011 Just Two Good Old Boys

Gene: 0:23

Well, how'd he been? Happy New Year.

Ben: 0:25

Happy New Year, Jean.

Gene: 0:27

We kinda missed the the first episode of this year, didn't we?

Ben: 0:31

Yeah, I wasn't good to throw you under the bus, but Sure.

Gene: 0:35

Yeah. Good old jeans. Partied a little too hard the night before and

Ben: 0:39

forgot what day it was.

Gene: 0:41

what day it was. Damn. Straight. Yeah, it was on those days where it was like, why are you bothering me? We're not doing this until tomorrow.

Ben: 0:51

It's all good. Yeah. And then unfortunately the other opportunity we had to record, I ended up having to be in Houston,

Gene: 0:57

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Speaking of Houston, so, you sent me an article about a a shooting out there.

Ben: 1:05

Yeah, yeah, yeah. There was a shooting and Taka.

Gene: 1:08

Oh, okay. Now, now that was, did you send it just cuz it was interesting or because you were actually there,

Ben: 1:14

Oh, I wasn't there, but no, I sent it cuz it's, it, it's a perfect example of a good guy with a gun.

Gene: 1:20

Mm-hmm. although

Ben: 1:22

this

Gene: 1:22

you read the comments, they're damn near all negative.

Ben: 1:25

well, I mean,

Gene: 1:26

Why couldn't he, why he, he should have just winged them.

Ben: 1:30

yeah, well, so when you actually look into it, and this has gone around on no agenda, social and Twitter. The guy walks in with a gun. Apparently it was. Either no ammo or a fake gun. The, there, there's some contention on that. But anyway, brandishing what appears to be a Glock and is about to rob the place. He turns his back on one of the patrons and the guy stands up and lays into him. He shoots him three or four times before the guy hits the ground. And when the guy hits the ground, he makes a move and it looks like he's trying to reach for the weapon and he shoots him dead in the head. I mean the, the, the, the, the good, the guy with the gun definitely did not hold back. He was going to kill that guy, but to me that's justice.

Gene: 2:15

He was gonna stop the threat.

Ben: 2:16

Exactly. Which in this case ended up killing him, which is completely

Gene: 2:21

is often the way to stop threat.

Ben: 2:23

Exactly.

Gene: 2:25

Yeah. And, and it, then when I read the description, that's kind of, that was my impression. Then I started going through the comments and everybody was like, oh, this is just murder. No, the guy was already leaving. You don't shoot somebody in the back. Hey, the gun he, his gun wasn't even working. He was leaving. He had the gun. He never used it. This is clearly a, a vigilante murder.

Ben: 2:44

Nope. Sorry. Don't point a gun at me.

Gene: 2:47

And yeah. And it's like, I really wonder where the hell these people live that are posting those comments because they, they don't live in San Francisco. because people there are starting to realize that when the guy shows up with a gun you're likely to get injured or killed yourself. They don't live in in, real parts of Texas because everybody has a gun

Ben: 3:12

Yeah. Well,

Gene: 3:14

but I don't know where these must be East Coast people or something.

Ben: 3:18

yeah. Well all I can say is you don't want me to point my gun at you. Don't point yours at me. Right. It's that simple. I mean, I all I can say is I would've done the exact same

Gene: 3:27

yeah. I mean, armed robbery is, is a good way to get yourself killed.

Ben: 3:32

Absolutely. Thank goodness that guy who had a gun and was able to stop the, the incident

Gene: 3:38

Yeah. Maybe,

Ben: 3:38

because it isn't clear to me from the video that he was going to leave. That's bullshit. He was walking around brandishing a weapon in inside the ta. There was no movement. Like, oh, I'm gonna go to the door.

Gene: 3:50

was this guy to try and rob a ta

Ben: 3:52

Exactly. I mean, it's not gonna be a high cash flow business

Gene: 3:57

Or maybe, maybe, maybe it is high cash because people aren't using credit cards.

Ben: 4:01

maybe, but even then it's not gonna be a ton of cash cuz it's not just that profitable of business. But, one of the things I'd say is to the comments about shooting him in the back. Of course, of course. If I can get the drop on the bad guy, that's what I'm gonna do. Why would I try and draw my firearm when he is looking right at me, when his is already drawn and get myself shot?

Gene: 4:22

Yeah. The idiots or you don't shoot somebody in the back. No. That's clearly murderer. No. If you shoot somebody in the back, that's, that's murder. Well, what Idiots?

Ben: 4:30

Yeah, that's nonsense.

Gene: 4:32

Mm-hmm. Yeah. If, if you shoot a bullet into the air and then it hits somebody thousand yards away by accident, that's still a murderer.

Ben: 4:42

Hmm. It's manslaughter.

Gene: 4:44

It depends who it hits. If it's a kid, it's murder.

Ben: 4:47

Why would it be if it's

Gene: 4:49

That's the way the laws are, man. I'm just, I'm not saying one way or another,

Ben: 4:52

Any accidental death should be manslaughter.

Gene: 4:57

for children. Yes. Yes. You, you can't

Ben: 5:00

children would be a special thing.

Gene: 5:02

not allowed. It's kinda like drunk driving.

Ben: 5:06

Yeah.

Gene: 5:08

your pet peep,

Ben: 5:10

Yeah. Well, and we had some test of my thoughts on that. So most people know, I think that drunk driving is erroneous and shouldn't be a thing. It's, it's driving drunk in and of itself should not be a crime. Because I, I see it no different as if you're tired and you cause an accident, you kill someone, you do whatever the reason why you did it really. Relevant. It's that you did it. And just to share with everyone on the 30th of December, since we missed the last show my stepdaughter was involved in a crash. She got hit by a drunk driver. Her car rolled three to five times and all the airbags deployed, cars totaled. Luckily she seems to be mostly okay. She had a concussion and minor

Gene: 5:58

do they know how fast the other car was going?

Ben: 6:00

No, but pretty fast. She got pushed several hundred yards down the road,

Gene: 6:04

Oh, wow.

Ben: 6:04

So it was a very violent wreck.

Gene: 6:08

the the photos, the car was totally totaled.

Ben: 6:11

Oh yeah, absolutely. Like it's,

Gene: 6:13

no part of it. That was normal looking.

Ben: 6:16

no, I mean, I, I am very, she's lucky to be a, a short girl because the way the roof was caved in over the driver's side, if someone, even my height or her brother's height would've been driving, you would've had a head injury. There's just no way. So, yeah. But anyway, the the girl the, the police report is out and the girl admitted to drinking and taking drugs and you know that she drinks and takes drugs all the time and that she shouldn't have been driving and so on. Absolutely. And I mean, the, the quotes in the police reporter just. Astonishing.

Gene: 6:55

Yeah.

Ben: 6:55

And this is how dumb her and her friend were. Her friend was also driving behind her, following along, stopped, got out and started talking to the officer and also got arrested for a D U I. So Yeah.

Gene: 7:09

Wait, how did that happen? How you can have two people arrested for D u I in the same vehicle.

Ben: 7:14

They were in separate vehicles.

Gene: 7:15

Oh, okay. Okay, okay.

Ben: 7:17

Yeah. She was following. Yep.

Gene: 7:19

Jesus Christ.

Ben: 7:21

Yep.

Gene: 7:22

At least she didn't get hit by two people that night.

Ben: 7:25

Yeah. Well, I mean, it, it's, it's gonna be interesting to see how this plays out. We happen to have the same insurance, so,

Gene: 7:34

you filed a lawsuits yet?

Ben: 7:35

No, I, and I don't know that I'm going to, we'll see, it all, it all comes down to, it, I'm not a litigious person and this is a, a bad enough crash that, getting a lawyer and running with it would be a thing. But, we are just looking to be fair and, now I will tell you this. I will be talking to the da to, bring her up on neglige negligence charges and destruction of property and those sorts of things.

Gene: 8:00

What? Doesn't get you anything?

Ben: 8:03

I understand that.

Gene: 8:05

All right. I'm just saying, I mean, it's like you don't know what, what kind of injuries your daughter might have gotten as a result of this, that. Are not apparent.

Ben: 8:16

Well, and she's following up next week with her primary care physician and we're, we're gonna watch her and we're gonna make sure that she's

Gene: 8:23

what I would say. Based on having dealt with lawyers after a car accident I would definitely get a lawyer. I would have the lawyer will tell you what kind of specialist to take her to for injuries that are not apparent, to get reports, and then sue that family. And that your daughter's still very young, so this is probably like a five to 10 million lawsuit.

Ben: 8:44

I, no,

Gene: 8:46

Yeah. Now you just don't, I mean, somebody that young gets injured you may end up having symptoms that don't show up for another 10 years and then what, like, her life could be ruined because the car accident, if you don't do something right now, it'll gonna, it's gonna be too late to recoup money.

Ben: 9:04

well, we can talk about this offline.

Gene: 9:06

I'm just saying for anybody listening, this show does not provide any kinda legal advice. But I will say that explore your options.

Ben: 9:15

Yeah. What I would say is, we, we are definitely gonna get the property claim out of the way and, get the car totaled out so we can get her a new car and we're not going. Settle the personal injury claim until this is done, and we have a good idea of how she is. But you know, we're, we're definitely not looking to go soak the insurance company or anyone for money. That's just not in my personality type.

Gene: 9:41

I mean, you pay for insurance. If you don't use it, you're just throwing money away,

Ben: 9:44

Oh, no, I'm, we're, we're going to use it for a reason.

Gene: 9:48

just saying all right, what

Ben: 9:49

talking about another car wreck? The house,

Gene: 9:53

What?

Ben: 9:54

the House of Representatives.

Gene: 9:56

Oh, metaphorical car wreck.

Ben: 9:58

Indeed.

Gene: 9:59

It was very enjoyable. I will say that I, I've, I've rather enjoyed, along with Tim Pool, I think laughing at what was happening there.

Ben: 10:06

Oh, I, I mean, Friday night when they did the 14th vote, and I thought they were, I, I went to bed before they did the 15th photo. Unfortunately, I thought they were done, but the the 14th vote was hilarious to watch. I mean, like McCarthy and Gates almost got into fisticuffs at one point. Like it was a very tense thing.

Gene: 10:29

Yeah. Yeah. I'm I, I always kinda assumed that it would end, well, one of two ways. So this, this was probably the default option is that there would be enough negotiation to put'em in there. The other option was that McCarthy's side would just get sick of trying to appease these folks and instead just reach across the aisle to Democrats and say, okay. I'm gonna give you some committee chairmanships, if you guys just give me 12 people to vote for me

Ben: 11:02

Yeah.

Gene: 11:03

and, and then just do a deal with the Democrats. That like, that was a less likely option, but I think it was possible.

Ben: 11:09

yeah, I think the reason why he didn't do that is because, well, I think he would've lost more Republicans immediately, and it would've become even harder. And second of all I don't think the Democrats were interested in doing that. Just because, the e every vote that happened has made McCarthy a weaker speaker just by default. And I gotta say kudos to Matt Gates. The power of one man standing there and all the way through the end saying, no.

Gene: 11:38

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 11:40

We should all do that more

Gene: 11:42

Yeah. Yeah. I think Rand Paul's done that and his dad has done that.

Ben: 11:47

Yep. But very few people have. So, when when, when he was told that Trump had endorsed McCarthy, he said, his response was perfect. Sad Yeah. So I, Trump is not in control of the Freedom Caucus Are the MAGA side of the party anymore at

Gene: 12:07

No, definitely not.

Ben: 12:10

Yeah.

Gene: 12:11

Yeah. It's That's the thing is I, I think that there, the, the other good thing that came out of this is it be, it became very apparent who is just providing lip service

Ben: 12:20

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 12:22

and who is actually committed

Ben: 12:25

Yep. And the numbers of the actually committed are pretty small.

Gene: 12:29

yeah. Yeah. Very small.

Ben: 12:31

I mean, Marjorie Taylor Green caved in on the first vote.

Gene: 12:34

Yep. Yep. I got no respect going on there at all. I, I don't care if she wins or lose next time. She may be a nice lady, but clearly not the person we need in Congress.

Ben: 12:45

Yep.

Gene: 12:47

And yeah. It's, I mean, along with the vast majority of Republicans, frankly, they're all right nows, that's what I've been saying for a long time is that the Republican Party right now is the Rhino Party. The, the people that stand out as actual Republicans, as conservatives are not really the mainstream Republican party. They're, they're, it's like the Tea Party. It's like when the Republican party just kind of swallowed up the Tea Party. That was the problem. What, what should have happened is the Tea Party should have replaced the Republican party.

Ben: 13:21

Yeah. And the problem there is people running as Republicans start a third party,

Gene: 13:27

Yeah.

Ben: 13:27

If you're principled enough to get elected in your district running as a Republican, it shouldn't matter. You

Gene: 13:33

Or you should do, if you, if, if you're gonna do this, if you're gonna run as a Republican, even though most Republicans are really Rs, then you need to immediately kinda like, what's her name? Sensa, Seneca, whatever the, the Democrat that dropped out. Y once you get elected, you should just ou Oh, and by the way, I am now a tea party candidate or a tea party person. I'm no longer a Republican

Ben: 13:58

Hmm.

Gene: 13:58

because that's the only way that we're gonna get people elected in. And whether it's Freedom Caucus party, what, whatever, I don't care what you call it. It's clearly not the Trump party. And remember, I was one of the first guys saying Trump is done. And I think this also helped demonstrate to people where Trump is now, which is part of the establishment.

Ben: 14:23

I wouldn't call him part of the establishment, but I think he's not committed to, I think they've made his life enough of a hell that he's not fully committed

Gene: 14:31

I don't care about reasons, he is literally the guy that was telling everybody to vote right from the get-go for the same person that was trying to get him impeached.

Ben: 14:42

He didn't do it right away. It, the, it had gone several votes before then.

Gene: 14:48

well that's when, yeah, fine. Several votes, whatever, but point. You just, how do you do that? You don't do that. This is the guy that literally was working to get Trump's candidates to not get elected, and then he's saying, yep, I'm gonna endorse him.

Ben: 15:06

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you, you're not, I don't like the move. I don't think he should have done that.

Gene: 15:13

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 15:13

I am happy with some of the concessions that the Freedom Caucus was able to get from McCarthy.

Gene: 15:18

what did they get?

Ben: 15:19

They got, the one member of Congress can challenge the speaker, so you know, they can call one member. Proposing a no confidence vote, it has to be called. One of the big things that they got was a church style commission to go investigate the intelligence agencies. Now

Gene: 15:39

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 15:41

the problem with that is already you have people coming out and saying, yeah, but we're gonna have to do it in the skiff where we can't do this fully publicly.

Gene: 15:51

Oh, sure. Yeah.

Ben: 15:52

So, that's bullshit

Gene: 15:54

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 15:55

once they go in that skiff, you have no, I, you, you only have what the congressmen who are on it come out and say. So it'll be interesting to see who's appointed because unless Jim Jordan or Matt Gates are on that committee, I don't know how much I'm gonna trust it. And even then, I don't know how much I'm gonna trust it.

Gene: 16:15

Well, you're not gonna know anything about it.

Ben: 16:17

Exactly. The other big thing that they did get was no omnibus. So the budgets have to be passed individually. So we'll see if that holds because, you get down to the end and all these rules can be voted on and changed. Hopefully they hold up, but we'll see. And then the last big thing is no clean debt ceiling boat. So no moving the debt ceiling without some budgetary changes and concessions.

Gene: 16:45

Mm-hmm. Yeah. That's good. Yeah. I mean, it's good that they got some concessions for sure. But man, it would've been nice if this just kept on going with a no speaker for a good month or so.

Ben: 16:58

Yeah. Yeah. And in, in the modern day though, I don't, know how realistic that is because pressure can be brought onto people much faster. Whereas the last time this happened, was in the 1850s and, then to, to get word and some donor or landowner from your district to put pressure on you took a while. It doesn't take that long now. So I, I can understand why that cycle was shortened. And now I will say this, the last time this happened was pre-civil war and,

Gene: 17:30

Yeah. And I think there was over a hundred votes that year.

Ben: 17:34

yeah. And it a hundred and some odd and it took several months to resolve, like a month and a half or something like that. But the, the point is the fractious nature of our politics, we, we've been saying that it's been heading towards a revolution of sorts, and I, I think that this is nothing but further evidence of that.

Gene: 17:53

Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. This is a very good indicator, and it's not, I don't think just a random timing, that this is the second longest it's ever taken since the Civil War.

Ben: 18:09

This is the longest it's taken since the Civil War. The only other time there was a contested vote was in 19 23. And it only went eight rounds.

Gene: 18:18

Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, that's what I mean, since the Civil War, so it's, but the last time was before the Civil War, is what I'm saying.

Ben: 18:24

correct. Yes.

Gene: 18:25

Yeah. So, once again, not that we're just trying to be right but it really does look like civil warrants coming.

Ben: 18:33

Well, of some form. I, I think you know the comments on the, the, the robbery in Houston as a perfect example, we have people living in two different realities. Because obviously you and I go, no, of course he did exactly the right thing, right? Someone came in, was threatening people. He put an end to it. And then there are people who want to caveat and say, oh, he should have done this or that, or the other. I don't know about you, but someone holds a gun on me. I'm, I'm not looking to injure that person. I'm looking to remove the threat and whatever that means. So you just have two different realities of thought and the more fractious

Gene: 19:15

have a, a magic wand with fairy dust and, and it works to remove the threat, I'll use that.

Ben: 19:21

Sure. Agreed.

Gene: 19:23

the threat, man.

Ben: 19:24

Yeah. My, my point here though is not to really get back in the discussion just pointing out the differences in thought process and the way people think and their attitudes about how life should be.

Gene: 19:40

Yeah. Yeah. No, that's,

Ben: 19:43

when you have two philosophies that cannot coexist in the same body of laws, that becomes problematic.

Gene: 19:51

I, gosh, I wish I would've jotted down what I was watching, but I watched a video recently where somebody did a very good job of describing the woke movement as a rebranding of Marxism,

Ben: 20:08

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 20:09

follow up with a whole bunch of examples coming right out of the right out of Mark's writing and pre Russian revolution as to what's going on right now with the woke.

Ben: 20:22

Oh yeah.

Gene: 20:23

the revolution, that we've been, I think talking about, and what people probably associate with is like Texas Independence and like the country's going to a hell in the hand basket, the West Coast states need, we need to leave those guys. But just as valid is thinking of the coming revolution as the the American Marxists bringing in communism and they're getting closer and closer to being able to.

Ben: 20:55

Well in, that, that is the danger is that if we have, in when we say that there may be a revolution, it I think a lot of people tend to assume we're saying, oh, the, the south will rise again. Or the, that the that the or that Texas's secession, they think of a conservative positive thing, but it's very equally possible that it will be, a night of the long knives slash communist style revolution, you

Gene: 21:23

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 21:24

so, that,

Gene: 21:25

Yeah. Because,

Ben: 21:26

a good thing.

Gene: 21:28

no, and, and it's it always starts in California it seems. So just pay attention to the local laws passed in California, and that's a good indicator of what they want to push on the entire nation.

Ben: 21:39

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 21:41

And the fact that California has got its own superior court out there, or the what is the court? I can't remember even

Ben: 21:48

ninth Circuit.

Gene: 21:49

ninth. Yeah, right. There you go. That, that basically just affirms all that bullshit with rare exception.

Ben: 21:56

Now what? Go ahead.

Gene: 21:59

Well. So just paying attention to what's going on. There is a good leading indicator of what they're pushing for. And people leaving California right now, the the Democrats that are all moving to Austin are they're exporting that not, and it's not just Austin, obviously I'm, I'm being a little facetious here, but a lot of'em do end up in Austin if they move to Texas, cuz they're afraid of living anywhere else in Texas. Kinda like that. That great TV or TV series that great B Balon b series that they did of Californians moving to Texas. That's I believe five parts. They just hit all the nails on the head on that one,

Ben: 22:38

Yep.

Gene: 22:41

including how awesome. Buckys is?

Ben: 22:45

So, one of the things that I think is fortunate And have you watched the latest j r e with Weinstein

Gene: 22:54

No oh, I saw a clip. I, I didn't see the whole episode.

Ben: 22:57

Worth listening to the majority of the whole episode? I, I don't listen to Joe Rogan regularly, especially anymore since he's only on Spotify, but occasionally he'll have someone like that on that I'll want to hear what they have to say and their talk about the the shot and people still doubling down and, not seeking forgiveness and talking about what happened with Covid is very good and I think they make some good points. One of the things I would say that is definitely contributing to this fractious nature in our environment is a lot of people are waking up to the fact that, they took something that we don't know the ramifications of till still to this day. We had a guy damn near drop

Gene: 23:40

you can't sue'em.

Ben: 23:41

Monday night football that everyone saw that. You can say that, you know that it was, he got hit and it interrupted his heart,

Gene: 23:51

No, that's

Ben: 23:52

be, well it's extremely rare. Um

Gene: 23:56

Well, there was, somebody did a great video. Of course. You gotta have the memes of that, of a whole bunch of m m MMA fighters like kicking each other in with a knee right into the heart.

Ben: 24:08

Yep.

Gene: 24:09

Say, Hmm, none of these guys got it. Interesting.

Ben: 24:13

Well, and it, it, it, the tackle was not some weird tackle. It was not it was not like, you sometimes when you're watching football, you can watch a tackle go wrong and go, oh my God, that had to hurt.

Gene: 24:25

I always hear the sound of bones cracking when I watch football.

Ben: 24:29

Yeah. This was not that. This was not a particularly hard hit. This was not a, particularly rough thing. And, he's, he's still in intensive care. He's, n probably never gonna play football again. You

Gene: 24:42

Oh yeah. I'm sure.

Ben: 24:43

And the thing. They had people out there on the field immediately. They got medical treatment and equipment to him immediately. This is sort of as best case scenario as it could be for whatever it is, myo, cortis or whatever commotion of the heart that they're suggesting. And the only real explanation of, okay, if that was the case when they shocked him, when they defibrillated him, why didn't he go back into normal rhythm?

Gene: 25:11

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 25:12

The argument there is, well, maybe, it was left too long and, part, he, he suffered consequences for that. Well, hello. I mean, it wasn't very long. It was just a few minutes. So. This shouldn't have been that sort of case. Anyway Weinstein lays out the arguments far better than I can. He goes into a lot of the potential issues with the shot and why it's problematic. And what it comes down to is,

Gene: 25:40

really, that's like his issue now.

Ben: 25:43

yeah, it is. And

Gene: 25:45

really jumped into it and, and he. Eminently qualified for this because,

Ben: 25:50

mm-hmm.

Gene: 25:50

His PhD is actually on research about it was, what the fuck was it? It was about the medical research sector's changes in d n A on mice.

Ben: 26:04

Yeah.

Gene: 26:06

So really close

Ben: 26:08

There, there's lots of, he, he is very well qualified to, to at least question this. And one of the great things that I like that he's bringing up is,

Gene: 26:16

and he's a liberal,

Ben: 26:17

we have, yeah, he, yes.

Gene: 26:20

him more qualified.

Ben: 26:21

Anyway, he, he's just questioning, why aren't we studying this? We should be able to say, if all cause mortality has gone up, we should be able to see this,

Gene: 26:29

we know it has,

Ben: 26:30

He talks about the clots that were in died suddenly. He said, we should be able to know if that is actually happening or not, which, is, is this new or people just noticing it now, those sorts of things. And he really lays out the case. know, of what, and I love the way he phrased this of why zero is such a powerful number. Because when you have none of the mainstream media questioning this,

Gene: 26:54

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 26:55

that's how, a narrative's being pushed, it just slaps you in the face. And when people like him waking up and seeing this is heartening to me.

Gene: 27:07

Oh, yeah. Yeah. It's Yeah, I, I'm, I'm happy to have him beyond this case because he is the kind of guy that'll literally spend years on it

Ben: 27:19

Mm-hmm. well and has a very good chance of persuading a lot of people. Because he is well spoken. He does speak from a place of authority, and his politics are such that that will not come into question for anyone who's serious. The people who will, who will question his politics or motives clearly are just looking to, for an excuse.

Gene: 27:42

Well, and it's hard to question his politics because he, he's never jumped on the Republican ban. He's still liberal. He still considers himself a liberal. He just thinks that the, the Democrat party was taken over by crazy people,

Ben: 27:59

which it

Gene: 27:59

But, but his, his liberal ideas have not changed. And same thing with his wife. And so that does add a certain, it's not so much credibility as it's, it's a, it removes a vector of attack.

Ben: 28:16

Well, he's just clearly a principled individual.

Gene: 28:20

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, probably. I have no reason to think he's not. And he is, he's one of those guys that has never gone out to seek what's the phrase attention or any kind of, public notoriety. But he's managed because he's managed to have unpopular opinions in circles where they are unpopular. He's ended up becoming more visible or just, there's more news coverage, et cetera, about him.

Ben: 28:54

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 28:56

So, I like him. I like him. He is the kind of liberal that I grew up with. The, the kind that, you can have a disagreement with in the kitchen about ideological things without each of you wanting to kill each other,

Ben: 29:11

Yeah. Without it breaking down to you can have a actual conversation and debate, not an argument.

Gene: 29:17

right? Yep.

Ben: 29:19

Yeah. Speaking of another liberal that I'm at least fond of did you see the news about Jordan Peterson?

Gene: 29:27

Well, which news? I mean, there's news every day with them.

Ben: 29:30

Well, the Canadian licensing body, I guess the College of Psychologists wanting to, threatening to remove his license to practice unless he submits to social media sensitivity training or whatever they want to do.

Gene: 29:47

Yep.

Ben: 29:47

Literally reeducation,

Gene: 29:49

Yeah. It's, it's, yeah. He has to go in for reeducation training. Yeah. It's insane. In an Orwellian kind of way. But when I posted about that, I immediately had somebody jump in and say, oh, but he, he's a psychiatrist, not a psych, or, no, he's a psychologist, not a psychiatrist. So he's not an md, so it doesn't really matter.

Ben: 30:13

Well, I mean it does.

Gene: 30:14

he's licensed to Yeah. To practice. So it kind of does matter. It's, and not only that, in this case, he's talking about losing his license to, and, and by the way, he was always a practicing psychologist. He was not a just purely theoretical

Ben: 30:31

Right?

Gene: 30:32

a lot of

Ben: 30:33

clinical

Gene: 30:33

over the years. What?

Ben: 30:35

clinical psychologist.

Gene: 30:36

psychologist. And so, but, but even still, there are plenty of, of doctors that have or are in the process of losing their medical licenses because of their stance on covid as well. So this idea of taking away. The thing that somebody spent a decade achieving in order to work is a very common practice for the Marxists out there. They, they really wanna utilize every leverage they can including by, by infiltrating these boards, by being able to control who, who has a license and who keeps it.

Ben: 31:18

Did you see his response?

Gene: 31:20

Yeah. He said he is gonna go in and he's very interested in, in the process and he'll talk all about it.

Ben: 31:26

No, he said he would do it if he could record the training and make it public.

Gene: 31:32

Oh, okay. Well, the first, when he first talked about it, he just simply said that he's gonna do it and he is gonna tell everybody what they expect them to do.

Ben: 31:40

So

Gene: 31:41

now he's put a condition on it, so he may not do it, then he may just let his license lapse.

Ben: 31:45

I, yeah, I, I think there was,

Gene: 31:48

I was looking forward to watching. See what, what they want him to do.

Ben: 31:51

well, I, I think that they pushed back on his comments basically saying, no, you're not going to do that.

Gene: 31:58

Obviously they're not gonna let him record anything.

Ben: 32:00

Right. So, no, I, I think they pushed back on his original comments of, I'm going to, okay, fine, but I'm, I am going to talk about what was said and what's done, and I'm not gonna change what I'm doing. So I think that he pushed back with the caveat of, no, I, I am and fact, let me record it. What do you have to hide it? It's actually a pretty decent tactic from him. Hey, I'm totally willing to do this. Why, why, why? What do you have to hide? Clearly this reeducation is, is for my own good, and others could benefit it from it as well. Right.

Gene: 32:30

Yeah. Yeah. That's it kind of reminds me of all the, the school boards that just shut down their meetings when people start bringing up indoctrination of their kids and they immediately, the school board just ends the meeting.

Ben: 32:48

Yeah, and

Gene: 32:50

Yeah. Grooming what? No, I, no, this meeting's over.

Ben: 32:54

well there, there's a lot going on. I'm very heartened with what some of the Muslim communities are doing with their school districts.

Gene: 33:01

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 33:01

Thankfully the, the Christians need to wake the hell up and take a principled stance as well. I, I think you and I are very much aligned that we don't care what someone does as an adult in their own life and who they're attracted to what they want to do, do not care. I don't think that it should be normalized to children in the ways that it's being done. I, I think, having, gay adult characters in film or whatever to a representative proportionality of the society is fine. I don't think you should push it and make it in your face. I think that the, there, there, there is a fine line that can be walked where we can normalize the behavior to the extent that it is normal in. Regardless of what that is, whether it's gender dysphoria or anything, we can talk about these things. We can normalize mental illness and say, Hey, there are a percentage of the population

Gene: 33:51

Well we used to, we used to have a small bus.

Ben: 33:54

Exactly.

Gene: 33:55

I don't think, I think these days everyone rides a small bus.

Ben: 33:59

yeah, and that's the problem. But you know, when you're talking about,

Gene: 34:05

bus. Sorry, short bus.

Ben: 34:06

when you're talking about normalizing minor attracted persons as a thing that is the same as, gender dysphoria,

Gene: 34:15

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 34:16

it's actually not that far of a logical leap because pedophilia is a mental illness. It is a problem.

Gene: 34:26

Yeah. And, and that's when you stop treating mental illness as an illness and you just treat it as a mental choice or option, that's the real problem, because you're, The normalization is simply an acceptance of an illness as a condition that you should not do anything about.

Ben: 34:51

and I really like the analogy, if someone came up to me who was anorexic and wanting affirmation of their anorexia, should I do that? No, that person's gonna end up

Gene: 35:03

sure. What?

Ben: 35:05

That person's gonna end up dying. They're gonna

Gene: 35:07

Yeah, everybody dies eventually. I mean, in the end, I also don't think that that people ought to be telling others what to do in this case. But if you have a kid, the kid should know that they have to fucking eat. It's not their choice.

Ben: 35:20

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 35:21

Right. Finish your damn food on your plate or else that's, that's what used to be back in my day. And I think that there's a reason for it because the children's built-in senses and mechanisms are not sufficiently developed for them to recognize that if you don't eat a good balance of the right foods, that you will get all your vitamins and minerals and everything else you need in order to grow healthy. If they only eat sugar, they will not grow in a healthy way.

Ben: 35:54

and.

Gene: 35:55

you have to have adult supervision here. And that's what I think this normalization of a lot of these mental illnesses does, is it effectively is removing that adult supervision. And, and this brings up a very good point, which is what I started this portion of the conversation on, which is in the video that talked about Marxism being woke, is the, a lot of the blame that this person is pointing at is two generations of parents. Or really it's the millennial, the, the parents of the millennials and the parents of the Zoomers having a far more relaxed attitude towards what the children are allowed to do and see. And they're, and really treating children as though they were miniature adults. And I had this discussion on unknown agenda, the social maybe a month or two ago, and it was the same thing. And I was surprised by how many people were chiming in saying that well, you remember we talked about it saying that you shouldn't be spanking a child. You should explain to the child what they're doing wrong and make sure that they understand it. It's like, yeah, with the magic wand, with fairy dust and unicorns. Because the reality is that until a certain point of maturity comes. That does not convey the message the way the spanking does. And so this, and it wasn't specifically about spanking, but a, a related attitude that, that somehow shifted between the eighties and the nineties to where in the nineties more parents just started.

Ben: 37:35

Talking to their kids.

Gene: 37:36

yeah. Talking to their kids and having their kids be more, here's the, here's the bid that was missing, is the stuff you and I had in our childhoods, which is the freedom to ro and get in trouble and then still have our parents create boundaries for us.

Ben: 37:54

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 37:55

And instead it got replaced with constant visibility not being allowed to roam anywhere. And, and the, the, the only thing that happened is, the parents had to explain at you for what you're doing wrong. It's like, dude,

Ben: 38:13

Well, and

Gene: 38:14

removing the child from life. It's removing'em from what we've been doing for millions of years as, as humans which is having a combination of experiences and parents educate us.

Ben: 38:29

in consequences and, and it's anathema to me that like, for instance siblings having, life 360 on their phones to track each other so they know where each other are and check up on each other. I, why the hell would you want that?

Gene: 38:44

yeah,

Ben: 38:45

Why would I want my sister or brother knowing where the hell I am? No. Well, and my much less the parent's doing it,

Gene: 38:55

mm-hmm.

Ben: 38:57

first of all, if a kid's young enough that you need to know where they're at and worry about'em, why the hell do they have a cell phone? Second of all I, if they're old enough to have a cell phone, in my opinion, and then why do you need to worry about'em? Let'em go roam off. And, they have a cell phone, so if they get in too bad of trouble, they can reach out to you, let'em go off into the ether a little bit, right? I mean, but I, here's the thing, I, I just don't see the activity of going and sneaking off. I, I told my parents one time I was going to a football game and I ended up at the rock quarry with my girlfriend, and I got caught.

Gene: 39:34

as one does,

Ben: 39:35

Yes, exactly. But that's okay. That, the, but I don't see the desire to do that in kids these days anymore. And it's just shocking to me.

Gene: 39:46

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 39:47

I mean, half of them don't even want a driver's license.

Gene: 39:53

Yeah, no, I agree. It's a it's, it's weird. The, and I, I think it is cultural though. I, I don't think this is a case with kids in other countries or at least some other countries,

Ben: 40:08

Yeah. Well, when I was a kid, as I, I got my driver's license as soon as I could, and that car was my freedom, and, my, my parents weren't too super strict with me. They knew they could trust me and I wasn't gonna do something too stupid. And I didn't, in high school, I, I, I didn't drink or go to parties and stuff like that. The most that they had to worry about me was running around with my girlfriend, so yeah. And that was gonna happen one way or the other, and they knew it. So,

Gene: 40:35

Yeah. Well, if your parents raised you right, then they can trust you to a certain degree.

Ben: 40:40

yeah. And anyway, it I don't know. It all worked out.

Gene: 40:46

Did it though,

Ben: 40:48

I just don't see kids these days going and doing the risk taking behavior that I know you and

Gene: 40:54

it's funny cuz you look back at like the parents of the kids of the 1960s.

Ben: 41:02

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 41:03

And what they were saying, the way we're talking right now is the exact opposites. Like kids these days are insane. They, they want to have no rules. They just want to go off and do their thing and, be completely independent and, and, and, go, go join a hippie commune or whatever. It's like they don't want to stay in, in the hierarchy. They wanna leave the hierarchy. And that's literally 180 degrees from what we're saying right now, which is these little perfect little bots that are being manufactured that don't ever want to leave rules. Like they're all rule followers. They're all expected to just not deviate,

Ben: 41:48

Well, and they're pushovers

Gene: 41:50

They're total pushovers. Yeah. And they're, they're trading in life experiences for just a an app on the phone.

Ben: 41:59

well, and a lot of'em are seeking, they, they spend a lot of money on travel. They don't save money. They don't wanna buy a house. They, I, I'll, I'll say I'm kind of odd in my generation that I haven't done especially. With, my income and everything else that I haven't done more traveling and things like that. I, I, most of my peers, from an age group standpoint try to do, they're very much more about life experiences. But, I, I think about that. And at the same time, by the time I was in my mid twenties, I had done a lot of what they're doing in their thirties. Right. I, I, I, I grew up traveling the United States. I grew up going to DC and lobbying Congress. I, I grew up being out on the, the Gulf for extended periods of time. Learned to do lots of things at a very young age, rock climbed, skied, so I, I don't know. I guess I got that outta my system.

Gene: 42:56

Well, I guess the counter-argument could be, well that's cuz you're only gonna live to be 75 and they're gonna live to be 105. So 30 for them is your 20.

Ben: 43:06

maybe? Maybe.

Gene: 43:07

That the American life expectancy is actually, you've been going down for the last two years.

Ben: 43:12

yeah, it's been decreasing and I reference back to the shot comments. Yeah.

Gene: 43:18

Yeah. So I don't know it, it's I do blame the parents. I always have, uh uh, because that's ultimately the control. We we're not at the point where the children are surrendered by their parents at two years old to go into government run camps, apparently they don't have to be because the parents are incapable of actually teaching their kids proper life skills. So pretty, pretty nuts. Let's see, what else going on? Hey, so, one of my favorite topics that everybody seems to think I'm wrong about is China.

Ben: 43:54

Hmm.

Gene: 43:54

What do you think of this Peter Zhan guy?

Ben: 43:57

I'm not necessarily familiar.

Gene: 43:59

Oh, okay. I'll send you a link. Cuz he has been like big lately, meaning over the last year or so on the whole collapse of China bandwagon. And his latest, he just was on Joe Rogan and talking about how China's got like 10 years left and then it's done.

Ben: 44:19

well, I, I very much see a lot of things going on in China. Economically that I think is pretty interesting. And I'm gaining more visibility into that given my new job and roles and responsibility. So, as I can get into details a little more, I will.

Gene: 44:37

Yeah. And I think that's gonna be the interesting bit is that with your new job, you're gonna be. Yeah. Your new cover job, you're gonna be able to get a lot more information firsthand about what's going on in Asia in general and China more specifically.

Ben: 44:52

Yeah, I mean, we, we have or four offices in China proper. And

Gene: 44:57

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 44:57

I've got a guy in Singapore now, and, we we're very involved with things in Asia, so,

Gene: 45:05

Yeah. So that, that will be interesting, at least to the extent that you can talk about it. But yeah, he's just really like I don't understand the purpose of somebody just going around different talk shows and talking about the collapse of China. To me, it almost really seems like he's working for China. It's like that South Park episode where the the, was it, I think it was a Japanese are attacking, it's like, oh, don't be afraid of us. Yeah. Small penis. Small penis. It's that kind of approach, right? It's, it's like diffusing the threat. It's like, oh, you don't have to worry about China. China's not like this big enemy. Russia is a big enemy. China's just this little tiny little country, biggest one in the world that is no threat to anybody. Cause they're on the verge of collapse anyway, like 10 years max. That's all, that's what it sounds like to me. Like he's actually. A Chinese agent trying to minimize the threat analysis of China.

Ben: 46:06

Well, I haven't seen it, so I can't speak to

Gene: 46:08

Yeah, I'll, I'll send you a link, but it's one of the Joe Rogan episode's. Probably something easy enough for people to find. So yeah, definitely watch it. And then I'll be curious to hear your, your take.

Ben: 46:21

Well, so one of the things that I find interesting about the current China situation is the reversal of the zero covid policy, which I expect them to do for a while, and as cases surge go, see, this is why we were doing what we were doing, and then crack back down. But they don't appear to be doing that.

Gene: 46:38

Hmm.

Ben: 46:39

So I, I think it's gonna be interesting. I think we're gonna see lots of new variants and we'll see what the West does. And I, I, I think that c is going to be a problem for a while still because of China having had the policy that it had and then, not having the immunity and anyway, I, I think that we're. It will be interesting to see if people take it or if they go, no, you know what, I'll, I'll just get sick,

Gene: 47:06

yeah, well it's, I mean, obviously you know what my choice is, but

Ben: 47:13

Oh, yeah. And again, I'm not gonna say that Covid isn't real or anything else, but I think that it definitely is something that, if you are infirm, if you have something wrong with you where you would normally worry about the flu or getting a cold because you're immunocompromised, then yeah, you should be worried about Covid. If you're not, then you know, hey.

Gene: 47:40

Yeah, just stack up on the iin.

Ben: 47:42

Yeah.

Gene: 47:44

No medical advice. So you sent me a link to a gun. What's that all about?

Ben: 47:49

Just someone in my family recently got this. It's actually a pretty neat little gun and it's at a great price. It's a Springfield Armory, it's an xd. Which have come a long way. I was never a fan of the Xds for a long time, but they've really refined it. And if anyone's looking for a good carry gun, this is an awesome gun at an awesome price. So, s r p on this package from Springfield, is normally around five 70.

Gene: 48:13

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 48:14

And Bud's Gun Shop has it right now on sale for three 70, and it's a Springfield XD and nine millimeter with a grip safety, which I like a lot as an option with a crimson trace optic on top.

Gene: 48:27

Yeah,

Ben: 48:28

So the two coming together is pretty cool.

Gene: 48:31

I, I'm not a fan of the X dss. They're like, the grip is too short to be useful, in my opinion. I like the longer grip guns.

Ben: 48:40

Yeah.

Gene: 48:40

But yeah, I suppose if somebody wants to have a a nine millimeter for concealed, that's could be a good way to go.

Ben: 48:50

So the, the person who got this was my mom and, she's a petite old lady and she's just short and anyway

Gene: 48:57

Yeah. Old lady with a

Ben: 48:58

finding a gun to fit her hand is pretty difficult. So this was a good option.

Gene: 49:03

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Ben: 49:04

It probably is not if you're Darren or you or me, but Yeah.

Gene: 49:08

Yeah. Yeah. But yeah. Yeah, Darren would get like one finger around that grip

Ben: 49:15

Yeah.

Gene: 49:15

Yeah, it's I've, I've always liked XD guns. I used to have Xds when they first came out and I upgraded all, all of'em to X dms and then when those came out and I was thinking of upgrading'em to the latest versions of X dms with the cutouts for the optical sites. But before I did that, I figured I'd, I'd at least try another gun with optical sites. So I got that. The I w Masada.

Ben: 49:47

have you put a site on it

Gene: 49:48

I have not put a sight on it. No, I need to do that. I haven't shot it, I haven't taken that, I haven't put a sight on it. I just, I got it.

Ben: 49:55

yeah.

Gene: 49:56

as far as I got.

Ben: 49:57

This Crimson Trace red dot that just came out that's on this xd looks like a pretty interesting option depending on what the footprint is on your gun. It's got pretty decent battery life. It's around two years. So

Gene: 50:08

I'm gonna go with the the whatcha wanna call it? The what the fuck is the brand? Yeah. Truk. Yeah. That's, that's it comes with that plate. And I just, I, I like the dual illumination. That's, if more companies made it, then I, I would go with somebody else. But right now they're the only ones that do dual illumination and, and nobody does what they used to do. And I don't understand why they, they stopped doing this site, but they used to have a combination of tridium and fiber optic with no battery at all.

Ben: 50:41

mm-hmm. because it's expensive.

Gene: 50:43

Yeah. But it was great. I wish I could find mine.

Ben: 50:47

Yeah. But it has a limited life and the battery sites you can achieve similar lifespans, with the batteries and not have to, send it in and have

Gene: 50:58

I know, but just not having electronics at all in there just makes it so much more durable.

Ben: 51:05

Okay, sure. If there's an e emmp Cool.

Gene: 51:09

Yeah, exactly. When there's an MP over the, over my head, I could still shoot.

Ben: 51:14

Yeah. That's what irons are for.

Gene: 51:16

Yeah. Well, which is why this is the first gun that I bought to even use a site, but I don't know. I don't know, man. We'll, we'll see. I do need to order it though.

Ben: 51:27

Yeah. Well, I'm in the in the market for 1911. That's

Gene: 51:31

Are you really?

Ben: 51:32

yeah. Yeah.

Gene: 51:34

Hmm. Well, Springville actually has a pretty nice 1911 that is reasonably priced before you get into the crazy$2,000 custom jobs.

Ben: 51:45

Yeah.

Gene: 51:45

are you looking for one of those$2,000 custom jobs?

Ben: 51:48

No, not at all. I, I have very few guns that are over the thousand dollars mark, to be honest with you.

Gene: 51:55

Hmm.

Ben: 51:55

I, I just, I don't, I've got a few, now I've got some rifles that I've gone and customized and done that I've got a ton of money in, but, my average gun is not over, a thousand bucks. My, my daily carry, my, my sig is, even with the site and everything under a thousand dollars. So

Gene: 52:13

Hmm.

Ben: 52:13

I think it's a pretty nice gun. So,

Gene: 52:17

Yeah. It's a good site,

Ben: 52:18

yeah, I mean, and I've got like my SOCOM 16 that, that's probably over two grand with the optic and everything I have on it. I've got AR 10 that's probably pushing that my bagar, things like that. But, you

Gene: 52:33

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 52:34

I don't typically go crazy custom generally because I, I'm a fairly decent shot, but I'm not that good of a shot where the gun is going to be the inhibiting factor there, when you're talking three quarter M moa I don't know that I can shoot much better than that. So,

Gene: 52:52

Hmm.

Ben: 52:53

personally,

Gene: 52:54

Yeah. I, I don't really care what myki is for anything. I

Ben: 52:58

I know you want the best of the best of the best.

Gene: 53:01

well, not, not even so much, I just don't want the tool. No, it's actually the other way around. The better I get at something, the less I care about the quality of the, of the thing I'm using

Ben: 53:09

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 53:10

because it, those add up, right? It's your error plus gun error.

Ben: 53:14

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 53:16

So if I'm okay, I want the best possible gun, so that doesn't introduce any errors or really more like optic as well. And, and I think the best example of this was paintball when I was playing paintball every weekend and I got really good. I was wearing less and less camos and I was doing a more and more basic setup because I was still able to get a lot of hits with them. When I first started playing, I went all out and bought a compressed air system with a back, back mounted tank and a hose going up through my sleeves to my arm to run the gun. I mean, it was just like, I try trying to get every advantage technologically to make up for the lack of actual skill.

Ben: 54:00

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 54:02

So, and I know some people do it the other way, they like dip their toe in the water with something kind of cheap in that super guy, good quality. And then if they get into it a lot, then they buy the expensive thing. I've found that the only thing that does when I've tried to do that route is it wastes money on the cheap thing, cuz I always end up replacing it with the expensive thing anyway.

Ben: 54:27

well, like when you and I started doing this over on Sine Speaks I started out with just the headset that I had and said, okay, we're gonna keep doing this. So I ended up getting the baby MO two that I had the M two, and I actually went with the mic. I still have the electric voice at your recommendation, but that was because I couldn't find the ultra light. And then I ended up getting the ultra light when I found one. But that said, I wouldn't have said, okay, I might be doing this for a while, so I'm gonna go ahead and spend the money to get the exact thing I want right away. I, I'm just not gonna do that.

Gene: 55:02

sure,

Ben: 55:03

But, I have a wife and kids and a budget to maintain.

Gene: 55:06

Yeah. That's probably why I don't have a wife. Cause I, I've always done that, even when I was married.

Ben: 55:12

Yeah.

Gene: 55:13

it's like, I am cooking, therefore we're buying this really expensive set of knives.

Ben: 55:18

Well, okay, so that's a great example. I don't have crap knives, but I don't have, I mean, I don't have high, high end chef knife or something like that. I've got a couple sets of hinkles that are pretty, nice knives. But

Gene: 55:35

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 55:36

something that'll stay sharp. That I can actually sharpen. I don't have Walmart special knives, but I don't have, a several hundred dollars chef's knife.

Gene: 55:44

You don't have a a thousand dollars Swedish steel knife.

Ben: 55:48

No, no. I just have a set of German hinkles that are fairly nice.

Gene: 55:53

Yeah.

Ben: 55:53

Hinkel and Cutco, I think is a decent benchmark of, a decent

Gene: 55:57

Cutco sucks. Dude. Cutco is such shit. People just pretend like that's expensive and good quality stuff because their salespeople are trained to sell it that way.

Ben: 56:08

Uhhuh huh?

Gene: 56:09

But it's, it's, at best, it's no better than your hin.

Ben: 56:14

No, I, I, I agree. I'm saying they're about the same, and I'm not suggesting there's some fantastic knife, but they're decent.

Gene: 56:21

at best,

Ben: 56:22

Yeah. I put that in the decent category,

Gene: 56:24

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 56:25

but I'm not trying to do, I, a knife is just a tool and it's okay. Do I need, it, is the Husky brand wrench going to work for me, or do I need a snap on?

Gene: 56:37

yeah. You need to stamp on Of course.

Ben: 56:41

why?

Gene: 56:42

Wait, was that not the question or the answer?

Ben: 56:45

I mean, I would love to have it, but the amount I'm going to use it, I don't think I need that.

Gene: 56:51

Yeah. Yeah, I guess I, I don't know.

Ben: 56:54

It, it's l it's like beer,

Gene: 56:56

I don't cook as often as I used to because being single and ordering food on Uber, you tend not to cook nearly as much. But I still got a, a nice set of chef's tools, including a Japanese as well as a Swiss knife. And they're in a thousand dollars range each. And then all my everyday use knives are all ceramic.

Ben: 57:17

Huh. Interesting.

Gene: 57:19

and I have my two oldest ceramic knives I still have, and they're chipped at this point. They look like crap,

Ben: 57:27

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 57:28

but they still work quite well. And I originally started getting ceramic kni. in 1998 back before they were available in the US I bought'em in Japan. I was like just blown away at the difference between ceramic knives and steel knives.

Ben: 57:46

Yeah.

Gene: 57:46

so I've pretty much over the last 20 plus years focused on buying really high-end ceramic knives as well. But the ceramic knives I would not have considered to be as good as the the high-end chef's knives.

Ben: 58:03

Hmm. Yeah. I, I like a good, high carbon steel knife just because being able to sharpen and maintain it. There's a balancing between a how hard this steel is and how soft it is. The softer it is, the sharper you can get it, but the quicker it dulls and so on. So, did you see the pictures of the beef order that I sent you?

Gene: 58:24

I did. Yes. Nice.

Ben: 58:27

Market research.

Gene: 58:28

much did you buy?

Ben: 58:29

I it was a total of seven pounds of meat.

Gene: 58:33

Oh, that's it. So they're all small portions. Okay.

Ben: 58:36

no, no, they were all right. So the steaks were all a pound each, including the filet, and then a couple pounds of ground meat. So,

Gene: 58:43

Got it.

Ben: 58:43

yep. It was just a package deal. Which that filet man is a, just absolutely gorgeous,

Gene: 58:49

Yeah. Where's Jordan

Ben: 58:50

K n C cattle,

Gene: 58:52

and where's that from?

Ben: 58:53

Austin.

Gene: 58:55

K N C.

Ben: 58:56

Yep. K n c,

Gene: 58:57

Hmm. I wonder if I've seen'em at the, the farmer's market.

Ben: 59:01

Yeah, Adam's talked about'em quite a bit. They're doing a lot of good regenerative farming. Had

Gene: 59:06

Oh, those guys? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah,

Ben: 59:07

yeah. Had a good conversation with Texas Slim as well on some of my plans and so far we're, we're moving forward, so it'll be interesting. Yeah.

Gene: 59:17

good. Do grassfed?

Ben: 59:18

well grass fed and probably finished the last 90 days, but not in a feed lot style. More of a giving them the opportunity to have grain in the last 90 days.

Gene: 59:29

hmm.

Ben: 59:29

So kind of a mixture in between. So they will be grass fed and local

Gene: 59:35

is not too bad. 32 bucks a pound

Ben: 59:38

for what?

Gene: 59:39

for the canned candy. Or

Ben: 59:42

K and c? Yeah. For what?

Gene: 59:45

for filet.

Ben: 59:46

Oh yeah. They're, they, they're cheaper than the grocery store, man.

Gene: 59:48

Yeah. That's cheaper cuz the grocery, well where I get'em, they're usually like 45 bucks a pound.

Ben: 59:53

well, H e b I looked this up. If I were, if you were to buy the Tenderloin, a good size tenderloin, it's$50 a pound right now

Gene: 1:00:02

is

Ben: 1:00:02

the local h e b here. And that's for Prime. That's the U S D A prime. But I, I'm telling you this, this Tenderloin there's this filet that I got

Gene: 1:00:11

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:00:12

is,

Gene: 1:00:15

what do you think of Weu? Let me ask you this.

Ben: 1:00:18

huh?

Gene: 1:00:19

What do you think of Weu?

Ben: 1:00:22

I, I, I, that's not the kind of beef I like.

Gene: 1:00:24

I'm right there with you, man. I've had weu numerous times. Usually when somebody else wants to impress somebody,

Ben: 1:00:30

Yeah.

Gene: 1:00:30

and to me it's like, you know what? I can see that you're paying for the difference, but it's not a difference I would ever pay for.

Ben: 1:00:40

Right. I, I, and I don't, generally when I'm buying steaks if I'm buying a steak at the grocery store, I don't get prime. I usually get choice because I think, and I look for a darker steak than a lighter steak, and, and that, that to me is the difference between a, an animal that's been pasture raised and then potentially grain finished. And a feedlot cow. I mean, when you look at the meat, they are totally different. One's a light pinkish color, the other is a dark, deep red.

Gene: 1:01:09

Yeah. Yeah, that's true. There is a clear differentiation. I do like to look of the the corn fed better, but I like the taste of the grassfed.

Ben: 1:01:20

Yeah. And, with, with the, with the grain finish, you end up letting the cow get some marbling. You let the cow gain a little bit more weight and you're good. The biggest problem I think the industry has right now, based off of what I'm researching, is getting kill dates. So right now, all the local processors you're a year in advance on scheduling your kill date.

Gene: 1:01:45

Oh my God.

Ben: 1:01:45

So that's really a barrier to entry for someone like me wanting to get involved.

Gene: 1:01:50

yeah. Well, that, or just you need, well, I guess, yeah, you gotta use an U S D A certified house if you wanna sell it,

Ben: 1:01:56

You don't actually, if you're selling just inside of Texas, all you have to have is a state certification.

Gene: 1:02:01

okay. Okay. Because if you're just doing it for your own food, then

Ben: 1:02:08

Then there's no Yeah.

Gene: 1:02:09

do it yourself.

Ben: 1:02:10

Yeah. But

Gene: 1:02:11

a cow is obviously much bigger than deer, but I'm thinking the insides aren't all that different.

Ben: 1:02:16

yeah, and I mean it's it's not much different than really an elk.

Gene: 1:02:20

Three bucks a pound for liver. Wow. That's a pretty good deal.

Ben: 1:02:23

yeah, they've got some good prices. I mean, if you, if you look at buying a whole cow or a half cow from them, it come, a whole cow from them comes out to like$6 and eight$6 and 80 something cents a pound.

Gene: 1:02:34

They got any kinda no agenda discount or anything?

Ben: 1:02:37

I don't know. You'd have to ask Adam.

Gene: 1:02:38

You, you didn't use one?

Ben: 1:02:40

no I didn't. And it, it's one of those things that they're, and I mean, they'll deliver free to you cuz you're in inside 60 miles of Austin. So,

Gene: 1:02:49

Yeah. I'm inside of one mile of Austin

Ben: 1:02:51

yeah. Anyway but they've got a pretty neat setup there. And this selling directly to the customer is definitely better for the rancher. It obviously doesn't scale. So the big boys who are running 500,000 acres over in West Texas, obviously they can't sell directly to the customer. But you know, if you can find a customer for every bit of that cow, you're, you're, you're really doing well and getting some good margins. So, the bones and the trimmings and the organ meat that doesn't sell. If you can find a dog food manufacturer to sell to, that's obviously ideal. And then really trying to find a tannery that you can sell the hide to. That, that's another big thing because that's,$700 in revenue per cow. I'm sorry.

Gene: 1:03:35

what that is? Denver steak. What? Cut? Is that

Ben: 1:03:38

They're different. I mean, Denver steak is not a typical cut that I'm familiar with. I, I'm aware of it, but, and that's another thing is how do you, what is your cut menu going to look like? Right.

Gene: 1:03:50

Yeah. Filet

Ben: 1:03:54

Okay.

Gene: 1:03:56

By the way, you, you do

Ben: 1:03:57

no

Gene: 1:03:58

that that from the first car you're actually selling bits from, I'm buying the filet on that. The entire the entire thing.

Ben: 1:04:04

Okay.

Gene: 1:04:05

Yeah. So you better make it tasty.

Ben: 1:04:09

Well that, and um, that's already in discussion. So you know, the first thing before we. By Calum, put it on the pasture is okay. Gotta get fencing in any cross fencing that we want. What, what improvements are we gonna do to the pasture? Do we want to reseed? And if we are, what are we gonna recse with? So it's partially improved coastal already, so I think we'll make sure and continue that. And then the question is, how many acres per cow are we going to run? So we're not having to push it. We don't have a big hay bale,

Gene: 1:04:41

old are the cows? Are you gonna be buying?

Ben: 1:04:44

I'm sorry.

Gene: 1:04:45

How, how old are the cows are gonna be when you buy'em?

Ben: 1:04:47

They're gonna be just weaned. So probably either, yeah, a 500 pound range steer or heifer. I'm not interested in doing a cow calf operation. I'm just gonna find someone with decent genetics by

Gene: 1:04:59

But they're so cute.

Ben: 1:05:00

Yeah, well there, there's also a lot of risk in that, so I'm letting other people handle the risk of that infant mortality range. Also, by the time I get'em, they've already gone through and had any vaccinations and things like that, I'm not going to continue with any antibiotics and things because I'm not gonna be putting'em in a feed lot real

Gene: 1:05:16

Well, that's, that's the best way to get one with nothing, with no vaccines at all, is just to have your own.

Ben: 1:05:23

Yeah. So I don't, again, I'm not an anti-vaxxer, so some of the things they're vaccinating them for and the history of how long it's been, and it's pretty much the same way. I, I don't, I don't see a problem with it. Now when they start moving to some of the other technologies like mRNA and so on, then I'll, I'll start questioning it and maybe I'll find someone who's like-minded and, know, get the, get the

Gene: 1:05:45

mRNA for cows. No, no, no. Let's test it on people first.

Ben: 1:05:48

Yeah. Well, anyway yeah, it, it's gonna be an interesting thing. I'm, I'm gonna have to develop a whole set of efficiencies, but the, the goal will be to really try and get this to probably around a hundred to 200 head in the next five years or so. That's gonna be the goal,

Gene: 1:06:04

Your parents got that much land. Holy shit.

Ben: 1:06:07

No, they don't have that much land. Well, that, that'll be part of the growth is finding land to lease and

Gene: 1:06:12

How many can you keep on their land,

Ben: 1:06:14

So on their land, the, where they're at in east Texas with the pasture improvements that we're talking about doing, it'll be one to three acres per cow.

Gene: 1:06:22

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:06:24

So depending on the year and water and how well the grass grows and so on, that's what that range is. And that's without devastating your pasture, obviously. That's the regenerative. I'm not gonna have to fertilize a shit ton. I'm not gonna have to round up and really push and so on.

Gene: 1:06:40

Hmm

Ben: 1:06:41

so, which I don't wanna do. Right. We're, I glyphosates will not be a thing for this operation. It, so we are gonna start the first run's probably gonna be three or four cows and we have, room to grow from there still on their land. And we'll, we'll see how it goes, but I'm just from a financial risk standpoint, gonna say we're probably gonna start with three or four.

Gene: 1:07:04

Got it. Okay. Did you watch any of those videos of that farmer? Dude that I watch.

Ben: 1:07:09

I have not

Gene: 1:07:10

Okay. I would still recommend that

Ben: 1:07:12

Okay.

Gene: 1:07:13

he's got cool cats.

Ben: 1:07:14

Okay.

Gene: 1:07:16

He's got well, he's got actually really cool dogs too. I, I really like his breed of dogs that he's got. Mimas. Do you know that

Ben: 1:07:24

not familiar with'em.

Gene: 1:07:25

The mimas are Italian shepherds.

Ben: 1:07:28

Hmm.

Gene: 1:07:30

And they're pure white, completely white dogs.

Ben: 1:07:34

Interesting.

Gene: 1:07:34

Not racist or anything. Just really

Ben: 1:07:38

up, growing up I always had German Shepherd.

Gene: 1:07:42

Yeah. Well, that's, not anti-Semitic or anything.

Ben: 1:07:46

Why is a German Shepherd an antisemitic?

Gene: 1:07:49

He's German.

Ben: 1:07:50

Oh God.

Gene: 1:07:52

Of course. Why, why else would he be antisemitic?

Ben: 1:07:55

Okay.

Gene: 1:07:57

Mm-hmm. Well, shit, these ribeyes are not cheap.

Ben: 1:08:00

What did, huh?

Gene: 1:08:02

Oh. I'm order, I'm ordering steaks here while we're talking. I figure it was a good opportunity to order some food while we're

Ben: 1:08:07

I, I will say that their rib eyes are absolutely gorgeous and yeah.

Gene: 1:08:12

mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:08:13

Yep.

Gene: 1:08:15

Well, and so you got a ribeye, you got a filet and then ground beef. What else you get?

Ben: 1:08:19

New York strip.

Gene: 1:08:20

You did to get a New York strip? Okay.

Ben: 1:08:22

Yep. I ordered one of their specials at the time. So the, the,

Gene: 1:08:27

try of, a little bit of everything kind of thing,

Ben: 1:08:30

yeah. And it's, it's one of those things, it's not cheap by any stretch. But it's cheaper than the,

Gene: 1:08:35

a store.

Ben: 1:08:36

well, it's cheaper than the store if you're, it's not on sale. Right. So if you're like me and you shop the sales on meat it's way more expensive. But that's not the target demographic. The target demographic

Gene: 1:08:49

bucks it looks like is their special.

Ben: 1:08:51

huh?

Gene: 1:08:52

So their special is 165 bucks.

Ben: 1:08:55

For that one? Yeah. They, they've run different ones, so, Again, the target demographic is the, rich yuppy who wants really high quality meat.

Gene: 1:09:05

Well that's who everybody's trying to please. Isn't that

Ben: 1:09:08

Yep. Well, and there, there's the whole demographic that will like the idea of happy cows, right?

Gene: 1:09:15

I like happy cows. That's always been my thing. Like I love buying milk that has the cow's name that the milk came from. Like that's a cool thing.

Ben: 1:09:25

Oh man.

Gene: 1:09:27

But then again, I grew up drinking fresh milk,

Ben: 1:09:31

Yeah.

Gene: 1:09:31

like not at all cooled off, just out of the cow. And then you, you drink it right after that.

Ben: 1:09:37

Yeah. I can totally see Jean underneath the cow,

Gene: 1:09:40

Now I wasn't drinking from the cow, but I mean, I would, yeah, I look, milking a cow was work, so you ought know me enough to know that somebody else did the work. And then I was just drinking the milk.

Ben: 1:09:51

indeed.

Gene: 1:09:52

But, but no fresh and even up through all through my teens we used to go to a dairy farm and then buy milk off-label.

Ben: 1:10:02

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:10:03

Cuz I just don't believe in pasteurization

Ben: 1:10:05

Well, I, I think pasteurization

Gene: 1:10:09

kills flavor.

Ben: 1:10:10

well, pasture pasture pasteurizing milk has its place because you shouldn't sell un pasteurized milk in a supermarket

Gene: 1:10:17

think it ought to be available without pasteurization, if you're willing to take the risk.

Ben: 1:10:21

Absolutely 100%. And, whole milk unpasteurized is, it's different. I mean, it's like, for, for instance, I never understood why people liked Guinness until I had Guinness outside of the United States,

Gene: 1:10:35

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right.

Ben: 1:10:36

because inside the United States it's pasteurized, whereas outside of the United States, it is not.

Gene: 1:10:42

cultures.

Ben: 1:10:43

And it is a totally, totally different taste.

Gene: 1:10:46

Yep. And it's same thing with qu which is that Russian drink that if you've never had at some point, we'll definitely make sure you do, but it's it's made kinda like beer, but the process has stopped before there's any alcohol. So it's basically carbonated. It's, it's a soft drink, but it's basically like carbonated pre beer.

Ben: 1:11:10

Interesting. I, I don't know why anyone would, would want that but

Gene: 1:11:15

It's, it's very tasty, it's delicious

Ben: 1:11:18

Okay.

Gene: 1:11:18

and it's what people have been drinking for ages all over Europe. But anyway all the costs sold in the US manufactured in the US are imported into, well, I shouldn't say that. All the costs made in the US for sure. It has to be pasteurized.

Ben: 1:11:34

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:11:35

So the, the, the yeast is killed effectively and that makes the flavor different. And I found that there's actually Canadian made qu that is unpasteurized that you can still get sometimes, rarely. And that tastes a lot more of what I remember as the authentic quest. It's spelled K V A S S two S's. And it's a pasteurization certainly works, but it also changes the flavor profile.

Ben: 1:12:11

Well un change. Pasteurization is, live cultures and live things are, are good for you, right? For instance acidophilus, which is a primary culture in milk is very good for your digestive system. If you are taking antibiotics, you should probably do a probiotic afterwards, that sort of thing. E eating live yogurt cultures can help you know that there are beneficial cultures as well as bad cultures. And the pasteurization process, unfortunately, is indiscriminate, right? And you also break down a lot of the amino acids and different different items that cause other issues.

Gene: 1:12:48

irradiation does not seem to change the flavor profile, so I, I don't know why we

Ben: 1:12:54

it's not heated in the same way, but you're still killing all beneficial things

Gene: 1:12:59

So I don't know why they only just use that more in this country. In other countries they do.

Ben: 1:13:04

because it's scary

Gene: 1:13:06

No, it isn't. How's it scary?

Ben: 1:13:10

because the average person saying, oh, my food was irradiated. Ew.

Gene: 1:13:14

that's a good thing.

Ben: 1:13:16

I, I don't disagree with you. I'm just telling you. Most

Gene: 1:13:19

know, and, and having milk that has like a month's shelf life is pretty cool too.

Ben: 1:13:24

it, it, it's scary to me.

Gene: 1:13:26

Eh? Yeah. And, and it's sold in bags instead of cartons.

Ben: 1:13:31

Yeah. You know what? I would say it would be far better, you know what the settlers used to do to keep milk from turning as fast?

Gene: 1:13:38

Put a frog in it.

Ben: 1:13:39

No. They put a silver dollar in it.

Gene: 1:13:43

Sure.

Ben: 1:13:44

They did.

Gene: 1:13:45

Just like a frog. Same effect.

Ben: 1:13:47

Why? Why? What would the frog do?

Gene: 1:13:49

I don't know what it does. I just remember this from childhood, like when we were living out in the country and you have the root cellar that's the coldest place that it keeps anything. So if you want you to keep your milk from going bad, you put a frog in it.

Ben: 1:14:01

That's interesting. I've never heard that one. But the, the silver dollar, silver is a natural antibiotic. So yeah, basically doing the same thing as pasteurization in some ways.

Gene: 1:14:14

Yeah. I mean, if you put silver shavings in there, you want a lot of surface area, that'd be even better, but Yeah.

Ben: 1:14:20

Yeah. No

Gene: 1:14:21

interesting. All right, well we got, we got through the food portion of the podcast.

Ben: 1:14:26

What'd you order?

Gene: 1:14:27

I ordered a two ribes, two packs of ground beef and two filet mignons.

Ben: 1:14:33

Cool.

Gene: 1:14:34

I just made up my own thing. I, I looked at what they're special includes too much meat. I don't really eat,

Ben: 1:14:40

Yeah,

Gene: 1:14:41

I mean, even the ribeyes, I'm kind of, I have to be in the mood for

Ben: 1:14:45

okay. Well, it comes frozen and vacuum packed, so, it'll, you can throw it in the freezer and it'll

Gene: 1:14:50

So do my rabbits

Ben: 1:14:52

Yeah.

Gene: 1:14:54

which I'm probably, I'll be making the drive probably in another two months

Ben: 1:15:00

Okay.

Gene: 1:15:00

up on the rabbits again. So, at the very least I'll see you then

Ben: 1:15:05

Okay. We should have

Gene: 1:15:05

if you're in town. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's a good point. So when I, when I know I'm coming out for sure, then we can plan a, a time around it and have a meetup when nobody shows up. That'd be cool

Ben: 1:15:16

I, I bet you a couple people do.

Gene: 1:15:18

you think? All right. Yeah, yeah. Well, it's a, it is an expensive flight from, from Ireland to here, so I don't think our polish run's gonna be showing up, but

Ben: 1:15:27

Which, y I, I know you haven't seen this, but apparently he was injured so,

Gene: 1:15:32

Oh, no.

Ben: 1:15:33

Yeah, he dislocated his shoulder and I, I had missed it, but yeah, he's rehabbing. So shout out to c s b. Hope he heals up well,

Gene: 1:15:41

Yeah. The, the, the person with the name that she'll now be mentioned hopefully you get.

Ben: 1:15:46

yeah.

Gene: 1:15:47

Shoulders suck. Dude. I dislocated my shoulder when I was like 27.

Ben: 1:15:51

Yep.

Gene: 1:15:52

It took three years.

Ben: 1:15:53

Yeah. I, I, I dislocated mine when I was how old was I? I was 17. Yeah. And

Gene: 1:15:59

took less time.

Ben: 1:16:01

it, it still took a long time to heal and it, that shoulder still is, you, you've, you've got rotator cuff damage. If you dislocate your shoulder, you're going to have, it's not

Gene: 1:16:10

me,

Ben: 1:16:11

huh?

Gene: 1:16:12

it took me a decade to get full mobility back because I would, I would force it into uncomfortable positions in order to get that mobility back and, and it, over a decade, it, it did work, but damn it took a long

Ben: 1:16:25

Yeah. And it's something that, in csb, I'd encourage you to listen to your physical therapist and actually do the, the

Gene: 1:16:31

No, no medical advice on this podcast. Thank you.

Ben: 1:16:34

I'm not giving medical advice. I'm giving him advice. Don't be stubborn, because if you, if you are and say, ah, I don't need to do all this, you'll regret it later.

Gene: 1:16:42

Mm-hmm. Yeah, it's, you gotta be very careful and you gotta watch to not make sure you don't re-injure it, cuz it's gonna be much more prone to injury for the next several years if it's an actual dislocation.

Ben: 1:16:57

Yeah, especially right here.

Gene: 1:16:59

In some ways, dislocations worsen a bone break because those ones set, they actually get harder, stronger. The, the joint socket just gets fucked.

Ben: 1:17:11

well, you, your ligaments have been stretched. They're not going to hold as tight everything

Gene: 1:17:16

Yeah. Yeah. And it's gonna make noise probably.

Ben: 1:17:19

Yep.

Gene: 1:17:21

And you're gonna tell what the, the weather's coming like, it's all part of getting old,

Ben: 1:17:27

yeah. Anyway, heal up man.

Gene: 1:17:29

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:17:31

what else you wanna talk about Jean?

Gene: 1:17:32

I'm trying to think. So I'll send you the Peter Zhan thing. You can read up on that yourself, see if you have any commentary. I'm trying to think of what is new, if anything. Cause I think we covered the big, the big stories. We didn't talk at all about Ukraine. The only thing I would say about that is the, the offer of a Christmas

Ben: 1:17:51

Amnesty.

Gene: 1:17:52

am, well, not an amnesty, but what do you call it? Break. Ceasefire was not accepted by Ukraine who kept launching missiles the whole time.

Ben: 1:18:01

Yeah. Yeah.

Gene: 1:18:03

But again, it's not really surprising that kind of, I think it was probably, I'm, I'm sure that the Russians assumed they would not be accepted as well.

Ben: 1:18:16

Yeah. What?

Gene: 1:18:19

than that, I think things are, moving along in there. It's everybody's getting to test their weapons. Every, every country that has weapons is. Getting an opportunity to, for live fire testing opportunities. So

Ben: 1:18:32

What'd you think of the Ukrainian embassies? Christmas party invite?

Gene: 1:18:36

Oh, yeah, yeah. Sponsored by Raytheon and Uhhuh. I think it's appropriate. I mean, look, let's, let's just bring it right out into the open. The the companies that just got huge contracts from the US government in order to provide weaponry out there are happy. Why wouldn't they be, I'd be happy if it was me.

Ben: 1:18:57

Oh yeah. They're getting lots and lots of money.

Gene: 1:19:00

The irony of the us doing a, a swap for a private arms dealer

Ben: 1:19:07

Huh.

Gene: 1:19:08

while themselves being the largest arms dealer in the world is pretty damn funny.

Ben: 1:19:13

Oh yeah.

Gene: 1:19:16

It's, and that's what he said in his interview. It's like, well, the US didn't want the competition. That's that's why they arrested me.

Ben: 1:19:25

and I'm sure there's some truth to.

Gene: 1:19:27

Yeah. right?

Ben: 1:19:29

So not to disparage a fellow podcaster, but why the hell is Tim Pool doing this Twitch model now?

Gene: 1:19:39

I think I don't know, but I think it's because he, he sees where the, the money.

Ben: 1:19:46

Yeah. But it's just annoying.

Gene: 1:19:48

I don't think it's annoying. Why is it annoying?

Ben: 1:19:51

I don't know because he, the way, because he is, record the whole thing and put it out and then do clips from there. So I don't, the way he is just doing clips, it's okay. Well, was there anything said that isn't part of the clip? You

Gene: 1:20:06

I guess you'll have to go on Twitch, find out and pay him some money.

Ben: 1:20:10

I don't, no.

Gene: 1:20:11

I think it's the right model, honestly. I, I think if you're gonna do this on a daily basis, the way he is right now,

Ben: 1:20:18

mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:20:19

two choices. You could do it like a news anchor where you have a full production staff creating everything ahead of time. You show up, you do your, your line reads and reactions, and then you have an editor going through and, and tweak everything. But I think Tim's too much of a control freak for that. And so I think this is a much better approach for him because you don't have to have other people involved. And he can literally do stuff on the fly in real time and streamed. And for the diehard people that are paying him money, they're gonna watch it. And then you just have one editor taking that stream, then chopping it up into pieces to make episodes that are available on.

Ben: 1:21:03

Yeah.

Gene: 1:21:04

So I, I could totally see why he is doing this. It, it probably will make more money for him in the grand scheme of things, but also I think Tim is, he's in some real danger of being stretched too thin right now.

Ben: 1:21:16

yeah.

Gene: 1:21:17

I don't know if you heard his new Coffee Shop ventures.

Ben: 1:21:20

Yep.

Gene: 1:21:22

So they bought two buildings, or they bought one building and they're renting another building. So again, there's gonna be two different Tim Pool coffee shops. I don't know what the names are gonna be yet

Ben: 1:21:33

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:21:34

in their local West Virginia area.

Ben: 1:21:37

which seems odd to do too, but go

Gene: 1:21:40

I maybe they got a super good deal. I don't know who, who the fuck knows.

Ben: 1:21:44

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:21:45

But his plan is to open'em up all over the country. So he wants to create kind of like a Tim Pool listening areas all over the country. And I think that's a great idea. I remember back in the day, rush Limbaugh had a similar thing. Russia didn't own any of these places, but there was a bunch of shops, restaurants, little coffee shop type places that were,

Ben: 1:22:13

that would have rush on. Yeah.

Gene: 1:22:15

Have rush on and they would make a big deal about it. They were, places for Rush listeners to get together during the day, during lunchtime, whenever, drive time, and hang out, get some food, get some drinks, listen to Rush, talk to each other.

Ben: 1:22:29

Well, and Tim's talking about doing a lot of alternate media stuff, not just his stuff. So there's that. He, yeah, I

Gene: 1:22:35

considers himself to be a musician too, on top of all that stuff. So, I mean, I'm not a huge fan of his music. I'll definitely say that. He, he does know court progressions. He does play but he enjoys it. It's creative outlet, more power to him.

Ben: 1:22:50

Yeah. So anyway I, I guess my biggest problem with him doing this hot take, and maybe this is what he's always done, typically when we're discussing these topics or whatever, it's something that we've been looking at for an extended period of time. Right. So for instance, the house vote that is something that I was watching the whole way through talking to some people that I know getting the skinny on what was said to a large extent. And, doing some research, not just pulling up the news article and, oh, well let me expound on my opinions on this. Right.

Gene: 1:23:20

The only thing I did is just watch Tim Pool to get all my news about the household.

Ben: 1:23:25

Yeah. So I, I need more than that to inform my opinion before I can really make it and espouse it. So I, I just, I, I, I would not be able to have a cogent opinion on something that I just read. And then, I'm sorry,

Gene: 1:23:41

really? You would just say, I don't know yet.

Ben: 1:23:45

I would have, I mean, depending on the subject, yeah, I'd want to do more research. I'd want to understand more and go a

Gene: 1:23:51

I would certainly say I wouldn't have any kind of expertise in something I just read, but I was sure I'll have an opinion after. I just like that story you sent me about the shooting in Houston.

Ben: 1:24:02

Yeah.

Gene: 1:24:03

I don't know anything about it other than watching the little, like two paragraph article and then reading some of the comments. That was it.

Ben: 1:24:12

And fair enough. If you want to just, have that opinion, then that's, that's okay, I guess. But I,

Gene: 1:24:17

Yeah. But I think that's

Ben: 1:24:18

know more about what.

Gene: 1:24:22

Yeah, I, I, sure. I guess, but I, I think that's the, the reaction video right now is the most profitable video type on YouTube. And this is talking to a number of creators on there that I, that I know and people that never used to do reaction videos are starting to do reaction videos for that reason. And so in some ways what Tim's doing is a reaction video to a current news.

Ben: 1:24:52

Yeah.

Gene: 1:24:53

It's, he is never been a new show. Like they don't purport themselves to be reporters. That's why anytime Tim has a story that is an internal story, he always credits their news team. Not himself or, or the the livestream show because somebody who's an actual reporter, and I can't remember any of the names of the people he's got, but he's got a, a handful of people that are professional reporters that actually write stories that are news articles, and then Tim's job is just to react to it.

Ben: 1:25:30

And that, that's fine to have a, have an opinion piece and clearly label it as such. But for me personally, I like to have an informed opinion, not just a reactionary.

Gene: 1:25:44

Would you consider back in the day Rush limo to be a reporter or to be an opinion

Ben: 1:25:49

Totally opinion.

Gene: 1:25:51

Okay, well that's all Tim's doing.

Ben: 1:25:52

Yeah, I understand.

Gene: 1:25:54

Okay.

Ben: 1:25:55

But I

Gene: 1:25:55

don't know why the hell

Ben: 1:25:57

talked didn't read the topics for the first time while he was on the

Gene: 1:26:01

oh, he sure sell did. I'm old enough to remember him opening up the New York Times Flip, flipping the pagers so you can actually hear him reading a headline for the first time and then giving his opinion on it and then continuing on to read the article and giving more opinion

Ben: 1:26:19

Okay. Through with his formerly Tobacco Stained Fingers.

Gene: 1:26:22

With his at the time presently, stain Tobacco Stain Fingers, he was still smoking quite a bit. This would be like late eighties, early nineties. So yeah, he totally did that. And I, I think as his show became, well, as he became richer and, I guess the show got more prominent. He probably had more like both Nerdly doing more prep and shit. But yeah, Russia's show was essentially reading a newspaper show for many years.

Ben: 1:26:51

Yeah. It, it's interesting Tim talking about Ian and the Fire Ian crowd versus the Keep Ian crowd. That was

Gene: 1:26:59

Oh, he loves that. Yeah, he loves that tension.

Ben: 1:27:02

Yeah.

Gene: 1:27:03

I think Ian is a complete idiot and he is an example of why you shouldn't do drugs. But also he is a, a fun little diversion that if it didn't exist would make the show more, more boring.

Ben: 1:27:18

And occasionally he says something That's pretty cogent.

Gene: 1:27:23

And that's, that's the rare occasion that kind of makes you not completely ignore everything that comes out of him cuz he might have a gem and, and and if it's not that, it's usually graphine.

Ben: 1:27:37

Yeah.

Gene: 1:27:38

Do you know, do you, have you heard of Graphine?

Ben: 1:27:40

Yes, yes, yes. Well, anyway yeah. Interesting.

Gene: 1:27:46

I don't know. I, I also wouldn't really call a fellow podcaster. Tim is a fucking media mogul at this point. He's not a podcaster, but,

Ben: 1:27:54

It, it's really interesting to see how much money people are making off of YouTube at this

Gene: 1:28:01

mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:28:02

if they're not demonetized.

Gene: 1:28:04

Yeah. Well, and then his, the amount of money he is making directly is more than he's making off YouTube.

Ben: 1:28:12

I think YouTube's still the majority of his

Gene: 1:28:14

no, no, no. He talked about it. He, he was very happy that they donations crossed over that mark.

Ben: 1:28:20

Good.

Gene: 1:28:21

So his direct income is higher than income from YouTube, which he still getting plenty of income from YouTube, and he still has a sponsor, like every four or five shows,

Ben: 1:28:32

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:28:32

there's somebody that's willing to sponsor'em, which is rare. But it's, it does happen on occasion. But I think the biggest thing

Ben: 1:28:39

think CPM is for his show?

Gene: 1:28:42

I couldn't even imagine, dude. I don't know. I, it would be a total shot in the dark.

Ben: 1:28:47

Hmm

Gene: 1:28:48

But the one thing I think that is very evident every time I've seen like a background of their show or their, their house or the chicken coop or whatever, is just how little money he spends.

Ben: 1:29:01

mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:29:02

Like, I don't think anybody on that show makes six figure. I don't think Luke does. I don't think nope. Nope. I think Luke makes more money promoting his t-shirts than he does off of Tim Cast.

Ben: 1:29:18

really

Gene: 1:29:19

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:29:20

well. That that, that's a shame. I mean, his shirts are fantastic by the way, but,

Gene: 1:29:24

He, they are, they're some of the best.

Ben: 1:29:26

and Luke is, I mean, I've liked Luke Winkowski or however you say his last name for a very long time. Him and Michael Malice have definitely been on the radar for a long time. But yeah, I don't know.

Gene: 1:29:37

that reminds me, I gotta reach out to malice. Yeah. It's I, I think Luke represents generally my thoughts when he says something.

Ben: 1:29:47

Largely, yeah, I would agree, but,

Gene: 1:29:49

Yeah. Because when he chimes in, it's like, yep. Yep. Exactly that. And his, the it, I, I love the way that he mispronounces some words.

Ben: 1:29:57

Yeah.

Gene: 1:29:58

just funny cuz it's not in a, like a funny accent kind of mispronouncing it, it's like he just doesn't know how they're spelled.

Ben: 1:30:07

Well, batter and Tim does the same thing where they've clearly only ever read the word, not heard it, spoken aloud. Yeah.

Gene: 1:30:15

Yeah. No, it is. That's funny. But I enjoy having them on there. The guests have been mostly good. I think, I hope Tim has seen also with this last house votes on the speaker he's noticed which of his former guests and acquaintances have been on the why are these people holding things up, bandwagon versus the good for them bandwagon? And because there's certainly been quite a few guests on Tim's show that are part of the rhino crowd as far as I'm

Ben: 1:30:48

Absolutely. Absolutely.

Gene: 1:30:53

but as he always says, he's not a Republican. And I, I'd say the same thing. I'm not a Republican either. I, I happen to agree more with the, the actual Republicans, but I would love nothing more. In fact, I had a poll, I don't know if you participated on those, on the social, I had a poll that asked people's political affiliation. And in the intro to the poll, I said, I would love to live in a place where the two major parties were the Republicans and the Libertarians.

Ben: 1:31:23

absolutely. And I, I I that absolutely.

Gene: 1:31:28

And again, that, that's the battle we oughta be having is like, is, is is the libertarian solution going to be the optimal or is the conservative Republican solution gave me up?

Ben: 1:31:40

Well, and you, you always need both, right? You need the liberal to push you forward, but you need the conservative to say, Hey, let's not risk everything, because if you are too much of Aiser, you end up burning down the house. If you're too progressive, you end up losing everything right there. There has to be that balance. Yeah. I'm starting a new book here shortly.

Gene: 1:32:03

Oh, which one?

Ben: 1:32:04

Alex Jones, the Great Reset.

Gene: 1:32:06

Oh, really? Interesting. Okay. I didn't realize he had a new book out.

Ben: 1:32:09

Yeah, he's got a new book out and it's actually I, I bought a physical copy, but they, they have it on Audible and I was shocked. So I even bought another copy

Gene: 1:32:19

by him?

Ben: 1:32:19

Huh?

Gene: 1:32:21

It was it Read by

Ben: 1:32:21

I don't remember. Not him, but

Gene: 1:32:23

Not Him. Okay.

Ben: 1:32:24

no, no, that I, I don't know that I could do that, but I did buy the audible copy just to kind of support that, and I'm surprised Amazon allowed that on Audible, so I wanted to, yeah, well I bought the physical copy directly from him, but the audiobook I wanted to, also support, just because I, I, I want to send that signal, so, yeah,

Gene: 1:32:46

Yep. Well, it'll be interesting to see how this whole lawsuit thing in the appeal happens with the the trillion dollars that he owes.

Ben: 1:32:56

yeah, yeah.

Gene: 1:32:57

I, I think he's gonna have a hard time making the payments on time.

Ben: 1:33:02

Yeah, indeed. I, I can see him there, there will be a judgment against him. The question is just how much is actually gonna stand up in what it actually looks like.

Gene: 1:33:12

Oh, I'd love it to go up to the Supreme Court.

Ben: 1:33:16

and hopefully he will continue the fight and maybe it will end up there.

Gene: 1:33:20

Yeah. Because I think it's, it's high time that we start having some some sanity in these court cases because a whole slew of people that are not qualified to be judges or judges right now,

Ben: 1:33:37

Yep.

Gene: 1:33:38

and if you don't do anything about it, they're going to perpetuate this sort of emotional, idealistic judgment style and not the impartial judge style that they're supposed to have. And it'll just simply become more the norm. It's a, it, it's always what happens when you don't put a stop to bad behavior.

Ben: 1:34:03

Yeah. But do you think that the Supreme Court would actually hear the Alex Jones case? Are they gonna go Alex Jones? Yeah. We're not touching that.

Gene: 1:34:11

I think they would, the only, the only third rail that I've seen that nobody is willing to touch is election results.

Ben: 1:34:19

Yeah. Which is.

Gene: 1:34:20

no courts is interested in inserting themselves into the political process. So even the, the unfortunate side effect of that third rail for them is that anything goes in, in an election. Like you literally have people be threatened with death. You can have all the third world tactics of having an election, and now we know you can do that because no court will intervene.

Ben: 1:34:49

Well, and the fact that you have as much evidence coming out of Arizona as you do,

Gene: 1:34:54

Evidence doesn't matter.

Ben: 1:34:56

That,

Gene: 1:34:56

Their, their excuse is always lack of standing.

Ben: 1:34:59

no, that, that they did not do that this time. And here, here's the thing, the, a lot of the lack of standing was, Hey, there's not enough evidence of fraud here in the Trump cases to overturn the election, so we're not gonna touch it. That was the rationale. Well, in the Arizona

Gene: 1:35:16

was lack of standing. Those are two separate things

Ben: 1:35:20

okay, there were some that were lack of standing, some that, Hey, we're gonna dismiss this because even if it is true, it's not going to materially affect the

Gene: 1:35:28

there. Sure, yeah. Some of'em were that, but in, in this particular case in Arizona,

Ben: 1:35:35

There's absolutely enough that

Gene: 1:35:37

There's tons of evidence. Yeah. But I, the, the high bar that was set was that even if there is fraud, you have to demonstrate that it was fraud. Yeah. It was malicious intent has to be shown that it was fraud committed specifically and consciously for the purpose of rigging the election.

Ben: 1:36:02

which is something, unless you

Gene: 1:36:04

You

Ben: 1:36:05

find evidence

Gene: 1:36:06

you can literally never

Ben: 1:36:07

says they're doing it, you're never gonna prove it.

Gene: 1:36:10

yeah. That, that, that only way you're gonna prove that is in the Perry Mason episode where the, the opposition witness says, oh, you got me

Ben: 1:36:19

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:36:20

Where they just blow their own case apart.

Ben: 1:36:22

my understanding it, Carrie Lake is still appealing. That, is she not?

Gene: 1:36:26

Yeah, I believe so. Yep. I think the appeal that that'll take longer to keep going, and she is the right person for this. She's kinda a lesbian looking female, and that, that goes a long way towards not getting a case dismissed. So hopefully she can keep pushing on this for longer. I don't think she'll ever get the ruling she wants on this, but I, I think it's important. To keep this as a hot topic. And apparently, and I don't know how true this is, but I, I heard a little blurb that says that that her, she's in the same district as that Democrat chick who decided to not be a Democrat anymore.

Ben: 1:37:10

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:37:11

What's her name? Sienna. Something like that.

Ben: 1:37:14

Yep.

Gene: 1:37:14

And Sinema. That's right. Sinema. Yeah. It was a funny name. She's a bisexual one, right?

Ben: 1:37:20

You have no idea.

Gene: 1:37:21

I believe she is. I'm pretty sure she's bisexual.

Ben: 1:37:24

Okay.

Gene: 1:37:25

some stuff that came out about how she was the first member of Congress that was bisexual.

Ben: 1:37:30

Does that really matter?

Gene: 1:37:31

well it's interesting news to me. I mean, it matters more than the politics she has, that's for sure.

Ben: 1:37:36

I mean, I, I think most w most women have far more that's far more common among

Gene: 1:37:42

what's the email address? Go ahead. Yes, Ben's just about to say all women are bisexual. Go ahead, give'em your email address for those comments

Ben: 1:37:50

Dude@nametobend.com.

Gene: 1:37:53

due to name Ben, that comment. That's right. Now you're not wrong. I agree with that stance. I think all women are bisexual, but there's a and for good. Yeah. Yeah. To what degree are they comfortable? And I think that, It's. I think in women's prison, a hundred percent the population is doing it. At least every women's prison movie I've ever seen,

Ben: 1:38:16

Yeah. Well, I mean there's the whole

Gene: 1:38:19

TV show

Ben: 1:38:21

Yeah.

Gene: 1:38:21

There are still dudes in, in men's prison that will not have sex with other guys. But I'm, I'm pretty sure all women have sex with women,

Ben: 1:38:32

Yeah.

Gene: 1:38:35

at least in my imagination anyway.

Ben: 1:38:37

there you go.

Gene: 1:38:39

that's what's important. But yeah, so if cinema runs, which there's no indication that she wouldn't run again in that district, then she's splitting the Democrat votes and the Republican is likely to win. And if a Republican is likely to win, then, then Kerry Lake is likely to be the one running. So how funny would it be if she turns her governatorial bit into a senatorial win?

Ben: 1:39:02

well, and that very well may be exactly what happens, but I still would like to see the lawsuit continue and, put potentially some consequences out of it. And, and if there's not, then you know, one of the consequences of Keri Lake being able to present enough of the evidence that she has and it being more or less dismissed the way it is,

Gene: 1:39:24

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:39:25

that's going to discourage people's belief in the elections. People are going to

Gene: 1:39:30

oh, they're all fake anyway.

Ben: 1:39:31

as illegitimate.

Gene: 1:39:32

They are legitimate. Totally.

Ben: 1:39:34

Well, that, that could be

Gene: 1:39:36

But I think it's been that way for a while. I just don't think it's a new

Ben: 1:39:39

a very long time, but when you have the population waking up to it, that's a different

Gene: 1:39:42

Mm-hmm. But are they Other than the people that have their own podcasts, are they waking up to it?

Ben: 1:39:50

and this could be an echo chamber of the people I'm around. But I would say that even people at work Typically, or hey, something, something's not right here. Right? So I, I think based off the, and again, it could be self-selection bias, but the people I deal with and work with often are, to me, waking up to a larger degree than I would've said, 10 years ago. So,

Gene: 1:40:18

Well that's a good sign. I have not experienced that. I think people are blindly leming onwards.

Ben: 1:40:27

mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:40:30

It's like, oh, well that's just how it is.

Ben: 1:40:33

well, that would be sad, but,

Gene: 1:40:36

And then who else? Oh one other thing I saw, I forwarded this to a few folks. I don't know if I forwarded it to you in the last email from the founder of Gab Andrew something earlier. I can't remember his. His predictions were fairly aligned with mine, which was that the Republicans will not win 2024. There will not be a red wave of any kind, and a Democrat will still be a present.

Ben: 1:41:00

hmm.

Gene: 1:41:01

what can you do about it Was the end result of that, that emails like it's all about, living in two separate countries in one physical location. It is only patronizing people that share your political views. It is, it's all the usual stuff, but I, I thought it was nice to hear somebody in a position of somebody's got a lot of followers essentially saying that same approach, because I'm just getting tired of the Republicans being surprised every time they lose.

Ben: 1:41:33

Yeah.

Gene: 1:41:33

you're gonna lose. Why wouldn't you?

Ben: 1:41:35

what I would say is that there's a danger in that. I mean, if you really go the parallel economy route that several people are espousing,

Gene: 1:41:43

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:41:44

While seeding the the auspices of power to the other side,

Gene: 1:41:48

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:41:49

I mean, quite frankly, that's how you end up in a ghetto with a star on your shoulder,

Gene: 1:41:56

But we're a minority in this country. You have to realize that, it's not like you're going to be able to do anything about it. You're not gonna have, I'll, I'll have the number of kids to become a majority again,

Ben: 1:42:07

Well, there, there's that there is not putting your kids in public schools.

Gene: 1:42:11

Is parallel economy. Yes.

Ben: 1:42:12

But I, I mean, it, it's just another step towards war. It really is.

Gene: 1:42:17

Yeah, yeah. It's inevitable. inevitable. And I think that it's the, what the parallel economy does is at least it keeps more of the money in the hands of your country and not the enemy side.

Ben: 1:42:33

Hmm.

Gene: 1:42:35

And this is, this is a distinction that used to exist as we u back when we had actual Republicans and actual Democrats, is you could have debates and conversations about the best approach because the approach was simply how you get to the end result that you both agree on, but you get there by different paths. Do you reduce crime by removing guns or by increasing sentences? Right. But now that's not the case right now. I think it's more accurate to say that. A little over half this country would like nothing more than to see us end up in prison or dead.

Ben: 1:43:21

Yeah.

Gene: 1:43:22

And I, for one, am not a Christian, so I'm not turning the other cheek. I, I'm, I'm in old school eye for an I Jew,

Ben: 1:43:32

Well, and I, I would say that that's a somewhat of a misunderstanding of turning the other cheek, right. Uh

Gene: 1:43:39

Well, I'm using it metaphorically. I, I know it wasn't intended in that

Ben: 1:43:42

well, I mean,

Gene: 1:43:43

the way a lot of people use it.

Ben: 1:43:45

P Christians need to remember Christ was absolutely not a pacifist. The throwing over the money changers in the temple, and not only that, he, one of his commandments, which there weren't many commandments in the New Testament, one of the commandments to his followers, where, get a sword. If you do not have a sword, go sell your cloak. Go sell your coat and get a sword, be armed. And the definition of meek for the meek shall inherit the earth. Everyone thinks of the modern definition of meek, but that's not, that's not the founding of that. The, the, the, the term meek as it was used at the time was really those who are capable of violence but do not initiate. So meek doesn't mean being weak in that context. means being capable of violence, but not a violent person.

Gene: 1:44:38

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's, it's something Peterson said in one of his lectures as well, is that to, to be a, a man, you have to be capable of violence. It does not mean you should be a violent man, but it, it means you should have the capability for violence because an awful lot of the end results of what happens in your life have to include personality traits of that personality. So, I don't know if I'm saying it, the, I'm sure I'm not saying it quite the way that he did, but in the fact if you're somebody that is not capable of violence, you cannot perform as a male.

Ben: 1:45:25

Well, a, as a said differently, there are plenty of males that are not men.

Gene: 1:45:31

Yes. There you go.

Ben: 1:45:33

So what I would say is someone cuts in line.

Gene: 1:45:37

Yes. And, and I guess

Ben: 1:45:40

Do you have the ability to project yourself in such a way that they get back in line?

Gene: 1:45:45

Yeah.

Ben: 1:45:45

Are you willing to escalate that?

Gene: 1:45:47

Or the other way around. Can you cut in?

Ben: 1:45:49

No. I don't agree with that one.

Gene: 1:45:51

Well, no, cuz this is John. John's totally right about millennials don't say anything, so you might as well cut in line cuz they'll never say a damn thing.

Ben: 1:45:59

Yeah, I'm okay. I, I choose not to be the asshole whenever possible.

Gene: 1:46:06

well I, I'm just testing a hypothesis. That's all I'm doing

Ben: 1:46:08

Uhhuh.

Gene: 1:46:09

every time. I did remember who was talking about the Marxists in the last two generations getting fucked up. It was actually not surprisingly, a guest on Jordan Peterson's podcast.

Ben: 1:46:21

Hmm.

Gene: 1:46:22

It was Dr. Dr. Uam has

Ben: 1:46:25

that's one from a few months ago that you sent me.

Gene: 1:46:28

Probably yes,

Ben: 1:46:31

Yeah.

Gene: 1:46:32

3 0 5 on, on Peterson's podcast if anyone's interested, which I'm shocked. He's got that many episodes already, but he cranks'em out

Ben: 1:46:40

really stepped up his contents creation since he joined

Gene: 1:46:43

since he's getting paid for it. Yeah. I'd say,

Ben: 1:46:46

Yeah.

Gene: 1:46:47

yeah. Now that crew pays well from what I hear.

Ben: 1:46:52

Well, there, I mean, I, I, I'll flat out say it, I subscribe to the Daily Wire at this point because of some of the stuff that Peterson's putting out on there. It's absolutely excellent. And they're

Gene: 1:47:01

but I think the deals that their Daily Wire is doing with people are for real money. They're not like a hundred grand. They're like millions.

Ben: 1:47:10

Well, but they're, they're making that, you

Gene: 1:47:12

They are. And there's an, an actual ad in the middle of Peterson's podcast now,

Ben: 1:47:17

Yes. Which is unfortunate.

Gene: 1:47:20

Eh, at least. And he's not doing the the sales of Bit,

Ben: 1:47:24

yeah.

Gene: 1:47:24

the way that Ben doesn't mind doing like every five minutes.

Ben: 1:47:27

Which I'm not a huge

Gene: 1:47:29

It's, it's, I know it's annoying. I hate it. I like one, an episode I'm okay with.

Ben: 1:47:35

Yeah.

Gene: 1:47:35

like, oh, here's a product that's, that's making this episode possible. Okay, fine. But literally and I, I actually inquired a while ago for a different, for a product into into their operation, like how much the ads are, and ad rates are very expensive.

Ben: 1:47:52

really

Gene: 1:47:53

Yeah. I can't remember what it was, but it was significantly more than YouTube.

Ben: 1:47:57

interesting. So,

Gene: 1:47:59

so they know their target demographic.

Ben: 1:48:01

yeah, I mean, they very much do. There are two subscriptions that I pay for as far as alternative media is concerned, and Daily Wire is one of'em. Just because,

Gene: 1:48:12

yeah. Just ju Lever.

Ben: 1:48:13

not really Shapiro, but some of the other stuff that's on there has been good. And then warrior Poet Society,

Gene: 1:48:20

Yeah. Which I don't like those guys,

Ben: 1:48:22

why not

Gene: 1:48:23

Ah, I just don't like them.

Ben: 1:48:25

too much of a Christian vibe for you?

Gene: 1:48:26

Little too much of that kind of thing going on. Yeah.

Ben: 1:48:30

Yeah.

Gene: 1:48:30

It's not even so much a Christian vibe, it's just, I just, I've met very few warriors in my time and I've met a shit ton of people that put that sticker on themselves.

Ben: 1:48:43

oh, well, yeah. I mean, there are plenty of people who larp, but I don't think you, I like John level. I, I, I think highly of his philosophy. He seems to be very mi like-minded to me. And he's gone out and put out a lot of pretty good stances and taken some risks in his life on those stances. And I wanna support him on that. Tim Pool. I don't pay for Tim Pool's channel because I think he's too milk toast. I don't think he

Gene: 1:49:09

No, you don't. Cuz you, you email me and say, Hey, can you grab that thing? They're from the Tim's behind the scenes thing that I wanna watch that I don't pay for

Ben: 1:49:17

Yeah.

Gene: 1:49:18

because I, I pay for Tim,

Ben: 1:49:21

I, if, if he starts taking some more stances, then I'll support him.

Gene: 1:49:24

Yeah. He, I don't think he needs to take any more cents. I think he's exactly where he should be right now, which is, he is hated by the left and he is called milk toast by the right.

Ben: 1:49:39

Yeah.

Gene: 1:49:40

I think that's a good position for him to be in because he, he has the advantage of complete independence. He doesn't have to put out a, a statement that agrees with anybody.

Ben: 1:49:53

Which is fine. All I'm gonna say though is, it, I support people who take a stance, so,

Gene: 1:50:03

Yeah. Fair enough. And I, I don't know, I just, I, I like his approach. I think to me, when I watch Tim Pool, especially when he makes decisions or something changes, right? Their, their show changes or their, he started up a new venture or something. It's like watching a younger brother be making the right decision. That's the best way I can explain the feeling. I'm like, yep, good for you, Tim. That's exactly what you ought to be doing. It's, it's like he, to me, represents kind of the kid brother thing.

Ben: 1:50:36

okay. You ever feel like he's screwing up?

Gene: 1:50:39

Nope,

Ben: 1:50:40

You haven't had that experience yet? Okay.

Gene: 1:50:42

I have not. I, I think, I mean, I think it's kind of funny that a guy his age still skateboards, but whatever that's, it's activity, it's physical exercise. Can't complain about that.

Ben: 1:50:55

I was never much as, I was never into skateboarding. I just

Gene: 1:51:00

Only the dirt bags skateboarded. When I was a.

Ben: 1:51:03

Yeah. I, I, I, yeah, the, I didn't like the skateboarding crowd at all. I,

Gene: 1:51:09

I roller bladed man.

Ben: 1:51:10

Oh, I did too, and I skied and did lots of, I, that was not a, I was not afraid of sports where, injury is likely by any stretch. So it wasn't that, it was just, I didn't like the skateboarders,

Gene: 1:51:26

No, I didn't like the

Ben: 1:51:27

the snowboarders that much.

Gene: 1:51:29

I didn't, yeah, like I, I've never hung out with guys with long hair.

Ben: 1:51:37

yeah.

Gene: 1:51:38

know it sounds very tripe of me probably, but it's, it's a generalization based on observation, not some kind of there, there's no coded message here or anything. It's just that generally people, males that had longer hair in my youth tended to be the ones that their lives were not going anywhere.

Ben: 1:52:00

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:52:02

And I had way too many ideas and visions of what I want to accomplish, and by when, by what age. I want to accomplish those things to spend time hanging out with people that clearly were not going there.

Ben: 1:52:16

Well, and there are some people who act like that in their twenties and then change their life and do something different.

Gene: 1:52:24

Oh, I'm sure some people, well, yeah, you're bald. Of course you're gonna hang out with people with long hair. Bum

Ben: 1:52:31

for the record, I am not bald.

Gene: 1:52:33

No you're not. That's true. Oh, you'll get there. Don't worry.

Ben: 1:52:41

Yeah.

Gene: 1:52:41

Give it a few years. Or, how's your grandpa on your mom's side? Was he balded at

Ben: 1:52:46

No. He had head of hair until

Gene: 1:52:48

Oh, okay. Well then you're, then you'll do pretty good then

Ben: 1:52:52

Yeah.

Gene: 1:52:52

because that's usually, it's on your maternal grandfather is the one you, you're most likely to have similar hair to

Ben: 1:52:58

Yeah. Well, yeah. He, he was a short, hairy Irishman, so

Gene: 1:53:06

Yeah. I don't think there's too many bald Irish people are there.

Ben: 1:53:09

Not that I know

Gene: 1:53:10

I think that baldness is not very common to them.

Ben: 1:53:13

Yeah. And when I was in until really in my tw mid twenties that's when I started getting away harrier,

Gene: 1:53:20

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:53:21

enough. But yeah, definitely the Kelly jeans came out more as I matured,

Gene: 1:53:28

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:53:28

which is interesting. All right, Jean, anything else that we wanna talk about?

Gene: 1:53:34

No. No. I think we've, we've kind of stopped talking like half an hour ago and just been catching up on the few things. So I guess the, I would just remind everybody that the best way to help us. Is to promote the show, tell others about it, and to leave a review on Google and Apple because shows with reviews tend to be showing up in searches a lot more than shows without reviews.

Ben: 1:53:57

Absolutely

Gene: 1:53:58

Awesome. All right, well we'll see you next week, Ben.

Ben: 1:54:01

see you then.