Trillbilly Worker's Party - Episode 220: The Slippery Slope, Part I

Episode Date: October 14, 2021

The first half of a two-part series on podcasting, media, and taking the Washington Post's Conspiracy Theory quiz. Listen to Part 2 at our Patreon: www.patreon.com/trillbillyworkersparty

I mean, the reason, well, I've had them outside on my new front deck. That's why they've gotten so big. I've got them on Stera. I mean, it's just a monster. And it's gorgeous, but also it's got a little mite on it I'm having. That's why I haven't brought them in yet. I'm trying to get the. Spider mites?

No, they're scales. Real gross. They don't look like bugs. They just look like little brown spots. But they're scales and they attract ants. They don't look like bugs. They just look like little brown spots. But they're scales. And they attract ants. Because ants eat their shit.

But you never see them move or anything. Are they shit? Are they aphids? I have those fucking things. I have no idea. But this is what I looked up. I looked up scales. Like, they're just little scales.

But they will move plant to plant. I've got three plants with them on them right now. And so I've been treating them with neem oil i've done four neem oil treatments but you can only do them you can only do them every every seven days the neem oil treatment so i've done like three weeks in a row of the neem oil and i've got them all settled and i'm congratulations you uh you have better preventive measures than nap harvest is that what they didn't even think to use neem oil what the fools so yeah i've had them on like a three-week rotation and then i've cleared out one room like my studio room i've moved all the plants out of there and i'm gonna put all of the

infected plants in the room together so that they don't fuck with any more plants even after i get them clean so what i found is that i'm treating them with neem oil that's done the job on a couple of them but then i have to use alcohol to actually scrub off the dead scale like they don't go anywhere so once i do the alcohol rub down on them i'm gonna bring them in the house and it's just prayers thoughts and prayers from there i guess yeah but i'm but i've still got them segregated into one room i mean i got operation going up there now It's a fucking greenhouse It's too bad none of it's smokable

Truly Just pretty It's beautiful Have you noticed that black spot on the Step Up onto my porch It looks Have you noticed that

No it's fucking... Up on the branch above it are those aphids. Oh, what do they look like? They kind of look like scales. Are they big? They call them like boogie aphids or something like that. These are tiny. They do like a dance if wasps or something. They're smaller than the end of my nail.

Like they're really small. They call them like zigzag aphids or something aphids but they fucking like take a bite out of the beach out of the beach and then they shit and ants and wasps yeah are like obsessed that's what i read yeah i read yeah i read that the ants can't... Something about the process in the scale breaks down the sugar or something or turns something into sugar and shits it out and ants love it. So then you have ants all over your fucking plants and they like eat holes in them and shit. Boogie woogie aphids is what they're called. Boogie woogie aphids.

So weird. Boogie aphids is what they're called. Boogie woogie aphids. So weird. I mean, I got my binoculars out and watched them a long time the other day. Wow. Hey, is it slime mold season? You see any slime mold?

You can see slime mold pretty much all summer, really. Oh, is it summer? I thought it was like the real hot, like, oh, well, yeah, I guess. Yeah, I mean, I've not seen any around here. I mean, I feel like I've only seen them really high, like up on top of mountains, Pine Mountain and mountains in West Virginia.

I saw a couple stick bugs this summer. Did I tell y'all that? Did I mention that? I saw one as well. I mean, I feel like I went years, because as a kid i love not stink bugs sorry my house full of stink bugs stick bugs stick bugs everybody's got stink bugs every goddamn where but stick bugs motherfuckers get in stink bugs i don't know they're fucking i mean the other day i look ruby's tossing one up there's fucking tossing it around bopping it

with her nose like it's just like they've moved in. At this point, I don't even kill. I mean, if you kill them, they stink like hell. I just put them out. Me and Terrence lived together. My mom gave us a dryer. And the whole back end of it was full of those. And I didn't know it.

Oh, fuck. And we turned it on. Imagine burning stink bugs in the house. Oh, my God. It was hard to deal with. A mass stink bugs in the house. It was hard to deal with. A mass stink bug grave. I cannot imagine. They like to get it.

I read this article about them a few years ago. They have this thing called thigmotaxis which means they like to get in small spaces and like wedge their little bodies in there. They seem to all just be on my plants they just hang out on my plants i usually just don't bother them because i don't think they bother the plants

they don't bother like they they destroy crops but oh but not houseplants yeah i think they're fine if they would eat these fucking scales that'd be nice i wonder if there's something i can introduce to eat i wonder if ants and wasps are just sitting around like all summer long, fucking like just dehydrating. Like, man, I can't fucking wait for fall for that boogie woogie aphid shit. Shit hits definitely. They just live for it, you know, like we live for like, you know, funnel cakes at the fair or something.

Yeah. The scales gross me out though. I feel like my plants have scabies or some shit. This is what happened. When my sister went to live in an RV full time, she gave me some of her plants, and her plants had them. And now two of my plants have them. It spread.

Well, if you... It ate up. I feel like having a garden and having plants, you will encounter some pretty fucked up shit. Yeah. Some pretty gross stuff. Yeah. But that's the way it goes.

So is the circle of life. That's the way it works, yeah. For sure. Okay, I told y'all I have a little, I have a gift. I come bearing gifts. Well, break it down. We haven't had a deeply, deeply diseased in a while. You ain't talking about these coke nails and them

bitchin' boots. That's a gift, too. I love these boots. These are my fall shit kickers. They're nice. I would love to step on a throat with these. Wow. You don't want to say that too loud. You have about

6,000 motherfuckers being like oh okay well pony up baby annie up peace i need money i got a green kitchen i'm trying to buy bristol please step on my neck please absolutely destroy my chances at procreation queen um my coat nails yeah i did a photo shoot this week I had to put some big nails on What's the deeply diseased See the thing is the reason why It's because everything is so deeply diseased

You need to revive it No that's not why The reason why is because I'm so sick of this show I'm so sick of this show. I'm so sick of the segments. You can't be more sick of it than I am. There's no way. Oh, buddy.

Let's have a contest. Let's do it. Let's see who's more sick. No. I mean, I do think me and Tom are bitches to work with. I can see that. I won't say anything. I'll show up dutifully and do my jokes.

That's not why. It's not even that. It's more like an existential... It's more of like... It's got nothing to do with the particulars. It's kind of the fans because they're pretty annoying. But it's mostly the fact that i'm

34 and i have a job that's like something like a 21 year old should be doing well okay no offense to 21 year olds out there i was 21 year old once i want to i wanted i wanted to water plant when i was 21 i had a 35 year old job when i was 21 and a 21-year-old job when I was 35. I was a janitor when I was 21. That's exactly right. Yeah. With Benjamin Button in this. I was a bartender.

I'll be a TikToker by the time I'm 50. It's more the fact that I'm approaching middle age and I feel worthless. I don't contribute anything to society. Well, I want to. I don't blame you for hating this because one it's a job now jobs suck too but i want to discredit that because that's all like that's truly cultural shit it's just like we we like it's just we've memefied podcasting but radios though like it's just radio radio has been an old man's sport.

Long time. You're right. The internet just gave it more legs. Gave it youth serum. Yeah, we literally got our start in radio. It's not like we're just pretending. You're right. No, I mean, you're right.

Radio is a respectable profession. It is an honorable and noble profession. But I do fear that my father probably does not see. He probably thinks that I am not. I don't make an honorable living. My mom's proud of me. My mom is very proud that I don't have to work hard. She loves that.

I mean, okay. Because she wants better for me than she has. She works too hard. You say it's a job, and you're right. It's definitely a job for me. But... As opposed to me and Tom. As opposed to you two. And Aaron.

Although Tom, I feel like Tom is, I don't know, Tom and I probably put the same amount of hours in for sure. I'd do an October just because of the shirts. Has the shirts went well? Pretty decent. It's more like you could grow food, even though that's not even a profession that anybody does anymore. And spend your whole life doing that.

And I think you could feel pretty fulfilled or teach or be a, a firefighter or an EMT or a nurse or something. Every nurse teacher and firefighter I know is fucking miserable. Well, the point is though, like what and firefighter I know is fucking miserable. Well, the point is though, like what has a better, what has okay, I think I asked you this the other day. If all left podcasts disappeared tomorrow, would that have

a net positive or net negative effect on society? Do you think society would be better or worse? I don't think you asked me this. Oh, maybe I I think I, maybe i asked every other person in my life like please say negative and validate no i think it would yeah i think negative if all nurses disappeared tomorrow it would be a net negative yes i mean it may not be

that bad but i still think it would be pretty bad. If all teachers disappeared tomorrow, bad. If all podcasters disappeared tomorrow, probably good, right? No, I don't think so. No? I'd say neutral. All media makers? I'd say neutral. I mean, look, the New York Times is printing literal lies. Not that I'm comparing us to them, but do you know what I mean?

Paper of record versus us. Yeah, it's like, I mean, it's just a bad time for journalism in general. And that's not like I think we're some saving grace, but we at least aren't being paid to say insane shit. We also don't have a fact-checking department. We don't have fact-checkers. Okay, sure. I would say we are being paid to say it. Well, okay.

But I mean, no one is pressing us to tell lies. True. We're not being pressed to spread misinformation. I don't even know what misinformation is now. I sat down and I spent at least a day doing good, honest research into like, into like me tom let's do an episode about origins of covid why not i mean every now and then why not now you know why not me and tom like to do some science dives every now and then listen i will tell you all but but

then but then people spend fucking three weeks telling you you're dangerous yeah dangerous you're spreading so then i'm like well okay i could do two things here i could stop listening to everybody across the board whether you have good feedback or bad feedback for me i'm just not going to listen to you anymore i could do that or i could drive myself insane trying to like figure out what the truth is and still never know so i guess it's the first option well i'd like to offer this one is that i spent a very few minutes on the patreon this week and immediately ejected myself because i couldn't handle it and if people if people were as critical of me as they were you i'd already quit quit. I'd quit long ago. Long ago.

I'd have told them to kiss the fattest part of my ass and I'd have been deuces. Y'all know this. No amount of money. Well, that's not true. I envy you. I would have just been like, hell no. I ain't listening to this garbage. But y'all got thick skin.

I'm proud of you. Y'all are brave. Both of you. Brave souls. Thick skin's relative. I've been crying about people being mean to me for three weeks. Two. Yeah, you're right.

But the second. Thick skin. A rhinoceros over here. Number two. I've been doing my tarot readings again, and almost everybody, I ask them how they found me, and it's almost all Trillbillies fans. They always say, I'm a Trillbilly, which I love. Yeah, let me be clear.

We have a lot of great fans just well here's the thing though you have to apply across the board which is what i'm doing they're all neutral no there's no good fan or bad fan well that's for your own that's for your own saying that's for my own but i just want to say that in particular yesterday and one day last week everyone i did terror readings with gushed about us and how like helpful we've been and make them laugh through like miserable times and like i mean i just i didn't even i just hardly even could hear it it was so sweet i was like this ain't even true where are you finding them they're so sweet the ones that approached me told me I'm fat and can't read good.

God damn. Send the sweeties my way. Dabble further into the dark arts. Send nobody Terrence's way. Sweet, bad, or otherwise. But anyway, I just wanted to offer that feedback. It was a lot of sweetness out of Alabama and Washington and Tennessee. I mean, all over. People just really loving us.

And I was shocked. At how sweet you were. You'd heard different from us there. Yeah, y'all convinced me. Everybody hates it. No, I'm kidding. Anyway, I just wanted to pass on the good vibes. Because it was for all of us, not just me.

Yeah, well, I I mean I don't know Maybe it would be a net negative If all podcasters quit tomorrow But I just I just think that's the wrong way to look at it Maybe you're right I'll entertain you What's the right way to look at it

I mean obviously we could twist up any number Of weird What ifs, just like that crazy article we talked about on the Patreon of the scale of bullshit. Yeah, authoritarian. Yeah. Like. Yeah.

So anyway, I just. I mean. I did make a flip comment the other day. I want to apologize for about calling you a left podcast. That's not who you are. You're not a leftist podcaster. calling you a left podcast that's not who you are you're not a leftist podcaster you're so much more when we're talking about the the weird uh i feel like we're a christian rock band that has to say like no actually we're a rock band that just happens to be christians you know me like like

switchfoot and bands like that will do that yeah but yeah i mean people are obsessed with podcasts people really i don't well the discourse this week is about true crime podcast right those are a little bit why is that like are they like a net negative and katie slinger made a good point it's like they kind of subtly like promote the surveillance state it's not even subtle yeah and they just like that is true yeah they really float a lot of fear-mongering they're they're pretty right wing very right i mean in one way they really what they do is detail how inept cops are how just completely fucking useless but also they which sounds which sounds cool but they're actually wanting tons of um advertising no they're

they are advocating for tons of punishment oh yeah like in prison yeah punitive like they're very right i could see these these people be the type of people that would like go and go to family of a murder victim into like oh yeah confronting like their child or loved one's murderer and like saying everything you know what i mean like that type of shit you know just but not for any sort of catharsis or anything just for like their dumb ass like podcast you know what i mean so yeah they definitely support a surveillance state they support more carceral punishments like how are they so insanely popular and they i think this is maybe the worst part is they like force people to fear each other and that is pretty antithetical to any type of revolution

any type of movement in this country is fear of each other podcasts or not podcasts the pandemic is doing a pretty good job of that on itself yeah um why is that the discourse this week is that the gabby curious i don't know i'm curious like i don't know i think someone wrote an article there was like um a i did see a tweet when before they had found um gabby i don't realize name is? Oh, that's right. Like this true crime podcaster was like, so excited to discuss the Gabby Petito. It was just weird juxtaposition of their chipper attitude and this really morbid, gruesome thing.

Yeah. I think it's popular because I'm offering a little bit of insight into this. Like three years ago I had something really traumatic happen to me. Like someone close to me died. And right after that I inexplicably got really into true crime

stuff. You know like for like six months. Like it was a grieving thing? I guess it was like I don't know if it was like a grieving thing so much as like i remember you going down some reddit holes about like yeah cases that were like open still yeah yeah and stuff like that but i never associated the two yeah i mean i i think that it's kind of like um there's several aspects maybe there's a sort of like dopamine um thing where you feel like maybe you're solving something you know like maybe you're a part of sort of like the q anon

thing you are a part yeah well you have you have uh use in this world a strange thing happened to me i went to my friend aaron's wedding a couple weeks ago. And after the wedding, we're all back at the place we were staying and sitting in the hot tub. And all these people, some friends of mine from college were like, yeah, we heard you got a podcast. We've just kind of gotten into podcasts recently, you know, that kind of thing. And they were rattling off all the true crime podcasts they listened to. And one, I was like, well, when y'all ready to get grown i'll introduce you to the to the real stuff bring over here into the darkness yeah you think true crime's dark oh yeah uh mueller she wrote or whatever that ain't shit uh but uh it's weird that's like sort

of the entry point and i think it maybe it has to do with the same reason why we like anytime you turn on tv basic cable or whatever you watch tv with these days it's like wall-to-wall cop procedurals and all that kind of stuff yeah all day long i'm in the barbershop the other day and it's just fucking law and order on repeat my ex was super into true she'd watch the id channel all fucking day yeah i was creep i mean i was creeped out by all of it i'd watch the ID channel all fucking day. Yeah. And just creep. I mean, I was creeped out by all of it. I'd watch a lot of forensic files and stuff. Yeah. I don't know. I mean, I don't mean to imply that everybody that's into it is like traumatized, but I

do kind of think maybe that might be one aspect of it. But I think a lot of us are just scared. And so it's like, maybe it's a fantasy world where like. Oh, I'm living in a lot of fantasies right now. It's helpful in these trying times. Yeah. Fantastical. And I don't mean to be like,

don't let people enjoy things type of person or whatever. You know what I mean? There is an angle on the true crime thing that is... Well, you mentioned one of them, which is like the ineptitude of cops and how a lot of serial killers are cop adjacent. thing that is well you mentioned one of them which is like the ineptitude of cops and like how a lot of serial killers are like cop adjacent but then there's like there is also another angle on it which is i mean for example like the manson thing like i think there's pretty considerable

evidence that a lot of the serial killers in the 60s and 70s during that whole surge of serial killers like weren't a lot of them i don't say all of them or even a lot of them but i think that like a significant portion of them had been um had gone through some sort of like government paramilitary training or mk ultra or mind and a lot of them too like I know when they found Charles Manson he'd been like raped and all the juvies and stuff he'd been in and out of his whole life and stuff like that. I mean look at the domestic violence rates. Yeah like

all this data shows that this is completely ruining our society. All of it. Yeah. Katie makes a good point. It does seem like they exist for the same reason that like Facebook and other stuff exists, which is to sell you shit.

Yeah. It's like get you scared and then sell you home security products. That's interesting. Again. If only we could sell a left wing movement. It's like after the Bernie thing kind of came undone it's like now we don't have anything done didn't we almost have a couldn't we have done an ad didn't a mattress company want us to run ads for them or something no we never got approached by we got approached by

uh you know there's like these agencies that like link you with opportunities you know what i mean or whatever we have never, yeah, I don't think we've ever been approached by any. I thought there was a mattress or something, which I thought would be pretty fun. I do think it's pretty interesting that we've never been approached by, yeah,

an advertiser. In five years. I mean, I'm always saying it. We've never got our due. Yeah. He says, always saying it,

people. I'm just kidding. I don't want our due. I don't either kidding i don't want our deal i don't need i don't want whatever's up to us i keep it i don't want it i'm good i'm good i'm due yeah um jesus okay you want to hear this deeply deeply yeah yeah it's pretty good yeah okay i need to set up the scene here. It's a coffee shop. Okay.

So it's already a little bougie. But it's in a small town. Horror one, huh? Yeah. It's bigger than that. Not in Kentucky, but close. But it's in kind of a little bit of a bougie town, like a college town. A lot of college students work there. Like Boone, North Carolina.

Yeah. Something like that sure okay so um the owner has come in recently to manage because the son or whoever was managing stopped doing that so we got a new new manager on the block which is the owner and she's apparently a real piece of work the managers the owner yeah the owner yeah okay mommy mommy mommy uh mommy owner to her as mama um so apparently uh one of the young you know young student employees um got another job and was like ready to light it on fire on the way out like they like he already had another gig lined up so he was like okay i'm doing this so they all make trash money of course but one of the main like one of the main things that the workers have been talking about recently that's pissing them off is the fuck they don't they're not allowed to take tips and instead the owner has a fucking jar sitting out that everyone thinks is tips but it is a diff every month she picks a

different um call charity yeah to donate the tip to donate the money to and no one's allowed to have tips it's actually a donation jar but most people don't even realize that and they're just throwing tips in also just as a little aside and a you know public service announcement here whenever you put change in the jar of the ronald mcdonald house at mcdonald's that goes straight to the franchise owner's uh vacation fund yeah yeah i was told that by several workers yeah damn that's robbing well and what what usually happens in what this case is, is that money, that's tax write-offs. Yeah.

All that charity, that's all these donations, that's all tax write-offs for the owner. I was at a coffee shop in Albuquerque, and they had like four jars set out. And it was like, you know, it wasn't explicit, but if you looked close enough, like the fine lettering, one was like, the National Foundation for Women.

And I was like, so yeah. And the workers are all like, everyone thinks they're, they're tipping us, but we're not allowed to, like, it's not tips.

That's why I shorten that fucking jar up. Right. So old Bubby decides, okay, for my last day, I'm putting out a fucking tip jar and we're splitting it. So he just putting out a fucking tip jar and we're splitting it so he just puts out a second jar for tips and he start they're they're getting tips

well she comes in and mommy owner mommy mommy shows up mommy rolls through and he's already ready to like throw down because he's got another job he's ready to go out with a blaze. Comrade boy. This kid. And he's like 21, 22. So. Respectable age. Yes. Very respectable. Yeah.

When you do stuff like, yeah, construction work and roofing. And so mommy rolls in and she realizes what's happening. And like they get through a rush of customers and then she's like what are you doing she picks it up she's like this is no you absolutely cannot have this this is totally against policy this is like what are you doing exactly no and he says no that's my money i put that out we deserve like we are all paid terribly we deserve these tips i'm splitting that with everyone who's working on the morning shift today and she's like absolutely not and they're literally fighting over this basket oh in the in the fucking coffee shop and she is a grown old woman is fighting with this child this fucking 21 year

old over what over yeah like literally pennies everybody's gonna get three bucks and so she escalates by saying this is supposed to be for charity. You're stealing. You are stealing this from charity. He says, absolutely not. This is tips. These people tipped me. And she starts saying, you're stealing this.

And she's trying to put it back into the charity bin, which is just her fucking tax write-off. Right. So boy, Clipson says, you're stealing from your fucking employees. You pay us nothing. You're selling $ your fucking employees you pay us nothing you're selling ten dollar fucking frappes out of here la la la so he's like taking her to fucking court this bitch and she just escalates and starts she's just screaming so finally and he comes to a head and he takes off he takes us he gets his cash he leaves and she's like get out of here you need you gotta leave so he leaves like this is his he's fired he's And she's like, get out of here. You got to leave. So he leaves.

Like, this is his. He's fired. He's quit. He's gone. And then my friend who's still at work, who had, like, talked to him all up through this, is just, like, on a fly on the wall now, listening to her berate and go ape shit. Now, here's where it gets good. This woman says, now there's no one to cover his shift.

And she's like, I have to go pick up 5,000 minnows. Minnows? Like fish? Exactly. Everyone's just staring at her. She said, minnows! 5,000 minnows for my pond! Her pond.

And they're all just staring at her. And she just starts yelling about all this stuff she has to do instead of work. Where she just kicked this kid out. And now no one's there to work. she's gonna have to work the shit she's like and i have to go get my son-in-law's truck because my truck has the horse trailer on it she's a horse girl someone literally the manager says oh you have horses she said oh yeah you might and she said horses are basically digging a hole and throwing your money in it she just starts throwing an absolute hissy fit but this bitch yelling i have to go pick up 5 000 minnows for my pod

can you imagine a more insane thing to say after fighting and firing over twelve dollars over tits that's amazing five thousand minnows i could not i said she was telling me this i was like this is un this can you paint i bet you couldn't write that yeah you could not make that up five thousand min five thousand minutes for her pond her pond and i can't even take my car it's got the horse trailer on it the horse trailer and everyone's just staring at this woman throwing an absolute fit it is she got that fucking crazy over charity money that she is funneling out of like away from her work over money she's funneling away from her workers for tax write-offs it is one of the most surreal things to watch a boss have a meltdown you know what i mean like a like um a physical emotional mental meltdown

and like you can't laugh at least not out loud i mean you can't obviously you can later but like they have the power in the situation it's such a weird surreal feeling it's like watching your boss throw a temper tantrum like a four-year-old and but and if you smile crack a smile about it they can fire your ass or like you know lose it on you or well oh boy oh hero of the story he made out with that money and he text everyone who was on who was on that morning said i got you i got your cut from the from the tip jar got you six bucks hell yeah he's still gonna split it with everybody he made it out with that fucking money well i mean also the other thing you should do in a cash business just just steal. Yeah, literally.

Yeah, just steal it all. You can't fucking, yeah. But good on him for just using his last day to just fucking ruin this woman's day, at least. No, he's going to go pick up my 5,000 minnows. 5,000 minnows! I've never taken advantage of a last day at work, I don't think. At least not like that. Well, when I left...

Bell County High School. I set off smoke bombs in the gymnasium. No, I've sent some scathing emails. But that's not near as good. No, I mean... Oh, no, actually, I did throw a little bit of fit in a bar one time. Because by the time... Oh, no, actually, I did throw a little bit of fit in a bar one time. Because by the time, oh, my God, there was a sex scandal going on because the owners were a married couple. He ran the kitchen.

She ran the bar. And he was fucking one of the other bartenders. At the bar you worked at? Yeah, at the bar I worked at. And she was, like, we were super young. And these were older people. And I was just like, y'all. Was this a we see you at the end of the bar and we dig

your vibe situation or but they own the bar no no old girl was not into it and she was abusing us as work like she was abusing us to pay him back we were being literally abused because he because he was fucking the girl yeah and me and her both lived in the same town so we would car pull together and it was just became and it all came out it all came to a head at the christmas party because he usually does he's a fucking idiot he's he was he loved tequila he was like a tequila connoisseur and he had all these really nice tequilas and so we all got shit faced on tequila and it got nasty not a good one not i've never had a good nasty tequila night i'll tell you that it's always went bad nasty for me i ain't crazy about tequila i'll take bourbon any

day but yeah it went ape shit real fast so that was kind of a like i got to do some fuck yous to some people on my way out i know i've never done enough fuck you i'm just kind of i feel the same way my last breakup i wished to god i had went just a just ape shit i've been i'm too nice to these cunts i'm so fucking i think the best on a breakup i think smooth as can be oh i was so sad you never want to get nasty and messy i don't care what the service you mean like for jobs like even when you leave a job i'll leave a job relationship relationships i think you oh yeah jobs no i was too nice well i was gonna say because there are people that say like you don't want to mess

it up you don't want to mess up your um your resume your resume your recommendation recommendation bob's wing emporium yeah Yeah. Riverside Bar and Grill. Yeah. Home of the infamous Bot Night. Fucking Days Inn of Moorhead, Kentucky. Okay. Fuck off. Oh, shit.

UPS store. Oh, God. I've never even put one of those on a resume. Yeah. I mean, it is pretty sad like as bartender we were literally making 250 an hour literally managing biker we'd have 500 bucks on the property on a thursday night and we're managing all these egos drunk bikers which bikers are usually pretty good they usually like keep each other in line in my experience with them but yeah you have not obviously not lived

in downtown white's burg anytime in the last 10 years well no the bikers downtown are have been pretty much dicks remember that time i got drunk at seed time well remember the time that i left my car parked in main on main street when everybody was supposed to move for bike night y'all remember this yeah we usually had to deal with the brunt of stuff like that. Yeah, because me and Tom lived down there. My car was the only one on Main Street. People would knock on our doors. They would.

Whose fucking white truck is this? Yeah. Which implied that they were going up and down the street. Speaking of bike night, did you guys see this? This is in the newspaper, the Mountain Eagle for this week. State police sponsoring big car show here in Letcher County on Saturday. Without the public's help, many children throughout the state police post would not get to experience the magic of Christmas,

says Kentucky State Police. I cannot deal with shop with a fucking cop. I've written a whole sketch comedy about shop with a cop about getting pulled over. I just want to see the first kid when the cop shows up to go shopping with them. I don't want Christmas that bad. I live in abject

poverty. I don't want a Christmas that bad. Well, this is weird because what it is, it's Trooper Matt Gayhart and Trooper Michael Burton are the driving forces behind the first annual Cruising with Cruisers. They're cruising. There's a funny thing. Matt Gayhart is in one of the X-Men movies. Really?

Yeah. Like an extra or something? Yeah, his sister is Rebecca Gayhart, the actress. What? Yeah. What the fuck? From the Scream movies? Yeah, who's married to McSteamy from Grey's Anatomy.

Oh, in real life she's married to him? Yeah. I had no idea. Yeah, because she's from Not Killing. Yeah. Yeah, that's right, yeah. Her brother is putting on a car show. What it is, is they're showing old police cruisers.

They have a 1990 Ford Mustang that's an old police cruiser. I mean, I guess the Konseki State Police will have three of its special show vehicles on hand, including a 1990 Ford Mustang, a 1978 Ford Crown Vic, and a 2015 Camaro that was named Wesley. A 92 Crown Vic. A 78 Crown Vic. I was like.

I don't know. Have you ever heard? I mean, obviously I've heard of Stop, like, Shop with the Cop. Like, we've talked about that a lot. But I've never heard of them, like, trotting out their old cruisers for, like, a car show. Who cares about them yeah old cruiser you'd see them like probably shit that was over at brookside in harlem county

usa is the same yeah it'd be about the right timeline there were uh natasha said there were a bunch of four-wheelers parked behind the police station in town this week they were doing some kind of four-wheeler show who knows they are They are so fucking bored. Matt's got a, I'll tell you this, if I was a Fell brother, you don't see Eric Roberts going and being a cop, except for in, you know,

a couple of movies. Who? You know, like if you're just an actress as like Fell brother, like just, go do B movies and, Live off of her.

Yeah, live off of her, man. Don't be a fucking cop. Letcher County is not doing great. Although, so we talked on the Patreon about how we've lost 28% of our population since 2010. But we've also- The golden years we've all lived through here. I know.

Literally, I moved here in 2012. I moved here in 2010. So right at the beginning of that. We ran them all off, Terrence and me and you. Smoked them out. Smoked them right out. We are facing a severe shortage of EMTs. That's kind of what I was getting at.

I kind of might go be an EMT. Just show up on crime scenes or, you know, car accidents. You'd be like, in bringing out the dead, you'd just be like. Yeah, like Nick Cage. Yeah. Just drinking heavily and driving around. Yeah.

Just go volunteer with Pine Mountain Rescue. Because then you can, then it's like, you're in the know, you'll get a radio and you'll know when weird shit happens,

like people get lost in the woods and shit. They will give me a CB radio, you're right. Hootman did. Here's what they did. Hootman was there.

We need to join the volunteer fire department or Pine Mountain Search and Rescue. Maybe not Search and Rescue because I think you'll get bonded as a police officer. Really? And then PI. Then you have one.

Well, I have been thinking about getting my PI license. Are you kidding me? We just should have. No, no. Imagine what that says. Those are good cops. This is the next step from being obsessed with uh true crime true crime it's becoming an actual pi god damn i want to get into some shit you know like embroiled into some

like shit and have to like shoot someone with my snub nose 30 oh my god a friend literally texted me yesterday asking me about something. I was like, no, it wasn't no big deal. I was like, damn, I was hoping for some drama. My life's too good right now. I think it actually, what's literally the issue- There are people that need a little bit just to keep them going.

There ain't enough going on. They were like, yeah, I'd like a little drama. Terrence, ain't got enough going on. He's trying to seek in some drama. Seeking it out. I think it actually goes back to living in fantasy lands. COVID is so... Everything's so dystopic right now

from all of the in and outs of the pandemic. I just want to start an extortion wreck. It's my interest in PI. Well, that's why... Somebody says, I'll uh you know i'll give you a thousand dollars catch my husband cheating then i'll just go to the husband saying look down here 15 down here 1500 over here you were born for this job tom was what do i hear no you tell him she's offering two grand and you need four grand to flip.

You could keep going up the line. I mean, you could just keep going back and forth. I was like, bro, listen. You've got both their retirements. It's bro code. Listen, it's bro code, so I'm going to do you solid for today only. Four G's and this all goes away. He's out here hawking his wedding ring.

People are like, oh, God. Yeah. Everybody lives in fantasy. Tom was born to be an excellent con man, but he don't have the stomach for it. It is, I'm a con man with a nervous stomach. Yeah, it's the anxiety. I actually don't have any qualms about that stuff. I just, my anxiety's more existential than life.

Well, still, it gets in the way of you making money. Yeah, just my physical ailments. This idea, though, is, I think you're right. It's the same reason why all these, like, right-wingers spend all day talking about, like, when the Civil War comes. Well, and the liberals do it, too. The libs do it, too. Everybody lives in the fantasy they want to see. Oh, yeah.

And it's the same reason, honestly, that, like, there was such a big anti-vax thing. and honestly that like there was such a big anti-vax thing like i mean there are problems with uh this vaccine in the sense that like it was literally rushed through fda approval i mean no matter how you spin it like i think that's kind of concerning i got the vaccine but it's like i do also know somebody who had a heart attack after getting one like and they they couldn't say for sure that that's what caused it but like come on but like the point being though is that like a lot of people they want to live in that fantasy world where like the culture war they are engaged in on a daily basis like can actual it can come into actualization and the vaccine offered a a tangible thing it was like the first time that they actually got all this other stuff is abstract voting protesting but like not getting a vax or getting a vax it's

like so tangible you literally put it in your veins it's like it's the first time that the culture war is actually you actually had literal skin in the game you had literal skin in the game right this is why i spiraled in the last week and and it honestly i think all spun from us talking recently about how like there would be way more vaccinations if trump had been elected and me just kind of spiraling about that you know like how dystopic that is it's like more people would have got vaccinated if trump were in office telling them to because we you know anti-trumpers would have already got would have just got it anyway and you know what i'm saying yeah i guess what we were talking about and it's just like so much of our health care have become like wedge issues and culture war issues like that that the both parties are just using to raise money and get

elected and it's so much of its health care it's like they're literally playing with their lives it's so demoralizing it's over this abortion campaign that i'm having to do now it's like everybody's like yeah we're we're gonna raise money and this abortion campaign it's like i don't want to do any of this we shouldn't happen to be fighting tooth and nail for one goddamn abortion clinic in the in a state of four million fucking people. To me, you know, and a lot of people have said things, you know, our based turn or our conspiratorial turn or whatever. I prefer based. I am based.

Yeah. What does that mean? I thought that meant cool. I'm not sure. It's just. You know it when you see it. Like porn. No, I mean, it's like you don't care anymore oh i'm

yeah i'm fucking mask off you know but i'm just so it's so depressing that so much of our health care has just been well that well that's what i was gonna say is like what everybody's like it's just literal capitalism bro it's just like uh you know it's just like to make money and it's like it kind of feels a little like you know like your friend that needed a little messy drama like the ruling class is like nah let's just kind of i just kind of want to fuck with them a little bit the plebs a little bit i've got enough money you know it's just like to me like the whole idea of like oh they just do it so they can make money off of you. Well, obviously that's true because that equals power.

But it's like, you've obviously never read Mike Carroll's books about LBJ, about the elevator man who used to be in the Senate. You know what I mean? It's like, the currency of power spends way longer than money, especially in this fucking country. You know what I mean? And you're fucking crazy if you don't think that there is a class of people that don't get off on our misery you know what i mean as part of yes also to keeping us broke and penniless while they accumulate it but i just don't like that whole like uh babe quit looking for a fucking boogeyman under the bed it's it's capitalism bro it's like did you were you were you under a fucking rock with the epstein

stuff man like come on literally this isn't this i didn't realize until recently that this was like a lib talking point that they're literally it's like they're what that what is that the like system big system blame which makes them feel really smart instead of talking about the people with names and addresses that are straight up ruining fucking lives yeah like remember i did that training and i was like going off and and someone like in the training was like yeah well i saw where you uh you know tweeted about um about our leadership and you know i think maybe going into getting going in on we're just talking about this about how fuck on about how people think that capital is just this amorphous blob that's like evil and dark and like there's lightning bolts striking

and like slime dripping off and just floats over the surface of the earth without form and void it's just this we don't need to indict people we need to indict the system who the fuck do you think puts a system in place and runs it well Yeah, it's like, whoo! I was wondering about this because, I don't know if you guys noticed this, last year during the primary, make sure it's 2021. It still is. For the next 60-something days.

Last year during the primary, it was weird watching the Biden people pivot to systemic racism. Did you notice that? They were all of a sudden talking about systems. They were talking about things are systemic. That's the best way for them to weasel out of probability. Yes, that's exactly right. By Biden, one of the people who got us the crime bill,

got us into Iraq, all of a sudden started talking about systems. And it's like, gee i wonder why who was the architect of said system of course racism is systemic of course poverty like of course these things are systemic none of that there is no oppression without fucking power well all of this power that they've literally sucked out of us none of us and i'm in present company included know how to the right way to confront power in such a way that it like helps us make sense of this moment and do something about it

is there it's an open question i think there is but i just don't know if we know i mean because i think people have done in the past but we just haven't figured out how to do it here now maybe or in the sheer numbers that we need to do it for in order for it to work and be worth a damn. Well, I think this kind of is why people like the true crime stuff. It's like mysterious, right? There's forces operating behind the curtain that like kind of gives you, like I feel, okay,

if you're reading some like really creepy true crime thread on reddit and like you get to a part in the story that kind of makes you like shiver or like you kind of have this like moment where you're like oh my god the call's coming from inside the house yeah exactly like you don't know what just happened or how it happened in the story but it's mysterious and inexplicable like i think that's a big reason why true crime is so resident well tell me this why have we not been hearing more about the continuing the the all the declassification of alien shit well glad you brought it up tanya someone brought this someone brought this up to me this week and i was like i don't know man well you know what i think it is um there's a really good movie that's

too real that's that's not mysterious enough well i think that so there's a there is like an added factor in all this if you're talking about true crime true crime is pretty straightforward right like it seems that way anyways in the sense that like there's um three girls and they disappear from their hometown and like what happened next you know like uh and it was it the creepy guy down the street or was it the um satanic pedophiles who run the town who want to use them for like ritual murder like that's that's pretty mysterious too but the thing is just like there's a power critique in it and then there's like another kind of just like a story where it's like okay maybe it's just a weird pervert who lives

in town but then like but but in a lot of these stories and the same with ufo the the i don't want to call it the wild card because I think they're the biggest sort of animating factor behind all this, but that is like the intelligence and military community. There's a really good movie called Mirage Men. You should watch. Yeah, I watched that shit on Terrence's recommendation. And I went into that being like,

oh man, yeah, I believe. And leaving it thinking, I don't believe. UFOs are complete bullshit. Complete bullshit. And the reason, what happened in this story, it tells a story about this guy who saw something outside of Kirkland Air Force Base, outside of Albuquerque, and he filmed it.

And one of the intelligence officers at that base found out that he knew that had um documentation of what he filmed some you know sophisticated what they say in the documentary this was in the early 90s it was probably a drone or something something that was being like you know built workshopped and um tested out there but it was completely classified like it was not supposed to get out to the public that the United States had this technology and killing capacity. And so they sent intelligence agents, and they even interviewed one of the intelligence guys.

They sent intelligence agents to this guy's house to basically convince him that what he saw was a UFO. That he had seen. It was military shit. But it was military shit. This guy was a demon that was doing this shit. Yeah, yes. And they went through extraordinary lengths

to convince him. Gaslighting. It was like a PSYOP, classical PSYOP. Like they really did go through all these lengths to convince him that what he was seeing was UFOs. And in the documentary, they interview the guy, and I felt like the guy was even psyoping the audience. He was trying to be like, but maybe there are

UFOs. And it's like, motherfucker, you're lying to us, and we see it. There are no UFOs. Look at a map of all the UFO sightings in the world. Like, 95% of them are in the United States. Like, I wonder why. I wonder why that is, yeah.

I mean, there's shit like Amu Amu is interesting, you know what I mean? But that's like not in our sphere. You know what I mean? So you think that declassifications is just garbage they're just feeding? I think our conception of UFO like sort of

uh, uh, not encounters necessarily, but like UFO sightings and stuff like that. Almost all military stuff. Yeah. Even Mothman. Yeah. Probably.

I mean, who the fuck knows what that was, but burnt the bridge to throw off the scene. Something fucking happens. And it wasn't like, obviously like a cryptoid, like, nor was it a UFO.

So like, what the fuck was it? probably some sort of military project the current uh american horror story season right now double features all it's like uh nixon not nixon uh well richard nixon is the vice president so it's eisenhower right right yeah so eisenhower's the president it's going through all this crazy alien shit where they're the guys what ended up being we had a ufo encounter in west virginia what ended up being the cause of that um well i wasn't with you what about all them drained cows we talked about i don't know cattle mutilations honestly i probably think that's also a military thing it probably is who the fuck knows maybe they like built some bionic

humid and just put them in a field and we're like see how many cattle you can fucking just like precision surgically remove their like organs yeah well i mean no one of this like there's so many elements of the pandemic to be just like freaked out about but one of them is just how discuss how nasty the u.s is is being with the rest like with hoarding vaccines pulling out of the who just like so like we've just been the worst we could possibly be we've behaved the worst we could possibly behave in a pandemic as a country we're bad friends oh my god just just it's just horrifying it's like and we've just invested more in military to protect ourselves so that we continue to be horrible they're right it's just eventually that's to hit a dead end though yeah I mean

on a long enough timeline it all does for sure when all their billets expire I don't know no I don't think so I have some friends well the term friends

you should take loosely but who lived just right over here on Jenkins Road and they were digging in their garden one day and they found a gun buried in the garden from like the 1950s. Had to have been a murdered weapon. Or a PI that has snub

nose that went on to a PI. He snubs in my website. I gotta make this go away or nobody will find it. Buried in the yard. Buried in the yard. Buried in the yard. Two feet deep. Wait, so does that show have Nixon? Who's playing Nixon?

I don't know. It's not a good... He's not doing a good Nixon. He's trying. He's like... He does a lot of that. He's UFOs holding him. The only fun part is that it's like they play up that Eisenhower hates him.

And so it's like the president, vice president dynamic is very funny. Well, I'm sorry I asked about aliens. You know. I don't know where we were going. Mysteries. I kind of hope a moo-a-moo or something. I really, I have, I mean I going mysteries i really i have i mean i i it is a wonder because it is a mystery because i have

often wondered what would possess me to lay at my mother's house in front of her cable television watching a marathon of law and order special victims unit because it's literally just torture it's at the all the content is absolute violent how it sucks you in is amazing it is i know i'll like watch six episodes and come out of it be like what did i just do why would i last three hours why would i do that to myself yeah literally why it's so depressing but it just sucks you right in oh my god i think there's something about police work that is a again i mean i think people like mysteries there's something about police work that it's like i remember you used i used to think this literally when i was like 19 i was like i would love to be a detective i don't want to be a cop but i would

love to be a detective you know like there's to be a cop, but I would love to be a detective. You know? There's something about solving a crime or a mystery. That's very Texas, New Mexico thing to do, too. And going into penance is one way you can achieve it without being a cop.

Going into what? Just being a PI. You're just going to be a bounty hunter. Just be a bounty hunter. No, I don't want to. You're bonded. I don't know.

Oh, I see. I don't know. I don't're bonded. I don't know. I don't believe that. I don't believe in that. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. It could be fun. It could be fun. Yeah. I don't think...

I haven't met any work yet that's fun. Yeah. Well, I mean, this thing started, this show started out as a hobby. It was fun when it started, yeah. I mean, it's still fun. It's just... I still like doing this.

Tom's like, this is fun now. We act like we work in salt mines or something like that. It's not so much that. It's just... What else is there to say? i'm just whining about something that is completely you're right tom it's like it could be worse it could be so much worse it could be so much worse right and at this point like we're locked into it anyways like we are we're trapped i mean we have people paying us money so they can yell at us pretty much yeah but like

there there is something that's like not honorable about having opinions for a living and they're not even good opinions like the thing about the microphone is it's it is itself is a psyop because it's convinced people that like okay i'm I'm not smart and I'm not funny. I definitely wouldn't stand behind any, almost anything I say, I can't stand behind. Yeah. I would say y'all need to give yourselves a little more credit. Well, the reason I started doing-

You broke the Amy McGrath story. That's true. I mean, you broke some- You do deserve an award for that. We are, you think we're actual journalists... You do deserve an award for that. We are... You think we're actual journalists? No, I wouldn't say that. I've thought about it before,

like putting that on my passport that I never have used. Oh, no, no. If you put journalists on your passport, you might as well write spy. You gotta stand. You might as well write spy. You will end up in the closet

if you did that on your passport. But it seems more respectable than just saying... You write executive. Executive. Executive. I just think about somebody... Associate. I just think about someone writing spy on their passport

because they think it's cool. Oh, boy. Yeah, go to Victor Orban's Hungry and write journalist on your passport and see what happens to it. No, well, for like bios and shit, if I have to write anything, I just put media maker.

True. Well, I've gotten... It's more ambiguous. i started my own like my little podcast because it's like more niche and fun it's it's because current events are not fun they're miserable that's the that's that's what's hard it's like there's a mental there is a legitimate mental anguish at trying to comment on current events through the hell we are living in yeah that's what it is like and that's what i'm sure that's the pinch you feel yeah some of it yeah some of it in the sense that like um right there's no floor really i mean i i feel completely like uh i don't know what to believe anymore. Yeah, and that's a scary thing.

It's like a loss of control on our own fucking society as they cross us. Well, yeah, yeah. That is part of it, for sure. Yeah. I mean, whatever. I mean, it's not like just podcasting causes you to have those sort of crises. No, it just documents it for everybody to say. Well, and it exacerbates it.

Yeah, it probably does. Definitely does. But does it exacerbate it for other people? That's what I want to know. I gotcha. Because the thing is, and the reason why... I was thinking about this the other night. The Washington Post had this...

I'm up late thinking about the Washington Post. Eel! This man's eel! This should be in the DSW. Or whatever it's called. The DSW. What's it called? It should be in the DMV.W. What's it called?

It should be in the DMV. Wait, what's it called? The DSM. Yeah, the DSM. That was close. This was in the Washington Post the other day. Will you fall into the conspiracy theory rabbit hole? Take our quiz and find out. Oh, this was great.

It's another quiz. It's another quiz. So, okay, lists are out. Quizzes are back in. I'm here for the quiz. I love another quiz. So, okay, lists are out, quizzes are back in. I'm here for the quiz. I love the quiz in the Cosmo. I was a teen girl, and I would buy Teen Beat and Cosmo and all of them and do all the quizzes. Well, okay, here's what it says.

And, by the way, the reason I'm bringing this up is what I was thinking about the other night wasn't just the Washington Post. the way the reason i'm bringing this up is what i was thinking about the other night wasn't just the washington post and i and um what what i was thinking about is like all of these media organizations now they're the reason they're doing stuff like this is they are trying to cull their own audiences at this point right like so basically they're trying to set the parameters on what is and isn't acceptable to think right and it's the same thing that we're doing and that every other media platform is doing. Except we're expanding the boundaries of what's acceptable to believe and think. Instead of shrinking. Who believes in conspiracy theories?

Statistically speaking, almost everyone. A team of researchers recently showed several thousand Americans a list of 20 common conspiracy theories and asked if they believed them. Does it list them? Yeah. These included false conspiracy theories again. False? Are they putting 9-11 false conspiracy theory on here? What do they say about the Iraq war being solved?

We can't take it. We are freaking out, Terrence. I haven't even gotten to it. What do they say about that? I mean, the one that pissed me off the most is John F. Kennedy. Because it's like, of all of these, like, that one is so fucking clearly, like, the narrative, the official narrative is not, like, real. But yeah, they said John F. Kennedy assassination, 5G cellular wireless technology, Obama birth certificate, COVID-19 and climate change.

Like they throw all of these in in the same pot. Yeah. Like the racist ones with the ones that are. It's like Tuskegee syphilis experiment, 5G. All this ridiculous shit. Oh my God. I mean, also, this also feels like maybe another way to throw off i mean saying throw off the sense very conspiratorial no it is i mean because like there is a critique of power in the

truth behind the john f kennedy assassination whereas the obama birth certificate one is literally a racist conspiracy theory so it's like by throwing them in together, you taint the one that is an actual critique of American power. Okay, so are they calling climate change a conspiracy? Also, I hate to break this to you. If eight out of ten doctors agree on a conspiracy theory, it's true, ostensibly. What makes it conspiratorial? That's what I'm saying.

I like this. It says, the result, nine in ten Americans believed in at least one conspiracy theory. Then it's not a conspiracy. I don't understand. Wait, you said COVID and climate change. Yes. What are they calling a conspiracy here? I think they mean like...

Lab leak versus spillover. The people that don't think climate change is real, for example. Climate denial versus... Okay. Okay, look, let's just get started. Let's get started. Which of the statements below is true? Oh, God.

Jeffrey Epstein, the billionaire accused of running an elite sex trafficking ring, was murdered to cover up the activities of his criminal network. Obviously, that was true. Oh, but they said that was wrong. Wait, okay, wait. When you thought... was wrong they don't let you do it you know what people forget about that here's what people forget about that the fucking here's what people forget about that y'all remember that they made two attempts on his life in the span of like a couple weeks right right and they failed the first time and it's like the other ones on here uh President John F. Kennedy was killed by a conspiracy

rather than a lone gunman. Also true, but that one's also false, apparently. The one that is true, the FBI kept tabs on civil rights leaders such as Martin Luther King Jr. attempting to find compromising information and damage his reputation. It's like, yeah, but I think it was a little bit more incent.

They literally tried to get him to kill himself. Yeah. And then they did kill him. And then they did kill him. And killed him it's like what two of these are wacky and one of them is like somewhat look this is so insidious there's a lot to unpack here it feels like um we're over an hour um so let's let's continue this on episode two should we do you want to continue it on the patreon yes this is a little teaser come on over come on over wait well let me finish this part then because there's there was four parts in this first question um and the first one was epstein the second one was john f kennedy the

third one was the quote-unquote correct one about martin luther king the fourth one regardless of who is officially in charge of the government and other organizations there is a sequel single group of people who secretly control events and rule the world together and apparently if you click on that one that one's false it's like so when you click on that one, that one's false. So when you click on this, they reveal to you what their reality is. What their reality is. Here's the thing. The Illuminati

is not real. There's not a Bavarian salon that exists into today that Jay-Z and Beyonce are part of. But guess what? You're fucking stupid if you don't think that there's like a class of people that run everything you know what i mean called capitalists yeah yeah and the world leaders like angela merkel and other people like that that's those are the ruling

elites now we can you know uh piss them on about it being codified into like a little like secret society or whatever but but it doesn't matter. There is a small group of people that run the world. They want us to believe that those people didn't kill Jeffrey Epstein. They really believe that. They really... Well, it's an easy sell,

right? Because what do you know about jail? Pedos don't do well in jail. So it's like, you know what I mean? It's like the wing can nod to just prison violence. Which is disturbing on another level. Alright, like when you click on this, oh whoa, so when you click

on each one, it tells you how, oh wow. Okay, so if you click on the fucking, oh god damn it. If you click on the John F. Kennedy one, it already erased it, but it said, wrong. The evidence is overwhelming. the evidence is overwhelming. The evidence is overwhelming, huh? The evidence is over...

Okay, I just want to point out the class of journalists the Washington Post had in the 60s. Ben Bradley, who was, like, doing coke and fucking, like, you know, starlets on John F. Kennedy's boat and shit. Like, you know what I mean? Like, all those motherfuckers were not real journalists the weird thing about this is like the warren commission which was set up right after the but by lbj had you know earl warren but also alan dolus on it and all these cia spooks who they decided that there was nothing to see here he was killed by a lone gunman but in the late 70s there was the house committee on assassinations or whatever and their report was like something happened here it was

like a conspiracy also i want to say this i don't say this lbj even himself who was there said that he had heard what four gunshots yeah now let me ask you a question just as like if you have two eyes does lyndon baines johnson strike you as the type of guy that doesn't know much about guns and John's. Yeah. Now let me ask you a question, just as like, if you have two eyes, does Lyndon Baines Johnson strike you as the type of guy that doesn't know much about guns and how they work? I like if you click on that, the last one.

Wrong. Many people have vied for power throughout history and no single group secretly has control. That's, okay, like if you think that, the idea that uh a group of

powerful elites doesn't control the world like that's woefully deficient explanation for how power works truly i mean even remember that moment and when there was like 20 republican candidates in the primary when trump stood up on stage and said, I've donated money to every one of these people. Their doors have been opened to me. When I say jump, they say, hell yeah! Yeah! It's like, that kind of shit is why people love his dumb ass. It's like, he did pull back

a little veil for a few dumb motherfuckers. That's part of it. That's part of it, too, is because if they concede on any of these, then they have to acknowledge that there was something particularly mystifying about Trumpism. You know what I mean? And they don't want to concede on any of these then they have to acknowledge that there was something particularly mystifying about trumpism you know what i mean and they don't want to concede that point yeah because it's not polite you know um you want it so there's six questions you want to do three on main and we'll do three on patreon that sounds fair huh okay does that sound fair okay all right number two partisanship plays a role in what people believe.

Both Republicans and Democrats are prone to believe conspiracy theories that make the other party look bad. Can you pick the true statement or will you be blinded by party loyalty? The first one. Republicans cheated their way to win the 2000, 2004, and 2016 presidential elections. I've got something to say about that, but I'll hold it for a second while we go to the second one. Hillary Clinton conspired to provide Russia with nuclear materials. Third, during Ronald Reagan's presidency,

government officials secretly and illegally sold weapons to Iran and used the money to fund Nicaraguan revolutionaries. They said revolutionaries? Yeah. Not death squads? Yeah. Contras? Yeah.

Revolutionaries. Oh, my God. What the fuck? Well, that's part of what you were saying, too, about how you just put Tuskegee and all that stuff in the same pot with QAnon. Haven't they admitted to Tuskegee? They've admitted that, haven't they? Yeah.

No, that's true. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. They tried to obscure, like, they did this with communism by trying to attach it to Hitler and all that. Right, right. They admitted that they fucking whacked JFK, too! Yeah, and the Washington... And the fourth one,

Barack Obama faked his citizenship to become president. Okay, so, like, I don't think the fourth one is correct. That one is incorrect. Faked citizenship. But there is a true statement in all of these. And it's like, I guess it's the one about Ronald Reagan. It's got to be the one about Ronald Reagan, right?

In their read. I'm going to click on it. I think that's probably it. About him funding revolutionaries? Right, right. That's the correct one? It is! It's the correct one!

What? What? What? Okay, for those of you keeping score at home, apparently it's a conspiracy that Republicans cheated their way to win the 2000, 2004, 2016 elections. But also, they may have cheated in 2016. I don't fucking know. They definitely cheated in 2000 and probably in 2004 and in 1980 they fucking colluded with the iranians to not release hostages and in 1968

fucking kissinger and nixon went behind the uh democrat party's backs and like talked with the vietcong like about the north vietnamese about like getting a better deal yeah dude this is this is malpractice this is what it is but yeah no they didn't fund nicaraguan revolutionaries they literally funded the death squads who were targeting the families of the actual revolutionaries right that is insanity i gotta see what they say about the republic wrong republicans won republicans won fairly in 2000 what they use the word fairly okay even if you believe that one vote wait wait they said they actually say the republicans won fairly the word fairly the washington post says fairly in 2000 2004 and 2000 fairly and squarely

being decided by the most undemocratic legislature in the world yeah exactly it's like even if you don't think even if you don't think something as mischievous as rigging voting machines, even if you don't think that, how about gerrymandering, Beth? Or nine people on the Supreme Court. I think, Tanya, you're about to have a stroke. You're so mad. You're so damn mad. This is what I'm saying when I was talking about the fucking new york

town it's like i'm not saying that we are uh saving journalism here or nothing but these motherfuckers are are spreading mass fucking lies and we are literally dying because of it well that's another thing like people i don't know i need to stop grinding my axe here but let's just dial it out and say that like um twitter and other platforms are like banning accounts for quote unquote spreading misinformation and like you even see this with like the kyrie irving stuff and all this and regardless of what you think about what kyrie Irving's beliefs are on the vaccine, it is indisputably true that the government went back on their own messaging several times this summer. And you can even make the case that you can even make the case. So we've had this Delta surge and all these people are dying right the biden administration was so cavalier

about people being able to just be normal and chill and take off their masks and shit by july 4th that they i don't know if this was intentional or not if you want to be really cynical about it which i think you could probably make that case you could probably make the case that they kind of encouraged people to get back out there so that the vaccinated people who are mostly democrats would go and spread the virus around and kill the people who weren't democrats who weren't vaccinated like regardless of whether they did that intentionally or not that's what happened and and and again whether they did it cynically or not they still did it negligently it still happened like they still did it negligently by

like being cavalier and being like this thing's over we beat this thing and then a fucking 100,000 people died between then and now here's a question does intent matter when you are the leader of the free fucking world when you're the president of the biggest empire to ever reign like no i don't think so does intent matter at all i love this conspiracy theories follow a simple formula look at this powerful people plus use deceitful or shadowy means plus benefit themselves or harm the public that's what the formula of a conspiracy theory is they exist if that's your definition they everywhere. Because that's what powerful people do. Let me taste it.

This same paper. I'm going to lose my fucking memory. I'm just peeing. I'm losing it. Another example of that. I'm losing it. Should we just pause it there and carry it over? No, go ahead.

Finish your point. We'll do this third one and then we'll... Here's another thing I was going to say. I go back to this all the time and i think about this it like you know when we talk about moving the goalposts of the government and stuff like that this is undisputable bob bob trump and bob woodward's february 2nd interview february 2nd interview trump says to him yes thing could get really nasty. It's aerosolized.

It's like, tells him all the shit that's true. Right. In March, Fauci's saying, you don't need a mask if you're not sick.

Right. You know what I mean? And there's like two, there's two abdications of responsibility there because Bob Woodward's like, supposed to be like the king boss

of like journalism or whatever to these people. Didn't he sit on that until six weeks ago? Yeah. Because he's got a book that was coming out in October. The first time anyone heard about that was like June 2021

on Colbert's show or something. Are you serious? You mean to tell me what a liberal could say is, well maybe Trump knew but Fauci didn't. Okay. Real world events sometimes follow this formula as well.

Example, the Reagan administration acted secretly and illegally in the Iran-Contra affair, and the FBI did spy on King, but the key difference is that these real incidents are backed up by evidence, facts, and witnesses. Wait, so you're saying... Conspiracy theories are different. They're just theories. There's fucking evidence!

God damn it! I mean, it's not even a theory that they armed the Contras. And that they... I mean, there's substantial evidence that they fucking threw the 1980 election, that they fucking meddled in that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Didn't Trump bring back, do you remember when he brought back Elliot Abrams and remember that news cycle and Omar, Ilyan Omar was like giving him the business or whatever? Yeah, conspiracy theories are different. They're just theories. Most have no evidence to support them.

They often connect unrelated facts that create an impression of plausibility. Yet almost everyone believes at least one according to enders one thing i noticed a lot in talking to colleagues journalists and students people don't realize that a lot of people just believe weird stuff a lot of this commotion about conspiracy theories especially in the last four or five years is fueled by this complete misunderstanding of the basic contours of public opinion again like the whole point of these exercises is just to call their audience.

Like, anyways. Are you saying poll? You know what I mean? Sort of like calling the herd. Separating out the disbelievers. You don't need to poke around any further. We've did the work for you. And here's what our independent review finds.

Alright, we'll do this last one and then we'll switch over to Patreon. Number three. Conspiracy theorists commonly seize on subjects that most people have little expertise in, such as health and science, and therefore cannot easily be debunked. Half of Americans

believe one of the claims in the list below, but only one is backed by evidence. Which one of these is true? They're saying there's no evidence for JFK's assassination. You have to... This is insane. Which one of these is true?

The dangers of genetically modified foods are being hidden from the public. True. The U.S. government secretly dosed Americans with LSD in an attempt to develop mind control technology. Are they saying that? If they say that's not true, I will lose my fucking mind.

That's what I'm saying. You know they're not going to say it's true. I'm feeling fucking crazy right now. You know they're not. I thought MKUltra was just a matter of record now. I mean, I thought. By the CIA's own admission. Here we go, the third one. The AIDS virus was created and spread around the world

on purpose by a secret organization. And fourth, the- They didn't stop it! They certainly didn't stop it. Yeah, the Reagan administration. One of them even wanted to put barcodes on gay people so that they could fucking scan them when they fucking- Anyway.

Yeah, you're talking about the intellectual forebears of the Republican Party, William F. Buckley and stuff, wanted to tattoo homosexuals and people that test positive for HIV. And number four, the coronavirus was purposely created and released by powerful people as part of a conspiracy. Okay, so obviously the one that they think is true

has got to be the first one. The dangers of genetically modified foods are being hidden from the public, right? They're saying true. They think that's true, right? That's probably, yeah. I mean mean because like the whole thing about gmos is like it's such a wide umbrella the fucking indigenous people before here practiced genetically modifying so we have like 20 000 different kinds of corn i mean like anything can be gmo anyways oh i was wrong they did say the u.s government secretly secretly dosed Americans with LSD.

Oh, thank God. They acknowledged that. Wow. Wow. Okay. Tom's brain was broke. God, if they would have said that was bullshit, I was going to walk out. Anyways, let's see.

AIDS. Let's see. Wrong. HIV, like many pathogens, jumps from animals to people. But one in five Americans think it was created by a conspiracy. The correct answer... Well, here's the thing. You know, when it runs roughshod through certain communities

and then the government response is... Good luck. Good luck. Wonder why people fucking think that. Yeah, they won't even give out condoms, for God's sakes. And then if you click on the coronavirus one, the World Health Organization just restarted a probe into the virus's origins. The leading theories are that the virus evolved naturally or accidentally escaped a lab,

not that it was created in a secret plot. So, like, just going off of what they say in this. Even the lab link. I didn't even think. Okay, so, like, I've been pretty say in this even the lab like i didn't even think okay so like i've been pretty agnostic about the covet origins and if you even listen to the episode i left plenty of room open for like anything but like the fact that they say this that it was that it was not created in a secret plot convinces me that there's a chance definitely there's a non-zero chance it was created in a secret plot truly like okay this combined with the new york times this week printing

the defund the police i'm gonna save it for the picture let's save it because we need to cut this off i'm losing my shit all right um if you want to hear more, the rest of this, go to patreon.com, P-A-T-R-E-O-N.com slash Trillbilly Workers Party. $5 a month. Just go sign up for this. You can listen to the rest of this quiz, or if you'd like to read it, go to the Washington Post. It says, will you fall in the conspiracy theory rabbit hole?

Take our quiz and find out. It says, will you fall in the conspiracy theory rabbit hole? Take our quiz and find out. You can take it for yourself at home, folks, and drive yourself crazy in the company of your friends and family. Thanks for listening this week, everybody. Go to the Patreon. We'll see you next time.

Bye-bye.