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The Daily Beans
Oh No, Pamela Jo (feat. Greg Proops)
01:08:12
Thursday, November 20th, 2025 Today, Pam Bondi says the DOJ will release the files but only certain ones; prosecutors in the Comey case admit in court that the grand jury didn’t vote on the indictment; Trump says he’s going to start dismantling the Department of Education; a federal judge denies to block the release of hundreds of detainees at the Broadview ICE facility in Chicago; a new Marist poll shows voters favor Democrats by double digits; Larry Summers is stepping down from an AI board after the latest Epstein file dump; the FBI trainee fired for displaying a pride flag is suing the government; the Maine Human Rights Commission sues five schools over anti-trans policies; and Allison and Dana Deliver your Good News.
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- [00:00]
A
Msw media. Hello and welcome to the Daily beans for Thursday, November 20, 2025. Today, Pamela, Joe Bondi says the Department of Justice will release the files, but only certain ones. Prosecutors in the Comey case admit in court that the grand jury didn't vote on his indictment. Trump says he's going to start dismantling the Department of Education. A federal judge has denied to block the release of hundreds of detainees at the Broadview ICE facility in Chicago. A new Marist poll shows voters favor Democrats by double digits. Larry Summers is stepping down from OpenAI as a board member after the latest Epstein filed dump. The FBI trainee that was fired for displaying a pride flag is suing the government. And the Maine Human Rights Commission sues five schools over anti trans policies. I'm Alison Gill.
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B
And I'm Dana Goldberg.
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A
Hello, Thursday. We're chugging along.
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B
We are chug, chug, chugging along. We've got some good news, some fucked up news, some middle of the road news, and we've got it all for you today. Just everything you could possibly want, it's coming at you.
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C
Yes.
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A
Anything on, on your news plate, including some distraction news. But that's also very terrible for people.
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C
Because that's how Donald Trump tries to.
- [01:36]
A
Distract from the Epstein files. True. By being terrible to people and especially children whenever he can. I think that's, I think it's written like on his motivational. What are those vision boards? I think he has a vision board that says hurt children today to distract from Epstein files.
- [01:54]
B
That sounds right. If he doesn't, Steve Miller does for sure. He actually has probably voodoo dolls of children he just sticks pins in from time to time.
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A
That fucking guy. Oh, my God.
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B
Yeah.
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A
But to lighten the mood a little.
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C
Bit later in the show, I'm gonna.
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A
Be speaking with Greg Proops and he's.
- [02:09]
C
Got a new album out called the.
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A
Free State of California. You can get it@gregproops.com and as you.
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C
Knew, you know him probably from Whose.
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A
Line Is It Anyway? Or from his comedy.
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B
He's fabulous.
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A
He has a podcast called the Smartest man in the World. And I agree, he's so smart, it's sometimes his reference right over my head.
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C
And I'm like, what?
- [02:27]
D
What?
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A
But I'm excited to speak with him. So we look forward to that interview.
- [02:34]
B
Wonderful. And as you said in the top of the hour, Trump is trying to distract us, which he always does. Right after the Epstein file bill passed, the Trump administration announced on aggressive plan to continue dismantling the Education Department, ending the agency's broad role in supporting academics at elementary and high schools and in expanding access to college because he likes people who are uneducated. Those responsibilities, by the way, which has been overseen by the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education and the Office of Post Secondary Education, will instead be largely taken over by the Labor Department. The Labor Department, I don't even understand.
- [03:12]
A
I mean, I know he had announced several times, and they put it in Project 2025, that they were going to dismantle the Department of Education and move the jobs that they have to do under law to other agencies, which violates the law. But, you know, that's never stopped him before. But the Labor Department, I don't know. Awful. Awful and horrible.
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C
Like I said, what can I do.
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A
Today to hurt children, to distract from the Epstein. All right, everybody, we have a lot.
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C
Of news to get to, so let's.
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A
Hit the hot notes.
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C
Hot notes.
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A
All right, first up, holy shirt balls.
- [03:48]
C
Actually, this is our podcast.
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A
I can say holy motherfucking shit balls.
- [03:52]
C
If I want to.
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B
Yes, you can.
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A
Justice Department lawyers acknowledged Wednesday in a hearing that a full grand jury never heard the final indictment against former FBI Director Jim Comey, a remarkable admission that.
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C
Could threaten the viability of the case.
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A
That's to put it lightly. Washington Post. The revelation came during a court hearing in which US District Judge Michael Nachmanoff Menachem. He quizzed prosecutors over what appeared to be a missing portion of transcripts and tapes of the grand jury. Remember when I said 139 minutes was missing? Turns out there's a reason the grand jurors had rejected an early version of an indictment, the first version charging Comey with three counts. Hours later, the grand jury, four persons, signed off on a two count indictment charging Comey with making false statements to Congress and obstructing a congressional proceeding. The foreperson said at the time that a majority of the panel had approved those two counts. So he signed it. The the grand jury had been dismissed. So she brought in this new two count indictment. The four person signed it while a second juror watched.
- [05:03]
C
I don't.
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B
I don't either.
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A
That sounds dirty. All right. The grand jurors in this case, I mean, what could they possibly be thinking? Like maybe the whole grand jury left and was like, all right, cool, we didn't indict him.
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B
Bye.
- [05:16]
A
We don't know. And that's a huge problem. Prosecutors acknowledged Wednesday they revised the indictment to delete the rejected count. But in a remarkable concession, they told Nachmanoff, do, do, do, do that they never presented that revised indictment to the full grand jury for approval. Instead, they said they had the foreperson sign the new version before presenting it to a judge while a deputy foreperson was also in the room. So remember, the greyhound watched.
- [05:39]
B
Yep. This is exactly what this is.
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A
What the.
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C
This is how they add flavors to Lacroix. Right. Just by having fruit.
- [05:48]
A
That.
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C
This is how this happened.
- [05:51]
A
So that means, quote, there is no indictment that Mr. Comey is facing. That's what defense lawyer Michael Dreben has said. Dreben, by the way, dynamo attorney. He has argued before the Supreme Court in, like, at least 100 cases. He also worked on Jack Smith's team. The Assistant U.S. attorney, N. Taylor Lemons. That's one that they had to bring up from another state because no one in the Eastern district of Virginia would touch this with a 10 foot pole. Lemons sought to downplay the error, arguing that the revised indictment was changed only to remove the count. The grand jury rejected the new indictment. Wasn't a new indictment, he said.
- [06:25]
C
Oh, my God, yes it was.
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A
Nachmanoff said little during the two hour hearing on Wednesday about how he viewed.
- [06:33]
C
The significance of this. Just a massive fuck up.
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A
The hearing had been called to consider Comey's arguments that the case should be dismissed on the grounds that he is being prosecuted because of vindictive and selective prosecution.
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C
The judge also did not immediately rule.
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A
On that vindictive prosecution motion, saying that the issues were too weighty and too complex for a quick decision, which I love because the longer it takes, the more shit we can find out that.
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C
This fucked up DOJ tried to do.
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A
So, yeah, drag out the pain. Comey's attorneys have already signaled they intend to file a separate challenge to the case based on these grand jury irregularities. Throughout the proceedings, Nakhmanov quizzed Lemons about the earlier decision BY A former U.S. attorney, Eric Siebert, not to pursue charges against Comey. The judge asked Lemons whether the prosecutors under Siebert had written a formal declination memo laying out the reasons for not seeking an indictment. Lemons initially demurred, telling the judge, I don't know the whole world of documents that exist. But Nagmanoff pressed him. You are council of record on this case. When you became counsel of record in this case, did you seek out a declination memo? Lemon said he was trying to answer the court's question. He danced around this for a while, but he. But eventually he said he was constrained because the Deputy Attorney General, Todd Blanch's office directed him not to reveal whether such a memo even exists. While the Justice Department studies whether privilege issues applied legal privileges might give the Justice Department grounds to not disclose the document. Work product privilege, for example, or deliberative process privilege. Those are the two privileges that Bill Barr tried to argue keep his declination memo, declining to charge Trump for obstruction of justice in the Mueller investigation out of the public eye. He lost that battle in court. Judge Baral. How ordered it revealed. That's how come I know about it. Two people familiar with the memo have told the Washington Post that it does exist, but they spoke on the condition of anonymity. This is banana pants, Dana. The whole thing is, I can't believe that someone who has appeared on South Beach Toe like Lindsey Halligan, doesn't have the, I don't know, you know, consummate experience. I'm shocked to know how grand juries work.
- [09:01]
B
I'm shocked.
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A
I thought south beach toe gave you really good insight into how to, you know, carry yourself in grand jury proceedings. Who knew?
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B
I feel like I've seen enough, like SVU and like Law and Order that I could probably do a better job in this case.
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C
She basically. They rejected the thing. She sent them home, and then she.
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A
Rewrote it and brought it to the.
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C
Jury foreman, had somebody watch while he.
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A
Signed it, and then she, like, altered.
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C
The original indictment by writing on it.
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A
Except for count one.
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B
Unbelievable.
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A
That's government documents.
- [09:40]
B
My mom listens to the podcast, and obviously we text and stuff before, and sometimes, you know, you and I get something while we're recording. And I was finishing up a conversation and my mom said, have fun with the beans. And then she said, the DOJ screwed up with Comey. Yeah, mom. And I said, allison's reading that story right now. And she said, incompetence. I love her so much.
- [10:04]
C
High five, Mom.
- [10:05]
B
High five. You're so right. All right. She's a keeper. Okay. This one's also from the Post. For the past week, official Washington has talked constantly about the Jeffrey Epstein investigation, except. Except for the agency that has custody of the Epstein files. The Department of Justice has been silent. On Tuesday, the House and the Senate agreed to pass a bill calling an Attorney General Pam Bondi to release all unclassified information and files related to the sprawling sex trafficking investigation into the one time powerful financier. And now the. He's not a. He's not a powerful.
- [10:39]
A
There they go with their financier shit again.
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B
I can't. I can't just stop it now. A one time powerful financier. He was also probably one time good kid. That Wasn't doing fucked up things in the world. Can we just not.
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A
Hitler painted trees.
- [10:52]
B
Yeah, he was an artist. Okay. The Justice Department so far has continued to say little about how it would respond to that demand. There are many reasons to doubt that a bulk of release of the files is imminent that's going to happen anytime soon. On Wednesday, Bondi broke the official silence, but only slightly. At a news conference on an unrelated issue, she parried repeated questions about the Epstein files, saying, and I quote, we will continue to follow the law with maximum transparency while protecting victims. Fuck, we don't give a shit about the victims.
- [11:25]
A
Parried is a nice way of saying.
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C
Danced the fuck around. Yeah, that's like a. I think what they're referring to here is a Perry in fencing, like Perry thrust. But that's a nice way of saying it.
- [11:38]
B
Yeah, there's a lot of nice ways of saying the things that they're doing. But by the way, we've talked about this before. If Trump really wanted Bondi to release all the Epstein files, he could have just ordered her to do that at any point in the past six months. He didn't.
- [11:51]
C
Isn't that what the journalist was asking?
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A
Why?
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C
You know, you've been able to release.
- [11:55]
A
These the whole time when he called her a piggy. Yeah.
- [11:59]
B
There's so many things in those emails that were released. Man, the damning information. Bannon. I hope to God we get the House back and stop some of this, because Bannon needs to be behind bars for things that he cannot be pardoned for.
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A
I agree. Yeah.
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C
I mean, that guy should be under a jail, as far as I'm concerned. A walking canker sore.
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B
Yeah.
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C
I wonder how hard it was for.
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A
Him to only wear one shirt at a time when he was in prison.
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B
He must have been freezing.
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A
Somebody asked him. I don't know.
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B
Maybe it kept the smell. Yeah.
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A
All right, next, riding a wave of recent election victories. This is from pbs. Democrats have another reason to hope for a repeat performance in next year's midterms. According to a new PBS NPR Marist Poll. This is an A plus poll. A majority of voters said they would rather elect a Democrat. If the midterm were held today, they would prefer the Democratic candidates. Now, remember we talked about the general ballot last month here on the beans, when the Democrats were up nine points, which was the highest it's been since 2023. So keep that in mind as I tell you what this number is. Poll found that registered voters, if they were choosing today, 55%, would elect a Democratic candidate. To represent them in Congress, while 41% would vote for a Republican. That's a 14 point advantage. It is the largest since November 2017, a year before we swept the elections in 2018. We got more than 40 seats in the House alone during that election.
- [13:29]
B
Let's go.
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A
So two seats here in Indiana, one seat here.
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C
And like you.
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A
Yeah, let's go is right. Independent voters in this poll say they would select a Democrat over Republican by a 2 to 1 margin.
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B
2 to 1.
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A
So given a list of issues, a majority of Americans, 57%, think that lowering prices should be the top priority. The White House majorities of Democrats and independents, as well as a plurality of Republicans held that view in the latest poll. Controlling immigration, a major focus on Trump's second term, came a distant second in the public's list of presidential priorities. 41 points behind, number one. So 16% immigration, 57% affordability.
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B
Wow, that's crazy. Those numbers are nuts.
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A
Yeah.
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C
And to be clear, that that 16% that are for immigration, that is to make it tougher.
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A
It's not like only 16% are worried.
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C
About mass deportation and what Trump is doing wrong.
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A
They want this, the border to be secure. So I just wanted to clarify that.
- [14:41]
B
Thanks, Alison. All right, this one's from wbbm. The federal judge has denied a request from the Trump administration to delay releasing hundreds of people detained during operation Midway Blitz. 442 people arrested without warrants could be released as soon as Friday under U.S. district Judge Jeffrey Cummings order. The Justice Department still has an appeal in the case that ordered ICE to put 615 people arrested by federal immigration agents into detention altern alternatives or be released on bond. Meanwhile, the number of people being held at the ICE processing center in Broadview has dropped significantly since a different judge ordered the federal government to improve conditions at the facility. That's interesting.
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C
Yeah.
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B
Government lawyers said in court that only four people were held there as of Tuesday morning. All the pressure, all the pushback, everything is working. And they may not be working fast enough, but it's fucking working.
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A
Yeah.
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C
And I know a lot of people.
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A
Are like, ah, the courts, he doesn't.
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C
Listen to the laws.
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A
This is an example of where they do. And it's important. All right, from the Times, Lawrence. Larry Summers, the former Treasury Secretary, will step down from the board of the artificial intelligence startup OpenAI. He and the company said this on Wednesday after Congress released emails last weekend that showed Mr. Summers had regularly corresponded a look with again, disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein. Sex trafficker, rapist, child rapist, Maybe. Yeah, throw that in there. Quote, in line with my announcement to step away from my public commitments, I've also decided to resign from the board of OpenAI. That's what he said. He's 70 years old. I'm grateful for the opportunity to have served. Excited about the potential of the company, look forward to following their progress. It's interesting. They always put their age in there, right? In a statement, Open AI's board of directors confirmed Mr. Summers resignation. We appreciate his many contributions and the perspective he brought to the board. Mr. Summers exit from OpenAI is part of the widening fallout of those who were in the orbit of Mr. Epstein, who authorities said killed himself in prison in 2019 while awaiting trial for sex trafficking charges. President Trump and the filmmaker Woody Allen were among those mentioned in the more than 20,000 Epstein estate emails made public by lawmakers this month. And let me just say, Trump was the most mentioned. And if these numbers are off the top of my head, so correct me if I'm wrong, out of the 2,423 emails, 1623 included Trump, 72%. That's a lot. Yeah, a lot.
- [17:14]
B
And this was from WGME in Portland, Maine. The Maine Human Rights Commission is suing five school districts that ban transgender students from playing sports and using bathrooms for the gender they identify with. That's according to our media partners at the Bangor Daily News. The commission claims these districts violated state law. The lawsuit asked a judge to order these districts to repeal what the commission says are discriminatory policies. All of which passed when the White House began pressuring Maine last year to ban transgender athletes from girls sports. And with a little bit of a shift but Related this is from the Times. David Maltinski, an FBI agent in training, had only a dim suspicion of what was going on when he was suddenly pulled from his classmates one evening last month and called to a meeting with top officials at the academy, where he was only three weeks away from gradu. He happens to be a gay man who had previously worked at a civilian cyber tech assistant in the Los Angeles field office. Mr. Maltinski knew that the meeting might have something to do with his sexual orientation. Or I don't understand why people would say sexual identity. It's annoying.
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A
Okay.
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B
Or with his wide ranging efforts to the Bureau to promote LGBTQ issues, I know everyone's following. What he did not expect was a letter he was handed when he arrived at the FBI Academy's front office. It was assigned by the Bureau's director, Kash Patel. It was signed by fucking Kash Patel. He announced that he was being summarily dismissed from the academy because of political signage. I want you to remember that when I tell you what this was, because he had once displayed as his workspace in Los Angeles. Now, the only thing that that could have been, that he quickly realized, was a rainbow plaid flag that had hung near his desk for years. Years. And had been given to him as a gift by his former bosses. Well, on Wednesday, Mr. Maltinski filed a lawsuit against Mr. Patel in the Federal Bureau of Investigation, claiming that his firing was illegal and asking a federal judge to reinstate him at the academy, where he had been pursuing his lifelong dream of becoming a federal agent. I know. He and his lawyers described his dismissal as the latest move by senior FBI officials to play politics with internal personnel moves in a way that had not only damaged morale inside the bureau, but had also hindered its ability to carry out its public safety mission. And this is a quote. Clearly, this was not about who I am, but what I am and with what I represent. That was Mr. Maltinski. He said that in a recent interview. He said it's about trying to stoke fear in the workplace, especially in the queer community at the FBI. That has nothing to do with protecting the American people. In fact, I would say people that happen to be queer in the FBI probably are protecting more of the American people than any fucking homophobes that happen to have an FBI badge who have a problem with the fact that there's a pride flag sitting on his desk.
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A
That was given to him by his bosses. Yeah, well, good for him, Keshe Patel.
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B
He's such a douche.
- [20:16]
A
I hope that this case, you know, these cases take a really long time. And I hope this case comes to fruition maybe in 2029 or 2030 when we have a Democratic president in the White House and maybe an awesome sort of Jack Smith, maybe attorney General that's willing to make these settlements happen for these wrongfully terminated people. Thank you so much for that story.
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C
That's better news.
- [20:42]
A
I'm glad he's fighting back. And we're going to talk to Greg Proops, but we have to take a quick break. We're also going to have the good news.
- [20:49]
C
After that, you can send good news.
- [20:51]
A
To us dailybeanspod.com and click on Contact. And later on, if you're a patron, we will have the video sent out to you for the Beans Talk, which is our new video pod that's going to launch to the public on December 1st. So everybody stick around. We'll be right back with Greg Proops after these messages.
- [21:08]
C
We'll be right back.
- [21:11]
A
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- [22:48]
C
Today I get to talk to one of my best friends. He hosts the Funniest man in the World. No, the Smartest man in the World. He's just in my head the funniest man in the world. But podcast is called the Smartest man in the World. He also has a film club and he's an actor, an activist, a comedian, an improv extraordinary. Now he's a new comedy album out called the Free State of California. Please welcome my friend Greg Proops. Hi Gregory. Gregory hi ag.
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D
How are you darling?
- [23:12]
C
I am well talking to you in this space compartmentalized from the rest of the world. I'M awesome. But if we gesture broadly, it's so hard. Talk about everything else. Things are bad. There was a new video put out today by members of Congress telling the military that they don't have to follow unlawful orders. And I never thought I would live in an America where members of Congress, where a co. Equal branch of government has to tell.
- [23:39]
A
The military not to follow unlawful orders.
- [23:41]
C
It's a scary, scary story.
- [23:42]
D
Now, you're Navy. You were Navy, right?
- [23:44]
C
Yeah, for a minute under Clinton. So we just read books, but yes. Yeah.
- [23:50]
D
Well, I know you're a veteran. Yeah, I know it's amazing. It's astonishing. And. But I mean, on the other hand, this has been a really awful week for them and the optics haven't improved at all. And the Texas gerrymandering thing got voted down. Indiana decided to bail on theirs and Virginia is going to get some extra seats. So when we have an election, and yes, we are going to have one, they're not going to stop it. I think they're going to get wiped out. And also, you know, look at him this week. He's punching, you know, king Bonesaw and whatnot in the arm yesterday and calling women piggies and it's just not. I don't think it's a big PR win this week. Now mind you, I'm in Alabama where I'm sure half the population here is thrilled beyond measure that they're getting exactly what they wanted. But on the other hand, I think it's not going. Also look at him, sweetie, he's dragging. I mean, this pig's gonna go quiet real soon.
- [24:50]
C
Yeah. And you know, we had a new poll come out. PBS just released the results. The general ballot. If the midterms were today, the Republicans are down 14 points and they haven't been down that far in double digits since 2017. Right before we had the massive blue wave that. Where we got 40 seats back, at least.
- [25:09]
D
Yep.
- [25:09]
B
So it's.
- [25:11]
C
Yeah, it's a bad, A bad PR week. There was just a comey hearing in his case where they found out that Lindsey Halligan is even a bigger fuck up than we previously thought. It's going bad for them. And he's kind of acting like a cornered, dying ferret. No shade to ferrets.
- [25:30]
D
He totally is. He's grumpy and out of sorts and, you know, nothing's work. None of the old. He only has like the three songs, you know what I mean? He only has three songs that he goes over and over and over and over the same songs. And he's already done the Biden song. We've heard it. And the Hillary song is so old. And you know, then what was it this week? The Democrats are the ones who are involved with Epstein. And it's like that song doesn't even get on the charts. Even the lamest person on earth, the smallest possum down here in Alabama, knows that that ain't happening. And you can blame the Democrats all you want for Epstein, but honey, honey, honey bear, it's a rich dude thing. What can I say? And I'd like to thank Allison because I like to think the best of people, even though I'm a comedian, that people are tired of the abuse and the pedophilia. It's not seemly. And I think deep down inside people know that it's an awful thing and that they've made a terrible mistake. Having said that, white people still vote, vote overwhelmingly for Nazism.
- [26:38]
A
Yeah.
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C
Though it's coming to their backyards.
- [26:40]
A
Right.
- [26:41]
C
And that's kind of what it takes in certain circumstances is for people to be negatively impacted. And I think that's why we saw the huge sweeps this couple Tuesdays ago. And Trump is out there with his invisible accordion talking. Don't talk to me about affordability. Everything's fantastic. Why are you talking about Epstein being quiet piggy? Let's talk about how great everything is even though it's completely ungrate. It's desperation. It's desperation. And when we talk about these burgeoning autocracies, they get in, they try to consolidate power as quickly as they can and he's doing it as fast as he can. But he keeps losing. He keeps losing court cases where he can't deploy the national guard under 12406 he assume is going to try to, to invoke the Insurrection act to try to take it that route. But you know, and we might find out this week what the Supreme Court thinks of his deployment of the National Guard because it's coming up for Chicago's case. It's fully briefed by November 17, so we'll see what happens there. But you travel around, you travel to a lot of different places. And I imagine your audience, this is probably a little, you know, more to the left. Your brand new comedy record, which is gold by the way, it's called the Free State of California, was taped live in San Francisco. And we know that's a hellscape of woke Marxist war zone, inflatable animals, swirling.
- [27:57]
D
Vortex of baby killing and homosexuality.
- [28:00]
C
But what's it like when you go out and maybe not necessarily at your shows, because we know where those folks. Bread is buttered. But like, when you're out getting coffee, walking among the people, do you see any difference between now and maybe his first term with regard to support, or do you see anything like that, or is it kind of indistinguishable from how it's always been?
- [28:23]
D
No, I think it's changed. I mean, you know, I go to every single state our group plays. Every. The only state we haven't played is Wyoming, and I think we're playing it next August. And our crowd is white, largely white. And so therefore, there's a very good chance that especially with the men in the crowd, over 50% of them, you know, voted for him. So I judge by the Trump jokes we do and the political jokes we do, whether the crowd is with it or not, obviously we play a lot of cities. And what a lot of I think Coasties don't understand, and liberals in general, is that almost all cities are blue. Like, you could be in the middle of Alabama, wherever Georgia, and cities tend to be blue. It's once you get out of the city that everybody gets a little crazy. And then we're shooting road signs with meth bullets. But having said that, the other night we did. I did a joke in Atlanta, in Buckhead, which is a very wealthy place. So wealthy white people scream Republicans. I said, you can say whatever you like, because up until January, this used to be a free country. And that one gets a huge howl if we're in a very blue place. And it got a big howl. And then the conservatives tend not to boo at the improv show. They go quiet and they're sad for a second because they know you've got them and then they move on. They actually do that white people thing of pretending it didn't happen, but we're sad. And then we move on to the next thing. I haven't seen nearly as many Trump signs as I did the first term. And the place where I think you really see that jazz isn't the Deep south where I am now and where I love, by the way, that food here, oh, my God, is rural Pennsylvania, rural Ohio, places like that. That's where you see a lot of the thin Blue lion flags, a lot of Confederates. It flags the Northeastern and the Midwestern states. And then if you get like, we also go up to North Dakota, South Dakota in there, and that place is, wowzers. It's more conservative than you could possibly imagine in a long way. To answer your question, it's gradually Shifting. It's really hard to move white people off the things they believe and the things they're shown. A lot of them live in information deserts, as you know, and a lot of them are just contrarian and don't ever want anything to be better or changed.
- [31:07]
C
But they also live in food deserts and healthcare deserts. And when things go wrong, it impacts them and they recognize it. And when you have. Even for like, low information voters, and I don't mean that as an insult, I just mean people who don't pay attention to the news, like you and you and I or folks who listen to this podcast. You can't lie your way out of somebody's pocketbook.
- [31:30]
A
Right? You can't.
- [31:31]
C
If you can't, if your local rural hospital is closed down, your Medicare has gone away, even if it's called something else, like Bamacare or something, you notice that. And when you realize that it's the White House and both houses of Congress are controlled by the Republican Party, then you can put two and two together, generally speaking. And I think that's why they have their negative double digits now on the general ballot. But I remember when you were in San Diego, it's a pretty purple city, tends to lean a little bit blue. But there was an improv bit where you brought some people up from the audience, and one girl's job was to hit play on her Spotify and you were gonna. Or one of the actors is gonna hit play on the Spotify and she has to start singing whatever song it is that comes up. And the song she chose was Fuck Donald Trump. And the whole crowd went wild. And I was like, all right, all right. Cause I know that your comedy audience, like the people who came, bought tickets to see you for this new comedy album that you're doing again, Free State of California. It's incredible. You sent it to me, I immediately listened to it. I died laughing. And I've come back to life. I'm Lazarus. But you know, that crowd's a little politically different than the crowd that comes to see who's lying.
- [32:40]
A
Right.
- [32:40]
C
So it's really, really interesting to kind of weigh those two things. And I'm glad to hear that you're seeing a little bit of a shift, at least with regard to the Trump jokes when it comes to whose line. All I know is we were hooping and hollering and standing on our feet when that girl. Fuck Donald Trump. Yeah, fuck Donald. And we would just woo. That was a really pretty special night.
- [33:06]
A
Thank you for inviting us to that show.
- [33:08]
C
By the Way I was rolling like, five deep with my entourage that night.
- [33:11]
D
I know you had everybody on that.
- [33:13]
C
One to go see. Whose line. So talk a little bit about the new album. First of all, the title and then the track, Free State of California.
- [33:23]
A
Both hilarious.
- [33:25]
C
But in it, you do a lot of political comparisons to different regions of the country, which stood out to me because I'm originally a Midwesterner, though I now live in the Free State of California. I mean, some of the observations that you make, I think, are very timely and also prescient. So talk a little bit about that.
- [33:44]
D
Well, I mean, I make a living out of, you know, especially in stand up. I'm so provincial and I'm from San Francisco, and there's so many barrier references on the album, every single album that I do, that sometimes I get confused over what I'm talking about. I'll make a joke about Antioch and you'll hear the crowd laugh. And I think no one outside of the Bay Area has any idea why they're laughing at a Fremont joke or a Foster City joke.
- [34:05]
C
You can figure it out.
- [34:06]
D
So, yeah, I really, really leaned into to Ohio, Wisconsin on this last album. Although I've hit the south before. What I always said about the south on a previous album was, the south never lied to you. The south never said, hey, everybody's welcome. We got a gay pride flag wave and come on down. The south is the South. It's the other states that lie to you and go, oh, no, we're cool. Everybody's welcome. And then you get there and you're like, not so much. I mean, you go to the north of Michigan or the north of Wisconsin, and. Yeah, yeah, it's a. There's a.
- [34:39]
C
You talked about the Yoopers. Yeah, right. We have tons of Yoopers that listen to this show. And so it's always a mix. And, you know, like you said, because I think Tommy Lahren, that Nazi Barbie, had put out some sort of a tweet saying there's going to be a mass exodus from the Marxist cities and the Communist cities to the big, beautiful red cities. And I started to think, like, I put out a thing. I was like, can anybody name a big red city? Give me a city that has more than 250,000 people. I think there's like, four, like, Oklahoma City, but, like, some of them have actually flipped. Like, Omaha went through this last election. It's really a hard exercise, and people were, like, trying to, you know, get down into the weeds to figure it out. I'm like, it's not. You don't really have to tell me. It's just kind of a thought exercise. I want you to go, huh? You know, that's kind of what I don't really need an answer, but it's true. So wherever you end up, particularly in cities that happen to have theaters, it's going to be more blue, because that's.
- [35:47]
D
Who lives there, no question. Like I said, where people have vendettas against waterfowl or epic generational anger against deer and whatnot, those are the places where it gets a little freaky out there. Like I said, almost every city is fairly blue, especially if you've got an opera house and a concert hall and an art gallery. You know, once you start introducing culture and mixing things. The thing about the south that I really enjoy is black people and white people go to the same things and you see them and you interact with them. Whereas in California, our beautiful state, which is my favorite state, we're a little more segregated. It's, you know, activities are segregated in California. You really don't see black and white people going to the same shows as much or eating in the same restaurants all the time. Is our state more liberal? Oh, hell, yes. But, you know, there's that going on.
- [36:44]
C
Well, I think there's also a bigger wealth gap here in California. When you think about. When we talk about rather left or versus right, we talk about top versus Bott. We've got some of the richest people in the world in New York, California, San Francisco particularly. And so I think that that kind of lends to it. And then the generational quashing of certain marginalized people makes that a sad reality about the current picture of certain places where the wealth gap might be larger than, say, in Ohio.
- [37:18]
D
Well, all those predictions, like, tell me, Lauren, what did you call her? Bump stock Barbie?
- [37:25]
C
That's better than that.
- [37:26]
D
All those predictions that the conservative pundits make are inevitably and almost inexorably untrue because they haven't any notion of. There's no reality ever informing any of their opinions. The whole thing is kind of a fantasy. He's a fantasy. Like you said at the beginning, affordability and prices are going down and the economy's great. None of those things are true and everybody knows it. It's a matter of whether you're willing to suspend disbelief and, you know, go along with this thing. No one is moving to big, beautiful red cities except for all the douchebag podcasters who moved to Texas, to Austin, to be near Joe Rogan. And if you Go there. Then that main drag where his club is on, it smells like sick. And it's a really touristy, cornball kind of bar, saloon scene in that area. And I've watched Austin go from a kind of acute, small alternative town into this completely overbuilt, overblown, corporate strip mall.
- [38:34]
A
Corporate?
- [38:35]
D
Yeah. It's just. It's lost almost all of its. I mean, mind you, I could say the same thing about Raleigh or Nashville or Memphis or all the cities I've been going to for. Yeah, Phoenix for a hundred years. They used to be smaller. They used to be more collegial and small townie.
- [38:52]
C
We got the best shows in Phoenix. At Maisei epitheater, it was 20 bucks. We could see New Order. We could see the Cure. We could see the Smiths. We could see, you know, Duran Duran, Depeche Mode. 20 bucks a piece. And the shirt was 20 bucks. You got in and out for 40 bucks. Whatever your acid was, that was extra. And your clove cigarettes, of course, were another $4 a pack. But it was a $30 night is what I'm saying.
- [39:16]
D
There's no more $30.
- [39:17]
C
And it's very different now. It's gleaming. It's like trying to be Dallas Fort Worth. But you're right, it's a fantasy. Like my friend Dana and I, who co hosts this show, we always talk about how being a trad wife is actually, that's kink, I'm sorry to tell you, but that is kink. That is a kink lifestyle, being a trad wife. And the other problem that you touched on is everything is so binary, especially for our corporate media. I remember when the Charlie Kirk shooting happened, that school shooting and the news, and everybody was desperate. Was the shooter a Republican or a Democrat? And it's like, you know, there are Republicans who hate. Who think that there's people to the right of Charlie Kirk. Like this, like, gender.
- [40:08]
A
This exists.
- [40:08]
C
It's a fluid thing. It exists on a spectrum. It doesn't have to be one or the other. And it seemed like everybody was so desperate to put this person in a specific box. The same with the person who tried to shoot Donald Trump on his golf course. Everyone's like. Or the guy at the. Who, you know, took out the. The volunteer firefighter in the other attempt. It's like everybody wants to put people in. It's black and white. It's histrionic. And I think that we need to get away from that kind of frame of mind. And I feel like the underpinnings of your Jokes, sort of. I mean, yes, there's this versus that and this versus that, but I think what I come away with is that it's not as black and white as we've been led to believe by corporate media.
- [40:56]
D
No, it isn't. Life's complex, and politics are complex. And like you said, gender is complex, and there's no easy answers. But that's impossible for the media to get their mind around or to sell because they don't like complicated ideas because they require discussion and thought and lateral.
- [41:13]
A
Thinking and nuance and context and being.
- [41:16]
D
Able to hold abstractions in your mind and. And what they want is doublethink. The Orwellian thing of being able to hold two contradictory ideas simultaneously and believe them both. The economy's doing really well, and he's a great president. Now. Those are contradictory ideas. They don't make any sense. They're not even true. And yet lots of people will believe them. And that's what we're being sold on a constant basis. And I think people are capable of way more nuanced than that. Again, like you and I. I was talking to someone yesterday as well, and we're in the. You know, the.
- [41:54]
A
For.
- [41:54]
D
What do you want to call it? The chattering class, the social media class. We follow every bloody news story. We follow every bloody social media site. We listen to politics all day. Oh, my God, there's a cat. Careful, you're gonna be attacked.
- [42:07]
C
Oh, his food bowl must be only half full.
- [42:10]
D
Which is why I was gonna say that I'm getting in the. A feeling that someone has neglected Tabby.
- [42:14]
C
Oh, they're so neglected. They're very, very sad. Neglected.
- [42:18]
D
They're not that fat, though, so they're not overfed. Yeah, so I agree with you. Like, they really want a binary thing. And then, you know, yesterday, for instance, how complex was it that they gave a marching band and a flyover to the dictator of a terrible monarchy that doesn't allow homosexuality or women to drive.
- [42:43]
A
He dismembered a journalist.
- [42:45]
D
We know for a fact, because our intelligence agencies told us that MBS was absolutely involved in the bone saw killing of the reporter who was investigating Jared Kushner's involvement in graft in the Middle East. So we were presented with it. It was supposed to be this glorious moment of. Of, you know, international diplomacy, when really, it was a kind of a horrible. You know, why are we letting. Why are we even letting. When Mary Bruce asked the question, what about the people from 9 11?
- [43:21]
B
Yeah.
- [43:21]
D
And then, you know, the Great Pumpkin lost his mind and Started screaming and his usual thing. And then MBS said that horrible thing about. I feel very painful about it.
- [43:31]
B
And.
- [43:31]
D
And then.
- [43:32]
C
But we need to live in reality, right?
- [43:36]
D
When the word but joins into the conversation, when you're making an excuse. And he wasn't even making an excuse. He was simply lying and saying that he felt pain for the people from 9 11. Now, mind you, we've always sold arms to the Saudis as well as having Oman and Qatar and in Dubai and whatnot. Especially the Emirates, I think is our banking states. And they don't have any politics. They absolutely take money from anybody. It's not like they sit around discussing what's right and what's wrong all day. That's not really an issue.
- [44:16]
A
No.
- [44:16]
C
The Qatar Investment Authority bailed out Kushner's dad in that 666 Fifth Avenue Devil building. The Saudi wealth fund backed Kushner's hedge fund, private equity, whatever, investment authority thing for 2 billion. And we've had Donald Trump mock our intelligence community in front of a dictator before. He did it in Helsinki in 2018. And everybody was like, and now we.
- [44:44]
D
Know that there was that Epstein email that just preceded that where Epstein was actually in contact with the Russians saying, what do you want me to do about him? I can handle him. And then the week later, Helsinki and him up there diminishing our intelligence agencies, by the way, which Hillary said 16 different intelligence agencies have said that the Russians are on his side. And of course, no one listened to her because women's high peeping voices tend to make men's man bag shrink up into a small silver ball.
- [45:15]
C
Yeah, yeah, she said something on the Internet and his dick fell off as one of my favorite memes. Yeah, well, good old Star Trek.
- [45:25]
A
Well, my friend, I really want to.
- [45:27]
C
Encourage everybody to listen to this new album.
- [45:29]
A
I was dying laughing.
- [45:30]
C
It was a really nice respite. Although there are fundamental truths that need to be told that you can't get up on stage. And by the way, the timing of.
- [45:40]
A
This album, tell everybody when you recorded this.
- [45:44]
D
I recorded it right after the election last year, New Year's last. And so it was three weeks before it all went to, you know, hell in a hell basket. And I believe I say at the beginning of the album, and you were.
- [45:58]
C
Like, I'm not going to talk about it. I'm not going to talk about it. And then you talk about it.
- [46:01]
D
Yeah, but also, you know, I brought up the idea that we've had insane, megalomaniac, maniacal, right wing, Nazi racist presidents Almost strictly that this isn't new. It's just worse in its own way. Reagan, Nixon, pretty much every president except for maybe four or five in the history of the country has been a right wing maniac. So it's kind of, you know, and if you're say, like not a white person, I'm not certain that this is as any different for you than most presidents are. You know, as far as being stopped, seized, hassled, destroyed, have your community rankled and, and interfered with by armed forces and whatnot. So the good part is, and it was a line I used on an album a couple of albums ago, things are getting so bad that white people are noticing. And that's what it takes. It takes white people to notice. You notice that the air traffic thing has been slightly resolved since it inconvenienced rich people. When we reached the rich people were inconvenience point, it kind of bounced right back to.
- [47:09]
B
Yeah.
- [47:10]
D
Also, I would say another thing that should give everyone help.
- [47:14]
C
I was actually at the airport recently before the shutdown, and I was looking around and I was like, this is like, reminds me of the dmv. It's the great equalizer. Unless you're on a private jet, everybody's got to go through this line, right? Yeah.
- [47:28]
D
And even the private jet people, I think, were starting to feel the squanch because they have to have air traffic controllers too. Yeah. You know, when everybody's affected by it, I think it starts to make people think a little more about their situation. And also, Pete Hesketh, Kirsty Noem Bovino, these aren't the best and the brightest. These are literally people you would find in a car park. And they're sort of like petty criminals who've been given jobs that are way above their pay grade. So the idea that they're gonna efficiently and awesomely tackle each issue as it comes up and really make some bold moves isn't really materializing.
- [48:15]
A
No.
- [48:16]
C
They've won the power lottery. I constantly read stories of regular folks who win a lottery and are crushed by the impact of that. They can't manage the money. They aren't sure what to do. Everybody comes out of the woodwork looking for stuff. Here we've got the same thing. But they've won the power lottery and.
- [48:37]
A
It'S very dangerous for the rest of us.
- [48:41]
C
And it's in our hands and we have the power.
- [48:46]
A
It's a little more limited than a.
- [48:48]
C
Pure democracy because we aren't one person, one vote. But it is in our hands. It is our government. And I think that we can even not just kick out the Nazis, but cull some of the more donor class.
- [49:02]
A
Centrists from our own party.
- [49:04]
C
And I think we're going to see that in spades in the primaries and in the midterms come this year. So I am hopeful, but only mostly because there's really nowhere to go but up. It's always darkest before the dawn.
- [49:20]
D
Listen, my parents went through the Depression in World War II. My wife's parents were Vietnam parents. I'm old and I was a little kid in the 60s. And what no one will ever tell you, of course, is that there was a civil war in this country through the 60s, young versus old, black versus white, women versus men. And there was mad violence in the streets and mass assassination, hijacking, terrorism. Like I said, we just showed networks on our film club a couple weeks ago, and the crowd sat there stunned. And these are, you know, Hollywood people. We show in Hollywood the idea that a movie from 50 years ago, from 1975, has a television network that's hired a terrorist group that kidnaps and shoots people on TV as part of their entertainment, and that the news has been reduced to tabloid legal battles of celebrity gossip and a mad person giving a rant at the end of every episode. Falling down and passing out is what the television news is. And in the movie network, and everyone's out there like this. And it was like that. That's how we saw ourselves in 1975. So that would. I'm not saying it to be depressing. I'm saying it has to give you hope. Because I'm not sure who said it, maybe John Lewis. But I mean, the same fight has to be fought over and over again, and there's just no way around it. Our parents fought it, our grandparents fought it. We as artists or whatever, have to remember that there was art during World War II, during World War I, when everyone thought the world was going to end, a thousand times the world was going to end. And you have to carry on being creative and you have to carry on having a sense of self and feeling joy. Like I was on George. I was talking to George Hahn the other day, and he said something Joan Rivers said, a joke's a vacation, and everybody needs a little vacation. You know, and feeling joy and feeling your own creativity and. Or going to see other people's art or whatever is an act of defiance in a world like this, because look at their misery. I mean, when you see Bovino throwing the Nazi salute and he's so small and he's in a little military onesie and he's screaming into the mic and everything. It's not going to end well for him. No one's going to elevate him to some giant position in the world. It's just not going to happen. And don't go. I mean, people go, oh, my God, what about when the Great Pumpkin dies? Vance will be worse. No, he won't. Vance has no following. No one loves the couch pig. And the billionaires are going to go at each other like Wolverines at a yard sale. I mean, it's going to be bad if you think all the billionaires are going to hold hands together and go, God, we should really. It's not like in the movies where they all split up the world and they all sit in a room with those green lampshades over them. I mean, you see them. You saw them last night at the dinner. Musk can't even wear proper shoes to a formal. I mean, we're not talking about really accomplished people who know what they're doing.
- [52:39]
C
We're talking about and RFK Junior's doing dmt. Oh, my God, that explains so much. Well, like I think Henry Rollins said, it's punk rock time. This is what Joe Strummer trained you for. And that's true for all art, no matter what your art is. So thank you for continuing to make the art. Tell everybody, shamelessly promote yourself. Tell everybody where you're going to be, what you're doing, and where they can find the free state of California.
- [53:01]
D
All right, I will. AG GregProops.com is where you can find all the stuff. The Smartest man in the World podcast, which I do with my wife Jennifer, the Greg Proops Film Club we're showing on the 21st Nunochka. I don't know if you know that movie. It's a Greta Garbo comedy from the 30s by a brilliant director named Ernst Lubitsch. She's a Russian who comes to America with her commie friends. And America's capitalism is so awesome that they're completely overwhelmed and lose their ideology of world domination. Yeah, so that's why my wife chose that one. In any case, that's there, too. And then I'm on the road with who's Live. We're in. Where Are We? Tonight we're in Birmingham, and then we go to Mobile tomorrow, and then New Orleans, and then we're in California in December, and then we pick it up again next year. I'll be at the Punchline New Year's Eve the 30th and 31st in San Francisco with Dialect Marian and Jackie Cashin, who you should have on your show because she's awesome.
- [54:01]
C
I love Jackie.
- [54:02]
D
The album is available at GregProust.com, and all my previous albums which were all recorded improvised in San Francisco. When I say improvised, I have an idea of what I'm going to do over the four shows. I work out all the jokes, but I really am doing it off the top of my head. One because I don't do clubs as much as I used to, so I don't really work on the material like I would have if it was a regular album and 2 I wanted to challenge myself because I like the tightrope of being able to get it on with the crowd and see if I can make my raving sound like material with jokes.
- [54:39]
C
I remember the first time I went up cold, I was just too tired to put a set list together and it was awesome. And I was like I'm never putting a set list together again and I'm not doing two shows a night anymore. I won't do it. All right my friend, it's always wonderful to see you. Thank you so much for joining us on the Daily Beans. Thanks AG and I really appreciate you bringing laughter to the world. You're right, joke is like a vacation and we could all use a vacation. So thank you so much. Greg Prooper everybody.
- [55:06]
A
Stick around.
- [55:06]
C
We'll be right back with the good news.
- [55:08]
A
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- [55:48]
C
I was recently able to share with.
- [55:49]
A
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- [55:55]
C
They said it was delicious, full bodied, it was rich.
- [55:58]
A
It had vibrant cherry and BlackBerry flavors. Ended with long spiced finish. Perfect bottle of wine for the evening.
- [56:03]
C
And I've already got another one on the way.
- [56:05]
A
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- [56:44]
C
It's time for the good news. Who likes good news?
- [56:47]
A
Everyone?
- [56:48]
D
Then good news everyone.
- [57:02]
A
Hey everybody. If you have any good news, no matter how small, no matter how big, no matter how recent, if it was last week or if it was 30 years ago, we would love to hear from you. You can also send shout outs to us. If you have a shout out to.
- [57:15]
C
A loved one, a spouse, we'd love to hear that.
- [57:18]
A
A self shout out. Toot your own horn. Let us know why you're awesome. We want to hear that too. We love those.
- [57:23]
C
Maybe you have a shout out to.
- [57:24]
A
A small business in your area or a nonprofit or a food bank that could use a boost. Let us know about those. Maybe a shout out to a government program that's helped you or a loved one. We want to get all that on the record so that we have it for posterity. These are weird times and I'm hoping historians can go back 50 years from now and listen to all of your good news stories about how government programs you know, they desperately tried to take away but failed I hope is what they say how how important they were and are to us. Also, if you have any street jokes you want to send us confessions corrections, especially pronunciation corrections, and you can send it all to us@dailybeanspod.com click on Contact. And all you gotta do to get your stuff right on the air is pay your pod pet tax, which means attach a photo of your pet. And if you don't have a pet, you can attach a photo of a random animal on the Internet or send us an adoptable pet in your area or send us some birdwatching photos, which can be a bird or you and your family and friends flipping the bird to Trump Properties. We love those. I have several in my phone. Dana, I know you've got a recent one from Chicago. Yes, I do, because you sent it into the good news. That made my day. Any. Any photo.
- [58:34]
B
Really?
- [58:35]
C
Family photos, Your garden, a happy place.
- [58:37]
A
A sunset, some favorite signs at a rally, some overpass signs that you've seen. Whatever it is, send it to us@dailybeanspot.com Click on Contact. All right, first up is your good trouble. And your good trouble today comes from Heidi. Pronouns she and her hello, fellow legumes, especially those in North Carolina. If you haven't heard, ICE has been making a big presence in our state, and I wanted to give you an excellent resource for connecting others in your area who are working to quickly mobilize our communities. Red Wine and Blue has a very active North Carolina community on their app. If you live in North Carolina and download and join the app, you'll be automatically added to the North Carolina community, which will show up at the top of your home screen. There are tons of resources being shared in the app from organizations already working with the immigrant communities. How to join ICE hotline rapid response teams to trouble nation groups. 3D, printing whistles and handing them out to the most threatened by ice. There's always a place for you in the resistance as podpet tariff. A combination of what are you making.
- [59:39]
C
And what the mutt.
- [59:41]
A
My daughter loves stagecraft and recently participated in the never ending story with our local community college. Here's one of the puppets she helped create. And the dog.
- [59:51]
C
His breed to the script is a.
- [59:54]
B
Sorry, 100% good luck dragon.
- [59:56]
C
Oh, the falkor.
- [59:58]
A
Yeah. That's fantastic. That's fantastic. His breed, according to the script is a blank, but we're pretty sure he's got some canine in him, too. Perhaps the greyhound could tell us.
- [60:08]
C
I don't see the dog photo.
- [60:11]
B
Oh, it's because they're making a joke about the stagecraft that Good luck dragon. Oh, yeah, yeah. Falkor.
- [60:20]
A
Luck Dragon.
- [60:21]
C
Falkor.
- [60:22]
A
Okay.
- [60:22]
C
That's what's behind the redaction.
- [60:23]
A
I'm looking for the dog here.
- [60:26]
C
I am looking for the.
- [60:27]
A
Okay.
- [60:27]
B
And that's why they said maybe there's canine in him, but we don't know.
- [60:30]
A
Yes, that is 100% luck dragon.
- [60:32]
C
Very, very well done. I was fooled. Heidi.
- [60:35]
A
Thank you.
- [60:36]
B
So sweet. All right. This is from Janice. Hope. No pronouns given. He mentioned government programs that have impacted our lives. We have three adopted children who all benefited from disability assistance with basic daily needs. They're adults now. And it's so obvious how much the early childhood education and all the supportive government programs, along with family and community involvement, have helped them shine. And we've got a couple dog photos from Janice. Oh. Oh, cute, sweet baby.
- [61:05]
A
Oh, these are beautiful babies.
- [61:07]
B
Love them.
- [61:09]
A
Oh, so very great. Thank you so much for that, Janice. And.
- [61:13]
C
And yeah, it's pretty incredible how these.
- [61:18]
A
Government programs impact our lives and therefore the lives of people around us. You know what I mean? It comes back tenfold. All right, next up from Michelle. Hi.
- [61:29]
C
I want to give you some good news.
- [61:31]
A
I can't think of anything better than this. Makes me smile broadly and laugh in a little Twitter every time I pick up my phone. Tell me I'm wrong. Her name is Chloe, and she's the only female of three that were found in a cardboard box under a car. What is wrong with people? Look at this angel and her little jammies. Jammies are so cute. Oh, my goodness. Yes, you're right. This is fantastic.
- [61:59]
C
And good news and a pod pet.
- [62:00]
A
Tariff all at once. Michelle, thank you so much for sending that in.
- [62:04]
B
Well done.
- [62:05]
C
I'll grab the next one too. That was pretty short.
- [62:07]
A
This is from Liz Pronoun. She and her. Hi, AG and dg. Thank you so much for your podcast. And I'm enjoying the videos too. I want to give a shout out to Seattle Reconomy, which runs a couple of tool libraries in the Seattle area. I recently started volunteering with them and it's an awesome organization. In addition to loaning out a variety of tools, including gardening tools, catering equipment, they're having a series of handmade for the holidays classes where participants can make gifts for loved ones instead of purchasing them. They are also participating in Circular Monday, which encourages buying used instead of new. They have many, many tools and supplies for sale in their shoreline tool library. You can check them out@seattlereconomy.org R E like economy, but with an R in front of it. For my pod pet tariff, I've included a sign that I made for no Kings Day and a picture of my sweet chonky cat, Maisie. That's a great name for a chonky girl cat. Thank you again for your great work. There we go. Project 2025 is UN American. That's a fantastic sign. Oh, and look at this calico tabby. Nice. Very beautiful, baby girl.
- [63:14]
B
All right, this one I'm just gonna say some anonymous because it says prefer not to say hello, beans queens. I wanna shout out Podcast out and into Open Arms, sponsored by NH Outright. Give it a listen and if you think the stories might be helpful to someone else, please let people know about it. It is the stories of trans youth and their families that is called out and Into Open Arms.
- [63:40]
A
I love it. Yes. I'm gonna check that out for sure. Thank you.
- [63:43]
B
Sax is paid with these lovely pups.
- [63:46]
C
Look at these babies.
- [63:48]
A
So very adorable.
- [63:50]
C
Did they take up the whole couch all the time?
- [63:52]
A
Anonymous do you get a place to.
- [63:54]
C
Sit or is that their couch? We had a giant dog and the love seat was just his. No one ever sat in it.
- [63:59]
B
You wanna close this out today?
- [64:01]
A
Yeah. From Kathy Pronoun. She and her. And Paulie Pronoun. She and her. There are a few of us at Homewood Friends, an historic Quaker meeting in Baltimore, Maryland that have independently joined the Leguminati over the years. In fact, getting approval to submit this good news may have brought in a few more listeners to the Daily Beans. Nice. Quakers have a tradition going back centuries of causing good trouble. It's important to us to speak up and to live our values in our everyday lives. Homewood Friends has a number of trans and non binary people who are integral members of our community. We support each other in life for the big moments as well as the day to day. And we're deeply concerned about the scapegoating, hate and increasing threats to the trans and greater LGBTQ community in these absurdly awful Times. Early in 2025, we realized that we had public minutes, official statements on many important issues, but nothing in support of trans rights. It's more important to walk the walk than just talk the talk, but it's even better to do both. Nice. After much Quaker process, if you know, you know. We recently approved the following minute. Several of our trans, non binary and LGBTQ Friends were deeply involved in its creation. The minute was embraced by the whole Homewood Friends community because there's so much anti trans hate out there. We wanted to share a strong and positive statement of support with your listeners on this week of trans remembrance.
- [65:23]
B
This is really cool.
- [65:25]
A
Yeah. And we're going to have an excerpt from the public minutes. A link to the full minutes will be in the show. Notes. It says, we recall the critical role that Quaker women took in discerning Friends paths from the early days throughout the present. We believe that trans and non binary Friends have a similar unique and important role to fill that we may have been slower in finding it in the atmosphere of the current US administration, which is actively targeting and scapegoating trans and non binary people. We take seriously our commitment to the trans and non binary friends. Within our own meeting, we seek to offer support and counsel that may help these friends find their quiet internal peace of their true selves. In addition, we seek to provide support for medical transition and or surgery for those who need it. We are also committed to supporting young people and children as they come to understand their gender identity and helping them as they express it in the world. Our attached POD tariff is a photo of Kathy's rescue doodle with some signs for our candlelight vigil on Thursday night. Night we'll be in front of the meeting house on a major street in Baltimore standing in memory of those lost to transphobia and anti trans violence, followed by a simple potluck dinner. We'll be thinking of others and observing this solemn day in whatever way feels right to you.
- [66:41]
B
Oh, this is a wonderful submission.
- [66:45]
A
Oh that's just lovely. And the whole unanimously accepted it the minute. That's big and well, like I said, we have a link to that in the show notes. Look at this Pupper. Trans lives matter. Wonderful.
- [66:58]
B
I know.
- [67:00]
A
Oh everybody, thank you so much. I needed that on this Thursday, but it's actually Wednesday when we're recording this, but you know what I mean. Thank you so much for sending your good news. Please send it to us dailybeanspod.com click on contact and thanks to Greg Proops for brightening my day with his new album. It's called the Free State of California. You can get it gregproops.com and Dana, do you have any final thoughts before.
- [67:25]
C
We get out of here today?
- [67:26]
B
No, not today.
- [67:27]
C
All right, well we'll be back in.
- [67:28]
A
Your ears for tomorrow. It's going to be fuel saying Fridays here on the Daily Beans, so I look forward to that. Until then, please everybody take care of yourselves, take care of each other, take care of the planet, take care of your mental health and take care of your family.
- [67:38]
B
I've been AG and I've been DG.
- [67:40]
A
And them's the Beans. The Daily Beans is written and executive produced by Allison Gill with additional research reporting by Dana Goldberg. Sound design and editing is by Desiree McFarlane with art and web design by Joelle Reeder with Moxie Design Studios. Music for the Daily Beans is written and performed by they Might Be Giants and the show is a proud member of the MSW Media Network, a collection of creator owned podcasts dedicated to news, politics and justice. For more information Please visit msw media.com msw media.