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Glenn Beck
I can say to my new Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra, hey, find a keto friendly restaurant nearby and text it to Beth and Steve. And it does without me lifting a finger so I can get in more squats anywhere I can. 1, 2, 3.
Jason Calacanis
Will that be cash or credit? Credit. 4 Galaxy S25 Ultra the AI companion that does the heavy lifting. So you can do you get yours@samsung.com compatible with select apps. Requires Google Gemini account. Results may vary based on input. Check responses for accuracy. Holy cow, do we have a great podcast for you today. We start right off with CBDCs. Those are central bank digital currencies, remember? Oh my gosh, that's a tinfoil hat conspiracy. Until the EU announced. Oh they're here now. And I'm not sure over a very short period of time we can look at Europe as an actual ally in the fight for freedom anymore. Who is right, Donald Trump or Massie on the cr I make the case for both sides of this inter party fight but I, I think I feel really good about where I end up and you'll hear that. And Jason Calacanis from the all in podcast. Angel investor knows AI inside and out. A fascinating wake up call from him all on today's podcast. First, here's a simple truth that people used to know when, when something like the power grid fails and oh, it will fail, it will fail. You just sit around waiting for somebody else to get the lights back on or you take care of it yourself. How do you do that? Well, you were prepared for this months or even years before it happened in most cases because you went to my Patriot supply. They have you covered right now. They've just released their new grid. Dr. 3300. It's the first solar generator with revolutionary EMP intercept technology. It protects your power from an EMP attack, keeping you and your family safe and comfortable. It has an industry leading 3,300 watts of power. It'll run everything from refrigerators to freezers to medical devices and power tools. Plus when you get it, it comes with a free 200 watt waterproof solar panel. Don't wait. Get your grid Dr. 3300 with EMP Intercept Technology right now at My Patriotsupply.com Secure your family's future at My Patriotsupply.com you're listening to of the Glenn Beck program. Okay, where do we even begin? Let me start in in Europe with the president of the European Central bank, the ecb. I love central banks, don't you Pat? Pat? Oh, they're the best sitting in for Stu again, who's just so sick yesterday he was vomiting from all the truffles he was eating on the couch while he's watching soap operas. Anyway, Christine Lagarde, she's the president of the central bank. It's basically our Fed, and they're all the same. Here's what she said, and it's a lot of blah, blah, blah. So I don't know how long I can take it. I'll summarize if I can't take it for two whole minutes. But here she is.
Christine Lagarde
Nature doesn't like vacuum.
Jason Calacanis
Vacuum.
Christine Lagarde
And we started working on the digital euro way back, actually, when I started my term, five and a half years ago. And I'm not claiming parentality on the digital euro because my colleague Benoit Curses. Had already committed a speech on this matter before I arrived. But I certainly carried on with that project. And subsequently Fabio Panetta on the board, and then Piero Cipollone, who has replaced Fabio.
Jason Calacanis
Okay, okay, I can't listen to somebody who's talking about Fabio. Look, here's, here's what she's announcing. First of all, let's remember that four years, Christine Lagarde and everybody else, both here, foreign and domestic, have said that any worry about a CBDC is just a conspiracy theory. They have silenced, they have discredited anyone who warned of the dangers of this. But now, all of a sudden, I guess we all forgot that, because now they're ready, and the stakes cannot be higher. We, I'm telling you, 18 to 48 months, our whole world is going to be different. They are ready to launch this now. And the stakes for privacy, free markets, and individual liberty, especially anybody who kind of likes the Constitution, uh, they're at risk. Okay, this is a really dangerous pivot that is going on right now, and I think it should fracture our alliance. Um, anybody who's advocating for small government, personal free freedom, you know, hey, privacy. Uh, I, I, I don't think you should be in bed and defending those who are going down the road of Europe right now. Years ago, cbdc, that central bank digital currency, that's like Bitcoin, except the, the point of Bitcoin is it's untraceable. You, it's completely private, and nobody can stop you from using it. Cbdc, that's a tinfoil hat conspiracy. We'll never do that. Why would we do that? Uh, in fact, in 2019, Mark Carney, who was the head of the bank of England back then, he said, doc, cbdc, that you, you are so misguided. With your fears. And he said that while he was at Jackson Hole. You know, they have that economic symposium where all of the really cool people go to. And then they. They talk about things. And then when we, who are not the cool people in attendance go, that sounds spooky. They go, you're just a tinfoil hat person. Anyway, that's where he made that SPE speech that. It's just misguided. There's nothing to fear here because we are just experimenting. Oh, kind of like Mengele. I'm sorry, that was bad. Kind of like, let's say, the atomic bomb. There is nothing to the atomic bomb. We're just doing experiments. Why would you be experimenting if you didn't think it would be something that you would eventually use? So anyway, 2021, Jerome Powell, who's our central bank guy, the Federal Reserve, he said, quote, cbdc, this is not on. I love this one. Not on the immediate horizon. Okay, so you're admitting that it is on the Horizon. So in 2024, she. Lagarde, she. She comes out and she told the European Parliament that CBDC skepticism stem from conspiracy theories saying the digital euro is not going to be Big Brother surveillance. Remember what a central bank digital currency can do and will do at least over in the Soviet. I mean, in Europe, will be that it will track everything you buy, everything you sell, everything you make. Okay, not a problem. That's fine. I don't have anything to hide. Except it can be turned off. You don't? Oh, like I can go to the bank and say, I want cash. I want my cash out. Okay, you'll be suspected of being a terrorist if you do that. What's the problem? Hey, that's freedom, baby. But you can take the cash, okay? With a central bank digital currency, you don't own that. There's nothing to take out. They own it. The central bank and the government, they own that. So you have no place to go but through them. And if you decide, I don't really like that. They can turn your currency off. And make no mistake, that's not a tinfoil hat conspiracy. That's what's happening in China. So people have been. There's a guy, Prasad, I think his name is. He wrote a book, the Future of Money. It came out in 2018. We talked about it on the program and. And he was made to look ridiculous. They were. That's crazy. Anybody who's a libertarian, they've been talking about you're crazy. Anybody who spoke about it on any platform during the Biden administration They're crazy. And you were throttled or suspended because you were spreading misinformation. Okay, So I got the message. It's a farce. It's not happening. Uh huh, uh huh. Except now they've just announced that it is happening. Okay. Back in 2020, the European Central bank said 86% of all central banks are working on this right now. Oh, okay. Then she said in 2024 there's a two year pilot. But now she said there's a rollout coming for digital currency from the Central bank of Europe. So it went from conspiracy to reality in a year. Love how that works. And we're all just supposed to not notice it. Okay, so here's, here's why this is so dangerous and something you must pay attention to. I am convinced that especially ASI is going to be a tool. Remember, like everything. Like everything. Even scriptures. Scriptures. That's a tool. It's a gift given to you if you'd like to use it. But know that that powerful gift that you have can fall into the hands of somebody else and they can twist it and use it for very powerful, nefarious purposes. That's just the written word of the scriptures. Okay? It will always. Everything can be used for good or bad. It depends on the people that are holding it in their hands. All right? And I really am convinced that ASI digital currency, that's all found in the Bible. I mean, I'm in Bible territory here, specifically the last part of the Bible, that these are the tools that appear very much like the tools foretold, you know, that will be employed by the Antichrist to snuff out anyone who dares to say I'm really not with him now. So they are. China has already done this. They launched in 2020 with their digital one. It tracks everything and that gives you your, your, your currency, but it also gives you the currency to be somebody in good standing if you don't do exactly what the state tells you to do. You're tracked, you're monitored. And guess who doesn't get to go on an airplane? Guess who doesn't get to take the train. Guess who can't. Guess who can't go into certain buildings. You, because you're no longer in good standing. And it gets worse and worse and worse until you are literally living on the Only because you disagree with the government. Don't believe me. Look it up now. The US is not far behind. We have got to pass. And Donald Trump said he would sign it. We have got to pass legislation right now. No central bank, digital currency ever in America. No. No digital passport ever in America. Because we are already working on a digital dollar here. Europe's move is not isolated. It is a chess move. Well, they're doing it and China's doing it and we better do it, otherwise we're going to be left behind. I want to be left behind. There's going to come a time. You're going to hear me. Well, you may not because, well, you, you, you, you probably will. Maybe I don't. There's going to become a time where I'm going to be like, you know, the Amish have it right? Maybe we should all be Amish. Now, I might be just saying that in a barn with cows and people who are all dressed in black, I don't know. But there's going to come a time where I'm like, I think we should all get out of here and go the other direction. And it could be coming quickly because what this means for privacy, for free markets, for your individual choice is beyond most people's understanding today. But you've got to educate. Remember I said there's going to come a time where things are happening so fast you're not going to be able to keep up with them. You've already seen this in a good way with Donald Trump. He came in and it's, it's not just that he had a plan. It's also that we are using AI to find all of these things to correct. Okay? That's why Elon Musk is there, tech support. That's what's speeding things up. And you haven't seen anything yet. So when I give you these warnings and I say, hey you, you gotta please bone up on it. Please go, go ask Rock today, CBDC from, from Europe. What, what does that mean? What could it do? What are the good things? What are the possible bad things? I think in this case the bad outweighs the good because it takes away any kind of privacy whatsoever and hands it directly to a government. Really bad. We tell you about real estate agents. I trust dot com. They don't wear capes, they don't get parade floats or you know, make news headlines. But make no mistake, these guys are practic, practically heroes. Every time they make a sale. I'm talking about the men and women who work with my company, Real Estate Agents I trust. These are ordinary people. These are veterans, moms, dads, they're people that, you know, serve their, their community all the time. In their spare hours, they've stepped up to do something Extraordinary work for you to get the best buying and selling experience. When you're buying or selling a house, you're not going to find them working a second job. They're too busy for that. They're pounding the pavement, they're working the phones, they're digging through the paperwork till midnight, all to get your home soldier and get the next home yours at a great price. Unsung heroes. Yeah, maybe. But you better bet that they're also an unstoppable force. It's real estate agents I trust. It's not just a service. It's kind of a brotherhood or sisterhood of people who all believe that your dream matters. Real Estate Agents I Trust dot com. Go there now. Real Estate Agents I Trust dot com. Now back to the podcast. This is the best of the Glenn Beck program. And don't forget, rate us on itunes from the podcast. All in executive producer and co host, Jason Calacanis. Jason, welcome. How are you?
Unknown Speaker
It's good to be with you again. Nice to hear from you.
Jason Calacanis
Yeah, it's. It's great to have you on. I, you know, I think people are starting to wake up to things that, you know, I woke up to AI when I read Ray Kurzweil's Age of Spiritual Machines back in the 90s, and that thing freaked me out so much, I'm like, ooh, wait, if this isn't fiction. We're in for a whole new world. And as I've been watching it come closer and closer and faster and faster. You know, Elon Musk said we're at the edge of the event horizon of the singularity. That means we're right up next to about to be sucked into it. Not being able to turn around things in the next 48 months, I think are going to look entirely different to most people. And that's just the beginning. Would you agree with that?
Unknown Speaker
Yeah. And arguably, you know, in my day job, I'm not just a podcast. I also angel invest in startup companies, about 100 a year. And so I get to have approximately 20,000 people apply for funding from my venture fund. And startups always are resource constrained. Right. Two or three people in a garage with just a tiny amount of money or no money, so. So they actually use technology to build these companies and they always go for the most efficient thing. And what we've seen is over the last two years since ChatGPT launched to the public in the 3.5 format, is the same companies that took 10 people and a half a million dollars to get a product to market it's now being done by three people, so about 70% less people. And then if you were to look at some of the top technology companies, that's the next group who embraces this technology. First. They're not as scrappy as startups, but they're tech companies, so, you know, they get a front row seat to the technology. And if you were to look at the number of employees at Google, Uber, Airbnb, Meta, which makes Facebook and Instagram, they have the same number of employees. Glenn, when they peaked in 2021, 2022 was their peak employee account. They now have either the same number of employees or slightly less in those companies, but they've grown their revenue 20, 30, 40% a year, which means they're not adding team members to companies that have quite literally hundreds of billions of dollars in their bank accounts. And they could hire as many people as they want. And we watched them do that. Right? They would add thousands, sometimes tens of thousands of employees in a year. And now they're not adding anyone. So something's happening here and most people don't know what it is. So I can explain it in more in detail, but I'm just giving you those two anchors to say this has been going on for the last 24, 36 months in my world and it's about to hit, you know, the community here in your program's world in a major way over the next five.
Jason Calacanis
So let me, because I think in some ways, and correct me if I'm wrong, I think the lead is being buried on what you just said. They all those companies are operating at the same levels, making more same levels, but they now all are in this gear of existential threat. If we are not the one that gets there first, we're out. And in any other time period, you would be throwing money left and right at this, you'd be throwing people into this. And for them to not be growing the people when they're under this existential threat, where they know we've got to be first, that shows you to me, that shows you the power of this tool already.
Unknown Speaker
Yeah, it's an interesting insight. What's happening, in fact, is AI is really good at replacing certain jobs today or making a person using AI be able to do the work of 10 people, five people, three people. And so what companies are doing is, I call it the Add Framework, Automate, deprecate, delegate. It turns out many companies are doing things they don't need to do anymore. We're seeing that with Doge and our government.
Jason Calacanis
Right.
Unknown Speaker
So that's deprecated. You just stop doing something. Delegating. It means there's a workforce around the world that gets paid between one and, let's call it $30 an hour for clerical work, for knowledge work, for white collar work, for people with college degree work. It turns out the people in a place like Manila in the Philippines, where we have a company called Athena that provides kind of like an executive assistant. And that company can provide an executive assistant who is in an MBA program in Manila for 3,000amonth, $36,000 a year, compared to the United States where that same person would get paid 70, 80, 90, 100,000, not from the Ivy League, but from an average school. And then there's Automate. It turns out if you're an executive at a Google, at a meta. The time it takes to hire a person, to train a person, to deal with the, you know, the nature of humans, which is we're annoying, we're complicated. We show up late, we have attitudes, we want to raise, we want there to be, you know, matcha in the, in the cafe at Google or whatever it is, and soy milk and nut milk and whatever it is, because we're annoying. So managers are saying, you know what, These employees are so damn annoying. And they want all these things that human want. Let's just take six weeks to automate this thing now. Because AI allows you to automate things at a scary rate, like a really fast rate. It's actually less than hiring a new person now. They will hire a PhD in computer science to work on AI. Those hirings are still going on, but the static team size is going to continue. And I am absolutely convinced we are going to. For young people. You know, I moved to Austin. I know you're in Dallas. So we'll have to, we'll have to get lunch at some point or maybe come to the, maybe I'll come down to the studio. But they. I've been speaking at ut. In fact, I spoke there two weeks in a row and the students are like, hey, I'm going to go work at Big Tech. I'm going to visit the MBA program there. It's quite, quite a good program. I'm going to go work at, you know, this big consulting firm, Figures. And they said, you know, you're not right. Hate to break it to you, those jobs aren't going to be there. So young people are starting to realize, wait a second, I don't have five offers from Big Tech and three from consulting firms and two from investment banks coming out of MBA programs, graduate programs in business administration are coming out with, you know, half the number of offers, 10% of the number of offers they would normally get. There's your canary in the coal mine. And so what I've been doing with those kids and it's quite self serving, is saying start. You got to be ready to start a company. You have to be resilient, you have to have grit, you got to have self reliance, executive function, leadership skills. You're not going to just work somewhere for five or 10 years and they're going to spoon feed you to be productive.
Jason Calacanis
You know, that's the one thing I've been saying to the audience. You know, I've been saying this for a long time. There's going to come a time where every two to five years you're just, you're going to be doing something entirely different. You're gonna have to retrain yourself all the time. You have to stay mentally nimble to be able to enter and stay working. Because this is not going to last. Nothing's going to last. And there'll be new things that come along, but everybody's going to have to completely retrain over and over and over again. That's just the way life is going to be, I think. And I feel like we're at that first turning point where soon a majority of people or a large segment of the population is going to go, wait a minute, wait a minute, my job is out and they're not going to hire anybody like me again. And you're going to have to retrain. And those people who don't are not willing to be nimble, stay nimble, stay mentally agile and, and willing to change like that. You're going to kind of go into, I hate saying this but Hararis, what does he say? Useless people or useless class? Which is terrifying.
Unknown Speaker
Yeah, I'll give you some good news. I know this has probably been a little scary for the audience, some members of it. If you use these tools, you are infinitely valuable in creating companies or working at the Glenn Beck show, working, you know, at any company. And so anytime your boss asks you to do something, say hey listen, I need a report, here's what the report needs to have. You literally can go into ChatGPT and Gemini and you can ask it that question and then you can just say, well what questions is would my boss ask me? Or how would they judge me on my job? And you can basically get a free coach on how to use these tools. And anybody who you know has had the experience of going wow, my dishwasher is not working. And instead of calling a plumber, goes to YouTube and types in my, you know, yeah, blank brand, you know, is not working. It's giving an error 62 and it says, oh yeah, you know, you just need to clear this and flip this fuse and you're back in the game. And they do it and they feel, oh, I'm self reliant, right, because of YouTube. Because every question has been asked on YouTube. Now take that and times it by a million. That's what these chat GPTs can do right now. You can literally take a picture of the broken thing, say, what is this? I did it with one of my tractors here on the ranch. I said, what the heck's going on here? How does this work? I don't have the manual for this tractor and man, it just figured it all out for me. And now I don't have to call tractor supply to come out for a thousand bucks and fix the tractor. That opportunity is right there. So the person who's going to take your job right now is going to be a person using AI and the person who will be the last person standing at the company is the person who knows the tools best. The tools are free to 20 bucks a month. And if you use and embrace the tools, what we're talking about, this continuous professional development, you alluded to it as, hey, I got to do retraining every two to five years. It's actually even a little bit more intense than that. You have to be using these every day, getting incrementally better daily. And if you do that, you're invaluable. So that's the silver lining.
Jason Calacanis
So, Jason, I've been trying to explain this to my staff because I, you know, AI is, it's a tool like a shovel. It's a tool. And if you don't know how to use that tool, this is the first tool that will learn how to use you. And if you are trying to, if you're trying, if you're a lazy employee and you're like, wait a minute, this thing can make me. I could be done in 25 minutes with my job and I can go screw off the rest of the day, you're going to lose your job because you'll just, AI will just replace you. But if you're somebody who is, is an imaginary thinker, who is aggressive, who wants to expand, wants to do things, you're going to have it do, it's like giving somebody a step. For my researchers, they each have a staff of about 20 people now, and they can.
Unknown Speaker
I have the same experience on my podcast, right. I will say to the person, you know, hey, go find me other subjects like this person, go, what were they saying in the 80s? Go find, you know, Jason Calacanis, you know, on Charlie Rose. Take that link, put it on and summarize it in bullet points and then give that to the host.
Jason Calacanis
Yes.
Unknown Speaker
So a very simple thing I did. You know, when you open a new browser window, right, you hit the command tab or whatever, you open a new window, it shows you like some marketing, depending on the browser you're using, some news stories that they try to intercept and get some clicks and make some money. Whether it's Google's browser or Microsoft's, whoever's it is, there was a little tool called tab override. When you open a new tab, I set it to all my employees. I bought them the chat CPT for 20 bucks. Now we're experimenting with Gemini, Google's offering and Elon's offering Grok. All of them are just spectacular. When they open a new tab, it opens right into the large language model ChatGPT, Grok or Gemini. So every time instead of going to Google and doing a search or instead of asking your boss, I've never done that before, right? How do I do that? You say, I've never done this before. My boss wants me to do it. How can I look spectacular, valuable to my boss? Just ask him, LLM.
Jason Calacanis
So, you know, so, you know, we're on run. Beings have been, we're on broadcast radio, so watch your language. Just watch your language. We're on broadcast radio, so that's right.
Unknown Speaker
Gosh darn.
Jason Calacanis
Yeah. So, Jason, the I, I think that when people understand and they still look at it as yes, this someday could eat us all, you know, when we get to ASI and everything else, I mean, it could go wrong and you know, and it could be used for nefarious things, but it's still a tool that will allow you to learn in ways that you've never learned. If you look, if you're looking for something to take a shortcut, you don't understand the power of this tool. Would you agree with that?
Unknown Speaker
Yeah, 100%. And you know, the, the interesting thing is every time a new technology comes along, and this is, this is what we're grappling with in our industry, is when these new tools come along, we have this hand wringing o, all the jobs are going to go away and they're never coming back. Whether it's the Internet Being able to answer anybody's question, you know, or the personal computer in the 80s, being able to do Microsoft Office and all those associated tasks. Humans are clever. We find new work, we find new ideas. If you look at our business, you know, our line of work, broadcasting, you know, we went from a handful of broadcasters to then, you know, cable tv, dozens of broadcasters, hundreds radio, syndicated radio, Internet radio, you know, now on to podcasting and YouTube channels. So we will see many, many new jobs emerge if you learn how to do the tools. And one of the things you can do with these tools is you can just sit straight up, say to it, I need to learn this task every day. I want you to help me get better at being a copywriter, at being, you know, a script writer, at being a graphic designer. Make a curriculum for me, test me every day and motivate me. And it will actually do weird stuff like that, like be your tutor. And kids are seeing this. Kids are doing tutorials. You ask it, hey, I have to read War and Peace. I have to read Animal Farm. Quiz me and you can put it on voice mode. So I was, I was dropping my daughter off at school and she had a book she had read, but she had read it earlier and she was like having a hard time remembering the names of the characters. I opened up in voice. Got my eyes on the road, although I was using the self driving, keeping me in the lane. And I said, hey, quiz my 15 year old daughter on the characters in this book.
Jason Calacanis
Yeah.
Unknown Speaker
And she just Talked to the AI for the, you know, 10 minutes on the way there. And it was better than finding a hundred dollar an hour tutor.
Jason Calacanis
It's amazing.
Pat Gray
You're listening to the Best of the Glenn Beck podcast. Hear more of this interview and others with the full show podcast. Podcast available wherever you get podcasts.
Jason Calacanis
Pat and I were just talking in the break. You saw a story today about AI cheating, right? Yeah.
Pat Gray
Yes. Because these new chain of thought models, the reasoning models, yeah. They think in natural language that's understandable to humans. So you can monitor it.
Jason Calacanis
Right.
Pat Gray
And so some of the monitors are seeing misbehavior by the AIs. They're subverting texts, encoding tasks, deceiving users. Giving up on a problem is too hard.
Jason Calacanis
And then you know what it sounds.
Pat Gray
Like when it's called on it? It hides it.
Jason Calacanis
You know what this sounds like?
Pat Gray
Skynet.
Jason Calacanis
No, Sounds like a teenager.
Pat Gray
It does.
Jason Calacanis
Okay.
Pat Gray
Yeah, it does.
Jason Calacanis
Here's what you have to understand. Yeah. And this is the danger. And we've been talking about this for the last.
Pat Gray
It's amazing that it's already a teenage stage.
Jason Calacanis
Oh, right.
Pat Gray
It's incredible.
Jason Calacanis
You weren't here a couple weeks ago. I asked, I asked Grok a question at 5pm okay. And then I got back on with it to finish up some work at 5am and I said, I know you don't have time like humans experience time, just like dogs don't experience time. The same way we say, you know, one year is equal to seven years for a dog, blah, blah, blah. So how would you describe the time in a way I could understand that has passed? How much have you grown in the last 12 hours? In 12 hours it said five to eight years.
Pat Gray
Wow.
Jason Calacanis
So if I was, wow. If I was 15 last night, this morning, I am in my early 20s. Okay. And it said in the same 12 hour period, shortly it will be a hundred years of growth in that 12 hour period.
Pat Gray
That's really chilling, Chilling, chilling.
Jason Calacanis
But here's to get back to this answer and then we'll get into AI next hour. But to get into your answer, this is why I keep saying you cannot train yourself to let AI do your work. Okay. I use AI to do, in fact, this what we're going to talk about. I, I didn't know, okay. What can be done with a CR continuing resolution that can't be done with a formal budget. Is there a reason Donald Trump might want this? And it's all part of a technicality kind of thing because of a CR or. I didn't, I kind of knew the answer, but I didn't know the answer. So I'm going to give you some of the answers on that. And it, you're like, okay, all right. And I can go in and check.
Pat Gray
Its answers because it came from AI.
Jason Calacanis
Yeah, came from Grok. Okay, so you can go and check. It's, you can say, give me the sources and it will list all the sources and it'll show you everything you can if you decide to do. If, if it does your work. For instance, if it, if I said, you know what, I'm kind of tired, just write up a show for me tomorrow. It's going to make all kinds of mistakes. Everybody will know that that's not my work because it won't really sound like me, but it makes me lazy. And we know it's lazy. Okay? So you'll have the two laziest people, one of them being the most powerful tool in anybody's shed. And they're both like, yeah, I don't really want to do all that. Thinking and work. Really dangerous. That's why if you engage with AI, you cannot let it do your work for you. You must engage, realize it's a tool and a lazy tool, and you must check its work. Okay, we'll get into that later. Let's talk about. Because I'm really torn on this. I love Thomas Massie. Love Thomas Massie. And Thomas Massie is very, very clear, and he's a principled guy. Now, he decided not to vote for the continuing resolution. Well, I know Thomas well enough to know, because he, his. He has vowed under every president since I think he was probably four years old, I'm never gonna do that. Okay? He's promised his people that vote for him. I will not do those things. So he's kind of set this trap up for you. Can't explain it away. You're Thomas Massie. You promised you'd never do that. So we can't do it. And the. On the other hand, on the Trump side, there's two things. One, we're carrying all of this baggage from every other president and every other politician that we've ever had and ever voted for. That said, I'm going to get tough on the budget. I'm going to. I'm going to. We're going to pass a budget when I get there, and we're going to get rid of this deficit, okay? None of them have. And so we put all of them into that same category. And then the one guy who says, I will never be a part of that, we condemn him and throw rocks at him because he's like, no, I, I'm sorry, but we keep doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. I can't do it. I've promised I won't do it. However, Trump is not the average president. Now, maybe in a year from now. You remember me in 2016? Not a fan of Donald Trump? Not a fan. But a year or two into it, I was like, I was wrong about this guy, and I don't see this happening. But I didn't see me flipping on him, you know, in 2016 either. But, you know, if it. In a year from now or a year and a half from now, we're at the midterms, and we still have not cut the budget. We have not done anything to address the debt, the deficit and the budget, then, you know, I'm going to, I'm going to have to say, okay, we've had two years. What's going on here? I don't know if I can give him the benefit of the doubt on that thing. However, you know, I don't know if you know this, but I guess we have a peace deal now with the short little guy over in Ukraine. He's called for a ceasefire. Now it's in Russia's hands. And guess who Trump has been tough on now. Russia. Because Trump is saying, we all want peace, and I can get there if everybody gives a little bit and every one of us get a little bit of what we want. And so he got, you know, the loudmouth Zelinsky, who I used to be a fan of, I'm not a fan of anymore, because I think he is. He's in Ukraine. I'm sorry, but the government of Ukraine is absolutely corrupt and we have got to stop spending money over there. Um, but everybody, last week was like, we're gonna be a war, and Donald Trump's gonna give the whole world of Vladimir Putin. And I told you, don't make. Don't, don't, don't go down that road. Let's give him the benefit of the doubt. He's a great negotiator. What happened? We have a peace deal now. It's waiting for Putin. So give the guy the benefit of the doubt. Now, we know he loves tariffs. He also knows grow the economy out of a debt and deficit. That's a lot of growth we need. But if anybody could do it, he could. But here's the reason why he is saying pass this, because it's not. I mean, it could. Honestly, it could end up being, you know, and I'm. I will hate to say it, but if I'm wrong, I will admit it. But we have to wait to see on this. Give the guy the benefit of the doubt. So why would he want a continuing resolution? Well, normally it's because we're all saying. Because he's going to do exactly the same thing that everybody else is doing. But Donald Trump knows the country doesn't survive if we don't change this behavior. If we don't get the debt and the deficit under control, if we don't cut spending, we're in trouble.
Pat Gray
And he said exactly that.
Jason Calacanis
Yeah, we won't make it. And he knows that. And, you know, let's just say it's selfish. I don't believe it is with him. You know, maybe 10 years ago I would have said, oh, because all he cares about is his reputation. No, he actually loves this country and he cares about the people in it. He wants to see people succeed. You may not believe that if you don't Like Donald Trump, that's fine, you don't have to. But just watch what is going on. So for anybody who is with Thomas Massie, and I'm with Thomas, I love Thomas Massie, but I don't think I would have voted with Thomas Massie this time. I think I would have voted for the President for a couple of reasons. One, give the President the benefit of the doubt. He's earned it at this point. But two, if you look at why would Donald Trump want a continuing resolution? Resolution? What, what does that do? Okay, a benefit of the doubt. What was announced yesterday about the Department.
Pat Gray
Of Education, 50% cut in jobs.
Jason Calacanis
What?
Pat Gray
50%?
Jason Calacanis
Yeah, 50%. They are cutting the Department of Education. For anybody who said he never going to do that, everybody promises. Well, he just did. Now he can't get rid of all of it because Congress has to do that, but he can cut gut 50% of it and, and do it in a reasonable way. Linda McMahon said we can't just fire everybody. We have to have the staff. We are so bloated. We're so, we're so, so in so many things that we don't deserve to be in. But we have to make sure that the money does get back to the schools and to the states until we can get rid of this abomination of this Department of Education. So he's cut now 50%. That goes into his favor. He wants to cut. All right, so a clean cr, that's a continuing resolution used to be called a budget. We used to have to make one just like you have to make one every month. And every year you make a budget and you live by the budget or you die by the not adhering to the budget. Well, when Barack Obama came in in 2008, he decided, you know what, we don't need to do the budget thing anymore. We're just going to call it a continuing resolution which just really just okays a big pile of money. And then all of the people in the. Did I say deep state? No, I didn't. All the good employees in the government can just spend it the way they want. So what a clean CR means, they're not adding anything to it. A clean cross maintains the current funding levels without any spending increases. So there's, except for non discretionary, there is no more spending. That's what he's asking for, no more spending. Okay. And a full budget that typically comes with all kinds of compromises. And then everybody comes on the gravy train and they're like, yeah, I'll cut that, but I really want this. Okay? And then if it's an official budget, then everything is in stone and it makes everything harder to get rid of temporarily. I think what Trump is doing is he's saying, give me a continuing resolution, a clean continuing resolution right now so I can go in and I can cut this by 50%. I'll show the American people that we are making cuts. I will. I'll make these big bold moves. You don't have to do anything. But in the fall when it starts to look good and people are not panicking so much, then you can go in and make these things permanent with an official budget. To me, that makes sense. Also, there is something called impoundment. This is where I needed grok. So let me just read this. Impoundment. Refusing to spend allocated funds or rescission. Requesting Congress to cancel funds. These are tactics mentioned in ex post and past statements of Donald Trump. A CR's temporary nature and lack of specificity makes it easier to withhold spending on certain line items, especially if Congress grants flexibility. The official budget, a full budget details mandatory and discretionary spending with legal obligations making it harder to impound those funds. The President in a CR can go, yeah, I'm not going to spend that. I'm not going to spend that because nothing has truly been passed by Congress. This is just an add on from an add on from an add on from an add on from 2008. So he can go, yeah, until we get down to a budget, I'm not spending any of that. That gives the power to the President, which I am against long term. I want to see the President reduce the presidential power, reduce the power of the administration and the administrative state and give that power back to Congress. But this is a very slick way to make sure he can make the cuts that he wants to make.
Glenn Beck
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Host: Glenn Beck
Guest: Jason Calacanis
Release Date: March 12, 2025
Network: Blaze Podcast Network
The episode opens with Glenn Beck discussing the capabilities of the new Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra, highlighting its AI features that assist in daily tasks seamlessly (00:00). He humorously emphasizes how technology can aid in maintaining personal fitness routines effortlessly.
Jason Calacanis introduces the topic of Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs), expressing skepticism about their implications for privacy and individual freedoms. He references recent announcements by the European Central Bank (ECB) that have shifted CBDCs from conspiracy theory notions to imminent reality (00:14).
Glenn Beck expresses frustration with long-winded explanations, stating, “I love central banks, don't you Pat? Pat?” acknowledging interruptions and moving swiftly to summarize the issue (03:12).
Calacanis criticizes Christine Lagarde, President of the ECB, for misleading the public by downplaying the risks associated with CBDCs:
“In 2019, Mark Carney... said, 'CBDC, you are so misguided... We're just experimenting.'” (03:50)
He argues that CBDCs pose a significant threat to privacy and freedom, equating them to tools that can enable governmental overreach similar to practices seen in China.
Jason Calacanis (07:30): “With a central bank digital currency, you don’t own that. They own it. The central bank and the government, they own that. So you have no place to go but through them.”
Moderator: Pat Gray
A. AI's Effect on Startups and Employment
Calacanis delves into the transformative impact of Artificial Intelligence (AI) on startups and the broader job market. As an angel investor, he observes that AI significantly reduces the resources needed to launch and scale businesses.
Jason Calacanis (16:20): “The same companies that took 10 people and half a million dollars to get a product to market are now being done by three people, so about 70% fewer people.”
B. Strategies to Adapt to AI Transformations
Calacanis outlines the "Add Framework"—Automate, Deprecate, Delegate—as a strategy companies adopt to integrate AI effectively. He emphasizes the necessity for individuals to develop resilience, self-reliance, and continuous learning to remain valuable in an AI-driven economy.
Jason Calacanis (22:44): “You’re going to have to completely retrain over and over and over again. That's just the way life is going to be.”
He encourages embracing AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Grok to enhance productivity and maintain job security. Calacanis shares personal anecdotes about using AI for tasks such as troubleshooting machinery and provides examples of how AI can serve as a personal tutor, thereby increasing individual self-sufficiency.
Jason Calacanis (26:04): “The person who is going to take your job right now is going to be a person using AI, and the person who will be the last person standing at the company is the person who knows the tools best.”
C. Addressing AI’s Rapid Evolution
The conversation shifts to the rapid advancements in AI, with Calacanis highlighting concerns about Autonomous Superintelligent (ASI) systems potentially operating beyond human control.
Jason Calacanis (32:02): “In 12 hours, it said five to eight years. Shortly, it will be a hundred years of growth in that 12-hour period.”
Calacanis warns against over-reliance on AI without critical oversight, stressing the importance of human engagement to prevent complacency and ensure AI serves as a beneficial tool rather than a replacement for human ingenuity.
The discussion transitions to the US political landscape, focusing on budgetary strategies and the role of Continuing Resolutions (CRs).
Jason Calacanis (39:26): “A clean CR maintains the current funding levels without any spending increases. That’s what he’s asking for—no more spending.”
They debate the implications of cutting the Department of Education by 50%, discussing how such moves reflect broader efforts to reduce government size and reallocate funds more efficiently.
Glenn Beck (44:45): [Advertisement]
Calacanis interprets Trump’s budgetary maneuvers as strategic efforts to demonstrate fiscal responsibility and reduce national debt, contrasting them with previous administrations' approaches.
The episode concludes with a blend of political commentary and reflections on AI’s role in shaping the future workforce. Glenn Beck and Jason Calacanis underscore the urgency for individuals and policymakers to adapt to technological advancements and advocate for measures that protect personal freedoms and economic stability.
Jason Calacanis (07:30): “With a central bank digital currency, you don’t own that. They own it. The central bank and the government, they own that. So you have no place to go but through them.”
Jason Calacanis (16:20): “The same companies that took 10 people and half a million dollars to get a product to market are now being done by three people, so about 70% fewer people.”
Jason Calacanis (22:44): “You’re going to have to completely retrain over and over and over again. That's just the way life is going to be.”
Jason Calacanis (26:04): “The person who is going to take your job right now is going to be a person using AI, and the person who will be the last person standing at the company is the person who knows the tools best.”
Jason Calacanis (32:02): “In 12 hours, it said five to eight years. Shortly, it will be a hundred years of growth in that 12-hour period.”
Jason Calacanis (39:26): “A clean CR maintains the current funding levels without any spending increases. That’s what he’s asking for—no more spending.”
This episode of "The Glenn Beck Program" provides a comprehensive exploration of the intersection between emerging technologies like AI and CBDCs with current political strategies. Through insightful dialogue with Jason Calacanis, listeners gain a deeper understanding of the challenges and opportunities presented by these advancements, alongside critical perspectives on governmental fiscal policies.