Latest / Words & Numbers / Episode 497: Electoral Nonsense

Transcript

Episode 497: Electoral Nonsense · Words & Numbers

0:00
Coming up next on Words and Numbers Halftime.
0:03
Paying for artists. The Super Bowl.
0:05
And doing that thing where you change the boundaries on voting
0:08
districts. All this and more coming up next
0:11
on Words and Numbers, a Civil original production.
0:13
Check us out at civil.com. That's C ivl.com.
0:18
Hi, I'm James. And I'm Anthony and this.
0:20
Is words and numbers. Aunt, it's noon exciting in your
0:27
world this week. That was a spectacular intro, by
0:30
the way. That thing when you do the thing
0:33
I. Forgot the word.
0:34
I, I know you say, hey, next time it's going to be, you know,
0:37
that guy in that place who did the thing with the lady.
0:42
We should tell the people though, Aunt, today is a very
0:45
auspicious day. It is auspicious.
0:48
It's James and Aunt Bro Day. That's right.
0:52
That's right. We met on this day in 2009.
0:56
How many years is that aunt? Lots 17 years.
1:02
Try again. 17 years. That's a long ass time.
1:08
Yeah, I don't know that in those 17 years I've even gone a week
1:14
in which I haven't spoken to you, even when you did the
1:17
dumbest thing in the world and walked, literally walked across
1:20
the country of Spain. That's right.
1:23
Not once, twice, but what? A dozen Times Now.
1:26
Yeah, we have. Yeah.
1:29
I mean, now that we have Danny and the good people civil taking
1:32
care of us, we communicate less interestingly, which is sad for
1:37
my social life but great for my blood pressure.
1:40
I do refer to you when people ask as my heterosexual life
1:44
partner and meaning to say I'm heterosexual and you're my life
1:50
partner. All right, I take it.
1:54
Don't tell approach with the rest.
1:56
Of that my son sent me this. The title is Ireland makes its
2:02
Basic Income for Artists Permanent and apparently Ireland
2:06
tested this out for several years wherein the government
2:09
made basic income for the arts program which was a temporary
2:15
thing. They now have made it permanent.
2:17
As a result, 2000 artists will continue to receive roughly $375
2:23
per week. I'm sorry I have to do the math
2:26
here. 37552 All right, so to make it about $20,000 to support
2:33
their. I got to move to.
2:35
Artistry. Yeah, well, apparently they must
2:38
have. Since there's 2000 of them.
2:40
There had to be some vetting process that they went through,
2:43
but the the article says it's saying why this is a good thing.
2:47
And it says the artist created about 22% more work during the
2:52
pilot than they did prior. But who's the coffee?
2:57
Well, but here's the question. It doesn't matter that they
3:00
produced more work. What matters is that the work
3:03
that they produced was worth the 20,000 a year we're paying them.
3:08
That's the question. If it's not, producing more work
3:10
is actually a bad thing. I can guarantee that it it, it
3:13
wasn't worth that. Well, if.
3:16
It were. If it were, people would already
3:18
be paying them. And that brings us to the second
3:21
bullet point. They claimed they, the people
3:23
who are writing this, that the program generated more value $93
3:28
million, then it cost $84,000,000.
3:32
To which I reply, if there is some activity that can generate
3:37
more money than it costs, entrepreneurs are going to be
3:40
all over that. Everything.
3:42
If the entrepreneurs aren't all over that, you have missed
3:45
something that indeed it does not generate more than it costs.
3:49
You you haven't missed something.
3:51
You're lying. Yeah.
3:52
But yeah, well, that's the thing about, I don't want to say
3:55
lying, but it's a thing about when do you get the government
3:57
to do something? It becomes way easy to hide
4:02
things. And I don't mean necessarily
4:03
nefarious way that you're deliberately hiding them, but it
4:06
makes it easy to overlook costs that the entrepreneur can't
4:10
overlook because he's got to pay them out of his pocket.
4:13
And it says here, finally, it shows how supporting artists
4:16
strengthens the culture in communities.
4:19
Again, to which I reply, it doesn't matter even if it even
4:22
if supporting artists does support the community.
4:27
What matters is that the support that you're providing the
4:29
community is worth more than $20,000 a year times 2000
4:35
artists. I need to do that number as
4:37
well. 20,000 a year times 2000 artists.
4:42
It's $40 million a year. Can you imagine how much good
4:46
you could do for your culture and community with $40 million a
4:50
year? Maybe artists are the right
4:52
thing, but maybe something else is a better thing.
4:54
How will we know? We won't because entrepreneurs
4:57
aren't driving this. Bureaucrats are driving it.
5:01
And you know, not for nothing, but I happen to be an artist,
5:06
and if somebody out there would like to support me, please be in
5:09
touch. Seriously, be in touch.
5:12
You want to support an artist? I'm your man anyway.
5:16
And I, I want to talk about the something sadly, that has
5:21
already happened. I mean, we talked about the
5:24
Super Bowl last time and it had already happened then.
5:27
And we're going to talk about the Super Bowl not once, but
5:30
twice today. And it's already happened.
5:33
But I, I want to and, and God, I hope my beloved Patriots won or
5:39
at least didn't lose by more than 4 1/2.
5:43
But I digress. There is an alternative Super
5:47
Bowl halftime show. Did you know about this?
5:50
The, every, all the conservatives are, they've got
5:53
their, their undies in a bundle because of Bad Bunny.
5:59
Who I, I, I just can't listen to him.
6:02
He's so intolerable. What is there?
6:06
He's a Puerto Rican. I think I used the word singer
6:09
loosely here, who makes lousy music that I don't care about.
6:14
The kids love him. And the idea of the Super Bowl
6:18
halftime show is twofold. It's to keep people tuned in who
6:23
are already tuned in, and it's to broaden the market for.
6:28
Football. So you they typically go and get
6:31
people who you wouldn't think football the minute you looked
6:36
at Big Bunny or Big Bunny, Bad Bunny, Big Bunny.
6:39
I, I can't even get his name right.
6:41
He's so inconsequential in my world.
6:43
The young people, though, love him, and the NFL is forever
6:48
trying to attract a different demographic, so they're giving
6:52
it a shot. And I say go, go with God.
6:54
I won't be watching anyway, 'cause, you know, halftime is
6:58
when I get up and do things like melt cheese onto things and go
7:03
to the bathroom. All kinds of important life
7:05
events happen at halftime, and then I come back and the
7:08
second-half starts. But Turning Point USA has
7:13
decided they're going to get into the halftime business, and
7:17
they have decided that Kid Rock is going to be their halftime
7:23
show. Now, I actually like Kid Rock.
7:27
I, I think I should be ashamed to admit it, but I like him so
7:31
much that I'm not. I think Kid Rock is great.
7:35
Am I going to go watch his halftime show?
7:37
No, for reasons already mentioned.
7:41
Well, what the hell is Turning Point USA getting into the
7:44
halftime business for? Really.
7:48
I mean, really? And do you really want Kid Rock?
7:53
Because I'll tell you, he is incredibly profane.
7:57
It's one of the things I admire about it.
8:00
I I really like it. He, he works in, in profanity
8:04
the way that Van Gogh worked in oils and and he's, he is
8:09
talented. But I, I want to, I just want to
8:13
point out that Turning point USA, you know, all those good
8:18
Christians over there, they're hiring a profane, A profane
8:22
performer. All right, maybe, maybe that's
8:25
not so bad. He has a song called Cool Daddy
8:28
Cool, which I'm sure you've never heard.
8:31
I don't blame you. Most people haven't, but it
8:34
extols the virtues of having relations with underage girls.
8:39
Oh boy. This really what you want,
8:42
Turning Point USA? Is this really what you want?
8:46
And I want to point out that this is not, I say again, not
8:50
the foolishness of the weak. Shame on you, Turning Point USA.
8:55
You should have better judgement than this.
8:57
And you were, you were once an organization that I would have
9:03
nothing to do with. You became an organization that
9:06
I would have been happy to deal with.
9:08
And now you're an organization that I would have nothing to do
9:11
with again. So way to go.
9:13
Maybe you can get Candace Owens back back into the fold and come
9:18
full circle. I'm Anthony Davies, Co host of
9:20
Words and Numbers. James Harrigan and I are proud
9:23
to be on Civil's Network because we believe in their unifying
9:26
principle of human respect, which is the idea that our
9:28
well-being as humans is diminished when we employ
9:31
coercion and that conversely, our happiness and prosperity are
9:34
maximized when we cooperate. If you believe in our mission,
9:37
join civil.com. That's civl.com.
9:41
The foolishness of the weekend stays with the Super Bowl, which
9:46
incidentally, I got this, this crazy urge cause I've, I've
9:51
never been to the Super Bowl. Kind of like almost every other
9:54
human being on the face of the earth.
9:56
And I thought, well, it's just, you know, a short flight away.
10:00
It's on the West Coast. Maybe I can find myself a cheap
10:05
ass ticket and go, go take in a Super Bowl.
10:08
Cheap ass tickets. Come to find out, we're about
10:10
$4500. Oh, wow, yeah, yeah, yeah.
10:14
The, the the pretty good tickets were $27,000 and the really good
10:20
tickets were about $60,000. And I read an article yesterday
10:23
that that indicated prices are down 30% from last year.
10:29
Now there's a. There have got to be a lot of
10:32
good. Well, there are a lot of seats
10:33
anyway, but a lot of good seats. There are that many people
10:36
willing to drop north of $60,000.
10:40
Apparently so. So.
10:44
So I can tell you, looking back into the past, I am now
10:48
predicting the past. Anthony, I didn't go to the
10:51
Super Bowl. Yeah.
10:53
Guess who else didn't go to the Super Bowl?
10:56
President Donald J. Trump, OH.
11:00
He could go for free, and he decided not to go because he
11:05
knew if his ass showed up at the Super Bowl, he would be booed
11:11
like crazy. And the last thing he wants is
11:16
to have all of America seeing him being booed on the largest
11:21
stage in the world. So his skin is so thin, he's so
11:27
twerpish in his behavior that he refuses to go to the Super Bowl,
11:32
which he could go to for free because his ego can't take it.
11:38
Jackass, I really want to go to the Super Bowl.
11:40
If I go to the Super Bowl for free, everybody could Boo me the
11:43
entire time I was there. I would wave to them.
11:47
I would eat a hot dog. It would be wonderful.
11:49
See, you should. You should run for president on
11:52
the platform that as president I get to go to the Super Bowl for
11:55
free. That's right.
11:58
I bet you there'll be a lot of people came out of the woodwork
12:01
saying I vote for this guy. He knows what he's.
12:03
About that's right. And I'd go to the World Series
12:06
and a bunch of other shit too. Every big fight, all the MMA
12:10
stuff. Although I predict we're going
12:13
to have a future foolishness of the week when they have MMA
12:17
fights on the White House lawn. Is this the?
12:22
Thing what could be? Yeah, what could be classier
12:25
than that? Anyway, that's enough of that
12:28
nonsense. We're going to talk a little bit
12:30
about elections today. Aunt you, you might recall, and
12:34
you know, look, elections, not my area of expertise.
12:38
I generally don't even care about them.
12:41
I've declared recently that not only am I not voting in the next
12:45
one, I'm likely never to vote again.
12:48
The the people on Twitter do not, they fail to see the wisdom
12:52
in my approach there. They keep telling me I must
12:55
vote. Why never get an answer?
12:58
Anyway, so we're going to talk about elections come, come hell
13:03
or high water. We've got to do it at least once
13:05
in a while, right? And our story today begins in
13:10
Texas, when they decided, you might recall, to redistrict the
13:14
entire state to favor Republicans so there could be
13:17
more Republicans in the House, the Republican majority, and
13:20
right now is down to 1. In the house, yeah.
13:24
In the house and we. Haven't even hit midterms yet.
13:26
It is the very definition of razor thin.
13:29
Yeah, 2 Republicans die and they have a real problem.
13:33
And and two Republicans might die.
13:36
I can, I could see it happening, but we'll leave that for a
13:39
future episode. In response to those Jack wagons
13:46
in Texas who are within their rights, let me add right, If if
13:52
you're the party in power, you get to district your state
13:57
however you want, as long as it's in conformity with the
14:00
Constitution, which says damn near nothing about this and
14:05
Supreme Court decisions, which unfortunately say quite a lot.
14:09
And it's almost always about diluting the minority vote,
14:14
right? You can't set out to dilute the
14:17
minority vote. And even if you just happen to
14:20
dilute the minority vote, you may get smacked down by the
14:23
Supreme Court right there. There was one district that was
14:27
at one point as wide as a street.
14:32
Oh wow, Congressional. District and the Supreme Court
14:34
said, Yep, that's what we're looking for.
14:37
So right that this is the level of foolishness you get to at the
14:40
level at at the Supreme Court on redistricting.
14:44
But in the large, apart from those issues, if the state wants
14:49
to redistrict, it can, period. And this is always an exercise
14:57
initiated by the party in power and.
15:00
Of course it's a state. It's a state issue.
15:03
It's not a federal issue. It's not a federal issue at all.
15:07
And the party in power who starts doing this, they always
15:11
work with the assumption that they're not going to alienate
15:15
their own voters. They're just going to make their
15:18
own voters happier. And generally that's exactly
15:21
what happens because what do the the members of the party in
15:26
power want the most to marginalized the out of power
15:29
party even more. Now, very typically we
15:33
redistrict after a census because that's what it makes the
15:38
most sense to do it, right? You know how many people you're
15:42
dealing with, you know where they live, you know how many
15:46
house districts you're going to have.
15:48
But there's, there may be, you might call it a principled
15:53
reason not to do it otherwise, but there's no legal reason not
15:57
to do it otherwise. You do whatever you want.
16:00
And after Texas did this and, and Texas made a profound error,
16:06
and I'll tell you what it is right now, because people,
16:08
people aren't going to believe this.
16:10
Hispanics in Texas voted in historic numbers for Donald
16:15
Trump, and between Election Day and right now, that support has
16:24
all but evaporated. So the Republicans redistricted
16:28
Texas on a very flawed assumption, and they may lose a
16:34
bunch of seats that they redistricted because Trump
16:37
pissed off a bunch of Latinos so.
16:41
They redistricted to let make greater leverage of the Hispanic
16:47
vote. Well, they just assumed that now
16:49
that they had the Hispanic vote, they always.
16:52
Yeah, not a good assumption. Not a good assumption.
16:56
Anyway, be that as it may, the the minute this gets rolling,
17:02
Gavin Newsom over in California says, hey, wait, wait a second.
17:06
I got this big giant Democratic state, hold my beer, let let's
17:10
get working. And and they went a little
17:13
further. They had they consulted the
17:16
public. There was a referendum and they
17:18
worked it through the legislature.
17:20
And you know, let's face it, for Democrats to do those things in
17:25
California is largely performative.
17:28
Of course they can do it. It's.
17:29
A Democratic legislature. They're Democratic voters and
17:31
Democratic California. Is a single party state if there
17:34
ever was 1. And that's why gas costs what it
17:38
costs there, among a million others, other things.
17:42
But they said if Texas is going to do it, you know, in between
17:47
the censuses, we are too. And we're going to make
17:52
Republican House members about as rare as pterodactyls.
17:57
And then both cases immediately went straight to the courts, as
18:01
you might expect. But today, as we record on
18:06
February 4th, not bro day, bro day is February 12th.
18:10
That's the day you hear this. But as we record this, the
18:13
Supreme Court of the United States has ruled on the
18:18
California redistricting and in what amounts to be a memorandum
18:26
said, Yep, that's fine. No dissent of any kind, just go
18:31
ahead. So that's the world we're living
18:34
in. Ain't that something?
18:36
And I, I can, I'm simultaneously, I look at that
18:41
and say California's decision to do this.
18:45
I look at that and say that's not right and they have every
18:50
right to do it. Yeah, I'm I'm right there with
18:52
you on every count. The last thing I want, and I
18:56
mean this to my core, is a federal legislature utterly
19:00
dominated by Democrats. Yeah.
19:03
I I also don't want want one utterly dominated by Republicans
19:07
either. But, you know, here we are.
19:10
But. But but that that comes and goes
19:13
with the decades. What you absolutely don't want
19:17
is a federal government that can dictate how a state apportions
19:22
its districts, because that will not go away.
19:25
And that gets us to the next point here.
19:30
We're we're back to Trump on this, who said in recent remarks
19:37
that he wants. Well, here, I'll just read you
19:40
the exact quote, but it's not exact there.
19:43
There are ellipses in the quote. They don't matter.
19:46
But you can go look it up for yourself.
19:48
If, if you think I'm I'm lying to you.
19:51
The federal government should get involved.
19:53
If they can't count the votes legally and honestly, then
19:56
someone else should take over. He, Donald Trump, the president
20:01
of the United States, is calling for, not suggesting, calling for
20:08
a federal takeover of, of elections and even in
20:16
congressional elections. So on both the House and the
20:18
Senate side, the states control those elections.
20:23
Federal government has nothing to say about it.
20:25
There are only two people who stand for election nationwide,
20:31
and that's the president and the vice president, and even their
20:35
votes are handled by the states. The Constitution vests almost
20:42
every important aspect of administering, collecting and
20:48
counting the vote to the states. It has ever been this way.
20:54
And and there's Congress has a role constitutionally and it's
21:01
the times, places and manner section of the the Constitution.
21:07
So the federal government, Congress can declare when we're
21:11
going to have an election. It can declare where we're going
21:17
to have elections and it can it it can determine how we're going
21:23
to have elections. And that's it.
21:25
What? What is the?
21:26
The where and the how business. Well, we have an Election Day.
21:32
No, no, no. But yeah, that's the when, but
21:34
the where, I mean, it's it's nationwide, right?
21:37
But yeah, but you know, you it, it can involve itself by saying
21:41
you don't have enough polling places in this region.
21:46
I see. I see.
21:47
OK. Right, things like this.
21:50
The when comes up again. The times come up again in
21:54
absentee voting. And everybody.
21:57
Gets all pissed off about absentee voting like it's some
22:01
kind of problem. I lived abroad.
22:03
For a while. Does that mean I don't get to
22:05
vote? What about the military?
22:07
Do you want them not voting too? Of course we're going to have
22:12
pre voting if you want to call it that.
22:15
Of course we are. Yeah.
22:16
But this is where congressional authority begins and ends.
22:20
And when Donald Trump says I want Congress to take or the
22:25
people behind me, meaning, you know, feds to take over, what
22:31
he's saying is I want us to be like a Banana Republic where the
22:37
administration itself decides how the vote's going to go.
22:43
Now, do I trust every single poll worker at every single
22:48
voting place? Of course I don't.
22:51
That's why there are so many of them.
22:54
There are Democrats and Republicans alike looking things
22:59
over all day, every day when we vote.
23:04
Trust me, they don't trust each other at all, which is precisely
23:09
what I want. I want a bunch of people who
23:12
don't trust each other watching the same thing.
23:14
James and I are delighted to be working with Civil.
23:17
For years we've been pushing people to think about how we can
23:19
make the world a better place. Civil's mission of upgrading
23:22
society fits exactly with what James and I have been talking
23:25
about for years. Civil helps us by allowing us to
23:28
do what we do best, which is researching topics that are
23:31
important and communicating these to our listeners in ways
23:34
that we hope they will find enjoyable.
23:36
To see Civil's extensive list of content, including our podcast
23:39
words and numbers, in our lecture series, These Words and
23:41
Numbers Live, visit civil.com. That's civl.com.
23:46
Have we ever had wholesale voting fraud in the United
23:50
States? We most certainly have not.
23:52
Was the 2020 election stolen? You'd have to be an idiot to to
23:59
to believe this. And, and here and now we have
24:02
the federal government raiding places in Georgia to
24:07
functionally steal voting equipment so they can go through
24:10
it to get the answer they wanted the whole time.
24:13
They're not going to find it. It's not there.
24:16
There were Republicans and Democrats watching that process
24:19
unfold all day long. But think that through for a
24:24
moment. Even if they did find something
24:27
and suppose the thing they found was so monumental it would have
24:31
made a difference and thrown the election to Trump instead of
24:34
Biden, what fundamentally would have changed?
24:37
Well, Trump would be out of office right now.
24:39
He would have had two terms. Well he has two terms.
24:42
What the real practical thing that changes is it gives the
24:45
federal government the excuse to to Co opt the system to strong
24:50
arm the states. Sure.
24:52
I mean, look if and you will find voting irregularities and
24:58
you're going to find them in all 50 states if you look hard
25:01
enough. They amount to statistical
25:03
noise. People don't understand
25:05
statistics at all when when you get 20 or or 25 or 30 votes in a
25:13
pool of 350 million, of which 170 million vote or whatever,
25:21
this is meaningless. Well, nonsense.
25:24
You're, you're right, James, it's statistical noise, but
25:27
there is a condition under which it's not statistical noise and
25:31
that's when you are, you are specifically looking not for
25:35
voter fraud generically, but voter fraud that harmed your
25:39
side. Well, but that's all you'll find
25:42
from people in power. That that's all, Yeah.
25:44
So then of course you'll say, well, there's this big problem
25:46
with. The problem isn't in the in in
25:49
the irregularities. The problem is you only look for
25:51
one type of irregularity. Sure.
25:54
And and look, the the people in 2020 who thought the election
25:57
was stolen were a pack of wands. And I predicted, I believe on
26:03
this very podcast that that was going to continue to happen now,
26:07
because of course it will. Once something stupid happens,
26:10
you can't get it back in the bottle.
26:13
And no sooner had Trump been re elected than a bunch of damn
26:16
fool Democrats were saying this election was rigged.
26:20
No, no pumpkin, it was not. Now when you find people who do
26:28
mess around with election and when you find election fraud,
26:31
it's almost always some idiot who voted twice, right?
26:38
Who had a a ballot from here and a ballot from there or went to
26:42
two polling places, or it was it's always some fool who voted
26:46
twice. I think the book should be
26:49
thrown at these people as hard as is humanly possible.
26:54
I think their their right to vote should be forever taken
26:59
away. I think they should do jail time
27:01
for it. I think they should do prison
27:03
time for it, right? This is in a Democratic
27:07
Republic. Voting has to be sacrosanct.
27:12
You can't mess around with it, yo.
27:15
And and this if you want to go I'm, I've taken chunks out of a
27:20
lot of Republicans, but now I'm going to fall right in line with
27:23
a lot of Republicans. If you don't think that we
27:28
should have ID requirements to vote, you're an imbecile.
27:35
Of course we should. Voting is important.
27:39
You should be who you claim to be, and that should be
27:42
verifiable on the spot. And, and what's the answer We
27:48
always hear? Oh, that's racist.
27:50
Oh horseshit. How is that racist?
27:53
Well black people can't get to the DMV to get official state
28:01
identification. Funny I see poll after poll
28:05
after poll where black people say yes I can and yes we should
28:13
have an ID to vote. The only people who don't want
28:18
it are Democrats in Congress. Why is that?
28:22
Seriously, why is that? There can only be 1 answer and
28:27
they want to leave the door open for malfeasance?
28:30
Yep. They haven't figured out how to
28:32
do it yet, but they're going to, and they're going to make sure
28:35
that that there's not this impediment in place.
28:39
And I can't fly to visit you without an ID.
28:46
Is flying to visit you infinitely more important than
28:50
voting in a Republic? I should say Not right, but the
28:54
politically what could be more important now, the fact that I
28:58
don't do it is because I don't think anybody who gets elected
29:03
deserves it. I'm I'm voting no to all of
29:07
these fools, but that doesn't mean I don't think voting is
29:10
isn't the lifeblood of a Republic of.
29:12
Course it is. Let's let's go back to something
29:15
you said a moment ago. You're saying about one side and
29:19
the other saying that this that the election is rigged.
29:22
And now we've had, we've seen both sides say this and we've
29:24
also seen both sides use that phrase, not my president,
29:28
Democrats or should Trump, not as president, the Republicans
29:31
going Biden, not my president. And I, I think all of that is
29:35
incredibly dangerous because because it brings into question
29:41
the legitimate, legit the legitimacy of government itself.
29:46
That's right. I think you're calling into
29:48
question the legitimacy of that particular party.
29:51
No, you're calling to question the government.
29:53
So, so the very same, the very same office of the presidency
29:57
that you are now calling into question because the other guy's
30:00
there. Four years from now, your guy
30:02
will be there and he will be similarly Hanford.
30:05
Like you're trying to hamper this guy.
30:07
Yeah, that. That's right.
30:08
Whoever wins the election, that's everybody's president.
30:12
That's the whole point of a democracy, that we're going to
30:15
get together and we're going to make a decision collectively.
30:17
We're not all going to agree with it, but it's the way we do
30:19
it to avoid the alternative, which is that we start killing
30:23
each other over the. Question.
30:24
But people always seem to forget that bloodshed is the
30:27
alternative, right? And a bunch of wannabe tough
30:30
guys say, Oh yeah, bring it on. Well, where are they when the
30:35
government's actually shooting its own its own citizens?
30:38
Apparently now they don't want you to bring it on.
30:41
They only want it. They only want it when Democrats
30:44
are in charge. And it's don't tread on me, but
30:47
go tread on everybody else. That's fine.
30:49
Who gives a shit about them? And and I'm I'm tired of it.
30:53
And don't think as many people do.
30:56
I've heard now that well, the answer is we just go our
30:59
separate ways and the Democrats become one country, the
31:02
Republicans can't do another. However that works, can't do it
31:04
because what what happens is you haven't solved the problem.
31:07
The problem being learning how to live civilly with your fellow
31:12
citizens. And if you split, you're going
31:15
to have the same problem all over again.
31:16
It's just going to be the left-leaning Democrats and the
31:19
right leaning Democrats and also on the Republican side.
31:22
But I. Mean, look, I, I have for some
31:26
years now predicted the dissolution of the United
31:29
States. I, I stand by it.
31:31
That will be my prediction for all time.
31:35
And, and you know, why the hell would it be?
31:37
Every country falls apart sooner or later.
31:41
Nonetheless, we can't divide into two camps because the land
31:47
mass isn't contiguous, right? It's not like we can say
31:50
everybody below this line, well, that's Republican land, and
31:53
everybody above it, that's Democrat land.
31:56
And you can't even really do it by state, at least not with all
32:00
of them. So here I am in Northern
32:02
Virginia, and Northern Virginia is very Democrat, the rest of
32:05
Virginia very Republican. So to Pennsylvania when we both
32:08
live there. Philadelphia very Democrat,
32:11
everything else very Republican. And where I live, it's as red as
32:16
a baboon's ass. If you drive 2 hours to Phoenix,
32:20
you're in, I think, the most conservative city of its size.
32:25
No question. So yeah, look, this isn't going
32:29
to happen. You're going to have to figure
32:31
out a way to deal with each other.
32:32
And I hate to use this word because I hate the idea so much.
32:37
Compromise is the correct answer.
32:39
Compromise intolerance. Yeah.
32:42
And you know, look, when when you have a president of the
32:47
United States openly encouraging people to violate the
32:54
constitutional norms that have kept us relatively violence free
33:01
for over 200 years, you, you are making a tragic mistake.
33:06
I mean, this will end so very badly if he follows through on
33:11
it. But as luck would have it, he
33:14
does say a lot of dopey shit and then just forgets.
33:17
So maybe this is just going to be one of those types of things.
33:22
Here's the open. Civil is on a mission to host
33:25
ideas that will lead humanity to an abundant future.
33:28
Civil is a streaming platform with apps on TV and mobile,
33:31
Watch shows, films and debates, and be part of an emerging
33:34
community of people who believe we can innovate beyond our
33:37
legacy system built on coercion and 0 sum politics.
33:40
Join Civil and let's build a new era of prosperity together.
33:44
Learn more at civil.com. That's civl.com.
33:48
Now that we've reached the end of our episode, James is going
33:51
to regale. This was one of his stories, and
33:53
this is the point where James goes off his leash.
33:56
So if you have young children in the area, this would be a good
33:59
time to turn the volume down. Or maybe just shut the whole
34:03
thing off or work with me here. Let them listen.
34:08
Words don't hurt anybody anyway. So, aunt, this seems a
34:13
ridiculous question given that you are the most Catholic man I
34:18
know. Have you ever been to Rome?
34:21
No, never have. Wow, you've really missed out
34:23
Rome. Rome is one of the truly great
34:25
cities in the world. I've been there several times
34:29
with students a couple of times. And the first time I was there,
34:37
man, I was unaware of the mores, the processes, if you will, of
34:46
European bathrooms, public bathrooms.
34:50
Turns out they don't really have any.
34:52
And by the time I learned that I was an inch away from wetting my
34:57
pants. I mean, really, I was, I was
35:00
doing the pee pee dance. And I'm saying to one of my
35:03
students, ma'am, we have got to find a bathroom.
35:06
And I mean right now. And as luck would have it, we,
35:11
we looked up right where we were standing.
35:13
We, we looked up and there were two.
35:15
I was like, oh, God himself wants me to go use that
35:18
bathroom. And, and you know this because
35:20
God lives in, in Rome and, you know, you can kind of feel his
35:24
presence there. And we got up to the bathrooms
35:27
and she said, I, I also must use the bathroom.
35:30
And there were two. So he said, well, problem
35:32
solved. And you have to put a euro in a.
35:36
Whole. Fucking euro.
35:38
They charge you fucking euro to use a bathroom?
35:42
As an American, I'm offended, but as a person in distress, I'm
35:47
digging in my pocket for a euro, which I found.
35:50
We each put a euro in the doors both opened.
35:55
She walked in, the doors closed, my doors opened, and it was like
36:01
it was as if a person's intestines had exploded in the
36:04
room. It was foul.
36:08
There was human excrement everywhere.
36:10
The stench was unreal. And I thought to myself, no way,
36:18
I'll wait. And I mean, I would.
36:20
I was at maximum capacity and I wasn't.
36:24
Taking a step at a euro at this point.
36:26
And down a euro. Yeah.
36:28
And I wasn't taking a step into that filthy, filthy room.
36:31
It would have been on my shoes to this day it was so filthy.
36:35
So I walked over to where my student had gone and I figure
36:38
I'll get in line. Italians don't like lines, but
36:42
nobody gets in front of me this time.
36:44
And and she walked the doors open.
36:46
She walks out and I just walk in, figuring I paid my euro over
36:52
there, the Italians can go fuck themselves.
36:55
And, and, and she reached in with two hands and grabbed me by
37:02
the back of my shirt and dragged me out of the bathroom.
37:07
And I, I as soon as the doors closed, I started swearing at
37:11
her, rightfully so. And then she said, listen to
37:17
what's happening. And it's a scalding hot bunch of
37:23
water comes from the ceiling to the floor, followed by a
37:29
chemical bath, followed by more scalding hot water.
37:35
Oh my God, you almost walked into that.
37:37
And if I weren't dead, I would have lost half my head.
37:42
Yeah, it probably would have killed me.
37:45
And it just so happened that the the bathroom on the other side,
37:48
that whole system had failed. Yeah.
37:51
So I I just assumed there's no system, but lo and behold, there
37:56
was a system. And I was very glad to have been
37:59
pried out of that bathroom. I located another euro, put it
38:03
in and availed myself of very clean facilities.
38:07
But there, for one bright shining moment, all was almost
38:12
lost for want of a bathroom. Next week on Words and Numbers,
38:18
I'll tell you all about how you pee in Amsterdam, which is
38:22
really quite fun.