Then You Need New Underwear Because You Wet Yourself

Summary

Armstrong & Getty On Demand

Episode: "Then You Need New Underwear Because You Wet Yourself"

Date: October 14, 2025
Host: Jack Armstrong & Joe Getty (with Michael)

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Overview

This episode of Armstrong & Getty navigates a mix of heavy current events and lighter, humorous anecdotes. The show opens with reflections on the return of Israeli hostages and deceased hostages' remains, pivots into a critical discussion of political language and leadership, then shifts into a "Gender Bending Madness" segment about trans athletes and cultural conflicts. There's discussion of viral youth memes, Halloween hijinks, retirement policy in Europe, and crime stat manipulation in the U.S., all delivered in the duo’s signature irreverent, opinionated, and at times self-deprecating style.

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Key Discussion Points & Segment Highlights

1. Hostage Crisis in Israel/Gaza & Political Language

[00:27 - 11:13]

• Clarissa Ward (CNN) Recap: Reports return of living hostages and the remains of deceased Israeli hostages from Gaza. The clock in Hostages Square (Tel Aviv) keeps ticking until all are home.
• Discussion:
  • Jack Armstrong questions the sanitized language in media (“the deceased will be returned” rather than “murdered” or “tortured to death”) and the rationale for diplomatic phrasing.
  • Michael adds context about Hamas losing track of some victims' remains amidst war chaos, noting the horror of the situation.
  • The hosts highlight the value for families of closure, even if remains, not living loved ones, return.

"To say that the deceased will be returned as opposed to the murdered or tortured to death or executed is, you know, really something." – Jack Armstrong [01:07]

• Political Gaffe Moment:
  • Clip of UK Labour's Keir Starmer mistakenly calling for the "return of the sausages, the hostages" during a Gaza statement.
  • Laughter and reflection on the seriousness of the subject versus the absurdity of the gaffe.

“It's tough to enjoy that idiotic gaffe as much as I should... The conflict would have gone on forever if these people were in charge.” – Michael [03:15]

• U.S. Political Leadership:
  • Critique of U.S. leaders (Biden, Harris, Blinken) for what hosts see as failed, toothless diplomatic efforts.
  • Praise for Trump’s unconventional, forceful negotiating style, quoting various pundits and “Trump haters” admitting he got results.

“Trump embodying U.S. power as no president since Lincoln was uniquely essential. The hard part... Trump is by orientation truly a bastard. How can such a sensibility have done so much good?” – Quoted unnamed pundit [08:15]

• Foreign Policy Philosophy:
  • Debate over American presidents’ willingness to exercise power. Both hosts argue world leaders must be credible and feared to effect change.
  • Joe laments what he calls the “lowest moment in American foreign policy”—America’s hesitation and hollow threats.

“If you're an American president and you're not willing to be a brutal bastard when it's necessary, you have no business being in charge of a superpower.” – Michael [09:34]

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2. Gender Bending Madness: Sports Edition

[13:13 - 18:20]

• Case Summary:
  • Washington State: a 15-year-old girl refused to play in a girls’ basketball game against an 18-year-old “boy” (trans athlete), calling out the unfairness.
  • The girl was then charged with bullying and harassment for “misgendering.”
  • Parent describes the scene and frustration with state law and athletics policy.

“If as a 15 year old girl you object to playing against a grown man and say that's a man, you're charged with bullying, harassment, intimidation and misgendering.” – Michael [16:02]

• Host Outrage:
  • Armstrong and Getty decry the situation as dangerous and insane, focusing on competitive imbalance and girls’ safety.
  • Mention of similar incidents in Canadian sports, concluding with pointed remarks about the absurdity and dangers of letting ideology trump fairness and realism.

“There has never been a spot in the world or a time in history where anybody agreed with this nonsense.” – Jack Armstrong [16:21]

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3. Halloween Store Antics & The Mannequin Incident

[19:53 - 24:22]

• Jack’s Halloween Tradition:
  • Shopping at pop-up Halloween stores, buying new yard decorations annually.
  • This year, Jack bought a mannequin, leading to repeated household scares—family members forgetting the mannequin is fake and being startled.

“I put my foot on the thing and it leapt for really fast with its mouth open and I whipped about wet my pants. It was very, very embarrassing and children laughed at me...” – Jack Armstrong [21:16]

• Host Banter:
  • Discussion of possible prank ideas (dressing up as the scarecrow, fog machines, etc.).
  • Reflection on primal startle response to unexpected “intruders” and aging.

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4. Viral Memes and Shared Experiences: The 'Six Seven' Phenomenon

[24:32 - 29:46]

• Trend Explained:
  • "Six Seven" meme: youth in schools shout “6, 7!” from a Skrilla song (“Doot Doot 67”)—now an in-joke and classroom disruption.
  • Jack’s theory: Kids create memes/inside jokes to fulfill basic human need for shared experience in a fragmented media landscape.

“These completely manufactured common experiences have been created. I think it's our—we're just trying to grasp some shared experience to feel a connection.” – Jack Armstrong [26:47]; [27:41]

• Host Analysis:
  • Notable disdain from some adults (e.g., Jack’s kid), but Jack defends the impulse behind seemingly meaningless meme trends.
  • Reflection that sports remain one of the last communal conversation topics for strangers.

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5. Retirement Age and Policy in Europe

[33:58 - 37:53]

• German Retirement Age:
  • Germany proposes raising retirement to 73 to preserve pension system solvency, linking age to longevity.
  • Historical perspective: Original Social Security intended most wouldn’t reach retirement age.

“When we originally set up Social Security, life expectancy was so much different. I mean the idea was most of you aren't going to make it that long. So those of you that do, at 65, you can quit.” – Jack Armstrong [34:40]

• Comparison with France:
  • French retire in their 50s; creates strain on government finances.
  • Hosts question philosophical basis for guaranteed retirement.

“Who came up with this everyone deserves to retire idea? I mean, that's completely a manufactured notion… that's not the way animals are built, human beings are built.” – Jack Armstrong [35:30]

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6. European Business/Work Culture vs. U.S.

[35:59 - 38:00]

• Firing and Hiring Laws:
  • Armstrong reads from The Economist on contrast between U.S. and European layoffs: U.S. gets it done quickly, Europe involves endless negotiations, strikes, and court cases.
  • Result: less dynamism, fewer mega-corporations in Europe.

“You can never ever fire anyone... You just can't do anything.” – Michael [36:11]

• Entrepreneurial Climate:
  • Hosts credit U.S. system for creating Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, etc.

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7. Crime Statistics Manipulation in D.C.

[38:00 - 39:10]

• Dept. of Justice Probe:

  • Reports that D.C. police manipulated crime data to make city stats look better; officers whistleblowing.

• Media Critique:

  • Hosts criticize Washington Post's language as if officers were mob informants, not public servants.

“They're cops telling the truth. Why are you saying they're feeding information to the Justice Department? WaPo. Come on.” – Michael [39:03]

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Memorable Quotes

• Jack Armstrong:

  "The crazy man theory or the bastard theory... both sides actually believe he's willing to do anything." [10:39]

• Michael:

  "If you're an American president and you're not willing to be a brutal bastard when it's necessary, you have no business being in charge of a superpower." [09:34]

• Jack Armstrong:

  “How insane is that fight?” [16:14]

• Michael:

  “The meme is A prime example of brain rot. The Internet. Junk food consumed by people of all ages to suck away time...” [27:15]

• Jack Armstrong:

  "I screamed at the top of my lungs and waved my hands like this." [24:07]

• Michael:

  “It’s a gender bending madness update.” [17:56]

• Jack Armstrong:

  "This isn't going away. This is going to be the rest of our lives because we don't have those common experiences anymore." [29:27]

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Tone

Direct, irreverent, sardonic, and occasionally reflective, Jack and Joe balance heavy, often provocative takes on serious topics with personal vulnerability and comedic self-mockery.

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Suggested Listening Timestamps

• Return of hostages & media language: [00:27 - 03:58]
• Political gaffes & U.S. leadership: [03:58 - 11:13]
• Gender Bending Madness—trans athlete in girls’ basketball: [13:13 - 18:20]
• Halloween mannequin story: [19:53 - 24:22]
• 'Six Seven' meme & shared experience: [24:32 - 29:46]
• Retirement age in Europe: [33:58 - 37:53]
• Crime stats probe: [38:00 - 39:10]

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Note

Advertisements and sponsor mentions have been omitted for clarity and brevity. The summary includes only content segments relevant to listeners interested in the hosts’ political, cultural, and personal commentary.

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Transcript

[Jack Armstrong]

This is an iHeart podcast broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio at the George Washington Broadcast Center.

[Joe Getty]

Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty.

[Michael]

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

[Clarissa Ward]

In addition to those 20 living Israeli hostages, we were also expecting to see the remains of a further 28 deceased Israeli hostages. Now, we did see those four coffins earlier that emerged from Gaza into Israel, so those families can finally have some closure and grieve. But that clock in Hostages Square that has been taking count of every minute, every hour, every day since those hostages were first taken on October 7, that clock will continue to tick until all of the bodies of all of the hostages are finally home.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah. So that's Clarissa Ward on cnn. I don't mind that people were using that kind of language because I understand why. It's the. This is as good as it's going to get, given the circumstances. We want the live people to get back, blah, blah, blah. But it's. Since we, Joe and I, can't, you know, upend world peace the way, you know, some politicians or major news outlets could, I can say out loud. To say that the deceased will be returned as opposed to the murdered or tortured to death or executed is, you know, really something. Again, I understand why they're doing it, because you don't want to cause any waves. I mean, this. This is good for everybody. It's good for everybody to have this happen.

[Michael]

Mm. Yeah, I would agree. But the point remains. Yeah. These people did not die of old age. They were either shot or starved to death or tortured or whatever, or died of easily treatable diseases. And I would never, ever defend Hamas on any level. But they're saying, look, we've lost track of where some of the bodies are. Israel was bombing the Biala out of them. And so I could see where perhaps when you're running for your life, you don't bother, you know, bringing the remains of some of your victims along.

[Jack Armstrong]

Well, and they certainly don't care about the dead Jews.

[Michael]

No. And the sensitivity of those still alive who want to retrieve the body. So. Yeah, that I suspect the remains of a number of the hostages will never be restored. You know, it occurs to me in the midst of all this serious discussion that it was Keir Starmer, wasn't it, who unleashed the worst bond, the worst gaffe in the history of misspeaking.

[Jack Armstrong]

You have that for us, Michael? Here we go. It was our clip of the year last year, I think.

[Michael]

No, was it.

[Jack Armstrong]

I think it was clip of the year. I call again for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, the return of the sausages, the hostages.

[Michael]

Because it's so tragic and terrible and serious. It's tough to enjoy that idiotic gaffe as much as I should also. And Michael, I'm glad you played the longer version of that. I'm reminded of the fact that Starmer and Biden and Harris and Blinken and all those people prolonged this conflict by telling Israel, don't drive Hamas into a position of desperation. That's the one thing you must not do. Pull punches. Stop. Stop hitting them. It would have gone on forever. It'd be going on five years from now if those people were in charge.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yep, no doubt.

[Michael]

Anyway, on a cheerier note, this.

[Jack Armstrong]

Two.

[Michael]

Years of pent up anguish unleashed in an instant, one after another, 20 newly freed hostages and their families hug, cry, kiss, scream and pray, reveling in their new, almost unbelievable reality. Their nightmare is finally over. Those scenes of reuniting were. If you didn't have a tear in your eye, you're a hard hearted human. They were amazing and I can't even imagine the anguish. And then there's the families that will never know the joy at the end of the anguish, unfortunately. But it was an amazing achievement. Play Hillary Clinton 53, Michael, would you? It's a really significant first step and I really commend President Trump and his administration as well as Arab leaders in the region. We have a trio of Davids. Jack Drucker, French and Ignatius. I know. I want to get to Ignatius. Not Lee Roth, not David Lee Roth. He did not make the list today. Only the top three Davids do. We all know the rules. I'm kind of curious to hear what Drucker has to say. Michael, give us 54, would you?

[David Ignatius]

What was accomplished yesterday and what we saw yesterday was a really big deal. All the while he had a lot of conventional standard negotiating going on on multiple tracks. So rather than fighting with an ally, creating a trade war or a diplomatic war, rather than insulting the allies voters, he created this space to have the support and leverage to in this instance. And I think it's a good lesson.

[Michael]

For the President as he's looking at nonsense. Okay. He's trying to teach Trump how to, how to do his job. That's fine. I wondered if that was a misprint. Trump acted conventionally. It says. Wow, wow. I'd like to talk to David about that. Let's try another David. That one won't do. David Ignatius, 56.

[David Ignatius]

It's important to move quickly, as quickly as possible to the, to the second phase of this comprehensive peace deal. And what that means is getting in place the countries that have agreed to take part in an international security force and quickly train up vetted Palestinian, Gazan police, people who can keep order, who can replace Hamas police wherever possible. This is not going to be a bloodless process. The international force and the new Palestinian security force are going to take casualties. So that's going to be the test of whether this is serious. This is going to be, I suspect for some months, a low level insurgency. Hamas can't threaten Israel itself anymore. That's over. But it can try to hold on to the territory it has.

[Michael]

They're dead enders. They've always been dead enders. I doubt they'll change their stripes. They need to be wiped out.

[Jack Armstrong]

So David Ignatius of the Washington Post. We haven't. So we don't have Lee Roth or.

[Michael]

Bowie or Beckham declare David Bowie has passed, or Letterman or Schwimmer. David Beckham was not a fade Attenborough. It's a battle of the Davis, Hume.

[Jack Armstrong]

Foster, Wallace, Sedaris, David Robinson, Michelangelo's David.

[Michael]

Any other Darius Michelangelos, David again, he's not with us. Yeah, yeah. You know Walter Russell Mead, who's a great writer, he said he has, you know, essentially the five big takeaways, I guess, from October 13th, the return of the hostages. And the second he says, is that only Mr. Trump could have made this happen. No other living politician could have reassured Israel, threatened Hamas and patched together a broad Arab coalition the way he has done. Mr. Trump has his shortcomings and even he wonders if he will get into heaven. But he is a leader who bestrides the world scene like no other.

[Jack Armstrong]

He is. He absolutely is. This, I didn't know whether, when, where I wanted to put this, but this is interesting. So Mark Halpern had this today in his newsletter. He didn't say who it is, but it's from a well known thinker who hates Donald Trump. Absolutely hates Donald Trump. But I thought this was interesting. What he wrote is a Trump hater. Bibi plowed the field. Witkoff and Kushner cultivated the orchard. Donald insisted the peaches ripe, which is an interesting phrase. And the time was now to make the pie non conventional politicians. It took more than Trump, but Trump embodying US power as no president since Lincoln was uniquely essential. The hard part. And this is from a Trump hater. But again, I think this is interesting. Trump is by orientation truly a bastard. How can such a sensibility have done so much good? I can't get My head around it. Nonetheless, I not only accept it, I delight in the irony of it. It's funny. It's very funny. Don't misunderstand me. I still hate Trump. He's despicable, and I can't abide by that. But somewhere deep inside, I feel I somehow am in danger of being like him. I mean, civilization can't work on his moral compass, yet it can't work without him. There's too much to process here.

[Michael]

Yeah, that's. That's funny. I think they're maybe overthinking. Became incredibly unfashionable to exercise US Power after Vietnam and then Iraq. And they're a kind of a weird moral code grew up around that hesitation, that it was distasteful and wrong. And Barack Obama, hell, he's probably made a speech that says this. Essentially, the only reason anybody would ever use the military or military force is because they're not as skillful a negotiator as I am. We can use incentives and negotiation and accomplish everything war could. Could in the past, and we're far more refined than that. And Trump is a bastard. But I would. I would suggest even if you're Barack Obama or, Or, you know, anybody, if you're an American president and you're not willing to be a brutal bastard when it's necessary, you have no business being in charge of a superpower.

[Jack Armstrong]

Well, you have to have complete credibility. You can't pretend it. You can't say stop. Like Biden and Harris did when nobody, everybody knew they weren't going to actually do anything. Trump is, you know, the crazy man theory or the bastard theory or whatever you want, dumb bastards or whatever you want to call it, where both sides actually believe he's willing to do anything.

[Michael]

Yeah. You know, it occurs to me, and I think there were. No, there probably weren't any this year. Biden and. Or Harris saying don't ought to be our clip of the year.

[Jack Armstrong]

That was. That was our weakest moment as a country.

[Michael]

I was going to say that may be the lowest moment in American foreign policy. I mean, going back to the Barbary Pirates, going back to when the Brits burned the White House. That was worse because it was so pathetic. Not a joke.

[Jack Armstrong]

What do you have to say to Benjamin Netanyahu and their talk of going into Rafa, Don't. And then they did whatever the hell they wanted because they weren't scared of you in any way. And to Hamas. Don't.

[Michael]

Or trendy Iragua members who are coming to the US Dope or Iran.

[Jack Armstrong]

Don't. None of that worked. Only force worked.

[Michael]

Gender Bending Madness Sports Edition Coming up in a moment or two. A lot of good stuff.

[Joe Getty]

Stay with us, Armstrong and Getty.

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[Jack Armstrong]

I want to talk about going to the Halloween store over the weekend and a poor purchase I made that's scaring the crap out of us. Get to that later.

[Michael]

Oh my. But first, it's a gender bending madness. Update Sports Edition.

[Joe Getty]

So I kept hearing about this thing called.

[Michael]

They'Re locos. We're in a brave new world. Today's subtitle could be the State of woke America. Specifically Washington State. In an astounding story, a 15 year old girl refused to play basketball against an 18 year old man in a girls league.

[Jack Armstrong]

Wow.

[Michael]

What happened will astound you. Let's start there.

[Joe Getty]

Well, I heard my mom and my coach, the varsity head coach talking and at that time I wasn't looking over at the other team, but I heard my mom say that is a boy on the other team. And sure enough, there was a boy. And I went and sat out and my coach asked me if I was okay and I said no, there is a boy on the team. I will not be playing or participating in any part of this game.

[Jack Armstrong]

You realize that a bunch of states were trying to make that a crime. What? She just said to say that.

[Michael]

Yeah, including Washington State. Yeah. And in fact she ends up being the bad guy in the story in Washington state. Roll on, Michael.

[Parent of 15-year-old girl]

So after we realized there was a boy on the team and let me just say this person is 18 years old. So it's he's a grown man at this point. That was playing on a JV versus JV basketball game with 14 and 15 year olds. So I went up and I talked to the athletic director and I said, can you tell me if that's a boy on the team? And he said, I'm not going to, you know, say we do not discriminate based on sexual identity. And I said, well, President Trump just yesterday signed an executive order saying there's no boys or men in women's or girls sports. And he said we do not have to follow that. We follow Washington state law and wiaa.

[Michael]

All right, we've got to get to this part. The 15 year old girl who refused to play against a grown man in a girls league, what happened next?

[Parent of 15-year-old girl]

So once that happened and I realized that Francis was sitting out, it wasn't until towards the end of the game when she, there was a lot that went on between the time that we realized there was this boy on the team. And when she was leaving, she was so mad. She feels like she had been exposed and it was just a terrible situation. She walked by and said that you're a man. She was so frustrated in the situation and that is why she has been now charged with bullying, harassment, harassment and intimidation for misgendering this person.

[Jack Armstrong]

There you go.

[Michael]

Washington State. If as a 15 year old girl you object to playing against a grown man and say that's a man, you're charged with bullying, harassment, intimidation and misgendering.

[Jack Armstrong]

How insane is that fight?

[Michael]

The woke mind virus.

[Jack Armstrong]

There has never been a spot in the world or a time in history where anybody agreed with this nonsense.

[Michael]

The Washington State's new motto, maybe in Latin is got to be obey the delusion or face prosecution. Katie. So does that mean they were allowing a grown man to go into the locker room with high school girls? Well, that's a legally, you know, of age man. Almost certainly. Oh my gosh.

[Jack Armstrong]

Got it's jv. So you know there's probably a lot of girls, not the greatest basketball players, athletic, not very old, young out there with an 18 year old man. A lot of freshmen, right?

[Michael]

14 year old girls playing against a grown man. And if you point it out in Washington State, you are the bigot.

[Jack Armstrong]

Well, just good enough. God, just from a safety standpoint, I don't want my, my 14 year old daughter who weighs 80 pounds getting hip checked by an 18 year old grown man.

[Michael]

It's indefensible on any level. Let's end the update with a note of absurdity. There was recently a college basket volleyball game match in Canada in which three men were playing for one women's team and two men were on the other. The team with more men ended up winning the match. Both teams had multiple dudes on them. As one person said, this is the reductio ad absurdism of the woke mind virus.

[Jack Armstrong]

That's incredible.

[Michael]

Yeah. Wow. It is. It's a gender bending madness update.

[Jack Armstrong]

Holy crap.

[Michael]

I know, I know. And you know, some days it feels like we're making progress. The fact that these things are still happening now we have miles to go before we sleep and people who need.

[Jack Armstrong]

To protect the infrastructure of it because they're scared to speak out, it's just wow.

[Joe Getty]

Armstrong and Getty.

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[Michael]

And Muncie Skies one to center field hit. Well, this one's got a chance.

[Sports commentator]

Feeling the ball back to the wall. He leaped. It's in and out of his glove, but he caught it. And now chaos on the basis might have a play at the plate. The throw not in time. No, he's out. He's out. It's a force play at the plate and he is out. That is not all of this is going to be reviewed.

[Jack Armstrong]

That is not your typical double.

[Michael]

No, it is going to be reviewed. In fact, the Supreme Court has agreed to take on that play this session, as they should.

[Jack Armstrong]

Amazing play by the brewers against the Dodgers. Although the Dodgers went on to win against the best team in the regular season. So Seattle's up to nothing. Dodgers up one, nothing. Major League Baseball and the networks, I'm sure, are hoping not to have a Brewers, Mariners or Brewers Toronto World Series which would not get very good ratings open. The Dodgers are in there. I guess I went, we went to the Big Hallow. The, you know, the Halloween's. The pop up Halloween stores that happen in every town in America. You know those. And it's a good idea. I don't know how the whole pop up thing works. I should look into it. I'll bet it's pretty fascinating from a business standpoint the way that whole thing works. You find a retail space that's empty, you make some deals and you decide two months this is gonna be our Valentine's Day store or our Halloween store or whatever it is. But when we got one of those giant Halloween stores and so they got all the stuff set up in there and there they usually have. They had them. The, the scary stuff is set up and they got it turned on and you can go. There's a button you can press with your foot to make them do their thing. And they had some sort of witch character there that I didn't know what it was going to do. But you know, it's not like I'm surprised or you wouldn't think I would be surprised because I know it's going to do something. So I walk up to the witch character thing they got in the big Halloween store. I put my foot on the thing and it left for really fast with its mouth open and I whipped about wet my pants. It was very, very embarrassing and children laughed at me and I did not like that at all. But anyway, so every year I buy one more thing to add to the yard. A couple years ago it was the giant inflatable pumpkin that I put in that's 20ft tall and that everybody loves that, including the neighbors. And they come over to my house and say, hey, the wind took your pumpkin down the street and you need to go get it. And then I have to go get the giant inflatable pumpkin from two blocks down the road. But this year my son thought the thing to buy would be. It was. It's called a dummy, I guess it's basically a life size mannequin. And then you can dress it however you want. And I thought, yeah, I thought that'd be kind of cool to have around the house. But it's ended up. Everybody has scared the crap out of themselves with it. And we're not trying to do it, it's just having it sit around someplace. And I did it again this morning. I come out and it's sitting at. Just because there's somebody there and you're not Expecting him. It's got pants and a shirt and a hat on. And just. It's happened to everybody coming in the kitchen.

[Michael]

Of course, the real classic is you've got one of those and then you dress just like it and you move at the kids.

[Jack Armstrong]

Oh, that's a good idea. I've not done that. I don't. I live in a cul de sac. Last year, I think we got three kids, so I don't have enough to do that, but that's a good idea. So you sit there next to the mannequin and people think they're both mannequins.

[Michael]

Yeah. Or you use the mannequin one year than you the next year. There are many variations.

[Jack Armstrong]

And when you had the fog machine, so you had the whole thing going, you went thunder and lightning, you went big. That's very, very good.

[Michael]

Yeah.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah. Other than scaring the crap out of myself, I gotta tell my son. Don't set it at the kitchen table. Where I get up early in the morning and I go flip on the light. There's somebody sitting there.

[Michael]

Prop it up in the doorway so I can see it when I wake up.

[Jack Armstrong]

Put it at the foot of my bed, leaning over me. Oh, my God, myself, the willies. Even thinking about that. It's funny. That's a good way to figure out your fight, flight or freeze response if there's an intruder in your house. You know, we often talk about. You don't know how you'd act until it happened. I guess the way I would act if I flipped on the kitchen light and there's somebody sitting at the tables, I'd go, because that's what I did this morning. What am I supposed to do? I'm supposed to immediately go into a crouch in a judo position, quietly ready.

[Michael]

To take them on.

[Jack Armstrong]

I. I screamed at the top of my lungs and waved my hands like this.

[Michael]

I'm glad you didn't shoot it.

[Jack Armstrong]

That'd be something.

[Michael]

Oh, fire off four or five shots, center of ass. Oh, boy.

[Jack Armstrong]

So do you want to get to Gavin Newsom coming up before we get to the top of the hour or next segment or what do you want to do?

[Michael]

You know, I'm taking a look at it work better as the One More Thing podcast, honestly.

[Jack Armstrong]

Okay.

[Michael]

I like that because there's a lot there and I'd hate to be in. In such a hurry. We. We have to rush through it. None other than the Wall Street Journal has written an article about the 67 phenomenon craze among children.

[Jack Armstrong]

Oh, yeah, I talked about that last week. That's right. Six, seven.

[Michael]

Numbers six and seven are making life hell for math teachers. Right.

[Jack Armstrong]

And it comes from a rap song. I mentioned it to my son. He said, dad, that is so old. Nobody does that anymore. Okay, well, I'm just learning about it now, and there's been several articles about it and teachers who creatively come up with a. I'll give you six minutes to write a seven sentence paragraph. And everybody likes it because it's six, seven.

[Michael]

Right, Right. And they quote a handful of math teachers who say, we've just got to avoid it completely. Maybe. Maybe giving into it's a better strategy. Like you pointed out, if you're like, hey, you need to do questions six and seven, they just immediately start yelling six, seven. And doing the weird seesaw hand gesture that looks somewhere between juggling and melon handling. Well, there's.

[Jack Armstrong]

There's something bigger going on here, though. I think the.

[Michael]

The.

[Jack Armstrong]

The. Like, this probably makes no sense to you whatsoever. There is a song where they mentioned 6, 7, and it just caught on what I think is going on here. And it's like with skibidi toilet from a couple of years ago, it didn't. It didn't mean anything. Six, seven doesn't mean anything. It's got to do with our lack of shared experiences. I think we desire as human beings shared experiences so much, and because of modern society, we don't have it. Because when I was a kid, we would come in on a Wednesday morning and talk about Happy Days episode on television from last night because we all watched it together. That doesn't exist anymore. So you have to manufacture these shared experiences because we crave them so much. And just somebody saying skibidi toilet. And you know what it means, and they know what it means, and you get to recognize that fills you with some sort of needed emotion. Oh, that these completely manufactured common experiences have been created.

[Michael]

I wish I'd known you had that screed ready. I'd have asked you to hold off, because the person who writes this article, and it's funny, it's masquerading as a news article, but like a lot of news these days, it's opinions, writes the memes, meaning. And its whole point is that it has no meaning.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah.

[Michael]

Maybe a French philosopher, Albert Camus, if he'd had TikTok, could explain it. The fact is, 6, 7 is not funny.

[Jack Armstrong]

There was him as a toilet. It didn't mean anything other than I know it and you know it.

[Michael]

Right. They get into that. The meme is A prime example of brain rot. The Internet. Junk food consumed by people of all ages to suck away time, productivity and the living of life. Kids have been saying six, seven for about, sorry, six or seven months since the spring. But the recent return to school has supercharged the trend. Then they mentioned skibidi toilet.

[Jack Armstrong]

Oh my God.

[Michael]

You know, it might be a prime example of brain rotation, but I think you're right.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah. I don't think it has to be brain rot. I think it's our. We're just trying to grasp clearly it's human nature and we're trying to grasp some shared experience to feel a connection. That's what it is. It doesn't have to be a negative. I guess it's a negative overall that we don't. We have so few shared experiences anymore that we have to resort to things so stupid. It drove my son, my youngest son, nuts. He couldn't stand. One of the things he couldn't stand about school briefly when he was in. In an actual school was these memes that would crop up and he said, but it doesn't mean anything. And everybody says it and laughs and it's got no meaning. It would drive him crazy.

[Michael]

Right? Yeah. Well. Rapper Skrilla.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah.

[Michael]

Song doot doot 67 includes the phrase 6 7, a reference to 67th street in Philadelphia, where many of his friends grew up.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah.

[Michael]

Now raking it in at concerts.

[Jack Armstrong]

I think adults, teachers, everyone would be better off if they recognize. Need to go searching for what it means.

[Michael]

Right.

[Jack Armstrong]

What it means is we have some connectivity between us. That's what it means.

[Michael]

One math YouTuber says this is very close to middle schoolers. Previous favorite, number 69. There's some relief for teachers that this meme is not sexual. Then astro numerologist Kelsey Jesse Kelsey, author of the Power of home numbers, called 6 and 7 a very unconventional energy that is somewhat unknowable quote. It has a meaning, but it is very hidden among us numerologists. Shut up, you snake oil selling quack.

[Jack Armstrong]

I wanted to be an astronomeologist, but that class was full so I had to do something else.

[Michael]

Wow. Wow. It's just a common experience.

[Jack Armstrong]

This isn't going away. This is going to be the rest of our lives because we don't have those common experiences anymore.

[Michael]

I won't hear it in the woods.

[Jack Armstrong]

I wish you all well made up dumb memes. I think that's one of the things that sports has going for it. At least it's something you and another guy could talk about that you both know something about, right?

[Michael]

Indeed. Yeah. You. You don't know somebody at all, but you can chat about that. A word from our friends at Webroot. Speaking of Halloween, the scariest part of Halloween is not haunted houses or horror movies. It's being vulnerable to cyber criminals.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah, if somebody hacks my stuff and it has it on the dark web, I'll also go and wave my hands like this. But Webroot can help you out with that. They've got all this different stuff from lightning fast antivirus to identify theft, protection with dark web monitoring to see if your information's already out there on the dark web. Secure vpn, unlimited cloud back backup and Webroot total protection. Helps defend every part of your digital life with up to $1 million in fraud, expense reimbursement, plus 24.

[Michael]

7 US based customer support, thank you very much. And new text scam detection. You're backed by powerful protection that's built for today's threats. All of them from tech scams to data breaches. And the rest. Change your October from cyber scary to cybersecur with 60% off webroot total [e-mail] Armstrong that's 60% off for a limited time, but only when you go to webroot.com armstrong so I guess what I.

[Jack Armstrong]

Should hope is that instead of screaming and waving my arms, I should have like immediately gone into a crouch, roundhouse kick to the head of the dummy, knocking it to the floor and then over it with like a death blow before I recognize it's inanimate.

[Michael]

Right. Well, and go ahead and administer that death blow to the dummy because you rarely get a chance to, to practice it in real life. Five fingered death punch, if you will.

[Jack Armstrong]

How fast does the human brain work? Does any. Has anybody ever measured that? From the light comes on, My brain believes there's a person sitting there. There's not supposed to be someone sitting there. Fear kicks in. Then memory of the. Oh yeah, it's the dummy. I mean, how, how, how long is that whole span of time? Like a millionth of a second. Oh, it's short.

[Michael]

It might be a second.

[Jack Armstrong]

It's not very long.

[Michael]

One 1000? Yeah, it's about a second. I'll bet.

[Jack Armstrong]

That's wild.

[Michael]

It's bad feeling, I'd say.

[Jack Armstrong]

And then you got to get new underwear on because you wet yourself. We got more on the way. If you missed a segment, get the podcast. Armstrong and Getty on demand.

[Joe Getty]

Armstrong and Getty.

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[Traveler]

We had driven for two hours and needed to stop for gas. My husband gets out of the car and it's like the cat is on the roof. And we're like, what? What do we do? We're already so far into the trip, we have a long way to go to get to New Hampshire. My husband says, well, he's just gonna have to come with us. And he had such a good time and a great, you know, adventure. I actually did videos and pictures everywhere we went of him.

[Jack Armstrong]

So at what point did they realize the cat was on the roof?

[Michael]

100 miles.

[Jack Armstrong]

How did the cat knock?

[Michael]

At which point dad said, bad news, kids. We gotta drive another hundred miles. It's still up there. Why?

[Jack Armstrong]

Why was it in a container or how did enough fly off?

[Michael]

It's just clinging to the roof. Right, Michael?

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah.

[Michael]

How I understand it just cling to the roof.

[Jack Armstrong]

Wow. Thank you. I'm glad the cat's all right.

[Michael]

Dug in its claws, thank God. Yes. Poor little pussycat. Yes. Here's more about retirement in Germany than you ever wanted to know. Free press reporting. The government. A government panel in Germany has proposed raising the country's retirement age to 73 to prevent the collapse of their pension system.

[Jack Armstrong]

73?

[Michael]

Yeah. Meanwhile, in France, they're retiring at what age? 26 or whatever it is?

[Jack Armstrong]

73.

[Michael]

Yeah. The, the authors of the report write, quote, we will have to work more if we want to maintain the scope of the Social Security system without simultaneously leaving even larger burdens for future generations.

[Jack Armstrong]

You know what's interesting about that, while 73 I think makes most of us go, ah, is when we originally set up Social Security, life expectancy was so much different. It was basically the same thing. I mean the idea was most of you aren't going to make it that long.

[Michael]

Right.

[Jack Armstrong]

So those of you that do, at 65, you can quit.

[Michael]

Well, right. In fact, excellent, excellent observation. One of the next things they mentioned is quote, the retirement age must be linked to life expectancy. So interesting. The Germans saying we're not going to spend our kids and grandkids into, you know, crippling indebtedness. And we've got to be realistic about how long people are living now. Whether this actually passes or not, I do not know. But that's what the report says. But yeah, same problem. They're just being honest about it.

[Jack Armstrong]

You know how mad I've been about this for so long. When Barack Obama said everyone deserves a dignified retirement, who came up with this everyone deserves to retire idea? I mean, that's completely a manufactured notion that you get to quit working at some point and live off of something else. I mean, that's not the way animals are built, human beings are built. That we created this concept.

[Michael]

Right. Societies have never been built around that idea. I mean, maybe you saved enough that you could, and that's great, but. Or maybe your family took care of you or whatever. Yeah, the assumption that. Well, the assumption of the assumption is. Is wrong anyway. Meanwhile, literally in your 50s, you can retire in France and live the rest of your life sucking off the government teat, which doesn't sound bad. Also, one more thing about Europe, the government, this is so interesting in the free press they're Talking about why 0 of the top 25 largest companies on earth are in Europe, not a single one of them. And they talk about why that is partly you can never ever fire anyone. The Economist has a brutal analysis with a paragraph you need to read. It says, so I'll read it. There are two ways for Western companies to sack lots of people. The American one involves the boss inviting hundreds of unsuspecting employees on a zoom call, offering them a few months wages as severance and insincerely wishing them luck in their future endeavors. Oh, and by the way, have your desk cleared off by lunchtime. The European method is different. Companies waiting to enact mass layoffs typically start with consultations with unions, representatives of which sit on companies boards. In Germany, a plan, a social plan, is drafted. Strikes inevitably ensue. Politicians get involved in badger the employer into hiring fewer people than it had originally planned, firing fewer rather or to pay for its soon to be ex staff to be retrained. The full cost of downsizing is only known Once labor courts are called to rule on the matter years later. Meanwhile, the company in question often cannot hire more employees, lest it be made to hire those who are just let go, who they don't need anymore. That's the creative destruction of capitalism, European style. You just can't do anything.

[Jack Armstrong]

It's not an accident that the Steve Jobs and Elon Musk's and whoever else of the world almost are always in the United States or come to the United States.

[Michael]

Right? Final note. I thought this was really encouraging. We talked last week about the crime victimization survey said, yes, crime is way up in American cities and it's not not Trump fiction. The Department of Justice has launched a probe into the D.C. police force, accusing them of manipulating crime data to make it look like the city was safer. And you got a bunch of cops now going to the Justice Department and saying, yeah, this has been systematic. It's been going on for a long time. Here are a bunch of examples I've, I've, I've compiled. It's, it's good stuff. They, they mentioned that the Washington Post reported the story. They actually used the term D.C. police officers are feeding information to the Justice Department. The willing participation of officers in the investigation could put senior D.C. police officials under a microscope. Like they're mobsters that have gone state's evidence or something like that. They're cops telling the truth. Why are you saying they're feeding information to the Justice Department? WaPo. Come on.

[Jack Armstrong]

We need to get a handle on this whole crime statistics thing. As a nation, it would benefit, absolute benefit, absolutely everybody.

[Michael]

Now, the lies are too useful. They'll never let them go.

[Jack Armstrong]

So we do a lot of segments, a lot of hours every single week. If you miss any or you just want to hear them and get them played for your friends, look for the podcast Armstrong and Getty on Demand. You should subscribe. Then it'll actually just show up there automatically.

[Michael]

Play it back half speed. We sound like we're drunk. It's always amusing.

[Joe Getty]

Armstrong and Gettysburg.

[Jack Armstrong]

This is an I heart podcast.