00;00;00;00 - 00;00;04;20 George All right. I, so, yeah, we need to talk about inseams. Right? I mean, what's the like? 00;00;04;20 - 00;00;16;10 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Is that what is what is wrong with everyone? All of you ever want everyone has been discuss it, discussed the inseams thing on blue Sky, and all of y'all are out there wearing some coochie cutters. 00;00;16;10 - 00;00;23;16 George Yes, sir. I have some gigantic thighs. They're very pale and like to see the sky. I don't know what the issue is here. I'm not. What's the problem? 00;00;23;19 - 00;00;27;13 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer No. No shorts need to be at the knee or just below it. 00;00;27;13 - 00;00;32;22 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE I wear a 29 inch inseam in my shorts. 00;00;32;24 - 00;00;51;29 Propter Malone See, we can't let George generation gap us on this. I mean, I think, you know, I critical support to these guys. Out thighs out brothers among us. But, for those of us who were a little bit older, the shorts tend to go a little bit longer, whereas I think, you know, once you're on the other side of that micro generation, the inseam just kind of starts creeping up. 00;00;52;05 - 00;01;19;01 George Listen, I grew up in a world where it was totally fine and legal to rock a nice five inch natto red crush, a PBR or a Busch Light, or whatever light beer of choice you care to enjoy on a sunny day and not worry about it. And I will be damned if you gen-xers are going to take that away from me and my people of the millennial. 00;01;19;01 - 00;01;19;29 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Generation, Gen. 00;01;19;29 - 00;01;25;02 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE Xers. I feel like I might actually be the only actual Gen Xer. 00;01;25;06 - 00;01;38;22 George Take it. Take take your long shorts and your guitar riffs and your skateboarding and whatever else you freaks are up to. We want nothing to do with it because we're having a good time over here in our slutty little shorts. 00;01;38;22 - 00;01;50;02 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE The main reason I don't wear shorts and this is a true story. The main reason that I don't wear shorts most of the time is because I have a lot of very bad Star Trek tattoos all down my right leg. 00;01;50;05 - 00;01;59;22 George Are you getting a Jadzia Dax situation on your thigh? 00;01;59;24 - 00;02;03;14 Propter Malone We are normal, man. I'm crofter, I'm George. 00;02;03;17 - 00;02;05;18 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer I'm a low tech speedrun enjoyer. 00;02;05;21 - 00;02;07;00 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE And I'm go like hell machine. 00;02;07;06 - 00;02;24;17 Propter Malone And today, since we've been throwing relentlessly horrible news at you guys for a couple of weeks, we thought we would take a little bit of a break from that and look at some of the hijinx and foibles of the Trump administration to date. 00;02;24;19 - 00;02;37;20 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE Let's talk about the clown shows and calamities of the second Trump administration. I want to start with Pete Hegseth, because peak Hegseth has been in the news a lot lately, and he's the official spokesman of breakfast. Jen. 00;02;37;24 - 00;02;57;26 George And let's be clear here, we are not opposed on this podcast to the occasional breakfast tipple. This is a long established and proud tradition across mostly the English speaking world, but also other places around the globe. And we're okay with that. But if you're the kind of person drinking gin and tonics at breakfast, we are not okay with that. 00;02;57;26 - 00;03;03;11 George You are not the kind of person that should be wandering around in society, let alone running the Pentagon. 00;03;03;14 - 00;03;17;26 Propter Malone And specifically, this is this is a reference to a story about Hex Seth, from somebody who allegedly he worked with at Fox, who claimed that he crushed three gin and tonics at a business breakfast. 00;03;17;29 - 00;03;24;25 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE What? What kind of person has three drinks at any business breakfast, much less gin and tonics. Jesus. 00;03;25;02 - 00;03;46;20 George Yeah. I'm not really an expert on business breakfast, but I do do them a couple times a year. And the idea of someone ordering alcohol at one of these events is quite shocking. The idea of some kind of pervert ponying up with a gin and tonic, as opposed to a gentleman's drink at breakfast, like an Irish coffee or straight bourbon, is just. 00;03;46;20 - 00;03;49;28 George I can't imagine sitting through that with a straight face. 00;03;49;28 - 00;04;01;11 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer I can't, I can't imagine drinking straight bourbon at breakfast. I definitely can't imagine drinking a gin and tonic at breakfast like I, I I'm nauseated just thinking about that. 00;04;01;13 - 00;04;10;05 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE Now imagine three cocktails. So you sit down to a business breakfast with someone and they had three cocktails that are gin and tonics at like 930 in the morning. 00;04;10;05 - 00;04;23;05 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Wait. I was told that cocktails that that a gin and tonic would not be a cocktail. That that rum and Cokes are not cocktails, gin and tonics are not cocktails that it has to have. Like what, three or more ingredients to qualify as a cocktail? 00;04;23;10 - 00;04;46;11 George Low taxes? Absolutely correct. Gin and tonics and rum and Cokes are both versions of the highball, which is distinct from the cocktail, where the line between highball and cocktail is actually drawn is a little bit fuzzy, depending on how anal you want to be about it. But we can say with confidence that gin and tonics are highballs. 00;04;46;13 - 00;05;00;24 Propter Malone To move for a second from the taxonomy of alcohols to the taxonomy of alcoholics, at least the urban legend about gin is that it's preferred by some because it does not show on your breath as much. So it may be that that's the reason for Texas breakfast preferences. We don't know. 00;05;00;27 - 00;05;20;13 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE So in any case, talking, less about his alcoholism and more about his incompetence. So just a rundown what's been going on with Hegseth over the last few weeks. Everybody knows about the first signal incident that happened. And Waltz's waltz, the national security advisor is probably the guy that screwed this up by adding, Goldberg to the chat. 00;05;20;19 - 00;05;41;26 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE This is one thing that Hegseth has not screwed up. He has, however, screwed up just about everything else. Over the course of the last week, almost his entire senior staff have been fired. It's a little bit unclear whether he wanted them fired or whether he was sort of forced to push them out, but that is mainly left him with his brother and his wife. 00;05;42;02 - 00;05;58;20 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE And the weirdest part of this story is how many official meetings Pete Hegseth brings his wife to. And these are like big meetings overseas. And his wife, who has no security clearance and who got denied one, just sits in with them, apparently. 00;05;58;23 - 00;06;16;01 George To be clear, this is not the couple's Facebook account where he stepped out on her and has to bring her to all the meetings because there's going to be a bunch of, sexy counterparts. This is something a little different. Wouldn't be entirely surprised if the couple's Facebook account was a thing for that particular marriage. But, you know, we're speculating on that at this point. 00;06;16;04 - 00;06;38;22 Propter Malone I think the smart money is that we're on death. Watch for Seth right now. We have had literally every weekday for the past week. We've had a new and different story drop on him sometime between 9 a.m. eastern time and 11 a.m. eastern time from a major Washington based publication. It's been, signal hijinx. It's been, it's been around a firing. 00;06;38;22 - 00;06;56;22 Propter Malone It's been, him taking a personal laptop and setting it up in a controlled info environment inside the Pentagon. Anything that you can possibly screw up in terms of kind of the compulsory reforms of being a national security professional, he has apparently screwed up in his first three months on the job. 00;06;56;25 - 00;07;10;23 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE So what you're saying is that all of these stories drop right around gin and tonic. Time for Pete Hegseth. 00;07;10;25 - 00;07;33;17 Propter Malone I guess it's business brunches out here in DC these days. Which maybe brings us to, Kristi Noem. Who who I have chosen as my personal Trump cabinet spirit animal. She runs DHS, the Department of Homeland Security. And the major story about her in the last week, is that she managed to get her purse stolen at Capitol Burger. 00;07;33;20 - 00;07;53;26 Propter Malone Capital burger swings, a decent burger in DC. It's it's overpriced and kind of, I think basic is a fair description of it. But, she was apparently there with her family for Easter, when a a masked man. I assume that's an N95 or similar. Stole her purse by stealth. Her purse had some, had some interesting things in it. 00;07;53;26 - 00;07;54;19 Propter Malone Some things we maybe. 00;07;54;21 - 00;08;05;03 George Since when do Assassins Creed levels get set in Capitol Burger in DC? I mean, at least do it in the National Cathedral or Congress or something like that. 00;08;05;06 - 00;08;26;02 Propter Malone Yeah, we got all of this great architecture. She had $3,000 in cash on her. I don't carry three grand in cash when I go out to brunch. Maybe I maybe I need to be living bigger. I don't know, she also had her passport and her official ID, her checkbook. She has a grandmother, so I guess that tracks. 00;08;26;07 - 00;08;29;27 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Wait, wait, wait, how old is she? She can't be that old. 00;08;30;00 - 00;08;32;08 Propter Malone Kristi Noem is 53 years old. 00;08;32;15 - 00;08;33;17 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer And she's a grandmother. 00;08;33;17 - 00;08;39;22 Propter Malone Already. She's a grandmother. They do things differently, apparently out there and, out there in the Dakotas. All right. Faster. Anyway. 00;08;39;24 - 00;08;56;20 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer If you're walking around with three grand in your purse like you're in DC, you are taking bribes, dealing drugs, or you are 5000 years old. And remember the Great Depression and and keep stuff in your mattress or something. 00;08;56;20 - 00;09;08;25 George There are very few times in my life I have ever had more than $1,000 cash on my person, and it certainly wasn't at a low key burger spot that is overpriced, but sling's a decent burger. 00;09;08;29 - 00;09;21;14 Propter Malone I believe somebody put together the math on this, and, the burgers run about 20 bucks. At Capital Burger. So for your $3,000 cash, we're we're getting what? We're getting 150 burgers worth. 00;09;21;20 - 00;09;27;08 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer So that's what, like half a Five Guys burger. So it seems like a pretty good deal for y'all up there. 00;09;27;10 - 00;09;51;23 Propter Malone I just go for the peanuts, man. Doug Burger, who's running interior, his scandal was a couple weeks ago, but I. I enjoyed it so much. I want to bring it back. Anyway, the, he apparently is having political appointees to interior, bake him cookies and is screaming at them if the cookies are not up to his satisfaction. 00;09;51;25 - 00;09;54;04 George I mean, extremely relatable stuff, right? 00;09;54;06 - 00;10;07;28 Propter Malone I mean, I mean, in his defense, if you ever put me in a position where I have people who I think I have the right to ask to make me cookies, and they're not producing cookies that meet my exacting qualifications, I'm definitely going to let them know. 00;10;08;00 - 00;10;21;23 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer I'm now imagining an office environment that has dug, Bug Man, whatever his name is. Doug, Doug Burgum and, Matt Iglesias with his is, dishwashing issue at Vox. 00;10;21;25 - 00;10;24;03 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE What is it? The water in Washington, DC. 00;10;24;03 - 00;10;37;04 George Man, it is a swamp, after all. Like a literal swamp, what with the malaria and and so forth. Used to be a hazard posting, for crying out loud. Like in the 19th century, if you got sent to DC, it was literally a hazard posting. 00;10;37;08 - 00;10;52;09 Propter Malone Doug Burgum was supposed to be one of the more serious members of this administration. That's kind of where the bar is at. There's just not a whole lot of quality hires that Trump made this time around. 00;10;52;11 - 00;11;12;25 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE To be fair, you know, cookies is kind of quaint as compared to the scandals that are originating from all of the different other agencies. So there was a bunch of news about Kash Patel this week who is somehow not been the most malicious member of the administration, which is nuts, because he's the one who I thought was going to be the worst. 00;11;12;27 - 00;11;21;01 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE Now we're still and I'm going to point this out. We're still under 100 days, so he's got plenty of time to screw up. 00;11;21;04 - 00;11;31;10 George The man directed the arrest of a state court judge for exercising discretion in her courtroom this week, and he's still not the most malicious member of the Trump administration. I mean, that's that's astounding. 00;11;31;16 - 00;11;44;06 Propter Malone Kash Patel, I think, is one of the places where I really wish we had video to go with audio. Because, this is this isn't my line, but every picture I've ever seen of cash Patel looks like he has just had his testicles bitten by a snapping turtle. 00;11;44;09 - 00;11;54;16 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer His eyes also do not line up like they're. They're what? One is down by by on his cheek and one is up on his forehead. It's bizarre. And, yeah, he's. 00;11;54;16 - 00;12;01;03 George Just doing the Green Line dominance thing there that that's that's that's just you're falling. You're falling to his his tactics. 00;12;01;06 - 00;12;22;12 Propter Malone Anyway, Kash Patel was mostly living in Vegas these days while simultaneously directing the FBI. There's no particular reason that you should have already gone deep on the cash, Patel or I have, because I, I guess, enjoy chronicling the ruin. The man is a former public defender, who later got into, merchandizing and writing children's books. 00;12;22;14 - 00;12;43;10 Propter Malone And it was primarily, I think, the merchandizing process that brought him into touch with Trump, for whom he moved some boxes around, most famously, to from the archives to Mar A Lago, that were then the subject of an FBI investigation. The bar for him was very low for running the FBI. And in some ways, I think we're better off that he's mostly, soaking up seats in luxury boxes. 00;12;43;13 - 00;12;57;18 Propter Malone Then actually running the agency, but it's still kind of crazy that we've gone, you know, from the very serious man of the FBI to Kash Patel. 00;12;57;21 - 00;13;07;05 George Let it be known that we are a staunchly pro public defender podcast. And it's very unfortunate that such a sainted group of people, in aggregate, have been besmirched by this one particular reprobate. 00;13;07;11 - 00;13;15;28 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer On the flip side, since cash. And by the way, I love that Kash writes his name with a dollar sign. 00;13;15;28 - 00;13;18;18 Propter Malone On, he doesn't. 00;13;18;20 - 00;13;21;28 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Know he he writes it on on his his Twitter posts and stuff. 00;13;22;04 - 00;13;25;28 Propter Malone Do you think he started doing that before Ke$ha did, or is that or is that downstream? 00;13;26;01 - 00;13;46;13 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Shepard tell now now if cash isn't there running it day to day and he's off in Vegas with his his country music girlfriend, which is that's a strange couple that that also means that, Dan Boingo or whatever his name is, is is there every day running it? 00;13;46;14 - 00;14;07;20 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE The funniest thing about the Vegas connection with Kash Patel is that it's not just like a normal apartment that he owns in Vegas. It's an apartment that he got from some timeshare fraud tycoon guy. It can't just be that he has a penthouse in Vegas. There's also a scandal attached to his actual penthouse in Vegas. 00;14;07;20 - 00;14;09;19 George As long as there's a Cybertruck parked out front. 00;14;09;22 - 00;14;11;01 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Which there is. 00;14;11;04 - 00;14;14;14 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE Yeah, yeah, he has a red Cybertruck, if I remember correctly. 00;14;14;14 - 00;14;21;12 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Yes, he does. 00;14;21;14 - 00;14;45;05 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE All right. So laziest Senator Emeritus Marco Rubio, turns out not to be the laziest member of the Trump administration, which is really unfortunate, because I think pretty much all of us expected that he would be kind of a bump on a log, which he hasn't been. He has spent a lot of time defending, kind of the the worst elements of the Trump, the second Trump administration's policy. 00;14;45;07 - 00;15;03;25 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE And also picking fights with the MAGA base at the same time. So he recently fired this guy. Pete, Pete, Marocco or Morocco? I'm not sure how to pronounce it. But he fired him in, in the doge style, which was that, as he was had left a meeting at the white House and was walking back to his office. 00;15;04;00 - 00;15;24;16 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE Marco Rubio had him fired and had all of his access terminated during the middle of his walk. The the reason for this sounds like doge and some of the MAGA people getting in Rubio's way when it comes to U.S. aid and getting in his way for wrecking state the way that he wants to wreck it. 00;15;24;19 - 00;15;51;17 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Yeah. Marco. So do we think is Marco just trying to assert himself here and show that he's a real boy and and all that? Every time I see Marco Rubio and hear him talk, I always think of like a kid on his bike delivering newspapers. And in the 1930s or something who's just like, you know, here's your paper, Mr. or Mrs. Smith, I can't believe this clown is in is is running the State Department. 00;15;51;20 - 00;16;11;04 Propter Malone Yeah. I got to say that he's he's probably the most disappointing cabinet secretary for my perspective. Because, you know, fell for it again. But I really did have higher hopes for him running state than what we've gotten out of state, which has been the trashing of USA aid and the complete subordination of state to this goal of deportations. 00;16;11;06 - 00;16;19;00 Propter Malone He's he's turned out to be, I think, one of the worst at this, you know, at this admittedly early juncture. And, you know, I expected him to be at least replacement level. 00;16;19;06 - 00;16;47;17 George Yeah, it's less that he specifically has bad ideas, which some of these other examples are not. The issue that their ideas are absolutely terrible and more just. He is a U.S. Senator who has just completely suborned himself to Trump in the most embarrassing and personally pathetic ways you can imagine. And he did not need to do that. If you are, someone like Kash Patel, your only meal ticket is supporting yourself to Trump entirely. 00;16;47;17 - 00;17;12;03 George And okay, fair enough. I get it dude. Like it's still sad, but at least it's a path to something that you wouldn't have otherwise had access to. For Rubio, you're talking about a former presidential candidate, a former, you know, up and comer in the Republican Party, someone who had a very safe Senate seat that he did not have to leave, and he's just thrown all of that away to be like, oh, yes, Daddy Trump, please love me. 00;17;12;05 - 00;17;17;01 George And I don't get it. I just don't get it. 00;17;17;03 - 00;17;39;27 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE The only upside to this is that all of the video footage and every photo you see of Rubio, he looks absolutely miserable. So in the weird televised appearances that they're doing in the Oval Office now, where Trump sits in the chair at the end, and then he has all of his goons lined up on the couch. Rubio looks absolutely miserable every time you see him on that couch. 00;17;39;29 - 00;17;46;28 George JD Vance does not look miserable, but because there is a couch in the room, so he's he's quite happy. 00;17;47;01 - 00;18;13;29 Propter Malone I think kind of the through line between particularly Hegseth and Rubio's firing of Pete. I'm going to go with Morocco, but I have no more confidence in that, than anybody else did. Is that there's a lot of internal conflicts within all of these cabinet offices, every, every major department in, in the federal government, right now has scheming and has backstabbing and has internal office politics from hell. 00;18;14;01 - 00;18;24;09 Propter Malone And, to some extent, the fact that this is all happening so fast means that that's kind of not playing out for. 00;18;24;11 - 00;18;32;25 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE Us. So speaking about scheming and backstabbing, what's going on with all the econ guys in the Trump administration? 00;18;32;27 - 00;18;54;14 George Oh, the econ boys, we love us some econ boys. So the crack economics team of the Trump administration are Peter Navarro, who is the special adviser to the president on, manufacturing and trade. And his whole deal is is it morning tariffs. Is it midday tariffs. Is the sun out. Tariffs. Is it cloudy. Tariffs raining. Tariffs feeling up. 00;18;54;14 - 00;18;56;27 George Tariffs feeling down. Tariffs. 00;18;56;29 - 00;19;03;26 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Now that's not fair. He does periodically make some room for just straightforward Chinese anti-Chinese racism. 00;19;03;28 - 00;19;26;24 George That's true via tariffs Howard let Nick is sort of the second guy. He's the commerce secretary I think of him as the dollar store version of Lloyd Blankfein, former CEO of Goldman Sachs. This is true both in terms of appearance and overall vibes. He used to run a Wall Street brokerage that is much less impressive or relevant than Goldman Sachs, and he acts like he has something to prove in this respect. 00;19;26;26 - 00;19;46;26 George Thirdly, we have Kevin Hassett, who runs the, who's the chair of the Council of Economic Advisers and the world's worst market timer. He wrote the Dow for Dow 36,000 book, which at that time I think was like a doubling or tripling, right before the tech bubble popped. And, so, yeah, don't take any advice on anything to do with markets or economics from him. 00;19;46;28 - 00;20;24;14 George None of these three have been on TV recently. And you know this because the market stopped tanking every time they opened their mouth in the period from roughly April 2nd through, roughly April 9th, the stock market dropped about 100 points. So, there actually is some quantitative evidence for this, by the way. Neil Dutta of Renaissance Macro did a study where he looked at days where one of these guys talked and he looked days where our fourth cast member, Kevin Hassett or sorry, our fourth econ boy, cast member, Scott Bisson, talked and and on days when Basak talked, the market went up. 00;20;24;14 - 00;20;47;20 George And surprise, surprise, he's the one we're hearing from all the time. The fact that Basant has been able to or bezzant. I'm sorry I'm bad with pronunciation. The fact that he's been able to take a break from demanding the rest of the world stop selling our bonds at every opportunity is, pretty impressive, because he has been doing that on hands and knees. 00;20;47;23 - 00;21;08;01 George These four have managed to avoid some of the scandals that we've seen from the likes of Noam Patel, especially Hegseth, because I don't think at this point there's good evidence any of them are drunk, despite some of the crazy stuff they've been saying. And, that that's great. Doesn't mean we haven't seen that yet, though. 00;21;08;03 - 00;21;12;25 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer I might feel better about the others if they were trying to be clear. 00;21;12;27 - 00;21;46;25 George Yes, yes it is. It is a grim bunch. And it it goes beyond simply having bad economic ideas, which is, I think, definitely true of Navarro being a flunky, which is definitely true of Hassett, being generally unimpressive or uninteresting or useless in your pursuit to power, which is true of luck, Nick, or generally not having a good time, which is very similar to Rubio when it when it comes to Bassett. 00;21;46;28 - 00;21;58;06 George These four are about as bad a group of economic communicators and executors that you could possibly come up with. And they are running, such as it exists, macroeconomic policy for this administration. 00;21;58;08 - 00;22;03;15 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer They will make you long for the days of Larry Summers running the show. 00;22;03;18 - 00;22;19;08 Propter Malone One thing, one thing that again, to return to the con to to to return to the theme of conflict within the teams in the Trump administration. These guys are not on the same side in terms of what they want to do with tariffs, which is one of the reasons why you're seeing the market bounce in different directions when different of them speak. 00;22;19;11 - 00;22;32;18 Propter Malone And we have some fairly good reporting that. And we several of the major tariff actions recently have been a function of who managed to get face time with Trump in the absence of the countervailing faction. 00;22;32;21 - 00;23;00;19 George The story on when he he on April 2nd they announced the big reciprocal tariffs deal. On April 9th, they rolled it back. The story of the rollout is that Hassett was deployed as a foil and a sort of distraction to get Navarro off into a different part of the white House. And then Bezzant and what Nick went into the Oval Office and basically forced the president to write a true social post and literally watched over the shoulder to see that he was hitting send before before leaving the room. 00;23;00;23 - 00;23;07;06 George So everything's going great inside the gilded Court of the white House. 00;23;07;09 - 00;23;09;23 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer We love a mad king, don't we, folks? 00;23;09;25 - 00;23;31;10 Propter Malone So actual status on tariffs is that we're still in this in this kind of pause. After, why will your coyote runs off the cliff, but maybe before he looks all the way down, when this the bulk of this much larger set of tariffs are still slated to go into effect. And what is about 60 days now? 00;23;31;12 - 00;23;50;29 George Yeah, it was a 90 day pause from I think it was April 9th specifically. So, you know, that takes you into the middle of the summer. The thing is, though, the China tariffs are still broadly in effect, they exempted a bunch of stuff like consumer electronics or not fully exempted, but much lower rates that make importing those goods more economic. 00;23;51;05 - 00;24;14;14 George But the thing is, we're already even even with that pause, because global trade runs on very long distances at relatively slow average speeds. You have a really long lag between when a decision gets made in Washington and when it actually plays out in in ports on China's coast or ports in California. 00;24;14;16 - 00;24;32;11 Propter Malone Well, it's actually physically happening here, is that these big container ships are how we transport most goods around the world, because that's the cheapest way to do so. Turns out the big boat is still the best technology in the world. Some of these are literally using sales as an add on, to help move things, more efficiently. 00;24;32;13 - 00;25;04;09 Propter Malone Like George said, these have kind of a long lever arm in terms of when you make the decision and when the impact is actually hitting, the eventual destinations and some of the shipping data that we're getting out of, out of ports now is already pretty bleak. We've got, no, international container ships at all. And the Port of Seattle, as of this week, we're not even going to get through, this, this next week, before, LA, which is the much busier port, also goes dry. 00;25;04;11 - 00;25;10;08 Propter Malone George, do you, do you have a sense of of whether that's going to have an impact on outgoing goods as well? 00;25;10;09 - 00;25;31;15 George Short answer. Yes. Long answer. We don't know how bad it'll be. So the way to think about this is a subway car coming into a station and dumping a huge number of people off during rush hour. And then if you want to take that subway car back uptown, if you're in Manhattan and you want to hop on it, you got to let all those people go off and then you get back on. 00;25;31;15 - 00;25;51;08 George There's much more, fewer people going back out. And, this up the line, you go, that's how it normally works. We usually take in a lot more goods, both on a container basis and value basis, than we send out of the West Coast ports. But at a certain point, yeah, if you have zero coming in, then anything going out gets very complicated. 00;25;51;08 - 00;26;17;17 George I think that's a lesser concern for the time being, because the ratio of available capacity is so much different. But hypothetically, that will be an issue. I think the bigger problem in the, in the sort of medium or near term, starting about a month or now, couple weeks from now, you're just not going to have containers flowing from the port of L.A., Long Beach, which is where the vast majority of Chinese goods come into the US. 00;26;17;24 - 00;26;48;17 George You're just not going to have them flowing into warehouses in Ontario, California. And the massive logistics complex out there, if you're ever flying to LAX and you see, like just as you flying east, coming in east to west, you'll just see untold miles of warehouses. And that's stuff that's come from China that is then going to go onto a truck or go onto a rail line and work its way into shopping malls, other warehouses, distributors, wherever, across the rest of the country. 00;26;48;17 - 00;27;01;15 George And eventually that flow of goods is just going to stop. There's just nothing to move, and that's going to start hitting railroads. It's going to start hitting trucking lines. It's going to start hitting warehouse jobs all over the country. And it's not going to be good when that happens. 00;27;01;22 - 00;27;09;07 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer So what you're saying is, Sean O'Brien, did right by the Teamsters, by cuddling up to our big wet president. 00;27;09;13 - 00;27;32;28 George Yeah. All time home run there, Mr. O'Brien. Well done. Really looking out for your interest, buddy. I gotta say, I don't. I am really cautious about declaring that there will be mass shortages of everything you can imagine on the shelves of stores. There are a couple reasons for this. The first reason is we're not sure what demand is going to look like, so we don't know how much stuff is getting get bought. 00;27;32;29 - 00;27;52;23 George The second reason is it doesn't look like there's a ton of inventory. It stocked up like a huge volume of inventory. Stock up. There are some and we don't know how it's how long it's going to take to burn through those, both stuff that is normally in the supply chain at wholesalers. Or, or sort of at initial warehouses that it works its way through. 00;27;52;23 - 00;28;13;17 George I mean, it could be that we have a long way to run before that inventory gets worn down. And also because we just, we just don't know what goods this is impacting the most or how it's all going to play out. The sort of the thing I've always said about this is we have an incredibly complex machine that we've just taken a huge sledgehammer to, and it's probably going to stop running. 00;28;13;17 - 00;28;38;29 George But how fast it stops running and the way it stops running is a little complicated. So I would just caution people against assuming that the store shelves will be empty in June. Because not because they won't be, but because I just this is really complex, and assuming the worst is not a good way to forecast it. That said, there will be substantial declines in the volume of goods moving through the economy. 00;28;38;29 - 00;29;17;07 George Like there's no way around that. And even if we had all tariffs go off tomorrow, total restart, everything's back to normal. There's a lot there's a lag right. There's there's at least a month to get goods flowing across the Pacific. Again. So this is not going to go away any time soon after that, that the shut off of whatever the bad policy is right now, it's 145% tariffs. 00;29;17;09 - 00;29;38;29 Propter Malone One of the things that we're anticipating, or at least that the Trump administration is hoping will happen in the long term, is that American manufacturing is going to step up, to counterbalance some of the decline in imports, that we're going to see associated with these tariffs, that that itself is a little bit at cross-purposes with the other functions that the Trump administration is putting on the tariffs. 00;29;38;29 - 00;30;08;21 Propter Malone They're saying it's going to raise a lot of money if it results in investment in American manufacturing, it's not going to raise as much money. They're saying that it's going to result in renegotiation of trade deals, which is a little bit tangential to the other two points in some ways. But one of the stories that we've seen get a little hype in the past week that I personally, at least I'm really excited about is, is the sweet trucks, which are going to be, an American made, low cost pickup truck. 00;30;08;23 - 00;30;14;23 Propter Malone That post EV credit, they're fully electric, is going to retail for about 20 grand. 00;30;14;26 - 00;30;23;14 George Welcome to normal men truck talk. It only took us four episodes for a bunch of middle aged dudes to start talking about pickups, but we did it, folks. We're here. We're doing it. 00;30;23;16 - 00;30;28;03 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer I believe this truck is a real thing at that price when I see it, though. 00;30;28;06 - 00;30;42;19 Propter Malone So the big innovation of this truck is that, they're deviating significantly from how autos in this country normally get made by making the whole thing out of plastic. It's not quite the whole thing. It's all the exterior body panels. I think it's still I think it's still a steel frame. 00;30;42;22 - 00;30;49;15 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE Aren't they also deviating from kind of the, the average truck manufacturer by including basically zero features? 00;30;49;18 - 00;30;56;21 Propter Malone Yeah. That's correct. This thing, I don't think it even comes with a radio. You've got to you've got to bring your own device, to plug into it doesn't have. 00;30;56;21 - 00;31;02;26 George A radio, doesn't have power windows, doesn't have, any of the lane keeping technology or anything like that. 00;31;02;26 - 00;31;17;21 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE As the only certified Gen Xer here, I tell you that I was prepared for this in that I had a boombox in like three different cars that I owned because three different cars didn't have stereos that worked. So I'm, I'm all set. 00;31;17;23 - 00;31;34;00 Propter Malone So. So the idea on this is that you buy the truck and then you customize it. Aftermarket. It's only coming in one color, which is kind of a shark gray. And the idea is that you're going to put vinyl wraps on it, you know, to suit your mood or whatever. And this is going to be doable easily and cheaply at home. 00;31;34;00 - 00;31;40;03 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE Sure. Gray is really a kind way of putting it. It mostly looks like primer gray. 00;31;40;05 - 00;31;53;16 Propter Malone I think this is going to be a really cool kind of homebrew scene. If they if they actually sell these at scale, these things out, like, like an art students dream for one thing. I'm sure, I'm sure the kids at read are going to get up to a lot of fun. Thanks. I'm. 00;31;53;16 - 00;32;27;18 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer I'm looking forward to it. Just because if you've if you've read car blogs and the car press at all, for the last like 20 years, the, the commenters especially, but also the writers are constantly griping that the automakers refuse to bring us, you know, smaller, stripped down automobiles. And this is your chance. Now, you can't have sat there and bitched about this for 20 years and then not buy this damn thing when it finally comes out. 00;32;27;21 - 00;32;49;27 George And it is small. I mean, it's a two door pickup and it is only a little bit longer than a two door Jeep Wrangler, which, I mean, that is not a huge car. It's roughly two thirds the length of one of the new, GM or Ford pickups, one of which I happen to drive, EV pickups. It is a very, very small vehicle. 00;32;49;27 - 00;33;08;23 George It's also not designed to go 300 miles. It's going to go on the base model. It's like 150 mile range, give or take hundred and 50 more four miles, I think is their stated number. It is not. It's designed to be around town. It's designed to be able to haul stuff with a decent sized bed. I think if I recall correctly, the truck bed is roughly the same size as the one in my full size pickup. 00;33;08;25 - 00;33;24;28 George But of course you don't have the second row seating. But the other cool thing about this is it's not just that they're going to let you accessorize them. They're going to let you turn them into an SUV with a flat pack kit that you buy. So come in a big cardboard box and you can turn it into an SUV in your driveway. 00;33;25;00 - 00;33;29;11 George It's a complete reimagining of how Americans interact with their cars. 00;33;29;18 - 00;33;47;16 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE Hopefully, they deviate from other American manufacturers in these regards, because every single other time that I've ever seen a truck that has one of those, the the the beds, the the the things you put it on the back of the bed, once you get it on, you're never going to get it off again. And if you do get it off again, you will never get it on a second time. 00;33;47;23 - 00;34;01;07 George Now, to be clear, like it's not just, oh, it's putting a truck bed cover on it. You can do that. They'll have a they'll have a mod for that. But no, it's fully you can buy the seats and everything and it's a two row SUV with, two door access. 00;34;01;07 - 00;34;20;20 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Yeah. I'm just telling you, people will. People will say, oh, I want I want those seats. I want the flat pack. I want to be able to convert it into an SUV. So I actually drive a Jeep Wrangler and the rear seat in it. It's a two door. Because those are the only real jeeps. Those four doors are minivans. 00;34;20;23 - 00;34;38;29 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer The back seat will come out of it. You can take it out. And so then you've got, you know, kind of sort of a bed on it. I did it one time. My wife agreed to help me with it. She pretty much forbade me from ever doing so again because it was such a royal pain in the ass to get the thing back in. 00;34;39;02 - 00;34;56;27 George What they're saying is the conversion time is is 2 to 3 hours. Whether that's actually accurate or not, I'm not sure who knows? This this company just came out of stealth. But I think it's interesting to talk a little bit about the economics of of vehicles. There's a reason that cars in the US have gotten so big. 00;34;57;00 - 00;35;25;27 George It's partially driven by policy. There are a bunch of different regulatory, trade policy related, factors that aren't just normal profit seeking, driving larger cars, but it's also that Americans really do like larger cars. I mean, that is that is that is a that is a totally transparent thing in the marketplace. And not only do Americans like larger cars, they are more profitable for, automakers to build. 00;35;25;27 - 00;35;48;05 George And if we think about this not just in terms of size, but all, but only in terms of capability. So hold the size constant. But look at feature sets. So for instance, higher end finishes on the interior, more doodads and infotainment systems and whatever inside. This is a normal profit seeking thing for car companies to do. 00;35;48;12 - 00;36;20;26 George Because when you add in a bunch of additional services and bundle, you get better economies of scale. It's the same thing as how, cable TV worked, right? Like instead of buying one individual channel at a time, you buy the whole package and the economics work better for everyone that way. Now, there are downsides to this. And we've seen with video streaming, over-the-top services like Disney Plus, Netflix, Hulu, you name it, go unbundle that that that cable bundle and and try and go about it a different way. 00;36;21;03 - 00;36;52;06 George But the bundling unbundling thing is, is a very it's a profit seeking sort of thing. So I don't I'm I'm not I am kind of pessimistic about how this is going to work in terms of actually being commercially successful, but it's awesome that someone's going to try. And I think having a very, very simple manufacturing process where everything that rolls off your line is the exact same every time is going to mean that the cost advantages is pretty significant, and they're actually gonna be able to deliver a pretty low cost vehicle. 00;36;52;08 - 00;37;05;19 George Whether all the aftermarket stuff that then makes it appealing to a broad set of consumers is viable is another question. But, hopefully will be, I mean, I wish, I wish these guys nothing but this, this company nothing but success. But, we'll see. 00;37;05;26 - 00;37;26;11 Propter Malone I haven't actually seen a whole lot of discussion of this, but it seems to me that if they're if they're building a good product, this has potential fleet applications as a low cost truck. For if you're doing, you know, any kind of like a municipal truck fleet, to move stuff around, parks maintenance, building maintenance, what have you commercial to. 00;37;26;11 - 00;37;47;06 George And they know they're leaning into this, so they did in their release website like 25 different builds that they say will be doable relatively cheaply through their their different aftermarket mods that they're going to sell. And you see this wide range of different commercial applications. So you see one that's like set up to be like a small moving company. 00;37;47;06 - 00;38;14;16 George You see another one that's set up to be like a I think it was a plumber. Another one that's set up to be a flower shop's vehicle, I think. And they've all got slightly different applications of all the different wraps and SUV version versus pickup version and all this different stuff that they, they're offering as aftermarket mods that hypothetically, is, is adapted with this, really simple system of anchor points. 00;38;14;16 - 00;38;15;22 George So we'll see. 00;38;15;24 - 00;38;40;08 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer I mean, one one thing that we're perhaps not seeing here. So these little trucks look like it's a little trucks they sell in, Japan to me, the little K trucks or whatever you call them. And as we all know, because we're all terminally online, there are a lot of weebs in this country, and there's a real chance they could move. 00;38;40;10 - 00;38;46;07 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer I mean, dozens of those people have jobs. And so we'll. 00;38;46;07 - 00;38;51;23 Propter Malone Tax. Can I can I ask you to define for the less brain point of our audience what what is a weeb? 00;38;51;26 - 00;38;59;18 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer A weeb is a a Japan, a file, someone who is, is, has an unhealthy obsession with Japanese culture. 00;38;59;20 - 00;39;17;25 Propter Malone So, so these these K trucks, one of the major advantages of them is that they're cheap and they tend to be old enough. I think it's that they're over 25 years old, so they get grandfathered in under under a classic car exception, for being street legal in the United States, despite the fact that if they were made today, they would not be. 00;39;17;27 - 00;39;45;17 Propter Malone The story is that these trucks are going to be better about that. All this fleet versatility potentially gives them an edge in terms of resale, assuming that they're they're well-made and they hold up. And if I may wax nostalgic for a minute, when I was growing up, my dad, for the entire time I was living at home, drove a 1972 Toyota Hilux that he purchased used in 1976, which was still running on the day he sold it in 2021 for the princely sum of $500. 00;39;45;24 - 00;39;46;22 George Hellyeah, brother. 00;39;46;22 - 00;40;11;03 Propter Malone So you can get you can get a lot of mileage. You can get a lot of mileage out of one of these two seaters. And, a lot of a lot of use, a lot of utility, about having access to a cheap truck. You can move to moves you can use to move stuff around, you know, if if you're if you're mostly using this for fleet purposes, the range is probably not that big a deal, because you're planning on recharging it on a regular basis. 00;40;11;05 - 00;40;19;28 Propter Malone We'll see whether or not these guys can actually deliver the product they claimed. But if they can, this is this is potentially going to be a cool thing that happens in this country in the next couple of years. 00;40;20;00 - 00;40;47;27 George I think the interesting thing with EVs, too, that hasn't really been explored properly is because, frankly, we just don't have enough data yet is that the drivetrains are going to hold up a heck of a lot better than internal combustion engine drivetrains. If you think about the amount of friction it takes to contain a small explosion to drive a piston up, which then spins a gearbox, I mean, it's just there's so much stuff that can go wrong. 00;40;47;29 - 00;41;01;23 George EVs, in terms of the drivetrain are so, so much easier on in terms of the number of moving parts. And on paper that should mean that you get way better longevity out of the major parts. 00;41;01;26 - 00;41;10;01 Propter Malone The greater longevity of EVs was one of the major selling points of EVs early on in the transition. But then it turned out that Tesla dominated the US market. Yeah, and. 00;41;10;03 - 00;41;26;28 George There's your issue. Tesla's longevity issues and Tesla's build quality issues aside, if you just look, you know, on paper now, it may not play out this way. I will say, like with my truck, I'm coming up on 30,000 miles with one set of tires. And I think the reason is, is because I don't ever touch the brake pedal. 00;41;27;01 - 00;41;49;07 George I never put friction on the brake pads. And the reason is because I'm region, I'm I'm using region. I'm very aggressive about taking my foot off the gas and gas. I mean, it's electric, but taking my foot off the accelerator and recapturing energy whenever I can just because I'm a nerd, right? Which is great. Okay. The point is, there's a lot less friction on the tires and a lot less friction on the brake pads. 00;41;49;07 - 00;41;58;25 George And we'll see if that actually leads to greater longevity overall for the fleet. But I do think there's a real possibility that that one of these things could drive for 30 or 40 years. 00;41;58;27 - 00;42;07;00 Propter Malone And George, to break in for just a second. For those of us who are not sufficiently brain poisoned in a different way, what what is region in this context? 00;42;07;02 - 00;42;49;02 George So the way an EV works is, while not all of them, but it works in the same way as a hybrid, typically where the default mode, again, it depends on the brand, but the default mode for most of these vehicles is when you take your foot off the accelerator. An automatic, recharging process goes on, and the generator that the motors that we're turning electricity into, torque reverse and the effective brake you without the friction braking that you see, from a traditional internal combustion engine car, traditional internal combustion engine car, you've got a, steel plate that is squeezed by, by, by abrasive, brake pads. 00;42;49;02 - 00;42;56;15 George And that friction slows the car. In this instance, there's no friction. It's it's loading electricity back into your battery. 00;42;56;17 - 00;43;04;20 Propter Malone Right. So, so so you're actually recharging the battery and increasing your increasing your range. When that happens, it makes you more efficient as well as doing the things you wanted to. 00;43;04;20 - 00;43;25;18 George Do on it, which is why EVs are so much better in urban environments where you're start stop, you know, every time you're starting and then stopping. If you're good about using region, you're recapturing the vast majority of the of the energy that it's taking to slow you down. As well as burning energy to speed you up in an internal combustion engine car, all of the energy you use to speed you up is gone. 00;43;25;18 - 00;43;47;22 George And then you don't recapture any of it because it gets burned off as waste heat from the friction of your brake pads slowing down the car. Hybrids also recapture energy in this way. So that's one of the reasons hybrids are so much more efficient is purely that they're recapturing energy that would otherwise be lost as waste heat. One other thing I'll say is, is we haven't talked about the batteries lives yet. 00;43;47;24 - 00;44;19;04 George There is decent evidence so far that in the real world these lit they're they're almost entirely lithium ion batteries. Running in EVs are holding up to way more recharge cycles and and performing in terms of longevity much better than was expected. We'll see in the long run whether that remains true. But replacing the battery pack should, on paper be relatively cheap compared to replacing the drivetrain of an internal combustion engine car. 00;44;19;07 - 00;44;42;25 George Assuming you have the right form, form factor and all software and all that. But even if you, just have to scrap the car when the, battery is, is at the end of its useful life for the auto application, it is still useful for other things. Before you go and recycle it. So, for instance, my truck's battery could, on paper, power my home for roughly three days. 00;44;42;28 - 00;45;11;03 George If it gets to the point where it's only, able to hold a charge equivalent to about half of what it does, well, that's still a really useful amount of power for emergency backup power, for instance. And it doesn't take many of these things ganged together to supply a really material amount of electricity. Maybe you aren't going to want to be using that to do, grid management services or do it every day, but is relatively cheap emergency backup power or other sorts of applications like that. 00;45;11;05 - 00;45;24;11 George There's there's a lot of potential here. So, one of the cool things about the, the rise of EVs and one of the things I've been really enthusiastic to nerd out about is some of this new stuff that just wasn't around before. 00;45;24;13 - 00;45;49;27 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer So these electric trucks, and electric vehicles, I'm optimistic about them, although I want to see now something like the Top Gear episode in which they drop the, Toyota Hilux, off of a building, that is being demolished and it's still fires up. I don't think that's going to work with the lightning or, the Cybertruck or the slate. 00;45;49;29 - 00;45;51;21 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer But it could. We got to see this. 00;45;51;25 - 00;45;54;13 George You can't drop my lightning off a building. I need to drive that. 00;45;54;14 - 00;46;00;06 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE You. You couldn't drop a Cybertruck off a curb and have it hold up. 00;46;00;09 - 00;46;20;08 Propter Malone So one of the other famous uses of the Toyota Hilux is as a technical. And for those of you who may not be aware of what a technical is, the definition is hotly disputed. But basically this is this is something where various warlords around the world, mount a machine gun on the back of a truck and have a mobile firing platform. 00;46;20;10 - 00;46;35;22 Propter Malone For their war already. The Toyota Hilux specifically is famous for this, and I imagine there'll be some application for a highly modifiable, slate, in that same in that same market. 00;46;35;24 - 00;46;50;16 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer The official truck of ISIS. So much so that, I believe, didn't the Pentagon actually have to sit Toyota down at one point and go, how do these how do your pickup trucks and Land Cruisers keep winding up in Syria and Iraq? 00;46;50;16 - 00;46;52;03 George Yes, that actually happened. 00;46;52;05 - 00;47;11;03 Propter Malone We touched on this a little bit earlier when we were talking about tariffs and shipping. But one of the cool things that is sort of an underpinning of the modern world is very, very heavy standardization. Across parts and systems. So like shipping containers are the things that you're loading onto these gigantic container ships. Those are super standardized. 00;47;11;05 - 00;47;31;21 Propter Malone The shipping, shipping containers, every shipping container in the world essentially is the same dimensions. So that means that if you're shipping the shipping containers, you only have to worry about the certain set of dimensions when you're designing your gigantic boat. That is going to sail around the world, thousands of times what George said earlier about batteries. 00;47;31;21 - 00;47;51;29 Propter Malone If you have something that emerges as a real market leader in terms of in terms of battery form factor, that's potentially a game changer for these kinds of plug and play applications. Because you get economies of scale on those batteries and you get economies of scale on whatever the future standard is for those batteries. And that's something that we may see more of a movement of. 00;47;52;02 - 00;48;13;01 Propter Malone We may see more of a movement towards, in the auto industry in the future. I think there's already been some amount of consolidation in China in particular, where the manufacturers are converging on certain battery standards and they're getting a lot of mileage, so to speak, out of that standardization. But these kind of interoperable standards are a huge deal for everybody who's working in the space. 00;48;13;03 - 00;48;40;10 Propter Malone We're all recording this on probably, USB c mics, that, you know, that's that's a standard technology that enables all kinds of other things, that can run off that same interface. It's not necessarily the best possible interface for any one of these things, but the fact that it but the fact that it works for everything means that it's much, much better than something that's narrower and better for that one thing. 00;48;40;14 - 00;48;45;14 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer According to the EU, it is the only interface and it is the only interface you will ever need. 00;48;45;16 - 00;49;00;07 George And that's why we're all moving to Europe. 00;49;00;09 - 00;49;06;04 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE Speaking of Europe, let's talk about their favorite sport, the NFL. 00;49;06;07 - 00;49;29;07 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Oh, Don. So the past few days have been made up, of the NFL draft. And I think, we're all or most of us are football guys. George is a former tight end at, Duke. I am a lifelong Florida State fan. Prompter. I believe you're, you're a Hawks fan. 00;49;29;10 - 00;49;32;20 Propter Malone Seahawks and and wazoo and wazoo. 00;49;32;20 - 00;49;56;19 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer That's right, that's right. And so I don't really watch the draft. I usually tune I usually pull up the ESPN site and I'm like, all right, who who did the Dolphins choose to ruin this year? We're we're still not going to rebuild the offensive line to keep to, out of the hospital. And it's it's it's a fun time had by all. 00;49;56;23 - 00;50;19;13 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer So I pulled up ESPN yesterday. And of course, nonstop every story appears to be about, Shadow Sanders, the quarterback of Colorado and, son of, deranged sports parent, Deion Sanders. 00;50;19;16 - 00;50;42;21 Propter Malone And for those of you who may not have a baseline, football knowledge, Deon Sanders is a, Hall of Fame quarterback, primarily, from days gone past who played for mostly, the Niners and the Cowboys and who has gone on to what is at least a very interesting coaching career, at the collegiate level. 00;50;42;24 - 00;51;12;22 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Yeah. And and he is, of course, actually, he's best known for playing at Florida State. Don't don't try to elevate the Cowboys in the Niners up to our level here. And, and as well he played for he was a dual sport athlete. He played for the Atlanta Braves for a long time as well. But anyway, so Dion was certain that his, his large adult son, Shrader, would go in in the top five, picks of the draft. 00;51;12;25 - 00;51;34;05 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer And, Schrader apparently did not have a good time at the NFL combine. And one thing that happens at the NFL combine is they sit you down, in an office room in front of a whiteboard. And if you're a quarterback especially, they're going to, you're going to meet with some coaches and scouts and they're going to draw up, plays and say, you know, how would you respond to this? 00;51;34;05 - 00;52;00;21 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer How do you read this defense? What what player you checking into? Do you guys run stuff where you have to make those sorts of choices? And Shrader apparently cannot do that. Which is a bit of an issue in the NFL and was apparently very nonchalant about the whole thing. And so he fell from a top five pick, as Dion advocated to a fifth round pick. 00;52;00;23 - 00;52;24;09 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer So somewhere in the, how many, how many picks is, like the hundred and 50 range? Maybe a little higher. So I am thoroughly enjoying this, because when Dion was Dion is currently the coach of, the Colorado, NIMBYs or whatever they're called. 00;52;24;12 - 00;52;25;12 George Buffaloes. 00;52;25;14 - 00;52;53;04 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Yes. The buffs. Prior to going to Colorado, Dion was at Jackson State, which is an HBCU, a historically black college university. Over in Mississippi during the recruitment of, a star player named Travis Hunter, who was the number one recruit in the country, Dion got together with, Barstool Sports and decided, that they were going to make a move on Travis Hunter. 00;52;53;07 - 00;53;25;08 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Now, Travis Hunter was committed to, Florida State University, which is my alma mater, and Dion's Dion and Barstool, decided they would give Travis Hunter, $10 million to come to Jackson State. And so he did. So. And Dion, raked Florida State over the coals, in the media for days afterward. And so I'm thoroughly enjoying this, and I would I have always hated Dion. 00;53;25;11 - 00;53;33;27 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Everything is always about Dion. And I would just like to know God don't like ugly Dion. So that's what you get for that. 00;53;34;00 - 00;53;55;29 Propter Malone I think the shooter Sanders story is really interesting because on on the one level, you have this story about hubris and pride and a father, I think very clearly not doing well by his son. And on the other hand, you have a lot of people who were taking a lot of a lot of pleasure, in, in the comeuppance for that hubris. 00;53;56;02 - 00;54;18;19 Propter Malone One particularly cruel thing that happened during the draft is somebody prank called Shooter Sanders on the phone line that he'd apparently purchased for purposes of the NFL draft, pretending to be a, I think I think it was, Loomis, the Saints GM, telling him that he was about to get drafted. That's kind of a crappy thing to do to a college kid. 00;54;18;21 - 00;54;52;08 Propter Malone Oh. It's terrible. Yeah. I mean, he's he's already sitting there watching, watching some of his professional dreams, disintegrate. It's really piling on to jump in. And as it later came out, it was a, it was a coach's kid who called him up, to prank him. I want to say Falcons, defensive coordinator. Our, our kid, who made the call, so, you know, like, there's going to be bad blood on that for a while. 00;54;52;08 - 00;55;19;04 Propter Malone I think from everybody involved. This is not a thing that you should do with your kids. You should not try to stage manage their career to this extent. Where you're inflicting your own, your own dreams and your own prejudices on the course they take, and maybe this was a little bit of helicopter parenting to, from from Deon, and that you got to let the kid fly at some point. 00;55;19;06 - 00;55;48;01 George Yeah. As both the other resident dad on this podcast and a former college football player, I could not agree more. I it should or I don't have a strong opinion about Deon or should or quite frankly, I am much more of a soccer sicko these days anyways. But I think it is really a comment of our on our times, both how media hype or social media hype. 00;55;48;01 - 00;56;16;11 George I mean, you know, he was live shooter. Sanders was live streaming on Twitch the entire time he was falling down the draft order, basically, and the transposition of individuals experiences into content, I think is is a really interesting story about his career and he's done this in part to himself, as well as having his father act the way he has. 00;56;16;11 - 00;56;44;18 George I think I think it's a it's a two way street there, but at the end of the day, he's he's a young person who's gotten bad advice and gotten bad leadership and is also a talented athlete to to some degree. I mean, you know, whether he was a first rounder or something like that, is that mean? Whatever. But he is certainly someone who has a shot at playing in the NFL, which instantly puts you into a very high percentile of athleticism for any human that has ever lived. 00;56;44;25 - 00;57;05;06 George So, you know, I, I just I feel for the guy being in this situation he's in, not just in terms of his father, his own decisions, but also the society he lives in where, calling that, you know, that prank is, is viewed as like something that's, that's worth doing. It's a, it's a, it's a minor act of cruelty in the scheme of all this. 00;57;05;06 - 00;57;12;09 George But it is, I think, a profound act of cruelty and something that a healthy society shouldn't celebrate. 00;57;12;11 - 00;57;48;15 Propter Malone Sanders also was eventually drafted by the Cleveland Browns, which has its own special sort of punishment. And, yeah. And, and, you know, there's a little karmic comeuppance there, too, right? Because Cleveland is in a bad quarterback situation right now, in part because they threw an absurd amount of money. Deshaun Watson, who was available for trade under unusual circumstances because he had committed kind of a lot of sexual assault at his previous stop in Houston against massage therapists. 00;57;48;18 - 00;58;14;18 Propter Malone So, Cleveland the Cleveland Browns front office decided that they wanted to take that ride and they pushed, I think it was about $300 million at, at Watson, to persuade him he had a no trade clause that he needed to waive to be traded anywhere. So a essentially, he got to pick his destination. And because they were throwing this very, very large amount of guaranteed money at him, he picked Cleveland. 00;58;14;20 - 00;58;44;02 Propter Malone And then it turned out that Watson couldn't play anymore. He'd been benched for a year and change at that point. And when he came back, he was no longer up an NFL caliber quarterback. In addition to getting hurt several times. So, you know, you've got a snake bit franchise that is drafting a kind of a a snake bit young man as the second quarterback they, they picked in this draft to to come in and maybe play franchise savior. 00;58;44;05 - 00;59;10;23 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Yeah. They've got four quarterbacks now. They've got so they they signed Joe Flacco which I don't know why you'd need anybody else after that. That's you've landed your elite quarterback. We're going places baby. They also I think they traded for Kenny Pickett from the Steelers. And then they drafted Shrader and this Gabriel something I don't know his name. 00;59;10;24 - 00;59;14;24 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer I think he played at Oregon. I'd never even heard of him. 00;59;14;26 - 00;59;39;04 George To close out. I just wanted to highlight one. Not sure Sanders directly related quote, but, remarkable quote from Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, who, oh, God has a horrible track record on this sort of thing, but said something I thought was just really interesting. Bad guy. I'm not saying this to be laudatory about Jerry Jones. I he you can do some googling. 00;59;39;04 - 01;00;01;04 George He's he's he's got a checkered history, but he was asked, about the word woke. In a press conference this week and his quote, or sorry, he wasn't asked. He was asked about the influencer culture around some of these young picks, like, sure, Sanders. And he says these guys are influencers with their work ethic and their understanding of what's the word for it today? 01;00;01;04 - 01;00;33;10 George Woke. Seriously, what is that? That's having some good instinct, that's looking ahead, that's understanding, that's caring when maybe others don't. Some woke these guys, all of them really, they've demonstrated that they've got the ability to not only feel it, but to use it to help their teams. I am really taken aback by that quote, because I think it sums up our four approach to the concept of woke, and our approach to the concept of being caring about the people in the world around us and thinking about how we can make the world better. 01;00;33;12 - 01;00;50;12 George And it is staggering to me that it came out of the mouth of Jerry Jones and given me that blank text from any source and said, who said this? I would I wouldn't have believed you if I had seen it come out of his mouth, but it did so, you know, I don't know if we gotta hand it to him. 01;00;50;12 - 01;01;12;22 George Whatever. I'm not trying to say this guy knows what he's talking about. But those words were good, and I. I'd just like to close out with with those. So y'all have a good week. We may be delayed on our next episode release next week, because I will be traveling, but we will have an episode at some point and we look forward to hearing you, or we look forward to you hearing us. 01;01;12;22 - 01;01;25;15 George Then. Also, please rate and reviews in your Pod Cap podcast app of choice when you get the chance, because it sure does help folks find us for that. For normal men, I am George. 01;01;25;18 - 01;01;27;01 Propter Malone I am prompter. 01;01;27;03 - 01;01;30;03 Lowtax Speedrun Enjoyer Okay, I am low tech speedrun dryer. 01;01;30;05 - 01;01;32;02 GOLIKEHELLMACHINE And I'm go like hell machine. 01;01;32;05 - 01;01;39;29 George Be normal y'all.