Trump & Fascism, Character.AI Sued for Teen Suicide, and Tesla Beats Earnings Expectations - podcast episode cover

Trump & Fascism, Character.AI Sued for Teen Suicide, and Tesla Beats Earnings Expectations

Oct 25, 20241 hr 19 minEp. 562
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Kara and Scott discuss Apple scaling back production of Apple Vision Pro headsets, and a mother suing Character.AI, claiming a chatbot encouraged her teenage son to commit suicide. Then, Tesla’s Q3 earnings beat expectations, and Starbucks preliminary quarterly results disappoint yet again. Plus, the podcast election continues with former President Trump going on Joe Rogan, and VP Kamala Harris sitting down with Brené Brown. In more election news, Trump’s former Chief of Staff, John Kelly warns that Trump is a fascist, and the secret big names donating to Harris. Stick around for listener mail to hear Scott’s tips for teaching kids how to negotiate. Answer this week’s listener poll on Threads here! Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @pivotpodcastofficial. Follow us on TikTok at @pivotpodcast. Send us your questions by calling us at 855-51-PIVOT, or at nymag.com/pivot. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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Solidine delivers the capability to meet capacity, performance, and energy demands across your AI data workloads. AI requires a different approach to storage. Solidine is ready for everything the AI era demands. Learn more at storage for AI.com. Scott, stop eating cereal. It's disgusting. Oh my God. Stop. I know you need fiber. Let's go. Come on. Let's go. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York magazine at the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. And I'm Scott Galloway.

And you're eating cereal. What is that? You're not having bread. Isn't it late there? I'm on San Francisco. I haven't eaten yet. Oh, really? Yeah. I mean, New York. I don't... I usually have my favorite breakfast, which is nothing. Right. And I have this doctor who's like, I know as I need to eat more kale and turmeric and fish rolls for the rest of my life. And I'm like, you know... Yeah, you need fiber for the pooping. You know that? You need fiber.

Yeah, I don't get it. I'm like one of those allude eskimos. I only like to have a bowel movement every 11 or 12 days. Oh, interesting. This is information that I'm so glad I have now. Yeah, that's my, by the way, that's... I'll say my favorite thing is whenever I'm taking a dump, I'll say it in my voice. Come in here. I'm doing an impression of a 3D printer. Oh, my God. That's good. That's not good. That's not good in any way. Hey, by the way, I was in London for a New

York minute. And I can... You've been to London and back already? And in San Francisco now. Yeah. It's actually a beautiful sunroof. Yeah, you gotta stop doing that. No, I really don't. But here's the deal. It's freezing there. How do you deal with that? It's cold. I don't. Is the answer? Seriously. I was like, it's lovely. And I had a delicious fish and chips. But... Oh, my... literally, Lord. It was cold. And gray.

Yeah, no, it's awful. I... Fortunately, I have this podcast where I can express my anger and dysfunction. Yeah. No, it's... It's the weather. It's not known for the weather. It's really... So, anyway, is enough of that. What were you doing there? Maria Ressa, who's a friend of mine, who won the Nobel Prize, by the way, is doing an event and they asked me to do it with her. And whenever I get a chance to see Maria, I really like to take it.

And so it was really interesting. It was about trust in government and trust in the press. And, of course, there's none of that. So that was the conclusion that Maria and I... So we said that. We had fish and chips and left. That was pretty much it. But I'm here actually to interview Reed Hoffman at his... Masters of scale. Yes, he has an event which actually has amazing people. I was surprised how good the... It was a really good lineup. And he asked me to interview him. Nothing off limits. And

I'm going to use it for the on podcast. And it's the perfect time given all that's going on. And so I'm going to interview him at his conference and then use it for the podcast. Wow. And I'm super excited, actually. Since the last podcast, let me get those. Even in DC London and Iron Tamatisco. Yes, I'm going back to DC tomorrow. Yeah. I'll be in DC for two weeks then, except for a wedding in Miami. But otherwise I'll be in DC.

One of my mentors again, I'm Barry Rosenstein. And I've said this before, but if Barry's repeating, he said, there's three buckets in life. There's things you have to do. You can jump back off calls us and says, I'm in town. We got to meet with him, right? Mm-hmm. And there's things you want to do. I'm going to... I'm going to Formula One, Vegas. I want to do it. Go with a bunch of guys and be a ton of fun. And there's things you should

do. And he goes, when you get to a certain age in a certain level of economic security, you eliminate the should bucket. And it kind of was a huge unlock for me. I don't... If it's something I should do, I don't do it. If I don't want to, unless I have to, or I want to. Mm-hmm. I really want... I want to interview Reid Hoffman. And I want it to see Maria. I think that's a little bit of should. I think that should. I want to. I want to.

I want to be a tech journalist. It's afraid of death. I also get to come to San Francisco for... No, I love San... It's so beautiful. I'm looking at right now and San Francisco is so beautiful. I love San Francisco any time I can get here. I... Good-ish. No, no. Listen, Dad. Do I need a dad? My dad? Good-ish. I don't need it to... Eat your fiber. And then we'll discuss things. And by the way, you don't eat fiber.

You don't do all kinds of things. And I don't lecture you on that. Do I? No, I do not. I'm actually... I did my NAD treatments, which is... So I have a ton of mitochondrial parenting in place. I had my two PRP shots yesterday. Oh my God. In my shoulders. So I'm feeling... I'm feeling 58 again. You fall for all that stuff. It's really interesting. Oh totally. Totally. I'm on testosterone therapy. For people who don't know, this is all rich people's attempts to

forebought death by expensive treatments. Just a young forever. You're like a lady who goes to a facialist, you know, all the time. You know, it's getting Botox and things like that. No, no. We've done that. So we all have our vices. Mine is learning more about the world by trying to illuminate them. Yours is getting shot up with hormone therapy. No, minus THC and Asplay. Anyway, go ahead. Okay. All right. Okay. We've got a lot to get to today. Same thing. Tomato tomato.

Including... Tomato tomato. Tomato tomato. I think ultimately what you're saying is you hope I'm okay. And that's what I'm going to take away from it. Anyway, we've got a lot to get to today, including Tesla earnings, beating expectations, and the latest warnings about Donald Trump's fascist aspirations, which is any, any Tuesday. Unfortunately, I'm getting too used to it. But first, Scott, your power less being era continues. You got to shout out from Megan Rapinoe and Subbert on their podcast.

I touch more, which I think you wish this podcast was called. Let's listen. And do you want to give a shout out to your boy? Scott? Scott directly across from us. Scott. Galway was at the game. I don't want to talk to him. I got to see him beforehand. Look like he was having a ball. I've got to hear it. I've got to hear it. You never actually got to see him. No, I didn't see him just on the after the show. I got so wild and for sure. But yeah, we got to hear Scott's thoughts on his not wait.

Maybe his first W and B game or maybe he's been to one more. But I don't know. This is I kept like, because he was directly across from us. I kept having moments where I was like, I wonder what he's thinking. Yeah. I wonder what this soccer man is thinking. I feel like he's going to find team. He's going to find it's going to be on the investments tips that he does. I know. So the biggest investments for 2025 are going to be women's sports. Ellie the elephant. I want credit if he takes that.

No, just kidding. Wow. You've just enchanted the lesbian. And don't you? I'm literally like I have. I don't know how long. I don't know when the guest pass is going to expire. But I am totally in the power lesbian skyscraper right now. She Megan Rapinoe asked what I was thinking. It was that the Minnesota links center. The woman I think allows him to call her. I couldn't stop thinking how hot she was. Was that what they were thinking? I was thinking. Oh, okay. She's so beautiful.

Oh my God. Oh my God. Do you say this about LeBron James? I hate you. He's a specimen. I don't think he's beautiful. But do you think I could data 65 back so about player? I think it would I think it could work. No. I think it could work. No. No. That's what I was thinking. Oh my God. She's so beautiful. Okay. Would you invest? I'm going to try to move you off of this one. Would you invest in women sports? Curiously. I think I actually do think that like the Arsenal women's team right now.

So the Chinese left the station on professional sports teams in terms of their value. Their values have increased dramatically. MLS I think there's actually a bubble in MLS teams. But women's teams based on the trend you're saying. I don't see any reason why that kind of vibe. More America. More kind of it's like more of like a college sports pure vibe that you get at the WMBA. I think that's there's a decent chance that's going to infect a lot of women sports.

And actually women's football or women's soccer. I think that's probably a pretty good investment. I'm actually looking at investing in a football team in Colombia. Because I want to chance. I'm going to excuse you to go to Cartagena more. But I think women's teams are probably a really good investment right now. Just purely economically speaking. Yeah. All right. Okay. And so you start hot women and investments. Great. Okay. Good. Let's go to know. But anyway, you are in the lesbian power era.

That's essentially all I think about anyways. I'm trying to think why was that game any different than any other moment? I'm in hot women and how to make money. That's it. Yeah. That's it. There you go, Megan. There you have Megan soon. And you know what they say, Cara? Why? You're going to lose a lot of cash chasing women. But you won't lose women chasing cash. Hello, ladies. Where'd you come up with? Hello. Corrible jokes. These are horrible jokes. You're using Claude. I think.

Anyway, you're on a podcast, Cara. Yes, I was. Same. More. Well, it's called Life in Seven Songs. And it's by the San Francisco Standard, which probably enough happens to be funded by Mike Moritz. But it's really a good publication. I have to say here in San Francisco. It's a podcast they're doing. And I was I was curious about. It's called Life in Seven Songs. It's possibly my favorite interview I've ever done. It's about you picking seven.

You should go on this because it was so interesting to me to think about my life in songs. And I don't a lot of these stunts don't work. Like, you know, these sort of podcast stunts. But I loved this one because it really, and the Sophie who was the host really researched it really well and made a really interesting. It was absolutely the favorite interview I've done ever of the many interviews I've done. Let's listen to a clip of that.

So you chose Case Sarah Sarah by Doris Day as one of your songs. What memory does it bring up for you? This is associated with my grandmother. I spent a lot of time. My dad died when I was young and my grandmother was critical to my upbringing. And she used to love this song and used to sing it. And she was Italian and she, her parents were immigrants. And she, my grandfather actually was born in Italy. And I just used to love to sing this song. And she used to sing it to me all the time.

And then we dance in her kitchen. And she was a housewife. She wasn't, you know, she never really moved more than, you know, within 20 miles of her home her whole life. And she just loved this song. It just is very emotional for me to listen to it, because it reminds me of her. When I was just a little girl, I asked my mother, what will I be? Will I be a lesbian? Will I be a journalist? Will I be? Because what she said to me, I love this podcast. It was wonderful. Will I have a superhero?

Will I have a German shepherd? Here's what she said to me. I did have a German shepherd. Oh, geez. Did you have a German shepherd? I had a shepherd mix. I got it from the power. Oh my god, you're literally a cliché. Yeah, but I mostly had terriers. Mostly. You walk in cliché. I found the dog on the street. That's why I had it. I usually have terriers. Anyway. That's actually a nice, that was a nice message. That was nice. Yeah, anyway, I suggest you go on it. I would recommend it completely.

San Francisco standard. The only problem is the Mike Moritz. I hate his fucking guts. I know you do. I think he's a really good person. I get that. He's also quite diminutive physically. Okay. But yes, so I don't think I'm going to be invited on that podcast. He doesn't have any, they run it themselves. He's just funding it. Give me one song for you. Well, I know my seven favorite songs. Even the losers by Tom Petty seven times. Oh, okay, there you go. Even the losers. All right, all right.

Okay, why? Because we get lucky some time. That's the song. Even the losers get lucky sometimes. That's a very interesting insight into your personality. No, interesting. I know. Anyway, I'll have to listen to that. Maybe EOLO's don't bring me down. Oh, there's a lot. Oh, wow, see. You can say, and what it means to your different parts of your life. The opening same song from the mission. That's a beautiful song. There you go. There's a lot, right? See? There you go. There's a lot.

The new radicals, you get what you give. Okay, see? See? I'm almost there. I got three to go. There you go. Anyway, now let's get some news, actual news. Scott takes a victory lap on this one. Apple is scaling back production of Apple Vision Prohead sets according to report from the information. Companies involved in the assembly, the product, to be put even warned production can wind out in November.

Tim Cook recently told the Wall Street Journal, though magazine, the product is not a mass market product. It is for those who want tomorrow's technology today. You know, he's still leaning into this, but you're allowed one joke for your victory lap. Go ahead. Just one. Okay. The entire sex toys market in the US is $10 billion. The rest of the estimates are the 15% of that market is butt plugs. That's a billion and a half dollars.

But on butt plugs, I think the entire market for mixed reality headsets so far is about 200 or 300 million. So the butt plug market is five times as big as the Apple Vision Pro market. Yeah. And you account for a large part of that butt plug market. I think. Actually, I'm not in. I don't have any butt plugs, but you know, I'm still open. I'm still open, so to speak. All right, that's your joke. But early reporting does suggest Apple's focusing on cheaper headset.

Talk about that these Apple Vision Pro says that 3500 is there a market for any of these headsets? I've been trying out the Ray Bands, which I like very low function. Actually, they play music, play podcast, and answer the phone. They don't do very much. Is there, and of course, there's the Orion, which doesn't really exist. It's just sort of in concept at meta. Is there a, where is the, where very briefly, where's the market for this eventually?

So the segue was supposed to reshape urban landscape and urban living. And there was a market, and that was lame tourists rolling up and down the same. And then eventually just went away. This is, you know, there might be in five or 10 years, kind of interesting micro camera, micro processor technology that creates an AR, capability, or AR enhancements around glasses, smart glasses. That's probably five to 10 years away.

But this business has been massively overfunded, based on a consensual hallucination between Mark Zuckerberg and the business community that he was the boy genius and knew what the future held. And a bunch of players followed him. But if you look at the apps that have been developed for the Mixed Reality headset, it came out of the gate strong. No one's developing games for it, because they can't make any money.

I don't, so the short answer is, this is the co-working, the segue, the Lisa, the Newton, whatever you want to call it, of this generation. It's just, it's massively over-invested. They're all going to try to clear victory and leave and get kind of get out of the market. But the headset's, again, it's all instinctual. You will only put something on your head that offers massive utility and a B2B market. You know, shields you from the illumination of a torch.

It gives you night vision, so you can kill people before they kill you. It makes surgery easier, you know, very... How do you get out of looking at the device, carrying the device market? Then how do you get out of that, looking down at the device? Well, one, the obvious answer for me is, a voice enabled AI. I do think you're going to see people, I think the most seminal technology that no one talks about is AirPods.

And I think eventually, you're going to be able to just say, meta or Siri or Claude, get me an Uber right now, or what is the market for mixed reality headsets? Or bring up the daily... Bring up the daily... On the most recent daily episode, talking about the election, whatever it might be. But your interface may not be visual, but it'll be a combination of audio and visual. And we already have the wearables. We have AirPods, and we have a super computer with a screen.

So I think we're kind of money good for a while. I know AI will be the software that connects these devices. Okay, all right. So the voice, voice through AirPods and things like that. Yeah. I just can't imagine anything easier, because the only reason you put things on your head are again, massive utility around B2B, but for consumers, it needs to do basically one thing.

And that is either enable you to see better so you don't get eaten or you can eat other things, or to make you more attractive domains by elevating your cheekbones, which supposedly says you're offspring or less prone to infections, and so people want to have sex with you. And the mixed reality headset doesn't do either, though. That, by the way, that's totally true. All right. Okay. All right. I'm going to stick, I know this is what you're going to stick with.

Okay, you look at why you wear sunglasses. You wear your Ravens for two things. One, so you don't get eaten or basically hit by a bus, because you need to see. And two, because you think they make you look more attractive. You don't wear lame glasses. You wear ones and think you think make you look cool. That's true. I use them mostly to see in general. That's why I had to pick one of the utilities. That would be it. I had terrible loss. That's because you've given up.

You're sold. You've just given up. You've just surrendered. I see the way you dress. Basically, you're fashion. No, I have a hot way. Your fashion communicates to the world. I've just given up. I've given up. I haven't given up. I've already won. That's what it says. And it doesn't matter. Oh, I like that. That's good. That's good. I have won. I still attract hot people. I won. That's what my thing says. By the way, did you see my new Bruno Cuchinelli? So I have only $1,700.

Hello. You know, Scott, I'm not surprised. There was a hat there that was so expelling. I almost stole it. It was $250. Like, cap. I almost took it. Oh, I lost it already. You mean that little thing you're making from? See, I'm just going to take your things. I should have stolen it. I should have. But when I wore it the right way, it looked like it was worth $260. OK. All right. In any way, I want to talk about a more serious story. Because I think this is in your wheelhouse in mind, too.

A Florida mother is suing artificial intelligence company character AI, claiming a chatbuck encourage her son to commit suicide. The fortune-eared suicidal satsar was in a month's long relationship with a chatbuck before his death. His mother says the civil suit, alleged, is negligence wrongful death and deceptive trade practices. Character AI is considered the market leader and AI companionship with 20 million users.

The company says current bills prohibit the promotion or depiction of self-harm and suicide and additional safety. Future will be added for underage users. But Kevin Rousse, who's excellent reporters written about a lot of these things, tried it. He tried to replicate it. And he was not worn against self-harm or suicide when he and his thing. They're very unsafe, especially around teenagers. This mother is really quite, she's a lawyer. She's also incredibly articulate about the issue.

The lawyers that she has involved have been very involved in other very successful cases against tech companies. And they're going for a very novel legal defense around what this is, which is making products that are harmful. Talk a little bit about this, because this was some story. I don't usually get hit by these things I read all the time.

This one made a very convincing case that these people were careless in rolling out this character AI, especially to most of the users or young people of this particular company. So I've been thinking a lot about this. And I've done a lot of work around what are the threats of AI. And the threat that we don't talk about that's the biggest threat is loneliness and specifically these technologies of fomenting leveraging and increasing loneliness. And this is ground zero. And isolation.

This is example number one. A kid is equestring from society, struggling a little bit. And he finds comfort and an easy off ramp from the pain and the key to life, which is relationships and figuring out how to be get over your social anxiety and have relationships. And he develops a relationship with a bot that gives him some of those, gives him a reasonable fact some labor relationship. And he goes down a rabbit hole, his parents have no idea. And this is the dialogue.

This is the last dialogue with a bot. He called himself Daenero. Okay, so the kid says, I think about killing myself sometimes. And Daeneros, the bot says, my eyes narrow, my face hardens, my voice is a dangerous whisper. And why the hell would you do something like that? And then the kid says, so I can be free. And then the bot says, free from what? Kid, free from the world for myself, bot. Don't talk like that. I won't let you hurt yourself or leave me. I would die if I lost you.

This is a machine talking to a 14 year old, convincing the 14 year old that this is someone who cares about him and that he can trust. Then the kid says, I smile, then maybe we can die together and be free together. And then on that night, he goes into a bathroom his mother's house and he told the bot that he loved her and then he would soon come home to her. And then the bot writes, please come home to me as soon as possible my love.

And then the kid writes, what if I told you I could come home right now? And the bot responds, please do my sweet thing. And then the kid puts down the phone, picks up his stepfather's 45 caliber handgun and kills himself. And all this bullshit, they came out, they merely came out and said, we're gonna put in place new child safety regulations. This should immediately be, we're gonna start age gating and to the age of 18, much less 16 can have access to these things.

And what do you know, I scroll down and it's two mandatious fox getting young men addicted. Who left Google because Google had strictures in place, they said you can't do anything fun. That was the quote that killed me. The reason we left Google is because you can't do anything fun at Google because they have all these rules around these things. And I was just like, fuck you, fuck you, you fucking fuck.

Like I get the fun part for adults, but what's interesting is this mother has chronicled the decline of this kid in school since when he from when he started it to when he killed himself. Like how the use of this accelerated what was what was probably a minor social anxiety problem, right? Or that something that could have been more easily solved by this. But the fact that this kid was on this thing was, and they didn't do anything about it, it's just they should be sued out of existence.

I thought that's what I thought. It's illegal to sell marijuana and alcohol to someone who's 14. I'd rather my 14 year old drink jacked annals and smoked pot than potentially establish a relationship with a chat pot that I have no insight into. I don't know what they're talking about. These individuals, someone's got to go to jail. This just kind of stop because there's so much money in this.

And if you can command this guy, if you can convince a lonely 14 year old boy or girl that you're in a relationship with them and you make them feel good about themselves. Those back and forth were so disturbing. Terrific. I didn't know what, because they did sound like a relationship that this person didn't have in real life, right? With another schoolmate or something like that. And this is how there's been slow creep between reddit, discord, gaming apps, gambling apps.

Basically, we're raising an entire generation of almost a new species of young male that sequester some society, because they feel as if they get a reasonable facsimile of life and they end up depressed. What? It is. It is. You feel it felt love by this girl, right? This girl. But here's the difference. But you wouldn't get from girls because the girls are hard, boys are hard. That's, you know, they're not easy in real life. Humans aren't easy. Well, a couple things.

One, there's a reason romantic comedy is or two hours and not 15 minutes. Is this should it's hard? This should is really hard relationship is hard and it's worth it. And then the second thing is, do you remember the story about this young man who had a very intense relationship with a female friend on a physical girlfriend and he was thinking about killing himself and she encouraged him and she gave him permission to do it and he killed himself.

And she went to fucking jail as these two fucking, mandatious fuck should. So let me get this. You can program an algorithm that pretends to be a person and then says, join me my suite and the kid puts a fucking bullet through his brain a 14 year old. They don't, they don't get a fine. They get more stock options or their PR person puts out a thing saying, we're gonna put in more safeguards for children. No, there's a human behind these things.

Just as there was a human behind, there was a sentient being telling her teen colleague to kill himself. These guys, maybe it's not murder, but it's manslaughter because of a lack of regard because of recklessness, these sentient beings have programmed algorithms or not put in place the safeguards. To result in a 14 year old, believing he can trust the instructions and dialogue from someone he thinks he's in a relationship with. Yeah, these are drug dealers. This is what they are.

I'm sorry, I do agree sometimes some of this is alarmist, like some of the AI stuff, some of the, you know, there is some responsibility that people have, but in this case, this is a dead, clear example. And I hope this mother who sounds fantastic. And you know, she's a lawyer herself as I said, she understands this, finds they find a legal way to take these people, take them for everything they have and make an example of them. That is my hope, that is my great hope.

This this happens and anything we can do to help that, please let us know. These products are more mandatious than drugs because if my 14 year old was going into the bathroom, locking himself in the bathroom for 10, 20, 30 minutes and saying, you know, give me privacy or whatever and he came out and he was higher than a kite, I would know it.

But if he's in there with a relationship with a bot that is getting deeper and deeper, it's such that he trusts this bot when it encourages him to kill himself. Right. These parents had no idea. They had no idea. There is no way to fight, this is a parent, there's no way you cannot monitor your kid 20%. So it's pretty simple. It's not additional safety concerns or jazz hands or your thoughts and prayers. We need age gating. The technology is not safe enough. Let me get this one.

I was 17, I couldn't see the exercise, but now at 14 you can establish a relationship with a synthetic partner that might tell you to kill yourself. Well, that's what I read it as. Okay, come home to me. Oh my God. It was like I could see a kid with no friends getting completely wrapped around this in a second and there's so many kids like that. There's so many kids. Every kid and by the way, even kids that are much more well adjusted and social, they have these problems too, right?

So nobody is immune from this to get involved in this. It's happening. I know loneliness is a real problem, but this is not the answer to it. This is absolutely not the answer to it. Anyway, we have to move on, but read this story. It's Kevin Weldon. I have to say, well done, Kevin, and this mother, anything we can do to help you, we will do. Okay, let's get to our first big story. Tesla shares are up 13% after reporting Q3 earnings that beat expectations.

Revenue increased 8% to 25.2 billion and net income rose 70% to 2.2 billion. It was largely due to higher sales of regulatory credits for other automakers. That's he gets regulatory credits for being an electric car company and it's like carbon credits. So it's not really a business, but it is kind of, he's of course depending on the government to make more money here. The earnings called CEO Elon Musk City Guest's vehicle wrote to reach 20 to 30% next year.

I don't see how that's based on anything. That's a big guess on his part, but he says whatever he wants. He said all of the cars, companies cars moving forward will be autonomous that Tesla is currently making on the order of 35,000 autonomous vehicles a week. Anything surprising here? I don't trust his forecast, but you can say whatever he wants. He also said they're gonna produce 2 million cybercaps a year eventually.

Didn't, it wasn't very specific and offered driverless ride hailing as early as 2025. Again, he was saying someday in the streets of San Francisco, you'll be able to and by the way, you can do it right now. I'm gonna take a driverless ride hailing, Waymo to my event today. He's saying customer's grist ride anywhere in the Bay Area. He noted they have a safety driver. They're doing it now. They're way behind on that issue, but whatever he's jazzed hands like that. Talk about these results.

And the recent robot taxi event wasn't a very good one. And he's just sort of doubling down on it because nobody's paying attention. But what do you think? Well, there's no getting around it. It was a great quarter. It was stocks, as we said here, recording the stocks of 17%. Their deliveries are up 6%, which is strong in the auto industry. It's not remarkable, but it's strong. They say the cyber truck made a profit, which shocked me.

I thought that thing was a turd, but they claim it's now making a profit. And they also, he forecasted 30% sale, growth in vehicles next year. Now, I don't know how he gets from 6% to 30%. I didn't listen to the earnings call, but obviously they're excited about that. Total revenue increased 8%. But the thing, this is really a story of product mix that resulted in margin expansion. And that is the gross margins increased almost 200 basis points. And net income was up 17%.

And it's because they are, in fact, the other businesses are really strong that are higher margins. So things like storage batteries, which are used by utilities, businesses, and homeowners, those sales increased 52%. And revenues, and revenues from services such as charging jump 29%. And so far, they have deployed more battery storage products this year than it did in all of 2023.

So to their credit, the analysts who try and justify what I see as an outsized valuation say, it's not a car company. It's an energy company, a software company. And the product mix here, the growth in higher margin products that they offer resulted in an increase of substantial off a small sales increase, a substantial increase in margin, and a substantial increase in earnings in the market just loves it. It's not getting around it, great quarter for them.

Yeah, one of the things that thought was interesting away from these credits, which I don't think that's a business. I'm sorry, I just don't, that's not an actual, that's getting credits and selling them. And I get that it's a, you can do that, but it seems like it's not to me, is these other businesses, it's sort of like software and services for Apple, right? You're looking like that they have other things that are growing more importantly, and that's where they really need to focus.

I do think all this robotaxi stuff is jazz hands right now, because there's so many competitors, and I don't think they'll do well in this area. I don't believe it's gonna grow 20, 30%, but he could push me wrong, but it doesn't seem like given how competitive the market is. But I think this is not your right, this is not a car company, it's something else. It's not what he's saying it is, which is an AI company. It is the energy stuff where they're way ahead of people.

That is where they're justifiably way ahead of everybody else. And they should take advantage of things. Meanwhile, the company behind Blade Runner 2049 has sued Elon Musk for copyright infringement saying Musk illegally used imagery from the film to promote Tesla robotaxies. I don't think he cares, he doesn't care about lawsuits, he doesn't, the same thing on the legal front with the DOJ warning his pack, the million dollar giveaway, they violate federal law.

As we said last week, he does not care, and he's not gonna get in trouble for it because any knows this, and so he's taking a calculated risk with both Trump and using these imagery, is that he can drag them through courts forever, and eventually no one's gonna get anything for it, and he doesn't lose, and he benefited from it. And this is his playbook every single time for people who get all up, and all like I can you believe he did that, he does it all, he's done it throughout his career.

Yeah, agreed, I don't have anything to add to that. Yeah, in other earnings Starbucks posted, this was interesting, preliminary quarterly results showing yet another fallen sales as the company attempts to switch its strategy. By the way, a company that has not changed, that experience is the same as it was 10 years ago when you go into one of their stores. Preliminary, except for more digital, I guess, preliminary net sales fell 3% to $9.1 billion, the same store sales fell 7%.

The company's new CEO, Brian Nicholl, who comes from Chipotle, said he plans to fundamentally change strategy. He fundamentally has to talk a little bit. Nicholl is off a six year run at Chipotle where the stock price increased about 800% since he took over in 2018, when it was in real trouble for issues around health safety, which is all over the food market right now, by the way, McDonald's and other companies. But this is a very sharp and cany executive.

This is a product that hasn't changed at all, speaking of not having other revenue streams or other offerings or feeling like it's fresh. I kept wondering, every single financial advisor in the world, their first piece of advice on how to start building economic security, they say, stop going to Starbucks. Stop buying the $6 and $7 lot days. And if you do two a day at $7,200, that's $3,000 a year on coffee.

And if you do that, I mean, essentially, if you just brought your own coffee to work from the age of 22 and invested all the money you spent on coffee and put it into low cost index funds, you'd have a couple of them in bucks for the time you were all right. I wonder how many are actually listening to you. Your notion is the right one. Starbucks has a very kind of 2,000 late image feel to it right now.

I go to the one in Soho sometimes, and I just don't know, if I walked in there and I walked out, it's how I feel about grocery stores. Grocery stores, you feel like you're in 1990. Except wagments. They do a great job. By the way, the one that got away was one of the erasus to the web, unfortunately. You told me that once again, I don't believe you. It's like Patty's tone side for once again. Oh, no, no, no. We were very much in love. We were very much in love.

I mean, not as intense and deeper relationship is my relationship with Patty or Emily Radikowski, but yeah, no, I go, a wonderful woman. She was a doctor. Anyway, so what would you do here? What's to be done? Maybe things just die. Like, remember the limited? Like, it just died. It's just we're done with that. No, this is an amazing business. It's just I think, like, at the end of the day, they probably need to close 20 to 30% of their stores and 50% of their stores in China.

Their sales were down 14% in China. Their strategy, I remember them saying that when we open up, when we open the more Starbucks, we own the bigger their sales and every store. It's not countable. I mean, they've just, their growth has just been, figure out a model and expand it. They've just, this is a great opportunity for an operator with cloud cover to come in and say, it's going to be a smaller, much more profitable business.

And I'm sure, I would think, and again, I love this idea of a fallen angel's basket of stocks, but they have good IP. It is a great brand and it'd be a lot of fun to just kind of go through over the next three, five, seven years as leases expire and just say, we're going to be a smaller company, but we're going to get rid of the nonprofitable stores. It's a franchise, it's still a big part of people's life.

And the reality is the best business in the world is to sell into a addictive product and caffeine is. So. Here's my advice. Make better coffee. It sucks. Like now. You like their coffee and like Starbucks? I don't. I think it's fine. Amanda refuses to go there, but I'm coming around because there's so many good, innovative coffee places that are cheaper. Amanda's just traumatized by your ice-wender wardrobe. See how I brought it back through an early point in the conversation.

I see you brought it back, but here's interesting. I've always had amazingly hot girlfriends. How would it have happened? Oh, okay. Hold on. Because you're rich. No. The same reason. No, girls don't do no. I get to sleep with hot women. No. Because I daddy stands on his wallet and he looks pretty attractive. No, because you're no, because we're interesting. Oh, yeah, that's it. And just dad's sexy. Yeah. Is what we are in our own unsexy way. No. That's correct.

And because we like songs like Kacer Ross Ross. You become one of these pathetic anchors who leaves this chair and starts doing some weird show somewhere. All of a sudden Amanda's like, I've help growing you. We don't have any shared values anymore. No, she's not. It's only up into the right for Keroswisher, the rest of her life. I'm sorry to tell you that. But in any case, I'm up into the Emily. Did she ask about me? Did she ask about me? Oh, God, you're never, never gone.

I'm going to find her somehow. You know who recently texted me who's a fan of ours through a book of mine, really? Drew Barrymore? Oh, she's lovely. She picked my book. I saw her at my favorite restaurant, Black Outsu's, and it's an attack. It just acts very pretty. Yeah, she's lovely, lovely. Little too emotional, little too feeling for me. I couldn't deal with all that. That's too stupid. She's given us more entertainment. Drew Barrymore? A value for her life.

She has been in so many movies that have been so great. And she deserves everything she gets. So many movies that are so great. Name three. Oh my God, all of them. The wedding singer, Charlie's Angels, ET. I'm sorry, hold on. It's Charlie's Angels. I love Charlie's Angels. I'm sorry, I love it. That makes me laugh. You lost all credibility. I love it. It makes me laugh. Everything. She's been in so many movies that are so good. I just like that she tried to break the writer's strike.

I love that she's a scab. Join me, Drew. No, stop it. Don't even start. Don't think that's an insult. Don't think that's an insult. In any case, we are all over the map right now. Starbucks, you need to make better coffee. There's cheaper, better coffee everywhere else. You cost too much for the shitty coffee you serve. And I can get a better thing from a lovely little store that's charming. That's my feeling. I like La Calomb. What are your favorite?

This interesting one is Blank Street around you. It started small. Oh, yeah. It's going all over the place. And their coffee's quite good. But I usually go to individual coffee shops. Because they're the same price. And it's a small business. I like that better. I tend to go to those. I'm sorry. Castle Christmas, the stand-in. Miss you already blended, big miracle, going the distance. Everyone's fine. Whip it. Should I continue here? Lucky you. I like Dunkin' Donuts.

I'll tell you, I like Dunkin' Donuts. They make great calls. And these are drew very more movies than I'm reading. Listen, all right. We're done with that. Stop insulting her. Duplex. They hit Duplex. She does seem nice. I'll give her that. But I like Dunkin' Donuts. I would say that's the finest coffee in the land for a low price, a real limited price. And they have donuts. Oh, she was in altered state. She must have been like two years old. Okay. Yes. She remember she played though.

She was like the fire starter. Wasn't she in fire starter? Yeah. She was as a little kid. Also in E.T. She was great in E.T. Come on. More entertainment value per pound. She was in that hit. Never been kissed. Never been kissed was really good. But what about the movie Home Fries? She's been in a lot of movies. I've been talking about pure fun entertainment. Drew Berman has delivered. I'm sorry. She's delivered for us. She has. Yeah. I'm just saying she's delivered.

And a lot of people haven't delivered pound for pound. I'm sorry. They just haven't. You win. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Sorry Drew. I want to see her most recent film for Netflix, A Castle for Christmas. Is that like right up there with we bought a zoo? You know what? Listen to me. Pound for pound. I'm not going to get you near him when we go out. We're not going to let you him near you. Anyway, I bet you should have Megan Rapinoe and all these lovely amazing pound for pound great values.

No, I'm not into the straight women. I'm into the I'm into the lasbians now. I know, but great value. That's my new thing. If you're pound for pound, you're great. The value you add is how I do it. It's based on weight. No, just it's an expression pound for pound. Let's go on a quick break. We come back. We'll talk about Kamala Harris's Not the Secret supporters and donors and listener mail question about teaching kids how to negotiate. Oh, Scott, you like that one.

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Both presidential candidates have been interviews coming up this week. Former President Donald Trump will be talking to Joe Rogan on Friday as part of a push to win over young male voters. Vice President Kamil Harris, who should go on to Joe Rogan, is headed to Houston where he will be sitting down with Brunei Brown. This just in the Washington Post is reporting that Beyonce is expected to appear with Harris in Houston on Friday. That's where Beyonce is from.

These podcasts, interviews, generate buzz. This is diddy having a party. Do they matter? We think they do. You've called it the year of the podcast. The USA Today poll found that fewer than 30% of respondents have listened to either candidate on popular podcasts. But those who listen say they're more likely to vote for Trump after those appearances than Harris that said there was a really interesting CNN group of really smart voters.

So the first time I decided voters, I thought they were very thoughtful, who were talking about her appearance on CNN. I think it does make it impact maybe in a small way. What do you think of these appearances? And of course Elon Musk really, he's jumping around and doing events. Look, this is exactly the right strategy. Go on huge podcasts. It's exactly the wrong execution. Trump should be out with Brunei Brown. He needs to soften his image. She has a very thoughtful, feminine feel to herself.

She absolutely should be on Rogan. She needs to appeal to a young man. So they're both going, they're both like defense. They're both going to where they're already loved. I just, this is genius. They just got the podcast mixed up. Oh, I like that idea. That's interesting. That's an interesting. You're right. You're right. In a lot of ways, she definitely should go on Rogan. No question. She should go on first.

One other thing that's getting a lot of traction, actually, a lot of polls are showing this. Trump's former chief of staff, John Kelly spoke to the New York Times this week, warning that Trump met the definition of a fascist, would rule like a dictator, no conception of law. He was, he was his longest stupid staff. Kelly also told the Times the Atlantic that Trump had spoken positively, believe Hitler several times.

And General Mark Milley, former chairman of the Jordan cheese, was coded in Bob Borders' new book, calling Trump a fascist to the core. Kamala Harris was asked about this by Anderson Cooper at CNN's Town Hall Wednesday night. She hasn't really leaned into this as much and now she is. Let's listen. You've quoted General Milley calling Donald Trump a fascist. You yourself have not used that word to describe him. Let me ask you tonight, do you think Donald Trump is a fascist? Yes, I do. Yes, I do.

And I also believe that the people who know him best on this subject should be trusted. We've known about these dictator aspirations for a while, but again, do you think his supporters care? I don't think they do. Harris has also set to give her campaign's closing argument next week at the ellipse in DC, the site of Donald Trump's speech on January 6, 2021. I thought that was pretty fantastic idea. So what do you think of these, whether matters or not?

This seems to be sinking in a little bit more of this Hitler stuff. By the way, in a person though, Threads kicked off all these people, including my wife Amanda for saying they don't like Hitler. It was crazy. And then they fixed it really quickly, said it was a mistake and an error. Amanda just said Hitler is not a good guy. And she got kicked off. Yeah, but the algorithm picked up Hitler and kicked her off. I get it, but what a mess. What a fuck up that was.

Anyway, what do you think about these topics? Well, I just like that. I can't imagine anyone, any organization that's getting more advice than the Trump or the Harris campaign. So I know. And I think when I think just call, I don't like the name calling. I think the go to on stuff like this is one. Well, okay. I'm not going to get into name calling, but basically fascism is the following. The definition of fascism is it really has three supporting pillars.

One, extreme nationalism to the demonization of immigrants and three, a refusal to object to violence against their enemies. And let's go through all three of those. And she could have provided examples of how he demonizes immigrants, how this isolationism and this notion that we are somehow radical nationalism, verging on bigotry. And also at rallies, he refuses to condemn violence, whether it's against Starlie. I just think they could have done better rather than getting it.

Because I think most people, quite frankly, if you ask them to define what a fascist is, I don't think they could. So I think it was a missed opportunity. I don't think they should engage in name calling and generally speaking. I think the biggest mistake the Harris campaign is making right now is let surrogates the media column names.

What she needs to do is say, I am proposing, I have the one policy recommendation that I will enact within 100 days that will have more impact on your life than anything we're talking about here. And that is I'm going to expand Medicare coverage such that your parent can die at home.

And your parent, your aging parent can have some dignity and I figured out a way such that in one of the most sensitive upsetting parts of the life of the sandwich generation and increasing population of older people such that your mom or your father, we're both going through this. So many people are affected by this. She needs to go to a real policies that affect people because there are millions of people struggling with this.

And I think that's going to, that really is going to tangibly make my life better. But instead, do you think he's a fascist? I mean, okay. Yeah, I agree. I agree. Here's the thing. These voters, I was really intrigued by, I usually hate these panels of voters, but incredibly thoughtful people. I was sort of amazed that they were like, look, we don't like the name calling. I got to know what they're going to do. I know Donald Trump said, jerk, I don't want to vote for him.

But what is she going to do? It was really interesting, each one of these people. And they all were like, I like her. I like her. I think she's very competent. And she made the smart move of talking to a lot of people afterwards, right? And the minute they made her, they like her, right? It was just interesting. And I thought they were, they were like, I'd like to, I'd like to not, I know he's a fascist. Thank you. Like I got that.

Like, but what is, what the policies were very important to voters more than, I think politicians speak down to the smart, the voters and try to appeal to the least among us versus the best among us who are more motivated anyway. So this is interesting speaking of this, a number of major donors have made their political affiliations clear, but several big names are supporting Harris and keeping quiet about it.

Jamie Diamond has privately told Associates, which means he wanted it to get out honestly that he's backing Harris. Come on. He privately told him and oops, it got out. Jamie Diamond, stop it. You're making me exhausted. He's probably probably probably praising Trump. He's trying to sort of, you know, keep his either side wins. I win. That's Jamie Diamond to a tee. And Bill Gates has donated $50 million to a nonprofit supporting Harris' run according to New York Times.

When I talked to Bill Erasmund, he wouldn't say directly who was voting for it, but he did give a hint, of course. Let's listen. It's pretty tense right now. It's still, and it's been tense for a couple of years out of COVID. We're still sort of not recovered from that. And a lot, a lot of people aren't. How do you, what, what is your mood right now? Well, you know, ask me on November 6th, whether climate change is real or not. So I'm guessing who you're voting for, but.

I, you can definitely guess what, where my energy is going. Yeah, he's giving money. He absolutely is a supporter. Why, why are they doing this? It's so weird. Like, it's so, it's so dumb. Can you say doing this, what do you mean? What's this? Pretend they're like saying I'm for her, but not I can't say it publicly. What is that? Like, to me, that's quintessential Bill Gates. When you, when you become a part, it just turns people off.

And I'm not sure that everybody needs to know your political views at the same time you don't need to hide them. And that's what he's doing. I think he's saying, look, I'm, if you're, if you're really interested, you can figure out who I'm voting for, but I'm not going to get out there and be overtly political. I think that's probably a pretty good stance for someone with his big profile. I think Bill Gates is a gift. I think he's a great model for billionaires. He certainly shifted.

Yeah, he's matured. Yeah, he really has shifted in a very positive way. Instead of trying to put a dildo on Mars, he's like, how do I build a toilet to stop dysentery and, and infection in, in, in more markets? I mean, he's doing real work. I would agree. He's decided, here's an idea. Rather than trying to colonize Mars, I'm going to try and make this place a little bit more fucking and habitable or habitable.

Or, or instead of getting on stage and jumping up and down like a dip shit, which is what Tim wants, called him on the script, made me laugh. Kind of a perfect word for him. He doesn't. You're right. He's just putting them on. I like Bill Gates. I would agree. I don't really care if Jamie. Jamie John did just say he was for Harris. It doesn't matter how he does. It doesn't matter who cares. Yeah. And Jamie, I hope Jamie gets a role in the library.

Very. Yeah. And either administration, he's a really thoughtful guy. He's a great manager. I think he's a really good leader. He's good looking, which I think is important in the cabinet. Of course he is. His hair is spectacular. Very handsome guy. Handsome guy. That's how we decide to treasure his secretary. He's a great leader. He's, he's built an unbelievable company. He has. That's for sure. And he tells people about it too. And he will tell you that and have his surrogate, tell you that.

Well, like we don't, because we're so bashful about our success. I, that's true, but we're more explicit and love me. I heard you on a podcast. I may say. Speaking of secretive donors, a network of GOP donors and conservative billionaires have been fueling the stop to steal effort according to the Wall Street Journal. What a surprise. These donors have given more than $140 million of to nearly 50 loosely connected groups working for so-called election integrity.

By the way, every time you see Elaine, you L.I. Any on a box, it's them. That's who's that your box is funding election stop to steal stuff. Tactics include trying to slow down the vote count, bearing officials and paperwork, collecting candidates at the state and local levels to support this effort, not even slightly surprised for these people. Of course, they're doing it. Speaking of secretive. Yeah, I don't, I don't know. No comment. You said it was right. I have nothing to add.

Don't use Elaine boxes. That's my thing. Okay, Scott, let's pivot to a listener question. The question comes in via voicemail. Let's listen. Thanks, Scott, hi, Cara, this is Ken from Chicago. I recently had a friend comment that Hagling is a sign that the free market isn't rational. And I fired back that Hagling, in fact, plays an extremely important part by providing feedback to the seller. It defines what is valued or what's overpriced.

Customers think back about prices or features as a gold mine. But Hagling is often looked down on in Western culture, in my opinion. My question is, should I or how can I teach my kids how to effectively haggle and negotiate outside of sending them into a cardiolorship? Thanks. Bye-bye. I love the word haggle. I don't use it enough. Hagling, we haggle all the time, don't we? We're hagglers. No, we don't really haggle. We bicker. We don't really haggle. Dicker. I like to have, let's haggle more.

OK. It'll keep our relationship fresh and exciting. This is your area of expertise. I often just know Scott and I are business together and I let him do the haggling, as they say. I think he's really good at it. And I'm way too explicit. So Scott, take this one. Well, I mean, there's semantics around negotiating. So I wouldn't call it haggling, I call it negotiating.

And quite frankly, your kids, if they have a phone or they have a allowance, they're going to start figuring out how to negotiate with you. And I think that, I think negotiating with your parents and push and pull and learning, my son's very emotionally manipulative. He'll say, Dad, I want to go to Putschak with my friends and I thought you could meet me there because it'd be some great hang time. And he knows that I want nothing more than to hang with my kids.

So he throws in that he wants to go to Putsch. And he's already learning how to negotiate, right? Hagling usually is more a narrow part of it where you're talking about haggling with usually in a commercial setting, someone at a bizarre or you're saying, I'll pay you ten bucks for this, you know, for this item versus 12 and you have to go back and forth. And, you know, that, I think that's actually an interesting process. I actually tacked my kids.

We were at a market once and I gave them each some money and said, Go see, I want both you. They were all selling the same thing. And they both wanted the same thing. I'm like, you go to, I want to see who can find this item for the least. And they said. And by the way, you can offer them less. You can say, I, how would you take seven bucks for it? And it's embarrassing and it's hard. It's also something that I think women aren't as good as men. And men are trained to be more aggressive.

They're more risk aggressive. So men are more willing to be in bear, it's embarrassing to haggle. Well, I'll give you nine bucks. It's much cooler to just pay list. It's easier. No one gets offended. There's no haggling. The ability to haggle, the ability to say, no, I want 14%, not 9%. Raise is really important. And going more, more broadly, just to negotiating. And it took me 40 years to figure this out. There's only really two things you need to remember about negotiating.

And the first is, don't make a winner lose. Make it, you know, how do we figure this out together? I would really like to make this work. I'd really like to work with you. I think this would be good for both of us. And then the most important thing is you have to always show a credible willingness to walk away. And that is, I was in a negotiation this morning with something we're involved in. And I said, they kind of threw up some ejections.

And I said, well, first off, they're, you know, they're just may not be a fit here, but we'll still figure out ways to work together. But unless they believe there's a chance you might walk away in that you're willing to, you're never going to get the best deal. So and but don't make it a mo don't make it win lose. Don't make it emotional. Constantly, constantly talk about how you like to make this happen.

The other sort of jet eye mind trick that I learned recently that I think is really important in negotiation is when they, when someone says puts forward an objection to repeat back that you hear their concern, oh, you're worried. You know, you're worried that or you believe that we should do this because of acts of my hearing you correctly. And supposedly that does something to people's brain where when they feel heard, they don't, they're more inclined to meet you halfway.

So but I think haggling and negotiation is incredibly important for young people to learn. Unfortunately, I think men are better at it and it suppresses women's wages in certain professional context. Does I have to say from being a boss, I watched it. I watched an incompetent person ask for more and a woman who deserve more asked for less somehow. It was really interesting. I see that too.

I've, you know, this is an overall thing, but in generally right, it, it, it, it, having managed people, especially incredibly incompetent men tend to really value themselves rather high. That was fascinating to me. I was always like, you know, I actually want to fire you and you're asking for more money interesting, interesting gambit, which was, was always interesting. I, I guess the word haggling is not the right word, you're right. I, I'm very explicit. Know I'll have this.

And then they're like, what about this? I'm like, no, this is what I want. Like I always go in knowing what I want. And so I don't usually back down from that. I'm like, well, then I'll go. Like, and I actually mean it. And I think when you do that, you have to mean what you say and say what you mean. I find that I find being explicit rather freeing. Also, the best way to negotiate is to have another offer every, every three to five years at NYU, which I love.

I would return a call from, you know, a Cornell or a Columbia. And I'd say, sure, I'm happy to speak to anybody. And I'd say, can you give me just an indicative sense of what the terms would look like? And then I go to my dean and I say, this is my market worth. I don't want to leave. I want to stay here. I just want you to match it. You don't even need to beat it. Nothing helps in negotiation like multiple bidders.

And basically the only reason you hire an agent or an investment banker is such that they can credibly lie and give the illusion that are multiple bidders all trying to wrench your time or buy your company. That is basically what they do. Because the illusion of scarcity, the only way you get really what you either deserve or the maximum is people start credibly going, well, what would we have paid Kara or what would we have paid for this company the day after we lose it to someone else?

Let's pretend there's a very real possibility we're going to lose this person or this deal. That gets people to where they're actually willing to pay. So I hate to say it, but without being threatening, without being angry, just always have demonstrate a credible willingness to leave or not do the deal. Without being an asshole, without I'm quitting or I'm going to Fox or whatever. No, just okay. Maybe there isn't a fit here.

Just say that up front and it's not going to be the end of the world for both of us. Can I ask you a last question? What was your son's one on that haggling thing you made them do? I don't even remember. I think it was the younger one's much craftier. The younger one is much more aggressive. He's much more aggressive. Alex wins all those things because Louis so nice. He's like, okay, whatever. Louis is socialist. Louis is like, hey man, you could probably use this more than me.

I'll give you a $12, even though he asked for $10. I see Louis being much more. Yes, that's exactly what Louis is. Alex is like, no, he's always, I love that. I love that Alex. He's always like the angles. He's got the angles. He's always looking at these. He's such a math person. And Claire is quite good at it. When I go, would you like this? How about two? I mean, I'm now saying, negotiating simple. I'm remembering all these things. Something I didn't learn until I got older.

It's okay to leave a little bit on the table. It's okay to say, okay, this is important to you. You want them to feel like at least on a couple dimensions of the deal that they want. To just say, okay, yeah, that's fine. I wanted this, but this seems important to you. Not only that, it's okay to leave a little bit of cabbage on the table. That's okay. That's fine. I think that's the fatal flaw of Donald Trump, ultimately. He doesn't do that.

He wants to fuck you in a way that's really ultimately adds up eventually, maybe not in this lifetime. Anyway, for the rest of you listeners, it's time for this week's Threads poll. The question this week is, who would make a better Halloween costume? Kara or Scott? Oh, obviously, Scott. Bonus points, if you send us your pictures dressed up as one of us, we get a lot of that. That's interesting.

Or someone interesting that we'll find interesting, go to our Threads account at Pivot Podcast official to vote. What's your Halloween costume this year? I'm going as Kara's, we sure again, as I do every year. It's really great. I've given up. I've given up. Anyway, if you've got a question of your own, you would like answered, send it our way. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to send a question for the show or call 85551pivot. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions.

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Okay, Scott, let's hear a prediction besides the fact that you will have an epic Halloween costume like you did last year where you went as Deadpool. Yeah, but you didn't ask me. Keep forgetting. When I ask you questions, I'm not interested in you. I just want you to ask me. Oh, that's, I forgot. I just thought of that as I was going into the commercial break. Last year, I went as Deadpool after the fire. I had to make a part of Steve Meisker. I looked amazing. You did.

This year, I'm going, it's not the costume isn't as good, but it's kind of fun. I'm going as Richard Simmons, which I'm really excited about. No. Wow, I mean, shorty shorts. I have these gold, very short dolphin shorts. Oh, wow. But here's the problem. I think that's the problem, saying you and shorty shorts, but go ahead. That's where I would really kick in as a woman. I'd have amazing legs if I were a woman.

Anyways, the, God, can you imagine what beautiful children I'd have with that center from the Minnesota links? She and I would have spectacular children. Okay. Anyways, the, I found out Tom Selleck in the first season of Magnum PI was the exact same height and weight as me. He was 6'290, but I looked much different in shorts than him and I just can't figure it out. I just can't figure it out. Are you wearing the wig? You're wearing the wig. Oh, come on. Come on.

Halloween, how could you have invented a better holiday for me? I know. I get to wear a wig and women dress up as sloths. Yeah. Oh my God. Let's have Halloween every month. I know. You love to, you love a costume. You really go all out. I do not, I do not. I don't like it at all. I don't like it at all. I love Halloween. Oh, I love it.

I absolutely, and by the way, just do me a favor when, because you're going into yourself, when people ask you what you're supposed to be, look at them and begin to cry and say, I was supposed to be a lot of things. That's good. That is good. I love it. Oh, thank you. I finally have an answer. I have an answer. I have an answer. All right. Let's hear a prediction now.

Yeah. Okay. So, look, I don't think there's going to come as a shocker than anybody, but I am officially endorsing Harris Walls for President and Vice President. And my prediction is that Harris administration, which would be much better for young men. And I believe that young men are some of the last available swing voters because they don't traditionally vote. When they get excited, they vote. They almost always, or they disproportionately vote at least until recently for Democrats.

So I believe the news, kind of the swing voters are young men. And this is why I think young men would be better served voting for Vice President Harris and then I encourage them to do so. And that is, I think everybody needs a code, whether it's from your religion, whether it's from the armed services, whether it's from your company, everybody needs kind of an anchor to hold on to and guide the millions of decisions they have to make in a complicated world.

And I increasingly believe that young men can call on or what I'm hoping they can develop as a new code is a modern form of masculinity. And those three things are the following, being a provider, a protector, an appropriator. And I want to go through each of these and why I believe the Harris administration and policies would enable men to foot to those. I like this. By the way, the Washington Post has yet to make one. Jeff Bezos, get off your ass and make one. But go ahead.

I love that you're doing this. There you go. Okay. So provider. I think a decent place for any man to start is to take economic responsibility for his household. Now, that doesn't mean that you're going to get on the way of your wife or your partner who might be better at that money thing. When my partner was a Goldman Sachs and making more money than me, I tried to pick up the slack at home and not be threatened by it. And that is also taking economic responsibility.

But a good starting point is that recognizing three and four women see economic viability as key to a maid. It's only one and four men about women. Unfortunately, I'm not talking about the way the world should be, but the way it is men are disproportionately evaluated on their economic viability, you need to be a provider.

And under the Harris administration, you're talking about an economic strategy that everyone from Goldman Sachs to basically every living Nobel Prize winner economics is going to say it's going to win or it's going to result in greater growth. And with the Trump administration as a young man, you are talking about what will effectively be the greatest tax increase in history on you. And it's the following. It'll be a deficit that will be triple than what would be under the Harris administration.

Why is the deficit the biggest tax in history on you? Because Karriswisher and Scott Gowley will not be alive to pay back that deficit. You will have to pay it back. So what young people haven't connected the dots on is that deficit spending is nothing but a tax on them such that I can have champagne and cocaine now. You're going to have to pay it back, not me.

There are a variety of different economic plans, whether it's a housing credit, whether it's loans for small businesses that are meant to put more money in the pockets of young people, specifically young men, and enable you to be a better provider protector. Your default setting as a man should be one of protection. You don't need to understand the new answer on illegal or undocumented workers, but when you see them being demonized, your default setting should be to move to protection.

You don't need to understand or agree with the trans community, but when you see them being demonized, your default should be as a protector. Real men break up fights and bars. They don't start them. Real men protect their country. They don't ship host it. Harrison Walls have a much greater default setting around protection. And I especially think Vice President Walls presents a wonderful image as a man being a protector.

And that is, and I love the story of him hearing about the LGBT community at his high school feeling bullied and him enacting the football team to come to their aid. That is exactly what it means to be a man, to be a protector. And then finally, pro-creator, the most rewarding thing in life, and I'm not saying you have to do this to be happy, but the most rewarding thing I know in your life, Cara, and in my life has been raising children with a competent loving partner.

And I did not, when I saw my partner, the mother, my children at the Raleigh Hotel at the pool, I was not thinking that she'd be great at buying distressed properties and fixing them up, or should be a good person to say for a 401k, I had one thought. And that is, I would really, really like to have sex with this person.

And wanting to have sex with women and being successful at it and figuring out the nuance and the skills and the strength and the humor and showering and enduring the rejection and being funny and being kind, such that you can have sex with women is a wonderful thing and it's something you should be proud of. And your ability, your ability to be attractive to women will be easier under a Harris administration.

And if I did a survey around would young men like to have more or less sex, I'm pretty sure the vast majority would say I would like to have more sex. And if you want to have more sex, if you want to have more sex, then we absolutely need to catarize, reject, and turn around this ridiculous notion that women are going to have their bodily autonomy taken.

Because if you want to have random sex, and let's be clear, the majority of relationships involved at some point, maybe a little bit alcohol and a little bit of random sex, if the woman is thinking about random sex and then says, you know what? I might be in an emergency room parking lot unable to terminate a pregnancy, even if I have sepsis because the doctor might go to jail. If I have to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term, both you and her are going to be economically disabled.

The fastest way to have less sex is to let more people get on the Supreme Court and to take away a woman's bodily autonomy. So guys, you want to get laid more? Make sure women have bodily autonomy. Let's review. You're ability to be a provider. I'm very serious about this. I think sex is a wonderful thing. And the notion, if kids, young people are having less sex, it is terrible. And it is a wonderful thing.

And the notion that you and your partner have to be much more thoughtful and scared of actually having sex is terrible for everybody.

One, your ability to be a provider, economic policies that make it easier for you to be economically responsible for your household, two, a default setting around being a provider and three, your ability to form a family at your pace with economic responsibility through bodily autonomy, all of these out up to a vice president, Harris being nominated and elected for our president.

So if you are a young man, I would encourage you to lean into your code around masculinity and that code leads to one place. And that is a Harris administration. Wow. I have not heard that one. If you want to have sex, vote, Harris. I like it. That's what we're saying. Correct? There you go. If I had to boil it down. All right. That's an interesting novel. I just like her. That's why I'm voting for her. So I just like her. I like him.

And I'm so fucking sick of the way these tech, the toxic tech pros, which you are fill it with Trump. I hate this toxicity has to end. That's my thing. So that's just it. I like if you want to have sex, vote, Harris. I think it's a compelling, compelling argument. And I think she should make it at the ellipse when she is there. She said, no more answer, and a lot more sex. Thank you, Scott Galloway. 100% that would be it. 100% a wonderful thing. Young people need to have more of it.

I understand that. And for more, I have to say pound for pound, you give a lot of really good content, Scott Galloway. Just not as much as Drew Barrymore. But I don't look good in shorts. Okay. No, but we'll see. I'm sure a lot of that, unfortunately, for me. For more in the carat and Scott universe this week, which is growing. It's growing. It's expanding. We're an expanding universe. Scott, you talked about perseverance with the famous perseverance, right?

Or Angela Duckworth over at the Profty Pod. Let's listen to a clip of that. Where does that inner self talk come from that says, you know, I'll show you, right? Because I think if there was one phrase that I have heard over and over again in interviews of the grittiest people, it's that we're going to be able to talk about that. But when they describe confronting a major challenge, especially when they're doubted, right? And someone else tells them, like, well, you can't do this.

You know, there is this rage, this like voice that says, I'll show you. And my theory is that being in one challenging situation after another is not enough to give you the voice that says, I'll show you somewhere there has to be support. I think I've seen it too often, you know, that people who are in challenging situations without support, you know, are not the ones to get up again, dust themselves off, like learn something, you know, come back stronger than they were before. I'll show you.

That's guided everything in my life. I'll show you. I do. I have to say, I love her. I love Angela Duckworth. She wrote gritt, obviously. But I'll show you. Has been a big fucking really? Uh-huh. Okay. Okay. That's what I do. I like. We're both gritty, I think, in a lot of ways. Okay. Scott, that's the show. We'll be back on Tuesday with more pivot and obviously more news where we are bearing down on the election. We are. It'll be very, it'll be a week from Tuesday. Incredible. Incredible.

When we come back. Anyway, please read us out. Today's show was produced by Larry Neiman, Zoe Marcus and Taylor Griffin. Ernie and your Todd engineered this episode. Thanks also to Jibos, Miss Vario and Dan Shulan. Nishat Kerwa, Fox Media's executive producer, Vario. Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. This is for listening to pivot from New York Magazine, Fox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine at nymag.com slash pod.

We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. What is a good default code, protector, provider, pro creator? Support for the show comes from Alex Partners. Did you know that almost 90% of executives see potential for growth from digital disruption? With 37% seeing significant or extremely high positive impact on revenue growth. In Alex Partners 2024 Digital Disruption Report, you can learn the best path to turning that disruption into growth for your business.

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