Episode 881 Scott Adams: Sip Away Your Cares and Learn What the Future Holds

Date: 2020-03-30 | Duration: 53:31

Topics

My new book LOSERTHINK, available now on Amazon https://tinyurl.com/rqmjc2a Content: Expertly managing the psychology of the American people Immunity certificates in Germany Homemade masks

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

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## Transcript

[0:13]

bumbum hey everybody come on in it's the morning and it's time for the simultaneous if and coffee with Scott Adams hey Omar good see ya come on in here Mary always a pleasure Darren first I am periscope and you have the good luck to come here Darren Fox you are the luckiest periscope watcher of all time good morning good morning you know if you'd like to participate in the simultaneous up and you know you do you do want to well all you need is a copper of Margar glass of Tang coach Alistair Stein the canteen Joker flask Oh vessel of any kind to fill it with your favorite liquid I like coffee and join me now from the unparalleled pleasure of the Delta P Neos the day the thing that makes everything better including the pandemic it's called the simultaneous imp and it happens now go well many of you saw my

[1:15]

happens now go well many of you saw my periscope last night and you know that I thought that the president's most recent press conference on the corona virus is the best he's ever done in my opinion I think he had the best tone following the experts showed showed command of the topic showed confidence showed you know decisive leadership I thought that I thought it was a whole package so I would say it's his best performance yet
but does that make everybody happy no it does not there's the big news of course is that the president moved his aspirational target from the middle of April to the end of April few more weeks and that'll think it'll be done then necessarily it might be a few weeks after that I would say this was exactly the right way to play it even though it looks like a mistake here's why if you could design in

[2:16]

here's why if you could design in advance the best way that the president could have played it you know if you had high insight perfect hindsight how would you advise him to plant and this is with knowledge of how things turned out now if you had knowledge of that with the way things turned out you probably would have played it exactly the way he did which is to set a date that wasn't so far in the future of the people would panic and it wasn't so far in the future that people would start to hoard again so people wouldn't say my god it's gonna be weeks and months I better reward so inside he study says you know we're gonna we're gonna make the decisions based on the data so he always left himself the opening the things could stop you know change in a minute he always said that as clearly as possible by aspirational we're gonna shoot for the state now that date was soon enough in the future that it probably did not cause anybody to do much of any extra hoarding and also felt that I could make

[3:19]

hoarding and also felt that I could make it handle that I could do a few more weeks you know then see how it looks I could probably hit the left and that as we get you know a little closer to that that deadline the president has looked at the data listened to the experts and extended it that's probably the very best way this could have played out because if he had originally said April thirtieth and would have felt really hard but by saying you know the cat's on the roof if you don't I mean that's an old joke you know sort of easing us into it I think that psychologically we were more primed to say uh okay few extra weeks I'm going this far you know it hasn't been the worst thing in the world I could go a few extra weeks so even if he had had perfect hindsight and had known from the start exactly when when the new dates were going to be probably was better to have an interim date and then just ease

[4:19]

have an interim date and then just ease us into it because been managing our psychology is one of the biggest parts of his job right now ah but here's my favorite part the president in pivoting from the guy who wants to open up maybe too early and go back to work maybe a little bit before the experts say changed overnight into the guy who really is gonna lock us down for a quite a few weeks so if you're see you then what do you criticize because you've got to be on the opposite side how do you get on the opposite side of somebody who has had two opposing opinions in 24 hours how do you do it so if you've watched the president's enemy press either CNN where MSNBC there are a little left-footed today because they don't quite know what to do especially since the way the president pivoted was publicly and obviously in response to

[5:21]

publicly and obviously in response to his best experts giving him their best advice what are you gonna do I mean seriously New York is critic and he just took the advice of the experts the very thing that that people are most concerned about this president and he did the opposite what are you gonna do so just watch for this for purely entertainment purposes watch how desperately the anti-trump press is just searching for something that he did wrong now of course we would expect that the criticism would start landing on the should have taken it seriously sooner you know we should have been more prepared sooner now of course almost every day I'm going to tell you that's the that's the losers criticism because everything should have been done sooner just out all the time everything in life on every situation on every topic from the beginning of time

[6:21]

every topic from the beginning of time to the end of time if there's something that was good to do probably you should have done it sooner all right it's just universally true but in this case the president has a stronger defense and you'll have to fact-check this for me but I was just reading an opinion piece in The Washington Post I forget who wrote it and the the author was saying that no other country prepared better in other words we didn't we didn't do as much as we could have to prepare for how bad it is but neither did Canada neither did anybody else so if you're going to judge Trump harshly for I don't know what not listening to the experts early on not preparing you're gonna have to explain why all how many countries are there in the world several hundred you could have to explain how hundreds of other countries active no differently well

[7:23]

countries active no differently well everybody knew but nobody did anything or was it only dumb old Trump was the only one who didn't do anything no that didn't happen turns out everybody who had the same information as Trump which was really the leaders of all the you know the big countries they all they all had the same basically preparation which is not not well enough and as somebody saying South Korea and Singapore prepared the best I don't know if it was preparation or was it response they may have responded the best and I'm gonna you know I hate to go against the experts no I don't I love to go against the experts it's just a dangerous and dumb thing to do most of the time but I'm gonna do it right now here's my non expert opinion subject to I don't know if we'll ever be able to fact-check this but I'll put it out there anyway in my

[8:23]

but I'll put it out there anyway in my opinion South Korea's success and somebody said Indonesia in my opinion the success of let's say Japan South Korea and Singapore is more mask wearing of even the people who don't have symptoms so that's my prediction my prediction is that when I don't know if will I reveal to determine this but after it's all said and done and the the people are doing the autopsy and they say what worked what didn't work I think that the countries that had the highest percentage of mask wearers which was probably only related to supply I think some of the Asian countries especially if they already had some pollution problems which probably doesn't apply as much except outside in China but I've got a feeling that the number of masks is going to be the most the variable that explains the most about why some countries did well and I

[9:23]

about why some countries did well and I don't think it's going to be the testing alone the testing will be a factor but I can't I can't wrap my head around how a country that's you know this many millions of people but no matter how many tests they have it's only it's only you know a small percentage I can't wrap my head around how that's the biggest factor when there's so few tests compared to people but if 80% of the public going people would outside wore a mask and that's I'm not sure that's true but I could easily imagine in South Korea 80% of the people going outside had masks pretty quickly is that true yeah I did a fact check of it but that feels like that would be a much more aggressive and direct way to battle it so we'll just see that's just my guess and I also think that when there are more of those myths in the United States that we'll see a big drop the daily deaths I'm having a little trouble

[10:26]

deaths I'm having a little trouble understanding the the data but if feels like the number of deaths is starting to not increase as much while the number of infections is still zooming which is the good news especially since the FDA approved the use of the hydroxychloroquine and I think the chloroquine as well for its now approved for people want to use it for for treatment now I think that that also allowed maybe more manufacturers to make it so there's a supply problem
here's a question for you I'm just gonna put this out there I have no idea if this is a good idea because I can't quite under I can't think through all of the parts so maybe somebody else can what would stop the government from saying oh and again this is a poorly

[11:27]

saying oh and again this is a poorly thought-out idea I think there are problems with it let's just put it out there suppose the government said that just for the period of the crisis will create a second currency and it will be a crypto currency that's a relevant crypto we'll just make something up or they could use the one that exists and just endorse it and and they would just say we're gonna we're gonna assign these crypto coins to everybody even though a certain income or even just everybody and they will expire at the end of three months or six months whatever or they'll be automatically converted to cash I suppose you could do that too if you just force the exchange to do it I don't know if that would work because then it would drive down the value this is part part I haven't thought through so the point is could you have a temporary cryptocurrency that would operate it's the same time as a dollar all the people who are doing okay and still have some

[12:28]

who are doing okay and still have some dollars they just go ahead and spend them like usual but if you lost your income you just you don't have a dime you could use the crypto and then the government would sort of guarantee its value on the exchange in other words the the government could buy and buy and sell the crypto to to balance its its value and they it feels like the government could just create money out of nothing for a while and then just make it go away by forcing you to convert it would that work now I think it's the I think it's the winding it down part that doesn't work if you out it up you probably have to run it forever or people would lose some somebody would lose I haven't thought that through but I feel like there's something there I just can't I can't hold all the parts of my hand enough to know if it would really work Bill Gates seems to be quite in favor of the longer shutdown the six to ten weeks he thinks which makes me feel a lot better about everything you know I'm not

[13:29]

better about everything you know I'm not gonna say that Bill Gates is wrong is right about everything all the time who is really but who's got a better track record have you ever seen the comparing Bill Gates's oldest predictions about what the world would look like comparing it to what the world actually looks like if you ever seen those lists of things he said it would happen and then you compare to what happened and you look at it you go this is the same is he from the future because he's really good at this guessing what's happening in 20 years business so for Bill Gates who is quite informed in this and quite good at math yeah as you know if he thinks six to ten gets us past the hardest part I'd rather be on his side you know all things equal how would you feel comfortable if your opinion was the opposite of Bill Gates on something he's really looked into I mean this isn't something that he's sort of casually you

[14:30]

something that he's sort of casually you know glanced at Bill Gates is dug into this you know in his Bill Gates way he can go pretty deep on topic and if he thinks this is the right play I feel like I should think that - you know the experts seem to be agreed here's an interesting thing this week and maybe the next week - I'm watching the people who had been saying it was just the flu and seeing just white from a you know people-watching perspective watching their voices go from a full scream it's just the flu you idiots can't you see what we see it's obviously it's some kind of a hoax and you know every there's a little more data a little more data and then you know a few fewer people are saying that and they're maybe not as loud and fewer and you're not quite as loud and I feel like this week this might be

[15:32]

and I feel like this week this might be the week that because the actual Hospital impact will be a little more clear I think those voices are going to start to get really quiet now I would love for them to be right wouldn't it be great if the people who say it's it's overblown and we'll get on top of this in no time it's no worse of the flu weird it'd be great if there right but I think the odds of that are shrinking every day still possible you still cannot rule out you know if you're being objective you can't rule out the things go a lot better than the experts law my prediction is ridiculously optimistic in that we will save a lot of lives from just being shut down fewer car accidents fewer just you know industrial accidents fewer fewer ways to die in general and that even though we will lose thousands I've already lost thousands to the coronavirus that I don't think will net

[16:32]

coronavirus that I don't think will net more than 5,000 now nobody else agrees with me so if you're trying to place your own bets be aware that nobody in the world has my prediction it's the dumbest most outlier prediction anybody can make because the government is thinking this even even if we do a good job the government is saying even if you do a really good job and do everything right there is we're talking tens of thousands hundreds of thousands it's going to be a big number say the government and I'm going full contrarian on that but I'm not saying that they were wrong about the potential problem I'm saying that the experts were largely right about how big issue it was you know in a order of magnitude way but that will be more successful than people people imagined so that our innovation will make a big difference now I think that this is interesting but the the prospect of the hydroxychloroquine

[17:33]

prospect of the hydroxychloroquine working well enough to at least keep people from hospitalization which is the whole game to me the entire game comes down to does the hydroxychloroquine if given early and do we have enough supply that's a big question if given early does it keep people from being hospitalized
anecdotally that looks to be the case and even some largest small studies either small studies but you know they're not tiny tiny seemed indicate it does but I don't know if you can trust anything yet you know I I don't trust so here's my career thinking I don't trust any small study in this country or any other I don't trust it and I don't think that we can because even in good times when you've got plenty of time to do peer review and everything else even in good times half of the things that get peer reviewed and accepted turn out to

[18:34]

peer reviewed and accepted turn out to be false and that's when you got plenty of time and everybody's doing the best slowest most careful work how good are the studies that people are slapping together in an emergency in theory the quality of those studies should be the lowest of any studies you've ever seen because they're so fast and they're smallish and you know things are imperfect because it's a crisis but that doesn't mean it's wrong and what I'm looking at is until I find any doctor who is working on this problem who would not personally take it I'm gonna think there's something there right we have not correct me if I'm wrong have you seen one doctor even one literally just one I'll say one American doctor who is actually working with these patients who would advise against taking that drug is there even one if there's one I'm gonna say to myself well maybe there's something there I used to

[19:36]

maybe there's something there I used to have a phone here I was gonna check the stock bracket but I guess I could put my phone somewhere else alright so I think that's uh it's gonna be good there article that says Germany is considering and I think considering is the key word here because it's not like this is imminent but they're considering issuing thousands are giving people immunity certificates so you would get some kind of a certificate that said you would already had it you're over it you have an immunity so you're allowed to go back to work and mingle I guess now I was trying to think and again this is not imminent it's just something they're considering in Germany but I thought to myself how would you execute that because if you say okay let's say 10% of the public you can go back to work how would the authorities know if they were I saw people on the streets or working in the shops or whatever how would they know that was the right 10% because people would massively cheat

[20:37]

because people would massively cheat they'd say I'm not I'm not a Buick nobody's gonna know I'm gonna go back to work and the police couldn't stop and check everybody right I mean they could check some people but they're not gonna say show us your papers she'll ask y'all PayPal deal are you allowed how I shall pay pass so that doesn't feel like that would work just too many people involved and then I thought well supposed to people who had have the immunity had had to wear a lanyard it's just got like the certificates right in the lanyards like you know I passed and I thought well that would take five seconds for people to 3d print those things or or photocopy the fakes and you couldn't really you know how could you tell so here's my suggestion my suggestion is this is if the government clears you and maybe a doctor has to do it the doctor goes into his database and plugs your

[21:38]

goes into his database and plugs your social security number into it now you're registered as somebody that a doctor has certified you can't do it yourself a doctor is certified the you have immunity so you're in the mint in the national database then here's my idea you build an app so that maybe only the police can tell so let's say in the beginning it's it's just something law enforcement and they can track everybody's phone and they can see see on the map all the dots and the doubts are either green or red so if the police go into you know a neighborhood that's opened up and the stores are open they can pull out their app and they could say okay green green green up there's a red and they can just say though the Reds 20 feet over there and then it can walk over and say or even click on it because the police may have the secret database you know that all your privacy is gone you just click on and say looks like Bob 20 feet over there is a red Bob Bob come here for a

[22:43]

there is a red Bob Bob come here for a minute Bob you do not have the immunity certificate go home immediately so could you build an app in which at least law enforcement could walk through a crowded street and see on the map if there's a cheater I think so now you'd have to give up a binson ounce of privacy to do it but we're certainly at that point where that could happen and of course the you know the the brute force way to do that is with facial recognition right but people are going to be wearing masks so what do you do with facial recognition if ever if so many people are wearing face masks so you probably have to do it with a database situation a person I don't know on Twitter asks this question are we going to have a civil war because this extra lockdown is going to make people pretty antsy and so as a person reasonable asks is this going to lead to

[23:44]

reasonable asks is this going to lead to civil war now there are some things that are hard to predict and there's some things which are not this is solidly in the category of not hard to predict so let me tell you exactly what's going to happen visiter the question of a civil war there will not be one not even a little chance nothing could be closer to zero or or more zero than the odds of a civil war let's say between now and you know the you just to just to put a period on it the odds of a civil war in the United States are the lowest they've ever been right now then it'll never been lower here's why in order to have a civil war you have to have an enemy that's in your own country somebody in your country you're fighting against who is that who's the enemy now the enemy is the virus we're all the same we're on the same side you don't get a civil war when

[24:45]

same side you don't get a civil war when your entire civil community is fighting the same external in this case it got into the country but you know it's fighting a third party that's the most unifying thing that could ever happen to a country so we are in whatever is the most opposite of a civil war is what we're experiencing that we're experiencing the most unity you could even see it in the news yeah even the news is going easy on the president we felt this is the most unity this country has had in my lifetimes by far there's nothing even cloak well 9/11 maybe 9/11 was was one of those points in time what were the odds that there would be a civil war within a month of 9/11 happening 0-0 the the odds of a civil war when when this country is threatened by any kind of a you know external force the odds of civil war just goes to zero and that would be true of every every country really countries bind together so if you're going to make a list of

[25:47]

so if you're going to make a list of things you should worry about the odds of a civil war that ones just zero we've never been further from that if you're worried that in the person that commented to said well this could be in looting well it's kind of hard to loot right now because unless people will now amass looting doesn't work you can't be the one looter you can't be like well nobody else is looting but I'm gonna do some looting you know those stores are all empty I think I'll break the window because if you really that you're the only one you're kind of noticeable your opposite being caught a hundred percent so you can't loot one on one and I don't think we'll have crowds because people are still are well warned enough that nobody's gonna really form a looting crowd it would be a bad strategy you would just be giving each other viruses and then how many burglaries or home

[26:48]

and then how many burglaries or home invasions are we gonna have when everybody stay home was zero well probably not zero but not many people are going to have their homes burgled when they're home all day yeah so burglars are gonna be downloaded murder is going to be down a lot of crime is going to be down as well as accidents so now no risk of the Civil War and I think also no risk of not having food because if you went to you know robbed your neighbor let me just give you the scenario let's say you're out of food and you have a gun then you go to your neighbor you say I've got a gun give me all your food what is your neighbour gonna say in the middle of this crisis I think your neighbor is gonna say what's the gun for him here's some food if you need some more food I'll make a run to the grocery store for you cuz Safeway has plenty of food nobody's running out of food you're running out of money

[27:50]

of food you're running out of money maybe and if you know if you need me to help you with some some food until the government check comes in or whatever uh sure no problem no problem so nobody's gonna rob people for food simply because there'll be plenty of people saying I'll give you food you don't have to rob anybody alright um let's see so the range of people who might die according to in the United States according to experts is everything from you know maybe a hundred thousand if you did everything right two hundred thousand to two point two million and I guess the two point two million is what got Trump to say yeah let's close everything now as I've said before if you're playing it politically and you just let's say the only thing you were interested in is getting reelected

[28:51]

interested in is getting reelected I don't think that's the case you know I've said this before but no matter who you are be you democrat or republican by the time you become president I think there's something about the process and something about the office that really does guarantee that your interests are for the the benefit of the public and you're being watched them carefully so I think all presidents genuinely want what's best for the country but they also want to get reelected the best thing for getting reelected is to not make the mistake of doing too little so you can see this in a number of ways so if the relief package had been one trillion after somebody had suggested it should be two trillion that would have been just a mistake politically I don't know what it would be economically but politically it would clearly be a mistake psychologically probably a mistake because you don't get penalized for being too decisive or too aggressive in

[29:51]

being too decisive or too aggressive in an emergency you can get penalized for not doing enough for being weak so every time the president has been presented with a tough option you know the one that makes them look like a strong leader versus the you know the weaker version he has consistently picked correctly this strong option now the strong option at the moment most people would agree that the strongest option is to close down that's different from the right option the optimal appa you know who knows I'm not smart enough to know but if you're just trying to judge it on the strength of it whatever that means to each of us you know we can interpret that a little bit differently but closing the whole economy at the risk of the president losing the crown jewel of the thing he cares most about in terms of his accomplishment which is the economy so you're watching the president who cares more about the economy than maybe anybody I mean we care for our own you know individual

[30:53]

you know individual outcomes but I guarantee you this president really really cares about the economy for all the right reasons and all the personal reasons and don't forget Trump the Trump of business it could be bankrupt at the end of this now Trump has said they've got a good balance sheet but you need a really good balance sheet to get through you know no customers for three months or whatever it's going to be for the Trump properties so when you watch a leader who is making a decision that in my opinion will bankrupt his own fortune you know Trump might actually be broke by the time he gets out of office and that has less to do with the whole economy that it has to do with the fact that he's in the you know that leisure industry and the leisure industry is just gonna be the hardest hit so watching a leader make a decision that in my opinion might bankrupt his own

[31:55]

in my opinion might bankrupt his own company and his own family they might I don't know if it will but I'd say it's it's got to be in that 50/50 risk just because everybody in the industry is going to be at least a 50-50 risk of bankruptcy at this point so that's a strong decision strong decisions can be right and they can be wrong but they almost never are politically wrong so long as they're also compatible with what the experts are saying so Trump is so politically right this and also according to the experts right he's about as right as you can get and you could argue should have been there sooner you know what was he talking about yesterday those those are good conversations but at the moment he's as right as you can get all right so I guess Joe Biden appeared on Meet the depressed and he was not asked about the accusations against him by by a woman

[32:58]

accusations against him by by a woman who used to work with him on his staff on his staff you know what I mean working on his staff during the 90s and she she has very credible sounding claims that he me tutor pretty pretty hard and which is not funny nothing funny about that and it's that was credible but you know even when she tells the story how do I not get myself in further trouble there's but what the heck I'll get myself in further trouble even as she tells the story the way she tells it and she's the yeah she's the victim in the story so you'd expect the victim to put you know the spin on it that is you know friendliest of their version and even she says that Biden even with his alleged bad behavior seems to have genuinely been confused about whether was welcome or not and there's something

[34:01]

was welcome or not and there's something in that that's that's important to understand especially that has to do with you know male let's say male perceptions over time you know the way she tells the story the you know the alleged victim and the accuser who again has a very credible sounding story the way she tells it is that was like he made a you know a way to aggressive move the type that you certainly should be asking for a little bit of you know a little bit of a you know agreement to end being on the same page about and without getting into details let's just say he you way crossed the line of something you should do without knowing it's okay with let's just say that that's ambiguous but even the way the victim tells the story it's as if he didn't know that he literally didn't know it wasn't okay because he acted in a way that that well you would only act if you if you were literally confused

[35:03]

if you if you were literally confused about why it didn't go well and I have to say like what what do people say about that story even through the eyes of the accuser if they if they take the accusers version of it how do you process that when you know they even her version is that he didn't know he was doing something wrong even the way she tells it it you know it you know we have the we have the benefit of hindsight so we can see it perfectly in hindsight so we know it's wrong there's no ambiguity when we're what we're hearing the story but it is at least a little bit feasible that Joe Biden in the 90s the way things were now saying they should have been that way I'm not I'm not forgiving anything so don't take me out of context but you could kind of see that he actually wouldn't know which is not an excuse it's more of a historical point of interest you know it doesn't forgive

[36:03]

interest you know it doesn't forgive anything have you noticed that the the standard for quality for broadcast interviews has gone way down in a good way well let me give you an example I'm so old that I was around in the corporate world when computers were invented meaning that I lived in a world with typewriters as the the main business tool and and watched you know computers come in and replace them and during that transition there was this weird thing that happened in corporate America and if you're young you're just gonna laugh at this dude just have pity for the people in my age group that we went through the following so I'd be in my cubicle in corporate America and I need to write a memo to let's say some manager and another group but I had to go through my boss now that doesn't sound so bad right you have to write a memo to somebody who's above you in another department well of course they should probably go through your boss

[37:04]

should probably go through your boss just to make sure you don't you know do anything dumb but the way we had to do it was I would have in those days a little computer with a dot matrix printer so the process was I would write up my letter the draft form and printed on a dot matrix but you are not allowed you were not allowed to give a printout from a dot matrix printer to a manager in the company because that would be unprofessional it's a dot matrix printer had to be printed it had to be typed on a Selectric typewriter so you take the dot matrix printer and you give it to the your boss's secretary at the time back when that was actual job title and the secretary would retype what you typed but on this electrics and then she would show it to you and then you say no there's some typos and she'd have to retype it and then you'd be happy that she had typed what you had on your dot dot matrix and then you would take that to your boss and your boss would change it every time not most of the time not a

[38:08]

it every time not most of the time not a lot of time every time and then you would start from scratch again and you would go back to your dot matrix printer and you would make the changes you give it back to the secretary she would retype it on this electrics with their errors you would have to change those errors again because it's being retype from scratch and then you show it to your boss again and your boss says you know yeah there's one thing I forgot to tell you and then he changes it again and you go right back to the cycle again so the process of sending a memo to somebody in my own company that I knew personally who just happened to be a level above me in management could take two weeks it's not a joke you could spend two weeks because you have to get your managers attention and time after time and the secretary has to not be working on something two weeks to send an email to somebody that you know who is a hundred yards down that way in the office two weeks that was typical and so

[39:12]

office two weeks that was typical and so what happened of course is that things evolved to the point where the casualness of communications went way way way way down because they just had to so at this point in any business I think it wouldn't be that big a deal to send a poorly written mistyped email to somebody at a level above you copy your boss or not copy your boss everything's more casual now so you know so so the world accepted the casualness of email because you just had to after a while you couldn't wait two weeks every time to exchange a memo but I think the same thing is happening because of this shutdown I'm watching a lot of the major broadcast networks doing basically Skype quality interviews with split screens and I'm watching it and I'm thinking I don't mind that at all so I'm watching people who have to you know mute their camera because their kids are screaming in the background and you know the cat walks by and you know somebody opens the

[40:13]

walks by and you know somebody opens the door behind them and you hear a siren and the back and stuff and you know the news industry of course would prefer not to do that they'd like a nice clean professional headshot well you've said thank you for asking that question let me talk about my professional knowledge and give you the background that's the way it's always been done but I think this the the shutdown what's this called by the way do we have a name for this where we're all staying home it's not a quarantine visit but I think it's lowered our expectations or or at least our standards for what a split screen interview would look like and I think that's actually gonna be a crew to the good in other words I think the whole TV split-screen interview thing may forever become more casual and maybe maybe anybody can do it at this point at this point I think I have the hardware and software that I can put on a a nightly

[41:13]

software that I can put on a a nightly news show that would be similar in quality to CNN in terms of you know to bad interview things of the screen because that's what they're doing right now
so some people are yakking the Fox News will have some legal liability because they downplayed the coronavirus now when I say they downplayed it I don't mean Fox News as an entity I mean there were individuals mostly opinion people who downplayed it now can you sue can you sue a news organization if their opinion people had the wrong opinion that doesn't seem like a that doesn't seem like a lawsuit you could win does it at what point is having the wrong opinion legally actionable especially if your show is clearly presented as opinion if

[42:15]

show is clearly presented as opinion if somebody gives you an opinion and you act on it like it's a fact Wow that's a little bit on you isn't it so the all the news businesses have that problem of making sure that your opinion stuff and your new stuff is clearly delineated there's a real issue that people can't tell the difference you know I think CNN is a little more ambiguous about what's opinion than what's news I think Fox does a much better job of labeling who's an opinion person who's a news person I mean it's a little more obvious over there but still you do know that people are turning on the animate and treating it like it's the news even though he's as clear as he could be that he's an opinion show but people probably taken his news you have to know that's true but could it be actionable I can't see how you know I'd hate to think it would be so there's a little weird little article about the President of Mexico who was visiting I guess he

[43:16]

of Mexico who was visiting I guess he was doing a political visit to the home turf of El Chapo so that the area in Mexico where El Chapo I don't know if he was born or his family was there or whatever so El Chapo is in jail but the Mexican president stops and goes over and shakes hands with el chapo his mother I think it was her birthday or El Chapo his birthday somebody's birthday and acted like they knew each other pretty well and they were quite friendly and some video that the President of Mexico you know stopped his motorcade got out and personally shook hands with the elderly mother of El Chapo and had some nice words with her it's he got her a letter I assumed her letter was something about her son and I thought to myself wow how am I supposed to feel about that how am I supposed to feel about the president of New Mexico being quite friendly will that El Chapo

[44:19]

being quite friendly will that El Chapo is mom certainly raises an eyebrow doesn't it well I've been saying for a while that we should maybe just drop the charade that the government of Mexico and the cartels are separate entities maybe they they certainly have separate job descriptions but then I will think we can assume that the government is trying to crack down on them the cartels can we I would say that that's not a thing all right I wonder if we're gonna see a bunch of authors going on podcasts such as mine because they can't do book doors so let me put this out there my knowledge of the book industry is that there are there are two big releases each year so there's a there's a big release in the spring or the summer spring or summer so it's coming up around June ish I think I

[45:20]

it's coming up around June ish I think I don't know exactly the dates but then there's another one in the autumn before Christmas so my books I usually released in the autumn because they tend to be gift items you know for Christmas but there could be a whole bunch of authors who can't do a book to her and can sell their book and they just spend you know a year or two building this book and just can't market it because he can't get on TV nobody wants to interview with yet cetera so I'm hoping that the podcasters of the world can pick up the slack and maybe maybe reach out to some of the big publishers because they wouldn't be hungry for audience at this point I would imagine all the big publishers shouldn't be hard to find one if there's a favorite author you think has a book coming out and you're a podcaster and you said yourself under normal circumstances I would never be able to get this famous author to come on my little podcast but I bet you could now
now about you would be surprised that you could get an author to come on your podcast now because the options are low

[46:35]

getting phone calls and what that means Korona and chill let's see there will be an avalanche of new books so stefan molyneux is using zoom well you know I think using zoom for podcasts is no risk you know that the fact that zooms traffic goes through and some servers in China would be terrible if you were a big corporation with corporate secrets but if you're just doing a podcast that you're gonna release anyway zoom would be a great product
let's see Bret Easton Ellis does this on his show okay good time to call your favorite celebrity Dennis Miller went on Dave Rubin to wear a mask Scott so I was that I opened a cupboard yesterday and I found a m95 mask that I don't know it's been sitting on the shelf for probably a

[47:37]

been sitting on the shelf for probably a few years I don't know why it was used or went and I thought to myself okay if an n95 mask is sitting in a dry cupboard and there's you know no great humidity or any problems like that it's been there for a few years is that safe I mean I know it's safe from the coronavirus because it's been sitting there since before it existed but there's a safe in general if it's just sitting in a cupboard can any can any prior germs live there for years of the years I don't know doesn't it seem to you that we should get going on genetic testing because I think that might be another way to get some people back to work faster and
we probably only have to let people who have been exposed to it out at first that might be the first wave but soon after it seems like you also should

[48:38]

after it seems like you also should release people who might be let's say they've got a prescription for hydroxychloroquine and they have a genetic makeup that's the the least dangerous one suppose you had those two things you're you're on the drug let's say the doctors decide ok you do shed maybe a little if you catch it but you were also on the drug at the same time maybe you would even not even notice you had symptoms so maybe you know technically you could shed it but the odds are low I can imagine that we would keep tweaking our strategy based on what we learned and I can easily imagine that people who had the right genetic makeup let's say they're not overweight and chronic smokers and elderly or whatever and then they're also on the hydroxychloroquine maybe that's the second wave of people who can go back to work alright I have a suggestion for you are you ready goes

[49:39]

suggestion for you are you ready goes like this do you remember during the Revolution the Revolutionary War there was a famous seamstress her name was Betsy Ross Betsy Ross and her friends sewed flags so the famous Betsy Ross famous for sewing something at home to help with the fight we have that same situation now wouldn't you like a government-approved design you know with experts wouldn't you like that the the administration just published a make it home mask so it yourself with your either by hand or maybe with your sewing machine some specifications about what materials to use because you wouldn't want to go to the store to buy materials you'd want to be able to use that old pillowcase or you know the old jeans the jeans that you don't wear anymore you want to be able to cut out some pieces so wouldn't you like to have a Betsy Ross design just to do a callback to a famous

[50:40]

just to do a callback to a famous seamstress a Betsy Ross design that you could make out your prior to us having enough in 95 etc I think you would because people are a home a lot of people know how to sew especially a certain generation they've got their sewing machines you don't think you're your grandmother and her sewing machine would sort of be happy to have something to do it's if she had the design and the government specifications would she make some Betsy Ross masks I think she would I think she would maybe a good thing to do just to make people feel like they're part of something all right I think that's all I want to talk about today so you saw a poster of a woman sorry masks yeah I think that all over the country that are people making their own masks but I don't think they're working on a common design so it's the it's the feeling like you're a part of the larger effort that's adds a little fun to it

[51:41]

effort that's adds a little fun to it and giving it the Betsy Ross brand if you will you know takes you back to a time when you know you have to sew a piece of fabric and it actually made a difference to the war effort and we're there now there are also sewing machines that you can program right can't you program a sewing machine to whip out masks fairly quickly if you if you had cut the squares or if you had cut the components couldn't you program these new sewing machines even at your home you know they're pretty programmable to just scope remember remember and put a mask now there are also sorry machines in which you can sew like a pattern on something could you not create a mask design for the people who have the programmable I guess you could do it by hand - but programmable sewing machine - put a little American flag on it so that

[52:41]

put a little American flag on it so that you you will say it's a any color could be any color mask but the you know the common design is that where your mouth is would be a little American flag or something like that maybe it's the side I don't know wherever it goes best be kind of fun all right that's my Gus suggested for the day and always somebody says their church has done thousands yeah all I really want is a common design that's the the Betsy Ross version and you can put a flag on it that's what I'd like to see they're not too OSHA safety approved that is true but I think the experts are coming around to the idea that's better than nothing better than nothing all right that's all for now I will talk to you tonight 7 o'clock Pacific ten o'clock Eastern