Today’s Show is About a Different Show That is Not About Tapirs

Summary

The Gist: Today’s Show is About a Different Show That is Not About Tapirs

Release Date: April 12, 2025
Host: Mike Pesca
Producer: Peach Fish Productions

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Introduction

In this intriguing episode of The Gist, host Mike Pesca delves into a meta-discussion about creating a podcast episode that is explicitly not about tapirs. Embracing the show's signature provocative and thoughtful style, Pesca navigates the challenges and humorous contradictions inherent in attempting to avoid a specific topic while inadvertently bringing it into the conversation.

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Concept Exploration: The Not-About-Tapirs Show

00:00 - 01:04 | Initial Setup

The episode begins with a brief nod to the unconventional premise: producing a show that purposely avoids discussing tapirs, yet the mere act of defining such a concept makes it impossible to remain oblivious to the subject.

Colin McEnroe introduces the idea:

“We decided that we would do a show that is not about tapirs... It is specifically a show that is not about tapirs or tapirs.”
[02:35]

Team Reactions: Embracing the Absurdity

The production team grapples with the paradox of avoiding a topic that becomes a focal point by definition.

• Josh Nalea expresses strong opposition:

  “I just don't think should be on the air.”
  [04:25]

• Jonathan McNicoll shares his confusion:

  “I'm starting to get really confused.”
  [05:07]

• Josh further critiques the concept by comparing it to an episode of Seinfeld pitched to network executives:

  “As soon as you sort of, like, state your intentions to do a show that is not about something, then it becomes a bad idea.”
  [05:32]

These reactions highlight the inherent difficulty in maintaining a show centered around the absence of a topic, as the mere mention of tapirs undermines the premise.

Analogies and Reflections: Seinfeld and Beyond

Colin McEnroe draws parallels to Seinfeld's "about nothing" concept, placing the not-about-tapirs show on a spectrum of thematic focus:

“If Seinfeld were truly a show about nothing, it would be zero on the scale... we would do something that is a negative number.”
[06:00]

This analogy underscores the innovative yet flawed nature of the endeavor, emphasizing how defining a show by what it excludes can inadvertently define it by what it includes.

The Tapir Dilemma: Unintended Focus

Despite efforts to avoid the topic, tapirs inevitably surface in discussions:

“See, now, see, look what's happening. We're talking about them, Mike. We're trying to do a show that's not about them, and we're talking about them.”
[15:33]

The team acknowledges that complete avoidance is nearly impossible, leading to humorous and self-aware reflections on their predicament.

Guest Insight: Conversation with Mike Pesca

As The Gist hosts Mike Pesca, a guest appearance by himself adds a layer of meta-commentary to the episode. Colin McEnroe engages Pesca in a conversation about the challenges of avoiding a topic in podcasting:

“What if we tried to do a show that was not about a topic?... it would certainly waste the listener's time.”
[13:13]

Pesca contributes by likening the concept to improv techniques, pondering the futility and potential of creating content without a central theme. This segment deepens the exploration of thematic absence and its implications for content creation.

Satirical Commentary: The Trump Tariff Speech

In a departure from the main theme, the episode includes a satirical rendition of a Donald Trump speech addressing tariffs. This segment serves as a humorous interlude, showcasing the show's ability to critique and parody political discourse.

Satirical Trump declares:

“No other president would have done what I did.”
[19:43]

Colin McEnroe humorously analyzes the implications:

“The President has started with the truth... he got into the world trade picture.”
[20:11]

This segment satirizes political rhetoric, aligning with The Gist's tradition of reasonable critique across the political spectrum.

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Conclusion: Embracing Imperfection

As the episode wraps up, the production team reflects on the experiment's outcome. Jonathan McNicoll encapsulates the experience:

“I just want to say we've afforded ourselves the option of failing during this show.”
[09:46]

Colin McEnroe acknowledges the inherent challenges:

“We can still live with that. That'll be okay.”
[10:09]

Despite the struggles, the team appreciates the humorous and thought-provoking nature of their attempt, embracing the imperfections that come with such an unconventional approach.

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Key Takeaways

• Nature of Content Creation: Attempting to exclude a topic can inadvertently highlight it, making thematic absence challenging to maintain.

• Team Dynamics: Diverse opinions within the production team reflect the complexities of innovative content strategies.

• Meta-Commentary: Engaging with the concept of not focusing on something offers a unique lens through which to examine podcasting and thematic development.

• Satirical Elements: Incorporating satire enriches the episode, aligning with The Gist's mission to critique and analyze ideas thoughtfully.

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Notable Quotes

• Colin McEnroe:
  “This is fundamentally different from all the other shows, ostensibly not being about tapirs.”
  [05:32]

• Josh Nalea:
  “This is the only kind of show we've ever done. We've always done shows that were not about tapirs.”
  [04:58]

• Jonathan McNicoll:
  “This moment right here is about Tierce.”
  [09:50]

• Satirical Trump:
  “I could say, here's a wall. I'm going to go through it.”
  [17:05]

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Final Thoughts

The Gist successfully navigates the humorous and philosophical challenges of creating a show that intentionally avoids a specific topic. Through candid discussions, team dynamics, guest insights, and satirical elements, the episode offers a reflective and entertaining exploration of thematic absence in podcasting.

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Produced by: Corey Wara & Michelle Pesca
Brought to you by: Progressive Insurance

Transcript

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[Colin McEnroe]

Hey, it's Saturday. It's the Saturday show where we bring you one from the Vault and one from the week. Okay? The Vault's not our vault. The vault is Colin McEnroe's vault. It's the 15th year of the Colin McEnroe show, defined kind of loosely. He's been doing it for 15 years, so meaning he's in his 16th year. It doesn't matter. He deserves a celebration. And I've been on that show a couple of times recently. But. But I was reminded of an appearance I did, and it wasn't. It wasn't mostly about me, but it was in 2019. And what Colin likes to do is take a topic like, say, toast and do a whole show on it. And it's crazy how often it works. And so the ne plus ultra of this was he did a show that wasn't about tapirs. Tapir. Tapir. It appeared to be about tapirs, but it wasn't about tapirs. You know the animal. I know them mostly from Dora the Explorer. I was briefly on that episode. Colin McEnroe is such a good show, and I recommend it and I've recommended it in the past. So I'm going to play some of that episode here and there'll be a link to a 2019 show that they played just a couple weeks ago. And then the one from the Gist. Oh, yeah, the Gist does its old thing, I think. On Wednesday we had a pretty good spiel. Trump talked next to Some race car drivers and I talked about Trump talking. And, yeah, here's a little bit of what we do. All right, enjoy.

We're going to do a show that's a little unusual. In fact, it's very unusual. We're going to do a show because we've done thousands of shows, each of which was about a topic or a series of topics or a group of topics. We decided that we would do a show that was not about something, a show that is not about tapirs. Tapirs are a certain kind of animal. We can't tell you very much about what kind of animal they are because today we are doing a show that is not about them. It is specifically a show that is not about tapirs or tapirs. All right, so in the studio with me now to sort of get things going and just sort of give you a sense of how people are feeling about this right now is senior producer Betsy Kaplan, who doesn't want to be here and doesn't like this. And Carlos Mejia, the mejiasaurus. Jonathan McNicoll, who is producing this entire.

[Jonathan McNicoll]

Episode and also doesn't want to be.

[Colin McEnroe]

Here and also doesn't really want to be part of this conversation, but is the only other person who really is behind this concept. And then finally, producer Josh Nalea, who is bitterly and angrily opposed to this whole idea. So I think I've effectively set the stage here. The whole idea is we've done so many shows that we're about various things. Could we possibly do a show that is not about something that is. I mean, we've done thousands of shows that didn't deal with tapirs in any way, but they were not specifically not about tapirs. But today we are going to do a show that is specifically not about them. So a tapir is a certain kind of animal. And we will eventually, by talking to a zookeeper, explain to you a little bit about what a tapir is. Just because I thought it was important for you to understand what we're not doing a show about. But I think it is now, so. So, Josh, every time this comes up, you who are ordinarily, I think, a rather calm.

[Josh Nalea]

Yeah, I'm pretty easy going.

[Colin McEnroe]

You're a mild mannered person.

[Josh Nalea]

Yeah. I think this is like the first show that I've really strongly objected to us doing. I don't know if it's the first show. No, I've had my doubts about shows before, but I've always been behind them, sort of hoping for the best, eager to sort of see what they turn into this one, I just don't think should be on the air. Colin, you said that we've done thousands of shows that have been not about tapirs, but this is the first one that's actually. I mean, in essence.

[Colin McEnroe]

No, we've done thousands of shows without doing a show about tapeers. We've never done a show that was not about tapirs.

[Josh Nalea]

But actually, this is the only kind of show we've ever done. We've always done shows that were not about tapirs. The only difference with this one is that we're giving it a label, like we're saying what it is.

[Jonathan McNicoll]

I'm starting to get really confused.

[Colin McEnroe]

I know.

[Jonathan McNicoll]

It's just like every meeting we've had when we talk about this show, all.

[Josh Nalea]

Of our prior shows that we're not about tapirs, they're kind of like subject Seinfeld that really was not about anything. And this, to me, seems like the episode of Seinfeld where they pitched the idea to the network execs and it sounded like the worst idea ever. As soon as you sort of, like, state your intentions to do a show that is not about something, then it becomes a bad idea.

[Colin McEnroe]

I have a very specific thing I want to say about this, because I knew Seinfeld was going to come out, and I was pretty sure you were going to be the person who brought it up. But, Jonathan, before I do that, did you want to say something?

[Jonathan McNicoll]

I just want to. It's fundamentally different. What we're doing today is fundamentally different from all the other shows, ostensibly not being about tapirs. They weren't intentionally not about tapirs. Tapirs could have come up at any moment. Colin's the kind of person who's likely to bring up tapir up at any moment for whatever reason. This is a hole that we've consciously chosen to shape a show so that it's not about tapir.

[Colin McEnroe]

I do want to make clear that I didn't bring a tapir up. Like, I didn't adopt one and raise him as my own.

[Josh Nalea]

But this is becoming a show about tapir.

[Colin McEnroe]

No, not exactly. Right.

[Josh Nalea]

Well, we're talking about it.

[Colin McEnroe]

No, we're talking about not talking about it.

[Jonathan McNicoll]

We're, like, talking about the word.

[Colin McEnroe]

So here's the thing I want to say about the Seinfeld thing, because I think. Because this helped. Actually helped me think about this. So let's think about shows that we've done in the past. Okay, so Josh did a show about hats one time. So that's about something. It's about hats. So that's like on the scale of being about something, that's an 8 or a 9 or a 10. Because it's really about. It's a show about hats. All right, so then Seinfeld, if Seinfeld were truly a show about nothing, it would be zero on the scale. This is a negative number. Right? We're trying to do a show that is a negative number. That is actually as opposed to being about something or about nothing is specifically not about a thing. And I think that's never been done before in radio. I don't think anybody's ever. Carlos is like pinching. It just doesn't even make sense.

[Jonathan McNicoll]

I'm sitting here listening and I'm just imagining what listeners are thinking hearing this. This is specifically not about something. Right.

[Colin McEnroe]

It's not about something.

[Jonathan McNicoll]

But doesn't that make it something?

[Josh Nalea]

That's exactly right.

[Colin McEnroe]

Exactly.

[Josh Nalea]

That's exactly right. Making it about something. And it is very gimmicky. And I have always thought, I've always. Even since before I worked here. One of the magic of this show is that we would do shows about topics like hats or shoes or donuts or tapirs or tapirs. I don't think we've ever done one. But like. Yeah, but we did a show about.

[Colin McEnroe]

Beavers, which are very much.

[Josh Nalea]

We would do shows about that. And all those ideas sort of verged on being a gimmick, but we saved them from being a gimmick because in the process of doing that show, we would sort of drill down into them and reveal some truth about that topic which kind of like unites us as people or something. And like, oh, very. So nice. And voila. Suddenly it's not a gimmick. This show about shoes is not a gimmick. It's like a really interesting show that people want to listen to. And this is not that. This. We've gone.

[Colin McEnroe]

You think this show has no potential to do that? Exploring the negative regions of information.

[Josh Nalea]

Exactly.

[Colin McEnroe]

I would say we can possibly get to some deeper truth.

[Josh Nalea]

Now we've gone full. As Robert Downey Jr. Said in Tropic Thunder, we have gone full gimmick. And I don't think you used the word gimmick, but I'll say another objection. I have, and I say this mostly in jest, but not entirely. Is this like, how insulting is this to tapirs and to all those people who love and study tapirs, that somehow we find shoes and hats and donuts worthy to do an hour long discussion on in tapirs? We finally met our match well, they.

[Colin McEnroe]

Are kind of funny looking, you have to admit.

[Josh Nalea]

Sure. But like, we finally met our match. A topic that is so unworthy of our time that we not know if we're totally unworthy.

[Colin McEnroe]

Well, first of all, I think we have to acknowledge. Jonathan and I have to acknowledge something about this, which is the matter. This show has made Josh the more we've wanted to do it and that has kind of fed our delight about the whole idea. But no, I think, you know, I think you have to pick a topic that has enough substances, that takes up enough space on Earth that you could do a show that wasn't about it.

[Jonathan McNicoll]

Right. Right.

[Josh Nalea]

Now you've lost all of us.

[Jonathan McNicoll]

Oh, come on. There will be one or two parts of this show that contemplate whether or not we should have done a show about tapirs.

[Colin McEnroe]

Right. And we should say that tapirs do represent a part of a climate that's endangered. And we are going to put on our website some information about how to help save this thing that we're not doing a show about.

[Josh Nalea]

If we do any of that, we have ruined the premise of this show.

[Colin McEnroe]

That is a question.

[Josh Nalea]

Now, it is about Tiberes.

[Colin McEnroe]

But no, how can we do a show that's not about De Beers without at least acknowledging their existence? All right, Jonathan, you have something you want to add?

[Jonathan McNicoll]

I just want to say we've afforded ourselves the option of failing during this show.

[Colin McEnroe]

Right.

[Jonathan McNicoll]

It may wind up being about tapirs at one or two points.

[Colin McEnroe]

Right? Yeah. I mean, that's one of the things that at a certain point Jonathan and I had to acknowledge was we shouldn't be afraid to have it fail a little bit and have tapirs creep in. Because first of all, that's something tapirs like to do. They wait until it's very quiet.

[Jonathan McNicoll]

That's right.

[Colin McEnroe]

And then they creep in.

[Jonathan McNicoll]

This moment right here is about Tierce. But anyway, go ahead.

[Colin McEnroe]

So, I mean, yeah, you know, we're not. We're trying to do a show that's not about Tiberius. If we occasionally fail, if there's a little crack in our armor, that's okay. We can still live with that. That'll be okay. All right, So I should tell you that some of the things that we are going to talk about today, we are talking to a person who teaches meditation. Because I think one of the things you're trying not to think about something and trying not to talk about something, obviously, that's sort of like meditation. You have to sort of clear your mind. How do you get the T word out of your mind. And we'll also be doing a few other interviews with people from here around the building about this very exciting project that we're doing right now. And we'll be talking to at least one person outside the building, renowned broadcaster Mike Pesca, who has enjoyed making fun of really bad ideas we've had. So we're going to have a conversation with Mike about whether this is one of them. All right. Anything else anybody else wants to say? I hadn't. Why?

[Jonathan McNicoll]

Why tapirs? Why did you put a show not about tapirs in the calendar?

[Colin McEnroe]

It has to be something because they're funny. I mean, they're kind of amusing. If you've seen pictures of them, they're funny. I don't know. They've always been kind of a funny thing. You know, a tapir is something you have to really work at, not doing a show about tapir, because you barely know what it is in the first place. All right, so I think we should wrap this segment up here. We have got other stuff coming for the seven or eight people who are still listening to this episode. There's a lot of excitement coming, so no flipping.

[Jonathan McNicoll]

Yay.

[Colin McEnroe]

Yay.

[Jonathan McNicoll]

That was like three times as long as I expected.

[Colin McEnroe]

We'd be able to just cut out all the stuff that Bitsy Caplan said.

[Mike Pesca]

We can talk about Cato and Plato and Bedo. We can speak of Daenerys or Kamala Harris. We can talk about anything. So it appears. But let's not talk about tapir. We can talk about Mookie and Sookie and Wookies. We can talk about Solo and YOLO and Polo. We can talk about anything in the newspapers. But let's not talk about tapers.

[Colin McEnroe]

So as the host of a show, you know, I don't have that many other people I can talk to. I mean, there aren't that many other people who are hosts of shows, first of all. And then there aren't that many other people who would put up with an idea as strange as the one that we came up with. But Mike Pesca is probably my best hope. Kind of like Obi Wan. He's my only hope. Mike Pesca, of course, is the host of the Gist, a terrific five day a week podcast. So you, first of all, Mike, you understand what it's like. You hit one of these big marks and you take stock, Right. You wonder what it is that you haven't done yet.

Yeah. And you think it matters, and you wonder why no one else cares.

Right. And so that's. You've summed up very beautifully and touchingly part of the position that I'm in right now. And so what I thought was, what if we tried to do a show that was not about a topic? What if we pick something and tried as hard as we could to do a show that was not about that thing?

Right.

Yeah, go ahead.

Well, I guess the closest analog I could think of is something like the Herald from Improv, where they go in without anything set, and nothing is preplanned but one word or suggestion is given. And I guess you just have to have that suggestion as a jumping off point, and they begin free associating. Though if we broke down what free associating is, and sure, it's not totally free, the very fact that we're thinking in and uttering a shared language shows that there are some restrictions to it. But from that, something arises. But I don't know how to do that other than you come up with a fictional work of improv. Can you essentially do a Harold. Where you're not trying to create a situation? And it would be nonfiction. I mean, it would get somewhere. It would certainly waste the listener's time. But I think something like that could happen.

We've already succeeded in doing that quite a lot. But so what we decided was that we would pick a particular thing. And so I'm going to say that thing. It's an animal called a tapir or tapir. The things that we like about this particular animal is that there's not a common consensus about how even to say the name of the animal. And so we are doing a show that's specifically not about that animal. You know, I've kind of violated the premise of the show a little bit by telling you what that animal is. But on the other hand, we're probably not going to entirely succeed at not doing a show about tapirs anyway.

My kids used to watch Dora the Explorer. Dora had a number of friends, and one of her friends was, I think she called it tape here. But who knows? And if you didn't know, you know, just based on the animals that are exposed to children, I think they probably. There was one point in their life where they thought that of the four animals that aren't pets in their house, tape here must have been one of the top four, just based on its presence on Dora. We could do this to people.

See, that's an interesting generational thing because. And it's also the best cinematic or dramatic experience that tapirs have ever had, because their other big one, apparently, is that at the beginning of 2001, you know, where they have a bone. You know, they're like. They're hitting each other with a bone and stuff like that. It's a tapir bone. They've killed and processed a tapir. That's whose bone it is.

Is it the nose bone? Because I guess that's the tapir's most prominent feature. They're proboscis. Probosc.

But see, now, see, look what's happening. We're talking about them, Mike. We're talking about them. We're trying to do a show that's not about them, and we're talking about them.

Are we trying to not. I haven't thought of an elephant, though.

That's true. See, that is very much the analog. I mean. Yeah, don't think about an elephant. Well, obviously, then you do. And for that reason, we are talking to a person who teaches meditation to see if there's a way we can screen it out.

Right. So I think what we. What you have to do to not do a show about tape years is to intensely research tapirs and find their most essential elements and then veer away from that. So you wouldn't do what I did.

Yeah.

You wouldn't talk about nature.

Right.

You wouldn't talk about the fact that they live for, you know, three more years in captivity, which is something, actually, that's interesting.

[Josh Nalea]

What.

[Colin McEnroe]

What do we.

What do we.

What do you make of this, Colin? You always hear that animals in the wild have a lifespan, but then in captivity and domesticity, much longer lifespan.

Right.

I always question, well, does that argue for captivity? The very word captivity would seem to argue against it. Or does say something about how we, ourselves, as human animals, we default to lifespan as a huge indication of quality of life. It seems to be wrong. It seems to be the exact opposite of what we should be defaulting to.

Right. I mean, and it probably is true that if you can control an environment, you know, you can probably remember when they whacked Whitey Bulger in prison.

Yeah.

And he was like, 89. Like, what's the point of killing somebody who's 89 years old? You'll never see 90 again, Whitey. So.

But the assassin. The assassin dubbed himself the actuary.

So. But it's probably true that if you have a person or an animal in captivity, you can make sure it eats the right things and maybe it doesn't do some of the wrong things. Maybe even bug it to go out in the yard, get some exercise. It probably is. And you're right. We have a Prejudice, a bias towards lifespan.

And I also think that the idea of free range animals, which we think is good, it's only good for us. Right, see, okay, cages and confinement is wrong. But do you think animals want to be free range? When animals are free range, it's. There's still a range element. I think they just want to be free. I don't know what they want. The wants of a tapir are immaterial to me and us in this conversation.

You know what a tapir wants? It wants to live fast, die young and have a funny looking corpse.

Maybe. Maybe influence a Stanley Kubrick film, albeit obliquely.

Yes, absolutely. Well, Mike Pesca, as usual, I think first of all that you have. You've got to something that we hadn't gotten to, which is that, yes, one way to not do the show about tibers or do the show that's not about tibers, is to locate the glue glowing white heart of the Truth About Tapirs and then steer away from it, take your space shuttle and veer off in a completely different direction.

Right. That's the photo negative. And since the white heart would also be about something, you'd, I think, have a penumbra. Right, right. And the penumbra could be so many things. Yeah, that's it.

And so the gravity of the tape here might keep pulling our space shuttle back towards it, but we have to just gun it with a little extra energy to try to get away. All right, so if that was a conversation that you enjoyed and even stayed with all the way through, you should be listening to the gist, which is even way better.

We have topics, though, I swear.

Yeah, already. You don't want to be damned by association to this thing. You're like, Peter, you're already denying that you had anything to do with this.

While I admire the tapir experiment, we do not indulge in said experiment.

Mike Pesca, host of the Gist, thank you so much for joining us again.

Oh, my pleasure.

[Mike Pesca]

Only one thing's forbidden, so why not renounce it? Let's just keep it hidden while we can't pronounce it. There are so many things we can sit and dissect, like the wind in Nepal or the rain in Utrecht. But darling, one thing's for certain and one truth is true. When I don't talk about tapers, I want to not do that only with you.

[Colin McEnroe]

And now the spiel. Donald Trump spoke outside the White House today, surrounded by a phalanx of race car drivers. The questions turned to tariffs and Trump put the pedal to the metal.

[Donald Trump]

No other president would have done what I did. No other. I know the presidents, they wouldn't have done it.

[Colin McEnroe]

He knows. I mean, all of them. Chad, Arthur, Millie, Philly, all four Johns, both Johnson's, both Harrison's, both Franklin's, Delano Roosevelt, and Pierce. Don't forget Pierce. And none would have done this.

[Jonathan McNicoll]

Know what?

[Colin McEnroe]

I think he's right. I believe him. So what we hear is that the President has started with the truth. And I will tell you, he will end with the truth, too. But before that, he got into the world trade picture.

[Donald Trump]

Last year, China made $1 trillion off trade with the United States. That's not right. And somebody had to do it.

[Colin McEnroe]

We also bought a trillion dollars worth of goods from China, which would have cost us something like $2 trillion had they not been made in China. We have $36 trillion of debt for a reason.

[Donald Trump]

We don't have it there for fun. They have it for a reason.

[Colin McEnroe]

And I don't know, it's a little bit of fun thinking about, say, $1 trillion stacked end to end going to the sun 40 times. I mean, probably get singed when it got to the sun, but still, 37 or $36 trillion weighs six times the weight of the Hoover Dam. Also true. We don't have it for no reason. But one reason that we have $36 trillion in debt, about a quarter to a fifth of the reason, is that during Trump's first time in office, he added $8 trillion to the national debt. The president then segued into an area very comfortable for him. Where do immigrants come from?

[Donald Trump]

And there were people from mental institutions.

[Colin McEnroe]

Insane asylums, looney bins, funny farms, daffy day spas.

[Donald Trump]

They were taking their mentally insane and they were dumping them into our country. And I'll tell you, Tom Holman and Kristi Noem are doing a fantastic job.

[Colin McEnroe]

Just as the Chinese were dumping steel. So what we're going to do is we're going to tariff them for dumping the mentally ill. For every one insane Guatemalan they dump, we're going to charge them 1.25 insane Hondurans. That is Liberation Day.

[Donald Trump]

Think of it. They take over. They want these people coming back. Trend Iraqwa from Venezuela, the Venezuela jails that cut off the fingers of a man in Colorado. They cut off his fingers because he called the police looking for help. They said, did you call the police? He said, yes, I did. Put your hand down. And they cut off the fingers. This is what they want to bring these people back now.

[Colin McEnroe]

And what this Gang did, when you think about it, was impose a 10% finger tariff. They cut off one pinky. Then the rival gang retaliates. They raise it to 125% finger tariffs, which is 10 fingers and two and a half toes. I say, can you take the toes first? But the answer is no. No, you can't. Also little note to you if you're ever in that position when asked by a Venezuelan gang, did you call the police? Say no. Say no. Try it. The President then returned to more explicitly economic issues.

[Donald Trump]

If you look at Apple, Apple is going to spend $500 billion building a plant. They wouldn't be doing that if I didn't do this. They'd just keep building them in China.

[Colin McEnroe]

Here's what Apple actually announced.

[Josh Nalea]

Apple is planning to temporarily source more iPhones from India to send to the United States in a bid to offset the impact of President Trump's tariffs on China.

[Colin McEnroe]

Trump was then asked if he'd consulted with any heads of industry or top bankers.

[Donald Trump]

Well, I watched Jamie Dimon on Maria Bartiromo show this morning and he was very good. He said that that actually made the statement to effect that something had to be done with the tariffs and trade. He said that. He said, look at some point, but he said something has to be done with tariffs and trade. He understood it.

[Colin McEnroe]

Here is what Dimon actually said. Note his description of the Trump administration's understanding of its own plan. So what do you think about the tariff plan?

[Jamie Dimon]

I think it is perfectly reasonable for someone to say that trade was unfair. There were unfair trade things. And remember, it's not just tariffs, it's tariffs. I think they have the VAT wrong how they understand and I think they should really get a better understanding to make it easy to negotiate. But there are all these non tariff barriers around food and energy and then subsidies, which you know, China is famous for. So it's totally reasonable to say we want to make trade better. But I also want to point out to the Americans, we have the best economy in the world. Our GDP per person is $85,000 tariffs, China's is $15,000. So you got to put a little bit in the context. But you know, and then of course, when they put the tariffs and it was way beyond what people expected, that will cause inflation, slow down growth.

[Colin McEnroe]

Yes. So quite the opposite of an endorsement. And finally, the President concluded by answering how he knew which companies deserve a.

[Donald Trump]

Break, just instinctively more than anything else. I mean, you almost can't take a pencil to paper.

[Colin McEnroe]

And that too not being able to take pencil to paper that ranks as fact check true. And in the final few moments, he turned to the race car drivers next to him and analogized their job to his saying, I could say, here's a wall. I'm going to go through it. Sometimes you have to be able to go under the wall, around the wall, or over the wall. These guys know better than anyone. And they all nodded because it's easier than saying, we're Indy car drivers, not the cast of the Road Warrior. What the hell are you talking about? And with that, the President strode off. Having overseen a hugely successful policy that only led to four straight days of trillions of dollars worth of losses, he then, in the tradition of any IndyCar driver who crashes headfirst into a wall on the first turn, took his victory lap. That's it for today's show. The GIST is produced by Corey Wara, working late and Michelle Pesca, working later. Later. Improve G Peru. Do Peru. And thanks for listening. The GIST is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Fiscally responsible financial geniuses, Monetary magicians. These are things people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to Progressive and save hundreds. Visit progressive.com to see if you could save Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations.