Speaker 1: All right, everybody, good evening, Good evening. Welcome to another
Speaker 1: edition of The Cajun Night. I am the Cajun Knight,
Speaker 1: Jacob Mook, and so here I was here. I was
Speaker 1: getting ready for this episode today, and I thought, you
Speaker 1: know what, let me just peruse the news as we do,
Speaker 1: just nothing in particular, just random little topics that were
Speaker 1: coming up on the news, some of them from liberal media,
Speaker 1: some of them from more conservative sources. And I gotta
Speaker 1: tell you, I wasn't expecting to see all of these.
Speaker 1: Some of these I expected, right, Yes, the updates on Doge. Yes,
Speaker 1: some things that Trump is going on about these days,
Speaker 1: like you, sure, absolutely I expected to see that. I
Speaker 1: didn't expect to see the NSA firing one hundred people
Speaker 1: because of explicit chat room conversations. Apparently TULSI found some
Speaker 1: inappropriate conversations going on with someone for agents and fired
Speaker 1: a hundred of them. So, yeah, we're gonna talk about
Speaker 1: all of that. I apologize now my voice sounds a
Speaker 1: little a little horse. I was in New Orleans most
Speaker 1: of the day to day, and not for the fun reasons,
Speaker 1: not for Mardi Gras. I was there Norwich Military Academy
Speaker 1: or University. I should say, they are down here right
Speaker 1: now for a ROTC drill meet at two Lane, and
Speaker 1: so I went out and helped them, you know, kind
Speaker 1: of tighten up their drill a little bit and things
Speaker 1: like that. It was a fun time, but ended up
Speaker 1: I because I'm a little bit I'm a little dumb
Speaker 1: sometimes I'm just gonna be real with y'all. And I
Speaker 1: had my hat on backwards, as I do, and I
Speaker 1: didn't realize that it's been a good while since I
Speaker 1: was just indirect, so I have a sunburn. I have
Speaker 1: the backwards hat sunburn on my forehead right now. So
Speaker 1: I'm like, well, it looks like we're not going to
Speaker 1: Bandana for the next few days. But uh, it's also
Speaker 1: been a while since I called commands. So if my
Speaker 1: voice sounds a little horse, my apologies. But for now,
Speaker 1: let's just get straight into the wildness, shall we. So
Speaker 1: let's start here. Trump vows to impose twenty five percent
Speaker 1: tariffs on imports from the EU. I'm not sure how
Speaker 1: this one's gonna play out long term. I know what
Speaker 1: he's trying to get out here, I just don't know
Speaker 1: if it's gonna work out the way he's thinking it will.
Speaker 1: But let's listen from the man himself, Old Donnie t
Speaker 1: as president.
Speaker 2: If you just made a decision on what level you
Speaker 2: will seek on tariffs in the European Union.
Speaker 3: We have made a decision. We'll be announcing it very
Speaker 3: soon and it'll be twenty five percent, generally speaking, and
Speaker 3: that'll be on cars and all other things. And European
Speaker 3: Union is a different case than Canada, different kind of case.
Speaker 3: They've really taken advantage of us in a different way.
Speaker 3: The European Union was formed in order to screw the
Speaker 3: United States. That's the purpose of it, and they've done
Speaker 3: a good job of it. But now I'm president, we'll
Speaker 3: have it in these countries. Or that you retaliate, they can't.
Speaker 3: Mean they can try, but they can't.
Speaker 4: They that wanted to affect China's retalies Ertaris on the
Speaker 4: tenth of February. Has there been any impact that you've
Speaker 4: been able to observe? That's right now.
Speaker 3: They can do it and they can try, but the
Speaker 3: numbers can never equal what ours because we could go off.
Speaker 3: We are the pot of gold, We're the one that
Speaker 3: everybody wants, and they can retaliate, but it cannot be
Speaker 3: a successful retaliation because we just go cold turkey, we
Speaker 3: don't buy anymore, and if that happens, we win.
Speaker 1: Intesting So a couple of things that he just said
Speaker 1: that I'm not sure if I really get down with
Speaker 1: the one hundred percent. I don't believe the EU was founded
Speaker 1: and formed to screw over America. Okay, that would be
Speaker 1: like saying NAFTA was formed to screw over all other
Speaker 1: nations and all of the continents. Not necessarily, the EU
Speaker 1: is for their own collective betterment, or at least that's
Speaker 1: what I was given to believe. I don't believe that
Speaker 1: Germany and France are in cahoots to screw over a Maria,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. I just don't see it
Speaker 1: that way. It would make sense that all nations of
Speaker 1: a certain continent would get together to kind of form
Speaker 1: an alliance of sorts, especially in the realm of trades.
Speaker 1: So I'm not really agreeing with that one. Now, a
Speaker 1: twenty five percent tariff on everything from EU nations, that's
Speaker 1: a little hefty' that's a next level type of tariff.
Speaker 1: I mean, what are y'all's thoughts on these things?
Speaker 2: Well, I'm kind of against tariffs but then again, he
Speaker 2: must be doing some kind of trade off here, and
Speaker 2: I think he's a big believer in the positive aspects
Speaker 2: of tariffs, and personally I don't see it. But then again,
Speaker 2: this isn't really an issue I'm an expert on. That's
Speaker 2: just my overall general feeling on it that I've had
Speaker 2: for many years. I don't like tariffs.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I see what they what he's trying to do here,
Speaker 1: and I'm not necessarily against tariffs. But if COVID taught
Speaker 1: us as consumers anything, right, it's that once the prices
Speaker 1: get hiked up, they're not going to go back down,
Speaker 1: even if it gets to be cheaper to actually produce
Speaker 1: the good to which we're buying. Just throwing out an
Speaker 1: example here energy drinks. Fair enough, you know something that
Speaker 1: I am a huge proponent of, Right cool, If all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, all the air drink companies got together
Speaker 1: and decide that they're going to market up, call it
Speaker 1: for tariff, call for this reason, what, it doesn't matter,
Speaker 1: whatever the reason is, and instead of going to two
Speaker 1: fifty a can, they decide to go to four to
Speaker 1: fifty a can, and then, through whatever reasons, the supply
Speaker 1: chain gets cheaper, and they're able to actually produce it
Speaker 1: for fifty cents a can. They're not going to start
Speaker 1: selling it back at two fifty a can. If they
Speaker 1: already get the public use to buying it at this
Speaker 1: high price. I just I don't they should. You would
Speaker 1: think they would, but that's not the way greedy business works.
Speaker 1: So hard imports from Europe they're already expensive as is.
Speaker 1: Putting on an extra twenty five percent tariff on that,
Speaker 1: I know what the idea is, Oh well, they'll eat
Speaker 1: that cost, not us. That's I just don't see it
Speaker 1: working out that way, right, Small things, small bumps and prices. Potentially,
Speaker 1: there's no way you're gonna do that to scale on
Speaker 1: everything coming from Europe. I have a hard time believing it.
Speaker 1: Getting into this big pissing match with China, right, the
Speaker 1: tariff war US versus them, and shit. I okay, fine,
Speaker 1: I at least understand that I am not a big
Speaker 1: fan of China or the CCP, so if we're doing
Speaker 1: that in that realm okay, I at least understand the
Speaker 1: purpose behind it. But I mean I get it. America
Speaker 1: is a nation of consumers. That's what we do. We
Speaker 1: buy other people's stuff like buy and large. But it's
Speaker 1: not like if America puts too high of tariffs on it,
Speaker 1: then like, yeah, we just go cold Turkey and then
Speaker 1: we'll just stop buying it. They'll lose, they'll sell to
Speaker 1: other people and or Yeah, the idea would be that
Speaker 1: American industry would pick up the slack on whatever vacuum
Speaker 1: is left from European imports and things like that. But
Speaker 1: it's not like our infrastructure or our jobs or whatever else.
Speaker 1: It's not like our manufacturing is currently up to speed
Speaker 1: to pick up that slack. I just don't know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I agree, and you know, I'd certainly prefer that
Speaker 2: our country be a manufacturing pub for the world, or
Speaker 2: at least for ourselves. But we outsourced so much stuff.
Speaker 2: So for example, my company makes metal detectors, and we
Speaker 2: used to make them here in the United States, but
Speaker 2: now we get them all made in China. And some
Speaker 2: of our people have been asking recently in our meetings,
Speaker 2: what are potential tariffs going to do to us? And
Speaker 2: you know, how much time would it take for us
Speaker 2: to start making them here again, even if we wanted to.
Speaker 2: So yeah, maybe it was a mistake to outsource them.
Speaker 2: But I guess it seemed like, Oh, it's so cheap,
Speaker 2: and we're gonna be winning. We're gonna be making so
Speaker 2: much more money, and I really want us to produce
Speaker 2: more here. But I feel like the overall environment for
Speaker 2: manufacturing is really bad, not only from higher cost of living,
Speaker 2: but other things that make it more expensive to produce
Speaker 2: stuff here compared to making them in China. And we
Speaker 2: got one hundred different things to work on to bring
Speaker 2: down costs of production, to make things like cars and
Speaker 2: microchips and computers here, and metal detectors more efficiently, yeah,
Speaker 2: and a thousand other goods.
Speaker 1: Now, I'm also thinking that this might be Trump doing
Speaker 1: the art of the deal.
Speaker 5: Right.
Speaker 1: If he throws out the idea of a twenty five
Speaker 1: percent tariff, the European nations obviously will get pissed, as
Speaker 1: they should. Cool, got you, and then they would be
Speaker 1: able to come to the table and maybe negotiate to
Speaker 1: ten percent tariff or something along those lines. Right, is
Speaker 1: this him? You've seen pawing stars, right, You've seen how
Speaker 1: they start dickering on price, will absolutely undercut them go
Speaker 1: way too low. The doode will come way too high,
Speaker 1: and then they try to find some sort of medium
Speaker 1: ground where everybody feels like they want, but in reality,
Speaker 1: Rick's the one that's still making the money at the
Speaker 1: end of the day. I'm wondering if this is not
Speaker 1: a part of Trump's thing, and not only with the tariffs,
Speaker 1: with tax laws in the IRS, if he's talking about
Speaker 1: abolishing the IRS altogether, just chopping it all down. Of course,
Speaker 1: the politicians will get pissed about this, and the bureaucracy
Speaker 1: will have their upheaval about it. Then when he comes
Speaker 1: back and says, Okay, fine, maybe we won't do away
Speaker 1: with the IRS, but let's renegotiate all these tax laws
Speaker 1: and work for a different percentage, then all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: people are more willing to come to the table. I'm
Speaker 1: hoping that that's more along the lines of what's happening here,
Speaker 1: but it's really hard to tell with this guy not
Speaker 1: gonna lie.
Speaker 2: Yeah, some of the other things they could be arguing
Speaker 2: about are the NATO minimum defense spending, or the exchange
Speaker 2: rate between the euro and the dollar, or you know,
Speaker 2: interest rates in Europe versus the United States. There's this
Speaker 2: guy named Tom Luongo who goes on and on about
Speaker 2: how the entire Jerome Powell is very much anti European,
Speaker 2: and he's one of the good guys in Luogo's opinion,
Speaker 2: and Janet Yellen would be one of the bad guys.
Speaker 2: And Trump is more on the side of Powell trying
Speaker 2: to screw over the Europeans because somehow he thinks that
Speaker 2: will benefit the United States. But most of that, honestly
Speaker 2: is over my head. So if anyone's interested, I would say,
Speaker 2: check out Tom Luango and yes that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I But okay, you're talking about the
Speaker 1: GDP spending for NATO defense budget here you talk would
Speaker 1: you like to see that increased or decreased?
Speaker 2: I would like NATO to go away, But if it exist,
Speaker 2: I would prefer that all the countries and it spent
Speaker 2: their two percent. I heard it's two percent. I think
Speaker 2: you've said three percent.
Speaker 1: I think I'm not. It's somewhere around there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, all of the eure countries are only spending like
Speaker 2: one percent on it. But a reason I think Trump
Speaker 2: wants that to go up is that that would mean
Speaker 2: defense contractors in the US like Raytheon and Lockey make
Speaker 2: a lot more money because they supply a lot of
Speaker 2: that weapon rate. So that would be millions potentially, I
Speaker 2: probably billions of dollars flowing into the US into those
Speaker 2: specific companies, But personally, I don't really want to benefit
Speaker 2: those companies too much. I would prefer an overall decrease
Speaker 2: in military spending across the board from all countries. So,
Speaker 2: you know, that's just my bias.
Speaker 1: I feel that I'm My bias is that everybody should
Speaker 1: be spending ten percent on their military. I know, I
Speaker 1: know I'm crazy for that, but I'm also the Department
Speaker 1: of Offense here. That's my biggest jam. But I get it.
Speaker 1: If they're going to start dickering on prices about things
Speaker 1: and percentages on things, there's way more productive things that
Speaker 1: they could be going back and forth on right now.
Speaker 1: Like I said, I'm hoping that this whole twenty five
Speaker 1: percent tariff to Europe, maybe that goes for like a
Speaker 1: year and the European countries collectively get so mad at
Speaker 1: him that he's like, Okay, wait a minute, now, let's talk,
Speaker 1: and then they start negotiating and finagling on some things.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't know. We'll see how it goes,
Speaker 1: but yeah, all right, we got goth Alex Anthony also
Speaker 1: in the chat, har g and Grimatria Royce is in
Speaker 1: the chat. Kyle, good to see you and as always,
Speaker 1: Raven Lee. Great to have all of you with us
Speaker 1: on this evening. All right, So next, let's move on
Speaker 1: to the next point of potential contention. Elon with these
Speaker 1: confusing emails that he sent to federal employees. This a
Speaker 1: kind of mixed bag of emotions on this one. Let
Speaker 1: me know what y'all think.
Speaker 6: Another ominous warning from Elon Musk to federal workers, as
Speaker 6: the billionaire demands they email what they accomplished last week,
Speaker 6: he posted to the discretion of the President, they will
Speaker 6: be given another chance. Failure to respond a second time
Speaker 6: will result in termination. It's the second go at getting
Speaker 6: the workforce to comply with five billet points justifying their jobs.
Speaker 6: After the first attempt led to mass confusion, The Office
Speaker 6: of Personnel Management eventually told agencies they can determine if
Speaker 6: their employees should respond, after several had already told their
Speaker 6: workers to ignore the email, with others telling workers to reply.
Speaker 7: We advise federal workers, unless your agency has dictated you
Speaker 7: not to to respond to this email. In fact, I
Speaker 7: can announce that we've had more than one million workers
Speaker 7: who have chosen to participate in this very simple task.
Speaker 6: A new Harvard Capps Harris poll shows voters overwhelmingly support
Speaker 6: reigning in government. Eighty three percent support reducing government spending
Speaker 6: over increasing taxes, and seventy seven percent say a full
Speaker 6: examination of spending is necessary. Musk only got forty four
Speaker 6: percent favorability in the same poll, and fifty eight percent
Speaker 6: of voters thought his Department of Government Efficiency shouldn't have
Speaker 6: access to American sensitive info. Some Republican lawmakers have been
Speaker 6: confronted at town halls around the country by angry constituents
Speaker 6: over DOGE job cuts. Some have blamed activist groups for
Speaker 6: stirring the pot, but are still calling for a lighter
Speaker 6: touch in the government slashing efforts.
Speaker 8: They have best interest in their retirement. I won't have compassion.
Speaker 9: I think Elon Musk talk to us about that long time,
Speaker 9: a couple of years ago.
Speaker 8: I think some of this is happening too fast and furiously.
Speaker 10: There are rash decisions being made, and it needs to
Speaker 10: kind of slow down a little bit.
Speaker 6: More than twenty federal technology staffers who were integrated into
Speaker 6: the DOGE team resigned, according to the Associated Press. That
Speaker 6: includes engineers and data scientists who wrote in their resignation
Speaker 6: letter they would no longer use their skills to quote
Speaker 6: dismantle critical public services.
Speaker 1: Shocker that the AP would be speaking in that way
Speaker 1: towards this. So all right, I watched a little bit
Speaker 1: of the press conference where was speaking more in depth
Speaker 1: about these emails, and so did Elon basically, And I
Speaker 1: know I'm probably oversimplifying it a bit, but according to
Speaker 1: what Trump and Musk were saying, it is the same
Speaker 1: type of trimming the fat, or at least that's the
Speaker 1: mentality that's going into it. At least that's what they're
Speaker 1: saying that went into cutting all the wasteful spending from
Speaker 1: USAID and things like that. So, for example, from what
Speaker 1: they said, they sent out five million, six million emails
Speaker 1: to government employees basically asking them what they did this week,
Speaker 1: And literally any email would have been acceptable, even if
Speaker 1: they told them, you know, kind of a slow week
Speaker 1: at the office this week, or I was on vacation
Speaker 1: this week, it didn't matter. What they were looking for
Speaker 1: is essentially how many jobs are currently being paid out
Speaker 1: to people that are aren't actually clocking into work. From
Speaker 1: what they said, the same way that we had millions
Speaker 1: of dollars going here that nobody really knew anything about,
Speaker 1: nobody checked in on. They're saying, essentially, we have thousands
Speaker 1: of offices around the country that are all federal employees,
Speaker 1: and if I sent out an email to every single
Speaker 1: one of them, they should be able to respond within
Speaker 1: a week's time. If nobody responded, how many of these
Speaker 1: office positions are actually were cutting a check to them
Speaker 1: every month and no one's actually clocking in to do
Speaker 1: that job, right, some of these no show jobs that
Speaker 1: they do have within government bureaucracy from time to time. Now,
Speaker 1: I am not well versed enough to say how thick
Speaker 1: that really is within our government, but essentially that is
Speaker 1: the message that they were putting out. Basically, they're just
Speaker 1: seeing if somebody's even in that position or not, and
Speaker 1: if they're not, why are we paying that a person,
Speaker 1: any ace, a person, a shadow figure, if you will,
Speaker 1: to work that job. Now, a lot of people are
Speaker 1: saying that this is them overreaching, which, of course certain
Speaker 1: people are gonna think that Trump breathing is a vast
Speaker 1: overreach of his executive power. Like I, okay, fine, I
Speaker 1: get it, I get it. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: if we have out of five million emails that were
Speaker 1: sent out, and I'm throwing that number out. I don't
Speaker 1: know the exact figure, but if five million emails got
Speaker 1: sent out and only one million emails got sent back,
Speaker 1: I see that as a problem. Now, Like they said,
Speaker 1: there are certain departments that told their employees not to
Speaker 1: respond to them. Okay, the employees did as they were
Speaker 1: told by their supervisor, but that supervisor needs to have
Speaker 1: an answer for that, Like, I don't know why you
Speaker 1: even sent that. I have thirty people in my department
Speaker 1: and I know them all personally, and this, this, and this. Okay, fine,
Speaker 1: looks like he vouched for his people. That's solid, but
Speaker 1: that is essentially what they're trying to get at here.
Speaker 1: What are your thoughts on this? I feel like if
Speaker 1: I had a crew of thirty people and I was
Speaker 1: to send an email out and I only got five
Speaker 1: responses back, that should be a clear indication of things
Speaker 1: that need to happen or get shifted or changed. But
Speaker 1: I might be alone with this. What do y'all think?
Speaker 2: I'm fully in favor of doge, so that's just my
Speaker 2: libertarian instinct. And the federal workforce grew six percent under Biden,
Speaker 2: so if it goes down three percent. Those are the
Speaker 2: numbers that I read. That sounds perfectly reasonable to me.
Speaker 2: I would like to cut it way further, so agree
Speaker 2: thach is already exceeding my expectations. I'm not expecting it
Speaker 2: to cut quite as much as I'd love it too,
Speaker 2: but it's doing the right thing in my opinion.
Speaker 1: No doubt. Again, I don't even know how efficient they
Speaker 1: wanted these employees to be when they sent these emails
Speaker 1: out and we're expecting to get something in return. It
Speaker 1: was like five bullet points. And I don't know if
Speaker 1: they even cared if those bullet points were answered in
Speaker 1: kind or if they just got any answer back whatsoever.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but tell us five things you did. That's what
Speaker 2: it was, right?
Speaker 1: And I mean, honestly, how hard is it to say
Speaker 1: I did this report, I filed this paperwork, I did
Speaker 1: this Okay, okay, just send something back and if that
Speaker 1: email wasn't what they asked for, then they'll probably send
Speaker 1: you a follow up email asking for more in depth information.
Speaker 1: And you go like that. It's been a long while
Speaker 1: since I worked in some sort of office setting. And
Speaker 1: don't get me wrong, I am the worst at responding
Speaker 1: to emails. I get it, But if I was working
Speaker 1: in a federal office building, I feel like I'd be
Speaker 1: a little more keen to answer my emails, especially if
Speaker 1: it came from the fucking White House. I don't know,
Speaker 1: that's just me, But we shall see. We'll see if
Speaker 1: people start responding to these emails a little more uh direct,
Speaker 1: I don't. I don't really know. Let's see here. Actually
Speaker 1: they should respond, and people should be held accountable, but
Speaker 1: it should be looking at work instead of an email.
Speaker 1: I agree with that, Raven, But I don't know how
Speaker 1: that goes as far as looking at in a office building,
Speaker 1: because that's the thing we're talking about, a whole government
Speaker 1: building full of how many positions. How do you go
Speaker 1: through and check the efficiency of each employee? I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm sure there's a method. I'm sure there's some sort
Speaker 1: of a grading rubric, right, I mean, I know in
Speaker 1: the military we had like our proficiency and conduct marks.
Speaker 1: I'm sure in an office setting they have like quarterly
Speaker 1: reviews or something like that. I feel like that's a
Speaker 1: thing that we should have. If we don't, then we
Speaker 1: absolutely need to start implementing it. But I agree, I
Speaker 1: think it should be merit based. But I mean we're
Speaker 1: talking about the federal government. How much merit based things
Speaker 1: are there actually happening within where our tax dollars being spent.
Speaker 1: So no, no, I have hopes. I have hope is
Speaker 1: that this will Let's see, most computers track their progress.
Speaker 1: Almost all companies have reviews and can see what is
Speaker 1: being done. Yeah, that's true. I guess it's only one
Speaker 1: AI system away, isn't it now I think about that
Speaker 1: out loud. It's all government. Like they all got their
Speaker 1: cat cards that they put in their and their keyboards
Speaker 1: and it says exactly what they do with each stroke
Speaker 1: of each key. So it shouldn't be hard to see
Speaker 1: which person is being more efficient and which one is
Speaker 1: wasting hours. So fair enough, so we will see.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you shouldn't at least be able to see activity
Speaker 2: that way, and that's a pretty good indicator. But even then,
Speaker 2: the private sector, it can be pretty hard to assess
Speaker 2: how many dollars a person brings in. So it's up
Speaker 2: to the judgment of the managers for sure. And it's
Speaker 2: been hard at most of my jobs in order to
Speaker 2: put a number on how much money I've actually made
Speaker 2: for the company. It's kind of a vague feeling, especially
Speaker 2: when you're in chemistry research or something like that that
Speaker 2: doesn't make any money right away, but it might help
Speaker 2: the company make money in the future. So I don't know.
Speaker 2: It's still ambiguous even in the private sector, but I
Speaker 2: feel like the private sector is under way more financial
Speaker 2: stress that it has to actually work, and the government
Speaker 2: doesn't have anywhere near enough of that, And as far
Speaker 2: as I'm concerned, a lot of that can be slashed, agreed.
Speaker 2: And every time the government shut down, you know, the
Speaker 2: last one was in twenty thirteen, there's all this whaling
Speaker 2: and gnashing teeth. But they have the most job security
Speaker 2: of ever anyone, and they get their job back with
Speaker 2: back pay, and private sector people never pretty practically never
Speaker 2: have that kind of security. So I think the government needs,
Speaker 2: you know, most of the people in it, they need
Speaker 2: to be doing something else, more productive, more subject to
Speaker 2: market forces. And yeah, most of what they're doing is
Speaker 2: not in the constitution at all anyway, So anyway, that's.
Speaker 1: I fully agree. That's my dietron I was living in Washington,
Speaker 1: DC in twenty thirteen when the government shut down. I
Speaker 1: was in the Marines at that time and I remember
Speaker 1: somebody had spread a rumor and somebody had looked up
Speaker 1: some law, and god knows if it was actually on
Speaker 1: the books, or if it was one of those old
Speaker 1: school laws from like one hundred and fifty years ago
Speaker 1: that never exactly got taken down. Who knows. But the
Speaker 1: going trend was that if the government states shut down
Speaker 1: for more than thirty days and we didn't receive our paychecks,
Speaker 1: our contracts were null and void, and we could all
Speaker 1: just go home, like back to our home states, and
Speaker 1: our enlistments would be up. I don't believe that's how
Speaker 1: it actually works, but we were all banking on it. Man.
Speaker 1: We were waiting to see to please, one more week
Speaker 1: stay down, and of course they didn't. They didn't. We
Speaker 1: had to go back to work and all the stuff.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I just yeah, it's crazy to me that
Speaker 1: these government organizations that claim that they are just so
Speaker 1: good at their jobs or so valuable they're you know,
Speaker 1: doing the things that need to be done and it's
Speaker 1: critical for the nation and all this. It's crazy to
Speaker 1: see how whenever they're shut down, life continues just trucking
Speaker 1: right along, doesn't it. But I don't know, it's never
Speaker 1: going on for more than I don't even think it's
Speaker 1: gone a full thirty days. I think when the government
Speaker 1: has shut down in the past, it's only been for
Speaker 1: like a week or two. And that always seems like
Speaker 1: it was more of a flex right, that seems like
Speaker 1: it was a Obama, you know, it was in office
Speaker 1: at the time, but it wasn't him that shut the
Speaker 1: government down, but he got blamed for it. Or was
Speaker 1: it Congress that god blamed for it? Or was it
Speaker 1: the Senate that got blamed for it? They just kept
Speaker 1: playing past the buck until they decided to show back
Speaker 1: up to work, and I it always was just covered
Speaker 1: in controversy start to finish. But I mean that's what
Speaker 1: you get whenever Barry was in office. But all of
Speaker 1: that to say, as we're talking about that, they also
Speaker 1: said that the nation as a whole was in favor
Speaker 1: of doge and what was happening, or at least they
Speaker 1: were in favor of the government being audited, but they
Speaker 1: were not in favor of Elon being the one doing
Speaker 1: it because he'll get access to critical information for the people.
Speaker 1: And I'm saying I've said it before and I'll say
Speaker 1: it again, this is a tech guru, y'all, Like, does
Speaker 1: anybody actually think that if he wanted your social he
Speaker 1: couldn't just get it? Like he's not rich enough to
Speaker 1: hire a team of hackers to just do whatever he
Speaker 1: wanted to do in the back door anyway, Like he
Speaker 1: didn't need the permission. He has it and he's gonna
Speaker 1: use it for you know, the means of which he
Speaker 1: was hired to do. But like, are people actually worried
Speaker 1: that the richest guy on earth just got their credit card? Statements?
Speaker 1: Like I just I have a hard time believing that
Speaker 1: he's using it for these purposes. But you know, people,
Speaker 1: people have their hesitations towards him, especially because now he's
Speaker 1: getting seen as the dark Maga and and all of
Speaker 1: these things. That that whole thing with the chainsaw, I
Speaker 1: thought it was funny, but I thought it was better
Speaker 1: when the Argentinian president did it. It went harder when
Speaker 1: you know it was first done by him. But anyway,
Speaker 1: speaking of the government spending and the money and the
Speaker 1: things and the stuff, I'm hearing reports about this, and
Speaker 1: I want to get y'all's two cents on this one here.
Speaker 1: Doge cuts are not saving as much money as first thought?
Speaker 11: Nearly forty percent of federal contracts canceled by DOGE aren't
Speaker 11: expected to save the government any money. That's according to
Speaker 11: data from the Trump administration. They say of the twenty
Speaker 11: three hundred contracts DOGE canceled, about eight hundred aren't expected
Speaker 11: to save the government any money. Official say those contracts
Speaker 11: are fully obligated, which means the government is legally required
Speaker 11: to spend the money it promised. In some cases, DOGE
Speaker 11: is canceling contracts for goods and services the US already
Speaker 11: paid for. The Trump administration says it still makes sense
Speaker 11: to cancel the contracts because they're seen as dead weight.
Speaker 1: Could y'all hear at that time? Yay, nay, yeah, I heard.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, we heard it that time.
Speaker 1: All right, good things, good things, all right, So what
Speaker 1: are your thoughts on this? Apparently forty percent is not
Speaker 1: doing things to help the nation. But I mean, at
Speaker 1: the same time, you're telling me we got a sixty
Speaker 1: percent success rate, I mean that's not the best odds. However,
Speaker 1: I'll take that as of what's been going down for
Speaker 1: the last twenty years. Where are y'all at with it?
Speaker 9: Wasn't there the whole twenty eighty like ratio to where
Speaker 9: like twenty percent of the people do eighty percent of
Speaker 9: the work.
Speaker 1: Probably that sounds about accurate.
Speaker 8: So it seems like that would be something in this
Speaker 8: case estentially fair enough.
Speaker 1: Anthony, you were chiming in there, but the video I
Speaker 1: was having issues playing you were what were you saying there? Brother?
Speaker 12: I was just saying that, you know, this has only
Speaker 12: been like what a month ish, like everything was estimates.
Speaker 1: I am not.
Speaker 12: Surprised or deterred that it's not quite what we initially
Speaker 12: thought it was. You know again, even if forty percent
Speaker 12: isn't doing anything, you know, by by most, by most metrics, uh,
Speaker 12: sixty percent is solid.
Speaker 8: Like if I if I.
Speaker 12: Instigated an initiative that saved the company I work for
Speaker 12: sixty percent of the spending that they were, you know,
Speaker 12: in an area that they.
Speaker 1: Were doing, I'd get a badass promotion.
Speaker 12: So you know, Uh, perfect is the enemy of better
Speaker 12: and those that hate you will get caught up on
Speaker 12: Oh you're not at one hundred percent.
Speaker 8: When you know sixty is solid?
Speaker 1: I agree, absolutely agree. I mean, and like you said,
Speaker 1: it's it's only within the first month this has even
Speaker 1: been enacted, Like you're not going to have a one
Speaker 1: hundred percent success rate right out the gate. There's been
Speaker 1: some mistakes that have happened. They fired some nuclear engineers
Speaker 1: and then hired them back the next day. You're gonna
Speaker 1: have a little bit of some oops from time to time,
Speaker 1: and they fixed it. But yeah, I agree with you
Speaker 1: one hundred percent saying that this is at least sixty
Speaker 1: percent effective as opposed to fueling more of the debt fire. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm taking that as a win. Personally. I'll take those
Speaker 1: odds every day, and I mean they're only going to
Speaker 1: get better as time goes on and as they do
Speaker 1: more appealing back the layers of this rotten onion. So
Speaker 1: I'm with you. Anybody else have anything to add in
Speaker 1: on that one? All right, excellent? So moving on into
Speaker 1: the next field of things I wanted to discuss on
Speaker 1: this evening, we have this one. US and Ukraine close
Speaker 1: in on economic deal over rare earth minerals. I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna lie. Didn't see that as being the lynchpin for
Speaker 1: the deal, but also happy that it is. Uh, y'all
Speaker 1: give me a thumbs up if you can hear this
Speaker 1: one this time ever after redo it.
Speaker 13: Tonight, the US and Ukraine are inching closer to finalizing
Speaker 13: a key economic deal. If agreed to by both sides,
Speaker 13: it would give the US some of the money from
Speaker 13: Ukraine's rare earth minerals. The President Trump has its compensation
Speaker 13: for the US helping Ukraine in its work with Russia.
Speaker 3: It's all been worked out. We're happy about it, and
Speaker 3: I think that.
Speaker 1: Very importantly, we're going to be able to make.
Speaker 13: A deal, President Trump says. Ukrainian President Zelensky may visit
Speaker 13: Washington this week to sign the agreement. Zelenski says he
Speaker 13: wants definitive security guarantees for Ukraine from the US in
Speaker 13: the future.
Speaker 1: Okay, so I don't know exactly what deals Zelensky's hoping
Speaker 1: to gain from the US. However, it's interesting that the
Speaker 1: rare earth minerals would be the lynchpin that would make
Speaker 1: this deal go through, because I know, was it last
Speaker 1: week or maybe even earlier this week? It's the time
Speaker 1: stamp is getting a little fuzzy for me. But Zelensky
Speaker 1: was super mad that Putin and Trump had met up
Speaker 1: to discuss the end of the war and he wasn't invited,
Speaker 1: even though he absolutely was invited to the meeting. But
Speaker 1: you know whatever, And now Trump and Zelensky are supposed
Speaker 1: to meet up to talk about the other end of
Speaker 1: that deal, and now America's gonna get a cut of
Speaker 1: the take, so to speak, as far as the minerals go.
Speaker 1: What are your thoughts on this?
Speaker 2: Yeah, these rare earths are things like californium, And I
Speaker 2: just learned a week or so ago. My company uses
Speaker 2: californium for radiation something like. It's like smoke detectors that
Speaker 2: use amisium. It's these really rare elements that on the
Speaker 2: periodic table there are like seventy or eighty or ninety
Speaker 2: grams per mole. They're towards the bottom, and they're pretty
Speaker 2: rare in the universe, and they're very dense, and they
Speaker 2: mostly tend to stink below the Earth's crust, which is
Speaker 2: you know why they're not up here as much. But
Speaker 2: Russia's got a ton of them, China's got a ton
Speaker 2: of them, and my business or a related business under
Speaker 2: the same corporation, they actually failed to meet a major
Speaker 2: revenue target. I hope I'm not revealing too much, but
Speaker 2: it was because there's they couldn't get californium out of
Speaker 2: Russia or Ukraine, and I think even these disputed regions
Speaker 2: have a lot of these minerals underneath them. So yeah,
Speaker 2: my company is waiting to establish better relations with Russia,
Speaker 2: and you know, the EU in the western half of
Speaker 2: the country is half of the world really is waiting
Speaker 2: to see who's going to be controlling these assets. So yeah,
Speaker 2: it is important.
Speaker 1: I absolutely agree. Oh yeah.
Speaker 2: Archer Daniels, Midland, DuPont, Monsanto and a couple other US
Speaker 2: companies have taken control of a lot of Ukrainian farmland,
Speaker 2: which wouldn't have been possible three years ago, but they
Speaker 2: rewrote their constitution to allow all that farmland to be
Speaker 2: used as compensation or collateral for all the billions of
Speaker 2: dollars they were getting in military aid. So Ukraine is
Speaker 2: very largely owned by the West now just in terms
Speaker 2: of acreage, liked percent of it, but I think it's
Speaker 2: like twenty percent of it.
Speaker 1: I could believe that as well. That's like the new
Speaker 1: Age imperialism, right. So now it's not the United States
Speaker 1: that's going to have a colony in Ukraine, but it
Speaker 1: will be hypothetically, of course, the United States corporations that
Speaker 1: will own the land and farm it or mine it
Speaker 1: or whatever the case is, which of course will go
Speaker 1: back to the US government. So it's new age imperialism.
Speaker 1: There's no governments in charge of it. It's all corporations.
Speaker 1: So all right, we'll see all that shakes out. Just
Speaker 1: pulled up this article the BBC as a matter of fact,
Speaker 1: what minerals does Ukraine have and what are they used for?
Speaker 1: This was posted fifteen hours ago, so apparently this is
Speaker 1: definitely a hot topic of debate. It says Ukraine has
Speaker 1: substantial supplies of key minerals, but some are now in
Speaker 1: Russian occupied territory. Ukraine has agreed to the outline of
Speaker 1: a major deal that would give the US access to
Speaker 1: Ukraine's mineral deposits, a senior official from Kiev has told
Speaker 1: BBC Kiev has faced growing pressure from Washington to seal
Speaker 1: the deal, which has been at the center of a
Speaker 1: rift between the United States and Ukrainian presidents. What minerals
Speaker 1: does Ukraine have? Kiev is estimated to have about five
Speaker 1: percent of the world's critical raw materials. Estimates that about
Speaker 1: five percent of the world's critical materials are in Ukraine.
Speaker 1: Five percent doesn't sound like a lot, but five percent
Speaker 1: of the world's critical role materials. That's that's a solid chunk,
Speaker 1: especially in a country that happens to be war torn
Speaker 1: at this moment. This includes some nineteen million tons of
Speaker 1: proven reserves of graphite, which the Ukrainian Geological Survey State
Speaker 1: Agency says that the nation quote one of the top
Speaker 1: five leading countries in quote for the supply of the
Speaker 1: mineral graphight is used to make batteries for electrical vehicles.
Speaker 1: Ukraine has seven percent of the world's supplies of titanium,
Speaker 1: a lightweight metal that is used in construction of everything
Speaker 1: from airplanes to power stations. You know, I will say
Speaker 1: that I hope that their titanium like starts getting used
Speaker 1: and maybe we'll get a cut rate deal because that
Speaker 1: brigandine that's set up right behind my helmet, that's a
Speaker 1: titanium brig. It's light. I like it, and I would
Speaker 1: like more parts of my armor to be made by titanium.
Speaker 1: And that shit's expensive. So I'm very much hope that
Speaker 1: we get a better deal on that. Of course, here
Speaker 1: we go. It also is home to a third of
Speaker 1: all European lithium deposits, the key component in current batteries.
Speaker 1: I just had a weird feeling that lithium was gonna
Speaker 1: make its way into the conversation. Before I pulled this up,
Speaker 1: I just I had a feeling in the bones that
Speaker 1: lithium was going to be one of these conflict minerals
Speaker 1: that was being discussed. Other elements found in Ukraine include
Speaker 1: beryllium and uranium, which are both critical for nuclear weapons
Speaker 1: and reactors. They had to throw the weapons in there,
Speaker 1: they had to. I would think that it'd be more
Speaker 1: critical for nuclear reactors in this day and age, but sure,
Speaker 1: we got to talk about the bombs. Deposits of copper, lead, zinc, silver, nickel, cobalt,
Speaker 1: and manganese are also significant. Further, Ukraine has significant deposits
Speaker 1: of rare earth metals. These are a group of seventeen
Speaker 1: elements that are used to produce weapons, wind, turbines, electronics,
Speaker 1: and other productive vitals products vital to the modern world. Turbines, Like,
Speaker 1: why would we even add that. That's that's just dumb,
Speaker 1: bro But uh, actually, with this BBC article, they have
Speaker 1: a map of Ukraine to show what minerals are where,
Speaker 1: and uh, yeah, titaniums are zinc, zirconian, excuse me, titanium
Speaker 1: and zirconium. They have some in the conflict areas. They
Speaker 1: have some rare earths in that area as well, But
Speaker 1: I mean the rest of Ukraine also has pretty solid
Speaker 1: deposits of these expensive minerals. So okay, Trump basically coming
Speaker 1: in there to make a deal if we can get
Speaker 1: a you know, cut rate on some of the stuff.
Speaker 1: I get this. Some of the mineral deposits, however, have
Speaker 1: been seized by Russia, according to Yulia sur Off Danko
Speaker 1: spur Of, Yeah, sure, I don't like when they mix
Speaker 1: like five consonants next to each other and expect us
Speaker 1: to just know how that ship's pronounced. Anyway, Ukraine's Economy Minister,
Speaker 1: resources worth three hundred and fifty billion dollars remain in
Speaker 1: occupied territories today. In twenty twenty two, the Secretary of Defense,
Speaker 1: a geopolitical risk consultancy based in Canada secdev Okay, excuse me, SECDEV,
Speaker 1: a geopolitical risk consultancy based in Canada, conducted an evaluation
Speaker 1: which established that Russia had occupied sixty three percent of
Speaker 1: Ukrainian coal mines, as well of half of its manganese, casium, tantalum,
Speaker 1: and rare earth deposits doctor Robert Muga. Muga principle of
Speaker 1: secdev says that such mineral add a strategic and economic
Speaker 1: dimension in Russia's continued aggression. By seizing them, he says,
Speaker 1: Moscow denies access to revenue for Ukraine, expands its own
Speaker 1: resource base, and influences global supply chains. Okay, so wait
Speaker 1: a minute, why does the US want Ukraine's minerals? Well,
Speaker 1: I mean, I would just say business as whole, but
Speaker 1: all right, critical minerals are the foundation of the twenty
Speaker 1: first century economics. They are keys to renewable energy, military applications,
Speaker 1: and industrial infrastructure in play a growing strategic role in geopoliticals,
Speaker 1: geopolitics and geoeconomics, he said. Additionally, the US is keen
Speaker 1: on a deal for Ukraine's mineral resources because it wants
Speaker 1: to reduce dependency on China, which controls seventy five percent
Speaker 1: of rare earth deposits in the world according to Geological
Speaker 1: Investment Group. In December, China banned the export of some
Speaker 1: rare earth minerals to the US, having previously limited mineral
Speaker 1: exports to the US in the previous year. Okay, so
Speaker 1: how would a deal help Kiev exploit its minerals. Some
Speaker 1: commentators have described the US offer as colonial. Hey, that's
Speaker 1: like I said earlier, how about that? But Kiev is
Speaker 1: interested in joint exploration of its resources. According to the
Speaker 1: World Economic Forum, Ukraine has about twenty thousand mineral deposits
Speaker 1: covering one hundred and sixteen tight but only about fifteen
Speaker 1: percent of sites were being actively exploited at the time
Speaker 1: of Russia's full scale invasion in twenty twenty two. For instance,
Speaker 1: the country's sizeable lithium deposits are still largely untapped. Likewise,
Speaker 1: rare earth deposits are known to exist, but none of
Speaker 1: them have yet been mined because of a lack of investment.
Speaker 1: Developing these mineral resources is extremely difficult and expensive. According
Speaker 1: to Irania Spernum, Whatever, chief executive of Geological Investment Group,
Speaker 1: a mining advisory firm based in Ukraine, She argues that
Speaker 1: if Ukraine can attract US investors to help develop its
Speaker 1: natural resources, it will be highly beneficial for the country's economy.
Speaker 1: We will get technologies in our mining industry that our
Speaker 1: mining industry lacks so much, she explained. We will get
Speaker 1: capital that means more jobs, tax payments, and we will
Speaker 1: receive revenue from the development of mineral deposits. So Ukraine
Speaker 1: is on board as long as that means that America
Speaker 1: will help foot some of the bill that goes into
Speaker 1: the mining of these minerals. And America's on board because
Speaker 1: that means that that's one less thing we got to
Speaker 1: worry about from China. So okay, okay. So we're talking
Speaker 1: about potentially ending the war quote unquote. I don't know
Speaker 1: if that's exactly what's going to lead to this here.
Speaker 1: I don't know if one plus one equals two in
Speaker 1: that regard, but I could see it helping in a
Speaker 1: lot of ways. Tony, You, being the resident Russia Ukraine correspondent,
Speaker 1: what is your take on this?
Speaker 2: I wish I were more knowledgeable, but my overall take
Speaker 2: is I hope that we can get along with both
Speaker 2: of these countries. It's just after World War Two. I
Speaker 2: feel like it took about five years for America to
Speaker 2: get along with Germany and Japan, and it was only,
Speaker 2: unfortunately driven by enmity against the Soviet Union. So I
Speaker 2: hope we don't develop a new enemy to rally against.
Speaker 2: And I'm really hoping that Russia and Ukraine can can
Speaker 2: bury the hatchet like the American North and South did
Speaker 2: after the Civil War, and that we can all be
Speaker 2: one big, happy family. I realized, maybe that's too optimistic.
Speaker 2: We can just exploit these minerals together, the same with
Speaker 2: same with China. I first heard more about this with
Speaker 2: regard to China a few years ago and how we
Speaker 2: get a lot of europium from them. It used to
Speaker 2: be used to make the red pixels in crttvs, and
Speaker 2: since those are going away, we don't need as much
Speaker 2: europium anymore. But I worked for a company that actually
Speaker 2: used a lot of europium and it was more expensive
Speaker 2: than gold, if I remember correctly. We were getting that
Speaker 2: from China. And you know, I feel like market forces
Speaker 2: should just be able to distribute any of these rare
Speaker 2: metals anywhere. And well, anyway, I think the war between
Speaker 2: in Ukraine is reaching its natural conclusion because the lot
Speaker 2: of the battle lines are not moving that far and
Speaker 2: I'm really hoping that they will just freeze where they
Speaker 2: are and luganskill be Russia, Dunets her Suns and Zapparosia
Speaker 2: are going to be divided. There's probably gonna be a
Speaker 2: Ukrainian Dunyats Gonna and the Russian dunyetskna Ukrainian Zaporosia and
Speaker 2: a Russian Zepparosia.
Speaker 1: So more of like a DMZ type situation like the
Speaker 1: ending quote unquote of the Korean War.
Speaker 2: Yeah, maybe like a five mile thick stretch of of
Speaker 2: a buffer zone. Perhaps maybe maybe not, I don't know.
Speaker 2: And hopefully maybe it'll even be like jam Mun Kashmir
Speaker 2: between India and Pakistan, where those used.
Speaker 8: To be.
Speaker 2: States of sorts that were not an autonomous I don't
Speaker 2: know what the right word is, but now the border
Speaker 2: between India and Pakistan goes right between both of them,
Speaker 2: if I understand correctly.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and if I'm not mistaken, Pakistan is not exactly
Speaker 1: happy about it. Neither is India. They don't like the
Speaker 1: way the lines were drawn, but neither of them want
Speaker 1: to go to war over it. At this time. They
Speaker 1: keep popping off like they want to and then like
Speaker 1: taking it down a notch. It's like that, that's like
Speaker 1: a pot on the on the stove that's like almost
Speaker 1: boiling over, and then like it goes down on its
Speaker 1: own and almost boils over and goes down. India and
Speaker 1: Pakistan still hate each other to this day.
Speaker 2: That Yeah, definitely. And yeah, I think the populations of
Speaker 2: those two regions, Gammu and Kashmir, they're heavily Muslim on
Speaker 2: both sides of the border, right and the Indian side,
Speaker 2: I mean the side that belongs to India. If they
Speaker 2: could just have a referendum on it, they'd vote to
Speaker 2: join Pakistan, but India won't allow it. That's my understanding.
Speaker 2: I've I've heard a very I've heard a very pro
Speaker 2: Pakistan slant from one of my old co workers, But
Speaker 2: I also have another a friend of my wife, my
Speaker 2: wife went to college with them, who is on the
Speaker 2: very pro India side and really hates Pakistan. I haven't
Speaker 2: completely gotten his take on it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I mean I like us not having to
Speaker 1: resort to China to every little thing, because I mean,
Speaker 1: I've been saying that for years. China has been trying
Speaker 1: to take over the world, but not in a military
Speaker 1: conquest side of it. They've been trying to take over
Speaker 1: in the financial sector, and they've been trying to take
Speaker 1: over in the business sector. That's why all these minerals
Speaker 1: have to come through them, because they're the ones that
Speaker 1: have set up the mining operations and all of the
Speaker 1: Western powers left shop, not just I mean pretty much
Speaker 1: in every country in Africa right now. Most of the
Speaker 1: mining operations that are going on, and yes, not like
Speaker 1: the blood diamond, not like the full on slavery that's
Speaker 1: going on in Africa right now, but a lot of
Speaker 1: the things that used to be owned by Western mining
Speaker 1: companies are now owned by Chinese mining companies. So whenever
Speaker 1: we see that there might be a deal struck that
Speaker 1: can help get some of that off of China to
Speaker 1: where we don't have to go to them, I'm on board.
Speaker 1: And I know I got my biases on that, but
Speaker 1: I like it thus far. Let's see, let's check this
Speaker 1: chat here. Zombie said, rare earth is where all the
Speaker 1: money is, but with the huge green push, a lot
Speaker 1: of places are wrapped up in red tape. A lot
Speaker 1: of these are our finite also. Yeah, no, I fully
Speaker 1: agree with that. And that's the thing. China does not
Speaker 1: give a fuck about the earth or any kind of
Speaker 1: green deals whatsoever, which is why they do what they
Speaker 1: do and why they are the go to person country whatever.
Speaker 1: For all the rare earth minerals, Ukraine has twenty critical
Speaker 1: raw minerals one hundred percent with one hundred and eleven
Speaker 1: billion in coal or in iron. Yeah, and a corner
Speaker 1: of the BBC article, we just read. Most of that coal,
Speaker 1: which is where the iron ore comes from in that
Speaker 1: regard is currently under Russian control, which I think Russia
Speaker 1: is happy with. You know, they're to make their money
Speaker 1: off the deal. Hold On, Zombie sent a link. Let's
Speaker 1: see what this one's about the Moscow Times. Oh well,
Speaker 1: we simply must read about this one here. Hold on,
Speaker 1: share the screen. Here we go. Let's read about it
Speaker 1: in the Moscow Times. Rare Earth's for aid Ukraine's minerals
Speaker 1: threatened by war. US President Donald Trump has signaled he
Speaker 1: could trade aid to Kiev in its fight against Russia's
Speaker 1: invasion for access to Ukraine's rare earth's medals key elements
Speaker 1: used in electronics. How here are the facts about Ukraine's
Speaker 1: overall mining reserves, some of them in regions controlled by Moscow,
Speaker 1: and the strategic and commercial stakes for the United States.
Speaker 1: Trump said on Monday he wanted to negotiate an agreement
Speaker 1: with Kiev guaranteeing supplies of specific category of rare earth medals.
Speaker 1: The US Geological Survey indicated in a report that the
Speaker 1: United States depends on imports for some critical minerals, while
Speaker 1: China is leading excuse me is the leading producer of
Speaker 1: such minerals, including rare earths. Ukraine has said it has
Speaker 1: strategic rare earth metals such as beryllium in six locations,
Speaker 1: but it does not have large reserves of these. The
Speaker 1: EU Commission to described the country as quote a potential
Speaker 1: source of over twenty critical raw minerals fifteen trillion dollars
Speaker 1: in minerals. Forbes Ukraine in April of twenty twenty three
Speaker 1: estimated that Ukraine's mineral resources amounted to one hundred and
Speaker 1: eleven billion tons worth fourteen point eight trillion dollars, mostly
Speaker 1: coal and iron ore, but more than seventy percent of
Speaker 1: these resources were in the Dunetsk and Luhansk regions partly
Speaker 1: controlled by Russia. And Tony helped me out on that word.
Speaker 2: Oh, I got a zoom in. No, I can't see
Speaker 2: it anymore.
Speaker 1: Dni pro dinimber.
Speaker 2: Petrufsk probably sorry, I can't even see.
Speaker 1: It, dinya protrufsk ye bro.
Speaker 2: The first D is silent.
Speaker 1: Of course, It's like Django, where Moscow's forces are approaching.
Speaker 1: The Washington Post in August of twenty twenty two had
Speaker 1: estimated the value of Ukraine's mineral reserves as high as
Speaker 1: twenty six trillion dollars, nearly half of that in areas
Speaker 1: under Russian control. Interesting. I wonder if that's why Russia
Speaker 1: was so keen to get those locations thirty eight billion
Speaker 1: dollars in lithium. Demand for lithium is booming. It is
Speaker 1: essential in making batteries for electric vehicles in the green
Speaker 1: energy transition. Yeah Forbes Ukraine wrote that in twenty twenty three,
Speaker 1: Ukraine has thirty three million tons of lithium or worth
Speaker 1: thirty eight billion dollars. Russia is advancing near the large.
Speaker 2: Shit ching kievski.
Speaker 1: Yep lithium deposit in Donetsk and has captured another deposit
Speaker 1: at Kruta Baka Balka in Zaparizia region. Big titanium reserves
Speaker 1: Ukraine is said in twenty twenty two investment presentation that
Speaker 1: it is one of the top ten countries in the
Speaker 1: world for proven reserves of titanium, according to seven percent
Speaker 1: of the global production. As of twenty twenty three, The
Speaker 1: United States imported more than ninety five percent of its titanium.
Speaker 1: According to the US Geological Survey titanium is used in
Speaker 1: aerospace and electronics nineteen million tons of graphite. We talked
Speaker 1: about that earlier. Iron ore. In twenty twenty two, Ukraine
Speaker 1: ranked tenth in the world's in terms of its share
Speaker 1: of iron production according to World Mining Data. Prior to
Speaker 1: Russia's full scale invasion twenty twenty two, Ukraine was the
Speaker 1: fifth biggest iron ore exporter in the world at six
Speaker 1: point eight billion dollars in twenty twenty one. I mean,
Speaker 1: that's not a little chunk of change by any stretch
Speaker 1: of the imagination. Uranium and more. Ukraine also has substantial
Speaker 1: reserves of other sought after elements, including uranium, manganese, mercury,
Speaker 1: and gallium metal used in electronics. So there we have it.
Speaker 1: They absolutely have untapped, very lucrative mining reserves, and that,
Speaker 1: in my opinion, is probably one of the main reasons
Speaker 1: why this whole special military operation took place in the
Speaker 1: first to go. I mean, I'm not saying it's one
Speaker 1: hundred percent of why. It was absolutely because Ukraine kept
Speaker 1: trying to join NATO. It is because a lot of
Speaker 1: Russia bought, you know, their food from the farmland that
Speaker 1: Ukraine at the time owned these days, it is going
Speaker 1: to be owned by America whatever. But I mean to
Speaker 1: say that these moves weren't made strategically to take over
Speaker 1: the mines as well. I could see it. I absolutely see.
Speaker 1: It's a resource grab, the same as any other war.
Speaker 1: It's about land and resources, same book, different chapter, honestly.
Speaker 1: But yeah, so we shall see if T is able
Speaker 1: to make this deal happen and bring a I'm not
Speaker 1: going to say a swift into this war because I
Speaker 1: really don't see it being a clean cut ending of
Speaker 1: any of this at all. But if we were to
Speaker 1: get a little bit of money off the top for
Speaker 1: these minerals and we no longer had to go to
Speaker 1: Asia to get him, I see that as a win win, honestly.
Speaker 1: I mean, what are your thoughts on this?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I fully agree that it must have been an
Speaker 2: asset that was on the table and brought into the
Speaker 2: calculation on both sides as to whether the war would
Speaker 2: be worth it. But it's probably maybe ten or twenty
Speaker 2: percent of the reason, and the other eighty percent has
Speaker 2: to do with NATO and the public opinion on the ground.
Speaker 2: So yeah, all these things factored or should have factored
Speaker 2: into the reasons for the war on both sides, if
Speaker 2: both sides were at least somewhat competent and rational about it.
Speaker 1: Agreed. Now, as far as the competency and rationale of
Speaker 1: high ranking officials of different governments and things and stuff,
Speaker 1: let's go ahead and go into the next conversation here.
Speaker 1: Over one hundred national intelligence officers fired over sexually explicit
Speaker 1: chat rooms. Yeah, I didn't see this one coming on
Speaker 1: the BINGO card for this week, but apparently Tulsey Gabberd
Speaker 1: has found some things out about some of her agents,
Speaker 1: and you know what, let's just let it play.
Speaker 14: More than one hundred intelligence officers are now being fired
Speaker 14: for allegedly participating in sexually explicit conversations in National security
Speaker 14: agency chat rooms. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabberg made
Speaker 14: the announcement yesterday, calling this a violation of trust. Intelligence
Speaker 14: agencies were told to identify employees who participated in the
Speaker 14: chatroom conversations and fired their employment by Friday. Those officers
Speaker 14: will also have their security clearances revoked. The NSA says
Speaker 14: misuse of those platforms won't be tolerated and that investigations
Speaker 14: are on go.
Speaker 1: More than one Okay, so you know, I so to
Speaker 1: say that you have like a chat with your coworkers
Speaker 1: and some offensive memes might get shared from time to
Speaker 1: time or something like that. Okay, all right, I get it.
Speaker 1: These are employees of the NSA, right, These are the
Speaker 1: people that have the Patriot Act under their jurisdiction, and
Speaker 1: they're spying on everybody. I am not happy to hear
Speaker 1: what they're talking about, you know, as far as that goes,
Speaker 1: because I mean, okay, is it possible that they're just
Speaker 1: talking about the hot chip from the office and that's
Speaker 1: that's what's in the group chat or something like that.
Speaker 1: It's possible. But because it's the NSA in particular, I
Speaker 1: can only see this going in the darkest of internet corners, honestly,
Speaker 1: and over a hundred of them are being fired over this.
Speaker 1: That's kind of major. Now. I don't know if this
Speaker 1: is all from one office or if this is a
Speaker 1: collective thing or whatever the case is. But man of
Speaker 1: all the people to make the call on this, y'all
Speaker 1: got Tulsi Gabbard. Y'all got Lieutenant Colonel Gabbard up in
Speaker 1: this bitch who's basically saying, oh, really, this is the
Speaker 1: level of professionalism that y'all are bringing to my organization. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we're just gonna go ahead and nix that right off
Speaker 1: the rip. That was a wild one. I mean, y'all
Speaker 1: chime in on this one for sure. Hold On, let's
Speaker 1: do with your guy in the chatt here. Hold on.
Speaker 1: I think it just goes beyond just Jackie the bathroom.
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, Alex, I hope this goes beyond that. If
Speaker 1: this is just a bunch of office guys, they're sharing porn,
Speaker 1: like just porn links and that's what it is. I
Speaker 1: feel like that wouldn't go that far. But at the
Speaker 1: same time, they're using official chat groups to do that.
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't know. I don't know if these
Speaker 1: are there's all a bunch of office dickheads that have
Speaker 1: like a giant group me put together, and that's what
Speaker 1: they're sharing. It owner if this is like a giant
Speaker 1: Snapchat group of all these people. But again, if this
Speaker 1: was if this was USAID, if this is the Department
Speaker 1: of USAID where something like this was discovered, I feel
Speaker 1: like it would. Yeah, it needs to be handled, of course,
Speaker 1: but it's not. It's not the same. It doesn't carry
Speaker 1: the same weight as the NSSA, that's just me, you know,
Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know. Let's see here, they
Speaker 1: they set up orgies and trains. Wait, Raven, or is
Speaker 1: that just you coming out and guestimating that or are
Speaker 1: you actually finding something saying that that's what they were doing,
Speaker 1: because man, that's a bit of a claim. What was
Speaker 1: that one? Oh wait? What was that cop? Y'all? Remember
Speaker 1: that lady cop that, come to find out, was hooking
Speaker 1: up with half of her department And the only reason
Speaker 1: that they got caught was because the chief tried to
Speaker 1: get in there and get a piece of it, and
Speaker 1: she told him no. So basically he blew the lid
Speaker 1: off of all of it. She was telling them all
Speaker 1: that her and her husband were swingers. In reality, he
Speaker 1: knew nothing about it, and like had these dudes over
Speaker 1: at his house for like barbecues and stuff. In reality,
Speaker 1: like eight of them were taking turns on his wife
Speaker 1: on the clock and he knew nothing about it.
Speaker 2: Oh man, you remember everyone knows her face now. It
Speaker 2: became quite a meme.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah it did. I mean it wasn't like she
Speaker 1: was a ten by any means either. I Mean, I'll
Speaker 1: give it a very generous six point five on that,
Speaker 1: but apparently, you know, workplace Shenanigans was worth it to
Speaker 1: risk it for the biscuit, I guess, But Raven says
Speaker 1: she was a three. Look, I'm being very generous with
Speaker 1: that six point five, Okay, Like she wasn't like she
Speaker 1: wasn't a donut eating cop that was like two hundred
Speaker 1: pounds overweight by any means. But she was also like
Speaker 1: I think she had only been in the force for
Speaker 1: like two years, and at that point it was just
Speaker 1: all you could eat buffet of dick for her, I suppose,
Speaker 1: So she just went in with it and there her
Speaker 1: husband is just holding the bag, trying to trying to
Speaker 1: be a good old dude here and finding out that
Speaker 1: she's just getting railed out by half the department. And
Speaker 1: I don't know. If that's what the NSA is doing,
Speaker 1: then we have way more problems than just some inappropriate
Speaker 1: chats being had. But yeah, as we're talking about cutting
Speaker 1: out the wasteful government spending and sending out these vast
Speaker 1: emails out to see if people are even clocking or not,
Speaker 1: now we're losing NSA agents because of their misconduct, which
Speaker 1: for the record, we need less NSA agents. I think
Speaker 1: we can all get on board with that one as
Speaker 1: a matter of fact, so I'm not mad at it.
Speaker 1: I think it's hilarious that this is what they got
Speaker 1: fired for. But at least we are cutting the fat.
Speaker 1: We'll take it as a win as far as that's concerned.
Speaker 1: I was being nice with that three even you ask
Speaker 1: why you got to hate on their spicy group chat.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm not hating on the spicy group chat.
Speaker 1: I'm just saying, if you're gonna do a spicy group chat,
Speaker 1: perhaps perhaps you don't do it on a official government
Speaker 1: forum or an official government chat. And also with that
Speaker 1: being said, this is the NSA, Like, this is the
Speaker 1: agency that gets paid to spy on the people. Shocker
Speaker 1: that their boss was spying on them. I find that
Speaker 1: to be the big with that Spider Man meme where
Speaker 1: they're all pointing at each other, this is that, and
Speaker 1: now a hundred of them just lost their jobs over it.
Speaker 1: I think this is great. You know, again, I didn't
Speaker 1: see that one coming. As I was looking through the
Speaker 1: news feed of random things to bring up on this episode.
Speaker 1: That was a fun one to discover.
Speaker 2: So you know, I got a few more thoughts about it.
Speaker 2: If you've ever worked anywhere that makes you do sexual
Speaker 2: harassment training, there's a pretty low bar in terms of, oh,
Speaker 2: this is offensive, this is against company policy, And if
Speaker 2: they want to throw the book at you, they can
Speaker 2: easily do that with memes and stuff like this. I imagine.
Speaker 2: Another thing is I'm wondering what ed Edward Snowden's thinking
Speaker 2: about this, if he has an opinion. But he also
Speaker 2: talked about how he had co workers looking up their
Speaker 2: girlfriends whereabouts and spying on their girlfriends and spying on
Speaker 2: their family and stuff like that. So absolutely, yeah, that's
Speaker 2: another reason we don't really need too many of these people.
Speaker 2: And the third thing is I think that what tempts guys,
Speaker 2: especially but maybe some women to it to share this
Speaker 2: explicit stuff, is that it it feels like it creates
Speaker 2: more trust between them. It kind of like you know,
Speaker 2: guys swearing at each other at work and stuff like that.
Speaker 2: It turns it into it deliberately turns it into into
Speaker 2: a less professional environment. But also you know, like you're
Speaker 2: really bros with these people, and sometimes they want to
Speaker 2: cultivate more of a relationship like that, but it can
Speaker 2: really blow up in your face.
Speaker 1: Uncohesion. Yeah, I get that. I mean there is a
Speaker 1: time and place for that. I agree, But again, like
Speaker 1: you got to cover your tracks like you're working for
Speaker 1: the NSA.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you should only be doing that in person with
Speaker 2: each other.
Speaker 1: Or yeah, I mean you do that at the bar
Speaker 1: over a couple of bruskis with your co workers and
Speaker 1: you talk some shit that you know, there's ways about that.
Speaker 1: But man, wait, okay, hold on, hold on, let's read here.
Speaker 1: Zombie just shared something in the chat here. Gabbart announced
Speaker 1: the firings in a Tuesday night appearance on Fox News,
Speaker 1: but did not say what the employees discussed in what
Speaker 1: appeared to be private employees support groups or private employee
Speaker 1: support groups. That sounds a little more official than a
Speaker 1: group snapchat. I could be wrong, or why it continued,
Speaker 1: or why it constituted grounds for dismissal. She said the
Speaker 1: employees were using the chat rooms inappropriately to talk about
Speaker 1: really really horrific behavior. See now it goes a little
Speaker 1: less funny because at first, I was thinking, like, bro,
Speaker 1: because she's Tulsa Gabbard's not unattractive to most people. I
Speaker 1: was thinking that maybe she saw a group chat of
Speaker 1: dudes talking about her. So she was like, hmm, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm not standing for that. They're all fired if it's
Speaker 1: the NSA and these are the people that find the
Speaker 1: pedophilic rings and things like that, and she is describing
Speaker 1: it as really really horrific behavior. Now it's got me
Speaker 1: a little more concerned about things. It says there were
Speaker 1: over one hundred people from across the intelligence community that
Speaker 1: contributed to and participated in this what is really just
Speaker 1: an egregious violation of trust, basic rules and standards around professionalism.
Speaker 1: Gabert said, I put out a directive today that they
Speaker 1: all will be terminated and their security clearances will be revoked. Apparently,
Speaker 1: it goes on to say that it was a wide
Speaker 1: ranging discussions of sex, kink, polyamory, and castration. Okay, Now
Speaker 1: again context matters, So like was it talking about like
Speaker 1: the castration of Barack Obama or something? You know what
Speaker 1: I mean, Like, okay, that'd be funny, or castrating pedophiles?
Speaker 1: All right, I'm good with it. If it wasn't that,
Speaker 1: and it was more disgusting, then you see what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: It's like it's it's it's gonna get messy, it's gonna
Speaker 1: get messy, obscene, pornographic, and sexually explicit chat rooms by Friday.
Speaker 1: According to D and I spokesperson Alexa Henning, one popular
Speaker 1: chat topic was gender affirming surgery. Was it roof reported
Speaker 1: using outdated terminology? Okay, I feel like I feel like
Speaker 1: the outdated terminology might have been the British term for
Speaker 1: a cigarette. I could be wrong. I could be wrong,
Speaker 1: but I just have a feeling that they were talking
Speaker 1: about what used to be Internet words that were set
Speaker 1: on Xbox Live chats when we were in middle school.
Speaker 1: I could be wrong. Yes, yes, Scott, Alex, Yes that
Speaker 1: was the word I was referring to, but apparently reads hard.
Speaker 1: We reclaimed you could say that one again. They tried
Speaker 1: banning that word and we got that one back. But
Speaker 1: apparently that particular F word is seen as like the
Speaker 1: cardinal sin of things. And yeah, people are retarded.
Speaker 8: Anyway, you guys, all the paths I.
Speaker 1: Would I would like to think that I have a
Speaker 1: pass on that, but yeah, you have a pass on that, Alex.
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure there's not a single gender affirming term,
Speaker 1: hate for or not that you couldn't say. You are
Speaker 1: a resident trans correspondent, so I you know, what I mean,
Speaker 1: You're like, you're like the resonant black guy that you
Speaker 1: used to say the N word that you can't say,
Speaker 1: so you just point out him and he knows to
Speaker 1: say it. You're like that for the chat right now
Speaker 1: here we go. It says, uh, chat logs with purported
Speaker 1: conversations among employees in which they detailed their sex lives
Speaker 1: after transitioning, as well as hair removal, estrogen injections, and
Speaker 1: the experience of sexual pleasure post castration.
Speaker 15: All right, uh hmm, yeah.
Speaker 1: I wasn't really ready for that one. I don't know
Speaker 1: how a person who was born a biological male, right,
Speaker 1: and I don't know. I'm not speaking on behalf of
Speaker 1: people that have gone through the surgery and postop trainees
Speaker 1: and things. I don't know how that goes down as
Speaker 1: far as the feeling of sexual gratification goes for them.
Speaker 1: And I'm not going to pretend to speak on their behalf,
Speaker 1: but post castration and the experience of sexual pleasure, you know,
Speaker 1: And these were NSA agents that were talking about this.
Speaker 1: That's wait, the NSA agents were the post ops. Oh,
Speaker 1: now that's another level to this. Okay, quote, we're brazen
Speaker 1: in doing this because when was the last time anyone
Speaker 1: was really held accountable. Certainly not over the last four years.
Speaker 1: Certainly not over the last ten, maybe twenty years when
Speaker 1: we look at some of the biggest violations of the
Speaker 1: American people's trust in the intelligence community. Okay, well, that
Speaker 1: took a whole extra turn that I really wasn't expecting.
Speaker 1: I thought, this is a bunch of dudes being bros
Speaker 1: and being a little extra in a chat room. That wow, wow,
Speaker 1: and now we're here. Okay, anybody want to chime in
Speaker 1: on this one this? Yeh, thanks Raven, Yeah, you're welcome.
Speaker 1: You ask, all right if anybody would like to chie
Speaker 1: him in here that I don't exactly know what to do.
Speaker 1: I feel like my brain just hit a weird reboot,
Speaker 1: you know. Yep, Okay, about what I expected. Okay, moving
Speaker 1: on to the next topic. Holy shit, cool. Yeah. You know,
Speaker 1: you get a game plan together, you make some ideas,
Speaker 1: and then next thing you know, you're down a whole
Speaker 1: other winding road you didn't intend to go down. I
Speaker 1: stand by my statement. I'm happy that the NSA is
Speaker 1: losing employees. I think we need to go ahead and
Speaker 1: just chop that off by ninety percent. More than likely.
Speaker 1: I'm not a big fan of the government spying on
Speaker 1: its own people. I feel like we need to be
Speaker 1: spying on other countries. But ye know, yeah, cool, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know. The more I ponder what I just read,
Speaker 1: the worse it gets. Honestly I did yep. Okay, So
Speaker 1: let's move on here, breaking down the Supreme Court's reverse
Speaker 1: discrimination case. I don't exactly have an opinion on this one.
Speaker 1: I found it and thought that it was interesting, but
Speaker 1: it sounds more like the pendulum swinging the opposite direction
Speaker 1: of where it has gone the last four years. But
Speaker 1: let me know what y'all think about this. Let's check
Speaker 1: it out.
Speaker 16: We begin this evening at the Supreme Court, where the
Speaker 16: nine justices heard oral arguments in the case of Marlene Ames.
Speaker 16: Ames was an employee at the Ohio Department of Youth
Speaker 16: Services who applied for promotion. The role was given to
Speaker 16: another employee, a gay woman. Ames was then demoted her
Speaker 16: position filled by a gay man. Ames, who is straight,
Speaker 16: claims her sexual orientation was an issue in each decision.
Speaker 16: That's the story her lawyers presented today and joining us
Speaker 16: now is Jessica Elevensin CBS News legal and analysts and
Speaker 16: Loyal and law school professor Jessica what's that issue with
Speaker 16: this case?
Speaker 10: So what's an issue really is what standard are we
Speaker 10: going to use under a federal statue, Title seven when
Speaker 10: it comes to workplace discrimination claims? And specifically, are we
Speaker 10: going to use a different standard for people who are
Speaker 10: members of the majority, whether that be in this case,
Speaker 10: people who are straight or people who are white. What
Speaker 10: standard will we use in order to prove that there
Speaker 10: is in fact workplace discrimination?
Speaker 16: And in oral arguments there was this. I think it
Speaker 16: was Gorst who said there was radical agreement. Was that
Speaker 16: a little bit or in the whole thing? And if so,
Speaker 16: what were they agreeing about.
Speaker 10: I think there was radical agreement that the idea that
Speaker 10: the standard would be different, meaning harder for people in
Speaker 10: the majority to prove a workplace discrimination claim was not proper.
Speaker 10: And what do we mean by not proper? That it
Speaker 10: was no, not a proper reading of Title seven of
Speaker 10: that statute.
Speaker 8: So I think there was.
Speaker 10: Quote radical agreement, and we don't talk about this very
Speaker 10: often when the court agrees, but based on the idea
Speaker 10: that you can't have different standards for different people. If
Speaker 10: there is discrimination, then there should be the same burden
Speaker 10: that everybody faces in trying to prove those claims.
Speaker 16: And if they find for aims, then she will have
Speaker 16: to go back and win in court. Let me ask
Speaker 16: you now about Marburi versus Madison, which is the case
Speaker 16: today was a part of judicial review. Marbori versus Madison,
Speaker 16: the anniversary of which is this week. Why is that
Speaker 16: such an important case in all of these cases in
Speaker 16: this system we talk about so often.
Speaker 10: Well, it's so important because it says, federal judges, you
Speaker 10: have a role to play in our three branch system.
Speaker 10: And here's what it is. As you've said, it's judicial review.
Speaker 10: So it's not just what the constitution means. But it's
Speaker 10: looking at statutes. We've been talking about Title seven today.
Speaker 10: It's looking at popularly enacted statutes where the executive and
Speaker 10: the political and excuse me, the legislative agree, and it's
Speaker 10: judges saying, but we have the last say. We can
Speaker 10: tell you whether or not that statue is proper, and
Speaker 10: we can help interpret it. It's a huge part of
Speaker 10: our system.
Speaker 1: Okay. So, and I don't know the nuances to this case, right,
Speaker 1: I don't know if she put in for this promotion
Speaker 1: and didn't get it because the person, regardless of sexual
Speaker 1: orientation or anything else, because they were better suited for
Speaker 1: that position. I don't know, okay, and I can even
Speaker 1: accept that. Then she got removed from the position she
Speaker 1: was in and the person that took that position happened
Speaker 1: to be a gay man. Again, I don't know the
Speaker 1: nuances if there was, like she already okay, let's look
Speaker 1: at it from both sides here, okay, completely open here.
Speaker 1: If she put in for this job already, she sucked
Speaker 1: at the job she was currently operating out and I
Speaker 1: don't know, don't know, but if she currently was not
Speaker 1: up to par in the position she hailed, that may
Speaker 1: be a reason why she didn't get that promotion. And
Speaker 1: maybe they were already looking to remove her in favor
Speaker 1: of somebody more qualified or better suited for the job.
Speaker 1: I don't know. However, I could see why she would
Speaker 1: think that this was a play against her right, like
Speaker 1: they were making moves against cisgendered white women, I suppose,
Speaker 1: in favor of people that aligned more with the LGBTQ
Speaker 1: plus element OPABC community. I don't know, but like I said,
Speaker 1: I feel like this is kind of more of like
Speaker 1: the pendulum swinging back the opposite direction from what we
Speaker 1: saw from the past. I kind of want to say
Speaker 1: more like twelve years. It wasn't just the last four.
Speaker 1: It's not like Biden really cared as far as the
Speaker 1: unity of these things were concerned. Trump came in and
Speaker 1: he was very clear, like he doesn't care who you
Speaker 1: want to bang or who you want to marry, like
Speaker 1: that is beyond something. He gives a fuck about. Obama.
Speaker 1: He was there and he was very pro all of
Speaker 1: these things, but it was Congress that had to pass
Speaker 1: the laws and make everything legal and all that. So,
Speaker 1: I mean, are we gonna start seeing more of this? Y'all?
Speaker 1: Think if a person loses their job to somebody that
Speaker 1: identifies with that community, are they immediately going to say
Speaker 1: that they're being they're being ostracized because they're straight. I
Speaker 1: don't know. I could see it. I could see that
Speaker 1: becoming more of a thing. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: it's gone all the way to Supreme Court, so I
Speaker 1: feel like how they rule on this will also lead
Speaker 1: to a lot of legal precedence to all of what
Speaker 1: happens next. And you, no, h that's gonna be interesting.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be very interesting to see how this case
Speaker 1: plays out, because they are gonna absolutely take lead from
Speaker 1: this to go. I mean, this is at the federal level,
Speaker 1: and I get that, but the states are gonna take
Speaker 1: their lead from this, and they're gonna start making it
Speaker 1: to where if certain people lose their jobs. And that's
Speaker 1: the other thing too, how much of it's gonna be bullshit? Right?
Speaker 1: How much of it's gonna be somebody that showed up
Speaker 1: to work drunk a bunch of times, they lose their job,
Speaker 1: the person that takes it over their position happens to
Speaker 1: be gay, and then they're gonna try to sue the
Speaker 1: company for some sort of like prejudice against them, and
Speaker 1: how many of that will be justified as well. It's
Speaker 1: gonna be a very interesting thing to see how it
Speaker 1: plays out. Let's see here. Raven Lee says there's too
Speaker 1: much context missing to understand what is happening with this case.
Speaker 1: There was kickbacks for a lot of companies that checked
Speaker 1: boxes like gay, liberal, black, Mexican, disabled, et cetera. Right agreed,
Speaker 1: it's a double edged sword because there is discrimination for
Speaker 1: straight or gay people. That's I guess that also depends
Speaker 1: on the type of industry you're in. Right, Like, I mean,
Speaker 1: I know, we always make jokes about Hollywood, but at
Speaker 1: the same time, to say that you are a double
Speaker 1: or triple minority, you're probably gonna get accepted in Hollywood
Speaker 1: a lot sooner than a sis gendered straight white male.
Speaker 1: I feel like that's a pretty easy thing to guess.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, if you're trying to go
Speaker 1: to like an engineering firm, well, no, that's not necessarily true.
Speaker 1: I know tons of gay engineers that are killing it
Speaker 1: at their job right now. I guess. I guess it
Speaker 1: just really depends on the industry and the job feel
Speaker 1: that you choose to go into. If you would experience
Speaker 1: some sort of discrimination based off of that type of thing,
Speaker 1: I could absolutely see that being the case, And then
Speaker 1: I could also see that being a wash as well.
Speaker 1: You know, I know it depends there should be a
Speaker 1: serious test or something for jobs that is blind reviews
Speaker 1: based solely on how a person performs. I agree, But
Speaker 1: then again, it also depends on the job and on
Speaker 1: the field, like Okay, for instance, and I know I'm
Speaker 1: drawing on my own experiences for this one, but bear
Speaker 1: with me. I went on a ton of interviews to
Speaker 1: get jobs in different oil refineries and chemical plants at
Speaker 1: one point in time, and I missed out on a
Speaker 1: lot of those jobs. Usually there was nepotism involved, which
Speaker 1: that is the way of the world. If you're not networking,
Speaker 1: you're not working. And if you're really qualified for that job,
Speaker 1: but some supervisor has a nephew that also needs a
Speaker 1: job that happened to be on interviewing the same day
Speaker 1: as you. Hey to break it to you're probably a
Speaker 1: getting the job that guy is and okay, fine, that's
Speaker 1: how the world works. But there there was a lot
Speaker 1: of also, like they were trying to see if the
Speaker 1: person was the right fit for the crew. Take away
Speaker 1: religious dogma and racial bio and gender preferences and all
Speaker 1: of that just for two seconds. Certain places operate at
Speaker 1: a more laid back and slow scale, and they don't
Speaker 1: want somebody who's super high strung in there because that's
Speaker 1: not the way that this place flows. They want to
Speaker 1: make sure you're going to be a good team member
Speaker 1: for the team that they have built. Flip that script.
Speaker 1: There are certain places that are very high pace and
Speaker 1: they need somebody that's go go, go, go go, And
Speaker 1: if you're more of a laid back person, that's more like, look,
Speaker 1: we'll have a little meeting about it. We'll do this,
Speaker 1: and then we'll do that. They don't want you and
Speaker 1: the crew either, because you're not going to be a
Speaker 1: good fit for the team they've built. So I could
Speaker 1: see that kind of going that direction as well. That
Speaker 1: being said, yeah, like you said, Raven, it is a
Speaker 1: double edged sword on that one. And while there should
Speaker 1: be meritocracy in all facets of professional workplaces, it's a
Speaker 1: slippery slope because at what point does that does professionalism
Speaker 1: and a good fit. You're trying to find that perfect fit, right,
Speaker 1: the perfect gel to go across all of it. Sometimes
Speaker 1: it's not always the case, but especially in cases like
Speaker 1: this though, right like this person lost their job and
Speaker 1: I don't know if they were fired, they were demoted.
Speaker 1: They still maintain their employment. So that's the thing. I
Speaker 1: it'll be a very interesting turn of events to see
Speaker 1: how this case plays out. Absolutely Royce chimed in here
Speaker 1: and said, but they didn't care before this point because
Speaker 1: discrimination only goes one way. Yeah, yeah, discrimination has only
Speaker 1: gone one way up until now, and with the Supreme
Speaker 1: Court currently stacked more on the conservative side of things,
Speaker 1: like I said, it'll be very interesting to see how
Speaker 1: this one plays out. I don't know. It's one of
Speaker 1: those things. So just wanted to bring that up and
Speaker 1: wanted to air it out here and see what everybody
Speaker 1: thought about it. I'm going to go ahead and share
Speaker 1: the screen woman again. I think I had one more
Speaker 1: thing I wanted to share, didn't I? No, I did not.
Speaker 8: No.
Speaker 1: We already talked about the minerals. Okay, fair enough, all right,
Speaker 1: cool Tony, I know you had something that you wanted
Speaker 1: to discuss on this episode.
Speaker 2: Well, this may even relate to the topic of discrimination
Speaker 2: a little bit.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: I think that I am going to discriminate against female
Speaker 2: Indian dentists from now on for my sake. And now,
Speaker 2: if I tell you the whole story this is going
Speaker 2: to take.
Speaker 1: I did. That's a very specific niche market that you're
Speaker 1: discriminating against your brother.
Speaker 2: But all right, and I wish I could be more
Speaker 2: scientific about it. I don't know if it's the fact
Speaker 2: they're female or the fact they're Indian that causes them
Speaker 2: to behave like this one hundred percent of the time
Speaker 2: in my limited experience, But let me let me tell
Speaker 2: you a bit of a story back in back in
Speaker 2: twenty fourteen. I hadn't been to the dentist in a
Speaker 2: long time, but I started going and it was this
Speaker 2: older Germanic Armenian guy, interesting blend, and he gave me
Speaker 2: six fillings between a bunch of teeth because I give
Speaker 2: was my it was my fault for being stupid and
Speaker 2: not taking care of myself. But that was all I needed.
Speaker 2: And then twenty fifteen and twenty sixteen, no need for
Speaker 2: any more work. But in twenty seventeen, one day he
Speaker 2: was out of the office and his female Indian coworker
Speaker 2: was substituting for him, and she said, oh, you have
Speaker 2: four more cavities here, here, here, and here, And I
Speaker 2: was kind of dubious. I thought, I don't feel like
Speaker 2: I've had any pain or anything, so you know, I
Speaker 2: don't want to get these fillings. And you know, they
Speaker 2: had the paperwork ready to go. I'm like, hey, just
Speaker 2: sign here, and I was like, no, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 2: I don't think I need this. Next checkup, it was
Speaker 2: back to the old dude, the Germanic art Median dude,
Speaker 2: and he didn't even notice anything. And I said, well, hey,
Speaker 2: what about here, here, here, and here, And he said,
Speaker 2: there's nothing there. Don't worry about that. I could write
Speaker 2: it down if you want me to. No, you don't
Speaker 2: need anything anyway. Twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen, or fine, twenty
Speaker 2: twenty and twenty one, I got a new dentist. He
Speaker 2: was a male Japanese American and he also didn't notice anything.
Speaker 2: And I asked him, what about here, here, here, and here,
Speaker 2: and he said, oh, no, don't worry about it. Then
Speaker 2: in twenty twenty one, I moved to Texas and a
Speaker 2: former coach, very lady back guy, and again he didn't
Speaker 2: notice anything. And I asked, what about here, here, here,
Speaker 2: and here, and he says, no, big deal, don't worry
Speaker 2: about it. And then finally he retired at the end
Speaker 2: of twenty twenty three. And in twenty twenty four the
Speaker 2: office was bought by an Indian woman and I go
Speaker 2: in and all of a sudden, Oh, you got cavities here, here, here,
Speaker 2: and here. We need to fill these And I said, nah,
Speaker 2: I don't think so. Sorry, I'm gonna forego treatment. Six
Speaker 2: months later again, hey, when are you going to get
Speaker 2: these done? You need to get these done. I said no, no, no,
Speaker 2: no thanks. And then yesterday I went back and it
Speaker 2: was a new Indian lady. But she said, oh, no,
Speaker 2: I found five of them right here. Oh, and this
Speaker 2: one's really really bad. You really need to get this
Speaker 2: one filled right away. And I said, ah, man, you see,
Speaker 2: I want to forego treatment. They wanted me to sign
Speaker 2: things right away and I just said I don't think so.
Speaker 8: Sorry. Sorry.
Speaker 2: So this morning I went to another dentist or a
Speaker 2: second opinion, which I had never done before, and he was,
Speaker 2: I guess, fifty years old and white, and I think
Speaker 2: he's Mormon. Not that you know that should make much difference.
Speaker 1: But somehow it does, though, doesn't it.
Speaker 2: I don't know, but he's He probed me and took
Speaker 2: X rays and he said there is nothing wrong. You
Speaker 2: don't need anything. And I just hate these dentists out
Speaker 2: there who scam people. And no, it was a whole conversation,
Speaker 2: but I thought, this is the best state the dentist
Speaker 2: I've ever had, because the first time was thinking, oh,
Speaker 2: you might be borderline here on this one. But no,
Speaker 2: he's like, you don't need any of this. These people
Speaker 2: scam you, and you know, race and ethnicity and the like.
Speaker 2: Gender did not come up. But I've had three female
Speaker 2: Indian dentists, and all of them have been the exact
Speaker 2: same experience, and I don't think I'll have another one.
Speaker 1: I mean, I have, you know, similar feelings towards Vietnamese
Speaker 1: dentists strictly because there was one I had a cap
Speaker 1: that popped off that he put in, I might add,
Speaker 1: and I'm saying Vietnamese because his name is Win, so
Speaker 1: clearly he's one of the VC fucking Charlie and so
Speaker 1: all right. I asked him for a gold cap for
Speaker 1: multiple reasons. One of those would be because at heart
Speaker 1: I am but white trash. Okay, it is what it is,
Speaker 1: and I already have one. On one side, it would
Speaker 1: have been a match. On the other side, I thought
Speaker 1: it was pimp but whatever, and uh, you boy put
Speaker 1: in a porcelain cap because that's the standard these days.
Speaker 1: But but but it pops off. U. This was about
Speaker 1: six months later, I might add, fine, fine, wait what
Speaker 1: happened here? I'm sorry, something popped up on the screen
Speaker 1: and okay, it hurt like a bitch. I call them
Speaker 1: up and I say, hey, this just happened. I'm coming in.
Speaker 1: Oh uh, we don't know if it could fit you
Speaker 1: in today. I'm like ma'am, I have an exposed nerve
Speaker 1: and it feels like someone's shoving a red hot ice
Speaker 1: pick into my jaw. Y'all are gonna see me whether
Speaker 1: I'm on your little schedule or not. I don't know
Speaker 1: what else it's I'm going to be at your office
Speaker 1: very irate in about thirty minutes. You can prepare for that,
Speaker 1: or I can make myself known when I get it
Speaker 1: doesn't matter to me like no, So they gave me
Speaker 1: the run around. Thankfully, I had a my ex wife's
Speaker 1: aunt is a dental assistant. She was able to fit
Speaker 1: me in, like it took five minutes. It took five
Speaker 1: minutes to scrape off the old stuff put it back
Speaker 1: on correctly this time. And that's my point. It's like, Okay, well,
Speaker 1: you know what, fuck that Vietnamese dentist. And I'm not
Speaker 1: saying that's indicative of all dentists from Vietnam, but I'm
Speaker 1: definitely saying that that guy sucks dick for crack. So
Speaker 1: you know, I mean, I get it all right. So
Speaker 1: you're saying that there's a little bit of a stigma
Speaker 1: towards at least in your experience, has been three for
Speaker 1: three on email Indian dentists that suck.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, and the other dentists say, ah, man, they're not.
Speaker 2: I didn't bring up ethnicity or gender at all, but
Speaker 2: they just said, yeah, some dentists out there are these
Speaker 2: real scammers, and most people don't get a second opinion.
Speaker 2: But sometimes you got to be your advocate. You gotta
Speaker 2: do that. You got to look it up back in
Speaker 2: twenty fourteen. That's what started getting me interested in nutrition
Speaker 2: and the Western Price found and how nutrition is probably
Speaker 2: like sixty to eighty percent of the battle in keeping
Speaker 2: your teeth healthy. Western Price was a dentist about one
Speaker 2: hundred years ago who investigated how animal fats and vitamins
Speaker 2: and fat soluble vitamins like D and K two are
Speaker 2: so important for calcium transport. And I could go on
Speaker 2: and on about that, but yeah, nutrition is pretty important
Speaker 2: and you just got to be your own advocate there.
Speaker 1: You don't really see many Indian dentists now I think
Speaker 1: about it. You usually seems really.
Speaker 2: I mean on Google maps and stuff. Yeah, there's a
Speaker 2: lot of them, even in Texas, and I remember quite
Speaker 2: a few of them in California too, or at least
Speaker 2: in the Dallas area.
Speaker 1: I've only seen them as far as like doctors for sure,
Speaker 1: but I mean, you know, I know dentists are technically
Speaker 1: doctors too, yeah, but it's it's they're not seen as
Speaker 1: doctors by you know, actual doctors. But you know, that
Speaker 1: being said, I've only ever seen Indian people in surgery
Speaker 1: rooms or with an MD by their name. I don't
Speaker 1: think I've ever actually met or seen a dentist of
Speaker 1: Indian descent. I mean it's not like I just know
Speaker 1: all there is to know about dentistry or you know whatever.
Speaker 1: But that's fascinating. I mean, most of their most Indian
Speaker 1: families tell their kids to be doctors and lawyers. But
Speaker 1: like if you were a dentist, I feel like that'd
Speaker 1: be like be bringing home like a C plus on
Speaker 1: a test. Like they're not fucking happy about it. I
Speaker 1: don't know.
Speaker 2: Interesting, Yeah, I don't know what. There's a lot of
Speaker 2: them that do other chips, like Sam Hyde was joking about,
Speaker 2: there's so many of them at gas stations and motels
Speaker 2: and stuff. And I travel a lot for my living
Speaker 2: and it's very often Indian people. And usually I have
Speaker 2: no problem with them if they're running a hotel or motel.
Speaker 1: No, they're great people. You know, I think their food
Speaker 1: is insane. I cannot palette the taste of most of
Speaker 1: their cuisine. But you know, they seem to be good
Speaker 1: people just trying to make their way in this world.
Speaker 1: Just wow. Okay, So typically female Indian dentists in my experience.
Speaker 1: As I'm getting ready to finish that sentence, I could
Speaker 1: just hear it sounding racist. But like, you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: you're three for three on this and at that point,
Speaker 1: that's that's a pattern. Mm hmm. Maybe they just don't
Speaker 1: like you, bro.
Speaker 2: Well well, no, my new dentist said, I've seen a
Speaker 2: lot of people coming over from that old office. You're
Speaker 2: not the only one. There's plenty of other people who say, man,
Speaker 2: I haven't had a kevity in like five years, and
Speaker 2: all of a sudden they tell me I have nine.
Speaker 2: You know, there's something off about this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're trying to make that money, bro, they're trying
Speaker 1: to scout people.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, those five they would have made eight hundred dollars.
Speaker 2: So yeah, there's a clear incentive there, and they just
Speaker 2: lower their threshold and maybe they even believe it that
Speaker 2: oh yeah you really need this. Maybe they actually believe it,
Speaker 2: and you know, one of the easiest people to lie
Speaker 2: to is yourself. But that's still no excuse.
Speaker 1: God, that's wild man. Well, okay, as far as the
Speaker 1: discrimination goes and meritocracy being what it is, yeah, that
Speaker 1: kind of did play in a weird type of way,
Speaker 1: but it played in nonetheless. I'll be dangous.
Speaker 2: Yeah, as a customer, as a private citizen who's not
Speaker 2: filling out employment paperwork like W two's, you are allowed
Speaker 2: to discriminate for any reason you want and ask you
Speaker 2: that's not literally what I'm doing. Yeah, I'm going to
Speaker 2: be really suspicious going forward.
Speaker 1: Those dentists, did they sound like they were from the
Speaker 1: Old Country or did they sound like they were born
Speaker 1: and raised here and had no accents? That's also kind
Speaker 1: of important.
Speaker 8: Okay.
Speaker 2: The first one in twenty seventeen was definitely Punjabi. The
Speaker 2: second one also was definitely from overseas. The third one,
Speaker 2: who I just saw yesterday, had perfect American accent as
Speaker 2: far as I could tell. So two out of three
Speaker 2: were from the Old Country.
Speaker 1: So two out of three we're first generation and the
Speaker 1: second generation didn't seem to be much of a didn't
Speaker 1: give you no warm and fuzzy feeling either, so damn yeah,
Speaker 1: to one could be a one off. Two, it might
Speaker 1: even be you know, just bad luck. Three is a
Speaker 1: pattern that's that's kind of hard to ignore. Man, Damn.
Speaker 2: Okay, figure I'd share that. So yeah, everyone take care
Speaker 2: of your teeth and be your own advocate.
Speaker 1: Absolutely. And I'm still going back to get that gold
Speaker 1: tooth put back in because I I think that's bad ass,
Speaker 1: and worst comes to worst, I pop that bitch out
Speaker 1: and sell it. So, I mean, you know, there's there's
Speaker 1: multiple levels as to the reasons for things, you know,
Speaker 1: But uh okay, uh, I guess I didn't really have
Speaker 1: much else to go on on this evening. If anybody
Speaker 1: else is anything that they would like to bring up,
Speaker 1: please air it out and let's let's chat about it. Otherwise,
Speaker 1: think we might rap early on this one, Alex. I
Speaker 1: hope we didn't offend you earlier talking about the things
Speaker 1: and the stuff. Although you're you seem to be home
Speaker 1: and not at work, so now I'm very curious. Okay,
Speaker 1: what is your take on that post castration sexual pleasure.
Speaker 1: I don't I'm not asking if you're a post or
Speaker 1: pre op or whatever. That's none of my business. But
Speaker 1: I don't know how that goes down, and my brain
Speaker 1: is still a little extra fried on this, so please
Speaker 1: help me out here.
Speaker 17: No, he didn't look at me for that. I do
Speaker 17: think too far.
Speaker 8: I don't really know how it works. I didn't look
Speaker 8: into any of that, okay, so.
Speaker 1: Just stupid. This is why you are a resident trans
Speaker 1: correspondent because you, as you said in the messages, when
Speaker 1: I when you first told me that that's what the
Speaker 1: situation was, You're like, yeah, I'm trans, but I'm not retarded,
Speaker 1: And I'm like, I fucking love you. You get it.
Speaker 8: I'm not a fucking retard, yes.
Speaker 1: Indeed, okay, and I'm is it weird that now I
Speaker 1: want to read the transcripts from those chats to see
Speaker 1: what the fuck they were talking about, because it's like
Speaker 1: those those tidbits are like almost too incredible to believe
Speaker 1: that that's what was being discussed. But now that I
Speaker 1: know that, it's like, all right, I need more clarification.
Speaker 1: Now I don't even know Royce, what are your thoughts
Speaker 1: on this, bro, our resident Jewish correspondent, Please chime in?
Speaker 9: That's I mean, as you said before, part of it
Speaker 9: is some people getting together and just trying to try
Speaker 9: to talk and try to talk shop because hey, well
Speaker 9: this is cool and this is cool, and just you know,
Speaker 9: one leads to another, a leads to be, leads to see,
Speaker 9: leads to really bad shit. Right, it can be very
Speaker 9: easy to also get complacent. Right, So if you start
Speaker 9: talking about things and there's no moderator and there's no one.
Speaker 8: Well, oh well, nobody's watching it.
Speaker 9: Yeah I know I'm on a government computer or I
Speaker 9: know I'm being watched, but like no one said anything,
Speaker 9: so it's okay, right, And especially if they're labeling it
Speaker 9: as oh, well, we're just affirming this, or we're not
Speaker 9: we're not slutshaming, we're not translating whatever.
Speaker 8: It's kind of using it under that kind of guys.
Speaker 9: Also retarded and ridiculous, very very sad, But like that
Speaker 9: just shows the corruption of the people who are supposed
Speaker 9: to be watching us.
Speaker 8: So if the people who are in this.
Speaker 9: Power are watching us and they're doing this, it's like
Speaker 9: you're not being very good examples.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree, I agree. Yeah, that's what a weird
Speaker 1: turn for this to take in that regard. But this
Speaker 1: is this is twenty twenty five, y'all. This is the
Speaker 1: world that we are currently living in I guess. I
Speaker 1: guess to some people that whole conversation would be deemed normal.
Speaker 1: I you know, it'd be like that. Okay, super out
Speaker 1: of left field. But Royce, while I got you here,
Speaker 1: what does the word emmett mean in Hebrew?
Speaker 8: Brush proof?
Speaker 17: No?
Speaker 8: Truth is in like lie the opposite of a lie. Truth?
Speaker 9: Oh yeah, so you're so so you're talking about what
Speaker 9: you're talking about?
Speaker 8: What goes on the forehead of gollum?
Speaker 1: You knew exactly what I was talking about, yes.
Speaker 8: And by the way, so so yeah, yeah.
Speaker 9: And then when you erase the olif, which is the
Speaker 9: very first letter of that three letter H word, it
Speaker 9: becomes mate or mace, and that is the word for death.
Speaker 1: Oh so true. It brings it to life, and then
Speaker 1: death makes it go back to being clay incorrect.
Speaker 9: And then there's also like, I believe a piece of
Speaker 9: parchment with one of God's names on it that goes
Speaker 9: inside the mouth.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've heard. I think you might have told me that,
Speaker 1: or Jonathan might have told me that. I don't know,
Speaker 1: but okay, interesting, and it's one of the names of God.
Speaker 8: What are the names of God? Goes inside the mouth?
Speaker 8: I don't.
Speaker 9: I do not know which one that would be a
Speaker 9: that would be something that an.
Speaker 8: Actual Cabbalist would know.
Speaker 9: Got you okay, Because they have these fun esoteric traditions.
Speaker 1: I would love to have a conversation with one of
Speaker 1: them one day, but I also I feel like my
Speaker 1: biases would get in the way of having a productive
Speaker 1: conversation on that. It's the same way I want to
Speaker 1: have a real conversation with a true Satanist. And I
Speaker 1: mean I'm not even trying to have a fight with
Speaker 1: them or a debate with them, just serious questions as
Speaker 1: like why, what do you expect to gain from that?
Speaker 1: Is it? What do you think is happening next.
Speaker 9: Here's the thing, Contrary to popular belief, Cobblists are not
Speaker 9: these evil people who are trying to take over the world.
Speaker 9: So when people say, oh, well, they're a part of
Speaker 9: the cabal andkabala like no.
Speaker 8: This is this is completely incorrect.
Speaker 9: So kabbala, which does come from the Hebrew word kabail,
Speaker 9: which does mean to receive, are these are our traditions.
Speaker 9: These are things that are taught two masters. But it's
Speaker 9: only in a line of holiness, not anything else. So
Speaker 9: that's kind of an annoyance on on my part whenever
Speaker 9: I hear people speak very derogatorily or you know that, well,
Speaker 9: these views are doing this, these you are doing that.
Speaker 9: It's not not correct because when whenever you have these
Speaker 9: people that are in that level, they're doing everything, shame,
Speaker 9: shamime for the sake of heaven. So for for example,
Speaker 9: the Labavacher Rev who died at the nineteen ninety.
Speaker 8: One, I think.
Speaker 1: That's the one that people thought was the Messiah.
Speaker 9: Correct, that was one of the people that that group
Speaker 9: actually believed and still believes is the Messiah.
Speaker 8: Believe it or honest.
Speaker 9: There So there were times where he he would perform miracles.
Speaker 8: His father was and his father in law was a Cobbalist,
Speaker 8: and like.
Speaker 5: His father's name was Alah no no, his father in
Speaker 5: law was a like hold hold the fuck on here now, Okay,
Speaker 5: my bad continues.
Speaker 8: So sorry.
Speaker 9: So there are plenty of people that that study kabbala,
Speaker 9: that that actually study like a book called Tanya, which
Speaker 9: was also was written by the first Lebabareb, which kind
Speaker 9: of goes into some cobalistic ideas. You have other people
Speaker 9: name let's see uh one of the rabbis of of
Speaker 9: Breslav there.
Speaker 8: You know, they have a lot of works of uh
Speaker 8: that are in that are kabbala Sorry I can't speak,
Speaker 8: that are that way in nature.
Speaker 9: But everything is going towards holiness, and to gear it
Speaker 9: towards holiness and not the other and not the other
Speaker 9: way around. Like the whole idea is to not give
Speaker 9: power to the other side. Is only to do things
Speaker 9: and and holiness and only to.
Speaker 18: Do things right, like people that actually study this stuff
Speaker 18: that have from actual masters, not like these people that
Speaker 18: you know, talk to Madonna or other people and here we're.
Speaker 9: This little red bracelet and you're gonna be okay, Like
Speaker 9: these people that are.
Speaker 8: Just doing it for for the charms or for the
Speaker 8: lulls or whatever, that that's not a true form of cabal.
Speaker 9: Like they take these things and they'll either they'll take
Speaker 9: it out of context or not really understand it, because
Speaker 9: some of these things are so out of left field
Speaker 9: unless you actually know everything in depth. There, you know,
Speaker 9: you'll you'll read a story in the the Kabbalah and.
Speaker 8: It will not make a lick of sense.
Speaker 9: Unless you're actually able to understand, you know, what, why
Speaker 9: is this word use?
Speaker 8: Why is this other thing used?
Speaker 9: So no, but people who actually study and who teach
Speaker 9: the Gabala, it's a very very select few people.
Speaker 8: And these people are.
Speaker 9: Are not doing it for the sake of of ruling
Speaker 9: the world.
Speaker 8: They don't want that at all.
Speaker 9: What they want to do is help, in most cases,
Speaker 9: help the Jewish people, help their help their community.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 9: So, there was plenty of stories where there there were
Speaker 9: couples who were barren and the doctor said, you know,
Speaker 9: I'm sorry, you know, your your uterus just can't have children.
Speaker 9: That woman got a blessing from the rebbe and she
Speaker 9: gave birth and the doctor's like, how the hell is
Speaker 9: this possible? Like literally like you have no overag or
Speaker 9: you have no this like your reproduction organs shouldn't work
Speaker 9: yet yet these this woman, this couple where we'll have two, three,
Speaker 9: four children, so like and then that's just you know,
Speaker 9: one one story. There are literally thousands of stories where
Speaker 9: people would go not only to the Labavacherebb, but the
Speaker 9: Tasha Rebby who was in Tush, Canada.
Speaker 8: He probably died about five years ago.
Speaker 9: He was known to perform to perform miracles, and he's
Speaker 9: not trying to take over the world like he's trying
Speaker 9: to serve God. So like anybody who actually studies and
Speaker 9: teaches this very I.
Speaker 8: Don't nests they want to call it secret, like you
Speaker 8: need to be on a very verb, you need be.
Speaker 9: A sage and all honestly to be able to be
Speaker 9: on this all with it's not for the not for
Speaker 9: the normal normal guy.
Speaker 1: Okay, So you told me once that like you may
Speaker 1: not know the person, but like you know the person
Speaker 1: who knows the person, because the Jewish community, everybody knows everybody. Essentially,
Speaker 1: you're like three steps away from knowing the guy. Could
Speaker 1: you potentially get the cult of conspiracy in touch with
Speaker 1: a true Cobbalist because that would be a fun episode
Speaker 1: to talk about.
Speaker 8: Things I don't know. I can try.
Speaker 9: I make no promises in this regard, okay, because only
Speaker 9: because like there, I don't know how much they would
Speaker 9: even say, you know, and I'll honestly like they're so, well,
Speaker 9: why are you doing this?
Speaker 8: Why are you doing that? Well, I'm doing it for
Speaker 8: this for the sake of Heaven. We're doing this. But
Speaker 8: that's if they would even be willing to do it.
Speaker 8: And I just don't know.
Speaker 1: To tell you the truth, I would appreciate if you
Speaker 1: would kind of put the word out and see if
Speaker 1: any uh you know responded, But if they don't, I understand. Yeah,
Speaker 1: way that goes u Alex. You said in the chat
Speaker 1: you can go to a meet and greet for the
Speaker 1: band Ghosts if you want a Satanist yo. Fair, fair,
Speaker 1: But even still like I if because at that point
Speaker 1: they're like in they're in concert mode, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. It's not like having a one on one
Speaker 1: with a person, like talking with them over a beer
Speaker 1: at that point. Because I've seen some of the meet
Speaker 1: and greets and the conversations that they have and it's
Speaker 1: it's funny, but that's the point. They're doing it for
Speaker 1: the the oohz and the ahs of it at that point.
Speaker 1: I don't know how much of that is them being
Speaker 1: authentic or them doing it for the showmanship, you know,
Speaker 1: which even still they're Satanists, but their sound is so
Speaker 1: soft compared to their look. I like some of their music,
Speaker 1: but it's just, you know, a little more melodic than
Speaker 1: you would expect by looking at their album covers and things.
Speaker 17: Yeah, not at all I thought there would sound, but
Speaker 17: they're still in a band. I just think that finding
Speaker 17: anybody that says say, I actually believe that would be
Speaker 17: just like anyone trying to be edgy or whatever. Yeah,
Speaker 17: anyone really thinking.
Speaker 8: That, because it's fucking stupid at least I think so.
Speaker 1: I agree. But like that's the thing, you know that
Speaker 1: there is at least one or two of them somewhere,
Speaker 1: probably local to each of us right now, not just
Speaker 1: some edgy kid that you know, picked up a couple
Speaker 1: of grimoiirs and is just like, yep, I'm a witch
Speaker 1: now it's whatever, like you know what I mean, like
Speaker 1: somebody who really is about that life to the service
Speaker 1: of the dark Lord. And for some reason, maybe it's
Speaker 1: just because we don't know where to look, right You
Speaker 1: don't you don't fish for shark in a lake, you
Speaker 1: don't hunt for elk in the desert. Perhaps we're not
Speaker 1: looking in the right places to try to find one
Speaker 1: of these people to come onto the show. But I'm
Speaker 1: also I don't know. I agree. I feel like the
Speaker 1: vast majority of them are just people that are being
Speaker 1: edgy for the sake of being edgy. But I don't know,
Speaker 1: I don't know. Maybe one day we'll make that happen,
Speaker 1: and Royce, maybe you can find that Cobby list for
Speaker 1: us who can come in and educate us on some
Speaker 1: things I don't know. We can only hope and pray
Speaker 1: on it, you know.
Speaker 9: But uh, hold on, by the way, before you go,
Speaker 9: the very beginning of the chat, I did send two
Speaker 9: fun links about some interesting AI slash robots that you
Speaker 9: might find very fun.
Speaker 8: It's like that.
Speaker 9: So there's two. So the first one shows like the oh,
Speaker 9: here's the good side, and the second one is the
Speaker 9: creepiest shit the cool things I saw this week.
Speaker 1: Let's go for it here. Let me go ahead and
Speaker 1: share the screen. Cool, cool, cool, and let's get after it.
Speaker 19: Uh.
Speaker 1: Futurism is the name of this publication. You are completely
Speaker 1: un prepared for what this humanoid servant robot looks like.
Speaker 1: That's unexpected. Whoa, Okay, they're trying to make it have
Speaker 1: soft features. Look at this. Norwegian robotics startup one X
Speaker 1: has shown off its latest humanoid robot, dubbed Neo Gamma,
Speaker 1: in a fleshy new promotional video. Okay, that just sounded dirty.
Speaker 1: In a fleshy new promotional video claiming to show the
Speaker 1: bot preparing tea, doing laundry, and vacuuming around the house. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it looks like it's like wearing a sweater almost, and
Speaker 1: the face just looks like a screen with some eyeballs
Speaker 1: on it. Okay, in a bid to separate its bipedal
Speaker 1: household laborer from the far creepier competition one x wrap
Speaker 1: Neogamma and what in what it's calling a knit suit,
Speaker 1: an eyebrow raising onesie that's soft to the touch and
Speaker 1: flexible for dynamic movement. Yeah, it did look like it
Speaker 1: was kind of wearing a sweater onesie here. It's a
Speaker 1: fascinating choice with some eerie results despite its full body sweater.
Speaker 1: Neo Gamma's face is more conventional panel of a black
Speaker 1: plastic dotted with an unsettling pair of but set back eyes.
Speaker 1: It's as if evil scientists crossed Baymax from Disney's Big
Speaker 1: Hero Six with Jason Vorhees, a hockey mass doning antagonist
Speaker 1: from the Friday the Thirteenth film series. My favorite as
Speaker 1: far as the Slashers go, by the way, with maybe
Speaker 1: a splash of of Ugi Boogie from Nightmare Before Christmas
Speaker 1: and the Haunted sat Guy from nine. There is a
Speaker 1: not so distant future where we will all have our
Speaker 1: own robot helper at home, like Rosie from robot and Baymax,
Speaker 1: said one X CEO Burnt bjorn Nick. Okay, because they're Norwegian,
Speaker 1: I don't know how to do their Viking sounds in
Speaker 1: a statement. But for humanoid robots to truly integrate in
Speaker 1: everyday life, they must be developed alongside humans, not in isolation.
Speaker 1: Oh they got a video with it.
Speaker 4: That's really what I wanted you to show.
Speaker 19: Oh, yes, perfect.
Speaker 1: I am slightly creeped out by it. I know I
Speaker 1: have my biases towards robots in our homes.
Speaker 8: But okay, wait till you get to the next one.
Speaker 1: Oh I'm sure of it. I'm of course. Uh but
Speaker 1: whether any of what one X showed off it's Apple
Speaker 1: like promotional video will even will ever turn into reality
Speaker 1: is awfully hazy. In a press release, the company claimed
Speaker 1: the design is only a quote unquote first step and
Speaker 1: opens the door to start internal home testing. Yeah, I'll
Speaker 1: bet it does. In other words, don't expect Neogamma to
Speaker 1: go on sale anytime soon, although, as is typical in
Speaker 1: the hype fueled tech sector, the company is simultaneously promising
Speaker 1: exactly that even as it manages expectations. Here's a direct
Speaker 1: quote with Neogamma every engineering and design decision was made
Speaker 1: with one goal in mind, getting Neo into customers' homes
Speaker 1: as quickly as possible. We're close. We can't wait to
Speaker 1: share more soon. One Nexus is far from the first
Speaker 1: company to show off a flashy humanoid robot designed to
Speaker 1: help out in the home. Elon Musk's Tesla, for instance,
Speaker 1: is working on its own bipedal assistant dubbed Optimism, but
Speaker 1: despite plenty of fanfare, the ev maker has employed a
Speaker 1: lot of smoke and mirrors to make up for reality,
Speaker 1: failing in failing to live up to some pretty bowl
Speaker 1: claims so far. California based AI robot company Figure has
Speaker 1: also shown off an AI powered humanoid, because again, that's
Speaker 1: exactly what we needed. More AI in human robot form
Speaker 1: now that can talk courtesy of OpenAI's largest language model.
Speaker 1: The company claims on its website that the second generation
Speaker 1: of its robot, Figure O two is the world's first
Speaker 1: commercially viable autonomous humanoid robot, but as yet to announce
Speaker 1: price or availability. Interestingly, one X also received funding from
Speaker 1: open Ai last year as part of a one hundred
Speaker 1: million dollar series, in another sign of the hype for
Speaker 1: humanoid robots. That can talk to other talk to their
Speaker 1: masters with the help of generative AI. But despite the
Speaker 1: attention and investments being poured into the industry, nobody really
Speaker 1: knows when or if we'll see robots like Neogamma being
Speaker 1: offered to consumers. The engineering challenges are immense, and whether
Speaker 1: they can power excuse me, whether they can prove to
Speaker 1: be actually useful in a home setting, let alone be
Speaker 1: affordable to those who aren't hugely wealthy, remains to be seen.
Speaker 1: At least, we'll give one X credit for the a
Speaker 1: creative new twist on the otherwise uncanny aesthetics of robotics,
Speaker 1: filled with creepy facial expressions and twitching extremities. Yeah. Uh,
Speaker 1: the the knit sweater pattern, I'll say, makes it look
Speaker 1: less threatening. You know. It looks like a sweater your
Speaker 1: your grandma knitted you. And that's that's a move. And
Speaker 1: now we get into the creepy robots here. Oh, for
Speaker 1: the love of God, Okay, and this is from interesting Engineering.
Speaker 1: Let's let's dive in here video world's first humanoid robot
Speaker 1: with lifelike muscles and bones twitches to life. Yeah, why
Speaker 1: why did we need that? Why did no one on
Speaker 1: Earth Earth asked for that, yet they're making it because.
Speaker 8: West World ask for it. West World asked for it.
Speaker 8: That's where they're trying to get to.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's a good point. Uh uh. Protoclone God.
Speaker 1: Protoclone now uses pneumatics, but will shift to hydraulics, mimicking
Speaker 1: human skeletal, muscular, vascular, and nervous systems. That just looks
Speaker 1: creepy like that. That straight up looks like a scene
Speaker 1: from a horror movie before it starts taking over. A
Speaker 1: Polish startup, Clone Robotics has unveiled a lifelike synthetic human
Speaker 1: prototype named proto Clone v I or V one excuse me.
Speaker 1: It boasts over two hundred degrees of freedom, one thousand
Speaker 1: mile fibers, and five hundred sensors. The faceless android is autonomic,
Speaker 1: anatomically accurate, and has sparked fascination and unease. The firm
Speaker 1: claims that Protoclone V one is the world's first bipedal
Speaker 1: muscul musculo skeletal android. Clones mile fiber technology uses artificial
Speaker 1: muscles to move the skeleton by attaching them to precise
Speaker 1: bone points like animals and humans. In December, Clone entered
Speaker 1: the competitive humanoid Robotics market with its debut of Clone Alpha,
Speaker 1: its first full scale humanoid robot. Earlier, the firm also
Speaker 1: unveiled a humanoid torso capable of human like movements. Oh joy,
Speaker 1: there's a video, and it's so cool when there's a video. Okay, Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're definitely making the sound. Also super creepy on this thing.
Speaker 1: Bro Jesus, is any gonna kill the volume on this thing?
Speaker 1: That is off putting as hell?
Speaker 8: Yeah, and checking out the website for this colony. It's
Speaker 8: really it's crazy. So they actually yeah continue sorry.
Speaker 1: Oh my god. Biomimetic robots. Yeah, I said that right,
Speaker 1: biomimetic mimetic Okay. In a forty second video posted on
Speaker 1: social media, the proto Clone is shown suspended in a
Speaker 1: workshop performing dynamic movements, with its face hidden behind a
Speaker 1: black reflective mask. The protoclone prototype currently uses pneumatics, but
Speaker 1: will soon switch to hydraulic systems as development advances. Unlike
Speaker 1: other humanoid robots, it features synthetic systems replicating human skeletal, muscular, vascular,
Speaker 1: and nervous structures. Clone Robotics claims it is the first
Speaker 1: bipedal Okay, we kind of already said that through the
Speaker 1: University of Tokyo JSK Lab introduced a similar humanoid, kane
Speaker 1: Goro in twenty seventeen. However, king Goro was designed as
Speaker 1: a research tool, while Clone Robotics claims for commercial or
Speaker 1: aims for commercial applications. Okay, is this the other robot
Speaker 1: or the video here? What is this one? Clone specializes
Speaker 1: in biomimetic robots, whereas others like Tesla creates pots for
Speaker 1: domestic chores. It was established in twenty twenty one to
Speaker 1: emulate the strength and agility of biological creatures, addressing the
Speaker 1: difficult task of human body mimicry. Okay, sure, let's play
Speaker 1: the next video. Why not? Yeah, I'm lowering that volume.
Speaker 1: Good guy. This looks like CGI is this?
Speaker 9: I don't know, I know that that's not that that's
Speaker 9: actually real.
Speaker 1: That's real hands. Yeah.
Speaker 8: Well, they're actually when they say, like mimicking.
Speaker 9: So the skeletal structure is actually two hundred and six
Speaker 9: bones just like the human skeletons. Really, they're trying to
Speaker 9: mimic us, like literally like legitimately.
Speaker 17: Wow.
Speaker 1: And so they're already talking about using hydraulics in it
Speaker 1: rather than but why for efficiency reasons? That can't be
Speaker 1: better better than what, like, as far as a robot
Speaker 1: is concerned, Why would you do that rather than just
Speaker 1: go off of like, okay, to make a muscle fast
Speaker 1: twitch happen. Why wouldn't you use a solenoid? Why would
Speaker 1: you want to use a hydraulic system? I seem I
Speaker 1: feel like that it's like they're going out of their
Speaker 1: way to make it more human, like when the point
Speaker 1: of it is to not be human. But that never mind,
Speaker 1: this company is really trying to make it as human
Speaker 1: as possible, which again I feel yeah, yeah, I guess
Speaker 1: there's like all these movies that they've come out with
Speaker 1: over the past few decades about robots taking over the
Speaker 1: world and all of this. I guess they just kind
Speaker 1: of didn't see that as a warning and saw that
Speaker 1: as a blueprint. But okay, let's keep reading here. The
Speaker 1: company began by building a robotic hand that mimics human
Speaker 1: function using artificial bones and muscles. Its thumb can easily
Speaker 1: catch a ball and rotate. Building on this, the team
Speaker 1: create a humanoid torso with realistic shoulder joints, a cervical spine, yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: a cervical spine, and a moving elbow Wow. Clone originally
Speaker 1: imitated human anatomy before enabling natural motion using artificial muscles
Speaker 1: as opposed to creating movements around its robotic structure. The
Speaker 1: outcome is remarkably lifelike, A wins remarkably okay, almost uncanny
Speaker 1: and how much it resembles the human body? That doesn't
Speaker 1: That doesn't resemble the human body to me and.
Speaker 14: Day?
Speaker 1: Yeah, well yeah, I guess so the first video a
Speaker 1: little bit more. But it also looked like a corpse
Speaker 1: that was kind of twitching for its life. But I
Speaker 1: guess again, mimicry. You know, anybody listening to this on
Speaker 1: Thursday that would like to see what we're talking about
Speaker 1: or be a part of the chat, come check out
Speaker 1: the Cajun Night on Patreon if you that's the best
Speaker 1: way to support this and join into the conversation here. Anyway,
Speaker 1: let's keep going here. Clone Robotics has advanced its humanoid
Speaker 1: design to achieve natural walking by replacing rigid actuators with
Speaker 1: soft water powered artificial muscles. Okay, so they're trying to
Speaker 1: make it more smooth and not as rigid. I guess
Speaker 1: that would be why they're using that rather than solenoids
Speaker 1: and things fair enough, this shift enhances human like movement.
Speaker 1: Showcase in the company's growing expertise in robotics. Realistic Android
Speaker 1: Motion Clone is advancing humanoid robotics with its myofiber artificial
Speaker 1: muscle technology designed to animate a full skeleton by attaching
Speaker 1: musculo musculo tendon YEAH units at anatomically accurate points. These
Speaker 1: monolithic units estimate tendon failures and replicate mammalian scale platile muscles,
Speaker 1: achieving response times under fifty microseconds, over thirty percent unloaded contraction,
Speaker 1: and at least two point two pounds of contraction force
Speaker 1: for a three gram muscle fiber that's actually on the
Speaker 1: engineering side of things. That's kind of impressive. According to
Speaker 1: chlone Robotics, milefiber is unmatched in power, speed and efficiency.
Speaker 1: The Alpha Android skeletons closely mirrors human anatomy, featuring all
Speaker 1: two hundred and six bones with mirror fusions or minor fusions,
Speaker 1: rather fully articulated joints and artificial ligaments. Precise ligament and
Speaker 1: tendon placement enables one hundred and sixty four degrees of
Speaker 1: freedom in the upper torso, including twenty in the shoulder.
Speaker 1: Six per vertebrae in the spine and twenty six across
Speaker 1: the hand, wrist and elbow. And check this video out
Speaker 1: two while we're at it. I mean as far as
Speaker 1: creating a robot to be able to act as a
Speaker 1: human and do the movements of a human. And I
Speaker 1: mean this is still in the protos type stage. They're
Speaker 1: gonna get better with this over time. But like, I
Speaker 1: feel like that would also be really good in a
Speaker 1: haunted house, like just as is for sure, Like you know,
Speaker 1: especially for the jump scares and stuff like that. You
Speaker 1: have that thing completely dark, It like has a bunch
Speaker 1: of led lights or strobe lights that come out and
Speaker 1: it starts like doing its movements and shit it people, Oh,
Speaker 1: they would lose their minds. Wow.
Speaker 8: Or when you wake up and you see it right
Speaker 8: standing in front of you.
Speaker 1: I would shoot immediately, Like I wouldn't even ask questions.
Speaker 1: I would unload instantaneously on that. Oh my god. In
Speaker 1: its nervous system allows real time muscle control using pro
Speaker 1: prioceptive and visual feedback. Okay. The system includes four depth cameras,
Speaker 1: seventy internal sensors, and three hundred and twenty pressure sensors
Speaker 1: connected to micro controllers that transmit data to a Nvidia
Speaker 1: in video du jets and thor GPU running clones. Cybernet model.
Speaker 1: A five hundred watt electric pump powers the vascular system,
Speaker 1: delivering hydraulic pressure efficiently with Aquajet valve technology, ensuring lifelike motion.
Speaker 1: I also feel like the maintenance on that thing is
Speaker 1: just gonna be a bitch and a half, right, Like
Speaker 1: you're gonna have to have a tech among texts to
Speaker 1: be able to change out these little components to make
Speaker 1: that thing work if one thing goes wrong. I ah, yeah, well,
Speaker 1: thanks Royce. I don't dream, but I might have nightmares now,
Speaker 1: so that's dope.
Speaker 8: You're welcome.
Speaker 1: Oh Jesus, Okay, Well, we covered a wide and wild
Speaker 1: range of top on this episode. I want to thank
Speaker 1: everybody for coming out here and having this conversation as
Speaker 1: we typically do. Again for anybody listening to this on Thursday, Yeah, Thursday,
Speaker 1: and if you would like to join into the conversation
Speaker 1: next week, come check out Cajun Night on Patreon and
Speaker 1: join in the conversation until next time. Everybody, Thank you,
Speaker 1: thank you for listening, and God bless