#1617 - Mike Baker

[0] Joe Rogan podcast, check it out.

[1] The Joe Rogan Experience.

[2] Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day.

[3] It's a sweet and sultry sound of Mike Baker lighting a cigar.

[4] Hey, Al. Good to see you, buddy.

[5] What's happening?

[6] Good to be seen.

[7] Good to be seen.

[8] You know, not much going on in these times of ours.

[9] I'm very excited to talk to you because I had a guy on Jamie Metzley yesterday, a scientist who scared the shit out of me talking about China.

[10] He's talking about China.

[11] We were talking about China amassing naval power.

[12] China's taking over tech companies and how huge they're getting and how much influence they have over their people as opposed to the way we do it.

[13] Well, he's not wrong.

[14] Yeah, I can't spot the line in what you just said.

[15] But, I mean, look, I mean, there's so much we can talk about.

[16] But if you think about it, just in the past handful of months, there was this solar winds hack, right, by the Russians.

[17] So the Russians go in.

[18] They hack into a company called Solar Winds.

[19] That is an IT management software company that happens to be fairly deep into government organizations, agencies, treasury, and a variety of others throughout the U .S. government.

[20] And they're also into parts of the intel community, defense department, and a lot of commercial sectors.

[21] So anyway, the Russians figure this out.

[22] Now, around about December or January, Microsoft identified this as a problem.

[23] And I think it was the head of Microsoft said it looks like the most sophisticated attack we've ever seen.

[24] So this is December, January time frame.

[25] And they're still trying to figure out the depth of this hack by Russians.

[26] At the same time, and going back months and months and months and months before, the Chinese had been engaged in a more sophisticated attack that, While everyone is focused on what's going on, and so fully aware that we got problems, right, from nation states out there who don't like us, everybody's talking about solar wins, and now they've just now released information about the Chinese attack against Microsoft exchange servers running the exchange email systems.

[27] And this thing is enormous.

[28] And so the Chinese, yeah, I mean, we've been so focused for four years on the run.

[29] Russians, you know, and they're, you know, they're out there to cause us all sorts of problems, so we should be focused on them.

[30] But it's China.

[31] That's the biggest problem.

[32] And so this guy is absolutely right.

[33] Jamie's right.

[34] It was terrifying.

[35] Listen to what he was talking about, the way he was explaining how they, you know, they have this plan, I think he said 2049 to be the global superpower of the world and essentially be take the place of what America used to be.

[36] Yeah, do it their way.

[37] And they do it their way, which means, we're going to bypass all the costs and the heavy lift of research and development over the years, and which is going to steal everything.

[38] And they've been doing it for decades.

[39] So people think, oh, China, it's a problem.

[40] We've talked about this before, you know, this idea that perhaps this is just something relatively new or it's popped up during the previous administration of Trump.

[41] And honest guys' truth is it's been going on for decades.

[42] And they decided that that's how they're going to get to the top of the food chain is by stealing shit because it's a lot easier to hoover up everything.

[43] thing, and then reverse engineer it.

[44] And the technology has made it even easier, right?

[45] It used to be old school.

[46] They'd go out and recruit somebody.

[47] They'd find some Chinese American working for a company here in the States.

[48] They'd appeal to sort of, you know, you've got to help the motherland, and they would.

[49] And that was the old school way of doing it.

[50] But, you know, cyber theft is, it's incredible what they're able to do.

[51] And this latest attack, while they're still trying to sort out the mess, right?

[52] So when they do this, so if they get into this email, server, are they targeting anything specific?

[53] Is there specific companies?

[54] Are they just like throwing a net out there and seeing what they catch?

[55] Yes, is the answer to both of those.

[56] It's it looks like what happened here was that their initial point of attack or the initial focus was intelligence, right?

[57] So then it branched out and it branched out very, very quickly, right?

[58] To hit everything.

[59] Small companies, medium -sized companies.

[60] And that's kind of the M .O. for the Chinese.

[61] The Chinese regime and their intel operations, they've got this long vision.

[62] And they've also got the resources.

[63] And they've got the desire to hoover up everything.

[64] And then sort it out later.

[65] We take, as a country, we take a very sort of targeted approach.

[66] We say, okay, this is a piece of information that's a priority tasking for the U .S., for our national security.

[67] We're going to go out.

[68] We're going to figure out who has access to it.

[69] We're going to develop a very sort of surgical strike to figure out how do we get to somebody who's got this piece of information.

[70] That's typically how we or some of our allies would operate.

[71] The Russians, the Chinese, have always had a different approach.

[72] I mean, the Russians is less elegant.

[73] The Russians are just throw shit at the wall and see what sticks, right?

[74] But the Chinese, they've got this long view and they've also got this ability.

[75] So in this particular attack that they're still trying to assess that was, was perpetrated by, you know, Chinese state -sponsored hackers based in China, they're just going to take everything, and then they'll sift through it.

[76] They'll figure out what they got.

[77] A lot of it's going to be just, you know, chaf, not of interest, but they're going to find a lot of gold in there, too.

[78] And they're willing to do that because they've got the patience to do it.

[79] They'll develop a target.

[80] They'll develop a potential recruit for years and years and years.

[81] or they'll infiltrate a society or an organization, right?

[82] They'll put a student out here who's actually working for the PLA for their intel operations and they'll put them out as an undergrad and then they'll go to school and they'll get good grades and they'll go to a grad school and they'll get a job and they'll get another job and then 30 years down the line it may pay off but they're willing to make that investment.

[83] So we should be scared?

[84] Well, we shouldn't be scared.

[85] But we said, yeah, I don't think we should be scared, but I think what we should be is is pragmatic and understand why, for instance, I mean, there was a lot of, you know, Hugh and Cry over the past four years.

[86] I can't believe I just said Hugh and cry.

[87] I don't even know what that means.

[88] It's old -timey.

[89] Is it?

[90] Oh, by golly.

[91] Look at me. It's like the cat's pajamas.

[92] It's, so, you know, four years of Trump and sort of his antagonistic relationship with China and people were all wringing their hands in Washington, D .C., you know, sort of the think tankers and the traditional pundits and the diplomats of the U .S., you know, the long -term people.

[93] They're, oh, my God, we've got this adversarial relationship with China.

[94] Well, you know what?

[95] We better, right?

[96] So that's not a bad thing.

[97] So I'm hoping the current administration maintains to some degree, and we'll see what happens.

[98] They still haven't responded to the solar winds to the Russian attack, right?

[99] They're talking about it.

[100] Now they're saying they're going to engage in several clandestine.

[101] retaliatory acts.

[102] Well, it's not that clandestine because they've announced that they're going to do it.

[103] And so, you know, but I'm hoping that they will take serious action against the Solar Wins -Russian Act.

[104] But they've got to with China.

[105] They've got to maintain this posture.

[106] We've got to make it clear and understood to the Chinese regime that we're not going to put up with this shit.

[107] They're going to keep doing it, but we've got to make it painful for them.

[108] So how do you make it painful?

[109] Well, you know, it's the old word sanctions.

[110] You got to go with the sanctions because there's not much else.

[111] Trade wars, you know, I know everybody hates a trade war.

[112] Not everybody, but you've got to find a way because the problem with cyber shenanigans is that there's no real clear definition, right?

[113] We know if a country fires a ballistic missile off, you know, we know what the retaliatory act is.

[114] We know what appropriate response is.

[115] in cyberspace when you're talking about warfare coming up with a definition is very difficult and hasn't been done yet we've got cyber command right and we're still trying to sort out what are appropriate responses because it can escalate quickly right next thing you know they get shut down our infrastructure right well that's what I wanted to talk to you about supposedly what they did in India so if you could explain that to people they shut down the power grid in India allegedly they said they didn't do it but apparently there was some sort of a warning about the power going out, right?

[116] Yeah.

[117] They've done it.

[118] I mean, the Russians did it famously in the Ukraine, right?

[119] I mean, not that long ago.

[120] And China's ability to interfere in infrastructure here in the U .S. or in India or with our allies is because for years now, they've been probing.

[121] There's been testing going on.

[122] You know, we talk about, it's a good example.

[123] We talk about how in the U .S. have three grids.

[124] And I think people were stunned to find out that Texas has its own power grid.

[125] Well, yeah.

[126] But it's not so much.

[127] People were like, oh, my God, look at Texas.

[128] They're terrible because, you know, they wanted to make it a political thing, right?

[129] They wanted to make it sound like the reason why it's so terrible is because it's Republicans and they've got, they want their own independence.

[130] Well, no, all three grids are fucked, right?

[131] The East and the West and the Texas grids are all cobbled together over the years.

[132] So it's a very sort of, it's like a patchwork quilt.

[133] And they were never built to withstand physical attacks.

[134] I mean, you could drive by any substation, right?

[135] You could get close enough to pee on it.

[136] And they certainly were never designed to withstand a cyber attack.

[137] So over the years, what goes on is essentially a mapping exercise, right?

[138] Where, whether it's the Russians, whether it's the Chinese, whether it's the North Koreans using Chinese capabilities, whether it's the Iranians, whomever.

[139] They're in there probing and trying to understand the weaknesses, and they're drawing up a map.

[140] Now, the reason why they're doing that is to have a game plan, right?

[141] And I guarantee you, sitting on the desk somewhere, not too far from, you know, Xi's office, is a playbook that says, if this thing escalates, here's what we're going to do.

[142] And if you think that it was bad in Texas, you know, a couple weeks ago when, you know, the power was out, and it was bad.

[143] But think about that lasting for eight, 10, 12 weeks around the country, right?

[144] Power grid shut down.

[145] What happens?

[146] You can't transport shit, right?

[147] You can't get cash.

[148] Fuel doesn't get to the gas stations.

[149] Food doesn't get to the stores.

[150] Depending on the time of year, heat issues, obviously, water supplies.

[151] And that's where the next big battle is going to be fought, right?

[152] They're going to bring it to the homeland.

[153] And we will do the same thing, right?

[154] It's not like we're not doing it because people always say when I say something like that, well, the U .S. does it too.

[155] I think, well, fuck, yeah, the U .S. does it.

[156] We better.

[157] We better hope we're prepared.

[158] Does that frustrate you when people say that?

[159] Well, the U .S. does it too.

[160] Yeah, it does in a sense because, and this is where I think, you know, now personal opinion comes into it.

[161] Look, I spent most of my adult life overseas, and I like to think that I've got a fairly pragmatic view on things.

[162] I do admit that I, you know, obviously, look, I look at the U .S., and I like to think, and I have seen on occasions.

[163] We do a lot of things for the right reasons.

[164] Sometimes we don't do it properly, right?

[165] We make mistakes.

[166] Of course we make mistakes.

[167] But we try to self -correct.

[168] I guarantee you, if we're talking about the major powers out there, if we're talking about China and us, the Chinese regime, I'm talking about obviously.

[169] If we're talking about the Russians, the Iranians, North Koreans, we better hope that we stay up there, right, and are able to exert influence and leverage and control the top, right?

[170] Because If it's, if it's, and again, maybe I'm wrong here, but the Chinese don't view anything in an altruistic manner.

[171] The Chinese regime, right?

[172] It's all about self -interest.

[173] And sometimes, I'll tell you what's frustrating.

[174] Sometimes we seem to be the only country out there that apologizes, right, for that sort of thing.

[175] And so when we act in our own best interest, and we go, well, we're really sorry about that.

[176] You know, we're kind of acting in our best interests.

[177] Well, every other nation does it, and they don't give a fuck.

[178] Yeah, but shouldn't we be the moral high ground for the world?

[179] I think we should.

[180] I think it's nice if we do all the same shit they do, we say, sorry.

[181] Yeah.

[182] As long as we do all the same shit.

[183] I guess it doesn't cost anything to say sorry.

[184] It's not a bad thing.

[185] It's not a bad thing.

[186] We're setting a tone.

[187] Yeah, I guess that's true.

[188] As long as we're also then at the same time acting at our own best interest.

[189] Because we have to be, again, we have to be pragmatic.

[190] If we think that somehow, you know, look at climate change, that's obviously it's back on the table.

[191] It's a big issue.

[192] It's a major policy direction.

[193] Hey, fine.

[194] Great.

[195] Who doesn't want clean energy?

[196] But, you know, to act as if China's not the number one polluter out there is insane.

[197] Yeah, that's where it gets weird.

[198] Yeah, it gets a little weird.

[199] Giant difference between the amount of particulates, the amount of pollution, the amount of CO2.

[200] You know, I think they've tried hard to mitigate that over the last few years in particular.

[201] But you remember when they had the Beijing Olympics?

[202] Yes.

[203] And they had to shut everything down because the air quality was so bad that the athletes, you know, it would actually be dangerous for the athletes to perform and to compete under those conditions.

[204] So I'm lighting with cigarettes.

[205] Light it up, baby.

[206] Don't worry about it.

[207] It's, um...

[208] I'm not allowed to smoke cigars at the house because, you know, I don't want to sit a bad example for a scooter and sluggo and Mugsy, but, um...

[209] Well, I'm allowed to in the house, but I get yelled at by the kids.

[210] Do you have air handlers in any part of your house?

[211] No, I have a thing, one of those, uh, purifiers, those air things that suck things out.

[212] Yeah.

[213] And I have some spray that I bought on.

[214] Amazon that's supposed to kill the spray.

[215] You're like Fabriz?

[216] Yeah.

[217] And in my office, I just, I open, I have a window thing.

[218] I open the windows and get the air out.

[219] That's old school.

[220] That's good.

[221] Yeah, it works.

[222] I live with all women, man. It's all women in my fucking house.

[223] It's always women in there.

[224] I like being a man every now and then.

[225] We put the fights on.

[226] I smoke a cigar.

[227] Put my feet up.

[228] I feel like a man again.

[229] Dude.

[230] Mike Baker.

[231] No, I know.

[232] Look, I got a different situation.

[233] My wife is completely outnumbered, right?

[234] Even with the pets, except for we got a Siberian hamster.

[235] It's a female, we think.

[236] I got a male dog at least.

[237] Yeah.

[238] There you go.

[239] How's he doing?

[240] Marshall?

[241] He's awesome.

[242] Marshall, right?

[243] He's the best.

[244] Yeah.

[245] Dogs are like, oh, my God, dogs are great.

[246] But, so yeah, the Chinese is not good.

[247] I hate to, you know, I hate to, I think sometimes people say, ah, quick kicking the Chinese in the ass.

[248] But the regime really does have a plan, as you pointed out.

[249] They would like to accelerate that plan to before 2049.

[250] And it's everything.

[251] It's the aggression in the South Pacific seas.

[252] It's their build up.

[253] of their military, particularly their Navy.

[254] It's primarily, the part that is most frustrating, is the theft of intellectual property.

[255] And, I mean, look, this hack that I just talked about earlier with Microsoft, with the exchange, we're getting screwed, right?

[256] So they're out there.

[257] We don't know the extent.

[258] We know it's huge.

[259] We don't know the extent yet of this attack.

[260] But do you think that's going to stop?

[261] Is Microsoft going to stop doing business in China?

[262] No. Absolutely not.

[263] No. Facebook is banned.

[264] You know, what's not banned?

[265] Microsoft, right?

[266] LinkedIn, right?

[267] Bing, right?

[268] So, who fuck uses Bing?

[269] I know, Bing, I know.

[270] I didn't even know it was still in existence.

[271] I have a Windows laptop.

[272] It wants to pull up Bing sometimes.

[273] I'm like, what are you doing?

[274] I know, get out of here.

[275] Bing.

[276] But it's at that point, Bing, is it?

[277] How bad is Bing?

[278] Is it bad?

[279] It's not bad.

[280] Bad of Bing?

[281] It's just no one's using it, right?

[282] I'd use Duck, Duck, Go.

[283] That's what I like.

[284] Because duck, duck go gives me uncurated information, whereas like, that's good.

[285] You know, and it doesn't, duck, duck go doesn't save your information.

[286] It's not trying to, like, use your data.

[287] And it just gives you a search.

[288] Do you know what it is?

[289] Are you aware of it?

[290] No. No. Look at me. I, you know, I know how to do a couple of things on my laptop.

[291] One of them is send emails.

[292] I've looked for things on Google and I couldn't find them page after page.

[293] I looked on Duck, Duck, Go, and I find them instantly.

[294] Duck, Dock Go does not censor or censor.

[295] curate any of the information.

[296] It just tries to search out keywords that you're looking for.

[297] So, like, here's a perfect example.

[298] How do you know what's not curated, though?

[299] Well, the difference is the way I try to find things on Google and try to find things on duck, ducko.

[300] So this is a good example.

[301] There was a doctor in Florida who died immediately after the COVID vaccination, whether it's causation or correlation or just random bad luck.

[302] This guy was in his 50s.

[303] He was held.

[304] relatively healthy as far as the article says takes COVID vaccination dies so I'm trying to find out what this is because somebody sent it to me and then I Google it I cannot find it two three four pages and can't find it duck duck go first page right away I'm like well something's happening I think Google is trying to they're you know look I think they're doing it for altruistic purposes I think they think that they're being good citizens and good human beings, trying to encourage people to get vaccinated, and they want to, they want to discourage anti -vax propaganda.

[305] If you have 320 million people that get vaccinated, you're going to have 100, 200 ,000, 2 ,000 horror stories.

[306] That's just, that's if you give, if you give 320 million people Tylenol, you're going to have 2 ,000 horror stories, right?

[307] Agreed?

[308] Yeah.

[309] Yeah.

[310] Yeah, I remember the Tylenol scale.

[311] I remember that from years ago.

[312] Well, that was different, though.

[313] That was someone was poisoning.

[314] Exactly.

[315] Yeah.

[316] But I mean, if you just.

[317] give them, I mean, Tylenol might not be the best example, but there's a lot of medication that if you give people, they, some people for whatever reason, like I'm not allergic to dogs, but my wife's allergic to dogs, you know, like I'm not, you know, some people, like my friend Brian, his mom, if she even licks a Brazil nut, she's dead, you know?

[318] Yeah, my wife's like that with hazel nuts.

[319] I don't know what the fuck that is, but this is also the case with virtually anything that gets introduced to the human body.

[320] We vary so much biologically that if you have a wide swath of people, if you have an enormous number, 330 plus million, you're going to have a few horrible cases.

[321] Now, that doesn't mean that people shouldn't get vaccinated.

[322] It doesn't mean people shouldn't eat Brazil nuts.

[323] It just means you should kind of have access to all the information, but we also should have unbiased, objective reporting of these things.

[324] And someone should state it that way.

[325] And I try to do that.

[326] Is duck, duck go?

[327] Is that spelled, some funky spelling?

[328] It's just an app.

[329] It's just an app.

[330] It's spelled like duck.

[331] Yeah, yeah.

[332] It's not like Dukay or anything.

[333] Okay, no, no, no, right.

[334] Some clever thing.

[335] It actually has a duck and the logo's a duck.

[336] Ducks are a d 'allel.

[337] But I like it.

[338] We're getting a farm duck.

[339] Oh, yeah, I know.

[340] Their eggs tastes like shit, though.

[341] Have you ever had duck eggs?

[342] No, we've just, I have had duck eggs.

[343] I bought a fucking dozen duck eggs.

[344] I gave them to my dog.

[345] Where'd you get duck eggs from?

[346] Some fucking weirdo market.

[347] Yeah, farm's a table market.

[348] Yeah, some weird.

[349] They suck.

[350] They're in fear.

[351] They're slimy.

[352] We're just getting the duck game for the farm duck for entertainment purposes.

[353] But they leave like a film on your mouth.

[354] Well, that's good to know that.

[355] I'm about to tell my boys, don't eat the duck eggs.

[356] Like if you blew Donald Duck, it'd probably be the same as eating a duck egg.

[357] I mean, look, if it's a matter of starving death or you know about that would be Daisy.

[358] Quail eggs, though, are delicious.

[359] Quail eggs are delicious.

[360] I had a quail egg last night.

[361] Did you?

[362] I did.

[363] I was sitting on top of some tuna tartar.

[364] Oh, look at tuna tartar.

[365] I know.

[366] Look at you.

[367] Whale, like.

[368] Well, let me just adjust my ascot.

[369] Did it have tiny sprinkling parsley?

[370] Yeah, I believe there might have been foam on the plate, too.

[371] Remember that that was a big thing, foam.

[372] We're going to put foam on my plate.

[373] When people do that drizzle, like, balsamic.

[374] Put a little bit, they go creep to criss.

[375] No, it's, what was I going to say?

[376] Something about the, oh, the Russians, you talk about, the inability to get information so and you talk about vaccines so just something popped in my head the russians are added again right so they did the solo wins they know that retaliation is or retaliation you have a hard time with that word i do fuck it hell what's the problem retaliation retaliation that's good it's not you're not even from you're kind of from another country but it's england right you're born in england yeah aluminium yeah that's a weird one and tires with why yeah we want to put we want to put but extra but you're american basically oh sure yeah How American are you?

[377] First or foremost.

[378] When were you born there?

[379] You lived there to how long?

[380] My childhood.

[381] And then I moved to Australia.

[382] What year did you move to America?

[383] I did my final year of high school in America.

[384] You can't be.

[385] Of course I can't be.

[386] You're basically a foreigner.

[387] I'm a very trustworthy person.

[388] I feel like he's a foreign agent working for the CIA.

[389] Like, right?

[390] Jamie, don't you feel this way?

[391] That seems harsh, Jamie.

[392] Don't say yes, Jamie.

[393] I know there's pressure to say yes.

[394] Australians are basically, I feel like...

[395] Australians are great.

[396] Yeah.

[397] Say nothing bad about Australians.

[398] No, I fucking love.

[399] Australia.

[400] If I was going to live anywhere outside the United States and Canada, I would live in Australia 100%.

[401] Or New Zealand.

[402] New Zealand's beautiful.

[403] I've never even been to New Zealanders.

[404] I'm surprised at that.

[405] I mean, that's a beautiful place.

[406] I'm afraid I'll stay.

[407] Yeah.

[408] Well, it's a long ways away.

[409] People say it's a great place to ride out the pandemic.

[410] It's no better than Idaho.

[411] Idaho is a great place to ride out of the pandemic.

[412] That's a good place, but it's a lot colder than New Zealand, motherfucker.

[413] Yeah.

[414] No, that's not incorrect.

[415] New Zealand looks like Hobbitland.

[416] But the Russians, let me tell you about what the Russians are up to now, having just on the heels of the solar winds hack, which was very successful for them.

[417] And we still don't know how much intel they've pulled.

[418] And it's probably a great deal.

[419] But now, you know, what they're doing is they are engaged in a covert action campaign, a covert, basically a propaganda campaign against U .S. vaccines.

[420] Pfizer in particular.

[421] Against them.

[422] Yes.

[423] Basically, what they're doing is they're using social media and they're seeding.

[424] information about, well, this Pfizer vaccine.

[425] I don't know if it's really legit, right?

[426] Because the Russians created their own vaccine.

[427] This is basically a monetary decision for them.

[428] They're trying to sell their Sputnik vaccine.

[429] Is that what it's called?

[430] It's called Sputnik.

[431] Really?

[432] Yeah, they never got over that space race thing.

[433] So they call it Sputnik.

[434] They're trying to sell it to every country that'll buy it, right?

[435] And so what they're trying to do is trying to push down, they're trying to create a lack of credibility in the Pfizer vaccine, in particular, U .S. made vaccines in general.

[436] And so they're seeding stories out there.

[437] In the old days, before the Internet, what you would do is you would pay off journalists, and you would get stories planted in the newspapers, when people read newspaper.

[438] And that's how you would influence, to some degree, public opinion.

[439] You do other things.

[440] The Russians, you know, they're very good at this, but that was one of the old days, the ways that you would do it.

[441] Now, as we know, from the elections in the past.

[442] They're using that same methodology that they did during the elections sort of like, you know, put in this idea that our electoral system isn't credible, that there's problems with it.

[443] That's in their benefit.

[444] But they're also now doing it as far as the vaccines go.

[445] And primarily the driver there is a monetary issue, right?

[446] They just want to sell Sputnik.

[447] And it really is called Sputnik.

[448] It's really called Sputnik.

[449] It's the Sputnik.

[450] yeah by the way my friend who's a doctor took the Russian vaccine he got a hold of the Russian vaccine a few months ago he said zero side effects he said did he do it as an experiment or did it do it because it was the only vaccine he could get he can get whatever he wants yeah I think well he's a really fucking smart guy he's one of the smartest people I know and he just you know a lot of smart people so yeah he's a he's a genius like a legitimate genius and he decided that he wanted to take the Russian vaccine I haven't talked to him about it in depth, but he said based on the research that he did on the vaccine, he said it's as legit as any of them, and he had access to it.

[451] Is it an MRI virus the same, or vaccine rather, is the same as Pfizer and Mogherna?

[452] Yeah, I think it's using the same technology and the development of it was kind of the same, I think, but they just, but they raced it out there, right?

[453] So, and they, what they don't have to do is, it's like a lot of other things overseas.

[454] They don't necessarily have the FDA, you know, breathing down the next thing.

[455] These are the sort of clinical trials you've got to go through.

[456] These are the sort of approvals you need.

[457] So part of the problem that they've been facing with Sputnik is like, you got this out here pretty quick, right?

[458] And so...

[459] They probably tested it on like Pussy Riot and political dissidents.

[460] Oh, God.

[461] You know Pussy Riot?

[462] The band?

[463] No, no, no, no, I don't.

[464] No, I don't.

[465] I have a T -shirt back in my L .A. house.

[466] I need to bring it over here.

[467] It's a free Pussy Riot.

[468] I was wearing it on...

[469] Haven't you sold the L .A. house?

[470] I have two L .A. houses.

[471] sold one of them.

[472] Listen to you.

[473] You know?

[474] Yeah, look at me. He's big of the real estate market.

[475] He knows things.

[476] He slipped up there, didn't he, Jamie?

[477] Yeah.

[478] He might have slipped up a little bit.

[479] I didn't slip up, no. Sometimes you want to see the fact that, you know, there's a piece of information floating out there.

[480] You put it in a sidebar conversation.

[481] But, so anyway, so the, yeah, the Russian, bottom line is, like, I don't want to sound like one of those people, but we just have to be pragmatic, right?

[482] Yes.

[483] And so to go back to that question you had, which I think is very interesting is, do I get frustrated by people saying, well, the U .S., you know, does it too.

[484] fuck yeah it's a hostile world out there whether you want to believe it or not right it's it's it's not a happy place out there and there's a lot of people that would would like to see us you know at the bottom of the food chain and so you know all those people that say well the u .s does it too yes we do and you know what you're sitting here in the u .s and you're using the benefits of being here in the u .s so you probably want to at on occasion just on occasion maybe root for the home team i think it's a natural thing that people do when one country is the most innovative, the most militarily successful, you know, there's a lot of shit about the United States that angers people that even are a part of the United States in terms of our interventionalist foreign policy.

[485] I mean, you've got guys like Ron Paul who don't think we should be anywhere.

[486] There should be control in the United States.

[487] And you've got other people that think that we should go over there and fucking kick ass and conquer the whole globe and keep them on the straight and narrow the way allegedly we are.

[488] But the thing that bothers me more than anything about the United States currently is like there's a there's an unnecessary divide that I see amongst us.

[489] There's like there's a racial divide.

[490] There's a sexual orientation divide.

[491] And I wonder how much of this is cultivated and how much of this is curated.

[492] like when I see like even weird things that don't make sense like in Connecticut 15 of their state titles state records for women's athletics are held by two biological males who identify as females tell me look yeah there's is one thing this there's one thing to be tolerant to be open -minded but there's one thing to look at the whole picture and go what better way across the board with everything to get people upset and frustrated and distracted and constantly engaged in arguments in battle than to cede social media with nonsense and and and and and and and and and and and all we know from the uh internet research agency and rene de rest his work and all this that they that russia in particular and probably china in Iran are constantly flooding social media with arguments against all sorts of policies and pro, all sorts of other policies, simultaneously just to encourage argument.

[493] And you wonder, like, how much of the racial divide in America is real.

[494] For sure, there's real racist in America.

[495] But also, for sure, there's a lot of, like, malarkey.

[496] There's a lot of shit that's like, most of us get along.

[497] Yeah.

[498] Most of us get along.

[499] I agree with it.

[500] of Democrats.

[501] Most don't give a shit because they're worried about their daily fucking life.

[502] They're worried about their children.

[503] They're worried about the same thing.

[504] It's like that old Sting song.

[505] The Russians love their children too.

[506] Yes.

[507] Yeah.

[508] Yeah.

[509] It's the, yeah, I'm done.

[510] You just quoted Sting.

[511] I love Sting.

[512] The, I think what's happening is the fucking, the world is so filled with information and there's some players that are manipulating that information to keep people being antagonistic against each other.

[513] And the thing is, like, they're over there.

[514] and we think, oh, these motherfuckers are coming after us.

[515] They're doing this.

[516] They're hacking this.

[517] No one is together, right?

[518] Human beings are supposed to be like you and I are right now, having a cocktail, smoking a cigar, sitting across from each other.

[519] And we all basically want the same things.

[520] We want to be healthy and successful.

[521] We want the best for our kids.

[522] Yes, yes.

[523] We want the best for our community.

[524] We want to be happy.

[525] We want to be happy.

[526] And there's too many filters in this life between human beings sitting down and communicating.

[527] with each other and breaking bread with each other and talking with each other.

[528] There's too many, there's too many filters.

[529] Well, I will say, don't, nobody should underestimate that point that you just made earlier, which is that there is a very active covert action wing within the Russian government, within Chinese intel, within, and their whole point sometimes is not to do anything other than just to so distrust and instability and chaos.

[530] People say, well, why would they do that.

[531] Well, they do it because it's in their best interest.

[532] Again, going back to that same thought.

[533] So is it in the, say, the Russian best interest to kind of see the idea of, man, you know what, domestic terrorism and racism, that's your top priority in the States?

[534] Well, of course it is.

[535] And so we feed into that, right?

[536] And we do our own part too, right?

[537] There's this desire to slice and dice the demographic, right, for political purposes, right?

[538] If I can control this block or If I can control that block, then I can win the election.

[539] Yeah.

[540] Well, that's fucked up.

[541] It's fucked up.

[542] And I, you know, I'm old enough to, you know, remember the riots, you know, okay, I was watching TV and as a kid, but the riots of the 60s and that whole civil rights process and I'll be honest with you, you know, up until a handful of years ago, I really thought we'd moved on.

[543] I thought, you know, it was all about who you are as a person, right?

[544] Your character, as Martin Luther King used to talk about, right?

[545] I think you'd be disgusted by this idea that it's all about your, the color of your skin.

[546] That's bullshit.

[547] It is bullshit.

[548] And it's also the sexual orientation.

[549] I don't give a fuck what your sexual orientation.

[550] I don't need to celebrate it.

[551] I don't care.

[552] Yeah, I don't care.

[553] I think these are attack vectors.

[554] Yes, that's a good way to put it.

[555] There are ways that people can figure out a way to sow the seeds of dissent and discontent.

[556] And I think that, you know, one of the things that happened that was really, we talked about, the whole situation with the power grid here.

[557] It was really sad to me to watch people on the left saying, hey, you know, hey, Texas, you know, you still want your independence now?

[558] Like, look what happened.

[559] Like, man, you've got babies freezing to death.

[560] You know, you got people without clean water.

[561] Like, is that who you are?

[562] Because as an American, I don't give a fuck if you're a Republican or a Democrat.

[563] I share ideas from both sides.

[564] I'm kind of a hybrid in a lot of ways.

[565] I'm a big supporter of the Second Amendment.

[566] I'm a big supporter of the military.

[567] But I'm very liberal.

[568] I'm socially very liberal.

[569] I don't buy this idea that I have to be a part of one party or another party.

[570] I 100 % support gay rights.

[571] I 100 % support women's rights, civil rights, trans rights, across the board, but not at the expense of other people.

[572] Yeah.

[573] Which is why I'm against this whole idea of trans athletes competing against biological females.

[574] But it's also why I'm also in support of the Second Amendment.

[575] Like, people are, some people, they're raised poorly, they're abused, they're torture, they're fucking put in foster care, they find their way into juvenile detention, that they go to prison, and then they're out, and they have no money, and then the pandemic hits, and they want to rob your house.

[576] If you don't think you should have a gun to protect yourself from bad people who just, by circumstance or by bad fucking luck, find themselves at your doorstep.

[577] You're crazy.

[578] You're crazy.

[579] You don't love your family.

[580] If you don't think you should be able to protect, if you're in a bad situation, and it's you protecting people against an attack from bad people, you're out of your mind.

[581] You've never experienced bad people then.

[582] You've never experienced dangerous people.

[583] That's a good point.

[584] I mean, a lot of people like to imagine that there's a community of goodwill out there and that if just given the opportunity, all people would be, you know, they would be inclined to go along with what's in your best interest.

[585] Look, I, you know.

[586] Yeah, if you could find them as babies and raise them, right.

[587] When you have children and I have children, too, and there's a thing that you find out when you have children.

[588] When I had children, it changed me as a man. It changed me as a human being.

[589] And one of the most profound ways it changed me is I stop thinking about people as static things.

[590] I stopped thinking about a man It's like this is a 54 year old man And here he is I go oh this is a grown up baby And I really started thinking about people like that I started thinking about people as children Yeah That grew up and by bad circumstance By abuse by Horrible environments They became this bad person But I don't think people are born bad Yeah I agree with you I don't think they are I think the environment creates, you know, I mean, and, yeah, I mean, look, there's so many sides to this, right?

[591] I mean, like, criminal justice reform, of course, right?

[592] We need to focus on criminal justice reform.

[593] But at the same time, you know, I, as somebody who owns a walk -in safe, yeah, you're never going to convince me that it's not my right to protect my family.

[594] When you say walk -in -safe, you mean a gun -safe.

[595] Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[596] You know, I'm fucking gold bars in there, bro.

[597] I got catheters and gold bars, yeah.

[598] That's what I got.

[599] No, no, I'm kidding.

[600] A collection of dildos from the 16th century.

[601] That's like, well, you know, those things are Roman clay dildos.

[602] Where did that come from?

[603] But, no, as a walk -in gun safe, yeah, look, you have the right.

[604] I mean, think about a family, you're raising your kids, and the legitimate police response time is 20, 30 minutes, right?

[605] not because, you know, the police are overstretched, but even just because you're living in some place where that's how long it's going to take, right?

[606] And it's like this idea of, what's a good example?

[607] It's like when you're, you talk about, well, should some of the teachers in a school be armed?

[608] Well, we have in Idaho, we have schools where legitimately the sheriff getting to that school is going to take him 25 minutes because of the fucking distance, right?

[609] So yes, do I want a couple of well -trained, vetted responsible teachers and that's public school to be armed in case there is god forbid some incident yeah fuck yeah i do yeah so that just that to me is common sense and then you'll get people go well that's just just wrong you know well how how is it wrong you're protecting children well it's also the idea that people are mutually like these are two mutually exclusive ideas like someone can't be a math teacher but also be trained in firearm use yes yeah yeah that's crazy it's a human being if it's a human being that understands math that's that guy could be good at anything else.

[610] Right.

[611] And you insist that they do.

[612] And there's ways to do it.

[613] This is not a heavy lift to have someone trained up and then, you know, go through continuous training because they have to do that.

[614] I mean, the problem with a lot of people is so, you know, they'll get scared or for whatever reason they'll think, oh, they're going to take away our guns.

[615] So I better go out and buy one, right?

[616] There's a huge surge in gun sales.

[617] Oh, my God.

[618] The pandemic was the best thing that ever happened at the gun industry.

[619] Oh, for the manufacturer.

[620] No, absolutely.

[621] And I'm sure the NRA too.

[622] I'm sure the NRA's membership went up too.

[623] They've had some, NRA's had some serious problems.

[624] Well, they have, a lot of problems.

[625] But they're the, there's not a lot of organizations that are fighting for gun rights.

[626] Yeah, there's very few.

[627] Yeah.

[628] So, so they're important in that sense, but I think, I think that, do I think that it's important to insist that, but again, that's common sense, right?

[629] I don't want the federal government to say, you know, what you have to do, but it's, it's like the masks.

[630] I'll tell you this, flying into Texas, right?

[631] on an aircraft I was on one of the flight attendants came up and kind of tapped me on the shoulders we were getting ready to land and said well be careful because you know you know Texas has gotten rid of the mask mandate so and and the point was from the flight attendant was you know did she just say it to you yeah it's going to be like to like yeah it's a wild west it's going to let you know well you know just like mr. pink or you'd be careful out there because you know I like you yeah and and so but the point My wife was sitting right next to me. There was nothing untoward.

[632] It wasn't like, you know, no, we were not engaged in any shenanigans.

[633] But the point was that they looked at it and they go, oh, you know, Governor Abbott said this.

[634] And it's political, right?

[635] But my point of my story is I walked off the plane.

[636] Everybody was wearing a mask.

[637] Yeah, this is the thing the governor, rather, Abbott said, he said, I encourage you to wear a mask.

[638] You should still wear a mask.

[639] But I don't want the state to tell you what to do.

[640] That's what I support.

[641] And if you don't want the state to tell you what to do, you shouldn't want the federal government telling you what to do.

[642] You get this, and we talked about this earlier before the show, but was the idea that some people just like to suffer, and they suffer well, right?

[643] They enjoy the fact that this is hard and bad, and that's really sad, but it's true.

[644] There's people that they enjoy being depressed.

[645] It's a hard thing to even say, because you don't want it to be real.

[646] You don't want there to really be people out there that like, there's some people that when we got shut into our homes and everyone was sad and everyone was scared they enjoyed it because that's how they live all the time yeah yeah or that's just it's their time to shine some people have have really shown during the pandemic yeah and it's like I saw this post from this this individual who's a professional clearly from their job and they they posted oh I'm dealing with such anxiety now because of the possible return to normal and the idea that I'm going to have to travel and I won't be able to have dinner with my kids and I'm just like and I'm thinking fuck you you've had that it was clear from the post that they've had the luxury of working from home yeah and not losing their job and they could teach their kids and it's this idea of not opening the public schools these kids out here who don't have Wi -Fi who don't have laptops who I have a one -parent home who has to work all those can't afford a tutor can't make a little pod to teach their kids, you know, those people aren't doing well, right?

[647] And those kids are suffering.

[648] And then you get like the people who can afford to set up a private pod for their kids and bring a tutor in and have strong Wi -Fi and can do all those things.

[649] Have English as a first language.

[650] And they're doing just fine.

[651] And they're like, well, we should not go back to school.

[652] Fuck you.

[653] Kids have disappeared off the radar during this past year.

[654] And the schools don't even know where they are in places like New York and Chicago and other places.

[655] So.

[656] it's it's fucked up yeah you know it's there's narratives out there and the problem with these narratives are it's not that they're all completely inaccurate the problem is when you say when you when you when you espouse these narratives in a very condensed processed way like social media you get a bunch of people that support it a bunch of people that argue against it but if it's a narrative like we should stay home we should all wear masks yeah pretty hard for people to fight against that right so people they they pile on and then And then people get addicted to like the reactions and the interactions on Twitter.

[657] And it's like it becomes this weird fucking method of communication, the method of discussing ideas.

[658] And they get people get really attached to whatever they believe in, whether they believe the kids should be in school to the end of time.

[659] And all fucking interactions should be done through Zoom or that we should all throw away our masks and achieve herd immunity.

[660] And you should take vitamin D and go out in the sun and fucking exercise and be healthier.

[661] You can do all of it, right?

[662] You can wear a mask because, you know, okay, fine.

[663] My freedoms aren't infringed by wearing a mask.

[664] I don't give a shit.

[665] It's not that big a deal.

[666] Yeah.

[667] But at the same time, do I want my kids back in school?

[668] Do I think it's healthy from my oldest boy's sluggo to, you know, be wearing his, you know, pajamas or his sweatpants all day long and learning from distance?

[669] No. And I think that it's just, so there are, I, you know, I do agree with the idea that there are people that suffer well.

[670] They're kind of wielding this whole thing as a, it's a, Sort of justice, yeah.

[671] Well, you know, a good example, the comedy community is an interesting example because one of the things that a lot of my professional comedian friends have found is that there's a lot of people that never worked.

[672] And when I say never, I'm exaggerating, but they weren't, they weren't successful.

[673] They didn't, they weren't selling out clubs and theaters.

[674] They weren't doing well.

[675] And they're so angry that some comics have decided to go on the road again.

[676] because a lot of places have opened up Texas has opened up Florida's opened up you can go and do shows but that's a chance to do work right I mean so it is but they're angry and they they want the narrative is that you're doing these super spreader events people even got mad at me and Dave Chappelle because Dave and I were doing these shows at Stubbs Amphitheater in Austin outside there's no evidence whatsoever that the virus spreads outside and I mean literally none there's no evidence and then on top of that we test everyone in the crowd it's expensive it takes a long time the people get there early we test the entire crowd are you doing temperature checks no we're doing we're doing uh antigen tests for the entire crowd that's crazy yeah that's great but it's crazy it's expensive but it's the way to do it and we had a great fucking time and we're doing it again and but some comics have been mad at that but if you go and look at the comics that are mad they're all unsuccessful yeah yeah or super liberal and they're virtue signaling.

[677] They're looking to like tag on to this idea that what you're doing is bad and then what we should do is all stay home and lock down.

[678] You can go outside.

[679] And by the way, most people like 99 .9 whatever percent survive.

[680] There was a recent study that showed that 78 % of all the people that are hospitalized from COVID are overweight.

[681] Have you seen that?

[682] Yeah, I've seen that.

[683] Where is the shame in that?

[684] All these people are talking about fat shaming, you want to talk about the super spreaders, it's people that have ignored their health.

[685] And those people need help and they need support and they need love, but there's a reality to the people that are getting sick from this.

[686] If everyone was healthy, this would almost be a non -issue.

[687] Now, that's not a health -shaming thing.

[688] Like, we should be shaming people that are in poor health or people that are born with, you know, comorbidity factors like diabetes and whatever.

[689] Right, of course, yeah, yeah.

[690] But we're not looking at this thing 100 % of it.

[691] objective.

[692] If we were, we would have a completely different take on it.

[693] Well, look, there's no science.

[694] That's an example.

[695] I'm focused because I got these three knuckleheads at home, right?

[696] So I'm focused on like the education side of things as well.

[697] And so as are you.

[698] But it's, there's no science.

[699] People believe science.

[700] Well, of course, believe science.

[701] That's one of the funniest narratives.

[702] Believe science.

[703] Well, who the fuck doesn't believe?

[704] I mean, that's fine.

[705] But it's a political issue, right?

[706] So, but I think that there's no science that shows that, that, you know, a six -foot distance in public schools for kids, right, is essential to their health.

[707] So, in fact, the science shows three -foot.

[708] That's fine.

[709] And what that does, though, the importance of that is logistics, right?

[710] Because it allows for you to get the schools open again.

[711] People will talk about the six -foot distance.

[712] We can't get the kids back into their classrooms with six -foot distance because we can't get enough of them in there.

[713] It's the little things.

[714] It's the logistics of it saying, well, get it down to three -foot, which is what the science supports.

[715] And then, you can get these schools, you can start opening these places back up in a responsible manner.

[716] Honest to God, we're going to look at this thing in a year or two.

[717] Maybe we won't because we're not going to be honest with ourselves.

[718] But if we actually did an honest hot wash of this reaction to the pandemic, our reaction has been pathetic, right, over this past year.

[719] This has not been a shining moment for us.

[720] Don't you think part of the problem is we started out with a different idea what the virus is?

[721] We started out thinking that it was going to be like the next Spanish flu and that it was going to kill.

[722] I mean, everyone was terrifying, me included.

[723] I was scared of it.

[724] In the beginning, I thought that it was going to be something that kills 10 % of the population.

[725] And it didn't turn out to be that way, but we never made an adjustment.

[726] Yeah.

[727] No, I, yes, I think that's true, and I think also part of it is you can't negate the, or minimize the political reaction, right?

[728] If Joe Biden had been president when this thing broke, I guarantee you the reaction would have been somewhat different.

[729] The fact that Trump was in there, and created so much emotion.

[730] And there was such animosity.

[731] Thank God Trump wasn't pro -vaccine.

[732] We would be fucked.

[733] Because, you know, he was pro so many other therapeutics.

[734] And they're like, hydroxychloroquine is racist.

[735] You know, like, thank God he didn't say anything about ivermectin or vitamin D or quercetin or any of the other things that we've been or zinc.

[736] Yeah, but I do think that way, you know, that was a big issue was like, oh, see.

[737] He's so polarizing.

[738] And we can't trust the vaccines because, you know, they were developed under Trump.

[739] Right.

[740] Fuck, I believe the science.

[741] It were developed by companies that have nothing but scientists and doctors and engineers working inside them.

[742] And so if you believe the science, then you better believe that they were developing vaccines that you should have been happy about.

[743] So, you know, I don't know.

[744] It's the political nature of this country.

[745] And again, going back to what we were talking about earlier with the Russians and the Chinese, they see that.

[746] and they just keep sticking the knife at us.

[747] And the more they do, the more they tear the threads of our belief from the system.

[748] And the more polarized we get and the more yelling that goes on.

[749] And the more bullshit people believe when they read social media and they don't bother to say, well, who wrote this?

[750] Is this actually a scientific piece of work or is this just, and what's the origin of it?

[751] What's the outlet, right?

[752] And half the time the outlet is overseas someplace.

[753] And then you've got to dig into it.

[754] It's like an asset tracing exercise.

[755] Who owns that company?

[756] Then you find out it's owned by some, you know, Russian entity that's got an operation out of Cyprus, whatever.

[757] Well, there's a weird thing when you find something like you find a meme, like a political meme or a meme that has something to do with anything that's going on in the popular culture.

[758] And then you go to the page that runs the meme and you find out this page has this like weird address and they're all memes and there's no quotes to the memes.

[759] There's no English.

[760] And you're like, what is going on here?

[761] and you realize like, oh my God, this is like, this is a propaganda page.

[762] This is a page that someone or some entity has set up to try to make fun of things, to try to turn things viral, and they turn them out, six, seven, ten a day.

[763] And they're just trying to make viral memes that influence the way people look at things.

[764] And the ease of doing that.

[765] Look, yeah, you go back to the sort of earlier days of the CIA and you think about, trying to influence opinion or actions in a particular foreign government, right?

[766] And again, going back to that idea that, well, you didn't have that many opportunities.

[767] So what did you do?

[768] You try to influence the local media.

[769] Well, that was newspapers or radio or whatever.

[770] So you target that, you know, how do I place these articles, right?

[771] And the ability to do that now is, I mean, God, I wish I was still in the business now, right?

[772] Because you could change public opinion in a heartbeat, compared to what it used to be like.

[773] But the Russians in particular are very, very good at this.

[774] And people would criticize, as an example, Voice of America.

[775] Remember the old Voice of America?

[776] It still exists.

[777] What is it?

[778] But Voice of America, VOA was, you know, it's out there.

[779] And in the early days, the idea was to get news into the former Soviet Union at the time, right?

[780] So it was this broadcasting outlet that would provide news to parts of the world that were, under communist influence, right?

[781] And was it directed in this, was it, was it designed to criticize the, the, uh, regimes that were, you know, the Soviets or whomever was running that?

[782] Yes, of course it was.

[783] Was it designed to promote democracy and the idea of free think?

[784] Of course it was, right?

[785] So is that propaganda?

[786] Is that covert action?

[787] Well, yes, it is.

[788] You know, is it designed to promote, you know, the idea of democracy and freedom?

[789] Yes.

[790] So can we, you know, Is that better than the Russians trying with their covert action to criticize and so disbelief in the U .S. manufacturer vaccines?

[791] Yeah, I think I can make a relative judgment and say one is better than the other.

[792] But again, going back to your thing about people saying, well, the U .S. does it too, there's degrees of what is acceptable and what isn't, what is right and what is wrong.

[793] And, you know, it's a gray world out there.

[794] There's no black and white.

[795] But I guess what I'm, you know, so, yeah, I am fascinated by that question about, you know, does it frustrate you that people say America does it too?

[796] Yeah.

[797] And I keep going back and people say, oh, you know, like rose -colored glasses and all that bullshit about, you know.

[798] But I've seen enough shit over there to think that, yes, we do try, we try to do the right thing.

[799] Or we try to mirror our values, right?

[800] And what are our values?

[801] Well, if you think about it and we say, that's fine, I would rather have our values existing in a place like Iran, and the population were too frankly, than theocratic regime that exists there.

[802] So, I was disappearing down a rabbit hole.

[803] No, there's a weird narrative, a weird anti -American narrative that exists even inside of America.

[804] And that's oftentimes when you have children, they rebel against their parents.

[805] and I don't think there's, I think there's a similar thing.

[806] Like, you know, America's not perfect, but Iran executed an Olympic gold medalist in wrestling because he protested against the government, and that's a fact.

[807] You know, it's, you know, we were talking about China yesterday, what China has done in terms of, there was a, you know, that Jack Ma guy who disappeared for three months and came back and his, he's been, you know, whatever.

[808] He's towing the line.

[809] He's a little more compliant now.

[810] Let's put it that way.

[811] I realize that he doesn't like prison.

[812] Yeah.

[813] You know, and I realized they can disappear him for a few months.

[814] When was the last time anybody talked about the Uyghurs?

[815] Yeah, that's good.

[816] That's fucking genocide.

[817] And we don't know what they're doing, right?

[818] No. No, we know it's bad, right?

[819] But, you know, it's Xi's regime, right?

[820] Look, that guy has spent years now cementing his place.

[821] And, you know, much like Putin did.

[822] but with more subtlety, he's smarter than Putin.

[823] Putin's a very smart politician, right?

[824] He's kept himself in power in a place where it's a constant, you know, kabuki dance to try to figure out how to, you know, avoid your opponents.

[825] Putin's proved himself to be a master at that, but Xi has cemented his place in there.

[826] He is the most important leader of China going generations back, right?

[827] And he has done it through suppression.

[828] He's done it through, you know, the build -up of the security service, the internal security services, the suppression of information, oppression of journalists.

[829] And so, yeah, do I think that, you know, so again, you know, every time I start off on this path, you know, I get these responses that it's just like, wow.

[830] Do you read the responses?

[831] Do you read that shit?

[832] Not really.

[833] That's part of the problem.

[834] was reading that shit yeah i know it's probably the russians texting yeah send your messages yeah let's face it yeah my my my daughter worked and lived in china for you know for a while right she speaks chinese and she's a great kid but she would always be like dad jash come on i got i got work and live over here and i said well look you know you're you're you're you know she she gets it she got the joke right she understood you know how oppressive that place could be because she had spent time over there.

[835] I get questions from companies that are doing business over there or are about to start doing business over there.

[836] And their questions are always typically in the same bucket, right, which is, you know, how do we protect our information, right?

[837] We're going to build a manufacturing facility over there, or we're going to build a lab over there to whatever it might be, pharmaceuticals or technology.

[838] And the question is always, how do we, you know, how do we go about securing our information and protect?

[839] And you don't is the answer, right?

[840] You build facility over there, they're going to get it.

[841] They're going to either get it through coercive means of saying, well, if you want business over here, this is what you have to sign up to.

[842] We're going to have access to your code or whatever it may be, or they're just going to steal it.

[843] So, again, going back to the same thing as we just have to be pragmatic, right?

[844] I mean, stop acting as if, you know, the rest of the world is trying to come together in some community of nations, right?

[845] And I think, actually, I think Biden gets it, right?

[846] I mean, I don't know how long he's going to be in charge of of the administration but you know I'm worried about him I mean of course yeah I think he's I think he's a he understands that he's a pragmatic guys he's he's he's a he's a smart character but he's got a lot of pressure on him politically from a variety of different angles and so I look at you think he's lucid though do I think he's lucid yes right now that's a long pause yeah it's a long pause no no every fucking couple days.

[847] He gives a speech and it goes viral and the, you know, the quote under the viral video is like WTF.

[848] Yeah.

[849] Like, what is he saying?

[850] Well, look, he's, I mean, I think he is.

[851] He should be fishing.

[852] I shouldn't have paused that long.

[853] I think he is.

[854] I just think that I think his instincts are overridden by the, the, the priorities of the further left portion of the party.

[855] Yeah.

[856] And so, You know, for me. Why do you think that is?

[857] Do they think that that is more effective?

[858] Do they think the further left, like that the people in the moderate left will go along with the further left because at least it's far away from the far right?

[859] Yeah.

[860] I just think that, you know, the extremes always make the most noise.

[861] Right.

[862] They always make, whether it's the far right or the far left.

[863] And so I think that they're the vocal, in a sense, minority, right?

[864] They're the ones who are always going to be beating the drums and screaming about shit.

[865] and it's like this thing not to not to change subject entirely but it's like if you look at the far right we had an incident in in in uh idaho in boisey not that long ago a few days ago where some parents brought their kids to the state house and um they had a mask burning ceremony i saw that yeah mask you bring your kid you know who sent me that video alex jones look they're taking over they're figuring it out America's coming back but you know what the secret to that is none of those people and it was a small gathering right it made news because basically because they brought their kids right and it's kind of wacky you know it didn't make news bombing Syria yeah yeah that didn't make news no both those things are happening at the same time and this fucking ridiculous exercise of burning these cotton masks became important but you know what in that crowd, and that small crowd, you know, how many people were from Boise?

[866] None.

[867] So what you had was, you had some people coming from out of town.

[868] They're all Russians.

[869] That's right.

[870] There are a lot of Chinese in there.

[871] Where they from?

[872] They were mostly, they were all from out of town.

[873] And none of them from a town where they had a mask mandate.

[874] It wasn't like they were forced to wear masks.

[875] They were just trying to make a point.

[876] But because it was like one of those moments where you think, really did you have to come?

[877] Is this?

[878] Yeah.

[879] Did you have to?

[880] I mean, look at this.

[881] So these people.

[882] I don't like how that one's hanging over the edge.

[883] Throw it in there, girl.

[884] Get that in there.

[885] Yeah, watch yourself.

[886] Don't set that fleece on fire.

[887] Hey, come over here.

[888] That's a nice girl.

[889] Be a nice to her sister.

[890] Oh, clap, clap, clap.

[891] Come over here.

[892] Get those in there.

[893] Come on.

[894] Get that.

[895] Oh, here you go.

[896] Look at that mask.

[897] That kid behind him wants to.

[898] He wants to throw his in, but he's a little awkward.

[899] Look the guy there with a double flannel.

[900] You fucking fashion victim.

[901] That's one of those shirt jackets.

[902] That guy's a fashion criminal with his double flannel.

[903] He doesn't know who he is.

[904] You know what?

[905] Those shirt jackets that he's wearing.

[906] Those were very popular in the 70s.

[907] Look at the girl clapping.

[908] Yeah.

[909] I know.

[910] Oh, look it.

[911] Yeah, burn that mask.

[912] Yeah, get away from the fire.

[913] What does the thing say?

[914] What does the sign say?

[915] Not suffering?

[916] What does that say?

[917] Don't self -sufficate.

[918] That lady is in the Westboro Baptist Church.

[919] Yeah.

[920] So she's just there on vacation.

[921] So it's not like, again, not a big crowd, but it made the news because, and to your point, because it feeds some narrative, right?

[922] It feeds some narrative.

[923] Look at the lady, the lady in the back with the red, the lumberjack.

[924] She had a fucking old -school camera she was videoing.

[925] She doesn't even have a phone.

[926] Oh, wait, you're right.

[927] That's like a...

[928] She doesn't have a fucking phone.

[929] Especially you didn't have one of those video cameras you'd held on your shoulder back in the other days, yeah.

[930] She's got a Windows phone and it can't update.

[931] Oh, God.

[932] But it's not like those people live in a city where there's a mask mandate, right?

[933] So they come into town, they do this thing, and to your point, it got how much coverage?

[934] That son of a bitch guy, I heard from all sorts of people saying, what the hell's happening in Idaho?

[935] That's just Facebook.

[936] Yeah.

[937] People get excited.

[938] They want to see, oh, my God, it's going to go everywhere.

[939] Yeah.

[940] But it's going to be everywhere.

[941] You know what?

[942] You go to Boise.

[943] You go to, really, most points I know, everybody's wearing a mask.

[944] They're doing the right thing.

[945] They don't have to be told by the federal government to do the right thing.

[946] They're just doing it because what the fuck.

[947] But isn't, there's this thing going on where there's all these different arguments and there's all these different narratives and all these different people that are arguing their points.

[948] And no one knows exactly what the motives are, exactly who's doing what or why.

[949] And, you know, you're worried about the far left if you're in the far right.

[950] and you're worried about the left everybody in the right is worried about the left everybody in the left is worried about the right and everybody in the center is trying to figure out where the fuck the rational people are one of the things that I'm worried about and this is going to sound really weird but I'm worried that what this is really going to what all of this dissent and confusion is going to bring about is the rise of some sort of technological symbiosis where we could read each other's minds where we can understand each other better and it's going to make us less human than we are currently.

[951] I'm really worried about that.

[952] I'm worried about these weird interfaces like Elon Musk is trying to do this neuralink thing and I think he's doing it because he wants to access he wants to increase the bandwidth between human beings and information which is a very, it's a noble concept.

[953] You're going to make people smarter, more access to information.

[954] One of the things he said to me, you're going to be able to talk without words.

[955] You know, I think I don't know that there's a correlation between access to more information and getting smarter, right?

[956] But this is what I think.

[957] I think ultimately there's going to be some sort of technology that literally allows people to understand people's intent and to read their thoughts and ideas.

[958] And I think it's not that far away.

[959] It might be 50 years, whatever it is, but we're moving in this direction where we're going to be less human.

[960] And that might be, Because of all the bullshit that's been created by social media and by these conversations, by these algorithms that encourage people to be upset about things, they encourage outrage, that we're going to move into some weird place where we're going to have to change who we are in order to recognize what are the motives behind these different programs and campaigns that are forcing.

[961] people into these situations where they hate each other.

[962] Yeah, as somebody who's taking the polygraph, I don't know.

[963] Hooked me up with us.

[964] I want to see if I don't lie.

[965] Yeah, well, what I was going to say was, I mean, we used to say with a polygraph that, oh, my God, can't you just put like a, like a colander on our head and just read our thoughts because that would be a lot more pleasant and easier, right?

[966] Have you ever, have you beaten a polygraph?

[967] Have you ever lied?

[968] No. It can be done, right?

[969] I've had a lot of inconclusive because the polygraph, the thing about the polygraph is, A, it's all physiological activity, right?

[970] It's blood pressure and sweat and, you know.

[971] What is it?

[972] It's like heart rate, right?

[973] Heart rate.

[974] And it's an imperfect system.

[975] Yeah, because it doesn't hold up in court.

[976] Right.

[977] And it's also entirely dependent on the experience and the abilities of the examiner, right?

[978] And that varies because it's a human effort, right?

[979] So you'll get a good polygrapher.

[980] You'll get one that's got less experienced.

[981] You'll get one who's had a bad day and it's just, you know, whatever.

[982] And I've seen these things fail miserably.

[983] I mean, obviously in the intel community, in the agency, we've, you know, we've had people, Aldrich Ames, right, is a good example.

[984] Who's that?

[985] He was one of our traders, right?

[986] So Aldrich Ames went to work for the enemy.

[987] Which enemy?

[988] The Russians.

[989] And sold out, caused a fair number of deaths.

[990] Hansen is another good example from the FBI.

[991] Edley Howard, I mean, oh, my God, Jim Nicholson, all these people that were able to beat the polygraph because essentially they're psychopaths, right?

[992] They don't see the difference between right and wrong.

[993] So the polygraph doesn't have any influence on it.

[994] If you're a Quaker, if you walk around and you feel bad about everything, right?

[995] Ah, God, I remember I took that, I took those cookies when I was a kid and I shouldn't.

[996] I plugged that toaster in.

[997] I fucked up.

[998] Yeah, yeah.

[999] I mean, it doesn't, so whatever.

[1000] The old toaster incident.

[1001] I use that electricity.

[1002] I'm a bad, I'm a bad person.

[1003] I shouldn't have done it.

[1004] So if you carry that with you, then, yeah, you're going to have a problem with a polygraph because you're going to be thinking about all these things.

[1005] And I've had, you know, back in the day, you know, you take the polygraph in the exam to be like, oh, my God, can we, we're going to take it again.

[1006] It's inconclusive.

[1007] Look, we're just worried about, have you sold secrets to the enemy?

[1008] That's all.

[1009] We don't worry about any of the other shit, right?

[1010] And yet, if you get somebody who doesn't think that way, like an Aldra James or some of these people, then, yeah, they'll pass a polygraph.

[1011] So in our minds, we were always thinking, well, just come up with something better.

[1012] Now they're getting there, right?

[1013] They're getting to the ability to, with scans, brain scans.

[1014] FMRI.

[1015] Yeah.

[1016] So, yeah.

[1017] So you can, you're getting closer, but it's not one of those things that you're going to, you know, subject your workforce to.

[1018] It's costly.

[1019] It's very difficult to do.

[1020] It's all these things.

[1021] So you use it for a high.

[1022] high -value target, for instance, you know, like a KSM or, you know, one of these cats from the old terrorist days.

[1023] But so I guess my point with that is we're still relying on the old school technology of the polygraph for the most part.

[1024] And we know it can be beaten.

[1025] And we know it can be beaten.

[1026] And it can be beaten if you feel no difference between right and wrong, right?

[1027] If you're, if you just walk through life and you don't give a fuck, then the polygraph isn't much of an issue for you so it's but but luckily most people aren't like that most people will get hooked up and they'll start reacting right and that's and that's a good thing but what about false memories because there it's been shown that particularly through hypnotic regression that you can introduce false memories to a person so if you say to a you know you can create a memory in a person you know like you know whatever about seeing bigfoot or whatever it is and that person can really believe it.

[1028] It's been proven that they can do that, especially under hypnosis.

[1029] So if you can hypnotize someone, get them to believe a false narrative, and then hook them up to a polygraph, and then describe that false narrative, they'll show that they believe that thing, even though that thing is not really true.

[1030] Yeah.

[1031] And that's true.

[1032] If you talk to somebody who said, okay, I was kidnapped by a UFO, by aliens.

[1033] They're going to believe it, right?

[1034] They're not going to So what do you do with the polygraph?

[1035] Again, people are like, oh, we're having a lesson on the polygraph.

[1036] But, I mean, what you do is you have other information that you've developed about that individual, right, that you use.

[1037] So it's a tool in the kit bag that you use, at least in the intel community, to determine credibility.

[1038] It's just one tool.

[1039] It's just one tool.

[1040] Yeah.

[1041] You do not want to completely rely on the polygraph, right?

[1042] But I have seen it work well, and then I've seen it fail miserably.

[1043] right so you know and what i would like to see i mean i look at it from a counterintelligence perspective if we can create something that can read people's minds great because you know what that does is that allows us to identify the traitor within the the group the mole a lot quicker and and counterintelligence operations are always an enormous lift people say like i can't i can't believe you allowed whomever you know hansen to operate you know within the bureau and and have all those lives lost and betray us to the russians for all those years and my response is always, you know, it's very, I can't believe we caught him because it's a very heavy lift.

[1044] It's a very difficult thing to do.

[1045] So, but to your point, yeah, do I want us to develop that ability in general?

[1046] No, I think that's inevitable.

[1047] I think it's inevitable.

[1048] I think it's coming whether we want it or not.

[1049] I think if you look at the, if you go back in time and you go to Martin Luther and you go to the printing press and the, you know, the ability to, you know, um, translate the Bible into a phonetic language and the changes that that had on society and you move that into the future and you go to the free press and then you go to the internet and you go to social media and you go to where we are today one of the things that's common the the thing that all shares in common is that there's a course in this path that seems to be inevitable is that there's a shrinking of the distance between human beings and information.

[1050] And information is far more accessible than it's ever been before.

[1051] And there is some resistance to that, right?

[1052] Like there's some censorship in terms of like what you're allowed to search and what you're not allowed to search.

[1053] We talked about earlier with Google and Duck Duck Go and, you know, the things are curated and we all aware of the problems with big tech censoring certain voices on social media because they're concerned with the narrative that's going to be, because they're thinking about it in short -term gains and losses.

[1054] But ultimately, all technology is leading into, there's a boundary between human beings and information.

[1055] It's getting smaller and smaller and smaller to the point where information is going to be instantaneously accessible, whether it is a decade from now or a month from now or a hundred years from now, whatever it is, it is inevitable in my opinion that as technology continues to progress and innovation continues to be something that people value and that is prized and that is rewarded, we're going to move to a position where you're going to be able to read people's minds.

[1056] You're going to be able to understand people's intent.

[1057] We're not going to trust people who aren't willing to do that.

[1058] And it's going to help people in a lot of ways because lying doesn't just hurt the people that you lie to.

[1059] It hurts you because you're living some bullshit life where you're trying to pretend that you're something that you're not and I think ultimately people are going to get that and there's going to be people that fall by the wayside.

[1060] There's going to be people that rise because of it and it's going to help culture ultimately.

[1061] But I think one of the big things it's going to do, it's going to eliminate propaganda.

[1062] And that's why I think it's going to be embraced because you can't have propaganda if people can actually understand what people's intentions are in a clear, like you know how you have like if you have if you enable location finding on your phone and you say, hey, I'm in Russia.

[1063] And you're like, no, motherfucker, you're in Oklahoma.

[1064] It says it on your picture.

[1065] You piece of shit, this is fake.

[1066] Well, who's to say Oklahoma's a little bit of a foreign destination.

[1067] It depends on where you are and who you are.

[1068] Yeah, it's true.

[1069] How dare you.

[1070] See, I like Oklahoma.

[1071] It's foreign if you live in Connecticut.

[1072] Yeah, who wants to be there anymore?

[1073] Connecticut's a rough spot right now.

[1074] Didn't they just decide to open wide?

[1075] up?

[1076] I do not know.

[1077] I think they did too, didn't they?

[1078] Jamie?

[1079] I think Connecticut opened wide up too, which is odd.

[1080] We left Connecticut to go to Idaho and I've been, Connecticut is a highway.

[1081] It's barely a, it's a bare, any city there is barely a city, and it's barely a state.

[1082] It's a highway between Boston and New York.

[1083] See, I will disagree on the, it's going to be a benefit overall.

[1084] I don't think it's going to be a it's going to happen.

[1085] I don't disagree with that idea that it's just going to happen.

[1086] But I think the quicker and the more access that we have to information is not done us any favors to date.

[1087] Hasn't it though?

[1088] People are way more educated and informed than people were a thousand years from now.

[1089] Yeah.

[1090] Yeah.

[1091] I think, I'm very conflict on this.

[1092] Is the potential there for good?

[1093] Yes.

[1094] But if you look at the reality of it all, look how divisive.

[1095] we are now right look how but maybe isn't that because we don't have access to all the information so we're concerned and we're worried yeah I mean maybe part of it is how much credit you give to the to individual humans but I just think that we're we haven't done ourselves any favors yet maybe we learn and you know maybe yes maybe there's one day when you know it's all instantaneous and so therefore everybody's showing their cards all at the same time and you know there's no there's no issues I just I have a feeling that so far, you know, so far, I don't think the Internet has really, it's going to sound like I'm some sort of Luddite, but in terms of our children, in terms of general society and the way that we deal with each other, I don't know that it's done us more good than harm so far.

[1096] I just have this feeling that the way that we are currently, right, and people, because people, the human condition is still going to be that they're going to, they're going to go to wherever they believe, right?

[1097] So the fact that I can, I know your intentions doesn't mean it's going to make me altruistic and understanding, right?

[1098] That's not human condition.

[1099] It's just going to make me hard in my opinion or figure out some way to get around the aspect of what your intentions are.

[1100] Maybe I'm more cynical than you are.

[1101] Let me push back on that.

[1102] Isn't that a lot of that like fear and a lot of that is distrust of other people?

[1103] There's a lot of the way we interact with each other.

[1104] A lot of it is based on fear and distrust.

[1105] Yeah, but I don't think the additional access to information and instantaneous understanding of all, I don't think that's going to make us, somehow it's going to make the human condition better.

[1106] I don't think it's going to make us more, again, more open to new ideas or others ideas or opinions.

[1107] I just have a feeling we're going to figure out a workaround, and it may harden our positions.

[1108] And I don't know.

[1109] But maybe there's a workaround to the workaround.

[1110] Like, let's go back to the people in 1950s that were terrible.

[1111] The people in 1950s that were terrified about rock and roll, right?

[1112] They were terrified.

[1113] Elvis Presley shaking his hips.

[1114] You can't show it on television.

[1115] There was a real argument.

[1116] It was a real argument that that guy, he's swinging his.

[1117] cock on TV and these girls are screaming not literally porn it's got it let the porn what it led to like like dirty porn no no there was porn before I mean but like more more more more more and more Elvis go more Elvis did yeah Elvis directly responsible for a lot of porn a lot of porn with the neural link thing there's going to be software and hardware issues that's kind of piggyback off what he's saying that would be very hard knowing what we have seen over the past 20 30 years hard to keep that out of there like people would be able to mask their feeling from being seen by downloading the whole thing for now but you know that's that's also again like location services and like a lot of other things like there's these little hurdles that come up that keep people from truly understanding the nature of an actual thing that you're just the they're experiencing look from my perspective as from an operational perspective right and from my business perspective what do we we you know we're involved in a lot of investigations a lot of fraud concerns a lot of asset tracing all these things that my folks do hey great i'd love to be able to know immediately what somebody's intentions are that makes the job so much easier you know but uh i guess what i guess what i'm saying is i think it doesn't change the the base nature of of human characteristics you know and so i don't think it's going to make us suddenly come together as a community and understand you know and and and get together i think the, the, what's happened is the ability to access more information has just driven us apart and created these, these, uh, silos where we all just sit and listen to whatever affirms our opinion.

[1118] And I don't think that, you know, a neural link or anything else is going to suddenly make us better people.

[1119] And I think it's going to not be, I don't know, I, and, what the fuck do I know?

[1120] I'm not a neuroscientist, so I don't know.

[1121] I'm not a psychiatrist.

[1122] I don't What the fuck do I know too?

[1123] But my, yeah, what the fuck do I know?

[1124] But my experience has so far have told me that oftentimes people's intentions aren't particularly good and that we have to be pragmatic and sometimes being cynical is not a bad thing.

[1125] No. But, yeah, I don't think it's a bad thing either.

[1126] But I think that what we're dealing with is there's a lot of confusion and there's a lot of distrust and there's a lot.

[1127] lot of conflict.

[1128] There's a lot of these things going on.

[1129] And a lot of it is based on the unknown.

[1130] A lot of it's like we don't know what the Russians are doing.

[1131] We don't know what the far left is doing.

[1132] We don't know what the far right is doing.

[1133] We don't know what the Chinese are doing.

[1134] And there's a problem with our own biology.

[1135] It takes a long time for human beings to evolve biologically.

[1136] Like, there's not much difference between our DNA and the DNA of people that lived 10 ,000 years ago.

[1137] But there's a massive difference in the world that we exist in.

[1138] You're saying we're Neanderthals?

[1139] Because I've heard recently that that's bad.

[1140] Neanderthal thinking is bad.

[1141] Yeah.

[1142] Yeah.

[1143] I think that as we move forward, technology is increasing at a pace that biology can't possibly keep up with.

[1144] So we are left with these tribal biological instincts.

[1145] that evolved when people were in tribes worried about other tribes coming over and attacking us.

[1146] We were worried about the unknown.

[1147] We were worried about animals.

[1148] We were worried about attacks.

[1149] We were worried about the sky turning into a monster that we didn't understand.

[1150] And now we know so much more, but we still have the same human reward systems.

[1151] We still have the same DNA and biology that was essentially programmed.

[1152] to keep us alive during these ignorant situations.

[1153] We didn't really know, but now we know a lot.

[1154] But now we know so much we have this ability to communicate that's unprecedented.

[1155] And it's evolving and changing it.

[1156] The only way I see that we can keep up with it is if we do something to interface with the technology in a way that's unprecedented, in a way that's different than just looking at a screen or looking at a phone, because you're still using the same biology and you're interfacing with new information when you're using a phone.

[1157] And that's also created a lot of confusion.

[1158] You know, that's part of the reasons why people isolate and insulate and get into these fucking little bubbles of information and thought.

[1159] And, you know, they insulate themselves from opposing ideas.

[1160] And it gives them comfort.

[1161] And it makes them tribal.

[1162] It makes them more tribal.

[1163] And I think it's not a coincidence that the more technology increases and the more access to information increases, the more likely people are to get into these weird fucking groups where they have echo chambers.

[1164] I think one of the only ways that's going to move us out of that is some sort of technology that alleviates a lot of our concerns by giving us information about intent, give us information about what people's real thoughts are and real intentions are and let people know that most, of us want the same thing.

[1165] Most of us really, truly want the same thing.

[1166] And a lot of the conflict that has been exploited, whether it's by social media algorithms or it's by foreign countries or bad entities, they've done so by preying upon these biological limitations.

[1167] Yeah, I don't know.

[1168] Maybe I don't want to live in a world where I can read people's intents, right?

[1169] I mean, because part of it is sort of like, you take it down to the base level in terms of just relationships, right?

[1170] I just, I think part of it, part of the excitement of life is not knowing in a way, right?

[1171] That sounds maybe stupid.

[1172] Sounds like a married guy.

[1173] Yeah, it sounds like a married guy.

[1174] If you were single, when you say, Jay.

[1175] I was trying to think about what age do you do this, if you do it to a baby, because then you could hear what your baby's thinking, but also you're going to have to replace that multiple times as they grow older or their brain might not develop correctly because there's already an interference, you know.

[1176] And interference, how so?

[1177] Because there's wires in the baby's brain, that's not biological.

[1178] Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1179] The wires thing is like, I think the wires thing is like a wired phone.

[1180] You know, it's like, you know, like right now we don't have to have a wire.

[1181] I don't have a phone in my house, like a wired phone.

[1182] Nobody's got a landline anymore.

[1183] No, yeah, yeah, but we used to.

[1184] You know, I think this wired thing is like a shitty technology.

[1185] We still have to have a, let's just get, the wires a sensor then is still close to your brain and you have to cut the hole in the head and...

[1186] For now, but remember when we were talking with Jamie Metzell yesterday, about CRISPR.

[1187] What if CRISPR gets to the point where, you know, there's some new technology that we literally develop the human mind to the point where it can access Wi -Fi, where it can access some new software or some new hardware that allows people to communicate with each other without any, any, no filter, no filter between us, whether it's language.

[1188] I will say this.

[1189] It sounds awful.

[1190] What you're describing, I'm a sense.

[1191] simpleton, I admit it.

[1192] You sound like a guy in the 1950s who's a pastor who's working at Elvis Presley, shaking his head.

[1193] It's not, no. This is the end of civilization.

[1194] I love, I loved Elvis.

[1195] Look, I was, you know, but what I'm saying is I think, look, what I want to grow up as a kid today compared to what I grew up, which was we didn't have access to that news.

[1196] We had, we had like three channels for news, right?

[1197] Everybody had a shared experience in a sense, right?

[1198] Now, am I saying, I'm not, somebody who looks back in the past and goes, oh my God, it was, It sounded wonderful.

[1199] It was, you know, there were problems then, too.

[1200] Of course it was.

[1201] And so, you know, but was there, as an example, was there a benefit to having, you know, much of the country sitting down at for the, whatever, the 5 o 'clock news or the 11 o 'clock news?

[1202] And everybody had a shared experience.

[1203] They were getting the same news, right?

[1204] And they were, now they were processed differently based on their own personal life experience, right, and where they were sitting in life.

[1205] But there was a shared moment in time, right?

[1206] This is a small example.

[1207] But I look at that and I go, you know, was there some benefit to that?

[1208] And I think there was because now you don't have that.

[1209] And that creates in part what we've got today with this divisiveness that exists.

[1210] And everybody's sitting in their trenches.

[1211] It's like World War I, right?

[1212] Everybody's throwing grenades.

[1213] Nobody wants to come out into no man's land.

[1214] And then I go back to the other part of it, which is some more touchy -feely admittedly, which is, you know, I don't want to know.

[1215] I don't I there's a there's a element of life that you know it's it's sort of the it's the unknown right I don't want to walk around knowing exactly what your intention is or what you what Jamie's intention is or what it it's not a concern of mine right life can be pretty simple if you think about it right if you think I what am I interested in I'm interested in trying to be a good person raising my family so that the kids are good people and productive people and I the idea of getting to some point in life where we don't have to talk to communicate, right?

[1216] I mean, oh, no, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not a buyer on that one.

[1217] This is where we're headed on my picture.

[1218] We're going to be these little aliens.

[1219] I know.

[1220] I remember that Star Trek?

[1221] I think it was a two -part episode where they all just kind of communicate without talking.

[1222] I think, oh, that's fucked up.

[1223] I, like, again, I don't want to, you know, I'm not.

[1224] But the problem with the scenario that you're painting in these rosy, rose -colored glasses is that there was a small group of people.

[1225] people that curated that information that was portrayed on the five o 'clock news sure that's the problem it's like then you relied on government entities and propaganda and you know you could you could have people with unscrupulous ideas and that's what led to stolid russia but are you saying that now it's but are you saying that now it's better in terms of politics and the governments and our reliance on government and the way that we it's better in terms of whether or not we know the government's full of shit because we're way more way more more aware.

[1226] Way more aware of corruption.

[1227] I won't disagree with that.

[1228] I won't disagree with that.

[1229] But, you know what?

[1230] Part of that is an investigative responsibility, right?

[1231] Part of that is the ability of individuals to question what's happening.

[1232] That never changes, right?

[1233] That's been the same now as it was during the penny press.

[1234] No, they have access to Google and Duck, Duck, Go, and search engines.

[1235] Are you an investor in Duck, Duck, Duck.

[1236] No. Oh, okay.

[1237] Just checking.

[1238] Nothing to do with it.

[1239] But I like it.

[1240] I'm a good I'm a believer in unbiased sources and I think there's only a few of them out there there's like there's things that don't they don't it's one of the reasons why I like Apple over Android's they don't they don't share your information the same yeah and I think there's real value in that because human beings have been using these things whether it's Google or Facebook and we always thought that that was the product that we were using these things and that these things Facebook was the product Google was the product and then somewhere along the line, we realize, no, we're the product.

[1241] Our data is the product, and we're selling.

[1242] But by using these things for free, by using whatever it is, their message services and posting on these things, we think we're getting something for free, but we're not.

[1243] Because we're giving up our data, we're giving up all of our metadata and all of our information, and through these algorithms, they've been able to amass insane amounts of wealth just by using our Well, and it's something that, yeah, I always laugh when people talk about the government, you know, collecting information on you, say, that's a good government's not the problem.

[1244] The U .S. government's not the issue.

[1245] Nothing in comparison to social media, panic in a doomed submarine.

[1246] Yeah.

[1247] So, I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's the corporations.

[1248] But.

[1249] And these new corporations that, you know, 25 years ago didn't even exist.

[1250] There was no such thing as Facebook and Google.

[1251] They didn't have an influence on world ideas.

[1252] They didn't have an influence on the way people.

[1253] express narratives.

[1254] There was no, there was no influence by tech companies on other than selling you cool products.

[1255] Twenty -five years ago, all they did is sell you things that you thought would enhance your life.

[1256] I guess what I'm saying is I don't disagree in the sense of, again, going back to the operational perspective, there's a lot of advantage, right, from somebody who is worried about security and national security concerns.

[1257] And I think, hey, there's a lot advantage to getting to that point, I just don't think, you know, it's going to improve the human condition necessarily.

[1258] I don't think there's going to be the upside that necessarily comes from, you know, instantaneous immediate access to understanding people's plans and intentions and information.

[1259] I don't think it's going to make us less tribal.

[1260] This was the same argument they had about the printing press.

[1261] It really is.

[1262] No, you know, I just been caught.

[1263] I've been caught short to.

[1264] I I can't spot the lie in what you just said.

[1265] If you follow like Stephen Pinker's work and you follow like the analysis of violence and crime as it relates to the progress of civilization and humanity, there's a path.

[1266] And this is not to discount all the situations where people have been the victim of violence and the victim of crime, but there's less instances of it statistically.

[1267] If you had an overlook, if you were looking at the earth from above, And you looked at a trend in terms of like the way civilization is heading.

[1268] As technology progresses, as access to food and resources and information progress, you have less instances of violence, less instances of crime, and less instances of all the undesirable things, whether it's sexual assault or racism, all the things, they occur less over time.

[1269] And I think that as technology increases, this will be a trend that, that can continues to go in that direction.

[1270] This is just me guessing based on the work of other people far smarter than me that have gone over this sort of pattern and looked at it in terms of like where are we headed.

[1271] We're not headed in a bad place.

[1272] People can concentrate on all the bad things that still do exist, whether it's sexual harassment in the workplace or whether it's violence or whatever the thing you want to concentrate on.

[1273] There's 8 billion people on this planet.

[1274] you can find massive amounts of data that can support your idea that this is still a problem.

[1275] And it's always going to be still a problem until there's no problems.

[1276] Until we reach Utopia, and I don't know if we're ever going to reach Utopia.

[1277] No, we're not going to.

[1278] That's where I think.

[1279] Unless we turn into these guys.

[1280] Unless we turn into those guys.

[1281] These little genital -less, mouthless little mind readers.

[1282] By the way, we're getting ready to film a second season of Black Files to Classified.

[1283] Do you have any...

[1284] Look at that.

[1285] It took a while.

[1286] We do.

[1287] We're going to have a couple of really good episodes on that.

[1288] I've been very underwhelmed lately by people who are involved in the UFO world, unfortunately.

[1289] I think this is going to be good.

[1290] We're visiting.

[1291] We're going to have a couple of good episodes on this.

[1292] Where are you visiting?

[1293] I'm prescribed from saying the exact show map right now, but I've seen the...

[1294] You're prescribed?

[1295] Well, I've seen the topics, and, you know, it's, you know, I'm not allowed to talk about it.

[1296] I am allowed to say that the first season of Black Falls to Classified is available.

[1297] on Discovery Plus.

[1298] But you're not allowed to talk about what happens?

[1299] About what we're going to film in the next season?

[1300] No. But that's, which is fine.

[1301] But I just, I think, I think, I don't, A, I don't think we're heading towards Utopia.

[1302] I don't think that's ever going to happen.

[1303] I don't, again, I, maybe I'm too cynical about the human condition and the way that we, we always find a way to fuck things up.

[1304] Let me ask you this, though.

[1305] In your home, I bet it's pretty utopian.

[1306] In terms of, like, if you had a, you think about the way people lived as cave men versus the way you live today?

[1307] Oh, sure.

[1308] In your home.

[1309] And your home with your family.

[1310] Yeah, the invention of the wheel.

[1311] And the invention of the toaster.

[1312] I mean, it's all good stuff.

[1313] Electricity, warmth, hot showers.

[1314] Pretty goddamn good.

[1315] It is very, very good.

[1316] Do you think it's going to continue along those same lines?

[1317] Yeah, but that's different than me sitting here and reading your intent immediately.

[1318] That's separate from that, right?

[1319] Now, again, if I'm concerned about finding a trader in my intel organization, I like the idea very, very much.

[1320] Right.

[1321] But if I'm just some dude, right, who's interacting with people on a daily basis, do I find that less appealing?

[1322] Yeah, I do.

[1323] And I don't have a – there's not necessarily logic to what I'm saying.

[1324] I know that.

[1325] Listen, you have a handicap.

[1326] You're not even American.

[1327] That's part of the problem.

[1328] You barely You got over here a couple of weeks ago Oh my God Like some fucking European Australian character I know You probably liked You liked the European Union idea I don't know I didn't even pay attention to that Oh God I'm too busy Yeah No I know Some people didn't like it Hey you mentioned By the way I just followed it away And I just popped up in my Databank again Syria You mentioned Syria?

[1329] That was a it's a very good point A There's very little attention paid to it, except...

[1330] People were paying attention to Ted Cruz trying to go to Cancun.

[1331] They didn't give a fuck about Syria.

[1332] At what point...

[1333] At what point didn't his chief of staff or somebody, right, who was booking his tickets, didn't say, you know, Ted, probably the optic isn't look good.

[1334] So maybe you shouldn't do it.

[1335] Why can he wear, like, a better mask?

[1336] Did he wear a mask at all?

[1337] Yeah.

[1338] But, I mean, like, if you're going to wear a mask, like, get someone to fucking dye your hair blue or something.

[1339] Yeah, you can't hide that Ted Cruz look.

[1340] He's very discernible.

[1341] Shave your head.

[1342] She Wear an eye patch Yeah Come up with something It's just like If you're gonna go to Cancun In the middle of a deep freeze And then also Be aware that you can't say I was gonna head right back When people can fucking research your ticket And find out you actually Wouldn't coming back until Saturday It was weird It was strange It was a bizarrely Bumbled job On his part And his staff's part Right Because most of these people Are kind of controlled By their staffs How about his wife's got a bunch of friends that are fucking rats.

[1343] How about that?

[1344] They sold her down the river.

[1345] Yeah.

[1346] Oh, no, absolutely.

[1347] Well, you know.

[1348] Gave up all her text messages talking about how it's freezing.

[1349] We're going to have.

[1350] But listen, if you have the means and you are stuck in a place where there's no power and the power is not coming back on and you can just fly to Cancun, I get the optics for Ted.

[1351] But his family should absolutely be allowed to do that.

[1352] If they have the money.

[1353] It's not like you shouldn't have.

[1354] to stay and suffer because everybody else has to stay and suffer.

[1355] No, if you're going into public service, though, you should.

[1356] You should tell your family.

[1357] No, he should.

[1358] Yes.

[1359] Because there's no dividing line.

[1360] Yeah, there's no, people don't perceive the difference between Ted's wife and kids went to Cancun.

[1361] They're not going to then say, but Ted stayed here, so that's good.

[1362] The headline's going to be, ah, he sent his family to Cancun.

[1363] So whether he went or not, it didn't matter.

[1364] And so that's why I say it was a stupid, stupid, stupid, political move on his part, and a very amateur move.

[1365] But if his family went without him, do you think it would be?

[1366] I mean, I don't think anyone would even pay attention.

[1367] No. If he stayed home in a fucking tent with a mucklucks on, a beaver hat.

[1368] I mean, you might as well be in a tent if your fucking house has no heat.

[1369] Yeah, I know.

[1370] Hey, look, in Connecticut, where we used to live, apparently when you move to Connecticut, you signed some agreement.

[1371] I don't remember signing it that said every winter, the power is going to go out at least four or five times during the winter.

[1372] and for days at a time, I mean, not just a couple of days.

[1373] The first winter we were in Connecticut, because all the utilities are above ground, right?

[1374] So, you know, and they get a lot of storms.

[1375] Trees come down.

[1376] So the next thing you know, the entire town and a bunch of other towns are without power.

[1377] It is a common occurrence there.

[1378] But the difference is, as opposed to here in Texas, you're used to it.

[1379] You're prepared for it.

[1380] So what happens is you get generators and you get food and you understand it's going to happen.

[1381] Right.

[1382] You have a fireplace.

[1383] It's going to be okay, even if the power is out for six or seven or eight days, which it is, right?

[1384] It's not an uncommon occurrence.

[1385] So, I mean, I remember we didn't have a generator, the first winter, right?

[1386] And I remember looking outside.

[1387] Power was out for a few days.

[1388] Other people got their lights on, right?

[1389] And our neighbors were great, and they'd say, come on over.

[1390] You just stay at our house for a few days until, you know, and that's what we were due.

[1391] And then eventually, you know, my wife, the finest person I know, she said, She knows not about that handy, but she said, you're going to go get a generator for the family, right?

[1392] Maybe take care of the family.

[1393] So I went to a home depot to buy a...

[1394] Did you just talk to like a foreigner?

[1395] Home Depot.

[1396] What the fuck is a depot?

[1397] Jamie, it's a depot.

[1398] I heard it.

[1399] I was going to let it slide, but...

[1400] It's depot.

[1401] Home Depot.

[1402] Depo.

[1403] You fucking foreigner.

[1404] Jesus Christ.

[1405] You go to home...

[1406] Don't they teach you in the CIA?

[1407] You go to Home Depot.

[1408] Yeah.

[1409] Talk like a goddamn American.

[1410] All right.

[1411] So I went to...

[1412] I'm an American.

[1413] I was born here, bro.

[1414] There I was in my beaver hat.

[1415] And I went to the Home Depot with my buckskin jacket.

[1416] And I went, but I went there, and I remember walking, and I thought I got to buy a generator.

[1417] They already bought.

[1418] Well, there was like one left, right?

[1419] And the manager, because I approached some guy, and I said, look, I'm looking to buy a generator.

[1420] And the guy says, well, you know, I'll show you where they are, but I don't think we have any left.

[1421] And there was a fight going on over the last generator.

[1422] Like we were about to face the zombie apocalypse, right?

[1423] There was a battle going on in this Home Depot where they were going to, they were going to come to, as we used to say, fisticuffs.

[1424] And so they, I remember standing there looking at thinking, you've got to be shitting me. And then I slipped the manager some money, and he took me out back and gave me the last generator.

[1425] Really?

[1426] How much you have to give them?

[1427] Yeah, not that much compared to the cost of the generator.

[1428] The point being, though, is then I had the generator, and then I realized after running it for a while that it needs oil.

[1429] I didn't know that until it burned out.

[1430] Oh, no. Yeah, because I'm not that handy.

[1431] But I guess the point being is we were used to it, right?

[1432] We didn't have a problem with it.

[1433] And then you look at what happens in Texas, and I had friends on the East Coast that were saying, I want a bunch of pussies, right?

[1434] They're all complaining because they don't...

[1435] And I said, look, it's Texas.

[1436] When was the last time they had a deep freeze like this, right?

[1437] It's all what you're used to and what you're prepared to get ready for.

[1438] So, I don't know where I was going with that story.

[1439] And most people around here didn't know how to drive in it, which is...

[1440] Really?

[1441] Yeah.

[1442] Of course, yeah, that's a good point.

[1443] They didn't have the tires for it.

[1444] They didn't have four -wheel drive.

[1445] Or if they did have four -wheel drive, like, there's a lot of guys with trucks that were...

[1446] They look at...

[1447] They have these pickup trucks, but they're two -wheel drive trucks.

[1448] Yeah.

[1449] Yeah, yeah.

[1450] No, and we get that too.

[1451] I mean, you know, you'll get you're the worst.

[1452] They'll fucking weight in the back.

[1453] You have sandbags back there or something.

[1454] Put at least 100 and 150 pounds of sand in the back and then you're good.

[1455] But, I mean, we got people that move up to Idaho that, you know, particularly from California, that, you know, they get that first winter.

[1456] And we don't plow the roads, right?

[1457] The general feeling is if you don't know how to drive in the snow, then stay home, right?

[1458] So they don't, there's nobody's plowing the roads.

[1459] So it's, you know, we still get people out there that don't know how to trash here.

[1460] They don't plow the roads?

[1461] No, I mean, if it's a lot, you know, in Boise, then they'll get out there and they'll give it an effort.

[1462] Do you have, like, a serious vehicle up there?

[1463] Yeah, we've got, we've got, we've got nothing, but I got a truck.

[1464] What do you drive?

[1465] It's a GMC.

[1466] Some fucking foreign piece of shit.

[1467] Oh, it's GMC.

[1468] Denali, and we got a suburban, I got a wagon ear.

[1469] I got a 91 wagonaire.

[1470] I told me that before, yeah, yeah.

[1471] With the wood panels?

[1472] Yeah, exactly.

[1473] I know.

[1474] I look pretty fucking good in my beaver hat driving that wagon here And then I just bought a A 1965 MGB Oh really?

[1475] From a guy in the UK From a vicar A little convertible ones?

[1476] A vicar, yeah, yeah It's a beautiful car Oh man 1965 Don't they have like wooden frames or something?

[1477] No, no That's an old ass car man That's an old, that's an old car No, 65 is it's a brilliant It's a brilliant piece of machinery And this one's been, ah, yeah.

[1478] Look at that.

[1479] Well, that's, that's a sweet little vehicle right there.

[1480] Look at the wire wheels.

[1481] Nice.

[1482] You Google, uh, 1965 MGB.

[1483] Yes, yeah, there you go.

[1484] And, uh, it's, it's, uh, so I'm going to pick it up in Liverpool.

[1485] Oh, look at that black one.

[1486] We're going to drive it around.

[1487] You're literally going to go to England to get it?

[1488] That middle.

[1489] Actually, no, bring it back.

[1490] Actually, Jamie, I think you got my car.

[1491] The green one?

[1492] The green one, yeah.

[1493] Really?

[1494] Uh, and.

[1495] Oh, look at that.

[1496] That's beautiful.

[1497] So I'm going to take, I'm going to take, um, over to, uh, England.

[1498] We're going to drive it around for a while.

[1499] And then I'm going to ship it back.

[1500] And now, this is not a car you drive in the winter in Idaho.

[1501] But in the summertime, it's going to be great.

[1502] And Sluggo, my middle boy has already claimed it.

[1503] He said, when you guys die, he talks like that all the time.

[1504] When you guys die, do I get the house?

[1505] What the hell?

[1506] You better have AAA for that fucking car.

[1507] Yeah, yeah.

[1508] That's a British car, right?

[1509] Yeah, it is.

[1510] They're not known for their reliability.

[1511] What is it about the Brits where they make shit -bag cars?

[1512] They're your people.

[1513] They make great.

[1514] They make very solid.

[1515] cars.

[1516] We made the spitfire for World War II, you know.

[1517] They make great cars, but they don't have the best reliability ratings.

[1518] You're thinking about Italian cars.

[1519] You're thinking about Fiat's.

[1520] Listen, listen, I'm Italian.

[1521] I'll tell you right now.

[1522] I don't buy my people's cars.

[1523] I don't trust anybody like me to make a fucking car.

[1524] But the, like, Land Rover, like they make a fucking hell of a car, but they break all the time.

[1525] I looked at the new defender.

[1526] Have you seen the new defender?

[1527] Get yourself an old defender that's what that's what lasts forever that's what lasts forever yeah those things break constantly oh no it's like buying it's the difference between buying an old land cruiser Toyota land cruiser and a new land cruiser the old ones they will stay on the road forever as long as you take care of them you gotta take care of you're a good guy but you're talking out of your ass no I'm not let me tell you something right now if I could talk it up and you stepped into my realm that's going to be the new land cruisers are virtually bulletproof those fucking things last forever the old land cruisers anything on those things you don't have to they don't break the old land cruisers also virtually bulletproof don't you want a car you could fix there's an old saying that they used to say when you want in australia in particular if you want to go into the bush you bring a range rover if you want to get out of the bush you bring a land cruiser yeah yeah because those range rovers suck they're beautiful they look cool they like makes it look like you're an artist like you got like one of them fucking moleskin notebooks and you're writing deep thoughts about your soul oh you're gonna solve you're gonna solve a murder mystery in a village somewhere.

[1528] Yeah.

[1529] Yeah.

[1530] Yeah, that's like a, that's a 100 series, right?

[1531] Isn't that?

[1532] Yeah, I have an 80 series.

[1533] But that's right there.

[1534] Look at that.

[1535] Yeah, that one right there.

[1536] That's sweet.

[1537] That one's going to stay on the road forever.

[1538] Nice.

[1539] Yeah.

[1540] What year is that?

[1541] That's a 70 series, right?

[1542] What is that?

[1543] Yep.

[1544] Nice.

[1545] See, I know my shit.

[1546] I have an 80 series.

[1547] I have an 80 series.

[1548] Yeah.

[1549] Land Cruze.

[1550] Yeah, 1995.

[1551] It was souped up by ICON, so it's got a supercharged Corvette engine in it.

[1552] Holy shit.

[1553] Yeah, I was driving it around why everybody was freaking out about the snow.

[1554] I was like, ha -ha.

[1555] I got locking differentials.

[1556] You can find mine, Jamie.

[1557] Find mine in there because it's fucking souped up.

[1558] And it's lifted so it can go over everything.

[1559] And it's got like a fucking...

[1560] That's it on the far left.

[1561] That's it right there.

[1562] Yeah.

[1563] That's my car.

[1564] That's it.

[1565] Yeah.

[1566] That fucking thing.

[1567] That fucking thing.

[1568] I loved driving that thing around.

[1569] Do you still have it?

[1570] Yes.

[1571] I drove it around during...

[1572] That's my buddy, Jonathan Ward.

[1573] He moved out here, too.

[1574] I don't think you wants anybody to know too late I'm sure it's just between you and me nobody else knows but that fucking thing man I you drive that anywhere it's awesome I mean it was so sturdy and sure -footed and it's got solid axles and you know front and rear look at that supercharged corvette engines in some of places overseas that's I mean land cruiser was all we had they'd show up somewhere and you know that was the sort of the fleet of vehicles that we had available to us to get around that's why and yeah no they're they're great vehicles but But don't be fucking with the Defender.

[1575] That's a great vehicle.

[1576] Listen, the new Defender is a, go Google Ranger, 2021, Range Rover Defender V8.

[1577] They have a new one that has 500 plus horsepower, 90 series.

[1578] 90 series is the one.

[1579] It's a fucking beautiful car, but they have literally the worst reliability ratings that are out there.

[1580] That's a fact.

[1581] Look at that.

[1582] Come on.

[1583] That's a beautiful goddamn car.

[1584] That is.

[1585] That truck goes zero.

[1586] to 60 and a little over four seconds 518 horsepower You can go over there and pick up a Land Rover and go through their Yeah And it'll break down before you even get home You wouldn't even be able to get it back to the fucking faculty Well anyway That fucking 65 MGB Is going to be It's going to be sweet And yes you're right But you know what I can do with it I can also work on it Bring your AAA card I can jack that thing up and work on it Because I don't need a computer system To figure out what's wrong with it That's true That's true you know it's broken And there it goes Replace the engine Well, I know what's going on.

[1587] Yeah.

[1588] Ah, anyway.

[1589] They're beautiful cars.

[1590] And there is some real value to the simplicity of those old cars.

[1591] Like you could work on the carburetor, you could figure out, oh, I'll replace the spark plugs.

[1592] You could do things to them.

[1593] Yeah.

[1594] I had a 67 triumph one time that...

[1595] Oh.

[1596] That's where you got stolen.

[1597] See, you really are, Britt.

[1598] You like those old ship boxes.

[1599] I do like that.

[1600] Yeah.

[1601] All right.

[1602] I give up.

[1603] You're right.

[1604] too, man. I think they're cool.

[1605] Look at that, man. I know.

[1606] Look at that.

[1607] God, that's beautiful.

[1608] It's like driving a go -car.

[1609] You're so low to the ground.

[1610] So little, too.

[1611] Look at the little tiny -ass tires.

[1612] Yeah, no. God, that's awesome.

[1613] They have fun to drive, man. You know what I really love?

[1614] That jaguar E -type, the long front nose, like a fucking barracuda.

[1615] No, those are, I will admit.

[1616] Those are always in need of repair.

[1617] Constant.

[1618] Constant.

[1619] I think they've got the new ones dialed in, though.

[1620] The new Jaguar.

[1621] It's made by Ford.

[1622] Yeah.

[1623] But for whatever reason, they can't figure out the new Range Rovers.

[1624] They still break down.

[1625] There's a YouTube channel that I follow that reviews trucks.

[1626] And they...

[1627] God, I can't remember the name of the channel.

[1628] These guys, I believe they're from...

[1629] I don't even know where they're fucked they're from.

[1630] But they bought the base model Rangerover Defender.

[1631] And they got, you know, the four -cylinder one, the cheapest one you can get with the metal wheels.

[1632] And it broke down on my...

[1633] immediately after having it and it took like more than a month for them to get it repaired and this is a brand new truck these guys yeah the fast lane yeah so their their fucking defender broke down like like right away the guy's laughing his ass off this guy he's a really good reviewer on YouTube he's got an awesome channel it's really really informative and well thought out but what's it called the fast lane the fast lane and most of it is so our third brand new land rover defender but will it be our last because they kept breaking down these fucking things they they had to fly sewing in from england to fix it well that's inexpensive and you know yeah because it they just couldn't and also when you got a channel that has you know millions of views on their their reviews and you sell them a fucking shitty lemon and it keeps breaking down like you've made a mistake it's not good yeah they have the worst reliability ratings and it's unfortunate because the other than that like i don't know what corners are cutting where their stuff sucks because the the engineering and everything the design is amazing i tell you what we've been happy with seven thousand miles my wife drives a uh my wife drives a suburban right now it's it's like what is it at 2019 i think and uh and we needed something we could throw all the sports gear in for the kids right and and like haul all them and the dogs and everything around and and it's been amazingly reliable i'll say that that much.

[1634] And I never had a suburbia before, but it's been probably the best vehicle we've owned in terms of just reliability, right?

[1635] Yeah, those new GM cars are far better than the old ones.

[1636] Like, a perfect example is the new GM Corvette.

[1637] That new Chevy Corvette is fucking incredible.

[1638] That's an incredible car.

[1639] It's the best value sports car you can get.

[1640] It's a mid -engine American supercar, and it's super reliable and really well engineered.

[1641] I mean, they went above and beyond for a long time they worked on that goddamn thing and they made a masterpiece that new corvette look at that thing yeah that is a masterpiece no it's an amazing they went through they went through a they went through a dark period look at that thing man that thing's it's fucking gorgeous too it looks like a Ferrari well that's what I was going to say they there was a period of time where yeah but again American design cars went through a period that thing though come on remember when every every that's beautiful we had a we had a 69 Camero for a while um and But there was a period where Camaros, firebirds, transams all looked alike.

[1642] Oh, yeah.

[1643] When they got into the 70s and the 80s, they were dog shit.

[1644] But that's a magical vehicle.

[1645] They really came out of.

[1646] And the interior was always like the big thing about, go check on, click on one of the photos of the interior, Jamie.

[1647] Because that was always like the big criticism.

[1648] That interior is amazing.

[1649] It's beautiful.

[1650] And the new one that 2022 was supposed to be even better looking than that.

[1651] What's the price on that?

[1652] It's not bad.

[1653] I think the base model, $60 ,000.

[1654] So it's like an SUV.

[1655] For a car that looks that good and it's that fast, I mean, it's ridiculously fast, and because it's mid -engine, all the weight is above the rear wheels.

[1656] So it's really well balanced, it handles fantastic.

[1657] I mean, they have rave reviews all throughout the internet and all these different websites.

[1658] They nailed it.

[1659] Yeah.

[1660] What's your favorite car you've had?

[1661] I have a 1965 Corvette It's probably my favorite I'd give them all up Except for that one If I had to give them all up I'd keep that I think I've seen that You had that parked one time At your old place At the comedy store too Yeah That fucking thing is That thing is It's just Yeah It's just the perfect Little car It's like it's fun But if I had to choose One car to drive If you said You can only drive One car It would be my Tesla Because that's Really Oh yeah Yeah It's it makes other cars seem like they're foolish, like they're dumb.

[1662] Have you ever driven one?

[1663] No, I've never, never, never actually been inclined to even think about.

[1664] They're so fast.

[1665] They're so fast, you can't believe it.

[1666] You can't believe it.

[1667] It goes zero to 60 in 2 .4 seconds.

[1668] That's two seconds faster than that new Corvette.

[1669] That's how, well, one second, one second faster.

[1670] New Carvettes under four seconds.

[1671] But it's, it's preposterous how fast it is.

[1672] Yeah, that's one area I can't even speak about because I have not been in a Tesla I haven't They'll fuck with your head Yeah They'll fuck with your head Because they they do things in a way That you go Why don't other cars work Don't you feel the same way I'm gonna say mine's all back Go show them real quick Come back Mine's all back too Okay Mine's back there too Yeah There's an EV Corvette coming out it says Yeah What it's gonna be is a hybrid They're gonna have Electrical motors in the front And I think they're gonna have Still have the mid -engine But it's gonna be like The Accura NSI X, which is like a hybrid.

[1673] This is not it, though.

[1674] I'm trying to figure out the difference.

[1675] Thousand horsepower Corvette Zora is in the works.

[1676] Oh, Jesus, everyone's going to die.

[1677] It's just like a stop order on future car development.

[1678] Well, my boy, John Hennessy already takes a regular Corvette, and I think he jacks it up to a thousand horsepower.

[1679] Go to Hennessy's Corvette.

[1680] I have a Hennessy Raptor.

[1681] Oh.

[1682] Oh, yeah.

[1683] That's my Texas truck.

[1684] I had to get one when I moved here, just to show.

[1685] But I'm fucking committed to being a Texan.

[1686] He got to have a pickup truck It's my first pickup truck I've ever owned in my life Really?

[1687] Yeah I will say I you know Probably if I look at it This is This is the Hennessy C8 Corvette He's got a thousand horsefowl Corvette Watch how fast this thing passes Come the fuck on Oh come on That to me That's an eagle strangling a terrorist Yeah That's America I don't know that you just see that the thing on it Hennessy's awesome he does some come and take it he's got the cannon on it look at the first 200 mile rodeo that's crazy yeah Generation 501 203 .9 miles per hour yeah he makes some wild shit see I'm I'm you know I got I get weird taste I mean I the pickup that I've got now I really like I'm a big fan and I think a pickup truck is always a great option but ever since I was a kid I've never owned one I've looked at a lot of them i'll come close to buy in them but this is going to sound weird but the car that i've always wanted to buy is a 56 bell air oh it's a beautiful car it's a beautiful car it's a beautiful car it's something about sort of the excess of that period of time right yeah where it was just like it was all about like melding the car design with with uh with uh airplanes and just it just that whole idea yeah oh god yeah but i've never found one that i thought yeah i'm going to buy this i saw 55 the other day that was souped up that was at this uh auto shop that i uh get my repair done out in Austin, and it was amazing.

[1688] It's just such a, just the boxiness, but the chrome bumpers and the shape.

[1689] It's a gorgeous.

[1690] It's a different world, right?

[1691] It's, you know, but it's, inefficient.

[1692] Nonsense.

[1693] Yeah, it is nonsense.

[1694] But they're so beautiful.

[1695] Yeah.

[1696] I don't know why, but I go to car shows, and I'm always looking around.

[1697] Look at that.

[1698] Fuck, look at that.

[1699] I know.

[1700] God, that's beautiful.

[1701] Tell me that's not beautiful.

[1702] Is that a 56, Jamie?

[1703] Oh, God.

[1704] That's so pretty.

[1705] That is so pretty Everything about it Just sort of the It's just so fucking excess But it's just gorgeous And the color schemes they had back then Just crazy You know who made a really killer one Who the fuck was it that made a really killer one Somebody made one for rides It was Google 55 Corvette No 55 Oh, excuse me, 55 Bel Air for rides, for the TV show rides.

[1706] They did it.

[1707] I'm trying to remember who the fuck designed it.

[1708] But there's a difference right between a car that you have for transportation and a car that's really just pure enjoyment and fun.

[1709] And that's what that is at this point.

[1710] Yeah.

[1711] No, it's, you've got to have something that you know is always going to be reliable.

[1712] It's not going to break down.

[1713] It's always going to be there.

[1714] but then the fun of cars is i think is in part is just sort of the quirks that each one brings you know and and i will say i keep going back to the same thing it's just the ability to work on a car as opposed to i got to take it in i got to have the diagnostics figured out and i get yeah you know i don't know it's but it's yeah it's i always said if i had enough money that's kind of where the money would go is that a rides car wow it's pretty look at that thing My God.

[1715] I can paint job on that.

[1716] Amazing.

[1717] Yeah, it's just, I mean, it's a statement, right?

[1718] It's not just a car.

[1719] It's like a love letter to American automotive engineering from the 1950s.

[1720] There's just something about...

[1721] No, I'd say, look, that's optimism, right?

[1722] In that time, that shows you what sort of the mindset was, right?

[1723] We're launching off to the unknown, right?

[1724] We're going to the moon.

[1725] Whatever it is.

[1726] There's this concept that says it's...

[1727] not just about utility right you know there's there's there's there's a belief in what we're moving towards but boy that was deep i remember who had it now yeah that was deep uh christopher titus the comic he had one he had a bill there yeah yeah i think he has a 55 that uh he had made for rides my buddy uh bud brutzman's show is that it yeah that's it look at that one is super customized Yeah, that is.

[1728] Yeah.

[1729] That is some heavy work on that.

[1730] That's a Chip -Fuse car.

[1731] Chip Fuse designed it.

[1732] Wow.

[1733] Yeah.

[1734] I mean, that is a goddamn, I believe he sold it.

[1735] But that's a gorgeous car.

[1736] Gorgeous car.

[1737] Gorgeous car.

[1738] My God.

[1739] Yeah.

[1740] Yeah, that's not a Kia.

[1741] Perfect 55.

[1742] Yeah.

[1743] It's very customized, though.

[1744] I'm not going out, not buying a Camry.

[1745] That's very customized, though.

[1746] There's a lot going on with that car.

[1747] that doesn't look at that thing oh my god that one right there look at that oh my god yeah yeah the retro mod industry is really you know come on big um you see a lot of this in the shows nowadays and and sometimes it's tough i mean if you're looking for something that's just straight up from the numbers and and you know is is is legit it's tough to find sometimes because this is people do that yeah people are going that direction but anyway say yeah we're going to go over to england I'd probably stop at the Home Depot and outside of London, pick up some duct tape, and some extra wire, then pick up the MGB, drive around, wait for it to break.

[1748] Do you have someone that can inspect the car for you over there to make sure that it's okay?

[1749] Yeah, I got folks over there.

[1750] I got an office over there, and so, you know, I got some people happy to go up.

[1751] But I had talked to these guys for a while.

[1752] I've been looking for this particular car for a long time, and you see a lot of crap, right?

[1753] Right.

[1754] And so, but this literally had been owned by a vicar and garage held forever, right?

[1755] And there was just not a bit of rust on this thing.

[1756] All the lines, the seams are perfect.

[1757] It's just, it's really good.

[1758] But the problem has been trying to get over there.

[1759] I was going to go over and, you know, towards the end of last year to pick it up.

[1760] I've delayed that trip several times.

[1761] It sounds like a 1 % problem.

[1762] But, you know, it's anyway, so we'll go over.

[1763] You're all vaccinated up, right?

[1764] I am, yeah.

[1765] Do you get both shots?

[1766] I got both shots.

[1767] I did the Moderna thing.

[1768] I got the second shot kick you out.

[1769] Yeah, it did it two weeks ago.

[1770] And I've never had a reaction to anything, right?

[1771] Any sort of flu shot or vaccine.

[1772] And the agency used to pump us full of all sorts of stuff.

[1773] Take it, it'll be fine.

[1774] Here, go downstairs.

[1775] Send us down to the office of medical services downstairs to get some shots to go some shithole somewhere.

[1776] And you never questioned it.

[1777] You always like, yeah, whatever.

[1778] but I never had a reaction to anything and the docs used to say well this might lay you out for a while and it'd be that fine so anyway long story short a couple weeks ago I get the second shot of Moderna and I go in and they said well stick around for you know 15 20 minutes see if you have a reaction or whatever see if you die yeah if you die right you're going to fall into a seizure or whatever I didn't so I went home and I was like yeah I'm fine I'm fine I'm fine I got together with some friends that night because it's Idaho so we can actually get together with outside of our bubble and and we drank and I woke up the next morning I thought I got a hangover right from the you know too much red wine or whatever and and then the rest of that day 24 hours my fever was spiking from like 103 down to 96 right I mean I was going from from 103 to 96 in a matter of an hour and a half or so it was it was very odd for 24 hours it just laid me out and and that was it then and after that I was fine no problems But it's the same thing I've heard from just about everybody else I've talked to that have taken that second shot.

[1779] They say, yeah, about 24 hours, you just feel like shit.

[1780] What about younger folks?

[1781] You know any younger folks that got it?

[1782] I try not to socialize with younger folks.

[1783] I'm curious.

[1784] Makes me sound like Wilford Brimley.

[1785] I was watching this video where Ben Stein was on the Internet.

[1786] He was talking about how bad he got wrecked by the second shot.

[1787] but Ben Stein is like 80, right?

[1788] I mean, he was a writer, speechwriter for Nixon.

[1789] Yeah, yeah, Bueller.

[1790] Yeah, Bueller.

[1791] Yeah, he's been around a long time.

[1792] I'm trying to think, actually, you know, that's not true.

[1793] I do know some folks in their, in their, what were 40s, early 40s.

[1794] How did they do?

[1795] They also said the same thing.

[1796] In fact, one of the guys, I got the shots because I was doing some work for a company that's considered to be a, whatever they call it, a critical infrastructure company.

[1797] So they put me on their list of people that they wanted to have because they were given a certain number of, of, vaccines.

[1798] So they said, you know, can you, would you mind getting on the list?

[1799] And so I said, fine.

[1800] But I remember some of their folks, probably late 30s and early 40s, they all said the same thing, which is that, yeah, the second shot, knocked them on their ass.

[1801] It varied a little bit.

[1802] A couple of days, maybe three days.

[1803] They all had sort of the same thing.

[1804] Fever, chills, aches.

[1805] It flu symptoms, right, basically.

[1806] And again, I didn't think anything of it because I I haven't had a reaction in the past, but yeah, it was, you know, it was kind of shitty, but, you know, I mean, I, look, I, you know, I've got some, you know, I had a heart attack, right?

[1807] I've had cancer, right?

[1808] So I was happy to get it, right?

[1809] Because I don't want to, you know, you hear the stories about people, you know, get COVID and they've had other issues in the past.

[1810] Right.

[1811] Okay, fine.

[1812] I felt like, you know, and at my age, you know, whatever I am, 48.

[1813] I feel like.

[1814] so I felt like I'm going to get it and it wasn't that bad right in the scheme of things I don't want to sound like a whiner it really wasn't that bad it was 24 hours of feeling like shit big deal and then the next day you're fine yeah yeah yeah I was fine and then you know did you work out at all afterwards yeah oh yeah yeah the next day yeah I felt fine I actually I feel I feel better if I work out in fact I tried to work out that day when I felt like shit because you get kind of get moving right and you feel you know what it's I mean you know and you know I went upstairs we got a home gym and I tried to And I thought, fuck that.

[1815] I can't do it.

[1816] Because it was, it's just the temperature changes.

[1817] We're just like really screwing with me. But, you know, it is interesting.

[1818] It's, I've been surprised by the number of people who don't want to take it, right, who are disinclined and included in that number of healthcare people, right, who are saying, eh, I'm going to give it a pass.

[1819] Yeah.

[1820] So I think that's surprised a lot of people, right?

[1821] The general public, and that doesn't send a good message to the general public when they see health care, you know, professionals saying, I think I'm going to give this a miss and everybody's got to make that decision for me it was like fine fuck it I'll take it and you know again maybe I'm too simplistic but you know fine you know and my wife has got the first shot she's going to get the second shot at some point here I think the next couple of weeks so it'll be interesting to see because she's somewhat younger than I am and then there's that Johnson Johnson one where you take one shot but it's not as effective yeah and that's interesting because again I think people need to go in and it's just like with everything else.

[1822] Regardless of what you're reading, you need to figure out what the outlet is, right?

[1823] Because there is no doubt.

[1824] I can't go back to the same thing.

[1825] I sound like I'm beating a fucking dead horse.

[1826] But the FSB, the Russian intel service, is engaged in a covert action campaign right now to denigrate the U .S. manufactured vaccines.

[1827] So I'm not saying there's not legit information out there that says, you know, you should think about it.

[1828] Maybe it's not right for you.

[1829] Fine.

[1830] But at least know what the hell you're reading, right?

[1831] And pay attention to what the sources of information are that you're getting.

[1832] And until that day when we all can figure out what the intent is immediately, yeah, I mean, pay attention to what you're doing.

[1833] Whether you're reading about foreign policy or domestic politics or the vaccine, just fucking pay attention.

[1834] What's weird is that they want you to take the vaccine even if you've already had COVID and you have the antibodies.

[1835] That's weird.

[1836] Yeah.

[1837] That doesn't make sense.

[1838] Like, Jamie's got strong antibodies.

[1839] Jamie got the, he caught COVID in October.

[1840] He was barely sick.

[1841] He didn't even think he had COVID.

[1842] He thought he had a sinus infection.

[1843] Jamie, speak for yourself.

[1844] I'm still strong with antibodies now.

[1845] Strong.

[1846] Strong.

[1847] Strong.

[1848] Strong.

[1849] Like, fucking Ronnie Coleman's strong.

[1850] Like, we looked at his, uh, his antibodies, fucking thick, thick fat line.

[1851] Today, today, me, here we are.

[1852] What is it?

[1853] March, what is it, March, what is today?

[1854] Today's the ninth.

[1855] March 9th.

[1856] March 9th.

[1857] Oh, God.

[1858] Five months.

[1859] Five months, strong antibodies.

[1860] The kids are freak.

[1861] Look at them.

[1862] Well, I mean, yeah, he seems a picture of health, right?

[1863] Specimen.

[1864] It's got me, God.

[1865] But, I mean, why would anybody tell him that he has to take a vaccine?

[1866] That's a thing that keeps coming up, even if you've had COVID.

[1867] I didn't know that was the advice.

[1868] I thought they were saying you don't need to get in line for the vaccine if you've already had it.

[1869] I didn't know that.

[1870] No, they're telling people, even if you've had the vaccine, or excuse me, if you've had COVID, you should still take the vaccine.

[1871] And I don't necessarily think I understand that.

[1872] Yeah, I would think they'd be pushing.

[1873] people who have tested positive, like Jamie, who, you know, now has superpowers, that they would push them to the back of the line, basically, and say, you know, what, I'm not going to prioritize you for the vaccine because that actually doesn't make sense.

[1874] Look, you think about that the population in the U .S. that's had COVID already, and then you think about the numbers that have been vaccinated, and you've got to think, okay, is that line shifting?

[1875] That line that where we thought a year ago, we get to this number, we're approaching herd immunity or whatever they call it.

[1876] you would think we're almost there, right?

[1877] And I don't know.

[1878] They think we are approaching it.

[1879] They think we're going to hit it somewhere around the end of April.

[1880] That Fauci guy needs to shut the fuck up.

[1881] As much as he's an expert and God bless him.

[1882] But he keeps saying that one of the things he said that made me angry, he said, we're never going to shake hands again.

[1883] Yeah, we're never going to go back to shaking hands again.

[1884] I never stopped.

[1885] What the fuck are you saying?

[1886] Wash your hands.

[1887] It's not, shaking your hand is not going to kill people.

[1888] Stop saying things like that.

[1889] He says too many things that he takes back and too many things that he said in the beginning that masks don't work and now he's saying wear two masks like come on man I think I think he's become a little enamored of the limelight right I think he's you know and that's a natural human thing I think but I think he you know I'm not saying that it's he's not you know he's a scientist right fine great okay yo believe science but I'm just saying human condition is you know he's a human the attention is It's been not unattractive to him.

[1890] And so then some of the things he says, and I think that's been part of the problem for the general population, is the inconsistency of messaging.

[1891] And I think part of that is because people are starting to realize, like, look, medicine's not a fucking black and white issue, right?

[1892] It's not a science.

[1893] And I have...

[1894] Well, it is a science, but it's not consistent across all human beings.

[1895] Right, right.

[1896] But it's not, it's not, look, there's a lot of educated guesses to go on in medicine.

[1897] Yes.

[1898] Right?

[1899] I had a stress test.

[1900] and a full workout for for for for my heart uh and they said whatever you're doing keep doing you're in great shame god bless you eating a lot of steaks ah i eat a lot of steaks uh do you i i like red meat i'm not going to lie i like red meat me too keep talking it's good protein man oh yeah we're going to start talking about elk elk porn and uh so uh but then a week later I have a widow maker on an airplane, right?

[1901] Just drop on an airplane.

[1902] What do you mean?

[1903] I was going to Puerto Rico to give a speech at a conference.

[1904] And thank God, Emily was with me. We were flying.

[1905] They said, look, you're coming down to Puerto Rico.

[1906] It's a really nice place.

[1907] Stay for a few days afterwards, you know?

[1908] So all I do is give a stupid talk for a little while and, you know, something boring.

[1909] And they said, hang out.

[1910] So Emily came with me. We were going to have a really great time.

[1911] We passed through DFW through Dallas.

[1912] We got to the airport in Dallas, waited for the connection.

[1913] out on the connection, going to Puerto Rico, get on the plane, sit there, they wind up the engines, move off to the taxi, they get to the runway, they literally pointing down the runway, winding up the engines.

[1914] And I look at them and I go, I'm not feeling that, and that was the last thing I said.

[1915] I didn't even get to work good out.

[1916] And I just collapsed, right?

[1917] I was done.

[1918] How long ago was this?

[1919] This was three years ago.

[1920] And a week before I had a stress test where they said, everything's good, man. you look good and I got a family that's got a history of heart concerns right so that's why I was in for the stress tests and and if if my wife hadn't been with me I would have died on that plane because everyone would have thought you know how the engines wind up and you get ready and people fall asleep it's just you know it's a white noise and so but uh she jumped up and said get this fucking plane back to the gate and one of the attendants said uh would he like some orange juice because I mean she probably thought I was diabetic or something I passed out and And according to a couple of doctors on the plane who came to visit me afterwards, they said my wife was very funny.

[1921] She said, he doesn't want to eat fucking orange juice.

[1922] Get back to the fucking gate.

[1923] So we got to the gate.

[1924] Luckily, the Baylor, the Grapevine Institute, the Heart Institute, is like seven minutes away, right?

[1925] I couldn't have been luckier.

[1926] And so we get back to the gate.

[1927] They get me off the plane.

[1928] I wake up on a hospital bed, staring up with the doctor who's like right there in my face, right?

[1929] And I come to it, and he says, he's very funny, but he says, you know how you can avoid this in the future?

[1930] And I'm like, where the fuck am I?

[1931] Is this, like, you know, have I gone to the afterlife and this is what it is?

[1932] I'm, you know, talking to a doctor.

[1933] And he says, have different parents.

[1934] And then he laughed, right?

[1935] That was the first thing I saw.

[1936] What I did?

[1937] No, he was funny.

[1938] He's a great guy.

[1939] Great doctor.

[1940] Thank God he was there.

[1941] But anyway, but the point being is that what I learned from that episode and then the subsequent treatment and all the other things that go on with it, I should have known before because I'm old enough to be pragmatic, but a lot of medicine is educated guests.

[1942] Right.

[1943] And yet the general population, right, has grown up to believe that medicine is science is definite, is black and white.

[1944] Here's your answer.

[1945] And that's not the way it is.

[1946] And I think so I think it's natural that with a pandemic like this, of course there's going to be, it's not misinformation.

[1947] It's just inconsistent messaging because we're still figuring it out, right?

[1948] So that's not, it's not medicine's fault.

[1949] It's just the way it is.

[1950] But that creates this distrust among the public because they're anticipating that it's all going to be clear, right?

[1951] You're going to get the exact answer that you want, and it's going to be right.

[1952] And it's not.

[1953] So we've had this period of time over this year where people kind of wig up and you get these different sides arguing about things.

[1954] We're just trying to figure it the fuck out.

[1955] So do the smart thing.

[1956] Just try to be responsible, right?

[1957] But don't expect that, you know, medicine is going to give you the answers right off the bat and it's going to be correct.

[1958] Just like, don't fucking turn to the federal government.

[1959] I don't know where I'm going with this.

[1960] But don't turn to the federal government for a all your answers, and, you know, don't buy an MGB and expect it to work.

[1961] Or a Range Rover, expected to make it out of the woods.

[1962] So when you had this heart attack, what advice they give you in terms of, like, how do you keep from having one again?

[1963] Well, they put me on blood thinners.

[1964] That was a big part of it.

[1965] So did you have, like, some sort of a clot or something?

[1966] I did.

[1967] My one side was entirely blocked.

[1968] Whoa.

[1969] Yeah.

[1970] And so that's what they call the Widowmaker when you, it just like, it just happens.

[1971] Did they tell you to resume cardio or to have more cardio?

[1972] Yeah, I went into some, you know, sort of very slow.

[1973] It was very funny because they put me in this program where I show up and I'm basically it's an exercise program.

[1974] So I would go there four days a week and everybody in there was at least like 25 years older than I was, right?

[1975] And I'm, you know, I'm not young, but they were all in there.

[1976] And so they'd kind of be walking around the track.

[1977] And I was like, I'm hooked up and I'm walking around.

[1978] I made some great friends, frankly.

[1979] So some of these guys were fantastic.

[1980] And so you'd go there, I actually was looking forward to it.

[1981] I'd go and I had coffee with Fred, and Fred's, you know, 89 years old, and we'd have a great time talking.

[1982] But they'd be looking to me like I was 20 years old, which I kind of enjoyed, right?

[1983] Because I'm the youngest guy in there.

[1984] But it was, so it was a lot of, you know, build back up your level.

[1985] Now I work out just like I did before, right?

[1986] But the interesting thing is that they basically, now, when you go in and you say, because there was some talk about, well, let's do the other side, meaning let's get in there and clear it out, put a couple of stents in the other side and make sure you're all good.

[1987] But they're like, you know, you talk to one cardiologist, and they said, maybe we should.

[1988] And the other said, eh, maybe we shouldn't because there's a risk if we go in there.

[1989] So maybe we just wait.

[1990] And then their answer is always kind of like, well, if you start to feel anything, then, you know, we'll go in there and we'll intervene.

[1991] And you think, well, I didn't feel anything before.

[1992] Right.

[1993] So just came out of nowhere.

[1994] I'm just but again being fairly pragmatic I'm thinking well that's that's life right there's no fucking guarantees I don't have a I don't have a problem with that change your perspective at all like having a widow maker experience where you're almost died did you get out of that saying you know like where you like not to be cliche but every day is a gift like that kind of shit yeah I mean look I had a stretch of time with the with that with the heart situation I also had colon cancer right because I I I did what a lot of guys do I thought I I put off the colonoscopy, and I put it off.

[1995] You're supposed to start when you're 50, I think, is the general advice.

[1996] And I was thinking, like, I have no interest in going in and getting a colonoscopy.

[1997] It just doesn't, it's not the sort of thing.

[1998] So I always found a reason to put it off.

[1999] I put it off for like five years.

[2000] And then finally, my wife said, no, you got to go and get it done.

[2001] For no reason, it's just I wasn't feeling bad or anything.

[2002] She said, you've got to go get it done.

[2003] So I went in.

[2004] It turns out it's nothing, right?

[2005] If my one piece of advice to anybody as a dude to other guys is go get your fucking colonoscopy because you don't even know it's happening, you know, and it's not like some sort of prison situation, you're fine, right?

[2006] You're going to wake up, you have no idea it happened, but get it done when you turn 50, start doing that.

[2007] Why is it with guys?

[2008] Like, what is it about guys?

[2009] I have no idea.

[2010] I have no idea.

[2011] I mean, I probably should have researched it afterwards, but I remember going and getting it, and then I'm still doped up, right?

[2012] And so I kind of wake up, and I'm aware that M standing there talking to the doctor, who would turn out to be a great doctor.

[2013] She's fantastic.

[2014] And they're talking, but I don't know what they're talking about.

[2015] So then we go from there, and I go immediately to another part of the hospital to get some tests done, some scans and everything.

[2016] And then I get some more tests done.

[2017] And then I go home, and I'm happy as a clam, right?

[2018] Because I'm still lubed up.

[2019] I'm still just, you know, I've got whatever anesthesia they use, and I'm feeling pretty good.

[2020] And I go upstairs.

[2021] I want to take a nap.

[2022] wake up from my nap a couple hours later and I'm happy as a clam I'm going to go outside and do some work and M says you don't have no idea what what's going on do you and I said no so it turns out I had to have cancer and they they'd schedule me already I'd go in and get a what they'd take a section of your colon out right turns out we got like six feet of everybody's got like six feet of whatever colon or again I'm not a doctor but they had to take out a section of it through the surgery and I like yeah I had no idea until it was explained me so you go in you do all of that and then you got a period of time where you got to go through some treatment and everything and but again you don't you can sit and you can think about it and you can go oh my god why you know i don't have no history of that in my family just happened just happened as they said it was it was an outlier do you know do you take vitamins do you yeah doing the sauna do you like do you do anything to take care of something i'm a healthy guy i mean in the sense i mean i watch you know i okay i read meat but i watch my my diet meat's not bad for you No, I exercise a lot.

[2023] You know, I've got an active lifestyle.

[2024] I do all those things, right?

[2025] There's a lot of people that try to make correlations between red meat being bad for you, but they're all from epidemiology studies where people are eating cheeseburgers and fries and shakes.

[2026] Exactly.

[2027] If you're just eating steak and vegetables, that's normal human food.

[2028] I mean, people have been eating meat since the beginning of people.

[2029] Yeah, I haven't changed.

[2030] I know it sounds weird, but after the heart attack, after the cancer day, I haven't changed my diet because I had a good diet before, right?

[2031] Does anybody try talking to being a vegan?

[2032] Nobody that knows me well.

[2033] Nobody had, like, I got some nieces who are very serious vegans, and they're up, and they're like, you know, they're like a religious zealot, right?

[2034] There's nobody more, you know, obnoxious than somebody who's adapted to religion, right?

[2035] They get zealous about it.

[2036] Vegans kind of can be the same way.

[2037] God bless them, they want to do that, that's fine.

[2038] Don't get up in my face about it.

[2039] Yeah, I got some family.

[2040] It's an interesting psychological thing because they just want to show it.

[2041] everybody that they're doing the right thing and they really do believe in it you know it's it's weird i've a friend who's a vegan who's a real asshole he's such a shitty person to other people that aren't vegans it's like isn't it supposed to be all about kindness meanwhile the the the you're just a terrible person of people it's like but it's like a lot of other things right it's just like you know i you know it's like wearing a mask fine i i don't care about wearing a mask i'll wear a mask but don't get up in my face about about well there's there's things that happen where people people use those opportunities as it's a moment for them to yell at folks.

[2042] It's a moment for them to be righteous and, you know.

[2043] Yeah, never underestimate the strength of the power of someone feeling righteous and smarter than anybody else.

[2044] And that's, and again, but to answer your question about every day a gift and everything, you know what, I kind of felt that way before, right?

[2045] I've seen my, you know, I've seen my family going.

[2046] I've seen, you know, siblings and good friends.

[2047] So I always felt like, you know, yeah, every day's a gift, but I don't think you need some sort of life -changing moment if your priorities are right to think that.

[2048] Well, some people, that life -changing moment, though, is just enough of a jolt to just let you know, like, this is real.

[2049] Because sometimes we all know we're going to die, but it's not something you dwell on.

[2050] But when you almost die, don't you dwell on it more?

[2051] for a little while I'll tell you what the one the one reaction to the heart attack on the plane was was getting on other planes right and I got to travel a lot for my line of work and so there was that moment where I get on a plane because you feel like okay I got no choice if I'm sitting on a 13 hour flight right and I'm halfway through it I'm fucked if something else happens right so there was that that side of it but otherwise no there was no there was no come to Jesus moment where I thought oh my god I just I will say this I don't dwell on death but I do find myself this sounds really odd but I find myself sometimes thinking you know I just want like just give me 25 more years or give me you know get me 30 more years or whatever because What are you plan on doing those 30 years?

[2052] Well you know what?

[2053] Nothing?

[2054] I just want to see my kids grow up and and you don't want to leave them behind and leave them sad Yeah it's like it's like you know what's that old line from Butch Cassidy, the Sundance kid, Butch said, you know, I always thought when I grow up I was going to be a hero.

[2055] I don't think that I'm going to be a hero when I grow up, right?

[2056] But I want to see my kids grow up.

[2057] That's, that to me is the driver.

[2058] I want to say, I got young kids, right?

[2059] I got young boys.

[2060] So I want to see them grow up.

[2061] You know what line?

[2062] I thought you were going to say?

[2063] What?

[2064] When they're about to jump off the cliff?

[2065] Yeah.

[2066] One of them goes, I can't swim.

[2067] He goes, doesn't matter.

[2068] The fall is probably going to kill you anyway.

[2069] So many good lines out of that movie.

[2070] Yeah, I know.

[2071] That's a great movie.

[2072] Yeah.

[2073] Oh, my God.

[2074] Yeah.

[2075] I don't think anybody I don't think anybody at 40 actually remembers that movie.

[2076] No, it's a great movie.

[2077] Oh, God, it was funny.

[2078] Yeah, there's a lot of those movies, man, from those days.

[2079] And, you know, people, they told stories different back then.

[2080] Yeah.

[2081] Yeah, there was more character development and fewer explosions.

[2082] It wasn't influenced by, like, you know, these studies, these focus groups.

[2083] They're trying to figure out what people tune into and what people don't tune into.

[2084] They were just trying to tell a story.

[2085] yeah yeah and and and it was and you could develop the story in a slower fashion yeah right there wasn't in part because i go back to what we were talking about the access to information right it's created shorter attention spans right uh yeah uh it's too much yeah and so people want that answer right away they want they want they want satisfaction right away they want you know i'm going to buy something i'm going to buy it right away i you know i want the story to get over with so you know i can move on to the next one i'm going to binge watch something and so yeah i think i think there was something to that.

[2086] I mean, there were a lot of bad movies made in the old days, but I mean, but, you know, a lot of them did allow for more dialogue, more story development, more character development.

[2087] They were appreciated and respected your intelligence enough that you could sit and watch something.

[2088] A couple years back, it's been a couple years, but a couple years back I watched Lamonts with Stephen Queen.

[2089] Yes.

[2090] And the beginning of the movie, there's no dialogue for a long -ass time.

[2091] For a long -ass time, it's just setting up this, you know, this scenario.

[2092] That's a great movie.

[2093] That's a great movie.

[2094] Great movie.

[2095] Oh, God.

[2096] Great movie.

[2097] And, you know, you realize, like, what those guys had to go through back then, driving those race cars in the 1960s, those things were death traps.

[2098] Yeah.

[2099] Death traps and a lot of physical work.

[2100] Oh, yeah.

[2101] You were beat to hell by the time you finished.

[2102] Well, LeMons is 24 hours.

[2103] Yeah.

[2104] You're driving for a full day.

[2105] I mean, that's part of what the race was about was your mental endurance.

[2106] Yeah.

[2107] That's a good result.

[2108] If all this does is get people to watch Le Mans or Butch Cassidy, that's great.

[2109] And pay attention to China.

[2110] Yeah, pay attention to China.

[2111] Yeah, going back to, I did want to touch on the Syria thing because I think it is important.

[2112] What is going on over there?

[2113] Well, I think it's interesting for a couple of reasons, but one is just, I found interesting was the realization amongst a lot of people that we still had troops over in Iraq, right?

[2114] That seemed to catch a lot of people off guard because what happened was there's Eastern Syria where we did the airstrikes, a couple of weeks ago, we struck a facility that is essentially a hub, a center for transportation of fighters, foreign fighters, and money and hardware, weapons, that the Iranians have set up.

[2115] Iranians have basically created a transportation system from Tehran to all the way to Beirut, right in their effort to try to control the region and so you had this eastern syria outpost with iranian backed militia and they were engaged in occasional attacks against u .s and coalition forces right so they were they were lobbing missiles and and and there were a couple of incidents where we lost contractors and some coalition members and so essentially what happened was the the Biden administration I think correctly so said okay look we got to we got to do something we got to send a And so they did.

[2116] They, you know, they struck a facility there run by some Iranian -backed militia.

[2117] But the news that it was because of the attacks that they were committing on U .S. forces in Iraq, that's the interesting part because they caught people by surprise and going, like, what the fuck?

[2118] We still got people in Iraq because we've gone, we've gone well beyond that time when, you know, support our troops.

[2119] You know, wounded warrior and there was always, you know, the ads up there.

[2120] And everybody thought about it, right?

[2121] But it's been, I think about how many years it's been, right?

[2122] And so I think we've forgotten that we still have.

[2123] We don't have many, but we still have troops over there.

[2124] And so it raised an interesting question, which is an important one to talk about, I think, which is, you know, why are we still over there?

[2125] Or what are we doing over there?

[2126] What's our end game?

[2127] What's our reason for being, right?

[2128] And, you know, look, 19 years, 20 years since we've been in Afghanistan as an example.

[2129] And what that, you know, what's the point?

[2130] And so I think that's a legitimate conversation to have, regardless of where you fall on on the answer i think it's it's a good question to have and we should be talking about it but we don't because we get wrapped up in domestic politics or we get wrapped up in covid or whatever it is so occasionally something like that happens that causes people to to shift their focus outside of their bubble and outside the u .s and think about what the hell else is going on in the world and that's from my perspective anyway that's a good thing right because there is a lot of happening over there but it's just shocking how little coverage there is yeah because And how much coverage there is about Ted Cruz wanting to go to Cancun, right?

[2131] Yeah.

[2132] If you look at the difference, that was in the front center of the media.

[2133] That was the thing they were talking about the most.

[2134] That was all, because that's, and they know that, look, most journalism now is on social media, in a sense, right?

[2135] And so it's all about getting clicks on your story, which is why headlines are so sensational, oftentimes don't line up with the actual story then, right?

[2136] Because all you want to do is you want to get people clicking on it, right, and are talking about it.

[2137] And that's the way that the journalism gets driven forward.

[2138] So, yeah, it's no surprise that Ted Coon or Ted Coon, Ted Coon, Ted Cruz and Cancun.

[2139] Who's Ted Cune?

[2140] I was combining Cancun and Ted Cruz.

[2141] I came up with Ted Coon.

[2142] I'm not saying not to go with it.

[2143] So that's why that gets the attention.

[2144] And air strikes in Syria, you're not going to get the clicks on that, right?

[2145] People aren't going to let go.

[2146] Oh, that's interesting.

[2147] It's outrageous to see Ted Cruz in the middle of a crisis that's, happening in Texas, his state, he's a senator, he decides to leave the state and go to a resort in Mexico.

[2148] Yeah, that's going to get more clicks and likes.

[2149] You, son of a bitch.

[2150] Yeah, yeah.

[2151] So it's on, from, again, that, it makes sense why certain stories drive a narrative, right?

[2152] Because, again, because people have sort of a very short attention span, limited time in their day to gather information.

[2153] They're going to go for the salacious thing.

[2154] And so, yeah, yeah, cruise in Cancun, why not?

[2155] Syria?

[2156] It's too complicated.

[2157] It's too complicated and it's also so far away.

[2158] It's hard for people to wrap their heads around it.

[2159] Yeah.

[2160] But it is, I mean, it will be very interesting to see where this administration goes.

[2161] I mean, again, God bless them.

[2162] I hope they do well.

[2163] We should have hoped that the Trump administration did well.

[2164] We should, you know.

[2165] You should always hope they do well because they do well, we do well.

[2166] Exactly.

[2167] The problem is when people don't want them to do well.

[2168] Like, I was hearing people saying that they wanted the economy to tank so it would get people to realize that Trump's a fraud.

[2169] Like, why the fuck would you want the economy?

[2170] economy to tank.

[2171] Yeah.

[2172] It's like even if you hate Trump, you'd want them to do well because then the country does well.

[2173] Yeah.

[2174] It seems like a simple equation.

[2175] Yeah.

[2176] You don't know the guy.

[2177] It's not like you talk to him every day.

[2178] Oh, this dick again.

[2179] Like, just stop watching CNN.

[2180] Yeah.

[2181] You won't be so angry.

[2182] Well, the problem is access to instantaneous information.

[2183] That's the problem.

[2184] Isn't it weird how they're taking out Cuomo now?

[2185] Oh, New York.

[2186] Although with New York, your problem, probably one more sexual harassment allegation away from opening up New York.

[2187] Yeah, getting the restaurants open.

[2188] And so I think they're probably hoping one more woman will show up and say, yeah, you know.

[2189] Yeah, but De Blasio doesn't want anything to be open up.

[2190] That fucking wrong.

[2191] Yeah.

[2192] Yeah, it is, yeah, although he's, it's interesting to see the dynamic, right, with Cuomo and De Blasio, they've never seen eye -dye.

[2193] They've always been kind of going at each other.

[2194] And De Blasio sees us as a moment.

[2195] Yes.

[2196] Right?

[2197] And I think he felt like he was probably done, right?

[2198] Nobody really wants him as mayor in New York, the people that are in New York.

[2199] And so he probably sees this as a possible entrance ramp to the governor's slot, right?

[2200] He might be able to make his, well, I mean.

[2201] Everybody hates him.

[2202] Everybody hates him, but look, you know.

[2203] Do you see that video that he put out?

[2204] Stranger things have happened in politics.

[2205] I don't know about that.

[2206] That's pretty strange.

[2207] Even liberals don't like DeBlasio.

[2208] Did you see that video that he put about out about bringing the arts back to New York?

[2209] Yes.

[2210] You see that with the bad dancing, the out -of -sync music, and the uncoordinated dancing?

[2211] That was the weirdest thing ever.

[2212] That was like a part of a Cohen Brothers movie.

[2213] That's what that was like.

[2214] That was like the Big Lebowski.

[2215] Like, you're watching this.

[2216] You're like, what am I seeing?

[2217] I just watched that again the other night.

[2218] Fuck, that movie's good.

[2219] It's so fucking good.

[2220] Such a good movie, man. You know what I watched the other night?

[2221] A lot of my friends.

[2222] Face down in the muck.

[2223] Died!

[2224] Chinaman.

[2225] I don't think you're supposed to say, Chinaman.

[2226] There's so many good things in that movie.

[2227] You know what I watched the other night?

[2228] That's a great movie that I kind of forgot how good it was.

[2229] Napoleon Dynamite.

[2230] Oh.

[2231] My God, that was good.

[2232] My God, that was good.

[2233] My 10 -year -old did not understand it.

[2234] Really?

[2235] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[2236] She just, there's certain aspects of him.

[2237] She's like, he's dumb.

[2238] I'm like, that's the point.

[2239] Yeah.

[2240] The point is that's all dumb.

[2241] That's a brilliant movie.

[2242] My kids, again, we're out in Idaho.

[2243] My kids have all watched it.

[2244] They love that movie.

[2245] Fuck, that movie's funny.

[2246] Isn't it in Idaho?

[2247] It is, yeah.

[2248] It's a couple hours outside of Boisey.

[2249] God, it's funny.

[2250] My youngest boy, Mugsy, can do the entire dance.

[2251] Jamiroquai, I think, did the music for that.

[2252] And can't heat or whatever that song was.

[2253] And he can do that entire dance.

[2254] He did it for a talent show at school one time, which was absolutely brilliant.

[2255] The uncle who wants to a time machine.

[2256] Uncle Rico wants to go back in time to when he was playing football in high school.

[2257] I could throw that football over that mountain.

[2258] What fucking movie is so funny.

[2259] And then a dojo.

[2260] Oh, my God.

[2261] bow to your sensei it's just brilliant no it's a funny movie god that was funny yeah there he is yeah yeah lafonda remember lafonda comes out she turns out to be real don't worry don't worry demoli and you'll find your soulmate one day yeah yeah and everyone's thinking that lafonda's fake turns out she's real and they really do love each other it's a great movie man I caught you a tasty bass yeah no you're right that's a you know again there's certain movies I I had my boys watch old school the other day.

[2262] That's a great way, too.

[2263] Yeah, there's some movies I think the kids, boys at a certain age, should always watch.

[2264] I sound like I'm sexist, but, you know what I'm going to say.

[2265] But I got boys, so they should watch these movies.

[2266] But, yeah, old school's great, stepbrothers.

[2267] Isn't it funny that it's sexist if you say there's movies that you think a boy should watch, but it's not sexist if you say there's movies that I think girls should watch?

[2268] Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's true.

[2269] We got international women's day We just had international women's day Yeah, because men are all scared Yeah, we don't have men's day We're scared of being called out For being sexist Yeah We have careful You have to be careful about everything Right Right In fact, that's what Emily told me She dropped me off here She said just Be careful, you're talking about Rogan It's probably high No, no, no she loves your show But she's like She's worried about me She's worried about me saying something stupid And so Have you taken heat from shit You said on here in the past?

[2270] Yes, yes I have and a lot of it but that's fine what's the big one well the big one's in sort of a general category where you say that like the far right they're full of shit and the far left's full of shit and then people get upset because what I get mostly is well if you're in the middle you don't stand for anything that's ridiculous but that's what you hear mostly is because because you say something about you know how fucked up the far like the mask burning like that's fucked up right or you say something stupid about like the far left, you know, not seeing the irony of wanting to ban books, you know, and you're thinking, okay, fine, but then you get called out because you exist somewhere in the center where you're trying to see that there's smart ideas on both sides, and yet people are so angry that they don't want that, right?

[2271] And it's like that idea that we were talking about before, where the people who are shining during the pandemic, who love the suffering in a sense, right, who really don't want us to return to a normal because they've actually found this to be a good time for them.

[2272] And that sounds wrong.

[2273] I know that sounds wrong.

[2274] You know, a lot of people, but there are some people who seem to suffer well, right?

[2275] Yeah.

[2276] And, you know, to some degree, they're the same people who grieve well, right?

[2277] You know, you get those people who, they didn't know the person who died, but, you know, my God, they're grieving more than anybody else, including immediate family.

[2278] Right.

[2279] And so, I don't know.

[2280] I probably don't want to, don't want to disappear.

[2281] I'm I'll say something stupid and then I'll get caught out again but what do you think of saying that was maybe stupid let's talk about this Capitol Hill shit what did you think about that because we haven't talked about that yet that's happened this last time I saw you yeah that's you know what that's a good example of getting called out on shit I did a show on the sixth right it was a news a new segment where I was talking and I said that President Trump's reaction that day was pathetic and that's what I said right And my point was is that a lot of what he did over his four years, it was just self -inflicted wounds.

[2282] It was unnecessary, right?

[2283] And a lot of the noise was unnecessary.

[2284] It was because of his personality and the way that he responded, right?

[2285] Now, I know his base love that because they felt like, well, that's real, right?

[2286] And he's really speaking truth to power.

[2287] He's not part of the swamp and all that.

[2288] But my point was, look, you can be smart enough as the president of the United States to come out in a meeting to say, regardless of what's going on.

[2289] just say back the fuck off yeah right this is wrong right don't do it right you can protest but not violently and get the fuck out of the capital building right right and he didn't do that it was sort of the same thing that he always does which is it's not a strong statement and it's a self -inflicted wound so i said that man did i take some fucking heat right from the right from the right side from the right side who's saying ah yeah yeah yeah full what people on the right don't think that that's wise.

[2290] That's what I understand.

[2291] Well, it's the people on the farthest spectrum, which again, I go back to the same thing.

[2292] Now, now they have to understand that they were wrong.

[2293] You would think so.

[2294] But I think a lot of people don't.

[2295] A lot of people still think, um, look, was there fraud in the election?

[2296] Yes, I believe, but there's fraud in every election, right?

[2297] It's just, it's the nature of the beast.

[2298] That's what I said was like, do you think that the fraud in the election was zero?

[2299] No one thinks that.

[2300] No. Oh.

[2301] I mean, how much do you think the fraud?

[2302] was.

[2303] Do you think the fraud was enough to shift the election one way or the other?

[2304] I don't.

[2305] I don't think so either.

[2306] But I don't know.

[2307] But I think that if we allow, if we allow to normalize certain aspects of the electoral system, I think what you're doing, look, I work in fraud all the time, right?

[2308] That's what my guys do in my business.

[2309] That's all they, they work in fraud.

[2310] If you allow conditions to create a potential for fraud, then people are going to fill that gap and they're going to rush in and they're going to engage in fraud.

[2311] So if you, this is the part that I can't figure out.

[2312] Everybody should want right, right or left to allow the ability, the easy access to vote for every U .S. citizen.

[2313] But we should also want to not have people who aren't citizens or whatever.

[2314] I mean, just to not allow fraud into the system.

[2315] And so I have, I have a hard time understanding how people can't come together and say, yeah, we want integrity in our electoral system.

[2316] Do you think any other country allows for a sort of lax program that says, eh, we're not going to check?

[2317] And we're just going to, we're so keen to show how righteous we are that everybody has easy access to voting that we're not going to check and make sure they're a citizen.

[2318] I guarantee you, every other country makes sure that the people voting are citizens of that country, if they're given the right to vote.

[2319] We don't do that?

[2320] Well, what I'm saying is there's a potential if we just expand the ability to vote, right?

[2321] In our desire.

[2322] Well, no, I'm not even saying non -citizens.

[2323] What I'm saying is the way that we allow people to vote.

[2324] If we don't have integrity in ensuring that the vote is coming from a legitimate citizen, right, and the right and the right, we should, everybody, you want people to be able to vote.

[2325] Of course you want fucking people to vote.

[2326] It's like believe science.

[2327] Of course you believe science, right?

[2328] But you want everybody to be able to vote, and you want them to be able to do it easily.

[2329] But you also want to make sure that you're not opening it up in your desire to allow people to vote so that you're not, you don't have the ability to check and make sure that there's no fraud.

[2330] So that doesn't seem to be a heavy lift.

[2331] Allow easy access to voting for every U .S. citizen, but ensure that the integrity of the system allows you to make sure that you just have U .S. citizens voting for your country's elections.

[2332] That's what every other country does.

[2333] And again, it goes back to that thing about sometimes we apologize for it.

[2334] It's a righteous idea that, you know, well, you know, I don't know.

[2335] Let me ask you this, instead of like examining all the problems.

[2336] What could be done to make voting more secure?

[2337] Like, is it possible to vote online?

[2338] I mean, I've said, why is it that we can bank online, but we can't vote online?

[2339] Yeah.

[2340] Well, I think if your system, part of the problem, I think, think as if your system isn't clearly explainable and transparent.

[2341] If people can't look at it and go, I see.

[2342] And the reason why, like in -person voting, right, the day of the election was for so long, was, nobody questioned it, was because that's simple, that's transparent.

[2343] You can look at it and you say, yeah, I get it.

[2344] That's what happens.

[2345] It's election day.

[2346] Everybody go to the voting polls and vote.

[2347] And so if you're doing it online or there's just unsolicited mail -in ballots, then people can look at that and legitimately go, well, I don't understand it.

[2348] And so therefore, I don't know that it's incredible.

[2349] Do you think the mail -in ballots leave more of an opportunity for fraud?

[2350] There's a potential.

[2351] Do I think, I mean, again, I go back to the same thing.

[2352] Do I think there was enough in this patent?

[2353] No, it wasn't so much fraud that.

[2354] But I think that - Do you think there's fraud on both sides?

[2355] Do you think there's fraud on the Republican side and the Democrat side?

[2356] Oh, sure.

[2357] So it probably cancels itself out?

[2358] Well, I think it's, I think there's a, there's a, you know, again, you go back to the human condition.

[2359] I think it's, if there's an opportunity for fraud, I don't think, you know, Republicans are going to be less inclined than Democrats or Democrats are less inclined than Republicans.

[2360] I just think it's the way it works.

[2361] But it's, I think you have to, you have to have a transparent, clearly explainable, you know, system that you can look at and go, yes, I get it.

[2362] That's why.

[2363] And so I'm a big fan of in -person voting.

[2364] And unsolicited mail -in ballots?

[2365] No. In the old days, we had absentee ballots.

[2366] And that was, look, we changed the rules to try to accommodate for the pandemic.

[2367] and that made sense, right?

[2368] But there has to be an ability for both sides to look at the system and say it's credible because it's clearly explainable and transparent, and I just don't think that's where we're at right now.

[2369] That's what created this confusion and distrust.

[2370] That's a very dangerous thing.

[2371] And also then we had outside elements trying to drop in there with their covert action campaigns to cede that inability to believe in the system.

[2372] So, yeah, we better get this nailed down.

[2373] before the next election.

[2374] Otherwise, we're going to have the same problems.

[2375] Yeah, I'm worried that Trump comes back in 2024, and I'm worried that these people that were at the Capitol building get more organized and more emboldened.

[2376] The only difference is what's really kind of hilarious is these dummies were also anti -maskers, so they all showed up with no matter.

[2377] I mean, it was like a perfect storm of stupid.

[2378] Yeah, it was a perfect storm of stupid.

[2379] Because if you think about it, the facial recognition abilities that we have now.

[2380] All they do is wear masks.

[2381] You fucking idiots, you could wear a mask.

[2382] and you'd be totally justified and nobody would ever catch you perfect opportunity to wear a mask and not be identified yeah and these fucking idiots are putting their feet up on nancy pelosi's desk oh my god taking photos yeah no that was and but there was but then they got to do a hot wash and we still haven't gotten the results of that yet in terms of the you know what what was the breakdown in all of this why why was it so difficult to just simply secure the capital building right and look at the difference between when the black lives matter protests were there and they had hundreds of security guards surrounding the Capitol building versus this.

[2383] Right.

[2384] Was a pittance.

[2385] Right.

[2386] And what was it?

[2387] But I think that's an easy thing to do, right?

[2388] To walk that back and say, okay, let's do an investigation.

[2389] But the problem is with D .C. is, you know, they seem incapable of doing an investigation into anything, right?

[2390] It's where good investigations go to die.

[2391] And yet these sort of things happen all the time.

[2392] You do a hot wash of some scenario or something that happened.

[2393] You can do that.

[2394] But in D .C., because of the dysfunctional nature of that place, I don't think we're going to get any sort of easy answers out of this.

[2395] But it should be relatively simple.

[2396] I know some of the people that were, you know, the sergeant of arms office there in Capitol building and Capitol Police guys.

[2397] And it shouldn't be difficult to say, what's the timeline?

[2398] Who talked about security in the days leading up to this?

[2399] Who requested additional security?

[2400] Why was it denied?

[2401] All these things need to be looked at and then explain to the general public in a clear and nonpartisan way.

[2402] do I think that's going to happen?

[2403] No, because it's Washington, D .C. Do you think that the attack on Capitol Hill in many ways is like what happens when the social media chickens come to roost?

[2404] This divide that we've had on social media that is accentuated by algorithms, it does emphasizes these echo chambers where people believe the election was stolen, and they only communicate with other people that believe, If you go there, we're going to get together patriots.

[2405] They were calling themselves patriots violating the law, right?

[2406] Violating the Capitol Hill, storming the gates, killing a cop, and you're calling yourself a patriot.

[2407] Look, I mean, I think the vast majority of those people, right, once they found themselves inside the Capitol building, we're probably like, oh, fuck, I'm in the Capitol building.

[2408] But you had some of those people who knew exactly what they were doing.

[2409] And they were, you know, they, and so they should be punished, of course.

[2410] But I think that, yes, I think social media played a big role in it.

[2411] I think Trump himself, you know, I know people were saying, well, he said, he called for peaceful protests.

[2412] Well, yes, but he could have done it in a better way.

[2413] He could have more demanding.

[2414] I don't think he anticipated that they were going to do that.

[2415] I think he thought they were going to go there and chant and scream like what has always happened and that would be the end of it.

[2416] Right.

[2417] Yeah, exactly.

[2418] Do I think Trump, you know, intended or thought that they were going to storm the capital?

[2419] Of course not.

[2420] No, but he did want to incite them.

[2421] to cheer and chant and let people know on his behalf like the same like that tape that got leaked of him calling up the governor of Georgia and telling them to change the election results yeah and be a patriot like that kind of shit everything's disconcerning everything's a problem with his messaging and self -inflicted wounds and look we we talked back in uh what november right i think was the last time.

[2422] And I think at that time, I said that, you know, he's losing the election and he should, the next important thing was going to be the Georgia Senate runs.

[2423] If, you know, if you're a Republican, you should be pissed off, that he wasn't smart enough to understand that after the election, he should have turned his attention to Georgia and simply said, all you to do now is you've got to focus on Georgia.

[2424] You got to get out there and vote.

[2425] You've got to do everything possible.

[2426] He couldn't do that.

[2427] He couldn't do it.

[2428] Now, look, that doesn't mean I don't like some of the policies of the previous administration, right?

[2429] You can, you know, you can have disagreements with the person who's in the White House and still like the policies, right, the foreign policy, the attitude towards China and the way that we dealt with China, some of the other things that we were doing.

[2430] That's great.

[2431] We don't live in that world now where you can separate and kind of, you know, look and analyze.

[2432] policies from people, right?

[2433] Now it's like, if you, if you say, look, there were self -inflicted wounds, people go, oh, you're fucked up, you're not a Republican and you're, you hate the policy.

[2434] I didn't know.

[2435] I'm just saying, look, he clearly, through his actions, caused the Republicans to lose Georgia, right?

[2436] He could have, from that bully pulpit of his, he could have pushed, and we probably would have won both of those elections in Georgia, right?

[2437] But he didn't do that.

[2438] How can you've done that?

[2439] What could you've done?

[2440] Simply by shutting up about election fraud and realizing that this is, the Democrats, one thing that they do, right?

[2441] And again, I'm a centrist here, but one of the things that I always thought Democrats do well is they focus on the end result, right, on the game, right, on the game plan.

[2442] And sometimes Republicans get lost in, like, principle and theory and, and the purity of it all, right?

[2443] And, and, and, and it's, It's like with, I don't know, so I think that what he could have done was just immediately pivot after the national election, the presidential election, and said, look, we're all disappointed, right?

[2444] It's not the result that we wanted.

[2445] But now we have an important task ahead of us, and that is the two Senate seats in Georgia.

[2446] If you like the policies that we've been promoting and you like the deregulation or you like the China policy or whatever it is.

[2447] folks your attention in Georgia but do you think that would have made a difference because the people that are on the fence do you think there's that many people that are on the fence that would have voted Republican but wound up voting Democratic because he...

[2448] I think I don't think they wound up voting Democratic I think they just stayed home I think what they did was they sowed this belief in the lack of integrity of the election system and they probably thought oh fuck it you know they stole the first one they're going to steal this one so I'm not going anywhere you know I'm going to protest or whatever it might be So I think that's where the mistake was.

[2449] But, you know, again, look, I, you know, what the hell?

[2450] I hope the Biden administration does a great job.

[2451] I hope they.

[2452] Do you think he's going to make it four years?

[2453] I hope he does.

[2454] I hope he does.

[2455] I mean, it's going to make it.

[2456] Yeah, of course he does.

[2457] You think he's going to make it four years?

[2458] You know, what am I?

[2459] If you had a bet.

[2460] If you had a bet.

[2461] If you last hundred bucks.

[2462] What's our bet?

[2463] We have a bet that I bet that Trump won't come back and run again.

[2464] Oh, he's coming back.

[2465] Oh, you, I know.

[2466] How much to it was our bet?

[2467] What was it, Jamie?

[2468] A thousand bucks?

[2469] Thousand bucks?

[2470] I think it was, I can't wait to spend that money.

[2471] Yeah, I think it was a thousand dollars.

[2472] I'm just reminding you because I still think I'm going to win.

[2473] I'm spending it right now.

[2474] He's coming back.

[2475] What are you going to spend it on?

[2476] Oh, good stuff.

[2477] All kinds of good stuff.

[2478] Good stuff.

[2479] I'm going to buy an eagle sculpture.

[2480] I think screaming.

[2481] He's coming back.

[2482] He's coming back.

[2483] I don't know.

[2484] I don't think so, but what did you think about when they attached in the COVID relief bill 180 days for the CIA to release all the information they have about the UFOs.

[2485] Did you see that?

[2486] That's one of the things I love about this.

[2487] We can go from there.

[2488] Yeah.

[2489] Oh, my God.

[2490] Yeah, we can't be taken seriously that way.

[2491] Yeah.

[2492] No, no. But I will say this.

[2493] I tell people this all the time.

[2494] They say, why is it so entertaining?

[2495] I say, because he's curious about everything.

[2496] He's genuinely curious about everything.

[2497] And that's a good question.

[2498] Look, I'm happy that when it comes to UFOs, there's a lot of things that the agency needs to keep you know off the radar right for sources and methods right it's a need to no issue and frankly again going back to what's in in you know the u .s. best interest you know for that day when china decides to release all of their intel operations and information then great maybe it's time for us to be transparent but that's not the way the world works a lot of it is a lot of it is just uh secret programs defense well well no what i'm saying what i'm saying is oh in terms of the UFO think Yeah, a great portion of it is.

[2499] Yeah, a great portion of is...

[2500] 50 %?

[2501] Oh, now the...

[2502] 47 % actually, but don't tell anybody I said that.

[2503] That's well known.

[2504] Inside the community.

[2505] Yeah, no, look, I think it's good because I think the...

[2506] Look, it's for the same reason that Pentagon released the information about ATIP about the Advanced Aronautical Thread identification program.

[2507] I think it's actually good.

[2508] There's no reason why we shouldn't.

[2509] unless you are talking about developmental aircraft as an example, right, which is important, because when you're talking about hypersonic aircraft or missiles or whatever it is, there's some stuff that needs to be kept off the radar screen because there is a tremendous competition going on right now, particularly for things like control of space.

[2510] That's going to be a huge issue, right?

[2511] Because the weaponization of space, for a long time, people were thinking, ah, space, it's a great exploration and it's good for mankind.

[2512] Frankly, you know, there is a race to figure out how to weaponize space.

[2513] And so as an example of what we're talking about, the idea of just saying, oh, we're going to open the books as a country and reveal all our information about, you know, developmental aircraft as an example, that's the wrong move, right?

[2514] But do you think there are any credible stories, whether it's from Commander David Fravor, who saw that Tick -Tac vehicle off the coast of San Diego or whatever, If I had to point to one, I would say Fravor.

[2515] Yeah.

[2516] I would say, without a doubt, I'd say the one that if I were somebody who's looking for some redemption, because I've been beating the drum about UFOs and nobody's ever believe me and they always roll their eyes, I would say the one thing that would give them comfort would be the incident with Commander Fravor and that sighting.

[2517] That's one that I have yet to see an explanation for that makes any sense.

[2518] Well, not only that, there was, they tracked it.

[2519] Yeah.

[2520] Like there's, oh, yeah.

[2521] Yeah, and then also it blocked their radar systems, which is an act of war, and actively jammed radar systems.

[2522] It's, it's not simple as like they saw something they didn't know what it was.

[2523] Like, they tracked this thing going from, I think it was close to 80 ,000 feet above sea level to one in one second.

[2524] Yeah.

[2525] No signs of propulsion.

[2526] Yeah.

[2527] No heat signatures, nothing, right?

[2528] And it was a, yeah, it's one of those things you look at and you go, okay, and look, the A -Tip program made sense in the sense that, you know, if a nation is out there, if the Chinese are out there, the Russians, or whomever, and they're developing propulsion capability that we don't know about, then, yeah, we should have a mechanism within the Pentagon, within the intel community to understand what that is.

[2529] Let's research, let's investigate, right?

[2530] And so oftentimes, you know, they come to a logical conclusion.

[2531] The favor, and I have yet to see any information that explains it.

[2532] So that to me, and also, as you pointed out, the way that it was tracked, the verification of it from very credible individuals.

[2533] That, to me, is like the prime example.

[2534] And they have video footage of this thing too.

[2535] And then on top of that, the Nimitz.

[2536] Yeah, they have gun camera footage.

[2537] It's incredible.

[2538] Yeah.

[2539] And the Nimitz saying that these things are fairly common, that they're seeing them every couple of weeks.

[2540] They were seeing them, and, you know, when Fravor's like, hey, guys, what the fuck is this?

[2541] And they're like, yeah, you see it?

[2542] Yeah.

[2543] We've been seeing these things.

[2544] And there's no upside for somebody like that, a very well -respected, you know, aviator with great experience.

[2545] There's no upside for these guys to come forward, right?

[2546] In fact, there's pressure to not because it's not necessarily good for your career, right?

[2547] To come in and say, I think I saw a UFO, right?

[2548] What do you think is going on?

[2549] I don't know.

[2550] We've talked about that before.

[2551] I'm not, you know.

[2552] I'm trying to get the right answer out of you.

[2553] asking it to you forget what you said before yeah i know right you forgot about the damn bet i shouldn't open my mouth i know people will go back to that though they would have called me out if trump comes back and runs they would say oh you owe him a thousand bucks can't wait to get that fucking screaming eagle in here that i'm gonna buy you know i'm gonna put i'll buy it for you with the money and i'll put a little plaque on there to say where it came from big bronze eagle i know big oh i've got one i i gave a speech one time up uh for a veterans day event and And they gave me this big eagle.

[2554] I keep it in my office now.

[2555] It's fantastic.

[2556] I keep in the background when I do news segments from my office.

[2557] And it's like perched over my shoulder.

[2558] Nice.

[2559] And you got to have one in here.

[2560] Anyway, I don't know.

[2561] You think about it at all?

[2562] Yeah, I do.

[2563] And like I said, with Blackfiles to Classify coming up, I just got another plug -in.

[2564] We're going to do an episode.

[2565] That's on the Discovery Channel, isn't it?

[2566] It is on Discovery Channel.

[2567] And you know what?

[2568] You can see the entire first season on Discovery Plus.

[2569] So I think it's foolish to discount these things because there's so much we don't know, right?

[2570] So, and the idea of thinking that somehow we're the only, you know, credible life forms out there, I think is ridiculous.

[2571] So I think it's a high possibility that there's, that there's, yes, I do think that.

[2572] But at the same time, then I also question sort of the way that that's great.

[2573] If some alien life force with amazing technology that we can't even fathom right now comes to visit us, then what the hell are they doing?

[2574] Are they just sort of like watching us just for their entertainment value?

[2575] So I'm always puzzled by that part, like, you know, the idea that, you know, I don't know.

[2576] Well, they probably want to observe, but they don't want to interfere.

[2577] It's probably if they're super advanced, they probably realize there's a process that, in tells us, intelligent life goes through, where there's stages of their evolutionary development in terms of use of technology, understanding of each other, mitigation of war and conflict, and then ultimately entrance into the Galactic Federation.

[2578] I'm on board that.

[2579] I'm good.

[2580] I'm good.

[2581] If I had a guess, that's what I would think is going on.

[2582] I hope we get good uniforms.

[2583] Space Force.

[2584] Space force.

[2585] Like that one over there, the silver one.

[2586] right we wear that when we get high and do shows sometimes that's fantastic it looks like some out of better call sol it's from amazon .com i got it from amazon i've been watching that again you watch better call sol i've never seen it you know oh you should watch it i'm watching it again a second time around it's actually really good it's so you know it's that's yeah breaking bad yeah so it's actually very entertaining it's well written and uh but yeah it's uh sol's not as good as that black file show though right it's not as good as a black file show which is the first season's on Discovery Plus.

[2587] And we're going to start filming in mid -April, traveling around the country, doing all the...

[2588] And you are going to cover UFOs.

[2589] We are covering UFOs.

[2590] We've got at least...

[2591] Anything else, salacious we get to add before we wrap this up?

[2592] I think that's about it.

[2593] Actually, we're getting...

[2594] I shouldn't say that.

[2595] This is interesting.

[2596] We're getting into...

[2597] We've invested recently in the cannabis business.

[2598] Oh.

[2599] Yeah, I know.

[2600] I'm starting to become a believer.

[2601] I'm not a believer in Bitcoin yet, but I'm a believer.

[2602] believer in the cannabis business well it's a fucking giant business it's like not being a believer in trees yeah they're out there it's like the lorax yeah yeah yeah no it's uh we've we've uh we've but we're hitting it from a different direction we're hitting it from because i've always thought I've done some some work a couple of shows on the problems that that are around cannabis in terms of the cash economy the inability of banking systems to get involved and all of that So we're going in on a business that does the, is worried about the tax and banking side of things.

[2603] So it's sort of the intersection of the trade with commerce and pulling it into, you know, sort of the legitimate world of commerce.

[2604] Well, that's one of the hopes of the Biden administration that they'll pass some sort of federal law on marijuana, that they'll change it and make it legal, which I think they should.

[2605] They should.

[2606] I think it's time at this point.

[2607] Look, the horses left the barn, regardless of where anybody thinks of.

[2608] about, like, you know, weed.

[2609] Yeah, you don't have to smoke it.

[2610] No, no. But in terms of legitimizing it and getting it out of sort of the cash economy, I think.

[2611] So, anyway, this business, it's backed by Snoop Dog, actually.

[2612] Oh, my goodness.

[2613] Yeah, Casabirde.

[2614] So it's, yeah, yeah.

[2615] So it's a business that is working on that portion of it.

[2616] And I think it's, so it's interesting.

[2617] It's not like a grower.

[2618] It's not, you know, it's not the production side.

[2619] And I think in that regard, it makes more sense.

[2620] But it's sort of an initial foray, you know.

[2621] And, you know, for a guy that came out of the agency, that's an interesting thing.

[2622] It is.

[2623] Congratulations to you.

[2624] Thank you very much.

[2625] Open them eyes.

[2626] Look around.

[2627] Take a little hit yourself.

[2628] That's like, oh, I was playing golf the other day with a guy who said he had a big bag of gummies.

[2629] Oh, that's a dangerous person.

[2630] I know.

[2631] But he said, you want some gummies?

[2632] And I was going to like, I play golf, dude.

[2633] I'm just out here playing golf.

[2634] And he goes, it's going to improve your game.

[2635] Impose pool.

[2636] It definitely improves pool.

[2637] No. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[2638] Smoking pot improves pool tremendously.

[2639] There's no way.

[2640] 100%.

[2641] I play better.

[2642] Do you smoke or just edibles at this point?

[2643] I do both.

[2644] Yeah.

[2645] But when I smoke pot, well, edibles too.

[2646] My game gets about a ball better.

[2647] Really?

[2648] Yeah, ball better means like if you were playing someone and they, you're like playing a nine ball, someone would give you the eight ball.

[2649] if they were a little bit better than you.

[2650] I'm like one ball better when I smoke pot.

[2651] I have a better feel.

[2652] That's interesting.

[2653] Yeah.

[2654] A lot of pool players, like high -level pool players.

[2655] Like Earl Strickland, one of the best pool players of all time, smokes a lot of weed.

[2656] Really?

[2657] Or they...

[2658] Is it sort of like the halfway...

[2659] Like, what do they call it?

[2660] What do they call it, Delta 8 or something like that?

[2661] Yeah, what is that shit, Jamie?

[2662] You were telling me about this stuff that's legal, right?

[2663] What is that stuff?

[2664] I've gone to buy it yet.

[2665] What's that?

[2666] it's legal though right there's some weird what is it it's uh like a variation or i think it's called delta eight dhc delta nine is what it gets everybody really high right but this is like a more a more mild a little more mild yeah yeah and it's and i think it's it's legal because it's derived from hemp and i think which is not a controlled substance in most states me and my friend tommy junior whenever we play when i see him in new york he plays real good and whenever we play we get barbecued first and then we play.

[2667] I'm telling you you play better.

[2668] It's better.

[2669] Yeah, you play better.

[2670] You really do.

[2671] We play a lot of pool in our house.

[2672] Do you?

[2673] Do you?

[2674] Yeah.

[2675] And the boys are very good at it.

[2676] Well, if I lose that thousand bucks to you, I know how I'm getting it back.

[2677] I'll take you up on that, actually.

[2678] I'll tell you.

[2679] You come up and hunt some elk.

[2680] Okay.

[2681] Up in Idaho.

[2682] We'll play some pool.

[2683] Oh, you'll play some pool for money?

[2684] Yeah.

[2685] Okay.

[2686] You better bring a lot of money.

[2687] You better bring that damn eagle.

[2688] So I'm going to take that eagle from you.

[2689] All right, my friend.

[2690] Well, always good to see you.

[2691] Again, your show is coming out.

[2692] It's out on Discovery Plus.

[2693] You can get it right now.

[2694] And the new season starts.

[2695] Yeah, later in the year, we're starting to film in mid -April.

[2696] All right.

[2697] Well, always fun.

[2698] Always fun.

[2699] Thanks, Mike.

[2700] Goodbye, everybody.