Cognitive Dissonance - Episode 678: The Excel Files

Episode Date: March 20, 2023

Show Notes

This episode of Cognitive Dissonance is brought to you by our patrons. You fucking rock. Be advised that this show is not for children, the faint of heart, or the easily offended. The explicit tag is there for a reason. recording live from glory hole studios in chicago and beyond This is Cognitive Dissonance. Every episode we blast anyone who gets in our way. We bring critical thinking, skepticism, and irreverence to any topic that makes the news, makes it big, or makes us mad. It's skeptical, it's political, and there is no welcome at. This is episode 678 of Cognitive Distance. Got it. Nailed it. Whatever.

Just had to scroll back over to my notes. You crushed it. In order to do that. Cecil, I've got a story to tell you. It's a little bit of confession time. Oh, okay. It's a little bit of like, it's an embarrassing story. So, and I thought I would relay it to you here.

Oh yeah, no, yeah. So you and several dozen thousand of your favorite friends. Right, yep, yeah. All right, so as you know, Cecil, for I don't know how many years now, when it comes to tax time, I do a P&L statement for our show. Yeah.

So I just, I balance out all of our revenue and all of our expenses and I categorize those items and I create a balance sheet, which you have to do to give your accountant for tax time. Yeah.

And the way that I've done that every single year until the point of realization that I had this year, which I can't wait to tell you about and you can laugh at me, is I have literally printed PDF versions

of all of our bank statements and credit card statements. Okay, dad. And then I sit with those papers. Jesus Christ. And I manually enter into a spreadsheet. Are you kidding me right now? Every single line item. No.

Jesus Christ. This is how I've done it for years. You know you can download a CSV, right? Well, Cecil, you beat me to the punchline. You didn't know? I had no idea. Because I had no idea that you could just download your bank statements

as Excel documents. You're like, oh yeah, I did the spreadsheet. I'm thinking, yeah, all he did was just, he downloaded it and then he just recategorized it. It gets worse. Oh God. The way that I've done it in the past is. Come on. This is so much work.

Come on. I would sit with a pen and paper and these printout PDFs. You're cursing me. Cursing them, by the way. Jesus. And then if there was like Grubhub and Grubhub and Grubhub and Grubhub, I would add them all up on a calculator off to the side. And then get the total and put it in as that month's meals.

You're like fucking Sam Ace Rothstein from casino with his fucking giant glasses and his calculator and his race horse statistics over here. His printout race horse statistics. You're Sam Ace Rothostein. That's who you are. Ace. No idea. I mean, like, the only way I found out, guys, this is the part that's so funny. So the only

way I even found out that you could get your bank statements and your credit card statements as CSV files. And I remember thinking, Cecil, this would be so much easier if I could just download this somewhere. You never buy it.

Like, look. It's not. It's a little hidden. I will say on the bank, on the bank website, it's like when you go to statements, it just shows the statements. It says view PDF or print PDF.

Oh my God. It doesn't say anything about Excel or like open a CSV or any, it just gives you PDF options. You have to like go hunt for it. And the only reason I knew to hunt for it Cecil is because you had suggested to me this year, he's like, you were like, why don't you just get QuickBooks? We'll do it through QuickBooks. And I was like, oh, that's a great idea. So I got QuickBooks. And then in order to get last year's stuff into QuickBooks, it was like you have to import this file. And I'm like, how am I going to import a file? So then I'm Googling.

I'm Googling Cecil how the fuck I'm supposed to get last year's bank account information. And it's just like, hey, there was like, there was basically like a, like a page that was like, hey, dipshit. You just navigate here here here and here

and then you can download all of your shit so see so for years oh my god for all the years that i've done that pnl statement i have literally typed every entry this so this is the first year that It's 564 line items. I have done that for how many years? So Sam Ace Rothstein, what's your top three pick on there? Who's going to win place in show? That's outrageous. Tom, I- Oh my God, I know. I teach people sometimes how to do what they call digital storytelling.

And it's a thing where you record an audio of yourself and then you find images that, like, especially a very personal audio. And then you put something together that's sort of a visual of that. And very often that includes like personal photographs or images of things, etc. And so I teach people how to not only record themselves, how to write a script, but then also how to use Premiere, which is an Adobe product. And one year I had a guy, he was in my class and he was in his, at the time, probably late 50s. And he's in my class with a bunch of other people and we're working. And he said, he calls me over and he said, you know, I just, I can't figure out how to get,

you know, this file open over here in this window. And I need to move it to my flash drive. And I said, sure. So I reached over, I clicked, and I just dragged one file from one window to the other window. And it was like, he saw like a fucking alien life form for the first time. He was blown. He was just, it was like, he was like, it expanded his consciousness. That guy is the same level as you. I'm just saying. No, you're not, You're not at all wrong. Because for years of doing this,

for years in my back of my mind is like. You learned how to drag and drop. That's what you do. Motherfucker. Why can't I just get this shit and fucking excel? Why can't this be easier? I wish I would have suggested like

Quicken or QuickBooks years ago to you. I just didn't. It didn't occur to me. Because I did it on QuickBooks and then I didn't trust it. And I manually did it again. But even manually doing it again, because I had this just all downloaded within Cecil, within minutes. I just had all this stuff that I spent years just keying.

Hours. Just keying and keying and keying and keying all this shit well it made me fucking insane it made me fucking insane well i am i am glad that we figured out a way to automate super embarrassing automate the one thing you do for the show so yeah for for the future i actually outsourced it to india yeah so it's gonna be so where are you from originally uh you just moved here right yep delaware delaware our first state in the union yes it is that's great no sales tax in delaware right yeah there's not that's weird you know so much about delaware you fucking joe. He's from Delaware. See, I do that. You a makeup examiner.

This story comes from MSNBC. And this actually comes from the Rachel Maddow blog. And I don't usually grab news stories that are like this kind of editorializing. But there were some numbers in here that were just really easy to find from the story that I thought were really good. So House Republican leaders have not, you know, they are, they are opposed to the Biden budget plan and they are opposed to the Biden budget plan for the very specific reason that it is the Biden budget. Yes, that's exactly right. That is it. And when they have been asked many, many times, all right, what's your fucking plan? Yeah. Yeah.

They, whatever is not your plan appears to be the answer. There is literally no meaningful response from the Republican side on what their alternative plan is. What their plan is is to be a bunch of

cock-blocking dickheads and to grind this country to the fucking halt in order to not accomplish anything. That is their plan. What their plan is, is to have their cake and eat it too, right? What they want to do is they want to say, well, we want to keep the Trump tax cuts, which favored the ultra wealthy in a major way.

We want to keep those tax cuts and we want to keep all these other programs. And it's just like when you're at home and you have your own budget, right? You have your own budget numbers and you get, let's say you lost your job or your spouse lost her job or his job. And you say, okay, now we don't have as much money coming in, right? Because that's what tax cuts are, guys. That's not as much money coming in. So imagine somebody loses their job.

I'm going to talk about this in a real, real simple way, even though no one can ever follow it. Imagine somebody in your household lost their job and then you have to decide what you're going to keep paying for because all your money, just like most of Americans, is already accounted for. And so you have to look forward and say, okay, well, now we've got to get rid of anything that's extra, anything that's not essential. And then suddenly you're cutting a bunch of stuff out of your budget that you think is nonessential. And then suddenly you're cutting a bunch of stuff out of your budget that you think is non-essential.

And basically what the Republicans have to do is look at the budget and say, okay, we have to cut non-essential things. The problem is, is that they would have to cut in order to keep two major programs and that's social security and the military whole, they would have to cut a hundred percent of everything else to keep those whole and keep the tax cuts. You can't have both. You have to pick one. It's like when you take

your kid down the candy aisle. You can't have both. You have to pick one and they won't pick one and then you just leave them in the store forever and become child free. That's what you do.

I wish I had known that part of the plan. I never knew that part of the plan. They finally came out and they said, well, you know, what we want after,

and it's not really a plan because they didn't really elucidate or articulate a plan. like they finally they finally came out and they said well you know what we want after and it's not really a plan this is because they didn't really elucidate or articulate a plan what they said is we want we want the budget that is proposed to be balanced within 10 years and they like the cbo like came back and was like that's not possible you can't balance the budget within 10 years if you did balance the budget within 10 years. If you did balance the budget within 10 years, if you allow the Trump tax cuts to sunset, you'd have to cut 86% of all federal spending. That'd be the only way. And then, well, we also want to keep the Trump tax cuts.

And then the CBO is like, you would have to cut 100% of all federal spending in order to balance the budget in 10 years, keep the Trump tax cuts, and not cut into social security. Yeah. And the military. Like everything else.

Everything else would have to go. And that is the Republican plan. First of all, that's not a plan. That's a wish, right? That's like a rubbing. That's like saying like like a rubbing that's like saying like what's your plan for retirement well i'm gonna find a genie bottle yeah you see the first thing i'm gonna do is i'm gonna find a bottle uh with the genie in it obviously a magic

genie uh and then once i get the bigger dick and the six pack then obviously the last wish uh is definitely going to be to balance my budget if i thing is, if I got a six-pack, my dick would appear bigger because it would push back and then it would look bigger and I would be like, all right, I don't need the second wish. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. I had two for one sale at the Genie store today. I got a BOGO.

That's why you got to make those wishes in the right order. If you make them in the wrong order. You got to do it in the right order. And you got to wish for a six-pack abdom If you make them in the wrong order. You got to do it in the right order. Yeah. And you got to wish for a six-pack abdominals, not just a six-pack, or you get like a fucking six-pack of natty light.

And you're like, you get some fucking trickster genie who fucks you. It's ridiculous, stupid genies. Here's the other thing too, though, Tom, and I want to remind people of this. I want to remind people of the Republican healthcare plan that never came to fruition because it never existed in the years that Trump was in office.

Oh, he got a great plan. Such a good plan. I'm going to tell you the plan. It was like his second day in office. He's like, yeah, I got a great plan. It's going to come out. And then four years later, there was nothing because they don't have any ideas. Their ideas are don't do that.

No, no, that's the right. That's not an idea. That's nothing. That's literally you could be replaced by a fucking by something by literally by A.I. that just says no. It's not even A.I. It's a computer program with like three lines of code. It's not even AI.

It's a computer program with like three lines of code. You could replace all of the Republicans in Congress with a magic eight ball where the little fucking thing in it has just been replaced with a thing that just says no, no matter how you turn it. Yeah, it's a coin that says, I don't think so.

And no, that's it. Yeah, that's what comes up. Heads I win, tails you lose. That's my coin. Yeah. They have no plan. They've never had a plan. And here's the thing.

Now that they're in charge of the purse strings, they can't go back on all the terrible rhetoric that they've been talking about. The American people that are on their side are, they don't know what they want because they don't understand, right? I'm not trying to be dismissive of a whole slew of voters, but there's a bunch of these people who literally don't understand, right? I'm not trying to be dismissive of a whole slew of voters, but there's a bunch of these people

who literally don't understand the simplest math of if it doesn't come in, you can't spend it. Like they just don't understand that. What they want is they want no government. But then the moment that they need government, they want as much government as possible.

Look at what happens during disasters. This is literally what happens. Every single disaster in a red state, they are begging for someone to come down and fix it. They want government. They only want it

when it fucking matters to them. It doesn't matter when it matters to everybody else. They can't think past their own fucking thick head. Yep. Yep. A thousand percent, man.

So like it's going to be exciting. I don't know what the word is, Cecil. It won't be boring to see what happens. If he doesn't yield, then it's going to be, it's going to be madness because they're not going to yield either. And it's going to be a bunch of people trying to say, well, you know, I mean, eventually it's just going to, it's just going to have to go into default. I don't know what happens because at this point, these people are too stupid to know what to do.

Yeah. And the thing is like the demand is an insane demand. Like the demand is an impossibility. The Republican demand of we got to keep social security and Medicare because they all, they all, Biden got them all to clap for it. Remember like Biden? So now they are like, okay, well, we're not touching entitlement, those, those major entitlement programs. So that's, that's off the table. Social security and Medicare off the table. We're going to keep that. We want to keep the Trump tax cuts because we sucked his dick so hard. We fucking have the taste of his fucking cum in our mouth for the rest of our lives. So we can't really go back on that either. So we got to keep that. Okay. So, and then we want to balance the budget because we've, it sounds like a thing you say. That's really the only reason. Balance the budget. Why? It sounds like what you're supposed

to say. Balance budgets are good. So, okay. We the budget. Why? It sounds like what you're supposed to say. Balance budgets are good. So, okay, we want that. All right, so what do you have to do? We have to cancel literally all other federal spending, like no exception. So no federal judges get paid. Like we're talking about 100% of all federal spending.

It would shut down. Congress wouldn't get paid. It's 100%. The military. Everything goes away. Then they're just like, all right, well, okay, so Biden, I guess, balls in your court. Biden can't yield to that. What is that? That's nothing. It's like a hostage demand where it's like, all right, I need you to send me a billion trillion gazillion golden coins. And you're like, that's not even a number. And I'm going to kill all the hostages. Right. I've already killed the hostages.

Please send me an impossible number of gold bullion. And the counteroffer, I'm going to predict this right now. The counteroffer that comes back from the Republicans cuts away anything, literally anything that helps a human being outside of the few things that they think are okay. So they're going to, and the thing is, is that they cut these tiny little programs, these tiny things that are insignificant to the rest of the budget, these tiny little programs that really only help like, like for instance, like school lunches, right? If you cut that out of the budget, you wouldn't see anything from it. It wouldn't matter. It wouldn't matter even in like probably one-tenth of one percent, right? It wouldn't matter at all in the grand scheme of the budget, but that'll be a thing

they go after. That type of thing. Any type of thing that they think that is in their sights, they're going to go after it. So imagine, of course they hate schools, so they're going to try to tear that budget apart. Any kind of money that goes to schooling gets torn apart. They're going to do this throughout the entirety of the government. If they sit down even and look at it, I don't even think they have enough attention span to do that. You know, it's amazing to me that we've come to this place in American political history, Cecil, where anybody is really anti-schools. I know, man. The Republicans weren't always anti-school.

Like, how the fuck are we anti-school? How are we anti-education? It was fucking W was no child left behind. That was one of his big programs, right? left behind that was one of his big right programs right education has always been one of those things that maybe we disagreed around the edges on but we didn't disagree that like it was a fundamentally good thing to have an educated populace right we didn't disagree about that but now we're getting to this place where we're saying like well it's not it's really not government's business to educate kids like yeah it fucking is like it's part of the goddamn social contract the idea that like education this

like very basic core value that like any responsible person should embrace in their own society it's that's a crazy fucking thing to like throw away because the result would be a less educated populace. Yeah. And a less educated populace is an inherently worse off populace. Like it's,

it's a, it is a society that will not be able to take care of itself. That will not be able to compete in the world. That will not be able to like fund itself.

Yeah. The idea that like we are at a place that has gotten this out of control is a little shocking. Yeah. It is a little shocking. Yeah. It never used to be like this. No, man, it's very different. You're right. It's very different. And it is, and it, and it is seriously like it's, it's like a movie. It's like that movie. I've never seen it, but I've heard about it at Idiocracy. It really is like that movie. It really very much is like that movie.

Yeah, man. I saw Idiocracy not that long ago, Cecil. First of all, it's actually worth watching. I thought it was much better than I anticipated it being. But in a lot of ways, I thought about this not that long ago. Idiocracy is better than the world we're in now. It really is.

Because in idiocracy, at the end, they realize their own errors. And they realize that they have to have smarter people be in charge of them. It ends where they actually solve a major problem. So it's a fantasy is what you're saying.

It's a fantasy. It's a fucking, in many ways, idiocracy is utopian by comparison to the fucking well we're sliding down. We've got a vaccine

for COVID now, but it's making some people have a cow. A crazy, crazy gaining force that should be for a horse. I just want to say real quick before we start this story. I'm super glad we're not on fucking YouTube because they would not be able to understand this next segment at all. And they would bounce us. They would give us a medical strike for it.

You're absolutely right because fucking YouTube kind of blows. From Vice, an ivermectin influencer died. Now his followers are worried about their own severe symptoms. You gotta read some of this. I think you gotta read some of this, Tom. Let me just read some of this. Yeah, you're right.

You're right. You're right. Just before 7 a.m. on March 3rd, Danny Lemoy posted an update in his hugely popular pro-ivermectin telegram group called Dirty Road Discussions. Here's what he wrote. Happy Fridayiday all you poisonous horse paste eating survivors hours later he was dead jesus christ are

you kidding me this motherfucker's been doing fucking horse paste we'll get to it in the story i'm gonna read the whole probably the whole story it's fucking short it's been fucking reading doing horse paste for years. So, uh, for the last, when you do horse pace, when you do horse pace, do you have to sniff it off of a mayor's ass? Is that how it works? You don't have to, but I mean, why would you do it any other way? Why would you do it any other way? Do it off a donkey's ass. You get kicked in the face. So I, I actually, I don't know if it was this story there was there were two ivermectin stories that both were related this week and i only put one of them in the notes for brevity but and i

don't remember if it's from this one or not cecil but one person who was like writing in on their little telegram group to ask questions they've been injecting it as paste they're fucking mainlining horse paste jesus christ what the shit that's a when you're when you look at a paste and you're like that would probably be better in my veins do they have to melt it down like heroin with a spoon and i guess maybe it doesn't go in their veins. Maybe they're not mainlining. Maybe it's like subcutaneous or like intramuscular or whatever. I don't know. But it still is like. You know.

What? Do you know how like horses have that hair? Instead of train spotting, it's main spotting. Main spotting. Anyway. But I'm. Horse train or spotting. It's not working. Anyway, okay. But I'm... But I'm... Horse train or... Decade.

It's not working. Anyway, go ahead. For the last decade, Lemoyne had taken a daily dose of veterinary ivermectin, a dewormer designed to be used on large animals like horses and cows. In 2021, as ivermectin became a popular alternative COVID-19 treatment among anti-vaxxers, he launched what became one of the largest telegram channels dedicated to promoting the use of it,

including instructions on how to administer ivermectin to children. Jesus Christ. To kids, dude. God. To kids. You take them to the chiropractor so they could break their neck

and then you just stuff their face in ivermectin. Stuff them full of fucking horse paste. God damn. The things that people do to kids and then you're just like, why can't we just take them? You didn't want them anyway.

Like you clearly didn't want them anyway. Why not just shake the shit out of them when they're littler? No kidding. Like why are you torturing them like this? It's outrageous when you hear the stories about what people do, how they fucking withhold medical care

or fucking make up their own medical care. And you're just like, what are you doing, man? Yep. Yep. This story is fucking average. Despite Lemoy's death, the administrators of his channel are pushing his misinformation, even as his followers share their own worrying side effects from taking ivermectin and question the safety of the drug.

Lemoy, a heavy equipment operator who lived in Foster, Rhode Island. Are you allowed to operate heavy equipment under the influence of mectin? You get your horse pace and it just says do not operate heavy equipment. Just picturing some cow behind a fucking

bulldozer like... What? He has to pee in a cup every couple weeks and they're just like we can't even tell what's in your system there's clearly

something in but we don't know what it is do you have any human pee sir do you have any human urine in you he whips out his cock

and it's like the size of his arm cause he's taking all the horse piss he's got this fucking giant horse dog he's got a horse cock yeah not all the side effects are bad you know i i actually feel great but my wife won't let me stop taking this stuff every time i say i'm gonna stop she says nay

hey i don't know what my job is, but I am a heavy equipment operator. You know what I mean? See, now this is why we're kicked off. This is why we'd be kicked off YouTube because they'd think that we're honestly saying that ivermectin gives you a horse cock. Horse dick, right? Okay, but I am saying, just so we're clear, because we're not on YouTube, so I can say whatever I want.

I am saying that I think that veterinarian ivermectin will probably give you a horse dick. I do think that that probably happens. Here's what I think, Tom. I think it'll give you a horse heart. I think it'll give you a horse fucking voice while you croak out your last words. That ain't a good thing.

A horse heart is not a good thing. Not a good thing. No. No. It's fucking galloping all the time. Also, just one other thing. Like, if somebody's giving you medical advice, and this is no shot at heavy equipment operators, right?

Like, that's great. That's your job. But if somebody is giving you medical advice and they're just some jamoke, that's not your guy. That's just not your fucking guy. You might as well get your fucking medical advice from a podcast then, if that's the case, right?

Don't get your medical advice. Here's a tip to everybody, right? To everybody out there. Don't get your medical advice from anybody but a medical professional that is currently in the industry working, period. That's it. That's who you should go to for you.

Talk to your doctor. Have a doctor. Don't be like, I can cure everything by rubbing dirt on it and sniffing horse glue or whatever. Like that's not how you, don't do that. Go see a doctor.

Like we've, like we fucking went out of our way to like learn about the human body so we could help prevent problems. Like figure it out. Just go see a doctor. And if you don't like that one go find a new one but just keep going to see a fucking doctor man like i get not every doctor

is the same quality doctor right like so you may need to find somebody that like understands you and your needs and you're like that's fine but you know what it's not a fucking heavy equipment operator on fucking telegram no it's not that's not your guy that's not and the other thing it's not is cecil if anybody is proposing one medicine or treatment or modality and it solves and it's like everything ridiculous like laundry list it's a panacea fuck you It's not real. Yeah, exactly. Like, oh, you know what? Ivermectin will help with your asthma and your autism

and your... That's shitty real. No, it won't. No, it won't. Nope. Absolutely not. Go fuck yourself forever. Yeah.

Forever. If you're tempted to poke around on fucking Telegram or fucking Instagram, any of the grams, if it's a gram of any kind, of any kind, you're in the wrong fucking place. Yep. Yep. And to piggyback off your comment,

I don't care if they're a doctor of something else, right? A PhD in something, right? Let's say they have a PhD in fucking engineering. Doesn't matter. It literally doesn't matter how much schooling they have. I don't care how much they could have fucking six PhDs that aren't an MD. Don't listen to them. Don't listen to them. Yeah, man. Neil deGrasse. I would not let Neil deGrasse Tyson run my fucking medical care. Right. Not because he's not brilliant. He's fucking brilliant, but he doesn't know fuck all about medicine. Right. Like that's not his fucking job it's not his education like we do that thing where we're like well he's really fucking smart you're like who

cares yeah who fucking cares that's not the qualification that you should be looking for right like you should be looking for specificity yep and experience god damn fucking ivermectin people all right so this fucking heavy equipment operator he dies unexpectedly on march 3rd according to an online obituary he was survived by his parents and brother the obituary obituary gave no details about the cause of his death gave no details about the cause of his death in the telegram channel administrators broke the news of his death to his followers quote though it was obvious that danny had the biggest heart it was unbeknownst to him that his heart was quite literally overworking and overgrowing beyond its capacity nearly doubled in size from what it should have been

the admins wrote adding we understand this is going to raise questions for those who are following him and it's like yeah man also maybe wasn't. Because there was no cause of death listed in his obituary. And like, how the fuck do you know? How the fuck does the administrator of the telegram know that he had a fucking heart like the fucking Grinch had just like saved Whoville? You know, and it got like three sizes too big or whatever. How the fuck do we know yeah you're just reading shit on telegram yeah that could also just not be true you're absolutely right that's the thing that makes me crazy like yeah oh yeah how'd he die i don't know i'll tell

you what i do know from like having known people cecil who have had autopsies to determine a cause of death you don't get it back in a week or two yeah an autopsy to determine a cause of death, you don't get it back in a week or two. Yeah. An autopsy to determine a cause of death very frequently takes 6, 8, 12 weeks before you get the results. Because of the toxicology report probably, right? Because it takes a while to get that shit from the lab, et cetera. It's just not really a big priority unless there's something to prioritize.

Lots of people die. People are overworked. Your corpse goes in a queue, dude. And that's just something to prioritize. Lots of people die. People are overworked. Your corpse goes in a queue, dude. And that's just how it works. Like they'll fucking cool you down, freeze you up. Like, it's not like you see on TV where it's like died on Tuesday

and someone's cutting the fucking chest open Tuesday night. And like by Wednesday morning, you've got your fucking path report. Like I've known several people who've died and like it's taken months to get a autopsy report. Month've known several people who've died, and it's taken months to get an autopsy report. Months. Sure.

So, whatever. The fucking admins probably just made that up. The admins added that Lemoy had undergone testing on his heart last year, but the results had shown no cause for concern. Lemoy began taking the version of ivermectin designed for animals on a daily basis in 2012 after he was diagnosed with

lyme disease according to a detailed account of his medical history he gave on his own podcast again you have to believe again you have to believe that though like right it's right it's his own medical so if he's trying to push ivermectin recently he might not have been taking it since then who the fuck knows sure right exactly exactly that it's like we talked about on our and if you guys get a chance to listen to our last episode, which we did a deep dive, there's literally no reason to believe anecdotal personal stories you read online. Like you could watch here. This is because it's this easy. I've actually been taking ivermectin for 15 years myself. I take ivermectin horse paste

and I use it as a fitness supplement. And it's part of how I lost weight and, you know, have started to get much more fit. I take ivermectin. I rub it in my eyes personally because I find it penetrates the mucous membrane of my eyes. And I do squirt a tube up my ass. The crazy thing is, is that my horse, my teeth are the size of fucking chiclets now. They're like horse teeth. It's amazing. Anybody can say anything. Yeah. Anybody can say anything. Yeah. Anybody

can say anything. Yeah. No, I get it. And like, here's the thing about this whole fucking deal. You were absolutely right about the panacea, but like, man, when did ivermectin shift into that fucking mode? I know. This is crazy person talk, right? And why on earth did it shift past hydroxychloroquine, which was the first COVID cure? Like, I don't get why it shifted past this. Why is this medicine, which is for a very specific thing, the thing that these people are latching onto? And is it because, you know, Trump said at one time,

what is happening with our collective consciousness that this sort of thing grabs hold of people so deep that they will take it until they die, until they kill themselves. And then, Tom, you'll have to read some of the fucking side effects that some of these people are having. Quote, Danny was fully convinced

that his heart had regenerated after his incident with Lyme disease that almost ended in congestive heart failure, their admins wrote, before claiming that, quote, a family history of heart disease and chronic stress were congestive heart failure, their admins wrote, before claiming that, a family history of heart disease and chronic stress were why his heart

had ultimately become engorged. All of his other organs were unremarkable, the admins wrote, and this was determined to be a death by unfortunate natural causes. The admins of Lemoy's channel

did not respond to Vice News' questions about where they got any of their information about his death. Lemoy's surviving family did not respond to Vice's news requests

for comment on the cause of his death. So they're just like did not respond to Vice's news requests for comment on the cause of his death. So they're just like, I just fucking made it up. Yeah. So here's what people are saying. Other people were following the fucking ivermectin protocol.

I'm four months now and all hell's breaking loose. All pain has hit my waist down. All pain has hit my waist down with sciatic shin splints, restless leg syndrome, tight, sore calves, and it feels like some pain

in my bones, a member wrote on Friday. Lemoy explained away those negative side effects of taking veterinary ivermectin by describing them as herxing, a real term used to describe an adverse response that occurs in people who take antibiotics as a treatment for Lyme disease. Here's what another member wrote. My wife has been taking ivermectin for three months. She's being treated for autoimmune hepatitis, thyroid, and vertebra issues. She's had some serious herxing. Today, she has a migraine, vomiting, and severe stomach pain. Does anyone have any ideas on how to help?

Are these herxing symptoms? Don't ask a fucking Telegram channel that question. What is wrong with you? This is the person you love. Why would you turn to Telegram to be like, hey, I'd like to crowdsource this information. This isn't fucking who wants to be a millionaire. You're not phoning a friend.

Get a doctor, man. What the fuck is happening? It's, oh, you know what? I got to go to that Instagram channel that is run by a heavy equipment operator. Jesus Christ. Who takes horse paste. What the fuck, man? That's my guy.

That's where I'll's my guy. That's what's where I'll find my answers. We're just crowdsourcing it. Like, I mean, like there's a bunch of yahoos in this channel that are going to tell you something and you're like, it's fucking worthless. You might as well ask your cat. You know, there is, and it's interesting Cecil, because there is a crowdsourcing methodology for getting diagnoses of complicated stuff that crowdsources only to doctors. Haley and I actually used it. It's actually really interesting.

You can pay money and you can go online and you can put in the problem that you're having and then it will actually crowdsource your issues only to other medical professionals because sometimes multiple minds are better than one, right? Absolutely. I won't disagree. Not multiple random minds, which is your point, right? Not like, well, let's ask like

the fucking secretary of the PTA and the heavy equipment operator and Tom, the podcast guy and Joe, the real estate agent. Like, what are they? Like, they don't know. They don't know. They don't know.

Even if they have limited personal experience that anecdotally connects to yours, that is that is nothing more than to be said. Like that has no more value than to say like, all right, I found that interesting. Now I need to go talk to an actual doctor about it. Like it can be step one to talk to family and friends and like be like, oh, my mom also has a history of these issues. And when they came up for her, the doctor said it was X and I have these issues and I'm going to talk to my doctor about it. But if you skip that second half where you go talk to the doctor, you're just making shit up. This is how you end up with a fucking ass full of horse paste.

It's literally a useless information. And this isn't just for medical information, right? Like, so imagine you had a room full of these people, these exact same people that were on signal, right? Take them all, put them in a room, and then turn to them and be like, what do you guys think Foucault meant when he was talking about birth of the clinic?

What do you think, you know, like what's going to happen? Do you think that they're going to have a smart, intelligent answer for something they have no fucking idea about? Right? I read that book and I have no idea about it. So like, what do you think they're going to elucidate to you? Just think for two seconds, man. These are just random people.

And it literally, it could be a random smattering of people with a range of IQs and a range of professions and a range of everything, ethnicities, et cetera. It doesn't matter. But it doesn't mean that they're going to have an answer for you if they don't have a very specific skill set of knowledge. That's what they need. That's the only fucking qualification that you need to answer that question. And if nobody in that room has it, you might as well talk to the wall. It's literally useless information. I cannot believe we live in a time where people have access to medical care that is life-saving across, like in many places, I'm not saying across the globe, because I know there's places in the world where you don't get

it, but there's a lot of countries in the world that have amazing medical care and we throw it away. Like, would you crowdsource a broken arm? Would you crowdsource that? You wouldn't do it. You would go to the ER. They only do it for certain things. Yeah, well, you know,

do you remember the show Car Talk? Yeah. Like, people would call in and they'd be like, all right, you know, I got a fucking 83 GMC Sierra and when I put it in park, it goes, ker-tunk-a-tunk-a-tunk-a-punk. And they'd be like all right you know i got a fucking 83 gmc sierra and when i put it in park it goes and they'd be like laugh but they were dudes that knew cars they were mechanics

yeah like they'd spent years it wasn't like car talk was not a show where you called and said my gmc sierra from 1983 goes and it's like some fucking realtor on the other end of the phone and they're just like well uh i want that uh yeah yeah right yeah we don't ask random people to opine on other important issues when i want to do my taxes i get a fucking cpa yeah right i don't go to fucking burger king and be like hey man do you guys know how to do my taxes? Because they would be like, no man, we make fucking Whoppers. It says home of the Whopper. It does not say anything about your fucking taxes.

And even if I'm like, well, I can have it my way, and my way would be you did my taxes. You did my taxes too. That's not how it works. The fuck? The fuck? Like, my fucking whole body hurts. Admittedly, Tom,

somebody at Burger King probably knew that the CSV was downloadable. I was gay when you punched me. In a weird way, it might have been homophobic not to punch you just because you were gay.

Right. So, see, so this story comes from Salon and the headline grabbed my attention. I don't, I don so this story comes from Salon, and the headline grabbed my attention. I don't typically do Salon commentaries, but the headline did grab my attention. Quote,

I need a woman who looks like she got punched. End quote. Republicans become more openly pro-abuse. I need a woman who looks like she got punched. So saith a recent hire by representative Matt Gaetz. Andrew Kloster, as Roger Sollinger of the Daily Beast reported, this self-proclaimed raging misogynist is hardly some random troll that famously provocative Gaetz picked up off of Twitter. Kloster denounced sexual consent as a pernicious fetish and argued

that, quote, Natalie Portman should have stayed 11 years old. Kloster is also a member of the Federalist Society, the GOP pipeline for their far right federal court judges. He worked for the Donald Trump administration and was once a clerk at the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. He's worked with religious right groups like the Heritage Foundation, while also tweeting, quote, if you don't defend child pornographers, then we are only one step away from Nazism. What? This is a dude who is not just, this is not like some fucking shit posting fucking shit lord troll. This is a guy who's got a bigger, better, more important, more influential job than

you and I have, Cecil. Yeah. This is a guy with power. And this is the kind of power, this is the kind of shit that a guy with this kind of power is doing with it right now. What does he even mean by that headline? I don't even understand what that means. Do you know what that means? I don't know.

I have no idea. It's not... It's a quote! It's a quote. He said that out loud! It's not fully contextualized in this article, so I don't know. But, like, the headline grabbed me, and I did think about that, Cecil,

because I don't know what it's from. But, like, that's never something to say. This is supposed to be, like I said, this is supposed to be somebody who's a serious guy. This is not somebody with a shock jock talk show. This isn't somebody who's just trolling for lulz. This is a guy who was clerking for the fucking Seventh Circuit Court. This is a guy who was clerking for the fucking Seventh Circuit court. This is a guy who sits on the Federalist Society. This is a guy who will help shape policy if he gets an opportunity. This is a guy who will be taken seriously by the entire right wing. And this is a guy who's talking about some of the most horrifyingly misogynist and vitriolic shit I've ever heard because I think we've gotten

to a point and Roe, the overturning of Roe has made this possible. I think you're right. Where we've gotten to a point where now we can all say it out loud. Yep. You can attack women and that's okay. Yep. Yep. And now misogyny, which is something that for a long time, I think, which is something that for a long time, I think, was being frowned upon, at least in the open, right? The same way that racism was not really, in polite circles, racism was not allowable. It still was certainly very much institutionalized. I'm not saying it wasn't. And the same is true of misogyny.

But we were trying to, I think socially, we were pushing that shit to the margins and to the fringe. Yeah. And now it's becoming mainstreamed again. And it's becoming mainstreamed in these really like out and open and aggressive ways where we're just coming out and saying like, yeah, women should just look like they've been punched. We should get rid of the age of consent. Consent itself is a pernicious fantasy or pernicious fetish.

What the fuck? I think you're right too, because I think what happens is that when it is in the mainstream that this is not an acceptable way to treat people, right? When it is in the mainstream that you're showing that racism is small-minded, petty, stupid, and useless, and not something that a normal, regular, well-adjusted person should be doing. It changes our public opinion in a big way and makes it so it has to find its home on the fringes. It can't last and can't stay in the light.

So it has to retreat. It has to retreat because it's rejected, right? You know, you go into a place where, you know, once in a while where someone will say something racist and the more that it's pushed out of the open, the less even in private situations, it becomes acceptable.

And so it becomes more, it becomes less and less acceptable. But once you start opening up these gates and you start taking rights away from people, specifically talking about with Roe, you start taking rights away from women, suddenly become less than. hate women to continue and bring that, drag that right out into the mainstream and make it so that women hating, you know what I mean? Like you're going back to the fifties, like you're going back to before the before times, like, and granted the fifties is not that long ago, but still it's a very long time ago from now it's 80 years ago. So it's like, or 70 years ago. I don't know. I don't do math very well. I'm like an American. But in any case, I'm, you know, fucking, you're looking at a 70 years ago thing and it's within human lifespan

away. But at the same time, it feels like a long time ago. And when you talk about, you know, the simple, terrible comedy of just making fun of a woman because she's a woman, like it's shockingly, shockingly unfunny, but look at all the people now that are on the right, that that's their fucking joke. That's their joke. That's, that's what they think is funny. I mean, I saw, who did I see? That was that fucking Andrew Tate was arguing with a guy on Twitch by the name of Hassan. And I watched this video where Hassan came on, was just like, because Tate was talking,

he was like, women are worse drivers. And I don't know, if you have ever been in a car with a woman, you know that she's the worst driver. And he's like, well, that's just factually not true. And here's my data to back that up.

It's factually not true that women are worse drivers. Here's why it's not true. And then he started like listing off like insurance data for the, you know, women is lower cost than it is for men.

You know, like there's like a bunch of reasons like they get in less accidents. They do this, it's like blah, blah, blah, blah. And his, and all Tate could do was offer anecdotes, right?

Well, every time I get into a car, I drive. And so that's, if I drive more, then there's a better chance of me getting into an accident. He's like, but that's not,

he's like, just because you said it doesn't mean it's true for everybody. And there was this fight. But the thing is, is like Andrew Tate has a huge following of people who follow him and listen to him and think that's funny, right?

They think that's hilarious. Like, ha, ha, ha. Here's the thing that he said. And so like, this is a common thing that's happening now. And this is, that's only part of this article. There's a, like this is a common thing that's happening now. And this is, that's only part of this article.

There's a ton of other stuff that they talk about in this article, you know, specifically talking about abortion. And they're talking about how in certain states they're starting to look at it like we are going to

basically charge people with murder if they're involved in an abortion. Yeah. Like one thing that, that occurred, like two things that occurred to me is like when, when the misogynists get a win, just like when the racists get a win, right. It emboldens them. Sure. It teaches them that like, and, and make no mistake, the repeal of Roe, the, the overturning, I shouldn't say repeal, the overturning of Roe

by the radical right Supreme Court is absolutely a win for misogynists. And so they see this and they think they're emboldened by that win because they're looking and they're saying, okay, now I know that the institutions of power grant me access and authority to spread my message with impunity, that my message, that there will be corners of the world where my message is not only welcome, but will be amplified and well-received by the halls of power. And so when you give misogynists and racists, when you give them a win, you create more space for them. You blow air into that fire. Every time you give them a win, you blow air. And so once you've dehumanized somebody a little bit, like, I really think that like for most people to be, and I think about, think about these words, like to be, to be human or to be not human, to be human or to be dehumanized, it's a binary thing. You can't strip somebody a little bit of their humanity. You strip somebody of their humanity

a little bit and you strip them completely of their humanity. And so when you dehumanize somebody a little bit, you've created a binary situation where now I don't have to think of you as human. I get to think of you as something other

than fully human. And as soon as I can think of you in one way as less than fully human, that allows me to think of you in any other way that I want as less than fully human. It's like to think of you in any other way that I want as less than fully human. It's like, I know that sounds like slippery slope, but sometimes slippery slope isn't

a fallacy. Sometimes it's a strategy. And in this case, it is absolutely a strategy of misogynists to oppress women. To your point about like Andrew Tate, it occurs to me that like, To your point about like Andrew Tate, it occurs to me that like one of the things that's happening, I think, socially is there is a conflation of that which is designed to be funny being conflated with what's true. So guys like Andrew Tate, they're trying to say things that are funny. And the audience that listens, if it was funny and if they laugh that makes it feel more true and so the message is sort of like a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down right like it's this bitter bitter bitter fucking medicine of racism and misogyny and all this horrible shit but it's like we'll sprinkle a little bit of this humor and i don't think it's funny but obviously other people like, we'll sprinkle a little bit of this humor. Now, I don't think it's funny, but obviously other people do, right? They'll sprinkle a little bit

of humor across the top of that, and it helps that fucking bitter medicine go down, and soon we are poisoning ourselves, and we're doing it fucking laughing, dude. We are poisoning ourselves with a smile right now with the Andrew Tate troll shit. We are watching our world get worse by the hour with this poisonous fucking messaging. And then all of that, again, it cycles back into the halls of power. In South Carolina, they introduced a bill and the introduction of that bill would redefine a person legally, would redefine a person as any fertilized egg, basically. The moment of conception, any fertilized egg. And so an abortion would then be, by every statutory definition, murder. And in South Carolina, a murder of a person under the age of 11 is eligible for the death penalty. And it's a very intentional, when they redefine these words, they redefine these terms, they do that in order to create space to put women in jail.

do that to create space and to create institutions and halls of power that allow men to put, because I want to say it's like, they allows men to put women in jail. It allows men to put women in prison for their fucking healthcare. Yeah. Holy shit. Yeah. How are we here? It's, there's an interesting schism that's happening around abortion. Because when you look at abortion publicly, when you look at the public approval of abortion care, and then you start hearing these stories of these women who they can't get an abortion in some of these states where their fetus is dead or it will live like a second before it dies. And normally that wouldn't be, no one in the world would think that's an abortion that's like an evil whatever. You know what I mean? I don't know how to phrase this in a way that doesn't sound like an asshole. But I know what you're saying. But there's a group of people who hate all abortions, but even they would go, you know what, in this case,

that's not an abortion, that child's dead, or that child is- Some kind of compassionate exception. Exactly, right? So there's even to like rabid anti-abortion people, there's still some leeway. Now I'm saying there are some that 100% agree with this rule,

and they happen to be, some of these people happen to be in government, and they've passed these very rigid rules. And now women are feeling the brunt of some of this stuff. But these are constituents to people in red states and they start getting complaints and they start hearing about it. We saw the change of heart of that one guy.

It wasn't really a change of heart. It was him just saying something and then he never actually changed his heart. He wound up fucking like being absent for a vote or something. I don't know if you remember this, but there was a guy from one of these local areas that was like talking, oh my gosh, I finally realized

after a second, after being actually hearing stuff that women suffer under this law and now I'm very sad that I voted for it, but he never actually did anything to change that. It was just a big, like, he just said that in a speech. There's a bunch of fucking crocodile tears because the moment he had an opportunity to vote again,

he abstained from the vote. He just said something, yeah. But in any case, you know, you see this, you see this schism starts to open up because there are people in government in these different places that are starting to push back because they're starting to create not just one law that's like, okay, well, Roe versus Wade was a little lax. We're going to come down on the

weeks or whatever. No, they're like, no, it's not allowed. And even if you're sick and you're bleeding out, it doesn't matter. We're not going to give you that kind of care. And in fact, now we're going to go after the day after pill, which is used for other things. We're going to take that away from you. And we're going to go after this other time. You know what I mean? So they're just going to start going after all these other things. And it's starting to create this little schism. Now it's a small party, but they're going to realize, I think, as they start seeing poll numbers come back, because we've seen it on the ballot in different places, that the Republicans are wrong about the popularity of this particular legislation. They are wrong about it. Most Americans want this kind of care.

And every place you put it, it doesn't matter. It could be the reddest red state. They still want this kind of care. And this is their one thing that I think some of the smarter Republicans are realizing, this is a loser for us. We're going to lose. We appeased a small group and we're going to lose because of this. You know, I hope you're right. I have this weird fear that I don't know how to like, I don't know where it comes from and it may just be nothing. But I have this weird fear that the right has for so long traded on a language and a platform of anti-abortion that even though people, even though the numbers say that more people, overwhelmingly more people want some amount of access to this kind of care, right? to this kind of care, right? Even though that is,

part of me thinks that that narrative though, that like language, that like fiery speech is still weirdly appealing even to the people who, it's almost like the content and the form of the speech in some ways feel like different to me.

I can honestly see people who don't want to see, you know, women actually go to jail, still vote for these guys because like they have for so many years in their churches and in other parts of the sort of national rhetoric, they have been a part of this sort of like speech bubble, this speech silo. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. Like it's like, it's so embedded at some point into the sort of like culture of the right that, that I wonder how it will play. I hope that it will absolutely play out that all these fucking radicalists

end up getting fucking out on their ass and that the Republicans figure out this is a losing fucking strategy and they walk away from it and that the blue, the Democrats pick this up as their own wedge issue and say, look, look at what they've done. They had a moment of, they had a one moment. We let these guys one moment, we let them have the Supreme court and look what they've done with it. Yeah. Yeah. I think too, you know, when I first heard this law, I wondered if it was one of those troll laws where you put something in place because you brought it to the logical conclusion. Because I feel like if you bring this to the logical conclusion of what they want, you're talking about, you know, it's literally a nothing right after conception. You wouldn't be able to find it.

It's a nothing. It's a pencil tip. It's the tiniest thing. You wouldn't know whether it's alive or not. It's not visible to the human eye. You wouldn't know. And so you're at this point where you're like, okay, you know, you have, you didn't think about this. You didn't think about this in this sense.

We're going to bring this to the most ridiculous level. And then maybe you'll think about it. Maybe that'll wake you up. Maybe that'll be like, oh, you know what? Maybe we do need a sort of Roe-like system where there's protections at a certain point, but underneath this point, it's really not a thing. And we should just be okay with it underneath a certain amount of weeks. We should be okay with it, which is what Roe was. You know, it was like, there's protections at a certain point. You can make laws at a certain point. But underneath, really, we shouldn't be like fucking with that too much. They, you know, I think that a lot of Americans,

even though they were complaining, were fine with Roe v. Wade and how it set that and how it was the precedent in the land. And I think bringing it to that logical conclusion was going to be something that would wake people up, not get like 23 people to sign on and co-sponsor it. I know, man. And some of them, some of them, when they were pressed on it, to be fair, they backed away from co-sponsoring the bills. There were some people that were like, that's what I'm saying.

There's a little schism that's opening up, but it's not, it's not all of them. Yeah, no, you know, it's not all of them. And like we,

I, I would not be shocked. I really wouldn't be if there were states in this country that, that went to a place where getting an abortion were a legitimately like criminally prosecutable act of murder. And like you were talking about, like on day one, you were talking about something that is a tenth of a millimeter. Yeah.

A tenth of a millimeter. That's fucking absurd you're gonna kill with a death penalty you're gonna kill a living breathing fully actualized woman over something that is a tenth of a millimeter in diameter that is an absurdity that like but but there are there are people who again just like our last thing, like there are people who are sort of like, quote unquote, very serious people, important people, people with power and authority. That's why they're very serious. They're like, yeah, 100%. Let's do it.

Yeah. Let's scare the fuck out of women. Yeah. Let's keep moving. Like punch them. Punch them. Just fucking punch them. They should look like they've been punched.

Yeah. Florida man. So Florida man, are we ever going to see a headline that's good that has the phrase a Florida man? This story comes from CBS News. Ukraine invites Ron DeSantis to visit after Florida governor calls war a territorial dispute. Wow. There's an understatement. Yeah.

Yeah. Like, I mean, sure. Yeah. yeah i mean it's not a territorial dispute technically he's right it is a territorial dispute it just happens to be you know you have a territorial dispute when someone invades your country that's what happens like yeah aren't all wars of conquest territorial disputes like when yeah when Germany invaded Poland that was a territorial dispute right Poland was like I am disputing your invasion of me and Germany was like and I

am disputing that you're not Germany now like that's a territorial dispute yeah like what what do you fucking and this is important because all indications are that DeSantis is now he hasn't announced officially yeah but he's touring Iowa and he's bouncing around. He is going

to run. Like, DeSantis is absolutely going to run in 2024 for, he's going to primary Donald, right? That is absolutely going to happen. So far, the only primary challenger that's announced is Nikki Haley. But DeSantis is giving every education

that he is going to run. He's going to primary Donald. So he's potentially very powerful, like way more powerful than even just being the governor of Florida. And he's looking at the situation in Ukraine and being like, this is really just like a little real estate squabble.

He has to do it. Because here's why he has to do it. Even though other Republicans rebuked him for saying this, right? Lindsey Graham, couple others were like, you don't know what the fuck you're talking about. You're saying some dumb shit. Even though that's the case, the people that will vote for Donald Trump,

he needs to get those people. He needs to excite those people. Donald Trump has said some dumb shit for a long time. Or, you know, in some ways, maybe he just knows where his fucking bread is buttered, right? I don't know. I don't know about Donald. I don't know exactly how he got his wealth

or how connected he is to Russian oligarchs. But I will say that he certainly has been, since he's talked and opened his mouth in the last several years, very pro-Russia. And so the fact is, is that Donald has to say certain things and the people who follow him eat up literally everything he says. And so you have to follow his crazy. You have to take his crazy and embrace his crazy or else the people who follow him will not choose you. And so he has to embrace all the crazy Donald Trump has done over the past four years.

I don't know if that's a good or a bad thing. I think throughout history we've seen Donald Trump is a fucking gigantic liar and he's done crazy self-interested stuff. And he's done crazy self-interested stuff. So what you have to do is embrace a bunch of self-interested stuff that Trump did as if it were official policy. I don't know how that works. Yeah, I don't know if there is something about being a right-wing populist asshole that also makes you a stooge of Putin. I don't know. Maybe.

Yeah. But it seems like they all are it seems like all of them are absolutely fucking putin stooges like they're it's just like there's like tucker carlson yeah is absolutely a right-wing populist asshole governor desantis is a right-wing populist asshole trump and like and they're all all these guys all of these guys are like absolutely fucking Russian apologists yeah they're Russian apologists in a war that really couldn't be much more morally clear sure like there are very few times where like these sort of like political territorial disputes let's call them I don't know for lack of a better term these territorial disputes, let's call them. I don't know, for lack of a better term. These territorial disputes where they are more like clear cut that like, yeah, Russia should not have invaded a sovereign nation.

They should not have invaded and should not be like fucking firing hypersonic missiles at civilian targets. Like that's fucking, this is like pretty fucking clear moral territory. Yeah. fucking this is like pretty fucking clear moral territory yeah and because it's so clear it is all the more striking when these fucking populist dickheads end up on the wrong side of history on that's such a weird space man we've talked about before it's insane that the right that worshipped ronald reagan for how many years and Ronald Reagan was the guy who led America. He was the fucking cold war hero of American history. That's what's a huge part of

why the right loved him, right? Is that Ronald Reagan in their minds helped America win the Cold War against Russia. And now, the right wing of the same party is like pro-Russia. And I'm like, your wrinkly-ass fucking hero would be turning over in his fucking grave right now. This is crazy talk. I think the Republican Party is unrecognizable.

I think they would make a distinction between the USSR and Russia, though. I think their Republican Party is unrecognizable. I think they would make a distinction between the USSR and Russia though. I think their argument would be, well, it's not the same country. Now it's a country that agrees with us or whatever essentially is what they would say. They would make something up, even though we shouldn't be allowing any country

to invade another country, right? You shouldn't be like, hey man, that's okay to do. Like, that's not how this works. I mean, even though we've done it a bunch of times, like a bunch of times. Yeah, we were wrong and we did it. Of course, we were 100% wrong. We were terribly wrong and we did it.

I mean, not according to Hitchens, but according to other people, we were not wrong. Yeah. I just think that there's another schism though in the party. This is another one of those things because there's clearly people in the Republican Party

that are pro-Ukraine. And so those people now have to fight because the only reason you would be anti-Ukraine is if you're a Trump supporter, right? That's the only reason. And they have to court that crowd in order to handle this. And so like, there's a weird schism here. And the same thing goes for other things where there's starting to be these schisms in the Republican

Party. It's weird because we haven't seen that before. For all my adult life, the Republican Party has been a monolith. They have made their decisions together and they have stuck to those decisions. Terrible as they are, they've made those decisions and stuck with those decisions. And now we're starting to see cracks where different portions of the party are fighting with each other over big issues. And I think that's heartening to me, is that amplify those voices. Make sure the loudest voices in this are the people who are anti and pro-Ukraine, but they're Republican voices. Make those the loudest voices

to drive that wedge as hard as you can. Drive that wedge, split Trump off. You know, I had Eli on the show a couple of weeks ago and he had a really interesting point. He brought up the fact that Donald Trump, if he leaves office, if he doesn't win this particular primary, he's the perfect candidate to run third party. Now, we did get some mail that said if you lose the primary as a Republican in some states, they won't even let you on the ballot.

You can't get on the ballot if you can't run. You can't run third party if you lose a primary. So if you primary for them. third party if you lose a primary. So if you primary for them. So that would mean that he would hear that ahead of time. And he would just say, if he doesn't look like he's going to win, he would just jump third party. He would just say, fine, I won't run then. I will be third party. And so I think, you know, there'll be some of that, that, that has to be made clear. I don't know which states and how many states, but I did get a message from someone who said in one state for sure, they can't do that. And so, you know, so, so, but, but a really interesting point is that

Trump is the kind of guy and the perfect candidate, a guy who was fine with the government being overthrown to run third party and running third party is an absolute nail in the coffin for anybody who runs Republican, anybody doesn't matter, nail in the coffin. And I, Republican. Anybody. It doesn't matter. Nail in the coffin. And I don't disagree with that. I think it's not only possible, but bordering on likely that we will see the formation of a MAGA party, and then that will split Congress, right? Because certain idiots in Congress will leave the Republican Party and they will join the MAGA party. I read something that was so fucking weird because I couldn't disagree with it

and I hated myself for not being able to disagree with it. But like Mitch McConnell last week fell down and like bumped his head. Yeah. And he got a concussion. Yeah. And at first I was like, and then he woke

up and he's like, I like Donald Trump. But I read something and said like, that motherfucker's 81 and we should be scared of a world without Mitch McConnell in it. Because Mitch McConnell in many ways is still one of the most important figures in politics, still one of the most important figures in politics still one of the most important and clever figures in the republican party and as evil and he is as evil as mitch mcconnell is he is still better than the troll party that is waiting behind him and if you strip away this sort of like and i don't even believe i'm going to say this if you strip away this sort of like, and I don't even believe I'm going to say this. If you strip away the civilizing force of Mitch McConnell, what you're left with is a, it's fucking monkeys with wings,

dude. It's fucking winged monkeys. Who is it? And that's the entire, and those people are in. Yeah. It's chaos. Who picks them?

Cause I can't think of anybody on the other side that I'm like, yeah, it's that guy. I'm like, no, none of them come to mind. And there's nobody to keep those guys in check. Yeah. There's nobody to keep the most radical members of the party in check. I mean, look at Kevin McCarthy is falling apart at that job

because he doesn't, he can't control that group that really just hamstrings him. And there's too many of them and he's got to appease all the things they want. And so he has to deal. And it's a fucking mess because of those people. Guys, McCarthy's got no power.

If Mitch McConnell goes, and he will go, he's 81. Yeah. Like, what is right behind him? I don't know, man. Scarier. That's scarier. How are we in a world where I'm like, man, I kind of hope Mitch McConnell

doesn't bump his head again. I was like initially so happy when he bumped his head. I was like, great news. I hope it hurts all the time. I hope he has those like cluster fucking headaches. Yeah, like I've erected headache. Yeah, right.

Like I just do because I hate him. I think he's done irreparable damage to people in this country. Irreparable damage. You're absolutely right. I truly do. Like, we would not have the Supreme Court we have. Women would still have rights. You're right. If we didn't have

Mitch McConnell. You're right. So, like, I do genuinely wish him nothing but the worst. He's a monster of a human being. And as much as I do truly believe that in my heart, I'm also like, holy shit, right behind him, it's worse. Hang on, man. I know.

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