Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio, the George Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty arm.
Strong and Getty and he Armstrong and Getty.
I think if you've run the numbers here, you know, twenty five percent chance it turns out really well and there's a secular country kind of emerges. I think twenty five percent it shuts down pretty quickly as Jihatas takeover. Maybe a fifty percent chance it looks like Libya, which is an ongoing state of conflict.
Man, seeing how people the happy, those people were in Syria over the weekend, bringing down those statues, dancing in the streets, children, old people, people crying as they saw loved ones who were released from the prisons that they hadn't seen in decades. But you know, if you're old enough to have lived through the Arab Spring, you know how a lot of these turned out unfortunately.
Right, So an enormous couple of days for the people of Syria with the uncertain future ahead. Also, the fall of the Asad regime has sent shockwaves.
That's a cliche.
I should have avoided it throughout the region, and geopolitically is it's exposed Russian Iran is much much weaker than they've been formerly.
Where does it all go?
Perhaps we'll we'll discuss that with Mike Lyons, military analyst who joins us from now. Mike, I realized predictions are extremely difficult in that part of the world.
But this is a big one, isn't it.
Yeah? For sure? That was Admiral Sterheti's I take it from his voice. Yep, yeah, right, So you know, fifty percent turns into living interesting analysis. I think that there's a higher probability that things go south very quickly. Unfortunately, it's just human nature of what we've seen in history in that part of the world. But there is opportunity, no question. The main thing is what are these external
countries like Turkey going to do to get involved. I see the United States and Israel already going after military targets, taking away capability, military capability of this new group, this HTS group that seems to have taken control of the country right now, getting rid of their AMO dumps and keeping them from waging more conflicts. But what Turkey you would like to do is create this state of Kurdistan.
I don't know think of Syria becoming let's say, Balkanized and kind of chopped up to a big piece of land, not a lot of desert areas. So the cities are the built ups there. But what Turkey you would like to do is find a home for thirty million people that are indigenous to that part of the world and call it a homeland. Now, the problem Theyria has as a country. It doesn't have a lot of natural resources, It doesn't export a lot of things. So you have
a country, you have to have all those things. Anyway, all those things you brought up tremendously important as well. Russia is now weigh down the fact that they've lost a war and more report in the media. Tranian the Uranians can't help either. So we'll just have to see. But I'm betting things there to go south before they get better soon.
Well, we have nine hundred troops there, seventy five air strikes yesterday, so we're involved at some level. As reading this from the La Times, their headlined in Syria, militias armed by the Pentagon are fighting those armed by the CIA.
Yeah, yeah, it's likely a story as we have looked to prop up some groups. The problem though, this this HTS group. This the main the main rebel organization is nothing more than a merger of different al Qaeda facts and al Nustra in factor or one of their main supporters and so as that was used in some ways to fight ISIS, and that and that reason you're still at groups that are on the terrorist watch list, which is why I know that this administration is looking anywhere
to get a win. You saw ject Sullivan over the week and talking about how well Israel has done because of the Biden foreign policy. Well, actually they've done well because they've not paid attention to the Biden foreign policy. That's really what's happened there, not anything that this administration did. But this administration is looking for some victory as it walks out the door as it cheapestly has the door
kind of shut it behind as it leaves. And if they can, if they can try to claim something that this will go well, they'll obviously try to take credit for it.
So we'll see.
Yeah, speaking of Israel and Iran, this is a huge blow to Iran, It's got to be, and to its proxies. I mean, has Law, which has already had the hell beat out of it by Israel right now lacks a direct supply route.
How significant is this?
Yeah, incredible, the fact that exactly that land bridge now is torn between Iran and those proxy forces there as well inside of a rock. That's why those nine hundred troops are there as they kind of they straddle the tigers euphrate's value there and try to shut those supply lines down on a lot of the attacks that were taking place that we took over the weekend were against
those Militsia forces that the Urine support. So they've lost all of their proxy forces in Hasbla, in Hamas and then these these small splinter groups that it's now open season for US, I'd say at some level, which is why I heard eight tens for example, we're striking some of their targets there. So again, Irana is very exposed right now. They've never been weaker. Russia to me, is
no longer any kind of superpower whatsoever. And again part of the issue is going in destroying that military equipment that Russia left behind, because if that falls into the wrong hands, I think that the world is going to see increase conflict that Israel is looking to show up AT's bordering a Golden Heights with Cerea as well.
So for a lot of our audience, I don't know what percentage, but a chunk of our audience would say this we should stay out of it. Did we never get a good result. I don't want us involved at all. What's what's your response to that?
There's nothing that we can do to influence anyone's side. Let's see what Turkey does. Let's see what Turkeys respond. Is going to be as there in the region. Let them do a lot of this dirty work. It does not make any sense to even send treasure there to pick one side or the other. The only thing we should do is continue to support our ally Israel as I would not be surprised if this new organization at run Syria declares so I'm kind of ge hot against Israel.
So that'll just be another, you know, another target for Israel to take down. That would be that would be bad because Israel would eventually accomplish that mission. And this that's where this revolution then that just took place there would go down with die in the ashes, it would ever get off the ground, because again, Israel's Israel's at the strongest point right now. But there's literally not a single soldier, not a single dollar we should send to their way right now at this point, So.
You can clarify something for me, because I know we'll be pressuring Turkey not to go wild on the Kurds, who have been you know, reliable US allies. But so are you suggesting that because Turkey has always been vehemently against some sort of Kurdish homeland. But is it now that the Sad regime is gone they can carve it out of Syria that now they're in favor of it?
Is that right?
Yeah?
Yeah, that's right there against the homeland because most of them sit inside of Turkey proper and they don't want that to happen. They sit in rock Syria, Turkey and Iran. And so this is similar to what happened in the forties when when Israel gets its own homeland set up by the you know, kind of a World Council. That's what I would not be surprised if Turkey does though
again that Balkanization. They're gonna they're going to take fury of what was once is big land Masks and whack it up into four or five different areas and different secular groups. The Drus, There's there's a Christian section there in Damascus. There's all different areas that you can easily do this. But but again you have to create more of a republic because it's you know, each of these different groups, would we have a have a channel surviving on their own. So for example, if if the Curds.
One of the reasons why the Curds are so successful as an indigenous group outside is because they own oil rights in the northern part of Iraq. They generate red If you don't have a country, you got to have a generate revenue. If to the military, all these kinds of things, you've got to figure all that out when you try to redraw new boundaries. Here the boundaries that Syria has created after World War One by colonial powers that just thought these were the boundaries that we were
going to do. Saying with the rocks sands koit same with everything that exists there, and now they're falling into more of the natural position as to where they are based on the tribal people where they lived.
I think this question is relevant. So I was looking at the end of the year book lists and various publications because I like reading the best books of the year.
And there's this book that Steve call wrote I wrote read Ghost Wars years ago, but the Achilles Trap Sadam lu saying the CI and the origins of America's invasion of Iraq, and it's all about how we had four different presidents that were pro regime change and all our momentum towards Iraq and how we invaded and what did we get out of it and all that sort of stuff. You were there, do you feel like I'm not trying
to like relitigate Ara. I'm just trying to figure out is that where your point of view comes from of we should stay out of Cerea, that we rarely get a good outcome.
Yeah, we try to. We try to import democracy into places that can't. It won't take it, It won't hold there on any level. I mean, it's just not going to work. What we should try is create the environment where we import capitalism. I think that's what's failed in a rock in the last twenty years. We always have the government and you know, we have those people with the pictures and their purple thumbs, but next thing, you know, the extremists and the regime start cutting their thumbs off
because they just they're not into democracy. Is that they just don't they don't have that this feeling of self rule. However, capitalism and money and wealth is more or less a you know, a human condition as well. That's more easily transferred to. If you can create the conditions where businesses can exist, then then democracy will follow. We've always tried to do it in the different other direction. We try to implement the democracy first and then capitalism hasn't worked,
and that's why that's why it's failed. I think in Iraq, if we could figure out a way to bring capitalism there first, bring the businesses first, I think the democracy would follow well.
And Americans in general have a naivete that would be charming if it wasn't so dangerous that they imagine either everybody around the world thinks like Americans do, or they can be persuaded to when you're talking about hundreds of year old's religious fundamentalist, fanatical movements, that they're just nuts. That doesn't make me a racist, that makes me a realist, exactly.
You know, so much of the world, especially in the Middle East as part of the world, where the normal civilians go hours without electricity, they can't drink water from the faucet. There's so many things we take for granted here in our you know, in our country, that they don't have, or their basic necessities that the government can't
provide for. But no, that's right. It's the real politique to how we should deal with this, and we should get back to containment, get back to the countries that we know, our allies in that region, and support them and make sure that they don't fall. But let the ones in the region take care of it. Let's say, if Turkey is successful at carving out a Curtistan, they solve a couple of problems. They solve a revolutionary potential
problem in their country. The Turks are concerned that the Kurds will all get together because there's thirty million of them. If they all get together to tide to overthrow the Turkish government, well that creates a NATO problem then at some level. So that's what I think that we should the path we should go down.
Military analyst Mike Lyons, Mike, great to talk to you, Thanks so much for the insight.
Great guys, thanks for me absolutely so, I can't tell if I'm inconsistent or wise. I don't actually know, but as you know, if you listen, I'm big time supporter of US being involved in Ukraine, and I think it's very important to the world order, and I think it's directly important to the United States, and the Secretary of Defense Austin announced yesterday another one billion dollars in military aid for you. I'm all for supporting Ukraine. I am
not for getting involved in these Middle Eastern countries. I just don't see what we've gotten out of it over the years.
Well, obviously the answer to that is long and complicated and probably book length. You know, I'm more than happy to engage in that chat if you want. It just has to do with our national interest obviously, and which seel like we.
Get the same result whether we get involved or not in these countries Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Egypt.
Oh yeah, in the Middle East. Yeah, you could make that argument, But more on that to come. After a quick word from our friends at Simply Save Home Security, You us, We everybody worries about the safety of your home and your family.
No better time to act than now.
Simply Safe is extending its massive Black Friday deal for our listeners. Get fifty percent off a new simply Safe security system with their spectacular advanced monitoring abilities. Yep.
If someone's lurking around acting suspiciously, agents actually see them in real time through your cameras you have set up, talk to them directly, set off your spotlights, even call the police before they've had a chance to break in. That's not what other security systems do.
No, it's simply Safe, active guard outdoor protection that changes the game. It prevents crime before it even happens. There are no long term contracts, there are no cancelation fees, and it's around a buck a day for all this protection. Yeah, that's a fraction what you paid for your crappy old system. And me too, simply Safe again fifty percent off a new system with select professional monitoring plans. This is your last chance to claim best offer of the year. Head
to simply safe dot com slash armstrong. That's simply safe dot com slash armstrong. There's no safe like simply Safe. It's interesting.
Mike Lines is one hundred percent stay uninvolved in Syria and Trump, who's going to be president here soon and to some extent he is is also, we have no business being there, so that's probably the direction we're going for better or worse. Oh, we got a lot more on the way. You can join us anytime on the text line four one five two nine five kftcrong.
A woman has filed a lawsuit against Diddy, accusing him of assault and dangling her off a seventeen story balcony, which is just incredible grip strength for a guy coated in pavi oil.
Wow. Wow, So I really I see that you didn't grab any of them, Michael, and I understand why their first like four jokes were all about the assassination of that United Healthcare CEO in Manhattan, and unfortunately I saw blowback against that before I saw the jokes would put a thought in my head, I hate that. Uh. I didn't think they were particularly out of line him. They're distasteful.
I don't like being the joke police. Ever, if you're intent his humor, you know some of it's distasteful, and then you know, if you don't like it, you don't like it. But I don't mind jokes about serious things. The this stuff the New York Time Times headline. Some on social media see suspect and ceo killing as a folk hero. You know that's sort of like turning him into a folk hero stuff I am bothered by. But making jokes about things either you like it. I had the same experience.
I ran into the online condemnation, thought, oh, I had to listen to those jokes, and I found them much more innocent than they're portrayed.
A couple of yes. On the insurance thing, we got quite a few texts that are really interesting about the way insurance companies handle bills and people who work in the industry and stuff like that. And again, I'm uncomfortable with even getting into that because there's a certain bit of the killer getting his way. It's kind of like when you read a school shooter's manifesto and take his argument seriously. Yeah, I get that.
Ethically, I'm uncomfortable going into it, although there are it's beyond denial that we have serious issues with health care and insurance and stuff in the country, and a lot of people get hurt and a lot of people are mad.
So I get it.
Yeah, we shouldn't buy the discussion with the blood of this poor son of a gun who's gunned down on the pavement, but it is a legitimate discussion. I just hate to even imply that therefore it's okay to shoot people in cold blood.
Well, we got some text about it. We'll get to them later. This hour.
Got an email from Jan wanted to know if I buy a present for my husband.
I shouldn't have used a real name. Ah, you just ruined their Christmas. I hope you're happy you probably Christmas, probably every Christmas to come, because the pain of this day will linger in their memories. Anyway.
A woman whose name is definitely not Jan wonder whether if she got her husband a present from the Armstrong a Giddy store, whether it would get there in time for Christmas?
Yes, but do it today? Oh I need to do that. I actually had that thought over the weekend.
The premium may in ge hoodie flying off the shelves. People are loving the cut, the crab t shirt, and the hot dogs are dogs as well.
Armstrong getdy dot com? How is it? How do you crass commercialism? How do you feel about me buying family members Armstrong and Getty stuff? Does that seem it's a little odd? Is it's fine? You would you would like it? Here's a gift to you. You helping me by wearing an advertisement that puts more money in my pocket. It's Michael, I bought family member stuff. Yeah, they liked it.
Oh yeah, And I don't know if you've seen the books, the money actually doesn't go in our pockets. But I remember, well, this is a long story. To listen to the show because they see the advertisement. That's what I oh. Yeah, yeah, yeah, because yeah, that's that's a good point.
Yeah. Ah oh, we've just got thirty if I bought my parents, I bought you a billboard on I eighty in your name for Christmas advertising the radio show. It's well, it's it's.
A warm wearable that taken the say look, this is my brother, my son, my whatever.
It says. Shit, I don't know, do whatever you want. Trump did an hour plus interview and meet the press yesterday kind of got obscured by the news of the day with the ultrabiased she Wolf.
Kristen Welker will have the highlights of that interchange between the evil suckubists and the power resident elect coming up Armstrong and Getty.
Well, I don't want to be breaking up families. So the only way you don't break up the family is you keep them together, and you have to send them all.
Back there you go.
Trump, in response to the inevitable question, you say you wanted to poor people.
Are you going to separate families? Always asked from the point of view of it being bad, even though he ran on that got elected and sixty percent of people approve of it. So it just drives me nuts.
Whenever we talk about this, I'm reminded of my youthful idea of living in Germany to work and study and stuff like that, because I studied German and thought that might be interesting, and it became clear that there were severe limitations in getting into the country.
Then staying in there and working was very, very difficult.
You had to get permits and stuff like that, so I and I accepted that. I thought, well, that's unfortunate, but it is what it is, the idea that I would go to Germany sneak in and then when they say, hey, you don't have authorization to be here, and you certainly don't have authorization to work, me saying, how are you gonna separate.
Me and my family?
And what would the Germans say to that, Well, they'd say it in German, so you wouldn't understand it, folks. But what it would mean essentially is be quiet and get back in line.
It's not our problem. We got a bunch of clips, but I thought maybe the most important one that should have gotten a lot of attention but didn't from Trump was when he was asked about do you ran on re retribution and he said, I'm really looking to make our country successful. I'm not looking to go back into the past. I'm looking to make our country successful. Retribution will be through success. Okay, there's your hitler for you, there's your hitler, there's your thermal.
Would be another election again, well, and he has made that point repeatedly. The retribution is how successful we're going to be.
That lays it to rest. But it's such a good clickbaiting narrative.
The lion liars in the media and Kristen Welker is their unholy princess. They just can't leave that to the narrative alone.
Stop it.
There are real problems with Trump quld making stuff up right. By the way, I'm told Daniel Penny has been acquitted in the death of that homeless lunatic on.
The New York subway. Wow, so it's over for him, Thank you, bless him?
Yeah, yeah, shame somebody had to die, but enforce the law in New York.
Yeah, well you don't want to die, don't go jumping on a subway car threat and a whole bunch of innocent people. That'd be a good way to avoid it. Poor Daniel Penny, What a trial he has been through. And I shouldn't use that term. What a you're the word guy, come up with a word? What a difficult period of his complit journey whatever, Yeah, journey is good. What a horrible thing to have to go through when all you did was you're the one alpha male in the room who's willing to try to stop this guy
from hurting people. Everybody on the train car was thrilled that you did something about it, and you came this close to go into prison.
Yeah all right, So back to Trump and Welker. A lot of people have enjoyed this clip. It's thirty seven, Michael. They are discussing January sixth.
In general, officials say that the order never came in.
For the national ars on January sixth. Let me ask you this about.
Joe in a statement that he has destroyed evidence.
Let me ask you this about January sixth.
I wish you could be a if you you know, you have such potential, if you could be just just non biased. You hurt yourself so badly. I'm telling you, they deleted and destroyed all the evidence. Everyone knows it, and you off like it doesn't mean anything. No, if I.
Didn't deny it, that's all I'm saying.
List if I did it, you would be standing up in that chairs shouting at me, and you know what I do, I'd say, you got me.
My main takeaway with that is, Okay, you're gonna ask him about January sixth again and try to get him to admit to something or whatever. Do you I assume, Christian Walker, you don't like Trump and don't want him to have power and be elected. You're helping him. You're helping him.
Yes, the majority of people are like whatever, move on to something else. I know a lot of super hardcore Trumpeters would love to talk about January sixth for the rest of their.
Lives, but that's not where most of America is.
Well, no, America saw it and they had a choice between Trump and then Biden and then Harris, and thank goodness said we're not electing either one of them. So yeah, he brings with him that baggage. But let's let's look to that. What are we accomplishing by relitting gating it at this point? And Jack and I were both harshly critical of Trump then, and I have not changed my opinion of his activities on the day one Ioeda, I
still condemn it. And yet here we are, excuse me, in the year twenty twenty four, with a hell of a lot on her plate.
Let's get on it.
So speaking, which Christen Welker, who again I should have written out all of my various insulting adjectives I'd had in my head to use for her, because I find her obnoxious, smugly, one sided, and snotty ooh, just not a good person anyway.
Ah, she brought up the.
Federal minimum wage and clip thirty nine B.
You see that one. Michael.
I don't if you remember this, but during the debate in twenty twenty I asked you if you would raise the minimum wage. You said you would consider it. And so my question for you is now that you are going back to the White House for these nineteen states that voted for you, are you going to raise effect.
It's a very low number, I will agree it's a very low number. Let me give you the downside though, In California they raise it up to a very high number, and your restaurants are going out of business all over the place. The population is shrinking. It's had a very negative impact. But there is a level at which you could do it absolutely.
What is that level?
I don't know.
I mean, I really don't know. I can say this, you have a lot of businesses that are open and thriving because of the lower minimum wage. If you raise it too much, and you understand this, if California went crazy, they went crazy, and people the restaurants are closing all of them, many more people are hurt.
So I hear you saying similarly to sort of what you said in twenty twenty.
Will you consider this something you're going to look at.
I'd want to speak to the governors. And the other thing that's very complicated about minimum wages is places are so different. Mississippi and Alabama and great places are very different than New York or California, I mean in terms of the cour of living.
And other things.
So it'd be nice to have just a minimum wage for the whole country, but it wouldn't work because you have places where it's very inexpensive to live, where a minimum wage, which is eight or nine dollars might be you know, might have very much, very little effect because the cost of living in certain places is really low.
This makes me so tired, I know. So first of all, he's the leader of what is now the working Class Party, and the raising the minimum wage polls. Well, it's unfortunate. I think with a five minutes of explanation, you could explain to a lot of people why it's not actually good for you to raise the minimum wage. But Trump realizes,
you know, the party that he's leading. But even when he states to her there's a downside to raising the min wait, she just completely blows that off and goes with the next question of obviously it would be good for everyone to raise the minimum wage. I feel like I should inject here one from one of your Thomas swell so Well quote on Twitter about the minimum wage.
The minimum wage law is very cleverly misnamed. The real minimum wage is zero, and that is what many inexperienced and low skilled people receive as a result of legislation that makes it illegal to pay them what they're currently worth to an employer.
Well said, very succinctly, said, Trump frustrates me always because he does just a half assed job of of explaining some of the principles that I hold dear.
But you know, he is what he is.
But the federal minimum wage is to call it irrelevant is to exaggerate how relevant it is. It is a complete non factor in anyone's life. It's a silly discussion. If states want minimum wages, they should pass them. There is, you know, with the exception of a couple like enslaved immigrants who are probably trying to escape right now, and I wish them well, there is nobody in America who is exchanging their labor for a wage that they are unwilling to exchange their labor for.
Nobody.
If you don't want to do a job at a particular wage, you will not take that job. The idea that the government can, somehow, especially the federal government, prop up some sort of minimum it's just it ignores everything that is the most fundamental about economics. It's just silly. It's a silly question. I mean, it's it's pretty silly on the state level. On the federal level, it's completely ridiculous. Say you're gonna have a minimum wage for Coonhuller, Kentucky.
And what is that gonna do for the people in Seattle for instance? Or La Nothing, it's just dopey Kristen.
Oh, what's the main business in Coonhuller?
Squirrel skinning, mostly squirrel pelts, squol, squirrel coats, squirrel hats.
I make and sell, I make and sell frog gig and sticks. Oh, you're the jack of Jack's froggy sticks. Yes, jack sticks are very pointy. My daddy used to tell me, boy, you go frog giggins son. You don't have jack sticks, you might as well have popstickle stick. Eh. Anyway, I assume you stab the frogs or something.
More of Trump and welk in a moment after a word from our friends at Omaha Steaks. Perfect gift for people who don't need stuff. My dad give him Omamaha steaks all the time because he doesn't want something on a shelf, or he doesn't need more golf clubs or what have you. He has everything he needs, so get him Omaha steaks. And there's a fabulous deal going on right now.
Yeah, I have anybody on your list who eats, I'll bet you do right now, unforgettable gifts with fifty percent off site wide at Omaha Steaks dot com. Plus score an extra thirty dollars off of the promo code Armstrong. The steaks obviously it's right there in the name fantastic, but also the hamburgers, the hot dogs, the apple tartlets, the various potatoes, all really really great.
If I go to a restaurant and have a bad steak, I want to weep. I want to destroy the place. I want to stage a protest.
I hate it.
Okay, I take steaks seriously, Omaha Steaks. The last filet Judy and I had was melt in the mouth. It's just so good. From legendary stakes to mouthwatering desserts.
More.
Save fifty percent off site wide for limited time at Omaha Steaks dot com. Plus you good people get thirty dollars extra off with the promo code Armstrong. Again, that's Omaha Steaks dot com and use that code Armstrong.
Minimum purchase may apply.
Let's see which what else do we want to play?
I like where he calls her hostile and nasty. Yeah, let's play for me, Michael.
The press has to straighten itself out because Honestly, it's lost all credibility based on the press. I should have gotten no votes none. Oh, and yet I got the highest number ever. And the reason is because I'm able to go on a show even like yours, even though you're very hostile, I'm able to go on a show like yours.
No, Well, hopefully you thought it was a fair interview. We covered a lot of policy grounds.
It's fair only in that you allowed me to say what I say. But you know, the answers, the questions are you pretty nasty?
But look, that's true. You know, you would think.
The press would like to see strong boarders, great education, are powerful military. So we have a country left and all these different things, and somehow they don't want.
To see that.
As always, I wish I could, you know, be the fly, or not the fly on the wall, but the voice in Trump's here and have him say, like you've pointed out, Jack many times, you ask every question from the perspective of liberal Americans. More than half the country is conservative. Ask a question from their perspective ones you might like it.
Yeah, And on some specific issues like the deportation, there's polling that shows the vast majority it's in ease. It's a sixty to forty win for deporting illegals, right, So why why ask it from the point of view of the forty speak which she asked every single one of her immigration questions. From the perspective of AOC pretending to cry in a parking lot miles away, the phoniness thirty one. He's talking about, you know, deporting people, and you know both ends of the equation.
You know, the people that have been treated very unfairly are the people that have been online for ten years to come into the country.
And we're going to make.
It very easy for people to come in in terms of they have to pass the test. They have to be able to tell you what the statue of liberty is. They have to tell you a little bit about our country. They have to love our country. They can't come out of prisons. We don't want people that are in for murder. We have to get the criminals out of our country, and we got to do it.
Yeah, we're going to let the good people in, the smart people who we can use, and we're going to get rid of the murderers. But what about separating families? What the hell?
So we got some we had the conversation earlier about that United Healthcare CEO getting assassinated in New York and how awful that is, and anybody who acts like that's a way to fix problems is a lunatic. But we got some interesting comments on the insurance industry and things that people have observed and experience that are worth discussing, So we can do that when we come back. Stay tuned.
Arm Strong Hengetty fans are counting down to one last magical performance on Taylor Swift's Eras tour. One thing is certain the tour's earthshaking impact.
Over the past two years.
The newly minted.
Billionaire has become Spotify's most streamed artists, broken box office records, lifted the NFL's ratings, and boosted economies, all while dropping.
More than seventy songs.
Surveys estimate the arastour has driven more than seven billion dollars in consumer spending in the US and Canada alone, between tickets, travel, food, merch and outfits.
I remember we broke this down when she was touring the US, the amount of money she brought into La the three I think she played there in various cities. It is a huge economic boom boom boom if she came to your town and now she's finally finishing up a two year long tour so she can fully focus on Travis Kelcey and the Chiefs playoff run. TMZ is saying the United Healthcare ceo murder person of interest has been detained by the police. I don't see that anywhere else.
Oht CBS has it now. A person of interest is being questioned in Pennsylvania in the United Healthcare CEO's murder. Could be nothing, could be everything. We'll find out they probably got them. I'll bet they do too. So we already had the discussion of whether or not we should be dignifying the guy's probable arguments about healthcare costs and being out of control, which we kind of are by
bringing it up. But got these texts. My wife works for an oncologist here in California as billing specialist, so all she does is bill insurance companies, and she tells me that the dirtiest thing the insurance companies do is repeatedly deny certain services hoping the bill will go away. And it works because the biller gets tired of trying. What you guys said, about doctors losing money on medical Medicare patients is one hundred percent true. I think we've
all experienced that. It seems like they just say no, at least once to see if you'll go ahead and pay it, and then sometimes like I, just ignore it and eventually gets paid, which is a very frustrating way to have a system. Right, Yeah, I can picture that.
And again, none of this justifies gunning a man down in cold blood, not even close. But yeah, I could see as a policy, Yeah, hey, just deny everything. If people have the wherewithal to reapply, then give it to them, but we'll cut four percent that way.
Another point of view, different topic. I can guarantee you that if insurance companies approve everything doctors recommend, we will soon be given MRIs every time we have a headache. The problem is fair resolution of what's medically necessary, and that's hard to achieve when the person making that determination is employed by the company that has to pay the bills.
We may need a separate, independent board to make such decisions, rather than a claims agment claims agent who thinks he's going to move up the corporate ladder by being hard nosed and save the company money.
All right, as I've had I've got a couple of friends, golf buddies who are doctors, and they pointed out that, you know, a patient says, my elbow hurts, I want an MRI, and you tell them, well, there's practically no chance that it's anything an MRI would discover. Blah blah blah, it's just not worth the cost. And then that one in two hundred and fifty case turns out he had a tumor in his elbow and it kills him or even you know, he has to go in a hospital
or whatever, you get sued. It's enormously expensive, and so you think, all right, ef itt you want an MRI, I'll send you for an MRI. It's a complete waste of everybody's time and money. But the insurance companies say, dude, you don't need an MRI. So, yeah, that push and pull is fairly natural.
Yeah, well, I remember though, on the I.
Wouldn't claim for a second that it's not sometimes unfair and immoral.
Yeah. I know, somebody right now keeps getting denied for they got a black spot in their lungs something like that they can't improve for any MR what's the other one. The other one's cat scans or whatever. I had that at the beginning of my cancer, where they just yeah, that the insurance company hasn't agreed to that yet, we're gonna so you could. I finally paid cash. I paid twelve hundred bucks out of my own pocket and went
to a different place. I figured out which one was the cheapest, drove forty five miles and had it done there, paid cash. It got reimbursed by the insurance company. But the fact that they wouldn't do right off the bat was highly annoying, given the fact we were already down the road to something wrong. So right, you know, sometimes it's very frustrating. Again, does not justify murdering the CEO has nothing to do with this decision, especially because and
that the correspondent made reference to this. We were talking about it earlier.
Is the unholy uh relationship between the government and the private health insurers and how the government has forced them into an incredibly difficult spot. Or they're making a lot of profits, but they're essentially we the ratepayers, are getting ripped off.
But more on that to come. Well, if they did arrest the guy who did it, We're going to find out what his reasoning was pretty soon. If you miss an Iver, get the podcast Armstrong and Getty on demand Armstrong and Getty