The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - #BecauseMiami: F-CK, IT'S HOT!

Episode Date: May 24, 2024

Billy Corben and Roy walked into the a studio with a broken air conditioner in the hottest month of May in the history of the city of Miami. We talk climate change and how it affects South Florida wit...h Brian McNoldy from the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science. Florida governor Ron DeSantis wants chaplains to be employed by public schools in the state. Lucien Greaves from The Satanic Temple joins the show to talk about religious freedom and how no government should dictate wh ich religion is more important. Plus, we spin the Wheel of Despair. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Starting point is 00:00:00 You're listening to Giraffe King's Network. That's the sound of unaged whiskey transforming into Jack Daniel's Tennessee Whiskey in Lynchburg, Tennessee. Around 1860, nearest green taught Jack Daniel how to filter whiskey through charcoal for a smoother taste, one drop at a time. This is one of many sounds in Tennessee with a story to tell. To hear them in person, plan your trip at TNVacation.com. Tennessee sounds perfect. Now's a good time to remember where the story of tequila started. In 1795, the first tequila distillery was opened by the Cuervo family.
Starting point is 00:00:49 And 229 years later, Cuervo is still going strong. Family owned from the start, same family, same land. Now's a good time to enjoy Cuervo. The tequila that invented tequila. Go to Cuervo.com to shop tequila or visit a store near you. Cuervo, now's a good time. Trademarks owned by Beclet. SAB the CV. Copyright 2024. Proximo. Jersey City, New Jersey. Please drink responsibly. On Thursday we reported on NBC6 News that the government of Florida was beginning to roll back
Starting point is 00:01:18 really important climate change legislation and really important climate change language in spite of the fact that the state of Florida over the last couple of years has seen record heat, record flooding, record rain, record insurance rates, and the corals are dying all around the state. The entire world is looking to Florida to lead in climate change and our government is saying that climate change is no longer the priority it once was. Please keep in mind the most powerful climate change solution is the one you already have in the palm of your hands the right to vote and we will never tell you who to vote for but we will tell you
Starting point is 00:02:00 this we implore you to please do your research and know that there are candidates that believe in climate change and that there are solutions and there are candidates that don't. Miami meteorologist meltdown that was Steve McLaughlin of the NBC Miami affiliate. Listen, he's melting down because we're all melting. Shit Roy, I am melting in here today. It's hot. We were thinking that the episode title for this would be, it's hot.
Starting point is 00:02:38 If only because we'd have to put a little asterisk. Yeah, yes, I had to put the hyphen. Now you have to put the little asterisk. Now what, you. Listen, Roy, I'm coming in today all worried about the fact that it is the hottest May so far in the history of Miami. We experienced a heat advisory the earliest in the year ever in the history of recorded meteorology in Miami. The state of Florida just basically passed
Starting point is 00:03:09 and the governor signed, don't say climate change legislation. And I'm worried about the infrastructure crumbling. I'm worried about refrigeration and ACs not being able to handle the workload with temperatures this hot. And I come into the studio today and there's no air conditioning.
Starting point is 00:03:26 So all the fears and the nightmares coming to life. Brian McNoldie is a senior research associate at the University of Miami Rosenstiel School, one of the world's most respected institutions for oceanography, atmospheric science, and meteorology, which we all know is just junk science. It's Chinese conspiracy bullshit, Roy. Who are you gonna believe?
Starting point is 00:03:47 The governor or your lion flesh as it boils, boils when you step outside for five seconds in the month of May. SPF one million. Brian, talk to me, hottest May ever so far. How does this bode for the future of our community and our planet? Yeah this is a it's a rough start I mean we all know that once the heart of summer comes in it's brutal but May is usually kind of one of those months that we we ease into it a little bit and
Starting point is 00:04:20 this past weekend was just it was like fast forward to August and then turn the heat up a little right I mean, that's the thing is that earliest in the year to be setting records is the thing too like we expect August to be you know, like a friggin sauna, but it's May Like so what are the numbers because there's people listening all over the country, all over the world. I don't think they have an idea of what it's like to live in an armpit. Yeah. Yeah, we had two days in a row this past weekend where the heat index topped out at 112 degrees Fahrenheit, which for here, that's very hot.
Starting point is 00:04:59 I mean, the highest ever on record is 114, which just happened a year ago. Oh, so we're breaking records every year then? Yeah, fantastic. Miami, breaking records, man. Not the good ones, but nonetheless. No, two days in a row at 112 is absolutely crazy. That broke the previous records for the day by 11 degrees Fahrenheit.
Starting point is 00:05:20 Wait, 11 degrees? To break a record, yeah. And it also broke the record for the entire month by 6 degrees. In other words, the previous highest heat index any time in May of any year was 106. Now it's 112. You know, anecdotally, I've been saying I'm a native Floridian, a lifelong Miamian, and I've been saying for a lot of years, it feels like it's getting hotter every year.
Starting point is 00:05:47 I mean, that's purely anecdotal. It's purely just my impression of, man, it's hot. And sometimes you forget how hot it can get in the summer after 45 years of this bullshit, but the numbers bear that out. It is getting hot. It is hotter now, and it is getting hotter every year. So when people say, man, this feels like feels like the hottest, like that's all true.
Starting point is 00:06:08 Yeah. People who who are saying that are not imagining it. It absolutely is hotter now than it was 20 years ago, 40 years ago, 60 years ago. The trends are up. It's hotter and it's more humid. Speaking of humidity, what about rain? What is the rainfall like? What are the trends? Is it abnormal? And what does it indicate about what's happening to the climate and what may happen?
Starting point is 00:06:33 I think what everybody's really concerned about and scared about, which is hurricane season hasn't even started yet. It's not even June. The trends in rainfall are a little bit harder to yank apart and look for anything too substantial there, but what we have been seeing I think in recent years is more instances of extreme rainfall. So, even though your, let's say your total over a month or total over a year is not trending
Starting point is 00:06:59 that strong, we are seeing more instances of extreme rainfall. So, how much rain can fall in a short period of time, which, of course, we know that that creates giant messes. We've seen a few examples just within the last year, year and a half of that around. Absolutely. And we're here in downtown Miami, right by Bayside, which is ground zero, not just for aliens, mind you, but also for sunny day flooding.
Starting point is 00:07:26 Obviously, if it will flood in the sunshine, it gets really bad in the rain. Right over here is where Miami's own big dig is happening just north of the studio. The so-called billion dollar signature bridge. I mean, it just turns into an absolute ocean whenever there's a downpour of any kind. And it gets, I I mean it's untenable like you just can't go anywhere or do anything and mix that rainfall with the heat with the mugginess with the skeeters and it gets pretty terrible and what do we know or what we don't know anything but what what indicators do we
Starting point is 00:08:01 have for because obviously when there could be a busy hurricane season, we don't know what or how many storms will ever make landfall, but obviously if it's a busy season, odds are we're going to be threatened at some point or several points. So what are we anticipating or what should we look out for? What are the warning signs for this hurricane season? This is an action-packed question. So we're looking at here in May, we're looking forward to the next few months to a combination of environmental factors that we've never experienced before.
Starting point is 00:08:35 That's just excellent when you have no history to learn from or anything, of course. We just love that. The two things coming together. One, we have Laña coming, which all other things being equal, La Niña's act to enhance Atlantic hurricane activity, okay, not great for us. In addition to that, the Atlantic Ocean and the tropics, the Gulf of Mexico is all warmer than it's ever been also. And those warm anomalies are expected to continue into the heart of hurricane season.
Starting point is 00:09:07 So we've got a La Nina combined with ocean temperatures that have never been this warm. So what could possibly go wrong? I think what people may or may not understand is that the heat warms the ocean and is that warm water that really fuels, right? These storms. So that's why they become...
Starting point is 00:09:27 Yeah, hurricanes love warm water. They need it. The warmer it is, the more ecstatic they become. And that, I guess, increases the category and the severity of hurricanes. Yeah. Yeah, it can make them stronger. It makes things like rapid intensification
Starting point is 00:09:42 becomes more likely, where they can go from like a category one to three or four in one day, you know that that becomes more likely when you have really warm ocean temperatures. And what about this? This talk of perhaps creating a category six hurricane right now it only goes up it only goes up to five. But this Roy, this feels to me a little bit like the amp that goes up to 11 in spinal tap, you know, like it's like, well, this one goes up to 11. It's like we can't we just have like category five, like we know, I mean, obviously you might have to increase what the intensity on that. It's not even that it's like category five is anything over a certain threshold, right? I mean, do we need a cat six? What do we need? No, um, I don't think so. It's. It really was just kind of a thought exercise that the authors of that paper put out there.
Starting point is 00:10:31 Using the numbers that they proposed, there actually would not have ever been a category six in the Atlantic at all. The closest one would have been in 1980. We haven't come close to what they would say a category six would be since then. Yeah, we don't do thought exercises on the show, Brian. Okay, fine. Good. So last question before we go. I often talk about a corruption tax that we all pay here in Miami, whether we like it or not. And it is a real tax. It is real money out of our pockets that could otherwise be used to, you know, feed and clothe and house our families. But there is also, statewide, a what I call a climate change tax or a hurricane tax. This to me is
Starting point is 00:11:10 like if people don't care about the environment or the climate or the oceans or they aren't scared of hurricanes for whatever reason or they don't know they live in, you know, areas that aren't low-lying and don't flood like we experience here in the lost city of Miami or or soon to be lost city of Miami. People should care in Florida because everybody pays this tax. How does it manifest itself though, for like why people should care
Starting point is 00:11:36 because this hits their pocketbooks and their bank accounts? Yeah, I completely agree. There are aspects of climate change and just the climate in general here that cost people money. Let's go back to the heat topic. Crazy heat. If you have air conditioning, excellent, but it's gonna gradually cost you more and more and more. It puts more and more stress on the infrastructure to provide air conditioning at the peak hours of the day. And for people without air conditioning,
Starting point is 00:12:07 I mean, it's a significant health concern. Yeah, and as Bloomberg reported this week, Florida has experienced, and this is just an average, 125% surge in property insurance bills. And that means that some people are experiencing upwards of 200% or more increases. Brian, how does that, I mean, is climate change and hurricanes have something to do with that?
Starting point is 00:12:33 I imagine as hurricanes hit and damage is done and insurance companies have to cover those costs, those expenses have to somehow get passed back to the customer, no? Yeah, that's unfortunately the way it goes for us. And insurance is absolutely one of the biggest topics in Florida for the hurricane insurance is just mind numbingly out of control. I wish I had an answer, but it's one of those things that is becoming
Starting point is 00:13:00 a reason that people need to move. They can't afford to ensure their houses anymore. Absolutely. Businesses are closing down. People are moving out of the state, particularly Miami. I think Miami-Dade County had a net population decrease once again this past year. And what did you say?
Starting point is 00:13:16 Mind numbingly, what was the turn of phrase? Mind, whatever it is, mind numbingly out of control. I think that's what people call this show as well. Brian McNoldy, find him at B McNoldie on the platform formerly known as Twitter. He is a great follow if you enjoy existential dread. Brian, thanks so much for being here. Please come back and see us again
Starting point is 00:13:39 if there is a place to come back and see us again. I would love to, thank you. Since the dawn of mankind, we've cooked our food over an open flame and debated the best way to grill. One thing not up for debate, grilling and beer always go together. And not just any beer will do. Whether you barbecue Texas style or celebrate Wednesday with burgers and dogs, you need a beer that tastes great and is less filling. So you have more room for food. You need Miller Lite. As you guys may or may not know, I'm a pretty decent cook, especially behind the barbecue. So when I start the fire for my smoker on a hot day, really the only thing that I have to worry about is what wood I'm going to
Starting point is 00:14:14 use. The easiest decision for me is what I'll be drinking. That's a nice ice cold can of Mille-Lite. Oh, and by the way, here's a pro tip. It really goes well with brisket. Mille-Lite keeps it simple, undebatable quality, and tastes as great as your barbecue. A perfect companion for grill masters across America. With the Miller Lite in hand, grilling doesn't just taste great, it tastes like Miller time. To get Miller Lite delivered right at your door,
Starting point is 00:14:36 visit MillerLite.com slash Dan. Or you can find it pretty much anywhere that sells beer. Celebrate responsibly. Miller Brewing Company, Milwaukee, Wisconsin. 96 calories per 12 ounces. But if these students have the ability to get mentorship, to get counseling from faith leaders, that is something that they should have the right to pursue if that is what they want. And this bill ensures that. And I think it's going to make a positive impact on a lot of students throughout the state of Florida.
Starting point is 00:15:05 Now, some have said that if you do a school chaplain program, that somehow you're going to have Satanist running around in all our schools. Just understand, we're not playing those games in Florida. That is not a religion. That is not qualifying to be able to participate in this. So we're going to be using common sense when it comes to this. So you don't have to worry about that. The frightening thing about common sense is whose sense are we talking about? Well, common sense isn't common there, Billy. No, it's not common and particularly not in Florida where we are immune to reason and
Starting point is 00:15:54 sanity. More importantly, if it doesn't upset you that the governor of anything is telling us what is and isn't a real religion. The governor Ron DeSantis signed a law into an effect that will allow school boards, in fact, I think forced them to vote as to whether or not they want religious ministers, chaplains, they're calling them in public schools to these are untrained people. These are unlicensed people. I think they just have to register and pass like a background check. And then they're just welcome to come and minister to children in public schools. Now, the Satanic Temple is a non-theistic religious organization that fights for religious liberty recognized by the IRS as a religion, Roy, they do not worship Satan, nor to my understanding do
Starting point is 00:16:46 they even believe in the existence of Satan or anything supernatural for that matter. According to their website, the satanic temple.com, your new homepage, Roy, they believe in reason, empathy and the pursuit of knowledge. The complete opposite of Satan. They say, quote, Satanists should actively work to hone critical thinking and exercise reasonable agnosticism in all things. Our beliefs must be malleable to the best current scientific understandings of the material world, never the reverse. Co-founder Lucian Greaves joins us now. Lucian, thanks so much for being here on Because Miami. First thing
Starting point is 00:17:23 I'd like you to do is respond to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and his remarks there at that recent press conference. Well, to put it politely, he's full of shit on every level. He's wrong about us not being a religious organization. We're recognized as one by the IRS, and that's been upheld by a federal ruling since then. And we have all the benefits that a religion is coming to us that are coming to us from being a religious organization constitutionally.
Starting point is 00:17:53 And for a governor to stand up and say that he's going to bypass the constitution itself because he doesn't like the ramifications of endorsing pluralism in a particular circumstance is a horrible precedent. It's just a horrible thing to say. It's obviously irresponsible, it's divisive, and it has no legal weight whatsoever. The bill itself does not do anything to exclude us, and him standing up at a podium delivering these proclamations by fiat, hold absolutely no legal weight. So if he has any competence whatsoever, he should realize that he's simply grandstanding
Starting point is 00:18:35 in front of people. He's counting on people to forget this the next day. He's counting on people to forget that when Satanist chaplains are in the schools, that he invited them. But I guarantee you, we will remind them when we are in the schools and we have our chaplains there, we will be sure that people recognize that it is because of Ron DeSantis and he made it so.
Starting point is 00:18:58 Now, I want to understand what that means, because you have in other states and other school systems where there have been religious clubs and after school organizations, you have fought and gotten courts to and school boards to obviously be forced to agree to have Satanist or Satanic temple clubs as well. So people understand what would a Satanic temple club or in this case minister, minister to students in public schools? Well, similar to our after school Satan clubs, we would want our chaplains to be there as an alternative to somebody who's going to try to deliver indoctrination and proselytizing to people. We would hope that they would actually fulfill the role that people like DeSantis are saying they will, to provide more resources for children who need emotional support.
Starting point is 00:19:48 We know that's not the real reason they want chaplains in the schools. They want to show people that you can't just preference one viewpoint over another or give one viewpoint the stamp of authority of the government. And in case that is useful to children, it will be there. But don't get me wrong, while our after school clubs, I think, are a good thing, and I don't really necessarily mind if school districts have religious after-school clubs so long as pluralism is being respected. I think the chaplains are a horrible idea and I think our presence is just trying to mitigate some of the things that are horrible about it. But at the end of the day, I think they absolutely shouldn't be there. The reasons they give for putting chaplains in schools sound spurious at best.
Starting point is 00:20:47 And I just think they're bringing their culture wars into the school districts again, and they're not thinking about what this actually means for children in practice. I think this is interesting too, because basically what you're saying is, you don't really want to have Satanist ministers or chaplains in the public schools in Florida.
Starting point is 00:21:05 You don't want any chaplains in public schools in Florida, and you're attempting to illustrate the absurdity of this and the idea that the law itself cannot discriminate against your religion any more than it could Judaism or Islam or Christianity or Catholicism or Buddhism. You either need all or you need none. To that point, there is a mother from the Fort Pierce area, and this is a great story from the local affiliate WPTV, where immediately in real time, she started to rethink the wisdom of this policy. The Satanic Temple says they want ministers on campus to some folks originally in support
Starting point is 00:21:47 are switching sides. That makes me want to think maybe we should just keep maybe all of it out and just I know I just like completely like flip flopped in reverse. That is Cheyenne Bingham, a conservative mom from Fort Pierce that supported the idea of these chaplains when she thought it was only going to be chaplains that represented, I guess, the religion that she decided she once represented that she would think is a quote unquote real religion. The rest of her quote, Lucian, is I know I just completely flip flopped and reversed,
Starting point is 00:22:19 but that way, you know, no matter what religion you are, you don't have to worry about any influence of a different religion. Is this what we call a come to Jesus moment or a come to Satan moment? Like what, like you can practically see a light bulb go on over her head when she realizes, oh, I see if we have to allow all religions, including Satanism, maybe we shouldn't have religions in our public school this way. I think it's a come to democracy moment.
Starting point is 00:22:47 I think it's coming to understand the value and having that kind of separation between church and state. These are long time standards we've had and these kinds of walls we've had built up were part of an evolutionary process as we learn to kind of live with each other, coexist and not be in a state of constant civil war. And now we have people kind of provoking those things. And I think it's nice when people come to the realization and begin to see that perhaps the greater evil here is in allowing the government to dictate to people what is appropriate religious expression, what is not. When you actually have government functionaries
Starting point is 00:23:27 like somebody is irresponsible as DeSantis, getting himself involved in the most granular and personal of issues that could possibly be in somebody's lives. And I think even Christians begin to notice that they don't necessarily want followers by coercion. They want people to come to the truth as they see it. They want people not to be held under the thumb of government authority,
Starting point is 00:23:55 coercing them to take certain viewpoints, and none of us do. And I think that's what's really at stake here. As Billy said before the interview started, you don't actually believe in Satan or any religion, actually, you're just using this as a symbol. An over the top bang, bang somebody in the head with a sledgehammer symbol, just to get it out there. Well, I wanna ask you that, that's a good point, Lucian.
Starting point is 00:24:19 The Satanic temple has been around for, what about a decade? I think now you've been accused, or the organization's been accused of being a joke, a stunt, a hoax, dismissed as trolls. But this has also gotten pretty serious. I mean, life and death kind of serious. Not only is your membership up, but you've become the targets of some grave threats and in fact, real violence. So this isn't just a symbol or a joke of some kind, is it? No, we truly believe in these values and we're fighting for them with our lives. And people look at the fact that we're non-theistic and take that to mean we don't really believe in what we're doing. But to us, even that symbolic construct of Satan as the
Starting point is 00:25:00 ultimate rebel against tyranny is something that's inextricable for us from our identity. And we try to live by the values that the kind of narrative constructs for us. So, it's also something we identify with, but we also think that people's response, while it's expected, it also serves a greater good in hopefully getting people to realize that there's always more than one side to the story. You really do have to evaluate people based upon what they do, what they truly believe, how they interact with the real world, rather than these assumptions we posted on people under this assumption that they're working with the ultimate evil or that the ultimate evil is embodied and personified in some character that's conducting his minions above or below. But I think we have all the aspects of a religious community. We have people, you know, congregationally worldwide, and they do rituals and everything else in a non-superstitious
Starting point is 00:26:09 fashion. I think you'll understand that when you think about weddings and funerals and how there's not necessarily any supernaturalism tied to those. But non-theistic or not, it's a real religion. I hope people can, if not, try to bother to understand what we actually believe in practice, at least respect the fact that, as I said, the greater evil is in allowing the government to dictate those types of viewpoints. – Again, Roy, I just think it's scary when you have someone from the government saying
Starting point is 00:26:39 something is not a real religion. You may feel that way. In fact, there are religions who do not identify, respect, or, you know, other religions. They say we are the only true and correct God and the only true and correct way to live your life and ensure that you are prosperous and go to heaven or whatever you may believe in. It's just like there's people who say Mormonism isn't real, Judaism isn't real, Scientology isn't a real religion. Who do we let make that decision? If that is your belief system, if those are your core values, why is the government able to say, well, when we say we want religious chaplains in schools,
Starting point is 00:27:13 we don't mean your religious chaplains. We mean these religious chaplains. Oh, that's BS. No, totally, totally BS. Lucian Greaves, thesatanictemple.com. I'm sure you wind up on some government watch list if you navigate to this web page, but I will tell you Roy, it's actually incredibly informative and kind of turns what your idea or perception of them might be on your head.
Starting point is 00:27:36 If you care about the first amendment, if you care about true religious liberty, check out the satanic temple dot com. It's not what you think it is. Lucian Grieves. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much. Hey, Billy, what happened to that DNC chair campaign? What was going on with that? Why did you stop that? Hey Roy? That was a real like you can't do that on television kind of like opening up the locker. Oh, he needs some slime I got some water right here. Hey Billy. Hey, Roy. I don't know. Oh, yeah
Starting point is 00:28:14 You mean my week-long campaign to be Miami-Dade Democratic chair the old grand opening grand closing on that campaign No, yeah, that is a long crazy grand closing on that campaign. That one, yeah. Yeah, that is a long, crazy story. I did not lose the election. I pulled out. Speaking of pulling out, we should do this wheel of despair. And I'll tell you next week about that other shit.
Starting point is 00:28:33 Oh, okay, next week. I'm looking forward to that. I'm gonna have to do it again. If we're not on hiatus again next week. If we're not on hiatus again. Is there gonna be air conditioning next week? I'll be here if there's air conditioning here. I don't know.
Starting point is 00:28:43 I'm probably gonna melt before I find out so here's the list for this week's will. World Cup half full. World Cup half empty if you ask me. Yeah well I'm a realist. Tricky Vicky. Yes my friend. Yeah your buddy. The algorithm's gonna get you. The algorithm's gonna get you. The algorithm's gonna get you. Nice Miami sound machine pun there. Mm-hmm. Miami no shit report. Well, Miami's full of shit report, maybe. Oh, yeah, but the complete opposite.
Starting point is 00:29:12 And... GOP threesome. GOP threesome. Are we talking about golf or what are we talking about? We're not talking about golf. Okay, GOP threesomes. Can't wait, letP threesomes. Can't wait, let's spin the wheel.
Starting point is 00:29:26 Hey, hey, the threesomes. GOP threesomes. You Republicans are freaky. Freaky, and I don't mind it. I'm here for it. The problem is the hypocrisy Florida Trident org you might remember some months ago We had Bob Norman on who was covering the story of disgraced ex
Starting point is 00:29:53 Florida GOP chair Christian Ziegler and his wife Who is a Sarasota, Florida school board member and the co-founder of the racist anti? LGBTQ right-wing book ban-banning hate group, Moms for Liberty, aka Cland Carenhood, aka Moms for Taking Liberties, she boasts that she helped write Florida's Don't Say Gay Law. Well, turns out that they have been engaging in threesomes, and according to a police report, have been, quote, on the prowl, end quote, in bars, for women to bring home
Starting point is 00:30:25 you might remember one of the threesome partners had accused Christian Ziegler of sexually assaulting her the police investigated seized phones and evidence and videos and they did not charge him they cleared him of that but in the meantime the Ziegler's are trying to get a court to seal the evidence they seized a lot of this is personal and private material text messages investigators found quote numerous sexual videos end quote on Christian Ziegler's phone involving the couple and other women and quote there were numerous text messages between Bridget and Christian where they are on the prowl for a female and
Starting point is 00:31:03 Bridget is directing him to numerous different bars in search of a female that they are on the prowl for a female and Bridget is directing him to numerous different bars in search of a female that they are both interested in. During these conversations, Christian is secretly taking photographs of women in the bars and sending them to Bridget, asking if she wants this one or that one. Bridget is telling him to pretend to take pictures of his beer so they don't see him taking pictures of them. She tells him, quote, don't come home until your dick is wet, end quote. Okay, did he stick his dick in the beer? I don't know if that's what she meant, but we'll extend an invitation to the Ziegler's to have them on the show.
Starting point is 00:31:41 Now we got questions. Roy, Roy has questions. Roy, get your girl on the phone. Brinton Ziegler. I'm a journalist. Get your girl on the phone. I, Roy is a journalist, damn it. And he's got questions. All right, let's spin this world before my wife divorces me.
Starting point is 00:32:02 I'm gonna spin this world before my wife divorces me. I'm gonna spin this world before my wife divorces me. I'm sorry. World Cup half full. Sports welfare. More sports welfare. Broke ass taxpayers making it rain on millionaires and billionaires. It's the way of the world. The Miami-Dade County Commission just awarded about $36 million in public funding and free services to the seven matches coming to the Hard Rock Stadium in 2026. This is on top of the $15 million in cash and prizes that
Starting point is 00:32:42 we gave to billionaire dolphins and Hard Rock Stadium owner Stephen Ross back in 2022. That's part of a deal that gives him basically bonus money for securing certain special events like Super Bowls and and in this case World Cup. So it's welfare for millionaires or billionaires all while there's no air conditioning at the Medley County Animal Services facility. Or the other. During a record hot summer, but yet we are giving tens of millions of dollars away
Starting point is 00:33:15 to millionaires and billionaires to watch a bunch of guys kick a ball around. I love that the World Cup is going to be here. I just don't see this whole idea that I mean, I got to get it straight in my head. Capitalism is when you steal money from the poor and middle class and give it to the super rich. And when you tax the super rich to help the poor and middle class, that's called socialism. That's what I have to get straight in my head. But rest assured, by the way, this $36 million that the county is giving of our money to
Starting point is 00:33:49 FIFA of all organizations, for crying out loud. By the way, an organization, both MLS and FIFA, are represented by my mayor, Francis Suarez's law firm. Your mayor. Your boy, Francis Suarez. No, no, no, don't you dare. How can I help? This is not going to be the end of it.
Starting point is 00:34:07 Before the end of this year, they're going to give at least 10, if not more, million dollars from our taxpayer money that could go to help people do real things, shore up infrastructure, mitigate climate change and sea level rise and flooding, and all the things we need to do. They're going to basically give that money away to millionaires and billionaires even David Sampson or Dave as I know him as Dave Sampson and I like kind of agree on ultimately for all the benefits the intangible benefits you might think come from having these major duty sporting events in your community and I agree with that the ultimate beneficiary of all of this
Starting point is 00:34:45 are the teams and the leagues. And of course, the politicians who wind up getting free tickets and free access, and ultimately, usually in some form or another, some kind of donations. I'm using, I'm doing hard air quotes, I'm getting carpal tunnel. Stop sports welfare, man, stop it.
Starting point is 00:35:04 I mean, come on, I'm holding out for a new arena for the Panthers in Broward County. God, yeah, you're good. I'm trying to move them out east towards Fort Lauderdale. Come on, man. Give me a break. Oh my God. No, stop.
Starting point is 00:35:14 The taxpayers already built them. I'm sorry, taxpayers have built them two arenas. Theoretically, Dade County built the Miami Arena, which I believe is one of the greatest deals in the history of sports welfare, because it's the best ROI, because it got us two professional sports franchises, and it cost about 50 million, which is a bargain.
Starting point is 00:35:34 And it was obsolete the day they broke ground on it, but that's not the point. It actually did what it's supposed to do in the best case scenario, which got us an NBA franchise and got us an NHL franchise. And since then, we've now built how many f***ing monstrosities, how many albatrosses of concrete do we need to have that sit empty for the vast majority of the year?
Starting point is 00:35:58 Hard Rock has to be one of the most activated NFL venues in the country because it has so many of these ancillary events. There's F1 and there's World Cup and there's tennis, there's all kinds of shit, but it's still only activated for less than 40 days out of the year. Otherwise, you just have this giant thing and all of this parking around it that just sits empty there for 330 days or 320 days out of the year. It's not something we should be investing in. Oh man, I'm just, hang on, I totally, totally have a card for this. No one's listening! Hmm. Okay.
Starting point is 00:36:36 Spin the wheel, Roy. Of course I will. Uh, the algorithm's gonna getcha. We have biometric technology. We've been talking about John Ruiz. The former Miami Hurricanes, NIL, sugar daddy. I say former because I don't know when the last time he made a deal or signed up any of these players
Starting point is 00:37:10 to help them out. He signed up a lot of them though, and used a lot of money to make it rain on the Canes. But it now seems that his company, Life Wallet, a publicly traded company, in an annual report that they filed last month revealed that federal, civil, and criminal subpoenas are seeking corporate documents about the company's data analytics as well as a stock price
Starting point is 00:37:36 decline, marketing materials, and agreements offered to potential investors. We have biometric technology. This is something that we've been talking about on this program for a couple years, back when Kane's Hole Twitter was ripping us for being nothing but haters, because in Miami, as you know, this is a place where lies are love and the truth is hate. If you just say what the obvious thing is that's happening right in front of you, that there might be some disingenuous or shadiness going on here, perhaps, we need to be a little bit more careful or cynical or question when Miami boosters start to open their
Starting point is 00:38:12 wallets and get generous that like maybe we have to do a better job as an institution of protecting our student athletes. Everybody jumped down our throats. They jumped down Dan's throat, your throat. Mike Ryan was on here. Well, I think that day he was Mike Ruiz because he was here defending his uncle John. They're not asterisk. They're not. There is no relation. Addendum. Yes, there is a footnote. No relation. There's no relation between Mike Ryan and John Ruiz. But the bottom line is, is that we were skeptical. Roy, we said, what is going on here? He's talking about these...
Starting point is 00:38:43 We have biometric technology. And these proprietary algorithms that sounded a little dubious and we were... Sounded like he was making it up. We were questioning the validity of that and now you know who else is questioning that? The federal government. FBI open up! That's right. The feds, both criminally and civilly, want to know what's up with that.
Starting point is 00:39:08 Are there in fact? We have biometric technology. Biometric technology and proprietary algorithms. I had a lot of sources in that community who were saying that they don't know of any kind of special technology or algorithms that exist that would be able to accomplish what he said it would be able to accomplish what he said it would be able to accomplish you have to remember that the company announced twenty twenty three revenue of little more than seven point seven million dollars
Starting point is 00:39:35 and a net loss last year of eight hundred and thirty five million dollars now what they don't want to money what they said was their lofty projections were that they would take in more than 990 million in gross revenue in 2022 and more than 3 billion dollars in gross revenue in 2023. Instead in 2023, as I said, they took in 7.7 million in revenue and a hit of 835 million, more than double what the company reported losing in 2022.
Starting point is 00:40:10 Yeah, it sounds like something's a bit off. John Luiz is asleep. Cocaines. Since the dawn of mankind, we've cooked our food over and over in flame and debated the best way to grill. One thing not up for debate, grilling and beer always go together. And not just any beer will do. Whether you barbecue Texas style or celebrate Wednesday with burgers and dogs, you need a beer that tastes great and is less filling, so you have more room for food. You need Miller Lite. As you guys may or may not know, I'm a pretty decent cook, especially
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Starting point is 00:41:09 To get Miller Lite delivered right at your door, visit MillerLite.com slash Dan. Or you can find it pretty much anywhere that sells beer. Celebrate responsibly. Miller Brewing Company, Milwaukee, Wisconsin. 96 calories per 12 ounces.

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