Trump Keeps Losing, Stagflation, and RFK Jr.’s Senate Meltdown

Summary

The Find Out Podcast

Episode 40: Trump Keeps Losing, Stagflation, and RFK Jr.’s Senate Meltdown
Release Date: September 9, 2025
Host/Panel: Tim, Rich, Jake, Luke

Episode Overview

This episode dives deep into the ongoing political chaos of Trump’s second term, with a sharp focus on the recent Supreme Court decision allowing racial profiling in LA, Trump becoming more emboldened post-court victories, worsening jobs and economic numbers, looming stagflation, chaos amongst the farming community due to tariffs, and a detailed summary of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s disastrous Senate testimony. The hosts break down the challenges of countering MAGA propaganda, lament the erosion of normal political and journalistic norms, and riff on the wildest current events with their trademark blend of humor, exasperation, and leftist realism.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

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1. Trump’s Legal Rollercoaster & Supreme Court’s Racial Profiling Ruling

[00:16–01:37]

• SCOTUS Decision: As the show begins, Tim reports that the Supreme Court sided with the Trump administration on racial profiling in LA, calling it a “not exactly wonderful ruling.”
• E. Jean Carroll Civil Case: The court upheld the judgment in columnist E. Jean Carroll’s civil case against Trump; the judgment stands.
• Cynicism About Trump Paying Damages:
  • Jake (01:02): “Do you think he’ll pay E. Jean Carroll in Trump coin or does it have to be cash?”
  • Luke (01:06): “It’s such a fucking loser thing… he could pay, but he’s choosing not to.”
• Trump’s Habit of Not Paying Contractors: Explored through anecdotes about Trump’s decades of screwing over ordinary workers and contractors.
  • Tim (01:17): “He doesn’t pay people… it’s just in his DNA to say, screw you.”

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2. The Norms Are Dead: Why Should Democrats "Play Nice"?

[03:07–04:56]

• The hosts debate the futility of expecting Democrats to “restore norms” when the GOP no longer abides by them.
  • Luke (07:07): “Stop fucking around because clearly their side of the politics doesn’t give a single solitary fuck about following the rules.”
  • Tim (03:41): “There are no more norms to break. They’ve all been broken.”
• Consensus: The next Democratic presidential candidate needs an unapologetically aggressive agenda and must pursue real accountability for Trump's lawbreaking.

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3. Trump Distraction Tactics & Media Analysis

[05:01–11:49]

• The Blue Pill US Open Photo: Amused speculation about a viral image of Trump at the US Open, possibly “chomping” on a blue pill.
• Fresh Conspiracies: The team jokes about Trump being outed as an “FBI informant” in the Epstein case, lampooning the absurdity of recent right-wing talking points.
• Media Critique:
  • The failure of mainstream journalism to label Trump’s lies as lies.
    • Jake (06:28): “There are so many times now that that has been proven and they still won’t just say: Donald Trump lied about this.”
  • The mainstream press’ anxiety about appearing biased has led to an overcorrection—now accommodating right-wing narratives and figures like Bari Weiss (Tim, 08:50).
  • Nostalgia for when journalism provided a “sane person’s take”—a role now largely missing and filled instead by social media and left-wing content creators.
    • Jake (10:18): “What we do have is the fucking voice of sanity… that has been completely erased from all mass media outlets… now you have to dig deep into Politico’s opinion section to find someone who just says ‘yeah, this is super fucked up and they’re all corrupt by the way’.”

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4. Trump’s “Whitewashing Domestic Abuse” and Response to Economic Crises

[12:13–17:52]

• Trump Downplays Domestic Violence: Trump’s recent comment that some crimes are just “little fights with the wife” is called out.
  • Luke (12:41): “You mean he’s just whitewashing domestic abuse?”
• Job Numbers Worsen:
  • Tim (13:21): “We got a really bad jobs number on Friday…mountain of terrible, terrible economic news.”
  • The panel attribute the economic downturn to Trump’s tariffs, with Axios even backing the analysis.
• Contrast With Biden Era:
  • Jake (16:33): “Joe Biden delivered an average of 215,000 jobs per month… all the way up through January this year. No job losses every single fucking month of his tenure for four years.”
  • Recognition that up until mid-2023, wage growth began outpacing inflation: “He literally gave us a soft landing.”

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5. Stagflation & Economic Discontent: Who Gets Hurt and Who Gets the Blame?

[17:52–25:10 & 39:56–44:33]

• Describing Stagflation:
  • Jake (39:56): “Stagflation is prices are going up… and there’s stagnant economic growth. The last time we had stagflation was in the 70s.”
• Tariffs as an Economic Time Bomb:
  • Tariffs, plus possible interest rate cuts, could mean rising prices without renewed growth—classic stagflation.
  • Worries about the impact on housing, auto loans—essential consumer goods with prices propped up by tariffs.
• Farmers Hit Hard:
  • Arkansas farmers, who overwhelmingly supported Trump, are now “begging” for help due to tariff devastation.
    • Rich (24:13): “One of them said: ‘Trump keeps saying that he loves farmers and I need him to show me that love now.’”
  • Hosts insist these voters may simply need to “hit rock bottom” before they stop voting red, but acknowledge it’s rare for such voters to then flip blue.
• Tariffs’ International Fallout:
  • Rich (27:08): “It’s consolidating our enemies—like, what a surprise—threatening India with 50% tariffs. They’re going to China and saying: we hate each other, but let’s figure this out.”
  • America’s trade wars are pushing major global economies together and risking U.S. standing.

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6. Why Can’t Democrats Reach Working Class Voters?

[29:55–32:31]

• The hosts ask themselves: Is there any hope of persuading suffering Trump voters?
  • Consensus: Not likely.
    • Luke (30:25): “You gotta let them hit rock bottom.”
    • Jake (30:55): “They’ll just stay home [instead of voting blue].”
  • Social wedge issues (“abortion, the gay stuff”) have less pull than economic pain, but ultimately, the hosts see “logic” as ineffective against committed MAGAs.

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7. Foreign Adventurism: Venezuela Provocation & Department of War

[32:01–36:41]

• U.S. recently sank a Venezuelan vessel, with little evidence for “drug-running” claims.
  • Vance’s response: “I don’t give a fuck about that” (32:56), which the hosts say appeals to MAGA and even some centrists.
  • Jake expresses concern about the U.S. "playing world police" again, contradicting Trump’s “America First” rhetoric.
• Trump’s push to rename the Department of Defense as the “Department of War”—a move estimated to cost $1 billion and be purely symbolic.

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8. RFK Jr.’s Senate Meltdown: Anti-Science Lies & Vaccine Debacles

[44:33–56:43]

• RFK’s Testimony:
  • The hosts detail the bizarre “Health and Human Services Secretary” RFK Jr. Senate testimony, with him screaming, lying, and stating outlandish things (e.g., Trump deserves a Nobel Peace Prize for the vaccine, the same one RFK asserts "killed more people than Covid.")
  • Tim (46:51): “Explain to me how Donald Trump deserves the Nobel Peace Prize for the vaccine that you called the deadliest in history that killed more people than Covid.”
• Florida Surgeon General’s Anti-Science Policies:
  • Scrutinized for eliminating school vaccine mandates “without conducting any analysis.”
• The Vaccine Misinformation Plague:
  • The panel explodes at the idiocy of anti-vax talking points, especially misrepresenting VAERS (Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System), focusing on anecdotes and statistical ignorance.
    • Rich (51:55): “VAERS is Yelp for vaccine adverse reactions. That’s all it is.”
    • Jake (54:17): “Maybe Statistics 0.001—the way I explain fractions to my 8 year old is what all Republican voters need explained to them.”
  • RFK Jr. blames Tylenol for autism, dismissed as “zero evidence.”
  • Exasperation at the public’s inability (and sometimes experts’ unwillingness) to translate medical science to the layperson.

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9. The Right-Wing Media Ecosystem & Why Leftists Must “Build Our Own”

[20:35–21:54 & 61:10–61:56]

• The right effectively communicates its message via an ecosystem stretching from Fox News to online gaming streamers.
• The left lacks equivalent infrastructure, which the Find Out Podcast team is trying to build.
  • Tim (61:10): “Somebody has to do it because otherwise we’re never going to get those people back.”

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Trump’s strategy: Jake (02:08): “It’s what he’s doing in government: do whatever you want, and then people have to figure out how to stop you…if they give up or if they run out of money, then you win.”
• On media failure: Jake (10:18): “We [have] the fucking voice of sanity…that has been completely erased from all mass media outlets.”
• On Democrats playing by outdated rules: Luke (07:07): “Stop fucking around because clearly their side…doesn’t give a single solitary fuck about following the rules.”
• On inflation and jobs: Jake (16:33): “Joe Biden delivered an average of 215,000 jobs per month… no job losses every single fucking month… the reason inflation wasn’t as destructive… was because we were mostly employed.”
• On farming pain and tariffs: Rich (24:13): “Trump keeps saying that he loves farmers and I need him to show me that love now.”
• On the futility of converting MAGA voters: Luke (30:25): “You gotta let them hit rock bottom.”
• On VAERS/vaccine data chicanery: Rich (51:55): “VAERS is Yelp for vaccine adverse reactions. That’s all it is. Anybody who doesn’t like the vaccine…can go in and say, ‘I got 20 new ears and six new legs because of the vaccine.’”
• On right-wing media power: Tim (20:35): “We have to combat an entire network that goes from TV down to streaming…and we don’t have it.”
• On science deniers: Jake (54:17): “Statistics 0.001 is what all Republican voters need explained to them—crime data, vaccine data, the age of the earth.”

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Important Timestamps

• [00:16–01:37] — Supreme Court ruling on racial profiling; E. Jean Carroll judgment stands; Trump’s history of not paying creditors.
• [03:07–04:56] — Debate over breaking “norms” and what Democrats need to do moving forward.
• [05:01–11:49] — Trump’s media manipulation, blue pill story, and the failure of mainstream media to hold Trump’s administration accountable.
• [13:21–17:52] — The bad jobs report, Trump’s economic blame games, the legacy of Biden’s positive jobs numbers.
• [17:52–25:10] — Stagflation, tariffs’ economic impact, and how farming and rural communities are being hurt.
• [29:55–32:31] — Hosts analyze whether struggling Trump voters can be won over (consensus: very unlikely, best hope is apathy).
• [32:01–36:41] — Venezuela boat sinking, “Department of War” naming controversy, media antics.
• [44:33–56:43] — RFK Jr.’s Senate meltdown, vaccine policy misinformation, public health skepticism.
• [61:10–61:56] — The urgent need for independent left-wing media infrastructure.

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Tone & Style

• Irreverent, direct, heavy use of expletives and sarcasm.
• Cathartic, with a sense of shared frustration and weariness at political regression and institutional breakdown.
• Humor repeatedly used to blunt the absurdity and anger the hosts feel over current events.

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Final Note

The episode closes with the hosts promoting their merchandise (union made, made in America), previewing a special episode featuring a progressive Senate candidate from Maine, and reiterating their mission: creating the left’s answer to the relentless, nationwide right-wing media machine.

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Transcript

[Rich]

Foreign.

[Tim]

Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the Find out podcast. We've made it to episode 40. There is so much crazy to talk about today. It is kind of insane. Uh, but as we were going live, we did just hear that the Supreme Court has essentially ruled in favor of the Trump administration in racially profiling people in la, which is not exactly a wonderful ruling. So. But we also did hear this morning that on his civil case, the judgment that Eugene Carroll got against him is going to stand. So there is some good and there's some bad today, and I think that's pretty much how the fall is probably going to go. A little good, not so bad.

[Jake]

Do you think he's going to pay Eugene Carroll in Trump coin or. Or does it have to be cash? I think, because I think he made.

[Luke]

Like, 5 million of those Trump phones.

[Jake]

Just the phones.

[Luke]

It's such a fucking, like, loser thing, too, because just in the money that he's grifted so far, this presidency, he could pay, but he's choosing not to.

[Jake]

And he's, He's. I think he's never been known for, though.

[Tim]

He doesn't pay people, he doesn't pay anybody. So it's just in his, in his DNA to say, screw you. I mean, there's the reason why everybody in New York City hates his guts. It's. Everybody has a story about a friend of a friend who did work for some area of Trump's world and never got paid or got paid half, because that's what he would do.

[Rich]

How does he get away with it? Like, imagine if one of us tried to do that.

[Tim]

It was just never work because he was going after people that he knew he could screw over, like contractors and stuff like that. He would basically say, I have, I have lawyers on. On retainer, so go ahead, file a lawsuit. And, you know, a lot of people just think, oh, you could just, like, you know, sue them, but it takes a lawyer. And, like, if you're a contractor or whatever, you don't probably have cash for that retainer, and that's only in the hopes that you get the money back. So he knew he could just do it.

[Jake]

The battle of attrition. It's like you just do whatever you want. I mean, it's what he's doing in government. Do whatever you want. And then people have to figure out how to. How to challenge you and stop you and, and beat you. And if they give up or if they run out of money, then you win. And.

[Luke]

Because that's what Democratic candidate for President 28, that says he's going to use the DOJ to seize all those assets and I will be lining up to vote for him. I like, we're gonna get these. That's what.

[Jake]

Yeah. Like, what about health care? No, it doesn't matter.

[Luke]

See, that comes after we get.

[Tim]

We get even.

[Jake]

Put the, put the pedophile in prison and take all of his shit and then we can talk about health care. Minimum wage.

[Tim]

Let's write the broke. Yeah. And let's make sure that everybody knows that there are consequences to breaking the government. And I don't think I.

[Luke]

We can break it our own way and give everybody health care. Like we should have done 40 breaking.

[Tim]

Yes.

[Rich]

They're going to maybe fix it our own way. There are good.

[Tim]

There are good ways to break it. There's bad ways to break.

[Luke]

That's the thing that, like, I have come out of this presidency wanting out of a Democratic president. Stop around because clearly their side of the politics doesn't give a single solitary about following the rules.

[Tim]

So why are we like, there's this.

[Luke]

That millions of people are asking for and you're like, oh, we just can't do that because, like, we got to follow all the rules that there. You have the power to do that. They've clearly shown they have the power to do. So do it.

[Tim]

There is a term within the DC Beltway crew that's basically like talking about not breaking quote, unquote, norms.

[Luke]

Yeah, that.

[Tim]

And that started with Donald Trump in 2015 and 16 and they continue. There are no more norms to break. They've all been broken. So I, the argument of, like, the Democrat just has to come back in and, you know, make everything nice again. I think I agree with you, Luke. I don't think that's right. I, I think it's. We need to hold people accountable who have been breaking the law over and over again. And let's be honest, Trump has been breaking the law hoping that a conservative Supreme Court will bail him out, which happens pretty frequently time, you know, so, like, he gets to do things that a regular court would not approve of, like this racial profiling. But I agree, I think the candidate next year or was not next year, but for 28 has to put forth one a like cleaning house agenda and then also an aggressive policy agenda as well. I think they've got to do both.

[Rich]

Yeah. I mean, it's the one positive thing that came from Trump is that I think he sort of broke the log jam of like, how politics is supposed to go because nobody liked it. Like, nobody liked the way politics was, it was all this, like, stiff dude, we're at a suit, just dictating down a bunch of. Nobody wants that anymore. Like, it used to sort of be like, let's just get back to where I don't have to think about politics. Like, that world is gone and the new world is like, you got to do, you know.

[Luke]

Speaking of stiff dudes, what do you think that little blue pill that Trump was taking at the. The U.S. open was?

[Rich]

Little blue pill. I didn't see that.

[Tim]

So there was a. For those who didn't see, there was a, A photo.

[Luke]

That was my.

[Tim]

That was my. That was a photo of him at the, at the US Open with what appeared to be a pill. He was like chomping down on it. It was a weird photo. And I did see legitimate reporters talking about it. So it's a real photo.

[Jake]

He was outed as an FBI informant in the Epstein case this weekend. So maybe it was one of those cyanide two things. And he was like, he's like, I'm exposed.

[Luke]

Exposed to all the booze.

[Tim]

Yeah, well, the. And if you didn't see it this weekend, which, you know, hopefully you were not paying attention like we were. But yes, they. Mike Johnson, the Speaker of the House, suggested in the most hilarious way that the reason that Donald Trump is in the Epstein files is because he's an FBI. Was an FBI informant, which also runs right in the face of the Epstein story as a hoax. So. And I think he walked that back.

[Luke]

I think, I think walking it back is such like a cop out of a way of saying it. The lied. He lied.

[Tim]

Yeah.

[Luke]

And he won't repeat the lie. So call it what it is and.

[Tim]

Call it a lie.

[Luke]

He stopped lying.

[Tim]

Yeah, but like this.

[Luke]

Oh, they walked it back. I don't like that.

[Tim]

Well, it's funny that we still to this day, most mainstream reporters won't say that the Trump administration is lying, even though they are lying. Lying most of the time, even when.

[Jake]

They'Re caught, like in a tech, like you can technically prove that they did know that things were true and then they said that they were not true. And then like, that is the proof. Because that's always the hang up in journalism world, is like you have to prove that the person at the time they uttered the statement knew that they were wrong and they said it anyway because they have some nefarious intent. I'm like, there are so many times now that that has been proven and they still won't just say, Donald Trump lied about this.

[Luke]

I mean, every time he talks about alternatives, every time he talks about gas prices, it's a lie. Every time he talks about wind turf turbines, it's a lie and they refuse to say it.

[Tim]

But are you suggesting that wind turbines don't cause cancer?

[Luke]

I'm pretty sure they don't.

[Jake]

Only, only whale cancer.

[Rich]

I, I think, yeah.

[Luke]

Junior and wind turbines, the two biggest causes of whale death.

[Rich]

I think that there's a problem with this though. It's like two problems. One is nobody gives a anymore. Right. It's the same as like, it's an overused word. We say Trump's lying and everybody goes, I know, I don't care. Like it's, it's, that's the thing. All these, you know, fascism, authoritarian, all these words have no meaning left because we just overuse them. Because he did lie all the time. But like, I don't know, it's one of those things where I look at it, I'm like, I don't know what the right approach is, but like where they beat us is not that it's like positioning. They don't give a shit if what they're saying is true or false because they understand how to position their, their narrative. Like, we're like, well, for them don't.

[Luke]

Give a fuck if it's a lie or not. No, of course, like the pretty painting of an idea that this is all going to be true. And you know, right. Grocery groceries are going to be 10 cents and a burger is going to be a nickel.

[Rich]

Yes.

[Tim]

Right. Well, but I think what we're seeing is also, which we talk about a lot because obviously we're trying to counter is the fact that there is a very large right wing media ecosystem that every time they say something that the mainstream press says that they don't like, they send everybody after them and they've essentially succeeded in pulling the norms to the right.

[Rich]

Yeah.

[Tim]

So that things that didn't used to be normal and they shouldn't be normal now are treated as such like the lying and the hypocrisy and the stealing, all of this. And we haven't had the same thing on the other side. And because the media is so worried to this day about not being seen as biased.

[Rich]

Right.

[Tim]

They have, they have shifted. Right. To placate them to the point which this still, it makes me ill to even say this. CBS News is in talks with Barry Weiss, who has started this thing called the Free Press, which is actually the number one substack there. And it's filled with nonsense as you might imagine they're in talks to buy that for $200 million and they're going to let her, Barry Weiss, who left the New York Times because her reporting was so biased, they're going to integrate her into CBS News. $200 million and an influential spot in mainstream media.

[Rich]

That's a waste of $200 million.

[Jake]

Not to toot our own horn. I always hated that expression, by the way. It's just terrible expression. I'm like, who's tooting horns, right? But journalism, like I love journalism. I love what it used to be. There, there used to be judgment in journalism. And they would give you that, you know, you think back to like Walter Cronkite in that era. And before that they would give you the sane person's take, like the everyman take on what they're reporting as they're reporting it. Because otherwise you're like, am I crazy or does it feel like they're lying? Or am I crazy or does it feel like this is super fucking corrupt and they don't give you that part of it anymore? And I think that's why people are going, I mean it's definitely why people are going to social more than ever. But it's not just for the fact based reporting because like we don't have the resources to go and do these investigative, you know, reports where you have to be inside of a covert operation essentially for a year so you can get the details. And we don't have those relationships, or at least most of us don't. But what we do have is the fucking voice of sanity when this stuff is happening. And that has been completely erased from the surface of, of, of all mass media outlets to where you just, you have to dig into the like Politico opinion section to find somebody who just will say, yeah, this is super up. And they're all corrupt by the way. Like you're not crazy. This is actually true, right?

[Rich]

No, it's true.

[Tim]

I think that the media like that, that system relied on two sides relatively playing the same game, right? And then you'd have somebody in the middle, you know, like the Murrows and Cronkites and all of those being able to, you know, report fairly and honestly. I'm sure they had biases too. But you know, for the most part both sides were playing the same game. It doesn't work when one side has decided that they are just going to demonize those people in order to justify to their audiences what they're doing. I mean, it's actually from a Purely power play move. It was genius of Trump to just call everything in the mainstream media fake news or lies. He's using those terms even though he was lying about the lies.

[Rich]

No, it's extremist positioning. That's all it is.

[Tim]

Yeah, but it worked and they fell for it hook, line and sinker. And then they were like, well, we can't have one side calling us biased because then that's going to make us look like we lean left and they have overcorrected, there's no doubt about it.

[Rich]

Oh, yeah.

[Tim]

But essentially destroyed the mainstream media vehicle anyways because now nobody really buys what they're selling. See.

[Luke]

Okay, I just, I just got this report. This is an interesting thing that. I hate this. This is a good example of Trump skewing things.

[Rich]

Yeah.

[Luke]

This is a quote from Donald Trump today. He claimed that crime is down to virtually nothing in D.C. and adds that crimes are, that are happening are, quote, much lesser things. Things that take place in the home they call crime. You know, they'll do anything they can to find something. If a man has a little fight with the wife, they say this is a crime.

[Jake]

See, Trump said this, Trump said that.

[Rich]

That's not surprising.

[Tim]

You mean he's just whitewashing domestic abuse.

[Rich]

Domestic violence, no big deal. Yeah, he doesn't care.

[Jake]

Holy sake.

[Rich]

That's, that's the thing. It's like the, the other reason why this works is very clear. It's that the way that society has become so their, their attention span has just gotten shortened. Context is boring now. Yeah, that's really the biggest problem is that like, to like, it used to be like, what, Rich, you're talking about, where it's like journalism mattered and all this shit mattered. It doesn matter because people just can't pay attention that long. So like, that's why Trump being a headline based speaker is what makes him so effective, because nobody cares if he's telling the truth or not. They just want an exciting headline.

[Tim]

Well, and, and he's doing this right now. Rich just smartly pointed out in the chat, you know, we got a really bad jobs number on Friday.

[Jake]

Really?

[Tim]

And, and, and the revisions were just as bad. June actually got revised so that it was a negative 1000 jobs in the month of June. It was originally with 12 or 13,000 gained, which isn't good, but that's even worse. They revised August up to 6,000, but no July up to 6,000. And then August came in at 22,000. So he has had a mountain of terrible, terrible economic news, which by the way. Even Axios, which nobody can claim is left leaning, said that the, the sluggish growth is almost entirely related to, what do we think? Tariffs.

[Luke]

What a surprise.

[Tim]

They keep yanking them back and forth. There are no real Made in America. Very, very few Made in America products anymore when you think about the ingredients and, or the, the pieces. And so he is doing this now. I don't know why whitewashing domestic abuse is, is the answer to, you know, this.

[Luke]

I'd like to take this one from, I'd like to take this from South Park. It's because Donald Trump is fucking Satan. That's it.

[Rich]

He just doesn't.

[Jake]

Not like, not like he is actually Satan. You mean literally Satan could be even more.

[Tim]

I mean, they're a perfect pair. I wish them all the best. I just wish they would go off and do their thing in, in their own home. But, but like, let's think about it.

[Luke]

What is it they say? We don't care what you do behind closed doors. That's what all the Republican stains always parent.

[Tim]

Except they, except, except they do. Except they do. So here's every opportunity to care.

[Jake]

And gay stuff. No abortions, but you can hit your wife.

[Tim]

Yeah, yeah. Because that, they're. That's okay.

[Luke]

Happening behind a closed door.

[Tim]

So here, here are a few things that Donald Trump has either said or done since this terrible jobs report came out. First of all, he, you notice how he didn't demonize the new head of the BLS because it's a heritage guy, but still reported the 22,000 jobs, so that failed. But this weekend he decided to go to the US Open and got booed pretty badly. First, first when they let him in.

[Luke]

That'S after they said, we don't want to show the booing on tv.

[Rich]

Right, Right.

[Tim]

Well, they, when he originally came in and was waving to the crowd, it was completely empty. So when he entered, they made sure that the room wasn't full to minimize that. But then he was there for the full thing. And if you looked in his box, it was like, just filled with like the most garbage of his minions hanging around him. Caroline Levitt and Dan Scavino and all these people. And they got booed. And, and so there was that. So apparently he's, he's decided to say, you know, domestic abuse in the home is cool. He was also weirdly chopping on some blue. It looked like a pill. There was a photo of which I don't know if he's just like trolling everybody now or if he could be like a Horse.

[Luke]

He needs like something to fixate on, you know.

[Tim]

Yeah. So the, I don't know if the US Open was just meant to distract from the jobs report probably, but you know, like he's just.

[Jake]

Yeah, I just, we, we have to emphasize because it makes me so fucking crazy. Joe Biden delivered, I think, an average of like 215,000 jobs per month on average for 48 consecutive months. No job losses every single fucking month of his tenure for four years, all the way up through January this year. Job gains, job gains, job gains. The reason why inflation wasn't as destructive as it was, they made it into a political bomb, but was because we were mostly employed. If you wanted a job, you could get a job. And up until I think it was early 2023 is like March 2023 wage growth and began to outpace inflation. And so even though prices were going up, wages on average were going up like 2% faster. And so we had, we were in this like they called, they kept saying, oh, maybe it's a soft landing and we'll never have a recession. He literally gave us a soft landing. And then like a fuck mile long Runway of landing to just coast it out as long as possible. And then we started growing and now it only took him, it turns out, four months as president, it's hard to turn the economy in any direction. But by June we had lost jobs. After him inheriting this amazing economy, that.

[Luke]

Stupid lib he kicked, prices were too high. So now there's like 400 new jobs for an American. I actually had someone comment that and it was like, oh my God, you are insufferable.

[Tim]

You could not.

[Luke]

You are as used to, you are as much used to society as a screen door on a submarine. Holy.

[Tim]

We were essentially at full, full employment. We were pretty close. And, and again, we say it because it's important. We did have high inflation in the United States, but. But compared to the rest of the world, it was lower. That doesn't mean that people didn't experience pain. And I don't mean to, to say that, but it's important context to know. Close and the entire world closed, basically shut their doors for a year. And then so nothing happened. Lost job losses, all this stuff. Then we opened it and of course there's going to be a surge of activity which is going to drive inflation. But we also made sure that people had money to cover it. We also, like Biden, passed the strongest climate legislation in history, which included producing electricity, which the Trump administration has now taken away. You know, we had The CHIPS Act. The CHIPS act is something that isn't talked about enough where a company, companies are literally closing plants in other countries and moving them here. There's, there was, I don't remember the company, they had a plant in Germany. They closed the plant and relocated everybody or just we're going to rehire in the US because the incentives were so good. And this is the thing that is the difference between Republicans and Democrats that has gone till from the 1950s on the way to stimulate the economy. And it's been proven time and time again the way to stimulate the economy is to pump money into it. If you want to stall the economy, you take money out of it. And that is exactly what Donald Trump has done. Both from tax cuts that are going to the wealthy, which means they're just going to stick in their pocket and tariffs which drive prices up at the same time. It is a, it is a self own time bomb that is now going off at exactly the time that everybody said it would go off.

[Jake]

Unless you're a server getting tips at the yacht club, then you might make a little bit.

[Tim]

No, no, no.

[Luke]

They don't even get it on their paycheck. It goes to tax exemption at the end.

[Tim]

Right. It's not even. Yeah, you're not. It's just you don't get it in the year. Right. And it's only for two years or something like that. Yeah.

[Luke]

The absolute knuckle draggers that told me about how they needed to vote for Trump so their paycheck would be bigger when they worked overtime. And I was like that's never gonna fucking happen.

[Tim]

But. Yeah, but now our job is to explain somehow to, to them. I mean they'll realize it when like, I mean their paycheck never gets bigger. It's the same size all the time. But this goes back to what you know, we are doing and some others are doing on the left is that like we have to combat an entire network that goes from TV down to streaming.

[Rich]

Right.

[Tim]

And I don't mean, I don't mean streaming like, like Netflix. I mean like, like gamers and things like that where there's a whole network of folks that are, that tell people from 85 that this same message over and over again and we don't have it. And that's part of the reason why we are building this.

[Rich]

Yeah.

[Tim]

Because somebody has to do it and because otherwise we're never going to get those people back.

[Rich]

And we just don't position ourselves in time too. Like for example, like this is a good Conversation for the moment we're in because. But this is not going to be what it is in a few months. Rates are going to get cut and business is going to boom and Trump is going to look great in six months. And we have to be prepared for that message to be like, this is temporary. There are specific things that are going to be really bad. Be prepared for it. But we're going to be in this reactive. We're always reacting as opposed to, like, setting the tempo.

[Tim]

I don't know if that's going to happen.

[Rich]

100% is going to happen.

[Tim]

That's how I'll take that bet.

[Jake]

I'll take rates get cut, though. So then prices go up.

[Rich]

But the rate of inflight rates are only going to get cut if inflation is not going to boom, which we know Powell has been trying to. So he's. And he's made it clear he's going to cut rates and cut rates are going to increase. It's going to make the housing market better. It's going to make businesses make more investments. It's going to increase the job market. It's temporary because in the end it will create more inflation. We'll have to scale that shit back. But this is the pendulum of the economy. What is going to happen is rates will get cut and the economy will get stimulated by that cut.

[Tim]

Oh, I agree. I agree with the, the logic behind that, but the problem that I have with it is that the tariffs are still there and the yanking back and forth is still there. So, yes, it will be cheaper to borrow money. Right. Like, and we're gonna borrow money.

[Rich]

They're absolutely more expensive, though.

[Tim]

They're absolutely, absolutely. At the end of the month, that's all that matters.

[Rich]

And it'll be a mixed bag is what I'm saying. So that's what, that's what I'm saying.

[Luke]

The idiots that we were just talking about don't know the difference. They don't know what a cut rate means. All they know is what it costs to fucking buy a steak at the grocery store.

[Rich]

True.

[Luke]

That's what made them vote for him.

[Rich]

The challenge with it is they're already experiencing high prices. So, like a price going, but, like.

[Luke]

If it jumps another 15%.

[Rich]

Yeah. Then it's different. But I don't think it will for a while. Like, I mean, it's, it's like, you know, look at inflation globally. For example, the pen. The effects of the pandemic that Tim, you were just talking about that created that global inflation took almost a year and A half to actually be seen in the marketplace across the world. So, like a lot of this, what we're talking about, these higher prices, they will happen, but they're not going to happen for a while. Like, it's, it's going to take time to really cycle in. And what you're going to see in the short term is, is the appearance of growth. So we need to be able to understand how to message like, this is a completely false thing that's happening right here and you're about to have a problem ahead of time.

[Luke]

They're going to have to do that. But at the same time, they'll have a sterling example of what the fuck is going on with the farmers.

[Rich]

Right. The farmers are ruined.

[Tim]

That's my.

[Luke]

I, and that is also my, that's also my hot take for the day, is we should let them suffer.

[Tim]

So before we jump in, but I want to give context to the listeners if they were not if they didn't see this this weekend. So there were clips of a, of a. I don't know what this event was, but there were farmers in Arkansas.

[Luke]

Yep. I've got the stats pulled up.

[Tim]

Overwhelmingly voted for Donald Trump. Right.

[Luke]

64 of them. 60 farmers of farm. Of Arkansas farmers.

[Tim]

64. They held an event this weekend and they were begging, like, literally begging Donald Trump for help. And one of the guys said, I have never seen it so bad in my, like profession. Yep.

[Luke]

It's just like last time, at the present rate, because of the tariffs, a third of them will be bankrupt by this time next year.

[Rich]

Yes, it's true. And one of them had a great quote where he said. What did he say? He said, I, you know, Trump keeps saying that he loves farmers and I need him to show me that love now. Like that.

[Luke]

What an odd thing.

[Rich]

It's like, I mean, it really. This is where they really find out, you know, of like, this is what.

[Tim]

Here's my thing. Okay.

[Luke]

You want some government handouts, you pull yourself up a blue vote history.

[Rich]

Right.

[Luke]

You voted for him. This is what you get.

[Rich]

Yep, that's true. That's. I mean, it has, it's not new, though. I mean, like, like they said, like last year was bad for them too. Like, farming has gotten. Because, you know, farming, you had to.

[Tim]

Bail them out the first time.

[Rich]

Yeah.

[Luke]

This is the consequences of your own actions.

[Rich]

And farming is definitely a low margin game. And when you have higher, when you have inflation, it's very challenging. So, like, it's.

[Jake]

It.

[Rich]

That's why Trump won them because like, they, even in 24 were not doing well and now they're just doing worse and they're like, well, fuck, what do I do?

[Tim]

The tariffs are bad for them too. I mean, if you think about soybean farmers got screwed in the first go around.

[Rich]

Yeah.

[Tim]

And I'm going to throw lobstermen in there. They're not really farmers, but like, like I know this one, but like they, but when you put those tariffs on China in particular, all or whatever Asian countries, like these farmers and lobstermen do a lot of business in Asia and you just made it far more expensive in one of the biggest markets on earth. China, you know, he's put these tariffs in and it kills them because some of their product is, you know, sold here, but also farm, a lot of.

[Luke]

It is sold it over there.

[Tim]

Right. But like farm equipment gets more expensive. Right. Because where are all those parts made? Not here. And there's no way they're going to be made here.

[Luke]

I thought that there were going to be magical factories that were going to spring up from the earth, like magic springs. That was going to happen day one.

[Jake]

You know, it's actually a better use of all of that farmland in the middle of the country. Yeah.

[Luke]

All up.

[Jake]

You know, just replace all of that, that soil with factories to make little. What did, what did Scott Besant column. Was it widgets or was it something like. It was like. It was a word like widgets. It was like doodads or like tr.

[Tim]

Think it's like pieces, parts or something.

[Jake]

So we're all going to work in, in factories that are built out of retrofitted grain silos. Making American iPhones 12 hours a day.

[Tim]

Our 5,000 iPhone.

[Jake]

That's the American dreamy. Guys.

[Tim]

There's another way. There's another way that Donald Trump screwed over farmers. And that is a lot of farmers over the past 10 or 15 years have been subsidizing their, their crops by allowing energy companies to put wind turbines on their land because they are big open spaces. And there's a lot. When there's big open spaces, there's wind. And he and the BBB killed all of the incentives for that. So they don't even have that that they can go for now. And that's not like the majority of them, but it is something I know in Iowa they do. In Texas they do like all these places. Right. And. And now no more. Yeah.

[Rich]

You know what the worst part of the tariffs is too? And like nobody ever talks about it and it was perfectly on display in the last week is that it's Consolidating our enemies and bringing them, like, bringing in allies. Like, like, what a surprise. Threatening India with 50%. What do you think they're going to do? They're going to read. They're going to go to China and be like, hey, I know we hate each other, but let's figure this out.

[Luke]

Trade with me for less than 50%.

[Rich]

Right.

[Jake]

I don't think that anybody understands exactly how one intertwined all of this is. But two, how irreparably I think he is damaging relationships, destroying our status in the world. Because bricks right now is where growth is. Brazil and Russia and China and India especially. Well, I think that's most of bricks. What is ass? There's one more. I don't know.

[Rich]

Who is this?

[Tim]

Who's it?

[Jake]

Syracuse. It's a college. Got it. But Russia or less Russia, But India and China and Brazil are all growing their GDP faster than the United States. And the trajectory for India and China, especially with their population, is a hundred times the trajectory for our economy. You can only grow a country with 340 million people so much economically compared to two countries with 1.4 billion each, and to allow them to consolidate. And then like, did you guys see his mean girls tweet? He like posted like, well, I hope they have a very happy life together. He just sent. Sounded like a little bit.

[Luke]

It's just so cringey. Imagine being such a loser.

[Jake]

And now we're not selling to those markets, which is why the price of soybeans and corn is dropped by about half each. And I, I read that there's a. It's a wicked bumper crop this year, which normally is great when you have buyers, but now we don't, which means the market, which has half the demand that it used to from 2022, was the high point in the middle of Biden's presidency. The. The market has dropped in half, right as it's about to get flooded with more than ever. And nobody has made advanced orders for next year either. So they already, They're. They're looking at, I think it was a 50% drop in exports this year. And they have $0 paid in advance for, for 2026 from China, specifically these. Once they get their food, they get their, their gas, they get their natural gas, they get their oil, they get everything from everywhere else. And they're getting as good or a better deal. Getting ourselves back into the place where we have been used to being for the last 60, 70 years, 100 years is. It's going to be tough, if not impossible. Without a fucking good leader and a smarter Congress.

[Tim]

So here's a really tough question that if we really do the answer to it, we'd be probably very, very wealthy. But how do we. So, like, all this bad shit's happening. Right. And it's app like farmers are getting hit and other sectors are getting hit as well. But, like, how do we. How do we reach these. Some. Some. Not all of them. How do we reach some of them and explain that, like, Democratic policies would benefit them. Is it just a lost cause?

[Rich]

No, I think it's super simple. It's the simplest thing ever. You got to let him hit rock bottom.

[Tim]

Yep. Like, they.

[Luke]

The only thing that's going to make them even slightly. Because the thing is, I don't even think that you'll ever get them to vote blue. I grew up in an area that was full of wits like this and I watched them. They got shafted by Trump. Farmers got shafted by Trump his first time had to get bailed out so that they could put food on the table and then lined up to vote for him the second time.

[Rich]

Yep.

[Luke]

And the only thing that's going to matter is if they get absolutely ruined and he doesn't bail them out this time and then next time they won't go out to vote at all.

[Jake]

They'll just stay home.

[Tim]

Exactly.

[Rich]

They're not going to vote anybody blue.

[Luke]

As the, you know, demon rat. Can't do it.

[Tim]

But.

[Jake]

And then they pivot back to abortion and they, they. That's. I mean, that's where the social wedge issues come in. But they're not as impactful as economic issues, which is why Joe Biden absolutely annihilated Donald Trump in 2020. It was not a close election in the end. And we will get that again because, like, to answer your question, the same thing that us in 2024 is going to help us in 2026 and 2028, which is.

[Luke]

Right.

[Jake]

You can't logic like, Luke, you've said.

[Luke]

You can't logic people, somebody out of position they didn't logic themselves into, and.

[Jake]

They will look with that same irrational lens at their own lack of prosperity when the time comes. And you won't be able to explain to them there's a good reason why you have less money. They. They just see less money and they're angry and they will either act or not act accordingly. But it's not going to go to J.D. vance.

[Rich]

No, that's for sure.

[Luke]

Just dance France.

[Rich]

He's like, the thing that's scary, though, is that like, people at the top of their party, Trump and Vance in particular, are so good at making terrible arguments sound appealing. Like, they're so good at it. And even people in these. Like, these people are vulnerable to their ideology. So, like, yeah, they might look at their bank account and go, I got. But look, J.D. vance made it sound okay, so. And it. That's all it takes, right?

[Tim]

Well, here's a good example of that that I think most of us who saw it were pretty horrified about. But, like, you know, apparently we are now like, military. Like, we were like, threatening Venezuela and we. Over the weekend or last week or whenever it was shot or sunk. I should say shot. I say shot down, but I guess blue. Yes, yes. Yeah. A. A boat that we claimed were running drugs, but there are no. There's no evidence of that. And I. Was it in Venezuelan waters or was it.

[Luke]

No international waters?

[Tim]

International, but it came from Venezuela. And so Maduro got all bent out of shape about it. But, like, when I think someone asked, someone pressed Vance on press Vance on it about like, how this is a violation of international law and like, blah, blah. And he goes, I don't give a. Yep. That's what he said.

[Rich]

People.

[Tim]

Like, I do. I agree. I, I'm horrified by it because it's, It's. It's very dangerous and we can't just be out there like sinking boats and being like drugs when like maybe, or maybe not or also. Oh, he said. What happened to due process, I think.

[Luke]

Was what somebody said.

[Tim]

And they. He was like, I don't give a. About that. That's a vice President of the United States who tweeted it out and it is still there, which means he stands by it. But I think MAGA folks love it, right? Because they're like, yeah.

[Rich]

Like, I think. Here's the thing, though. I think it's not just mega folks. I think people in the middle in this country also look at that. I don't care either. Like, because they look at it and go, all right, either immigrants who are trying to get here illegally, drug runners or whatever.

[Tim]

Like, who do.

[Rich]

What do I give a shit?

[Tim]

Really?

[Rich]

The reality is prevailing. Look at it.

[Luke]

They said there are probably brown people on that boat and they said they don't give a fuck. And that's the truth of it.

[Jake]

Yeah, I mean, people. People aren't going to. This one incident is not going to move the needle, I think probably for anybody because it's like, worst case scenario, they broke the law and they killed people. I don't know. Best case, Scenario they killed drug dealers and cartel members. And I mean, I, like, I'll be fully on. I'm actually, I'm not going to say I'm conservative. I, I think I'm a regular person when it comes to law and order, which is if there's a criminal, do something about it. Like violent criminals. Like the cartel is out of control from the top half of, of South America all the way through Mexico. And those countries need to use their police and or militaries to get that shit under control. We obviously should keep those people out of our country. But if you start talking about shooting ships out of international waters because you think that there was something wrong, all it takes is for one boat full of fishermen to be accidentally labeled. And I mean, maybe they'll never go and prove that there weren't drugs on the boat because they blew it into oblivion and now it's at the bottom of the Atlantic.

[Rich]

Right.

[Jake]

But something, this is not a good path to go down. And more importantly, I'm not going to talk about like, hey, we need to defend cartel members or like maybe cartel members. But I will say this is the President of peace, the person who everybody, they all said was like going to keep us out of all of these foreign conflicts. And now, and now he wants to be the world police again. Right from South Park. He wants to be world police with the Department of War curing the world of its drug problems all While you pay $750 for a steak at the grocery store.

[Tim]

Yeah, it's just, it, it blows me away. And I mean at the end of the day, the name is like not a huge deal, but like for a.

[Luke]

Guy who wants to cost a billion dollars, that I feel is a big deal.

[Tim]

It's a billion dollars.

[Luke]

I've seen it estimated.

[Jake]

I don't even think he can rename it.

[Luke]

Like there's some, every, there's some legal, legal questions.

[Tim]

Yeah.

[Luke]

But yeah, every contract the Department of Defense ever has done has to be changed.

[Rich]

Jesus Christ.

[Tim]

But like what, like the symbol of the symbolism of it is the opposite of being the, the President of peace. Right.

[Luke]

Like really, just ask me. Like the Department of Defense sounds cooler than the Department of War.

[Tim]

I mean we used to have the Department of War when we would go to war a lot. And then it, we, I think we realized that maybe something that is like aggressive like that when we're trying to be like protector of the world is maybe not the best thing to call it.

[Rich]

Yeah.

[Tim]

But I also just don't really think it matters. I Don't want to spend a billion dollars on. If he's fine spending a billion dollars on this over feeding some poor, poor children. I have a serious problem with that.

[Rich]

Yeah, that's a whole other, you know.

[Tim]

He doesn't, clearly doesn't care where his money is spent as long as the right wing donors are satisfied with what he is doing.

[Rich]

Right. I think we, like, one thing I want to talk about with this issue because I think like there's like, Rich brought up an interesting point. I sort of line where he lines with this, like, like Law and Order feels conservative to say that we like Law and Order and shit like that. I think like Democrats are missing a huge opportunity here. Like, I'll give you an example within how they're handling the cartel in Mexico, for example. Trump's whole concept is like, hey, we should invade Mexico and like go and attack the cartels and we should do the same thing in Venezuela, which is clearly wrong. Like, it's a stupid thing. There's no, you know, there's no sovereignty for these potential other countries. Makes no sense. However, the United States getting into a joint military operation with the country. So for example, Mexico, we go and make a deal with them and say, hey, we'll work with you with our military and your military to clear these motherfuckers out together and have a mutual benefit from it. That is something, I think most people in this country would be popular, right? Democrats can take the germ of a good idea from Trump's approach to this shit and erase all the horrible shit and go here, here's an actual solution. And it would make, make people in the middle look at Democrats and go, wait a minute, that's actually a pretty good idea. They don't do that. Why, like, what's the, what's the harm in a plan like that?

[Jake]

If you're, and instead of framing it as, I mean there's, there are a lot of ways you'd frame that, but instead of framing it as we are sending our military to kill cartel members, what you, what we, what we do is say we are supporting an ally to stop the bleeding at home.

[Tim]

So.

[Jake]

Because that's what's driving a lot of immigration, you guys, that's, that's the most insane thing that they don't understand is that if they had booming economies and safe cities in Central America and in Mexico and South America, suddenly they're becoming desperate to find prosperity anywhere. They're not trying to get through Donald Trump's black painted, 900 foot, piping hot border wall. With Kristi Gnome standing at the top with a.

[Tim]

People have already climbed, by the way. People didn't work.

[Jake]

But it's so hot.

[Luke]

How does that know. Cut in it.

[Jake]

It's just science. It's too hot to touch you guys.

[Rich]

God.

[Tim]

Yeah. There's a video I saw online of somebody just, like, climbing. It took him like, 26 seconds to get up. I just looked at it.

[Luke]

It is $1 billion to change it.

[Rich]

That's crazy.

[Jake]

Perfect.

[Luke]

Every single piece of letterhead, building signage, road signs, base information, books, fighting manuals, technical manuals, operations manuals, plaque, ceremonial goods, branded gifts, stationary, and every other thing with DoD branding on it has to be changed. And all the contracts that have ever been done with the dod.

[Rich]

That's fucking crazy.

[Jake]

But he wants the Nobel Peace Prize.

[Luke]

Yeah. Can we make it the Nobel War Prize?

[Jake]

A billion dollars to rename it the Department of War so that he can win a Peace Prize.

[Tim]

Yeah. Should there be, like, the Razzies, which is like the worst movies of the year? Can we do that? Can we do the reverse on the. On the Nobel Peace Prize? Kind of interesting. You know, easily the worst.

[Jake]

The Nobel.

[Tim]

Netanyahu, Maduro, you know, like, you could do that.

[Luke]

Some serious competition in there.

[Rich]

I really would.

[Tim]

Yeah.

[Jake]

I want to go back to the. To the economic discussion real quick, because there's just one piece that we didn't really call out regarding rates and job growth and economic growth. Tariffs really are an insane wild card there. And I think that there's a word that has kind of been floating around in. In some news articles about this, but it's stagflation. Stagflation is not something that I think really any Americans under, like, 60 have seen firsthand, because the last time we had stagflation, I believe, was in the 70s. And essentially what stagflation is is prices are going up. So it's inflation and there's stagnant economic growth. So GDP is like zero. GDP is flat or pathetic, and job growth is flat or pathetic, and yet prices are still going up. And the way you get it feels foreign, because we've always had fairly open trade relationships to resolve that. And so if you increase exports and you keep the growth coming, you can avoid stagflation. But if Powell lowers rates right now and everybody says, hey, I can get a cheaper loan for a vehicle or I can get a cheaper rate on a house, which are the two biggest drivers that regular people.

[Tim]

Use.

[Jake]

Rates for 100, they'll go in and they'll buy that car. It'll increase the demand or at least they'll start shopping. It'll increase demand for the car. But the car is still made out of tariffed steel and aluminum. The house is still made out of tariffed lumber from Canada. And when you bake in those prices, what you're doing is you're increasing demand for the, for the product which, which will increase the price. You're not incre supply, you're actually constraining supply and you're increasing the cost of the materials. So you have all of these functions that are pushing the cost of the material up. And so even though people will maybe get a lower rate, it's just going to make prices go completely apeshit. Unless he then slides in at the last minute to save the day and say, look, I saved us from myself again and I'm going to make a deal on lumber so that you can have a low rate and you can have your house too.

[Rich]

There's also just the other element. Even if you erase tariffs from it, it, the concept of lowering rates will inherently make things more expensive anyway. Because if demand is going to go up and prices.

[Jake]

That's why Powell won't do it.

[Rich]

Yeah, I mean that's, I mean I.

[Jake]

Think he is going to.

[Rich]

Right? He's. No, no, he is going so bad. They have to. I mean like that's really what it comes down to.

[Jake]

That's why he hasn't for this long.

[Tim]

Right? That's why he waited. Yeah, that's why he waited and he.

[Rich]

Should have, he should have waited. Like I don't like it, but he should have.

[Tim]

Good for him for holding. But. Yeah, yeah.

[Luke]

So here's a question. Have you guys been up to date on the Lutnick, did you read about that?

[Tim]

What is, what does everybody have to say about one of the biggest bunch.

[Luke]

Of like firms on Wall street buying up the right to a potential refund of your tariff money and in exchange for giving you 20 of it. And guess what one of the biggest buyers of that is the company called Cantor Fitzgerald. And guess who's the head of that recently? Recently, that would be Howard Lutnick's two 20 something year old sons.

[Rich]

Perfect.

[Luke]

Wonderful. So there's no conflict of interest there.

[Jake]

They're setting it up to get paid coming and going.

[Luke]

If, if the tariffs get deemed illegal and they have to refund, they get.

[Tim]

Which is increasingly possible, money.

[Rich]

Yeah, it is possible.

[Tim]

Actually a lot of most experts I think say that even this Supreme Court will rule them unconstitutional because there's too many things underneath it that will Fall apart. If they said they were fine, fine.

[Luke]

I think that's Donald Trump's off road or off ramp. If he takes the off ramp, gives back the. I think they have to give at least like 50 of it.

[Rich]

Yes, that's what they said.

[Luke]

And find some way to give it to the actual people and not like give it to people that paid increased costs. Because if they just give it to the companies, nobody gives a. But if he can do that and then like try and put us back on Biden's path of the economy or even just let it like stagnate by itself without actively making it worse, all that's. That's what's going to happen is the MAGA shit wits are going to love that.

[Jake]

I think they'll get their tariff rebate check with Trump's name on it. And they'll be like, look at what he did for us. He'd be like, you mean he took money. He took your money with no interest for 12 months.

[Tim]

I don't think that's gonna work though, because, like, as far as, like shooting the economy back up, I think.

[Luke]

No, I don't think he's ever gonna shoot it back up. I think if he could just keep.

[Jake]

It flat, that's all it takes, guys with them. And at least RFK is the one who shoots things up.

[Tim]

Up. All right, so that's where I was going to pivot from before was because we got. I mean, it was a few days ago now, but we got to talk about. It was this just completely, completely unhear and insane Senate hearing that was Thursday or Wednesday last week.

[Rich]

Whatever day it was, was terrible.

[Tim]

I can't even believe I have to say these words. Health. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Testified in front of the Senate. One of the. I don't remember which committee it was, but Commerce or I don't know.

[Jake]

And it was good people. It was Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, like, they're not around people. And he went and around Michael Bennett.

[Tim]

Well, even the Republicans. So one of the. My favorite parts. So first of all, he was screaming at them as they were screaming at him, which is.

[Jake]

I mean, can you call that screaming? Well, it was like a gravel truck crashing into a garbage disposal.

[Tim]

It's like the. He's like the male version of Katherine Hepburn at this point. And with the. I have very. But anyways, I'm not gonna do it because I do terrible. And I wouldn't make fun, except he's such a horrible human being that I don't give a his Voice sounds like.

[Luke]

A fork in the garbage.

[Tim]

So. Yeah. Right. Well, so first of all, he. Everything he said essentially was a lie. And like, he just. The thing that. The thing that he has gotten by on for so long is one, his name. But two, he states things with numbers that sound. Right, Right.

[Rich]

Yes.

[Tim]

And then you. But you have to know it in order to push back. And the senators knew it. And the senators knew it. So my favorite part was when Senator Cassidy, who, by the way, is a Republican from Louisiana, who is a medical doctor who also voted, but also voted to confirm rfk. I don't want to let him off the hook.

[Rich]

Yeah.

[Jake]

Because RFK promised he wasn't going to limit access.

[Luke]

Idiot looked at him and said, yeah, he won't point.

[Jake]

So a Republican.

[Tim]

So the best part was there was this whole stupid conversation about Donald Trump getting a Nobel Peace Prize for Operation Warp Speed, which was the program that helped to fast track, though not that fast, but fast track the MRNA vaccines and to market. I just meant that they were already working on before. They probably would have been ready, but they got. They did. They did speed it. So they said.

[Jake]

Right.

[Tim]

They said, do you think that Donald Trump deserves the Nobel Peace Prize for Operation War Speed? He said, yes. Senator Cassidy said, explain to me how Donald Trump deserves the Nobel Peace Prize for the vaccine that you called the deadliest in history that killed more people than Covid. He. He actually said that. You can't. That. Yes, you can. You can be correct on both.

[Rich]

That doesn't make any sense.

[Luke]

It doesn't have numbers work.

[Rich]

It doesn't make any sense.

[Tim]

You deserve the new. The. The Nobel Peace Prize for killing a million people, because there's about a million people in the United States, maybe 1.1 million at this point, and they still to this day, dying of COVID By the way, people forget this. There are still hundreds of people every month dying.

[Jake]

Yeah, every month.

[Rich]

Yeah.

[Tim]

And actually mostly in red areas, mind you, as well, where vaccine hesitancy is higher. Did you see that?

[Luke]

It was that Florida, the Floridian.

[Rich]

Oh, my God.

[Luke]

Surgeon General said he didn't even research if more people were gonna get sick.

[Tim]

Well, he doesn't care. Shit's insane. He doesn't care. So. And by the way, he was a serious doctor before he went to Florida, so he just completely sold out for power. He was not like this before. But Jake, he was on CNN this weekend, and Jake Tapper said, said to him, did. What is the analysis that you guys did to determine what the increase in hospitalizations and deaths will be by getting rid of vaccine mandates in the schools. And he said we didn't. Yep.

[Rich]

Of course not. Because that's not the point.

[Luke]

Trust Dr. Fucking McGillicuddies more than I trust a Republican doctor.

[Rich]

The response I have to that is so simple too, where it's like he talks about his parents rights and this other. The parents have the right to not send their kids to public schools.

[Tim]

School.

[Rich]

They can homeschool these kids.

[Tim]

People they have the choice off.

[Rich]

Right? Nobody, you know, sticking a gun to the kids head and going go to the public school.

[Tim]

What happens to the parents of a kid who has some sort of autoimmune deficiency in which they can't get a vaccine. They, they lose the choice to send their kids to public school when you don't have these mandates. So they're just. So that parents choice thing is completely and utter bullshit. It's the same thing with like, well, I don't get to say. You might. You're making my business. Put the, you know, vaccine in my arm, then get another job. That's remote. That's your choice. You. There is no.

[Luke]

These people still fucking whine about the fact that they had to show they were vaccinated to go to Applebee's one time five fucking years ago. They will never stop whining about this.

[Rich]

You know how, you know this take is terrible is that Trump agrees with us. Trump was in the Oval Office and like aggressively agreed with this stance of like, no, this is really stupid what Florida's doing and it's dangerous and I don't know why they're doing it like, but he did.

[Tim]

I, I'm not going to give him too much credit though, because he is allowing RFK to do the same thing.

[Rich]

At least he's like, he knows the power of his voice and he was kind of like somebody dumb.

[Luke]

As I saw somebody that tweeted, ask not what you can do for your country, but ask what the is wrong with my nephew.

[Tim]

And that made me laugh. I mean it. It's just the good news, there is some good news is that there are states in the northeast and states on the west coast. They're all blue shocker that are forming their own sort of vaccine guideline commissions.

[Rich]

Right.

[Tim]

It doesn't help the folks in the middle of the country, but you know, I think that at least there is accurate information and there will be, you know, obviously listening to your doctors. Kathy Hochul, the governor of New York, Pat, signed an executive order basically allowing anybody three and up to get a vaccine without a prescription which is great. I. I don't know why it wasn't. Six months was where it should have been, but maybe there were some legal reasons for that. So. So you're the information hopefully will get out there. But again, the people who like this are the ones that are going to suffer the most, which is the most frustrating part about all of this. Oh, and also guys, I don't. Did we talk about this last week that RFK discovered the cause of autism?

[Rich]

Oh yeah, Tylenol.

[Tim]

Not aspirin. Not aspirin, Tylenol. And of course Tylenol came out. Or whoever owns Tylenol and said there is zero evidence. Two points.

[Rich]

Because it's the most docile drug you can put in your body like infinity.

[Jake]

Billion doses and there's no causal. That's the thing. Like on both Tylenol and vaccines. Yes. At the time the. The vaccine development was as fast as possible. Rightfully so, because people were dying every single day and wanted the vaccine and not Covid. But now there have been like 500 billion doses of MRNA.

[Rich]

500 billion people have gotten this vaccine.

[Tim]

It's the most vaccine ever.

[Jake]

I didn't even have an end market study. Like, this is the study. I'm not dead. I am right here.

[Rich]

The world is still turning.

[Luke]

We're all. But vaccine death, vaccine harm.

[Rich]

There are vaccine injuries. Have you heard about cases of vaccine deaths?

[Tim]

No, no, Zach, no, no. Zap back. It's all in the various systems.

[Rich]

I. For anybody out there ever hears that Vaers is yelp for vaccine. Adverse reactions. That's all it is. Anybody who doesn't like the vaccine, like, if you hate the vaccine, you can go on various and be like, I got my 21st. I got 20 new ears and six new legs because of the vaccine. It's. It's not vetted, not verified, and then just stays in the system. It's the stupidest thing ever.

[Jake]

You could have 1% functioning blood flow in your arteries, get the shot and then the next day have a catastrophic heart attack.

[Rich]

Yes.

[Jake]

Because you've been eating lard and potato chips for 57 years straight. And then your sister can go into VAERS and say, my husband died. Well, it's probably the husband and the sister too, but the brother and the husband. But my husband died because he got the shot yesterday. And various is like, like, cool. Let's share this with the world.

[Tim]

There was, there was a period, right, where anytime anybody died, the anti vaxxers were like, yeah, there it was Hank Aaron. There's one Hank Aaron who is Second on the all time home runs list.

[Jake]

And was first if you don't consider steroids, but correct.

[Tim]

755, 755. Beating Babe Ruth at 714. And he died at like 88. And they were like it was because of the vaccine. He was 88 years old.

[Rich]

Oh, you know who another one was? Demar Hamlin. Remember that? The guy almost died on the field in the.

[Tim]

Oh, it was a heart attack because.

[Rich]

Of, because of the vaccine. Are you like, no, it wasn't an.

[Jake]

NFL safety hitting your chest at 950 miles an hour. It was, it was the shot you got two years ago. That's nuts.

[Rich]

Absolutely.

[Tim]

But that's the thing with the anti vaxxers, right? They don't have, they have these, they, they hang on these little kernels, right? Like the thing we've talked about before where it's like well there was mercury in the vaccines in the 80s and it's like they have studied that shit 3 billion different way. And yes, they don't use it anymore because they don't need it. But yeah, but like yes, there were people who more they're like, well more people died that had the vaccine that didn't. It's like yeah, idiot. Because it's like infinitely more people getting vaccines than not. So yes, more people are going to die because inevitably there were just x, you know, 100 times more people.

[Jake]

It's just I feel like they don't understand the difference between like, like a raw number and then like a rate.

[Rich]

Right.

[Jake]

I don't know. It's like they don't. It's like maybe statistics. Not even 101, not even 100. Like statistics.001 like the way I explain, explain fractions to my 8 year old is what all Republican voters need explained to them. Whether it's crime data, whether it's vaccine data, whether it's the age of the earth. Like there are just number arguments that are so beyond lost on them. And they say well 12 murders in Chicago. And I'm like there are a million people in Chicago. 12 murders is nothing when you have 100 fucking million people.

[Rich]

Same when you like the myocarditis like at men where they go look at men got increased risks of myocarditis with the COVID vaccine. It's like yes, that's true. But you know what's more likely to give you myocarditis? Having Covid.

[Jake]

Actual Covid. And it's like not close. It's like 50 or 100 times more likely.

[Rich]

Way more likely. It's it's insane. It's like, yes, you have an increased risk there, but then your risk is way worse over here. But just ignore that part.

[Jake]

But my uncle in Arkansas, his heart exploded. Okay. And anecdotal, sir.

[Tim]

Well, it's like there was an episode of Joe Rogan either Thursday and Friday when he was again, pedaling anti vax.

[Rich]

Yeah.

[Luke]

He wouldn't let the other guy talk.

[Tim]

Yeah. Yeah, he wouldn't let him talk because the other guy was like, wait a minute. Because he was talking about tetanus. So you don't need a tetanus shot. It's like, oh, the.

[Jake]

You don't step on a nail and tell me you don't need a tetanus shot.

[Tim]

The tetanus shot of. Of all the vaccines, I think that's one of the very few that if you get the. If you get the tetanus vaccine, you are 100 immune from.

[Rich]

Yes. You're, like, completely fine.

[Tim]

There are very few of them that are 100, and tetanus is one of them. Now. Now, we don't. We don't want to save people from rusty nails.

[Rich]

That's the other thing is, like, people don't understand the point of vaccines. There's like, they're like, well, I got it still. Like you. It's not about, like, oh, instantly. I'm just impervious to this disease. A. You need herd immunity for that to happen. Like with polio and like that. But then it's. It's about the likelihood of death after transmission.

[Jake]

Like, it's lost him at likelihood.

[Rich]

Right. It's like, the second.

[Jake]

It's like, let me explain.

[Rich]

They're like, no, you're lying to me. Like, I know. I'm explaining to you there's a difference.

[Tim]

It's like, you're here.

[Jake]

Don't understand it. Doesn't mean it's a lie.

[Tim]

You're here and you didn't go to the hospital. Like.

[Jake]

Right, but I got a cold anyway. Yes, exactly. You got a cold. You didn't have an iron lung.

[Tim]

Yeah. And your body was trained to fight it off.

[Rich]

Yep.

[Tim]

Notice it didn't say, like, defeated 100 fight it off. It's still there, dude.

[Jake]

I can't even.

[Tim]

Yeah. I mean, it's also. There's no how it works. No. Well, that. It was a new type of vaccine, guys.

[Rich]

We never used it because it's got this RNA DNA. They're like, well, it sounds like it changes who I am. Like, no, shut the up.

[Tim]

I had somebody that I.

[Jake]

Who you are is not what we need in this country, man, you should change who you are with a vaccine.

[Tim]

I had somebody that I knew that I worked in Democratic politics who's not in it anymore. But like, I remember at the beginning was saying, like, well, I don't want it to mess with my DNA. I'm like, what the fuck?

[Rich]

What was he talking about?

[Jake]

It's just because it's RNA DNA, they're all just too confusing. It's.

[Tim]

Oh, it's the NNA are going to get scrambled. Like, what are you talking about? Like, please, God, just read something for five minutes. Don't. You don't have to read the whole research paper. Just look for five minutes, right? That's all I'm asking for.

[Rich]

Well, it's like the conversation Morgan was having that you were talking about where like the cr. The crux of that argument to me was when the guy went, well, you're not a scientist. And he's like, I don't have to be a scientist. Like, yeah, you kind of do have to be a scientist to understand this.

[Luke]

You do have to be a scientist, right?

[Rich]

Like, go read these studies. They're extremely complicated.

[Jake]

That's the scariest, most dangerous thing as far as like, I mean, everything but public health especially is like, we've gotten to this like critical mass of people on the wrong side of the Dunning Kruger curve, which is like when you learn a little bit about something and you consider yourself an expert, that's where the whole country is right now. Like, or at least like 60 ish percent of the country is like, way too far. Like, you got to learn enough to be humbled by knowledge. And then you go, maybe I should shut the up because I don't know what I'm talking about.

[Tim]

I have had a few arguments with people who are anti vax and they. It is the. It really, you shouldn't even bother.

[Rich]

It's agony. It's not worth it.

[Jake]

Because my favorite flat earthers, it's like there's.

[Rich]

Yeah, it's like, get out of my face.

[Tim]

Yeah. Well, it's funny because one person, like, this is the telling thing. They sent me a video, a YouTube video, because of course, this quote, unquote, doctor, doctor talking about the dangers of the vaccine. So I, you know, I, I watched it and I'm like, wow, this, none of this feels right. And then I go and I Google the doctor's name. Oh, he is a, he is a disgraced doctor that nobody listens to anymore. And so I pointed this out and they go, oh, well, you're always blowing up our side of the argument. I'm like, are you not learning, like, maybe that, like, your source is not as good as mine, which 99.9 of doctors say vaccines are safe and effective and, like, you should get them unless you've got some underlying health conditions position. Maybe you're just wrong that you're per. They always find something with our.

[Jake]

Agree to disagree, Tim. Agree to disagree.

[Rich]

Imagine if this was like how they were about, like, plane, like, aerospace safety. Like, they would never do this because, like, they would never get on a plane again. They wouldn't be like, let me. Let's have the planes built. And then, you know, managed by people online, like, no, get the experts to build the planes.

[Tim]

Well, it's also funny. There's a scene in the show the Pit, which if you guys have haven't watched it, you absolutely should on HBO. It's basically like ER Part 2, but a little different. And there's a scene in there where, like, the doctor. There' one of the doctors like, okay, we're going to ship you up to the ER now. And she had already been like, I'm not wearing a mask. And they're like. And I think she had to be like, I don't know if it's like appendicitis, so something where she had to get cut open and the. And the doctor. And of course, they would never do this in real life, but, like, the doctor turns around and goes, so do you want me to tell the surgeons upstairs while you're open on the. On the table to wear mask or not wear masks? Because you don't believe. You don't believe in this, right? So, like, you don't. You don't want him to wear masks while your insides are open. And then she goes, I'll take. I'll take the masks, of course. Yeah, it's. It's just like. But again, all of these conversations we've been having today all come back to the same thing. They could get all that inf. That information from every single source. And they. And unless one of us, like, like, with me, it was somebody that I knew from home. I could. I could burst it because I had a direct contact to that person. But then they look at me like I'm an alien. Because they're like, like, no, we know. Like we have been told that this vaccine is deadly and that, you know, Kamala Harris eats babies and you know all this, but because they're hearing it from, you know, Fox News down to, I mean, like, video game Streamers who are mostly right wing at this point. And so. And in newsletter all this Tim Pools and like t, you know, you can, you can get a steady diet of 24,7. And because of the way algorithms work, it's not like they're shoveling loving leftist content in front of you because you won't engage with it so they don't give it to you.

[Rich]

Right.

[Tim]

Right. So it's. This is the world that we live in and this is why it's so important to do what we're doing. Which seems like a good moment to ask people to please become a subscriber to the Find out podcast. You can do this by going to findoutpodcast.substack.com I almost screwed that up. And for $6 a month you could help us build what we are doing here and allow us bigger and you know, create new shows and all these sort of things which would be really exciting. And also the other thing you can do is purchase some wonderful find out merchandise like this shirt that comes both in white and black. So you can choose your preference. And they are all Luke. What are they all?

[Luke]

Made in America.

[Tim]

Yes. Union Made in America. And you can buy.

[Luke]

I think the grooming is starting.

[Tim]

Come through.

[Rich]

They said that very quickly. Made in America. Union made. Yes.

[Tim]

And they're comfortable and they come really fast and.

[Luke]

Oh, that was a bad one. Very poor choice of words.

[Rich]

Yeah, I'm ignore that one.

[Luke]

Arrive very quickly.

[Jake]

God damn it, Tim. They don't come fast enough.

[Tim]

They show up fast.

[Jake]

They don't come fast enough because I ordered a bunch on Wednesday and they're going to get here today. But they didn't get here in time for me to put it on. So I made. I made my own. I'm gonna duct tape this to my chest.

[Tim]

I like the shirt though.

[Jake]

Thank you.

[Tim]

He is wearing a Red Sox shirt if you're listening.

[Jake]

It's true.

[Tim]

And I put my team.

[Jake]

I put it. I wrote find out. I had a Sharpie on my desk so I wrote find out on a piece of garbage. And that's.

[Tim]

I promise you are dramatic. I appreciate. I appreciate the effort, but yes. So yes, buy the [e-mail] and click the merch button or subscribe atfindout podcast substack.com I'm also gonna. We also haven'. Done which I should have done at the beginning. Want to make sure that everybody is participating Wednesday night on the around find out 50 online fundraising event that gov. Governor Newsome and Brian Tyler Cohen and us are helping to lead. And we've got all these great guests. Elizabeth Warren's going to be on there. A lot of influencers will be there. And the goal is to raise money to educate Californians on this. Yes, on 50 gerrymander ballot initiatives initiative that is happening. It is very, very important and we need to give them money now so that they can put it on the ground. You can RSVP by going to fafo50 the number50.com that's fafo50.com Also, we've got a very exciting guest coming with to us on Thursday. We are going to my homeland. We're not going but like our guest is from my homeland Maine. It is Dan Cleben, who is the president of the Main Brewing company or Main beer company and has just jumped into the Senate race and is looking to take on Susan Collins. So we are very, very excited about that. So you're going to hear me talking a lot of Maine. I will not put the acc.

[Luke]

Get an accent out. I was going to be disappointed. I think you should.

[Tim]

It got beaten out. Not, not physically, but somebody. It got, it got like my when I went to, I went to school in Pennsylvania and the first time I said wicked. That's wicked. Awesome that people were like what the are you saying? And because I was 19 years old and wanted to fit in, I just, just like got the most mid Atlantic accent that you could possibly ever get. So that's, that's sort of where. But if I'm home or back in Maine and had a few drinks with my friends, that's the way you would hear it. But we're very excited to have him on the show. He makes the best his company makes the best IPA on the plan planet, 100%. Which is, which is lunch. Which I don't know if we can mention it when he's on because he's a political candidate, probably will say it anyways. Will not ask him to send us any because that probably would be an FEC violation. But so we're gonna ask about all things Main. So if you have questions for him, please send them to us on any channel and we'll be sure to make them. But I'm also guys, I haven't told you yet but I'm gonna work on a on a Mainer quiz for him to, for him to take. So maybe it'll only be funny for me. And there's also the conversation about Bath last time I had so many of my friends reach out and say that was that was awesome. Thank you for standing up for the. The only ones I have are the ones I've made along on this journey, you know, so we saved. Anyways.

[Jake]

Nice save.

[Tim]

It's. It's safe. Anyways. All right, I think that does it for us today, guys. Thank you, everybody, for joining us. Please check out the Fafo 50, buy our merch, subscribe, and we'll be back on Thursday with another episode talking all about how we beat Susan Collins, which I know everybody's very excited about. So until then, have a great week, everybody. We'll talk to you soon.