Latest / The Death Of Journalism / Episode Two Hundred Fifty Four: Turn Into The Curve

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Episode Two Hundred Fifty Four: Turn Into The Curve · The Death Of Journalism

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Welcome to episode two hundred and fifty four, The Death
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: of Journalism Podcasts. My name is John Zigler, I'm your host.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: In today's show, President Trump federalizes the Washington d C
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  Speaker 1: Police and liberals freak out. South Park continues on its
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: anti Trump rampage, but Republicans are turning into the curve.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: The WNBA could learn a lesson from that as they
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: navigate Dildo Gate. The NFL now has ownership over another
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: major news outlet, as a truncated preseason game reveals just
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: how soft the league has really become, and part two
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  Speaker 1: of my fascinating interview with my father. We begin this
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: episode of the podcast with the biggest news story of
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: the week, at least politically, and that is that President
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: Trump has federalized the Washington d C Police and is
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  Speaker 1: bringing in the National Guard to try to deal with
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: crome in Washington, d C, as well as homelessness. Liberals
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: are freaking out about this because it fits their narrative
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: that Trump is a would be authoritarian, a tyrant, and
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: that he is taking too much control. As a libertarian,
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  Speaker 1: I understand where they're coming from. There are lots of
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: things that Trump does that bother me. In this realm,
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  Speaker 1: and I think are creating very dangerous precedents for the
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  Speaker 1: future and are pushing us in a direction of federal
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  Speaker 1: power and control that is very, very dangerous. However, in
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  Speaker 1: this particular case, I think there are some fairly unique circumstances.
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  Speaker 1: The first is that I don't think people fully understand
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  Speaker 1: how different Washington d C is with regard to legality
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  Speaker 1: and the freedom and power that the President of the
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  Speaker 1: United States has legally over Washington d C. You know,
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  Speaker 1: Washington d C does not have two sets. Washington d
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  Speaker 1: C is not a state. There are legal ramifications and
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  Speaker 1: reasons behind all of that. So if this was some
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  Speaker 1: place other than Washington d C. I would have a
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  Speaker 1: much bigger problem with it from a precedent and a
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  Speaker 1: legal perspective. Now, from a practical perspective or standpoint, I
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  Speaker 1: do think that Trump is picking Washington d C. Partially
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  Speaker 1: because he has the authority, but also because he wants
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  Speaker 1: to make a statement about liberal cities being incredibly soft
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  Speaker 1: on crime. There's been all sorts of arguments about whether
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  Speaker 1: or not crime in DC really is out of control.
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  Speaker 1: You can do anything you want with statistics. There are
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  Speaker 1: some stats that indicate that things are actually well bad,
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  Speaker 1: not getting worse, and maybe even getting better, and that
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  Speaker 1: there are places in the country, other liberally controlled urban centers,
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  Speaker 1: that are actually worse with regard to crime than Washington,
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  Speaker 1: d C. I'm not sure that that's a really great
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  Speaker 1: argument though for liberals. I mean, is there a problem
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  Speaker 1: in Washington, DC? And is this going to at least
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  Speaker 1: temporarily solve the problem. My guess is there's a very
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  Speaker 1: good chance that Trump is going to be able to
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  Speaker 1: point the DC and say, see, we brought crime down,
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  Speaker 1: we fix the homelessness problem, which is the other element
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  Speaker 1: of this equation that Trump is focused on. And there's
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  Speaker 1: obviously a clear connection between crime and homelessness, and so
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  Speaker 1: I think Trump's gonna win this. So I'm troubled by
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  Speaker 1: the whole concept, but I'm not outraged by it, and
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  Speaker 1: I'm going to more of a wait and see mode here.
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  Speaker 1: I'd like to see whether or not he's actually successful
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  Speaker 1: in doing what he's trying to accomplish, which I think
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  Speaker 1: there's a very good chance he will be, and if
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  Speaker 1: he is, this will be a classic Trump situation where
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  Speaker 1: Trump does something that the liberals say is outrage and
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  Speaker 1: authoritarian and he's a tyrant, and it ends up actually
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  Speaker 1: being effective and politically doesn't harm him at all. In fact,
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  Speaker 1: the liberals make themselves look silly by overreacting and protesting
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  Speaker 1: the idea that we're trying to fix a crime problem.
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  Speaker 1: And let's be clear it, much like other urban centers,
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  Speaker 1: Washington d C is led by a group of liberals
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  Speaker 1: that don't have a clue, especially when it comes to
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  Speaker 1: fighting crime and dei hires. It's just amazing. It's amazing
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  Speaker 1: how every major urban center seems to have a female
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  Speaker 1: police chief, oftentimes a person of color. They're clear dei hires.
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  Speaker 1: They're clearly weigh in over their head in the places
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  Speaker 1: where you would most need experience and expertise, because the
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  Speaker 1: job is most difficult because of the circumstances that exist
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  Speaker 1: in our urban centers in this country. And those circumstances
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  Speaker 1: are extremely complex, but they are clearly in evidence. I mean,
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  Speaker 1: the statistics are overwhelming, and the statistics exist in Washington,
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  Speaker 1: d C that there is a significant problem. Now, most
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  Speaker 1: of the liberal reaction, including many of the mainstream news media,
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  Speaker 1: has been to push this authoritarian and tyrant narrative and
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  Speaker 1: to try to claim that the crime problem in Washington,
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  Speaker 1: d C. Is not nearly as bad as Trump is
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  Speaker 1: trying to make it out to be. But there's been
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  Speaker 1: at least one prominent exception to that. And I want
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  Speaker 1: to play a clip because it was so rare that
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  Speaker 1: this would come from somebody who is an ABC News anchor.
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  Speaker 1: She's not a top ABC News anchor, but she is
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  Speaker 1: an ABC News anchor. Now there is a caveat. Normally,
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  Speaker 1: if you're an ABC News anchor and you come out
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  Speaker 1: and basically take President Trump's side when it comes to
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  Speaker 1: an issue of controversy whether or not there really is
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  Speaker 1: a significant and worsening crime problem in Washington, d C.
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  Speaker 1: That would be a unicorn moment. Oh my gosh, because
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  Speaker 1: this person's clearly not a conservative. Well, the caveat here
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  Speaker 1: is this particular woman, Kira Phillips is married to John Roberts.
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  Speaker 1: By the way, good job John Roberts, who's a much
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  Speaker 1: older guy. But John Roberts is a well known Fox
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  Speaker 1: News Channel anchor and clearly no liberal. And so I
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  Speaker 1: think it makes sense that this would mean that Kira
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  Speaker 1: Phillips is at the very least not a bleeding heart liberal.
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  Speaker 1: She might even be a closet conservative somehow working as
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  Speaker 1: an ABC News anchor. But here is one of a
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  Speaker 1: couple different clips from her on ABC News where she
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  Speaker 1: goes up against this liberal narrative that the problem in
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  Speaker 1: DC really isn't that bad, and she uses her own
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  Speaker 1: experience as well as experiences of those that she works
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  Speaker 1: with in the ABC News bureau in Washington, DC. And
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  Speaker 1: here is one of those clips that went viral on X.
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  Speaker 2: We've been talking so much about the numb and yeah,
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  Speaker 2: usually that's how you played Devil's Advocate as you talk about, oh, well,
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  Speaker 2: stat's say crime is down. However, I can tell you
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  Speaker 2: firsthand here in downtown d C where we work, right
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  Speaker 2: here around our bureau, just in the past six months,
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  Speaker 2: you know, there were two people shot. One person died
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  Speaker 2: literally two blocks down here from the bureau. It was
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  Speaker 2: within the last two years that I actually was jumped
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  Speaker 2: walking just two blocks down from here. And then just
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  Speaker 2: this morning one of my coworkers said her car was
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  Speaker 2: stolen a block away from the bureau. So we can
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  Speaker 2: talk about the numbers going down, but crime is happening
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  Speaker 2: every single day because we're all experiencing at firsthand while
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  Speaker 2: working and living down here.
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  Speaker 1: Now there's another clip circulating where Phillips directly blames homelessness
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  Speaker 1: for a lot of the problems that Washington, DC is
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  Speaker 1: having with crime, and I think she's probably correct in
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  Speaker 1: that analysis, so kudos to her. I think, as I've
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  Speaker 1: already said, Trump is probably going to win on this
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  Speaker 1: because it does seem as if the tactics are probably
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  Speaker 1: at least in the short run, gonna curtail crime, and
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  Speaker 1: Trump will be able to point to statistics showing that,
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  Speaker 1: and that will be a victory because even liberals, at
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  Speaker 1: least most liberals, but even liberals who live in crime
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  Speaker 1: ridden cities would like to see crime go down. Nobody
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  Speaker 1: really is in favor of increased crime, and they're never
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  Speaker 1: going to give Trump credit for it, but at least
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  Speaker 1: they might be able to say, Okay, that wasn't as
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: bad as we thought it was going to be. So again,
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  Speaker 1: my basic take on this is I'm concerned with the president,
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: but I think from a tactics perspective and politically, this
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  Speaker 1: is probably going to end up as a winner for
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  Speaker 1: Donald Trump, partially because of the over reaction and the
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  Speaker 1: absurd reaction of liberals once again feeding this narrative that
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  Speaker 1: they are super soft on crime and can't handle their
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  Speaker 1: own cities. Now, the other major political controversy over the
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  Speaker 1: last couple of weeks has been this issue of redistricting
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  Speaker 1: and what's been going on in Texas and as as
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  Speaker 1: of this taping, the effort in Texas to redistrict the
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  Speaker 1: state of Texas in the middle of a decade, which
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  Speaker 1: is really not the way this is supposed to work.
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  Speaker 1: Just for those who may not know or may have forgotten,
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  Speaker 1: I mean, this used to be a fairly standard procedure
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  Speaker 1: and fairly universal, where you have a census every ten years,
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  Speaker 1: and then based upon that census, you get allocated your
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  Speaker 1: number of representatives to the House of Representatives, and that
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  Speaker 1: then equates to electoral College votes, and then the state
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  Speaker 1: draws a map to delineate. Okay, where are these districts
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  Speaker 1: in which district is each voter voting in. Well, Texas
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  Speaker 1: is trying to redistrict in the direct middle of a decade. Obviously,
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  Speaker 1: this is twenty two twenty five. Now, it's my understanding
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  Speaker 1: that this is technically within the law of the state
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  Speaker 1: of Texas. I don't agree with it, but it does
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  Speaker 1: appear to be legal. Democrats have tried to do everything
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  Speaker 1: they possibly can to avoid a vote. Finally, Republicans were
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  Speaker 1: able to force a vote in the Senate and the
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  Speaker 1: Republican redistricting plan passed overwhelmingly, meaning it only needs to
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  Speaker 1: be passed now by the House, which is expected to happen,
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  Speaker 1: and then it would be signed by the governor of Texas.
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  Speaker 1: So it appears as if, as of this taping, that
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  Speaker 1: the Republican plan, which has been clearly designed to try
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  Speaker 1: to increase Republican representation in the House of Representatives from
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  Speaker 1: the state of Texas, is going to become law now.
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  Speaker 1: Trump keeps saying, and others keep saying that this could
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  Speaker 1: mean as many as a net gain of five Republicans
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  Speaker 1: in the House delegation of the state of Texas. I'm
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  Speaker 1: skeptical of that. I mean, I guess it's possible, But
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  Speaker 1: to me, I'm not sure that that's anything close to
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  Speaker 1: a done deal. Because inherently, when you redistrict and you
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: try to gerrymander in order to squeeze out that many districts,
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  Speaker 1: you're actually decreasing your margin for error in several of
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  Speaker 1: these districts. So it's quite possible that you may lose
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  Speaker 1: one or two because you miscalculated or because the wind shifts.
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  Speaker 1: And right now Republicans, especially Trump fans, are a bit
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  Speaker 1: in denial the polls, and I realize people don't believe
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  Speaker 1: in polls anymore, but the pulling on congressional preferences is
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  Speaker 1: terrible right now for Republicans. Now, the midterms are more
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  Speaker 1: than a year away, and if the Trump economy is
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: perceived as doing very well by then that whole situation
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  Speaker 1: could change very much in Republicans' favor. But right now,
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: on paper, it's not looking great for Republicans in the
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty six midterms. Republicans are way over confident because
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: Democratic approval ratings are way down. They're in the toilet.
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  Speaker 1: But part of the reason Democratic approval ratings are in
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: the toilet is one, they're out of power. And two,
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: you have a huge number of liberals and Democrats who
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: are pissed off that they don't think Democrats are fighting
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  Speaker 1: back hard enough. So they're telling posters that they disapprove
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: of Democrats, but they're still going to vote for them,
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: especially in a mid term election. And then you have
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: the problem on the Republican side that with Trump not
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: on the ballot, there are a lot of maga people
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  Speaker 1: who just don't show up. We've now learned that through
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  Speaker 1: the history of the Trump era, so I can understand
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  Speaker 1: why the Republican Party is trying to squeeze out a
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  Speaker 1: few more seats in Texas. I will be surprised if
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  Speaker 1: they're able to get five. They'll probably able to get three,
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  Speaker 1: for sure, but five seems like a little bit of
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  Speaker 1: a stretch. But the part of this that is really
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  Speaker 1: exercised be the most obviously living here in southern California,
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  Speaker 1: is the Gavin Newsom. And I you know, I've been
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  Speaker 1: as outspoken as anybody about what a absolute turd Gavin
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  Speaker 1: Newsom is, or Gavin Poussam Governor Poussam as my children
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  Speaker 1: call him. During the COVID panic, Trump calls him new scum. Now,
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  Speaker 1: the relationship between Newsom and Trump has obviously deteriorated. It
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: was once way too friendly, and now they are at
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  Speaker 1: each other's throats. But Newsom is openly, I mean openly
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  Speaker 1: saying that he will retaliate, even using that word retaliate
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  Speaker 1: against what Texas is doing by redistricting California to try
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  Speaker 1: to get the same number of seats for the Democrats
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  Speaker 1: that Texas is trying to get for Republicans, and there
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  Speaker 1: are a couple of major problems here interrational world. The
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  Speaker 1: first is that we have a state constitution in California
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  Speaker 1: where the redistricting plan is part of the constitution. It
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: was passed by the people of the state. Okay, we
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: have a very clear cut plan and system for doing
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  Speaker 1: our redistricting. It's done by an allegedly nonpartisan panel. It's
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  Speaker 1: done after each census. This couldn't be more clear cut.
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  Speaker 1: And so NUSU, who constantly talks about how democracy is
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  Speaker 1: in peril, is openly flouting the state constitution of California.
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  Speaker 1: You keep saying, oh, we still believe in the redistricting
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  Speaker 1: panel system. Bullshit. No, you're clearly saying you don't believe it.
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  Speaker 1: You're just paying lip service to it. And you're banking
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  Speaker 1: on the fact that the incredibly liberal media here in
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  Speaker 1: California is going to let you get away with that,
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  Speaker 1: which by the way, is probably the correct analysis, unfortunately,
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  Speaker 1: And you're also counting on the fact that the voters
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  Speaker 1: are so ignorant and dumb and democratically biased that they're
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  Speaker 1: not going to be able to see through what you're doing.
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  Speaker 1: So I mean, this is to me, you want to
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  Speaker 1: talk about democracy in peril. This is almost as bad
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  Speaker 1: what Nusom is proposing as what he did during the
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: COVID panic, where he anointed himself a king, gave himself
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: emergency powers never ending, and went on for a couple
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: of years which he completely exploited in ways that were
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: incredibly damaging and not based in science or logic or
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: health or anything else, and about which he was completely
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: and totally wrong on almost every single front, and there
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: was no accountability whatsoever other than a failed attempt to
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: try to recall him. And so far it seems like
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: he's getting away with that. He's threatening. I think there's
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: a chance he's bluffing. I don't know this, but because
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: he's actually you know, dust out protests too much, he's
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: he is constantly threatening and even telling Texas to stand
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: down because he doesn't want to have to pull the
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: trigger in re retaliation against Texas. And so that tells
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  Speaker 1: me that maybe he doesn't fully have confidence that he
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  Speaker 1: can pull this off, because this wouldn't be that easy.
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  Speaker 1: What he is going to have to do to retaliate
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  Speaker 1: against Texas is he's going to have to call a
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  Speaker 1: special election in November, which is going to cost a
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: lot of money, which in theory right, would create an
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: enormous amount of backlash and negative media coverage. That's not
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: going to happen here in California, but at least some
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: people are going to be offended by that. And then
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: he's going to have to put some sort of a
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: proposition on the ballot for this special election where the
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: voters pass a redistricting plan against the state constitution purely
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: for political partisan purposes. Now, I have no doubt, because
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: of the massive advantage of Democrats here in California, that
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: there's a very good chance it would pass. I got
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: to believe they're going to be legal challenges to this.
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  Speaker 1: There's not that much time. I have to believe that
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: Republicans could tie this up in court enough to prevent it,
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: or at least make it very very difficult. But then
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  Speaker 1: even if Newsom gets everything he wants, I have already
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: referenced it with regard to Texas. I'm a pretty you know.
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: I wouldn't call myself an expert, but I'm close to
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: an expert on the districting situation in California. I watch
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: it very, very carefully and I have tried to figure
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: out how in the world knew some things he could
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: read district California to get five more Democrats in Congress.
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  Speaker 1: To me, I don't see how that math works. That
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: math ain't mathing, And in my view, now, you can
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: always do crazy things like you could somehow take a
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: portion of San Francisco and draw an incredibly narrow line
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  Speaker 1: all the way to the to the easternmost portions of
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: rural California, and you know, so you could put in
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: one hundred thousand Liberals in San Francisco into a formerly
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: Republican rural district that's hundreds of miles away. I can't
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: believe that would pass muster, even in California. I mean,
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: people are gonna see through that, because one of the
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: things about our districts is that they're really very straightforward.
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: They're drawn in a very logical and almost all of
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: them are square, depending on the geography. Obviously, in Los
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: Angeles and San Francisco you can have much smaller geographic
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: districts because you have a much higher population. But generally
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: the map looks sensible. Now it's already very biased towards Democrats.
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: I mean, Democrats have way way more representation in California
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: than their statewide vote total would dictate. So to me,
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: I talk all the time about how Republicans lost four
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: close races in twenty twenty four, which is why I
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: thought Democrats might take the House in twenty twenty four,
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: because I thought Republicans would lose House seats in California
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: and New York, which they did, but they were able
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: to still maintain barely their very small advantage in the House.
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: There's only a couple of more competitive seats left where
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: you could change the lines to disadvantage Republicans. I mean, so, yeah,
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: he could squeeze out easily another two Democrats, but past two,
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: I don't see where he goes unless he's going to
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: do something really, really, really crazy that may end up
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: backfiring nationwide, and who knows, maybe even here in California.
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: Although I hate to be optimistic about the voters in
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: California seeing through Gavin Newsom's bullshit. There's one other thing
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: about the whole redistricting situation, and I realized redistricting isn't
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: the sexiest of topics. Although it's clearly been very much
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: in the news lately, this has always been a pet
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: peeve of mine, and this goes to an issue that
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: at ninety nine point whatever percent of Americans are unfortunately
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: very ignorant about. My guess is, by the way, that
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: even members of the news media and maybe even members
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: of Congress are ignorant about this. My big pet peeve
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: about redistricting in Congress is I've never understood why it
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: is that we are stuck on this magic number of
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: four hundred and thirty five representatives to Congress. There are
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: four hundred and thirty five congressional districts in this country.
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: You know when that number was reached over one hundred
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: years ago, nineteen thirteen, and in the late nineteen twenties,
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: that number was made permanent by law. Of course, the
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: law could be fairly easily changed. I mean politically, it
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: might be difficult because everyone would be arguing over, okay,
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: who will be advantaged, Republicans or Democrats. But you know,
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: if you had a if you had a decent proposal,
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: you could ease increase the number. But my point here
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: is I want to illustrate just how completely absurd that is.
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: In nineteen thirteen, each of these four hundred and thirty
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: five congressional districts had a population of a little bit
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: over two hundred thousand people. Obviously, nineteen thirty was a
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: very different time with regard to communication and travel, and
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: so if you represented two hundred thousand people most of
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: the country was very rural, then you know that was
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: that was a difficult task, but at least it was manageable. Today,
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: over one hundred years later, each congressional district represents about
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: eight hundred thousand people, almost four times as many people.
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: It's just ridiculous. So each district has lost well over
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: half of its power, if you will, with regard to
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: each particular vote. My point here is we need more representatives.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: Not because I'm in favor of conquersspeople, because most of
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: them are idiots and corrupt, but from a representation perspective,
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: our founding fathers had always thought of the House of
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: Representatives as being very very close to the people, very
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: responsive to public opinion. But when you represent eight hundred
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: thousand people, I mean, that is an insanely high number
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: of people, and I think causes all sorts of problems
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: that we don't even contemplate now. I guess there's space
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: considerations at the Capitol and office space and at where
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: do you fit everybody? But to me, logistically you can
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: make this work. I mean, I frankly think that you
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: can make an argument that the House of Representatives ought
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: to be as ought to be twice as large as
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: it currently is, and you still wouldn't be back to
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: the numbers with regard to population in nineteen thirteen. But
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: if you did that, a lot of this controversy would
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: go away, because each individual district would be really pretty insignificant.
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: So to me, the congressional districts have gotten way too
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: large from a population perspective, and no one ever talks
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: about this except for me, for better or for worse. Now,
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: I have also been talking recently about how the animated
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: cartoon South Park, which is, in my opinion, one of
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: the best and most important television shows of the last generation.
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: I don't agree with everything south Park does. I've always
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: perceived them as being very common sense oriented, very anti liberal,
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: anti woke, pro libertarian. They're anti conservative in some ways,
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: but generally, you know, in comparison to the rest of
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: the crap that's been on television, I've always thought south
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: Park was funny, rational, not always right, but important, important
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: from a free speech perspective, and also important from the
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: standpoint of defending certain concepts like libertarianism. And most importantly,
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: it's just been funny. I mean, it's a very funny show.
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: It can be offensive to people at times, but I
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: think it's been great, and I think the main character,
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: Cartman is absolutely genius. And both of my daughters with
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: no effort on my part whatsoever, because I can assure
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: you that if I try to get my daughters interested
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: in anything, they immediately rebel or repel from that subject matter.
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: So I had absolutely nothing to do with it. But
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: both of my daughters, Grace and Diana, are big fans
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: of South Park. And the reason I'm mentioning this and
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: have previously on the podcast, is that in this new season,
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: which just began a few weeks ago, they have been
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: going on the attack on Donald Trump and on Donald
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: Trump's administration and on a couple of prominent conservative figures
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: in a way that is extraordinary, not just because they
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: really haven't done it before, but also because it comes
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: on the heels of their parent company, Engage Paramount, engaging
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: in this this deal with Donald Trump, this settlement. Over
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: the sixty minutes controversy and Trump effectively approving their merger
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: and their sale and acquisition, and so it's really been
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: extraordinary considering the fact that, you know, Stephen Colbert is
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: seen as this martyr because he got fired by CBS,
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: and South Park just signed a one point five billion
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: dollar streaming deal, and they're going after Trump like there's
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: no tomorrow, like they never have previously, which to me,
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: one of the best parts about this in the liberal
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: media has never acknowledged this. It kind of puts a
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: lie to the entire Stephen Colbert narrative. I mean, how
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: does that make any sense? Stephen Colbert got fired because
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: he was too anti Trump, and South Park gets a
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: one point five billion dollar streaming deal and they go
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: after Trump harder than they ever have before. No, the
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: reality is that Stephen Colbert was fired because he wasn't
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: funny anymore and his show is losing millions of dollars
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: a year. South Park isn't losing money. South Park's still funny,
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: it's still popular, and it's making a crapload of money.
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: And so they have the freedom and the authority and
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: the leverage to do whatever whatever they want pretty much,
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: and they have gone after Trump really really hard. And
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: what I find most interesting about this situation involving South
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: Park going after Trump now, Weirdly, Trump himself has not
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: taken the advice that I'm about to talk about, but
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: others under him have. And what I'm referencing is what
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: I call the turn into the curve strategy. And you know,
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: this is a weird example, but my wife, Allison loves
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: to talk about the turn into the curve strategy. She's
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: a big believer that when you're involved in a controversy
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: or a crisis or a scandal, whenever possible, turn into
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: the curve, meaning embrace it, don't run away from it,
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: Embrace it, and you will actually take away a lot
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: of its power. The most prominent example of this strategy
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: that my wife has referenced with me many many times,
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: and she said this right from the start, so I'll
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: give her credit. She believes that if Tiger Woods back
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: in two thousand and nine twenty ten had turned into
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: the curve on his cheating scandal, that his entire career
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: moving forward would have been different and he may never
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: have gone through several of the slumps that he did
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: after that. Specifically, now, there were injuries that were clearly
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: part of this equation. But there's also no question that
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: Tiger Woods's game suffered after that massive explosion of negative
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: news stories, for which he was very apologetic, and he
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: went into hiding and he didn't play for an extended
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: period of time. And my wife's theory has always been
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: turn into the curve. And if your Tiger, you know,
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: that would have meant at the time when the story
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: started to come out and his wife, Healing, went after
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: him with a nine iron, shattered the window on his car,
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: he hit the fire hydrant, he should have come out
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: and said, you know what, you got it me, You
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: got me. That's right. Check out all my bitches. That's
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: almost a direct quote from my wife. Look at all
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: my bitches. Yeah, I've been having sex everywhere, and come
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: out with some you know, gold chains and you know,
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: maybe an attire change and just completely turn into the curve,
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: embraced the whole new persona of Tiger Woods post cheating scandal,
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: and that it might have gone away because it takes
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: away all the power from the attacks. Not to mention,
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: you know, it changes your persda and in Tiger's case,
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: he would have been much more dominant rather than submissive.
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: That's I think my wife's theory on why turning into
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: the curve would have worked for Tiger and would work
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: in other similar situations well. With regard to South Park
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: and the Trump administration, Trump himself, apparently since it came
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: from the White House, put out a statement originally when
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: South Park first went after him, claiming absurdly and ludicrously
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: that South Park was no longer relevant and they hadn't
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: been relevant for twenty years and no one cares about
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: them anymore, which was completely ridiculous given the fact that
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: they had just signed a one point five billion dollar
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: streaming contract. But those other than Trump who have been
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: attacked have all, I believe, extremely successfully turned into the curve. Now,
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: in this episode of South Park, they basically turned mar
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: al Lago into the old TV show Fantasy Island, and
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: Trump was the host and JD Vance was the midget,
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: saying to Blaine de Blaine and JD Vance was just skewered,
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: absolutely tortured, I mean, made the look literally like a
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: midget and being subservient to Trump and Trump having absolutely
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: no respect for JD Vance whatsoever, and instead of complaining
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: about it or ignoring it, JD Vance tweeted about it
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: and said, I have finally made it and done and done.
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: It's over. Okay, you got the joke. You're not gonna
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: act like a liberal and be all offended and you know,
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: collect your pearls and say this is outrageous or say
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: this ought to be off the air. I finally made it.
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: Good job, Jadi Vance. That's the way to handle this
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: kind of situation. Christy Nome is probably well even more
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: attacked by South Park, more viciously attacked by South Park.
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: She's obviously the director of Homeland Security, and she is
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: shown killing puppies all over the place because she wrote
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: a book in which she referenced killing her own dog
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: stupidly and mystifyingly. But I mean all sorts of ways
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: she is attacked. She's attacked for her appearance, she's attacked
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: for her tactics, she's attacked for killing puppies. I mean,
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: she is made to look absolutely horrendous in this South Park.
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: And what does Christy Nome do? She takes an image
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: of herself from the South Park cartoon and tweets it
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: as a recruiting ad for people to join ICE. I'm
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: not even a Christy nob fan, but again turn into
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: the curve. Great job, good work. It completely mitigates the
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: entire issue, strips it of all of its power. And
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: again not responding like a liberal, which is the whine complain,
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: or responding like liberals think you're gonna do, which is,
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: let's take south Park off the air. There's been nothing
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: like that. Now, maybe they've lost their leverage over CBS
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: because the merger has been approved in paramount, but there's
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: not even been any talk about that, which is good.
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: This is exactly the right way to handle this situation.
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: And then there's MAGA commentator Charlie Kirk. Now, Charlie Kirk
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: was also skewered, and because they made Cartman into a
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: Charlie Kirk character in a very funny and frankly in
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: some ways accurate fashion, but also in a way that
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: at times made Charlie Kirk look terrible, basically making jokes
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: about being a master debater. And you know, liberals looked
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: at this as, oh, this is awesome. South Park is
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: really taking it to Charlie Kirk. Well, what does Charlie
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: Kirk do? He makes the Cartman version of Charlie Kirk
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: into his avatar on social media, he talks about it openly,
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: He shares the clips, he praises elements of the way
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: South Park handled him as cartman, and basically embraces the
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: whole situation. And this drove liberals bananas because they're like, wait, wait, wait, wait,
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: why aren't you upset? Don't you understand you're being ridiculed here,
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: You're being attacked. You're not in on the joke, Charlie.
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: And I don't think Charlie Kirk is a dumb guy.
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: I think he understood exactly what he was doing, and
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: I think whether he was conscious or subconscious about it,
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: he understood that the best tactic here, the best strategy,
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: was to turn into the curve, and it's worked wonderfully
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: for him because weirdly, and this is liberals just do
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: not understand this at all. But on the rare occasions
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: when a very popular mainstream cultural phenomenon like South Park
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: gives a conservative, especially someone like Charlie Kirk, the credibility
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: of being so openly mocked, there's actually a positive to that,
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: even if they ridicule you. And at times they actually
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: quoted Charlie Kirk accurately, and so he would focus on
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: those situations and the times when they are ridiculing you,
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: conservatives are like, oh, that's just you know, the liberal media,
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: that's just you know, Hollywood whatever. There's no negative to that.
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: So this is absolutely positively the right strategy. And so
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: kudos the JD. Vance and the Christy Noman, the Charlie
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: Kirk and you know. And I've never been a fan
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: of Charlie Kirk, partially because of some of the things
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: he did and said regarding the Kerry Lake efforts in Arizona.
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: I don't think he's a bad guy, but but I
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: now have to at least be nice to Charlie Kirk
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: because he was nice to my daughter Grace. I was
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: shocked to learn a couple of weeks ago that that
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: Grace was a big Charlie Kirk fan, which I clearly
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: had absolutely nothing to do with. Again, if I had
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: tried to make her a fan of somebody, she would
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: have rebelled against that. But she came up to me
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: and said, I really like Charlie Kirk. I've been watching
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: his videos. I took a video of her talking about
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: Charlie Kirk. I posted it on Twitter. Charlie happens to
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: follow me. Charlie saw it and promised to send Grace
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: a signed hat, and I told Grace about that, which
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: I was hesitant to do because a lot of times
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: these things fall through the cracks and they never get handled.
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: But you know, he'd tweeted about it publicly, so I thought, Okay,
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: you know he's got a he's pretty much on the
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: record here saying he's gonna do this. I thanked him
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: for that, and sure enough, about a week later, Grace
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: got a package in the mail from Charlie Kirk with
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: a MAGA hat signed by Charlie Kirk, some stickers, and
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: a copy of his book about Bokeness, and she was
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: thrilled by the way. We made a video of that
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: posted that that got like four hundred thousand views because
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: Charlie Kirk retweeted it. So I can't say anything bad
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: about Charlie Kirk personally. I'm still not a fan of
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: a lot of his commentary, but he's been very good
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: to my daughter, and so kudos to Charlie Kirk, first
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: for how he's handled the Cartman South Park situation, but
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: more importantly to me, how he made my daughter Grace
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: happy by the way. She hasn't yet gone out in
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: public on the because it's a MAGA hat that he signed.
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: It's very nice make America Great Again hat, and it's funny.
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: A couple of times she thought about going out in
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: public with it. She was very excited to show it off.
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: I think the only place she's going to feel safe
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: here in South California wearing her red MAGA hat signed
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: by Charlie Kirk is when she goes to hang out
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: with her church friends on Wednesday nights. So that will
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: find out tonight what the reaction is to the MAGA
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: But she's not worn it in public because I think
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: she's afraid, and I think her mom is afraid of
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: what kind of reaction she might get here in southern California.
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: Even though we're not in a super blue area or
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: north of Los Angeles, we're in Ventura County. Still, it's
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: toxic enough, especially for a young girl, that you don't
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: want to deal with that. So that's been an interesting
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: side story regarding the Charlie Kirk situation. But bottom line
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: is turning into the curve. That's the main point of
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: this commentary. Turning into the curve, especially in the modern era,
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: I think is absolutely positively the right strategy. And by
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: the way, normally Trump does abide by this tactic. He
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: just didn't do it in regard to South Park, maybe
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: because they went after his dick. That's probably what happened
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: when you when you go out to Trump's dick, which
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: South Park did, mocking him rather relentlessly on that front,
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: that was probably a bridge too far for Trump to
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: turn into that particular curve. Now, when it comes to
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: turning into the curve, I really believe that the WNBA
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: could be learning a very important lesson from what's been
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: going on with Republicans and South Park. And I'm referencing
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: this bizarre and hilarious controversy that they have been dealing
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: with where over several weeks periodically there have been incidents
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: of fans throwing large, colorful dildos on to the court
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: during WNBA basketball games. And the WNBA being run as
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: a very very liberal, very very pc very very woke organization,
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: they buy and large have done everything but turn into
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: the curve. Interestingly, the only person that I've seen within
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: the WNBA that has turned into the curve on dildo
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: Gate is Sophie Cunningham. Sophie Cunningham is the very attractive,
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: tall blonde player on the Indiana Fever that has essentially
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: become Caitlin Clark's enforcer. She is a marketing genius. She's
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: not that great a basketball player, but she's beautiful and
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: she's on the right team, the Indiana Fever, which has
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: at least three heterosexual white females who are above average
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: in attractiveness, and Sophie Cunningham is way above average in attractiveness.
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: And so she openly on her brand new podcast and
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: on social media joked about the whole dildo situation and
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: joked about what would happen if it occurred to her,
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: and then lo, I believe this was dildo number three.
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: It did happen to her, and I have no doubt
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: that that wasn't a coincidence. Someone tossed a dildo at
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: her during the game. And what did she do. She
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: laughed about it, and she posted about it on social
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: media in a humorous way. So she turned into the curve. Meanwhile,
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: the entire league is acting like this is nine to eleven.
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: They literally like it's nine to eleven, banning bags. Fans
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: can't bring in bags because presumably that's, you know, a
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: way to prevent someone from bringing a large dildo into
• 40:39
  Speaker 1: the game. That didn't work, So then they came up
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: with this idea to put nets nets around the court.
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: So they're I mean, by the way, an enormous expense
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: and aggravation and a hindrance to the fan experience. So
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: you're gonna make this like a baseball game. I mean,
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: it's just completely ridicult when all they couldn't all they
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: had to do was laugh about it, and there would
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: have been no real incentive to keep doing it. The
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: only reason why this kept happening, and apparently it was
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: being done promoted, funded whatever, this operation by some sort
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: of a crypto group, which might be the first time
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: in history that a crypto group has provided some benefit
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: to society in the form of at least some humor
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: in exposing what a joke the WNBA is. But the
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: WNBA went in a completely opposite direction, actually giving the
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: dildos way more power than they deserve. And I fully
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: acknowledge it's a stupid thing to do, it's beyond juvenile.
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: But the WNBA got exposed as a joke league that
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: doesn't know how to handle basic situations and where they
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: should be turning into the curve. Just you do what
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: Sophie Cunningham did, laugh about it, it will go away.
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: But because they're run by a bunch of li liberls
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: who are super woke and are super sensitive and are
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: wanting to be victims all the time, it's not in
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: their DNA. And so I don't know whether not dildo
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: gate is over with, But as of this moment, there
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: hasn't been a dildo attack in recent days, so we'll
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: see what happens with that. Not too dissimilarly, when it
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: comes to sports, there are two other situations that have
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: happened over the last couple of days that certainly are
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: in the realm of PC and wokeness and virtue signaling.
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: The first is that Major League Baseball had a female
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: umpire for the first time in history. Now, I like
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: a lot of people were surprised to even know that
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: this had never happened before. Because it's happened in the
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: NBA and it's happened in the NFL. I'm not a
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: big fan of it, not because I have anything against
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: women being referees. It's because inherently, inherently, whenever you create
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: a circumstan dance like this, you're at least going to
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: have the suspicion. And it's not irrational that the person
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: being chosen to break such a barrier is being chosen
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: not because they're qualified, or they're good, or they're experienced,
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: but because they lack a penis, and that they're taking
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: a position over somebody else who may be more qualified,
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: more experience, maybe better at the job, may have actually
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: played baseball, for instance, or played football, for instance, which
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: women clearly have never done at a high level. I
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: mean that auto means does. It's not rocket science, so
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: it's it's basic common sense. Having played baseball might be
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: a good thing to have done if you want to
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: be a Major League Baseball umpire. Having played football tackle
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: football might be a good bit of experience to have
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: to be a National Football League referee when you consider
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: how comp the headitive these jobs are, how many thousands
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: and thousands of people would love to have them, and
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: who try to obtain them inherently, when you decide you're
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: gonna have oh well, this is a woman. My gosh,
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: she just happens to be one of the best referees
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: we have at our disposal. No, come on, that's not
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: the way this works. You've been chosen because you do
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: not have a penis. That's the essence of DEI. It's
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: not because and of course the worst part of DEI
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: is it puts suspicion on anybody. In this case, a
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: woman who gets a job like this, you automatically presume, oh,
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: you got your job because you don't have a penis. Well,
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: that doesn't do that any favors. And we've seen this
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: in the form of race all the time. We've completely
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: destroyed almost all accomplishment in the black community because whether
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: it's getting into elite schools or what have you, whatever
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: job it might be that's high profile, we automatically now
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: much presume that at least part of the reason they
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: got the gig was because of the color of their
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: skin and not the content of their character. And that's
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: the essence of why I despise DEI. So Major League
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: Baseball this past week had a female umpire for the
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: first time, and hilarity ensued. I mean, you really can't
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: even make this up. So after I think she umpired,
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: and she was an umpire for a couple of games,
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: and then she was the home plate umpire, and you know,
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: there's all this hype. First time a female was behind
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: the plate for a major league baseball game. First pitch
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: comes down and it's clearly inside, it's clearly a ball,
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: and she calls it a strike. She misses, clearly misses,
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: her first ball and strike call as an umpire in
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: major league baseball. And it wasn't even close. Now, this
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: happens all the time now, especially that we have these
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: computer generated strike zones, and I think we're now realizing
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: for the first time of the last couple of years,
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: just how bad even major league umpires are and how
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: regularly they missed very clearly balls and strikes. But this
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: was really bad. But the reason why it was significant
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: was this was the very first pitch ever umpired behind
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: home plate by a female umpire. And then, because history
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: is everything, right, we might it's history, uberallis, even if
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: it's contrived history. They take the baseball and they take
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: it out of play because it's now an historic artifact.
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: Cannot make this up.
• 46:47
  Speaker 3: So yes, it's a historic artifact that the first female
• 46:51
  Speaker 3: uppire blew the first ball and strike call in the
• 46:55
  Speaker 3: history of female umpires in Major League baseball.
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: Good job, everybody, way to go. And as it turns out,
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: in that game. Her umpiring made lots of mistakes. It was,
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: I believe, statistically below average, which is not good because
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: major League baseball umpiring, from what I can tell, is
• 47:15
  Speaker 1: terrible these days. I don't I don't know, honestly whether
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: or not it's always been this bad, or whether or
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: not we now have the statistics and the technology to
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: be able to discern just how bad the umpiring is.
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: But I'm sorry. I mean, look, I've never major I've
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: never been a Major league umpired, never been a player
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: past the high school level. I have umpired as a
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: teenager little league games. It's hard for me to understand.
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: I realized the speed there is nowhere near what it
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: is and major League baseball, but balls and strike shouldn't
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: be that difficult. It really should not be that difficult.
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: And to catastrophically blow your first call then have that
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: baseball be taken out of the game because it's now
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: going to it's now going to the Hall of Fame,
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: I don't know. It's just completely ridiculous and such an
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: indication of how absurd our times really are now. Not
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: totally dissimilar from that, the National Football League has a
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: bit of controversy going on when it comes to gender,
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: because the Minnesota Vikings have decided to add men for
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: the first time to their cheerleading squad. Now this is
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: interesting to me because liberals have tried to claim, well,
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: this is no big deal. You're adding men to the
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: formerly all female cheerleading squad for the Minnesota Vikings. And
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: my goodness, you Republicans, your conservatives. Don't you realize that
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: George W. Bush was a cheerleader at Yale. Don't you
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: realize that Ronald Reagan was some sort of a cheerleader
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: at some point. Come on, you're a bunch of hypocrites. No,
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: those are not analogous situations. Men have been cheerleaders on
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: the college level for a very long time because they
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: are there to support the stars who are the women.
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: They're literally there to help push them up into whatever
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: position they want to get into, catch them when they
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: do jumps and leaps. They're there for some muscle in
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: a supportive role of the female cheerleaders. Right, there's nothing
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: wrong with that. And by the way, under those circumstances,
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: I wouldn't really care if the man was straight or
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: the man was gay. It wouldn't matter to me. That
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: is a perfectly understandable, logical role for a man to
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: be able to be there because they need some muscle
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: to perform the cheerleading tricks. That is not the situation
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: in the National Football Number one, they don't do those
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: tricks in the National Football League. National Football League. Cheerleaders
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: are there for TNA. That's all they're there for. Okay,
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: some of them look really good, others not as good,
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: but generally it's there for the male experience, all right.
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: They're they're borderline strippers, and these male cheerleaders are not
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: there to be supportive of them. They're being there. They're
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: there as one of them, and they are openly gay.
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: Now that matters because you're taking an experience, a fantasy
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: that is supposed to be enticing to the heterosexual mail,
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: and you're putting in the middle of it something that
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: is about as much of a buzzkill as you could
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: possibly imagine for a heterosexual mail, and that is putting
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: a homosexual mail in the role of one of these cheerleaders.
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: And people are upset about it, and liberals are trying
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: to mix and match with the Bush and Reagan analogies
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: and others saying, oh, this is just homophobia. Now, it's
• 51:15
  Speaker 1: not homophobia. You're destroying the experience. And to whom are
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: you appealing. That's the part of this that never makes
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: any sense with wokeness. Right, we see this time and
• 51:27
  Speaker 1: time again. What's the audience for this? I mean, the
• 51:32
  Speaker 1: number of what homosexual men who are going to be
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: enticed artillated by this is got to be minuscule. Who
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: are Minnesota Vikings fans who are really excited to see
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: gay men be part of the Minnesota Vikings cheerleading squad.
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: It's just completely ridiculous, and it shows that despite Trump's victory,
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: we are so far from killing political correctness, so far
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: from killing wokeness. It is still a disease, a viral
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: strain that is still very very much alive and has
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: not been eradicated. And it's not even been eradicated in
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: the National Football League. In fact, I would argue that
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: it's as bad in the National Football League as it's
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: ever been and probably still getting worse, even though you know,
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: Trump has been you know, trying to drum up some
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: semblance of a chance of changing the Washington Commanders back
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: to the Washington Redskins. I'm becoming more and more convinced
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: that's never going to happen because he stopped talking about it.
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: I mean, here he is federalizing the DC Police, clearly
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: has all sorts of authority over everything that happens in Washington,
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: d C. And he stopped talking about changing the commanders
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: into the Redskins. So I was already pessimistic about whether
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: or not he was ever really going to follow through
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: on that, and now I'm becoming even more pessimistic. And
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: when it comes to the National Football League, as we
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: gear up for the season to start in a couple
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: of weeks, I did a rather extensive diatribe in the
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: last episode of the podcast about how incredibly troubling it
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: is the National Football League now owns ten percent of
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: ESPN and all of the ramifications for that. When it
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: comes to the death of journalism, I mean, sports journalism,
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: especially ESPN is already on life support. But how in
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: the world do you possibly cover the NFL when they
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: own ten percent of your company. It's literally not possible,
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: especially in this day and age where the corporate bigwigs
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: are completely in control. Almost none of the talent has
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: any real leverage. They're all just hanging on for dear
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: life for their except for a couple of you know,
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: maybe you know at Pat McAfee or Stephen A. Smith
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: at ESPN. Other than that, everybody else is on the
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: chopping block. There's cutbacks all over the play. Nobody has
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: an audience large enough to give them any leverage to
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: have true freedom to go against the corporate overlords. And so,
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: you know, I think this is a major story that's
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: been vastly underrated when it comes to the impact on
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: ESPN's coverage of the National Football League. Well, now we
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: learn in an interview with the new head of what
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: was CBS Paramount that effectively the NFL now owns part
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: of CBS, which is obviously a major news sports outlet
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: that covers the National Football League that the CBS carries
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: obviously the National Football League. They have the CBS Sports Network.
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: And so how in the world can CBS News in
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: sixty minutes and CBS Sports and the CBS Sports Network,
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: How in the world can they possibly objectively cover football
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: league when the NFL is a part owner of their
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: broadcasting outlet. It is not possible. And now we have
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: a situation where the National Football League, and this is
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: not totally new, it's just going to a new level
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: of absurdity. I mean, just the fact that the National
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: Football League was business partners with virtually every major broadcast
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: outlet was already problematic. But now it's gone from being
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: a broadcast partner where there's an exchange, you know, we
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: give you product, you give us money. Now it's actual ownership,
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: which is a course of a completely different color. It's
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: something that first of all, can never be really reversed.
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: But it also it just entrenches the idea everybody at CBS,
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: everybody at ESPN is going to know we have to
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: tread lightly on the National Football League. We have to
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: get anything that might be constrat virtual approved by the
• 56:01
  Speaker 1: higher ups. And by the way, the higher ups who
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: don't give a flying fuck about journalism are never going
• 56:07
  Speaker 1: to improve anything. I mean, I know this from my
• 56:10
  Speaker 1: own career. You never get approval from higher ups, especially
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: of this day and age, to do anything that's remotely risky,
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: because they don't care. And that was not always the case.
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: Ownership used to care at least a little bit. They
• 56:26
  Speaker 1: at least pretended to care about journalism. They see journalism
• 56:30
  Speaker 1: now as nothing but a nuisance, and so the chilling
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: effect here is going to be profound, and I believe
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: the ramifications are going to be substantial. Now, before I
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: get to the issue of ramifications on the journalism, there's
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: another element of this whole NFL owning ESPN or part
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: of ESPN and part of CBS that is not being
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: talked about at all, or hardly at all. There were
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: a couple of tweets that went viral on where someone
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: calculated the amount of money it will take for an
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: NFL fan to watch every single NFL game this year,
• 57:11
  Speaker 1: and it's in well over one thousand dollars. Not only
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: is it well over one thousand dollars, it's also a
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: massive aggravation because you've got to sign up for all
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: sorts of different streaming apps and cable and all sorts.
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: I mean, it's almost impossible, but it's cost a lot
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: of money and a lot of aggravation to get a
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: situation where you can watch every single NFL football game.
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: And that's one issue, you know, the issue of what
• 57:37
  Speaker 1: happened to free television. I mean, the NFL used to
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: be free, but it was also very restricted. You know,
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: back in the glory days of the seventies, eighties, and nineties,
• 57:48
  Speaker 1: when I grew up as a huge NFL fan, you
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: were only assured of getting your home team's games on
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: free television and so and that was only if you
• 58:01
  Speaker 1: sold out. So there were these blackout rules that basically
• 58:05
  Speaker 1: incentivized your home team to sell the games out and occasionally,
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: you know, teams got to buy their own tickets to
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: make sure that their game was on television locally. And this,
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: to me, well it was highly criticized, was brilliant and
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: I think this system was at the center of what
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: made the National Football League so popular because there was
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: an inherent scarcity. I'm a big believer that that sometimes
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: you have too much of something. You know, we live
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: in a world of supply and demand. Sometimes less is more,
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: And the National Football League figured out, I believe, brilliantly
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: during this era that you're going to do a couple
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: of important things by focusing each individual market. Back in
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: the over the air, free television era, on the home team,
• 59:02
  Speaker 1: you had geography that mattered, your home team mattered. You
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: were almost brainwashed into being a fan of your home team,
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: your home market team, because those were the only games
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: you saw. I mean, for instance, like the Atlanta Falcons
• 59:20
  Speaker 1: were never a good team, but the entire South got
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: Atlanta Falcons games because there were the Charlotte team didn't
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: exist yet and Jacksonville didn't exist yet. So I mean
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: there were massive markets that weren't even close to Atlanta
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: that that was their home team, and so there was
• 59:40
  Speaker 1: a connection that was made to the team. And that also,
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: by the way, made Monday Night football incredibly significant because
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: that was oftentimes the only game in a week where
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: the entire nation was seeing the same game. And then
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: you got Sunday Night football, Thursday night football, and you
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 1: generally got a national game on Sunday afternoon, but sometimes
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: you didn't get that depending on what was going on
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 1: with your home team, and it was confusing and sometimes
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: it was nonsensical, but it created a loyalty to your
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 1: home market team. And now we're living in a completely
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: different world. Television has totally changed. Cable has collapsed. Over
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: the air means basically nothing. Some of these rules still exist,
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: but they're basically irrelevant because you, if you're a big
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 1: enough fan, can purchase the entire slate of games, So
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: scarcity is gone and connection to your home team has
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: totally eroded. And then you add on top of that,
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: the focus on fantasy football and betting, and to me,
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: this is where the National Football League is really in
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: dangerous territory. I would love to know if they even
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: give a shit about this, if they understand how dangerous
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 1: this is. But almost everything they are doing has eroded
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: the connection between the fan, the core fan, and a
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 1: specific team. The loyalty is no longer to a team.
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 1: It's loyalty to whoever is on their fantasy team or
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 1: whatever team they're betting on, or they can be a
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 1: fan of whoever they want throughout the entire league, because
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 1: now they can, if they have enough money, they can
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 1: watch all their games, even the ones that aren't on
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 1: Monday or Sunday night or Thursday night. And there's nothing
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: special about Monday or Sunday or Thursday night anymore. The specialness,
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: the magic has been completely dissipated, and so I think
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 1: an entire generation of football fans or would be football fans,
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: are becoming attached not to a team via their city
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: where they live, but instead to these things that can
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: change on a dime, and do change on a dime,
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: with free agency and retirements and injuries and who's on
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: your fantasy team and who's popular in the moment, and
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: so to me, what's eventually gonna happen? And I realize,
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: you know, I'm an EU or I'm a pessimist. A
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 1: lot of sometimes I'm overly pessimistic in my predictions. But
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 1: if I'm the National Football League, I am very concerned
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: about the long term future because eventually the generation, my
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 1: generation that still is attached to teams because that's the
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: way it worked when we were kids, is going to
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 1: die off. And now you're gonna have no core fans.
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 1: So who's going to show up and pay a ridiculous
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: amount of money to you know, go through parking and
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: traffic and concessions and tickets to go to these games.
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: You got to really be a hardcore fan. And I'm
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: not saying that, you know, no one's gonna go to
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 1: NFL games'll be popular right now. I'm not talking about
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: this in the next year or two whatever. I'm talking
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 1: about ten twenty years from now where this connection is eroding.
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: And it's because of the changing media landscape and the
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: NFL designing. They need to cash out now. They are
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: selling their magic beings now, damning the future, and they've
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 1: done it in all sorts of ways, and I think
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: this also goes to the wissification of the sport and
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: the focus. For instance, another great example of this is
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 1: embracing the whole tailor swift effect. I mean that has
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 1: worked for them in the short run. All these decisions
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 1: are being made in the short run and the long
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: term be dammed. And I think that what we're seeing
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: with streaming is exactly that. And you know, there's so
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: many problems with streaming. The weird weirdest part about streaming
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: to me is that it feels like we're kind of
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: evolving back to a cable universe, only it's going to
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: be more expensive and more difficult both to navigate and
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: more complicated. But that's another story for another day. But
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: the CBS NFL ownership situation is also troubling, much like
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: the ESPN one, and it's indication of the death of journalism,
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: especially in sports, and where lots of negative things are
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: going to happen in the future that we're not even
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 1: gonna know about. Let me just give you a couple
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: of real quick examples. You know, the John Gruden situation.
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: There was a legal decision by the Nevada Supreme Court.
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 1: You may recall, John Gruden was the coach of the Raiders.
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 1: He suddenly got fired when someone ordered a code read
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 1: on him, or emails that he sent that were misinterpreted
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: in my view that where he wasn't even an employee
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 1: of the National Football League at the time, were made public.
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: I actually think this is directly involved in the whole
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: Washington Redskin name controversy, or at least indirectly for complicated
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: reasons I'm not going to get into, but the point
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 1: is someone ordered a code red on John Gruden, he
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: got fired, he sued for defamation, and now the Supreme
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 1: Court in Nevada has ruled that his case can be
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 1: go forward and he can go forward publicly, which is
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 1: going to be very, very problematic for the National Football
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 1: League because if discovery occurs as expected, we're going to
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 1: find out exactly what happened there and who ordered the
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 1: code ren on John Gruden, and there's a darn good
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: chance that's not going to be good for Roger Goodell
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 1: or for the league in general. Well, how in the
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 1: world can ESPN or CBS or any of the other
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 1: broadcast partners of the National Football League cover a story
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: like that in a remotely objective fashion. They can't because
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 1: they're too deeply embedded and literally invested in the National
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: Football League and vice versa. And so I'll be fascinated
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 1: to see how that whole thing goes down. You know,
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 1: normally the National probably will settle with Gruden, But normally
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: the National Football League would be terrified, terrified of where
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 1: this is going. From a discovery perspective, they might not
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: be that terrified because they know that the sports media
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 1: is completely in their back pocket and will spike whatever
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: they want spiked. So that'll be that'll be an interesting
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: test case to see what happens there with regard to
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 1: how much control the National Football League really has over
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 1: the broadcast outlets that cover them more directly and more specifically,
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: there was an episode that occurred during the first full
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 1: week of the National Football League preseason slate of games
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: that to me personified so much of what is wrong
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 1: with the National Football League, so much with what is
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: wrong with sports, and so much is what is wrong
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 1: with our society in general, especially when it comes to
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: feelings and panic, and you know, where we're so afraid
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 1: of taking any sort of risk whatsoever, and how soft
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 1: we have become in every possible way, and how broadcasters
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: are contributing to this very very dramatically. What I'm referring
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: to is an exhibition or a preseason game between the
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 1: Trent Lions and the Atlanta Falcons, and it's the beginning
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: of the fourth quarter and a Lions player by the
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 1: name of Maurice Norris gets badly injured, seemingly badly injured
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 1: head injury, seem to be either knocked out or somewhat paralyzed,
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: not moving on the field. This happens periodically. It's one
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 1: of the unfortunate realities of playing tackle football. You cannot
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: play tackle football without this happening occasionally, and it's a
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 1: serious matter, and it took quite a while to get
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: Norris off the field, but by and large, other than
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: in the DeMar Hamlin situation, which was pretty unique because
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 1: he had a cardiac arrest and effectively died on the field,
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: and it was very very clear that he was unresponsive,
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: and that was an extreme situation. Even as extreme as
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: that was, it turns out DeMar Hamlin was not only okay,
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 1: he ended up playing and still playing in the National
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 1: Football League. So you know that in retrospect, that whole
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 1: situation was completely overreacted to, and I still don't believe
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: we know the truth about what really transpired there. I've
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 1: talked about that extensively, many many times. But even the
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 1: DeMar Hamblin circumstance turned out just fine for DeMar Hamlin,
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 1: and it looked like, as has always been the case,
• 1:08:41
  Speaker 1: the game was going to continue on after Norris had
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 1: been removed from the field. So I'm going to play
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 1: two clips here because I think the way the broadcasters
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 1: handled this was extremely telling, extremely telling about one the
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 1: nature of broadcast they did. Two is how terrified everyone
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: is of doing anything that is seen as UNPC and
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: we have to take into account everyone's feelings and we
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: can't take any risk, and how people's incentive structure directly
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 1: impacts what they're going to say on air. The first
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 1: clip I'm going to play here is in the aftermath
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 1: of Norris being removed from the field, the game, as
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 1: it has always happened in the past, whether preseason or
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 1: regular season or postseason, the game went on. You have
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 1: to continue the game, because if you don't continue the game,
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 1: and you set a precedent that we're going to stop
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: the game, then then what's the new line, Where is
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 1: the line? What is the standard? So you must continue
• 1:09:44
  Speaker 1: on unless the circumstances are incredibly extreme, and it looked
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 1: like that might be the case with DeMar Hamlin. But
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 1: even in that situation, everything turned out just fine. And
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: that caused all sorts of problems for the NASH the
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 1: Football League, because that was an importan in regular season game,
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 1: and they ended up having to do all sorts of
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 1: crazy things and set all sorts of bad precedents. So
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: this game looked like it was going to continue on,
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 1: and I want you to listen as the announcer, the
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 1: play by play guy is rather confused. He's trying to
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 1: figure out what is going on because there's a snap
• 1:10:24
  Speaker 1: of the ball, but there's no play and the players
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 1: just stand there. And you're not going to be able
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 1: to see this because it's an audio podcast, but it
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 1: looks to me as if the players are essentially signaling
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 1: that they're going on strike, that they don't want to
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 1: continue playing and listen to the announcer confused trying to
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 1: figure out what was going on. And this is before
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 1: any decision had been officially announced about what was going
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: to happen to the fourth quarter of this game, And
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 1: here's what it sounded like on the broadcast.
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 4: Minutes and I just hope he's okay. It's like they're
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 4: gonna let a play go.
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 5: It looks like Emery Jones was looking up, they were
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 5: ready to snap the ball. I'm not sure exactly what
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 5: is happening. We're getting reports that there might be a
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 5: clock issue at the moment. What turned what was a
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 5: really good game, exciting fun has turned on its side
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 5: right now. And Sean hockeyly the referee, he's not doing anything.
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 5: Could this be them just letting the clock run out?
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 5: But I don't think you would do that, would you?
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 5: Would you just call the game if that were the case.
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 1: Both teams are talking in the middle and.
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 5: Now they're just going to come in to pray.
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 1: Oh my gosh.
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 4: And we did see coach Campbell and coach Morris speaking
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 4: for a moment, and you wonder if they did question
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 4: given the potential serious nature of this injury.
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 5: Now the entire crowd has stood up.
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 1: All right now. It's important to point out that broadcaster
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 1: clearly never thought about the idea that the game was
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 1: going to be canceled. He's confused, he doesn't understand what
• 1:12:47
  Speaker 1: is happening. He's starting to think, well, what are they doing?
• 1:12:50
  Speaker 1: Are they going to run out the clock? This doesn't
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 1: make any sense, which I'm one hundred percent with him.
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 1: If I had been broadcasting this game, and many many
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 1: years ago, I used to to do television broadcasts for
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 1: high school football games in Ohio and West Virginia, if
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 1: I had been broadcasting this game, I would have had
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 1: a very similar reaction to what the play by play
• 1:13:10
  Speaker 1: announcer did during that set of circumstances. But then the
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: officials announced that the game is being canceled. The whole
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 1: fourth quarter is not going to be played, and this
• 1:13:26
  Speaker 1: will not be an official football game. We're all going home.
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 1: So if you were somebody on the sidelines hoping to
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 1: get your one shot to prove you can play in
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 1: the National Football League and that's going to happen in
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 1: the fourth quarter of the first preseason game, sorry, you're
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 1: out of luck. Your whole life, your maybe your whole
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 1: life's work has been for nothing. Your one shot has
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 1: just been taken away from you. And oh, by the way,
• 1:13:52
  Speaker 1: if your kid and you can't afford to go to
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 1: a regular season football game and you get to go
• 1:13:57
  Speaker 1: to this preseason game. Yeah, we're only going to get
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 1: three quarters. And if you were better and you for
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 1: some reason put a bet on this game, there's not
• 1:14:06
  Speaker 1: going to be a result in this game. Because this
• 1:14:09
  Speaker 1: game is not going to be official. We're gonna, you know,
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 1: we're gonna claim that it's postponed, but there's never going
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 1: to be a rescheduling of it. It's just over with.
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 1: And listen to how the broadcaster completely changes as Dune
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 1: and claims that no one's going to argue with this decision.
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 1: This is obviously the right decision. And then the color
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 1: guy comes in, and I thought this was really interesting.
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 1: He clearly understands that a lot of fans are going
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 1: to be upset by this, and he tries to make
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 1: the argument of well, you know, the NFL is changing, folks.
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 1: It's changing, meaning it's becoming way way what'sified and way
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 1: too soft. And this is even before we knew that
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 1: the player involved is perfectly fine. I mean, Norris is
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 1: now back with the TV. He's a concussion protocol. This
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 1: turns out to not be an unusual injury at all,
• 1:15:06
  Speaker 1: and yet here we have announcers immediately telling us clearly
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 1: doing exactly what the league wants to try to put
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 1: lipstick on this pig, that somehow this is not only
• 1:15:19
  Speaker 1: the correct result, it's the only thing the league could
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 1: possibly do under these extraordinary circumstances. And here's what that
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 1: sounded like at this point, per New York, this game
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: is suspended.
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 5: So we just got the word from Sean Hockey League
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 5: from New York. But this game has now been suspended.
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 5: And I don't think anybody here in the stadium, here
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 5: in the booths, or on the fields disagree with them.
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 4: The game is changing, right You mentioned with the rules,
• 1:16:03
  Speaker 4: the protocols, the equipment to make it safer, but also
• 1:16:05
  Speaker 4: the mindset and the mentality when it comes to injuries,
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 4: recognizing that these are human lives, right that we're out
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 4: here and it's not just this brutal blood sport anymore.
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 4: You know, this is a game where people fully understand
• 1:16:24
  Speaker 4: the implications when you step between those lines, and to
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 4: see the evolution of players and coaches saying, you know what,
• 1:16:32
  Speaker 4: our health and safety and our emotional health for the
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 4: players who are able to continue this game, say it's
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 4: not worth it to put them in any sort of
• 1:16:41
  Speaker 4: precarious situation. That speaks volumes about how far the game
• 1:16:45
  Speaker 4: has come.
• 1:16:46
  Speaker 1: I found that whole exchange to be so incredibly telling
• 1:16:51
  Speaker 1: and so depressing because right there you have a situation
• 1:16:56
  Speaker 1: where the announcers, clearly from the play by play first
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 1: reaction and from the color analysts, you know, jumping in
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 1: and trying to explain how the league is changing. They
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 1: know this is ridiculous, but they have to take the
• 1:17:12
  Speaker 1: league's position on it. They can't push back against the
• 1:17:16
  Speaker 1: league at all. And I realize there's a lot that's
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 1: unknown at that time. And this is this is where
• 1:17:23
  Speaker 1: the whole risk aversion thing is so difficult to combat
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 1: because inherently you're never gonna know how bad an injury
• 1:17:31
  Speaker 1: is at the time, but statistically, almost every single time
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 1: the injured player turns out to be okay. And there
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 1: are there were far, far worse injuries that have occurred
• 1:17:47
  Speaker 1: in even preseason games where games went on. It's that
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 1: this one, I guess, looked dramatic because it took a
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 1: long time to get the player off the field. Now,
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 1: to me, there's a couple of elements of this that
• 1:17:59
  Speaker 1: are in pot even though it's just the preseason game one.
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 1: I just exposed the true nature of broadcasting and how
• 1:18:07
  Speaker 1: much power the National Football League has and how the
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 1: narrative will change to whatever the National Football League wants,
• 1:18:13
  Speaker 1: and that's going to have ramifications, especially with the changing
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 1: media landscape going forward. Thanks for listening to today's free
• 1:18:21
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• 1:18:24
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