The A&G Replay Monday Hour Two

Summary

Armstrong & Getty On Demand
Episode: The A&G Replay Monday Hour Two
Date: October 13, 2025

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Episode Overview

In this hour, Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty deliver their trademark blend of humor, cultural observation, and incisive critique while discussing topics ranging from grammar quirks and economic anxiety to generational attitudes about braces and the pitfalls of government-run “equity” initiatives. Interwoven with lighthearted banter, the hosts provide a lens onto current social, economic, and political trends—with a heavy dose of skepticism toward both modern social norms and government intervention.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Semicolons & Everyday Language

Time: 00:52–02:02

• Discussion on grammar: The hosts open with thoughts on semicolons, referencing Kurt Vonnegut’s line about their pretentiousness.
  • Joe Getty: “Kurt Vonnegut, who I'm a big fan of, said that the semicolon... it's showy. It's chiefly used to show you've been to College.” [00:52]
  • Jack Armstrong: “I actually use it semi frequently. ...I've heard it described as a soft period, stronger than a comma, but not quite the full stop of a period.” [01:22]
• Humor and light teasing as they meander from semicolons to using “dot dot dots” and their own habits in writing and speech.

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2. Consumer Spending & Economic Anxieties

Time: 02:02–06:31

• Economic breakdown: The hosts discuss recent economic data showing that the top 10% of earners now account for half of all U.S. consumer spending, while middle and lower-income Americans grow increasingly anxious.
  • Joe Getty: “Right now, half of consumer spending is just the top 10%.” [02:02]
  • They reference the Michigan Index; consumer sentiment dropped from 70 to 55, indicating deepening pessimism.
  • Jack Armstrong: “Doesn't everything just feel a little precarious?” [04:51]
  • Personal anecdotes on 401ks and investing philosophies vs. the urge for caution ("Buy gold bars or Bitcoin or Dogecoin or GameStop stock. Is that still going on? I don't know." [06:09])
  • Memorable comparison: Jack likens the coming market correction to a strict nun: “It's going to be more like an angry Catholic school nun in 1950... the ruler is going to come down with a resounding smack.” [05:23]

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3. International Affairs Brief

Time: 06:31–07:48

• Breaking news: Netanyahu apologized to Qatar for a strike in Doha.
  • Speculation on political dynamics and what’s discussed behind closed doors, joking about “Trump-Netanyahu tapes” being like the Nixon tapes. [07:12]
  • Joe Getty: “Someday I wish they would release the Trump Netanyahu tapes like they did the Nixon tapes.” [07:12]

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4. Societal Observations: Student Drivers & Group Stereotypes

Time: 07:48–13:26

• Anecdotal humor about driving lessons between Joe and his son.
  • Jack: “If I'm on a city thoroughfare where nobody ever goes the speed limit and somebody's going the speed limit and I say, patience, please, student driver... I get it. So cool.” [09:22]
• Deeper social critique:
  • Conversation veers into the taboo of discussing certain group weaknesses, stereotypes, and societal double standards in discussing group attributes.
  • Joe Getty: “You can point out the strengths of a racial group... but not weaknesses. And it makes no sense whatsoever that any group could have only positives and no negatives.” [10:49]
  • Critique of positive stereotyping, “woke” identity politics, and the shift from individuality to group-think:
    • Jack Armstrong: “Even positive stereotypes are racism and wrong. ...Then the woke crowd came along... And they're like, everybody is the stereotype of their race.” [11:45]
• Comic relief:
  • “The Irish can't drive. And I also, I said it out loud.” [13:22] before segueing to the next segment.

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5. Braces as a Societal Status Symbol

Time: 14:34–18:22

• Personal observation: Joe’s son got braces, prompting reflection on how common—and expected—orthodontic treatment has become.
  • Joe Getty: “As we decided at some point that everybody needs to have perfectly straight teeth and they need to be as bright as the sun...” [14:34]
  • Only one-third of kids “truly need” braces for functional reasons; for many, it’s cosmetic and socioeconomic in nature—higher income, higher rates of braces.
  • Discussion: Social self-reinforcement of cosmetic standards. Jack notes, “Hence the social pressure.” [17:01]
  • Joe Getty (on parental decision): “...it's not even that am I gonna have my kid die on that hill because it's not me who's living with it, Right? So that's what every parent is dealing with. But it's expensive.” [18:09]

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6. Violence, Media, and Internet/Social Media Influence

Time: 19:29–25:31

• Social violence: Discussion on the difference between ideological political violence and “angry, probably suicidal” violence with incidental ideology.
  • Jack Armstrong: “There is political violence that is the culmination of... a political philosophy... and then the other thing... is the I'm angry, I'm probably suicidal...” [20:32]
  • “Most of these are glorified suicides.” [21:45]
• Media and social media: Connection between the prevalence of violence, media coverage, social media, and youth malaise:
  • Utah Governor’s 60 Minutes appearance on the social damage of social media.
  • Jack: “I think the culture of this has got to be posted online to validate the experience. Online is what life is.” [22:45]
  • Joe Getty: “And I was just thinking, is there a solution to this? I'm not sure there is... I think he's a hundred percent right about the damage it's doing and how it's crazy, it's making us and depressed...” [23:28]
  • Jack Armstrong's solution: "It is clearly the solution. Anybody who's looked at it knows it's the solution." [24:25]
    • But Joe remains pessimistic: “Yeah, but it's never going to happen. That's why I dismiss it.” [24:37]
  • The futility of “fixing society”:
    • “There is no fixing society, quote unquote. There's only fixing individuals. But that is doomed as well.” [25:07]

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7. NYC Mayor Scandal & Rise of Socialism Among Youth

Time: 25:49–29:37

• News: New York’s mayor (Eric Adams) drops out of the reelection race amidst scandal.
• Political maneuvers: Job offers and the politics behind encouraging his withdrawal, fears of a “communist” mayor.
• Socialism’s appeal to youth: WSJ article suggests the 2008 financial crisis was “ground zero” for younger generations’ shift toward socialism:
  • Joe Getty: “That is the ground zero for all the socialist communists out there of what turned them, the direction they got turned.” [27:05]
  • Jack Armstrong: “It's unfortunate that so much of the crash was set up by stupid government policy... But the young people reacted to that with, we need more crappy government policy.” [28:12]
  • Critique: “Socialism is one of the greatest, most clever scams ever created by humankind because you can get young people to fall for it over and over again.” [28:56]

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8. San Francisco “Equity” Weed Dispensary Fiasco

Time: 30:47–38:15

• Local government “equity” program critique:
  • A SF “equity” weed dispensary, founded to compensate those "unfairly burdened by the war on drugs," becomes a textbook example of cronyism.
    • Joe Getty: “San Francisco's first equity weed store was an epic failure. City hall insiders still may pocket millions.” [30:47]
  • Details: Permit system supposedly gave preference to marginalized individuals but, through connections (including childhood friendship with the mayor), one individual secured the lucrative spot.
  • Outcome: Despite failure, well-connected insiders profit, taxpayers pick up the bill.
  • Jack Armstrong: “Cronyism and the connected get rich—that is socialism. Every single time.” [35:54]
  • Joe Getty: “That is what happens every single time in socialism. ...It's always their buddies or somebody who bribes them that gets the cool deal and gets rich and it doesn't help anybody.” [36:47]
  • Term proposal: “Crony socialism” as the more accurate label; all socialism becomes cronyism in practice. [38:01]

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

• “I feel like I have enough spices.” — Jack Armstrong dismisses the old justification for colonial exploration, in reference to Columbus Day. [00:44]
• “The correction isn't going to be like the gentle parenting craze. It's going to be more like an angry Catholic school nun in 1950.” — Jack Armstrong on the stock market's precariousness. [05:23]
• “You can point out the strengths of a racial group...but not weaknesses. And it makes no sense whatsoever that any group could have only positives and no negatives.” — Joe Getty, on social double standards. [10:49]
• “Socialism is one of the greatest, most clever scams ever created by humankind because you can get young people to fall for it over and over again.” — Jack Armstrong [28:56]
• “Cronyism and the connected get rich—that is socialism. Every single time.” — Jack Armstrong, summing up the San Francisco weed store story. [35:54]

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Timestamps for Notable Segments

• Semicolons and Grammar: 00:52–02:02
• Consumer Spending & Anxiety: 02:02–06:31
• International News (Netanyahu/Qatar): 06:31–07:48
• Student Drivers & Social Stereotypes: 07:48–13:26
• Braces and Social Pressure: 14:34–18:22
• Violence & Social Media: 19:29–25:31
• NYC Mayoral Race & Socialism's Appeal: 25:49–29:37
• SF Equity Weed Store/Crony Socialism: 30:47–38:15

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Language & Tone

The conversation flows casually, with Armstrong and Getty riffing on each other’s jokes and observations. There's a blend of satire, cultural criticism, honest reflection, and pointed skepticism toward establishment narratives—delivered in a conversational, irreverent, and often self-deprecating style.

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This episode is a quintessential Armstrong & Getty experience: blending humor, social commentary, and a skepticism of both pop culture trends and government “solutions,” all presented with the duo’s signature wit and rapport.

Transcript

[Announcer]

This is an iHeart podcast.

[Show Host Intro]

Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln radio studio at the George Washington Broadcast Center. Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty.

[Jack Armstrong]

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

[Joe Getty]

While you're enjoying the Armstrong and Getty replay, don't forget the reason for the season. That's European explorers, colonial settlers. I don't know. I don't know what the reason for the season is. It's Columbus spices, right.

[Jack Armstrong]

Looking for India.

[Joe Getty]

Was that it?

[Jack Armstrong]

I don't know. I feel like I have enough spices. I'm not going to anyway. Enjoy a carefully curated Armstrong and Getty replay.

[Joe Getty]

The writer Kurt Vonnegut, who I'm a big fan of, said that the semicolon said of the semicolon, it's showy. It's chiefly used to show you've been to College. More than 2/3 of young Americans say they know how to use it. About the same number test prove. Actually don't. That's pretty funny. Two thirds of people say they know how to use a seven column. Two thirds actually don't. Kurt Vonnegut says you only use it to show you've been to college. That's pretty funny.

[Jack Armstrong]

You know what? I actually use it semi frequently. It to me takes the same role, has the same role as like, it's, it's, it's. Well, I've heard it described as a soft period, stronger than a comma, but not quite the full stop of a period. I have a big meeting tomorrow, semicolon. I need to prepare tonight.

[Joe Getty]

Less cramping.

[Jack Armstrong]

Oh, you're an idiot.

[Joe Getty]

So my dot, dot, dot, which I'm a big fan of, is basically using a semicolon. Yeah. Okay.

[Jack Armstrong]

I think so.

[Joe Getty]

That's fantastic. So I did want to talk about this. This is actually important. So the stat from a week or so ago really got my attention. Consumer spending is doing okay. Pretty good. Hanging in there. Because when consumer spending goes, the economy collapses because two thirds of our economy is consumer spending. But right now, half of consumer spending is just the top 10%. So the burden of consumer spending is being is on a small number of people.

[Jack Armstrong]

I find myself wondering what's the usual percentage that the top 10% actually they have more money?

[Joe Getty]

Yeah, yeah, I actually had that and I don't remember what it was, but it was significantly significant change. Okay, because I wondered that too. I'll have to look that stat up because that is important to the whole thing. But so this news out of that is not that surprising. While the wealthy prosper, middle class Americans increasingly Feel the pinch. There is something called the Michigan Index, which I've heard before, whenever you get into this topic. It's a common and well respected consumer sentiment gauge that factors in a bunch of different things. The Michigan Index, anyway, consumer sentiment was at 70 not that long ago. In the summer it collapsed. It's down to 55 where the number 100 signals neutral feelings on the economy. When you're at a hundred, you're just like, yeah, it's okay, it's not great, it's not bad. I don't know, below that you're, you're mostly negative. But it went from 70, which was already somewhat negative, to 55 for the middle class. Economic anxiety is running particularly strong among lower and middle income consumers. And they're, and it fell off a cliff this summer. Higher income Americans. And for this study they're calling anybody that makes more than 100,000 a year. You make $101,000 a year in the Bay Area. You do not consider yourself a higher income individual. Probably they have buoyant sentiments.

[Jack Armstrong]

I rarely describe myself as, hey Joe, how you doing? Buoyant.

[Joe Getty]

I'm going to start doing that more often.

[Jack Armstrong]

You should.

[Joe Getty]

How's it going?

[Jack Armstrong]

Buoyant. Af.

[Joe Getty]

I'll say. But in June, middle class confidence gave out and the index went down a lot. And this concerns economists, of course, everything concerns economists and they disagree on everything. But that doesn't surprise me really. Things are still expensive. Yeah, well.

[Jack Armstrong]

And as I've said before, doesn't everything just feel a little precarious?

[Joe Getty]

Yes, yes it does. Well, if you, if you're, you know, you follow the stock market at all my life experiences when it's setting records, like every other day there's a correction coming. And like my dad, who's been retired for quite some time says I've lost everything. I've half of everything. I've got like three times since I retired. I mean, it happens now and then where you get the big correction and.

[Jack Armstrong]

The correction isn't going to be like the gentle parenting craze. It's going to be more like an angry Catholic school nun in 1950. Okay, the ruler is going to come down with a resounding smack.

[Joe Getty]

God dang it. Have you all looked at your 401k? I rarely do. I just had to for some form. The other day I looked at my 401k. I was like, holy crap. I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised with the stock market constantly setting records and it's pretty tied into that. But.

[Jack Armstrong]

Should I be Hardcore long term investor guy. If you miss the drop by a day and the rally by a day, you will lose out on an enormous amount of wealth.

[Joe Getty]

Right.

[Jack Armstrong]

That's why you just ride it out. On the other hand, I look at what's going on right now and I think, oh God, cash out, cash out. Just cash out now. Cash out. Buy gold bars or Bitcoin or Dogecoin or GameStop stock. Is that still going on? I don't know.

[Joe Getty]

Gold bars, yeah, Maybe that's the answer. This is breaking news. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke on the phone with the prime minister of Qatar and apologized for violating Qatar's sovereignty in the strike on Doha and expressed regret for the killing of a Qatari security guard while they were taking out the various Hamas leaders. There.

[Jack Armstrong]

See, everybody's fine.

[Joe Getty]

Now Netanyahu is sitting with the president as right as we are. I wonder if that was that part of the deal. Trump said, you got to call and apologize. Tell him you're sorry. No, tell him you're sorry and mean it.

[Jack Armstrong]

Someday I wish they would release the Trump Netanyahu tapes like they did the Nixon tapes. I don't know if there are tapes, but you know, like after the Qatari attack, the word was Trump just lit him up. He yelled at him. But then they subsequently, whether it was a couple hours later the next day, had a very good, calm, productive chat. So they've obviously got a couple of alpha male, hot tempered, yelling at each other. You know, a relationship.

[Joe Getty]

I'd love to.

[Jack Armstrong]

Hear it someday or just read the transcripts, but I don't know if that'll ever happen.

[Joe Getty]

Semicolon, that would all be amusing.

[Jack Armstrong]

Agreed. An anti ice protester in Massachusetts forgot to put her car in park while yelling at agents making an arrest of an illegal alien and her car rolled into a lake and sunk.

[Joe Getty]

That's disappointing.

[Jack Armstrong]

Tells Fox News. It happened in up Upton, Massachusetts, a small, very blue town in blue Worcester County, 40 miles west of Boston. In a clip, a voice can be heard saying, well, that sucks. Look at that, Lucy. Her car got lost. As the woman's car drifts further into the water.

[Joe Getty]

The lesson for all of us. Oh, that reminds me, I was practicing driving with my son yesterday. We were driving around on county highways in his truck as he is coming up on getting his license. And so I took him over to a friend's house and Saturday night and his friend, who is a few months older than him, has his license now and I saw him pull up and it was just like it was, I'M sure you've had this experience. Just. It was so weird to see this kid that I've known since he was in kindergarten driving a car.

[Jack Armstrong]

It's like, what the hell? Just seems strange. Sure. This is all right. Is this really. Yeah.

[Joe Getty]

Times change. People grow.

[Jack Armstrong]

Hey, do you guys have a student driver on your.

[Joe Getty]

On your bumper?

[Jack Armstrong]

A little, son.

[Joe Getty]

No. No, I don't. Can you get those? Are you supposed to have those? I guess.

[Jack Armstrong]

I mean, I don't.

[Joe Getty]

And does it carry any legal weight? Do you get any? You get.

[Jack Armstrong]

No, it doesn't care. Legal weight. But I appreciate it, honestly. If I'm on a city thoroughfare where nobody ever goes the speed limit and somebody's going the speed limit and I say, patience, please, student driver. I see that.

[Joe Getty]

You're right.

[Jack Armstrong]

Oh, okay. Got it, got it, got it. Yep. I. I won't get up on. Not that I would like dangerously tailgate anyway, but I get it. So cool. You're cool. I'll just go.

[Joe Getty]

I do. I pull around in front of my brake, check them, then I roll coal on them. I do. I do everything. You drive them too, for me.

[Jack Armstrong]

Oh, not rolling coal, but yeah, that.

[Joe Getty]

Happened to me just the other day. I was. Was that a weird four way stop situation? And I said, what is that person doing? And Sam said, they got the student driver sticker. And I was like, oh, okay. Yeah, they're trying to figure it out. And yeah, my patience went way, way, way up.

[Jack Armstrong]

Right. I shouldn't have screamed. Go, you f f ing mfer. I just. If I'd seen the sign, I wouldn't.

[Joe Getty]

Have, you know, my son, I think, figured out the other day we were having a conversation about a particular group of people that seemed to struggle with driving.

[Jack Armstrong]

Oh. And I think he came upon this realization himself.

[Joe Getty]

No, no, no, no, no.

[Jack Armstrong]

We.

[Joe Getty]

He was. He's very aware of it. He's very aware of this, the existence of this. And I won't say why, but I think he figured out why. And it's always been a mystery. Why does this particular group of people struggle with driving so much when they seem to excel at other things? I won't. I won't name the group, but I've.

[Jack Armstrong]

Got a great punchline. But it would end our careers today.

[Joe Getty]

And I can't. I can't explain why, but it reminded me of one of the many Armstrong and Gettysburg. I don't know, laws of social physics or whatever things that we've come across over the years. The fact that you can point out the strength of a Racial group or ethnic group or whatever, or really any group, you can point out their strengths as divided out from other people, but not weaknesses. And it makes no sense whatsoever that any group could have only positives and no negatives. I mean, that doesn't make sense on any face of it whatsoever.

[Jack Armstrong]

No. You want another layer of irony? If you were to say, because you.

[Joe Getty]

Didn'T say that group has high homeowner, owner, owner, high homeowner rates less crime, gets divorced less. But if there's a negative stat, you can't say that out loud or you're in trouble.

[Jack Armstrong]

Well, so here's the extra load of irony for five times. Can't drive, for instance. And particularly in. Particularly if, if you were to suggest that sort of thing, even a positive. I remember if you were to suggest that, yeah, Indian kids, you know, they work really hard and they value education and you weren't even supposed to say that because that reduces the individual to just his group. And that's ugly. That's a stereotype. Even positive stereotypes are racism and wrong. And then the woke crowd came along and took over the left. And they're like, everybody is the stereotype of their race. All white people are evil white supremacists. All black people are victims. There are no individuals. You will not be judged on your individual achievements or efforts or character. You will be painted with the color of your race. Period. And that was the left again, but.

[Joe Getty]

The new Left, yeah, I wish I could talk about this more, but I can't. It would end our careers and people.

[Jack Armstrong]

So weak and stupid that they really, they ought to be at the end of the leash that their dog is holding. People so damn stupid they couldn't recognize what was going on. Fell for it all. And they're thick in our nation's universities and schools and blue towns. Yes, indeed, they believe every word of it. And when the new new left comes along and utterly contradicts that, but yells at him a little bit, they'll go along with that next.

[Joe Getty]

The Irish. The Irish can't drive. And I also, I said it out loud.

[Show Host Intro]

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[Joe Getty]

My son got, my 13 year old got braces yesterday and I was wondering what percentage of kids get braces in the modern world? As we decided at some point that everybody needs to have perfectly straight teeth and they need to be as bright as the sun in terms of whiteness.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yes.

[Joe Getty]

Just. That's what we decided. It's. If you watch a movie from the 90s, all the actors like not bright white teeth, they're just kind of, you know, John Travolta's got kind of yellowish.

[Jack Armstrong]

Teeth like people have normal colored teeth.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah, it's, it's, it's striking and I.

[Jack Armstrong]

Love this, this is my favorite aspect of modern movies. If the, you got a movie, it's a western, it's set in 1840 and you got a character who's a town drunk who's dying of consumption, he's still got gleaming white teeth. Right.

[Joe Getty]

About 70% of kids in the US currently get some sort of orthodontic treatment, braces being the number one. And at least a third or only a third truly need braces in, in the traditional sense. Like it would be a quality of life situation if you didn't get your teeth straightened out. It's, it's cosmetic. In other words, for two thirds of them. Which, you know, if, if we've decided, you know, I had a person really berating me for the fact that I hadn't got my sun braces yet. Yet. If we've decided that you gotta have straight teeth, is that kind of like we, we use the example of the, the cracked phone screen. That's like the modern day missing tooth and that's because nobody's missing teeth anymore. So are you, are you, are you really setting yourself aside as you can't be part of even mid level or above society if you didn't get your teeth straightened? I don't know, I don't know. What it's like out there. I have straight teeth just naturally. So I don't know what it would be like. I don't know how self conscious I would be. Lots of people had crooked teeth when I was younger. But like every kid has braces. It also socioeconomically, depending on your, you know, your social strata, the higher you go up the income, the more it's like 100% of the kids get braces for even mildly crooked teeth according to this article.

[Jack Armstrong]

Hence the social pressure. Sure.

[Joe Getty]

Right.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah.

[Joe Getty]

So it's kind of self reinforcing.

[Jack Armstrong]

I'll be in Britain next week, so. Boy.

[Joe Getty]

Well, that would be interesting.

[Jack Armstrong]

Bring your report.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's, it is interesting that that is, it's not uniformly a western society thing. I mean United States leads the way in like needing to have perfectly straight teeth for cosmetic reasons. And it's expensive and painful, but yet we do it. And I just find it interesting, you know, we did it, I'm doing it.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah, that's, it's a conundrum. I mean if you were a real activist, you'd say, all right, this is an artificially imposed social norm, right? A status norm. An eminence front is Pete Townsend who just turned 80. Of the who? Pete Townsend of the who was 80. Good Lord. Anyway, as he would put it. But if indeed it is a barrier to achievement, acceptance, dating, whatever, certain relationships.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah.

[Jack Armstrong]

And are you gonna die on that hill? As people like to say, far too casual.

[Joe Getty]

And it's not even that am I gonna have my kid die on that hill because it's not me who's. Who's living with it, Right? So that's what every parent is dealing with. But it's expensive. Man, I was shocked by the price. Yow.

[Show Host Intro]

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

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[Joe Getty]

This is yet another message of it's not us and them, it's us. It's a country, it's a people. And when these things happen, instead of the divide, this is the time to unite.

[Jack Armstrong]

And is a sheriff in Michigan talking about how we've got to do something about all this violence in the wake of. I don't know, Pick your favorite bit of horror of the last week and a half to a month.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah, I didn't know what you were going to say there. If it was somebody in North Carolina from the guy that shot up that bar, whatever. Yeah, I don't know. So on the political violence stuff, it's easier because you can talk about the rhetoric and how we're all Americans and this is only going to get worse if we don't blah blah, blah. On just the random. I'm just mad at this church, bar, school, whatever. I don't know.

[Jack Armstrong]

My wife.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah.

[Jack Armstrong]

We have in my mind two distinct things happening. Number one, there is political violence that is the culmination of a maybe stupid and crazy but thought out formation of a political philosophy. You got your antifa violence for instance. They know what they're doing and why they're doing it. They all talk about it all the time. They are a group. You have various groups on campus. You got the up with Hamas, people committing various acts of violence. You have some folks on the right who are loonies, they have their militia in the woods, whatever. Once in a great while they committed an act of violence. That is one thing. Then the other thing is, and we've got to recognize this in the half wit jackasses in the mainstream media, never will because they have neither the capacity nor the desire to understand anything and they suck at their jobs and I hate them.

[Joe Getty]

Wow.

[Jack Armstrong]

Anyway, the other thing that we have going is the I'm angry, I'm probably suicidal. I think other people should be hurt. And sometimes those people grasp onto an ideology like in the last four months before they commit their glorified suicide.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah, that's what most of these are, glorified suicides.

[Jack Armstrong]

And the way they get attention for their suicide is to take a few or a bunch of people with them. That is a different thing and we need to recognize that as a society, I think. But as far as going over the details of the latest horrors and the. The suspected motivations and blah, blah. I just don't have it in me.

[Joe Getty]

Well, and there's. There. Well, not only that, is it depressing and I don't have it in me. There's just no. There's no point. There's just no point in it. So. The governor of Utah was the lead story on the season premiere of 60 Minutes last night. You know, that got so much attention after Charlie Kirk was assassinated in his state. And he was again on 60 Minutes last night going on about social media and the evils of it and how it's making us all insane and crazy. Do you think that plays a role at all in the glorified suicide stuff? I wonder if it does. Just because it makes the world seem worse than it is.

[Jack Armstrong]

Well, and I think it is just. I think the culture of this has got to be posted online to validate the experience. Online is what life is that a lot of the. Because you point out to me, please, the next time one of these shooters turns out to be an outgoing person who was involved in several civics organizations and not. He spent all his time online. He smoked a lot of potty, played a lot of video games. So their worldview is it's got to be big and be posted online to matter.

[Joe Getty]

Man. I was listening to Governor what's his name? What's the governor of Utah's name?

[Jack Armstrong]

Cox.

[Joe Getty]

I can't remember his name for diversion. I was listening to Governor Cox last night talk about the social media thing and the algorithms and how it dominates our lives and how many hours a day people spend on it and that sort of stuff. And I was just thinking, is there a solution to this? I'm not sure there is. Just he's right about all that. I think he's a hundred percent right about the damage it's doing and how it's crazy, it's making us and depressed and it seems like there's nothing good in the world and. But I. I don't know if there's anything that can be done about that.

[Jack Armstrong]

Spreading awareness of what you just said.

[Joe Getty]

Through what, Facebook?

[Jack Armstrong]

Exactly. You got to post it online.

[Joe Getty]

Post it on Tick Tock, have a tick Tock dance about. This is bad for you. I'm with the ca.

[Jack Armstrong]

Right. The newest trend is to reject all trends. Yeah, I don't know.

[Joe Getty]

I'm not optimistic about that. Okay, so that's that. Here's a different story that got a lot of attention in the last 24 hours.

[Jack Armstrong]

It's five. You always go ahead. You always say that, and you're right, but that is the solution. It is clearly the solution. Anybody who's looked at it knows it's the solution.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah, but it's never going to happen. That's why I dismiss it.

[Jack Armstrong]

It is going to happen.

[Joe Getty]

You think people are going to turn away from, from the Internet?

[Jack Armstrong]

I think the people who turn away from the Internet are going to turn away from the Internet.

[Joe Getty]

It's going to be a small percentage.

[Jack Armstrong]

Of people and we'll be very happy.

[Joe Getty]

Okay, you're talking about individuals. I'm talking about society. Yeah. I'm wanting society to get better. I'm wanting all these shootings to stop, for instance. That's not going to stop.

[Jack Armstrong]

True.

[Joe Getty]

Okay, well then we agree on that.

[Jack Armstrong]

Well, well, yeah, I know. It's, it's, it's. Yeah, it's an entirely rhetorical distinction. In the same way that a corporation is people. As Mitt Romney tried to point out to much mockery. Society is a collection of individuals. There is no fixing society, quote unquote. There's only fixing individuals. But that is doomed as well.

[Joe Getty]

Why would anyone listen to this show? Can't imagine when you have many other options out there. Listen to some happy music or somebody talking about sports or something like that. Anyway, here's a different news story for you.

[Jack Armstrong]

Just five weeks before election day, the scandal scarred mayor of New York City.

[Joe Getty]

Eric Adams is dropping out of the race. Despite all we've achieved, I cannot continue my re election campaign. So the big question is who gave him what? Both, both Republicans and Democrats. Trump offered him a job a while back and Adam said he didn't want to take it. So. But there's all kinds of people offering him jobs, spots on, you know, a corporate board where you're not going to have to do anything, where you're going to get paid a lot. Just get out of the damn race. There's so many people left, right and center who don't want the communists to become mayor. Democrats don't want it because it's, they're going to have that hung around their neck for however long he's mayor of New York is. You want this, this party, this guy. Republicans don't want it because he's going to bring policies that are going to be awful. So no, nobody wants this guy. So I, I just wonder what did Eric Adams get to drop out? That's one story.

[Jack Armstrong]

The immunity.

[Joe Getty]

Oh, that could be. Yeah. And then so you got the interesting thing of one crook dropped out so that it's now a different crook can run Alone against the communists to see who's gonna be mayor. New York, what a situation. But the reason I wanted to bring this up is Wall Street Journal had an article of why young people are turning to socialisms. What was socialism? What is the moment that got them all interested in socialism? And according to the Wall Street Journal, the main moment for Mamdani himself and a lot of his friends and a lot of people of that ilk today, it was the 2008 meltdown, financial crisis. People that were of the age that they were out and about and knew people who were losing their homes because the mortgage rate jumped all of a sudden because, you know, you bought it at 3% and then it jumps to whatever it was going to be after five years. And people said they didn't know that or whatever. But that whole thing where the world crashed, that's what the Tea Party grew out of. When we had the $800 billion bailout for these companies that had gone around ripping people off, they got bailed out. That is the ground zero for all the socialist communists out there of what turned them, the direction they got turned.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah, it's unfortunate that so much of the crash was set up by stupid government policy messing with the free market. Barney Frank and Bill Clinton telling the banks, you got to lend to anybody who fogs a mirror, otherwise we'll bring you down. They said, all right, we'll go ahead. And then they lent to people who had no business having a mortgage, and it all went curblooey, credit default swaps, etc. But the young people reacted to that with, we need more crappy government policy. In fact, we need the government in charge of everything. That's how we'll prevent this. It's like we were saying last week, socialism is one of the greatest, most clever scams ever created by humankind because you can get young people to fall for it over and over again.

[Joe Getty]

It'll be interesting to see what the first polling is with Eric Adams out. And it's, you know, well, some of those people that were supporting him, go to mom, Dummy, the Commie, or will they all go over to Andrew Cuomo, the woman grabbing old person killing liar and crook, and I love you.

[Jack Armstrong]

And that was the short version of Cuomo's resume right there.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah, yeah. Can we just call him the villain.

[Jack Armstrong]

Cuomo or something to summarize it?

[Joe Getty]

And he's the great hope to stop the awfulness of the communists. Darling, I kissed a woman on the cheek.

[Jack Armstrong]

All right. Yeah.

[Joe Getty]

What a funny situation.

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Armstrong and Getty.

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[Joe Getty]

A story I want to get on and this is from the San Francisco Chronicle. And I I couldn't I'm not wearing a hat, but if I were, I would tip it as high as I could tip it or however you tip a hat for them doing this story Headline San Francisco's first equity weed store was an epic failure. City hall insiders still may pocket millions.

[Jack Armstrong]

Wow.

[Joe Getty]

And the reason I wanted to do this story is it's a classic socialism story. It's a classic the reason socialism doesn't work will never work. And idiots like the people that are supporting Mom Dummy in New York just, well, you're just too young to know this or stupid or something. The cannabis shop on storied Hate street had it all. Prime real estate, star power, political clout and social justice. Then things got ugly. The idea of it to start with is amazing. This was going to be the first permit holder. Remember when weed became legal, it was all about, you know, who gets to have the permits to open a up weed stores. And they're going to be limited on, you know, how many per street and all that sort of stuff. Just like a liquor store or anything like that. And hate in the Haight Ashbury area, Big tourist area if you've never been to San Francisco, tons of foot traffic. This would be a big hippieville. This would be a big deal. I mean how many people would be coming from around the world that would love buying weed on hate in San Francisco, right?

[Jack Armstrong]

Sad people who imagine some sort of hippie utopia and just want to absorb a little bit of that you know, three and a half generations later.

[Joe Getty]

Right. The first permit holder in the city's social equity program which reserved cannabis business licenses for people unfairly burdened by the war on drugs. So the only way you could get a license to open up one of these gold mine weed stores was if you were part of the crowd unfairly burdened by the war on drugs.

[Jack Armstrong]

A drug dealer.

[Joe Getty]

So they had experience.

[Jack Armstrong]

I like the policy. It makes sense.

[Joe Getty]

Well, it was just you, you had to be black because the idea were of a puck. A person of color. Because throughout history, according to this, people of color have been unfairly targeted in the war on drugs and suffered and to. And this social equity. Weird situation for people who believe this is true. That by helping some dude today that had nothing to do with what was going on 30 years ago, you've somehow fixed the world. I just, I don't even understand that concept.

[Jack Armstrong]

So people of color. How about like dudes in dresses? Trans crowd. Do they get pot licenses too?

[Joe Getty]

This would be an experiment, the store on hate to see if legalization could atone for decades of racist law enforcement excesses and empower small businesses, some owned by members of the city's dwindling black populace. You got to like it already, right? This social experiment.

[Jack Armstrong]

There. There's another great example of luxury beliefs coming up in a gender bending madness Update next hour. Stay tuned.

[Joe Getty]

So this dude got the license and didn't sell it as the only weed retailer that was going to be allowed on the main drag of Haight Asbury thanks to the strict zoning laws. He resisted temptation to sell out. He said he rejected cash offers from some really big dogs out there that wanted to buy his permit once he got it. Well, he ended up being a big dog. Is the reason he. Hang on. Hung on to it. We. We find out at the end of this. I hope every other person of color can look at this and see that it can really happen. Yeah. If you grew up with the mayor of San Francisco. So he literally was friends with Mayor Breed since he was a kid their whole lives.

[Jack Armstrong]

Oh, funny coincidence.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah. His contacts in the, in the mayor's office. And so they're trying to figure out how are they going to dole out these permits in a fair way. They came up with all kinds of different ways the how you could do it. And a lottery. No, somebody could rig a lottery. No, we could do it this way. No, somebody could rig that. I know what we'll do. We'll just make it. Whoever fills out the form the fastest, they get the License. And unbelievably, believe it or not, they opened up the applications online in the city of San Francisco for the form, showed up at whatever it was, 10am on April 1 or whatever it was, and immediately, you know, everybody is waiting around to click on the computer and get the forms and download them and fill them out and get them back in as fast as they can. And just the craziest coincidence of all times. This guy who grew up with the mayor and has known her his entire life and his friends got their application in first.

[Jack Armstrong]

Wow, those high school typing classes really paid off.

[Joe Getty]

And they, they got the license and they opened the store and then the. And I'm not going to go through all because it's a very, very long article, but the ending is they made millions while the place went bankrupt and ended up closing. But they got millions and millions of dollars through all kinds of different government things that went on.

[Jack Armstrong]

And cronyism and the connected get rich that is socialism. Every single time.

[Joe Getty]

Every single time. Amid the good vibes, there was little to indicate what was to come. That the store would go belly up in little more than four years, that the great expectations of the equity program and legal cannabis would crumble along with it. And that despite the failure, Richard, that's the guy's name, who grew up with Meyer Breed and his partners would still be poised to pocket millions with taxpayers footing the bill. Good for the Chronicle for doing that story. But that is what happens every single time in socialism. The people that claim that it's all about fairness and equity and the downtrodden, it's always their buddies or somebody who bribes them that gets the cool deal and gets rich and it doesn't help anybody.

[Jack Armstrong]

Right. The whole argument of the reality of equity is it is a quasi fake, it's a fake moral argument for why some people should get special treatment from the government. And that always turns out to be the people well connected with those in power for whatever reason, for whatever kinship, whether it's skin color or political philosophy or they're just cronies. But yeah, equity is a fake argument for special favors from the government.

[Joe Getty]

They interviewed a whole bunch of people, I mean, because there were some big time people that were trying to get that particular license to open a weed store. And so they were ready to log on and they had, you know, all kinds of smart people there to jump into, filling out the forms and getting in as fast possible like that. And they didn't even come close to getting in as fast as this other guy did. And they're all, like, telling the San Francisco Chronic. They're all telling them, like, please give me a break. I mean, don't even pretend this was on the up and up. Well. Right.

[Jack Armstrong]

No, we can't have a lottery because you could rig a lottery. Let's have a speed typing contest that our friend, our friends and family happened to win.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah. Good Lord, that's something.

[Jack Armstrong]

They don't even try to hide it anymore.

[Joe Getty]

No, they don't. And they're the people that preach equity all the time and how the systemic this and that, it's just. It's amazing.

[Jack Armstrong]

And again, who got screwed? Taxpayers. They all got rich. Keep falling for it. Blue cities. Idiots.

[Joe Getty]

Why does the term crony capitalism exist but not the term crony socialism? Maybe because you don't need it, because all socialism is crony. It's the whole thing.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah, but you're right, that is. That is useful, though, because that's exactly what that needs to be tattooed with that.

[Joe Getty]

That was crony socialism.

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

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