0:00

Welcome to Worst Year Ever, a production

0:02

of I Heart Radio Together

0:13

Everything, So don't don't do why?

0:20

Hello there, and welcome back to Yes,

0:23

you guessed it, the Worst Year Ever. My

0:26

name is Katie Stole. That's

0:28

wild that you

0:30

are that person's name. Um

0:33

doing what I'm doing? Well, I'm gonna start

0:35

this again. I'm gonna respond to Katie a different

0:37

way. Oh God,

0:41

should we start the whole thing again? No? No,

0:43

no, we never restart anything. Do not

0:45

listen to Robert nobody only we

0:48

agreed on when we don't trust this fucking haircut.

0:50

I don't trust. We start introducing

0:52

an episode, we never go back.

0:55

Sorry for there's no podcasting

0:58

relentless, but there's

1:01

no editing in podcasting. There's no editing

1:03

in podcasting. We just have to keep moving forward,

1:06

like the Marines on Omaha Beach or whatever

1:08

guys were on Omaha Beach, whoever was the

1:11

po Yeah,

1:13

what Katie was trying to do was to get

1:16

Cody, who is a co host,

1:18

and Robert who's a co host, to say their names.

1:20

But you know it didn't happen.

1:22

Here. We are real

1:25

early and apparently we're not resetting. Daniel,

1:28

do with this what you will um

1:30

do what thou wilt shall

1:32

be the whole of the podcasting editor's

1:34

job. Daniel, I'm joined here

1:37

today with my co hosts Cody Johnston

1:39

and Robert Evans, and our producer Sophie.

1:43

I pronounced that riot, Yes, yes,

1:45

you did, you got it. I just realized that's something that I always

1:48

read, and it's actually Katie,

1:52

get it, get it right. Come on, we'll

1:54

come back and

1:57

not this is Katie and

1:59

Rob. It is here on Sophie is here as well, and

2:01

we're just gonna talk so much about

2:04

so many things today that it

2:06

was it was it was hard for us to even

2:08

to even come together with a consensus

2:10

on how we were going to start talking to you, the

2:13

listeners. For example, I completely

2:15

disagree with how this has gone. Look,

2:18

but you know, in the middle

2:20

of an unprecedented surge of authoritarianism

2:23

worldwide, the

2:25

best thing this podcast can do is be a

2:27

shining example of the powers of democracy.

2:30

And in this case, it means several

2:32

minutes of introduction before even saying

2:34

the name of the show, that this is no

2:37

no clear leader emerges,

2:40

not like um a solid

2:42

direction the listeners

2:44

disaster hits. Then

2:46

then Katie takes over with an

2:48

iron fist and sends in federal troops

2:51

to set up sniper's nests on the roof of

2:53

buildings overlooking protest camps.

2:55

So you saw my notes, huh, Yeah I did.

2:57

I did. But for but for now, there's democrat

3:00

seeing equality on this podcast where we're

3:02

all equal partners, is what.

3:04

But you can see the lights starting to go out,

3:06

see it. It is the worst driver.

3:08

This is the podcast, Katie. You want to talk

3:10

about stuff and not do another intro? Yeah,

3:14

so I

3:18

do, I do. Um, guys, a little

3:21

transparency up top. The

3:24

world is chaos. It's not doing

3:26

great, it's awful, and it's so

3:28

hard. I think we're mailing this metaphor.

3:31

Yeah. The President just declared

3:34

basically a war on the city I live in.

3:37

So that's a fun development. It's

3:39

for law and order's sake, Robert, like, we get we get

3:41

over this and over this. He wants to

3:43

take take law and order to where you are.

3:46

Okay, Um, I know not. And

3:48

before his law and order, there were no snipers

3:51

nests on the roof of the federal courthouse,

3:53

and now there's snipers on the roof of the courthouse.

3:55

So that's exactly.

3:59

But it's your tone makes me think maybe you think

4:01

that's bad. Whenever

4:03

we feelings about snipers, Oh,

4:06

we'll get into that. Whenever

4:08

we um sit down

4:11

to decide what we

4:13

want to talk about each week, it gets

4:15

increasingly difficult because you're like,

4:17

there are so many things that we could

4:19

talk about, and and I'll just say

4:21

personally for Cody and I, we also have even

4:24

more news. So at the beginning with

4:26

this show, of course, we had

4:28

a specific purview, which was

4:30

to be talking about election related things,

4:32

and obviously that has changed about

4:37

the election, I mean, I care about it, but you

4:39

know, so it's always like an interesting

4:42

negotiation of like what are we going to cover in each

4:44

episode? But our dear friend Robert

4:47

has covered, you guys, no

4:49

been covering the protests in Portland

4:52

really intensely. It's been

4:55

traumatic and dramatic and doesn't

4:58

look like it's going to stop being way as

5:03

um. So today Cody

5:06

actually came up with this idea,

5:09

is that we are going to kind of

5:11

go through a lot of news

5:13

headlines and kind of fill Robert

5:15

in on stuff that he's missed or

5:17

might have been aware of peripherally,

5:20

and and you know, we're gonna keep it kind of fun

5:22

and loose, because nothing's fun or loose

5:24

right now? Does that sounds fun?

5:27

I think I've emerged as the leader here. I don't

5:29

know. Yeah, you have. You've you've

5:31

violently taken power uh

5:33

and sent in your shock troops to enforce

5:35

order. And your shock troops in this case are

5:38

Cody. And if you didn't and if

5:40

you didn't smile like, I

5:44

don't know what's wrong with you? Also,

5:46

you you probably you're you're listening

5:48

to this, so you couldn't have seen how

5:51

not fun and not loose I was as

5:53

I said it, But I felt my whole

5:55

body tightened as I said fun and loose. Cool,

5:58

Your hair stood on and it's wild,

6:01

but that's normal. That's part for the course for me these

6:04

days. UM. We should probably

6:06

start by by just, uh,

6:08

you know, mentioning that coronavirus

6:10

is still a thing very

6:12

much so it's a problem. I'd go so

6:14

far as to say, um, yeah,

6:17

get out of here, coronavirus, go on. It's frustrating.

6:20

We've got over a hundred

6:22

and thirty thousand deaths

6:25

at seven thousand deaths, but that's

6:28

just the low bow ballpark number.

6:30

We don't actually know. Um,

6:32

and America's

6:35

failing miserably. We're embarrassing

6:38

compared to other countries. Um.

6:41

The unfortunate reality

6:43

is that this is what it looks like when a civilization

6:46

dies. That's what we're seeing in the United

6:48

States and worldwide. And there will

6:50

be some areas that weather this for

6:53

a while, but most most

6:55

of us, most of us won't. Are

6:57

you suggesting that we're an empire in decline, No,

7:01

I am suggesting that

7:03

we are a global civilization on

7:06

the edge of a cliff. Um, So

7:08

people should learn how to garden. Yeah,

7:11

Robert's growing some practical advice. Wash

7:15

pick up. Yeah, my squash is doing

7:17

amazing this counterpoint Robert

7:19

squash counterpoint delicious.

7:22

Hamilton's on Disney Plus.

7:26

Do that instead of the

7:28

gardening the survival stuff that you were talking

7:30

about, how learning to learning to

7:32

live in a new world. Just watch Hamilton.

7:35

It's two It's two hours and forty minutes long.

7:37

You can just like two and out. It's great. That

7:40

does sound nice. You know what I'm

7:42

changing my advice. Watch some Hamilton's.

7:44

I do recommend doing it.

7:47

It's pretty catchy. Um, But

7:50

let's talk a little bit about the responses

7:53

we're seeing this week with coronavirus. For example,

7:56

Monday, Trump retweeted uh,

7:59

conservative Can Beersey theorists and former

8:01

game show host Chuck Woolry, did

8:05

I love the things we get to say these days,

8:07

um, with a tweet

8:09

that reads, the most outrageous

8:11

lies are the ones about COVID nineteen. Everyone

8:14

is lying, the CDC, media, democrats,

8:16

our doctors, not all, but most that

8:19

we are told to trust. I think it's all about

8:21

the election and keeping the economy from coming back,

8:23

which is about the election. I'm sick of it.

8:26

I'm also sick of it. I'm sick of

8:28

that bullshit. Um. So

8:31

it's important to know that this is just after Trump

8:33

has started very openly disneying

8:36

himself from Anthony Fauci. Apparently

8:38

he hasn't even met with Fauci since June. UM

8:40

and then last week on Fox News,

8:43

Yeah, on see, why

8:45

would he need to meet with the nation's head

8:48

doctor during an epidemic? Why would that? Why would

8:50

that to do? Was go golfing

8:52

a bunch and

8:54

said federal troops into Portland, Oregan.

8:58

Yeah, but again only

9:00

if law Well, somebody,

9:03

somebody, somebody slightly burnt some plywood

9:05

on the side of a building, so we

9:08

need sniper's nests, Newt. Sorry,

9:10

my head is in a specific point now, that's why

9:12

we're that's where we're telling you about other

9:14

terrible stuff. It's okay. This is part of the therapeutic

9:17

process. You are allowed to vent

9:19

about the stuff that's happening.

9:22

We're we're here to help guide you

9:24

through this. I don't know. I'm not

9:26

a therapist. Um. I

9:29

was just trying to say that Trump Um

9:32

flat out said that

9:34

he disagrees with Anthony Faucci. When

9:36

Faucci had said the country is not doing well.

9:39

He said, I disagree with him. Um.

9:42

And another interesting little fun

9:44

tidbit this week that Sophie also brought up before

9:46

we started recording, Um, Ted Cruz, our

9:48

buddy Ted uh was photographed

9:52

at the airport, like in the terminal and also

9:54

on an airplane, an

9:56

American Airlines flight without a

9:59

mask. Ted Cruiz, who's been quarantined

10:02

twice for his amazing

10:07

I mean, it's wild, it's wild.

10:09

Um. You know. So American

10:11

Airlines is now looking into it, reviewing the

10:14

details of this matter because

10:16

their policy is

10:18

opposite of what Ted Cruz

10:21

did. Um spoke. This person

10:23

said he just removed the mask while eating

10:25

or drinking. But that's not what we see

10:27

in the pictures. No, he's

10:29

not eating or drinking anything in the

10:31

pictures, nor is there a mask visible

10:34

exactly. So also, like I don't

10:36

trust Ted Cruise to do literally anything,

10:39

so you

10:41

can cause some Twitter beefs. Oh

10:44

yeah, Ted Cruiz is um

10:47

the worst I've gotta Well, let's talk

10:49

about Ted Cruz for a little bit, for a moment. We

10:51

can get back to the seer, the real serious

10:54

news. But one of the things I think that

10:57

we have we've lost a bit in

10:59

this show The worst year ever

11:01

is all the stuff that was happening before these

11:05

wild crises emerged. Because

11:08

you know the original show, that's the worst year

11:10

ever. It's gonna be bad for Trump's

11:12

gonna hate it, his opponent's gonna hate it.

11:14

We're gonna hate it. Republicans are gonna hate it. It's gonna

11:16

be bad for everybody. The culture

11:19

war stuff, everything is so stupid, it's

11:21

gonna get dumber, and it did. But

11:23

also there's this pandemic going on. Um

11:26

so, but that stuff is still going on, That stuff

11:28

is still happening. Ted Cruz spent

11:31

like two days tweeting about Goya

11:33

beans. Robert, have you heard about Goya beans

11:35

lately? I sure have, uh

11:38

it and it it. Yeah, I don't

11:40

know. I was just if I make another comment, it's just

11:42

going to be about that sniper's nest. So

11:43

I'm just gonna yes,

11:46

I heard about the beans. So

11:49

I mean this is kind of the point though, right, Like, uh,

11:53

the CEO of Goya was like Trump's

11:55

good, and then all these libs are like, oh,

11:57

We're gonna not buy Goya beans anymore.

12:00

And then all the conservatives came out like, well,

12:02

we're gonna only eat beans

12:04

now, We're gonna by Coya and

12:07

I'm eating I'm eating beans right now. I'm brushing

12:09

my teeth with beans. And

12:11

then like, meanwhile, all of the systems

12:14

that make our lives possible are

12:16

like slowly being eroded and in

12:18

some cases,

12:20

and everyone's ignoring, like, yeah,

12:23

there's news that the San Andreas fault is

12:25

is much likelier to go off soon than people

12:27

think. We're like on the cusp of wildfires

12:30

the likes of which the planet has never seen.

12:32

Um, but yeah, the fucking beans. Let's

12:34

all talk about beans. I

12:36

mean wildfires where we don't

12:39

I mean, we grotesquely use prison

12:42

labor to fight fire wildfires,

12:45

but there have been some there's less

12:48

prisoner work for the

12:50

whole thing's fun, the whole thing. We're

12:52

not going to send a bunch of like prisoners

12:55

with COVID to fight the fires, are we, because that's

12:57

where they're getting it. We are

12:59

going to do that. But they're at We're absolutely

13:02

but stupid because they act like this is

13:04

like a liberal thing to like cancel a

13:06

brand when they did the same thing

13:09

with Ted Cruze has done it repeatedly. Yeah,

13:12

they did the same thing when they were destroying

13:14

their fucking curing machines a year ago,

13:16

right, Yeah, burning

13:19

their nikes. Yeah. So Ted Cruz is obsessed

13:21

with beans because he's a United

13:23

States senator and there's nothing else going on

13:25

in the country, let alone his state that he's

13:27

a senator of. UM, so he's

13:30

uh, he's really just like leaning into the culture

13:32

where stuff this tweet is really it's

13:34

like fascinating to me. James

13:36

Woods of all people speaking of chuck woolery

13:39

and like old cranks who like have

13:41

no grip on reality, James Woods

13:43

tweeted about the Goya thing and then Ted

13:45

Cruz is like Goya is a staple of Cuban food.

13:47

My grandparents ate Goya black beans twice

13:50

a day for nearly ninety years,

13:52

and now the left is trying to cancel Hispanic

13:55

culture and silence free speech

13:57

by Goya. So like a few things out

14:00

this, Goya wasn't like a hasn't

14:02

been like around for as long as uh

14:04

ted is intimating. Um, nor

14:07

was it available to his grandparents

14:09

in Cuba during that time. Um.

14:12

The whole thing, it's just a mess. It's just a mess of like

14:14

weird lies and like half truths

14:16

about like oh they ate beans

14:19

twice a day, they fuck on beans,

14:22

um, And like it's just fascinating

14:24

because also like the claim that um,

14:27

the left by boycotting Goya,

14:30

which we can like discuss how silly

14:32

that is and how it's not like whatever, boycott

14:34

Goya if you want, who cares, like,

14:37

donate Goya the people who need it whatever.

14:39

Um. But Uh,

14:42

this is like cancel culture. Boycotting is

14:44

cancel culture um, and boycotting

14:46

is silencing free speech. Um.

14:49

Despite again, like you're saying, like literally

14:52

calling for boycotts in the NFL, calling

14:55

for boycotts against so

14:57

many things throughout his career, and

14:59

it doesn't matter matter, and it's so frustrating

15:02

of like, I guess this is the part of the worst year

15:04

where we just like call out hypocrites, uh

15:07

into the void again still

15:09

and nothing matters, and it doesn't change anything.

15:12

And he's still gonna do this, he's still gonna go on

15:14

the plane, and he's still

15:16

gonna not have a mask on. And someone's

15:18

going to point out how he's a hypocrite because of that,

15:20

But it doesn't matter, because this year

15:23

is just the worst. And I'm just I'm

15:25

just fascinated by the by the bean stuff because

15:28

it doesn't matter. It's pointless, it's silly,

15:30

it's stupid, and it's like all the

15:32

all the culture worst stuff has been bubbling

15:34

over and getting dumber and dumber. Has continued

15:36

to get dumber and dumber. But um,

15:39

you know the pandemic, Yeah,

15:43

speaking of the planned emmic,

15:48

the conspiracy. No no, no, no, no no no. Apparently

15:52

Florida reported more than fifteen thousand

15:55

new cases on Sunday. Florida

15:59

number one, to believe, which

16:02

is number one. And then I

16:04

like, I like how America likes

16:07

America is the Florida of the world. But

16:09

Florida is still the Florida of America seems

16:12

like America the

16:14

NBA returned back to write

16:16

seems like a good fu.

16:21

We we need to demandate everyone

16:23

in Florida immediately go on

16:25

a massless vacation to another random

16:27

state and then just pay for that with I

16:29

don't know the education budget

16:31

of this this nation. Speaking speaking

16:36

of that around, let's talk

16:38

about the education budget

16:43

because Trump last week we mentioned

16:45

Triefully on even More News.

16:47

Yes, Donald Trump, but the president of

16:50

Florida, these states of the United States

16:52

of Florida, UM,

16:54

he threatened to take away school funding

16:57

if states a lot

16:59

of shows to reopen in the president

17:01

threatening schools. So but

17:04

like we can use that money to

17:07

fund Robert's idea, is

17:09

my point. There's a lot to unpack

17:11

here with the school conversation,

17:13

because it's not an easy one to have. But

17:16

one thing we know is that not every place can

17:18

return to school in the fall. Just not.

17:21

It's just not realistic, feasible. Maybe

17:24

maybe it could have been if we'd had a different response

17:26

from his administration. UM,

17:28

but we are not in a place where

17:32

we can safely have students or

17:34

teachers or administrators UM

17:38

back now all communities UM,

17:41

and this affects everybody, but you

17:43

know, people with means we'll

17:46

have the luxury of doing homeschooling.

17:48

You know, this definitely impacts

17:50

low income communities more. There

17:53

is the same question that we had at the end of

17:55

last school year. It's you know, how

17:58

comparents work if their kids are at home?

18:00

How do you work and balance your child's

18:02

education? You know, there's the

18:04

impact on them developed mentally. Um,

18:08

but I don't think that there's enough of a conversation about

18:12

the teachers. You know, how forcing

18:14

them back to school will impact them.

18:16

They're being paid not

18:19

a living wage already to come in

18:22

and risk their lives, and and like, what about

18:24

the psychological impact on students

18:26

if say their teacher gets sick, sick and died,

18:29

how do you educate that classroom

18:31

of students You're going to get a substitute to

18:33

come in when coronavirus might be spreading

18:35

around, and also be like,

18:38

hey, kids, the teachers

18:40

dead because of you being

18:43

here, because we're all

18:45

here, Like how do you move forward

18:47

from that? How do you move forward from that? And

18:50

I get it, it's hard. I mean, I mean teachers

18:53

are also literally getting it while discussing

18:55

during did you how to do

18:57

this. Yeah, there's a fucking Reddit post.

19:00

It was some twenty four year old and I think I

19:02

think it was Indiana talking about how like there

19:05

they're going to be opening the schools again

19:07

and like we've been told that

19:09

we can't even require the kids to wear masks,

19:12

Like all you can do is strongly suggested,

19:14

um, and so like the whole post was him

19:16

asking for advice. I'm like, how do I set

19:19

up a will because I want to make sure that my house

19:21

goes to my spouse. Uh if

19:23

I die from this, because I think there's a good chance

19:25

i'll die from this because I get sick

19:27

every year when the school starts again,

19:30

and like I know that's going to happen with COVID, and I

19:32

don't know that I'll make it. And it's like that's

19:34

a fucking teacher, Like they shouldn't be teacher.

19:37

Yeah, it's it's my My sister

19:39

in law's a teacher, and I need to get on the

19:41

phone and have a bigger conversation with her about

19:43

it. But we were just texting today.

19:45

She's scared and part of the problem

19:47

is it's also going

19:50

county by county in different areas, so like

19:52

but for example, here in l A, we

19:55

just got the announcement that you

19:57

know, we would be still be doing remote schooling

20:00

starting in the fall. Orange County, however,

20:03

does not want that. In northern

20:05

California, where my sister in law teaches, her

20:08

county does not look at

20:10

this point that they are pushing for remote learning,

20:12

but counties around her are. And

20:15

it's a strange it's a strange

20:17

dynamic for them within teachers. And you

20:20

know, like because it's not that much different

20:22

from one county to the other, it's wild

20:24

the way that they're making these decisions. But she's also

20:26

saying, you know, when she shared an article, a

20:28

lot of teachers are choosing

20:31

to retire rather than return to

20:33

teaching in the fall um

20:35

and so what does that impact on our education

20:38

system? And if they refuse to teach

20:40

on their several states where they'll lose their pensions.

20:43

But I mean, yeah, that's like the whole like willing,

20:46

they're willing to give those things

20:48

up because of the situation they're being

20:50

forced to go into. Like my

20:53

my mom works at a with elementary school kids.

20:55

Uh, A lot of people that work at

20:57

these schools are like in that at

21:00

risk range, age range like you have

21:02

all these kids they're

21:04

uh. Like Robert, you're saying

21:06

like, yeah, it's not mandatory, you have you like can

21:09

politely request that they wear

21:11

masks. But they're also kids,

21:14

and so you have to you're worrying about

21:16

not only like all these kids interacting with

21:18

every single adult at the school, but then going

21:21

home and interacting with their parents. You don't know what their

21:23

parents are doing. Um, it's just such

21:25

a it's such a a

21:27

messed up situation where like it's the same,

21:29

it's the same, it's the same thought process for

21:31

like like we got like obviously like

21:33

schools are more important than being able to go to

21:35

David Busters, but like you have,

21:38

it's the same thing. Like you're putting all these people

21:40

at risk that work there,

21:43

like all these like people in the service industry

21:45

and like every everyone that that has to work

21:47

right now they put at risk.

21:49

And we're just like trying to pile on uh

21:52

in this I don't know, it's I mean, you know you're hitting

21:55

that's the whole point. You're right, And what's

21:58

frustrating and not

22:00

surprising but demoralizing

22:04

is that we don't seem

22:06

to learn at all throughout

22:09

this Well, no American

22:11

never does well because we can't go to school,

22:14

Katie, Yeah,

22:17

no, but I mean we've had so Like I just

22:19

said, in spring, a lot of parents were

22:21

just trying to make it to the summer. They

22:24

were just trying to make it to the summer and get

22:26

through this. And we all saw that

22:30

we were resoundingly failed

22:33

at the home schooling experiment. There's a lot of reasons

22:35

why. There's a lot of things

22:37

that have to be worked out, and we understand that.

22:40

But you know, the hope

22:42

was like, Okay, we get a grip on the virus. Over

22:44

the summer. Also, we start to develop contingency

22:47

plans, we start to work out how to approach

22:49

this differently. Now we're just gonna culture

22:51

war about it. That's no, We're just going to culture war.

22:54

I mean culture

22:56

warring about stuff. We're so good at culture

22:58

wars. No other country culture wars

23:00

like US. America first number one

23:02

American number one culture war. Although I

23:04

did see an article today about a French

23:07

bus driver that was beat to

23:09

death. Um after asking

23:12

that people in the bus war

23:14

masks so well, you

23:16

know, don't have every now and then another country

23:18

is going to try to compete for the two slot, but I

23:20

feel pretty comfortable. Oh yeah,

23:22

America first, America number one. Forever, we

23:25

we rule the culture war. We're going to die

23:27

the most, thank you very much here

23:31

in Florida. Yeah,

23:33

we have to. We have to leave room for like

23:36

Dan Crenshaw to accuse Tammy

23:38

Duckworth, a veteran of trying

23:40

to destroy who lost

23:42

her legs and come back and

23:46

she wants to destroy America. That's

23:49

the line. I there's

23:52

a tweet I saw recently, um

23:54

that was just starting to think forming an

23:57

entire society around legal and semantic

23:59

loopholes might have been a bad idea. And

24:01

that's really like the thing that that comes to mind most

24:04

in this because it's this like like

24:06

that that's the thing that the mass stuff turned into is

24:08

like people cutting holes in masks, people like

24:10

like making purposefully

24:13

shitty masks, like just because they

24:15

didn't like this, this this reckless

24:18

disregard for the

24:20

fact that there are some things that you should

24:22

just do because it's it's

24:24

the right thing to do. And like, no, fuck

24:26

you, this is America. And if someone

24:29

if I'm supposed to do something, the right

24:31

thing to do is an American is find

24:33

a way to not do that thing without getting

24:35

in trouble. Like that's the whole, that's

24:37

the entirety of our society.

24:40

Yeah, it's all. It's like, it's just like the

24:42

debate nerd troll stuff, just

24:44

like heightened to a level that is

24:46

literally a matter of life and death appose

24:49

to pointless online bullshit. Yeah,

24:52

we should purge our society

24:55

of debate nerds. Speaking of

24:57

that, it's time for an add break.

25:00

Oh okay, that's fine, that's fine,

25:02

too cool. Here's

25:04

that ad

25:11

together everything

25:18

and we are back from that ad. Very

25:20

cool, very cool

25:24

by the products or boycott them. I don't

25:26

know whichever side you're on. Who cares.

25:28

Um, So we

25:30

were sorry.

25:34

We were just talking about, you know,

25:37

school stuff and that

25:39

complicated conversation. UM,

25:42

let's talk about this

25:46

new UH rule. This this Trump

25:48

administration announcement last week

25:50

that international students can't stay in the

25:52

US of schools are not operating in person

25:55

classes, basically making them

25:57

a pawn in his push to reopen the Universe

26:00

cities in the fall. Unbelievable.

26:03

UM. Seventeen states have filed

26:05

a lawsuit against the Trump administration

26:08

against this rule. UM, and I really, fifty

26:10

universities, including IVY League schools have joined

26:12

in. Um, God,

26:14

but it's wild. This is just I

26:17

guess it's not another one of those things that's not surprising,

26:19

but it's just kind of a gut punch because

26:22

also, we're having historic numbers

26:24

of international students. I'm

26:26

sorry, cut that in reset. Also

26:28

we're having historically low numbers

26:30

of international students here even without

26:33

this development. This is according to the Washington

26:35

Post quote, the desire to study is

26:38

study in the United States has flagged since the start

26:40

of the Trump administration. Before the presidential

26:42

election, the number of Indian students was

26:44

growing annually by double digit percentages,

26:46

but the growth rate fell sharply in the eighteen

26:49

and nineteen academic years.

26:52

Um, this is just

26:54

sending so many people

26:56

reeling. Also, you're trying to make

26:59

people travel internationally during a

27:01

pandemic. It's

27:05

just it's gotta get we gotta get him

27:07

out or whatever, whatever, you know, whatever whatever

27:09

reason is, like do whatever. I

27:12

think that there's going to be a lot of effort from schools.

27:15

Obviously this this lawsuit has been passed,

27:17

and you're seeing you know, people

27:19

at different institutions

27:22

scrambling and you know, maybe

27:25

making one technically in person class

27:27

that maybe people don't have to show up to you know what,

27:29

I mean, to try to start navigate the rules.

27:32

But it's justo loopholes

27:34

to help people, loopholes instead

27:36

of loopholes to cough on people. Yeah,

27:41

that's an appropriate reaction, Robert.

27:44

I'm so tired all the time. I know,

27:46

I know, Um,

27:49

Sylphie, you you wanted to rant about Betsy

27:51

Devas a little bit. She's a monster. She doesn't

27:54

know how to answer a question. She's encompetent,

27:56

she's an evil, evil, evil, evil

27:58

person and should not have the job she has. And she's

28:01

causing so much harm to her education system.

28:03

Every second she's employed

28:06

as the secretary of education. Bad

28:08

things happened. Evil woman. Yeah,

28:11

almost for hiring her. She's so not

28:13

qualified and its damaging

28:15

our children. Yeah, it's it's

28:18

remarkable the amount of harm that she and

28:20

her brother have done to the world. Truly

28:24

a case for I'm just going to say

28:26

it, tremendous random

28:28

violence. Uh, would

28:31

be would be useful? Um, I

28:34

won't be more specific than that. I'm very

28:37

angry. Yes, very well, you said it. You

28:39

said random, So that could be anything, Yeah,

28:41

yeah, you know, random source. It

28:45

could be like an ear flick, you know, yeah,

28:47

an random violence. Yeah that's not Yeah,

28:50

that's a good way to not be

28:52

legally inciting anything. To go and

28:54

give her hair a good yank evil

28:58

what anarchists used to do and dearly

29:02

solid hair yank. Yeah, a

29:04

lot of hair yanks. That's William McKinley.

29:06

President McKinley got his hair real yanks.

29:09

Yeah, he was real, real, real

29:11

childish at flirting. Archduke

29:15

Franz Ferdinand got some fucking hair yanks

29:18

pretty pretty hard. William

29:22

guy got a lot of three Stooges

29:24

stuff going on there. Um,

29:27

Cody, I know you

29:29

gathered some some news items

29:32

you wanted to go through as well, just

29:34

a couple of things. You know, there's there's

29:37

news and then there's uh again, I'm

29:39

like there's a lot of there's so many things

29:41

that's like, this is the news, right,

29:44

and then there's so many things like this is the dumb

29:46

stuff we were talking about, This

29:48

is the stuff that was going to make this year

29:51

so bad, and like we don't even

29:53

need to talk about Roger Stone that much.

29:55

It's the thing that happened, Robert, you don't care about it, and this

29:57

this episode is for you and informing you. Um,

30:00

but I'm already seeing prominent

30:02

people, one of them including Hillary Clinton, literally

30:04

using this Roger Stone commutation to

30:07

warn us about Russia interfering with our election.

30:10

Excellent. Uh, this commutation

30:12

of his sentence is tells us

30:14

that Putin is in charge, and it's just a wild,

30:17

wild thing to say. Um

30:19

not that like Russia isn't that isn't

30:22

a thing and around, but my gosh,

30:25

um. Uh, Tucker Carlson's

30:28

racist, racist head writer was

30:30

fired. Did you hear about that, Robert? I

30:32

did hear about that. Uh. I'm

30:35

surprised that he got fired because

30:37

it would seem like his entire job was

30:39

to do the thing that he got fired for, just

30:42

to a massive audience. Right.

30:44

You'd think like his his actual application

30:46

for the job would have like boxes like are

30:48

you like secretly racist? Check the box

30:51

and okay good? Yeah,

30:53

I mean getting

30:55

hired by Tucker Carlson. Like the job

30:58

interview is can you reach orgasm

31:00

while lying on your back on the grave

31:03

of a Bothan S S man? That

31:05

was my assertion, Yeah, yeah, do you

31:07

say the fourteen words when you come? Okay?

31:09

Perfect, You're hired? Great? Um?

31:12

So yeah, just like stuff like that it's like

31:15

that, it's still going on. We're

31:17

also in a pandemic. Um. But

31:19

but this is also originally

31:22

an election show. You know, there is an election

31:24

going on. I don't know if anybody remembers this, um,

31:27

but we we can, we can possibly

31:29

have a different precedent in a little bit. Um.

31:32

And that man's name is Kanye

31:34

West. Not just kidding, it's Joe. I

31:39

don't want to engage. We will not We

31:41

will not be engaging. I

31:44

will say this. Um.

31:46

We talked about it last week on even More News

31:49

briefly just the right amount of time with

31:51

our guest Joel Leon, who's amazing, and

31:54

I think that he handled that conversation

31:57

the best when saying, um,

32:00

did we all forget that he Kanye

32:03

is bipolar, that struggles from

32:05

you know a lot of you

32:08

know, instability. He's on breakdowns

32:10

and apparently he is been going

32:12

through a bipolar episode and

32:14

his family and friends are worried about him. So let's

32:17

you have stopped giving weight to that conversation

32:19

or even jokes about it, you know, because this

32:21

has had enough steam. Also,

32:23

he's not on the balance Well

32:26

yeah, it's not running for presidents. Why are we been

32:28

talking about it. But yeah, that's just something I

32:30

I just I repeat that again because I think

32:32

not all of our we've got some overlap. But you

32:35

know, if you if you're at

32:37

this show but not the other one. I think that that's a really important

32:39

point in something to keep in mind when you're seeing

32:41

that dialogue online. He is

32:43

he is someone who is a narcissist and

32:46

also has other mental health issues, um,

32:48

and is not insert

32:51

like I don't. I don't think he's even

32:53

capable of really understanding

32:56

why it's a bad idea to do what

32:58

he's doing. Um, I don't. Yeah,

33:01

Yeah, there's a lot of exacerbating

33:05

behaviors and things, um that

33:07

Yeah, that conversation

33:12

talking about this conversation of the election,

33:14

you know, and I've seen people online being like,

33:17

well, we don't like Joe Biden, you know, so

33:21

let's so let's let's try Kanye,

33:23

you know, and especially using the argument of like,

33:26

well Joe Biden has

33:29

clearly deteriorating mentally,

33:32

and you know, it's

33:35

tricky, it's a tricky conversation to have online

33:37

to that one because I understand where they're coming

33:39

from. I also I'm not a doctor

33:42

to diagnose. Also,

33:44

they're like that is going to I mean, speaking

33:46

of the worst year ever. Uh, this is all stuff

33:49

that was going to happen anyway,

33:51

but it's happening more. More and more people are saying

33:53

it. Um, the cognitive

33:55

stuff that's gonna be a thing. You

33:57

know, Like last year we did that some More

34:00

News episode about how Joe Biden, if he wanted

34:02

to like save the soul of the country, could like run

34:04

as a Republican and sort of save the Republican Party

34:06

from itself and move them a little towards

34:09

more towards the center and recalibrate

34:11

in that talking about how like it's just gonna

34:13

be constantly debating, like your

34:16

mind is going, No, your mind is going you

34:18

touch women inappropriately? No, you do.

34:21

And that's sort of back and forth. Um, and we

34:23

are seeing that they're

34:25

both commenting on each other's cognitive abilities.

34:27

Now they're doing

34:30

it's it's awful, which which

34:32

which of the clearly sick old

34:34

men is the least clearly

34:36

sick. It's so it's let's

34:38

give him control of a nuclear arsenal

34:41

unreal, And like they're just doing they're

34:43

just like they're both just like leaning into

34:45

it. Like I took a cognitive test. I think Joe should

34:47

take a cognitive test, and Joe's like, actually,

34:50

I'm I'll take a test against him any day,

34:52

and it's just already so I

34:55

will save this. I

34:57

obviously am not a Joe bi fan,

35:02

and I think

35:05

he's got angry issues, temperamental problems.

35:08

Uh, he might be in some sort of

35:10

cognitive decline. I think it's a

35:12

dangerous thing for us to talk about, especially

35:15

for the thing that you guys are saying right here. I'm

35:17

not somebody that's up here saying we

35:20

can't hold him to task. Um.

35:22

I think that stigmatizing

35:26

people immediately is having dementia

35:28

or something like that, and there's

35:30

not We don't have things that are now.

35:33

What we should stigmatize is allowing

35:35

people for whom who

35:37

are part of a category of the population,

35:40

for whom that is a real concern,

35:42

we should stigmatize them running

35:45

for the highest office. In the nature of the issue, isn't

35:47

Joe Biden or Donald Trump's individual

35:50

health. It's it's the fact that it's

35:53

the norm for people who are fucking eighty

35:56

two be the present. It's

35:58

the fact that this is even a conversation, and not only

36:00

that we not only that we like people have

36:02

in the discourse, but that both of the candidates

36:05

are engaging in it's going to get

36:07

worse and worse, and they're gonna keep talking about

36:09

it and to age cap

36:12

shit at like six for

36:14

the president of the things.

36:18

No, I mean, I'm agreeing with you. And I

36:20

think that's why I say this, because especially

36:23

as we start to see these

36:25

conversations more and more, like we already

36:27

are like, no, you're the one

36:29

that's like losing their

36:31

mind. No, you're the one. You know, it's

36:34

like grounding

36:36

it in something a bit more productive at least

36:39

long term. Well, yeah, all

36:41

these conversations that we've had about like Joe

36:43

Biden and Donald Trump and all like all the discourse

36:45

around it um and how it's getting

36:47

worse and like there's a responsive way to talk about

36:49

and so on and so forth. It is like just

36:51

like the problem

36:54

that people often

36:56

point out that is like kind of lost and like you're

36:58

helping Trump or you're helping and you're like whatever it

37:00

is, it's that we're in the situation

37:03

at all. That's the real

37:05

problem that we are in this situation.

37:08

And then it's like become a

37:10

normal thing that we just are like, well,

37:12

that's just how it is. This is this

37:14

is our this is our nation, you know, Cody

37:17

Hearing all that makes me think of the

37:19

lines of a wonderful Lee Greenwood

37:21

song, because I am

37:23

proud to be an American, or at least

37:25

I know I am free to

37:28

spread a plague to strangers

37:31

because I don't want to be mildly uncomfortable,

37:34

So I'm not.

37:36

I feel like there's a more poetic way to say that, And

37:39

I won't more the men who set

37:41

up a sniper's nest on the roof of to

37:45

defend my right to not have plywood

37:48

singed, and I will proudly

37:50

fire riot control rounds into the

37:52

skulls of fucking twenty

37:54

year olds with boom boxes next to

37:56

you and defend her. Okay, I'm done

37:58

with I've done with the Lee green with it. No,

38:01

it's great. I love I love listening that whenever

38:03

they played at ball games that used to exist.

38:06

Cool. That seems like a really

38:08

good spot to take our next ad

38:10

break. I need a break

38:12

for as I

38:15

had that bumper sticker. I break for ads

38:21

together everything,

38:26

So don't don't done.

38:29

We're back again from that ad

38:32

break. Cool, Well rested,

38:34

and ready for whatever Cody is about to throw

38:37

at us. Now, Cody, I

38:41

am furious. That's

38:43

Starburst candy.

38:45

Oh something we

38:48

need to Let's buy starburst

38:51

and flush it down the toilet.

38:53

Um. No, So we're gonna talk about Biden a little

38:55

bit. Um. I didn't even intend to talk about the

38:57

other stuff we just talked about. Um,

39:00

it organically came up because of I guess the

39:02

Kanye of it all. But uh, it's

39:05

like a little election update right

39:07

there. Obviously aren't really a lot of rallies

39:10

going on. Um, there's not a lot of

39:13

like there's no real like outwardly

39:15

facing like it's a it's an election year.

39:17

The election is kind of in the background. It's

39:20

always this sort of like white noise, just humming

39:22

like it's coming. There's the there's the election

39:25

problems. What things are happening a little bit.

39:27

I guess Biden still has not chosen a

39:29

running mate. I

39:32

hope it's you too. I think it might be. I think

39:34

I'm interested in your random

39:36

violence platform. Oh,

39:39

very pro We're gonna have that. My only

39:41

promise as vice president is a sniper

39:43

on the roof of every public building in this country,

39:46

just shooting at random. Yeah,

39:48

exactly exactly, Um,

39:50

America first at sniper's

39:53

everywhere, random American

39:56

America's America first targets.

39:58

I don't know, please get to there's there's

40:01

work to be done on the messaging, but good

40:03

to know that you're you're not wavering on that

40:06

America first in randomly

40:08

placed snipers exactly.

40:10

Colon law and order, colon

40:13

Uh. If things are fine, um, and

40:16

we'll continue to be even better. So

40:19

we have talked on the show a briefly. A little

40:21

we mentioned when it was going on there was that the

40:23

task force to bring uh,

40:26

the Bernie wing of the party and the Biden wing

40:28

of the party together um in perfect

40:30

harmony to take on the

40:33

guy, you know, and that task force

40:35

has released uh many page

40:38

document with their recommendations that

40:40

they've come up with. And so there's a

40:42

little bit. Uh. I don't go into

40:44

too many details because I think that

40:47

people are gonna be uh ultimately

40:49

disappointed, and also like other people

40:51

are gonna be like, that's not so bad. They're pushing

40:53

them left a little bit. There is no

40:56

Medicare for all, there's no green new deal kind

40:58

of stuff like that. It focused

41:00

a lot on like granularly

41:03

stuff and like you know, defending the a c A, raising

41:05

minimum wage, things like that, and

41:08

one thing I think it's important

41:11

to note about it too. Um

41:13

Like a lot of people, a lot of people in the Bernie wing we're kind

41:15

of disappointed. Um even

41:18

in articles about people on the task force

41:20

saying like, you know, it didn't have everything

41:23

that we wanted, didn't everything Biden wanted.

41:25

But as Bernie points out, there's

41:27

no question that on some of the major issues facing

41:29

this country, if that agenda is implemented, life will improve

41:31

for tens and tens of millions

41:34

of working people. Um. So it

41:36

is you know, trying to frame it as

41:39

it's pushing it left. But

41:41

also, um, it

41:43

is recommendations. It's

41:46

not I'm not saying it's nothing, but

41:48

the campaign hasn't like committed

41:51

to doing anything on it. Uh, they

41:53

have committed to reviewing the recommendations,

41:56

right, So it's not actually

41:58

like we're look at the platform they're gonna

42:00

do all this stuff. It was Biden

42:02

and Bernie people getting together and putting

42:05

together things that they hope Biden

42:07

does. But again,

42:09

it doesn't include banning fracking, doesn't include

42:11

like you know, a lot of like Biden is very

42:13

against legalizing marijuana. Still, things like

42:16

that. UM. One thing I did

42:18

kind of want to point out in there though, UH,

42:20

But again this isn't the platform.

42:23

This is taking things into consideration.

42:26

UM. But one of the things they talk about

42:28

is, uh what they think

42:31

Democrats need to do with the FCC, UM

42:34

very clear language about net

42:37

neutrality and reversing

42:40

all of the things that Trump has done in regards to net

42:42

neutrality. UM. But also Democrats

42:45

will take action to prevent states from blocking

42:47

municipalities and rural co ops

42:50

from building publicly owned broadband

42:52

networks and increased federal support

42:54

for municipal broadband. UM.

42:56

Basically, like everybody should have the

42:58

internet. UM. We were like even talking

43:01

earlier when we're talking about the

43:02

the problem with schooling. One

43:04

of the problems that a lot of kids have with

43:06

doing like do school from home. Not

43:09

everybody has great internet access or internet

43:12

access at all, or access to this kind of uh

43:14

kind of service and what should be a public

43:16

utility. Right. So I don't know

43:19

that's something to to be like,

43:21

Hey, if they do that, that's good, but again

43:23

it's not um necessarily things

43:25

that they're going to uh to implement.

43:28

UM. A quote from UH

43:30

one of the folks on the task force is we did

43:32

not have any impressions that we were going to turn Joe Biden

43:34

into Branie Sanders. That was not going

43:36

to happen. That did not happen. We don't

43:39

expect Biden to be uh

43:41

uh Bernie Sanders, although

43:44

he has recently released a

43:46

an ad um with

43:49

uh the message and phrasing

43:51

that it's not about him, It's about us,

43:54

which I find interesting. Um,

43:56

he continues to talk about how health

43:58

care is a human right while

44:01

uh not proposing policies

44:03

that would make it a human right. Um,

44:05

Like if if not everybody had the right to vote,

44:07

I wouldn't say, like, well, I think voting

44:10

is a right. So I think

44:12

here's a way that you can pay your for

44:14

your vote. Um, that's not what rights

44:17

are. Um. So there is it's still a disconnect

44:19

there. Um. It's it feels

44:21

in the background because we are in a pandemic.

44:24

Um. But I think pushing on things

44:26

like Medicare for all are still really

44:28

important to do. Um. Even though

44:31

I think this headline that I'm seeing right now

44:33

times five point for million Americans

44:36

lost health insurance during the pandemic.

44:39

Yeah, yeah,

44:41

well's there

44:43

that's the like the really frustrating one

44:45

of the more frustrating things in talking about this kind of

44:48

stuff where it's like, Okay, yeah, they're moving

44:50

on this and they think this and they're recommending this.

44:52

But if you're not just saying like we're

44:55

gonna do we're doing this. We're doing

44:57

this Medicare for All plan. Everyone should have health care, every

45:00

on, every single person in America

45:02

should be able to go to the doctor. End

45:04

of story, because health care is a human right. If

45:06

we're not doing that, especially now, what

45:09

are we doing. Um, we're tying

45:12

healthcare to employment. Still, we're

45:14

protecting private insurance still. Um,

45:16

we're even more like merging

45:20

like personal life with um

45:22

work life. Like that's that's an

45:25

interesting thing that we're going to see more of as

45:27

this pandemic continues. Like

45:30

we as a society put so much uh

45:33

importance on our jobs, Like we like

45:36

we are our job in a lot of in a lot of

45:38

ways. Um, and now we're

45:40

all working from home. A lot of people are working

45:42

from home, and uh that is

45:44

going to be a continuing thing. Like that's just policy

45:46

for a lot of companies now in

45:49

general. And so you're you're

45:52

forcing work into your home space

45:54

permanently now. So we

45:56

are we're slowly moving

45:58

towards that relationship between

46:01

like, well, you are your job,

46:03

and your job is how you get healthcare

46:05

and all these things. We're pushing

46:07

more, even more towards that, UM

46:10

in a way that I don't think we're

46:13

necessarily ready for. I don't know, I

46:15

just don't like the idea of like, oh, yeah, we're all we're

46:17

all working from home. Now, we wake up in your home, but you're

46:19

also work. It's always in your mind. Now.

46:21

I don't think that's necessarily a healthy thing to do. But

46:25

anyway, it's not about him, it's about us and so

46:27

on. Yeah,

46:30

I mean it's

46:32

a bit demoralizing. It's hard at

46:35

the end of the day. I mean, I've

46:37

I've waffled on this but a bit

46:40

on this show and our shows because it's it's a

46:42

bitter pill to swallow. But I'm

46:45

going to vote for Biden. I guess, I

46:47

mean, I guess I don't know how many to you here in California.

46:50

But it's tough.

46:52

I keep coming back to hoping

46:55

to continue having these conversations.

46:57

Yes, we need to be calling out this bullshit

47:00

it UM and pointing out the things

47:02

like health

47:05

care is a human right. Okay, then we need to give it to people.

47:07

Look at all these lost their health insurance.

47:09

Let's do that. But I I'm

47:13

I don't know what to do. I don't know what to say. I

47:15

am not gonna go for Donald Trump. I'm going

47:17

to do my best to keep him out of the out of office

47:19

another four years because it would ruin us.

47:22

Yeah, and just I mean, just keep pushing and don't like let

47:24

I don't know, like there's it's easy to let

47:26

the aesthetics of like moving

47:29

left or like we're progressive or more progressive

47:32

than fdr um. But politics don't

47:34

happen in a vacuum. Um. Aesthetics

47:36

aren't policy. Aesthetics

47:39

aren't what people actually believe.

47:41

And a lot of what Biden seems to be

47:43

doing is aesthetics because

47:45

he's also reaching out to, you know, like Republicans.

47:48

That's part of his whole thing is like we've got to get the modern

47:51

Republicans on our side too. So

47:54

if you're trying to please everybody,

47:57

what are you, like, what's your actual plan? Um?

47:59

But the other hand, like there is also this thing I

48:01

wanted to there's something about Biden. It's

48:04

it's the transition from just being

48:06

very frustrated with this and um

48:09

to like the reality of like we're in an election, is

48:11

Trump or this fucking guy um

48:14

The reflective like defensive

48:17

Biden when Republicans

48:19

criticize him, uh in

48:21

a way of like, no, you don't get to do this,

48:23

you don't get to play um.

48:26

Sorry. Like the other day, I

48:28

mean, like Sean Hannity uh tweeted

48:30

like some video like you know, I think like

48:33

Joe has misspoken quite a bit,

48:35

and there's sometimes I'm like Joe, just like

48:38

what are you doing, bud um? But he shared

48:40

some videos like Joe Biden said

48:43

woked like people were woked.

48:45

He said the word wrong, and it was like a huge

48:47

thing, uh for like half a day and

48:50

it was just like shut up, leave leave Joe

48:52

Biden alone, and just like that sort

48:55

of reflective like coming to his defense

48:57

because what you're criticizing him for him

48:59

for his nonsense as opposed

49:02

to this other stuff that I think is substantial

49:04

and worth continuing to hope

49:07

and both of those things can coexist and

49:09

be like, well, that's not a reason to criticize

49:12

him. Have you seen the president speak, however

49:15

the important things that we should be talking

49:17

about, just

49:20

like anyone him talk.

49:22

It's like, look at your president, shut

49:24

up, go away, you

49:26

can like you can hold you can only criticize Joe Biden

49:28

for the reasons like that if you also think

49:30

Donald Trump is of moron, shouldn't

49:33

be the president. Yes, that

49:35

gets to a lot of my issues with I

49:37

don't know, it's just like it's incredibly frustrating

49:40

when people bring up valid critiques

49:42

of Joe Biden as a reason not to vote for

49:44

him. That like, but also the person

49:46

who would win who's not Joe Biden

49:49

is guilty of all of those same things but much

49:51

worse. Exactly. Yeah,

49:53

and that is that is It's the same thing with Hillary

49:56

Clinton, where it's like she she suffered

49:58

more for vote for the Iraq War

50:01

than George W. Bush or any Republican

50:03

ever will, Which doesn't mean that it was okay

50:06

that she voted for the Iraq war, but it's fucking

50:08

wild, like, of all of the people in

50:10

American politics to actually pay a

50:12

concert like a price for it, it was Hillary

50:15

Clinton and not like any Yeah

50:18

great, yeah, the

50:21

w at the ball game with Ellen but always

50:23

canceled. Yeah, yeah fucking incredible.

50:26

Um, yeah, yeah,

50:28

that perspelt like it's just important to maintain that perspective

50:30

and like be aware and like I am

50:34

so because the discourse

50:36

is gonna change too, because during the primary, you're

50:38

trying to choose the best person who represents

50:40

the things that you want. Um. And

50:43

so those criticisms from the left

50:46

or during a Democratic primary,

50:48

I think are valid and worth discussing,

50:51

but in the context of against Donald

50:53

Trump maybe less. So. Before

50:55

we end this Hodgepodge

50:57

episode, Robert, why don't

50:59

you us um a couple

51:01

of updates from Portland's

51:04

outside of the sniper situation. Yeah,

51:09

Portland's the you know, the

51:12

good so Portland has is you

51:15

know, we had this uprising that started six

51:17

weeks or so ago and kind of everywhere

51:19

was involved and now a lot of peles

51:22

still have regular marches, but Portland's really

51:24

the only city that's like has

51:26

continuously been in a state of uprising.

51:29

Like most nights since

51:32

this started, Uh, there's

51:34

been like a riot or a civil disturbance.

51:36

There's been tears, like and now the Feds have

51:38

gotten involved and they've they've they they have been

51:40

On Saturday, they rioted in just

51:43

an unbelievably brutal way. Uh.

51:45

They like at one point, like a homeless

51:47

man two different actually people started seizuring

51:49

because of the tear gas. There's like video

51:52

of of U S Marshals like kneeling

51:54

on this guy and holding his body down

51:56

as he sees is, which is the thing you don't

51:58

do when someone has a siege. Um.

52:01

And they know that because they all have basic

52:03

life saving medical training, Like they knew what they

52:05

were doing. Um. There was another point at

52:07

which like a kid was standing in the park playing

52:10

music on the boom box and they shot him from

52:12

thirty feet away in the head with a rubber bullet

52:14

and shattered his skull and permanently changed

52:17

his life. He's in the hospital now. He very nearly

52:19

died. They shot him right in the fucking head.

52:21

There's video of it. He was holding a boom box.

52:24

They shot him in the fucking head from thirty ft

52:26

away. Um. Because these

52:28

people aren't cops. These are the kind

52:30

of yeah,

52:33

like the whole like guiding the

52:36

like literally the entire guiding um

52:38

motive force of my career

52:40

in life since I was in

52:42

mosel Um was like

52:45

because when I when I went to a rack and watched

52:47

them level that city. Watch the same kind of men

52:49

who shot that kid from thirty feet away, Like that's

52:52

those are the that those are the people who burnt

52:54

Mosell to the fucking ground to drive

52:56

Isis out. Ever since then, UM,

52:59

it has been my overwriting goal to try to stop

53:01

that from happening to to other cities, particularly

53:04

to cities in America, because

53:06

that's where I know how to affect things.

53:09

Uh. And like the the

53:12

that's that's the situation that we're in right now is the

53:14

President has basically said, like, these are the guys

53:16

I'm sending in. I'm gonna let them beat the ship out

53:18

of people, um for a night or two,

53:21

and if you all want to continue what

53:23

you're doing, UM, you know I can. I

53:25

will let them off the fucking leash. Like that's the

53:27

promise that's being made here. UM

53:31

said yeah take over. Yeah, yeah,

53:34

you're fucking city government. Your state government

53:36

doesn't matter. And I don't think people I

53:38

think people on the ground are starting to get that,

53:40

UM, to understand stand that at the very

53:42

least, we should maybe not be prodding

53:45

them constantly at their courthouse where they

53:47

have a defensible position set up that

53:50

they're they're using the building as a weapon. Last

53:52

night was weird. I was out last night and

53:54

they fucking stayed inside the whole time like that. I

53:57

spent a huge drink of the night watching like like

53:59

yeah, teen age boys like karate kicking

54:01

a courthouse and like throwing like just

54:04

to try to like to try to force the federal

54:06

marshals out to shoot at them. It was. It

54:09

was very strange, um. And it was

54:11

like at the same time as this was all happening,

54:13

UM, at least for an example

54:15

of something wonderful that started to happening for about

54:17

the last week, there's been a guy who

54:20

set up a rib restaurant in the

54:22

park outside of the Federal Courthouse. It's

54:25

called Riot Ribs, and it's amazing. And

54:28

he's like he's like a black dude in his forties

54:30

and he'll he'll just be out there all night and all day

54:32

in a bulletproof est cooking ribs for people.

54:35

Um, and all the ribs are free. Everything's

54:37

free. Like it's a mutual aid sort of situation.

54:39

People donate to keep it going. Uh.

54:42

Donovan Farley, who's another local journalist

54:44

journalist and one of the nights when like we

54:46

were all running from the cops and they charged

54:49

out. Was like like defended the rib shack

54:51

with his body and his press pass Like you won't,

54:54

you won't, Like no, don't

54:57

take our ribs. Yeah.

54:59

Uh, Riot Ribbs is fucking incredible. Uh

55:02

there, it was, well take

55:04

our ribs and so on. Yeah. At one point

55:06

last night, the protesters who were out in

55:08

between the Federal Courthouse and the Justice Center were

55:10

lighting random fires and we all started

55:13

to be afraid that like the cops were going to come

55:15

in. And it was just like I was standing

55:17

in line for ribs and like this one

55:19

of the one protesters kind of like walked up to Riot

55:21

Ribbs and was like, hey, guys, uh, people

55:24

are starting random fires, so we might wind up

55:26

having cops real soon, just like as a head's

55:28

up. Uh.

55:32

So Riot Ribbs is good.

55:35

Um yeah. That's one of the things that's given

55:37

me some hope in all this is that, like them

55:40

in in the face of something that's

55:42

really fucking terrifying, it

55:44

hasn't made anyone in Portland

55:47

give up. Um so I I think, and

55:50

I think they're gonna have to shoot a bunch of

55:52

people dead in the street to have a chance of

55:54

stopping the nightly protests

55:56

in Portland. And I think they'll do that. Um

55:58

yeah, I think they will do that at eventually. Um

56:03

yeah. And the people do We're gonna do that, don't have any

56:05

qualms about doing that. No, And the the

56:08

the unit that has been sent to Portland. One

56:10

of the units is the Packed Force, which

56:12

is like a multi agency but like run

56:14

by Homeland Security. Um, it's

56:16

like protecting America's um

56:19

cities and whatever. It's a it's

56:21

a federal law enforcement

56:23

unit made up of sociopathic Special

56:25

Forces veterans um whose

56:27

entire job and life purpose is

56:30

breaking human bodies. Um

56:32

that they're sending the streets to deal

56:34

with seventeen year old kids who charged

56:36

some plywood. Um, it's it's it's

56:39

the thing that I've been trying

56:41

that I was trying to warn people about, and it could happen

56:43

here. It's like the thing that has

56:45

been like screaming in the back of my head for

56:48

three years and change now like that it's

56:50

it's here. Uh, it's here,

56:52

and it's a nationwide problem.

56:54

Um. And I don't know

56:58

how to stop it at

57:00

this point. Um. Getting Trump

57:02

out of office will help, But

57:04

most of what it will do is by us a year

57:07

or two to figure out how

57:09

to actually stop

57:13

this country from falling

57:15

off of completely falling. Yeah yeah,

57:18

but that is where the stakes are. This is

57:20

an annihilation question. It's

57:22

yeah, some of the footage is just unbelievable

57:25

and they're all like the sorry,

57:28

just it's interesting still to

57:30

me, the Home Department Plant of Security doing

57:32

all these things. Um, they turn eighteen

57:34

this year. Uh huh, Yeah,

57:37

they're finally an adult. I'm excited

57:40

from when they get a drink. Yeah, I

57:42

know they have a few more years left. Um,

57:47

it's wild. I mean, you

57:50

have been talking about this. This is the culmination,

57:53

not the culmination of your work. But like

57:55

it's a nightmare come true. It's

57:57

one of those things where you're like, you

58:00

do not have any satisfaction

58:03

in seeing yourself being right. I would imagine

58:05

no, no, no, I did. I really didn't

58:07

want to be right. I really really fucking

58:09

didn't want to be right because I've watched

58:11

the city die and I don't want

58:13

to watch another city die. Call

58:16

that it could happen here, but it shouldn't, but

58:19

it, but but I would like it.

58:26

Um, I don't know about tonight. I might kind

58:28

of depends on the Portland Press

58:31

corps Um, who again has responded magnificently

58:34

to this. Uh, whatever the funk you

58:36

want to call it. Um. We we

58:38

we We've got a pretty good job of setting up shifts.

58:41

Um. I did have. I was out with friends,

58:43

just like trying to have a night of sanity on

58:46

on Saturday when the Feds rioted,

58:48

and you know, one of the one of the great

58:50

local journalists, Garrison, Um

58:53

was like, hey we could, we could use some more people

58:55

on the ground, and thankfully other people volunteered.

58:57

UM. And I had this moment of being like, well,

59:00

I'm gonna let Garrison and the others handle it. And

59:02

and Garrison's seventeen. Um,

59:04

So I guess I got to finally have that wonderful

59:07

human experience of being like, yeah,

59:09

I'll let the teenager get

59:12

go get shot at for me. I'm

59:15

old tonight, I'm gonna let a seventeen year

59:17

old take the fucking And he got shot with a grenade

59:20

that night, thankfully in the backpacks, and it didn't

59:22

quite ignite his backpack, but it would have if other

59:24

people hadn't stopped it. UM.

59:28

Shout out to Garrison hungry bow tie on Twitter.

59:30

He's fucking amazing. Really

59:35

really took a turn immediately with that grenade.

59:41

Well, yeah, I guess that does

59:43

it for us today. On that uplifting

59:45

note, Um, make

59:47

sure to brush your teeth with beans. Yeah,

59:49

brush brush everything with beans.

59:52

However many beans there are in your house,

59:54

there's not enough beans. Wipe everything

59:57

with beans. Look, if you're using

59:59

beans for everything, then soon all

1:00:02

barriers between beans and the rest of the

1:00:04

world will become so blurred that

1:00:06

you exist in nothing but a continuum

1:00:08

of beans that is everlasting and unchanging.

1:00:11

And isn't that what this country is about? Yeah?

1:00:14

You really do make it seem like beans

1:00:16

are the magical fruit. M Yeah,

1:00:19

A lot of people are saying that, Katie, A lot

1:00:21

of people are saying that. Um,

1:00:24

you guys can check us out online at

1:00:26

Worst Year Pod on Twitter and

1:00:29

Instagram. Thanks

1:00:31

for sitting through this hodge

1:00:33

Podge episode. Hopefully

1:00:36

you learned something. Hopefully you had

1:00:38

a laugh for two and

1:00:40

um, that's what I

1:00:42

got to say. You can follow Katie

1:00:44

and at Katie Still on Instagram and Twitter. You can follow

1:00:47

Cody at Dr Mr Cody on Instagram and Twitter.

1:00:49

You can follow Robert on Twitter, not Instagram

1:00:51

and I write okay, um,

1:00:56

and so is why Sophie why?

1:00:59

Al Right, guys, we'll see you next week.

1:01:01

Not really, you'll hear hear each

1:01:04

other. Yeah, yeah, I mean some of

1:01:06

you. Like theoretically, there's got to be one or

1:01:08

two people with synesthesia who'll listen to us,

1:01:10

so you will see us next

1:01:13

Yeah. This is the color blue, signing

1:01:15

up everything

1:01:21

everything, So again.

1:01:26

I tried. Worst

1:01:29

Year Ever is a production of I heart Radio. For

1:01:31

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