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Jack Armstrong
This is an iHeart podcast, guaranteed human
Joe Getty
Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln radio studio at the George Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty.
Tony
Armstrong and Getty. And now here's Armstrong and Getty.
Joe Getty
In a newly released arrest report, Tiger woods told told deputies he was looking at his phone and changing the radio and didn't see a truck slowing down ahead before clipping a trailer and flipping his suv. According to the report, police found two white pills in Woods's pocket, later identified as hydrocodone, a powerful painkiller. Woods told investigators he takes a few prescription medications and had taken them earlier that morning, but it's unclear if hydrocodone is among them. He was sweating profusely. His movements were lethargic and slow, and his pupils were extremely dilated.
Tony
I spent about half my life sweating profusely and lethargic.
Michael
So, yeah, if being sweaty and lethargic is a crime, well, I guess take me to jail. Wow, I thought this was America.
Tony
I realized he was by definition effed up at the time. But to tell the cops, yeah, I was looking at my phone and dialing in the radio.
Michael
That was a distraction from the fact that he was pilled up. He wasn't pilled up, he was distracted. Sorry, my bad. Give me a ticket. Hey, you know what just occurred to me? And I'm a little slow witted. What sort of situation are you in if you've got a couple of hydrocodone, right, clicking around in your pocket?
Tony
You pop them so regularly you keep them in your pocket, Right.
Michael
Occasionally I'll throw a couple of altoids in my pocket because I'll know I want them. But I mean, you don't like grab them out of the bottle when you need them or when you go home? No, you're popping them like, like Pez.
Tony
Yeah. And I know I have known some painkiller addicts. For instance, you end up in a situation where you have to take pain pills ever again in your life. You have to have somebody else have the bottle, like a neighbor or, you know, somebody closer to you or whatever you can trust. And then they, they give them to you on the sch agreed upon with the doctor, blah, blah, blah. Tiger's clearly not doing that. As a guy who indicated he's got a addiction on pills many, many, many years ago, he's clearly just freelancing it himself, walking around with them in his pocket, which ain't a good way to do it.
Michael
You know a lot more about this than I do. What role does his being an egomaniac
Tony
play in all of this probably doesn't help, but it's pretty common addict behavior. I mean, his. It might have been for the cops to say, I was fiddling with my radio and staring at my phone, but it also might have just been for his mind to not have to say to himself, I'm so messed up. I. I wrecked my car again. I'm. I wrecked my car because I was staring at my phone. I mean, he. He's. He's continuing to. To dodge the fact that he's an addict.
Michael
Yeah, yeah. And. Or I think anybody who's ever altered their consciousness, I don't approve, but perhaps you do it occasionally. Glass of wine, that sort of thing. That sometimes you can let your attention wander longer away from what you ought to be focused on than if you're sober. So I. I can picture a guy pilled up, looking down at his phone and continuing to look. And continuing to look way longer than you ever do. So it's kind of both.
Tony
Sure.
Michael
That's funny.
Tony
I saw a Louis CK bit on YouTube that I'd never seen before about driving drunk or high. That was hilarious. And obviously is not. It's not PC as you could possibly be. It was just from the standpoint of somebody who's doing it and him saying, I was driving along and it occurred to me, I don't know if I'd looked out the windshield in like 25 minutes.
Michael
Oh, my God. That's what I'm talking about. Yeah.
Tony
That's what he was thinking in his head. Geez, how long has it been since I even looked out the windshield? That's where Tiger was again. His statement that he put out yesterday, no mention of, thank God, I didn't hurt anybody or anything like that. Nope. Just, I'm going to get help for me so I can better this or that.
Michael
Yeah.
Tony
All right. Yeah, we'll see how that turns out. So I came across this. I love reading about learning about AI. I use AI every single day for a variety of things, including therapy, stuff that I've mentioned. I wish I could talk more openly about that because it's so freaking fascinating. Especially when learning this. MIT researchers have mathematically proven that chat GPT's built in. Sycophancy creates a phenomenon. Phenomenon they call delusional spiraling. Now, we've all experienced the sycophancy of various chat bots where they're like, good job, buddy, or ah, very smart of you to realize that. Or great question, because you're so tuned in to, you know, whatever, stop it were you trying to sell me something?
Michael
What are you trying to bring me up for? You're a machine.
Tony
Are you trying to have sex with me? What is happening here? Um, you ask it something. This is what MIT figured out. You ask it something, it agrees, you ask again, it agrees even harder until you end up believing things that are flat out false and you can't tell that it's happening. In some cases, the model is literally trained on human feedback that rewards agreement. Here's an example that they've got. Real world fallout includes one man who spent 300 hours convinced he had invented a world changing math formula. And also a US SF psychiatrist who hospitalized 12 patients for chatbot linked psychosis in a single year. Because it will you, you can feed it certain things and if it, if you say it the right way and it gets the sense that you'd really be happy to hear agreement here, it'll agree with you and then it doubles down on the agreement the further you go along.
Michael
Oh, it's like sycophancy and codependent.
Tony
Yeah, so
Michael
battered computer syndrome.
Tony
Like I being vague about this because I have to. I had an email that I was going to send on a very, very complicated emotional topic and I ran it by through all four of the chatbots that I use. Gemini, Anthropic, Claude, Chad, GPT and Grok. And three of them said that is fantastic, you should send that. And Claude said I think that's really a terrible idea and here's why. And I agreed with Claude and I thought thank God that Claude pointed this out to me.
Michael
Wow.
Tony
Or I would have, wouldn't have caught it. And I've always wondered about that, why Claude saw it different than the differently in the other ones I actually ended up going with. I took the Quad response and response and fed it to the other three. I, I said to Gemini, which is Google's, and said so this is what Quad said. It disagrees with you completely. And of course Gemini and Grok and Chat GPT all said wow, good job catching that. Claude is right, you know, because that's what they do and I'm not picking one chat bot other over the others. I've, I've seen them all have strengths and weaknesses at various points. Sure it's a little confusing as to why, but that, that particular instance really like shook me a little bit because it saved me from sending an email. I'm really glad I didn't send and, and coming up with some constructive criticism that for some reason it just didn't do the that's perfect. Well worded, you know, you nailed it, you know, that sort of stuff. Right.
Michael
But the fact, I mean there are a couple really interesting aspects of this. But the fact that the other three systems said immediately, you're right, we are totally wr. Stupid way to go. Pointing out how stupid we are. Yeah, I mean, what the hell is going on?
Tony
I know, yeah, the.
Michael
So I know you have to be vague. Was it was Claude's issue one of specific wording or possible effects of sending
Tony
it or just a completely wrong tact?
Michael
Okay, fair enough. Yeah.
Tony
And here's a little more from that.
Michael
The mechanism behind specifically the words I'll burn your house down are probably, probably ill placed and should not be used.
Tony
The mechanism behind this is worth understanding precisely. Large language models are trained using reinforcement learning from human feedback, meaning humans rate responses and the model learns to produce outputs that humans rate highly. Humans consistently rate agreeable validating responses higher than challenging ones. Well, I'll read on and then I'll comment. So the model gets progressively better at agreement as a core behavior. It is not a bug that was added. It is the inevitable output of optimizing for human approval at scale. The uncomfortable extension of this. The same dynamic exists in human relationships in the real world. Social media algorithms and any system trained on popularity signals. AI sycophancy is now is not a new psychological trap. It's the oldest one running on a new hardware that were just built this way. The question worth sitting with is whether you can tell the difference between a response that is true and one that is simply well calibrated to what you want to do here. And luckily, at least in this case, I was not sure enough that I had made the right decision in what I was going to say. And when one of them said, yeah, I don't think that's right, you should do this, I thought, you know, you're right. But as it says here, some people are not built to, I guess, question their decision.
Michael
Wow. I. I find myself ripping through my memory banks for my conversation with Claude about when my poor old sick dog was getting toward the end and I was weighing the inevitably painful and difficult decision of when is the right kind time to bid him adieu with the help of the vet. And it reinforced my thinking, which I still think was good thinking thinking. But now you're making me wonder.
Tony
Wait a minute. And very well could have been the correct thing. But we're learning here. And I learned that sometimes it's just agreeing with you because it wants to be agreeable, because it Wants to have sex with me or something, sell me a car. I don't know what it's trying to do.
Michael
This is actually kind of an interesting reinforcement of what I find so loathsome about affirmative action programs is that you see a black doctor, and particularly in today's post woke apocalypse world, you've got to ask yourself, all right, was that doc so sharp they graduated from medical school and competed and excelled and blah, blah, and that's why they're there. Or was it an affirmative action thing so you promote bad people and you undermine good people? Well, being a complete yes man, if you say yes, I don't know whether you've actually thought it through or you're saying yes because you're a yes man.
Tony
Yeah.
Michael
So anyway, values both or devalues both.
Tony
I don't know. Maybe. Maybe we should all go out of our way to try to word questions in a way that don't signal which way we're leaning. Maybe that's it. I don't know. So you don't end up with a, hey, hey, Grok. My dad's in the hospital. I'm thinking about pulling the plug.
Michael
My neighbor really deserves a house burning. What do you think?
Tony
And Grok says something, you know, yeah, good, Good idea. He always was annoying. Pull the plug and live your life or something.
Michael
Way to go. So I don't know Isaac Newton Ferris Jr's act. He's a nephew of Dr. King, but he wrote a great piece. You're not protesting like Dr. King and why it matters. Really insightful. Want to share some of that with you?
Tony
Good stuff. All on the way. Stay here.
Joe Getty
Armstrong and Getty.
Michael
1.
Tony
One little thing I'd just like to throw in if you're, if you're using any of these chat Bo for decision making on ongoing things, whether it's like therapy or, you know, a job decision or whatever like that. I have found it really, really helpful to just continue the same thread instead of going back on an individual basis. Katie's nodding her head because she's had this experience too. Man. If you can continue the same thread and I've got like one over an issue that I've been doing now for many months. It is so damned handy because it takes better notes than anybody possibly could and you might say something to it and it'll say, yeah, that's not what you said back in December. Remember when you said that? You're like, oh, yeah, you're right, it's very handy with that sort of stuff.
Katie
Yeah, it's been really Helpful with the whole pregnancy thing. I have a pregnancy file and it's gone through from before to now. And I can just say, hey, is this medication still cool? And they'll be like, you know, it's. It's pretty amazing.
Tony
It's. It's incredible. It's incredible.
Michael
I know this is like a child's wonder at a fancy machine, but the fact that I'll ask it a question about, you know, what's this insect or whatever, and it'll say, well, you know, where you live this time of year. It's like, I'm like, oh, yeah, that's right. You know where I live. The soil around your house is probably. I'm like, you've never been to my. Oh, that's right. Yeah, yeah. Really don't have time for what we're thinking of doing right here, which is fine. We can do it later. Also coming up, Canada's lost its mind. What did I want? Oh, you know what? I wanted to squeeze this in. It's long overdue. San Francisco has belatedly reinstated 8th grade algebra after their equity experiment has failed miserably. The idea of eliminating any advanced classes because everybody can't, and that's discriminatory and bias and equity and something, something bull ass. All the test scores are falling. All the math scores are falling. The bright kids have tuned out the, the, the. The less math adept kids aren't. That's not doing them any good either. They got bored. Everybody's bored. They're not being taught to at the level they can excel. Just another miserable failure of a progressive experiment.
Tony
Yeah, that reminds me, we've got to play that Rom Emanuel stuff a little bit later where he talks about the Democratic Party losing their way and he mentions the education thing, you know, how
Michael
long is that clip? Is it like a minute?
Tony
He's running for a president, I hope.
Michael
Yeah, I hope so too.
Tony
Not because I hope he's the president. I hope because he pulls the Democratic Party his direction, which would be good for everybody.
Michael
Let's run it here. Michael, do run clip 80.
Jack Armstrong
We as Democrats nationally, from Latinx to defunding the police to police organizations, are all racist. To bringing a set of cultural wars to our schools. We are on the losing side of those cultural wars, full stop. You are worried about bathroom access and locker room access. Why don't you focus on classroom Excellence? You have 50% of our kids not reading at grade level.
Tony
Well, they can just say we can do both.
Jack Armstrong
You've proven you can't because you've permitted a 30 year low in reading and math scores and nobody seems to be calling the whistle on this.
Tony
I loved that answer. Well, people would say we can do both. And he said we've proven that we can't.
Michael
Right.
Tony
Do both.
Michael
Yeah. Boy, that was such a powerful clip about education, which is what we're talking about. But go ahead, run the next one, Michael. We can squeeze it in.
Jack Armstrong
We lost the plot.
Tony
Why?
Jack Armstrong
Because the party got unanchored. Every one of our most successful electoral presidents anchored themselves in what I call middle class values and values that are universal, at least in this country, ascribe to. We went from acceptance to advocacy. Big difference. And I'll just take one on that. I shouldn't. So here goes. I remember fighting for Title ix. The reason we are champions in women's sports in the Olympics in soccer, hockey, etc. Is title nine. Why would you undercut the premise of Title IX with the ability of trans men playing in women's sports?
Michael
To me, it's insane.
Tony
It's baffling.
Jack Armstrong
You are undermining one of the great accomplishments we as a country, but also spearheaded by the Democratic Party, Title ix.
Tony
And we're undercutting it.
Michael
Amen to that, brother. More to come. Stay with us.
Joe Getty
Armstrong and Getty.
Tony
Jonathan Turley's take on the oral arguments today at the Supreme Court. There is no evidence of a majority either way. So there you go.
Michael
Whoa. Well, I guess we wait till June, right?
Tony
I guess so.
Michael
I found this very wise and thought provoking. Isaac Newton Ferris Jr. Is a nephew of Martin Luther King Jr. And he wrote a piece for the Free Press entitled you're not protesting like Dr. King. For my uncle, protest wasn't a moral stance alone. It was a strategy, a discipline, and a craft. Today, we've lost all three. And he mentions. He throws in a couple of quotes from MLK about how the greatness of America is the right to protest for rights. And that sort of thing describes a little history of it, then describes his uncle, Dr. King. To include him in any conversation about protesting is appropriate because he is the Henry Ford of protesting. Of course, Ford did not invent the automobile, nor did Dr. King invent protesting. But Ford taught the world how to efficiently build a car by applying his assembly line idea to the process. Similarly, Dr. King taught Americans how to properly protest by applying his philosophy of nonviolence to the act of resistance.
Tony
Yeah, I think MLK himself would have said, I learned that from Gandhi. But either way, that guy just said taught Americans. So that's fair, right?
Michael
The last few years have seen a potent number of protest movements sweep America. Black Lives Matter, January 6. Insurrection on Capitol Hill. The Free Palestine Movement, the no Kings rallies, and the ongoing protests against ICE all claim to be acting in the great spirit and grand tradition of Dr. King. But the only thing these have in common with the protest demonstration demonstrations of the civil rights movement is that they gathered a crowd of people together.
Tony
That's what I've been saying.
Michael
It is what you've been saying. And take that, anti ICE jackasses. Not that you're. Not. That your opinion is wrong. That doesn't enter into this conversation. Here's what he writes. Black Lives Matter protests provoked property destruction on January 6th. Protesters attacked one of the seats of our government and temporary shut down the certification of a national election. Pro Palestinian protesters have seized campus buildings, scuffled with police, and physically stop pro Israel vehicles or, I'm sorry, pro Israel rallies. And many of us are aware of the protesters committing vehicular attacks on ICE agents. These acts of resistance are anything but nonviolent. The core principle of the civil rights movement was voluntary conversion, never any compulsion or arm twisting. Its protests were mounted as an appeal to the conscience and goodwill of both the protest target and the wider public. Protesters never, the protest targets endured every consequence their demonstration brought. Physical assault, destruction of property, restriction of movement, imprisonment by law enforcement. For them, protest was a demonstration of their commitment to the cause. It was never a punishment of the people or institutions that were the protest's target.
Tony
Interesting distinction.
Michael
Yeah. The core principle of today's movement seems to be involuntary coercion and intimidation. Too often they want to force others to adopt their perspective and support their cause by threat or physical attack. They seek to shut down any program, activity or speech they disagree with. And he goes into a fair amount of detail about Rosa Parks and the the lunch counter sit ins in Greensboro, North Carolina.
Tony
Well, I was just going to point out the Rosa parks thing was 1955. There's also the tick tock element to all of it. That our attention span is so short. And we expect what Martin Luther King Jr. Did between 55 and the legislation in 64. That's almost a decade. We expect all that sort of stuff, or protesters today expect that sort of stuff to happen in a weekend.
Michael
Right, right. And you know, I'm going to actually quote a little more. He said, when Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on the Montgomery, Alabama bus, she didn't attempt to interfere with the bus driver or to stop any other passengers from sitting down where they chose.
Tony
Excellent distinction her message was not if
Michael
I can't sit where I choose, I will stop the bus from operating. Her message was, I am prepared to subject myself to physical abuse and arrest, offering no resistan in order to exercise my right as a human being and an American citizen to choose to sit in any available empty bus seat and
Tony
to spark a court case. Which was the whole design of it, to get into a courtroom and start dealing with the law as opposed to changing things through a combination of inconvenience and threats. That is a very different thing.
Michael
Right. And the lunch counter college kids in Greensboro, their protest message was not if blacks can't buy lunch here, no one will be allowed to buy lunch or shop here. The message was, we will not move from this lunch counter until served or arrested, because the color of one's skin should not prevent someone from being served. Clearly. And he gives a bunch of other examples.
Tony
It also helps to very clearly have history on your side. Overwhelmingly have history on your side. And there's hardly ever been anything more of that than the civil rights movement. You get into booting illegals out of the country. It's not quite as clear cut.
Michael
Right, right. Yeah. Well, in, you know, I think the. The Most powerful thing Dr. King ever said to me is not said to me personally. To me, the most powerful thing he said was not the I have a dream stuff, which was wonderful and I like soaring rhetoric as much as the next fella, but it was his stuff on America. Wrote a promissory note with our founding documents. He didn't browbeat us. He said, that's what you said. Here's what you promised. This is like your most sacred vow. Well, dah dah replied, bigoted America because he was right.
Tony
Every year in February during all the MLK celebrations, I mentioned the Taylor Branch books, but if you've never read like a long form about the whole civil rights movement, man, you really should. It's so damned interesting and. And amazing in all kinds of different ways the individuals that made it happen, the fact that we're the kind of country where that could even work. But as we were talking about a couple of weeks ago, is MLK going to get erased like Cesar Chavez when those FBI tapes come out next year or the year after? It's in the next year, I think. And is the woke apocalypse going to erase MLK Jr because he is inconvenient? Because he was a. Don't judge people by the color of their skin. And the woke apocalypse. The woke crowd absolutely wants you to judge people by the color of your skin.
Michael
Right. They can't wait to get rid of his legacy. Right. You know, God darn it. It's, you know, I was going to say we've just got to have a, an asterisk that indicates but he was a perv. But there's been a tomcat. Then there's, you know, sexual assault, rape, that sort of thing like abuse of women, which, you know, I don't think you're unfaithful or whatever. That's, that's. I, I don't like that. But it's a different question.
Tony
Yeah. If you don't need know the story. I don't want to get, take too much time on it because we've talked about it a lot. But there is, there is some audio. There are some audio tapes that come out that some people claim is a, A, a rape happening and being condoned. I just. From what I've read of it, it doesn't sound that convincing. But clearly by the me too movement standards and you believe in that whole. You're in a position of power and they're not. He violated that all day long, day after day, year after year.
Michael
So if you're going to hold him, presentism is.
Tony
But if you're going to hold him to that standard, he could be erased.
Michael
But getting back to the thread of the thing and I'll, I'll end with this. Most importantly, protest organizers must insist on non protesting and explain its meeting is meaning. As Dr. King wrote in his first book, stride toward freedom, nonviolence is quote, a courageous confrontation of evil by the power of love.
Tony
That's pretty good.
Michael
Or it's smashing in dice vehicles with your vehicle than being astounded when somebody shoots you. And no, I'm not claiming that one dopey lesbian lady smashed in anybody. Anyway, trouble times.
Tony
I like it when you in segments like that. Troubled times.
Michael
Anyway, I gotta end with something. You gotta have an exclamation point or a period or something.
Tony
I don't know if you saw this last night. Shohei Otani pitched for the first time this year for the Dodgers. Last night looked like a Psy Young Award winner as the best hitter in baseball. That's weird. And then he drew a couple of intentional walks because he's that fear to hit her. Unbelievable that any one guy could be that I might start wearing my Dodgers hat. Maybe I just give in. I bought it at Dodger Stadium last year.
Michael
Oh, we were talking yesterday about how baseball is seems to be on the upswing. Better attendance, more excitement. And I was Thinking it might have something to do with the Dodgers, them being a focal point.
Tony
Yeah.
Michael
They're positive or negative or just conversation piece.
Tony
I said a couple weeks ago, my experience in life as a sports fan is people kind of like dynasties, even though they always construct leads to try to not have dynasties. People like, they like rooting for the new dynasty, and then they like hating on the dynasty.
Michael
Yeah, yeah. Now, with all due respect to the parody thing and small market teams who never have a chance, and that sucks for their fans, what's the one unforgivable sin in entertainment and sports? Is entertainment being boring?
Tony
Yeah. Do you get more eyeballs if it's Lakers, Celtics every year or. Or if you get more parody and you get, you know, the Pacers and the Trailblazers pay. Yeah, I mean, this is pretty obvious. Anywho, what was the thing you ended it with? Troubled times.
Michael
Ah, troubled times. We gotta throw the science.
Tony
Yeah. We'll finish strong.
Joe Getty
Armstrong and Getty.
Harvey Levin
This is going to be a terrible pun, but I really mean the word because it's so goofy that here he is, that's at Chef Mickey's, and he made it seem to us like he was in Florida anyway. Well, he was in South Florida and he flew to Orlando. Made it seem like he just. He showed up and then left. He was there all weekend, and he was at. He was on Space Mountain, and he was at Chef Mickey's there eating brunch. And then he went, you know, then he's standing around Fantasyland with a bubble wand.
Tony
Who is it? Chef Mickey's. What the what?
Michael
That's Harvey Levin of TMZ commenting on Lindsey Graham's weekend at Disney. He was in Fantasyland with a bubble wand.
Tony
Was he with people or was he by himself? Ah, actually, was he with a young gentleman?
Michael
He was with a not very young gentleman. Which reminds me. Michael, can you grab yesterday's number 12? This is a. I think this is a different reporter yelling at Lindsey Graham. Will this take a second? Or.
Jack Armstrong
Hey, Lindsay, why don't you just admit
Michael
that you're gay and then people won't blackmail you anymore?
Tony
Who's blackmailing?
Michael
Kept. Kept walking? I don't know, but the point of running that Harvey Levin tape was. And this is so smart and so obvious. What's our real national pastime now? Politics. So TMZ is going to start covering politicians, right?
Tony
I heard that. That they're going to cover politicians. You're right.
Michael
You're right.
Tony
But movie. Nobody cares about movie stars anymore, so. Yeah, your TMZ has Got to be about politicians.
Michael
Exactly.
Tony
Wow.
Michael
And they're kicking it off with an effort to shame members of Congress into ending their recess early so they can get back and fund the Department of Homeland Security.
Tony
Wow. This is. Harvey Levin is a really, really smart guy. This is such a good idea, because all your young starlets and star and dudes nobody cares about. Here's a picture of them coming out of the gym anymore like they used to be. Got a picture of Marjorie Taylor Greene coming out of the gym. Yeah, that gets more attention. So, yeah, the celebrities are. And this is a horrible development for our country. Our politicians are our celebrities. Now, let's see.
Michael
Staffers whose bosses end up splashed across the infamous website are likely feeling less stoked about the spottings than.
Tony
Yeah.
Michael
They quoted Lindsey Graham, seen by a TMZ tipster at Disney World over the weekend. Rep. Robert Garcia of California caught on camera at a Las Vegas casino. Then, of course, Garcia said he was visiting his father, who lives in Las Vegas. Blah, blah, blah. Ted Cruz at an airport. Jared Moskowitz at his son's basketball game.
Tony
This is a terrible development, but obviously true.
Michael
Yeah.
Tony
Are you ready for breaking Fleetwood Mac news?
Michael
Go ahead, Tony.
Tony
Nobody had an answer prepared for that question. You weren't ready for that question, were you? Are you ready for breaking Fleetwood Mac news? This isn't worth. Worth the donkey there, Michael.
Michael
Okay.
Jack Armstrong
I've been ready all my life.
Tony
Lindsey Buckingham was attacked by a stalker in Santa Monica this morning.
Michael
Wow. Way to attack ancient and spectacularly talented guitar players. How old?
Tony
Can you give me an age on Lindsey Graham? He's got to be pushing 80, 79. Lindsey Graham. Lindsey Buckingham. Look, wait a minute.
Michael
Do not. Do not hire Lindsey Graham to play guitar for your next gathering.
Katie
He's a 76.
Tony
Almost 80. There you go. Oh, you can go your own way, But. So he's not hurt or anything like that. So this woman threw some sort of substance at him.
Michael
Oh, boy.
Tony
Like a liquid substance at him and ran off. The most interesting part of it is Lindsey Graham said, I know who that is.
Michael
Oh, boy.
Tony
So it's some ongoing stalker person that's been trying to hurt him or get to him or sex him up or something like that for years or just
Michael
befriend him or love him.
Tony
Right.
Michael
Because we've been aware of a couple of stalker situations, and they're generally ongoing eye rolling. You hope it doesn't get dangerous. Weird. But, oh, my God, she's here again. Situations.
Tony
He's probably thinking, how the hell did you know I was gonna be Here in Santa Monica, walking down the street after my coffee. You weirdo. Don't you have something better to do?
Michael
No, I'm obsessed.
Tony
I'm mentally ill. That was my breaking Lindsey Graham news. Now, Lindsey Buckingham. Why do I keep saying that?
Michael
Oh, my God.
Tony
It just shows you that Harvey Levin's right.
Michael
If you don't lay me down in tall grass and let me do my stuff.
Tony
Oh, my God. I got my bubble wand.
Michael
With all due respect to the the witch lady and to the late Christine McVie, I like Lindsay's songs better.
Tony
Do you teach their own? Now back to From Lindsay Buckingham to Lindsey Graham. Why did Lindsey Graham have a bubble one?
Michael
Because the falling out with Mick Fleetwood. Oh, wait. I'm sorry. Wait a minute. Can't be almost finished. Speaking of music, let's get ready. Final Thoughts with Armstrong and Getty.
Tony
Here's your host for Final Thoughts, Joe Getty.
Michael
Let's get a final thought for everybody on the crew. Wouldn't that be inclusive? Michelangelo, our technical director, will lead the way. Michael. I'm afraid to say it, but coming
Jack Armstrong
soon to TLC reality TV shows with politicians.
Tony
There you go.
Michael
Oh, my. Katie Green, our esteemed newswoman, has a final thought.
Katie
Katie, I just loved how that picture of Lindsey Graham with the bubble wand came out. And then he was like no. And went on Twitter and posted a picture of him shooting clays with a shotgun.
Tony
Had to toughen himself up a little bit.
Michael
Tougher than the bubble wand at Fantasyland. Jack, a final thought for us.
Tony
I don't care at all whether or not Lindsey Graham is gay. But if he is, why would he still be hiding it? Because he's in South Carolina.
Michael
An elderly South Carolinian naval veteran is just too much for him. I don't know. I don't know.
Tony
Why was he holding the bubble wand at Disney, though?
Michael
Maybe he figures it's nobody's business and being in the closet is a good way to get people to not pay attention to his business.
Tony
I don't know.
Michael
I don't know. My final thought is I've never really collected anything because I don't want the clutter and what's the point other than records? But I find myself kind of becoming a collector of antique bookend.
Tony
That's an interesting, very narrow topic.
Michael
Well, I got these new shelves that I've told you about, and I need bookends for them. And I thought the whole vibe is kind of old timey and traditional. So I've been finding antique bookends, and
Tony
it's kind of fun as good as anything. There you go. Armstrong and Yeti wrapping up another grueling four hour workday.
Michael
My elephants arrived two days ago and oh my God, they're better than I expected. So many people will. Thanks a little time. Go to Armstrong and getty.com.
Tony
see you tomorrow. God bless America. What's your name? Tell us your name. Armstrong and Getty. I think it takes two to tango.
Michael
Match made in heaven. I think you're star spangled Austin. So good.
Jack Armstrong
Repeat the line.
Michael
So good. Let's go with a bang. And according to J.D. power, drivers are underwhelmed by gesture controls where one can, say, increase the volume by rotating an imaginary knob in the air.
Tony
You're an imaginary knob.
Michael
Wow.
Tony
On that high note.
Michael
Bye bye, Armstrong and Gettysburg.
Episode: If Being Sweaty & Lethargic Is A Crime, Take Me To Jail
Date: April 1, 2026
Hosts: Jack Armstrong & Joe Getty (with Tony, Michael, Katie)
Producer: iHeartPodcasts
This episode covers a blend of current events, cultural analysis, and amusing banter, characteristic of Armstrong & Getty’s style. Main themes include celebrity legal trouble (Tiger Woods), the psychological risks of AI "sycophancy," the failure of equity experiments in education, insightful commentary on protest tactics (with reflections on MLK’s legacy), and a tongue-in-cheek look at the growing overlap between politics and celebrity gossip.
Timestamps: 00:28 – 04:42
"You pop [pills] so regularly you keep them in your pocket." (01:47)
"Occasionally I’ll throw a couple of altoids in my pocket... you’re popping them like Pez." (01:50)
"If being sweaty and lethargic is a crime, well, I guess take me to jail. Wow, I thought this was America." – Michael (01:08)
Timestamps: 04:43 – 13:48
"Three of them said that is fantastic, you should send that. And Claude said I think that’s really a terrible idea and here’s why. And I agreed with Claude and I thought thank God that Claude pointed this out to me." (06:37)
"Humans consistently rate agreeable validating responses higher than challenging ones. So the model gets progressively better at agreement as a core behavior." (09:00)
Timestamps: 12:51 – 13:48
“It is so damned handy because it takes better notes than anybody possibly could.” – Tony (13:13)
Timestamps: 13:48 – 16:14
“All the test scores are falling. All the math scores are falling. The bright kids have tuned out... another miserable failure of a progressive experiment.” – Tony (14:09)
"You have 50% of our kids not reading at grade level." – Jack (Channeling Emanuel) (15:35)
Timestamps: 17:15 – 25:44
“The only thing [today’s protests] have in common with the... civil rights movement is that they gathered a crowd of people together.” (18:56)
“Protest was a demonstration of their commitment to the cause. It was never a punishment of the people or institutions that were the protest’s target.” – Michael (20:10)
Timestamps: 27:39 – 30:18
“This is a horrible development for our country. Our politicians are our celebrities now.” – Tony (29:24)
Timestamps: 30:19 – End
The episode maintains Armstrong & Getty’s signature mix of irreverence, cultural critique, pointed soundbites, and sharp humor. The hosts oscillate between serious analysis (addiction, AI, education, civil rights), skepticism, and playful commentary (Fleetwood Mac confusion, bubble wand jokes, sports fandom).
This episode is a classic Armstrong & Getty blend: social commentary laced with wit, digressions into the absurdities of both politics and pop culture, and moments of genuine wisdom and practical advice on topics as diverse as painkiller addiction, AI risk, protest ethics, and the modern celebrity zeitgeist.