The A&G Replay Monday Hour One

Summary

Podcast Summary: Armstrong & Getty On Demand

Episode: The A&G Replay Monday Hour One
Date: October 13, 2025
Hosts: Jack Armstrong & Joe Getty
Production: iHeartPodcasts

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Overview

This episode is a "best of" replay, featuring curated segments from previous Armstrong & Getty shows. The hour is packed with insightful, often irreverent commentary on politics, culture, literacy, and societal change. The hosts spend much of the episode discussing recent political book tours, the decline of reading, the importance of culture and language, and the effects of immigration on national identity. The tone is candid, conversational, and sprinkled with signature Armstrong & Getty wit.

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Main Topics & Key Discussion Points

1. Kamala Harris' Book Tour and Media Struggles (01:29–15:28)

Summary:
Armstrong & Getty analyze Vice President Kamala Harris's recent book tour, focusing on her ineffective interviews, backpedaling on statements, and overall lack of conviction or clarity.

Key Segments:

• Harris's Phone Call with Biden Before the Debate

  • Kamala claims Biden called before her Trump debate to ostensibly "wish her luck," but the call focused on his grievances instead of supporting her.
  • Getty: "She would have made a horrible president... Her brain don’t work." (02:03)
  • Armstrong: "I found myself being lulled into this weird hypnosis by her droning nonsense." (02:23)

• Book Tour Missteps and Media Critique

  • Mark Halperin's analysis: Harris avoids backing up claims in her book when questioned (02:50).
  • Halperin: "It's like she's being confronted with her journal that leaked out, and she's trying to explain away the passages." (03:58)

• Backing Away from Controversial Claims

  • Armstrong quips that Harris "hasn't even read" her own book (04:39).
  • Harris's evasiveness on Biden's fitness for a second term:
    • Harris: "It is one thing to have the capacity to govern. It is another thing to go through an election." (05:17, 07:23)
  • Getty criticizes her argument that running is harder than governing: "Some of those tomatoes might be bombs if you make the wrong decision. What a moronic thing to say." (08:09)
  • Armstrong adds: "So a couple more points in her unreadable and unread book." (08:30)

• Transgender Sports Issue

  • Harris's vague statement about biological factors is deemed incoherent and illogical.
  • Armstrong sarcastically compares the writing to H.L. Mencken’s critique of Warren G. Harding:
    • Reads: "He writes the worst English that I have ever encountered... It is rumble and bumble. It is flap and doodle." (10:01)

• Identity Politics and Pete Buttigieg

  • Scott Bessent: "It shows her emphasis on identity politics... She was just a terrible candidate... Let's look on merit, and on merit, he's a failure. And on merit, she's a failure." (12:07)
  • Armstrong summarizes: "She's obsessed with identity politics. She has contempt for the American people." (13:03)

• Electoral Claims

  • Getty disputes Harris’s claim about the 'closest presidential election.'
    • "It's not true by any measure anybody can come up with." (15:04)
  • Armstrong: "She lost all seven swing states." (15:25)

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2. Decline in Reading and Literary Culture (20:32–30:52)

Summary:
A sobering look at the collapse of reading habits, the impact of smartphones, and potential cultural implications.

Key Segments:

• The Reading Revolution and Its End

  • Getty shares stats: "In America, reading for pleasure has fallen by 40% in the last 20 years." (22:35)
  • Armstrong: "That's incomprehensible and stunning." (22:35)

• College Literacy Crisis

  • Reference to "The Elite College Students Who Can't Read":
    • Getty: "Most of our students... are functionally illiterate." (24:10)

• Root Causes and The Smartphone

  • Getty: "The freaking smartphone. Of course. I mean, it’s made it hard for me to read." (25:50)

• Why It Matters

  • Getty reflects: "I feel like there’s zero possibility that you can have progress with humankind if reading disappears." (27:29)
  • Armstrong (sarcastically): "I'm going to dedicate the rest of my life to deceiving and taking the money of the ignorant." (27:37)

• Generational Shift

  • Getty: "75% of young people read nearly daily back in the 80s... Now it's down to like 10% of people under 18." (29:15, 29:24)
  • Armstrong: "One of the themes of Brave New World is that you don't have to work very hard to oppress people. You just keep them high and amused." (29:37)

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3. Cultural Identity, Language, and Immigration (32:02–39:37)

Summary:
The hosts explore how language and culture are intertwined, concern about Western cultural preservation, and critique progressive immigration stances.

Key Segments:

• Living and Preserving Culture

  • Armstrong, quoting musician Jordan Thibodeau: "You either live your culture or you kill your culture." (32:10)
  • Reflections on language as core to cultural identity:
    • Getty: "Language is culture... If a language dies out, that culture's died out." (33:49)

• Immigration & Cultural Change Critique

  • Armstrong: "We have the one culture that not only is... not beautiful... but it’s evil and we deserve to have it stamped out." (34:37)
  • Critique of Hillary Clinton's reported comments that US prosperity relies on immigrant birth rates as American birth rates fall, and higher immigrant birthrates are taken for granted by the political class (36:44–39:12).

• Disconnect of Elites from Everyday Americans

  • Getty: "Any neighborhood you ever lived in, Hillary, become primarily a different language? The restaurant you used to go to become a food and language that you don’t know? No, it doesn’t happen to you." (39:12)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Getty on Kamala Harris as President:

  • "She would have made a horrible president. I mean, absolutely horrible... Her brain don't work." (02:03)

• Armstrong Satirizing Political Memoirs:

  • "Not only did she not write the book, Mark, she hasn't even read it." (04:39)

• Getty, on Public Discourse:

  • "Instead of selling her book, it's like she's being confronted with her journal that leaked out, and she's trying to explain away the passages that have leaked out." (03:58)

• Armstrong Reading Mencken:

  • "He writes the worst English that I have ever encountered... It drags itself out of the dark abysm of pish and crawls insanely up the topmost pinnacle of posh. It is rumble and bumble. It is flap and doodle...” (10:01)

• Scott Bessent on Harris and Buttigieg:

  • "Let's look on merit, and on merit, he's a failure. And on merit, she's a failure." (12:19)

• On Reading Trends:

  • Getty: “In America, reading for pleasure has fallen by 40% in the last 20 years.” (22:35)
  • Armstrong: "That's incomprehensible and stunning." (22:35)

• On Smartphones and Decline in Reading:

  • Getty: "The freaking smartphone. Of course. I mean, it's made it hard for me to read." (25:50)

• On Culture and Language:

  • Armstrong (via Thibodeau): "You either live your culture or you kill your culture." (32:10)
  • Getty: "Language is culture… If a language dies out, that culture's died out." (33:49)
  • Armstrong: “We have the one culture that... is not beautiful and worth preserving... It's evil and we deserve to have it stamped out.” (34:37)

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Segment Timestamps

• Kamala Harris Book Tour Analysis: 01:29–15:28
• Dunkin Donuts Fire Incident & Generational Commentary: 17:36–19:20
• Decline in Reading and Culture: 20:32–30:52
• Culture, Language, Immigration, and Elites: 32:02–39:37

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Tone and Language

• Candid, often sarcastic
• Critical of political figures and societal trends
• Wry cultural observations
• Frequent references to historical context and literature
• Occasional use of satire and dark humor

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Summary

This "replay" hour showcases Armstrong & Getty's ability to mix sharp political critique, cultural commentary, concern for societal trends (like the collapse of reading), and humorous asides. The hosts question the competence and motives of political leaders, lament the shallow, distracted modern world, and warn about losing cultural and linguistic heritage. If you want a thought-provoking, at times scathing, yet entertaining snapshot of conservative cultural commentary, this episode fits the bill.

Transcript

[Jack Armstrong]

This is an iHeart podcast.

[Commercial Announcer]

This is the story of the One. As head of maintenance at a concert hall, he knows the show must always go on. That's why he works behind the scenes, ensuring every light is working, the H Vac is humming, and his facility shines with Grainger's supplies and solutions for every challenge he faces. Plus 24. 7 customer support. His venue never misses a beat. Call quickgranger.com or or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done.

[Joe Getty]

Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio at the George Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty.

[Armstrong]

Armstrong and Getty. And now here's Armstrong and Getty.

[Getty]

Not live from Studio C. Hey there. We're Armstrong and Getty. And for the first time ever, I think we actually are taking Columbus Day off. I do not like the way you are treating Italian Americans. I can't handle it. I'm too angry to come to I've.

[Armstrong]

Rented three ships and I'm going to go exploit someone. We're taking it off more for personal family reasons than Columbus Day. But anyway, a carefully curated, delightfully entertaining collection of best of Armstrong and Yeti clips coming up in moments.

[Getty]

So now enjoy the Armstrong and Yeti replay.

[Armstrong]

He.

[Jack Armstrong]

He called me and I. And again, listen, this book. I am being candid. In this book, are you? And in a way that I hope is helpful for people to understand what that all was. And part of that call that he made to me the afternoon before the debate was to wish me luck, but also to talk about something that was more in his interest than it was in mine, especially in the context of that time.

[Getty]

She is the hardest person to follow of anyone. She would have made a horrible president. I mean, absolutely horrible. And not. I don't just mean in the normal I don't want the Democrat to win. I'd rather have Gavin Newsom. You can name tons of people I don't like that would be better to be president. Her brain don't work.

[Armstrong]

No, no. I found myself being lulled into this weird hypnosis by her droning nonsense.

[Getty]

She can't spit anything out. She can't make a decision. She's too cowardly to say anything anyway. So she's having what Mark Kalperin is calling one of the Most disastrous first 48 hours of a book tour anybody's ever had. And here's a little of his analysis with a couple of the people on his show from yesterday.

[Mark Halperin]

Kamala Harris. She's done two interviews. Rachel Maddow last night and JMA and most distinctive to me, again, as someone who's as expert in selling books as anything I'm expert at, she's not doing a particularly good job of selling the book, in part because she's pulling her punches. When the questioners have asked her about the newsiest parts of the book, she's not backing up what she said in the book. She seems reluctant to repeat some of the accusations she's made. So, for instance, the Rachel Maddow. Rachel Maddow said, I'm very disappointed that you suggested that the country wasn't ready to elect a black woman and a gay man and picking Pete Buttigieg. And she said, oh, no, no, that's not really what I, what I mean. What I mean is, you know, I think it would have been tough. I mean, she just, she didn't follow through. And then here's two examples from Good Morning America. First, she was asked about the phone call that she writes in the book that Joe Biden called her right before her debate with Donald Trump and rather than just wishing her well, started to complain to her about his own grievances.

[Getty]

Right. And that's the clip we just heard. And so Mark Halpern made the point, and then I saw him on Megyn Kelly's show. I thought it was said. He said, instead of selling her book. So usually you write something strong in your book and then you get asked about it because you made some strong statements and you, you know, you, you add more to it. You're trying to create excitement and, and, and, and, and, and get people to want to go out and buy the book. That's the point of it. She backs off of all of them. And he said, instead of selling her book, it seems like she's being confronted with her journal that leaked out, and she's trying to explain away the passages that have leaked out.

[Armstrong]

Yeah. My only disease, my only disagreement with Mark is not only did she not write the book, Mark, she hasn't even read it.

[Getty]

Oh, you don't think so?

[Armstrong]

No, no. She sat down for a bunch of interviews with some professional writer, which is perfectly fine. I mean, that's what politicians do, and they, they crafted a book. But she was probably surprised at some of the way things were characterized, and she is gutless and has no principles. So, yeah, backing off of everything.

[Getty]

Here she is on Good Morning America. Ask about, was Joe Biden capable of serving four more years? As we sit here today, do you think he would have been up for running the country for four more years?

[Jack Armstrong]

I. Here's the distinction that I make. It's. And having had the experience myself, it is one thing to have the capacity to govern. It is another thing to go through an election.

[Armstrong]

There you go.

[Getty]

Right off the bat, she couldn't just even come close to answering the question on her book tour. She just keeps as the. Even the Democrat on Mark Halpern's show said, this is just a disaster. It seems like she looks like she regrets her book tour two days in from having to answer these questions. We're going to play another clip, but here's something interesting that came out of that. So Sean Spicer is on Mark Halpern's show. Sean Spicer was Trump's first White House press spokesman.

[Armstrong]

Spicy Spicer loved him and he wrote.

[Getty]

A book after his time. And he mentioned yesterday, I thought this was pretty interesting. He said he writes his book, he gives it to his agent and his agent said, okay, did that feel pretty good getting that off all, all, all that off your chest? And he said, yeah, it felt really good. He said, okay, now that you've gotten it off your chest, do you actually want 10 years ago, 10 years from now for that stuff to be in a book? And he said, not all of it. And he went back and took some of the stuff out. I thought that was really interesting. So you make some score settling comments and then you think, yeah, I don't really want that in a book. And they were relaying that to maybe Kamala. This was her version of like really letting it all out. And then when she sits down to be interviewed, she can't, doesn't have the guts to stand by what she wrote.

[Armstrong]

Right. I mean, it fails on every level.

[Getty]

Yes, it does.

[Armstrong]

It's amazing.

[Getty]

So we started to play this, but ran out of time. We thought we'd give you the whole thing. She was on Good Morning America yesterday with the football player Michael Strahan. And he asks the question about Trump, Biden running for four, serving for four more years. And listen to her answer as we sit here today. Do you think he would have been up for running the country for four more years?

[Jack Armstrong]

Here's the distinction.

[Getty]

No.

[Jack Armstrong]

And having had the experience myself, it is one thing to have the capacity to govern. It is another thing to go through an election for President of the United States. So you are an athlete. You may appreciate this kind of metaphor. Running for President of the United States is like being in a marathon at a sprinter's pace with people throwing tomatoes at you every step you take. It is not for the light hearted. It takes an Incredible amount of endurance and stamina.

[Armstrong]

You know, that was one of the more coherent things I've ever heard her say. Yeah, but.

[Getty]

But it doesn't fit with the. With her first sentence.

[Armstrong]

Oh, no.

[Getty]

So. So. And she's making the argument, as Halperin pointed out, that running for president is harder than being president. Oh, you don't think anybody's throwing the tomatoes at you when you're president? And some of those tomatoes might be bombs if you make the wrong decision? I mean, what a moronic thing to say. And the question, by the way, if you've forgotten, was, do you think Biden could have served four more years?

[Armstrong]

I had forgotten.

[Getty]

That was the question.

[Armstrong]

Right. So a couple more points in her unreadable and unread book. She says that she.

[Getty]

Number two on Amazon right now. Number two book on Amazon.

[Armstrong]

Yeah. That's easy to manipulate anyway, but she and her people are buying up thousands and thousands of copies themselves. But. So she writes about transgender boys in girls sports, and here's what she says. I agree with the concerns expressed by parents and players that we have to take into account biological factors such as muscle mass and unfair student athletic advantage weight when we determine who plays on which teams, especially in contact sports. With goodwill and common sense, I believe we can come up with ways to do this without vilifying and demonizing children. I mean, that is, I would like, in the course of, like, an English class, to spend the entire hour analyzing that handful of sentences. It is incoherent, grammatically incorrect, suffers from several logical fallacies, and it's just idiotic.

[Getty]

Well, the idiotic part. What bothered me. So are you suggesting that we take. So if you got a dude that wants to participate in girls sports, you say, yeah, you're kind of an effeminate boy, so I guess your muscle mass is low enough will let you compete against girls. You know, I mean, how are you going to determine that, right?

[Armstrong]

Case by case basis, you're going to check their junk or whatever. It's idiotic in the idea of Villa without vilifying and demonizing children. Nobody is doing that. That is a straw man of strawman. On the other hand, I find myself fascinated by her speech, and I enjoy listening to clips of it. And I'm reminded of what my hero, H.L. mencken, said about Warren G. Harding way back in the day, and this applies to Kamala. What he said about Harding was, he writes the worst English that I have ever encountered. It reminds me of a string of wet sponges. It reminds me of tattered Wash on the line. It reminds me of stale bean soup, of college yells, of dogs barking idiotically through endless nights. It is so bad that a sort of grandeur creeps into it. It drags itself out of the dark abysm of pish and crawls insanely up the topmost pinnacle of posh. It is rumble and bumble. It is flap and doodle. It is balder and dash. Now, that's right.

[Getty]

It is almost like jazz answers.

[Armstrong]

Yeah, well said. Okay. And so a more eloquent take than mine. Scott Besant, who's one of Trump's closest advisors, he's brilliant. He's on the economics team and he's openly gay. Responding to that whole idiotic comless saying that she didn't pick little Pete because he's gay. And that was asking too much of America. You remember we played the Rachel Maddow clip, we probably should have brought it back in. Which say, she says, look, saying you couldn't pick a beat gay dude really disappointed me. And Kama's like, I didn't say that.

[Getty]

I didn't say that.

[Armstrong]

And then after a bunch of flap and doodle and balder and dash, she says, and so I couldn't pick a gay dude because that would be uncool. So Scott Besant is commenting on that.

[Jack Armstrong]

She wouldn't take on people to judge because he was gay. She wouldn't take on people to judge because he was gay because she said it was a risk to have a running mate who was a gay man. Your reaction?

[Scott Bessent]

Three, three things, Maria. First, it shows her emphasis on identity politics and the American people have moved on. Two, it shows how low regard she holds the American people.

[Getty]

Yes.

[Scott Bessent]

That they, you know, she was just a terrible candidate. And three, you wouldn't pick Pete Buttigieg because he might have been the worst transportation secretary in history. Like, if I thought I was left a mess at Treasury, I can tell you your friend, my. And Sean Duffy, our great transportation secretary, people judge left him a mess. The FAA is a disaster. The Amtrak, you know, anything to do with transportation was woefully neglected over the past four years. So, you know, she judges him on his identity, his sexuality. Let's look and see whether he did a good job. Let's, let's look on merit. And I can tell you, on merit, merit, he's a failure. And in merit, she's a failure.

[Armstrong]

Yeah, I thought that was great analysis. She's obsessed with identity politics. She has contempt for the American people. And the question of effectiveness doesn't even creep into her thinking. It's just back to identity politics.

[Getty]

The left has such a lower opinion of the country than the right does. I remember when Barack Obama was elected and George Stephanopoulos talking about how he cried. Niku's crying, sitting with his wife because he just didn't think we could ever elect a black person. And I wasn't surprised in the least that we elected somebody with black. Didn't seem surprising to me. I'm from rural America, supposedly the racist part of the country. And didn't surprise me at all that we're willing to elect a black person if we thought they were capable of doing the job. George Stefan Lopez just was so surprised. He didn't think we were there yet.

[Armstrong]

Well then, then I have made a handful of Americans, huh? Yeah, lefties.

[Getty]

So what it means is I have a much higher opinion of the country than Kamala Harris. George Stephanopoulos do.

[Armstrong]

Yeah, yeah. By the by, Kamala also denied that the whole kama's for they them. Donald Trump is for you. She didn't think that would had any real impact. It was a minor issue. Nobody cared. She also ignoring the fact that 70% of moderate voters saw the issue of Donald Trump's opposition to transgender boys playing girls in women's sports and locker rooms and bathrooms and the rest of it. 70% of moderate voters said that issue was important to them.

[Getty]

I, I hope she runs. I don't think she's going to ultimately. But the other, the final dirt throwing on Kamala Harris's political grave. Every interview she does, she says, I only had 107 days and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And even with all of those things against me, it ended up being the closest presidential election in the 21st century, which isn't true by any measure anybody can come up with. It's not true. In terms of raw vote total, it's not even close. Bush. Gore was closer. Bush, who do you run against the second time?

[Armstrong]

Kerry.

[Getty]

Yeah, Bush. Kerry was closer. Trump was closer and Biden was closer. But other than that, you're right. And, but if you, and if you go by electoral total, it's not true either. So.

[Armstrong]

But she gets away with it in.

[Getty]

Every interview because nobody does any homework and is willing to say, wait a second, that doesn't sound right to me. I don't think this wasn't the closest election of the last 25 years.

[Armstrong]

Well, she lost all seven swing states.

[Joe Getty]

The Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty. The Armstrong and Getty Show.

[Getty]

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[Armstrong]

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[Dunkin Donuts Customer]

Do you have a fire extinguisher? Do you know where it is? There's got to be a fire extinguisher. Do you guys have a manager you can call? Yeah, there you go. Fire extinguisher right there. Here, you want me to help you? You're going to pull?

[Commercial Announcer]

Thank you.

[Dunkin Donuts Customer]

You're so welcome. You're going to have to call the fire department. I just saved the Duncan and lost a nail, but I'm good.

[Getty]

Everybody's safe. It's really awesome you had a grownup there at the Dunkin Donuts when a fire started who was, you know, just had the, you know, grown up way of handling a problem and took care of things.

[Armstrong]

Wow. That. This is like a Rorschach test I took from that that the employees didn't have a single idea what to do in case of a fire.

[Getty]

Well, that's kind of funny.

[Armstrong]

And a customer had to say, all right, do you have a fire extinguisher? Great. Here's how it works. Do you have a manager? Probably ought to call a manager now. One of you needs called fire department. And they all just stood there looking at her.

[Getty]

Well, I'm excited that there was an adult there who didn't just stand there looking at the situation. There was some human there who was willing to do something. That's what I'm excited about.

[Armstrong]

That was a restaurant full of kids who were never allowed free play. Probably.

[Getty]

Yeah. Yep. So nobody. Yep, you're probably right. That's. Yeah. An entire college level paper could be written on that whole instance right there.

[Armstrong]

I was going to say I could rant on, but yeah. They did not have a childhood full of encountering problems and solving them on their own. They were supervised, wearing their cute little uniforms and directed by adults. Everything they did in their childhoods.

[Getty]

So yes.

[Armstrong]

But they make damn fine coffee. They're damn fine.

[Joe Getty]

The Armstrong and Getty Show. Get more Jack, more Joe podcast and.

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[Getty]

So this is not getting better. We've stopped reading. Came across this on a sub stack yesterday and thought it was damned interesting. Joe brings up a lot the what future are we headed toward? The Orwell future or the Huxley future? That would be the 1984 future where they ban books, or the Thomas Huxley Brave New World future where you don't need to ban books because there's no one who wants to read them, as pointed out by Neil Postman in Amusing Ourselves to Death, which I can't believe I've never read. It's one of the classics of all time. I've never read that book and it's a subject that is on my mind all the time. It's clearly the latter. You don't need to ban books because people aren't going to read any books that are put out there. And let me get into that with this piece. One of the most important revolutions that happened in human history happened about 300 years ago. Now. The printing press was invented around 1500, but it took a couple of hundred years before reading really caught on a thing, partially because no one could read. I mean, you also had the actual printing and distribution of reading material and somebody had to write it, but nobody could read really. But by 1700, in Britain and France and Germany and, you know, growing in the United States, literacy was just exploding and people loved reading. Absolutely couldn't get enough of it pamphlets, books, poetry, whatever, to get themselves more knowledge or have an idea what's going on locally or around the world. Now I get to the piece that I read yesterday that horrified me. More than 300 years after the reading revolution ushered in a new era of human knowledge, books are dying. Numerous studies show that reading is in free fall. Even the most pessimistic 20th century critics of the screen age would have struggled to predict the scale of the present crisis. In America, reading for pleasure has fallen by 40% in the last 20 years. Since 2005, Reading for Pleasure has dropped 40%.

[Armstrong]

That's incomprehensible and stunning.

[Getty]

In the UK, more than a third of adults say they've given up reading entirely. The National Literacy Trust reports shocking and dispiriting falls in children's reading, which is now at its lowest level since they've been keeping track. The publishing industry is in crisis. As is pointed out, books that once would have sold in the tens, even hundreds of thousands are now look lucky to sell in the mid four Figures. So a book that might have sold hundreds of thousands of copies just a few years ago is going to sell 5,000 copies now.

[Armstrong]

Wow.

[Getty]

Nationwide.

[Armstrong]

Talk about a different industry. Well, you know, the money changing part of it is the least of our problems. Right.

[Getty]

But Tim Sandifer, who's written a number of books, was pointing this out to me. We were texting the other day about how he said, nobody reads anymore. You can't sell books. Nobody reads. That's horrifying. An article published in the Atlantic called the Elite College Students who can't read.

[Armstrong]

Books and nobody Read that article, but.

[Getty]

Back to you cites the characteristic experience of one professor. Twenty years ago, this professor's classes had no problem in engaging in sophisticated discussions of Pride and Prejudice or Crime and Punishment, some of the classic texts of all time. Now his students tell him up upfront that the reading load feels impossible. It's not just the frenetic pace. They struggle to attend to small details while keeping track of the overall plot. Most of our students, according to the professor, are functionally illiterate.

[Armstrong]

Oof.

[Getty]

The person that wrote this said, this chimes with everything I've heard in my own conversations with teachers and academics. One Oxbridge lecturer I spoke to described a collapse in literacy among his students. And these are people at some of your better universities. This isn't the average population. The transmission of knowledge, the most ancient function of the university, is breaking down in front of our eyes. Writers like Shakespeare, Milton and Jane Austen, whose works have been handed on, handed out for centuries, can no longer reach the next generation of readers. They're losing the ability to understand them. Isn't that stunning? This is happening before our eyes, but getting like no conversation.

[Armstrong]

This is the sort of thing that people have said throughout history because it's kind of an egotism, but I think it's right. Finally, we witnessed the peak of mankind.

[Getty]

You are correct on both. It is. It is the sort of thing that people say because of presentism and it's exciting to have your moment be the most this or that. But it's also true.

[Armstrong]

Yeah, sometimes it takes the form of I can't bring a child into this world because it's so terrible. No, it's not. It's one of the most comfortable, cushy worlds that's ever existed in any universe. You baby. On the other hand, we have witnessed mankind's peak and are now witnessing the decline.

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They point to one particular thing. I'll give you one guess as to what it is that really caused the super rapid decline. Anybody? Do I Even need to say it.

[Armstrong]

Online porn.

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I won't even say it.

[Armstrong]

I.

[Getty]

The freaking smartphone. Of course. I mean, it's made it hard for me to read.

[Armstrong]

Yes.

[Getty]

And we all know it. So that's just a. That's just a fact. But what is. What is a world where there just aren't books? We're practically there. We might already be there where they're just hard books. I mean, people write them and you can print them, but nobody's buying them or reading them. What is a world where there are no books? How does it. Because they point into this article is very, very long in the way that substack is. But it goes through how it is tied into the rise of democracies and capitalism and civil rights and all the different things that have good things that have happened for mankind humankind in the last 300 years.

[Armstrong]

Not to mention technological advances and food production and a thousand things.

[Getty]

Yeah. These college professors saying Shakespeare's just going to disappear from the scene. My students can't read it. They can't understand it and they won't read it because they hate reading so much.

[Armstrong]

This is unfortunate.

[Getty]

Too slow. Exactly. My kids hate reading. They just hate it. And they've grown up in a household with a dad who reads constantly, but they just hate it. And so do all their friends. And I. It's hard to be critical of it because I know that feeling. It's work for me to read in a way that it wasn't years ago just because of, you know, what the dopamine addiction and the attention span and everything has done to us. But there's. I feel like there's zero possibility that you can have progress with humankind if reading disappears.

[Armstrong]

Am I wrong?

[Getty]

Am I just an old person who claims that, you know, the invention of the automobile is going to ruin society? Or.

[Armstrong]

Well, that's true too, but. Oh, yeah, no, you're right. You're absolutely right. I've made an important life decision. I'm going to dedicate the rest of my life to deceiving and taking the money of the ignorant. I mean, just because the question before us is how do you have a happy life in the world of the decline of humanity? And that's exploiting the ignorance of others for your own wealth. So ripping people off is the key to joy? Well, yeah.

[Getty]

In.

[Armstrong]

In words of a single syllable. Yes.

[Getty]

Michael, Those who.

[Armstrong]

Parlance of the common man.

[Getty]

Yes. Those who do not read but have some money, let's separate them from their coinage.

[Armstrong]

Precisely. We, the learned, owe it to them. To administer the firm handed spanking that they deserve.

[Getty]

I'm trying not to have any judgment in this conversation about the reading because I didn't read, because I'm a good person and I'm going to blah, blah, blah. Whatever it was, there was a lot less to do. The pace of life was slower and I really enjoyed it. And like I said, it's my enjoyment of reading. I read much less than I used to, certainly long form books, stuff like that, because my attention span has gotten so short. So we've created a world where our brains are ruined and people don't read as much. But the chart about young people, people under the age of 18, it was amazing. The, the two lines crossing at about 2008, right when the smartphone hit, but it was already on the decline. I wonder why that is just the Internet in general, maybe the Internet in general.

[Armstrong]

The omnipresence of media, I think could be. But anyway, look, when you've got, when you've got 200 channels, you're more likely to find something you like than when there are three.

[Getty]

But is something like 75% of young people read nearly daily back in the 80s? I did.

[Armstrong]

Yeah, I did.

[Getty]

I read every day just for fun. I knew not only just stuff assigned, I'd read before I went to bed. Things that I like to read. Now it's down to like 10% of people under 18 that read for pleasure daily.

[Armstrong]

For a while there I was reading Brave New World like every other year in 1984, like once or twice a decade, just because it's long and a little tougher. But yeah, one of the themes of Brave New World is that you don't have to work very hard to oppress people. You just keep them high and amused. And they have no interest in opposing totalitarianism.

[Getty]

Oh yeah.

[Armstrong]

And the other aspect that I wanted to mention of the people in the book was they were very shallow.

[Getty]

Ding.

[Armstrong]

Right. You're.

[Getty]

You'Re, you're gonna, you know, take money from dullards, you know, exploit people. You're gonna figure out a way to steal from them. What do you think governments are going to do or are doing when people.

[Armstrong]

Don'T read anymore or they're milking us like cows?

[Getty]

Yeah. Oh man.

[Armstrong]

They call the theft taxes, but it's the same process.

[Getty]

You know, I won't live long enough to be able to win this bet. But you are right. We saw the peak of mankind in our lifetime.

[Armstrong]

Right. Wow. Planet of the Beavers. That's fine. Again, they're hard working. They got the flat tail they build stuff bees maybe can be their buzzy little assistants.

[Getty]

Let the bees have their shot at the world, huh?

[Joe Getty]

Armstrong and Getty.

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You say a lot that's in some of your song lyrics. You want to tell us what it.

[Armstrong]

Means? You either live your culture or you kill your culture.

[Getty]

And there's no in between. So I'm gonna get up every day and I'm gonna live my culture today. What was that nonsense he was muttering in the middle?

[Armstrong]

That was French, Jack. It's a language. That was Jordan Thibodeau, who was featured on 60 Minutes as part of a really interesting segment about essentially Cajun and similar music in that culture. I thought that was a really interesting statement. You either live your culture or kill your culture. Especially because I was corresponding with a friend of mine about my upcoming trip to London with my bride and he sent along some commentary about have you.

[Getty]

Been brushing up on your English to get ready for it? Hilarious.

[Armstrong]

And it was a commentary on how Britain and Europe, having permitted rampant immigration that nobody voted for but the elite wanted, had caused enormous dislocating cultural problems. And it's something we've talked about several times, but and pointing out that like the mayors of most of the big cities in Britain are all Muslims, inexplicably, because they're still a fairly small minority. But there are hundreds of sharia councils and sharia courts and the rest of it in Britain. And I found that really intriguing.

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Which way to Buckingham Palace? It's right over there.

[Armstrong]

Which way?

[Getty]

Over there.

[Armstrong]

Over there.

[Getty]

Why are you talking like that?

[Armstrong]

So I was for Whatever reason, that came within 24 hours of hearing Mr. Thibodeau talking about, you live your culture or you kill your culture.

[Getty]

I always remember when I read the giant biography of Pope John Paul ii, he was constantly saying language is culture, talking about that it is. They travel together, they just do. And if a language dies out, that culture's died out. And if you can. And, and that's why, that's why Russia goes in and. And forces people to speak Russian, various languages in various areas. Because you.

[Armstrong]

China. Yeah, exactly, yeah. You dare speak one of your ethnic languages in China, you will be hauled in a re education.

[Getty]

That's why it's so hilarious that we're so willing in the United States to like turn over giant swaths of the country to another language. We just put up signs in that language and start putting things in that language and say, that's fine, we don't care, we don't need to hang on to our language.

[Armstrong]

Well, exactly. You called it funny and I get you're being kind of ironic, but I was just going to say it is one of the more horrifying and obscene things I've observed in my life that we of the West, Europe and the United States and Canada, primarily the English speaking world and Europe, have been convinced that we have the one culture that not only is not beautiful and worth preserving or awesome or successful or whatever, but it's evil and we deserve to have it stamped out. And anybody who doesn't participate in that stamping out enthusiastically is an awful person and should be shamed or forced out of their job or what have you. And you know, if you just look at England, never mind the United States, look at England.

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Hello.

[Armstrong]

They've practically brought us democracy. It's existed in different forms in different places, but my God, the Magna Carta and the emergence of the Parliament as a counter to the King and working with the monarch and just over hundreds of years hammering out the details of how does a people self govern and then that giving birth to the United States. I mean, you want to talk about a culture worth being proud of and preserving? How about British culture? And it's offshoots. So do you have more you want to say on that topic before I get to my next. This all came together like in the last three minutes in my head.

[Getty]

Wow.

[Armstrong]

So why would those who were brow beating us to flush our own culture down the toilet, hate our own history, hate our own people? Why would they do that? I think a lot of you are probably a little bit ahead of me at this point, but I came across this this morning. It's a, it's a piece in the National Review and let's see. Oh, it's by the notorious MBD Michael Brendan Doherty, who came across some audio of Hillary Clinton, of all people, doing an interview at one of those never ending, look how smart and cool and rich we are. Speech a thons.

[Getty]

God, who goes to those things?

[Armstrong]

Well, it's a certain class of people, but I've never heard of most of these things. This is the 92 NY part of the Newmark Civic Life series.

[Getty]

Oh yeah, the 92 Street Y is a huge deal in New York. If you're important. They have those all the time. Yeah, I see those on YouTube videos regularly.

[Armstrong]

I've never been so Hillary was jabbering about. She was. She launched into the screen and we could get the audio, but it's better to shorten it because, you know, she rambled a little bit. He launched into this, mocking the idea of the Trump administration or anybody else trying to get Americans to have more babies. And she's right in that it's ultimately going to fail. But she launches into a screed in which she says the quiet part out loud that the progressive, the affluent progressive lifestyle, however you want to describe it, lifestyle liberalism, certain forms of feminism. It's the privilege of affluent Americans and is supported by mass immigration, legal and illegal. Progressivism is not economically or socially sustainable except if we import brown people and foreign people. She said it's crazy trying to make America great again by returning to the lifestyles and the economic arrangements of not just the 50s. I mean, let's keep going back as far as we can. The nuclear family, return to being a Christian nation, a return to producing a lot of children. These are quotes even though she says.

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They alleged particularly offended by her throwing out the nuclear family as something to give up on easily.

[Armstrong]

Wow. Then she takes a shot of Republicans said they have no interest in paid family leave or funding quality child care. They're cutting Head Start. But she said it's sort of odd because the people who produce the most children in our country are immigrants and they want to deport them. None of this adds up. This is all a quote. In fact, one of the reasons why our economy did so much better than comparable advanced economies across the world is because we had lots of immigrants, legally and undocumented who had a larger than normal by American standards family. So quoting Doherty, taken together, Clinton says that immigrants make the American lifestyle of today add up in part because of their higher birth rates. And she's right. Although he later points out, within two generations, certainly three, immigrant birth rates plunge down to Native American birth rates.

[Getty]

I'd like to also point out the reality any neighborhood you ever lived in, Hillary, become primarily a different language. Speaking in the restaurant you used to go to become a food and language that you don't know in your school.

[Armstrong]

The teachers you couldn't learn in schools because there are so many languages.

[Getty]

When you go to the emergency room, a lot, a lot of Spanish speaking or whatever that really slows things down is that, no, it doesn't happen to you. It's funny. It happens to everybody else.

[Joe Getty]

Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty, the Armstrong and Getty Show.

[Jack Armstrong]

This is an I Heart podcast.