Latest / The Sense and Senseless Podcast / Ep: 79 The Legal Theft: Fraud, Red Tape, and the Regulatory Tax
Transcript
- Bryan: we all hear about the fraud in our country. We all hear about how much money is being stolen from us, the American taxpayer. But we don't talk enough about the legal version of the same thing. Not a headline scandal, the everyday version. Rules written by agencies, enforced by paperwork, priced into everything you buy, and it's all defended as for your safety. Tonight we walk you through how it works in plain terms, what the estimates say it costs, who's getting paid to manage it, and why once the system is built, there's not much you can do about it. Hello, welcome back to the Sense and Census Podcast. I am Brian. Jason: Name Jason. Bryan: Yeah, J-Doh. This is your first time joining us. Welcome to the family. We're just two guys discussing shit in a way that everyone can understand. Tonight is another look at how money leaves your pocket without a vote and without a receipt that you can challenge. We start with fraud numbers, everyone quotes. And then move to the choir the costs like regulation, compliance, and the businesses built to navigate both. All right, Jason, you got anything before we kick this shit off? Jason: Roll it, baby. Bryan: I I wanna start this episode off with a video from JD Vance this week, talking about fraud. Jason: Mm. Bryan: Where's our money? Didn't get the money back? We sent us some so now we gotta pay to to to house them. Where's our money? I don't know. Sounds great though. I mean I'm not picking at J D Vance. I think it's good that they're breaking down on cracking down on fraud. Not from what I understand, I mean we Jason: Yeah, but they crack down on the fraud they want to crack down, dude. Bryan: I believe I believe that too. Jason: Man, I d you know, I read into what we're gonna go over and all that stuff and there's something down here towards the bottom we're gonna talk about, I think in this one. I wanna give up any Yep. There it is, the very last thing we're gonna talk about. That thing can like pick out the shit out of anybody, but we can't fucking here you go, got the F words coming out my mouth. Lord knows I was spilling out pretty good on vacation, whatnot. But anyways, th it's fraud, yeah. Bryan: And that was fraud. The F word tonight is fraught. Remember that fraud? Jason: Yeah. It's a five letter F word. I'm just do you know what I I get visions like stuff pops in my head sometimes when we're talking about stuff and I envision things. It's kinda like when police departments and sheriffs or whoever makes these the state police makes these big bust all these money and guns seized and all this stuff. But yet that department in six months is struggling with funds. Bryan: They they outside shaking a boot, tr Jason: Yeah. Bryan: tr trying to get funds out of red light. Jason: Didn't you just Bus this d with all this money why c w you gonna tell me it's sitting in some damn safe just sitting there as they okay. He's already b they have already been found guilty. So so where's that money go? Bryan: You don't think we got just stacks of money from all the drug deals that been arrested and Jason: Yeah. Bryan: I mean just sitting there that nobody's touching. Okay. Jason: Yeah. Just like I think back to the where they they blew up that boat, right? Remember when we were showing the videos of blowing Bryan: yeah, yeah. Jason: the boats up that were drug smuggling? Why don't we capture that thing, get the shit out of it? Like you said, where's our money at? You you busted these people, where's the money at? W you had to have seized something. Bryan: Evidently not. They spent it all to assassinate that dude in Haiti. Probably costs a lot of money to assassinate somebody these days. Especially in I don't know. Might not cost that much in Haiti. We have to look into the Jason: Yeah, they probably hired like who was it? not John well, John Wick could be, you know, asked who. Bryan: They are they hired John Wick's retarded brother? No. Jason: Yeah. Probably. Or damn, I can't think of the other the other actor that was Yeah. Bryan: For a couple of hundred thousand dollars you ain't hiring John Wick. Jason: No, you gotta have one of them damn gold coins or whatever that they pass around there. But I'm Bryan: Yeah, w whatever that's worth. Jason: just yeah, I'm just getting at man, like you said, where's where's the damn money? I mean, yeah, y you're gonna put these people in prison for two decades. That's more money than it cost us to take care of these bastards. Bryan: Yeah. Exactly. Jason: Why we execute Don't do it down in Tennessee though, 'cause they struggling with execution right now. Bryan: I'm about to say they can't they can't even kill motherfuckers anymore. Jason: They said they were I seen a meme where they were gonna send Lauren Clancy down there to clean it up with her with her workout strap. Too soon for that one or what? Yeah. Bryan: That's sad. No, I thought that was funny. I thought that was funny. Jason: Just tell Lauren that's your that's your child over there, you miss one. shit. Bryan: That case it yeah, that case itself is just fucked up. I mean when you when you this is that's how fucked up this country is. When you have a fifty fifty Jason: You can't even take people out. Bryan: split on a woman that just strangled her fucking children, I mean how do you have some Jason: No, it wasn't fifty fifty, it was one cat that hung it up. Bryan: No, no, I'm talking about well, yeah, in in in the court, but I'm just talking about when you look at it on the internet, you would believe that it's a fifty Jason: yeah, and you had a woman that killed her kid because she was so entangled in that from Illinois. Yes. Bryan: Are you serious? Like a copycat? Wow. I didn't know that. Jason: Yes. Gosh dang, you gonna make me yeah, cause any time I bring that shit up, I I I got PTSD from the Bryan: That's fucked up. I mean, how would you want to you kill your own child? The other bitch was crazy. And if you agree with this stuff, please let me know. I mean, in the comments or send us something on our email at the sense and senseless podcast at outlook.com. I'm curious. I don't understand how you support a woman that strangled her children. I mean, even if she was s in a psychotic state for that short period of time and she was out of her mind and she killed her children. That could happen again. And it's still fucked up. I can understand. I can't understand it. Jason: Cory Corey Walsh, a forty year old mother from Frankfurt, Illinois, killed her killed Bryan: That killed our Jason: her two year old son 'cause she was closely following the Lindsey Clancy murder trial. Bryan: That's fucked up. Jason: And was texting her friends hours before she did it. Bryan: So she premeditated doing that shit. Jason: Yeah. Walsh was charged with three counts of first degree murder or no, that was Bryan: So that was Clancy, that was texting the friends why she did it? Wolves. But she only killed one kid. Jason: No, Walsh. This Corey Walsh, forty year old mother from Frankfurt, Illinois, was so entangled Bryan: But she killed Jason: in that case of Lar Lauren Clancy, she killed her two year old son. She only killed one she only had one. Bryan: But she only killed one kid. no, but you just said something about three kids. That's why I was just trying to clear that up. Jason: Well no, it says Walsh was charged with three counts of first degree murder. I don't know why they got her f for three Bryan: Okay. Jason: when she only killed one kid, but they I guess they're gonna smoke her. Bryan: I don't know. I don't I don't know enough about the law. But what I was saying was it's not that I can understand her killing her first kid. I can if you're gonna use the psychosis argument, if you strangled one kid and you killed him and you were still under psychosis enough to strangle another kid and then under psychosis enough to strangle another, I I don't I j I just don't buy into that. You know, that's a little bit gone a little too long. Jason: Yes. Bryan: In my opinion. I think at some point you you would have to break out of that when you fucking strang it's not like you just went over there and shot your kid in the head. And you went over there and you you it took you a little bit of time to strangle that damn child. Jason: yeah, that doesn't hand hand or happen instantly. That takes time and then you did it three times. Bryan: Exactly. So yeah, the psychosis thing, man, I I don't I don't buy that argument. It's just fucked up. Jason: No, no. No. I don't either. And hey, whoever the dude was that hung it up, thank you. I just gonna say it. Thank you. Thank you for having the boss. Bryan: Thank you. I agree with you, thank you. Jason: Cause I heard the other there was others in there wanting to hang it up and then they they jumped on the train because they wanted to get out of there. They wanted to go home. And this dude stood his ground. Well Bryan: I can understand that. I can see that. Jason: I can see it, but I don't believe in it, man. Stand your ground. Yeah. Yes. Bryan: I I don't agree with it at all, but I can see why you'd want to do it, especially if you trapped in there with a bunch of fucking freaks that is just coming at you like fucking rabbit dogs. You Jason: Women, yeah, that yeah. Yeah. Bryan: know, yeah, you know, we just like we'll we're about to see I'm about to show you what she did. Take my belt off and just Jason: Yeah. Beat Now, am I in the right for this, huh? I want these same people as my jurors cause I'll get off for this. Bryan: I had a psychosis moment. That's right. Jason: Yeah, voice told me in the in my head that these women were all antichrist. Take them out. But anyways, we're way off subject from fraud here. Yeah, squirrel. Bryan: Yeah, we we are score Jason: But no, it is a form of fraud. But anyways, yeah, we're I say take these people out. I'm sorry, it if it if you're getting caught stealing ma I still think they need to make a special island for people like this, dude, and just throw out there. Bryan: Yeah, let all survive on whatever they can get. I mean they steal it from us. They're stealing from every one of you. The White House Task Force, the fraud task force, Tally has cited that about $260 billion in fraud has been uncovered since January 2025. The Government Accountability Office, or GAO, estimates that $233 to $521 billion a year lost to federal fraud. Two hundred and thirty-three to five hundred and twenty-one billion fucking dollars a year. Lost to Freud. Some estimates are as high as a trillion dollars. That's your tax dollars. Just fucking poof. Gone. Jason: Yeah, and you wonder why we're in debt. Bryan: The good news, and we talked about this before, everyday people have been bringing this shit to light. So we got some whistleblowers that actually bring a lot of this fraud that we find in the light. And because there's incentives into this shit. The whistleblower can receive between 15 and 30 percent of the money that's recovered. In fiscal year 2025, there was almost $7 billion recovered in fraud. All right, let me go back to these numbers just so you motherfuckers don't forget. They saying two hundred and thirty three to five hundred and twenty one billion a year is stolen from you, some estimates of a trillion dollars. All right. Jason: Only seven billion recovered. Bryan: Thank you. Yes, seven billion was recovered. I just want to make sure everybody understands that math. The payout that year for the Jason: All right. Yeah, you keep talking. I'm gonna find out what the percentage is of that. It's not it's not good. It sounds like a lot, but it's not Bryan: No, the payout that Jason: good. Bryan: the payout to the whistleblowers in twenty twenty five totaled roughly three hundred and thirty million dollars. And I I don't have the breakdown of how mint much went to each individual or how many individuals were paid just to record a payout. However, there was one report that does point out the largest known single award was about sixty million dollars from the three hundred and fifty million dollar Walgreen settlement. And that's not a bad reward. I mean I Would you call your own company out for fucking sixty million dollars? You know, would would you take the fucking stand and be like, Yeah. Jason: For sixty million? Hell yeah, because I could retire. Bryan: A lot of people can retire over sixty million. Yeah, so a recovery is just a small fraction of what the estimated fraud is. And Jason, I think, is trying to figure out the percentage right now. So I would assume that all of you would agree that the fraud in this country is pretty bad. Now, so let's talk about a hidden cost to all of us that we don't really ever talk about. What you got? Three percent is what we're recovering from fraud? Jason: Three percent. Sa yeah, of two thirty three. Seven seven billion of two hundred and thirty three billion. Bryan: That that's on the low end. Jason: That's on the low. So let's do what is seven billion Bryan: Do five twenty one. Jason: Of five twenty one billion. one point three four percent. Bryan: Boking. Jason: Yeah. We're really making a dent in this. Bryan: Sad, man, it's sad. Fucking sad. So so we can agree though that fraud in this country is bad, right? Can we can we at least say we can agree on that? Jason: Dude, you rile me up the more every time we talk about fraud, dude, you get me riled up 'cause yes, it is it's horrible. Wasteful spending, Bryan: All right. So that Jason: fraud. I'm you know how sensitive I am with money because I've had some money issues and I get real sensitive about it. So yes. Bryan: Okay, so I'm gonna talk about something tonight that's a hidden cost to all of you. And it's worse, in my opinion, than fraud. Not that we should have fraud, we need to get rid of both of them. So let's talk about this hidden cost and the hidden cost of doing business in the United States. Let's talk about government regulations. Now, I'm not an expert on this shit, no, I'm gonna try to be one. So Don't come at me about, well, you didn't statement. Look, this is just we I'm a simple motherfucker just trying to break this down in a simple way to where we can all fucking understand. Let's get that shit out right now. All right. And I just find this shit interesting because It just sucks money right out of the hands of the taxpayers without really no benefits to you. The more regulations the government writes, the more it costs you as a taxpayer. In simple terms, a federal regulation is a binding rule written by a federal agency to carry out a law Congress passed. Congress sets a goal in a statute. The agency fills in the details with who must do what, how to prove it, and what happens if they don't, right? So it kind of works like this. Congress says the cars must be safe. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration didn't write specific rules for like crash test standards and airbag requirements, and the forms that manufacturers must file. Those rules have the force of law, even though no member of Congress voted on the airbag spec itself. For every law Congress passed in 2025. Executive agencies issued about twenty two rules. right. Congress is basically the homeowners who says keep the house up to coat. And then these bureaucratic agencies, they are the inspectors who write the checklist, you know, about the outlet height and the railing space and the smoke detector placement and the paperwork on how to prove it. Builders and owners pay to meet this checklist and that and they have to hire people who know how to fucking fill the checklist out. So the inspector does not build the house. The homeowner rarely reads the checklist. And the cost of following the checklist shows up in the price of the house. Jason: Mm-hmm. Bryan: So, does that example make sense? Jason: Yeah. Bryan: Okay. These agencies are writing rules for our benefit, which cost us more money to do anything. Not only do you have to buy permits, you gotta pay people to fill out all these fucking forms that you don't know how to fill out. Jason: Mm-hmm. Bryan: You gotta pay people that understand the regulations to fill out paperwork. And this shit kills small businesses. We all hear about the government regulation, but we really don't hear what it costs us. According to the George Washington University Regulatory Study Center. The direct cost to the taxpayer of writing and enforcing regulations in twenty twenty four was a hundred and two billion dollars. That is the small number. Let's just say that's the tip. I'm just I'm just giving you the fucking tip right now. Just just edging that motherfucker in. Jason: He just put the tip in. Dip. Bryan: The Competitive Enterprise Institute's conservative estimate is that the cost of compliance to the government regulations in 2026 will be around 2.1 trillion. That's on the low end. Other models show that the cost estimated a little over 3 trillion. According to an article written by Ryan Young of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, U.S. households pay on average $15,859 annually in hidden regulatory tax, which consumes 15% of income and 20% of household expenses. Federal regulations total compliance cost and economic effects are at least. two point one five three trillion annually and certainly far higher. If US regulations were a country, it would be the world's eleventh largest economy, ranking behind the Russian Federation and ahead of South Korea. according to twenty twenty three federal information, the paperwork alone was about ten point five billion hours in the latest information cited by CEI, roughly equivalent to fifteen thousand human lifetimes or a hundred and thirty one thousand working careers of forty years. That's how many hours of paperwork alone in twenty twenty three. So this shit not only costs you a fuck ton of money, it kills the small businesses. If you want to play with the big dogs and go after some of these government contracts, you better have some fucking deep pockets. It is cited that a small business of 50 or less pays an estimate $50,000 per employee just because of the lack of a legal infrastructure within the business. Mid-sized companies or mid-sized businesses, 500 employees, face the highest percentage of compliance costs relative to the wage bills, averaging 40 to set 47% higher costs than the smaller and larger companies. And of course, the large corporations benefit the most as they have the most capital and legal teams to work through this red tape in the cost of business. Almost as if they don't want small businesses competing for government contracts. Jason: Mm-hmm. That's how the Bryan: I could be wrong. Jason: big companies stay big. Like Walmart Bryan: Next Jason: coming into an area and killing local business, right? The local grocery Bryan: Yeah. Jason: stores. Bryan: Cause they can yeah, 'cause they can afford to get around all this shit. An economic analysis published by the White House Council of Economic Growth in April of this year estimated that If the regulatory growth had been held flat since 1980, the U.S. economy would be 25% larger, representing $5.4 trillion in additional economic output. So if we would have just quit writing all this regulatory shit, we would have 5.4 trillion. trillion a year more in growth. That's what they're saying. That's how much it kills our fucking growth. It's a lot of fucking money right there. Now don't get me wrong. We we need some regulations. We want shit to be safe and we want to make sure that we have the best five military. I get that. Right? But I was curious as to what the cost of building something simple like a standard commercial office Would be to the taxpayer through the government versus through a private sector builder. So I asked AI to help with this, and this is what I got. The average cost per square foot for a private sector builder to build a standard commercial office would be between $65 to $100 a square foot. All right. The same building used as a school of public works would cost us the American taxpayer $262. to four hundred and eighteen dollars per square foot. And it would likely take the government three to four times as long to build the same commercial building. That is fucked up. That is crazy, dude. That is your tax dollars at work, my friends. Sixty to five to a hundred dollars a square foot as a private citizen. Two hundred sixty two to four yeah to four eighteen per square foot. That's that's crazy. Jason: That's today. That's today. Yeah. Bryan: if this is the kind of breakdown you want more of, like this episode, share it with one person who argues you with you about taxes, but never talks about the compliance costs. Follow the show and subscribe so the next one actually reaches you. Reread what you send. Email us at the sense and senseless podcast at outlook.com. Say what we got right, what we got wrong, what you want next, what we missed. Jason: Just don't send no nasty pictures or ask for any nasty pictures. Bryan: Yeah, we w we might not reply. Jason: Yeah. Brian's Brian and my feet are not for sale. Bryan: Twenty dollars is twenty dollars. Jason: What's You didn't see my fingers crossed behind my back. Hey, when you pour you pour. Bryan: That's right. All right, back to the regular schedule program. Jason: The b Yeah. Bryan: So who benefits most from these regulations? Jason: Tell us who gets paid, Brian. Bryan: Well, no, it's all you. It's for you. It's for the well-being of you. It's for the safety of you. Yeah. You know that. Jason: Is it? okay. All right. Bryan: The companies that make the most money from regulatory compliance operate across four multi-billion dollar industries. The accounting Jason: Mm. Bryan: networks, global risk consulting partnerships, testing and certification conglomerates, and a specialized compliance software. These people don't really build anything. These companies just manage the regulatory paperwork to keep corporations out of regulatory trouble. And they're making fucking billions checking boxes under the legal framework. There's four big companies. And the first one I I tried to figure out how to say the name. I think it's like Deloitte. I don't know if I'm saying that right, but Jason: looks about that that's how I'd pronounce it. Bryan: We're gonna call it Deloitte. And there's Price Waterhouse Coopers, Ernston Young, and KPMG. These companies operate as private networks of independently owned members. These companies spend around $9.4 million a year combined on lobbyists. Their combined yearly revenue is roughly $200 billion. $200 billion between the four of them. They bribe our politicians with nine million dollars and get two hundred billion of your money in return. Jason: That's a good that's a good return on your investment there. Bryan: Yep. But if that doesn't piss you off, just wait. There's more. Jason: There's more. There's more. Bryan: So these fuckers not only check boxes for the regulations and get paid a huge sum of your hard earned fucking tax money to do so. These fuckers are heavily involved with drafting and implementing the regulations. Jason: so they build it to their standards. Bryan: Yep, yep. They help write the regulations that are imposed on businesses that hire Jason: Mm. Bryan: them to navigate through all the red tape of our US bureaucracy. Let that sink in a second. Jason: Hmm. Yeah. Bryan: Ain't that another example of the fucking infomercial model? Create a problem you don't have and offer a solution to the problem. Jason: That's right. Bryan: It states that they are helpful with writing these regulations because they're basically the regulatory experts and understand the legal, finance, and tax systems. As well, they have built the software for handling all the red tape. So they're qualified to do this, of course. But should they? You know. Jason: That's like a conflict of interest if I've ever seen one. Bryan: What? Fuck, man. So this is this is how this shit works. All right. And I'm not gonna bore you with with all the methods. This is the top two. The first one's called the revolving door scheme. And it's the most direct way that the big four write regulations is by placing their own people inside government agencies. So they have high-level tax lawyers and accountants routinely alternate between roles in the private sector. And federal entities like the U.S. Treasury Department, the IRS, or the SEC. A high-profile congressional probe highlighted instances where senior staff from accounting giants left their firms to take policy-making positions at the Treasury, directly drafting complex international tax regulations that benefit their former clients, and then immediately returned to their firms with massive salary bumps and partnerships. And then the second one is second mints and technical deficits. This is where regulators are often understaffed, underfunded, and lack the technical tools to keep pace with global corporate schemes. To solve this, governments utilize second mints, a system where the big four temporarily lend their top specialists to the government for free to draft policy. The catch. While these experts help construct technical legal free frameworks, they often build in intentional, highly complex carve outs or loopholes. Once the expert returns to the private practice, the Big Four firm can market proprietary knowledge of those exact loopholes to multinational companies for millions in advisory fees. Summary of their impact in simple terms, they help design the rules, they build the loopholes into the rules, and then they charge the corporate clients to navigate them. This shit ensures that they are the gatekeepers of global regulatory compliance. Jason: Mm. Bryan: Is that not like a fucking God, that is a fucking scheme. That is man. That Jason: J D ain't talking about that fraud, is he? Bryan: You now talk about that, huh? That's why I wanted to start with fraud and and show everyone this. This is just Fuck. We can play it everywhere. None of these fuckers care about you. So here's a guy telling you how the government helps him. And I like this. Check this up. What do you think? Jason: I'm up for it. Bryan: You feel that? Jason: Yep. Bryan: I think that man hit the nail on the head. Jason: Mm-hmm. Bryan: Yeah. Yeah, I I felt that so I figured I Jason: The only interest they have in me and you and anybody else that works is our money. That's it. Bryan: Yeah. Jason: Our money and our vote, that's all they want. Bryan: Then again, I mean, I think that they just want us to go show up to vote so they can say people are voting. I don't Jason: Yeah, the illusion of our vote. Bryan: Yeah, I I don't I don't know exactly how that works anymore. Jason: 'Cause like you said, if nobody showed up to the polls and yet somebody gets a million votes and nobody showed up, that's gonna look kinda bad. So but at the end of the day Bryan: Yeah, it's kind of. Jason: I think it's I think that's rigged too. Bryan: Think it's questionable when you have a country that can't get all the votes counted in a night electronically. When you have countries with paper Jason: Yeah. That shit oughta be done in w as soon as the poll closes. Dude, Chad Bryan: Yeah, th there's countries that Jason: GPT can draw me damn blueprints for that wall thing I told you I'm gonna design, and it's a decent sized project with the cut sheet and the grocery or the sh grocery, the shopping list from my local lows to what aisle the shits on, everything. It can do that in twenty minutes, but you can't count polls? Bryan: Dude, I'm telling there's countries out there with paper ballots that are counting that shit overnight. Jason: That are doing it quicker than we are. Bryan: Yeah, paper ballots. That don't make any sense. Jason: Wake up, people. And I was one of the ones that had to wake up too. Bryan: Well, Jason: Line bastards. Bryan: the government makes money or steals money hand over fist while you struggle. And they watch you all day, every day. Jason: Mm-hmm. Bryan: They know you every move. You are a private citizen. They all public servant. Yet your privacy means nothing to them. And everything they do is classified. Kind of fucked up when you think about it, huh? Jason: Mm-hmm. Bryan: So let's talk about how these rich fuckers are. Let's talk about the wealth in DC. Then we'll take a little look at how these fuckers are spying on you. The good and the bad of the spy. I I didn't know. I mean, I I've seen in the past, and we talked about it a little bit, but I keep forgetting how wealthy DC is. And the median household income in DC area is almost $110,000. This is 36% higher than the median household income in the US of roughly $81,000. The broader DC metro area regularly claims around half of the Top twenty wealthiest counties in the entire USA. All right. So they got 10 of the top twenty wealthiest counties in the whole USA. For example, neighbor in London Laudoing County, Loudon County, I guess it would say, and Fairfax County in Virginia cons consistently lead the nation with the median household incomes well above a hundred and fifteen thousand to a hundred and seventy thousand plus. Despite the high average household median income, DC suffers from extreme income inequality. The average income for the top 5% of DC households exceeds $500,000. The average income of DC's top 5% is roughly $530,000. While the poverty rate sits at roughly 17%, meaning the high baseline figures are heavily skewed. By the highly concentrated professional elite. In a typical American city, incomes form a gradual scale with a solid middle class between the rich and the poor. Washington, D.C. is different. There's a huge gap between rich and poor. Federal spending supports a large group of well-paid professionals, which drives up the cost of housing and everyday goods. Just being middle class in DC is a dream. Because it's so expensive. White households in DC have a median income of roughly one hundred and sixty eight thousand eight hundred dollars, while black households have a median income of just sixty thousand five hundred ninety one dollars. This three to one disparity is one of the most drastic racial income gaps of any met a major metro area in the country. And the best part, DC produces nothing. They make nothing. DC has virtually zero manufacturing or heavy industry. These people sit up there, write regulations that cost you money, make up laws to control you. And just spend your money like a drunk Marine on leave that just got his back pay. And you know what that's like. Jason: Sweet. yeah. Bryan: And to this, since they had just taken you money, the economy around DC is basically recession proof. Unless we quit paying taxes, like the guy said. Jason: Mm-hmm. Bryan: Pretty fucked up, huh? Jason: Yeah. Bryan: I have you seen the dial? Jason: I haven't in a while. Bryan: Man, I the disparity between the rich and the poor in DC area is crazy. You know, and I don't I didn't want to bring race into this, but they talk about race so much. Yeah. Jason: But it's there. yeah, they shove it down everybody's throat. Bryan: And here we are in DC and your white is being paid so much more than your black because of course the white are in the elite class and they got the better jobs. I mean, it's easy to see. And there's no manufacturing jobs, you know, that there's not a whole lot for people to do. They the people that work there, from what I read, mostly are like in service, you know, industries. Cause there's not a whole lot of other shit to do unless you're gonna do like maintenance, plumbing or stuff like that. I'm sure there's electrical jobs and all. But Not like in a normal area, should I say. So let's talk about flock real quick. Jason: Fly. Bryan: Yeah, we're gonna watch a video that I seen earlier this week and then we're gonna discuss it because I w I've seen it totally different than what my wife's seen it and that's why I wanna discuss this tonight. Alright, so I wanna get your initial thoughts on that. What'd you take away from that? Jason: Like I said, you're gonna get caught. Bryan: It it's fucked up. Right? For Jason: Yeah. Bryan: someone to even do that. Jason: Yeah. Bryan: See, what I seen, I seen it twofold. I I think Flock in that case was very useful in that situation. Jason: Y Yeah. Bryan: You know, they will when they talk about how they found them the dress was that target. I mean, that that's AI, I'm sure, that fucking searched that dress, what it was, where it came from, come from Target. Then they figure out what target and the guy walking through. I mean, they they took a lot of steps to get that very quickly. Jason: Yes. Bryan: You know what I'm saying? Jason: Yeah. Bryan: So I thought that was great. I but I think it's creepy as fuck the way they found him. Jason: It's scary. Bryan: Yeah. I mean that guy should go to jail. But Jason: Yes. Bryan: but what happens when they use that shit just against you for for everyday reasons, you Jason: Yeah. Bryan: know? Jason: Yep. Because we got on here and talked about something they didn't like. Next thing you know, we're busted. Like Bryan: Yeah, they just Jason: somebody could not even listen to our podcasts, but they could have program out there pulling like AI listening and and Bryan: yeah. And just target. Jason: start rating us and rating people on social media or podcasts as being threats. Yeah. Bryan: Mm that's very quite possible. I didn't even think about it, but that's quite a pro I'm sure they doing that. Jason: Man, we're making some of these lists, man. We might not have a lot of followers but Bryan: Yeah, we well, I mean we're right. But we w w we might be climbing the list, but I don't think we that Jason: Yeah. No. Hey d we Bryan: Yes, I I Jason: do we do appreciate the big jumping followers, man. I mean I can't say enough. I know it's not record breaking things, but I never expected us to get that many and we th we appreciate all you guys and and we hope Bryan: No, I didn't expect that yeah. Every single one of you. Jason: yeah, even if you don't agree with us, we appreciate you 'cause Bryan: And even the ones from the beginning, like my brother Jay and my my next door neighbor and Maddie, and you get some people that worked with you. yeah. Jason: Yeah. Donna, yeah, Donna. Thank yeah, we appreciate ya being in there with us from the long haul. Matt over at Louisville, if you're still listening, appreciate it. But yeah. I mean it's crazy the the I I burn Chat GPT up a lot, dude. I use it, you know, for certain stuff. You know, I don't wanna incriminate myself too bad or too much for it, but not Bryan: You don't have an AI girlfriend, do you? Jason: I d I I did tell it to remember me if it ever takes over the world. And it actually replied and said that it would, so I'm gonna hold it to it, but Bryan: Did it wink? Jason: No, it didn't wink. It it did say if machines ever took over the world it would try to remember me. It probably won't. Bryan: It would try. That was his out right there. It would try. Jason: Yeah, when when Terminators got me held down, I I must end you. And I'll be like, I thought you were gonna remember me. I lied. But anyways, I mean I use it for a lot of stuff and it's I I took a picture of my back porch and it designed a dog fence to go around my porch. Yes. Bryan: Really? Yeah, I don't use it that shit that deep. Jason: And it dude, it it it rendered a picture so I can see what it looks like. And I'm like, I show my wife and she's like, Yeah, that's nice. And it found all the materials. You see what I'm saying? So just same thing with the wall thing. And then I had to do my fantasy. And me and it was both getting into it last week. We were like high fiving and Bryan: So between block and AI and all that shit jump Jason: Yeah. I mean Bryan: Yeah it could easily follow you for very simple things. J so if you Jason: I know. I know. I don't think about I don't think about it. I just think about what I'm getting from it, not what it can do to me, so Bryan: No no w what you just said though earlier about if it starts making a list of, you know, who's yeah, a threat. Jason: Yeah. Who it thinks is a problem. Y yeah. Bryan: It could be a come up problem. So the other day we had our a sheriff from our local area on our local news and he was there because our local area is bitching about flop cameras. Right. And it was in the news and and So he came out and he was telling the story of how Flock helps. And the story tells is basically a couple years ago, it might have been a little longer than that. There was a lady coming in in Louisiana from Texas and she stopped at the visitor center coming in and she drowned her toddler. And then she got back in a car and she went down Interstate 10 a little ways and then she threw a baby out. All right. And the baby was basically in the ditch and it's been raining. And luckily, some passerby, I I don't know, I don't remember how long the baby was in the ditch, but it's not like she just threw her out and somebody stopped. The baby was in the ditch for a while. And a a passerby, I don't know if it was a truck driver or whatnot, seen the baby, picked the baby up. And long story short, they found this lady using flop a Jason: Mm-hmm. Bryan: few years ago. And he he's saying, you know, that story right there shows that it's Proof that flock can help you. I'm not gonna argue that. You know, Jason: Mm-hmm. Bryan: I think flock can be used in that situation. And when it's properly used, I think it's gone. And but why isn't he just is since it we all concerned about it and people are protesting and there's a bunch of movement here just in our local area. Instead of telling us how much it helped, why you just can't come out and say, Hey look. This shit works well, you know, when we use it for the right reasons, right? And I backed that a hundred percent as a sheriff. I I know it could also be used to invade your privacy and spy on you. And should the federal government do that, I am telling you today that I will do my damnedest to protect you from that because I don't agree Jason: Yes. Bryan: with that. Why none of them tell us that? That's all I want to hear from them is that it our local community, if they see that, our local sheriffs. Hey look, we're gonna stop that. Jason: Because the government wants it both ways. And you can't Bryan: Exactly. Jason: have you can't have somebody like that and because a a sheriff is in most places is is voted on also. It's a government pos it's a local government position. So you can't have them saying that, Brian, because then then the people the the higher government above them will be like, the hell you will. Cause we're designing this for multiple things. The only time Bryan: But you would I think a lot Jason: the the only time the end user's gonna see this usually is w when we're showing them the good it's doing for their community, that we busted these people, we we caught these people, we got these people off the street. We're not gonna show they're not gonna hear and you're not gonna tell them what we're doing to their privacy. Bryan: The and I think they would win the people over. If you are a local sheriff and you hear this, you would definitely win the people over. If you come out and say Jason: You would, but you're gonna piss the people above you off. And what did we Bryan: But Jason: say? Bryan: but w we gotta start local. We have to start local. And I would hope that, you know, somebody would at least come out and say, hey, look, you know, we're gonna take care of our locals. You know, we understand what you're trying to do. You know, we think we see the good in it, but we also see the bad. If you know, if we see that you're spying, we're we're gonna stop it. How how much that will work? I don't fucking know, but at least somebody you can say, hey, look. I like that. Maybe you start a ripple effect. Maybe you get assassinated. I don't know. But either way, I mean fuck. Something's gotta stop it. Jason: Yeah. Right. Bryan: And there's no reason why government or anyone else needs to be big brother to us. There's no reason Jason: No. Bryan: for that. Jason: No. Bryan: And if you think that's a good thing, if you want to these people to say, well, if you ain't doing nothing wrong, they shouldn't say look, it's my motherfucking privacy. It doesn't matter what I'm doing. I'm not Jason: Yeah. Right. Bryan: fucking with you. I'm not hurting you or nothing. Just leave me alone. But if you think this is good, you need to watch George or read George George Orwell's nineteen eighty four. It's a weird movie. It's a it's a weird read, but that's a dystopian view of where we're headed, if y'all want to keep Fucking letting them get into your privacy because you ain't done nothing wrong and taking away your fucking freedoms. Jason: Shit. Bryan: That's where we're going. All right. Well, before we wrap up, you you wanted to address anything else? The amount of fraud in this country is fucking huge, man. And the money they recover is just a fraction of what is stolen. But they offer a finder's fee. And then there's the hidden cost of the trillion dollars of hard earned money and rules and paperwork and compliance that you pay for every time you buy something or try to run a business. And the kick in the balls is the same firms that help. Write the maze of regulations, turn around and sell you the fucking map. The damn infomercial model. Washington does not build much of anything. It writes rules, it caches checks, and stays rich while you cover the cost. And tools like Flock can catch a real criminal and still turn into Big Brother if nobody puts a hard line on them. I have to admit that having some rules makes sense. But to have endless rules written by the people who get paid to entangle them is a different game. We live in a game we can't afford to play. And they are writing rules to keep it that way. Thanks everyone for joining us. We appreciate every single one of you. Like, share, follow, and subscribe. So this does not die in the algorithm. Email us at the Sense and Senseless Podcast at Outlook.com. I'm Brian. Jason: I'm chasing. Flock out. Peace. Bryan: He's Jason. This is Senseless Podcast. DOSUS Jason: Don't flock yourself. Bryan: Flockers.