024 Just Two Good Old Boys

Gene: 0:11

hey Ben, how are you doing?

Ben: 0:13

I'm good man. We're we're recording a little off scheduled cuz of Easter, but hey,

Gene: 0:18

damn pesky Easter getting in the way.

Ben: 0:20

Yeah, Hey, just the, Mo I would argue the most important holiday in Christianity, but hey,

Gene: 0:26

Nah, that's Christmas.

Ben: 0:28

New, new, new. No, no, no. If you actually Christmas may be the most popular,

Gene: 0:35

Christmas is responsible for at least a quarter of the GDP of the us. It's clearly the most important

Ben: 0:42

yeah, from, from a religious standpoint he has risen and Christ resurrection and all that being extremely

Gene: 0:50

but Santa Claus now that that's really the important guy in Christianity.

Ben: 0:55

Ah, yeah. Christmas stems out of the Catholic Christ Mass, right? So, yeah. Anyway in this household, at least to try and get back to the original meanings.

Gene: 1:07

Mm, icy. So, did you have a good Easter?

Ben: 1:10

yeah, I'm sorry.

Gene: 1:11

Did you have a good Easter? Would you make some good food?

Ben: 1:14

We had great food. So at the in-laws we had good food at my parents and my family's stuff. We had good food and kids got to honey Easter eggs a couple of times and got numerous Easter baskets from us, from in-laws from my parents. And yeah, so

Gene: 1:33

Did you paint the eggs?

Ben: 1:36

no, no, no. We, we gracefully avoided that because our kids are young enough that that just ends in a mess.

Gene: 1:42

Mm, I see.

Ben: 1:44

They've, they've got time. They can do that later.

Gene: 1:47

Yeah, these days you can actually like print pictures on your computer and then transfer'em to the eggs and

Ben: 1:53

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:55

Not like the olden days when I was young.

Ben: 1:58

Yeah. We still in, in my family at least when we went to my family stuff, they had the dye set out on the back porch with the different dyes and stickers and things like that. Very much the way we did it when I was a kid and yeah, I don't know.

Gene: 2:14

Stickers. That's great.

Ben: 2:16

Yeah, we, we always used to do two hunts. So you, you've got the younger kids that go first and the plastic eggs are filled with candy and stuff like that. And then you've got the older kids that go and thereafter money.

Gene: 2:30

Now they don't, do they still sell the cab eggs or not? I don't even

Ben: 2:34

Oh yeah, yeah. Cat berry egg still thing.

Gene: 2:36

Okay.

Ben: 2:37

I think they're disgusting personally, but hey, whatever you want.

Gene: 2:40

they, they kind of are, but but it definitely seemed like they were a big thing around Easter time.

Ben: 2:48

Hey, you got that commercial that's been running since the nineties hasn't changed.

Gene: 2:53

Really? Okay.

Ben: 2:54

Yeah. With the lying of Mark bark, mark, all the different animals, but the only, the bunny could be the Cadbury egg bunny.

Gene: 3:00

Okay. Yeah, I

Ben: 3:03

Come on. You've seen this commercial.

Gene: 3:04

have not

Ben: 3:04

been running since the nineties, gene.

Gene: 3:07

not had a TV since the nineties, so I.

Ben: 3:10

Okay.

Gene: 3:11

Don't like advertising, man. Don't watch it.

Ben: 3:14

Unless it's Tim Pool

Gene: 3:15

that's not advertising, man. That's that's

Ben: 3:18

total native

Gene: 3:19

in, in formation. Yeah. Tim Pool was on fire last night. Holy cow. That was a good episode.

Ben: 3:25

I made it through part of the actual episode. I didn't even begin to get into the

Gene: 3:31

The after show. So you know who Peter Bogosian is, right?

Ben: 3:35

I do know who Peter Bogosian is.

Gene: 3:38

So he is a fairly typical dark web liberal rich dude who who has found himself somewhat without a home because the left has moved into cuckoo socialist land.

Ben: 3:53

The left left him.

Gene: 3:54

The left, left them. And so

Ben: 3:57

by the way.

Gene: 3:58

it's what?

Ben: 3:58

I sent you the commercial by the way.

Gene: 4:00

Okay. Thank you. And so. He is doing some fun stuff. His YouTube channel is basically him at colleges

Ben: 4:10

Yeah.

Gene: 4:11

trying to practically show the youngsters, the college students that woke is stupid.

Ben: 4:18

And if I may, Peter Bogosian came to fame by transposing pronouns in I believe mine, kpf, and putting it in as an academic paper and getting it through

Gene: 4:32

Yeah, yeah. So, right. The, yeah. I mean that there's been, there's a few things like that they've done.

Ben: 4:38

So that's the kind of character you're dealing with.

Gene: 4:40

Yeah. Yeah, it's basically, it's the kind of thing that most people would not understand and people that do think it's hilarious.

Ben: 4:50

But people who do also already recognize that academia is trash.

Gene: 4:56

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. Exactly. So he's got a PhD and what was, what was fun of the after hour segment? The the paid portion is that, well for whatever amount of debate that they had during the normal show that got ramped up to 11 in the after hours where it was pretty obvious during the normal show that Goshen was trying to avoid the topic of Ukraine because he's on the wrong side of it. And, and the after hours, holy cow, Tim just went all in on that topic and basically was telling him how he doesn't understand that. That he needs to not have an opinion if he doesn't have full information, which I agree with. And the, and then pointing out a bunch of logical fallacies to him, which again, is great when a guy who dropped outta college is telling a guy with a PhD that he's wrong and he's acting like an idiot.

Ben: 6:05

Yeah. I, I, I think okay. I don't see that as necessarily uncommon,

Gene: 6:12

And, and common with what?

Ben: 6:14

uncommon.

Gene: 6:15

Oh, I'm common.

Ben: 6:16

I, I think there are quite a few of us out there who can go toe to toe with some PhDs in certain subjects.

Gene: 6:23

yeah. Yeah. But it's, it's, it's definitely enjoyable to see somebody doing that because I'll tell you, becausein was. At the beginning of the show right at the start in the intro. I don't know if it was Ian or somebody asking don't you also have a PhD? And said, yeah, but don't worry. Just call me Peter. He's trying to be all like, oh, it's not a big deal, don't worry about it. And by the end of the, certainly in the after hour segment he, he was like a deer caught in front of headlights or a freshman sitting in the wrong class because he is getting schooled up to wazoo by Tim Pool with and I, I hate the term cuz it's, it's inaccurate. But Tim bringing facts and receipts and be Goshen basically making but Russia bad. Okay. Arguments,

Ben: 7:16

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 7:17

which is very

Ben: 7:18

Russia bad.

Gene: 7:19

his age. Okay. And it's, I recognize this because I'm of that generation. I'm his age, and so I can see this in a lot of people that are Mike and compatriots that it, it, they grew up their entire lives with this idea that we're in the Cold War. Russia's bad and they didn't take the win when the US won. They just kind of, waited for a decade when Russia was in complete desolation and bankruptcy and just ignored it and focused on other things until it got to be a little more together again, and then just picked right up where they were before. With Russia, bad, we've always been the Cold War. NATO should always be growing. We should always be trying to fight Russia

Ben: 8:15

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 8:17

with. No actual rationale behind it, which was, what was so cool about Tim pointing this out to him is from a different generation, a younger generation, although Tim's getting up there in years too.

Ben: 8:28

Dude, Tim's my age.

Gene: 8:30

exactly. You're getting up there in years and you are, you're, dude, you're, you're like five years away from old man sas.

Ben: 8:38

No

Gene: 8:39

Oh, hell yeah.

Ben: 8:40

Negative.

Gene: 8:41

Yeah. You'll see, you'll see, you'll be saying these damn whipper snappers.

Ben: 8:48

Oh, dude, I already say back in mad day we had WW squat

Gene: 8:53

Mm-hmm. Yeah, exactly. So was it particularly fun episode and it's, it's good to see Tim getting.

Ben: 9:05

feisty.

Gene: 9:06

Yeah, that's a good word for it. Feisty for the right reason. Because what was not fun was, as you will remember a few months ago, Tim getting feisty about his members telling him that Eliza Blue is a fraud, and him not wanting to hear it. So this is, this is the right kind of Tim that I enjoy hearing.

Ben: 9:25

I'm glad I avoided that drama.

Gene: 9:27

Yeah, yeah.

Ben: 9:28

Of went all in

Gene: 9:29

I was all in because a buddy of mine whose show I ended up joining for at least a, a good chunk of time was very intimately connected with it. He knew Eliza back when they were in their twenties, so he's one of the guys that was writing the shit saying she's full of shit. She's lying about this stuff cuz he

Ben: 9:50

I did not realize he personally knew her back in the twenties. Okay.

Gene: 9:53

Not in the 1920s or 20 2020s, their

Ben: 9:56

Their twenties, their, their.

Gene: 9:58

So, yeah, and I, I was enjoying myself. I was having fun being a part of that, cuz I, I like a little controversy now and then, believe it or not.

Ben: 10:07

Yeah, spicing it up.

Gene: 10:08

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 10:09

Speaking of controversy how are you feeling about the new Pentagon papers,

Gene: 10:14

The, the new pen. Get on papers. What did I miss?

Ben: 10:17

Papers leaked around the Ukraine War and US deployments and

Gene: 10:22

Oh, yeah,

Ben: 10:23

of, hundreds of US troops and other native

Gene: 10:25

yeah, yeah. It's interesting that stuff's

Ben: 10:27

and the death estimate estimates pretty much what we've been saying on this show right in line. So either we're paid for by Russia or,

Gene: 10:36

I wish we're definitely not paid for it by

Ben: 10:38

Hey, Kremlin, check please.

Gene: 10:39

Yeah. I think they got a few expenses right now. Yeah. It's it's interesting that somebody finally came out with that stuff. I did. I did check on that. I, I sent it to some friends I have that, that have clearance and it was validated that it definitely looks authentic. Whether it is or not is a

Ben: 10:59

oh, no, no, no. The, the Pentagon has already said that it is authentic, but certain items were doctored,

Gene: 11:06

what the Pentagon says. I'm gonna use my own sources.

Ben: 11:09

Okay. But I'm saying it's, it, it is authentic. The question is whether or not the casualty numbers for Russia slash Ukraine are actually in

Gene: 11:19

Americans don't have those numbers, so it kind of doesn't matter.

Ben: 11:22

I'm sorry.

Gene: 11:24

Americans don't have those numbers, so it kind of doesn't matter.

Ben: 11:27

I think the US government has those

Gene: 11:29

No, they don't. How the hell would they have those numbers?

Ben: 11:32

Because we have boots on the ground

Gene: 11:34

No, we're not in that war. What are you talking about? No, we, we, it's literally physically impossible for us to have those numbers.

Ben: 11:40

Okay.

Gene: 11:41

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 11:43

Anyway I I just found it hilarious personally, but, Hey,

Gene: 11:47

What, what they had on there was essentially the numbers that are reported weekly by the by Russia. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Ben: 11:56

Which is counter to what the US slash Ukrainian estimates are. Right. You, you, the official US Ukrainian numbers are that Russia's lost 200,000 troops.

Gene: 12:08

Call those estimates. I would say the Russian and Ukraine, or sorry, the American and Ukrainian propaganda numbers are about 10 times higher. Yes.

Ben: 12:17

yeah.

Gene: 12:17

But I don't think anyone actually believes those numbers. They, they have no basis. They're just

Ben: 12:22

Ooh. There are a lot of people in the West that believe those numbers entire, Peter, perfect example, all in

Gene: 12:28

said,

Ben: 12:28

the Ukraine.

Gene: 12:29

nobody important believes those numbers.

Ben: 12:32

All right. You can throw the important tag out there. Fair enough. But I'm, I'm just telling you, there are a lot of people who are, oh, Ukraine bad.

Gene: 12:42

Yeah. But, but let's say they were right. And let's say that there's 10 times as many Russians that died. I don't see how this is good for the us

Ben: 12:52

I agreed.

Gene: 12:54

so the

Ben: 12:55

back Russia into more of a corner. It's

Gene: 12:57

Yeah, yeah, exactly. Make it more of a sun cost fallacy argument for them, because everybody loves those

Ben: 13:07

Yeah.

Gene: 13:08

And nuclear war is the ultimate Suncoast fallacy.

Ben: 13:11

Well, nuke going, nuke is definitely the if I can't have it, nobody

Gene: 13:19

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Screw you guys. I'm getting him.

Ben: 13:24

Yeah. And I'm taking my bow with me.

Gene: 13:27

Yeah, exactly. And then again, so sanctions, that's kind of a screw you guys. I'm going home argument too.

Ben: 13:34

China's starting to impose a few

Gene: 13:36

I think China's getting ready for a move.

Ben: 13:39

I think China's about to move on Taiwan. Yes.

Gene: 13:42

Yeah. I don't know if it's gonna be on Taiwan though. I think Taiwan might be a distraction.

Ben: 13:47

Where do you think they would

Gene: 13:49

That'll be interesting to find out.

Ben: 13:51

Obviously you have some thoughts.

Gene: 13:53

I, I have

Ben: 13:54

Surely you wouldn't, drop that palm and then not explain.

Gene: 13:58

I, I have no insight information whatsoever on this topic. All I'm saying is that it just seems like China's getting ready for a move. They're starting to flex a little bit.

Ben: 14:08

Yeah. And where do you think they're gonna go, if not Taiwan?

Gene: 14:11

I think it's gonna be the Western hemisphere.

Ben: 14:14

R okay. I could see Brazil,

Gene: 14:16

Mm-hmm. Brazil could be definitely

Ben: 14:18

that would be a friendly takeover, not a

Gene: 14:22

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Friendly. But I said flexing. Flexing. And I think that a good form of flexing would be like, let's say China signed a five year agreement with Mexico for something really big. Like all Mexican petroleum products will be sold to China for the next five years.

Ben: 14:42

Mm. I, I think I think that will be a hell of a test of the Monroe Doctrine and I'm

Gene: 14:49

threw that out the window when they started being the world.

Ben: 14:53

Okay. I actually 100% disagree. I think that the Monroe doctrine has always been our principle and what will come

Gene: 15:01

might have been our principle, but we had no, not, we could never enforce it.

Ben: 15:06

We

Gene: 15:06

It was an empty threat and it, it is becoming more so every day. Completely not

Ben: 15:12

has the very much, has the naval ability to absolutely lock off North and South America from the rest of the

Gene: 15:19

navy is irrelevant. The Navy is anachronistic at this point. It is literally a figment of the 20th century that matters. Is zero today, except for submarines. Submarines are still important. The rest of

Ben: 15:31

You only say that because the only naval power that Russia or China have that is anywhere near equal to the US is submarines.

Gene: 15:41

No, I say that because submarines are the only important parts of the Seas Division. So the fact that Russia and China have'em kind of means they agree with what I'm thinking. I don't say it because of that, it's because the rest of the stuff is irrelevant. What, what is the last naval conflict that has happened on the planet Earth? Do you remember?

Ben: 16:06

Yeah, go on. Vietnam.

Gene: 16:11

Vietnam

Ben: 16:12

Yeah. Vietnam had naval elements.

Gene: 16:14

did it. I don't even remember that. Okay.

Ben: 16:16

You could argue river boats.

Gene: 16:18

I, I was

Ben: 16:19

Gulf of Tonkin. You could argue lots of

Gene: 16:21

Korea, but yeah, it's been like 80 years

Ben: 16:26

Yeah. Because we've been involved in Sandy places without water.

Gene: 16:30

because the navies are useless. The only thing that, that has provided something for the

Ben: 16:37

Shipping. Okay. Okay. Shipping. The US wants the fuck over to China.

Gene: 16:42

U

Ben: 16:42

to

Gene: 16:42

not want to fuck over China, US is very afraid of fucking over China because US economy doesn't just stop it. It literally disappears overnight. If shipping with China is impacted.

Ben: 16:55

I, I think that's very much the other way around. Actually,

Gene: 16:59

no, no.

Ben: 17:01

dude, all we do is import from China. We

Gene: 17:03

you? Exactly,

Ben: 17:05

not dependent upon China.

Gene: 17:06

exactly. All we do is import. That's all we do. We don't produce, we import. That's all we do.

Ben: 17:13

produce food, we produce lots of things. We are

Gene: 17:16

We produce. We produce very little and we import the vast majority of everything that's consumed

Ben: 17:23

Okay? So all the

Gene: 17:26

start with drugs. If China couldn't ship drugs to us for two months, people would be dying in this. Because us doesn't manufacture drugs, it's too expensive.

Ben: 17:39

All the US has to do is place one carrier in the Malacca Straits and they can cut off China from the vast majority of their trade. And then if you have

Gene: 17:50

That's an act of war. That would be an act of war. And that carrier would

Ben: 17:55

It is not Chinese

Gene: 17:57

It would be nuked. See, here's the thing

Ben: 17:59

Good luck.

Gene: 18:01

didn't understand, and I don't think you do right now either. An act of war is not a legal term. An act of war is something that causes the other side to retaliate for your actions. Now, parking a boat inside of territorial waters is illegal according to international law.

Ben: 18:23

to Taiwan right now?

Gene: 18:24

Now that that.

Ben: 18:26

has, China has gone through and put vessels in the streets of Taiwan and

Gene: 18:32

There's no such thing as the Straits of Taiwan.

Ben: 18:35

sh. Excuse me.

Gene: 18:36

It's the South Chinese Sea.

Ben: 18:38

Okay. Different terms by

Gene: 18:40

They also have never recognized Taiwan,

Ben: 18:44

who has never recognized Taiwan. Okay, good for them. Why would the CCP

Gene: 18:48

So why would, why would that be illegal for them to put something next to a country that doesn't exist?

Ben: 18:55

It does exist, and

Gene: 18:56

not exist according to them.

Ben: 18:59

Okay you, you, okay? 1984. Congratulations. You can go down that road if you want. The fact of the matter is China has interdicted shifting already and ordered vessels to Heath two and brace for inspection and to be boarded. So, that is an act of war in and of itself against Taiwan, not us, but

Gene: 19:22

Yeah. Which is a part of China

Ben: 19:24

no. Taiwan is a freaking independent country, my friend.

Gene: 19:27

well, not a green China.

Ben: 19:29

Not according to China, and I will say the biggest mistake the US made during the Nixon era was the one China policy. Instead of saying, yeah, no, we'll recognize Beijing as the capital of mainland China, but Taiwan is now it's own thing.

Gene: 19:47

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 19:48

Had we done that in the 1970s and said, no, no, no, we're not gonna recognize one

Gene: 19:52

of mistakes that were made in the 1970s. I, I

Ben: 19:54

Oh, just a few. Jimmy Carter not being the least of

Gene: 19:56

and I'm o obviously I'm sitting here with a big smirk on my face talking about all this stuff, cuz I think it's important to be able to view the perspective of your.

Ben: 20:07

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 20:08

just look at it from the American standpoint, which, which is very limiting and it is not one shared by an awful lot of countries around the earth. And so when you look at Taiwan, that is, there's certain strategic elements there for the United States. There's also, or used to be anyway, a policy of containment of communism that was at work. I'm not sure that I've heard anybody in the US government for the last 15, 20 years

Ben: 20:42

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 20:43

talk about the containment of China. I've heard about China being our enemy. I've heard about China stealing our shit, our trade secrets. I've heard a lot of negative things, but I haven't heard anything about we need to prevent communism from spreading cuz I ain't spreading cuz everybody knows it doesn't work. we're not really going after communism in China. Yeah. Okay. Fair enough. The homegrown American communism is primed for spread. But when you

Ben: 21:11

Don't

Gene: 21:11

look at the policies of United

Ben: 21:13

you've got a couple Japanese islands

Gene: 21:15

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And Japan. And Japan is a lot more worried about it than we are for sure. Yeah, it's and again, what it comes down to is a, a question which was raised yesterday on, on Tim cast with Pa Goshen. Is

Ben: 21:28

This is not the temp cast review hour, by the way.

Gene: 21:31

it, it's not. But that show literally just happened. So, I'm using it as a jumping board and I do encourage people to watch Tim Cast. It's with, with the ups and downs he's had, it's still the, the guests he's getting are really good.

Ben: 21:44

Yeah.

Gene: 21:45

Like, I'm not seeing those people on other shows, I guess is the My definition of good and

Ben: 21:50

Yeah. And I would say his I, I did listen to his culture war with Vek and totally worth to listen. And again, man, I'm gonna double down on Beq.

Gene: 22:01

So I've heard a

Ben: 22:03

going to have some legs. He's, he's going to be in the debates and he's going, if he is in the, let me rephrase. If he is allowed to be in the debates in the Republican primary, he has a very good shot of gaining some momentum.

Gene: 22:17

there's starting to be a conspiracy theory spreading about him that he, he is the, the state Department candidate

Ben: 22:26

Okay.

Gene: 22:27

that essentially he is being positioned in to get their man in the Republican party and is much in the same way that people are calling DeSantis the the insider.

Ben: 22:39

the Bush candidate.

Gene: 22:41

Yeah, that's what they say. Although again, we haven't heard,

Ben: 22:45

is the bushy candidate. I'm sorry, Carl Rove is in there advising? Yes.

Gene: 22:51

Because I tried to dig into this when I heard it and there's not a single thing that says Kyle Rose working anywhere right now. His name's not on anything.

Ben: 23:00

Okay.

Gene: 23:01

So all we have is Democrat talking points trying to sync DeSantis before the elections by aligning him with Bush. And I think it's working cuz you're believing it. But there, there's literally nothing, there's nothing out there at all that that is, is tying him other than mainstream television.

Ben: 23:24

The, Eric Trump has talked about it, and Don Jr. Has talked about it. And then there have been a lot of

Gene: 23:32

Yes. But has anybody, have we seen that? Because when Bush was. We saw those guys. Like we, this was not some secret hidden meetings that were happening. This was actually

Ben: 23:45

Yeah. If DeSantis is smart, he would have to keep it quiet.

Gene: 23:51

Yes. That's, that's how all conspiracies work. If, if everybody knew about it they wouldn't, they'd be able to do it. Therefore, they have to keep it on the hush low and there's no proof. That's how we know

Ben: 24:00

seven days ago, Carl Rove downplayed Ron DeSantis Pole Plunge, Carl Rove and how to beat Trump. Stormy Daniels.

Gene: 24:08

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 24:09

What voters know to know more about. Hold on.

Gene: 24:15

Don't cal Roe is a lot to have an opinion on the elections without working for somebody.

Ben: 24:19

Vaccinated is

Gene: 24:21

Mainstream media,

Ben: 24:24

okay. Carl Rove himself being interviewed, but you know, Hey, who, who, who? The car,

Gene: 24:29

well, before I lost my Twitter account, car Roe followed me on Twitter. So I could have asked them, but unfortunately I lost my account when the banning happened, so no longer follows me.

Ben: 24:41

Okay.

Gene: 24:43

I'm just saying it's it's just rumor and rumor that is generally gonna be perceived as negative, not positive. So when we actually hear something from Carl Row, or we see something from Santa's team saying we met with Carl and here's our plans and here's how we're gonna beat Trump, then I'll say, okay, looks like he's working for him.

Ben: 25:07

Yeah. In an interview with Martha McCallum we're going to rally around him. If he's under attack rep problem is going to rally around him. Carl Rove is in an interview giving a lot of supporting language. It sure seems like a dude. I, I, I, I'm just saying reading between those lines

Gene: 25:24

Yeah. Yeah. So Guy has an opinion about elections. We know he doesn't like Trump. We knew this before

Ben: 25:31

guy whose opinions okay. Yeah. Whatever.

Gene: 25:35

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 25:36

like Carl Rove. You should accept yourself

Gene: 25:38

That's fine. But Car Rove got Bush elected and that was pretty good. Not good for the country, but it was good for Bush. You did a good job.

Ben: 25:46

or something? Hold on. Get the hell up. Get your act

Gene: 25:50

You had some background noise.

Ben: 25:51

response. Yeah. My, my phone just started randomly playing YouTube for

Gene: 25:55

Oh, that's so good.

Ben: 25:57

No, sorry about that.

Gene: 25:58

Yeah.

Ben: 25:59

where is this coming from?

Gene: 26:00

I thought somebody turned the TV on in the background or something. Anyway, my,

Ben: 26:04

I'm in

Gene: 26:04

bottom line with this stuff is I, I just think that and again, I'm not buying into the rumor, but I'm starting to hear similar stuff being said about the ve is that he is connected to the establishment. He's being pushed through as the, the young candidate. Cuz clearly DeSantis is not like, it's not going through with him. And so we need to be careful and we need to watch out and dig into exactly who is pushing him in. So, and I, I don't know, there

Ben: 26:38

I, I, I buy that on DeSantis. I don't buy that on vec. And the reason why is DeSantis to me, rings as a hollow shell clone of actual principles. I think DeSantis is a good soldier. I think he's a good follower, but I don't think he's a leader

Gene: 26:58

I think it's a much better governor than the one we have here.

Ben: 27:02

Okay, that's not a hard bar. Congratulations. Special Olympics. Good job. Sorry.

Gene: 27:09

God

Ben: 27:10

apologize to all those who that offended, but

Gene: 27:12

right.

Ben: 27:13

if you knew our governor, you might get it.

Gene: 27:15

Timmy,

Ben: 27:16

anyway,

Gene: 27:17

governor Timmy.

Ben: 27:18

yeah. Yeah. But the, the point is so when DeSantis speaks, he's following other people's thought patterns. He, I, I have in, if someone can point out an area where DeSantis has been the thought leader on something, by all means, please send it to me, but.

Gene: 27:37

definitely led the way in Covid.

Ben: 27:39

No, they did not.

Gene: 27:40

Okay. Who do you think led the way in Covid?

Ben: 27:42

South Dakota, Christie. No.

Gene: 27:44

I'll give you that. Chrissy Noem, a total population smaller than the Miami of the entire state.

Ben: 27:50

Doesn't matter. The thought wasn't his. She never locked down.

Gene: 27:55

She never did. No. Yeah, that's true.

Ben: 27:58

So yeah. Anyway, my point is show me where DeSantis has actually been a leader, and I will acquiesce. But yeah. From my point of view, I don't think DeSantis has been a leader. I think he's been a very good Republican governor that has executed Republican thoughts in a very brave way. So, for instance, Florida changing and moving away from the lockdowns.

Gene: 28:24

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 28:24

V he was the first to take that leap and move away from the lockdowns Texas to follow which is a failure of Abbott and why Abbott should never be even ever considered for president.

Gene: 28:35

believe he got reelected.

Ben: 28:38

He shouldn't have been,

Gene: 28:39

He

Ben: 28:39

I voted

Gene: 28:39

him. Yeah, same here.

Ben: 28:41

I, I absolutely voted against,

Gene: 28:44

Yeah.

Ben: 28:46

but, he's, Abbott is a milk toast governor at best, so, yeah.

Gene: 28:56

Yep. And if he doesn't pardon this shooter guy.

Ben: 28:58

Oh, he's going to, he dude, it, that might end up in a recall.

Gene: 29:03

Yep.

Ben: 29:06

Like seriously,

Gene: 29:07

No, seriously. Yeah, I would support that big time.

Ben: 29:09

I, there are already calls for a. If he does not pardon this, which there's some interesting points in Texas state law. So we're, we're shifting topics here, but

Gene: 29:23

We

Ben: 29:23

governor has to receive, in Texas, the governor has to receive a request for a pardon from the parole board.

Gene: 29:30

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 29:31

He cannot just pardon anyone he wants,

Gene: 29:33

Now why is that? That's stupid.

Ben: 29:35

Because Texas has actually one of the weakest governors in the United States. And this is something a lot of people don't understand, but the Texas governor is not the most powerful politician in Texas.

Gene: 29:45

Hmm. Who is

Ben: 29:46

The lieutenant governor and the railroad commissioner are pretty much neck and neck

Gene: 29:50

the, the railroad commissioner.

Ben: 29:53

Absolutely.

Gene: 29:54

Wow.

Ben: 29:55

The railroad commissioner has a immense amount of authority over land and how things are used and permitting and everything else. The, the Railroad Commissioner is an extremely powerful

Gene: 30:06

Most people never heard of that position.

Ben: 30:09

Exactly.

Gene: 30:11

So what's the deal there? Is that just a historical artifact or,

Ben: 30:17

So you know, obviously as the name would imply, it started out with the railroad and everything else, but really oil and gas pipelines, basically the lifeblood of Texas economy all throw, all go through the railroad commissioner's

Gene: 30:33

that's an elected position.

Ben: 30:35

It is,

Gene: 30:36

I couldn't tell you who the hell I would've voted for that, for that position.

Ben: 30:40

yeah. Maybe you should pay more attention to politics in your own state, man.

Gene: 30:44

fuck you, never, I've never seen a single ad for anybody running for that.

Ben: 30:51

Why? Yeah, why would you? It's an innocuous position. No, but if you look it up, man, oil and gas, all the drilling

Gene: 31:00

Maybe add a run for that position.

Ben: 31:02

Go for it.

Gene: 31:04

Yeah, that couldn't be that hard. Knowing

Ben: 31:08

Actually, it's one of the bigger races. It's

Gene: 31:11

How's it a big rate if nobody buys ads?

Ben: 31:14

Because it's one of those things that it's very much a internal boughton paid for sort of thing

Gene: 31:20

This is an interesting thing. I wanna find out what it takes to get on the ballot for that position.

Ben: 31:25

It's a statewide ballot, so,

Gene: 31:26

Yeah, but how many signatures do you need? I wonder if it's a

Ben: 31:29

It's the same as any statewide ballot.

Gene: 31:32

which is how many

Ben: 31:35

Oh my god. I don't know. I'd have to Google it

Gene: 31:36

Yeah, I'll Google it.

Ben: 31:39

Yeah. But railroad Commissioner is an extremely powerful position in Texas government, and you have to remember, we have a legislature that meets every other year as well.

Gene: 31:51

Right, which is, yeah, I could see pros and cons of that.

Ben: 31:57

I see nothing but pros.

Gene: 32:00

Just from a less chance for them to do anything standpoint.

Ben: 32:05

Yep.

Gene: 32:06

Yeah, I could see that.

Ben: 32:09

Don't touch my shit.

Gene: 32:12

Yeah, the problem is that it also makes it more difficult to address things that are timely, like, I don't know, making Austin not a city any longer.

Ben: 32:22

That definitely needs to go through.

Gene: 32:25

It's, yeah, it's been moving in the wrong direction.

Ben: 32:28

Yeah. So just a little bit about the Texas Railroad Commission and the Railroad Commissioner. So. This is just a little bit of their regulatory enforcement capabilities, mining reclamation, water pipeline power power, transmission lines, transportation, et cetera. So literally everything that controls the economy in the state of Texas.

Gene: 32:59

Hmm. That's significant.

Ben: 33:02

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 33:04

Yeah.

Ben: 33:06

So what were we talking about before you ticked

Gene: 33:09

It's a, it's a whole, it's a whole web of conversation. I don't know that there was a

Ben: 33:14

Anyway Christie Nom was the thought leader, not DeSantis. So

Gene: 33:19

5,000 signatures.

Ben: 33:21

yeah, you can get that.

Gene: 33:23

Eh, that's

Ben: 33:26

You might have to leave your house,

Gene: 33:27

doable. I might have to leave my house. Yeah, I've gotten, I've gotten 3000 before when I ran, but I've never

Ben: 33:33

Dude, all we gotta do is go to a couple meetups and we'll get that

Gene: 33:37

Yeah, more than a couple. But, ah, it might be fun. It might be fun to do. I'll think about it. Why not

Ben: 33:46

anyway. I think DeSantis is a kept creature, and I, I think DeSantis would be a fantastic vice president. The bushes can force on Trump or the vec, but I think the VEC is the real deal. Man, you, you can't speak the way he does about topics and not have internalized those topics extremely well. Like it can be propaganda that you internalize, but you have to internalize it.

Gene: 34:14

Yeah, I, I like what he has to say. I don't, don't get me wrong. I think that he's saying the right stuff. The, the question is he, he's saying the right stuff because it's the stuff he believes or is he saying the right stuff? Cuz that's who they decided to put in to be that guy.

Ben: 34:34

Yeah. I, I don't see that as a thing, but Okay.

Gene: 34:38

I don't know.

Ben: 34:38

I, I think DeSantis is that

Gene: 34:40

there's plenty of time because obviously he's not gonna do anything this election. But he's still young.

Ben: 34:46

I You say that dude, but he's pulling ahead of where Trump was when he walked down the escalator.

Gene: 34:52

It doesn't matter. He's not gonna do it. No. It, if

Ben: 34:56

you watch

Gene: 34:57

Trump is

Ben: 34:58

episode with.

Gene: 34:59

I watched it. But do you think anybody who's not a Tim cast viewer knows who he is?

Ben: 35:04

Yes, absolutely. Dude. Jordan Peterson had him on. He is being very

Gene: 35:09

you're talking, you're talking about people that are part of the give me politics every single day crowd, which both of us are.

Ben: 35:18

Peterson is not that at all. His crowd is not

Gene: 35:21

It

Ben: 35:21

you are totally misunderstanding the reach. He, he was on Glen Beck. He was on

Gene: 35:26

Politics, politics.

Ben: 35:29

Peterson's, not politics. He was on Tim Cast, which is politics, where he goes next. But I, I'm, I'm telling you, he is building a social media campaign that we haven't seen the likes of this. The first was Barack

Gene: 35:42

Yang was doing that the previous election.

Ben: 35:44

I'm sorry,

Gene: 35:45

Yang was doing that the previous election.

Ben: 35:48

not like this.

Gene: 35:51

All right. We'll see. We'll see if the if the

Ben: 35:53

Yang

Gene: 35:54

better than the Chinese guy.

Ben: 35:55

Vec can.

Gene: 35:57

Have you seen him debate? I haven't seen him debate.

Ben: 35:58

I've seen him in conversation with Jordan Peterson, Tim Pool and Glenn

Gene: 36:03

people who agree with him.

Ben: 36:05

To an extent. Peterson's not, but no, no. Peterson's far more progressive. Peterson's a liberal dude in many, many ways. I love the guy, I love his thought patterns on lots of things, but ultimately, he is a liberal. Not tend towards libertarianism

Gene: 36:21

no. He's not in the, no, he's, I would call him, he's more of a theist.

Ben: 36:27

New, new, new, new, new, new, new, new, new, new. Totally wrong. He would never support a Theocratic government.

Gene: 36:36

Mm. Yeah, I think you would.

Ben: 36:39

Having read literally everything he's ever published and listened to pretty much every bit of content he's ever put out. Yeah, no

Gene: 36:48

having read everything he's ever published and listened to every bit of content, cuz I don't work

Ben: 36:55

You, you've gone back and went through all his lecture series and everything else

Gene: 36:59

Yes.

Ben: 37:00

Seriously, I've

Gene: 37:01

yeah. I, I didn't have to go back and I

Ben: 37:03

before Bill C 16

Gene: 37:05

Yeah, exactly. I didn't have to go back cuz I was watching him when he was putting'em on YouTube and he was one of the few guys doing it and I went to see him live.

Ben: 37:15

and Me too.

Gene: 37:15

Yeah. So I, I

Ben: 37:18

a copy of one of his

Gene: 37:19

this is, and a buddy of mine debated him. And this is one of the areas where I

Ben: 37:25

buddy?

Gene: 37:25

The I told you about him, the atheist guy. He did a debate with him back about five years ago, and I think Peterson, this is my one complaint with Peterson. Is he, he always ties everything back to religion.

Ben: 37:39

Okay. Did you read Maps of Meaning?

Gene: 37:42

Yes.

Ben: 37:43

Did you understand it?

Gene: 37:44

I don't know. I think so.

Ben: 37:46

How many times did you read it?

Gene: 37:48

I don't ever reread anything yet, so it's just.

Ben: 37:50

Okay, then you didn't understand it because, I'm sorry. That book is dense enough that I, at least I am not intellectually capable of fully sussing out everything that he's saying in one read. It takes a lot. And to the, the entire point that he's making in that book is around Really the biblical corpus and the meaning behind it and how the Bible is a meta-narrative of all the narratives throughout history pieced together. You, you can see bits of oh, good God, I'm blanking. What, what's the oldest known text? Jesus.

Gene: 38:29

The the oldest known text,

Ben: 38:32

It the Es gig.

Gene: 38:34

Yeah, yeah,

Ben: 38:35

Yeah. Yeah. So you can see elements of gilgo mesh. You can see elements here. You can see elements there, but you see this meta-narrative forming. And one of the things Peterson would say do you believe in God? It depends on what you mean by belief.

Gene: 38:47

Yeah.

Ben: 38:48

And he goes through this narrative. But what it comes down to is, whether the Bible is metaly true or not, whether the there is an eternal being that wrote it or humanity written together this meta narrative that while it, the events may or may not have happened, as laid out, the ethics behind the story are ultimately true. So, he would say that a theocracy, a any one religion is not the right answer, but the building upon the knowledge of our ancestors and creating a meta ethic is absolutely necessary. So if that's what you mean by theocracy, sure. If you mean okay, Catholics are in charge now, or Baptists are in charge now. No, that would never happen.

Gene: 39:37

Yeah, no, I think as far as Catholics and Baptists, they, they would both just be clumped together, but

Ben: 39:44

Only from an outsider Jew standpoint.

Gene: 39:47

exactly. It's like, it's like all you people,

Ben: 39:51

all you Christians

Gene: 39:52

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 39:52

thing over here. Yeah. You've never fought amongst yourselves or done

Gene: 39:56

I think no, there, there are

Ben: 39:58

been Holy Wars based off of Protestant versus Catholicism.

Gene: 40:01

Yeah, it just goes

Ben: 40:02

Shout out to my Catholic buddy.

Gene: 40:04

It's clearly not defined, isn't it?

Ben: 40:07

No.

Gene: 40:08

Uhhuh? No. I, what I mean is there are plenty of people that in academia, which is where he comes from, that can make similar arguments or arguments for the same conclusions as he does without bringing in God, and he always brings in God. And that's, like I said, this is the one area where you know, it, it's, I, I think it would be better to do it without bringing in God to make it truly universal. But that's not, that's not his experie.

Ben: 40:52

yeah. But again, the way he's bringing in God is saying,

Gene: 40:56

Yeah, there's probably not enough God for most Christians in his lectures.

Ben: 41:01

But he's not. Pushing a religion. He's not a reformist. Which by the way, I think we are on the verge of a, a new great awakening. I, I see signs of it all around and I

Gene: 41:15

the quickening you mean?

Ben: 41:17

Huh?

Gene: 41:17

The quickening?

Ben: 41:19

Great awakening.

Gene: 41:20

The quickening.

Ben: 41:22

No, great awakening.

Gene: 41:24

There can be only one.

Ben: 41:26

Thank you. Not a fan of Highlander

Gene: 41:28

Kind of. There's awesome dude. It's a great movie.

Ben: 41:31

Oh, okay. You can make an argument for the first

Gene: 41:34

Sean Connery doing a, a Spaniard with a Scottish accent. What could be.

Ben: 41:40

again. You can make an argument for the first one that. Nope.

Gene: 41:46

Yeah, no, I agree. I agree. The first one was yeah, that's the only one I was referring to.

Ben: 41:50

ma'am. Anyway.

Gene: 41:51

How can you have a second one when there can be only one

Ben: 41:54

Gene. I'm trying to make a point

Gene: 41:56

uhhuh?

Ben: 41:57

Anyway, what it comes down to is I, I think we are on, and I think Peterson is the tip of the iceberg because I don't think he is approaching this from a religious fervor standpoint, but I think his messaging has enough similar content that people are realizing this vapid world we've been living in for the last two decades can't really exist any longer. It's done. And if you believe, which by the way, I have not watched any Peter's Zion except what you've sent me for over a month now, by the

Gene: 42:34

got me to start watching him again. God damn it.

Ben: 42:36

I got No, no, no, no. You, you are the, you, you're the fanboy

Gene: 42:40

I, I introduced Zion to you and then you said, oh, I'm one down this rack rabbit hole, and watched all his shit. He, I think he's right. And then I'm like now I have to watch him tell you why he's wrong.

Ben: 42:51

But I, I think he is right on a lot of things. I don't think he's

Gene: 42:54

this last one that I sent you this morning, I couldn't find anything to disagree with, unfortunately.

Ben: 43:01

Right. Yeah.

Gene: 43:02

he didn't, he kept his mouth shut about the usual topic of people getting older. So here he mostly talked about difference between Europe and Southeast Asia, and it was actually pretty, pretty spot on.

Ben: 43:17

yeah. So what it comes down to is if you look at the shifting dynamic, I, I think we are going into a de dollarized world. Saudi Arabia is talking about it. I. MBS has come out and said he's no longer interested in pleasing the us. You've got all these things, which the US could still maneuver and make some changes here, but I think the US is about to go through a time of extreme hardship and relative hardship. Let me put it to you that way because I think the rest of the world's gonna ha be hit a hell of a lot harder than the us with the possible exception of Russia and France being right around where we are because so from a food standpoint, the US will be fine from a technology and, certain goods are gonna get scarce, but you know, we're not gonna starve to death. Other countries are going to starve to death. France should be okay. Russia should be okay because the insular nature of our economies, if China really makes this push to de dollarize the world unless they go against thousands of years of history and the way Asians inflate and change currency, that's gonna fall apart immediately. Right? Okay. So Saudi Arabia sells China oil at one price, and by the time the ship gets there, they're one or worth 10% less. That's not going to be a trade deal that's going to last very long. It's just not so, unless China does a complete 180 that is always done on its monetary policy. They, they, they can't, the wine is not going to be the replacement to the dollar. It's just not.

Gene: 45:07

Yeah, it has to be a currency set up for this purpose. Not, not a

Ben: 45:14

Correct. And if the bricks nations do what they have tried to negotiate and yet failed to do and set up something that is based in rare earth elements, minerals, gold oil, something in Saudi Arabia, joints, bricks, and every current, everyone backs the currency by a set commodity that they have, which they're trying to negotiate what that would be and what the exchange rate would be, which given the disparate disparate nature of the bricks nations is not an easy task. That is not a foregone conclusion. If they can do that, sure they will repay, replace the dollar as the means of exchange. But that's a big leap and a big jump to get to.

Gene: 45:59

It's not gonna happen overnight,

Ben: 46:01

No.

Gene: 46:02

but you know, the use of the dollar I think was done more as a. Hedge against the volatility of the rest of the world's currencies

Ben: 46:14

And,

Gene: 46:15

other countries.

Ben: 46:16

and, and here's what I'd say to that. The biggest thing that I learned from Zhan that I did not understand previously I, I've always looked at our inflationary rates. I've never looked at the world. I never bothered looking at what Southeast Asia and China are doing. I never looked at really what Europe is doing to its currency. I've always said, oh my God, what are we doing to our currency? Then I look around the world, motherfucker, we inflate the least. We print the least amount of dollars compared to the rest of the world com. It's insane.

Gene: 46:47

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 46:49

Okay, so the, the, the expansion of the dollar, you look at that money graph curve that Tim's fauna showing and everything else. Compare that to the euro, compare that to the one, compare that to the Rubal. US inflates the least. And that is why we are the reserve currency.

Gene: 47:09

I think one's definitely tied to the other. I'm not sure that's a causal relationship.

Ben: 47:13

Oh, let me say this. If we inflated the way everyone else did, we would not be the reserve currency. And that's why I don't think there's a currency set up today to take us over and replace us. Could the bricks nations set up a currency that is by default, non-inflationary and replace us? Absolutely.

Gene: 47:31

The rubal is tied to gold at this point, so Rubal is a good candidate for it.

Ben: 47:36

partially tied to gold.

Gene: 47:38

What do you mean partially tied to gold?

Ben: 47:42

Only a portion of it is, and it that they, they still reserve the right to inflate at least in my understanding of it.

Gene: 47:49

You're, I, I'm not sure where you're seeing that because right now you can literally go and trade rubbles for gold or gold for rubbles at a fixed rate.

Ben: 47:59

Hold on. All right. E expound.

Gene: 48:03

So when they made the announcement that,

Ben: 48:06

500, 5,000 renewables per gram.

Gene: 48:08

yeah, so what, how's that change? They've announced what the rate is. A daily basis, unlike here where gold price changes literally daily.

Ben: 48:19

Russia's rubal gold standard. Unlikely to last.

Gene: 48:23

Okay. Mainstream media, thanks for the.

Ben: 48:25

Yeah, Asia Times, I don't think that's main.

Gene: 48:28

Oh, Asia Times. That's, that's a ca run paper.

Ben: 48:32

I believe it actually is Chinese, but Okay. Anyway there were some caveats in that, that I remember, I would have to go back and look, dude, but I believe that they have periods of adjustments. So it's tied My recollection, and please correct me if I'm wrong, but my recollection was that the, they were tying the rubble to a gold for a fixed price, for a fixed amount of time, and then it would be reevaluated and reassessed.

Gene: 49:03

Yes, you're correct in that.

Ben: 49:04

Okay? So what that means is the inflationary, the inflationary waves are drawn out. So if you think of inflation, deflation, and that as a cycle, as a sine wave, all you're doing is extending out the wave.

Gene: 49:22

Yeah. I, I think that's a little different than saying that it's partially tied to gold. I think it is tied to gold until there is a new bid of legislation that decouples it from gold.

Ben: 49:36

Okay, let me rephrase. It is tied to gold with the price set to change on a periodicity.

Gene: 49:44

Potentially, with like, they haven't said it's gonna change.

Ben: 49:50

Okay. Fair enough. You, we have not gone

Gene: 49:53

All I'm saying is it's not, it's this, I would prefer this in the US to what we have.

Ben: 50:00

mm-hmm.

Gene: 50:01

Which is a complete decoupling from gold

Ben: 50:04

100% agree.

Gene: 50:06

so, yeah.

Ben: 50:09

Money should be tied to a standard, whether that's oil, whether that some commodity has to back a paper money or the paper Money is purely fiat and worthless at some point in time,

Gene: 50:21

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Ben: 50:24

which the US unfortunately is about to find out the hard way.

Gene: 50:27

So the managing editor of Asia Times is Sean Crispin, the business editor is David Goldman, opinions editor David Simons.

Ben: 50:37

Okay. So Israel controls it.

Gene: 50:39

It's, it's a, yeah, it's a western propaganda paper. That's what I told you.

Ben: 50:43

You missed the joke, but

Gene: 50:44

No, I got the joke. Miss Goldman clearly a Jewish guy. Yes. Jews run media, so what do.

Ben: 50:51

Which, you know what? I, I, I, I wish that I, the presidential race that I most wish I could go back in history and change that I think would have the biggest impact today.

Gene: 51:02

What's that?

Ben: 51:03

Goldwater Johnson

Gene: 51:04

Oh, yeah,

Ben: 51:05

had Goldwater won. I think we would be in an entirely different

Gene: 51:09

that would be, that's, I think a lot of things would be different. That's not like a minor tweak. That's a major tweak.

Ben: 51:16

Absolutely.

Gene: 51:17

Yeah.

Ben: 51:17

Dude, I have a

Gene: 51:18

But not all positive either. I'm sure there'll be some negatives as a result of that as well.

Ben: 51:22

Everything's got some natives, but it, dude, Goldwater was, have you ever read Conscience of a Conservative?

Gene: 51:29

No,

Ben: 51:30

Oh, Jesus.

Gene: 51:31

I know you've told me about that before. That's on my list. Yeah.

Ben: 51:34

Yeah. And, hi. His, his speech was just so.

Gene: 51:39

Mm. So why? Why did Johnson have such a big lead in that election?

Ben: 51:45

Because Johnson played on fears that Goldwater was too much of a war hawk that would get us into World War III with Russia.

Gene: 51:55

Hold on. So a Democrat was playing the anti-war card.

Ben: 52:00

Yeah. He ran, he ran ads saying Goldwater elected, and then pictures of a nuke going off

Gene: 52:08

Wow.

Ben: 52:09

and,

Gene: 52:10

ad campaign.

Ben: 52:10

oh, I it yeah, it, it, Goldwater was too honest. So the problem with Goldwater, and the reason why he didn't win is he was v he was a very convicted and he was not an establishment candidate. He was. He was Mr. Conservative, Mr. Libertarian himself. This is a man who stood up during the Republican nomination and said, I will remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And I will let me also remind you that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.

Gene: 52:46

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 52:46

Okay? This was a man who was a firebrand who he, he was the guy to go and burn the house down before anyone else, right? Had he gotten elected, C I A F B I, everyone would've been fucking gutted. And that's part of the reason why he lost.

Gene: 53:05

And he was in Arizona, right?

Ben: 53:08

Yes.

Gene: 53:09

It's amazing. They have a democratic government right now.

Ben: 53:12

So, he was Arizona, but you, you have to remember this is the sixties. So the fact that he came from an extremely small state to win the Republican nomination shows you the fire brand that he was okay. Now, he lost tragically on the national election. But just go back and read Goldwater. He is anti status to the core.

Gene: 53:40

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 53:43

My kind of guy,

Gene: 53:44

Yeah.

Ben: 53:45

anyone who hasn't watched his speech at the Republican convention, you 100% should

Gene: 53:51

Yeah. It's on YouTube.

Ben: 53:52

yeah, also watch Reagan's speech time for choosing. Yeah. Reagan? Great. Orator. Bad president.

Gene: 53:59

He was a very good order.

Ben: 54:02

Yeah, bad president.

Gene: 54:04

Yeah. I, he was not a good president, but there's many worse,

Ben: 54:09

Yeah. We're living them under one.

Gene: 54:12

we're living under one that's worse than Carter even. And that's a hard thing to pull off. So what states, let's see. Goldwater got, oh, he got Texas. He got Texas, Florida, California, north and South Dakota, or no, South Dakota, Nebraska, Illinois, and Indiana. Oh, that's in the primaries. Okay. So in the primaries. I was gonna say, how did he get California? So it, those are, that's all he got in the primaries. Jesus. That's not much. Hmm. Yeah. Interesting. I, I've not read anything of his at all, and I probably should.

Ben: 54:56

I, I would recommend conscious of a conservative. It's a, it's a primer. His speeches are fantastic. I, I believe, I, I truly believe that a big part of it was, had he not had the last name Goldwater, he would've probably been elected.

Gene: 55:11

God damn racists.

Ben: 55:12

Yeah. At the time I. Jesus Christ, we had just elected a Catholic, now we're gonna elect a Jew.

Gene: 55:18

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 55:18

just I, I I, I, I say that in a joking way, but I'm

Gene: 55:22

there's something to that. I'm a very leery of Catholic candidates. We got one right now, in fact.

Ben: 55:29

But, but what I'm see current evidence, but

Gene: 55:32

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 55:33

what I'm saying though is I, I really, truly do worry and believe that

Gene: 55:38

Oh, Romney attacked Goldwater, apparently.

Ben: 55:41

Oh, yeah. Why would Romney ever align himself with such a horrible person that, know me by my enemies, man,

Gene: 55:49

Mm-hmm

Ben: 55:50

those who stand against me say everything about me. Right?

Gene: 55:54

hmm. Interesting.

Ben: 55:56

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 55:57

And that was the 64 elections.

Ben: 55:59

Yep. And his vice presidential campaign candidate Miller was not too bad. Much of a slouch himself. Like I said, I have a campaign button from there, so if there's any doubt how big of a political geek I am. There you go.

Gene: 56:13

So I guess the, there was a TV ad where there's a girl pulling up daisies and then a,

Ben: 56:18

And then a bomb going

Gene: 56:19

goes off behind her. That's really good. That is a very good advertising, huh?

Ben: 56:27

Yeah. Polls shifted after that ad dramatically, like they were polling fairly close and then it just went. Johnson

Gene: 56:37

Hmm

Ben: 56:38

like that is arguably the most effective political ad in history.

Gene: 56:43

hmm. Interesting. Holy shit. Yeah, like all of Texas voted for Johnson. That makes sense.

Ben: 56:53

Yeah, he was from

Gene: 56:54

Local boy

Ben: 56:55

Yeah.

Gene: 56:57

Johnson

Ben: 56:58

and Lady Bird.

Gene: 57:00

I thought they named Johnson after Johnson.

Ben: 57:04

I'm sorry.

Gene: 57:05

The city of Johnson. Was that named after him?

Ben: 57:08

I don't know.

Gene: 57:10

I'm pretty sure that's how it, I don't think he was born in the city called Johnson.

Ben: 57:15

Yeah lady Bird and Johnson were terrible people and the couple of presidents Texas has produced nominally. I apologize for profusely, although I'd say that George Bush is not a Texan.

Gene: 57:28

Yeah. Yeah. You consider him a, a May night

Ben: 57:32

I consider him a maniac.

Gene: 57:35

maniac, Uhhuh. What else going on? Where I'm, I'm, I've been Past history shit. What's

Ben: 57:42

There there was a lot of Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, trumpety. Trump. Trump, Trump, Trump,

Gene: 57:47

Yeah, so he got indicted and then he went back.

Ben: 57:52

Yeah. The indictment have you read it?

Gene: 57:54

No, I have not. I don't see a point to reading it. It, it

Ben: 57:59

It's very repetitive.

Gene: 58:01

completely made up and phony and bullshit, so,

Ben: 58:04

Yeah. His entire theory is, okay, I can charge this as a felony if there's another crime committed, but the law says, I don't have to really tell you if there's another crime

Gene: 58:14

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 58:15

So we're gonna go on the theory that if Donald Trump did this and there was another crime, it's a felony, and we're gonna stack those charges up. So it equals 34. Hmm.

Gene: 58:28

I have we even seen an itemized bill from the lawyer?

Ben: 58:33

There is no itemized bill.

Gene: 58:35

then it's the, there's nothing there.

Ben: 58:37

just says legal fees,

Gene: 58:38

Legal fees is not a payoff to a hooker. That's not a payoff to a hooker. So sounds like we need to prosecute the lawyer for billing for a payoff to a hooker that he paid.

Ben: 58:51

E, even if it is, even if, let's assume the worst. And Trump said, Hey, hey, hey, hey. She's bringing up stuff that we did and I don't want her talking about it. Pay her off. I'll pay you back and we'll just add a little bit extra to your check until it's paid off legal.

Gene: 59:14

Yeah. is legal. Absolutely. There's nothing illegal about paying somebody in exchange for a nondisclosure

Ben: 59:23

agreement. Now what they're arguing is that the business records were not kept correctly, that he should have itemized that. And one of the legal theories that they're trying to say is that it was a campaign contribution.

Gene: 59:36

yeah. Wasn't it made before the.

Ben: 59:38

No, no, no, actually. So if you consider it a campaign contribution,

Gene: 59:42

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 59:43

when these payments would've happened, he would not have had E, even if Donald Trump said, okay, I will consider this a campaign contribution, I'm going to file it. He would not have had to, the filing deadline for that campaign contribution would've been after the election took place. So to say this had any sway on the election or anything else, no matter how you put it. He did something legal in saying, and here's the thing, whether they hooked up or not, I don't know, don't care. But if Stormy Daniels,

Gene: 1:00:14

up. He wouldn't have

Ben: 1:00:14

I'm not

Gene: 1:00:15

He wouldn't have paid if they didn't hook up

Ben: 1:00:17

Yeah. So here's why I think they didn't hook up. It was only$130,000.

Gene: 1:00:22

one time, they hooked up.

Ben: 1:00:24

Oh, okay.$130,000. If she had proof or evidence that they hooked up more than just whatever contrived story that she had she could have gotten a lot more out of him. So, no, I, I don't know that they hooked up. I think that there was enough around it that she could make a credible claim and sought a payday. Look at what she does for a living. I, I think that is what she did.

Gene: 1:00:49

Yeah,

Ben: 1:00:51

But regardless, I don't care if they hooked up or not. It's totally irrelevant to me.

Gene: 1:00:56

yeah. I, exactly. I don't think it matters one way or the other. In fact, if anything, it's ridiculous that women are paid this kind of money for hooking up. That's insane. But he can afford it. But in, in no version of reality, is this an illegal.

Ben: 1:01:18

Yeah, I, I don't think it is in any way, shape or form. Again, non-disclosure agreements are legal.

Gene: 1:01:24

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:01:25

they're pretty standard throughout multiple industries.

Gene: 1:01:29

Yeah, they're saying it's

Ben: 1:01:30

I've signed more than one NDA in my life.

Gene: 1:01:33

campaign expense. Right. It's sort of an unclaimed campaign expense or whatever.

Ben: 1:01:36

They're saying it's a campaign contribution

Gene: 1:01:39

Yeah. How's it a contribution,

Ben: 1:01:41

because he benefited from it. So that's like

Gene: 1:01:44

he paid for it?

Ben: 1:01:46

wait, wait, hold on, hold on. It's like saying if I buy this comb, my hair will look better. So therefore it's a campaign contribution.

Gene: 1:01:54

Or are they saying that the lawyer gave him a contribution by paying it on his behalf?

Ben: 1:01:58

Yeah, but that would only go against the

Gene: 1:02:00

Right. That wouldn't go against the campaign.

Ben: 1:02:04

Except he didn't file it correctly.

Gene: 1:02:06

but he

Ben: 1:02:06

Alvin Bragg is a dumb ass, and the, he jumped the shark. This is a jump, the shark moment.

Gene: 1:02:12

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:02:13

So he stepped out on the ledge and everyone was like, oh, there's gotta be more. There's gotta be more. And even fucking John Bolton's like, this is underwhelming.

Gene: 1:02:22

looked very disappointed. I saw Bolton's interview and he was just, the mustache was not liking this.

Ben: 1:02:27

no. Bolton was just like, oh, damnit.

Gene: 1:02:32

Yeah. There's nothing there. It's the same fucking shit as when they tried to go after him for the Russiagate stuff. There's nothing there.

Ben: 1:02:39

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:02:40

that's the thing is people ascribe all this stuff to Trump. Guy doesn't drink, doesn't smoke.

Ben: 1:02:46

Trump is one of the cleanest motherfuckers that has walked the earth. I could you put that sort of scrutiny on me and I shrivel away

Gene: 1:02:55

going down, man. Exactly.

Ben: 1:02:58

And I'm a pretty clean cut

Gene: 1:02:59

Uhhuh.

Ben: 1:03:00

but you know, I, I, I can't believe that he has been under investigation, looked at as deeply as he has, and they have found fucking

Gene: 1:03:08

They've l they've spent literally hundreds of millions of dollars of man hours investigating him. Years worth of time, probably decades worth of time of investigation, and nothing, they got nothing.

Ben: 1:03:24

It's astonishing.

Gene: 1:03:25

It's, he is, he's the cleanest politician in Washington,

Ben: 1:03:29

which makes you a question who

Gene: 1:03:31

makes you understand why they all want to get rid of him.

Ben: 1:03:34

or who controls him

Gene: 1:03:35

Yeah.

Ben: 1:03:36

anyway the point is I think Alvin Bragg jumped the shark. And I think what we're going to see from here on out is when this ultimately fails, because I think it will fail. I, I don't e everyone's like, oh if Trump goes to trial, he's gonna be convicted because New York and everything else, I, I don't see a way this goes to trial. It, I,

Gene: 1:03:57

I better hope not cuz they will convict him

Ben: 1:04:00

okay. And it will be overturned on appeal.

Gene: 1:04:03

at the singular matter. They're just gonna say, yep. Convicted pre, we can't have him be as president.

Ben: 1:04:08

There's nothing in the constitution that would prevent that, so good luck. In fact, I think if they were to

Gene: 1:04:15

I'll tell you what'll happen.

Ben: 1:04:15

they do the trial right, when they're saying, and it's in during 2024 and this joke happens, Donald Trump will be elected president in a landslide.

Gene: 1:04:27

I, I think it'd be hilarious if that happened. I don't know if it would. Here's one thing they could definitely do, is they could just not have him be on the New York ballot because he's a convicted

Ben: 1:04:36

He's not gonna win New York anyway. Whoop. He fucking do.

Gene: 1:04:40

Eh, eh

Ben: 1:04:41

Anyway, I, I, and I don't know, man. I, I see

Gene: 1:04:46

See, this is all that drama shit that I was talking about as to why Trump shouldn't be running.

Ben: 1:04:51

but he is and he's gonna win.

Gene: 1:04:54

He win nomination, but he'll lose election.

Ben: 1:04:57

No. Okay. Zhan no. He, he will win.

Gene: 1:05:01

You call him,

Ben: 1:05:02

Biden. Everyone is a, the, let's go Brandon Chance are drowning out everything else in this world. Gene, the average

Gene: 1:05:13

you're paying for a steak dinner when he loses.

Ben: 1:05:15

All right. If, if, if Biden is reelected, I will take you to the Republic Steakhouse here in College Station. My treat,

Gene: 1:05:24

I don't think Biden's running, dude. I think they're gonna run somebody else.

Ben: 1:05:27

he's already filed.

Gene: 1:05:29

I know he's filed, but I don't think that he'll be the nominee from the Democrats.

Ben: 1:05:33

Who do you think

Gene: 1:05:33

It's too damn risky for him. It's gotta be somebody younger. I don't think there's a good name out yet. They don't have a good name out yet. Newsom's gonna be one of the guys. I think

Ben: 1:05:43

He will get

Gene: 1:05:44

as well. Yeah, I think they realize that, but they don't wanna run.

Ben: 1:05:49

o c

Gene: 1:05:51

AOC might actually do well against Trump.

Ben: 1:05:53

I, dude, I would love to see those debates. It would be hilarious. It would be

Gene: 1:05:59

be Trump repeating the same sentence 18 times and a o c crying. That would be the debate.

Ben: 1:06:07

I can see, just see the grabber by the pussy jokes.

Gene: 1:06:10

Oh my God. Yeah. You should probably say that too, is that this guy admitted to grabbing women by the pussy. He's a rapist.

Ben: 1:06:19

No, no, no, no. So what he said was, you're rich, they let you do anything. You can literally walk up and grab

Gene: 1:06:25

I know what he said. I'm just saying this is what she would say. Remember this is the woman that was terrified for her life when somebody was breaking her door

Ben: 1:06:33

Where is she?

Gene: 1:06:35

Yeah, exactly.

Ben: 1:06:37

Even though she's in another building. And this

Gene: 1:06:39

Different building. And there was a cop

Ben: 1:06:41

Oh

Gene: 1:06:42

because she's afraid of cops cuz she's colored.

Ben: 1:06:45

Yeah. She is our favorite big booty Latina, though.

Gene: 1:06:48

Yeah. Although, not anymore because I've definitely switched my allegiances from a o c in the Latina category to Representative Luna. She is,

Ben: 1:06:59

who is this now?

Gene: 1:07:00

Oh, I've sent you pictures, dude. I've posted

Ben: 1:07:02

No you did not.

Gene: 1:07:04

Luna from Florida. Oh man, I love that check.

Ben: 1:07:06

Semi league,

Gene: 1:07:08

I will send you, I'll do better than that. I'll send you a picture. She is so fucking hot.

Ben: 1:07:12

Jean at sir jeanne speaks com.

Gene: 1:07:14

I, what's wrong with having a fetish for hot politic?

Ben: 1:07:17

It's just a little weird.

Gene: 1:07:18

at all, man. Not at all.

Ben: 1:07:20

I don't know, seeing some of the swimsuit photos, but Nancy Pelosi were very uncomfortable for me.

Gene: 1:07:25

Have you seen Nancy when she was 18?

Ben: 1:07:27

I've seen the JFK

Gene: 1:07:28

18. Yeah. She's fucking hot

Ben: 1:07:30

I, I don't know if I'd go that far, but Okay.

Gene: 1:07:32

for Yeah. At that age she was

Ben: 1:07:35

Yeah, I, I would bet money the Kennedy,

Gene: 1:07:38

fucked her totally. 100%. No two ways about it. Guaranteed. Okay. How do I give you this photo?

Ben: 1:07:45

Signal.

Gene: 1:07:45

can I paste? Oh, here you go. I just put it into our zoom meeting.

Ben: 1:07:50

Mm. Okay.

Gene: 1:07:52

Ah-huh.

Ben: 1:07:52

have to download and save a file.

Gene: 1:07:54

No, you can click on it. Can't you just click on it?

Ben: 1:07:57

Nope.

Gene: 1:07:57

Oh, I can put it into signal. I guess that that is fine. But yeah, if you guys haven't seen Anna Paulina Luna, check her out. She's my new fair Latina politician.

Ben: 1:08:10

she ah, okay.

Gene: 1:08:13

Ah-huh. She's a hottie.

Ben: 1:08:16

Eh,

Gene: 1:08:17

Whatever

Ben: 1:08:20

she's in the picture. Jean sent me, she's holding two ar fifteens and then a tight tank top, so I can totally see why he's drooling. But,

Gene: 1:08:28

Extra hot man. Extra fucking hot. No, she's

Ben: 1:08:31

and guns thing has never done anything for me.

Gene: 1:08:34

Oh, I, I like girls and guns. What's you like dogs and stuff too, right? There you go.

Ben: 1:08:40

Scroll, I'm sorry.

Gene: 1:08:44

I don't mean, I don't mean

Ben: 1:08:45

yeah, yeah, yeah. Just the one just in the conversation that was just like, oh, Jesus

Gene: 1:08:51

Her Instagram's awesome, dude.

Ben: 1:08:53

Okay.

Gene: 1:08:54

Do you not peruse your favorite politicians? Instagram's all the time.

Ben: 1:08:58

I am, I, I have never once been on Instagram.

Gene: 1:09:03

Uhhuh,

Ben: 1:09:05

It's not a thing,

Gene: 1:09:06

not a thing.

Ben: 1:09:07

not a thing.

Gene: 1:09:08

All right. Fair enough. But if they did a, if they did a, if they did a girls of Politics, she would definitely be on there in the on the cover.

Ben: 1:09:18

I think this all started with Sarah Palin.

Gene: 1:09:20

Pamela was kind of hot back in the day.

Ben: 1:09:22

There was,

Gene: 1:09:23

Cel Alaska.

Ben: 1:09:24

yeah.

Gene: 1:09:26

It's pretty hot.

Ben: 1:09:27

Which everyone ascribes. I can see Reha from my house. That was Tina free.

Gene: 1:09:33

Tina Faye did say that. Yeah, that's true.

Ben: 1:09:35

But you know her, her Palin, as much as I'm not a Palin fan,

Gene: 1:09:40

Mm.

Ben: 1:09:43

shouldn't have been the vice presidential nominee to McCain. She should have been the nominee.

Gene: 1:09:50

Yeah, she should have been totally agreed. Yep. We should have

Ben: 1:09:52

Had she been the nominee, they would've had a better chance of winning. Mc

Gene: 1:09:56

lutely.

Ben: 1:09:57

as much as I hated Obama,

Gene: 1:10:00

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:10:01

no way in fuck I was gonna vote. McCain,

Gene: 1:10:04

No, no, no. That that guy is a weasel.

Ben: 1:10:07

he's a warmonger.

Gene: 1:10:09

Yeah. But also weasel.

Ben: 1:10:12

Hmm. There, there were a couple politicians when they died. I was, I won't say happy because I'm not gonna be. I'm, I'm not gonna be happy in anyone's death. I, I'm not going

Gene: 1:10:24

I was happy when he died. I don't have to

Ben: 1:10:25

on someone's grave, but I was relieved when McCain and Bush Sr. Were no longer on the

Gene: 1:10:33

Mm-hmm. Bush, Bush Senior at least was out of politics. A damn long time ever since he was president, but but McCain kept fucking things up for everybody.

Ben: 1:10:45

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:10:46

Now. He was, I always just referred to him as the Urian candidate.

Ben: 1:10:50

Absolutely. Because he was, tortured. Did I ever tell you

Gene: 1:10:52

he was never tortured. That's my point, is he did a deal. He was never tortured

Ben: 1:10:57

How did his bag get fucked up?

Gene: 1:10:58

During the crash when he rammed his airplane into a US war.

Ben: 1:11:05

I don't think he rammed it into a US war

Gene: 1:11:07

look it up. Look it up. He's the only guy that's actually killed Americans during Vietnam.

Ben: 1:11:13

Anyway, he's the only guy. I think the Vietnamese killed a few.

Gene: 1:11:17

No, I, you know what I mean? Like an American that killed Americans.

Ben: 1:11:20

All right. Let, let me just say, did I ever tell you about the Halloween costumes that me and my friends did during the 2008 campaign?

Gene: 1:11:29

Don't recall. You may

Ben: 1:11:30

Okay, so I'm totally gonna out myself on this one, and it's gonna be hilarious. So I dressed up, huh?

Gene: 1:11:37

You wore a skirt, didn't you?

Ben: 1:11:39

No, no, no. I dressed up as a, I got an Obama mask. I put it on and I tattered some clothes up to make me look homeless, and I wrote some signs and I went as a homeless Obama begging for change.

Gene: 1:11:53

To beg for hope too, or just

Ben: 1:11:55

yeah. Oh yeah. One of my signs was hoping, hope, hope, changing Change. Change.

Gene: 1:11:59

Jesus Christ.

Ben: 1:12:00

I still have these by the way. And one of my buddies went as a McCain, p o w, and he was dating this Vietnamese girl at the time. So she went as a Viet Cong and just walked around with a cane beating.

Gene: 1:12:12

McCain. McCain,

Ben: 1:12:14

Exactly. Anyway, back when you could be offensive in college still, this was my college

Gene: 1:12:19

you gonna be

Ben: 1:12:19

days. It was funny,

Gene: 1:12:21

out of

Ben: 1:12:22

but now I'd be accused of being in blackface and Oh, what a horrible person I was. I was making

Gene: 1:12:27

like, if you're doing Obama.

Ben: 1:12:29

to do with the man's race.

Gene: 1:12:30

Yeah, that's true.

Ben: 1:12:31

He hope and change. And hope and change. And by the way, the, the party we went to that night literally had an Obama sign in the yard.

Gene: 1:12:39

Where should do,

Ben: 1:12:41

So I was a very popular person at

Gene: 1:12:43

what, so what college should you go to?

Ben: 1:12:44

Texas. A

Gene: 1:12:46

Yeah, so I've got a, a friend's kid that, that's gonna go there.

Ben: 1:12:50

mm,

Gene: 1:12:50

What?

Ben: 1:12:51

don't,

Gene: 1:12:52

Don't go.

Ben: 1:12:52

It, it has changed substantially since I was there. The school has become much more liberal in many, many ways. I'm quite frankly the two schools that I may be willing to send my kids to are really the one school is Hillsdale and maybe, maybe Liberty. But you know, the liberty, there's some issues there. So, but definitely Hillsdale. Other than that, I don't know that my kids are growing to college.

Gene: 1:13:21

Yeah. That's probably the better plan is to not have him go to college.

Ben: 1:13:26

So if, if they're coming here and they need someone to look out after'em, I'm, here they're a and m's. A good school in lots of ways from an academic standpoint, there's definitely some

Gene: 1:13:36

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:13:37

meat on the bone there. But ever since, bonfire fell in 99, the, and Gates got in and Vision 2020 it, the school has changed dramatically and has been pushed in ways that I would've never thought it would've been pushed before. A and m never had a fraternal system, right? There wasn't frats and sororities really until after 99. And the reason why is because your dorm was your fraternity. Because we were all involved in Bonfire, and I've got my bonfire pot actually behind me and as well as one of my best friends who's now

Gene: 1:14:12

I have no idea what you're talking.

Ben: 1:14:14

Okay, so Aggie Bonfire. Aggie Bonfire pre 1999 was one of the biggest traditions in all of college football. Literally a and m students would go find some land that someone wanted cleared. We would chop down the trees by hand, no chainsaws, load the trees by hand onto trucks, haul them to campus and stack them up into a multi-story bonfire before the UT Austin

Gene: 1:14:43

pretty pagan to me.

Ben: 1:14:45

oh dude, you, you have no idea. We have Groals. We have lots of things. So I was in Aston which Aston Hall was the first non-core dorm to participate in Bonfire. So our road Yale was C1 nrp civilian, one non Reg Bonfire, and some of the Gro Yales were. Pretty, pretty gruff especially for some of the female dorms. But anyway, different dorms had different portions of the either cutting down loading or construction of bonfire. And then we'd put a outhouse on the top of bonfire painted burn orange and call it a ut frat house in very much opposition to the culture of the University of Texas, which definitely had a fraternal system.

Gene: 1:15:37

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:15:37

in 1999, bonfire, collapsed and killed 12 aggs. And,

Gene: 1:15:42

What are they doing underneath it?

Ben: 1:15:45

They were on it working to build it,

Gene: 1:15:48

Oh, it wasn't lit. I thought you meant it was lit.

Ben: 1:15:51

No, no, no, no. They were building it. And I I, I remember watching the news when bonfire collapsed. And you have to understand, my dad went to a and m. My grandfather went to a and m. And the first time I ever saw my dad cry was watching the news coverages, bonfire collapsed. And I was actually in student government when Rick Perry had talked about bringing bonfire back to to campus because it's been going on, but it's off campus now. And I was on student government listening to some of the testimony and going through giving student to government's opinion on it. And to this day, I still have an ax handle that. An ax handles are a very powerful symbol in bonfire culture at a and m because ax handles were used anyway, lots of things. So a bonfire pot is your. Helmet, your hard hat that you wore during construction and so on, and it's painted with your dorm and the, your name and lots of things. And then the design of the helmet says if you're a crew chief or not, and so on, which I was

Gene: 1:16:59

You would love being a young pioneer.

Ben: 1:17:02

okay in, in anyway. Same sorts of stuff. It's just a big cultural thing for anyone who went to a and m anyway, the, I have the crew chief from Appell Halls, acts handle that was there during the 99 collapse. And he gave it to me as a a memento and something to carry on, and it's one of my most prized possessions to

Gene: 1:17:22

What year were you there?

Ben: 1:17:25

I was at a and m from 2004 to 2007 ish 2008.

Gene: 1:17:30

That's right. I forget how young you are sometimes. Yeah.

Ben: 1:17:34

Yep. I, I was there when Gates was president,

Gene: 1:17:38

Mm-hmm. Bill Gates

Ben: 1:17:40

Robert Gates and Yeah, I told you about going as his illegitimate

Gene: 1:17:44

did? Yes. Yes, yes, yes. He thought he thought he was hilarious. Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:17:51

yeah. Anyway, Bob Gates, man, he's an interesting character. Yeah. In my time at a and m I had a, a lot of opportunities. So I, I met I met Carter and I met Papa and Baby Bush and Clinton all during that time period.

Gene: 1:18:09

That's pretty good.

Ben: 1:18:10

Got to meet Stephen Hawking. I was a physics major, so Stephen Hawking came in and the, the physics students were allowed to come in and have a kind of a private audience thing. Yeah. At this point in time in his life, there was no real conversating with hawking, unfortunately. Yeah. But between steering government and just other things, I, I, I had a lot of really good opportunities. I am, and a, a and m is a fantastic school in lots of ways,

Gene: 1:18:39

So that's why you're saying don't go there. Okay.

Ben: 1:18:42

but it has been so captured by, it's just a move, dude. Almost all colleges with very few principled exceptions have gone way too woke in, and it's not even necessarily the faculty, it is the student body. You cannot go to a major university and it not be woke.

Gene: 1:19:02

Yep. No, I get it. It's things are a change in, and that was one of the topics of discussion yesterday on Tim Cast is What is ultimately responsible for this gagosian's take is its education and Tim's take is that it's the algorithm

Ben: 1:19:22

I think that it's both.

Gene: 1:19:24

I do as well. Yeah, totally agree on that.

Ben: 1:19:26

I, I think those are in a feedback loop.

Gene: 1:19:30

Yeah, I the, the algorithm is greatly enhancing the, the power of the poor education there.

Ben: 1:19:39

Yep.

Gene: 1:19:39

It's making, and I think more difficult for anybody to Push back.

Ben: 1:19:44

Hmm. All right, man. So what other topics do we need to cover? It's been a long week. We've gotta have

Gene: 1:19:50

It has been a long week. That's true. I'm trying to think what else is going on. I will say I do like that outfit that rep Luno was wearing in that last photo too.

Ben: 1:19:59

Oh God. Now I've gotta go back to my phone and look

Gene: 1:20:02

Ah, Jesus Christ.

Ben: 1:20:04

Jean sending me his her Instagram pictures trying to, trying to lure me into the dark side

Gene: 1:20:10

man. No, I look, if, if you got somebody that is on the right side politically and looks hot doing it, why would you not celebrate that?

Ben: 1:20:21

because what the earth looks out to do with anything.

Gene: 1:20:24

Hmm.

Ben: 1:20:25

You know what? Here's the thing. Oh, what's her name? Jesus rep from Houston.

Gene: 1:20:32

Rep from Houston. Which one? What's her? I.

Ben: 1:20:37

Hold on. Come on Google. Damn, you bing. Sheila Jackson, lady.

Gene: 1:20:45

Lee? Yes. Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:20:46

so Sheila Jackson Lee.

Gene: 1:20:48

It's not at not attractive.

Ben: 1:20:50

I would vote for her in a heartbeat

Gene: 1:20:52

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:20:53

if she had good ideas. I don't care what someone looks like, I just care about the content of their character.

Gene: 1:21:00

yes. You can keep pretending that I'm more honest out of the two of us, and I will say that hot chicks definitely are gonna get more of my votes.

Ben: 1:21:09

Yeah. Okay. So, Brazil and China reached an agreement nominally to trade in each other's currencies. Interesting point on this. And a lot of people have pointed this out that generally it's the companies that decide what currency is used for a transaction, not the country. And, the state isn't the primary mover of goods,

Gene: 1:21:40

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:21:42

and the agreement is written in such a way that it is again, they agree to trade in each other's currencies. Okay, so when do they use one? When do they use pesos? That is not determined by this agreement,

Gene: 1:21:59

Yep.

Ben: 1:22:00

and it does not exclude them using any other currency.

Gene: 1:22:04

Right.

Ben: 1:22:05

So a lot I think, is being made out of what I think is essentially I don't think currencies are

Gene: 1:22:11

A nothing burger.

Ben: 1:22:12

contracts. Yeah.

Gene: 1:22:15

Yeah, I don't disagree with that. I, I think that it, like a lot of political things, this is more to do with posturing than it is with reality.

Ben: 1:22:25

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:22:26

But it's definitely one of many postures being taken by countries around the world right now to effectively distance themselves from the US dollar.

Ben: 1:22:36

Yeah. I think it remains to be seen if they actually do, though that's, that's I guess what I'm getting at.

Gene: 1:22:42

Yeah. Yeah. And then you what, probably two weeks ago we had Saudi Arabia with their announcement.

Ben: 1:22:50

Yes, they announced they, so Saudi Arabia, and we alluded to this earlier, announced that they had reached an agreement with China to trade for some of their oil exchanges in one.

Gene: 1:23:03

Mm.

Ben: 1:23:04

I don't think that will be long-lived because of the reasons I listed earlier. I, I think that the China, unless China changes its monetary policy dramatically, which by the way would destroy the country's economy, there's no way that or the, the, that or the Chinese are gonna have to pay a premium to trade in one.

Gene: 1:23:27

Yeah.

Ben: 1:23:28

Saudi Arabia is gonna say by the time it's delivered and we get this payment remitted to us, it's gonna be only worth, 90% of the contract value. So you're going to pay 115% of what you would in dollars.

Gene: 1:23:41

I looked at a bunch of different currencies and the the Swiss Frank seems to be one of the most stable ones out there.

Ben: 1:23:50

Yes. But not used on the world stage.

Gene: 1:23:52

Yeah.

Ben: 1:23:53

So it, it, the currencies that I would look at are the major countries. So the Euro, the one the Rubal, the Australian Canadian dollars the various pesos, and that's

Gene: 1:24:07

they're all very unstable.

Ben: 1:24:09

extremely. But compare compared to the us.

Gene: 1:24:13

Yeah. But it's, or you could, I, I guess if you were to make the argument say that the US dollar is unstable compared to some of these other currencies, you could say that, but I don't know. I was just scrolling here while we were talking, looking at the, the last decade worth of inflation in all these different currencies and I, I kinda leaned towards the Swiss Frank, myself.

Ben: 1:24:36

The, the Swiss are, the Swiss are unique in many ways. Also, a country that didn't lock down. I, I, I think the Swiss are very much standing. All right. of a conspiracy theory, you believe in. If you look at it, the Swiss seem to be standing outside of it all. They really do seem to

Gene: 1:24:57

way the New World Orderers run from.

Ben: 1:24:59

in a way that no other country is or has.

Gene: 1:25:02

Up until recently, up until they decided to go all in on nato.

Ben: 1:25:08

Okay. I, I don't know that they're all in, but you know, they have been extremely neutral and I think their currency depicts that as well.

Gene: 1:25:17

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:25:17

That's all I'm saying.

Gene: 1:25:19

Yeah. And they're fairly generous in a lot of the YouTubers.

Ben: 1:25:23

They're very socialist. Yes.

Gene: 1:25:24

The the people making the biggest financial donations are typically either British American, or Swiss.

Ben: 1:25:34

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:25:35

There's really nobody else making multi hundred dollars donations to YouTubers.

Ben: 1:25:39

No one else has the money

Gene: 1:25:41

Yeah. That could be. The Swiss definitely have the money. They, they hold onto it for

Ben: 1:25:45

I, I guess you could say that the Arab countries have the money, but you know, they don't have the culture.

Gene: 1:25:49

I don't know if the Arab countries watch YouTube.

Ben: 1:25:53

Oh God, yes they

Gene: 1:25:55

Do they, do they watch different YouTube? Because I don't see a whole lot of Arab names popping up anywhere

Ben: 1:26:00

So it, it depends on where you're at and what you're talking about. And it depends on the class. So

Gene: 1:26:05

like Tim Cast.

Ben: 1:26:07

yeah, if you're talking about the upper echelon of the Emirati, for example. Yeah, no, not on

Gene: 1:26:12

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:26:13

If you're talking about lower functionaries and so on that are more westernized, the ones that are making a few hundred grand a year versus

Gene: 1:26:22

Mm-hmm.

Ben: 1:26:22

Probably and same thing in guitar would be my guess, just based

Gene: 1:26:27

You should have met up with the the, what was the, the Grand Duke of Lower Slob. Ovia.

Ben: 1:26:32

Next trip.

Gene: 1:26:33

Next trip. There you

Ben: 1:26:34

Next trip. I'll try. I tried to meet up with csb, but you know, he was not seeing anyone until June.

Gene: 1:26:41

What Till June? What's in June?

Ben: 1:26:43

Yeah. Something like that. Yeah.

Gene: 1:26:45

That's too funny. Yeah. I will say that,

Ben: 1:26:48

I was like, Hey dude, I'm gonna be in your neck of the woods ish. Wanna meet up?

Gene: 1:26:52

Yeah. It's like Europe's close enough, right?

Ben: 1:26:55

I, I was actually in, the UK as well, so

Gene: 1:26:58

right. Yeah. No,

Ben: 1:27:00

depending on where you think he is, if he's in Poland or

Gene: 1:27:03

No, he's been in Ireland

Ben: 1:27:05

I, I was in the general neighborhood for a couple weeks, so,

Gene: 1:27:08

He also, al Al also hates when I mentioned that he's in Ireland for some reason.

Ben: 1:27:12

You Russian bastard.

Gene: 1:27:13

satellites. Dude.

Ben: 1:27:14

Anyway, Hey, AI doc cooking.

Gene: 1:27:17

Have you listened to that?

Ben: 1:27:19

I have not.

Gene: 1:27:19

So I was listening to an episode last week. I, I

Ben: 1:27:22

So you hate listening too. Got

Gene: 1:27:24

No, I'm not hate listening. No, I was curious. No, we, we buried the beef Dude, it's all good. I'm, I'm send, I'm putting up tweets and putting him into the tweets and stuff or not, not, actually tweets too, cuz he's on Twitter. But mostly on no general social. If it's an AI related thing, I always tag him.

Ben: 1:27:40

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:27:41

But so I listen to that show and I was a little.

Ben: 1:27:45

Griff,

Gene: 1:27:46

Yeah, with Griff, who I've interviewed on Seine Speaks incidentally.

Ben: 1:27:50

don't know how he didn't get fired after that.

Gene: 1:27:52

Right, exactly. But and Griff is a kind of a child actor turned bartender or bar owner, I guess. He's got a couple of little bars. And by little I mean like, we don't have bars that small in this country. They only have'em in Europe that's size something with a couple of tables kinda size.

Ben: 1:28:09

Huh?

Gene: 1:28:10

And not, not to make fun of'em, just saying that like, when, when I say he

Ben: 1:28:14

pay the

Gene: 1:28:14

of, when I say he owns a couple of bars, don't imagine places with room for a hundred people.

Ben: 1:28:20

Okay. Yeah, but does it pay the bills? It can still be profitable.

Gene: 1:28:25

it seems to be paying the bills enough for him to not have to do other stuff, which is good.

Ben: 1:28:30

Ah, there you go.

Gene: 1:28:31

So,

Ben: 1:28:32

Oh my God. Someone on social media is saying, talking about tummy Tuesday, please, please cut. Scott. Do not make this a thing.

Gene: 1:28:40

So in that show, what I was surprised by is, I,

Ben: 1:28:45

from you there, G.

Gene: 1:28:46

I don't know what that is, so no reaction.

Ben: 1:28:49

Fat girl. Strong. Your tummy.

Gene: 1:28:51

I don't know what those are. I don't have a concept of that, not something. Have you seen my, my favorite member of Congress? No, no tummy there.

Ben: 1:29:03

I'm going

Gene: 1:29:03

anyway, the, the, I assumed it was gonna be something that was written word for word by C s B and then read by his

Ben: 1:29:15

I

Gene: 1:29:15

human AI voice, Griff. No, that's totally not what it is.

Ben: 1:29:21

Okay. What

Gene: 1:29:22

It's, it's basically Griff talking about himself. With a li with an occasional bit of story thrown in by csb, which I was quite surprised by it cuz it seemed like there was more ad lib content than there was actual reading.

Ben: 1:29:40

Now you realize you may be throwing Griff under the bus

Gene: 1:29:42

Oh, not at all. I told csb, I'm like, dude, how have you not fired this guy? He's totally not reading what you're writing. No. CSB seems to be happy with it. He, he's totally like, thinks this is what he wants, which is good cuz he is getting what he wants. It's just totally not what I expected. Given the description, because if you recall this was like, I remember when CSB was first planning this show, cuz we were talking about it on, on unrelenting that he, he was supposed to be a guest on unrelenting and then he decided he's gonna use a computer voice. And this was like a year ago back when they sucked. Darren and I are both like, ah, fuck no, no, you're not gonna be, we're not gonna sit there say something and then wait for you to type shit in and then have a crappy sounding voice read it. That ain't gonna work. And so when he decided to do his own show he was going to use, and in fact I think he did for the first one or two episodes, use a computer voice and then he ended up using Griff after that. But I assumed it would just be somebody reading what he wrote. And in fact, one of those early, early episodes when Griff first started doing it, I thought was exactly that.

Ben: 1:30:54

Mm-hmm.

Gene: 1:30:54

And then a year goes by and and it's totally different. And again, like if they're both happy with what they're doing, that's great. It's just not what I was expecting given the description. And it had quite a bit less AI conversation than I was expecting as well. So, and Griff is not a techie. He's not like, he's not, he's just kind of making fun of stuff. He's the everyman opinion

Ben: 1:31:22

Okay, so I've gotta listen to aia.cooking.

Gene: 1:31:26

I, yeah, yeah, I would check it out. Give CSB one more sub and then

Ben: 1:31:30

Absolutely. Him some Sato.

Gene: 1:31:32

see what you think. I can't figure out how to work that, but Yeah.

Ben: 1:31:35

How can you not figure out how to dude fountain? Easy, easy.

Gene: 1:31:41

Does our show have Satoshis? No, because it's complicated.

Ben: 1:31:45

No, because the reason why our, our show does not have Satoshi's and down the value for value train of podcasting 2.0 is a our hosting company, and then that you wanted to use, and b, I'm too lazy and busy to go through and set it up.

Gene: 1:32:01

Exactly, exactly. Just what I said. So you're complicated.

Ben: 1:32:08

You're the one who doesn't have a job. You could spend a little bit of time on this.

Gene: 1:32:12

I'm working on it. I'm trying to have a job. I'm trying to get some stuff moving. I got some, some meetings I've been to, to

Ben: 1:32:21

I, I will say it's damn impressive to, for you to be able to maintain your lifestyle without having to have worked for what, a year

Gene: 1:32:30

That's about a year. Yeah, and I I didn't

Ben: 1:32:34

I, I,

Gene: 1:32:35

years during Covid. That really sucked.

Ben: 1:32:37

I'm sorry,

Gene: 1:32:38

I didn't work for three years during Covid.

Ben: 1:32:40

Jesus.

Gene: 1:32:41

I know it sucked, I'm, I'm very cheap. I'm a, I'm a, like a

Ben: 1:32:45

You are not cheap.

Gene: 1:32:46

cheap date. I, I will only order one entree at Rus Chris

Ben: 1:32:51

Uhhuh,

Gene: 1:32:52

and super cheap.

Ben: 1:32:53

I've seen I've seen what you spend on, guns. Dude, you're not cheap. I'm cheap.

Gene: 1:33:00

I, I don't know about that. You're, you're spending money as well on things.

Ben: 1:33:05

Mm. Such as,

Gene: 1:33:08

I don't know. You just bought a car for your kid.

Ben: 1:33:11

yeah. After the, the previous one was totaled by a drunk driver.

Gene: 1:33:15

enough. Fair

Ben: 1:33:16

This was not, this was not a, oh, let's go get a car. No, no,

Gene: 1:33:21

no, you are driving an old car still low.

Ben: 1:33:23

yeah. My dude, my truck is, my, my truck for those who listen is a paid off 2013 F-150 with around 200,000 miles on it. And yes, I could go buy a new

Gene: 1:33:36

you're definitely due, you're, you're due for an upgrade.

Ben: 1:33:40

Yeah. I, I, I'm debating on when to sell my truck and get something else,

Gene: 1:33:45

Have you thought about getting one of those fun vehicles instead,

Ben: 1:33:49

what do you mean?

Gene: 1:33:50

Like a. Raptor or TX or something.

Ben: 1:33:56

No,

Gene: 1:33:57

No, I think that'd be fun.

Ben: 1:33:59

I will get a cheap used truck.

Gene: 1:34:04

Right? Or you could get like one of the 700 horsepower trucks.

Ben: 1:34:10

I, I don't want to spend quite frankly, my, what I even given everything my bud, my budget for a new truck would be 30 to 40 grand.

Gene: 1:34:20

Mm-hmm. Yeah. So like a, basically a 2014.

Ben: 1:34:25

New.

Gene: 1:34:25

I just had to, I, I had to go there.

Ben: 1:34:28

Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, I, I just, I'm, I'm just simple man. I, I don't, I don't need, I, I don't need to have I don't, I don't need to make up for things, Jean.

Gene: 1:34:38

I see, I see. Yes, that's true. No, you, you've got you got plenty of other expenses. You got kids growing that need to go to college,

Ben: 1:34:47

Yeah. I pay, I pay for diapers in college at the same time. It's a lot of fun.

Gene: 1:34:50

That's what you get for having kids that are smart enough to be in college when they're neighbors.

Ben: 1:34:54

Not how that works, but, okay.

Gene: 1:34:57

Uhhuh,

Ben: 1:34:58

All right, man. I'm coming up on a hard out, so we've got about 30 more minutes if you wanna talk about anything else.

Gene: 1:35:03

I don't know if I got 30 minutes worth of stuff to talk about.

Ben: 1:35:06

We got a Easter update in,

Gene: 1:35:09

we did.

Ben: 1:35:09

lot of people took a week off. Ours may be a little late, but we got it in and we can talk next Sunday.

Gene: 1:35:17

Yeah, that sounds good. Oh, one thing I was gonna say is at some point before too long, maybe in the next two months, I'm gonna need to make a, a runout to get some rabbits.

Ben: 1:35:29

Hmm. Okay.

Gene: 1:35:30

So if we wanna organize any kind of a meetup thingy.

Ben: 1:35:34

Yeah. Let me know when we've got the Houston meet up coming up.

Gene: 1:35:37

Oh yeah. When is that?

Ben: 1:35:39

if we're gonna go to or not.

Gene: 1:35:40

I wouldn't mind going, when, when is it? I can't remember.

Ben: 1:35:43

You, you're gonna

Gene: 1:35:44

I don't know. I can't recall

Ben: 1:35:46

anyway, whenever the Houston meetup is. We'll look it up

Gene: 1:35:48

Try and make that

Ben: 1:35:49

decide by next show.

Gene: 1:35:50

All. So, yeah. We'll, we'll we'll let people know beforehand and then I'll put all the photos of rep Luna into the podcast so y'all can see them. If you have a podcasting 2.0 compatible podcast app, you'll be able to see all the photos.

Ben: 1:36:07

In, for those who are offended, Jean

Gene: 1:36:10

How are you offended by looking at photos of a politician? I'm sorry. How does that work?

Ben: 1:36:15

I don't know. Misogyny. I don't

Gene: 1:36:17

Especially a hot politician.

Ben: 1:36:19

Jesus Christ. All right, gene. Talk to you later.

Gene: 1:36:23

we'll talk to you next week.