← The David Pakman Show
The David Pakman Show
5/20/25: Trump tax plan exposed as he claims “Stage 9” Biden cancer
01:03:31
-- On the Show: -- JL Collins, author of major personal finance books including The Simple Path to Wealth, joins David to discuss the instability of the Trump economy and how the average person should navigate it financially — Far-right...
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- [00:08]
David Pakman
We start today with what we are calling the Maga kiss of death. Romanian Trump has gotten absolutely crushed. Let me explain what's going on. It just keeps happening. It just keeps happening. It's another one of these far right Trump style candidates who is biting the dust. And this time it's in Romania. We saw it in Canada, we saw it in Australia. And this time what we have is that George Simeon, Romania's sort of answer to Trump, with the same nationalism and the same conspiracies, the same make insert country great again, nonsense. He just got wrecked in the presidential election. Now, interestingly, Simeon actually won the first round, but, but when it came time for the real thing, voters picked the centrist Nicosaur Dan instead. And the sound you hear is a sound of relief, a sigh of relief coming from the European Union because Simeon ran on this anti immigrant, anti vaccine, anti European Union rhetoric. And increasingly, to fewer and fewer people's surprise, he spent months whining about voter fraud and alleged Russian interference. But here's the twist. It was real. It's, it's, the story is, it's almost beyond parody. The first round of Romania's election was thrown out over legitimate evidence of Russian meddling. And guess who benefited from that? Simeon. Which is of course classic, just par for the course at this point in time. So after a redo voter, voters dumped him for the pro democracy, pro EU, moderate, just sort of an unremarkable moderate. And just like that, another one of these Trump clones went down. Now, I think that this is a perfect time to zoom out and now realize that this is not specifically about Romania, although good for Romania for stemming this potentially problematic fiasco. Think back to Canada and think back to Pierre Pollyv, the Canadian conservative leader who tried to out Trump. Trump realized it was a bad idea, panicked, and said, I'm not aligned with anybody. I'm just doing my own thing. Not only did he end up losing his chance to become the Canadian Prime Minister, Mark Carney, of course, with the Liberal Party ultimately winning, but Polly have also lost his seat in Parliament straight up. Not just he's not going to be Prime Minister, he's not going to be in Parliament at all. He's out, he's done, he's toast. And then meanwhile, former central banker Mark Carney is now leading the Liberal Party. Not a progressive hero, but, you know, not. You're not going to confuse Mark Carney with a Fox News host made Secretary of Defense, let's put it that way. We then go to Australia. In Australia, Peter Dutton, they're kind of like right wing Trump style attack dog and Trump wannabe. He got booted as well, lost his seat, handed labor a second term. And his whole campaign was, you know, the typical fear mongering, culture war bait, parroting American right wing talking points. And it failed. So now with Canada, Australia and Romania as examples, we can say what is going on here? What is going on in this seeming reversal of the global Maga movement that during Trump's first term, quite frankly, was terrifyingly successful and increasingly powerful. And the idea here is there was a period during which if you screamed loud enough and said fake news enough, you can kind of ride this wave to power. It seems to be running out of gas. It didn't. This is not a trend that started in 2025. We've seen these waves before. Trump won in 2016 and it kind of rippled globally. Bolsonaro in Brazil, Modi doubling down in India or Bond tightening his grip in Hungary. And it was a sort of golden age of right wing populist nationalism where every country suddenly had its own version of fake news and have drained the swamp and of build the wall. But it seems to be wrapping because it's a stale playbook. People have seen what happens when these guys get in power. Although the voters in the US in total were not smart enough to go a different direction In November of 2024, it seems as though in many other countries they have figured out this whole Trumpian experiment. And Trump light around the world is a very, very bad idea. You've got corruption, you've got incompetence, and basic institutions are getting attacked. And we can have fun with the talking points, build the wall and all that stuff until the economy tanks, until your health care system starts to collapse, until infrastructure crumbles. And as it turns out, most voters don't want a full time culture war absent actual tangible economic achievement. So people want affordable groceries and they want hospitals that work, schools. You can count on leaders who can form complete sentences here and there. So populism is not dead. As I've said before, populism is an ideology. It's a, it's a rhetoric more than anything else. It's not a set of policy ideas and it still has cachet around the world. But the Trump brand of populist rhetoric, the paranoia, the anti vax conspiracies, love letters to Kim Jong Un or Putin authoritarians, I'm hopeful that more and more global voters are getting over it. And so the kiss of death of Trump, it's not just metaphorical anymore. It's an electoral kiss of death. I guess that still is sort of a metaphor. It's showing up on ballots tangibly is the point that I'm trying to make. So when we hear, oh, Trumpism is the future, the model is here, but it's a global model. Show them the map. Right. Romania, Australia, Canada. These guys are being sent packing. And that's a great thing. Maybe. Hopefully what we are seeing is the beginning of a correction, a slow rejection of the idea that shouting globalist and woke is a substitute for actual policy. If the trend holds, I, I hope it does, it could reshape global politics in a way we really haven't seen arguably since the post World War II order was built. In its total effect, we're going to follow it. Three countries on the list. Let's see if we can soon add a fourth that says bye bye to Maga Trumpism. All right, it is time to talk about the Trump tax plan. I'm going to give you a hint. I'm going to, I'm going to skip to the end. And there is not a pot of gold at the end of this rainbow. There's a pot of coal. The rich get richer. While taxes may even go up for middle average income Americans, let's talk about what is in this bill. And it's critical to understand that some of this is still under negotiations. There are even some Republicans who don't like elements of this. There are Republicans not pleased with what they want to do with the salt cap. There are Republicans not pleased with what they want to do with Q bid. Ok, so we're going to talk about it, but here's what's in the bill as we understand it right now. First of all, the 2017 tax cuts for individuals are going to be extended. Now, this has been misinterpreted by some as the richest will get a cut. That's not, strictly speaking, true. Now, the richest may end up getting more cuts from some of the other things in the bill. But remember that the 2017 Trump tax bill lowered the top federal tax rate from 39.6 to 37. That expires at the end of this year. So if not renewed, the top earners would go from 37 to 39.6. What this bill would do is keep the 37% tax rate. So tax rates wouldn't go down, but they wouldn't go up as scheduled to do. And that top tax rate would remain 37%. You may recall that there was a little bit of flirtation, very, very flirty with maybe we'll raise taxes on millionaires. Now, when they were talking about that, as is often the case, when they said raise taxes on millionaires, we didn't know if they meant people who have a million dollars in income a year or a million dollar net worth including the equity in their primary home, or a million dollar net worth excluding the equity in their primary home. We don't know. But it doesn't matter because it's not in the bill. They flirted with it, they played coy, they may be swiped left or right, which is it, once, but they're not going to do it. No tax on tips and no tax on overtime is in the bill. It excludes what they define as highly compensated employees. I don't know exactly which those are. And it also includes no taxes on tips for gig workers. So if you get tipped driving Uber or Lyft, you wouldn't pay taxes on those tips. Some of the stuff in the tax bill expires in 2029 when Trump leaves office. Shortly after Trump leaves office, increasing the child tax credit from 2000 to 2500 will expire in 2029. A thousand dollar bonus to the standard deduction for single filers. So if you're single, you can take a $16,000 standard deduction instead of $15,000 that expires in 2029. The debt ceiling would be raised by $4 trillion. As part of this bill, a new savings plan for kids will be created. Now listen to this sycophancy. It's called the Money Accounts for. For Growth and Advancement. Money Accounts for Growth and Advancement. The acronym is maga. No accident there. And they're already calling them MAGA Savings accounts. It'll be potentially a thousand dollar contribution from the government and would then allow you to contribute up to 5,000 annually in after tax dollars. This is not that awesome because after tax dollars means you're not getting a tax deduction for the contributions and then there's no ability to withdraw the money tax free. So it's like, it's not really that great, but it's in the bill. And then there's a whole bunch of stuff for businesses. New deductions for depreciation of property interest expenses, R and D costs. It would make permanent the 199A deduction. This is what we call the qualified business income deduction, or I call it Qubid. And it would give it a new rate of 23%. I've spoken about how huge of a tax cut this is for businesses like mine. They want to Keep it. And they want to make it bigger. Do I like it personally? Sure. I love keeping more of the money that my business takes in. Does it make sense at a macroeconomic level? Not really. Not really. There's also a rollback of a whole bunch of clean energy credits that were implemented under Biden, like for solar panels, electric vehicles. They want to get rid of that stuff. They flirted with closing the carried interest loophole. They're not going to do it. No surprise they flirted with changing the corporate tax rate. Trump said he wanted it lower. No change in the bill. And then like the big thing, the elephant in the room, the orange entity in the corner of the room, is what happens with salt deduction. You may recall that in. If this is too wonky, by the way, please let me know. You may recall that in 2017, this, Trump's tax bill capped state and local tax deductions at $10,000. This hit people disproportionately who live in some of the more prosperous blue states, which overall have higher state taxes. What it means to cap salt at 10k means that. Imagine that your property has a $7,000 a year property tax and that you pay another $6,000 in state income tax. We're up to 13,000, right, 7k for your property, 6k in state income taxes, that's 13k. If you cap salt at 10k, you only get to deduct from, from your federal taxes 10 of the $13,000 you have in that type of tax. So people in blue states, California, New York, Massachusetts, who say, hey, I pay 13,000 a year in state and local taxes. I pay 16, I pay 25,000 a year. I only get to deduct 10k. You're disproportionately punishing blue states. And of course they were. They don't know what they're going to do with it yet. In this new tax bill, there's the idea of raising the salt cap to 30k. There's one proposal which would raise the salt cap to $62,000. If that is done, we could be talking about $1 trillion in expense for the government over the next decade. So this is the totality of the bill. There's some, there's work requirements, there's the Medicaid rollbacks we've talked about. That's all in there. The theme is big picture. Make it easier for the rich to get richer and don't make it particularly easier for lower and middle class Americans to get a leg up and have the potential to improve their economic circumstances in society. I don't think anybody is going to be surprised by the fact that that's what this does. Now the question is, what can they get past? Because even some Republicans are not happy with some of these provisions. Let me know what you think. Let me know if you like these segments explaining what's in a bill. And make sure you're getting my newsletter, which you can get by signing up for on my website. Or just shoot me an email info@david pakman.com say, David, please put me on that newsletter. If you or someone you love is on Medicare, this is important. The Department of Justice filed a major fraud complaint against three of the biggest Medicare brokers in the country. These brokers pretended to offer unbiased advice while secretly steering seniors into plans that paid them the greatest kickbacks. This is why I recommend CHAPTER after seeing their own families get scammed, they created a better way. CHAPTER is fully independent and the only national Medicare adviser that searches every plan available to find the one that actually fits your needs. They advocate for you, not the insurance companies. No steering, no pressure, just expert help. Completely free. CHAPTER has saved the average senior over a thousand dollars a year and they are a free resource for my audience. So if you want help with Medicare, give Chapter a call by dialing £250 and saying the keyword Medicare. You'll talk to a real person who will help you figure out exactly which plan is right for you. Or go to ask chapter.org pacman. All you have to do is dial £250 and then say Medicare. Or you can go to ask chapter.org pacMan. The info is in the podcast notes. As an independent progressive media program, we depend on your support to do what we do. Get the full David Pakman show experience, which includes audio and video versions of the show, lacking commercials made available hours before we publish the show publicly, and also an extra show every day called the Bonus show. Read about it and sign up in about a minute. You know, people say, david, how difficult is it to sign up? Does it require clicking? Do I need to fax anybody? No. With very basic tech skills, you can sign up@join pacman.com and I estimate in 60 to 90 seconds, assuming you have ready access to a credit or debit card. All right, check that out. We saw yesterday a complete and total cognitive collapse from the current President Donald Trump, stating with confidence that former President Joe Biden has stage nine cancer, something that does not exist, and Trump devolving as he was given increasing amounts of rope with which to hang Himself devolving into conspiracy theories. The suggestions that there has been some kind of COVID up here. This is the President of the United States. I will allow you to see how this went south more and more and more. And you will notice the people standing behind Trump motionless, as if they are thinking to themselves, maybe if I don't move, I'll blend into the wall and they won't notice that I'm here. This is like nothing I have seen before.
- [17:50]
Caroline Levitt
Respond to President Biden being diagnosed with cancer. Are you going to call your processor?
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Donald Trump
I think it's very sad, actually. I'm surprised that it wasn't, you know, the public wasn't notified a long time ago because to get to stage nine, that's a long time.
- [18:07]
David Pakman
To get to stage nine, that's a long time. Now, I'll tell you what this is about. The Gleason score for Biden's tumor is nine. That's a measure of the aggressiveness of the cancer cells. Now, of course, Trump is confusing stage 9 cancer with a Gleason 9 tumor. And you might sell what would say, well, it's nine. It's an innocent mistake. But most people sort of generally in the world understand that when we talk about cancer and stages, we talk about 1, 2, 3, and 4. Trump with stage 9 is, of course, indicative of something we already knew. He doesn't have the ability to retain or synthesize information. He remembers the number nine, and at no point is there a checking mechanism that goes, wait a second, I might remember something about nine. It can't be stage nine because there's no such thing. I know that. I know that because I have friends and I have family and I exist in the world, and I know there's no such thing as stage nine cancer. That mental process is not happening. The correct synapses are not firing for Trump, and then he devolves directly, apropos of nothing, into bragging about his own cognitive tests. What?
- [19:25]
Donald Trump
I just had my physical. You saw that? You saw the results of that particular test. I think that test is standard to pretty much anybody getting a physical. Good physical. We had the doctors at the White House and over at Walter Reed, which is a fantastic hospital. I do it. I did a very complete physical, including cognitive test. I'm proud to announce I aced it. Got them all. I got them all right. You proud of me? Yes. Your husband would be proud of me for getting them all right. It's a little risk. If I didn't get them all right, these people would be after me. It would be not a good situation. But I think, I think frankly, anybody running for president should, you know, take a cognitive test.
- [20:03]
David Pakman
Remember, the question is, will you be calling Joe Biden after learning of his cancer diagnosis? Trump goes, I'm shocked we didn't hear about stage nine before. And then he starts bragging about a dementia test, say it's unconstitutional.
- [20:18]
Donald Trump
But I would say in that particular case, having a cognitive test wouldn't be so bad. But when you take tests medical, as, as a male, that test is very standard. I don't know if it's given to everybody, but it's given.
- [20:35]
David Pakman
Now Trump doesn't mention it because of course his brain is mush. I think he's saying getting a PSA test, it's a blood test, prostate specific antigen, that it's standard. But of course, what's standard is once you turn in some places 70 or 75, it's not done anymore. Now should it be done? That's a discussion that can be had. There are some urologists floating around online who said, you know, it's not standard, but it should be done. The reason not to, you might say, why wouldn't you do it? If the risk of prostate cancer goes up the older you get, why wouldn't you do it? And my understanding, speaking to a urologist is you stop the PSA because since prostate cancer is typically considered slow growing and if you've gotten to age 70 or 75 without it, it would typically, these are probabilistic outcomes. It would typically mean that if you get it, it would be the slow growing rather than the aggressive kind. You can have false positives of mildly elevated PSA just as a result of age, that if you kept testing in 70, 75, 80 year olds, it would send you down a garden path of 10 testing. That's not necessary. This is, this is just what is said right now. We could have a conversation, should you keep testing PSA or not? Trump can't even, because his brain is just such mush he can't even string together. What he really means is about, and.
- [21:52]
Donald Trump
It takes a long time to get to that situation. Now I think, you know, to get to a stage nine.
- [21:58]
David Pakman
And again, there's no such thing as stage nine cancer.
- [22:00]
Donald Trump
I think that if you take a look, it's the same doctor that said that Joe was cognitively fine, there was nothing wrong with him. Well, he said, if it's the same doctor, he said there was nothing wrong there. And that's being proven to be a sad situation. And the auto pen is becoming A very big deal. You know, the auto pen is becoming.
- [22:20]
David Pakman
A big deal because it's now Trump is off into conspiracy world. The question, remember a minute and a half ago, was, will you be reaching out to Joe Biden over the cancer diagnosis? Trump is saying now that the auto pen is part of some way in which the 2020 election was rigged against him. Wow.
- [22:38]
Donald Trump
Like that maybe was the president who ever operated the auto pit. But when they say that that was not good, they also, you know, you have to look and you have to say that the test was not so good either. In other words, there are things going on that the public wasn't informed. And I think somebody is going to have to speak to his doctor. If it's the same or, or even if it's two separate doctors, why wasn't the cognitive ability, why wasn't that discussed? And I think the doctor said he's just fine and it's turned out that's not so. It's very dangerous. Look, this is no longer politically correct. This is dangerous for our country. Look at the mess we're in. You're talking about all these questions on Ukraine and Russia. That would have never happened. As an example if I were president. Would have never happened.
- [23:22]
David Pakman
And the other thing, all right, so now he goes into his standard, none of this would have ever happened if I were president. It's a big week, I know, for the Biden cover up here. But Donald Trump is more incoherent and more wrong than Biden ever was here. The only difference is Trump's energy is high when he's incoherent. And of course, Trump has no ability to correctly process and store information. And that is completely evident here. Here. Completely and totally evident here. By the way, one other little clip from this. The guy who constantly brags about how great he is cognitively, he can't open a box and someone has to help him during the same event. Look at this.
- [24:04]
Donald Trump
So you want to help.
- [24:13]
David Pakman
He hands the box to someone and this other guy just opens the box. So Trump struggling with basic stuff, but listen, he thinks Trump believes we should have heard about the stage 9 cancer which doesn't exist a long time ago. Also yesterday, Donald Trump stunned his audience with mayo brained delusions. And I challenge you to figure out what this guy is talking about. But meanwhile, the focus continues to be Joe Biden. Somehow this guy's president now. This guy currently has access to the nuclear codes. Trump started talking about Los Angeles and sending them water, big water, beautiful water. In a statement that I can Only describe as reflective of stunning levels of imbecility.
- [25:03]
Donald Trump
I'm the mayor of Los Angeles. Los Angeles is not looking too good with what the water. We just sent so much water down their way. They didn't want to take it because it was bad for the environment. I said, no, water is good for the environment. They would have had it when I told them to get it. They wouldn't have had the fires or would have been very small.
- [25:21]
David Pakman
This is sort of like the epitome of this simplistic thinking. How could water be bad? Water is simply good. Wow. You know, that's interesting, Don. I never really thought about it that way. Water is good, therefore just put water everywhere. Why even think about it on the tariff stuff? We've finally had a few days where things are like a little bit calmer, where it seems maybe this guy is not going to, you know, put the country off of a cliff. And all of a sudden Trump gets on the mic yesterday in D.C. and starts saying we are not necessarily tariffing the things we should be tariffing and they're going to be going up. And he again talks about putting tariffs on pharmaceuticals. And again, after hours trading starts getting extraordinarily shaky because of 25 years they.
- [26:10]
Donald Trump
Were taking advantage of us. We never did anything. But now we're doing it to them and fairly. Very. I'll tell you what modestly, but we'll be taking, and we are taking in right now, 25% in cars, 25% on steel and aluminum, 25% percent on other things. And that'll be going up to 50, 75, maybe 100 in some cases. We have to get our pharmaceutical industry back. Once we establish that in another couple of weeks, it'll start roaring back. It's already roaring back because they know we're doing it. And it's really been, you've done a great job.
- [26:47]
David Pakman
But so Trump again saying pharmaceuticals, we got to get them back taxes, tariffs might have to go. Import taxes, which is what a tariff is. We might have to put them up to, to 100%. Of course, anyone with even an iota of economic understanding knows that tariffs are not going to bring anything back. We still have a federal minimum wage in the seven dollar range in the United States. We've got a housing crisis and lack of access to health care. And Trump thinks tariffs on foreign goods are going to solve our problems. It's wild. Trump also suggesting, I guess, that Robert Kraft created the New England Patriots.
- [27:27]
Donald Trump
Created won't be the fund, I thought, but it is fun. I like to create. You like to create. Most of the people in the room like to create. Just like Bob Kraft created the New England Patriots. He happens to be here.
- [27:39]
David Pakman
Robert Kraft actually bought the New England patriots close to 40 years after their creation. He didn't create them. It's just, you know, do facts matter? I don't know. And then unable to get away from maybe the most triggering and titillating topic to the failed current president, he says 2020 was rigged. He's still going to also one.
- [28:02]
Donald Trump
And I said, that's good. And then when it came time to do this after the election was rigged, the second one was rigged. Whether you like it or not, it was rigged like nobody's ever seen. And now people are seeing it. Now people don't even fight me. You know, they used to say, sure, not really that nice to see. I mean, honestly, it was rigged. And unfortunately, that's what happened. They look at some of this.
- [28:21]
David Pakman
That's right. It was rigged by the cats, it was rigged by the dogs. And if you thought Trump was inco, incoherent and orange during this indoor event, just wait till you see what he did outside the White House yesterday. A the Take It down act was signed by, by Donald Trump. This is a bill that focuses on what is colloquially known as revenge porn. And Trump rambling about deepfakes, looking as orange as ever in another clown show known as Deepfakes.
- [28:59]
Donald Trump
We've all heard about deepfakes. I have all the time, but I don't. Nobody does anything. I asked Pam, can you help me, Pam? She says, no, I'm too busy. Too busy doing other things. So we're. You'll, you'll survive, but a lot of people don't survive.
- [29:11]
David Pakman
That's right. Deepfakes is something Trump knows more about even than the pornographers. He would tell you. Trump on the Take It down act, he says, this was tough to do. You know, there's all these amendments. You never know what's going to happen with these.
- [29:26]
Donald Trump
To take your pick, seen before, it's getting worse and worse and I think this is going to hopefully stop it and not easy to do. People talked about all sorts of First Amendment seconds, Second Amendment. They talked about any, any amendment they could make up. And we got it through.
- [29:43]
David Pakman
We were able to get it through regardless of amendments people were making up. It was crazy Trump casually mentioning he's got to keep this event short because he has to get back to Putin, which, you know, it's such a nothing, throwaway comment. But also he has to go and get back to Putin. He can't be here with his crowd in the United States because Putin's waiting for him.
- [30:06]
Donald Trump
I guess this is big stuff. I'm in trouble because I don't have your names. They didn't give me these names. We have so many. We have half of the Senate here now. They're all going to hate me because I can't introduce you. We don't have the time for that. I have to get back to Putin and people.
- [30:21]
David Pakman
He's got to go. Get back to Putin and people, as you can see, who is in charge there? And then finally, and this is one of those things where it's like, is Trump lying or is it true? And we've got to investigate it. Trump says he got $5 trillion from Middle Eastern countries during this recent trip, which sounds weird because there's no place.
- [30:46]
Donald Trump
Like the White House. I found out, you know, you have a lot of places and I just left some of the richest places and we loved them and we, they gave us a nice contribution of about $5 trillion. But this is a special place. Even they talk about it. So it's great to have every.
- [31:01]
David Pakman
The American economy is about a $30 trillion economy and Trump casually says he got 5 trillion from Middle Eastern nations during this recent trip. It I, we just don't know. As orange as ever, as dishonest as ever, and as unfit as ever. Later in the show, we'll talk about the fallout that that is now having even within the Republican Party. Make sure you're subscribed to the YouTube channel. It costs nothing and we are pushing to 4 million subscribers, a number nobody could even believe. Make sure you are subscribed. We'll take a quick break and be back right after this. Many in the audience know my first language is Spanish. I learned English later when I moved to the United States. And these days I do a fair amount of traveling and I always make an effort to learn some of the new language before I get to the country. I've tried a bunch of methods for this. I keep coming back to the app Babbel because with Babel, you really can start speaking a new language in just three weeks instead of paying hundreds of dollars for classes or fooling yourself with language apps that are basically just simple games. Babble is designed by real people for real conversations. All of Babel's tools are approachable. They are rooted in real life situations. They're delivered with conversation based teaching you might have seen on my Instagram. I was recently in France. Babble got me ready. Last minute I got to France. I was ready to order food, ask for directions, talk to people at stores and hotels without having to use my phone to translate. There are studies from Yale, Michigan State University and others that continue to prove that Babel is better. One study found that using Babel for 15 hours is like a semester of that language at College with over 10 million subscriptions sold. Babble is real language learning for real conversations. Here's a special limited time deal for my audience right now. Get up to 60% off your babel subscription, but only for my audience at babel.com/pacman rules and restrictions may apply. Get up to 60% off at babel.com/pacMan spelled b a b b el.com/pacman rules and restrictions may apply. The link is in the podcast Notes. It's great to welcome back to the program today, J.L. collins, financial author and investor. A revised and expanded edition of his book the Simple Path to Wealth is out now, a book that will one of my favorite personal finance books and it's on the list on my website. JL it's so good to have you back on.
- [33:47]
J.L. Collins
Hey, it's a pleasure to be back here with you, David. I'm looking forward to the conversation.
- [33:53]
David Pakman
So listen, I mean I think one of the interesting things about the timing of this conversation is if we think about the last few months and the alleged Liberation day event of April 2, the announcement of and then pause of and then reminder that they're still on of these various blanket tariffs. The point of it all is whatever was announced, whatever was done, whatever was taken back, it created in the stock market some ups and downs and for a period of time they were pretty significant downs. The many of your expected commentators were saying it could take 10 years to get back to the stock market level where we were just months ago. We of course we're back there now, right? And so I think to kind of open the conversation as the average person is looking at what could be political and or economic instability and thinking what do I need to do right now in the market financially? Is the answer once again proven to be figure out your asset allocation and stick with it.
- [35:03]
J.L. Collins
That that is the answer. And even the shorter version to what should I do now? Is nothing. You stay the course. Which is always the answer, right? So if you go back four, six weeks when we were in the middle of this downturn triggered by the tariffs, nobody, certainly not me, would have predicted that we'd be back in positive territory already. But the corollary of that is, nobody knows where we go from here.
- [35:29]
David Pakman
Right?
- [35:30]
J.L. Collins
Right. I mean, it could be that we're back on the way up on a growth trajectory. It could be. This is a brief pause before we hit something much more serious. For the record, I'm not a fan of the tariffs. I think they're a terrible and dangerous idea. But one of the things that I've learned is my opinion doesn't matter to Mr. Market at all. And it will do whatever it is going to do. Six weeks ago, you know, my social media and blog were lighting up with predictions of doom. And you know what I say all the time? It's the same thing I said Covid is there's always something scary when the market plunges. That's why it plunges. But it never lasts. Eventually it turns around and continues its growth. I don't know if we're at that turnaround part now, as I said earlier, but that's always the trajectory. And if you look at Covid, it's even a better example because it's in the rear view mirror and clear. You know, Covid killed about a million people, which is tragic, but in a population of 330 million, it's a tiny fraction. So it's not a major disruption. Had Covid been the Black death, which killed 50, 60% of the population back in the Middle Ages, that's a civilization ending event. But then it doesn't matter where your money's invested.
- [36:53]
David Pakman
Right. Having a little gold is not going to make a huge difference if that.
- [36:57]
J.L. Collins
Scenario make any difference at all. Yeah, ammunition might.
- [37:03]
David Pakman
You know, I have friends who I consider very smart and have sold businesses, do high level legal work, high level finance, and over the last couple of weeks, they look at me and they say with total conviction, this is a dead cat bounce. We're going to see a 30% drop in the market. They are as convinced as they are about the sun coming up tomorrow. Or I have other friends who say, we got through it, it's up, up and away from here. Trump's not really going to put the tariffs back on. It's smooth sailing. And to all of them, I say, how do you know that? I have no idea which of those two scenarios is more likely. And I'm building my outlook over the fact that I don't know. If you don't know, what would it make sense to do is kind of my approach. Are you surprised by sometimes people who clearly are intelligent, thoughtful people who seem convinced that they know it makes sense to get in or get out at any particular point in time, I have no idea about it.
- [38:13]
J.L. Collins
Yeah, I know. I'm not surprised by that. In fact, you know, at one point in my life, I was probably one of them.
- [38:19]
David Pakman
Me, too.
- [38:20]
J.L. Collins
It seems so tempting to think, you know, so if we reel back to 2016, when Trump first won the election, whether you love Trump or you loathe him, one of the things that was common wisdom, and I think accurately is he is a disruptive force. And I in 2016 sat back and I thought, you know, we. Of the things I know about the market is it hates disruptive forces.
- [38:43]
David Pakman
Right.
- [38:43]
J.L. Collins
It hates uncertainty. Maybe I should go to cash, which was completely against my discipline. And fortunately I didn't because I stuck to my discipline, because I recognized, while it seems so absolutely clear to me what was going to happen, I don't really know that. That's just my opinion. The market doesn't care about my opinion or yours. Doesn't care about the opinion of the people who, who think it's going down 30%. Doesn't care about the opinion of the people who think it's going up from here nonstop, or it may just plateau for a while. Market doesn't care. And when you start thinking you know what the market's going to do, you've fallen prey to hubris. Nobody can predict it, so you stay the course, knowing that the market will recover. Whatever.
- [39:31]
David Pakman
What do you say about someone who doesn't take a. An extreme perspective, like, I'm selling it all and going to cash, or on the other side, I'm putting in every dollar I can find into the market because I expect it to go up. But, for example, I was listening to Scott Galloway recently who his approach was, I think, over the next. I'm paraphrasing, over the next 10 to 15 years, US stocks, I believe, are going to be flat. So I'm still dollar cost averaging. I've still got my asset allocations that I'm thinking of that are appropriate for my. I'm moving into, I think he said, Asian and some other continental markets. It's a shift, maybe in the focus, but more or less sticking to the plan. On the one hand, there's some appeal to that, intuitively. On the other hand, I ask myself, why didn't I already have those in my asset allocation if they were such a good idea? Am I being swayed by news and the politics of the day? What do you say to an idea like that? Just shift into Asian markets as an example.
- [40:40]
J.L. Collins
Yeah. So again, you think you know what's going to happen in the future and you don't could be that. Scott's right. That's exactly what will happen. But I remember a decade ago, David, all the smart people in the market were saying, you know, the market has such a great 10 year run or whatever, however long it's been.
- [41:00]
David Pakman
Yeah.
- [41:01]
J.L. Collins
Just can't expect these returns going forward. You should get used for the next decade, which of course now we've lived through of maybe 4% returns in the market. Well, the markets had a stunning decade, I mean a stunning decade of growth. So they were all wrong. Now I stayed invested because that's my discipline. Not because I knew the market was going to have a stunning decade, but because I knew I didn't know. Right. So I have no idea what the market's going to do in the next 15 years. For instance, the first part of this year, European stocks have absolutely trounced the US market. That hasn't happened in 10, 15 years. Now is that the new trend? Because there have been historically times when international has outperformed us hasn't been true for the last 10, 15 years. Maybe that's the next 10, 15 years as Scott thinks. But I don't know that. What I do know is that the US accounts for 60% of all publicly traded companies in the world. When I invest in vtsax, which is a total stock market index fund, the large majority of those companies that make up that fund are international by definition. And so assuming the rest of the world, like Asia and Europe and Africa continue to grow and prosperity, their markets will do well. But so will my VTSAX benefit through that. So I don't feel the need for international, by the way, that puts me very much out of step with the vast majority of people talking about this stuff. And so if somebody said to me, hey, you know jl, I take your point, kind of makes sense. But I feel more comfortable with some international. I say God bless you, go for it. Buy a world fund, a low cost world fund from somebody like Vanguard and, and call it a day. In fact, that's what I tell my international readers because the US is the only country that is dominant enough in the markets that you can get away with that, that home country bias. So if I were anywhere else in the world, I'd already be in a world fund.
- [43:09]
David Pakman
I want to ask you a little bit about some of the more speculative assets where the natural one to talk about is Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies more broadly. We talked about it a little bit the last time you were on, but now we've seen, you know, even presidents get involved in meme coins and it's really, we're seeing certain things that I don't know that I would have ever predicted five years ago. My view to my audience has been, and this has been my view for 12 years or something. I have absolutely no idea what the future of cryptocurrency or bitcoin specifically is. Once it was around long enough that I said this might be something, I, I decided two and a half percent of my assets felt like a nice balance where if I lose all of it, I'm okay, but I've got some upside exposure. I don't know. I had zero predictive power as to where it was going to be. As it went up, I would sell down to my two and a half percent. When it went down, I would top up to two and a half percent. And then, and I just wait. I don't know what's going to happen.
- [44:15]
J.L. Collins
Right.
- [44:16]
David Pakman
Where are you now with. Maybe for some people it's 2, maybe it's 4%. Some portion of their assets in something that is known to be speculative is there. What's your guidance on something like that?
- [44:30]
J.L. Collins
So first of all, let me, let me address that whole concept of taking a small portion of your portfolio and playing with it, so to speak, because it's a question I get all the time, Time. Is it okay If I take 2, 5, 10% and play? Sure, it's okay. But understand that if, if you are correct, it's really not going to be enough to move the needle because by definition, you want to put in not so much. They won't move the needle if you're incorrect. So that's one of the reasons that I don't bother. But talking specifically about crypto, as an example, Bitcoin, my take on it is real simple. It's way too volatile to actually serve as a currency. Right. Currencies need stability in order to function as a means of trade. That's why inflation and for that matter, deflation are so terribly damaging is because suddenly the currency isn't reliable. It's either worth less and less as you go forward in inflation or more and more in deflation. And that makes it unsuitable for a means of trade. So crypto is not at that stage yet. Maybe it'll get there someday. So what it really is is not an investment, in my view, but a speculation.
- [45:44]
David Pakman
Yes.
- [45:44]
J.L. Collins
So what do I mean by that? Well, an investment in vtsax is in companies that are actively operating to sell products and services to grow their businesses and hopefully if they're doing it effectively to make a profit that we as owners benefit from. A speculation like crypto or gold for that matter, or classic cars or art, is where you're buying something and you're anticipating and hoping that at some point in the future somebody will pay you more for it than you paid for it. Right? That's a speculation. There's no underlying dynamic creating value there other than what the world around you continues to perceive as value. Now, to be clear, if you'd invested in crypto 10, 15 years ago, you and held through the very wild and rocky ride it's been, it would have served you extraordinarily well. But that's the nature of speculation. You don't know. There's been were lots of other speculative investments you could have made 10, 15 years ago that crashed and burned. So the question if you're looking at crypto or bitcoin in particular now is not that 10, 15 year run, it's where does it now? It's $100,000 a coin or something, where does it go from here? And again, to your point, nobody really knows. So your 2.5% investment may do well, it may not. But it's not going to move the needle into your portfolio all that much probably anyway.
- [47:20]
David Pakman
All right, the Simple Path to Wealth in its new expanded edition is now available. We've been speaking with the book's author, J.L. collins. J.L. always great to talk to you. Really appreciate it.
- [47:33]
J.L. Collins
It's always my pleasure. Anytime, my friend.
- [47:37]
David Pakman
Many of us know it can be tough to stay on top of nutrition every single day, especially when things get busy and hectic. That is why I've made AG1 part of my morning routine. AG1 has now launched their next gen formula. Still just a scoop a day, but it's been upgraded with more vitamins and minerals, a stronger probiotic blend and this is the biggest thing clinically backed by four human clinical trials. Most supplements don't go through anything like that. In one clinical trial, AG1 Next Gen increased healthy gut bacteria by 10 times. It's also clinically shown to help fill common nutrient gaps even if you eat pretty well already. I mix AG1 with water before my world famous cappuccino in the morning. Quick. Tastes good. Just helps me feel like I'm covering my nutritional bases. And now, clinically backed with an advanced formula, it's the perfect time to try AG1. If you haven't head to drink ag1.com/pacman to subscribe, you'll get a free bottle of AG D3K to a welcome kit and five travel packs with your first order. The link is in the description. The White House press secretary for the Trump administration is Caroline Levitt. We've heard from her before and one of the new things that's going on is she is occasionally holding MAGA influencer briefings completely separate from the primary press briefings. But sometimes, sometimes they will allow a new media correspondent into the big boy and big girl press briefing room. This time it was a guy from the conspiracy site Zero Hedge named Liam Cosgrove who, by the way, has invited me to stuff he's organized before. David, it's Liam. Do you want to debate this person? Do you want to debate that person? Of course, I've politely declined those invitations. We learn here as Caroline Levitt smirks about a completely bonkers Clinton body count conspiracy theory related to Jeffrey Epstein and a whole bunch of other stuff. Caroline Levitt smirks as this conspiracy theorist asks the question. Levitt's job is entertainment. It's not news. She's extraordinarily focused here, not only on the sort of visual presentation she provides, but on entertainment. And it is a humiliation that this is now part of a press briefing. Listen, I've heard conspiracy theories before. This is something else.
- [50:21]
Liam Cosgrove
So over the weekend, President Trump posted Truth Social, a video highlighting what most people call the Clinton body count, which is the shrink.
- [50:30]
David Pakman
And look at that smart number of.
- [50:32]
Liam Cosgrove
Suicides that seem to happen in Clinton circles. I have a headline here from the Washington Post that said Trump pedals false conspiracy theories, tying the Clintons to several deaths. So I just wanted to highlight real quick, this wasn't in Trump's video, but this is from the Arkansas Times and it's the death of Mark Middleton, who was a former Clinton White House aide who was found dead on a Clinton foundation property. And I'll just quote from the Arkansas Times. Middleton apparently shot himself in the chest with a shotgun and also hung himself from a tree with an extension cord. So I have no idea how somebody commits suicide that way. But if the Washington Post is here, maybe you can enlighten us as to how that was actually a suicide. So anyways, that's just a lead into my question about the most famous Clinton related suicide, which is that of Jeffrey Epstein. There's still a lot of climate questions around that case. You've released phase one of the Epstein files. What was missing from that is any connection to his ties to intelligence agencies. And that's really the whole story that not just trafficking Young girls doing it on behalf of intelligence agencies and even potentially as part of a blackmail ring with potential ties to the Israeli government.
- [51:38]
David Pakman
So did you guys even catch that? This, the real story of the Epstein case is that he was trafficking young girls, but it was because intelligence agencies were having him do it. And it might also involve the Israeli government. That is a doozy. And also, the Clintons killed a lot of people for phase two.
- [51:58]
Liam Cosgrove
When can we expect it? Will it have information pertaining to those aspects of the Epstein case?
- [52:04]
Caroline Levitt
I know the attorney general has committed to releasing those files. I would defer you to the Department of Justice on her timeline. But when she has made a promise in the past, she has kept it. And I'm certain that she will in this case as well.
- [52:18]
David Pakman
Oh, this is, this is part of an official, official press briefing right now. What a debasement of what is happening in this country. What a. What a. Caroline Levitt was asked is, is Trump okay adding to the deficit with this tax bill? Every serious economist and scoring agency has looked at it and said, this is going to blow up the deficit like Trump always does. And Levitt just goes, it's not going to add to the deficit.
- [52:43]
Donald Trump
A quick follow up.
- [52:45]
Caroline Levitt
Is the president okay with this bill adding to the deficit? This bill does not add to the deficit. In fact, according to the Council of Economic Advisers, this bill will save $1.6 trillion.
- [52:59]
David Pakman
And now remember, she's playing a game here. A bill can save 1.6 trillion in one bucket and then cost 3 trillion in another bucket. So you've got to subtract things. OK, well, it still adds 1.4 trillion to the deficit. Right. I can, I could say to you, hey, I found some savings. We're no longer getting those sumo oranges. God, those are delicious. We're out of season now. I went the other day. I looked everywhere. I couldn't. They're done. Okay. Okay, let's go back. I found savings. No more sumo oranges. So we're going to. We're saving. Right. But if you replace that spending with twice as much on the golden Kiwis, which I highly recommend, you found savings, but you found more spending. And every serious analysis finds that this Trump tax bill, if passed in its latest iteration, would significantly increase the debt. Caroline Levitt says that everybody who calls the plane being gifted to Trump a personal gift is wrong, even though, of course, after Trump leaves office, it goes to Trump's presidential library. But she's big mad because people need to correct their stories very clear.
- [54:18]
Caroline Levitt
The government of Qatar, the Qatari family has offered to donate this plane to the United States and Air Force, where that donation will be accepted according to all legal and ethical obligations. It will be retrofitted to the highest of standards by the Department of Defense and the United States Air Force. This plane is not a personal donation or gift to the president of the United States. And everyone who wrote that last week should go and correct their stories because this is a donation to our country and to the United States Air Force as well, for a timeline, because it is the United States Air Force that is accepting the plane. I would defer you to them for specifics because the president, frankly, has nothing to do with it.
- [55:00]
David Pakman
It's the Air Force's project, of course, not denying that. The plane goes to Trump's library foundation after he leaves office. Yesterday we discussed Trump's thinly veiled threat at Walmart, where he said, walmart, you'd better eat the tariffs. Don't raise your prices. Because of the tariffs, I'm going to be watching you. A very clear threat. Caroline Levitt asked, what did you mean? What did Trump mean by that? Here's what she said.
- [55:24]
Caroline Levitt
The president is committed to ensuring that prices remain low for American consumers, and he maintains the position that foreign countries will absorb these tariffs. What does he mean by I'll be watching Walmart? He'll be watching, seeing what they're doing, Jennifer.
- [55:38]
David Pakman
That's all. He's just going to watch, you know, like a case study, that's all. Next question is about Trump's physical health. Caroline Levitt says, he's just so healthy.
- [55:50]
J.D. Vance
Follow up on former President Biden. White House doctors may have missed the early stages of his prostate cancer. So is President Trump worried about the quality of care that presidents get here?
- [56:05]
Caroline Levitt
Not as far as President Trump is concerned. The White House position we have here is phenomenal. And the team of physicians that take care of the president, particularly at Walter Reed Medical center, are great. The president had his physical recently, as you know, he had perfect results. He's in very good shape, I think.
- [56:22]
David Pakman
Perfect.
- [56:23]
Caroline Levitt
Those of you who traveled to the Middle east with us last week can attest to the president's endurance. And by the way, I will add, we returned home from a very long and tiring trip last week and on Saturday, where was the president? In the Oval Office, working all day. He doesn't stop, he doesn't quit. He's in great health and he trusts his physicians.
- [56:42]
David Pakman
Healthiest president ever. And then finally, Trump also recently taking out his anger on Taylor Swift, saying Taylor Swift is no Longer hot. What did Trump mean by that? The last one.
- [56:56]
J.D. Vance
What does President Trump mean when he says that Taylor Swift is no longer hot?
- [57:04]
Caroline Levitt
Look, he is speaking about Taylor Swift's political views and how perhaps it has impacted the support of the American public for her work. And I will leave it at that.
- [57:13]
David Pakman
There you go. It has nothing to do with whether Trump is attracted to Taylor Swift. Peter Doocy, get your mind out of the gutter. Another failed and completely humiliating press briefing. These are now of zero value in communicating anything of substance to the American people. Vice President J.D. vance wasted no time in showing us exactly who he is responding to Joe Biden's cancer diagnosis. Not stage 9, stage 4 with a Gleason 9 prostate 2 tumor. J.D. vance had the following to say, this stuff is sickening.
- [57:59]
J.D. Vance
Look, I mean, first of all, of course we wish the best for the former President's health. And you know, it sounds pretty serious, but, but hopefully he makes the right recovery. I will say whether the right time to have this conversation is now or at some point in the future, we really do need to be honest about whether the former president was capable of doing the job. And that's, that's no. You know, you can separate the desire for him to have the right health outcome with the recognition that whether it was doctors or whether there were staffers around the former President, I don't think he was able to do a good job for the American people. And that's not politics. That's not because I disagreed with him on policy. That's because I don't think that he was in good enough health. And in some ways I blame him less than I blame the people around him. And why did the American people have a better sense of his health picture? Why didn't the American people have more accurate information about what he was actually dealing with? This is serious stuff. Look, I mean.
- [58:58]
David Pakman
We just learn that Joe Biden has stage 4 metastatic prostate cancer and the Vice President of the United States decides it's the perfect moment to question his competence and to kick start this political autopsy. There's no decency, just a thinly veiled attack that he dresses up as concern. I'm just concerned. You know, Biden is not in office. He's a private citizen and he has a life threatening illness. There really is an urgency now to assess his fitness for a job he doesn't hold and for which he ultimately realized he shouldn't be a candidate for now. Should Biden have even started running for reelection? No. Was it a mistake to even attempt? Yeah. It was. It was. But the only urgency here is that JD Vance wants to sneak in this political, politically opportune moment, and it's just disgusting. But this is who J.D. vance is. He's a guy who built his brand on feigned humility, and he turned it into a career of parroting Donald Trump's worst instincts. And it just doesn't stop there. Here's another clip that, you know, if we're going to have a category called bootlicking diplomacy, here is JD Vance blaming Vladimir Putin. I'm sorry, not blaming. Excusing Vladimir Putin, saying, Putin's in a tough spot now. Putin started the war. Listen to this.
- [60:30]
J.D. Vance
Talks have been proceeding for a little while. We realize there's a bit of an impasse here. And I think the President's going to say to President Putin, look, are you serious? Are you real about this? I think, honestly, that President Putin, he doesn't quite know how to get out of the war. This is a little bit of guess, but I think the President would, poor guy, agree that part of this is. I'm not sure that Vladimir Putin has a strategy himself for how to unwind the war. Of course, that's been going on for a few years now. There is fundamental mistrust between Russia and the West. It's one of the things the President thinks is frankly stupid, that. That we should be able to move beyond the mistakes that have been made in the past. But that takes two to tanko. I know the President's willing to do that, but if Russia is not willing to do that, then we're eventually just going to say, this is not our war.
- [61:14]
David Pakman
This is so weird. You know, Putin started the war. He invaded Ukraine. It's not like a sitcom plot. He wandered into it by accident. Now he has to find some zany way out. There's a really easy way to get out of the war. Pull your troops out of a sovereign nation that you're invading, stop bombing and stop doing all the things that you're doing. That's it. But instead of condemning the architect of one of the worst invasions in modern history, Vance is kind of like, you know, Putin's in a really tough spot at this point. He's in. Imagine if someone said Hitler doesn't know how to stop the war. It just. It's such a tough spot that he's in. This is such cowardice, and it's really appeasement dressed up as realism. Listen, I'm just being real with you guys. It's a. It's a tough spot. And this tells you everything about how this second Trump term is planning to handle global authoritarianism. They're going to apologize for it. They're going to give excuses, they're going to defer to it. JD Vance kind of wants to brand himself as the populist outsider with common sense. Putin's in a tough spot. But he's not. J.D. is not a serious thinker. He's certainly not a moral leader, and he's not even a particularly clever troll. He's a guy who watched Trump weaponize cruelty. And now as his number one deputy as the vice president of the United States, he's realized that weaponizing cruelty is, I guess, the path to power. So that's where JD Is, and it's really pathetic. We've got a fantastic bonus show for you today. Cash Patel and Dan Bongino are facing the wrath of MAGA because they are saying Jeffrey Epstein genuinely took his own life. There's no conspiracy. He just did it. And MAGA is furious with them. Secondly, a New Jersey representative has been charged with assaulting ICE agents during a clash at a Newark facility. And finally, Ashley Babbitt's family is going to receive $5 million from the Trump administration. She was the individual killed for her actions on January 6, 2021, the riots. Why is her family getting $5 million? All of those stories and more on today's bonus show. Sign up@join pacman.com I'll see you then.