A Geek History of Time - Episode 212 - GI Joe and Latchkey Kids, Reaganism vs Reagonomics Part IV

Episode Date: May 20, 2023

I said good day sir. You don't ever plan anything around the Eagles because the Eagles represent the grace of God. You heathen bastards. One of vanilla Nabish name. Well you know works are people too. I'm thinking of that one called they got taken out with one punch. So he's got a wall, a gole, a gole, and a wall. Every time you mention the Eagles, I think done Henley.

Ha ha ha ha. 1.0-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5- This is a history of art. Where we connect in our memory to the real world. My name is Ed Blaylock and I'm a world history and English teacher in Northern California. And as regular listeners will hopefully recall, I just recently started a new D&D campaign with a kind of a recurring group of folks that have been playing with for a while. And we instituted a change in the adoption of the new campaign we've moved over to Roll 20. And if you're not familiar with Roll 20, one of the features of that is you have a virtual character sheet.

And when you take an action in game, either make a skill roll or any kind of role that you make. One, you click on whatever that skill is, like I'm gonna make an diplomacy role. I click on my diplomacy skill. And the role 20 program has all of my skill bonuses and everything plugged in and it uses a random number generator to then give me my role. Now there's a certain

haptic element that's missing there and I'm still getting used to not not being able to roll a die. But it does in many ways it speeds up play which is nice when you have a large group like we have. The downside is it's supposed to be a random number generator and I don't know how random it really is because we all agree in our group that after our game last night, the big bad evil guy was actually the dice roller because everybody in the party had struggled to roll over a 10 for anything all night and it was so bad that the DM was struggling to roll over a 10 all night and I mean, we did.

My wife's, my wife's thief on one occasion got a very notable critical hit that was really cool, especially based on the fact that the rest of us were all rolling for shit. But yeah, it was one of those nights where like a combat Yeah, but it was one of those nights where like a combat that should have lasted probably four rounds total, like it was supposed to be a quick, okay, ha ha, and we have the reveal of who the double agent within town

has been, and that's supposed to be the big thing, but the big thing was trying to take down a pack of goblins because we couldn't hit anything to save our souls. And yeah, and then at the same time, because my wife and I are playing virtually, Robert, a little boy, has gotten used to on game night. He gets to roll the dice for mommy and we had to explain to him. We're not we're not doing that anymore.

We don't we don't have a physical die for you to roll and he was he was very disappointed which on the one hand I'm sad that my kid is disappointed on the other hand. I'm raising him right because he's excited about rolling dice So we're going in the right direction. So anyway, that's that's what I've had going on, you know, hashtag nerd problems. How about you? Well, I'm Deemy Harmon, I'm a Latin teacher and a US history teacher at the high school level up here in Northern California. And the thing that I've got this week is that I've finally gotten my last Latin class through the book. I think I'd said something about having

taught the final Latin grammar lesson on a previous episode. So what happens next is that they don't go straight from that to now, you can translate Latin. There's an intermediate step that I've created for them. The curriculum I designed was designed to get them through a fourth year. I found a guy from the turn of the 20th century, his last name was Richie, and he wrote the Fabulae Foculus. No. That what he wrote, that might be. Anyway, he wrote essentially, re-wrote four major myths. You had the story of Perseus, you had the story of Hercules, you had the story of Jason the Argonauts, you had the story of Odysseus, and he re-wrote it in such a way that it would increase in complexity as they went along. And it would serve as a bridge between students in the turn of the 20th century

who had finished their Latin reader and were then going to move on to reading actual, translating actual Latin. And it works. It works really well. Actually have a copy of the book. I'm going to think of it. I have a copy of the book back here. And that book is from 1925. Oh, damn. And it's a reprint because the original about 1903.

Okay. So I was looking forward to doing that book in the 100th anniversary of having that book. Mm-hmm. And I will have missed it by two years because it's the last time for that program. Yeah. So it is a bittersweet moment because this is the last time I'll get to do these stories with students that are not my own children. And the jury is out as to whether or not they'll want to go that far into it. I hope so. But yeah, it is a bittersweet thing because I love these stories

dearly. It's part of why Latin 3 is one of the easiest classes of Latin, or it is the easiest Latin class that I teach because by the point, by this point, you know your stuff and it's fun translations. But there's nothing to move them on beyond. So it's, I guess it. Yeah, it sucks. Bittersweet. Yeah. Yeah. Not a fan. Um, especially when my district is, is trying to do all kinds of things of like, you know, we need to really increase like the amount of, uh, world languages we teach. And I'm like, why don't you say, um, hi. Yeah. Too bad.

So anyway, uh, that bitterness aside, uh, it is still cool because we're doing the story of Perseus. And most kids at the age that I'm teaching have read Percy Jackson. And so they're finding fun things there. And then we'll switch over to Jason the Argonauts. Nice. Then they'll switch over to Odysseus or Ulixus. And there will be all kinds of fun stuff with all of those things.

So nice. Yeah, very cool. Yeah. So anyway, let's see, last we left off, George W. Bush was talking about human animal hybrids in a state of the union address. And what's wild is that's not the most ridiculous thing talked about in a state of the union address. And what's wild is that's not the most ridiculous thing talked about in a state of the union address in this century.

So. Yeah, no, it's not. Yeah. And yeah, but essentially like GIO is in its second season and it is punching hard on the button of science and DNA and altering people's DNA. And it's also like it's got a twin blast going because the other thing it's really pushing on is technology, the use of computers, hacking, viruses, things like that. And these are the big things that it's pushing on.

And there's other stuff along the way. But those seem to be the main themes that G.I.G.O. pulls on in its second season. And it develops characters as it's going along. And you really get to see kind of an internal life of these characters, internal motivations and things like that. It's really... And what's interesting too though is that you have characters that you've introduced who are high-ticket item characters, for instance, Sargeous Lauder, who disappear for

several episodes at a time. Yeah. You know, and Sir Pentor, who started off as this huge menacing big bad evil guy, and this is the problem with writing sometimes when you write the bad guy to end all bad guys. You have you have nowhere to go from there. Exactly. Yeah. So it's referred to as villain decay. Okay. Cool. Well, unfortunately, villain decay leads to him being pecuniary in his focus. So, telephones, getting rich people to give them money, shaking them down, or stealing young women to then drain their youth. You know, okay, so he's draining their youth in 86.

Yep. The podlings were being drained by the Skexis in 82. Yeah. Okay, just that kind of harmonic kind of kind of hit. Yeah. Okay. You know, what's really, that was an episode that honestly disturbed me too

with Madam Vale because at the very end, they stopped the machine, but not before they got it started. And then you hear Madam Vale screaming and that she's hideous and don't look at me. And there's like just a few frames where you see her face and it's literally just blank. That's like Twilight Zone shit. Yeah, but at least Twilight Zone it was grotesque, right?

This is like seriously they forgot to draw on the face. Like that's what her face now looks like. And they ask Lifeline though like can you do something for her? He's like I'll try but there's not much to work with. And it's like, the wages of sinner really fucking high. They are our permanent disfigurement. Again, no, he's disturbing. Yeah. But like, oh, damn. Yeah. So, and then, you know, you, so you've got that episode and you've got these, you know these semi-silly episodes and things like that. And then you've got some really deep ones that you're like, wait, that's a GI Joe episode, like the one with the dust children. And then like I said, there's an overarching storyline for some of these characters, or at

least character development throughout, right? And then there's an episode that's like midway through the season that really kind of makes me truly wonder if the writers suspected that Reagan had Alzheimer's. Okay, you you fully have my my attention. You have my intrigued. Yes. Now, and I'm and this is not by joke. This is I genuinely wonder because people were joking at that time. Now I sent you a link in advance of this show, of a skit from Saturday and I live. Yeah, Phil Hartman. Phil Hartman played Ronald Reagan. And I believe so much when he died.

Yeah, I know. And I believe that particular one was from 1986. If I remember right, yeah, I think so. Yeah. So, and now that makes me kind of wonder, doubting myself. But yeah, I mean, it's from the mid 1980s. It's from around that time.

Yeah, second term. Yeah, absolutely. So you've got this skit that's actually occurring in 1986 when this stuff is all happening. So the skit has him. Well, why don't you describe it? I had you watch it. Why don't you tell me what the skit is?

Is he to the skit and so on? The conceit of the skit is the skit starts. I don't remember what it is Reagan is Reagan. Phil Hartman as Reagan and remarkably good impersonation. He's, you know, the daughtering, oh, he's talking to a reporter. He's specifically talking to a reporter about Iran Contra. And he's saying, well, you know, I just hope that my answers have been, you know, useful since I really, I really don't know anything. And, and, and like they punch up the, I don't know, I don't know. I don't know, like four or five times, right?

Like as a, as a comedic, like, I really need to get into the phrase. I don't know. I don't remember, you know, as many as many times as I can say it to, you know, push push the line. And then reporter leaves and he and he turns around and still in a Reagan-like voice. But, but you know, without all the affable all shocks, you know, kind of, Affability. Yeah. Now, commanding. He's now he's now very sort of very commanding. He, you know, hits the hits the intercom button on his on his desk and says, all right, get in here. You know, and, and, you know, a whole bunch,

all the, all the other cast mail, all the other cast members from the show, you know, rushing into the room, they all take up chairs, and he's like, all right, now get this straight, and nobody, nobody forget any of this. And he's going through it once. I'm only gonna say this once. Yeah. And he goes through this convoluted explanation

of how they're gonna get money from here to move it to the contras and, you know, the Swiss bank accounts and this, that and the other thing. And it's this unveluded thing. And then in the middle of it, you know, the secretary, somebody sticks their head and says, you know, Mr. President, the girl scout who's sold the most cookies this year is here for her photo up. He's like, God, I hate this part of this job. All right. This is the part of the job that I hate.

Yeah, this is the part of the job that I hate. All right. Everybody out, send her in. And then, you know, he goes back to being. And he takes a beat, too, where he just kind of starts to beat. Where he went around. You know, it's, it's, he almost, he practically waves a hand in front of his face, right? And then, and then, oh, well, you know,

Susie, I hope you can use some of your sales smarts to help me with Congress. Yeah. You know, the, you know, bullshit politician joke, right? And then, and then, you know, she leaves and he goes right and right back to, all right, back in here. I'm not done yet. And, you know, they all come in and he's, you know, throwing stuff out. This is gonna take a phone call and speaks in that person. Yeah, he speaks, yeah, and it's, and it's a bullshit Arabic.

It's actually offensive fake Arabic by 1986. Yeah, 1986, you know, fake Arabic. And he says, all right, so the Syrians are on board. You know, I have a good news. The Syrians are on board and we're gonna, you know, something, something, whatever. And then somebody sticks their head and says, Mr. President Jimmy Stewart is here.

Right. And Dana Carvey comes in as Dana, as you've changed, Dr. Charles. You've changed, you're just, you're a jerk, Ronald, Ronnie Dutch Dutch. He calls him Dutch every time he's, you know, and, you know, and then, and then, you know, there's, there's a, like a moment of remorse for having shot a, a friendship in the, in the, in the foot, but then he,

you know, goes right back to, all right, you know, get in here and the skit ends with everybody else on the staff, fast asleep. That's right. Cause he's been going like all day. Right. And he says, Oh, wow. Oh, wow.

It's it's 3 a.m. Well, you know what? The banks will be opening in Zurich about now. And he gets on the phone and, right. And, you know, start speaking German. Right. And that's, and that's the close. And hadn't he like been doing like complex, like math of like, you know, well if we

Yeah, one of them says says something about yeah, and I know I know I know I know Yeah, um So you know clearly here's this evil genius is the the conceit of the skit is that that he's actually this evil genius Who's who's hiding all of that behind his affable, well, you know, I really can't talk about that. I don't know very much kind of demeanor. You know, and the thing is, at the time, it was funny because everybody was talking about what a daughtering old man

he looked like. Yeah. You know, and his constant refrain of, well, you know, I can't say as I remember. Yeah. And it was like, I don't recall to 139 questions. Yeah. And it's, and part of that, and I remember at the time.

On the stand. The commentary at the time was, okay, we know some of this is bullshit, but it is all of it bullshit because how much does he really not actually remember? Right. It was a question of the questions. Yeah. And so they took that and completely flipped it on its head for comedic value. And the funny thing is with almost 40 years of hindsight on it, there's a part of me that looks at that and is like,

you know what, these guys might not have been far off. Like I kind of wonder, if there wasn't at least a grain of truth, did I do that? No, no, no, he really was actually, you know, in the thick of it, and, you know, the multiple decimal point math, obviously, is, you know, exaggeration. But like, how much of it was his third tier guy running things without him doing proper oversight? his third tier guys running things without him doing proper oversight. How much of it was actually him being a, no, no, I'm a fucking cold warrior.

This is what we're going to fucking do. You know, well, I, I think let's find out. Okay. Here's some research. Now the facts are this. Ronald Reagan was officially diagnosed with Alzheimer's in 1994. People immediately started combing through his work as president to see if there were any early science, because very often you do have early onset Alzheimer's. You share with you a very sad but hard not to laugh

at its story. A friend of mine, a good friend of mine called me, oh God, I think it was before COVID or maybe right when the pandemic started. And she said, Hey, you know, I want you to know, I have early onset Alzheimer's. So my God, how are you with that? Like, you know, just let's talk it out. Mm-hmm. And she was relatively sane when about it. Um, like, what else are you gonna fucking do? Yeah. And so she's just like, yeah, like, like, it's, it's almost like, I don't know, parts of my house are going to be demolished. And I won't remember that they were there. That kind of a thing. Yeah.

How, you know, and so she's put all the plans into place and all that kind of stuff. It's like, oh, yeah, you know, I'm so glad you told me and I'm so sorry and Doobley's keep in touch and as much as you'd like to and Three weeks later, I got the exact same phone call It was hard and I also couldn't help but kind of laugh that I'm involved It was hard and I also couldn't help but kind of laugh that I'm being called by a person who's not remembered that they called me. Yeah. Tell me that they have Alzheimer's.

Yeah. And then about a month later, I got the same call and like this happened seven times. Oh, shit, really? And it's like I'm laughing, not crying at this, but like, number one, this is one of my greatest fears. Number two, like, I mean, central casting called they want an easy skit, you know, like, yeah, like, like, goddamn.

So, so there are early signs and sometimes it's that you call a friend multiple times to tell them that you have Alzheimer's. So they're coming through his work because it really felt like he had it. From 1986, interestingly enough, for he Ronald Reagan spent his time in increasing seclusion. Reportedly, buy people on his staff, paying less and less attention in cabinet meetings. Now, this could be attributed to simple depression because he'd taken a massive hit to his reputation as an image from the Iran Contra scandal, right? So this could be the end. Yeah. But further backward research has found two measures. Okay. And all

time research is always developing. The use of repetitive words is one measure. Right. And the substituting of non-specific terms like, like thing or specific nouns, you know, hand me, hand me the thing. Come on, the thing that's right there, you know, right? Yeah, yeah, okay. Yeah. These both increased toward the end of Ronald Reagan's presidency compared to the start of it. Now, there's that a third measure, his use of unique words also declined as well. Now, when we say unique words in this context, what does that mean? So where he would use words that he doesn't normally use.

Okay. Okay. So instead of falling back on the same types of like, wrote speech words, I guess an example would be, you know, unique words would be evidence that you're still learning and you're still reading and you're still doing things. Okay. You know, using using the same words over and over again, or the same types of words. And or just, you know, you can measure how many how many words are in a person's speech. Yeah. And you could do a chart. You could do a word word cloud, right? Right. Right. Yeah.

Yeah. And those things in that cloud, the fewer unique words you have. Okay. That makes sense. All right. And because, yeah, the same, the same kind of measures have been done exhaustingly to our, our most recent before this one, president. Yes. And quite frankly, given that this one's age should do the same. Now, I was bringing you here as an age of pediment, which might skew that data. But it is still a worthwhile study when you keep hiring septiginarians to do this goddamn job. This is true. You know, we do set an age limit at the bottom because we recognize that not enough

age gives you not enough experience. Perhaps we could set an age limit at the top considering that the average age of men up until recently was well below this number. This is true. So, but anyway, imperceptible cognitive decline often predates by many years, the precipitous downturn that occurs once compensatory strategies like relying on a well rehearsed phrases and simple words fail and an individual can no longer mask their cognitive deficits. So if you always use the same kind of catch phrases, You start to use those instead of anything else and people won't necessarily pick up on the fact

that you forgot the word. Right, right now. The thing is, we also know that when people are put under deep anesthesia for, say, life-saving surgery, that can actually jump start the symptoms of dementia. That okay, yeah. Okay, and it can also just permanently lower their cognitive ability of the patient.

When Bill Clinton went in for bypass surgery, he came out of it greatly diminished cognitively for multiple years. He was much slower. I'm not, you know, his slower is still most people's like turbocharged because that guy's fucking smart. Yeah. But there's a thing called pump head.

Essentially when you're put on a bypass pump. Yeah. You mentioned, you mentioned that, I think, episode before last. Okay. There you go. Yeah. So a study that got published in 1988 suggested that Ronald Reagan had some cognitive impairment during his debates with President Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale.

But the authors said that their findings were insufficient to conclude that the changes affected Reagan's policy, judgments and ability to make decisions. So like, we're not saying, but we're saying. Okay. And that study comes out after G.I. Joe, the cartoons. So, right, right. I cannot, I cannot enter that into evidence, but yeah. That study was an ongoing study. Yeah, but in 1986, there were people who were already kind of looking at scants that, how much? You just, you know, describe. Yeah. Yeah. Right.

But this much is true. At least one memo reached his chief of staff in 1987. Now again, that's after this, this show is over, but for that memo to have gotten there, et cetera. Okay. In 1987, it came from several aides who were concerned enough to suggest invoking the 25th Amendment. In 87. Yeah. Oh, wow. All right. Yeah.

And remember, he was in greater and greater isolation. He would just sit down and watch movies. And that was it. Oh, wow. Yeah. A few quotes from folks, including James Cannon, an aide who made the case to Howard H. Baker Jr. who came aboard in 1987 as chief of staff, quote, talking about Reagan, quote, he was lazy. He wasn't interested in the job.

They said he wouldn't read the papers they gave him even short position papers and documents. I'm going to break in here. You remember there was a lot of talk about how Reagan only wanted it to exist on two sides of a paper. Right. Wanted to tame the paper blizzard as he called it. So he already starts off with like, Hey, I am I was elected to lead not to read, right? I was elected to lead not to read, right? Bush asked for it only on one piece of paper. Really? Yeah. Bush, Jr. Jr. Yeah, yeah. He asked for it only on one side. Yeah. And, and Trump wanted a lot of pictures.

That's right. He did, didn't he? Yeah. Yeah. Oh, wow. His, his, I remember this is, this is within the first two years of, this is when the first half of his term, right, they were got out from the White House about how much trouble they were having getting him to pay any attention to briefings like you need to make it you need to make it, you know, bullet points punchy brief and and give him graphics like right which lock me he's supposed to be the leader of the free world like come on, you know, well and you remember with with Trump it was kind of uh You know his his intuitive ideology guided what he did But if you were the last person to talk to him he wanted to seem smart so he would listen to that person Yeah, this also was true under Reagan

They were jockeying for position with his calendar makers to see if they could be the last one in the room Because you typically got your way talking to him now that also is pretty common. Well, because if you can't remember the first three people that you talk to right the fourth and fifth people are going to get what they want. Yeah. So back to the quote. They said he wouldn't come over to work. All he wanted to do was to watch movies and television

at the residence. Now again, this could just be depression. Of course, if you're depressed because you got caught doing illegal shit and you had to lie to not get impeached, I got some problems there. Also, okay, if this is depression, fucking see a doctor because you got a job to do, man, like, or step down, you know, there was a perfectly capable shithead guy who is way more qualified than you. Waiting in the number two spot. Yeah. So I love, I love how you can say shithead and still say he was still way more qualified.

Yes. Like highly qualified, a dick, but highly qualified. Yes. Yeah. And probably of the three generations of Bush's, the least shitty in this, which I mean is a little bar. But it is when his dad was hiding Nazi money. Yeah. And had been part of the businessman's plot and his son was was W. Yeah. Yeah. So another

quote, Steven F. Not a professor of national security affairs in the United States Naval War College said that by 1987 Ronald Reagan quote, was never a detailed person. Felicipe cabinet meetings in the midst of briefings from droning bureaucrats was horrible at remembering names. This was a man who required lots of rest and recreation. So 87 Reagan is not the great communicator. 87 Reagan is riding on the coattails of the great communicator shit that, that,

oh yeah, well, yeah, I mean, by the last, but the last two years of the second term. Yeah, yeah. No, it was, it was the grand visears were running shit. Yes. Which makes it all the more alarming because prior to that, his wife was giving him advice based on a San Francisco scholarship. You know, maybe, maybe based on that, there could be an argument made that maybe we were better off with the viziers running things.

But the viziers were evil fucks. So, you know, we being white men. Yes. Yeah. Everybody else not. We are people know. We being brown people know black people know women know. Like, yeah, only one group. Yeah. And even then only one small segment of that group. So, yeah. Right. But now now baker to his credit, Um, then this is not Jim Baker. He'd been shot. Uh, Howard Baker, the, the Jim staff in 87. Yeah. His credit, he took this memo seriously and he kept an eye on Reagan. He ended up dismissing the idea because he didn't find any significant decline. Now in fairness, he had just stepped into the job in 87. So there's that.

Yeah. But you don't just step it's not like they plucked him off the street either. Yeah, no, he'd been around. Exactly. So how much do you want to find? But okay, still in 86, we've got that that skit that Hartman is pretending to be the daughtering old fool who's out of his depth until the public's gone. And at that point, he's running the whole world, right? So this is clearly in the zeitgeist. Professor Moriarty. Yes. So the episode of GI Joe that made me wonder was that Sir Pentor was having them go all over the place to pick up his old toys. Not literally. He wants his old weapons so that he can feel powerful again to hold his old weapons. And

each one that he holds, he looks like that character, which is, you know, okay, now you've got some some representation there, right? Yeah. Um, he, so he's got them all these ancient weapons and, and they're going to make him more powerful or more immortal or some shit like that. It's never fully defined. Um, he ends up poisoning Leatherneck and Wetsuit. Uh, or no, he ends up poisoning Leatherneck. Um, and Wetsuit has to go and save Leatherneck. And so it's really this rivalry between the seals and the Marines. Yeah. And ostensibly these ancient weapons are helping Sir Pentor rejuvenate and things like that. But at this point, none of

Cobra knows why he's doing what he's doing. They feel adrift in following him. They're devastatingly afraid of his physical violence toward them. It just kind of has a Alzheimer's we don't we don't want to talk about how grandpa is declining. Yeah, kind of vibe going on. And it's weirdly fantastical, even for a guy who is made up from the DNA of all these different. Yeah, guys, it's just this like, well, we'll follow him despite it not making any sense.

And he never offers to make any sense. He never shares with anyone else what his plans are. He just wants it done. And that feels very much like what I just described with Reagan. Have I mentioned that Tomax and Zaymot own a corporation, extensive enterprises that works hand in hand with Cobra? Yeah. Okay.

Here's Ronald Reagan on taxation. Quote, some say shift the tax burden to business and industry, but businesses don't pay taxes or business doesn't pay taxes. Oh, don't get the wrong idea. Business is being taxed so much so that we're being priced out of the world market, but business must pass its costs of operations, and that includes taxes onto the customer in the price of the product. Only people pay taxes, all the taxes. Government just uses businesses in a kind of sneaky way to help collect the taxes. They're hidden in the price. We aren't aware

of how much tax we will actually pay. Hmm. Ah, yes. Hypercapitalism and the unfettered free market. Corporatism galore. Oh, so much. Yeah. There's an episode also where sci-fi and sci-fi is a character. So there's some of these characters, just they're really dumb. So sci-fi is a character. So there's some of these characters,

and they're really dumb. So sci-fi, I can't really tell what his specialty is. You could probably look it up and it would say something dumb, but sci-fi is a character who is like, you can barely just, he almost looks like a transformer took over a human. All you see is his jaw. And then there's another character named Zap who is specifically

a laser specialist, which what are all their guns doing? Yeah, I know. So, but yeah, so he's He's a generic kind of high anything high tech shit laser weapon systems electronics. Okay. And here's the thing. I'm going to guess. I guess here that him being introduced in about 86. 86. This is the very, very nascent beginnings of the Army starting to work on next-gen soldier programs. And so there's an echo of that because something I noticed like back in the first episode. The- When I was talking satellites, you were talking satellites and also when you sent me the the compilation of you know Look at look at all this happened in Marvel comics, you know TV advertisements, which they're not really advertising comics, but They are because that's legal in ocean. No

Like even I tell you what even even as a 10-year-old, I'd have been like, I don't think you're advertising with comic book. But I want whatever the fuck it is you're selling. But they, they, a lot of the vehicles in the earlier few, few episodes. A lot of the vehicles were very clearly Directly inspired by what was the cutting edge zit-guys thing the US military industrial complex was now doing You know ACEs ACEs aircraft at least the top cat or they got the Y-way, the, you know, forward-swept wing model, was an F-14 tomcat.

Yeah. G-I-J-O got an M-1 Abrams tank, basically earlier than most units in the US Army did, because the Abrams was, you know, this is what we're going to use to stop the Soviets getting through the fold of pass. They had a Dune Buggy with a cannon on it. Yeah. We lost. Triker.

Yeah. We'll kind of pass that because that's coming for garbage. But um, and the cobra, I gotta look this one up. But I had to. Cobras main, uh, plane was like an A 10 Wart hog. Yes. That it's, it's wings would turn, so it would have upward movement. Yeah, it was V-tall.

Yeah. I can be second here. I'm going to look this up. And then, all right. Yeah, good. So, but GI Joe had a helicopter gunship that was, that was because I had the toy. I know it was because my father used me as an excuse to get some of these things because he's a military hardware geek.

But the GIO gunship was a Huey cobra, which now had been around since the 1960s, but was still kind of hot shit. And this was right before by the time that was being released, this was I don't know five or six years, I think before the Apache showed up. Okay. And so, but there's this consistent theme

within the development of GIGO characters and the toys that feeds off of, okay, what's the latest thing that's being developed? Because of course, when a forward swept wing aircraft wound up being tested and was all over the headlines as this new high tech thing, then almost immediately that's what Ace was flying. Yeah. You know, even though that test model wound up failing because the computer system forance sophisticated enough to keep it from being a widow maker. It wasn't Ace anymore.

It was slipstream. Right. Yeah. Okay. Which sounds like a transformer name. stream. Right. Yeah. Okay. Which sounds like a transformer name. I think it might have been some borrow over. Yeah. Yeah. So. But yeah, you have the energy technology constantly being with with GI Joe. So. Yeah. And so and so sci fi because sci fi is the second, second or third generation figure. Uh, zap. He's fourth. Oh, what was that was like third or second. figure. Zapp. He's fourth. Zapp was like third or second. Yeah, I know Zapp was earlier. I want to say Zapp was like a second Gen. And he was the laser rifle trooper

and it was a sp and in the toys, it was a really special thing. Right. You know, because the toys carried conventional weaponry, but in the cartoon show, they were all using lasers because. You know, because the toys carried conventional weaponry, but in in the cartoon show, they were all using lasers because, you know, we can't show them actually firing guns. Right. Because we are a American censorship. Yeah. Well, you know, we can show the guns landing in terms of like, yeah, you could hit vehicles, but you're always going

to hit just behind the tail or you're going to, you're basically going to give them chance to bail out. Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, sorry. No, no, it's fine. Um, so sci fi and sergeant's lauder go to a science fiction convention. Okay. All the trophy stuff there about what sci-fi conventions are. Yeah. But you also have an author who is there whom cobra is trying to recruit to perfect a laser. Because he's he's apparently an expert on this laser. So cobra needs to recruit him. Now in season one, cobra had Dr. Lucifer, had several, you know, really

important evil scientists or Romani woman that they would bully or whatnot. Now it's go and find this author who is like the equivalent of Thomas Jane, I guess when it comes to lasers And so and he's disabled Okay, it's real Judgment. All right, and I'll say this for Joe They portrayed a man in a wheelchair who is not just a nice guy, which is so easy to do right like Yeah, so this guy is a total asshole to his younger brother, Jeremy, like, and a prick to his younger brother. And he doesn't actually get a redemption arc either, where he learns that the real disability is his attitude. No, he stays a prick. And Jeremy's like, could, depending enough that it's okay. But Cobra is still able to woo him by saying shit like, well, of course you want to walk, don't you?

Okay, so You know, I have to interject this science fiction author who's an abusive prick. I Got it. I got a I kind of want to look him up and see if he looks like Harlan Ellison Harlan Ellison. Harlan Ellison had had a reputation. He was was one of these guys who was a genius. I am never going to take anything away from Harlan Ellison's talent. Oh my God. He's exactly like Harlan Ellison. No shit, really? No shit. Yeah. I just looked him up while you're doing it. Yes. Yeah, somebody in the writers, somebody in the writers room

had met Harlan Ellison at a convention and had an extra ride. Ellison, there are a legion of people who knew Ellison and were fiercely loyal to him in life and are still fiercely loyal to him to this day. Too hard on him since credit, he was unfailingly generous to people he loved and cared about. And he had a number of very good, good characteristics. But one of the things that he's famous for is he was a genius and he fucking knew it. And he could be wrickly to a remark like like huge

spines prickly and not only did he kind of carry a chip on his shoulder that way, but he could be unbelievably condescending, like grotesquely condescending. Yeah, and so when you say that this guy, you know, was a prick to his two-year brother, and he's the same insurrection author, I'm like, yeah, you know, that's what immediately went through my head. So yeah, apparently he does look like him. So there you go. Yeah, he's a prick. The upside is that there's costumers and cost players at this convention. Yeah, so the point where a sergeant slaughter starts fighting against cobra people and his tank comes in remember cobra uses the history. Yeah, yeah, yeah, which is a panzer. Yeah. And and they also they also had because remember there's always parity when it came to Vehicles right yeah, so the GI Joe had the the not as exciting

M1 Abrams and Then you didn't look nearly as cool the his tanks man. They looked fucking cool. Yeah Then Cobra or then GI Joe would have the the Tomcat cool. The histnics man, they looked fucking cool. Yeah. Um, then cober or than G I Joe would have the, uh, the Tomcat, cober had the, the, the warthog, right? Yeah. Um, it, and they had a cool character named wild weasel who was flying it. Yeah. Um, and then you had the G I Joe, uh, the dragonfly. Yeah. Those are those the, are those the ones you were talking about earlier? Hold on.

I'm going to look it up. Okay. Because there's, there's wild bills, uh, dragonfly and then there's lift tickets, uh, rescue helicopter. Um, but then, uh, cobra only had one, uh, helicopter and it, it had no cockpit. It's just an open seat. Yeah. So yeah, the dragonfly was the Huey gunship. Okay, cool. Yeah. The other one was the Apache then. Yep. Yeah. So anyway, so you had all that.

So the his tank comes crashing through the wall and Sergeant slaughter is beating a shit out of Cobra guys and, you know, and and they're trying to protect the the protect the author who's an expert on lasers for some reason. And Cobra seduces him to come with them. And while the fight's going on, a bunch of costume people are like, this isn't nearly as good as last time. Last time they use such and such. So super tropey shit, right? Oh yeah. And yeah, it shows people dressed up at a convention.

The downside is that this convention literally exists only in two different rooms at a small room facility, because it's a science fiction convention in the mid 1980s. And of course, the ableism. But I did like that number one, we see Sargeous Lauder come back in number two, we see a science fiction convention.

And Sarge even says, shouldn't we go undercover and Syfy is like, trust me dude, we're fine. And to be fair, having been the, being, I should say the kind of guy who has been to Sandy here, Comic Con four or five times. You know, he's not 100% wrong when he says that. No, not all. You'll lend right in. Yeah. So all these plots to take over the world are now weaker than under sub-pentor than they were under Cobra Commander. And by the last half of the second season, it's clear that the show has run out of

casts. Cobra's plots are now just background for different G.I. Joe's individual members developing their characters. This is why there's no fewer than three episodes highlighting lifelines pacifism. Yeah, I remember that was like, do we have to harp on this again? Right. I mean, I get it. His family are Quakers and,

yeah, like can we move on? Oh, and I'll discuss the family are Quakers episode two. Okay. But you remember how the flag got sunk, right? Yeah. It's still sunk. Again, they come back to this plot point, which this also is kind of interesting

because it means that the writers are self-referencing prior works, which, they paid attention So there's an episode called raise the flag and in it they mentioned professional wrestling They don't mention sergeant slaughter, but they have this quote you couldn't hit hastaxe Calhoun with a shovel Okay Hey stacks Calhoun with a shovel. Okay. Now what's awesome is that it's possible that he stacks Calhoun would have seen this episode because he didn't die until 1989. Hey stacks Calhoun was build it being six foot four, six hundred and one pounds.

What? Oh, he's a big dude. You're welcome to look him up. But he retired due to his weight and diabetes in 1980. Also this episode, you had a cook for Cobra on a ship that also sunk. And so it took over, he took over the flag somehow with any reprogram the bats, the battle Android troopers. Okay.

Okay. And he's the cook and he's making everything out of seaweed. And he's making them harvest like he figured out a way to, you know, make a garden of global food and stuff. You found that picture of Hastax, didn't you? Yeah. Big dude, any? Yeah. Yeah. The picture I've on Wikipedia shows him standing between Tex McKenzie and Mario Milano. And Tex McKenzie is having to hunch over to fit in the frame of the photograph. So yeah, oh my God.

Yeah. But anyway, so down under the water, he's managed to find plenty of places with plenty of air and and he's basically when the Joes go down there and Cobra goes down there, he captures all of them and he makes them his slaves and he's cooking and the song he's singing is the song by cold slither from the previous season. Wow, yeah, okay. Yeah, it's just those little things that I'm just like this is it's it's there's a depth no pun intended to this episode, there's a depth, no pun intended to this episode either. There's a depth to what the writers are doing despite having run out of all the gas. So, in this episode, also, I learned about something called the bends.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. So, just again, they're teaching me shit, right? After school. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So just again, they're teaching me shit, right? After school. Interestingly, that whole, you know, programs, the robots and, you know, farming seaweed and everything. There's a really strong silent running vibe to that. Yes. Which is like at that point, I mean, silent running came out in 1972, but like, I feel like whoever's whoever's in the writing

room has has an SF pedigree. Well, you know, here's the other thing. Ducktails would come out a few years later. And there would be an episode where they meet a guy who was a captain of a ship that got stuck in the Bermuda Triangle, but it turns out the triangle, it didn't swallow all the ships. Um, people just can't get out because there's so much seaweed, but they turned the seaweed into food, and they made hot dogs out of seaweed and all this kind of shit,

as duck tails. Yeah, but around this time, you start to see a little industry creeping in to the health food industry. And that is algae as food. Okay, yeah. So, all right. Anyway, most of the plots of Cobra are just super low rent. There's one where they promote the least capable leaders of GI Joe into being in charge by, again,

hacking into their commands computers. And of course, and it's lifeline, dial tone, and shipwreck. And so of course, lifeline is like, we gotta get rid of all these weapons that are on our vehicles. And dial tone is like, we gotta try all these really complex maneuvers. And shipwreck is like, don't tell me about what's going on. I'm in charge, I'm a colonel now, I say fire. And of course, this leads to people being injured

and all kinds of shit because, you know, you have the three of them in charge. And GIOs fucked for battle until real leadership shows up in the visage of Hawk and they start kicking ass again. And Hawk basically says, it's obvious that Cobra did this because of the three that you picked. He says, don't worry. It's actually a really interesting lesson

to give kids who are home alone, because he says, don't worry. It's not your fault that you're bad leaders. Not everybody is born to be a leader. And he says, lifeline is capable, but has no desire. Dial tone has desire, but is not capable. And shipwreck neither has desire nor is capable.

Or shipwreck, man. I know. So put upon. Why, why, why, why, why, you gotta pick on the Swabby, man, come on. Right. In the nightmare episode, there's a nightmare episode, low light, who, guess is, his specialty

is probably night fighting. He says, quote, you make do, you have no choice. When Lifeline asks him about his nightmares and how he copes with them, because Cobra is sending nightmares to the GI Joe's to make them more pliable and vulnerable and sleep deprived. Okay. So Cobra is really working on the mind control aspects

of the Cold War here, right? Right, right, right. Yeah, well, Lifeline has, or I'm sorry, low light has forever been besieged by nightmares. And so, he's just that very gritty, you make do. You don't have any of the choice, right? And in his dreams, he's dealing with daddy issues, and the whole cartoon is dealing with psychological abuse that low light went through in his childhood,

and how he processes that by, you know, having nightmares every night. As a result, though, he's resistant to Cobra's nightmare inducements, and he's almost wolverine-like. He seems to run on anger and grimness and that's a boon to G.I. Joe. Okay. Also in this episode, Sir Pentor has told that the process will take weeks and Sir Pentor immediately starts yelling at minebender that it must result immediately despite what he was just told by the guy who designed the damn thing and is seeing success. So as a result, of course, they overrush it. And the same exact thing kind of happens in a different way in another Lifeline Center episode about secondhand emotions. Lifeline's father is a minister, like you said, they seem to be staunch Quakers and Lifeline gets blamed by his sister before her wedding for his father being shitty to him.

Like he comes in for the wedding and, you know, if you're in the military, you're supposed to wear like formal military garb. Yeah, class A, class A uniform. There you go. And of course, that's an insult to his father and and lifeline's like, Hey, dad, how you doing? And you know, you're wearing that military uniform of blah, blah, blah, you know, and he's like, well, I'm sorry, dad, but this is really important to me. And then his sister blames him for his their father being a dick. So that's cool. The coma plot seems to be hitting the Joe's with some sort of neck tag that sends them into sends emotional signals from a very specific pipe organ that minebender is playing. And Sir Pentor again sees that it's succeeding and he says, okay, get out of the way. I want to do this. And he tries to fast track this

project as well. And of course, this ruins lifeline sister's wedding and there's a lot of overwrought emotions and lifeline gets violent and and his dad is super intolerant. And and what's interesting that this met this episode actually mentions something called emotional paralysis. In many ways, this is an episode about combat fatigue or what we now know is PTSD, which had shown up in the DSM 3 in 1980 And given that it's a show about militarism. It makes sense that they're bringing it up only 11 years after the Vietnam war ended Okay, yeah So in Joe's night out a new fuel source is developed which will use nitrogen in the air as fuel which fuel sources developed, which will use nitrogen in the air as fuel, which, uh,

mainframe tells the scientists that this quote, this will mean, quote, the end of the fuel crisis in 1986. Um, and frame. Mm hmm. What rock have you been living under since 1970 to, right. But yeah, okay. But again, we're kids, we're seeing this, we're hearing this, right? Yeah, yeah. So there's mention of the Hule Crisis. And the whole rest of the episode is so goddamn ridiculous.

Dial tone and Leatherneck and a wetsuit all go to a club with women, they all have dates, and they're all wearing their knives and their grenades. Like, they don't switch into like party gear. Well, because in a, you know, parallel universe where all of this happens, you know, yeah, you have to, you have to look at this as an adult, you have to go into watching this thinking, okay, look, I'm watching, imagine that I'm watching a Quentin Tarantino movie. Yeah, reality needs to be left at the door. Right. I imagine that I'm watching a Quentin Tarantino movie.

Reality needs to be left at the door. Right. You know what I mean? It's the same kind of thing of like, how is it that Hulk always has purple pants on? Yeah. You know, that kind of thing. So, and I get it, they're iconic that way, but it is still funny that like.

Yeah. So, Sir Pentor gets on the screen of the club for this new night club. Sir Pentor is on the screen and he thanks them for falling into his trap. So he's seriously kidnapping club patrons and sending them into space while rigging a bunch of explosives to this thing so that they'll blow up in space. so that they'll blow up in space. And he's using that as a way to kidnap the scientists in charge of the nitrogen fuel. Like,

what? Yeah. And I'm going to skip over the ancient Greece episode, just like I skipped over the Egyptian afterlife episode from the previous season. Yeah, okay. They were probably for the best. Yeah. But in the episode, not a ghost of a chance, there's actual punditry going on. Hector Ramirez is giving equal weight to Cobra and G.I. Joe when discussing the experimental plane that G.I. Joe claims that Cobra shot down.

It actually deserves notice because it's kind of a rachimana episode. Okay, all right. But they also have a Kathulu episode that involves the occult. Um, desert actually. Yeah. Good. Could that Kathulu episode be kind of a tie- in within humanoids. At that point. No, I don't think so. Okay. Now I know what you're saying,

because Hector Ramirez shows him in fact. Yeah. Yeah. No, because it literally is Destro saying words backwards. Well, he says this really a culty sounding words that was actually just a backward recording of Destro saying anyone listening to this backwards for a secret occult message is a

real dweeb. Which we'll get to that in a second. So, and it summons this really weird cockroach thing that cobra commander summons to kill serpentor. Okay. But then distro wants to not kill serpentor. And so yeah, he resummons it with anyone listening to this backwards for a secret to call messages a real deweeb, but backward.

Yeah. Which makes me think of I think it's breakfast cloud in the phrase neo-maxisumed webe. Yes. What is that? I just, it's just like, it's not enough to call somebody a do webe. You're in neo-maxisumed webe. Yeah.

Was the context in which it was used. Gotcha, gotcha. So by 1986 back masking, which is getting messages by playing music backwards, was actually a real fear for all sorts of parent groups. Like, yeah, and I don't remember, I feel like it was earlier than this, but I know that Cheech and Sean did a bit on one of their records back when you know you actually listen to it on a record player Where Where one of the things they said was You know

Sounding like you're playing it, you know the characters in the skit or playing the record backwards and what they hear is You're really fucking up your needle I like it. Well, the parent music resource center was formed in 1985, and they were very worried about demonic messaging in the back masking. This group specifically accused Led Zeppelin. You see, in 1983, an Arkansas and a California bill, both got proposed that basically outlawed satanic messages played backwards and enabled people to sue backmaskers for an invasion of privacy. Governor Bill Clinton sent the bill back to the state assembly where it died and the California one never got out of committee. But we actually had lawmakers suggesting seriously that we ban demonic

messages or now outlaw satanic messages, like the amount of shit you have to swallow for that to be true. Yeah, well, I mean, this is the height of the satanic panic. This is when my next door neighbors were legitimately uncomfortable with the fact that I was into Dungeons and Dragons because they weren't fully on board with, well, the idea that you're gonna somehow learn how to cast spells is stupid,

but we're worried about the cult overtones of this, and then of course I grew up to be the, you know, fucking Boy Scout that I am. And years later, they said, well, you know, you know, seeing how you turned out, you know, helped us kind of get past this, this worry about. They literally told me that I was the example to help them overcome satanic panic, which on the one hand feels really good. On the other hand, like, how pervasive fucking was this? These are not stupid people.

Yeah, you know, like, oh my god. Yeah. Well, in Sparks, Nevada, a couple of young adults shot themselves, one successfully killing himself and the other one dying presumably of a drug overdose three years later. Of course, in addition to the pot and the alcohol and the access to guns, they also had allegedly been listening to a Judas Priest album, stained class,

which was alleged to have subliminal messages. This was never proven. Slayer put in a bit of backmasking on their 1985 album that simply sent join us. Okay. So at the end of it all, G.I. Joe is using back masking in a Cthulhu episode, right? Okay. Yeah.

Ultimately, if you take a look, you just combine it all. G.I. Joe is about one version of Reagan that's bad for the world, being defeated on the daily after school for all of us. By another version of Reagan, that's hella bad ass. Capitalism versus militarism. Okay. Now in 1985, America was also one of the best, or was one of the best armed countries in the world.

In 1986, this is even more so. A few Arab nations actually outspent the US in the world. In 1986, this is even more so. A few Arab nations actually outspent the US in terms of percentage of GDP, but no one outspent the US in raw dollars and capabilities. And it's grown. So I'm going to pin everything to 2021 dollars so that we can compare. Okay. And God, I hope I did this right. I'm going to sound like Marjorie Taylor, drink green if I didn't. In 1976, the United States spent 94 billion, 715 million, $250,000 on the military. In 1979, that number jumped up to 1266,879,930,000.

And again, this is all pinned at the $2021. All of that was under Jimmy Carter, the great pacifist. In 1981, it went from $126,576 $558,880,000. Okay. By 1985, it was up to $272 billion, $163 million, $230,000. And in fact, the first time I found it dropped between $76 forward was 1991, where it dropped from $325 129 million 310,000 down to 299 billion 372 million 780,000

Okay, so It dropped again from 93 to 96 since the Cold War had ended yeah But then it started climbing again, and again, I'm keeping the dollars constant so we can see. So even when we had won the Cold War, it was still way above what it was in 1976. From 2002 to 2003, there was an enormous jump. And I cannot figure out the reason why you have this huge jump in expenditures and budgeting toward the military. It went from $378 billion, $463 million, $140,000 up to $440 billion, $532 million, $70,000. I can't account for why. Can't account for that. No, I

Yeah, it's a mystery between 2002 and 2003. Yeah, cruise missiles that $700,000 pop doesn't, you know, no, I don't know why we'd need more. I think that doesn't. Yeah, okay. Yeah. All right. So it'll forever be a mystery. I don't know. Just sheer spent ammunition costs. Yeah. Yeah. Wild. You know, there was talk of like we switched our camouflage. Um, so maybe that's large. I don't know. Yeah. I'm not an expert on these things. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Scholars may never know. Um, but by 2009, uh, under, uh, the great, the great saint Obama, it was 705 billion, 917 million dollars. And it continued to rise until peaking in 2012. And then it started to drop below the 700 billion dollar rate, again, pinning it to 2021 numbers. And then it started rising again, starting in

2016, which is. I wonder why. Right. And so in 2021, it crested over 800 billion. This year, it's 816 billion, 700 million dollars. Now, if you took our military, the money we're spending on our military, same dollars, same 2021 value, and you add up the next nine countries military budgets, we're still outspending them by $39 billion. Yeah. This is unsurprising to me. $39 billion. Yeah.

This is unsurprising to me. Yeah. 23% of our defense budget is set for personnel. 23%. 14% goes to R&D. Yep. 19% goes to procurement. Okay.

Now, I mentioned those three things because if you think about what G.I. Joe toys were selling figures. Okay. Yeah. People. Right. Yeah. So as the economy was deflating, we can see a huge growth in the military.

Clearly increasing militarism in the 1980s was a good thing. Yeah. Right. From a certain point of view. Well, and to secure a Jedi truth there. Right. Security, the knowledge that we were safe because of all of our weapons is definitely the message, the message that you would want kids who are home alone after school at record numbers because there's increased economic pressure on the parents to have nobody staying

home. You want the kids to feel safe because there's increased economic pressure on the parents to have nobody staying home, you want the kids to feel safe because there's weapons. Yeah, as a semi-latch-key kid who grew up in a house full of firearms, yeah, that's a great thing to be telling kids. Yeah. Well, and then socially, like don't pay attention to what business is doing to your family or how your schools are failing you because they don't have the money. We're safe because we have these bombs and these tanks and these planes and these guns.

Yeah. Go drink your chocolate milk, do your homework and save the world yourself with your new toys with a lot of really cool color schemes. Militarist Reaganism will protect you while you're home alone due to capitalist Reaganism. And don't we all want to feel safe before our parents get home?

We're safe in knowing that. And knowing is half the battle. Wow, you know, I didn't think that this was going to be as bleak as some episodes because of all the camp, because of everything. And then, and then you hit me in the last 45 seconds. And now all these children home alone and now I wish I hadn't drunk the only beer I had in the house already. Sorry.

Because damn. Yeah. Yeah. That's a really grim subconscious kind of message there. Wow, we've taken your parents out of the home, but don't worry. But don't worry because because, you know, there are there are rough men ready to do violence to protect you. Right. From the Soviet hordes. Right. you right from the Soviet hordes right you okay dad I didn't even get into like the Bay root bombings or any shit like you know what I what I find interesting you know you mentioned you mentioned the Bay root bombing and that and that kicks my brain in a certain direction what I find interesting is you you know, there's so frequently when we're talking about stuff

on this podcast that we're doing, we wind up running into places where something has been oddly preciant. oddly, a preciant. And in this last minute or five, what strikes me about it is this particular series was so very much tied up in that moment. That it's that there is kind of actually, then they felt backwards into Fox News. Yeah. But there's no predictive ability shown Right. Shown here. This is this is entirely a product of this very specific moment, and it is very like naval gazingly focused on that moment and that phenomenon. And you know, and I wonder if it's like, okay, these are the circumstances that gave birth to this being a thing.

And so it can't escape that. You know what I mean? No, I very much so. Because I also like there's no way that those writers could have predicted anything that we've been through in the last four years. And yeah, there's no way they could have not seen that coming on some levels because they didn't just start in 1983 in a bubble because they wanted to make toys and comics. All of that was built upon, I mean, Larry Hama himself was, you know,

editor for the nom and shit like that. Like all of that was built upon all the experiences of the 70s. Yeah, don't think that I honestly, we'll talk about hinge points in history, talked about, talk about alternate universes, right? If RFK had not been killed, right, I don't think we would have had Trump. Okay. Yeah, like I see what you're saying. No way to find out. I don't think we would have had Trump. Okay. Yeah.

Like, I see what you're saying. No way to find out. Yeah, but not a testable hypothesis. Building a lot of steam. And if you still had MLK killed during that time, he would have been able to galvanize and wrap himself in the, you know, in the martyrs shroud, similar to how LBJ had done.

Yeah, JFK, right? And if you have that, I the martyrs shroud, similar to how LBJ had done. Yeah. JFK, right? And if you have that, I'm doing all the, just realize I'm doing all of the acronyms. But, uh, but if RFK had not been killed, I think he would have stood a very good chance at beating Nixon. Yeah. Because Nixon, Nixon, like, basically, like I showed you, you know, got rid of Muskie and handpicked a governed RFK would have, I think would have stomped his ass and would have gotten us out of Vietnam and could have gotten us into a very different space

and if that had happened The Republicans would not have felt as entitled to the White House as they were Yeah, with the only interruption being Carter along that way. So if that had happened, you wouldn't have had watergate, you wouldn't have had all these other things. Iran Contra. Right. Yeah.

Because that means you probably don't have a Ronald Reagan because you don't have somebody reacting. Yeah, no, you sure shit don't want to have a Ronald Reagan. So without all those things, we are living in the absolute worst possibility because that's how evolution works. We are in the darkest timeline. Yeah, but that's also how evolution works, right? It's fractal to just get over the next hump. Well, hyperaggression seems to just get over the next hump.

You know, hypercapitalism gets over the next hump, you know, those kinds of things, especially when all these other things have happened. But yeah, I don't think it's predictive, but I don't think that it was in any way escapeable either., if you, you know, take a look at these guys in the 80s or writing about and these gals in the 80s are writing about, no, these comics and these cartoons are talking about it is 100% informed by what happened 10 years prior and it's obviously calling all the shots that it

had no business calling, you know, 40 years later. So yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then again, you know, it called plenty of shots that don't exist. Like we don't have space stations that get taken over by the the ferocious furries. Um, you know, we don't have, you know, we don't have, uh,, Aztec snake venom that could kill an entire squad of Marines. We don't have that like those things also don't exist. We don't have a beauty transfer device. Yeah, well, you know, the stuff that's actually built on, you know, magical pseudoscience.

No, we don't have. But yeah, I assume I, yeah, we got to count the misses if we're talking about the predictive capabilities of a cartoon. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Well, yeah. Yeah. But anyway, what have you gleaned? You know, it's become a sort of fashion on some and kind of pissed off tone about how, okay, no, look, you've just consistently overlooked us. You keep overlooking us, but let me tell you something about what we had to put up with, right? You know, and sometimes it's hysterical and sometimes it's tired, but we really did get kind of mind fucked. Like it's really not a stretch. And I don't think it's a try, I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that we really got

heavily programmed in a way that the boomers didn't. And by a set of messages that are very different from the ones that were pointed at the millennials staff to us and the Zoomers after them. Like we had, I don't know how many, you know, five or eight or 10 channels on TV, right? So you'd come home from school and if you weren't watching GIGO, what else were you watching, right? So you'd come home from school and if you weren't watching G.I. Joe, what

else were you watching, right? There was, there was an ability to reach because there was a relatively limited number of channels available. There was an ability for the people sending stuff out to reach a bigger audience because whatever was on TV got a bigger share. And so, like, we really got programmed hard. And we all have reacted to it in one way or another, some of us differently than others. But I think it really is something that's very much a gen X kind of thing. Because I, you know, Saturday morning cartoons disappeared sometime after, you know, when you and I were in high school Saturday morning cartoons started to kind of decline. Yeah. You know, um, and they're, and they're not, they're not even a thing

anymore. They just don't exist. Really? Oh, yeah, no, well, because where are you going to, who's, who's going to watch them? Yeah, yeah, You know, how many people still watch broadcast TV? Like, you know, if in a given household, it's like, okay, Saturday morning we're going to put on the TV for the kids, it's like, okay, well, you're going to be on Disney Plus or Amazon or what are you going to do? Mm-hmm. Like, you know, before Robert was born,

my wife at one point in a fit of nostalgia trying to feed her inner child on Saturday mornings would get up and go to YouTube to watch the gummy bears. Because you know, like you can't find cartoons on a Saturday morning anymore. I guess the DVD market is kind of it for that. Yeah, you know, and so all the gummy bears if you want to borrow. I'll let her know. Okay. They're also streaming channels. I mean, yeah, well, yeah, yeah, they're on Disney Plus. Yeah. Well, we didn't have Disney Plus at the time.

But, you know, but yeah, I get you. You know, and so that is a generational artifact of our collective psychology that has left a mark on us. And I mean, demographically, we're a smaller group than literally any of the others around us. But, you know, I don't think it's unfair for us to be able to point to this and go, okay, no, look, look at the fucked up shit that we that we dealt with. Like right here, I just want you to sit down for 10 minutes and watch this fucking cartoon. And you tell me this didn't fuck with us. Right.

And again, this is not a cartoon that we watched with family. This is not a cartoon that we reflected with anyone on. I cannot emphasize that enough. Yeah. That a large number of us saw this cartoon alone to not share it with anyone. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I guess that's my emotional resonance about this cohort. You know, yeah, that's that's pretty much that's it. Well, what do you want people to read?

I'm going to list the trilogy in the proper order this time. Because on our last episode, I listed the last book first, but NeuroManser count zero and Mona Lisa overdrive the Sprawl trilogy by William Gibson. I'm highly highly recommend because I'm going to be doing an episode on Cyberpunk here soon. I don't know if it's going to be the very, it's not going to be the very next one we do, because we have other stuff on the calendar first. But it's going to be my next like solo, these are my notes episode. And so number one, it'll be preparation for that. Number two, if you haven't read them before, they're well worth your time. And it's a, it is the series that codified the tropes that tie to the genre of Cyberpunk. So, okay. There we go. How about you?

Well, I'm going to recommend things one. There is a documentary That was oh god. It's gotta be like 14 15 years old now It's Michael Moore put out a capitalism a love story It's really good And it has it honestly You don't even have to watch the whole thing though though I do recommend it. Just watch the part about Ronald Reagan. Um, and then number two, I'm going to recommend to you, uh, the man who sold the world, Ronald Reagan and the betrayal of Main Street America by William Klein, Nick, Klein, Clank, Nick,

Klein, Nick, anyway, William Klein, KL, E, I, EINK, and then it'll fill in the rest for you. But the man who sold the world, Ronald Reagan and the betrayal of Main Street America. So there you go. Very cool. Those two, I think, are pretty good companion piece. So cool. Well, do you want to be found? Uh, no, I, I continue to to be a to be a shadow in the warp

I do not wish to be found But we collectively of course can be found at Wobba Wobba Wobba geek history time.com and on Twitter. We are geek history time So if you want to shout at us about some some from the GIGO TV series that we got wrong, or if you want to yell at me preemptively about Cyberpunk as a genre, that would be one place to do it. At least as long as that site doesn't explode in a ball of blue, the wittering flame. And how about you, where can you be found? Because I know you, you have a public persona unlike me. I do, I do.

The best place to find me right now would be to buy a ticket to the May 5th Capital Punishment Show at Luna's up here in Sacramento. If you can't make it to the May 5th one or if this episode pops out after that, then go to the June 2nd Capitol Punishment Show. Also in Sacramento, at Luna's bring $10 and then bring another $10 so you can buy some merch and buy some food. Cool. That's where you can find us. So for the history of time, I'm Damien Harmony. And I'm Ed Blalock, and until next time, Taubera!