Speaker 1: From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
Speaker 1: riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
Speaker 1: learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
Speaker 1: production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt,
Speaker 2: my name is Noah.
Speaker 3: They call me Ben. We're joined as always with our
Speaker 3: super producer Andrew Treforce Howard. Most importantly, you are you.
Speaker 3: You are here. That makes this the stuff they don't
Speaker 3: want you to know. If you are tuning in the evening,
Speaker 3: this publishes welcome to December sixteenth. You guys, we're so
Speaker 3: close to twenty twenty five, not even the project, just
Speaker 3: the calendar year.
Speaker 2: I think twenty twenty five is already in effect.
Speaker 4: Yeah, full effect.
Speaker 5: No, no, we'll see, we'll see quick updates.
Speaker 3: The US courts have rejected the Onions bid to buy
Speaker 3: Info Wars for now. Another court ruled that boneless chicken
Speaker 3: wings can still be you know, pieces of food that
Speaker 3: have bones in them. One thing that is on everybody's mind.
Speaker 3: We have taken some time for our personal lives, so
Speaker 3: you'll hear some classic episodes coming up in the next
Speaker 3: few weeks, and like the rest of the United States,
Speaker 3: dare I say the world we have been paying attention
Speaker 3: to the recent assassination of a CEO.
Speaker 4: Oh boy, are we ever? I was, you know, it's funny.
Speaker 5: I was in New York last week and was right
Speaker 5: down at the iHeart offices, which are very close to
Speaker 5: that Hilton, and I had no idea what was going on,
Speaker 5: but I was eating it a deli and there was
Speaker 5: a reporter talking and asking some guy that worked at
Speaker 5: the Hilton about like maybe the security cameras something. I
Speaker 5: didn't know what they were talking about until.
Speaker 4: After the fact.
Speaker 3: Wow. Yeah, And we'll probably make a full episode on
Speaker 3: the story of Luigi Mangeo.
Speaker 4: It's what a name.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I don't know if he's related to Chuck Uh.
Speaker 3: Do you guys remember Chuck?
Speaker 4: Is he related to Mario? Though? Is the question?
Speaker 3: Is he related? Yeah? Or as the internet is asking us,
Speaker 3: does this mean there is a wa Luigi who works
Speaker 3: in private equity swear?
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Then I heard the Chuck MANZIONI question come up to it.
Speaker 5: If anyone doesn't know, Chuck Manzoni was like sort of
Speaker 5: an easy listening.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Trumpet player really made most famous for me by his
Speaker 5: appearance on King of the Hill.
Speaker 4: All the time. He's the spokesperson for megalo mart.
Speaker 3: Finally, Finally, and speaking of spokesfolk, I like that speaks too. Yeah,
Speaker 3: we're gonna hear some spokespeople for a popular band back
Speaker 3: in the day. We're gonna hear some stuff about Santa
Speaker 3: of course, you know, some comments about facial hair. We're
Speaker 3: gonna end with a wholesome story. We'll have a lot
Speaker 3: of updates along the way before we get to our
Speaker 3: first break. I would just like to tease something. Have
Speaker 3: you guys ever interacted with a phone scammer?
Speaker 5: Oh?
Speaker 6: Many?
Speaker 5: Well, yeah, lately I just kind of once I realized
Speaker 5: that that's they are, I say no, thank you and
Speaker 5: just hang up. But you know, back before I was
Speaker 5: a little less irritated by the avalanche of scam calls
Speaker 5: that I receive, I probably would have played along for
Speaker 5: a minute.
Speaker 2: H Yeah, it's only in the very first stages, but
Speaker 2: you can kind of tell when something is off when
Speaker 2: it's a big corporation calling you about your account.
Speaker 5: Yeah, have you guys been getting the one where it's
Speaker 5: like a loan company calling to ask you for additional
Speaker 5: information about the loan that you applied for. I've been
Speaker 5: getting that one just non stop lately.
Speaker 4: It's weird.
Speaker 3: I get a lot of I'm with you. I get
Speaker 3: a lot of unsolicited advertisements for Russian made anti aircraft okay,
Speaker 3: no armament. Yeah it's weird. It's weird. But if they
Speaker 3: make it through all the proxies enough to advertise, oh, here.
Speaker 4: On them nice.
Speaker 2: Mine's mostly been text messages saying my UPS package has arrived,
Speaker 2: but it needs some more information from me to get.
Speaker 3: Oh, I get that. I got that one.
Speaker 5: I was saying it needed to clear customs. It had
Speaker 5: gotten held up in customs, and it asked for my uh.
Speaker 5: It said there was a problem with the zip code.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, and all you have to do is click
Speaker 3: the link. Spoiler, folks, don't it is a conspiracy.
Speaker 4: It did have a link it has said. It said
Speaker 4: you get a close this click the text message.
Speaker 5: I clicked the link in the text message, but it
Speaker 5: wasn't even a blue link.
Speaker 4: It was like you would have had to copy and
Speaker 4: paste it.
Speaker 5: And then it said when it's when it starts getting
Speaker 5: too complex, like close the text message open a browser.
Speaker 4: Definitely a red flag every time.
Speaker 3: Mm hmm, yeah, a flag so read that even the
Speaker 3: color blind can see us. So with this in mind,
Speaker 3: we know, for anybody who listened to our previous episode
Speaker 3: on the Troubled Border of Mean Mar or our series
Speaker 3: on that, we know that there are a lot of
Speaker 3: scams in the world or the information age, and there
Speaker 3: are people who have deployed one method or another of
Speaker 3: combating those scams and those scammers. So I suggest we
Speaker 3: take a break from a word from our sponsors and
Speaker 3: then we introduce everyone to Daisy.
Speaker 4: How's that sound sounds good?
Speaker 3: And we're back. Actually, let's just have Daisy.
Speaker 6: Take for it.
Speaker 7: Right, seven and Temperates have been targeted by scammers, and
Speaker 7: it's not just our grandparents. I was one of them.
Speaker 7: This film isn't about getting scammed. This is about getting
Speaker 7: even meet my friend Daisy.
Speaker 6: Hello, scammers, I'm your worst nightmare. I'm an AI created
Speaker 6: by O two to waste phone scammers time. So w's
Speaker 6: then a DOT.
Speaker 4: Three d W and then dot I think your profession
Speaker 4: is bothering people?
Speaker 6: Right, I'm just trying to have a little chat.
Speaker 5: It's nearly been an hour.
Speaker 4: Finally, benevolent use of AI.
Speaker 6: It's showing me a picture of my cat Fluffy. It's
Speaker 6: showing you the picture of your fluffy stop calling me, dear.
Speaker 6: Got it, dear, because while they're busy talking to me,
Speaker 6: they can't be scamming you. And let's face it, dear,
Speaker 6: I've got all the time in the world.
Speaker 4: So that my heart das finally a benevolent AI right.
Speaker 3: Like doing good. Daisy is not human. Daisy is an
Speaker 3: AI creation that impersonates sort of as we can tell,
Speaker 3: a British granty or a granting from the UK who
Speaker 3: answers calls in real time from suspected fraudsters with the
Speaker 3: entire goal of keeping them on the phone for as
Speaker 3: long as possible such that they don't reach real vulnerable
Speaker 3: human beings.
Speaker 4: That's amazing.
Speaker 2: What was that piece from that we just heard?
Speaker 3: This is from O two O two associated with Virgin
Speaker 3: Media and you know Richard Branson's whole strange experiment. O
Speaker 3: two has recently, as of last month, they've unveiled something
Speaker 3: called this thing Daisy, and it's a death of a
Speaker 3: thousand cuts for scammers. This came out you can read
Speaker 3: about this on Virgin Media's official sites from mid November,
Speaker 3: just last month. Daisy is a big deal at O
Speaker 3: two for right now. Her official title is head of
Speaker 3: scammer relations and what the entirety of this model is
Speaker 3: centered on. Weirdly enough, the kind of recommendations that intelligence
Speaker 3: agencies gave back in the Cold War. It's always to distract,
Speaker 3: to ramble, to go on tangents. Daisy may, in fact,
Speaker 3: I think, be a pretty good podcaster. The way it
Speaker 3: works is it's an agglomeration of different AI models and
Speaker 3: they work together in a stew to listen and respond
Speaker 3: to fraudulent calls instantly, And it so far has a
Speaker 3: pretty great success rate, probably because it still has that
Speaker 3: new car smell and criminals aren't aware of it. It
Speaker 3: can keep people on, Like the goal is to keep
Speaker 3: the scammers on a call for about forty minutes at
Speaker 3: a time. This is a small part of a larger
Speaker 3: thing that virgin media two coals swerve the scammers.
Speaker 2: Amazing.
Speaker 4: I just love it, I really do.
Speaker 5: Have you guys seen that film The Beekeeper starring Jason
Speaker 5: Statham Matt You'd really like it.
Speaker 4: It's a good old rollicking action banger.
Speaker 5: But it is like a revenge fantasy essentially, where the
Speaker 5: titular Beekeeper, who is a high level black ops killing
Speaker 5: machine who's gone into retirement and literally just keeps bees,
Speaker 5: has a dear friend of his who is an older
Speaker 5: woman scammed by these awful basically villain you know, comically
Speaker 5: villainous you know, evil individuals corporation. Really in the in
Speaker 5: the movie, and minor spoiler alert for a thing that
Speaker 5: happens very early on in the Beekeeper, she takes her
Speaker 5: own life because they basically stripper of all of her funds.
Speaker 5: And also she was the keeper of some funds for
Speaker 5: some sort of nonprofit organization, a charity, and it all
Speaker 5: kinds of things, but it is exactly what we're talking
Speaker 5: about here. It just you know, I've obviously done stylized
Speaker 5: and done like for maximum action effect.
Speaker 4: But this is a much less violent way.
Speaker 3: Of dealing with these gums, right, and we see that
Speaker 3: it comes from real life concerns. Everybody knows that people
Speaker 3: who are not what we will call digital natives can
Speaker 3: be a little bit less situationally aware of scams and ststers,
Speaker 3: and this is a huge concern in the United Kingdom.
Speaker 3: Virgin Media's own research, in partnership with some of the
Speaker 3: boffins they got on the case, shows that seven in
Speaker 3: ten are actually more than seven in ten, seventy one
Speaker 3: percent of people in Britain or Brits would like to
Speaker 3: get some sort of revenge against scammers, because scams, especially
Speaker 3: telephonic scams, are so common there that if you have
Speaker 3: not been the victim of a scam attempt yourself, then
Speaker 3: you know someone who has. It's uh, it has proliferated
Speaker 3: across that area of the world.
Speaker 4: Well, and Ben, it's not. It's it wouldn't continue to
Speaker 4: the point.
Speaker 5: Where folks like you or I, who are you know,
Speaker 5: more or less wise to this stuff continue to give
Speaker 5: these kind of calls if.
Speaker 4: They weren't making money off of them. They have to
Speaker 4: be successful to some degree or else why would they continue.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it's kind of like the terrible logic of
Speaker 3: the so called pua or pickup artists, where they say, hey,
Speaker 3: well we'll just do a numbers game. You know, it's
Speaker 3: not the nine people who don't fall for the malarkey,
Speaker 3: it's the one who does.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they just need to come up with something now
Speaker 2: that also tracks somehow back to the server that is
Speaker 2: functioning like whatever the scammers are using, so that you
Speaker 2: can nuke the server, not actually nuked, but you know,
Speaker 2: why destroy the server and dds at the very least
Speaker 2: take it out or adjacent Statham group that just gets
Speaker 2: deployed every time Daisy is in use.
Speaker 3: I'd be very interested in your thoughts on Beekeeper. It's good.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, I all right, different show, but yeah yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: yeah yeah.
Speaker 4: I wasn't expecting to like it, and I truly loved it.
Speaker 3: So speaking of truly loving things, there is another story
Speaker 3: that so many people have contacted us about. It's an
Speaker 3: ongoing thing. We have to talk about it, at least briefly, gentlemen,
Speaker 3: the mystery drones. Earlier in our previous Strange News segment,
Speaker 3: I want to say we had explored the story of
Speaker 3: drones monitoring US bases in the United Kingdom. It turns
Speaker 3: out there are more mystery drones across the pond. Not
Speaker 3: just that Chinese student who took a one way trip
Speaker 3: after he got popped. But we know that residents in
Speaker 3: Bay Ridge, Brooklyn have been reporting drones. Over in New Jersey,
Speaker 3: a lot of people have been reporting strange stuff in
Speaker 3: the sky, and these are We have to remember, this
Speaker 3: part of the United States is very densely populated, so
Speaker 3: if one person sees something, many other people saw it
Speaker 3: as well. There's not a way to. You know, it's
Speaker 3: not like the days of Blue Book. You can't just
Speaker 3: find the one farmer and intimidate them. These drones have
Speaker 3: been seen near US military facilities, even near President elect
Speaker 3: Trump's golf course in Bedminster. The FAA tried to tamp
Speaker 3: down and said, hey, look, any drone flights over this
Speaker 3: airspace are going to be restricted. So then this helps
Speaker 3: us eliminate, you know, the probability of known drones coming
Speaker 3: in everybody pad it.
Speaker 2: One thing we should note here is that these are
Speaker 2: not your drones that you can go pick up at
Speaker 2: Best Buy if you you know, came into a financial windfall,
Speaker 2: or you can go over to you know, any of
Speaker 2: the places that sell drones. Right now, these are, or
Speaker 2: at least they're being reported as huge, like suv size
Speaker 2: drones that function a lot like those quadri copter drones
Speaker 2: that are loud as hell apparently, and again huge flying around,
Speaker 2: and that is very I think that's part of the
Speaker 2: troublesome bit, right. It's not as though it's a bunch
Speaker 2: of hobbyists, as you've been saying there, Well, it's something else.
Speaker 5: And from my own education here, guys, are we talking
Speaker 5: these are like models that are outside.
Speaker 4: Of the norm even of what we know as.
Speaker 5: Military drones, because those don't seem like they're incredibly loud.
Speaker 4: I mean, I mean, I know they are.
Speaker 5: They make a drone sound, but I mean it would
Speaker 5: kind of kill out the element of surprise if they
Speaker 5: were like as loud as these things seem to be.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I want to I want to shout out some
Speaker 3: recent interactions we've had on social media, some emails, and
Speaker 3: some folks who used our call in line to specifically
Speaker 3: note this this is an active, developing situation, and to
Speaker 3: be clear, I appreciate that clarification. Yeah, obviously we're not
Speaker 3: implying that these are hobbyist drones, not the kind of
Speaker 3: stuff you could buy on Amazon or at your local
Speaker 3: radio shack. I think there are still radio shacks. Maybe
Speaker 3: I'm dating myself. These are big, almost to what we
Speaker 3: would call UAV size. I really want to get to
Speaker 3: the statement from the FBI's Newark Field office. They said, quote,
Speaker 3: we understand the concern, and we are doing all we
Speaker 3: can to figure out what's going on. We truly don't
Speaker 3: have much information to provide at the moment, and this
Speaker 3: is I want to add the further context here. This
Speaker 3: has to be terrifying and deeply upsetting, perhaps even offensive
Speaker 3: to people in the area, given that nine to eleven
Speaker 3: didn't happen too long ago, Right, So shouldn't this air
Speaker 3: space be especially protected, be especially monitored. Out of all
Speaker 3: the places in the United States outside of maybe you know,
Speaker 3: Groom Lake or area fifty one, How on earth are
Speaker 3: these things getting through? And how on earth are they
Speaker 3: apparently unidentified.
Speaker 5: Getting through without being shot down like or at least
Speaker 5: you know, acknowledged.
Speaker 4: How are they getting this far right?
Speaker 3: Right? That's the thing I would advanced to you guys.
Speaker 3: At first off, the logical cover story would be this
Speaker 3: is a training exercise, right, everybody, keep calm, we know
Speaker 3: what's happening. However, that is not the path the FEDS
Speaker 3: have chosen to take.
Speaker 2: Well, it is weird because it could be test vehicles
Speaker 2: for some company, you know, some startup company that's attempting
Speaker 2: to make flying cars that are more quadricroft or style,
Speaker 2: which is something we've seen prototypes of over the past
Speaker 2: Finally six years, where's.
Speaker 4: A flying car? I mean, we're finally getting to them.
Speaker 2: If you look at the footage of them up there,
Speaker 2: it looks like clearly a human made flashing light vehicle
Speaker 2: you know that should be in the sky and is
Speaker 2: flying probably safely in the sky with all of its
Speaker 2: flashing lights and everything. It's just very very odd, especially
Speaker 2: when you see one and then there's like five more
Speaker 2: that you can tell, or the same thing flying around
Speaker 2: out in the distance.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we've had reports again to our show in particular,
Speaker 3: and just reports in the public sphere where these are
Speaker 3: reasonable people, These are not wing nuts. There are folks
Speaker 3: who happen to live in the area, maybe even without
Speaker 3: an interest in aviation or UAP, and they're saying, what
Speaker 3: the heck is going on? If you're part of that,
Speaker 3: if you have experienced this, you can of course email
Speaker 3: us conspiracy atiheartradio dot com. We'd love to see any
Speaker 3: clips you have. You can also call the FBI if
Speaker 3: you want one eight hundred in averse of creativity, one
Speaker 3: eight hundred call FBI. That's two two five five three
Speaker 3: two four. And people are saying they've reported these sightings
Speaker 3: multiple times and they have not gotten responses. What the
Speaker 3: heck is going on? There's very much something they don't
Speaker 3: want you to know, and the question is who is they?
Speaker 3: So again we would love to hear your reports, thinking
Speaker 3: to everybody's written in, contacted us via the internets, or
Speaker 3: dropped a line to us via telephonic device. I wanted
Speaker 3: to got wanted to go a little bit lighthearted with
Speaker 3: a couple things. The one story about justice. So you
Speaker 3: guys know how recently the nation of the DPRK or
Speaker 3: North Korea as has called here in the West, sent
Speaker 3: some of their own military personnel to fight in Russia's
Speaker 3: war with Ukraine. It appears Russia has you know, reciprocated
Speaker 3: a bit. They sent a crack team to North Korea. However,
Speaker 3: the crack team is not human. They sent one hundred
Speaker 3: and I'm quoting here elite goats.
Speaker 2: Oh heck, yeah, elite goats. Do they have weapons strapped
Speaker 2: on them or something?
Speaker 3: They have? Every goat is a weapon, right, Yeah, these
Speaker 3: are the goat goats. Because they have cleared four hundred
Speaker 3: and forty seven goats for shipment to North Korea. It's
Speaker 3: the first batch of live animals. This occurred back in August.
Speaker 3: Now they're continuing to send these. A lot of these
Speaker 3: goats are pregnant. They have been microchipped. The idea is
Speaker 3: that while the speculation in the West is that this
Speaker 3: is meant to help address food shortages in the country.
Speaker 3: So perhaps by having these high quality goats, which sounds
Speaker 3: like a weird thing to say, perhaps that will help
Speaker 3: the country. Wait, how many, Well, in August they cleared
Speaker 3: four hundred and forty seven. Quite recently they sent one
Speaker 3: hundred over.
Speaker 4: We're going to need more goats, a bigger gut.
Speaker 3: We've got to have more goats. We also know this
Speaker 3: is part of a larger story which I really want
Speaker 3: to dig into with you guys later. Last month, in November,
Speaker 3: Russia also sent more animals, not just pregnant top tier goats,
Speaker 3: which again is just a very weird statement. They sent
Speaker 3: to bears, two yaks, twenty five pheasants, forty mandarin ducks,
Speaker 3: five cockatoos of one African lion. It does sound version
Speaker 3: of that Christmas Yeah, that's what he's gonna say. It
Speaker 3: sounds like a weird version of that old Christmas song,
Speaker 3: doesn't it.
Speaker 4: It does.
Speaker 5: I mean, immediately my mind was looking for the partridge
Speaker 5: and the pear tree.
Speaker 4: It seems logistically difficult to ship though.
Speaker 3: Yeah, partridges are tough. Internation, well, they know what they
Speaker 3: is true.
Speaker 4: Where is the bear? Fitting.
Speaker 2: This is just like two bears just in case, Like,
Speaker 2: we got to fin these herds at some point, and
Speaker 2: we need to make sure these bears are ready.
Speaker 5: Ye, straight to the DMZ where they cocaine bears is
Speaker 5: my second pertion.
Speaker 3: Every bear is a cocaine bear if you catch it
Speaker 3: on the right Saturday. So we are out of time
Speaker 3: for this. We're not going to get to the staff
Speaker 3: orgy at the Tennessee VA hospital. Why, we are happy
Speaker 3: to report Broward County has vacated victions for people who
Speaker 3: bought crack recently because it turns out that crack was
Speaker 3: made by the local sheriffs off what yes Bury the
Speaker 3: lead guy?
Speaker 2: True, but what about this orgy?
Speaker 3: We're just we're throwing these out. If you want to
Speaker 3: learn more, Uh, if you want to learn more about
Speaker 3: VA orgies, uh, do check out sure News network, where
Speaker 3: VA officials have resigned after a report of a staff
Speaker 3: orgy at a Tennessee VA hospital.
Speaker 6: Uh.
Speaker 3: If you want to make sure you're, I guess buying
Speaker 3: high quality crack, then go to Broward County. Uh, because
Speaker 3: over in Fort lauderdel Floyd.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 5: I also just say I went to Philadelphia this weekend
Speaker 5: as well, for a personal trip and energy no personal trip, and.
Speaker 3: I are's there's a really thank you for your sir.
Speaker 5: There's a really wonderful queer historical queer bookstore called Giovanni's
Speaker 5: Room where a friend of mine works, and I went
Speaker 5: there and as we left, he was giving us all
Speaker 5: these little extra little bits to add to our things
Speaker 5: that we bought, like little you know, posters and things,
Speaker 5: and he said, oh, and here, test your drugs. And
Speaker 5: he gave us like these drug testing kits. So just
Speaker 5: putting it out there that that stuff is available, and
Speaker 5: if anybody out there is indulging in things like crack
Speaker 5: cocaine or cocaine, I'm not advocating that, but do test
Speaker 5: your drugs because there are all kinds of horrible adults
Speaker 5: arend stunt to mention fentanyl and things that can actually
Speaker 5: kill you outside of just a goofy story.
Speaker 4: So just putting that out there.
Speaker 3: Yeah, if you're in a situation where you are choosing
Speaker 3: recreational activities like that, please do be aware of fentanyl
Speaker 3: and other forms of contamination have swept through the US
Speaker 3: and parts of Europe like a thunderstorm or a hurricane.
Speaker 3: Who always be safe to the best of your ability,
Speaker 3: there should be resources available. If you are, of course,
Speaker 3: in Broward County, be aware that for at least three years,
Speaker 3: the Sheriff's office there produced its own crack cocaine so
Speaker 3: that they could sell it to people. And then are
Speaker 3: those people for buying the crack cocaine that law enforcement
Speaker 3: had made.
Speaker 5: It's like the Dave Chappelle bits, or it's like putting
Speaker 5: a crack rock on you, you know, I mean, good lord,
Speaker 5: that is despicable.
Speaker 2: I just want to know who cooked up that idea.
Speaker 3: Ok, yeah, yeah, Well, and when they're getting promoted, right,
Speaker 3: speaking of promotions, We're going to pause for a word
Speaker 3: from our sponsors. Will return with more strange news.
Speaker 5: And we have returned with a few more pieces of
Speaker 5: strange news. Will lead with a holiday related themed story
Speaker 5: out of Russia.
Speaker 4: I think this one is just a hoot. Guys.
Speaker 5: There's a prominent pro Kremlin activist by the name of
Speaker 5: Vitaly Boradin who has called on the Russian state to
Speaker 5: designate Santa Claus as a quote quote foreign agent.
Speaker 3: I mean technically he is, well.
Speaker 4: Absolutely he is.
Speaker 5: I mean, well, yeah, he's he's coming into your homes, y'all,
Speaker 5: and he's, you know, leaving things in there that weren't
Speaker 5: there before, and yet somehow we welcome this terrorist.
Speaker 3: No, I'm just such a weird I mean, think about it. Though.
Speaker 3: I was talking about this with our pals at Daily's
Speaker 3: like Geist. It is such a strange, uh, strange trope
Speaker 3: that we all accept. If you're very good, an overweight
Speaker 3: man that you don't know will break into your house.
Speaker 3: It'll leave you stuff, and you should also leave him.
Speaker 4: Sticks and thank you, thank you for the privilege.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and if you're not good, he's still going to
Speaker 3: break into your house, but the gifts will be worse.
Speaker 2: Or and he's always brandishing an American Coca Cola.
Speaker 4: Isn't he weird in the bottle too? Mmm? Refreshing? But yeah,
Speaker 4: it's true.
Speaker 5: There's definitely some odd stuff around Santa Claus, the commercialization
Speaker 5: of Christmas and all of that good stuff. But I
Speaker 5: think we can all agree because of Matt's point about
Speaker 5: the Coca Cola company sort of proliferating the image, the
Speaker 5: modern image of Santa Claus that we know it is
Speaker 5: very very much or he is very much part of
Speaker 5: Western culture. Even though we know that Santa Claus of
Speaker 5: course comes from Europe. There are you know, tons of
Speaker 5: Santa Claus analogus, you know, Cinder Klaus and all of
Speaker 5: that stuff, Black Schwatza, Pater, some more problematic ones and
Speaker 5: things of that nature that come from other parts of
Speaker 5: the world. But the bearded home invading, you know, jolly
Speaker 5: old elf that we know as Santa is very much
Speaker 5: a Western creation.
Speaker 3: From Thomas Nast and then later popularized be a Coca Cola.
Speaker 3: We have a ridiculous history.
Speaker 4: You're absolutely right.
Speaker 5: He was a cartoonist, he kind of created, He was
Speaker 5: a political cartoonist, and he created the image that we
Speaker 5: know that was then kind of co opted by the
Speaker 5: Co Cola company. So it does make sense that someone
Speaker 5: who is so pro Kremlin like Borden might see Santa
Speaker 5: Claus as not as like a physical foreign agent, but
Speaker 5: as a way of infiltrating and undermining traditional Russian values.
Speaker 5: He addressed a letter to the Secutor General and that
Speaker 5: this was reported by the New York Times, where he
Speaker 5: referred to Santa's rising popularity in Russia and the idea
Speaker 5: that it jeopardizes the prominence of a Russian sort of
Speaker 5: Santa Claus esque figure, Father Frost or dead Moros which
Speaker 5: is a cultural figure that's central to Russia's New Year's
Speaker 5: of celebrations. Father Frost is depicted as being from veliky
Speaker 5: Ustyog in Vologna Oblast, which is a place in Russia,
Speaker 5: I assume, and he has a helper. He has a
Speaker 5: Santa's Little Helper type figure, which is his granddaughter, Snegoroshka.
Speaker 5: And during the Soviet era he was very much pushed
Speaker 5: forth as the embodiment of the spirit of New Year's
Speaker 5: you know, reflection and gift giving and all of that
Speaker 5: stuff gratitude. Right, But since the fall of the Soviet Union,
Speaker 5: Western culture and capitalism, along with Santa Claus, has been
Speaker 5: proliferating through Russia. So Borden in his letter highlights the
Speaker 5: one point six trillion dollar global price tag of Santa
Speaker 5: Claus trademarks, and he believes that exporting this figure, what
Speaker 5: he represents Santa Claus, the exporting by international corporations run
Speaker 5: the risk of eroding and exploiting and I guess maybe
Speaker 5: more diluting Russian cultural norms, which is something that we've
Speaker 5: heard of a good bit recently. And now I'm having
Speaker 5: a hard time remembering the country of origin, but there
Speaker 5: was a country. I believe in the Middle East that
Speaker 5: was prohibiting music of a certain beats per minute because
Speaker 5: it did not align with the traditional folk music of
Speaker 5: that region. So that's very much like this idea of
Speaker 5: let's keep these cultural norms on lock and prevent and
Speaker 5: push away any invading forces. Which the reason I said
Speaker 5: I thought this was a hoot, guys, is because isn't
Speaker 5: Russia kind of notorious for infiltrating our norms and political
Speaker 5: processes nowadays? I mean, I just think it's a little
Speaker 5: bit of a hypocrisy going on here with someone that's
Speaker 5: so pro Kremlin, the Kremlin being constantly at the heart
Speaker 5: of a lot of these seemingly quite likely conspiracies about
Speaker 5: Russian agents infiltrating our social media here, influencing voter turnout,
Speaker 5: even doing you know, DS attacks and things of that
Speaker 5: nature to affect the outcome of our elections.
Speaker 4: Which is about as central to culture as you can get.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, perhaps I have a I have a I
Speaker 3: don't want to say a conclusion here at all, but
Speaker 3: I do have an interesting thing to bring up you.
Speaker 3: You may have noticed, folks, that it may just be possible, well,
Speaker 3: that this is a response to some breaking news about
Speaker 3: Santa Claus. Did you hear that the the sarcophagus of
Speaker 3: the quote real Santa Claus has been discovered in Turkey?
Speaker 4: It just does it have jingle bells on it?
Speaker 5: Is it a big giant sleigher I just picture Santa's
Speaker 5: tomb being mobile in that way.
Speaker 3: They found the burial site, apparently the suspected burial site
Speaker 3: of the Greek bishop Saint Nicholas at the Church of
Speaker 3: Saint Nicholas and Talia, Turkey. It's a limestone sarcophagus. I
Speaker 3: don't know about the bells, but maybe this is what
Speaker 3: inspired Russian activists to say, all right, Santa Claus definitely
Speaker 3: a foreign agent. You could check it out. Archaeology News,
Speaker 3: December seventh. Shout out to Dario Radley. I'm just super interesting.
Speaker 3: I had no idea about that, and his last thing
Speaker 3: for me on this one. This does align with some
Speaker 3: other efforts that are happening within the Russian government. Mikhail Ivanov,
Speaker 3: who's a regional legislator, has been pushing for the removal
Speaker 3: of Santa Claus figurines from store shelves in favor of
Speaker 3: being replaced by more Russian center holiday figures.
Speaker 4: Literally not just figurines.
Speaker 5: He criticized Santa Claus as representation of gross Western ideals, commercialization, capitalism,
Speaker 5: et cetera, and these things that are disconnected from the
Speaker 5: spiritual essence of Christmas. And we could make that same
Speaker 5: argument over a year, and plenty of people do. So
Speaker 5: these things aren't happening in a vacuum. But it does,
Speaker 5: it does. It does seem interesting that these folks are
Speaker 5: acknowledging this aggressive infiltration by outside elements that are diluting
Speaker 5: their own cultural norms, when again, they themselves seem to
Speaker 5: be guilty of doing the same thing to us. Sure
Speaker 5: it didn't mean the yap so much back And I
Speaker 5: can see your your your gears turning there.
Speaker 4: What do you think about this?
Speaker 2: One had a conversation with I so on this morning
Speaker 2: about Santa Claus and Jesus and Christmas and all that stuff.
Speaker 2: And I think it's just I think it's a war
Speaker 2: on Christmas. Guys.
Speaker 3: Okay, I.
Speaker 4: Just choke you. I'm just no, it's fun.
Speaker 5: I mean, have you guys seen the genius cinematic masterpiece
Speaker 5: that is Red One. No, it's this like Holly this
Speaker 5: popcorn you know movie that just came out it's apparently
Speaker 5: quite terrible and not doing particularly well, starring Dwayne the
Speaker 5: Rock Johnson, where he plays I think a bodyguard for
Speaker 5: Santa who's played by the guy that played j Jonah Jamison,
Speaker 5: who's also the neo Nazi dude in OZ whose name
Speaker 5: is totally eluded to me. He's the mean drum teacher
Speaker 5: in Whiplash. You guys know what I'm talking about. His
Speaker 5: names is totally ascab of me. But AnyWho, he's Santa
Speaker 5: Claus and he's apparently totally jacked. And it's this like
Speaker 5: Christmas themed adventure that none of the critics that I
Speaker 5: pay attention to seem to be able to understand who
Speaker 5: it's for because it's like too violent for little kids,
Speaker 5: but it's too childish for adults.
Speaker 4: So that's the other example of the commercialization.
Speaker 3: Does it Dwayne still have this is a pop culture conspiracy?
Speaker 3: But does he still have that thing in his contract
Speaker 3: where he supposedly whatever character he plays he can't lose
Speaker 3: a fight.
Speaker 4: Oh, I don't know about that. That would that would
Speaker 4: be It's interesting.
Speaker 5: I know he has to have a gym on site,
Speaker 5: and he has to have time to get Jack built
Speaker 5: into the shooting schedule.
Speaker 3: You got to get your games. Also, the actor you're
Speaker 3: looking for their nol is jkse thank you, Yes, love
Speaker 3: him just based on his name, Matt, I.
Speaker 2: Think Steven Sagall is the guy I remember having the
Speaker 2: thing in the contract about not losing a fight, but
Speaker 2: I don't.
Speaker 5: I don't remember well, Dwayne the Rock Johnson, because that's
Speaker 5: his name. He did have some controversy around the shooting
Speaker 5: of Red One, where he apparently was late all the
Speaker 5: time and was known to pee in bottles on set,
Speaker 5: which seems a little inappropriate, and he sort of answered
Speaker 5: to those claims saying they were largely overblown. But there
Speaker 5: was definitely some hit pieces out on him being a
Speaker 5: bit of a pill during the filming, but that is
Speaker 5: neither here nor there. If you guys in mind, I
Speaker 5: think I've got time.
Speaker 4: For one more.
Speaker 5: That I had a third, well, I'll just say the
Speaker 5: third one just because it's interesting.
Speaker 4: Really quickly, Scotland.
Speaker 5: The police force in the Scotland had proposed a ban
Speaker 5: on facial hair for any officers of the law. There
Speaker 5: a clean shaven policy that was going to be introduced
Speaker 5: in May, what was postponed during a wave of complaints.
Speaker 5: Now they have officially decided to scrap the plans. So
Speaker 5: I say, that's a victory for Beard. He's everywhere, yeah, and.
Speaker 3: That's you know, that's a victory for the public of Scotland,
Speaker 3: because if someone doesn't have a mustache, how can you
Speaker 3: tell that they are true?
Speaker 5: And also Scotland being a pretty bearded country, I would
Speaker 5: argue it let us a lot of lovely beards there.
Speaker 5: And it was specifically supposed to encourage the wearing of masks,
Speaker 5: those N ninety five masks that I.
Speaker 4: Sit really tightly.
Speaker 5: But again the backlash was just too severe and they
Speaker 5: couldn't do it. So lastly, I just want to talk
Speaker 5: a little bit about the absolute.
Speaker 4: Disco banger that is YMCA.
Speaker 5: There's been a little bit of controversy recently when the
Speaker 5: singer of the band, I believe he was the cop.
Speaker 5: If you're looking at the video, there was like, you know,
Speaker 5: the construction worker, the cowboy, the Native American figure, there's
Speaker 5: like a soldier, a leather daddy kind of figure wearing
Speaker 5: like literally chains on his bare chest, and then a
Speaker 5: police officer. The police officer who is the co writer
Speaker 5: of the song Ymca, a guy named Victor Willis, is
Speaker 5: still living, and he has come out saying, actually, I'll
Speaker 5: just give the quote come January twenty twenty five.
Speaker 4: My wife. Why he's singling out his wife and not him.
Speaker 3: Well, he doesn't want he wants people to know his.
Speaker 4: Oriented fair enough, that's a good point. Okay, Well let's
Speaker 4: get to it.
Speaker 5: My wife will start suing each and every news organization
Speaker 5: that falsely refers to YMCA, either in their headlines or
Speaker 5: alluded to in the base of the story that YMCA
Speaker 5: is somehow a gay anthem, because such notion is based
Speaker 5: solely on the song's lyrics alluding to illicit activity for
Speaker 5: which it does not a little interesting grammatical structure there.
Speaker 3: Yeah, three things real quick. First, why is your wife
Speaker 3: suing him? Why not you? Second, do you, as the
Speaker 3: creator of anything, be a story, a painting, a sculpture,
Speaker 3: or a song, do you get to dictate what part
Speaker 3: of the world or what demographic identifies.
Speaker 4: Well, that's exactly right, man.
Speaker 5: Whether or not the song was set out to be
Speaker 5: a gay anthem, the reality of the matter is is
Speaker 5: that it has come to have the stature of a
Speaker 5: gay anthem. And if you watch the video, and I
Speaker 5: mean the performances and just like the lyrics, they're pretty innocuous.
Speaker 5: It is just singing the praises of the young Men's
Speaker 5: Christian What is it association? I believe YMCA a place
Speaker 5: where you can go have a hot meal and you know,
Speaker 5: play a little ping pong, get a shower if you're
Speaker 5: down on your luck, and of course hang out with
Speaker 5: all the boys. Another very interesting statement from the singer
Speaker 5: says that that famous line that I just quoted was
Speaker 5: simply nineteen seventies black slang for black guys hanging out
Speaker 5: together for sports, gambling or whatever.
Speaker 4: There's nothing gay about that, no, homo.
Speaker 3: I mean, okay me thou dost Well, that's.
Speaker 5: What I was gonna mention Ben and Matt. This does
Speaker 5: feel like a classic example of the streisand effects. Right
Speaker 5: we're in somebody says no, it's not this thing, or no,
Speaker 5: don't look at my picture on the internet where and
Speaker 5: it just kind of doubles down on whatever that thing is,
Speaker 5: or makes people have eyes on whatever the thing is
Speaker 5: you don't want them to look at, and it just
Speaker 5: comes off like Freud with cigars totally, and it just
Speaker 5: comes off as really tone deaf and clueless, and a
Speaker 5: great example of someone who doesn't understand what their own
Speaker 5: work means to other people. And the interesting thing about
Speaker 5: this is it comes kind of as a result of
Speaker 5: this song having been co opted by the Trump campaign
Speaker 5: being played at all of these events. And originally, apparently
Speaker 5: mister Willis was not for that, just because he said
Speaker 5: it was a quote unquote nuisance. I guess he was
Speaker 5: getting bugged about it a lot. But then the Trumpet
Speaker 5: Organization actually purchased a political license for the song through BMI,
Speaker 5: a publishing company that owns the rights to that song,
Speaker 5: And since then mister Willis has changed his tune entirely.
Speaker 5: He isn't making it a political thing, but he is
Speaker 5: saying the financial benefits this is from his mouth have
Speaker 5: been great. YMCA is estimated to grow several million dollars
Speaker 5: since the President Alex continued use of the song. Therefore,
Speaker 5: I'm glad I allowed the President a lex continued use
Speaker 5: of YMCA, and I thank him for choosing to use
Speaker 5: my song. And rather than leaving it that, I just
Speaker 5: do want to add it wasn't just his song. He
Speaker 5: was the co writer of the song along with a
Speaker 5: gentleman by the name of Jacquise Morale who or Morale Rather,
Speaker 5: who produced the record. He was a very well known
Speaker 5: French disco and dance music record producer and songwriter. The
Speaker 5: Village people were, from my understanding, assembled, They were like
Speaker 5: a boy band.
Speaker 4: They were put together.
Speaker 5: Each of their respective characters were very meticulously chosen, and
Speaker 5: it was a time where queer culture was much more
Speaker 5: out in the open all of a sudden, and it
Speaker 5: was capitalizing on that. So, I mean, you know, you
Speaker 5: can't say that the biker in the leather with the
Speaker 5: chains on his hairy chest isn't like a symbol of
Speaker 5: a queer iconic thing. Whether that happened before or after
Speaker 5: that choice was made, it is inextricably that. But Jacquise Morel,
Speaker 5: who is no longer with us therefore not able to
Speaker 5: defend his position on the use of this song or
Speaker 5: it's you know, gay roots or lack thereof. He did
Speaker 5: pass away due to complications from HIV he contracted in
Speaker 5: the mid nineteen eighties, and he was openly gay, and
Speaker 5: he died of rather, he died of AIDS related complications
Speaker 5: in Paris at the age of forty four. So very clearly,
Speaker 5: you know, you got to wonder if the producer, who
Speaker 5: also gets a co writing credit, how much who wrote what?
Speaker 5: And how much of that what with that relationship was even?
Speaker 3: Like, and how do people try to retroactively redefine right
Speaker 3: historical events? You know, history is history is written by
Speaker 3: the people in the present ongoing conversation. Also with that
Speaker 3: in mind, you know, guys, how cool would it be
Speaker 3: for a Village People two point zero to come out?
Speaker 3: And if so, which characters which tropes would be assembled?
Speaker 3: You know, like who who? Who's the equivalent of the
Speaker 3: Village People cast role wise in the modern day.
Speaker 5: They have to leave out the Native American with full
Speaker 5: head dress. I would argue that that needs well, the.
Speaker 4: Rest of them, I think are Okay. I don't know.
Speaker 5: I always will think of Wayne's World, that the scene
Speaker 5: of Wayn's World where they do IMCA.
Speaker 4: But yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 5: I just think this is interesting and a great example
Speaker 5: of kind of like a the stressand effect and be
Speaker 5: someone kind of being a little bit clueless about their
Speaker 5: own legacy, whether the intent was there or not. I
Speaker 5: don't think you can shut down what a thing has
Speaker 5: come to represent just by saying.
Speaker 3: So, yeah, it's kind of like, uh, it's it's kind
Speaker 3: of like uh, you know, an old school gangster rapper
Speaker 3: coming out and saying I've never once condoned violence. You
Speaker 3: guys are hearing the me Is it wrong?
Speaker 4: Yeah? One way.
Speaker 2: I do think this is like a roundabout way to
Speaker 2: maybe get what he wants though, say some like insensitive
Speaker 2: possibly homophobic things out loud, you know, and now if
Speaker 2: you listen to the song, you're supporting this guy, right,
Speaker 2: So I do think it might actually have the messed
Speaker 2: up effect he's looking for.
Speaker 5: Well, it's maybe changing the narrative in a way, because
Speaker 5: I mean, you know, Trump is you know, I would
Speaker 5: he has some platforms that I think are not particularly
Speaker 5: friendly to the LGBTQ and trans community. Let's just say
Speaker 5: so to co opt that song in that way and
Speaker 5: then have the co sign of the creator, it does
Speaker 5: seem to flip the script on what that song represents.
Speaker 4: And I think he's trying to help serve that narrative.
Speaker 5: And now it maybe is more of the Trump dancing,
Speaker 5: you know, jerking his hands off in the air kind
Speaker 5: of song rather than this queer anthem that it has
Speaker 5: in the past been.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it is a weird way to stop getting even
Speaker 2: the small amount of residuals you still getting no.
Speaker 4: No, But he's getting more. He's getting that's the point,
Speaker 4: though he's getting no.
Speaker 5: He said it's generated a million dollars specifically by from
Speaker 5: use of the Trump campaign, and it shot up in
Speaker 5: the charts as a result of that too. But my
Speaker 5: point is, I think the audience is changing or something
Speaker 5: like the people who are listening to it for different
Speaker 5: reasons or with different connotations now. But you know, I've
Speaker 5: never it's always been pretty embraced by everyone. It's at weddings,
Speaker 5: you know, everyone loves the dance. Everyone loves a song
Speaker 5: with a dance associated with it that I don't think
Speaker 5: was even created by the band. I think that kind
Speaker 5: of came naturally from a performance on American Bandstand or
Speaker 5: something where the audience kind of invented that. I don't
Speaker 5: know exactly the details there, but it's really interesting on
Speaker 5: a lot of levels. So anyway, those are my stories.
Speaker 5: Let's take a quick break here, a word from our sponsor,
Speaker 5: and then come back with a bit more strange news
Speaker 5: for you.
Speaker 2: Coming back just to play off of that YMCA story,
Speaker 2: You guys, we have another piece of news that matches
Speaker 2: up really well with this. You can't control who consumes
Speaker 2: the art you create and what that art becomes for people.
Speaker 2: A book written by author Jay Feineman, first published in
Speaker 2: twenty ten, has skyrocketed to number two on the Amazon
Speaker 2: Nonfiction Charts, the best selling nonfiction charts. The subtitle is
Speaker 2: Why insurance Companies Don't pay claims and What you can
Speaker 2: do about it. The title is delay, deny, defend.
Speaker 3: Hmm.
Speaker 5: Okay, just saw that those three words for the first
Speaker 5: time in my life recently on those shell case things.
Speaker 5: And then Ben pointed out to us in our group
Speaker 5: chat that this was kind of a popular way of
Speaker 5: referring to how insurance companies, you know, basically get out
Speaker 5: of paying claims that are legitimate.
Speaker 2: Yes, and you know, it is just it's strange the
Speaker 2: way this whole thing is playing out. We will talk
Speaker 2: about it very soon in a more full way, just
Speaker 2: wanting to point it out there. You know, Jay Feineman
Speaker 2: probably didn't imagine his book would be associated with, you know,
Speaker 2: the assassination of a healthcare CEO. And now it is
Speaker 2: all right, so let's jump to the news coming out
Speaker 2: of CNN Business. This was written on December tenth by
Speaker 2: Nathaniel Myerson. The title is Federal Judge block's largest supermarket
Speaker 2: merger in history. So, guys, back in twenty twenty two,
Speaker 2: Kroger and Albertson's, these are two massive grocery store slash
Speaker 2: supermarket corporations. They announced, Hey, we're gonna team up together.
Speaker 2: We're going to merge into one big old thing. The
Speaker 2: plan was to combine both the fifth and the tenth
Speaker 2: largest retailers in the United States. That is now hear
Speaker 2: that largest retailers. Think of all the stores that could
Speaker 2: be considered retail, this is the fifth and the tenth.
Speaker 2: So that's not just grocery stores. So why go Voltron
Speaker 2: like this? Well, because both of these giants were losing
Speaker 2: ground to the recently emerging Titans of grocery, specifically Walmart
Speaker 2: and Amazon. And you know you got your costcos and
Speaker 2: then also tied to Walmart's like your Sam's Clubs and
Speaker 2: things like that. They're losing out to these guys. So
Speaker 2: they thought, well, if we get huge too and become
Speaker 2: a titan together, maybe we can actually compete. Well, it's
Speaker 2: not just Albertson's, the grocery store maybe you've heard of
Speaker 2: or have been to, or the Kroger that you've heard of.
Speaker 4: Or been to.
Speaker 2: These companies own a bunch of other brand name stores.
Speaker 4: They're more like regionally specific. Right.
Speaker 5: You might have yes, Kroger over here in Atlanta, but
Speaker 5: then it's like Vaughn's in Los Angeles and southern California
Speaker 5: and such, right.
Speaker 2: Harris Teeter, fred Meyer, Safeway, all kinds of places. And
Speaker 2: there are dozens, by the way, not just those. So
Speaker 2: from this article written by Nathaniel, it says Kroger and
Speaker 2: Albertson's employ mostly unionized workforces, and said they wanted to
Speaker 2: merge to become more competitive against these non union giants
Speaker 2: such as Walmart, Amazon, Costco. The grocers also faced increased
Speaker 2: pressure from another store that maybe you've been too recently,
Speaker 2: All the which is the fastest growing German discount supermarket chain.
Speaker 2: They're popping up everywhere where I live. All these are
Speaker 2: just I'm just seeing them proliferate. I can imagine that
Speaker 2: there's lots of pressure there. This is what they wanted
Speaker 2: to do. And here's a quote from Rodney Mullen, the
Speaker 2: CEO of Kroger. He's saying this merger would accelerate quote
Speaker 2: our position as a more compelling alternative to larger and
Speaker 2: non union competitors, which again seems like maybe a good thing. Right,
Speaker 2: you've got unionized workers in these places. They're e merging
Speaker 2: together a bunch of unionized workers, which at least has
Speaker 2: protections for the people who are working at the stores.
Speaker 2: That feels like a better thing than you know, at
Speaker 2: least what we've heard about Amazon in some of their
Speaker 2: business practices there when it comes to employees as well
Speaker 2: as Walmart and others, seems like an okay thing. The
Speaker 2: big deal here, y'all is that Kroger. When this announcement
Speaker 2: happened in twenty twenty two, they committed to lowering grocery
Speaker 2: prices by one billion dollars. Now what does that mean?
Speaker 2: I guess the price of groceries across all of the
Speaker 2: United States by a billion dollars, which translates to not
Speaker 2: much money for each individual out there shopping in a Kroger.
Speaker 2: But it would be Yeah, it's a tricky numbers thing.
Speaker 2: And if you just say it like that, it sounds
Speaker 2: so great, Oh my gosh, a billion dollars.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but it's like a class action lossuit, you know
Speaker 3: what I mean.
Speaker 2: You get eleven dollars, you get four dollars.
Speaker 4: Hell, let's pay out in coupons. You know exactly?
Speaker 2: That all sounded interesting, good, maybe not great. It's tough
Speaker 2: to like giant corporations getting together and joining forces.
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 5: What we talked about is the nature of monopoly recently too,
Speaker 5: and how it often seems like that's just.
Speaker 4: Sort of the order of the day.
Speaker 5: This is kind of we we've grown to expect it
Speaker 5: almost right, and to usually not see it getting shut
Speaker 5: down or for there to be a loophole to make
Speaker 5: it just not monopoly enough to make it but still
Speaker 5: for all intents and purposes, that's what the heck it.
Speaker 2: Is exactly well, guys, this week, as we we are recording,
Speaker 2: on Wednesday, December eleventh, a federal judge and Oregon judge
Speaker 2: Adrian Nelson rejected all of those arguments and basically said
Speaker 2: no to this merger. She blocked the proposed twenty five
Speaker 2: billion dollar merger between Albertsons and Kroger. And this ruling basically,
Speaker 2: if you sum down, what her statement was is that
Speaker 2: it would limit competition and it would harm consumers. So
Speaker 2: she issued a preliminary injunction that's what they call it,
Speaker 2: halting the deal at least temporarily. In a ruling, she
Speaker 2: said that supermarkets are quote distinct from other grocery retailers
Speaker 2: and are not direct competitors to Walmart, Amazon, and other
Speaker 2: companies that sell a wider range of goods. She said
Speaker 2: that this merger would eliminate head to head competition between
Speaker 2: Albertsons and Kroger and potentially raise prices for consumers rather
Speaker 2: than lower them, as at least the CEO of Kroger
Speaker 2: was touting, right, we're going to get bigger and we're
Speaker 2: going to lower prices because theoretically we can all supply
Speaker 2: you know, we can get a bunch more from the
Speaker 2: same suppliers. We can do all this stuff to negotiate
Speaker 2: and lower the prices of goods. This judge is saying,
Speaker 2: I don't think that's what's going to happen.
Speaker 4: I'd like to trust you, but I maybe know a
Speaker 4: little better. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Well, again, this is an injunction, so it's temporary, just
Speaker 2: saying hey, we're going to pause on this until we
Speaker 2: learn some more things. Then we can come back to
Speaker 2: the negotiation table and try and see what this merger
Speaker 2: looks like. Well, at the end of yesterday, Tuesday, December tenth.
Speaker 2: This preliminary injunction halted the deal, but the companies had
Speaker 2: this option to appeal and move forward to keep going.
Speaker 2: Well as of today the eleventh, Albertson's said, now we're done.
Speaker 2: We're not going to do this. It's over Kroger. You've
Speaker 2: wronged us, because they're suing Kroger for breach of contract,
Speaker 2: and they're alleging that Kroger made the merger get blocked.
Speaker 3: Like they blew it up, like they like did It's crazy,
Speaker 3: like a poison pill.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, yes, they're saying that Kroger failed to exercise
Speaker 2: its quote best efforts and to take quote any and
Speaker 2: all actions to secure regulatory approval.
Speaker 4: I don't have em understand what that means.
Speaker 5: How is it their respond I mean it's up to
Speaker 5: the judge, right, Like, I don't get it.
Speaker 3: They're saying Kroger, if they really wanted it, could have
Speaker 3: done much more. It's similar to if I understand the
Speaker 3: legal proceedings. Just to interject it, it feels like Albertson
Speaker 3: is kind of accusing I even kind of is accusing
Speaker 3: Kroger of doing that classic Gene Wilder line from Charlie
Speaker 3: and the Chocolate factory. One of the kids gets in
Speaker 3: trouble and he goes, oh stop, he said, Kroger didn't
Speaker 3: really hustle.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, it is weird because Kroger's the biggest grocery
Speaker 2: chain out there, right, and then Albertson as albertson Is
Speaker 2: is like number ten, right, we said five and ten.
Speaker 2: Kroger is actually number one in just grocery, and then
Speaker 2: Albertson's is smaller. So Albertson's is kind of hoping to
Speaker 2: join up, I guess, with the like team up with
Speaker 2: the bigger player in some way. So I suppose they
Speaker 2: have more to lose when going into this type of merger.
Speaker 4: And I can.
Speaker 2: Imagine that's why the company and all of their legal
Speaker 2: teams are saying, hey, we need to get something out
Speaker 2: of this, because this was going to be a big
Speaker 2: deal for us.
Speaker 5: They may have already put some things in motion, you know,
Speaker 5: towards whatever that was going to look like, and maybe
Speaker 5: that's wasted effort and funding and what have you.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, and we have no visibility into that. But
Speaker 2: again that same due that, we read a quote from
Speaker 2: Rodney Mullens, CEO of Kroger. He said, just before all
Speaker 2: of this stuff went down, he said, we're well positioned
Speaker 2: to grow even if this deal ends, which is, you know,
Speaker 2: one of those things you put out in the ether
Speaker 2: as a merger is happening, and it's probably not a
Speaker 2: great for investors to see or regulatory folks to look at.
Speaker 2: I know this is kind of boring at all. I
Speaker 2: think it's just I think it's just important to remember
Speaker 2: that this is the kind of stuff that's happening, and
Speaker 2: it's the kind of stuff that happens when enough corporations
Speaker 2: grow and grow and grow and grow, and they can't
Speaker 2: do anything to grow any further unless they envelop another
Speaker 2: one of these big players that's doing the same thing,
Speaker 2: and eventually, over the course of time, you get you know,
Speaker 2: you get the Google in the Facebook and these companies
Speaker 2: that just become one big thing like an Amazon, right
Speaker 2: or a Meta Sure, and in this case whatever Krogerson's
Speaker 2: would be, but.
Speaker 5: It did not happen, and it would seem like now
Speaker 5: there's bad blood that would lead one to believe that
Speaker 5: it's never gonna happen. They're done with each other. But
Speaker 5: I just do you do you see I don't know.
Speaker 5: I mean, I know you're not a legal expert here,
Speaker 5: But do you see, like with Kroger being so much
Speaker 5: bigger than Albertson, it just seems like a pretty kind
Speaker 5: of a shot in the dark roll of the dice
Speaker 5: to do this, to like go up against them when
Speaker 5: they were trying to join up with them.
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 2: It depends what they have, right and if they can
Speaker 2: prove it, then maybe they get away with a bunch
Speaker 2: of money and the investors view them as scrappy.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Sure, you get that.
Speaker 2: The share prices of both of these corporations were up,
Speaker 2: by the way after this whole falling through, which is weird.
Speaker 4: I don't understand any of that stuff.
Speaker 2: Well, that's it for grocery stores. Let's jump really quickly
Speaker 2: over to the Democratic Republic of the Congo and talk
Speaker 2: about a quote unidentified illness that is causing alarm with
Speaker 2: the WHO and the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Speaker 2: This comes to us via The Guardian and journalist Cat Leigh.
Speaker 2: It was written on December tenth, twenty twenty four. This
Speaker 2: is a mystery disease that is spreading according to DRC's
Speaker 2: Health minister last week, as we record today, it had
Speaker 2: this disease had killed seventy nine people, and that since
Speaker 2: October twenty fourth, and there were three hundred and seventy
Speaker 2: six cases identified. The reason why we want to talk
Speaker 2: about this because again that's a low number of people, right,
Speaker 2: but that is quite a few number of people who
Speaker 2: died in proportion to the number of people who are
Speaker 2: getting sick. The main symptoms here are similar to flu, headaches, coughing,
Speaker 2: difficulty breathing, anemia. There is quite a bit of testing,
Speaker 2: but it's in a remote part of the DRC there.
Speaker 2: So actually getting somebody to a testing facility or getting
Speaker 2: let's say blood that's sampled to a testing facility, you're
Speaker 2: talking three hundred and four hundred miles away just to
Speaker 2: make that happen, and then you factor in the time
Speaker 2: that it takes just to travel that length. Do the
Speaker 2: testing get results? It's not it's not a quick moving
Speaker 2: situation for people on the ground, right, attempting to figure
Speaker 2: out what's going on there. And again I said, I
Speaker 2: think I'm restating this, but the reason why I wanted
Speaker 2: to talk to this and bring up to you guys,
Speaker 2: is because they're speculat that this is is what is
Speaker 2: known as a disease X. This is some previously unknown
Speaker 2: pathogen that has the potential to become a pandemic.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 2: I think anytime we see something like that hit our radar,
Speaker 2: we at least want to raise a flag and say, hey,
Speaker 2: there's a possibility here of some other insane thing happening,
Speaker 2: depending on how spread occurs. But as of right now today,
Speaker 2: the update is that many of the people who actually
Speaker 2: were tested their twelve initial samples that were collected, the
Speaker 2: ten of them tested positive for malaria. But the doctors
Speaker 2: are saying it is possible that malaria is one illness
Speaker 2: and there's maybe a second illness as well. In there
Speaker 2: you can read the article some mystery disease patients in
Speaker 2: DRC have malaria? Who says, and again that's in the Guardian.
Speaker 2: That's all I've got today, guys.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and there's much more to explore, especially with the
Speaker 3: nomenclature of disease X shadows of colonialism, we could argue.
Speaker 3: For right now, we're going to call it a day.
Speaker 3: We are hoping you have a wonderful mid December. More importantly,
Speaker 3: we're hoping you reach out and contact us. We cannot
Speaker 3: wait to hear your thoughts. On everything from especially those
Speaker 3: mystery drones. They're still getting to me. Have you ever
Speaker 3: sent anyone elite goats? All this and more? Let us know.
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Speaker 3: via telephone and of course our email Noel, how does
Speaker 3: someone touch us on the line.
Speaker 4: Josh, and I'm glad you asked.
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