Speaker 1: Cut booms.
Speaker 2: If you thought four hours a day, twelve hundred minutes
Speaker 2: a week was enough, think again. He's the last remnants
Speaker 2: of the old republic, a sole fashion of fairness. He
Speaker 2: treats crackheads in the ghetto cutter the same as the
Speaker 2: rich pill poppers in the penthouse. Wow. The Clearinghouse of
Speaker 2: hot takes break free for something special. The Fifth Hour
Speaker 2: with Ben Maller starts right now.
Speaker 1: In the air everywhere. It's a football Sunday, National Football League,
Speaker 1: and this is the unofficial pregame show to your football Sunday.
Speaker 1: Here the Fifth Hour with me, Ben Mahler. Danny g
Speaker 1: is away on assignment on a tropical island, far far away,
Speaker 1: and so in his place we have my friend Alex
Speaker 1: ty Shirt, Alex the vegan as I like footballer. Yeah, you,
Speaker 1: thank you for that. Very nice years. The seventeenth day
Speaker 1: of November and I did not finish the Malard travelog,
Speaker 1: so I wanted to start with that again. I talked
Speaker 1: about the malor meat greet, talked about the barbecue a
Speaker 1: little bit. But on this Sunday morning. Now you've known
Speaker 1: me for a few years now, Alex, you know that
Speaker 1: I am not a morning person doing the overnight show.
Speaker 1: I go to bed in the morning. Yes, I have
Speaker 1: crackhead hours. I don't wake up in the morning for
Speaker 1: anything other than maybe a plane, right, maybe a plane.
Speaker 1: So on Saturday, we did the Mallor meat greet. We
Speaker 1: had a great time, went out, had some app We
Speaker 1: were so full from the Mallard chicken fingers. They're so
Speaker 1: big that we just had some appetizers and a couple
Speaker 1: of drinks and then that was it and called it
Speaker 1: a night. Because I had on NFL Sunday, Week ten
Speaker 1: of the NFL season, we had had a four thirty
Speaker 1: am wake up call.
Speaker 3: Stop it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, four thirty am wake up call on a Sunday.
Speaker 1: And it wasn't to go to church. Well, it was
Speaker 1: the Church of Pigskin is what it was. So get
Speaker 1: up at four thirty. Uh, your wife has to get
Speaker 1: ready and all that she had to get prepared for
Speaker 1: the day. I had to wake up because I was
Speaker 1: driving the rental. So we drove and we met up
Speaker 1: outside a Bass Pro shop somewhere in Kansas. And I'm
Speaker 1: not exactly sure what town in Kansas, but it was
Speaker 1: right across the border. So we we meet. The meet
Speaker 1: point is the place we meet. The meeting point is
Speaker 1: I think we were meeting at six am was the time.
Speaker 1: So we left it. The left hotel at five thirty,
Speaker 1: got up at four thirty, left hotel at five thirty,
Speaker 1: got there at six o'clock. We parked the car and
Speaker 1: I met my friend Bob, the radio guy, and his
Speaker 1: buddy Ralph. These are all his friends, so Ralph, his kid.
Speaker 1: Bob's family was there, his daughters, his wife. There were
Speaker 1: some other people that were there as well that are friends.
Speaker 1: And Ralph pulls up in a Kansas City Chiefs mini bus,
Speaker 1: which is amazing. It's painted for you know, obviously Chiefs
Speaker 1: colors and all that. And this is the tailgate bus.
Speaker 1: We're there to tailgate.
Speaker 3: Right stop it.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So I have been tailgating a couple of times,
Speaker 1: but never like this. It's just different. And so we
Speaker 1: leave our cars. I guess I shouldn't say that part
Speaker 1: out loud, but we leave our cars outside the bass
Speaker 1: Pro shops. Okay, we get on the little short bus.
Speaker 1: I've been on a short bus before. I know a
Speaker 1: thing or two about short buses. Yeah. So I get
Speaker 1: on there and this thing is is painted, it's it's
Speaker 1: got the Chiefs Red He's got all kinds of sayings,
Speaker 1: Chiefs Kingdom, super Bowl Champions on the side, right and
Speaker 1: all that. So we're driving it's still dark out at
Speaker 1: at six am, and we're just seeing the sunrise as
Speaker 1: we're driving through Kansas back into Missouri, and I watched
Speaker 1: the sunrise. We got to Arrowhead. The gates weren't even
Speaker 1: open yet we got there. By the time we got
Speaker 1: to Arrowhead, it's probably about six thirty or so, six
Speaker 1: thirty six forty five. The gates opened at seven thirty
Speaker 1: in the morning. So we're there's a line of cars
Speaker 1: to get into tailgates. There's no way at Yeah, this
Speaker 1: ridiculous hour it was. It was nuts. So we're waiting
Speaker 1: there and Ralph Wreckett, Ralph the guy the different record, Ralph,
Speaker 1: not the radio record, Ralph, it's a different record, olaha exactly.
Speaker 1: So he's kind of starting up the barbecue in the back,
Speaker 1: trying to get the the thing ready and the smoker
Speaker 1: hit a smoker, and then we are seven thirty the
Speaker 1: gates open. It's a mad dash, right, everyone's you know,
Speaker 1: scrambling to get their cars placed and the griddle and
Speaker 1: the barbecues out and all that stuff, and you know,
Speaker 1: right there, and I didn't have to do anything. I
Speaker 1: just sat in the bus. Everyone did everything. You know.
Speaker 1: I was just a guest, so I didn't have to
Speaker 1: worry about it. And by the gates open at seven thirty.
Speaker 1: By eight am, we are ready to go. We are
Speaker 1: eating Smokehouse barbecue. I know you don't like barbecue, but
Speaker 1: for the rest of us who like barbecue, can my
Speaker 1: Bob's favorite barbecue place. Now, when you go to a place,
Speaker 1: you've got to go where the locals go. Yes, always,
Speaker 1: And I don't live there. My friend Bob Fescal of
Speaker 1: the Morning Guy loves Smokehouse barbecue. I just cannot say
Speaker 1: enough good things about it. And I was like, oh whatever,
Speaker 1: it's probably just like all these other places A dime
Speaker 1: a dozen. And no, I don't even like chili. I
Speaker 1: refuse often to eat chili. But they serve barbecue brisket
Speaker 1: chili at eight in the morning, and it please the
Speaker 1: greatest thing I've ever eaten, no way. And then they
Speaker 1: had burnt ends, barbecued burnt ends, which were delicious as well.
Speaker 1: And I'm drinking alcohol and eating barbecue and all that,
Speaker 1: and I paused my fast. I said rare and appropriate,
Speaker 1: and I did a shorter fast and just had a
Speaker 1: wonderful time walked around great people watching, Alex, I can imagine.
Speaker 1: Are you usually go out to the forest by yourself?
Speaker 3: Yes, I don't.
Speaker 1: You don't strike me as a people watch like a
Speaker 1: human zoo doesn't really interest you?
Speaker 3: Am I not anymore? No, you're correct.
Speaker 4: It used to like I used to be very enamored
Speaker 4: by Disneyland trips here in SoCal or going to the
Speaker 4: B Trick, et cetera. But I have It's funny you
Speaker 4: mentioned that I have completely one eighty and I prefer
Speaker 4: to be exclusively alone or with my lady and we
Speaker 4: go do something, but we prefer to do it by ourselves,
Speaker 4: like when we go to the Hot Springs or something.
Speaker 4: It's on a week day. Like we don't like to
Speaker 4: be around other people because it's almost like the energy
Speaker 4: conflicts now with where we're going. And especially when you
Speaker 4: say people watching, I'm pretty sure I've seen it all
Speaker 4: at this point, so there's not much.
Speaker 3: More to see.
Speaker 1: Yeah, No, I have noticed, like like I think you're
Speaker 1: moving more towards like unibomber status where you live in
Speaker 1: a shack in Montana. I would love to call me
Speaker 1: your hermit's way away from everyone and just send like
Speaker 1: explosive letters. I don't know if I'll do that part,
Speaker 1: but yeah, I do want my own little place away
Speaker 1: from it all. That's self sustainable. I just want to
Speaker 1: have my own ecosystem.
Speaker 3: Basically off the grid. Oh yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1: Have you picked a state you're gonna move to?
Speaker 3: Well, Ben, if it's off the grid, I can't tell
Speaker 3: you that, can I?
Speaker 1: Well no, I mean you can tell me, okay, because
Speaker 1: I mean it's off the grid. I won't be able
Speaker 1: to find off the grid around the woods somewhere in Montana.
Speaker 1: I mean, I love you, I consider you a friend,
Speaker 1: I like you a lot. You're You're important, thank you,
Speaker 1: but not that important. I'm not going to the moods
Speaker 1: of Montana.
Speaker 3: Go on, what if I have brisket at eight am
Speaker 3: for you?
Speaker 1: Well, I mean maybe then maybe then will consider it.
Speaker 1: But I I'm an introvert, as you know, but I
Speaker 1: love from time to time going to Venice Beach and
Speaker 1: wandering around and looking at all the weirdos, all the
Speaker 1: my fellow human beings.
Speaker 4: Right Ben, I'm telling you, this is the one thing
Speaker 4: that COVID took from us and it'll never happen again.
Speaker 4: Was the three am Walmart trips. Those were where you
Speaker 4: could see some of the most interesting people in the world.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, the good news is even at three in
Speaker 1: the afternoon at Walmart, you still see some very interesting, right,
Speaker 1: human beings, some very interesting.
Speaker 3: Questionable human beings. Are you really human? I don't know
Speaker 3: right now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so we we tailgated from eight in the morning
Speaker 1: when the foods was served, until about eleven eleven fifteen
Speaker 1: Kansas City time. Because being in the Midwest, I'm not
Speaker 1: used to this. Obviously, in California and most of my
Speaker 1: experiences on the East Coast or the West. On the
Speaker 1: East coast, the games kick off at one o'clock, but
Speaker 1: in Kansas City it's an hour before hour back from
Speaker 1: Eastern time. So the game kicked off at noon. And
Speaker 1: the Chiefs have been so good. How good have they been?
Speaker 1: The Chiefs have been so good that they normally play
Speaker 1: later in the day. They normally play at three o'clock
Speaker 1: or at seven o'clock. They don't typically play at noon.
Speaker 1: So this is like a rare treat. People can get
Speaker 1: up early and celebrate and eat and be merry and
Speaker 1: drink and all that stuff, and the game starts at noon,
Speaker 1: and so we got into the stadium about eleven twenty
Speaker 1: or so. Never been to Arrowhead awesome, watched many games
Speaker 1: my childhood on big national TV games and saw some
Speaker 1: great moments there, certainly recently with the Chiefs. So got
Speaker 1: in and settled in. Had seats at the fifty yard line,
Speaker 1: which are I know you're not a football guy, Alex,
Speaker 1: those are primo seats. Why primo seats? I got hooked up.
Speaker 1: I got spoiled. I did. I got spoiled. Bob and
Speaker 1: the guys in Kansas City from ninety six point five
Speaker 1: to the fan, they took good care of me, really
Speaker 1: good care. So it was. It was awesome at a
Speaker 1: great time, and all that watched the game he had
Speaker 1: access to. Bob and the station have a luxury box,
Speaker 1: so we were able to go in there from time
Speaker 1: to time and hang out with some of the executives
Speaker 1: from the radio station and some of the you know,
Speaker 1: the big advertisers were there and I got to schmooze
Speaker 1: and had at a fine time. And the game came
Speaker 1: down to the very end and Denver looked like they
Speaker 1: were gonna win. It was all set up, and then
Speaker 1: the Chiefs blocked the field goal on the final play
Speaker 1: of the game and procured a two point win, and
Speaker 1: the crowd went wild. It was my my guy, Bob Fesco,
Speaker 1: the Morning Guy. I was standing behind him as that
Speaker 1: play unfolded. And the thing that I will remember for
Speaker 1: years and years is when the Chiefs won the game,
Speaker 1: it was like watching one of those televangelists on TV,
Speaker 1: because it was it was insane his reacit. It was
Speaker 1: like it was like a religious experience, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, You know, as somebody's like shaking feeling joy
Speaker 1: and it's like.
Speaker 3: There's no way.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you get that from if you're really invested in sports,
Speaker 1: you get that. And you know, there's not a lot
Speaker 1: of things in life that can give you that feeling,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. I mean, I don't know
Speaker 1: what you for you like in your world? What what
Speaker 1: gives you that kind of feeling?
Speaker 4: Maybe out hugging a tree, a fresh redwood that hasn't
Speaker 4: been hugged in a while, ye squoia the giant forest
Speaker 4: or something like that. Right, I'll be honest with you.
Speaker 4: If I see a view for the first time I've
Speaker 4: never seen or find like this secret ghetto or a
Speaker 4: place that not too many people know about, and I
Speaker 4: experienced it on my own, I'd say it's close to
Speaker 4: that feeling.
Speaker 1: Ben Yeah, all right, well, well fair enough. We had
Speaker 1: a great time. It was just perfect, and I was
Speaker 1: very worried because we stayed to the very end of
Speaker 1: the game. There was some talk we might leave early
Speaker 1: if the game was a blowout. If you know, Kansas
Speaker 1: City won by lot, lost by a lot, and and
Speaker 1: Ralph and the guys because they're regulars, the locals, they
Speaker 1: knew which exit to go to. We got out of there.
Speaker 1: There was no traffic. I've never been to I've been
Speaker 1: to a lot of NFL games of years, I've never
Speaker 1: been to one without traffic.
Speaker 3: So I don't know how.
Speaker 1: They figured that out. But it was, you know, sixty
Speaker 1: thousand people all leaving at the same time and no traffic,
Speaker 1: which was which was pretty nice, and just that it
Speaker 1: just a wonderful day. Went out, had some more barbecue
Speaker 1: last night in Kansas City. Drove my wife around a
Speaker 1: little bit, showed her some of the places I had
Speaker 1: seen on Saturday. Went over, had a had a meet
Speaker 1: and greet with my friend Bob at his house over
Speaker 1: in Kansas, and we hung out with him and then
Speaker 1: got up early and moved back to LA. I flew
Speaker 1: back to LA and that was wow. That was that.
Speaker 1: So it was just a perfect weekend. And then unfortunately
Speaker 1: I came back to LA and I was on a
Speaker 1: rocky mountain high or a Kansas City high, and came
Speaker 1: back and lost not dead, but many of our colleagues
Speaker 1: lost their job unfortunately on Monday. So it was not
Speaker 1: not a great day. After a great weekend, I felt
Speaker 1: like I was on top of the world. I came
Speaker 1: back and I was like, oh boy, can I go
Speaker 1: back to Kansas City. It was like that line You're
Speaker 1: not in Kansas anymore from Wizard of Oz. I was like,
Speaker 1: I'm not in Kansas anymore. I'm in the big city.
Speaker 1: And it ain't pretty. It's not not pretty. And if
Speaker 1: you missed it, we did have Eddie on the Friday
Speaker 1: podcast chance to do what I thought was a therapeutic
Speaker 1: show Alex because in radio, as in, you don't get
Speaker 1: a final show now, you never know it's your final show.
Speaker 1: It's just your final show. They don't tell you. And
Speaker 1: so I didn't get to work with Eddie on Sunday
Speaker 1: and the Monday because I was traveling back and I
Speaker 1: wasn't doing the show that night. So when I worked
Speaker 1: with you the next night, there was no Eddie. The
Speaker 1: chair was empty. And so getting to do the show
Speaker 1: this week to record an episode of the podcast, it was,
Speaker 1: as I keep going back to that word therapeutic, I
Speaker 1: can imagine something I needed to do. And you know,
Speaker 1: Eddie said he'll come on the podcast from time to time,
Speaker 1: so we'll put him on and you'll have a good time.
Speaker 1: Now let's get to the mail bag.
Speaker 5: It's thank you very much, ohio Al who sent that
Speaker 5: one in beautiful man sent that in a while ago.
Speaker 1: So this is the mail bag, actual letters from actual
Speaker 1: consumers of the show. Now I was not going to
Speaker 1: start with this, but since you're here this weekend, I
Speaker 1: wanted to start with this, producer, Okay, yeah, because this
Speaker 1: is right in your wheelhouse, because this is something we've
Speaker 1: talked about in the past. This one comes from Mike
Speaker 1: who is in Austin, Texas, and Mike says, I want
Speaker 1: to know, as a fellow media guy, Ben, what are
Speaker 1: your thoughts on what happened to Alex Jones and his
Speaker 1: his business info Wars and so, Mike, I don't know
Speaker 1: that the masses know this. Maybe they do by now.
Speaker 1: This happened several days ago, happened a couple days ago.
Speaker 1: But the the story, uh, the the satire website, The Onion.
Speaker 1: You've heard of that, right, the Onion. Yes, yeah, the
Speaker 1: people that own The Onion have purchased Info Wars. They've
Speaker 1: acquired Alex Shones website. Yes, a satirical website. The Onion
Speaker 1: has purchased the Info war Wars Empire from Alex Jones.
Speaker 1: It was a court ordered auction and all this because
Speaker 1: of that lawsuit, the Sandy Hook story years ago, and
Speaker 1: the the payment that you know, there's no way Alex
Speaker 1: Jones you have that kind of money. Nobody does the
Speaker 1: amount of money that has to pay. So so anyway, Uh, yeah,
Speaker 1: the Onion purchased info Wars, and Mike asked what I
Speaker 1: thought about I mean, I really haven't thought uh out it.
Speaker 1: I know you you've talked about Alex Jones and what he
Speaker 1: was able to do by one man. He started that
Speaker 1: in the nineties, yeah, and uh, late nineties and built
Speaker 1: up a pretty decent sized media company, considering it was
Speaker 1: a a mom and pop shop had a lot of followers,
Speaker 1: and uh was certainly on the on the fringes. Even
Speaker 1: if you love Alex Jones, you would admit he's on
Speaker 1: you know, on the fringes. And yeah, he ended up,
Speaker 1: you know, saying some things that he should not have
Speaker 1: said and about the families of Sandy Hook and was
Speaker 1: ordered to pay one point five billion. Imagine that's one
Speaker 1: point five billions.
Speaker 3: Was he supposed to do any of that?
Speaker 1: Yeah? I mean, oh my gosh, there's no chance unless
Speaker 1: you're Elon Musk, you know, right, that's just a Tuesday
Speaker 1: for him. Yeah. So anyway, so that's it. The the onion,
Speaker 1: I guess is a gag bought bought the info Wars
Speaker 1: web site and took him, took him out of business. Wow.
Speaker 1: So I really haven't thought about it much, Mike. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's you know, it's what happens when you get soon
Speaker 1: gets involved in all that stuff. I don't even know
Speaker 1: how it works. Could Alex Jones just starts something else up?
Speaker 1: I mean I would assume possibly, But yeah, I mean money, Yeah.
Speaker 3: That's tough, you know.
Speaker 4: I think the thing that sucks the most about it is, like,
Speaker 4: as you mentioned, it was a mom and pop right,
Speaker 4: So it was before real social media or anything like that.
Speaker 4: He started his own brand really about trying to find
Speaker 4: truth within a world. And he was one of the
Speaker 4: first people to release the videos of Bohemian Grove. This
Speaker 4: little secret place in the Sanford Francisco or San Fernando,
Speaker 4: San Francisco was Where's Cisco.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's supposed to be like a secret meeting of
Speaker 4: the wealthy and the elites, and they have their own
Speaker 4: rituals and et cetera. And he was like one of
Speaker 4: the first to bring a lot of these things up.
Speaker 4: And then he had like such a drive to bring
Speaker 4: people's awareness to chemtrails or like one of the most
Speaker 4: prominent things I saw on TikTok and stuff. He's like,
Speaker 4: you're making the frogs gay, you know, Like he has
Speaker 4: like these little things where he gets so into it
Speaker 4: that I can see why a lot of people were
Speaker 4: turned off by him, because there's like a proper and
Speaker 4: improper way of doing things.
Speaker 1: Ben.
Speaker 4: And you know this perfectly because you're in media. You
Speaker 4: talk for a living, you talk very well for a living.
Speaker 4: That it's how you say things and the way you
Speaker 4: say it and what's behind it. So if you're giving
Speaker 4: people a lot of things that they've never thought about
Speaker 4: or heard, or that's on a deeper level. If you're
Speaker 4: yelling and screaming and almost sporading people's eardrums about it,
Speaker 4: it can kind of almost like take away from the taste.
Speaker 4: It's like if you like spicy food, right Ben, if
Speaker 4: it's too spicy, do you really enjoy it then anymore?
Speaker 3: You know?
Speaker 4: Like so, I it's kind of like a double edged
Speaker 4: sword for me because a lot of the stuff he
Speaker 4: talked about and I'm by no means like an info
Speaker 4: war fan.
Speaker 3: I've never even looked at the website myself.
Speaker 4: I just know that a lot of the stuff he
Speaker 4: did talk about had some validity of things to investigate
Speaker 4: about food and different chemicals and et cetera, and what's
Speaker 4: going on behind the scenes fifty one, Like it's really interesting.
Speaker 4: I like to think outside the box. But again, he
Speaker 4: hurt himself because I think he got caught up in
Speaker 4: the whole thing, which a lot of people do in media,
Speaker 4: which is the ego that he wanted to be like
Speaker 4: always the first one. So like Sandy Hook, it's all fake,
Speaker 4: all this this is It's like, Okay, Well, even if
Speaker 4: you have this insight or maybe some intel or things.
Speaker 3: That you believe. You gotta be careful about certain things.
Speaker 4: I mean, we even had something happen here that one
Speaker 4: time with Doug and stuff. You know, like it's it's
Speaker 4: the way you do it, how you say it. And again,
Speaker 4: I mean, he could have really been true or right,
Speaker 4: but it doesn't matter now because again, the way that
Speaker 4: everything works in the system, et cetera. When you bite
Speaker 4: the hand that feeds Ben, you're only gonna get away
Speaker 4: so long with doing that. And so unfortunately this was
Speaker 4: finally something that brought him down and then it almost,
Speaker 4: in my opinion, the reason why it does suck again
Speaker 4: is that it takes away everything he's done now. So
Speaker 4: it doesn't matter if he really did some good stuff
Speaker 4: or brought up something that should have been talked about.
Speaker 4: This is all that resembles now, and this is all
Speaker 4: that'sa and it's it kind of it's it's a lot
Speaker 4: of heartbreak.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and the thing that he's obviously on the fringe,
Speaker 1: Alice Jones, but he did a lot of stuff like
Speaker 1: Art Bell when I grew up, did stuff, but he
Speaker 1: did it in a very calm delivery, and he was
Speaker 1: he would ask questions, yes, quizzing people. But as you said,
Speaker 1: the abrasive style the firebrand of Alex Jones, and he was.
Speaker 1: He was intertwining, he was combining like storytelling, and some
Speaker 1: of it was embellishment, but the way he delivered it,
Speaker 1: you couldn't tell what was embellishment. And I learned early
Speaker 1: on in my broadcast career, I had a program director
Speaker 1: who pulled me aside. He kind of taught me the
Speaker 1: birds and the bees of of how this works, and
Speaker 1: it was the most important lesson I've gotten in terms
Speaker 1: of liability. And he said, listen, Ben, in this country,
Speaker 1: you cannot be sued for your opinion. So you can
Speaker 1: say whatever you want on the radio or television or
Speaker 1: whatever medium you're on, as long as you say this
Speaker 1: is my opinion, because nobody can sue you for having
Speaker 1: the wrong opinion. But when you report it as fact,
Speaker 1: when you reported as this is what happened and it's
Speaker 1: not fact, you've crossed the rubicon, and that's where you
Speaker 1: end up getting in a lot of trouble. So if
Speaker 1: Alex Jones had said exactly what he said but said
Speaker 1: this is my opinion, I don't have any proof this
Speaker 1: is my opinion. He would have never been sued, he
Speaker 1: would have not lost Info Wars, and that would have
Speaker 1: been that that's wild. Yeah, So it's just a simple
Speaker 1: thing you add on in adendum, and it gets you
Speaker 1: out of legal trouble because in any court, you're not
Speaker 1: if you're in media and you give an opinion, you say,
Speaker 1: this is my opinion. And we still have that in
Speaker 1: this country, and we still have that. But the power
Speaker 1: it also goes back to Alex Jones, to the power
Speaker 1: of storytelling. Yes, and how humans have communicated since the
Speaker 1: very beginning of time via stories, right, and if you're
Speaker 1: an orator a communicator, and you have and he's certainly
Speaker 1: not Charles Dickens or Shakespeare, but those are people that
Speaker 1: have been gone for a long time and we still
Speaker 1: reference their work. The great storytellers of our time like
Speaker 1: Lewis Carroll or more modern JK. Rowling, right, Steven Spielberg,
Speaker 1: people like that to tell story, Walt Disney, the modern storytellers.
Speaker 1: So it's it's interesting, but thank you for that, Mike
Speaker 1: steven Tempe writes in he says, Ben, Now I want
Speaker 1: to address this because I've gotten a version of this
Speaker 1: email from like fifteen different people this week. Okay, Ben,
Speaker 1: why didn't you give up some of your multi million
Speaker 1: dollar salary to keep Eddie on the payroll. You are
Speaker 1: a selfish asshole and I'm not listening to your show anymore.
Speaker 1: I don't care if you read this email, Steven Tempe. Well,
Speaker 1: thank you, Steve. I appreciate your passion. Now. I love
Speaker 1: the fact, Alex, that many people believe that I am
Speaker 1: making multiple millions of dollars doing a radio show from
Speaker 1: two am till six am in the morning.
Speaker 3: Well, I do see your Bentley Park next to Steve
Speaker 3: Harvey's when he's here. Ben, just say.
Speaker 1: Yes, I am Alex. I am genuinely honored and flattered
Speaker 1: that you think I make that kind of It really
Speaker 1: warms my cockles that you believe that to be true.
Speaker 1: And I promise you, Steve and all you other wacka doodles,
Speaker 1: that if I did make that kind of money, I
Speaker 1: promise you I would have cut a big fat check
Speaker 1: to Eddie Garcia. And not that it would have mattered
Speaker 1: because they had to get rid of him on the payroll.
Speaker 1: I guess whatever. I don't know how that works, but
Speaker 1: that's not my business. But I would have done everything
Speaker 1: in my power. I unfortunately, I don't want to say
Speaker 1: how much I make. It's not important to say. People
Speaker 1: get upset if I say it. But there are jobs
Speaker 1: that some of you have. You make more money than me,
Speaker 1: which is fine. I like my job. That's fine. But
Speaker 1: this misperception, Alex, it's out there, so it's wild.
Speaker 3: So that's actually a thing.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of people that think I'm making millions.
Speaker 1: I'm making coward money, Okay, And I promise you, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's that's not close sending bu as far from that
Speaker 1: as can be, right.
Speaker 4: Dude, one thousand. Even the fact that they think you
Speaker 4: had any plot or play to decide any of that
Speaker 4: had in that like what yeah?
Speaker 1: Yeah. Jake from the Bay Area right since says this. Hey,
Speaker 1: he says, been, this bit with Eddie is getting laid off,
Speaker 1: is played out. You need to end to this thing.
Speaker 1: Stop the bit, bring the big Zamboni back. That's from Jake.
Speaker 1: He thinks that this is all a bit. Is it
Speaker 1: a bit, Alex? Is this a bit? Are we doing
Speaker 1: a bit here?
Speaker 4: No, to my knowledge, we are not. Because just like you,
Speaker 4: I came back on Tuesday after taking Monday off to
Speaker 4: be at a hot spring and found out that, yeah,
Speaker 4: the entirety of what we knew was no longer the same.
Speaker 1: So yeah, this is our world had fundamentally changed.
Speaker 3: Yes, you know.
Speaker 1: So yeah, anyway, what do we have? Rick writes, and
Speaker 1: he says, I just woke up he wrote this the
Speaker 1: other day. So I browing some coffee, getting ready to
Speaker 1: hear the four am overnight report from Eddie, and I
Speaker 1: hear a different voice did the four am overnight report,
Speaker 1: which I thought was unusual. Then you came back and
Speaker 1: you started dancing with an explanation about what had happened,
Speaker 1: and the two had worked together for twenty years. And
Speaker 1: then the dreaded announcement. Now I thought you were about
Speaker 1: to make and you did make it that Eddie was
Speaker 1: no longer on the show. And he said, what the
Speaker 1: hell can go wrong? And on a Tuesday, he says,
Speaker 1: then he rips the presidential election. He says, firing Eddie
Speaker 1: is unconscionable. Well, he got laid off, he didn't get fired,
Speaker 1: which is a technicality, right when you get laid off.
Speaker 1: And it had nothing to do at all with the
Speaker 1: performance of Eddie.
Speaker 3: No zero, Freddie's persona and.
Speaker 1: For that matter, everyone that got let go by the company.
Speaker 1: This was not a performance based situation at all. And
Speaker 1: I don't know exactly how they make the sausage, and
Speaker 1: nor do I really want to know, But from what
Speaker 1: I've been told is a lot of companies. It's not
Speaker 1: just in radio. We are affected by it because we're
Speaker 1: in radio. Yes, but this is the time of the year,
Speaker 1: in November and December where you clear the books. Yes,
Speaker 1: you get rid of some people off the payroll. Yes,
Speaker 1: because that way it helps you going in the following year. Yes,
Speaker 1: and you keep costs down. And there's reasons for that.
Speaker 1: And so from what I understand, I believe that to
Speaker 1: be the reason this happened. I don't know, Maybe I'm wrong,
Speaker 1: Maybe somebody gave me some bad information, which my opinion,
Speaker 1: that's what I've heard, So who knows. But anyway, Rick
Speaker 1: was very upset by this. He said he he's loved
Speaker 1: the show and pucked the world and all of that
Speaker 1: and wants Eddie back. He found the show. He said
Speaker 1: he used to listen to k Fan in Minnesota and
Speaker 1: stop listening because some of the stuff that they were
Speaker 1: doing on the air, and he listens to our show
Speaker 1: and Jonas's show, Two Pros and a Cup of Joe,
Speaker 1: and he says, now what do I do? He says,
Speaker 1: with Eddie being gone, he says, how do I get
Speaker 1: my hockey? Well, Eddie's guy's own podcast, as he talked
Speaker 1: about on Friday, the Puck Podcast. So just listen to
Speaker 1: that and hopefully at some point maybe Eddie will come back.
Speaker 1: I know, Alex, before you worked at the company in nine,
Speaker 1: I was. I was laid off, I was whacked. I
Speaker 1: was still in the a teen January twentieth of nine. Wow.
Speaker 1: I was out of work. And six months and twenty
Speaker 1: six days later they brought me back.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 1: So it does happen, yes time, Yes, all right, Masshole
Speaker 1: Mickey writes, and he says, greeting's been and fellas. I
Speaker 1: really hope you were doing well this weekend after such
Speaker 1: a great trip to Kansas City and then get a
Speaker 1: Mike Tyson punch to the gut and to hear what
Speaker 1: happened to Eddie. The militia, as you know, are not happy.
Speaker 1: That is. I've certainly heard the full throated anger, Masshole Mickey.
Speaker 1: He says, my question for you guys is what cheers
Speaker 1: you up when you're sad. I'm sure a lot of
Speaker 1: malle militia could use some advice. All right, Alex, you're
Speaker 1: you're a self help guide. What cheers people up when
Speaker 1: they're sad?
Speaker 4: Well, See, that's such a complex and simple question at
Speaker 4: the same time, because I think when it comes down
Speaker 4: to you realizing that everything doesn't matter, and we give
Speaker 4: matter meaning, that's when you start to see things differently
Speaker 4: and being so tribilistic as humans, and we get so
Speaker 4: caught in the things we love in rotation and humans
Speaker 4: by just instinctual nature, we have a hard time letting
Speaker 4: go or accepting things end. It's a really tough thing
Speaker 4: to find a way to be happy in it. But
Speaker 4: I think a simple thing again is just to know
Speaker 4: that you should always be happy it happened, even though
Speaker 4: it sounds cliche, than not at all. And I think
Speaker 4: the beauty is knowing that something so real had a
Speaker 4: place to exist. You should take comfort in knowing you
Speaker 4: got to experience it rather than never knowing it at all.
Speaker 4: That's a big thing for me.
Speaker 1: So nothing matters, yes, but kind of everything does.
Speaker 3: Yes. It's crazy right.
Speaker 1: Parallel dimensions, Like nothing really matters in the end because
Speaker 1: we'll all be gone and that. But then at the
Speaker 1: same time.
Speaker 4: It's all beautiful in the matters. Yes, wild right, I
Speaker 4: love it. So just smile, go outside, put your feet
Speaker 4: in the ground, maybe go for a walk, or go
Speaker 4: back and re listen to some of your favorite ones.
Speaker 4: That's the best way to know it ever happened.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well it is, it isn't and we listen. Eddie's
Speaker 1: not dead for sure. Yeah, And a lot of people
Speaker 1: seem to think he's dead, but he's not. It's and
Speaker 1: I've tried to explain this, and some of my radio
Speaker 1: friends have been, you know, very very good to me,
Speaker 1: and they point this out over the ears like that,
Speaker 1: there's just it's just a little different the connection that
Speaker 1: you have with like for Eddie's a great example, like
Speaker 1: the radio the magic. Yes, it is not a relative,
Speaker 1: it's not. It's not something you're not gonna like hang
Speaker 1: out with us in real life, although an occasional Mallard
Speaker 1: meet and greets. But yet, and I feel the same
Speaker 1: way about my consumption to media that it is so
Speaker 1: much a part of your being. It's part of your routine,
Speaker 1: you know, you know, radio show, a lot of our
Speaker 1: guys work in factories and they're every night they listen
Speaker 1: for four hours. We like to think we give them
Speaker 1: some solace. So there's that. And then but if you're
Speaker 1: it's you get up. You hear these voices. These are
Speaker 1: voices that are part of your your life. And when
Speaker 1: all of a sudden you don't get that, it's it's
Speaker 1: a body blow, right, it's it really is, and it sucks,
Speaker 1: and it's not fair and and all that and unfortunate
Speaker 1: as the way you know this stuff works, and you
Speaker 1: don't get any warning. Joey the Bellman writes in real quick.
Speaker 1: I know we have much time, he says, Bill Miller
Speaker 1: and Ben Maler could be one of the funniest bits
Speaker 1: you've come up with. Must be tough without Eddie, you
Speaker 1: guys were a great team. Sucks, it's Joey the Bellman. Yeah,
Speaker 1: well that's uh. You know, necessity is the mother of invention.
Speaker 1: And you know Eddie used to do the toss backs
Speaker 1: to me. But Eddie's not there anymore, and they didn't
Speaker 1: replace Eddie. So I'm on my own, and so I
Speaker 1: decided I would go Phil Henry and just make a
Speaker 1: you know, make a I used to do Bill Miller
Speaker 1: back in the day. And I brought Bill Miller back.
Speaker 3: That's awesome.
Speaker 1: I brought him back. That's all we have halftime for
Speaker 1: I believe thanks to Mike and Fullerton. I saw alf
Speaker 1: the Alien o'pineer. But we're we're short on time, so
Speaker 1: we gotta get out. I'll be back tonight, God willing.
Speaker 1: I'll be back on the radio eleven o'clock in the west,
Speaker 1: two am in the East with another fresh week of
Speaker 1: the Ben Matler Show. And uh, now what about you
Speaker 1: Alex here you'll be Are you back tomorrow?
Speaker 2: La?
Speaker 1: God Willing?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean hey, as of now, that is the plan,
Speaker 4: and I plan.
Speaker 3: To just do it every day to the fullest.
Speaker 1: All right, And again your podcast, how can people follow
Speaker 1: your your work there?
Speaker 3: Ben?
Speaker 4: Just look up three words Shallow Oceans podcast, because in
Speaker 4: a world that seems so vast, it's really not as
Speaker 4: deep as you think.
Speaker 3: Ben.
Speaker 1: All right, And if you're listening to this early here
Speaker 1: on this Sunday, don't forget Benny Versus the Penny still
Speaker 1: available on Peacock and regional cable television. Check that out,
Speaker 1: little gambling show, Benny Versus the Penny, and talk to
Speaker 1: you next time later. Skater