Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 10/6/26: Sam Altman Says Bad Things Coming From AI, Wemby Blasts Sports Gambling Partnership

Episode Date: October 6, 2026

Emily and Saagar discuss Sam Altman says public should accept bad things from AI, Wemby calls out players with sports gambling partnerships.   Logan Phillips: https://www.racetothewh.com/   To become a Breaking Points Premium Member and watch/listen to the show AD FREE, uncut and 1 hour early visit: www.breakingpoints.com    Merch Store: https://shop.breakingpoints.com/   See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Lisa, tell them about our new show. We have a new podcast. It's called Don't Lie to Me. I'm Lexi Youanu. We're two best friends, 22 years apart, but so close at heart.

And I'm Lisa Di Giulio, the old one, which means we have wildly different references, occasionally different opinions, and at this point in my 50s, I've lived it all. Now in my 30s, being the founder of new shoes, good taste is my business. Listen on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, this is Kylie Breakman.

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We rely on our premium subs to expand coverage, upgrade the studio, ad staff, give you guys the best independent coverage that is possible. If you like what we're all about, it just means the absolute world to have your support. But enough with that, let's get to the show. Well, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman sat for an interview with Politico yesterday, and you have to listen to what he said about how he sees the way our government, our society should accept everything coming out of his private company and industry, D1. We have always been a big believer that this technology has to be democratized and put in people's I think one of the biggest differences between us and some of the stricter, let's say, AI safety people, is we believe that the world should accept some bad things happening for the benefits of this technology and people having the agency.

So, like, you know, I disagree, but I understand the perspective of people who are like this technology is going to get so powerful and it's so dangerous that a single lab in San Francisco should have it and make sure nothing bad happens and kind of figure out how to do out the benefits. I think that is a completely unacceptable tradeoff from a perspective of liberty and human agency and people self-determining the future. But I understand where it comes from. And I do think the lighter touch regulatory stance that we advocate for comes with an accepting of the fact that some bad things are going to happen as society figures out the resilience. So I wouldn't take a trade of saying, like, we'll make sure there's no major hacks. There's no kind of misuse of this technology. There's zero scams. There's zero, all the other bad things that will happen.

Because I think people will do tremendously orders amounting through more good stuff than bad stuff. But when it comes to the potential of like a serious loss of control to AI, and this is not a today worry, but it may not be in the distant future. This is where I would say to the accelerationists, like, let's be a little thoughtful about lurching into this future. So I would say, accept bounded risks, accept risks that we understand in exchange for the benefits and Liberty agents, all those things I was just talking about, but don't accept, like, the really catastrophic risk. So, Sagar, what Sam Alman's saying there is absolutely defensible in theory, right? We would say this about cars. Yes.

Right? We would accept a tradeoff. You and I think it's about guns, right? Yeah, exactly. But his cold insistence on being the man to make this cost-benefit analysis for all of society as this like utilitarian trade-off. Well, he's also speaking in the same breath about democratizing the technology, I think is what sets people off because it is not democratic when you have CEOs of massively powerful companies being the ones to outline the contours of what that cost-benefit analysis looks like, right? capturing the government, putting so much money, they're putting money into the elections now. They've done it before. But that's not, there's nothing democratized about the technology when the

technology is being driven top down by CEOs like Sam Altman, who are determining what the cost benefit analysis is going to look like, what the costs should be and what the benefits they think will be. Yeah, no standards, no regulation, no proven benefit. Like, and that's why I've been having this huge tussle online, Taylor Laurent, who, by the way, I haven't said her name, I think, in four years here on the show. I don't think about her basically at all. But she got very upset yesterday because I put out this take. We can talk about it now because I think this gets to this question. I said, nobody actually needs a personal AI assistant. The average screen time in the U.S. is seven hours a day. People have plenty of free time. There is no evidence that freeing up more will lead to

anything but more TikToks growl away. Bro, you got roasted. Daily life needs more offline friction. She was furious about this, basically saying I'm calling people lazy. No, I'm not. What I'm actually making the point is kind of what you were saying, is that you are captive to an algorithmic dopamine addiction on your phone. The vast majority of people are addicted to slop. The average American watches 53 minutes of short form video per day. Gen Z is spending 16 hours a day either on their phone or watching television. The vast majority of screen time in the United States is non-work-related, three to five hours of leisure screen time per day, only two and a half hours of that being television. My only point here is that we have come up with different metrics around benefit and productivity.

And this is why I want to separate it out, is that we talk a lot about these models and breakthroughs. I think all of that is true. I think that if you are a Silicon Valley rich guy who, you want this world of a personal agent who's, I mean, one guy this morning is booking about a problem that he had with his agent booking him a black lane. He thinks that people don't know what that is. I know what that is. That's one of those black car services. But I only know it because that's what those TV networks send to come and get you. Whenever you do it, just so you know.

Not that you've done that news. Never paid for it myself. My point is just that this guy is posting about booking a black car. And I'm like, is that an experience that most of us need? Is that an experience most people have or want? Some other guy goes, the agent can check in flight for you. I'm sorry. I fly it.

Or used to you before I had a kid. I fly a ton, all right? Checking in for a flight takes about five seconds. You just go in the app and you go, check in. That's about it. Even checking a bag, it's not that bad. I mean, which you shouldn't. But checking in a bag, it's not hard.

It's not difficult. And then another person goes, well, my agent deleted 40,000 emails. I go, okay, I mean, look, I get that it's mentally kind of annoying to have. I have 88,412 emails. I have inbox zero. It's not that hard. You don't need a little robot to do it for. But it's like, that's not productivity in a certain way.

Like, it is, in a sense, but it's not actually massively enriching your life, right? So I kind of think about it in the way where when you ease friction, like what we did with email, we made it easier than ever before to contact each other. And we said, wow, this is going to unlock all this productivity. I said, wow, what a beautiful technology. And so what happens then? Is it connects everybody forever, and you end up working more than ever before. 100%. It didn't make you more productive. Well, I guess it made you more productive for the S&P 500.

Yes. Economically. It actually destroyed your life. And ask anybody who works in Fortune 500, if you're on Slack, like, oh my God, these people are, they are glued to the phone. They're slaves, basically, at their bosses beckon calls to be able to be on call. I mean, if you're compensated well enough for that, that's a trade you should make. But that's not really how it's working. And everyone's mining your Slack and email data. So you're just becoming more productive, like you said, of the SMP, so you're more valuable to the tech companies that are taking your data because you're spending more time on social media and email. Bingo. And so there's just like all I look at is that we become captive to these Sam Altman's. And you actually are giving up like a ton of your personal agency and freedom by allowing it. I mean, even in email, like one of the things that they're trying to push hard is the connection of your email, which, you know, it sounds fine.

But what you've also seen is that with OpenAI is that they use them that email. that data, they're going to train their model. They're trying to mimic human communication, allegedly, to help you. But in some cases, potentially to replace you. And that's what a new MIT economist is warning about in a new interview with 60 minutes. Let's take a listen. Literally all of the top 20 economists in America, they would say the exact same thing, which is that there's going to be more jobs in 10 years than there are today.

You're a top economist in America. What say you? No. No, not on our current trajectory. I don't saw that could happen. What we are living through with AI is unprecedented. The first phase of the Industrial Revolution lasted for 80 years. Today it's taking place in one or two years, and it's taking place across many sectors at the same time.

Daron Osamoglu is a Nobel Prize-winning professor at MIT who studies technology's impact on labor. We were told by a lawyer and also a music producer. There are some things that humans are so fundamental, humans do them, robots can't. Do you buy that? Today, absolutely 100%. You said, today? Today. In 15 years' time, what it's going to be capable of doing?

I don't know. But there's going to be this huge sector of work training these AI models. So if you're a law student, you have a hard time finding a job, you can still use your expertise. Here is one thing I'm not uncertain about. What you just described is BS. Why do you say that? Because the number of people they're employing in these positions, is small relative to the number of people who will be replaced.

I mean, that's the whole point of automation. Asamoglu says we could see unemployment triple in the next decade if we do nothing and continue on our current course. Unemployment literally triple. I think that's an important point. Actually, you're starting to see some of this pop up in New York City. Put D4 up here on the screen. This was from Mark Levine.

He points out, AI already may be impacting the job market in New York City specifically a lot of these creative industries and in customer support. So you can look here at the change in New York City entry-level job posting. So in design, media, and writing, it is down by 40%. Customer-client support down by 35, clerical administrative, 30, business management operations, 27, finance, 23, social analysis planning 12, sales 10. That actually makes sense. Sales people that it's not doing yet because that requires calling people up on the phone,

which they haven't yet mastered. But I do think that the economist's point, you know, is pretty important for, look, you know, right now that's the big debate. Right now we haven't seen a mass job loss. It could be coming. It could not be. They all warned about it until they stopped warning about it. They don't know. That's the point.

The point is we just don't know. Yeah. But, yeah, I mean, for me, it's just I keep coming back to that, the technology. And I go, okay, this friction. And I apologize if I see an obsession with it, assess with this. But you see it in everything. Silicon Valley has this theory, which has been completely wrong. Mark Zuckerberg believed by creating a more interconnected world

that people would have better social interactions. That was 20 years ago. I think he actually did believe that originally. Agreed. I think they stopped. A lot of people. But this is totally wrong. What we have learned is that online social connection

does not translate into the real world and directly pulls from it. You and I both remember the Tinder panic. where when Tinder came out, people were like, oh my God, pick up me, hooking up all the time, what happened instead? Went down. Social ability, number of dates and all that have plunged in terms of in-person social interaction. It turns out that the swipe alone seems to have hijacked the dopamine system to the point where people, they don't even want to go, talk to anybody more or anything, right?

So you've seen that replicate in every social interaction, which has had technology supposedly be like something that's going to enhance it, has pulled from it. And so when I look at this agency talk and a lot of this AI use, they go, oh, you're going to be so much more productive so you can have all this extra time on your hands. What they don't tell you is that the majority of their profit, their screen time, etc., is centered around being addicted to the phone so that you do nothing else. It's actually a binary problem. The more things that you do outside in the real world, the less time you are on the phone, the less ads that they can serve you. They need you to be a slave. I think this is actually a really good point that you're making, and I haven't heard a lot of other people make, which is that if Zuckerberg wants to make this argument about muse and about the boss,

then he should actually also be, if he wants to say this is going to make you so much productive that you can spend more time in the regular world. Then any, yeah, yeah, exactly. That's a fantastic point. But they won't do it because that's where all the money comes from. Right, exactly. And so let's also look at, you know, the report out of New York was very interesting where it saw some of the pressures on jobs.

But also what it got at is that AI is creating a lot of value in the real estate market at an interesting time in New York City. So let's put this New York Times tear sheet up on the screen as well. This is D3. High interest rates aren't slowing the AI boom. That's a problem for the Fed. So the Federal Reserve, the Times reports, has a conundrum on its hands as it tries to tame an elevated inflation. One of the primary drivers of today's growth and the price pressures that have followed in this wake

appears nearly immune to the higher interest rates that the central bank has begun to impose on the economy. Companies seeking to expand their AI abilities have been undeterred by not only U.S. borrowing costs that have recently reached multi-decade highs, but also soaring costs for electricity, high bandwidth memory, and other inputs that are crucial to continued growth. So how are you supposed to when all of these companies have a million resources in front of, they have the resources to do basically whatever they want, despite the fact that they're still going to strong arm your local city council into giving them all kinds of tax breaks, which they don't need? Right now, they're also going to artificially probably prop up the real estate market

and prop up the entire market, prop up the entire economy. It's horrifying, Saga, because if that intended productivity doesn't materialize, and there's disagreement, as we showed from Asimoglu in the other clip, that is very, very frightening. And Sam Altman is trying to shove it down everybody's throat with him as the arbiter of what's a cost and what's a benefit and what exactly that looks like. There's just something, you know, I watched the trailer for the artificial movie.

I saw it yesterday in theaters. first of all, it looks incredible. I can't wait to go and watch it. But there, I, maybe this is too personal. I look at Sam and the way he talks, I'm like, dude, I don't trust you. Like, it's just what, and I think the reason why is because I put him in the same paradigm of Dario and Zuck and Sergei Bryn. Zuck is the best example. Larry Page.

And I have 20 years now where I can look back and they're like, well, this is how it's all going to work. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Like, every single thing that they predicted about social media. has had the opposite intended effect. Remember with Twitter, they were like, it will lead to mass democratization. No, it didn't. It was a disaster.

Look, look, it's been beneficial in some ways. Obviously, we've built our careers here, and there's a lot of plus side to it that we're able to go around these gaykeepers and all of that, et cetera. And for the people who watch this, like, seriously, thank you. We do our best to make this, what I hope. To not respond to bad incentives.

Yeah, to not respond to the bad incentives. But take a look at the top 10 most watched stuff on YouTube. Take a look at the top 10 most watched stuff on Netflix for movies. Take a look at the most popular reels, TikTok creators, and all these that where actual everyday people are spending the vast majority of their time. Right. And then you see the degradation. I mean, Gen Z is literally. literally dumber than millennials on an IQ basis. The first generation in modern history to actually

drop points whenever it comes to IQ. Why? Screen time. It's not even a debate. And then you take a look at, we talked a lot about educational technology here on the show. We had on that great gas who wrote the book, taking down like the ed tech cartel. And then after he came on, I don't even know if we've done, we were going to put in the show, something broke. But there's all this global test data now to show that it's not the pandemic. It literally is just screens across the entire OECD, which is nukeings test scores, same benchmark, same population. I'm talking about different demographics, different educational systems, different cultures. Every single developed economy in the world is watching the same precipitous drop in test scores. There's a few outliers, but I mean, you know, we, like all I see is just creating more fake free time,

unlocking more fake productivity just so people, to the extent that they have more free time, we know what you're going to do. We literally could see it in the consumption data. All of it just continues to go up on the phone and less in the real world. And then depression, anxiety, marijuana, gamble, all of this is a natural outgrowth.

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Stream Miley's new album, Bass Persuades, today. Lisa, we should tell them about our new show. Oh my God, Lexi. We have a new podcast. It's called Don't Lie to Me. I'm Lexi Wano. We're two best friends, 22 years apart, but so close at heart. And I'm Lisa Di Giulio, the old one, which means we have wildly different references,

occasionally different opinions, and at this point in my 50s, I've lived it all. I'm not going to get anyone fighting. That is wild. I learned that about you today. Now in my 30s, being the founder of new shoes, good taste is my business, and I've always got something to say. If men were just honest about this, they were just honest about this, be so much more peace in the world.

We're going to talk about dating, relationships, beauty, getting older, and a little wiser. We're best friends, but we don't always agree. Because you told us how accommodating you are. Obviously, I would do what I think I could do to fight the fight, but there's only so much fight I can fight. Don't lie to me. Don't lie to me. Don't lie to me.

Don't lie to me. Don't lie to me. Don't lie to me. Liar. Listen on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast, I don't really care. I'm Lacey Mosley, author, actor, stand-up comedian, creator, and host of Scam Goddess Podcasts. The True Crime Comedy Podcasts all about robbery, fraud, and those who practice it.

Each week I bring on incredible guests like Conan O'Brien, Iowa Debrie, Lamorne Morris, and Nicole Byer. Ooh, I scammed them. What? I can talk to you for a hour. You're a generational yapper like me. That's why I had to make yapping a job. And the scams run the gamut. I'm talking about scams from the 1800s.

all the way up to today. I also warn you and keep you safe against scammers. Call your grandparents. Tell your parents to stop clicking on links, please. And now you can catch full episodes of my show on YouTube. If there's a scam, I'm here to protect you. And I'm also here to laugh with you. So if you like fun, if you like comedy,

and you like learning and protecting yourself from criminals, start listening to Scam Goddess on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Zuckerberg and Jack are the best examples of people who were trusted authorities on this and had a very strong theory of the case and it turned out to be untrue. And so right now what we're seeing is another generation. I mean, they're the same generation, but another wave of people in the industry who have a theory of the case that is up in the air that even experts are saying is dubious. There's disagreement among experts and strong disagreement among experts on this. Meanwhile, Trump has named a new AI chief.

So he actually named the DNI, D5. We can put this up on the screen. I'm curious to get your take on this saga. DNI, Jay Clayton, is now the new AIs are. So that's Director of National Intelligence, Jay Clayton. People were thinking it might be somebody from the industry. I heard Jebia's name floated. I heard other tech leaders' names floated.

But he went with the DNI. Yeah, straight. I mean, it is very odd, right, as to why you pick this person. For some, from what I get, Clayton and Trump, Trump just loves this guy. So a lot of it is personal, as I understand it. With Trump. I remember, you know, for the whole DNI thing. and he's been floating around previously,

like he was the SEC chairman, he was Southern District. Trump, for some, he like kind of captured Trump's attention back in the day. He just seems to be very enamored with him. But I do think that the DNI issue is important because they look at it purely in terms of, well, we don't want China to be able to take some of the technology.

They don't care really at all about regulating the technology itself. In fact, they need it. I mean, they literally needed to prop up the S&P 500. I mean, I was looking at it just this morning. Yeah, I mean, we're a record high today. It's like... Yay! I mean, cool.

It feels good. If you own stocks, that's cool. But, you know, you've got mortgages at like 7.2, 7.3%. You've got gas at 420 a gallon. You got a record high home price. So, I mean, yeah, if you're rich and you have a bunch of stocks, that's awesome. But if you're not, which, what, 80, 90% of people aren't, you can see exactly where it's like...

They look at that. For them, they don't care about how NVIDIA's stock price are doing. And that's the other issue I've always made, too, is even if you don't care, even if you don't have a stake in it, when it goes down, you may not benefit on the way up, but you're definitely going to get screwed on the way down.

Last thing, go ahead. I was going to say, I'm obsessed. Go to the Sun-obsessed list chart. This is a fascinating chart put out by A16C, so obviously they have their own stake. Makes it even better. Put D6 out up on the screen. They say 98% of U.S. households

are not paying for AI yet. Now, a lot of, I think, more leftists picked up on this to show AI's fake. I will give you the counter, which is included in their own chart, is there actually something called a 3% consumer adoption threshold, which usually is the paid adoption rate for paid technology, which is going to preview a mass adoption boon. So, for example, personal computer, personal adoption paid was 3% in 1980. led to the personal PC revolution, paid home internet.

1995, only 3% of Americans paid for home online internet. Wow, that makes me realize how early my dad was. Smartphone, 2006, only 3% of U.S. mobile users owned a smartphone in 2006, and paid consumer AI in 2026 is 3% of U.S. consumer. So you could look at it two ways. You could say it's fake. You could say also they were quickly approaching the 3% consumer adoption threshold. a lot of this stuff is at the bleeding edge.

So I don't know. How do you look at it? Yeah, it's interesting because compared with some of those other things, I mean, if you use AI without a subscription, you are also paying with your data. Yes, that's true. I think I'm more curious in like total use, which my understanding is still lower than a lot of the AI people.

Probably what, 30, 40%? Yeah, it's still not like, it might be a little bit less than that. But that would be my guess, be around like 20 to 30%. But that's, I mean, it's going up month over month. So it's the, the trajectory, at least, according to A16Z, is, it's funny because it's still only at 2.2%. But, yeah, given where it started in April or January, 2023, I mean, it's almost at 0%. So three-year period, you're going up every single month.

That's obviously what they want to see, although the rise every month isn't huge either. So it's not like a important. And another one seems obvious, but we should always make the point. Even if you're not paying for it and you're using it, then you are the product, right? And when you are paying for it, which, you know, most people, don't need to pay for it. I pay for both Claude and for ChatGBTGPT. I even use some of these personal agents. And it's not because I want to.

Do you really use agents? Yeah, I use Muse. I'm an early adopter of technology. You are. Just because I like to see what, I want to be like, what's the bleeding edge? What does it look like? That's one of the reasons why I eventually came to the point

around the agents was I was using it. I go, you know, I don't think this is all that useful for a lot of people. So for, you know, Ben Thompson, I think it creates more work sometimes too. I totally agree. They're like, oh, you need to approve this. Oh, you need to do that. Here's your summary of all this.

I go, is this really saving me time? I mean, it's easier to just scroll my inbox than it is to get a summary, which is kind of shittily worded and doesn't particularly do a good job. Ben Thompson made a good point about shopping. They're like, Muse can go out and buy something for you. First of all, that's not even true, Amazon shut down recently their access, which stops their ability to do it. But second, he goes, you know, people love shopping.

This is my screen time thing where do people really want to spend less time shopping? I'm not so sure about that, actually. I think people love to shop. I think people, you know, websites, entire billions of dollars have been spent. People like to go to wirecutter and read reviews and all that. It's like, hmm, is that really something they want to outsource to AI? Again, I could be very pessimistic, but I just don't see the evidence. Like, all the use cases that are put out there are like, it'll book a dinner reservation.

for you. I mean, since I had a child, I've gone out to dinner a nice dinner one time, which required. I'm like, this is not a problem. Shout out to Gillian. Yeah, thank you. Take her out of date. Yeah, thanks. She's the word I booked it for me, ironically. Like, literally a really nice restaurant. It went once in the last 17 months. I don't know if that's that unique. I feel like that's probably pretty common. Yeah, your baby's little, yeah. No, but I'm saying generally for most people, if you're a parent, like, I mean, how many times you go out to nice, which requires a hard to get resourable? like twice a year? Most people never.

Yeah, most people never, maybe twice a year? Like, Max, special occasion for a big party, like maybe your dad's birthday or something. You know, I mean, it's just not, like, this is not a problem. Like, or they're talking about checking in for flights. 50% of Americans don't even fly, period. The other 50, you know, the vast majority of those people, they take a flight like once a year to go to Thanksgiving or Christmas. Like, these, they just feel like they're creating solutions to problems which only exist for

the 1%, maybe even the 0.1%, like the guy booking a black car. I'm like, okay, man, like next one. Cool, dude. Trying to break my black car, I'll reach out to Hughes. Literally never. Yeah, Pew's research says about half of adults say they ever use chatbots. A quarter use chatbots daily.

So the kind of like hardcore AI people, I think, are still in a bubble about how the public is actually adapting. So if you have a quarter using it daily, I think that's actually still a pretty low number. It's up, obviously, astronomically, over time. But It's the way it's talked about in the media is like it's already taken over the entire workforce.

And it really hasn't quite yet. Yes and no. Right. It's in the background. I think the B2B application is very important. Like enterprise and obviously at the research level, so I don't want to take away any of that. But this is a different question. This is like a consumer question. And part of the reason why people are so disconnected, only 2% of people are paying for something.

98% are like, I don't, I'm not so sure about that. Obviously, A16Z, the point they're trying to make is that everyone will be using it eventually. I still remain skeptical. Or if they do use it, it's not going to be in the way that currently the tech people are selling it. All right. Let's get to gambling. This record is on. Miley is having a moment.

New name. Close of shows. So IHard Radio is sending you to experience it all. Life at the Hollywood Polites, Hotel, tickets, and $1,000 cash. Listen to IHard new music for 10 minutes a day on the IHart Radio app. And click enter. Every day you listen is another chance to win. Stream Miley's new album, bass persuades today.

Lisa? We should tell them about our new show. Oh my God, Lexi. We have a new podcast. It's called Don't Lie to Me. I'm Lexi Youan. We're two best friends, 22 years apart, but so close at heart. And I'm Lisa Di Giulio, the old one, which means we have wildly different references, occasionally different opinions. And at this point in my 50s, I've lived it all. I'm not going to get any of your fighting. That is wild. I learned that about you today. Now in my 30s, being the founder of new shoes, good taste is my business.

And I've always got something to say. If men were just honest about this, there would be so much more peace in the world. We're going to talk about dating, relationships, beauty, getting older, and a little wiser. We're best friends, but we don't always agree. Because you told us how accommodating you are. Obviously, I would do what I think I could do to fight the fight, but there's only so much fight. can fight. Don't lie to me. Don't lie to me. Don't lie to me. Don't lie to me. Don't lie to me. Liar. Listen on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. I don't really care.

I'm Lacey Mosley, author, actor, stand-up comedian, creator, and host of Scam Goddess Podcast. The True Crime Comedy Podcasts all about robbery, fraud, and those who practice it. Each week, I bring on incredible guests like Conan O'Brien, Iowa Debray, Lerbry, Lombe, Lom. Warren Morris and Nicole Byer. Ooh, I scammed them. What? I can talk to you for an hour. You're a generational yapper like me.

That's why I had to make yapping a job. And the scams run the gamut. I'm talking about scams from the 1800s all the way up to today. I also warn you and keep you safe against scammers. Call your grandparents. Tell your parents to stop clicking on links, please. And now you can catch full episodes of my show on YouTube. If there's a scam, I'm here to protect.

you. And I'm also here to laugh with you. So if you like fun, if you like comedy and you like learning and protecting yourself from criminals, start listening to scam goddess on the IHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Turning now to gambling, so at the very top, I'll just admit this. I don't know anything about the NBA. In fact, I can barely pronounce Mr. Wembe's name. I do know he plays with San Mr. Wembe. So shout out to them. Now, with all that said, I do at the very least track some of the cultural backlash amongst some of these athletes against sports betting. And what you will notice is that the vast majority of our American homegrown athletes, people like Kevin Durant and LeBron

who admittedly, in some case, you know, they come from troubled backgrounds or struggling communities, they have no problem showing for sports betting and encouraging that amongst their fan base. But for some reason, it's these athletes that come from abroad and specifically, Specifically, I guess with France, where you both have Wembe and Killian Mbapé who call back to their, you know, childhood and to their country and are there like, we feel shame for to want to promote as something as disgusting as sports gambling. So here's Wembe. He was asked about it. Will you ever sign a deal with sports betting company? Here's what you had to say. Absolutely not. I will never deal. Honestly, I think it's very sad to see some players come out of making it. Everybody does whatever they want to. How do you make decisions on which companies, which brands you connect with and connect your names?

You know, in the past, there was a dimension of money in the past, not anymore. Now it's, now it's, even if I say that, I've refused, you know, many, much much more money that I've made for things that were not to my values, you know. And now I want to come on things that have a good impact, have a good influence. I can, well, with who I can share messages, you know, and values. But one thing that's very important, for me our biggest strength is not our obviously we're in millions and millions

this is not a biggest strength our biggest strength is inspiring and we can inspire in a good or a battle I want to inspire in a good way that's the strongest thing I can do nice little standard there that these French athletes are setting remember Killian Mbapé had said

when they asked him why don't you take sports betting money he even refused to participate in a photo shoot for the French national team because they were doing some deal with, but he said, no, I'm not doing that. The translation is rough, but basically, you know, when he says suburb, because a lot of Americans didn't understand that, and Babe was like, well, a lot of us grew up in the suburbs

and were like, well, here are the suburbs are good. I'm like, yeah, but they're bad. You know, as you could turn on the news in France right now, but to see what's going on. But the point remains is that these foreign athletes appear to just have like a moral land in the sand, and he even said in there, he's like, look, we have plenty of money. It's not about money, you know, for a certain amount of them. And yet, for our athletes, it is. Kevin Durant, Washington. Washington, D.C. here native, here's what he had to say whenever he was confronted about this, considering he just signed a partnership with Fandool.

That's Wimby. I mean, you're going to do what he does. That has nothing to do with me. I mean, I don't really have, I really don't think about that question at all. It's not really on my mind as much as here, so. But, yeah, people are going to do what they want to do. That's really what it is. What do I do on the day that I try to partner with people who kind of align with my day-to-day visions on stuff. So, you know, some people, you know, some partners are going to be with for a long time for something you want.

But that's just the nature of the business. A nature of the business, I didn't even think about the morality of promoting this. And this is somebody who came, again, from Washington, D.C., from a difficult childhood, difficult background. He doesn't care that his fans and others who are dead, broke in PG County from where he is from, are literally all going to lose, you know, on average, like a significant part of money, which they would be putting into savings. I mean, that's what I find, like, so disgusting about this entire thing. Well, and it's a perfect contrast with Wembe, actually, who didn't even think about doing it.

So it's, like, actually, the perfect contrast, because what you saw with Wembe was just complete and total moral clarity. He gets asked the question, and he just says, absolutely not. Right. And then here you have Durant being like, you know, it's part of the business. It's just part of the business. It's going to do what we're going to do as if it is a value-neutral decision. Yes. It's not a value-neutral decision.

No, of course. And the thing that always gets me with these guys, you're getting paid hard cash. They don't have to do this. You're getting paid. These people have worked hundreds of millions of dollars. What's LeBron worth? A billion dollars? Something like that, $800, $900 million?

Got to be close. All of that. Put the next one up here, E3, just to put it into perspective, you know, for all of you. So LeBron's polymarket deal is now rated at some $15 million per year. So, I mean, on the one hand, first. any of us, that is a life-changing sum of money. For him, it's a rounding area. It's less than 1% of his entire net worth. And yet, he has decided to not just promote this company, he does weekly picks, follow him on parlay. He does this ad with Polymarket and Eli Manning and Spike Lee

and all of these other figures. And, you know, what's crazy to me, as they even point out here in this athletic story is, you know, the ethics of this inside the league and with the NBA rules, they're, you know, they're really uncomfortable. As they point out, the NBA can regulate salary, but it can't regulate everything else. It gets uncomfortable when the money is coming from these prediction markets, which are literally being sued in many of these cases by different states for operating, according to them, illegal gambling houses. Remember, Janus, one of these other NBA stars, became a Kalshi shareholder for the tune of

some $25 million. And before the trade deadline, $25 million, even before he came a shareholder, was traded on markets about his next team. The current league rules permits them to hold stakes in prediction markets and gambling companies.

Adam Silver goes, well, it's only capped at 1%. There's no evidence that they've done anything wrong. But I'll give you a great example. This is different. This is NFL. So, Polymarket and Kalshi, remember, like, look, we're not gambling. We don't have to regulate gambling. Like, you know, it's all trading.

It's just investing. If you lose your money, it's fair. It's a lot fairer than when you lose your money in the casino. Okay. And, well, according to them, they have the most responsible bets on Polymark and on Cali. And the NFL has sent them multiple letters. And they are actually begging our government to come in and to say, please, at the very least, the NFL, who are the most capitalist scum in the world, who are happy.

to partner with draft kings and Fanduil and all these other people, they are begging calcium polymarketing, hey, there are certain markets you guys have. You need to take these down. And the reason why you need to take them down is they're highly manipulatable, right? Is that they're actually very easy to, you know, have insider trading that all these other kinds of problems.

Calcium polymark, you know what their response is? No, we're not going to do it, right? Because they can't. Yeah, they don't want them. Because they don't want them. Because people will gamble on it. And so that's my point is, look, If there's enough of a moral outrage, like, let's say, over injury markets and all those things,

they won't do it because it, quote, looks bad. But there's nothing preventing them from doing it. A lot of these trade decisions mention markets, numbers of points, numbers of yard, rebate. I mean, all kinds of things which are so easily to manipulate, to shave, to push in one certain direction. You don't have to throw a game anymore. You can just do one or two things differently and, quote, hit the under. and you can make somebody millions of dollars. That's the issue behind this entire thing.

And I just think the contrast between these foreign athletes who appear to just have some sense of moral character and say, I am a, you know, LeBron, this guy, oh, boys and girls club and all that. What message does it send to the boys and girls club to all of these, like, people who are not going to play in the NBA and be like, yeah, I am a proponent, a paid proponent of gambling.

What message is that going to send to those people? And that's the thing, you know, for the vast majority of these people, the vast, vast majority of people who gamble, you're not, quote, doing anything wrong because you're not an addict. But you have to remember that the vast majority of the profits come from the 3 to 8% of the customers who are no-shit gambling addicts who are comprised of almost 60 to 80% of the profit. And so the only reason you get to do and have your fun $1 bet or $2 bet or whatever is because

of those 3 to 8%. And that 3% when you take that across every man in America and apparently 10% of women, I've been getting messages lately for moms of young girls who are apparently in the sports betting. Women can do anything that can't do.

You're right. I can't imagine. I just pray, you know, look at my... I can't imagine my daughter 16 years old, she's like, betting it over on women's tennis. I'm like, what do you do it? Anyway. Betting on Caitlin Clark. So, yeah, betting on Clayton Clark's number of rebounds. But from what I understand, you know, within, is that this three to eight percent, you know, do the math at scale. This is the first year in American history. The gambling is legal nationwide, thanks to Donald Trump, the CFTC, with all of these Kalshi and Polymarket defense that they've given them, that three to eight

percent over hundreds of millions is literally millions of people. Yeah. Millions of people. And check your social media feed in the same way that you have with, we had with fentanyl, right, which swept the nation. And I'm sure you know somebody. I was checked. A couple people I graduated from high school with. People have a fentanyl story, overdose story, prison story, something like that, right? Which people you never would have predicted. Well, these types of stories are all going viral on social media. Quote, I'll just read you one. Somebody sent it to me yesterday. I just found out that a couple I've been friends with for years are now getting a divorce because the

husband lost $300,000 gambling and just lost the house. And what they said is, so he was responding, he even posted the text exchange. They say they had to get a HELOC to cover all their debts and had no equity to sell. And so apparently, you know, they tried to save their marriage, et cetera, while all this, he lock, they don't have the money to pay back in it. Now they have no equity that's sell the house. They're coming out of it, completely bust. So that's how quick it can all happen. And just if you think that's anecdotal, I have covered day after day after day here on the show about all of these lawsuits, some cases wives, were posting these types of stories and are being like, look, look what my husband did. Look what's happening here. Look what's happening here. You know,

it continues to show up in a lot of these lawsuits to the extent where these guys are gambling away millions of dollars. Why? It just should not be acceptable. People say, oh, you're an idiot. I agree. We can keep the personal responsibility. Yeah, you are an idiot. You betrayed your family and you failed them. However, we should not enable you to do so. And that's what gets me about this entire thing. You know, I texted you recently because I've always been with you on this issue.

But Wade in, it was on Megan's show with the Sydney Sweeney ad, the Novig ad, right? And I texted you, it was such an interesting backlash because it was a pretty, like, I guess it was a, the clip must have been going viral or something. Yeah. And the combination of Sydney Sweeney in sports gambling was utterly toxic. But what I found so interesting about it is that having covered men's, like, the sort of undermining of men that has happened across American society in a lot of ways that some of our viewers may disagree with. But like as a conservative, we can have that. Oh, yeah. Of course, I'm with you.

No, I know. But it was interesting because I think some of the backlash is that men feel like, they're once again being sort of treated, I don't know, condescendingly by like elite. You're saying like you can't be trusted to handle X, Y, and C. And it's like, it's interesting that that to me was the characteristic of the backlash. Who are you to tell me what to do? Right, right. And it's interesting because it's like, I'm with you on all of that.

These corporations are designing products that are meant to keep you poor. That's all I'm trying to say to them is you think you're making a choice. You're not. you are being. Or many of you are not making it. Many of you lose your capacity to make a choice. Just like we all do when we get addicted to alcohol drugs. Exactly right.

Everybody who knows anything about drug and alcoholics. It's the same thing with social media. I'm sorry, the same thing with social media addiction. Social media. There's an element of choice, but there's also, at a certain point for a lot of these addicts, the concept of choice starts to operate within a system where the confines are, you know, 10 drinks or 18, but you're drinking no matter what. Right.

Same whenever, fentanyl, heroin. any of these types of things. At a certain point, the chemical, the actual addiction, the same thing applies to gambling. So, like, let's take the Sydney-Sweeney thing. You think I have the right to do that. So you are watching a multi-million dollar corporation used softcore pornography and gambling. So the promise of riches and porn to the things that are basically designed to tickle your dopamine system and take it all the way up as high it can possibly do to trick you into placing bets to lose your money. And you are such a fool you think that you're in control. And that if anybody else gets completely out of control, that's on them and that you actually have this illusion, right? That's around you.

And that's the part which really bothers me. Like, for example, let's put E4 up here on the screen. Perfect example. It's not gambling. Here's a great NPR report. After bankruptcy, they profile this guy. They say he was banned from sports betting sites. Then he discovers Kalshi. Oh, how did that happen? Well, you have a guy named Thomas, 35 years old, quote, identified by his middle name fearing his problem gambling history could affect his career. Yeah, you think. But he says, sports gambling was different. It really got to me.

He never cared much for sports, yet betting on games just seemed like an easy way to make a buck. Here we go. He started placing wagers on football and tennis using parlays. And lo and behold, he goes completely broke. working from home in Pennsylvania in the financial services industry. Thomas says that there were a few moments he didn't have one eye on placing a bet as he juggled work emails and bets. When his paychecks arrives, he would quickly squander all of it trying to dig himself out of

the gambling hole only to find himself deeper. This cycle continued for years. He ended up racking up $75,000 in debt from credit cards and personal loans and ended up more than $50,000 in the red from the online sports books, filed for bankruptcy in late 2023. He then did, and this is a very important practice, which, by the way, took advocates years to push for, despite what the casinos will tell you. He banned himself from Fanduil and draft games, which is great. This guy's debt-free, declared bankruptcy, and he says, I want to self-exclude myself. Phenomenal. One day, he says, I then come across an ad.

I'm scrolling on Instagram, another addiction, and I come across an ad for Kalshi. I was bored. I thought this could be fun. Thomas saw an ad offering a $20. cash bonus for the first $10 bet. Now, first of all, do you know any stock trading app that's giving you free money and free bet and all that? Huh? Robin Hood or any of that? They might give you one free stock. We should try to do that. We should just give people free money. Yeah. Hunter Biden's Yeah, you're right. All right. So he goes, betting 10 became a couple hundred. The couple hundred became thousands more. Before long, I was more than $25,000 in the red. Kalshi calls this, quote, a cherry-picked case. If you ask our millions of traders, they would emphatically tell you

an exchange model is significantly healthier than a sportsbook model. Our profits are not tried to trade or losses so we don't have the same predatory incentives. Really, because the more trades this guy make, the more money you make as an exchange. And so they point out, Thomas, who now has to live with his mom and works as a grocery store cashier, and apparently his grandma and a childhood home, has now been economically struggling for decades. So you went from a financial services industry making good money to bust bankrupt, addicted, do you even know what bankruptcy does to your credit? Start over again, get re-addicted to this entire thing. And what happens is that Kalshi only recently introduced self-exclusion, not because they're required to,

but because they were pressured by advocates, people like me, speaking out against this. Kalsi, quote, did eventually bar him from betting, but now he is trying to find his financial footing after frittering away all of his savings that he was able to get back. Yeah. In this time period. So that's the problem is the people, you know, Trump administration has legalized all this. You cannot even get Congress to pass something called a national self-exclusion list, which would require Kalshi Polymarket on all of these other exchanges to just abide by that. Or the other problem is some of these will be statewide. So like, let's say you're an addict in Missouri. So you walk in, you're like, ban me. People are like, okay, you're banned. Or MGM, properties. You could still, you could literally leave the state and you could go to a Caesar's property. Right. They'll love to see you coming. A gambling addict who's banned from one of their competitors,

they're like, that's a dream. Yeah. And so that's how they make all their dollars. Look, I know it covered the, but you have to give people information to counter program. Yeah. I mean, when you watch the NFL, it is literally nonstop. Calci, Fanduel, Draft Kings. You can't even listen to anything about the games without people telling you about spreads, my five picks, my blazing hot ones, my locks of the, there's no such thing. Like, you know, and it's just, I don't know, it really makes me despair. Because people are going broke at such a rapid pace. They just don't appreciate it, especially with the type of bets that they're placing.

That NPR article also mentions one of the things that just, I feel like, is not talking about enough. They mentioned recently, however, Kalsh asked federal regulators to allow to introduce a product that would allow traders to bet with borrowed money. insane. Yeah, margin. Known in the financial sector as quote-unquote leverage. Kalsh said the features aimed at attracting large institutional investors who the company is also trying to draw in.

So that is also now part of their strategy is that you, on your couch, trying to make a buck to pay for the bill when you take your girlfriend out on a date this weekend, you're betting against these institutional investors with like massive AI-powered programs behind them. So it's not really just like a David versus, or I'm sorry, it's not like egalitarian. now like a David versus Goliath, but in a way that is designed to be exploitive, basically.

Exactly. The people who are taking the other side of your action, the market makers, they're doing it because they're driving, I forget how to pronounce it. It's like Susquehanna or something. Yes, Susquehanna. They are literally driving Porsches, buying mansions. That's Jeff Yes. Yeah. They're buying mansions, Porsche's second homes in Florida, Palm Beach, private jets off of your money. Yeah. All right. That's what's happening. And yet, people just want to throw it all away. And the last thing I just want to show you is if you think it's just Republicans that are the problem in this entire thing, let's put, what is it, the last element, guys, about Keisha Lance Bottom.

So yesterday, Keisha Lance Bottoms, who is, which is the Atlanta mayor, she's running for governor in the state of Georgia, very likely, not likely entirely, but, you know, she's a competitor. She could easily the election is now saying she supports a state. statewide vote on casino gambling and says legislation or a legalization of casino gambling would, quote, be an economic development tool for struggling communities. Okay? An economic development tool for struggling communities. What do you think is going to happen when you put a casino in a struggling community? What's the most likely thing that's going to happen?

Oh, I've seen it happen. Yeah. No, I literally go go take a, there's a casino here in Washington, D.C. Not anymore. Or the MGM? No. In Navy Yard? No, the MGM.

Oh, so they put an MGM sports book in Navy Yard. Oh, I didn't know that. Okay. Even better. So there's an MGM casino. Go on down there and see what happens to struggling communities. And a recent casino conference estimated that one in five people on the casino floor are actually gambling addicts. Not just the three to eight percent, but the actual physical presence of the people who are on the casino floor are no shit actual addicts who are just throwing all their money.

And that's people who are actually on the floor. a lot of friction to get from point A to point B, Bingo. So that's what we've legalized. Thank you, Wembe. I'll buy a jersey. Thank you guys so much for watching. We had a scheduling issue with Todd. We'll try to work it out and get him back here on the show. But Emily and I are going to be on again tomorrow. So we'll see you all then. See you. Lisa, tell them about our new show. We have a new podcast. It's called Don't Lie to Me. I'm Lexi Wanu. We're two best friends, 22 years apart, but so close at heart. And I'm Lisa Di Giulio, the old one, which means we have wildly different references,

occasionally different opinions, and at this point in my 50s, I've lived it all. Now in my 30s, being the founder of new shoes, good taste is my business. Listen on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, this is Kylie Breakman. Angel Geratana. Jeremy Colhane. Patrick McDonald. And we're the hosts of the Artists on Artists on Artists Podcast. The Improvised Character Comedy Podcasts were each week a new.

panel of artists discuss their craft. Join us for a panel of Eurovision participants. And we do a little Halloween sometimes. Does the Pope dress up? He winks on Halloween. It's right up next to the microphone. I hear you can almost hear the eyelashes hit each other. You never seen Italy so quiet as when the Pope gets up to wink on Halloween.

Listen to Artists on Artists on Artists every Thursday on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Lacey Mosley, author, actor, stand-up comedian, creator, and host of Scam Goddess Podcast. The True Crime Comedy Podcasts all about robbery, fraud, and those who practice it. Each week I bring on an amazing guest. Ooh, I scammed them. What? I can talk to you for an hour. You're a generational yapper like me.

That's why I had to make yapping a job. And now you can catch full episodes of my show on YouTube. Start listening to Scam Goddess on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.