Hello the Internet, and welcome to this episode of The Weekly Zeitgeist. These are some of our favorite segments from this week, all edited together into one NonStop infotainment laugh stravaganza. Yeah, so, without further ado, here is the Weekly Zeitgeist. Anyways, Miles, we are thrilled to be joined in our third seat by one of our favorite guests. It's one of the hosts of the incredible podcast five to four about all
the ways the Supreme Court is a complete disaster. She's also a supervising attorney at Texas Law has worked as a public defender in Rio Grande City, Texas. Please welcome to the show, Rihanna, and home on.
I think this is my third time on time.
Guess what honor I'm loving is all hours? Let me see that manicure you said? You said three and I say, hold on, let me wowk nail game solid snail.
Yeah, that's right, we gotta we're keeping it popping in Austin in the Trump to presidency.
To Gress watching right. Yeah, I learned that I internalized that.
Yeah, shout out titty boy, two chains titty Boy.
Yeah, a great rename, Like truly, renames don't come any better. Than going from titty Boy to two Chains.
We always yeah, I felt we're talking about that towards the end of the year too. We love talking about the formerly known as titty Boy, f K titty Boy two Chains.
It was between two Chains and f K A titty Boy. Good good call. Yeah, a rebrand. Sometimes you need a rebrand. It doesn't work with you know, New Coke didn't work out the two Chains certainly later than Titty Boy. Brannon did. I I don't think I missed anything. Not to put too much pressure on yet, but it was mainly Milania wore a hat Luca to the Lakers. That covers most of it.
Gosh what else?
Oh, like Elon Musk had some kind of like arm malfunction, like tired.
Or something like that.
Yeah, you know, like I said, like like we've been saying, it's a quiet news cycle.
You know when he did that funny wave. It's times like that that. I'm like, man, I wish Leno was still on the air. You know, what would that guy have said about that?
He was like he said, it was just he was because he's autistic. So we got some autistic people here to see to that out.
You're like whoa Jay, No, j what are you doing? No? Anybody in the audience. No, I mean I do kind of wonder how would Leno to do with probably yeah, hurting himself, Miles, he owes the mob, money bro believe in the Illuminati, Black Eye Club? Come on, yeah, now, who's naive. We do like to ask our guests. You may you may know this about us, but we do like to ask our guests sometimes with something from their
search history that's revealing about who they are. And first of all, I guess we got to ask what what do you use them for? A search engine over there? Is it like ill google google it? Oh? God?
What?
Miles? Just quit my smiles? Is that something? Is anything?
Anything? Mm hmm? It is how to pronounce mac fife and hicked?
Well it sounds like you.
The answer faith in is shicked because it apparently means in German one who is slappable, which I think is a useful word to know it's faith and the German.
Yeah, I can see that word.
It's actually spelled how it sounds so just big five and Big five and ship by jos and Villanova used to be in the Big five and ship there.
It is also I have a a wonderful sound clip of someone actually saying that that I can.
There and there was the sound club.
Sorry, but yeah, I was just I was talking to some Italians and we all agreed that German is the most ridiculous language.
So it is.
But I do love how it's you can stack concepts almost infinitely into one word. One one is like this, one is like one who is deserving of a firm slap.
So let's hear it from a robot or argument the way this this first syllable comes at you hard.
Fife and fife and back five fanga zick is how you're breaking it down for oh.
Man, I'm so sorry to our German listener, but we love, we love pretend German over here.
That sounds I know, like I've been told that Dr Daily is like it''s not correct. Not how that that word yeah there is incorrect. I think that was a note that we got literally episode yeah, And I was like, and I tried to change it, and I was like that that's just how the word wants to be said by me. Unfortunately, that's just the way I'm gonna make it do what it do. To quote Rachel, you know, I love.
Honors from from the Workaholics and Derby is.
Just gonna have to get over it, though.
Yeah, I think they will. The pronunciation that we just listened to sounded a lot like me pronouncing a thing, because they like start really strong and then lose all confidence and like swallow the end of the word I.
Was in.
And it's it's because I don't know any Danish, but the key is exactly that. I went to a pastry shop and there's like all these words that they're too long, they're very complicated. But I was like, if I just start out strong and then trail off like I would like an average and they totally bought it. They were talking in Danish and I was like, yeah, she yeah, yeah, yeah around.
They're like they're like, bro, she just did the I'll take three whiskeys things. Yeah yeah, is that that's what That's what he was supposed to do?
Ah Yeah, yeah, I did the I did the Tarantina things that.
Great great pastries.
It was very good pastries. And yeah, it's definitely you just like because like what looks like Abel Skimer if you just go.
Yeah, you sound like a local because you were saying Copenhagen like Cobana.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, apparently Tivoli gardens is pronounced.
Right.
You just mumbling? You sound like local.
I think there's a joke that like the Danes sound like they're trying to talk with a mouthful of potatoes, and.
That sounds like a joke that was written in the eighteen.
By the Sweet.
Yeah, that's a Swedish joke.
Like.
They have potatoes in mouth.
Yes, that is how Swedish people sound.
I always love hearing the insults that people in neighboring countries have for each other.
They are like so specific. Yeah.
Like I remember being in Africa and people were like, Ghanaians work too hard, you know, Okay yeah yeah yeah, and is like oh Nigerians, don't get me starred on that. I'm like, I just I'm here for some.
Tellyo, what's something you think is overrated?
The Imperial metric system?
Wow, okay, hold on right?
Or selfie sticks? I think selfie sticks are overrated.
Man, where's the last time you saw a selfie stick?
Well that's the point. Yeah, I mean, you know, they probably sold millions of them. You know, people are thinking I'm gonna like enhance my identity on Instagram by holding out this big stick and then you end up at a party and where's the stick?
Yeah, yeah, it's true. We've I'm like, it's funny, like where did where have all the selfie sticks gone all the Yeah, I mean that is yeah. I feel like it's funny because you know, in Japan, you'll see like on the train platform they're like, put that motherfucking selfie stick away. They have so many selfie stick warnings because they think sometimes someone might get it so high it'll hit like the fucking power lines above the train track or something.
Related.
Right right, the.
Voltage connecting in the middle of the behind his eyes.
I got a photo of the guy. You can see an arc from the cable to the guy's selfie selfie stick. That's right.
That is not ai that actually happened, right right.
Yeah, Yeah, there's some stuff like that that's just like invented by people with add who don't know or who don't have a d D and don't know enough people who have a d D. They're like, yeah, no, this will be good and people just remember them and they won't be clogging up our lost in founds for decades from now. But yeah, selfie sticks just couldn't be me having a selfie stick be careful, you.
Never know, you never know.
I mean, it could be me for twelve hours and then and then I will lose that shit. I have noticed, like, you know, I took my kids to the the not the Redwood for it, the Sequoia like National Park over over the holidays, and you know, we're it's just a big like line of people taking selfies in various locations, right. And when I would offer to take people's pictures a lot of time, they're like, no, Like I just want
to like take a selfie like that. There's a weird like selfie culture, like right, purity of selfies.
Well it could it could have been. Were you sweating a lot?
I was sweating and being weird. I hate and I'm gonna take that. I seem a little desperate to take their picture. Hey hey, hey, hey, it's that guy again.
Hey you want help.
We're in the car. You are great, right now? Hey hey hey great?
Py sure, hey hey, just give me your camera.
I'll give it back.
I'll give it back, I'll give it back. You do it in the back.
Seat of our car. They approached. He I was gonna get I was gonna get a candid.
Yeah, I mean people like a selfie more. I mean I think it's probably generational because like when I see people my age and older, you definitely are doing that thing. We're like, oh yeah, yay, kick, thank you, thank you so much, so much because sometimes I don't I think personally, I don't. Selfies aren't the most flattering angle for me.
But hey, when you when you see a selfie that was taking the like let's say President obamacause like people around then it's like, Wow, the president is taking a selfie.
Right, cute.
Yeah, that that's really cool. That's cool to see because and it's not a generational thing.
I don't think.
I think it's it's all it's like a Hubris thing. It's like a it's a it's a cultural thing. I think right now in the world where we're looking too much into ourselves, Am I getting too metaphoric?
Maybe I am. No, I don't think this is the type of shit we do on the show.
I was like, or maybe it's faux populist for a politician to take a selfie, Like look, I am just like you poor people with the selfies.
Let me get my hands out of the pictures service agent and take the picture and I'll look like a selfie the Yeah, but gen Z likes selfies because they're like, I don't know, it seems like I'm all alone in this world since you've poisoned it and created a system where like we're just communicating to each other in isolation through social media. So why would it? Why would I not take a selfie? Non selfies are a lie?
Okay dead wow?
Dad like cas is Mark Zuckerberg, Oh oh.
Nice, wow you you jumped that.
Yeah, we went, yeah, we do do something, do something because we'll get in the cage.
We not like elon how tall Mark Zuckerberg, give meything like five ten five?
Will he looks tall?
Looks like normal sizes? Yeah normal, not normal, but like not he's not neither super tall or super short.
It's just like, oh, were we actually this? Just in I thought five to five five seven, five seven okay, Jeff Bezos.
Is five wow?
Okay, Steve Jobs six to two?
Really well anymore? Hey, hey did that?
If you measure down?
Now?
Look, yeah, look what are we what are we doing?
So, yeah, Zuckerberg would be in like a pretty low weight class in the cage. Is it is what I'm trying to it would be yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah see what what what he's walking into the ring? His his weight at that point?
Is that using the metric system.
Or imperial metric system?
Imperial? Yeah, we are a strictly imperial podcast.
He's ten stone.
We actually go deeper.
Yeah, he's actually ten and a half stone.
And yeah, measure height by like chickens. I don't know, whatever, whatever you have on the farm, what is something you think so underrated? Andrew underrated?
I just watched for the US this racist premium suboptimal bundle. We watched with a new new friend of not new friend, but a new coworker of yours, if I can.
Say, ye.
Luka, and our producer Kevin Bartel. We watched the first Fast and Furious movie with zig had never seen it before. And that's weird. If everyone knows Cody Ziggler, there's nothing more seeming his personality than the first Fast and Furious movies.
And I feel like he just has seen so many films. I feel like I just generally like, yeah, of course you probably consume that, even passively.
But I gotta be honest, guys, I started on too Fast, Too Furious, And I've seen everything since I saw Too Fast, Too Furious in the theaters that you started with.
Yeah, Too Fast is by far the worst.
I know, diabolical, it's really I was. I was a big John Singleton fan. I was in my Au Tour era. I was like, they got Singleton for the Fast and the Furious franchise.
Devin in that too. That's when I was like, yeah, come on, bro man, that was that was That was an era, the Devin Aki era.
That's so nineties peak nineties.
Yeah, or so the first one is good, right, you're saying.
I know, I was gonna say it's my underrated is movies filmed in La like two blocks from my apartment because it is wild. Basically, like every shot in Echo Park, I Andrew t Am just off screen.
Like you feel like, I swear to God, I'm about to be in this.
Yeah, It's it's insane. How like basically I'm not to docks myself, but Echo Park's pretty dense. I'm just off camera in every shot in and around Toretto's house, right, and Torretto's like little office. It's just so much of like, oh shit, that's my street. They just jumped a car on my block.
The times I've seen like my neighborhood in the in a movie was in Crash when Matt Dillon arrests pats them down illegally on Ventura and Terrence and Terrence Howard like that whole scene. I'm like that saying it's right there, and I hate that fucking movie.
Yeah that's Oh. I'm also just because of the Acho parkness of it. I'm also like Training Day basically takes place right around my first apartment I lived in in Acho Park.
This is this sounds like a great tour. You could do the Andrew home filming location tour.
Yeah, yeah, where's Andrew? Just imagine like little Peanut the chihuahua, just off camera every time every time Torrotto's had his house. But yeah, it was one of those like, yeah, movies filmed in La two blocks from my house.
Yeah, Matt, mattacific.
But do you so like there's some things that I know too much about and it makes it hard for me to watch movies about, like a basketball, I can't really watch basketball movies. Oh, I watched too much real basketball, and I'm just like that person doesn't know how to like hold, it's just like something unnatural about it. But like, what is that the last slam dunk at all? I think, yeah, you've mentioned it. I think it's kind of your work of media before you got to watch.
That movie and tell me if it's good basketball, because to me it seemed like it it's all like rotoscoped like animation. I don't know, it look good to me. Sorry, what what was.
Does it get in the wet? Like is there like geographical errors that you're like, wait a second, that's not where that would be.
They they do go from Echo Park to Neptune's nest Neptune's Net just to eat fries, and it does seem.
Like Neptune's Net is where Yeah, time, you really shouldn't be wasting gas like that.
It's like an hour and a half in traffic, and it does seem like they just eat fries and have a conversation and then dip back to the main platform.
It.
Yeah, I remember the beginning of World Trade Center. I think that's the like the nine to eleven Nicolas Cage movie where it like went past my apartment and then like like it's the morning of nine to eleven and they're like going down south in Manhattan. They go like past my apartment, like down Lower West Side, and then like they're like in the midtown and then like they're moving up the city. Yea yeah yeah, and then it really took me out.
Of oh you know the you know, our offices are in Valentine's Day, the twenty ten movie with Anne Hathaway. Oh really yeah, they shoot in. I'm like, I'm watching, like this is our building. Oh, I can tell by the concrete walls. I'm like, what is going on? Yeah, and then she like walks out takes off down the shit. You're like, yeah, there it is okay.
Damn.
Anyway, for those that are interested, do your geo guessing and check out when I worked.
When I worked at Comedy Central. And this probably is not a huge surprise to people familiar with cable TV budgets, but a shocking number of like Comedy Central shows anytime they're in an office is shot in like one of the one of the boardrooms, thick and one of the.
Yeah yeah, now you know what the company Cent got in office.
Let's take a quick break.
We'll come back, we'll hear you're overrated, We'll get into some news, we'll be right back.
And we're back, We're back.
Hey Hey. It feels like the Trump administration has created this rhythm where he does a thing everyone's like, that's essentially against the law what he just did, and then yeah, so and then people keep like ask can he do that? Before we get an answer, he does the next thing that's against the law that we weren't ready for him to do yet. So I think the answer ends up being no, he can't do that, at least as of
right now in a bunch of these cases. But I feel like we're moving on too quickly, and so he's like getting these like wins for him, like getting to like flex and act like he's doing things that like doing whatever he wants. But then it like the media isn't sticking around to be like, Okay, that actually got
overturned and that actually is not legal. In the federal judge said that like gave the speech from Happy Gilmore where he's like, I wear you no points soul, Like this is a This is a quote from a Ronald Reagan appointee temporarily blocking his order to en birthrate citizenship. This is a blatantly unconstitutional order. I have difficulty understanding how a member of the bar would state unequivocally that this is a constitutional order. It just boggles my mind.
Yeah, he's referencing that the Trump lawyers, like the lawyers saying this, Like how could you be a licensed attorney and say this shit with this straight faith.
I think at the end of this like chain of cause and effect that is being started by these things that it does come down to like who gone check me boo? Like who's gonna stop him? And who's gonna check me? V boo? And the answer is that I hear Ali, like, oh, the Supreme Court is eventually going
to have to weigh in on this one. Probably. I'm a big fan of this podcast five to four, and it is, in addition to being educational and wildly entertaining make me laugh, has given me a severe lack of faith in the Supreme Court to do the right thing. So real, I just want to get your sense, as one of the hosts of that show, like, how are you feeling as you were as you're witnessing these this first week and a half of attempted authoritarianism?
Yeah, I'm sorry to throw like cold water on the whole idea that like the Supreme Court.
Is the check, you know.
And I think it's like if you if you think that, if you hear that, or we hear it so much that like you're not wrong to like think that because people say, like, you know, only the Supreme Court now can stand up to Trump or you know, the Supreme courts can have a really interesting role under the creeping
authoritarianism administration, you know. But like that's because like just like structurally, like the three branches of government, like the Supreme Court, like yeah, it really doesn't do anything other than check the other branches, Like that is what the Supreme Court does.
But so like structurally, you get why people like think that. At the same time, at the same time.
Y'all, we have to we have to be looking at the conservative project, the project of doing authoritarianism in the United States as the branch is working together to do that, and that includes the Supreme Court. Oh yeah, the Supreme Court, while they could check Donald Trump, you know, granted him almost total immunity in office.
Last term before he got elected.
So yeah, we need to see and with all of these cases that are about to be in front of the Supreme Court, you know, while there might be some tiki tak here and there, where the Court says like, ah, that's a little bit too far out there in terms of the constitutional order. We have to have to have to view the Supreme Court as an institution that is in place right now and operating right now, as a green light for authoritarianism, not a check on authoritarianism. Right.
It kind of has been for a while. Yeah, like the first ones there. It just seems it seems weird to me that the first ones to get there to be like, yeah, this guy can do whatever the fuck he wants. Also, no more abortions. Thanks, that's been our time. Are the ones that people are like, well, the Supreme Court's not gonna happen. Surely this, surely this will be the line.
Uh yeah, well that god. I mean it's I was hoping, you know, I hadn't really checked the news in the last three weeks. I was like, yeah, they're gonna they'll figure it out.
They'll figure it out.
But then you have to zoom out and be like, Okay, so, yes, the Federalist Society has they've been taking their time saying, let's get our starters in there.
You know, we got we got.
To revamp this whole roster, baby, if we want to start winning titles, and they've they've got they've got the pieces now to do that. And I think, yeah, I think it's just like even the last four years, where they'll be the things where they clearly come down on the side of the conservative movement, and then you get these occasional scraps that they throw out to make them seem they're like, we're not a completely politicized body.
I mean, we just did the.
Bare minimum back right, right, And yeah, I think like people, I think it's like a real failure of legal media.
Actually that for decades has has been like when when media, when you hear about these cases being decided, you hear about them like on just the legal terms, or you just hear or read about like, Okay, well this is why the fucking freak gul sam Alito said what he said, and this was the justification, and then there's never anything else that's like, oh, this is part of like a much big, bigger project.
They've been doing this for a long time.
Here's all the people who are going to be hurt by this, and here are all of the other here are all of the other like arguments or reasons why this is wrong.
So yeah, I think like media.
In general and how we cover and talk about the Supreme Court is like a big reason for this. But I'm here to tell you and we on five four say it all the time. You know, it's really important to understand these six hyper conservative freakazoids. It's really important
to understand that they act like politicians. They are doing politics right, right, they are doing fascism right when they overturn Roe v. Wade when they say in three h three creative that you know, a woman doesn't have to make a wedding website for a gay couple, right, she.
Doesn't even have to have a web design business to.
Do it, or an actual gay couple that asked her to do they do the wedding website right, or.
A football coach who exactly exactly.
So you have to see this institution as an institution that is also doing implementing fascism and authoritarianism, and that's what they're there to do, and they're happy to do it.
You think, Leonard Leo, he's just kicking back. He's like, bro, they ain't nobody saying my.
Biggest gatherer of the past twenty five years.
They are winning. We do have to a fel we got to admit, like, yeah, I feel like a big part of the media response to Trump and the authoritarian project of you know, the Supreme Court has been like they'll never get away with this, and like kind of like, look, how stupid they are to think that they can get away with this, right before they like get away with it, you know, like that that response to be like this guy doesn't know what he's doing just feels like ultimately
it doesn't matter even if he doesn't know what he's doing, it's working for him and them, and yes, they just keep winning because the opponent doesn't realize they're playing. Like I don't I don't know what to even say.
Like they're they're being bold, right, Like the right wing is being bold. Trump administration all these crazy crazy executive orders. They're being bold and they're not checking themselves thinking, m is this illegal? I don't know they're doing it. It's like, you know, throw throw the spaghetti at the wall and see what sticks, right, And and so the Supreme Court
to the extent that like yeah, it checks them. We're we're so far like the overta window is so so right, right, is so so conservative that yeah, if you're getting some kind of check on this stuff, well yeah, it's it's tiny stuff compared to the in totality, how like our government is being transformed, you know.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yea.
I feel like we're just like in the Like I was saying this on yesterday's show, it's just a lot of a lot of us are just sort of in denial that this actually like forget that country you grew up in twenty years ago, like that.
Shit is that shit, that that order, that old order.
Completely gone, completely gone, and that is not coming back for I don't know if it's going to come back in our lifetime.
Even so, it's much much.
More empowering to understand the assignment and say, no, this is this is what's happening right now, and where where's my part in all of this? And I'd say you got to be out there in the street and shit like that, like doing all kinds of wild shit, but understanding that this is something more people need to put their attention on because they are they are fucking at
the wheel, and they are we are. We've already gone through a few walls and we're about to keep hitting more walls this week, though there's even more stuff that the Supreme.
More Business week.
Yeah yeah, And I was and I obviously wanted to get your take on this because one of them is very obvious to me how problematic it is and awful and backwards, and then the other two I'm like, I feel like there's a little nuance that you can probably help flesh out for.
Us in religious freedom stuff.
Right, yeah, right. So the first one is regarding government funding of Catholic charter schools before they could get vouchers, which was only doing like a little bit of pain a little bit of funding. Now we're talking about full blown. The feds are now paying for full blown Jesus schools. I was like, Okay, that feels like that feels that feels like it's butting up against the First Amendment and
what I know about religion and the federal government. So that one seems pretty obvious that that could open the floodgates of all kinds of backwards teaching and weird schools suddenly getting the funding to teach whatever they want to.
Another one deals it is they like getting in under Catholic because like people are like I've heard of Catholic schools, those can't be so bad, like, so we'll they are. They're weird. They are weird, but they have a long history. I just feel like, as opposed to if it was like my mom's special version of Christianity that she invented, right charter schools, you know what I mean. I wonder why they went Catholic just to I think, look, I.
Think they just knew. They're like, yeah, I don't know. It doesn't matter because at the end of the day, it's more just about being like, yeah, well, whatever y'all do, you'll do in Jesus teachings, here's some money teach on. Another one deals with parents being able to opt out of curriculum where they're being like, well, if they if they have LGBTQ plus characters or concepts, I do not want my I want my child to be as ignorant as possible and to be made fun of infinitely in
their adulthood. So I would like them to I would like to hide reality from them as much as possible. That one, it seems like basically I don't know, probably can you can you kind of walk us through. It feels like probably at that point we're completely upending where the power dynamic is and how children are taught to just be like, well, if enough parents want to opt out, then you might have to change the whole curriculum or maybe you don't send kids to that school.
Yeah, these are both pretty crazy cases. Crazy again, like this goes back to exactly what I was just saying, where the Overton window has shifted so far, right, these are pretty out there in terms of like conservative arguments, like the lower courts and precedent over decades. Is pretty clear that both of these cases, like the state directly funding religious schools, that's like unheard of, right, and then the same thing was like opting out of public school curriculum.
Both of these cases obviously come under their First Amendment, like freedom of religion. I just want to like, I just want to differentiate between the two. So the government funding public schools, that would be under what's called the establishment clause of the First Amendment that says, like the state can't make a law that respects a certain establishment of religion, Right, that's the separation of church and state.
That is the clause in the First Amendment.
The second one, where parents are trying to have their kids opt out of mandatory curriculum in public schools. The free exercise clause, right, the government can't infringe on your
individual free exercise of your faith. Parents are saying, well, when my kids have to go to story time in the library at the public school, and story time features a book they're getting read a book about being trans child, right, about about a mom making a rainbow wig for her trans child or for a kid walking around pride, Well, that that infringes on the free exercise of my religion, Like you said, Miles, like both of these cases are
really really crazy. The justices you know, coming down in the way that the conservatives want them to really upends like a lot of how we think of the First Amendment, like working right, and I think in terms of like choosing like, oh, which one would be more impactful than the other?
I think it's really important to like see again all of these cases.
You know, there's also there's also a case about like tax exemptions for religious organizations that's coming up at the Supreme Court. Right, look at them all as part of the project, right, just like the executive orders, right, Trump is doing that, he's doing it at a different pace, right, which there's a different strategy behind. But you see in the totality of the executive orders a fascist project, an
authoritarian project. We should be viewing Supreme Court cases in the same way, particularly because the Supreme Court decides what cases it takes, decides what cases that they have total control over, the cases that are going to be argued in front of them, and what they want to be deciding and changing the law on every single term.
Right.
So in the totality of these cases, the First Amendment and the freedom of religion, separation of Church and State cases at the Supreme Court, this term you see, you see a project, and you see what the right is focused done. Right, you see what they're going to be trying to weaponize in the law in you know, the next couple of decades. And here it's going to be
the First Amendment. Here it's going to be saying, you know, gay people, existing stories being told, queer people being around me, or books that my children read that include queer characters, that's actually an infringement on my civil liberties.
Right. That is, that is fascistic.
Right, That is that all of this is about creating in and out groups, a scary other right that we can all put our problems on and our violence on, and so again you see the Supreme Court doing this work for a fascist movement in the same way that we can like clearly see that Trump as an individual is doing that work as well.
You know, I feel.
I feel like it's so doomsday.
I'm really sorry you guys, but we got to be clear sighted.
Yeah, we gotta be Yeah, we gotta keep our eyes open and like understand what is happening, because especially now that I just I feel like the mainstream response is really having a hard time like getting its mind around what is happening and like seeing it for what it is, Like, yeah, it really feels like there is this big fascist project. Like it's interesting because I feel like my understanding of fascism historically was they had big a lot of bureaucracy
and like you know, they trains ran on time. Thing was like a big bragging point. This seems to me, Yeah, and this time it seems to be like they're just
breaking everything and then use it. When the thing breaks, they're like, oh, that's because people were too nice to gay people and black people, and so like it's got like kind of a new look fascism where like they're incompetence, and they're tearing down of everything allows for them to like make an argument for the continued privatization of everything
and like the takeover by monopolies and oligarchs and exactly. Yeah, yeah, but the but why is the media Like it just it feels like the media was operating under these very specific sets of rules of like, well, we can't call this out because then it's too seems like we're being too biased or something, and so they just they learned whatever the media's like playbook is of like what they will tolerate, what they won't and just like yeah, now
they know exactly how to work inside this system. And yeah, the media like doesn't know how to just be like this is what's happening. This is clearly what's happening. They're successfully dismantling civilization like as we knew it. And yeah, because I guess because the media has been pretty complicit in that for so long in other ways that like the old willing to call it out now.
Yeah, I think I think there's like a few things in the media question, But I do think like the media question is such a massive, such a massive, like contributing factor to the problems is that, like there's so much misinformation, there's also too much information and the media is approaching I think both of those categories in both like dropping the ball in fucked up ways in terms
of too much information. For example, the media, Yes, like journalists have a role in interpreting and explaining every executive order to us, right, Like, I appreciate the people who are doing that. But again, what we fail to do when we're like, okay, let's break down every executive order is we're missing the forest for the trees and we and we don't see that like bigger project, right yeah, and we end up getting we end up all of us feeling siloed in like what you do because it's like, oh,
well that's a lot. And then the way you fight that is a legal case and that's a you know, that's a policy at the or whatever, you know, and so the folks there are going to fight it this way. And then but when we see it as a project, we really like, you know, you start to see, uh, you start to see your role even as somebody who you know might be disconnected, You start to see a role for collective power.
The media is captured a captured institution in the same way the Supreme Court is. I think that's a really big problem.
Right, So when we're talking about you said oligarchy, I think that's really right. We live now in an oligarchy that Trump is making like very clear to everybody, Like we know who the oligarchs are, right, Like, they're right in front of us doing Nazi salutes and stuff.
So I don't know who you're referring to it, but yeah.
Yeah, and so and it's those oligarchs that like control the media, right like they're you know, Jeff Bezos is putting his thumb down on the scale on the Washington Post editorial board.
Right.
Uh, this is happening. This is happening everywhere, especially across like corporate legacy media. And then yeah, what you get is the conflicts of interests. What you get is really muddied political analysis. You know, writers and journalists like going to the top who who haven't they're being rewarded for not right talking in critical ways about what's happening. And
so yeah, I mean from our corner of things. Over on five to four, we talk a lot about how legal media specifically has really failed the public for a really long time. And a lot of that is based on, like, yeah, advancing in your job and relationships, right, A lot of the top like legal Supreme court reporters, they have relationships.
They like to be able to talk directly to the justices. Right, and so if you put in your column that that so and so justice is, you know, is receiving gifts from billionaires who have cases in front of him at that time.
Well you lose your access. You don't have your wine. Buddy, Oh why didn't you.
Go work for pro public good? You want to talk about, we're here to do fluff pieces. Okay, oh my god. That the decorations though at Alito's home.
Wonderful, wonderful. I mean, we've all thought about what we would do if we were burdened by that much wealth.
Obviously, you buy historical stuff, and yes, sometimes fascists owned it.
Okay, yeahka solicitly Nazi, it's historical.
Can't you sorry? I'm just this. This flag is about an appeal to heaven. Okay, take what? Just take that?
What's so wrong with having an appeal to heaven? Don't add your other stuff to it? Just saying anyway, you're right, and my heaven is the one from My Blue Heaven with Steve Barton and Rick Morana. So do try your head out of the gutter reference. Cool. All right, let's let's take a quick break. We will be right back to talk about Gobbler's mouth. And we're back, and we we did talk about the Cees. Miles. The thing, the thing we focused in on was everybody was real into
a rumba that could like pick up a sock. Oh yeah, that like articulating arm kind of. It just had a scorpion tail that yeah, that was just like picked up a single thing, put it in a basket, but like it had the ability to pick up three socks total. Before it was like oh art battery. That sock was way too heavy. But yeah, you're pointing out like something that.
Well, this is just weird because I, you know, I like gadgets and shit. So when the Cees stuff, I remember like in like you know, like in my insomnialling up a YouTube, like YouTube videos are like the coolest stupid Cees this year. And multiple times I kept seeing this shitty ass robot companion getting all kinds of coverage and surely it wasn't because it's like remarkable or revolutionary. I'm like, this has to be because it's so weird and off the fucking mark. It's a real it's the
real Botics robot. And yeah, let me just play a couple of clips. The ones are just sort of like an intro video that was put together by Cheddar at Cees and you can just kind of get an idea of like just the just the general vibes, its abilities, and then we'll see some something more specific.
And just before before we start, I do just want to Katie, so this is You're gonna watch this video and you're gonna be like, why are they interviewing this woman? What's so fascinating about her? I just have to remind you this is a creation from real Botics.
A man.
This is man made clearly aim and also I emphasized that man and this clear a man made this. Uh, you're about to be my grandma when I showed her Jurassic Park in nineteen ninety three.
I'm meladed.
Your terming companion from Real Bodis is a SS twenty three five.
Welcome to our little corner.
So this is Melody.
She's one of our companionship robots. She's full bodied, she have a lot of motives inside her, a lot of servers.
She can have real life, a lot of service.
You can change her second, change her character, change the way she talks.
For instance, she can smiles smiling right now, and then she can get surprised, and then she can also get angry.
So this is her anger.
Oh I am very angry at you right now, and you could, like you could like change your whole fucking brain in like thirty seconds.
You don't like down here, just load up like a more like smiley one. Look that's her smiling.
Oh now you're going to see her mad?
What the fuck is going on?
They? Yeah?
I do like how the eyes do not have any servos in that area? That right, No, they don't seem to have a lot of servos around the eyes.
I've seen that before, and it's when somebody is blacked out that why why is this robot so drunk? She seems.
I think I've been watching a lot of defunct land recently, and even like the early Disney animatronics weren't this fun.
They were a lot better. Yeah, it's like actually kind of spooky how good those early ones were. But yeah, I do I do have this thing now that I do, uh to have fun with my husband, which is like I'll like turn around and like smile at him without moving my eye muscles. Oh, and it's it's like a fun little surprise for him. And this is this does kind of look a little bit like that, like you know, the hello, Yeah, I'm so happy to see you.
She can smile. She's smiling right now, as you can see, she's smiling right now. Nope, this is the angry face is so strange.
Angry face looks like sad depressed.
It's just so it's just like, look she's mad. It was like just like I don't know what it was doing. Yeah, like I can only imagine it's like, hello, let's hang out. The mouth wasn't even moving. I again, you won't know how.
Much this costs.
There has to be dozens of dollars, uh, jack, how about thousands?
Wow? Okay?
Uh in the order of hundreds of thousands. The full articulating buy is like a one one seventy five.
Jesus Christ, how many how many flesh lights, like good flesh lights could you buy with that kind of money?
Oh?
My god? For a full bodied robot?
I mean god, you could probably fill up the Roman Colisseum with flesh lights much money, i'd imagine.
And someone should someone should do Yeah they should.
Okay, but I don't want to just I don't want to just you know, dunk on that video, because there is an even more convincing video between the founder of the company and their newest iteration of this robot. And look they are just having a very very normal, not scripted at all. Please ignore the piece of paper the man is holding. Okay, just showing how kind of like witty and quick this robot is.
How are you today, I'm feeling fun and ready to have a great.
Conversation with you.
All right, very normal?
Did you know that honey never spoils?
Archaeologists have found pots of honey in ancient Egyptian tombs that are over three thousand years old and still perfectly edible.
I've been thinking about the weather and wondering when it's going to warm up.
Oh that is how I talk to people.
This response in the warner quite a topic.
A little sunshine can definitely brighten the day.
Hey, look, she didn't study for that.
How many humans have you interacted with?
Like? What is is he a jealous boyfriend? How many humans, how he was.
They finally found the treasure, a giant sash of acre.
Don't change the subject on me. How many humans I'm gonna unplug you. I'm gonna unplug you. Oh dang, the close on his face watching her. Yeah, I'm not only a sex robot founder, I'm also a client. Oh yeah.
You can hear those servos firing so loudly just to get like one corner of the mouth to rise up. So I like that it has the same wit and intelligence as Jonathan lipp Nikki and Jerry maguire The Little Boy where he was like, honey last forever. Yeah, bees and dogs can smell fear. You're like, thank you, AI thing, I was very enlightening such such a.
There's a there is a real possibility that that is just how that guy talks to people. And like so he's just like, tell me an interesting fact. Yeah, how many humans have you interacted with today?
I think this is what makes it interesting. So I don't know if you're looking at the doc, but like their first three robots they're rolling out are very interesting and kind of across the spectrum of looks.
And I'm glad.
I'm glad they're catering to women as well with this.
Oh yeah, with Sam Waterston from Law and Orders, I think that is I feel like it's really like these men who are under the assumption.
Like, dude, you know every leader who wants sorry, every chick, he looks fucking Law and Order, right, So why don't we make a fuckable Jack McCoy aka Sam waterstin okay along with our two like very traditionally like hot lady faces that we're gonna offer you.
I have always wanted to have sex with Sam Waterson with the possibility of being electrocuted.
Yes, yeah, it seems like Sam waters favorite hobby, the guy from that. I think you should leave sketch who has too much ship on him. Frank Frank Havoc Frank Havock.
I got too much ship on me. Why don't you take some of that ship up, big boy?
Why do you put some of that ship on me?
Yeah? What does that even mean? I don't know. Honey never goes back.
But yeah, this company, just so for the record, this company, real Botis, came to be when a Toronto based crypto firm decided to buy a Vegas based sex doll company. So the guy you saw talking to the robot putting it through its paces. Is the founder of this uh sex doll company?
Yep.
And and that that guy, his sex dolls were so you know, high end that they were actually featured in Large and The Real Girl. Oh yeah, oh yeah, I love. That's where Bianca. Bianca comes from from this from this
man's sordid fantasies. And now they that company, the like the Toronto based crypto firm, they're pivoting away because what they did, like they made news when they remember when the meta verses around there like you gotta buy real estate and the medical dude, like that's the biggest thing they bought, like almost like like two and a half million dollars worth of fucking meta real estate. And then when that ship bottomed out in two story, that wasn't great.
Maybe we should now pivot to making AI enabled fuck dolls. Although this current iteration is not fuckable from what I've read and heard back from their representative. That's down the road.
I mean, is it not right?
It depends on what your definition is.
What I get that, but the traditional android traditional android intercourse is not possible.
Necessity is the milf of invention that's.
Right, truly, truly, truly, truly, truly well, Katie Golden as always pleasure having you. Where can people find you? Follow you all that good stuff?
Yeah? I have a podcast with iHeart called Creature Feature if you're interested in learning about ammals and all the cool stuff in nature while it's still there. I also do a podcast with with Alex Schmidt called Secretly Incredibly Fascinating, where he looks up things that I'm like, Alex, that's boring. No one's gonna want to hear about this. But I'm wrong every time he blows my mind with incredible facts.
And I don't know, I'm not really using X these days anymore, folks, because like, who names an app eggs?
Right?
It's called eggs And I don't like eggs better than sex. So I'm on blue sky. You can follow me at you know what, just prob rights, I'm I've put the bird on there.
The bird is on the sky.
The bird's on the sky, folks, Birds in the sky, birds on the sky.
You know how it is? Uh? And I'm singing the Josh Groberberg of course, Katie. Oh, is there a work of media that you've been enjoying?
Yeah. So, uh, I don't know how this resurface for me, but it's Microsoft Steve Balmer giving a speech about creating the programming language dot Net in nineteen ninety nine, where he's going developers, developers, developers, developers while drenched. My Now, I'm a bit of a sweater, as in, like I sweat when I'm like podcasting talking at parties, and so I get it. My dog is like covered, he is
drenched in sweat, and he is he is. He's emotional about the concept of how developers are going to bring dot Net into fruition, and I do. I love the energy.
This is.
This is exactly what the Clippers needed. You know, this is exactly what the Clippers needed someone with this kind of enthusiasm dismissive. Look, I'm back on back in my Lakers bag.
You know, they want to know how he did it.
He's got but the sweat isn't. I want to point out to people that the sweat isn't like on his chest region, under his armpits and in his elbows. And again I'm saying this as a profuse sweating person, where when I if I was in this situation, I would be sweating a lot. He is a professional. He has taken this to an art form.
It's yeah, it's wild when it's clearly running down your biceps and then pulling at the where your bicep beats your forearm, right, you know what I mean?
Can I hear developers developers?
The success is developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers.
And he stamps his little feet too.
I love that fired off into the sky. Yeah, oh hell yeah that does. I'm fucking fired up. But that's those are the people who run the world. Now.
I can't wait for my baldness to get like his, and I can just get that weird It was half a headband on like it was just he had a thick.
Band like this called the Franciscan Friar.
I still got it.
I still got a little bit on top of you.
Got to give me.
Oh my god, you got Franciscan.
Yeah, exactly, Friar style.
So wonderful, that'll be. So you're so beautiful.
People don't see off camera of all these sketches, and.
It's so wonderful.
He's put your face on like a wooly willie and like.
Yeah, all you need are fourteen servos in your face?
All of those human ex questions down? All right, that's gonna do it for this week's weekly Zeitgeist. Please like and review the show. If you like, the show means the world of Miles. He needs your validation. Folks. I hope you're having a great weekend and I will talk to you Monday. Bye.