Higher Learning with Van Lathan and Rachel Lindsay - R. Kelly Sentenced and Inflation Talk With Marc Goldwein

Episode Date: July 1, 2022

Van and Rachel react to R. Kelly’s 30-year sentence and the "normalization" of his crimes (17:02), plus Ketanji Brown Jackson is officially sworn in (24:26) to the Supreme Court. They are then joined by Marc Goldwein, senior policy director for the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, to break down the current state of the U.S. economy (41:07). Host: Van Lathan and Rachel Lindsay Guest: Marc Goldwein Producers: Trudy Joseph and Donnie Beacham Jr. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Yo, yo, yo, thought warriors. What is up? Higher learning is on. Is I. Van Lathen, Jr. And it's me, Rachel Lindel. Guess what happened, Rachel? UCLA and USC are leaving the Pact 12.

Football talk. Is that finalized? I thought that was just rumor. They're out. Pretty boy football is on the ropes. The Pact 12. So they're going to the Big Ten. They're going to the Big Ten.

guys don't know, this is what happens in all of the college football air conferences is the PAC 10 or the, excuse me, the PAC 12, the Big 10, the Big 12, the SEC, the ACC, that's your Power 5 conferences where all the big schools are. UCLA was a part of the PAC 12, which was all the pretty boys schools on the

West Coast. You had your Oregon, your Oregon State, your Stanford. To help me out, Arizona, Arizona State, Washington, Washington State, all of these schools, schools on there. All the schools. Utah in the Pat 12. Utah is in the Pat 12.

Guess what they're leaving? The Pat 12 is done. Pretty boy football. Wait, just two schools are leaving. Yes, they're going to the Big Ten. Which travel-wise, that's a lot. I don't know how that works. And as a person who lived in Big Ten area for three years,

uh-uh. Big Ten football is not for me. I'm sorry. Big Ten football is not for you. What do you mean? I just, it wasn't as exciting. I remember when I lived in Wisconsin's, so it was 2008, 2011.

On Saturdays, I'd be like, oh, it's not as sexy as the SEC or the Big 12. Maybe it's coming around, but back then it was not. I was not into it the same way. Like, they have great offenses. No, no. It was just a slower game. It was. I mean, I see what you're saying.

Traditionally, the Big Ten, I just, you know, I disagree. But think about it, you got teams like, Ohio State always has a high-flying offense. You know, they're always flying around to the football, throwing the ball. Okay, get your face out of the camera. I see what you mean. That's one team. But you like, but you like, I mean, you, you like Texas, right? You like people that almost get it.

Hey, Archmanic. Hey, Archmanic. Hey, it's a new day. I can't wait for, first of all, it's a new day now. Because it's, it's not going to. He's not going to do. But here's the thing. They have Quinn yours already.

They have the best quarterback of the class before the last old. Texas is doing fine. Arch Manning is super overrated. Shout out to the whole Manning family. The Arch Manning, I can't wait. There was another Texas. There was another battle at Texas. It was between a great quarterback and a quarterback who wasn't that great.

It was between a guy named Chris Sims and a guy named Major Applewhite. Major Applewhite was quarterback at Catholic High from Baton Rouge, and he got to Texas. Oh, is that where he's from? Absolutely. Major Applewhite came from Catholic High in Baton Rouge. She played in the same team with Travis Minor and all of those guys. Those guys were unbeatable.

They're crazy. He was great. And you know what? Texas felt pressure to play Chris Sims, who was never that good. I'll be honest with you. He was never that good. Applewhite broke all these records. The son of Phil Sims.

There was the legacy there. They were expecting big things. It didn't happen. But that's okay. We have major and we did. We never won a championship with Major. Never won a championship with Chris Sims. Okay.

Well, neither with Major. So it wasn't until all Vince Young came through. It was the best. Which there was a battle there. Vince Young wasn't the starting quarterback at first either. Yeah, but that was just like. Do you know who it was? I can't remember.

I think it was Chance Mock. Oh, was it Chance Mock? Was it Chance Mock? Like, that was just regular. nigger shit. If you're a nigger and you too fast, they don't want you to play. They're going to call me out.

That was just regular nigger shit. You know, when you're like a quarterback and you're a nigger, especially back in those days and you hit campus, and they're like, oh my God, he could throw the ball 90 yards. He also runs a 3-940. Let's make him the long snapper. You know, like that was just nigger shit. Then you get on the field and you take the ball,

you run it down the field and they go, hey, maybe we should give him the keys to the, offense because he's the best guy, the best option we have. But nah, the world of college football is topsy-turvy right now. I don't even need the NFL. You know what? Fuck the NFL. How about that?

Oh, so you're not going to be watching this upcoming season? Fuck them. It's going to be all about college ball. Because college ball has all of these storylines, right? The death of pretty boy football, the Pac-12's ending. College football has, it has NIL. It has the return to Texas. Texas not only got Archimani, they've signed nine since Archmanning signed.

They just signed a five-star from Louisiana. Texas is tooling up. That's why the falls. You want to go to a game? I'll go to a game. The fall's going to be epic. Can't wait. And guess what is next year in this city?

What? College football playoffs. The championship game will be in L.A. Yeah. Texas won't be there. We'll go. We'll go. Texas won't be there.

Neither will LSU. Now I know LSU won't be there. We have a better chance than you do. Absolutely. When do we enter SEC? When do we go? 2023? 25.

I think 25. I think 25 or something like that. 25. In time they get that. Heaney kicked. Hi-ney. Listen, it's a lot of news breaking in sports today. Let's talk about it.

Basketball. We got free agency. We got to talk about it later. We got some people moving around. We got to talk about it later. They don't like sports talk. That was sports talk. Y'all, congratulations.

If you're watching the video, goes out to Van Lathen, who was on the Daily Show. The Daily Show, Trevor Null. It's a big, hot shit. It's a big deal. Daily Show with Trevor Null. I've never been on a Daily Show. Let me tell you guys something. Daily Show got good snacks backstage.

I'm very impressed. That should take away? I'm very impressed with the snacks at both The Daily Show and Jimmy Kimmel. Oh, Kimmel's got a whole set. Is the Daily Show like Kimmel backstage? There's only one difference between the backstages at the Daily Show and Kimmel. One difference. Kimmel had a shower.

Remember this little shower they had? There's a shower. So this whole time I'm running back home to do Kimmel to shower before I go to Kimmel, right? Because I had something to do that morning. And I'm like, yo, I didn't know that y'all had a shower. I could have just gone to the gym and then came stank but nasty and been showered and refreshed to go out. out there and do the show. No shout at The Daily Show.

Okay. Wow. Did you enjoy yourself? Who were you on the show with? Because Vand didn't let anybody know. Now, we knew it was coming. We just didn't know when it actually came. I was on the show with Trevor Noah.

No, I mean, like, what other guests were on the show? I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Okay. I have no clue.

All right. Let me tell you something. Well, congratulations. A big deal. I went there and I hadn't brushed my teeth yet. Yeah. Man Hadn't brushed my teeth

Why? Were you too excited? Were you just like Explain this to me So shout out to the Dream Hotel I love the Dream Hotel Dream Hotel Midtown

That's where I'm saying It's great It's right by Columbus Circle You know So I walk over there And I go Well it's not right by Columbus Circle It's like

I'm like Is it Midtown or Columbus Circle Because it's like Well it's actually It's actually Well it's actually the dream Midtown but it's like it's midtown but it's Columbus

it's not right next to Columbus Circle but it's like I can walk to Columbus Circle right so I walk over to Columbus Circle I walk all throughout the most wondrous place in the galaxy which is Central Park I don't care what anyone says Central Park is full of wonderment

joy and bliss I saw so many rats I didn't see any rats see the negative see you see the negative you know how many different things I saw at Central Park. I see at Central Park every time I'm there.

I saw chicks laying out bikinis in Central Park. I saw. They did a, there were these doctors who were in front of these lady doctors who were in front of this New York Senate podium who were giving this talk on women's

reproductive rights. I saw an outside roller disco. Okay. Yeah, I saw all of these different things. Central Park is wonders. It really is. It really is. You don't feel like you're in New York. You really get lost in Central Park. It really is a beautiful place.

I love it. So I come back to, I land yesterday at 9 o'clock, 9 a.m. Because I have to take the 1 a.m. flight out. Red eye. Do my stuff. Take the 1 a.m. red eye out. So I get here at 9. I don't get to the hotel until 11.

I paid for a platinum suite at the hotel. But I ended up staying in a regular room because they didn't have. It's not unacceptable. It's not their fault. It's my fault. They didn't have a sweet ready until two. And I looked at the people. I was like, yo, I got to go to sleep.

So whatever you got, just give it to me. They're like, we can't change the price. I'm like, thank you. I don't care what the bad thing. I'm like, so the room is nice. But here's the thing. I forgot my toothpaste in Los Angeles. So I get my sleep.

Okay. I wake up. I call. I say, hey, you guys set up a dental kit. I'm doing my thing. getting ready. I'm thinking about little anecdotes I'm going to tell on the show. No dental kit comes. I'm like, hey, can you guys give me a dental kit?

No dental kit. I'm about to leave. I'm like, yo, man, I need the dental kit. Cars downstairs. We got to go. Can't be late to the daily show. I'm like, what the fuck am I going to do? So I drink a lot of water, switching it around. I'm taking the toothbrush and I'm brushing my tongue, you know, trying to get the funk in the plaque off. No dental kid. I don't have time to leave. I couldn't

stop on the way. I was feeling I was very stressed out. And then what happens? I get to the daily show. And I was going to have a PA go get me some stuff from the thing, right? I get to the daily show. I get into the bathroom at the daily show. What do they have? Toothbrush,

toothpaste, mouthwash, boom. I'm in the building. I'll, I'll, I use the mouthwash. I brush the teeth. I brush my teethis. and then I decided to go live and when I was trying to go live from Twitter

from Instagram it told me I couldn't go live from my account because I called Clarence Thomas O'Coon and because of that my going live privileges have been taken away roller coaster ride before the daily show

because your call clearance what? I called Clarence Thomas Acoon and that's hate speech Oh so I couldn't go live So your Instagram was taken away? They took it away for a little while.

Then they gave it back, but I still can't go live. Yesterday? That's so funny. Yeah. But I called somebody a racist and my stuff wasn't taken away. I think Coon is a racial slur. It is. I don't think Coon is a racial slur at all.

I think if a, why? Because you were a black person to say about another black person? Because if a white person calls you a Coon, it's a, it's a slur. It's a racial slur. If a white person calls you a coon, it means absolutely nothing. It's like. Trudy, Donnie, is it racist? Actually, this should be a poll that you put up.

Is Coon a racial slur? Do it again on Instagram and see if it gets taken down. I guess. That means somebody reported you and said it was hate speech. I don't think Coon is a racial slur. Trudy, Donnie. Donnie, I think it is? How is it not?

How is it not a slur? I don't think it's a racial slur. I think it's a description. I'm a slithy and go with Van. I think it was a fact. I think it's factual. Of course it's a fact. Of course it's a fact.

But so thought warriors can coon it up with you. No. What I'm telling you is if you want to call me a co-win, it's an, hold on, hold on, hold a way, it's an insult. I mean, I'm not saying it's certainly an insult. I don't think it's a racial slur. It's an insult for sure. I'm not saying it's not an insult.

Like if you call somebody a coward, right, a coon to me is a black. traitor. Like it's not like it's not like it's it's it's it's it's definitely an insult but I don't think it's a racial slur. I don't think when white people were using it back then that they were using in the form of a black traitor. And if it's particular to a race that's what makes it a racial slur. You don't call non-black people coons. It's some non-black

It's only it's only particular and you know the reason like they call it Coons because snow coons. Is that a bad in Roots thing? Is that what they say? Got some white coons out there. They got some snow coons out there. They know who they are. Did we pod?

Sorry. I was thinking about something. Sorry. Sorry. Keep going. Sorry. Today's Thursday. I'm tired.

I'm tired. I flew in from Texas this morning. So I've technically been up since one morning, L.A. Time. Yeah. I was in Florida. And then I was in Texas. I was in Orlando speaking in a teacher conference.

Shout out to get your teach on. Spoke to 4,000 teachers. It was amazing. And then I went to Dallas because, and I really want to do something on the pod, so thought warriors hold me to this, black women in Dallas have the highest HIV rate in the country. Wow. Why is that? That's crazy.

Right? Yeah. Black women make up 60% of new cases in the country and 70% of new cases in Dallas. I'm a black woman. I'm from Dallas. I went down there to hold a conversation on HIV prevention and care. It was a beautiful talk. And so I really want to do something to bring awareness to it because I learned so much that has to do with HIV and criminalization and disclosure.

And if you're a trans woman, there's so many layers to it. And I really want to bring somebody on to break it down and talk about what's going on in the country. Yeah. You went from Florida to Texas. Florida to Texas. So I had dinner with the fam, moderated. My little nephew has COVID. So I couldn't see my sister.

them and then came back, had dinner with friends and I came back. I'm going to Dallas next week. I told my parents. I want to have dinner with your parents. They were very excited. So now you have to. I want to go to a nice restaurant with your people. They will take you.

Or maybe. Pretty hair won't cook. They're renovating the house. She can't cook. I know, I know you'll have to come back. Pretty hair can't cook. Because I would like to stay in your room. Okay.

Anybody else find that weird? I won't want to come to the house and stay in your room and like have a reimagining. It looks different. My walls were yellow. They repainted them white. I remember I told you about this. They turned it into a lovemaking room. Your parents.

Okay. You never said that. And no, they did it. They did. It turned into a lovemaking room. Because think about it, they couldn't do every room in the house when you were a kid because they didn't want to. But like, after you left, they were like, let's make sure that every room in the house has our stank on it. They have been living in that house since before we were there.

So that could have already have. Definitely. They probably did. So let me ask you a question. What do you think the chances are that your parents had sex in your room? Reddit's going to be so bad. We have decided to not have these conversations on the podcast. You want to have dinner with people.

pretty hair in the judge or not. I do. I do. No, they're really excited. They love you. All right, you guys, a lot of stuff today. Got to get to it. We have Mark Goldwine to talk inflation on the show today. He is a great guest. We're going to talk a little inflation a little bit later. But there is a barrage of news coming at us from all angles. And we're going to get to it right on the other side of this big deal of the day has to do with Robert Kelly. For adults with Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis symptoms, every choice matters. Tramphia offers self-injection or intravenous infusion from the start. Tramphia is administered as injections under the skin or infusions through a vein every four weeks,

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Restrictions apply. See terms at Fandul.com slash predict slash bonus dash offer. that terms. Okay, Rachel, I know you are sad to hear this. R. Kelly has been sentenced to 30 years in prison for federal racketeering and sex trafficking charges. Yikes. This grace R&B singer R. Kelly was sentenced to 30 years in prison. Conviction, federal racketeering. Prosecutors had asked the judge to sentence Kelly 55 to more than 25 years behind bars, while his defense attorneys asked for 10 or fewer, saying prosecutors' requests was tantamount to a life sentence.

In deciding the sentence, U.S. District Court judge and Donnelly said she considered Kelly's own traumatic childhood during which his attorney said he was reportedly sexually abused by a family member and a landlord. Quote, it may explain, at least in part, what led to your behavior,

the judge said, but it is surely not an excuse. Some former victim spoke, including Lizette Martinez, Because we're going to give her her say right now. Donnie, run that for me. Today was a very special but hard day for us. I personally, this happened to me a long time ago. I was 17.

I'm 45 today. I never thought that I would be here to see him be held accountable for the atrocious things that he did to children. I don't know what else to say except that I'm grateful. I'm grateful for today. And I'm grateful that Robert Sylvester Kelly is away, will stay away, and will not be able to harm anyone else. Also, Javanta Cunningham, a former backup senior for R. Kelly, she spoke as well.

I started this journey 30 years ago. I was 14 years old when I encountered Robert Sylvester Kelly. There wasn't a day in my life up until this moment that I actually believe that the judicial system will come through for black and brown girls. I stand here very proud of my judicial system, very proud of my fellow survivors, and very pleased with the outcome. 30 years did he do this, and 30 years is what he got.

Arkele's attorney, Jennifer Bonjean, also spoke, said that the racketeering charge was inappropriate and said that they planned to appeal the sentence. I would imagine that you're

that you're good with all of this. I mean, 30 years at a minimum, you know, I would have been happy if he got even more than that. I just, there's just certain things I just can't stop thinking about. One, how big the fall from grace is for him. Two, how we just ignored it. And I know we didn't know everything, but we knew. We do.

And we definitely knew. The third thing is, victims because there really is just this whole thing of any time something prior to him actually being in jail and incarcerated and awaiting, you know, what was going to happen with this trial and the sentencing. He was still out and about. He was still doing things. And we would make memes about these things. We would laugh about it. You know, they would do skits. We talked about it on what they used to do on Mad TV. Dave Chappelle did something. He was always the butt of jokes. And I just keep thinking of how these women who were victims terrorized by him constantly had to be reminded of him, of what he did and how the public continued to uplift him and ignore everything that he was doing.

You still have people outside that courtroom who were saying he's innocent and it's the fault of these women. You know, you could go back to, I think he married Alia in 1994. I don't and then in 1997 there was a woman who accused him of I think it was sexual battery and something else and then that settled out of court she was a minor we ignored all these things he didn't even go into trial I think until 2008 and then he was found out Gitsley and we still ignored it like we saw the video of him peeing on the girl people laughed about it people you know they made a mockery of this man was a predator we joked about him being the private uh the pie the pie the pie Piper. And I just keep thinking about these women and how nobody self-included considered them.

So I hope that, you know, it doesn't even really matter what I think or what you think or other people. It really matters about how these victims feel. And if they feel that justice was served, if they're able to finally heal and move on now that people are finally recognizing what a terror and demon that R. Kelly was. Yeah, I mean, you don't, you don't tell me. It doesn't matter what I think. Okay. Do you want to say it? So Van, Van, Van thinks differently.

Van, would you like to talk about the other side of it? You don't come in me. You don't tell me. It doesn't matter what I think. No, just very well said. The road is not over for R. Kelly. He still has to be moved back to Chicago. He faces another federal trial in August on child pornography and obstruction

charges. so his troubles in a lot of ways are just beginning. You know, you hear different buzzwords now in society, and let me be honest with people. I'm getting sick of shit. I'm definitely getting sick of shit. I'm getting sick of a lot of the complaining. I'm getting sick of people policing language.

I'm getting sick of all of this. But when a case like this happens when it occurs, it reminds me of how visually we sometimes have to me. Because everything that you're just talking about is can all be summed up in one word. That word is normalization. So a lot of times it's now one of those buzzwords that you hear all thrown around where people are like, hey, the normalization of this, the normalization of that, the normalization of this. And we're thinking, ah, man, I'm just talking shit. I'm just joking. It's like whatever. Shit that's not normal or let me not say normal because normal is.

is a, is a subjective word. How about shit that's destructive and toxic shouldn't be normalized? And what we essentially did was we took Arkelley's predatory behavior and we cooked it down to a quirk. It's a quirky thing about Arkelly. Hey, it's quirky. He likes underage girls. It's a quirk, you know?

And so for years and years and years, this guy. who is musically incredibly gifted, we took his music in exchange for his abuse and we all made that decision. It was very transactional.

We knew we took Arkelly's music in exchange for giving him the free reign to abuse people. I just hope that we'll all keep that in mind the next time we're faced with that choice. The next time someone asks us to make a choice that might be transactional in that same way that we'll think about what we're

what we're normalizing. And secondly, we'll think about what the tradeoff is. Okay, it's Jackson time. KBJ, Katanji Brown Jackson, torn into the Supreme Court on Thursday. It's today. Shattering the glass ceiling is the first black lady, 51 years old, 116th justice. Breyer is out. He's just going to go eat his brand of ice cream. and now she is going to a court that to me is wholly illegitimate. I'm happy, but at the same time, I'll ask you, in light of what's happened with Roe, and not just Roe, but a string of bad decisions. The Supreme Court is on a roll.

They're like Miles Bridges. the Supreme Court is if you guys don't know who Miles Bridges is, Miles Bridges is an incredibly talented basketball player who is desperately desperately, desperately, desperately trying to ruin his basketball career.

Just bad decision, our bad decision was just arrested today on a domestic violence situation. Before it, just all kinds of stuff, the Supreme Court and Miles Bridges are on the same trajectory, just ruining it at all. Okay.

So to have Katanji Brown Jackson there means a ton, but I'm reminded of what I felt earlier when I was like her appearance on the court. Yes, I thought about that. Is maybe a little bit more cosmetic. I'm not in any way. It's not cosmetic. I don't want to say that, but I wish it mattered. I wish she had the power to,

she's going to write a lot of dissenting opinions and I'm sure it will be beautiful. For right now, we're so fucked with the court. A lot of dissenting. I don't know. Listen, I thought about what you said, you know, knowing that this was going to happen and it is a historic moment. I don't think it's cosmetic. I think that when she was confirmed, we celebrated, we realized how big of a moment it is. We talked about the representation of it.

We talked about what this means. We talked about how this was long overdue. We talked about how she's well qualified and more qualified than most of the people who are currently sitting on the bench. but yes, in the grand scheme of things on a court where it is currently 6-3, her being on in the minority, it doesn't make, it doesn't make a difference in regards to decisions that are going to come from this court. But it does make it makes a difference in the composition of the court. And I don't want to take away from that.

However, I celebrated that back when the confirmation is happening. So, yeah, like the fact that this is how she's actually getting sworn in is a beautiful moment, but in light of what's happened this week or last week and now even some of the decisions that have come out this week, they're done for now. I guess until they start up again, letting the rulings go. I'm, yeah, I'm a little disenchanted at the moment because of what's happening with the court. But I still stand by everything we said when she was confirmed originally.

Yeah, I feel you. I listened to an NPR interview with comments. Harris and Kamala Harris was talking about I wish I had audio from the interview and she was talking to the NPR interviewer about everything that the Biden administration has delivered on and oh was it a short interview no it wasn't because it was a very interesting interview I think it's on the NPR politics podcast I suggest everybody go listen to it and it's about the fact that there are so many things because NPR said to Kamala Harris, they said, look, people turned out, you're telling people to vote again, right?

And a lot of people are disenchanted with that message. People turned out record numbers in 2020 and they expected to be a little further along or to have some protections that they didn't get. And she starts talking about everything that she feels like people stood outside for. She said she was talking about people stood outside for the child tax, credit and we've done that. We've ended child poverty. People stood outside for having clean water and the infrastructure bill. And we did that. We're going to get the let out of the water. We promised to do that in 10 years. We're passing the first infrastructure

bill after all of this time. People stood out there because we promised a black Supreme Court justice, and we did that, Katanji Brown Jackson. I am not obsessed with bashing the Democrats. When I'm listening to her, I'm thinking, that's not why we stood out there. I'm going to be honest with you. All those things are fantastic. And this administration does deserve a tremendous amount of credit for a lot of the things that they've done and attempted to do. I'm not in any way saying that they're the bad guys. But just listening to her double down. I know that that's political speak. She's not going to get up there and say, hey, there's a lot of stuff that we thought we were going to be able to do when you can't do.

it. The best option is the, the best recourse that we have is actually to go vote and turn some of these places. We're going to talk about them in a second. But I don't know. When I heard Katanji Brown Jackson in there, I was like, I know I didn't stand out there to vote for a black female Supreme Court justice. I think that's amazing. But I was out there for voting rights and I was out there for violence and policing. And I was out there because I hate fucking down. and I'll be out there again but don't lie to me about while I was there. Don't play me. Even though a lot of stuff you mentioned was great.

All right, let's talk about something we talked about on the last podcast. The last podcast, we talked about the Democrats need to message a little bit better about some of the races

that could be, that we could win, you know, as far as the left, the people that don't want to steal women's uteruses. Rachel, did you see the, did you see the

response to that? Did I see a response to what? On Reddit? That you're talking about? Was there a response on Reddit? Some of the Solace Jackals on Reddit were very upset with us. Wait, this was about the because you said, we said we wanted to put it all together in a list and the Democrats need to be better with their messaging. On Reddit, they said that we need to do our own research. Was that that post? They said, we need to do, they said, not only do we need to do our own research, but that the Democrats, they said that this stuff is easily find, easily searchable. You can go out there and figure it out. Forget about the Democrats don't need to do this.

You do it. You're an American. Go find it. And by the way, that's, I don't disagree with that. I just think if you want to win, it might be a good idea to message the information. Look, I go out and I I investigate political things that I think about all the time But I think it's a good idea if you want to win an election

And you're up against stupid people, right? Who continue to kick your ass I think it might be a good idea To give people the intellectual ammunition that they need to fight back I don't know. I don't know, I don't know In one place, I don't think that that was too hard of an ask I really don't I really don't

I guess I was a little shocked it was like such a strong stance to that. Yeah, listen, yes, we could do our own research, but at the same time, when we talk about the Republicans messaging and we talk about how they seem to be aligned and push out the same message, whether it's hypocritical or wrong, they still continue to push it out.

They're aligned on their messaging, right? You know where they stand. You know what they're doing or they're not doing and they're lying about it. But when it comes to the Democrats, everybody says the same. thing. They need to do better with their messaging. So we're simply just asking for one place for it all to be together so we can all go to the polls and vote and change the way things are going.

That's it. I've really shocked at the strong response. So a couple of things here. Number one, Elizabeth Warren, who is a fantastic politician, actually put out something that I retweeted. I suggest you guys go out there. If not, we'll post it for the Solace Jack. We can post on Higher Learning. Posted on higher learning. Elizabeth Warren actually put out some messaging that I think was fantastic on this. And I spoke to a friend of the podcast, somebody who I know you guys all love, somebody who you guys do not think is an untrustworthy political operative. One of my friends, someone who I know is a good person, Bacari Sellers.

I've seen some of the talk about Bacari on the Reddit as well. Damn it. That's my man. I talked to Baccarat, this was the exchange between me and Baccarat. I was like, what are the racist in play? Baccarry said, I said, are there any races in play? What can the Democrats gain seats this year? All the races in play?

He said, yes, nigger. And I said, well, shit, I got a message since y'all not going to do it. Baccari said, look, when the same states Biden won, flip Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Hold Georgia and Nevada. If we get freaky, we can win Ohio, Florida, and North Carolina. You could actually get to 55. 55.

You could actually. This is the Senate. This is the Senate. This is the Senate. You could actually get to 55. So we're going to run down some of these races. In Nevada, you have a CINITY GOP candidate. Adam Lackset.

He said Roe versus Wade was always wrongly decided. and called overturning the landmark abortion rights A Case of Historic Victory. Abortion rights are very strongly, very strongly protected in Nevada. But still though, a senator there, and look, we have a plan here at Higher Learning to interview every single Senate politician

in every single state where it is winnable so that we can give them all the platform and help their fundraising dollars so that we can win. The goal is 55. 55 and we can do some shit. Rach, we got to be the change. Are you ready?

We got to be the change. You're right. I am ready. Are you ready to have Reddit finally on our side? Actually, not you. That'll be the day, right? They love you. No, they, oh my gosh, they came out of me.

I posted something the other day because they were like, oh, Rachel was so wrong about that. That's not true. Texas, Beto's winning. And I was like, actually, here's an article. This is where I got that from. No, he's not. They do.

They come in me all the time. I love Rachel, but she's, you know, she's wrong again. And I do get things wrong sometimes. Please tell me when I get things wrong. They do not always love me. That is, they love you. Oh, by the way, once again, when I was out this week, I just kept meeting thought warriors.

People were running up to me, telling me that they love the podcast. They love you, Van. They love what we do. And I just love that. Oh, I can't wait for a live show. So we can just stop. We can just stop judging everything by Reddit. There are thought warriors out there who love what we're doing.

I love Reddit. Everybody go to the Reddit. All our thought warriors. I go there. It goes down. It goes down in the Reddit. It goes down. You have Pennsylvania.

You have Dr. Oz. No, you can't go down. Who is 100% anti-abortion. Which I never knew. I never knew. Any of this shit about doctor. That he was so conservative? I know.

I'm like, where did this come from? My question is, was his show getting canceled? Or did he just say, I'm so fed up, I got to run into politics? Yeah. Because he seems very, I had no idea he was conservative. And again, I didn't watch his show. He's up against Lieutenant Governor John Federman, who said the right to an abortion will be on the ballot this November in Pennsylvania. I need to get John Fetterman on this podcast.

In North Carolina, the candidate is Sherry Beasley up against Ted Bood. He called Roe Historic, an historic victory. Okay. So we need to get Sherry Beasley on this podcast. You have Wisconsin, Senator Ron Johnson. It's a record on abortion, right? Fucking putrid. Putrid.

All right. The Planned Parenthood Action Fund lost an advertising campaign against Ron Johnson, Wisconsin is another place that we might be able to make some inroads. We need to make sure candidates and places where we have chances are going to get this. You're going to get this information.

You're going to hear from these candidates here on higher learning. People like Elizabeth Warren are putting this out. But it's if you're, if you listen to my voice and you live here in New York or you live in California, you live in a place where the ladies that you share your community with are going to be okay, that's great.

Happy for you that you don't live in Gilead. However, we need to be a part of the solution to this problem everywhere. And we need to be supporting people. Also, down there in Georgia, Stacey Abrams, she's trying to get her thing popping again. We need to make sure that we're on top of the. that Stacey Abrams and support Stacey Abrams. A lot of people were mad at Stacey Abrams because she said some pro-police shit.

I don't know how you guys expect. I don't know how you guys expect Stacey Abrams to be the governor of Georgia and diss the cops at the same time. I don't know. Like, to be honest with you. Did she have to make a comment? She does. I don't know what the context stuff was her for saying it.

I didn't know. So this was the same thing that got Joe Biden in trouble, that I was mad about, right? The reason why I was mad about Joe Biden saying this is because it was completely at the antithesis of everything, of everything that we were talking about. My thing is, I thought that Joe Biden's statement on it was a slap in the face to a lot of people. Stacey Abrams, I think it was a lot more measured. I still support Stacey Abrams.

My support for the police is at an all-time low. But the reality is Stacey Abrams is much better for the future of Georgia. And as making Georgia purple or blue, it would be much better to have her there than Brian Kemp. Okay. All right. Obviously, that state is coming down to the, you have two. You have fucking C.E. Jimmy, Herschel Walker up against Raphael Warnock. Okay.

So we're going to be there. We're around. We're making it happen. We're going to be in all of these places. Even we have to go all of these places and stuff for these people. I'm not taking this row shit lying down. We shouldn't. Arizona as well.

The challenge Mark Kelly is the senator there in Arizona. So I like having every single one of these people, trying to get every single one of them who's in these states that we just mentioned on the podcast. Let's talk to them. Let's promote them. Let's put it out there. Let's do our part.

Let's do our part. Trudy, Donnie. Let's do it. All right now we have to talk to as Rachel has a dog on her. Is that brownie? It's brownie. He's a little sick.

It's not feeling good. So he's being a big baby. So right now we're going to talk to Mark Goldwine about some inflation. We've been talking about this. There are things going on here that affect Americans. And inflation is one of them. He is from the center of fiscal responsibility. And we're going to talk to him.

And he's going to do a damn good job. Explain how American got into a situation with inflation that's in right now. now and what we might be able to do to get out of it. We're going on the other side of this break. This episode is brought to you by WeatherTech. Everyone knows winter is the MVP and making a mess. You don't need WeatherTech floor liners in the summer unless you hit the beach or go camping. Then you'd want a cargo liner or a road trip goes sideways.

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owners already trust Spectrum Business. So visit Spectrum.com slash business to learn more, restrictions apply, services not available in all areas. Okay, guys, you might have noticed the price of things. It's like the wire. So one point on the wire guys where Avon Barksdale, well, actually wasn't Avon, it was, it was, it was, uh, fuck. Yeah, let the wire go. Let the wire go. Let's just keep it moving.

It's Marlow. It's Marlowe. Yeah, yeah. You guys, society is like the wire right now. Remember Marlowe, Marl Stanfield told everyone. The price of the brick is growing up. It's going up. And you might have noticed this happening.

The gas pump, you might have noticed this happening at the supermarket. This is called inflation. We haven't really talked about it much on higher learning. We're going to talk about it now with Mark Goldwine, who is the senior vice president and senior policy director of the committee for a responsible federal budget. I ran across his Twitter, which is a great Twitter, when I was looking for information on inflation. I thought it would be great for Mark to join us.

We thought it would be great for Mark to join us on higher learning and help us understand how inflation is affecting the lives of daily Americans and what might be able to be done to stop it. Mark, thank you so much for joining us on higher learning. Yeah, thanks for having me. Okay, first question. Explain to people that might not know like we're children, which we are, what inflation is and how it affects a country's economy.

Sure. So inflation is basically when the prices go up for the same exact goods. And it's not just when one price goes up. This happens all the time, right? The price of apples is higher or the price of yes than is higher. Inflation is when the price of everything is going up. And so you're buying the exact same stuff and paying more for it. Gosh, you said it said it in such an easy way to understand, right? Okay, Mark, should we be scared? scared. I don't think we should ever live in fear, but we should definitely be concerned. Inflation right now, depending on which measure you use, is running at like 8.5%. What we aim for is 2 to 2.5%. So we're basically at like three or four times where we should be.

This is the highest it's been, by the way, since 1981. And 1981 was a really crazy inflation time. So I wouldn't say scared, but yeah, we should be concerned. and inflation is really, really high. You just terrified me. It's very hot. And by the way, you know, inflation has destroyed societies in the past. It's like wiped out whole country's economies in the past. It is something that's, you know, it can be disastrous to people's everyday lives.

Speaking of the 80s and the 70s, for specifically, there was a time when, we had crazy inflation, okay? We'll get to the causes of our current inflation. If we look back into the past, it was, there was, in the 70s, inflation was bad, and the Fed had to take drastic action to get American inflation under control. And it was led by a guy named Paul Volker at the time,

who really became something of a national villain for some of the actions that he took to curb inflation. Can you tell us a little bit about what happened then and what might need to be done now to curb the inflation that we have? Yeah, I think that starts with understanding why inflation arises. And it could be for a lot of reasons, but mainly it happens when there's too much, in economics terms, we say there's too much demand for the amount of supply in the economy. And that either has to mean people are spending way too much money or the economy's not

producing nearly enough stuff. It could be either or it could be both. But when that happens, the Federal Reserve, who's in charge of control. the inflation really only has one tool. And that's to get people to slow their spending. And the Federal Reserve gets them to slow their spending, usually by raising interest rates. When there's higher interest rates, homes are harder to afford. People's retirement accounts or other values decline so people have less money to spend from their savings. Ultimately, this trickles into the labor market. And it causes economic pain. And if we do this early,

and there's only a little bit of inflation, the Federal Reserve can cause just a tiny bit of pain by getting people to spend less and that can stop the inflation. What happened in the 70s and 80s is inflation was so far out of control that Paul Volcker felt like the only course of action was basically to drive the economy into a deep recession, to really cut off the spending so much that nobody again would question that the Federal Reserve was willing to do what it took to bring inflation under control. And it did cause a recession, but it also worked. After that, we had 40 years of basically no excessive inflation.

So we have seen the Federal Reserve raise the interest rates at this point. Are we starting to now see things cool off a little bit or go down because of that? Yeah. And will they go higher to continue in that way? So through the entire COVID pandemic, the entire cut first two years, the Federal Reserve had cut its interest rate to zero, right? Now what's interest rate is a little bit above one and a half. And maybe more importantly, the Federal Reserve has.

a signal, it's probably going to raise it to about three and a half. Maybe it'll go a little bit less, maybe to go a little bit more. But that signal is important because, especially the financial markets, like for people generating mortgages, the signal already starts to set how they set the mortgages. And so it already is having an effect, especially in the housing market. If you wanted to buy a home a year ago, you could probably get a 3% interest rate, maybe 3.5. Right now, 6% is normal rate for a 30-year loan. And so guess what people aren't buying a house? If they can avoid it, right now they're not. So we're already seeing the cool down there.

We are seeing cool downs in other sections of the economy. It's hard to tell how much of that is interest rates and how much of that is what's going on with oil prices related to, related to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Mark, you hit a nerve. He's making that face. Go ahead. Go ahead. No, Mark, you hit a nerve. Rachel just bought a home.

She would buy a home. She bought a mansion with a pool. No, I did not. I got good interest rates. I got locked in right before they just started to really shoot up again. Yeah, I've been admiring your bookshelf and your background this entire time so far. So, I'm glad. Mark, you should see the pool.

Honestly, I have the best luck with interest rates. We put our offer on our house on, I forget, March 1st, 2020. And then we got the loan like right before April 1st, when everyone thought the economy was going to go into a deep depression. and I got like the best interest rate in the whole world. I'm really lucky on that. Oh. So let's...

Good for you, Mark. Good for you, Mark. But then I was locked in that house for the next two years. So you win some you live. So let's talk about, before we get to gas, let's talk about specifically some of the back and forth right now, um, on what people believe caused this, uh,

little spike of American inflation that we're having right now. now. You hear from both sides of people, it's a highly politicized issue. You hear, hey, the decision to give Americans cash while we were inside caused inflation, right? That drove things up, caused inflation. You also hear that a lot of the supply chain problems that we're having right now cause inflation. You're hearing, hey, maybe it was some of Trump's tariffs and the prices on goods as a result of the tariffs that Trump implemented that caused inflation. Was it one those things more than the other, or was it the combination of those things that got us to where we are right now? Look, all of these things have to come together, but I think there's really two causes. One of you can think of as the 2021 inflation and the other than you can think of as the 2022 inflation. The 2021 inflation, I think, to a large degree, really was the stimulus we sent people. Not the money we sent in 2020 when people were locked in their homes, but the money we spent just as the reopening was happening, right? Just as people were starting to get back to normal.

There were vaccines, you know, schools were reopening. We sent everyone, we sent a family of $5,000, $7,000. We sent a new round of unemployment checks. We sent states that were already running surpluses, big amounts of federal aid. And immediately, that money showed up in the spending data. In April, purchases of cars went through the roof, for example. We immediately saw that. And that probably caused a lot of the inflation in 2021.

Now, things were not getting back to normal with their own, but, Things were starting to stabilize, I think, at a elevated rate, maybe 4% or inflation a year, which is still twice what it's supposed to be, but better. And then we had the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the international response. And that's probably spiked it. That's really responsible for a lot of the 2022 inflation, because that took an already bad inflation situation, and it added to it the highest oil prices we've seen, you know, in modern history and higher food prices and all sorts of other chaos to the economy.

How, though? What specifically about the Russian invasion of Ukraine ended up making Americans filling in their wallets? The biggest factor was basically there's less oil available and less natural gas available for purchase. For us, it's more oil, but it's a global market, so it all matters. The international community came together and sort of cut off Russia from some markets. And from a sort of international peace perspective, that's probably a good thing. but from a price perspective, it means there's less oil out there, but there's still the same amount of driving that people want to do. Right? People still want to purchase through the same amount of stuff. In fact, because we're still doing pretty financially well from all the money we had in 2021, people are actually spending more than normal. They're doing more flights, more car trips, et cetera. And so if there's less oil, but people still want the same amount or more, the price is going to go up.

And so that's the biggest area we're seeing in it. We're seeing similar things in a lot of kind of food. There's a lot of wheat that's grown. for example, in other grains that are grown in Ukraine and Russia. You know, vodka prices are up. So we're seeing it in food as well. Yeah, I mean, we all have seen it when we go to the store to get our weekly vodka, right? But, oh, you guys don't do that? No. It's mainly appearing in gas prices.

And the problem with gas is that's an input price to everything else, right? Because any kind of good, they're shipping associated with it, you know, either the shipping you do or the shipping between stores and warehouses. is if it's a service, people are still kind of having to commute. So those gas prices are trickling through everything else. And that didn't cause the inflation, but it took an inflation that was bad, but stabilizing it and turned it into a situation that was really bad and not stable at all. So, Mark, it was trending on Twitter today that the price of Arizona iced tea had gone

from 99 cents to $1.29. Did you see this? I did it. I didn't. That's fucking hilarious. But it didn't. They were mixing up the U.S. dollar with the Canadian dollar. The Canadian dollar.

But it's not true. It's a whole like NPR thing, wrote an article about it. People were going wild thinking that the price had gone up 30 cents, but it raised this bigger question of, you know, it's still 99 cents, but how much longer can these companies stick to these fixed price items? Like how much longer can they hold out? Will we see, you know, our beloved Arizona iced tea jump up in 30 to 30 cents more? or things like that.

Yeah. So these kinds of fixed prices is one reason that you rarely see sort of medium inflation. You either see low inflation or high inflation because they'll want to stick to 99 cents as long as they can, right? There's no benefit of them raising from 99 cents to $1.5. If they're going to raise, it's because they're raising to $1.25 or $1.50. And so some of these prices are going to be sticky, but when they unstick, they're probably going to unstick by a significant amount.

The other thing companies can do, and we see this at like McDonald's, is, something called shrinkflation. You charge the same price, but you know, you were the McDowell, it used to be a double cheeseburger or two slices of cheese. Now it's the McDouble with only one slice of cheese, right? Or now, for now instead of five ounces of meat, it's four ounces of meat. So they do things to give you a slightly smaller product or a worse product for the same price. That's also inflation. It's just less visible inflation. You don't see it as much. But the nerds at the Bureau of Labor Statistics, they do measure that kind of inflation as well. What number from your calculations, what interest rate number will we have to hit to see our current inflation affected?

Well, I think as we raise interest rates, it's going to be affected. The question is like, what interest rate to get inflation back down to the federal resource target of 2%. That's a really tough question. That's like the trillion dollar question. But at minimum, the interest rate is going to have to be higher than the inflation rate significantly. So, wow. And that doesn't mean nine and a half percent because as we raised- I was about to say.

Yeah. Shit. As we raise the interest rate, hopefully the inflation rate's going to come down. Right? So hopefully it will converge. So right now, now there's different measures inflation, but the Federal Reserve preferred measure inflation. Right now it's at six and a half. And they're straight at 1%.

One and a half. Maybe as they raise it to two and a half, it goes. goes down to four and a half. So I don't know where they're going to converge, but they will have to converge somewhere for the inflation rate to get down to 2%. Gun to my head, being forced to guess, I would say we're going to have to have an inflation, sorry, interest rate of 4% or higher, maybe 4.5% if we want to get inflation down. But I also think there's a chance to the federal does that guarantee a recession? It makes it very likely. So I think there's a chance. I think the chance the Federal Reserve is going to look at the situation, they're going to do enough

interest rate hikes to get the interest rate down to say, inflation rate down and say 3%. And they're going to say, well, we're shooting for 2%. But 3% is pretty good. And let's stick here for a while and see if we get the economy moving, then maybe go a little further. So I think there's a chance that to avoid a recession, they'll accept an inflation rate so it's a bit higher than their target. Because the administration won't accept the recession. I think the administration is going to want to avoid a recession at all costs. I'm sure they'll want to, but they may not be in control of this. And I got to say, a lot of the ideas that they're throwing out, frankly, are going to make the situation worse.

Like this gas tax holiday, this is going to save people like 8 cents at the pump. And it's going to have to cause the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates more. It's going to increase the likelihood of a recession. How do you feel like the administration is handling all of this? Not great. There are some things they do that they're doing that thing with. very helpful. I don't think supply chains are really the main story here, but they've been doing a good job trying to clear up some of supply chain issues. It was good that they released some oil

from the Three Jail Petroleum Reserve. But overall, I don't think they're ready to admit that part of the problem was we put too much cash to the economy all at one time. And until they can admit that, they can't, to you admit the source of your problem, you can't solve it. And they keep proposing solutions that are actually adding to that, like the gas tax solosies, like student, student debt cancellation, all sorts of stuff that's actually going to make it worse. So. Yes, Mark, you wrote an article about that. Speak on that.

I was going to ask you about that. You said it's bad for 85% of Americans. Yeah. Speak on. Yeah. So here's a situation. 13% of Americans have student debt. For some of them, it really is crippling and they really need relief, especially

Americans that didn't finish college and have the debt and didn't finish it. And so we should figure out how to, and I have a lot of ideas, but it's a whole other podcast, how to help those folks. A lot of that 13% is doing quite well. They have college degrees, advanced degrees, law degrees, medical degrees, they're earning high amounts of money. If we effectively send them $10,000 of cash, which is what this is big, they're going to go out and spend it.

That's going to make the inflation situation worse. That is going to raise everybody's prices. And so basically, we're going to make 13% of people better off. Of that 3% really needed it. The other 10% didn't need it, but they're going to spend the money to make the other 87% face higher prices. Yeah, I'm going to tell you right now, I would have been part of the people who spent it. We've had the student loan discussion here. And I can't make people upset every single time I talk about not paying them. So, I mean, it's, it's great. If you have student debt,

it's great to not have to pay it back. It's, I would love $10,000. But when you're thinking about the entire economy, you need to consider what putting more money into an economy, we're already spending more than we can produce is going to do to the inflation rate. Do you know what the problem with that is, Mark? And we're about to run up into, you're about to become a cancer on the left, Mark. I'm not sure where you are. But they're going to look at you and they're going to say, Mark, that Mark doesn't want to cancel our student loans. The problem with, like the problem with that is for me, I'll just be honest with you, see what you think about this. Throw this out at you, Mark, is that there are a high percentage of black and brown people.

with these loans that, in my opinion, are predatory and could really use the debt cancellation, the debt forgiveness, however you want to put it. So I guess the question is, is there a sweet spot? Mark, I believe in sweet spots. You ever eat an M&M? I love Eminem. Yeah, sure.

Price is throwing up. Stop, Mark. Stop being negative. It's actually the same price, but now you just get Mennon have minis. Just get the minis. No. What did you call it? Shrinkflation.

Shrifflation. Shrinkflation. There's a lot of women out there that go through shrink flesion. Man. Make your point. So what I'm saying is, is there a sweet spot of loan forgiveness or cancellation that can affect some of the Americans that are most vulnerable to this, but not affect the overall American economy?

in a way that is counterproductive to everyone. Because you said that maybe there is, and what does that look like? Yeah, I think there is. Look, we're never going to get it perfect because when was the last time Washington never got anything perfect? Of course, I think the three angles to think about here are, first of all, what are the truly predatory loans? And there's a lot of the administration's been actually doing a good job kind of going through one by one and finding the colleges that are really just scams. some of them have since shut down. Cancel those loans.

I think we can do that. The administration is, let's do that more. The second is there's something called income-based repayment. It already exists, but it's a mess. Nobody even understands how it works or if they're in it. But we can clean it up. We can clean it up somewhat with administrative actions more for than to actually do legislation. We can get people in it that they're supposed to be in it.

What it effectively does is it caps how much you have to pay of your income to loans in any given in any given year. It also has an exemption based on, you know, if you're making less than 150% of poverty, you're paying nothing. And then after a certain time period, it wipes away whatever is left. So we got to fix that. But then the third thing is, and the whole, this is getting way off the inflation, but I'll be back to it a little bit, is that the problem that here is actually college affordability, right? Canceling debt is about solving a problem we already, we already did. It's about, it's a windfall for people that already got the degree. But the problem is, we're just going to have a new generation of people that are entering college and actually facing even higher tuition.

Because if people think there's going to be debt cancellation every presidency, every four years, they're going to take out more in debt. Colleges are going to see that. They're going to hike tuition more. They're going to offer more degrees that are either useless or just not worth the return. So we actually need to get to this affordability thing. College doesn't need to be four years for everyone. Colleges should be offering three-year bachelor degrees that are more no frills. We don't need, you know, every university to be a, to be sort of a fancy, fancy spa.

We don't need so much administrative spending. We need them to accept advanced placement credits and IB credits so people can get more credit in high school for colleges. There's all sorts of things we can do in the front end to hold colleges and universities accountable. To me, just canceling everyone's debt across the board is a cop-out. It's saying we're not going to deal with the problem that colleges and universities are charging too much.

We're just going to put this one-time band-aid on it. Band-Aids actually may be infected, so it's maybe going to make the problem worse going forward and kick it to a future president, future Congress to deal with it. And I just think that's the wrong approach. Mark, if we don't get this under control under this administration, and let's just say Biden doesn't win again in 2024 and we have a whole new administration come in, is that going to be, do you think, and I guess this is a hypothetical, do you think that is going to make things worse? If we don't get it done in the next year and a half, it's going to make it worse? Well, let me say this.

I think that what we've seen in societies throughout history that suffer long periods of very high inflation is often it leads to like a lot of political problems. And our political system is already a mess. Often it leads to demagogues to come to power. Often it leads people to look for, you know, quick fix solutions that are not. That doesn't always happen. You know, I think in the 80s, all we just had was a horrible recession, but otherwise things were okay. But I think there's a lot of potential political damage, like not political damage, little political,

like big political damage to our society, if this goes on for too long. Now, is two years or three years too long for that? I don't, I don't know. This may just be more of the same kind of political damage we've been having recently. But I do think there's a balancing act here, because if we want to get inflation under control without causing a recession. And that may mean accepting a period of time that inflation is declining, but it's still high.

So last question for me. Bill Maher was on the show, and he was echoing actually some of your sentiment saying that sending people, some of the stimulus checks that we sent them, contributed to inflation. Crystal Ball, which is a great name. I don't know if you saw this.

Crystal Ball, from, she's a political commentator, punted, if you will. She shot back that there was also a trillion dollars, a trillion dollars,

I think it was around a trillion dollars, pumped into Wall Street around 2020 at the time that the stock market was in tatters. That around the time coronavirus started to cause some global panic in the market.

So February 2020, March 2020, that we shot a trillion dollars into Wall Street to stabilize things a little bit and try to get ahead of some of the financial instability that COVID might bring us. And that nobody talks about that and how that might have infected inflation, but they want to talk about extra money for Americans that might want to, you know, buy a car or, you know, pay off a loan. or something like that. How do you think those two things compared to one another? So we didn't send a trillion dollars to Wall Street.

We did actually say we were going to, depending on how you measure it, send something along that magnitude. But the Federal Reserve never actually sent most of that money. It turned out it was in the tens of billions. The bigger gift to Wall Street actually was these low interest rates. When interest rates are close to zero, it basically causes stock values to go way up. And that's what we saw with the stock market. And I do think that contributed to a lot of our inflation people with a lot of money felt even wealthier because their portfolio has went up 30, 40 percent.

And guess what they spent that wealth? So I do think the very low interest rates boosting the stock market has been a big contributor to inflation. The difference between that and the checks to some degree is we've actually solved for that already with the higher interest rate. So I don't know if you've seen the stock market recently. But basically all those games have now been. All those games have been wiped away. Yeah. It's not pretty.

So the Federal Reserve, I think, is doing what it's supposed to do to unwind those games. And the stock market is going down and basically has adjusted for inflation. The stock market has lost all of its games from the pandemic. Wow. Those checks are also being spent down now. So like those checks aren't a forever problem. But meanwhile, the fear now is what was this one-time boost in demand from the high stock values and also from the and also from the money of business and the states is going to start to embed in the economy

because people are going to see its 8 and 1% inflation and they're going to start expecting that inflation is going to be higher. Maybe they're not going to expect 8.5% but they're going to expect 4%. If they start expecting that, they're going to start asking for higher raises. They're going to start being more willing to pay more for products. Business is going to start raising prices more. So the biggest fear isn't this one-time demand boost, whether it's from stock values or from household balance sheets.

it's that sets in motion, this ongoing inflation that continues even once, once people aren't having that elevated income anymore. Fantastic. Last question for me, Mark. Last question. Did inflation kill crypto? Well, actually, that's the thing that could get me really in trouble is if I opine on my views on crypto. Oh, give it to me.

We're not for it. We're not pro-Crypto on this podcast. Well, yeah, I mean, I would say I hope so. I think actually high interest trade killed crypto. I think that crypto seemed artificially attractive because interest rates were near zero. And I don't want to be to be so negative on the Fed cutting rates. I think that was absolutely the appropriate thing for them to do in 2020, was to cover rates to zero. But just because something is the right thing to do doesn't mean it doesn't have consequences.

And one of the consequences is people were searching for, it's called searching for yield. And they were searching in some pretty dumb places, right? like some of it was they were searching in stocks that turned out to not be that valuable like Peloton, but some of it was that they were searching for things that had literally no value, right? No value like Dogecoin. And, you know, I'm just waiting for pox to come back. So let me ask you a question. Can crypto exist with a higher interest rate?

Does a high interest rate mean, in your opinion, the death of crypto? Death is a strong word, but I think that with a high interest rate, crypto is going to be a lot less attractive. And Pogs will be less attractive. Mark Goldwyn. Thank you so much. Thanks, for you. Yeah, that's great. You've made us a lot smarter.

We understand the issues now. Thank you so much, Mark. Where can they find you? What are you doing? Tell them about yourself before we get out of here. Yeah, sure. Check out CRFB.org. We're the Committee for Responsible Federal Budget. And check me out on Twitter at Mark Goldwine.

I have lots of opinions about Pogs. No opinions about crypto. All right. Peace, brother. Thank you for joining us today on higher learning. Thank you so much. For adults with Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis symptoms, every choice matters.

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Clinic Kids is a registered 501C3 nonprofit. That was fantastic. Rachel, did you learn about inflation? Man, he broke it down in the most simple, like, we could teach a class. We could. We could. No, he's great. We got to have him come back in because this doesn't sound like it's going.

way at all. So we're going to, Mark is now a friend of the show. And we will have him back, guys. Donnie, give me my drop. Right stick. Right stick. We don't stop. This week in Dick riding, straight to Stephen A. Smith. I'm sorry, I have to do it. This week in Dick riding, I got to tell Stephen A. Smith, get off Kyrie Irvin's dick. It's embarrassing. I don't know if you guys saw it today. DeRant requested a trade from the Nets. He's out.

Kyrie opted in. KD said trade me. KD might get traded to the Sons. He might get traded. So I don't know. The heat. He put out a list of teams. He's probably going to get traded the place where the Nets can get the best deal.

It looks like to me the best deal would be a sign of trade. DeAndre Aidan sent a bunch of picks back. Kevin Durant ends up in Phoenix with Devin Booker. and Chris Paul, the sons are right away NBA finals contenders, the championship contenders right away. I'm watching ESPN while they're talking about Kevin Durant asking for a trade. I'm watching ESPN and what does Stephen A. Smith do? He takes the entire situation around Kevin Durant asking for a trade

and talks about how it's a reflection. on Kyrie Irvin and how Kyrie Irvin ruined the franchise. Look, I am not in any way saying that people's opinions about Kyrie Irvin and how he handled his time in Brooklyn aren't warranted.

I'm not saying that at all. But what I'm saying is this. I've talked about this before. Media members taking the time to have personal vendettas with young black athletes, especially when you're an older brother like Stephen A. Smith is fucking disgusting.

I get if you don't like the way somebody carries himself for what it is that they're doing. I understand it. But the reality of the situation is having a platform like Stephen A. Smith has and taking every opportunity you can to disciree Irving, whether warranted or unwarranted,

is flagrant, thick riding and I can no longer abide by it. Get off his nuts. Stephen A, we know you don't like Kyrie Irvin. For whatever reason, you guys have gone back and forth. You've called him names. You've said things about him. He's called you a peon.

Whatever. Whatever. You're basking it. It's not good. This Skip Bayless thing of all of these guys having a LeBron James, somebody that just harp on and beat on it, talk shit about him. I don't think as black men in the media, this is the way we should handle shit. I don't.

I'm disappointed, Stephen A. Smith. I've seen blatant dick riding, and I have to call it off. Well, let's just be honest. There's a lot of things that you've been disappointed about with Stephen A. Smith when it comes to this podcast. You've talked about Stephen A. Smith quite a lot. And I don't think one of those things has been positive. One could say you are to Stephen A. Smith, what Stephen A. Smith is to Kyrie.

What? Are you a cue? Look at him. Look at him doing Stephen. Right. We don't stop. Are you accusing me of being a dick rider? Look at you getting to your Stephen A. Smith mode.

Listen, listen, in all seriousness, when you put it that way in regards to to a black man constantly talking about another black man. I totally get it. You're right, because it gives non-black people the opportunity to harp on that situation because Stephen A. Smith's it. So I get it from that perspective. However, Stephen A. Smith also likes the whole pomp and circumstance of it all. It's very similar what he does to the Dallas Cowboys. Because Kyrie engages with him, it's easy for him to keep going because he knows he's eventually going to get a response out of Kyrie. And that's great for his show. That's great for his brand. And it is. And I mean, the moment Kyrie said something to him on Twitter, he's on Twitter putting up a video about it.

And you could guess that. It's like clockwork. You know exactly what's going to happen. And all that is, it's like it's ratings for the show. It's generating his worth in this whole industry when it comes to sports broadcasting. That's what he's doing to me. To me, it's not really that deep, but I do understand the perspective of it as a black man to another black man. It's exploitive to me. It's like Stephen Smyr-Smith asked Kyrie Irvin to join him. It's some Skip Baylor shit so they can confront each other one-on-one for the world to see. Right.

So the way to get this popping is for him to come validate you by coming on your show. That's all he wants. That's all he wants. And listen, if we had a back and forth with someone, we'd want them to come on the podcast. because we're going to go back and forth and at the end of the day, it's going to be great for higher learning. That's what he's doing.

That's true. Have you been keeping up with the January 6th committee? So last time you asked you that, I didn't want to. I said, no, I'm not. But somehow it's seeped into, it got on my radar. Oh, yeah.

So I haven't been watching it. I haven't been watching it. Like, it's not on. I'm not watching it, but I'm paying attention to it now in a way that I was not paying attention to it before. It's very juicy. Very juicy. So yes, to answer your question.

You know what I was about to say? Shout out to Cassidy Hutchison for her bombshell testimony when she talked about the fact that Donald Trump lunged at the Secret Service driver who was driving the beast to try to get him to take him to the Capitol. The Capitol. Here, as people were fucking over it. It seems to me that a lot of what the January 6th Committee is putting together is not only a president, that had an inkling that there would be violence at the Capitol in January 6th, but the president who was counting on the fact that there would be violence that wanted to in some way instill into lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

And kind of, obviously, we know he went to take the American government into his own. So Cassidy Hutchison, who has now been made into an American hero, but we should say was in the Trump administration. And a lot of these people that you're going to hear from were in the Trump administration. So I think as I listen to people who under-establishment, estimated the president's pension for destruction. I appreciate them coming forward as Americans and doing what they feel like is the right thing. But also, I kind of wonder.

We don't forget. Yeah. We know. But yeah, there's more to come out from January of Smith. We just want to make sure that people know that we're paying attention to it here. I want to talk next week probably to somebody who's covering it to see what the, because the messaging is very polarized. It's like, hey, this is a bombshell.

You hear that on CNN. And then Fox News goes on. It's all hearsay. You know, and so what I want to get on the podcast is like a voice that can help me understand what the potential ramifications of the January 6th committee could possibly be. What are we looking at, you know, the deeper we get. So just want to touch on that real quick. But it's time for something to return that we haven't done in a while.

Give it to me, Donnie. Animal, animal, animal, animal games. Animal, animal games. Animal, animal, animal game. Animal, animal games. That's the Animal Games theme song right there. Donnie, take it over. Let's go.

All right. As it stands, the score is all tied. Everybody's got two points apiece. Woo! Yeah, so this is a big one. Shake it up. Okay. The first question is coming from,

I got these two submissions, same question from Shari Sanders and from Bruce Call, which, this is for you, Van, which mammal is known to have the most powerful bite in the world? I got some multiple choice options. Yes. Bingo Tiger, hippopotamus, crocodile, grizzly bear. Is this for me? Yes. I'm going to go crocodile. No, yeah.

Rachel's right. You are wrong. No. You're wrong twice. So do I get, so now I get to answer? Wait, wait. I will say that my internet went down. So I didn't hear what the beginning is.

Oh. No, it did. It did. So I don't know how. No, no, I could be wrong. But how am I wrong twice? Which mammal has the strongest bite? Yeah, how is he wrong twice?

Why am I wrong twice? Because you said crocodile. Crocodile is not a mammal. And it does not have the strong. Oh, damn. Well, crocodile has the strongest bite, but it's not a mammal. So, so here's the thing. The trick question.

shit, fuck it, dog. Don't give us any trick. Don't give us any trick questions. No, that was good. That was good. It was good. So Rachel wants to steal. Rachel, can you steal? This is hippopotamus in it. Yeah, that's what I was going to say. I think it's a hippo. Yeah, it is a hippo. Rachel's got three points. Wow.

Okay. Okay. I think we officially institute stealing. Because I knew it was a hippo too. Now, Trudy. Trudy's like, or E, is it a human? By the way, I don't think that we should. should be able to steal quite yet because

Trudy didn't know that they were stealing. So take that point back. Give it to Rachel. And I get another question. Take that point away. I don't know, but... So I get the point. I get the point. You get a half point. You get a half point. Rachel, half point. 2.5.

All right. Give me my... I got another question, right? Give me another one. No, you don't. You got that one wrong. You do, but it's later. It's Rachel's turn now. Okay. This was coming from Ellen. The question is, how fast... can zebras run. Your options are 40 miles per hour,

25 miles per hour, or 62 miles per hour. I'm going 40. So easy. She's right. Yeah. It's so easy, bro. The questions that, like the quid,

the discrepancy of the questions. First of all, nigga. Then, I knew the answer to yours. Y'all gave, y'all, y'all, You knew the answer to minds. Yeah, y'all gave Rachel 20, 40, and 60. You gave her three different things about one animal. It's so easy.

Protest. I'm salty. Rachel's up in animal game. She's doing great. All right. Trudy, this is coming from March. She wants to know which snake is not found in California. What the hell?

Say what the fuck I'm talking about? That is so hard, dog. Let me see if I can go. go three for three. Let me see if I go three for three. I don't even know. No. No. No. Just listen. No. Ask the question. That's so hard, bro. Give her the multiple choice. Give her the multiple choice. I'm feeling on fire. I'm feeling on fire. Your options are a gop for a snake.

A who? Go for a snake. Use it innocent. I'm just kidding. A gopher snake ate a gopher. The ring neck snake. A speckled rattlesnake or a Copperhead snake. Brough. What were the first two options again? Rachel, are you Googling?

No, I swear to God, I'm not. You're looking down at your phone. Leave the fucking phone along. What are we talking about? I'm not Googling. That's a rule for Adam again. He just can't. No phones.

What's the first? What's the first two again? Go for a snake. Second one. Ring-necked snake. Third one, speckled rattlesnake. Last one, Copperhead. Snake.

I'm literally only going to just choose this because I feel like I could draw it if somebody asked me a rattlesnake. Nigger. No. You never. California. You never go to, whatever. You never go to like, wait. Try to steal.

Try to steal that one. Wait, hold on, Donnie. I'm wrong. Yeah, you're wrong. Yeah, of course you're wrong. Yes, you're wrong. What are you talking? You're like, it's like you never go to Runyon.

It's rattlesnakes everywhere. I'm going to go with. Maybe you're not rattlesnakes somebody? Yeah. Because I do. What? So I'm going to go with. The only thing I know was a gardener snake and that wasn't even an option.

Right. I'm going to go with ringneck snake. You're going to be wrong. Does anybody else want to steal? I was going to go. No, I won't take it. But gopher was going to be mine. Okay.

You would have been wrong too. The answer was copperhead snake. We got him here. That's not even fair. That's such a hard question. Like, Rachel gets how fast can the zebra run 2040-60? And she gets the snakes in California. Give me my last question.

All right. Okay. Your last question. This is coming from Deirdre. What wild cat species has three different, oh, there's thunder. All right. Sorry. What wild cat species has three different common names for the same animal?

And then what are the names? Oh. Wildcatsby's each? Yes. So is it Mount Lion Puma Cougar? Oh, you are correct. Yes. My lion.

Whoa! Because I had no idea. Wait, they're all the same thing? Yeah. Yeah. A Puma's a mountain lion? Yes. Yep.

Puma and Cougar I would have put together. Mountain lion, Puma, Cougar. You tried to fucking sneak that one on me. Because you know. That's great. You should get two points. It's my line adjacent. You did it quickly.

Okay. Your last one, Rachel. This is coming from Markey Craig. He asks, what four animals are depicted on Canadian coins? Just start listing animals. A bear. A bird. I can't.

A protest. What? What? A bear. A bird. Um. A, huh, a turtle and, and, and, hmm, a rabbit. Can I try to steal?

Yes, you can. Bear, moose. Oh, that's a good one. Beaver. Fuck. You're going to say bird, Bird, aren't you? Yeah, you're right.

So a van successfully stole. It's polar bear. There's a loon, which is a duck, which is a bird. Caribou, which I don't think is technically a moose, but I'm going to give you caribble. Count it. Yeah, yeah. And then Beaver, you're all right.

Also, now you like that steel rule because you're caught up with me. Now you like it. We're tied. Tide. Oh, fix it. Jesus. Danny, what's my question? Okay. Your question is from Grace Dickerson.

Name three extinct animals that lived with humans. Lived at the same time as humans. Oh, Trudy. So easy. What the, I'm in dinosaurs? Oh, wait. Nigna, if you say fucking dinosaur

dog, like, Trudy. How are you going to? Wait. That would have to be right. years ago. No. A dinosaur that lived with humans. I believe in the Bible, Jesus Lord.

Nothing was human. Honestly, I will fight y'all to the death. I went to a Christian school and they told us that dinosaurs and people was definitely linking up back in the day. See, this is why Roversus Way got to overturn shit like this. I'm serious.

I'm serious. Like, no. Amman. Oh, good one. Ammon. Ammon? What the What is extinct? Like, that's a lot.

Can I phone a friend? I'm about to call my nephew. Like, what else is there? What other animals? People, can I use people? Extinct animals. Oh, I mean, a mammoth? What's the, is that, is a mammoth, the elephant?

Yeah, a woolly, hairy. Harry. Yeah, a woolly elephant, yeah. Okay, I quit. I don't know what else was extinct. I was bad. Who wants to steal? No.

Me. I don't want to give them an opportunity. Me. Go ahead, Van, because I, mammoth was all, mammoth was what I had. Mammoth? Sabreto Tiger. Oh. I should have known.

Dodo bird. Got him. Got him. Never would have ever. A dodo. But I've heard of all of that. Like now, if it was a multiple choice test, I would have passed it. All I had in my arsenal was mammoth, because that's really the only thing I know.

I love this. And dinosaurs. Come on. Dinosaurs. I'm fighting. 65 million years ago. Right. Back me up.

All right. Fans in the lead. Animal games. That's it. That's enough for animal games right now. That was good. Those were good. Those were good questions.

I was the best animal games ever. Worth the weight. The only question that was truly out of pocket was snakes in California. I really, I really. Oh, because that's the one you got. wrong. No, actually you got your first one wrong. I got that one wrong. That was a fucking hard Yeah. All right. Mailback. Yeah, it was hard. Oh, I'm sorry. No mailback. Cancel mailback. Keep this in the podcast too. We have to do one last topic. We don't have room for mailback this week. I'm sorry, guys.

What's the topic? I need Trudy on this too. Oh, I know you're fine. I need Trudy on this too. We have to do you guys. There's a lot of things we have to still talk about. Roll over Emmett Till. until Monday. Need to talk about them until. We cannot leave this podcast without talking about this McDonald's thing. I'm sorry, guys. I'm sorry.

I need all of y'all for this topic. We need four people for this topic. I am so sorry to everyone. Okay. We'll get your mailbags. We'll get your mailbags. We'll do mailbag on Monday. We'll get to your.

Rachel is right. I cannot leave and let Trudy leave because you guys, this is Trudy's last show with us. It's very sad. I cannot let Trudy leave. without getting her on this. We love you, Trudy.

You have been an indispensable member of the higher learning team. Amazing. We're happy that you're moving on to do amazing things. But before we leave, we need your toxic ass on this on this. Okay.

A mom goes off on a dad for bringing food to only his son and ignoring all of the other kids. Donnie, give me the sound. What's up? Because I'm going to expose you. Because that don't look enough for all my kids. That don't look enough for all my kids.

What is that? That's just one burger, one burger, one fry? What do you mean? Okay, what about my other kid? What about your other kid? What about your kids? Okay, but them your kid siblings, them your kid's siblings, though. So what you want to be?

My other kids are going to be left out. You didn't feed him? You know I don't get my full chest to the seven. First, okay, stop, stop. Cut it off. First of all, I believe that all of this shit was set up. Number one. But number two, the fucking audacity here floors me.

Before I even get to it, the women, please, the women of the podcast, give me your thoughts on this. She's mad because she has kids and he brought his kids something to eat without bringing her other kids something to eat. guys' thoughts. Like this one, I've thought really deeply about. And I'm going to be honest. I'm just going to assume that the kids are all, like, close in age, maybe. And he obviously, they're obviously not in a relationship. I feel like for some reason that matters.

If they were in a relationship, I think that he should be bringing food for everybody. But since they're not and he really is just taking care of his particular kid, I actually don't have an issue with it. I was wondering what people thought, Rachel? What do you think? I'm glad Trudy said it first. I actually, now, when she said my food stamps, I never heard that. The first time I listened to it, I didn't hear that.

I heard that. So that kind of like changes things up if you know she's struggling and you can provide. But let's just pretend we didn't hear that part, right? I don't have a problem with it. He's taking care of. his child, just like child support. He's paying for his child. She's not up to her what she wants to use the money for, right?

But he's taking care of his child. Is it a bad look? Absolutely. Why? Well, it looks bad that you're walking up with a bag of food and you hand it to your kid and the other kids are standing there hungry. It, like, the optic, it looks bad. It looks bad.

So this is, but I get it. So look, let me tell you what I would do. If I was him, I would come get my son and take my son on a walk. And as we walk, we will go to me down as he would eat. I wouldn't have him eat the food in front of the other kids. But the reality of this situation is we have to have some fucking limits, man. If it's me, I would like to think people know around here van feeds everybody all the time.

Come over to the house, van feeds everyone, right? I don't, I just think that, what the fuck, man? Like how? I think both looks bad. That looks bad too. It looks bad to feed my son? It looks bad that if, even if you took your son away,

I think it's the same thing. If you took your son away, so they see their daddy coming to take, like to spend time with, with them, not, or him, that one kid and not the others. Your dad takes you away. He feeds you. He's going to come. Then he drops you. back off. They see all of that. And then the kids

like, they're like, oh, what you do? It's like, oh, my daddy took me here. It still looks, it's still, it sucks for the other kids regardless. It just sucks. Hey, look, that's the way shit goes, dog. I'm going to be real with you, man. Like, you can't, at this particular point, we don't know what this man's finances are.

He might be doing just well enough to where he can take care of his son. He might not have it to be able to take care of everybody else's kids, man. Get, Look, I was no, fuck, no, I'm not doing it. How about that?

I'm a bad person. I'm not doing it. I'm not doing it. Like, I don't have to. What? I'm not feeding everybody. I got a son. Yeah, we agree with you.

I'm not doing it. I was upset that there was even, look, if you can feed the kids, feed the kids, but you're not obligated to. No. You're not obligated to. We don't know how this guy's doing. Why do you think it was fake? Because it's just too.

Who tapes that? I mean, expose you. She does, it's definitely fake. But it brings up a good society. I just figure he does it all the time. He doesn't. So she was like, this time I'm, I just figured she doesn't, he does it all the time. So she was like, this time I'm going to show people what you do, what you come over here to do.

Can we not hold her accountable? Like we have to be. Oh, I'm team the dad though. But remember, I'm team the dad. I think she's a bad person. I'll be honest with you. You do? Yep.

I think she's a bad person for shaming a nigger for feeding his fucking son. I'm gonna be real with you. We lost Donnie again. The way you say it. It's like we lost Donnie. We got to end it.

You got to end it. We got to end it. Take a deep caps off, but do not stop learning. If you're watching on the thing, we just put the higher learning logo over it. Take it the decaps off, but do not stop learning.

I am Van Lathan, Junior, make sure you can feed your kids. I'm Rachel and Lizzie. Bye, guys. Bye-bye. Oh, wait, wait, wait. You guys, I know y'all always get on us when we don't remind you

when we're not podcasting. Our podcast is going to drop Tuesday. Monday is a holiday for some people in this country. And we are going to drop a pod later on Tuesday. So check it out. So don't blow up the Reddit. Tuesday morning. It's coming.

It's just going to come later in the day. All right. We'll talk to you all then. Bye. Bye. Thank you.