The Daily Zeitgeist - Weekly Zeitgeist 40 (Best of 9/3/18-9/7/18)

Episode Date: September 9, 2018

The weekly round up of the best moments from DZ's Season 47 (9/3/18-9/7/18.) Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy informatio...n.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th 2017 was assassinated. Crooks Everywhere unearthed the plot to murder a one-woman WikiLeaks. She exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. Listen to Crooks Everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. woman had done before, tried to assassinate the President of the United States. One was the protege of Charles Manson. 26-year-old Lynette Fromm, nicknamed Squeaky. The other, a middle-aged housewife working undercover for the FBI. Identified by police as Sarah Jean Moore. The story of one strange and violent summer, this season on the new podcast, Rip Current. Hear episodes of Rip Current early and completely ad-free and receive exclusive bonus content by subscribing to iHeart True Crime Plus
Starting point is 00:01:07 only on Apple Podcasts. How do you feel about biscuits? Hi, I'm Akilah Hughes, and I'm so excited about my new podcast, Rebel Spirit, where I head back to my hometown in Kentucky and try to convince my high school to change their racist mascot, the Rebels, into something everyone in the South loves, the biscuits. I was a lady rebel. Like, what does that even mean? It's right here in black and white in print.
Starting point is 00:01:33 It's bigger than a flag or mascot. Listen to Rebel Spirit on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. There's so much beauty in Mexican culture, like mariachis, delicious cuisine, and even lucha libre. Join us for the new podcast, Lucha Libre Behind the Mask, a 12-episode podcast in both English and Spanish about the history and cultural richness of lucha libre.
Starting point is 00:01:59 And I'm your host, Santos Escobar, emperor of lucha libre and a WWE superstar. Listen to Lucha Libre and a WWE superstar. Santos! Listen to Lucha Libre Behind the Mask on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you stream podcasts. Hello, the internet, and welcome to this episode of the Weekly Zeitgeist. These are some of our favorite segments from this week, all edited together into one nonstop infotainment laughstravaganza. So without further ado, here is the Weekly Zeitgeist.
Starting point is 00:02:36 All right, let's get into the stories. Something that's coming up this week, the Kavanaugh hearing. He is the least popular Supreme Court nominee with the public, according to polling. And that usually, usually like the three other least popular were people who did not get approved during their hearing. So we'll see. He could be the guy who helps Trump if anything goes to the Supreme Court about presidential power. Right. It's like you saw this move from the jump, like what the reason was.
Starting point is 00:03:08 Right. Yeah. Because McConnell was like, just don't select Kavanaugh because he has the biggest paper trail and that's going to, you know, slow things down. And but Kavanaugh was the dude who had that presidential power thing. Yeah. You know. Well, and I think when they were talking about, you know, when Kagan was being confirmed,
Starting point is 00:03:26 they got 99 percent of the documents that like she handled it with the White House and with Kavanaugh. It's like something less than like 10 percent. Yeah. Because there's just too much. Yo, he had his hands on all kinds of shit during the Bush administration that they're like, oh, right. Let's make sure, you know, like they're hiding so much shit.
Starting point is 00:03:45 And that's why everyone's being like, what are they hiding? You know, like with the documents. And I think at the very least, if they want to have some semblance of like equity here, at least let everybody review the documents. But that just shows you how underhanded this whole process is. What if they're just hiding like Kavanaugh's crayon drawings of George W. Bush? You know what I mean?
Starting point is 00:04:03 Like what if it's like really nothing? Yeah, but something. George W. Bush. You know what I mean? Like, what if it's, like, really nothing? Yeah. But something. But something. Yeah. Apparently, the, like, preparations they're going through, they're doing, like, mock hearings and, like, staging fake protests. Oh, really?
Starting point is 00:04:15 Don't let this get you off your game when suddenly people are, you know, like, pulling your card about, you know, X issue or whatever. Wow. Inevitably, when people will be there to protest because this is a Supreme Court seat, they stole again. And the Democrats are seemingly okay to kind of pretend like they're going to oppose him, but there have been a lot of people who have been like,
Starting point is 00:04:36 okay, we had a good conversation. No one's gone full out being like, no, I will not vote for him, or yes, I will vote for him, but I don't know. We'll see. The math. The Republicans have the votes, right? Well, yeah, they had 51 seats, but I not vote for him or yes, I will vote for him. But I don't know. We'll see. The math. The Republicans have the votes, right?
Starting point is 00:04:46 Well, yeah, they had 51 seats. But I think with John McCain passing away now, it's 50 seats. Which is enough, right? Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, they need a defection for him not to get nominated. And who knows if that's going to happen? It seems like it might just go down party lines.
Starting point is 00:05:01 Who knows if that's going to happen. It seems like it might just go down party lines. Let's talk about what a world-class asshole we have in charge of the free world right now. So we'll just say whatever we want right now? Yes. All right. Fuck his hair. Yeah, right? No.
Starting point is 00:05:18 Politico has this story where, I mean, we always knew that Donald Trump hated Jeff Sessions because he thinks the attorney general just means the guy who will protect you from the law, I guess, is like his idea of personal. Yeah. Or like just guard dog will be like any legal trouble. Apparently, the attorney general just helps you skate on all that shit. So they were talking about, you know, if Sessions recusal, this is from Politico, was his original sin, Trump has come to resent him for other reasons. Griping to aides and lawmakers that the attorney general doesn't have the Ivy League pedigree the president prefers, that he can't stand his southern accent, and that Sessions isn't a capable defender of the president on television. In part because he, quote, talks like he has marbles in his mouth. That's not fair. Jefferson Ball recalls. Yeah. I mean, look, talks like he has marbles in his mouth.
Starting point is 00:06:07 That's not fair, Jefferson Ball recalls. Yeah, I mean, look, leave illegal Smeagol alone. You know what I mean? Like, he's doing what he has to do. Also, no, fuck that guy. But let's be—I think what's funny is the whole idea that he's like, oh, his Ivy League pedigree when Trump is nowhere even close to being any kind of intellectual to be able to sort of throw that around as an insult. Also, you know, Alabama has a lot of his supporters there.
Starting point is 00:06:29 I'm surprised he thinks he's much more well-liked than I'm sure Trump is. But who knows? I haven't really seen polling about that. But this whole thing of him really hating him is just getting more and more intense and intense and intense. Do you think he's going to get fired? more intense and intense and intense. Do you think he's going to get fired? Well, they think that it probably won't happen until after the midterms because they don't want that to become another thing that will just mobilize more people to vote against him.
Starting point is 00:06:51 They'll be like, look, if you're going to do it, wait for the blue wave to crash on the Capitol and then go into full panic mode because at that point all bets are off. But, you know, it's just Trump doing his little hate. And there's another thing I was reading that Trump really doesn't like his supporters because they're not like pretty people. No, I mean. And so this all fits into his, you know, torture worldview. Yeah. I mean, he has that narcissism personality disorder where he's just trying to fill a hole that can't be filled with, you know.
Starting point is 00:07:23 With MAGA hats. With the presidency of the United States. He's still just like, why is Hollywood so mean to me? Yeah. Because you're an asshole. Yeah. But like the biggest asshole maybe in America, the best at being an asshole in the country potentially.
Starting point is 00:07:41 There's also the story where he basically said, in a room full of reporters to bloomberg off the record i'm i'm really fucking canada you know that right like just like and they're like uh honestly yo like off the all right i guess off the i mean i'm gonna report this right but that's so funny though so here's the problem if I say no the answer is no if I say no then you're gonna put that and it's gonna be so insulting they're not gonna be able to make a deal I can't kill these people he said
Starting point is 00:08:12 of the Canadian government off the record Canada's working their ass off and every time we have a problem with a point I just put up a picture of a Chevrolet Impala because the Impala is produced at the General Motors plant in Ontario. So, yeah.
Starting point is 00:08:30 Again, off the record, they came knocking on our doors last night. Let's make a deal, please. Dude, he has such an issue of understanding what off the record, on the record, confidentiality agreement. He just thinks like, okay, off the record, okay, I'm going he just thinks like okay off the record okay i'm gonna get spicy and this won't get out okay so apparently that was said to a bloomberg reporter they didn't report it but there are other people in the room who heard it and then reported it now i mean there is i guess some sanctity to uh the journalistic integrity of you know to the ones off the record yeah but with this fucking guy i I mean... It's so funny and sad.
Starting point is 00:09:06 You know what I mean? It's like you got to laugh instead of cry at this because who the fuck... What is he? Like some kind of super villain? Like, I want you to fuck Canada. What? Yeah, I'm just going to hold up a picture of the Impala.
Starting point is 00:09:18 It's like this isn't a fucking love and hip-hop reunion show where you get all fucking messy like this. But he's Mr. Reality TV so I guess he really does think of how like it's the kind of way that if you were scripting out like a fun way a shitty president would act like it's this kind of stuff
Starting point is 00:09:35 and I think he's just like yeah I'm just gonna hold up the picture and that'll shut him up or I said tame Impala Chevy Impala but them too them too he's gonna fuck Australia as well I said Tame Impala. Chevy Impala. Tame Impala. He likes them too. But them too. Them too. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:09:47 He's going to fuck Australia as well. Oh, shit might. So affirmative action is back in the news because there is a group that is suing Harvard, basically claiming on behalf of Asian Americans rejected by Harvard that Harvard has systematically discriminated against them by artificially capping the number of qualified Asian Americans. Harvard and a lot of Asian American communities are also saying that this group does not speak for us. And so they're back in the news because the Trump administration, Department of Justice, just sided with the group that is suing to
Starting point is 00:10:25 basically they're trying to end affirmative action. Oh, good. Yeah. So that's cool. They're suing because they were capping the number of Asian-American students. That's what they're claiming. And Harvard's admissions board is claiming that just race is one of a number of different factors that they take into account when considering an applicant.
Starting point is 00:10:48 But they have not provided specific details of what their admissions policy is or it can't be broken down into a systemized, detail-based, point-based system. Yeah, they should probably do that, though, in general. Just to eliminate any ambiguity. Right, exactly. Yeah, they should probably do that, though. You know what I mean? In general. Right.
Starting point is 00:11:06 Just to eliminate any ambiguity. Right, exactly. Because then they have the defense like, well, that's one of the other things. Yeah. But what are those other things? Right. My mood.
Starting point is 00:11:16 The weather. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, they are asking them to show their work. And I think Harvard thought they did that to a sufficient degree. And anti-affirmative action people are claiming that they didn't. But I mean, a statement from a Harvard Alumni Association said eliminating race conscious admissions would disproportionately harm applicants of color,
Starting point is 00:11:38 including some Asian Americans. And I mean, there are other forms of affirmative action that upper class's solutions for inequality and all the problems that ail our government and our society are rigged to keep them in power. And he was talking about how people point to China and India over the past couple decades as examples of capitalism doing good and, you know, proving its worth because they have like basically, you know, shot up out of nowhere and had all this success. But he was pointing out that there's a massive historic affirmative action program in India to correct for the historic caste system. Right.
Starting point is 00:12:45 So it's a combination of these things. And America just thinks, well, capitalism on its own will fix things. Doesn't take into account human greed. Right. Yeah. A factor. Yeah. Affirmative action.
Starting point is 00:13:00 There are examples of it being extremely successful and important in market economies and also in education. Big story from over the weekend. Colin Kaepernick is now the face of the 30th anniversary of the Just Do It campaign. We were all on the edge of our seat being like, who are they going to choose for this campaign were we no no we were not uh i didn't know didn't know that it was the 30th anniversary i guess i didn't know but you know it's cool that they're siding with colin kaepernick instead of the evil nfl owners who are you know who they who pay them to make all of the uniforms for every team? Yeah, that's kind of cool. They are still a giant corporation that has all sorts
Starting point is 00:13:50 of problematic things going on, but in terms of taking a side in the culture war, I think it's been fun to see the response from the right. Oh, man. So many people. So unpredictable. I never would have thought they would burn their shoes.
Starting point is 00:14:07 Yeah. Right. Yeah. After they burned their other Nike equipment. I feel like Nike, when they were burning their Nike NFL jerseys, was like, all right, motherfuckers. You've started a fight. You're like, guess what, asshole? We just re-upped the deal with the NFL for eight more seasons.
Starting point is 00:14:24 Right. Exactly. Hope you can find those old Reebok jerseys from like the early 2000s. So yeah, I mean, Fox News was not happy. Tucker Carlson is describing this as an attack against America. And I think we have audio. It's pretty decadent, actually, I think. I mean, first of all, it's factually ludicrous. You can't give up everything and maintain a Nike contract but the decadent part isn't even really about Colin Kaepernick he's an athlete at a young guy you know I would give him a pass actually on a lot of this it's the executives profiting from him and his attacks on the United States while simultaneously denying that
Starting point is 00:15:03 they are attacks on the United States so simultaneously denying that they are attacks on the United States. So they're saying, you know, he raised the issue of racial discrimination in this country as if it's never been raised before, or as if, you know, the historical problems with that aren't obvious to every single American. Of course they are. This is an attack on the country. So it would be very different if he were saying, you know, I'm protesting this politician or this policy or this specific person, this specific thing. But no, sitting during the national anthem is a way of making a broad based, generalized and therefore impossible to rebut attack against the country that made him and Nike rich. And again, there's something really decadent about that. When the most successful people in your society hate the society, you've got a real problem. It's a
Starting point is 00:15:49 metaphor for our entire ruling class, many of whom feel that way. They hate and resent the very system that made their prosperity, their success possible. It's a huge problem for all of us. The amount of work that he's doing to contort himself so that his position of siding with NFL owners is the little man. The not the ruling class. Is him sticking up for the underdog is amazing. Boy, they do not like when black people have opinions, huh? No. Not on Fox.
Starting point is 00:16:19 Oh, my God. I mean, this is they called this a fucking attack on America. He's exercising his right to bring awareness to systemic racism. Yeah, you have to be willfully ignorant, which I would not put past anyone there to not know what he's protested. Like to say that there's no there's nothing. There's no topic or issue. Yes, there's not a specific person. Yes, there's not a specific whatever it's a politician.
Starting point is 00:16:42 But it's so clear that there's a cause whether you agree with it or not, whether you want to attend to it or not, there's a cause. How do you not see that? Well, that's the only way they can avoid talking about it is by saying, well, I don't want to engage him on the basis of him bringing up, you know, the violence towards people of color from police or whatever, that it's just like, well, no, because this is attacking against the troops. It's a disrespect against the country. Right.
Starting point is 00:17:03 Like, just be like, if you're really going to look like some sane person or be a social critic, why don't you then engage him on the idea of what he's arguing? And I know it's not the biggest point, but the fact that he said he's sitting during the National Anthem where it's so obvious that he's kneeling because, you know, because he chose to kneel based on talking with someone in the armed forces. Right. That was more respectful. Again, it's willfully ignorant. It's, it's trying, it's ignoring any,
Starting point is 00:17:26 any truth of, of, of the issue. And, but, but I have to say, I, there is something that doesn't quite feel right.
Starting point is 00:17:34 There's something that does seem something a little bit exploitative that I, that I guess I would agree with a little bit that like, yes, it's certainly better than saying, you know, pro NFL or, you know, or, or, or going with this whole, you know, he's disrespecting the America of the troops.
Starting point is 00:17:50 They could have shown J.J. Watt like putting his hand over his heart, like during the national anthem and made that the face of their 30. Even though J.J. Watt's not a bad guy. Sorry, I don't mean to imply that. Yeah, but there is something that does feel a little weird of co-opting a cause, you know, but, you. But Nike has done this before and other big companies do this all the time. And again, you'd rather have it be on what we think is the correct side of the issue or not. The answer to all those questions with what corporations are going to do is always for profit. So they're like, it is more profitable. So on one hand, yeah, I totally see it. It's like, okay, I see what you're doing.
Starting point is 00:18:21 But also it's better to be on the right side. Exactly. And especially when it's actually a real issue. It's not like after 9-11 and Budweiser running ads with American flags and supporting the troops and all that. It is something that obviously is going to get a big response. But on the other hand, it's like this also means that Colin Kaepernick is getting paid, which while it's not being paid for making football,
Starting point is 00:18:44 for what do you call it with the sports in the running room? Making football. Yeah, for making football plays. You did not let me finish my sentence. It's not for playing football. Like, he is being paid for being an athlete and an activist. And, you know, I'd rather have that happen than not happen. Right.
Starting point is 00:18:57 And, again, I think it will put it back in the conversation. But obviously, yes, of course. Of course, this was not an uncalculated move where they figured all the free publicity they were getting. I mean, how much usually would you charge Nike to have a discussion this long on your podcast? Right. I mean, that's billions right there. Yeah. Especially on this one.
Starting point is 00:19:15 Yeah, exactly. All the free publicity they're getting, there are no dummies over there. Right. Yeah. I was just going to say, I mean, the fact that they made this decision, you know, their motives were probably purely profit related, but the fact that they looked at the issue and said, okay, this is what's going to make us the most money, I do think is a sign that at least the right side is winning because, I mean, they wouldn't do that without doing tons and tons of right market research right and you know they looked at the people who are going to be behind this decision
Starting point is 00:19:51 they looked at the people who are going to cut their socks up that guy who cut his socks up that'll learn him what the fuck was he cutting the socks with had a point uh on wonkett the guy was saying like yeah because walking with jagged ass socks isn't going to lead someone to go, hey, what happened to your socks? And they'd be like, oh, you know, Nike, because blah, blah, blah. It's like, you're already inviting more discussion about Nike from aggressively fucking your socks up. I kind of feel bad for the sock cutters, though.
Starting point is 00:20:17 I mean, you know, they are pretty powerless. Like, what can you do as a consumer? You know, let's say you do legitimately, you know, believe that issue. It's like, you're kind of powerless. What are you going to do if anything corporation you start a hashtag pig socks which is the most confusing hashtag well there's this other thing to remember like when keurig pulled their advertising on certain fox shows they're like we're throwing our keurig machines out and people are saying like if you really want to fuck them over take your item and then sell that so then you are getting the profits from that by destroying something.
Starting point is 00:20:47 They've already collected your money. Right. And you're not doing anything. And that means someone is less likely to buy a new one because they're going to buy that one. But there is a myth on the right that the right is trying desperately to perpetrate that, you know, going against their beliefs, going against conservative white supremacist politics is dangerous for businesses.
Starting point is 00:21:06 And, you know, they are focused on one of the headlines on Drudge this weekend was NFL ratings expected to go down again this year, which would have been true whether or not there was this controversy because NFL ratings, along with all TV ratings, have been going down pretty steadily on average. Like when you look at the mean, they've all been going down because more and more things are on streaming and, you know, you can play video games. There's just all sorts of reasons TV ratings are going down. I'm going to focus on that because, you know, we'll talk a little bit later, but they are the smaller group in a cultural landscape where they're having to, you know, do a lot of work and a lot of contorting to make themselves seem a relevant and important and, you know, like they are the underdog, I guess. Yeah, always the victim. Always the victim. All right.
Starting point is 00:22:04 We're going to take a quick break. We'll be right back. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017 was murdered. There are crooks everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate. My name is Manuel Delia.
Starting point is 00:22:28 I am one of the hosts of Crooks Everywhere, a podcast that unhurts the plot to murder a one-woman Wikileaks. Daphne exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. And she paid the ultimate price. into a mafia state. And she paid the ultimate price. Listen to Crooks everywhere on the iHeartRadio app,
Starting point is 00:22:53 Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This summer, the nation watched as the Republican nominee for president was the target of two assassination attempts separated by two months. These events were mirrored nearly 50 years ago when President Gerald Ford faced two attempts on his life in less than three weeks. President Gerald R. Ford came stunningly close to being the victim of an assassin today. And these are the only two times we know of that a woman has tried to assassinate a U.S. president. One was the protege of infamous cult leader Charles Manson. I always felt like Lynette was kind of his right-hand woman. The other, a middle-aged housewife working undercover for the FBI in a violent revolutionary underground.
Starting point is 00:23:43 Identified by police as Sarah Jean Moore. The story of one strange and violent summer. This is Rip Current. Available now with new episodes every Thursday. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I've been thinking about you. I want you back in my life.
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Starting point is 00:25:12 This podcast is an intergenerational conversation between Latinas from Gen X to Gen Z. We're covering everything from body image to representation in film and television. We even interview iconic Latinas like Puerto Rican actress Ana Ortiz. I felt in control of my own physical body and my own self. I was on birth control. I had sort of had my first sexual experience. If you're in your señora era
Starting point is 00:25:40 or know someone who is, then this is the show for you. We're your host, Diosa and Mala, and you might recognize us from our flagship podcast, Locatora Radio. We're so excited for you to hear our brand new podcast, Señora Sex Ed. Listen to Señora Sex Ed on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And we're back. Speaking of things that aren't normal. So book Fear by Woodward is out, Bob Woodward. And it's just full of mind blowing details with regards to the Trump White House. So let's just take a look at a couple. There are so many. There's just so much stuff in here.
Starting point is 00:26:25 I'm just going to pull quotes from the Washington Post article because they were the ones who had access to the book because Woodward is obviously a Washington Post reporter. They talk about Trump sitting down to a mock interview of like what the questions Mueller would ask him and how he would perform. ask him and how he would perform. So his lawyer Dowd peppered Trump with questions about the Russia investigation and kept provoking stumbles, contradictions, and lies until the president eventually lost his cool, shouted, this thing's a goddamn hoax. And at the start of a 30-minute rant that finished with him saying, I don't really want to testify. Right. The next part of that, when they say that Jay Sekulow and John Dowd went to Mueller's office to talk about like why they probably don't want him to interview is amazing because he's saying, I'm not going to sit there and let him look like an idiot. And you
Starting point is 00:27:16 publish that transcript because everything leaks in Washington and the guys overseas are going to say, I told you he was an idiot. I told you he was a goddamn dumbbell. What are we dealing with this idiot for? John, I understand, Mueller replied, according to Woodward. We all understand. Even Mueller's like, no, I mean, I get why you wouldn't want this guy, but
Starting point is 00:27:37 sorry, them's the rules. Or I mean, if they're our rules, who knows anyway. Woodward is the guy who brought down Nixon through Watergate and his investigation to Watergate. So it's important to like this is somebody who has some, you know, frame of reference of like how a corrupt and fucked up White House operates. So he also there's a story about how John Kelly would frequently lose his temper and told colleagues that he thought the president was, quote, unhinged. In one small group meeting, Kelly said of Trump, quote, he's an idiot. It's pointless to try to convince him of anything. He's gone off the rails. We're
Starting point is 00:28:16 in crazy town. I don't even know why any of us are here. This is the worst job I've ever had. End quote. Wow. And just to be clear again, this is not like a Taco Bell in Topeka. This is the worst job I've ever had. End quote. Wow. And just to be clear again, this is not like a Taco Bell in Topeka. This is the White House. This is the White House. This is John Kelly being like, this is the worst job. I hate it. He's so dumb. Why don't you resign? Right. Who cares? I mean, he's
Starting point is 00:28:38 already shown himself to be a disgrace, too. So I don't think, you know, John, go do yourself a favor too, and why don't you resign because it's not like you're the one who's like oh he's the one holding it all together i don't know though who the fuck would come in and run things dennis rodman yes like what would it look like like we would we all just be i don't know i just don't know who we want in that role because it has to be someone that Trump respects.
Starting point is 00:29:06 Well, anyone who would want that. But it even sounds like John Kelly can't even get him. So it's not like there's anyone actually keeping it together. If John Kelly's like, he doesn't even fucking live. What's the fucking point? Yeah. No, he's. So yeah, then what's the point of you being there anyway?
Starting point is 00:29:19 Very frustrated. In terms of how Trump thinks about the people around him, the book says that he does an impression of General H.R. McMaster behind his back, puffing up his chest and exaggerating his breathing as he impersonates him. because he doesn't wear expensive suits. And he called Attorney General Jeff Sessions a traitor, complained everyone's trying to get me, and also called Sessions, quote, mentally retarded. Yeah. He said, this guy is mentally retarded. He's this dumb Southerner. He couldn't even be a one-person country lawyer down in Alabama.
Starting point is 00:30:01 Yeah. And who picked him again for... Right, exactly. The other thing about Wilbur Ross, he said, like, Trump told Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who actually looks like a person who's rotting from greed inside. Right. He said, Trump. He's the guy who lied to Forbes, right? Yeah.
Starting point is 00:30:17 And who I think we talked about. Yeah. How his lies about being a billionaire to try and get the Forbes list. And he's actually one of the biggest criminals in that administration. But he's just been so stealth about it. He's not like the Scott Pruitt ilk of just doing it out in the open. Anyway, he told Wilbur Ross, who's like older than him, goes, I don't trust you.
Starting point is 00:30:33 I don't want you doing any more negotiations. You're past your prime, which that makes sense. But again, these are the people that you're hiring. The best people. Only the best people. The other amazing one, did you read the one about Gary Cary cone like stealing stuff off his desk no so okay so gary cone has basically because this dude is so you know mentally not there all the time there was a thing he said according to woodward this is in the washington post thing he said cone quote stole a letter off trump's desk end quote that
Starting point is 00:31:01 the president was intending to sign to formally withdraw the United States from a trade agreement with South Korea. Cohn later told an associate that he removed the letter to protect national security and that Trump did not notice that it was missing. Wow. That's awesome. And then CNN also reported on this more. And from Cohn, it said, I stole it off his desk, Cohn told an associate. I wouldn't let him see it.
Starting point is 00:31:20 He's never going to see that document. Got to protect the country. So that's how we're doing it. It's just like, you know. know and the reason just steal the desk yeah right take it all here's an anecdote uh about why they might be worried about national security with him in charge the president once phoned defense secretary james mattis and said let's fucking kill him after syrian leader bashar al-assad launched a chemical attack on civilians let's go in let's kill the fucking lot of them Trump said and yeah
Starting point is 00:31:53 they were like oh okay so so that's not how this works that's against international law the way this was reported is because he basically was granted interviews by people who were familiar with the situation on the condition of what's called deep background, which means that he can write what they tell him. He just couldn't reveal the particular sources, but he's like, this was a person who was there and saw this. This is not hearsay.
Starting point is 00:32:23 This is direct reporting. I'm just not allowed to say who it was. I thought all anonymous This is not like hearsay. This is like direct reporting. I'm just not allowed to say who it was. I thought all anonymous sources were made up, though. Yeah. That was fake news. Be careful. Whoever this anonymous source is, he needs to go to jail. I don't know who this guy is.
Starting point is 00:32:35 Can we go back to the beer salesman thing? How does a beer salesman dress? And how would Donald Trump know how a beer salesman dresses? He doesn't drink. He doesn't pay people. Was that even a profession? Like a door-to-door beer? Because you think he's thinking of a time when
Starting point is 00:32:50 he's still engaged with the normal world. So like in the 60s were there door-to-door beer sales? I'm imagining one of those kids trying to raise money for a softball field trip. Hello, man. My name is... Would you like to buy this beer? This Coors Light. Yeah, we have either Hershey's chocolate, giant Reese's Pieces.
Starting point is 00:33:07 Whatever you want. Man, I'm buying that beer. I'm buying that beer. Yeah, a lot of these sort of excerpts are just... But also Trump's suits are terrible. Yeah. Trump doesn't dress well. His clothes aren't well tailored.
Starting point is 00:33:19 He's got these super long jackets and ties. He looks terrible. He does seem to have a double standard with regards to other people and himself. Sure. I've noticed. I don't know. That's just trademark. One last one about Ivanka, though,
Starting point is 00:33:32 that I really like is that there's an interaction with her and Steve Bannon. He goes, you're a goddamn staffer. Bannon screamed at her, telling her that she had to work through Priebus like the other aides. Quote, you walk around this place and act like you're in charge and you're not.
Starting point is 00:33:46 You're on staff. End quote. Ivanka Trump, who had special acts with the president and worked around Priebus, replied, quote, I'm not a staffer. I'll never be staffer. I'm the first daughter. Oh. Speaking of messy drama, a lot of shit is going on on Capitol Hill today.
Starting point is 00:34:03 The Kavanaugh hearings are ongoing, getting pretty contentious. There was Pat Leahy implying that Kavanaugh was given hacked Democrat emails to prep for past hearings. Yeah. Well, so basically when Kavanaugh was working at the White House for Bush, you know, part of his duties was preparing Bush appointees, nominees to guide them through the judicial confirmation process. And he was saying like, you know, part of it is trying to figure out what senators are going to ask during the hearings to kind of make sure everyone's prepared. But Pat Leahy was basically saying like, you worked with a dude who stole emails from me and you gave him, he gave you information on like very specific pointed things I wanted to talk about. And you use that to like your advantage to kind of figure out
Starting point is 00:34:47 however you're going to spin it. And there was like this whole very tense back and forth where like Brett Kavanaugh was trying to play dumb, but Pat Leahy like had documents in front of him was like, is this email not from him talking about like with my email? And then he's like, well, let me see. And he like just took the paper. And read extremely slowly.
Starting point is 00:35:03 Yeah, like you could tell he was doing that thing where he was like, okay, what the bread? What the fuck you gonna say here? He's like, oh, I'm CC'd here. Okay, and Pat Leahy is so, I mean, he's also someone who is slipping into senility before our eyes. Like watching him and Chuck Grassley go back and forth
Starting point is 00:35:19 was very painful. But yeah, that was like a very painful moment. There's another one where he was saying like, did you know about these warrantless surveillance programs that the Bush White House was going to engage in like post 9-11? Right. The Patriot Act. Right. And he was saying like, oh, well, there are a few. I don't know. Like in 2004, he said he knew nothing of it. And then Leahy played him a tape from like 2004 or 2006 or something. And then he was like, so at that time, you're saying that's when you found out about it?
Starting point is 00:35:44 And he's like, yeah. And he's like, well, when did you start talking about these kinds of programs? Was it maybe after nine 11? And he's like, oh, I don't know. And he looks at Chuck Grassley and he's like, well, the chairman has made some documents, basically committee confidential, but I believe if this were made public, this would jar your memory in a way that you would be able to answer me very clearly. Right. And then Chuck Grassley was like, it was like this whole, it literally was the sound of that whole thing yeah it got a little hot in there but then then lindsey graham on the republican side what kind of questions are they well you know pat lay he's like where'd you get these hacked emails blah blah blah and then lindsey graham's like
Starting point is 00:36:17 did you hug your kids last night and what did you say kavanaugh specifically said and this is important information guys that he gave his daughter a special hug. Yeah, or she gave him one. She gave him a special hug. But they also keep asking him about 9-11. Like one Republican senator was like, what were you doing on 9-11? And then another was like, there was that fateful day when two planes struck the Twin Towers and one struck the Pentagon down here. Like, it was like yeah no we
Starting point is 00:36:45 remember 9-11 yeah you don't have to jog his memory well they gotta give it wasn't the hindenburg which i also saw uh but yeah i think he they had to give him that breathing space because like after the democrats grill him although diane feinstein could have gone a little bit harder then they level it off by being like and when you read to kill a mockingbird uh you actually didn't say the N-word even in your head as you read it, correct? Because that's how not racist you are. Like they were bringing, for some reason he kept talking about To Kill a Mockingbird and how like woke he, it was a strange thing. But again, this is all, it's all theater.
Starting point is 00:37:19 Right. And just to kind of make the stakes clear, because his background, he is very anti, like, Trump probably won't have to testify or, you know, be indicted if he is nominated. Right. Well, yeah, I think that's the other thing is he has a very generous view of executive power. Right. Basically, like, yeah, when you're president, you're king of everything. So or but hiding under the idea of like, well, you can't be distracted, but this man can't even color the American flag correctly.
Starting point is 00:37:50 And then apparently there was this case Roe v. Wade that people keep talking about. You should have heard him basically give the Wikipedia answer to it. Cause like Lindsey Graham was like, you know, Roe v. Wade. And he was just like, Roe v. Wade was a case of like, it was so odd. We're like, okay, we get it. You guys worked on this before. Right. But yeah, there's a lot of issues that he would probably be a tie breaking vote in the wrong direction, especially when you look at things like labor and reproductive rights and the like.
Starting point is 00:38:16 Let's talk about the anonymous op ed in The New York Times. The what? So have you heard about this? Have you seen this? Hey, have you guys seen this? Have you guys heard about this? Have you seen this? Hey, have you guys seen this? Have you guys heard about this? So a high-ranking White House official has taken the drastic step of reporting that they are in a perpetual state of like a soft coup where they just protect us and the president from his worst inclinations and that there were whispers of the 25th Amendment early on. A soft coo is the sound that pigeons make.
Starting point is 00:38:50 Right, it is. Yeah. Exactly. It's just kind of nice and white noisy. And so, I mean, this has kicked off a full-on game of clue in the White House where people are examining the language. The writer uses the word lodestar, which is kind of a weird and specific word that apparently Vice President Pence has used multiple times in the past. And he is probably the person who would have the most
Starting point is 00:39:20 to gain if Trump left office. He's probably also used it most on speeches that were like spelled phonetically with pictograms or whatever. Right. Yeah, that's very true. But apparently Lodestar is a piece of military terminology. So it could also be any of the hundreds of people who have military backgrounds. Yeah, because the title that they use describe a senior aide could be like hundreds of people. Yes.
Starting point is 00:39:47 So, yeah, I think it's a large group. It could be a nobody. It could be a somebody. Right. The point is we should be very excited that unelected career bureaucrats, famously the chillest people, are shadow running the government. Right. Oh, you chose to move to D.C. at 21?
Starting point is 00:40:05 Right. Right. That's kind of- Oh, you chose to move to DC at 21? Right. Awesome. It seems like that's what they were expecting or based, that seems to be how people took the intention of the op-ed is that they just wanted credit for the fact that they are doing the right thing. I feel like there are plenty of cynical ways that this could be viewed, though, either, you know, as somebody, first of all, like planting words specifically to implicate other people. I don't know why. It's like internal politics within the staff. Let's get Pence's speechwriter fired or whatever.
Starting point is 00:40:37 And also, I mean, this is coming out. I mean, this was submitted last week, but it is hitting at the same time as the woodward book which you know has a bunch of specific names talking shit about the president so if you were behind one of those people you had some sense that this book was coming out that was going to make somebody in front of you look bad and then you planted an op-ed that seemed like it was could have been written by them or just to like further infuriate the president. I don't know. It just seems weird that we're just kind of taking them at their word.
Starting point is 00:41:11 Well, yeah, like on one side, I know a lot of liberal people were like, oh, that's fucking dope, man. I'm glad there are people trying to do it. On the other hand, too, you can look at it and be like, this is also kind of terrifying, too. Oh, yeah. Do you know people that felt the former no i think the initial reaction was sort of like holy shit man yeah like fucking stop this guy or
Starting point is 00:41:31 whatever because on the shallow state yeah because on like you know when you hear about military like generals being like yeah they told me to do something but fuck that i'm not going to do it which makes sense because they know when their military expertise like to take orders from the president when he's saying like yeah let's's just execute heads of state or whatever, do things like that. That is completely bonkers shit. But at the same time, when you hear about like the military not taking orders from like the president, like that can slowly turn into some other kind of military coup problem. But not that that's that's really not sort of, this is such a bizarre case because you have someone who is doing things
Starting point is 00:42:07 that are completely out of the normal and completely divorced from the reality of the diplomatic situation or whatever the actual world situation is that it's hard to sort of look at it and go like, oh, this is fucked up. It's kind of unnerving. Yeah, I mean, that it seemed to be as much like,
Starting point is 00:42:24 it'd be one thing if they were just like we think this guy makes not sensible decisions that are uninformed so we're doing our best to keep things level-headed because he's impetuous or whatever but it seemed to be kind of shadow saying like we believe this man has some form of dementia or dissociative right like degenerative disease of the brain. But don't worry, we're going to like keep things running until he, you know, his head explodes or he's indicted or someone else is elected. And it feels like that is actually specifically what the 25th Amendment is for.
Starting point is 00:42:57 Right. Like rather than just being like, we disagree and he's a bad guy. Right. Right. He gets mad. Yeah. I mean, Miles, you were saying kind of this could be viewed as a cry for help to Congress because they're just not doing their job.
Starting point is 00:43:10 This is for real, right? Congress should be like, hold the fuck up. There are people in the cabinet or in the White House who are just out there being like, yo, this guy is wholly unfit. You would call them and be like, please tell us about what's going on at the White House. Right. Please tell me what you know, what you have seen, because as part of the Congress, we can check the presidential power. And if they're if this person is that unfit, we need to
Starting point is 00:43:33 know so we can do what we can to whether impeach that or just figure out or bring to light what is actually going on. But again, I don't think I think the person who wrote this op ed, like who are the if they really felted, like who are the, if they really felt like this, who are they going to go to in Congress? Right. Especially before Kavanaugh is confirmed. I feel like whatever, whatever suddenly out of nowhere righteous action that might happen is not going to happen until they get their Supreme Court justice. Yeah. And there's so many Trump hacks in Congress that who do you know you can trust is tell that to, and they don't, they don't immediately go to the white house and be like, Hey, this guy just said this shit.
Starting point is 00:44:06 Right. You need to figure this out. But I think that that could be the other thing too, because I think part of it was saying like the people need to come together too. And maybe that's us putting pressure on Congress now to like really look into this more, but with everything that we've read and even just the last three days,
Starting point is 00:44:20 like with the Woodward excerpts and excerpts. And now this, you think that Congress would be like, it sounds like this guy is really fucking up, as if we didn't know that already. But now, like, how are they going to hide and completely abandon their responsibility to actually have any kind of power to look at the presidency and say, like, okay, we need to look at this a little bit and figure out what to do. to look at the presidency and say, like, OK, we need to look at this a little bit and figure out what to do.
Starting point is 00:44:44 There was a New York Times profile of Paul Ryan a couple weeks ago where he basically expressed a similar thing where he was thinking of himself as sort of the last line of defense because he was saying, man, you guys have no idea how bad, like, how many catastrophes I've averted. Right. Like, essentially. It could have been way worse. Right.
Starting point is 00:45:04 It could have been way worse. Like. It could have been way worse. Like I'm here to prevent the president from ending the world. It seems like that's how everybody on all sides is thinking. And I mean, yeah, maybe this person is just trying to bring it to a head in some way because there's no way that they wrote this and thought Trump wouldn't have a reaction. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, right. I mean, so much of like, I feel like right wing use of the media is like to communicate with or provoke him specifically in a way that you can't in a face to face meeting, but like headlines and that is how you get to him. So it's like, what do they want out of him? You know, like and him calling like, is this treason or like the New York Times? Like, I'm going to demand them legally that they tell me or it's like, what do they want out of him? You know, like in him calling, like, is this treason or like the New York Times?
Starting point is 00:45:46 Like, I'm going to demand them legally that they tell me. It's like, I don't know where that goes. Yeah, right. Well, other people think maybe like if maybe it could be Don McGahn because he has a knack for getting things out there. And this could also serve as a distraction from Kavanaugh's hearings, which aren't going that great. Right. And now everyone's going to be like, who's the op-ed? Right.
Starting point is 00:46:06 Who is this op-ed? You know, like, and because, you know, Don McGahn is close friends with Brett Kavanaugh, that people have seen it as a distraction to that. People have seen it as a right wing way of getting people to believe in this deep state conspiracy even more that there is like this other government working against Trump, too. But at the very least, we can see that the dysfunction has reached fever pitch. Right. But again, it's like one of those things, man.
Starting point is 00:46:31 We've been knowing how bad this is and how awfully this administration has been running that I guess maybe it's just to get Congress to run out of like rhetorical defenses of as to why they don't need to investigate the president or why they don't impeach him, be like, I'm sorry, I have an op-ed. There's an op-ed from people in the White House saying like, this thing is melting down. And you're still not gonna do anything? But it seems, I mean, yeah,
Starting point is 00:46:54 the New York Times credibility has been so well called into question in that sort of fake Trump actualized fake news way that I feel like it's not very hard for them to just be like, you know, the New York Times refuses to say the name. We don't believe this is real. Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, the idea of normalization could be raised in relation to basically every Trump story that we're talking about or have talked about in the past month
Starting point is 00:47:17 on this podcast. But I was listening to this podcast, Rational Security security that's hosted by a bunch of you know professors and analysts and experts on national security and who have worked their whole careers in the national security apparatus and they were just marveling over the fact that trump openly called for sessions to stop going after people who are loyal to trump and like pushing him to go after Democrats because it's bad for the Republicans in the lead up to the midterms. And they were just saying like, that's just textbook corruption. That's like what, if this was on some secret tape of him telling his attorney general, stop going after my people, go after these other people because it's better for me personally,
Starting point is 00:48:09 then it would be grounds for impeachment. But because he does it on Twitter and we're so used to him just tweeting the wildest shit ever that it just doesn't even register. They were saying nobody even wrote about the fact that he did that. Right, yeah, because it's just been like, oh, here he goes.
Starting point is 00:48:26 That's how everyone's saying, like, baby's whining again. Yeah, yeah. When it's not like the president is trying to fucking melt down the republic. The president profoundly doesn't understand how law or morality works. Right. Uh-oh. Yeah, that's how we're approaching it. Yeah, it's true.
Starting point is 00:48:42 This dummy needs a nap. Yeah, there is this article in the New York Review of Books. It was about global warming, but it was talking about the fact that, I'll just read the quote, the great Dutch writer and historian Geert Maak once told me that in 1933, the Dutch newspapers were full of stories of the threat of Nazism. Yet by 1938, those same papers were all but silent on the subject. Sometimes it seems threats to our future become so great that we opt to ignore them. And also I think it's like sometimes it's just you get tired of a story
Starting point is 00:49:16 or you just get used to the story or like the temperature in the room gets heightened to a point that you don't even really notice when like a certain line is crossed. Cooking lobsters in cold water. Right. Exactly. Slowly turning it up. Yeah. I don't know why it's always frogs.
Starting point is 00:49:31 They say that you don't you don't eat frogs for poor. Yeah. Lobster is what you would cook that way. Right. Yeah. And then I think that's what also makes me think, too, you know, like maybe the Republicans do know that the clock is ticking for trump and they do know that something's probably going to go down and then this is the kavanaugh thing is just the last thing they're going to get out of this is just to get him confirmed like that's another reason why i feel like they've had that feeling though for 18 months and that they
Starting point is 00:49:57 are just like people at a casino and one of those like cash grab things with a wind tunnel where they get a minute to like grab 20s but like they keep adding time to it. They're like, this is insane. There's now just 20s kind of buried in the corner. I've got most of them, but like I'm obviously not going to stop grabbing the 20s until they let me out. But oh my God, like they keep giving me time. And with regard specifically to the Sessions-Trump relationship, just a year ago, Lindsey Graham
Starting point is 00:50:24 was saying it would be the beginning of the end of Trump's presidency if he fired Sessions-Trump relationship. Just a year ago, Lindsey Graham was saying it would be the beginning of the end of Trump's presidency if he fired Sessions, and now he sees that tweet, he sees no one's responding to it, and now he's saying, well, he deserves an attorney general he can trust. So he's just like, we'll let you fire him after Kavanaugh gets approved.
Starting point is 00:50:41 I don't know what's going on with Lindsey. And apparently Lindsey Graham was on some show yesterday saying, sort of laying out a more detailed groundwork for the firing of Sessions, saying that he bungled the family separation story. Oh, I love that. They don't give a fuck, but then they're like, let's just pin it on that guy. Right, right. We like the idea of the child separation, but then let's just act like we don't.
Starting point is 00:51:03 And then Jeff Sessions. From a PR standpoint, it wasn't handled as well as it should have. Right. There's summer camps though, as they were saying on Fox. Right. All right.
Starting point is 00:51:13 We're going to take a quick break. We'll be right back. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th 2017 was murdered. There are crooks everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate. My name is Manuel Delia. I am one of the hosts of Crooks Everywhere, a podcast that unhearts the plot to murder a one-woman Wikileaks. a podcast that unhurts the plot to murder a one-woman Wikileaks. Daphne exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state.
Starting point is 00:51:51 And she paid the ultimate price. Listen to Crooks everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This summer, the nation watched as the Republican nominee for president was the target of two assassination attempts, separated by two months. These events were mirrored nearly 50 years ago, when President Gerald Ford faced two attempts on his life in less than three weeks. President Gerald R. Ford came stunningly close to being the victim of an assassin today. And these are the only two times we know of that a woman has tried to assassinate a U.S. president.
Starting point is 00:52:38 One was the protege of infamous cult leader Charles Manson. I always felt like Lynette was kind of this right-hand woman. The other, a middle-aged housewife working undercover for the FBI in a violent revolutionary underground. Identified by police as Sarah Jean Moore. The story of one strange and violent summer. This is Rip Current.
Starting point is 00:53:00 Available now with new episodes every Thursday. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 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.
Starting point is 00:53:20 All you need to do is record everything like you always do. One session. 24 hours. BPM 110. 120. She's terrified. Should we wake her up? Absolutely not.
Starting point is 00:53:36 What was that? 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.
Starting point is 00:53:53 There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing. They're just dreams. Dream Sequence is a new horror thriller 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.
Starting point is 00:54:33 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. 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
Starting point is 00:54:56 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. And we're back. And so there's a story in the Wall Street Journal a couple weeks ago about how Qatar is seeking to influence American policy now and basically they've realized that because we don't have a process driven institution running the
Starting point is 00:55:32 country and instead we just have like a cult of personality yeah one adult megalomaniac that like they just need to get to people around him so they've spent 13 million dollars lobbying people who they know just like hang out with him, lobbying people at Mar-a-Lago, putting op-ed pieces where he might see them. It's basically the equivalent of putting billboards up in his eyeline that you know or he might see because it's just- Because that's how predictable this yeah it's just like he's the guy and this is a corrupt authoritarian style government so we just need to like
Starting point is 00:56:12 get in front of him somehow and so they paid for alan dershowitz who has no like official role other than like dude trump talks to a lot right And the guy who just makes up cool legal theories to be like, oh, no, he's cool. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They flew him to Qatar and he wrote a positive op-ed about them in The Hill and then was like, when it was discovered that this was all part of a lobbying effort, he was like, if I had known that they were doing this because they thought I would influence the president, I would not have gone. Okay.
Starting point is 00:56:48 But it's just like, yo. Yeah, because the Qatari Board of Tourism really needed the Alan Dershowitz fucking seal of approval
Starting point is 00:56:57 to get people to, what the fuck is he thinking? Well, he can't hang out in Martha's Vineyard anymore, so he was like, what's another cool place I can spend summers?
Starting point is 00:57:04 Qatar. Will they be cool with me? I guess Doha is the new Martha's Vineyard anymore. So he was like, what's another cool place I can spend summers? Qatar. Will they be cool with me? I guess Doha is the new Martha's Vineyard. That's what they say. Mike Huckabee is also one of his friends that they're trying to influence. Cool friends. Yes. It's, yeah.
Starting point is 00:57:17 Funny dude. I mean, because they were also, you know, flirting with the idea of floating Jared some money to handle his debts too. So you've seen how Qatar has kind of entered the picture here and there to, to try and get some influence. But man, that's just so like, I guess the game is so elementary that,
Starting point is 00:57:33 you know, the tactics here are just like, dude, just get him, get to him through his friends. Right. It's like how, like I think any person starting out trying to figure out how to infiltrate
Starting point is 00:57:42 something is like, I guess I can get through their friends. Like if you, if you're like a SoundCloud rapper and you're trying to get your fucking mixtape heard, you're like, well, who does Dre hang out with?
Starting point is 00:57:49 Okay. I'm gonna hang outside the Apple music offices and I'm gonna offer some, every person out there 50 bucks to take my mixtape just to take it. You know what I mean? It's the same sort of, the logic is very simple. It's like taking a catering job at like a studio heads, daughters,
Starting point is 00:58:04 like bat mitzvah and like sliding a script under the toilet or whatever. You know, I do drive by this billboard kind of often that just has a picture of a dude with a hat on and it just says at Chaz Fusion. And it says like, I will entertain you. And like I keep at first I was like, who is that? This is so funny to buy. Like it's such a tall billboard and it's in a strange neighborhood that doesn't have a lot of billboards. And then I was like, I'm kind of interested. Who is Chaz Fusion? Who is Chaz Fusion? It's such a tall billboard. And it's in a strange neighborhood that doesn't have a lot of billboards. And then I was like, I'm kind of interested.
Starting point is 00:58:25 Who is Chaz Fugin? Who is Chaz Fugin? It seemed like he could entertain me. He got my attention, Chaz. Did you find out? Oh, man, we're giving him all this free press. Yeah, I know. I might be misremembering the handle,
Starting point is 00:58:35 so don't worry. He'll have to pay me. I'm trying to sign him, basically. 28% is standard. All right. That's going to do it for this week's weekly Zeitgeist. Please like and review the show if you like the show.
Starting point is 00:58:52 It means the world to Miles. He needs your validation, folks. I hope you're having a great weekend, and I will talk to you Monday. Bye. Bye. Bye. Thank you. assassinated. Crooks Everywhere unearths the plot to murder a one-woman WikiLeaks. She exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. Listen to Crooks Everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Starting point is 01:00:26 How do you feel about biscuits? Hi, I'm Akilah Hughes, and I'm so excited about my new podcast, Rebel Spirit, where I head back to my hometown in Kentucky and try to convince my high school to change their racist mascot, the rebels, into something everyone in the South loves, the biscuits. I was a lady rebel. Like, what does that even mean? It's right here in black and white in print. It's bigger than a flag or mascot. Listen to Rebel Spirit on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. In California during the summer of 1975, within the span of 17 days and less than 90 miles, two women did something no other woman had done before,
Starting point is 01:01:04 try to assassinate the President of the United States. One was the protege of Charles Manson. 26-year-old Lynette Fromm, nicknamed Squeaky. The other, a middle-aged housewife working undercover for the FBI. Identified by police as Sarah Jean Moore.
Starting point is 01:01:19 The story of one strange and violent summer this season on the new podcast, Rip Current. Hear episodes of Rip Current early and completely ad-free and receive exclusive bonus content by subscribing to iHeartTrue Crime Plus only on Apple Podcasts. There's so much beauty in Mexican culture, like mariachis, delicious cuisine, and even lucha libre. and even Lucha Libre. Join us for the new podcast, Lucha Libre Behind the Mask, a 12-episode podcast in both English and Spanish about the history and cultural richness of Lucha Libre. And I'm your host, Santos Escobar,
Starting point is 01:01:55 emperor of Lucha Libre and a WWE superstar. Listen to Lucha Libre Behind the Mask on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you stream podcasts.

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