Black Rifle Coffee & Kyle Rittenhouse w/ Mat Best | PBD Podcast | Ep. 173
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PBD Podcast Episode 173. In this episode, Patrick Bet-David is joined by Mat Best, Tom Zenner and Adam Sosnick. They discuss the hardest thing when transitioning from the military to civilian life. They also discuss who will be the first female president, China buying farmland next to sensitive military bases, the Black Rifle/Kyle Rittenhouse controversy and why China is rolling tanks down its streets.
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Patrick Bet-David is the founder and CEO of Valuetainment Media. He is the author of the #1 Wall Street Journal bestseller Your Next Five Moves (Simon & Schuster) and a father of 2 boys and 2 girls. He currently resides in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.
To reach the Valuetainment team you can email: booking@valuetainment.com
0:00 - Start
8:07 - The biggest challenge with transitioning from military to civilian life
15:46 - Black Rifle Coffee reacts to the Kyle Rittenhouse controversy
25:17 - The truth about the camaraderie in the military
38:22 - Why is the White House redefining the term 'recession'?
44:24 - Why do people want to stay in California?
57.01 - Is Joe Biden mentally fit to be president?
1:06:42 - Will the U.S. ever have a female president?
1:16:08 - Reaction to China buying farm land next to Top Secret Military bases
1:25:49 - Did China try and buy Patrick Bet-David?!
1:36:35 - How to take advantage of opportunities to earn money
Why would you pet on Goliath when we got Bet David?
Value payment, giving values contagious.
This world of entrepreneurs, we can't no value to hate it.
How do you run, homie?
Look what I become.
I'm the one.
When you got Bet David.
This sets the tone.
I like it.
Listen, Tom, we miss you.
I got to tell you, man, it's been a minute since.
Now, obviously, I saw you last week in LA, but we miss you.
We are back.
We haven't done a podcast for a week.
A bunch of things going on in LA.
But today we have a special one for you, folks.
Let me tell you why.
If you've ever seen the movie Deadpool, okay, I want you to think about it.
If you've ever seen a movie Deadpool, imagine the real life person of playing Deadpool, but this is a real life type of guy that you're talking about.
Badass, military, ranger, I think five tours, a rapper.
One of his songs was a billboard number 36, YouTube channel with a million and a half subscribers, makes viral videos.
He came out of the closet one day telling his parents he's a conservative.
Just a lot of different things.
Very interesting, dynamic, funny, intense, badass veteran.
Special guest, Matt Best, co-founder of Black Rifle Coffee.
It's good to have you on.
Thank you so much for having me on.
I feel amped up after that intro.
Thank you so much.
Yes.
We're excited about having you on.
The whole thing with podcasting, man, when you do it and you're having fun, you want to do more of it.
And then you got interesting characters like you that come on.
It makes it even more exciting.
But Tom, last week we were in LA.
I got to tell you what happened in LA, which was kind of weird.
You know how you went to New York and you said, wow, New York's much better and et cetera, et cetera, right?
That's what you were talking about about a month ago.
And by the way, I talked to you, Tom, then I think you said you went to New York and it was great.
Oh my God.
We went.
We took the family.
We went to D.C. first and then we went to New York City.
You know, the thing is, you're so programmed now to believe the media or you're just so susceptible to the crap that they feed on you.
So you think it's chaos.
Yeah.
It couldn't have been better.
I thought New York was better than it was the last time it was there, pre-pandemic.
DC was incredible.
So don't believe the hype, man.
These theaters are open, but I'm anxious to see what you have to say about Los Angeles.
Are you going to announce that you're moving to Portland?
I think the audience.
One state at a time until I get to Florida.
I got to say Chaz.
Yeah, he would make a great leader, Chaz.
Tom, what do you think about that?
That's pretty, that's a good thing on your resume.
I'm considerate.
We had a similar, I guess, conversation last time we were in LA.
The first time we were there, 2020, we went literally looking for the homeless.
We didn't have to look hard.
Was it that bad, though, when you and I found it?
How about the last time you and I were there?
Not bad at all.
Let me explain to you what happened this time.
Let me explain to you what happened last time.
So I lived in Granada Hills.
So we went and we kind of went back on all the offices and buildings and everything that I was leasing.
And Granada Hills filled with homelessness everywhere.
Couldn't believe it.
Glendale, homelessness, lower.
This time.
This time.
Glendale was like a three.
Granada Hills was a seven.
You ready?
Let me put it to you this way.
Beverly Hills was a 10.
Get out of here.
Beverly Hills.
You know what?
You know how you say this?
It sounds like you're, you know, how it's like you're overhyping it up.
Come on.
I can't believe you're saying this.
So I go to a new restaurant in Beverly Hills called Catch, okay?
And it's a steak restaurant.
Our friend Kevin took us to the next one.
Remember I told you the story about catch on a podcast?
What's that?
Remember my friend had his car set on fire in front of his business on La Cienega?
Is that catch?
It was right across the street from catch, and they couldn't open catch for the longest time because some homeless had pitched a tent and they couldn't get rid of them.
Tyler, I'm sending you this clip.
If he can show it, if you can pull this up and show this.
So this is Beverly Hills, right across from SLS.
What is SLS Hotel supposed to be?
Low end?
Is it like a competitor Motel 6?
It's a competitor, Ritz Carlton.
Okay.
Four and a half.
By the way, the homeless guy built a treehouse across from SLS.
I mean, that's pretty creative if you think about it.
That's impressive.
That's ingenuity.
He turned it into an Airbnb.
Enterprising young man.
Do you have the clip or no title?
Just give me one sec.
Okay.
So I'm pulling up on Beverly Hills.
You're assuming, like, if there is a city that represents America that cannot be bad.
But think about people from, look at this right here.
Press play.
So that building that you're looking at across is SLS.
You see all of that?
Sit up right there, homeless.
There's even a treehouse that's in front of SLS Hotel in Beverly Hills.
I could not if there was a city that I thought would not have any of it, it's Beverly Hills.
But so I was going hoping I can come back with a story like you had about New York.
I don't have that story about LA.
And it's going to be interesting to see what happens.
So what changed?
Because maybe we just went to different neighborhoods.
We were in Venice.
We were expecting to see all shit.
This literally happened.
It wasn't back to Venice.
Not at all.
The last time you were there?
Yeah.
But why would you allow, like, listen, if we're in Florida and it's not even like shitting on California, you can't allow Beverly Hills to look like that.
But it is what it is.
I'm born and raised in California, so I'm embarrassed.
Some of my state a little bit.
So the crime in Beverly Hills is off the charts, too.
I mean, anybody that goes to Beverly Hills for dinner now, they will not wear their nice jewelry because they could be followed home.
It's a big deal.
This stuff happens like all the time.
Yeah, guys, everybody's DMing me saying, hey, take that jewelry off.
Take that watch off.
You don't want to be seen walking across in the streets with them.
I'm like, what are you talking about?
So you think propaganda, people are talking a lot about it.
And then you're like, no, maybe it's really happening.
Gas prices were $669, by the way.
So $669 is a legit.
Oh, great.
It went down a little bit down.
So, Matt, where do you live?
By the way, if we can, for the audience that doesn't know, Matt, do you mind taking a minute and give them your background?
You know, how you guys came about with Black Rifle Coffee Ranger for the audience that doesn't know.
Sure, sure.
The Reader's Digest version is essentially born and raised in Santa Barbara, California.
I come from a very long lineage of military history.
All my great uncles served in World War II.
My dad's a Marine in Vietnam.
My two brothers served in the invasion of Iraq.
Actually, it's in my book, but they were supposed to graduate September 11, 2001.
So it was a kind of compelling story about how that kind of the day they were supposed to graduate changed the course of their lives forever and kind of probably my life as well.
Because I'll give it to the Marines.
They look good in those dress blue uniforms.
And when I saw them walking up there, I said, hey, I want to serve my country.
And so joined the military at 17, went on to serve in 2nd Ranger Battalion, did five tours with them, got out, hated my life as a civilian, actually moved to Los Angeles.
And for me, it was just the politics and then the age group that I was in at 22 years was just so different than where I had been conditioned to be in my life.
And so I went to rejoin the military, but actually got a job contracting in the intelligence community.
So I did that for about five and a half years.
And that was kind of the way that I helped fund a lot of my businesses early on was essentially taking the capital from deploying, segmenting times when I was home and then just kind of knocking stuff out day by day.
So it was a lot of like risk management because I was making a decent six-figure salary working for the organization I was working for.
And I just applied that and worked my butt off, put myself through college.
And the rest has kind of been history.
Matt, a question.
You know, a lot of times you'll go, there's a friend in Dallas, Ballin is his last name, who they run this military thing with another guy that we went to their event.
There was a bunch of guys, Rangers, Delta, Special Forces, you know, paratroop, all the badass guys in a marketplace in the military.
What do you think is the biggest transition from guys who made it here in a military to coming into civilian and making it?
Because, you know, it's kind of like, well, if you can make it in the military, you work so hard, camaraderie team, leadership, ya, da, da, da, da.
Shouldn't you come out and kill it in the private free enterprise?
Because it should be an easy transition.
What is the biggest challenge to transition from you're here protecting, saving lives on the front line, you're getting shot up, seeing people, you're seeing some difficult things, I mean, chaos nonstop to transition into civilian?
I think there's a lot of job skills, obviously.
Like if you're a team leader in an infantry unit and you're making dynamic decisions while getting shot at, you already have such a leadership sensibility about you that absolutely applies to the civilian sector.
For me, it was the cultural change from the military, right?
Because all of a sudden, I had to deal with fucking feelings.
And that's the truth.
Whereas when I'm overseas and you're working with a very professional team, you know, we have the most edgy jokes to each other, but we all know that we got each other's backs.
And for me, coming into the civilian sector, that was the hardest part because all of a sudden I had to like worry about a pronoun, like straight up.
And for me, it really messed with my head.
And it was the whole reason I went back overseas because I wanted to be around people like me that could make jokes, be a little reverent.
And then that kind of metabolized into me saying, hey, I'm going to start my own businesses because I can choose culturally who's a part of that.
And I want to work with fun, exciting, educated people that want to crush life.
I don't want to work with people that want to be victims.
And that's what I found a lot in the civilian sector.
And I'm not painting that for everybody.
I'm just simply saying corporate America has been conditioned like that, especially the last 10 years.
It's gotten so much worse.
So if we have the opportunity to create a culture and hire veterans that believe in the stuff we believe in and give them, you know, a safe space in a way of in irreverent terms, kind of the opposite of a space space where people can wear their tattoos, say the F word, like, let's just get work done and treat people well.
Do you ask that in the interview process?
Like, or do you, are you more, I'm actually really curious because you guys have built a very, very successful brand company.
I mean, you guys are killing it.
It's not a small thing that you guys are building.
You guys have done a great job with the company.
So is it you use a recruiting firm that specifically focuses on talent and culture and you tell them, these are the five things we're looking for if you come here?
Or do you guys in the interview process specifically ask certain questions that filters out people that maybe won't fit your culture?
What's that process?
Yeah, I think it always starts with the top, right?
So you have a CHR or whoever your head of human resources is, like that comes from the founders and the executive staff as far as, hey, these are the things and the attributes that we want in someone.
And it's almost like back in the intelligence community, you'd rather have someone that has a TSSEI clearance and then train them how to do a profession because the clearance is the hardest part.
The culture in business for me is the hardest part.
Once you see someone and you know, okay, they might not have the exact skill set that we need quite yet, but we can put a professional development plan together.
And then honestly, I like that because especially if they're a veteran, we're providing them a structure to succeed, learn a new skill, and they already have their leadership experience.
They have the culture experience.
Now it's just a matter of like, how do I roast coffee?
That's a pretty easy skill.
And we're giving them a new skill.
So it's all in, I think, the format of who you're looking for and the culture aspect of the employee side is a very large thing for me, at least.
Got it.
So it's upfront.
So if I'm going through the interview process, I'm already going to know what it's going to entail to be part of Black Rifle Coffee.
Yeah.
And let's be honest, a lot of it maybe doesn't even need to come from us because if you look at the company and you go on and look at the videos and you watch Coming Out as a Conservative, you referenced that earlier, you have a pretty good indicator of what my values are and what the company's values are.
You either like it, you don't like it.
You know, a lot of people don't like it and they don't come work for it.
Have you ever had people that don't agree with your values that work with you guys and were successful?
I'm sure, yeah.
I mean, they probably were quiet about it a little bit.
How big are you guys at this point?
How big is we're over a thousand employees?
A thousand employees.
Got it.
About 50% veteran high rate in that too.
No shit.
50%.
Yeah.
Props to you around there.
First of all, thank you for your service and thank you for hiring vets the way you are.
50%.
Yeah, I mean, that's what we set out to do, and we're not done.
I mean, this is just the start, to be honest with you.
So what's the vision?
What's the grand vision?
What are we going to be doing?
Are all of us going to be drinking coffee one day?
Hopefully.
I saw some other coffee back there in the green room.
I might have to change that out.
This is weak, bro.
This is not your coffee.
I'm not drinking it.
I was expecting maybe a gift or something, bro.
I don't just in the mail, I promise.
No, I mean, we made a promise to our customer base.
We're going to hire 10,000 veterans years ago.
And that has been at the forefront of our journey this entire time.
And you start to see that a lot more with some of the brick and mortar locations opening and a lot of other strategic partnerships that we're doing, like partnering with Dallas Cowboys, stuff like that.
So it's always who loves you?
Who hates you?
Who loves black rifle coffee?
Who hates black rifle coffee?
I mean, a lot of people love us and a lot of people hate us.
You know, we've been in a culture war a few times during it.
So we're not shy to, yeah, a little hate in the internet, but I'm okay with it.
It is what it is.
Speaking of haters, you guys, since whatever deal you put together with the Dallas Cowboys, made a lot of news.
Yeah.
What was that?
What was the drama with all that, especially with the recent string of mass shootings or school shootings that was kind of in the news?
It's an emotional position from woke media, in my opinion, because when I look at this and I look at it like battle space back in the military of like, who's taking shots and why are they taking shots?
Well, they're trying to rip away like people that just love America.
And that's where I started because it's America's team and America's coffee.
So when a lot of people somehow, based off of us having black rifle coffee in our company's name, tried to use that and sensationalize that into saying that somehow it was distasteful because a national tragedy happened and then a football company and a coffee company are partnering.
I don't understand.
Was it the timing?
Is that what it was?
Yeah, but I mean, when is, but that was months and months ahead, right?
So it is what it is.
If people want to get offended at that, hey, it is.
Yeah, I think you need to be congratulated for doing a deal with Jerry Jones.
That's the epitome.
I mean, that is phenomenal.
That's going to pay huge benefits.
Let me ask you this, Matt.
You're not that far removed from the military.
What are people telling you as far as the wokification of the military?
Is that real?
I mean, are they changing?
Yeah, I mean, we've talked about this over the years.
It seems from a lot of my friends, not every unit, but there are specific units and the cultures that have been changing because when you have a lot more progressive leadership that comes into the White House and other portions of the country, their influence over generals and admirals and name the brass, that top down, right?
Top down comes from culture.
And yeah, I don't know, this whole like mandatory vaccination thing in the military, I mean, it seems as we are just trying to create a weak force, which is like the opposite of being a war fighter.
Like it's okay to have tattoos and you're going out on target with your friends to kill or capture high-value targets.
Like that's a real job.
And you need people that signed up for that.
I'm trying to be very casual with my statements there, but the whole purpose of being in the military is to fight wars and win them.
But I think man's men are making a big comeback.
I think it's coming back.
And I think people are sitting around and saying, what the hell are you talking about?
By the way, you know who's going to help man's men make a comeback?
Women.
It's going to be where a lot of like, you had a girl on on your podcast who's like, listen, this is what I'm looking for for a man.
I want to be able to do this.
I want a man that does this, where they're looking for more alphas of men who are willing to step up and take the lead rather than being, you know, pansies walking around thinking they have to please everybody.
And I think it is making a comeback.
So I don't think that's going to slow down.
By the way, just out of curiosity, what was the issue with Rittenhouse?
What happened with the shirt that was worn?
If you can talk about that a little bit, because there was a little bit of controversy with that.
Yeah.
I mean, we got kind of thrown in the center of that.
I mean, the start of it was, and it's weird that I have to say this so much, but going into that, When you watch that video for me, Kyle Rittenhouse defended himself with a firearm legally.
And I've been a huge Second Amendment proponent my entire life.
I mean, I'm one of the like OG guys on YouTube that started making comedy videos.
Well, when the shirt came out, it was a huge mix up with like kind of a sponsorship essentially.
And it was pretty much said that we'd sponsored him and we didn't sponsor him.
And so when we put a statement out saying we didn't sponsor him, people took that as we don't support him.
Drastically two different things.
And also like we had a, we had kind of a weak response, to be honest with you.
We were caught off guard and we were, we kind of fucked it up, to be honest with you.
Oh, no, shit.
Yeah, like, okay.
I think there wasn't clear and concise, like, this is what we believe.
It was scattered information and then people ran with a false narrative.
And, you know, when you look back at certain things like that, like I'm not a PR expert, man, I was carrying a gun professionally like eight years ago.
So, but it is what it is.
And I think most people see now, especially even after the company went public, we have not veered from anything that we've ever done.
Like at the time where most people might change their brand position, we're going hard in the paint with their support for Second Amendment.
I mean, I just did a great podcast, I thought, with the Firearms Policy Coalition, who I think is the leader in Second Amendment, lawsuits and everything they do to protect the Second Amendment.
So we're out there doing what we believe in.
And I'm a constitutionalist and most people know that.
Question for you.
Sure.
In that moment, because I remember one time, you know, Media Matters came after me and Daily Beast came after me.
We were having an event, I think, with Kobe Bryant, the late Kobe Bryan, and President Bush and Jordan Peterson.
We put, you know, you were at this event, right?
6,000 people were put in the room and it's an incredible event, phenomenal event that we had.
Next thing, you know, Patrick, but David, this, I'm like, what the hell is going on?
So we came back and we called them up and we addressed them.
We handled, we had a lengthy call.
I was just coming back on a flight, a incentive trip we had with our guys.
But we didn't have a publicist at the time.
We didn't have a, you know, a big Sunshine Sachs in New York saying, here's how you handle it.
First number, you say this, this is a script.
When that happened to you guys, did you have somebody that was kind of directing you guys where you took the counsel from them?
Or was it more, here's how we're reacting to this crisis?
For me, it was more, I was just so taken back that people on like our side would be like, that we went woke and we're not, we're anti-2A.
I was actually more confused than anything.
And a part of that too is like, I didn't really realize the importance of that situation for the Second Amendment.
Whereas if he would have been found guilty, what that would have done for case law.
Didn't know that until probably a couple months when I sat down with a lawyer and a friend.
He was like, this is why this specific instance matters so much.
And went, oh, I got it.
But then also, right, I look at the sense of I'm a veteran-owned and operated coffee company that puts veterans first.
And I like am a huge gun guy personally.
And so like, I didn't necessarily know why the company had to make a statement in that situation.
It was just very confusing at the time, I feel like.
And so I think to your point, you make mistakes, you learn from them.
And all you can do is be exactly who you are and stay authentic.
And I think we've done exactly that.
Just again, just to finish this up, I want to move off on this topic.
But if you, like, the next time around something like this happen, what's going to be the different approach?
Is there like a new system?
Because we created a system for ourselves.
Because if you don't know how to deal with the immediate, they're going to bully you.
And they're not going to stop because they'll keep picking at you.
What is the new approach that you guys are planning on taking if something like this happens?
Well, in our initial statement, we said we believe in the judicial system pretty much.
It was like verbatim that.
I don't want to say verbatim because that'll let's speak a turn.
But it was, we like we it was implied that we were fully supporting Kyle and we believe he was going to be found innocent.
But there was still gray area in there.
So probably Ford, I'm going to be so clear and concise with my statements because obviously anybody can take, I mean, we see the news that has done that so many times just over the years.
They take an interview, they misplace the statement, and they make you look like an asshole.
You know what it almost is?
Here's the craziest thing.
What it almost is, and you hear this over and over and over again, until it happens to you, man, you know, to apologize or not to apologize, right?
To bow down or to say, listen, this is what we stand for.
The guy has the freedom to wear that shirt.
This is what he supports.
Did we ask him to wear that shirt?
The guy chose to wear that shirt.
How come you don't call people the next time there's a shooting and the guy's wearing Nike?
How come Nike doesn't get called out for that?
How come, you know, Puma, how come whoever it is?
I don't know who wears Puma, but how come these other guys don't get called out for that?
But this specific area, it's because of, hey, this is what you stand for.
You're conservative.
Boom.
Let's go after this.
So, you know, it's almost if you are specifically, if you're conservative, it backfires if you try to play the diplomatic game.
They will keep bullying you over and over and over again.
Yeah, plus there's no doubt where you guys stand and you're very articulate.
So you don't really make mistakes if a microphone goes in front of you.
So I think you have that as an advantage.
I think people are getting tired of apologies.
I think a few people are going to, we're just exhausted from it.
Don't you think a few people are just going like you watch some of these commentators right now that, oh, and comedians, and you see what happened to Dave Chappelle in Minneapolis.
I'm not sure if you guys talked about that, where his show got canceled last week at First Avenue.
But I think people are just exhausted of apologizing and hearing apologies all the time.
Like, who has the time to be offended by everything?
Like, if I said something that offended a lot of people, I honestly wouldn't care.
I mean, like, why would I want to go out of my way to apologize to somebody in Topeka that I've never met before?
Well, I laugh on that too, because, you know, I don't speak a lot about politics.
I don't know as much as you guys do, but I have obviously my opinions.
But I'm like not a political pundit.
I'm like a knuckle dragger that carried a gun for 10 years and then does stupid comedy on YouTube and somehow started a business.
So for people to over believe that I am like the smartest guy in the room is the wrong thing.
I'm just putting one foot in front of the other and trying to do what I got to do.
But you've created a thousand jobs.
You've taken 500 vets that you've given them a job.
So I remember when you go through the ETS process and you're going through not MEPS, what is the other one that you're kind of going through?
It's like six weeks.
And hey, you know, here's a job opportunity.
You know, I was going to be a cop at Fort Lauderdale Mall.
They offered me 36 grand and I'm living in LA.
I'm from L.A. I'm from Granada Hills.
I'm like, am I going to go take this job at the Fort Lauderdale?
We're building a new mall.
Would you like to be a cop here?
Literally, $36,000 of your salary.
And I'll, hey, you can go do this.
You can go work for post office.
If you take the test, you get an additional 10 points.
You can be a firefighter, but there's a freeze in L.A.
That whole process, when you're going out of it, it's like you're going from hardcore routine, hardcore formation, hardcore structure, to now you're a civilian and in the military.
And that transition, you know, I think you talk about transition where anything in life, anytime you're transitioning, that's not a, that's not easy, you know, when people go through a transition process.
So for you to help currently, I'm sure you guys have hired more than 500 vets, but currently to have 500 active vets that are working with you guys, you know, you're helping in a way the government.
You're doing government's job without taxpayers needing to support those vets.
You're giving them a job, but they're able to have dignity and pride in the work that they're doing.
And I think that needs to be celebrated.
And they need to say thank you to you for what you guys have been doing rather than the other way around.
Well, we're stoked because the DOD and a lot of leadership, specifically in some of these old soft units, are making really good decisions, I think, as far as when people are getting out.
So we've been working with the DOD, like with skill bridge programs, and it's something that I wish could have happened to me, but probably good it didn't, is when about six months before someone's getting out of the military, they'll actually pay their, the DOD will pay their military salary.
They come and work for us for six months and intern within the company.
And then from there, a lot of the times, more than not, we'll hire them on as a direct hire right there because they got to learn.
And if not, then they at least get to see and taste what it feels like to be in the civilian sector and more of like our realm.
So if they go somewhere else, so it's helping with that transition stuff.
And we've had quite a few of those coming through the doors lately.
And it's a really rad program.
And how long have they been doing that, that transition?
Specifically DOD.
Skill Bridge stuff.
I'm not sure how long that program's existed with us.
I think we got involved about two years ago with that.
That's cool.
That's great.
Go ahead.
Here's my question for you, bro.
I mean, you're a patriot who served our country.
And I know your book was thank you for my service.
So thank you for your service.
You're a patriot who served our country.
Now you're serving coffee to Americans.
So respect.
But my question, because I think only 7% of living Americans have served in the military, right?
I didn't serve in the military.
I've actually been around more military people since joining Valutainment, hanging with Pat and Sapala and Eric and Chris, like some of my very closest good friends.
But a lot of Americans don't have experience with military.
I think less than 1%, 0.1% are active in the military.
So what I'm trying to understand is mostly for people watching this, I assume 90-something percent of people have never served in the military.
I want to understand the culture a little bit better because if you're not around it, you don't get it.
You don't get why people in the military love 2A so much, right?
What the brotherhood is, what Pat always talks about, the camaraderie.
So, I mean, you're hiring veterans and you're around these people.
You're empowering these people.
What I want to understand is what is it like?
Why does the military obviously are proponents of the Second Amendment?
What is it about the military that people just don't understand the brotherhood of the military?
Well, a lot of most people that were war fighters in infantry special operations tend to be proponents of the Second Amendment because when you're deployed, like black rifle coffee, black rifle, that's a life-saving equipment.
That's a life-saving tool.
Everywhere you go, I slept with that thing.
I went to chow with it.
That is the difference between saving my own life and my teammates' life and not being very proficient with it.
And it's a tool.
And a lot of this, like the civilian side that's never touched a gun, right?
You're scared of what you don't know.
But that's what we did.
We hand it every day.
We know how to safe handle it.
And I mean, I carry a gun every single day in Texas because, I mean, if something happens and I'm not to get too far into it, but like when people, oh, more guns will fix the gun problem.
We just saw it happen in Indiana when an active shooter shot, I think, two or three people and a concealed carry license holder shot the guy and saved countless lives.
So for me, that's the whole reason.
It's a tool and it's a tool of safety.
And that comes from, I think, a lot of us just carrying those in our background.
But yeah, to the culture side of the military, man, it was just we lived in a tent together for like months upon months.
And so you just kind of had this bond that never changes.
I had the opportunity to see my two best friends I've known for 18 years.
Went to basic training, airborne, RIP, Ranger School, war.
So we got to drink whiskey and tell war stories this weekend.
So that's cool.
I haven't talked to them in months and we just pick it up right where we left off and something like that.
I'm very blessed to be part of.
In your videos, because it's not all glory.
It's not all glorified.
I mean, in your videos, some of your best friends are in your videos.
Half of them have freaking no legs, bro, or missing an arm.
I'm like, holy shit, this guy's doing comedy.
He's doing satire.
He's being funny.
But at the same time, just looking at the images, guys are missing limbs.
How do you grapple with the humor of life, but also some of the downs of being in the military?
I can't speak for, you know, all amputees or anybody.
I'm not an amputee, so I can't say anything.
But I will say, like, most of my friends who are missing limbs, they want to be treated like they're human.
And I think a lot of times with visible war injuries, people treat them differently and they just want to be a part of the crew.
And that's why you see a lot of the jokes that we make where I think Crispy Omar Avila, he rolls the lawnmower and pretends to chop his leg off and then, you know, stuff like that.
So it's kind of humor through horror kind of vibe where we just have to laugh about it because you can't change what happened.
You can only change what hopefully will happen.
Do these guys have regrets, missing limbs?
Do they wish they never went to the military?
Do they double down and saying it was the best decision of my life?
I'm trying to understand the mindset, especially when you lose limbs for your country.
I would say that we should be very thankful that such men and women exist that can lose limbs and say, I'm happy and I would do it over in a heartbeat.
One of my mentors, Clint Triall, absolute badass dude, over 20 years in the military.
Last deployment got both his legs blown off.
And he works with us now and he's been like a mentor.
And I sit down and talk to this guy.
I just want to go like do pushups, you know, swing a kettlebell because his perspective on life through all the tragedy that he's had is just absolutely brilliant.
And I wish more people would sit down over a cup of coffee and listen to a gentleman like that.
Pat all the time talks about, like, I feel like that's like your fondest memories of life is your time in the military and the camaraderie.
And I mean, you've had friends come in here on the show and be a part of this.
What's your take on that?
Listen, I mean, he's at a different level.
You got five, you know, you're talking about he made it to the pinnacle of experience on what you do with the military ring, you know, to do what he did.
But the main word you'll hear from almost everybody in the military is the C word, it's camaraderie.
That camaraderie.
And by the way, here's the part.
If you have thin skin, you're not going to make it in the military because the jokes, if 10% of the jokes were seen in the public, like you know, military, they can't do vlogs because the YouTube channel would be shut down.
They would offend everybody.
The jokes are so direct and painful that you're either going to be able to handle it or you're going to say, I got to transfer to a different unit.
So it toughened you up.
You built friends, relationships.
And you see anyone, like the other day, one of my guys sent me a message, Klingerman.
Klingerman, this guy was funny.
He was a guy that played football in Ohio.
So we'd go to bars in Clarksville and we'd go drinking.
Here's how he was.
He would drink one, two, three, four, five, 10, 15, 20.
I mean, he's drinking, right?
When he comes out, if he didn't meet a girl, guess what he's doing?
Getting in a fist fight.
Oh, first of all, that's automatic.
Because he was a linebacker.
This guy almost made it to the next level.
If he didn't meet a girl, no joke.
His head is going into a car's window.
I mean, we have to like, not tonight.
Bam!
To entertain you guys?
Was that part of it?
No, that was frustrating.
It was almost like the movie.
Remember the program?
Remember the movie, The Program Course?
Where that one guy would go in, you know, with his psychopath.
He would paint his face with a blonde gun.
But you know what?
Crazy of a guy as he was.
Everybody loved him.
That's crazy.
You tell these stories and people are like, but Pat, that's not normal.
Yeah, listen, you buy your normal.
This is our normal.
It is what it is.
The reason that I'm so freaking fascinated by this, because I played college football.
Tom Zenner also played college football.
There's a level of camaraderie and manliness and like, you know, like, but I feel like in the military, it's even more enhanced.
Like the camaraderie in football, it's cool.
We get along.
We'll be battling, you know, punch each other in the face and all that.
But military, it's life or death.
It's not life or death.
Different meaning for throwing a bomb.
For sure, that's for damn sure.
It is very similar.
And I think I get along with a lot of pro athletes.
Like I have a lot of EFC fighters that are my friends just because the culture is the same.
It's put in the hard work.
Love your kin and then have some fun.
It's pretty simple.
But remember, one you're doing for a team, one you're doing for a country.
Right.
No, I'm not.
And one is life and death.
Correct.
Every day, yeah.
So, but, but, I mean, I'm sure it's very close to.
No, I'm saying it's probably not very close.
That's the closest thing I can to experience.
And I see them see old friends that they used to play.
That's true.
Like that one time you brought a friend.
We went to Yard House.
Who was the guy that was a basketball player?
Oh, Tarot.
And he was saying, Charles, what did he say?
The waitress came up and said, Charles Barkley is the greatest player of all time.
Yeah.
I'm like, what are you talking about?
She says, Michael Jordan's not even in top 10.
Do you remember that weekend?
Yeah, exactly.
That's very weird.
That's what I remember about your friend.
The waitress is what I remember.
But you and him used to play basketball.
That guy was all county, 10th, 11th grade, 12th guy.
He was amazing.
And just you guys exchanging stories.
Yeah.
Again, to Tom's point, we were never life or not.
But football of any sport, I'd say, is the closest.
Well, let me just what you go through.
So then, then, Matt, let me do it for him.
I don't think he wants to do it.
I'm going to do it on behalf of Adam.
Adam's asking if you can make any contacts where the military can make an exception where a 41-year-old man can join the military.
At least a couple weeks of basic training.
I do want to go shooting, though.
I've never shot a gun.
How about that?
Is that crazy?
What?
Yeah, did you see his mind shot?
I never shot a gun.
Never shot a gun.
Dude, I shot my first, I think I shot it when I was four.
Yeah.
But this is what I'm saying.
I ever shot a gun.
Exactly.
I live in Miami.
I live in South.
Have you ever shot a gun?
Reaction.
Very minimal times.
I've shot guns.
Tom's 50-something years old.
He's 10 years old.
I'm here for verbal warfare.
Yeah, I own a 20-millimeter.
I own an anti-material craft phone.
But, brother, this is the point of.
You don't want me and Adam having.
This is the point of my question: there's a lot of guys out there.
We've played football.
It's not like we're fucking pussies.
Like, we've battled on the gridiron, but very few Americans have served in the military.
And that's like, I want to go shoot a gun just to fucking feel what it's like.
You sleep when you're sitting in Texas anytime y'all are invited.
Adam and I are bookending two guys that have more artillery than some countries, I think, right?
Well, then why don't you do this?
I think we got a couple guys right after.
Let's just go get it done today.
Pop your cherry today.
We don't have to talk to them.
There's a large percentage of Americans who, when they see, like, you've done a video, the gun-free zone video.
Yeah.
Hilarious, bro.
Like, robbers come in, guns, you bust out your shirt and it says gun-free zone.
And they're like, oh, okay, well, guess what?
Put down like the way that you use satire to make fun of these situations, I think, is truly admirable.
But a large swath of Americans really have never shot a gun.
They don't get it.
They don't get gun culture.
I'm trying to let them understand and soak the knowledge out of you of why it's so important.
Yeah, I mean, especially that one.
I made fun of that because it's my way of combating some of these ridiculous narratives that I believe for gun control where, you know, putting a sign up that says you're an easy target sounds pretty stupid to me.
Like schools that you're saying.
Just like even at my house, if I was like, hey guys, no guns in this house, no dogs either.
Just come on in, right?
And like, here's my Instagram so you can see when I'm out of town.
Like, are you that stupid and like benign in your brain that you can't understand that there's evil in the world and the only person that's going to come and protect you is yourself?
I mean, come on.
But by the way, you know, whether you have guns or not, you probably would benefit from saying you have you put a sign outside your house that says this house, we have guns, shotguns, and you say a freaking Rottweiler or a pit bull lives here.
Attack whether it lives here.
Whether that's sort of guns, you're probably safe.
Horrible marketing.
Now, you may get some, what do you call it, some socialist flyers of somebody that's running for office that are going to put in front of your building or your house, but you're not going to have to worry about somebody breaking into your house.
Interesting perspective.
So, okay, did you have any other military questions for him or can we transition?
Did Jerry Jones have your back during that controversy?
Did he call you and say, hey, man, I got this covered?
Because I think he alleviated some of that heat with his power, didn't he?
Yeah, Jerry's absolutely amazing.
And I mean, from what I heard, he was stoked on the release.
My business partner, Evan, has direct comms with him, so I'm not that important to talk to Jerry Jones.
I don't rate that high, you know?
Prediction: Will the Cowboys win a championship while Jerry Jones is alive?
Still, I mean, I'm back there caffeinating them all with black rifle coffees while Jerry Jones is alive.
Wow, you went there, huh?
So you don't think they're going to win one?
I don't.
I think he needs to step down and move away.
I think he's over his what, though, is GM?
I just, look, they've had their run in the 90s.
They had their run Michael Irvin, Troy Edmund, Emma.
Salad or just step them in and bring a GM in.
I just don't see them winning with him now.
With him as well.
I think it starts with a quarterback, but that's another conversation.
They've got a top five quarterback.
I don't know about Tom.
Dallas is one of the best things in the league.
It's just they shit the bet in the playoffs.
Guys, they haven't won for a long, long time.
It's been 25, 26 years that they haven't won.
It's been a minute since they won.
We're going to win this season.
How about that?
This season?
Prediction time.
Black Rifle dropped.
If you're going to be gamble here, I'll bet five bucks on it.
There you go.
You got a bet.
Come on.
You shake out what's going to win this season.
Let's shake it off.
There we go.
Adam and Matt have a bet.
The playoffs, a first-round playoff win.
Five bucks.
Five bucks or one-third of a tank of gas.
I'll come collecting too, bro.
He is a collector.
Okay.
Okay.
Sounds good.
You guys mind if we get into some stories?
A lot of stuff.
We learned a lot.
Let's hit some stories here.
So one of the ones I want to hit up is how the White House is handling inflation.
If you guys are okay with that, let's go into that one.
Page six.
Okay, so here we go.
The White House wants to redefine recession ahead of possibility of disastrous GDP report.
Economic commentators frequently use two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth as rule of thumb that an economy is in recession.
While the economy shrank by 1.4% in the first quarter, President Biden's economic team argued that even if second quarter GDP is negative, it's still unlikely that would indicate the economy is in a recession.
The National Bureau of Economic Research defines a recession as a significant decline in economic activity that is spread across the economy and lasts more than a few months and looks at everything from inflation-adjusted income, various employment statistics, consumption expenditures, and industrial production.
Google, however, defines the phenomenon as a period temporary economic decline during which trade and industrial activity are reduced, generally identified by a fall in GDP in two consecutive quarters.
Can you do me a favor, go to Twitter?
Go to Twitter if you can.
And go to my Twitter.
Yeah, go to my Twitter.
The last thing what the White House released on July 21st.
I think everybody has to see this.
Go up a little bit.
It's so interesting when they do it and how they do it.
Keep going up, keep going up.
It should come up on the next one.
Go a little lower, go a little lower, go a little lower.
Right there.
Click on that one.
Oh, my God.
It does that every single time, huh?
Give me a second.
I got you.
Okay, so when you read that tweet, you know, what the White House released, that was released July 21st, which is what, five days ago.
I think today's the 26th.
Make it bigger so they can see it.
Just click on the, no, just click on, yeah, click on that.
Zoom out a little bit.
Okay, watch that.
So what is a recession?
While some maintain that two consecutive quarters of fall and real GDP constitute a recession, that is neither the official definition nor the way economists evaluate the state of the business cycle.
Instead, both official determinations of recessions and economists' assessment of economic activity are based on holistic.
Look at the data, including the labor market, consumer and business spending, industrial production, incomes.
Based on these data, it is unlikely that the decline in GDP in the first quarter of this year, even this is a key word here.
This is a key word.
This is protecting to say they're about to announce that there was a decline in the GDP second quarter.
Watch how it ends up.
Even if it followed by an even if followed by another GDP decline in second quarter indicates a recession.
Now, if this isn't trying to redefine a recession pre-midterms, I don't know what it is.
Tom, what do you think about this?
You know, it's just, I think they're testing our limits to just how stupid we think we are, they are.
It's just not working anymore.
In order to sell this, you need other than very creative writers, and they have some.
I mean, I give them credit for trying this spin, but the realities are out there.
Everybody's dealing with this on a daily basis, and there's no credibility coming back from the White House anymore.
Like you would believe them if they said that.
We all know the situation right now.
It's just, I think they spend so much time ignoring the real issues, not finding ways to fix problems that they start believing it themselves.
And every day, there's something new that they're trying to brainwash us with and news flash.
We're just not that stupid.
I think collectively, people are waking up.
Yeah, for me, it's more like a White House.
It's like clout over country where all they care about is the feel-good virtue signaling stuff as they just watch economic collapse happen.
And then, I mean, to the point there, I mean, they're making excuses already and they're lying.
Well, they're coming.
They know that report is going to be coming.
That's like saying, just because this tastes like water and the second sip tastes like water, it's not water.
Yeah.
And we're smarter than you.
You have to believe us, man.
But that's not why.
I guess not water.
Yeah, because we make all the definitions.
You don't.
Adam, would we trust them anymore?
Like, come on.
Like, over the pandemic, and they're coming in here.
Does anybody believe this?
That's the point, though.
I think that's the main question because what's the approval rating?
What approval rating just came out?
I saw something.
23%.
Because I know Adam always talks about that as bad as his approval rating is, it's not lower than Trump.
It might be worse now.
Yeah.
His approval rating is the lowest, like all-time low beating Trump.
So if I'm correct, though, Trump's approval rating was like at the end of his term, right?
It was at the very end where during COVID.
Yeah.
And then after January stuff, but this is like, this is now, you know, not even two years into it.
Adam, what do you think when you hear this kind of, you know, well, I think that the GDP report is supposed to come out on Thursday, I believe.
And I don't believe that there's going to be a pretty picture inside.
So right there now, they're trying to do a spin job.
They have, what's the new press secretary, Corine St. Pierre?
She's out there sort of doing like mental wrestling, trying to redefine what a recession is.
But whether they come out and say it's a recession or not, I think Americans feel what's going on, right, with inflation, with surging home prices.
People feel it.
So they're going to, look, whether it's Republican or Democrat, nobody wants to own that you have, yeah, we have it.
You know, congratulations.
You're going to try to do a spin job.
But at the end of the day, the voters are going to have, you know, their opportunity to say what's on their mind this November in the midterms, and we'll see what happens.
But clearly, economically, it's not a pretty sight in America right now.
We talked about the Fed doing the quantitative tightening right now.
So they're saying that inflation is what it reached 9.1% in June.
They're starting to say that it's coming down.
They're starting to say that gas prices are coming down.
And whether you're a Democrat or Republican, I think we are on the same page.
We want prices to go down.
We want inflation to go down.
We don't want a shitty economy.
So we'll see what kind of spin job they do.
But for the sake of the country, I'd like to see us not in a recession.
But like you talked about on your housing, real estate housing segment you did recently.
I think my fear is, is the worst still upon us?
Like if this is the worst of the worst right now, I think Americans have dealt with it.
Is the worst, is something worse coming?
I think that's the question right now.
So I'm going to read this from an economist.
If you can pull this one up, because this is all over the place.
Here's an economist.
His name is Nouriel Roubini.
Just so you know who Nouriel Roubini is.
He's an Iranian American economist.
He teaches at NYU, Stern School of Business, and chairman of Roubini Macro Associates.
So this is not a regular guy.
He got his degree from Harvard and he's done very well for himself.
He also went to Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
I know you would appreciate that.
So economists, shallow recession calls are totally delusional, Rubini warns.
This is a Bloomberg article.
He said, the U.S. is facing a deep recession as interest rates rise and the economy is burdened by high debt loads, calling those expecting a shallow downturn delusional.
There are many reasons why we are going to have a severe recession and a severe debt and financial crisis.
The chairman and chief executive of Macro Associates said on Bloomberg TV on Monday, the idea that this is going to be short and shallow is totally delusional.
Look, you got two sides.
You pick and choose who you want to believe.
Okay.
I was in LA this last week and I was given a talk and I decided to open up my message in a completely different way.
On Wednesday night, we had a dinner with one of our lawyers, entertainment lawyer, solid guy.
We went to cross stations, great conversation.
Anytime I go to a dinner with a lawyer, I have a time clock where I said at 45 minutes, I'm going to say I got an emergency call.
We got to go.
It's been great seeing you.
But this lawyer.
You're saving some money that way.
Two and a half hours later, we're having a blast.
Funny guy, and he's a badass.
And so we're sitting there and having a guy.
I said, Pat, you won't believe it.
You know, I just, my house in Toluca Lake, 2,000 square feet, three bedrooms, right outside of Van Nuys, like Toluca Lake, Chandler.
He says, $1.8 million.
He says, I can't even believe it.
He says, how can you live in a 1.8 million home?
Who can afford a $1.8 million house?
Three bedrooms.
So I go when I'm giving this speech at Santa Monica.
I went to Santa Monica and I spoke at Montebello and at Granada Hills.
So here's how I opened it up.
I said, I got a question for you guys.
I said, raise your hand if you have no plans of leaving California in the next three to five years.
Okay, I just looked at me like, what?
I said, let me ask this question one more time.
Raise your hand if you have no plans of leaving the states you love in the next three to five years.
70% of hands go up.
That's 70% is, to me, it's low.
I thought it was going to be higher.
They have no plans.
No plans of leaving in the next three to five years.
How many people in the room, by the way?
400 people.
300 people are not leaving.
Dude, so 300 people are not leaving.
So I said, raise your hand if for the first time in your life, you're actually considering leaving the state of California.
30% will leave Durham.
I'm like, okay, interesting.
It's 100 people, though.
It's a lot of people.
So I set the phone.
I said, can I just speak to the people that are planning on staying here?
Yes, absolutely.
I said, if you're staying in California, what you're telling the world is you like being part of the state that has the highest gas prices.
Okay?
You're okay with that.
You're saying you're okay with being in the state that has the highest state taxes, period.
You're okay with that.
You're saying you don't mind being in a state with the highest all-in taxes.
You're okay with that.
You're saying you don't mind being in a state that has the highest homelessness in America.
You're okay with that.
I said, do you want me to continue?
You don't mind having the most, by the way, this Friday, they're announcing masks are coming back in LA, just so you know.
I said, you don't mind.
Stop.
This is in LA.
You can't see this.
You don't mind the fact that you're overly regulated, controlled.
Everyone's telling you everything you need to be doing.
You're okay with that, right?
I said, do you still planning on staying here?
Their hands weren't.
Yep, we're still planning on staying.
I said, no problem.
Then if you're planning on staying here, why don't we do a little bit of math together?
They said, sure, let's do it.
I said, a friend of mine I had dinner with two nights ago.
He said he just sold this 2,000 square foot house, barely 2,000 square feet, three bedroom, two bathroom, for $1.8 million.
I said, do we have a realtor here?
Lady stands up.
I said, can you help me do math here together?
Yes.
If I'm buying a $1.8 million house that's only 2,000 square feet barely and it's three bedroom, if I got a family of four, I can barely live in this place.
How much of a down payment do I need to put on this $1.8 million house?
She says 10% minimum.
I said, what's 10% of 1.8 million?
180.
How many middle Americans in California have $180,000?
Not a lot, but let's just say you got it.
So you put $180,000 down.
That $1.8 million, now you're financing what?
$1.62.
I said, can you tell me what's a mortgage payment on $1.62?
She says roughly $12,000, PNI, everything included.
I said, perfect, fine.
I said, this $12,000 I make, is it pre-tax money or after-tax money?
She says, that's after tax money.
I said, so what do I need to make pre-tax?
18 G's.
She says around $20,000 to afford $12,000.
I said, perfect.
I said, is everyone tracking?
They're like, we're tracking.
I said, perfect.
What is the number typically you're only supposed to spend per month on your mortgage payment?
Isn't it supposed to be a third?
It's supposed to be a third.
So for a 2,000 square foot house, that's only three bedroom.
If you need to make 20 grand pre-tax money, what do you need to make to be able to afford a third of it going to mortgage payment?
They said $60,000.
I said, what's that times?
$12, $720.
I said, how many of you guys are going to make $720 in California the next three to five years?
I said, now let me ask you this.
How many are still planning on staying in the state of California?
You've seen what happened.
I said, how many of you, just based on that, are open to the idea of leaving the state in the next three to five years?
You know what happened?
What happened?
Of the 70%, half of them raised their hands and they said that's just not sustainable.
I said, then let me speak to the other guys that are planning on staying here.
How the hell are you going to get to 720?
Tell me, I'm curious.
Yeah.
I'm curious.
I really want to know.
The numbers just don't make sense.
I mean, what do you want?
The median income in this country is 50 grand.
And we're talking about making 700 grand.
Here's what's ridiculous.
And on top of that, at all of this inflation, at all of this stuff that's going on, how are you going to be ready for this?
I don't understand how people in California survive.
Why are you guys looking at me?
By the way, the weather's great.
And the Rams just won the Super Bowl.
Even on top of that, too, just the pressure that the federal government did with the lockdowns in state, specifically in California.
I mean, they just ruined the middle class and then the inflation right after.
I mean, it's the whole like, who gets to judge an essential business?
You know, and then you look at states like this great state of Florida and DeSantis, who I hope is president one day and Texas, like they incentivize small businesses.
And, you know, and that's what we should be doing rather than letting these conglomerate huge corporations just swallow up the small man.
Like it sucks.
Hey, Pat, to your point about mass coming back in LA.
So about, I'd say about a week and a half ago, I started getting the alerts from the LA Times on my phone.
In a week, the numbers are up where there's probably, I couldn't believe it.
I was so depressed.
I mean, literally, I could not believe what I was reading.
And they kept throwing it at you for the next three or four days.
A couple of days ago, the LA Times sent out a little alert that said that the levels have tapered down a little bit.
So I bet there's some powerful forces in LA that are saying there is no damn way you're doing that again because I don't know, man, I'd be shocked if they do it again.
It was trending that way, but I just saw one that said that the numbers have gone down a little.
So, you know, LA is on a tipping point right now because we have a mayor election coming up this fall.
And there is a progressive on one side and there's Rick Caruso on the other side, who I believe personally will fix LA.
I mean, he's got a background of doing that.
He's very tough.
He ran as a Democrat, even though he's a businessman.
He saved USC.
I mean, if you want a fascinating read, look up in the LA Times the story about how Rick Caruso was brought in as the de facto CEO of USC after they were facing billions of dollars in settlements from a rogue doctor, abusing patients and whatnot.
I mean, they couldn't have been lower.
He brought in the new football coach, essentially, Lincoln Riley.
He got them back from being in debt from these huge payments.
He saved USC.
This guy's smart.
He'll fix homelessness.
He'll bring hope to people.
I think he'll help with business.
I mean, this is a big, big thing coming up in November in California with that mayoral election in L.A. On Friday night.
We had dinner with a couple of guys that are, you know, Hollywood type of guys, you know, actors, producers, directors, and we're having dinner with them.
And I said, so you guys politically, you don't lean towards the right.
You lean towards the left.
This is what side you've been on.
Yeah, what about it?
How do you feel about what's going on in your city and your state?
What do you think about masks next week?
What do you think about your governor?
And you'd be amazed what they said.
They said, Pat, low-key, there aren't many people in Hollywood that support this guy.
But what's the alternative if you're going to be vocal about it?
You have to be.
If you're in the entertainment industry, you have to.
Even in the entertainment business, you either support just to get career advancement or you just don't talk about it.
Okay.
They're not happy about the mask.
Can you pull up that NBC story I just sent you?
Look at this.
LA County Indoor Mask Man.
They could come back this week.
Look at the date.
Yesterday, July 25th.
There you go.
LA County indoor mask manager.
They're not going to come back this week.
I think you nailed it on the head, though, because cancel culture isn't just like a media internet thing.
It is in professional like Los Angeles.
A lot of my friends who are actors will on the side like whisper in my ear, I have a clock at the house.
And I, you know, but if they were to say that to anybody on set, they're fired in a heartbeat.
It's over.
Fired because they have a gun, you're saying?
Or that they say that's that, that's just how it starts, right?
Oh, I heard he's a gun owner.
And then it's like, well, he looked at me weird.
He sexually assaulted.
And then it's the cancel, the cancel play, you know?
They do it to so many people.
Hey, to Matt's point here.
So you guys heard about Chappelle's show that got canceled in Minneapolis last week.
That's First Avenue.
All right.
He's performed.
That's Prince's Club.
Remember First Avenue, Purple Rain?
Epic club in downtown Minneapolis.
All set to perform.
They cancel on him on Wednesday.
So then a different theater booked him and he went over there and did some killer shows.
But they talked to the people, like, why would you do this?
And they sent, it was about the trans, right?
The trans topic.
And the owners of First Avenue were saying, hey, we had to do it.
Our lives were being threatened.
Our families' lives were being threatened by trans supporters, the ones that came out there and protested and were throwing eggs at people waiting in line.
So to everybody's point here, just because they're acting some way publicly doesn't mean that's how they really feel.
But people's hands are tied.
They're backed into a corner in a lot of situations.
Let me tell you what I did.
So while I was there, this is what I think a lot of people need to be doing.
Okay.
And if you're listening to this, if you don't like your state, well, do something about it.
So Pat, what can I do about it?
Very simple.
Let me simplify it for you.
Number one, if you know people that would make great governors, go challenge them to run and back them up.
If you think somebody is a person that would be a good leader, go have a serious conversation with them.
One of the days while we're in LA, I go to a very, very, very well-known man named Dudley.
And I sat down with him for 45.
I said, so tell me, how's California been last?
Obviously, I'm first trying to recruit him to Florida.
It's the first thing I do.
Then if you say no to moving to Florida or Texas, and then I say, you're planning on staying here?
Yes.
Perfect.
You do want to stay here?
Yes.
You love your state?
Yes.
You want to do something about it?
Yes.
Why don't you run?
Why do I need to run?
Who else needs to run?
If none of the great leaders who have backbone want to run, then who the hell is going to run?
Is it always going to be somebody else that's going to run?
If you love your state, you love the policies.
Well, my way of contributing is in a different way.
Totally get it.
I mean, we all have a different way of contributing, but eventually, if you really want to change policies, you got to run.
But it's not pretty.
Of course it's not pretty.
It's not supposed to be attractive.
It's not supposed to, but go run.
It is the only way if the people in California truly want their state to improve, get behind a candidate and rally.
Rally and be a flag carrier like never before.
Do whatever you can for that person to get elected and then help make some changes.
It is worth it.
Or if that's not what you want to do, you can't sit on the sidelines, well, you know, maybe one day, yeah, maybe one day, and maybe one day, yeah, maybe one day, and maybe one day.
No.
Then you have the choice that you got to make for your family.
One guy said, well, Pat, you know, I'm not going to leave.
I'm going to stay here.
Okay.
So let me ask you a question.
What's your point?
You sound brave when you say it the way you say it.
Like others who leave are less brave than you.
So let me ask you a question.
Didn't your parents leave another country to come to America?
Are your parents not brave?
If they left Mexico to come here, were your parents not brave?
If my family left Iran to come here, should they have stuck it out in Iran?
You know, either impact through policies or make the better choice and move.
But the pain must be felt.
And you know what?
I think if they don't have the wherewithal or the ability to run for governor and they're powerful and important and they could have influence, somebody has to stand up and support a candidate that goes against the grain, that you're going to take some public backlash from it.
I think that would almost be as brave as running for office.
Don't you, if some powerful person in Hollywood supported a Rick, I mean, it does happen a little bit, but you get the Jeffrey Katzenbergs of the world who are just attacking Caruso and whatnot.
But even if you couldn't run for governor, I think if you supported somebody that was pro-business or wanted to actually clean up a state, I mean, that's bravery too.
Have we invited Caruso yet or no?
I don't know if we have.
We can't.
Can you text Rob and say, let's invite him?
I mean, I know it's Florida, but we'd get him a few million eyeballs.
I'd love to speak with you.
Hey, can I ask you guys a question?
Just back on the recession thing.
I'm curious about this because I have a theory.
So regarding the recession, how cognitive do you think Joe Biden is?
Literally.
Do you think he's driving anything?
Do you think he has any original ideas whatsoever?
Because here's my thought.
There's no way in hell he's on the ticket in 2024 and he knows it.
So I think if he's cognitive enough that he's thinking about legacy right now, he spent his whole life in government.
And I think his motivation is to not be the worst president.
So he's making day-to-day survival decisions, not leadership decisions, because he's trending to be as bad as Jimmy Carter.
I mean, that's who you compare him to right now.
So my question is, do you think he has, is he calling the shots on any of this?
Or is he just back, hopefully reading the prompter, not screwing that up?
I mean, that's, I think that he's waking up in the morning to a B12 shot and his handlers and their whole goal is for him not to say something stupid.
I don't think anything's coming out of him.
I think it's his corrupt team that's pushing this progressive narrative.
I mean, all the data is there.
Like when he has a cue card telling him where to sit in your chair and you have to capitalize your, I mean, at this point, you're not even coherent.
And I was making fun of it there for a while, but to me, as like an American and I love this country, like my family, it is my family.
It's given me everything.
It's terrifying.
It's absolutely fucking terrifying.
And then when everybody goes, hey, well, he needs to step down.
I'm like, so you want Kamala Harris in there?
Like it's just, it's bad form right now.
And bro, I don't even think Democrats want him to step down because they're afraid Kamala will run it because it's even going to be worse.
No, notice how much they hide Kamala from the camera.
So it's not like you can't find her anywhere these days.
No, but by the way, you know what?
I knew a lot of good friends in high school and in middle school and junior high school.
And this is pure shout out to Kamala Harris.
I had a lot of good friends that were great at hide and go seek.
She's the champion.
I mean, I've never met anybody that's good as she is at it.
Do you think, like, what's your opinion on Biden right now?
Because, I mean, where does it go?
So for me, I've said this many times.
I think in life in companies, the sooner you realize whether you are a number one, a number two, a number three, a number four, or a number five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, the better you're going to do.
If you plug in an eight to be the one, that company is going to collapse.
If you put a one in a seven, you're underutilizing the one.
And eventually that seven's going to leave and be a one elsewhere.
Okay.
But a one is a one and a five is a five.
And you just have to understand that.
It took Carmelo years to realize that you want to win a championship.
You're not going to win as a one.
AI didn't win as a one.
Okay.
Westbrook.
So you have to know.
And by the way, this is by far one of the hardest thing to embrace.
It's the hardest thing to embrace to know that you're not a one.
Okay.
So Biden to me, I think Bernie Sanders is more a one than he's a number one.
I know this sounds weird, but forget about being a socialist.
I think Sanders is a, in the socialist community, he is a one.
I think in the Democratic policies, I don't think he's a one.
I think there's plenty of guys that would be better ones than he would be.
So I don't see the guy as a leader.
I see him as a potential number two, number three.
I think two is even high.
I think he's a number three, four, five, five guy.
Do you think the administration has a responsibility to tell the American public his health?
You saw the interview with Pete?
Did you see the interview with Pete when Pete was being pushed yesterday?
I don't know if you guys saw that or not.
Who did a judge?
Pete Butichic.
Did you see that or no?
He was being pushed yesterday.
And he says, hey, I don't know who was pushing him, but he was asking very good questions.
He says, listen, in 2019, you posed the question that you don't think President Trump was mentally fit to run America.
And President Trump wasn't stumbling.
And then he shows all these pictures.
By the way, you have to see this interview.
We'll find it and we'll post it.
And he says, President Trump wasn't stumbling.
President Trump wasn't shaking hands with ghosts.
President Trump wasn't being told where to sit.
President Trump wasn't doing any of that stuff.
How come you're not publicly calling out the mental fitness of Joe Biden as you did of Trump?
And it's 10 times worse.
And obviously, Pete Budich says, I can see the level of insult in your question.
So I will dismiss that.
He says, no, no, you can't do that.
You said President Trump three years ago wasn't mentally fit to run the country.
And he never went through what this guy's going through.
He says, well, I'd love to see President Trump ride a bicycle.
That's what he said about the fact that.
Yeah.
There was a doctor that came out and said the same thing, a doctor that treated Trump and Biden.
And he said, what?
What was the concern?
Same thing.
I think it was the exact same question.
But that's how they respond, right?
You put a cat in a bathtub and they just react with violence or anger and no logic.
Just answer the question.
You see this everywhere.
You see Shapiro put guys in that position.
You see all these, and they just can't respond.
They get mad and say, well, that's offensive and walk out of the interview.
Like, that's not debate.
That's just you being a child.
Here's my question.
You're lost.
You lost.
If Biden is better as a number two, which I actually fully agree with, I don't think he's side dealing.
I think he's the accidental president.
The timing, you know, COVID, Trump, you know, exactly his polling wasn't obviously doing so great.
Biden, he was more the conservative Democrat, not the leftist, Bernie Sanders.
But would you have a problem if, in fact, Obama was helping him call the shots behind the scenes or even a Susan Rice?
I think that gives me a lot more comfort if someone, quote unquote, grown up in the room was actually helping run the government rather than Biden.
Meaning, he's not exactly who you want in charge.
Or do you want him in charge because he is the president?
I don't have a problem if, quote unquote, his handlers.
I don't think it's like the daycare staff.
I think it's Susan Rice.
I think it's Secretary of State.
I think it's Tony Blinken.
I think there's some people around him who I do trust enough to control the government.
So do you have a problem if it's Obama actually calling the shots?
Let me ask you a question.
Do you think if you're in my ear, you can help me be a better basketball player?
Yeah, I can.
You think you can do that?
I can show you form.
You can show me form.
Just like if I was in my ear, he'd probably help me be a better market.
But no matter how much you're in my ear, can you help me play in the NBA?
No, sir.
Why not?
Some things you just can't teach.
What if Jordan's in my ear?
Let's say Jordan every day spends two hours in my ear telling me how to be a better basketball player.
Am I going in the NBA?
Probably not the NBA, but your mentality is everybody has limitations in different areas of life.
President Biden's limitation at best is a VP of OPA, VP of Ops, not a president.
I'm with you.
So even the point I'm trying to make to you is I can go and talk to a VP of ops to be the CEO of an insurance company.
And no matter what I tell that VP of ops in his ear, he's not going to be able to execute.
There's a lot of experiences you need to be a leader.
And Biden just doesn't have it today.
Maybe 30 years ago, I don't know.
Maybe it would have been different if his mental fitness was different.
But he doesn't have the capacity today to be a president.
Look, I'm on the same page.
I don't think he's a qualified number one.
I will say that I haven't seen anything that's like, all right, he has full-blown dementia.
He has no clue what he's talking about.
I think, obviously, satire and humor and doubling down on anything that he does wrong.
He fell off the bike.
I get it.
But is it that bad?
I guess that's my question.
How bad is it really?
I think it's almost as bad as it can get.
He can't talk.
I mean, you have to just sit down and listen to an interview.
Did you not watch him go, end of quote, repeat the line?
Like sit there and read the data.
He Ron Burgundy, he read the text.
Even in Saudi Arabia.
He's sound at him.
And that's the thing.
It's not like for me, it's like he had a bad day.
It's consistency is king and it's consistently awful and it's progressively getting worse.
I mean, even look back when he was VP or look back a year ago, like you're seeing a massive decline.
Like all politics aside, being the president of the United States is a really, really hard job, right?
The way to the world, everybody's going to scrutinize you on the left or the right, your travel schedule, it is the hardest job in America, right?
So when you put someone with the mental decline that he has in one of the world's most challenging jobs.
Yeah.
And here's the thing.
He's vulnerable.
So the progressives are all over him.
I mean, he's just a little sucker right now, falling for all of that.
If he was a CEO, the board of directors would be removing him right about now, don't you think?
Thank you.
That's a perfect way of putting it.
By the way, let me ask you this.
Do you think he makes it out?
Do you think he makes it out?
That's a long time.
Two and a half years?
That's a long time.
I don't think so.
You don't think he makes it out?
You also don't think he's going to make it out.
In the primaries, he said, I'll come down, something along the lines of, I'll come down with a disease and I'll be switched out.
I think that's exactly what happened.
Yeah, he did.
He said he had a joke.
He said it as a joke.
But you know what?
I think the Democrats are so afraid of Kamala Harris having that, you know, just being in front of the microphone every single day that they'll prop him up any way they possibly can, like weekend at Bernie's if they have to.
I actually agree with you.
This is what's crazy, by the way.
This is what's crazy.
For somebody that follows like history, first person to, first person to do this and all that stuff, I don't know.
I don't know if history wants to have Kamala as the first women president.
I'd much rather have Hillary as the first in heaven.
I know that sounds very weird to say that, but it's very weird.
Like you have a choice between Kamala and Hillary to be the first ever.
Unbelievable.
She dropped out of this.
It's not famous.
Listen, the answer is neither.
The answer isn't like, I'm not sitting here campaigning saying I'm going to volunteer to go help Hillary, but there's no way, at least Hillary, you know, Hillary was, you know, a person that could get up and articulate a message.
You know, she's BSing you.
You know, she's just saying whatever's going to take at that time.
But man, have you heard Kamala given some answers?
And she's always laughing.
And she's got that weird vibe of the way she speaks that is happening.
I actually don't even think it's close.
I think Hillary is way more qualified than a Kamala.
Okay, whether you like Hillary or not, robotic, you know, paid, whatever, she's killing people.
Whatever you want to say about Hillary, 50% of America voted for her to be president.
She went to EU and she lost by a slim margin to Donald Trump.
Kamala didn't even get one percentage of the Democratic primary vote.
She does not even call the person a racist.
But here, let me toss on my tin hat for a second because that very statement I think justifies an exit of Biden at some point during his term because the progressives will have the opportunity and Kamala with her influence will have the opportunity to go the first ever female African-American president.
Not earned, given, right?
Participation trophies are real in America.
That's what it seems like for me will happen, even if it's six months out or something.
I don't know.
Yeah, but it's not earned.
I hope you said that.
Let me give you a dark, dark perspective that I have in this topic.
How much influence do you think Hillary has today in America?
A lot.
Okay.
A lot still?
Oh, bro.
Bro.
Let me tell you my assessment.
Again, I'm fully, I'm a business guy.
I'm an entrepreneur.
I'm not a guy that's involved in this world.
But I will tell you this.
I think she has a lot of influence.
And I think the reason why Biden may not step down, if there even is any influence left, is because of Hillary.
Hillary will not.
She cannot accept Kamala being the first president.
I don't think, I think if Hillary has any influence, she's probably the one that wakes up every morning telling Biden's assistant to give him vitamin C, to give the vitamin B12, to give him TRT, to give him whatever it is that he's on, to just make it for two and a half more years because Hillary, over her dead body, to have Kamala be a president before her.
Anybody but Kamala, she would be okay for Michelle to be the first president.
She would not be okay with Kamala being the first president.
So I think in a way, Hillary's keeping Biden in office for another 20 hours.
By the way, I don't think your assessment is fully wrong at all.
If you're talking about someone like Hillary and you're seeing that if Kamala just gets kind of caked walked into the presidency, Hillary's like, this does not sit well with me at all.
But it's how much money I spent on my celebration party.
I really think that part of Biden's main, if he can have these thoughts, is not letting Hunter blow him up.
Just keeping that thing so that thing doesn't explode, truly, because that could just open a Pandora's box of so much.
And, you know, he's never, that's why governors make good presidents because they've run something, a state.
They've made big decisions.
When you're a senator for 40 years, what have you done?
You run for office every once in a while.
You take handouts.
You know, you vote, but you're not a leader.
You know, you don't do that kind of thing.
So I think this whole hunter, you know, it's so funny because if I have an extra muffin at Starbucks, Shonda knows, and I get in trouble.
I can't get away with anything.
Why does Hunter Biden get away with all this?
I'm in trouble for having a muffin.
I do love him not being a black person.
Have you not met her?
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean, dude, I love Trump Jr.
Great, great dude.
And I'm like, I can't imagine under Trump's presidency if he did one, like one ounce of like the ton that Hunter has done.
Like, do we, they just completely ignore it now?
Like, as if it's totally fine to be smoking crack and having sex with prostitutes and all these other things.
I mean, do you, buddy?
It looks like you're having a lot of fun, but, you know, not as the president's.
Well, I don't know if it's ignored.
It's like an embarrassment, man.
Yeah, I agree with you.
There's nothing attractive about the president's son smoking crack with hookers.
No doubt.
The question is, did he sell his country out or not?
And that remains to be seen.
So the jury's still out there.
Real quick, I want to, Adam, you said earlier you would feel more comfortable if you thought that Obama was running behind the scenes, right?
But that's what's happening.
It's all Obama holdovers.
Anthony Blinken was a former deputy secretary of state to Obama.
Ron Clain was chief of staff to Al Gore.
He was a part of the Obama.
These are all Obama's holdovers, and this is exactly what they want.
Biden wasn't an accidental president.
He's exactly who they wanted.
They didn't want Bernie.
They ran Bernie out twice because he was closer to Trump than he was to the Democratic Party in a lot of ways.
He was a populist.
He was weirdly America first.
He was closed the borders.
So this is exactly what they want.
So I wonder how we'd be better off if that was the case, if it was Obama people.
Again, it just is.
This is exactly what they want.
Was there a question there?
Yeah, like you said.
So I'm asking you how to do it.
How can I get to you?
Like, are you going to take that on camera?
I was watching.
Like, what are you going to say, Tyler?
Tyler, sometimes I'll just point it up as to you.
Okay, there it is.
Well, there's a question.
You said I would feel better if I thought Obama's people were running the show.
No, I said Obama.
Okay, so it is Obama.
It's Obama.
It's Obama's people.
It's Obama's Secretary of State.
It's all, excuse me, his chief of staff.
It's Al Gore's chief of staff.
It's all these people.
They are running the show.
And this is what we're getting.
So how do you feel better about that?
Because it's not Joe Biden.
Well, do you want Biden running the country or not?
But that's case.
You can't say, oh, he's not fit to run the country, but I also want him to be leading the country.
Which one is it?
I'm saying that I feel comfortable with Obama running the country.
If he is calling up Obama, being like, Barack, I'm a little over my head right now.
What's your advice?
I'm fucking okay with that because I think Barack Obama at least can control things that Biden can't.
So you can't have your cake and eat it too.
Do you want Biden running the country or not?
Well, I don't think he is.
To be fair, I don't think he is at all.
I think what he's trying to say is no and no is what he's trying to say.
But let's transition into a different topic and let's talk about tanks.
So did China deploy tanks against protesters?
What we do know and what we don't.
This is a newsweek store if you want to pull this out.
Viral video of tank processions on Chinese street have caused a global stir last week with claims across social media alleging that China's military was drafted in to protect its banks following a major financial scandal.
Posts on Twitter, which have received hundreds of thousands of engagements, allege that the vehicles were deployed to prevent a run on the banks after millions of dollars of worth of deposits were frozen from account holders earlier this year.
Rizawo, the location mentioned in the videos itself, has not been at the center of the banking protests.
Either the city is more than a half 500 kilometers from Henan, where demonstrators have been widely reported.
The general public featured in the video certainly does not appear to be energized for protest.
Most passersby are glancing idly at the military vehicles.
So, okay, so let's say that's what it is, Newsweek.
Let's say that's what it is.
I mean, is this a show?
Is this like a 4th of July show celebration?
Hey, let me go see some tanks.
I mean, how often do tanks just come out?
Why did the tanks come out?
Are they going shopping?
Are they going to In-N-Out to order a double cheeseburger?
I don't know.
What are these guys doing?
Are they just kind of playing video games?
And, hey, let's go show off and, hey, let's get some girls and stuff.
Why are tanks parked outside of a bank?
I'm not speculating.
I think that's a safe question to ask.
I think it's intimidation.
I don't think the Chinese play around with their tanks.
You're used to seeing those when they're out in Tiananmen Square doing some damage.
Yeah, I don't think anything's accidental there, even though I feel so bad for these Chinese citizens, man.
The ones, well, first of all, they lock them down if someone has a sniffle, right?
They knock down a whole city.
And then with these funds, now this happened a long way away from where that was.
But, man, you think about China.
You think how they are under the thumb, Chinese citizens, and you wonder, man, could they ever rise up?
Guns are basically illegal in China.
I don't think Chinese citizens could ever do anything, even if they wanted to.
This is intimidating seeing this.
I think that's like a general military tactic right there.
It's just show of force.
It's letting you know what we can do.
It's the same thing when you're on target and people are getting squirrely and you fly a F-16 right over their heads and you're like, just so you know, we're here.
We're going to do something.
Say something.
We're here.
Yeah.
By the way, they were saying billionaires were trying to take out $58 billion out of China.
And China's like, no, you made your money here.
You ain't taking it out of here.
There's a lot of people that want to leave China, but they can't be taking their money out with China.
And do you have the story about what happened with mortgages in China and the banking system?
Did you see that story or no?
Is this the one?
No, this is around high net worth individuals.
Oh, there you go.
Around 10,000 high-net worth individuals in China are seeking to leave their country this year and could be, okay, it's $48 billion in wealth with them, according to a new wealth migration report by Henry and Partners, an investment migration consultancy.
Interesting.
Hong Kong members rank high.
Yeah, there was a story about what's going on with mortgages in China.
They're in some interesting situation right now.
By the way, I think they just bought like 300 acres in South Dakota and DeSantis is not having it.
DeSantis like sitting saying, hey, what are you doing buying all the farmland in America?
And he's calling a huge problem.
Let me tell you, that concerns me way more than what's happening in this China banking situation.
We covered the story a couple of years ago with this Evergrand.
I never even heard of them prior to this, but they've overleveraged and they've built up crazy amounts of construction and a lot of Chinese citizens have bought pre-construction and crazy debt and there's all this stuff going on in China.
I don't really give two shits about Chinese real estate.
I care about American real estate.
Okay.
I care about if China is buying up U.S. farmland and DeSantis is calling out, now you're talking to me.
Okay.
Because I doubt many Americans are waking up.
Most Americans are waking up trying to pay their own fucking rent and their own mortgage.
I got to be worried about what's going on in China now.
Let me tell you why.
Don't give two shits.
I get it from the macroeconomy.
No, no, no.
But most Americans are more focused on their real estate.
So when DeSantis calls out what's going on in China, like we talked about schools, Texas A ⁇ M, for example, takes money from Confucius Institutes so they can teach Chinese doctrine indoctrinization to students and take their money.
Harvard's on this.
That, to me, is way more of an issue when China is taking their money and their soft power and bringing it to the United States.
Whatever happens to China, I get it.
There's a real estate situation going on.
Figure it out, guys.
The only reason you do see what's going on with China is the same way when you're buying a house, you do comps to see how much houses around your community are selling for.
And if you're a rifle a coffee company and you want to know what your company is worth and you go to someone that's doing valuation, they're going to do comps to see what other coffee companies your size are selling for with the EBITDA revenue market, states, countries where you're at.
It's the same way we have to see what's going on in China's real estate market and loans because that's a case study to see what could potentially happen to the American economy.
That's the only reason we would look at what's going on over there because it's a scary side.
They're having a rough situation over there.
China's homebuyers are running out of patience with the real estate slump last week, a spike in reported numbers of homebuyers halting mortgage payments prompted many banks to announce their low exposure to such loans across banks covered by Goldman Sachs.
Average exposure to property, including mortgages, was just 17%.
If more homebuyers refuse to pay their mortgages, the poor sentiment would reduce demand and theoretically prices in a vicious cycle.
So these are the reasons why you do pay attention to some of this stuff.
But going back to your point, you're right.
Why are these guys buying up all this land?
By the way, one of the places they bought, they bought 300 acres of land in North Dakota 20 minutes from a military base.
What are you doing?
Like, you have to ask motives.
Yeah.
Yeah, why?
Yeah, why are you buying it near a military base 20 minutes away?
Did Bill Gates buy up a crap ton of land?
Well, he's the biggest landowner for farmland in the country.
By the way, I'm way more okay with Bill Gates owning land in the United States than China, the CCP.
I mean, what are we talking about here?
When you compare this to the article that just came out about their interfering with nuclear weapons and how they were installing listening devices, the question isn't why are they doing it?
question is why are we allowing it to happen?
Good question.
Why is the government not stepping in and saying, no, not a fucking chance we're going to live.
Like this is, this is absurd.
20 miles from an airbase.
Of course they're going to install listening devices.
The question isn't why.
It's why is it happening?
Or excuse me, why are we letting it happen?
I guess the question would be, what is the law against the country buying land in another country?
What is the law?
DeSantis says he wants to make it a state law in Florida.
So meaning if there isn't a law of doing that, well, then you need to create a law.
Years ago, when Trump was uncomfortable with Huawei's daughter that was going around talking to Iran and she was in Canada, I don't know if you remember if you remember that whole scandal and Huawei was a number two or number three phone company in the world.
What did he say?
He said, you can't do Huawei in the U.S.
And Huawei took a massive hit.
Huawei was coming up in America.
Huawei took a massive hit.
If this is what is going on, the president has the ability to sanction anyone from China buying agriculture or land in the U.S.
They could do that.
They can add those sanctions on Chinese investors.
That is simply one announcement for him to make.
Well, you hit the nail on the head.
Chinese investors, they're not coming out and saying, hi, I'm here on behalf of the CCP and I'd like to buy some farmland.
It's some guy named whatever.
Or TikTok.
That's a whole nother conversation with white dance.
China has.
But it could be just a Chinese investor.
There's nothing illegal about a guy showing up and buying some property.
But you know that if a guy shows up with a couple billion bucks from China, it's like, who's really pulling the strings there?
Right?
That's the only question.
There's nothing illegal about a guy buying property or a corporation buying property.
It's just how far removed are they from the CCP?
Well, my assumption is not far.
China has no problem saying every day who their enemy is.
It's us, right?
For some reason, we just can't say that and admit it.
So I think we just, we should assume anything they do is to harm us.
If they're coming here to buy five acres of farmland, hang out, plant 5G, whatever, they're out to get us.
Pat, we've been talking about China for a few years now, at least on the podcast right now.
Do you think we haven't realized what China is about to do?
Like, is there still people in the government?
Are the citizens of the United States still unaware of what China is doing?
I feel like it's out there, right?
It's probably out there, but a lot of people are like, oh, get over it.
Kind of just get over what?
You know, it just turned a blind eye, I think, because it's easier to not care than it is to care.
And you think the fact that we're now, that Russia, you know, typically our largest adversary is now in the war in Ukraine, that's kind of taking the attention away from what China is really doing?
Most likely, yeah.
And then the Chinese presence in Afghanistan after absolute failure of pulling out.
I mean, they're making smarter plays, you know, and then you have to look at the Taiwan situation.
What's the Chinese presence in Afghanistan now?
I mean, they have a large CI threat there, like counterintelligence.
So, I mean, I'm sure they're directly working with the Al-Qaeda.
I mean, they're going to own Afghanistan, I'd say, eventually, because they're going to do it more diplomatically rather than militarily.
Like the Russians tried and we tried and we failed at.
They'll pump money into it.
That's how they do it.
But you served in Afghanistan.
At any point, did you be like, why the hell are we here?
Didn't we learn from history that Russia couldn't take over Afghanistan?
We've been here for 20 freaking years.
Taliban isn't going anywhere.
There's any part of you that's like, yeah, why the fuck are we even here?
Is there any part of you that's happy you got the hell out of there or we got the hell out of there?
Even though it was a disaster on the way we left, at least we got out.
Yeah, I think it's just like a relationship.
You have to be all in or all out.
And yeah, leaving Afghanistan would have been fine if we would have had a phased in plan and stuck to it.
And we did have that, but then they just pulled out.
And that's a whole different conversation.
But no, I think that the reasons there, early in Afghanistan, we were hyper-successful in our mission.
And then we kind of got lazy and complacent.
And we sat around and tried to build bases.
And then it just became an occupation.
And we kind of suck at occupations because it's just you're slowly bleeding the U.S. economy and having Americans die for really no specific reason and campaign to win.
Like we fight to win.
We don't fight to stay.
So yeah.
Thank God we have Elon Musk's sex life to get us off these crazy topics.
Do you think he did dangerous?
Kind of.
You know, the other day I saw a, I don't watch golf, but I saw an interview.
That was very I'm trying to find this to show it to you to answer your question where the reporter asks this golfer, he says, hey, the the journey you have been told Saudi Arabia is on, you know all this other stuff that's going on.
How do you feel about the women oppressed, the migrant groups having the rights violated, the LGBTQ individuals criminalized, the families of the 81 men accused, you know, executed and marched and all?
He's just going okay with all this stuff that he's talking about.
And the guy responds back and I think it's Graham McDowell.
I wish I could find exactly what he says to share it with you.
I loved his response.
He says, you know what's so interesting when it comes down to politics, says listen, we're golfers, we're not politicians.
But he says, I'm so curious, why do you guys target Saudi Arabia but none of you guys are saying anything about what's going on in Taiwan and what China's doing to Taiwan?
Why don't you?
You see, the report is like boom, silent.
So so if you're gonna come after me for Saudi, why don't you go after what's going on with, you know, Taiwan?
Same thing in the NBA right, you get those guys.
They'll never talk about it.
They'll talk about other social issues, but they take $500 million per year from China right, so it's a double standard all the way.
So you're bringing up the China deal and you you can always tell who is uncomfortable to call out China.
You better believe there's some kind of a business dealing going on over there and you know, strategically you got to give credit to these guys because they're going and buying up people left and right in America that are for sale.
Strategically yeah, this doesn't mean you have to like it.
This doesn't mean it's the right thing to do.
Your people are for sale.
We're buying them.
Good luck trying to buy our people.
Okay, good luck buying our people in China.
Come on, try buying our people.
See what happens.
But your people are for sale.
I'll never forget when China tried to buy you.
You remember that I do.
As funny as it sounds you, I'm not even bullshitting.
Right now they are war.
We were at when the email came in.
We were in Dallas Texan, at a office, at least I remember.
Call that the creepiest, creepiest zoom we ever did.
They offered you, I think, a quarter million dollars to speak.
I have the email till today and then another quarter million dollars that you're gonna donate something I don't, you want to tell the story.
Yeah, he says, look, we want to fly you out to China because this charity, we're willing to give you $600,000, of which we want you to present a $300,000 check out of your bank account to us.
But you're gonna net $300,000, we're gonna treat you royally.
And an email came out.
Mario and I and a couple of our guys got on the Zoom with them.
It was a PR firm out of New York with folks in China to give $600,000, And so I'm like, I just wanted to hear them out to see, like, are people actually saying yes to this?
And then what is your outcome?
Is it later on in case because we're loud against you for you to come back and say, well, he came to China, give us $300,000 to charity?
So he was a supporter and all this other stuff.
So, you know, it's, but you got to realize.
So if somebody, to somebody, if $600,000 is a lot of money to somebody, like, oh, you know, I'm going to go out there and take a look at this.
But man, a lot of Americans are being sold to China.
A lot of Americans are being sold to China.
Did you come back with a counteroffer after you told them no?
No, it was a very awkward Zoom, and the man was very, there was nothing pleasant.
The two publices were very pleasant.
There was nothing pleasant about the guy.
It was very uncomfortable.
Who was the guy?
Do you recall?
We have the name of the email, but the guy was very disturbing.
And you can understand.
Think about that PR agency.
You answered your own question.
Do people really take the money?
That's what they're doing.
An American PR agency representing China interests, trying to suck in influencers and wealthy people here in the U.S. so they can put them in their back pocket for when they're needed.
Listen, I mean, we criticize prostitutes in America a lot.
And they, you know, they chose to live a life for exchanging whatever they're doing, you know, sex for money.
But there's a real prostitutes are in Hollywood and sports that are taking bigger checks and they're selling their souls and their country to any country that's willing to pay him the money.
So, you know, we have to kind of, if you're really going to talk about prostitutes, you got to really go to the point where these guys are getting paid some real money to sell their country out to other people.
That, that to me, that's, that's, I mean, that's just, you know.
Do you ever see a time where there are people like that can be potentially tried for treasonous activity?
I don't think that'll happen because there's ways to cover through it.
But, but, but just think about it from this standpoint.
To be bought for the rest of your life, no matter what the dollar amount is, you bet.
Like, look what happened with.
Look what happened with what's his name, who just stepped down from who's the guy that just stepped down?
The big wrestling CEO.
Oh, Vince McNamara.
They forced this guy to step down.
Okay.
What did he do behind closed doors?
He bought him.
What's the number now?
It's like 14.28 million.
I don't know what the number is.
It's 14 now.
How many people he bought out and how many people he did that?
Okay.
So what's the solution?
You know, what's the alternative?
Do you know what the real alternative is?
Hey, if you don't come in, I'm going to tell the world about it.
Here's the reality.
If anybody ever threatens you that they're going to tell you about you hooked up with them, you should tell them, look, you're eventually going to tell them.
So if you're going to ruin my marriage now or three years from now, just go run.
I'm not giving you shit.
Because you're going to tell the world.
So you know what?
Matter of fact, let's do three-way with my wife.
Go ahead.
Hey, babe, just want to tell you I screwed up.
Here's a lady.
Oh, I was looking at a three-way, totally different.
And by the way, I'm telling you this.
I'm telling you, you're a freer man to take that approach than to take this approach.
Every single month, you have to be waiting for somebody to say, I'm going to bring this out and take it public and tell you, tell this, tell that.
It seems like kind of a weak way for Vince to go down, doesn't it, a little bit?
I mean, the guy was such a hard charger.
He's the face of wrestling.
No one's been more important in the sport than him.
So what's the story?
He was having the board is basically forcing him out.
Because he was paying women under the table because he was having sexual relations with them.
He was relationships, covering things up.
Was he paying out of his own money or the company?
I think he was paying his own money.
So what's the problem here exactly?
Well, time to go.
Extramarital affairs.
It's a bad look.
It's bad PR.
I mean, his wife ran for Senate in Connecticut.
I mean, she had a high profile herself.
She had a big role in WWE too.
So maybe they all just collectively felt it's time to move on.
Let Stephanie.
By the way, I respect that.
And that's their business.
If they're having the conversations right now and the wife is saying, the hell is the matter with you?
You know, I understand all this other stuff.
What are you doing?
And they're going to have their whatever and they're going to say, you know what?
This is what we're doing.
We're either getting a divorce or you got to step away.
Yeah.
Because this is embarrassing the entire family.
Great.
Make the decision.
You think it was a family decision, a wife decision?
Or the WWE director?
What decision it is?
All I'm saying is, if somebody comes and does this to you, they own you for the rest of your life.
That's not the way to go out if you're that guy.
I don't know why.
No, you need a big tribute.
By the way, can I tell you, and this is the truth?
Now, this isn't quite as big as your offer from China, Pat.
I got an email yesterday with an offer.
Literally, this guy emails me and says, hey, I saw your hosting reel on YouTube.
Would you be interested in some non-sexual naked hosting?
So after all, that's a compliment.
You should be like, babe, working out of something.
People still want me naked.
You know, maybe I will have to reconsider.
Yeah, when do you start?
When do you start?
Congratulations for having a husband where they want to pay him to be naked.
What a bold look for company.
I'll follow up with it today.
I'll show you.
Oh, I bet you will, sir, for the right price.
Well, now that you guys have told me, maybe I will.
But you know what?
No, I don't think I'm that guy.
The naked part.
No.
They think you are that guy.
Have I told you the porn story about what happened when I was working at Chatsworth?
Have I told this?
Go for it.
Okay, crazy story.
So I'm working at Chatsworth.
This guy comes up to me with another girl.
Chatsworth was at the time 80% of porn in America was being produced in Chatsworth.
So that's where I lived.
Until they banned condom or made condoms mandatory.
Weird little factoid.
Yeah, by the way, it all of a sudden disappeared.
Yeah, that's why.
And I used to recruit a lot of these guys, and you would go and you'd all of a sudden sit down with a bunch of porn stars.
You're a recruit for insurance.
I was not in that business.
But I'm at Chatsworth and this couple comes out.
And by the way, you can obviously tell they're in the business, very obvious.
And they look at me and they say, so how much money do you make here?
I said, I'm the top sales guy.
I'm the TO guy.
They come to me to close.
I make very good money.
He says, oh, yeah, what is that?
I said, I make $3,500 a month.
Like, ooh.
Is that Valley's?
And I'm like, you show me a check for $3,500.
I quit my fucking job today.
And he says, how would you like to make that a weekend?
I'm like, damn, that's some real good money, $3,500 a weekend.
How old are you, by the way?
Dude, I'm 20.
I just got out of the army.
I'm like, my testosterone level is like 1,400.
I'm ready to print out.
Dude, I'm like, you know, and he says, hey, you know, for, you know, if you come, you know, here's all you need to do.
Are you comfortable in front of camera?
I said, I'm not shy at all.
I mean, I can be in front.
So I'm thinking it's like, hey, maybe these guys are in Hollywood and they're seeing that, you know, we need a Middle Eastern guy to play some kind of a role.
And I say, yeah, are you comfortable being naked?
I said, we just took a different turn here.
He says, well, listen, let me tell you, you know, porn industry, Chatsworth, you're going to make $3,500 a week and you'll have the time of your life.
The parties we put together, they're insane, all this stuff.
And I'm sitting there, I'm looking at this guy.
And for like five seconds, I'm just looking at him.
I'm like, let's play this along.
So, okay, you go this route.
What's life look like 20 years from now?
And I came back.
I'm like, yeah, no.
But I went home and I pulled the biggest prank on my dad.
I got, my dad knows this.
My dad knows this till today.
I said, I'm going to pull it on him and I'm going to do, I'm going to keep it for a week.
I said, dad, I got to talk to you.
He says, what's that?
I said, dad, we're going to make some money.
We're going to make some money.
He says, what do you mean?
I said, honestly, you ain't never going to work at this 99 cent store in Inglewood ever again.
He was a cashier.
I said, what are we doing?
I said, Dad, I think Hollywood finally found me.
And he said, really?
I said, yep.
I said, except it's a different kind of Hollywood.
What do you mean?
I said, I have to be naked.
It's going to be porn.
He says, you're going to do porn?
I said, yeah.
He says, if you ever do porn, you will never, ever be my son.
You cannot do porn.
I said, dad, just think about all your friends watching porn saying that's Gabriel's son.
Would that not be a proud moment for you?
He was so furious.
So what do I do?
I leave him hanging.
I leave the house.
Nice.
Do you know for one week this guy thought I was going to go into this thing?
Well, he probably did believe you at the time.
Did you write a business plan at the time?
Did you take your own advice?
No way.
Boy, that's a fork in the road, though, man.
If you go down that direction.
No, but you're around it.
I mean, Chatsworth, you're in L.A., you know, you're around it.
We would have the club.
We had the best club for porn stars because we had the only outdoor swimming pool.
So these guys would only one in Valley's was Chatsworth.
And they would say, hey, what time are you guys close to it?
I'm like, 12 o'clock.
You mind if we stay two more hours?
And it would ask you, it's just going to be out there hanging out.
If you want to party with us, I'm like, listen, I'll give you 30 minutes.
It's like, okay, sounds cool.
And, you know, boom, people would show up and then they would leave.
But Chatsworth was the mecca of porn at that time.
This is 99 peak.
PBD.
Well, Valley was always the capital.
Is it no longer?
It's no, I think when I was living in North Hollywood, they did a mandatory condom thing for porn actresses and actors, and that like killed all of it.
And I forget, I think it moved states or something.
But I'm just glad at that age, 22, no one offered me that.
500 bucks?
Our country.
What if I came in a year to go?
What would your name be, though?
You would have a military name.
What would it be like?
Oh, geez.
Sergeant Slaughter right there.
Sergeant Slaughter.
You would have been the Iranian sheep.
Come on, girl, let's get in line.
But I do have a serious question for you.
Number one, if you know anything about Gabriel Bed David, he would have disowned you straight up.
You were dead to me.
But you've said this multiple times, that you have the ability to look deep into the future.
You talk about 20 years from now, 20 years from now, longevity, not having myopic thinking.
You know, these days, like that was pre-internet days, right?
I mean, that was early 2000s.
I mean, the internet wasn't what it is now.
Social media now.
Now, I mean, I can't even tell you how many girls I run into that do OnlyFans and like the internet lasts forever.
I don't know how many guys are getting approached for OnlyFans or porn these days other than Tom.
I mean, I encourage you to look into that.
That sounds like some good money.
But the ability to think long term and not for the quick buck.
How do you grapple with that?
What's your advice for young people out there these days?
Because there's a lot of easy money out there, especially for women right now.
It's not easy.
I mean, I'm not going to, there is no way of doing it.
Look, here's the craziest thing about life.
Here's the craziest thing about life.
We're all being tested the entire time.
Let me tell you, man, this is a one big ass experiment of what you're really all about.
And you're going to fall many times and you're going to learn a lot about yourself.
And your goal is to keep trying to make better choices.
It's not easy.
So I can't sit there and play, you know, hey, let me tell you, judge, you know, I'm not going to be doing that.
That's your choice.
And everyone's in different types of situations.
I just will tell you, you know, it's very, like even right now, yesterday we were talking about politics.
I said, do you realize the right candidate with the right policies that we need in America today would never get elected?
Let me say that one more time.
The right candidate with the right policies that America desperately needs today would never win an election today.
Why?
Because the right policies would be, folks, guess what?
If you vote for me, we're cutting back on 50% of entitlement programs.
We're cutting back on unemployment checks.
We're going to go from six months to 90 days to 30 days.
We're cutting back on all this spending that we're doing.
We're cutting back on the military spending that we're doing.
We're going to put in more in cyber and biowarfare and being prepared for that because right now wars are not going to be done up there.
It's going to be more cyber, what Russia is doing.
You're going to have to get to work the next eight to 12 years because we all have a job to do.
No one would vote for you, even though those are the right policies.
Nobody would vote for you, right?
Okay.
So how many presidents become presidents and they make policies that benefit you 30 years from now?
Nobody, nobody does that.
Everybody becomes a president, just like the difference between a founder and a CEO.
A founder started that company.
It's emotional.
CEO is just trying to get the quarterly numbers to be hit.
So it looks, it's a very different mindset.
A lot of today's presidents are just trying to hit their quarterly numbers.
That's all they're thinking about.
So going back to your question on what you're saying, how you tie these two together, man, life is a test of making short-term decisions versus long-term.
And it ain't easy, bro.
Well, I think a lot of it too is you have to be comfortable with your decisions.
And if you're comfortable doing OnlyFans or whatever, or pornography, I think I do you.
It's your body, your choice.
That's the way I look at it.
But what we come back to people when they take control of your life.
And I look back at decisions that I made that didn't, I didn't know what the third and fourth order effects were going to be, but I got proposed a lot of decent deals back in the day when I started YouTube.
It was multi-channel networks.
It's when those are really popular.
They were taking essentially 12 digital creators, putting them under one marketing umbrella, cross-pollinating audiences and getting brand deals and then pushing them through each different person.
And I took a look at it and some of it was like hyper, hyper, like, I could have made a lot of money advantageous for me.
And then some of the other stuff that I started to see was all of a sudden the parent company kind of started to tell these guys what they can and can't do.
And I'm an irreverent guy that likes firearms and I knew that would always be an implication with working with these other people.
And so I never did it.
I said, screw it.
You know what?
My business partner at the time, Jared Taylor, said, hey, let's start some shirts.
And all we did was go, I'm going to put a design in this shirt that I want to wear every day and a really comfy t-shirt that it feels good.
And we went with what we wanted, how we wanted to do it.
And it took longer, but the consequence of those decisions were now when I'm 35 years old, I own my ideas.
And the biggest, the worst decision I ever could have made in business was allowing someone else to own my intellectual property because I know that's what I am.
I'm a visionary.
I'm a really creative guy.
I'm not the best in operations, but guess you can hire this people in and all that.
So it kind of goes back to when you're talking about the one through 10 analogy is focusing on your core competencies.
I'm like, I'm a creator.
I'm a visionary and I want to own that.
And I never let anybody else own me.
And that's, I think, what is a testament to my success.
I kind of unknowingly did that, but then I started to realize it more and more as my life went on.
Yeah, power and respect to you guys, man.
Much respect to you guys for what you did and to be where you're at right now.
You guys are just getting started.
I mean, right now, 10,000 veterans, that means if you got 10,000 veterans working for you, you got 20,000 employees.
You guys are on track to get there.
It's a great success story in America, and you guys are not slowing down.
Do you know, to answer your question for you, so for me, you know, I'm all about finding ways to drive you or me better, right?
It's like, how do you have, because when you run a sales organization with, you know, 27,000 insurance agents, you have to learn this person is going to be driven in a different way than this person, than this person, than me, than you.
We're all different, right?
Okay.
Do you know what is the highest driver?
You know what's the highest driver?
The highest driver, my experience, has been purely pride.
Pride in what?
Pride in your last name, okay, which is passed down from your parents.
Pride in your nationality, your heritage.
You have to have pride in that.
That's your blood.
Whatever people say, you still have to have pride in that.
Pride in your industry, what you do as a trade.
You have to have a lot of pride in your trade.
I don't care what you do.
You got to have pride in your trade and constantly get better.
Pride in your community.
Pride in your family.
Pride in your country.
Everything is about representation.
This, there's only one of this in the world, okay?
And that's you.
How you represent yourself to the world.
Eventually, one day they're going to sit there and say, I tell you, man, I just this mad guy, man, was a freaking badass.
Yeah, look, you know, respect, salute.
This Adam guy, the way he lived his life, now, you know, a lot of times at the beginning, but I got to tell you, man, this guy's salute.
That is worth making the long-term decisions.
Because all this short-term stuff that we do, it's going to come, it's going to go by, but it's going to stick around with you for a very, very long time.
Anybody can take the short-term victories.
It ain't hard to do.
Only a few can take the long-term victories.
And I'm telling you right now, history favors those who take the long-term victories.
But it's just going to take 20 to 40 years for people to realize who the real players in the game were.
Not two years, not five years, not 10 years.
Adam, 20 to 40 years.
You know, I got a weird call this week from one, from somebody in the industry.
Which industry?
Not porn.
Not porn.
No, that was retired.
We know that five cycles.
That job was a thought and it was gone.
You're still thinking about it, though, contemplating.
This guy's with my offer.
This guy calls me.
You know what he says?
He says, hey, you know, we're part of the same class.
I remember.
He says, so, you know, I've done very well himself.
He says, well, you took it to a whole different level.
I said, I think you killed it yourself as well.
You know, I call him the 32-year-old Brady.
So you got a 10-year run on you.
And he says to me, he says, everything you said, everybody behind closed doors would say, yeah, he's not going to do it.
Yeah, he's not going to do it.
And for a long time, we all believed it.
He says, but it took 13 years for us to realize that everything you said you were going to do.
You just, you got to be patient.
You know, market's going to say a lot of stuff.
But if you're running for 10 to 20 years, you got nothing to worry about.
You have a lot to lose sleep over if it's a three-month run.
You have a lot to lose sleep over if it's a six-month run.
But if you're running 10 to 20, you're going to be fine.
You know, it's interesting about that because I've been asked a lot over the years about how to prep for a selection, right?
And there's mental and physical, but the foundation of everything that I believe in when you're going through any selection, especially in the military, is a 70-day course.
We'll look at Ranger school.
70 days of being uncomfortable, hungry, tired, mad.
Guess what?
You got to wear a ranger tab for the rest of your life.
Sick.
And I never got why people, some people quit like halfway, three-fourths of the way through Ranger school.
I'm sitting there going, man, you're three weeks away from your life's largest accomplishment, something that you can hang your hat on, something probably down the road when you have children that when dad shows their little son a ranger tab, the inspiration that your child will go, man, my dad did something hard.
And that's what people have to do in this life.
And so often, especially with technology and social media, all of our behavioral patterns are becoming so impulsive, immediate gratification.
And like, put the fucking phone down, go feel the grass, like actually dedicate your life with purpose to something and follow through with it.
I mean, I do weird exercises every day.
Like I, I tore my bicep about two years ago and it took a while to rehab almost a year.
And I said, well, I really took for granted using both arms, as silly as that sounds.
So I bought a drum set and every day I pay 20, I play 20 minutes of drums.
And at first I could barely do anything.
Two years down the road, you know, I feel like I could play a venue.
And it's just weird tasks like that where I challenge myself mentally.
And I wish more people just wrote it on their little pad.
It doesn't have to be crazy.
Like Spanish is one of them, but I'm a little lazy on that.
I'm not going to get back there.
It goes to show, you know, think about it.
You go through three quarters of Ranger school and people still drop out.
That just goes to show how smart the people that set up the program are because it really does take that extra effort to make it all the way through or else everybody would be trying to do it.
You know, when we were in DC, you know, I think one of the things that this country lacks right now more than anything, especially unfortunately, young people is perspective.
We went to the Holocaust Museum.
Have you guys been to it in D.C.?
Yes.
Unbelievable, right?
I mean, how can you go to the Holocaust Museum and then have a complaint about anything in your life?
You know, I was listening to when Jordan Peterson was on with you, and he was talking about New York City and talking about what a minor miracle it is that Manhattan can exist with 12, 15 million people, just the infrastructure.
I was thinking the exact same thing as I was walking the streets of New York a couple of weeks ago.
How does this city even happen?
How does the garbage get picked up?
How do the vendors supply all the food in every single restaurant and these people never miss a beat?
How do the waiters show up?
How do the windows get clean?
You know, it's just unbelievable.
If we could all take a deep breath and not be offended by everything, you know, we'd understand that what an amazing existence life is and how lucky we are.
Everybody wants this vending machine now and they think life is so simple, you know, boom, boom, boom, and you get what you want.
But man, after walking out, Dash was the one that really wanted us to go to the Holocaust Museum.
And I'm so glad we did.
Yeah, and it was at the end of our trip, too.
And you walk away from that.
You just need a couple minutes.
It's just unbelievable.
And they laid it out so perfectly, how they walk you through it and you get the evolution.
And you see how Hitler, it all started with brainwashing people.
It all started with a plan of four or five years.
We're going to get you thinking a certain way.
And then we slide in and do what our plan is.
And chilling.
Perspective is everything.
And something I used to say quite often was, how do you have the unity and the patriotism of September 12th without the tragedy of September 11th?
Because you look at the effects of what this country did, it reinvigorated the American public to believe in itself, believe in the people, right?
Screw the government.
America's awesome because there's men and women willing to give everything to protect it in the name of freedom and liberty.
It's amazing.
But we lose sight on that, right?
Because we're convinced that you should be offended at everything you do.
It's just I don't know the answer on how to, because you have to go and seek perspective in these times because stuff is pretty easy.
I mean, we have inflation, but generally speaking, America is a really rad place to live, like the best place to live.
And I don't know how we convince people to have a better perspective, to appreciate that and move forward just to like.
I have one suggestion for people.
If you want to have a better perspective in life and if you want to relieve from stress from your life, you got to cut out mainstream media if you're ingesting it all day.
You've got to stop doing that.
It's very harmful.
I mean, even for someone like me who's in the news, right?
And I've been in the media business my whole life.
When I'm bombarded with this stuff, you know, the alerts on your phone and whatnot.
And then you go and like when Adam went to New York, when I went to New York, you see, it's not that bad.
Now, unfortunately, you know, Calif, I wish we could have shown you some good parts.
And you were in Orange County.
Orange County feels different too, doesn't it?
It's like a lot better.
Night and day.
Different mentality down there.
Night and day.
So, so Tom, tell us about your podcast because we have, when's the last time you were on a podcast with us, by the way?
I think it was the end of March or early April.
It's been a while.
Yeah.
So tell us about one degree of scandalous.
Oh, thanks.
Okay.
So you know I've had this in mind for a long time.
So I have this one degree brand where we just are, we have access to so many people in the entertainment world, the sports world to tell their story.
So if you see the guy with his, with the glasses, that's Kato Kalen.
So everybody that remembers the OJ Simpson saga, Kato was living in the guest house.
You know, he was the man in the middle of it.
He was the star of the OJ trial.
And Kato's a friend of mine.
And I thought there's no one more associated with scandal than Kato Kalen, right?
So I wanted him as my co-host.
And we started this podcast.
We're two months into it.
And it's really fun.
So it's called One Degree of Scandalous.
And we talked to the people that were directly in the most high profile, visible, coolest, craziest scandals there were.
I'll give you a couple examples.
Remember when Ariana Grande went in and licked those donuts at that donut shop in Riverside?
This was in July of 2015.
We have the donut shop owner.
But when you hear the backstory, right?
Or two weeks ago on our show, we had one of the guys that grew up with everybody with death row records, right?
He has the most amazing story about how he basically saved Tupac's life before Tupac was Tupac.
And now he's involved in championship rings.
He just did the Rams ring.
This past Sunday, we taped our new episode.
It's going to be incredible.
We have the pastor that just married Jen and Ben.
So we were finding out, did he tip?
What did they pay with?
You know, was this a hostage situation?
Did he bring her in?
And we're all over the OJ.
People, Pat, I found are so fascinated with the OJ Simpson saga.
They just can't get enough of it.
On our first show, Cato holds up the key that he actually still has the key to the house in Rockingham.
So if you wanted a diversion from the craziness of the world, one degree is scandalous with Kato Kalen and Tom Center.
Get it anywhere.
You get your podcast and on youtube.
Thanks for the plug.
Can we put the link below?
Can we put the link below description in the chat?
And Matt, if folks you're not, you're not hard to find.
I mean you're all over the place.
So if guys want to find you youtube for for better, for worse, I mean yeah i'm i'm i'm, i'm everywhere, but no, Black Rifle Coffee is our coffee company and um, we have, I think, one of the greatest missions out there for the size of the company.
And um yeah, if you want to watch our crazy contents youtube, I have NEW YORK Times bestselling book whatever, whatever.
Just we have a marine and it's Eric Eric.
Shout out to Eric Eric's like listen man, I read his book.
It's sick, it's awesome.
Couldn't put it down.
So you you, you got fans everywhere.
I don't care what you're doing.
So let's make sure we put the link to the youtube channel Black Rifle as well as the book.
Uh gang, it was good to be back.
I think we're doing podcasts again this thursday.
Thursday, are we doing thursday?
Representative Joe Walsh.
Representative, Joe very, the way you said is very serious yeah, so we have, it's gonna be interesting actually.
All right, sounds good, gang.
I hope you enjoyed it as much as we did.
If you did, give us a thumbs up and subscribe to the channel.
