Cognitive Dissonance - Episode 820: Elon Musk Is President

Episode Date: February 10, 2025

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Transcript
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Starting point is 00:02:15 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 mat today is Wednesday, February the fifth. I think we're back to a time where every day counts. I know, right? Can you imagine how much things are going to change between now and Monday when this releases? Oh, Oh, we're essentially recording this podcast in like a land of irrelevance. Yeah. We might as well be tweeting it out from the Titanic.
Starting point is 00:02:53 We used to like talk about this 24 hour news cycle. Now we have like a 24 minute news cycle. It's insane, dude. Every time I open like one of my news apps, I'm like, well, that's a fresh hell. I don't even know what to do. It's so bad. Every day is the worst. So bad.
Starting point is 00:03:07 The only upside is that we can soon book our vacation to the Middle East Riviera. And that, Cecil, is a thing that was said out loud yesterday. Can I just say how angry all of that makes me? I mean, I'm just so fucking furious. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, if they if they actualize this and So far He's fucking doing everything. He's the thing is like I'm not gonna I told you so I promised myself
Starting point is 00:03:36 I wouldn't do that, but I'm gonna say this once right now. Just do it quick We really did a lot of people did but like I I told you so! We really did, a lot of people did! But like, I just want to say that the only things that are happening are all the things we were told to expect to happen by the guy doing them right now. That we were warned about, he warned us. So like, our surprise and our shock and our dismay
Starting point is 00:03:59 shouldn't be that we didn't know what this snake was. Like, that's not fair. Like, it's not really a fair take on what's going on. Our surprise and our shock and our dismay should come from the destruction of the norms and the systems that we thought were in place to protect us from like this kind of overreach. When it comes to like the Gaza thing,
Starting point is 00:04:23 I do think like to some degree, he made a lot of noise about not wanting to be involved in wars in the Middle East, not wanting to, you know, go sort of adventuring off into these endless wars, all this kind of stuff. So I do think that this, this particular solution of, we'll be, I'll just real estate develop, we'll just, we'll displace 1.8 million human beings into a, a beautiful unnamed land. Fucking question mark details to follow. We'll bulldoze the rubble and build condos. Like to some degree that's a shock, but also to a larger degree, no, it's not. It's like, did you, did really, like no serious person could possibly have thought,
Starting point is 00:05:08 I bet Trump will have a more gentle, more fair, more empathetic, more, a solution that will recognize like the sovereignty of the Arab peoples. There's no serious person that could have thought that. This is a bizarre solution, of the Arab peoples, there's no serious person that could have thought that. This is a bizarre solution, but honestly, when I read his remarks on it,
Starting point is 00:05:31 I thought all of this is very consistent. It's all on brand. Yeah, it's all perfectly on brand. I wanna build condos, like of course he does. If we fucking hired a real estate developer to be the president, and his solution is like, well, I got this hammer. I'ma walk around looking for nails.
Starting point is 00:05:49 Yeah, when everything's a condo. Yeah, I feel like, I feel the same, I feel in a very similar situation where, you know, I don't want to say, you know, I told you so. I don't know that that's helpful in this situation. I also don't know that I am properly presenting their argument, because I think a lot of people who might have protest voted or stayed home or whatever they did, they knew it was going to be bad either way.
Starting point is 00:06:15 So I don't think that they were expecting this to be good. I think they were expecting it to be bad, but to them, it doesn't matter how bad it is, it's always going to be bad. That's their thought process is that it's always going to be bad, but to them, it doesn't matter how bad it is, it's always going to be bad, right? That's their thought process, is that it's always gonna be bad. And it is, it's always gonna be bad. I think there was something to be said about the right before there seemed to be a ceasefire deal
Starting point is 00:06:39 that was worked out right before Biden left office, there was removal of certain types of weaponry that they stopped doing during Biden. So I don't think you can arguably say that it's the same thing. I think they are two totally different things. And I think you're lying if you think that they are exactly the same. But I think we're in this situation now where we've got to expect that, you know, the people who were following Trump, they were saying and beating the drum of, stop these endless wars, stop these endless wars, let's make sure America's out of it.
Starting point is 00:07:14 But they never cared about that, just like they don't care about the deficit when they take over, they don't care about the spending limit when they take over, they don't care about taxation when they take over, all they care about is that they took over. And then whatever they take over, they don't care about taxation when they take over, all they care about is that they took over.
Starting point is 00:07:27 And then whatever they wanna do, whatever these oligarchs wanna do in office, we just let them do it. And I don't think they actually cared or had a principal stance about any of that stuff before he took office. I have a question for you, a serious question that just occurred to me is that when it comes to
Starting point is 00:07:43 us on the left have, I I think there's a divergence here. And I wonder what you think of this. Like I think that there's a, I get a sense that there is a group of people who are willing to stay home or protest vote or otherwise not engage the system sort of as it is. And I think that there's a desire to do that because they wanna see lasting long-term change,
Starting point is 00:08:08 shifting the Democratic Party to the left where their values are better aligned. And that is an opposition to sort of this patience for incremental change. I think you and I have more, we're a little older, we're more institutionalists, I think, in general. And I think we have I have more, we're more, we're a little older, we're more institutionalists, I think, in general. Sure. And I think we have a higher degree of patience for incremental change because I think my experience has taught me that that is more likely to happen. But I think that
Starting point is 00:08:37 there's a lot of idealists on the left who are saying we need, we're going to accept a certain amount of carnage in the short term in order for the Democratic Party to actually rebuild itself as really a left-leaning party that will have long-term and lasting change. If I think about it that way, I think it's a more generous take. I think that what's happening when I think about it that way
Starting point is 00:09:01 is we're misaligned, I think, on our timeline and sort of like, but our goals are the same. Do you see what I'm trying to get at? Yeah. What do you think of that idea, that tension? I think there's, I think there's something to that. I really do think that. I think one thing that people that are more wishing for something to move quicker don't
Starting point is 00:09:22 realize is that because of the way the pendulum swings in our country, and even if you do get something that feels quicker, right? You feel like you're quicker. If you go too far, the conservatives pull you back. And so regardless of how far you progressed, they're still going to pull you back. So it's still incremental. So no matter what, if you go incremental, then maybe you can stay in power, so it's still incremental. So no matter what, if you go incremental, then maybe you can stay in power, but it's not as fast as possible, but you're not tearing things down
Starting point is 00:09:51 and building them up constantly. Instead, you're just building up slowly and building up in a way that has a deeper comfort zone for people that are in centrist and maybe closer to the right. Whereas if you build up too quickly, look at what's gonna happen with gay rights soon. Yeah, I know.
Starting point is 00:10:10 Look at what's gonna happen. Look at what's gonna happen. Look at what is already happening to trans people. You know, so, and look at, there's a myriad of things you can point to right now. Abortion access. There's all these things you can point to to say, we had that slow incremental
Starting point is 00:10:25 progress for a long time, and if people wanted to move past that, now we're ripping it down and we're well past where it even started to go upward. So I think the thing is, is like, there's a pragmatism to the slow and steady because it doesn't upheave, there's not as much upheaval back and forth. There's not as much big of a pendulum swing back and forth. Have you ever had Cecil in your life, like maybe there's not as much upheaval back and forth. There's not as much big of a pendulum swing back and forth. Have you ever had Cecil in your life,
Starting point is 00:10:49 maybe there's a crazy analogy, but like walk with me here. Like have you ever had like a knot, like maybe you're out camping or something, like all your stuff just, and it's this crazy knot and you look at it and it's like fucking, it's like a knot on a knot on a knot on a knot, and you start like sort of trying to figure out how to untie it.
Starting point is 00:11:07 And it's become so gnarled and so like weather beaten and worn and like cemented in that like your fingers hurt and you just kind of can't even get to the base of the problem that first starting knot. And so you grab a knife and you cut the rope and you start over. And what I think I feel is that all across America on both sides of the aisle, there is a desire to,
Starting point is 00:11:32 there's so much frustration at the complexity of all these systems and the complexity of these problems and this sort of like, you know, quagmire of non-solutions and slow solutions and half solutions we keep finding ourselves in. I think that both sides are sort of like, let's start by cutting the whole fucking thing. Let's start by burning it down and then we'll rebuild it.
Starting point is 00:11:55 Because the right certainly has a burn it down attitude. And I think to some degree, there is a feeling on the left as well that is like, all right, we need to break it in order to rebuild it, to fix it in terms of the Democratic party. And it feels like it comes from that same place of like, look, these knots have become too complicated and we need to just cut it and throw it away
Starting point is 00:12:15 and start over. And I am, as a person who 100% reaches for the knife every time in his life and is like, that looks hard. Like I'm so sympathetic to that. But I also like fully understand that that's that, that it feels easy because it's quick, but it's the hardest, slowest, worst way to build solutions. Yeah. Because starting from the bottom, like it's like when Trump talks about
Starting point is 00:12:41 Gazan, he's like, well, it's all rubble. So we'll just bulldoze it and start over. And it's like, well, it's all rubble. So we'll just bulldoze it and start over. And it's like, yeah, it's easy to say, man, but like there's 2 million human beings that live there. So like his solution feels like, well, we'll just fucking cut the knot and do something different. So I actually think that we're kind of motivated
Starting point is 00:13:02 psychologically by very similar principles. I don't know if that makes any sense, if that's a good analogy or not. I think it's a great analogy. And I think too, I don't want to give people the impression that what I'm saying is that we need to be in the center. I don't think that's the case. I think there is progress to be made.
Starting point is 00:13:18 And I think we can make progress. And I think we can move forward with a level of progress. And I am also frustrated by the level and quickness at which progress sometimes gets stagnated. So I'm a hundred percent with the people who are farther left that say, no, this is moving too slow. And I'm also very privileged. So I sit in a center where I'm not actually in problems.
Starting point is 00:13:40 I'm not in these issues. I'm not in this deep, like maybe racism or transphobia or I don't need abortion access or I, you know, I'm not living in a way that I'm like, you know, I might be unhomed or something like that, right? Where I need that sort of triage right away. So I recognize that place that I speak that from. But I also, I wanna make sure that like,
Starting point is 00:14:03 like that shit just doesn't go away forever. And what you're witnessing is starting to see this, this shit is starting to go away forever. I really do believe what I said last week when I said, we need to make a tent of all the people they hate. And guess what, man, you fucking leftists that are out there that are mad at how slow it's going, you're with us. You're with us.
Starting point is 00:14:23 Yeah, I want you to drag us. I want you to push us. I want you to do that, but I want, you're with us. You're with us. Yeah, I want you to drag us. I want you to push us. I want you to do that, but I want you to be with us. Be with us. I get it, you're that part of the party that we need. We have to have that push forward and I want you there, but what I don't want is for you to fucking peace out every time it gets hard.
Starting point is 00:14:42 That's what I don't wanna see. I want you to see, I wanna see you pushing harder on the party time it gets hard. That's what I don't want to see. I want you to see, I want to see you pushing harder on the party when it feels hard. I want you to be that motor that pushes us that way. I also don't want to push the people away that might be on the fringes of the right, where, you know, it might be difficult and hard for them to be in that space, to be in that progressive space,
Starting point is 00:15:01 but I want to help those people be in that space. So I want to do both things. And I want to make sure that progressive space, but I wanna help those people be in that space. So I wanna do both things. And I wanna make sure that this party is bigger and more inclusive instead of less inclusive and isolationist. Yeah, you know, we got, I'm gonna draw another analogy because I think it's really socially apropos. And I'm just trying to like, you know,
Starting point is 00:15:19 what I recognize is important, I think, is to really try to understand at the ground level, what is motivating us so that we can do the work of building the tent. Because the thing, we were talking about this before the show, like if the last 20 days or 30 days or whatever it is has taught, less than 30 days, Jesus Christ, have taught us anything, it's this.
Starting point is 00:15:39 And I really need to. 16 days. Fuck me running. Fuck me running, bro. Like here's the most important thing. Winning matters more than anything else. Yeah, man. This is, if there's ever a doubt in your mind,
Starting point is 00:15:54 the last 16 days needs to prove that the most important thing is winning because when they win, look at what the fuck is happening. So we gotta find a way to win. And a way to win is not to like flip fucking birds at people because we're right about something. And to like break our own party apart or to refuse to create a bigger party
Starting point is 00:16:15 and a bigger, you know, arms around tent full of people who have divergent views because they don't pass the same like ideological testing that you feel like you pass, right? I know I'm wrong about some things. I'm a human being. I must be wrong about things. I can't know what those things are.
Starting point is 00:16:35 If I did, I would stop being wrong about them. So I have to hold that in my head, you know what I mean? I have to hold in my head that I know I'm wrong. I don't know what I'm wrong about. So I need to have more people with more opinions in my life. And if I have more people with more opinions in my life, maybe I can get closer to right,
Starting point is 00:16:54 or I can have more considered positions. That's how we build a bigger party. We got an email from somebody, I don't know if you saw it, we got an email from somebody talking about like the difficulty right now that men are having. It was a very lengthy and thoughtful and considered email.
Starting point is 00:17:10 I did see it, yeah. And as we're talking about this and as you were talking, I was thinking of that email that we got. And one of the things that I was thinking is, I don't think it matters very much in a practical sense, whether I think that that guy is right or wrong. What I recognize from a practical sense is that, like, we are in a place where there is a crisis,
Starting point is 00:17:34 where people, a serious cohort of people feel like they have no ideological home, and that if we don't give them a home that is empathetic and decent, they will find whatever other home takes them in. So our responsibility is to provide a home, even if we don't agree with all of the people all of the time,
Starting point is 00:17:58 but we can build a home together that is better and more ideologically decent. If we don't do that, they will go find some place that accepts them. They'll find some place they fit in. Yeah, and the same is true like from this email that we got, you know, he made a really good point. He's like, hey, if men feel this way,
Starting point is 00:18:15 they're gonna gravitate toward these other messages. And you could have a real argument about like, hey, men really shouldn't feel that way. It's a bullshit way to feel. That's not useful. That's not useful. You're never gonna tell somebody, hey. It's a bullshit way to feel. That's not useful. That's not useful. You're never gonna tell somebody, hey, that's a bullshit way to feel,
Starting point is 00:18:29 come into my house and this is a trusting space where you can be vulnerable. It doesn't work. You have to invite them into your house first. Teach them to trust you. Allow them to be vulnerable. Allow them to share and break bread with you ideologically. And then we can work on building like the right kind of shape for this party.
Starting point is 00:18:47 Does that make sense? It feels so similar, like the same inflection and crisis points. Sure. No, I don't disagree. I think that it's important to point out that not everybody has to do that work. I think it's important to point out that people who are in vulnerable spaces shouldn't be the ones who have to go out and do that outreach. So that's an important thing to point out that people who are in vulnerable spaces shouldn't be the ones who have to go out Oh, yeah that outreach so that's an important thing to point out
Starting point is 00:19:08 Right the people who have the privilege and the power and the ability to do that work should be the ones who are reaching out And saying hey Let me help you make you comfortable and then we can sort of see where you stand and how you can maybe understand this process right, I don't expect someone who's part of the Sort of cohort that this person doesn't like because they think they're being oppressed by them or something to have to do that work. I don't feel like that's a good thing to do. So I want to make sure I make that clear, but I don't think that throwing people away because they don't think
Starting point is 00:19:39 exactly like you is a good idea. I think you need to try to convince people that your ideas are good. And along the way, you may learn that they're not. Yeah, right. You know, along the way, you may learn something about yourself that says, you know what, maybe I, maybe I didn't consider this as well as I should have before. Yeah. And you know, you change and you grow. And so like, I think that we need to be in a place where we're okay with that sort of reaching out. Do I want to reach out to, and I know people will say this, like there's a story in the thing today that we have in the block, we might not get to it,
Starting point is 00:20:11 but it's Klobuchar calling for bipartisanship and people are like, hey man, there's no room for like, like our, like our, aligning ourselves with fascists, right? There's no room for that. Totally agree. And bipartisanship means that, right? Right now, because the one side is fucking crazy. So I get that and I understand there is a line where there's like, no, there's just
Starting point is 00:20:32 too far. You've gone too far. I can't reach you. You've got to come on this side in order for me to reach you. After this point, there'll be monsters here and there's no way, I can't reach you anymore. You have to reach me now. Now it's on you to reach me. At a certain point, there's a group of people like that.
Starting point is 00:20:52 But I think that group is bigger than sometimes we allow, we're willing to let it be. I think there are people that are completely reachable that you can still reach and pull back and say, look, we've got to work together if we want a better world. Man, 100%. Like, it is, what I'm suggesting just to be clear is it's, we need to build a space where the left and the center left
Starting point is 00:21:15 can figure out how to win together. Yeah. Right? That's what I'm trying to suggest is the left and the center left have to figure out how to win together. And we'll work out the fucking details and payroll. We'll get all that stuff. We'll get a lot wrong.
Starting point is 00:21:29 We'll get some of it right. That's great. But what we can't do is lose again. Like that that's not working. That can't work. The 16 days and we're you know like when we record next I don't know if there'll be a Department of Education. Might not be.
Starting point is 00:21:44 Well, it's got to go through Congress. You know, like when we record next, I don't know if there'll be a Department of Education. Might not be. Well, it's gotta go through Congress, but still. I don't know if the Department of Education will have any people that are working there. You know, like there's a lot of ways to break things. And they're looking for- Doing all their best. They're doing their best work right now.
Starting point is 00:21:57 Right, to break everything. Let me tell you, they are doing their best work. The IRA is here to show them that an ounce of resistance is worth a pound of votes. So this is a great story. Resistance is important. Yeah, absolutely. This is a great way for resistance to occur.
Starting point is 00:22:14 This is our governor, Governor JB Pritzker, who you and I had deep reservations about, but I really fucking like. I was talking about it the other day. I was having a conversation basically saying the same thing. Like, man, I was not a fan of this guy, but I am much bigger fan of JB Pritzker now than I ever was before. I held my nose and voted for him, but I'll tell you what, you know, I didn't like Rauner. I was willing to do anything I could to get rid of Rauner, who was our previous governor,
Starting point is 00:22:40 who was a Republican, and he was like almost like a libertarian Republican. And I thought he was ruining the state. He was terrible. I did what I could. I voted for him. He's one of the first Democrats I voted for in a long time because if you remember Blagojevich was part of that ticket that I wouldn't vote for Blagojevich either, but I'm happy I did. Same.
Starting point is 00:22:58 Yeah. So Illinois governor, JB Pritzker blocks January 6th rioters from state jobs after Trump partons in a written directive. The democratic Illinois governor tells his hiring office that no one who attempts to overthrow a government should serve in government. Duh, he wrote after. It feels like something important to make sure
Starting point is 00:23:17 you do the background check, because you know it's not going to be on their resume. Dude, I'm like, what the shit? Like, hey, imagine this. Imagine a scenario where you're like, on the resume. What the shit? Like, hey, imagine this. Imagine a scenario where you're like, hey, here at First National Bank, we don't hire bank robbers. And you'd be like, well, fucking of course.
Starting point is 00:23:34 Like, do you write that in your handbook? The problem though is like how many anti-vax nurses are there? Yeah, I know. Like, dude, you're right. There's so many. There's so many, there's so many scenarios. There's even a fucking constitutional amendment called, Hey, if you were an insurrectionist, you can't be president.
Starting point is 00:23:52 I know, I know, man. You know, we ignored that one. These are suggestions. The amendments have become suggestions. That was a, that was a do over. Yeah. Well, birthright citizenship is, they're trying to make that a suggestion too. That's a do-over. Yeah. Well, birthright citizenship is they're trying to make that a suggestion too. That's a do-over too. Yeah. I'll pull, I'll believe this amendment when I pull it out of the hat and it's not a practice. There's only two amendments and it's the second amendment. Yeah. And you read it twice. You read it once and then you read it the second time saluting it like we used to do the Pledge of Allegiance with your hand in the air.
Starting point is 00:24:25 Yeah. Oh my God. Right. Yeah. Look at me. Sure. Look at me. Sure.
Starting point is 00:24:33 I'm the captain now. All right. This story is speaking to your hand in the air. Go ahead, Tom. Yeah, no shit. This is the Atlantic. Elon Musk is president. The world's richest man has declared war on the federal government
Starting point is 00:24:46 and his influence appears unchecked. What's been happening the last 16 days and feels so illegal. Yeah, I am floored at how it's not illegal. I don't I genuinely don't understand that if this is legal, like we have enormous loopholes that my God, how did we function before this? Elon Musk and his cohort of exclusively, it seems, white guys, like white men,
Starting point is 00:25:16 are running roughshod into these places. Some of them, by the way, as young as 19 years old. 19 years old, yeah. Running into government buildings, USAID, the Office of Personnel Management, the Treasury Department, taking over their computer systems, gaining access to personnel and pay files, shutting shit down, sending out emails,
Starting point is 00:25:38 the same email that went out to fucking Twitter employees, fork in the road, y'all wanna be fired or quit? This guy's not even an employee. He's not even an employee of the federal, the Department of Government Officials. It's not even a real department. This guy's not even an employee. Can you imagine how insane it would be if you were like,
Starting point is 00:25:59 as a boss of a facility, if I was like the boss, and everyone there works for me, and some fucking 28 year old kid walks in with his fucking laptop and won't give you his fucking last name, and he's like, hi, I'm from dogecoin.org or whatever. I'm here to fire you. I'd be like, fucking security, escort this kid out.
Starting point is 00:26:20 Yeah, but the problem is he's escorted in there by US Marshals. That's what's so insane. Yeah, well, he runs the executive branch. So when you run the executive branch, you can basically do what you want. And I also want to caution people that even if we had one of these houses, let's presume we had a house, right? One of them, House or Senate, doesn't matter because we've seen these people refuse subpoenas
Starting point is 00:26:43 before. Right. Like we, I mean, granted, one of them went to jail because of it, but even still. But they got fucking pardoned afterwards or whatever. But, but there's not a lot of teeth. We didn't put anything in that makes it so the Senate can say, stop what you're doing right now. That's not allowed because they can say that. And then it doesn't matter. Yeah. Right. So even if the Senate were to step up and say,
Starting point is 00:27:06 you can't do this, it doesn't matter. There's nothing there. Same thing with the House. We're gonna call you in and make you explain it to us. No, I'm not coming in. Well, there's nothing to enforce that. What do you do? The problem is that the executive branch
Starting point is 00:27:19 has way too much power. And this has been a focus of the right for a very long time. Pour as much power as you can has been a focus of the right for a very long time. Pour as much power as you can into the executive branch. And they've been trying to create executive power for decades because they knew that if they were able to topple and keep one of these pillars higher than the other ones, then the other ones can't do fuck all to it. And we saw a judiciary that added to them last time. So the judiciary during Biden's term said,
Starting point is 00:27:48 we want even more executive power. We want even less accountability from the executive branch. So, I mean, the only way to really change this is to change a lot of the inner workings of government and you're gonna have to have all three systems of government that are working together. Because even if you got two of them
Starting point is 00:28:04 that were working together, it's not enough. It's not enough. It's not enough. Like what was fucking insane is that the last administration, the Biden administration, straight up called out how dangerous this was, how the consolidation and as the executive authority, how the consolidation of power into the executive branch is bad for America and bad for democracy. He said that shit out loud and it still is happening because to your point, the judiciary was basically like,
Starting point is 00:28:33 well, we'll just decide cases in a way that says that the executive branch is effectively like immune to everything. What one thing that occurs to me too is that pretty much the only thing that separates a banana republic from a functioning democracy is the preference for force or the threat of force versus legal and administrative power or authority.
Starting point is 00:29:02 When you have federal marshals allowing these, forcing these guys in, that's force or the threat of force. It's literally the only reason that they're there is because people with guns on their hips are showing up to allow that to happen. That's banana republic shit. That is exactly what that is. It's essentially a coup.
Starting point is 00:29:23 It is exactly a coup. It's like we elected a guy who's like, I'm installing myself as king. And that's what's happening right now. There is some push on the right against this. On the right. So I am seeing some rumblings of people that are on the right that are less for power in government. We're talking about the people who don't wanna see the government being as powerful that are very upset with what Elon's doing, where he's going in and now he's got the treasury,
Starting point is 00:29:57 all the names and social security numbers, he's got backend access to all kinds of crazy shit. He's stopping payments unilaterally. He's doing all kinds of crazy shit. He's stopping payments unilaterally. He's doing all kinds of crazy shit. They don't like that. Sure. They're like, we don't like, that's overstepping. And so you're seeing a group of people
Starting point is 00:30:13 and some of these people are in government too. So you're talking about some of these people in like the FBI and other places that are being attacked by Trump, that are like, we're gonna get rid of all these people. Even the people that are Republican are now Trump, that are like, you know, like, we're gonna get rid of all these people. Even the people that are Republican are now pushing back and being like, you know, so I think that hopefully,
Starting point is 00:30:31 it's my hope that they've done so much crazy shit in the first few days, that it wakes a bunch of people up and starts, they start allying with each other instead of with Trump, because now he's seen as the force. You could see some of these larger protests occur and things like that. I don't know how big this is gonna be,
Starting point is 00:30:51 but I think the people in government have to resist as deeply as they can. They clearly can't just get rid of you. They clearly can't just override you. They have to be our last line of defense. They have to be the line of defense that says, fuck you. Because if they could just get rid of them, they would just get rid of them.
Starting point is 00:31:09 Yeah. They would have just done it. Right. But they can't. They can't. So I think, like, the real key is those people are going to have to be the people who step up to the plate and tell them no, and then work, and then slow things down,
Starting point is 00:31:21 and make it difficult on them. I think that's going to have to be the key. Because these people, with the keys to the kingdom, and then work and then slow things down and make it difficult on them. I think that's gonna have to be the key because these people with the keys to the kingdom are just fucking trashing the joint worse than the party on 16 candles. Yeah, man. Like there is, you look over at the fucking Illinois
Starting point is 00:31:38 or at the Department of Treasury and there's just a turntable with a pizza on it. And the thing is just bouncing. You know, it's just insane. Itable with a pizza on it. And the thing is just bouncing. It's just insane. It's so fucking absolutely bonkers. Like just to lay a little bit of blame where it's due, because it's important to do for back when, like at some point when we are clutching the last book
Starting point is 00:31:59 amidst the rubble and the smoke, and we're hoping that it's a history text, and we can say before the radiation takes us, you know, how did this happen? Like remember that this began, this consolidation of power really began in earnest with the unitary executive theory that George W. Bush and his administration pushed forward. That deep consolidation of power up into the executive branch really began there. So don't let Dick Cheney who's sitting in this fucking cowboy hat, bitching about Donald Trump trick you into believing that he didn't start this.
Starting point is 00:32:30 Exactly right. Exactly right. Those fuckers, those neocons sons of bitches, they said, like when they, we've talked about this in so many other ways, like the problem with these kinds, like one of the big problems with these kinds of like structural and legal changes to the co-equal branches of government that do these things like create immunities or create new theories of executive power is it works for everybody. So you can't control it. Once Pandora is out of the box, it's out of the box.
Starting point is 00:33:01 That's how the box works. So it's like, well, you can't be like, well, we're just going to use it for good. We're just going to use it to get this done or that done or the other thing. It's like, well, the next guy's going to, you have no idea what the next guy is going to do. Maybe the next guy is going to fucking have a South African emerald mine, magnate immigrant show up who's a fucking right wing Nazi saluting lunatic. And he's going to like blow up the government by ripping it apart from its fucking servers down. Maybe that's the thing that'll happen
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Starting point is 00:35:16 You're only confusing the boy. Before you're through, he'll be so mixed up, he'll be wearing his shoes on his head. Men has always learned from the past. After all, you can't learn history in reverse. It's confusing enough for heaven's sakes. So if you've been following the tariff tennis, I don't know what it was. Trump announced a series of sweeping tariffs, 25% Mexico, 25% Canada, 10% China on most goods.
Starting point is 00:35:46 Then like three days later, made a deal with Canada and Mexico that basically like, all right, you're gonna do the things that you were already gonna do. We'll take our tariffs back for the most part. Mexico is sending a force of 10,000 troops to the border. You're seeing this shit online where it's like, oh, like all Trump got was what Biden had already given
Starting point is 00:36:05 or what Biden had already gotten. Like that's only partially true. Mexico was sending a force of 10,000 troops to the border, supposedly to current federal. Our border, it's important to point this out. This is, because the thing is, is like, what I read about this is that there was already 15,000 troops at a different border.
Starting point is 00:36:24 So at the borders coming into Mexico, not to go to our nation, there was already troops and people are counting that as what we already gave him, but that he's saying 10,000 to our border. So it's important to point that out. It is. Yeah. So like, I don't want to pretend for the purpose of accuracy that Trump didn't get any concessions out of this.
Starting point is 00:36:42 He did get concessions out of this. There's a meme floating around that he didn't get any concessions. That's just inaccurate Trump did get some concessions out of this. He got much less out of Canada I think there wasn't really a whole lot of it wasn't anything really. Yeah, they got the same thing. Yes for yeah So that's not really much of anything. Yeah, but now there's a fucking trade war with China. Yeah, I also think too You know this should not be overlooked. Even if you got what you were planning on getting anyway from Canada,
Starting point is 00:37:10 your goodwill with your closest ally for many, many years is shot. Completely shot. It's shot. And if you're gonna keep doing this, you know, I saw the conservative argument for this was that they were saying, well, you know, Trump got what he wanted, what he wanted. He knew that he wanted, he wanted to get the things that they already promised, but, you know, Trump got what he wanted. What he wanted, he knew that he wanted,
Starting point is 00:37:25 he wanted to get the things that they already promised, but he wanted to force their hand to make sure they went through with it. And that's what those tariffs are there for. And I'm like, no, that's what friendship is there for. That's what, you know, allyship between two nations is there for. You talk to them and try to convince them to do it
Starting point is 00:37:43 without trying to damage them economically and damage their businesses that exist in their economically because the sentiment from Canada is fuck you then. How about I never fucking do business with you? And I'll tell you what, there's been a huge bunch of people all over Canada that are now boycotting American products, boycotting American services, and basically saying, okay, well, I can't ever trust you again.
Starting point is 00:38:10 That's not something you want to create on the world stage. So, you know, yeah, maybe he did get them to say that they were going to do the thing that they were going to do. And he said, well, I'm going to keep this tariff over your head, like the sword of Damocles, waiting for you to fuck up until I can fucking cut that thing No What you should do is try to co-work convince them to do it because it's in the best interest of both our nations Like a normal person would do with foreign policy and not try to use a fucking hammer every time you want to try to get something done Why burn down?
Starting point is 00:38:42 Relationships you don't have to burn down? Trade bridges we've built for years. It's so stupid. It's so, it's so short-sighted, but it tells you everything you need to know about why government and business, why some of a businessman shouldn't be in government. Because to him, the only thing that matters is the quarterly report and the people who follow him and will lick up his fucking balls sweat. Yep. Those people all think he did a great job.
Starting point is 00:39:05 But if you look at the overall thing that's happening, it's damaging to our economy because we are now a little less sure about whether or not we're gonna be able to do business down there. And so now, suddenly they're gonna find other trade partners where they can sell their goods and there isn't gonna be that threat of tariffs. So it's just bad business.
Starting point is 00:39:26 It's great in the short term. Right. Got what you needed in the short term. It's terrible in, in, in sort of the relationship building part of business. Yeah. This is, this is so, and so let's talk about China now. So we've put this 10% tariff on Chinese goods and China was like, awesome. Guess what asshole?
Starting point is 00:39:44 You need us too. So now we're in a fucking trade war with China. That's just where we're at now. And who knows where that's gonna go except for your shit's gonna cost more. Everything's gonna cost more. No matter what, everything's gonna cost more. Even if these tariffs get repealed,
Starting point is 00:40:00 your shit's still gonna cost more because those companies aren't gonna build their price system after it's man. After it's over. So you've just increased the cost of everything forever. Yeah, for what? In perpetuity. For fucking what? Yeah.
Starting point is 00:40:12 For fucking what? So Trump can feel strong and all the people who voted for him can feel like they're right for a few minutes. You know, I think what's happening is like, clearly, I mean, it's indisputable that China is in ascendancy right now as an international power, right? Their ascendance as a technological power is certainly on display with DeepSeek.
Starting point is 00:40:32 Their ascendance as a military power is at this point unquestioned. In fact, many would argue that their Navy is the best Navy in the world, not second best, but the best Navy in the world. Their ascendance as an economic power is unquestioned. And I understand that that gives a lot of people really justifiable pause, right? China is not a nation known for its positive human rights record, for example. It is not committed
Starting point is 00:41:00 to democracy, freedom, liberty, things along those lines, things we value. So I understand. Do we? Well, things that we have made lip service toward valuing and no longer value. But like what it feels like is Trump is trying to like put China in its place the way you would a subordinate without recognizing that you can no longer treat China like a subordinate. China is not our subordinate. This is not how superpowers of which China is indisputably one can or should treat one another and to our previous point, it's not how we actually will accomplish the things we want.
Starting point is 00:41:40 If there was any better example of how short-sighted the mentality is, it's the shutting down of USAID. USAID is an important intelligence and strategic program across the world. We deliver humanitarian aid so that we can accomplish important political and strategic goals. So it's humanitarian, yes, but it is also very politically valuable to build goodwill, to establish relationships, to build intelligence infrastructure. We get a lot out of it, more than what we put into it. It's like, you know, like my fucking dad used to say, like, you know, you get more with fucking honey than vinegar.
Starting point is 00:42:20 Like that's an old saying. It's fucking true. And instead we're just like, pour some vinegar on it. Yeah, man. Yeah, we're not. We're in a position now where we're going to be burning bridges with three different countries, which are huge trade partners with the United States. We're going to be, even if they don't have tariffs on it, you're still not going to have the same level of communication and, and, you know, sort of a goodwill that you had with two of them. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:42:47 China, if you're going to fight with China, I don't know that you're going to win that fight. And Trump, I think is just too stubborn and too, too, too myopic to recognize that he's going to be outplayed in all this stuff. For sure. And, and you know, he's been talking about terrorists for a long time and all the people that follow him, they love to talk about how right he is. But man, I think he did irreparable damage to two of our really close allies and the people who are literally next to us on a map. He did irreparable damage to those relationships over the last week. Yeah, you know, honestly, the only hope I have is I hope that when Trump is out of office, I hope that we have a sane leader
Starting point is 00:43:25 and I hope people say, all right, that guy was a fucking lunatic, this is more business as usual. Like, How do they trust us though? I don't know that they'll trust us. How do they trust us? I mean, he was voted out,
Starting point is 00:43:39 he had a fucking insurrection. Yeah, and America. And then America put him back in. So how do you trust us again? I don't know, man. It's a good question. We keep going back to the really bad boyfriend. Yeah.
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Starting point is 00:44:45 Bet MGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Okay, wait a minute. I'm the smartest guy in the world? Says who? The IQ test you took in prison. You got the highest score in history, brought to you by Carl's Jr.
Starting point is 00:44:59 Yeah, dumbass, you've been smarter than President Camacho. That's how come he's making you Secretary of Interior. Okay, so who are you?'s making you Secretary of Interior. Okay, so who are you? I'm the Secretary of Energy. You want a contest, got to be a cabinet member. I'm the Secretary of State. I'm brought to you by Carl's Jr.
Starting point is 00:45:16 Why do you keep saying that? Because they pay me every time I do. It's a really good way to make money. You're so smart, why don't you know that? Motherfucker. the secretary of defense. And the fun bag's over there is the attorney general. Hi. And that's the secretary of education.
Starting point is 00:45:35 It's kind of stupid, but this President Camacho stepbrother still does a pretty good job, eh? NBC News, White House preparing executive order to abolish the education department. President Donald Trump promised for years to abolish the department, which he can't do without congressional support. So his executive order acknowledges
Starting point is 00:45:55 he needs Congress to do this, and he's essentially asking Congress to do this. You think they will? No, you don't think they will? No, I don't. I think this would be insane for Congress to do. I think this would be insane for Congress to do. If they do this Cecil, and I want to like, I mean this with all sincerity, if they abolish the education department and they get that through
Starting point is 00:46:19 Congress, all bets are off. Literally every single bet. There's nothing at that point that is not on the table. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, everything always is a hundred. This is the like litmus test for it. Almost everybody that you know knows somebody who's got like a special needs kid or lives in a school that has, uses these funds.
Starting point is 00:46:47 Like very, very, very few of us don't know anybody that we love that doesn't have and needs services that the Department of Education provides. So I think if I were a congressperson, there's not a constituency out there that would not be harmed, deeply harmed by this. There's not a constituency out there that would not be harmed, deeply harmed by this. Yeah, I think you're seeing, you know, at least I'm seeing a lot of people that voted for Trump that are upset with some of the things he's doing. And some of them are dealing with people that are looking to get like more money, you know, they need more money, they need help, they need aid, and they're not getting that aid, or that aid gonna be slashed or he's threatening to slash it and these people are feeling that pinch.
Starting point is 00:47:30 The real problem is that we've seen the Republican Party be really mean to their base in the past and do things that was against their interests and their base still votes for them. And that blows me away. It's like what we should be doing is, you know, if anything, the last election should show you that like, you know, there's a pendulum swing.
Starting point is 00:47:52 And it's my hope that those people that are injured by Trump this time around, if he does do some crazy shit that is injuring a lot of people, that they pay attention to that and remember that come election day to try to get rid of this day to try to get rid of this and to try to get rid of MAGA completely, get rid of it forever.
Starting point is 00:48:09 Never let it be part of our system again. But this is such an emboldening time for that whole group of people. And they've been making these victory laps. And I think right now you're gonna see, I think our government is teetering on the edge of this MAGA thing. I will be happy if they don't abolish it, you're going to see, I think our government is teetering on the edge of this MAGA thing.
Starting point is 00:48:26 I will be happy if they don't abolish it, but I'm not positive they won't. Yeah, here's what I'm worried about. I'm less worried and then maybe I'm just crazy. I admit, maybe I'm just crazy. I'm less worried that Congress will abolish it and I'm more worried that they'll just break it so that it's useless. Yeah, that's always a possibility, right? It's like, you know, you can always break it.
Starting point is 00:48:46 You know, what Trump said and Doge said was, essentially, we know we can't abolish this, but we want you to begin the work of diminishing yourselves. That was what they said. So I think that they can understaff it. I think they can underfund it. I think they can create all kinds of structural barriers to essentially neuter the Department of Education
Starting point is 00:49:10 such that it exists and doesn't function. And that would be just as bad, right? And in some cases, that would be worse because what it would say is that we're supposed to have a system to make sure this doesn't happen. Here are the ways to break that system. Here are the ways to go around that system and break the things you wanna break
Starting point is 00:49:30 without having to go through the red tape of getting the people involved. Why don't you suck a fart out of my asshole, you slave driving fascist. This story is from Salon. There is no common ground with fascists. Progressives rip Klobuchar's call for bipartisanship. The Minnesota senator called for compromise. Progressives called for her head.
Starting point is 00:49:53 Look, this is not the time for bipartisanship. When Cecil and I were talking at the start of the show, we're talking about expanding the left, right? What it means to about expanding the left, right? What it means to be on the left. We're talking about building a bigger tent so that the center and the center left and the left all win the big prizes politically.
Starting point is 00:50:14 And then we figure out what the priorities are after we've won, because we've got to build some fucking safeguards in here to not destroy our government. This is not a time for bipartisanship. The other guys are fucking lunatics. Lunatics. If you got a fucking elephant on your fucking lapel or whatever, you're a crazy person.
Starting point is 00:50:34 Why don't, you can't come in my house. We are not friends. At this point right now, they are breaking government and they are asking to put in the craziest people you've ever seen as part of their government to break it more. So what you need to do as someone who's going to be in this government is you need to basically resist everything that they are doing because every piece you resist, you stop a little bit of the government breaking, right?
Starting point is 00:51:01 You know, don't vote for Pete Hegseth. Don't vote for these people. Even if they do have to go to the vice president to get their vote. Force it. You gotta force it every time. Every single vote counts. Every single one of these.
Starting point is 00:51:14 Don't capitulate, resist everything. Because these people are trying to destroy the whole thing. They are trying to get rich off the destruction of the United States. They're trying to clear cut the United States and burn the wood. You've got to make sure that you fight against this from tooth and nail and Klobuchar
Starting point is 00:51:32 and some of these middle of the road people. I fucking hated Klobuchar from when she ran. I fucking hated her from then. I don't like her now. What I don't want to see is her as somebody who's trying to be this great unifier between the parties because they're, they're, they are literally oil and water right now. There's nothing you can do to make that an emulsion.
Starting point is 00:51:53 I'm sorry. There's not enough mustard in the world that can bring those two things together. What I'll say to you is this. I'll say, look, there are people that, you know, we have to rely on and that group of people shouldn't include her. It shouldn't include a lot of these old guard Democrats. I want to see them gone. I want to see Nancy out of there.
Starting point is 00:52:13 I want to see Klobuchar move from there. I don't want to see any of these old guard Democrats in four years. I want to see them gone. I want, you know, maybe Bernie. Bernie can stay. The rest of them, I don't want to see. Liz Warren can pick her up.
Starting point is 00:52:26 Yeah, Liz Warren. You know, some of these people who are far to the left, great. I'm fine with it. But these people who are still like, like Nancy Pelosi's got to be out of there. Just get rid of her. You know, all these people that are old guard Democrats that think that they are thinking that the United States government works like it did in the 1980s and it doesn't anymore. No, it does not.
Starting point is 00:52:45 It does not. We need somebody there who's gonna be able to resist this stuff. You cannot have people who think you're gonna be able to reach across the aisle. You can, because then super importantly, there's no good faith on the right. There's none.
Starting point is 00:52:56 So you can't be the unifier, build a bridge, reach across the aisle. Like that's, they're lying. They don't want, like they don't need it. They don't want it. They were always lying. There's no compromise. They're fucking. They don't want like they don't need it. They don't want it. They were always lying. There's no compromise They're fucking lunatics. It's like arguing about what time it is while somebody's inside the mechanism of the clock Bashing the gears with a hammer. What are you doing? Yeah, stop trying to be like well, we all decide
Starting point is 00:53:19 It's two o'clock twice a day who fucking cares man. They're in the gears Dismantling the machine. You don't get to be like, but they were right about what time it was twice. Fuck you, stop, stop. Well, and all the people that tried to oppose Trump are gone. All those people are out of government.
Starting point is 00:53:38 Where's Adam Kinzinger? He's on CNN. He quit. Where's Liz Cheney's riding fucking horses on her dad's ranch in fucking Wyoming or whatever. Like name all the people that were Republicans who were fighting against Trump and saying, a Trump will ruin America.
Starting point is 00:53:53 Where are they? Yeah. Where are they now? Mitt Romney quit. Mitt Romney's gone. Yep. Who else is there? There's not a lot of, there weren't a lot of voices before
Starting point is 00:54:01 and there's none now. None. None that I can see. I'm happy to hear if there is one, right? So if you're a listener and you say, nope, there's this guy or this gal, I'm happy to hear. Awesome. Happy to hear it. But I don't see them.
Starting point is 00:54:13 I haven't seen any. Yeah, sure do. They once in a while had their hard edges rub up against what Trump wants and they don't give it to him. Yeah, maybe once in a while, like Mitch McConnell not voting for Hegsath. But for the most part, everybody's capitulating. So I don't want to hear about like, you know, these, these voices of dissent because they don't even exist. They don't even exist. Because
Starting point is 00:54:33 if they did, you could maybe have a way that I would agree with bipartisanship. You'd be like, okay, Kinzinger was still in there and Cheney and a couple more, and you could get enough of a voting block together to say, fuck no to some of these things, then yes, I would agree. But it doesn't sound like any of that can happen. No man, no, because they've all sworn fealty. They've all bent the knee and kissed the ring and they've abdicated their responsibility as a co-equal branch of the government.
Starting point is 00:55:00 Absolutely. We got your t-shirt, you got your left fingerprints and all. You are so dumb. You are really dumb. For real. You don't have to come and confess that you did it. We're looking for you. We're going to find you. I'm letting you know now so you can run and tell that homeboy. This is from people4.org, formerly right wing watch.
Starting point is 00:55:21 Johnny Enlow says Trump and Elon are being guided by the archangels Michael and Gabriel. Remember Johnny Enlow? I do, man. Gosh, get somebody to look at you like Johnny Enlow's wife looks at him. Man. All right, so here we go. We're going to go listen to this. It's a very short clip. The apostolic clarity that's coming right now is coming from King Donald Trump, but it extends even over the church because he is a fellow believer and he's every single one of his values that he lays out there are biblical values. Jesus, he's not just King anymore, Tom. I know. Now he's even bigger than King. He has the same value. So before he was king, but he was an asshole and he didn't believe it. But now he's in the club. Now he's in the club. Yeah. Before he was like the biblical
Starting point is 00:56:10 people will recall it, but he was like, he was that king. He was an asshole, but God was using them anyway. Yeah. Cyrus. Cyrus. There you go. Billy Ray Cyrus. And now, now everything he's a fucking wrecking ball. He's like Miley Cyrus. Like now everything he's doing is a biblical value. So selling fucking strump cards or whatever, like strump coins. Are those biblical value cryptocurrencies? Yeah. It's crazy to me that these guys, these guys want this to be this guy so bad.
Starting point is 00:56:43 So bad, man. I'm blown away that even, you know, we talked about it last week, that when somebody says to have mercy and all these people like, mercy is evil. Yeah. I mean, if you're on them- They were two Cobra Cods. I mean, genuinely, man.
Starting point is 00:56:57 Genuinely, they wanted to sweep that lady's leg. I'll tell you, I'll tell you what. Jesus is on the sideline, put him in a body bag, Johnny! Put him in a body bag! I'll tell you I'll tell you what Jesus is on the sideline Apostle Trump, yeah, let's go with Prophet Elon. There are some things the Lord show me Archangel Michael is Working very closely with Trump Archangel Gabriel working very closely with Elon. Yeah, get the fuck out of here.
Starting point is 00:57:27 Absolutely, those guys are right there in his cabinet. That's how it works. Every day Elon gets on his tweets at Archangel and then they tweet back. Yeah, that's who's actually playing his Path of Exile account. Yeah, somebody's gotta be doing it. Somebody's gotta do it. It's not fucking Elon.
Starting point is 00:57:46 That's for sure. Jesus Christ. Fucking Archangel Michael is the one helping him throw a fucking Nazi salute in the air. He just ties, he ties a string around his arm and then he just flies his wings up. So it lifts his arm up in the air. I would actually kind of believe that Archangel Gabriel
Starting point is 00:58:03 is animating him based on how he uses his body. It's all fucking. Oh, I haven't been in one of these in years. That's why he was jumping so weird. He was hoping for upsies. He was hoping somebody was gonna pick him up, like lift him. They were gonna lift him up,
Starting point is 00:58:15 lift him up like fucking, like dirty dancing. Dude, can you imagine how weird it would feel? Just real quick, like if there was a giant who picked you up from under your arms like a baby. Can you imagine how weird it would feel? Just real quick, like if there was a giant who picked you up from under your arms like a baby. Can you imagine how insane that would feel as a grown person? As a grown up, it would feel weird as shit. It would be fucking, I kind of like,
Starting point is 00:58:33 I hope that when I die that there is a heaven and I just get like swept up just once like a giant baby. They get that guy who's doing like the, lifting those big ass stones in Scotland to lift you up. The fucking mountain or whatever. The mountain guy or whatever. So he just picks you up and throws you.
Starting point is 00:58:51 Maybe that's what Gabriel looks like. It's so funny though, these people, they have to go to their followers and they have to say Trump is a hundred percent chosen by God. And we saw, like I said last time, when people were saying empathy is bad and mercy is evil, they are able to manipulate these large swaths of people. Don't let them convince you that religious people have, they have cornered the market on goodness.
Starting point is 00:59:21 Don't let them convince you of that. If they're out there saying after somebody says to Trump, hey, let's be merciful, and they're saying mercy is evil, don't let them convince you that they've cornered the market. This is a group of people who are manipulating everyone for gain. And there's a large group of these people
Starting point is 00:59:40 that are gullible enough to believe it. Look, man, when Elon Musk, who's supposed to be being guarded by Archangel Michael or whatever, when he tweets out that the largest humanitarian aid organization in the world, USAID, is evil and despicable, which is what he said. So what are you like? Yeah. Doing God's work. And you're just like, yeah, Jesus wouldn't want AIDS vaccines for kids either. You're just like, what the fuck is wrong with you? It's just like a box meal in some, in some underprivileged person's hand and Jesus walks
Starting point is 01:00:12 by and dumps it like books. Get that shit out of your hand. USA aid. Get the fuck out of here. Get the fuck out of here. Jesus, the hedge fund manager. I won't put up with this shit. He's just, he's just fucking making money and playing pickleball. He's slogging waters and crushing spreadsheets. Amazing. Jesus Christ. All right. This is Tom. How long has it been since Michelle? Oh, Bachman had Michelle Bachman on the program. It's been a long, long time. It's been a long time. Years years is from also people a long time. Years. Years. Is from also PeopleFor, formerly right wing watch,
Starting point is 01:00:47 Michelle O'Bachman says Trump's world economic forum speech was almost like Big Brother. All right, here we go. I gotta open this on a different window. See, I did listen to this clip, by the way, real quick. And before I listened to it, I thought, when I saw this headline, I thought, oh, is she gonna be critical of Trump?
Starting point is 01:01:04 Wouldn't that be amazing if that was the case? Right. I don't think that's the case. Sneak preview. All right, here we go. It's shocking that someone like Donald Trump is leading from a fairly biblical perspective. I'm not saying Donald Trump is Messiah. What I'm saying, he's a man, but it's remarkable that this man is leading from a more
Starting point is 01:01:27 biblical perspective for the good of humanity than these monsters who want to see mankind dead. And they squealed on themselves. They told themselves the truth. And Donald Trump spoke to this crowd. When he spoke, it was genius. He spoke to them via zoom in a huge projection screen, almost like big brother. And he called them to task. Okay. Hold on a second. She needs to reread that book. She does. But I think, I think one of the important pieces that we're missing about all this is her saying, you know, they want to ruin the world. It's like you're the end time blood cult. Yeah. Like, no, like we're not in the end time, but we want good stuff ruin the world. It's like you're in the end time blood cult. Like, we're not in the end time,
Starting point is 01:02:07 but we want good stuff for the world. We don't want to send, if I can avoid sending the fucking red haired heifer or whatever in fucking Egypt or wherever it's gotta go before that starts the cog that spins, that kicks the mouse trap that falls in the, whatever it does to start the revelations.
Starting point is 01:02:26 I want to avoid that. You're the one who wants to fucking genetically engineer the heifer. And now a reading from Rube Goldberg chapter three verse nine and lo did the basket fall upon the candle like and it made a wonderful sound. Boink. I've always wondered that man like why are they hastening the apocalypse and in every case they're just like alright so the world's going to end in pain, destruction, fear and fire. How do we get that done sooner? Like if I believe that I'd be like let's not do that at all.
Starting point is 01:03:03 Yeah let's avoid that if we can. That sounds bad. We'll do what we can. That sounds bad. We'll do what we can. I love this photo of her too. I want to call it up on the screen again. This photo of her, she's standing there with Paula White and a bunch of other pastors, right?
Starting point is 01:03:15 And they're all standing with Trump, and Trump is doing the thumbs up sitting at the desk. Looking very authentic, by the way. She's the only one, she looks like she's about to break the fourth wall. She's looking at the camera. She's the only one she looks like she's about to break the fourth wall Camera she's the only one all the rest of my looking at each other and she's the only one being like and this is where my life You know what she kind of looks to me she kind of looks to me like a fucking Chuck E Cheese animatronic, uh-huh Yeah, no, you're not wrong. If you handed her a fucking banjo,
Starting point is 01:03:45 You're not wrong. She would strum that banjo and like. I feel like they would all make a good band, a good jug band for Chuck E. Cheese. I feel like they would rock it. Yeah, man. These crazy people, they treat him like he's a demigod. Like they genuinely treat him like he's a demigod.
Starting point is 01:04:01 And that's something else we have to worry about. It's not just the people on the right that think he can't do any wrong when it comes to policy or any of this other stuff. These people are instilling on him supernatural powers. And that's something we have to keep our eye on too. Do you think that to some degree, this is, and there's a cognitive bias for this
Starting point is 01:04:21 that's slipping my mind what it is, but like, he's, like, here's what I mean. Like, if you're like one of these like fundamental, you know, Jesus crispy fucking right-wing evangelicals, you know that you have to back whatever the Republican is. You just have to do that. And then you get Trump, and he's fucking nuts, and he's got like three wives and he's cheated on them all. And he's like, he's done all this stuff that should be against your entire belief system, right?
Starting point is 01:04:52 Not mine, yours, your entire belief system. He does everything that flies in the face of that. So do you think that like the cognitive dissonance there is so hard that they have to actually back it more, that they have to like double down harder and harder and harder. Because like if they don't, they'll have to admit that sometimes the Republican's a piece of shit
Starting point is 01:05:14 and maybe they've been wrong this whole time. It's like, there's a fallacy, I forgot what it is. It's sunk cost. Sunk cost, it's exactly right. It feels like that. The reaction is so big and exaggerative. Yeah. And they're so invested in this being right.
Starting point is 01:05:28 Yeah. Right, you're so invested in Trump being the way out of this, whatever this is, right? So they're so invested in it being the right decision that no matter what Trump does, it's always the right decision. Right, yeah, yeah. So what you deal with is,
Starting point is 01:05:42 the best way to deal with that is, you just make it divine. And then you say, well, you can't understand the divine because that's one of their main tenants and then it's easy for you to explain Trump's crazy fucking actions every week on your show. If you're that guy and Johnny Enlow, it's so easy for you to be like, yeah, well, we said on a couple shows ago, when we said Michael and Gabriel and all the rest of the Beatles were getting together to hang out with Trump, we told you that he was divine.
Starting point is 01:06:13 So now when he does things that are unexplainable, it's easy to explain, because I just say, well, it's divine. I told you that already, dummy. Dude, how much of, as you're talking, like what was occurring to me, is like how much of, as you're talking like what was occurring to me, like is like how much of the divine right of kings, how much of the divine right of kings is like, is now built into the presidential immunity thing. When the king does it, it's good because God works through the king.
Starting point is 01:06:39 So even if it appears bad, God works through the king so it's good. So even if it appears bad, God works through the King so it's good. Whenever a president does something, it's legal because he's president. It's the same fucking tautology. It's the same tautology of infinite authority. Yeah, it is.
Starting point is 01:06:58 That's not good, by the way, that's not good. Okay, tomorrow's 17 days. 17, I hate that. One day closer. I think we're at this point, 1400 days away. So. Neat. Oh, cool. All right. In your prison cell. It's four and then a slash. So it's four and a slash. All right. That's going to wrap it up for this week. We will have a funny show for you this upcoming Thursday. We had to shift over a week because we had some, uh, Tom actually hadn't come over in a while.
Starting point is 01:07:36 So we did our Christmas last week. So we had an opportunity to hang out a little before show and it pushed everything back. There was no way to record a funny show last week. So everything got moved back a week, but don't worry, everything's gonna come out this month. But funny show on Thursday, come back for it. Cause hey, life's tough. Yeah. Come back for the funny show this Thursday.
Starting point is 01:07:53 We're gonna leave you like we always do with the Skeptics Creed. Credulity is not a virtue. It's fortune cookie cutter, mommy issue, hypno Babylon bullshit. Couched in scientician, double bubble, toil and trouble, pseudo quasi alternative, acupunctuating, pressurized, stereogram, pyramidal, free energy, healing, water downward spiral, brain dead pan, sales pitch, late night info, docutainment.
Starting point is 01:08:21 Leo Pisces, cancer cures, detox, reflex, foot massage, death in towers, tarot cards, psychic healing, crystal balls, bigfoot, yeti, aliens, churches, mosques and synagogues, temples, dragons, giant worms, atlantis, dolphins, truthers, birthers, witches, wizards, the nuts. You ought to be separated from the rest of us and put someplace where you can do something for them. Shaman healers, evangelists, conspiracy, double-speak stigmata, nonsense. Expose your sides.
Starting point is 01:08:56 Thrust your hands. Bloody, evidential, conclusive. Doubt even this. Thanks for tuning in. If you enjoyed the show, consider supporting us on Patreon at patreon.com forward slash dissonance pod. Help us spread the word by sharing our content. Find us on TikTok, YouTube, Facebook and Pretz. All under the handle at dissonance pod. This show is CAN
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