Speaker 1: Guess what, mango, what's that will? I know you're a
Speaker 1: big fan of couzies, so I've got a great story
Speaker 1: for you. Just just go with it. It's a good setup.
Speaker 1: So you know how we've had so many good business
Speaker 1: ideas since starting this show. We had amish dust, we
Speaker 1: had remote control condoms. Well, I think we need to
Speaker 1: try and apply for some government money to get these
Speaker 1: things off the ground. So you really think we'd have
Speaker 1: a shot. Well that's where the coozies come in. Just
Speaker 1: a couple of years ago, to students at the University
Speaker 1: of Washington, we're doing some pretty cool research on how
Speaker 1: foam couzies helped keep a can cold in the summer heat.
Speaker 1: And you know how much they got from the National
Speaker 1: Science Foundation to explore this one point three million dollars
Speaker 1: you're making up? I'm not. And it turns out that
Speaker 1: there's a little more to the story than just that headline,
Speaker 1: and that the study was part of an effort to
Speaker 1: learn more about climate change. But it's more fun to
Speaker 1: ignore the important science e stuff and just say one
Speaker 1: point three million to study cazies. And I'm sure we
Speaker 1: could come up with a bigger, more noble cause behind
Speaker 1: our ideas, but it does make you wonder what are
Speaker 1: the weirdest things our government has invested in? And that's
Speaker 1: what we're talking about today, Mr Hei their podcast listeners,
Speaker 1: Welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm Will Pearson and as
Speaker 1: always I'm joined by my good friend Mangueshot Ticketer and
Speaker 1: today we're breaking out our calculators and taking a hard
Speaker 1: look at questions on government spending. What exactly does the
Speaker 1: US budget pay for? And more importantly, what's the weirdest
Speaker 1: stuff our country has ever invested in? And to talk
Speaker 1: about that, We've got a few fun guests today. Who's
Speaker 1: gonna be joining us today, Mango. Today we'll be joined
Speaker 1: by James Ledbetter, author and editor of inc Magazine, and
Speaker 1: he's got this great new book, One Nation Under Gold,
Speaker 1: where he digs into Operation Goldfinger, this bizarre secret federal
Speaker 1: plan from the sixties that tried to sniff out golden
Speaker 1: strange places. And we're also going to talk to a
Speaker 1: couple of coin collectors. You know a thing or two
Speaker 1: about unusual investments. They're going to give us a low
Speaker 1: down on some of their best finds and in return,
Speaker 1: we'll put them to the test. All right, Well, that
Speaker 1: sounds like a fair trade. So to kind of dip
Speaker 1: our toes into this topic, I thought we should first
Speaker 1: address what most people already know about government spending, which
Speaker 1: it turns out isn't a whole lot. Plenty of us
Speaker 1: could probably point to healthcare and national defense as big
Speaker 1: parts of the US budget, but beyond that, the specifics
Speaker 1: actually get a little hazy for most people. Yeah, sad,
Speaker 1: but true. The Pure Research Center to the study back
Speaker 1: in two thousand fourteen that really helped illustrate just how
Speaker 1: little we know about where our money goes. PU pulled
Speaker 1: Americans on what they knew about carent events and issues
Speaker 1: in the news, and while the average respondent was fairly
Speaker 1: knowledgeable about many of the topics, when it came to
Speaker 1: how much the government spent on particular programs, most people
Speaker 1: were pretty clueless. So when they were pulled out, what
Speaker 1: were they asked about? Well, respondents were asked how much
Speaker 1: money they thought the government spent on four programs. It
Speaker 1: was foreign aid, transportations, social security, and paying down interest
Speaker 1: on the national debt. Or rather, they were asked to
Speaker 1: put them in order from like largest the smallest, so
Speaker 1: at thirty three the majority of people said we spend
Speaker 1: the most money on foreign aid, followed by interest on
Speaker 1: the national debt. That was at thought. Social Security received
Speaker 1: the most money and only four percent. Name transportation is
Speaker 1: the top expense, all right, so I'm guessing that's a
Speaker 1: little off. So what's the actual breakdown, Well, social Security
Speaker 1: nets the most money of the programs on the list
Speaker 1: by far. It received ninety four billion dollars in the
Speaker 1: fiscal year two thousand and sixteen, and that's roughly seventeen
Speaker 1: times the annual spending on foreign aid. It's also nine
Speaker 1: point five times the amount spent on transportation and almost
Speaker 1: three and a half times the amount spent on interest
Speaker 1: for the national debt. So people underestimated how much we
Speaker 1: spend on Social Security and they also severely overestimated the
Speaker 1: money we devote to foreign aid. Yeah, yeah, I'd say,
Speaker 1: well that that's that's very interesting. How do you think
Speaker 1: we should reconcile the fact that Social Security always ranks
Speaker 1: is one of the most popular government programs among Americans.
Speaker 1: So I'll barn aid consistently ranks as the least popular
Speaker 1: spending category. I think it really points to how our
Speaker 1: preconceived notions and political opinions can color the way we
Speaker 1: view the world, including our nation's spending habits. Well, how
Speaker 1: is that? Well, we tend to assume the worst about
Speaker 1: our government spending, and I think that's because we're aware
Speaker 1: in this really broad sense that the country burns through
Speaker 1: a lot of money and that the national debt is
Speaker 1: this like sky high number that's unimaginable, but it's always
Speaker 1: on the rise, even if we don't know the specifics. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, it seems like we take the pessimistic approach,
Speaker 1: and you know, it's easy to imagine our government that
Speaker 1: we must spend the least amount on programs we like
Speaker 1: and the most on ones we don't like. And I
Speaker 1: guess that's kind of human nature too exactly. But a
Speaker 1: closer look shows that the worst case mentality doesn't always
Speaker 1: add up. For example, foreign aid, that's the program that
Speaker 1: tops the chart in terms of unpopularity, but in reality
Speaker 1: it only accounts for roughly one percent of the total
Speaker 1: federal budget. Wow, I wouldn't have guessed that. All right,
Speaker 1: So let's set the record straight on this and once again,
Speaker 1: and it's Pew Research to the rescue here. So they
Speaker 1: broke down how the US government spent its three point
Speaker 1: nine five trillion dollar budget last year, and according to
Speaker 1: their senior writer, Drew to Silver, our country is basically
Speaker 1: a giant insurance company that also has a defense gig
Speaker 1: on the side. So we spend most of our money
Speaker 1: on healthcare in the national defense, oh definitely. About seventy
Speaker 1: of the total budget went for different kinds of social insurance,
Speaker 1: so that would include Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare, unemployment compensation,
Speaker 1: veterans benefits, all of the things kind of like this. Now,
Speaker 1: another fifteen percent of total spending went for national defense.
Speaker 1: Interest payments on national debt came in and looks like
Speaker 1: six percent, and education and related services made up less
Speaker 1: than three percent. So I'm just looking at the numbers
Speaker 1: on your page here, So seventy fifteen six three that's
Speaker 1: only whereas the other six well, that's the crazy thing.
Speaker 1: Every other program, whether that's national parks, public broadcasting, foreign A, NASA,
Speaker 1: you name it, all of those fit into the remaining
Speaker 1: six percent of the federal budget, which is all the
Speaker 1: stuff we squabble about. But it's all the fun stuff too.
Speaker 1: I know, it's a pretty sweet six percent, And it's
Speaker 1: inside that six percent that we're going to be focused
Speaker 1: on today. Yeah, but again, the worthiness of those programs
Speaker 1: is up for debate depending on who you ask, right,
Speaker 1: So we're not going to get into that debate. If
Speaker 1: you haven't noticed, we typically avoid big political statements here
Speaker 1: on the show, but we do love to dig up
Speaker 1: the most interesting fact. So that's what we're gonna stay
Speaker 1: focused on. Right. Well, we definitely see federal spending running
Speaker 1: into the same problems we face as individuals. You know,
Speaker 1: what to buy at the grocery store, or how much
Speaker 1: of your incomes should go to entertainment versus savings. Most
Speaker 1: people aren't going to agree on this stuff, and the
Speaker 1: fact is not everyone wants to spend their money in
Speaker 1: the same way, and that causes pretty big headaches when
Speaker 1: you're spending from a pot to which every taxpayer contributes. Sure,
Speaker 1: and that's why you'll never reach a consensus on certain
Speaker 1: line items, like, for example, whether or not it was
Speaker 1: a wise move for the government to invest nine dollars
Speaker 1: to promote Vidalia nions as part of a promotional campaign
Speaker 1: for the fourth Shrek movie. Ninety thousand dollars. I think
Speaker 1: we can all agree that sounds like a really bizarre
Speaker 1: use of money. Don't tell me that actually happened. It did,
Speaker 1: but I'm not so sure the can was a waste.
Speaker 1: Like according to the Vidalia Onion Committee, which is a
Speaker 1: real committee I was going to call, onion sales were
Speaker 1: up thanks to the Shrek promotion, and that's a huge
Speaker 1: deal here in Georgia, where agricultural makes up like a
Speaker 1: good chunk of the economy. By the way, did you
Speaker 1: know even more than that was spent in two thousand
Speaker 1: twelve to help Idahope promote their caviar. It's like three
Speaker 1: hundred thousand dollars Idaho. Again, it was to help the
Speaker 1: local farmers in rural areas. Onions and caviar yummy. All right,
Speaker 1: fair enough, But but here's another one for you, unrelated
Speaker 1: to food. So in two thousand and ten, the government
Speaker 1: gave six hundred and fifteen thousand dollars to the University
Speaker 1: of California at Santa Cruz so they could digitize Grateful
Speaker 1: Dead memorabilia. How crazy is this? That's over half a
Speaker 1: million in federal funds that went a digitally preserving old
Speaker 1: Grateful Dead concert tickets, t shirts and posters of dancing
Speaker 1: Teddy Bears. I mean, maybe it's just me, but that
Speaker 1: seems a little tougher to defend. I feel like we're
Speaker 1: gonna get a ton of angry emails from deadheads now.
Speaker 1: By the way, I was on Wikipedia the other day
Speaker 1: and I found this incredible page of what fans are called,
Speaker 1: And so do you know what Barry Manilow's fans are called.
Speaker 1: They're called fan alos and cris Pines fans they're called
Speaker 1: pine nuts. I'm a huge pine. Maybe I didn't know that,
Speaker 1: but I mean, I see your point, right. Like expenses
Speaker 1: like the Shrek Onion promotion and a federally funded Grateful
Speaker 1: Dead archive, they're tough to justify because they tend to
Speaker 1: benefit a much smaller segment of the population than you know,
Speaker 1: something like medicare Well, it's definitely an eye of the
Speaker 1: beholder kind of thing, and some programs will seem like
Speaker 1: good investments to you and others won't. And there's bound
Speaker 1: to be a lot of disagreement among people as to
Speaker 1: which or which. Absolutely so one of my favorite examples
Speaker 1: of that disparity and thinking comes from this weird research
Speaker 1: study from two thousand five. Biologists at Yale University received
Speaker 1: a federal grant to study the reproductive anatomy of ducks
Speaker 1: and namely the mail ducks unique corkscrew shape privates. Right, So, like,
Speaker 1: pundits and politicians were all over this, and they counted
Speaker 1: the study as like a particularly egregious case of wasteful
Speaker 1: government spending, so much so that the lead researcher, and
Speaker 1: her name was Patricia Brennan, she actually came forward to
Speaker 1: defend her work for the public. What did she say, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a pretty great statement. Actually, so I'm just gonna
Speaker 1: go ahead and read it. Quote, this is basic science.
Speaker 1: The headlines reflect outrage that the study was about duck genitals,
Speaker 1: as if there's something inherently wrong or perverse with this
Speaker 1: line of research. Imagine if medical research through the line
Speaker 1: at the belt Genitalia, Dear readers, are where the rubber
Speaker 1: meets the road evolutionarily, that's a statement. What a great
Speaker 1: quote there. But you know, that kind of dismissive attitude
Speaker 1: is it's actually pretty common when dealing with research projects
Speaker 1: that can admittedly sound a little nutty when take and
Speaker 1: in isolation. In fact, there are a few senators who've
Speaker 1: made it a yearly tradition to publish waste books, as
Speaker 1: they call them. These detail hundreds of what they deemed
Speaker 1: to be the worst cases of wasteful spending for a
Speaker 1: given year. I should note that the two thousand sixteen
Speaker 1: waste book was titled Pokemon Go. It's pretty great. But
Speaker 1: while these reports always make some fair points, they also
Speaker 1: tend to ridicule grants for quirky research and present them
Speaker 1: without mention of their connections to the broader fields of
Speaker 1: legitimate study. Yeah, and I want to make sure we
Speaker 1: don't fall prey to that same temptation. But that's a
Speaker 1: They're definitely other parts of the federal budget that seemed
Speaker 1: wasteful no matter the context. What do you say we
Speaker 1: look at some of the strangest cases of clear cut waste,
Speaker 1: along with a few more examples that skirt the line
Speaker 1: between impractical and outright crazy. All right, well, that sounds
Speaker 1: good to me. Why don't we start with Operation gold Finger,
Speaker 1: which seems like a prime candidate for the outright crazy category.
Speaker 1: Why don't we see if we can get our first
Speaker 1: guest on the line to talk through it. Our guest
Speaker 1: today is the editor of inc magazine and the author
Speaker 1: of a new book titled One Nation Under Gold, How
Speaker 1: One Precious medal has dominated the American imagination for four centuries.
Speaker 1: It's a terrific book. And with today's episode being focused
Speaker 1: on weird government investments, we're going to focus this conversation
Speaker 1: on an incredibly bizarre effort known as Operation gold Finger.
Speaker 1: James Ledbetter, Welcome to Part time Genius. Thank you so
Speaker 1: much for having me. All Right, well, James, can you
Speaker 1: help us set the stage for our listeners. So it's
Speaker 1: the early nineteen sixties. What is the state of gold
Speaker 1: at this point? So, when World War Two was coming
Speaker 1: to an end, the major powers of the world gathered
Speaker 1: in New Hampshire in Bretton Woods to hammer out a
Speaker 1: new monetary system for the globe. Uh and that system
Speaker 1: had at its heart the convertibility of the dollar to
Speaker 1: gold at the rate of thirty five announced so Bamian theory,
Speaker 1: anyone with thirty five dollars could go to the United
Speaker 1: States Treasury and get a bounce of gold, and anybody
Speaker 1: with announce of gold could go to the High States
Speaker 1: Treasury and get thirty five dollars. That every other currency
Speaker 1: in the world was then pegged to the dollar, and
Speaker 1: the dollar was fully convertible to gold. This system worked
Speaker 1: pretty well. It arguably worked too well in the sense
Speaker 1: that the growth of Western Europe and Japan starting in
Speaker 1: the late forties through the nineteen fifties was so rapid
Speaker 1: and extensive that you now have all of these dollars
Speaker 1: out in the world and dollar backed securities that if
Speaker 1: they were to be redeemed at the same time at
Speaker 1: that treasury window, there would be no more gold. And
Speaker 1: that was considered to be an absolute disaster that had
Speaker 1: to be prevented because it would it would bring the
Speaker 1: whole system crumbling down. And that's not because we didn't
Speaker 1: have any gold. We had amassed the largest stockpile of
Speaker 1: gold known to mankind, but it still wasn't enough to
Speaker 1: deal with all of the dollars that were out there.
Speaker 1: And so with this problem being very well known by
Speaker 1: the country's leaders and the Federal Reserve, there was a
Speaker 1: kind of desperation about what to do, and so on
Speaker 1: top of that you have pressure coming from the United
Speaker 1: States gold mining industry. The the keeping the value of
Speaker 1: gold at thirty five an ounce was very depressing to
Speaker 1: the US gold industry. That it's a little analogous to
Speaker 1: like oil companies when oil is at twenty barrel it's
Speaker 1: really not worth their time to drill in certain places
Speaker 1: or to go where you need to do fracking. At
Speaker 1: a hundred dollars a barrel, it's it makes a lot
Speaker 1: more sense. But with the price fixed at thirty most
Speaker 1: of the gold that was easily accessible in the United
Speaker 1: States had already been tapped out, and and so the
Speaker 1: question is where what could be done to get more gold?
Speaker 1: And a strange combination of high placed Treasury officials, l
Speaker 1: v j's science and technology advisor, and some sympathetic members
Speaker 1: of Congress cooked up this scheme in the mid sixties
Speaker 1: that because it's the mid sixties, what else are they
Speaker 1: going to call it? Operation Golder and the idea, the
Speaker 1: idea was to use state of the art technology to
Speaker 1: basically find gold where it had never been found before.
Speaker 1: So you had this is all completely top secret. There
Speaker 1: was no congressional debate, There was no budget line item
Speaker 1: for it. You know, there wasn't like people said, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: let's let's uh, let's sign off on the on the
Speaker 1: on the alchemy quest. Um. It was completely hush hush
Speaker 1: because they were afraid, uh they they they believed that
Speaker 1: there was so much gold that they could find that
Speaker 1: it was essentially you know, double or triple the amount
Speaker 1: of gold already mind in the world. That's that's so
Speaker 1: one of the things I say is it's not like
Speaker 1: discovering a new gold mine. This was like they thought
Speaker 1: discovering a new planet, and that they felt that that
Speaker 1: if that got out, it might be so disruptive to
Speaker 1: the world central banks that you could cause you know,
Speaker 1: any number of economic problems. And so what were some
Speaker 1: of the weirdest places that they started looking for gold?
Speaker 1: It feels like this insane exploratory mission. Yeah, so so
Speaker 1: they were There were kind of three parts to Operation
Speaker 1: gold Finger. The first part involved using state of the
Speaker 1: art technology to see if there is in fact gold
Speaker 1: in places where it had traditionally not been looked for. So,
Speaker 1: for example, uh, is their gold in the ash that
Speaker 1: comes out of cold plants? Is there gold in certain
Speaker 1: types of um plants and flowers? Is their golden animal brains?
Speaker 1: Is their gold in deer antlers? Is their gold in seawater?
Speaker 1: Um Literally dozens and dozens of projects all across the
Speaker 1: country and internationally to find out if there's some you know,
Speaker 1: kind of hidden source of gold. And this is almost comical.
Speaker 1: This is an instant of when science kind of gets
Speaker 1: in the way of wisdom because the technology was really great.
Speaker 1: The fact is there are traces of gold in lots
Speaker 1: of places, but at parts per million or parts per billion,
Speaker 1: to get the gold out of the deer antlers would
Speaker 1: cost way more than thirty five dollars, So it really
Speaker 1: wasn't a solution, even though yeah, it was kind of there. UM.
Speaker 1: The second component of Operation gold Finger again goes back
Speaker 1: to this idea that we know where the gold is,
Speaker 1: but all of the gold that can be easily and
Speaker 1: profitably mined in location X has already been mined out.
Speaker 1: There's a very good chance that there's more gold underneath there,
Speaker 1: but it's not really accessible um at thirty five dollars
Speaker 1: announced if you use conventional explosives. But what if what
Speaker 1: if we put nuclear explosives in the ground and blast
Speaker 1: out the gold and then lead it out with a
Speaker 1: with a with a chemical and this this was a
Speaker 1: very enticing idea in the in the mid sixties, there
Speaker 1: were a lot of government scientists who really believed in
Speaker 1: what we're called the peaceful uses of atomic energy. UM.
Speaker 1: It was a somewhat naive time in the sense that
Speaker 1: people were not paying a lot of attention to radioactivity. Uh,
Speaker 1: and that's a bit of a problem. But there were
Speaker 1: a number of experiments that were conducted using nuclear weapons
Speaker 1: to to move large amounts of earth, and it was
Speaker 1: it was kind of in the books to do this
Speaker 1: for mining purposes. But by the time the words started
Speaker 1: to get out and some of the more um uh
Speaker 1: kind of conscious scientists, the program was eventually scrapped before
Speaker 1: it actually took the form of of using nuclear weapons
Speaker 1: for for gold mining. Um. And then the third component,
Speaker 1: which really didn't get too far beyond the conceptual stage. Um.
Speaker 1: But let's call it what it is, was to turn
Speaker 1: base metals into gold. It was nothing short of a
Speaker 1: twentieth century alchemy proposal. And here again the science kind
Speaker 1: of outpaced people's understanding of things. You can do this,
Speaker 1: It can be done. Glenn Seaborg, who was for many
Speaker 1: years the chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, and there's
Speaker 1: there's elements named after him. He's he discovered a number
Speaker 1: of elements. Very distinguished scientists actually did this. In you
Speaker 1: could you could take very very thin foil of bismuth
Speaker 1: and bombard it with proton beam and it displaces electrons,
Speaker 1: so that some of this remaining is in fact an
Speaker 1: isotope of goals. So you can create gold out of
Speaker 1: base metals. But again here's the problem. When Seaboard did this,
Speaker 1: he estimated that to produce gold by this method would
Speaker 1: cost probably one quadrillion dollars per ounds as a way
Speaker 1: of replacing the gold that was propping up the dollar
Speaker 1: that was worth thirty five This was not really a
Speaker 1: very good proposal. Um. But but you know, it's it's
Speaker 1: kind of easy to make fun of these ideas. Now,
Speaker 1: it has to be said that at the time these
Speaker 1: these were considered viable ways of propping up the global economy,
Speaker 1: which was it was a very serious, sober thing to do.
Speaker 1: But it shows you how twisted and um and kind
Speaker 1: of um uh, what's the word I'm looking for, how
Speaker 1: unsustainable the monetary system had become, that that that that
Speaker 1: you would have someone seriously thinking of putting nuclear weapons
Speaker 1: in the ground, is you know, a better way of
Speaker 1: propping up the world's monetary system as opposed to say
Speaker 1: changing the rules. It just shows you how the logic
Speaker 1: had had really become you know, kind of work. And
Speaker 1: I think that's that's part of the theme of my
Speaker 1: book One Nation Under Gold, that for whatever reason, sometimes
Speaker 1: we're good, sometimes we're not so good. This metal has
Speaker 1: kind of warped the American mind over time, and uh,
Speaker 1: and we we can't we can't stop. It's it's this utter,
Speaker 1: utter fascination with this substance. Well, James, this has been terrific.
Speaker 1: I hope everyone will check out One Nation Undergold. James,
Speaker 1: thanks so much for joining us. Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: You're listening to part time Genius and we're talking about
Speaker 1: the weirdest things our government spends money on. To ango.
Speaker 1: Before the break, you mentioned that there were some clear
Speaker 1: cut cases of wasteful government spending that are tough to dispute.
Speaker 1: So when you said that, what did you have mind?
Speaker 1: Oh man, where to begin? I'd say one of the
Speaker 1: worst I came across was the staggering ninety million dollars
Speaker 1: that federal agencies spent on unnecessary printing charges each year.
Speaker 1: Like this includes about twenty eight million dollars just to
Speaker 1: print the Congressional Record, and that's a daily transcription of
Speaker 1: every word spoken in Congress. So there are over copies
Speaker 1: of this record printed every single day. And the worst
Speaker 1: part is the whole thing is available online. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: pretty much the definition of wasteful. And I've I've got
Speaker 1: another one here. So, according to a two thousand thirteen
Speaker 1: report by the Office of the Inspector General, the government
Speaker 1: spent big on inside advertising to increase traffic to their
Speaker 1: Facebook and Twitter pages. How exciting is that Facebook and
Speaker 1: Twitter for government? All told, the State Department told out
Speaker 1: six hundred and thirty thousand dollars of the course of
Speaker 1: two years, and this was basically to buy more likes
Speaker 1: for their social media posts. Man, did they at least
Speaker 1: get the traffic they wanted? Well, no, unfortunately. I mean
Speaker 1: although the State Department's pages did see an uptick and
Speaker 1: visit ters, I think it was less than two percent
Speaker 1: of them actually liked or favorite at any post. So
Speaker 1: not only was it a big waste of money, but
Speaker 1: I'm guessing it was kind of a blow to the
Speaker 1: government's pride. You know, I almost feel bad for them.
Speaker 1: But what about how much is spent on the annual
Speaker 1: upkeep of vacant government buildings? Yeah, I remember you were
Speaker 1: looking into this, so I'll buy it on this one.
Speaker 1: So how many of our tax dollars go to empty buildings,
Speaker 1: way way too many of them. So, according to the
Speaker 1: l A. Times, the government spends as much as one
Speaker 1: point seven billion dollars each year just to maintain the
Speaker 1: more than seven hundred seventy thousand vacant buildings it owns.
Speaker 1: And you want to talk about wasteful. Even though the
Speaker 1: government already pays for all that unused space, some of
Speaker 1: the agencies continue to buy at least new spaces rather
Speaker 1: than put the vacant ones. To use seven hundred and
Speaker 1: seventy thousand vacant buildings, that is insane. Well, it's it's
Speaker 1: especially frustrating in cases like that where a little more
Speaker 1: communication could cause multiple problems to cancel each other out.
Speaker 1: I mean, in addition to easy workspace for employees, these
Speaker 1: buildings could be used as government storage. Take the I
Speaker 1: R S. I mean, the I R S alone has
Speaker 1: more than twenty thousand pieces of unused office furniture, and
Speaker 1: rather than sell it or stored in government buildings, the
Speaker 1: agency pays nearly one million dollars each year to rent
Speaker 1: storage space. That's so crazy. But you know, as crazy
Speaker 1: as these expenses are, if we want to find the
Speaker 1: weirdest government investments, we've got to talk about DARPA. Very
Speaker 1: good point, all right. So for those who haven't thought
Speaker 1: about DARPA lately or or ever, the full name is
Speaker 1: the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Was created back in
Speaker 1: ninety eight to help with the US space race and
Speaker 1: quickly switched focus to developing technical innovations for defense. This
Speaker 1: was once NASA took over the space research. DARPA research
Speaker 1: has led to all kinds of breakthroughs, from the first
Speaker 1: stealth aircraft, communications, satellites, and drones to the less military
Speaker 1: minded inventions like driverless cars and robotic vacuum cleaners. Right,
Speaker 1: and if rumas weren't weird enough, DARPA is also responsible
Speaker 1: for about sixty years worth of really far robotics projects,
Speaker 1: many of which were never put to active use. You know.
Speaker 1: One of my favorite examples of this was called EATER.
Speaker 1: That's e a t R, also known as the Energy
Speaker 1: Autonomous Tactical Robot. I don't know if you saw this, Mango,
Speaker 1: but it was back in two thousand twelve. They were
Speaker 1: all these online rumors that the government was developing some
Speaker 1: kind of monstrous flesh heating robot. It was to be
Speaker 1: used in combat. What I mean, I feel like I
Speaker 1: definitely remember about that. Well. Thankfully, the rumors turned out
Speaker 1: to be exaggerated. Researchers clarified that Eater was strictly vegetarian,
Speaker 1: which is comforting seeing as the robot was equipped with
Speaker 1: a chainsaw and a powerful gripper arm and this was
Speaker 1: help but collect plant based biomass to use for energy,
Speaker 1: and the idea was that Eater could support troops in
Speaker 1: the battlefield without the need for conventional fuels. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's actually kind of cool. So instead it would simply
Speaker 1: collect twigs, grass, paper, other plant materials to help power itself.
Speaker 1: And I like this statement from the CEO of the
Speaker 1: company that was funded by DARPA to help develop the robot.
Speaker 1: He said, completely understand the public's concern about futuristic robots
Speaker 1: feeding on human population, but that is not our mission.
Speaker 1: That's super comforting still for my money. You know, the
Speaker 1: scariest thing Dark has worked on has to be their
Speaker 1: Total Information Awareness project from way back in two thousand two.
Speaker 1: I mean, that does sound way scarier than managing robots.
Speaker 1: I know. It was basically this massive counter terrorism database
Speaker 1: that was supposed to collect, process, and even analyze mind
Speaker 1: data to help prevent terrorist attacks. And as you'd imagine,
Speaker 1: there was a lot of pushback against what was essentially
Speaker 1: this electronic version of Big Brother. And if you thought
Speaker 1: the name was creepy, you've got to see the logo
Speaker 1: they came up with. They used the Eye of Providence
Speaker 1: symbol that's on the back of the dollar bill, you know,
Speaker 1: the pyramid with all seeing eye on top. But then
Speaker 1: they managed to make it even more creepy by showing
Speaker 1: it projecting a beam of light onto the surface of
Speaker 1: the entire planet o God. Yeah, okay, nothing unsettling about that. Now.
Speaker 1: Not all their research is terrifying, though. One of the weirdest, coolest,
Speaker 1: and most non threatening projects from dark Uh is this
Speaker 1: robot that can play jazz music. And we already have
Speaker 1: artificial intelligence programs that can produce pseudo original classical music
Speaker 1: by analyzing the work of human composers, but DARPA has
Speaker 1: its eyes set on robots that actually write and perform
Speaker 1: their own jazz songs. All I think about when you
Speaker 1: said this is like the creatures from Showbiz Pizza. That's
Speaker 1: pretty much what it is. They were so far ahead
Speaker 1: of their time that show Biz. But tell me why
Speaker 1: jazz and how do musical robots like help with defense. Well,
Speaker 1: jazz was chosen because it would require the robots to improvise.
Speaker 1: I think it kind of makes sense. So in order
Speaker 1: to jam along with human musicians, the robots need to
Speaker 1: be able to think and react to the situation in
Speaker 1: real time. So the aim is to produce a form
Speaker 1: of AI that can make you know the spur of
Speaker 1: the moment decisions and response to constantly changing conditions, which
Speaker 1: is definitely a skill that would come in handy on
Speaker 1: a battlefield just as much as in a jazz club.
Speaker 1: So I can't believe you just convinced me that jazz
Speaker 1: playing robots are smart investment, or at least that they're
Speaker 1: not the worst way to spend our talks about No,
Speaker 1: not the worst. But it's, like we were saying earlier,
Speaker 1: so many of these seemingly outlandish projects don't sound nearly
Speaker 1: as crazy when they're given the proper context. So how
Speaker 1: about we try and experiment, mango. Let's take a look
Speaker 1: at a couple of the country's most recent strange investments
Speaker 1: and see if they're as silly as they sound, if
Speaker 1: they're actually worth the money. I'm up for it. But
Speaker 1: why don't we take a break for a quiz, first
Speaker 1: a mango. Who do we have on the line today,
Speaker 1: We've got Charles Morgan and Hubert Walker from the wonderful
Speaker 1: publication Coin Week. Welcome to part time genius guys. Hi guys,
Speaker 1: he has gone for having. When people are getting into
Speaker 1: coin collecting, what are some of the mistakes they tend
Speaker 1: to make? So the first one is that people who
Speaker 1: really get into a hobby really intensely in the beginning,
Speaker 1: I think that there's a race that they need to
Speaker 1: buy everything they see because somehow they're all going to
Speaker 1: disappear and they're gonna run out of time. And the
Speaker 1: fact the matter is like nobody has ever are a
Speaker 1: symbol of a a coin collection and that has everything. It's
Speaker 1: just it's it's probably not even possible even if you,
Speaker 1: you know, even with Esos his money, I don't think
Speaker 1: you could do it because you would run out of time,
Speaker 1: and then there would also be coins that would be
Speaker 1: so rare that maybe there's only one or two known
Speaker 1: and you have to convince the person who owns at
Speaker 1: the celt Sea. But the second thing is one of
Speaker 1: the most profoundly stupid stories that we had covered in
Speaker 1: the last few years involved a guy who was an
Speaker 1: investor who bought a quarter million dollar gold coin from
Speaker 1: a one of those you know called the eight hundred
Speaker 1: numbers listened to on radio kind of gold dealers, and
Speaker 1: they sold him this this amazing coin, like any collector
Speaker 1: who is a real collector would have been just thrilled
Speaker 1: to own it. But he found that it had a flaw,
Speaker 1: a little bit dingy, so uh, he basically polished the
Speaker 1: life out of it, and by the time we saw it,
Speaker 1: it looked like costume jewelry, like something that it didn't
Speaker 1: even look real anymore. I mean it was it was gold,
Speaker 1: so it looked like gold, but it was so shiny,
Speaker 1: and it was a coin. It looked like something made
Speaker 1: to look like gold. And he still only got like
Speaker 1: five six thousand dollars for it on auction. So now
Speaker 1: you're used to dealing with much more valuable coins. But
Speaker 1: I was curious, what are your thoughts on getting rid
Speaker 1: of the penny. I'm personally in favor of a total
Speaker 1: coinage reform, which would include getting rid of the penny
Speaker 1: at least and maybe the nickel. And if you think
Speaker 1: about it, there has never been a success They push
Speaker 1: to eliminate a piece of paper currency in favor of
Speaker 1: a coin. Uh. In the past, probably a hundred or
Speaker 1: so years in this country, we used to actually make
Speaker 1: currency notes called fractional currency, which were parts of a dollar.
Speaker 1: That was done during the Civil War because they didn't
Speaker 1: want to, you know, use silver precious and being hoarded.
Speaker 1: So they were making basically stance over money. But uh,
Speaker 1: you know, when they tried to introduce the Susan B.
Speaker 1: Anthony dollar, it didn't replace the one dollar bill and
Speaker 1: the presidential dollar in the second to we it all
Speaker 1: are also failed to do that. So from a minting
Speaker 1: industry sent point, the elimination of any point from circulation,
Speaker 1: it is a slow death spiral for that as an industry.
Speaker 1: The second part is the good part. So in the
Speaker 1: United States we have essentially had the same coin structure
Speaker 1: since seven The coins are different and there are some
Speaker 1: different denominations that don't exist, more like a half cent,
Speaker 1: half dime, two cent, or three cent piece. But in
Speaker 1: eighteen fifty seven the United States meant in a major
Speaker 1: pointage reform which eliminated the half cent and the cent
Speaker 1: large cent size cent which was oh gosh, maybe in
Speaker 1: between the size of a half dollar and a quarter. Essentially,
Speaker 1: that's how big the scent used to be, and they
Speaker 1: eliminated it in favor of the small size scent that
Speaker 1: we used today. Well, the elimination of that meant that
Speaker 1: there were scents that were made from three the eighteen
Speaker 1: fifty seven, which are like now obsolete, and they were
Speaker 1: being redeemed it turned in and destroyed. Well, that's what
Speaker 1: started coin collecting in America as sort of a popular hobby.
Speaker 1: And so my opinion is if they eliminated the scent
Speaker 1: and the nickel, it would actually help coin collecting because
Speaker 1: people who grew up using those coins would realize they
Speaker 1: were no longer going to be available and people would
Speaker 1: start looking for the different dates and mint marks and
Speaker 1: things like that. So for coin collectors eliminating stuff like
Speaker 1: that it's probably a good thing, But for the mincing
Speaker 1: industry it's not. That makes a lot of sense. Well,
Speaker 1: you guys are used to dealing with rare coins and
Speaker 1: much more valuable coins, but we're gonna put you guys
Speaker 1: to the test with something a little more simple. Mango,
Speaker 1: what game are we playing today? We're playing the quarter quiz,
Speaker 1: and basically we're gonna tell you what's on the back
Speaker 1: of the U S quarter and you just have to
Speaker 1: tell us the state where it's from. But we're gonna
Speaker 1: have you guys face off against one another, and in
Speaker 1: order to chime in, we're going to have you make
Speaker 1: some animal noises. So Charles you will chime in with
Speaker 1: a cow's move, and Hubert you will have the lovely caca. Alright,
Speaker 1: so let's get started. Question number one. This stake quarter
Speaker 1: has a picture of a common loon on it, though
Speaker 1: the phrase Land of ten Thousand Lakes might be the
Speaker 1: bigger giveaway. All right, so that's Hubert, what's the answer there?
Speaker 1: All right? I think that would be Minnesota, Absolutely nicely done.
Speaker 1: Question number two. There are no slot machines or poker
Speaker 1: tables on the back of this stake quarter, just a
Speaker 1: pair of beautiful mustangs running free. Oh that sounded like
Speaker 1: a very realistic cow. Okay, Charles, what do you think
Speaker 1: I do? Mind us? Uh? That would be Na Bob, absolutely,
Speaker 1: and Nevada is actually home of the nation's wild horses.
Speaker 1: Question number three. This state quarter has the phrase Crossroads
Speaker 1: of America on it, right under a picture of a
Speaker 1: race car. Okay, Hubert, Indiana al right, well done. Question
Speaker 1: number four. Unlike North Carolina, which also features the Right
Speaker 1: Brothers plane, this state quarter paired. They're playing with a
Speaker 1: picture of John Glenn in a space suit. Wow, Huber
Speaker 1: just barely beats Charles with a coca alright, what's the answer?
Speaker 1: It is Ohio? Alright? Question number five. This state quarter
Speaker 1: has a ring necked pheasant in the foreground, though the
Speaker 1: pick of Mount Rushmore in the back might be more recognizable.
Speaker 1: Um I, why don't we give it to Charles? Yeah?
Speaker 1: That would that would be the South Dakota. You got it,
Speaker 1: all right? Question number six, This state has a bucking
Speaker 1: cowboy on it, and it's accompanied by the phrase the
Speaker 1: equality state. It's better known as a home of Dick Cheney.
Speaker 1: This is also probably the worst coin design and the
Speaker 1: entire STA series, and that would go to Wyoming. Wait,
Speaker 1: why why do you think it's the worst state design. Well,
Speaker 1: it's not because of the iconic image of the bucking cowboys,
Speaker 1: because there's no detail on it. It's just basically a silhouette.
Speaker 1: I mean that's kind of boring. Anything that is pretty boring. Okay, Well,
Speaker 1: if I'm not mistaken, we are tied at three. So
Speaker 1: this is the very last question, the tiebreaker number seven.
Speaker 1: This state quarter has a picture of a peregrine falcon
Speaker 1: and the phrase may it be forever in Latin. There
Speaker 1: are zero potatoes on it, however, alright Hubert for the
Speaker 1: wind Idaho, it is Idaho. Alright, Mango. How our contestants
Speaker 1: done well? He just barely edged out Charles. But it
Speaker 1: was a great competition. And as always are, whinner gets
Speaker 1: a note to his mom or boss sing his praises.
Speaker 1: And because we don't want Charles to go home h
Speaker 1: empty handed, We're gonna send you home with the weirdest
Speaker 1: poin press we could find online, a hedgehog coin purse.
Speaker 1: I can't wait to use it. Well, congratulations guys, and
Speaker 1: thanks so much for joining us on part time genius.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much, guys, great, thank you guys. Thanks, We
Speaker 1: will thank you. Okay, Well, so it's time to live
Speaker 1: out the ultimate taxpayer fantasy. We're basically gonna audit the U. S.
Speaker 1: Government and see if any of their two thousand and
Speaker 1: sixteen investments past muster. Where do you want to start? Alright?
Speaker 1: So here's what I want your opinion on. The researchers
Speaker 1: and m I T developed a new program to view
Speaker 1: six hundred hours of television shows and four hundred hours
Speaker 1: of online videos to see if they could learn about
Speaker 1: and anticipate human behavior. So with this, do you think
Speaker 1: the government was right to foot the bill for a
Speaker 1: couch potato computer. I'm not falling for this. I feel
Speaker 1: like I need some more information, So tell me what
Speaker 1: it watch. Well, the program was trying to anticipate actions
Speaker 1: like hugs, kisses, high fives, and handshakes, so the researchers
Speaker 1: had to watch tons of YouTube videos and hours and
Speaker 1: hours of Desperate Housewives, The Office, and Scrubs, to name
Speaker 1: a few, which isn't a bad plan, but like, what
Speaker 1: was the end goal? I mean, is the government really
Speaker 1: interested in like saving people from being left on high fives. Well,
Speaker 1: the real hope is that, with enough time and enough
Speaker 1: binge watching, the program could be used in security cameras.
Speaker 1: Is a way to automatically call for help. It identifies
Speaker 1: that somebody is about to be injured, or that a
Speaker 1: crime is about to be committed. It's it's it's actually
Speaker 1: pretty interesting stuff. Yeah that's pretty neat. So, um, why
Speaker 1: don't we try another one? Since it's beach season, let's
Speaker 1: look at the three million dollars study the National Science
Speaker 1: Foundation did on how background music affects viewers perception of sharks.
Speaker 1: But before I go into more detail, I'm going to
Speaker 1: give you how the Internet frame the studies conclusion. So
Speaker 1: here it is the theme music from Jaws caused people
Speaker 1: to view sharks in a negative manner. That did. I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna say we got ripped off, but it
Speaker 1: does strike me as a fairly obvious conclusion. I mean,
Speaker 1: the Jaws theme was composed to feel ominous. It follows
Speaker 1: that the song would make viewers wary of whatever's played
Speaker 1: alongside it, whether it's sharks or whatever, which is a
Speaker 1: totally fair response. Now, let me fill in some of
Speaker 1: the gaffs and we'll see if it changes your opinion. So,
Speaker 1: as part of the study, researchers determined that the public's
Speaker 1: negative perception of sharks is actually hindering conservation efforts, and
Speaker 1: we tend to ignore cases where sharks are exploited or abused,
Speaker 1: and we donate less money to shark conservation programs than
Speaker 1: we do to similar programs for other creatures. I mean,
Speaker 1: that's a little sad, But again, is this surprising our culture?
Speaker 1: Has a bad habit of blowing shark on human violence
Speaker 1: way out of proportion, especially when you look at all
Speaker 1: the Jaws and shark nadoes of the world. So what
Speaker 1: what is the angle here? Well, according to the NSF
Speaker 1: and I'm quoting here, participants rated sharks more negatively and
Speaker 1: less positively after viewing a sixty second video of swimming
Speaker 1: sharks set to ominous background music, compared to participants who
Speaker 1: watched the same video clips set to uplifting background music
Speaker 1: or silence. And here's the thing, right, Like, researchers didn't
Speaker 1: use footage from Jaws or other horror flicks. They used
Speaker 1: a clip from the BBC's Blue Planet Nature series, which
Speaker 1: just showed sharks like swimming around and being sharks. So basically,
Speaker 1: the study is a warning about making educational content that
Speaker 1: borrows too heavily from the Hollywood Shark Playbook. Yeah, pretty
Speaker 1: much so, the studies actual non inflammatory conclusion was quote.
Speaker 1: Given that nature documentaries are often regarded as objective and
Speaker 1: authoritative sources of information, it is critical that documentary filmmakers
Speaker 1: and viewers are aware of how the soundtrack can affect
Speaker 1: the interpretation of the educational content. All right, I think
Speaker 1: I see where you're going with this, and you know,
Speaker 1: suddenly a laughable research study doesn't seem quite as ridiculous.
Speaker 1: But I mean, three million dollars, was it really worth
Speaker 1: that much? Yeah? I mean, I guess that depends on
Speaker 1: how the educational community responds to the findings, and of
Speaker 1: course whether or not you like sharks. All right, Well,
Speaker 1: you know this might sound silly, but auditing the government
Speaker 1: is much harder than I thought it would be. There's
Speaker 1: just so many angles from what you can analyze these expenses,
Speaker 1: and they all make a certain amount of sense. I mean,
Speaker 1: our country spent a hundred and twenty five thousand dollars
Speaker 1: on a three D printer that can create edible pizzas
Speaker 1: for astronauts. On the one hand, that's exorbitant, But on
Speaker 1: the other, do we really want to be the kind
Speaker 1: of people who would deny astronauts pizza? I don't, I know.
Speaker 1: I mean, there are real benefits to even the most
Speaker 1: ridiculous sounding investments, but balancing those potential benefits against the
Speaker 1: real world costs, I mean, that can all be dizzying.
Speaker 1: That's why it's so important to try and keep things
Speaker 1: in perspective when looking at these weird government investments. What
Speaker 1: do you mean by that, Well, just like with the
Speaker 1: thread of sharks or that one percent of funding goes
Speaker 1: to foreign aid, we have a way of making these
Speaker 1: weird expenses out to be way bigger problems than they
Speaker 1: really are. Take those government waste books, for example, they
Speaker 1: document billions spent on questionable grants and programs. But even
Speaker 1: all nineteen billion dollars of that is only half of
Speaker 1: one percent of the three point nine trillion dollar federal budget.
Speaker 1: So while it's definitely not something we should ignore, it
Speaker 1: doesn't make as much of an impact on the government's
Speaker 1: bottom line as you think. That's actually pretty comforting. I mean,
Speaker 1: I want people to like sharks and I want astronauts
Speaker 1: to eat pizza. So if those things can happen at
Speaker 1: no huge cost to the country, I consider that a
Speaker 1: win in my boat. We'll hold onto that feeling well,
Speaker 1: because it's time for the fact not bring it on mango,
Speaker 1: h All right, So I'll kick it off. Every wonder
Speaker 1: where all those old Neon signs go when they burn out.
Speaker 1: In two thousand ten, one eight million dollars was given
Speaker 1: to construct a Neon sign graveyard near Las Vegas, and
Speaker 1: I mean, I clearly want to check this place out. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I kind of do too. Alright, well, Mago, you and
Speaker 1: I both have young sons who are very curious about
Speaker 1: video games. Are doing the whole Minecraft thing now, but
Speaker 1: it won't be long before they're begging to play games
Speaker 1: like World of Warcraft. And it turns out there could
Speaker 1: be some good money in this. The creators of one
Speaker 1: study received two point nine million dollars to look into
Speaker 1: how online virtual worlds such as World of Warcraft and
Speaker 1: Second Life can help organizations collaborate and compete more effectively
Speaker 1: in the global marketplace. Have you ever been to Denali
Speaker 1: National Park? I haven't. Well, when you do, I'm sure
Speaker 1: the animals and mountains and stuff will be pretty cool
Speaker 1: to look at. But be sure to check out the
Speaker 1: toilets because they've got some seriously fancy new ones, or
Speaker 1: at least they'd better be fancy. At forty one dollars
Speaker 1: perceed with thirty six toilets, that comes out to one
Speaker 1: point five million dollars. Wow. All right, Well, I'll try
Speaker 1: to swing by right after I visit the home for
Speaker 1: the US Ambassador to NATO and Brussels to see the
Speaker 1: nine hundred and sixty violets, nine hundred and sixty tulips,
Speaker 1: nine hundred and sixty begonias, five four Iva geraniums, and
Speaker 1: lots of other plants, totaling seven hundred and four thousand
Speaker 1: dollars for this one residence. I feel like he cut
Speaker 1: the budget on the ivy geraniums. Yeah, everything was at
Speaker 1: nine hundred and sixty until the ivy geranium. So 'st year,
Speaker 1: the government allocated like close to a million dollars to
Speaker 1: post poems and zoos throughout the country. The poems are
Speaker 1: there to quote, increase environmental awareness. Thank goodness, Yeah, thank
Speaker 1: goodness for that one. All right. I'm not sure if
Speaker 1: you remember this ad back in two thousand and ten,
Speaker 1: but the government invested two point five million dollars on
Speaker 1: what would later become known as the worst Super Bowl
Speaker 1: ad ever. So back in two thousand twelve, then Congressman
Speaker 1: Mark Newman noted that he wanted to save taxpayers a
Speaker 1: hundred seventy five thousand dollars by cutting the funding for
Speaker 1: a study on quote the connection between cocaine and the
Speaker 1: risky sex habits of the Japanese quail for risky sex,
Speaker 1: I know. And while the study was really intended to
Speaker 1: help researchers understand the connection between drug abuse and sex
Speaker 1: habits and public health options. I want to see his
Speaker 1: study on coked up quails. All right, I'm with you
Speaker 1: on this one. That seems like the most necessary use
Speaker 1: of government money we've talked about all day. So I'm
Speaker 1: gonna get this one to you. Congrats, thank you, and
Speaker 1: that's it for today's Part Time Genius. Thank you so
Speaker 1: much for listening. Thanks again for listening. Part Time Genius
Speaker 1: is a production of how stuff works and wouldn't be
Speaker 1: possible without several brilliant people who do the important things
Speaker 1: we couldn't even again to understand. CHRISTA McNeil does the
Speaker 1: editing thing. Noel Brown made the theme song and does
Speaker 1: the mixy mixy sound thing. Jerry Rowland does the exact
Speaker 1: producer thing. Gay Bluesier is our lead researcher, with support
Speaker 1: from the Research Army including Austin Thompson, Nolan Brown and
Speaker 1: Lucas Adams and Eves. Jeff Cook gets the show to
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