← American Fever Dream
American Fever Dream
What The Manhunt For Luigi Mangione Says About Society, ft. Stephanie Ruhle
00:49:25
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- [00:00]
Shopify Representative
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- [01:17]
Stephanie Ruhl
Young people are like, f that I'm paying into a broken system that's never, ever, ever going to pay me back. Lawmakers know this, but unfortunately, they can't do anything about it. There's times there are tons of lawmakers on both sides of the aisle that know that we need entitlement reform. But in order to enact entitlement reform, they can't get elected. Senior citizens are one reliable group of voters, and you ain't touching their Social Security.
- [01:48]
Sammy Sage
Hello, and welcome to this very special bonus episode of American Fever Dream. I'm Sammy Sage, and I am here with Stephanie Ruhl, NBC senior business analyst. Welcome.
- [01:57]
Stephanie Ruhl
Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to be part of the bonus.
- [02:01]
Sammy Sage
Well, everyone was really, you know, loved our episode last time, and we want to talk again. This time, we're going to talk about the United CEO murder. And can you believe this story?
- [02:12]
Stephanie Ruhl
I mean, this story touches everything, everything, everything. Mm.
- [02:17]
Sammy Sage
It's like if you had to design a story to kind of represent our time, he is the murderer of our time. In a weird way, I don't want to glorify that.
- [02:27]
Stephanie Ruhl
If you were to design a story of our time, it's about the murderer. But the horrible, sad part about it is that the murder has somehow become the sideshow. When at the end of the day, we cannot forget that not very many days ago in the middle of New York City, three weeks before Christmas, a human being was gunned down in cold blood in the early hours of the morning. And that's the universe we're living in.
- [02:56]
Sammy Sage
And the NYPD didn't find him. A random employee slash patron, where I think it might have been an and situation are the ones to recognize him. Someone from Altoona, Pennsylvania, when he has a family with at least 37 cousins on just one side and seems to have been by all accounts, a pretty popular guy.
- [03:15]
Stephanie Ruhl
This has blown my mind. New York City Police department has a $6 billion budget. When you think about facial recognition technology, when you think about 200 plus times a day, we're recorded by some sort of camera on the street. And yes, he had his mask on for almost the entire time. But where I have just been blown away, a random person, a random Karen goes off in the aisle of a target or at a checkout counter, somebody posted online. And within minutes people are like, that's Joanne.
- [03:50]
Sammy Sage
She's in my country club.
- [03:51]
Stephanie Ruhl
She's at my country club. You know, she's a travel agent right outside Detroit. She has four cats. Her husband's name is Herb. All that. It was five days. This young man was valedictorian of his high school class. Less than 10 years ago, he went to Penn. Less than five years ago, no one recognized him. That blows my mind.
- [04:09]
Sammy Sage
Well, that's what I want to know because I feel like I've seen a few people who are like, I went to Penn. And then people were kind of talking about it, but no one was like, oh yeah, we recognized him this whole time and we didn't turn him in. It seems surprising to all the people that I have whose comments I've seen.
- [04:24]
Stephanie Ruhl
It does. But then I think, you know what? When we see a person on video, we often hear their voice, we see their mannerisms. We really only saw his eyes. What really has has me amazed. You know, it was a group of people in a McDonald's in Altoona who first they were talking about it, saying, that guy looks like the shooter from New York. The employee heard it, but it was The Daily Beast that reported the police department in Altoona has said they are getting threats to that McDonald's, that McDonald's employee. When you talk about somebody who is, you know, doing the right thing, the, you know, police department, the Department of Justice said, help us find this person. And a McDonald's employee did it. And it's amazing. It's a sign of the that that this person is now facing threats.
- [05:14]
Sammy Sage
His lawyers apparently getting offers to pay his legal bills. There's something psychological here about both his individual psychology and the mass psychology of all these people who are not hurt, who, who feel like, oh, I'm gonna. I'm not. Fuck these people. I'm not gonna help them find him. I empathize with him, and I'm not going to be the one to turn him in. What confuses me is that his parents filed a missing person report. He lost track of his friends, family for six months. And I have my own psychoanalysis of what has gone on here. But I think with. With that, it's like, why is the public quote unquote taking his side? Now? I don't think most people who, like, put a laughing emoji on the announcement of his death would ever go out themselves and murder a CEO, but they feel comfortable enough putting their name attached to, like, I'm gonna cheer this on in a snarky way at least. And what does that say about the way that people's people are willing to break this taboo around cheering? Death? That is feels karmic to me.
- [06:20]
Stephanie Ruhl
I would say two things. It's highly dangerous, and I want to get your take, because when I was young, maybe I'll say younger people didn't see graphic videos, right? They didn't to this extent. Right. Once every few years, you may have, you know, like some stranger. Now people see graphic, violent videos every single day. What's deeply upsetting, and I'm not, I'm putting over in category A, the rage against the health insurance industry. We can even talk about it as it relates to inflation, numbers that just came out. We're gonna put that over here in category A. But in category B, this is so highly dangerous because we're normalizing. This person screwed you over. Not cancel. Remember, canceling somebody was the worst thing just a few years ago. You know, fire them, claw back their bay. No, murder them. Right. On Sunday, a music critic who writes a newsletter, a respected newsletter, had a piece out. Well, who could be next? The head of Live Nation? The head of Ticketmaster? We're really upset about ticket prices. Sure. We are really upset about ticket prices and hidden fees, but that doesn't mean we're gonna kill another human. And I fear we easily forget how dangerous social media is. Every single thing that I say on television has to get approved by legal and standards. We have the FCC in our ear, up our nose, down our throat, up our. You know what, and we're held liable for everything that we say or do. We already know that there are foreign adversaries that push misinformation. We know that campaigns and campaign staffers were hacked in this upcoming election, and we keep forgetting about it. Right now, January 19th, though I doubt it happens. TikTok is going to be banned in the United States because of its Chinese ownership. Do the majority of users of any of these apps care? No. They're saying, don't take my drug away.
- [08:18]
Sammy Sage
They don't believe that.
- [08:19]
Stephanie Ruhl
They don't believe, don't take my drug away. And my concern is that, can you believe all the rage? Can you believe people are cheering on his death? I don't know that I believe the source for a lot of these people pushing violence, pushing chaos, pushing death are actual disgruntled Americans. And there are lots. I think there's a very good chance. Remember, what do our foreign adversaries want to do? So chaos. Never forget, it was before the last election when Steve Bannon was talking about his love of Stalin. We wanna burn it down. And so part of this rage. Cause this is what I wanna ask you about. Because what I. I almost said love, but I don't. What I'm amazed by in the backlash is that now it's not working because this boy's story no longer tracks. Yesterday I spoke to a.
- [09:07]
Sammy Sage
People don't think it tracks, but it actually does. People who think it doesn't track don't know what Gen Z' cause it's incoherent offense.
- [09:16]
Stephanie Ruhl
Yes. And that's what I want you to explain to us. But yesterday I got a call from a huge guy in the finance industry who said, well, of course this boy was indoctrinated at an Ivy League university by super liberal professors. And I'm like, what? And that person I spoke to ignored the fact that this person also follows a number of super right wingers. This takes us back to the original Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump campaign, where there's a universe of young people who are saying, f the system. And for anyone who's saying it's the right, oh, it's the left. It's not you. Please, you explain this to us.
- [09:53]
Sammy Sage
I Think people, we need to ditch the right left thinking because especially younger people are not thinking in the ways that the mainstream media is using those words. Like these are not coherent ideologies. And I think that that's what was so confusing for people is that they thought, oh, he's gonna be a leftist, he's gonna be this like working. And what they failed to realize is that his ideology and all of its contradictions, even though he was clearly a smart and thoughtful, well read person, his ideologies were so confused and conflicted. And you look at who he followed and it was not like super leftist people. It was like really fringe ways of thinking. And what you're saying about you can't say anything on TV that's not verified. The people he's listening to are the people who are outside of that world where they can just say whatever they want and present it as if it's this like really high minded argument. And that they're like some sort of like intellectual boundary pusher.
- [10:52]
Stephanie Ruhl
But also that the mainstream media is keeping this truth from you. Yeah, they're lying to. When I think about in the last week, you know, every sort of vigilante quote unquote, independent journalist who's like, oh no, no, this was his wife. This, this I know. And the mainstream media is hiding. It's, there's no hiding.
- [11:09]
Sammy Sage
He's so never his wife. Like, maybe if it was the CMO, maybe if it was 10 years ago, I'd be like, oh yeah, that guy's wife's pissed. But because it was the CEO of this company and this situation right before this investor conference and he even wrote, I believe in one of his to do lists, like, wouldn't it be funny if I got him at his own bean counting conference? And like it was, I feel like I could immediately see like this guy is radicalized and he thinks he's a hero because. And you even see he's like rationalized not killing him with a bomb because there would be external, you know, there would be casualties. He really thinks, I mean, I think there was probably some sort of psychotic break potentially that occurred due to his pain and like also his isolation. Not to excuse it, but I feel like that's how he got to this point, especially like a kid who had everything going for him. But what you're saying earlier about we see so many graphic images and we're so like used to this horror. And that's why I think people don't even have a problem joking about it. Why they're like, ha, Ha ha. It's so fun that you know why they're making jokes about how big his dick is and, like, how that why they're buying Luigi hats. I think the reason is because nothing even feels real to people anymore. The CEO doesn't feel real to people. Daniel Penn, you know, Jordan Neely doesn't feel real to people. All the people who are denied health coverage and denied insurance. Because when you read those stories around, like you read people's stories about their experiences, it's like, oh, I feel really bad for those people.
- [12:39]
Stephanie Ruhl
People's experiences around healthcare and the health insurance industry. Horrible, horrific, horrible. They're waiting for endless, endless hours for someone to even speak to them on the phone, right? They're waiting months to get the doctor's appointment. The doctor wants to give them this treatment. The health insurance company rejects it. It goes back to the doctor, back to the insurance company, back to the doctor. Denial, denial, denial. And during that period of time, you got sick. This isn't like. But that's it. This isn't like you're sitting in front of your screen, frustrated, waiting for Taylor tickets. You're getting sicker, and that is causing.
- [13:12]
Sammy Sage
You more illness, most likely the stress of it, the worry. I think everyone, you know, anyone in that, like, Lex Fridman world will tell you there's like this mind body connection. Like, this is a real thing. And I think that, hold on, you.
- [13:24]
Stephanie Ruhl
Don'T need to be in a Lex Friedman world to know that this is true, to know that. But I imagine your emotional health and your physical health are completely intertwined when you attach to that, an Internet that will take you absolutely anywhere, especially if someone does have something like back pain where they can't get out, you know, chronic back pain, and they can't get out of bed. I look at my own sons and the way the algorithm works. You're watching a vintage 1970s football game, you're watching a basketball game. It doesn't take many clicks to go down a really scary rabbit hole. And that's what we're being fed. And in as we ingest this misinformation, we're also being told and the world around you, the corporate media is lying to you. You know, kind of a podcaster type of person who came from more mainstream media, reached out to me on Saturday and said, I just can't believe it. Stephanie, is this true that your corporate overlords, your bosses, won't let you acknowledge that there's this backlash and have sympathy for the real. And I said, that's been on all but I said what are you talking about? I said I hosted a show last night, my first guest, blah blah blah. I explained to this person how much we're covering and then a day later I looked at their social media. He ignored everything I said cuz it didn't fit his narrative. And this is dangerous because in this time of isolation where we have a crisis of loneliness in this country, people are being fed misinformation combined with real pain. Inflation numbers came out today. What are some of the biggest costs in our lives? Insurance, homeowner's insurance, health insurance, car insurance and in health insurance, it's captive. There's nothing you can do about it and you need it to get any medical treatment.
- [15:19]
Dr. Naomi Bernstein
Hello oversharing Listeners, it's Dr. Naomi Bernstein with some exciting news. Starting January 13th, our Oversharing Calm the Fuck down subscription is getting even better. Subscribers will get oversharing episodes a day early, plus additional exclusive bonus content on the second and fourth Thursdays of each month. Here's what's new. One bonus episode with even more emails and advice, and another where we follow up with past email writers who could be you. While we won't be releasing new meditations in the new year, don't worry, all of our past meditations will stay available on the feed for you to enjoy anytime. Plus we'll have a new Meditations playlist for our Spotify listeners. To sign up now, head to subscribe.basches.com and select Oversharing. Calm the Fuck Down. We're so excited about creating this new bonus content, talking to more of you, hearing your stories, sharing some of our own, and reminding us all to calm the fuck down. Down.
- [16:17]
BetterHelp Representative
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- [16:48]
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- [17:19]
Sammy Sage
I keep coming back to this question, like, why is our basic health insured? Like you insure something that against a catastrophe. We're all human beings, we're all marching in one direction. So it's like, why do we have insurance for it? I know this probably sounds crazy. Like I'm basically just going to say, oh, I'm arguing for like a single payer system with maybe like some supplements. And then you should build an incentive for people to have preventative care. But not like, oh, you have to go to the prove that you went to the gym 150 times a year. Do you get $200 off? Like there should be a preventive system. People should be screened for things. Like I think of so many women I know who, who find out when they're 32 and want to have a kid, that they have PCOS, they have endometriosis, they have fibroids, they can't have a baby because they have some sort of random condition that they would have never known they have. And that condition didn't just like affect their ability to have kids. I found out I have PCOS and I can now trace like seven different things in my life to that. And it's like it would have just been so easy to give me the medication to regulate that when I was 15 and it would have saved me a lot of issues. Like it's kind of why, why don't you get screened for things like this right away when I had every single obvious symptom and it had to take me freezing my eggs and like to figure this out out of my own pocket.
- [18:36]
Stephanie Ruhl
It's a broken system that's only gotten more and more and more broken. And what's interesting about that, American young voter, you know, earlier this week, Donald Trump was asked about the TikTok ban and would you want to uphold it? Something that's been been already passed, basically. And he didn't answer the question. He said TikTok. You know, I really won with the youths. I had a great social media guy, his name was, you know, I can't even remember what we called him, blah, blah, blah. They love my content on TikTok. What was amazing to me is, right, TikTok's not gonna go away. Donald Trump's not gonna do anything about it. But a lot of these people who voted for him, because this idea that he's gonna break the system, he's gonna change it, he's gonna burn it down and make it work for you, he's not going to. And when you look at things, you know, all the people he's surrounding himself with, for the most part, there are many of them, are extraordinarily successful business people. Good on them. But the answer from business people to government is often privatize, privatize, privatize. If we go that route, it's only going to get more expensive. That.
- [19:38]
Sammy Sage
And we are like, the vibe I'm getting is very French Revolution and let them. You know, there's no one saying let them eat cake. But when you look at your feed and you're seeing images of people in war, you're seeing people like the shooter. You're seeing. You're reading all of people's stories about their insurance, about how horribly they've been treated by insurance. And then you're seeing someone doing their makeup and getting ready with me and like, here's my clothing haul and look at me on my private jet. And you are getting the message of let them eat cake simply by having, like, your brain, your brain can't process those two things.
- [20:13]
Stephanie Ruhl
Okay, you are, you are 100% correct in that. Last week, I did an event with personal finance, high school personal finance teachers.
- [20:23]
Sammy Sage
That exists now. I would have loved that.
- [20:25]
Stephanie Ruhl
It does. You know, it's funny, I'm 48 years old. When I went to high school, they had home economics, which everyone just was cooking, but home economics with actually sewing and personal finance. Home economics. It's how do you get a loan? How do you get a budget? We forget about that part.
- [20:42]
Sammy Sage
They taught you that?
- [20:43]
Stephanie Ruhl
Yes, we forget about that part. Cause we're like, no, it was just cooking. It was sewing. It's how do you sew a button on? We stopped having those electives and many schools are coming back. But the reason I bring it up is what I kept hearing over and over from these teachers. Teenagers now are so living online and sucked into this system of, I'm just going to be an influencer. I don't need to learn about any of this stuff. I'm going to be an influencer. That clothing haul that you're talking about, I'm going to do a few posts and brands are going to sponsor me and they're going to send me gear and I'm going to take that money and I'm going to invest it in crypto and I'm going to become a day Trader.
- [21:19]
Sammy Sage
They might as well say like, I'm going to be a famous actress.
- [21:22]
Stephanie Ruhl
Correct. But when you're seeing it in mass and when you're looking online, it feels like there's countless influencers and they're making all this money. So I was talking to some teachers that were like, I can't get these kids to focus on, here's how a mortgage works. I'm going to explain interest rates where they're like, I don't need a mortgage. I'm gonna be paying for a fat apartment in New York City, cash. And they believe it and that. So think about how do you tell.
- [21:50]
Sammy Sage
Them, like, no, that's not going to happen because your brain is only seeing right now, you're not getting this money now.
- [21:57]
Stephanie Ruhl
But they don't believe it, cuz it's the ultimate boomer. No, but also, okay, Boomer, Jake Paul just made a zillion dollars wearing.
- [22:05]
Sammy Sage
There's one of him.
- [22:06]
Stephanie Ruhl
Million. Yes. There's only one of him. Like at the time there was only one Elvis. But they look at a Jake Paul, they look at all these women influencers and they're like, well, just a few years ago they weren't anything. I could be that too. And so take the.
- [22:21]
Sammy Sage
They might as well say, I'm gonna. My plan is to win the lottery.
- [22:23]
Stephanie Ruhl
Listen, I agree 100%, like you've just made your career plan to win Powerball. But start when a kid is 11 and 12 and they're online and their fear of missing out. Okay, when I was 11 and 12 and I didn't get invited to a sleepover, maybe I heard about it, maybe I didn't, I moved on like days later too. Correct. Now all of that exists online, on Instagram, on Snap, right? The whole, you know, Snapchat is, I'm just gonna swipe and do this weird picture of myself to show all of you that I'm not sitting at home, that I'm at a cool place and that place is cooler than wherever you are. And I'm with cool people. So let's start there. When a person's 10 and that fear of missing out is really creating rot in their stomach, now it's going further and further. And now the people are becoming older and older and they're like, wait a minute, I can't afford school, I can't afford rent, I can't afford this. And then they go online and people are, I'm headed to the super bowl on a PJ with my boys.
- [23:21]
Sammy Sage
Okay? Not only do we have extreme wealth.
- [23:24]
Stephanie Ruhl
So when you first say, I'm getting French Revolution. I'm like, girl, what are you talking about? Like, we're the most prosperous country in the world. We have more people working today than ever. People are doing so well, but that's irrelevant. How people feel is relevant.
- [23:38]
Sammy Sage
Well, also factually, inequality is more than it's ever been. And the idea that you can then see all these people who have done so well, they're all on vacation. Sometimes I walk down the street and I'm like, how is there so much to buy? Like, how? Who is buying all of it? I genuinely am. Like, who? How? How can there be so many stores, so many hotels, so many restaurants? Who is buying all that? There's not that many people who can afford a bag like this stupid bag that's $3,000. And then also, like, live their lives. Like, there just has to be a limit. And I don't understand, like, where all these people are getting this money and.
- [24:17]
Stephanie Ruhl
Okay, I see wealthy people. Okay, you ready for your rage? Connect that rage to the immigrant crisis. Okay? Eight years ago, when the child separation policy happened, people said, this is an act against humanity. This can't be happening in our country. We cannot do this. Fast forward, you've got governors Ron DeSantis and Greg Abbott. While it may have been hurtful, harmful, it was brilliant politically. They sent migrants to cities all across the country. Now, we just had an election where you saw huge shifts, where the South Bronx voted for Donald Trump. Suburbs of Long island, parts of Queens, New Jersey, where I'm from. Remember when Trump did a rally in the South Bronx? People are like, what in the hell is he doing here? He's never going to win. And then he did extraordinarily well. And this goes back to the point you were making a moment ago. You walk down the street and you're going, how is there all this stuff for sale? How are there all these hotels? Well, when people are driving over the bridge from New Jersey and what they pay for the bridge now, $14, $16. Now it's $100 for them to park that hotel that maybe they used to stay at a husband and wife every few years as a treat.
- [25:26]
Sammy Sage
$800 a night.
- [25:27]
Stephanie Ruhl
Correct. They can't afford it. It's hundreds and hundreds of dollars a night plus the add on fees, plus the resort fee, plus the tax, plus.
- [25:34]
Sammy Sage
The living wage fee.
- [25:35]
Stephanie Ruhl
Correct. And then they're driving down the west side highway and they're seeing migrants that are standing there, and then they're saying, hold on a minute. That group of people Lives at the Roosevelt Hotel. They got a cell phone, they got a stipend, they're getting a meal plan. And even if all of that isn't true, even if a portion of it is true, even if crime isn't spiking, that rage, that French Revolution rage that that person is feeling driving down the west side highway is real. Because at the end of the day, most people, it is not about what their political affiliation is. They want the world to be fair. And when you don't feel like things are fair, you are pissed and you're saying things are good for that person and that person and not me. And if we start to come from this place, that every person deserves to be and wants to be physically safe, socially free, financially secure. And to me, those three verticals are the three verticals that government should always have in mind. Not that we have to run perfectly and efficiently. And like a business, we need to make sure that people have these three columns right in order for their lives to function. So people feel like these three areas are not currently secure and they're mad and, and things aren't fair. So when they see something like that guy having gotten shot, yes, they should think the lack of humanity, how could this happen? If we don't have decency, we have nothing. But people aren't considering decency and civility, right? Decency and civility are zero. That's the starting point. But we're not currently operating at the starting point. And that's why this fragile system, I think, is so broken.
- [27:18]
Sammy Sage
I completely agree. I think that that's what people are looking at. It's not like I resent that every person has something I don't have. I think people understand a level of unfairness and they're willing to entertain that. And I think even in some ways, like people aspire and they respect someone who has worked hard and gotten somewhere. But what I imagine the people who are cheering on this, this shooter are thinking is, well, that guy has killed effectively my family member because his company denied the treatment that they paid for, because they've been paying premiums. And he has now made $10 million a year, plus the 15 million he took off the table when he inside traded allegedly, potentially. And it's like, is that like he's literally living his life because their fa, because of their family members deaths, you could say.
- [28:14]
Stephanie Ruhl
So where do we put this? Right? So if you are the health insurance industry, where do you put this?
- [28:19]
Sammy Sage
I am getting out of the business. Like, I don't believe that health should be Insured. I'm doing what? Something like what Mark Cuban's doing with Cost Plus Drugs. And I wanted to even start this conversation with like, okay, people are cheering on the murder, but what kind of action would they maybe have cheered on? That was an act of justice. That was not murder. And one thing I was thinking was about the show, you ever see Mr. Robot where they like hack the whole system and they clear the debt. I was like, that would be a good use of someone's engineering skills. But even beyond that, I'm thinking, I think about the co founder of Cost Plus Drugs who emailed Mark Cuban a cold email with his idea for this Cost plus premium, certain percentage pharmacy. And that would drive down the costs and consumers could just buy it directly from them, no insurance. To me that seems like a really productive way of using one's, one's intelligence and understanding of the system in order to actually create a solution that could ultimately be competitive. And now why don't we do that situ do that for like radiology and for like blood tests and for all these other pieces of the system and then force the insurers to provide a better product.
- [29:29]
Stephanie Ruhl
So I think this mindset that you have is part of the open mindedness or the celebration of an Elon Musk going to Washington.
- [29:42]
Sammy Sage
But I don't celebrate him.
- [29:43]
Stephanie Ruhl
I know you don't. Yes, yes, I know you don't. But like, just stay with me while I try to connect this. So there's lots of reasons not to celebrate him. But there's a site I keep hearing from people, Elon Musk is so screwed when he goes to Washington. He has Potomac Fever, which is this idea. Business people go to Washington, they're so successful, they're change it, they're going to fix it and then they're slammed into the bureaucracy and they can't. That's what happens to kind of every business person that walks in. And again, I'm not endorsing Elon Musk, I'm just walking you through it. But Elon Musk does live outside the lines. Right. He is a brilliant inventor, creator, business person who has said, f the system, I'm going to break it and I'm gonna make something better. Take Twitter. We could all say he destroyed it. He fired all the people, they lost all their advertisers. I don't know. Did he destroy it? I'm still on it.
- [30:36]
Sammy Sage
Not for his own purposes.
- [30:37]
Stephanie Ruhl
I'm still on it and not for his own purposes. Right, right. Twitter in large part, in my opinion, in the Last two years has been used to push right wing ideology. And it worked, right? Yeah, Right. Yes. He spent $250 million. He's made a zillion since then. Donald Trump's campaign had and spent way less than Kama. And social media was a boon for him. But the reason I'm getting back to this is people keep laughing, saying he has no power in this Department of Government Efficiency. It's over there in Siberia. It's just an advisory group. They can't do anything. Maybe they can't, but also the people who want them to get nothing done are part of a bureaucratic system. And so I'm just saying this goes back to your original point. Can't we just break this? Can't we use this cost plus model and do something else? We only can if someone actually says, f the system, let's start over. Now you're what I think fear and concern is like, yes, let's say F the system and let's start over, but let's not have Donald Trump and Elon Musk behind the wheel. I think that's what you're saying.
- [31:40]
Sammy Sage
Yeah, I mean, here's the thing. F the system. But I don't think that like doing like, I don't think that when you screw the system, you're necessarily helping the people that you intended to help. So I'm very wary of like reactionary, just, oh, just get rid of this system. Like most people who say that don't actually aren't that well acquainted with the system they want to throw out in general. And they don't necessarily understand it. And I don't want to say I do because I really hardly can get my, my mind around like what a PBM is. But I think that like, this is, I don't believe that it is unfixable without, like, without having a revolution. Like, I don't think you need to have a, you know, the French Revolution or you need to be shooting CEOs in order to find solutions.
- [32:23]
Stephanie Ruhl
To me, you never, ever, ever need to shoot a CEO or anyone. But you do need a revolutionary mind to make something happen. I'm gonna give you a business example, and there's lots of reasons why people don't like this person. We'll put that aside. Travis Kalanick, the co founder of Uber, he was then kicked out of the company, so on and so forth. If Travis hadn't had an FU to the system mindset, Uber never would have existed. Because in every city in this country, the Taxi and Limousine Commission, the people who Own taxi medallions would have pushed Uber out, so it couldn't have happened. You have to have a revolutionary mind to say, we really want to change the system and improve it. And it's very difficult to do that within an existing system because there's tons of job functions that should get broken up. There's tons of businesses that shouldn't exist. And it's very hard to do that when you're saying, I want to take baby steps. Kara Swisher and I once had an argument. This one was more about politics. And I being somebody who has never been oppressed or discriminated against for my age, my sex, my race, my sexual orientation, my religion, I'm always like, can't we just take baby steps? Can't we just take one foot in front of the other? We don't have to burn the house down. And Kara said to me, you think we don't have to burn the house down because no one has ever tried to burn yours down. And so I think you and I are like two ships in the night here, that you're like, we need a French Revolution mindset. We have to break this. We have to start over.
- [33:58]
Sammy Sage
No, I'm saying there will be a French Revolution type situation if people do not solve this problem.
- [34:03]
Stephanie Ruhl
So we need other people, not necessarily in Elon Musk, but the reason people are open to the idea of an Elon Musk is because they need people to say, these systems that we have aren't working and there needs some sort of radical change in order to improve them. And I think that the demand for radical change in part comes from the rage machine. Listen, there is a concentrated business of hate complex out there that's only ratcheting up the anger, and that is, I.
- [34:40]
Sammy Sage
Think, partly driven by our adversaries, but they're tapping into something real. So speaking to Elon Musk, revolutionary mindset, but ultimately very greedy. Why is there only one Mark Cuban? Like, why is there only one guy who's like, I'm going to start a public, public benefit corporation, and I'm not going to become this greedy psychopath who has to be thrown out of my company? Why is it so hard for people who have so much money to be like, you know, I'm good. Like, it's. If I don't make more. Like, I'll just be good. Like, you're fine, you're fine. So why are people so discontent with that? It always has to be more like, why can't you feel like I actually am fine now?
- [35:29]
Stephanie Ruhl
I think that's part of human nature. And like, let's be clear, Mark Cuban is a hugely successful guy. He's made an enormous amount of money. I think it's part of human nature. Especially a lot of people who are the high, high, highest achiever levels. Just the other day I was thinking about this. Some of the most extraordinarily successful people in the private equity industry who are in their 70s, in my mind, in my 70s, if I'm one of these guys, retire, retire.
- [35:57]
Sammy Sage
I lived.
- [35:58]
Stephanie Ruhl
Live on an island about. But these guys are trolling the earth. Yes. On their airplanes, looking for deals. Looking for deals. And this is an adrenaline addiction. This is oftentimes when you encounter people that are the highest level of business excellence and competitiveness, they don't ever have a feeling of content. They reach a goal. They want the next one, the next one, and they are just trolling the earth for the next deal. The next deal, the next deal. It's who they are.
- [36:25]
Sammy Sage
Are they excellent or are they addicted? Because, like, are you.
- [36:28]
Stephanie Ruhl
Are they so excellent at one thing? They're excellent at deal making, and they're addicted to it. But the sadness so excellent when you.
- [36:35]
Sammy Sage
Have all the money and all the leverage and the lawyers. Like, are you actually that good or are you just seeing companies that, for them, $20 million sounds like a great deal because they have been running a small business for a long time. But for this guy who's been trolling the earth for a great deal, he. It's like nothing. It's gonna use his, like, line of credit for it.
- [36:53]
Stephanie Ruhl
It's how you define excellence, Right? When I think about, do you think.
- [36:58]
Sammy Sage
Do you think just making the most money is what is, like, the. I know it might be for these people.
- [37:04]
Stephanie Ruhl
Definitely not for me.
- [37:05]
Sammy Sage
And if you're not happy, what's the fucking point? If you can't even, like, sit and be just happy in your health and wealth on your yacht, what are you doing? What is the point? Go live on Mars and, like, have a billionaire competition. Like, why can't they leave the rest.
- [37:21]
Stephanie Ruhl
Of us the fuck alone? Because everybody defines happiness in a different way. Right? So that wouldn't be happiness to me. But for those people that status the notches on their belt, the deals that they won is their idea of happiness. What it's not is giving them any peace whatsoever. And so that's why, like, a lot of people are amazed that all these people who know better on lots of Donald Trump issues, who know better on tariffs and how damaging they would be to our economy, who know better in terms of their wives and their daughters and bodily autonomy, but they just know that a vote for Donald Trump means they're never facing the wealth tax. They know that carried interests will never be touched. And so different people have different priorities. And part of the rage that you're talking about in young people and in Gen Z and about the health insurers industry, insurance industry, goes back to things like Social Security. Young people are like f that I'm paying into a broken system that's never, ever, ever going to pay me back. Lawmakers know this, but unfortunately they can't do anything about it. There's tons of lawmakers on both sides of the aisle that know that we need entitlement reform. But in order to enact entitlement reform, they can't get elected. Senior citizens are one reliable group of voters and you ain't touching their Social Security.
- [38:46]
Sammy Sage
Is it fair to touch their Social Security either? They paid.
- [38:49]
Stephanie Ruhl
Agreed.
- [38:49]
Sammy Sage
These aren't like, these aren't like, okay, have you ever asked any of these people who are so afraid of like losing the carried interest loophole, like, have you ever asked them, like, what are you so afraid of? Like, you'll just find another way to make money. Like, it'll be fine, you'll be fine. So carry your money is budding on itself already. What is the just like, can't it be enough? Like, how much can you spend in a year? How much can you spend?
- [39:12]
Stephanie Ruhl
Truly, carried interest is a unique one because no one wants to talk about it. Okay.
- [39:18]
Sammy Sage
Yeah.
- [39:18]
Stephanie Ruhl
There's not a single lawmaker. Every, every, every lawmaker I ever interview, I'm always like, by the way, would you protect the carried interest loophole? No one ever, ever wants to talk about it. Cuz carried interest is an absolute giveaway. There are just some protections in business and businesses are saying I'm not getting rid of it. And, and part of this is, but.
- [39:36]
Sammy Sage
They'Re not in charge. They're not supposed to be in charge, but they are.
- [39:39]
Stephanie Ruhl
And right now, thanks to Citizens United, there is more money in politics. I mean, what was Jon Tester's, I mean, hundreds of millions of dollars for elections in places like Montana. Right? Kamala Harris campaign had over a billion dollars. Right. People are just putting more and more and more and more money into the system. Because think about this. We're sitting here debating whether or not TikTok should be banned in the United States. What about all of the other social media companies? They face almost zero regulation in this country. This goes back to the first thing we Talked about. Everything that I say or I do on my news broadcast is reviewed by legal and standards. And what I get wrong, the FCC will come for you. You are liable. You could be sued for it. Social media is where Gen Z and scores of other people get their news. And they face absolutely no regulations. Why? How? Because they have such enormous lobbying efforts. No one actually creates the framework. And now when you hear the likes of Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos say they're excited to get involved in government and they really want to help with deregulation, we need to remind our audience what deregulation is. Yes, there is some bad, painful, onerous, unnecessary regulation. If you were a professional hair braider in New York City and you wanted to move to New York and be a hair braider in Chicago, you'd have to get a whole new set of licenses to do that. Right? There's some ridiculous regulation. But this idea, isn't that like a racket, though? Yes, that's just a racket. That's what regulation is, a racket. But, like, tons of regulations.
- [41:18]
Sammy Sage
Credit scores.
- [41:19]
Stephanie Ruhl
Tons of credit scores. And by the way, I urge people, you can get it once a year for free. Go get your credit score. Cause there's a really good chance there's a mistake. Oh.
- [41:27]
Sammy Sage
Oh, yeah.
- [41:27]
Stephanie Ruhl
There's a mistake in it. And what that credit score is directly impacts so many elements of your financial life.
- [41:33]
Sammy Sage
And the longer you let it go, it's like, real.
- [41:36]
Stephanie Ruhl
Correct. Yes.
- [41:37]
Sammy Sage
Yeah.
- [41:37]
Stephanie Ruhl
But. But just this idea, let's get rid of regulation is so dangerous. And of course, these guys want to be involved in it, just like my children want to be involved in the rules that we set for that. Yeah, my kids would love to be like, all right, I'm in charge of what the rules are for me, and I'm going to pick what my allowance is. So all these businesses saying, I want to be involved in regulation. Sure, you want to be involved in what's known as regulatory capture. Create regulations that are difficult for the other guy and great for you.
- [42:07]
Sammy Sage
But also, even regulations, the corporate legal complex has become so savvy that the reg, like, okay, so you write a regulation, and then they make a new business entity to work their way around it. That's how OptimRx and all these pharmaceutical benefit managers came to be, because there was a law in Obamacare that you have to spend 80% of the premiums on actual medical care. So what they did is they own these pharmaceutical benefit managers, which are where people get their pills and their prescriptions and they basically then work out these shady deals. Literally. I, I can't think of what the name is. It's basically they're. If you ever wonder why you need like a rebate card to get your birth control and like suddenly your birth control goes from being $500 to $20. That's because of the PBMs and insurance companies who are basically create worked around this regulation that they have to spend this money and they end up paying themselves inflated prices.
- [43:04]
Stephanie Ruhl
Yes.
- [43:04]
Sammy Sage
So that's why your, your drugs are so expensive. That's why they're able to make so many profits because of an attempt at regulation.
- [43:12]
Stephanie Ruhl
Yes, this.
- [43:13]
Sammy Sage
So they'll just write a new one.
- [43:14]
Stephanie Ruhl
What you've just laid out is the heart of regulatory capture. So after the financial crisis, when they put all these new regulations on banks, which was a good idea in theory, it strangled the little banks because the little banks couldn't afford to hire 200 more compliance officers couldn't afford to do all this. But if I'm JP Morgan, I'm the 800 pound gorilla, I can afford all of that. So when you create more regulations, if you don't do it in the right way, it strangles the smaller business. Cuz they can't afford afford to follow these new rules. And the big guys are like, sure, I can do that, no problem.
- [43:54]
Sammy Sage
And also you have the people who are working in the government making the regulations, then going to big law. Then you have the people in big law going to the government to make the regulations. And if you think they don't still text their friends in the old, in their old workplace, that's insane.
- [44:08]
Stephanie Ruhl
This is why many people are open to this idea of an Elon Musk going to Washington because Crazy. Yes, because he does understand the systems. He sees where the loopholes are and they think he's gonna close them. Now you're gonna say to me, yes, but he's gonna close them to help himself and he's gonna help himself. Well the counterargument would be yes, but that's already happening. The system's so screwed. If he pays himself and enriches himself, fine, as long as we also benefit too. That's the mindset.
- [44:44]
Sammy Sage
They might as well close their own coffin then, because that's literally what they're doing.
- [44:48]
Stephanie Ruhl
But right now they're saying the system is so screwed, let's do something. Because the way it's currently set up makes absolutely no sense.
- [44:57]
Sammy Sage
Well, they're right. Thank you so much. This has been very fun.
- [45:01]
Stephanie Ruhl
It's been amazing.
- [45:01]
Sammy Sage
Everyone should watch Nightcap tomorrow night.
- [45:04]
Stephanie Ruhl
You're gonna be on.
- [45:05]
Sammy Sage
I am gonna be on. And Uncle Sylvia. Sylvia.
- [45:09]
Stephanie Ruhl
You'll see. It's going to be an awesome day.
- [45:10]
Sammy Sage
I saw it. I got an email. Very excited.
- [45:12]
Stephanie Ruhl
It's going to be awesome.
- [45:14]
Sammy Sage
Stephen Van Zant. My mother's very excited. All right, until next time, I'm Sammy Sage, and this is American Fever Dream. Good night. American Fever Dream is produced and edited by Samantha Gatzick social media by Candice Miniga and Bridget Schwartz. Be sure to follow us on Instagram and TikTok Etches News. And follow me, Sammy Sageammy and the UnderTheDeskNews. And of course, send us your emails to American Fever Dream.
- [45:52]
Stephanie Ruhl
Betches.