NY And LA Back2Normal? Girl Scout Cookie Drought 6.16.21

In episode 931, Jack and Miles are joined by This Day In Esoteric Political History host Jody Avirgan to discuss GOP refusing to help the Democrats, Republicans being blacklisted for criticizing Trump, New York and Los Angeles getting back to normal, Darnella Frazier being honored with a Pulitzer nod, UFOs, Girl Scouts, and more!

FOOTNOTES:

1. Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell On President Biden Judicial Nominees, A New “JCPOA”
2. White House to Democrats: Get ready to go it alone on infrastructure
3. A ‘political death warrant’: GOP lawmakers struggle after criticizing Trump
4. ‘I didn’t take an oath to defend Donald Trump’: Rep. Tom Rice tests whether Republican voters will support a conservative who crossed Trump
5. Former congressman Dana Rohrabacher breached Capitol police barricades on Jan. 6
6. Cuomo: New York going back 'to life as we know it' after reaching vaccine threshold
7. California officially reopens its economy
8. Teen who recorded Floyd’s arrest, death wins Pulitzer nod
9. 'Truth embargo': UFOs are suddenly all the talk in Washington
10. Do We Believe in U.F.O.s? That’s the Wrong Question
11. Thinner Mints: Girl Scouts have millions of unsold cookies
12. LISTEN: Hiatus Kaiyote - 'Chivalry Is Not Dead' (Official Audio)

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello the Internet, and welcome to Season one, nine, Episode three,
After Days, I gus the production of My Heart Radio.
This is a podcast where we take a deep dive
into America's shared consciousness. It is Wednesday, June one. My
name is Jack O'Brien a K. When I'm done pitching pods,

(00:21):
I go back on the Daily's I when I stopped,
but turned around and do meetings with Miles till I
get to the evening. Then I do it again. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
I heart Empire Nanar Nanar Nanar Nano Heart Empire Nanar
Nano Nano nan That is uh an ak to Helter

(00:43):
Skelter courtesy of Johnny Davis, and I am thrilled to
be joined as always by my co host, Mr Miles Gray.
It's Miles Gray a k A Miles Gray Wolf ak
the Miles in the gray flannel suit aka the Portrait
of Miles Gray a gay. I can see about Miles
and Miles and Miles again when two for two today,

(01:08):
It's been a while, been a while, Johnny for those
as right, Yeah, trying to do that a K. Just
then give me a real appreciation for Paul McCartney's vocal
perform I think it's Paul McCartney's vocal performance on that.
Maybe it's John lynnon but yeah, man, that was yeah
White album. I only know because of the Gray Album.

(01:29):
I'm like, oh, yeah, that's from the Gray Album right then,
And I'm like, oh, Beatles then that means from White album,
right well, Miles. We are thrilled to be joined today
by a very talented podcast producer and host currently hosting
This Day and Esoteric Political History from Radio Topia, where

(01:52):
you can hear him talk to you know, Lightweight. It's
like Jill Lapoor about a Russian propagandist who traveled the
US and sauce in a way we couldn't ourselves, very fascinating.
Most recent episode, for instance, he was willing to cover
the fact that America has a white supremacist, a little undercurrent,

(02:12):
overcurrent type of thing. He is the story editor on
The Line, the Dan First podcast we raved about when
we had Dan on, executive producer of Death at the Wing,
the Adam McKay podcast about tragedy and basketball in the eighties.
You may have heard him hosting thirty for thirty for ESPN,
they Politics podcast. We are thrilled to be joined by

(02:36):
the brilliant and talented Jody Abergant what's up, Hey, And
going into this, I told myself I'm not going to
be one of those guests on that daily Vicas was
flustered by the ak It is impossible to not be
flust That is quite a thing to witness. Yeah, so
I think it inspires a different range of reaction. Some

(03:00):
My favorite is outright confusion. Yeah, when they look around
the room, it's like the it's like the best moment.
I'm like yeah. And occasionally you get that one where
it's like the notification of someone just leaving zoom, like
oh yeah, or they like in the chatter like what
the funk is this? Like sorry, that was from my manager.

(03:20):
It's a podcast. I told you no fun Boys. Oh look,
and I'm wearing my shirt that says Oslo City fun Boys.
You go wow. I didn't even see that. It was
Paul McCartney, by the way, it was okay, great performance.
He's got that growl. Yeah. I feel like he created
with that and the end of Hey, Jude, I feel

(03:41):
like he created Steven Tyler's entire career well that his
vocal stylings. Jody was good man, what's new? Well, can
you tell us about esoteric history. Well, I'm just over
here slacking, only doing three episodes a week where you
crank out every day. No, you know, it's been it's
been fun to do this show, which has been my

(04:02):
main thing since I left ESPN about a year ago.
But you know, I'm trying to like engage with the
world by looking at the past and not having to
get dragged into the bs of the of the day,
whereas you guys have decided to just stare directly into
the sun every hour. At this point, I could look

(04:23):
into the ark of the Covenant and nothing would happen. Yeah,
I would be like, oh cool light show. Yeah, everyone,
I wonder what Twitter it is. I mean, I'm telling you.
I mean that this was like how I designed my
my last year. And I didn't even know last year
was going to be what it was. But I was like,
is gonna be crazy? I want to somehow talk about

(04:45):
it but not actually have to feel obliged to yap
about whatever the bs of the day will be. And
so my answer to that was, let's look to history
and pick little historical moments that like they're resonant. Yeah,
people slept a lot better than I did when I
was covering the election. And I'll tell you that much. Yeah,
I bet all right. We are going to get to

(05:08):
know you a little bit better in a moment. First,
we're gonna tell the listeners a few of the things
we're talking about. We're gonna talk about the Democrats looking
for more reasons to play nice with the GOP. We'll
talk about what Trump is continuing to do to the GOP.
That's sort of a continuing story. Uh, New York and
l A are back to normal, baby, So we're just

(05:28):
gonna talk about all our plans to just go mask
free and uh, really rub it in people's faces. We'll
talk about the pandemic problems at the Girl Scouts. We'll
talk about Dartnella Fraser who took the George Floyd video
and got honored by the Pulitzer Committee. I want to
ask the overall question, and Jody, as a historian, I'm

(05:52):
curious for your perspective on this about whether we should
continue to cover the UFO stuff. I am going to
continue to, but I'm just interested in the question of,
like why people do or don't cover that, because I
don't feel like there's a historical corollary to it. But
maybe maybe you can correct me all of that plenty more.

(06:13):
But first, Jody, we like to ask Eric Guest, what
is something from your search history. It's a very good question.
One of the things that I was recently searching for
my search the actual search term was just Deadwood swearing.
I don't know if you've seen the show Deadwood, but
we recently did an episode on my on My History

(06:34):
podcast about Andrew Jackson's funeral during which his pet parrot
had to be escorted from the room because it was
swearing uncontrollably throughout Andrew Jackson's life. I guess he had
taught this parrot to swear, and I think Andrew Jackson
was probably just a salty individual. Apparently during the funeral,
the parrot just went off and started swearing, and so

(06:55):
it's a it's an amazing story. One of my favorite
tippets on the historical accounts or that people didn't just
find the parrot destructive, that they found it like rude,
Like several accounts just say like the parrot was removed
for for not understanding the solemnity of the moment, like
the parrots supposed on You're not just swearing, but you're
you know, you're not taking seriously what's going on wrong
with that bird went to parrot finishing school exactly. Unfortunately,

(07:19):
there's no historical record of what the actual swears were,
and so I was trying to get a sense of
what like mid eighteen century swearing would be, and I
think Deadwood is my best analog. Yeah, that's great question.
I always kind of assumed the Deadwood was a heightened
like almost like Shakespearean like, people didn't actually talk like this,
but it's fun to just kind of hear reality described

(07:43):
in these ways like it. Where did you find that
Deadwood is actually an accurate portrayal of how creatively people
swore back in the day. I think it's somewhere between
the two. If I think that the creators of Deadwood
were careful to only use swear words that were of
the time, I think the amount of swearing, I mean,

(08:04):
it's something like seventy two. There's like seventy two cocksuckers
and the the pilot or something that maybe you know,
there weren't people like that, but I think the I mean,
you know, you look at you look at swear words.
There's some interesting ones from back you know, from back then.
But it's just a lot of motherfucker on cocksucker too.
That's are pretty big. Yeah, the classics, very few fun boys.
In the first episode of the what What's something you

(08:28):
think is overrated? I thought, yes, was it on yesterday's
show that someone said on your show yesterday that they
said going out is overrated? I think that's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
I kind of Actually I think that may have stolen mine.
I kind of been finding myself getting back to the
normal of saying no to stuff. And we're gonna talk

(08:50):
about that. We're gonna talk about the return to normal later.
But I find it very liberating to know about to
like do what I usually do, because have all these
wonderful things that could be doing and then say no
thing and I'm just gonna stay home. Yeah, So that
is my That is my return to normal. The wave
of relief when somebody cancels is uh, like when somebody's
like I can't do that, like one of our so

(09:13):
like we can't do the play date like that is
you know they say introverts like get life from being
alone and extroverts get life from being around people. I
get life from people canceling with me. The extremely specific
phenomenon I'm going undergone because I'm on the East Coast
is um plans to watch basketball games that on the

(09:33):
East Coast start during the playoffs. East Coast start at
like ten pm. And I'm like, but I still want
to get together with friends. We're gonna watchstball. This is great,
we can watch sports together. But you know that game
is gonna end it. I mean, I'm gonna fall sleep
halfway through that game. Uh. And then when someone cancels
on me, it's like, oh great, I can falls by
my couch and piece during this game. Yeah. Whenever I
get like sometimes there are those moments you're like, damn,

(09:56):
maybe maybe this doesn't happen this weekend. And then you
get like the text that it isn't I go to
church that Sunday God is real. Yeah I didn't. I
wasn't believing. Man. And then you came through and you
you canceled that barbecue, Thank you, thank you. Food does
not taste good when they cook. Oh man. The NBA
playoffs though, what a I feel like those are I

(10:18):
feel like the plans for the NBA playoffs are being
canceled everybody's getting hurt a bummer. Yeah, what what's something
you think is underrated? I this might be sacrilege to say,
but I think, um, listening to anything other than podcasts
is underrated. And I cannot tell you how consistently it

(10:41):
feels like a miracle whenever I just like, remember that
I can listen to something other than a podcast music,
Oh my god? Like who would have thought? This is amazing? Uh?
You know? Or like audio books? I may, I listen
to a ton of audio books, but I just I mean,
I'm working this industry, It's what I do. I love
podcast but but like there's just something magical about getting

(11:01):
in my ears something else to listen to, and and
it feels like fresh and new every time. Yeah. Yeah,
that's my my My search constantly is for new music,
because that's like the one dragon I keep chasing. It's
like when you just hear like a new artist or
like a new album or that you're like, where was this?
My whole life? And that to me is like some
of the that's what the juice of life is. But yeah,

(11:23):
I find myself really leaning into that. Although I've been
the audio book pendulum has been swinging very aggressively back
into my life against Yeah, I listen to I would
say the majority of what I listened to that's not music.
His audio books instead of podcast. Hit me. Hit me
with a good audio book that you've I'm listening. I'm
listening to um a Brief History of Seven Killings? Have

(11:44):
you heard that Marlon James or read that? I have
read that with my ears. Yeah, there you go, really
and really well well read, but brilliant book. I will say,
of course, under cut myself. Marlin James also hosts a
really good podcast, So there you go. You should. You
can go listen to. He does this amazing thing. I
forget what it's called, but it's it's a podcast that

(12:06):
he hosts with his editor, and they just have an
amazing relationship. And it's the kind of thing that, like,
I feel like a really good novelist and their longtime
editor have a type of relationship probably unique in the
in the world, right, And so they have that and
they just talk about books they love. But it's, you know,
it's really based around their chemistry. But it's like so
open and I mean, I wouldn't I don't know. I've

(12:28):
been people's editor and I've had editors. I don't know
if I would ever have those like really honest open
conversations knowing that then at some point I'm gonna have to,
you know, send them my work and they're gonna have
to tear it apart, or we're gonna have to I
don't know. But it's a it's a really great it's
a really great podcast. So underrated is his podcast? Somehow,
somehow came back to recommending a freaking podcast after all this, Miles,

(12:50):
what do you read? What do you uh? What audiobook
are you read? My Life in Red and White by
the former manager of Arsenal, Arson Venger, and it's there
raided by him as well, and he just has a
fantastic perspective on life and soccer football as it were.
And I think for a lot of fans of Arsenal,
myself included, like, there are a lot of things that

(13:12):
happened during his tenure that he never really spoke about
with much depth. He wasn't really always like giving like
the most sort of open interviews, but in this book
he's able to really speak about how he saw player
management and like he you know, he like has a
background as an economist and that factored heavily into how
he even like managed trades and things like that, So
there are there are moments as fans are like why

(13:32):
why would he trade this person? Or like what's going on?
Like why what's why do we keep these people? And
then you find out like sort of from from his perspective.
So it's a nicely sort of post mortem on his
time there, and his voice is just you know, classic miles.
Do you do you know that show Desert Island Discs,
That BBC show, I've heard of it. Yeah, it's like
been running for eighty some years now, but it's basically

(13:53):
a guest talks about the five or eight records they
would take with them onto a desert island. But it's
sort of an excuse to talk about. But he did
one of my favorite Desert Island discs recent memory, not
of all time. It's just phenomenal, so I go check
it out. But yeah, he's he's got a great voice
and very thoughtful guy and you know, yeah, I'm not
an Arsenal fan, but I I admire him. Yeah, change

(14:14):
the game. And now he's now he's wrapped up in FIFA,
so he can't really even speak space scathingly of this
body that is probably actually ruining the game. But hey,
you know, that's that's how they get to I can't
give a anti recommendation for audio book. You should get it,
but just don't do what I did. I fell asleep

(14:36):
listening to Blood Meridian. Oh no, no, no, and uh.
And then I was like, why why am I so
like anxious today? And yeah, it is because Blood Meridian
was dancing. Visions of Blood Meridian were dancing through my head.
I thought it would give me like some insight into

(14:57):
you know, we we need to know about Texas as
as they're about to descend into an apocalyptic post electricity hellscape.
I was like, let's let's get into this Blood Meridian
I've been hearing so much about. Yeah, that's that's fucked up.
I don't I don't know who narrates it. I just did,
uh the Autobiography of Malcolm X narrated by Laurence Fishburn,

(15:21):
and that was fucking amazing. Narrators can do so much.
But Jody, just based on your podcast, I was curious
if there are any like esoteric moments in history or
esoteric kind of trends in history do you think are
kind of underrated in terms of understanding the current zeitgeist

(15:44):
and kind of modern America. I'm sure there's a ton,
but like anyone that sticks up, Yeah, it's an interesting question.
I mean, you know, I I try and be open.
You know. Part of this is like you bring a
lens of your own, and so I'm one of these
people who are often I kind of feel like every
story is a media story, and so, you know, I

(16:04):
just feel like in every conversation we have, at some
point it comes down to just the like radical transformation
in media that goes back further than maybe you know,
Fox News came around in the early two thousands or
in the in the nineties, but you know, you um
and my co host Nicolehammer studies wrote it an amazing
book called Messengers on the Right and wrote a you know,

(16:25):
and and studies a lot how especially the GOP came
to really um radicalize around new media in the you know, sixties, seventies, eighties,
and nineties. But that's that's the kind of thing that
I always I feel like doesn't get it doesn't get
rated properly. It's just the way in which we've just
been fractured intentionally by changing media landscape. So there's just

(16:49):
all sorts of stories of people who were doing stuff
in the fifties and sixties and seventies where you're like, oh,
that's the blueprint that we're just seeing right now. You know.
Facebook's just Facebook's just the latest in ration of of
you know, the way in which it took all the
breaks off. Yeah, exactly, exactly, Yeah, I mean it was interesting.
Jillapor on your most recent episode was talking about how

(17:10):
the current culture wars are basically the modern like leftovers
from the Cold War and not the leftovers, but no,
it's basically they kept the Cold War going by attacking
left wing politics within America. Yeah, I had I actually,
you know, when she said that, it was the first
time I've ever heard anyone really frame it that went

(17:31):
and a few people, i mean like you know, but
basically she said, you know, and this is the billions
that Jillapor was just to sort of like tossed off comment,
but she was like, you know, when we quote unquote
won the Cold War, all the moves were still there,
and so we just turned those inwards and we started
fighting the Cold War with each other. And I was like, oh, right, yes,
that makes sense, But yeah, it was. It was a
very good insight. Yeah, very cool. All right, Well, we're

(17:53):
going to take a quick break and we'll come back
and talk about culture wars and we're back, and you know,
they're the culture wars that we were just referencing before

(18:14):
their break. But then there's good old bipartisanship that is
the cure all to that. And we just need to
be nicer to each other. I think that's the end
of that story, right, Miles. Yeah, bipartisanship will save us.
It's not a lay mass excuse for not advancing any
real transformative legislation, not at all. That's not the case.
It's not that we have people that are completely not

(18:35):
up to the task of governing in the moment. But yeah,
this bipartisan ship is becoming it's just like so in
your face at this point. They've been so many times
that the Republicans have shown themselves to not have any
interest in governing in any way, like there's merely just
a bunch of racist snakes piled up in a trench

(18:58):
coat who are trying to grind like the progress of
society to an absolute halt, because that's it seems to
be the only way they'll be able to sort of
maintain their power or to just kind of do away
with elections as we know them. But now you know,
first it was like there was the stimulus Bill where
it's like, well, let's work with Republicans, and they did,
and they still didn't vote for it. But then that

(19:20):
wasn't enough to say, Huh, maybe these aren't people worth
talking to. Maybe their mindset is such that it's not
there's nothing they could bring to the table that would
elevate or we can find any kind of compromise on.
And so now we're just seeing more examples. Like recently
we talked about how Mitch McConnell said he would intervene
if Trump's picks just got way to like out of
left field for them to actually win elections. But part

(19:42):
of that interview with Hugh Hewitt was this other thing
that he said was essentially, if as long as I'm
alive and we control the Senate, the Republicans do, I
will never advance a Supreme Court pick that comes from
the Democrats. Never. You can count on that. And I
don't care what you say, I no. I We had
the thing where it's well, Marrick Garland. Those different because
an election year. But then when it was Amy Coney Barrett,

(20:03):
we got the hyper speed people mover or not even
a red carpet just to be like let's fast track
this person straight into the Supreme Court. It's all ringing,
very hollow. And now we're sort of encountering the same
thing with the Infrastructure Bill, where it's about of like, well,
let's get some bipartisanship going, but all of their concerns
are sort of rooted in like nativism or like some
oligarchical ideology that there's no room for things like you know,

(20:27):
climate change, like really addressing that in this bill, because
that's a way to help the economy and also change
our dire situation. So yeah, we're seeing just more and
more of like complaining about bipartisanship with no one really
offering like like actually saying the heart bits out loud
of well, we need to move forward without them. I'm
wondering when he says that he would never allow like

(20:51):
a democratic Supreme Court nominate to move forward, like is
he doing that too? Like do you think he wants
the Democrats to try to load the Supreme Court because
then it would be unpopular, it would like get kind
of put things more in the sort of all out
warfare that he feels most comfortable in, because that's just

(21:12):
such a needless like concession to make of. Just like
I think, I think you are overthinking it. Yeah, I
mean that that's that's almost getting at like three D
chess kind of stuff. And I just think the GOP
just has goals and they say what they want to do,
and they do what they want to do, and that's it.

(21:33):
And so I think when you know, it's like, um,
believe him, you know, when he says it, and they'll
change the rules, you know, and and the rules will
just sort of be the rules that are most convenient
at any given moment. And it's a game that the
GOP is like perfectly willing to play and does not
feel there is no discordance in their head about it.
That's just like that, you know, no no one in

(21:53):
the GOP is like feeling bad about this behavior or
feeling worried about being you know, charged with hip hypocrisy
or whatever. That's it's just the game that they play.
And I think that's the thing. There's just an asymmetry
in terms of the different the games that the game
that Republicans are playing in the game that Democrats are playing. Yeah,
I think Republicans can tell like the writings on the
wall in terms of the popularity of their party, so

(22:15):
it behooves them to go all out, just like, let's
do everything. Let's try and jerrymander the funk out of
these districts, Let's suppress the vote as hard as possible,
Let's do whatever we can to eke out these majorities,
because it doesn't seem like the party's gonna grow based
on them just screaming like socialism is gonna antifa your
guns and that that's for a very select group of people.

(22:38):
And yeah, I think because of that, the Democrats are
looking at it with this calculus of like, well, then
democracy will like I mean big d Democrats have been
sort of trying to defend like, well, we we have
to try and make it work, because if then we're
not participating democratically speaking, then then nothing works and then
we're in this terrible situation. But it completely sort of
ignores the fact that one side of this is a

(23:00):
group that has a complete, like an antithetical agenda to democracy.
So how do you then what what are you preserving
exactly like with this sort of you know, Hine the
Skuyt of bipartisanship. Yeah, And I think that that gets
to I mean, so much of our culture wars and
political wars an our just I think are people both
willfully and just sort of maybe subconsciously like defining key

(23:23):
terms in radically different ways. And so I think that
there's just a definitional gap with the word like bipartisanship.
And there's this sort of old school notion of bipartisanship
being within the Senate. You reach across the aisle and
you talk to the fifty people or whatever it is
on the other side of the aisle. There's another definition
of bipartisanship, which is doing stuff that is broadly popular.
And I feel like Democrats for a bit, we're starting

(23:46):
to make that argument. I think now there's still this
lingering fealty towards bipartisanship is within Washington as opposed to
things like infrastructure, things like healthcare, you know, are broadly
popular and if you can rent, you know, if you
can redefine by partisanship to that, we're going to do
populist things that have wide appeal. Then maybe you start

(24:07):
to get you start to get somewhere. Though, I think
miles to your point. I think the the GOP is,
you know, with clear eyes, starting to move away from
that notion of our jobs to do stuff that has
wide appeal. Yeah. I mean you mentioned the word populist,
and like that's a word that people used to describe Trump,
and it's like kind of the opposite of that, Like

(24:28):
he what's a populous appeal, But it's an incredibly narrow path,
you know, electorally, and his populist appeal is to a
small portion of the of the population. It's just that
it's the trappings of popul We associated racism with populism
early on, and I feel like that's racisms are pretty

(24:49):
popular for a while though to be yeah, yeah, but
I feel like it's becoming less. Yeah. Boy, can I
can I say one thing? Just as you were talking
about your definition of by partisanship, Also, it made me
think of my daughter who's just turned four, and we're
trying to teach her about sharing, and I think we're
doing a pretty good job, but she has now I
feel like overlearned what sharing means, which is, you know,

(25:12):
I have something I'm like eating a sandwich and she
tries to grab it for me, and she's like, we're sharing,
you know. I feel like that's that's sort of Republicans
thinking about bi partisanship, partisanship, Sure, let me have that.
We're doing it my way, right. That's bi partisanship. By
partianship is you don't say no to me's the deal here?
And that that's how Democrats very much see and that's

(25:32):
why I like, it's really frustrating when people now you
have like Ed Markey and and Jeff Merkley saying like
we're not going to vote for some watered down infrastructure bill,
like we give a ship about the climate. So if
those things aren't actually articulating the legislation, we're not going
to support it. And that puts them in a really
tough spot because how what are you gonna get twelve

(25:52):
twelve Republicans on board? I don't know, And I think
that's what a lot. There's a lot of hesitation even
within the House, like they're saying, like, what is a
bill that it's gonna actually get support in both chambers
because the water down version you're gonna have defectors on
like the progressive end who don't want to support it,
So then what's the math there? And that's led to,
you know, one of Biden's advisors going to the Hill

(26:13):
and basically saying like, look, there's two ways we do this.
One is in seven to ten days you figure out
how to get Republicans on board, and if not, we'll
just try and just smash this through under reconciliation. So
we'll see where that ends up. But uh, yeah, the
first time I've heard them be like, we'll do it
without them. But will they? Can they? But do you
think there's any any benefit to putting something out there

(26:36):
that at least feels like it could get sixty votes
just to get some Republicans on the record voting against
something that is just like super simple, super straightforward, has
all that bipartisanship bipartisan No, I mean it depends. I
don't know. It's really hard to know like who that
appeals to because I'm clearly like in my own echo
chamber and bubble and how I look at the politics

(26:56):
on the Hill, and I have a calculus I used
to determ and if I want to support a party
or not, And I don't know if some people are
just think of it seems like the mainstream or a
lot of the mainstream Republican views just say no to
everything Democrats do, like we're so piste off about the
election that all we can do is just burn the
house down. And so I'm not sure if that as
much as like there have been these like moves to

(27:18):
try and get Republicans on the record or try and
coax them out, it doesn't seem like it's happening because
Trump still so much he has somen't we care, he
has just so much influence still, So yeah, I don't know.
It's a hard it's a hard one to predict. There
was a article in the Washington Post about like but
two of the leaders who are basically being black balled

(27:39):
by the Republican Party because they disagreed with Donald Trump
on like one individual thing. Republican Tom Rice of South Carolina,
i think, voted to impeach Trump after the insurrection, and
another kind of Chip Roy in Texas voted to certify

(28:00):
the election results. And those two like one off decisions.
They've agreed with Trump on literally everything else. Those two
one off decisions, they're like, yeah, that I signed my
political death warrant by disagreeing with him once and now
I'm being primaried from the right. So that's the threat.
I mean, because I'm I'm I'm very curious about this.
What is the actual You hear it said all the

(28:23):
time the GOP is scared of Trump. And I think
for a while in two thousands, sixteen and seventeen and eight,
even into eighteen, you know, there was a real threat
of like Trump, you know that you could get primaried.
Trump can swing elections. I don't think that threat really
is there anymore. I think Trump is a political liability.
So what is the threat? That's what I'm trying to

(28:44):
figure out when you say he's a political liability, Like,
do you do you think that he can't win like
another election? At this point? I think it would be
very hard for him to win another election. I think
he stuck his nose in. I mean, it was very
hard for him to win in two thousand sixty. People
people weirdly like talk about underrated like people weirdly forget

(29:04):
that was like the most Rube Goldbergian way to win
an election ever, um and people have forgotten that. Not
to diminish you know, the consequences of it. But um
but I mean, you know, he stuck his nose in
Georgia and um, yeah and probably lost that election. And
I just I think that threat but maybe I'm wrong.
I mean, you know again, I'm curious what you think

(29:26):
is the actual threat that to uh, that a Republican
elected official feels if they crossed Trump, I'm scared of
X happening. I think it's like there's like anecdotal stuff
like Kinsinger has talked about how much his life has
become a hell, like with constituents like bombarding him with
calls or harassing his family or his family harassing him.
Because I think in general, they're not really they're not

(29:49):
operating on principle. They're operating on what's popular or what
gets the most cheers for them at a rally. So
like if the Trump thing helps them, then I feel
like that's what they were gravitating towards and just any
bit of turbulence that occurs from their base because there
maybe be like you know, vocal maga people in their
in their constituency that hearing those words is enough for

(30:10):
them to think that Trump very much has his power.
Like yeah, I'm I'm also a curious thing because there
are a few Republicans have said, no, I don't give
a ship, like, um, this is what I believe come
at me, And increasingly they have said, hey, I've had
to spend more money on security. And I don't know
if those sort of anecdotes sort of are the sort
of the backdrop for a lot of these people's perception

(30:32):
that this guy can make things really hard for you.
But when you but I totally agree when you look
at the people that he wants to run, like, how
could you go from people who are like on paper
like objectively not to say that I agree with their politics,
but from a purely plus one winning strategy point of view,
that you have viable candidates, which just because they're not maga,

(30:54):
you're gonna flip them for someone who is completely not
competitive in the same district. That's where I think, like,
is it happened in two Like there he put out
a bunch of weird people and they didn't they didn't
they weren't up to Scruss. So I don't know if
it's going to take another cycle like that, and maybe
they go, man, this guy doesn't what he's doing, Like
we're gonna lose the party. But I don't. I don't

(31:16):
know how many of those Republicans are there who are
thinking we're gonna lose the party, because there there's these
new batches like, hey, we're here for nativism and white
nationalism and you know, making hot giving hot takes on
the Holocaust. I think I'm just like blown away by
the fact that one of the two major parties in
the US is essentially openly authoritarian. Like the thing that

(31:38):
they disagree with is an open and fair election, and
like that's what gets you blacklisted and within that party now, right, Well,
that's and part of that is what comes with when
you're you know, your singular goal is retention of power,
and then you're clear eyed about the fact that you
can't really do that through normal meetings. You know, that's
how you end up being an authoritarian. But you know,

(32:01):
I also think that one underdiscussed current in this sort
of like engine of the modern GOP is like anti
anti Trumpism. Right. I don't think it's necessarily pro Trumpism,
but I do think this like culture war owned the Libs.
I feel like since the Muller Report, almost when the

(32:21):
GOP convinced itself that like, oh, the Muller report was
there was it was a sham. There was no Russian collusion.
Liberals have gone around the bend, you know, YadA, YadA, YadA.
I think that anti anti trumpism for like the Lindsay
Grahams of the world. I actually think that's what's making
them tick. It's this sort of like anti liberal thing
more than it is core fealty to Trump, if that,
if that distinction makes any sense, Yeah, it's just I

(32:44):
guess that's what it's hard when all of their rhetoric
is tied up in defending him or defending his actions still,
and then that's when you're like, well, then what is
it exactly like that? What is this other dimension or
this influential you know, lever of power or this for
worse that we're not able to see with our eyes
or ears. And that's also affecting them because yea, at

(33:04):
the same time, you Lindsay Graham, like he would have
won if the Wuhan lab leak thing was properly invest you, like,
what you're still talking about this what do you owe him?
Like what's going on? But I feel like at some level,
I thought, you know, maybe Liz Cheney and the old
school Darth Vader wing of the GOP would be able
to do something. But seeing that that didn't have much sway,

(33:27):
I think shows that there's definitely like a different endgame
for these people. Yeah, and just another gapeanos. Dana roar Backer,
who we've used to talk about, is no longer in power,
super arch conservative Trump supporting congressman. It was recently pictures
revealed that he breached the police bearer kids at the

(33:48):
insurrection and was like, they're kind of breaking the law.
So that's one direction that you know, Trump can take
your career is your Yeah, well, I mean Dana Rohbach gurd,
I mean he went he fought with the Mujahideen against
the Russians in the eighties, Like he went to Afghanistan,
Like he's he's always been like hey, where's the party yet?

(34:11):
Type of energy always where you're like, oh wow. There's
like a really interesting photo of him like with like
a collistion to CoV and stuff in Afghanistan in the eighties.
Very interesting image. He was just born to be in it, right,
It's just born to be in it exactly. Oh man,
what an inauspicious beginning to to that campaign. Man, that's

(34:34):
just born to born to be in it. Now watch
this kick flip. Let's talk about New York in l
A getting back to normal. And yeah, kind of, I
just I just brought this up more because like it's
more of just a feeling I have around all of
there's like this fanfare about reopening and like, you know,
you have Cuomo being like, you know, we can go

(34:55):
back to life as we know it, and other people
saying like you don't have to live with fear of
the virus anymore, and like we can, we can go back,
and these like all the verbiage being used, it just
feels like it's not acknowledging like how traumatic this entire
ordeal has been. And there's like a there's like a

(35:16):
dimension of acknowledging the humanity of the pandemic that I
feel like really missing from all of like the headlines
and you know, news stories. It's like, hey, man, like
the l A galaxy is going to full capacity, and like,
isn't that great? Because at the end of the day,
I feel like there's so many people who have gone
through so much this last year and have had to

(35:36):
compartmentalize and then on top of it like the way
people even looking at their work and like how we
you know, we saw all of the like the grim
realities of like the ills of our society and who
reaps the benefits and whose labors being exploited, while we
just like give fancy labels like essential without the real
like material acknowledgement that what they do is essential to

(35:57):
the country running. And and yeah, there's just there's just
something that like rings this hollow that I'm just I
don't know, I'm I'm I'm more curiously how everyone else
is sort of seeing that because I feel like all
of the messing just like, oh man, that's over a
few Okay, great, it's all come out. It's over, guys.
And nothing happened back then. That was the last year.
None of that happened. Like it's I don't know, And

(36:18):
not to say that we have to dwell on it,
but on some level, I feel like part of the
reopening should have a dimension of like wellness to it
or acknowledging how you like, acknowledging that it was a
fucked up year for many people unless you were at
a certain socio economic level. Yeah, And I think if
we don't acknowledge that out loud, it will be acknowledged

(36:40):
in some other like weird cultural I don't know, like
that we saw that. Whether whether we go forward and
like spend a lot of time talking about it and
processing it, My my guests would be Americans not not
going to do that, Like mains from American culture not
the best at processing trauma. And also we talked before

(37:00):
about how like when you look back at the historical record,
the nineteen eleven pandemic was basically just like it didn't
really leave a mark, Like people didn't write that many
novels about it. But then you know they're people have
speculated that it led to all sorts of like kind
of under the under the surface cultural movements and stuff.

(37:24):
It'll be interesting, but I do agree like there's a
healthy way to do it, and we probably won't be
doing that. Yeah, I mean, Myles, I'm glad you said
that because I I think it was you know, maybe
a month or so ago, there was just a lot
of consternation about if you're vaccinated, to take off your mask,
and just a lot of pressure and a lot of
people sort of taking these weird stands about like wearing

(37:45):
a mask and and and giving people a hard time
for still wearing a mask, you know. And I had
the same reaction, which is, like, this has been a really,
really tough year. If it's gonna take someone a couple
of weeks to get to the place where they're comfortable
taking off their mask, or if they're gonna be like
unsure of what to do, like let them be unsure,
let them be uncomfortable, like a couple of weeks, Like
this is gonna work itself out, And and like why

(38:07):
is that the hill that people feel this desire to
die on? This like this has to happen now, and
we have to draw these bright lines now, we have
to flip this binary switch. Like, you know, I'm incredibly
excited to get back to the normal things. I'm incredibly
excited to rip off my mask. Like you know, I
don't like wearing a freaking mask. But like this idea
that I would, um give someone a hard time if

(38:28):
it's going to take them a few weeks or they're
gonna have to you know, slowly slowly ease their way
back into things. Um, It's it's bizarre and sort of like, yeah,
there's no humanity to it, And I think you're right, right, yeah,
it's and even with the mask thing, it's sort of like,
you know, what have It completely ignores that so many
people know someone, whether directly or indirectly, probably someone that's

(38:52):
passed away because of COVID, and or you know, has
someone that is experiencing long COVID, or you know, I
know people who are still on oxygen like from time
to time because it's still not they haven't quite fully recovered.
All of those things play into people's minds because that's
what the reality has been the last year. It's not
like got it. My whole last year has been me

(39:14):
inside just playing Fortnite over and over and over again,
and I just wish I could go outside and just
like start drinking at Applebee's again. Like it's been fraught
for many people who's been like I don't know what
I'm gonna do with my kids. I don't do them
at my house or my job. I don't know if
my parents are gonna survive. And it's also freaky for
me to try and see them because on top of that,
I have the weight of potentially infecting them because I

(39:36):
don't you know, Like, all of these things have been
thoughts that have been racing through well, I think a
lot of people's minds, and especially for people who have
had to go to work throughout it, they've felt that
they've been forced to work in really unsafe conditions. Their
their safety has been completely disregarded, and no one there's
no consideration for that. And then there's no acknowledgment that

(39:57):
they were putting themselves at risk this whole time too,
And then it's sort of like, yeah, man, everything's great, huh,
and there's just something that I just I I don't
know why, Like you'd hope that on some level they're
like mental health professionals that were also being like people
are going to have to sort of deal with what's happening,
because I do see this left over trauma that's occurred
from the pandemic, Like, yeah, metastasizing into something else later

(40:20):
down the road because people didn't deal with all this
other energy they had that was just papered over in
the name of like getting back to normal. Right, not
down the road, I mean metastasized in real time. Last year, right,
we saw, you know, we saw the results of of
what what this did to us as people were cooped
up and the connect with each other yeah, I mean

(40:41):
the mask became a symbol of like anti individualism. I
feel like for a lot of people in the country,
and like they reacted absolutely violently. I do wonder if
we'll see a because I mean, there there's no avoiding
the fact that we just saw this social safety net
just completely collapse and made spider webs and it was

(41:05):
made clear you know who who is prioritized in America.
And I you've seen like small ways that things have
moved a little bit leftward, like just allowing people to
make more money and kind of service jobs. But it's
like you really people have had to had their hand forced,
like Chipotle had to have their hand force to do

(41:28):
that after the pandemic. But I am wondering if like yeah,
I'm wondering if that's going to be a broader thing, right,
Like that's everybody now has this new normal where they're like, oh, yeah,
this is this is bullshit, Like it's not. There are
certain circumstances where we can't pull ourselves out of the
quicksand by our own bootstraps, and you know, we need

(41:50):
to we need something there to to grab onto, and
it wasn't there, so like well, I mean I'll tell
you something I think about a lot, which is in
the last spring and then even into this spring, but
certainly the first round of stimulus, you know, I was
really surprised, to be honest, that like in the conversation
around the first round of stimulus and then Biden's first

(42:12):
round of Stimus as well, it was really kind of
taken as a given that there is a robust role
for government in helping people in times of crisis, and
that is not something this country has kind of like
taken for granted, you know. And and so I mean,
I think there is some sort of level of progress there,
I mean. And then there was another example that is
there was there was some Republican congress person or senator

(42:33):
someone just fairly recently who tried to trot out that
Reagan line of the scariest words in the English language
are I'm from the government, that I'm here to help,
and they basically got laughed out of the room, I think,
kind of by both right and left. And I think
it was an indication like that kind of language doesn't
play anymore, like people are starting to really take for granted,

(42:55):
I think across the spectrum or whatever you wanna call
whatever we're living in right now that there is a
role for government, and so I do think like maybe
that's one of the lasting things. And who knows how
long lasting is, but you know, at least right now
it feels like it's out there. I'm sure we'll see
another squeeze and you know, action from people. As you know,
certain Republican governors begin turned saying no to federal stimulus

(43:17):
money for unemployment, and see what comes out of that
when they say, all right, well let's say people completely
off of this uh and force them into jobs that
don't even meet the you know what most economists say
is the minimum to live in a state, um, and
if you have a child, like, it's not even close.
So yeah, I'm yeah, I think. But that's the other

(43:37):
thing is like I think there are other people to
have found boundaries to or something, or at least they've
become more resolute and trying to say what they want,
are willing to do or not willing to do, or
at least express that more openly, because I think before
this everything was just sort of like, oh God, this whatever,
this given job sucks, There's nothing I can do about it,
that's it. And now I think because unfortunately people have

(43:59):
been taken to the brink that they're starting to be
more vocal and say, you know what, I'm watched me
say no to this job. That's how serious I am
about not taking sub subsistence wages to keep my life going. Right. Yeah, Yeah,
I feel like it's sort of a hacky metaphor, but
I do feel like we're living in a bit of
a era where people are seeing the matrix a little

(44:22):
bit and are seeing the sort of way in which
government um and historical forces aligned to affect their day
to day lives and are asking sort of fundamental questions
about that. Which that's why I'm always talking about how
we try to redpill people exactly, metaphor that we think
works really well for the dailies. Fist and uh, We're

(44:43):
hoping people get it, and you keep breaking trying to
reclaim exactly. All right, let's take a quick break. We'll
be right back, and we're back. And Darnella Fraser, who

(45:08):
was the seventeen year old who took the video of
Derek Chovin murdering George Floyd, has been honored by the
Pulitzer Board. I guess it's not a full pulitzer. I
don't know, like all the different levels of pulitzer. It's
a citation, which sounds bad. This sounds bad. You don't
want to be you don't want a citation. But this

(45:29):
is it's an honor. She she's one of the only
kind of private citizens to get it. I guess the
famous photograph of the fireman holding like pulling a baby
out of the rubble in the Oklahoma City bombing was
also taken by just like somebody who worked nearby, and
that person got a similar like pulitzer honor. But this

(45:53):
seems like it's on a whole new level like that.
I don't know, I can't. I can't think of anything
more deserving of a pulitzer. Like she was just a
kid going to get snacks at a corner store and
just I mean head to stand in the face of

(46:16):
like them holding onto their like pepper spray and just
like doing all sorts of threatening ship like to her,
and just like kept taking the video and like really
changed the world. It's like a pulitzer even enough, you know,
I feel like like in terms of like I get it,
because it's more you know, for like you know, journalism
and literature and music and things like that, and like

(46:38):
this is something it almost transcends all of those things
because it, Yeah, I unfortunately it took this like unadulterated,
uncut video of this happening to inspire like a lot
of other people who were probably were treating the like
this the white supremacist ills that week's into this country

(47:00):
just like I don't know, like not real until that moment,
and it just seems like it's so far beyond I
mean because considering like the amount of sort of danger
she was in for a certain period of time, like
right after that, and the trauma that she had to
go through, and just other people who were there at
the time trying to plead with the police. Yet it's yeah,

(47:22):
I mean, the idea that Choven will, while ignoring the
cries of bystanders and murdering someone just in cold blood,
like in front of everybody, has asked him, was that
pulled out his mace? Like that is like who who
is that for? That's probably for the people who are
just standing there, And she just didn't move, she didn't

(47:44):
let it make her run away. Yeah, I mean I
think the yeah, I think the citation here is the
sort of surface level is this this photo had an
enormous obviously an enormous impact. But I do think what
you what you two are getting at this that what
she did, um was it was was journalism, right, It's
a truth telling. It's standing there and bearing witness. And

(48:05):
so I think that that's the sort of real level
of of commendation here, citation here. And I also just
think this is a reminder, another reminder in this moment
that like, if her video did not exist, Chauvin would
have gotten off you We've all seen how the original
police report was written up. You know, we're living Yeah,
we're living in a sort of era that is defined

(48:28):
by whether if you know, police behavior is captured on
on a cell phone video, then that that's you know,
that changes everything, and that's sort of one of the
defining features of this era. And so I think of this,
this moment, this award, the citation to her um as
a reminder of just kind of like the power of
starting with you know, starting at this point almost ten

(48:48):
years ago, just the see change of everyone having a
camera in their pocket and what that's done. And still
it's like so rare for me to pull out my
camera like that. It just really puts unto perspective, like
how common these sorts of things must be, Like the
number of times that something like what Derek Chovin did

(49:10):
or worse happens that it doesn't get captured on camera
like that. I also think about that with the Walter
Scott murder where the cop shot him as he was
running away in the back and then just like walked
up and planet evidence like that is it's wild that
somebody happened to be just like taking a video of
that like from you know, twenty feet away. It's truly

(49:32):
unbelievable and you know, an amazing stroke of luck that
just goes to prove, like God, how frequently is this
happening when like the one in a million chance that
somebody has their camera out at that moment isn't in effect, Yeah,
it kind of bums you out there, two, because you
have mounds of bodycam footage that are just as incriminating

(49:53):
in a lot of cases too. But somehow, and like
these other cases, the needle doesn't move, And yeah, think
for for all that's happened just shows just the insurmountable.
I don't know, I just almost feel it's just like
this mountain, we're still at the foot of of trying
to ascend because there's still so many obstacles to actually
bring people who are abusing their power to justice. Yeah,

(50:16):
it's worth pointing out that, Darnella Fraser, I believe this award.
It's a special citation, but it comes with the same
prize money as all the other awards. It's not a
ton of money, but you know, it is worth pointing
that out. Okay, real quickly. I I do kind of
just want to get because I've been getting questions and

(50:36):
like comments from people saying like, come on, we have
enough problems here on Earth. Why are you covering this
like unidentified unidentified aerial phenomenon or you know, submerged phenomenon nonsense?
And I just I kind of want to just get
have that conversation on the show, like about like Miles,

(50:58):
what your thoughts are on, like whether it's worth continuing
to like kind of keep an eye on. And also
Jody as somebody who hosts a history podcast, like what
how do you view like the importance or like just
even the conversation around the video evidence that's coming out.
I think it's compelling. Yeah, I mean I the no

(51:20):
one's saying this footage is fake, and so that based
because of that, my curiosity is I'm immediately interested to say, well,
what is going on? Yea, what is this? Why are
things moving like that? Is it a technology we don't know?
Is it some other thing? But at the very least
I'm interested because it goes against bucking everything I thought

(51:42):
that was realistic or possible or plausible up until this point,
or like you know, it's always treated as things like
get over it is some other thing that happened, but
that that I don't know. When you see this all
all this footage and then you on top of the
Pentagon's like help us, I'm definitely interested. I don't know
if it's don't think it's like frivolous to talk about
it necessarily, but I think it's I don't know, it's

(52:05):
it seems pretty significant unless what at the end of
the day it comes out and they're like, oh, they're
all fake like then then then yeah, then it was
what were we talking about this whole time? But well,
I don't I think even in that scenario, it's a
worthwhile conversation. I mean I think that I think the
disconnect and maybe Jack, you're you're hearing a little bit
of this is just that for some reason, there's this
expectation that we haven't talked about UFOs for so long

(52:28):
and a conversation about him have been sort of relegated
off into the corner, and now we're finally tearing the
top off, and that means that we should, uh, there
should be a big, definitive answer at the end of that,
and like we're not gonna we're not going to get
that anytime soon. It doesn't mean it's not a worthwhile
conversation or it's not interesting, especially if you have to
host a daily podcast. You gotta fill forty five minutes

(52:48):
every day, and what else are you gonna do? You know,
we can, we can fill it with all kinds of
nonse more, we're filling it with conversations about whether we
should have conversations see the Metal, Yes, but no, I mean,
you know, I I have found it endlessly fascinating and
also incredibly confounding. Like I don't feel anymore like I

(53:13):
know more with the capital kay, no more any you
know now than I did. But I found it interesting
to think about feel like everything else, we sort of
have a historical corollary for or you can at least
like think about it in the context of history, and
this one is just we we don't. It's well, yeah,

(53:35):
you mentioned very briefly at the beginning of this project
I did called Death at the Wing. It is with
this guy Adam McKay, who's one of my favorite sort
of directors, and he's just a brilliant guy. And he
has this production company. You know, this is sort of securitis,
but he has a production company called hyper Object Industries.
A hyper object is a thing. I'm probably gonna butcher this.
You'll have some sci fi geeks get in touch with
you about the actual definition, but you know, it just

(53:57):
basically a like thing that doesn't have context. It just
arrives and you do not know how to place it.
And you know, I think climate change is one of
those things that's just like there is not a historical
precedent for coming around to understanding. I would argue, actually,
like the level of wealth and equality we're seeing in
this country is sort of a hyper object, Like we
just don't have the language to process what it means

(54:19):
to be a multi multi, multi billionaire and what that
does to us. I think the UFO thing is sort
of the same, Like there is not a continuum of
conversations that that prep us for this, right, It's just like, yeah,
we're beyond the we're beyond the looking glass here, Jack,
You're a modern day Copernicus, man, That's how I like, Yeah,
you know what I mean. You're challenging, like, oh wow,
Geocentris City, Okay, I'm a modern day Copernicus. Groupie. It

(54:45):
was like, yo, Copernicus, we love you, We love you Copernicus.
So one thing that I think is tied up in
like my interest in this is the the idea that
if this is real, there is like some hopefulness that
that like there is this scientific continuum that keeps going
beyond like what we currently know, and whoever is at

(55:08):
that level beyond what we currently know has decided not
to kill us like that. There's something like almost like uh,
religiously like optimistic about that idea to me, that like
is basically contained in any version of this that isn't
just uh that this was somebody uh doing fake photography

(55:30):
and somehow fulling a bunch of fighter jet pilots. Yeah,
And I think I think some people pushed back though
too because a lot of this ship that's discussed about,
you know, aliens or UFOs is like art bell type
ship where it's a little bit like you know, coming
out in a like left field and you're like, I
don't know, is this like for real? This guy said

(55:51):
he was on a Navy ship in the seventies and
saws and like, okay, let's everything felt like it was
just sort of these like this oral tradition of like
you know, people saying basaw stuff. But I think that's
what makes this really interesting is that we're going to
like what the government is saying, like, no, this is
this is the real footage, this is what has happened.

(56:11):
It's documented, and we're still saying we're not sure what
we're looking at. And I feel like anything that gives
a little bit more sort of fuel to it, I
think there would be art bells or you know, any uh,
if there was any like real event that was treated
as the way that UFO and alien you know, culture

(56:34):
is treated like I feel like anyway, if you were
just like baseball doesn't exist, and the military's official position
was like, yeah, there's no such thing as baseball, and
the only people like people who had been to games
were the only sources of information, and like you couldn't.
Like I I just feel like any observable thing that
was treated by the military, like so many of these

(56:56):
pilots are now being like, yeah, we see it every day,
and we just we're scared of like being called crazy,
so we didn't do it. Like that's such a profound
stigma to like try and then create, like build a
body of information around Like so yeah, I did not

(57:16):
get that at all, um, but I really admired your
You're saying it's bigger than BASEB. Alright, finally, let's let's
talk about what's going on with the Girl Scouts real quick.
Some some pandemic related problems. Yeah, apparently many look, many industries,

(57:38):
governments had their deficiencies exposed during this pandemic, and I
guess the Girl Scouts aren't safe either, Like the story. First,
I just saw that they had They did terribly with
Girl Scout cookie sales last year. They have fifteen million
unsold boxes, which is like never happened before. They're like
everyone's scratching their heads of a lot of the people

(58:00):
at these like at the local council level up to
the like the national level have different I guess, competing
ideas around this. At the highest level, they say, look,
it was a global pandemic that was unprecedented, Like what
do you that's why we have that's why we have
this surplus of cookies. Like I don't know how to
explain it, Like the traditional ways of selling weren't available

(58:21):
because store like where they have the folding table out
in front of the girl. It's all just informal like
foot traffic, like yeah, and it's all like networks, there's
typically just whatever. You just exploit your own social network
to just being like yeah, let me just crank out
a bunch of boxes being sold. So that's the one

(58:44):
that's the sort of overarching idea. Then other people point
to like problems that are a little bit bigger within
the Girl Scouts that they said, you know, over the
last twelve years, the membership has declined from two and
a half million to one point eight million. And some
say they said, because the Boy Scouts have like began
to rebrand and change their policy that just that will
also allow like anyone to join out, not just boys.

(59:06):
That it's also siphoning away some of their membership, Like
is like the more conspiratorial, like it's the Boy Scouts,
they're they're they're messing up our recruitment. I think the
other there's a few other things though, too that I
think might make sense. Wait, the argument there though, is
that there are not literally not enough boots on the
ground for the Girl Scouts to move the product essentially,

(59:27):
Like that's one because this gets soldiers soldiers on the
corners exactly, everyone exactly, and then they come back to
the throw a tennis ball across the street, and then
you throw up a hand signal, so you know how
many things to give the custis. But the other thing
that's really interesting is that whole like at the end
of the last year, that the huge stories that were

(59:47):
coming out about palm oil production and how it's used
this child labor. It's terrible for the environment, and it's
also like a huge ingredient in Girl Scout cookies. And
that led some troop leaders in certain jurisdiction in certain
parts of the country say, you know what, we don't
want to use our children to sell products that were
created by children. Huh. Interesting. Um, so that's like another

(01:00:12):
reason they said, some some people were so woke. But
then I think a lot of people also just point
to the fact, like you're saying, there's no when people
aren't going into an office, you're not able to just
voist just tens of boxes on coworkers and people like that.
And also they say that just overall, like for the
last ten years, there's so much more options for kids

(01:00:34):
for things they can do, like and what they want
to put their energy, and it's not always just going
to be Girl Scouts. Now there's your radios, I tell
you what rot their damn brains. They seem like the conflict, Yeah,
that that this feels like an er situation where it's
just we were not together and sort of Girl scott

(01:00:54):
cookies are you know, a social product that seems like
the answer to me. Yeah, yeah, And I just don't know.
I think also, I don't know. I feel like over
the years, I've slowly began to look at Girl Scout
cookies with more contempt, just in terms of like they're
not they don't hit the same Like this was it

(01:01:14):
because I was a kid, and I was like, you know,
it was like the one thing that like the sweets
that my parents would like let me have because it's
like we're supporting my friend school who wants them. But
then now, like I remember, just like some of the
newer flavors just don't sit right with me. I don't know,
I don't know if maybe my palate is I've just
gonne beyond the girl Scout cookies. Now yeah, also, like

(01:01:36):
I mean, why don't they just collapse? Like I'm sure
it will become increasingly weird for the Scouts to be
gendered by like boys Scout girls scout right, and the
boy Scouts changed their name to Scouts B S A.
I don't know why they kept it kept the initials
of Boy Scouts of America, but like it seems like

(01:01:58):
that is probably the next move is just to like
collapse them. And but I don't know, the fact that
that's not even being part of the conversation suggests to
me that maybe I'm too naive for this cub Scouts game,
all right? Might be? Yeah, well, Jody, such a pleasure
having him in. Where can people find you? Follow you here?

(01:02:21):
You all that good stuff. I appreciate you asking that
people can listen to this day in esoteric political history.
It just rolls off the tongue, doesn't it. Um Wherever
you get your podcast. It's a Radiotopia show, so um,
you know, you can find us there. And then I
I am on Twitter at Jody Abragan and you can
find me there too. Nice And is there a tweet

(01:02:42):
or some of the work of social media you've been enjoying.
I actually do have one Instagram account I really do
want to recommend I've been enjoying the hell out of lately.
And it's called It's the Countess ball House. If you
just google ball House Instagram, it's like got some weird spelling,
but if you google you'll find it. But it's it's
this guy who does side by side images of photos

(01:03:05):
from the NBA with like master artwork next to it
that sort of look the same. I mean, it's it's
very hard to describe, but he finds these synergies and connections.
So have all have a photo from last night's playoff
game with like a Dega right next to it and
they look almost exactly the same. Or you know, he'll
have like a Da Koon ng and then a photo
of James Harden and he just has this ability to

(01:03:26):
to make these mashups and find these connections. It's like,
uh has has it in any just world. This would
have like five million followers and right now it's like
two thousand. But it is amazing. These are you see this? Yeah,
and it's spell like house. The house is spelled like
bow house. So it's it's it's all underscore. So it's

(01:03:47):
B underscore A underscore, L underscore L underscore, H underscore
A underscore you underscore s got it. But it is
brilliant if you know, if if you like art at all,
not that you don't even have to know anything about art,
but if you feel things looking at works of art,
this is actually it's. Yeah. The way he's sort of

(01:04:07):
distilling a lot of these images and then finding like
these parallels and find art is yeah. I like this. Yeah,
I likes pretty great. It's pretty good. Thank you. It
was one of those things when I discovered it, I
like immediately emailed and texted everywhere, right, so I'm trying
to spread the word. It's one of those get in
early miles. Where can people find you? And what's a
social media work? You've been enjoying Twitter, Instagram, Miles of

(01:04:31):
Gray and also the other podcast for twenty Day Fiance.
You could check us out on Twitch, dot tv, slash
four twenty day fiance. We're talking ninety day fiance if
it wasn't clear, And you know, I'm not really kind
of in the same boat, you know, I was talking
about therapists. I'm like, you know, sometimes you're you get
your get your wheels going spinning too fast when you're

(01:04:52):
on that social media. So I just want to shout
out an account on TikTok of this really fantastic drummer
who plays like drummin bay and like jungle type beats
like on a kit and has like all these like
really great symbols to give you all kinds of like
reverse symbol sounds and stuff. And he's playing it all
live and so it's a combination of social because you
get to watch it. But then he gets a little

(01:05:13):
to naj and the count is called ned Drums one
to three. That's on TikTok. I think he has an
Instagram account, but you can see this dude just get
just nasty on the kid playing like what is you know,
traditionally like sample electronic beats. So yeah, check that off tweet.
I've been enjoying Josh Gondleman just in general has been

(01:05:35):
very funny on Twitter lately. He tweeted, It's unreal that
the public bathroom air hands dryer industry a k. The
airborne germ blowing around industry survived the past year and
a half. They must have the most powerful lobby in Washington.
And then George Wallace Mr. George Wallace, classic tweeter and
comedian tweeted, I grew up so poor we could only

(01:05:57):
listen to cool or the Gang. Um uh thet you're
feeling that? Uh. You can find me on Twitter at
Jack Underscore O'Brien. You can find us on Twitter at
Daily zeitgeiscre at the Daily Zeitgeist on Instagram. We have
Facebook fan page and a website, Daily zeitgeist dot com,

(01:06:20):
where we post hire episodes. On our footnotes, we link
off to the information that we talked about in today's episode,
as well as a song we think you might enjoy. Miles.
What are we sending people towards more Hiatus? Coyote? Yeah
you haven't been listening, Come on now, get into it
and Coyote spelled k A I Y O T E.

(01:06:43):
They're my favorite band right now. They're so solid on
their instruments. I say that every time as someone who
plays bass and trumpet and want to be drummer. I'm
always impressed with the instrumentation. This track is called Chivalry
is Not Dead, and it's just the songs are so
like rich with the sounds that they use, and like

(01:07:05):
even how they go into odd meter at times. So
check this out. Chivalry is Not Dead. I can't believe
they have a song named after my catchphrases Chivalry is
not Dead, Ladies. The Daily Zyka is a production of
My Heart Radio from more podcast from my Heart Radio,
visit the heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you
listen to your favorite shows. That's gonna do it for
us this morning. We're back this afternoon to tell you

(01:07:27):
what's trending, and we'll talk to you all day. Bite, bite,