Episode 844 Scott Adams: Biden’s VP Pick, Covid-19 and the Usual Fun

Date: 2020-03-08 | Duration: 1:05:31

Topics

My new book LOSERTHINK, available now on Amazon https://tinyurl.com/rqmjc2a George Takei’s campaign video for Joe Biden Kamala Harris’s charisma makeover Allowing doctors to practice across state lines Balaji Srinivasan: Far UV light kills airborne viruses Elon Musk says coronavirus panic is dumb

If you would like my channel to have a wider audience and higher production quality, please donate via my startup (Whenhub.com) at this link: https://interface.my/ScottAdamsSays

> [!note] Rough Transcript
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## Transcript

[0:07]

hey everybody wake up sleepyheads I hope you remember to set your clocks if you happen to live in a backward country where clocks get set twice a year why do we do that I don't know I've earned a good reason for it actually let's stop doing it but all the matters is you're here now and you are here for some of the best parts of your day maybe the best really if I might be immodest it's called the simultaneous ippon you don't need much all you need is a cup or mug glasses that you're jealous or sign the canteen charger plus a vessel of any kind fill it with your favorite liquid I like my coffee enjoyed me now for the unparalleled pleasure the dopamine you know the day the thing that makes everything better it's called the simultaneous up and it happens now mm-hmm I saw somebody to come and say lock the

[1:12]

I saw somebody to come and say lock the clock and I've been trying to think of clever little marketing sayings for coronavirus because you know if you have a little clever marketing saying like for seat belts in California they have billboards to say click it or ticket reminding you to wear your seat belt and I thought well we need something like that with the hand washing and the face touching with the Chrome virus so we need a little rhyme it's something like
clean it or die or something I don't know it's got a ride put some work into that get back to me all right let's see what's going on here CNN has a big piece on their website video piece in which they're talking about women being paid 80 cents on the dollar for the same job as men what but literally the most debunked

[2:13]

but literally the most debunked statistics in all of life and CNN unabashedly runs like it's a fact now do I need to get into that now if anybody is new here you know that there are two movies on one screen and then one movie it's a fact that women are paid eighty seventh son a dollar and you just ask anybody you ask anybody it's a fact but in the other movie where people have actually looked at the studies it just doesn't exist now it does exist if you looked at all jobs compared to all jobs because women and men take different jobs they have different amount of experience etc but once you drill down to the variables that if most of it disappears so I believe there's still some I'm still not too certain I'm not the person who would say this sexism doesn't exist in the workplace I'm not

[3:14]

doesn't exist in the workplace I'm not going to tell you that men and women get paid the same because that's probably not true but the 80 cents of the dollars I don't think that's even close to the actual gap it's probably probably in the five cent range that's the actual discrimination part anyway it's amazing to see CNN just unabashedly run such disproves such easily disprovable anti-science fake names and then also today CNN's SE Cupp and now this is just the headline so I didn't read the article and we know that sometimes the article doesn't match the headline but the headline enough is worth commenting on so whether it's right or wrong it's worthy of comment you know and the headline says tributing attributing this to SE Cupp says americans panic over the corona virus can be attributed to a lack of trust in both the government and

[4:15]

of trust in both the government and president Donald Trump can it Kenneth it is that is that like a news fact the news fact is that we can attribute the coronavirus panic to a lack of trust of the government is that what's happening that's just a fact right just report that right on the news channel now of course a c-cup is an opinion person so she doesn't she doesn't have to adhere to the standards of the news journalists per se but you need a little more meat on that opinion because from my standpoint it looks like the panic is caused by a combination of we have something to worry about that's real it's this is it it's not unreal and secondly it's the way the news covers it because it's 24-hour coverage it's the only thing happening so it's the news is

[5:19]

only thing happening so it's the news is there is there anybody who thinks and this is an honest question is there anybody who thinks that no matter what President Trump did about the virus as long as it was also still spreading he's going to get criticized in the news we'll treat it like a panic because everything is you know hyperbole to sell clicks so it is such a bold just such a bold lie to say that it could be attributed to the government when it's so obviously the media and then and the nature of the problem itself there's all you need it wouldn't matter which government you put in there don't you think if you just wish the government to democratic government Fox News would say they're doing everything wrong CNN maybe would say less of that but there'd be exactly the same amount of panic it wouldn't have to do it has nothing David so what the one thing you could change is who's in charge it's the only thing you would change and have exactly the

[6:20]

you would change and have exactly the same result as you're seeing now for CNN reports with the opposite
was that when shopping yesterday I don't know how often I'll do that again so I'm I'll be 63 in June and I have a history of asthma so I take I take meds every day to suppress it so I rarely have any kind of feeling of asthma so I don't have a bad case it's probably in the mild in the mild category and it's treated so it doesn't have much impact on my life but I'm in the kill zone meaning that if you're over 60 do you have any kind of history with the respiratory situation you're supposed to just stop going anywhere and so so I'm in that category so I'll tell you what I'm gonna do I am going to and have already so I've already done this

[7:21]

have already so I've already done this substantially modify my schedule so for the time being I won't go to my gym I'll keep my membership and just work out at home oh I'm gonna shift my hours a little bit for shopping so I'm still gonna go to the grocery store because I was talking to Christine about this yesterday and this is how dumb I am and I was saying you know it might be a good idea if if you did the shopping because usually we divide up some of the stuff and I like I like doing the shopping she doesn't talk about food shopping so I said I like doing it I was doing that and she was doing other stuff for them but I said well maybe you should do the food shopping and then I realized well if she got the coronavirus I'm definitely getting it it doesn't make any difference if you send your spouse to the store or your girlfriend or your friend if they come back with a corona

[8:22]

friend if they come back with a corona virus if they live in to your house you're not buying a lot of safety by a little bit you know it's not a guarantee that a spouse is going to give it to a spouse but it's pretty close to a guarantee so I'm going to keep shopping but
but gonna probably move my hours a little bit to try to hit the store when it's the least amount of traffic and if I do that I can actually avoid any line at all it'll just be me and a cashier and then I say to myself well what good did that do because I'm probably not gonna get it from the customers I'm gonna get it from the cashier because if there's anybody in the store at it it's cashiers gonna get it so I'm not entirely sure how much of this is eated real yeah obviously I'll do home delivery but for food it's it's a problem because you can't get it the same day and same selection and all that stuff it's getting there but not yet alright so far

[9:25]

getting there but not yet alright so far the only impact I've seen in my state I assume this will change but the only impact I've seen in my state is a stimulus which which really brings to question how good we are at predicting the obvious because you think it's gonna be obvious right that all the experts are saying it's obvious the economy will slow down it's obvious because their supply line problems people won't be going to things it's just obvious the economy is slowing down and then I go to the store it's just freakin packed people are buying out way Amazon Amazon can't ship enough stuff it's like it's like freaking Christmas I've never seen so much buying so maybe I mean maybe the net effect will be negative that all the smart people say so and if you have to bet on it you know if you're gonna put your money on a bet that it's gonna be negative for a while but why isn't it happening yet I

[10:26]

a while but why isn't it happening yet I mean at the moment people are just buying like crazy I went to a restaurant the other night and I was kind of thinking it might be the last time for a while that I go out to a restaurant there's a lot of people in it but I thought well I'll get it get it out of the way before the virus gets too close to my neighborhood so you know the restaurants just packed its back I don't know so far it just looks like we're spending a lot more money now less now of course the travel industry will get devastated there's no doubt about that so Stanford University decided to cancel all classes but not not the cafeteria and you know I guess I got people they got to keep alive their food wise and I thought to myself Stanford closing the entire campus are closing classes but not the campus I guess they closed classes and they're doing it all remote now they can do it

[11:27]

doing it all remote now they can do it because they have a very advanced online training system that apparently they can just switch over and make that work now not everybody can do that but here's the important thing Stanford is not like other colleges what is it about Stanford that's different from every other college in the United States you could argue in the world there's one thing that's very different about Stanford arguably it's the top top college and arguably I mean Harvard might disagree and Yale in those guys but Stanford's kind of the smartest school we have with the smartest people and the smartest instructors so when your smartest school goes first what does that do to everybody else if it were a random school just just one of you had heard of you'd say to yourself well it's just a school I've heard of there are lots of schools I'm not gonna

[12:29]

there are lots of schools I'm not gonna take anything from that it's just one school about that decision but Stanford's not just one school Stanford is fricking Stanford if Stanford says they're gonna make a change that dramatic you gotta stop what you're doing right you got to put down your tools and listen because this isn't you know this isn't the you know your Community College this is freakin Stanford they got some smart people they put some thought into it they're not missing anything so I have a feeling that Stanford going first is going to have a gigantic psychological pressure on everybody else in a way that any other school would not Harvard maybe the same but I feel like Stanford is the lever that moves the whole thing so you're gonna see a lot of school closings that seems inevitable I was in an elevator yesterday and go

[13:29]

was in an elevator yesterday and go shopping and there were a couple of fun looking grandmother types I'm guessing there were 75 each and there were that you know spunky full of life you know gonna live to a hundred kind of 75 year olds the kind you want to hang out with the couple a couple ladies and they had some political pins on them and and they were chatting they were chatting out loud in the elevator about their favorite Democratic picks one of them liked be booed edge but since he's gone they were gonna I think they were gonna back birdie and they're just chatting away in a crowded elevator and I thought to myself I couldn't do that I couldn't could you if you were a trump supporter well certainly in California maybe it's different in your state but if you were in California you couldn't get into an elevator in California and just have a casual conversation with the person you came into the elevator with and say yeah yeah get ready to support Trump and

[14:30]

yeah get ready to support Trump and we're going to a rally and stuff now there's somebody says you know I do I think if you're a certain size if you're male and you're certain size and you you know and and nobody's gonna pick a fight with you you can say anything you want that's just the fact but I would I would actually be I would feel unsafe in a crowded elevator of just normal citizens and suburbs you know scary looking people just normal citizens I would feel unsafe to say anything positive about Republicans now yeah you see in the comments um I'm not alone it has a lot to do with where I lived and when I say unsafe I don't mean I don't mean they're gonna beat me up I mean it's be some kind of unpleasant encounter and I thought to myself I don't think there's enough reporting on that the the fact that half of the country can't even talk out loud about their political

[15:33]

talk out loud about their political opinions I've never seen that before has that ever been the case and I can't think of any any situation where half the country was silenced in public you actually could do it on social media you know because you have some distance here but that's a pretty bad situation and I I think I have to I've avoided saying this but now I'm you know I've been tripped over the line the left is a violent hate group now that sounds like the things that somebody says in a political season and it sounds like hyperbole and it sounds like just something it just sounds like something you say it doesn't sound like anything that's close to something real to call an entire political party a hate group but why is it that I can't talk in front of them about just a normal political process a normal you know I don't know

[16:35]

process a normal you know I don't know how normal Trump is but but an ordinary political conversation I can't have I can't have that in public I couldn't even wear I would not go out in public with a shirt that you know said Trump on and you know I don't wear that kind of stuff anyway but I wouldn't if I did so is it is it hyperbole to say that the Democrats are a hate group because an ordinary well-meaning citizen church-going loves the Constitution has never discriminated just likes low taxes just having a conversation in an elevator you couldn't do that you could not do that so I think I think it's not hyperbole to say that the Democrats have evolved you know not intentionally but I think they've evolved into a hate group that can actively actively you know execute through a in public in public apparently people are

[17:36]

public in public apparently people are okay with it oh my god I'm right on the edge of flipping out again I told you about that the prednisone puts me right on the edge it's only the fact that I know it is not my genuine opinion that the the meds are influencing me to be a little bit more competitive it's only that that allows me to pull back that that little extra knowledge alright here's my prediction and this is the most boring ordinary prediction in the world but it always comes as a surprise so how could something be bored ordinary boring happens every time and when I say it it's still gonna sound like a surprise watch this the presidential race is a horse race and the media will cause the underdog to catch up so that you have you so that the lead gets switched a lot of times so there's just an automatic universal pressure to let the underdog catch up so that it's it's

[18:38]

the underdog catch up so that it's it's a close race again so what happened we had we had Bernie had a dominant lead what was the prediction well the horse race the prediction is that the dominant lead no matter how dominant would be challenged sure enough Biden has this big Super Tuesday so now now Biden's the the definite nominee right totally gonna be Biden nothing could happen now he's got a commanding lead Biden's going all the way right well no the prediction is that the media controls the stuff and they're going to make it close and I don't know that the media needed to do that but have you heard this latest compilation clip of Biden's gaffes it really is a new level and and it feels like you can again this could be confirmation bias but it feels like as an observer and it probably doesn't matter if it's

[19:39]

matter if it's formation bias because if I'm perceiving it that way others are and that's how people will vote but it looks like Biden is losing it in an actual predictable way that we're observing in other words six months ago I don't think he used as bad as he is now is that my imagination now probably a lot of you will agree with it but we have to be honest that that could be confirmation bias so you've seen people agreeing with me but but take the same caution that I'm giving myself which is it might look like that even if it weren't true because we're sort of looking for it but let me see if I can play this latest clip it's just it's just shocking so this is Biden trying to get out in a sentence so watch out mangle this is he

[20:41]

sentence so watch out mangle this is he actually worked hard on that sentence struggled and when he was done he decided that what he wanted to say is that we should elect re-elected we should work hard to reelect Donald Trump he this isn't funny anymore okay that's not to say I won't have my my laughs at future things but it's not a joke anymore to say that there's a little bit of elder abuse going on there's something happening here this deeply troubling and that has nothing to do with politics right and I feel like don't the Democrats see this you know I'm sure the Democrats were saying the same thing and maybe still do that that Trump has his own issues blah blah can't we all see it so they might be as equally puzzled about why we can't see what they see in

[21:43]

about why we can't see what they see in Trump but honestly this is either a wonderful illusion that you know some people can see what with Biden and some can't or are we the ones were wrong don't rule it out maybe we're the ones who are having a bad perception what if he's fine do you think there's any chance of that I don't you know you have to trust your own judgment because that's the world we live in I mean you have to do something you got it you have to act you can't just sit there and starve to death so you have to choose your judgment but we really have bad judgment just keep that in mind you have to act anyway all right let's see what else is going on George Takei do y'all know George Takei he's a great Twitter account to follow he was of course played Sulu and Neil at the original Star Trek and he's a big anti-trump er now most anti-trump accounts are just

[22:47]

now most anti-trump accounts are just painful to follow like you probably don't if you're a trump supporter you probably don't follow any anti Trump accounts but if you wanted to follow on that is often clever and funny and doesn't always have politics George Takei is actually he's a fun follow because even when I don't agree with him the others something entertaining there so he's of course very vocal in the celebrity world of being an anti Trump ER and he put out his own video in which it looks like he cut pieces from Biden video official videos and put together basically his own little commercial like I can't pay that to show how great Joe Biden is but here's the embarrassing part he focused on Joe Biden going to have a burger with beto at the Wonder burger where they just went into an ordinary fast-food place and sat down and had a burger and talked and in order

[23:47]

and had a burger and talked and in order to sell Joe Biden what George Takei had to do with his own little homemade video is remove the parts where Joe Biden is talking I'm just thinking about that in order to make a favorable video about Joe Biden you had to edit out the parts he's talking now he did say something but it was just a brief statement then all the rest was Beto talking or or video of him walking in or some commentary they actually had to remove the parts where he talks let me just think about it because do you think that George Takei you know you can tell from his Twitter account he's a bright guy he's paying attention he's watching and he cares he cares a lot do you think he doesn't see this do you think he doesn't know that he didn't have a way to make Joe Biden look good if Joe Biden was

[24:48]

Joe Biden look good if Joe Biden was speaking and I just don't see how Bernie doesn't or I'm yeah I don't see how Bernie doesn't make a slight comeback so here's what I think I think people are gonna be talking about Biden's brain at the president's already talking about it it has to be obvious to Democrats that he can't possibly win right am I wrong about that isn't this the most obvious thing we've ever seen in politics let me put it this way has there ever been a potential matchup that had so little mystery to it this doesn't look close there I don't think Bernie can win either so they do have two choices of you know which way do you want to lose let's talk some more about that Carla Harris put out a little video today in which he as anticipated endorsed Joe Biden but here

[25:49]

anticipated endorsed Joe Biden but here is the interesting part according to me maybe it's only interesting to me wolf I doubt I had predicted when she dropped out of the race keep in mind for context that 18 months ago or so I predicted that she would be the nominee for the Democrats obviously she has suspended her campaign so my prediction that she would be the nominee people said not so good but I say well she might reemerge as Biden as a vice president but she would come back and I'd predicted this correct me if I'm wrong you've heard me say this right because I think I've said it more than once that that the Democrat experts would give comma a makeover a charisma makeover because I think that's the main thing she needed and so she does this little video after disappearing for a while and the the disappearing for a while was part of the prediction that she would disappear she add like Batman she would chew a train

[26:50]

add like Batman she would chew a train to fix whatever flaws she had and then she would come back and she would be a different product well it might have just happened because if you watch the video and I just tweeted it so you can see it in my Twitter feed here are the things that I had criticized her about in the past or thought about criticizing in one case but didn't say it out loud and then here's what she's done about it so the old Camila old being you know a few months ago she had she would her dress what he called the clothes she wore not a dress but she wore these boxy suits that made her look awful am i right the the way she dressed was frankly awful I may be as politicians go one of the worst dressers now before you say sexist excess sexist I have on record of saying that Hillary Clinton

[27:51]

record of saying that Hillary Clinton did an excellent job of dressing and I will reassert that Hillary designed essentially like a uniform if you will so she had it she had a look in style and you don't have to be a supermodel to to dress fashionably and and as well as you can and I think I hit think Hillary did a perfectly good job in the in the fashion way and it matters I think when the president wears his suit it matters I think wow they dress makes a big difference and cobbler comes back and in her video and again we don't know if this is a trend yet we're just looking for it early she's wearing only a black some kind of a top that is very flattering so she's so the the boxy jacket is off with the little shoulders and stuff they make her look like a box and instead she's wearing just a black top and I'm you know I'm

[28:51]

just a black top and I'm you know I'm not your fashion guy right I'm just saying that it was a world better a world better just look to have just a nice simple black top framed her nicely she had a nice background it was different it was way better that was just a trend we don't know yet we'll have to see her a few more times the other thing that she got right is that and again I don't want to make this sexist all right because it's gonna sound like that I make fun of birdies hair all the time Biden's hair these are these are disasters of haircuts Trump is a sort of a special case because his hair is more of a you know part of the brand but you don't the men in the race have some issues with hair because how you look does matter were a shallow world and I would say that Carla's hairstyle that she had been using mostly on the campaign was hit or miss it was

[29:53]

campaign was hit or miss it was different on different days but I wasn't a fan in this this video where she is promoting or endorsing Joe Biden she's in my opinion her hairstyle is improved a little little more I don't know it's just better now again is that permanent is it just you know women change their hair fairly frequently maybe was just a good day but it's noticeably better somebody says more feminine I don't know if it's that I think it's just better you know if you've ever seen somebody who went from a bad hair stylist to a good one it makes a big difference I think maybe she got a better than herself the other thing she did is no giggle this was my biggest complaint is this she giggled is just a mannerism she would giggle at her own jokes and it would make her look unserious no gain she got through the entire video without without the nervous girl giggle and I think that really costs her when she

[30:54]

think that really costs her when she does that if she got coached out of that it's gonna be a big change because that's her biggest weakness in my opinion now you she has one more thing that she needs to work on which is she has a chihuahua like shaking quality when she talks have you noticed that so she'll talk and and her body will be moving so should be should be like this I'm talking I'm gonna endorse Joe Biden and you can't feel she doesn't feel confident because she her body is not calmed there are moments in which she comes a little bit and her voice is calm and watch and so he says you're obsessed but watch how much power she projects when she calms down her her body and I think the experts are probably telling her this too so this is my speculation that she's being coached finally by good

[31:55]

that she's being coached finally by good people because it looks like there's a change if she can calm her body the force of her voice just goes through the roof because she does have a really good powerful voice that she completely kneecaps by jumping around and being a chihuahua if she could calm it down it's really gonna be remarkable and she had a nice smile and she was more likable on this and that's that's part of her problem all right now given all this there's also here's a hypnotist observation while she was endorsing Biden she was shaking her head no she needs to stop that watch me shake my head now as I'm talking which makes me wonder if I do it I wonder if I do that but she's endorsing him while shaking her head no she's like Joe Biden's the best person in the world and I'm so glad that I'm endorsing him I'm making this up that's not exactly what she said and her head is shaking back and forth like

[32:56]

her head is shaking back and forth like in now while she's talking I'm not a hundred percent convinced that that means anything it would be easy to to look at a common mannerism and over interpret it but keep an eye on and see if she shakes her head now on other topics if she doesn't maybe it does mean something all right I still think Klobuchar would be the stronger choice for Joe Biden and the reason is the Klobuchar doesn't seem to have any negatives except maybe some personal likability that frankly voters don't care about people don't care too much if you're mean to your staff they really don't and Joe Biden is so nice that Amy Klobuchar is one tiny little small weakness of you know she ate a salad with a comer she she was mean to somebody it gets sort of erased because Biden's niceness will cancel that out

[33:58]

Biden's niceness will cancel that out and but I think Klobuchar strikes you as somebody who could take the job right away am I wrong about that even if you didn't like anything about Amy Klobuchar policies would you agree with me that if the choice was Kamala or Klobuchar let's say there was never any president you just had to choose Klobuchar or Carla let's say you dislike their policies equally you just had to choose who's a solid sort of presidential quality I think head-to-head is Klobuchar because she's she doesn't have negatives she has a solid success she's got success in those battleground states she has done things across the aisle she's been a senator for a long time she did better than cobbler did in the race I don't think it's even close if you're looking at her just as an individual but if you're looking at what balance is the ticket I've said cheekily before that

[35:01]

ticket I've said cheekily before that you might need to add a person of color to the Democratic ticket so that white people will vote for them because all the guilty white Democrats are gonna need a person of color on the ticket to feel good about it I've said before that black voters apparently are more flexible than white voters apparently are willing to vote for their self-interest as they see it and apparently are a little bit more flexible about who they vote for so kudos to that community CPAC that big big Republican convention apparently there was an attendee with a coronavirus and was a AIPAC they had one too and somebody shook hands with somebody who shook hands with the president and the president says he's not concerned at all now is that a good answer if the President of the United States in the middle of this crisis which you know they're telling us to be worried no

[36:02]

they're telling us to be worried no they're nothing else to be worried they're telling us to be prepared should the president say he's not concerned at all I think the answer is yes because I think you want your president telling people not to panic so long as they're also giving them the message to prepare and so long as they're also getting the message that there's a real thing out there that needs to be worried about i I'm a little bit mixed on the Trump performance so far as I always say you can't really tell if he's doing a good or bad job on the details of you know who's in charge and what decisions have been made and all that stuff you can't really tell because you don't know who how somebody else would have done we're not close enough to it you just don't know but you can tell the communication because that's the part you can observe directly does the president say things and go to you know create events and do things that make you feel comfortable and make you feel like the government's

[37:02]

and make you feel like the government's got this is that sort of a mixed bag I would say that as I said yesterday I think Trump's Trump's personality and the set of tools he brings to the job are extraordinary like we've never seen before but that's different from saying it fits every occasion you need the right president with the right tools for the right situation you know the war president is not the peace president they're different people probably I don't think Trump is good at this we now he's a famous germaphobe I don't know if that has anything to do with how engaged he is in this but he's not good at this can we agree on that now again being not good at this I'm talking about just the communication part doesn't mean anything about whether or not the government is being effective in dealing with us because it's not the president who's doing the work there are a lot of professionals smart people doing the work I imagine they're doing

[38:03]

doing the work I imagine they're doing everything that they can do I imagine private industry is doing everything he could do and I've said before that this is different than any other situation in which normally the president would be the most important person and would be making decisions that would affect everything I don't know that the president is the most important person anymore because the entire world has mobilized on this problem and they didn't have to be asked because it's a it's a global threat and humanity has focused its smartest bravest hardest-working people on the problem when is humanity as a whole focused on one problem that's so immediate and this important before or never right where we're focusing the entire weight of human capability on this one problem and it's phenomenal it's not really the president's job it's the globe as a sort of self-organized 99 percent of it and

[39:06]

of self-organized 99 percent of it and then the president says here's some money I'll sign it but the president is not doing the work the globe has kind of self organized plus using existing you know CDC and state governments and stuff but it's it's beautiful to watch humanity act as one and become this global brain as I've called it I called it a god brain and then I deleted that tweet because I think it just confuses people don't want people don't want their religion mixed in with their opinion so I just deleted that but let's call the global brain it is focused on the problem in a way we've never done before and at a time when we can all communicate and let me give you some examples of what's happening so yesterday I think was yesterday I tweeted that in order for telemedicine to work meaning your doctor being on a video call instead of in person in order for that to work efficiently we need an

[40:08]

for that to work efficiently we need an executive order that would allow doctors to practice across state lines now why is it that I could make that tweet and I think it will actually make a difference the reason I could do that is because I have experience with my own startup in which we work with doctors on telemedicine and I learned that one of the biggest problems is that you can't practice across state lines and if you could there would be far more availability because let's say there's a emergency in one state but it hasn't hit another state yet you'd have a lot of doctors in the other state who had a little excess capacity they're willing to give out maybe at night or whatever and they can help out across state lines at the moment it's illegal it's illegal can you believe that it's an emergency the country's in an emergency and an a qualified doctor in Connecticut they've got a pretty good you know requirements to be a doctor don't you think don't you think a doctor who's qualified to

[41:09]

think a doctor who's qualified to practice in Connecticut can give you an opinion and opinion in Pennsylvania I mean right is that dangerous do you feel at risk because you talk to a doctor who can practice in Connecticut but you're in Pennsylvania no you don't feel at risk obviously not it's a ridiculous set of rules maybe it's good for the states maybe the AMA has something to do with it but the point is I as a citizen had a little bit of exposure to that problem it's a gigantic lever in this crisis you know to free up more potential doctor advice even remotely could be a big and I happen to know that it would take one executive order to wipe all that away just for the emergency now you probably want to limit it and say something like you know it's just for coronavirus enquiries and assistants and it's only it's only for a limited

[42:10]

it's only it's only for a limited timeframe because you don't want to go through the whole trouble of changing the whole system in the proper way now some people have said to me can you do an executive order like that because you'd be wouldn't you be overruling all the states and is it legal and don't you need legislation and wouldn't it take longer and here's the answer to that no no that's what an emergency is an emergency is you do things that you'd only do in an emergency and this is one of them would it be legal for the President of the United States to accept to do an executive order saying doctors could temporarily and for this situation only practice across state borders and the answer is it doesn't matter if you're saying to yourself you know Scott it would be illegal for that an executive order yeah for that to be done by an executive order it doesn't matter who's going to complain this is very

[43:11]

who's going to complain this is very important if nobody's going to complain and nobody's going to complain I mean nobody in the matters if nobody's going to complain and it's literally one piece of paper executive order I ordered doctors to be able to practice you know across state lines that's it is one piece of paper one piece of paper nobody will complain does it matter if it's legal it does not does not should not matter if it's legal it's an emergency it's transparent it's obvious it's the right thing to do that's that somebody's saying malpractice insurance um you would probably need an executive order to handle that in some way yes but that's a detail all right so here's another little fact so if you haven't if you're not following Balaji Srinivasan you should you can find his I retweet him a lot

[44:13]

you can find his I retweet him a lot especially during during the coronavirus thing because his his insight and expertise in this is tremendous and one of the things that he found is that there was a development recently in that a certain kind of UV called far UV and I don't know the difference between regular UV and something called Farah UV but there's a technical difference and apparently in a 20-18 Columbia paper that the LA she was tweeting about it can kill airborne viruses so you can actually you can actually shoot the virus out of the air with light a special kind of light now I saw an estimate that you could build them for $1000 piece doesn't it seem like we could get that price down pretty quickly and frankly a lot of people would pay $1000 piece but one in let's say in a public space then I learned this made me a little angry then I learned that China

[45:16]

a little angry then I learned that China ordered basically bought all of the robots probably that looked like a Roomba it's a little robot that looks like a Roomba and has a big light on it that just drives around hospitals in China shoots the UV light into the environment to kill the virus in the air to which I said exactly what you're thinking right now what right when I told you that you heard that there were robots that already exist using technology that I think we can check pretty easily works you shoot some UV into the air and you either have same amount of virus or you don't and they're already using them they're built there in China they're doing their job there they're running around the restaurants disinfecting right didn't as soon as you heard that didn't you say where's my robot where does the United States have

[46:18]

robot where does the United States have any row because they're not buying them from the United States I think they bought them from some European company but as balaji quite accurately says this is not the sort of thing you want to run through some kind of long FDA approval thing is it not fairly easy for scientists to tell whether a light killed a virus I feel as though we could figure that out without you know all the double-blind experiments that you would normally do it's like virus light turned it on dead yes or no try it again try it in a couple of different rooms try it in a couple of different settings I mean it's not one test but as Balaji says you could very quickly get to the point where you were confident enough that it was safe enough I guess there's a safety issue but it's not a big one and why don't we just go gung-ho with this now it could be that you know there are gonna be a lot of false starts and

[47:19]

gonna be a lot of false starts and things we try that don't work and a be testing but this would certainly be on my list of things to go hard at now where where did the knowledge of this come from did or did the US government already know that there existed robots with fari UV light on them maybe not right you assume that the government knows everything but that's not my experience my guess is that people like Balaji you know doing the job of a patriot and a citizen just jumping in to do what he can do same as I am right now he's jumping in and saying did you know about this by now people in the government do know about it because he's widely followed and now a new piece of information is available for a potential solution so when you say did the president do a good or bad job I think you have to adjust that for the fact that it's 2020 and we don't need the

[48:19]

that it's 2020 and we don't need the President to tell us everything to do for a global threat that this that's this well known people are just jumping in people are jumping in they're doing what they need to do we don't need the presidents tell us speaking of that I'd like to tell you everyday those things you can do to keep yourself healthier keep your immune system hi this is especially important to me because I'm like I said I'm in the kill zone because I'm at that age where the virus will kill me especially because I have a the asthma background and so I'm keeping myself healthy and looking for tips on how to do that and of course you all know about the sanitizing in the hand-washing and the and I've added that you should do some moderate exercise get some Sun everyday get some vitamin D these things are all implicated in helping your immune system but there was another study that was sent around today and since this is a weekend especially I'm going to try to say this in the most

[49:20]

I'm going to try to say this in the most g-rated way I can so bear with me as for the benefit of the children I will be talking indirectly now about a topic wink-wink you know what I'm talking about and it goes like this apparently if you're an adult who is enjoying let's say time with yourself let's say your partner is unavailable for whatever reason and you're enjoying time with yourself if you know what I mean wink wink wink and that time results in let's say an experience which you might call a climax sorry children and apparently the science is pretty clear that that improves your cortisol situation which reduces your stress it improves your immune response so it turns out that one of the best things you can do to protect yourself and dare I say the country if

[50:21]

yourself and dare I say the country if not the world because you're a patriot you want to protect the country to well now you know what to do get a little exercise eat right sleep right and wink wink enjoy a little time with yourself so that's doctor's orders
Italy's got a lot of deaths Oh Elan musk let's talk about him so Elon Musk makes a little news on the coronavirus and he says in a tweet I think this was yesterday ish he said coronavirus panic is dumb which of course caused everybody to say Elon Musk is very smart why is he saying the coronavirus panic is dumb he's not saying the virus is a hoax or anything like that he's just saying the panic part it was dumb now of course he was asked to clarify what that means and he

[51:23]

asked to clarify what that means and he did here's what he said so I why do you listen to Elon Musk argument see if it you know passes all the tests just see if it makes sense to you so one of the smartest guys on the planet we all agree with that right whether you like your Tesla or don't like your Tesla Elon Musk is one of the smartest guys ever so let's see his opinion on this so he says the virality of this kovin thing is understated or nob sorry is overstated so he's saying the FRA reality is overstated due to conflation diagnosis conflating the diagnosis date with a contraction date so far so good all right so it is true that we don't know when somebody got the virus we only know when they were tested so we don't really have a sense of the virus it's it's the numbers are polluted by

[52:25]

it's it's the numbers are polluted by the fact of when we discover them not when they started so that would ruin your virality measurements and then over extrapolating exponential growth which is what which is never what happens in reality so he's pointing out that we have lots of history with flus and that they simply don't do what this one is projected to do now people are saying this was different so is his point that they don't that it's never what happens that's really about the past is it true that this one is like the past well that's a gray area some say yes ish some say no ish he's um he's on the side of it's more likely to be in the not exponential growth that we'll get a handle on it or something will happen he says keep extrapolating and virus will exceed massive the known

[53:25]

and virus will exceed massive the known universe so he's making the point the things you know don't increase forever it's just not history doesn't show that that ever happens there's always something that happens that stops things from increasing to infinity and then if he's right about that that he says the fatality rate is also greatly overstated let's follow his argument here he says because there are so few test kits sure enough those who die with respiratory symptoms are tested but those with minor symptoms are not and they says the prevalence of the corona virus and other colds in general is high so his point is that if if I could sort of summarize in my own way that this virus won't be that different from other viruses therefore the panic is overstated but here's what I asked and there was an amazing outpouring of loser think in the comments after I asked this question I said what about

[54:26]

asked this question I said what about the cruise ship deaths it's more than normal so how do you explain that so there were six people died on the Diamond Princess and of 707 infected there were no more than 1,000 or whatever a few thousand I forget how many people were on the ship but seven hundred and seven were affected in six died now for you on most comments to be accepted as the reasonable view it would also be true that cruise ships would not be experiencing unusual levels of death would you agree so I said what is it that it's Planes why the cruise ships had so many deaths I'm watching in the comments and every one of you are experiencing not every one of you but most of you are experiencing loser think if you said because the people in the cruise ships are old it's true and it's loser think

[55:27]

are old it's true and it's loser think that's not you did not make a good argument there if you said it's because they're tightly packed it's true but it's loser think it's not a good argument it's not an answer to the question can anybody tell me why tell me why it's not a good argument it's completely nonsense to say that the reason that there were more deaths on this ship is because they were older why is it nonsense because there are a lot of cruise ships and there are a lot of flus we have plenty of history to know that a cruise ship in which the flu gets out a normal flu how many people does it kill have you ever heard of one ship with six deaths never right I mean maybe there was some other epidemic in the past but if it were true that six people typically died in a cruise ship every

[56:29]

typically died in a cruise ship every every cruise then the Elan musk would be absolutely correct there would be nothing to scare us because we're not seeing anything out of the unusual and of the usual but if you just said it's because they're old and you don't know how to compare things in the comments I saw only one or two people who understood that it's a comparison problem you can't just look at one ship and say it's got old people on it no wonder they died unless all the other boats have old people dying at a similar rate whenever there's a virus is this the first cruise ship there's somebody had a virus on know how many cruise ships does at least some common virus and get loose on the ship how often does that happen my guess most of them most of them if you put a thousand people on the ship during flu season you don't think there's a flu on that ship a normal flu I think there is

[57:30]

that ship a normal flu I think there is so if we had a history of five or six old people dying every time there's a flu on a cruise ship I'd say yeah you love you right this is just a baseline there's nothing happening here but as soon as I asked that question people couldn't couldn't understand that you can't look at this one ship and say they're old and it doesn't mean anything unless unless it's a common experience with the other chefs and it isn't somebody else said and this was a good comment they they pointed out what about Italy because the death rate in Italy seems through the roof but they also have old people in Italy and you know I've heard that their ventilation isn't so good and closed spaces and there's love it a lot of touching and maybe their health care system is great it cetera so you can't really tell too much from Italy but these are the right questions but I think the cruise the cruise ship deaths and and the nursing

[58:32]

cruise ship deaths and and the nursing home deaths if you have a nursing home in which several people die from the same virus that only is meaningful if you've looked at all the other nursing homes who have had viruses me if it's common to have six people die or ten people died in the same nursing home from the same problem and it happens every flu season with the regular flu then you say oh this is like that but I don't think that's the case so the elon I would say you need to answer that question what about the cruise ship what about the high death rates in the old the nursing homes if you haven't answered that then I would say your position is strong and II might you know he's smarter than I am so you might have an answer for that but I haven't heard it all right let's see what else we got going on here see you then reported that there's a caterpillar that could eat plastic which would be

[59:33]

plastic which would be because you throw a bunch of caterpillars on your plastic and it eats it all up and no more storage problem except they you you read the article and way down and says there's only one problem that the the caterpillars poop becomes toxic if they eat plastic and I'm thinking okay well that didn't really move the ball forward I'm very happy that there's a caterpillar that can eat our plastic but if the outcome is that the caterpillar poops toxic waste I don't think we came out ahead so maybe that story didn't need to be told
speaking of telemedicine I'm gonna take a risk here I'm gonna take a risk I realize this could blow up in my face you all know I have this startup it's called when hub and has a product called interface that allows you to do a video call to an expert now when there was a there was a

[1:00:37]

expert now when there was a there was a hurricane a while ago and I had offered in public a people could use this app to get information you know about from people who were you know on the scene and everybody's today you're trying to profit from that disaster to which you know sometimes I'm more of a robot that I need to be and the robot part of me said no it's just a tool when people need that tool and they don't have to even charge for it so it's not even up to me if anybody makes any money I'm just saying it's a tool you can use but that argument fell on deaf ears and people said no they're people dying and you're trying to sell a product and I thought okay I will take that I will take that criticism to heart and I will not do that again so when the corona virus came off it was it's an obvious situation where you should have medical experts talking to people it's an app that does that and I stayed silent about it so I say silent about it because I

[1:01:37]

so I say silent about it because I didn't want to do that the same thing were you trying to sell some product in that concept but this feels different and I'm noticing that a number of remote software companies are promoting their work and other people are promoting them and nobody's complaining and I was trying to think well what's the difference like why is it that zoom can promote their product for telecommuting it's exactly the tool that people need it's you know it's a it's a profit company why is nobody complaining about that and I think there's a difference the difference is that we're all threatened by this virus and so nobody nobody's a spectator on this we're all in the game or no we will be and so if you're in the game and somebody says here's a tool for you you know might help you win the game people are much more comfortable with that than if they're spectating and saying hey you know we're just watching

[1:02:39]

saying hey you know we're just watching this and you seem to be doing something you know that as spectators we think is is you know inappropriate but as soon as you need the tool suddenly you feel different than that so let me make this offer if there's anybody out there who knows how to get to you the right person just connect me on social media and it's this question if the CDC or the government wants to do effectively a buyout in other words just take over the app for the for the period of the emergency that I would have that conversation and we can do it quickly because the app is already built so if there's anybody in the government who would like to promote telemedicine and I think it would be important for that an executive order to let doctors practice across borders at least for the for the purposes of the emergency coronavirus if there's anybody in the government who would like to immediately spin up an app

[1:03:40]

would like to immediately spin up an app that would allow anybody in the country to talk to a doctor who's willing to put themselves on the app we could do that immediately we could do it in a week and I would I would in one week I will pivot the entire company toward dealing with this emergency but simply says it exists and I would I would imagine that there will be a whole bunch of products in that space because I obviously they're telling tella medicine products but there isn't one that isn't part of a service so most of the existing products are people who have a you know subscription service or that sort of thing there isn't one where you can just say I need to talk to a doctor and I don't have money and it needs to be free so the government the government is putting pressure to to lower the cost if somebody doesn't have health care to get a test and this could be part of that so

[1:04:41]

a test and this could be part of that so anyway if there's anybody who knows anybody in the government or the CDC who wants to look into an app to connect a doctor for no charge just to get advice about should I should I quarantine myself why should I do I can make that a bit more alright so [Music]
yeah I'm just looking at your products look at your comments alright I think that's a let me check my notes here well I got here see if there's anything I want to say that I didn't say and I think I think not I think we did it alright that's all for now stay safe talk to you later