Loading summary
Transcript165 lines
- [00:00]
A
Okay.
- [00:02]
B
All right. Good morning, Doug. It's been a. It seems like a lot of holidays lately. We had. Of course, it's Pride Month. Can never forget we had Donald Trump's birthday extravaganza this last weekend. And now today is one of your favorites. Juneteenth.
- [00:17]
A
Yes, Juneteenth. You know, we have St. Patrick's Day for the Irish and I guess Columbus Day for the Italians. Although Columbus Day is no longer Columbus Day, it's now Indigenous People's Day, or something like that.
- [00:37]
B
Yeah.
- [00:39]
A
And of course, a joke I just heard is, what's the difference between St Patrick's Day and Juneteenth? Have you heard that joke?
- [00:48]
B
No idea.
- [00:51]
A
On St. Patrick's Day, everybody wants to be Irish. So, anyway, I. Look, there's too damn many national holidays, quite frankly. I can see July 4th. Okay. Although the United States isn't what it used to be or supposed to be anymore. Okay. But I still like July 4th and Christmas.
- [01:20]
B
Thanksgiving.
- [01:21]
A
Thanksgiving. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Thanksgiving, that kind of makes sense. And Christmas, it's a. Yeah, I know it's a Christian holiday, but at the same time, it's highly traditional. But what is there other than that. That should be national holidays? I mean, it's arbitrary.
- [01:43]
B
Labor Day, of course.
- [01:45]
A
Oh. At least our Labor Day is not the same as most of the world.
- [01:49]
B
May 1st.
- [01:51]
A
May 1st. Yeah. Which is a communist holiday. So I guess we came up with our Labor Day at the end of summer as opposed to the beginning of summer, so that we're not communists here. What else we got?
- [02:03]
B
Yeah, well, Memorial Day.
- [02:05]
A
Memorial Day, which I.
- [02:08]
B
You know, the truth is I like the. I like the sandwich nature of those holidays. They march kind of the official beginning and end. So I find them orienting in some way.
- [02:18]
A
Yeah, that's true. Beginning and end of summer. Okay. Okay. You can make an argument for that. Of course.
- [02:25]
B
We could also. We could just do this. The spring equinox, you know, instead.
- [02:29]
A
I mean, well. Well, we could. And for. For years. I mean, just to be contrary, people would whisper me, wish me Merry Christmas, and I would wish them all a happy winter equinox. Yeah. Or solstice, I should say. That's what I meant. But so what else. Any other holidays that we have? Because foreign European and South American countries have lots of holidays. I mean, they're their excuses not to work.
- [03:03]
B
Yeah. It's impossible to keep track of them here in Uruguay.
- [03:07]
A
Yeah.
- [03:07]
B
There's no way I can stay on top of them all.
- [03:10]
A
On the other hand, in my position, when a holiday comes up less People bother you. And I actually can work more effectively than I can during normal working days. So personally it doesn't bother me philosophically. I have a problems with these things. And I do have a problem with Juneteenth. And is Martin Luther King Day, is that a separate.
- [03:31]
B
Yes.
- [03:32]
A
National holiday?
- [03:34]
B
Yeah.
- [03:34]
A
Well, how come the blacks get two holidays? Well, one and a half anyway. Because I guess they have to share. They have to share Juneteenth with psychologically troubled people, LGBTQ, etc.
- [03:50]
B
But they also. There's also a month.
- [03:54]
A
A whole month, Right.
- [03:56]
B
I think it's February.
- [03:57]
A
Is it February?
- [03:58]
B
I think so.
- [03:59]
A
Oh, is that right? Well, I guess nobody pays attention to that.
- [04:04]
B
Black History Month, right?
- [04:06]
A
Oh, I guess Black History Month. So they don't have an Irish and Italian or Polish or Russian or an English or whatever. History Month. But then, but then they got National Hot Dog Day too, or. And that's true almost everything. Every lobbying group has their thing designated. So some days celebrate multiple of these phony things because they had a lobbyist in Congress. Anyway, I'm opposed to Juneteenth because I think other than being kind of a black holiday like Martin Luther King Day, it's a holiday for people with purple hair and nose rings as well.
- [04:55]
B
Well, and it also happens to be the day that Obama decided to open his, you know, much anticipated presidential library.
- [05:05]
A
Yeah, that's right. Well, that's kind of indicative, I guess. And looking at the library, you know, I used to live in Chicago, not on the south side where this is, which is I'm sure a bad area. And that might, might be the reason for the thing looking like a block house. Something out of a dystopian post apocalyptic movie with no windows. Certainly not on any low floors.
- [05:37]
B
Right. Apparently it's a 19 point something acre campus. And then it has this. What do they call it? They call it an Obama lisk. So like an obelisk, but an Obama lisk.
- [05:55]
A
And then it's got this rather cryptic inscription up there on the upper left side you can see, right?
- [06:03]
B
Yes. And this goes around the other side of it. So it like follows across it, makes it completely unreadable. If you're standing down here, you wouldn't be able to read it because half of it is over on the other side.
- [06:17]
A
So what's in that building besides a basketball court? I'm told there is a basketball court. I mean a full. Yeah. What are they going to put in there? I mean there's got to be a few books, but no, wait a minute. There are no books. Because there are no books in the Obama library. Because he says quite correctly, everything is done on a computer today, including all government papers and so forth. So I guess they, they must have some workstations where you can access stuff, but there's no books.
- [06:50]
B
Just.
- [06:51]
A
Brad.
- [06:54]
B
Yeah. I don't know. Well, and, and, you know, I think because. So just because this was. Came out then Trump released a promotional video about the Trump library because he's just got this fixation with Obama, you know, that he doesn't. He wants to take a little bit of the things away from Obama every chance he can, which Obama doesn't have anything, any, you know, reputation that needs to even be, you know, attacked because it's so bad.
- [07:24]
A
Yeah.
- [07:25]
B
I wouldn't even think he'd worry about it. But he's keeps it, so. But he had to try to overshadow it with the release of his own renderings of what his place will be like.
- [07:34]
A
And seeing the renderings, it's a skyscraper. But what's in that skyscraper? The bottom floor has the 747 that the Omanis are. I don't know if he's received that plane or, or not.
- [07:51]
B
I think he got it already. Yep.
- [07:53]
A
So is he using it? Because they had to modify it. So what good is that plane? It's a perfectly good 747 and it's not being used because it's got to be modified heavily for the use of the president, which takes forever unless they have the Chinese do it. But you can't trust them, of course. And then it's going to be put in this building where it's totally unusable. So.
- [08:23]
B
Yeah, you can, yeah, you can see in this video, this is their promotional video. You can see it parked here in the first floor.
- [08:30]
A
I, I don't understand. You really don't. In, in addition to all the other costs of. I mean, we're talking about. Who knows what that plane costs. A couple hundred million dollars, certainly. So, yeah, it's pretty impressive. Go ahead. It impresses me as a shameful waste of capital.
- [08:56]
B
Yeah. And what's this? I've got an F15 there too. I mean, I wonder, I wonder if they're going to get the. A decommissioned F15. Yeah. All the military stuff. It's really interesting. And this looks, this, this whole chamber looks, you know, has. Comes to it again, there's a ballroom,
- [09:12]
A
there's Trump's ballroom, but not the one in Washington. Yeah.
- [09:17]
B
I wonder if he gets a, A license fee every time it's rented out. But I, I was wanted to find this part where this theater room. Yeah. Like, what does that have with the gold statue of Trump?
- [09:30]
A
Yeah, yeah. This is, this is just unseemly. It really is. So anyway, I guess these libraries have become so gargantuan and expensive. They're really like one of America's answers to the Egyptian pyramids.
- [09:58]
B
Right. Is there you mentioned, except for the earlier you said, except for the fact that the presidents aren't buried there. Isn't. Isn't Reagan buried near his? Is that right?
- [10:10]
A
I don't know where Reagan is buried.
- [10:13]
B
Okay.
- [10:14]
A
I guess they can be buried in Arlington Cemetery, but you can't have a, unless you're jfk. You can't have a big or special grave. You got to be like everybody else. That wouldn't do. Trump.
- [10:27]
B
That wouldn't do.
- [10:29]
A
Where is he going to be buried? It's a good question. He's got to start thinking about that.
- [10:34]
B
I could see him wanting to be entombed in this building.
- [10:38]
A
Yeah, yeah, of course. And that'll, you know, putting a dead body in that part of Miami would entails some modification of, of zoning. But they can get that done no problem.
- [10:53]
B
I'm sure they can get that done. I mean, just like how they got the, the university, the local university to donate this really valuable land to them in Miami for free.
- [11:04]
A
Yeah. What's in it for the university or college, whatever it was, Miami Dade, whatever it's called.
- [11:10]
B
Yeah. I have no idea. But yeah. Anyway, warring presidential libraries, I mean, this is, this is what we've come down to, I think.
- [11:20]
A
And no, I, I think it's would be correct and proper for Trump to be entombed there. You know, so it's a real kind of modern day pyramid. Does Biden, does Biden have one? Do you have to raise money for these?
- [11:36]
B
Yes.
- [11:36]
A
Billion dollar libraries.
- [11:38]
B
Yeah, yeah, you have to raise money for him. So Biden, Biden might be able to
- [11:45]
A
get the Ukrainians to cough up a few million bucks, but I don't know what else.
- [11:52]
B
Yeah, he might have been able to when he was useful to them. I don't know about now, though.
- [11:57]
A
That's right. That was done. This is now. Yeah.
- [12:00]
B
So Biden's presidential library effort appears to have raised only a small fraction of its target so far, with disclosed and projected figures implying well under 10% of the roughly $200 million his team is aiming for.
- [12:16]
A
Oh, far cry from the. How much did Obama's library.
- [12:22]
B
I think it was 850 million.
- [12:24]
A
Yeah. And Trump is talking a billion so poor Biden. Well, he's kind of getting what he deserved. In fact, he's getting much more than he deserves with unequivocal presidential library at all.
- [12:35]
B
But, yeah, they should just, you know that the, the, the garage where they found those classified documents of his parked next to his Corvette, like that should be his library.
- [12:45]
A
Yeah, no, that's appropriate, actually. Yeah. Anyway, so, okay, so Obama's got his library and Trump comes back with a counter.
- [12:58]
B
And I read be bigger and Golder.
- [13:01]
A
Yeah. And I read in WaPo this morning that I can't. Can't call this up, but I guess anybody can check in the Washington Post that when Trump was meeting with these elite presidents and all this type of thing in Europe that Trump said. Washington Post quotes that Trump says that they said, yeah, Obama was a stupid son of a. And it didn't say which one of the European types said that, but that's what Trump said. Somebody said they don't like each other. So no wonder Trump wasn't invited to. And he wouldn't have gone if he was, I'm sure. But. But then again, he likes to put on a show so much that maybe he would have just to just. Just create a scene.
- [14:04]
B
Yeah, I could see him accepting that offer and then turning it into a circus, you know, bringing the, Bringing the motocross bikes with them to do their jumps on Obama's lawn.
- [14:17]
A
Of course. I mean, listen, cage fight on the, on the. In front of the White House, why not? There's no limits.
- [14:24]
B
Yeah. Yeah. And so speaking of the. The cage fight and theatrics around his birthday, it seems like the goal with his peace plan or this ceasefire agreement seemed to be mostly about having it done on that day. Because in his mind, the perfect day, you know, had Cage fights, it was his birthday, he was surrounded by people who love him, and he gets to celebrate because he got the peace deal, you know, but it seemed as trans. Seemed as passing as his birthday was.
- [15:00]
A
You know, you're right. And it is kind of a fun juxtaposition, a birthday celebration with Cage to cage fights and a peace deal. Yeah. So, anyway, my guess is that this is not going to hold up because the Iranians. Well, first of all, where are they going to get the $300 billion that I guess they've been promised? But who's going to put that money up? I like to know who it is and in what form. The Iranians want it, okay? And they should get it. Frankly, you do all that destruction in a, you know, surprise attack. I mean, yeah, that's not going to work. And the other thing is the Israelis are very unhappy with it and they're going to keep it up with Hezbollah. That's part of the deal too.
- [16:02]
B
I mean, there were heavy strikes on Lebanon in the last, you know, 24 hours. So.
- [16:11]
A
Yeah, so if this is going to happen, Iran's going, I mean, Trump is going to have to put a muzzle and a leash on his attack dog. Or depending on who you think the master is, the, the Israelis are going to have to curb their dog. I mean, who's the master? Who's the dog? I'm not even sure, but been unclear to me for many years between Israel and the U.S. i don't think it's going to work. And right now oil is about. What did I see? 75, $80. And I don't think it's going to go below that. And it could go way above it if things spin out of control once again.
- [16:56]
B
Well, and they have. If you think for the price of oil to go down, they have to at least spin into control first. And so far, you know, the Strait of Hormuz is not open and flowing the way that, you know, Trump says. You know, the estimates for yesterday are 25 ships transited in total. You know, that includes some coming in, some going out, which is, you know, 75% below the pre war level. So there's still a problem.
- [17:27]
A
And as you pointed out the other day, there are someplace in between 15 and 1700 ships that are trapped in the Gulf right now. Right.
- [17:37]
B
That's gonna, and if they left today, right. It's 30 days before they get anywhere to be refined into something that people can use. Right. So it's this whole enthusiasm with the deal and expect on oil prices seems overdone.
- [17:54]
A
And then of course we can go back to the Ukraine if things have they say calm down in Hormuz, which is not true. I don't think they've heated up a little bit on the Ukrainian front where the Ukrainians have launched. They say many hundreds. I've heard numbers in between 600 and 1,000 drones in an attack on Moscow. I don't know.
- [18:18]
B
Did you see the, any video, the video of the skyline, you know, with all the, There are several targets on fire having to do with their oil facilities there.
- [18:28]
A
Well, I would hope that if you launch a thousand drones and, or missiles that there'd be some fire started. Yeah, didn't look good.
- [18:39]
B
And I, I heard, I only heard this from Paul Craig Roberts, but he said in a podcast recently that Russian oil exports are expected to be sick, down 68% or. Down 68% or only 68% of what they were last month.
- [19:00]
A
Why just in the last month? Why would it have changed so much so recently?
- [19:06]
B
Well, they've been targeting these, they've been targeting these facilities. Yeah. Pretty aggressively for about the last two months, but maybe it's starting to have an impact.
- [19:14]
A
Well, I still don't understand why Putin doesn't do something to end this lingering open wound, which, which he opened for good reasons, but it seems like it's been very poorly conducted since then.
- [19:35]
B
Five years.
- [19:36]
A
Right. It's amazing. So how's it going to end? And, and when this is, this is like a little forever war on the part of, you know, and a lot of people are getting killed because apparently these little drones on both sides are, you know, just killing everybody that's anywhere near the battlefield. It's worse than having skilled snipers.
- [20:01]
B
Yeah, it's pretty terrible. And, you know, I don't know, until, until Putin considers it a war, I don't think it's going to end. You know, treating it like a police action doesn't work when the other party is treating it like a war.
- [20:17]
A
Yeah, but if Putin starts to treat it like a war, then the, then the, the soy boys in Europe who are doubling their armament budgets at this point might get involved. So this is something that could still spin out of control very badly.
- [20:36]
B
Yeah, I think it, I think first, I think eventually, I think these wars will, will merge. You know, it's part of something bigger, but who knows?
- [20:48]
A
Yeah, that's true. Well, war is the health of the state, so it's not going to go away. States like to stay healthy. They do.
- [20:58]
B
Don't we all?
- [20:59]
A
Yeah, don't we all.
- [21:02]
B
So what's your, what's your predictions around this ceasefire deal?
- [21:08]
A
Well, it's almost by its nature unpredictable, but it's not going to last. And it's going to, I think it's, I think it's going to blow up. It's not going to be a piece where everything goes to the status quo ante. Well, it can't go to the status quo anti. Just because the Iranians want all that 300 billion. That's going to be a problem. And I think they're going to insist in the future on a toll, a dollar a barrel or whatever, whatever it is they're looking for on that. And a lot of people may not want to pay that. And it's so hard to say, but this hasn't come to an end by
- [21:56]
B
any means, because no issue was resolved. Right. None of, no fundamental issue was resolved in any way by any of this. The only thing that has changed is the status quo. The status quo has been altered so that Iran's position is vastly improved.
- [22:13]
A
Yeah. And of course, when it comes down to, well, okay, what are you going to do about it? Well, what I'm going to do about it and I'm doing about it is I'm still long gold stocks and mining stocks generally, and I'm still long energy stocks because both are very underpriced relative to the rest of the stock market. They have much bigger dividend yields, which are a real outward sign of inward grace, actual dividend yields. So that's what I'm doing because I think oil's going to be heading higher. And even if it doesn't head higher, oil companies, which are very much out of favor, are the place to be, along with metal mining companies, particularly gold, of course, and uranium.
- [23:02]
B
Right. And we cover specific ideas in crisis investing, if you're a paid subscriber. So if you're interested in seeing the specific picks for those, go and sign up@crisisinvesting.com.
- [23:13]
A
yeah, so, Doug, I think all those stocks in those categories, they're all going to do well, but you're better off picking the good ones because a lot of them are frankly just crap. And they're often the ones you hear about because they're the ones that are overly promoted. They got to raise money to keep the lights on.
- [23:32]
B
Right?
- [23:33]
A
Exactly. Exactly.
- [23:35]
B
Well, some questions from some of our subscribers, Doug. The first one has to do with something we, we recommended is the corn ETF position. He says, I'm thinking about it. And he wants to know if, in your opinion, is the thesis still sound or is this one advisable to take a loss and bail on?
- [23:53]
A
No, it's not. I own, I own my position in the corn etf and I'm down a slight bit, not much. But even if you bought it at the peak, which was. What was corn at the peak? I don't know. It was only like 10% above where it is right now. So you can't get a big loss. And since corn is really cheap, all of the grains, all of the grains are really cheap. You can buy an ETF in all of the, any of them at this point and do. This isn't a trading vehicle. This is for a turn, a major turn in the cycle. About a year from now, that corn ETF, it's gonna be 50% maybe double from where it is here. That's the way I'm playing it.
- [24:47]
B
Yeah. It's kind of weird though, the, even the mentality that something we. I think we first talked about it maybe two months ago, something like that, that the idea is it's not performing right now, so it's. Should I liquidate? You know, it just shows like the, the, the frenzy, the frenetic nature of the markets now, where it's, you know, it's about momentum and it's about chasing stuff and if it's not going up, it's something you shouldn't own. You know, there's something in psychology that's different.
- [25:18]
A
Yeah. If you want, if you want action, I mean, you should be involved in a tech stock right now, which are double ultra highs right now. Well, I don't think that's a good idea. I'd rather be involved in something which is, you know, nobody's looking at, has real value and is at all time lows in real terms, kind of.
- [25:41]
B
Right. It's a fundamentally different approach. Okay, next question. Doug, what do you think about filmmaking as a new potential asset class, especially amidst the inevitable collapse of Hollywood?
- [25:57]
A
It seems to me Hollywood is collapsing and it should for lots of reasons. I mean, it's a, a hotbed of wokeism, for one thing. But, you know, I know two people, at least two people that are friends that have produced films and there were big money losers. Nobody watches them, nobody even heard about them, that they existed. So it's a tough business. And with AI as good as it's getting, maybe that's the way all films will be made. Maybe we can all become film producers just by talking to our AI and telling it like a director. I want this, but different, you know, So I don't know. How can you invest in the film industry at this point?
- [26:45]
B
I don't know. I think there aren't. That you kind of have to be connected to buy these things. But I mean, to me the way to invest in them as an asset class is to buy the royalties that are produced from it. And they're hard to get. I mean, we, you know, royalty exchange, we sell mostly music royalties, but we had, for instance, we had royalties on Shrek, that, that movie, and royalties on that old Eddie Murphy film with Dan Aykroyd. I think Trading Places.
- [27:18]
A
Trading. Trading Place. And the producer of that was an old friend of mine, for what it's worth. Yeah. And of course, our friend Frank Giustra made a lot of money by being the founder of Lionsgate. Which is one of the biggest production companies out there today. I don't know how much of Lionsgate Frank still owns, but he founded it and did well on it. But he's a good trader. He's probably been losing shares for years, seeing the way the window lower. Yeah.
- [27:50]
B
And I mean, I think the big thing you have to understand with all forms of media and really, actually any product, is that it's distribution is the key. Like if. If you are a product designer or an inventor, you can have like, the, you know, this amazing product, but it doesn't mean you'll ever sell any or, you know, or that you won't go bankrupt trying to sell some. The key is, do you have distribution in retail or, you know, do you have. So where Hollywood might not die, I. I think it's quite possible it will change. I think it will change, but I doubt it will die because they still own distribution, whether that's through Netflix or Amazon, however you get it. Now, the theaters that still exist, it's like getting in. Getting distributed is a hard thing. And if you can't get distributed, you can't make any money.
- [28:39]
A
Yeah. And when they raise money for movies, I don't know, a substantial portion of the budget goes for advertising. Yeah.
- [28:49]
B
Yeah. So I. Yeah. I mean, you know, the only time. Only I. The only thing I've ever invested in with, in the arts like this is royalties. And, you know, with those, you're looking at older things that still earn predictable earnings each year, you know, so not speculative, like producing your own film or something and hoping for Netflix distribution.
- [29:13]
A
Makes sense. I wonder who owns Casablanca, the Bogart movie, Some of the royalties available on that. That. That is not going to go away, that movie, among others.
- [29:27]
B
No, it's not going to go away. And it's. It's pretty opaque. The filmmaking is. Is much harder than even music royalties are to really nail down who the rights holders are. And there are certain rules that I think were, like, the. The actors, when they have a royalty, they can't sell it, you know, so it kind of stays in their estate. So unless you can get producer royalties, which you can transfer, then they're really hard to come by.
- [29:53]
A
Yeah, interesting.
- [29:55]
B
So, anyway, next question. Will the FIFA World cup be another disaster for Team Trump?
- [30:03]
A
Well, I see two sides to this coin. On the one hand, and it appears that U.S. customs and Immigration is doing really stupid things by shaking down teams and not letting the Iranians spend a day in the US So they have to somehow come in early, play their game, and then Leave. I mean, this is really compromising. Very, very unsportsmanlike. And, and what's this?
- [30:40]
B
This is the Uruguayan national team getting searched. Drug dogs and stuff. Oh, they came when they landed.
- [30:48]
A
That presents well. I mean, the Uruguayans are really dangerous type people do this with their soccer team. I mean, it's, it's embarrassing that this type of thing would happen. It presents so. Reflects so badly on the US and there's a lot of countries where their teams are being busted and hassled and.
- [31:11]
B
Yeah, they're just getting shook. They're just getting, you know, like at, on the airport tarmac, you see them getting wanded, you know, first extra, extra screening while they're on the, on the tarmac. Yeah, it's not, not really a good look and certainly isn't. It doesn't make the Americans look good. I can say this for sure. I was at my dentist the other day and the day after this had happened, and it came up in conversations with her and I'm just, I'm embarrassed.
- [31:42]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [31:43]
B
You know, my country's doing this.
- [31:45]
A
It's really shameful. But on the other side, I mean, once again, I don't know how much of this is factual and how much of it is just what you see and hear selectively. But the Europeans that are coming over to watch this are soccer fanatics. So they're not like the standard tourists to America. They're not businessmen, they're not students, they're not the elite who can afford to come to America. They're like common, average people. And they're really impressed with, as it should be, with a lot of aspects of America. I mean, the highways, the cars, the Costco's, the Walmart space. Big houses, everybody. Everybody's got a big house, everybody. And this is unusual. And I can see how if you live in a shitty little nothing to wear town in Scotland, you come here and you don't want to go home, you know, because all you know about America before is that they have gun battles in the streets.
- [32:50]
B
School shootings.
- [32:51]
A
School shootings, exactly. So, yeah, it's, it's a good thing and a bad thing. The FIFA thing.
- [32:59]
B
Yeah, yeah, I think so too. I think so too. Yeah. I mean, some of those. I know there was some German who was in Houston and you know, his compliments on the US went viral and, and so everybody saw it. But then a lot of companies started sending the guy free stuff, you know, you know, you're in Houston, you're at this hotel, like, let's send you stuff. And Then that just continues. It continues it on. And his impression of America is, you know, amazing at that point.
- [33:31]
A
Amazing.
- [33:33]
B
And if I was on the tourism board, man, I would, that's what I would do. I'd find people like that and then just push them up in the, you know, social media. So. Because it's definitely good. Because it's a definitely good look for America. That is.
- [33:47]
A
Yeah, that's good and bad. And for what it's worth, I think soccer is actually catching on in the U. S. It's taken a while, but it's here now.
- [33:56]
B
Well, now that. Now that the Latino population is so big, that helps.
- [34:01]
A
Yeah, that's right. Yeah. And if we get in trouble, we can import players from South America or, or, or from North Africa or wherever they. The French import their players.
- [34:14]
B
Yeah, I would say we'd look like the French team.
- [34:16]
A
Yeah. Right.
- [34:19]
B
Okay, let's see. Just a few more questions for you. So do you think it would be possible or maybe even a good idea to create a confederation of southern cone states or. And provinces that could work together in both trade matters and cultural matters?
- [34:35]
A
Gothen already done that with Mercosur, which is a big nothing.
- [34:40]
B
It is a big nothing. Yeah. And in general, do these trade blocks, do they. You know, I just, I just, whenever I think of this, I immediately think of the EU and think of how just destructive that has been, you know, from a regulatory regime and everything.
- [34:58]
A
Yeah, these started out as kind of a good idea. It was a customs union for iron and steel. So these European countries wouldn't make each other's lives miserable with charging customs and duties and God knows what else. And then it got out of control. And then they built this giant gigantic bureaucracy In Brussels, about 100,000 people, which is incredible, you know, that regulate absolutely everything. So, you know, these things take on a life of their own. So the answer to the question is no. Any country in every and every country in the world should just have no duties, no customs free, you know, anyway.
- [35:45]
B
Yeah, that can all be done bilaterally. You don't need some super organization to do it.
- [35:50]
A
Yeah, exactly. And regulations the size of a New York telephone book, which no longer exists. But it's okay. But, but if any. But if any people are archaeologically oriented, they can recall that they're, you know, without 2,000 pages, whatever it was.
- [36:10]
B
Yeah. I think new places like New York, they'd probably have a two volume set.
- [36:14]
A
Yeah, probably. That's. That's right. Small print too.
- [36:18]
B
Yeah. So, Doug, along with our book, the preparation, all of your high Ground series books, plus the other things you've written. Can you recommend five other books every man should read?
- [36:34]
A
I don't know if we actually recommended them piecemeal in the preparation or not, but as I think about it now, and I'm not sure if I mentioned these in the preparation or whether they're in there or you put them in there, I can't remember. But I would. For politics, which I hate, I would put the Market for Liberty. Everybody should read that. For philosophy, I would put an raz. The Market. The. The Virtuous. Virtuous, yeah, that would be one for economics. And these are short, punchy, accessible books. I'm not talking about academic tomes, okay? Talking about the kind of thing that you can give to somebody and say, look, read this, it's simple, it's easy, it could change your life. That kind of book. And third book I would recommend would be See Market for Liberty, Virtuous Selfishness. Ah. For economics in this class, Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlett. Still a great classic and you know, for kind of like personal philosophy. I'm a big fan of Harry Brown's How I Found Freedom in a Non Free World. And I can't think of the fifth book right now. Maybe I will, but I can't think of it right now.
- [38:10]
B
The one I'll add to this, by the way, all of these are mentioned in the preparation and recommended reading. But the one I would add to it is a book called the Way of the Superior Man. It's on masculinity really is what it's about. And I've probably given two dozen copies of that book away to men I've met over the years. And I think it's incredibly useful for them. So let that be the fifth, I think. But all these are recommended, actually, if you, if you get the, the preparation, you'll see there's a excellent reading list in there. I wouldn't say it's totally complete because I'm not sure any reading list could be totally complete. But it's all, it's all good and it's in there. All right, Doug, so last question is, thanks for sharing your thoughts on Costa Rica last time. I'd like to hear your opinions on Malaysia and if possible, on Penyang Island.
- [39:10]
A
Well, I guess that's the island which is kind of been designated for foreigners to live in. And they give you, you know, a number of good deals if you're a foreigner living there. It's very nice. And I've been to Kuala Lumpur a Number of times. Most recently just before the great Covid hysteria and really favorably impressed with, with kl. I really like it. It's, it's, it's nice. It's crime free. You can get everything you want. Costs are low. It's like a, it's like a budget version of Singapore, if you would. And I've in Malaysia, I went one time up to one of the northern sheikdoms. They're not provinces because Malaysia was put together by the British for a bunch of, what do they call them, Sultanates, sheikhtams, whatever. And it was really uptight and unpleasant and ultra conservative Islamic. I don't know what, what in hell I was doing there, but guess I'm glad I did it because I got that impression. Nothing like KL or, or Penang where the foreigners go.
- [40:30]
B
So yeah, I've never been to Penang. I was in KL one time only. It was like 2013 and I was definitely favorably impressed with the place. I thought it was super clean and nice, very modern but you know, a little, with a little more exotic to it than most big cities are simply probably because of the, probably because it's a Muslim country. But, but it's also not an oppressive like you know, I didn't feel like the weirdo wearing western attire, you know, because everyone else was wearing burkas. It's not like that at all. So and, and I, from what I hear, we have, you know, one of our subscribers lives there and he says it's a wonderful place to raise a family. I mean very, very like family oriented. On Aison Penyang.
- [41:22]
A
Yeah, I think, I think it would be a good choice actually. It's a, a low budget alternative to Singapore and actually just about as good as Singapore.
- [41:34]
B
Okay, well, good, Doug. That's all the questions we have for today. But if you viewers, if you have questions and are a subscriber to Crisis Investing, you can post your questions in the chat. Actually at the top of the webpage. It's like ask Doug a question I think is the little button you push there and it'll take you to the place where you can ask the question. And we'll compile them all and ask them all on Fridays what we typically do. So anything else you want to add before we depart for yet another weekend, Doug?
- [42:04]
A
No, I'm just glad nothing happens over the weekend. So all the miscreants in the world involved in these wars, they must take a break too, over the weekend.
- [42:15]
B
Yeah, you know, in summer's here. Right. So like they don't like to work during summer?
- [42:19]
A
Oh, God, no. It's more fun to lay on the beach than go out and kill somebody, so. Absolutely.
- [42:26]
B
Exactly. So it should be easy. Okay. All right. Thanks, Doug. I appreciate it. We'll talk to you next time.
- [42:31]
A
Thanks, Matt.