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Patrick Bet-David Podcast Episode 99. Download the podcasts on all your favorite platforms https://bit.ly/3sFAW4N
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Patrick Bet-David is the founder and CEO of a financial services firm and the creator of Valuetainment, the #1 YouTube channel for entrepreneurship with more than 3 million subscribers. He is the author of the #1 Wall Street Journal bestseller Your Next Five Moves (Simon & Schuster) and a keynote speaker.
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Tom Zenner: https://bit.ly/3jJ93CN
Danielle DiMartino Booth: https://bit.ly/36nGzLn
Kai Lode: https://bit.ly/31LKsGB
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#PBDPodcast
00:00 - Start
00:36 - Adam's Cat Convention/$O$ Talks Cats
4:24 - Disney
17:42 - Bidenflation
24:34 - Elon Musk $10 Billion bill/World Hunger
39:10 - Mitt Romney on Billionaires
44:53 - S&P 50 reaches all time highs
53:52 - Joe Manchin
1:01:42 - DeSantis/Florida
1:10:13-DeBlasio Heroin Sites
1:18:42 - Supply chain
1:24:57 - Call w/Ramon
1:50:02 - Tom Brady Crypto
We have the great Danielle DeMartino booth in the house with Tom Zenner and Kai.
Adam is not here.
He was supposed to be here with Danielle.
The reason why he's not here, I think it's the biggest cat convention going on in Dallas right now.
And he's one of the keynotes.
Yeah, he's a sponsor too.
Sponsored too.
Sponsored, you know, Sauce Talks Cats in Dallas.
Catnip.
He's a big investor.
Massive.
Extremely supportive.
So Adam, enjoyed the cat convention in Dallas.
Catnip is very efficacious.
Save that cat litter.
So here's a guy who said he'd never return to Dallas.
We can't get him to stay here.
He's been back there more than you have.
He feels more connection with the health care workers of Dallas.
For sure.
For sure.
No, he only travels to Red States.
That's all he does.
That's classic.
Classic.
Anyways, Danielle, we miss you.
How you doing?
I'm great.
How are you?
But I'm thinking to myself, what if he meets the right woman and she's like based in LA?
What's going to happen?
That would be like existential.
Would he move to LA to get married and settle down?
I don't know if he would.
Would he be too cheap to fly out there all the time?
When you have to meet her in the middle of the game.
It'd be a Zoom relationship.
It'd be a Zoom relationship is what it would be.
Yeah, he would definitely be.
Virtual reality would probably play a role too.
But you know, the one thing I honestly have a hard time understanding is when you're only doing Lyft and Uber, how do you go on dates?
I don't understand that part.
Like, what do you tell her?
I'll pick you up in an Uber.
And this is a good-looking guy that doesn't struggle with women, so how do you do it?
At a stop, sure.
Is that what it is?
And you got to schedule a data.
Do you actually know or no?
Do you have friends that go date on?
I'm the queen of the city.
No, but you could do that.
Once you get in, you could have them go anywhere you want.
You just alter the route.
So you tell the girl, hey, Mary, I'm going to pick you up in my Lyft.
I'm probably going to get an X. I'll pick you up at such and such stop, and then we'll go to dinner.
Is that how it works?
I'm sure you can, yeah.
If he's showing up in a Hyundai, it's just not starting to.
Well, here's another problem.
He would probably show up in a Hyundai.
Or you just order an Uber for her, right?
And it shows up, and then you meet at the restaurant.
So he'll order a Lyft for himself and an Uber for her.
Meet you there.
And then he'll make sure that they coordinate and get to the place.
Well, listen, Hertz, the 100,000 Ubers, 100,000 Teslas that they ordered, they're going to team up 50,000 of them with Uber.
Did you see that yesterday?
I saw that.
Maybe that's like going to be Adam's play.
I'm going to pick you up in a Tesla.
So it's like a high-end Uber or Lyft.
It kind of goes with his Metro image.
I see it.
Plus, he can always say, my driver will be there at 11.30.
20 years ago, that was a big line.
Couldn't tell you what his name is.
That was a big line.
Yeah.
20 years ago is a big line.
Today's not a big line.
Anyways, okay.
So we got a lot of crazy stories that we got to go through.
Obviously, Danielle, you're going to give us an update on what's going on with Powell.
It looks like he may get fired by February, but we want to get an update from you.
Mansion is doing again the same thing.
Grid lock-in saying, I'm not going to do this.
Wealth tax, we'll cover that as well.
Biden inflation, Thanksgiving meal said to be the most expensive meal on record.
We'll talk about some of those numbers.
Disney's lost its mind, folks.
Disney has completely lost its mind.
You're going to find out what a Disneyland ticket that cost in 2000 costs today.
You will be blown away.
Matter of fact, I want you to guess it without Googling it.
We're going to get to that story.
It was $41 in 2000.
What do you think it is going to go to in 2021, today?
What the price is going to go to?
Don't Google it.
Just actually play this game and put the ticket, one ticket to Disneyland, where they're taking it to.
The port issue is massive.
We'll cover that Los Angeles and Long Beach.
What they're getting ready to do with the fines on the $100, we'll cover that.
Elon Musk, the taxes they talked about.
Romney said something very interesting about what would happen if the taxes went higher.
And then Florida leading the nation in economic recovery as well as COVID today.
They're the lowest in COVID, which all this criticism that they were getting, it's maybe the strategy DeSantis had was working.
I say we start off with the Disney story.
I think that's the story I want to start off with.
Okay.
Did we get any comments?
I see a lot of people actually getting it pretty right.
Some people are saying some ludicrous numbers.
Anyways, let's have fun with this.
Let's have fun with this.
By the way, when's the last time you went to Disneyland?
Probably three, four years ago.
Okay, when's the last time you went to Disneyland?
2016 for senior year.
Easter.
Easter?
Really?
Okay, so Easter.
Last time we went to Disneyland, I want to say three years ago we went to Disneyland with the kids.
Two years ago, something like that, three years ago into Disneyland.
It was a shocking experience.
Good or bad?
Bad.
Really?
In what way?
Well, they don't have fast passes anymore, or they didn't have fast passes during the COVID protocol.
They had limited capacity, which was BS, because the place was full.
But you sit in lines.
So you went there post-COVID?
During COVID.
Oh, Easter.
Oh, okay.
The land or world?
Here.
Okay, we're talking about Disneyland, though, right?
Disneyland.
Yeah.
Got it.
But the fact that you don't have a speed pass, that's a very different experience.
I'm just kidding.
When you're used to it at every amusement park you go to.
Dude, it's not a good experience without a speed pass.
They're not paying me to say it, but Universal Studios, the whole experience was better just because you could get the speed pass.
Universal is amazing.
Let me put it to you this way.
10 out of 10, I prefer Universal Studios over Disney.
It's not even close, by the way, for me.
I even have a good time as a parent going there over Disneyland.
It's fun.
The one in LA is great too because films have been filmed there.
Sean and I, we had a, here's how we did Disney.
With kids, you got to have a strategy, right?
So we would roll into downtown Disney, right?
Because then you could valet park because I hate the shuttle there.
So you valet park.
Slick.
You go into the first bar slash restaurant you see, you have a couple shots.
All right?
That's what we did.
Then you can get your parking valid.
Dash has a shot.
By the way, it's 10 a.m. in downtown Disneyland.
So you go down there.
No, no, you're your kids.
They're 11.
Not the adults, right?
I've got to say, man, don't say that on national YouTube.
I can see Dash being like, that, let's get this, right?
I can see him saying, yo, yo, pops, I'm buying today.
No, I got you.
He's got the money, by the way.
No kidding.
I'll be over with Snow White later, but let me hook you up with a little shot right now.
So then we do the Disneyland thing.
And our reaction after a day at Disney is always this.
Loading the stroller back into the car, you know, just dealing with it.
You just look at each other and you go, was that fun?
I mean, you have to go.
Did we even enjoy ourselves?
Disney's a challenge, man.
It's rough.
No, it's that.
Remember that show, Survivor?
That's like what it is.
When you get to the other end, you're like, okay, we made it through the whole day of combat alive.
I have to tell you, though, for me, 10 hours goes in five minutes when I'm at Universal Studios.
So weird.
10 hours goes in five minutes.
Like this, you're like, oh my gosh, it's over.
We're going home.
You almost want a little bit more of it because it's very different.
Anyways, let's – And there's a new roller coaster.
In Universal Studios?
How's the one in Florida, by the way?
I haven't been to the one in Florida.
That's where the new roller coasters open.
Have you been to the one in Florida?
I've never been in Disneyland.
Anybody here been to the one in Florida or no?
Oh, it's insane.
I wrote every roller.
It's good.
It's amazing.
Really?
Universal here in Florida.
Amazing.
I wonder how much, how different it is than the one in California.
I got to go check it out and see.
It's faster.
You've got more interesting rides.
Here.
Okay, cool.
All right.
So let's get right into it.
So Disney, in 2000, a Disneyland ticket cost $41.
A price hike just increased it.
Ready?
$264.
Okay, that's a 4X increase is what we're talking about.
Okay.
Disney announced Monday that it's adding a six level to its tiered ticket price system, a level that becomes available when there's a high demand at parks.
The six tier will set you back $164 for a single day single park ticket.
If you want the ability to visit both parks in a single day, you'll need to pay $224.
A tier six is set to go into effect in March of 2022.
In 2000, a single ticket to Disneyland costs $41.
Adjust it to inflation.
Ready, folks?
That ticket would only be $62 today.
So Disney, the inflation they're living by is a completely different.
They're living by Venezuela type of inflation is what they're doing.
Tiers two through five are also going up.
Tier two, previously $114 are going $119.
Tier three from 124 to 134.
Tier 4 from 139 to 149.
Tier 5 from 154 to 159.
The first tier will remain at 109, but only applies to lowest demand days, generally weekdays in slower months like February.
Parking has also increased effectively immediately.
Used to cost $25 a day to park in the main lots.
Now it's $30.
Tom, I'm going to go to your okay.
So I think it's interesting.
You got to look at what type of revenue does Disney draw from the theme parks for the whole company.
It's almost 40%.
And you know that that thing 40%.
It's 37 or 38, almost 40%.
So you know that tanked during COVID, right?
So they have to get that back.
Here's another interesting fact.
The guy who replaced Bob Iger was the president of the theme parks.
So there's going to be a priority.
That's where his focus is.
Yeah, for sure, without a doubt.
Now, here's the problem.
Disney has become so woke, right?
And their characters have changed.
And I think if you're not looking for that type of environment, if you want to go to Disneyland just to get away, to have that magical California experience that it was known for since Walt Disney opened up those gates how many years ago?
That was part of the magic and the charm of California.
You go there, everybody remembers their first time to Disneyland.
It's a slice of Americana.
It's as good as America gets.
You have nothing to worry about in there.
You forget about everything and then you leave and resume your life.
So when Newsom shut down the economy, that hammered all those other small businesses in Anaheim around Disneyland.
So it's a compound thing.
78,000 jobs lost, by the way.
It's so sad.
It's so tragic.
I mean, these people that their whole livelihood depended on Disney.
And for years, they could count on it, and then they couldn't.
So you've got them trying to make up for lost time for not having – and Disney was shut down for a year.
Disney World was open probably eight months before Disney landed.
So it's a huge difference.
It's sad.
I'm glad my kids are old enough where they don't want to go anymore.
They would much rather go to Universal.
Dash went to Six Flags last week for the big Halloween fun thing.
So Disney's kind of out of it for me.
And it's really, I feel like it's another thing that we've lost in this whole transformation that we've gone through as a country in the last year or two.
Well, think about a whole generation of grandparents that aren't going to go with their grandkids who went with their kids because of the wokeness.
I mean, I'm sorry, but you grew up with fairy tales.
You don't change a fairy tale.
A fairy tale is a fairy tale.
You don't alter the characters.
You don't say, you can't kiss Sleeping Beauty.
No.
Uh-uh.
Because there wasn't consent.
Are you kidding me?
It's Sleeping Beauty.
You cannot alter a fairy tale.
You can't kiss Sleeping Beauty.
No, no, no, because it's not consensual.
I don't remember that story.
That's just Kai.
Since you are the closest to understanding the ideas of Disney.
You're on both sides.
Tell us.
Kai had mouse ears on three years ago.
Matter of fact, in his job interview, he had a Mickey Mouse shirt on.
But tell us.
Tell us about this Disney story.
I thought that was going to be between you and I.
Yeah.
No, I think this is crazy.
And he brings up a good point with COVID and that it's been closed and stuff like that.
But in the grand scheme of things, I don't think that changes things all too much because in that case, they wouldn't have still raised the prices by $100 from 2000.
So in those 20 years, nothing major like COVID happened during that time.
So you can't really just blame it on COVID being it.
I think it's just more that they're continuously hiking up the prices because they can.
They know that people will come.
And I'm sure they've done the cost-benefit analysis of seeing how much will we lose if we do this versus how much will we make extra.
But I think the biggest thing for me as well is just the plus, I know when we'd go there, we'd be there all day.
We'd come in the morning and we'd leave after the fireworks at midnight.
Yep.
And obviously at that point, you need like two meals.
Now parking went up and there's the snacks and there's all the other stuff.
$16 chicken nuggets.
Yeah.
So that to me blows my mind even more of just there's so much more that's just plus $1,000 for sure.
Is that a fair number to put easily?
Because then they put the Disney store right.
You have to walk by it.
$1,500 for four.
You're right.
$1,500 for $4.
Yeah, it's all a profit machine in a sense.
Like at that point, it's one of those, if you walk in and everything's an upsell, then why are you also being charged that much initially?
But I'll go a different angle as well.
So here's the other angle I go.
When Jack Dorsey tweets out hyperinflation is coming to the States and the world and people lose their minds, what are you talking about?
This is hyperinflation.
So whatever you want to tell, this is a sign of when people say, no, it's not coming.
This is hyperinflation.
And this leads to the story with Thanksgiving, right?
When you're talking about Biden inflation with Thanksgiving.
But let's stay on Disney for two more seconds because I want to put my want cat on for two seconds and be dorky and be geeky.
This decision was made in the shadow of the third stimulus check being sent out to Americans when they felt like they had all this extra cash that they were flushed with that they could run out and take this big vacation.
So that's what management based this decision on.
There's no more stimulus checks coming.
I'm just saying they might not have the audience that they think they have.
You think so?
They might not, I mean, how many American families can afford what you just said?
$1,500 for a minimum for a Disney.
This also doesn't include if it's somebody like us that would have to travel there.
This is assuming you're just driving up and you're parking there.
Part of me loves this.
Let me explain to you why I love this.
I'm going to tell you why I love this.
Majority of people that go to Disneyland, what wealth bracket are they on?
Is it low-income, middle-income, upper wealth?
I say middle.
I agree.
Okay, perfect.
Guess who has the biggest voting power in America?
The silent majority in the American.
Okay, and the middle, right?
So the middle is going to go and they're going to say, what the hell is going on?
Then they're going to say, maybe this inflation conversation isn't bullshit.
Maybe this concept of constantly printing money and sending money to people, maybe it doesn't work and now we're feeling it.
So there's a part of me likes the fact that this Disney thing can become a social experiment for families to say, pump the brakes.
We ain't going to Disneyland.
How much are the tickets?
Are you out of your mind?
There's no way in the world.
And then they're going to say, you know what?
I think we need to stop kind of this printing money type of situation.
And the other thing, too, is if they're going to jack the prices up to this level, you know, if you have a couple kids, Disneyland, if you live in Southern California, is a must thing that you have to go X amount of times.
I wouldn't have a problem at $1,500 if it was a great day.
But if you end up spending this kind of money and it's not the same and you're a little offended and then it's too politically correct and you're annoyed over here, then you're thinking, what the hell?
I'll never come back here again.
What a waste of your time and money.
Because I think with that as well, people are willing to pay a higher price if you're getting a better experience for it.
But if you're paying just to pay and you can't have fast passes and you're standing in line all the time and all this other stuff, anyways, then that's more where I see the discrepancy of paying way more than it's worth.
Here's the other part.
When you're doing a business, like let's just say they had two major new shows or new thing that they built or a new experience and then you announce this.
Guess what I'm going to say?
Okay, cool.
Fair enough.
I'll come because I'm going to test out the new Viper, the new Superman, the new whatever thing, right?
It's like a new Star Wars thing here in Orlando.
And at Disneyland.
It was the Star Wars thing.
Yeah, it's basically a couple years ago.
Yeah, but what I'm saying is today, like if you're doing something today to increase it like this, you got to kind of give the audience.
You're making it better.
Here's why you want to come because we just announced an adults, da-da-da-da-da, and the kids, this, and this, then maybe, but just you just do it like, hey, guys, we're raising the prices.
Yeah.
Yeah, okay.
That's not how this works.
But it works because so many things are tied to each other.
And the American people today have to sit there and say, listen, let's reconsider how we vote.
We have to pay.
A guy yesterday, yesterday, Bernie Sanders tweeted something.
He says, three words, tax the wealthy.
I retweeted at him and I said three words.
You are wealthy.
Look in the mirror.
Then a guy says, but you don't understand.
Bernie never said he has a problem not paying the taxes, you know, even if he increases it.
He doesn't mind paying those taxes.
I said, Oh, really?
Is that why when he was going on his campaign trail, he was not paying his employees the $15 minimum?
He was paying them less than $15 minimum, but he was telling everybody else to pay $15 minimum.
So the hypocrisy eventually shows up in your finances and how you spend your money.
So, yes, I mean, these ideas of people just imposing the pain on others, eventually you're going to feel it yourself as well.
You know, I will just say this about Disneyland.
One of the best things about it for me was I hate roller coasters.
I could go on It's a Small World and kill a good 45 minutes to an hour where I wouldn't have to be brought onto a stupid roller coaster.
I hate them.
So, stupid.
I'm probably the only person that likes It's a Small World.
You know, you hear that song the whole time.
Yeah, I know.
You know what there's been a year?
And it stays in your brain the whole day.
You really look like you're struggling with the there's an emotional challenge going with you in Disney and some roller coasters.
What did you experience on a roller coaster?
You had a bad experience.
Can't you be afraid of heights?
I am afraid of heights.
Are you really?
Oh my God.
You get me on a ski lift.
I almost freak out.
I am 100% serious.
I cannot deal with it.
Well, listen, we were just going to say we were inviting you and Shonda to Aspen to go skiing together, and maybe this just got canceled.
I'll be the guy in the lodge all day.
He'll be in the lodge in the hot tub.
Having his shots for lessons.
Shonda, you gotta work on Taco.
Shonda, what do you do?
Oh, he's so interesting.
Listen, folks, if you're looking forward to Thanksgiving, you may want to start shopping early and maybe even have a couple turkeys in the back now to be ready for it because things are going up here price-wise.
Okay, Biden inflation.
Thanksgiving meal said to be the most expensive on record, the post-millennial story.
After supply chain crunches and an undeniable increased food cost, Americans are facing a huge increase in costs for their traditional Thanksgiving meal.
The New York Times reported that Thanksgiving 2021 could be the most expensive meal in the history of holidays.
The Biden administration made an enormous deal about how Americans' 4th of July barbecues were 16 cents less than they were in 2021.
The administration was widely mocked for their tweet, touting this less than impressive decline in food costs.
The Biden administration was so pleased with itself that they actually posted about how great it was that Americans would save 16 cents on their meals.
Well, that's not going to be happening at that Thanksgiving.
So what do you have to say about this, Danielle?
God, this is.
Look, I've got four kids, and I know what groceries cost.
And I can tell you they cost more and more and more every time I'm at the store.
And then the packages are getting smaller, which really pisses you off.
You know what the box of cereal size is supposed to be when you buy as many boxes of cereals as I do.
So it is, it's the most grating thing.
And then, God forbid, the gas tank's on empty.
And then you got to go fill up.
And you're like, okay, what's up with this price per gallon?
Seriously.
So I just came back from Europe.
I was over there.
And I mean, they're paying like seven bucks a gallon for what?
Gas.
Seven bucks a gallon for gas in Europe.
Yeah.
It's going to come $10 coming here soon, by the way.
But I mean, but the whole idea, and you know, and so I was in a socialist country.
Italy is a socialist country.
Extremely.
And there is so much resentment.
Right now they're rolling out a tax for the wintertime to have the people of means pay for the higher electricity prices for the people of lower means.
So they just tax the hell out of you left, right, and in between.
But no, look, I'm a working mom, but the grocery store has gotten to be too expensive.
So you guys have to stop eating.
We're having chicken.
You got to do what you got to do.
We're having chicken nuggets for you.
A lot of ramen for Thanksgiving.
You know what is crazy, though?
Everybody at this table, you're not struggling financially.
I remember when we did as a family and we were a welfare family and nobody was working.
My dad worked at a 99 cent store.
There was nothing going on.
You felt a slight price increase because you would hear it from your mom when she said, we can't afford that right now.
What are you talking about?
Can't afford it right now.
There's going to be millions of families that are going to feel it directly, not only Thanksgiving, they're going to feel it Christmas.
These are two back-to-back.
That's going to be felt and it's emotional and it's painful and it sticks.
As a kid, you remember 30 years later what it was like at a Christmas or Thanksgiving when you were broke.
Millions are going to feel that this is Thanksgiving.
You feel it in every direction, too, because it's not just that Thanksgiving dinner.
Then it's you can't afford to go to the movies.
And then the gas is more expensive.
Then you might not be able to afford that cell phone plan.
And then you can't get school shopping done or the thing.
So it's everywhere.
And that's what inflation is.
And that's what we're all going to experience pretty soon.
When I heard this story, the first thing that came to my mind with Bidenflation is Hunter Biden.
He's going to do an NFT, you know, of the phrase.
And he's going to get a Ukrainian businessman to open up a boutique.
And then he's going to sell them all.
He's going to market that and capitalize on Bidenflation, the name.
You know that they're proud of that, right?
You know, he sold a bunch of pieces of art last week at like $75,000.
And one of the ladies who was there, she says, I went there, they wouldn't even let me in because she's a critic of art.
And they said, you can't come in here.
She said, I went across the street and they were selling a Picasso painting original sign for $400,000.
So would you rather spend $400,000 for original Picasso painting or a Hunter Biden race for $75,000?
What kind of political influence is that?
Back to your lower-income families and Christmas and the holiday season.
Deloitte published a survey last week.
The average American family that's lower income is spending 22% less on Christmas this year.
The average wealthy American family is spending 15% more.
So when you print money and it all floats up to the top, and then inflation hurts everybody at the bottom, I mean, this is a train wreck.
But that's the biggest thing where it's like the people that are voting to send more free money are the ones that end up paying the biggest price.
I know what it is so freaking weird.
The basics of math, like this thing doesn't favor you.
The more money they print, every time Danielle, they printed more money, I made so much money.
I can't even tell you how much money I made every time they printed money.
That's where it flows.
It flows up.
Because they don't know how.
So anyway, so that concept, basic concept.
So let me say that number one more time.
So the low-income family is going to spend 22% less during Christmas.
Holiday season than last year.
Holiday season.
The wealthy is going to spend 15% more.
And that's if they could get the stuff they want to buy.
Right?
Just think if you try to go shopping early.
You know, this is private jets.
This is flying off.
No, I'm talking about renting nice houses.
I'm talking about the lower income people that they even want to buy the Christmas gifts.
They might not be available.
The toys aren't even out there.
Well, no, and you had, was it Hasbro?
There was some major toy company that came out a few days ago that basically said, you know, like we're down like a third in terms of the inventory that we need.
Well, I mean, the containers are sitting out there in the water.
That's great.
Baby, if you're listening, buy the gifts now, baby.
Dylan's going to be complaining.
Pre-planning, pre-planning.
I think the biggest thing that frustrates me with reading something like this is just seeing the hypocrisy in terms of how they're parading 16 cents in July.
And then now it's backfiring of like how they're trying to push that up.
One thing if they were like, you know what, inflation is happening.
We're working on it.
We're trying to figure it out.
It's going to get bad before it gets better, right?
It's going to get worse before it gets better.
But instead of them trying to parade with, hey, we saved you 16 cents over a full 4th of July barbecue to now coming back.
I think that's more where it upsets me in terms of them trying to parade something very small, make it look like a big win, not realizing that a bigger loss is going to come down the pipeline.
And that's just going to be more upsetting on that.
That's a really good point because it just shows how stupid they think we are.
Like we're going to get excited about saving 16 cents on the 4th of July.
How do you even compute that?
You can't.
It makes no sense.
It's not even around here.
You're not going to statement you ever want to hear.
Who's the marketer?
First of all, you never say 16 cents.
You say Americans are going to save $9.3 billion.
Yeah, completely.
Even the basics, multiply it times 335 million people.
Just give a number to it rather than 16 cents.
A mouse looking at us saying, what the hell is 16 cents, right?
When's the last of them even kept change?
Anyways, okay, let's talk about Elon Musk and what he said about the tax bill that's coming up that they're pushing.
So Elon Musk rips Democrats' billionaire tax plan that could slap him with a $10 billion annual bill.
This is an insider story.
On Monday, he criticized the Democratic tax proposal that would target American billionaires to fund a safety net expansion, saying it represented the start of a new campaign from Democrats to redistribute wealth from the richest Americans.
Eventually, they run out of other people's money and then they come for you.
He wrote on Twitter.
In a separate tweet, Musk said any government-induced reallocation of wealth would be better managed by the private sector.
Who is best at capital allocation, government or entrepreneurs, is indeed what it comes down to.
Musk could face up to $50 billion in taxes for the first five years under the plan if implemented.
And I'll continue for the next story as well, and then we'll talk about it.
CNN, this is another story.
2% of Elon Musk's wealth would save world hunger, says the director of UN Food Scarcity Organization.
Billionaires need to step up now on a one-time basis, said the director of the United Nations World Food Program, citing specifically the world's two richest men, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, $6 billion to help 42 million people that are literally going to die if we don't reach them.
It's not complicated.
Musk has a net worth of 289, meaning that Beasley is asking for a donation of just 2% of his fortune.
The net worth of U.S. billionaires has almost doubled since the pandemic began, standing at $5 trillion in October.
So, thoughts?
Daniel, I'm going to go to you first.
With what Elon said about the $10 billion tax bill per year and redistributing the wealth.
So, I mean, you know, there are two sides to this story, right?
And part of it has to do with the fact that as a country, we haven't really paid attention to the disparity for way too long between CEO pay and worker pay.
So there's something to be said for if you've got a great employee, pay the great employee what they're worth.
And that hasn't happened for a long time.
And the way that shareholder value is formed, the way that CEOs get compensated, you know, the value of their stockholdings, you know, it does look like everything is going into more and more, fewer and fewer hands.
But to say that somebody who's created all of these jobs needs to be tax to kingdom come instead of let charity be charitable.
Look at what some of these foundations have done around the world in terms of medicine, health care.
A lot of these people are very charitable.
If they're not, fine.
But trying to go after just a few individuals is kind of short-sighted in my view because a lot of these people are heroes to young American kids and they aspire to grow and be entrepreneurs like them.
Are they though?
Because, you know, each generation to me, whoever's in power in politics can redictate what a hero looks like.
And it confuses the hell out of kids.
So if you're Xi Jinping and you're Jack Ma, but we're not that kind of a person.
But wait a minute.
But wait a minute.
Go to Berkeley.
Go to a Columbia university.
Go to, I'm a 19-year-old kid going to school.
Do you really think 80% of the professors are selling Elon Musk as a hero?
Do you think professors at these universities are saying, you ought to grow up and be like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos?
Or do you think they're saying you ought to grow up and be like AOC?
And you ought to grow up and be somebody that's given back.
You ought to grow up.
What do you think they're selling as a hero?
So the kid, if you ever watch the parents who raise kids who win, if you're around the parents long enough, obviously some of the credit goes to the kids, which is half the credit is kids because the kids are the ones that have got to go to work.
But the other half is, what is the mom and dad selling gas success?
Is it money?
Is it who you are as a leader?
Is it giving back?
Is it making the world a better place?
Is it creating jobs?
Is it creating economy?
Is it finding your passion?
It's independent.
Independence.
Okay, perfect.
So that's, do you really think that's what's being sold as heroes?
Hell no.
Well, then that's the problem.
So Elon Musk today is not a hero to 90% of academia.
Danielle.
90% of academia, but you have to know that it's like, you know, you know a funnel, right?
You know a funnel.
Like what does a funnel look like?
It looks like something like this, okay?
All right, so we're going through what?
You know, K through 12, you know, whatever you want to put it, K through six, and then you got middle, and then you got junior high, and then you got high school, and then you got college, and then you got career, right?
I'm going through this funnel.
Well, at this funnel here, when I get to the college side, 90% of them are going to demonize Elon Musk.
So the kid is going to say, screw this Elon Musk guy.
Why should he be so rich?
The hell with Jeff Bezos, the hell with Buffett, to hell with Bill Gates.
These guys are a bunch of schmucks and greedy people.
Okay, so I've got, my oldest is applying to college right now.
Berkeley?
Hell no.
UCLA.
Good schools, by the way.
Yeah.
But I will tell you that his generation is very aware of wokeness, and they want to be able to maintain their conservative values in college.
And they push back against a lot of the teachers that they've had in high school.
And they come and they talk to their parents and they say, I'm not going to be indoctrinated.
So I think because of social media, because this is a generation that's grown up with social media, we didn't.
Because there's so much more out there that kids can read on their own.
Again, I go back to the word independent.
As long as you tell your children, just because somebody says something to you and they appear to be in a position of authority, that doesn't make it true.
You have to go back and check for yourself.
But I will say that I am pleasantly surprised with this generation of 17, 18, 19-year-olds who are aware that they're trying to be manipulated mentally.
Yeah, but you said something very powerful right now, Danielle.
So what percentage of parents do you think tell their kids, listen to your teachers?
Listen to what your teacher has to say.
Question.
Listen to your teachers.
Okay, you know what?
I'm going to answer your question.
I'm gonna answer your question because Texas is not you I said majority.
I understand.
I understand.
Texas has been on the receiving end.
So has Florida.
Okay.
Of people escaping high state income taxes.
But what we're starting to hear in Texas also from Californians who are coming in is I don't even want to flirt with critical race theory coming into my schools.
I'm moving to get away from this education system, period, and I want to raise my family in an area where they can think independently.
You know what that says, though?
It's not just an economic decision to leave California is what I'm saying.
No, no, but that's two things.
So the question wasn't answered, but I'm going to come back to the question.
But here's what I just got from what you just said.
What you just said is the final one.
Think about the people in New York, Jersey, Illinois, California that don't want to leave, that they're hopeful that it's going to change.
The people they need to stay are leaving.
Let me say this one more time.
Like, you know what I'm saying?
Like, imagine you're living in California.
You're like, dude, I can't leave.
My family's here.
My aunt's here.
My mom's here.
My grandma's here.
I can't leave this place.
Well, guess what?
This ain't flipping because those people are leaving to states like Texas and Florida.
Yeah, and it's killing their tax basis.
Of course it is.
But the question I'm asking is the final one.
What percentage of parents tell their kids, listen to your teachers?
I don't know.
I think it's a lot lower percentage than it was.
I agree.
I agree with that, but it's still a high number.
It is.
But you know what?
Because you have a different view of public school teachers' unions over the last year and a half.
No, they have done this to themselves.
Yes.
So I think that number is going down very, very quickly.
I mean, when you have Andrew Yang come out and say, enough with the New York public.
Enough with the New York teachers' unions.
Let the parents go back to work.
Let the kids go back to school.
You're taking a whole year of these kids' education in very formative years.
When somebody like Andrew Yang is saying, enough with the unions, I mean, that's powerful because people like that have a voice that speaks not just to conservatives, but to a lot of Americans.
So again, I think the unions have done Americans in general, parents in general, a great favor over the last two years because now we know that they're not advocates for our kids at all.
They're advocates for themselves.
What they call parents this week.
You saw the big controversy going back and forth.
Did you see that?
No, no, no.
But I can only imagine.
Yeah, it was where they're trying to control, teach critical race theory.
Parents are coming out saying, you ain't bringing CRT to my school.
Listen, just because I don't support CRT doesn't mean I'm racist.
I don't want to talk about this.
And they say, well, the parents are the real threat and we have to get involved and do this.
And no, no, we are not the threat.
Then they apologize because of what they wrote.
Then another position.
Anyways, it's a mess right now because school boards, think about the school boards across the country.
Are they ran by people on the left or the right?
Left.
Well, left, 100%.
majority so you know you know what i mean i i live in the wrong school They're borderline militant.
But you know what I will say to you?
You know what I will say to you?
And can we send our kids to military schools?
So the opposite end of the spectrum.
I was thinking about this this morning when I'm driving down here when you know when people make the argument, they say, you should have half your board should be women and men.
You should.
The board should be, your administration, it should be men, women, and gay community, representation for every community.
You know what I say to that?
I said, no problem.
You know what that should happen?
Let's apply it everywhere.
50% of professors should be conservative.
No, Not now.
No, no, we should do that.
I think you're right.
Let's do that.
50% of the board of all the school boards in America should be around myself.
That's a great line to have.
Why don't we do that?
Let's do that.
Let's create a hashtag, okay?
Okay.
Ideologically inclusive.
Shall we?
Go for it.
They wouldn't create a hashtag.
They would never support that.
Are you kidding me?
They would never support that.
I mean, that's what's wrong with so many of the, not just educational institutions.
Never support that.
That's what's wrong with places like the Federal Reserve.
You put 786 PhDs in economics in one organization.
You know what you're going to get?
The same friggin' thought.
You know, I'll tell you, one of the best moments for me in this past year is my older daughter is a teacher.
She graduated from Pepperdine and she's a great, great teacher.
And she got a job in a private school.
And I'm so relieved that she doesn't have to be in the LA Unified Teachers Union.
I'm so grateful.
And it's such a different world, such a different experience when you're in a private school environment.
You're so lucky.
I was in Santa Monica a few weeks ago filming with the great Jeffrey Gunlack.
Thank you very much.
If you didn't watch that episode, please do.
Go check it out.
But I was having a conversation with a parent of kids in private school.
Do you know?
You know, you probably know that they didn't let the private schools open.
The LA Teachers Union wouldn't let private schools that want it to open with safety protocols open.
They said, if we have to be closed, the public school system has to be closed down, so does the private school system.
I'm like, that can't be legal.
That just can't be legal.
I mean, when you hear these things that are coming out of California, it's the madness.
And the parents are still paying these enormous tuitions, and their kids can't even be in the classroom.
You know, can I make a point on this Musk situation here?
You know, the thing that really gets me, and I know a lot of other people, is it's just a plan like this is just so insulting.
And it's so unimaginative if you think about it, because they're asking us to believe that if you did receive $50 billion from Elon Musk, you would know what to do with it.
You could solve hunger.
What does that mean?
That they would get one meal a day, every single hungry person, and the rest would be red tape or whatever.
We don't, no one trusts them that they would know what to do with this money.
The other thing, too, is obscene wealth or the mega wealthy has almost become a new sport in this country.
Like people go to Forbes like they used to go to box scores in the sporting videos.
You know, who's gone up?
Elon Musk went up 36 billion on Monday because of the Hertz deal, right?
So it's unbelievable.
So if I was an Uber wealthy person, I think they'd be a little hesitant about this being out there so much because, hell, at VT Post, we could do a story on it every single day.
There's something new in that world of the mega wealthy.
And it's interesting.
It's fun.
It's fun stories to do.
And here's the other thing: a guy like Elon Musk, for instance, how liquid is he?
Like, if you try to give him a $50 billion tax bill, it's not like he can pay that.
I mean, it's not like he has that lying around.
And the final thing is: could you imagine if they forced Elon Musk to pay $50 billion or a Zuckerberg or some of these guys?
What would that do to the stock price?
It would kill everybody that's an investor in Tesla.
So it's just so unimaginative and so insulting when they come up with these ideas because they grab headlines.
They're catchy, but it just shows how small thinkers that are.
Yeah, and then Manchin says, excuse me.
And then we move on to the next plan.
And that's exactly what happened yesterday.
Manchin said, excuse me.
And then it had to get all dropped.
Bye-bye.
I have two things on this, which is interesting because part of the key point that he says is who is best at capital allocation, government or entrepreneurs, is indeed what it comes down to.
And I completely agree with that.
Like, first of all, the whole tax bill is a slippery slope.
If you're going to start, where are they going to stop it, right?
Once they get the door open, they'll swing it wide open and blow a hole in the wall while they're at it.
So no doubt that what piggybacking on what Tom's saying is that you need to have what it is for?
It's not a blank check.
What is it being used for?
And at that point, it could be like, okay, and that's where donations and coming in and being able to donate your money of, oh, I see what this is going for.
This is going for XYZ.
I want to be a part of that.
I want to invest in that.
Or I want to gift you guys this.
The other thing is with hunger, which is interesting, is that in the world right now, there's more obese people than there are mountain nurtured.
And every year, there's 108 billion pounds of food in the U.S. alone that goes to the base.
That's wasted.
That is $160 billion in food.
And actually, surprisingly, it's almost 40% of the food in the U.S.
Yeah, I mean, there are some great restaurateurs out there that make an effort every single day they close to get the food banks the extra food as opposed to throwing it away.
I mean, it's an effort.
You've got to have an extra employee on hand to do it, but it's the right thing to do.
Yeah, it is.
Instead of putting in the dumbass.
And stop and think about it.
When you roll through a restaurant or something high-end like that, you're going, where does all this food go?
Like, have you ever been to Italy?
It's a fun little place, you know, nice little Italian vibe there, but they have so much food on display and you're going, where does this go if someone's not buying it?
Right?
Do they throw it out?
Most of the time they do, yeah.
Here's a good tip: if you go to Randy's Donuts at the end of the day, you could probably get a dozen if you pay for one because they just throw them out.
We've been there if they close that eight.
They'll just say hey, you need a dozen donuts?
Yeah.
Go there right before.
This is Economics 101.
It closes, yeah.
Save that money.
Maybe the biggest tip of the day you just gave.
Legendary tip, right there.
You change people's lives.
Go to the donut shop right before closing.
Because that puts 16 cents into context.
So here's what Mitt Romney had to say about billionaires' tax.
He said, a billionaire tax will push the rich to buy paintings or ranches instead of stocks.
This is a market watch story.
These multi-billionaires are going to look and say, I don't want to invest in the stock market because as that goes up, I got to get taxed.
So maybe I'll invest in a ranch or in paintings or things that don't build jobs and create a stronger economy.
That was Senator Mitt Romney sharing one of the reasons that he's against President Biden's proposed tax on billionaires to help pay for Democrats' social spending bill.
I hope you understand how much a trillion is, Romney said.
A trillion seconds ago in the Netherlands, walked the earth.
So a trillion is an enormous amount of money.
And the Democrats, I think they are adding fuel to a fire, creating more inflation, and it's hurting the American people.
Danny, I'm going to go to you here.
Why is he saying to the average person who's saying, why would he buy paintings or ranches or baseball cards or things like that?
Why is he saying that?
They're trying to put their money in a hard asset that cannot be liquidated and thereby taxed.
It's pretty simple.
I mean, and it makes sense.
And that's why in times of kind of crazy economic distress, you've got people out there with dried powder who they buy land, they buy real estate, they buy houses.
They put their money in something that's going to hold its value in the next generation.
And that's what they do.
But if you're going to tax stock, by the way, take a guess at how closely.
Take a guess at the co-movement.
We call it correlation, at the co-movement of the S ⁇ P 500, the biggest stock market in the world, and CEO confidence.
So how happy a CEO is compared to the S ⁇ P 500?
How close of a relationship do you think that is?
CEO confidence versus S ⁇ P 500.
How close of a correlation it is?
I wouldn't be able to answer that question.
70%.
70%.
So if a stock price is going down, that means that people are getting fired.
And that's what people don't understand.
People always push back and say, Danielle, the stock market's not the economy.
I'm like, I get it, but based on the CEO and his stock price, and if the stock price can't do mergers and acquisitions and buy out other companies and try and grow, if the stock price falls, they're like, we've got to cut costs here.
So heads are going to roll.
And I don't think that the Democrats are thinking all the way through this process because it's going to trickle down and hurt the ones who are the most vulnerable.
As usual.
As usual.
As usual, that's what ends up happening.
Now, look, I'm going to push back for just a second and say that when you read about companies like Amazon not paying taxes for years and years and years, you're like, uh-uh.
Uh-uh.
Every company should have to pay its own.
You shouldn't have a tax code that's so full of loopholes that you don't have to pay a minimum level of tax.
Well, you know how you think.
You know how you would fix that?
Yeah, rip up the tax code and say, pay 15%, call it a day.
Not even rip up the tax code.
Get rid of lobbyists.
It's that simple.
No shit.
Yeah, you get rid of lobbyists.
So you get rid of lobbyists.
Half that stuff would be done because why do so many of these big corporations have a executive office in D.C. Because they're writing lawsuits?
The lobbyists are writing shocks.
That is a byproduct.
This is when people ask why are such billionaires on the left or why are such billionaires on the right?
Because when you get to that level, it's not about taxes anymore.
It's about laws.
And the way you get that is by hiring the best lobbyists who go lobby for you to pass a certain law or something.
No, they're writing the laws.
Let's get real.
That's the point.
So if we got rid of lobbyists and that model was gone, this game of politics would be very different.
We would be more American.
We would be more American.
Yeah.
We can all dream, right?
There's also no doubt who those tax loopholes favor, the mom and pop shop or the big corporations?
Oh, exactly.
It's always a small business owner.
When you hear thresholds like $400,000, you're saying to yourself, what's a small business owner going to do?
Because you're taxing an employee out of work.
That's what you're doing with a small business owner.
It shouldn't be a sin to make $400,000 and employ people.
It just shouldn't.
And if it comes down to the taxes or the people, you're going to lose an employee.
Again, these policies are not properly thought through.
And by the way, they're not even read.
We talk every day that the new bill is going to be $1.7 trillion and Biden's going to make taxes.
Pass a law so we can read what's happening.
Just make that thing so long that no one will put the time in to actually read everything that's in the bottom of it.
Pelosi famously.
Pelosi famously said, let's pass it first and then read it.
God, that's unbelievable.
You know, do you think some of the uber wealthy are going, damn it, Mitt Ronley?
Why are you giving these guys more ideas?
Now they're going to try to tax that somehow.
I wonder if that.
It's going to be very hard for them.
Somebody tweeted out something brilliant.
They were like, so if you're taxing untaxed gains, right?
Unrealized gains, what's going to happen if the stock price falls?
Is Uncle Sam going to write this person a check back and give them a refund for what they taxed?
Because unrealized is unrealized.
But what if the value is lost?
What if the CEO gets run over by a train?
Tough luck.
And he's worth, you know, he is the company.
And all of a sudden, the stock price goes from 400 to 200.
Is the government going to write the check back for having taxed unrealized gains?
I don't think it works that way.
They're not thinking this stuff through.
You know what?
The first thing I thought of on this story from Mitt Romney was: is that why Bill Gates has bought all this ranch land and all this farmland?
He is the largest landowner in the country.
It used to be Ted Turner now with the USB.
It's more farmland than anyone in the entire country.
I mean, hundred or maybe millions of acres.
Like it's hundreds of acres.
Millions of acres.
But look, you know, but that gets you to a much bigger discussion about corn and soybeans and pork and China buying one of the biggest pork producers in the United States.
I mean, food is national security.
You talked about SP earlier, right?
You said SP correlation with CEO 70%.
SP 500 hits record high on strength of tech and earnings cheer.
Gains in Tesla, NVIDIA, and other heavyweight technology names helped the benchmark SP 500 index scale a record high on Tuesday while upbeat results from UPS and GE added to optimism around the third quarter earnings.
Tesla rose 1% extending a record run.
That helps the electric car become a trillion dollar company.
I think that's the eighth trillion dollar company after they announced the Tesla deal with what do you call it?
With Hertz.
United Parcel Service surge 7.6% to the top of SP 500 index after delivery.
Firm reported better than expected quarterly earnings and revenue bolstered by strong e-commerce demand.
And GE rose 2.6% after the industrial conglomerate raised its full-year earnings forecast.
So, Danielle, you're in this world.
This is what you do on a daily basis.
Has your idea of what's going to happen to the economy change?
So I'm going to ask this question with the conversation that came about with Powell.
Is Powell going to keep his job after February?
Is it going to be a new person coming in?
Is the person that's going to come in somebody we ought to worry about?
You kind of talked about that before.
I had a conversation with Goldman two days ago.
Goldman said that rates are going to be going up no matter what because to control inflation.
It's not a choice.
That's the direction they kind of have to go to be able to do that.
What are some of the things you're seeing, trends, patterns that we ought to know about?
First of all, let's get past the SP 500 being at a record high.
The Fed is pumping $120 billion of liquidity into the market every month.
Most Americans that are putting new money into the market and retail, smaller investors are putting more money into the stock market.
You've had more money going to the stock market in 2021 than you had going to the stock market in the past decade.
So retail investors, how do they invest?
Index funds, right?
Every dollar of passive investing, every dollar of marginal dollar of passively invested money in an ETF or an index fund is a multiplier of 17 times because you're feeding a beast.
And on top of that, you've got share buybacks right back at record highs because the Fed encourages companies to do what?
Invest in the future and grow the economy?
No.
Issue debt and buy back their shares so that they can get their earnings per share higher.
So let's just understand liquidity is driving this trend.
And the Fed now, because they got so far behind the inflation curve, because they refused to get out of the business of buying mortgage-backed securities because they set off a speculative, like massive, the highest speculation in U.S. history.
What we're seeing right now, the average U.S. family, the first-time homebuyer right now, the median price of a home is beyond what they can afford.
This is higher than it was in 2006.
This is created by the Fed.
A lot of this inflation has been created by the Fed.
A lot of this inflation has been created by too much stimulus money.
So the Fed's getting behind the inflation curve.
So they need to tighten.
They need to hike rates.
And by the way, the U.S. economy just went from 6.7% in the second quarter to what we learned this morning, 2%.
So the Fed is tightening into a slowing economy.
This is the worst possible situation that you could possibly have.
And if Joe Biden thinks that he is that he can replace Jay Powell with effectively a socialist and have the stock market not throw up, he's wrong.
And that's why the White House is going to announce by Labor Day who's going to be whether Jay Powell is going to be re-nominated or not.
Trump had nominated Powell by November the 2nd.
The clock is ticking.
Halloween Sunday.
He still hasn't announced this morning on the wires.
Biden is thoughtfully looking through this process.
He's scared shitless because Jay Powell, Jay Powell equates to continuity in the stock market, continuity in policy.
Wall Street doesn't like change.
Lale Brainerd wants to get together with Omarosa and have a party and implement socialism in America.
That would be so my guess, I'm writing about this next week.
Yeah.
Somebody else.
Not him.
He ain't going to be there.
Or her.
Okay.
Got it.
So who is that?
Her?
Is that a lady that starts with the letter E or you're thinking it's not?
No, Lel Brainerd.
Okay, I got you.
Okay.
So which is the first time you're going to be able to do that?
So Lail Brainerd has advocated for, as has Amarosa, making sure that you get money to all Americans, the unbanked, digitizing currency.
How much of the current conditions are because of the climate, what it's like?
How much of it is because of Powell?
A lot of it's because of the liquidity, Patrick.
It's the liquidity.
Does he control that?
Is that on Powell?
He has been advocating to not put the brakes on.
He's the one who's pushed this situation out as far as it's been.
But now he's behind the curve.
How do you think he's going to be next Wednesday at the podium when he's at 2.30 Eastern and he's supposed to be answering questions?
And the first question out of the gate is, are you getting re-nominated while he has just started tightening policy and reducing the amount of liquidity that goes into the market?
I mean, that's going to be one awkward press conference.
And the Biden administration still has not made a decision because they're a deer in the headlights.
They're so afraid of this.
This is the biggest decision of Biden's entire career as president, is this decision.
You think he's going to go with her?
He can't.
She's not confirmable.
Why is that?
Because she's a known socialist.
This is not a reconciliation.
She's not confirmable.
She's not confirmable in the Senate.
Okay, then who?
You can't do it 50-50.
You've got to get 60 votes.
So who could be the person?
Who knows?
Okay, so really, is this something that people really don't know?
Is this like, because this is your world?
You're really saying people don't know?
You know how they say, okay, Ben Simmons is going to get traded.
He's going to go for, they're going to pick up Kyrie Rooney.
They're going to pick up who is there any nominee, any people that they're saying that could be.
Can we pull up predict it?
P-R-E-D-I-C-T-I-T.O-R-G, next Fed chair?
This is Vegas.
Shouldn't we root for the fact that he does appoint her because then we want socialism?
Well, no, she's not going to be confirmed.
So then we, a lot more people have their eyes opened as far as what the agenda is.
But people are dropping like flies.
You've lost two Fed presidents.
The head of banking supervision and regulation quit early, basically in protest.
Clarita, that's another vice chair.
His term ends in January.
At some point, there's not going to be anybody inside the Fed.
I mean, you can't.
So where are we here?
Next Fed chair.
73 cents.
Jerome Powell's down a penny on the day.
Lale Brainerd's up a penny, but there's nobody underneath that.
So if we can zoom in on that and look at the other people underneath it, they're like six cents.
No, no, you have to pull it up all by itself.
Next Federal Power.
Click on it.
Click on it.
Click on next Fed chair.
There you go.
And that's vice chair, and she doesn't want that.
Go back.
Go back.
The middle one.
She wants the big one.
Right there, yeah.
Right there.
See?
10 cents, 2 cents, 1 cents.
That's why I'm saying.
Are these other ones electable, though, or no?
I don't know.
Some of them aren't qualified to be chair of the Fed.
So, but, you know, but the wires are trying.
the media the liberal media and i i say that sorry but it is the liberal media is saying you never know this is the most inclusive president in the history of mankind there might be somebody else out there but that but the betting odds are completely lost but i this is the first thing i wake up every single morning and look at because the stock market wants the continuity of jay powell and the fact that they know he's a republican he's going to hold the line on socialism he's going to hold the line on negative interest rates Lale Brainerd has advocated for,
under the right circumstances, doing those things.
Did you throw Omarosa in there as control of the currency?
I mean, Omarosa right now is probably the highest trending name on my Twitter feed.
That's the fear factor.
She went to school in Moscow.
I mean, she's, I mean, she makes no apologies for it either.
No, And she has advocated for the central bank digital currency, which Lale Brainerd would help her implement, which would send this country down the path of socialism.
But that's why she can't get confirmed.
That's why Lale Brainerd, even though she's the second frontrunner, that's why she's at 21 cents.
Yeah, because everybody that voted for her would be exposed.
Hopefully they could, you know, leverage that and get some of those people out of her.
How would you want to be those 10 Republican?
There are Democratic senators who have said, hell no, I'm not voting to confirm her.
So she's not confirmable.
Good.
Thank God.
We haven't collectively lost our mind 100% yet.
It's getting there.
I don't think Omarosa is confirmable.
You don't think Amarosa is confirmable?
If they won't.
Lao Brainerd looks like a right-wing nutball compared to Omarosa.
Wow.
Some great options.
Yeah.
Obviously, we'll see what's going to happen here, but we'll watch this, follow this story very closely.
So I'm going to go to the Mansion because this is all in the same conversation here, and then we'll go to some sports maybe next.
Page six, if you want to go there.
Controversial Democratic IRS bank reporting proposal is likely dead, Mansion says.
This is a Washington Examiner story.
Mansion said on Tuesday that he spoke to President Biden about the proposal, which envisioned banks reporting all accounts, inflows, and outflows of over $10,000 to the IRS to crack down on tax fraud after the meeting.
He noted it will probably not be in the plan.
Manchin said he told Biden the idea was screwed up and that the president concurred.
Oh, wow.
Okay.
The first iteration of the proposal cast at an even broader net and would have targeted all inflows and outflows over $600.
However, that was met with fierce opposition from the banking industry and Republicans on Capitol Hill.
Republicans believe the bank reporting requirements violate privacy and would be logistically challenged.
So there you go.
So that's a dead deal.
Nothing's going to happen there.
We've already talked about that.
But the $10,000 figure is still running around out there.
Who is that going to annoy the most?
Whose life is going to get tougher because of that?
Americans?
Banks?
That's what I'm saying.
Is it more banks or is it more Americans?
I mean, how many people wire $10,000 every day all the time?
I think it's more for the banks because they have to then get it approved.
Yeah.
Imagine the extra work.
The accountant reporting.
It's more them.
It's not the individuals.
So the bank is the one that's going to be against that.
I'd say they're probably heavily against it.
It said Wall Street and the banking industry were very against it as well.
Of course they are.
Of course they are.
There's more workload on their end.
Now, Manchin says the complete op.
And that's pure overhead.
This next story, the Reuters story, is slightly different.
Manchin says everyone in the U.S. who has been blessed and prospered should pay patriotic tax.
Democratic Senator Joe Manchin said on Wednesday that people in the United States who have been blessed and prospered should pay a patriotic tax of 15% if they end up with a zero tax liability.
That's what you talk about, which is kind of what you're saying.
Manchin said he supported everyone paying their fair share and did not like to target different people.
Under this measure, billionaires who escape paying taxes by earning small salaries and borrowing off their assets would find themselves paying taxes to the federal government at a fixed rate.
Fine.
You're okay with that.
I'd like this too, honestly.
It's a form of a flat tax.
It's a good way.
Especially if with the current tax codes, kind of how they'll find a loophole either way anyways.
And this would then kind of limit that.
And I mean, at 15%, I think it's fair.
This is on what, though?
This is on gains, he's saying, right?
Or is this on income?
No, Right now what's being talked about with this $1.7 trillion, which is the new price tag, du jour, that the price tag changes every day, is people who make 10 million or more.
This 15% he's talking about is 10 million.
Well, right now they're talking about a 3% surcharge.
I saw that one, but that's different than this.
That's different than this.
This is cleaner.
What Manchin is proposing is cleaner.
So walk me through what this looks like.
It's pretty simple.
You pay taxes at April 15th.
On what, though?
On your income.
On the income.
So if the person makes income, because the thing that rich people or technically a lot of these billionaires do is they have a lot of debt borrowed up against their holdings and what they say.
To do the write-offs.
Yes.
That way, because debt, if your stock is appreciating by 6%, debt is a 3%.
I don't think that's a good idea, though.
Why not?
Because accounting purposes.
So now you have to track the debt people are taking against their income.
How do you do that?
You just close the loopholes.
Yeah, it's not bad.
But you're taking away the deductions.
But a part of that isn't a part of this linked to capital gains.
So if I'm making, so again, for me, it would be how do you measure to tax 15% on what, though?
What if the company had a bad year?
What if the income was, I mean, because if you're making income, you're going to pay the taxes on ordinary income.
So the way they're wording this, the patriotic tax, I kind of want to know a little bit more on what he means by that.
You know, because I don't think it's just on your income.
I get an income.
We already have ordinary income tax.
But you would never be able to.
You would have to close the loopholes.
And then what would the CPAs do?
You would have to fire all lobbyists.
Who's the most against getting rid of lobbyists, by the way?
The left or the right?
Who doesn't want lobbyists?
The right.
Well, probably I don't think it's a lot.
I think they're both sailors.
No, they're both.
I mean, God, they both spend like drunk sailors.
Both parties.
Some of the numbers you see like on pharmaceutical companies, on what they do with lobbyists.
The National Association of Realtors.
Yeah.
How about the fact that they associate the word or attach the word patriotic with wanting to pay more taxes, right?
Does that correlate?
Does that go to the bottom?
It does.
It does.
You should want to pay your fair share.
If you're in a country and you have freedom and you're able to be prosperous, then it shouldn't bother you to pay your fair share.
By force or by choice?
No, just by simple laws.
Just by simplifying the tax code.
Then you've got to simplify it all across the board, though, no?
Okay.
Yeah.
So let's just simplify it across the board.
Well, we're paying taxes, right?
What are our taxes supposed to pay for?
Why can't our taxes go towards simplifying the tax code?
I don't mind that.
But I like what Elon Musk said.
The challenge for me is who is managing the money I'm paying taxes for?
Like, is that money going to go to people in the government that are going to manage that money?
Because I have no clue what the hell they're doing.
Or is that money going to go to the private sector or at least they know what to do with that money?
Obama admitted it.
He said that his shovel-ready infrastructure plan did a whole bunch of nothing for the economy.
And we're talking about another infrastructure plan that's going to be doled out by bureaucrats to unionized workers.
That's what I'm saying.
It accomplishes nothing.
So you're right.
This makes a point.
Elon Musk makes a point.
A very good point.
So what's the one guy's name, Reich?
Rich Strike?
I don't know if it's Richard.
What's his name, Tyler?
Robert Reich.
Robert Street.
Robert Reich.
So he always posts stuff on Twitter, right?
And then he says, you know, people forget that how much public money Elon got to help him out with Tesla or all these other things, right?
Great.
The grants that they got, the billions of dollars grants.
But the money is going to private sector.
And people on the private sector know what to do with that money better than people on the public sector.
Remember, even Elon went back at him and said, Well, we paid off all interest years before plus interest.
So he paid off early with all the interest they would have paid if they extended the whole time.
And he's like, Well, look at GE.
They still have billions they have.
Same as GM.
But AIG paid it back, 183 plus interest, 21 billion.
Look, I mean, maybe they've taken it out of the textbooks already.
So, children, if you're listening, the new deal, the real part of the new deal that FDR implemented was done with public money through the private sector.
That's why we've got the Hoover Dam.
That's why so much was accomplished because it was public money, but then it was deployed to the private sector.
So, you're not wasting it.
It's not smart to do that.
You're not smart to do that.
You're not wasting the money.
It's combining the variables.
That's smart to do that.
That's the thing.
Because they're going to allocate the money and not use it more efficiently.
All those things.
Competitively, private's accountable.
Public is, I mean, not.
Exactly.
Yeah, especially when you talk about a huge infrastructure bill.
Like, are we going to see new airports?
Are the freeways going to be fixed?
Exactly.
Yeah, if they said, well, $32 billion is going to go to this airport.
It's going to be done by this state.
This is going to go for an intercoastal highway.
We're going to improve the 95.
We're going to allocate this much from this stretch to this stretch.
If you're giving specifics and when, it's like, okay, maybe that could be worth it.
But if it's not.
I mean, most Americans probably think that toll roads are really worth it because they're in better shape.
And you can get through faster, right?
As opposed to taking this lane, all that.
Nobody questions paying for the express lane how much you have to pay.
Like, look, you just say five minutes.
Is five minutes worth of $10, $5?
Yeah, go do it.
You don't want it?
Don't do it.
It's a choice.
I like that.
But it's also because the other infrastructure that's available is falling apart.
Yeah.
Look, this leads me to the story of what's going on in Florida.
DeSantis tweeted something out here.
Can you go on DeSantis?
As a matter of fact, go on my Twitter account and I retweeted what he said yesterday before.
You're getting to be much more active on Twitter, Patrick.
I appreciate that.
Yeah, well, you inspired me.
You inspired me to get more active on Twitter.
I think you're growing up.
Danielle, I listen.
We're helping you grow up on YouTube.
You're helping us grow up on Twitter.
My YouTube thing's going on.
My favorite part of Danielle is her Instagram account.
My favorite part is her Instagram account.
I can't even find it.
But your Twitter, you're crushing it.
So let's go to Florida.
So Florida, I'm going to go to page seven.
Yeah, if you want to click on that right there so that graphic comes up, and I'll go to it here in a second.
I'm going to read this article first.
Florida leads a nation, a nation's economic recovery, and it's not even closed.
This is a Daily Wire story.
The United States gained 194,000 jobs in a month of September, severely missing economics expectation.
However, Florida alone, you ready?
Out of the 194, 84,000 of those jobs was from Florida.
Let me say this one more time.
Out of the 194,000 jobs, Florida gained 84,000 jobs during that same period, leading the nation in terms of largest percentage increase.
Florida economy accelerated in September 2021, growing at three times the rate over the month compared to the nation.
And in addition, Florida has experienced 11 consecutive months of labor force increases, adding 50,000 workers over the month.
Florida's labor force work represents 5.4% increase over the year, which is significantly higher than the national rate average of 0.8%.
So this is what was posted yesterday.
I retweeted this.
84,500 jobs were created in Florida September 1.
Florida versus the nation.
So when you have an argument like this, okay, when you have an argument like this, last night I was at dinner, I was in an event in Bay Colony with the former first lady of Florida, governor's wife Carol, who was there.
We spent some time talking about what's going on.
People are both concerned and excited at the same time.
And here's what the feeling was.
I kind of brought this up.
I don't know if I brought it up to you.
I brought it up to Robert and I were talking about this.
People are concerned because they don't want to lose him to the nation.
They want him to stay as the governor.
But at the same time, people are excited to say, we got somebody that could actually win it because his resume right now is looking so good on what they're doing with Florida that all the hate that they got, all the hate, and he was being patient about it.
Now he's saying, hey, police officers, if you're being forced to do something, you don't want to do $5,000 bonus.
Ports, if you're struggling with the ports, listen, bring him over here.
We're open.
All of these things.
And no matter how many times the left is trying to get this guy canceled, they haven't been successful yet.
So.
Question I haven't asked you yet.
And then you can give your feedback on Florida as well.
Do you think running for president is about timing with all the stuff that he's got going on today?
It's important for him to consider running now.
Or should he wait eight years and then run?
Because he's only 43 right now.
What do you say?
What do you think?
No, I don't think the country has time for more octogenarians, more 80-year-olds.
I think we're done.
Actually, when I was here last month, I said the same thing.
We need a young, dynamic, conservative JFK.
We need somebody with fresh ideas who says, if this is what can occur in one state, imagine what can occur in 50.
We need a visionary.
We need somebody who's not afraid of the Washington establishment, to use that word.
We need somebody who understands that America is all about creating economic opportunity and jobs.
Yeah.
You know, he has to run.
In the private sector.
Yeah.
He has to run.
He has to.
He's never going to be hotter.
The only way the media portrays Ron DeSantis is as a quack, right?
In relating, they won't give him any credit.
You won't see any of these stories.
By the way, on top of that, great economic news, it's lowest in COVID now, too.
So his plan worked.
His plan was better than New York's plan, than California's plan, than Illinois' plan.
He has the facts.
He has a case study.
He's got it all right here.
Here's the thing I'd be worried about if I were him, because this is how vicious and evil the media is and what they're thinking right now.
Make sure your personal life's totally tight and buttoned up because that would be the only thing that they could go after and they would go after it so hard because they're threatened by him.
I think with COVID, in the sense of obviously we're beginning to achieve herd immunity in some way, shape, or form, knockwood.
I think that during this whole episode, he was so villainized that if the skeleton was in the closet, I think they would have found it by now.
Yeah.
They sure as hell were looking.
Look, you know, Pat, you mentioned that.
Three people yesterday told me the same thing in Florida.
We hope he doesn't run for president.
It's like, you know, you've got such a great thing.
What has he got?
Another year left?
Yeah.
And then he can think of another four here.
I mean, what he could do with this state if the rest of the country keeps going the direction that they are.
I don't know if you could support all the people that would be moving here.
At some point, we're going to be the United States of Texas and Florida.
There are 800,000 job openings in the state of Texas today.
800,000 job openings in Texas.
In the state of Texas.
Wow.
90% of them are restaurants in the world.
But this is a mass migration.
No, J.K. Morgan Chase has more employees in the state of Texas than they do in New York.
Crazy question for you.
Do you think it's good?
We've had this conversation, but this was about a year ago.
I don't know if we had the conversation with you.
Maybe we did.
Do you think it's a good idea for one of these states to kind of separate and be its own?
And I'm not talking about Civil War type of stuff.
I'm not talking about, you know, to get to that point.
But do you think it's a good idea for one of these states to say, listen, you know, we would, you know, like, do you think that campaign would go far with Floridians or Texans?
Do you mean secede?
Yeah, to say, hey, we just kind of want to separate from the United States.
Well, we're going to go.
I think the only state that could issue.
We have it in the Constitution.
It is an ongoing discussion.
The Port of Houston has done a fabulous job since the Panama Canal got widened of taking business away from the West Coast ports.
Texas is the largest exporting state in the nation.
In other words, we're our own economy.
We're our own ecosystem.
And because we're the largest exporting state, all the railheads heading into Mexico back and forth, NAFTA production, Texas, it's conceivable, and it's not even a secret.
It's an open secret.
Meaning, like a Brexit becomes a Texas.
Is that a problem?
Something tells me that depending on how kind of the fallout of Brexit happens, because now it's still kind of in the progress and they're trying to figure things out.
And it's not going so well.
No.
That would be my only concern because they'll see it and then they'll be like, okay, if it's this cluster for them, are we going to try?
And you also need somebody who's in power long enough to really push it through and make it happen.
Because if a governor comes out and then a new one comes in and then everything gets reversed, then you're back to square one.
But is it even really realistically possible?
Isn't the Constitution set up to prevent a state from actually doing this?
Texas has a clause or something like that where they only joined if they had the option to back out at their choosing.
The Republic of Texas.
Lone states.
But I will say this much about Texas.
I mean, it's got some of the worst education in the country.
So, I mean, certain things need to get fixed.
Step it up.
Let's go.
Join 421,769 Texans who believe it's time to Texas.
Interesting.
Oh, my gosh.
I didn't realize it actually.
Wow.
Texit now.
Kai.
Well, when you look at what's happened in cities like Austin, where people are just becoming so turned off.
I mean, what a PR disaster.
What?
For the city of Austin?
Yeah.
Musk moved to us, and a lot of people, Rogan moved to us.
I get it.
I mean, I've been to Austin.
The homelessness, it's mad.
That's what I'm talking about.
We have our own little miniature Los Angeles in the middle of the state.
And it's bizarre because once you get all the way to the Capitol building itself, then it's its own little.
It's crazy, by the way.
I don't know if you've been to it later.
It's not a, like, you know, we went to L.A. and we were recording.
Austin is just as bad as L.A. Wow.
Well, because the most liberal city outside of California, when the vote came up years and years ago to put public transportation in a rail system to alleviate the fact that so many people were moving in and there weren't enough highways and byways, they voted against public transportation.
Well, listen, if Texas doesn't work out for you, there's a city called New York City and the Mayor de Blasio pushing forward with legalized heroin injection sites for New York City.
This is not a Babylon Beast story.
This is not an onion.
This is a real story.
De Blasio pushing forward would legalize heroin injection sites for New York City.
This is a post-millennial story.
When is de Blasio's last day in office?
He's got a couple months left.
Hey, Tyler, can you pull up the story so people can see it?
As cities across the U.S. reject legalized heroin injection sites and needle exchanges, Mayor de Blasio is planning to resurrect a long-delayed plan to open supervised heroin injection sites in New York City, even as the Big Apple grapples with a massive surge in overdose deaths and open-air drug use on city streets in the middle of the day.
De Blasio has called the shooting galleries an idea whose time has come and said he was moving forward with the controversial proposal because he had the kind of potential cooperation he needed from President Biden and Governor Kathy Hoko, which, by the way, Biden and Kathy probably don't want that endorsement.
If they're getting it and it's real, it's not a good look for them either.
Earlier this month, Hoko signed a law decriminalizing the possession or sale of hypodermic needles and syringes.
The new law led to New York NYPD issuing a directive allowing addicts to shoot up in public.
What did this?
What the hell is this?
This is so incomprehensible.
What the hell is this all about?
Like, have you lost your mind?
So here's what I'm wondering.
What does this do?
So, does a mother say, well, you know what, babe?
Let's move to New York City.
Let's take the kids over there.
Especially if you're not, to begin with, concerned about homelessness, safety, violence, crime.
And then this is the idea of the.
How would you like to have a business that was in a block or two of that area where you can shoot up?
But I'm honestly, I don't think these people are dumb.
You're not idiots.
What is your outcome of doing that?
Can we play devil's advocate, everybody?
Give me one reason why you would do this.
Okay, devil's advocate.
If I have to fight against it, if I have to jump into his brain and try to figure out to keep an area where if you're going to be a heroin addict, we're going to offer you a safe place to do it.
And you can come here and it's not illegal and you're going to do it anyway.
So we're going to get you away from the suburbs or away from downtown or away from Times Square.
And then you come over here in the meatpacking district and shoot up.
I don't understand this.
So, Kai.
No, no, we're about to learn about Mr. DeBlasio.
I published this.
One more time.
One more time.
Okay, what you're looking at right there.
Change in death rate from 2009 to 2020.
We have an epidemic.
We have an epidemic of youth death in this country, and he wants to do something like that.
What is it for?
Is that drug overdose or what is that?
It's drug overdoses.
It's suicide.
It's something laced with fentanyl.
Wait, wait, wait.
Go back to this.
I'm trying to understand what this is.
Go back to this.
I didn't see the data.
Tyler, just swipe.
There you go.
That's okay.
So it's the one on the bottom.
It's bottom of page seven.
Kick me out.
There we go.
Kai to the rescue.
Wow.
This is exactly the moment for Kai.
Emergency.
Kai's loving it because he's seen as a hero right now.
This is what you call the Hegelian dialectic.
You set somebody up for failure, they fail.
You come in as the hero.
Let me show you how it's done.
He's reading too much of 40 Laws of Power.
Kai, do you want me to redrop it?
Yeah, just redrop it.
Okay, wait, how did you do that, though?
Okay, while they're doing that, while they're doing that, let me go back to the story.
You were saying, so the only reason, David, you're somebody that's, how do you process this yourself?
Yeah, I agree with Tom.
It's somewhere, if we want to play devil's advocate, you could say, yeah, it's somewhere where you can do it away from all the suburbs and just kind of do it in your own safe little corner.
Here's a safe haven to do heroin.
How's that working out in Los Angeles?
Or it's someone if you want to wean off of heroin and you can want to micro-dose it and kind of slowly fade to black.
Then you could just say that.
Heroin addicts vote.
I mean, I can't even believe they're going out of the way to do this.
Well, whoever replaces the heroin addicts vote.
So we're looking at the change.
We're looking at the change in the death rate.
If there's any way to zoom in on that one chart, so you're looking at the bottom of the chart is one to four years old, five to nine years old.
Over there, you see people are living longer, 80 to 84.
Close.
75 to 79.
That means negative means that they're living longer, that their life expectancy can be considered to be longer.
And then you get 20 to 24, 25 to 20, 30 to 34.
Oh, my God.
35 to 39.
28% change in death rate?
Yes.
Between 2019, 2009 and 2019.
2021.
It's probably going to be worse if you run 20, 20, 20, 21.
Well, all these people who've been isolated in their house.
And every one of those deaths is tragic because you're not dying of some prolonged disease at that age.
You're at the prime of your life.
This is when you're young.
And look at the other data right there.
Percentage of 20 to 39 year olds living at home as reported, and 1980 was 15%.
It's just going to continue to go up.
1991 to 74, and then it was a drop off in 2000.
Then we went up to 20.3%, then 23.7%.
And it's estimated to be going up to 25%, 24.9%.
2030.
Because socialism is good for America, right?
Teaching people how to go out, be independent, work on their own, make their own households, get out of their parents' basement, and look what direction we're going in.
That's too much.
But I'm still trying to understand.
Tell me how, why this makes sense to create clinics or places where people can go take heroin.
What is the logic behind that?
Give me the logic.
The only thing I can think of.
It's one of those if they're doing it anyways, let's supervise it to some extent or let's try to.
And that's his rationale.
Let's try to gather it all in one area.
Like, instead of it being scattered around, like, hey, let's just hide it over here.
I've taken six trips to New York, and it is, I mean, you can turn the corner and be like, whoa.
Really?
That's what I was wondering is how different does it feel?
I mean, you know, I have been gravitating towards downtown, downtown, downtown.
Like, the closer I get to the Freedom Tower, the more of a police presence I feel, the safer I feel.
I mean, I was always a Midtown person, but Midtown kind of freaks me out.
David, we can hear you, David.
Yeah.
You know, the only thing I would say is back in the late 80s, New York was a mess too.
And then one strong.
That's what it feels like.
Yeah, one strong mayor can change things, but I don't know if they're capable of bringing anyone in to replace the Blasio that could be better.
Anos just give on Super Chat.
Anos is from New York.
He said, I'm a New Yorker and it's bad.
I want to give my take.
They are even letting illegals vote and they are forcing the vaccine on students and city jobs.
I mean, that's just New York for you right now.
So what does this do?
Okay.
You know how they say don't turn my Texas into California?
In perspective, New York City is 8% of U.S. GDP.
New York City?
8%.
That's what states.
I'm sorry.
New York State is 8% of you.
But still, what is it?
90% is the city?
I mean, it's all about the finance sector, right?
Yeah.
Insane to think about that.
But interestingly enough, though, if they're losing a lot of that, how much is that going to go down?
That's what I mean.
I just said J.P. Morgan Chase has more employees in Texas than they do in New York.
Yeah, but I'm telling you, in Texas, you've seen this before.
Don't California, my Texas, right?
Or in Florida, they say everywhere.
Don't bring your politics down here.
Don't New York, my Florida.
You hear that all the time.
It's a buffer sticker.
So then the question becomes, who are the people that are leaving New York and California?
Okay.
Or if they're just bringing the same mindset ideology.
No, but again, remember what I said, that I'm starting to hear from transplanted Californians that they're upset about critical race theory.
So I don't think it's just liberals leaving.
I think it might just be rational people who don't want to pay huge taxes and support things like, I don't know, heroin sites.
It makes zero sense to me.
I'll go into a China story after this and we'll see.
We're trying to see if we can get somebody from, who is the person that runs LA and Long Beach port.
I think he's working with all the head of the Teamsters.
Yeah, head of the Teamsters.
So if we can get him, we can get him.
If not, because it's California time as well.
So let's cover what China just said, I mean, which is a pretty wild announcement here about China's advancement in their military.
China carries out first successful tests of underwater explosives that could destroy U.S. ports after launching satellite-crushing weapon and hypersonic missile.
Daily mail story.
China's carried out its first demolition of port using underwater explosive, a tactic that state media said could be used against the U.S. in an event of war.
Beijing's military carried out test on Saturday using underwater charges to destroy dummy wharf at an undisclosed location somewhere in China.
The technology is designed to cut off enemy supply lines in the event of a conflict and sneak attacks using underwater charges will make large vessels like U.S. aircraft carriers vulnerable.
It is just the latest in a string of Chinese military tests, including the launch of a satellite last week that the U.S. warns could attack other spacecraft and two tests of an orbital weapon that analysts think is a hypersonic nuke.
This sounds like a movie, but this is not a movie.
This is a real story.
China has the ability to kill us all 10 times, right?
I mean, they're going to get us like 16 different ways.
I hope we have smart people in our military, too.
I hope maybe we just don't have to broadcast and publicize everything that we're capable of doing.
I still think that the amount of money that we spend on defense and how advanced we are, and I don't know.
I mean, these stories are kind of scary, and it does show that China is so intent on presenting to the world that they're a military power.
And maybe this is more of a soft warning towards Taiwan and some of the other areas.
Japan, they said U.S. specifically.
They're preparing long term.
Here's the one thing you got to give credit to them for: they have a common enemy.
Sure.
It's U.S.
It's everybody that is against them is their common enemy.
In U.S., we don't have a common enemy.
The enemy in the U.S., the enemy of the Republican is the Dem.
The enemy of the Dem is the Republican.
This is like the most ununited state nation in the world today when it comes down to their politics.
And that's what makes us vulnerable.
That's exactly it.
So if we were united on who the enemy is, it'd be a different story.
But because you are not united on who the enemy is, a country like China keeps advancing.
Well, China's already playing a damn good game of economic warfare.
If you think about this supply chain disruption, 24% of the components in your average U.S. vehicle are being made in China.
25%.
24%.
Right.
And a lot of them are stuck on barges right now on the ships.
They're not even getting here.
Yeah.
And then you've got this potential strike coming up.
I mean, payback is a bitch.
Excuse my French.
But Joe Biden's 90-day sprint.
We're going to keep those Long Beach and Los Angeles workers.
They're going to work three shifts a day, 24-7, get us through the holidays, make sure they unload all these containers.
Oh, and by the way, their contract comes up for renegotiation and expires on June 30th.
Every single year since 1990, when they've renegotiated their contract, they've shut the port down.
But they got the ultimate leverage by doing that.
And do you know what they want this time instead of just more money and benefits?
And by the way, the highest paid unionized workers in the country we're talking about here?
Highest paid.
The Teamsters?
No, no, no.
This is a longshore.
And by the way, you can get him, I think, on Tuesday.
Okay, because this will still be a story.
I think he's running behind.
It's going to be a story.
It's going to be a bigger and bigger story because what the workers want to do, and this is going to bristle you.
The workers don't just want higher pay and benefits.
They want to stop the port operators from automating.
Well, yeah, because that takes away jobs.
Exactly.
Right?
Exactly.
But they want that written into their contract.
They don't know how you can win.
And like, they can't unload the containers as it is.
They need to automate as quickly as possible.
We need to, you know, get the supply chain disruption undisrupted.
Let's get into the portfolio.
And the union wants to take automation and put it in writing that they cannot automate?
Yeah, this is becoming a bigger story than it was just a few months back.
So Los Angeles Long Beach ports to fine shipping companies over backlog.
This is a Hill story.
Officials for the ports of Los Angeles Long Beach on Monday said that they will begin fining shipping companies whose cargo containers stay in marine terminals for too long as they work to reduce congestion in their ports.
Port of Long Beach executive director said with the escalating backlog of ships off the coast, we must take immediate action to prompt a rapid removal of containers from our marine terminals, adding that the ports are running out of space.
The fees collected from idling containers will be invested into programs meant to enhance efficiency.
Ocean carriers will be charged $100 per container with the fines increasing in $100 increments per day per container.
Increasing per day per container.
I'm backing that container up.
I'm backing the whole thing up and I'm going to Houston or I'm going to Miami if they start to do things like this.
The only thing with this, though, from what I was reading, is it's not like when they're on there, it's more when they get off because, okay, you unload the ship, but if it's just staying at the port, then you're screwed.
100 trucking companies went out of business.
100 trucking companies went out of business.
Even when you unload the containers, who's going to pick them up?
I mean, railroads have come out and said in the last few days, the railroads have come out and said, our volumes are down because we don't have truckers to pick up the containers from the railheads and take them around the country.
80,000 trucker shortage.
The average trucker is 55 years old, making 18 bucks an hour.
Only 7% are women, 93% are men.
Drug and alcohol issue that they've had, meaning they had an experience with it and they got, you know, maybe a misdemeanor or something.
91,000 at least have one violation.
72,000 currently suspended.
54,000 have not started reinstatement process.
We are down.
80,000 trucker shortage, and this is taking place.
This is a scary thought when you're thinking about what's going on right now.
So this is when a DeSantis is sitting there saying, hey, come on down here.
We'll be able to work for you.
Come on down here.
We'll be able to get this thing going for you.
You don't have to sit there and worry about that part.
Here, give this to Tyler.
I think we can do the call if we want to.
Okay, let's make the call.
Let's make the call.
Okay.
Do you need the connection there?
So this is who.
Can you tell us who this is?
So this is a good friend of mine.
His name is Ramon Ponce de Leon.
And I was incorrect.
He's not the head of the Teamsters union.
It's the Crane Operators Union.
And I'll let him clarify that.
But great guy, lives in Southern California, has been in this union for a very long time.
He's the president.
He has everybody underneath him and knows everything that's going on.
He can answer all these questions and tell us a first-hand account of what's going on with the crane.
I can't wait to hear what the payback's going to be for the 24-7, 90-day Biden sprint.
Yeah.
And I talked to him for a while yesterday.
I mean, they're already working their butts off.
I mean, there's really maybe two or three hours that the ports aren't active right now.
It's from 3 a.m. to 6 a.m.
Other than that, they are unloading these things constantly.
Let me see.
And I also asked him about how now Long Beach, the mayor of Long Beach, said you can now stack crates six high as opposed to one or two.
So that was going to alleviate some of the space of these things going out into the warehouses all over once the ships were unloaded.
And he didn't think that was a great idea.
So here's the thing I think.
Won't that complicate things for the crane operators?
This is what I think about with this: okay, you're going to find them $100 per container and incrementally increase it $100 per day.
Doesn't that even piss off people to not want to come back and do business with you?
That's what I'm talking about.
That's what I'm talking about.
The next time the ship sails, it's headed for the Panama Canal.
It's headed for Houston.
It's headed for Miami.
That's what I'm trying to say.
That this is going to leave a really bad taste.
And even though it's the way things are done, you go Shanghai to Long Beach, you go Shanghai to Los Angeles.
Even though that's the way it's always been done, if you start to find people to Kingdom Come, they're going to divert.
They're going to divert the truck.
Is it up?
I'm going to have to turn the podcast off, right?
Hey, Ramon.
Hey, is this Tom?
Yes.
Thanks so much, Ramon.
And I know this is a scramble, and I apologize for.
Well, that's why we have you on the phone, I think.
Hey, Ramon, say hi to Patrick.
Bet David, Kai is here as well, as well as Danielle.
Good morning.
Hello, Patrick.
Ramon, how are you?
Raise the audio a little bit, Kai.
Yes, Ramon.
So educate us on, if you don't mind, the audience doesn't know your background.
If you can take a quick second and tell us your background, what you do there, and then what's really going on in LA.
By the way, we may want to take that off because there's a lot of static noise right now.
Just give me the phone.
How about if I find someplace to pull over?
So I talk to people briefly.
Sure.
You're driving, Ramon.
Oh, whose phone is this, buddy?
Did we lose him?
I think he's listening to the podcast, too, so we'll call him.
Yeah, I think we lost him.
So he's the president.
Well, he runs the union.
He has 7,000, he runs the crane operators.
And I don't want to, you know, say this incorrectly, and we'll let him clarify it, but he is the president of the union.
He, the cranes, the trucks, everybody that's coming.
7,000 people.
7,000 employees.
So there isn't a more qualified person to tell us what's going on in LA.
Agreed.
And this is again to me at least this is critical because the longshore union contract's coming up on June 30th.
And I just, I think they're out for a big, huge pound of flesh.
Okay, so Ramon, if you're listening on the podcast, we're coming right back to you here in a second.
David, did you get it or no?
Just a phone call, guys.
You put it on phone call, I put them on speaker.
You know how you go to calls and then just enter that the numbers that we have.
It's 10 digits.
There you go, David.
I knew he had it in him.
Can you hear us now?
Can you hear us?
Yes, I can hear you.
Fantastic.
Okay, excellent.
We're glad you did that.
So, so, so, tell us, tell the audience a little bit about your background and what the current conditions are at the port.
Okay, my background is I'm a third-generation longshoreman.
We are called longshoremen because back in the day, they used to ask for labor, they would say along the shore wind.
So, we became longshoremen.
We're the ILWU, and I represent Local 13, which is mostly the labor of the ports of LA and Long Beach collectively.
Probably about 8,000 members, close to 8,000.
With a casual workforce, there'll be include include another 4,000.
So, about 12,000 members.
That's who works under the contract document that I enforce as the president for Local 13.
So, what is life like right now, Ramon?
What is life like right now for folks who are working there?
What is the day-to-day looking like?
There's a difference story between what the media is saying.
You're in it.
Tell us, is it worse?
Is it the same?
Is it better?
What is it like?
Well, first of all, since COVID, we have not stopped.
No one even looked at us.
We kept working.
We had 20 active members die as a result of COVID.
Some would report to work, be sick, and three days later, they passed.
It was that quick.
A lot of phone calls to a lot of families was really discouraging.
But since then, we've never stopped.
As a matter of fact, we've broken records, volume records throughout the year.
We're continuing to break records.
Our people are working double shifts for the most part because of the volume.
We have a process of registration, a list that's already been attained by the parties back in the early 2015.
And we're still going through that list to continue to hire through our list.
We'll probably have a new list when the next contract comes around.
Now, I just want to say something.
The automated terminals are just predicated on density, which you have premium land on the porch, and the congestion has exposed that if you continue to automate, what's going to happen is you're going to use more trucks.
If you've been to Southern California, there's no more room for trucks.
We've been advocating rail.
Now, we can load a rail with our top pick drivers.
It's like a big forklift that picks the container up on the top side.
We can move between 50 and 60 containers an hour and have a train of 300 moves with two gangs, we call them gangs, two units.
And in five hours, we have a train of 300 containers on the road.
So we need to be pushing for rail infrastructure through the ports.
We are not a storage facility.
We should be a throughput facility.
Automation is a storage.
If you can stack, if you go to the port and you go see it, so I'm just trying to bring everybody to light here.
Sure.
Our stacks are probably four high.
Okay.
Now, the stacks being four high because our yard cratings are four high.
They have to be able to go over it.
So if you have to, if there's six rows, you have to get the can on the bottom.
You have to take the cans away that's on top.
Get the bottom can and then load it and then put the cans back.
And because of the congestion, it continues to remain full because when the vessel comes in, we just put more right back on top.
So, and if you automate, even if it's an automated crane with no person in it, if it goes eight or nine high, can you imagine digging out eight or nine high?
So, and what is the risk, by the way, if it goes eight or nine high?
What is the risk for safety if it goes eight or nine high?
Well, there, well, in an automated terminal, there's nobody there.
Okay.
So, all you did was you just further congested the ports.
Automation is a farce.
Okay.
We've already proven, we've proof in the footing.
We've already moved the volume higher than anybody in this nation ever has in the history of this nation with container throughput.
And it's obvious, I mean, we haven't had containers, you know, back in the 30s, but we are moving cargo faster than anyone has ever had in any port.
And by the way, harbor maintenance tax is a tax where the Gulf and the East Coast take more percentage to build their ports than our ports that are Southern California ports with a 40% throughput for this nation.
Now, let me back up one more step.
There are 10 major carriers in the world of all waterborne goods.
Of those 10 carriers, we have three alliances.
It's a monopoly.
They control the price of the container.
They control it.
And guess what?
What?
Recently, in the last decade, they have now taken control of their own terminal operator.
The terminal operators who employ us used to be the mom and pop founded here in the U.S. People that were born and raised here.
They're still those employees, but the control is the carrier.
They're all foreign owned.
There's none here.
Now, and they are recording $3.5 billion a quarter.
CMA CGM, the number three in that chain, the number three carrier has recorded 3.5 last quarter and 2.1 the quarter before.
MERSC is the number one.
They recorded in two different quarters.
Back in the pandemic, during the summer of 2020 and the first quarter of 2021, you combine those two, a 4.3 and a 2.7.
That's $7 billion of revenue.
And if you do the math on that, the average is 3.5.
We're going to continue with this 3.5.
And none of that money goes back into our infrastructure.
None of it goes back into our economy.
So we've lost our beaches.
We lost our manufacturing.
All right.
Look at Detroit.
And now, here's the third part.
They are not calling the port of Oakland.
There's no backlog there.
And you know what Oakland is primarily used for?
Export of agriculture.
What happens if our farmers lose farm?
Are we going to be asking other countries for food?
And what's that price going to be?
And who controls the price?
We are Americans working for America.
So, let me ask you this here.
So, the questions about some of these other states that are sitting there saying, hey, if you have, like DeSantis says, if you're having a problem over there, bring them over here to us.
We can work.
We have workers here.
What is how much of the challenges that we're reading about is the shortage of truckers?
How much of the challenges we're hearing about is the shortage of workers.
How much of the challenge we're hearing about is politics.
What is the challenge?
How much of the challenge is it?
The fact that the ships are not getting someone higher to get it off?
What's the real challenge that's taking place there?
The real challenge is the lack of land space, and no one wants to purchase it.
We need to get the containers as quick as possible.
My suggestion is: some of it is empty, it's going back.
Some of these carriers don't want to do it.
I suggested to one of the port authorities that there should be a mandate of 50% of empty containers that must be loaded back on the vessel to get it out of here, back to wherever we buy our goods.
Okay, now that that'll clear some of the duck.
The other thing is the third shift.
Now, by the way, we have flexible ships.
We can work three different start times on the day ship, which is first shift, three different start times on the second ship, which amounts to about 20 hours of work.
And we do.
We have these staggered shifts.
So that's only about a four or five-hour downtime.
Now, that four or five-hour downtime on the third ship should be used for consolidating on the dock.
They should use delivery and they should be used for rail movement.
Okay.
So PNSF has, and UP has to get on board also.
So the stakeholder chain outside the ports has to make a move.
It's not the ports.
You guys are looking at the sink full of water when the clog is in the pipe.
The clog's in the pipe.
It's not the workers.
It's not anything.
It's not any labor shortage with us.
We work day and night.
And the deal is there's somebody with this $100 tax, I suppose some of the carriers and some of the everybody else in the stakeholder chain.
I don't know.
I'm not an economist.
I'm a longshoreman.
I'm a third-generation 40-year veteran here.
And all I know how to do is move cargo.
And we move it.
How do we get more truckers?
Take your automated system.
What's the best?
What's the best way?
What's the best way to increase the number of truckers in the country?
Some of the railroads have also said that they're sitting on containers because there aren't enough truckers to pick them up from the railheads.
So how do we get more truckers in America?
Well, that question I can't answer.
I mean, I'm just, like I said, a longshoreman.
But what I can say is this: that here's what's happened to our economy.
Since we've done overseas trade, every consumer, everybody buys Amazon.
I mean, I was a crane operator when I made president in office.
We have a very democratic system.
I was buying online.
Here's the deal.
The container is the warehouse.
If you go look at Costco, you go look at those shelves.
You see a pellet that's high up there and it's got shrink wrap.
That wasn't done at any warehouse in America.
That was done by whoever boxed it and say like China.
So the container has become the warehouse.
So when 2019 came around, there was a 25% steel tax to China.
Well, for some odd reason, we all of a sudden got the COVID in March of 2020.
Go figure and where it came from, okay?
So there was no end game when you attack China's economy, they attack you their way.
Wow, I won't say conspiracy, but you know, uh, uh, you know, I read, I'm a Bible bumper if you want to call me that, whatever.
So, I have a lot more thoughts of different than some of my you and your brothers and sisters.
But do you know what?
China does produce 89% of the world's containers, 89% is what China pays.
How about the percentage of chassis that they produce?
America, we've sold out to everybody, we're buying from everybody.
It's not we have to wake up.
We don't have our beaches anymore.
Okay, our economy is outside us.
We buy, we ship back empties and we buy goods.
I see it every day.
Ramon, two questions for you.
Ramon, two questions for you.
Number one, are you concerned?
Uh, uh, uh, are you concerned that some folks are going to say, you know what, I'm just, I'm going to, uh, instead of the strategy of going to Long Beach or LA, I'm going to go to a different direction.
I'm going to go to Houston.
I'm going to go to Miami.
I'm going to go to Jacksonville.
I'm going to go to Mexico's port.
Does that thought at all concern you that someone's not going to want to go to LA?
Or is this not an LA and Long Beach issue?
It's not an LA and Long Beach issue.
The supply chain outside of us is cramped.
There's kinks everywhere.
Even if they go to another port, who's going to truck it out of there?
Who's going to rail it out of there?
Okay.
The supply chain outside the ports, I don't care what port it is, is going to be hit no matter where you take the control.
So you're not at all worried that it could go elsewhere.
You're not at all worried that they're going to go elsewhere because other places are not putting that fine of $100 and another $100 incremental day by day if the containers stay there.
Well, of course, I'm always concerned that work leaves us.
Of course, that's a concern.
But you know what?
That's out of my control.
And I'm not going to, I don't worry.
You know, I say my prayers every day.
The good Lord's been taking care of us.
Hey, we're moving cargo in Southern California.
You know, when this balances out, the majority will be in Southern California because we're going to move it.
We're going to move it fast.
We're going to push for rail because rail saves the economy, saves the environment.
It moves faster because you don't have a congested freeway.
I can't even get on.
I'm going to, I have to leave so early to get to work.
I live in La Marada and I have to drive on the 91 and I'm in number one lane.
Everything else is trucks.
There's no more room to put trucks anywhere.
So when we and the ports are projecting to get, we're going to get to what they call TEU as a 20-equivalent unit.
We're going to get to where the 20 million mark, I suppose, by this year.
We did 10 million in a 12-month period in the port of LA.
And that was from May to May, May 2020 to about May 2021.
It was a big celebration.
But we're going to continue to move the cargo faster and more efficient than anybody.
And last but not least, from last but not least, from what you know, what are in these containers?
You know, you're hearing perishable goods.
You're hearing how businesses are telling the you know, America, yeah, listen, Christmas toys are not going to be delivered on time.
How aware are you of what are in these containers, brother?
Like I said before, we purchase everything outside the U.S. Corporations and big business have done their manufacturing outside the U.S.
We don't, where are the manufacturing plants in here?
Where are the toy plants?
Are they in the U.S.?
Where are automobiles made?
Detroit's gone.
That's just, this is just the life we live now in America.
We don't manufacture in America.
Ramon, here you come.
I'm sorry.
Outside of stuff.
Ramon, you and I were talking about this a little bit last night, too.
And the phone was kind of breaking up when you first started talking about it.
But you were talking about those companies that are profiting from the owners of the cargo ships.
Do you think any of this is politically motivated or anything because of the profits people are making because of this shutdown or this slowdown?
Is there something going on other than just logistics?
I don't know.
If you're a carrier and you could make money off the congestion and it's working for you, would you even care if the containers moved or not?
I don't know.
The poof's in the pudding.
Carriers, the major, three major carriers are recording $3.5 billion a quarter.
They're in congestion.
They raised the price of the container.
America, you know, what are we going to do?
You tax the carrier, he claims he's going to go, you know, they claim they're going to go elsewhere.
Okay.
Well, you know what?
Who's going to flinch first?
I don't know, man.
I'm a longstormer.
We've never backed down from anything.
We don't leave with our chin either.
So, you know what?
If this is the game other countries want to play with us, I know we got to find a strategy to defeat it.
And I, like I said before, I'm a long storm and not an economist.
All I know is I'm going to be moving cargo as quick and fast as we can.
We're going to work as many hours as we can.
Now, the employers are the ones who make the orders.
So when you look at this, us not working the 24, the 24 hours, the employers are the ones that have to put an order in.
They order us to go to work, we work.
Your employer says, okay, you're working nine to five, you're working nine to five.
Okay, whatever it is.
So that part of it is what I know.
Well, first of all, Ramon, one, thank you for pulling over and being a guest.
The audience is definitely enjoyed listening to you.
And number two, thank God a guy like you is leading that 8,000 and 4,000 union as the president.
Whoever gave you the promotion, well deserved to them and well deserved to you for leading men the way that you are.
Appreciate the insight.
And hopefully in the future, when we have another story like this, we'll invite you back on to come and give us your insight.
Okay, I give you a diss pray for our country.
Oh, we there's no question about that.
Thanks, buddy.
Appreciate you, Ramon.
Take care.
Drive safe.
Bye-bye.
Bye-bye.
So, two things, real quick: pull up the MarketWatch story, real quick, the one that was up there.
Wow.
To his point, yesterday, it was reported that our trade deficit rose to a record high of $96.3 billion.
Exported goods from America fell 4.7% last month.
Okay.
The record number.
Pull up the map of the rail network in America.
Whoa, where'd it go?
Okay.
There's not a lot of rail coming out of Southern California, to his point.
Look at where the rail is.
The rail is where the rust belt used to be.
That's where the railheads were built.
And Union Pacific has invested a hell of a lot of money in Texas and in a railhead that crosses the border.
But there's not a lot of rail traffic coming out of Southern California, to his point.
What is all of that up there in the middle?
Illinois, Ohio.
Those are all small rail lines.
Got it.
Got it.
Unbelievable.
That number you just said, you just kind of went through it fairly quickly.
Can you go back to that number she just put up?
96.2%.
Almost at $100 billion a month.
That's how much we're importing.
Folks, if you're listening to this, you enjoyed what Ramon had to say and you want us to bring back guests like this to kind of give their insight to our foot on the ground.
Give this channel a subscribe if you enjoy that.
Tom, thanks for that introduction with Ramon.
That was amazing.
That was fascinating.
I think the best point he had, though, too, was that even if you get it off the ships and you can't get it anywhere, then it's stuck just sitting in the ports.
And I remember I worked in a warehouse in Norway when there was a fire in one of the freezers on the other side of the country.
They would literally ship stuff across the country to us for us to take it out of a truck, repackage it, and send it back.
Because that was more efficient because of the backlog they were experiencing.
So I definitely think that that's something that I have overseen in terms of they can get it off the, if they can't get it off the ship and then it's just stuck at the port, it's not going anywhere.
And with the backlog we have, there's only room for so much before they have to start shuffling things.
And like you talked about, you're going four or five in the height, and you have to get hold of the container at the bottom.
You now need to move four containers just to get that to move it away.
And you talk about just increasing the time of doing that by four or five.
It's creating inefficiencies.
And I think the other good point, too, is they're busting their ass, right?
They don't determine their workouts.
We've not stopped working on COVID.
Right.
They just flat out said it.
That union is hired by the companies that bring in the goods and need them unloaded and shipped around.
So it's not like they're setting the hours.
But again, what set this off?
Too much stimulus money to where we went out and bought stuff like crazy.
This is a demand situation.
All these imports coming into the country and the trade deficit being at a record high, that's because we're buying more overseas goods as a country than we ever had.
And the lack of manufacturing.
He could not be more clear about the point that we don't even, like, Detroit is gone as far as making cars.
I mean, they're out of there.
24% of components come from China.
I saw a lot of the others come from Nexus.
It's proved that we don't have an infrastructure to support the new importing as opposed to exporting.
So if that's the way we're going to keep going, then okay, but then we have to adjust the infrastructure to be able to sustain that and to be able to get it off where it needs to be.
So who's going to pay for a big, old, new railroad?
That's Warren Boffett.
He owns one.
I like how I said, I said, are you worried that the business is going to go elsewhere and maybe to a different port, Houston, Miami, Jacksonville, Mexico?
He says, of course, it's something I think about, but I don't worry because I'm a praying man.
He went to his faith.
But he said, of course, I do.
That does concern me.
There's a reason that the president of Panama was recently in the city of Houston having a big old celebration because the units that are coming into the Houston port because of the widening of the Panama Canal are at record levels.
Pretty wild.
Do we want to do one more story before we wrap up?
If you can pick and choose one last story, here's what I got.
I got energy crisis story that has to do with Oramco, oil.
I have Fed prepares tapering asset purchases as inflation surges.
We talked about that.
Crypto millionaires move to Puerto Rico as U.S. territory becomes tax haven.
I got an Alibaba story that lost $344 billion, biggest, a world's biggest wipeout.
Amazon warehouse story, Tom Brady's story.
Okay, can we bring in Brady?
You want to do a Tom Brady story?
The economist is demanding the sports story.
Are we going to do Tom Brady's story?
The woman does not want to do a Tom Brady story.
By the way, Daniel stole all my notes on the economy that she was talking about earlier.
She looked at my paper, that five-minute soliloquy she went on that shit.
It was yours.
It was your notes.
She stole my notes.
Unbelievable.
I'm not plagiarizing anything.
Unbelievable.
Okay, Tom Brady.
Tom Brady gifts Bucks fan one Bitcoin for giving back 600 touchdown ball.
This is a sports illustrated story.
Buccaneers fan Byron Kennedy received quite the haul for return of football involved in Tom Brady's 600 touchdown pass on Sunday, including signed memorabilia and season tickets to Tampa Home Games.
And Brady had one more gift in mind for Kennedy on Monday.
Brady said he also gifted Kennedy one Bitcoin during an appearance on Monday Night Football with Peyton Manning and Eli Manning.
Now, perhaps that doesn't sound like much out of context, but Brady's gift actually comes with a pretty hefty price tag.
Current Bitcoin price, $60,000.
Yet it seems as though Kennedy prefers something other than a financial reward.
The Bucks fans said the ultimate wish is to play a round of golf for Brady.
Perhaps the GOAT will take Kennedy up on the request after Clinching ate his eighth Super Bowl in February.
I mean, listen, I like that.
The ball itself is fine.
Ken Golden came back and he said, this is a $500,000 ball.
Can I be the caddy?
Right.
Please.
You know what?
I think Tom Brady, he is a completely different person now.
And the fact that he escaped the prison camp that he was in for 20 years under that dictator, that nut job coach that can't win without him.
Why are you such a big fan of him?
And my dad backs me up by the money.
What did he do to you?
You know what?
You guys, that is the easy way out for all of you, but he's 17 games under 500.
Yeah.
How dare all of you?
I think Brady was drinking on Monday night.
I really do.
I don't like the Red Sox either, FYI.
Okay.
Well, I'll get started on that.
All Boston sports.
So Tuesday is the off day in the NFL.
Brady calls into that show on Monday night with Peyton and the boys.
You know he was having a cocktail or two that night.
But with the shackles off, he is just a completely different person.
And I think Brady needs to be an inspiration to everybody because he literally is showing if you want to operate at peak efficiency, physically, mentally, there is a way to do it.
Buy his book.
There's a roadmap.
If you want to invest the time and the energy and the dedication it takes, you can operate like that at the age of 44.
He's going to be the MVP this year.
And I'll give you this little anecdote.
When he was a rookie, his first year out of Michigan, when he was a nobody, I was the sports anchor at Fox in Boston.
I was in that locker room once a week in the locker room.
Maybe I saw him three times.
Maybe I glanced at him once.
He was irrelevant.
You wouldn't think of talking to him.
You wouldn't think of looking twice.
He wasn't the starting point.
He was his best friend.
Right, I've missed a great opportunity there.
It's just unbelievable how he's evolved and what he's doing.
He could be here with us now.
Seriously.
He could be calling in right now in a couple weeks.
I don't want him to call in.
I actually want him to be here.
The Tom and Tom show.
No, I think the other thing which was interesting about this was that you mentioned as well that Ken Gold was saying easily $500,000 for the football.
In the article, it said that there are 28 baseball players who've hit a 500-plus home run club, but there's not even anyone who's remotely close to the 600 touchdowns.
Puts him in a completely league of you're thinking, really, he's got so many mementos, so many monumental occasions and records and stats.
Why does that one matter?
But you're right.
No one will touch that.
600 touchdowns?
No.
Until the 700th, right?
Which will happen.
No, and obviously, I was reading, there was a whole bunch of things the other fan got, too.
Two signed jerseys, one helmet.
He got Mike Evans game jersey, signed cleats, two season tickets for the rest of the season.
And then there was one other thing he got.
He's going to sit in the suite with Brady for a game or with his family.
And then he got a $1,000.
The first thing they offered him was the $1,000 gift card into the 14 shops.
First of all, first of all, first of all, just so you know, the Charity Buzz.
I don't know if you've heard of CharityBuzz.com.
These guys go in, they'll say, hey, have dinner with Bill Clinton for $300,000.
Have this, have that, have this.
$500,000, you could have sold the ball.
Great.
You get a round of golf with Brady.
What is that worth?
No.
To a guy that's actually a Brady fan.
That's priceless.
Yeah, priceless.
That's it.
That's what I'm saying.
So, I like, because a lot of people were coming out saying, you know, he shouldn't give them all back, et cetera, et cetera.
He said himself, though, it's the right decision.
Like, this means more to him than to me.
More power to this.
This kid was raised properly.
Precisely.
More power to him.
There are a lot of parents in America teaching their children to be independent.
I totally agree.
Agree.
I totally agree.
We're from the same camp.
So, having said that, folks, it's come to an end.
What's next episode?
What is next episode?
It ain't going to be next Tuesday.
It's going to be next Thursday.
Next Thursday.
Episode number 100.
Next Thursday will be episode number 100.
It's going to be crazy.
We'll have some surprises.
There'll be some giveaways.
And it won't be two hours.
I think it almost is going to be three hours that we're going to do, but it's going to be next Thursday.
Tune in.
There'll be special guests, and we'll have some fun things that we'll be doing next Thursday, three-hour podcast.
Danielle, thank you so much for coming out.
I'm glad to be here.
This was a blast as usual.
Tom, appreciate you, buddy.
Kai, phenomenal job.
And Tyler, you're getting better.
You're getting better back there, which we like.
Just remember, Kai does not have cats.
But our friend Adam, who's at the Dallas Captain, does.
