The Daily Zeitgeist - Cash Splash 2020, STURGIS WAS V BAD 9.8.20

Episode Date: September 9, 2020

In episode 711, Jack and Miles are joined by Revision Path podcast co-host Maurice Cherry to discuss Trump's net worth losing it's worth, the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally being linked to over 250k coronav...irus cases, the Tokyo Olympics, wildfires and climate change, gender reveal parties, inside Ellen's home, and more!FOOTNOTES: Trump eyes spending $100M of his own money in reelection bid: report Trump's net worth fell $600 million in last year: Forbes How Trump’s Billion-Dollar Campaign Lost Its Cash Advantage  Sturgis Motorcycle Rally Is Now Linked to More Than 250,000 Coronavirus Cases Tokyo Olympics: Games will go ahead 'with or without Covid', says IOC VP Tokyo Olympics Will Happen Next Year Despite Virus, IOC’s Coates Says Stop Blaming Climate Change For California’s Fires. Many Forests, Including The Redwoods, Need Them. Lightning, fire and burning forests: Climate change in California The Influencer Responsible for Gender Reveal Parties Has a Few Regrets EXCLUSIVE: 'She treated us like we were nothing.' Ellen DeGeneres ran household like boot camp, tormenting workers over misplaced salt shakers, 'taking pleasure' in firings and 'laying traps' like matchsticks to test employees, ex staffer claims WATCH: Sacha Rudy - Be a Man Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 Kay hasn't heard from her sister in seven years. I have a proposal for you. Come up here and document my project. All you need to do is record everything like you always do. What was that? That was live audio of a woman's nightmare. Can Kay trust her sister or is history repeating itself? There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing.
Starting point is 00:00:18 They're just dreams. Dream Sequence is a new horror thriller from Blumhouse Television, iHeartRadio, and Realm. Listen to Dream Sequence on the iHeartRadio iheart radio app apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts hi i am lacy lamar and i'm also lacy lamar just kidding i'm amber revan okay everybody we have exciting news to share we're back with season two of the amber and lacy lacy and amber show on will ferrell's big money players Network. This season, we make new friends, deep dive into my steamy DMs, answer your listener questions and more. The more is punch each other. Listen to the Amber and Lacey, Lacey and Amber show on Will Ferrell's Big Money Players Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Just listen,
Starting point is 00:01:02 okay? Or Lacey gets it. Do it. Hi, everybody. It's Katie Couric. Have you heard about my newsletter called Body and Soul? It has everything you need to know about health and wellness, from skincare and serums to meditation and brain health. We've got you covered. And most importantly, it's information you can trust. Everything is vetted by experts at the top of
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Starting point is 00:02:09 Hello, the internet, and welcome to Season 150, Episode 2 of Dirt Daily Zeitgeist! Yeah! A production of iHeartRadio. This is a podcast where we take a deep dive into America's shared consciousness and say officially off the top, Take a deep dive into America's shared consciousness and say officially off the top, fuck the Koch brothers. Fuck Fox News. Fuck Rush Limbaugh. Fuck Buck Sexton.
Starting point is 00:02:31 Fuck Ben Shapiro. And fuck Tucker Carlson. It's Wednesday, September 9th, 2020. My name is Jack O'Brien, a.k.a. Blinded by Jack's thighs. Woke up, took a deuce, turned on the zeitgeist in the morn. That is courtesy of at MintyFreshGirl. At MintyFreshGirl2 actually on Twitter.
Starting point is 00:02:53 And I'm thrilled to be joined as always by my co-host, Mr. Miles Gray! Back to life. Back to the zeitgeist. Back to life. Back to the zeitgeist. Back to life, back to the zeitgeist. Back here with Shaq and Miles, oh yeah. Show me what is it, your search history.
Starting point is 00:03:19 Maybe we could tell some jokes with you. Whatever's underrated, whatever's overrated whatever's underrated whatever's overrated thank you so much to add dad hound for the soul to soul back to life uh inspired aka and jam but also but he this person was very clear said the real one not the one from belly okay but shout out to that opening Belly where they got the contacts in the nightclub and they're moving to the club like goons with the acapella version of the song. I don't know if you remember that. I don't.
Starting point is 00:03:51 They robbed the first scene in Belly when they're going through the nightclub and they robbed the nightclub and they have like the white masks they put on. It's all blue, black light. But it's only the acapella. It's just the vocals from that or it's a different acapella group. A college acapella group doing that. It's them doing it, but it's very contentious about what their version is. We respect this one.
Starting point is 00:04:11 Shout out to DadHound. I barely didn't use as many college acapella groups probably as I suspected. Miles, it's great to have you back. How are you? How have you been? Great to be back. You know, did a lot of looking in the mirror, talking to my therapist, taking in the heat. You know, all kinds of things.
Starting point is 00:04:34 Just recharging, ready to go into the final two months of this election with honor and integrity and strength. election uh with honor and integrity and strength that should be hard that should be our new uh the daily zeitgeist honor integrity strength yes uh yeah what was the what was the peak temperature you experienced i i hit 117 on an errand yeah uh one I was outside when it was like 1.12 where the players dwell. Oh, nice. Yeah, it was pretty hot. But it was nice.
Starting point is 00:05:09 I kind of just sat out there and smoked a blunt and let the sun hit me and just, I felt like a lizard just kind of sunning out there on the rocks. And then I was like,
Starting point is 00:05:17 very quickly, I was like, okay, there's only so much a human body can take. This is deadly. Well, we are thrilled to be joined
Starting point is 00:05:24 by the brilliant and talented Maurice Cherry. Welcome. Hey. I didn't know if I could chime in earlier, so I've been laughing silently over here. Oh, you don't have to laugh. Were you laughing, though? Come on, be real. Very impressive soul-to-soul rendition, by the way.
Starting point is 00:05:41 Thank you. That was pretty good. Do you know, are you familiar with the acapella version that was in the opening of the Hype Williams film, Belly? I am because my best friend from college fucking loves Belly. There you go. He loves that movie. So I've seen it an inordinate amount of times. I know the one he's talking about.
Starting point is 00:05:57 Okay, good. Good to know. Good to know. Yeah, I remember the first date I went on off of MySpace was because this woman had Belly listed as one of her favorite movies. I was like, you really like Belly? And she's like, yeah, fool. Like, Sincere is one of my favorite characters. I'm like, what about Keisha, though?
Starting point is 00:06:12 She's like, a queen. And I was like, let's go on a date. And it ended terribly. Turns out one movie directed by one of the most prolific hip-hop video directors as Common Ground isn't the basis for a strong romantic relationship when you're in your early twenties, but you know what you live and you learn. Maurice, how are you doing? Where are you, where are you coming to us from? I am in Atlanta, Georgia, the soon to be next COVID-19 hotspot, most likely, but I think that could probably be for any place that people went to over Labor Day weekend, but here in particular. Oh, was there a lot going on?
Starting point is 00:06:45 Were people out and about? Well, so Labor Day weekend in Atlanta is kind of affectionately known as the clusterfuck. And pre-pandemic, back when the world was open, there would be at least a dozen events here, book festivals. There's a big science fiction convention here called Dragon Con. There's Black Gay Pride. There's a number of sporting events, et cetera. And of course, because of the pandemic, a lot of those events have either went online or they've been canceled or postponed or something. That didn't stop people from coming here. So I'm pretty sure that we're going to have another big flare up. But it's been so georgia because we have had so little time
Starting point is 00:07:25 to be locked down so to speak we really only had about three weeks in april um so it's been like this very weird kind of i don't know at least for me it felt like this weird tension in the city because a lot of places still aren't open but you know the cases are still rising and people are still coming here and it's like the virus is still out there, y'all. It's kind of weird. Yeah, it's hard. It's hard for people to sort of like separate their human body and like socializing needs with the reality of the pandemic. I mean, in L.A., the beaches were packed because on top of it, we have a heat wave and not everybody has can get cool immediately so yeah the beach
Starting point is 00:08:06 looks like a pretty good solution but you you get the crowds going it's yeah it's definitely a hard hard uh period i think no matter where highest temperature in the history of la county over the weekend wow 121 so all right maurice we're gonna get to know you a little bit better in a moment first we're gonna tell our listeners a few of the things we'reurice we're gonna get to know you a little bit better in a moment first we're gonna tell our listeners a few of the things we're talking about we're gonna talk about the fact that the globally we're kind of going through that same conflict uh the olympics ioc is just like yeah we're gonna we're gonna do the olympics so uh they're pushing through to that we're gonna talk about trump campaign funds uh we people haven't been paying a ton of attention to that because of the many rings, circus, many alarm fire that he kind of keeps stoked in the background to keep us distracted.
Starting point is 00:08:57 So we'll talk about that. We'll talk about the results of Sturgis keep rolling in. keep rolling in we're going to talk about claims of connections between forest fires and climate change because that's on being disputed a little bit that one is feeding the other one is feeding the other it's it's interesting because it's not like a total uh plant for the oil industry who's disputing it, but his complaint is a little bit overblown. It's actually a plant for clean coal. Right. He's actually really into
Starting point is 00:09:31 nuclear energy. Very safe. Very safe. We're going to talk about gender reveal, parties, and life inside Ellen's home. Oh no. That's a thing? People found out?
Starting point is 00:09:46 Yeah. Yeah. Some of her household staff have come out and talked about what that's like. And let's just say it involves her planting matchsticks in places to make sure that the- They've been cleaned? Yeah, that the staff is cleaning there oh boy love it yeah that's like some joan crawford yeah dearest kind of thing yeah yeah it is is there anything about hangers wire hangers or anything like that as well just to fully complete that
Starting point is 00:10:18 circle there's like a list a daily list of complaints that includes stuff like uh you served this food in the wrong dish like that that should have been in this bowl rather than the bowl you served it to me oh boy um so you know just all sorts of interesting things uh so we'll get to all that plenty more but first maurice we like to ask our guest, what is something from your search history that's revealing about who you are? Oh, that's revealing about who I am. Yeah. Well, today I was looking up Moo Paper Masks. There's a printing company.
Starting point is 00:10:56 Printing company is called Moo. They make business cards, stickers, stuff like that. And they sent this email out. They're like, oh, we're now making paper masks. I'm like, why would you have a paper mask? Paper gets wet. That seems very ineffective for a mask. And so I Googled it to kind of see what they were talking about. And they're like, oh, well, we cut the sides in an accordion fashion for ease and comfort. And I'm like, but it's a paper mask. They even say it's not medical grade, nor is it ppe so why are you selling 25 packs of them
Starting point is 00:11:25 is it just capitalism it's really kind of weird and stupid yeah this is so i'm looking at the mask it it almost seems like a joke like a parody of itself yeah like it does feel that way it's very weird it feels like a buzzfeed article where's like, if you had like really good crafting scissors, it's like how you could turn a greeting card into fake ass PPE. And it's just like, I'm like, dude, I don't know what it's catching or just,
Starting point is 00:11:52 it looks like it's just probably redirecting the germs up or down. Like there's no. And they're like, oh, you can recycle it. Like, yeah, I'm going to recycle this spittle soaked paper mask.
Starting point is 00:12:04 Why? Ridiculous. Yeah yeah it's really something is moo like a popular company because i know look you're you're a designer you're in that space so i'm like moo i never heard of that is are they like a pretty big company um i don't know if they're big but i think they are pretty well known uh largely because of the different kind of sizes of business cards they have so one size that they have that i've used i don't know for at least 10 years now it's almost like the size of a pack of chewing gum like it's a small mini card and you can kind of just whip it out to people like aha here's my card right um and back when i really had my studio running i would get those cards made and they would look like those, uh, those like key ring lunch things that you would get where if you take it into a deli or something, they'll stamp it or
Starting point is 00:12:49 punch a hole in it or something. So I would do that for like repeat customers. I'd like Mark off a little X on the back of my studio was lunch. And so we kind of played into all of the kind of foodie aspects of it, but I think it's well known because of that. I mean, they do postcards and stickers and stuff like that but they're mostly i mean those little bitty cards i'm like the last person to know about anything to do with paper goods so i don't yeah i'm not surprised i don't know about um it is when you go to moo.com the the front page of their site is people wearing these masks and they're saying we love paper so when we wanted to make a more breathable mask option you can guess where our heads went yep and here it is a comfortable
Starting point is 00:13:32 but sturdy paper mask that's fully recyclable so it does seem like they are definitely walking that line uh because so it's uh then it has like four bullet points thoughtfully designed five versatile colors made with planet-friendly recycled paper lightweight breathable material and then it only then does it say this is not a medical grade mask or item of personal protective equipment right so they they get that in at the end well i guess does the ones typical cloth ones that is that considered proper pp or you know what i mean does the ones typical cloth ones that is that considered proper pp or you know what i mean because i know like an n95 is like truly like your sort of respirator thing so like you know i mean some of them i guess if they put like a filter in it maybe
Starting point is 00:14:17 but they're not meant to be like medical grade you know it's yeah because it's a porous material but i'm like here you're like breathing through a like a sheet of cardboard like yeah this is i can't be any better this looks like origami approximation of mask not actual mask it looks like it looks like it could be good like mortal kombat cosplay oh exactly it does yeah you could be yeah you could be sub-zero the the one that makes people nervous at a grocery store Yeah, you could be sub-zero, the one that makes people nervous at a grocery store. Maurice, what is something you think is overrated? Oh, God.
Starting point is 00:15:00 Zoom calls, Google Me calls, basically any video call at this stage of the pandemic, I think, is completely overrated. I tend to have these. I mean, I think probably everyone does it at this point. I've got a few of these that I have a week. And if I'm, my philosophy of it is if I'm not getting paid for it, I'm not turning my camera on. I also happen to be unemployed right now. So the camera really doesn't come on that much. I'm like, look, if I have to pick my hair out, I have to turn my ring light on and that's not happening for everybody okay you know and there will be something and there'll be some calls that are like oh well you know how come you don't have how come the camera's not on i'm like well on my main computer which is in my studio i don't have a camera which i
Starting point is 00:15:33 sort of mentioned to y'all before but i have one on my laptop so if i wanted to i could get my laptop and you know go through all of that but why like the stuff we have to talk about honestly could be a phone call it doesn't really have to be a Zoom call. It doesn't have to be a Google Meet call. I know those sort of stepped up as the default as the pandemic started to kind of, you know, go on in the spring going into the summer. But like the phone works too. We can just do that. It is funny.
Starting point is 00:16:00 I think like part of it too is subconsciously it helps make things feel slightly more elevated because you're like, yeah, it could be a phone call. And you know, for all intents and purposes, it probably should be based on, we just need to communicate with words and not our facial expressions to say,
Starting point is 00:16:14 I, we need to do X, Y, and Z. But there is something where it's like, Oh, it's okay. So we'll do a zoom call,
Starting point is 00:16:19 you know, cause we can't meet anymore. Do these other things. I feel like it somehow makes things feel a little more formal. But at the end of the day, it's like we're achieving the same thing on a phone call. No. Yeah. But like everything now looks like a Zoom call.
Starting point is 00:16:31 Like media stuff is looking like Zoom calls, Instagram lives, television. Like it's all I don't know. I'm I'm a bit overrated by video. I think video in general right now is a bit overrated. For your aesthetically oriented mind, how can we elevate this? What would be less boring to you? Is it the angles? Is it because everyone's sort of doing this same sort of like laptop facing thing? Do we need to put a camera in the corner, make it feel a little more like verite? I don't know. I mean, I think it's because
Starting point is 00:17:02 Zoom and I guess meet by proxy i mean these are these are enterprise level conferencing tools like they're meant for work and so the thing is that you've taken a work tool and now i've tried to make it into an everything tool now it's a happy hour it's a gym it's a daycare it's you know it's all this other stuff now and even zoom the company has had to sort of like step it up in terms of encryption and a number of different other features to try to meet this now big consumer market that they have, because they really just used to be for businesses. Now it's for everybody. I don't know a good way to, I guess, make it better. Although I have to say, you know,
Starting point is 00:17:40 if you're talking about events, because now, you know, the stars are sequestered and such in their homes and whatnot. But, you know, when you look at sort of award shows and video events and stuff i know the vmas just happened recently and they sort of had like a mix of live action and recorded sort of stuff which was yeah it was okay i think it worked i think the the kind of like creepy audience applause and silhouettes that they had in the background was a little kind of like black mirror-ish but yeah i think they did okay but like the best implementation of it that i've seen where it's like a good mix of recorded and distance sort of thing has been the bet awards like it's hands down the best one that i've seen so far this year that like has gotten it right because it's always going to be i think some kind of like tech issue or or something to that effect but like it's hard to get over the
Starting point is 00:18:29 fact that everything now looks like a weird version of hollywood squares because you just can't like escape that you can't escape the grid i'm pretty sure it's going to be a horror movie that comes out within the next year and a half based on that concept but yeah god i feel bad for the the development people at studios who are just going through piles of quarantine inspired material now right what do we do now what do we do with all these quarantine concepts i feel like the zoom thing is also being pushed by people who thrive on meetings or you know that i feel like the the quarantine and like work from home movement has made it evident that a lot of things that used to be meetings could have been quick
Starting point is 00:19:13 phone calls or emails uh and people like there's a pushback there's a a reaction to that where people are like well we gotta we gotta have a workplace we gotta right we gotta have an hr department right uh has happy hours there's also that like terrible culture of like productivity that's just hammered into american people's minds or it's like you gotta be productive how productive are you being and then working from home sort of actually for some people you realize how much more efficient you are and then you have time you're like oh fuck i need to do a zoom call or something. I need to do this.
Starting point is 00:19:47 Cause like, I'm efficient now, but I bought it, but I need to be productive. And you're like, yeah, well you happen to do that in two thirds of the time or, you know,
Starting point is 00:19:55 seven eighths of the time. I mean, my heart really goes out to parents right now that are having to kind of do the distance learning through zoom. Because that just adds a whole other dimension to this because now you're having to kind of get your your child or your not your toddler but like you have to get your child to kind of sit in front of this computer added screen time in order to learn but then now there's all these rules that may have taken place in school that now have to apply to the home when school is active if that makes any sense like
Starting point is 00:20:26 i've seen stuff on twitter where uh teachers have been like oh well if you're going to be in school from home you have to wear shoes like the kids at home if the kids are not wearing shoes unless they're putting their feet to the camera i don't see what the issue is like oh they have to dress up no onesies or something i was reading something in the washington post today about how um a kid had like a toy gun yeah and they called the police on him and they called and the school called the police on the kid at home like because he had a nerf gun yeah it was a nerf it was a fucking it was like orange no this did not look like some you know like he had a blammer on him and he was like flashing a camera it was a fucking toy nerf gun like and you see this right like there's like this new level of
Starting point is 00:21:10 nerf gun where people can like custom make them and kind of get a little like nerd out on them and this is what that was like that kid's hobby like he he had like his wall of nerf guns that he made he was like really happy about him and it's just like a kid just a fucking toy but again his child is black not i'm sure i'm curious what would have happened if a white child was waving their nerf gun in front of it but it was just another you know uh just just terrible dumb story about being like oh let's just harass this child just because but yeah zoom calls video calls all that stuff completely overrated boom what is something you think is underrated aha so i think
Starting point is 00:21:47 and i'm only saying this now because now i'm sort of getting to the point where i'm trying to find stuff to do during the day um lesser known streaming services are highly highly underrated walk with me here gentlemen so i think we all have like a streaming stack yeah at this point right like you've got like mine is like netflix disney plus hulu maybe prime video even though you know sometimes there's stuff on there i want to watch sometimes not so like we all kind of have the ones that we go to as our defaults but like there's so many uh lesser known, cheaper, more kind of fringe type of streaming services that might be worth checking out based on like what your interests are. So like if you're looking for a lot of say like old black movies and television shows, you would go to Quelly TV. Or if you're looking for like
Starting point is 00:22:39 indie films or documentaries, you'd go to Kino Now. If you want to learn some stuff, you could do Masterclass. Although I don't know if Masterclass is really lesser known, but I don't know if people know that you can also stream all of that stuff. If you really like jazz performances, there's a streaming service by Quincy Jones called Quest TV. There's a lot of lesser known streaming services out there that are pretty cheap, depending on what your kind of individual interests are. And they're not that hard to find. I think if there's a caveat to any of it is that the user interface just varies greatly. I mean, you know, we all know that Hulu sucks to kind of get around in terms of the UI, but like some of
Starting point is 00:23:18 these can be a little, little choppy, but they either have like an Apple TV app where you can cast your television via Chromecast. Like look at lesser known streaming services. Highly, highly underrated. Like are you using these to replace the standard stack or are they supplementary? They're kind of supplementary because I mean right now there's not really at least from what I can see there's not like a ton of production stuff that's going on in terms of like new shows for the fall or whatever. Right, right. And I've, you know, seen a lot of people complain like, oh, there's not going to be new movies or this, that and the other.
Starting point is 00:23:54 But like, there's a lot of older and I'm using older in a very relative term. I'm talking maybe five years ago. There's like a lot of older content from like when we were at peak too much TV. Now there's no way any one person has watched all of the movies and all of the shows and all that sort of stuff. So like I'm even having time to go back and rediscover stuff that I missed the first time around because I was probably busy doing something else. Like right now I'm watching season two of American Gods. I'm like in the middle of that because I watched the first season and then didn't really get to the second
Starting point is 00:24:29 one before that I was watching, uh, green leaf, which is the show on Netflix. Well, it's, it's from Oprah's network, the own network, but it's like this Southern black church family drama kind of shit. It's really good. It's on Netflix netflix but like i'm going back now and like discovering all this stuff that i missed before and i'm like able to watch it in the vacuum of really somewhat solitude because the articles have been written about them the reviews have went out the shows have wrapped it's like oh now i can like enjoy it for what it is in its own little capsule and not have to be influenced by outside reviews or opinions. Yeah. As a, uh,
Starting point is 00:25:07 as a service to our listeners, we, uh, dive into whatever's trending in the Netflix top 10 just to, you know, let them know whether it's worth watching. If there are any ideas, philosophies buried there in,
Starting point is 00:25:20 and, uh, this past week I watched Smurfs from 2011 and it was great to have the uh you know the entire uh critical consensus already you know all the scholarly articles have already been written about uh smurfs 2011 so it was nice to have that body uh all the way out there what is a what's a myth what's something people think, you know, to be false or vice versa? You know, I've, I don't know if people still ascribe to the myth that if you eat before swimming, like you'll get cramps or something like that. It was just having this conversation over the weekend.
Starting point is 00:25:58 I don't, I don't know if that myth is really, well, personally, I know that it's not true because i've done it but right i think it's a myth that might still it might still it might still persist out there i mean it's an old school myth like i think it's probably put out there by big pool like yeah you know i think we were we were talking about this jack didn't we say it was basically big mom was trying yeah big mom big adults yeah because it'd be like yo come, chill the fuck out for like 30 minutes before I have to watch you drown in the pool. Like fucking wait. I think that's what it was. Because the one scientific thing was that just sort of the digestive process would draw more blood to your stomach and like intestines.
Starting point is 00:26:38 And then that may cause someone to be lightheaded, but like in no way saying that like it is a danger to get in there we don't make kids stand still after they eat for like a half hour it's all big old guy swimming laps in the pool during it oh yeah like an uncle just be like no 30 minutes i'm trying to see how long i could go without taking a breath kids last time i did two lengths but you must wait 30 minutes that's right all right let's take a quick break and we'll come back and talk about what is happening i've been thinking about you i want you back in my life it's too late for that i have a proposal for you come up here and document my project. All you need to do is record everything like you always do.
Starting point is 00:27:29 One session. 24 hours. BPM 110. 120. She's terrified. Should we wake her up? Absolutely not. What was that?
Starting point is 00:27:42 You didn't figure it out? I think I need to hear you say it. That was live audio of a woman's nightmare. This machine is approved and everything? You're allowed to be doing this? We passed the review board a year ago. We're not hurting people. There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing.
Starting point is 00:28:01 They're just dreams. Dream Sequence is a new horror thriller from Blumhouse Television, iHeartRadio, and Realm. They're just dreams. former Packers star Kabir Bajabiamila, caught up in a bizarre situation. KGB explaining what he believes led to the arrest of his friends at a children's Christmas play. A family man, former NFL player, devout Christian, now cut off from his family and connected to a strange arrest. I am going to share my journey of how I went from Christianity to now a Hebrew Israelite. I got swept up in Kabir's journey. But this was only the beginning.
Starting point is 00:28:50 In a story about faith and football, the search for meaning away from the gridiron and the consequences for everyone involved. You mix homesteading with guns and church and a little bit of the spice of conspiracy theories that we liked. Voila! You got straight away. I felt like I was living in North Korea, but worse, if that's possible. Listen to Spiraled on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Dr. Laurie Santos, host of the Happiness Lab podcast.
Starting point is 00:29:21 As the U.S. elections approach, it can feel like we're angrier and more divided than ever. But in a new, hopeful season of my podcast, I'll share what the science really shows, that we're surprisingly more united than most people think. We all know something is wrong in our culture, in our politics, and that we need to do better and that we can do better. With the help of Stanford psychologist Jamil Zaki. It's really tragic. If cynicism were a pill, it'd be a poison. We'll see that our fellow humans,
Starting point is 00:29:51 even those we disagree with, are more generous than we assume. My assumption, my feeling, my hunch is that a lot of us are actually looking for a way to disagree and still be in relationships with each other. All that on the Happiness Lab. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. MTV's official challenge podcast is back for another season.
Starting point is 00:30:22 That's right. The challenge is about to embark on its monumental 40th season, y'all, and we are coming along for the ride. Woohoo! That would be me, Devin Simone. And then there's me, Davon Rogers. And we're here to take you behind the scenes of... Drumroll, please.
Starting point is 00:30:37 No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. The Challenge 40, Battle of the Eras. Yes. Each week, cast members will be joining us to spill all of the tea on the relentless challenges, heartbreaking eliminations, and of course, all the juicy drama. And let's not forget about the hookups.
Starting point is 00:30:53 Anyway, regardless of what era you're rooting for at home, everyone is welcome here on MTV's official challenge podcast. So join us every week as we break down episodes of the challenge 40 battle of the eras listen to mtv's official challenge podcast on the iheart radio app apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts and we're back and uh we are as miles, I think officially two months away from the end of the world. This 2020 election, the presidential elections always seem like they're a big deal.
Starting point is 00:31:35 This one feels especially. This one feels kind of different, huh? Yeah, a little different. I don't know. What is it? Why does this feel so different? We haven't paid a lot of attention to campaign finance because it just seems beside the point. I think early on there were some stories
Starting point is 00:31:53 that Trump was breaking all sorts of records with his campaign fundraising, and then Biden came in and he was beating Trump after he got secured the nomination. And now it seems like things have kind of slowed down for Trump and he's having to spend his own money. He is having to think about it. Blowing through cash like we've we've never seen. The there were stories over the weekend that said right now his campaign and other affiliated groups have spent over 58 million dollars just on legal expenses.
Starting point is 00:32:27 groups have spent over 58 million dollars just on legal expenses so that is just stuff for like them trying to you know do all kinds of things like enforce ndas and other things like to try and be you know have these sort of like intentionally uh sort of cynical lawsuits to try and like buy themselves a little bit of time so that bill is coming up to about 58 million or a little bit over that and there's that an accepted form of like spending of campaign finance i mean you may have legal things that you have to deal with but it's like the book say so for example among the expenses this is from an article quote uh among the expenses paid for with campaign donations are costs for lawyers who are seeking more than one million dollars in damages from a former campaign staffer who claimed she was the target of sexual discrimination and harassment by another aid. Other costs include costs during the Russia investigation and a lawsuit seeking to block enforcement of a California law requiring the president to release his tax returns. So that
Starting point is 00:33:19 money is coming out of the campaign to just keep the president from having to show his hand or his dirty laundry. So on top of that, the RNC and the campaign together have spent over $800 million since last July. And they had a $200 million cash advantage when Biden basically became the presumptive nominee. And they're like, oh, well, he's got $200 million. This is going to be something. But all that money just went into the air with those weird ass Super Bowl ads that they had. Apparently, Brad Parscale started a fundraising operation where people were getting paid very well. And they were in a very nice office. And there's just a lot of money leaving without much thought of how it's coming back. So now we're at the point where
Starting point is 00:34:05 the newest headlines we've seen is Trump is now saying, maybe I'll spend 100 million of my own. What do you guys think? Should I put 100 million of my own? He only put 66 of his own in 2016. So I mean, these are the marks of a very, very desperate man. And on top of that, Forbes said his net worth went down $600 million in the last year. So it's, I mean, I don't know. You can imagine someone like him, he doesn't want to face legal fees coming out of this. He must win
Starting point is 00:34:34 to just kick the can down the road a little bit longer. But yeah, all kinds of money going out. His net worth going down is because so much of his money is tied up in like hotels and hotels and just everything big cities in general uh are are getting hit by the coronavirus more the vancouver trump hotel shut down permanently shout out to them uh but
Starting point is 00:35:02 yeah it's it's like some places just like don't they're just like i don't know what you want to do with this building it's like toxic to like half the people in the country right that's wild that he can just you know defend himself against the illegal things that he has done as part of his campaign it's it's kind of like a little loophole he discovered in the system there's a other like quotes that have come out of you know a lot of the stories sort of investigating what's going on with the fundraising is that a few people on the campaign are now kind of like you know there are some austerity measures going into place some belt tightening that's happening and a lot of people like i don't that's not that's not a good look when we're you know around 60 days out from
Starting point is 00:35:43 election day like you want to be able to be like, okay, we've, we've, we're ready to just make it rain rather than being like, okay, we gotta, we're gonna have to figure out how to stretch this out. Um, but I think it's a testament to like all of the confusing sort of ads and mailers and all kinds of things that this campaign has to do to try and, you know, eke out a win by literally any means yeah it's especially surprising that he's uh or especially bad that he's out of money when you consider that he never pays independent contractors who work for him uh so it's gotta it's gotta hurt yeah you hate to see all right let's talk about sturgis we had talked about the about some early numbers that are coming in that 100 cases had been tied to the Smash Mouth concert slash Sturgis overall. And now, according to a new study, which tracked anonymized cell phone data from the rally, over 250,000 coronavirus cases have been tied to the 10-day event.
Starting point is 00:36:42 So that's a slight increase over a hundred uh 250 000 quarter million um that that's i i mean in the beginning i thought i was like okay obviously this is this is a super spreader event and then it was like okay a man in his 60s in minnesota passed away last week after contracting the virus at the rally. And now they're saying South Dakota has one of the country's highest rates of infection because of this. The cost, they're saying, to public health, it's an estimated $12 billion in public health costs for this just sudden. I'm like, yep, there we go. Quarter million cases.
Starting point is 00:37:23 There you go. Just for this one event? Yeah, for this, like, you know, potentially based on, like, the lack of insurance and what, like, the total cost is for 250,000 cases like this out of nowhere could possibly be up to that. They're not saying that's what it is because I was an outside group making that estimate. making that estimate but the way they describe this the researchers say quote the sturgis motorcycle rally represents a situation where many of the worst case scenarios for super spreading occurred simultaneously the event was prolonged included individuals packed closely together involved a large out-of-town population and had low compliance with recommended infection countermeasures such as the use of masks. Have they looked into whether having all those worst case scenarios together offsets?
Starting point is 00:38:10 Like, do they offset each other? Is that maybe a thing we could hope for? Do you think someone was thinking of it? Like, the planners were like, but what if, man? Just on the off chance everyone's safe because it's so bad. Like, it's so bad. It's like that Simpsons episode where, like where like mr burns has all the diseases and the doctor's showing him trying to push it through the door like it seems like you have an immunity because you have all these diseases trying to fight
Starting point is 00:38:34 that's wild i mean you would think they just had someone from the campaign die like a month and a half ago at a rally herman cain yeah it's it's bad i mean i don't know if you there's that channel like uh all gas no brakes oh my god i was just about to say all gas no brakes i was just did you see this one coronavirus wait what is this so all gas no brakes this channel this dude goes to literally the most lit things in the country constantly whether that's an anti-quarantine event in Sacramento to a Memorial Day hang in Michigan to Minneapolis protests to Portland. Like, he's just there. And he's kind of doing a very man on the street, very dry humor, and just kind of letting the people make the content for him.
Starting point is 00:39:21 And between him and his camera operator and the editing, it does its own thing. I sure you've seen an all gas no brakes clip if i showed you one but i mean like i mean he was at the portland protest he was at protests in minneapolis he was i think somewhere in florida for spring break like he's been at all of these places where people are kind of congregating and he's just putting the mic out there and letting people talk it's wild and these two old bikers his the video for stir justges starts off with this guy just making motorcycle sounds. They're at a stage, and he has, like, the host has his mask on, but he's like, all right. And this guy's just like, fuck coronavirus. And, like, they're talking to all these bikers.
Starting point is 00:40:03 There's, like, one biker who's like a problematic dude who's trying to play both sides when a black guy pulls up and saying like fuck the police he's like yeah man because they're mad hey i appreciate it like it's all kinds of awkward but you also see the mentality of so many people saying they're either like well i'm gonna die either way if you're gonna get it you're gonna get it and also fuck fuck all fuck all the liberals and socialists that are telling us to be scared was sort of like the overarching theme. But yeah, there are some people who are out there with the great sound effects, though.
Starting point is 00:40:30 Yeah. Well, we will keep an eye on this super spreader event. Fuck coronavirus! Coronavirus! Check the idea that people who ride motorcycles are still doing the four-year-old's motorcycle sounds. That's still cool to them. You have to watch it because the guy is like, I don't know. It's like, na-na-na-na-na-na-na.
Starting point is 00:40:57 That's the way his face contorts. It's so good. Na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na. Yeah. Drop motorcycle and life. oh my god well so uh the ioc uh the international olympic committee saw that what sturgis did and was like we will raise you uh a global scale how about we take this global gang uh so obviously the 2020 olympics were canceled although it didn't seem like it was so obvious to the IOC because it took them forever to cancel it because of all the money that was at stake. But now they are basically saying they're still going to get it done in 2021. Get it done in 2021.
Starting point is 00:41:59 One of the heads of the IOC said the games will start as planned on July 23rd, quote, with or without COVID, end quote. Whoa. Pretty sure it's going to be with COVID. Yeah. Right. Also, COVID is not a sponsor. It's not like signing on. What are you talking about?
Starting point is 00:42:18 With or without you, COVID. Yeah, you're not inviting my party, COVID. I don't care if you're there or not. Yeah, you're not inviting my party, COVID. I don't care if you're there or not. And so then another, you know, the hubris and confidence coming from the IOC is really something this official goes on to say. It will be the games that, quote, conquered COVID. We don't know that.
Starting point is 00:42:38 We don't know that. But you're saying. Well, here's the thing. So now we're saying, well, what do experts have to say? They're saying virus experts have warned that the Olympics are unlikely to happen even in 2021 as the pandemic won't be contained in time. And even if developed, a vaccine would take years to reach some of the poorer countries. Speculation the games will be canceled had increased there. So anyway, they go on to say there's another official, like the Japanese sort of chief executive for the Olympics said, quote, if a vaccine is ready, that will be a benefit. But we're not saying we can't hold the event without it. It's not a precondition. Oh, boy. And it's still going to be in Tokyo, right?
Starting point is 00:43:19 Yeah. Yeah. That's I don't see how that's that's really going to be possible. I know going up to the Olympics, one of the things that they were talking about is sort of a disease preventative measure was that the beds were going to be made out of paper. They're going to be like cardboard, like twin box beds, I guess. I don't know. Not that I think that would help, you know, kind of stave off transmission. But like you've got so many people from so many countries.
Starting point is 00:43:47 And I mean, look, Olympians, fuck, there's going to be so much sex and cavorting and everything going on between. I mean, you've got these young athletes at their peak physical prime from all over the world in one place for like two weeks yeah i mean come on can't stop the fucking i mean did you listen to adam ripon episode of las culturistas when he was talking about the olympic village at the winter olympics and i was like yeah that's what i thought it's like when they're like it can get nasty in the olympic village uh yeah i can only imagine like and at the same time the when you see people so cynical and you know the motivating factor in all of this is just to stave off the loss of billions of dollars it's just reasons like oh they really don't give a fuck and it pains me because
Starting point is 00:44:36 tokyo is like a second home for me like all my japanese family lives in the area and the idea that it's you know could be ground zero for some really reckless global sporting event it was really disheartening uh but i have a feeling they might have to cancel this they may be like you know because the other thing is the shares of the densu corporation which is like the just massive advertising firm that put together like the like the largest sponsorship package in the history of the Olympics, their stock went up like on the strength of these comments too. So,
Starting point is 00:45:10 you know, it's all a game, baby. It's all there. Everybody's holding hands. I mean, the hubris of the modern Olympic games to the ILC is well documented. Like every city that it's been in,
Starting point is 00:45:22 there's been some kind of issue. Yeah. Yeah. Except for Atlanta. What was that like during the development in the lead up to 96? Were you living in Atlanta at the time? No, no, no. I was still in Alabama at that point. I moved to Atlanta proper in 99, so like years afterwards.
Starting point is 00:45:39 But I mean, having lived here since then, I can't really say where the Olympics and maybe I'm speaking from a non-local point of view, but I can't really see where the Olympics on a long-term basis has done a huge amount of damage. I'm not going to say there hasn't been damage. I'm sure there has been just in terms of like relocations and things like that. But even when the Olympics were in Atlanta, with Atlanta being a being a landlocked city i mean a lot of the events were in other states like there was stuff in alabama there was stuff in south carolina there was stuff in florida so everything wasn't right in the city anyway right right right that is wild now that i think about it that the southeast had the olympics like that recently that's uh one of the great great games too yeah. Yeah, seriously.
Starting point is 00:46:27 That's Carrie Struggs here, right? When she had the wild with her busted ankle and that Michael Johnson was like the big 400 and 200 guy that year. Yeah. Yeah. The gold Nikes. Oh, boy. Those were so dope. Air Max 97s that came out the next year in all gold. Reference to that.
Starting point is 00:46:41 One of the more popular Nike Air Maxes to this day. To this day. Yeah. So so you know commercialism works on us occasionally but uh but this i don't know this just seems i i could totally see speaking of all gas no break i could totally see capitalism just going just fucking jamming this one through just being like we're getting this thing done one way or another yeah with or without you especially if if trump gets re-elected i mean yeah yeah oh the xenophobic patriotism is going to be off the charts but isn't there there's already
Starting point is 00:47:19 like a problem with the ioc in the u.s potentially because of trump right like yeah like because something he's doing oh yeah it says u.s could be thrown out of olympics over trump funding threats world anti-doping agency warns so because the trump is threatening uh to pull funding from the world anti-doping agency and they're like okay well if you do that then there's a chance we you will not be allowed to compete and i know they don't want that because that's like the one moment where americans forget how trash the country is and they're like you see look at especially after this year oh yeah we need that shit so bad oh yeah oh we need a win we need one in the w and i and i need all those like very sappy pre-produced packages talking about like the the fucking of this young man from this land, like from this country who came here for the American dream and is now making his foster family happy, whatever that is.
Starting point is 00:48:11 It's always the same shit. But like we really. NBC is so good at that shit. I know they have like a contract through like 2050 or whatever, but they're so good at like whipping up those packages. Oh, yeah. The Chloe Kim one for when she won her snowboarding medal, uh, the last winter Olympics in 2018.
Starting point is 00:48:27 I was like, I see it, man. I see it. Her parents are doing everything for her and she's trying to do it. So yep. Shout out to the producers of the pre-produced packages. All right,
Starting point is 00:48:39 let's take a quick break and we'll be right back. I've been thinking about you. I want you back in my life. It's too late for that. I have a proposal for you. Come up here and document my project. All you need to do is record everything like you always do. One session, 24 hours.
Starting point is 00:49:04 BPM 110. 120. She's terrified. Should we wake her up? Absolutely not. What was that? You didn't figure it out? I think I need to hear you say it.
Starting point is 00:49:17 That was live audio of a woman's nightmare. This machine is approved and everything? You're allowed to be doing this? We passed the review board a year ago. We're not hurting people. There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing. They're just dreams. Dream Sequence is a new horror thriller
Starting point is 00:49:37 from Blumhouse Television, iHeartRadio, and Realm. Listen to Dream Sequence on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. It was December 2019 when the story blew up. In Green Bay, Wisconsin, former Packers star Kabir Bajabiamila caught up in a bizarre situation. KGB explaining what he believes led to the arrest of his friends at a children's Christmas play. A family man, former NFL player, devout Christian, now cut off from his family and connected to a strange arrest. I am going to share my journey of how I went from Christianity to now a Hebrew Israelite. I got swept up in Kabir's journey,
Starting point is 00:50:20 but this was only the beginning in a story about faith and football, the search for meaning away from the gridiron and the consequences for everyone involved. You mix homesteading with guns and church and a little bit of the spice of conspiracy theories that we liked. Voila! You got straight away. I felt like I was living in North Korea, but worse, if that's possible. Listen to Spiraled on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Dr. Laurie Santos, host of the Happiness Lab podcast. As the U.S. elections approach, it can feel like we're angrier and more divided than ever.
Starting point is 00:50:58 Please stick to policy, don't get personal. But in a new, hopeful season of my podcast, I'll share what the science really shows, that we're surprisingly more united than most people think. We all know something is wrong in our culture, in our politics, and that we need to do better and that we can do better. With the help of Stanford psychologist Jamil Zaki. It's really tragic. If cynicism were a pill, it'd be a poison. We'll see that our fellow humans, even those we disagree with, are more generous than we assume.
Starting point is 00:51:26 My assumption, my feeling, my hunch is that a lot of us are actually looking for a way to disagree and still be in relationships with each other. All that on the Happiness Lab. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. for the ride. Woohoo! That would be me, Devin Simone. And then there's me, Davon Rogers. And we're here to take you behind the scenes of drumroll please. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
Starting point is 00:52:10 The Challenge 40 Battle of the Eras. Yes. Each week, cast members will be joining us to spill all of the tea on the relentless challenges, heartbreaking eliminations, and of course, all the juicy drama. And let's not forget about the hookups.
Starting point is 00:52:28 Anyway, regardless of what era you're rooting for at home, everyone is welcome here on MTV's official challenge podcast. So join us every week as we break down episodes of the Challenge 40 Battle of the Eras. Listen to MTV's official challenge podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back. And let's talk about fires. There's a fine coating of dust around the entire western half of America right now. there's fires in washington there's fires in denver southern california northern california and so what one story that i wanted to look into
Starting point is 00:53:14 is there's a like contrarian environmentalist who is typically like he's not just a total right wing quack. He is kind of generally accepted to be on board with the findings around climate change. But he's claiming that it's not just global warming. It's weird. So he's saying that it's more complicated than just global warming is happening landscape dries out fire is bad more global warming equals more fires there's like a uh an aspect of it where people were for too long fighting against forest fires and making sure there were no forest fires which just led to too much growth and too much fuel being built up and you know this
Starting point is 00:54:07 person's point is basically that like the native americans used to the largest fire seasons in the history of california for instance happened when indigenous peoples were actually like actively burning controlled fires to uh keep things from getting too hot and the sort of surplus of fuel that came about because people were uh were fighting against even small forest fires uh have created fires that are so hot that they actually destroy forests, like actually kill the forest. Whereas like normal controlled burns, uh, make it possible for the forest to replenish themselves. Um,
Starting point is 00:54:54 but so it's getting a lot of burn in conservative, uh, circles that this idea of like people are, uh, the, it's just like a counterfactual conservative side of the climate debate, quote unquote. But it's...
Starting point is 00:55:10 He's not claiming that the climate isn't a factor. The climate is absolutely a factor, and he acknowledges that it's a larger... It makes for a longer fire season. And... I don't know.
Starting point is 00:55:25 It's just like, there are plenty of like the, the whole point about the native Americans is interesting because they were using controlled fires to create these large burns that would make it so that fire season could be something that they controlled. make it so that fire season could be something that they controlled and now like we don't have those options available to us because people live in too many of the places that they used to burn so now it's basically we have a more out of control and longer fire season like that's not good and most people are acknowledging the complexities that
Starting point is 00:56:06 he's like trying to be like nobody's acknowledging this um so i don't know it's just something that is coming up a lot as people point to the connection between climate change and this sort of out of control uh wildfire season but yeah he's not advocating that he's like so relax on the climate change stuff you know he kind of is well then i think that's pretty disqualifying for any person who's trying to present a scientific opinion but i mean yeah i guess to your point he's walking this very i was reading his wikipedia page and he calls himself a eco pragmatist yeah that's what his whole thing is like i'm just i don't want he he's worried that by including false claims or exaggerated claims in environmentalists like you know commentary or uh what he calls activist journalism the environmentalist movement
Starting point is 00:57:01 is disqualifying itself among like people who you know pay attention to this sort of stuff or who might not pay that much attention to it but it's he's going too far especially with this argument he's like taking it too far in the direction of this uh you know and his peers are saying that it's not just me being like you've gone too far sir uh his peers are like no like he's kind of being misleading with the way he's talking about this um so so do we rake so do we rake the leaves or not so that's one of the things he points to as being like people scoffed at that but it was actually like talking around a true fact. It's just, you know, he,
Starting point is 00:57:48 Trump is such an idiot that it sounded dumb when he said it. I mean, it sounded quite literally, like he was talking to Gavin Newsom, like it was his 13 year old stepson. And he's like, what did I say about these leaves? You got to rake these up or we're going to have a problem. Yeah, he wildly misunderstood the true fact that more fuel leads to uh more out of control rather
Starting point is 00:58:08 than you're not doing your chores gavin yeah but the so part of this story i think it ties into it is that a i've also seen people be like well it's not that climate change is the cause of the fires. It's people, human behavior doing shit like gender reveal parties, which is. Oh, gosh. It's a very dumb way of approaching it. Wasn't that happening last year, too? Yep. It happens everywhere. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:58:39 It happens. It's happened before. Arizona, there was one that was awful. I remember California. There's been at least two. So this one in particular was happened while it was 116 degrees in Pasadena. Jeez. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:58:58 And people are want to set off fucking bang bangs in the fucking dry ass like parched environment just to be like this fetus has these genitals let's go yeah celebrate these genitals yeah like it's uh it what the funny thing is like it's brought in now the this this woman who is a blogger who apparently is like credited for starting the gender reveal party fad phenomenon. Her name is Jenna Carvanitas. And she went on Facebook begging people to stop doing it. Like some mad scientist whose creation had just gotten out of hand. But it also reads really not very sincere.
Starting point is 00:59:43 This is what her Facebook post said. Quote, oh my God, no. Okay, great. For a very impassioned plea for the people. The fire that evacuated parts of California is from a gender reveal party. Stop it. Stop having these stupid parties.
Starting point is 01:00:00 For the love of God, stop burning things down to tell everyone about your kid's penis. No one cares about you. It was 116 degrees in Pasadena yesterday, and this tool thought it would be smart to light a fire about his kid's dick. Toxic masculinity is men thinking they need to explode something because simply enjoying a baby party is for sissies. Oh, and of course, I'm getting hate messages. Excuse me for having a cake for my family in 2008. Just because I'm the gender reveal inventor
Starting point is 01:00:27 doesn't mean I think people should burn down their communities. Stop. Then puts edit. If you agree or don't hate this post, please do not put angry or sad reacts on it because Facebook punishes pages who get those reactions by limiting their reach. Facebook wants puppy pictures and not anti-gender reveal screens.
Starting point is 01:00:45 Like, oh, classy. I like you start off and then you're like, because Facebook algorithm. Like, what? So I'm guessing they're having a boy. Yeah, right? Because I was like, your kid's penis, that's presumptive, but okay. Do we know?
Starting point is 01:01:00 Do we know for sure? It's really, it's weird. What is her defense exactly here? Like she, but if it were a reveal for a girl or whatever female genitals, that that would be okay. But like, but it's, but it's a dude celebrating a boy. So it's toxic masculinity. Like, I feel like her, she could have started off
Starting point is 01:01:23 with like, yo, honestly, gender reveal parties, like even being a thing was an l like society saved the brand yeah yeah i mean i shouldn't put that shit out there it's toxic and regressive as fuck actually when i think about it that's the thing and not not being like i'm sorry i made a cake yeah i mean i get what she's saying about the fact that you need to include explosives in a baby shower. That it went from cake to like Tannerite in a forest. Right. Yes. And I.
Starting point is 01:01:55 Yeah, it is just funny to add some SEO, some search engine optimization at the end. Yeah. Like what is. So her biggest fear. Search engine optimization at the end. So her biggest fear, was it really that she was going to take a stand on these? Or, guys, Facebook punishes pages that get those reacts on their posts. Like, come on now. Don't be frowny face about this post that is, in fact, infuriating in every way.
Starting point is 01:02:22 Well, guys, I want to take you inside uh the home one of the many homes of ellen degeneres so this person who used to be on our staff who uh is remaining anonymous because they don't want to because her life could be in danger right so i'll just read from you the this interview they did with the daily mail who you know we've not the greatest source but uh still still interesting daily fail they said ellen was a hero of mine i thought she was an amazing person but before i took the position people were warning me not to take it i was told she had very high turnover and that I should stay under the radar as much as possible, avoid as much direct contact with Ellen as possible. Working there was described as being more like a boot camp. So that's what she hears heading in.
Starting point is 01:03:16 I do love that turnover, like that we talk about like a toxic work environment, the result of a toxic work environment and uh people quitting all the time sounds like just a a fun pastry um but then she says when i interviewed with ellen and porsche i felt much better about the job they were both charming funny and perfectly lovely i was a little bit nervous but it was well paid so that's you know that's not surprising we have seen that side of ellen for our entire for her entire public career yeah uh the harsh reality of the quote degenerate regime soon became clear after she started uh the staff is confronted each morning with a laundry list of passive aggressive notes listing what the entertainer didn't like about the previous day oh no that's
Starting point is 01:04:05 the thing that i'm most struck by in this interview is the level of energy that has to be expanded by ellen to put this much negative negativity out there. Violations included a chef using a guest toilet, so basically the help, a maid forgetting to put a piece of trash in the recycling, Ellen is terribly obsessive, and if anything's out of order
Starting point is 01:04:37 in her environment, she gets upset. There might be 20 to 30 things every day. We're talking about the finest, finest details here. A salt shaker out of place or a light switch left on? A salt shaker out of place really is giving me misery, like Kathy Bates and Misery
Starting point is 01:04:54 vibes, where it's just like that thing is slightly tilted in the wrong direction. What part of that? I just remember how she just messed up James Caan's legs. Because I think I saw it when I was way too young. I think I saw it when I was five, in the 80s. what part of that i just remember how she just messed up james khan's legs because i think i saw like when i was way too young i think i saw when i was like five like in the 80s yeah i don't know about this y'all was there a moment was that like when he's trying to escape or some shit i
Starting point is 01:05:15 think when he's trying to escape he knocks over a chess piece uh and then puts it back but he puts it back the wrong way the wrong direction i love that shit and that's what gets his uh legs that's my favorite villain thing of like when the person thinks they're smart but they have every detail like pre-mapped out they're like that that labels slightly askew yeah um the staff was getting better and better and making fewer mistakes, but she couldn't help herself so she would lay traps. She would actually leave match sticks around the house, behind cupboard doors, cushions, or books, to see if the staff was cleaning and moving things.
Starting point is 01:05:54 One day, the staff found around eight of them, all in weird places. The rest of the day became a race to find them all before she got home and fired someone. Oh my god. Jesusesus that's really fucking just it's like shows that you have such a fucked up relationship with people who are in your employ you know or like that you're like well if i pay you i can i can do whatever the fuck i want because
Starting point is 01:06:18 i'm giving you money and that means psychological trauma through these matchstick fucking traps. I mean, you've got our staff at work saying these same kind of having her having the same kind of control issues. And now it's at home to like, what was the thing about the Porsche twice? If you need us to get out. Yeah, right. I think she fired people for not liking the consistency of the latte foam. Because the machine was dirty or some shit? Yeah, she wanted the coffee maker deep cleaned every day after complaining that there was too much or too little froth on her latte. Which doesn't really relate.
Starting point is 01:07:00 Like, those things don't relate. That's the milk steamer, Ellen. Yo, your barista is lying to you yeah like we should have some assistant or pa do that at work or something that just shows you how disconnected she is from the latte making process that her staff lies to her they're like oh yeah okay we'll deep we'll deep clean the coffee machine then yes then you should deep clean every time the latte foam was a mess and it's like i don't even know how they fucking latte foams made when someone came
Starting point is 01:07:28 to the house for example to repair an appliance she wouldn't hold back it could be something as simple as the compressor on the refrigerator making too much noise that is that's a detail that I'm just like okay this person's telling the truth because like you can't make that up
Starting point is 01:07:43 that's absolutely like there's something that just rings so true about that she's like the compressor one of the top security firms in Hollywood terminated their contract with her some of the criticisms that this source heard were that Ellen didn't like the way they walked I'm not even kidding they literally didn't like the way they walked she literally didn't like the way they walked also how they opened and closed doors or what like opening closing i get because that's like a thing i grew up my grandma don't slam that fucking door so i'm sure like you're too loud with that door closing but opening like stomp around the house or anything yeah exactly making too but what are people entering like fucking kramer and seinfeld like that's how they're right like this is all stuff that i have seen like people who are really on bad terms with their roommate like i've heard them like start to complain like call
Starting point is 01:08:37 them like this person's like a thunder foot they everywhere they they just like stomp around and it's like you know that's clearly because you're just like annoyed by this person that's not they don't have especially uh large powerful footfalls like they're just um what one detail from the article that i wanted to point out though is that ashton kutcher is apparently one of the people who has tweeted in her defense she and her team have only treated me and my team with respect and kindness she never pandered to celebrity which i always saw as refreshing honesty i just wanted to note that via listening to uh way too many hours of podcasts i heard a anecdote about ashton kutcher from somebody who is like a successful writer director in Hollywood, but one of their early jobs was working for Ashton Kutcher's,
Starting point is 01:09:28 um, viral video site. Uh, they, they made that, uh, viral video in which the girl has diarrhea in the hot tub. Um,
Starting point is 01:09:37 that is a staged prank video made by Ashton Kutcher's team. Uh, but anyways, this writer director got fired by Ashton Kutcher's like main right-hand person and asked why he had been fired. And the entourage member said, Ashton hates your face, bro.
Starting point is 01:09:57 Oh, that's right. Ashton Kutcher did create punk. I forgot about that. Yeah. So, wow. Oh,
Starting point is 01:10:02 and then super producer on a Hosni in the chat says, Ashton Kutcher also told Demi Moore that he didn't think alcoholism is a thing in order to get her to lose her sobriety and drink with them. That's right. I remember you talking about that in that book. Wow. So, you know, I think that's the thing. Like, when you're living on that planet,
Starting point is 01:10:18 it's hard for you to see that it's any different than how you are. You're like, I don't know. Like, from all the rich people I know, like, I was pretty chill. Yeah, she's got a panda to. You're like, I don't know. From all the rich people I know, I was pretty chill. She's not a panda to celebrities. I mean, I'm a celebrity. I don't know anybody with an income that's less than $4 million a year, but I'd imagine she would treat those people okay as well.
Starting point is 01:10:36 Yeah, totally. Anyways, these details are just... I don't have any... like, not that I really doubted the complaints before, but these details are just like too like dead on for me to like think that any, any of this is made up. I would love though, that this is just like the best coordinated smear campaign. Like everyone's like, yo, these details are just too good to be fake and she's like i'm telling you i'm kind it's a coordinated attack against me i'm just curious
Starting point is 01:11:10 about the psychology where you get that i what is it because she's so rich that she feels omnipotent and therefore everything should be in her control or is it that like is it from lack prior to this that now the pendulum's just gone completely the other way and knocking walls down? It's like, I didn't have anything. Now I will have everything I want. Like, I'm just,
Starting point is 01:11:30 I'm trying to figure out like how I could, you know, if I worked for Ellen, like how I can maneuver that space, how you could win. Yeah. Power corrupts. Right.
Starting point is 01:11:37 Right. Yeah. Yeah. But like, I'm assuming this is all like pre pandemic, right? Yeah. I mean,
Starting point is 01:11:43 the stories of her have been long or, you know, anecdotal tales since the early odds from what I could tell. Yeah. Um, yeah, I, I don't know how it happens or,
Starting point is 01:11:56 you know, whether we're just hearing from, she's especially, uh, dedicated about, about how, about treating people like the the discipline to write a list every day that has like 20 to 30 fuck-ups from the previous day uh that you know
Starting point is 01:12:15 like that takes such energy oh yeah and that helps you feel superior too and you don't have to look at your own inferiority complex if you spend your time looking for the deficiencies outside of yourself. Right. There's something, you know, that's that control baby, you know, and you know,
Starting point is 01:12:33 Jack and I apologize. I will get that coffee maker deep clean for you. I know the latte foam was a little off, but I'm telling you that's not where it comes from, but I will clean the machine nonetheless. Exactly. Maurice, it's been so fun having you on today's episode of The Daily Zeitgeist.
Starting point is 01:12:48 Where can people find you and follow you? Yeah, so you can follow me on Twitter. My username is MauriceCherry, M-A-U-R-I-C-E-C-H-E-R-R-Y. Also, my website is MauriceCherry.com. Yeah, yeah. Is there a tweet or some other work of social media you've been enjoying? Hmm. You know, Twitter has been very interesting these past few days.
Starting point is 01:13:14 I'd say probably particularly today I was reading something. And this is not really, I guess, what I would share as part of this. But it was something around Odell Beckham. I'll just leave it at that. I was like, Oh, that's interesting. But I saw a tweet.
Starting point is 01:13:31 I think it was just floating around somewhere where someone was saying that they feel like there's just one set of clippers for black Republicans and they have to check it out like a library book. And I believe that. I believe that hands down. They've all got kind of that. It's either close crop or it's like that weird, like, 90s fade. It's that shit when your mom does.
Starting point is 01:13:52 When you don't go to a black barber shop and you go to the conservative part of town, you're like, I don't know. The barber there seems to know how to cut my hair. They've got the super cuts. Yeah, exactly. They're like, oh, boy. Great clips for hair or some shit like that scissors like it all works the same right no it doesn't uh miles where can people find you what's tweet you've been enjoying oh you can find me on twitter and instagram at miles of gray also
Starting point is 01:14:18 my other podcast for 20 day fiance with sophie alexander talking about 90 day fiance i have a few tweets that i'm really liking uh first one is but uh this is from at sarah papalardo at your papalardo i'm gonna let my children set their own wildfire when they're old enough to decide for themselves i appreciate that uh this is from at jurassic park to go jurassic park updates this was this is the tweet some of these fuckers are way too big. I just love this. This is stupid. And then a lot of people were tagging me in different Ben Shapiro jokey quotes.
Starting point is 01:14:54 And so I'll give you a little bit of Ben Shapiro voice. This is from at GTE00. This is saying, hoes, I got the gorilla grip pussy. Ben Shapiro. Gorillas are nine times stronger than a human. If your vagina could apply the same pressure as the grip of a full-blown silverback gorilla, the damage to a human penis would be devastating. The cock would be completely annihilated.
Starting point is 01:15:17 That's really good. That's really good. You should speed up a little bit at the end because he kind of does that thing where when he's hitting him he kind of tries to get it out he'll do that he doesn't have breath control he didn't take vocal lessons you know what I mean oh you can find me on twitter at jack underscore o'brien
Starting point is 01:15:35 couple tweets I've been enjoying soulnate at mnateshamalon tweeted gotta get my steps in for the day I say as I march directly into the sea. And then MacGyver
Starting point is 01:15:50 the Andrew Nadeau tweeted, my least popular conspiracy theory is that orchestra conductors don't actually do anything. Some guy just shows up and says, okay, I'm gonna direct you and the musicians play the same but treat it like a make-a-wish thing and are like, are like that's great bud you're directing so good wow you can find me on twitter
Starting point is 01:16:13 jack underscore brian you can find us on twitter at daily zeitgeist we're at the daily zeitgeist on instagram we have a facebook fan page and a website dailyzeitgeist.com where we post our episodes and our foot notes where we link off tocom, where we post our episodes and our footnotes, where we link off to the information that we talked about in today's episode, as well as the song we ride out on, Miles. What are we riding out on today? This is a track from an artist. I've not played anything from them before.
Starting point is 01:16:40 I just came across this recently. Sasha Rudy is the artist, S-A-C-H-a-r-u-d-y and the track is called be a man and it's just got this like spooky uh like sort of retro r&b but also with some good like futuristic production and you know the vibes i pick on these songs they feel familiar yet forward facing uh and yeah it's just kind of cool he has a nice soulful voice um and yeah it's yeah just check it out you know let's let's let's ease into the week it's a short one all right well the daily zeitgeist of the production by heart radio for more podcasts from my heart radio visit the iheart radio app apple podcast or wherever you listen to your favorite shows that is gonna do
Starting point is 01:17:21 it for this morning we'll be back this afternoon to tell you what's trending and we'll talk to y'all then. Bye. All I've got. I swear I did my best, I gave all I've got. All I've got. I got hypnotized by simplicity. It was prophesied when I was just a kid. Kay hasn't heard from her sister in seven years. I have a proposal for you.
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Starting point is 01:19:45 It's Space Gem, There are no roads. Good point. So where are we headed? Into the unknown, of course. Join us on In Our Own World as we uncover hidden truths, navigate the depths of culture, identity, and the human spirit. With a hint of mischief. One episode at a time. Buckle up and listen to In Our Own World on the iHeartRadio app,
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