Father Long

This month, a rare event: a Pod-less pod, with Rob and Jonah taking sole command of the GLoP bridge. But there's still plenty to talk about, including a big announcement for Rob, some thoughts about The Fall Guy, the boys have dinner in NYC, a little archeological rank punditry (yes, there is such a thing), get slightly scatological (again), and too off their heads rambling to list here.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Yeah, but he's not listening thesame way Pot is. You know,
it's a different it's a different energy. As they say. He's not sitting
on a New York City subway yellingat everybody. Leave it down, gave
it down. I'm trying to hear. I don't talk all the time.
Well, fine, you do youthen you know what? Then you do

(00:20):
it. My question is is ourdepiction fair? I have seen the worse.
There's nothing to offend a reasonable man. Father. The motion picture teleplay
was respectful and exhibited tastefulness and class. And what do you think, Rabbi?

(00:42):
I have been an opinion? Howdoes pot of a standard thing when
he opens this thing? Hello everybody, I'm Jonah Goldber sitting in for John
pud Hoortz, And uh, thisis an episode of glop or technically now

(01:07):
just blah or glue since pod isnot here, but I am happy to
introduce my friend and colleague Rob Longfrom New York City. Hi, Rob,
Hey, Jonah, I should say, is this like, is this
an episode of the Glemnant? That'sright? This will also be going out
on the on the Remnant channel,my podcast, and uh, we can

(01:30):
chop this up into like twenty sevendifferent martini shots, so you can little
bit. Well, that's right,you might have to. I would like
to say a very warm welcome toall our listeners and all your listeners,
Jonah, because it's going to go. We're we're crossing the streams you're not
supposed to do according to the Ghostbusters. But I'd also like to say it's
very special hello to a listener thatwe know is listening very tently, and

(01:53):
that's John padorits Hi. John,Hey, John, gotta keep listening to
Gotta have AI to a transcription becausewe're going to talk about you probably anyway.
Yeah. I can't promise this isthe Actually I can promise this is
not the last mention of John anduh. For remnant listeners who don't know

(02:15):
what glop is, how long havewe been doing glop? You know it's
I don't know. I mean becauseit started as a you me Mark Stein
thing, Yeah, right back inthe pleistocene, exactly right. So this
is a this is a decade atleast. Yeah, Scott Emergood or our
trustee producer is saying about twelve years. That seems short to really. Yeah,

(02:39):
Because so for people who want toknow the history of this, really,
the genesis of it was really you, me and Mark Stein used to
do these like night Owl, ComedyMan, Yeah, National Review, cruises,
right and uh, which of themwere really good? Which none of
us are invited on it anymore,that's right, for different reasons, for

(03:01):
very different reasons, yes, anduh. And then you and Immigrant and
some people launched Ricochet around that periodand it became a podcast. I don't
know what we called it with whenwe did it with Stein, I don't
know, because it wasn't glop becauseand then then when Mark went on to

(03:25):
different pastures, Yeah, we broughtin pod who had subbed had started doing
the panel stuff on the cruises anyway, and for the longest time was just
the unnamed podcast. And then Icame up with doing it as our sort
of our initials, so we couldcall it glop cultures instead of pop culture.
Right, not clever, but ithad been well, I mean,

(03:46):
it's so obvious, but it actuallyI never I mean, it's one of
those things, you know, It'sone of those things that I just never
thought about. And I think itwas like three years later, four years
later, Oh, glop I getit, like pop culture right, or
I know, I think it wasthe opposite. I think I said to
somebody like on one of our textchange, like, why are we always
talking about pop culture so boring?That's the name of the podcast, and

(04:11):
it's just something dawned on me.I just thought it was a funny sounding
thing that just we just decided tocall it glop because it was such a
weird coincidence, like turning out thatStormy Daniels was a porn star Louke garrettic
disease. It's just one of thoseweird things that happen, those weird things
I do. There are things likethat in my life that I just never
ever reflected on. I just sortof accepted and then later discovered, Oh
I oh, I get it.Oh that's what that is. And I

(04:38):
will say glop has a listenership,Yeah, that is large and also different
than the remnant listenership like I willmeet. Basically, I don't think our
listenership is particularly young. Well,we do our best to we do our
best to maintain that it takes warare of pop culture podcast Yeah, I

(05:04):
mean how old with the exception ofsay, like if you did a ringo,
if you did a blop bingo card. Yeah. The most frequently cited
names and concepts, you'd how youngdo you think you could be? And
still like get like no with somefluency. Larry Storche Forest Talker. I

(05:28):
was gonna say Larry Steorge too,That's that's not a good sign. I
I don't know. I well,I partly I feel like there's a little
like for the for the for thefor the older folks. Uh, it's
it's kind of fun to talk aboutthat stuff because it's like, oh yeah,
oh yeah. But even though evenyou know, we're it's hard to
explain it to younger people. Butwe know those things from the rerun,

(05:51):
so they were old when we watchedthem, and then younger people I think
just it's like, you know,it's like it's like they get to spend
time with three people they experiencing adultonset dementia, but they don't have to
clean up after us in the bathroom. It's like the best of all possible

(06:13):
worlds. We're all all we areis fun, and then they get to
move on with their lives. It'sprobably nicer way to put that. Yeah,
I think they probably is. Imean, I will sometimes get emails
from people who like when none ofus can remember the name of some actor
or actress, they will stop inreal time when they're listening, which is

(06:33):
obviously way in the future. Fromwhen to send me the answer, Grig,
what's wrong with you? We're notdoing it now you're listening to it.
Yeah. I feel like we dothis the best. I mean,
I know we're getting to this metacriticcriticism, but it's sort of interesting for

(06:57):
me. The most enjoyable ors thatwe spend doing this are when we suddenly
fall into a vein of interesting conversationor humor that has nothing to do really
with pop culture or with culture orwith politics. It's just sort of like
this one thing we suddenly remembered,or the one thing that we So the

(07:18):
three of us have in common thatwe don't know that we have in common,
that in fact the listeners have incommon as well. So we didn't
talk about this beforehand. And Iam technically driving this bus, but we
will obviously cut this out if youdon't want to talk about it, so
no one will ever know I hadit. I've had the system removed,
I had drained and removed excellent,excellent, and it contained the undeveloped fetus

(07:43):
of the twin brother I've been hankeringfor in my whole life. But does
it still talk to you? No, h you me Pod and our friend
clip as this. We had dinnerin New York and great dinner. It
was a great dinner, and youguys were all clued in on this thing
that's going on in your life thatyou dropped at the end, like,

(08:05):
oh, and by the way,it's happening, and I didn't even know
what was happening. Oh yeah,yeah, yeah. So you're thinking about
going to seminary. So I hadbeen accepted at the Princeton Theological Seminary.
That was very exciting to get anMDV. And then I was telling a
friend of mine a while ago whenI was thinking about doing this, and
I said, but I don't thinkI'm really going to go for the Caller.

(08:26):
I just kind of want to studyit and I have some time and
and help. I want to writeabout it. I mean, you know,
I want to write about this stuff, so I should learn about it.
But I'm doing the opposite of thatI've done my whole life, which
is I'm learning about something and knowingabout it and then writing about it rather
than what I usually do, whichis just write make it up and write
about it. Yeah, And thenI said, so, I don't think
I'm going to go for the collar, because that's in the Episcopal faith,

(08:48):
right, is a different, verydifferent kettle of fish. And his response
is, why on earth would youbother to go all that way and not
get the collar? Because the call, oh, I was gonna be the
fun part. And although I recognizethat this is not kind of like going
to police academy not getting the badge. Yeah, like now you gotta like

(09:11):
you know, now you gotta.I mean, you don't have to call
the collar. You get to likeyou walk at a restaurant and they just
give you a table as far asI understand it, right. And also
I say to all my friends like, if you think I'm insufferable, now
just wait until I can say untoyou, and that kind of stuff.

(09:31):
So yeah, so it's very weird. It's very strange thing. I'm not
I'm not surprised by it, butI'm surprised that I'm I'm going away through
it. But I'm the more I'mthe more I'm contemplating it, the more
kind of fun it seems. Imean, I've always wanted to do that
because I think I sort of youknow, I kind of coasted my way
through college and I didn't know alot of people feel that way. Like,
boy, if I can go backand learn something, I would really

(09:54):
learned something. You went to thattrade school in new Haven? Right,
I went to a trade school inNew Haven, which, ironically, I'll
be a be even more revealed.That was the first place I applied to.
Is the Yale Divinity School? Reallythey said no, Yeah, they
said no, they did not acceptme. And friends of mine was like,
of course they didn't. You know, for one thing, you believe

(10:16):
in God and for the second thing, they probably clicked on a few links.
Yeah, you know, they don'tlike what they saw. So I
don't know if that's true. Pointof information, like this is not an
interview, but question. Yeah,you say you're not going to go for
the collar, Like, what arethe extra steps? What would be involved?

(10:39):
Well, I probably am going togo for the collar, actually,
but the extra steps are you getyour MDIVE and then one of the years,
the later part of the years,you're basically doing some kind of sort
of outside work and you try tocombine that with what they would call like
an Anglican episcopal year, so thatyou're sort of getting certificate in those studies

(11:03):
and then and and then you're thenthat's your process of discernment. And the
discernment has to get got to findsome sponsoring church, which I have here,
I hope and the bishop, andthe bishop says, okay, go
ahead, and then you do yourstuff and then your day and and that's
when the fun begins. M yeah, yeah, So I know you hate
when this happens, when people dothis, but I got an idea for

(11:26):
a TV show for you. I'mall ears, Okay, A somewhat looche
irresolute, middle age Hollywood burnout witha lot of experience under his belt and
a sardonic eye for the ironic andthe weird, decides to go to Divinity

(11:48):
School. Yeah okay, he getsthe collar. And then the real twist,
the real twist starts running into allsorts of terrifying supernatural state off and
actually has to be like an exorcist. Guy. It's started because which is
sort of the story of the Exorcist, right, the actual and the Exorcist.

(12:09):
The father, the younger priest Marinno, not right, right,
right, right. But the youngerhe's jaded, he lost his face.
He doesn't believe it's real yet.Right, he's like a psychologist now,
and that's it. So like thatwhole idea, but for laughs with instead
of being a psychologist, being likea sort of pundit guy who then all
of a sudden, once he getsthe collar, God's like, yeah,

(12:31):
you're my guy to take on theforces of darkness. So like, uh,
Sam Raimi kind of like kind ofthing. I think. The only
thing weird about that is that wealready do have a pundit who believes that
the earth is beset by demons.So I would have to wait for Tucker
to move on to something else beforeI could do that. But I listened
one hundred percent. I'm with it. I mean, I you had me

(12:54):
at middle aged. Thank you,You're welcome. It's really the least I
could do. Yeah, that islike people say, well, well,
are you gonna, like, areyou doing something different? And I don't
think I will. I think I'lltry to do the same stuff. I'll
just do it with a slightly differentso you know, I'll add I'm adding

(13:16):
this into what I'm writing. Sowho knows what it'll be, who knows
what will come out, but it'llbe this will be part of it.
And I always know my truly religiousfriends because my friends who have faith or
just don't have faith, but arelike just generally positive. That's really fascinating,
it's really interesting. But my reallyreligious friends say, yeah, you're

(13:39):
going to the wrong place and you'redoing it in the wrong religion, and
they're not really very good, andyou're you're you're going to spend three years
learning absolutely the wrong thing. Ifyou really want to do it, you
spend three years, and then they'llmention some incredibly strict doctrine that they happened

(14:00):
to believe that I should then becomean ordained minister in which is just not
going to happen. The great thingabout they want to be like Robert pulling
your own armor through the Amazon rainforest. Yeah, I'm not doing that.
The great Episcal Church is that it'sbase is essentially groovy and and uh and

(14:20):
super woke. Uh. And youget to be a right winger, which
is nice. I get to beyeah exactly for them, that's there.
I'm absolutely unacceptable. But also Ijust I mean, you know, so
is part of the culture. Solike, I'm not afraid of that.
I mean, it's not as it'sit's it's it's grounded in something which is
more you can say for you know, journalism and entertainment. So we can

(14:43):
get off this. But I justquestion because I find it fascinating, and
my wife insists that I asked you, ask you about more about it?
Are you going to would you characterizethis primarily as a journey? Is it
and intellectual journey or faith journey?I think it's both. I guess that's

(15:05):
the right answer. Yeah, Imean it's got to be both, right,
I mean you why would you?I mean I think what I what
I would characterize it as like theidea that at a certain point for me
anyway, Uh, you're kind ofI'm just kind of more interested in what
are we doing here? What we'reall doing here? And that's sort of

(15:28):
where I've been led. And I'vebeen led you know, to AH to
this for over you know, tenyears, and in various speeds and velocities,
and so now I'm like, what, what, what? Why?
Why? I mean, And Ithink what for me? What what happens
is you end up saying over andover again. Well, I can't do
that. I can't well that notthat, like, I can't not have

(15:50):
time for that, I can't dothat. And then at some point you're
like, wait, wait, whydon't I have time for this again?
What? What? What? Else? But I'm you know, I'm not
gonna. I mean, it's astrange thing. I think when you're a
kid, right, you spend eighteenyears or more a twenty years plus years
learning a certain pattern, which isI do they tell me what to do
and I do it, and thenthey give me a grade and they must

(16:12):
promote me, and a lot ofthis sort of that. I think that
I don't know if you've noticed thatto younger people, that disconnect they have
with the world. Isn't just thatyoung people are sort of feckless and gen
z Ers and whatever, and youknow, bicycle helmet, everybody gets a
trophy generation. That is true,but it's also just a toxic in this
toxic brew basic which is necessary.But they're all been in school their whole

(16:34):
lives, in which case they knowexactly what they're supposed to do, and
then when they do it, youreally have to You're the other side of
the contract, is you get ana and a pat on the head,
and you get told how great youare. And I just I think that
that hangover lasts for a long timefor a lot of people, and there's
still remnants of it in my life. So one of them was like,
well, I can't like people expectme to do X, Y and Z.

(16:55):
The don't expect me to do this, so I can't do this,
which is like, well, no, actually they can. So are you
gonna like drive out to Princeton?Are you going to rent an apartment out
there? What do you move therefor the duration? Thanks fantastic. I
was just in Princeton recently to Lovelycount It's adorable town. Looks like there's
some good eating. Yeah, somegood eats. I mean it's I mean

(17:17):
it's rich. They're they're rich peopleliving in Princeton. Yeah, not that
that's the way I'm going, butbut you know, hey, but you
know you have to you have toassociate with the certain you've got, You've
grown accustomed to a certain associate youknow, associational level, peer, the
you know, of a lifestyle.Right. So yeah, yeah, there's
always this thing like, uh,there's always the old you used to go

(17:40):
to old French restaurants in in Francedefinitely, but in New York and the
fancy ones I'm talking about the eighties, you know, and you'd see there
would be a table. If they'reFrench, truly French, there'd be a
table, and there'd be like acouple of priests, they're usually Catholic priests,
and they'd be drinking the best wineand just dining, like full out

(18:03):
dining. Apple cheeks, eyes glinting, you know, slightly, words slurring,
and you know, the rosary clickityclocketing or whatever those people do.
And it was always kind of like, wow, that's you know, that's
I don't think that exists anymore,but at the time, it was kind
of like that was the that's anormal thing. I mean, obviously,

(18:26):
being the Episcopal tradition, it's verydifferent. I mean there's none of that,
but there's more mayonnaise. There's moremayonnaise, and there're more cocktails,
and a wider variety of blazers anda richer palette of pants, hues,

(18:48):
more reds, more exactly right,Well, yesterday was the Pentecost when everybody's
spoken tongues. Briefly, I liketo think of that as like pants hues,
like everyone's got crazy, it's likea Madras. Before we keep going,
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(19:11):
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(20:17):
word drink ag one dot com slashglop. That's drinkag one dot com slash
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for sporting clop. So. Idon't know if I've told you this.
I am the five hundred and thirtyeighth inductee to the Gridiron Club. Oh

(20:41):
wow, congratulations. Yeah, we'llsee about the congratulations part. I was
I was starting. It was itwas very nice that they asked me.
It was yeah, nice people andall that kind of stuff. I'm not
really a joiner, but I figuredit's I can always leave, right,

(21:02):
It's not like it's it's it's notlike joining the Jesuits in the fifteen hundreds
or something, right, So likeI can, I can check out,
but like worth kind of doing,you know, my parted parents thought would
have thought it was really cool andso blah blah blah blah blah, and
but I don't think so. Idon't think I told you the story.

(21:22):
So, Jonathan Carl, ABC News, one of my two co sponsors for
the grid Iron, I have differentsponsors in other contexts. Oh, sure,
that's right. They're they're asleep onthe job. Yes, that's yeah,
they are. They are to asponsorship what Rob Long will be to

(21:44):
uh fire and Brimstone preach craft.But uh so I uh so, No.
Carl calls me, and I'm onmy cell phone, you know,
we're talking and he's explaining, youknow, would I be asking, would
be interested in joining? And andyou know, here's how it works.
And I'm like, well, like, I'm not gonna dance and I'm not

(22:06):
gonna sing, you know, butlike I can't write skits or help with
the upsets or whatever. And forlisteners who don't know, the grid iroon
is this thing where they put onskits once a year and whampooning. Yeah,
anyway, so it goes on fora while and then and then John's
that are too funny for the humorsegments on National Public Radio. That's exactly
right, that's exactly right. Andso at the end of this conversation,

(22:30):
johnsans like, do you have anyother questions? And I'm like, I
should ask him, and I don'tknow what this thing is going to cost.
I'm like, are there any dudes? And there's this long silence and
he's like, well, yeah,there's some and I'm like, okay,

(22:52):
like yeah, are they are?Are they onerous? Are they bad?
Is is you know? Are theya hassle? Start asking all these questions
long sign and he's like, Iwouldn't I wouldn't call him owner what he
like? And it turns out hethought I'd asked are there any Jews?

(23:12):
His answers, well, there aresome. He didn't know how to answer
it. I mean, that isnot the answer. The answer if he
thought that was a question, Theanswer is like, of course, joanah,
how dare you? I mean,like answer he was so flustered,

(23:33):
but he was so flustered by thequestion, And then I was so flustered,
like, wait, am I notsupposed to ask about this? Is
this something one does not do andask about how much money it's gonna cost?
Well you have to ask, Yeah, you're you're the first person who
asked what it costs? So Iguess no, Uh is there a clubhouse?

(23:55):
Does they have a clubhouse? Canyou just go hang out? Is
that a thing there? I don'tthink so, at least that has not
been communicated to me as of asof yet. And uh, would you
be a shame like, Yeah,what's the one in New York? The
famous one? To which one theclassic comedian one? You know, the
one, Oh Friars Club? Ithink that's closed. Well. I belong

(24:18):
here in New York to the PlayersClub, which is Grammercy Park, which
we should go to sometimes. It'sit's it's was founded by the most famous
actor, famous person of his day, Edwin Booth, the actor Edwin Booth
and Mark brother of the Bad bothbrother of the brother that Booth and Mark

(24:40):
Twain, and they sort of hungout and they decided one day they're going
to start the Players Club for players. And and then when Edwin Booth died,
his house on Gramercy Park is theClubhouse, which is a lot of
fun and it's a it's a firstof all, you walk through there some
beautiful paintings and they're all paintings.Are the famous actors of the day and
in student like his Hamlet or something, and you just realize how terrible the

(25:04):
acting was back then. It musthave been terrible because they're hamming it up.
They're like, you know, thebig gestures and everything. It's like
that John Lovet's character acting. It'slike that. And then the second thing
is you go in the library,on the library one of the library tables
they have under glass. They havea facsimile, they have the real one
somewhere the letter that Edwin Booth andhis mother and brother wrote, the open

(25:29):
letter they wrote to the nation apologizingfor the actions of their brother, And
it's kind of very moving. It'sfirst because you realize, oh my god,
what terrible they can talk of theshame of it. But then by
paragraph three you realize it's not atall about John Wilkes Booth or Abraham Lincoln
or the nation. It's just afamily of drama queens making it all about
them. We can never show upface we are, but if you see

(25:52):
us, to turn away. Butit's this great old nineteenth century weirdness,
and the place is great, andit's like filled with actors and people playing
piano, and it's a it's agreat bar and now I'd love to go.
It's a lot of fun. Andthe dues are not onerous, and
there are some jus, I meanthere's there are some dues. Yeah,
yeah, but they keep them.They're very subtile, they're not they don't

(26:15):
make a big deal about the Yeah, all the dudes they try to pass
the Jews. Yeah. We talkedabout this briefly at our swanky dinner last
week and we started a conversation ofyou could do a good piece on dynastic

(26:41):
families in politics, arts, whateverwho ended up having to sort of make
apologies for their black sheep, right, Yeah, like the Kennedy's now with
Robert F. Kennedy Junior. Wehad another one and I can't remember.
We'll try to the families who haveto say, gosh, d reputy eight,

(27:02):
he doesn't speak for us kind ofthing, right. Yeah. There
wasn't a bad Adams was there,like, uh, because the Adams was
were a real dynasty. Yeah rightright, yeah, I mean people for
Edwin boot Just to go back toEdwin Booth was the most famous person.
I mean, he was unbelievably famousat a time when if you were an

(27:22):
actor and you were famous you werefamous for people knew who you were who
would never had never seen you actand would never see you act. Right,
it's just like they went to themovies and you know, and how
weirdly that all changed. You know, within half a century everything was different.
You know, the undeniably Charlie Chaplinwas the most famous person in the

(27:44):
world for a while and because theyhad all seen him. Yeah, it's
just movies. I mean that's yeah, movies and posters for movies and yeah,
laughing magazine stuffing like that. Butit must be weird to like have
that. I guess you know whatI think it was, like, which
one? Which Trump? Is it? That is the Mary Trump? Mary

(28:07):
Trump? Yeah, she's the loneTrump who actually has some dignity in class.
Well whatever, I'm just talking aboutjust this to the proportions, says,
you know, she's the the sadlittle Trump all alone. Yeah.
I think she didn't die. Thatwas the sister who died. The judge.

(28:29):
I think the judge died. Yeah, yeah, yeah, all right,
So what else should we talk about? Well, well, I'm glad
you asked, Jonah because says,you know, I've had to give you
the good news about Jesus, couldyou open the door, please give me
some literature exactly. It's going tobe interesting to hear you in a pod

(28:55):
uh uh go, you know battletheological with each other. Now yeah,
well of course we we include thatbook too, that's in the pews.
So it's like, you can't Christians. Often Christians forget that the you know,
three quarters of the book is youknow, crazy Jewish stuff, and

(29:18):
then one quarter of it is essentiallythe same story over again, told differently,
so like you just sheer tonnage.There's more smoting and smiting, and
there's more animal sacrificing letting the Romansgo up to God than there is turn
the other cheapness. So this isI mean, this is this is a

(29:38):
very unglopped topic. But since wedon't have pod here, what do we
want to really it's like our parentsare like away from the Jews. Should
we go through Let's eat over thesink? I think about this a lot.

(30:00):
I've been trying to get Tom Hollanddo you know Tom Honald how the
historian. I've been trying to gethim on the remnant for a while.
I am I'm really sort of well, two things. One I'm intrigued at
and he's really good on this abouthow virtually all of the criticisms in the
West of Christianity are within a Christianmoral framework. Right, So like all

(30:23):
the atheists, all the human rightspeople, they say that they've sort of
shed, you know, the backwards, datavistic religion of Christianity, but then
all of their critiques, all ofthe architecture and frameworks of their moral and
ethical systems, are basically Christian.And and so I'm sort of fascinated by

(30:47):
that. And then the second partof it is is like I'm fascinated with
the you know, our I don'tmean my people or your people in ethnic
or religious sense, but like onthe right is sort of it's sort of
just good manners to talk about JudeoChristian rather than just Christian. And it's

(31:07):
it's largely there's a very strong intellectual, historical argument for doing that. I'm
not trying to reject that whole land, but it manifests itself in a large
part as a matter of politics.Right, there's something icky in our politics
to just talk about Christian values.It feels, it feels sectarian in a
way that the second you say JudeoChristian. It feels much more ecumenical kind

(31:33):
of thing, right, Yeah,And so anyway, what I'm really interested
in, and one of reason Iwant to get Holland on is to get
his take on this is like,so separate the wheat in the chaff between
where is this a legitimate way offraming our moral framework and where is it

(31:55):
just like good pr for sort ofconservative value stuff. And I don't have
a great answer for it, andI have I can speculate, but now
you're going away to get this thing, so like offle you in. Yeah,
I guess my quick answer would belike, on the one hand,
it is sort of good manners,but it's also kindness because I think when

(32:17):
I mean, I mean to fulldisclosure. Had you asked me this a
year ago or six months ago,whatever, seven months ago, I might
have said, you know, thereason you say Judea Christian is you really
mean Christian? Because sometimes you do. The reason you say that is because
you know it makes Jews uncomfortable whenthey hear people have the Christian values for

(32:40):
like legitimate reasons. And then sixmonths ago I would have said, you
know, because the Jews like theythey're you know, they're a little overreacting
to this, to the signs ofanti Semitism that they see here in the
other place, and it's really notyeah, rolling my eyes Jesus like I
get it. I yeah, butyou know, come on, And then
of course now I would say them, oh, reikes, you're right all

(33:00):
along. And part of it isthat you can't really have a religion of
you know, love and forgiveness andredemption if you don't also have a religion
of you know, people learning aboutlaws and putting laws together. I mean,
there's no reason why Jews exist,should exist. There is no reason

(33:22):
why Judaism should exist. There's justno reason for it, really, I
mean, tiny little group of peoplealways being invaded by more powerful, more
powerful empires who themselves had religions infull career, right, So like the
Egyptians and the Persians and the Greeksand the Romans and these Syrians, all

(33:43):
these people had like fully formed religionswith literature and stuff. And there is
no reason really you can think ofwhy we nobody's praying to Isis or Jupiter
or you know, nebukad Nezar whoit gets Quadal, right, I mean,

(34:06):
so why did this last and oneof them I think is because the
most honest examination of a people tryto figure out how to live in the
world. Another one is like itabsolutely breaks in half the idea, the
sort of Marxist idea that power,it's all about power. Well, Romans
were more powerful than the Jews,and they tore down the temple. They

(34:28):
earned the temple. What yeah,so like, so how did this all
work? So like if you don't, if you're not focusing on that,
and then I think you're missing abig part of the piece. And then
I would just say, as aChristian chaupinness that Christianity and Jesus especially the
message was He's the first person inthe history of mankind or personhood or on

(34:52):
the globe uh and is really theonly religion in the world that says still
today you are important, You Jonahare important. Not where you belong in
the tribe, which is what Judaismis like the idea of keeping the people
together, which is understandable, notwhere you belong in the dharma, which

(35:13):
is sort of Buddhism and Hinduism,which is very These are very beautiful religions,
but they're not really about yourself.And personhood. This one is that
you are so important that God leavethe flock to find you, and that
is kind of radical, and itstill remains radical for people. But I
think if I was going to comeup with a theory, I would say
that one of the reasons why theWest was slow to move obviously, I

(35:38):
mean when the Arabs are taken overthe world and crossing North Africa entering France
from the south, which of courseis the way the French prefer it.
You know, Christians are burning eachother up and chopping each other's heads off
because you disagreed with my specific definitionof the divine right right thought the Holy

(36:00):
Spirit was something else. And thenbut at some point they caught up.
And I think they caught up becausein Christianity, you, your selfhood is
was for the first time the onlyplace was the was an important thing and
God knew you. And you knowthat's of course's been distorted and whatever over

(36:23):
time. But if I had to, like, you know, that's so
that's kind of my answer. Butyou can't really have one without the other.
So we'll be back to go upin a minute. But if you're
anything like me, you have acertain tendency to put things off until the
very last minute. Forty years ago, they told me I needed my wisdom
teeth out and I said, noway, this is true. And last

(36:44):
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(37:05):
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(38:13):
We thank Ladder for supporting us andfor a great product and just another
weird little piece of gossip. IfI could so, I was in Jerusalem
a few years ago. A yearand a half ago, I took a
tour very lovely, very generous,a very very philanthropic Americans, mostly Americans
zillionaires have had this most incredible archaeologicaldig I've ever been on in my life.

(38:38):
It's the the city of David,right, which goes from it's amazing,
goes from David down to the poolsof Salom. They've they dug it
up. So if you go toJerusalem, you're always told in Jerusalem,
Okay, in the Christian world wesay, well, it happened here or
near so this is not really here, but it was around here and I'm
twenty feet below. So these arenot the owns that Jesus walked in.

(39:00):
But they have dug up the pathfrom the pools of Salom to the second
what was then the Second Temple,and that is those are the stones.
Yeah, and that's kind of bananousto think about. But the the young
woman who's very lovely and smart andincredibly charming, was giving U the tour.
She's from Jersey, and she's like, I guess she was, I

(39:22):
don't know what she's doing. Shekept saying, and she kept saying Judeo
Christian, Judio Christian, da Christian. So there's a little bit of politics
there because what they want with herpoint is and guess what is not part
it's the third troublesome part. Soeverything in Jerusalem is political, so Robert
F. Kennedy of Monotheism, Itook it back. I it back.

(39:50):
No, the scene, David,thing is wild. It's really great.
I mean I was there ten yearsago or something, and I'm sure they
found a lot more cool stuff sinceI was there, But one of the
just like the basic like you knowthe old quarter of Jerusalem, right,
Like that's like the old quarter.It's like the oldest quarter of quarters in
urban world. Right. It turnsout that's the new Jerusalem, right,

(40:16):
And uh, but no, thecity the thing is is is just wild
and and like I'm not super versedon fluent on on biblical stuff about where
you know, the Philistines did thisand the so and so's did that,
but like I remember it when peopleremind me of it, and they're like,

(40:37):
yeah, so like where it saysthat in the Bible, that's right
here, you know, And that'sjust that stuff is really cool. It's
really cool. And you think,oh, so this is a this is
a record, this is a anda friend of mine who old college friend
of mine, so raised secular Jewish, not really our family was of the

(41:00):
very secular Jews from his parents andall this family from England. And once
he went back to England to visitsome old friends, old family friends,
and one of them was an oldthing this, CRISI tell me, is
your father still into Judaism? Buthe, you know, not that long
ago, converted to Catholicism. AndI asked him, I said, you

(41:25):
know why, and his response was, well, I think it might be
true for one thing. Oh wellthat's that's a pretty good answer. And
you know, it's you know,it's like, I don't know, if
you believe the Trojan War happened,and you believe that Caesar was assassinated,
and you believe, you know,a while of other things we say their

(41:47):
history, this has got as muchhistorical record as that. And then to
dig up I mean for the Jewsto dig up the David's temple is his
castle, and to find little piecesof bottery and stone and things with ancient
Hebrew on them, it's pretty amazing. Yeah, yeah, do you know
we can get off this in asecond. But like when I was there,

(42:10):
they felt like they were closing inon proving the historical existence of David,
which up until ten years ago atleast, Yeah, he's sort of
like King Arthur. It's like theythink there was someone named King Arthur,
but they can't find any physical evidenceto back it up. And Robin Hood's

(42:30):
different, right, But like KingDavid, I'm pretty sure there was a
King David. It'd be really weirdto like right around, you know,
to fictionalize that one, dude.But they hadn't found anything yet. I'm
just curious. Has that been naileddown? Do you know? I think
they've nailed it down, at leastthey represented I feel like they have.
I can't remember and and that andthat, and also all the various sieges

(42:52):
of the city, right is thefamous I think that these Syrians come back
and lay siege to the city andI forget what it is, probably in
chronicles or something where there's like aand the starvation, right because there's see
there, there's like there's starving themout, and they have they know that

(43:15):
something like that must have happened ata certain date because on the side of
the hill which is now sort ofright above so on the slope side on
the on the eastern edge of thecity, right above a giant Muslim cemetery,
they found all these like little placesand they found little toilet seats,

(43:36):
little stone toilets, and they duginto them and they found little ossified human
feces which they then tested and itrevealed the kind of diseases and traces of
things that suggest that people starving todeath. But it's you know, it's
just like a bow. That's somebody'sjob is to like, let's uh,

(44:00):
we're gonna test it of some elderlyJews and find out what was going on.
Well, no, I mean thething is is like, is the
dude working in that lab when hiswife calls and says he gonna be home
for dinner and he's like, look, honey, I'm just up to my
ears and right now, and youknow what, I don't have an appetite.

(44:24):
I went to this hold on dothey get like when someone comes in
with that, we got a newbatter we got to study, and he
says, don't come don't come atme with that and bring that to me.
You know, put all that,put all that there, with all
that other sh everybody's ever you knowI did. I went years ago.

(44:46):
I went to this some I don'tknow why I did this. I went
to a there's a name for them, a functional meta functional. I was
having like I was speeching right,and it wasn't like not like I was
allergic to something. And so Iwent to this doctor who's a functional medicine
and she's a I don't know,it's like some groovy not really quasi medical

(45:08):
scientific. And so she one,we'll test everything. We'll give you tests
and Sanino, we could also,you know, I send your stool to
a special lab. I was like, how do you do that? How
does that happen? Well, wegive you a kit. Connect the dots,

(45:30):
worry please, we give you akit. So she gave you this
kit which included all these things,including a prepackaged, prepaid FedEx box.
So I thought, well, whenis this going to happen? And because
you know, honestly, I thought, look, if everything goes horribly wrong

(45:54):
somehow, I think it's pay betterthat I do this when I'm gonna in
the night in the hotel anyway,right, because you know, I mean
yeah, so I yeah, SoI'm actually out of town and I'm out
of town. Good, I'm gonnabe out of town in two weeks.
I'll bring my kit. So Ibrought the kit, which includes by the

(46:15):
way, the kit the people whoput the kit together. They were way
out of everything, right, becauseI'm like a houses e gonna work,
and like, well, they havea little tray like you get when you
you know, like French fries.There in a little tray, and they
have a little plastic spoon, andthey have a rubber glove. I'm just
telling you what they got, right, And all these various various vials with
different like liquids in them to likepreserve, so you have to get like

(46:37):
three or four samples. And thenyou have a black sealable bag and you
put that in a thing. Youput this in a thing, and you
take it all to FedEx and youpretend when they say what is it?
What does it contain? You saybooks, you know, my manuscript?
Uh, what is this diseased?And then but then I got I was

(47:02):
coming home. I got home toolate to drop it off at the fed
X store, so I I putit in the refrigerator. M and then
I in the morning, when Iwent off to my little workspace office where
they pick up the fed X,I took it and I put it in

(47:23):
that refrigerator. It's a FedEx box, to be fair. I put it
in that refrigerator where everybody you knowstories there. This is my this is
my diet coke, this is mything, this is my sweet green whatever
did you put a note on it? And then I sent it away and
the results were not that interesting,but I smarted thinking like, wow,

(47:45):
that's like one of the percentage ofthe fed X boxes that you see in
office refrigerators. Anyway, that wouldhave been a enjoy very It would have
been a very, very very differentscene if Tom Hanks and castaway. We'll

(48:06):
be back to go up in aminute, but at first I want to
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(48:49):
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making a really cool and useful gadget. I do want to apologize to new

(50:00):
listeners of Glot that we don't don'tnormally dwell on the fecal in the scatological
for this long we went by theway. Yeah, and and we really
have gone sacred and profane in acertain way. Right, So we've done
almost no pop culture on this.So I'm gonna change gears again this weekend.

(50:23):
My daughter's in town and she isone of our oldest and most revered
traditions is we go to the moviestogether. It's just daddy daughter go to
the movies, right, And sowe saw The Fall Guy and it's not
bad, no, you know.I mean, I was never a huge
fan of the TV show, uponwhich it is very loosely based, but

(50:49):
Ryan Gosling is actually a pretty goodcomedic actor and it's funny. Yeah.
And the thing is, and thisis not really a spoiler. This is
about the credit sequence, right,so like, and anyone who goes to
that movie and thinks it's going tohave a tragic ending really does not.
But anyway, so the movie isreally a love letter to stuntman, which

(51:12):
I'm all in favor of. Andit did occur to me that the TV
show was basically a loosely loose ripoffof Hooper, and this is the movie
was kind of is like a ripoffof Hooper too. It so like you
can see the genealogy in it.But anyway, like they're they're playing country
music songs or songs about stunt men. It's all about how stunt men are
great. They're the unsung heroes.They don't get no gold, you know,

(51:35):
awards or any of that kind ofstuff. And so you'd expect during
the credit roll, when you knewthey were going to show you a whole
bunch of cool stunt stuff, right, you'd expect them to like put like
the names of the actual stuntman inthere so you can see them and stuff
and instead it was all like anhomage to Ryan Gosling pretending to be a

(51:55):
stuntman, as an ode to stuntman, and like you just and my daughter
pointed out you. She was like, I think this is kind of mean,
Like this whole thing is supposed tobe about stuntman, and then it's
at the star and then the endit's still about It's still it's actually proving
the point of all the complaints thatin the part that's supposed to be the
celebration of stuntman is still a celebrationof the talent. It was just interesting.

(52:21):
I hadn't caught it, but mydaughter was like, really pissed off
about it. Uh, yeah,it's weird. We're weird. A couple
of weird things about that. Oneone is Lee Majors, who's the star
of the of the Fall guy isstill alive. Yeah, well he has
a cameo in this. Oh that'sgood. I was going to ask about
that, and I, you know, it was this was part of an
argument. I hadn't seen the movie, but it seemed like it was fine.

(52:42):
But it's part of the argument Iwas making with somebody in the movie
business, and they threw this backin my face because I was saying because
the movie didn't do well, well, didn't do well, and part of
the part of the argument a bunchof different interpretations for it. One was
people's well I saw it, it'sstuck. It sucked, but I'm like,
okay, fine, I don't knowwhat. And now people said,

(53:05):
well, this is the problem witha movie. Business is entirely based on
what they call IP, intellectual property, which is a fancy way of saying
a title you already know, likesomething I already know, so I'm gonna
go see it. Because IP meansthat you're if you greenlit that movie,
you have some kind of corporate protectionif it if it fails, which is
really the most important driver of anythingin Hollywood is fear. And then the

(53:28):
second thing it means is that,Okay, I don't I don't need to
bring you all the way up tospeed on what this movie's about, because
that's gonna cost me money. Soyou're going to get more. You know,
you're a title or a name that'sfamiliar, it's gonna cost just cost
less to promote, and promotion isthe most expensive thing these days. And
so of the death of the IPobsession, because look, if people aren't

(53:52):
well flooding in to see this thisThe Fall Guy, which is this big
hit TV show a thousand years ago, then maybe IP, which isn't the
most important thing. Although the realityis that I don't think people really remember
The Fall Guy. Yeah, thiswasn't that big. But the third thing
I said was like, because thiswas thrown in my face, I've been
saying over and over again that,I mean, it wasn't that long ago

(54:13):
that every single summer had two orthree giant comedies, big loud, noisy
comedies that we still refer to,like people still say you stay classy,
right, Anchormannic to zooland or allthose things. Right, And if you
look where the script for those moviesor somebody's trying to explain what those movies

(54:35):
were, they were not IP.They had nothing to do with anything.
They were kind of weird. Likeif you had a meeting about Anchorman,
you'd be like, well, whatwhen is is it like set in the
seventies, right, And the answeris well yes and no. They're kind
of like, well, wait theyhave this big fight and people's arms get
chopped off. It's like yeah,but you just would have to close your
eyes and say, well, it'sWill Ferrell and his friends will be fun.

(54:58):
Yeah, And this is just Ithink this is an example of of
of the right directionally correct. Makea big, loud, noisy comedy,
but don't tie it to something.Just make a big loud, noisy comedy
and people will find it and they'lllike it, and you know, in
the summer, that's what you wantto do. Although some of the I

(55:21):
mean, there was a wave ofactually funny comedies that were based on IP,
like the Start Skiing Hoch Go Bad. I mean, I don't know
how it did, but I thinkit's right. Yeah. But and then
another topic which we didn't talk about, I think because uh, John Pedortz

(55:42):
vetoed it and people. What peopleneed to know is that the reason why
we let John talk as much ashe does is we're terrified of him and
he runs a very tight ship.It really does. And I walked to
a door and it was my fault. Uh. But we never talked about

(56:05):
Unfrosted, which I gathered did notdo great though I don't even understand what
the metrics are for do great forNetflix? Are I guess download the streams
right? But yeah, they decide. Yeah, so what did did you
see it? I saw parts ofit. I mean, I mean I
want to see the whole thing.I thought it was fun. I liked

(56:25):
it. I mean people like wereall up in arms by people said otist
stupid. I think it was reallyI don't know. I thought it was
the scenes I've seen. I haven'tseen a whole thing, but they seem
like, oh, I'm I'm gonnafinish watching this. Yeah, I thought
it. I liked it. Ididn't love it. I love the cat
and it seems to me, uh, it's it's a little bit like Saturn

(56:51):
Live. Like there are very feweven in the Golden Ages Live Golden Ages
Saturn Live was and you had ashot an episode is Sign of Life where
they had three successful skits right right, right, I mean they never had
one where every skit was great,right, And that and that's not because

(57:13):
that's not because they were terrible.That's because actually writing sketches is hard,
yeah, for sure, right,and you're throwing stuff at the wall,
right, And so like maybe itwas like two really good skits and one
great fake commercial and that's a supersuccessful show, right, And I kind
of feel like Unfrosted will have avery long half life because there are a

(57:36):
handful of legitimately really funny scenes andthat's kind of all you need to sort
of have a long hangtime, youknow, in the culture for a comedy.
I also think fall Guy is goingto be really really popular on cable
in reruns. Like there's just someshows you could see, Oh, I'm

(57:58):
gonna watch this for ten minutes andend up watching the whole and it feels
like that kind of thing, youknow. Yeah, it's like one of
those like the step Brothers that thatc Riley. Yeah, I'm like,
it did that great in the theater, but you know there's a period when
it was on cable all the timeand whenever you're flipping around and it's there,
like I'm watching the rest of itwithout doubt. Yeah, yeah,
it's one of those I mean,I'm it's the I'm just going to think

(58:22):
of like that that there are thosemovies like that. I mean, but
you kind of have to, likethe idea is that you have a vote
that you can't you can't do thekind of coverage that you would do.
You can't do the kind of likewhich meetings a meeting a creative meeting about
a script and there'll be some internto coverage. Now that's going to be

(58:43):
a I like tell you what happensto the script, the characters are,
and where the plot holes are,and that those are usually the creative meetings
that you have in a studio whenyou're making a feature film or television show.
But if you're dealing with a comicbrain like you, what what what's
the meeting going to be? Isonly going to be about budget. And
these movies are generally very cheap tomake. They're not that expensive, and

(59:09):
so there's no they they slip rightthrough. And that's usually where where you
know they're they're either going to doreally well or do really really well later
or if they don't get the rightkind of promotion or just bad timing for
the release. But movies like that, I mean, what makes them work
is that I think it's that there. It's kind of like we should call
it an old show business, asweat act. It's like a sweat act

(59:29):
is the act that it's a performerwho's just working really hard, Like is
a sweat act like the old Vegaslike the Headliners, the Wayne Newton,
you know, for a long timeis a sweat act. He's running around,
he's gonna he's earning the money.And that's like I remember like thinking
that like a show, a TVshow like thirty Rock or The Simpsons,

(59:55):
really like you know, like thisjoke is one coming right now. You
don't that joke is one coming rightnow. It's like we're putting jokes this
five jokes page. You don't likeone that's okay, By the time in
your brain registers that didn't work,there is another one's going to make you
laugh. And it's just that levelof like constantly working really hard. And
usually those are the movies that peoplelove. They like, but are they
all is every joke killer or no? But they're working and they're trying really

(01:00:21):
hard. I once gotten a bigTwitter argument with a young actor who is
a star of a show on Ithink the Fox at the time, because
he was a big improv guy.And I did a little my Little Martini
Show, one of my Little Martinishot shows, which was on public radio
in LA at the time, aboutyou know, I'm not a big fan,

(01:00:42):
like you know what I mean,maybe summer writers like how about this,
how about you you write it down? And then you rehearse it and
then you change it, make itbetter, and then invite me to come
and pay money to sit and watchit. But that that that's also an
option, right, write it downfirst, it's okay, And he was
sort of like, well, youdon't understand and problem. So we sort

(01:01:04):
of got into it in Twitter alittle bit. He's when we met.
He's a very nice guy. He'sa lovely guy. But I do remember
like thinking, we're writing it downand working on it, and I uses
my example, what are reliably thefunniest parts of SNL. Reliably the funniest
parts are the stuff that they've pretaped, the things that they've shot.

(01:01:28):
Those the commercial parodies, the whateverit is. Those are always killer because
they they had to work harder onthem, because you had to like shoot
them, and they had all thistime to make them better. And that's
a good thing. Making it betteris a good thing. Yeah, it
can go I mean, obviously youknow this process stuff much much much better
than I do. But it cango the other way too, right,

(01:01:50):
where stuff can get committed to death. You know, Well, this is
one of the reasons why I havealways disliked the process of institutional editorials.
Sometimes they're necessary, but like ifyou start getting everybody, so it's the

(01:02:12):
too many chefs problem, right,and it gets watered down and it gets
too broad and loses its voice.And I think that like most editorials,
like the way the washert Journal understandingdoes it is they sign it to one
person, they write an editorial intheir voice, and then other people And

(01:02:35):
the way I think the Washington Postused to do this and then yeah,
if people will chime in on itand offer boutiques, but it's got a
consistent voice to it. And theway the New York Time is my understanding,
at least they used to do it, is fifty people are writing the
damn thing, and so it comesout as just pablem nonsense you are you
know, and Islamophobia and everything youknow, Yeah, of course there is

(01:03:00):
scourge of Islamophobia. Yeah, Imean, like the number I mean this
is could be completely completely unfair,but I canna say it anyway. The
number of writers I know who areworried, you know, the event diagram
number of writers I know who arereally worried about AI and the number of

(01:03:20):
writers I know who's writing already soundslike AI is almost not quite overlapping,
not quite one hundred percent overlapping,but majority of huge overlap. Yeah.
Yeah, Like, like, Idon't do you think AI. Maybe in
the future they could, but forright now, I don't think AI could
write a joke. I could notwrite a chief file. Have you tried
it? I have. It's reallyreally bad, but it's it's I mean,

(01:03:46):
obviously you tried it last week.Uh no, no, no,
no, Like I asked, Isaid, write me a thing about this
in the voice of Joanah Goldberg,and I'm just like, I mean,
there are sentences that are like,I see what you're going for here.
Yeah, the whole thing, No, just doesn't kind of work. And
I agree with that. I mean, uh, you know, I went

(01:04:06):
into all this with the you know, like I wanted to get to a
point where you could put your handover my byline and people would say this
sounds like John of Goldberg, rightright, And I think that's what writers
are supposed to do. I meanthat reporters are a little different, right,
because there's a little less room forvoice, you know, which makes

(01:04:27):
the really good reporters amazingly good,right, you know, the ones who
are really good at it where theymanaged to get voice in there while also
staying within the narrow you know,within the lane of straight reporting. It's
really impressive and much more difficult.But anyway, we're neither. I didn't
mean to go down it. Yeah, no, I feel like it's it's
one of those things that's kind ofhard to do. And and if you

(01:04:49):
you almost as you get older inyour in your writing, I think you
you suddenly realize, at least Idid. I suddenly realized, oh,
oh that's oh that's how I write. Yeah, oh, that that's my
style. That's that's the person I'vecreated who does the writing, and that's
the you know, the you know, the persona when you're when you're stuck,
you're like, okay, well,what what would I write? What
would I write about this? AndI feel like that would be very hard

(01:05:12):
to recreate. Uh. I meanI never ever looked at stuff. There
was one time, a time fora long time, the National Review.
I don't know it's still true.The archives were all so messed up that
I know I had written a peeka little something for someone about and I
said, roughly, I told thisstory, and I was like looking for
it, looking for it and lookingfor it and I couldn't find it.

(01:05:36):
And then I looked on an Rbecause I like every time. Then I
wrote for the website and I foundit mm hmm on it. But it
was like it was weird attribution.It was kind of strange. I don't
know who. I don't know who. They still was writing it, but
it's like it was this weirdly hangingout there in the middle of the archives.
That's it. And I knew instantlyI wrote that. I remember writing
that. I remember that I couldtry to match it to my what's all

(01:05:58):
my dropbox from million years ago?What I could, and I thought,
oh, that's kind of amazing.That was that's I could. I could
tell that signature. And I mean, I don't know if I was reading.
I mean, the great thing aboutAAR or chat ept for me is
that I can ask a questions thatexplains things that I that takes. It's
shorter than googling and more efficient thangoogling. But it's not It's not fundamentally

(01:06:20):
different from googling. I don't thinkfor me in the way I use it.
Yeah, so every time I getI start to trust CHATCHPT again,
it disappoints me. And uh,like I've been on this. So I
had this guy Doug uh uh,I'm sorry, Ryan Bourne sure on the

(01:06:46):
Remnant recently and I was like,Okay, this is the perfect thing for
chat pt to do for me.Give me a list, asked, give
me a list of quotations for fromfamous economists, but the definition of what
a price is, you know.And I constrained the question pretty well,
I thought, and it was veryclear what I was asking. And it

(01:07:08):
gave me a list of quotes fromMilton Freeman said this in nineteen seventy six
in this book, and so andso said this, right, And I'm
like, I recognize this definition asbeing from Alex Tabarak, who's this great
economist at Mercada's in And then youstart going through it and it's like it
just I don't want to say itmade up, but it just got the
attributions for like half of these quoteswrong. And does it apologize it does

(01:07:35):
sometimes you say this is incorrect,you know, it's just you're right,
and then sorry, sorry sir.Then of course it's like it gives instructions
to the defibrillator machine in my hotel, my hospital room to give me a
heart attack or whatever. But uh, I find you're right, like like

(01:07:58):
the place the only place I findit reliable. Like I'm about to go
to TV and I'm talking about likeprotectionism. Yeah, like give me the
five arguments for protectionism. And it'snot like I don't know the arguments,
but yeah, running into this TVstudio being reminded of them. Oh yeah,
I know this one. I knowthis one. No, that's that's
not really one of the arguments.Blah blah blah. But I'm just I'm

(01:08:18):
I'm really still underwhelmed by it.I think it's late for biomedical stuff and
chemistry, but I'm just on thecreative side. I'm still not really sold
that it's going to be this oras earth shattering as people are making out
to be. I have a friendwho's who's been we're in this world in
the AI business for a long timefor medical imaging, and you know,

(01:08:44):
AI looking at your MRI is thewave And I said, wow, how
do doctors feel about that? Andhis response was they hate it? And
I tell them the solution to hatingit is be better than the AI,
because right now the AI is somelike a ninety three percent success rate,
and the human doctor as a seventythree percent success rate. But AI plus
doctor is a very very good successrate in identifying things and not not cutting

(01:09:09):
into you if they don't need tocut into you. That's one thing I
mean, I used it. Imean when we had our our our our
our little our dinner, fun dinner, which we should we should make a
regular thing, our fun dinner inNew York last week. On the way
there, I was, we weregoing all going to have these delicious patty
melts, and I said, wellto the chut you degenerate a North Korean

(01:09:30):
propaganda poster of people exalting the pattymelt and the first one was a perfect
perfect image of a Chinese propaganda posterbecause they all looked like Chairman Mao and
they had to start. Everything wasnot North Korean, so I said,
no, this is Chinese. Makeit North Korean. And it said,
oh, I'm sorry, let melet me help you. But it it

(01:09:54):
got really close and got really good, except it couldn't. It was always
a hamburger. Yeah, it's likea weird hamburger with like a patty on
it and lettuce and tomato and thena weird like brown thing on top,
like almost like there was a friedchicken filet on top of a hamburger,
which actually sounds a pretty good AndI had to get it to like,

(01:10:17):
please remove that thing above the patty, please make it you know, rye
bread. And I finally sent ita picture this is a Patty Melt,
and it said, thank you,I will to add that to my knowledge
base, and then it delivered mea Patty melk. So that's the highest
and best use of this incredible technology. It's just coming up with the funny

(01:10:38):
little picture that I thought of thattook you twenty minutes. Again, but
again like getting to your point abouthow the writers who already sound like chat
gipt you are in trouble. Yeah, It's like we are very far away
from AI coming up with like ifyou just said, give me something funny

(01:11:00):
about Patty melts, it is notgoing to come up with a North Korean
propaganda poster or worshiping Patty Melts,right, And it is very far from
doing that, right. So likeit's it can't make a joke. It's
sort of like you know, onStar Trek Next Generation, the scriptwriters they
would put as a placeholder like technobabbleor something like that for when they needed

(01:11:28):
to talk about how the flex capacitorsweren't able to control the dilthium overview or
whatever, and they just fill thatstuff in later because it's it's kind of
meaningless. But there's an art andyou needed and you need a consistency to
it, right, it needs tobecause there's gonna be some nerd out there
saying that's not how flex capacitors were, right, And besides, flex capacitors
are from back to the future.But like I could see chat GPT being

(01:11:50):
good at that. Give me languageabout how di lithium crystals don't work,
and it'll like because all chat GPTis for the stuff that we do is
a plagiarism machine. Right. Itdoesn't actually create anything. It just it
looks at the highest number of associationsof this word with that word within the
parameters of the thing that you askedit to do. Yeah, but I
wondered though, if you could hackit, like if there if there was

(01:12:12):
a worldwide human effort to hack it, like years ago when you when you
did a TV show or you justshot at to TV pilot. They would
especially for CBS. CBS spent likeninety million dollars and built this testing facility,
so like a focus group facility atthe MGM Grand Hotel in Las Vegas.
And the theory was that pretty mucha crowd wandering the streets of Las

(01:12:33):
Vegas or in the lobby of theMGM Grand Hotel, if you scoop up
some people and give him a freeslice of pizza, it's kind of representative
of your audience. And so youshoot a pilot and then you just take
it. They take it to thistesting facility and they would focus group it.
And this is the pome. LikeI've said this to the guy running
in Paramount Studio at the time whenwe did a pilot, I said,
well, look, we spent twoand a half million dollars three million dollars

(01:12:55):
in a pilot. Why don't wespend two hundred thousand dollars in cash,
hire a bunch of people, sendthree buses, you know, for the
week into the MGM Grand, havethe mill around until somebody scoops them up.
And then if they they we findthat they're watching our pilot dials up

(01:13:15):
they only have twelve people, twelvefifteen people, So like you're you only
need three people in there to likemake it a giant hit. And his
response was, Oh, that's crazy. And then thought, well, what
what would it cost? And Iwonder whether if you had an underground system
of people. It's like that oldSteve Martin choke, you know, whenever

(01:13:38):
you're around a baby talk wrong,Like what if they all just what if
you said thank you? That iscorrect? That is the Milton Friedman of
definition of prices. Oh. Also, do you have a picture of Milton
Friedman and the antlers he had?We have no pictures. Oh there's he
wore antlers. You didn't know that, Ai. You know, he was

(01:13:59):
the our most famous Nobel Prize forthe economists with antlers. I cannot believe
the day that John Padortz isn't fineglat. You were going full look at
the jew with his horns. Ohwell, I said antlers. Yeah,
well, we know what you mean. It was a stag. We'll be
back to glop at a minute.And I know we just I think Joan

(01:14:23):
and I talked about the fact thatwe all had dinner together a few last
week sometimes and there were there werecocktails served, just so you know,
there were cocktails served, and therewas some wines served, and then there
were some more cocktail served. Soit reminded me that I want to tell
you about a game changing product thatI use before a night out like that

(01:14:43):
with drinks. That's called z biotics. Because let's face it, after a
night with drinks, I don't bounceback the next day like I used to.
I have to make a choice.I could either have a great night
with my friends like I did lastweek, or a great next day.
But that was until I found zbiotics. Because let me tell you,
if there's a sure fire away towake up feling fresh after a night of
drinking, it's z biotics. ZBiotics pre alcohol probiotic drink is the world's

(01:15:05):
first genetically engineered probiotic who was inventedby PhD scientists to tackle rough mornings after
drinking. And it here's how itworks, because when you drink alcohol,
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gut. And it's this byproduct.It's not dehydration if you always say it's
dehydration, but it's not. It'sjust this toxic byproduct in the gut,

(01:15:27):
and that is what's to blame foryour rough next day. But z biotics
produces an enzyme that breaks this byproductdown. So all I got to do
is remember to take make z bioticsyour first drink of the night, and
then you know, drink responsible,don't go insane, and you'll feel your
best tomorrow. As I said,I was out on last week with the

(01:15:47):
glob crew and our friend Cliff,and there were cocktails and wines that were
served in abundance. It was verycheery evening, as they say, and
I did I have my little littlething of zibiotics before, and I bounce
back the next day felt really greatbecause not only was there a lot of
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(01:16:13):
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(01:16:35):
slash clop. Use the code glopat checkout for fifteen percent off. And
we thank z Biotics for sponsoring thisepisode and for making the day after our
big dinner last week such a breeze. You know, I think about that
kind of stuff all the time,about like how it wouldn't take much to
tweak all sorts of things, right, And but at the same time,

(01:17:00):
that's sort of why the Internet hasgotten worse in the last ten years.
Like I don't trust any Yelp reviews, I don't trust any of those four
star things, right because you knowthat they're just being gamed out there.
And and like I think half thetime I'm being harassed on Twitter. Now

(01:17:23):
I'm not even being harassed by humanbeings. There's just some bot that is
programmed to sat down again, right, Yeah, Like there's like there's like
one big fat dude in overalls anda dirty T shirt somewhere running like fifty
different algorithms make the jew angry,making you know whatever, and it just

(01:17:44):
running on autopilot while he's you know, playing angry birds or something or looking
at porn. Yeah, I meanwhy why uh, why put any effort
into it? Yeah, sort oflike this episode of glop effort. We
covered some big stuff here. Wedid we didn't. Actually it was a
pretty good one. I mean,not that you're supposed to think of it

(01:18:08):
that way, but I always sayto people when you know, I say
that people like when they complain aboutyour dog stuff. It's like on Twitter,
I want to say, like,I'm sorry, how much did you
pay for this? I want freeentertainment the way I want it. Like,
no, you don't get free entertainmentthe way you want it. That's
what that's what paid entertainments. AndI do want to apologize to our regular

(01:18:29):
listeners who are unaccustomed to hearing meand Rob finish complete sentences. But you
know, there's a price you haveto pay when when well, the three
is a you know, it's it'slike that movie Challengers. Three is always
complicated, that's right. What Iwas going to say was like, uh,
and there is this. I mean, I don't don't expect you to

(01:18:50):
finish it now because it's it's it'syour story and I'm sure it's not fit
for general ears. But walking outof the restaurant whatever last week, I
thought to him myself, Wait aminute, Jonan, never finished that story
that you started at the beginning ofdinner. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
yeah, for a whole lot ofreasons. But also and I'm not going

(01:19:13):
to finish it now either. Now, no, of course I won't do
it, you know, like theRussian and the Pine Barons, like what
story happened? What happens? Exactlyright? Exactly right? He's dead,
all right, I don't I thinkI think we've run our course here.
John Podortz will be back in thecaptain's chair, uh in due course and

(01:19:36):
h h, I sorry, Ihave to obey the forms here, right,
Rob are you appearing anywhere? Andthen you're not appearing anywhere? But
I'm I'm available as always on MartiniShot. So if you just subscribe to
Martini Shot, that's then you'll getone hundred percent of me. And you
are a frequent contributor to commentary magazine? You actually tie a commentary or are

(01:20:00):
you just like a frequent contributor?I have I have a column. I
think it's a column, but like, are you know that editor Matt Continey
has the most annoying title, atleast on the commentary podcast, because it's
like the Washington Commentary Commentary columnist orsomething like that. It's like there's a

(01:20:21):
two uses of the word commentary,one lower case one capital C. Well,
I mean I have to add tothat. In September, I'll just
demand to be called the I'm theJesus I cover the Jesus desk. There
you go. I like that.Yeah, well obviously yes, as the

(01:20:44):
AI insists, and you the remnantof course, but there's the Remnant you
can catch, you know, onall your better podcast feeds. And if
you want to sort of take Rob'suh so Mary prankster spirit to heart about
like messing with things a lot ofyou could go into things like iTunes and

(01:21:06):
give Blob and Martini Shot and theRemnant blowing five star reviews. Where does
work? The problem is is theonly people willing to go do that are
the people who already want to giveit a five star review. Yeah,
people want to give it a onestar review. You're not going to convince

(01:21:26):
them if you ask really nicely togo give it a five star review.
So it kind of defeats the PurposeAnd I'm on a CNN A bunch,
but what's your next CNN? Idon't know. I canceled this this coming
Chris Waller Show is supposed to beon. But I have a family stuff
because my daughter's in town. Andsure, it's a very weird thing for

(01:21:49):
me to hear I's gonna say atthe beginning, I mean, we want
to run, But it's a veryweird thing still for me to hear you
say the words of my daughter's intown, because in my brain she's always
she's ever going to grow up andnever have that little girl from the cruises.
Yeah, she's not ever gonna butapparently you have failed. It's a
parent and she's grown up, andshe's actually she comes into town now,

(01:22:11):
yes that's correct. And uh andshe's actually going to be doing like some
intern stuff, I think the TribecaFilm Festival this year. So maybe you
great good for her. And uh, that's it, So thanks for listening
and we will get back to normal. Uh. Three altacaccas sitting around eating

(01:22:32):
deli kind of conversation on the nextexciting episode of the Glot podcast. And
can I just say that John,it's you can turn it off now it's
or can you or can you?Three two one turns out. You know,
we kind of like having John around. He's pretty good. Yeah yeah,

(01:22:53):
I mean, oh wait, thiswas on Oh my god. Everybody
heard it, including John John Johngo now good things to do