should make let's say, you know,
(07:40):
reduce the these alliances or take money back. We've always
given them money anyway.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
So even if we save money, we spend it. And
you know, I was really happy to hear that, what
is it, katar is going to be building an air
Force base in Idahoo? Yeah, so can you think of
two more incongruent terms guitar and Idaho? But I think
at the end of the day, the real problem is this,
and it exists society wide. Is we spend more than
(08:09):
we have real easy and to address the problem, people
aren't willing to cut back or increase taxes. So I think,
and you identified it early what we're being stalked by
debt and deficit, and we had talked about it, not
just the federal government, but the state government, local government, everywhere.
I mean, how long can this go on?
Speaker 2 (08:29):
Bran Well, I think, because we're the reserve currency, because
we have our own fat, we can print money a
long time. But then listen, the consequences of when these
things go through are way worse because then you're such
a very severe cuts, very high tax increases and very
high inflation, not the type of inflation you saw after COVID,
which is kind of a supply shock demand induced inflation,
(08:53):
like long term money supply problems where you're actually printing
to pay off the debt. You have to make the
dollar value of doll are way worse, which is so
rather than having like eight percent, it's like eighty percent,
which is horrible, horrible to live in eighty percent inflation.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Might you know before we go to break? I think
you know the answer. Do you remember what the well
that that you were there? But what was the inflation
in Germany in nineteen twenty three? Oh?
Speaker 2 (09:19):
Man, it was it had to be. I think it
was something like ten thousand percent, right, it.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
Was a billion a bill, Yeah, that was.
Speaker 2 (09:26):
You see videos of that, and you see some videos
in Venezuela some stuff where people are literally burning money
just to keep warm because it's it's it's more value.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
No, it's crazy, but look we freak out when it
gets two three four percent. We're not. So yeah, there's
something we got to keep a under tab. I mean,
inflation is now two point five or.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
Three, yeah, so it's it's I think it's two point
seven so it's been static, so it's not two or
three ring isn't terrible, but also we wanted to bring
it down a two percent target, and it looks like
it's going to be stickier for I think a myriad
of reasons. One is I think the tariffs. Two is
also just the debt and deficit in general, and that
you know that's that's holding because you're increasing the money
(10:12):
supply beyond what It'sposedale.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
Well, well, let's hopefully we'll have something optimistic to say.
We haven't had anything positive saying about the last five
hundred shows. Eric Epstein. I'm in with Mallennial Brian. We're
being produced by Art Selby. This is Thunderdome, We're rock
the Capital and we'll be right back. Well. Look, I
think the big news by any standard, is what appears
(10:36):
to be not a truce but a cease fire, which
is really important and amazing and harkins back really to
the policies of Clinton, and I think Donald Trump has
picked it up. He there was no traditional diplomatic angle here,
you know, you had you know, obviously mister Trump has
(11:00):
deals with Saudi Arabian guitar by all explanations and observations.
When net Yahoo bombed guitar, it pissed the guitar off,
and you know you're sitting and he had made pledges
to Qutar that you know this wouldn't happen. So as
this progressed, I don't know if it lasts, but I
(11:24):
don't think this happens without Trump. You know, Biden was
always diplomatic and courteous and frustrated. Most of most American
presidents were. Trump was the same way. And did he
get to the point? Man, then you have this guy
is never going to stop. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
Yeah, he has his own goals and his own domestic
political entanglements too. So I think what Trump did here
as he got apparently got guitar. Turkey and Egypt right
with different things. So Katar was obviously a security agreement.
Turkey it's the F sixteens and the sanctions on different
economic things, and Egypt is a foreign aide to base
(12:00):
put a lot of pressure on Hams and say this
is it, this is over.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
And then that was smart though, because let's be frank,
Egypt doesn't have an economy. They need our foreign aid.
Guitar needs the security, and Turkey has been looking for
those planes for forever.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
Yeah, and then he has the Abram Cores as an
economic lever to say, hey, this is the type of
business and increase the investment and stuff. And then on
the Israel side, we obviously give them a ton of
ab but we also help them negotiate better economic deals
with the with the people in the area and their
economy because it's their military is so reserve based.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
Well what's what's ironic is well, they it's it's computer
and it's technology, and you know they have special skill sets.
But you know, basically Europe has abandoned Israel. So if
they are able to foster sound economic times at the
our world.
Speaker 2 (12:51):
That's gonna help. And they and you bring up the
technology point. Everyone from the United States, China, Europe even
but especially the re least that wants to modernize, especially
the golf republic or the golf monarchies that want to minors.
They want that technology. They want to be on the
cutting edge of the newest stuff. They want to be
I mean, you can see it in a different way
with I think the golf pushed in sports and entertainment
(13:14):
where they're hosting comedy festivals and they're hosting different sporting events,
Like they want to be on the cutting edge of
culture technology in the world, and they see America and
kind of Israel as part of that.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
But they've broken down barriers, you know, you know, and
I think sports, I mean, it's hard to overlook the
fact that for the World Cup and for other sporting events,
it's basically being constructed by slave labor. Yes, and you know,
basically it is it is.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
I mean, so if you look at they used to have,
like I would say, almost old school slavery just in
the nineteen sixties and seventies, and America, through their trading relationships,
basically forced them out of that. And that was some
brutal some super bowlers up. Now they have I guess
maybe the rtrompresentdentured servitude. But it's even worse than that,
because you could take people's visas away and even essentially
(14:06):
force them into permanent slavery.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
I think. I don't think Trump, I mean Bush thought that,
you know, democracy, you could just spread out a couple
of bullets advoider, and you have democracies that that part
of the world is not conditioned to be democratic, like
it or not, you're dealing with monarchy. Some more brutal
than the next. But I think there's a recognition and
(14:30):
clearly for Trump not a problem that hey, these are
not democracies, they are not likely to be democracies, but
they're allies, and run be the first time the history
of America that our allies, you know, have.
Speaker 2 (14:44):
Some moords and listen. I think that's that's practical politics.
And you kind of hope that American president can realize that, Hey,
you know, you can't look at this kind of like
pinnacle of World War Two, where Germany and Japan, you know,
change their societies and stuff like that, because there's so
many other different factors they were at those states. They're
all united. They had for democratic and market traditions before
(15:05):
I mean, you know, Middle East of the time a
fall the Ottoman Empire was all tribes. It was all tribes.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
So like to get there the British tribe, the American
tribe from tribe. I mean, but let me just back
up here a second, because there have been a number
of things over the last couple of years with Biden
and Trump that have altered conventional wisdom. We had spoken
about the treaty, he hoped. I don't know if it
(15:32):
actually took place, and Azerbaijan in Armenia, So now you
have countries that are tilting also towards Israel that didn't
used to. And also there's a really lush trade route
that that opened. So it's hard to because this should
be his crowning moment, and then the next day turns
around in staid one hundred percent tariffs on China, and
(15:55):
you know, China is adapting. It's and you know they
have us by the little coconut nuts when it comes
to rare earth minerals.
Speaker 2 (16:06):
So we don't know rare earth minerals are. They're like
they're very important, kind of like device starters or they're
in their phones. They're in almost every part of our
technological lives right processing CPUs and processes could not work
without them. And for the energy future, certain things like
lithium are very important for batteries and stuff like that.
(16:30):
China has a stranglehold very similar the way the Middle
East says strengthhold on oil to.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
Not just.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
Mining and but actually refining rare earth minerals. And we
have kind of been on the sidelines for decades and
not mining our own minerals, but also not developing the
capacities to refine them so we could use them so
we can make our own well, like phones and different devices.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
We spoke last year about the fact that there was
a rate to acquire rare earth minerals right in Norway
and China. We're in the lad you know, going under
water to get them. So I'm not sure what the
status of the race is, but it would seem to
me it's interesting because this administration is also very supportive
of fossil fuels, which which include oil. But to get
(17:14):
back to the Mideast, I think that both sides wanted
to take it's too much. So I noticed. I noticed
that there's some folks from Hamas that are trickling back.
I think that was inevitable in Gaza, and I'm not
sure I understand you know, the the I guess temporary government.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
That includes yeah, so I think that that got a
little more Polay than it should. So the big thing
for the security is there's gonna be an eeror peace
keeping force combined with potentially some UN or even American
Not true from many advisors and their idea that they're
gonna create the security situation and that's gonna disarm the
(17:55):
Moss that there's gonna be a coalition of people essentially
run an administrative government twenty words. One of those people.
It's also gonna have Arab involvement. It's not going to
have American involvement in.
Speaker 1 (18:07):
President Trump going to be the head of this, yes, which.
Speaker 2 (18:10):
He's not gonna actually run, but he's going to be
the as the figurehead. And they're basically just gonna run
in a mistery. He's gonna basically become like the mayor
of Gaza. So not Trump, but like this this administrative body.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
But with this body, you know, Katar doesn't really have
They're not a heavyweight when it comes to security. Uh,
Egypt is a military dictatorship with and you have Turkey
who is really become rather anti Israel. So you have
these three countries inside of Gaza, and everybody has their
(18:44):
own reason for being there. Again, how do you hold
folks accountable? I mean, because the relief trucks are coming
in and they they'll get ripped off again. How does
this work? Well?
Speaker 2 (18:56):
I think the idea is that if you want is
that you need to create the conditions that Egypt INSTIDAC
created in their deal with the with the real words,
it's a security agreement, but it's not a security agreement
because Israel so strong they can just push them back.
Security agreement based on the fact that they're not actually
going to actively try to attack each other. And it's done.
And then because of that, whatever disagreements they have is
(19:18):
going to be in the economic sphere or the political sphere.
But this is just the government to move it to
that direction.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
Right, I get that, but I mean it didn't work
out well for Sadat and that's true.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
But blood poison, yes, yes, very but the deal held.
I think the idea is if you have Arab buy in,
that that's that's some office strength. Exceptally they have that
they have support in the Muslim world and if you don't,
but they don't, they don't have the Arab buy in.
Speaker 1 (19:47):
Is it buy in or is it covered? Because no
nation has given the Palestinians say refuge for more than
a temporary period, and no nation and I'm talking Arab
nations have you know, welcome them as citizens. So you
get the sense and that everybody's being pragmatic. Where Saudi
(20:07):
Arabias looked telling Hamas as well as the Emirates and
Turkey Egypt that you're going to have to do this.
And if I get the sense that what's deterring them,
and I could be wrong more than Israel is Arab
country staying look, man.
Speaker 2 (20:22):
They didn't want to deal with the Yeah, I mean,
so people don't know the history of Palestinians in the
other Arab countries is they fomented either terrorism revolution. So
when Jordan they tried to overthrow the king and Lebanon they.
Speaker 1 (20:33):
Had brutal that was brutal.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
They had basically wars against Christians. I mean part of
the Seven Way Civil War in Lebanon, which is very
too complicated go in, but they were one of the
side that really went after the Christians very hard. In
Turkey they had their own support for different Kurdish groups
that had their own missions of training, their own separate state.
And then in Egypt, very famously after the sixty seven war,
(20:58):
Israel is like, well, how much how much of the
Gods strip do you want? Egypt's like absolutely none of it.
Speaker 1 (21:03):
So that shows well, yeah, well that's true. And the
Gaza stripped prior to Egypt occupying it was occupied by Jordan.
You know, the notion of a Palestinian people didn't really
arise till after the war. But if you get fixated
on that, you get nowhere. And Israel cannot live in
a sustained war economy and definitely, and so you know
(21:27):
there's some hope here. Getting the hostages back was paramount.
How do you see because the connection I think is
back in session. Yeah, they came back in September October
rather so is gonna have to call elections next year soon? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (21:43):
And if you've got the people that are against some
Bennett and Lepid they've all tried to create distinctions between
that Yahoo, at least for domestic concerns. Now we'll see
because everyone, no matter who gets elected Israel, they all
have to form some kind of coalition. So that's that's
where the kind of it's gonna we'll see how well
(22:03):
the deal holds through or how it gets made, because
the coalition is going to dictate what happens. That's what
happened with Small Trich and Bengavie in.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
This culag Well, they hijacked the government. You know, for
the far right don't have any troops in the mix.
And as of two days ago, we're saying we're never
going to give anything back, which is interesting from people
that don't have a military or army. So what we
take a break, come back. I want to talk about
Penn State, not the football program, although I told Molliel
(22:33):
had a great idea with a three hundred million dollar
surplus in the legislature, more than enough to buy Franklin.
There we go.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
This is something Pennsylvanias could be high.
Speaker 1 (22:43):
Think outside the think outside the tombstone. So Eric Epstein
with Millennial Brian art Selby is producing us. We're rock
the Capitol. The show is Thunderdome, and we'll be back
to Happy Valley. In amendment, hey, we forgot to touch
on the fact that the Nobel Prize went.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
To a gal from Venzuela, Venezuela. So she's so, I
don't know, it's Maria Karina Machado. Might have said that wrong,
Venzuela democratic democracy advocate. Obviously she was. She's been persecuted
by the Maduro government, which has just been a complete
economic collapse. Yeah, horrible dictators.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
The world's largest oil reserves.
Speaker 2 (23:25):
That's right. And basically what he's doing is key power.
Is he's not only you know, obviously killing his opponents
and perscue of him. But also he's paying the military
for anyone else, essentially him, the military and some of
his little cronies are making money. Everyone else is just
getting destroyed everywhere, and so.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
It's a tough country. There's no middle class. It's super wealthy,
super poor, mostly super poor. But the last couple of
Nobel Peace Prize winners, if people haven't been tracking this,
have been people that have been standing up to democracy
with fear of losing their life. Had a Filipino journalist.
It was either last year or two years ago. And
(24:04):
so I think they've been consistent. The application had to
be in by February. And it doesn't matter that Nana
who nominated Trump, it probably didn't help.
Speaker 2 (24:17):
Yeah, he's not He's not the most popular guy in
the world states. I think the argument is, you know,
in practical terms, obviously I bet this one was very obviously,
very courageous. Did Trump? Has Trump done more for peace?
To the answers, Yes, because this is such a difficult
thing to push through that you have to credit whether
you like him or not, because everyone fails in this,
(24:38):
everyone fails to get these two groups together or stop.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
On this one issue. But at the same time you
continue to bomb Venezuela unprovoked and well they're the fishing boats.
They fired back this with shrimp. So I mean the
reality is you can't be an situation where you're, for
(25:02):
lack of a better word, inciting violence in cities in America.
And this is no matter how it comes apart. And
I think Jared Kushner probably played a large role.
Speaker 2 (25:14):
They brought him back, Steve and Steve Wikoff too. I
think on other issues people have been critical. You know,
ve get this through. You cannot say anything other than
this is impressive because everyone else has tried.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
Well, it's and they did it in a non traditional way,
you know. Israel Uh never wanted anybody to talk to
Hamas directly, and Trump talked to Hamas directly. It's hard
to tell with Trump which threats are real and not.
And I know we're sending a couple hundred troops there
as quote unquote advisors, which is what we did in
(25:48):
Vietnam too. But I mean, if this was the two
promises he thought he could get done Day one Ukraine
in Israel, and it's interesting in the Ukraine he is
starting to move towards well.
Speaker 2 (26:08):
He's never moved to Ukraine. I think what happened with
Ukraine is this. So when he came in, he believed
that Biden would not negotiate with Putin over things like
NATO and that was the main cause of this war,
and that if he came in he could cut a deal.
The problem is, I know, did he offer that deal.
He offered Ukrainian territory that Russian had won. He offered
(26:29):
other deals around economics and sanctioned relief, and Putin still
said no. So when he does that and Zelynskin him
had that blow up, But after that they've been much closer.
Out of eye give both Lensky and yeah, he's he's
he's come around to say, well, you know, maybe this
wasn't the case. Maybe this is old style blood and
soil kind of Russian expansionism. If you look at Putin's speeches,
(26:50):
especially in Russian or you know, he does mention NATO sometimes,
but he also mentions, you know, the Russian Empire and
his glory of you know, re establishing not just that
but also the one people, one language, one economic tize,
those types of stuff, which is much different than it's
just NATO.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
Double standard where Israel bombs Lebanon, bomb Syria, bombs Iran,
and everybody gets it, others supporting terrorism. Yeah, and so
I think he views the fact that he invaded Ukraine
as a defensive measure, which is horse hockey.
Speaker 2 (27:28):
Well, I'm not sure if he does. I think he's
using that because the reason why is if he did
believe that, then I thought that the ghost. I'm shocked
the negotiations didn't work because I actually thought some of
the criticisms he made, especially about NATO, I could see.
I think having Ukraine as a NATO neutral country makes
perfect sense because you just don't want to get right
up on a nuclear powers border.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
That seems but did make sense until they started dispatching drooms.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
Yeah, oh yeah, the whole thing and that. But he's
Bruns Vincent the other way where it's like, oh, this
isn't about that, just Natty, It's about other stuff. Otherwise
the war would have ended.
Speaker 1 (28:07):
How does Trump not know that this guy is evil?
I mean, I don't know. If you saw last week
another person committed suicide, jumping off like a forty four.
That's what I like about the Russians. It's not the
second or third forth, it's the fortieth big.
Speaker 2 (28:23):
They really they get it done. And listen, he he
poisoned two x ex pats in Britain and one in Germany.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
That some novel stuff.
Speaker 2 (28:36):
I mean, when he came into power, he bombed CHESNYA
and rolled over them and then installed a dictator in Georgia.
When they were trying to.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
I want to stop you. He got stuck in Syria
where the Israelis pounded the crap out of them. So
they're overextended, but they have been able to remake the
Wagner Group. So Russia is probably the largest military presence
in Africa. So it's hard to, you know, stereotypically say
they're weak or strong. I mean, they have aspects of both.
(29:06):
And I think Putin was smart. He saw Trump's and
America first, we're backing off, yeah, I mean, I don't
know we talked about this before. How this ends in
the Ukraine or Russia.
Speaker 2 (29:17):
Well, initially I thought it was gonna be there's gonna
be Nano neutrality. They're going to make a dividing line
somewhere along those four territories where there's fighting, there's gonna
be some divine one wherever it is. And then there's
gonna be long term economic kind of deals tied to
peace negotiations, and then that that's gonna sudivise both Russia
and Ukraine to come to the table. But it seems
(29:37):
like Russia wants less independence for Ukraine over EU membership,
long term economic deals over mineral rights over even So
that's like a way different thing where if they're they're
essentially they want to have almost their foot on their
neck kind of like they do in Belarus. But if
Belarus wants to make a deal or elective leader, they
almost have to get approved by Russia.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
Yeah. Look, Belarus has essentially been annexed by Russia. Ukraine
will never never bend. And so you have the situation, Brian,
where do you think Putin was upset by h Trump
trying to cut a deal on rare earth minerals in
(30:17):
the Ukraine?
Speaker 2 (30:19):
Maybe, but I think he was. I for me, I
think it's the Putin thing. Putin Ukraine just goes beyond
Trump or any American present, because I just from point
because the points that I that you would get from
let's say, maybe not Russian defenders people say, hey, yeah,
understand their perspective was basically native neutrality, and that Russia
has seen America or other countries, you know, across this
(30:42):
line and they look at themselves and say, well, why
can't we cross that line, which I points I kind
of agree with. But then when you get you get
offered those points, when you get offered peace and you
turn it down repeatedly, and he got offered those, then
then it seems to be something different. If you look
what he says in Russia, it's about one you know,
one nation, one language, one people.
Speaker 1 (31:02):
That's right out of the Nazi handbooks.
Speaker 2 (31:05):
Yeah, it's like the Russian He actually he's not a
huge fan of the Soviet Union. He's a fan of
the old Russian Empire.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
Yeah, everybody is. I mean, because the old it was
the whole country ninety nine percent were sirs. Yeah, you know,
so you get him to do whatever you want. What's
interesting is that they have been rebuffed in Moldavia and Romania. Yeah,
so it's been an uneven success, and I think Europe,
(31:33):
out of necessity, has had to amp up their military arsenal.
And I guess I'm asking what happens because I thought
you had a great idea where you thought there would
be a chunk of Ukraine, which would be like the
Demilitarized Zone in Korea.
Speaker 2 (31:49):
So yes, what I thought was going to happen was
basically there was going to be the eastern part of Ukraine.
A certain portion of those four regions would be given
either Russian statuses under them or they'd have like their
own Automas regions, and then after that they'd have like
a line and it it'd be like the DMZ at
(32:11):
North Korea. You have South Korea in North Korea, and
Ukraine would be able to join the U and joining
a military last day.
Speaker 1 (32:17):
And I never see Russia.
Speaker 2 (32:18):
But that's not that. But that's not that. That deal
was offered, including native neutrality, and that was turned down.
So now I think it has to be turned it
down Russia Russia.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
I mean, I mean it's clear to me. Look, these
folks came in thinking they're going to roll over Kiev
in a minute, and I did too. I thought, okay,
this is this is gonna be over. Yeah. Yeah, it's
like there was a book play called The mouset Roared,
and it was about a fictional country in Europe that
was really down on it's luck economically spiraling out of control.
(32:51):
So it decided to invade the bigger country so that
they would be occupied and get economic aid. So I
thought that this would maybe coming down here. But uh,
real serious, uh and real difficult, real and transient. It's
it's interesting because I always thought Russia Ukraine would settle
before Israel.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
I thought it was gonna it could sell fast because
they're more or less at a drawl, and all you
have is just basically young people dying over very small
changes in that line. And so it's it's unfortunate. I
wish it never happened, but I'm kind of shocked that
it didn't end.
Speaker 1 (33:24):
I was.
Speaker 2 (33:25):
I don't say I agree with some on everything, but
I think his diagnosis was. I thought was this could
end real quickly if we just get a dividing line,
and that's not true. It's clearly the people that have
been more skeptical of Putin have been right, and we've
seen it in other countries in Georgia and Romania and Boaba.
Speaker 1 (33:42):
It goes back to looking at the history. Traditionally, Ukraine
has resisted any Russian ambitions, and they were treated brutally
during World War Two, which wasn't long ago. Real quick
before we go to break I think the economic sanctions
against Russia have been effective.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
They've been effective on technology and on some of their
old energy pipelines. The reason why they have not been
super effective is Russia Swiss rel war economy, which gives
them a short m boost. And they have China as
their main backstop, but they also have India as not
just a third party backstop, but also a third party
distributor to get to other countries. So they may not
(34:19):
sell oil to Europe. They get so oiled to India.
Who's to Europe that kicks it back to Russia.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
Yeah, that that we haven't stopped. I mean they have
economic alliances with China and Russia. And you'll also forget
there's been a surge in the consumption of porn since
the North Korean.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
Yes, North Korea is always funy happy, the North Koresia happy.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
They were eating. Yeah, man, it's like more and more.
What's what's a haircut guy's name? I can't think.
Speaker 2 (34:47):
Oh, Kim Jong hun.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
Yeah, he made overtures by the way recently and he
but it was interesting he told Trump, I'm not meeting
if you're talking about us divesting ourselves with nuclear weapons. Essentially,
that's all they have Eric Epsteine in with Millennial Brian.
The show is Thunderdome. The group has rocked the camp
being produced by the most valuable producer, Art Selby. We'll
(35:09):
be back for our final segment in just a moment. Well,
hopefully this concludes the worst week if you're a Penn
State Philadelphia sports fan. Yeah, I don't know what could
get worse. You know, Trump could name James Franklin to
head the Gaza effort.
Speaker 2 (35:26):
It'd be great. The Penn State football program. We should
support that.
Speaker 1 (35:31):
So Penn State, if you haven't been following they have.
They advertised they were going to close twelve campuses. Ultimately
they close seven. So people have been saying, well, problems
with enrollment, problems with the price of tuition. In September,
by a vote of thirty four to one, they raised
the salary of the president by fifty six percent. So
(35:52):
the president, this is interesting. The president of Penn State
now makes two point eight million. It makes sure the
highest base pay base salary in the Big ten. All right,
makes her the second highest and this is Republic universities
salary in the country after the University of Sex. Yeah,
So what's interesting is it makes her the fourth highest paid.
Speaker 2 (36:17):
Pen State versus and obviously for people that don't know, yeah,
the football coach, you're probably the basketball coach, and then
probably the athletic director that all get paid more than her.
Speaker 1 (36:25):
Well, so, Penn State has been sued successfully by Spotlight
magazine for violating sunshine, you know, conducting business in the dark.
And so this spring in the dark without any discussion publicly,
the Pennsylvania Turnpike gave themselves a three total of three
(36:47):
hundred and sixty seven thousand dollars in raises. The highest
raise came to Mark Compton eighty six grand or thirty
three percent, bringing his salary to three hundred and forty
eight thousand. At the Turnpike, there's six executives that earn
more than Governor Shapiro. And you know what, it's interesting
(37:11):
also with the current president Justice for inflation, the President
spends more on lobbying in Harrisburg than she has than
her predecessors. Okay, so I'm not really sure what to
make of all this. You know, presidents at universities make
a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (37:29):
Yeah, so I think if you're looking at the presidents
of the universities, you have a ton of Texas universities
here that get very high salaries, you know, University of
Texas in Austin one point four to five million. I
think the Penn State, as far as enrollment, as far
as size of the university, size of the I'm not
very size of the endowment is up there with some
of the best public university in the world, if not
one of the as far as richness in the world.
(37:52):
I think the question is the decision she's made to
shut down those campuses, how much money that's saved, and
then how much were they able to reinvest in the university.
I think that's where they got the justification for raising.
Speaker 1 (38:04):
Her Staffy Wellmonnial, I'm surprising you because there's no doubt
in my mind she got to raise in salary for
being the grim reaper. You know, it's not an easy job.
You know, Oh, we're going to close down twelve o No.
Only seven. And so if you look through her rays
through the eyes of campuses that are going to be shuttered, teachers,
(38:25):
staff going to be fired, and look, a lot of
it is not to blame with the current president, but
her predecessors are overbuilt. Right now, college is not a
given it's not it's not inexpensive, but I'm not real
because I looked at what the board of trustees said
giving her a raise wasn't real clear. It was one
(38:47):
of those vague, you know, real good things, and.
Speaker 2 (38:50):
Well that's the I mean, that's that's the as the
point that it looks bad because if you're closing campuses
and you're giving a raise to top executive, you know,
it never looks good. Also, colleges around the country are
going to go through because we're going through a demographic
slowdown of young people and college has got more expensive,
so that means the population of people that can go
to college is less. And that's why you see these campuses,
(39:13):
even these satellite campuses, they're heavily reliant on international students
and that's potentially will go down.
Speaker 1 (39:20):
So if you get I couldn't go down this year.
I mean, there's a lot of parents that don't want
to send their kids over here. But the growth was
with the international students because that was cash.
Speaker 2 (39:31):
Yeah, they pay the full price too. They didn't get
no sort of financial aid or something.
Speaker 1 (39:36):
I don't see Mahatma Gandhi son being the quarterback in Michigan.
I mean, there's other incentives there. And this is what
I always found interesting. People sometimes complain about there's too
many Southeast Asian folks that are professional who got their
education here, I mean, and people flock here to get
that education.
Speaker 2 (39:57):
Oh, it's a huge economic driver, not just that the
college is themselves. The kids spend money, they invest money.
But then when they graduate, if they can get good
jobs here, a lot of them getting very good jobs,
pay a lot of taxes, spend money in the local businesses.
It's it's an economic driver. I mean, we're in the
area of Penn State, Harrisport. To see where that university
was forty years ago to where it is now. It's
(40:17):
like it's not just the university, the area around it,
the airport, the train station, all the stores. You know,
it looks like like a mini almost like a little
mini town that I popped out of nowhere. So I
think a lot of these places, too, these college towns
filled in for where manufacturing left, where there was manufacturing jobs,
and that's where it drove the economy. And now it's
(40:39):
the college that kind of drives the economy.
Speaker 1 (40:41):
So let me ask you this. I think there's a
thread through today's show. You got folks going to Ireland
when the budget's not done under the banner of, you know,
growing our relationship with Ireland, which is complete horse, don't
boot me out. I won't say about you know, you
have folk at the turnpike giving themselves a raise behind
(41:02):
closed doors.
Speaker 2 (41:03):
For the highest toll turnpike in the world.
Speaker 1 (41:05):
In the world. Yeah, and it's going to continue twenty
forty one, at least twenty forty one. So why do
you get a raise for that? I mean, that's like
giving the guy who robs your bank of bonus. That's
good job man, thank you. Here's a couple you know,
so Art, how much time do we have? Brother?
Speaker 3 (41:24):
About three minutes?
Speaker 1 (41:24):
All right, so we got plenty of time. We didn't
get to I'm glad. I didn't really want to do
the government shutdown stuff, but I just wanted to point
out that. And I don't know how this happened. How
does Congress get paid and the employees don't.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
Well, it's part of they have stipulations in the proceeds
of the legend that the Congress always has to get
paid and their staffsk gets paid, which I can understand
because they're the ones that work like twenty four hours
running all these bills and doing all these compromises. The
problem is, of course, if you want incentives to get
the budget done on time avoid these shutdowns, you have
(42:01):
to you have to essentially withhold paint the people making
the decisions.
Speaker 1 (42:05):
That's what I'm saying is incentives don't work. This incentives work. Yes,
you know that, that's what you need to apply. I've
said this for the last twenty years. If you want
to clean up government and you want it to be
more effective, you have to give white collar criminals blue
collar time. Yeah, that's you know, all of a sudden,
if you're sharing a cell, you know, with a guy
(42:26):
that killed like three hundred people because he wasn't hugged enough,
it will probably change your perspective.
Speaker 2 (42:31):
That's right, and it's got to be by Parson. You know,
everyone likes to go after the other team. No one
wants to go out for people on their own team.
Speaker 1 (42:37):
That's what I mean. That's all I mean. That's really
the beauty of Rocky Capital. We hate everybody that's right.
Speaker 2 (42:43):
Equal opportunity.
Speaker 1 (42:44):
I mean, you know, when it comes to politics, it's
all bad. So are any news.
Speaker 3 (42:49):
I mean, on notre Dame Notre Dame is tied right
now nearing halftime, and the Hershey Bears have their home
opener tonight at Giant Center, so you're going to be there.
I'll be producing the game back at the station. They
take on Syracuse tonight at seven and again tomorrow at five.
Speaker 1 (43:03):
I was at the Flyer Cap exhibition. Yeah, it was great.
It was packed, and you know, you just can't believe
there are lines in the merch store. You know, you
have to wait in line to buy. I don't know
what it was. I think about a pretzel in two waters.
It was like twenty three bucks. You gotta do. Yeah,
it's and mcdavitt won yesterday they did. Yes, all right, Brian.
(43:29):
I'm looking right across from you and I see arts reflection.
It weirded me out a little. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (43:33):
So I think Penn State last timmer check was up
fourteen ten going into halftime.
Speaker 1 (43:38):
D and E done.
Speaker 2 (43:42):
Listen, He's yeah, this might actually work out in their
favorite because if they can actually fire him now and
move on that that might be the key. That is
the change They need to actually fire him rather than losing.
They do a lot of states.
Speaker 1 (43:55):
This might be a little he was a great recruiter.
I get it, couldn't coach yeah, yeah. I mean if
you looked at him in the last three games at
the end of the Fort Notre Dame, Oregon, Yeah, last Ucla,
he looked like, you know, a kid that had a
full diaper. I mean, and I'm gonna say he's been
there twelve months, twelve years. Rather yeah, he's got makes
eight point six million a year. All Right, you need
(44:16):
to perform, but I gotta be honest. The quarterback has
been a disappoint.
Speaker 2 (44:21):
Yeah, And I think that's the key is that Penn
State's goind to get an elite quarterback, I at least
elite college quarterback to cover the gap with the best
teams because they the recruitings up there. But if you
want to you got to get an elite quarterback and
not someone with elite tools. They say he's going to
be the next It's an actual elite quarterback.
Speaker 1 (44:38):
The best quarterbacks. Penn Status has wrestling had a guy
walk on from West to Haselton Stranton. I believe scrappy
that's what we need. And look this this guy. I
hope he does well. It probably has a career after this,
But you know, it just isn't working. Uh so hopefully
they can get by Northwestern. It's homecoming. I mean, they're
(44:58):
not going to beat Indiana and they're not going to
be Ohio state. Yeah, they may beat Northern Illinois. So
so this wraps up the show. Art, thanks for producing
US Millennial, Thanks for coming in. We'll see everybody in
two weeks. Man Rock the Capital Thunderdome. Shalom y'all,
All right, Saturday, October eleventh. It is as I predicted fall.
I think I predicted that. Last week. We were driving
Millennia and I wasn't driving, he was driving, and I said,
it feels like fall. The next day, poambo baby.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Which temper is down, is coming, It's coming. This is
the good temperatures though, where it's like it's not too hot,
it's not too cold. It's in the middle because you
know eventually it's just gonna come out. It's gonna be freezing.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Yeah. I mean, look, it has been halloweens since I
think September first, and as soon as Halloween's over, bam,
you know, we go right past Thanksgiving into christs Yeah.
The whole country is predicated on holidays. After that is
Valentine's Day, Saint Patrick's Day, Easter.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
That's how That's how we run on a calendar. Let's
be honest. Like, I still think New Year for America
is the start of football season. Kids go back to school,
summer's starting to end, you know, and then it's football season.
And you know, for men or our weekend is taken
up by more important things.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
Right now, I got you. I mean, look, this is fall.
I like the Change the Seasons. I'm Eric Capstine with
a millennial Brian. The show is Thunderdome. The organization is
Rocked the Capital. We are a good government anti corruption
organization founded twenty years ago. Our website done by Rebecca.
(01:17):
If you go to the website, check it out. She
did an excellent job. I can personally refer her. And
just also want to say shout out to my dinner
buddies Brian and Tom, especially Tom since he picks up
the tab all the time. And to my lunch buddies
Nancy and Larry. And if I missed anybody, I know
(01:37):
I did, We'll get you. So was this little nugget here?
I mean, there is absolutely no sense of urgency for
the legislature to get the budget done in Harrisburg, and
they went backwards. So after the House had an amended
budget that they sent to the Senate, they sent them
(01:57):
the same budget back. So what's interesting is during this time,
and I didn't know this, a couple of legislators went
to Ireland and the trip, you know, apparently involved the
Pennsylvania Ireland Trade Commission. So there was Senator langer Halt,
(02:19):
and you may remember him. He was a guy who
got elected and said he wouldn't take a pension and
took a pension, and Jim Rigby, so you know, it's
interesting and some of the people from the Shapiro administration,
because those guys are already going anywhere. Look, the optics
are bad, the reality is worse. And now you've got
federal employees not getting paid.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
School districts are working to potentially taking loans. Oh yeah,
so essentially run day day operations because they were why
especially on state funding. Right, so you have you know,
Pittsburgh Steelers versus the Vikings. You got to go out
there apparently for a trade mission. You know, it's always
funny when these politicians go out for NFL games and
they're like, this is the exact perfose for time to
discuss straight, It's like you just want to watch the end.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
Well, the NFL is an economic juggernaut, I mean, and
everybody wants a piece of it. But it's it's to
me again, it's an acute sense of not knowing what
time it is. The budget's not done them, you know,
and they're like saying, well, you know, if we would
have stayed around that much, you get done.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Which is even bigger indictment of them. It's like, well,
we don't do anything anyway, so it's like we believe
it don't even matter. It's like, well, hold on, I mean,
you've brought this up. There's no punishment for just doing
a late budget. I mean, and that's why it happens
all the time. And now that we have a divide legislator,
it's almost incentivized because you look better to your own
base if you're fighting the fight, fighting a good fight,
(03:39):
and that hurts everyone because this type of misspending is
the worst type because we lose the higher interest rates,
more loan spending. So you're not even making the argument,
like let's say the left wing argument of investing in
schools and bridges or the right wing argument of lower taxes,
you're doing you're doing both. You have higher taxes and
no investment, which is the worst type.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
Yeah, there's some other variables here that aren't good. You know,
if you're a school district, you're not hiring new people
as you're slowing or ending or halting building projects. Uh.
You know, there's a lot of social services entities and
we'll get that rather into that in the second quarter.
But the thing with Ireland is just reinforces in my
(04:19):
mind how out of touch and insensitive you are. So
you're going to a football game in Ireland and you're
justifying it as a part of the Ireland Trade Mission. Now,
apparently they're the sixth largest investor in Pennsylvania. But you know,
in the past, we've had a really high level elected
(04:40):
people take trips, take junkets. I mean, should I be concerned?
Should people be concerned? Or well?
Speaker 2 (04:49):
I think it's just this is sort of the what
we talk about is kind of the business as usual type,
maybe not even corruption, but just conplacency and competency failure
that we're you know, you're you have a budget in past,
you should be at less every day. You should be
talking about compromise. You're on this junket. And then also
to say, like, do we really think that Ireland is
(05:10):
the sixth biggest investor in Pennsylvania because these people went
out to watch an NFL game? I mean, come on,
I mean this is ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
We have healthy trade relationships with Canada and Mexico and
Ireland I think probably is the sixth largest trade partner,
which has nothing to do with this. Yes, and so
just wanted to touch on something other real quickly before
we get into our second segment. It looks to me that,
(05:38):
you know, you may see it differently, that the budget,
either federal or state is at an impass. And for
the federal what that means is that workers don't get paid. Now.
I think in the last shutdown in Trump administration, there
was about one hundred and fifteen thousand people dismissed. I
(05:58):
don't know how many people would be dismissed his time,
and Trump is saying that, you know, he may not
pay him back pay, which they actually have to do. Apparently.
Also they hired a lot of people that they laid off. Yes, so,
and the Congress still gets paid.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
Yeah, the Congress still gets paid, which is something we
could we should obviously correct. You know, if the federal
workers are gonna pay, Congress will get paid. That would
help almost all the time they get back pay because
just because of the legal situation dealing with unions all that,
and it's very very hard to fire federal workers, which
I actually you know, in this case, it might be
a good scenario, but I think in general it is
(06:32):
a bad because you want performance based hiring. I think
The problem is we're all hiding the issue. The issue
is not these independent individual departments or these little The
big issue is that we have entitlement programs and healthcare
and pension, and with an Asian society, so we have
less people working paying into the system, where people taking out,
and that makes everything harder to spend. If you want
(06:52):
to spend on left planing priorities like investing in infrastructure, education,
there's a bigger portion of the budget that you can't
spend on that. And then if you want to cut taxes,
the budget sort of automatically increases every Well, how would
you make.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
The argument on the other side spending on right wing priorities.
I mean, military and ice are doing pretty well.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
Yeah, that's right, and they are spending a ton on that.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
And then both parties response, oh, I know.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
And I think for the military. You know, both parties
will bring up the issue when they're either out of
power or with an alliance that like so for the Democrats,
the Israel Alliance will said we shouldn't be giving money
in Israel. For the Republicans is the European Alliance, so
we should be giving money Ukraine. But no one ever
actually reduces the money we spend on the military. No
one says, you know, we should make let's say, you know,
(07:40):
reduce the these alliances or take money back. We've always
given them money anyway.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
So even if we save money, we spend it. And
you know, I was really happy to hear that, what
is it, katar is going to be building an air
Force base in Idahoo? Yeah, so can you think of
two more incongruent terms guitar and Idaho? But I think
at the end of the day, the real problem is this,
and it exists society wide. Is we spend more than
(08:09):
we have real easy and to address the problem, people
aren't willing to cut back or increase taxes. So I think,
and you identified it early what we're being stalked by
debt and deficit, and we had talked about it, not
just the federal government, but the state government, local government, everywhere.
I mean, how long can this go on?
Speaker 2 (08:29):
Bran Well, I think, because we're the reserve currency, because
we have our own fat, we can print money a
long time. But then listen, the consequences of when these
things go through are way worse because then you're such
a very severe cuts, very high tax increases and very
high inflation, not the type of inflation you saw after COVID,
which is kind of a supply shock demand induced inflation,
(08:53):
like long term money supply problems where you're actually printing
to pay off the debt. You have to make the
dollar value of doll are way worse, which is so
rather than having like eight percent, it's like eighty percent,
which is horrible, horrible to live in eighty percent inflation.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Might you know before we go to break? I think
you know the answer. Do you remember what the well
that that you were there? But what was the inflation
in Germany in nineteen twenty three? Oh?
Speaker 2 (09:19):
Man, it was it had to be. I think it
was something like ten thousand percent, right, it.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
Was a billion a bill, Yeah, that was.
Speaker 2 (09:26):
You see videos of that, and you see some videos
in Venezuela some stuff where people are literally burning money
just to keep warm because it's it's it's more value.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
No, it's crazy, but look we freak out when it
gets two three four percent. We're not. So yeah, there's
something we got to keep a under tab. I mean,
inflation is now two point five or.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
Three, yeah, so it's it's I think it's two point
seven so it's been static, so it's not two or
three ring isn't terrible, but also we wanted to bring
it down a two percent target, and it looks like
it's going to be stickier for I think a myriad
of reasons. One is I think the tariffs. Two is
also just the debt and deficit in general, and that
you know that's that's holding because you're increasing the money
(10:12):
supply beyond what It'sposedale.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
Well, well, let's hopefully we'll have something optimistic to say.
We haven't had anything positive saying about the last five
hundred shows. Eric Epstein. I'm in with Mallennial Brian. We're
being produced by Art Selby. This is Thunderdome, We're rock
the Capital and we'll be right back. Well. Look, I
think the big news by any standard, is what appears
(10:36):
to be not a truce but a cease fire, which
is really important and amazing and harkins back really to
the policies of Clinton, and I think Donald Trump has
picked it up. He there was no traditional diplomatic angle here,
you know, you had you know, obviously mister Trump has
(11:00):
deals with Saudi Arabian guitar by all explanations and observations.
When net Yahoo bombed guitar, it pissed the guitar off,
and you know you're sitting and he had made pledges
to Qutar that you know this wouldn't happen. So as
this progressed, I don't know if it lasts, but I
(11:24):
don't think this happens without Trump. You know, Biden was
always diplomatic and courteous and frustrated. Most of most American
presidents were. Trump was the same way. And did he
get to the point? Man, then you have this guy
is never going to stop. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
Yeah, he has his own goals and his own domestic
political entanglements too. So I think what Trump did here
as he got apparently got guitar. Turkey and Egypt right
with different things. So Katar was obviously a security agreement.
Turkey it's the F sixteens and the sanctions on different
economic things, and Egypt is a foreign aide to base
(12:00):
put a lot of pressure on Hams and say this
is it, this is over.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
And then that was smart though, because let's be frank,
Egypt doesn't have an economy. They need our foreign aid.
Guitar needs the security, and Turkey has been looking for
those planes for forever.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
Yeah, and then he has the Abram Cores as an
economic lever to say, hey, this is the type of
business and increase the investment and stuff. And then on
the Israel side, we obviously give them a ton of
ab but we also help them negotiate better economic deals
with the with the people in the area and their
economy because it's their military is so reserve based.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
Well what's what's ironic is well, they it's it's computer
and it's technology, and you know they have special skill sets.
But you know, basically Europe has abandoned Israel. So if
they are able to foster sound economic times at the
our world.
Speaker 2 (12:51):
That's gonna help. And they and you bring up the
technology point. Everyone from the United States, China, Europe even
but especially the re least that wants to modernize, especially
the golf republic or the golf monarchies that want to minors.
They want that technology. They want to be on the
cutting edge of the newest stuff. They want to be
I mean, you can see it in a different way
with I think the golf pushed in sports and entertainment
(13:14):
where they're hosting comedy festivals and they're hosting different sporting events,
Like they want to be on the cutting edge of
culture technology in the world, and they see America and
kind of Israel as part of that.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
But they've broken down barriers, you know, you know, and
I think sports, I mean, it's hard to overlook the
fact that for the World Cup and for other sporting events,
it's basically being constructed by slave labor. Yes, and you know,
basically it is it is.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
I mean, so if you look at they used to have,
like I would say, almost old school slavery just in
the nineteen sixties and seventies, and America, through their trading relationships,
basically forced them out of that. And that was some
brutal some super bowlers up. Now they have I guess
maybe the rtrompresentdentured servitude. But it's even worse than that,
because you could take people's visas away and even essentially
(14:06):
force them into permanent slavery.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
I think. I don't think Trump, I mean Bush thought that,
you know, democracy, you could just spread out a couple
of bullets advoider, and you have democracies that that part
of the world is not conditioned to be democratic, like
it or not, you're dealing with monarchy. Some more brutal
than the next. But I think there's a recognition and
(14:30):
clearly for Trump not a problem that hey, these are
not democracies, they are not likely to be democracies, but
they're allies, and run be the first time the history
of America that our allies, you know, have.
Speaker 2 (14:44):
Some moords and listen. I think that's that's practical politics.
And you kind of hope that American president can realize that, Hey,
you know, you can't look at this kind of like
pinnacle of World War Two, where Germany and Japan, you know,
change their societies and stuff like that, because there's so
many other different factors they were at those states. They're
all united. They had for democratic and market traditions before
(15:05):
I mean, you know, Middle East of the time a
fall the Ottoman Empire was all tribes. It was all tribes.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
So like to get there the British tribe, the American
tribe from tribe. I mean, but let me just back
up here a second, because there have been a number
of things over the last couple of years with Biden
and Trump that have altered conventional wisdom. We had spoken
about the treaty, he hoped. I don't know if it
(15:32):
actually took place, and Azerbaijan in Armenia, So now you
have countries that are tilting also towards Israel that didn't
used to. And also there's a really lush trade route
that that opened. So it's hard to because this should
be his crowning moment, and then the next day turns
around in staid one hundred percent tariffs on China, and
(15:55):
you know, China is adapting. It's and you know they
have us by the little coconut nuts when it comes
to rare earth minerals.
Speaker 2 (16:06):
So we don't know rare earth minerals are. They're like
they're very important, kind of like device starters or they're
in their phones. They're in almost every part of our
technological lives right processing CPUs and processes could not work
without them. And for the energy future, certain things like
lithium are very important for batteries and stuff like that.
(16:30):
China has a stranglehold very similar the way the Middle
East says strengthhold on oil to.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
Not just.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
Mining and but actually refining rare earth minerals. And we
have kind of been on the sidelines for decades and
not mining our own minerals, but also not developing the
capacities to refine them so we could use them so
we can make our own well, like phones and different devices.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
We spoke last year about the fact that there was
a rate to acquire rare earth minerals right in Norway
and China. We're in the lad you know, going under
water to get them. So I'm not sure what the
status of the race is, but it would seem to
me it's interesting because this administration is also very supportive
of fossil fuels, which which include oil. But to get
(17:14):
back to the Mideast, I think that both sides wanted
to take it's too much. So I noticed. I noticed
that there's some folks from Hamas that are trickling back.
I think that was inevitable in Gaza, and I'm not
sure I understand you know, the the I guess temporary government.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
That includes yeah, so I think that that got a
little more Polay than it should. So the big thing
for the security is there's gonna be an eeror peace
keeping force combined with potentially some UN or even American
Not true from many advisors and their idea that they're
gonna create the security situation and that's gonna disarm the
(17:55):
Moss that there's gonna be a coalition of people essentially
run an administrative government twenty words. One of those people.
It's also gonna have Arab involvement. It's not going to
have American involvement in.
Speaker 1 (18:07):
President Trump going to be the head of this, yes, which.
Speaker 2 (18:10):
He's not gonna actually run, but he's going to be
the as the figurehead. And they're basically just gonna run
in a mistery. He's gonna basically become like the mayor
of Gaza. So not Trump, but like this this administrative body.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
But with this body, you know, Katar doesn't really have
They're not a heavyweight when it comes to security. Uh,
Egypt is a military dictatorship with and you have Turkey
who is really become rather anti Israel. So you have
these three countries inside of Gaza, and everybody has their
(18:44):
own reason for being there. Again, how do you hold
folks accountable? I mean, because the relief trucks are coming
in and they they'll get ripped off again. How does
this work? Well?
Speaker 2 (18:56):
I think the idea is that if you want is
that you need to create the conditions that Egypt INSTIDAC
created in their deal with the with the real words,
it's a security agreement, but it's not a security agreement
because Israel so strong they can just push them back.
Security agreement based on the fact that they're not actually
going to actively try to attack each other. And it's done.
And then because of that, whatever disagreements they have is
(19:18):
going to be in the economic sphere or the political sphere.
But this is just the government to move it to
that direction.
Speaker 1 (19:23):
Right, I get that, but I mean it didn't work
out well for Sadat and that's true.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
But blood poison, yes, yes, very but the deal held.
I think the idea is if you have Arab buy in,
that that's that's some office strength. Exceptally they have that
they have support in the Muslim world and if you don't,
but they don't, they don't have the Arab buy in.
Speaker 1 (19:47):
Is it buy in or is it covered? Because no
nation has given the Palestinians say refuge for more than
a temporary period, and no nation and I'm talking Arab
nations have you know, welcome them as citizens. So you
get the sense and that everybody's being pragmatic. Where Saudi
(20:07):
Arabias looked telling Hamas as well as the Emirates and
Turkey Egypt that you're going to have to do this.
And if I get the sense that what's deterring them,
and I could be wrong more than Israel is Arab
country staying look, man.
Speaker 2 (20:22):
They didn't want to deal with the Yeah, I mean,
so people don't know the history of Palestinians in the
other Arab countries is they fomented either terrorism revolution. So
when Jordan they tried to overthrow the king and Lebanon they.
Speaker 1 (20:33):
Had brutal that was brutal.
Speaker 2 (20:35):
They had basically wars against Christians. I mean part of
the Seven Way Civil War in Lebanon, which is very
too complicated go in, but they were one of the
side that really went after the Christians very hard. In
Turkey they had their own support for different Kurdish groups
that had their own missions of training, their own separate state.
And then in Egypt, very famously after the sixty seven war,
(20:58):
Israel is like, well, how much how much of the
Gods strip do you want? Egypt's like absolutely none of it.
Speaker 1 (21:03):
So that shows well, yeah, well that's true. And the
Gaza stripped prior to Egypt occupying it was occupied by Jordan.
You know, the notion of a Palestinian people didn't really
arise till after the war. But if you get fixated
on that, you get nowhere. And Israel cannot live in
a sustained war economy and definitely, and so you know
(21:27):
there's some hope here. Getting the hostages back was paramount.
How do you see because the connection I think is
back in session. Yeah, they came back in September October
rather so is gonna have to call elections next year soon? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (21:43):
And if you've got the people that are against some
Bennett and Lepid they've all tried to create distinctions between
that Yahoo, at least for domestic concerns. Now we'll see
because everyone, no matter who gets elected Israel, they all
have to form some kind of coalition. So that's that's
where the kind of it's gonna we'll see how well
(22:03):
the deal holds through or how it gets made, because
the coalition is going to dictate what happens. That's what
happened with Small Trich and Bengavie in.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
This culag Well, they hijacked the government. You know, for
the far right don't have any troops in the mix.
And as of two days ago, we're saying we're never
going to give anything back, which is interesting from people
that don't have a military or army. So what we
take a break, come back. I want to talk about
Penn State, not the football program, although I told Molliel
(22:33):
had a great idea with a three hundred million dollar
surplus in the legislature, more than enough to buy Franklin.
There we go.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
This is something Pennsylvanias could be high.
Speaker 1 (22:43):
Think outside the think outside the tombstone. So Eric Epstein
with Millennial Brian art Selby is producing us. We're rock
the Capitol. The show is Thunderdome, and we'll be back
to Happy Valley. In amendment, hey, we forgot to touch
on the fact that the Nobel Prize went.
Speaker 2 (23:02):
To a gal from Venzuela, Venezuela. So she's so, I
don't know, it's Maria Karina Machado. Might have said that wrong,
Venzuela democratic democracy advocate. Obviously she was. She's been persecuted
by the Maduro government, which has just been a complete
economic collapse. Yeah, horrible dictators.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
The world's largest oil reserves.
Speaker 2 (23:25):
That's right. And basically what he's doing is key power.
Is he's not only you know, obviously killing his opponents
and perscue of him. But also he's paying the military
for anyone else, essentially him, the military and some of
his little cronies are making money. Everyone else is just
getting destroyed everywhere, and so.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
It's a tough country. There's no middle class. It's super wealthy,
super poor, mostly super poor. But the last couple of
Nobel Peace Prize winners, if people haven't been tracking this,
have been people that have been standing up to democracy
with fear of losing their life. Had a Filipino journalist.
It was either last year or two years ago. And
(24:04):
so I think they've been consistent. The application had to
be in by February. And it doesn't matter that Nana
who nominated Trump, it probably didn't help.
Speaker 2 (24:17):
Yeah, he's not He's not the most popular guy in
the world states. I think the argument is, you know,
in practical terms, obviously I bet this one was very obviously,
very courageous. Did Trump? Has Trump done more for peace?
To the answers, Yes, because this is such a difficult
thing to push through that you have to credit whether
you like him or not, because everyone fails in this,
(24:38):
everyone fails to get these two groups together or stop.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
On this one issue. But at the same time you
continue to bomb Venezuela unprovoked and well they're the fishing boats.
They fired back this with shrimp. So I mean the
reality is you can't be an situation where you're, for
(25:02):
lack of a better word, inciting violence in cities in America.
And this is no matter how it comes apart. And
I think Jared Kushner probably played a large role.
Speaker 2 (25:14):
They brought him back, Steve and Steve Wikoff too. I
think on other issues people have been critical. You know,
ve get this through. You cannot say anything other than
this is impressive because everyone else has tried.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
Well, it's and they did it in a non traditional way,
you know. Israel Uh never wanted anybody to talk to
Hamas directly, and Trump talked to Hamas directly. It's hard
to tell with Trump which threats are real and not.
And I know we're sending a couple hundred troops there
as quote unquote advisors, which is what we did in
(25:48):
Vietnam too. But I mean, if this was the two
promises he thought he could get done Day one Ukraine
in Israel, and it's interesting in the Ukraine he is
starting to move towards well.
Speaker 2 (26:08):
He's never moved to Ukraine. I think what happened with
Ukraine is this. So when he came in, he believed
that Biden would not negotiate with Putin over things like
NATO and that was the main cause of this war,
and that if he came in he could cut a deal.
The problem is, I know, did he offer that deal.
He offered Ukrainian territory that Russian had won. He offered
(26:29):
other deals around economics and sanctioned relief, and Putin still
said no. So when he does that and Zelynskin him
had that blow up, But after that they've been much closer.
Out of eye give both Lensky and yeah, he's he's
he's come around to say, well, you know, maybe this
wasn't the case. Maybe this is old style blood and
soil kind of Russian expansionism. If you look at Putin's speeches,
(26:50):
especially in Russian or you know, he does mention NATO sometimes,
but he also mentions, you know, the Russian Empire and
his glory of you know, re establishing not just that
but also the one people, one language, one economic tize,
those types of stuff, which is much different than it's
just NATO.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
Double standard where Israel bombs Lebanon, bomb Syria, bombs Iran,
and everybody gets it, others supporting terrorism. Yeah, and so
I think he views the fact that he invaded Ukraine
as a defensive measure, which is horse hockey.
Speaker 2 (27:28):
Well, I'm not sure if he does. I think he's
using that because the reason why is if he did
believe that, then I thought that the ghost. I'm shocked
the negotiations didn't work because I actually thought some of
the criticisms he made, especially about NATO, I could see.
I think having Ukraine as a NATO neutral country makes
perfect sense because you just don't want to get right
up on a nuclear powers border.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
That seems but did make sense until they started dispatching drooms.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
Yeah, oh yeah, the whole thing and that. But he's
Bruns Vincent the other way where it's like, oh, this
isn't about that, just Natty, It's about other stuff. Otherwise
the war would have ended.
Speaker 1 (28:07):
How does Trump not know that this guy is evil?
I mean, I don't know. If you saw last week
another person committed suicide, jumping off like a forty four.
That's what I like about the Russians. It's not the
second or third forth, it's the fortieth big.
Speaker 2 (28:23):
They really they get it done. And listen, he he
poisoned two x ex pats in Britain and one in Germany.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
That some novel stuff.
Speaker 2 (28:36):
I mean, when he came into power, he bombed CHESNYA
and rolled over them and then installed a dictator in Georgia.
When they were trying to.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
I want to stop you. He got stuck in Syria
where the Israelis pounded the crap out of them. So
they're overextended, but they have been able to remake the
Wagner Group. So Russia is probably the largest military presence
in Africa. So it's hard to, you know, stereotypically say
they're weak or strong. I mean, they have aspects of both.
(29:06):
And I think Putin was smart. He saw Trump's and
America first, we're backing off, yeah, I mean, I don't
know we talked about this before. How this ends in
the Ukraine or Russia.
Speaker 2 (29:17):
Well, initially I thought it was gonna be there's gonna
be Nano neutrality. They're going to make a dividing line
somewhere along those four territories where there's fighting, there's gonna
be some divine one wherever it is. And then there's
gonna be long term economic kind of deals tied to
peace negotiations, and then that that's gonna sudivise both Russia
and Ukraine to come to the table. But it seems
(29:37):
like Russia wants less independence for Ukraine over EU membership,
long term economic deals over mineral rights over even So
that's like a way different thing where if they're they're
essentially they want to have almost their foot on their
neck kind of like they do in Belarus. But if
Belarus wants to make a deal or elective leader, they
almost have to get approved by Russia.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
Yeah. Look, Belarus has essentially been annexed by Russia. Ukraine
will never never bend. And so you have the situation, Brian,
where do you think Putin was upset by h Trump
trying to cut a deal on rare earth minerals in
(30:17):
the Ukraine?
Speaker 2 (30:19):
Maybe, but I think he was. I for me, I
think it's the Putin thing. Putin Ukraine just goes beyond
Trump or any American present, because I just from point
because the points that I that you would get from
let's say, maybe not Russian defenders people say, hey, yeah,
understand their perspective was basically native neutrality, and that Russia
has seen America or other countries, you know, across this
(30:42):
line and they look at themselves and say, well, why
can't we cross that line, which I points I kind
of agree with. But then when you get you get
offered those points, when you get offered peace and you
turn it down repeatedly, and he got offered those, then
then it seems to be something different. If you look
what he says in Russia, it's about one you know,
one nation, one language, one people.
Speaker 1 (31:02):
That's right out of the Nazi handbooks.
Speaker 2 (31:05):
Yeah, it's like the Russian He actually he's not a
huge fan of the Soviet Union. He's a fan of
the old Russian Empire.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
Yeah, everybody is. I mean, because the old it was
the whole country ninety nine percent were sirs. Yeah, you know,
so you get him to do whatever you want. What's
interesting is that they have been rebuffed in Moldavia and Romania. Yeah,
so it's been an uneven success, and I think Europe,
(31:33):
out of necessity, has had to amp up their military arsenal.
And I guess I'm asking what happens because I thought
you had a great idea where you thought there would
be a chunk of Ukraine, which would be like the
Demilitarized Zone in Korea.
Speaker 2 (31:49):
So yes, what I thought was going to happen was
basically there was going to be the eastern part of Ukraine.
A certain portion of those four regions would be given
either Russian statuses under them or they'd have like their
own Automas regions, and then after that they'd have like
a line and it it'd be like the DMZ at
(32:11):
North Korea. You have South Korea in North Korea, and
Ukraine would be able to join the U and joining
a military last day.
Speaker 1 (32:17):
And I never see Russia.
Speaker 2 (32:18):
But that's not that. But that's not that. That deal
was offered, including native neutrality, and that was turned down.
So now I think it has to be turned it
down Russia Russia.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
I mean, I mean it's clear to me. Look, these
folks came in thinking they're going to roll over Kiev
in a minute, and I did too. I thought, okay,
this is this is gonna be over. Yeah. Yeah, it's
like there was a book play called The mouset Roared,
and it was about a fictional country in Europe that
was really down on it's luck economically spiraling out of control.
(32:51):
So it decided to invade the bigger country so that
they would be occupied and get economic aid. So I
thought that this would maybe coming down here. But uh,
real serious, uh and real difficult, real and transient. It's
it's interesting because I always thought Russia Ukraine would settle
before Israel.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
I thought it was gonna it could sell fast because
they're more or less at a drawl, and all you
have is just basically young people dying over very small
changes in that line. And so it's it's unfortunate. I
wish it never happened, but I'm kind of shocked that
it didn't end.
Speaker 1 (33:24):
I was.
Speaker 2 (33:25):
I don't say I agree with some on everything, but
I think his diagnosis was. I thought was this could
end real quickly if we just get a dividing line,
and that's not true. It's clearly the people that have
been more skeptical of Putin have been right, and we've
seen it in other countries in Georgia and Romania and Boaba.
Speaker 1 (33:42):
It goes back to looking at the history. Traditionally, Ukraine
has resisted any Russian ambitions, and they were treated brutally
during World War Two, which wasn't long ago. Real quick
before we go to break I think the economic sanctions
against Russia have been effective.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
They've been effective on technology and on some of their
old energy pipelines. The reason why they have not been
super effective is Russia Swiss rel war economy, which gives
them a short m boost. And they have China as
their main backstop, but they also have India as not
just a third party backstop, but also a third party
distributor to get to other countries. So they may not
(34:19):
sell oil to Europe. They get so oiled to India.
Who's to Europe that kicks it back to Russia.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
Yeah, that that we haven't stopped. I mean they have
economic alliances with China and Russia. And you'll also forget
there's been a surge in the consumption of porn since
the North Korean.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
Yes, North Korea is always funy happy, the North Koresia happy.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
They were eating. Yeah, man, it's like more and more.
What's what's a haircut guy's name? I can't think.
Speaker 2 (34:47):
Oh, Kim Jong hun.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
Yeah, he made overtures by the way recently and he
but it was interesting he told Trump, I'm not meeting
if you're talking about us divesting ourselves with nuclear weapons. Essentially,
that's all they have Eric Epsteine in with Millennial Brian.
The show is Thunderdome. The group has rocked the camp
being produced by the most valuable producer, Art Selby. We'll
(35:09):
be back for our final segment in just a moment. Well,
hopefully this concludes the worst week if you're a Penn
State Philadelphia sports fan. Yeah, I don't know what could
get worse. You know, Trump could name James Franklin to
head the Gaza effort.
Speaker 2 (35:26):
It'd be great. The Penn State football program. We should
support that.
Speaker 1 (35:31):
So Penn State, if you haven't been following they have.
They advertised they were going to close twelve campuses. Ultimately
they close seven. So people have been saying, well, problems
with enrollment, problems with the price of tuition. In September,
by a vote of thirty four to one, they raised
the salary of the president by fifty six percent. So
(35:52):
the president, this is interesting. The president of Penn State
now makes two point eight million. It makes sure the
highest base pay base salary in the Big ten. All right,
makes her the second highest and this is Republic universities
salary in the country after the University of Sex. Yeah,
So what's interesting is it makes her the fourth highest paid.
Speaker 2 (36:17):
Pen State versus and obviously for people that don't know, yeah,
the football coach, you're probably the basketball coach, and then
probably the athletic director that all get paid more than her.
Speaker 1 (36:25):
Well, so, Penn State has been sued successfully by Spotlight
magazine for violating sunshine, you know, conducting business in the dark.
And so this spring in the dark without any discussion publicly,
the Pennsylvania Turnpike gave themselves a three total of three
(36:47):
hundred and sixty seven thousand dollars in raises. The highest
raise came to Mark Compton eighty six grand or thirty
three percent, bringing his salary to three hundred and forty
eight thousand. At the Turnpike, there's six executives that earn
more than Governor Shapiro. And you know what, it's interesting
(37:11):
also with the current president Justice for inflation, the President
spends more on lobbying in Harrisburg than she has than
her predecessors. Okay, so I'm not really sure what to
make of all this. You know, presidents at universities make
a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (37:29):
Yeah, so I think if you're looking at the presidents
of the universities, you have a ton of Texas universities
here that get very high salaries, you know, University of
Texas in Austin one point four to five million. I
think the Penn State, as far as enrollment, as far
as size of the university, size of the I'm not
very size of the endowment is up there with some
of the best public university in the world, if not
one of the as far as richness in the world.
(37:52):
I think the question is the decision she's made to
shut down those campuses, how much money that's saved, and
then how much were they able to reinvest in the university.
I think that's where they got the justification for raising.
Speaker 1 (38:04):
Her Staffy Wellmonnial, I'm surprising you because there's no doubt
in my mind she got to raise in salary for
being the grim reaper. You know, it's not an easy job.
You know, Oh, we're going to close down twelve o No.
Only seven. And so if you look through her rays
through the eyes of campuses that are going to be shuttered, teachers,
(38:25):
staff going to be fired, and look, a lot of
it is not to blame with the current president, but
her predecessors are overbuilt. Right now, college is not a
given it's not it's not inexpensive, but I'm not real
because I looked at what the board of trustees said
giving her a raise wasn't real clear. It was one
(38:47):
of those vague, you know, real good things, and.
Speaker 2 (38:50):
Well that's the I mean, that's that's the as the
point that it looks bad because if you're closing campuses
and you're giving a raise to top executive, you know,
it never looks good. Also, colleges around the country are
going to go through because we're going through a demographic
slowdown of young people and college has got more expensive,
so that means the population of people that can go
to college is less. And that's why you see these campuses,
(39:13):
even these satellite campuses, they're heavily reliant on international students
and that's potentially will go down.
Speaker 1 (39:20):
So if you get I couldn't go down this year.
I mean, there's a lot of parents that don't want
to send their kids over here. But the growth was
with the international students because that was cash.
Speaker 2 (39:31):
Yeah, they pay the full price too. They didn't get
no sort of financial aid or something.
Speaker 1 (39:36):
I don't see Mahatma Gandhi son being the quarterback in Michigan.
I mean, there's other incentives there. And this is what
I always found interesting. People sometimes complain about there's too
many Southeast Asian folks that are professional who got their
education here, I mean, and people flock here to get
that education.
Speaker 2 (39:57):
Oh, it's a huge economic driver, not just that the
college is themselves. The kids spend money, they invest money.
But then when they graduate, if they can get good
jobs here, a lot of them getting very good jobs,
pay a lot of taxes, spend money in the local businesses.
It's it's an economic driver. I mean, we're in the
area of Penn State, Harrisport. To see where that university
was forty years ago to where it is now. It's
(40:17):
like it's not just the university, the area around it,
the airport, the train station, all the stores. You know,
it looks like like a mini almost like a little
mini town that I popped out of nowhere. So I
think a lot of these places, too, these college towns
filled in for where manufacturing left, where there was manufacturing jobs,
and that's where it drove the economy. And now it's
(40:39):
the college that kind of drives the economy.
Speaker 1 (40:41):
So let me ask you this. I think there's a
thread through today's show. You got folks going to Ireland
when the budget's not done under the banner of, you know,
growing our relationship with Ireland, which is complete horse, don't
boot me out. I won't say about you know, you
have folk at the turnpike giving themselves a raise behind
(41:02):
closed doors.
Speaker 2 (41:03):
For the highest toll turnpike in the world.
Speaker 1 (41:05):
In the world. Yeah, and it's going to continue twenty
forty one, at least twenty forty one. So why do
you get a raise for that? I mean, that's like
giving the guy who robs your bank of bonus. That's
good job man, thank you. Here's a couple you know,
so Art, how much time do we have? Brother?
Speaker 3 (41:24):
About three minutes?
Speaker 1 (41:24):
All right, so we got plenty of time. We didn't
get to I'm glad. I didn't really want to do
the government shutdown stuff, but I just wanted to point
out that. And I don't know how this happened. How
does Congress get paid and the employees don't.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
Well, it's part of they have stipulations in the proceeds
of the legend that the Congress always has to get
paid and their staffsk gets paid, which I can understand
because they're the ones that work like twenty four hours
running all these bills and doing all these compromises. The
problem is, of course, if you want incentives to get
the budget done on time avoid these shutdowns, you have
(42:01):
to you have to essentially withhold paint the people making
the decisions.
Speaker 1 (42:05):
That's what I'm saying is incentives don't work. This incentives work. Yes,
you know that, that's what you need to apply. I've
said this for the last twenty years. If you want
to clean up government and you want it to be
more effective, you have to give white collar criminals blue
collar time. Yeah, that's you know, all of a sudden,
if you're sharing a cell, you know, with a guy
(42:26):
that killed like three hundred people because he wasn't hugged enough,
it will probably change your perspective.
Speaker 2 (42:31):
That's right, and it's got to be by Parson. You know,
everyone likes to go after the other team. No one
wants to go out for people on their own team.
Speaker 1 (42:37):
That's what I mean. That's all I mean. That's really
the beauty of Rocky Capital. We hate everybody that's right.
Speaker 2 (42:43):
Equal opportunity.
Speaker 1 (42:44):
I mean, you know, when it comes to politics, it's
all bad. So are any news.
Speaker 3 (42:49):
I mean, on notre Dame Notre Dame is tied right
now nearing halftime, and the Hershey Bears have their home
opener tonight at Giant Center, so you're going to be there.
I'll be producing the game back at the station. They
take on Syracuse tonight at seven and again tomorrow at five.
Speaker 1 (43:03):
I was at the Flyer Cap exhibition. Yeah, it was great.
It was packed, and you know, you just can't believe
there are lines in the merch store. You know, you
have to wait in line to buy. I don't know
what it was. I think about a pretzel in two waters.
It was like twenty three bucks. You gotta do. Yeah,
it's and mcdavitt won yesterday they did. Yes, all right, Brian.
(43:29):
I'm looking right across from you and I see arts reflection.
It weirded me out a little. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (43:33):
So I think Penn State last timmer check was up
fourteen ten going into halftime.
Speaker 1 (43:38):
D and E done.
Speaker 2 (43:42):
Listen, He's yeah, this might actually work out in their
favorite because if they can actually fire him now and
move on that that might be the key. That is
the change They need to actually fire him rather than losing.
They do a lot of states.
Speaker 1 (43:55):
This might be a little he was a great recruiter.
I get it, couldn't coach yeah, yeah. I mean if
you looked at him in the last three games at
the end of the Fort Notre Dame, Oregon, Yeah, last Ucla,
he looked like, you know, a kid that had a
full diaper. I mean, and I'm gonna say he's been
there twelve months, twelve years. Rather yeah, he's got makes
eight point six million a year. All Right, you need
(44:16):
to perform, but I gotta be honest. The quarterback has
been a disappoint.
Speaker 2 (44:21):
Yeah, And I think that's the key is that Penn
State's goind to get an elite quarterback, I at least
elite college quarterback to cover the gap with the best
teams because they the recruitings up there. But if you
want to you got to get an elite quarterback and
not someone with elite tools. They say he's going to
be the next It's an actual elite quarterback.
Speaker 1 (44:38):
The best quarterbacks. Penn Status has wrestling had a guy
walk on from West to Haselton Stranton. I believe scrappy
that's what we need. And look this this guy. I
hope he does well. It probably has a career after this,
But you know, it just isn't working. Uh so hopefully
they can get by Northwestern. It's homecoming. I mean, they're
(44:58):
not going to beat Indiana and they're not going to
be Ohio state. Yeah, they may beat Northern Illinois. So
so this wraps up the show. Art, thanks for producing
US Millennial, Thanks for coming in. We'll see everybody in
two weeks. Man Rock the Capital Thunderdome. Shalom y'all,
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