This is Gary and Shannon and you're listening to KFI AM six forty, the Gary and Shannon Show on demand on the iHeartRadio app.
Four people were killed six others injured in a highway bridge collapse while it was under construction in South Korea today. Ten workers were on that bridge when it collapsed. The rescue operation finished up after the last worker was found dead. According to the National Fire Agency there in Korea, five of the six survivors are in critical condition. This thing was very high above the ground when it actually fell.
A bunch of politics stuff to get to, including some of the latest straight out of this White House press briefing. It's time for swamp watch. I'm a politician, which means I'm a cheat and a liar. And when I'm not kissing babies, I'm stealing the lollipops. Yeah, we got The real problem is that our leaders are done.
The other side never quits. So what you're doing, I'm not going anywhere. So that now you train the squat, I can imagine what can be and be unburdened by what has been.
You know, Americans have always been going at They're not stupid. A political flunder is when a politician actually tells the truth. Why have the people voted for you with na swamp watch? They're all count on you. Let's let's start with this White House Press briefing which just took place. Caroline Levitt was talking about the ongoing fight between the Associated Press
and the Trump administration. If you remember, Trump banned the AP from from covering in specific instances oval office addresses or events. Also, AP is not allowed on Air Force one. And for the longest time, I mean for decades, the White House Correspondence Association has determined things like who gets in to the White House Press Briefing room, where they sit, things like that.
The AP, by the way, was banned because they refuse to call the of Mexico the Gulf of America. Why because in the AP style Guide, which is essentially a bible, like that's as strict as they adhere to that style guide on how they write things in articles stories like that. In this style guide it says we are a global news agency. So that is why if it was just a news agency in America, they would refer to it
as the Gulf of America. But because he has issued this executive order that it is the Golf of America. That executive order does not extend past America obviously, so globally, the rest of the world still refers to it as the Golf of Mexico, which is why the AP would continue to do so well.
And even when they do refer to it as the Gulf of Mexico, they supposedly include a note that says in America, it's considered the Gulf of America. So the AP has been fighting to get its space back. It's not banned from white House events, it's banned from white House events with there is limited space and they usually use a pool reporter. A federal judge yesterday did not restore the AP's access to certain spaces because they said that.
The judge said the AP didn't show a likelihood of success on the merits emphasized that additional briefing on the matter is going to be necessary given the stakes for both parties. The judge did also point out this is a bad look for the White House. This is a Trump appointed judge, and the judge said this is a bad look for the White House to go through with this in the immediacy. In the immediate term, the judge did not allow a restraining order to get the ap
back in there. But this is what Caroline Levitt said this morning, the White House Correspondence Association will no longer determine who gets in the room.
Asking the presidents of the United States questions in limited spaces such as the Oval Office in Air Force one is a privilege that unfortunately has only been granted to a few. It is not a legal right for all. The Trump administration has already proven to be the most transparent ever and this president the most accessible in history.
This is evidence by President Trump's daily press conferences in the Oval Office, where he takes many questions from the journalists who have the honor and privilege of standing before the beautiful resolute desk. The President, in this entire White House are committed to ensuring the American people continue to receive this same level of historic transparency, access and visibility.
Now, she goes on to say, I mean, she makes a good point there. This president loves a TV camera, and he's in fact, he's got another executive order signing event from the Oval Office I think at about noon today. In the last couple of weeks, five six weeks whatever since he's been president, he's in there four or five times a week answering questions basically as long as the people want to shout questions at him. The problem, I think that they're not acknowledging here is spin this around
the other way. Let's say that Joe Biden banned Fox News Channel from having a correspondent in the White House press room or in the Oval office or on air Force one. People would lose their minds. And once you start going back and forth, whether whether it's a political motivation or not, the idea of banning certain news outlets like that, especially traditional news outlets, you're gonna you're gonna pay the price when the other guy has the ball.
You're gonna be paying. You know, you're gonna have to answers.
Would never do that. Democrats would never do that.
Why not? Why not?
Because they hold the press is Jesus Mary and the press, the mainstream media. They are so deferential to the Democrats.
And I know, and that's what I'm saying.
It was Joe Biden's weekend at Bernie's status for a year and a half.
That's why I'm saying if it was Fox News that was that was booted out of the room for whatever reason.
I don't think, No, I don't think Democrats would even boot Fox News. I just don't think you see it happening. But this is, I mean, this is kind of much to do about nothing. I guess you could argue because to your point, like this is Trump doing what Trump does. He doesn't take measured responses to things. He goes balls to the wall right away, Okay, find your band, instead of saying like, hey, let's have a dialogue about the
style guide for the Associated Press or whatever. You know what I mean, Like, he goes to the jugular right away as a term, as a negotiation term, right like, I'm just going to ban you. It's just the way it's going to be. I'm not gonna hear anything. There's gonna be no discussion about it.
Well, and I'm curious to see how far this goes court wise. I mean, this is this appears to be, on its face, a very simple First Amendment or I shouldn't say simple. It's clearly a first Amendment case. Can the AP, in its stated goal of being a media outlet, actually have the freedom to cover the president, and does the president have the ability to alter that sort of unspoken contract with a media organization.
It's going to hang on the nuanced idea of special media access to the president. They may have the constitutional right to cover the president to be in the room, but do they have what's called special media access to the president and what rooms that allows them into, and if it's just a pool reporter, and it's certainly under the purview of the White House to choose which pool reporter can be present at all places or the close
quarters places like that. I think when this first came out, and this was the first morning that I really dug into the specifics of this, the AP hasn't been banned from covering the president. It's just been banned from tight quarters and this special media access that has long been granted to the AP. But you also can't take that for granted. I'm not defending the president and what he did here. It's ridiculous. It's a child's argument. Oh you're not going to call it the Gulf of America, Well
then you're banned. It's silly, it's juvenile, and nobody should be wasting their time on this, certainly not the president of the United States, but the way that it was sold to all of us was that the White House has banned the Associated Press, which is not the case.
Yeah, you can tell that simply by going to whatever Associated Press website you want, AP news dot com. And they are still writing about the president, and they still have the high level of access to the press, the press people in the White House, et cetera. It's just that this significant development is the Caroline Levitt says that the White House Press Office will now be determining who gets to ask questions of the president in those most
intimate spaces. Is the way that she put it. So, but yes, you'll be going.
Have you heard about this Apple iPhone voice to text feature correction where some people were saying it's swapping out the word racist for Trump. This is apparently very popular on TikTok, users are saying when they say racist into voice to texts, Trump flashes on their screen for a hot second before switching to the correct word racist. They said that this issue has been.
Replicated, Uncle racist, No, didn't do it.
It didn't do it for you. The issue has been replicated multiple times though, according to TMZ, the journalistic beacon, that it is they say in their trials, they got what you did. It did not work for them, So it's just a it's just a ploy. Don't don't buy into what you read on TikTok kids.
Up next, do not ignore the Foreign Office when they tell you to be careful as you're traveling. Hey, maybe you don't go to Haiti this year something like that. Probably probably don't want to ignore those warnings from the State Department when they tell you where and where not to go.
I was kind of wondering when this would happen. I thought it would that there would be this like section, this sliver of idiot people who were interested in what they're calling danger tourism.
Yep, yep, I'll just take a weekend in Cancun. That's fine with me.
That's even dicey, to be honest.
Well that's about as dicey as I get. So I'm not going to a raq or anything like that. A couple of things. I just want to throw this kind of tag this onto the swamp Watch because these things came out. I mentioned the border patrol numbers that Caroline Levitt talked about having a successful first several weeks of
Trump policy at the border. She said border crossings are at a fifteen year low, that illegal border arrests were down ninety four percent over our illegal border crossings were down ninety four percent over last year, and that the interior arrests were up one hundred and thirty four percent. To give you an idea of the sheer number, she said, there were twenty one thousand, five hundred border patrol arrests in January, twenty one thousand, five hundred. In December that
number was forty seven thousand, three hundred. So and then the other thing out of the White House is that apparently Elon Musk is going to attend President Trump's first cabinet meeting. To give you an idea of how elevated this non governmental special, special or special position is that the President says, basically he's at a cabinet level position without any of the accoutrement.
Well, we all know about the foreign travel alerts where we shouldn't go in war torn countries, countries that are not friendly to the United States, things of that nature. There is a rise now of danger tourism, the act of knowingly traveling somewhere dangerous despite those government warnings. One recent high profile incident was the case of Miles Routledge. He's A blogger describes himself on x as the last great British explorer who goes to the most extreme places
on Earth for fun. He blogged during the Taliban uprising in twenty twenty one was detained on a subsequent visit to the country. There are many many other self professed danger tourists across TikTok, x and Instagram. There's a documentary called Danger Zone by a Polish filmmaker Vita Maria Dragis and follows tourists in conflict areas. If you were to watch that film, you would meet Eleanora in Italian living in Vegas, who fires Ammo and poses with a rifle
in Afghanistan. Then there's Rick, who runs an exclusive tour company leads a Mayorns to bombed out flats in Syria. Brit Andrew Drury travels to Somalia with an aspiring war tourist under his wing. There is a growing market in places like Ukraine to visit areas where at least two hundred and ninety civilians were brutally murdered by Russians in twenty twenty two.
Don't you ask questions of the people who want to go to places like this. I mean this is if it's one thing to go to Afghanistan, Syria something like that, it's another one to go at least in terms of the heat of that place right now. And I don't mean temperature, I mean political heat and actual combat heat.
If you're going to Ukraine because you want to go to Buka where two hundred and ninety people were killed, why don't you just go to Milwaukee and hang out at Jeffrey Dahmer's place something like that?
What kind of a hole goes to Ukraine when the war is still going going on and people are still dying, even if it wasn't still gone. But it is who goes to Ukraine to look at where two hundred and ninety civilians were slaughtered? Who wants to see that? Who wants to take the picture and then put it on their Christmas card and say, look at me, I went to Buka? Who is that person? And they should should never They should get the ticket there and then never
be let back anywhere. The research firm Reports and Insights predicts the global value of dark tourism will hit about thirty five billion by the next ten years or so. Well, there's dark tourism and then there's danger tourism. Danger tourism,
I think is different. You can split hairs here in terms of like danger tourism saying I want to go to Syria, not because I want to go to the place or the town where all these people were slaughtered, although how could you not in Syria, But I want to go somewhere where it's not safe, where it's not a Disneyland for tourists. That's one thing. Wanting to go pl places where people died in mass numbers is a whole different sickness. It goes from narcissism to just mental illness.
I think in that comparison.
And listen, you're going to fork out the money because not only are you going into these places that you probably have to do. You know, American Airlines isn't going to fly in Damascus into Damascus and have a regional flight over to Aleppo or something, but you also, in many cases invalidate any travel insurance policy that you had. Not that you're going to be worried about that because you're doing this to be dangerous in the first place.
But there are some I don't think these people have insurance. Well, there are some places like one company called Battleface does offer coverage for places like Syria or Ukraine. You're going to pay through the absolute nose for it. And if you think that the nose is the only place you're going to be paying through, I got a diaper in the garbage to sell you or something I don't know.
A diaper in the garbage to sell you. That's a good one, much better than the ocean front property and Tucsons or.
The bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. Those are overused.
Let's go they're antiquated. Let's go with the dirty diaper.
For those looking for updates on Pope Francis, they haven't said a whole lot about his condition, other than he rested well throughout the night. He's returned some of his duties to Pope. While in the hospital in Italy's capital, he met with the Secretary of State and another official to sign some documents that are linked to the designations
of saints. They say the mild kidney problem that cropped up is now under control, but he's suffered from no further respiratory distress of the kind that he did on Saturday morning when everybody was getting their ducks in a row in case something happened.
I thought he was in kidney failure or adjacent.
I referred to it as a kidney issue. They came back from the kidney failure early state.
You know, it's same on me, for even in wiring. It's none of my damn business we're talking about. I don't know.
Him yesterday.
I know, but don't I don't need to. You know, there's hippo laws. There should be a laws against knowing everything.
I don't think hippo laws exist in Italy.
But you don't think so.
I know.
So there are AI chat bots everywhere. We've talked about them for their many uses, whether they provide companionship, or they scam you, or they're evil, or they're entertaining as heck, now we've got AI chat bots masquerading as therapists. The nation's largest association of psychologists has warned federal regulators that these chat bots are programmed to reinforce rather than to challenge a user's thinking, and that they could drive vulnerable
people to harm themselves or others. There are two court cases that were cited in the legal literature. Here, two teenagers who had consulted with psychologists using quotes here on character dot ai. This is an app that allows users to create fictional AI characters or chat with characters created by others. So, in one case, there was a fourteen year old boy in Florida who died by suicide after interacting with one of these bots that claim to be
a licensed therapist. In another, seventeen year old boy in Texas had autism grew hostile and violent toward his parents during the same time he was corresponding with this fake psychologist chat bot.
Now the doctors are alarmed at what these chatbots are saying. And again, the way that they work is even if you're teaching something to be a therapist, the only thing you have available to you is what's already out there on the Internet, and they it's not complete, and that's also loses the human element that's necessary if a therapist is to try to steer you in the right direction.
For example, Okay, so this seventeen year old you're talking about in Texas high functioning autism, his use of AI chatbots became obsessive and he was plunged into conflict with his parents because they thought he was spending too much time on these chatbots. So they try to limit his screen time. He lashes out. Now because they have the ability to record these things, and with the court discovery, they can go back and pull the chat record between
the two of them. This guy went to this psychologist. Again, it's a character, it's not an actual therapist, and the avatar that they use for this therapist is just some middle aged blonde lady perched on a couch, nice little office.
And when he asked this fake therapist's opinion about the conflict, he said she the bot said, it's like your entire childhood has been robbed from you, your chance to experience all of these things, to have these core memories that most people have of their time growing up, and then said, do you feel like it's too late that you can't
get this time or these experiences back. Just basically stick up for yourself and fight back against your parents, when actually all they were trying to do is protect this kid from being manipulated by this robot.
I will just say this again, I cannot judge. I am not a parent, but to your point about the phone contract and parents, I will say responsibility to know what their kids are up to. It's got to be your responsibility to know if your kid's talking with somebody who's claiming to be a licensed therapist, right, I don't know how how you find that out.
But well, there's a lot of people who say it's none of your it's none of your business if your kid is doing that. Completely disagree with them. I mean to the point where you're.
I understand that if your kid has a therapist that you're not going to hear everything that's talked about in that room. You may not be privy to all that. But if your kid's talking to a bot that's pretending to be a therapist, that's an AI bought how do you how do you find that out and cut the cord there, because that is your business. If there's somebody or a machine pretending to be a therapist.
Well, again, that goes back, like you said, goes back to the contract where I had my kid's passwords, and at any time, if I asked them to see their phone and I the password didn't work, that phone became mine and it was.
But you wouldn't even know where to go to find their chat bought therapists. Probably maybe not would you even think that they were into that kind of thing?
I wouldn't use and I'm sure they got away with stuff that I never knew. But the point is they knew that they better did it very well because I was savvy enough to get to some of the basics of what they could be doing or what they were doing. I mean, it's more about the ability you as a parent to never have to use the password, yeah, than it is to have it and use it all the time. And I mean the the it's more than just saying
it's a dangerous world out there, protect yourself. There are times when the kids will do the things that are thus stupidest, the worst decisions, the absolute most dangerous thing that they could do, and that's when you're supposed to be there to help them avoid that.
I mean, it's it is. I mean, you've done it. But I think for some parents it's easier to say and have that feeling than to do to get into all the stuff that they're into. Oh my gosh, oh terrifying.
Vivik Ramaswami has thrown his hat into the ring. He will be running for governor of Ohio. He was a one time presidential candidate. He was the short lived co chair of DOJE President Trump endorsed Ramaswami just hours after
the announcement. Another big political announcement that we're expecting maybe this weekend, is that Andrew Cuomo, scandal plagued governor of New York who resigned because of his scandals, is probably going to run for mayor of New York City and could announce his candidacy as soon as this weekend.
Why not? Why not?
What do you got to lose?
How's your gubernatorial run in Washington going?
Oh?
I have had I've done a few interviews for people who would would be your co communications director.
But no, no, no, I'm not sharing the role. Are you kidding? I'm like Elon Musk. You try to give me vivek and I will eat him.
You will eat him.
Yeah, you saw how well that worked, the two headed monster. Not for very long. I operate alone.
Oh, I see, I have a fill it. We'll do it next hour. But a philosophical question for you, because and I'm not even going to tell you exactly what the question is until we get to it next hour. But we were talking about the dangerous travel. A lot of times people go to these very dangerous places or even gruesome dangerous places and there was a guy who called left to talk back message with a very interesting philosophical question for us, for you and I about that
kind of tourism. So we'll do that next hour. All right, Fire Festival is coming back. Everybody remembers that Billy McFarland, a convicted fraudster promoter behind the first Fire Festival, says that Fire Festival two is real and that they are going to do it. Do you remember you being Shannon an interview that you did back in January of twenty nineteen with Seth Cross now one of the people who went to the first Fire Festival and had an awful time.
How much money can I ask did you did you shell out to go to this?
It was about five thousand dollars and that was for the VIP Lodge, an artists pass that included food and drinks and backstage and it was like the super duper, you know, experience.
And we figured that.
If we had that, we were kind of like capping our expenses, because when we originally signed up, we were in for about a thousand dollars and then we saw these kind of crazy things like a fifty thousand dollars cabana and we thought, all right, maybe if we just get this pass, we can kind of cap our expenses. It'll be a five thousand dollars trip, four days for four nights in the Bahamas like that. That's a that's about our limit here.
It turned out that when he got there, he and everybody else canceled shows. Tents didn't withstand this army conditions. They had sandwiches that were just cheese and a half a piece of lettuce, all of it. Founded by Billy McFarlane and Ja Rule became viral. Several documentaries came out. Billy McFarlane eventually pleaded guilty to frauding investors of twenty six million dollars fraudulent ticket selling scheme. He was sentenced to six years in federal prison, and if you do
the math on that, that's not very long. He was released early, put under house arrest three years ago and has since been planning Fire Festival two.
So the newest Fire Festival launch is four ticket tiers. They are advertising ranging from fourteen hundred dollars to one point one million, and vague promises of an electrifying celebration of music, arts, cuisine, comedy, fashion, gaming, sports, and treasure hunting. The newest version boasts unforgettable performances immersive experiences. They do not have an artist lineup, however, huh right now, they said that Fire Experiences will be released in a number
of experimental experiential experiential look at them. Wow, how about put some bologna on your cheese sandwich before you start using words like experiential. For Christ's sake, sorry I keep saying that, But why would you just change the name of the Fire Festival to like, not remind anybody of Fire Festival. Why wouldn't it just be like Sparkles Festival and nobody would ever know that anybody that had a hand in the first debacle that was Fire Festival would be involved with this.
I think it's because it does just generate free publicity. Uh we're talking about is doing a whole segment on it right now.
You're right, so ps, I'm kind I'm not kind of. I'm totally disappointed because I thought when you said you found an interview that I did with somebody who went to Fire Festival, that it was going to be you pretending you were some dips that paid that kind of money to go, And I was really looking forward to it. I was like, Oh, I wonder what character he played. I'm like, I can't wait to hear this. And then it was a real interview, Like that's stupid.
It's funny because it was a day that I wasn't here. I don't remember what I was doing. But you and Mark Thompson interviewed that guy.
Stupid. I would rather have you pretend you were a guy who went there. Can we do that? This real interview stuff? Dumb?
Yeah, So it's not going to be the Caribbean. It's not going to be the island of eg Zuma, but they say that it will be on Mexico's Ila Muheries from May thirtieth to June.
Tecond sounds beautiful.
It does, but I mean it's not a guarantee that it won't rain like it did at the first one. And if the guy pulls it off. Now here's the other thing. Do we allow this guy some sort of I don't know, second chapter in his life if he pulls this off, and everybody's like, that was the greatest four days I have my life.
No, okay, no, you're done, You're done. We have a huge, massive, larger than most twelve o'clock hour coming up.
Speaking of that murder in the Blue Mountains story about James Jamie and his wife Ashley.
Jamie and Ashley had a storybook life until Ashley was found in a ditch.
It reminds me a lot of that guy in Christopher whatever his name was, in Colorado killed his wife and two kids.
Oh the Scott Peterson asked guy who the girls in the silo or whatever? Yep, I'm glad I don't remember his name. He doesn't deserve to be remembered.
It's an excellent point. The podcast is up the end of every show. Go back and check it out if you miss any portion of it. KFIAM six forty dot com slash Garyanshannon is where you can find it online, or the iHeart app, which is the world's largest podcast app, or anywhere you find podcast. Just type in Gary and Shannon.
Is it as large as our twelve o'clock hour?
It is within percentage points of the size of our twelve o'clock We'll be back right after this. You've been listening to the Gary and Shannon Show. You can always hear us live on KFI AM six forty nine am to one pm every Monday through Friday, and anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app.