Latest / The Mark Belling Podcast / Mark Belling Podcast #162: The latest stats say the economy added lots of jobs last month but almost all are filled by non-college grads; what's up with that? Mark analyzes Fox's dumping of Maria Bartiromo for disclosing confidential information. And, tomorrow's NFL game is in Australia and only on TV on Netflix; has the league lost its way?

Transcript

Mark Belling Podcast #162: The latest stats say the economy added lots of jobs last month but almost all are filled by non-college grads; what's up with that? Mark analyzes Fox's dumping of Maria Bartiromo for disclosing confidential information. And, tomorrow's NFL game is in Australia and only on TV on Netflix; has the league lost its way? · The Mark Belling Podcast

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  Speaker 2: There's a seemingly small little story in the news that
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: I want to comment on. There was a key word
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: in that sentence, and that word was seemingly. Not a
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: small story. It just seems like it is. I'll tell
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: you what the story is, and then we'll get into
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: the analysis in a moment. Tom Tiffany, the Republican candidate
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: for governor, is declining to participate in the Wisconsin Broadcasters
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: Association debate of the candidates for governor. The two candidates,
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: Crowley and Tiffany, they're going to debate. But the WBA debate,
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: Wisconsin Broadcasters Association debate, is not going to be one
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: of the debates. That's the organization that historically has put
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  Speaker 2: on all of the major debates between the candidates in Wisconsin.
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  Speaker 2: This is a significant and important decision by Tiffany and
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  Speaker 2: the right one. I'm going to explain why and we're
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: going to dive into this in a little bit of
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: depth as we get into the program. Have you ever
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: been offered an add-on option for premium or white glove service?
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  Speaker 2: Uline provides only one type of service, the best. From
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  Speaker 2: Uline believes service is essential, not an option. Story reported
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: on JS Online. Here's the headline. Scrapped WBA debate between
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  Speaker 2: Crowley-Tiffany breaks 36-year tradition. Indeed, for the past 36 years,
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  Speaker 2: not every year because we don't have election every year,
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  Speaker 2: but for the past 36 years, the Wisconsin Broadcasters Association,
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  Speaker 2: which is exactly what it sounds like, it's an association
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  Speaker 2: of some of the radio and television stations in Wisconsin.
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  Speaker 2: It's their lobbying group, their trade association. has put on
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  Speaker 2: the debate for the candidates for governor. For those of
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  Speaker 2: you who were listeners to my old radio program, this
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  Speaker 2: may ring a faint bell. For those of you that
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: remember everything I say ever, it rings a loud bell.
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  Speaker 2: Because I've been pointing out, every time we have one
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  Speaker 2: of these debates put on by the WBA, and sometimes
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  Speaker 2: they've done United States Senate debates as well in Wisconsin,
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  Speaker 2: they are total bias jobs against the Republican candidates. It
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  Speaker 2: happens every time. Now, this is a problem in general
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  Speaker 2: with debates that the media is involved in. But with
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  Speaker 2: the WBA, it has been profound. And every time it happens...
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  Speaker 2: The Republican candidate complains after the debate, and the Republican
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: Party complains after the debate. And as you may recall,
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: every time this has happened, I won't say going back
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: as long as I've been doing this show, but for
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  Speaker 2: at least the last six to eight years, after this
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  Speaker 2: has occurred, I have loudly asked, why are Republican candidates
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: agreeing to do debates put on by the WBA? Why?
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  Speaker 2: It really is. Why does Charlie Brown keep thinking that
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: Lucy's not going to pull the football away? So far,
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  Speaker 2: there's one scheduled debate. It's going to be hosted by
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  Speaker 2: Channel 12. Now, I don't know that Channel 12 will
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  Speaker 2: be any better than the WBA. But as I said
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  Speaker 2: on X this morning, it can't be worse. The WBA
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  Speaker 2: staff is based in Madison. And as I say, it's
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  Speaker 2: an association of the broadcast state radio and TV stations
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  Speaker 2: in Wisconsin, those that choose to be members. I don't
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  Speaker 2: know if we still are, but as recently as a
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: few months ago, iHeartMedia here in Wisconsin was a member
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  Speaker 2: of the WBA. One of our past general managers was
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  Speaker 2: a big shot on the board or something. So I
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  Speaker 2: don't know if we still are, but I assume we
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  Speaker 2: still are because our company's been one of the members
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  Speaker 2: of it. Whether that's a conflict of interest or not,
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: I'll disclose it. It becomes operative in the point that
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  Speaker 2: I'm making here on this. Who they choose as panelists
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  Speaker 2: tend to be reporters from some of their member stations.
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  Speaker 2: And it's usually one or two TV reporters and maybe
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  Speaker 2: one radio reporter. They're all left-wingers. Now you could say, well,
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  Speaker 2: that's just because all members of the media are left-wingers. Except,
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: in the last couple of debates, one of the questioners
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  Speaker 2: was from public radio, which is overtly biased. They usually
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: pick somebody from one of the Madison TV stations. Well,
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  Speaker 2: what do you think you're going to get with that?
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  Speaker 2: Several years ago, I raised I knew they'd reject this idea,
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  Speaker 2: but I raised it formally. As I said, the radio
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  Speaker 2: station that I work for and the company that I
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  Speaker 2: still do the podcast for, iHeartMedia, is a member of
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  Speaker 2: the WBA, and I worked for WISN Radio in Milwaukee
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  Speaker 2: for 36 years. I offered up myself as a panelist,
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  Speaker 2: and I said, if you don't want me, we've got
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  Speaker 2: Jay Weber or Dan O'Donnell or Vicki McKenna. I didn't
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  Speaker 2: offer up Jason because you didn't work here yet. As
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: debate panelists, just put one of us on there to
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: provide balance to the lefties that you have. They wouldn't
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  Speaker 2: do it. Why? Because they only want biased leftist questioners. Now,
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  Speaker 2: if I'd be on there, I'd ask good questions of
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  Speaker 2: both sides. Way back when I was a reporter, I
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  Speaker 2: did debates. It was on panels for I don't even
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  Speaker 2: know how many of them. I could ask a good
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  Speaker 2: question of a Republican as well as a Democrat. But
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  Speaker 2: I know damn well that I would ask questions that
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  Speaker 2: that panel would not ask because they come at it
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  Speaker 2: from a leftist bias. Now, I'm hoping, and again, there
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  Speaker 2: may be more debates than the Channel 12 debate. As
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  Speaker 2: I understand it, the campaigns are still negotiating on this.
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  Speaker 2: And part of the negotiating is neither candidate has figured
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  Speaker 2: out whether or not it is to their advantage or not.
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  Speaker 2: Usually the candidate that is trailing wants to debate because
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  Speaker 2: they have the most to gain and the person that's
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  Speaker 2: in the lead has the most to lose. but nobody's
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  Speaker 2: really sure who's leading right now. The latest Marquette poll,
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  Speaker 2: the first one to come out, showed Crowley with a
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  Speaker 2: five-point lead, but the Marquette poll in recent years has
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  Speaker 2: had about a four-point bias toward the Democrats. Secondly, the
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  Speaker 2: polls in the summer always in Wisconsin favor the Democrats.
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  Speaker 2: You can go back forever on that Marquette poll. They
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  Speaker 2: tighten with the Republican gaining closer to the election. In
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  Speaker 2: addition to that, Crowley has stumbled several times coming out
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  Speaker 2: of the blocks here. Tiffany, on the other hand, has
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  Speaker 2: the drag of being a Republican in an off-year election
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  Speaker 2: that most people think nationally is going to be a
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  Speaker 2: big year for the Democrats. But my point is that
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  Speaker 2: nobody's really sure who's leading and who isn't, and therefore,
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  Speaker 2: who has the most to gain or most to lose.
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  Speaker 2: So we know that there's going to be at least
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  Speaker 2: one debate from Channel 12. There may be One or
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  Speaker 2: two in addition to that put on by other news
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  Speaker 2: organizations or other trade or somebody else. For many, many
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  Speaker 2: years at the national level, the presidential debates were put
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  Speaker 2: on by the League of Women Voters. Same thing there.
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  Speaker 2: This goes back farther. The Republicans just stopped working with them.
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  Speaker 2: Then after that, there was the Presidential Debate Commission. We
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  Speaker 2: set up a commission, supposedly bipartisan, to put on the debates.
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  Speaker 2: The Republicans stopped doing those because they were all overwhelmingly biased.
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  Speaker 2: So then they started having the debates where news organizations
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  Speaker 2: would host the debate. Those haven't been any better. Some
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  Speaker 2: have been worse than others. We've had debate moderators during
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  Speaker 2: Trump debates that just got up there and argued with
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  Speaker 2: Trump rather than asking fair questions. So this issue has
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  Speaker 2: been a problem at the national level as well here
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  Speaker 2: in Wisconsin. As I said, I think the problem with
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  Speaker 2: regard to the Wisconsin Broadcasters Association is its staff. I've
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  Speaker 2: talked forever about what happens when you have all the
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  Speaker 2: lobbying groups the political parties, and the trade associations, all
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  Speaker 2: these groups are all based in Madison. If you're based
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  Speaker 2: in Madison, your staff is going to be what? People
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  Speaker 2: from Madison. And that means you're going to have almost
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  Speaker 2: certainly almost all liberals. I think Kamala carried over eight
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  Speaker 2: not Dane County, but City of Madison, I think commonly
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  Speaker 2: got like 82% of the vote in the City of Madison.
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  Speaker 2: I might be off by a bit there, but it
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  Speaker 2: was just staggering. So even if you just get an
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  Speaker 2: average cross-section of the population, it would mean you'd have
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  Speaker 2: an 82% chance of hiring a Democrat staffer. And the
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  Speaker 2: kind of people that go to work in these organizations
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: tend to be liberal. Now, I've mentioned this story briefly once.
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: I'm going to bring it up here to provide further context.
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  Speaker 2: The Wisconsin Broadcasters Association is the overseer of the Wisconsin
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  Speaker 2: Broadcasting Hall of Fame. And there's a lot of people
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  Speaker 2: in that Hall of Fame. I mean, you can go
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  Speaker 2: to their website. There's a lot of people. There are
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  Speaker 2: people in the Hall of Fame that I'd never heard of,
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: and I've been in radio my whole life. Not just
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  Speaker 2: on-air people. There are like salespeople and station managers from
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: small towns and some guy who did a morning show
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  Speaker 2: in Clintonville or something. That's a fake example. Just all
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: over the map. A couple of years ago, I'm not
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: going to name names here, but anybody who knows the
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: corporate structure would be able to figure it out. One
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: of the executives in our company nominated me for the
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  Speaker 2: Hall of Fame. Given that, I have been the most
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  Speaker 2: successful radio personality in Wisconsin for over 30 years. I
• 12:02
  Speaker 2: had the most listened to radio station for most, radio
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  Speaker 2: program rather, AM or FM in the state of Wisconsin
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  Speaker 2: for most of the last 25 to 30 years. A
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  Speaker 2: few ratings periods, somebody else would pass me up And
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: at the time that I left, it wasn't even close.
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  Speaker 2: It was overwhelmingly dominant. And I had longevity. Obviously, I
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  Speaker 2: should be in the Hall of Fame. Now, for those
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: of you not aware of me, I don't care much
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  Speaker 2: about this recognition. I can prove that. The biggest award
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: in American radio is the Marconi Award. Way back, I
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: don't remember the year, I won the Marconi Award for
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: Best Broadcaster in the United States. they break it down
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: by market size. So I won in whatever category. I
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: don't know if we were large market or media market
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: or whatever they would call it, but I won the
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: national award, extremely prestigious. I think it was New Orleans
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  Speaker 2: where they had the thing. I didn't show up. I
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: still have somewhere. I don't know if it's on a,
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: I don't know what format I have it on, but
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: I'm probably something you can't play anymore. It might be
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: on a VCR reel or something. I still have the
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  Speaker 2: award ceremony where the guy reads my name and they're
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: looking around and nobody comes up and nobody comes up
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: and nobody comes. I guess he's not here. I don't
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: think they ever asked me if I was coming. They
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: probably just assumed, or maybe the person presenting the award
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: must have just assumed that I'd be, because most people
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: that are radio, I mean, they're just geeks for awards
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: like this and so on, so of course they're going
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: to go, it's the proudest woman of the, I didn't, just,
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: I'm sorry, I just don't give a crap about things
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: like that. Nonetheless, I think it's fairly obvious that I
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: should be in the Wisconsin Radio Hall of Fame. I'll
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: tell you who else should be. Charlie Sykes should be
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: in the Wisconsin Radio Hall of Fame. He's likelier to
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: get in now than me, since Charlie has turned Charlie's
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: been so many different ideologies throughout his life that it's
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: hard to keep track of them, but now he's a
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: lefty again. Because he's a lefty again, they may put
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: him in. Jay Weber should be in there. And again,
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  Speaker 2: if you looked at all the people that were in
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: and their credentials, this is not like the dumbbells who
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: vote for the Milwaukee Brewers Braves Walk of Fame. I'm
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: one of the voters on that. I criticize my fellow voters.
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: They never let anybody in. The omissions in that thing
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: are unbelievable because they choose to hardly put anybody in.
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: Wisconsin Broadcasting Hall of Fame is a thing. I could
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: tell you guys that I knew from La Crosse. Well,
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: I'm not going to make fun of the guy, but
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: I guess by bringing his name up. This guy, he
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: was a sales manager at a radio station in La Crosse.
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: All he was was the sales manager. He was a
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: great salesman. And the La Crosse station at the time,
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: that was when you could only own two stations in
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: a market. They just had an AM and an FM.
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: That's all they had. Well, I will name him. His
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: name was Bill Mann. That was an errand name. It
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: wasn't his real name. Sales manager. Now, there's a little
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: bit more to it. His big client was a then
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: early retailer in Wisconsin called Menards. And he voiced and
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: handled the account for For Menards, when Menards started, he
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: just stores in Eau Claire on the Cross in western Wisconsin.
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: And of course it took off, and Bill had a
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: little bit to do with the marketing of all that.
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: So I mean, probably he should be, but I mean,
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: this is where we're going with this. So what's the
• 15:43
  Speaker 2: reason I'm not in? It's obvious why I'm not in,
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: because I'm a conservative. And no matter how successful I've
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: been in radio, they're not going to put a conservative
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: in there. I've told this story, and again, For people
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: who think, oh, you're just looking for plaudits, anybody who
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: knows me knows that I just don't care about that stuff.
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: I'm far more motivated by, do I have a successful podcast?
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: Do I have a successful radio show? How much money
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: am I making? Then these goofy awards that are made.
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: People who care about awards are generally people who aren't
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: very good at their jobs. The more mediocre the field,
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: the more awards they hand out at it. Teachers, I mean, I've...
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: Is there a teacher that, I'm guessing half the teachers
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: at a public school get some sort of award in
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: a given year. And then there's this award and then
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: that award. They give a lot of awards out to nurses.
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: They're just zillions of groups that give out lots of,
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: the media in particular, journalism. I mean, you pick up
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: the JS online, we got 92 awards at this thing. Yeah,
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: I bet you did. Nobody even reads the story because
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: they hand those things out like candy. I'm bringing this
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: up to demonstrate the inherent bias in anything that is
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: an association. I am probably, not counting sports figures, one
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: of the five most prominent alumni, alumna. What is it
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: when it's singular? Is it alumni? That's singular? Alum. What's
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: an alumnus? There's another reason why I'm glad I'm not
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: on the radio right now, because everybody would be calling
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: up and offering the answers that they had, and I
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: actually don't care. Of the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, do
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: you know how many awards that university has given me
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: since I left that university? None. None. Every year they
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: hand out five or seven awards that distinguish the alumni,
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: and never. By the way, I've been nominated every year
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: by other alumni. They contact me. I give them the
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: requisite information. Then it goes to some committee. Oh, he's
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: that right-wing talk show host. He was on Rush Limbaugh.
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: I'm sure he's a racist. He supports Trump. And of course, no.
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: So when you have an organization like that that is
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: so biased, that their bias even extends into their Hall
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: of Fame. And as I say, Jay Weber's now retired
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: from radio. He does a podcast. So if you say, well,
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: you're still active in it. I'm not active in radio anymore.
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: I'm retired from radio. I'm now a podcaster. It's a
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: separate thing. The Broadcast Association and the podcasters are a
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: separate thing. And they put in all sorts of people.
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: For instance, Matt LaPay, the Badgers broadcaster. He's in. He's
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: still working. Matt LaPay should be in. But I think
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: most people would argue that I've had a more successful
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: radio career than Matt LaPay. He's a play-by-play guy, and
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: he's been a play-by-play guy for the same team for many,
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: many years. He deserves to be in the Hall of
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: Fame for that. Clearly, the criteria isn't audience generation, or
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: for that matter, being groundbreaking in terms of the importance
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: of the program. All right, now getting back to the point.
• 19:17
  Speaker 2: So that's the group that's been putting on this debate
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: forever and ever and ever. If they can't even be
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: fair with regard to a Hall of Fame, how are
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: they going to be fair with regard to putting on
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: a debate? So Tiffany's doing the right thing and not
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: getting involved in this. It's too early to make a
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: final determination on this, but so far, it seems to
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: me that Tiffany's campaign is avoiding many of the mistakes
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: that that past Republican campaigns have made. However, all the
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: big decisions are the ones still to come. The points
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: of attack and how do you respond to the attacks
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: that come from the other side. I want to analyze
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: now a national media story. The Maria Bartiromo story. Maria Bartiromo,
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: who became famous as the longtime stock market reporter for CNBC,
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: a number of years ago moved to Fox. And she's
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: had shows on Fox Business and on Fox News Channel.
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: She's an opinionated conservative. And for a time was quite
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: the superstar in that field of reporting generally on businesses.
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: It has been misreported that she's been fired. She's been
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: the same thing they did to Tucker Carlson. She's not
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: been fired. She's been taken off the air. It may
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: be a distinction, but there is a difference. Fired means
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: they're not going to pay you anymore. Being taken off
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: the air is she's still under contract, which, and the
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: reason that they do that is if she's still under contract,
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: it can stop the person from going out and getting
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: other employment. Tucker was able to challenge that by not
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: going on cable, but by going into a separate field,
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: he claimed, in terms of podcasting. They got rid of
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: her because they say that she violated the corporate policy
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: against disclosing confidential corporate information. And it appears to me
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: that she indeed did that. Let me quote from the
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: Washington Times. On July 16th, President Trump gave a rare
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: primetime address to the nation on communist China's vast capabilities
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: to interfere in America's elections. That's a big story by
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: any measure, the kind every major news outlet carries and
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: then chews on across its programming. Bartiromo booked me, this
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: is from the Fox, this is the Washington Times reporter,
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: Bartiromo booked me to discuss the speech the next morning.
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: Hours later, she told me Fox had clamped down on
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: any coverage and forwarded the text that had been given
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: to her producers from Suzanne Scott Enforcer. Suzanne Scott is
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: the head of human resources and talent and personnel at Fox.
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: Ralph Giordano. Fox Business News' programming chief, quote, hi, we
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: don't want to promote it or push to the speech
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: at all. We don't want to do 2020 election segments
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: at all Thursday or Friday. To maximize profits, Scott juggles
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: viewers against a cadre of Fox's biggest advertisers who despise
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: key mega issues. So Scott feeds the audience conservative red meat,
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: Democrat socialists, biological men and women sports, illegal alien rapists
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: and murderers, but keeps it inside the guardrails that wall
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: off MAGA themes such as election integrity, big pharma, and
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: benefits of the Trump tariffs. Tucker Carlson had the highest-rated
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: Fox News show. Lou Dobbs had the highest-rated show on
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: Fox Business. Both spoke freely to the MAGA base. Both
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: drew advertiser fire. Both were fired. Now that's the spin
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: on this from the Washington Times. Apparently, and the Washington
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: Times story I think is essentially the truth. Bartiromo wanted
• 23:38
  Speaker 2: to give coverage to President Trump's speech on election integrity.
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: They chose to not let her do a segment on
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: this on her show. She shared that information with the
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: Trump administration. Apparently, she shared a screenshot of the email
• 23:59
  Speaker 2: that was sent to her by her boss at Fox Business. Now,
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: I could tell you here at iHeartMedia, we have a
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: code of conduct that we all have to go through
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: and go through training. And one of the things they
• 24:14
  Speaker 2: make very clear is if you disclose confidential information about
• 24:18
  Speaker 2: the company, you can be disciplined up to and including termination.
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: So I'm under the same rules that probably she is,
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: and I'm guessing almost every major business in the United
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: States has the same rule in place, that if there's
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: confidential information within the business, you can't tell anybody about it.
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: And they enforce the rule, these companies enforce the rules
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: when they choose to enforce the rules. So Fox is
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: giving internal guidance to its hosts and employees. Look, we're
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: not going to play up the Trump speech. By the way,
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: Fox did carry the speech, but didn't want to play
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: it up by doing a bunch of interviews with regard
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: to it and talking about the issue and so on.
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: Fox has the prerogative to tell their hosts that they
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: can't talk about that stuff. In this case, Maria Bartiromo
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: shared this with the Trump administration. President Trump, it is known,
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: was very upset. that the major networks did not cover
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: this speech because, as you know, election integrity is a
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: big deal for him, not only the 2020 election, but
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: he's trying to pass the legislation that's not going to
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: pass to the Congress requiring photo ID for voting, proof
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: of citizenship for voting, and so on. And he wanted
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: to highlight the problems with regard to election integrity and
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: the strong evidence, and it is strong, that China did
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: interfere in the 2020 election. But Fox has a right.
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: to say, no, we don't want to cover this issue.
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: It's their network. And they also have a right to
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: have a policy that says, our employees like you, Maria,
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: can't share confidential information with other people. Now, here's where
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: my butt comes in. Fox is, in addition to a business,
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: a news organization. The reporters for Fox all the time
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: try to get confidential information from others. Their business reporters
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: are always trying to get confidential information from other businesses
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: if it's newsworthy. If they get some word that Apple's
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: got some new product in the pipeline that Apple's trying
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: to keep hush-hush, of course they'll report that. And it's
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: their job to try to ferret out confidential information. Now
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: in this instance, Maria Bartiromo is one of the Fox
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: employees that had a pipeline into the White House. That's
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: something that's positive for somebody who is either a reporter
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: or as she is a commentator. One of the ways
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: that you get information from them is you might share
• 26:53
  Speaker 2: information with the other side. So there is a give
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: and take here. My guess is that Maria over the
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: years has put out a lot of information that was
• 27:02
  Speaker 2: confidentially given to her by the Trump administration. In this case,
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: she gave something back. I think Fox is within its prerogative.
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: to take her off the air. And I'm not going
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: to say hypocrisy, but as I say, news organizations that
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: demand that their employees treat confidential information confidentially are always
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: encouraging them to get everybody else's confidential information and put
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: it on the air. As of the time I'm doing
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: this podcast, there's still not a lot of information on
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: this Milwaukee police shooting that occurred late in the afternoon Tuesday.
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: What we know is Milwaukee police were pursuing two suspects
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: over an incident. There were apparently warrants out or there
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: were suspects at an incident and there was a pursuit
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: on this and there was an exchange of gunfire. A
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: Milwaukee police officer was struck and That officer apparently also
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: struck one of the suspects. The suspect died. Hopefully, there
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: will be good camera footage of this. Hopefully, there's body
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: cam video and maybe dash cam video from the squad cars. Hopefully,
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: there may be other cameras that are out there. I
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: bring this up, though, in the context of the controversy
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: over the flock cameras, which all sorts of people are
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: objecting to because they've been abused. The flip side of
• 28:43
  Speaker 2: that is one of the advantages of these camera systems
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: is we have cameras almost on every block in the
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: city of Milwaukee and in many communities, and they come
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: in really handy in situations like this so we can
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: find out exactly what went on and so that the
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: public can see, for better or for worse, this incident.
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: Another story for you. This one's quite revealing. See, one
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: of the problems of doing a pun is when nobody
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: knows what the pun is yet, you probably should do
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: the pun after you've shared the story. I'm just amused
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: at my own cleverness. The story deals with a guy
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: from Brookfield. His name is Matthew Burnside. He's 17. 17.
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: Because he's 17, he is treated as an adult in
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: the criminal justice system in Wisconsin. He's been arrested and
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: charged in connection with several flashing incidents. Some of them
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: happened in Milwaukee County and some happened in Waukesha County,
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: so he's charged in both counties. Let me quote from
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: the report on GM Today, Waukesha Freeman. According to the
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: complaints against him, Burnside was reported to authorities on Saturday.
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: This would be a week ago Saturday. after a woman
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: who had taken her niece and nephew to cool waters
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: in Greenfield Park said she saw Burnside standing in front
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: of his vehicle exposing himself. She screamed at him, What
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: the bleep are you doing? There are kids here, the
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: complaint said. But Burnside responded by shaking his body at
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: her and the children. The woman got the kids back
• 30:43
  Speaker 2: into her car, drove away to call police according to
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: the complaint. The complaint said the woman got the license
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: plate number on Burnside's car, and as police went to
• 30:53
  Speaker 2: his address, an officer was notified that Burnside had been
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: taken into custody following another incident in which he was
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: alleged to have exposed himself to a woman and a
• 31:02
  Speaker 2: child in Brookfield the same day. The complaint in Milwaukee
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: County also indicated that Burnside received a citation in March
• 31:16
  Speaker 2: of 2025 from West Allis Police after he was found
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: naked in a woman's bathroom at Greenfield Park. According to
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: the complaint in the Brookfield matter, Brookfield Police received a complaint.
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: Now remember, that was the Milwaukee County matter. Now, so
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: Milwaukee County matter, there were these recent incidents, Greenfield Park
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: and a separate incident at the pick-and-save, and there was
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: the incident that he added his background to West Allis
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: in 2025. Now the situation from Waukesha court. According to
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: the complaint in the Brookfield matter, Brookfield police received a
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: complaint of a man who had exposed himself outside a
• 31:52
  Speaker 2: pick-and-save store at 15170 West Greenfield Avenue. I should mention
• 32:01
  Speaker 2: that Greenfield Avenue, the north side of the street is
• 32:04
  Speaker 2: in Brookfield and the south side of the street is
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: in New Berlin. So this must be on the north
• 32:07
  Speaker 2: side of the street. So it's Brookfield's case. If the
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: store was on the other side of the street, New
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: Berlin would have to be dealing with the flasher, but
• 32:15
  Speaker 2: this is on the north side of the street. Shortly
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: after 11 a.m. on Saturday, an officer was informed a
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: man driving a white Chevy Cruze had exposed himself to
• 32:25
  Speaker 2: a woman and a nine-year-old child in the parking lot
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: of the store and touched himself in a sexual way.
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: The woman told police she and her daughter observed a
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: man outside a car with his pants around the bottom
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: of his legs when he looked at her and yelled, Hey!
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: While pleasuring himself, the complaint said. Burnside told police, so
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: apparently he's not somebody who took advantage of his right
• 32:48
  Speaker 2: to remain silent. Burnside told police he did not expose
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: himself to a child and said a dashboard camera in
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: his car would prove he did not, the complaint said.
• 32:57
  Speaker 2: He stated he works at the pick and save but
• 32:59
  Speaker 2: left work early and was in the parking lot because
• 33:02
  Speaker 2: he did not want to go home to his parents
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: because he didn't want them to know he wasn't at work.
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: So in the final incident, the Waukesha County incident, which
• 33:11
  Speaker 2: is in Brookfield at the pick and save, he says
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: he works, I'm guessing that's true, that he works at
• 33:17
  Speaker 2: the pick and save, but he apparently walked off the
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: job early and instead he denies this, but the police
• 33:22
  Speaker 2: say that he pulled down his pants and he was
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: flashing a woman and a child there after doing the
• 33:27
  Speaker 2: same thing later in the day at a park, at
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: Greenfield Park in Milwaukee County. So you've got the two
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: separate incidents. Here's why I'm bringing this up. In the
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: Milwaukee County incident, Burnside is charged with a felony of
• 33:55
  Speaker 2: exposing genitals, public area, and intimate parts to a child,
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: and a misdemeanor count of lewd and lascivious behavior exposure.
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: In Waukesha County, the charges are virtually identical. Felony, exposing
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: genitals of public area, intimate parts to a child, misdemeanor, lewd,
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: and lascivious behavior exposure. In other words, the exact same
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: charges as the Milwaukee County incident, they add in in
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: Waukesha County disorderly conduct. So the charges the guy is
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: facing are virtually identical in the two counties. The way
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: that the case was handled in terms of bail, however,
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: was different. Many of you are assuming that the bail
• 34:58
  Speaker 2: in Waukesha County was tougher than in Milwaukee County. If
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: you are assuming that, you'd be wrong. It is certainly
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: generally true. the court systems are tougher in Waukesha County
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: than Milwaukee County. However, as I've pointed out forever, that
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: is not necessarily the case in bail. In the Milwaukee
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: County case, the court commissioner, Catherine Kuharski, set cash bail
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: at $ 1, 000. However, in the Waukesha County case, The court commissioner,
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: the infamous Christopher Bailey, released him on a signature bond.
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: A signature bond means you don't have to put up
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: any cash, you just sign your name. First of all,
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: this is a case of a guy who was doing
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: this repeatedly and in multiple locations to the point that
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: he got charged in two separate counties with these incidents.
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: How dangerous is he? We don't know. We don't know.
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: In some cases, flashers are just that. They're flashers. And
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: in other cases, they're people that are on the path
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: to worse crimes than that. I should point out, however,
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: that in both counties, these were felonies. I think the
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: $ 1, 000 cash bail in Milwaukee County is somewhat soft, but
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: at least it was something. In Waukesha County, we have
• 36:38
  Speaker 2: a case of a guy accused of exposing himself to
• 36:42
  Speaker 2: a child, gets a felony for it, and gets sent
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: home on a signature bond. The judges in Waukesha County,
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: and I've made this point forever, need to crack down
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: on the lame-ass court commissioners in those counties. that don't
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: even make you put up anything when charged with a
• 37:04
  Speaker 2: serious crime. And for those, well, it's not that serious.
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: Felony.
• 37:19
  Speaker 2: Some brief comments on the aftermath of the Lindsay Clancy case.
• 37:28
  Speaker 2: I was not aware. because, and I'll admit, I didn't
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: follow this case as closely as some people followed it,
• 37:34
  Speaker 2: and it appears to me that the people who followed
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: it most closely were the ones who wanted her to
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: get off. That's kind of unique with regard to these
• 37:41
  Speaker 2: kinds of heavily covered criminal court cases. It's usual that
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: people follow it close to the ones that want the
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: person convicted. Maybe that's not true, but when I think
• 37:51
  Speaker 2: of some of the Casey Anthony and Some of the
• 37:55
  Speaker 2: other big cases that have been out that the people
• 37:57
  Speaker 2: who follow that closely generally are the ones that are
• 37:59
  Speaker 2: really into, well, they ought to be convicted. Maybe that's
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: not true. It seems to me that the people who
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: are following this case most closely were the ones that
• 38:07
  Speaker 2: wanted her to get off. I followed it, but I
• 38:14
  Speaker 2: admittedly not that closely. I was not aware. Jason, were
• 38:19
  Speaker 2: you aware prior to the verdict that the jury was
• 38:21
  Speaker 2: 11 women and one man? Nine women and three men. See,
• 38:28
  Speaker 2: to the point that I wasn't even aware of it then.
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: What we are aware is that the verdict vote was
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: apparently 11 to 1. And the only one holding out
• 38:40
  Speaker 2: for conviction was a man. And he withstood days of pressure.
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: It strikes me that this, there's a famous movie, 50s maybe?
• 38:57
  Speaker 2: Henry Fonda, might have been the early 60s. I think
• 39:01
  Speaker 2: it was Henry Fonda. It was called 12 Angry Men.
• 39:04
  Speaker 2: There's a jury, and the jury, there's a hanging jury.
• 39:07
  Speaker 2: And Henry Fonda was not convinced of the guy's doubt,
• 39:09
  Speaker 2: and he would not cave, and he would not cave,
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: and he would not cave, and of course he's the hero.
• 39:14
  Speaker 2: This is the same thing, except in this instance, it's
• 39:16
  Speaker 2: the man that just will not cave, and he's the
• 39:18
  Speaker 2: one that's demanding convictions. There are women all over the
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: United States and the attorney for Lindsay Clinton that are
• 39:29
  Speaker 2: furious at this guy. Well, first of all, in criminal cases,
• 39:33
  Speaker 2: juries are supposed to have to come back unanimous. I
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: think that this guy has a lot of backbone to
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: be able to stand up here and not crack and
• 39:47
  Speaker 2: let this woman skate. But the fact that there has
• 39:54
  Speaker 2: been such overwhelming support for her, Clancy, particularly from women,
• 40:01
  Speaker 2: this is a new thing. We have had, certainly for
• 40:07
  Speaker 2: as long as I've been alive, mothers kill their children.
• 40:11
  Speaker 2: And it's often stuff like this. Sometimes it's a drowning
• 40:16
  Speaker 2: in the bathtub. There was a case of a woman,
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: I forget the state, in which... She drove the kids
• 40:23
  Speaker 2: over a cliff. It's not real common, but there are
• 40:28
  Speaker 2: cases of women killing all of their children. Another kind
• 40:34
  Speaker 2: of case that occurs from time to time, it's not common,
• 40:38
  Speaker 2: but it does keep repeating, will be a case in which,
• 40:41
  Speaker 2: usually a troubled marriage, the guy kills his wife and
• 40:44
  Speaker 2: then kills all the kids. Often when a man kills
• 40:49
  Speaker 2: his children, he also kills the mother. In this instance,
• 40:54
  Speaker 2: it's one of the cases that comes up from time
• 40:56
  Speaker 2: to time of a mother who just kills all of
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: her kids. This is the first one of those that
• 41:03
  Speaker 2: I can recall, and again, maybe I'm forgetting something, in
• 41:06
  Speaker 2: which there was support for the mother. In each instance,
• 41:10
  Speaker 2: I'm sure you could always say the mother had to
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: be nuts. Of course they were nuts. Who else kills
• 41:15
  Speaker 2: their kids? But does that mean that they were insane
• 41:21
  Speaker 2: to the point of not being responsible? My guess is
• 41:24
  Speaker 2: that you could go through every one of these past
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: mothers who killed their children in the past and they
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: all would have had the same kinds of things going
• 41:31
  Speaker 2: on in their head. They were sick in the head
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: in some fashion. But sick in the head in terms
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: of having warped morality and unable to fight off demons
• 41:40
  Speaker 2: that you know are telling you to do the wrong
• 41:42
  Speaker 2: thing and being so whacked out that you don't even
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: know what you're doing, which would be the standard for
• 41:50
  Speaker 2: criminal insanity, are different things. So something has happened in
• 41:54
  Speaker 2: our society where suddenly women who murder their children because
• 42:04
  Speaker 2: of pressure and postpartum depression and they're depressed and they
• 42:08
  Speaker 2: couldn't get help and all the crap she was spewing out,
• 42:11
  Speaker 2: suddenly people are sympathetic for There's a lot of areas
• 42:15
  Speaker 2: in our society where we've changed our attitudes. I still
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: remember when I was a kid. Every now and then,
• 42:22
  Speaker 2: you know, I lived not in a rural area, but
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: the rural was pretty close. You know, people cut off
• 42:29
  Speaker 2: the heads of a few chickens they'd have running around
• 42:31
  Speaker 2: in the backyard, and everybody would laugh about that. I'm
• 42:34
  Speaker 2: sure it still happens. But everyone now regards that as
• 42:37
  Speaker 2: terrible cruelty to animals. I don't think anybody regarded it
• 42:40
  Speaker 2: as that when I was a kid. Nobody, as far
• 42:42
  Speaker 2: as I recall, there weren't any parents that were upset
• 42:44
  Speaker 2: that the kids were doing it or anything. Seems like
• 42:46
  Speaker 2: a ghoulish thing to do. It's one of the areas
• 42:48
  Speaker 2: where our attitudes have changed. And clearly our attitudes are
• 42:50
  Speaker 2: changing here. They haven't changed for men. If a father
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: kills all of his kids, I just think there's no
• 42:56
  Speaker 2: way he's going to be able to go, oh, I
• 42:58
  Speaker 2: was nuts. But it is happening with women and it's
• 43:03
  Speaker 2: Aside from whether or not she should be punished for
• 43:06
  Speaker 2: what she did or not, to me it is far
• 43:08
  Speaker 2: more important to be introspective about what is happening to
• 43:11
  Speaker 2: our own nation. And I believe it's this. I made
• 43:19
  Speaker 2: these comments briefly before the verdict came in. And I'm
• 43:24
  Speaker 2: going to expand upon it almost as briefly here. The
• 43:28
  Speaker 2: mantra for the last 30 years from the left on
• 43:31
  Speaker 2: abortion has been My body, my choice. That's their big slogan.
• 43:37
  Speaker 2: They never want to use the word abortion, by the way.
• 43:39
  Speaker 2: My body, my choice. Well, it's clearly now my kids,
• 43:45
  Speaker 2: my choice. That's what it is. Well, they're my kids.
• 43:50
  Speaker 2: Who are you to tell me I can't kill my kids?
• 43:54
  Speaker 2: By the same token, it's my unborn baby. Who are
• 43:59
  Speaker 2: you to tell me that I can't have an abortion?
• 44:02
  Speaker 2: That's my body. We've now extended my body to my kids.
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: If one of the kids had been 10, would it
• 44:22
  Speaker 2: have been the same? I don't know. But I made
• 44:25
  Speaker 2: the comment last week that we've now we're now, as
• 44:33
  Speaker 2: a society, looking the same way at babies and younger
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: children as we do at unborn babies. When you have
• 44:43
  Speaker 2: states that pass laws that say you can conduct an
• 44:46
  Speaker 2: abortion even after the birth has occurred, how much of
• 44:54
  Speaker 2: a leap is it to say one-year-old or two-year-old? In
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: this case, all of the victims were under the age
• 44:59
  Speaker 2: of six. My kids... My life. My kids. My choice.
• 45:13
  Speaker 2: My body. My life. My body. My choice. My kids.
• 45:18
  Speaker 2: My choice. Well, she was so overwhelmed. She was... All
• 45:26
  Speaker 2: of that. Who gives a crap? We're supposed to accord...
• 45:37
  Speaker 2: the same human rights to the children as we are
• 45:39
  Speaker 2: to the mother, which means she doesn't get to kill them,
• 45:45
  Speaker 2: which was not a controversial opinion until evidently a few
• 45:48
  Speaker 2: weeks ago. There may be something more complicated to how
• 46:05
  Speaker 2: sick and depraved our attitudes in society have gotten. But
• 46:11
  Speaker 2: simple-minded little me simply says, it's got to be abortion.
• 46:19
  Speaker 2: I talk a lot about rationalization. Rationalization is the second
• 46:22
  Speaker 2: strongest human drive. Rationalization is forcing yourself to convince yourself
• 46:29
  Speaker 2: that what you're doing is correct. I've told this story
• 46:33
  Speaker 2: in the past. Let me tell it again. I was
• 46:35
  Speaker 2: at a seminar, one of these management seminars, zillions of
• 46:37
  Speaker 2: years ago. I'm telling you, I've been to several of those.
• 46:40
  Speaker 2: They're almost all worthless. I was at the one in
• 46:43
  Speaker 2: which it wasn't worthless. The seminar presenter actually made points
• 46:48
  Speaker 2: that I thought were outstanding and perceptive that I've carried
• 46:50
  Speaker 2: with me for the rest.
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: Of my life.
• 46:54
  Speaker 2: He did a show of hands. Three kinds of bread.
• 46:59
  Speaker 2: White bread, rye bread, whole wheat bread. Which kind of
• 47:03
  Speaker 2: bread do you, how many people prefer white bread? Raise
• 47:05
  Speaker 2: your hand. How many people prefer whole wheat bread? Raise
• 47:08
  Speaker 2: your hand. How many people prefer rye bread? Raise your hand.
• 47:12
  Speaker 2: First of all, I was shocked at the people who
• 47:14
  Speaker 2: rose their hands over white bread. You're not one of
• 47:18
  Speaker 2: them that would have raised your hand on white bread,
• 47:19
  Speaker 2: would you? I can't imagine that. I pretty much have
• 47:27
  Speaker 2: tried to avoid almost all bread for the last few
• 47:30
  Speaker 2: years because of the carbs and the whole thing, but
• 47:35
  Speaker 2: I would argue that it's either rye or whole wheat.
• 47:39
  Speaker 2: Rye can go either way. You can get good rye
• 47:41
  Speaker 2: or bad rye, but white bread and any of it.
• 47:47
  Speaker 2: After the people did their hands, he asked somewhat rhetorically
• 47:51
  Speaker 2: to the people who said they prefer white bread. He said,
• 47:56
  Speaker 2: why do you like white bread? Why do you prefer
• 47:59
  Speaker 2: white bread? And The answer, he said, was they like
• 48:05
  Speaker 2: white bread because they like white bread. They say they
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: like white bread because they like white bread. In other words,
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: the why is the what. Because this is what they prefer,
• 48:22
  Speaker 2: it's why they prefer it. any decision, therefore, we have made,
• 48:28
  Speaker 2: our opinion is that it is the right decision. We
• 48:31
  Speaker 2: feel the need to rationalize. The alternative is to run
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: around with total guilt all of our lives. Nothing is
• 48:38
  Speaker 2: ever my fault. That's rationalization. Not doing something that you're
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: supposed to. Well, I shouldn't have to because of this
• 48:48
  Speaker 2: or this. Rationalization. Rationalization. The greatest threat to rationalization is
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: thinking something through, because if you think something through objectively,
• 49:01
  Speaker 2: you're going to have a hard time defending the thing
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: that you shouldn't have been defending in the first place.
• 49:07
  Speaker 2: So once you take the step of rationalizing killing clearly
• 49:11
  Speaker 2: a human being inside your own body, you've already screwed
• 49:16
  Speaker 2: your mind up and your thought process up enough that
• 49:20
  Speaker 2: you start to justify killing the child after the child
• 49:24
  Speaker 2: was born. Now, when I bring this, when I make
• 49:28
  Speaker 2: this point, and I made the point in the past,
• 49:30
  Speaker 2: it hacks off the people that are in favor of
• 49:32
  Speaker 2: abortion saying, I'm in favor of abortion, but I'm not
• 49:34
  Speaker 2: in favor of infanticide, of killing babies, killing infants, not
• 49:38
  Speaker 2: in favor of murder. And my retort to that is,
• 49:41
  Speaker 2: then how else to explain it? What else is the
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: explanation for this? Must be doing some work in the
• 49:49
  Speaker 2: building in here. I'm hearing, was somebody on the roof
• 49:51
  Speaker 2: there or something? There was somebody, well, I think he's
• 49:55
  Speaker 2: still up there. I'm hearing banging around going on up there. Anyway,
• 49:58
  Speaker 2: you're listening to the Mark Belling Podcast. This is the
• 50:03
  Speaker 2: Mark Belling Podcast. The latest economic report that came out
• 50:08
  Speaker 2: A day ago is interesting. It shows that in July,
• 50:12
  Speaker 2: the economy gained, excuse me, in August, the economy gained
• 50:16
  Speaker 2: 162,000 jobs. Now, nobody trusts these reports anymore. They were
• 50:22
  Speaker 2: clearly manipulated during the Biden administration. And for all I know,
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: they're being manipulated under the Trump administration. But the numbers
• 50:30
  Speaker 2: are what the numbers are. It showed a significant gain
• 50:36
  Speaker 2: in employment. And the summer months are always tricky because
• 50:41
  Speaker 2: they do these seasonally adjusted numbers that are in there.
• 50:49
  Speaker 2: It seems to me that the economy is not in
• 50:54
  Speaker 2: a recession. I thought it would be. What the economy
• 51:01
  Speaker 2: is clearly still facing is inflation. Inflation can lead to
• 51:09
  Speaker 2: a recession because everything costs so much you only can
• 51:12
  Speaker 2: buy fewer things. And that slows the economy down. But
• 51:16
  Speaker 2: right now in terms of hiring, it doesn't seem to
• 51:20
  Speaker 2: be slowing. But I thought the second part of the
• 51:23
  Speaker 2: story was the more interesting component. Both were in the
• 51:25
  Speaker 2: Wall Street Journal. The Wall Street Journal said in its
• 51:31
  Speaker 2: analysis of these 162,000 jobs, Almost all of the new
• 51:37
  Speaker 2: jobs that were out there were going to people without
• 51:44
  Speaker 2: college degrees. Let me quote from the report. This is
• 51:48
  Speaker 2: a couple of days ago in the Wall Street Journal.
• 51:50
  Speaker 2: For most U.S. workers, those without college degrees, that is,
• 51:54
  Speaker 2: it is one of the best job markets in decades.
• 51:57
  Speaker 2: In fact, the unemployment rate for workers aged 22 to
• 52:01
  Speaker 2: 34 who never graduated from college has rarely been lower.
• 52:06
  Speaker 2: in the past two decades, according to a new analysis
• 52:09
  Speaker 2: by the labor market think tank, Burning Glass Institute. What
• 52:13
  Speaker 2: is just as remarkable is how different that is from
• 52:16
  Speaker 2: the experience of job seekers who did graduate from college,
• 52:20
  Speaker 2: said Gad Levinson, Burning Glass's chief economist. For most of
• 52:24
  Speaker 2: the past two decades, the two groups largely tracked each other,
• 52:28
  Speaker 2: good economic times and bad. Now, though, just as job
• 52:32
  Speaker 2: hunters without degrees are having one of their best runs,
• 52:36
  Speaker 2: Those with college educations are having one of their worst.
• 52:41
  Speaker 2: And those with advanced degrees or in such fields as
• 52:44
  Speaker 2: science and technology are having an even harder time than usual.
• 52:49
  Speaker 2: That divergence of fortunes is a departure from what the U.S.
• 52:53
  Speaker 2: economy has seen for years, and most of it boils
• 52:57
  Speaker 2: down to supply and demand. There aren't enough skilled tradespeople
• 53:02
  Speaker 2: to go around, for example, as older generations retire, and
• 53:07
  Speaker 2: immigration drops. Meanwhile, more Americans have college degrees than ever,
• 53:12
  Speaker 2: just as artificial intelligence is doing more of the entry-level
• 53:16
  Speaker 2: work companies typically hire young graduates for. Without sounding all
• 53:25
  Speaker 2: full of myself, I told you so. I've been on
• 53:28
  Speaker 2: this point for many years now. that we were cranking
• 53:34
  Speaker 2: out way too many college graduates for the economy to handle.
• 53:42
  Speaker 2: And we don't have anywhere near enough skilled non-college graduates.
• 53:50
  Speaker 2: When I say skilled, jobs that require some knowledge or training,
• 53:54
  Speaker 2: some skill, but not the skill that they teach you
• 53:58
  Speaker 2: in college. the one that everybody refers to as the
• 54:01
  Speaker 2: construction trades, but I'll go beyond that to any kind
• 54:05
  Speaker 2: of trade or skill that doesn't require a college education.
• 54:11
  Speaker 2: That'd be a lot of sales jobs. College education doesn't hurt,
• 54:16
  Speaker 2: but you can be a very good salesman in almost
• 54:18
  Speaker 2: any type of product line without having a college degree.
• 54:22
  Speaker 2: Numerous other examples of this. I've been predicting for years
• 54:28
  Speaker 2: That so many of these jobs right now, rather highly
• 54:31
  Speaker 2: paid jobs in our economy that don't require college degrees,
• 54:35
  Speaker 2: are going to face drastic shortages as the baby boomers retire.
• 54:41
  Speaker 2: Because there simply aren't enough, at the time millennials and
• 54:45
  Speaker 2: now following this up, Generation Zs, to replace them that
• 54:49
  Speaker 2: are leaving. A higher percentage of the last two generations
• 54:54
  Speaker 2: have gone to college than did in the baby boom.
• 54:57
  Speaker 2: So you have a higher number of non-college baby boomers retiring,
• 55:04
  Speaker 2: but what's coming into the workforce is a higher percentage
• 55:06
  Speaker 2: of college millennial and then Gen Zers. So the economy
• 55:11
  Speaker 2: is upside down. You have people that are over-trained in
• 55:17
  Speaker 2: fields in which there aren't sufficient jobs. This is one
• 55:21
  Speaker 2: of the things that I think is fueling the Marxism
• 55:24
  Speaker 2: and socialism that among college educated. I went to college,
• 55:28
  Speaker 2: I took out this big loan, I got this big degree,
• 55:30
  Speaker 2: and I can't find a job. Well, it wasn't entirely
• 55:34
  Speaker 2: your fault because everybody when you were in high school
• 55:36
  Speaker 2: told you to go to college. Now, if you're really
• 55:39
  Speaker 2: good in the field that you're going into, you're probably
• 55:41
  Speaker 2: going to be fine. If you're brilliant in whatever the
• 55:45
  Speaker 2: field is in college, likely you'll find a job. But
• 55:50
  Speaker 2: no matter what the field is, the top 5% is
• 55:53
  Speaker 2: going to be the top 5%. If you're just an
• 55:58
  Speaker 2: okay young person in terms of your skill in one
• 56:03
  Speaker 2: of the trades, you're going to be hired because they
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: have to hire someone. I believe this is a long-term trend.
• 56:23
  Speaker 2: The young people who are smart enough And this would
• 56:28
  Speaker 2: be primarily, I would say, not necessarily book smart, but
• 56:35
  Speaker 2: smart in terms of common sense, reasoning, skills, hardworking. You
• 56:41
  Speaker 2: can even say book smart. Some of the trades people,
• 56:47
  Speaker 2: any number of people that all of us know, they
• 56:49
  Speaker 2: never went to college, they know way more than all
• 56:52
  Speaker 2: sorts of people with a zillion degrees that are out there.
• 56:57
  Speaker 2: The future is wide open in the jobs that will
• 57:03
  Speaker 2: always be hard for AI to replace. I mean, the
• 57:09
  Speaker 2: robots are going to be doing more and more, and
• 57:11
  Speaker 2: I can certainly envision a day when robots are doing bricklaying.
• 57:15
  Speaker 2: Not hard to imagine that. But still, so much else
• 57:21
  Speaker 2: of anything involving physicality is going to require human beings.
• 57:33
  Speaker 2: Some people think, well, you know, the tech world is
• 57:36
  Speaker 2: so exploding and expanding. Why are people with tech degrees
• 57:39
  Speaker 2: having a hard time finding jobs? And the answer is
• 57:41
  Speaker 2: because there's a zillion of them. There are just so
• 57:45
  Speaker 2: many of them. I'll make another point on this. I
• 57:54
  Speaker 2: think I'll just take the tenure period in which I
• 58:00
  Speaker 2: graduated from college, going to like the late 70s, early 80s,
• 58:03
  Speaker 2: and that whole era. My guess is of the fellow
• 58:05
  Speaker 2: people that graduated from college in the tenure period that
• 58:08
  Speaker 2: I'm in, less than half ended up in fields that
• 58:12
  Speaker 2: were related to the thing that they majored in in college,
• 58:15
  Speaker 2: less than half. I was the exception. I majored in
• 58:18
  Speaker 2: this vague thing called mass communications, and I went into
• 58:21
  Speaker 2: the media. But I think any number of people may have, well,
• 58:25
  Speaker 2: I know friends of mine, They majored in one thing
• 58:30
  Speaker 2: and they ended up going to work in something completely
• 58:31
  Speaker 2: unrelated to the thing that they majored in. The college
• 58:34
  Speaker 2: education certainly benefited them in life because they received training
• 58:37
  Speaker 2: in other things and it might have helped them think
• 58:40
  Speaker 2: and so on. But they entered the economy in that period,
• 58:44
  Speaker 2: a terrible economy, and they took jobs in the areas
• 58:47
  Speaker 2: they could find jobs. It seems to me that there's
• 58:51
  Speaker 2: been a resistance over the last 10 years of people
• 58:58
  Speaker 2: who graduate from college in a certain area to take
• 59:01
  Speaker 2: jobs in completely different fields. They feel as if I
• 59:04
  Speaker 2: have a right to have a job here. Well, maybe
• 59:06
  Speaker 2: you should have sized up the field that you were
• 59:08
  Speaker 2: going into. And let's face it, some of these college
• 59:11
  Speaker 2: majors in terms of creating something that's useful for employment
• 59:15
  Speaker 2: are utterly worthless. Anything that ends with the word studies,
• 59:24
  Speaker 2: it's worthless other than getting a job as a professor
• 59:27
  Speaker 2: to teach more of those classes in that. What are
• 59:29
  Speaker 2: you going to do with that to grade? For a while,
• 59:35
  Speaker 2: they were hiring all of these people to work in
• 59:36
  Speaker 2: corporate America in the DEI departments. But as DEI is
• 59:40
  Speaker 2: falling out of favor, those are some of the jobs
• 59:42
  Speaker 2: that are likeliest to be cut. Here's an interesting story.
• 59:51
  Speaker 2: It looks like a class action suit is going to
• 59:53
  Speaker 2: be filed in New York City by operators of the bodegas.
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 2: I can't say that I've been to many cities that
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 2: have many of these other than New York. It's kind
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 2: of the nature of New York and the neighborhoods there.
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 2: And they're filing it again. They're planning to file it
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 2: against the city of New York against Mamdani's plan to
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 2: have operate city-run grocery stores. Mamdani's idea is have the
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 2: city of New York operate grocery stores in New York
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: so they can offer lower prices than are available out
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 2: there right now at the private grocery stores and the bodegas.
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 2: The bodega operators... are getting together and are going to
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 2: try to file a class action lawsuit to stop this.
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 2: The bodegas are, and if you've ever been to New
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 2: York and Manhattan, you'll just see them on the streets.
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 2: You know, there's zillions of people that live in these
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 2: urbanized areas, but there's no anywhere that have parking lots
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 2: and big stores. So the grocery stores are these small
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 2: little markets that are right on the main streets. I
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 2: think I'm explaining something I think everybody knows, but they'll
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 2: have some of the fruit laid out in there. Then
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 2: you go inside the store and they're very, very sharp
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 2: at what they stock. so that they stock the kinds
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 2: of stuff that people can make dinner with and all that.
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 2: That's what it is. The bodega operators fear that the
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 2: city of New York's own stores will undercut them, which
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 2: they will. This is yet another opportunity to instruct, for
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 2: the people who don't understand it, why socialism always leads
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 2: to disaster. So what will happen is, sure, if Mamdani
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 2: runs his city-owned grocery stores and undercuts the private sector,
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 2: the private sector store sales are going to suffer, and
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 2: as a result, they'll go out of business. So how
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 2: has Mamdani helped anyone by putting out of business all
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 2: of these families and employees that work at the bodegas?
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 2: In many instances... These are exactly the kind of families
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 2: that people like Mamdani claim that they care about. Immigrant families,
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 2: working families that come to the United States, they save
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 2: all their money to buy one of these places up,
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 2: the rent is terrible. On the other hand, the potential
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 2: customer base is enormous because of all the people who
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 2: live and work in New York City and walk past
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 2: them all day. So as we run all the bodegas
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 2: out of business, thus creating the need for even more
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 2: city-owned stores, The city-owned stores will be crappy as hell.
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 2: And the prices will eventually have to rise at the
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 2: city-owned stores because you know doggone well. The employees won't
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 2: work very hard. And the loss via shoplifting and theft
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 2: will be enormous. So you take away the entire entrepreneurial class,
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 2: these people that are trying to get ahead in life.
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 2: First work, usually your whole family working at the bodega,
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 2: get working there. Then maybe buy the store. Somebody owns
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 2: the store. Maybe then buy a second one. The basic
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 2: level of aspiration and entrepreneurialism where people can start from
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 2: nearly the bottom. To replace it with what? Now, my
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 2: experience and all my experiences with these bodegas is walking
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 2: past a zillion of them. That's what it is. Chicago
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 2: doesn't have many of those, do they? You know, part
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 2: of it is, though, Chicago's, and New York's downtown is unique. Like,
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 2: even in Chicago before it went all to hell, Once
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 2: you got away from the main parts of the loop
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 2: or the near north, there'd be regular streets with big
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 2: grocery stores and parking lots and so on. New York,
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: you have to go way, way, way out. Even in Queens,
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 2: it's still real dense and all of that. New York's
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 2: one of the few cities in which it's just all
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 2: packed together and there's just no place to have a
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 2: giant Target or a giant for our version pick and
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 2: save or even a big Walmart type grocery store. I mean,
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 2: I've gone in. The only times I've ever gone in
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 2: to buy any of those would be to like probably
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 2: back in the day, buy a bottle of juice or
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 2: some water or something. Because, you know, I'm in New York,
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 2: I'm staying in a hotel. Why am I going to
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 2: buy an apple? I don't need to buy a salad.
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 2: Sometimes you go into those places because they would serve
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 2: the carrot. You could sit right at a counter and
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 2: eat lunch and so on. I looked at that stuff
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 2: and it seemed to me that everything was always really,
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 2: really fresh and very, very highly priced. Very, very highly priced. Again,
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 2: imagine what the rent is to have a location, to
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 2: have your store. say, on Fifth Avenue or on Broadway
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 2: in New York City. I did always wonder, though, about
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 2: the produce. I mean, you go into a grocery store, admittedly,
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 2: everybody feels up the apples and feels up the other thing.
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 2: When I take those things home, I'm running the water
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 2: over for a long, long, long, long time. But boy,
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 2: out on the streets in New York, I mean, you
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 2: see that, like, that apple sitting in there, 18,000 New
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 2: Yorkers have fondled up that apple before you buy the thing.
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 2: I mean, I'm like a medium-level germaphobe. I'm not like
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 2: one of these, I just traveled again over the weekend.
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 2: These people that still wear the masks in the airplanes, just,
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 2: I have no problem with them doing it. I just
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 2: can't imagine how they can stand it. The whole time
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 2: we were in masks during COVID, I was never comfortable
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 2: with a mask on. Were you? You hated it. And
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 2: you still wear glasses. I had my cataract surgery a
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 2: few years ago and I switched from glasses in the interim,
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 2: but boy, they were just worse, I thought, when I
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 2: was wearing glasses. It would always steam up the glasses.
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 2: And now that I don't have to wear glasses anymore,
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 2: it still was like an annoying thing. So, I mean,
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 2: if people are afraid of germs, and, you know, airports
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 2: are cesspools of germs, and the planes are cesspools of germs,
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 2: I get all of that. I just would rather risk
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 2: getting the thing that was out there than have that
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 2: thing strapped all over my face. So, I mean, that
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 2: would be an extreme level of a germaphobe, but I'm
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 2: also not one of these people that doesn't worry about
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 2: all these bugs and all that crap that's out there.
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 2: I do. So I'm like a medium-level germaphobe. I bring
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 2: in my own, like, mouths. This thing, what do we
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 2: call these things? This thing, what do we call that?
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 2: My cover, there's another name for it. I bring in
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 2: my own, except then I forget it half the time,
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 2: and it's sitting here over on the table, and probably
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 2: somebody like you is using mine and blowing... blowing your
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 2: germs all over the whole thing. All right, next. I'll
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 2: probably save this story and report on it in greater
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 2: depth on one of the, like Monday we did a
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 2: special podcast in which we did a two-segment podcast where
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 2: I was able to dive into some stories in a
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 2: little bit greater depth than normal. But I want to
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 2: give A chunk of it to you right here. The
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 2: poverty rate in the United States of America in 1964
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 2: was 11% of the population. 1964 was the year that LBJ,
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 2: Lyndon Johnson, president, launched the War on Poverty. It was
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 2: the second biggest expansion of the welfare state. The first
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 2: was the New Deal of Franklin Roosevelt. The War on
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 2: Poverty was when Johnson established this massive federal apparatus to
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 2: dramatically increase the amount of welfare programs and assistance programs.
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 2: They didn't all start at the same time, and many
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 2: of them changed names, but it was in this era
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 2: that food stamps were expanded. that disability programs were expanded,
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 2: that tremendous aid to local governments to provide social services
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 2: at the local level were expanded. It was all an
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 2: attempt to spend billions of federal dollars to do exactly
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 2: what the term said, war on poverty. The goal was
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 2: to end poverty. Do you know what the poverty rate
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 2: is in 2026? 11%. Hasn't moved. There are a couple
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 2: of reasons for this. The first, and again, to me
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 2: this one is just so obvious and nobody ever seems
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 2: to understand this. You're always going to define poverty as
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 2: the bottom percentage of the population, right?
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: Right?
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 2: No matter what the average income of the lowest 10%
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 2: of Americans is, it's going to be lower than 90%
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 2: of the rest of America, right? So that's always going
• 1:08:41
  Speaker 2: to be defined as poor. So when you say that
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 2: you're going to try to eradicate poverty, if poverty has
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 2: always declined to say the bottom 10 to 15% of Americans,
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 2: that's what poor is. If we have a term rich,
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 2: people with more money than most people, poor would be
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 2: less money than most people. Somebody always has to fit
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 2: that categorization of poor. But secondly, it is obvious The
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 2: government programs and social service programs and programs to provide
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 2: financial assistance don't work. This is not an argument to
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 2: not do any of them. There has to be some
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 2: safety net. But I contend the only value for the
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 2: safety net is to help people survive. The safety net
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 2: doesn't do anything to get you out of the mess
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 2: that you're in. And this is where the war on
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 2: poverty has so utterly failed. Once poverty becomes tolerable, The
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 2: incentive to get out of it ends. And this has
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 2: been the problem with the Dole, the long-term people who've
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 2: been receiving government assistance for 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 years.
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 2: They get just enough of that assistance that they don't
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 2: take the steps in their life to get out of poverty.
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 2: I grant you, some can't. They're physically a mess. Or
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 2: they may have significant psychological problems or a physical disability.
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 2: But that's not most people. What the war on poverty
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 2: has done instead is create massive numbers of jobs for
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 2: people in mid-levels of government and mid-levels of social service agencies.
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 2: Because the overwhelming majority of the money spent in the
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 2: so-called war on poverty is on the people who work
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 2: in the war on poverty. If We go back to
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 2: 1964 before any of this started and we kept all
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 2: poverty programs at the same level that they were before this,
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 2: meaning we didn't give poor people much anything. Would anything
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 2: be different? My guess is that the number would still
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 2: be the same 11%. I'll add one PS to this.
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 2: The way we define poverty can be misleading. Poverty is
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 2: often based on income. There are certainly some, and we've
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 2: all seen this with regard to poor people that we
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 2: all know. There are some people that have a very,
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 2: very low income, but have gotten help from their family
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 2: or maybe had an inheritance that they've got much more
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 2: to be able to fall back on as opposed to
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 2: some people have a very low income and they don't
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 2: have any money. Their house doesn't have a little house.
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 2: The shack that they're in, the apartment that they're in
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 2: has no furniture and They really, really are hurting. But
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 2: you'll see in this same poverty group, people with the
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 2: latest smartphone, laptops, three TVs in the house, alongside people
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 2: who may not have a sofa. And one more set
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 2: of stats here. This comes from Senator Eric Schmidt. He
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 2: posted this on X. 25% of all Mexicans live in
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 2: the United States. 70% of them rely on welfare. 10%
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 2: of Guatemalans live here. 77% are on welfare. 12% of
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 2: Nicaraguans live here. 75% rely on welfare. 12% of Haitians
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 2: live here. 53% rely on welfare. Now, his point is
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 2: that in terms of Mexicans, and he's referring to Mexicans
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 2: by nationality, I'm guessing also citizenship. So many have moved
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 2: to the United States that a quarter of all Mexicans
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 2: in the world now live in the United States, not
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 2: in comparison to Mexico and everywhere else. 10% of Guatemalans, 12%
• 1:13:10
  Speaker 2: of Nicaraguans, 12% of Haitians. And in each of the groups,
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 2: Haitians the lowest, but still over 50%, the majority of
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 2: them that are here are on welfare. This is one
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 2: of the many problems with the way we do immigration now.
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 2: When we had an immigration system that works, and there's
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 2: still a portion of it that's in place, to come
• 1:13:36
  Speaker 2: to the United States, you had to work. And if
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 2: you didn't, you had to leave. The people that are
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 2: in the United States right now, legally, many of them
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 2: who are have not become citizens, have visas. And the visas,
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 2: in most cases, there's a number of months that they
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 2: can stay here without working. If you get a job
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 2: and work, it's pretty easy to stay long-term without becoming
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 2: a citizen. You're just simply a non-citizen. You know, people
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 2: don't like the term alien, but that was what the
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 2: reference to alien simply meant for and not from here.
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 2: In other words, somebody who is, let's just say, French,
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 2: and comes to work in the United States, Let's be
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 2: a cliche here and say that they start a French restaurant.
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 2: They never become a citizen. It's pretty easy for them
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 2: to stay together, stay here permanently, because they're working the
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 2: entire time. Somebody else comes over from France and they
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 2: decide they don't have a job at all. They live
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 2: on whatever money they have. They pretty much have to
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 2: leave every six months if they're coming through the front
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 2: door and they have a visa. And the reason that
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 2: we set it up that way is we said, yes,
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 2: you can come to the United States temporarily or permanently.
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 2: but you got to work. If you're going to come here,
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 2: you're going to contribute in part of the society. We
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 2: don't want you to come here and be a leech.
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 2: Our immigration has changed with A, the incredible number of
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 2: illegal immigrants who obviously they're not, the guy who's in
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 2: here legally on the six month visa is worse off
• 1:15:06
  Speaker 2: than the one who comes in illegally. All they have
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 2: to do is dodge ice and they can stay here
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 2: 12 months. But then if others have come in here legally,
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 2: They're coming in solely to get the welfare. When we
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 2: had a border that was enforced and we allowed you
• 1:15:25
  Speaker 2: to come in only if you had job skills and
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 2: a support system, we had immigration that resulted in people
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 2: assimilating and contributing, which is why this nation, a nation
• 1:15:34
  Speaker 2: of immigrants, worked for as long as it has. In
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 2: other words, it's worked until it currently doesn't. And it
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 2: doesn't because we've chosen to accept all comers, including those
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 2: who come in illegally. Now, Trump has been cracking down
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 2: on the visas as well. In addition to the illegal immigrants,
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 2: a number of people that are here and have been
• 1:15:56
  Speaker 2: overstaying their visas are being forced out as well. I'm
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 2: not as big a fan of that as I am
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 2: of kicking out the illegals. In some cases, you have
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 2: people that may not be making much money but are
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 2: providing some sort of a contribution while here legally on
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 2: a visa and I don't know why we go through
• 1:16:17
  Speaker 2: the resources of kicking them out of the country. Certainly,
• 1:16:21
  Speaker 2: kicking out the illegals and doing the work that ICE
• 1:16:24
  Speaker 2: is doing, I fully support. But those numbers, when you
• 1:16:30
  Speaker 2: see that the overwhelming percentage of immigrants to the United
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 2: States from central Latin America, really Mexico and Central America,
• 1:16:41
  Speaker 2: this didn't go into South America, coming here and the
• 1:16:44
  Speaker 2: majority of them being on welfare, What are we doing?
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 2: You're listening to the Mark Belling Podcast. This is the
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 2: Mark Belling Podcast. I posted a little bit of this
• 1:16:58
  Speaker 2: on my account on X. I don't even know if
• 1:17:02
  Speaker 2: I mentioned it last week. This two-year-old horse that my
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 2: partnership owns named USS Valor. I think I mentioned after
• 1:17:09
  Speaker 2: his first race, which was August 8th, that we thought
• 1:17:13
  Speaker 2: that we had a horse that might be really, really,
• 1:17:16
  Speaker 2: really good. First of all, he's looked really good ever
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 2: since he was a yearling, since he was a foal.
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 2: And every trainer that had him in his development process
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 2: as a yearling said that he was outstanding. When he
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 2: got to the track with his current trainer, he's trained
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 2: spectacularly well. So before he ran his first race, we
• 1:17:35
  Speaker 2: had extremely high hopes for him. Well, he didn't win
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 2: his first race. He was in the fastest race for
• 1:17:41
  Speaker 2: two-year-olds of the season at Saratoga at that point on
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 2: August 8th and had an incredible amount of trouble. He
• 1:17:47
  Speaker 2: was on the rail, he was knocked way inside at
• 1:17:49
  Speaker 2: an angle out, and then eventually at an angle really wide,
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 2: and the winner of the race ended up running the
• 1:17:55
  Speaker 2: fastest race that a two-year-old had run at Saratoga at
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 2: that point, and we lost the whole thing by only
• 1:18:00
  Speaker 2: about a half length. So it was one of those
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 2: cases where we didn't win but felt that the horse
• 1:18:05
  Speaker 2: was really, really good. Well, he made his second career
• 1:18:07
  Speaker 2: start this past Saturday, and I did go out for
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 2: that race, and he put on a show. Horse racing,
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 2: you can judge by time and by speed figures. It's
• 1:18:20
  Speaker 2: pretty easy to judge times if there's a bunch of
• 1:18:23
  Speaker 2: races at the same track on the same day. The
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 2: track can change if it rains and so on, but
• 1:18:29
  Speaker 2: usually it's pretty much the same. And in this day,
• 1:18:30
  Speaker 2: the track didn't change. And the times at Saratoga for
• 1:18:34
  Speaker 2: a race of each distance have been pretty consistent the
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 2: entire two months of the meet. He ran a blisteringly
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 2: fast race, just over 1 minute and 22 seconds. for
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 2: seven furlongs. Most races at that distance have been at
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 2: 123 and 124. even for far more accomplished and older horses.
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 2: The speed figure that he came back and got was astonishing.
• 1:18:59
  Speaker 2: There's a company called Bayer, named after the guy that
• 1:19:01
  Speaker 2: started his name is Bayer. He does something called Bayer
• 1:19:03
  Speaker 2: Speed Figures. We got a 105. By comparison, the winner
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 2: of this year's Kentucky Derby got a 98, and that
• 1:19:10
  Speaker 2: was a three-year-old running in like his sixth or seventh
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 2: career race. Now, this is a sprint, and the Kentucky
• 1:19:16
  Speaker 2: Derby's a mile and a quarter. It is sort of
• 1:19:18
  Speaker 2: apples and oranges, but for a two-year-old to run at
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 2: this stage of his season and only a second career start,
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 2: anything over a 90 is really, really good. Over 100
• 1:19:29
  Speaker 2: is almost unheard of, and a 105, as I stated,
• 1:19:32
  Speaker 2: is one of the fastest speed figures for a two-year-old
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 2: in his second race in decades. So he did that.
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 2: So we have a horse that's clearly very, very talented.
• 1:19:44
  Speaker 2: And as I said, I was at the race. I
• 1:19:46
  Speaker 2: fully expected that we were going to win. Two of
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 2: the prime contenders scratched trying to duck us. One of
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 2: the horses in the race was cross-headed in a grade
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 2: one stakes the following day, and they chose to run
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 2: them in the grade one stakes rather than run against us.
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 2: I mean, Everybody knew that our horse was good. I
• 1:20:03
  Speaker 2: don't know that anybody thought that he would go and
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 2: run off and hide as he did. He won by
• 1:20:07
  Speaker 2: 13 legs. So I get all these questions. Will he
• 1:20:10
  Speaker 2: be on the Kentucky Derby? Will he be this? Well,
• 1:20:12
  Speaker 2: the Kentucky Derby's next year. It's for three-year-olds, so he
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 2: would be eligible. It's just very hard to get from
• 1:20:18
  Speaker 2: where we are to get to there. But we certainly
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 2: have a horse that right now is of extremely high ability.
• 1:20:27
  Speaker 2: The challenge, of course, is to keep them healthy. The
• 1:20:31
  Speaker 2: faster they are and the bigger they are, the more
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 2: prone they are to injury. First of all, they're running faster,
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 2: so they're coming down harder. And also the horses, he's
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 2: just a behemoth. He is a very big horse, just
• 1:20:43
  Speaker 2: astonishing to the eye. For those of you who know
• 1:20:45
  Speaker 2: size of horses, he stands over 16 hands and he
• 1:20:48
  Speaker 2: weighs over 1,100 pounds. So for a two-year-old, he's just
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 2: a very, very big horse. So that means that all
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 2: of this, you know, this incredible speed, he's coming down
• 1:20:55
  Speaker 2: and The tendency for something to happen in terms of
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 2: pulling of this muscle or that or any kind of
• 1:21:02
  Speaker 2: an ouchie is just greater. So those things just happen.
• 1:21:06
  Speaker 2: That's the scary part of having a really, really fast horse.
• 1:21:10
  Speaker 2: Fast horses can go to the sidelines. I would compare
• 1:21:13
  Speaker 2: it to the same thing with baseball and Jacob Mizorowski.
• 1:21:15
  Speaker 2: We're very, very concerned that he's going to be able
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 2: to stay healthy for the long haul because he throws
• 1:21:20
  Speaker 2: so hard. You'd have less concern about a guy that
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 2: doesn't throw as hard as he is beyond that. Um,
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 2: we'll see how far we can go with the horse.
• 1:21:29
  Speaker 2: One step at a time. His next race is scheduled.
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 2: And again, this is assuming something doesn't go wrong. The
• 1:21:36
  Speaker 2: first Saturday in October, and he will now move up
• 1:21:39
  Speaker 2: to a grade one stakes called the Champagne. Um, he is,
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 2: it's too early to say he's one of the best
• 1:21:46
  Speaker 2: horses that I've owned because he's only run twice, but
• 1:21:49
  Speaker 2: he's already run faster than than almost any of them,
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 2: and he has the potential, obviously, to be a superstar.
• 1:21:55
  Speaker 2: The race was on Fox Sports 2, and all of
• 1:21:57
  Speaker 2: the analysts used that term. They all said, this could
• 1:22:00
  Speaker 2: be a superstar. So we've landed on a good one.
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 2: All right. The NFL, I'm doing the podcast here on Wednesday,
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 2: begins tonight. Used to always begin on Thursday night. Is
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 2: this the first year they open on a Wednesday? We
• 1:22:14
  Speaker 2: think so. The Patriots and the Seahawks, which obviously is
• 1:22:19
  Speaker 2: a marquee matchup, Open the season on NBC. Fair enough.
• 1:22:26
  Speaker 2: Tomorrow night's game is almost as attractive as a matchup,
• 1:22:31
  Speaker 2: but it's the Rams and the 49ers in Australia, and
• 1:22:37
  Speaker 2: the TV is Netflix. The NFL has lost its way.
• 1:22:49
  Speaker 2: I know all of the reasons why they're doing this.
• 1:22:52
  Speaker 2: It's money, money, money, money, money. But I just think
• 1:22:56
  Speaker 2: this is short-term thinking. The commissioner has this goal clearly
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 2: of being a global league. And I think if they
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 2: become a global league, it will long-term backfire. If you
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 2: have teams in countries all over the world Unless you're
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 2: going to have a 90 franchise league, which no one
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 2: wants other than maybe the owners, rivalries get shot, the
• 1:23:27
  Speaker 2: travel gets to be absurd, and you lose the nature
• 1:23:31
  Speaker 2: of the game. The only country in the world that
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 2: considers our type of football to be football is the
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 2: United States. It's an American game and it's been an
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 2: American league. While you can certainly have global competition in it,
• 1:23:48
  Speaker 2: even in the ultimate international sport, the Premier League in
• 1:23:53
  Speaker 2: soccer is the English Premier League. The English Premier League
• 1:23:56
  Speaker 2: doesn't have teams in Germany. Secondly, I get why they're
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 2: putting games on so many streaming services. Netflix gets one
• 1:24:08
  Speaker 2: game a week, and they pay a fortune for it.
• 1:24:13
  Speaker 2: Prime Video gets one game a week, and they pay
• 1:24:15
  Speaker 2: a fortune for it. They're trying to get just about
• 1:24:18
  Speaker 2: every streaming service in every network to have some games
• 1:24:22
  Speaker 2: so they can get money from all of them. But
• 1:24:25
  Speaker 2: not everybody is going to subscribe to every one of
• 1:24:28
  Speaker 2: the streaming services. So you have a national game on
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 2: a standalone night like a Thursday night, and it's a
• 1:24:34
  Speaker 2: game that a lot of people want to see, but
• 1:24:36
  Speaker 2: people who don't have Netflix can't watch it. okay, they're
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 2: going to make more money from Netflix than if the
• 1:24:43
  Speaker 2: game was, say, on CBS or something like that. And
• 1:24:47
  Speaker 2: there's no value for them. You know, they want to
• 1:24:49
  Speaker 2: have fewer and fewer games played on Sunday because they
• 1:24:51
  Speaker 2: hate the fact that on Sundays you have multiple games
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 2: being played at the same time. The commissioner's goal would
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 2: be to have no game playing at the same time
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 2: any other game is playing because he wants the whole
• 1:25:02
  Speaker 2: country to be able to watch every game. So the
• 1:25:04
  Speaker 2: only night, by the way, of the week this season
• 1:25:08
  Speaker 2: that won't have a game is Tuesday. saying that there's
• 1:25:12
  Speaker 2: a Wednesday game every week, but the only night without
• 1:25:14
  Speaker 2: a game the whole year is Tuesday. But there's at
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 2: least one Wednesday game, another Thursday games, it's going to
• 1:25:19
  Speaker 2: be Friday games, Saturday games, Sunday games, Monday games. So
• 1:25:23
  Speaker 2: they're trying to have as few games being played on
• 1:25:25
  Speaker 2: Sunday as possible to stop this competition from one another.
• 1:25:28
  Speaker 2: And by having all these standalone games at all of
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 2: these weeknights, you can give them all to a different
• 1:25:32
  Speaker 2: network or streaming service. And again, that's a way of
• 1:25:35
  Speaker 2: cashing the whole thing in. But the thing that has
• 1:25:37
  Speaker 2: made football what it is, is the number of people
• 1:25:42
  Speaker 2: who follow football on television and are able to watch it.
• 1:25:50
  Speaker 2: How big of a deal is it for the people
• 1:25:52
  Speaker 2: in Australia to get an NFL game? I don't know.
• 1:25:54
  Speaker 2: Maybe it's a big deal. Maybe it isn't. But for
• 1:25:56
  Speaker 2: the fans of the United States, which is the ones
• 1:25:58
  Speaker 2: that have made the NFL as big as it is,
• 1:26:01
  Speaker 2: what do they get out of it? I think almost
• 1:26:06
  Speaker 2: all fans dislike this. And almost all fans dislike it
• 1:26:10
  Speaker 2: when it's their own team that has to play one
• 1:26:12
  Speaker 2: of these overseas games. And it was one thing when
• 1:26:15
  Speaker 2: you did a couple of games in London, but now
• 1:26:17
  Speaker 2: it's several games in London. And then there's one in Germany.
• 1:26:20
  Speaker 2: And then we're going to try to do Mexico. They
• 1:26:22
  Speaker 2: may finally be done with Brazil. I don't know. Australia.
• 1:26:26
  Speaker 2: You know it's not going to be long before they're
• 1:26:28
  Speaker 2: going to be in China. There's no end to this.
• 1:26:35
  Speaker 2: I think it is long-term... short-sighted. It ultimately will have
• 1:26:43
  Speaker 2: the impact if they start expanding franchises. They have, say,
• 1:26:47
  Speaker 2: a team in Rome, a team in London, a team
• 1:26:49
  Speaker 2: in Sydney, a team in Berlin. Go through the list.
• 1:26:54
  Speaker 2: A team in Tokyo, a team in Beijing. You're going
• 1:26:57
  Speaker 2: to water down the player base. You're going to make
• 1:27:01
  Speaker 2: it harder for people to keep track of each of
• 1:27:03
  Speaker 2: their teams. You're going to eliminate the notion of rivalries.
• 1:27:07
  Speaker 2: And it also means that it's not going to be
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 2: long before the Super Bowl is probably going to be
• 1:27:11
  Speaker 2: played overseas as well. There may be, as I say,
• 1:27:16
  Speaker 2: short-term more money in that. But it's not anything that
• 1:27:20
  Speaker 2: hardly any of their fans, their customers, want. And I
• 1:27:27
  Speaker 2: don't care what business it is. If the business starts
• 1:27:32
  Speaker 2: doing things that the overwhelming majority of their current customers
• 1:27:36
  Speaker 2: don't like, It never works. Coles should be instructive to everyone.
• 1:27:49
  Speaker 2: Not going to comment too much about the Brewers and
• 1:27:51
  Speaker 2: the Cubs because I'm doing this podcast on Wednesday and
• 1:27:53
  Speaker 2: many of you will be listening to it after the
• 1:27:55
  Speaker 2: final game of the series went along. But the first
• 1:27:59
  Speaker 2: two games of the Brewers-Cubs series, First of all, they
• 1:28:02
  Speaker 2: had the same score of the game, and it was
• 1:28:03
  Speaker 2: almost exactly the same game in both cases. Jackson Churio
• 1:28:08
  Speaker 2: got a big hit in one case to put the
• 1:28:09
  Speaker 2: Brewers ahead, in the other case to tie the game up,
• 1:28:12
  Speaker 2: and both games probably should have been won by the Cubs,
• 1:28:15
  Speaker 2: but the Brewers are just in some sort of a
• 1:28:17
  Speaker 2: zone right now, and my fear has been that these
• 1:28:20
  Speaker 2: things tend to even out, that when you win a
• 1:28:22
  Speaker 2: lot of close games, you tend, ultimately, you're going to
• 1:28:25
  Speaker 2: lose a lot of close games with To say that
• 1:28:29
  Speaker 2: the Brewers have the Cubs number so far is an understatement.
• 1:28:33
  Speaker 2: I haven't taken a full look at how the playoffs
• 1:28:35
  Speaker 2: would shake themselves up, but it's still very possible the
• 1:28:39
  Speaker 2: Brewers and Cubs. will meet in the postseason. There was
• 1:28:42
  Speaker 2: one thing that I guess I didn't really figure out
• 1:28:45
  Speaker 2: until two weeks ago, and I don't know if this
• 1:28:46
  Speaker 2: is the first year of this. There are two teams
• 1:28:49
  Speaker 2: that get buys in the National League this year. Is
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 2: this the first year of that or last year were
• 1:28:53
  Speaker 2: the two teams with buys? Do you remember? I don't remember.
• 1:28:57
  Speaker 2: They change it so often. I was under the impression, though,
• 1:29:01
  Speaker 2: that the Brewers needed to have the best record in
• 1:29:03
  Speaker 2: the National League to have a bye. In fact, it's
• 1:29:05
  Speaker 2: the best two records that have a bye. So staying
• 1:29:10
  Speaker 2: ahead of the Dodgers would mean that if you played
• 1:29:12
  Speaker 2: the Dodgers, you'd have home field advantage against them. But
• 1:29:15
  Speaker 2: you don't have to stay ahead of the Dodgers in
• 1:29:16
  Speaker 2: order to get a bye. And I think a bye
• 1:29:19
  Speaker 2: in particular would be advantageous for the Brewers, who I
• 1:29:22
  Speaker 2: just think their pitching staff is fried. The bullpen is fried.
• 1:29:26
  Speaker 2: The starters are fried. After the first inning of last
• 1:29:29
  Speaker 2: night's game, I was fearful Mizorowski had been fried after
• 1:29:32
  Speaker 2: he was shelled in his pre-seeding start, but he did
• 1:29:34
  Speaker 2: get it back together after that. They're a team of very,
• 1:29:37
  Speaker 2: very young players, many of whom are playing more games
• 1:29:40
  Speaker 2: this season, especially the pitchers they've ever pitched in. But secondly,
• 1:29:43
  Speaker 2: the advantage of the bye is just it's one less
• 1:29:46
  Speaker 2: chance to get knocked out. But in order to get
• 1:29:48
  Speaker 2: that bye, they would need to have one of the
• 1:29:50
  Speaker 2: top two records. So that would mean that the team
• 1:29:52
  Speaker 2: that they need to stay ahead of is Philadelphia. And
• 1:29:54
  Speaker 2: as of the recording of this podcast, they're five games ahead.
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 2: As for winning the division with regard to the Cubs,
• 1:30:02
  Speaker 2: it's not mathematically impossible, but it's getting close to that
• 1:30:06
  Speaker 2: thing being locked up. And the Brewers control the tiebreaker
• 1:30:10
  Speaker 2: with the Cubs by virtue of having won the season
• 1:30:14
  Speaker 2: series with the Cubs. One other thought on that game.
• 1:30:19
  Speaker 2: I was not at the game. I'm going to the
• 1:30:21
  Speaker 2: Wednesday night game. I'm doing the podcast again. This podcast
• 1:30:23
  Speaker 2: is being done on Wednesday afternoon. I'm going to, therefore,
• 1:30:26
  Speaker 2: tonight's game. I have a pretty good– I'm not one
• 1:30:31
  Speaker 2: of these people like Front Row Amy or Baseball Bob
• 1:30:34
  Speaker 2: that stays for the last pitch of every game. I'm
• 1:30:37
  Speaker 2: just not. Are you? You used to be, but not anymore. However,
• 1:30:45
  Speaker 2: I tend, when the Brewers are ahead, to stay for–
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 2: I mean, I'm more likely to stay to a 9-1
• 1:30:53
  Speaker 2: game if the Brewers are leading 9-1 than losing 9-1, obviously.
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 2: I think almost everybody would do that. There are games
• 1:31:01
  Speaker 2: in which I will leave early. I mean, I can't
• 1:31:06
  Speaker 2: say this for certain because it's a hypothetical. I don't
• 1:31:09
  Speaker 2: think I would have left last night. A lot of
• 1:31:12
  Speaker 2: people did. For those of you who didn't follow the game,
• 1:31:18
  Speaker 2: the Cubs, it was the second game in a row
• 1:31:20
  Speaker 2: in which Trevor McGill had absolutely nothing. He's another guy
• 1:31:23
  Speaker 2: that just needs a rest. McGill got shelled in the
• 1:31:26
  Speaker 2: top of the ninth, and the Cubs took... a lead
• 1:31:30
  Speaker 2: of 3-1. And D.L. Hall, who's been spectacular, had to
• 1:31:35
  Speaker 2: come in and pitch out of a massive jam to
• 1:31:38
  Speaker 2: end the damage at 3-1. So the Brews are trailing 3-1,
• 1:31:42
  Speaker 2: going into the bottom of the ninth. After the Cubs
• 1:31:44
  Speaker 2: scored those two runs on the top of the ninth,
• 1:31:46
  Speaker 2: what I have left, my rule generally is if there's
• 1:31:48
  Speaker 2: only one inning and it's two runs, no, I'm not
• 1:31:50
  Speaker 2: going to leave. It's still close enough. Coming back from
• 1:31:54
  Speaker 2: two runs is rare, but it certainly happens. But then
• 1:31:59
  Speaker 2: there are the first two outs. Also consider, very big crowd,
• 1:32:06
  Speaker 2: not as big as Monday, but there are 37,000 people
• 1:32:08
  Speaker 2: at the game last night. And the traffic leaving the
• 1:32:12
  Speaker 2: game is always different with Cubs fans because they go
• 1:32:17
  Speaker 2: in different directions than the national order that would leave
• 1:32:19
  Speaker 2: with Brewer fans. And you can be stuck in that
• 1:32:22
  Speaker 2: parking lot for the longest time. I'm pretty sure I
• 1:32:27
  Speaker 2: would have stayed because, as I said, it wasn't 6-1,
• 1:32:30
  Speaker 2: it wasn't 5-1, it was still only 3-1. But 3-1
• 1:32:33
  Speaker 2: and two outs, you take that, you try to bit
• 1:32:35
  Speaker 2: that last-minute jump on the majority of the people and
• 1:32:37
  Speaker 2: get out there. So they had Christian Yelich, who's been
• 1:32:40
  Speaker 2: cold all season, come in to pinch it because it
• 1:32:43
  Speaker 2: was a lefty-righty situation. He was down to an 0-2 count.
• 1:32:49
  Speaker 2: I mean, the Cubs had the Brewers down 3-1 with
• 1:32:51
  Speaker 2: two outs and an 0-2 count. Yelich got a base hit.
• 1:32:55
  Speaker 2: Churio came up and hit a line drive that I'm
• 1:32:58
  Speaker 2: surprised didn't bust through the back of the bleachers. It
• 1:33:00
  Speaker 2: was just a shot. The game was tied up. And
• 1:33:04
  Speaker 2: they won the game then in the 10th inning, as
• 1:33:09
  Speaker 2: everybody knows. But for the people who did leave, I
• 1:33:13
  Speaker 2: always say this. If you left and therefore missed, they've
• 1:33:19
  Speaker 2: had several comebacks that you might say were more... I
• 1:33:23
  Speaker 2: would say that this was the most exciting comeback of
• 1:33:26
  Speaker 2: the year because, A, it was the Cubs. And secondly,
• 1:33:29
  Speaker 2: you were down to your last pitch with nobody even
• 1:33:32
  Speaker 2: on base. To have missed that, it is your own fault.
• 1:33:38
  Speaker 2: And it's the calculated risks that everybody makes when they
• 1:33:40
  Speaker 2: leave a game early when it seems as though it's
• 1:33:43
  Speaker 2: out of hand. And again, over all the years I've
• 1:33:45
  Speaker 2: been going to sporting events, there are games that I've
• 1:33:48
  Speaker 2: left early. I can't recall being burned maybe more than once.
• 1:33:53
  Speaker 2: And I can't even remember that instance. It always seems
• 1:33:56
  Speaker 2: to work out for me. I mean, if I leave
• 1:33:58
  Speaker 2: and it's 6-1 going into the bottom of the eighth inning,
• 1:34:01
  Speaker 2: usually they lose 6-1 or maybe even 8-1. But I
• 1:34:04
  Speaker 2: wasn't there. But there were a lot of people, from
• 1:34:07
  Speaker 2: what I could see on TV, it looked to me
• 1:34:09
  Speaker 2: that at least 10,000 people had left out of the
• 1:34:14
  Speaker 2: 36,000 or 37,000 that were there. And because the Cubs
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 2: were leading, it wasn't any of them that left. All right.
• 1:34:21
  Speaker 2: Out of time for today's program. Reminder that the Thursday podcast,
• 1:34:24
  Speaker 2: the final segment, will be the second week of our
• 1:34:27
  Speaker 2: football preview and our football picks. So tune in then.
• 1:34:30
  Speaker 1: Bye. The Mark Belling Podcast is a production of iHeartRadio Podcasts.
• 1:34:36
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• 1:34:40
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• 1:34:44
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• 1:34:49
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