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Language: en
Trump nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize.
People can now create false memories
with deceased loved ones. The secret to
making straight relationships work
coming right up. And China is getting
good at cultural warfare. Drew, it has
been a week, man. You literally before
we started rolling, you're like, it's
that was a week and a half ago, right?
Nope. It was like four days ago. It is
crazy. Somebody to like aim that at
something. um a different person would
rise to power. We'll get right back to
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ALO Capital. And now, let's get back to
the show. Well, New York will have to
decide what kind of city they have
because there's a new mayor candidate
that is making waves. Gotham alert. This
is nuts. No context. Let's jump into his
policies cuz Tom has thoughts. Grocery
prices are out of control. The cost of
eggs and milk has skyrocketed. Some
stores are even using dynamic pricing,
jacking up the cost over the course of a
day depending on what they can get away
with. It doesn't need to be this way.
I'm Zahan Madani, and as mayor, I will
create a network of city-owned grocery
stores. It's like a public option for
produce. We will redirect city funds
from corporate supermarkets to
city-owned grocery stores whose mission
is lower prices, not price gouging.
These stores will operate without a
profit motive or having to pay property
taxes or rent. And then he also had a
way to revolutionize transportation.
Our campaign is surging and you want to
know why? Because the ideas we're
fighting for are popular. This month,
for example, we got new the ideas that
you're fighting for are popular because
people do not understand the actual
cause and effect that is going on here.
Anyway, le let's keep playing him
because you're right. I have boy, do I
have thoughts. I have all the thoughts
here. When I start grabbing the
microphone, you know we're in trouble.
Support city- owned grocery stores, a
policy we've championed for months that
would guarantee cheaper groceries. But
that's not all. A separate poll found
three-4s of New Yorkers support making
buses free. Like this one. As a state
legislator, I won $15 million to fund a
firstofits-kind fair free bus pilot that
led to a 30%
in my deep dive on um how all of this
plays out. One of the things I said was
people get elected by promising things
for free. Like I cannot believe how
cliche this is. He's literally just
listing I'm going to lower this price
through tax dollars. Not by improving
the system. We're going to allocate tax
dollars to it.
Bro, that's so crazy.
This is so crazy. He's just promising
you, hey, everybody in the high school,
welcome to New York High. The vending
machines are going to be free. Everybody
vote me for class president. This is
nuts. This is nuts precisely because
it's popular. This is nuts precisely
because I know there are going to be
people that are annoyed that I think
this is crazy. Drew, this is uh Okay,
this is a moment. Like, I'll let you
cook. I know we going to talk about
eating babies and all these types of
things. Hypothetically speaking, yeah,
please give me give me the best
arguments. Yeah, hypothetically
speaking, y he sits down day one, he
looks at the mayor budget. He sees a
million dollar in office upgrades. He
sees $4 million in flat screen TVs. He
sees $3 million for new carpets. If he
says, "Okay, I'm going to take those
three, four, seven. Okay, now I got $8
million." That's the pilot now for the
bus program. No new taxes, no new funds.
Is your reaction the exact same or is it
still not going to work? My reaction is
the exact same depending on what he is
applying the money to. If he's applying
the money to something where every year
you're just going to have to fund it and
you don't get an economically viable
output, like if he were saying, uh,
we're going to make sure that all kids
have access to AI. I'd be like, okay,
word. Because that now you're educating
people. Now you're giving them equal
opportunity. If you get every kid in New
York is going to have access to uh $20 a
month um open AI Chad GBT, I could
actually get behind that because that
kind of thing is transformative. It
turns ROI. Oh my god. Like now you're
really doing something. If you're
investing in infrastructure, if you're
investing in children, yes, love
educate. if you are if he even wanted to
give the money as a tax incentive for
people to have more kids. Okay, dude.
Like there are certain things that
incentivizing them as an investment in
the future for the whole country and I
love it the most. But when you're doing
it for things that should be controlled
by the free market because the free
market will innovate and make them
better now you one you have to keep
doing it every year. It never turns into
an economic engine. Uh, and two, it's
never going to solve the absolutely
spiraling inequality. H okay. Free buses
because they're already state sponsored.
It's already not necessarily a free
market system. It's kind of like we at
least incentivize it. Um, what's the
word when we kind of give like a
baseline incentive and then it's free
market on top of that? Like uh
socialism. No. What we do with farmers,
um, we get like subsidize. Subsidize.
Thank you. Yep. Terrible [ __ ] idea.
Let me tell you a story about subsidies,
Drew. Guess what? The US government
subsidizes the life out of corn. You're
correct, Drew. Guess why? I am filming
in this big fancy house because the
government subsidizes corn. And so when
we were trying to make a protein bar
that tasted like it had sugar but
didn't, and we ran into the fact that we
could not get equipment that would run a
bar that did not have high fructose corn
syrup in it. We're like, why on earth
would every piece of industrial
equipment for this type of product
assume you're using high fructose corn
syrup? That doesn't even make sense.
It's horrific for you. And the reason is
it's cheap. Why is it cheap? because the
government subsidizes corn. So instead
of letting the farmers go, what do
people actually buy and then making that
and competing against other farms to
make sure that we stay in business? They
go in and they subsidize the life out of
things. And by doing that, you create
distortions in the market. Now, I'm not
saying no government. I'm saying the
government has to understand what you're
messing with. And when the government
does not understand what they are good
at and what they are bad at, then you
get all these problems. when you think
that you can control the market from the
top down and tell people these are the
healthy foods that you should be eating
or whatever a you don't know what you're
talking about because at one point the
government wanted to um tax companies
like Quest for having too much fat in
their product. [ __ ] you. They were fine
with sugar but they had a problem with
fat because they were ignorant. Dude,
this is only like 12 years ago. So, uh
the government is good at bureaucracy.
The government is terrible at
understanding where we should be
allocating dollars to get the biggest
economic bang. They are terrible at
understanding what's good for the health
of their citizens. So, I do not trust
them in the slightest to dictate uh how
buses should be paid for or any of that
stuff. So, build my infrastructure. Take
that money and build dope ass roads.
build roads that are um smart so that
the vehicles can uh be more innovative
so that things can get cheaper. Like
there are ways that if they really
thought about this that they could be
building infrastructure that would allow
companies to come in and make all of
this stuff cheaper. I mean I could
pontificate about things off the top of
my head that I think would work. But the
reality is you don't need me to pop off
literally unprepared. There are people
that all they do is think about the
things that we could do that would
actually make infrastructure better for
everybody that would unlock innovation
in the private sector, which is always
where you want the innovation coming
from. Because now you can trust the best
and the brightest from around the world
to say, "I want to go to America."
Because whether you love it or hate it,
people are motivated by getting a reward
for their work. People do not want to
work. They don't want to work. Full
stop. But I don't want to fractal on
that. People want to work. They want to
deliver a result. And if they can
deliver an outsized result, they want
outsized compensation. That is how you
motivate the best and the brightest. Uh
he's leading and it looks like he is uh
leading Andrew Cuomo who's also running
and they're both competing to go against
Eric Adams, the current mayor who has
his uh checkered past. I think Trump's
probably going to endorse him.
Yeah, you've got to pull up the David
Friedberg tweet on this because
Freedberg, who is a Impact Theory
alumni, uh had the perfect take.
It is vitally important for America that
Meldani gets elected mayor of NYC. He
can help maximally and swiftly tax the
rich, stand up governmentr run grocery
stores, eliminate the police force,
freeze rents, and make public
transportation free. It's unlikely that
taxing the rich will cause them to move
to other cities, collapsing NYC tax
revenue, or that city-run grocery stores
will fail to increase fresh vegetable
consumption in the inner city, or that
elimination of the NYPD will cause a
rise in crime and decline in quality of
life. Or that freezing rents will drive
landlords to dump properties, collapsing
prices, and property tax revenue. Or
that free public transportation will
result in unionled kletocracy. No way.
I'm sure this time socialism will be
different. If Americans don't want to
learn the lesson of socialism's failures
elsewhere, we should aim to learn them
as quickly as possible here. All right.
So, he goes on basically saying, "Okay,
I if we have to put our hand on the hot
stove personally and we're not willing
to take mom's word for it, who's got
scars on her hand from when she touched
it and we got to get our own scars, then
so be it." But this is one, okay, if you
can hear me right now, I have so much
love for you. I want to see you happy. I
want to see your life filled with like
joy and rad things. And we have a broken
system. We have to get rid of the
inequality. We have to educate people.
We have to make sure that being born in
the inner cities is not a death trap
like where you're stuck there forever
and those are musts. So I am on
anybody's team who wants to see that
kind of stuff happen. But this is where
I really really beg people to be a
student of history and to of the things
you're learning about to map cause and
effect. When you start looking at
countries that have tried socialism and
communism, it's basically the same
thing. You very quickly realize why from
a cause and effect perspective it
doesn't work. And if I can say it in a
single sentence, the reason that
socialism doesn't work is people won't
work for free. The second you, dear
listener, will work for free, socialism
will work. But the reality is you don't
want to work for free. And you certainly
don't want to work at a job that the
government picks for free. And that's
that's what you have to do to make the
system work. So when you're in a system
that's producing all these incredible
goods because you have thriving
entrepreneurs, people actually lose
sight of the fact it is obscenely
difficult to create a company and I'll
call it an economic machine. It's
extremely difficult to create an
economic machine where the inputs, the
people and the money, the ingredients,
the raw parts, whatever that you put
into it, output something that people
will willingly pay more for because it's
more valuable to them than it cost you
to make it. That's ridiculously hard,
ridiculously hard. And almost without
exception, the number one line item for
any entrepreneur is labor. It's the
people. So once you realize, oh, I'm the
problem. I'm the reason that socialism
won't work because I insist on getting
paid and people have a vision in their
head that they're not going to have to
work, that they're going to get
everything for free. You're not. You'll
coast on fumes for a little bit as you
break all the makers in society. So all
the people that have been able to do
that, they will just say, "I'm not going
to do it because you're taking you're
you're confiscating my wealth. you're
taking everything away from me that I'm
making. It's way too hard. It's way too
stressful. And so why would I do that if
the outcome is I get very little and we
get I mean basically what they ended up
having in Russia. You think it's going
to be amazing grocery stores and cheap
prices. It's not because it's just such
a wildly inefficient system. And people
don't recognize that the the rebound
effect of trying to control prices at
the store level means the farmer goes,
"Uh, yeah, I'm just not going to make
these things anymore because you won't
let me charge enough to make it worth my
while." The reason the cost of eggs had
to skyrocket was because a disease
forced farmers to kill god knows how
many chickens. And so it was like, well,
if you want me to keep dealing with the
chickens, I have to charge you a ton of
money for a limited time until I can
build my supply back up and all that and
the supply chain uh gets the right
amount of supply for the amount of
demand that's available. And so if you
don't understand that and you literally
think money
doesn't even have to grow on trees, it
just comes into existence that things
just show up at your grocery store when
you have no sense of supply chains cause
and effect. The farmer who's stressing
himself out, the entrepreneur that is I
was up at 2:30 a.m. this morning.
Nobody was with me. all alone doing my
thing trying to like create something. I
get that most people don't want that
life.
But that's what it takes a lot of times
to really build something of value. And
so when all of that's invisible to you
because the world just works from where
you're sitting, but there's something
broken and you can't afford a house and
you're under a crushing amount of debt
and you're looking at the wealthy people
getting wealthier and wealthier and
wealthier, you're going to scream for
change. And that's why I'm like, I'm on
your team, but you've got to map cause
and effect. Otherwise, you're going to
change the wrong thing, which is what
this is, and you're going to make it not
a little worse, you're gonna make it
catastrophic. And so, I really don't
want the story of eating kids to become
like this comedy thing. Uh, when I was
writing the deep dive today,
I was writing this like brief passage
about how there is a restraining force
for humans, and the restraining force is
culture. So, the world is ruled by
power. Who's got the bigger bombs? The
better military. That really is what
makes decisions as we just saw with US
versus Iran. But there's a restraining
force of culture. And I'm like, we're
better than animals. Animals, if if a
lion takes over a pride and the females
have cubs from the previous male, the
new male will kill all the cubs so that
the women will go back into uh being
fertile and then he'll have sex with
them and then make sure all the
resources go to his own children. We
don't do that. And then I was like,
well,
we don't usually do that. But the
reality is that as the quote goes, there
is only nine meals between mankind and
anarchy.
And read about mouse China. Read about
the red famine in the Ukraine. There
were two of them. There was one in the
20s and another one in the 30s. And
you can make some people hungry enough
they'll eat their own children. And the
only system that I know that delivers
that is communism. And what is the uh
like the precursor to communism is
socialism. It's just that simple. Okay.
I hear I receive it. I understand the uh
howling in the woods. But let's bring it
specifically to NYC in this small bubble
cuz yeah, all of America could be
socialist, but NYC could be a little
socialist. If the housing market
collapsed, more of the people from NYC
can stay in NYC. Yeah. You actually
pitched me this idea. Were you serious
when you said it wouldn't be a bad idea
if the New York housing market or
property market Most of the people that
work in New York live in Connecticut or
New Jersey? Yeah. Yeah. It's too
expensive. So, it's one of those things
where like, oh, okay, if a bunch of uh
wealth flies out of New York City,
that's not the worst thing. For
landlords, it's terrible. For property
owners, it's terrible. for the baseline
consumer, the homies from Jersey who
want to live in a big city, they'll be
able to go back into the city. That will
be nice for them. So, a lot of times I
think people don't think of the grand
scheme from a macro perspective. They
just think about their neighborhood. But
Drew, why do you think freezing rents
will make it possible for them to move
back in? That's what I was literally
just about to say. If if we can actually
walk through this for because I think
sometimes we we talk about what the end
result would be, but we don't talk about
the actual second order consequence. We
go from this is the proposal, fifth
order consequence, we shouldn't do it,
but let's just kind of stair step.
That's good. I like that. Yeah, let's
stair step it a little bit to kind of
see what So, tomorrow grocery prices are
fixed, rent controls are fixed, buses
are free. What happens? What happens?
Okay. Uh so what ends up happening is um
step number one, you get a momentary
jubilee. Prices are cheap. You go in the
store, everything is good. Then the
store owner starts getting frustrated
because his margins are thin and the
government creates some sort of program
where he can get cash back or whatever
where he can be subsidized because okay,
we understand, we see that it's causing
this problem. We didn't quite anticipate
that. Uh so we're going to help you guys
out, but then he's got to like file for
paperwork and he's got medical debt or
student debt or whatever. Something
happens to one of his kids. Now he's got
to sell the store or because what he
wants to do is he wants them to actually
be state-owned grocery stores. How's he
getting the stateowned grocery store?
It's going to be something like a
grocery store goes out of business and
they snatch it up. That creates a moral
hazard because now the government is
incentivized for you to go out of
business so that they can take over your
space if nothing else. They're certainly
not going to pay top dollar, right? So
the government is going to either
lowball you, hope that you go out of
business, or suck more tax dollars to
pay a premium to try to snatch up these
spaces. So you're already draining
resources or creating a moral hazard
where they actually want you to be in
trouble. That obviously then exacerbates
and you get to the point where now the
government's running the store, but
there are like the eggs aren't the
quality that you're used to or uh we
don't have the selection in the store
that we used to have. And so you
complain at that store and they're like,
"Well, this is what we've got. The price
is great, right?" But you're like,
"Yeah, but like I don't want to eat
this." And so you start looking for a
new store anyway. And so now you start
getting extreme gentrification because
you get your uh air wands and stuff who
start going, "Yeah, all right. You're
part of the rich crowd. So we're now
going to open so that you don't have to
go into these state sponsored stores."
And now you're seeing the inequality
widen and widen and widen just in a
grocery store. Okay, so that's a rough
play out of the grocery store. The
freezing the rents, what ends up
happening if you want to create slums,
freeze rents, because what ends up
happening owning a property is extremely
expensive, doing all the upkeep and all
that. And part of the joy of renting is
you don't have to worry about any of
that. You don't have to worry about
property taxes, but the government can't
cut the property tax because this guy's
giving everything away for free. If
anything, they're going to have to raise
property taxes to keep those taxes
flowing. So now I'm a landlord. I hear
this. I'm not buying any new properties.
That's for sure. I guarantee anybody
that was thinking about doing something
when they saw this guy spike in the
polls, they're like, I'm going to wait
and see how this plays out. I've done
the exact thing in LA. So from
experience, I will tell you, you start
hearing politicians make crazy noises
and you start going, whoa, okay, I'm not
gonna invest further because I need to
see how this is going to play out. So,
the reason that they're going to become
slums is they've got to keep paying
their property tax, which may go up. Uh,
they can't raise the rents even if their
costs go up. The cost of fixtures, let's
say, goes up. The cost of a plumber goes
up, but the cost of rents can't go up
with it. So, now what does the landlord
start doing? They fix as little as
humanly possible because otherwise
they're getting eaten. if they start
getting into the red, then they're just
going to give up the property or they're
going to try to sell it as fast as they
can. And so now when people are selling
distress, property values are going
down. The property value is clocked on
the last sale presumably if it's
anything like California, which I assume
it is. So that means that by freezing
the rents, you start driving the values
of the properties down, which means
they're collecting less rent, which
means fewer and fewer people want to do
any kind of investment inside of New
York. And so now things just sort of
start falling into disrepair. And by the
way, nobody wants to move out of their
apartment because they've got a fixed
rent. And so it's not like, oh, there's
suddenly a huge influx of people until
things start getting really bad and
people start fleeing the city. Then
economically the city just stops being
viable and you end up with Detroit. And
so if you want to see New York of the
70s where people being raped and killed
in Central Park, okay, like this is the
path that we want to go down. But the
reality is that law and order having
boundaries. Uh I forget they there's a
name for policing based on whether you
see broken windows in the neighborhood.
I forget what it's called, but they're
just signals that get sent to the
community about what's okay, what's not
okay, based on how things look, based on
how much pride people take in something.
And so when you're robbing them of all
the fruits of their labor, they just
stop taking good care of it. Nobody's
taking pride in something that the
government gets to control. So it's one
of those I totally understand the
impulse. I totally get it. I know what
people are grabbing for, but it's
I tell this story a lot. There are
people that I love that are in pain and
physical pain, like joint pain, because
um I mean, I know it's because of what
they eat. They want a pill. Let's take
Ozic. So, they want to start taking
Ozimpic to get their weight down, but
the problem is we find out later that
it's stripping muscle off the heart and
it's causing bone loss. the final
analysis of ozyic will play out. But
things like that where there's normally
second and third order consequences that
nobody's thinking about and so yes, you
get leaner but you also die sooner. So
instead of going the reality is nobody
can save you. If you want your joints to
stop hurting, you have to stop eating
sugar. Uh you need to lose fat naturally
by having a caloric deficit and you need
to work out and get sleep and drink
water. the basic stuff that people just
don't want to do and that's the hard
reality. Um the transportation thing, I
don't know transportation as well, but
again, you have to pay the people that
are repairing the vehicles. You've got
to buy the parts for the vehicles. And
so what ends up happening is unions end
up taking hold. And I'm starting to do
research on uh
Lee Kuan Yu, the guy that founded
Singapore.
Fascinating story. He's not who I
thought he was going to be. When I first
heard about him, I was like, "Oh, wow."
like he's this really poised, this was
the vision I had in my head, this poised
leader, deeply wise,
um, understands nation building and how
to get the best out of kids and how to
educate. And so I was expecting this
sort of Nelson Mandela story only to
find out this guy was not for [ __ ]
play. And he was a mix of I let the
communists know that I was willing to
fight to the death. Uh and I told the
unions to [ __ ] off when they started
becoming a problem. And I showed people
a path to owning their own homes. And
then I lived like they lived. And so if
I wanted air conditioning, I had to make
sure that we were a nation that had air
conditioning. Not that I lived in a
palace off of their backs. And this
[ __ ] has built one of the like
most prosperous nation states ever. But
hearing him in his own words, he was
like, "People have to know when you say
something that you're going to do it.
And if that something is I'm going to
back you the [ __ ] down, you better back
them down." And I was like, "Whoa, this
guy was not for play." And that's the
reality. Like, you've got to tell unions
you're creating the problem. You cannot
let like when I look at the education
system, I'm like, "This is a union
problem. This is a union problem. You
cannot have people who are not good at
their jobs keep their jobs. you just
can't have it. So, uh I imagine the
quality begins to decline. They stop
being on time. They try to um whip
people from the top down just like they
did in the Soviet Union. It just doesn't
work. So, it seems like there's a common
thread between the three of those
examples that the margins get suppressed
when we go away from a profit system.
So, that way the owners, the
implementers, the people that are
actually doing the thing, they are
disincentivized to upkeep, maintain, to
get new and fresh fruit. so that way
they can maybe do a sale. They're
they're not incentivized to put up a new
pool so that way they can drive up
rents. They're not incentivized to get
newer buses so that way you can get
there faster because they're still
getting the same amount whether if they
try a lot or they don't try at all.
Correct. And then this it just slowly
declines in quality and resources over
time. At that point with the system
being depressed because of these falling
property values, uh people being
dissented about the food, the driving
inequality, some businesses flee, some
uh money leaves, and then now the
overall medium income of the city drops
and then now people can't afford things
anymore. And it's just this vicious loop
as it keeps getting Now the government
can't afford things anymore because the
government begins losing revenue because
they can't take from those people
anymore. Exactly. Like the part that
people do not seem to understand is the
government has exactly zero dollars and
zero cents until they tax
an entrepreneur who is making something
that outputs something of more value
than what the inputs were. And that is
the only way. And so this is why you can
get away with not taxing your citizens
when you have oil that's just gushing
out of the ground because it's like,
okay, cool. We're doing great. But if
they don't transition their economy, I
don't know, 20 years from now, like
that's going to be a real problem. Not
because we're going to run out of oil,
because the world just isn't going to
use oil anymore. Um, so
when the voting public loses track of
how the government actually generates
money, then you get this moment. Yeah,
it's interesting. It seems like the
voting public thinks that money operates
the same way that government does where
they could just kind of print it and it
appears and then it can be used. They
just like think the government has money
and so like now I just want you to
allocate that towards me. This is why I
covered this in my deep dive about how
money actually works is what ends up
happening is when so much money is being
printed and people don't understand that
that's stealing from them. They just
know the government has $6 trillion even
though it only collects 4 trillion. It's
got 6 trillion to spend. So, it's like,
well, if we've got all this free money,
which is exactly how it feels, because
you got politicians like this guy
promising you free, free, free, as if it
doesn't have to be paid for by them. Uh,
and they just go, "Hey, we're going to
uh make this magic money." And people
go, "I want my share of the magic
money." And then it it becomes
completely detached from reality.
Period. New paragraph. One thing that um
I don't know if this problem is solvable
and the following sentence may explain
exactly why history loops the way that
it does. Mhm. The way the world works is
just complicated enough that most people
will never take the time to understand
it. And if you don't understand it,
you'll steer by emotion. Period.
And in this moment, this is just an
emotional reaction. It's just emotion. I
see. Yeah. The wealthy are getting
wealthier. Uh, that's unfair. And I'm
being crushed by student debt, which is
a problem for so many people. And
[ __ ] you, I want my peace. And so,
because they have that emotion of [ __ ]
you, I want my peace. And you get guys
saying, I'll give you your peace. Why
wouldn't I vote for that guy? And the
only reason you wouldn't vote for that
guy is because you actually understand
the cause and effect. But most people
don't understand the cause and effect.
We'll never understand the cause and
effect. And the whole reason that humans
have emotions is so that you don't have
to understand the cause and effect. You
just know that Russell in the bush
scares me. So I'm going to turn and run.
And so all we know is uh I'm mad as hell
and I'm not going to take it anymore.
This guy is telling me vote for me and
you don't have to take it anymore. I'm
going to take from whoever it is that I
take from and I'm going to give it to
you. Yeah. Yes, please. Nice. We'll get
back to the show in a moment, but first,
let's talk about the discipline hack
that most people miss. Discipline does
not stop at the gym or the boardroom. It
continues right into your kitchen. For
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$20 off your first box. Just go to
butcherbox.com/impact
and use code impact at checkout. Now,
let's get back to the show. In other
news, the Supreme Court just had an
emergency order. the highest court in
the land just hit pause on the lower
court's order that put some rules around
how the government can deport people to
other countries. Now, this isn't just
like a small legal tweak. The three
justices, justices Sodomire, Kagan, and
Jackson, they all dissented and they
called it a gross abuse of power. But
what they enacted was it allowed Trump
to continue to do his quick deportations
to third world countries. So, not third
world, third countries, excuse me, to I
thought that was a typo for something.
I'm like third countries. Yeah, third
countries. So, basically third party
countries. Um, the biggest example I
could use is there was a Guatemalan man
who was afraid to go back to Guatemala.
Um, so instead they deported him to
Mexico. However, the Mexican authorities
then deported him to Guatemala. So I
feel like it just takes the onus off of
Trump, but it at least allows him to
continue the deportations that they
have. It's interesting. There were some
riots in Mexico over people coming into
their country illegally. How hilarious
is that? It's ironic. Yeah. Yeah, I mean
it just goes I mean in fairness it's the
Mexican government has plenty that they
could do and should do to stop people
from crossing the border, but at the
same time it's like it is ultimately our
job to police our border. Uh and I get
it. They've got to police theirs and it
is weird watching the world wake up in
real time to something that we have
known essentially for all of human
history and that suddenly we've somehow
forgotten. This is such a weird moment
for me, Drew. the way that we are
swinging so hard in the direction of
compassion.
It's utterly fascinating to look at that
four-part cycle of strong men blah blah
blah. Everybody knows the thing and that
we're just firmly in the weak men are
making hard times moment right now and
we're we are going to relearn some
lessons from history in a violent
fashion. Yes. I'm I'm conflicted though
because we have seen more deportations
historically than we're seeing right
now. So, this is not like Trump is the
most deportationist president or like
like it's not like it went from zero to
5,000 a day or anything like that, but
it seems like how he's doing it is the
thing. Um, we had the conversation with
Rick Caruso um that came out and I
remember Rick even said like there's
certain ways how you can do it and
there's certain ways that kind of makes
it it makes it look like the villain
isn't acting. like the guys have on
masks. They're heavily militarized.
They're going into community centers.
They're going into Home Depot as opposed
to like sweeping up off the street
corners and going to a bit more
malicious places or places that we think
quote unquote criminals will reside. Um,
is there anything to the style factor
into that? Or do you just think it's it
doesn't matter if he was asking
grandma's nicely or if he was in black
suits, it wouldn't matter. We would
still react this way. If he were a
perfect human, he would do it better. he
would understand how he looks to other
people and he would temper that. He's
not a perfect person. Nobody is. So in
reality with the temperament that he
has, I don't think you're going to get
any better than this. I also think
people are so prone to hate him that it
doesn't matter what he does. Just like
the right was going to hate Biden no
matter what he did, the left is going to
hate Trump no matter what he does. Now I
do think Trump is uniquely divisive.
Like there is just there are a thousand
little nuances to his personality that
really wind people up. Mhm. So it's just
going to be a question of somebody like
that who does not care what you think is
looking at I want to achieve this thing.
This is what I believe I need to do to
achieve it. I'm going to do that thing
to achieve it no matter what. Um you
need a you need a person with a certain
level of aggression to pull it off. And
so you combine the historical rebellion
against him starting in 2016 or 2015
when he started running and for the
arudite
left elites that was just like
brainbreaking
the the thought like if you were a
40some
leftleaning
hyper intellectual
um person used to people sounding
presidential in 2015 15 and a [ __ ]
smug, arrogant, aggressive, brash,
billionaire entrepreneur from TV comes
in slinging mud at everybody. You had to
be like, "This is this is not my
America. There's no universe in which I
want this guy to be elected." And you're
just seeing echoes of that still. It's
crazy. Um, something else that humans
are not prepared for is this. AI can now
turn old family photos into actual
video. This guy retweeted Roman helmet
guy. Cognitive security rule number one.
Do not do this. This reminds me of a
sci-fi movie where like you can't
remember which memory is yours and which
memory is not. Is there a line here? I
feel like this is getting Black
Mirroresque where I don't know if we
should be able to do this. Is this
healthy? Is this coping? Or is this like
here is the hard reality.
None of your memories are real.
This is true. This is how memory works.
Okay? When you pull a memory out of
long-term memory, so storage, when you
pull that memory out of storage, do
whatever, think about it, and then
rewrite it, you're restoring it
differently, which is why you can't
trust like eyewitness accounts and stuff
like that. Every time you access a
memory, you change it a little bit. And
that's why I mean, people will blend
memories. They'll change memories.
They'll be convinced like the Mandela
effect that no I saw this movie. I know
I saw this movie. Memory is
hyperfallible.
Given that that just is already true
given how damaged people can be by
memories that haunt them. This to me is
like a Ginsu knife.
I can kill everyone in my family with it
or I can use it to um cut vegetables and
prepare an incredible meal. So, you need
to
you need to understand you're doing this
to yourself all the time, no matter
what. Now, this is your cue not to say,
"I'm never going to do this." This is
your cue to do this very carefully, very
intentionally. Mhm. But man, let me tell
you, when my mom passes away, the
thought that I could do something like
this, of course, I'm going to do
something like that. And worst case,
smooth out like if you've got a rough
memory with somebody that you and you
can never get that moment back. Imagine
the catharsis of working with a
therapist who has access to AI to be
able to create a moment where you could
communicate with your mom, significant
other, whatever. Again, you can do it in
a way that damages you or you can do it
in a way that helps you alleviate
something. Have you ever heard of
phantom limb syndrome? Yeah. Like when
people cut their and then they feel like
they still have a leg and all that.
Okay. So, one of my all-time favorite
guests on the show is a guy named VS
Ramachandron. And he was the one that um
came up with this idea. And what
happened was he had patients that had
lost their hands, but their mental map
of the hand was that it was clenched in
a fist so tight that they were in agony.
So even though they didn't have a hand,
they they were like just in in constant
neverending pain because they couldn't
unclench their fist. And so he was like,
"Huh, what if I created a box that
mirrored their good hand?" And so
they're looking down into the box. It
looks like they're seeing the missing
hand, but they're really just seeing a
mirror of their other hand. And he said,
"What I want you to do is open your good
hand and imagine opening your missing
hand at the same time." And people were
like, "Oh my god, it's like I've just
opened my hand."
People's brains clench up over the
weirdest [ __ ] traumas that will haunt
you forever.
Again, very powerful tool that you need
to be extremely careful how you use. But
man, if you use that to get closure, to
be hugged by your mom again in the midst
of just the unending grief of loss,
dude, I'm doing it all day long,
consciously, carefully, but I'm doing
it. That's how the company Replica
started allegedly that she her best
friend died and she fed all her Texases
into like AI and then that's like what
kind of like started like the whole AI
companion thing. Um this is this is a
real thing and the transitionary moment
is going to be scary and look I
unfortunately am not the guy that can
give people the um turn away from
technology, embrace the Lord like I
can't give you that speech cuz I don't
believe it. But I can give you the
speech that there are no utopias. There
are only trade-offs. Technology has been
changing the human species for ever. I
mean, since fire. And
if you want me to regail you with the
torturously cruel way that humans used
to live, uh, I can because anybody that
thinks that the past was somehow like
this better place,
unless you're pit stopping in the '9s,
which maybe I would sort of give you,
everybody goes to the '90s and stops.
They don't want to go any further than
that. It's so funny. When I wrote Neon
Future, I literally was like, "Where
would be the perfect technological
moment for people who are
technologically phobic?" And I was like,
"The '9s. You need the internet, but not
porn, not like all the crazy stuff." Uh,
it's interesting. So anyway, I think
technology ultimately is going to make
life unimaginably
better, but we're going to have to let
go of some of the things we think of as
um the way things ought to be. Yeah. It
sounds like you put technology in that
gun category where like guns aren't bad.
The people who wield guns the wrong way
are the bad ones where Yeah. But only if
you'll give me the context of technology
is like guns in the same way that guns
are like guns. When someone is actively
in your house trying to attack your wife
and they have a gun, it's like that.
Technology gave you antibiotics.
Technology gives you temperature
control. Technology gives you uh the
ability to make um wheat that can feed
the billions of people that we have on
the planet.
So technology reduced infant mortality.
I mean it's like technology is not like
cell phones and social media. Technology
is the constant promise of a better
tomorrow that we have been making to
ourselves for the last 500,000 years.
Copy. Copy. Um well I feel like straight
relationships are on uh their deathbed
with AI and technology and sex bots on
the horizon. But uh a lady from
Instagram has a cure and the fix for it.
Say that straight relationships that
survive and thrive are dynamics where
the woman is a little bit more mean and
the man is more patient and is kind of
obsessed with her. Based on my
experience working with couples, the
reason that I think this holds a little
bit of truth to it is because a man who
you would describe as obsessed is also
someone who values his partner's
opinion. They hurt the partner. They
care about their When I first started
listening to this, I was turned off by
the words uh mean and obsessed and
obsessed. But as she started going, I
was like, "Uhoh, I recognize a lot of my
relationship in this." Uh, I think she's
on to something about their partner's
dreams and they care about what they
have to say. Similarly, a woman who is
described as a little bit mean is a
woman who isn't afraid to call out bad
behavior and will only keep someone
around if they add value to her life. In
essence, I think these terms are like
counterweights to our current society
where women can hold their ground and
men actually care. And the reason that
it works is because it becomes balanced.
I found that to just be factually true
for my marriage. Now, whether this is
something that actually carries across
everybody, whether this is a secret,
because this certainly is not the secret
that I would give people like about what
actually makes a relationship work, but
as like uh to what she said, there's a
little bit of truth in it. What I found
interesting is there's no doubt that I
think many people would say that Lisa
certainly has a mean gear whether they
would say she is mean or not, but Lisa
like is not for play. And I remember one
time pretty early in our relationship
and I was like, "You're driving me
crazy." And she was like, "If you could
walk over me, you wouldn't respect me."
And she was like, "It is the fact that I
have my own opinions. I stand up for
myself that you're into me. And she said
it in like this fun, playful, like
seductive way. And I was like, [ __ ]
she's right. And if I could um always
get my way. If she always just did what
I wanted, like it wouldn't be
interesting. I would lose interest. If
she were faking it, it wouldn't be
interesting. But this is really just a
woman that happens to know what she
wants. Now, I will admit there are times
where people violate my wife's sense of
how the world ought to be. And she just
cannot remind herself in real time,
my values aren't objectively correct.
They're just mine. And so, she will look
at people like they have roaches on
their face when they don't live the way
that she thinks that they should be
living or interface with her the way she
thinks they should. Um, but it's true.
Her standing up for herself, um, has
been interesting. And then I have, I'm
sure I've said on here that I'm obsessed
with my wife. And part of the reason
that I say that, by the way, is that
reinforcing her as a central focus in my
life makes sure that she stays a central
focus in my life. And so I think it's
only a minor part of what makes our
relationship work. But there is
something to that dynamic. Yeah. It
seems like the takeaway from this was
balance. Uh, you know, I'm in these
balancing each other. Yes. Yes. Like of
of it's it's a scale. So balance is
that's why I'm blanking on a different
word. I'm thinking of like the justice
like balance, not like um I was having a
conversation with a woman on a date and
she was talking about how she didn't
want kids. She doesn't really know she
wants to like have a husband. Stuff like
that. And as I'm talking to her kind of
my response is like, "Oh well, you know,
I'm super domestic. Like I love being a
dad. Like I think I want to have more
kids. I want to do these things. Um I
engage in this like we" And she was
like, "Oh, well I have a kid with you."
And I was like, "Well, I thought you
didn't want like a kid." She's like,
"Oh, well, if you're going to help out,
then I'll have a kid." And I'm just
like, "What date is this?" What? Like,
what date? What date number? Uh, this
was like date one. Like, we were
friends. Damn, Drew. How much game do
you have? No, no, no, no, no, no. It was
like um like we knew each other. Like,
it wasn't like she was actually trying
to give me a kid, but it was like that.
Did she say I would have a kid with you
or a guy like you? It it was with me.
But I think this is what happens, right?
And this is the point I'm trying to
make. I'm going to bring I'm playing. I
promise I'm a plane. I did just meet
like a I like this plane. We don't need
to land this plane. The I want to know
more about the stewardist on this plane.
But it was interesting to me. I'm like,
oh, like in her mind having a kid meant
the man is not going to do anything.
She's going to have to cook and clean
and do all the housework and he's just
going to throw her money and ask her for
sex sometimes. And it's like sometimes
we get super rooted in these dynamics
that maybe we seen or we're just
watching too much Twitter or Andrew Tape
videos. I don't know what it is, but
we're coming with this like, oh, the man
is supposed to do XYZ, woman's supposed
to do XYZ. But as she was talking like
obsessed like, yeah, I should care about
what my partner feels and I should be
cheering my partner on and I should. So,
when you say you're obsessed with your
wife, it's like I don't take that as,
oh, Tom is the simp. It's like, yeah,
y'all been married. You should be
obsessed with her. That should be the
person. Like, I have my friends who are
married and like they, yes, they check
on their wives and they're so I didn't
have this like reaction that was like,
wait, obsessed mean? that's bad. I was
just like, okay, she keeps it spicy to
keep it interesting cuz you need that
like that that chase inside the man. And
then on the from a woman's perspective,
she likes to be uh dreamed about like
like she likes to be pursued. So in in
those two ways, it seemed balanced to me
just in like that kid example. So, I
think a lot of times we we think what
the relationship dynamic should be and
we're just getting bad takes from other
people or from our personal
relationships that didn't pan out and
we're thinking that's what it should be
and it's like no, it's it's actually the
way it ought to be is obsessed mean in
using her language, but a lot of times
we take other people's traumas and act
like that's the shoods and then kind of
change our dynamics or what we want
because of that. Yeah. So, it was just
interesting to kind of see this like,
oh, this wasn't as crazy. Well said. Um,
and we're going to China. Um, China
China's on a run right now when it comes
to video games. Um, I'm still locked in
in AC Shadows. That's Japan, I know.
But, um, China is this is I think their
third or fourth like AAA game that's
actually getting like some major
headway. Um, they just released a
trailer with IG. I think they've had way
more than that. This is uh because I
don't think you're into the that kind of
game like Withering Waves, Genchin
Impact. Like there's I forget what
they're called. Gotcha games. I think.
Oh god, someone's going to freak out of
me. But um there's a whole genre of game
where they've really established
themselves. I forget the name of the
company that did Genchin Impact, but
they've done a whole bunch uh of games
that have a certain aesthetic. Me
yoverse. Yeah. Hyoverse or something
like that. Uh so
yeah, China is definitely coming in
strong though. There's no doubt. Now,
when I saw this, what it made me think
is China is really on their um their
cultural
exporting game. Like America won the
cultural the like international cultural
wars back in the 80s for sure. Like we
were exporting American culture
everywhere. Denim, jeans, American
movies. Like people just Exactly. People
wanted to be a part of American culture.
And now China is whether this is on
purpose or they're just having their
creative moment because their stuff is
really good. My favorite anime right now
is from China. I just started playing
Withering Waves. It's beautiful.
Absolutely stunning. Very much like
Genchin Impact, not this kind of game
which is more of a is this first person
or third person? First person narrative
or a third person um single player
narrative, right? So people are giving
it like uh Uncharted kind of maybe vibes
where it's like cut scenes. you're
filming a story. Yeah. Not my favorite
kind of game, but certainly very
popular. But it I'll be interested to
see if this is like an intentional thing
that China is doing. Um or if it's just
like I said, they're really in their
moment. But as Americans, I really feel
like we've lost our mojo. We don't have
confidence in ourselves. There's not a
shared sense of internal identity. We
really are tearing each other apart. So
sad. And I'm really hopeful that we can
turn it around. It was way cooler
growing up believing in America and
thinking this place is cool and I love
all my fellow Americans and like we
create the best stuff. It's an awesome
feeling and I want to see people
recapture that and really try to build
and really try to create. Um but I will
admit as a game developer I also look at
this stuff and go all right I've got a
worthy opponent. Like China's not for
play. This is my non-threatening way to
compete directly with China. Uh and
looking for something here it is. Yeah.
Uh it'll be it'll be fun. It's the game
looks beautiful. They've done a
phenomenal job from a graphic
standpoint. Uh but ultimately this stuff
comes down to game mechanics. I was
playing Project Kaizen this weekend and
it is crazy how like much you have to
focus on things like how does it feel to
slide down a hill? Like little things
like that where you're like okay that's
got to feel good. Like anything that
you're going to do repetitively has to
feel nice. And to think that there is a
way to make pixels on a screen sliding
feel nice is weird. Uh but it really is
a thing. So as you approach it though,
like with your China like lens in mind
of exporting culture and things like
that, is it a chicken or the egg? Like
what comes first? Do you say like, okay,
I want to have a really good game now.
How can I America fight or like what can
what is easily built and what can I lay
over? Like did you start with Kaizen
with the story and then you wanted to
build out the universe? Did you knew
what type of game you wanted? like
what's the origin story of like building
a video game cuz nowadays there's no
more sides scrollers like everything is
huge worlds layers like I would as crazy
as there are sides scrollers but to to
the heart of your question I think it's
going to be different for every
developer some people have a spark of an
idea that's a game mechanic some people
will have a story beat that they want to
see turned into something for me it was
I went to Warner Brothers and I tried to
get the Rise of the Matrix back in 2006
16 and I just really wanted to tell a
story inside of a virtual world because
I'm so obsessed with that. One is what's
actually going to happen in the future
and then two as a metaphor for the human
condition. Huge. And then for me
everything has to be about empowerment.
So it was like okay I want to tell I
can't get the rights to the matrix. They
turn me down. Uh and but one day remind
me to tell you that story. It's a fun
story, but um I wanted to create my own
simulated universe just because I think
as a metaphor it's phenomenal. Uh I
wanted to tell an empowering story and
so then that creates like what would the
game mechanic need to be to be
completely aligned with both of those
things. Uh and so it just built from
there and then to be honest I'm an
iterative creator so it was like I had a
ton of the story up front. I knew like
the shell, the concept, um, but I didn't
know what the final game mechanic was
going to be and we really struggled.
Like I knew the two things that I wanted
to bring together. Like my early idea
was winning in Fortnite doesn't feel
cool enough. Like you get an umbrella
and that's it. I was like that's super
lame. I was like what would you have to
do so that when you won against other
players that you were like oh snap I
cannot believe it and I got this thing
and this thing matters. And so then the
answer for us became, could you
integrate Minecraft and Fortnite, like
those two mechanics, a survival world, a
gigantic survival world with the
competition against other players, so
that when you won something, it mattered
to you over in the survival world. And
so I think we've done it. Like playing
it this weekend, I played for like 14
hours stopping only to eat. Uh, and I
was like, "Oh my god, like it's actually
a game now." It took us three and a half
years to get here. Uh, but shout out to
the team. It's It's been incredible. So,
if I were going to try to Americanify
it, uh, which I'm not worried about that
with Kaizen at all, for me, empowerment
is that sort of like the thing that I
want to hide inside the game that people
will get. Uh, but like if you look at
Top Gun from the 80s, which was clearly
like the Pentagon going to Tony Scott
and being like, "Hey, bro. Uh, we want
to recruit for the Navy." It's it's just
all cut scenes of airplanes. Oh my god.
Literally uh airplanes and American
flags. Yeah. Patriot porn. So, and it
really does work. I mean, that upped the
um signups for the military by some
ungodly percentage. Uh so, yeah, if I
were doing that, then it's a
collaboration. It's like, okay, what do
you guys want to feature? And then if
you're a good writer, you step out of it
and like they did with the Pirates of
the Caribbean, you go, "Okay, I get like
where this has to be set, but I need to
find a story that is of that world, but
isn't like just a surface glancing off
like a pilot gets in plane. It's like
you've got to find the fear, limitation,
blocker, wound, you know what I mean?
all the like writery stuff and then
really tell a story that's going to
captivate like the sense of I see
something in my own human experience
reflected back to me from this movie.
Oh, it happens to be about the Navy or
it happens to be about a ride at
Disneyland, but I feel something of my
own life inside of this thing. This is a
deep question. What do you think America
as a culture needs to feel that they
once felt in the 80s that you don't
think they feel now? I love you for
asking that question. That if I work
hard, I will get better and I will be
able to yield disproportionate results
for my hard work. That's it.
That was a simple answer, right? If we
can get people back on that, oo, buddy.
All right, that's all I got. And to that
end, boys and girls, Drew's relationship
guide is going to be coming out soon
because on date number one, women are
saying they want to have his baby. I'm
married and I'm signing up. I hope you
guys will, too. And by the way, if
you're not already watching our lives,
be sure to check us out. You will get
more relationship advice from Drew on
exactly how to pull just like that. We
are Wednesdays and Fridays at 6 a.m.,
boys and girls. All right, until next
time, my friends. Be legendary. Take
care. Peace. If you like this
conversation, check out this episode to
learn more. The Israel Iran conflict is
heating up. US involvement seems
imminent. Trump dips out of the G7
early, presumably to plan Iran's
strategy. Both US and Israel claim
Israel has total air superiority over
Iran.