One two , three , four . Hey , this is D9 . This is .
Carol , this is Ty .
And you're listening to the Part of the Insurrection podcast , the podcast where you don't know if we're actually pro-insurrection or not , until you listen . But before we get to the crazy insanity of the week , let's give a shout out to our sponsor , Sheets and Giggles .
Actually , as a matter of fact , why not let the CEO of Sheets and Giggles himself step in and handle it from here ?
Thanks , steve , appreciate it . I'm Colin , founder and CEO of Sheets and Giggles , and if you haven't heard of us , we sell bedsheets . That's it . That's the whole elevator pitch . And pillows , and pillows .
Of course , we actually had to add the pillow specifically because I got asked too many times if I was like the my pillow guy and I said , well , not yet , I'm still pillows , and so I eventually had to add it into the product roadmap so I could say , yes , exactly like my pillow guy , that is exactly me .
Oh my God , so that's really how you start to sell your pillow .
But with many key differences .
I have to you know , to connect the podcast yet , but yeah , no .
So Sheets and Giggles , as the sponsor of this illustrious podcast , we make sustainable epileptic sheets , mattresses , pillows all renewably out of trees that are grown on biodiverse farms . We use about 96% less water than cotton , 30% less energy , no insecticides , no pesticides .
Cotton is using the insecticide that kills burden B populations and uses about 16 to 24% of the world's insecticides by itself . And then , of course , versus petroleum based products like polyester , our sheets do not leave behind any micro plastics or any trace materials or fully biodegradable .
So , for anyone listening , who is an eco friendly person , who loves cooling , temperature regulating softer than cotton sheets , sheets and Giggles- SheetsGigglescom .
You're talking directly to our audience because we're like what does it even matter ? We're blowing up the planet anyway . And like what can ? I do to say and like yes sustainability in your bed attire is just as important as like getting away from fossil fuels from the cars and all that good stuff .
But yeah , but also , your sheets are incredibly freaking comfortable .
They're amazing . Yeah , they're really good .
Yeah , they're the best sheets I've ever had and might be the best sheets I've ever slept on .
I remember when I got my first prototype , I actually audibly said fuck . Yes , because I knew . I told . I turned to my ex-girlfriend at the time my ex for a reason probably because I was busy starting a company and I was a ADHD entrepreneur , but I told her .
She doesn't thank you personally , she understands . No , no , we're still on good terms .
But I said I'm going to sell the shit out of these . I was like these are so good . I was like this is going to be awesome . So , yeah , they're really wonderful .
They're incredibly cooling , like I mentioned , and I always tell people like so for like the eco conscious people listening , which I know your audience is a lot of , I always tell people like Americans think that we can like consume our way out of climate change , which we can't .
So I always tell people like don't buy the sheets unless you need new sheets and I mean eventually , everyone will . And when you do , who's the company that invests into the environment , that invests into its communities and that makes products that aren't destroying the world ?
So polyester is actually the number one cause of microplastics in our waterways and , of course , they're all fossil fuel based polyester sheets . They're all synthetics , and 60% of the bed sheet market is polyester . So I really encourage people buying clothes , buying sheets , buying curtains , buying rugs try to avoid fossil fuel synthetics like polyester . And so it will .
You know , over time , that demand can drop down and they'll make less of it .
So yeah , I always wonder , like , with that , are we in this vicious cycle where we incentivize the companies to destroy the environment because we keep throwing money at them and if we stopped , would they stop ? Like , what ? Like who is the animus on in that cycle ? I have no idea .
I think it's a bit of both . I think it's a bit of both . I always tell people like people . I think the truth is that if the burden doesn't fall on the consumers in a sense like I really do think it falls on regulators . And you know , you have to give people the right incentives to do the right things .
Otherwise , if you can make $10 sheets out of polyester that are soft , people are going to do it and they're going to buy it and you have to just incentivize that .
Or you can incentivize people to make renewable products with subsidies and grants , and then you know tax breaks and different things like that , but right now there's no tax break for having a sustainable company , there's no tax break for having a company that invests , you know , back into the environment and the United States , we subsidize sugar and milk .
It's insane .
Sugar , milk and oil .
Yeah , what is going on here ?
Yeah , that's the biggest money . It's just a cycle , you know , like if you subsidize it , they make more money . They take that money to spend on a lobbying department , they get more subsidies and then you have a runaway cycle .
Yeah , I'm sure you're familiar with like what sugar big sugar is doing down there in Florida . I mean , you're poor state , I'm sorry bro .
Well , I'm a state . Like I said , I got out , I got out , I'm a Coloradan now . So eight years now Coloradan .
You could never shake that Florida man off of you entirely .
True , the Florida man . My friends still call me Florida man . I do Florida man things . It's kind of in your blood a little bit when I'm back down here . I do think the heat makes people crazy down here . I think it's like the combination of the heat and the no seasons change .
That's kind of my hypothesis is , when the seasons don't change , people lose their mind Like a temporal thing going on there .
Possibly might I add drugs into the equation . You could add a few different things .
You could add . You could add poor leadership into the equation , I think . I think the Santhus is a really a really bad example for for Florida people to look up to . I'm looking forward to his tenure ending out here .
I live in Tennessee . We're Florida light , we're like Florida , without the good stuff . We don't have Disney , there's no beaches , there's no drugs . I mean , I'm not .
But Nashville is like music , Disney right .
Okay , I guess that's somewhat fair . We have a lot of music but we don't have Cuban food , which is like very disappointing .
So Florida's got like a long list of things that are good and bad . A lot of places are middling places . They're kind of in the middle of Florida . It's just like the pros and cons are both massive lists and you know like there's a lot to love about it , so I'm not going to hate it on too hard .
Like my family is still down here Love coming down See him . I need some nephew . There's some messed up stuff about it .
I mean , I know one good , I know one thing about Florida that you do love for sure .
Yeah .
And that is the Miami Dolphins baby . How ? About knocking off those .
Are you seriously a Dolphins fan ?
Yeah , dolphins fan and Miami Heat , miami Marlins . You know , I always thought it was so funny how sports is like and I actually used to say this before . I realized that nobody changed their political views . But when I was younger , in my early 20s , I used to say it's odd that sports you never change . From the time that you're a kid you grow up with it .
They get out the worst owners , the worst players , the worst culture and you're still I mean , in some Cleveland Browns fans they hire a sexual predator as their quarterback and they're still like .
I'm a .
Cleveland Browns fan . You're not talking about that on this podcast .
I'm a gay-dured girl , so Like just a Florida gator girl .
I'm a gator girl , I'm also . I'm a Bolts fan . I'm a Bolts fan , I'm Florida .
You're like Central North Florida ? Yeah , I'm a Miami Hurricanes . So you know , like my dad grew up a Hurricanes fan , I'm a Miami Hurricanes fan . It's hard to be a Hurricanes fan man , especially with all the golden Canes giving us such a bad name , right , dee .
Oh man , hey , don't you get me started . One of the boosters tried to sue my co-host there , so oh no , oh no , that's crazy . John Reuz . Oh yeah , we don't say his name Ty . That's how we get that's how ?
Yeah , we gotta bleep that out . Yeah , bleep that out .
That's how our podcast gets our first official lawsuit .
Yo can I go on a rant about John Reuz's company real quick have you heard about ?
have you heard about ?
so okay so it's my understanding and I could be wrong . Life wallet , but it's my understanding and it could be wrong . That life wallet .
What it does is it combs through insurance claims , the health insurance claims that have already been paid , from the insurer to the doctors on behalf of the patients , and , using its AI , it tells the insurers which claims they actually paid erroneously , incorrectly , according to the letter of the law of their coverage policy , and then it sends a letter to the
doctor's office demanding this is all automated with the AI right , demanding reimbursement for that quote unquote erroneously paid claim . And the doctor's office has to give them that money back and then go after the patient for the healthcare bill that now the insurance company is retroactively denying , even though they already paid it .
So for small doctor's offices , they're getting hit with these phantom six figure bills for services already rendered and some of them are even having to go out of business or to go into debt to pay off these insurance claims that have been denied post fact .
And then patients are being chased for this money years after procedures and then life wallet takes up a percentage of the found revenue . I think that's my understanding of their business model , which feels like the most predatory , un-american , un-capitalist , anti-free market business model of all time , and Dan Lebatard , who I'm not always a fan of .
Love Dan Lebatard .
But he's my guy . He went all the way in on Ruiz when he came after me , like I wasn't trying to like be a part of , like whatever , but I was like put into this like space , yeah .
Well , you showed up on you showed up on because Miami that one time . So there was that .
Oh , with Billy , yeah .
Well , yeah , just like as part . Like you know , Herc , the company that she was working for at the time where she was doing some journalistic endeavors , ended up being sued by Ruiz , and they were talking about it on the show . That , yeah , it was crazy . Yeah , congratulations , that's awesome .
That's awesome though . I love Billy Corbin and I love I really wanna sponsor because Miami . I think it's such a great segment that he does and Billy's become a friend of mine through the Lebatard show . I think I can say that I think he tolerates me enough to let me call myself a friend .
But yeah , he's a guy we would like to be introduced to Billy . I mean I'll follow him on Twitter , but we don't like co-mail .
He's a good dude man . We've had lunch a few times and super , super nice guy , exactly the same in person as he is on the radio . You know , like he is one of those guys whose personality is always authentic and always shines through and I told my fiancee before we had lunch with him last time . I said you know that guy who listens to on the radio .
Sometimes she goes . Yeah . I said you know how fast he talks on the radio . She goes . Yeah , I go . He talks just as fast in real life .
I was like get ready get ready . Oh yeah , Well , I like his documentaries as well .
He does very good oh so good oh yeah , God forbid so good God , forbid Cocaine , cowboys , the you .
But no , you nailed Ruiz's company Like . You explained it better than I ever could , because the way I understood it is he's robbing insurance . Well , yeah , he's basically robbing doctor's offices of money that they probably shouldn't get and like the burden .
It's crazy .
Yeah , it's a banana . But the thing is he's actually not even good at doing that because you know he project . His company was , you know , projected to make hundreds of millions of dollars and apparently it's made only tens of millions since going public and it seems like a whole Ponzi scheme .
It seems like quite the unsupported market valuation . Yes , yes , the way that I would phrase it .
Going the direction of , like the Sam Bankman freed of Golden Canes .
He is someone that I , right away , when I heard about his company and stuff sponsoring the University of Miami as a fan , I was like I don't think that's someone I would want my university to be , so to speak , in bed with .
So that was kind of my initial response so , and I'll get in bed with just about anybody , so you know for that to go , for that , you know , because you make sheets , sir . Yeah , I'm in bed with hundreds of thousands of people . You know what I mean .
So Well , you're in bed with me just about every night . I even need to wash my sheets , but like I don't want to like sleep on my crappy sheets for like even one night , so I refuse to take them off the bed . But yeah , look .
D treat yourself .
And another pair , I think once they Colin is there a discount code available .
Yeah , of course I think it's a . Is it ? Is it pardoned ? The insurrection is a PTI . What code did I make you ?
I don't know if you made me one or not , but I actually , so I'll tell you . This is really funny . I was like I wonder if there's a way to get like it's a discount for these fucking cheese .
Of course , of course .
Well , and I just , like a maid , I went to , I think , shopify and , like , made some affiliate links and put them in the show notes . I haven't even checked to see if we've sold any through the affiliate links . I just wanted to make sure people get a discount .
But then what also happens is again , I know you're a big sports fan and every time the dolphins win you drop that promo code like yeah , of course , every time that I it's my favorite thing to do on Twitter is just , you know , I used to tell people that Twitter was for sports , politics or finance and it was really hard to , as a brand , break into any of
those three verticals . You know , it's very , very odd for a brand to do that . And then I found the Levitar show and was able to break into sports Twitter and our impressions went from like tens of thousands per month , like 20 , to like millions per month and it was awesome to see that growth and that channel . And now I'm sad because it's kind of dying .
Which makes me really sad , yeah , tears .
I mean . I see you using threads a lot now , which is great .
I do and I think it's it's a great platform .
I mean , it's honestly just like a Twitter clone , so what's not to love about it ?
Well , it's , it's Twitter , minus some features , but also minus some riffraff .
Dude , as someone who's I built the company , I care deeply about the user experience of my , of my products . I I go been through tech stars , which is an accelerator that you know . I've seen a bunch of technology companies go through it . I've mentored these companies .
I was at a technology company prior to founding Sheets and Giggles that also went through tech stars . It's raised millions of dollars . I care so much about user experience when it comes to a product , whether it's software , hardware , consumer good , and the fact that Twitter has completely trashed their user experience , seemingly purposefully .
And the main , like the one thing that gets me more than anything is that they had a perfectly good system for upvoting comments and replies , right , so when you reply to something , the best stuff , the most liked stuff , would rise to the top of the replies and you could see interesting things , funny things , insightful things that the community voted on .
And now it's just a sea of shit from anyone who has $8 a month in their pocket , who wants to promote their crypto or their book or their scam or themselves or their ego , and it's just endless blue checkmark , $8 burner accounts that are just hot taking , like yes , haha , like amazing , and I'm just like , oh my God , it's completely destroyed the user experience
, where I don't have a huge amount less enjoyment on going on Twitter now , and it seems so intentional to elevate people who pay for elevation instead of elevating good content . It would be like if Reddit allowed people to pay for their posts to reach the top 25 of Reddit and get hundreds of millions of impressions .
It would kill the platform because people wouldn't you know , they wouldn't find the organic content valuable anymore .
Yeah , it's been really frustrating for me because that used to be one of my main social outlets to end political and just . I don't know . Maybe I got way too wrapped up with it and it's maybe , in a way , Elon Musk did me a favor by helping to kick my Twitter addiction .
He broke everyone's dopamine cycle . Yeah , yeah , but it's also going to keep us disconnected from world news .
I mean it already has , it sucks . I'm like now where do I look at news ? I mean I'll find other things Not bad .
Me and D are pretty active on threads and the community there is pretty supportive . I also find the community there to be a lot nicer overall generally , although I think that will always change over time as the user base grows .
But I don't think there is going to be any platform that can mimic the insanity of Twitter , and that was before Elon , but Elon has definitely sent it to another level . But yeah , you're absolutely right .
He spent a gazillion billion dollars not to buy a platform , but to buy an audience and then tank whatever was useful about the platform that the audience was using . We just don't have time to get in . There's a whole yes , there's more than we could possibly cover in one conversation about that .
So earlier you were asking why we even began a podcast in the first place . Well , I would say it's something similar to maybe Elon's intentions with buying Twitter right Except for hours are slightly more wholesome . We like democracy and we like freedom , and we don't express that through platitudes .
We try and express that through presenting a fairly informed and sensible point of view , mixed with some , I would say , some rather slightly inappropriate humor from time to time .
So so D and then me yeah .
I mean , I don't know how you felt . I'd say , really , the impetus for the podcast was January 6th , right , you know , I'm at work and I'm like seeing these horrible things on the news . I'm like why isn't anyone doing anything ? And this is crazy . Our capital is under attack . We're about to have our entire legislative branch murdered in a coup .
Why won't someone stop it ? And then the conclusion I came to , like you know , a couple of months later , is that , in large part , we are living what seems to be a stable existence , except that it's mostly dependent on sheer luck .
It's mostly dependent on norms right and people keeping those norms and not violating the shit out of them .
Well , people do tend to violate them . We're just lucky no one's managed to successfully go so far as to end our democracy , but they came close that day .
They came and they're going to do it . A 2024 is going to be a fucking nightmare . I'm so , I'm so .
Yes , so you understand why we're doing this , because we were like , oh , I wonder how the media will attempt to put this into perspective . That will like enlighten the public discourse and put us on a course to repair our door . And they failed , and I were like , well , I guess we got to do it ourselves . So here we are .
Instead , they're like we're definitely going to lose the Senate . You're like , oh , I don't see that that's true yeah .
Yeah , why are ? you saying that they're third defeatist and they're and they're also , I think , contributing to a lot of it . One of the things that I try to keep in mind is that the media is owned by massive multinational , multi-hundred billion dollar corporations .
Right , like Comcast owns NBC , disney owns ABC , a three hundred billion dollar company , two hundred billion dollar company , I think . Time Warner did own CNN till last year . Now it's Discovery Warner , right , or Discovery , whatever they're called now .
And you know , of course , news Corp with Fox , but that's a different animal altogether because that's like actively like a different charter in terms of what they're trying to do .
The other three companies are trying to like keep calm , keep markets calm , keep people consuming , keep people happy and positive for the most part , at least , what the positive is maybe normal , normalize the very establishment type stations .
Well , I would say they try to keep people engaged more so .
Yeah , engaged and , for the most part , not panicked , at least not as much as they can , and so that tends to like when they report about climate change , they don't want to panic people . When they report about politics , they don't want to panic people .
When they report about the way things are , they don't want to panic people because panic is not good for Disney's business model , panic is not good for Comcast's business model , and so that's kind of what I try to funnel it through my head when I watch the news on those stations .
So I don't really expect them to do very much in terms of , like , sounding the alarm bell and letting people know that things are not going in the right direction , and so I'm glad that you guys took it upon yourselves to actually , you know , get out there . I fantasize about doing this all the time .
I just I have so many projects and Things in the fire already that like it feels like maybe one too many things for me to add to my , my to-do list . So who knows , you guys , for finding a time and working it in ?
I mean it's certainly a commitment , but definitely not nearly as much as starting . I don't know Consumer product business like it is it's challenging , don't get me wrong .
I mean that's Keep your day jobs , because it's it's you can be stressful , but I love it , man , like I encourage anyone listening who , or you guys even , to start your own business , because it has been truly one of the greatest gifts you know that I've given myself in my life and you know not just me , but all , all my early customers .
We did a crowdfunding campaign to bring the company to life in 2018 and there were 3,000 people that paid , you know , 100 bucks each and help bring the company to life , and I always have to have deals like the bomb with those people for helping , you know , bring my dream to life .
So I'm highly encourage you guys and all your listeners to start your own business . I think it's a it's if you can . It's a wonderful privilege to be able to take advantage of .
Well , you're definitely an eloquent and insightful gentleman . I hope you start your own podcast one day and if not , you know , there's always a potential that you could run for office one day . You know we need more good people out there doing the Raising money and dealing with lobbyists .
I'm 33 right now , so I got I got a little bit more time , but I'll be . I'll be . I'm looking at races right now . I own Macintosh 2024.com and Macintosh 2028.com , so and I feel like .
Congratulations on being ahead of that , by the way , because thank you ?
What district are you in ?
I'm in Colorado's Gosh . I want to say I'm in the third district , but I might be wrong . I'm . Brittany Pedersen is my rep and she's lovely . I actually met her At an event maybe two months ago in my district and I think I'm actually going to throw an event for her in the new year . I would love it to be like a fundraiser that I can throw .
It'd be my first time doing something like that and yeah , and it will be like the no , no strings attached fundraiser , so you can talk about anything on politics , of politics , so no one can ask the Congresswoman any favors .
Is it possible that you could like move to Lauren Boebert's district ?
A lot of people suggest that , but Adam Frisch , I think , is running against her again . Hope he wins , even though I don't know much about him . I hope anyone besides her wins , because she is . I don't know if the devil incarnate is too strong , but she is . It is shocking to see the type of people that we elevate in this society .
I think it's funny . You say that because you brought up a sexual predator who was signed by the Browns and Maybe he wouldn't have a record if you just called Lauren Boebert dude , she , she , she , like .
I feel like I'm living in like a simulation when I see the headline Like Congresswoman Boebert Picked out of Denver theater for like jerking off her boyfriend , and I'm like at Beetlejuice and I'm like , is this a real like , like , like this is like a CNN headline , like I don't think I actually said jerking off , but like that's a little vulgar , but like you
know what I mean like it's like , yeah , it's hard to . I'm like I feel like I'm being vulgar , but I'm describing what , my , what the Congresswoman did you know what I mean .
She just gets a pass by the same people that the hypocrites who , would , you know , condemn anyone else for that , and they're like . But it's okay though , because she's like a good Christian .
Dude . I saw the funniest tweet . It was like well , we're too woke , did you jerk off your boyfriend the theater . Now Like can't fucking you have fun anymore ? I Feel like that's exactly . The conversation is like oh , we're just fucking too woke now , like people can't have fun anymore . It's like no , dude , like people can't do that . Public sexual acts .
I'm glad you understand that we're living in constant insanity because , like that , it was like so I don't know , I don't even have . I talked about this on the podcast here .
So the like , the origin story of my ever-changing twitter handle , which hasn't well , my twitter screen name , which has a change here recently was that like All right , it was , it was 2020 and , like I had my name was my stream name and then , of course , you know it was the middle of the pandemic Trump was getting like on tv , like doing these fucking press
conferences or these interviews , and he was saying insane shit and it was just like this is bananas . I can't believe he said that . I never want to forget that . So I like change my screen name to the thing he said in , like yes , and then , like two days later , he said something even crazier . I was like what in ? Okay , let me change that again .
And then , like it was that famous I mean I maybe he was seen it , maybe you haven't , but it was that famous press conference of with him and dr Fauci and you know trump was like Um oh , about the bleach .
Yes , he was like you can inject bleach into like to help cure , cove it and then , or or you can like Use light and insert it into the body or whatever . I'm like all right , this is , this is crazy . So , uh , yeah , like the thing just evolved from . Like all right , well , it was like I smoked .
Uh Well , first of all , I dropped the chloroquine because he was recommending that , and then it was all right . He says something crazy here , it's like , all right , it's bleach now , bleach injectables or something crazy , and then the next week it could be another thing and it would change that .
And it was just this ever-evolving thing that I started in order to hopefully remember all the crazy things that happened , and it grew into this thing where now I remember none of the things because there's been so many .
Dude , I people ask people who like trump . They ask me if they're like . They're like , so do you hate the way like they think they're gonna like get me or something they're like you hate the way he acts or do you hate the policies that he passes ? And I'm like . First off , I think the policies he passes are very attractive .
But , more importantly , when I listen to him , the language center of my brain breaks down and I become a worse English speaker . My writing becomes worse , my speaking becomes worse . He is actively attacking , like , the language center of my brain when I hear him talk . So , yes , I find his policies destructive and I'm happy to go in .
I'm happy to go into why I think that . But , oh my god . And they're like what about the tax cut ? And I'm like , yeah , like 70 percent of tax cut went to the top one percent of earners . Like , I can show you a chart . Then you tell me your income . I'm happy to show you where your tax break actually lies and where it runs out in 2027 .
Do you know that it runs out in 2027 ? Mr , ask me about Trump's policies . No , they never fucking do . But like the but . The point is that like beyond the policy , beyond the behavior , beyond the threats , beyond the threats to democracy .
Just the language that he uses actively makes me dumber and I just I feel dumber every time I listen to him and I hate feeling that way , and so if I could just not hear him ever again , I would be so happy , I'd be so , so happy .
I would listen to Shane Gillis do his impression of him all day though I don't know if you've heard that yet the new comedian that had the Netflix special .
Oh , I've heard it . It's better than mine . I have like limited fake .
Better than yours , no .
Thanks . Is yours any good D , or are you going to embarrass yourself ?
Oh man , don't let me break it . I haven't done it in a while because I've been Hillary . Yeah , I got to warm it up . Hillary Clinton , barack Obama , all right , so like , give me wait here , let me read a Trump tweet for you , or something .
You don't have ? Oh well , yeah , you should have it now .
I think Shane really lays it out well , which is you have to say the thing and then you have to say the thing . You just said Like , wow , what a great podcast . I saw it on the zoom and I said , wow , what a great podcast .
Many people are saying it's the best podcast in the history of the internet . Yeah , I have just learned that the very biased Trump pitting judge in DC who should never have accused herself due to her blatant open . I can't do it right now , I need some . Let me warm up and like I'll get it the next episode .
I got you covered , oh good man , I'm glad you try it . It takes courage to try it live on air when you get put on the spot , that's pretty bad .
I can always edit that out . It's totally fine yeah .
So I'm curious and I'll interview you a little bit . So I'm always curious to ask the question of what are people's one or two core policy wishes .
If you had a magic wand or you were someone who could get legislation pushed through Congress and , I think , ignoring the elephant in the room or the root of all evil of campaign finance , which obviously prevents any of our wishlist items from ever being passed .
That's definitely number one , just being able to vote count two in the same way .
That might be close , that's sort of like a baseline right . You know what I mean , Like voting rights and that sort of thing . I guess I'm more like .
But the thing is , there's so many things we have considered baseline over our lifetime that are now being threatened . So I'm like , oh well funding education and being able to voting rights OK , well , a voting right should be taken for granted . Ok , funding education and women's rights oh , both of those are OK Well no , I have an answer for you .
I was just like it's definitely campaign finance , but if there's one thing I would like , if those things are all important , to me if there was no way that we could ever reform campaign finance like the number one thing on the list I would change tomorrow .
That would eliminate I mean not half the problems , but it would be a resolution for a large majority of problems , especially when it comes to how we elected our congressional representatives , is gerrymandering and it would also solve a lot of state problems , because you have , like you have states like Mississippi , which I can't remember the exact number , but something
like 40% of the population is black . But all of the representatives are all white . Yes , and the state legislature yeah , and like the only conclusion you can draw from that is like the entirety of the white population in Mississippi is voting against black people .
Yeah , I mean yeah .
Yeah , even if . Even if that were the case , if you eliminated gerrymandering , then you'd have 40% of the state legislature be chosen by the black population , that's proper representation , yeah , proper , more proper representation .
And I think , yeah , I think that the gerrymandering is a huge problem . I would put that easily in my top five . Carol , I'm curious what your , because you went on a laundry list there . I'm curious what your top one or two . If you really had to like narrow down to be like all right , there's one or two things I would love to see in the world .
Oh , I mean geez . I'm trying to think how big I can go with this you guys , go as big as you want .
I mean , you know , let's not do a world peace magic one , but you know what I mean , like maybe something like that America could do for America , you know , I mean .
I think that we could probably save as much money on if we diverted money from policing to building little small houses or anything to house like you . Use that money for housing instead .
I think it would more than pay off very quickly and as well solving , you know , all the humanitarian problems and keep not all of them , but the ones associated with like just letting our fellow citizens just like starve and freeze .
Waste away . Yeah , denver is doing something really aggressive like that . The new mayor is pushing really hard for homelessness funding and we're spending a record $242 million on homelessness this year here , with the goal of putting 1000 people in state paid for homes by the end of the year . And they're making good progress on it .
And I bet the crime rate would go down .
Oh , but I mean necessarily .
I mean you know where I used to live in Denver off eighth and grant it was the last month was all homeless encampments and you know I feel terrible for those people but also I feel terrible for the neighborhood because you know the restaurants get some of their stuff stolen and you know , or camped out in and damaged and that sort of thing , and you know
there's a lot of drugs and open air , open air bike shops and stuff , and so yeah , I mean it's a serious problem that that city's really need to tackle . So I'm excited that Denver is doing something about it .
It's awful here , Like the amount of money we spend on policing homelessness . As a city like you could actually afford to just build them houses .
Yeah , I mean , that was the point I was trying to make .
You made it . It's okay , we totally understand .
No , you made it very eloquently . I think that's exactly what I was trying to say is , denver is doing exactly what you want to do . It's a fight , though , because you got a lot of not in my backyard people , and so you know they don't want that . Look , it's funny .
The top comment on the Reddit post that I saw the other day about it was and I've seen a bunch of posts about it , but one that stuck with me was it was really funny . It was like , hey , as a Denverite , if we could just do something that costs no money and that inconvenience no one and that was implemented immediately , that would be great .
But again , it's funny because I feel like that's always the criticism of anything that cities ever try to do or people ever try to do is like I want it to cost nothing , don't inconvenience anyone and be finished immediately . It's like pick one .
You know what's crazy ? It sounds awesome , but you're running a business and I'm sure you , above all else , know that people trash spending all the time .
All the government spending all this money at the state , spending all this money at the city , spending , well , you know , depending on how you look at it , like you can't have anything without investing , and like it's all a drop in the bucket .
Man . I've spent the last five years . I've spent tens of millions of dollars selling betting on the internet , so to do , to do infrastructure and to do to tackle homelessness and education .
Like , yeah , it's a huge amount of money and effort and my wish was I then would cause trillions of dollars , which is I'm a big proponent of free healthcare and I , the way that I think about it is I think it's crazy that cancer can bankrupt you . I think it's crazy that premature babies can bankrupt you .
I think that it's insane that you can get shot in a school or on the street or in a grocery store , in a bowling alley , and then get a bill that bankrupts you after that . And I think that it's kind of a uniquely sick American problem no pun intended that we have medical bankruptcy . It's almost a completely unique American problem .
And as a CEO who chooses healthcare for families , I find it fundamentally absurd that I'm 33 years old . I started my company when I was 27 .
I had no experience , no training , no education , nothing forced upon me to study or to learn about how to choose healthcare for families , and yet because by the virtue of the fact that I started a pun based bedsheets business , I was forced , as CEO , to choose healthcare plans for disparate workers with families who have completely different needs from one another ,
and find a one size fits all plan for these dozens of employees .
And if they lose their job , if they're not great at selling bedsheets , this quarter or the company has a bad six months of selling bedsheets , and I really like to amplify the bedsheets part of it because I think it's so ridiculous their child can lose access to their doctor because we had a bad year of selling bedsheets .
I mean , that type of connection is so inane that I think it does make the point to people about how crazy our employer provided healthcare system is . So that's my wishlist item .
Yeah Well , that's not a bug , it's a feature of the system . Yes , unfortunately we .
These people , these people trapped in jobs they hate .
Yes , and unfortunately in our salar economy largely runs on that . I mean I wish there were .
Look , we're talking about large scale problems that one individual can't solve , and this is like why we're like hey , you know , when you vote for a president , just vote for a president that's going to move you in the right direction , because no single person can fix all of this , especially not in .
It would take dozens of presidents moving things in the right direction , inch by inch over the course of a lifetime to get in the direction we need to go , because there are so many counterbalancing forces who have so much to gain from keeping the system the way it is , if not breaking it further . You can't .
It might be impossible to solve again it might be . Things like you said with campaign finance , gerrymandering and get people in office who aren't incentivized to maintain the status quo .
So Take the money . I think the thing that really frustrates me above all else is that I see this frustration with you online too , when you tweet about some people is .
The conversations that I want to be having are about why it makes sense to move away from employer provided healthcare , why it makes sense for a society to invest in education long term , why it makes sense to provide people with sick days and with livable wages , and why we're subsidizing those unlivable wages by paying for food stamps and other things that companies
use to pad their bottom line . Those are the conversations I really want to be having . I feel like the over 10 window in the United States is so far to the right that all anyone ever wants to talk about is should we arm the teachers ?
Or it's transgender people under attack , or it's banning books that mention gay people , or it's one scapegoat after another after another , and it's never this really serious systemic problems that would actually improve the lives for not just the small percentage of people , but like 90% of people in the United States , and I think my greatest frustration is that we
spend so much time on these culture war niche conversations , but then I remind myself that they're not niche because we're actively playing defense against the erosion of these particular human rights , and that's , I think , what really makes me sad is the over 10 window is so far right that it feels like all we can do is play defense , and I really want to be
playing offense with some of these policies that can really help people , but it feels like we're so far away from that . So it's so far away from that and makes me sad . It's a sad thing to say , but it just feels so far away .
It looks sad as well . It makes me sad as well . I mean , I'm also sad , but that's why I am stoned , because I can't see the world otherwise .
Yeah , what can you do but fire up a blunt and try and forget about this shit ? And that concludes this episode of part of the interaction Start over .
Oh wait , okay no . But Colin , you are seriously awesome . You are really in the fight and you hold things down and you stand with your principles and that's not something that a lot of you know the sponsors , the people out here or whatever can say , and I really respect you for that .
Thanks , I appreciate it . That's super nice of you to say .
Andrew Hot .
Thanks , man .
He told me he's married , okay , engaged .
And he's like 40 years too young for me , so so Ty's okay with like a 25 year age difference , but she usually goes the other direction . Yeah , got it , got it and that concludes this episode of part of the interaction .