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March 7, 2025 - Louder Than Crowder

01:20:24

EPISODE 57: DUMB FRODO (FEBRUARY 27TH, 2025)

This week Steven self diagnoses as a sociopath in the wake of massive government layoffs, mocking folks who are sad to lose their livelihood. Nothing fun or funny about that. Like what we're doing? Want MORE for FREE? Join the Shrug Club at http://patreon.com/shrugclub Email: louderthancrowder@gmail.com Twitter/X: @thancrowder Music by DJ Danarchy

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Time	Text
	This is an AudioWall original.
	Donald Trump's going to gut Medicaid.
	Welcome to Louder Than Co.
	Crowder, a podcast about the podcast ladder with Crowder.
	My name's Byron, and I'm sorry.
	Dennis is in studio with me tonight.
	Is that why you're sorry?
	No.
	And our Lone Star brother in Occupied Texas, it's Jerry.
	Howdy.
	What are you sorry for, brother?
	What?
	Why are you sorry?
	What's going on there, little doggy?
	Okay, holy fuck you guys.
	I tried so hard.
	So hard to pull together a good show tonight, but I'll say it right now.
	I'm going to say we, because I did give Jared some options.
	Chose to cover today.
	I've got to pass the blame around a bit.
	Today's episode of Ladder with Crowder, Epstein File Watch and Doge's $17 million puppet show Explained.
	That's the title on Rumble.
	We're doing today's episode?
	Yeah.
	Wow.
	Softer title on YouTube, Canada Threatens to Nuke America and $17 million Muppets.
	Wait, they do different title names on...
	Rumble and YouTube?
	Typically not, but I have a feeling that they're going to get fewer views on YouTube with the word Epstein in the title.
	Sure.
	What a weird strategy.
	That's like having the cable version and the DVD release version of the series have different title names.
	Doesn't make sense.
	That's kind of interesting.
	Awful, meandering, angry, and they're just sitting there stewing and hoping that Epstein files would drop during their broadcast.
	Too bad for them.
	The Epstein files phase one from the most transparent administration in history, the 45th and 47th president of the United States, Donald J. Trump.
	That is what's listed on the binder.
	On the binder.
	That was passed out later in the day to a handful of conservative commentators like Liz Wheeler.
	Shia Reyeshek?
	Yeah, Shia Reyeshek.
	Lips of TikTok.
	I thought that was a different name.
	Nope.
	Who's Lori something?
	Liz Wheeler?
	No.
	Is this the binders full of women they were talking about?
	No, it sure wasn't.
	All those years ago?
	I feel like I just woke up.
	DC Drano also got the binder.
	A handful more folks did.
	DC Drano.
	Yeah, Rogan O'Handley is his name.
	At this point, I wouldn't be surprised if Cat Turd 2 wasn't selected to be part of the FBI. We are living in hell, folks.
	Yeah, 4chan itself has actually become the supercomputer that runs the government.
	Nick Fuentes thinks that it's President Reddit, not President 4chan.
	Yeah.
	When Nick Fuentes is ranting about how cringe things are, and you have to agree with him...
	I hate it.
	It's a bad world.
	I hate it.
	Things are not good.
	But I did get an email this week, and it was kind of fun.
	From Steven, I'd like to start there.
	After, of course, we take a quick second to thank some folks who support us over at Shrug.club.
	Hello, Shrug Nation.
	You've entered the Shrug-tuation.
	Because that always brightens my days.
	Yeah, great thing to experience.
	Of course, Shrug.club, that's the place you can go to to support us while also experiencing bonus content too hot for the RSS feed.
	It's also not...
	Always hot.
	It's never hot.
	Sometimes it's distressing.
	But some people are still into Dennis' feet.
	Yeah, it's fine.
	You did not get the URL Dennis' feet dot com.
	I will.
	Dennis' little piggies dot com.
	Here's why I would never get Dennis' little piggies dot com.
	It's because how do you pluralize...
	How do you add the...
	How do you make my name possessive?
	People get confused.
	Great point.
	Is it S apostrophe?
	That's true.
	I'd like to take a second and thank the folks who support us financially over at Shrug.club.
	Byron's mother.
	Nope, not yet.
	Oh, nice.
	She does listen, I think.
	Does she?
	Hi, Nancy.
	Allison O. Oh.
	Big butt.
	You got the butt.
	What?
	What?
	Wrong button.
	What a piece of shit.
	Sorry about that, Allison.
	When I saw that you pushed that big butt button, I was like, what is this?
	It was a slip-up.
	Whoops.
	And also, new buildings are a globalist conspiracy.
	Thank you for supporting us.
	Thank you so much for joining us.
	Waiting for Jared to say thank you.
	Jared!
	There's a good pause in comedy.
	Oh.
	Okay.
	Peace.
	Shit.
	Thank you.
	Wonderful work.
	God, okay.
	I'm fine.
	Consider supporting us at drug.club.
	Appreciate ya.
	Big butt.
	You get the butt.
	What is that one from?
	It's just Gerald today.
	I thought it was a funny little...
	Big butt.
	You get the butt.
	Big butt.
	You get the butt.
	Yeah.
	I do like that.
	Now this email from Steven that I received earlier this week.
	What do you think?
	Hey folks, I believe that our viewers and everyone who loves freedom deserves only the best.
	We want you to help shape the future.
	Of CrowderShop.com.
	Stop reading ahead.
	Oh, no.
	I'm not reading ahead.
	I'm guessing that he's going to try and do a design contest.
	We're always...
	You can make our own shirts, you know?
	Looking for new ways to bring you the best.
	And I'd love your feedback on some of our ideas and your recommendations.
	If you have any, take a moment to fill out this quick survey.
	And I said, don't mind if I do.
	And let us know your thoughts.
	As a thank you for filling out the survey, I'll send you a discount on your next order.
	Thanks for being part of the fight.
	Steven Crowder.
	That's a tilde?
	Yeah, right?
	Approximately Steven Crowder.
	All right.
	So here it is, a Google survey.
	CrowderShop.com.
	More or less.
	More or less Steven Crowder.
	CrowderShop.com customer survey.
	Hey, folks, I believe there are viewers.
	Yeah, same thing.
	Take a moment to fill out the quick survey and let us know your thoughts.
	Of the potential products below, which would you...
	I told you not to read ahead.
	I couldn't help myself.
	Of the potential products below, which would you...
	You'd be most excited about select your top three.
	He gave us four options.
	Four options.
	Tell us the one you don't want.
	Freeze-dried candy.
	Freeze-dried candy?
	Freeze-dried candy?
	You want Skittles pops?
	Is it like Gerald's face and I'm going to be crunching a bunch?
	No, it's clearly peach rings.
	They bought way too many spree candy and they got to push them.
	We got to freeze these things and pop them open.
	The second thing is coffee, which I feel like they're already...
	I partnered with Rumble's 1776 Coffee.
	I mean, they had Mug Club before.
	I don't know.
	It's a good point.
	But Chocolate.
	Okay, Jeremy's Chocolates.
	Already done.
	That's a different company.
	And then Supplements.
	Hell yes.
	Supplements.
	Here's what I need.
	I need Big Dick Supplements and I want Popped Spree.
	Yeah, I'm only going to select two.
	Top choices here are Candy Store or Raw Meat Store.
	What is this dichotomy?
	They only had food, they were hungry when they were deciding, and then two, Stephen's pretending like he doesn't have a little sweet tooth.
	Clearly not the case.
	The only thing I can see here, is there a three, Jared?
	I don't want to cut you off if there's a three.
	Yeah, third thing, he's trying to get, like, the liver king.
	Oh, we do gotta get...
	And he wants us to get, like, the liver king, too.
	Someone to grind up some beef liver into a capsule, because that'll change my life.
	I think Stephen, for the first time in his life, experienced freeze-dried candy.
	Probably.
	He's like, we gotta sell this stuff.
	Do people know about this?
	These worms get so big.
	You get the butt.
	Yeah, too many of these, Gerald, I'll tell you what.
	But I was at the gift shop at the museum the other day, and they were handing out free samples of this, and I was crunching a bunch.
	I mean, we have more of this survey here.
	Do you have any other product suggestions for us?
	If so, share them here.
	Fleshlight.
	Gerald's mouth.
	Fleshlight.
	If you've completed this form, enter your email to receive your discount code.
	We'll send that directly to you once we've tallied up your responses.
	Tallied up all of your responses.
	Yeah.
	Am I supposed to do more than one?
	Three questions.
	Well, technically three questions.
	One is, what is your email address?
	Yeah, so two questions.
	The other is telling you to check three of four questions.
	And then the other is just please help us.
	What do you guys want from that?
	Do you want like a towel set?
	What are you guys looking for?
	What would you purchase from us that you would not purchase from somebody else?
	Thursday, February 27th, I poured myself a cup of coffee.
	That's today.
	Opened up a protein bar.
	The sun's coming up.
	Blue sky.
	Very nice day today.
	This is how I started my day.
	Okay.
	Yeah, a very forced little parody of the Ryan Murphy genre series American Horror Stories Was that not it?
	I've never seen it before.
	It's kind of similar to that, but if there was a karaoke version of the American Horror Story theme song, that's what it would sound like.
	There are no lyrics, no.
	So they just played another theme song.
	Kind of like they did last episode when they did ER, which was just the ER theme with clips of them behind it.
	Oh man, I've had that in my head.
	All week.
	Dude, I got...
	This week I ordered a vinyl remix of the ER theme song.
	Sick.
	It's got...
	By who?
	Let's see, actually.
	Well, Byron, while you look that up, I want to share with you, Jared, and everyone listening, if anyone owns a Wii still...
	You need to get the Trauma Center series of games.
	Oh, those are fun.
	They're so good, and they're like a Japanese visual novel meets medical drama.
	They're very fun.
	Byron and I, we killed many patients accidentally.
	Is gameplay like this, like a hospital builder kind of thing?
	No, no.
	Gameplay is like...
	You'll be in the operating room and then, like, the nurse rush in and be like, Doctor!
	We have a guy who has life-flighted in and his arm's broken in ten places!
	And then it goes...
	And then you go in and you have to fix the patient.
	And it's like, here's the whole control breakdown, okay?
	Your left hand, you got a joystick, pick your tool.
	Your right hand controls the tool.
	You can, like, zap people.
	You can pull stuff out with forceps.
	Amazing game.
	Amazing game.
	Do not ever do the colonoscopy one, though, because your hand gets so tired from, like, shoving a camera deeper into a colon.
	Around the butt.
	Trauma Center Second Opinion is the one I recommend first.
	You get the butt.
	Yep, exactly, right?
	Big butt, you get the butt.
	Big butt, you get the butt.
	No one that you would know, but they do have a dungeon remix, which is kind of good.
	Nice.
	Not Diplo?
	No, Diplo's not.
	How do you feel about movie theater trailer style remixes of songs?
	We got a lot of show to do.
	Okay.
	You got a Spotify playlist you can drop?
	Nope, I think we talked enough about stuff.
	But yeah, I have fallen off on the American Horror Story viewing, but yeah, still just kind of annoying, right?
	I guess they're just doing TV themes.
	It's lazy.
	Thank you for being a friend.
	They used to sing.
	Remember they used to sing songs?
	Back in the old days, they used to sing.
	Yeah, I can't believe they used to sing songs.
	The thing that they do best is parody.
	They think...
	It's not really very good, but it's as strong as they can get.
	That's them fully powered up.
	I guess while we're ruminating here, why would they even come to thinking...
	Of American Horror Story.
	It's a very LGBTQ... Is it?
	I mean, Ryan Murphy's a gay guy.
	A lot of the themes are about sexuality, repressed sexuality, a lot of different...
	I just think it's so funny that they did a parody of a song with no lyrics.
	Well, that's what they did with ER. Well, it's strange.
	It's like if I wanted to show you something funny I made and I'd have showed you a karaoke version of Tears in Heaven by Eric Clapton and didn't say anything.
	And you were just throwing children.
	Out of windows.
	Speaking of parody, when I sip, you sip, he sip.
	Just like that.
	Everything's a little bit harder.
	Is that a band-aid?
	It's a band-aid.
	You don't need to know the story.
	It's just fingers not doing well, but it all began with an empanada.
	You're definitely telling a story later.
	Maybe later.
	I just don't want anyone to be blamed.
	It's no one's fault but my own.
	It is your fault.
	And the dirty Mexicans who do the construction and leave Epinanas all over the place.
	So...
	Tool Man and Gerald laughing.
	Third chair didn't laugh.
	He's injured, y'all.
	Not sure if it's cut or a burn, but every time you wear a Band-Aid, it should be declared.
	Yeah, absolutely.
	I have no bandages up right now.
	I'm worried about it.
	I have an injured knee, but I'm otherwise healthy.
	Well, it should also be blamed on another race if you are injured.
	Definitely.
	Yeah, yeah, for sure.
	I mean, for fun and laughs.
	Yeah, who's leaving empanadas around anyway, if not Mexican construction workers, I guess?
	What Mexican construction workers?
	And they're lousy with hand pies.
	I've heard that before, Stephen.
	Jesus Christ.
	We're really in for it, folks.
	Canada just had a debate for people vying for the head of the Liberal Party to replace Justin Trudeau, and there were some threats made.
	Did you know that they kind of threatened to potentially nuke the United States?
	That's not a clickbait headline.
	They actually imply it, and it's silly because Canada shouldn't exist.
	So I did search the entire three-and-a-half-hour debate, and I didn't see Nuke anywhere, which is kind of interesting.
	They did talk a little bit about some stuff that may tick off Steven, but of course it's reasonable to stand up for yourself when someone threatens to, with force, make you a state.
	Yeah, yeah, that's fine.
	It's all probably just whatever he's talking about is definitely blown out of proportion.
	No pun intended there.
	No pun intended.
	Gaza should be ours also, because it's all fucked up now.
	Yeah, right, exactly.
	No, it doesn't matter how it got fucked up or who did it.
	I just want to make it a gold-plated AI hallucination brought to life.
	That blew my mind to see that.
	I feel like we're very close to him showing that one video of...
	Biden in the wheelchair shooting the gun.
	I'm just hoping Frazzledrip finally comes out.
	Right?
	Like, we're kind of close.
	We are, man.
	We live in a unique time.
	Yeah.
	Oh, man.
	It's crazy.
	Can't wait to see the Riviera of the Middle East.
	Yeah.
	It's very cool with the AI and, like, the bearded woman.
	Bearded belly dancing women, yes.
	And...
	Did you hear the conservatives complaining that he's dancing with a woman that isn't his wife?
	Not that it's a trans woman.
	They didn't care about that so much.
	It's not a real person.
	Yeah, it's a fake person, and he's not real in it either.
	AI Elon eating a papaya.
	What a disaster.
	What a straight-up disaster.
	What else, though, is going on this week?
	We have the Epstein Watch.
	There could be a list released right now.
	This is, I believe right now it's 10, 12 Eastern, so we'll see what happens.
	I don't know what's going to be new coming from that.
	He's kind of right, which is surprising.
	Wednesday the 26th, which was yesterday, with mounting bipartisan pressure on Twitter, AG Pam Bondi announced that they would be releasing declassified Epstein files this morning.
	Okay.
	Saying the Epstein files were currently sitting on her desk.
	That's what she said to Jesse Waters on Fox.
	Great guy.
	Favorite guy.
	One of the best journalists in the business.
	Flight logs, names, and quote, a lot of information is set to be revealed.
	Spoiler alert, again, phase one, no new information.
	Same flight logs and client lists that had already been previously released years ago.
	Yeah, I think that Pam Bondi just realized they were just released.
	Maybe.
	Wow.
	She just started Googling shit earlier.
	Yeah.
	Oh, snap.
	Did you guys know that if you look this stuff up, there's like, I don't know, information about it?
	Yeah, amazing.
	Now, of course, they have two options.
	Actually releasing the evidence now after they scrub any mentions of Trump and Trump-associated folks.
	Yeah, you won't.
	Or start a conspiracy that the FBI is destroying evidence and hiding it, which I'm pretty sure that's the direction that they're...
	Leaning towards...
	Damn, they're smart, dude.
	And just a couple hours ago, Pam wrote a letter to Kash Patel, a conspiracy theorist and FBI director, saying, By 8 a.m.
	tomorrow, February 28th, the FBI will deliver the full and complete Epstein files to my office, including all records, documents, audio and video recordings, and materials related to Jeffrey Epstein and his...
	What is that word?
	Deerence?
	I've never seen that word before.
	Oh, that's a new word.
	Dearits?
	Oh, not a real word.
	It might be a typo.
	Is it a typo from her?
	That's a demerit.
	That's a demerit.
	You should check that quote, see if it's a...
	When I searched it, it pulled up the Hill article, which I got it from.
	I think she made up a word.
	Either way, regardless of how such information was obtained, there will be no withholdings or limitations to my or your access.
	Is this written to us?
	I think addressing us now.
	The Department of Justice will ensure that any public disclosure of these files will be done in a manner to protect the privacy of victims and in accordance with the law, as I have done my entire career as a prosecutor.
	Oh man, I have doubts.
	Yeah, I don't think anything...
	God, my conspiracy brain is always triggering in moments like this.
	Like, one, why were they...
	Quote, unquote, dropping something on a Thursday.
	They never do that.
	They always drop it on a Friday.
	Sure.
	This seems very intentional.
	Why would they...
	It was a publicity stunt today.
	Clearly a publicity stunt, you know?
	With the binders that describe Trump as the most transparent president.
	Yeah.
	Even though they weren't being made publicly available, they were given to conservative influencers.
	To 10 TikTokers, basically.
	TikTokers, yes.
	And the online discourse about this is bonkers.
	People are saying, like...
	They probably want this so that they can get the truth out before there's spin from the media.
	Yeah, I trust libs of TikTok to report real news.
	Yeah, yeah, right.
	Honestly, drop the PDF that they printed.
	Just put it somewhere online.
	I don't...
	God, I'm so conflicted, too, because I don't believe that in any case, this that was once classified because of the extensive number of victims, over 200 victims mentioned in these reports, I think no matter what, You're going to risk causing more damage.
	Of course you will, yeah.
	I think what's so interesting about this is when you have these conversations around this specifically, people will often say things like, If we release these, you know that the Democrats are going to be on this list, too.
	Okay.
	Yeah, and I don't understand.
	I don't give a shit about that.
	I don't understand why anyone believes that.
	That's not even close to a reason why I wouldn't want any of this released.
	Yeah, I would agree.
	If I found out that Bernie Sanders was a pedophile, I'd be like, fucking Bernie, bail.
	I would quickly defend him.
	What?
	What?
	Bernie wrote for life.
	I would feel disappointed that that happened, but I would never be like, well, I've got to keep supporting him.
	This is the tough thing.
	I'm aware that it is elitist to believe that not everyone should have access to everything.
	When you give everyone this much information, there's a higher chance that it's going to be misinterpreted or selectively used or spun in a direction that causes, again, more damage.
	The party that literally has to misinterpret everything that's ever said to them ever, right?
	Especially someone like Chaya Raychick, who's just like...
	You guys remember that interview?
	It was her and the other gal out on the street.
	Oh, sure.
	Who was she?
	I do remember that.
	Maybe not New York Times, but something like that.
	You know what I mean?
	It was Taylor Lorenz.
	Yeah.
	It's probably one of the most interesting 53-minute interviews.
	It is a fascinating watch because you just watch Chaya Raychik brain melt out of her ears within six minutes of this interview.
	They're sitting down and Taylor Lorenz just catches her in a blatant lie and she's like, why are you lying?
	She's like, it's not illegal for me to lie.
	And it's like...
	That's, yeah, yeah, like, why shouldn't I lie, basically, is the sentiment of her whole argument.
	So it's like, when somebody like that is given sort of the keys to the car, and what, you know, I guess culturally, the one thing that is like...
	Non-biased, I guess.
	This list, Epstein's death, everything surrounding that.
	Everyone loves to talk to the Diddy party.
	That's why it got so popular.
	Similar circumstances to the Epstein thing.
	People, especially on the right, I think agree that they want to see, not necessarily just billionaires, but when they see even this class sort of thing that surrounds it, I think that they can recognize that.
	I think stuff like this is kind of good for everybody.
	Because it illuminates how fucked up this whole thing can be sometimes that we're all like passively sitting through.
	Sure.
	I think that the universal agreement that everyone has is people who are perverts and pedophiles should be punished as such.
	Criminals should be held accountable.
	No matter what side they're on.
	If, like I said, left, right, it doesn't matter to me.
	Yeah, but we've got to lock up the MD Foodie boys.
	Yeah, of course.
	Taylor Lorenz was...
	Yeah, Chubb Pern fucking pissing me off, dude.
	She's responsible for the latest article about them.
	Oh, no.
	The big bio.
	You know, one thing I will share that I think, to your point, Byron, about how if everyone has access to everything, that people will misinterpret things.
	I remember distinctly having a conversation with somebody on Facebook or something.
	And there was a bill or some type of language that was being proposed in some official capacity.
	And it was fully in alignment with this person's perspective, but she couldn't comprehend the words properly.
	Yeah, we're talking like double negatives and stuff.
	Yeah, and she was like, are you saying that this is saying the exact opposite of what you believe it is saying?
	I'll let you vote the way you are, because I disagree with you.
	It was wild.
	I was just like, this person just didn't understand.
	It feels a little dirty to have that perspective because we're all equal.
	Everyone in the eyes of God.
	Our Lord.
	Praise be to He.
	Whether it's ignorance or intentional acts, I feel like you give people more ammunition to...
	Cause damage.
	It's not good.
	Yeah, and this was just straight up ignorance and it blew my mind to have that conversation and be like, they don't understand.
	They don't.
	Wow.
	I mean, on the other side of that coin, though, I do believe that there are people involved in the Jeffrey Epstein scandal that aren't being held accountable.
	Oh, of course.
	Tons of them.
	Clinton, for one.
	Chelsea Clinton.
	Okay.
	Well, that one's a little bit further from the target, but yeah, that's not what we're talking about.
	She's been taking L's for her parents for...
	30 years.
	You think she's going to stop now?
	Nope.
	Last week I mentioned the daily scripted push to Rumble.
	Yeah, yeah, right?
	Let me drop a hard slur to get over to Rumble.
	So this is what that usually sounds like, or sometimes sounds like.
	No slur this time, but...
	As we talk about Canada, I guarantee you that I'll probably lose my mind.
	So if you're still watching on YouTube, and you shouldn't be, you might see this.
	That means head on over to Rumble.
	We don't censor.
	So I hear that every week.
	I just want to make sure that I have that on the record.
	That's what that sounds like.
	It's so weird to me that they just purposely go over to Rumble.
	I understand that they want people to go to Rumble.
	So we've established we've got a Steven, and I slipped that we've got a Gerald.
	I don't know if he spoke up.
	I think he did already.
	But our third chair sitter, he's got a...
	And our third chair sitter, he's got a big announcement.
	You get the butt.
	Gerald.
	Glad to have you here, Captain Morgan.
	Thank you very much.
	And Mr. Josh Firestein, not underscore Firestein, on the X. I'm on Rumble, too.
	Check me out.
	I got three videos on there.
	There you go.
	On the Rumble.
	I'm a big deal.
	It's a big...
	Tonight it's a Rumble.
	Okay.
	Huh?
	Yeah.
	When I started writing the script to this, and I remembered pulling this clip, it made me feel not so bad for having kind of an off day.
	Okay.
	So really dumb attempt at a joke that confused everyone.
	Yeah, I don't even know what it meant.
	I feel like maybe like...
	I don't know, a couple times a week he confuses even his staff with what he says.
	I think everybody does, but Stephen thinks he's funny about it.
	It couldn't happen to a better guy.
	So that's why I don't feel too bad about making this episode.
	Not the best, I'm trying.
	These guys really aren't.
	We're only as good as the source material.
	That's a great point, and we usually try to make it a little better.
	So it's been an increasingly tough situation for folks working for the government.
	Yeah, lazy slog.
	Well, you and Steven really locked in.
	I haven't known anyone directly.
	You, me, and MGT. Having lost...
	Wait, what?
	Oh, Margaret Taylor Greene.
	I was thinking Machine Gun Kelly for some reason.
	Yeah, yeah, him too.
	He probably agrees a little bit.
	I don't think he knows about the budget.
	He does know about Air Duster.
	Let me have some of that.
	Fucking pass that over.
	I haven't known anyone directly having lost their job in the wake of Elon's Gooner Gang's reckless assessment of the government's spending, but I have seen a few friends of friends who have lost their jobs.
	It just sucks.
	It's such a bummer.
	It does, yeah.
	So many folks fully remove the human element of all of this.
	Get ready.
	Rumble.
	Yeah, you're cutting waste, cutting waste.
	It sucks to lose your job, but not bad enough that you should feel outwardly bad, right?
	I do.
	Gotta hide those feelings, Dennis.
	Can't let them see you cry.
	Real men don't cry.
	Some workers who were terminated by Doge have not been taking it well.
	Let's start with this.
	I really felt that we were providing support and care to humanity around the world because it's the right thing to do.
	And that made me feel proud no matter who was president.
	And now I don't know what to do.
	And I... I have cried every day.
	I think that that's normal.
	I have a 15-month-old at home, and I'm looking at him and thinking, well, what's this country that we're now living in?
	We're here for safety.
	And we're patriots.
	We love our country.
	That's why we're taking these jobs that don't pay us in the private sector.
	I'm an accountant.
	Shut up.
	They don't exist in the private sector.
	I can get a private sector job tomorrow, but I care about this country, and I want to be here.
	We're just witnessing the entire industry is going down, and what are the senators going to do about it?
	Did he just say this entire industry is going down?
	Yes.
	That's not an industry.
	It's not an industry at all!
	The bloat industry?
	Yes.
	Yeah, public service.
	I could get a job in the private sector.
	Well, then why didn't you?
	Do it.
	Why didn't you?
	That's a real question.
	Do you really believe that this person is doing it just for altruistic reasons?
	I did it because I want to serve my country.
	By doing accounting for a government bureaucracy, that's how you're serving your country?
	So, we've now equated...
	Suckling at the taxpayer teeth is serving your country.
	I've said this in the past.
	I want to do away with the term public servant unless there is a significant pay cut.
	How do you gauge your public service?
	How much have you risked?
	How much have you sacrificed?
	And by that objective, quantifiable parameter, Donald Trump is the most servicey public servant in the history of this country.
	Yeah.
	Yeah.
	What a privileged fucking piece of shit take.
	Is it even a take?
	Let me just put this out there.
	Is this even a take?
	This is the most lukewarm shit.
	All he's saying is, I don't think that you should have a job in the government sector, and only if you have gotten fake shot in the ear, there I said it, then...
	That's peak service, I guess.
	You have to take a bullet for not even necessarily this country, but you just have to take a bullet.
	For you.
	He took a bullet for himself.
	Yeah, he set it up himself.
	Well, not literally, but...
	This makes me so mad.
	There's just this generalization and misunderstanding about what people working for the government are doing.
	They're all accountants.
	They're all accountants.
	There's so many specialized fields that these people...
	And they don't even mention what these people were doing.
	Yeah, that's what I was wondering.
	But they're women, so...
	Government doesn't...
	They've never had accountants, and why are we starting now?
	You don't deserve a job.
	What are you talking about?
	Every business needs to know, like, how they're spending money, and it's not like, you know...
	To relate all of this back to, like, the dode shit that it's probably going to go into...
	Uh-huh.
	and and sorry also to like relate this back to giving these people the car keys to to form an opinion about what's actually happening here like controlling think or at least thinking they control the narrative and i guess for conservatives they do anyway but it's sort of the same thing here we're like the doge thing we can all i think agree that like i don't want the pentagon to just be paying for like 50 hammers and stuff right like
	A hammer doesn't cost $50 egregious spending like we know is happening.
	Or just the way that money exchanges through hands to get certain items, right?
	It just inflates it.
	We all understand that.
	And that's like, yeah, that should stop.
	We should probably audit the Pentagon or whatever, right?
	To then go and say, like, the left doesn't want you to do this because they don't think they should audit the government.
	It's like, that's not the thing.
	Not at all.
	The people who are in charge of it is who we don't want to be doing that because they are only going to stand to serve themselves.
	And that's the issue, right?
	Like, that's kind of what we're criticizing here in this.
	I've never met a single person, I'll say, that said, the government is very efficient with their money.
	No one has ever said that what I see people price of that but I just disagree there.
	Yes Yeah, the thing is like you can't just Overcorrect my analogy is gonna make earlier is if you're if you're drifting off the road a little bit You start feeling rumble strips You don't just grab the wheel and jerk at the other heart is switch No, you switch drivers.
	Yeah, you switch drivers real quick.
	You jump out of the car.
	You let the car just crash.
	And that's honestly like what it is.
	If you're spending it, your house got a little out of control, do you say, I'm not going to buy anything, even food?
	Yeah, if you're noticing your credit card bill is pretty high, you look at it and you go, oh, I've got three subscriptions to Netflix.
	I better burn my house.
	That's the only way out.
	We realized this the other night.
	Like, you got 98 bodies turning into pink goo in your former shell of a Pizza Hut?
	Uh-huh.
	Dude, you have to burn it down.
	Like, you have to just start over.
	You have to walk away from that.
	What a dumb take.
	But who's the real victim here?
	Absolutely.
	Elon Musk, you put him right there.
	People are like, oh, he's making so much money.
	Do you know how much he's lost?
	Yeah.
	Because of the Tesla boycotts that people...
	$120 billion of personal worth.
	Yeah.
	He's sacrificing.
	You're like, I got a 12 billion Starlink contract.
	Okay, or whatever it was.
	I think it was a SpaceX.
	Who cares?
	Describing...
	Loss of value to a company as if it's a sacrifice he's making for the good of the nation is the most brainwashed shit I've ever heard in my entire life.
	So he has that contract, likely many more on the way, and likely far less regulation moving forward.
	Also, he's the shadow president.
	Yes.
	Do you think money matters at all to Elon Musk?
	It doesn't matter.
	He doesn't matter.
	The richest man in the world is digging through our pockets right now.
	We're about to have the government-sanctioned car.
	The only one you can have is going to be the Tesla.
	This reminds me of how people feel about Trump supposedly not accepting a salary.
	Oh, yeah.
	I mean, this is the risk and service that we're talking about just a few minutes ago.
	People really respect that.
	He's lying to you.
	Yeah, it's so stupid.
	It's like Warren Buffett taking a 100k salary because he's leaving all his money in stocks and shit to avoid taxes.
	I mean, what is it?
	$400,000 a year is what the president gets.
	Our president, though, he sacrifices it all for the good of the country.
	Yeah, what he does is drops a meme coin the day before he gets inaugurated and makes a billion dollars.
	It's so dumb.
	Trump coin, value, what's it at?
	That reminds me, have you guys got Proudcoin yet?
	Oh, no.
	I spent all of our money from Patreon on Melania.
	Melania coin.
	$100 million in trading fees is how much he made.
	Yeah, but he's not great.
	I think that's just good business.
	As a president, he's making sacrifices.
	As a businessman, he's making money.
	And that's what we like, dude.
	We like it when...
	We like it when capitalism comes in and just strangles the neck of Jeffrey the giraffe.
	We love it when that same capitalism ruins...
	Guitar Center.
	And we should definitely make that guy the President of the United States.
	Bain Capital himself, right?
	Let me ask you this, okay?
	I've come to kill Jeffrey.
	Leave Jeffrey alone.
	Put his throat in my hands.
	Oh, no.
	Let me ask you this, okay?
	You guys and anyone listening.
	Oh, sure.
	Have you ever had a boss you wouldn't want to be President?
	Bing!
	It's the question of the day.
	Bing!
	Right?
	Oh my gosh, man.
	It's wild how simple it is.
	Put your boss's neck.
	All right, guys.
	We gotta get back to making fun of folks for feeling bad.
	Okay, cool.
	Are you a strong patriot, or do you cry every day?
	I'm a strong, independent woman, but it's pretty normal to cry every day over something that people experience usually half a dozen times in their life, right?
	Like layoffs.
	Isn't that normal?
	No, it's not.
	What am I implying?
	I'm implying that if you're crying every day because you lost a job that shouldn't exist, you're weak.
	You're weak of character.
	Oh my fucking god, man.
	You're upset.
	This makes me so mad.
	You know what?
	Cry.
	Nothing wrong with fucking crying.
	How many days has it been?
	When she said that I've cried every day, it'd probably been like three days.
	Yeah, and she probably did cry every day because it was fucking stressful.
	I lost my job.
	And she said, I just look at my 15-month...
	I was going to say year old.
	I always fall into 15-month-old baby.
	I look at my 15-month-old baby and I wonder what's going on in this country.
	I think that's a fair question.
	That's probably why.
	I bet Stephen can't look at his kids.
	That's why he doesn't cry.
	They're older now.
	Are they?
	We're several years older at this point.
	Implying that crying is weak is the most piece of shit that you can do.
	It makes me so upset.
	People experience getting laid off half a dozen times in their life.
	I don't think it happens that often.
	It's happened to me once, and I cried when it happened.
	I know you did.
	Yeah, there's nothing wrong with it either.
	I'm not a little baby.
	There's absolutely nothing wrong with it.
	Losing your jobs is one of the most stressful things that happens to anybody.
	It's super scary.
	Yeah, you know what?
	Honestly, if you had any other jobs, Stephen would be on your side.
	The fact that you're crunching numbers for, I guess, I don't know.
	Uncle Sam.
	The thing that you're complaining about is that, like, we don't know how we're spending the money.
	These people are in charge of how we're spending money in certain sectors of the government.
	Which seems very, like, counterintuitive to the thing that he's asking.
	These people, like, losing their jobs makes it more impossible for these agencies, legacy agencies, to...
	Report their cash spending, their money spending, right?
	So it's just like, you're just pulling the rug.
	Do you think firing the accountants will help you understand where the money's going?
	Well, if you have a bunch of teens to do it for you, yeah.
	Who apparently don't understand how the numbers are set up in there because it's like legacy data.
	With all the supposedly old people who are collecting social security and stuff?
	Guys, I think Stephen actually might be right.
	I'm 400 years old.
	Well, he's doing some reflection at least.
	Nice.
	Does that make me a sociopath?
	I don't even feel like a little bit bad.
	No.
	I know what you're thinking.
	Like, maybe 2%, no percent.
	No percent.
	Zero percent.
	Not even 1%.
	Not even 0.2%.
	Zero percent.
	Does that make me a sociopath?
	I don't even feel like a little bit bad.
	No.
	I know what you're thinking.
	Maybe 2%, no percent.
	No percent.
	Zero percent.
	Not even 1%.
	Not even 0.2%.
	Zero percent bad for these people because I guarantee you they wouldn't feel bad for you.
	They didn't.
	No.
	2021 or whatever year it was when they kicked all the military out for not getting a vaccine.
	Exactly.
	I didn't hear an ounce of empathy, an ounce of sympathy from them.
	Yeah, where were the USA protests then?
	Right, Josh?
	Yeah.
	I didn't see any tears.
	Yep.
	You know what I did see?
	I did see these same people, maybe the exact same people, but the same side saying stuff like, you know what?
	If you didn't get the vaccine, back of the line for you at the hospital.
	Yeah, exactly.
	So it was about 8,000.
	Folks who couldn't participate in their roles in the military because of vaccine mandates.
	Vaccines only affect the people who get them, right?
	Sure.
	They definitely don't affect the rest of the world, like public health or anything?
	I should just say really quick, nearly 6,000 veterans may have already been fired because of Doge.
	Okay.
	Cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool.
	So because veterans make up about 30% of the federal workforce.
	Of course.
	Yeah.
	This is just such a crappy, like, false equivalence.
	And I think it makes me upset because people really act like vaccines don't affect anybody else.
	You know, fucking a kid died from measles this week.
	Yeah, like right down here, yeah.
	Yeah, it's very clear that there's a big difference between having empathy for somebody who lost their job because of something they didn't do and someone who lost their opportunity to serve in the military because of something they wouldn't do.
	Right?
	It's a will versus a non-will situation here.
	Yeah.
	And, sure, you can disagree with the vaccines or whatever.
	I mean, I think it's dumb to disagree with the vaccines, right?
	Obviously.
	But there is a consequence of that, right?
	And if the consequence, like, these people just are trying to work, trying to do their job, and they're getting fired, and they're not doing anything to do it.
	They're not doing anything to be fired.
	Well, but they did something by being useless, pathetic.
	Fake.
	Federal fake employees.
	My take on the military side of this is that when you sign up for the military, the way that the military has been explained to me as somebody who grew up around the military, and I feel like I kind of understand the ins and outs of what that is to get into that position.
	They own you.
	You are not an autonomous being.
	You are a soldier in the United States military.
	You're a resource.
	Yeah, exactly.
	You are the water that flows.
	You are no longer yourself.
	You're a number.
	That company, who is the United States of America, who most of these people think should be ran like a company, when they look at you as a stocked item and they say this is what you have to be stocked with, is a vaccine.
	There's just no folding because we're the United States government.
	We're like...
	We are the guys.
	You either work here or you don't.
	If you work here, that means that you have to come with these features.
	Additionally, Josh, who is a former active military soldier, frontline military, he has every fucking vaccine that we've never even heard of.
	He has vaccines that we don't even know exist.
	Well, but look at him, though.
	Maybe we shouldn't do vaccines.
	Here's what I'll say about the empathy piece of all of this.
	I have empathy for the people who got kicked out of the military.
	Yeah, tough decision.
	I have it because...
	They were lied to about vaccines.
	That's my empathy.
	I empathize with them because I understand what it feels like to be misled by propaganda.
	Because it happens all the time.
	It probably happened to me right now.
	I bet that I am probably actually a conservative, but I'm just soaked in the liberal propaganda.
	That makes a lot of sense.
	So I empathize with them.
	But no, you chose something, but I believe that they were misled.
	And so that's where my empathy lies with that.
	I'm sorry that you're dealing with the consequences of people who took advantage of you.
	Well, it's time for the elephant in the room, or the elephant doging through the room if the room was the government.
	Medicaid and Medicare.
	The left is saying, hey, Medicaid is going to be cut.
	Medicaid is going to be...
	Donald Trump's going to gut Medicaid.
	Is it true?
	Well, it's time for an installment of Claim Truth.
	My favorite.
	What is this?
	Claims Truth?
	Claim and Truth, where he discusses a claim and gives you the truth.
	Oh, nice.
	He's really good at that.
	It's just a little fact-checking thing.
	It's a staple for successful comedy shows.
	Yeah, definitely.
	Point-by-point debunking of claims.
	Great.
	Right now, this is everywhere in the media, and they're really hoping to gin up some fear and solidify some votes.
	We'll get to the demographics in a second.
	Trump wants to gut Medicaid.
	Republicans playing with fire as they try to gut important benefits for millions.
	They passed a bill that's not paid for, that will add to the deficit, that will give $4.5 trillion of tax cuts to billionaires and the largest corporations, and will gut Medicaid and take healthcare away from millions of Americans.
	It's astonishing.
	They want to cut a minimum, the floor, of $880 billion from Medicaid.
	House Republicans' bill framework is to cut about $880 billion.
	Billion dollars from Medicaid.
	Okay.
	Here's the truth.
	Medicaid is mentioned nowhere in the bill at all.
	Not even a little bit.
	Once?
	Oh, shoot.
	I guess I should throw it on my notes.
	Throw it out, dude.
	I mean, deceptively cut both the clips or misspoken when they said that they're going to be cutting $880 billion from Medicaid.
	Explicitly.
	But yeah, based on the recent House budget resolution passed by the Republicans, cutting $880 billion from the budget without impacting Medicaid and Medicare appears to be extremely challenging, if not impossible.
	Sure.
	So that's what everyone's upset about.
	Yeah, it's like in my example earlier, like, oh, my credit card debt is too high, so I'm not going to spend money on anything.
	Sure.
	Especially not food.
	Yeah, well, I didn't say food.
	What?
	I didn't say food.
	I did say anything.
	Okay.
	That makes sense.
	Of course it's not going to say Medicaid directly.
	I'm probably not going to just because of obviously the optics of it.
	But if it's as simple as we need to cut this huge amount of money in order to make this budget work, you've got to save money somewhere.
	Oh, shoot.
	I just realized I got another clip.
	This is embarrassing.
	Sorry.
	Uh-oh.
	As a matter of fact, the one time that Donald Trump was asked about this, he was, some could argue, quite clear in his answer.
	Can you guarantee that Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security will not be touched?
	Yeah, I mean, I have said it so many times you shouldn't be asking me that question.
	This will not be read my lips.
	It won't be read my lips anymore.
	We're not going to touch it.
	Now, we are going to look for fraud.
	I'm sure you're okay with that, like people that shouldn't be on, people that are illegal aliens and others, criminals in many cases.
	Okay.
	That was clear.
	By the way, I was laughing during that montage a minute ago because CNN was saying, with $880 billion in Medicaid cuts, and the guy on the screen was nodding, the Chiron said, Mike Johnson promises not to cut Medicaid.
	I know.
	What are you doing?
	So both Donald Trump and Mike Johnson said that they're not going to touch Medicaid and Medicare.
	Yeah, of course.
	Yeah, you guys should trust these guys.
	That's all I need to know.
	So are we done with the episode?
	Egg on my face.
	That's all I can handle this week.
	I'm fine with that.
	Mike Johnson.
	He's got that coveted eyes account.
	Like, he's stress-worthy, dude.
	Of course.
	Actually, what we should do, contact his stepson who gets those notifications.
	Sure.
	Ask him, is this guy doing that stuff?
	Are you getting notifications?
	Did he turn it off on you?
	Like, what's that look like right now?
	We gotta know how trustworthy this guy is.
	That would be really interesting.
	We should reach out to his son to see how their masturbation habits are going.
	What are you talking?
	All right.
	So, again, like Dennis stated earlier, we all should be totally fine with getting rid of waste, fraud, and abuse in government programs.
	And we are.
	And we are.
	This is not how you approach this in a responsible way.
	You can't crash the car.
	You have to be mindful of the fact that real people will be impacted by these budget cuts.
	And like I said...
	It's not possible to do this.
	$880 billion was their minimum, their floor.
	Even that, it's not possible to do without affecting Medicaid and Medicare.
	And I definitely, so I want to read more on the budget before I talk too much about it because I haven't read it.
	I would like to too.
	But what I will say about it is just, if you believe that Trump is not going to do something because he says he's not going to do it, I have a bridge to sell you.
	Is it gold?
	No, it's not a gold bridge.
	He lies about everything.
	He lies about everything.
	He said that the Ukraine war was going to end within 24 hours of him becoming president-elect.
	Instead of that, he's now claiming...
	He's claiming Zelensky's a dictator and then says, I can't believe I said that.
	I don't think I said that.
	He's so good at being president.
	It's absolutely bonkers.
	The fact that you trust what Trump says is the problem.
	That's it.
	Yeah.
	Here's another truth.
	Medicaid is really just a form of wealth redistribution.
	That's why Bernie Sanders wanted Medicaid for all.
	You have 96 million people on Medicaid.
	96 million people.
	Okay, now if you look at those demographics, and this does matter, white Americans make up close to 60% of the population.
	They're about 43% of Medicaid beneficiaries.
	Hispanic?
	19% of the population, right?
	They make up about 28% of Medicaid.
	Black Americans, 12% of the population, 21% of Medicaid.
	If I were to tell you that one racial minority, one, makes up a smaller percentage of Medicaid than the general population, you're right, it's Asians.
	They're consistent.
	They're consistent folk.
	And that includes Pacific Islanders, so I guarantee you that's warped even a little bit more.
	They make about 5.8% of the population, 5.5% of Medicaid.
	Now, I'm not sure if he did this intentionally, the racist distraction, but I'm not sure if you caught it.
	He was pointing out Bernie Sanders' Medicaid for all plan.
	Bernie Sanders has always been a Medicare for all.
	Yeah, yeah.
	Not Medicaid for all.
	He leads in with that and then does a big rant about Medicaid and how the left just wants everyone to be supported by the government.
	And that's not exactly what...
	No, it's not.
	Not even close.
	But here's the thing.
	I want people to be supported by the government.
	I want universal health care.
	I mean, that would be wonderful.
	That's what I want.
	Yeah, I would like that.
	And I believe that nobody can abuse a health care system by using health care and making it as free as they can.
	Those are wonderful things.
	Yes.
	I gotta say...
	Apple hit me with the iPhone moment of like, hey, look at this old portrait.
	Look at this little book right here.
	Oh, photo album.
	Yeah, it must be.
	When I was in the Bernie Sanders pit in 2020, right before COVID hit.
	Man, that was like a magical time.
	It was magical.
	I miss Bernie as a bro.
	He was the best.
	It's cool.
	But yeah, if you are using Medicaid and you shouldn't be, The people you're hurting is the insurance companies that aren't getting your money.
	Like, that's how I feel about it.
	Obviously, that's a very generalization about things, right?
	Obviously, fraud is bad.
	We're unfamiliar with that in listening to this show.
	I mean, just a dumb take, man.
	Just a dumb take.
	Especially making it racist.
	I mean, that's the most unsurprising part of this.
	Yeah, imagine if we...
	Hey, Stephen, let's give you a stat just like that with...
	Cop violence statistics.
	Sure.
	Well, he'll find a way to...
	Of course.
	By the way, 27% of Medicaid beneficiaries are unemployed due to disability or some kind of illness.
	Only 27%.
	And by the way, there's a lot of fraud there.
	You know anyone who collects disability who kind of just like...
	Oh, wait.
	Does a guy follow me?
	Does he have a telescopic lens over there?
	All right.
	Give me my crutch.
	And he kind of does a little...
	Does a little blackbeard hop, right?
	We all know those people.
	That's telephoto lens, you dipshit.
	Okay.
	Well, also, the world is not movies, Stephen.
	Right.
	Not all of us have a friend actively involved in fraud.
	There probably is a bunch of fraud going on.
	There probably is, and I'm okay with getting rid of it.
	We're talking about character actors pretending to be disabled as a comedy bit in a 1990s comedy film.
	We all know the guy who's looking around and being like, I hope the insurance...
	And that's the strange thing.
	In the stereotype that he's referencing, it's always like insurance fraud, basically.
	Yeah, it's always like people burning down their own homes for the insurance money.
	Your girlfriend's dad buying a jukebox for $900 cash to avoid the IRS and then getting arrested.
	This is something we learned about Josh a couple weekends ago, actually, that I thought was kind of sweet.
	Kind of.
	My brother has Down Syndrome.
	He has held many jobs.
	Yes!
	He doesn't work well with others sometimes, so he's got to go through job to job, but yeah.
	He's a greeter at Walmart?
	No, the dude can shred papers and file stuff.
	He's got skills, man.
	I tell you what, they need someone like him at the FBI. I can shred the papers.
	Please do.
	They call me Shredder.
	I can't believe Josh let his boss...
	That's insane.
	Yeah, I mean...
	Hey, do you guys want to make fun of my brother really quick?
	Well, and that's not what he was doing at all.
	But that's what Stephen took it as, is anyone who has a Down syndrome sibling or family member or friend, they clearly make fun of them behind their back or to their face.
	I know.
	Of course they do.
	Gerald's saying that a Down syndrome person can only be a Walmart greeter.
	Yeah, my brother is actually, like, pretty good at work.
	Yeah.
	It's a disability, but that doesn't...
	Yeah, it's a learning disability.
	I just don't understand.
	I don't know.
	We see this from Steven every single time that anyone opens up or he has a guest on.
	Anytime that there's any sort of thing that he can get a one-up on, he's going to take that shot.
	He's going to take it every single time.
	Talking down to Josh about his brother by doing this voice at him is just so...
	How do you respect that?
	Like, man to man, Josh.
	Do you not respect yourself?
	Do you actually not respect your brother?
	Like, it's so grimy.
	It's really gross.
	But of course, I mean, Steve's not a monster.
	Sure, we're a nation that helps the most vulnerable among us.
	I understand that.
	And gives them an opportunity.
	But it's an opportunity to get back into the bloodstream to start providing for yourself.
	That is not what Medicaid is.
	That is not what our entitlement programs are.
	And again, I need to be clear, it is nowhere in this bill.
	But it should be.
	Steven, things don't always get better for people.
	Yeah, they don't.
	People have unique problems.
	Especially problems that require medical attention.
	I will say that one of the phrases I hate the most is when you hear people go, we should give a hand up, not a hand out.
	I hate that phrase so much.
	Because it's so, like, deaf to what people need.
	I mean, this is just a fun show.
	I love it so much.
	I have a really great time.
	Time of my life.
	Listen, you know, I'd qualify for disability.
	You probably would.
	People with rheumatoid arthritis.
	I think a lot of people would.
	I was saying that guy could have easily just not worked.
	And I would be fine with that.
	I would be...
	Oh, I'm fine with that!
	Great.
	He's got a bad neck, so he wants to get...
	Steven has a bad neck.
	Does he?
	He is, I think, probably.
	Yeah, he was eating pussy, remember?
	I forgot about that.
	Is that really what he said?
	I think they said that.
	They allude to the Larry David Curb Your Enthusiasm.
	Oh, yeah, I remember that.
	I guess, Stephen, if you're hurt enough that you can't work, yeah, maybe you should get some money from...
	Well, actually, he'll always have enough money until we're called to testify in some sort of lawsuit against him.
	As an expert witness?
	Of course, yeah.
	It's this thing where...
	People say, yeah, you should just get over it.
	I have X, Y, or Z. Sure.
	Well, you know, oh, you have a migraine?
	I get headaches too, so I just take ibuprofen and I feel better.
	It's like, okay, you have an experience that could be labeled as a disability, but...
	Let's go back to this clip really quick.
	Does that make me a sociopath?
	Yes, it does.
	It does make you a sociopath.
	Hey, COVID's just like a...
	Cold plus.
	Just a cold.
	Yeah.
	Clearly he has problems with empathy and isolating himself in a compound surrounded by his dad, a stand-up comedian from the Pacific Northwest, who is fine.
	Fine.
	And Gerald Morgan, a gay conversion therapist.
	Who sells wine.
	Yeah.
	It's not going to get much better for him, is it?
	It's like the Lord of the Rings a little bit, huh?
	Dumb Frodo.
	Steven has another medical issue.
	Does he?
	Yeah, and this is the first time he's ever...
	Well, actually, he has mentioned this before.
	Well, Stephen has giant assicus, which definitely qualifies for disability.
	Weird that Gerald would point that out, right?
	He's like looking at that dump truck every day.
	Hey, listen, Stephen's been doing lots of squats, and he's getting a little shapely.
	Big butt.
	You got the butt.
	Let me talk about that wagon.
	Let's talk about that dump truck.
	Well, yeah, and we're going to just lock it down.
	The fear.
	Surrounding a lot of this has been associated with Doge, and rightfully so.
	The Doge audit has revealed things that we expected, but quite a few things that we did not expect.
	This time it involves a $17 million puppet show, and the worst part is, this time it's not even Iraqi.
	So, Norm Eisen, he runs an NGO called State United Democracies Center.
	State United Democracy Center.
	Now, that NGO accepts $17 million in private donations.
	So I was researching.
	What did they do?
	Like, with $17 million, I started researching.
	But the only thing I could find, and I wasn't digging, but the only thing that I found...
	So they made a knockoff Muppet show.
	All those famous people at the NGO, and the only thing they did was $17 million was make a terrible Muppet show.
	So that clip requires a little bit of context.
	That's a News Nation interview with someone named Data Republican who has been shedding light on what they claim is.
	I heard that person's name actually on Reddit today.
	Oh, interesting.
	Widespread corruption and financial mismanagement within the US government.
	Okay.
	Recently, though, they were outed as Jessica Pounds, deaf software engineer from the state Sure, okay.
	Is that why they clip?
	Yeah, so in that News Nation, well, actually, yeah, this kind of explains a little bit of what was seen on screen.
	By the way, anyone else notice that her sign interpreter was quite cleavagey?
	I did not.
	No, I did not.
	Yes.
	You know, that's a good move if you want to distract people from your deafness.
	She had an interpreter who was participating in the interview and she was, I guess, busty in a way.
	Had a bit of a low cut.
	Is that right?
	What was her name?
	The interpreter?
	I don't think we need to name the interpreter.
	I think we can leave her out of this.
	Okay, that makes sense.
	One thing I'll say about the clip that stood out to me was she said...
	All that I could find as them spending that.
	It's a great thing to point out.
	Was it $17 million of private donations, I said?
	That is also an interesting point, yeah.
	Is that what you said?
	Their issues are that the donors are private to, I don't know what classification...
	Of a non-profit.
	Are they saying it's like dark money?
	They're implying that it's, you know, a way of laundering money or hiding assets.
	Okay, so kind of like if I was a company and I wanted to hide an asset of like, I was in a divorce or something.
	Sure.
	I could hide that asset.
	Is that kind of what they're concerned about?
	I guess.
	If, being honest, I didn't put a lot of work into understanding this because I... Listen, I'm not going to take the word.
	Doge supported Twitter username DataRepublican.
	You know it's not a biased thing.
	No, I don't think that this is worth even investigating or much...
	And $17 million doesn't seem like a lot.
	I understand that when we're talking about $500 billion in fraud.
	Hold on, hold on.
	I get it, but $17 million is a lot of dollars.
	But then you add up a few million here for, again, puppets in Iraq.
	You add up a few million here for LGBTQ education in Serbia.
	You add it up.
	And I don't care about the number.
	I really don't.
	We have to start with, is this an appropriate use of government power?
	Does a puppet show to a non-profit, does that fall under the legitimate purview of government?
	Yeah.
	Yes.
	Yes, it does.
	It might not seem like it's you, but it does, man.
	So he doesn't care about the number $17 million puppet show, right?
	Except it's in the title.
	Of both on Rumble and YouTube.
	And also stated 14 times in the course of this one hour program.
	He says $17 million puppet show.
	I don't care.
	I don't care.
	I'm going to talk about it a lot.
	I don't care.
	I don't care.
	Very strange.
	Yeah.
	Weird focus.
	Do you think he gets really upset when he sees, I'm just a bill?
	Yeah.
	He's like, this is fucking government waste!
	I feel like he would.
	He also liked to point out in this episode, I deleted the clip, but he's like, we do puppet stuff here.
	And, like, we don't need $17 million to do that.
	You don't, but I bet that you probably write it off so you agree that it's like a business expense.
	The strangest thing about all of this is he highlights it unintentionally.
	Yeah, you don't need $17 million to do a puppet show, but you do need $17 million to run your operation, which involves a...
	Puppet show bit that I don't think is funny.
	When they show the puppet show?
	They show Josh doing his puppet show where he's talking about the word of the day being trigger happy, I think?
	Trigger warning.
	They showed this months ago.
	We've seen this before.
	I think we even covered it.
	We did, yeah.
	This is not the first time it's been on the show.
	But they do something else with Josh on this one where they make him dress, I guess, like G.W. Bush.
	Also, but both times when they go to these things, I noticed it was like the audio gets so terrible in them where like they don't turn a fan off or like the AC is running in the background or something.
	It's probably airplanes because they're over by the airport.
	I actually just like...
	As soon as I was saying this, I was like, I have a fucking air filter running behind my voice this whole last episode, and I apologize.
	I was going to say, I feel like I hear it, but...
	It's alright, dude.
	It's there, and I just now noticed it as I was complaining about it.
	Oh no, now we're in trouble.
	Hot calling the kettle black, dude.
	Don't worry, we'll run it through Adobe Podcast, our new sponsor.
	Their thing is like a TV show, or like they're trying to fancy themselves to be a TV show, and it has this like...
	I don't know.
	I feel fucking stupid now.
	Let me turn this thing off.
	Okay.
	That's all right.
	You can admit that you were wrong, right, Jared?
	But I want to say...
	Yeah, I'm getting up.
	I'm walking away.
	So States United Democracy...
	States United...
	States...
	Oh, no.
	States United Democracy Center, they are a program that is mostly puppet shows and puppet-related stuff.
	Wait a second.
	Actually, their priorities listed here are connecting with state and local officials, public safety leaders, and pro-democracy partners across America with the tools and expertise they need to safeguard our democracy.
	It looks like they did do the puppet show, but also they provide resources.
	Cartoons?
	Comic books?
	No, not that.
	Extensive research projects surrounding democracy, election integrity, I think over 200 pieces on attitudes about elections involving different states.
	They clearly are doing work.
	But if it's goofy, is it working?
	What do you mean?
	If it's fun...
	Should we pay for it?
	Not everything is presented in Puppet.
	Are you sure?
	No, I'm not sure.
	Steven and everybody in this space, people on the left do it too, it's that you find something that sounds so ridiculous and then you tie the entire identity of that money, the entire identity of the organization.
	Exactly, you just tie it to that.
	And so that's what they're doing.
	They're just trying to demonize it by being like, aren't puppet shows ridiculous?
	Even though puppet shows and cartoons and comic books have a place in...
	Governmental spending.
	Do you remember Donald Trump was in Home Alone 2?
	Yes.
	We should only reference that, right?
	Donald Trump, the star of Home Alone 2. Home Alone 2, of course.
	Home Alone 2 is Donald Trump.
	This is just a small part of what...
	A tiny piece.
	And I don't know what all that money's going for.
	And I'm also not saying they're not wasting money.
	Yeah, they could be shelling and laundering.
	But using it to say that all federal money is bad, that's what they're doing, and it's a bad faith argument.
	Yeah.
	But was the comic, was the Muppet Show good?
	No, it only had about 120-some views.
	But was it good, though?
	I actually don't know.
	I'm afraid of puppets.
	Okay.
	I can't watch that stuff.
	There was a point where Stephen and the guys point out the website for States United Democracy Center, the YouTube page.
	Because this is the only metric that matters to them.
	It has 151 subscribers and 13 videos.
	And the work that they have done, I didn't mean to have led our listeners to believe that this wasn't multiple puppet videos because it's a series of videos.
	That makes more sense.
	They released specific videos titled how Michigan ensures accurate election results, how Arizona ensures accurate election results, how Wisconsin ensures accurate election results, Pennsylvania, Nevada.
	So that I can form all.
	And can we watch these?
	Can you guys share this to Zoom?
	Well, I guess I probably could.
	I could give you a little peek here.
	How does Michigan make sure elections are safe, secure, and accurate?
	Come on in.
	I'll show you.
	After all voter rolls are checked.
	Oh, that's Zingo Dwork.
	That's a cool name.
	12-15-1984.
	So this puppet...
	Millennial.
	This puppet looks kind of familiar.
	Wait, what?
	Zingo Dwork.
	Wait, you think he looks like Wildman or whatever?
	The drummer from the...
	Yeah, it's the...
	Listen, remember, I'm afraid of this junk.
	I actually hate it.
	These are, like, kind of low quality.
	I'm not gonna lie.
	Sure.
	17 million dollar puppet show.
	In Michigan, all ballots are cast on paper.
	Every cast ballot is secured, tracked, and...
	You got like an old lady voice actor, though.
	It's just kind of nice.
	A little charming.
	What?
	What the hell is this?
	It's bad.
	It doesn't matter.
	You guys see that key turn?
	Yeah, I see it.
	It's animated.
	I mean, they're also doing behind-the-scenes videos.
	I don't know.
	The content's...
	I'm not going to spend more time on this.
	We're already...
	First of all...
	This is going to radicalize Jared.
	A little behind the scenes.
	We're about halfway through, so we're cutting the entire Canada segment.
	There's absolutely no way I'm going to keep talking about that.
	I'm certainly not going to keep talking about puppets either, because it doesn't matter.
	This is a silly thing to focus on, and it's also irrelevant.
	They're focused on just because it's outlandish.
	It's a distraction.
	This NGO clearly does more than just make puppet videos.
	Allegedly.
	That's true.
	Maybe we should look into this.
	I think the only ones that we should be funding are...
	Sesame Street.
	That's it.
	I do like those guys.
	I think we should only fund the Claymation, Rudolph, and those other similar shows.
	All the Misfit Toys?
	Yeah, Burger Meister, Meister Burger.
	Gross.
	I can't handle that stuff.
	And give us a new Hershey's Chocolate Halloween special for crying out loud.
	Really quickly, I want to go back.
	You mentioned that this person was doxxed.
	Apparently, the New York Times felt that it was necessary to publish the names and faces of 45 of the Doge employees.
	It's necessary.
	It's something that the American people need to see.
	As much hatred and vitriol that's being pushed at these people who, by God, are just doing an audit and going in there and seeing where we are.
	Waste, fraud, abuse, and you not working when you're supposed to be working from home.
	They thought, well, yeah, the American people need to know the names and the faces of these individuals, and so we're the paper of record, I guess.
	Yeah, the left is evil.
	The left is evil.
	What a jump.
	What happened to transparency in government?
	The most transparent administration in history.
	If this was any other administration, they would be begging for those names.
	They would say that we shouldn't be paying people to do things unless they...
	Who are the mystery Biden tax cut people?
	It's late, so you're doing okay.
	But this is a silly thing to focus on.
	And also media outlets like the New York Times and the Washington Post don't post stories with anonymous names.
	That's why they were like this rogue Doge Twitter account.
	They can't just post a screen name without releasing information because that's journalism.
	Sure.
	And aren't these federal employees?
	Stephen gets that.
	Yeah, Stephen does.
	He will go to jail for you.
	No, that Republican is...
	I'm saying that these people who they're posting, the people who work within this government organization, right?
	Quote, unquote, doxed.
	But no, these people should have their job known.
	So who works here for this?
	Who's doing all these cuts?
	Secrets.
	Secret people.
	Yeah, secret people are doing it.
	Secret people are doing it.
	And I gotta say...
	New York Times, good work.
	Some of these, most of them make them look like ghouls, which is kind of fun.
	Some of them do, but some of them, Chris Young here looks like he's an NFL player.
	Thick neck on Chris Young.
	Yeah, good on that guy.
	What do you mean, get on him?
	Good on that guy.
	Oh, okay, good.
	Get on that guy.
	It's been a while since we've attacked, I guess, other Republicans.
	Not necessarily Big Con, but anyone who at this point is jumping on board the Trump train.
	Stephen's skeptical.
	You have a lot of Johnny-come-latelys who now...
	They try and get themselves into the fold with conservatives.
	Okay.
	You have to publicly apologize.
	Apologize.
	And you have to list the damage that you have done.
	Okay.
	There has to be some kind of restitution for it, and you have to tell us why you have changed.
	There needs to be no quarter for anyone who is engaged in the agreed upon lies that we have had to live through.
	I should write this all out.
	Forgive me for the harm I have caused this world.
	None may atone for my actions but me, and only in me shall their stain live on.
	I am thankful to have been caught, my fall cut short by those wizened hands.
	All I can be is sorry, and that is all I am.
	Well, not all, because you also have to provide some restitution.
	Oh, yeah, you're right.
	Shit, sorry.
	Yeah, yeah.
	Forgive me.
	I'm just kidding.
	That's from the TV show Severance.
	Oh, wow.
	Okay, see, yeah, that's a reference I'm unaware of.
	Very nice.
	Yeah, he's a psycho.
	It's insane.
	Yeah, yeah.
	Listen, if you really love Trump, if you really love him, tell him everyone else you fucked.
	Well, and also, we've got to discuss all these agreed-upon lies.
	Yeah, what?
	There's a big list of them.
	What are they?
	The agreed-upon lie that was COVID and that we had to lock down Cuomo and that we had to shut down businesses and the mRNA injection.
	The agreed-upon lie of the election.
	The agreed-upon lie that men and women aren't a thing anymore.
	The agreed-upon lie that government is out to serve you.
	The agreed-upon lie that you need to trust your institutions.
	The agreed-upon lie that any mistrust is actually a conspiracy theory.
	The agreed-upon lie that media is unbiased.
	Anyone who has taken part in these giant agreed-upon lies.
	It's not a conspiracy theory.
	It's not even a conspiracy.
	We have lived through agreed-upon lies.
	There needs to be no mercy, no quarter, and no forgetting.
	What they put you through.
	They're evil.
	That's my report, Captain.
	Stephen thought that was going to land.
	I mean, I bet it did with some folks, right?
	Like, anytime you list grievances surrounding COVID vaccines, elections, trans issues, the government's trust in conspiracy theories, you're going to nail, like, a lot of...
	Yep.
	Check boxes.
	You get one hook and then you listen to the rest.
	The agreed-upon lie that Reese's Pieces are as good as peanut butter M&M's.
	Reese's Pieces are better.
	Clearly bullshit, Dennis, and you're off the show now.
	Really?
	Yeah, obviously.
	There's a grit in the peanut butter of an M&M. They're different things, man.
	See, and that's a reasonable statement.
	This was agreed-upon.
	Stop it.
	It has been agreed-upon.
	I realized, though, why I had such strong negative feelings in a...
	Stephen is in the most gish gallopy mood I think I've ever seen him in.
	He's been frantic the last three or four episodes we've done, honestly.
	Something is going on, maybe not at home, and maybe in his nose, but I'm not really sure.
	I honestly had a moment where I was like, in the past it was mentioned, this is a show that's kind of about Vice a little bit.
	Is he fucking doing cocaine?
	Because this episode specifically, I was like, I've been around people on this substance before.
	I know how they talk.
	And it just has this scatterbrained, energy, jaw-clenched kind of thing that he's doing the whole time.
	And it's like...
	He feels like he...
	Or he's constipated.
	He hasn't taken his shit in like three weeks.
	Well, remember he was at some point allegedly scoring pain medicine from other employees.
	So that's what I'm saying.
	He hasn't been taking his shit probably.
	Yeah, exactly.
	That'll plug you right up.
	You know, when I had hernia surgery, that was the worst part of it.
	It's the constipation.
	A lot of pressure.
	Yeah.
	I mean, stack that with being the number one conservative podcast show in the world ever.
	And imagine getting passed over for Chaya Raeche.
	You don't get the FD pervert files?
	I mean, like, Steven is in the news sometimes.
	Sometimes, only when he causes big ruckus.
	Yeah, yeah.
	Which is fantastic.
	Or calls out Varma.
	A Varma.
	Big Varma.
	Yeah, that was a lot of fun.
	Yeah, I have no idea about...
	I've never seen cocaine or anyone on cocaine, I don't think.
	I just want to say, like, the amount of numbers that he's throwing out, the Doge, the Medicaid, the Medicare, and it's not terribly...
	What?
	Sorry.
	I just...
	I picture him doing that math thing where they count with their hands.
	They see numbers quickly and they count.
	You know what I mean?
	That's so funny.
	There's something behind it.
	And then when we move on to the segment, which is probably going to be available exclusively at Shrug.club because I did do some work to put together, so maybe we might as well record it at some point.
	He stayed up all night watching and breaking down that three and a half hour long debate for Prime Ministers of Canada.
	Really?
	But just the French stuff.
	He didn't do any of the English stuff.
	Oh man.
	He runs through a list of...
	Where did I... I jotted this all down here.
	Do you think when Josh and Gerald came in that it was like that picture of Charlie Day from Always Sunny when he has the board behind him and he's explaining it?
	I mean that's kind of like...
	He was breathlessly comparing troop numbers, nuke numbers, population density, troops...
	Per square mile compared to the United States?
	Running through allies and, I guess, number of all of those statistics versus the United States if Canada was to align with other NATO members to defend themselves against the United States?
	It was like this crazy, frantic gish gallop, and it kind of made me sick.
	There's something about it, and maybe I'm just actually generally ill.
	Maybe something could be going wrong with me, but it was a tough listen.
	It was really rough.
	And of course we're going to go through it.
	Let's go.
	But let's see if we can wrap this whole boring financial...
	Let's land this plane upside down, boys.
	Excuse me?
	All right.
	By the way, so we just launched the Trump Collection on CrowderShop.com.
	Go to CrowderShop.com right now.
	Order by March 7th and you'll get it before St. Patrick's Day.
	This is one of the coolest.
	I wore a version of this to the National Championship game.
	Don't say anything.
	And I got stopped like 10 times for people who didn't even know the show.
	They just thought it was a really cool shirt, so grab yourself one of these.
	It's the Fight Like Hell version that we just did.
	And you get $6 off any order with promo code IRISH. And you don't have to be a Notre Dame fan, but it helps.
	This is a Trump fan, and when you go get sauced on St. Patrick's Day, drink responsibly.
	Least effective fighting stance ever.
	Great.
	So maybe that's a good place to end this episode.
	Is this really what they're doing?
	They're selling parody merch now?
	Parody merch of Donald Trump doing a A fighting Irish stance.
	Yeah, they've also got Duncan, MAGA. MAGA. America runs on Trump.
	Clever.
	Yeah, not using AI for their designs at all, right?
	Can you go over to the categories?
	What freeze-dread candies do they have?
	Oh, they don't have any yet.
	Oh, shit.
	You miss their religious drop, too.
	I love it when people grift and make money on religion.
	How about mass deport illegals?
	That's a cool one.
	Cool.
	Deportation, the definition of deportation.
	How about I can't, but I know a guy with a cross?
	Oh, great.
	The action of deporting a foreigner from a country.
	That's the definition shirt.
	This merch is bad, man.
	Yeah, it's not good.
	Is this new style?
	Oh, they're dropping all kinds of cool stuff.
	I think...
	I think Bigly might not be doing very well because their strategies...
	I think they've given away too many trucks, if I'm being honest.
	Too many trucks are being given away.
	They're trying to get their creators to release more and more direct-to-garment options so they can just pump all this shit out and make some money here.
	But it's bad, and this episode was as well.
	And guys, I'm really sorry.
	I feel like I'm in a funk, and I don't need to apologize.
	You don't need to apologize, no.
	I mean, unless you're defrauding the government by using Medicaid.
	Maybe that's what's making me sick.
	That'll be it.
	The guilt.
	The guilt of knowing that I'm taking all this money from the U.S. government.
	No, it's just, you know, this is a tough week.
	And really, I don't think that Gerald or Stephen were terribly prepared to talk about anything on this episode because they were just standing by for the Epstein files.
	So this was more of like a throwaway episode for them.
	I'm glad you guys stuck with it and listened with me and the boys here.
	Appreciate it.
	I do too.
	Yeah, we always have fun.
	And you know who I really appreciate?
	One more shout out for Allison O. Allison!
	Piece of shit!
	And new buildings are a globalist conspiracy.
	It's a Fall Out Boy title.
	Yeah, could be.
	Thank you.
	What a piece of shit.
	Certainly aren't.
	Wait, I'm sorry.
	What is the name?
	New buildings are a globalist conspiracy.
	Wild parents.
	What happened?
	Globalist conspiracy is hyphenated.
	Oh, great.
	Shrug.club, if you want to be a piece of shit.
	Just like them.
	We'd appreciate it.
	I'd appreciate it, too.
	Here's a little tease for what we're going to be talking about on Shrug.club.
	So, and we've talked about this and we've joked about Canada, but seriously, Canada shouldn't exist.
	I mean that.
	Canada really shouldn't exist as a country.
	It's a disreputable place.
	It's a place right now that has become unworthy of respect.
	And I think that there needs to be some reform, namely a 51st state.
	It's the case for Canada not existing.
	So that's what we'll be doing.
	A lot of fun.
	That's all I can handle this week.
	I guess until you go to shrug.club where we can handle a little bit more.
	If you disagree with us, feel free to convince us otherwise.
	Feel free to rate and review us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
	That's a free thing you can do to help.
	I charged for it.
	What?
	I'll do a review for them if they pay me $10.
	Let's cut out the middle, man.
	Let's cut out the government bloat.
	Cut out the bloat.
	Cut out the bloat here.
	It really does help us out a lot.
	And you can find us on X and Blue Sky at Van Crowder, louderthancrowder.com, louderwithcrowder.net.
	That's the best one.
	You can also go to audiowool.com and you can pick up a Convince Me Otherwise hat when you click on the merch link there.
	Yeah, you can.
	Yeah.
	And until next time, I'm Byron.
	I'm Dennis.
	Let's slam that Shrug Club dump button.
	Oh, wait, excuse me?
	Shrug Club dump button.
	You've been listening to an AudioWall original produced by Byron McCoy.

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