The World Cup of News | Ep. 070 Lemonade Stand 🍋

Summary

Lemonade Stand Ep. 070: The World Cup of News (July 8, 2026) 🍋

Podcast: Lemonade Stand | Vox Media Podcast Network
Hosts: Aiden, Atrioc, DougDoug
Main Theme: Using each World Cup quarterfinal team's biggest news story as a predictor for who advances — the ultimate “World Cup of News.”

Episode Overview

Three friends (with "the experience to run a lemonade stand") riff on the business, politics, and current events shaping the countries in the World Cup quarterfinals. Their premise: the more interesting or consequential a country’s recent news, the further they advance in their satirical “World Cup of News” bracket. What follows is equal parts international affairs, historical context, comedic derailing, and cultural insight — all filtered through the group’s irreverent, conversational style.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Setting Up the World Cup of News Concept

• Premise: Rather than predict soccer results on athletic stats, the crew assigns each round-of-eight team key national news and lets the “most compelling story” determine the winner.
  • "We have realized a stunning truth. You can use the news from each country to predict the winner of the soccer matches." (Chris, 03:09)
  • Ongoing joke: The bracket is determined not by football, but by newsworthiness (and which story is wildest or most captivating).
  • Running gag: Tangents about Aiden’s blue-collar "thin yellow line" hat and sandwich-eating.

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Matchup 1: France 🇫🇷 vs Morocco 🇲🇦

France News: Marine Le Pen's Comeback in an Ankle Monitor

• Topic: Far-right leader Marine Le Pen is allowed to run for president after an embezzlement conviction and a five-year ban, but only under house arrest with an ankle bracelet.
  • (Chris, 06:23 – 10:13): Detailed run-down of Le Pen’s embezzlement conviction, the RN party's rightward shift, and the legal saga leading to her candidacy.
  • "Can a woman win the presidency of France while wearing an ankle bracelet from the police?" (Chris, 06:23)
  • "This is her moment. Even with a damn ankle bracelet, she's going to try and take it." (Chris, 12:40)
  • Political context: Rise of the far-right across Europe, Le Pen’s family history, and France’s increasing polarization.

Morocco News: THE SAND WALL & Western Sahara

• Topic: The world’s second-largest wall — a sand berm — divides Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara from the indigenous Sahrawi people, constituting a decades-long unresolved (but recently shifting) international dispute.
  • (Brandon, 13:12 – 31:11): Extended, accessible deep dive into the history of Western Sahara, colonial roots, phosphate resources, the Green March, and the "Game of Thrones-style" sand wall (130,000 troops, 9 million landmines).
  • "This is, literally, Game of Thrones—they’re trying to keep the indigenous people out." (Brandon, 20:56)
  • 2020s: Major geopolitical shifts as US, Spain, France, and now the UN recognize/endorse Moroccan sovereignty, leaving Sahrawi refugees stranded in Algeria.
  • Discussion and context about international reactions, with U.S. involvement (Abraham Accords, Trump’s deal-making), and the growing importance of Moroccan phosphates to global agriculture.

Result:

Morocco advances.

• "Morocco with the upset of the tournament! Because they have a more interesting piece of news." (Chris, 31:56)

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Matchup 2: Norway 🇳🇴 vs England 🏴

Norway News: Air Defenses for Ukraine

• Topic: Norway commits $300 million to Ukrainian air defenses as Zelenskyy tours Europe seeking anti-ballistic support to defend Kyiv from Russian missile and drone attacks.
  • (Aiden, 37:07 – 44:14): Discussion of diplomatic efforts (Chinese mediating attempts, Norway’s role), air defense significance, and mention of how Norway's robust economy draws scrutiny in Western press despite its relative health.
  • "Norway is directly funding air defense systems...one of the last holes in the Ukrainian defense." (Aiden, 40:27)

England News: The Push to Decentralize Power

• Topic: Andy Burnham, likely next PM, pushes to decentralize UK economic/political power from London to the North—highlighting England’s status as “the most centralized” G7 government and the consequences for regional inequality.
  • (Brandon, 45:48 – 54:26): Explanation of Burnham’s push, historical context about North/South divides, analysis of regional economic stagnation, and skepticism about whether power/money can truly be redistributed from "the City."
  • "Apparently the UK is...the most centralized. 96% of taxes...raised nationally." (Brandon, 48:44)
  • “What is breaking a piece of that [London’s dominance] really look like?” (Aiden, 52:04)
• Comedic detour: British theme park “Pontins” closes (Aiden, 54:26).

Result:

England advances, reluctantly.

• "I'll give it to England. Only because the Norway one is mostly a Ukraine story." (Chris, 55:02)

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Matchup 3: Belgium 🇧🇪 vs Spain 🇪🇸

Belgium News: Economic Crises and Chocolate Innovation

• Topic: The diamond (Antwerp heist, tariff trouble, divorce rings), chocolate (climate change decimates cocoa supply, and fake chocolate R&D), and beer sectors are all under threat.
  • (Chris, 55:35 – 63:14):
    • Antwerp diamond heist lore, U.S. tariffs, Trump’s removal of said tariffs after being given a diamond-encrusted ring, younger generations' shift to lab-grown stones.
    • “Mr. Beast is not the main disruptor—it’s climate change destroying Ghana’s cocoa crops.” (Chris, 60:38)
    • Belgian confectioners investing in synthetic, cocoa-free chocolate.
  • Humorous digression about heatwaves melting Europe (Aiden, 63:44).

Spain News: Massive Immigration Amnesty

• Topic: Spain grants residency amnesty to over a million undocumented immigrants, many from Latin America, amidst European anti-immigration trends.
  • (Aiden, 65:42 – 74:45): Description of Spain’s unique immigration context (mainly from South America, via overstayed short-term visas), soaring immigrant share ("1 in 5 are foreign-born"), and economic rationale for legalization/amnesty.
  • "The majority of their immigration is people coming from Latin America on short-term visas...now a crazy stat: in less than 25 years...from 1 in 20 immigrants to 1 in 5." (Aiden, 66:01)
  • Discussion: Language compatibility, economic dynamism, parallels to U.S. 1980s Reagan amnesty.
  • "Amnesty is underrated as a method of getting everybody rowing in the same direction." (Chris, 72:18)

Result:

Spain advances.

• "I think we gotta go Spain. Belgium...are all coming under fire." (Brandon, 74:48)

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Matchup 4: Argentina 🇦🇷 vs Switzerland 🇨🇭

Argentina News: The Great Beef Battle

• Topic: U.S. lifts restrictions on Argentinian beef imports to lower U.S. prices (and garner votes), creating a “beef war” that benefits exporters in Argentina but raises domestic beef prices, angering locals and hurting President Milei’s popularity.
  • (Chris, 76:59 – 81:25): Examination of political and economic effects of beef exports/imports, culture wars over "whose beef is better?" and news quotes from the grocery aisle.
  • "There's a beef battle...the price thing really, for most people. They want to have beef at an affordable price." (Chris, 81:25)

Switzerland News: Population Cap Referendum Fails

• Topic: Right-wing push to cap Swiss population at 10 million fails in referendum (55% no), after business and political leaders warn it would destroy privileged EU economic relations (i.e., "Swexit").
  • (Aiden, 85:46 – 90:42): Overview of Switzerland’s outsider EU status, deep trade ties, and the argument that anti-immigrant measures would jeopardize the country’s prosperity.
  • "The big criticism...all of our success has had to do with being open to [EU] a degree, economically." (Aiden, 88:58)

Result:

Argentina advances.

• "If only they'd done it, then Switzerland would win. Argentina did a thing." (Brandon, 90:58)

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The Semifinals & Final Showdown

Semifinals

• Morocco (The Sand Wall) vs Spain (Immigration Amnesty)

  • "Let's give it to amnesty." — But then: "Are you guys crazy? The Sandwall was like a revelation." (Aiden, 92:11/92:14)
  • Consensus: Morocco’s sand wall story is too wild and wins on interest.

• Argentina (Beef) vs England (Decentralization)

  • "I think we go [with] beef. Sandwall as the final matchup." (Brandon, 92:50)

The Final

Morocco (Sand Wall) vs Argentina (Beef Battles)

• Winning Story:
  Morocco’s sand wall--the world’s most epic “Game of Thrones” border--claims the World Cup of News.
  • "You gotta give it to the Sandwall guy." (Aiden, 93:04)
  • "Your World Cup Champion 2026...Morocco!" (Chris, 93:09)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

World Cup of News Gimmick

• “So far, it's been exactly 100% success rate, which implies that the game that's happening right now will be won by Colombia, which has a 14.3% youth [unemployment]...So you can tell that news, you know what I'm saying? It's all connected: news and soccer and 100%.” (Chris, 04:36)

On France's Political Turmoil

• “Can a woman win the presidency of France while wearing an ankle bracelet?” (Chris, 06:23)
• “A little bit of crime. You said a lot. It's weird how often you bring that up.” (Chris, 08:20)

On Morocco’s Sand Wall

• “This is literally Game of Thrones—they’re trying to keep the indigenous people out.” (Brandon, 20:56)
• “Second biggest wall in the world...It's wild. And this is the entire verticality of a giant country state, whatever it is...there are 130,000 troops from Morocco manning this wall." (Brandon, 20:31)

On Norway/Ukraine & International Defense

• "Norway is directly funding air defense systems...one of the last holes in the Ukrainian defense." (Aiden, 40:27)
• “That's awesome. That’s badass.” (Brandon & Chris, 43:47)

On Decentralizing England

• “Apparently, the UK is...the most centralized. 96% of taxes...raised nationally.” (Brandon, 48:44)

On Spanish Immigration Amnesty

• "In less than 25 years the country has gone from 1 in 20 immigrants to 1 in 5 people in the country are foreign-born." (Aiden, 66:01)
• "Amnesty is underrated as a method of getting everybody rowing in the same direction." (Chris, 72:18)

On Belgium's Struggles

• “Younger people aren't getting married as much. So they literally invented a thing called a divorce ring...” (Chris, 57:45)
• “Belgium's largest [chocolate] company, Barry Callebaut is...creating a new type of synthetic chocolate that doesn't require cocoa.” (Chris, 62:10)

On the "World Cup Bracket"

• "The most shocking part of this is that all the betting markets have France winning, but this was a more interesting story. And so our official prediction will be that Morocco wins." (Chris, 31:56)
• "You gotta give it to the Sandwall guy." (Aiden, 93:04)
• "Your World Cup Champion 2026...Morocco!" (Chris, 93:09)

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Timestamps for Major Segments

• [03:22] — Launching the World Cup of News premise & bracket
• [06:23] — France: Marine Le Pen ankle monitor backstory
• [13:12] — Morocco: Sand Wall, Western Sahara, phosphates, & geopolitics
• [37:07] — Norway: Funding Ukrainian air defense, China diplomacy
• [45:48] — England: Andy Burnham, London/northern decentralization
• [55:35] — Belgium: Diamond heist, tariffs, lab diamonds, chocolate crisis
• [65:42] — Spain: Mass immigration amnesty and economic rationales
• [76:59] — Argentina: The “beef war” with America
• [85:46] — Switzerland: Pop cap referendum and "Swexit" fears
• [92:50] — Finals: Morocco Sand Wall beats Argentina Beef — Morocco "wins" the World Cup of News

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Tone & Style

• Conversational, irreverent, and often self-deprecating.
• Deep dives paired with side-tracked pop culture riffs and in-jokes about blue-collar authenticity and running lemonade stands.
• Equal parts international policy wonk and YouTube-variety show.
• “If you put a gun to my head and asked me to tell you anything about Belgium...waffles?” (Brandon, 55:40)

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Overall Takeaway

The “World Cup of News” is won not by the best football tactics, but by the most dramatic, consequential, and just plain wild headlines.

• Morocco’s “sand wall” saga looms over all — a potent symbol of global resource wars, historic colonialism, and geopolitical bargaining — besting Argentine beef, British regional policy, and Spanish amnesty in the bracket.
• The episode is a whirlwind primer on global affairs, delivered with heaping scoops of sarcasm — both genuinely informative and joyfully ridiculous. If you missed it, you’ll come away richer on world news and thirsty for a glass of lemonade.

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For Further Listening

• More deep dives and bonus international news stories (plus the fate of teams knocked out early) available on Patreon.

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End of Summary

Transcript

[Aiden]

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[Brandon]

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[Chris]

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[Aiden]

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[Brandon]

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[Aiden]

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[Brandon]

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[Chris]

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[Brandon]

Thank you for your service.

[Aiden]

I feel like you're making fun of me.

[Chris]

No, I'm not. I think podcasters are the hardest workers in the world. I think your hat represents them.

[Brandon]

Also, for the record, it is July. It is 90 degrees.

[Chris]

Safety first though.

[Brandon]

Doug, you're right.

[Aiden]

It's hot out in the sun.

[Chris]

It is hot out there.

[Aiden]

I picked up another job. I've been busy and I'm. I barely have time to eat and you are making fun of me right now.

[Chris]

I shouldn't make fun of you. I do know that times are tough at mogul moves here and the yard collectively. So you needed a fourth job?

[Aiden]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Aiden]

So I started doing a little construction like two days a week. Because you know my history in construction.

[Chris]

I.

[Aiden]

Not to mention the thin yellow line.

[Brandon]

Yeah, this is.

[Aiden]

This right here?

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Aiden]

That's the fucking edge between society falling apart.

[Brandon]

No, no, don't touch it. That's American grit right there. I know you can't handle seeing a true blue collar American sitting in front of you. I know.

[Chris]

It does make me uncomfortable.

[Brandon]

Yeah.

[Chris]

My hands are so soft.

[Aiden]

You're never working today.

[Brandon]

People like you are why we don't win the World Cup.

[Chris]

Yeah, that's exactly right. And so I wanted to ask you, as a true blue collar worker, you've been watching the World cup at all. Is that something you've been keeping your eye on?

[Aiden]

I was not watching that gay European sport.

[Brandon]

Crazy. Because it's been absconding every weekend to fly to matches and watch them in

[Chris]

person near every match. You are like those Republicans who are homophobic.

[Aiden]

No, no. I went to Dallas. I flew to Dallas.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Aiden]

And I went to hang out with my. My old boy Todd, who works on the ranch. I went to Filthy McNasty's.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Aiden]

I skipped the game because again, I hate that sport. Yeah, I hate that.

[Chris]

I just. Based on photos you got with your Swedish doctor friend and went to a World cup game. So I'm. It's hard to pin down the truth here, but I like where your head's at. However, this is a World cup themed episode, so you're gonna have to keep up a little bit. This is our bracket with the current World Cup. I know a lot of you have either been watching or paying attention or at least know about what's going on in the ether. And we have realized a stunning truth. You can use the news from each country to. To predict the winner of the soccer matches.

[Brandon]

So far, this has been true.

[Chris]

So far, this has been 100% accurate.

[Brandon]

Because Belgium famously has a lot more news happening than America.

[Chris]

Exactly. America had a News draft and they 4:1 does on that. And so we're going to keep this theme going. We've brought. We've each brought pieces of news from all of the round of eight teams, one of which has not happened yet. That will happen live as we're recording

[Brandon]

literally currently going on. So we are going to give news stories about the seven confirmed teams games in the round of eight World cup and then at the end of the episode, we'll tell you who's going to win. Who's going to win, but also who just won. This is your live news for the World cup tomorrow. When you hear this.

[Aiden]

So we prep. You're telling me.

[Chris]

Yeah, we prep.

[Aiden]

We prepped. We prepped stories for all these countries.

[Chris]

Yeah, you were assigned some.

[Aiden]

I think I misunderstood because I got. Yeah, I'll be honest. I got three news stories, but it's. It's Texas, Louisiana and Florida. I got three big stories.

[Chris]

Just swap the name out. No one will know the difference. I'll just pretend to say it was Spain.

[Brandon]

I'll swap out the Morocco story with Louisiana and see if people think it's real.

[Chris]

They will notice. Wait, before we get into all our individual stories for round of eight teams, I will make a prediction on who wins the final game based on this stat that I saw today. Can you pull us up? Perry turns Out. The most predictive statistics of World cup success so far is which country has the highest youth male unemployment. So far, it's been exactly 100% success rate, which implies that the game that's happening right now will be won by Colombia, which has a 14.3% youth.

[Brandon]

Oh, sorry. Yeah, yeah. No, Mexico has 5.4% youth unemployment. They're crushing. That is in economy and not in soccer, apparently.

[Chris]

Yeah, 5.4 to 17.4 is crazy. So far it's been 100%. Right. So you can tell that news. You know what I'm saying? It's all connected news and soccer and 100%. So let's start with our first round of eight matchup. Who do we have?

[Brandon]

It's France versus Morocco.

[Chris]

Who's got Morocco?

[Brandon]

Me.

[Chris]

I've got France.

[Brandon]

All right, kick it off with France. France, I would argue, is. And this is a bit of a hot take. They might even win the World Cup.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Brandon]

And so I would imagine that the news that you're about to bring is extremely powerful.

[Chris]

They must have some hot news. Right?

[Aiden]

I mean, this is a tough battle for me because on one hand you have the French, who are just disgust. Just snooty, and on the other side you have Morocco. I don't know where that is. So it's.

[Chris]

And I'm so glad to have your opinion on this podcast. It actually helps a lot to get an honest, God work, God fearing, blue collar, American's opinion.

[Brandon]

So hold on.

[Chris]

I want to.

[Brandon]

So people who watch the yard this week are going to get like an hour and a half of this character, and then they're going to come here for another hour and a half of this character.

[Chris]

I don't think it's a character. I think he's got.

[Brandon]

Sorry, no, Yeah, I was afraid to.

[Chris]

You changed? Yeah,

[Brandon]

go ahead. Are they even relevant in the world anymore? I don't know.

[Chris]

It has some pretty big news. The question is for France. Can a woman win the presidency of France while wearing an ankle bracelet? Monitor from the police?

[Aiden]

Wow.

[Chris]

Marine Le Pen.

[Brandon]

Oh, right, right, right.

[Chris]

Marine Le Pen.

[Brandon]

I swear you were pulling up the Italian.

[Chris]

No, you made a huge. Le Pen is the head of the rn, which is kind of like the far right. You know, you could say MAGA type, AFD type party in France. Every European. It's hot right now. Every European country has one. It's a. It's a party that really focuses on immigration and is. Right. Leaning back to traditional values type thing. She's the head of that party and they've been enjoying some electoral success recently. If you look at polling, which I have here, they every, basically every opinion poll in France has them leading, which has a lot of people, I think in France understandably nervous. And she was not, until today allowed to run, even though her party was leading. They had her young, like 29 or 30 year old attache being the face of the party because she literally was banned from running because she lost an embezzlement case. The RN in France had parliamentary seats in the EU and you get little, you get money from the EU as a whole. All the EU's taxes go into a pool and they give you money to get like expert witnesses and, you know, things to help do your job as a, as a member of parliament. They were creating fake jobs and then billing the EU for that and then taking the money home. That was the. So they embezzled a few million from the eu, got caught doing it and she was banned from running for five years.

[Brandon]

Good people like us would never pretend to be doing jobs that we don't actually do.

[Aiden]

Of course not.

[Brandon]

That's a crime.

[Aiden]

I have always said the best leaders have done a little bit of crime.

[Chris]

A little bit of crime. You said a lot. It's weird how often you bring that up.

[Aiden]

Yeah.

[Chris]

And I guess as someone who's never faked a job though, you think this is probably a line too far.

[Aiden]

Definitely too far.

[Chris]

Anyway, so she was caught on this and five year ban, she could not run. And of course that five year ban covers 2027, which is the next big election in France. However, the appeal was this morning and there was a big question mark. What will happen? What are the possible outcomes of this big trial? Well, the news is in, she can run, but you have to wear an ankle tag.

[Brandon]

Does she have to wear one of those, like old timey jumpers too? Those like pinstripe prison outfits, the black and white.

[Chris]

She has to carry a big sack that says EU money.

[Brandon]

There's like a ball in a chair

[Aiden]

attached to her bowling ball tied to her leg. You can run, but it's going to

[Chris]

be hard, but it's going to be difficult to sell it.

[Brandon]

But dude, imagine how fast she'll run once the weights are off.

[Chris]

This is training mode, you know what I'm saying?

[Brandon]

Yeah.

[Chris]

So she has the ankle tag. She's under house arrest. She can only leave the house for a certain number of hours per day and has to wear this ankle tag. And that is with the, the environment. She has to make her campaign. Yeah. One year house resident, ankle monitor. So she's appealing again to try and get this. She's saying it's impossible for me to run under these conditions. So she is appealing. But realistically, after the first appeal, this seems pretty set. So the question now becomes, will I run again? Will Maureen Le Pen run again, is what she's saying. Or will she pass it on to her second in command who has been doing pretty well in this interim period where she thought she couldn't run? That's the big fucking question. That's the France news of the day. But it seemingly, as of like an hour ago, she announced she is going to run. So I think that's the plan. It's gonna be her with an ankle bracelet.

[Brandon]

How many hours a day does she get?

[Chris]

I don't know. It's not many. It's like a few. Few.

[Brandon]

I am reading a book about constraints and about how creating boundaries for yourself is actually usually almost a critical element of being creatively successful the long term. Ed Catmull talked about this famously while creating Pixar in his book Creativity Inc. And this just might be the thing that aligns and focuses Marine Le Pen.

[Chris]

Right. Do you think she'll be.

[Brandon]

Politicians usually have too much freedom.

[Chris]

I would say you're right. And she might make Toy Story 6 or something. While she's right

[Aiden]

on the job, we get. There's a lot of rules and regulations about how you might build a piece of infrastructure. For instance, I can't wait for you

[Brandon]

to play this character in Morocco.

[Aiden]

And there's new. There's new ways to sort of weasel around the restrictions they give you all the time. And that's like, that's half the job, I'd say.

[Chris]

And I do appreciate your insight on that because it comes from a place of honesty and of like, experience. And yeah, that's the story out of France. I mean, you know, we go deeper on like how the RN is kind of a spooky party, but they are crush. Unless something changes. I'll show you real quick. Last thing I'll say, this is the state of France. These are the next two leading parties. The guy in the middle, Macron, is the current president of France. He can't actually run in 27. It'll be his Gabriel Tal is next guy. But they're. They're pretty far down there. It's basically the Rah Rah Far right party, the Centrist party and the far left party under Bellen Sean, who's not really popular outside of his base. So yeah, that's where they're France has been a bit of gridlock. We'll see if this arrest changes things. But.

[Aiden]

And you might. You might remind me, because I. You might not expect this from the way I look. I'm surprisingly tapped into French politics.

[Chris]

No, but, audience, real quick, you're being a bigot right now if you don't think this guy can know the ins and outs of French politics.

[Aiden]

Well, I can't wear this hat. Me interested in French politics.

[Chris]

I can't work a blue collar job and no thing or two.

[Brandon]

What do you think?

[Aiden]

I'm watching it reading when I flip the sign all day?

[Chris]

Sorry I cut you off. What were you going to say?

[Aiden]

I was going to say wasn't. She's been at the lead of the party for a long time and had. Has already lost an election.

[Chris]

Yep.

[Aiden]

But. And that was four years ago now.

[Chris]

Yeah, something like that. Yeah. What I'll say is the Centrist party under Macron barely squeaked out last time.

[Aiden]

Yeah.

[Chris]

And then, like, it's happening all over the world. It's kind of in free fall. Everyone's going towards more of the extremes. And so this is her moment. It's like her family's party. I mean, her dad ran it for. They go back a long, long time. There's many, many controversies I go into. But now it's her turn in the sun. This is her moment. Even with a damn ankle bracelet, she's going to try and take it. And unless something changes within a year, it's looking. She's got a pretty commanding lead. So we'll see what happens.

[Brandon]

She can survive in the Marines. She can survive in the ankle bracelet.

[Chris]

Yeah. In France, they name you after your job. And she was in LA Marines. All right, counter that. Okay. It's the World Cup.

[Aiden]

I want to head over to Morocco, and for starters, you're going to have to show me where it is.

[Brandon]

No, actually, unironically. Can you pull up a map, Perry, and just have that in the background? Yeah, I. Look, I'm going to be honest. I was. I chose Morocco and I was like, let me find some local news about Morocco. And I realized I don't know enough about Morocco to tell you what interesting thing happened this week and how it relates to the last year of Moroccan politics. Can I.

[Aiden]

Can I say something?

[Brandon]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Oh, hey, it's hated.

[Aiden]

I'm going to say something. Seriously.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Aiden]

The. The true downfall of this episode and researching it during the World cup is that every news story to do with these countries right now has to do with the World Cup. And I Remember, I was scrolling through articles about Spain, like from the past two months, I think, on the ft. And I'm going through it's World cup headline after World cup headline, or it was New York Times. And I finally get to one where the headline starts off and it says, like, spain's biggest train, Spain's biggest strength has become its biggest headache. And I'm like, oh, wow, I wonder what's going. Interesting economic, political story. Will this be Spain's has too many good midfielders. And I finally found one. And this continued. This was the trend for all of these things. All of the news about these places in English media right now is just what happened in the World Cup. This week.

[Chris]

I was doing Belgium. I went to Belgian sources and translated them. All they can talk about in Belgium right now is that they won against. It's everyone's story on every piece of Belgian news. And it's the last 50 stories that is. It's really made the year over there.

[Brandon]

Morocco, the one more modern one is that the guy who's now being tapped to probably become the next premier of Morocco, the reason he's so popular is because he's led the football team for 10 years and they're doing really well. That's so, like, everybody's stoked about it.

[Chris]

That's goaded. I didn't know that.

[Brandon]

So I guess that is one story.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Aiden]

All right.

[Brandon]

I mean, Morocco. I am going to talk about a horrific refugee crisis happening in Algeria. Fun stuff. Okay, so quick primer of, you know, 200 years of history or whatnot. So Morocco is top left of Africa, right. Right next to Spain now for, I don't know, thousands of years, it's kind of different. People have controlled it. There was a whole Moroccan empire, I forget the exact name, where they even controlled part of Spain. And at one point in their history, they were sort of controlling or allied with the tribes in Western Sahara, which you can see is a country south of Morocco along the west side.

[Aiden]

You.

[Brandon]

You probably have not really heard of Western Sahara because it's mostly desert. Not that much stuff goes on. But if you have heard of it, it's probably due to this conflict with Morocco, which is starting to kind of maybe move towards a resolution thanks to Donald Trump. Aiden, you're looking confused.

[Aiden]

My. Maybe this is an insensitive question. Isn't the Western Sahara isn't even a country. Right. Like, it's a disputed territory that barely anybody lives in.

[Brandon]

Right.

[Chris]

So.

[Brandon]

So Morocco, right. Was taken over by France and Spain somewhat, interestingly, because they're playing in the World Cups, there's, like, legit grievance between Morocco and France and then also Spain, who controlled the region from, I believe it was 1912 onwards, Spain took control of Western Sahara when all the Europeans were like, let's take Africa like it's a pie. So Spain took the slice of Western Sahara. Morocco was split by France and Spain a little bit later on. So in 1956, Morocco gets France and Spain to agree to give them independence back. So Morocco has been an independent kingdom since three. What?

[Chris]

53.

[Brandon]

You said 1956. 56.

[Chris]

Okay, okay. Right after World War II.

[Brandon]

Right after World War II. So at this time, Western Sahara, the area below them is still controlled by Spain. And again, this is mostly desert with, like, a couple hundred thousand basically indigenous tribes who wander the desert with a couple areas, but they realize that there is valuable phosphate. Turns out most of the phosphate, not most, but, like, a majority of the phosphate in the world comes from Morocco and Western Sahara, which is what we use for fertilizer. So the modern agricultural world largely depends on Morocco and Western Sahara getting a ton of phosphate out of the earth so that we can grow crops. On top of that, Western Sahara has some minerals. They have a lot of fishing stuff. You know, you could fish there and then sell it to Europe.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Brandon]

But in general, Western Sahara is this small area that was, you know, sort of maintained by Spain. And then finally, 1975, Spain agrees to leave Western Sahara. There are three different parties who want Western Sahara. 75.

[Chris]

That's pretty recent.

[Brandon]

Yeah. 1975, Morocco wants Western Sahara. They have, again, some historical claim from, like, a thousand years ago. Mauritania, which is the country to the south of them, which is a little bit smaller and less influential, but they also want Western Sahara and feel like they have claims. And even the people who live in Western Sahara want Western Sahara. These are the. I will probably say it wrong, but the Sarahi people, so Rawi people. So the indigenous tribes in Western Sahara are like, can we have it? And Spain goes, yeah, probably, maybe. No. And last minute, they give it up and they say, morocco, you can have the top 2/3, and Mauritania can have the lower two thirds. So in 1975, Western Sahara is split. Now, Morocco, as they sense that this is about to happen, is like, we need to get in there and make it feel like this is our territory. So they do something called the Green March, and they send 350,000 citizens and 20,000 troops pour into Western Sahara, which, again, is mostly desert. Like, they have to invest a Ton of infrastructure to support all these people pour in there. So they can say, this is our territory. We got it.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Brandon]

Promptly, Western Sahara tribes form the. Technically, two years before this, but they form the. Let me get the exact name, Polisario Front, which is basically a resistance group. So the tribes people, the indigenous people, start fighting back against this. They successfully boot out Mauritania, but Morocco just takes over that owner, that land.

[Chris]

So the bottom third.

[Brandon]

So the bottom third. So to put this differently, a WWE match starts between these three, the indigenous tribes, the underdogs, Mauritania and Morocco. Morocco's the big dog. Maritani gets kicked out by the underdogs, the indigenous people, but Morocco basically wins. So to simplify this, since the 1970s, Morocco has basically been the big dog. Pushed in there with a ton of resources and troops. Got into Western Sahara and said, we are going to claim ownership. They take the big areas that actually have population centers. They take all the areas that have the main sort of phosphate and mineral reserves and the coastline, right? And they push the Polisario over to the east, and then they build a gigantic wall called the berm. And I didn't know about this. This is the second biggest wall in the world. It is made out of sand and natural resources. It is only smaller than the Great Wall of China. And at this point, it's a gigantic

[Chris]

sand wall in the Sahara across the

[Brandon]

entire north of, like, through versus look

[Chris]

like we've got to take a photo of.

[Brandon]

Yeah, yeah, it's wild. Vertically through Western Sahara, Morocco, over like seven or eight years, built a wall from north to south. And yeah, you can pull up pictures. In fact, that way I can look

[Chris]

at that Kingdom of Thrones ice wall.

[Brandon]

This is crazy. It's wild. And this is the entire verticality of a giant country state, whatever it is. And this huge wall of sand has intermittent military posts. There are 130,000 troops from Morocco manning this wall at all times. This is a gigantic military operation on the eastern side, which is where they're basically. It's literally Game of Thrones. They're trying to keep the indigenous people.

[Chris]

Yes.

[Brandon]

They have 9 million landmines. It's one of the most mined places on Earth. So Morocco in the 70s, once Western Sahara kind of goes up for grabs, they muscle their way in and they build a vertical wall, cutting off all the most valuable resources and population centers, and have pushed all the insurgents to the east with a gigantic wall blocking them off. That is the current state of Western Sahara.

[Aiden]

I. It's crazy that this is just exists And I've never, I've never heard of

[Chris]

the giant sand wall of the Sahara. That's crazy.

[Brandon]

Yeah.

[Aiden]

And I'm guessing the phosphate for the fertilizer is on Morocco side of the wall.

[Brandon]

Yes. In fact they somewhat identified that the eastern third of West Sahara is not that valuable. And so the sad part about this, as cool and fun as this has been up till this point, the sad part is that the hundreds of thousands of indigenous people have nowhere to go because they, there's a wall now protecting them from the parts that, you know, have a lot of industry and ability to live. This is in the middle of a desert where not a lot of life can happen. So what has actually happened over the last 40 years is that hundreds of thousands of Sahrawi people and you can pull this up, Perry. I found a 13 year old video of Windows movie maker. This like timeline. They moved to Algeria. This is basically right across the border. And there have been hundreds of thousands of people living in refugee camps for 40 years. Again, their homeland is occupied by Morocco. And so these pictures are from I think 12 years ago. This is a YouTube video. If you just search for SAR refugees and they're living in a camp in the middle of the desert that is supported by Algeria who kind of doesn't like Morocco. They just, they don't want Morocco to kind of win in this. And generally the international community is historically not been stoked about this. Morocco is sort of the aggressor and they have wanted the Sahrai indigenous people to have the at least vote about what happens to their country.

[Aiden]

We're by the way, so we're looking at these pictures of the refugee camps and I think the main difference I could describe for audio listeners compared to maybe like tents set up or something that seems a little more temporary. When you see refugee camps kind of the modern era is these are like built out homes of like clay or rock, like much more permanent looking communities. Albeit the video was showing that they don't have access to running water. They don't have access to.

[Brandon]

They're in the middle of the, of the Sahara Desert. Like it's all. They only can live there because of aid. Yeah, that is wild. It gets up to 122 degrees Fahrenheit during the day and then it gets to freezing at night because they're in the desert. Yeah. So this is, you know, if you're familiar with the map or you're able to look at a map of Morocco, Algeria is Morocco's neighbor and Algeria's basically agreed to host and take care of these refugees with international aid. But this has been going on for literal decades, and it is incredibly sad.

[Aiden]

The two pieces of context I even had going into this are I have looked at the map, you know, whether it be on a globe or Google Maps, and seeing that little section of Western Sahara, and it's always been like, it's marked kind of weird compared to like, other countries around it.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Aiden]

And then have this vague idea of Morocco being like some territorial aggressor in history of this area. But I didn't realize this had such a modern reality.

[Brandon]

Yeah. So. So then we get to like, okay, what's been happening since. So Morocco in the 70s got in there, built this wall. They are the de facto controllers of Western Sahara. However, the rest of the world has not recognized it. The UN does not recognize it. So it's a little. It's a little like the China, Taiwan situation where they're like, except Morocco actually is, you know, currently in control of Western Sahara. But they're saying, this is our historical ties. The rest of the world, you need to recognize that it is ours. And the rest of the world is kind of tiptoeing around it on the map. And the problem is that Morocco has become increasingly powerful, both because of the phosphate and generally just geopolitically. You know, they have massive tourism. They're kind of the gateway to Europe. It's like, for Europe, having a western aligned country that they can interact with and is right at the Strait of Gibraltar is very important. Morocco has done very well and has been relatively much more stable. Like, Algeria has had horrific wars at multiple points. Morocco has been the stability point. So for decades, the UN and the Sahrawi and Algeria have all pushed and said, let us have a vote to decide if we want to be independent, if West Sahara should be its own country. And Morocco has said, absolutely not. We will not allow that to happen. So that's been the battle going on. And recently, as in 2025, that has started to change. Actually, let's back up a little bit. One of Trump's last things before he left December 2020, I forgot Trump was involved.

[Chris]

Yeah. You said Trump solved this war. It's the tenth war he solved.

[Brandon]

Yes. So right before Trump leave the first term, he posts and like, I think it was Twitter posts, and officially recognizes Morocco's claim over Western Sahara. And this is basically part of Morocco is down to ally with Israel as part of the Abraham Accords. But in return, Morocco wants to be recognized as the owner of Western Sahara. Right. So this happened in 2020, if you remember the Abraham Accords. And this was Jared Kushner doing, trying to get the sort of Arab world to unite and you know, do agreements with Israel. Morocco did agree and it was a huge win for them. And that's what Morocco asked in return. And then in 2022, Spain also. And this is after decades of this situation being at a stalemate. Right. Of hundreds of thousands of refugees just being in Algeria. Everybody's just waiting. Nothing's happening. In 2022, Spain endorsed Morocco's basically, you know, autonomy. Morocco says, we want to own Western Sahara. They have said, oh, they can self govern, they can have some autonomy, but we need to be the owners of it. And then in 2024, French President Macron changed his policy. He said to the Moroccan king that he does support their plan for Morocco owning Western Sahara and only some self autonomy. And then last year In October of 2025, the UN Security Council officially voted and pivoted and they said they support Morocco's plan. And they said this is recent. Yeah, genuine autonomy under Moroccan sovereignty is potentially, quote, the most feasible solution. And more and more countries have been falling into line.

[Chris]

Can you autonomy under Moroccan sovereignty mean.

[Brandon]

So it would mean that Morocco controls the foreign affairs, the defense, the sort of high level policy, but that the local places still get to govern themselves. It is basically Moroccan ownership.

[Chris]

Yeah. Because like resource extraction and all that would go to Morocco. Right.

[Brandon]

It's Morocco.

[Chris]

They would have taxes on it. They would have the phosphate.

[Aiden]

They would, it's. They would get the phosphate.

[Chris]

Yeah, I think it's all they want is the phosphate.

[Brandon]

Yeah, it's great.

[Chris]

I'm just confirming what you said, but it's 70% of the world's phosphate in Morocco right now.

[Brandon]

Yeah, it's great.

[Chris]

Add in the Western Sahara parts even more. That's crazy.

[Brandon]

I think the 70 concludes Western Sahara because I think that's part of the thing. The reason this is so, I mean, Morocco, the reason these countries are all falling probably, you know, who knows exactly why Macron did this, but most likely it's like if you piss off Macron in the same, excuse me, Morocco, in the same way that China has gotten a monopoly on rare earths, like you

[Chris]

need phosphate, like your access to phosphate

[Brandon]

to like feed people. Right. And this is like a, this would be a global crisis if it was cut off.

[Chris]

Dude, it's so wild that every country on Earth is finding the thing they can squeeze.

[Brandon]

Yeah. I mean, you know, and to Morocco's credit, like they they identified the strategy 50 years ago. They, when, when the, when the land grab happened in 1975. Right. Like they were ready. They sent hundreds of thousands of people in, they built a gigantic wall which is insane. And they've been locked in and basically ready to hold the claim. So in February of this year, of this year now, US Decided to start leading the talks to resolve this. Trump wants that Nobel Peace Prize. They had direct talks between Morocco, Polisaria, which are the indigenous resistance group, Algeria and Mauritania. The Morocco proposes this new, you know, 40 page document called the Madrid 2026 roadmap. In May, Rubio R. Rubio said this. He reiterated that the United States recognizes Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara and supports Morocco's serious, credible and realistic autonomy proposal as the only basis for a just and lasting solution to the dispute. And talked about the Abraham Accords again.

[Aiden]

But this has really snowballed recently.

[Brandon]

Yes, it's like the last couple years.

[Chris]

There's like decades of no action in this.

[Brandon]

Yeah, in like the last two decades of this being a stalemate and then this, I mean, you know, the last couple years, major countries have been turning. End of last year, UN flips, which is huge. And now this year, Trump and Rubio are directly involved trying to resolve this. And the current state, right now Morocco has this new proposal. Everybody's talking. But ultimately, if this is really going to resolve, the Polisario, who are the insurgent group representing the indigenous tribes, needs to agree to it. They are still saying, absolutely not, we refuse to. And until they, I mean, until there's a resolution of some kind, you have hundreds of thousands of people still in a refugee camp for the rest of the year.

[Chris]

Actually, it seems like there's progress on the, the UN recognition, everything, but nothing has actually changed. This is the boots on the ground reality for it seems like decades is that they have a wall. They're, they're operating as if they own it. And now people are going, yeah, you own it.

[Brandon]

It's just, it's been a Taiwan situation where everybody tiptoes and doesn't commit. And now they're just basically all of the world powers are turning and going, morocco, we support you. And so the ability for the pulse area to resist this is basically disintegrating.

[Chris]

Right. That was their last hope, I guess, was like.

[Brandon]

Right. Because up until this point they've been able to paint themselves as the people who were being oppressed in this situation. And at this point, Morocco has kind of won the international battle. And now it's just a matter of, like, how do they get the insurgents to sign something? Finally, you know what?

[Aiden]

The UN resolution doesn't necessarily give them what they want, though, right? If the UN. If the UN plan or the UN approval the UN's proposal goes through, that's Morocco controlling this area.

[Brandon]

It's not even really a proposal. It's the UN just saying we.

[Aiden]

We sign support.

[Brandon]

We sign off conceptually with what Morocco wants, rather than what they had been doing for many years, which is saying, we think there should be an independence vote. Morocco's main goal is to stop there from ever being a vote about whether they should be independent. And now they are successfully stopping that. So pretty lovable stuff. And we'll see if they win against France.

[Chris]

The most shocking part of this is that all the betting markets have France winning, but this was a more interesting story. And so our official prediction will be that Morocco win.

[Aiden]

Morocco with the upset of the tournament.

[Chris]

Morocco with the upset of the tournament. Because they have a more interesting piece of news.

[Brandon]

But I literally started reading about this, and I was like, it'd be really cool to kind of learn something about Morocco. Maybe I can kind of root for him a little bit more. And I was like, ooh, this actually not that likable of a story. Morocco. Super endearing story, but I would argue, very interesting story.

[Chris]

Very, very interesting, which is why Morocco is going to the round of four.

[Brandon]

Huge upset. Congratulations.

[Chris]

Quite upset. My support independence in Western Sahara after this.

[Brandon]

Okay. It is kind of badass to have this grudge match. French came in and took over Morocco in, like, 1912. Isn't that sick to be like, we're going to take. I guess it's, you know, it's kind of like if we were fighting.

[Chris]

There's a ton of, like, colonial era matches in the World cup so far, by the way, if you look at it, even Portugal, Spain is like, in the 1400s, those two countries split the world in two and said, we get one half, you get the other half. That is what they literally did.

[Brandon]

That's less of a grudge match. I don't know.

[Chris]

Okay, well, that's more.

[Brandon]

They're fighting over toys. Like, that's. That's two spoiled kids. Like, that's not the same as a grudge match.

[Aiden]

There's a joke for a comedian I like, and he's. He's talking about how, like, dumb US sports rivalries are. And he was like, your town from over there makes you mad. Or like, you've been rivals for decades. And he's like, you know, in soccer, every Year Serbia plays Croatia.

[Brandon]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Yeah. There's been some bloody wars that are solving the pitch nowadays.

[Brandon]

Yeah.

[Aiden]

So you guys know that I got a fourth job.

[Chris]

We did.

[Aiden]

I've been doing construction.

[Chris]

Construction.

[Aiden]

And I decided that's not enough for me because I'm a bit of an entrepreneur. I decided to make the Thin Yellow line hat. But I have, I'm not kidding, 2000 of these hats in a warehouse that I decided to make and I need to sell them. Any ideas about, like, how I can make a website to, like, sell those to people?

[Brandon]

You could go through an enormously complex set of doing all of this yourself, but you could also just go to Shopify, use them to make an online platform. Makes it incredibly easy to sell whatever product for your business. Aiden, even though you made 2,000 of these things first, seemingly before having any idea of what you're doing afterwards and

[Chris]

not really being a representative of the thin yellow line of construction. But with Shopify, nothing stands between your idea and a real business. So go make it one.

[Aiden]

Doing construction for one. You also said that with an air of like, my business isn't real and I'm working super hard and I've.

[Chris]

I talk a lot about it. I've never seen you construct that.

[Aiden]

You use Shopify to sell Ludwig's inventory out of our old garage. And now it's my turn to sell this.

[Brandon]

I'm glad that Shopify is going to allow you to focus on your real passion, which is construction. And you can start [e-mail] lemonade that is shopify.com lemonade.

[Aiden]

Support for this show comes from Anthropic and Claude.

[Chris]

Claude, the LLM of choice for the thinking man. That's the tagline I'm giving them. I want to give a real use case. I am part of a Pokemon Nuzlocke tournament hosted by Point Crow and I don't know any of the Pokemon type matchups. So I asked my good friend and

[Brandon]

personal friend Claude and executive assistant and

[Chris]

executive Claude to create this game. I literally did, like a one sentence. I don't even know what my prompt was. It was Claude, my good friend, can you code up a game that tests my knowledgeable type? It created this type master, which pops in a thing and then I have to guess, I believe super effective against rock is fighting. Yes, I'm right. Okay. And then it gives me a sound effect if I'm right. And I just keeps testing it and it tells you why you're wrong. And I've been drilling this a little bit a few minutes at a time and it's been actually helping me learn the game and it's like a really great ui. It just pops all together. I thought it was pretty cool.

[Aiden]

Do you ever have that feeling where you really want to make fun of Brandon but he's showing you something cool so you can't be like this Nerd.

[Chris]

This is.

[Aiden]

Cut it. This is kind of awesome.

[Chris]

Yeah. This is sick, bro.

[Aiden]

Well, if you. You can use Claude like me where I send about 50 messages a day checking my Swedish grammar.

[Brandon]

Yeah.

[Aiden]

And I've actually been grinding out my reading and writing with Claude and, and assisting like messaging friends and things like that and it's been super helpful.

[Brandon]

So for problems we're solving. Get started with Claude today at Claude AI Lemonade. That's Claude AI Lemonade. And check out Claude Pro, which includes access to all the features mentioned in Today's episode. Claude AI Lemonade. Your team just added its 67th AI tool and also your 67th security blind spot. The good news, the Vanta agent works like a GRC engineer in the background, finding every app your team uses, scoring the risk and drafting fixes for you. Vanta is the platform used by over 16,000 fast moving companies like Ramp Cursor and Harvey who are shaping the future with AI and staying ahead of AI risk. Get [e-mail].

[Chris]

well, let's stay on the top half of the bracket and let's do Norway versus England.

[Aiden]

Ok. Oh well, well, well. It's been a Nordic fun fact of the week. Snuck its way.

[Chris]

Take that hat off. Take that hat off. Cause no blue collar American. Your hands are softening in real time.

[Brandon]

Ooh, the microphone hurts.

[Aiden]

Well, I. Well, as I described earlier, I thought it was somewhat challenging to find a piece of news about Norway right now that isn't. Holland dominates the competition record goal setting.

[Chris]

Like a lot of Holland stuff.

[Aiden]

So many articles. We. So many articles. We even had it as a segment last week. It's like Norway does Norway fans do the row on an escalator.

[Brandon]

Which is cool news by the way. It's cool.

[Aiden]

I'll give it to you.

[Chris]

It's cool when they want to look cool. I wonder if Sweden was pissed,

[Aiden]

but I did have two recent stories out of Norway from the past day about their perspective or involvement on the war with Ukraine. So a bit of a shorter thing. The Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi visited a bunch of the Nordic countries and Norway was one of his last. I think Norway was his last stop. And after meeting with the Norwegian Prime Minister, he made a public Statement about China's obligation to be the channel for diplomacy in the Ukraine Russian war, basically asking for China.

[Chris]

The Norwegian guy said this.

[Aiden]

Yes, like China is the one big ally and power that has the means to convince Russia to make big concessions and wind this thing down and publicly called upon China to be the channel by which those negotiations are done. And I admit, like when reading through this article, I felt a little, it did feel a little like. Or else type language.

[Chris]

Well, yeah.

[Aiden]

Where. How much meaning does this statement really have other than like public words of support? What sort of means does like Norway have to pressure the conflict in any significant way but within a 24 hour period? I read a different article about how Norway is committing over $300 million to Ukrainian Air defenses right now. And the reason why that's really important is we've talked a ton about the Ukraine Russian war in like the last couple weeks and how there's like all these changing developments there. But one of the last things that Russia has at the moment to really pressure Ukraine is they can fly ballistic missiles into Kyiv.

[Chris]

Yeah, they have been.

[Aiden]

And it's one of the only things they can still do effectively because Ukraine does not have adequate air defenses because these systems are so complex and expensive and they don't have access to them. So Norway is directly funding air defense systems with this money. They're making that commitment publicly now. And it's one of the last holes in the Ukrainian defense that is mounting a lot of pressure on Russia at the moment to finally make concessions in this war.

[Brandon]

Do you know what that looks like? I can't imagine you go to Walmart and pick up an air missile defense system for $10 million.

[Aiden]

When's the last time you've been to Walmart? Unlike.

[Brandon]

Be honest, Doug, you yellow line mogged me.

[Aiden]

I bet.

[Chris]

Yeah, it's no rifles.

[Aiden]

You can tell he's, he's, he's been getting out of touch. That's why you got.

[Chris]

People get air defense.

[Aiden]

You can get it like.

[Chris]

Yeah, dude.

[Aiden]

Well, you know about the gun show loophole, right?

[Chris]

Yeah, using the gun show loophole to get a. So you can get $300 million air defense system.

[Brandon]

Is that how we get around not declaring war on Russia? We host gun shows in Ukraine.

[Aiden]

Yeah, we host gun.

[Chris]

We're not helping offering wares up. We're.

[Brandon]

We're showing off our cool stuff.

[Chris]

Wait, pull this article because it tracks what you're saying. I read this yesterday. It was Zelensky's basically going on a tour of Europe and America saying the battle in the sky will decide the outcome of the war and is asking for air defense missiles. That totally tracks with what you're saying. He's saying the same thing. It's very, very important. The aerial battle.

[Aiden]

Yeah.

[Brandon]

And I would just assume that's like a decade to build up. That seems so hard to build in short term while your country is being attacked. But I don't know if that was discussed at all.

[Chris]

Yeah, I know war is easy, Doug. Nobody said war is easy.

[Aiden]

I don't know what the turnaround time on building out adequate air defense systems in Ukraine is, but I do know that other examples of attacks on Kyiv, like drone attacks from Russia, are way more limited right now. So there's this one, and I forget his name right now. There's this one, like, younger journalist who's been living in Kyiv for a while, and he talked about how over the course of the war, at night you can often hear the sounds of a ton of different drones flying through the sky all the time. And recently it's been much more quiet because the cell towers in Belarus that are required to fly the drones that deep into Ukrainian territory are no longer operating because of Zelenskyy's threats he made towards Belarus. He's like, see us attacking Moscow, you know, we could do the same to you if you do not.

[Brandon]

Whoa.

[Aiden]

Comply.

[Chris]

And those badass.

[Aiden]

Reduce your support for Russia either through these cell towers, through intelligence threatening Belarus to no longer support Russia in this war. And because of that, the ways that Moscow can get to attack the capital,

[Chris]

I think it's good to walk through it. I mean, because, yeah, Lukashenko running Belarus has been super, super helpful to Putin so far in this war and the recent Ukrainian success. He's been scared. He's been like. He like switches. He's like, you know what? I think Ukraine has a right to itself. And then like you said, Zelensky, like, threatened him. He's like, all right, well, if you believe that, then turn off your fucking cell towers.

[Aiden]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Or we're going to do it for you.

[Brandon]

So if so Belarus cell towers are the ones powering Russian attacks.

[Chris]

Yeah. Because they're. It's the northern border of Ukraine. So they were going through there and using their.

[Aiden]

Yeah. And apparently the boots on the ground reality, at least in the capital, is that because these cell towers are no longer providing that service to Russia, there's limited ability to fly Russian drones that deep into Ukrainian territory now.

[Chris]

Makes sense.

[Brandon]

Yeah, that makes sense.

[Chris]

Crazy. That's awesome.

[Aiden]

And so all they have is the ballistic missiles, hence the need. The greater need for the air defense system.

[Chris]

Yeah. Direct quote from the article. There remains only one unknown. Zelenskyy said, unfortunately it's the anti ballistic defense that is the major weakness for Ukraine in this equation. That's basically saying we've else handled. If we can just figure this out, we can win this war. That's. That's his optimistic take. Not with this photo. Really doesn't my optimism. But yeah.

[Aiden]

Yeah. And that's how my Nordic fun fact of the week morphed into a little more Ukraine Russia news.

[Brandon]

It's just not about Norway.

[Chris]

Norway quite a bit.

[Aiden]

I was reading, I was reading this other article.

[Brandon]

It was like something about the Nordics.

[Aiden]

It was something that the OECD had published. And the article, it's like, why Norway's economic stagnation is like something to look out for or something to that avail. And, and the article starts off by saying like, Norway is an incredibly well off country with low income inequality, high incomes. But it could be bad in the future. But it could be bad in the future.

[Chris]

No, it's ridiculous.

[Aiden]

And not to say that something like can't get worse in Norway, but it was funny. Is like, as I'm looking for news, this like critical article of what's going wrong in Norway economically right now is like, all right, things are pretty good, let's be honest.

[Chris]

Yeah. Comparatively, it's like they're just doing so much better. Even if there's some small.

[Brandon]

Yeah, they got Holland.

[Chris]

Yeah, they have.

[Aiden]

They have Holland. And I'm wondering what they even have to fear against England. If they can power Ukrainian air defenses, surely they can stop the cup from coming home.

[Chris]

Right?

[Brandon]

So looking at English news recently, what I found, Harry Kane's a little baby bitch. They're moving on. Norway wins.

[Aiden]

All right. All right. That was easy. That one was easy.

[Chris]

The UK has never had it rougher, dude. They don't even get a segment on our podcast. Okay, okay, dude.

[Brandon]

Trying to find something about England specifically. Not only is it all about the World cup, even more so it's about the UK and not about England. And so the best I got, which actually I do think is pretty interesting, is there's a guy who's set to replace Keir Starmer named, well,

[Chris]

Nigel Farage is going to win, but it's the other guy.

[Aiden]

It's B party guy, Andy Burnham.

[Chris]

Andy Burnham.

[Brandon]

Nigel Farage also seems like he's going through a silly little drama. Right?

[Chris]

Nigel Raj is like the rn. He's the. He's the fucking.

[Brandon]

He's A goofball.

[Chris]

Yeah, he's. He's crazy.

[Brandon]

Okay, correct me, correct me if I get my UK politics wrong because I don't understand the UK that much. So the king personally elects the leader.

[Chris]

The king does everything. He builds the, the tanks.

[Brandon]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Chris]

He builds the boat.

[Aiden]

And thank God we freed ourselves from him. Yeah, maybe 250.

[Chris]

King George the 48th is still in power. The long lineage. And he runs shit. He taxes your damn tea. That's the first thing. Yeah, that's his step.

[Aiden]

They don't talk about that anymore.

[Chris]

They don't talk about it, but he still does it. No, he doesn't.

[Brandon]

Labor Party. What is in control with Keir Starmer? Keir Starmer just stepped down. So they need to, they need to elect a new pm. And currently the main guy is Andy Burnham. And what I thought was interesting about this is he. So he was like the mayor of Manchester, which is the city in northeast England. And actually we pull up a map again if you want to pull a map of England. Now as a hot blooded, God fearing, freedom drinking, beer loving American, I don't give a shit about England. I don't know where the countries are. I don't know where the cities are. Manchester apparently is in the north of Lincoln.

[Aiden]

It's in the north Holland they call

[Chris]

the king in the north.

[Brandon]

They do call him that because they loved how he did as the mayor of Manchester, which is, you know, one of the other big cities in England. And so his whole thing which I thought was interesting because it relates to just straight up England is the push to decentralize power out of London and spread it to the other cities. That is like really what he's pushing on. And this has been something he's actually been pushing on for a while. So in 2017 there was a study by IPPR north showing that over like a seven year period, even though there was a 2014 initiative to be like, we're going to invest more in the north of England, actually the government expenditures in England, in north England with those smaller cities, fell by 6.3 billion pounds. While the south of England, which includes London, actually had an increase. So Burnham at that time, this is 2018, said almost five years after the government prom to us a northern powerhouse, we learned that the public spending in the north has fallen while rising in the south. This has got to stop. And it's time that the north came to the front of the queue for public investment. And I didn't know this. Apparently, apparently the UK is one of the most centralized governments in the G7 or I should let me rephrase, that is the most centralized. 96% of taxes, or, sorry, 94% of taxes are raised nationally rather than locally. And 80% of all money spent by the central government rather than local governments. So it's an extremely centralized government, even though their central government is kind of dysfunctional. Doesn't get anything done. And so what I thought was interesting about this Burnham guy, he is most likely gonna be the next Prime Minister of Britain.

[Aiden]

Wait, can you help me out a sec? He's gonna be the Prime Minister of Britain for the remainder of what would have been Starmer's term until. Until the election happens.

[Chris]

I don't know when the election. It's years. Starmer's stepping down. Can they can go for. I think it's like three to five years. It's a long time. So he's still going to run the country for a while.

[Aiden]

Yeah.

[Brandon]

So this is him talking about this centralization. We are one of the most over

[Chris]

centralized countries in the world. And worse, that over centralized heart of the country is not pulling in the same way, but in different directions.

[Brandon]

That's really the core of it reality. So he talks as somebody who was a MP for I don't know, like 16 years or something. And then this mayor, he's making a big push to say, look, our country has become entirely centralized. All the power, all the spending in London, and it's dysfunctional. And my explicit goal is to radically push power out of London and back to the other parts, to local governments around England. And I did not realize how centralized the English government is. And it's, I think, pretty cool for him to push for this. He's a more like so not like hardcore socialists, but more in that vein of like more government spending and local support. But this is interesting. He's pushing for the rest of England to actually have success.

[Aiden]

I think if you spend time talking to friends that live in different parts of the uk, it's pretty crazy the way they see their futures. Like most people around my age. From there you're faced with this weird decision of if I really want to progress in my education or career, I pretty much have to move to London. But then I have to figure out how to afford to live there. And I'm kind of gambling on the idea that my education or career development in that place will be good enough that I'll be able to afford it. I'll create a better life for myself versus the economic stagnation of these smaller cities around the country, especially in the north.

[Brandon]

Yeah. There's graphs all over the place basically showing that like GDP and spending and everything is just going down in basically everywhere else except London where it's going up. So. And actually a cool thing. One of the, one of the explicit things he is proposing if he becomes Prime Minister, which currently there's not even another candidate to become Prime Minister, so probably he will be.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Brandon]

Is he's going to have a second office in Manchester. So he's literally going to have the Prime Minister have a second office in one of the northern cities. Which, you know, may just be symbolic, but that's a, that's a key thing, right?

[Chris]

No, he seems super tied to me. I mean given his background as mayor of the area, he seems like he's actually going to follow through and try to move things there. But it remains to be seen like a lot of this stuff comes from network effects. Right. Like London is successful because it's successful in it.

[Brandon]

Yeah.

[Chris]

It's like, can you really do. Maybe you can, we'll see.

[Brandon]

But as a guy who in politics gets hyped up by the most recent thing he's heard, he's got some great stuff. I love this guy. He's. He seems great.

[Aiden]

Yeah. I think my fear is kind of that entrenchment you're bringing up where you hear a lot of the financial success in Britain that does exist has to do with like the financial services sector sector in London and what it specifically offers. Either because the city of London exists within London, which is its like own financially carved out city in a bunch of different ways. The attraction of London to like global elites and investors. How much of this industry that you have diverted so many of your country's resources and planning into over time for various reasons, can really be distributed to the rest of the country. I'm not saying that this won't be successful. I'm not saying that the UK can't dig itself out of a hole. That's kind of the thing I think about is like the country has consolidated so heavily around the economic success of this one sector servicing a type of client. And so many things are built around that in London. What is breaking a piece of that really look like and giving it to the rest of the country?

[Brandon]

Let's bring back Grimsby.

[Chris]

Who's Grimsby?

[Brandon]

It's over there on the east. I've never heard of this before in my life.

[Chris]

Grimsby right there.

[Brandon]

Zoom in, Zoom in, Perry. Zoom in on Grimby. Oh, more to the east.

[Chris]

I don't know about Grimsby.

[Brandon]

Down does bring up a there Grimsby,

[Chris]

which your mouse is over it. Zoom in some of the reactions.

[Brandon]

All right. That's the heart and soul of England.

[Chris]

The UK is like ok, he's going to take some stuff out of London and make it better in the north. But people in the south west are saying, well, fuck me. Well because they're already stagnating so hard and there's no real. They're not even getting mentioned counterpoint.

[Brandon]

Fuck those guys.

[Chris]

That's what my chest.

[Aiden]

We need the north if I'm in Wales east. What mean do you he say me for?

[Chris]

I heard yeah, I have a younger, more gen Z Chad. But they were just like, yeah, well those guys are all chavs and stupid. They're forgotten about. But I guess there doesn't seem to be a lot of like, hey, let's

[Brandon]

fix the problems outside of it's trickle down grims bics. It will follow from Grimsby. And that's why I think, to be honest, England doesn't have any cool news going on right now.

[Aiden]

My backup story for England was that Pontins. It's very.

[Chris]

Well, you talk about Pontons all the time.

[Aiden]

They're closing them. It's urgent.

[Brandon]

What is a Pontons?

[Chris]

It's a nearly defunct amusement park. One of the worst amusement parks in the world.

[Aiden]

I want you to imagine British Chuck E. Cheese, but it's British and it's an overnight camp and that's kind of what Pontins is.

[Chris]

Dude, you're getting stabbed and you said that's an angle. Nine times out of ten you're getting stabbed at Pontins.

[Aiden]

Norway moves on as the impartial party. You have to vote who wins between Norway and England.

[Chris]

I'll give it to England. I'll give it to England.

[Brandon]

Even England.

[Chris]

I'll give it to England. Only because the Norway one is mostly a Ukraine story. If you.

[Brandon]

Yeah, that's a.

[Chris]

This is just Norway. Just.

[Brandon]

We looked at a map of Ukraine and Belarus. Five minutes.

[Aiden]

Norwegians, I'm begging you for. Just sound off in the comments with a non World cup related story in your country and from the past month, please.

[Chris]

I'm just going to roast some more, dude.

[Aiden]

And it can't be the. Can't be the rowing. Okay, well why don't we mosey on down to Belgium versus Spain. Okay? All right. All right.

[Brandon]

Now if you put a gun to my head and asked me to tell you anything about Belgium, I think you

[Chris]

could tell me these three things. Belgium. What is it known for outside of Belgium?

[Aiden]

It's known for having Brussels which is often considered one of the least fun tourist destinations in Europe.

[Chris]

True. Also the capital of the eu. Consider all the EU organization meets there. But that's boring. What is Belgium known for? If you are a. Put on your hat. If you're a blue collar American. Are you.

[Brandon]

Are you saying waffles? Actually.

[Chris]

Damn it. That's probably the first thing.

[Brandon]

That's the only thing.

[Chris]

No, there's two other things. There's diamonds. Okay. Belgian capital of diamonds. And chocolate. Okay. Diamonds and chocolate. So these are two of Belgium's biggest exports by far. And this is what they've sort of built some of their. Belgium has an economy which is they have almost no natural resources. They just buy and they manufacture and they upgrade and they make something else and they sell it. They're one of the world's best at that. And they've become a prosperous nation on that. And their exports are diamonds and chocolate. And there's actually been two beast big stories in these areas. So I wanted to bring up both. I'm doing a double whammy in diamonds. There's a single square mile in the city of Antwerp that is known as the diamond district. And every single diamond company and diamond family worldwide has an extremely expensive bit of real estate there. And they have on. On the surface looks fine. All those streets have bollards that can come out to block exits. And it goes deep underground. It's actually one of the most secure areas in the world. They have some of the most advanced vaults in the world because the amount of diamonds in this one square mile are insane. And there has been a famous heist

[Aiden]

where you think me and my boys couldn't crack that sieve.

[Chris]

I don't think so.

[Brandon]

You get out of colt your colt 45.

[Chris]

You get out your colt 45, you bring a brew and you bring an American conference.

[Aiden]

And I bring four American friends.

[Chris]

Yeah, you could do it. They won't catch you on any of the cameras. So the diamond industry has been going through some tough times recently because, number one, younger people aren't getting married as much. So they literally invented a thing called a divorce ring to try and sell more to boomers who are getting divorced.

[Brandon]

That's a wait real quick.

[Aiden]

Yeah.

[Brandon]

Do you give the divorce ring to your partner when you get divorced or do you buy it for yourself?

[Chris]

Buy it for yourself.

[Aiden]

This isn't working out anymore.

[Brandon]

Speaking of that single get on one knee.

[Aiden]

It was.

[Chris]

We had a good run. You, me, me.

[Aiden]

40 years from now, next to my girlfriend. I think this is over. You just crack the box.

[Chris]

Nicest divorce ring you've ever seen. No, legitimately they're doing that because people aren't getting married as much and.

[Brandon]

But don't tell me the divorce ring business is suffering from fake diamonds.

[Chris]

The fake diamonds are the other part. Shit, the rise of fake, or I mean fake is probably the right just lab produced diamonds are undercutting this deck. You know, centuries long business that has been based here. And so the second thing that's been squeezing them, that's more immediate is the tariffs. A large part of the diamond exports go to America, billions of dollars, and they are getting hit with the new Trump tariffs. And it's drastically cutting into their margins and the ability of them to be a major diamond exporter. And so enter this ring. This is a really gorgeous ring where dozens of diamonds spell out the letter T next to the stars and stripes 1776, 2026, the numbers 45 and 47 in Superman logos. A diamond winged eagle carries a ruby shield catching an olive branch of emeralds. Below, a radiant 250 atop the phrase 250 years USA etched in 18 karat gold. This is a very, very expensive ring. I wonder who it went to. Could you guess if I gave you 15 guesses?

[Aiden]

15?

[Chris]

Yeah. Just off the top of your head, who do you think this ring went to? If tariffs are your problem, it better

[Aiden]

not have gone to Hillary Clinton.

[Chris]

It was presented to Donald J. Trump, who promptly removed the US Tariffs on diamond imports. So now, at least in the short term, Antwerp's diamond industry has a bit of relief. These diamond companies needed relief. So very similar to how the US Presented some information to FIFA to get a red card removed. Belgium is following suit on the diamond industry.

[Brandon]

Do you think we gave him the ring?

[Chris]

Yeah, maybe. Maybe he passed the ring along. It was a circle.

[Brandon]

Yeah, it's just a favor that gets passed from one corrupt organization.

[Chris]

And then I want to say something about the chocolate industry, because Belgian chocolates, everyone knows that they've been the world leader in chocolates for a very long time. They have the highest chocolate content in their cocoa. Content in their chocolates.

[Brandon]

Can I guess the thing that is disrupting this business?

[Chris]

Yeah, sure.

[Brandon]

Mr. Beast.

[Chris]

Mr. Oh, you think it's feastables, right?

[Brandon]

Was that right?

[Chris]

I couldn't do a Belgian accent, but I wanted them raging about Mr. Beast. It was not Mr. Beast. In fact, Mr. Beast is also being disrupted by the same thing, which is that climate, all of the world's cocoa, much like all our phosphates here, or. Sorry, yeah, all our phosphates here.

[Brandon]

Yeah, that was roughly.

[Chris]

Roughly. Right. All of our world's cocoa is grown here.

[Brandon]

And ah, that is Cape Verde. I just learned about that.

[Chris]

Yeah. And Ghana. Those two countries.

[Brandon]

That's not true. Sorry, never mind. Never mind.

[Chris]

Isn't it?

[Aiden]

Yeah, it is.

[Chris]

Right?

[Brandon]

No, no, it's not Cape Verde.

[Chris]

Oh

[Aiden]

wait, so all of this cocoa in Africa.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Aiden]

Is being sent to Belgium?

[Chris]

That's right.

[Aiden]

Be turned into chocolate.

[Chris]

Not all. It goes to. Some of it to Hershey and Mr. Beast.

[Aiden]

Right.

[Chris]

But yeah, all of the cocoa comes from here and it goes to the world's chocolate companies and they make the delicious candy bars you enjoy. However, a little thing called climate change. Fake and gay. As you always tell me, they're making it up. Well whether to make it up or not, these two countries are really in on the act because rising heat waves and floods have devastated the cocoa crop consistently. Last year it was horrendous. And the price of chocolate got so high that many companies like Hershey started removing the name chocolate bar from their bars because they didn't meet the minimum required amount of cocoa to be a chocolate bar. This really fucked with Belgium because they're known for having the highest cocoa content. So what's happening now is there was a brief relief. Prices went back down, everyone celebrated, chocolate was making a comeback. But then they started rising again because again the problems there have not gone away. And so now the largest chocolate company in Belgium has realized that they have two options. One is raise prices, which they tried but then their sales went way down and they realized, okay, that's not gonna work. The second option is to start making fake chocolate. So recent announcement is that Belgium's largest company, Barry Callebaut is like putting all of their money and R and D and effort into creating a new type of synthetic chocolate that doesn't require cocoa. That is the big update out of Belgium. They're betting on cocoa free chocolate.

[Brandon]

They can replace it with phosphate.

[Aiden]

Go phosphate.

[Chris]

Chocolate, rare earth minerals and phosphate. That way we can find easier supply chain.

[Brandon]

What's the most abundant stuff on the planet? Let's put all that in there.

[Chris]

And finally, I guess the third thing I'll say is that they have a third export which is beer. And they're just also struggling with that because Gen Z is not drinking.

[Brandon]

So like these three ruining everything.

[Chris]

I know. So these three big exports of Belgium are all coming under fire.

[Brandon]

Save yourself, Aiden.

[Chris]

And we did our job.

[Brandon]

One of us two got married.

[Chris]

We got married.

[Brandon]

We drinks occasionally on rare occasion.

[Aiden]

I mean I feel candy that didn't.

[Brandon]

Yeah, no, we're failing to kind of

[Aiden]

a made up issue, don't you think? Because the heat wave that we're experiencing is probably just going to peter off. We'll go back to normal, dude.

[Chris]

Actually, the fourth thing out of Belgium is that they're getting melted by this heat wave it's destroying. That's every piece of news that isn't World Cup. It's like we're melting, but we're crushing it.

[Aiden]

Soccer.

[Chris]

That's short.

[Aiden]

Aiden knows a guy.

[Chris]

Yeah. Okay.

[Aiden]

I messaged too, because I heard about how bad these French heat waves have been.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Aiden]

And I checked in with like my two friends that live in Paris and they're sending me what they're doing during the heat wave to like, they keep like wet T shirts and like put them in the fridge and then take them out and wear them. It's like 35 degrees Celsius indoors, which I think is like high. It's like high 90s.

[Chris]

Oh, fuck.

[Aiden]

And sorry. Sorry. That's at night. Yeah, that's at night when they're trying to sleep. That's not during the day.

[Chris]

You can't sleep at night.

[Aiden]

But the main thing they were complaining about was they just have no reprieve. You can't go anywhere to find.

[Chris]

There's no AC anywhere.

[Aiden]

Solace away from it because so few places have air conditioning. And there's this huge spike in drownings in the country. Like over a thousand drowning deaths. Because all of these people seeking out going swimming at the same time.

[Chris]

Don't add that to my story because that's too sad.

[Aiden]

Anyway, that's. No, that's France. That's France. Don't worry. Don't let it stain Belgium's reputation.

[Chris]

In Belgium, which is loaded with ac,

[Aiden]

as far as I understand. Go look that up. I'm stand up comedian John Marco Cerese.

[Chris]

And I'm actor penis model Russell Daniels.

[Aiden]

The Downside is our podcast where we bring on guests to talk about how miserable their lives are because less face it, things are not getting better. Every episode we talk about what's wrong with our lives. Our guests lives, the world.

[Chris]

But in a fun way.

[Aiden]

Bottom line is you're gonna walk away feeling better about your life. We've had so many cool guests. Caleb Huron.

[Brandon]

Busy Phillips.

[Aiden]

Stavros Halkias, Laverne Cox. Hassan Piker.

[Brandon]

Alana Glaser.

[Chris]

I promise you're gonna have a good time.

[Aiden]

Now on the Vox Media podcast Network work.

[Chris]

This is the Downside.

[Brandon]

Okay, That's Belgium.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Brandon]

Surely the heat isn't bad in Spain. Who are they all?

[Aiden]

It's actually been a frigid 55 degrees Fahrenheit. No, I actually, I found this interesting story about Spain after I read that lovely article about Spain's midfield

[Chris]

because I

[Aiden]

got sucked in by the headline, got

[Chris]

to know what's going on with the

[Aiden]

midfield and they have just passed like a resolution regarding immigration amnesty at a time when Europe is really cracking down on immigration and scrutinizing the way that people can even freely move within the eu. And Spain stands as one of the major countries within Europe that is taking a very different approach to tackling immigration. And while we have this very specific image of European immigration over the past 10 years of people coming from like northern Africa on boats over the Mediterranean Sea, Spain, the majority of their immigration and the majority of their like quote unquote illegal immigration is people coming from Latin America on short term visas that they're able to get and then just coming to the country and not leaving, which is a huge portion of their population. Now a crazy stat. In less than 25 years the country has gone from 1 in 20 immigrants to 1 in 5 people in the country are foreign born. Holy 20 years, less than 25 years. And most of these people that are coming are from South America. I think it's like 25% of like Brazil or what is it, Colombia, Venezuela, Peru were like the three biggest. And then Morocco is in the top end as well. Shout outs to Morocco, crazy stuff going on over there, that's an easy trip. But for the rest of it it's Latin American countries. And the reason that that is the case is because if, because of the shared language and cultural origin and things like that, you have access to this two year citizenship track if you are from one of these places. So if you want to move somewhere else because of instability in your own country, Right. Particularly Venezuelans are a good example where there's been a huge amount of people who have fled Venezuela over the past 10 years for a bunch of reasons we've talked about on the show. And Spain is one of the idealistic destinations because you can get your, you could apply for this type of residency, you have the shared language, you don't have to learn something.

[Chris]

The language is huge.

[Aiden]

And if you wind up with EU citizenship one day, then you can move and work freely in the rest of the European Union. And that has contributed to this huge amount of immigration. And instead of taking a more aggressive approach to shutting down immigration coming into the country, the current party in Charge is opting to take this massive group of people who has overstayed their visas. And as long as they have no history of criminal activity within Spain, they're going to give them like permanent residency status, amnesty or amnesty. And they put out this application for all of these people and not only do they benefit from the residency itself, but they're able to enroll in like Spanish social programs and access to things within the Spanish system that they didn't have access to before. So what I thought was interesting is they actually do have a history of doing this already. Like they, at certain points in history. I think the last time I'm probably getting this wrong, I think the last time was in like 2006. But they'll pass a resolution like this and then have these applications go out and then give a bunch of people residency all at once. However, this time is like four times as many people as any previous time. They've done this before.

[Brandon]

Yeah.

[Aiden]

And they, even when they had made, when they did the vote to put out this application or to pass this resolution, they expected like 500,000 applicants, I think. And this time they have 1.2 million applicants.

[Brandon]

What's the population of Spain? It's like what, 60 million? I want to say 50 million. That's a lot, a lot of people.

[Aiden]

So, so it's, and this isn't like a policy that's like free from divisiveness within Spain. It polled at like 38% support, 34% against, and then the remaining like agnostic to it. But this general story, I was talking to a friend like a couple weeks ago and I just didn't realize what a huge portion of the workforce and population within Spain now is from Latin American countries. Like I wasn't really aware of that. And I realized like the Spanish speaking world just by filtering of news media and by it existing primarily in another language. Like this is, you know, this is a native, like native Spanish speakers are greater than English speakers. And this is just like a, you know, a space of news that I am like so blind to because of that and the scale at which this immigration is happening. And Spain is still pretty pro immigration because they feel like they need it to like economically fuel their country.

[Brandon]

Right.

[Aiden]

Spain has been like particularly stagnant for a long time. High youth unemployment and they still a huge portion of the Spanish government. And Spanish people see this immigrant population as a vehicle to like growing economically growing out of their current situation. Not everybody agrees on that. But that is the reason to favor this sort of policy versus the more Aggressive approach that a lot of other European countries.

[Chris]

Yeah, I will say if they're already there, undocumented. So my wife's parents were given amnesty. No defense of Ronald Reagan here, But in the 80s Ronald Reagan did amnesty, a huge amount of amnesty for people who had done the same thing but in America from Mexico and her parents got some of the Reagan amnesty. And what it does is it allows you to go from being this undocumented, hard to like build a real life off the grid system to being able to be a tax paying productive. So you can, you're part of the economy, you can do normal social programs, you can, everything's just above board and it allows you to, to be more productive and part of the society that you're part of. So I would think like the argument about immigration is one thing, but if there's already all these people in your country, allowing them to fill out publication, become part of the society and do everything above board, I think it's just better. I think amnesty is underrated as a method of getting everybody rowing in the same direction back to Norway.

[Aiden]

I don't know all of the pros and cons well enough, but I think this is the general approach that I wanted to see within the US So it's interesting to see a country approaching it this way with such a large group of people. I do think there was a stipulation about how long they've lived in the country. You need to meet a minimum threshold of how long you've been there as well as not being a criminal. But yeah, that was my big Spanish news story then moving to do that.

[Brandon]

And we are probably not qualified to say so maybe if there's someone who's Spanish in the community. But whether the, you know, culture and vibes around immigration change substantially when the immigrants speak your language. Right. Because that is such a. Yeah, it's such an obvious othering of a person and it feels like they're not going to integrate into society easily because it is really fucking hard to learn a language. And that's what so much of culture is about. Right. And I just, I like, I'm trying to imagine a world where what if everybody in South America or, or you know, Mexico, wherever the majority of the immigrant population to America, if they spoke English, if that was everybody's shared language, would that change at all the American perception of immigration? You know, I don't, I don't know.

[Aiden]

I imagine there is a huge difference in opinion within Spain for that reason. Yeah.

[Brandon]

Like you intuitively, that feels like it Would make massive difference.

[Aiden]

I mean, not to say that Spain would be. Is like racism free or something, but. But I think the idea that like, oh, the majority of these immigrants are just someone I can immediately communicate with, I'm sure that gets rid of a

[Brandon]

lot of people to be an employer and be like, this is a per. I can instantly communicate with this person about whatever is needed.

[Chris]

But in Spain, don't they say Espana and then in Mexico they say Espana?

[Aiden]

Yeah. And that's probably a deal breaker.

[Chris]

That's probably a deal breaker. You got to imagine that th sound is like completely in my understanding.

[Brandon]

You cannot understand Spanish without vosotros. Exactly.

[Chris]

What's so true? Such a big.

[Aiden]

It's a critical, I think or if you live in like any Latin American country, like your experience or anecdotes about like friends or relatives moving to Spain and like why they did it. Would love to hear that.

[Chris]

I'd love to hear that.

[Aiden]

The little correction I want to put on this, the last time they did this was in 2005 and they had about half as many people get amnesty through that program. So it was about 600,000 in 2005. And now in 2026, it's going to be about 1.3 million, provided everybody gets clears the application process. So.

[Chris]

All right, who's winning?

[Brandon]

Damn. I think, I think we gotta go Spain. I think we gotta go Spain. Belgium. You know, it's funny that they're strong. I just don't feel like there's enormous consequence to diamond prices going up. I don't. It just doesn't feel like that's an industry that I care about at all in any way, shape or form.

[Aiden]

I do feel.

[Brandon]

Well, let me rephrase that. So hold on. I literally, you know, starting to think about this. And ideally I would like to buy a lab grown diamond because I want to suppress the wages of the children in the Congo mining diamonds.

[Aiden]

Right, right.

[Chris]

You're trying to make it to them.

[Aiden]

No, that's me, Me, the evil man that I am no longer buying raw natural diamonds because I want to pay the kids in the Congo less.

[Brandon]

That's what I said when you were talking about the diamond thing. I was like, oh, no, you're gonna have to pay the kids. You're gonna give them minimum voyage age.

[Aiden]

I mean, just seeing like Belgium flip. I think Spain, Spain, Belgium was, you know, has this relationship, like this cocoa supply relationship with African countries. Yeah, I'm always a little wary of that.

[Brandon]

Both industries are.

[Aiden]

So you ever dig into like the like history of like the Belgium rubber trade in Africa.

[Chris]

It's one of the most horrible friendship and camaraderie, and everyone worked together and the profits were shared equally.

[Aiden]

If you want to have a terrible day, go read about that. It is. It is actually. It's insane. Okay.

[Brandon]

But that means we're getting to the final match. Drumroll. Or did we already announce it? Oh, yeah.

[Chris]

Who's the winner?

[Brandon]

The winner of the final match. It's Argentina going up against Switzerland. Oh, my God. It's usa. Trump called FIFA.

[Chris]

USA wins. Belgium removed. Spain removed. Argentina removed. The USA wins. FIFA.

[Aiden]

Oh, my God.

[Brandon]

Is it Switzerland?

[Aiden]

It's Switzerland.

[Brandon]

Switzerland wins.

[Aiden]

Wow.

[Brandon]

So Argentina.

[Chris]

Holy moly. Okay, okay.

[Brandon]

Who's got a story about little Argentina?

[Chris]

I can give you one on Argentina, but we're gonna have to scramble live to get something for Switzerland.

[Brandon]

Yeah, yeah, we'll figure it out. Okay. It's. Yeah, the Swiss chocolate.

[Chris]

So for Argentina, there's been a bit of a story.

[Aiden]

What is Brandon Malay Shill Ewing have to say about Argentina?

[Chris]

Not going to be so much about Malay. I think that's a bigger topic that we could take a long time on. What I want to bring up, the story out of Argentina, is that there is beef about beef. The truth is that America and Argentina are two of the largest beef exporters in the world. And the beef industry of each one, especially America, Argentina, is feeling a little bit threatened by the other. And this World cup has actually been a kickoff point because the Argentinian team and fans, there's a huge steak culture, grilling and steak culture in Argentina. And they've been going around grilling and using Argentina steaks. And there's a lot of debate or competition over who has the better beef. And there's an economic angle to this because beef prices in America have been rising, which directly impacts the popularity of any politician who wants to win. Okay. Because people love their beef here in America, too. And so earlier this year, Donald J. Trump insured affordable beef for the American consumer. And the way he did this, you know, expecting a midterms problem if beef is too high. The way he did this was by drastically expanding the ability of Argentina to export to the US So they opened the floodgates. And so now Argentinian beef is flooding into America, which is good for Argentinian beef exporters. They're making a lot of money. But American beef ranchers are very upset by this, this new competitor that's kind of undercutting them and flowing in. And so the supermarket aisle is being filled with battles over beef over Argentinian versus American beef. They're running ad campaigns in America about how Argentinian beef isn't as good or what isn't marbled as well. Of course, to try and. But the flip side of this is I found Argentinian news. This is translated. So on the other side of it is that this is so good for exporters in Argentina, but it's making the price of beef locally way more expensive because all the beef is being exported to America, which can pay higher prices. And so Argentinian locals are having now the problem that United States is having before, where they can't afford their steak culture. It's becoming way more expensive. So, ironically, it's really hurting. Even though it's making more money for Argentina, it's really hurting Malay because the money's only going to the beef exporters and not the regular people who can't afford the beef. So it's this weird web where everyone's trying to bail each other out politically and also send money to beef producers, and it's going round and round. And, like, eventually, to solve this problem, Argentina might have to, like, import American beef, which is getting cheaper. So they put beef in a circle.

[Brandon]

No, they make it cheaper for Brazil to send beef. And then Brazil, if we keep kicking the ball, if you will, to the next country.

[Aiden]

Country.

[Brandon]

And we just do that forever, and

[Aiden]

then somebody's left holding something at the

[Brandon]

end, by the very end, like, Senegal can't afford beef, but everybody else vegetarian.

[Chris]

Who's the most vegetarian country?

[Brandon]

India.

[Chris]

India. So we'll just get to India eventually.

[Aiden]

No, no.

[Brandon]

India is not selling beef.

[Chris]

This whole plan.

[Aiden]

India does not have selling beef.

[Brandon]

India, you ruined it.

[Chris]

India. You screwed the whole plan.

[Aiden]

I'm gonna let you think about that one.

[Chris]

Later. We'll focus on.

[Brandon]

Is there any. Any definitive answer from your research about whose beef is better?

[Chris]

Whose beef is better? No. I saw arguments for both. Yeah, I couldn't tell you. They both say, be honest. There was a quote in one of the articles, and it was like, some actual person that eats. And he was like, no, they have

[Aiden]

a hard fucking time finding that guy. Guys, we got a guy who eats this week.

[Chris]

This guy. Argentinian fan Gonzalo Herrera browsed packaged meat at a Walmart in Arlington, Texas. He shrugged at the whose beef is better? Debate. Honestly, I don't see a massive difference as he packed 4T bone steaks. I don't. I'm not sure there's a massive difference. They both have a vested interest in saying it's better, but that's. It's A price thing really, for most people. They want to have beef at an affordable price. And there's a beef battle.

[Brandon]

Yeah, hold on. It says down there, quote, there's a big difference. Texans use a lot of pepper, they use butter, they use a little barbecue sauce. Argentina's like to bring all the flavor out of the steak by only using salt.

[Chris]

As you can tell from that quote. That's about what you put on the steak and it's nothing to do with the beef itself. You can do that with either.

[Aiden]

No, you can only salt Argentinian beef. You ruin, you actually ruin Japanese steak if you put salt on it.

[Brandon]

That's true.

[Chris]

That's true. I've heard that. So anyway, that's the Argentinian story. There's a beef battle. Well, what's going on in Switzerland that you just figured out?

[Aiden]

I just figured out.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Aiden]

I did have to do this on the spot, so forgive me.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Aiden]

This is because. Because it could have been Colombia.

[Chris]

Could have been.

[Aiden]

And yeah, I. Okay. So I decided to do a follow up, bro.

[Chris]

This could have been Egypt, by the way, based on how that game went.

[Brandon]

Holy.

[Chris]

We were literally in the discord. Like, it's Egypt.

[Aiden]

Yeah, we. I was like, atri, you got to figure out something for Egypt today. And then we watched Argentina score three goals in under 10 minutes. And I can't even complain about FIFA's potential corruption because by God, did they unblock that red card for the good old usa.

[Brandon]

That look quick aside fucked us so hard because for people who do not know, in the previous match, before the one we lost, our star player got a red card. An American patriot who loves his country.

[Aiden]

He loves his country. And God bless birthright citizenship.

[Chris]

Yes.

[Brandon]

Okay. He lived here. He grew up here for two months. And he wanted a white card and

[Chris]

a blue card to go with it.

[Brandon]

Let me tell you, given a red card card, which meant he was banned from the next match, which is an unappealable thing. And it to be, you know, it didn't seem like the red card was deserved, but the referee even looked at review footage and all that. And so we lost our best starter versus Belgium. And in my opinion, it was like, this is the best outcome because we have an excuse if we lose.

[Chris]

It's like playing a low tier in melee. It's like, it's options to lag.

[Brandon]

It's like, dude, we were probably going to lose to Belgium anyway. They're a good European team relatively. And, and, and instead Trump literally says that he called the FIFA guy and asked for a reversal and they just undid the thing and allowed our startup. So now we go in as the benefits of blatant open corruption. And lose. And lose. We can't win.

[Aiden]

First time in my life where I read the article and I was like, maybe Trump's base mode.

[Chris]

But he couldn't just even like, if he'd have done it and just shut the fuck up about it, that'd be one thing. But to go out there and brag that you called the FIFA guys, to

[Aiden]

be fair, that's crazy. That's why it's beast mode. You just say you made the call.

[Brandon]

Literally. He probably didn't like, called, right? Do you think?

[Chris]

I don't think he.

[Brandon]

What I'm saying is that if Trump

[Chris]

is notoriously corrupt, they gave him a peace prize. Yeah, he wants it. This is a rare overture.

[Brandon]

And I also would say that if Trump says I did a thing that now puts it at a 50, 50

[Aiden]

tops that he did, the likelihood is

[Brandon]

higher before he said he did it.

[Aiden]

Think about the state of American soccer and think about the World cup being hosted here. It's the 250th birthday, like in the. In the one in a million mirac that we won this tournament because he made that call. He gets to brag about it for the. Probably the next year and a half of his life.

[Chris]

Oh, I heard Howard Lutnick was involved. I. Listen, I think there was some pressure applied. It's a weird situation, and I agree with you. It's. They could have just lost and then we had the red card out, and it would have been awesome.

[Brandon]

It would have been like, awesome. Stupid rules, stupid rules. Soccer's dumb. We got an unfair red card.

[Chris]

It would have been. Been great. We would love to complain about that forever instead, embarrassed.

[Brandon]

They just spit in our butt, bro.

[Chris]

And I gotta tell you, I literally researched for the Belgium story. I'm not kidding. That's all they can talk about. Dude, they love it. They're all doing the Trump dance. They.

[Aiden]

If you're.

[Brandon]

If you're the 30th of our people.

[Aiden]

If you're a listener from Belgium, stop listening right now. I don't want you listening to the show anymore. I don't want you go find a different fucking show.

[Chris]

I was reading about, like, the. The Belgian prison system, and it was completely unrelated. In the article, it was like a prison warden being interviewed. He's like, I have some more pep in my step today. Because that.

[Brandon]

Oh, my God. All right, let's fucking see them face off against the Eagles. All right, get on the pitch against

[Chris]

the Eagles, you have to play real football. Okay.

[Aiden]

The Belgium national men's team versus eleven Eagles.

[Brandon]

But we're like, name any sport and we send our best 11 against Belgium. It can't be soccer. Can't be anything else. Be fucking curling. All right, it's fine. We will be you. Anyway. What's happening in Switzerland, the center of the world?

[Aiden]

Okay, this, this story's pretty short. I wanted to do a follow up on the 10 million population cap that I brought on the show a while ago because they ended up putting it to a vote and seeing how it play out. And at the time, it was expected that this would not pass because there just wasn't that much support for it. And it seemed like kind of a longer shot play by one of the further right parties within Switzerland. And that's pretty much how it played out. I think the, the way the votes fell was like 55. No. 45. Yes. Okay, maybe. Maybe closer than initially expected. But I wanted to, like, follow me.

[Chris]

And I know the answer to this. How do they propose actually capping it? The, like, are they gonna shoot somebody if they. If you have a baby over a certain population, is that.

[Aiden]

No, there's no way.

[Brandon]

It's just, you take a little bit off of each person, everybody loses a

[Aiden]

pink, everybody loses a chunk, as long

[Brandon]

as it averages to the total mass

[Chris]

of 10 million people.

[Brandon]

And that way, if you're, if you're a good person, you could offer a

[Chris]

leg so that other people and more babies can be born.

[Aiden]

I did look at this. It wasn't that specific.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Aiden]

The plan was the population would have to be capped at 10 million until 2050. And then I think at 9.5 million, they would start putting in provisions about how people could move into the country from the rest of the European Union.

[Chris]

It's more like a border thing.

[Aiden]

Yeah. So the big criticism that I saw to this, outside of the. For a group of people, there's always the more like, moral argument of we should be taking in immigrants and giving people, granting people asylum, being supportive, being further integrated in the European Union. But for other arguments people had, they were like, all of the success Switzerland has had in the past, like, couple hundred years has to do with our willingness to be open to other European countries to a degree, economically, even if we've maintained this, like, new status of neutrality for a long time, and the business that we do, especially at this time in the world where, like, relationships with the US Are a little more stressed, relationships with China might be a little more stressed so much of our trade is done with the European Union. And by breaking some of the stipulations that we have with the European Union. And keep in mind Switzerland is already a country that isn't actually a part of the eu. They have like very negotiated relationships with the rest of the European Union that kind of allow them to like circumvent EU regulations in a way that other member states don't have to deal with. And so they already have access to the club. They already have like an advantageous relationship with the European Union. And now people's criticism of this law is like, if you get rid of this freedom of movement that we have with the eu, you're starting to break down the current agreements that we have with the EU that our trade and economic success like relies on either on the business owner end where you want to be able to have like a flow of immigrants to have as like affordable labor at your companies. But even at like the lower end where the market of your like the reason my job exists is it like we're able to sell products to the rest of the Europe. This has been greatly criticized as basically like Swiss Brexit. If this goes through because if we get rid of the stipulations around movement, then it gets rid of the rest of the. And that puts us in a really bad spot.

[Chris]

Swexit, Swex it.

[Aiden]

And the reason that the right is pushing for this, which is a pressure on like social programs or a Swiss way of life, like these things don't, even if they do or do not have a truth to them, they don't nearly outweigh the fact that a huge reason for our country's economic success and place of importance has to do with our deep trade ties to Europe. And we cannot lose that at like any cost. So it didn't pass. And that was the expectation going into this. But I think this was my excuse to kind of. Okay, now that this vote is over with.

[Chris]

Yeah, give an update.

[Aiden]

What was the reason the last criticism I saw from people who are worried about now that this vote has been brought into the public conversation so prominently, people are worried that this type of discussion is like encapping the population is being normalized in political discussion at all and the risk that it poses to this like vote being brought up again

[Chris]

in Switzerland or outside of Switzerland? In Switzerland, Because I'm saying they're not. This is not setting the tone for right wing movements.

[Aiden]

No, no, no. Solely just within Switzerland. That was the criticism that I had read. But yeah, that's the follow up on Switzerland. Beef.

[Chris]

Who's taking it.

[Brandon]

That's clear. Beef. The story from Switzerland is that they didn't do it.

[Chris]

If the only they'd done it then Argentina did.

[Brandon]

Argentina did a thing. Argentina did a thing. I Argentina moves on.

[Chris]

Also, based on how the refs are going, I'm sure gonna win no matter what the news is.

[Brandon]

Have you got. I mean.

[Aiden]

Yeah, I did actually. You know what? After today's game, let's. Why don't we take a stab at who wins the whole thing.

[Brandon]

Okay. So the next match would be Morocco. Spain. Right. Which is also a hilarious historical matchup.

[Chris]

Oh my God. That is like it's generations long.

[Brandon]

It's just their literal two colonizers that they get to face off if Morocco beats France, which will not happen.

[Aiden]

Morocco's like let me beat my colonizers and let me do a little of it of my own.

[Chris]

Yeah, but like Morocco, I mean the Moors colonized like they both fought each other and called each other for like generations.

[Aiden]

Like yeah, yeah.

[Chris]

It's probably hundred years.

[Aiden]

I'm sure it's been one sided the entire, entire time.

[Chris]

I just think it goes back. That's like a crazy match. It's all in the field, you know.

[Brandon]

Okay, so based off news, do we think Morocco or spade moves.

[Chris]

That was the sand wall and it's

[Brandon]

Sandwell and immigration allowing it this time successfully.

[Chris]

Let's give it to amnesty.

[Brandon]

I give Damnesy. I give Dynasty as much as we love.

[Aiden]

Wait, are you guys crazy? The Sandwall was like a revelation.

[Chris]

More interesting honestly, something I I.

[Aiden]

You pulled up a picture in real life out of, out of like Dune.

[Brandon]

Yeah, it is. It is wild.

[Chris]

If it's based on interest, then I guess I have to.

[Brandon]

It's based on. Yeah. We didn't clarify, we haven't clarified what is.

[Chris]

It's not, it's not nicest of the new. I switched my answer. I think Morocco wins.

[Brandon]

Well, Morocco Sandwall is going to crush everything. Okay. Morocco moves to the Finals vs Norway

[Aiden]

or Argentina and then on or England are Argentina. So. So we have the story about beef or we have Pontins closing. Which of the two is it?

[Chris]

But what was the England story again?

[Brandon]

I think we go beef Sandwall as the final matchup.

[Aiden]

Beef.

[Brandon]

Sandwall Beef. And ladies and gentlemen, we are giving the official prediction right here that Aiden between Morocco and Argentina you got to

[Aiden]

give it to the Sandwall guy.

[Brandon]

You got to give a Sandwall Congratulations.

[Chris]

Your World Cup Champion 2026. Who would have guessed at the start of this what's crazy.

[Brandon]

We're going to start the final match and the Moroccans will built a sandwall in front of their goal.

[Chris]

It'll be like top from

[Aiden]

and then

[Brandon]

the Moroccans will give their sandwall technology to Ukraine and they won't need missiles.

[Aiden]

You only need sand walls.

[Brandon]

If the sandwall is very high. You don't need air defense here first, folks.

[Chris]

That was our lemonade stand World cup of News. Let us know what your predictions are and what you thought of this episode. That was really fun and if you want more, we're gonna have more stories that we didn't get to get to on the Patreon, including from teams that did not make it this far.

[Aiden]

I gotta get back to work.

[Chris]

Bye guys. Have a good week.

[Brandon]

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