Latest / None of Your Business Podcast / Spontaneity and Resilience A Thanksgiving Night with Shloime Zionce

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Spontaneity and Resilience A Thanksgiving Night with Shloime Zionce · None of Your Business Podcast

• 0:00
  The best interviews come from the place of least expected.
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  I have a letter from AMI rejecting my submission that I
• 0:07
  wrote for like. This is not going to work for
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  us. It's like a letter of rejection
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  from the magazine that I've been on the cover of 6 Times Now.
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  None of your business, Oshi, None of your.
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  Business Michael, it's the None of Your Business podcast hosted
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  by Michael and Oshi. Welcome back everybody to
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  another powerful episode of the None of Your Business podcast,
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  Oshi. I pick powerful because this man
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  is sitting in front of us is a powerful force of energy and I'm
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  going to get into it in a minute.
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  Thank you to our subscribers. Thank you to our listeners.
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  I'm Michael Greenfield, this is our Co host, She Schwartz and
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  our guest this evening. And I say this with a grin on my
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  face late in the evening, Thanksgiving evening, the great,
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  wonderful, powerful Reb Shlomo Zions.
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  Welcome to the program. Thank you for having me.
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  Thank you for being here. It's amazing.
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  You know, we've been trying to get to each other for a while
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  and we made it at pretty much midnight Thanksgiving evening
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  because it wasn't you missed your flight or something
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  happened. I did not miss my flight, for
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  the record. I arrived at the airport in time
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  for the flight, but too late for my bag to be checked in with me,
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  so they didn't let me board. And I learned something new
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  today. I was today years old when I
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  found out that after 2:00 PM on Thanksgiving, there's pretty
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  much no flights anyway. The pilots want to be home for
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  their Thanksgiving dinners. So usually flights to Texas
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  would be going like on the hour. Not today.
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  Last one was at 2:00 PM. First one is at almost 6
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  tomorrow morning. So I realized I was going to be
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  there. I was like, you know, let's make
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  the most of it. And I sent you a text and I said
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  I'm going to test your spontaneity.
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  And you passed the test. Thank you very much.
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  Anything for for you really. I I've been excited to do this
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  ever since we we tried from before circus to make this
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  happen. I think it's, I think it's
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  longer than that, Longer I think since PESA, you know, who told
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  me to, to, to come on the show. Who's that?
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  Israel Hami. Okay, we did pay together in
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  Japan, yes. I know you're talking about,
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  yeah. On pay stuff, he was telling me
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  you got to go on this. Someone I love him and I love a
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  lot of people in this regard. He's a status friend.
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  You know what I'm talking about? Because when I say powerful, I
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  want to go straight into this. You are doing so much.
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  I can't even catch my own breath watching you.
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  And, and, and I'm seeing what you're doing on status, which by
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  the way, for the record, you're in the 1%.
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  Most people, it's rides to Muncie and Lakewood and Borough
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  Park. Most people it's you know who's
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  going to Eric Cicero. So the 1% of people that are
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  actually keeping people entertained and enjoyed and
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  educated and inspiring and is you, you're, you're, you're,
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  I'm, I've, I've, you're one of the only people that are not
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  muted. And I'm watching you and I see
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  your journey and it's fascinating to me and I'm loving
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  every step of it. You're senior White House
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  correspondents to, to so like the, just the words coming out
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  of my mouth is like unbelievable to me.
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  And I see how much involved you are with Tadaka.
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  I see how much you're involved with Phil and I see how you
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  started your own podcast and you're a force to be reckoned
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  with. It's like literally watching you
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  is just amazing. It's beautiful.
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  You've got him all worked up, I. I I'm in awe of this.
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  He's a fan. I'm a big, big fan.
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  Yeah. I don't need Chachi to say
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  anything about you. I have it all right here and
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  right here. I've been watching you for a
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  while, and you're making a difference in people's lives on
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  a daily basis. You're representing us.
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  You're doing. You're making a kiddush Hashem
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  every day of your life. It's amazing.
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  Really amazing. Try my best.
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  We can all go home now. That's it, We're done.
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  OK, so we have a second listen. I know that everybody knows
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  pretty much, you know, they've seen your name, they've seen you
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  on a magazine, they've seen you on on in videos, and they've
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  seen you in so many different ways.
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  You're out there and they could see a little bit about what
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  you're doing. But you still deserve a ChatGPT
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  says what about you? Because the segment what we do
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  and gets the people to know you a little bit better real quick.
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  And it also gets you to know what ChatGPT says about you.
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  Are you you legitimately like publicly make this?
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  Everyone knows that ChatGPT is is formulating the questions.
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  Yeah. OK, I I love the honesty.
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  Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I just got printed 90 seconds
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  ago but. We're not talking about the
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  questions yet. The ChatGPT segment here is just
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  says about you. Oh.
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  It's like a summary. Yeah, OK, OK.
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  Yeah, this is what ChatGPT has to say about you.
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  Yeah, the questions research will be all ours.
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  Sadly, people ask me how much research do you do you know how
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  we were talking before? How transparent are you?
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  You're like everything goes and we're good.
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  We don't edit right? Same thing.
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  How much research do I do? I know the person usually, and I
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  printed out, so here we go. Ready.
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  He's one of the only people alive who can walk into a
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  conflict zone, interview strangers in three different
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  languages, and still remind a million people to put on to fill
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  in before breakfast. Mostly true.
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  I I think I would remind people to put on to fill in before but.
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  By the way, people wake up late and eat breakfast late.
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  That's just said breakfast before dinner time.
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  I say so. How many have 3 languages?
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  Let me guess. Yiddish, English.
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  Hebrew. Correct.
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  All right. You're not impressed?
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  You're not. Impressed.
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  I mean, many people speak. 3 languages.
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  Yeah, that's for a Jewish person that's not impressed.
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  Right chachi picks up by those 3 languages is impressive but.
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  The truth is you've been spending a lot of time in like
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  different kind of random countries, right?
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  So like you haven't picked up on any of those languages.
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  I know all the bad words in Russian and a little bit of
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  Arabic, a drop of Spanish, nothing, nothing conversation
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  worthy, but. Nice.
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  All right, a couple of more. You ready?
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  Sure. He's a Hasidic journalist who
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  travels the world and works the White House beat.
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  Basically he's either the bravest man alive or really bad
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  at staying in one place. Bad at staying in one place.
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  When did you when did you become a White House journalist?
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  What is that background about? That started just about a year
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  ago when my, I should say friend and mentor Jake Turks, who I
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  believe was on the show. Yeah, he was.
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  He was looking for other opportunities.
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  He wanted to stay in the White House, but he was thinking about
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  leaving Omni and they offered me the gig and I decided to take
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  it. Oh, so you took over his former
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  position at the Omni, Correct. Oh, interesting.
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  And he's at the Meshbacha now, correct.
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  Yeah, He was a great guest. Drake Tortz.
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  Yeah. Yeah.
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  Very interesting guy. Very unique.
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  Yeah. Exactly.
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  Look, that's what you need to take over.
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  Someone who's unique, and even someone who's more unique.
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  No, but he he deserves a lot of credit because he created that
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  position like there was never before.
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  Was there a Hasidic Jew in the White House like that?
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  And Trailblazer. Yeah, and now you're the second.
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  I am the second. Look, I see my infiltrating the
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  White House as soon as the White House real estate's gonna go.
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  What about just Jews? By the way, It's not that many
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  Jews. Not, not many religious Jews.
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  Yeah, I don't know if there's anything in the white.
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  House. Apparently there's a bunch that
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  just working quietly behind. The scenes, No, I'm talking
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  about for press reasons. Oh.
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  For press reasons, there's not. There are a lot of Jews in the
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  press, but I don't know how many of them are outwardly, visibly
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  Jewish, right? Right observance.
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  You're not hiding it. This is what I'm saying, no?
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  No. Or if I am doing a really bad
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  job. My question is, when you travel
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  to all these countries and you've gone to how many
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  countries till now? I think we're at 58. 58.
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  I believe so. Right.
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  So when you travel there, do you ever, are you ever nervous?
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  You have your you're always with your garb, your pay us out your
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  Yamaha. How does it work?
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  How do you I mean like? How does a guy like you walk
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  around Saudi Arabia? I'll be very honest with you.
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  I I was just in New York City and I got out of my car and I
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  was thinking, should I be taking my Yamaha off now?
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  Like I was literally nervous. And I'm like, and then I'm
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  thinking about people like you who travel to places that what
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  do you do? What do you feel like?
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  How is it like please if you don't mind.
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  So I've been to Saudi Arabia three times.
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  The first time I was completely in hiding and in hindsight I
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  think I could have walked around openly looking like a Jew.
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  I just didn't have the confidence in me, so I didn't do
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  it. Second time it was like half and
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  half and I was there a couple months ago and I walked around
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  literally wearing this suit, dressed exactly like this and it
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  was a really nice experience. Wow.
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  But the people there, like, nobody flinches like.
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  You get a lot of looks. People might whisper something
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  about you to a friend or spouse if they're if they see you.
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  But I mean, if you're comfortable being in a place
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  where everyone sees you as somebody who fell off the moon,
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  then that's fine. But you weren't scared.
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  Like, I wasn't scared. And even if there was hatred or
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  somebody would want to do something like the rule of law
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  is very solid in Saudi Arabia and no one messes like you're,
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  you'd be 100% safe. What's the crime like in
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  Saturday? But you're saying that it's like
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  you're safe over there. Very low.
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  Really. Yeah.
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  Interesting. Because there are consequences
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  to actions, there's no. I think Abu Dhabi is similar
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  also in a way. Abu Dhabi is very similar, right
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  Most of the Arab world. I've been very comfortable in
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  Abu Dhabi. You're saying you feel like that
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  going there as well? 100% I I've said this many
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  times, I'll say it again. I would feel more comfortable
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  walking down the Main Street of Abu Dhabi in my Stramel and
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  Baker show than I would feel in Manhattan.
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  It's unbelievable. Ellie Cohen, I'm sat in that
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  chair like a month ago and she said the same exact thing.
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  It's. True.
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  Literally that she. Said so I'm not crazy.
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  You're saying not crazy, No, but that's that is crazy though.
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  It's more. Dangerous 30 minutes from Monzi,
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  then thousands of miles away in. The heart of the Arab.
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  World in an Arabic country. OK, one second, I'm sorry, I
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  have to back up is I'm a big New York City fan, so you got to
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  know that about me. I love spending time in
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  Manhattan. I'm there usually once a week,
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  and I've been doing this already for over 20 years.
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  I absolutely love Manhattan. I found out recently, just by
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  getting to know you is that you don't live anywhere near New
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  York. You live on the other
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  hemisphere. I mean, just for our listeners
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  who don't know this part of you, where do you live, Shlomo?
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  Currently live in Texas. Texas.
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  The Great. State of Texas, just hearing
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  that come out of your mouth. Yeah, I live in Texas.
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  It's just, it's making me proud, actually.
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  I love that. Love that.
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  I've been to Texas. I've been to Texas for work,
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  just in and out. Not to come for play.
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  I should, I should. The truth is I don't only go to
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  work anywhere I go, I usually play.
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  Meaning I probably went to a nice restaurant there that I
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  think that you guys had. What?
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  City were you in? Houston.
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  OK, that's our city. Yeah.
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  And it was nice. We have a conference there once
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  a year. Honestly, next time we go, let's
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  yeah. I had my first cheeseburger in
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  Dallas, TX at a vegan place. Whoa, you scared?
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  Me, I know I said I did that for shock value.
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  I first said cheeseburger 'cause you weren't sure, like maybe he
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  eats cheeseburger to this guy, 'cause you never met me before.
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  I could have easily have been that kind of, you don't know,
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  But so I so I so I did that upfront on purpose.
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  That's strategic, by the way. But in Dallas, TX was the 1st
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  place that I ever had such a thing cheese in my burger and
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  was very cool. I felt a little guilty while I
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  was doing it, like it just didn't feel right.
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  But yeah, apparently it's a thing over there.
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  You don't. You don't trust what I'm talking
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  about. No, but we, we have, I mean, I
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  in DC, the restaurant has a lot of burgers with the cheese on
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  them, like cheese. That's not your thing you're
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  saying, you know. I do like it.
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  Oh, you do like it? Yeah, sure.
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  Oh. I just, I just, I don't like it
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  as much since last week when I found out that those slices of
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  cheese to like 150 calories each.
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  The vegan cheese is really, really, really.
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  It's worth it. Best thing ever.
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  What made you go to Texas? What?
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  What happened there? OK, so we were living in Israel.
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  OK, where? In Israel.
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  Telstone. OK.
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  Telstone. Sure, it's a little town.
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  I love Telstone, I never understood why more New Yorkers
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  are not in Telstone to be honest with you.
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  OK, well, I I can tell you why. More New Yorkers.
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  I'd love to. I'd love to learn.
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  Telstone is a little town about 15 minutes away from your
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  Shalaya, right next to Abu Ghosh, which is a large Arab
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  town. And it's the roots of Telstone
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  have a lot of Americans like in them.
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  I, I can't explain why this is, I don't know why, but a lot of
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  the older folk in Telstone are Americans.
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  Their kids kind of spoke English, but they were Israeli
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  eyes. And then the grandchildren are
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  just full, full blown Israelis. So we went there thinking that
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  this is like the little America within Israel.
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  And for people aged 50 to 75, it is, but in our age group, but
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  not so much. And eventually my wife was, I
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  mean, both of us weren't, weren't thriving there, but my
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  wife was thriving less. And she's like, we really got to
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  move back to the States and, but we didn't want to be in the
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  tri-state area. My wife appreciates warm
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  weather. I appreciate warm and welcoming
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  communities. And we basically went on a road
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  trip across the entire, I mean, we went from, we drove from
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  Toronto to Tijuana during COVID when everything was closed and
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  we started visiting different communities.
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  We've been to Texas once in the past.
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  We came again and we just fell in love with the place.
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  And we ended up staying for, we visited twice that year.
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  We came once for two for about 12 days and once for three weeks
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  and then we made a decision to move there.
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  I'm a little bit blown away. Right now.
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  Sorry. That's fascinating.
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  But she and I learned to listen, by the way.
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  Yeah, it's crazy. The 3040 episodes.
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  I would have cut you off 3 times already.
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  You have kids. We have 3 kids.
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  At that point we had two children.
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  We had a four year old daughter and a six month old baby boy.
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  And you're travelling with them and you're going from city to
• 13:01
  city the. Smallest vehicle so.
• 13:02
  This person who's in our audience right now, who, who is
• 13:05
  here, you know, because we do that sometimes, by the way.
• 13:07
  So we invite people to always come to the friends.
• 13:10
  Yeah, we love it. But we've had it many, many
• 13:12
  times. You met him there when you were
• 13:15
  there. I met him for the first time in.
• 13:18
  What's your name again? I'm sorry, are you Wolby?
• 13:20
  Rabbi Wolby, who was a really dear friend of mine.
• 13:24
  Now I met him November 2019. I came with my wife to Texas for
• 13:27
  just for a weekend. A year later in COVID, we did
• 13:30
  this road trip and I met him a second time.
• 13:33
  We connected much better. And then in March of 21, my
• 13:40
  rough told me, it's like, if you're actually thinking of
• 13:41
  moving to Texas, then you should visit for like an extended
• 13:45
  period of time just to make sure that you like it.
• 13:47
  Like kind of lived there, but without living there.
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  And I called her by Wolby and he hooked me up with a house.
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  She just knows people. He gave me a house for three
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  weeks we lived there. And after those three weeks, we
• 13:58
  decided to to make the move. How many cities did you visit at
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  the capacity of actually, you know, exploring?
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  If this is a place you want to live, how many cities would you
• 14:06
  say? I think if if one wanted to to
• 14:10
  recreate this journey, like if you really wanted to get a feel
• 14:12
  for a city, you would want to be there for Shabbos.
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  For sure, but that's when everybody comes together so you
• 14:17
  can see people. But that would be very
• 14:18
  difficult. We went to Savannah in Georgia.
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  Yeah, We went to, we didn't go to many places for Shabbos.
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  We, we kind of knew which ones we would be interested in, which
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  ones we wouldn't be interested in.
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  We passed through many cities. But for Shabbos we did one in
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  one in Savannah. We did one in one in Austin, one
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  in Houston, We did one in Tijuana.
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  Where's Tijuana? You think I'm moving?
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  No. But I I Chavez.
• 14:47
  No. I.
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  Just kept telling my wife I'm not turning around until we get
• 14:50
  to Mexico. I love it, absolutely love.
• 14:52
  It interesting and your wife like she enjoyed this process or
• 14:55
  she was doing it because you have to.
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  You don't have to. I definitely was the one pushing
• 15:00
  for it. The reason I the way I convinced
• 15:02
  her to go on the trip in the 1st place was during COVID.
• 15:06
  I don't know about you guys but I was losing my mind.
• 15:07
  My job involves travel and I literally lost my ability to do
• 15:11
  my job. So I was travelling 10,000 miles
• 15:14
  a month and then all of a sudden I'm locked into one square
• 15:17
  kilometer in Telestone for like 8 months.
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  I'm losing my mind. So I'm just surfing the Internet
• 15:23
  all day trying to plan trips for if and when the world ever opens
• 15:27
  up again. And I came across a video about
• 15:30
  a park in the state of Arkansas. It's called Diamond Crater State
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  Park. You're not going to believe
• 15:36
  this, but it's 100% true. You can check it, Fact Check me.
• 15:39
  There's a park in the state of Arkansas where for some reason
• 15:42
  the the earth churns out diamonds and some like 3 or 4 of
• 15:48
  the world's largest diamonds, largest diamonds ever found were
• 15:51
  found in that park. Anybody can go to this park.
• 15:54
  It's like 10 or 20 bucks for an admission fee.
• 15:56
  You take a sifter and and a shovel and whatever you can dig.
• 15:59
  If you find the diamond, you keep it.
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  My wife is like, we got to go to this place and find some rocks.
• 16:05
  So I told her let's do a road trip, I'll drive you to Arkansas
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  and then you know I want to continue on to Tijuana, She
• 16:10
  said. I'll go till Arkansas and then
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  we'll turn around. So we got to Arkansas.
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  We did the, the whole diamond thing.
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  Terrible day. I mean, she had a blast, but it
• 16:18
  was just like, it's really hot. A lot of people go there for
• 16:20
  their retirement. They buy like a, a, a RV and
• 16:23
  they just live in the parking lot and they look for diamonds
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  and then they find them and they sell them.
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  That's like people turn this into a living and like dozens of
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  older people who retired have heart attacks and die digging
• 16:34
  for diamonds cause the heat is the sun's baking down on you.
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  And it's, it's, it's intensive work.
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  It wasn't for me. She enjoyed it.
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  I didn't. And then after the park, I was
• 16:42
  like, OK, so let's go to Tijuana.
• 16:43
  She's like, let's turn around. I said no, I really want to
• 16:45
  continue on the journey. She said, let's go back to New
• 16:47
  Jersey. And I said, you know what, We're
• 16:49
  going to drive for a couple hours and then we'll stay at a
• 16:53
  hotel in the morning. You decide.
• 16:54
  We can turn around and keep going.
• 16:55
  And every day we just like we'd have this conversation, should
• 16:58
  we turn around? Should we keep going?
• 16:59
  And thank God I managed to keep her on board until we got to
• 17:02
  Mexico. And you were there for for how
• 17:06
  long? Just for Chavez.
• 17:07
  Did you or anybody you know around you during that day find
• 17:10
  any diamonds? We still have like a huge bucket
• 17:12
  of, of rocks, yeah, rocks that we don't know.
• 17:15
  We're not sure if they're diamonds or not Somewhere in my
• 17:18
  you. Tell me it's sitting there.
• 17:19
  You're not. It's my in law's house.
• 17:21
  It's sitting there. They're not mining companies
• 17:23
  that are there that are professionals that are digging.
• 17:25
  Out I don't I don't think they let the companies come.
• 17:28
  I think it's like a state, state thing that's.
• 17:30
  Preserved, natural, whatever. I don't know.
• 17:33
  It's it's for regular people, you and me.
• 17:34
  But you could strike like gold, so to speak, yeah.
• 17:37
  A couple weeks ago, somebody found the one of the top ten
• 17:40
  largest diamonds ever. No way.
• 17:41
  Yeah, Worth probably millions of dollars.
• 17:43
  Stefan are you chat GP thinking of this please?
• 17:46
  This is insane. This is pretty curious.
• 17:48
  About this I want to see like what it looks like.
• 17:50
  Diamond Believe. Me.
• 17:53
  Yeah, there it is. There it is.
• 17:54
  Trader of Diamond State Park. Wow.
• 17:57
  By the way, 100%, I believe everything you say, but you are
• 18:00
  just unbelievable. Yeah.
• 18:01
  Is that Rabobi? I have to ask you, you know, how
• 18:06
  long did you live there before Rochlomo joined?
• 18:09
  15 years before you came, 15 years in Houston.
• 18:12
  How did you end up there in 2005?
• 18:14
  How did you end up there? So 17 years.
• 18:16
  When did you move? Summer of 2220. 217 years before
• 18:21
  you moved. OK, I came to run a cure of
• 18:24
  organization. Got it.
• 18:25
  Bull. Torch.
• 18:27
  Nice. And how many Jews lived there
• 18:29
  back then in 20? About 60,000, about 70,000 now.
• 18:33
  No. How many were then in 2005?
• 18:35
  Yeah. You're saying this 60?
• 18:36
  1000 So it was a community of 60,000 from Jews, not from not
• 18:40
  from So how many from? Jews lived there, 150 from Jews
• 18:42
  then. 152 hundred families, 200 families.
• 18:45
  Families. Yeah.
• 18:46
  And now that's 700. OK, Not crazy.
• 18:49
  It's not huge. It's not.
• 18:51
  Huge, but it's enormous growth. Yeah, it's double.
• 18:53
  It's more than double. It's really nice, actually.
• 18:55
  So there's more than one jewel. Oh.
• 18:58
  Yeah, and we have 13 kosher restaurants.
• 19:01
  Oh, that's nice. We lost to this.
• 19:03
  What's what's schooling like for?
• 19:05
  Is there vouchers for children? The grounds starting next.
• 19:08
  Year really. End of 26.
• 19:10
  That's a big deal. I want everyone hearing this to
• 19:12
  like, spread the word. Like whenever I hear of places
• 19:15
  that have vouchers and are nice communities to live, I always
• 19:17
  want people to learn about it. You know, people who are
• 19:20
  starting off like you have opportunities.
• 19:22
  Take a drive to Mexico, get stuck in Texas and live your
• 19:24
  life. It's not a bad idea.
• 19:26
  It's. A good life.
• 19:27
  I hate that somehow the Jewish people just somehow got situated
• 19:32
  in New York, New Jersey, like in this part of the country.
• 19:34
  I hate it. I don't know who was responsible
• 19:37
  to make, you know, that started out here and settled over here.
• 19:39
  But there's so many better states that are out there.
• 19:42
  After that, we're stuck here. We can't go anywhere.
• 19:44
  Your whole life is here. Like, you can't just pick
• 19:45
  ourselves up and leave. And we built a massive
• 19:48
  infrastructure already. Like everything we all know is
• 19:50
  like right here, but how nice would it be if we could live in
• 19:53
  Texas? How nice would it be if we could
• 19:54
  live in like, you know, Missouri?
• 19:56
  Well, not Missouri. It's a.
• 19:57
  Cold place. The thing is, there's.
• 19:59
  So many other places. I'm, I'm, I'm agreeing with you.
• 20:01
  What's? Stopping you.
• 20:03
  Now not you. He's already too structured
• 20:05
  right now, perhaps. Yeah, especially because work
• 20:07
  the, the, the biggest challenge in my opinion, why it's hard to
• 20:11
  leave the tri-state area or Chicago or Los Angeles when
• 20:14
  you're, you know, is work is, you know, you need to make a
• 20:16
  living. And it's hard to find a new
• 20:18
  living that will pay for what your needs are, especially when
• 20:21
  you have kids that have to go to schools and private camps.
• 20:24
  And that's why the first question I asked is vouchers.
• 20:26
  So if you find out these vouchers, I always tell young
• 20:28
  people that are thinking not like what you're saying,
• 20:31
  actually think of going and doing it.
• 20:32
  But one of the challenges that, besides vouchers that I've
• 20:35
  always heard from people because I love this conversation, is
• 20:38
  making friends. Won't be a problem in Houston.
• 20:42
  I believe you and obviously look at the two of you.
• 20:45
  You guys are you guys. You can't move without each
• 20:47
  other out of Thanksgiving night at midnight.
• 20:50
  It's really a beautiful no, I really.
• 20:51
  I like it, I like it and I want people to also understand and
• 20:54
  feel that that that you know, you can actually move to another
• 20:57
  town. This challenge is still work,
• 20:59
  though I don't have a solution for that do.
• 21:01
  You know how many nursing homes are in Texas?
• 21:02
  Yes. You know that we on a regular
• 21:04
  night if I go into the fanciest restaurant in town.
• 21:06
  I agree with you if you want to get into healthcare.
• 21:08
  If you want to get into healthcare, you can definitely
• 21:09
  go to Texas. There's all these I see them who
• 21:11
  are just from the Tri studio people who we don't see around
• 21:13
  our neighborhood, but they're there for business.
• 21:15
  Great point. Any other industries that are
• 21:17
  strong in Texas that Jews real feel comfortable to?
• 21:19
  Also regular real estate. Yep.
• 21:21
  What else do we have, Rabbi? Technology.
• 21:24
  Well in gas, oil and gas. OK, good to know.
• 21:28
  Good to know. Guns.
• 21:31
  Lots of guns. Do you own guns?
• 21:35
  I want to take a step back, if you don't mind.
• 21:36
  Sorry. Did you want to say something?
• 21:38
  No, I was. I wanted to get back to the fact
• 21:39
  he was on Saturday. What the heck was he?
• 21:41
  Doing I know I I but. It's probably where you're
• 21:43
  going, so go ahead. Yeah, no, it's going to to the
• 21:45
  place of let's rewind a little. Let's rewind.
• 21:48
  Who are you exactly? How does a person like you grow
• 21:50
  up to wanting to go to Mexico and be comfortable in Texas and
• 21:54
  got lucky to marry a woman that will go on this journey with you
• 21:56
  and find diamonds? And it's very interesting.
• 21:59
  Like where'd you meet her? I'm I'm so curious about your
• 22:02
  just where, where were you born? I was born in Brooklyn.
• 22:04
  OK bar park my. Parents lived in the bar park at
• 22:07
  the time. My father's from Canada, so I
• 22:09
  grew up in in Toronto because when I was almost three years
• 22:13
  old, my parents moved there. My father got a really good job
• 22:15
  there and his family's from there.
• 22:16
  So they moved there. And then when I was 16, I was
• 22:19
  sent to yeshiva in Lakewood. 17, got kicked out of yeshiva in
• 22:22
  Lakewood. 18 My father sent me to yeshiva in Israel.
• 22:26
  I'm sorry, what did you get kicked out for?
• 22:27
  I have to ask. Oh, guess you went to shoot
• 22:31
  pool. No.
• 22:32
  Was there something specific that happened or was like a
• 22:34
  cultivation culmination of a lot we're?
• 22:36
  Working out. No, you went to a movie theater.
• 22:39
  No way. Are we way off?
• 22:41
  I'm not such a Russia. Was there something like my new
• 22:44
  something That's why? I had a phone with talk and
• 22:47
  text. Oh my gosh.
• 22:49
  That's a real bad boy and they caught me with the phone and
• 22:53
  they kicked me out for two weeks and they and then after two
• 22:56
  weeks I was taken back in. On the first day back, they
• 22:59
  found the phone again. Why do you need that phone so
• 23:01
  badly? Because I was like, I was like,
• 23:04
  I'm probably one of the 1st 10 from Jews on Twitter.
• 23:09
  I was like, I, I joined Twitter to follow Lipa Schmeltzer in I
• 23:13
  think 15 or 16 years ago and, and I needed the phone just in
• 23:17
  case he's going to like, you know, drop an update a.
• 23:22
  New song, A new. Voice.
• 23:23
  It was a smartphone. It was a palm Centro.
• 23:28
  There was. How many years ago was this?
• 23:29
  There was no Twitter app on the phone.
• 23:31
  Maybe I don't even know if the Twitter app.
• 23:33
  I guess it did. It was.
• 23:34
  It was Twitter through text. Remember this text?
• 23:36
  Hello to four O 4 O 4. You don't.
• 23:39
  You don't know this Twitter starred as a text platform.
• 23:41
  Yeah. Did it?
• 23:42
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 23:43
  How many years ago was this what you were talking about?
• 23:45
  I was kicked out of yeshiva. I will.
• 23:47
  I was 17 and my bar mitzvah was in 2006, so this is probably
• 23:54
  2010 or something. Yeah, 2000 and. 10 you make it
• 23:58
  easier for me. How old are you?
• 23:59
  I'm. 32. Thank you.
• 24:01
  I wasn't going to ask, but I was trying to like I was trying to
• 24:04
  do the numbers in my head and I wasn't working.
• 24:06
  You know you can get away, by the way, with looking younger or
• 24:09
  older. You could be 25, you could be 40
• 24:11
  like I I wouldn't be surprised, but either answer.
• 24:13
  I got carded in there of Shabbos last week in Texas and I could
• 24:16
  not buy wine for Shabbos. You don't have a lot of facial
• 24:19
  hair. And I did not have my license on
• 24:20
  me. Yeah.
• 24:21
  So you could look at, you know, you could get away, be very
• 24:23
  young. I'll take it as a compliment.
• 24:24
  Yeah, sure it is. It is, it is.
• 24:26
  Looking young is always a compliment.
• 24:28
  Unless you're trying to get people to take you seriously,
• 24:30
  OK, and and you need like a degree of age to be taken
• 24:32
  seriously and then like, oh, you're just a kid, but it's
• 24:34
  fine. You have that issue potentially.
• 24:36
  It hasn't come up, but I could see hypothetically why.
• 24:38
  Why? Like someone who takes
• 24:41
  themselves very seriously wouldn't take me seriously,
• 24:42
  which is. Totally fine.
• 24:43
  I got it. That's.
• 24:44
  The way God, God made me like this is my journey.
• 24:46
  That's. Fine, so I'm, I'm, I'm curious
• 24:49
  to take it a little slower because I enjoy this process.
• 24:51
  I'm sorry, if you don't mind. I know you I'm not right.
• 24:54
  So you got kicked out of yeshiva.
• 24:56
  You're on the phone, you're getting busy on Twitter for for
• 24:59
  Leepa Schmeltzer updates and you're getting to know what's
• 25:02
  going on in the world and the outside and like you're
• 25:04
  absorbing it all. I guess that's what you're up
• 25:06
  to. So you get that.
• 25:06
  What are you doing when you get kicked out of yeshiva at 17 that
• 25:08
  age? So alone in Lakewood.
• 25:11
  Yeah, and it was especially difficult because I didn't live
• 25:14
  in Lakewood, so my parents are in Toronto.
• 25:16
  There's nothing to do in Toronto.
• 25:19
  I just kind of, I honestly, I look back, I was like, I'm not
• 25:21
  sure what I did. I really don't know.
• 25:25
  I had a secret iPod Touch, which was what I would use to connect
• 25:31
  to the Internet in addition to my Palm Centro.
• 25:34
  I think I just binge watched a lot of movies and TV shows and.
• 25:38
  Where were you living? You weren't in the dorm.
• 25:39
  I. Wasn't in the dorm.
• 25:41
  So my father had a friend has a friend, the nicest people and
• 25:45
  like also this they live in Lakewood and this family's like
• 25:49
  really I don't want to I'm thinking how to say this the
• 25:53
  right way. They're like really from but not
• 25:58
  better than thou from just like genuinely accepting me mistake
• 26:02
  from also very accepting. And they put me in their son's
• 26:06
  bedroom, like with their son who is my age and like, I'm like,
• 26:09
  he's in one bed saying Krisha Malamita and I'm in the other
• 26:12
  bed with my iPod watching movie. And, and like, I, I don't think
• 26:17
  I would do the same thing if if I was in his position, but
• 26:20
  that's what they did. And.
• 26:22
  That's very risky from their. Part.
• 26:23
  Yeah, that's what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying.
• 26:25
  A big shout out to them, yeah. A big shout out to them, yeah.
• 26:28
  Special people, very nice and like I was like smoking on their
• 26:32
  front porch and like it wasn't like I'm assuming their
• 26:35
  neighbors weren't pretty happy about it and it's just really
• 26:38
  special them to take me in and it gave me a place like a home.
• 26:41
  There was food. How long were you there for?
• 26:43
  About six months. Wow.
• 26:45
  He obviously trusted your father.
• 26:47
  He knows him. It's a friend.
• 26:48
  I knew him also. I used to go for Shabbos.
• 26:50
  Meals. It's almost like you tell your
• 26:51
  own uncle whatever I. Remember, like my I got kicked
• 26:54
  out. I called my father.
• 26:55
  He's like, OK, let me see what I can do.
• 26:56
  He called his friend and he was like, yeah, come over right now.
• 26:59
  I walk into the house. He takes me in.
• 27:01
  He's like, this is your room, this is your bed.
• 27:03
  Make yourself comfortable. Said this is the fridge.
• 27:05
  This is the pantry. I'm not showing it to you again.
• 27:08
  This is your house. Whatever is here is yours.
• 27:10
  Supportive. Yeah.
• 27:12
  Non judgmental. Are you still in touch with
• 27:14
  these people or do? You.
• 27:15
  Unfortunately not but but my sister got married two weeks ago
• 27:19
  and he came to the wedding in Toronto.
• 27:21
  And I reconnected with. Him.
• 27:22
  Thank you. So you just saw him again?
• 27:23
  Yeah. And I and I, I went over like
• 27:26
  one of the most special parts, the wedding for me was just
• 27:28
  sitting down with this person, telling him, like, you have no
• 27:30
  idea what you did for me back then, like giving me a place
• 27:33
  that really was made Wi-Fi code. He didn't have Wi-Fi.
• 27:37
  So what'd you do? And he's moving.
• 27:40
  Oh, we, there was like a, a spot in Lakewood.
• 27:42
  OK, so you'd have to go to the Public Library, which is on
• 27:45
  Clifton Ave. and stand outside and, you know, like it.
• 27:49
  It's so shameful because you're standing there with your hoodie.
• 27:51
  You don't want to get recognized, but everyone knows
• 27:53
  what you're doing. Like everyone passing every you
• 27:56
  know that they know, they know that you know that they know.
• 27:59
  And you're just, it was, it was terrible.
• 28:00
  But you got to do it. You got to download that movie.
• 28:02
  You got to download that movie. Wow, did you become a fan of any
• 28:05
  television shows or movies? Because we're big movie and TV
• 28:07
  lovers. So yes, but I, I don't want to
• 28:10
  go into that because I don't want to encourage anybody to get
• 28:14
  into that world. Not that there is an
• 28:16
  entertainment value there. I just feel like we can do
• 28:19
  better things with our time. So if somebody, if somebody's
• 28:21
  there like do your thing, no judgement, but.
• 28:24
  Let me ask it this way then, if you don't mind.
• 28:26
  Sure, if an actor or actress was walking by, which one we would
• 28:31
  say, oh, I would love to see meet that person.
• 28:33
  That's what Did that happen to you?
• 28:35
  Or it hasn't happened, but I I would would not mind having
• 28:39
  Leheim with Adam Sandler. Yeah.
• 28:41
  That's a cool one. We love Adam.
• 28:42
  We love Adam Sandlin. I would love to put the filling
• 28:44
  on him. That would be a that would be
• 28:45
  cool. It's been.
• 28:47
  Done. Did you see Farrow get him yet?
• 28:48
  No, no he has not, but someone else did.
• 28:50
  He once stopped. I think he stopped at a filling
• 28:53
  stand on on the Hollywood Blvd. Why?
• 28:55
  How did you get someone to filling?
• 28:56
  But I love that you're doing it. So you also do that thrilling
• 28:58
  thing where you chase people down to.
• 28:59
  No, I don't. I don't chase people down.
• 29:01
  My thing is is a little different.
• 29:03
  I reach people through their phones.
• 29:04
  So something I've I've discovered and Rabbi Wellby can
• 29:09
  also tell you a lot about this, is that in the casitas world and
• 29:12
  in the, in the film world in general, there are a lot of
• 29:14
  people who are wearing the clothing.
• 29:17
  They're not necessarily there ideologically or they're
• 29:19
  struggling quietly with, with their, with their beliefs and
• 29:23
  their practice. And there's a lot of people who
• 29:26
  I know who would like to put on film every day.
• 29:28
  It's just not something that happens for them first thing in
• 29:30
  the morning and once they go to work or they get busy with
• 29:33
  whatever it a lot of times they miss it.
• 29:35
  So I make a point every day if I remember, which I usually do,
• 29:39
  it's like sometime an hour or two before sundown to put out a
• 29:42
  message, you know, don't forget to put on filling today.
• 29:45
  And every day I have multiple people sending me pictures of
• 29:47
  them wrapping, filling somewhere in the world.
• 29:50
  So like yesterday we had one from a guy in Hawaii and the day
• 29:54
  before was like a guy in the airport in Qatar.
• 29:56
  And we so we post this picture every day is like today's straps
• 29:59
  photo comes from Hawaii. Thank you so and so for sending
• 30:03
  it in and don't forget to put on Phil today interesting and you
• 30:06
  have no idea how many people who like look the part you think
• 30:09
  they're regularly Shiva guys are are sending me messages
• 30:13
  privately telling me you saved me today.
• 30:15
  I almost I almost missed it. Wow.
• 30:16
  And this is like a chat, like a WhatsApp chat.
• 30:18
  It's on my status. Oh, so people see it from your
• 30:21
  status? Yeah.
• 30:22
  So you post your status, a picture of somebody else that
• 30:24
  puts Phil in on like something I guess unique, like you wouldn't
• 30:27
  think they'd put Phil in on. It's not.
• 30:28
  It's usually not faces, usually just like an arm at a landmark.
• 30:31
  Or it's a very nice reminder and it works.
• 30:35
  It worked for me already in the past.
• 30:37
  And it's like, Oh my gosh, wow. And not since I've been at
• 30:41
  Arsalomo, though. I have to shout out to Arsalomo.
• 30:43
  I've been there for three weeks. Are you an Arsalomo guy?
• 30:44
  I became an Arsalomo guy and the most welcoming shul in the world
• 30:48
  for me, at least in my view, have.
• 30:50
  You experienced the hollow yet? Yeah, yeah.
• 30:52
  I've experienced the hollow. I've experienced travels so far
• 30:54
  from my experience. I also experienced not going
• 30:56
  there and I experienced traveling while I wasn't there.
• 30:59
  I experienced missing what it offers but also connecting
• 31:02
  without it which is what it's helped me in my life but.
• 31:06
  I'm so honest, Thanksgiving, I'm so thankful for this podcast
• 31:08
  that I get to learn something about Michael, because I
• 31:10
  wouldn't know otherwise that you're going towards going for
• 31:12
  the last three weeks. Yeah.
• 31:13
  And it's becoming a thing for you.
• 31:14
  Have no idea. Yeah, yeah, that's great.
• 31:16
  I'm so happy. Yeah, it's awesome.
• 31:17
  I love it. It's beautiful.
• 31:18
  I could talk about it all day, but again, it's not about me
• 31:20
  right now. But the telling thing that you
• 31:22
  do is awesome. I love it.
• 31:23
  And Michael Rappaport also got involved in the Tilling chat
• 31:26
  with Yossi Farrell, which is so cool.
• 31:29
  He's sending Tilling pictures from from from Haifa.
• 31:32
  Where was he? I don't know.
• 31:33
  Not Haifa, but he was in Herzli, I think it was.
• 31:36
  I saw the background of it. I sent him a message.
• 31:39
  Come on our podcast. Yeah.
• 31:41
  By the Marina. Exactly.
• 31:42
  It's unbelievable. It's just inspires others.
• 31:44
  You see it and you're like, OK, you know what?
• 31:46
  Yeah. And it's pretty cool.
• 31:48
  But how did you get into it, though?
• 31:49
  What happened that you got? So there's a story about two
• 31:51
  months after October 7th. I had just come back from Israel
• 31:56
  and I was filming some content posts, whatever happened there.
• 32:01
  And when I was in Israel, I had some merch made.
• 32:06
  I basically took you know what the Fist of Resistance is.
• 32:09
  I've seen you. I know.
• 32:11
  I know your pictures. I've seen your phone thing.
• 32:13
  Yeah. So there's like this fist that's
• 32:14
  been used by like the communists and the socialists.
• 32:16
  I think there was some kind that was involved in some French
• 32:18
  Revolution or something and I basically wrapped the fist and
• 32:23
  filling. And to me it's symbolized like
• 32:26
  the struggle of of our people in today's day and age when there's
• 32:31
  so much anti-Semitism and hatred towards us and we're expected to
• 32:35
  or expected or, you know, a lot of us look out where the Jewish
• 32:39
  and walking in the street looking like a Jew can be
• 32:44
  uncomfortable at best and sometimes dangerous at worst.
• 32:48
  So I basically created this image and I wanted people to, I
• 32:53
  wanted to make some merch to inspire people to be more proud
• 32:56
  of the Judaism. And I was wearing this
• 32:59
  sweatshirt with this logo on it. I was flying to Florida for an
• 33:04
  event. I took a selfie of myself.
• 33:06
  In hindsight, it's a little bit like the the wording I use kind
• 33:09
  of cheesy, but I made it. I wrote a tweet or what do you
• 33:11
  call it now an X. And I said something like I'm
• 33:16
  trying to look as Jewish as possible on my flight today.
• 33:18
  No anti semite is going to make me hide my Jewish bride.
• 33:21
  There's a picture of me with this with a shirt I'm wearing
• 33:24
  and in like in less than two minutes I had 100,000 views and
• 33:30
  some reason all the Nick Fuentes type people jumped on the post
• 33:34
  and it ended up getting 14 million views and the the
• 33:38
  nastiest most disgusting hateful comments you'd ever seen in your
• 33:42
  life. Like the one I'm pretty good
• 33:45
  with comments by the way. I get a lot of hate then I
• 33:47
  usually just slides right off me.
• 33:48
  There was one comment that really made an impression on me.
• 33:52
  Someone wrote I wish the Holocaust had happened.
• 33:57
  That's a double whammy, right? Because hey, yeah, first.
• 33:59
  Denying it, he's. Denying it happened and saying.
• 34:02
  If it if you really think it did happen, I.
• 34:03
  Wish it had happened. Yeah.
• 34:05
  So there's a lot of hate. And when I saw that, I was like,
• 34:09
  you know, I'm going to double down.
• 34:10
  We don't run away from this kind of thing.
• 34:12
  We go further into it. So I started posting pictures of
• 34:17
  myself wearing filling every day and people started telling me,
• 34:19
  you know, it reminds me to put on filling.
• 34:21
  I forgot or didn't get around to it.
• 34:23
  And then I asked started asking other people to send in pictures
• 34:26
  of themselves putting on filling and turn into a thing that we do
• 34:28
  every day now. That's amazing.
• 34:29
  I like that background, by the way, that you're saying, because
• 34:34
  I'm conflicted. I really am conflicted when it
• 34:36
  comes to going to New York City and being proud to be Jewish
• 34:39
  and, and being nervous and, but having a movement and saying
• 34:43
  something like that. I'm of the opinion not to look
• 34:45
  at comments. I, I stopped looking at
• 34:47
  comments. I don't know how.
• 34:49
  I mean, we manage our comments on our channels on YouTube and
• 34:52
  Instagram, but it's not me. It's personally.
• 34:55
  I'm saying it's not me. I, I would never be able to go
• 34:57
  through hate comments and, and, and, and, and take it.
• 35:00
  It would be, it would be like you're doing God's work is what
• 35:04
  I'm trying to say. You're doing it, you're out
• 35:06
  there, you're fighting the fight, you're putting it up
• 35:08
  with, you know, you're not that 17 year old kid on Twitter
• 35:11
  anymore. You're actually making an
• 35:12
  impact. So thank you for what you're
• 35:14
  doing. I wouldn't be able to see all
• 35:16
  that and like it would it would drive me nuts.
• 35:17
  I eat that stuff for breakfast, it fuels me.
• 35:20
  Amazing. Good for you then.
• 35:22
  Then. Then why should we be afraid of
• 35:23
  New York then? We shouldn't be afraid.
• 35:25
  I'm just saying I I have more confidence in the government of
• 35:30
  Abu Dhabi that they will punish somebody who messes with me over
• 35:35
  the no cash bail system we have in New York.
• 35:38
  OK, cool. Cool concept that you're saying.
• 35:41
  Very interesting. But at the end of the day, going
• 35:44
  into New York right now, are we, are we supposed to feel afraid?
• 35:46
  No, of course not. Of course not.
• 35:48
  Right, Right. I mean, let's put it this way.
• 35:52
  Realistically speaking, there's no doubt that if you're wearing
• 35:56
  a Yamaka on your head, you're a little more likely to get
• 35:58
  punched than somebody who's not wearing a Yamaka on their head.
• 36:01
  But you still shouldn't be afraid if your whole existence
• 36:04
  has to be hidden. What kind of existence is that?
• 36:08
  Like I think it's worth the risk.
• 36:10
  Maybe there's a half a percent chance you get punched or
• 36:12
  someone says something nasty or throws a penny at you or
• 36:14
  whatever the at the summits like doing and that's life.
• 36:19
  But you can't live in hiding. That's that.
• 36:20
  That would be a really terrible way to live.
• 36:23
  OK, I'm agreeing with you. I just, I want to tell you that
• 36:25
  for the first time when all this is happening, and it could be
• 36:28
  just hearing it from people and just getting nervous from what
• 36:30
  I'm hearing that I thought should I take off my Amica going
• 36:33
  into the I understand. Why you're nervous?
• 36:34
  Yeah, because I, because I started putting on my Amica a
• 36:38
  few years ago. Everywhere I go, I used to have
• 36:40
  the notion of I'm going to take it off at a bar or if I go into
• 36:43
  a, you know, a place to, you know.
• 36:46
  But that's a separate issue though.
• 36:48
  Taking it off at a bar is not because of safety, is it?
• 36:51
  Yeah. No, I would.
• 36:52
  I would know you. Take it at the bar because
• 36:54
  you're embarrassed you want to fit in.
• 36:56
  I had a story with him. I'm not going to go over it
• 36:58
  again. I take it over at the bar
• 36:59
  because I know back then I'm misbehaving.
• 37:02
  I'm. Right, that's what I thought.
• 37:03
  I don't. Want to have my amaco?
• 37:04
  I want to you know. But now I make a conscious
• 37:06
  decision to behave because I have the Yamaha and that's it.
• 37:10
  And that's my decision. I, I rather have it on.
• 37:12
  It's just that it bothered me that I even thought about taking
• 37:14
  it off. That's all I'm saying.
• 37:15
  And I'm happy you're saying this.
• 37:17
  And I want the message to be clear to every Jewish person
• 37:20
  that visits New York. Be proud, be out there, be aware
• 37:25
  of the situation and that's it. Yeah, you you'd like look
• 37:28
  around, make sure you know what's going on, but don't,
• 37:30
  don't hide. Definitely don't.
• 37:31
  Right. And don't have as much
• 37:32
  confidence unfortunately in New York that you wouldn't.
• 37:34
  But Dhabi, good point by the way, very good point.
• 37:37
  Yeah, I, I, I'm not. I don't think for a second that
• 37:41
  the entire Arab world is more friendly than New Yorkers, but I
• 37:44
  have more confidence in the government that they won't deal
• 37:46
  seriously with. That's an interesting point.
• 37:48
  That's an interesting. One can we get to this man here
• 37:50
  and what he does? Yeah, but I want to go back.
• 37:52
  Then let's go. I agree with you.
• 37:54
  Now let's go back to 17. I'm sorry, I think we haven't
• 37:56
  scratched the surface. Yet.
• 37:57
  OK, good. So let's keep going.
• 37:58
  So we're back. We're doing a lot of bantering.
• 38:00
  Here. But I, I would love to know.
• 38:01
  I mean, he's this guy's a famous guy sitting over here like he's
• 38:04
  been plastered on the Army magazine.
• 38:06
  That's where I saw. I remembered early on we were
• 38:08
  talking about, you mentioned the Army.
• 38:10
  That's one kind of triggered for me.
• 38:11
  I remember you were on the Army cover.
• 38:13
  That's where I think the first time I really saw your face.
• 38:16
  And then I started seeing you everywhere.
• 38:17
  Then I just started seeing all of this.
• 38:18
  But yeah, let's get there. But what were you saying?
• 38:21
  You want to go a little. Bit no, I know, I know.
• 38:23
  Yeah, that's I'm curious. Like if you know, I, I know it
• 38:27
  could take a long time to get there, but I'd rather go slowly.
• 38:29
  I I'd rather learn about not. Too slowly, please.
• 38:33
  I think it's interesting. I think it's interesting you
• 38:34
  got. Kicked that issue at 17.
• 38:36
  Yeah, but you? Would never have heard of
• 38:37
  Twitter and and X and the so on the first time if I wouldn't
• 38:40
  have slowed down. It said tell me about your 16
• 38:42
  and 17 year old self. I like learning these things and
• 38:45
  by the way, if the audience disagrees with me, then they
• 38:46
  could write it I'll never read it anyways.
• 38:48
  Let's. Get ahead to when things got
• 38:49
  interesting for you. I'm sorry, a little bit from 17.
• 38:52
  Things have always been interesting.
• 38:53
  Thank you, 1617. I know my character in front of
• 38:56
  me. I understand what's happening
• 38:57
  here. Every day of his life is so
• 38:58
  unique. The opportunity to come in.
• 39:01
  That's why we woke everyone up. We got the cavalry.
• 39:04
  So 17 I kicked out of school that you're this person took you
• 39:07
  in. Thank you amazing, right.
• 39:08
  That's where we're up to. I'm going back to that page and
• 39:10
  then thereafter. OK, then I ended up getting a
• 39:13
  job at a electronics store in Bay Ridge, OK, which was owned
• 39:18
  by a bunch of Jacita. Did you know what you wanted to
• 39:20
  do then or you were just getting a job?
• 39:21
  No, I just needed money. That's like he's 17 years old.
• 39:24
  I just kicked that issue. I don't know, maybe.
• 39:25
  He wants to get a singer. I just don't ask.
• 39:27
  I actually. Did want to be a singer at one
• 39:28
  point, but let's. See what was.
• 39:31
  Happening for for many years I. Said maybe he wanted to be a
• 39:33
  singer. He said I actually want to.
• 39:35
  Can you sing? Is that?
• 39:36
  Something I Can't Sing and I've composed over 200 songs.
• 39:39
  Yeah, yeah. For many years I thought that
• 39:41
  was going to be my path. Look at that.
• 39:44
  What's one of your favorite songs that you composed?
• 39:45
  Did anybody pick it up? No, I've kept them to myself.
• 39:48
  Why I I will one day when the time is right.
• 39:51
  Can you give me a 1 melody of one nice thing that you've done?
• 39:56
  I'd rather not. OK.
• 39:57
  None of your business. No, you can use it.
• 40:00
  You have one time. It's.
• 40:02
  Not going to waste it on this. What's the?
• 40:03
  Oh, there's you get one question.
• 40:05
  I forgot to tell you. No, everything's your business.
• 40:07
  I'm just not. Just not going to sing.
• 40:10
  I'm not a singer. I made peace.
• 40:12
  Perform for us? No.
• 40:13
  No, I'm not looking at the puppies.
• 40:14
  If he's a musician, he appreciates.
• 40:16
  There will, there will come a time when you'll see it.
• 40:18
  Yeah, there will come a time that'll do it gladly.
• 40:20
  OK. Yeah, by the way, I'm looking
• 40:22
  forward to that. Is that like I'm?
• 40:23
  Also looking forward to it. It would be a childhood dream
• 40:25
  too. Five year plan, Five year plan
• 40:27
  not. Necessarily whenever the time is
• 40:29
  right. Whenever the time comes.
• 40:30
  I'm very into like feeling the the universe's energy, OK.
• 40:33
  And when I feel it, I I'll. I'll know.
• 40:36
  OK, so you'll only a goal or something.
• 40:37
  OK, Anyways, OK, got it. So back then you're so you're
• 40:40
  you're you're writing music, you love music, but you also need a
• 40:44
  job. So you go think a job selling
• 40:45
  electronics. I wasn't selling electronics.
• 40:47
  I was actually a security guard. No.
• 40:52
  Which is a crazy no, I'm not kidding you.
• 40:54
  Did you get trained? No, they basically as the
• 40:57
  wildest thing, so. OK, so.
• 41:01
  He wanted to skip this, you understand.
• 41:02
  OK, so so basically when OK, I hope you have a long, I hope you
• 41:09
  have time. We have time.
• 41:10
  We're. Trying too much time not too.
• 41:12
  Much he wants to get to the hot tub.
• 41:14
  His shoes are off already. By the way, maybe we just moved
• 41:17
  the whole thing to the. I am ready.
• 41:19
  OK, so after I left this, I was in this this my father's
• 41:24
  friend's house for a while. And then I got sick of Lakewood
• 41:28
  because everyone else was in yeshiva.
• 41:30
  And like, if you're the only guy who's not in yeshiva, it's kind
• 41:32
  of like kind of sucks. So I went to Borough Park and my
• 41:39
  great grandparents lived in Borough Park at the time.
• 41:41
  My grandfather, when I was 12 years old, my great grandfather
• 41:44
  walked out on a Friday morning from behind the double parked
• 41:47
  car. Another car came, hit him.
• 41:49
  He was killed on the spot and they sent him to be buried in
• 41:52
  Israel. So my great grandmother, his
• 41:55
  wife went for the Shiva to be in Israel when they when they
• 41:59
  buried him and she had some children living there.
• 42:01
  She ended up staying there permanently for the rest of her
• 42:03
  life. So there was this huge house, 4
• 42:05
  stories in Borough Park at 13th and 53rd, which is like it's
• 42:11
  like prime. This is it's like Times Square
• 42:13
  of Borough Park. OK.
• 42:15
  And they had this house and I had once we did once stayed
• 42:18
  there and they made us a key. So I got my hands on this key
• 42:21
  and I basically just moved in. You're kidding.
• 42:23
  So I'm 17 and I have this whole house to myself.
• 42:25
  Two blocks from amnons, basically.
• 42:27
  On the corner of Eichlers, basically.
• 42:29
  Yes, yes, two blocks down from Eichlers.
• 42:31
  Two blocks down from. Eichlers, Schwimmer Chavez
• 42:32
  Sattmer on that block. Wow the best place and Paschkas
• 42:37
  Paschkas. There was a Paschka store 13
• 42:39
  What Man I remember the how did you not in my generation.
• 42:43
  This is Lieberman's Cafe, up 13th.
• 42:45
  I remember all of Bauer Park, but anyways, go ahead.
• 42:47
  So I had that was the house and I used to like have friends over
• 42:51
  and, and make parties. That's where like it started
• 42:53
  costing money. So I had to get a job.
• 42:55
  So one morning, maybe it was the afternoon, I was woken up by the
• 42:59
  sound of my cell phone ringing. And I'm in the house and a
• 43:02
  friend is on the other line and he's like, Schlemmer, you
• 43:06
  looking for a job by any chance? I said, yes, sure, why not?
• 43:09
  So he says my grandfather's opening an electronic store in
• 43:11
  Bay Ridge and they need a security guard.
• 43:13
  Can you come? I'm like, I have no background
• 43:16
  security. Don't worry, you don't need
• 43:17
  anything. It's just just a buzzer.
• 43:19
  I'm going to give you a buzzer and you're going to decide who
• 43:21
  who gets to come and who doesn't get to come in.
• 43:23
  Like how much are they paying? 10 bucks an hour, be there in an
• 43:26
  hour. So I just I took a bus down
• 43:28
  there. They gave me a vest with the
• 43:31
  logo of the of the store. I don't know if it said security
• 43:34
  on it or not. I just, I would like stand
• 43:35
  inside and if somebody came in I had to profile them and decide
• 43:38
  whether they should be allowed in the store or not.
• 43:40
  Did you ever stop anybody? No, no one came in.
• 43:46
  Easy job, yeah. So that went on for a while,
• 43:48
  keep going and then and then eventually like 2, like probably
• 43:52
  3 or 4 weeks later, my father called me and he said, you know,
• 43:56
  I want you to go back to yeshiva.
• 43:57
  I wasn't really interested. I was, I felt like I was done
• 43:59
  with the system. But he managed to convince me
• 44:02
  and he, they sent me to yeshiva in Israel.
• 44:05
  I actually really liked it. It was which one?
• 44:07
  It's called Arkadash. That's OK, It wasn't Telstone.
• 44:11
  It. Doesn't exist anymore, but it
• 44:13
  was very special place. That's how you found that about
• 44:15
  Telstone, I guess. Yeah, it was a really special
• 44:17
  place and I was there for three years and then I got married.
• 44:22
  Beautiful. In Israel, no.
• 44:24
  I got married in the states, the States to a girl from the
• 44:27
  states. A girl from America?
• 44:29
  Whatever. Union City, NJ.
• 44:31
  OK, cool. Wow, fantastic.
• 44:35
  And this was the I'm assuming. Very much so, yeah.
• 44:38
  Yeah. Wow, very cool.
• 44:40
  OK, so continue. So then I was very idealistic at
• 44:43
  the time, and we're going to live in Israel for the rest of
• 44:47
  our lives. So we moved to Israel without a
• 44:49
  plan. You basically fell in love with
• 44:50
  it when you were there. Yeah.
• 44:52
  And Yeshiva and Tulsa. I couldn't.
• 44:53
  I couldn't see myself living anywhere else beautiful.
• 44:55
  We lived in your Shaline for two years, got very expensive, so we
• 44:58
  moved to Telestone which is cheaper, but then like you're
• 44:59
  not in your Shaline anymore. And during this time, what are
• 45:01
  you doing? So in the beginning, I thought I
• 45:04
  was going to be in Kail, but turns out that's not my thing.
• 45:08
  I, I, I love Kayla. I support Kayla's, but I, I
• 45:12
  don't belong there, OK? I, I don't think God wants me
• 45:15
  there either, to be honest. No, I'm serious.
• 45:18
  Yeah, get out of here. I know a lot of Rasha Shiva's
• 45:20
  that we're not going to like that what they just heard.
• 45:21
  That's OK, they don't listen to your podcast.
• 45:23
  That's for Shalom. Are you kidding me that the
• 45:26
  person wants you there? No, no, absolutely not.
• 45:29
  Absolutely I will go. I'll fight to the death on this
• 45:31
  one. Got it.
• 45:31
  God doesn't want everybody in Kayla.
• 45:33
  OK, I agree with you. I'm just saying that, you know.
• 45:35
  It's you want to hear something crazy?
• 45:37
  Please. When I this is yeshiva in
• 45:39
  Israel, I have a very hard time with Gemara till today.
• 45:42
  My father told me that I should Start learning Agatha, which is
• 45:45
  like the easy readable story parts of the Gemara.
• 45:48
  So I started doing that and I got into it and one day I was
• 45:50
  learning something and was it Hagika?
• 45:55
  I think so. And the Gemara talks about a
• 45:59
  says that Hashem cries for three people.
• 46:02
  He cries for somebody who can learn well but doesn't, somebody
• 46:07
  who he can't learn but does. And a ask and a community
• 46:12
  activist who is corrupt. And the Mepharshan asked, why
• 46:16
  would God? We understand why God would cry
• 46:17
  for someone who can learn but doesn't, and why he would cry
• 46:20
  for somebody who is corrupt using community funds.
• 46:23
  What about a person who can't learn but does learn?
• 46:26
  Why would God cry for someone like that?
• 46:28
  And the answer is because God feels his pain.
• 46:32
  And I repeated this to a friend of mine and he said, you know,
• 46:34
  that there's a different answer, a different rabbi says God cries
• 46:38
  because if you can't learn, what are you doing in yeshiva?
• 46:41
  You should use your talents that God gave you didn't didn't want
• 46:43
  you to be the next rabbi. He wants you to be somebody who
• 46:47
  uses that your, you know, use the strengths that God gave you
• 46:50
  to make an impact on the world in business or in charity or
• 46:53
  some someplace else. So God didn't create for that.
• 46:56
  Of course he wants you to partake in the Torah, but to be
• 46:59
  learning all day? I think not.
• 47:01
  Makes a lot of sense. I, I'm, I'm listening to what
• 47:03
  you're saying and I'm not disagreeing with it.
• 47:06
  I'm just what I'm thinking about when you're saying that is then
• 47:09
  if you're in Kolo and and you're not becoming someone that making
• 47:14
  an impact, then then what are you doing in Kolo?
• 47:18
  That's exactly what. He said I can't judge for anyone
• 47:21
  else. I would tell someone like that.
• 47:22
  Take a good look inside your soul and if you have a rabbi who
• 47:26
  you trust to help you to guide you to make a decision, then say
• 47:30
  to him, listen, I'm in Kolo and I don't feel like I'm living up
• 47:33
  to my true potential and should I continue or should I leave?
• 47:36
  But don't just do it because it's the end thing.
• 47:38
  OK, so if someone feels their potential is to learn then then
• 47:42
  of. Course.
• 47:42
  And that's it of. Course, yeah, all right, gosh,
• 47:45
  I'm not going to beat this up even though I'm curious about
• 47:47
  this topic, but it's another time because we're we want to
• 47:50
  move forward. And again, I could do a whole
• 47:52
  podcast on that topic and hopefully we'll have time when
• 47:55
  the energy in the world allows it, we'll do it another time.
• 47:58
  But for now, continue Vitre. So I thought I was going to be
• 48:01
  in college. Look at me speaking you this.
• 48:03
  That did not work out. I started looking for, like, odd
• 48:06
  jobs just to pay the bills. I was.
• 48:09
  I worked in a bakery for one day until they found out I wasn't
• 48:12
  Israeli. They had to fire me because I
• 48:14
  didn't have a work visa. I also got burned that day.
• 48:19
  Physically burned. Yeah.
• 48:20
  Like I they, they like they literally brought me from Kail
• 48:23
  to. And the next thing I know, I'm
• 48:25
  in an oven. Like, yeah, don't ask.
• 48:29
  I did. I did like anything that would
• 48:30
  pay the bills that wasn't immoral.
• 48:33
  OK, that's a lot, by the way. I I.
• 48:36
  Oh my goodness. What?
• 48:37
  What pops into your memory? What other?
• 48:39
  What other I worked in a restaurant.
• 48:41
  It was just the worst. They they, they told me I was
• 48:43
  going to be like at the front, like taking orders from people.
• 48:46
  I ended up washing dishes in the back and then they made me take
• 48:49
  out the garbage, which I didn't mind.
• 48:50
  But one night, it's a whole long story, but one night these
• 48:53
  workers, they were closing up and they said, can you just take
• 48:56
  this bag of chicken wings, chicken wing bones to the
• 48:59
  dumpster? I'm like, sure.
• 49:01
  And it was a little odd because it was never my responsibility.
• 49:04
  Someone else would do that and they locked up and left me with
• 49:07
  this bag. And so just, you know, dumpsters
• 49:09
  around the corner. When I picked it up, I realized
• 49:10
  the bag was torn and that's why no one else wanted to do it.
• 49:13
  So they gave it to me and I the place was locked.
• 49:16
  It's midnight and I just picked it up.
• 49:18
  An old like 4000 chicken wing bones just fell down the stairs
• 49:24
  leading up to this restaurant. I didn't even have a way to
• 49:26
  clean it up and I was just like, I'm out.
• 49:30
  I just left it there, left it, left it there, walked away.
• 49:33
  You. Say immoral.
• 49:34
  I'm kidding. I'm kidding.
• 49:35
  They set me up. They.
• 49:36
  Set you up, You quit, though. You quit, you're gone.
• 49:39
  I came to the back to work the next day.
• 49:40
  Oh, you did? Yeah.
• 49:41
  So who cleaned it up? I don't know.
• 49:43
  But when I came back to work, the boss is like, you know, I
• 49:46
  don't think this is going to, I don't think this is going to
• 49:49
  work really OK. And that was the end of that.
• 49:51
  Because you got fired, then I. Got fired for for not passing
• 49:55
  the test with the chicken wings. Yeah, OK, Beautiful, beautiful.
• 49:58
  It's experiences that you've. Gone.
• 50:00
  By the way, this is the greatest thing that ever happened to me
• 50:03
  because after that chicken wing thing, I realized that I wasn't
• 50:07
  meant to work for anybody else. A and BI wasn't and stuff that I
• 50:12
  was passionate about, I was like, I'm never doing that
• 50:13
  again. I'm not taking odd jobs anymore.
• 50:15
  I'm going to find my strengths, capitalize on them, and build an
• 50:18
  empire out of them. How so?
• 50:19
  Tell me what you did. What happened next?
• 50:21
  So then I started pursuing journalism.
• 50:23
  How did that come to you? From where?
• 50:25
  Finally, OK. So, OK, it only took us an hour,
• 50:29
  An hour and a half, finally. I'm sorry, I'm loving every
• 50:31
  party. I'm tuning in.
• 50:32
  I'm tuning in. You have all of my attention.
• 50:34
  I've always been a big reader. I love reading and I knew that
• 50:40
  I'm good at writing. I just no one else knew and I
• 50:43
  had to convince people. So I started like reaching out
• 50:45
  to different publications and trying to submit my work and
• 50:48
  nobody gave me the time of day. I even have a somewhere I have
• 50:52
  to find it, but I have a letter from AMI rejecting my submission
• 50:56
  that I wrote for. Like this is not going to work
• 50:58
  for us. Please find it.
• 50:59
  I yeah, it'll be. Lovely for us you.
• 51:02
  Know what I'm going to do? I'm going to.
• 51:03
  I'm going to. I'm going to find it.
• 51:05
  I'm going to blow it up massively and frame it in my
• 51:07
  office, please. It's like a letter of rejection
• 51:09
  from the magazine that I've been on the cover of 6 Times Now.
• 51:12
  That's so beautiful. So So what did you want to start
• 51:15
  writing about? Like what was yours I.
• 51:16
  Didn't know. I just, I knew I wanted to be
• 51:18
  writing and talking to people and interviewing people.
• 51:21
  So I would send them these things like just cold, the cold
• 51:26
  submissions and everyone was telling me no.
• 51:29
  And then I bumped into Turks at a Simcha and.
• 51:33
  How many years ago was this? At what point is this?
• 51:35
  This is less than a year after I got married.
• 51:38
  Oh, so this is you're like 2122 at your time.
• 51:40
  I was. 22. 22 at the time. OK, so this is like 10 years
• 51:44
  ago. This is 10 years ago, yeah.
• 51:45
  So I bumped into Turks, and I was like, hey, aren't you Turks?
• 51:48
  I was like, yeah. And he was very nice.
• 51:50
  He gave me the time of day. And I said, you know, I really
• 51:52
  want to get into this line of work that you're in.
• 51:54
  Like, I want to start writing for magazines.
• 51:56
  Can you get me in? He's like, yeah, I'll make some
• 51:57
  introductions for you. And he made an introduction for
• 52:01
  me to a couple places. One of them was AMI.
• 52:03
  And then they started taking me seriously.
• 52:05
  So I like I would, they, they weren't asking me to write
• 52:08
  anything. But it's like they, you'd pitch
• 52:09
  us an idea and if we like it, we'll, we'll, we'll green light
• 52:12
  it. So I would pitch them ideas.
• 52:13
  And most ideas they said no to like, you know, like, I remember
• 52:17
  one of the ideas was like, why don't you give me $600.00 so I
• 52:21
  can go to Jordan and I want to go to the Caver of Iron and
• 52:24
  Cohen on his yard site and write an article about it.
• 52:26
  They're like, no. And then years later I that
• 52:30
  happened. Yeah, that's a pretty good idea
• 52:32
  that that's yeah. It was a great idea.
• 52:33
  It's. Not something people would read
• 52:34
  about, you know. But no one, no one, I guess at
• 52:37
  that time, no one saw my vision. There's like like this.
• 52:40
  It's just like this kid who wants us to pay for his travel.
• 52:43
  I was like, no, you don't, you don't understand what I'm going
• 52:45
  to build. But they didn't see it.
• 52:46
  I saw it. So I just kept trying like every
• 52:48
  year around the yard side, I would I would call Missus
• 52:50
  Frankfurter from mommy. It's like, hey, you know, it's
• 52:52
  that time of year again. Should we do it?
• 52:53
  And like, she's like, no, not this time.
• 52:55
  Maybe we'll think about it. And then in 2017, so I guess
• 53:00
  it's just a bit, 2 1/2 years after I got married, it was
• 53:05
  literally this time of year, it was the end of November, the
• 53:08
  Lubavitche was taking place. And I don't know how, but I
• 53:13
  convinced someone that's about to get me a ticket and I went to
• 53:16
  this thing and I noticed that the, all the rabbis walking
• 53:20
  around with power banks and I was thinking like, can't you
• 53:23
  just like get off your phone for three or four hours?
• 53:26
  Why do you need a power bank? And then I realized that every
• 53:28
  rabbi is like a rabbi, a therapist, Kevrah Kadisha,
• 53:33
  suicide helpline, anything that needs to be done to their
• 53:37
  community. It's all on their phone.
• 53:39
  So they absolutely need the power banks.
• 53:41
  Little epiphany that I had and I, I wrote a word like a little
• 53:43
  piece, like maybe 150 words. I sent it to AMI.
• 53:47
  I was like, how about this? Would you print this little
• 53:49
  piece? Like actually, it's really cute.
• 53:50
  We love it. And there boom, they printed it.
• 53:52
  And once they printed one piece, then they just started coming to
• 53:56
  me like why don't you do this story?
• 53:57
  And that story started sending things.
• 53:58
  To my wife. So that was your breakthrough
• 53:59
  story? It was like a it was like a
• 54:01
  footnote at the bottom of an article that someone else wrote
• 54:04
  about the chemist. Wow and.
• 54:08
  They spelled my name wrong. That was your first.
• 54:14
  Like other sorry, there were other articles that you wrote
• 54:17
  that were not submitted besides the one that they denied.
• 54:20
  No, yeah, there were some things that I submitted that they
• 54:23
  denied. None of those have ever been
• 54:24
  printed, right. But there were ideas that they
• 54:26
  didn't green light until after that happened.
• 54:28
  Tell me about other ideas that you because you're not just a
• 54:30
  writer, you're like a walking story teller.
• 54:35
  Like you're not just writing a story, you're creating the idea,
• 54:38
  the concept, you're there, your vision.
• 54:40
  It's like, you know, I guess I, you know, I'm just comparing it
• 54:43
  to, let's say, my life and I'm walking around.
• 54:45
  I put on something on status. You know, you think of creative,
• 54:48
  you put it up there, but you're taking it in.
• 54:50
  You're you're putting it into a beautiful story.
• 54:52
  You're taking the thoughts and you're putting it out there.
• 54:53
  So that happens to you a lot. Yeah.
• 54:55
  So what happened after that? How tell me more stories that
• 54:57
  happened. Like what?
• 54:58
  The stories. So I remember after that I was.
• 55:00
  Telling you you really impressed them or impressed the world.
• 55:03
  I didn't impress them. I so it was basically after that
• 55:05
  one, they're like, they're starting to take me seriously.
• 55:07
  So I asked for a meeting and I walk into their boardroom.
• 55:10
  It's like this big conference table and the publishers there
• 55:13
  and, and all the editors and I said, OK, so I have this crazy
• 55:16
  idea. OK, so here's what I want to do.
• 55:18
  I want to travel to, let's say, 50 countries.
• 55:22
  And we're going to do a story about a Chabad in this country
• 55:24
  and in that country. And every week we'll have like a
• 55:26
  column about Chabad in this place because I figured this is
• 55:29
  a way I could like travel the world and mix it in with Judaism
• 55:32
  and, and it's going to be great. And they're like, cool idea.
• 55:35
  No, it's, it's just not going to work.
• 55:39
  We can't do how about every week?
• 55:40
  You know, we could do how about some weeks?
• 55:41
  But there's so many other groups that that would want to be
• 55:44
  featured. And it's just logistically it's
• 55:46
  going to be very hard. And so that was the end of that.
• 55:50
  But, and I ended up getting a column that was a weekly travel
• 55:53
  column that I did for a bunch of years.
• 55:56
  So all these ideas were changed a little bit the different
• 56:00
  iterations, but they ended up working out in the long run.
• 56:02
  I've seen someone, I don't know if it's AMI or someone that does
• 56:05
  travelling when they picked a city and a town and they
• 56:08
  highlighted all the things about the town.
• 56:10
  That's that what you guys were doing or is?
• 56:12
  I mean, there was, there were few years that I had that, yeah.
• 56:15
  Yeah. Where is the AMI headquarters?
• 56:17
  Like, who are these people that are making these decisions to
• 56:19
  green light and not to like this sounds like a really big
• 56:22
  business. This sounds like they're running
• 56:23
  a big corporation. AMI is a big corporation.
• 56:25
  They're a pretty big Jewish media outlet, right?
• 56:27
  Like they're, they're responsible for a lot of the
• 56:29
  news that gets put out there and they're a reliable source,
• 56:32
  right? Like if they post it like you
• 56:34
  can has credibility. I mean, it's a pretty big deal.
• 56:37
  Is that right? I believe so.
• 56:38
  So where are they? Like, where's their
• 56:39
  headquarters? Like where?
• 56:40
  Barbark. In Barbark.
• 56:42
  Yeah. Now, recently they opened
• 56:43
  another office in Lakewood because a lot of it's
• 56:45
  interesting, but you know, New York is kind of like Brooklyn is
• 56:48
  losing its, it's not what it used to be.
• 56:50
  No, no, for sure not. It's being.
• 56:52
  Taken over by cameras, by banks, by It's not, you know.
• 56:56
  Donnie. The Brooklyn stock is certainly
• 56:59
  declining. It's you know, it's not what it
• 57:01
  once. Was I last week I said you know,
• 57:03
  I was talking to somebody and I said I think within like 5 years
• 57:07
  Lakewood might overtake Brooklyn.
• 57:10
  Everyone in the room was like that happened a long.
• 57:11
  Time. Yeah, exactly.
• 57:12
  Yeah. Really, I knew it was coming.
• 57:15
  They're paying you a salary like you're literally on working for
• 57:18
  them full time. I don't, I to be honest, I can't
• 57:22
  go into specifics about that, but at this point I, I do have a
• 57:27
  full time thing with them, yeah. So you have a contract with
• 57:28
  them, whatever that is, and, and you have an arrangement and
• 57:31
  you're dedicating most of your time to work for the Army and to
• 57:35
  find stories or. Your writing time not write
• 57:37
  about it. The the writing doesn't take so
• 57:39
  much time. I mean it takes a significant
• 57:41
  amount of time. Building it out.
• 57:42
  My week is built around what happens in the White House and
• 57:45
  in Washington, the president. Well, we didn't get to that
• 57:47
  point yet, so we got to rewind that a little.
• 57:50
  Bit So the beginning of the role was to just find different
• 57:52
  interesting things and then, you know, put it together.
• 57:55
  Anything that you wrote, I'm curious about that journey that
• 57:57
  was that stands out unique, controversial, something that
• 58:01
  got you in trouble throughout all those writings.
• 58:03
  Any any of those type of things happened?
• 58:05
  What's the most? Memorable piece that you put out
• 58:06
  that was like, interesting. I think the my favorite piece I
• 58:11
  ever wrote was an interview with a guy named Joelish Krauss who
• 58:16
  is a quasi member of Naturi Karta.
• 58:20
  But he doesn't doesn't go to like he doesn't partner with the
• 58:26
  Arabs. He just has an issue
• 58:28
  ideologically with the state, but he would never go with the
• 58:31
  enemies of the Jewish people. So he's like, it's an
• 58:33
  interesting balance. And also the craziest thing is
• 58:36
  that every Shabbos he has Kayla meeting at Shabbos table.
• 58:40
  Where does he live? Meshar.
• 58:43
  He's not the guy with the Palestinian flag, is he?
• 58:44
  No. So there's other people.
• 58:46
  There, there are some people there with Palestinians, but
• 58:48
  this is a guy who like loves every single Jew with his entire
• 58:51
  heart. Also is ideologically opposed to
• 58:54
  the current government and state of Israel, but he pays taxes.
• 58:58
  And he's OK living in Israel, obviously, I mean.
• 59:01
  Yeah, yeah, he's never left. Right.
• 59:02
  It's interesting. All the not a conflict.
• 59:06
  You could not a. Conflict.
• 59:07
  All these people that they're, they, they understand that the
• 59:09
  land was given to us by God. No, I get it.
• 59:11
  I just thought a lot of naturic out to people live here in
• 59:14
  Muncie. Yeah, there are there.
• 59:16
  Yeah, there's a bunch. There, I thought that's where
• 59:18
  most of them lived. I didn't know.
• 59:19
  The the the noisy ones are in Muncie.
• 59:21
  I see so. Most of the real I see them
• 59:23
  believe that like have that type of a model and that that
• 59:26
  mentality, the mainstream khasid them, that's their belief.
• 59:29
  This shouldn't be an Israeli state.
• 59:31
  They don't support it. They're not against it.
• 59:33
  They're not going to vehemently go and protest and side with the
• 59:36
  Palestinians. They would never do that.
• 59:37
  But. Siding with the Palestinians is
• 59:39
  I don't. Know that's what the true
• 59:40
  character does. They're very extreme.
• 59:42
  I don't know of any. In the head, I don't know of any
• 59:45
  rabbi who I respect who wants us to side with our enemies.
• 59:49
  That's that's a crazy thing to do.
• 59:51
  But it sounds like this guy is not siding with the enemies.
• 59:53
  That's right. So that's the most of us see
• 59:55
  them. I like this guy that's.
• 59:56
  What? No, no, no.
• 59:57
  Most of us see, you know, there there are hundreds of thousands
• 59:59
  of us see them who vote, volunteer for national service.
• 1:00:05
  I was in Benet, Brock this summer.
• 1:00:07
  I was doing a collab with a restaurant.
• 1:00:09
  They asked me to come in. They wanted to show me so I
• 1:00:11
  could show my followers, whoever sitting they accomplished this
• 1:00:14
  meal and. All of a sudden this huge group
• 1:00:17
  of Hasidim walk in talking probably 30 or 40 guys and all
• 1:00:21
  of them are have these land yards hanging from their around
• 1:00:25
  their necks. And the owner of the restaurant,
• 1:00:27
  not just me, he says, you know what that is said?
• 1:00:30
  Looks like a bunch of Hasidim. He says, you see the land yards.
• 1:00:33
  What do you think those are? I said, I don't know.
• 1:00:35
  Do they work for some, for a company?
• 1:00:36
  They're all like, it's like a corporate lunch.
• 1:00:38
  And he said no, all these guys are in military intelligence.
• 1:00:42
  We're talking long pace, long beards, the long suits.
• 1:00:46
  And it is all of them are giving their heart and soul to this
• 1:00:50
  country and they eat here for free everyday.
• 1:00:54
  Wow. So there's a lot of a lot of big
• 1:00:57
  Rebbas tell their Hasidim to vote and be there's basically
• 1:01:00
  when it comes to Zionism in the Kasidis world, there's two
• 1:01:04
  different, two different ways to go about it.
• 1:01:08
  There are some who believe that the state is no good, don't have
• 1:01:11
  anything to do with it. And they even believe it's
• 1:01:12
  against halacha to vote or to be a part of it in any way.
• 1:01:16
  And the other, I think, and even more common practice is people
• 1:01:21
  say, listen, I don't agree with everything the state does, but
• 1:01:23
  it's here, it's not going away. And I have an opportunity to
• 1:01:26
  influence the way the state goes based on voting and, and being
• 1:01:30
  involved. So that's the practical approach
• 1:01:32
  that most people take. Let's go back to your writing.
• 1:01:34
  So your writing and by the way, thank you for that story.
• 1:01:37
  I love it. I love I I wish I could see them
• 1:01:40
  and. You can.
• 1:01:40
  I'll tell you where to go, please.
• 1:01:41
  Do you're saying it's a specific restaurant that they go to every
• 1:01:44
  day? Where's the?
• 1:01:45
  Restaurant. Oh, this?
• 1:01:46
  This could be an intelligence issue, I'll tell you off camera.
• 1:01:50
  By the way, if anyone wants to know they can DM me and I'll
• 1:01:52
  I'll go with them. How about that, you know, but
• 1:01:54
  but that is a place that I would love, I would be proud to see.
• 1:01:56
  And I've heard of this things, but seeing it is next level,
• 1:02:00
  which is amazing. Someone just told me there's a
• 1:02:03
  software engineer that he's high hiring that lives beyond the
• 1:02:06
  Golan. You know what I mean?
• 1:02:07
  Like someone like, and there's a whole team of them and he's
• 1:02:10
  like, oh, hold on one second. I might have an intruder.
• 1:02:11
  I got to, I'll be right back, you know, put in the middle of a
• 1:02:14
  zoom call. So these kind of things that
• 1:02:16
  they're amazing to see go. Let's go through the journey.
• 1:02:20
  So what happened after the writing and you're doing the
• 1:02:22
  columns and it's going well for you and you start to get paid I
• 1:02:25
  guess, right? You get paid.
• 1:02:26
  Right. So that becomes your job.
• 1:02:28
  That's. Becomes my job, but even more
• 1:02:30
  so, I started doing travel pieces.
• 1:02:32
  Got it. And.
• 1:02:33
  By the way, you've done things on YouTube and stuff that I've
• 1:02:35
  seen incredible nothing to do with any of these things, right?
• 1:02:39
  I mean, that's a. What?
• 1:02:40
  What did you see on YouTube? You were in a in a Arab country
• 1:02:43
  somewhere and you were in a hotel room and you were
• 1:02:46
  videoing. So.
• 1:02:47
  So I'd say a lot or most of those trips were funded by AMI.
• 1:02:51
  They'd send me on a trip to write an article and while I'm
• 1:02:54
  there, like, I may as well take some footage.
• 1:02:55
  Got it. And you're building your brand,
• 1:02:57
  so to speak, as you're doing your.
• 1:02:59
  Thing and also AMI's brand. Sure.
• 1:03:01
  Of course. Of course.
• 1:03:02
  Yeah, that's awesome. So you have the experience and
• 1:03:06
  all that coming together, right? So you did that in the magazine.
• 1:03:09
  In the magazine, you did those stories.
• 1:03:11
  And then what happened after that?
• 1:03:13
  Eventually I think my my really big break when it comes to
• 1:03:17
  social media and like being on the Internet was when I reached
• 1:03:22
  out to a YouTube vlogger named Peter Santaniello and I invited
• 1:03:28
  him to come see the city community in Brooklyn.
• 1:03:30
  This is in September of 2020. This was Williamsburg.
• 1:03:34
  We did Borough park, Williamsburg and Crown Heights
• 1:03:36
  in one day. Wow.
• 1:03:38
  And he recorded this video, it got over 1,000,000 views like in
• 1:03:42
  the 1st 24 hours. And then I spent a couple hours
• 1:03:46
  convincing him to come back and we did like a series of 15
• 1:03:50
  videos which now have over 80 million views on YouTube, Wow
• 1:03:54
  and and Facebook combined. What made you think of that, by
• 1:03:56
  the way? I always, my wife tells me like
• 1:03:59
  the, the most common thing that comes out of my mouth is I have
• 1:04:02
  an idea. It's like 45 times a day.
• 1:04:05
  Most of them I forget about get lost.
• 1:04:07
  I write them down somewhere. Nothing happens with them, but
• 1:04:09
  there's always ideas. My, my, my brain is like a, like
• 1:04:12
  a dryer, just always spinning with, with stuff and you can't
• 1:04:16
  turn it off. It's, it's like almost a problem
• 1:04:19
  because I don't, I don't really get any Peace of Mind.
• 1:04:23
  So I'm always shooting out DMS, just random texts to people.
• 1:04:25
  I just had an idea and I sent this off, didn't think anything
• 1:04:28
  would happen with it. And within a few minutes, the
• 1:04:29
  guy gets back to me. He's like, yeah, let's, let's do
• 1:04:32
  it. He saw it as the opportunity of
• 1:04:34
  a lifetime to get. Into a community then.
• 1:04:35
  To be honest, I can't imagine if a person like you were saying
• 1:04:38
  that it's hard to get Peace of Mind and then you're blowing up
• 1:04:42
  and it goes even crazier how your life must be now.
• 1:04:45
  It's hectic. He knows I don't get any Peace
• 1:04:49
  of Mind. I mean, you say Peace of Mind.
• 1:04:52
  Are you using those words on purpose or is it just coming out
• 1:04:55
  of your mouth being quiet? Is that what you mean?
• 1:04:58
  You know, time for yourself? Like what do you actually mean?
• 1:05:01
  You say Peace of Mind. I have a turbulent mind.
• 1:05:04
  Right. I just, I don't there like I
• 1:05:08
  could think of maybe 3 or 4 instances when the in the last
• 1:05:12
  five years when I had a few moments that I, my mind was
• 1:05:15
  relaxed that it's just turned off and I was able to just be
• 1:05:20
  100% in the moment. Right.
• 1:05:22
  Wow. You know they have some drugs
• 1:05:23
  for that that I can introduce you to.
• 1:05:25
  I I prefer to stay away. What?
• 1:05:26
  What? What would you introduce me to
• 1:05:28
  if I wasn't to it? I have to tell you, I would 100%
• 1:05:31
  recommend to you, and this podcast has been changing my
• 1:05:34
  life for the better and it's been helping me grow
• 1:05:35
  tremendously. Fally Klein.
• 1:05:38
  Fally Klein was on an episode that we had here and she spoke
• 1:05:40
  about breathing and I took one of her pieces of advice and I
• 1:05:44
  did it and it was very, very helpful for me.
• 1:05:47
  After we had her on, yeah. What's do we like have a
• 1:05:51
  relationship at all? Tell you I don't see.
• 1:05:53
  Anyone literally like we're? Dividing and conquering you're.
• 1:05:56
  Living a hot life outside of the and.
• 1:05:58
  Conquering. I feel like you're like
• 1:05:59
  betraying me, like you're what's going on to me.
• 1:06:02
  Anyways, I'm telling you this how?
• 1:06:04
  Was that how was that experience?
• 1:06:05
  It was great. It was great.
• 1:06:06
  It's another. I would have done that with.
• 1:06:08
  I'm going to talk about it when Ezra Max comes on.
• 1:06:10
  That's the person that she recommended.
• 1:06:12
  So when he comes on, I'm going to tell him about the experience
• 1:06:14
  because he also knows about this world.
• 1:06:16
  But I'm recommend. You would have done it with me.
• 1:06:18
  I would not have done it with you.
• 1:06:19
  Not because it's you. I don't like working out with
• 1:06:21
  other people. I don't want to do this.
• 1:06:22
  I do this with other people. She did this yourself.
• 1:06:25
  Was in the Yeah, myself, intimate.
• 1:06:26
  The guy I got intimate. I see this guy from Monroe who
• 1:06:30
  is a superstar. Really.
• 1:06:31
  Yes, superstar. How long was it for?
• 1:06:34
  How long did it take the? Whole time it was a 2 hour I.
• 1:06:37
  Think I know who you're talking about?
• 1:06:38
  Yeah, I don't remember his name. Say it please.
• 1:06:40
  I don't know his name, I just know his face.
• 1:06:42
  Oh, he's a wonderful person. He also does consulting for
• 1:06:44
  businesses. I was a Newman with him.
• 1:06:47
  Yeah, so the reason why I'm saying it, by the way, and
• 1:06:50
  again, another podcast for another time, and it's a whole
• 1:06:54
  other world. It's the concept of being
• 1:06:56
  present and the. Best interviews come from the
• 1:06:59
  place of least expected. I have a letter from AMI
• 1:07:02
  rejecting my submission that I wrote for like.
• 1:07:05
  This is not going to work for us.
• 1:07:07
  It's like a letter of rejection from the magazine that I've been
• 1:07:09
  on the cover of 6 Times Now. None of your business or she.
• 1:07:14
  None of your business, Michael, the none of your business.
• 1:07:17
  Podcast hosted by Michael Anoshi Having Peace of Mind and you
• 1:07:21
  know, and, and, and being able to internalize what you're going
• 1:07:24
  through in life and appreciating the moments.
• 1:07:26
  I'm not thinking, you're not appreciating it.
• 1:07:28
  You're just recognizing and you're conscious about the fact
• 1:07:30
  that your mind is a is spinning, but, but different than most
• 1:07:33
  people. Your mind's not just spinning.
• 1:07:35
  It's spinning with amazing ideas.
• 1:07:38
  And he's a content creator, so he has to have these ideas all
• 1:07:40
  the time. He's got to keep the fresh new
• 1:07:42
  things that he's going to do I don't.
• 1:07:44
  Bother. I don't interested.
• 1:07:45
  I don't necessarily see it as a problem.
• 1:07:47
  Yeah. It's just, it's just my reality,
• 1:07:49
  Like I, my mind is really busy. I'm not saying it's a problem,
• 1:07:52
  I'm just saying I can't imagine how the dryer spinning,
• 1:07:55
  spinning, spinning, what it's like to be in your shoes right
• 1:07:58
  now because you have ideas. You execute and you not and you
• 1:08:01
  move forward. 99% of my ideas go nowhere.
• 1:08:03
  That's how crazy it is. The 1% is so much that you're
• 1:08:07
  doing. That's what's wild about your
• 1:08:08
  lifestyle. I've been watching you.
• 1:08:10
  You can't hide it. I've been seeing it and it's
• 1:08:12
  amazing. So it's just, yeah.
• 1:08:13
  So I think it's a negative thing, but it is a positive
• 1:08:16
  thing. It's a positive thing to breathe
• 1:08:18
  and take it. Easy.
• 1:08:19
  I think it's called ADHD. That's exactly what it's called,
• 1:08:22
  yeah, because. I think some people have a more.
• 1:08:23
  Yeah, some have worse. So what happens?
• 1:08:26
  So now you are blowing up. You're blowing up.
• 1:08:29
  You have, you know, notoriety. People know who you are.
• 1:08:31
  Your face is out there. We're not up to the White House
• 1:08:33
  yet. We're almost there.
• 1:08:35
  So OK, so then I decided like I don't want to say I'm going to
• 1:08:38
  go all in, but I'm going to invest a lot of time and energy
• 1:08:41
  and social media. So I started making a lot of
• 1:08:44
  YouTube videos. I know you guys commented that I
• 1:08:46
  don't have that many, but we do 128, which for me it was was
• 1:08:49
  hard. I have over 100 travel videos
• 1:08:52
  from some of the craziest places on earth that are in the bank on
• 1:08:56
  my hard drive. Never been released because I
• 1:08:58
  haven't gotten around to editing the end.
• 1:08:59
  Give me some like where? I'm from Saudi Arabia, from
• 1:09:03
  Afghanistan, from Lebanon. Was was on my hard drive for
• 1:09:06
  like for over 7 years until I put out the video and did very
• 1:09:09
  well even seven years later which.
• 1:09:12
  One, do you feel like you need to get out soon?
• 1:09:17
  I went to prison with Nissan Black in Texas.
• 1:09:20
  We visited a prison, prison to there's like a bunch of Jews in
• 1:09:24
  this prison. He went to sing for them.
• 1:09:25
  We filmed the vlog and we got special access, like bring
• 1:09:28
  cameras into the prison. I should put that out.
• 1:09:30
  That's awesome. What do you typically do when
• 1:09:32
  you go to a place, like you said, Afghanistan before?
• 1:09:34
  Like how long are you there for and what, what is your agenda
• 1:09:36
  like? What is your what, what's your
• 1:09:38
  steps? What do you do over there?
• 1:09:39
  So it really depends on on what the goal of the trip is and who
• 1:09:45
  the trip is for. Most of these trips were done
• 1:09:47
  for Omni Magazine. So the goal is to have an
• 1:09:50
  experience, interact with people, find some Jewish
• 1:09:54
  history, interact with some Jews who might still be left there
• 1:09:57
  and tell the story very visually, both like visually
• 1:10:02
  descriptive and with nice pictures in Omni magazine.
• 1:10:06
  And in addition to that, I was filming, you know, why not if
• 1:10:08
  I'm here anyway. And we can promote the articles
• 1:10:11
  by posting on social media and showing little clips.
• 1:10:13
  And I started putting together vlogs based on my, my
• 1:10:15
  experiences all, all around the world.
• 1:10:17
  And a lot of them I've been very, very special, very
• 1:10:20
  meaningful, especially in the Arab world.
• 1:10:21
  Like, I made a lot of nice connections with people and
• 1:10:25
  before October 7th had considered myself to have a lot
• 1:10:27
  of friends there. You got to tell me what's
• 1:10:30
  something that surprised you when you went to visit these
• 1:10:32
  countries or something that stands out right now in your
• 1:10:35
  head. I feel that the Jewish people
• 1:10:41
  and the Arab people, Muslim people, have a lot of things in
• 1:10:44
  common, specifically challenges, for example, with the youth.
• 1:10:48
  A lot of our youth are not connecting to our heritage, and
• 1:10:51
  they feel like there's another way and maybe they should be
• 1:10:54
  looking outwards. And the Arab world is struggling
• 1:10:56
  with this as well. And to see it happening and to
• 1:10:59
  meet with people who are like, outwardly they look like very
• 1:11:03
  religious Arabs, but inwardly they're completely secular.
• 1:11:06
  It's just very interesting to see.
• 1:11:08
  The commonalities, yeah. Yeah, and I, I feel like.
• 1:11:11
  The struggle is universal. The struggle is.
• 1:11:13
  Universal, it really is. Yeah, it's, it's AI think
• 1:11:16
  there's there's a big struggle in people who want to stay
• 1:11:20
  rooted in their past while moving into the future.
• 1:11:23
  And what's the right balance of that?
• 1:11:25
  Yeah, sorry, we had a pastor on the podcast like four or five
• 1:11:29
  podcasts ago. We did.
• 1:11:30
  Yeah. What?
• 1:11:32
  He was Graham. He was appointed by Donald Trump
• 1:11:34
  as the as the pastor of America. A very interesting guy.
• 1:11:38
  He actually is part of the White House administration, so he has
• 1:11:42
  a what was the thing he said at school with the president?
• 1:11:46
  The president has a book. The festival jobs.
• 1:11:48
  The plum book. The plum book.
• 1:11:49
  Or something, you know what I'm talking about.
• 1:11:52
  Nope. He mentioned that anyway.
• 1:11:52
  So he's he had that role. So he actually said that he's
• 1:11:55
  seeing that the younger kids in Christianity in their faith
• 1:11:58
  where they're actually reconnecting more than than it
• 1:12:01
  used to be. And like the conservative
• 1:12:04
  movement like is growing, you know, and the traditional
• 1:12:07
  movement is growing. That's what you know.
• 1:12:09
  He felt like I, I don't know if. Yeah, I think, I think Trump
• 1:12:11
  ushered that in. For sure.
• 1:12:14
  You got there much more into politics.
• 1:12:16
  You got there much more in tune with the world and the country,
• 1:12:18
  you know, became more nationalists and became more
• 1:12:21
  respectful to God and to the faith.
• 1:12:24
  Definitely was a big driver for that.
• 1:12:25
  Charlie Kirk also had a big impact on the Christians in this
• 1:12:29
  country. Take us there.
• 1:12:30
  Take us to how you got involved in this side of the world in
• 1:12:33
  Washington. What happened in Washington
• 1:12:34
  politics? How did you get into the whole
• 1:12:36
  world? Is it just Jake saying hey,
• 1:12:38
  there's an opening and. For years Jake has been telling
• 1:12:40
  me to me that if he was going to give up his job, he would want
• 1:12:43
  me to take. It.
• 1:12:44
  And I kept telling him, like, not going to happen.
• 1:12:47
  Not my thing. I like to travel the world.
• 1:12:50
  I like to hang out in the Middle East.
• 1:12:51
  This just leave me in, you know, in Syria with my people.
• 1:12:56
  And then you do Washington. Everyone's going to be happy.
• 1:12:59
  But he decided to leave. And AMI was like, you know, he
• 1:13:05
  also had gone to AMI and said, you know, we want like you
• 1:13:08
  should, you should convinced. Let me to take this so I went
• 1:13:12
  there to meet them and they offered it to me and I said no,
• 1:13:15
  thank you. I appreciate the offer It's like
• 1:13:17
  I I'm honored actually you want to put me there, but I really
• 1:13:20
  like what I'm doing and they said you don't have to stop what
• 1:13:22
  you're doing. We want you to add this to your
• 1:13:24
  portfolio so that I can do and then I stopped what I was doing.
• 1:13:29
  I like I. Do this full time.
• 1:13:31
  Yes, I, I, I don't travel the world as much now that I'm in
• 1:13:35
  Washington every week, but I decided that I have to also do
• 1:13:40
  that more like I, I really, I miss travelling all over the
• 1:13:44
  world and I'm, I'm going to be doing that again.
• 1:13:48
  So you are in Washington often now?
• 1:13:50
  Like, you go there every week? Yeah, you were in the White
• 1:13:54
  House once a week. Was there yesterday.
• 1:13:57
  And you're really. Yeah.
• 1:13:58
  Oh, wow. So you're like part of the press
• 1:14:00
  corps? Yeah.
• 1:14:02
  And you're asking questions like at the to what's her name?
• 1:14:05
  Like what's the I'm? Trying.
• 1:14:06
  It's very hard to get have. You gotten a question yet?
• 1:14:08
  Not from her, no. But I got a question from the
• 1:14:10
  President. Did you?
• 1:14:11
  Did is that reserve a clip of that?
• 1:14:14
  There is. What did you ask him?
• 1:14:16
  What was the question? It was the day after Charlie
• 1:14:17
  Crook was killed. I asked him if he had a favorite
• 1:14:20
  memory of Charlie. OK, what did he say?
• 1:14:23
  Basically that Charlie brought in all the votes and he really
• 1:14:25
  liked that. Now how does?
• 1:14:28
  He expect Trump to say I. Guess who decides who gets to
• 1:14:30
  ask a question? Well, in the in the press
• 1:14:34
  conferences, the the press secretary Caroline Levitt would
• 1:14:37
  do that. But if you have an opportunity
• 1:14:40
  to meet the president, for example, at an event or if he's
• 1:14:44
  getting onto the helicopter to, to Marine One before flying out
• 1:14:47
  or when he comes back from a trip, you can just stand on the
• 1:14:50
  lawn. And if he if he walks past, you
• 1:14:51
  could ask him a question. So he literally just picks so he
• 1:14:54
  wants to, you know? Yeah.
• 1:14:55
  But if he doesn't see a familiar face, doesn't know who you are,
• 1:14:57
  he doesn't wanna take the risk of you asking a question.
• 1:14:59
  He top the risk. He probably won't like it,
• 1:15:01
  probably won't pick on you. But he took the risk with me.
• 1:15:04
  He took the risk with you. Interesting.
• 1:15:05
  So, Karen Levitt, he never yet asked you for a question.
• 1:15:08
  I've asked her questions in private like I I've met her,
• 1:15:11
  been to her office stuff, but at a press conference.
• 1:15:13
  No, I'd like to hear about that, if you don't mind, because I
• 1:15:15
  look at her as also a very powerful person in general.
• 1:15:18
  I mean, it's, I mean she's. Got the most direct access to
• 1:15:20
  the president? And the craziest thing about her
• 1:15:22
  is I forget the name, I'm sorry, but the one before her,
• 1:15:24
  Kayleigh. Mcenany.
• 1:15:25
  Yes, amazing. I thought when I was watching
• 1:15:28
  her I was like, wow, I've never seen anything like this.
• 1:15:29
  I don't think anything. And then suddenly someone who
• 1:15:32
  came on it, I'm like, wow, respect.
• 1:15:34
  Yeah, she was really good with the Kaylee was really good with
• 1:15:37
  the with like the facts. So like she would just do these
• 1:15:41
  mic drop moments and then, you know, you hear the thug life
• 1:15:43
  music and the glasses fall down the joints in her.
• 1:15:46
  Mouth. Yeah, of course.
• 1:15:48
  Oh my God, they're both great. So tell me about her.
• 1:15:51
  Like, I'm just curious about, you know, when you're talking to
• 1:15:53
  her, you answer questions that you can share, like things that
• 1:15:55
  you wrote about. So the way it works is if you
• 1:15:58
  have a question, you can go to the press office and submit the
• 1:16:03
  question and somebody in the administration is supposed to
• 1:16:04
  get back to you. Obviously they're dealing with a
• 1:16:07
  massive load of questions, so you're not always going to get a
• 1:16:10
  response, but they try, they try their best.
• 1:16:14
  And you can also ask for a meeting with anybody in the in
• 1:16:19
  the administration. You're not necessarily going to
• 1:16:21
  get it, but you can ask. But over the, you know, over the
• 1:16:23
  past year, I've met with a bunch of different people and a lot of
• 1:16:27
  them are really nice. Who else have you met?
• 1:16:29
  Like one-on-one? Who have you interviewed?
• 1:16:30
  Have you interviewed anybody? No, a senator or none of that.
• 1:16:33
  Oh, so sure. I so that's a different part of
• 1:16:36
  my job. I'll hang around in the in the
• 1:16:38
  Capitol. So go like to the House floor of
• 1:16:40
  the Senate. And you can roam freely over
• 1:16:42
  there. He's gonna knock on people's
• 1:16:43
  offices like you. Know anyone can knock the The
• 1:16:45
  offices are not in the actual Capitol building.
• 1:16:47
  They're in office buildings surrounding the Capitol.
• 1:16:49
  Anybody can go. You don't have to have any
• 1:16:52
  credentials. All you have to do is walk
• 1:16:53
  through metal detector and you're and you're good.
• 1:16:55
  You can knock on anybody's. Office to which office?
• 1:16:56
  Where is this building? So let's say you go to the
• 1:16:58
  Russell Senate Office Building and.
• 1:17:01
  The senators are usually working there throughout the day.
• 1:17:04
  They're coming in and out of meetings and committees and
• 1:17:07
  stuff. So if you walk into the office,
• 1:17:09
  you're going to be met by a receptionist or aides, and then
• 1:17:13
  within the office there's like an inter.
• 1:17:14
  Office in the hallways. Yeah, that's where all that
• 1:17:17
  happens. That's where.
• 1:17:18
  All that happens. So you can, anyone can hang out
• 1:17:20
  there, but what I'm allowed to do is go into the Capitol and
• 1:17:22
  walk pretty much anywhere and you can interact with them
• 1:17:25
  'cause they're always coming and going from votes and committees.
• 1:17:26
  And so they you know what's your.
• 1:17:29
  Favorite room in the White House that you?
• 1:17:31
  My favorite room in the White House.
• 1:17:32
  That you appreciate, that you have access to, that you could
• 1:17:34
  see. The press generally has access
• 1:17:37
  to one room, which is the press briefing room.
• 1:17:40
  That's where the briefings happen.
• 1:17:42
  And then behind the briefing room there are a bunch of
• 1:17:45
  smaller offices with the large networks have like a little
• 1:17:48
  office within the White House. So CNN has one and Fox has one
• 1:17:50
  and AP has 1. And so the large networks have
• 1:17:55
  offices. There's a couple desks like kind
• 1:17:57
  of like a Co working space that anybody can work in.
• 1:17:59
  There's a little like break room slash coffee room with a couple
• 1:18:03
  of vending machines. There's a large outdoor area you
• 1:18:06
  can hang out at. But then when there's special
• 1:18:08
  events, which are almost everyday, there's something
• 1:18:10
  going on. They'll give not all members,
• 1:18:13
  but many members of the press access to a specific event.
• 1:18:15
  So let's say if BB's coming to the White House, they'll do a
• 1:18:20
  joint press conference in the East Room.
• 1:18:23
  So I was in the room when Trump announced that he was going to
• 1:18:26
  take Gaza and own it and do a job with it, which is like a
• 1:18:30
  very interesting day to be there.
• 1:18:34
  The the helicopters coming and going is also a very interesting
• 1:18:39
  thing to witness. There's the Rose Garden Club
• 1:18:42
  where he Trump likes to play DJ. And there's always things
• 1:18:45
  happening like, you know, he put up this presidential wall of
• 1:18:47
  fame with all the gold pictures and then find them with the
• 1:18:50
  autopen. The autopen, Yeah.
• 1:18:51
  Ultimate troll move, by the way. Yeah.
• 1:18:53
  That's right there. We we have access to some parts
• 1:18:57
  of the building, but not all of them.
• 1:18:58
  So your job is to just be around, be there and report back
• 1:19:01
  to the, I mean, write an article about the interesting things
• 1:19:04
  that happened. And that's what the viewers, the
• 1:19:06
  readers want to know is your perspective and what's going on
• 1:19:08
  in the White House. And try to interact with with
• 1:19:11
  the leaders as much as possible. Obviously we understand that
• 1:19:16
  you're competing with every other news company in America
• 1:19:20
  and a lot of people have been there much longer than you, so
• 1:19:23
  you know, you gotta. I gotta tell you, I, I I'm being
• 1:19:25
  stressed when I say this. I could be wrong, but I really
• 1:19:27
  believe this. In the firm world, no matter
• 1:19:30
  where you are in the world, in the firm communities, I think
• 1:19:32
  the Army has the most clue. I think the Army is the is the
• 1:19:36
  number one source of where you can trust information.
• 1:19:39
  It's Congress. Am I wrong on this?
• 1:19:40
  You're not wrong, but there is a mishpaka also I'm saying this
• 1:19:42
  too. Not more than the Mishpaka.
• 1:19:44
  I don't know. I the Mishpaka was first, then
• 1:19:46
  came on me. So you have two.
• 1:19:47
  Mishpaka was first. My understanding is that AMI
• 1:19:49
  sells more copies. I would think so.
• 1:19:53
  Let's say, again, I think they're both head to head.
• 1:19:54
  I don't know, there's no way to ChatGPT this right?
• 1:19:56
  So, but they're both out there tremendously and they're both
• 1:19:59
  doing these representations. But I'll tell you what they
• 1:20:01
  should do. They have like a like a digital
• 1:20:03
  social media platform AMI, like are they out there?
• 1:20:06
  They're only not doing a great job with that.
• 1:20:08
  They. Well, there's not the focus.
• 1:20:10
  First of all, it's, it's a, it's a fro magazine there.
• 1:20:13
  The focus is, is creating something that is printable that
• 1:20:17
  you read once a week. The digital, there is a digital
• 1:20:20
  version that you can get of Omni.
• 1:20:22
  So let's say you live in Timbuktu, you can get the Omni
• 1:20:25
  and download a digital, digital version.
• 1:20:27
  Talk about that. Talk about like social.
• 1:20:30
  Media I understand, but the social media?
• 1:20:31
  Presence that they're putting out.
• 1:20:32
  The social media presence at this time is to let people know
• 1:20:36
  the magazine is out, what's in the magazine, so they can get
• 1:20:39
  the magazine. Boring.
• 1:20:40
  I'm saying could they do something like they have a
• 1:20:42
  platform? Now they definitely can.
• 1:20:43
  There's no reason we talk about it sometimes.
• 1:20:45
  Somebody's dropping the ball on this, like the Army.
• 1:20:47
  Are making a decision not to go social decision.
• 1:20:49
  Why are they making that decision?
• 1:20:50
  They've got to play in this arena.
• 1:20:52
  It's out there. Too bad.
• 1:20:53
  The Army needs to be out there making sure that the right
• 1:20:55
  information is being spread and it's being controlled and
• 1:20:58
  someone's got to get ahead of it.
• 1:20:59
  If someone's going to do it and go rogue and then it's going to
• 1:21:01
  be, oh, we should have done it, it's going to be too late.
• 1:21:03
  You do understand that a large part of the army clientele is
• 1:21:06
  not on social media, doesn't want to have anything to do with
• 1:21:07
  social media? Well, let's extend the clientele
• 1:21:10
  beyond just those people. No, there's a lot of people like
• 1:21:12
  me and Michael and I would be interested in watching.
• 1:21:15
  Listening. I know so.
• 1:21:16
  A a reliable source like this and hearing their perspective
• 1:21:18
  and their views and getting some analysts on one of people, you
• 1:21:21
  know, amongst our like we don't have.
• 1:21:23
  This is probably why Israel, by the way, has a big problem in
• 1:21:26
  the social media presence and we hated universally, unfortunately
• 1:21:29
  is because the the wrong message he was putting out there.
• 1:21:32
  We're not doing a great job at portraying ourselves and
• 1:21:36
  delivering our message like we're not doing a good job.
• 1:21:39
  At it. I would respectively have to
• 1:21:41
  disagree with you on that one. I think Israel has issues with
• 1:21:45
  the way it's being portrayed and the way that things went after
• 1:21:48
  the war. But AMI and Israel have it's 2
• 1:21:51
  completely different things. AMI is a magazine that is that
• 1:21:54
  wants to be in your home and sell you a magazine every week.
• 1:21:57
  Israel is a country is fighting for its existence and AMI has
• 1:22:01
  not invested a ton in social media, although it's something
• 1:22:04
  we talk. About in the planet time like
• 1:22:05
  you have Ben Shapiro, he's got a big platform and he does this
• 1:22:08
  right. But other than Ben Shapiro,
• 1:22:10
  like, you know, I could list you 30 like, you know, with the
• 1:22:12
  Turks, you know, the other side of Ben Shapiro, I can list you
• 1:22:15
  so many of those other channels that are out there that are
• 1:22:17
  making waves and that have a big voice than about but on our
• 1:22:20
  side, how many of that three? I'm going to, I'm going to
• 1:22:22
  clarify I think what he's saying, if you don't mind,
• 1:22:24
  because I actually agree with something that you're saying.
• 1:22:26
  And maybe maybe it's clear to you and, and you just don't
• 1:22:29
  agree and it's OK. But I think what she's also
• 1:22:32
  saying is that if you have a magazine that's putting so much
• 1:22:37
  time, attention, money and effort and resources into
• 1:22:40
  representing the Jewish, you know, people and what what's
• 1:22:43
  happening in the world, you almost have an obligation to put
• 1:22:47
  yourself out there more because you're the people that are
• 1:22:49
  helping us represent who we are as a people.
• 1:22:51
  So therefore you're just hurting us in a way.
• 1:22:54
  Not you're hurting us, but meaning you're not really doing
• 1:22:56
  us people who are on social media all day a favor by because
• 1:23:00
  all the work that you're doing all week is all that's fit to
• 1:23:02
  print for Shabbos. That's what it is.
• 1:23:05
  It's not like you're reporting every day for I'm here live in
• 1:23:07
  the White House. That's what you're doing on your
• 1:23:09
  status. That's what you're doing
• 1:23:10
  personally. That's your brand and it's OK.
• 1:23:12
  I think what you're saying is that they're missing out on a
• 1:23:15
  very important, but they have to make a business decision.
• 1:23:18
  This is not their clientele. And don't.
• 1:23:20
  Defend it first was you actually articulated it very, very well.
• 1:23:23
  I feel like you guys are missing an opportunity.
• 1:23:25
  You aren't to something. Yeah.
• 1:23:27
  And you you stop make. A kosher Why not make social
• 1:23:29
  media kosher? Because we need more, we need
• 1:23:32
  more voices to be heard, not just from us, but by the way,
• 1:23:36
  yes, even from us for reinforcement.
• 1:23:37
  Like, you know, guys, we also want to see that stuff.
• 1:23:39
  It's inspiring, it's great. It's nice to see, you know,
• 1:23:41
  that, you know, somebody's representing us well and he's
• 1:23:44
  doing a good job. And, and it gives a lot of you
• 1:23:46
  know, but even for the other the non Jews of the world and people
• 1:23:49
  that don't know a whole lot about us, why should they only
• 1:23:51
  hear the other side? And we seem like we're awful
• 1:23:53
  people when there's so much beauty through it and there's so
• 1:23:55
  much nice things about our community.
• 1:23:56
  Let's showcase that more. And we need guys like you that
• 1:24:00
  are like somewhat of an influencer that you're, you're,
• 1:24:03
  you're bringing in a lot of that, that fun factor when
• 1:24:06
  you're doing it in a, in a cool way, you know, guys like you.
• 1:24:08
  Let's put promote this, let's do more of this.
• 1:24:10
  Let's invest in this so we can get a better messaging out
• 1:24:13
  there. That's what I'm saying.
• 1:24:15
  I, I think I agree with what you're saying.
• 1:24:17
  We definitely need more voices and it's something that I've
• 1:24:20
  been trying to do on a personal level and I think in many ways
• 1:24:22
  I've done with my platform, but I don't know that I mean
• 1:24:26
  necessarily sees themselves as having to solve every problem.
• 1:24:29
  They they got their magazine locked down.
• 1:24:32
  It's the number one best selling magazine in the room world.
• 1:24:35
  They are very happy with it. Everyone on the street loves it.
• 1:24:38
  They're constantly making news, having interviews with the
• 1:24:41
  biggest names. We've had Trump on the cover.
• 1:24:44
  Trump's children have been on in the magazine heads of state from
• 1:24:47
  other countries. The big people in Israel, the
• 1:24:50
  the greatest rabbis that we have today, they're all an AMI.
• 1:24:54
  So AMI is doing is totally killing it in the magazine
• 1:24:56
  department. And when it comes to social
• 1:24:58
  media, I don't think they see that as their role.
• 1:25:00
  But we definitely do need voices in in more voices in our
• 1:25:03
  community. Yeah.
• 1:25:04
  Right. It's interesting.
• 1:25:05
  All right, Stephen, you ready to start, Stephen?
• 1:25:07
  We're going to. Let's get Stephen on the case.
• 1:25:09
  Let's start, let's start a channel.
• 1:25:10
  Let's start some type of, you know.
• 1:25:12
  Are you thinking that the only thing, there's a lot going on,
• 1:25:15
  by the way, on social? I'm not on social media, so I
• 1:25:16
  don't know. But I know I mean personally who
• 1:25:19
  and exactly what, But I see what you're doing through your status
• 1:25:21
  and I see that the promotion of good things that are coming out
• 1:25:24
  of a lot of people and the world can use more.
• 1:25:26
  Of it and it's definitely helpful one big massive very
• 1:25:29
  social media no that's social media influencer that's from and
• 1:25:33
  that's that's a Jewish. Person So you said already Ben
• 1:25:36
  Shapiro, which is a big one. Ben Shapiro is the biggest one.
• 1:25:38
  It's the only one. And you know what?
• 1:25:39
  Ben Shapiro has his style and it, you know, caters towards,
• 1:25:42
  you know, certain demographics. And so, but we need somebody a
• 1:25:44
  little bit more diversified than just Ben Shapiro.
• 1:25:47
  Ellie Zeiler I. Don't know who that is.
• 1:25:49
  She's this girl from California who recently, I don't know, in
• 1:25:54
  the past couple years became from.
• 1:25:56
  She has over 10 million followers on social media and I
• 1:26:01
  think on TikTok. And she, like, stopped
• 1:26:04
  everything, went to seminary for a couple months or for a year.
• 1:26:08
  And she's a very powerful voice. I haven't met her.
• 1:26:10
  I have nothing to do with her, but I know that she exists and
• 1:26:13
  she's doing wonderful work. Love this.
• 1:26:14
  Yeah. And.
• 1:26:15
  This is what I mean. We it's exactly what I was
• 1:26:19
  saying. 10 million followers, right?
• 1:26:20
  She's like a. Huge jewelry company.
• 1:26:23
  Oh, you know what she does. I know.
• 1:26:25
  What she is, yeah, she she. Shared her story.
• 1:26:28
  On social media, yeah. She was on the seminary, like
• 1:26:31
  going through her whole journey. At the same time, she also has
• 1:26:34
  this huge jewelry company that she promotes on.
• 1:26:37
  Social. I think she was on a podcast.
• 1:26:38
  She was on Yakov Linger's division for the nation.
• 1:26:41
  Living in the Yeah. Okay, so more people like that
• 1:26:44
  so. But you know, just combat what's
• 1:26:46
  happening. It is interesting the other
• 1:26:47
  side. I'm buying more into what you're
• 1:26:48
  saying. Imagine if like, you know, all
• 1:26:50
  the people that are like can't go out to social media, like I
• 1:26:53
  don't know who they are, but even I mean, a good whatever it
• 1:26:56
  is starts blasting all their efforts on social media, but
• 1:26:59
  it's a challenge because it's. In a way the the the future is
• 1:27:03
  going to be, you know, ready is here, but get even worse.
• 1:27:06
  It's digital warfare, right? Eventually not even have to send
• 1:27:08
  soldiers into other. Countries.
• 1:27:09
  No, but I rather my cyber warfare, right?
• 1:27:11
  That's coming. It's the way of the future.
• 1:27:13
  So unfortunately there's going to be a whole digital world out
• 1:27:16
  there as well. And that's going to hurt or help
• 1:27:18
  the Jews. And we want to preserve what we
• 1:27:20
  have, right? We want to stay relevant.
• 1:27:22
  So once they're ahead of the curb.
• 1:27:23
  So this is something where I feel like we're sort of dropping
• 1:27:25
  the ball a little bit and we're not going to like it.
• 1:27:27
  And it's it's not preferable to do it.
• 1:27:29
  We want to get involved in that, but we may have to, we may not
• 1:27:32
  have a choice. Wake.
• 1:27:33
  Up there's more, it might be it. Might be too late at some point,
• 1:27:35
  God forbid. And if it can help.
• 1:27:37
  You don't feel like we're dropping the.
• 1:27:38
  Ball Not at all. I'm very involved in the social
• 1:27:40
  media space. I know pretty much everyone in
• 1:27:43
  social media. In the firm world, a lot of
• 1:27:45
  people are working on a lot of cool projects.
• 1:27:48
  I would say the, I don't know, I don't have exact figures, but I
• 1:27:52
  can tell you that 10s of millions of dollars, this, this
• 1:27:55
  social media economy in the firm world is worth 10s of millions
• 1:27:59
  of dollars. A lot of people are working on a
• 1:28:00
  lot of cool things, myself included.
• 1:28:02
  I have something that I that I think is going to address
• 1:28:04
  exactly what you talked about earlier and I don't think we're
• 1:28:08
  dropping. Something that you could share
• 1:28:09
  already or it's not. You're not ready for it.
• 1:28:13
  I guess I could share. I mean, I'm I'm working on a
• 1:28:15
  podcast that's going to be unlike anything ever that has
• 1:28:18
  ever been done in the film world.
• 1:28:19
  And I recently launched one in Yiddish, but this one is going
• 1:28:23
  to be English language. Your Yiddish 1 is called Teef
• 1:28:26
  teef. Teef teef.
• 1:28:27
  I love it. I see, I see it on your status.
• 1:28:29
  So I love the people that you're bringing on.
• 1:28:31
  You're filling that gap for people that need more podcasts
• 1:28:33
  or Yiddish speaking. People yes it's also in Yiddish
• 1:28:36
  there's nothing else like it it's like it's a it's a platform
• 1:28:39
  where anything goes you're. Going all English now.
• 1:28:42
  I'm doing I'm going to keep the Yiddish one.
• 1:28:44
  I'm. Going to start something, yeah,
• 1:28:45
  because. My English language audience,
• 1:28:46
  which is most of my audience, is complaining like you're putting
• 1:28:49
  so much effort into the Yiddish. Doing.
• 1:28:50
  I'd love it. I don't want to share exactly
• 1:28:53
  what I'm doing, but it's going to make a lot of noise.
• 1:28:56
  It's going to be, oh, I could say none of your business.
• 1:28:58
  No, it is your business, just not yet.
• 1:28:59
  Is it going to be controversial? It's going to be controversial,
• 1:29:02
  yeah. You're ready for that.
• 1:29:04
  All my life, baby. So you have like you're a,
• 1:29:07
  you're a free agent like you. You beat your own drum like you
• 1:29:10
  don't care what you know. Does your friend will be here
• 1:29:12
  know what you're doing? He knows what I'm doing.
• 1:29:14
  He knows. I see him smiling.
• 1:29:16
  Well, it'll be like you're. He's right sounding where we go
• 1:29:20
  on walks, like at 2:00 in the morning sometimes.
• 1:29:22
  Really. Yeah.
• 1:29:23
  And and can. We go on a walk, please, and
• 1:29:25
  just tell us what's going on. You don't like to walk with
• 1:29:27
  other people. I love walking with other
• 1:29:30
  people. I don't like exercise with other
• 1:29:31
  people. Half my conversations are on
• 1:29:33
  walks with people pacing up and down.
• 1:29:37
  You have to tell me a little bit more.
• 1:29:39
  I mean, I, I, I love this stuff. I love creativity and and new
• 1:29:42
  ventures and entrepreneurship thinking and.
• 1:29:45
  Well, I'll say this, OK, It's going to make a lot of people
• 1:29:48
  very concerned. It's going to make a lot of
• 1:29:53
  people think like, what is he doing?
• 1:29:56
  It's also going to make anybody with an open mind who's willing
• 1:29:59
  to listen to a few minutes of of what is going to be happening on
• 1:30:03
  my channels is going to say, wow, that that I did not see
• 1:30:07
  that coming. That's something unique.
• 1:30:10
  We actually haven't had something like this before.
• 1:30:11
  I think it's going to be very refreshing, but it's going to
• 1:30:14
  make a lot of waves and I don't think everybody's going to be
• 1:30:16
  happy with it. I'm excited.
• 1:30:18
  Is it a weekly thing? You're going to be excited.
• 1:30:20
  Like podcast. My goal is for it to be weekly
• 1:30:24
  in a very powerful lesson I've learned after my whole in the
• 1:30:28
  when after Peter Santaniello, when we could say I quote, blew
• 1:30:31
  up. I jumped into a lot of things
• 1:30:33
  way too fast. And then I crashed and burned.
• 1:30:35
  So now I'm in this mindset where I know how to build things and
• 1:30:40
  it's done in silence. And you don't talk about your
• 1:30:42
  plans until they've been done. You don't say I'm going to do
• 1:30:45
  this, say I did this. It's so interesting to speak to
• 1:30:48
  someone who going through that process and now you're doing it
• 1:30:51
  the smart, thought out, methodical way, but you're
• 1:30:54
  dropping hints. You're getting people curious.
• 1:30:56
  Yeah, this. Project is something I've been
• 1:30:58
  working on since that house he got me in 2021 in March of 2021
• 1:31:01
  that's when the concept was launched and I was telling
• 1:31:04
  people back then, oh by by April it's going to be out it's going
• 1:31:08
  to be on YouTube and it did not happen I learned my lesson and
• 1:31:13
  now I know how to build things slowly and I'm also so thankful
• 1:31:16
  it didn't happen back then so. Getting a time frame, when do
• 1:31:18
  you think it's going to happen by?
• 1:31:20
  When it's ready. It's a regular podcast model
• 1:31:22
  just to say the topics are going to be.
• 1:31:24
  The conversations that are going to be had are going to be
• 1:31:27
  newsworthy conversations that are going to make a lot of
• 1:31:31
  people uncomfortable, but also is going to open our minds to, I
• 1:31:35
  think in the in the big picture, make us expand beyond ourselves
• 1:31:38
  and and make ourselves. Beautiful, by the way, it
• 1:31:41
  doesn't go back to what I mean. It doesn't take away from what
• 1:31:44
  we were saying earlier. I'm with Oshi on this.
• 1:31:46
  I think that, you know, I think that people are comfortable
• 1:31:50
  doing what they're doing and they don't want to go too much
• 1:31:51
  out of their comfort zone because they don't want to risk
• 1:31:53
  things. It's like until competition
• 1:31:55
  starts, so to speak. And then, you know, it's like
• 1:31:57
  someone told me recently that the local supermarket here in
• 1:32:00
  Muncie used to close 1:00 on Friday.
• 1:32:02
  Now they close 10 minutes before Shabbos because everyone else
• 1:32:05
  closes 10 minutes before Shabbos.
• 1:32:06
  So like, you know, you got to pick up on it.
• 1:32:08
  So I hope that more and more people come to the realization
• 1:32:11
  that if you have the resources and you're doing it, put
• 1:32:13
  yourself out there more. Take the steps, take the bold
• 1:32:15
  steps. Create that other competition so
• 1:32:16
  that people can wake up. OK, Michael, I presume we're
• 1:32:20
  wrapping up shortly. I want to get one topic in
• 1:32:23
  before we wrap up. I just want to get you guys
• 1:32:24
  opinion on it because this just happened last night.
• 1:32:27
  I'm involved. Yeah, both of you.
• 1:32:28
  I want to take a little poll. I'm sure you know some of the
• 1:32:31
  viewers are going to hear this. I want to hear from them as
• 1:32:33
  well. And this happened last night and
• 1:32:35
  it was a debate between ten of us, ten of us in the room.
• 1:32:38
  By the way, and friends hanging out on a regular night, that's
• 1:32:41
  what she love it. What room is this?
• 1:32:43
  Somebody's house, a friend of my house, where we're in the, you
• 1:32:45
  know, are we? Drinking or are we playing a
• 1:32:47
  game? But all the all the above keep
• 1:32:49
  going. I'm going to stop there.
• 1:32:52
  At one point we said we got to order food.
• 1:32:54
  OK, so on our website is phone and places an order on Ubers and
• 1:32:58
  Uber Eats. And you know, somehow he
• 1:33:01
  mentioned I was about, oh, they asked for a tip.
• 1:33:03
  Now I'm not tipping. Why should I tip the driver?
• 1:33:05
  It's on Uber. What am I doing that for?
• 1:33:07
  No, not tipping. And I'm like, what do you mean
• 1:33:09
  you're not tipping? What?
• 1:33:10
  Why aren't you tipping? What?
• 1:33:11
  Why is this any different than anything else where you normally
• 1:33:14
  you would tip? Like what?
• 1:33:16
  It's not everything that the driver like doesn't know who we
• 1:33:19
  are. He's not going to see us.
• 1:33:20
  He's dropping off the food. Like what's the point?
• 1:33:22
  Why is that tip? And you're like, all of a sudden
• 1:33:24
  it became a conversation amongst everybody and half the room
• 1:33:27
  agreed and half the room didn't agree.
• 1:33:30
  But I vehemently didn't agree. I was mortified.
• 1:33:33
  I almost lost a little respect for this person.
• 1:33:36
  Like, I don't know if I could still be so such good friends
• 1:33:38
  with you anymore. Like, like I want to understand,
• 1:33:40
  like you, you're not tipping because you think you can get
• 1:33:43
  away with it or because you don't think he deserves it.
• 1:33:45
  Like, what's the reason you're not tipping?
• 1:33:47
  And as I'm hearing more, the way he I'm understanding from him is
• 1:33:51
  he doesn't feel like he deserves it.
• 1:33:52
  He doesn't feel like he should get tipped.
• 1:33:54
  This guy's working for probably 8000 an hour, 10,000 an hour.
• 1:33:56
  This guy's hustling. I promise you, he's a lot less
• 1:33:59
  fortunate than you are. And he's he's going for $8 where
• 1:34:02
  he's going from where he is to the store to pick up your hot
• 1:34:04
  food and deliver it to you, all for like, why wouldn't you give
• 1:34:08
  him a $3 tip? A $4.00?
• 1:34:09
  Why wouldn't you tip? Where do you go?
• 1:34:11
  To a restaurant? You tip your waiter.
• 1:34:12
  Yeah. Because that's, you know, it's.
• 1:34:14
  Yeah. So basically, if there's an
• 1:34:16
  industry standard to tip, you should tip.
• 1:34:19
  And if you don't, you're a bad person.
• 1:34:21
  Not if you can't afford. It's another story, but it's not
• 1:34:23
  a principle. You don't tip.
• 1:34:25
  I was so angry. I was so angry.
• 1:34:27
  And like, I don't know if I could like, I think of it the
• 1:34:29
  same way. I want to hear your thoughts on
• 1:34:32
  this. Is he wrong for not tipping?
• 1:34:34
  I have my instant reaction answer, but I'm curious what you
• 1:34:37
  have to say. Do you have an hour?
• 1:34:39
  An hour. You touched on so many things.
• 1:34:42
  Number one, you're like, he's a bad person unless he's poor.
• 1:34:45
  If he's poor, he's not a bad person.
• 1:34:47
  But anyway, let's take a step back.
• 1:34:51
  Why do we tip people? When there's an expectation to
• 1:34:55
  tip. No, Why?
• 1:34:56
  Why does somebody get a tip? Because they're not making
• 1:34:59
  enough money from what they're doing and part of their income
• 1:35:01
  is coming from tips, no? If somebody does a good job,
• 1:35:05
  they get a tip. Imagine, like, imagine somebody
• 1:35:07
  has a spear. What goes on top is the tip of
• 1:35:10
  the spear. OK, so they get some kind of
• 1:35:14
  base pay from Uber or from the restaurant they work in.
• 1:35:16
  And if they exceed and excel at what they do, then of course be
• 1:35:20
  nice, give them a bonus. The problem with tipping culture
• 1:35:24
  is that today when you order food with one of these food
• 1:35:29
  ordering apps, they ask you straight away, do you want to
• 1:35:32
  tip before the food comes? Let me is the driver going to
• 1:35:35
  going to spit in my food? Is he going to take a fry out?
• 1:35:38
  That's people do that. Drivers are are siphoning off
• 1:35:41
  food from from orders. Drivers are nasty.
• 1:35:43
  They drop the food, they leave it not under the awning when
• 1:35:46
  it's raining. So tipping is a wonderful thing
• 1:35:49
  when it's for somebody who needs it or deserves it and they act
• 1:35:52
  in accordance with somebody who deserves a tip.
• 1:35:54
  But just there's something wrong with society today where you go
• 1:35:58
  to, you'll go to like SIBO in the airport.
• 1:36:02
  OK, This literally happened to be at Newark airport.
• 1:36:05
  You know, there's these stores called SIBO where it's just a
• 1:36:08
  big fridge. It's just a big fridge.
• 1:36:10
  There's nobody there, Nobody there.
• 1:36:13
  And there's bananas and snacks and magazines and whatever.
• 1:36:17
  And I take a bottle of water and a banana and I go tap my card
• 1:36:20
  and it says would you like to leave a tip?
• 1:36:23
  No, that's crazy. For who?
• 1:36:24
  Yeah. For who?
• 1:36:25
  Yeah. For for Mr. Sibo, absolutely
• 1:36:27
  not. That's why I bought the banana
• 1:36:29
  from you. So no, I'm not tipping you.
• 1:36:31
  But then there's times when, like, you go to a fast food
• 1:36:35
  place and this is already like going to get controversial, but
• 1:36:40
  like, somebody packed your burger for you and put it on a
• 1:36:43
  tray and then you have to go pick it up yourself from the
• 1:36:45
  counter. And when you're paying, they do
• 1:36:47
  that casual thing where they flip the thing towards you and
• 1:36:49
  they look the other way, but they're kind of like, their eyes
• 1:36:51
  are like on the screen to see whether you tip or not.
• 1:36:53
  What's that all about? Why are we picking up the slack
• 1:36:58
  for restaurant owners who don't pay enough?
• 1:36:59
  I have no issue if every restaurant I go to raises their
• 1:37:03
  prices by 30% so they can pay their workers but don't.
• 1:37:07
  Basically what's going on is restaurants are like, we're
• 1:37:09
  going to be cheap, not pay our workers, and then we're going to
• 1:37:11
  guilt the customer into paying the tip because we're cheap.
• 1:37:14
  I want the worker to get paid but don't guilt me into it.
• 1:37:17
  Take my money by charging me more.
• 1:37:18
  Money from the buck on to me. Yeah.
• 1:37:21
  But my issue with this guy, I want to clarify is that he
• 1:37:24
  you're right, I don't know why it does that that's.
• 1:37:26
  What my answer was going to be I love tipping, why do they make?
• 1:37:29
  If the person. Deserves it.
• 1:37:30
  They should have this ridiculous thing.
• 1:37:32
  So I was going to say. If the person deserves it, they.
• 1:37:34
  Should get a tip, but let's just say, let's just say that you
• 1:37:37
  order the food, you expect it to arrive in 1/2 an hour.
• 1:37:40
  It arrived in exactly in half an hour and the driver left it
• 1:37:43
  there by the front door and everything.
• 1:37:45
  You know, he didn't do anything spectacular.
• 1:37:47
  He's not curing cancer here. He's delivering you food.
• 1:37:50
  But he did exactly what he should be doing.
• 1:37:51
  Everything's great. And then afterwards it pops up.
• 1:37:53
  Do you want to give him a tip? This guy also believes I
• 1:37:57
  wouldn't tip. He wouldn't give him a tip, he
• 1:37:59
  would. No nothing, no tip.
• 1:38:01
  That's what bothers me. I want to know if that is OK.
• 1:38:04
  Are we OK with this? Or should he have tipped this
• 1:38:06
  poor guy $5 for delivering his food?
• 1:38:09
  You get, go ahead. I was gonna say I need to hear
• 1:38:11
  his version. I don't know.
• 1:38:13
  Why would anyone say I'm not tipping a guy in the middle of
• 1:38:15
  the night, cold coming out, doing.
• 1:38:16
  Yeah, it's doing your job. But still, you know, he's not
• 1:38:18
  making a lot of money. Of course you tip him.
• 1:38:20
  What's the question? But I want to hear his theory.
• 1:38:22
  He must have something. Maybe he was saying that.
• 1:38:24
  Who knows for a fact that Uber pays a lot and they take half
• 1:38:27
  the tip. No, no, whatever.
• 1:38:28
  That's not what he was saying. Just simply, I don't need to.
• 1:38:30
  Why should I pay? Like, why should I pay him for
• 1:38:32
  what? What did he do for me?
• 1:38:33
  He did his job. That was what he said.
• 1:38:35
  That's what he said. He did his job.
• 1:38:37
  I mean, what do you mean? Everybody else that you tip in
• 1:38:39
  the world did their job that but you still tip them.
• 1:38:42
  Why did you? Tip Then do you tip your airline
• 1:38:45
  pilot? No, there's no expectation in
• 1:38:48
  the industry to tip your airline.
• 1:38:49
  Why not? Because there's no expectation.
• 1:38:51
  He did his job. We all know which industries,
• 1:38:53
  which type of job you're supposed to tip.
• 1:38:55
  We know. Why is that?
• 1:38:57
  I I want to get to the habit. To figure out how to ask you a
• 1:38:59
  great question. Why in certain industries do we
• 1:39:02
  guilt people into tipping and. Social standards became that you
• 1:39:04
  have to tip the the guy in Uber, but you don't.
• 1:39:06
  Have to tip a waiter? You tip your.
• 1:39:09
  Stewardess you tip your. Stewardess is a waiter on the
• 1:39:12
  plane, literally. Why don't you never tip your
• 1:39:16
  stewardess? I hear.
• 1:39:18
  By the way, I know people who do that.
• 1:39:19
  Really. I don't know if they can take
• 1:39:20
  money, but you want to get a real insider tip.
• 1:39:24
  If you fly a lot, buy snacks for your flight crew because they
• 1:39:27
  have the standard issued snacks from their airline.
• 1:39:30
  They never get anything else. So if you come on the plane and
• 1:39:32
  you're like, hey, I got these chips they don't have access to
• 1:39:35
  you made their day. Great idea.
• 1:39:37
  What do I need to make their day for there?
• 1:39:38
  What's that going to serve me? That serves them.
• 1:39:41
  They and be if you fly a lot and you have a status to the airline
• 1:39:45
  and you're seeing the same flight crews regularly, it's
• 1:39:46
  going to serve you. That that happens you see the
• 1:39:48
  same like you know. Yes, Yeah.
• 1:39:50
  I see the same people, really. Yes.
• 1:39:51
  Going on? Yeah.
• 1:39:52
  I don't think I've ever recognized one flight crew ever.
• 1:39:55
  I think he's on a plane every. Week I multiple times a week I
• 1:39:58
  know I know some of them by name there's a there's a you're not
• 1:40:01
  going to believe this. United has a set of twins,
• 1:40:06
  identical twins, who are stewardesses.
• 1:40:08
  They're. They've they're definitely in
• 1:40:12
  their 50s, probably 60s or higher.
• 1:40:15
  Brenda and Glenda, I've bumped into them a bunch of times, this
• 1:40:18
  cute set of older sisters and they fly everywhere together.
• 1:40:21
  They've been together for like decades on the same plane every
• 1:40:24
  day. We.
• 1:40:24
  Got to have them. That's hilarious.
• 1:40:26
  That's very cool. Do you get this worked up about
• 1:40:29
  other people not doing things your way in all areas of life,
• 1:40:33
  or just with tipping? It's a great question, by the
• 1:40:35
  way. And you only know me for like a
• 1:40:36
  couple hours, but I get very passionate about things that I
• 1:40:39
  believe in. I don't get like if I see
• 1:40:42
  something that I don't think is right, I feel compelled to say
• 1:40:45
  something I'm not. I can't hold it back and it gets
• 1:40:48
  me in trouble a lot. It really does.
• 1:40:49
  Like I should mind my own business, but like I just, I
• 1:40:52
  feel like I should set the world right.
• 1:40:53
  Like this is not OK and I I hate to stand up for what's right,
• 1:40:56
  you know? So it really bugged me that this
• 1:40:58
  guy just like, doesn't want to tell that's your.
• 1:41:00
  Ultimate answer song. I'm curious.
• 1:41:02
  I want to get to the root cause of tipping and try to figure out
• 1:41:04
  why someone deserves or doesn't deserve a tip.
• 1:41:07
  Why certain industries were. He's saying just random social
• 1:41:09
  standard. That's what you.
• 1:41:10
  I don't want to get into but I. Psyche of tipping and why I of
• 1:41:13
  course you why it's OK. Of course you do, because let's
• 1:41:15
  be social. Stand mainstream to tip your
• 1:41:17
  delivery driver. That's what I'm asking.
• 1:41:19
  Is it the norm? Right?
• 1:41:20
  Like if you got a room of 10 people, would 8 out of 10 people
• 1:41:23
  tip this delivery driver? Can we all agree that he is
• 1:41:26
  outside of what the mainstream would do?
• 1:41:28
  If the man deserves it, you give him a tip.
• 1:41:30
  No, this is Sir. He did his job.
• 1:41:32
  He picked up your food and delivered it timely and normal.
• 1:41:34
  He didn't come an hour late. That's it.
• 1:41:36
  Does he get a tip? If you can afford it, sure.
• 1:41:40
  Assuming you could afford $3 for all, how many people out of 10
• 1:41:43
  people would have pushed the button $3 tip?
• 1:41:45
  Probably. Most.
• 1:41:46
  Most right? Probably most, but that doesn't.
• 1:41:49
  Tipping is only an American thing.
• 1:41:51
  If you go to Europe, most of the time, especially in restaurants,
• 1:41:55
  when you give a tip, they actually sometimes they look at
• 1:41:57
  you like, do you know that in Japan it's offensive to tip
• 1:42:01
  people? If you give a tip in Japan, it's
• 1:42:04
  like, how dare you? I gave you this service from my
• 1:42:08
  heart and I gave it to you wholeheartedly, and now you
• 1:42:11
  think you can buy me with a tip. Will your I'm not sure I buy
• 1:42:15
  them. I gave you money after the fact.
• 1:42:17
  That's not will your. Friends say thank you to their
• 1:42:20
  housekeeper after they paid them, meaning they worked for
• 1:42:25
  me, I paid them. Do I also have to say thank you?
• 1:42:29
  It'd be the nice thing to do, yes, right.
• 1:42:31
  But but I pay them like, why do I need to say thank you?
• 1:42:33
  And I've had people actually deal with this like they're like
• 1:42:36
  struggling. I paid them like I don't need to
• 1:42:38
  owe. I don't owe them Also a thank
• 1:42:39
  you. And I, I believe you do.
• 1:42:41
  And I think the tip is the tip culture is more a thank you than
• 1:42:46
  giving them something. It's it's acknowledging their
• 1:42:49
  existence and their humanity. And the other guy slept out and
• 1:42:55
  did his job. But it's a form of thank you.
• 1:42:57
  Yeah. And it's not like you're giving
• 1:42:59
  a lot of money. You're giving $2.00.
• 1:43:00
  Now I know why you hang out with this guy at 2:00 in the morning.
• 1:43:02
  By the way, kudos to you. And I am going to, from now on,
• 1:43:05
  when I pay my housekeeper every week, take my time out and say
• 1:43:09
  thank you. I've never done it before.
• 1:43:11
  I think it's a great idea. I don't, I don't ever do it.
• 1:43:14
  You pay her. Here's your We leave it on the
• 1:43:16
  envelope. It's on the counter.
• 1:43:17
  She takes it and she goes stop for two seconds, say thank you
• 1:43:20
  for working so hard this week and keeping our house so clean
• 1:43:22
  and so shiny and so nice. Can we take it a step further?
• 1:43:24
  Yes. Should we tip our wives for
• 1:43:26
  doing the laundry? They did their job and that
• 1:43:30
  that's controversial. How dare you say it's her job?
• 1:43:33
  I believe. They should be acknowledged and
• 1:43:35
  of course, of course, but. How about how about tipping?
• 1:43:38
  Is this going on your podcast? This conversation?
• 1:43:40
  Is that type of conversations you're going to?
• 1:43:42
  Be your dish. It happens to be that I I just
• 1:43:45
  last week spoke to a restaurant owner and I said to him, I go to
• 1:43:48
  your place. Like tell me like what am I
• 1:43:50
  supposed to do? Like I'm there.
• 1:43:52
  It's a fast food. He has a sit down restaurant
• 1:43:55
  next door. So I understand that when you
• 1:43:57
  when you order at a sit down restaurant, you give a tip
• 1:44:00
  that's obvious. But at a take out like what am I
• 1:44:03
  supposed to do? He says don't tip.
• 1:44:05
  But if you Uber and you want to get your food, I recommend you
• 1:44:08
  tip because it's an advance but it's unfortunately standard.
• 1:44:14
  It's. Like almost a minute I'm
• 1:44:16
  welcome, right? Like, you know, it's which
• 1:44:17
  becomes like a Hala by the way, shout out, you know, shout out.
• 1:44:19
  I'm going to say my dad taught me.
• 1:44:21
  Shout out to my dad, ABBA, who taught me that when you throw a
• 1:44:25
  party, you throw an event and you're spending a lot of money
• 1:44:27
  and you know you're going to tip the person at the end, after the
• 1:44:30
  service, give the person a tip in the beginning.
• 1:44:33
  Whatever minimum you think you're going to give them, split
• 1:44:35
  that in half. Just give them something.
• 1:44:37
  Here's something I just want you to tell you.
• 1:44:38
  Thank you for being here tonight.
• 1:44:39
  Give them half upfront, something upfront.
• 1:44:41
  It makes the service that much better.
• 1:44:43
  Yeah. It was so nice having you here.
• 1:44:45
  I really appreciate. What are your friends call you?
• 1:44:47
  Slimey. Slimey.
• 1:44:48
  Yeah. Thank you.
• 1:44:49
  Can I call you Slimey? Sure, OK, You're my friend.
• 1:44:51
  Thank you, Slimey, I appreciate it.
• 1:44:53
  And Reb Slime, because I learned something from you today.
• 1:44:56
  I learned what it's like to live your life a little bit.
• 1:44:59
  We got a little bit of a glimpse, but I learned also what
• 1:45:01
  it's like to be Ms. to be truthful, to be honest, because
• 1:45:04
  that's who you are. You're looking for truth.
• 1:45:05
  It's like almost like every. I feel like that's a common
• 1:45:07
  denominator with everywhere you go, whether you're in Syria,
• 1:45:11
  whether you're in Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi, New York City,
• 1:45:15
  Texas. You seem to be, to me, to be a
• 1:45:17
  person that's searching for always truth and the realness of
• 1:45:21
  what's happening around you. And I appreciate that very much.
• 1:45:24
  And I know that everybody's listening also appreciates.
• 1:45:26
  It's on behalf of all of us, thank you for all the work that
• 1:45:29
  you're doing. Really, it's amazing.
• 1:45:31
  It's beautiful. Thank you I love it words and
• 1:45:33
  for for having me. I love what you're doing.
• 1:45:34
  I love your brand, I love everything you're about you and
• 1:45:37
  how you're growing so much. 2 questions before you leave is of
• 1:45:41
  course, do you have any questions for us?
• 1:45:42
  And then we're going to finalize our, we're going to finish our
• 1:45:45
  podcast with our famous question of who do you think would be a
• 1:45:49
  good person on the podcast? But because it's past one in the
• 1:45:51
  morning, I don't know if we're going to be able to call them.
• 1:45:54
  I'm I'm sure I have someone I can call.
• 1:45:56
  Oh, really? Yeah, I like that.
• 1:45:57
  OK. What's your question for us?
• 1:45:59
  OK. First question for you, how do
• 1:46:01
  you get such grade here? First of all, please follow me
• 1:46:05
  around more often so you can ask me more of these questions
• 1:46:07
  because this is great for me. I love it.
• 1:46:11
  I don't know I I don't know what like good here.
• 1:46:14
  I make sure to comb it in the morning, but that's it.
• 1:46:17
  I I don't touch beyond that. You know, Skin I.
• 1:46:19
  Eat a lot of a lot of pizza. I don't know, I think I think
• 1:46:22
  that might something. To do with it, that's
• 1:46:23
  definitely, definitely gonna help, I think.
• 1:46:26
  I think in general it's a good advice for life.
• 1:46:27
  Like eat a lot of pizza. It's good for your health.
• 1:46:29
  Love pizza. Any excuses can glow.
• 1:46:32
  I mean, I had pizza tonight, Nice on Thanksgiving.
• 1:46:34
  Can you imagine? Was there Turkey on the pizza?
• 1:46:36
  No, no, just just just good old fashioned cheese pizza.
• 1:46:38
  I had I had Turkey, I had stuffing, I had cranberries.
• 1:46:41
  So let's shout out to people that joined us for dinner.
• 1:46:44
  I probably had, I would say at a 365 days in a year.
• 1:46:48
  I probably eat pizza 250 days a year.
• 1:46:51
  Wow. Yeah, wow, Yeah.
• 1:46:53
  I mean, I don't go a week ever without not eating at least once
• 1:46:56
  or twice a week. So one second Mr. Jewish World
• 1:46:59
  needs more voices. When are we getting a from Dave
• 1:47:02
  Ram Dave Portland style pizza goats to.
• 1:47:05
  Do what are you waiting for? Dave Portner does a good job,
• 1:47:08
  but it's not kosher. I'm not going to open a
• 1:47:11
  competition to a fellow. I want you showing up to
• 1:47:13
  Mendelsons giving them a 9.9 and.
• 1:47:16
  Question, can you say that their pizza is bad?
• 1:47:20
  Interesting. I could technically, you know,
• 1:47:22
  hurt somebody's business. If I give him a 5.8 on the pizza
• 1:47:25
  score, you know it's not going. To here's my I have AI have a
• 1:47:29
  solution to that one. I've dealt with this many times
• 1:47:31
  in the past. If I go to a restaurant and I
• 1:47:35
  have a great time, I'll tell people I really had a great time
• 1:47:38
  here and you know, highly recommend.
• 1:47:39
  If I go to a restaurant and it's no good, I just won't post
• 1:47:42
  about. So I'll tell you where the good
• 1:47:44
  places are, but I'm not going to put anybody down.
• 1:47:47
  Interesting. OK, So if anybody goes below
• 1:47:49
  like a six, you just just. Delete that one.
• 1:47:51
  Don't. Don't post it.
• 1:47:52
  Yeah, but how many Jewish grocery pizza stores are there?
• 1:47:55
  Like I'll be out of business. Afterwards, no you won't once
• 1:47:58
  you get to Israel. Oh, Israel's a whole little
• 1:48:01
  story. Anyway, next question.
• 1:48:06
  What is one piece of advice you would give to somebody who's in
• 1:48:12
  the content content creation world that you've seen brings
• 1:48:17
  you success in general in business that can be applied to
• 1:48:20
  the content world? I don't know.
• 1:48:23
  I got the how do you have a good to hear question and he got the
• 1:48:26
  like the intelligent, you know, give me a device.
• 1:48:28
  Question living in the status. World together so the contrast
• 1:48:30
  of how you look at the bottom of us nothing personally happy to
• 1:48:33
  agree with you. I am, you know, a shallow person
• 1:48:35
  by nature and and he's he's certainly much more eloquent
• 1:48:39
  than I am. So so it makes sense.
• 1:48:40
  But it's funny that you like picked up on this in just two
• 1:48:42
  hours. He's a smart guy.
• 1:48:43
  Yeah, I see that. I was also going to ask him
• 1:48:45
  where he got those boots. Marshalls baby, go ahead
• 1:48:50
  Michael, give your advice. I'm going to say two things.
• 1:48:55
  Number one is consistency with whatever it is that you're
• 1:48:57
  doing. That's like, you know, I heard
• 1:48:59
  this from Yaakov Langer when I first started and I asked him
• 1:49:01
  and, but I don't know if that's the answer that you're looking
• 1:49:04
  for or the, or answering the question that you're asking.
• 1:49:06
  And, and that's not the answer I really want to give you.
• 1:49:08
  The real the real answer that I want to give you is that you
• 1:49:12
  and, and this is something that I learned after eliminating
• 1:49:15
  social media for my life. So I'm in a different position
• 1:49:17
  than you. So five years ago I used to fall
• 1:49:20
  asleep with it was Facebook and LinkedIn on my nose like.
• 1:49:24
  Literally. That happens to be so you know
• 1:49:26
  exactly what I'm talking about and the beginning of that
• 1:49:28
  journey. So meaning and, and you're
• 1:49:30
  living in that world and kudos to you for doing this.
• 1:49:32
  I'm telling you, I, I, the, the amount of strength that you
• 1:49:34
  have, it's amazing. It's really, really amazing.
• 1:49:36
  It's inspiring for me and for many others.
• 1:49:40
  I, I, I learned how to control it and not have it control me.
• 1:49:44
  And that's something that it took time, but of course,
• 1:49:46
  because I eliminated social media, it helped me
• 1:49:48
  tremendously. But is that something you took
• 1:49:50
  from your business life that can translate into your content
• 1:49:53
  life? No, it's something that I
• 1:49:56
  learned from just living life and it's that if you.
• 1:50:00
  OK, so here's what happened. I'm just going to be vulnerable
• 1:50:02
  with you and tell you before the podcast happened, I knew I
• 1:50:06
  wanted to promote it and therefore I opened status to the
• 1:50:09
  world. It used to be for 17 people,
• 1:50:11
  which are my family and closest friends or you know, jumped up
• 1:50:15
  to 30 people. And after years, my marketing
• 1:50:18
  department is like, maybe you should, if we're going to do a
• 1:50:20
  podcast, open it to the world and it'll be cool.
• 1:50:21
  And I'm like, Oh my gosh, cool. Anyways, I went into this world
• 1:50:24
  of status and I realized that it was controlling me.
• 1:50:27
  And what happened was, is every time I would go into a
• 1:50:29
  restaurant or an event or automatically I was like, OK, so
• 1:50:32
  we're here. And it was too much for me.
• 1:50:35
  So what I did was, and I shifted and thank God, you know, the
• 1:50:38
  podcast grew and it allowed me, I had the ability to do this is
• 1:50:42
  that I would experience something that I'm experiencing
• 1:50:44
  and I would record whatever I want to record, you know,
• 1:50:47
  quietly myself. And then afterwards I would
• 1:50:49
  write the story. So I controlled the environment
• 1:50:52
  as opposed to it controlling me. So I walked into a restaurant
• 1:50:55
  brand new and I took it all in. I didn't have my camera on.
• 1:50:58
  It was just this is the way I do it now, anywhere I go, anything
• 1:51:00
  that I'm experiencing. I saw cats in Manhattan today
• 1:51:03
  and I saw them out there playing and I was like, wow, this is
• 1:51:06
  amazing. And I went to them.
• 1:51:08
  I played with the cats for 5 minutes.
• 1:51:09
  I spoke to the guy and say, if you don't mind, I have a camera.
• 1:51:12
  I'm just going to put it back on.
• 1:51:13
  You know, I want to put it on just to record.
• 1:51:15
  And he loved it. And I said, let's repeat again.
• 1:51:17
  How what are you doing, man? My cat caught 19 rats today on
• 1:51:21
  the New York City streets. I'm like, wow, that's amazing.
• 1:51:23
  And this cat had world record. He's breaking 13 team kittens,
• 1:51:27
  you just said, and he just told it to me already.
• 1:51:29
  But the fact is that the audience doesn't know.
• 1:51:31
  He told it to me. And that's what I think that is
• 1:51:34
  helpful in my life, that I hope that it would help you in some
• 1:51:37
  way. Just experiencing things first
• 1:51:39
  and then share it later. Exactly.
• 1:51:42
  Nice. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we're good.
• 1:51:47
  OK. I have so many more questions
• 1:51:48
  for you, but we're going to have to wrap it up.
• 1:51:50
  My final question is, who would you recommend to sit in your
• 1:51:53
  seat on this podcast? Let me let me see if I can make
• 1:51:56
  a call 0. You're not even gonna tell us
• 1:51:58
  who it is. First, do.
• 1:51:59
  You want me to call the person on?
• 1:52:01
  It definitely want you, but I'd love to hear.
• 1:52:02
  These people tell us about who it is, who they're already ready
• 1:52:05
  to call. But I like this.
• 1:52:07
  The spontaneity. Great.
• 1:52:08
  Yeah, this is great. Yeah, this is even better.
• 1:52:09
  The, the thrill of who the, you know, this person is.
• 1:52:12
  And it's gonna be, could be anybody.
• 1:52:13
  Watch, watch, watch. Now we have to get him on.
• 1:52:16
  Wolby's phone is gonna ring. Watch.
• 1:52:19
  Is that what's? Happening get out of here.
• 1:52:21
  Is that true? That's 100% true.
• 1:52:24
  He's in the room. I'll just get up from the chair
• 1:52:26
  and you can sit down Right now. He's not answering.
• 1:52:29
  I don't know why you. Live in Texas?
• 1:52:31
  Hello. Oh, long time no speak.
• 1:52:35
  Yeah, he's here. I absolutely.
• 1:52:37
  You should totally have, man. He's an incredible man.
• 1:52:40
  Do you come to New York often? Yeah.
• 1:52:43
  I can let you in on a little. So he's here till Monday
• 1:52:45
  morning. So if you guys can get him
• 1:52:47
  tomorrow or Mata Chavez or Sunday night, you have a wedding
• 1:52:50
  Sunday night. But if you if you're down, get
• 1:52:54
  him while he's here. Wow.
• 1:52:55
  OK, so tell us a little bit about him and why you think he
• 1:52:57
  would be a good fit. He is a powerhouse of outreach.
• 1:53:03
  He has an amazing way of connecting with people and he is
• 1:53:06
  like the big him and his wife are like the Big Brother and big
• 1:53:09
  sister to like the whole city of Houston.
• 1:53:12
  It's, it doesn't really make sense, but everything going on,
• 1:53:17
  the city passes through his house and they're very special
• 1:53:22
  people. The Askin of Texas.
• 1:53:26
  I think askin is like, it's almost derogatory at this point.
• 1:53:30
  I know I'm going to get flagged for saying that, but like.
• 1:53:32
  I'm I'm actually agreeing with what you're saying.
• 1:53:34
  No, it's meaning people look at it maybe as a.
• 1:53:36
  Askin is like a guy who wants to be important.
• 1:53:39
  Yeah, he has four radios on his bells.
• 1:53:41
  A. Few that are.
• 1:53:43
  Ascot which is for. Everybody else.
• 1:53:46
  This is like moving in silence, quietly doing what needs to be
• 1:53:49
  done. Special people.
• 1:53:52
  By the way, I accept and I love it and I appreciate.
• 1:53:54
  I don't think we'll be able to have it by the Sunday night, but
• 1:53:56
  we'll do it next time you're in town.
• 1:53:57
  But before I let you go, do you have Jared Kushner on your
• 1:53:59
  phone? I'm just curious because I'm
• 1:54:01
  trying to get him. I do not.
• 1:54:02
  No, no. What about the press secretary
• 1:54:04
  lady? What was her name again?
• 1:54:05
  I have her on my phone but I can't share her.
• 1:54:08
  Number, so you can't call. Her right, you have her cell
• 1:54:10
  number. Not at this hour, but you have
• 1:54:11
  her cell number. You have her cell number, you
• 1:54:13
  think? She's the person that would come
• 1:54:14
  on our podcast. I think it's entirely possible.
• 1:54:18
  Don't take us in the wrong way. Highly unlikely because she's I
• 1:54:20
  mean, she's not even go like she goes on Lara Trump's show.
• 1:54:24
  Very rarely does she do. It's a very high pressure.
• 1:54:27
  The highest profile person that you know.
• 1:54:28
  Period. In the world, Yeah, that's a
• 1:54:33
  great question. First of all, by the way, I, I
• 1:54:39
  don't, I don't feel like I, I know that many super high
• 1:54:42
  profile. People, but people you know.
• 1:54:45
  I would have to think about that because I don't, I'm not sure
• 1:54:47
  what kind of high profile you're like you're referring to,
• 1:54:49
  government referring to. Referring to someone who's
• 1:54:52
  making an impact in the world knows who he is.
• 1:54:53
  Like a Ben Shapiro with that. Schmeltzer.
• 1:54:56
  He's in my. Phone Schultzer's great, but he
• 1:54:58
  just did a podcast. I don't like recycling people
• 1:55:00
  from podcasts, so. And Mr. Scheman, a few months
• 1:55:02
  from now, I would love to get him.
• 1:55:03
  But yeah, but someone, yeah, someone that's impactful in the
• 1:55:06
  world, that's high profile. Lipa Schmeltzer was your your
• 1:55:09
  OG. He was the one you got kicked
• 1:55:11
  out of yeshiva for. Well, I didn't get kicked out
• 1:55:12
  for him, but he got me on Twitter, yeah.
• 1:55:14
  Yeah, so you know him. I do know him.
• 1:55:16
  We traveled to Iraq together. We went for a week to He wanted
• 1:55:21
  to make music really inspired by Talmud Bavli.
• 1:55:25
  So he wanted to go to Bavil and, and there was no one else.
• 1:55:29
  He didn't trust anyone else to take him but me and.
• 1:55:31
  He did it, yeah, and it came out.
• 1:55:33
  He made a whole album. Oh, beautiful.
• 1:55:35
  OK. I don't follow his music so
• 1:55:36
  much, but he I love some of his songs are my favorite, like so
• 1:55:42
  Harley Geden in America, you know what I'm saying?
• 1:55:44
  Like, I know that was done with other people also, But OSHA,
• 1:55:47
  would you like to have a guy like Liba Schmeltzer on our
• 1:55:48
  podcast? What do you think?
• 1:55:50
  Sure. Yeah.
• 1:55:51
  He's not thinking high profile. Like he he wanted a Jared
• 1:55:54
  Kushner or a, you know, one of the Trump's.
• 1:55:58
  Can I share with you one little piece of advice that I've
• 1:56:01
  learned? I don't want to say the hard
• 1:56:03
  way, but from experience over 8 years of interviewing people, I
• 1:56:08
  think the best interviews come from the place you'd least
• 1:56:11
  expect, not the the high profile people.
• 1:56:14
  There's some superhero like superhero of a human sitting
• 1:56:18
  somewhere that no one knows who he is and no one will probably
• 1:56:21
  ever know. And if you somehow managed to
• 1:56:24
  pick that person out of the crowd, they'll probably never
• 1:56:26
  agreed to come on the podcast. But there are some really high
• 1:56:30
  profile souls running around this world that.
• 1:56:35
  I love uncovering those and we get them on our part of this, by
• 1:56:38
  the way. Sometimes we realize that, you
• 1:56:40
  know, we're talking to someone like they're special.
• 1:56:42
  Yeah, and just like out of the blue, like will surprise us with
• 1:56:45
  things and it's amazing. It's amazing.
• 1:56:47
  I was just curious, who's in your phone?
• 1:56:48
  Like, you know, if you had a, if you were in a situation and you
• 1:56:50
  were someone you knew was getting in trouble, who would
• 1:56:53
  you be calling? That's what I was asking.
• 1:56:54
  Let's put it this way. I am connected with people who
• 1:56:57
  are connected to people in really high places.
• 1:56:59
  How many calls are you away from Donald Trump, realistically?
• 1:57:03
  1. OK, OK.
• 1:57:07
  And multiple people, probably. Multiple people I who I who I
• 1:57:10
  could call, who are who have a cell phone number, who could.
• 1:57:12
  Call him? Yeah.
• 1:57:13
  Who would be able to actually call him?
• 1:57:14
  Get him on the phone. And people who work for him.
• 1:57:16
  People who work from there, all right, who will be able to get
• 1:57:17
  him within hours, I guess. I think the shorter than within.
• 1:57:22
  Hours. Within minutes.
• 1:57:23
  Unless there was something massive going on at the time,
• 1:57:26
  yes. Wow, OK.
• 1:57:28
  I look forward to hearing your voice more.
• 1:57:29
  I look forward to seeing your face more and to seeing you
• 1:57:33
  impact the world and keep growing with us.
• 1:57:35
  And we really appreciate you being here.
• 1:57:37
  Thank you to all our subscribers.
• 1:57:39
  Thank you to, of course, the Prime Source production team and
• 1:57:42
  to all of our listeners. We are growing.
• 1:57:44
  Goshi, it's happening whether you like it or not.
• 1:57:47
  I'm not paying attention. I'm just, I'm just doing my
• 1:57:50
  thing. It is what it is.
• 1:57:50
  OK, good, good. Well, thank God we have Stephen
• 1:57:53
  and Will and the whole team behind us who does their thing,
• 1:57:56
  responding to every comment and being on top of it and sharing
• 1:57:59
  it with us. All the love.
• 1:58:01
  We really appreciate it. Thank you everybody.
• 1:58:03
  That's a wrap. That's a wrap.
• 1:58:05
  Wow, wow.