Episode 861 Scott Adams: Sipping the Crisis Away. Join Me!
Date: 2020-03-20 | Duration: 1:08:14
Topics
My new book LOSERTHINK, available now on Amazon https://tinyurl.com/rqmjc2a Questionable stock trades by Congress members Rep. Ilhan Omar compliments President Trump Cash to Americans plan, Ray Dalio says DOUBLE needed Chloroquine thoughts and availability Joe Biden’s disgusting fake news coronavirus tweet
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## Transcript
[0:11]
um hey everybody come on in here a little bit of technical difficulty but I used all of my technical know-how to work it out it seems that if anybody from Twitter is listening for some reason the periscope would not initialize when I had the guest feature on but when I turned it off I did I tested that on my phone withered out and my iPad so there might be a little bug there at the moment or it could be a capacity issue I'm guessing the Internet is slowing down quite a bit people are noticing that already but oh why are you here yes I know why you're here and it's a little thing called the simultaneous it but all you need is a cup or a marker class a tanker Challenger style in the canteen drug reply a vessel of any kind join me now for the unparalleled pleasure the dopamine to the day the thing that makes everything better including a pandemic join me now go ah
[1:27]
just right well let's talk about all of the things so big story in the news is that there were some senators who sold some stocks ahead of ahead of announcing that things were as bad as they are and the thinking of course the thinking is that they they traded on insider trading but it seems like there are at least three sippers different sub different situations so senator burr seems to have been more of a cleaner situation where he got some information he sold some stocks and I think he owes the public an explanation now my experience with these things is they really have to hear the other side you really have to hear the other side but on the surface of it looks pretty bad so here's us an explanation that's the that's all I'm gonna say if he doesn't explain it I think Tucker
[2:29]
if he doesn't explain it I think Tucker Carlson said and I would agree with it if he can't explain it he probably needs to resign but I'm gonna say behold by holding my opinion until I hear the other side now the other two seem a little sketchier there's some somebody in Congress doesn't matter who who who has some money in a trust but is it a blind trust you know there's some question there then the one that is the least credible is the Senator Dianne Feinstein also some some amount of stock was sold but if you don't realize how rich Dianne Feinstein is it looks like bad behavior but as soon as you imagine that her wealth is this much and the amount she sold was like you know a dot in that in that universe the odds the odds of Dianne Feinstein was doing insider trading I think are vanishingly small the others have a little more to explain but we'll wait we'll see what's
[3:30]
explain but we'll wait we'll see what's what I want to mention something about Elon Omar's complimentary comments about President Trump which of course is the most unexpected thing in the world yeah and I'll remind you of this whatever you think of Elon omar personally or her politics and I'm sure that the audience for this is not big fans but setting that aside for a moment if we can just you know be adult and separate the the technique from the opinions etc her technique has always been good meaning that she's she's smart she knows how to capture the public's attention and here's what I loved about Elon omar's play first of all it was the right thing to do being being supportive of your president when he's when he's getting the right action which was maybe not day one right I mean even even supporters said it was
[4:30]
I mean even even supporters said it was off to a shaky start but once once the president got in firm footing and I think he clearly is at this point you know it does make sense given the national mood and the worry that's in the air it does make sense the Democrats would at least try to join ranks at least for the point of the emergency and she did that so if you could separate yourself from okay what is it order her hidden intentions what's she really up to we can't read her mind we can just say what was the right thing for a leader in the Democratic Party to do right now it was the right thing for the country but there's another level to this in which Elon omar solved one of her own biggest problems and that's the clever part of this because if you can find something that's unambiguously good for the country and I think praising the president you know once he was on firm footing was good for the country because
[5:31]
footing was good for the country because it builds confidence at cetera but there's another level which is just good for her which is you can argue that ulong Omar's biggest weakness as a politician is that people wonder if she's on the side of America right I mean this is not my opinion I'm not even going to put my opinion in any of this I'm just saying that that that is the criticism that her critics make a year you know you have some other loyalty you're not an American you want to destroy America etc so by going so conspicuously against form by complimenting the president who she's eviscerated on many occasions she makes a a really smart counterpoint which is from this day forward if you say Ilan Omar doesn't have the best interests of the United States in mind you have to explain today I didn't this week because to me it looked like clearly a counter counter
[6:35]
looked like clearly a counter counter political move sorry if you hear my cat she's going crazy
so she'll always have that thing to say you know if I were purely a political creature why did why was I complimenting the president unless I meant it so it's very smart play it's good for the country it's you know selfishly politically good but that's sort of hidden and should be by the fact it's good for the country so I would say if we could just separate what you think about our politically or personally from the technique good technique and and you just has to be pointed out I you know I hate to be divisive but there's something that's worth noticing in the public reactions to things you know I've said that this is a time when everybody seems to be volunteering to do whatever it is they can do you know what I can do
[7:38]
it is they can do you know what I can do is not that much I can do this right so so I do this I do this and but I've never been jumping in to do what they could do but the people who are at least equipped for this situation in many cases are artists you know writers journalists musicians poets etc they may not have the skill set that is immediately available now I think artists are very important and they'll certainly be part of you know getting us back to normal and making us feel right so artists are a gigantic part of our experience and what makes life good and and it's important so artists are wonderful and sometimes I pretend to be one but during the crisis who are noticing that the artists sort of default to what they can do and nobody cares about the art they're creating at the moment because we got bigger things to worry about and I think they're defaulting to criticism because it's sort of what artists can do so just a
[8:41]
sort of what artists can do so just a shout out to artists this isn't the time you know there will be a time when the artists are actually very important to our well-being our mind or our public sense of you know who we are all that stuff you know art's terribly important but not now which in terms of priorities so so you artists I know you've got some opinions and how about just hold them now but just hold them and help the help the national mind to get to some sort of comfort and some kortek sort of confidence and do what can be done that is that's good so cringy videos and and criticisms of things that aren't going to change just not helping all right here's a here's like a perfect example of bad behavior by an artist now I'm using artists to be you know writers and anybody in that field this is something
[9:43]
anybody in that field this is something that somebody said we're on a CNN opinion piece by not anticipating the catastrophe we are now living Trump joins a pantheon of American leaders whose failures of imagination have come at great cost the perspective was very different indeed been in the Obama administration Alice Hillel writes for CNN and thinking is this the right time to pretend we know what somebody's imagination was doing I mean it seems again not reading the room later later this would be great let's do our autopsy later but this kind of a week your generic concept level I think I read his mind but compared to the person I imagine who doesn't exist who was doing the job at the same time in my imagination man the imaginary president did so well so let me imagine what this president did and then I'll
[10:45]
what this president did and then I'll write something about why he was thinking and imagining as if I knew and compared to my magical thinking of somebody who wasn't actually there and doing the job and I don't really know any of the details of why they did what they did it was just craziness just skip them so I would say that for a while I'll you know people are gonna be reading these articles they have to generate content and unless let's be honest they need to pay check too everybody needs to pay check but for the time being maybe just don't read them yeah forget about whether they're right or wrong just don't read them for now concentrated something else the approval for the president has jumped dramatically in the last few days so it went from 43% of proving to 55% approving of his management of the crisis it's pretty good and I would say that the public is getting this right wouldn't you because I think the public
[11:46]
wouldn't you because I think the public said that's a bad start and the polls the polls reflect on that that was my opinion I mean my opinion was that we got off to a bad start but the difference is that when I say it's a bad start I'm talking like an adult an adult who's lived more than you know three years of an adult life an adult knows that in the midst of an emergency of the type we've never quite seen I mean nothing's quite like this experience there's no such thing as people who were smart and knew what to do that's completely imaginary every criticism of what the administration did or did not do right in the in the earliest days compares them to some magical non-existent person who knew exactly what to do that person didn't exist who exactly was the expert who knew what to do I believe there were none now that's enough to say that somebody didn't say the right thing from the start because
[12:48]
the right thing from the start because if you have any situation that it's complicated there's a gray area there's lots of unknowns and you can either go left or right well if you have talked to enough experts you're gonna have somebody who says go left and somebody says go right after it's done you will mistakenly say that one of those two teams these are the go left or the go right got the right answer but that's ridiculous because in any situation there would be people who say go left people who say go right and you're gonna go one of those ways somebody's gonna look like they were geniuses and fine sight that's not how it works if you're in the room in the early days you probably didn't know what to do and that's not because you're dumb it's not because you were incompetent it's because the situation itself was very opaque China wasn't giving us you know reliable information we didn't know yet to have successful we would we would be with this or that so
[13:48]
would we would be with this or that so yeah they're gonna be plenty of people who say oh yeah I told you so I knew it before the president did it's just not a thing it's just not a thing you will not find that there was anybody who just knew what to do and and here's the important part is not knowing what to do it's knowing exactly when to do it because remember you're balancing two unknowns the unknown of what it would do to the economy with potential devastating effect versus the unknown of what it would do to our health these who are two gigantic unknowns so I'm gonna have no patience no patience with the people who say that in that first week some more people knew what to do that just isn't a thing and and and let me say again that on January 24th I was cursing in public online saying close the airports you know a full week before
[14:48]
the airports you know a full week before the President did I think something like that now do I say I'm a genius because I got that right I mean in hindsight it looks right I do not I do not that was my opinion all right and when I said we should close the airports and I was damn certain about it does that mean I was right no does that mean that I mean it turns out I was right but did I know it at the time I thought I knew it but nobody's really that smart do I blame the president for waiting a few days I prefer he had gone earlier but blame is sort of a child's game here because I didn't know what the president knew so all I knew was there's something bad happening in China close the airport now when I said it and many of you experienced it live it was sort of a sort of a shocking moment where people
[15:51]
sort of a shocking moment where people who didn't quite know what how big the problem would become my reaction to her probably looked completely out of place
but here's the thing you know did I do that because I was smarter than you did I do it because I've got a grudge against China which I do did I you know did I do it because I'm some you know expert on epidemiology no I can't even pronounce it but don't let anybody else tell you just because maybe they were on the right side and they got it early like I did you know I I think you jack boo Sabich was even earlier than that I think in January 22nd he had tweeted you know close the borders I think he said something like Chloe's traveled but basically he was on it you know more than a week before the president closed it do I say them therefore oh you know Jack pasaba can die were the geniuses you know we knew and gosh anybody who didn't know and do
[16:53]
and gosh anybody who didn't know and do what we suggested got it wrong no no I don't because I'm a frickin adult and I've been in the world and I know what it's like to be in the room if you're in the room you know a lot more than cartoonist in California sitting in front of his iPad saying you know shouting f-bombs saying clothes the clothes the travel to them from China I thought I knew and I thought it was important enough to get people's attention so it was fully considered but no I didn't know what they knew I didn't I didn't have an economist saying yeah you know if you do the math you're gonna kill more people closing down the economy then you will maybe you wait a little I don't know what happened in the room who knows what the president was told who knows what the counter points were who knows what the opinions are so here's my thing I'm gonna say it a million times because maybe nothing has ever been more important judge what the administration does by their Corrections right not the mistakes because in an
[17:56]
right not the mistakes because in an emergency it's nothing but guessing making mistakes see what happened in correcting so if you're only judging the guessing and making mistakes part without the correcting part uh-huh you're not part of the productive world you're not looking at it correctly it's not an adult opinion it's almost like a childlike opinion yeah I know what the President of the United States and all of his experts should have done without being there in the room without having the knowledge all right so enough on that let me let me give you a perfect another example so the the government the administration is looking at you know there's cash payments to citizens to keep people eating and get them through the crisis and look at this so you're seeing a reproduction of the fog of war around this question of what to do to you know stabilize the economy this is very similar in type yeah I don't want to make an analogy but it's
[18:57]
don't want to make an analogy but it's similar in type because of the the unknowns to the original decision that the president and his administration had about what to do about the virus so this new fog of war is just a perfect example of what I'm talking about so you know some of the smartest people in the world are saying that you know or trillion ish dollars should be pumped into the economy now remember these are like smartest people in the government are saying I think about a trillion put it in there meanwhile you may know this name Ray Dalio said the stimulus package is way too small and should be maybe doubled doubled a hundred percent difference we're talking about an extra trillion dollars now who's Ray Dalio do you care well you should because everybody was smart knows Ray Dalio is like the smart guy of the smart guys right maybe in this world of finance and economics the people who
[19:57]
finance and economics the people who know this world and I count myself you know at least a little bit knowledgeable about it Mike if anybody's new here I've got a background in economics degree MBA and I've worked in in corporate America for a long time so Ray Dalio was somebody that would be very familiar to me actually I happen his book you know I have his book downstairs and if he goes into the room and says the right number is 2 trillion and other people were just as smart you know right Raymond um madhu chim and all of those cats they're all in the same room and one of them says the right number is a trillion and somebody else smart says the right number is 2 trillion who is the smart one the answer is nobody knows there's it's sort of a guess work so that's how big the difference is that the most qualified and well informed experts could be that far apart so they're gonna make they're gonna try something right
[20:58]
make they're gonna try something right so in the end there will either be a checked or not a check and that check will be a certain amount and not some other certain amount we're gonna try it if it isn't right we're gonna correct judge the correction all right you can see this one forming if it's too little and they correct that was the right move if it's too much well I don't know if you can do too much can you is that you can you do too much is that even a thing so look for the corrections fast corrections for your assumption of competence don't look for the first guess because the smartest people in the world are not anywhere near the same page so you should not be second-guessing the smartest people in the world and say well if I were there it's a trillion I think it's 1.2 trillion that's the rate about all right let's talk about the idea itself so the sticking point here is that at least the way it's been floated is that there'd be a hundred thousand dollar ninety-nine thousand
[22:00]
thousand dollar ninety-nine thousand dollar whatever cut off and you wouldn't get a check if your income is above that I don't know if that's family or individual but the details don't matter as much as the principal now what would happen to the country in terms of our you know unity our national mood etc if only the people under a certain income get that money and we all know I mean you don't have to be a genius you don't have to be raid alia to know this that there would be plenty of people above a hundred thousand you know maybe maybe below 150 whatever the number is they lost their job and they don't they can't buy food there are plenty of people I mean there have to be tens of millions of people in the category that they make more than that on paper but they can't buy groceries because they didn't get pay this week they've gotta be plenty of people so what happens if they don't get any money and other people do well there could be plenty of complaining and there's going
[23:00]
plenty of complaining and there's going to be a lot of people saying you know what's going on so let me let me toss out one possibility and I'm just gonna put that out there I don't know if this is a good idea again to my point as more people can disagree greatly in this you know field of great unknowns suppose you did this and I'll just put it out there as a suggestion I don't even know if it's a good one there is something very different about this situation that cannot be compared to anything that we humans and especially we Americans have ever have ever been in it has to do with the fact that we're all in the same team for all practical purposes that's a different situation and it allows maybe some different strategies let me just put this out here and I sent it one says that as a thought experiment but I'm getting more serious about it now it's
[24:01]
getting more serious about it now it's still just a thought but on a little more serious and it goes like this could you trust the people who have sufficient incomes to get through the the emergency I would be one of them could you trust them to donate their money back in other words if you just gave money to everybody with no regard to income could you trust that the the billionaire's the millionaire's or just the people were who didn't lose their paycheck could you trust that they would donate it intelligently in their community you know give everybody a check and say you know you're President of the United States look we don't have time to sort this out but your your local if you're rich I'm gonna trust you to do the right thing now maybe make it easy there could be a specific way you could donate it back there might be a way you can you know write void on your check and you know register it on something might be
[25:01]
know register it on something might be some way that you can you can be sure that you gave it to somebody who didn't already get money from somebody else so maybe there's a way to register you know who you donated it to to so they don't get it you know multiple too much multiple contributions and when somebody else gives nothing so I've seen a lot of knows but if you if you can and by the way I'm not selling this is a great idea I'm just putting it out there because the more ideas we have you know maybe that helps somebody fix a different idea somebody says some would in some wouldn't now that's the assumption that I would like to test imagine that some would just keep it what percentage and does it matter maybe not maybe it doesn't matter but I think this is a different national mood I think that every person who can help is helping
[26:02]
every person who can help is helping this is very different so and that's that gets down to why this is different than any other time if this were normal times of course you don't send money to rich people of course but could you trust them could you trust the citizens the rich ones the rich enough ones you know the ones that's not even rich but rich enough could you trust them I think yes now I would certainly I'm not gonna fight hard with you if you say no and that doesn't work it'll make things worse and people will complain because the rich people kept their money and all that but I don't think so I think the way I'm reading the room is that that money would fly out of the rich people's hands as fast as they could get rid of it I believe that they would be racing to get rid of it because you know what you don't want to be in the middle of a pandemic you know what you don't want to be the rich who kept money that should go into the poor nobody wants to
[27:03]
should go into the poor nobody wants to be that guy that woman that guy nobody wants to be that person and I think that money would just like fly and in the hands of the rich they do give it to a local restaurant they'd give it to a local business I think it wouldn't last 10 minutes before the rich gave it away that's what I think now I just put it out there it would require the highest level of trust can you trust your fellow citizens especially the ones who have more money can you trust them in this emergency I think you can I think you can't and maybe it would be a good thing for the national psyche just to prove it now I'm not the smartest guy in the room on this issue that's for sure not even close so I'll just put it out there as an idea all right you know here's a here's some
[28:05]
all right you know here's a here's some stuff I'd like to know an answer to so you know we're coming to understand that this is an information problem that got turned into a health care problem you know if we had perfect information we would have no problem already and be solved because I would know who has the virus and I'd say oh bob has the virus I'll stay away from Bob then two weeks later everybody's good so if you had perfect information you'd be fine and as we're gaining information about you know what tools and what tests and who has and who doesn't what works what doesn't you know we're that's that's how we'll get over over the top so definitely an information kind of problem but here's some questions with the information so some things I want to know to improve my feeling of comfort I would like to know the following thing what do we know about the number of people who were treated with chloroquine and then lived
[29:07]
treated with chloroquine and then lived or versus died so in other words we have death rates of just people you know summed up in average but I want to see the death rate specifically of people who got to chloroquine beat let's say before they were ventilated so you'd probably want to look at only pre ventilated people because then you could imagine that was too late so if you subtract down to people that you don't know if it's too late or not but it would ruin your numbers either way you take the obit demo so no ventilated people just people who were baby heading that direction how many of them who got the full you know chloroquine treatment actually died and then of the ones who died how many of them had an underlying condition that that explained it and because here's what I'm gonna predict all right and I'm gonna talk for him in a moment about dr. Fauci who is way less optimistic about chloroquine then then people who have read up on it are and
[30:09]
people who have read up on it are and I'll explain that in a minute but I want to know if this works to allow people not to die unless an underlying condition that would be very good to know now the president said it could be a game-changer you know maybe maybe not so we left some doubt there but use the phrase game-changer and that made the public think that we've really got something good and and things are gonna go well when dr. Fauci who we all recognized as the one we want to listen to you know if there's a tiebreaker on facts who are you gonna listen to right alright if our president who likes to put a good spin on things as this and dr. Fauci who does not try to put a good spin on things just trying to give it to you straight he says something a little different who are you gonna believe well under normal circumstance I'd say well maybe you want to lean toward dr. fauci but this might be an exception and let me
[31:10]
this might be an exception and let me say why so foul she was asked about it and he said there's Court no magic drug meaning that is and then he goes on to explain there's no magic drug that's both effective and safe or has been tested to be effective and safest that has been tested the part that's critical my cat won't shut up can you hold just a second I can let her out
Thanks you can tell this is a high quality productive because all your high
[32:10]
quality productive because all your high quality productions they stop what they're doing to let the cat out alright was talking about fallacies somewhat disagree with the president's characterization of this chloroquine so is it a game-changer maybe as the president says or is it no magic drug that is you know tested to be safe and efficacious why would they be sort of a little bit different well are they are they did the president say that the drug had been tested and was safe and efficacious he did not so when Fauci says that there's no magic drug that has tested that safe and effective that's compatible with what the president says the president is just saying it could be good felt she's just saying it could be good they're just using different words is basically there's no difference now ouchy is holding back on the optimism but i
[33:12]
holding back on the optimism but i believe he also cities gave us the why because we've already experienced a hoarding of toilet paper right so where in the world where we know that hoarding would happen what if how she said this is the magic pill if you have this pill you can live if you don't have this pill you might die what would happen what would happen right so I think ouchy is playing a careful game here which is I believe the government might have a lot more belief in its efficiency and safety then our top expert is letting on number one it just always makes sense not to let people get complacent it's still you know an emergency situation and there would be several benefits of downplaying it the number one benefit is that it would read it reason reduce the number of people who hoard it
[34:14]
who hoard it would reduce the number of people are willing to maybe get violent to get it because the last thing you want to hear is that your neighbor has some of this drug and you don't but you have a gun see where I'm going with this how would you like a country where there's a magic pill some people have it because they got a connection whatever so some people are gonna have anything some people got it from their secret of Mexico was source or whatever and they've got the pill but the neighbors got a gun you want to live in that country yeah if your government says yeah this is a magic pill if you have it you can live if you don't have the pill you might die neighbor has it the other neighbor doesn't have it but he's got a gun you don't want to live in that world so when you look at the the brain power in some of these people so no matter what you want to say about foul see you know he's gonna have his critics he's gonna have his supporters just like everybody right but he's so he's super smart and nobody's saying
[35:15]
he's super smart and nobody's saying he's not smart is it smart for a foul see to downplay it a little bit for now until we have so much of it that everybody can have as much as they want because that's where we're at right bear bears that they'd send us three million but do we have them do we have them probably not you not yet did they come over on the plane in the same day I don't know did they give us you know a hundred thousand but they're cranking out the rest I don't know how many hospitals are there how many people might need it what is it what is the projection I don't know but I do know that that if the supply is not directly under the control of the medical professionals we're going to have some problems how many of you know a doctor who could write a prescription and you've contacted that doctor and said doctor can you get me some of this quick before it runs out just in case you know yeah I'm not your patient I'm your best friend can you give you some of this how many
[36:16]
can you give you some of this how many people have done that already a lot a lot did I try to get some of that early oh I did did I contacted my my doctor by email of course and asked I said hey I'm in the the danger group they said I'm in the danger gonna Punk over 60 asthma and is there any way I could get ahold of this since it's well tolerated I said can I get ahold of it so I can take it prophylactically meaning to prevent getting the the virus if I'm exposed and my doctor gave me an answer that I feel like was the responsible answer but was probably also a lie I think it was a lie by omission it wasn't a lie in the standard sense and my doctor wrote back that it's we don't we don't handle it in the pharmacy now here's what's wrong with that insulin it's not carried in
[37:17]
with that insulin it's not carried in the pharmacy here's what's wrong with that do you believe that well first of all I don't know it's possible but the pharmacy can order kind of anything you want and your doctor can write a prescription that you could take to some other pharmacy so did my doctor give me a straight answer when she simply said and then just dropped it you know we don't carry that in the pharmacy she didn't say it was a bad idea to take it it's you know conspicuously not there she didn't say you know leave it for the medical professionals because then I would have been in hoarding mode for sure no I wouldn't have but you know my mind would have gone there and you don't want to be thinking about its availability like Oh what maybe if I tried harder I can guess some of this so I think my I think my doctor did the responsible thing by sort of taking me
[38:19]
responsible thing by sort of taking me off the trail just sort of nudging me off the trail and I felt it was like a gentle nudge it's like not now that's what it felt like and I think that was exactly the right the right play not good for me what's good for me is I get an early dose of unprotected and he or not right that's what's good for me but what was good for the public I think is the way my doctor played it which is we don't carry that now what I think that might mean and here I'm just guessing if I had to guess the big medical entities that would already have some supply this probably some time ago got an order from the government that you can't give it out prophylactically guessing I would like to think that my government was clever enough as soon as they thought this this drug has some potential because they knew before we did right they were hearing the the official news from other countries I would like to know that they immediately went to the people who had the supply
[39:19]
went to the people who had the supply and said lock it down it's gonna be only for the you know essentials only for I mean I'd like to I'd like to think that all of our first-line health care providers are getting a prophylactically by the end of the week you know there's a timing issue of course but by the end of the week wouldn't you like to know that even if you don't have it don't you want to know your doctor has it you know the doctor that's working on the front line you want them from davit first right and that's probably where we're heading and there's probably a limited supply so I'm gonna be a team player for now and I'm not going to try to find some secret way to hoard it even though I think I probably could if I worked on all right so I'm going to say that fealty and the president are not really on different pages but they're trying to manage manage our expectations differently I think I approve of the difference there's because there's a
[40:22]
difference there's because there's a little bit of an accidental you know the some form of a good cop bad cop bad example but if the president's giving us a hey there's reason for optimism the story and his expert is saying well not so fast but that's sort of exactly where I want them to be see what I'm saying I want my leader to say things will be alright at the same time I want my expert to say you know hold on you know he might be good but let's test this thing all right so I'm quite happy with that meanwhile the least relevant person in the entire world you may have heard of his name is Joe Biden have you heard that name he's running for president or something but he's the least important person in the world right now and he he tweets this out but yesterday yesterday he tweets us out the obama-biden administration set up the White House National Security Council Directorate for a global health security and bio defense to prepare for future bio
[41:24]
defense to prepare for future bio pandemics like covert 19 wow they were smart Donald Trump eliminated it and now we're paying the price well most of you know that's just fake news it was eliminated in the sense that there was functions were folded into something else and the redundancy was eliminated yeah the redundancy was eliminated but this is just not true now how would you like to be in the middle of a global pandemic the countries fighting for his economic life and the guy who wants to be President the only thing he added to it was fake news to make you feel bad about your president who is leading this effort seriously I mean I will think you could do a worse job of being even a citizen and we forget about you know what it is for his campaign that's gonna lose anyway I mean he's irrelevant because he's not gonna win but that's the best you could
[42:25]
gonna win but that's the best you could do for the country the best you could do for the country Joe Biden was to put some fake news up that makes you doubt your president during a time of crisis that's it but that's how you thought you could help disgusting and let me shout out some people who have been critics of the president who I think are really stepping up I said this before Mark Cuban great job leadership you know just love to see love to see natural leaders just just stepping up Yellin Omar praising the president's performance against I give her credit I think I think Presley said the same thing if I'm not mistaken fact check me on that and I would like to thank Bernie Bernie Sanders so this is not a this definitely is not a Democrat versus Republican thing because I'm praising Bernie Sanders for being productive for
[43:25]
Sanders for being productive for shouting down C and then about making this political Andrew yang very productive thank you Andrew yang you know good citizen and I think yang really softened up the public with his ubi to make even what we're talking about possible I mean it just makes it easier for everybody so I think yang has been tremendous and I think you know Dana Bash CNN contributor unless you're exactly a job title but very positive very constructive I think so a big shout-out to everybody who's being constructive be the Democrats were anything else but Joe Biden's not and I think that's worth mentioning so anybody buy stocks oh yeah I'm Mike Bloomberg I
[44:28]
buy stocks oh yeah I'm Mike Bloomberg I believe is donating gigantic amounts of money and at the moment I haven't heard bloomberg complain about the president Kasich John Kasich Patriot exactly somebody says Zuckerberg went live yesterday you know I don't know what Zuckerberg is doing but I think we can guarantee it's productive I know
Elon Musk said that Tesla could make ventilators if needed so I don't know if that's going to happen but people are stepping up somebody says maybe anti-malaria drug is a reason for a few cases in Africa that is possible the other possibility is that there's a genetic marker well there's a genetic difference that the aced the AC - you know inhibitors or whatever the hell is receptors and the lungs clearly I'm not a doctor but they're there does seem to
[45:30]
a doctor but they're there does seem to be some genetic difference that makes some people more susceptible and some of it might be smoking and weight and obesity and things like that and here's one thing you don't you know if if you're looking for the obvious how many obese people do you ever see in Africa and and every time I hear about somebody dying are they not 60% of them obese maybe maybe 60% of the world is obese but if I'm if I'm asking myself why it doesn't seem to be hitting Africa as hard as you'd want the the questions you'd ask is maybe they just don't have a good testing maybe it is and we don't know it may be there's a long difference that some people have maybe there may be they smoked glass I don't do do Africans smoke as many cigarettes as everybody else you never I can't think of a picture of Africa or worse so somebody with a cigarette in their mouth then they must have smokers but I don't know is it a big thing there
[46:32]
but I don't know is it a big thing there and how often do you see obese Africans in Africa oh it could be they could actually just be healthier could be that but it also could be that some of them are already taking the malaria drug that's possible I can't imagine there would be enough people taking it is it is it there's a like a vitamin in Africa de7
de7 somebody do a fact check on that right can somebody here's what I want I want somebody to do a fact jack where they overlay on the global map the percentage of people who are regularly taking the malaria drug just because they're in that zone is that a thing do you take it in preventively I don't even know if that's the thing but I like I'd like some visibility on that alright somebody says are you sure you want to go down this road I don't know why you're talking about not many obese Chinese but lots of
[47:36]
not many obese Chinese but lots of smokers it also could be ventilation you know one thing I imagine that you have less of in Africa correct me if I'm wrong is air conditioning known as cities I suppose they must have enough but I can't imagine there's a ton of air conditioning and just the you know the general African public outside of the the cities so maybe that's a factor too you know the the recirculating of the air yeah I saw that weird press thing where de Blasio said it's okay for him to go to the gym because he needs to stay healthy to manage the crisis I thought that that goes in the pantheon of bad political answers but again he's a frontline leader in an emergency and I'm not gonna you know I'm not going to kneecap de Blasio for going to the gym
[48:37]
kneecap de Blasio for going to the gym you know you can you can make your own judgement about that but at the moment we just need to be on the same team
somebody says Italy is a skinny country now others have suggested that the number of young people living with grandparents probably is a big factor in the death rate not in the rate of people together died exposed but we're getting a pretty good idea that they're probably five or six things going on that may have a factor even the expats I know in Africa eventually stopped taking it oh is this something you take for a while and then don't take anymore I've never heard that
it's experience from HIV Ebola prevention so somebody suggested in the Africa some kind of experience maybe
[49:38]
Africa some kind of experience maybe that's helping them but I don't know how that would translate into real-world action
somebody says remember you picked this road I don't know what you're talking about somebody says it's summer in Africa could be could it be a factor somebody says fifty percent of the world lives in malaria areas tell you doctor says men did not do as well as women would that also be related to the fact that men don't live as long as women so in other words if if your problem is that old people are dying and that and it generally just if it attacks you sort of generally you know it's not like well let me say it this way among very old people the males are going to die at a higher rate than the women right so the same threat to a man or a woman at age 75 should be harder on the man no matter
[50:40]
75 should be harder on the man no matter what it is is that true you'd have to fact-check that but it could be as simple as you know men have a lower lower life expectancy and it's just accentuated by this have I heard about the Stafford Act hoax yeah so apparently people are getting some kind of unsolicited text message saying that there's going to be some kind of martial law lockdown or something and we think that foreign foreign actors are behind it we think that might be China etc now you're watching the China continues to push the idea with people who are clearly have been cleared by the the government to blame the United States for starting the first start again and apparently they're going to keep pushing that button because their domestic audience you know they can tell them anything a lot and how should we process
[51:41]
anything a lot and how should we process that it seems to me that the there's legislation right now to bring the supply lines at least for pharmaceuticals back and I think there's other legislation about bringing just the supply chain in general back I don't think there's any I don't think there's any chance going forward that decoupling is not going to happen so if you're looking if you're keeping track of who said who we said the right thing first and you should because I always recommend you should look at people's predictions and then see how they did and you should do it for yourself and you should say it publicly because if you don't say publicly here's my prediction and then publicly I got it right or publicly I got it wrong it's too easy to forget the ones you got wrong if you know what I mean if you don't put it out there so other people could remind you I would like to remind you that not too many people were saying decouple from China before I was I
[52:42]
decouple from China before I was I wasn't first by any means you know Gordon Chang and Kyle Bass and those guys have been on it for a long time but I was early and they're gonna be a lot more people who are going to be joining that so if you're keeping score keep that in mind all right isn't LA on lockdown well I all of California is on lockdown as of yesterday I believe so lockdown means that we can only do we can only leave the house for essential services so banks you can do takeout food you can't go to a restaurant you can have delivery you can go to the doctor you can get you can get them heads and then anybody who's working on critical infrastructure stuff they can do so California is locked down how many of you I'd like to see in the comments I want to see if I've influenced you in this one way how many of you have added
[53:45]
this one way how many of you have added taking a nice walk to your daily routine and I mean daily not just something you did once how many of you have taken seriously going for a long walk every day
day it was a little delay in the comments so I'll wait to see but just just tell me how many of you are doing it because I could not recommend this more strongly I've a/b tested at home and the the one time I didn't go for my long walk man I could feel it like mentally mentally and physically I could really feel it yeah nikki Haley I don't know what that's all about doesn't trade encourage good behavior but apparently it did not the hope was that trading with China would cause them to be better partners but instead they used it as a weakness to to take advantage so given that that's what
[54:46]
take advantage so given that that's what we know they will do it makes no sense to follow that that plan still Trump ad yeah and I think you'd have to say that Trump was early on in the China's not necessarily our friend but let's not be let's not start a war with them but they're not our friend I think Trump was early on that I look at all the comments they're starting to come in now I'm very proud of you because there aren't many things you can do during the emergency that you know or the right thing to do let me just under big you ously you just know it's the right thing to do but taking a long walk every day is definitely the right thing to do now if you're going to somebody's mentioning Nassim Taleb now to be fair I blocked him a long time ago for not understanding this now he's a smart guy
[55:50]
understanding this now he's a smart guy and I'm sure if you heard his side of it it would sound differently it would sound you know maybe better than the way I'm going to characterize it but he was he was always the main proponent of the argument that even if there was just a small chance that climate change was real you should still put massive resources against it because a 1% chance of of doing that much damage to the earth is just too big so he sort of did a math approach to it and the what's it called there's some principle and he put he put big words to it and big names and I looked at it and I said that's just a great thinking there if you only had one problem if we lived in the world with exactly one thing that could take down the entire economy yeah you should spend all your money on it you should really make sure you don't have that 1% chance but what if you have more than one problems that could take out your whole economy if we had put but here's a thought experiment for you let's say that on day one when a OC and
[56:53]
let's say that on day one when a OC and and those who was supported or came up with the green new deal on day one and let's say we the country said you know sounds pretty good sounds pretty good let's do that green new deal now the one thing we know about it is it would be a massive change whether you like it or don't like it everybody would agree it's a fairly massive change to the economy how would you like to be going through a massive restructuring of the economy at the same time a pandemic and how much money would you have how much resources would you have you know would you be in the same shape well kind of depends wouldn't happen right but the point is if you live in the world where you might need an asteroid defense system you might need a whole new pandemic recovery thing and maybe there's a risk with climate change that you should be throwing a lot of money at - if you have multiple take down the economy risks the idea of massively spending resources on
[57:55]
idea of massively spending resources on just one of them it doesn't make so much sense anymore now can you think of anybody else in the world who said publicly and often for the past I don't know ten years you better not spend all of your money on climate change because pandemics could be expensive - specifically I've been specifically saying for probably ten years I don't know if I checked it maybe it's five but a long time that you got to look at pandemics you got to look at literally asteroids you know we should we put a trillion dollars into building a network of you know satellites they can see far enough that we can send an atomic bomb and change the direction of a meteor coming in our direction maybe maybe there is a very small chance we'd be wiped out by a meteor but you know maybe so you know in a world with multiple risks you got to be smarter
[58:58]
multiple risks you got to be smarter about your risk management somebody says you are making excuses for what I don't even know what you don't even know what that criticism is Oh make it I think I know how your criticism is making excuses for not doing enough about climate change but then you would have missed the whole point this lot of meter is at a hundred percent so this lauter meter is the prediction that the president would win based on current current conditions which nobody assumes would remain stable through the from now until the election so it's an artificial number it doesn't really predict it just says if nothing changed this is what would happen at this moment and you saw the president's poll numbers just just reversed in a week and went from it's pretty good job to you know from not such a good job at the moment
[59:59]
from not such a good job at the moment there's just no way he can lose unless if something new happen but of course new things will happen before now and then how much does the pandemic reduced co2 planet-wide more people tell me this that pollution can go away quickly you know just false the ground but co2 has a far longer you know period of reduction but I still think it's the right question now until somebody really really smart works in this field tells me this is dumb I'm gonna say that this is at least possible which is that we could learn something there maybe we couldn't have learned and any other way which is does the level of co2 come down at all yeah does it come down at all in a month where you're not putting out as much now you might be able to measure that it didn't go up now it again it depends on the sensitivity I'm only talking about doesn't go up by a thousand or something like that but
[1:00:59]
a thousand or something like that but it's science right science Kevin measure stuff somebody's asking me about the stock market which I haven't looked at today let's see what it's doing if my stock ticker is up to date well I guess you're pretty happy you bought stocks yesterday huh when resorts are up 25 percent today Snap is up 6 the the broad index of the fortune 500 is up 1.7 apples up 2.5 all green nothing but green somebody says co2 is not pollution you need to go somewhere where people don't know that and then shout that out everybody on this periscope knows that co2 and pollution are different things all right so if you're trying to tell me let's see em - and pollution or different things you're in the wrong
[1:01:59]
different things you're in the wrong place there must be somebody who needs to know that but nobody here did nobody here would be confused by that somebody says they missed me saying measure in my normal way measure my upstate New York way somebody says stop asking about stocks why American Airlines is up etc and let me throw out an idea for you this is a poorly thought-out idea you can immediately see the problems but if you if you're not new to this you know that I often throw out poorly formed ideas because it might make you think of one that's good so in other words it will just take your brain to a different place and you might say well you're doesn't work but you reminded me of something that would work so that's that's the spirit of this so we got a bunch of cruise ships sitting there
[1:03:00]
bunch of cruise ships sitting there empty because nobody wants to take a cruise and it's probably not even legal at the moment I don't know what the situation is we also have a bunch of young people who want to go on spring break see where I'm going what if we take the young people who were going to spend money on spring break and we say if you let us test you at least for a fever or whatever and again I know there's you can always get it all it cetera so the testing is incomplete but suppose we say all use spring breakers if you were going to spend your money anyway I'll give you a cheap cruise now how much would Spring Breakers like to be on a cruise ship a lot a lot now suppose you said alright since you know if you agree to go on the cruise ship you're also gonna have to agree to some other conditions which is you know if something breaks out you're all going to be there for two weeks but we're gonna
[1:04:02]
be there for two weeks but we're gonna be a lot smarter about you know maybe you only fill up half the cruise ship maybe we've learned something about the ventilation system maybe maybe you give them a pile of chloroquine and they're young people to begin with right so they're young and healthy to begin with you give them a barrel of chloroquine you get out of the ship maybe if again this is just brainstorming I do not kid myself that this is a good idea it's just sort of creative and moving in the right direction and maybe you could fix it so fix my idea for me if you can can we just load up the cruise ships with people who are a low risk young people who have been checked before they got on checked while they're on checked when they got off to the degree that you could even do that so one way you could save the cruise industry is by taking the spring breakers and testing them so I don't know how many tests I don't know how many test kits we have
[1:05:03]
how many test kits we have but if you could rapidly test could you save an industry by you know I know we need to test everywhere they're not enough but just brainstorming just stay with me could you focus some of the tests on an industry that could be at least kept on life support until the economy comes out and just maybe you know keep though the cruise ship business alive how about hotels how about you say you know the Marriott and pick a city San Diego has zero business and basically we're going to go out of business but if you're a spring breaker you're a young person will give you a deal half price there will be nobody in the hotel except young people no no old people will get an arrant you can't check in without taking the chloroquine before you walk in the front door and when you're here you can't leave and before you leave you'll be tested I'm
[1:06:03]
before you leave you'll be tested I'm just throwing out ideas could you save the travel industry by saying we're going to limit it to young people we're gonna slash the price cut it in half we're going to test before you get in and you're gonna be limited here but you know who would be mad about being stuck in a hotel with only other people who were single nobody yeah tell me a young person who doesn't want to go stay at the Marriott with only young people on spring break pay half price but you can't leave the building for two weeks might be popular so this is the human ingenuity not this idea but at least the the idea of being flexible somebody says save Airlines first so here's the thing you might be able to do something similar by testing people before they got on a flight but it seems like it'd be too slow in the case of a cruise ship people actually would go a day early you
[1:07:04]
people actually would go a day early you know and stay at the hotel near the cruise ship and you know you said you spend hours and hours waiting to actually board the ship itself so the cruise ship is already built for people to expect a you know eight-hour delay before they get on the ship that's just normal already but the airline industry is really about getting someplace and then when either their your your free-range chicken infecting people so maybe you could get enough rapid testing to make the airlines work again maybe you can you know only fill every third seat maybe maybe and 95 masks and gloves or mandatory so yeah I think I think there's a way you could do it might be different we don't have much information on the number of covent test gets coming so that's a big question mark I'd love to have more more information on that all right that's all for now I will talk
[1:08:05]
all right that's all for now I will talk to you again later today stay safe stay strong take walk eat right have a great day