069 Just Two Good Old Boys

Transcript

Gene: 0:22

Hey, Ben, how are you today?

Ben: 0:25

Oh, Gene, I'm about as good as I deserve, so. Yeah.

Gene: 0:28

Really? That good, huh? Wow.

Ben: 0:31

know about that. Okay.

Gene: 0:33

Huh. That's interesting. When I think of how much I deserve, I, I start with the universe and get bigger from there.

Ben: 0:41

No, yeah I, I,

Gene: 0:43

Especially the modesty portion. I think I have the biggest amount of modesty of anybody.

Ben: 0:49

it's, you know, sometimes we, we end up, you know, the, the, the the consequences of our actions come home to roost occasionally.

Gene: 1:00

Are you in karma? Yes, that does happen sometimes. Hmm. All right. So a few shows ago, I mentioned the topic that we do in the future and Unless you want to do something else, maybe today's a good day for it. And that topic being, if, if Texas were to have a constitution different from a state constitution, why don't we run through and figure out what all needs to be in there? Because I suspect a lot less should be in there, or I, I think a lot less should be in there, than would be in a state constitution.

Ben: 1:43

Yeah, we, we, we can certainly do that. I do want to address some of the news stories that have been going on.

Gene: 1:49

Do you want to start with the news stories, or do you want to start with a what do we think the constitution should look like?

Ben: 1:55

I think right now it'd be pretty general discussion on the constitution, but if you want to do that, we can,

Gene: 2:01

hmm. All

Ben: 2:02

know, I can see a we were rewriting the Texas, so the idea is, and make sure I understand what you're thinking here is. We basically go through and rewrite the Texas Constitution from scratch to be, it's the new national constitution of Texas.

Gene: 2:21

That, that's what I was thinking exactly. Because I assume there was a constitution when Texas was a country initially,

Ben: 2:29

Yep, there was.

Gene: 2:31

but I don't know that we need to start from that and then model it. I think we could probably start from scratch. Mm hmm. Okay.

Ben: 2:38

Okay. Yeah I think the principles that we should stick to are, you know, pretty straightforward, but

Gene: 2:44

And I, I know you're a not a fan of the Bill of Rights.

Ben: 2:51

Excuse me.

Gene: 2:52

I mean, you, you thought that the Confederacy had a better set of documents than what came out of the

Ben: 2:59

No, no, I think you're misunderstanding me. I think the articles of confederation were a better overall governing document than the constitution. I think the constitution gives too much power to the feds and we see the issues that we have there. So. I think you're, you're conflating the articles of confederation, the confederacy and. My disdain for the Constitution being that it was kind of, you know, born out of treason in a way, and I don't think we should have given Madison as much power in in writing it as we did.

Gene: 3:35

Okay. And then the, the reason I bring that up is then we shouldn't also start with modeling the Texas constitution after the U S constitution. I mean, Yeah. We should truly do it from scratch.

Ben: 3:50

I mean, everything is modeled on something, and we can't put our knowledge of The current governing, governing documents and it's pitfalls and its advantages out of our minds, right? That would be inhuman. So I think to an extent it would be. But I think what I would say to focus on is you know, less central authority. And I think the current even Texas state constitution has some really good provisions that prevent the centralization of some of that authority. So.

Gene: 4:22

Right. Okay. Do we want to start off with something that essentially is like a Bill of Rights that defines the powers, or, or do we want to start?

Ben: 4:35

So I think, you know, we can do some structural stuff. And I guess the best thing to do is we, we can have some debates. We can write a few things, post post this to the website or whatever we want to do. You know, not just talk about it, but actually put something down. So the first thing I would suggest that we start

Gene: 4:56

I'll put you in charge of writing.

Ben: 4:58

You, you get a right to,

Gene: 5:00

good at talking, man. I'm, I'm. Mm hmm.

Ben: 5:02

Uh huh, huh. Okay, so let's, let's pick you and I's favorite amendment as it sits right now, and say how would we change it as to avoid the NFA, right? Ever

Gene: 5:17

I think, I think, yeah, but I think this is kind of what I was saying, let's not do is just try and model stuff. I think where we, in my mind, what this makes, what, what makes this a fun exercise is that lately you've been pushing the whole anarchist angle. And I would I, yeah, over the last year, it's definitely increased from previous to that.

Ben: 5:41

Yes, my level of being pissed off at our current situation has increased.

Gene: 5:47

And so I'm, I'm very curious to see how that plays into you know, if you were magically Endowed with the power to

Ben: 5:57

If I were king for a day.

Gene: 5:59

That's a whole different one. No, no, no. I I've extensively spent time looking at what would I do if I was a dictator? You know, for funsies and and that would be quite different than what I would put together. For a constitution for the Republic of Texas, but at the same time, I, I think there are a lot of things that we shouldn't take for granted and we should think about whether they actually belong in the constitution or not.

Ben: 6:29

Yeah.

Gene: 6:30

And I, I think that, there, there are certain things that are in the current U. S. Constitution, in, in the, both in the Constitution and in the amendments, the, the Bill of Rights, that I think Would be phrased differently, or the focus would be shifted a little bit in my mind. On what I would like to have in the, in the Republic of Texas versus what the U. S. has.

Ben: 7:03

Okay. So I just started a a new blank Word document here.

Gene: 7:09

Hmm.

Ben: 7:10

Republic.

Gene: 7:10

you use Word?

Ben: 7:12

What would you use? I'm on a Windows computer.

Gene: 7:16

Oh, Windows. Gee. Ick. I can't believe you use that.

Ben: 7:21

Trust me, after the audio issues and crap we've been dealing with this morning, I don't want to be either.

Gene: 7:28

I'm just giving you shit.

Ben: 7:29

All right, so let's start with an outline. Chief Executive. Should we have one? Should it be Yeah,

Gene: 7:41

the ability to execute work is inversely proportional to the number of people that have the power to make decisions. So I, I am for the idea of an executive.

Ben: 7:54

but do we want an executive model after the U. S. president that has powers that can go through and take ever more power to himself a la what has happened to the federal government? Do we want something like a prime minister that has to govern very cautiously that is not directly elected? Do you want something like the executive under the Articles of Confederation, which basically had no power? Or kind of a mixed model, which is what the governorship in Texas is, where the governor is not a super powerful position. And in fact, Lieutenant Governor and Railroad Commissioner have more power,

Gene: 8:34

Yeah. The whole railroad commissioner thing. That's one of the things that I don't like.

Ben: 8:38

I mean, we can get, we can change it. And I agree that the history of why that ended up in that position is, is, is interesting. And

Gene: 8:46

Cause Texas had more railroad miles than people.

Ben: 8:49

Yeah, and if you're changing this from scratch, I get that that we won't have a position that's called railroad commissioner

Gene: 8:56

Yeah, exactly.

Ben: 8:58

You know, obviously, but when we're thinking of the executive branch,

Gene: 9:01

I think there should be a chief executive and in terms of who elects the chief executive. I'm kind of ambivalent, I have to say, on whether that is more of a parliamentary model and that person is elected by the elected representatives or whether it's a direct election. What are your thoughts?

Ben: 9:23

I, I think that the direct election of the president has. Never been what our founding fathers intended, right? That's what the electoral college was supposed to be. And it was supposed to be an appointment via the state legislatures in something separate. So the interesting thing about the electoral college that a lot of people miss. is that, yes, we're having an election, so on, and that determines who kind of gets to appoint electors and do things. But the entire point of the Electoral College was to have a group of people that could be elected, and a lot of these would be state legislature members outside of the House of Representatives, outside of Congress. But basically doing a parliamentary election, it's basically you're electing electors to do a special election and then they go away, right? Versus a parliamentary system, you're, you're voting for your member of parliament and then they vote on who is going to be in the government.

Gene: 10:28

Yeah. And I think with specific restrictions, like, term limits have to be in there. That's something I've been saying for almost my entire life. I remember writing a

Ben: 10:40

Term limits for the executive or term limits in

Gene: 10:42

For anybody that serves in government, there have to be term limits. It is too crucial a position to allow people for it to become a career.

Ben: 10:52

All right. So we'll have a chief executive and we'll work on who to elect. Let's talk about term limits.

Gene: 10:58

Okay.

Ben: 10:59

So term limits need to be for all government positions.

Gene: 11:03

All elected government positions.

Ben: 11:05

no, no, no, even bureaucracies, the bureaucracy in the

Gene: 11:08

to have the support functionaries also have term limits?

Ben: 11:12

Yep.

Gene: 11:13

Okay. I'm okay with that. I mean, as long as they're sufficiently long enough. To allow them to get something done. Cause what you don't, you also don't want this to have a shit ton of people in the bureaucracy who are not in it long enough to ever finish a project.

Ben: 11:32

Okay. So what's long enough.

Gene: 11:35

I think if I was just to take a stab in the dark and at say, what would be reasonable to never allow somebody to work longer than I'd say 10 years.

Ben: 11:45

I was thinking 8 to 10, so that

Gene: 11:47

Oh, okay.

Ben: 11:47

10 years, and then they are, you know, the other way we could do this. Okay. Is to say you cannot work in the the government, the, the government of Texas for longer than let's say four years without an equally long four year stint in the private sector and then you can come back like we could let them come back

Gene: 12:13

here's the problem. Here's the problem with that statement, and it probably could be tweaked, is you know that what's going to be considered private sector are going to be

Ben: 12:24

FDA or whatever we've seen where someone leaves government service goes gets on the

Gene: 12:29

Gets a job with a company that directly benefits from that and then comes back. So I'd say 10 year lifetime term for any government, anybody who gets a paycheck from the state of Texas, basically.

Ben: 12:42

Okay, no exceptions no more. Got it. Now Do we want to carve out an exception for courts? Do we want lifetime appointments on a Supreme

Gene: 12:53

I don't. Do you?

Ben: 12:54

Nope. I'm good with that

Gene: 12:57

10 years is plenty of time. Thank you very much. Now, the one difference here, I guess, let's, let's talk about courts because by the time you get to this Texas Supreme Court, which I assume we're going to have a Supreme Court, they probably have been a judge for a while and other things. So do we want to assume that? That, that full transition from the first appointment as judge to your seat on the Supreme Court can fit within 10 years?

Ben: 13:27

Okay, so I, I, I think of this a little differently. When, what I'm talking about right now is I'm not thinking of Texas as a state. I'm thinking of this as a nation. So counties now become basically provinces or

Gene: 13:41

Mm hmm. Mm

Ben: 13:42

in the U. S. parlance. So. I would say that we devolve basically all power down to the counties, and this term limit would then be on the county side, not the Texas state. Basically, I would basic, I would only have the Supreme Court of Texas looking at

Gene: 14:03

Mm hmm. Mm

Ben: 14:05

In fact, I would split it into two. I would have the constitutional court determining whether or not things are constitutional and I would have the criminal court and that's it. And all other power is devolved to the counties.

Gene: 14:17

But I guess that's the question, though, is for, for the ones that are not in the counties. For the Texas federal court.

Ben: 14:27

Yeah. I wouldn't have a federal court system as we have it now.

Gene: 14:30

I get that, but you're going to have you, but you would have something, right? You would have a

Ben: 14:36

I, we would have a initial court of appeals and then the Supreme court, right? So essentially your county court is a court. If you want to appeal, you go to a. State appeals court,

Gene: 14:51

Yeah.

Ben: 14:52

and then you go to the Supreme Court. So, judges would spend a few years in the They could be judges for 20 years in the county court. Who cares? It's only affecting that one county, whatever. And the people should be able to impeach them, do whatever. When they go to the state level court, which would be the first appeals court, that's when that 10 year timer starts.

Gene: 15:13

I see. Okay.

Ben: 15:14

And then, so, if they spend a

Gene: 15:15

we're not including. All government service. We're just saying

Ben: 15:20

we're div, we're, we're div, yeah, we're dividing,

Gene: 15:24

country service. Okay.

Ben: 15:25

yeah.

Gene: 15:26

Yeah. Okay. I could see that distinction. So somebody could be in, in lower government offices and then spend another

Ben: 15:33

want to put in their own term limits, they're more than willing, they're more than able to, or if they want to not have term limits, right, basically devolve the power to a more and more local stance would be my my, my, my thought.

Gene: 15:47

Got it. Okay. So we could end up with counties where we have the same thing as we do now in the U S where, you know, you have Lindsey Graham being reelected for 40 years. Or John,

Ben: 16:00

Yeah, for their local

Gene: 16:02

for the local government.

Ben: 16:03

Yeah, because I'm not going to tell people they can't do that locally. That's their business.

Gene: 16:07

Right.

Ben: 16:08

Not mine.

Gene: 16:09

you know, some people aren't really intelligent enough to come up with a system of government,

Ben: 16:15

Yeah, yeah. And okay. So, this is, this is the problem with our current system. People thinking that they know better than the individuals.

Gene: 16:24

but they do. I, my favorite quote on this topic is from the Bhagwan Sri Rajneesh who, you know, the clip I'm talking about, I assume, right?

Ben: 16:34

I don't know,

Gene: 16:34

Do you know who the Bhagwan Sri Rajneesh is?

Ben: 16:37

Not off the top of my head.

Gene: 16:39

Okay, he's probably around before you were born.

Ben: 16:41

I, I think, I think I'm picturing a small, I, I think I know who you're talking about, but go ahead.

Gene: 16:48

so, He was a I mean, negative press defined him as a cult leader, I don't think he was a cult leader, I think he was a, an Indian guru who happened to have connected at the right time in American culture to get a whole bunch of people interested in in his type of spirituality, and as a result of it, the community That they built grew tremendously in I think Oregon

Ben: 17:20

Yeah, I do know who you're talking about. Anyway, what was, what was the quote?

Gene: 17:24

Let me let me find the video clip

Ben: 17:27

Oh God, you're gonna try and play a video clip?

Gene: 17:29

No, I'm gonna send you a link. That's that's usually easier. Oh, I could Play it, I guess. Uh, and he has a, a, a quote about democracy and

Ben: 17:41

My favorite quote about democracy is it's two wolves and a sheep voting for what's for dinner.

Gene: 17:47

yeah, his is a little different, but in the same kind of vein. Let's see. Where is that quote? The guy has a whole bunch of quotes that are freaking hilarious. He had a, that's not it, he had a very good sense of humor, I find. Why is this not finding it? YouTube. And I'm sure some people listening are gonna know exactly what I'm trying to find and pull up and other people are like, Bogwan what?

Ben: 18:16

all right, so I think we should have a statement that, All human rights do not origin. So I think we do need to spend some time on the preamble and where that needs to go. So one of the things I would say is that we need to make it very clear the consent of the governed comes from the people

Gene: 18:35

Mm

Ben: 18:36

and that the people's rights do not come from the government, but from nature and nature's God or however you want to say it. You know, basically that whole, our rights are inalienable bit, and it's not my second amendment rights. The second amendment defines what the cons the constitution defines what the government can and cannot do to my rights that come to me from God. So I think we need to spend some time on that and making sure that the government has no way of thinking.

Gene: 19:06

find it.

Ben: 19:07

No way of thinking that they are the source of people's rights.

Gene: 19:12

Mm hmm. Yeah, they're, they're the, they should be the guarantors of people's rights that exist. Prior to the government. Do you want to listen to it real quick?

Ben: 19:21

Sure, if you want to play it.

Gene: 19:22

I sent you a link

Ben: 19:23

Okay.

Gene: 19:24

So I can

Ben: 19:26

play it on my cell

Gene: 19:27

Yeah, yeah

Ben: 19:28

it on the mic.

Gene: 19:29

Play it on yourself. I will keep talking. You don't have to play it on there and for anyone that's interested all you have to do is in youtube type o show o sh o And then the words, people are retarded.

Ben: 19:45

And yes, I know this guy and I know this quote.

Gene: 19:47

Okay, good, good. I wasn't sure if you did or not, because I think the whole thing, the whole controversy, and when this clip was recorded, went down, I think, before you were born.

Ben: 19:59

Probably.

Gene: 20:01

But I, I always liked him. I thought he was hilarious. I remember watching videos with him back in the 80s. And I always was very impressed at the life he managed to get him for himself. I remember one year he got a Rolls Royce for every year of his life.

Ben: 20:19

Okay.

Gene: 20:21

That was a cool present, I thought.

Ben: 20:24

Okay. Back to what we were talking about. Bicameral legislature?

Gene: 20:29

So, Hold on, let's, let's back up to the rights

Ben: 20:33

I mean, we're gonna have to, you know, this

Gene: 20:35

yeah, it'll take time. I, I, I get

Ben: 20:38

And we need a little bit more structure and some, some things in writing about what we're talking about

Gene: 20:44

Okay, you were talking about preamble. What else do we want in the preamble other than the fact that the government doesn't create rights? The government is there to protect the rights that exist.

Ben: 20:56

Mm hmm.

Gene: 20:57

Do we want to have something that is a somewhat rewarding of Jefferson's tree of Liberty?

Ben: 21:05

Mm, the way I would put it, instead of, you know, the tree of liberty must be watered from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. I would say that the right to self determination is inextricably linked to these principles and secession is a founding principle and, you know, if a county wants to split off, they can split off.

Gene: 21:29

Hmm. Yeah. I was thinking more in terms of that that if the if the practical effects of government differ from the conceptual form of government, it is not just the right, but the duty of the populace to reinstate a new government. Something along the lines of like. If what this document describes is not what actually exists then y'all aren't following this document and is fully legally within your rights to abolish the current government and recreate it

Ben: 22:07

Yep. Yep. So

Gene: 22:09

essentially is something

Ben: 22:11

with the wording.

Gene: 22:11

yeah, something that should have the effect of reminding everyone who gets a paycheck from. The Republic of Texas that if they don't do their job, they will lose their job and not just through an election. Something that I affect. I'm less, I'm less gung ho on secession than you are. I, I do recognize the right of a local people to change who they deem to be Representative them, but I don't want to make it super easy for counties to hold the Republic hostage by threatening to leave. Right.

Ben: 23:01

uh, because I think that that a government that is not government should require little to no force for the majority of the population to exist. And if it, if a county organizes to the point of saying, you do what we want or we're leaving. Okay, fine. Bye. You know, that should be the response. And if it's not, then maybe that County has a point. Maybe there's something in the economic interests of the rest of the

Gene: 23:32

But you, but you, you, as long as you're thinking through the lens of how can this be abused as well, because there is. A lot of incentive possibility coming from a big neighbor to the north to fuck with your counties by offering them financial immediate benefits, which the people who are, as Osho describes very likely to accept short term gains are accepted by most Americans and people in general over long term vision 99 percent of the time. Somebody say, if you guys want to leave Texas and join the United States again, where you really belong no taxes for 25 years.

Ben: 24:19

Yeah we can, we can work on that.

Gene: 24:22

I'm just saying, you, you need to think this shit through.

Ben: 24:26

I, I need to

Gene: 24:28

Not just you, but I mean, everybody needs to think this shit through because it's, it's not just about creating nice sounding platitudes that you think all patriots will, you know, love and follow along with it's again, I just keep looking at that quote from Osho and nodding my head and going, yeah, this is why there's a select group of people. The other thing I looked up is, do you know what the population of the first 13 states was? 850

Ben: 24:56

no

Gene: 24:57

000

Ben: 24:59

I was gonna say it was under a million.

Gene: 25:00

So it's smaller than a mid sized city in Texas. Not just smaller than Houston or Dallas, but like smaller than a mid sized city. Under a million. And, and yet, look at the amount of representation they had for that number of population.

Ben: 25:21

And that's, that's the thing is I, I think that we, and that's 1 of the reasons why I was wanting to ask about, do we have bicameral legislature and what we do there? So I think that we need to not cap the number of the legislature, but cap the number of people that can be represented by a member of legislature.

Gene: 25:44

So you want to have a fairly large legislature than the other. Mm hmm.

Ben: 25:50

And basically, I'm fine with having a bicameral system in some form or fashion. But, you know, this, this comes down to a design principle that we really kind of have to figure out.

Gene: 26:05

Okay. So.

Ben: 26:06

hold on. Hold on. If we think about why the Senate exists, right? The Senate originally was supposed to be the states. And that's why there's an equal number of them, because each state got two, and there you go. The state is represented, regardless of that. The House of Representatives is supposed to be the people's house, where you're proportionally represented by the number of

Gene: 26:32

And then of course people end up in prison if they actually go to the people's house. Anyway,

Ben: 26:38

Alright, so the question is, if Texas is operating as a Federalist Republic or not, Because if we are not a Federalist system, we don't need the Senate. Do

Gene: 26:52

Right. But so, but if we have a Senate, then it would be what. You kind of described as the counties who now become states

Ben: 27:01

we, do we want to do that? That's the question.

Gene: 27:04

I, I, I liked the idea. I've always been in favor of having representation from two different sources. So,

Ben: 27:15

So, the county commissioners get together and elect a single representative to represent the county.

Gene: 27:21

right. Except that they're really acting like States, but yeah.

Ben: 27:25

Okay, that's fine. I mean, the county commissioner structure doesn't have to change, right?

Gene: 27:31

Yeah. I'm less familiar with the Texas county commissioner current system. So I don't know. I may have some thoughts on that if I dig into it.

Ben: 27:42

Alright, what do we want to call the upper house?

Gene: 27:45

So much.

Ben: 27:47

Eh, copycat.

Gene: 27:49

It's a thousand year old term, dude. It, it two thousand, sorry. Two thousand year old term. Why change it?

Ben: 27:57

right. One representative per county or two.

Gene: 28:01

I think one is plenty.

Ben: 28:04

And how about we say to be elected as determined by the County.

Gene: 28:08

Sure. I mean, it opens up the door for nepotism, but sure.

Ben: 28:14

That's fine. People get the government they deserve.

Gene: 28:17

They do.

Ben: 28:19

All right. And then the lower house.

Gene: 28:23

That's directly elected.

Ben: 28:25

Yep. Who do we want? How, how, what do we want to call it?

Gene: 28:30

I don't care. You want to call it the People's House? What do you want to, what do you think is a good name?

Ben: 28:35

Vox Populi,

Gene: 28:37

Sure, that's fine.

Ben: 28:40

the people's voice, whatever. We'll just leave it as lower house for now. So

Gene: 28:46

That's another good term. Mm hmm.

Ben: 28:50

how about one rep per,

Gene: 28:54

Per what?

Ben: 28:56

if I could type,

Gene: 28:58

Mm hmm.

Ben: 29:00

let's see, what's the population of Texas right now? 24 million.

Gene: 29:04

Thereabouts?

Ben: 29:06

so, if, I mean, we could have Alright, so let's call it 30 because we're gonna grow. So let's think ahead. And let's say 1 rep, let's use the UK model, and say 1 rep represents 50, 000 people. That's 600, that's 600 members.

Gene: 29:32

Okay. And incidentally, for the Upper House, there are 254 counties currently. Thank you. You're welcome.

Ben: 29:37

Mm hmm,

Gene: 29:37

That'd be the number of senators.

Ben: 29:39

that's fine.

Gene: 29:40

Yeah, and then you want to fix that number so as the population grows, the number increases as well, right?

Ben: 29:46

Correct.

Gene: 29:47

Mm hmm.

Ben: 29:47

And the, the entire point is to actually encourage the devolution of power. So, one of the problems we have with the U. S. Constitution is when we allowed Congress to cap its number, that means that one man represents more and more people, which is not really doable. The argument is then your legislature grows to be too big and nothing ever gets done. Good. In fact, it, it, it encourages the breakup of a nation to smaller units to increase representation, which if you believe in the principle that that government, the government's best government's least, or that local government is best, then that's, that's a good thing. So,

Gene: 30:35

Okay. Yep, that's fine. Mm hmm.

Ben: 30:40

so we can say now we can give some flexibility. Absolutely. so that we can extend the timeline out before this becomes unmanageable. So I think it would be reasonable to say, and this would be the average over our lifetimes, one member of Congress, as it were, can't represent over a hundred thousand people. That would be actually about the average the average congressional district for most of your and I's lives,

Gene: 31:11

hmm. Mm hmm.

Ben: 31:12

you know, so I think that's a reasonable thing. I would like to see a smaller number, but again, shall not exceed versus represents, right?

Gene: 31:24

right.

Ben: 31:25

And I think the counties can carve this up. Um, I mean, how do we do that? How do we ensure one rep is representing the same number of people across the state? Because I don't want to do congressional districts like that.

Gene: 31:43

I know, that's the problem is it, the whole gerrymandering thing even if you try not to do it, you're still doing it no matter what.

Ben: 31:50

This is why I kind of want to do a unicameral legislature. And

Gene: 31:55

why don't, you know, the other way to do it is to have Statewide races for the representatives.

Ben: 32:03

cause then Dallas and Fort Worth and Austin, Houston, just run everything. I Mean, you, if you do that, then you're devolving power to the cities.

Gene: 32:14

I mean, yeah, you kind of are, but that, that counterbalances the one rep per county and the smallest county in Texas. Has 43 residents.

Ben: 32:25

Yeah. I'm assuming there will be some redrawing of the map there,

Gene: 32:28

Why they're actually well done. They're squares. I like the

Ben: 32:33

in West Texas, they're squares.

Gene: 32:35

Yeah. And in most of Texas in South Texas as well,

Ben: 32:38

Wow.

Gene: 32:39

they're kind of diagonal in East Texas. Yeah. That's, you got the Louisiana influence there, but yeah, for the most parts, I think Texas counties compared to what I've seen in other places are actually much better done. They're roughly the same landmass. Give or take the West Texas ones where El Paso is are way bigger, but Most of the counties were, it looks like they were drawn with a ruler.

Ben: 33:03

Yeah. I think we can get into this, but I think that Alright, if you want to counterbalance it that way, we can. So we can say,

Gene: 33:14

there's bound to be a handful of extremely popular candidates where a lot of people would vote for them to be in the lower house. And then there would be a bunch of people that they don't know. And they only know of a couple of them because they're locals.

Ben: 33:31

Okay, so this is kind of a unique idea. So we basically say, The lower house is a statewide election. How many positions do you want to have people voting for?

Gene: 33:43

Divide it by a hundred thousand, and divide the population, 24 million, by a hundred thousand. How many does that give us?

Ben: 33:48

I was doing 30, but

Gene: 33:50

Okay whatever.

Ben: 33:52

Alright, so you want me to divide 24 million?

Gene: 33:54

Mm hmm. So you've got, what, 240 positions?

Ben: 34:03

Yeah, if you're doing 20, if you're doing 24, and if you're doing 30, it's 300, obviously.

Gene: 34:10

Mm hmm. Pick whichever one based on the number of people. But yeah, it would be a very long list at the election. But also, I think that It's a, I like the way, that way of doing it, because it's like having a nationwide election for people you may or may not have heard of.

Ben: 34:32

That's a lot of people to, I, I don't agree, because I think what you're, then it's just the top 240 most popular names is what you're gonna get.

Gene: 34:42

exactly. But you already have the counties doing it the other way, so each county sends their rep, so that's geographic. This removes geography, and part of the reason I want to go this route is because, Geography means a lot less today than it did a hundred years ago or two hundred years ago.

Ben: 35:00

Okay what if we break it up by region, at the very least?

Gene: 35:05

Honestly, I don't see why we would.

Ben: 35:08

Because the interests of the Houston area are very different from,

Gene: 35:12

That, that's why they have a local government. I'm gonna use your arguments against you, buddy. That's why they have their local government. This is a state government.

Ben: 35:19

Then the state government has to be incredibly weak.

Gene: 35:22

Yeah, you already said that.

Ben: 35:25

Okay.

Gene: 35:26

I'm fine with that, no. But

Ben: 35:28

just don't think people are going to sit there and vote for 240

Gene: 35:32

I'm assuming they're not. That's okay. You're not required to fill in 240 names in there. Okay. You're, you're just given a list of names based on, you know, the people that were, In the primary.

Ben: 35:48

I think it's too big. Anyway, we can play around with

Gene: 35:53

A lot of people would say your, your 500 member house is too big for a small country.

Ben: 35:59

I, okay the UK has how many members of parliament?

Gene: 36:03

Yes, please go ahead, argue for my case, yes.

Ben: 36:06

What do you mean, argue for your case?

Gene: 36:09

I mean, there's nothing wrong with having those people elected through a national election.

Ben: 36:14

But the members of parliament aren't a national election.

Gene: 36:17

No, I know that.

Ben: 36:19

Okay. So that's not argument for your case.

Gene: 36:23

No, argument for my case is simply that we, we don't have to mimic what the United States is doing.

Ben: 36:29

I understand. But I, I think the British actually, you know,

Gene: 36:33

like to vote for Brendan Herrera. I don't live next to Brendan Herrera, but I think he would be great in the Republic of Texas's legislature.

Ben: 36:43

Okay, so we can we can work on this and come up with a unique idea there. But my point is, it's pretty ironic for a nation that was founded on the phrase no taxation without representation has less representation than its parent country. So just going to

Gene: 36:58

I don't think it has less representation. How do you figure?

Ben: 37:00

a member of parliament represents around 30, 000 people. In the UK at 30, 40, 000 people and in the U S it's, it's ridiculous. So anyway.

Gene: 37:11

oh, you mean the U. S. versus the U. K.? Oh sure, sure. Also, keep in mind that at the time that this, the eastern part of the United States was U. K., they also had a lot of holdings in other places,

Ben: 37:26

Yeah. Yeah. I get,

Gene: 37:28

all of Canada. Mm hmm.

Ben: 37:29

Yeah. I got it. I got it. Nice. I would argue they still have Australia and Canada.

Gene: 37:35

Then, so we get to blame them for Justin Trudeau?

Ben: 37:40

Yeah. I mean the queen blessed the government. So yeah.

Gene: 37:43

But the current queen, the policy with the current monarchy is non interference, which is a stupid policy if you ask me.

Ben: 37:51

Yeah. They can

Gene: 37:52

What's the point of being the head of state without making decisions about the state? I've never understood that.

Ben: 38:01

All right. So we have an upper and lower house.

Gene: 38:04

Now, do we have a King?

Ben: 38:05

We need to have some conversation about what that lower house consists of. We've got term limits. We have a chief executive. The court structure,

Gene: 38:16

going to need to really flesh out the chief executive's role as well.

Ben: 38:20

yes, we do.

Gene: 38:21

And the court structure for the, the federal court, it's a 10 year term max,

Ben: 38:28

for all positions, yes.

Gene: 38:31

but in just to make sure that. It's clear that what you suggested, which I agree with, which is that you're serving in the county or the state political positions does not count toward that.

Ben: 38:45

Correct. And also, I think this is it's up to the county to determine their own laws there. One of the things I would think of, so if I, If I think of important positions in what would be currently a state position for Texas, for instance, working for the prison system, right? That's a state job.

Gene: 39:09

So no federal prisons.

Ben: 39:11

no. And they all devolve down. Your postal workers, your, your, all those positions take that power out of the Out of the central government and

Gene: 39:21

Hold up, hold up. There's, there's going to be some issues there for providing services on a countrywide level without countrywide positions.

Ben: 39:31

Why?

Gene: 39:32

So let's say I'm in Austin

Ben: 39:34

Huh.

Gene: 39:35

and Austin thinks that the position of postal carriers is unfair and inhumane. And bans the use of postal carriers in Austin. So, you can't send any mail here.

Ben: 39:53

Okay, you've done that to yourself and you're stupid. Congratulations.

Gene: 39:58

Okay.

Ben: 39:58

You, you, your own citizenry will suffer.

Gene: 40:01

Frequently.

Ben: 40:02

Okay, yeah,

Gene: 40:03

live here man, I know how this works.

Ben: 40:05

you get the government you deserve. Now you have to have some consequences from that as

Gene: 40:09

Uh huh,

Ben: 40:10

should the rest of the state tell you that you're dumb other than to just go we get our mail.

Gene: 40:14

rest of the state might also suffer as a result, but

Ben: 40:17

I don't think so.

Gene: 40:18

Maybe. Okay, so Prisons, I could see being operated on a Is there such a thing as a federal crime?

Ben: 40:30

No,

Gene: 40:31

No federal crimes. So, really the courts, the federal courts are purely appellate courts.

Ben: 40:38

yes, they are just a check on constitutionality and criminal appeals. No civil, no federal civil courts at all. None. Sorry. Nope.

Gene: 40:51

Okay. Alright, I can see, I can go with that. Now, capital. Of Texas, should be where.

Ben: 41:02

I mean, we already have the buildings. I don't want to spend any money, but I would also say that the city of Austin's charter is hereby revoked and create a D. C. like district.

Gene: 41:12

Don't think you can do that. I think that's up to the people of Austin. Thank you very much.

Ben: 41:17

Nope. Nope.

Gene: 41:18

No, no no federalism here. No, we're, we're gonna just control our own damn place. I think that should be done in the same way as Washington D. C. I think you draw some lines on the map and whatever is in the smack dab in the middle you give an offer and buy out that land And you build a brand new capital that is geographically in the middle of the state.

Ben: 41:44

So, in the middle of West Texas.

Gene: 41:46

It, it shouldn't be, it's not West Texas, it's slightly west of Central Texas. But that way there's not a bias towards a big city. There, that way it's not just inherited from the, the extremely liberal location of Austin. It's a

Ben: 42:06

How about no capital at all? How about the capital mu No, no, no, no,

Gene: 42:12

Zoom meeting, we're all going to use Zoom meeting for our legislature.

Ben: 42:16

No, no, no, no. How about the capital has to move? How about once every ten years, the

Gene: 42:24

that's going to be a pain in the ass.

Ben: 42:26

Yes,

Gene: 42:27

How about every

Ben: 42:28

I want to punish you for going into the federal system and for federal government I want you to not want to do this

Gene: 42:34

there's some practical considerations there. So you're, what you're suggesting is different states, aka counties, host the capital on

Ben: 42:44

for a period of time

Gene: 42:46

And they can only do it once per lifetime

Ben: 42:49

obviously not, because we don't want to

Gene: 42:51

year, 254 year life cycle to

Ben: 42:54

there you go.

Gene: 42:55

of Texas. Once you're done, once every County's held the

Ben: 42:59

We're done. We're

Gene: 43:00

we're starting over all government is null and void. There you go. There's your energy. Hey, actually, it's funny as that sounds. That would be a hell of an idea. That would be the first self ending government in existence.

Ben: 43:16

Yeah, which would, as soon as our kids got in, would be amended and changed

Gene: 43:22

no, they're not allowed. No, I would, I would propose there should be no such thing as amendments to the federal laws. I think that amendments ruin things as per my arguments consistently over the 19th.

Ben: 43:33

Fuck the

Gene: 43:34

not just the 19th. There's plenty of other, I, frankly, I think anything over the 2nd can be removed.

Ben: 43:42

uh uh. Oh, dude, no.

Gene: 43:45

You like the 5th too much?

Ben: 43:46

The 10th and the 9th.

Gene: 43:48

Mm hmm. I, I think that the the idea of amending the Constitution gives the people who are retarded too much power.

Ben: 44:00

Yeah I

Gene: 44:01

I'm this is the whole point of doing this exercise is how would an intelligent government be set up?

Ben: 44:08

I think you've got the wrong two guys to determine that but you know, hey

Gene: 44:12

I mean, I, I don't necessarily disagree half of that statement, but, but nonetheless, compared to the average person. Living in Texas or anywhere, frankly, but certainly in Texas as well. I'm not going to say everyone in Texas is a genius because they're not, there are plenty of people that I would not trust to form a new government.

Ben: 44:37

Yeah,

Gene: 44:38

People can have rights, but we should also not automatically ascribe a competency level that does not exist.

Ben: 44:50

okay. I don't agree. Or don't disagree. So, Anyway I was pulling something up real quick. I think we've covered this enough for today. So let's go to the next

Gene: 45:00

you want to go to the news? Okay.

Ben: 45:02

But we'll outline some of this

Gene: 45:05

Yeah. And, and let us know guys when you're listening to this, do you think this is an interesting idea? I thought it was interesting. So I figured we might as well do it on the podcast because otherwise Ben and I would just have phone calls talking about this

Ben: 45:17

And debate,

Gene: 45:19

and yeah, some, some for sure.

Ben: 45:21

yeah, and there'd be more of me telling Gene he's a dumbass and wrong than I would, but

Gene: 45:26

I kind of doubt that you tend to do plenty of that in public as well.

Ben: 45:31

Oh, I am much more restrained in public and we both know it. Huh.

Gene: 45:37

But I think it's a good exercise. I don't know that there's ever been anything publicly put out there that does what we're doing right now. If there is, I would love to find it

Ben: 45:46

Yeah, it was called the ratification debates, and you know, the, I mean, have you not read, have you not read the constitutional debates? You know, when they were writing the constitution? No, of

Gene: 45:57

I'm talking about Texas specifically.

Ben: 45:59

Texas exists as well, but,

Gene: 46:01

Yeah. I guess maybe there probably were debates that we can find some. of, about the formation of, of Texas as a Republic. Initially, I'm sure it wasn't everybody nodding their heads in green. There must've been some disagreements along the way. Right. But I have not read any of those. So I if they, if they are there

Ben: 46:21

you should start by reading the constitution of the Republic of Texas.

Gene: 46:25

I've looked at it. I can't say I've really read it. I don't have a memorized version of what bits are where, but, but also, as I said, in our first opening. Of this topic, I don't want to just start with recreating something, bits and pieces that we like. I wanted to start from a blank sheet of paper,

Ben: 46:48

Huh.

Gene: 46:49

so. Alright, let's move on to news topics.

Ben: 46:52

Yeah, so, did you watch the body cam footage I sent you?

Gene: 46:56

No. Oh yeah, I did. Yeah, the guy that, the cop that killed that guy?

Ben: 47:01

Yeah.

Gene: 47:02

Yeah, I did see that. Yeah, the, you know, yelling put down your gun.

Ben: 47:07

Yeah, so, so let's talk. One second. So Roger Fortson is 23, shot and killed by a police officer. And by the way, this is the same police department that the acorn cop was from.

Gene: 47:21

Mm hmm.

Ben: 47:22

So that right there says a lot, right?

Gene: 47:26

Great training. Mm

Ben: 47:27

Yes. And let's just, so the full body camera footage is available. I encourage everybody to go watch it. You know, cop, it starts off with him talking to the property manager, property manager saying, Hey, this apartment, there's been a disturbance. He's hit her, which I don't know how this property manager knows, you know, basically setting up a domestic violence situation. Problem. His girlfriend wasn't even there. So, I don't know what the deal is, as far as, my first impression when I saw this footage was, okay, something's wrong here. There's a love triangle, there's something, this is a fucking execution. Right? There's no way that this just Played out the way it did. So I don't know if the property manager has a grudge against this guy or what, but the girlfriend wasn't even there.

Gene: 48:25

hmm.

Ben: 48:25

So this cop is responding to a disturbance on his own, walks up,

Gene: 48:29

Also, it's a solo cop. It wasn't two guys.

Ben: 48:32

on his own, walks up, knocks on the door and immediately steps out of view of the door. Which is bullshit. Because if I'm trying to respond and open the door and I can't see you, that immediately makes me nervous. And okay next time he knocks, he says, Sheriff's department, open up. Fuck, I can't see you, dude. I don't know if it's just someone yelling or not. The young airman legally owning a gun has it in his hand, pointed down, not in a threatening manner at all. As he opens the door, and the sheriff's officer guns him down, then tells him to drop the gun.

Gene: 49:10

Right. And, and it, it literally, it all happens in a matter of seconds in the video. The guy, the, the cop doesn't bust through the door. The guy opens the door voluntarily.

Ben: 49:22

Not yelling, not screaming,

Gene: 49:23

No, yeah, not yelling or screaming, and as soon as that door is open, the cop takes four very fast, rapid shots directly to the center mass of this guy who's about three to four feet away. And then, after a couple of seconds, he says put your gun down, drop your gun, drop your weapon. And then, like, that's after he shot him.

Ben: 49:47

hmm.

Gene: 49:48

So, looks like an execution to me, man.

Ben: 49:51

That's my entire thought, is, you know, and here's the thing. This cop, and I've said it on X quite a bit, this cop needs to be tried. I don't know if he's guilty, innocent, what all the circumstances are, but he needs, if this were under any other circumstances, that individual will be in custody and we'd be trying to figure out what was going

Gene: 50:14

Yeah, I, I propose we have a federal law in the Republic of Texas against qualified immunity.

Ben: 50:20

Oh, absolutely.

Gene: 50:21

But you realize that means we're going to have something that we're going to have to enforce on the counties because some counties like Austin are definitely going to want to have that.

Ben: 50:31

Again, the, not something we have to enforce, but if it's in the constitution and the Texas Supreme court says it's unconstitutional and a county chooses to ignore that. You know, I, I believe in nullification and let them enforce it, so,

Gene: 50:45

hmm.

Ben: 50:46

you know, the, the power is only as strong as the consent. I also think we should have something where if a percentage of the population, let's say, if over 10 percent of the population ever is charged with a crime, that law needs to be abolished

Gene: 51:04

Mm hmm.

Ben: 51:05

Because obviously it's a bad law. If 10 percent of your population is so a. k. a. drunk driving, for example, should not exist.

Gene: 51:13

though.

Ben: 51:14

No, no. Keep the bar low.

Gene: 51:17

and that I that's a very low bar ten percent

Ben: 51:21

out of 10.

Gene: 51:22

again one out of ten There could be stuff that people want to do that

Ben: 51:29

Yes. That they should be allowed to do

Gene: 51:31

No,

Ben: 51:32

protection of the minority. Anyway, back to the current story. We'll, we'll debate more of that later. Gene, let's move on. So, you know, number one, if you're the responding officer, Fucking stand in front of the door. No one's shooting it. Like, this cop was obviously scared. He didn't want to stand in front of the door and be seen.

Gene: 51:52

Yeah, he should not have gone there Alone, first and

Ben: 51:55

his entire mindset there is fucked. Second of all, if the guy opens the door willingly and says, hey, you know, and he, the guy in the, in the body cam footage, the airman that gets shot, it has his non dominant hand, he's got his A gun in his right hand, and he's holding up his left hand, palm out, like, hey, you know, easy, and so, you know, hey man, if I'm that officer, hey man, I don't know why you got your gun, but could you, could you set it down for me so we can talk? You know, he can even draw his firearm. He can draw his sidearm. That's fine. Hey, you got a gun. I got a gun. Let's deescalate this. I'll holster mine. You put yours down. We're, we're okay. Talk. Not to just go, oh shit, he's got a gun. Pop, pop, pop, pop, pop.

Gene: 52:41

Yeah. Yeah. I, I don't think this is from what, what, what area is that? Do you remember?

Ben: 52:46

Florida.

Gene: 52:47

But I mean, like, how urban is it? Are we talking like Miami Dade?

Ben: 52:51

Jesus Christ. I'd have to

Gene: 52:52

I don't know. But, but again, to me, the idea of that, the first thought that comes into a cop's mind when he sees a civilian with a firearm is I have to kill this guy.

Ben: 53:03

Which

Gene: 53:04

who has those thoughts?

Ben: 53:06

Modern cops.

Gene: 53:07

people like New York City. Or, you know, places where guns have been vilified. Florida usually isn't vilified guns.

Ben: 53:16

have you looked at the street cop training?

Gene: 53:19

Yeah,

Ben: 53:21

Like the actual thing that's called street

Gene: 53:23

I know, I know, I've, I've seen them.

Ben: 53:25

Yeah, it's sick.

Gene: 53:27

It, it's counterproductive, that's

Ben: 53:29

It's the warrior cop mentality.

Gene: 53:32

It's why, as I've said a billion times over, the mentality between the cops and the criminals and the Is a hair thin it's it's the same personality type that that ends up

Ben: 53:42

Yeah, it's the Destin area. By the way, Okaloosa County is Destin.

Gene: 53:47

Okay. Yeah, because like if that were to, if you see a guy with a gun in a lot of places in Texas, the cop would just wave to him.

Ben: 53:58

In, in Austin, they'd go give him shit at

Gene: 54:01

Yeah. In Austin, they would tell you to at least turn your gun and put a rainbow flag on it. But yeah. It's, like, not that unusual to see people with guns, though, in

Ben: 54:14

And the guy is in his own home. He has every right to have that gun. He has every right to answer the door. Like, the, the, them, like, one video I saw he, he was justified because the officer is responding to this and he opens the door with a gun.

Gene: 54:28

How's the guy supposed to know what the officer's responding to?

Ben: 54:31

Exactly, and, not only that, the officer, any time that you have oh assaulting a police officer, that shouldn't be a crime. There should not be a distinction, and this is something that, no group, there should be no hate crimes, there should be no Enhancements for police hitting a police officer. It's assault,

Gene: 54:50

Yeah, sounds like we're definitely going to have a lot of federal laws.

Ben: 54:54

No, it isn't. Not at all.

Gene: 54:56

If you want to prevent counties from having those, then you better make them federal.

Ben: 55:00

No, you sit there and you have a strong constitutional position and you let them do what they want to do. But anyway, regardless, the whole point is, like, this is a, this is a situation, like, a lot of people on the right are wanting to say, oh he shouldn't have had a gun and George Floyd 2. 0 and all this.

Gene: 55:24

George Floyd, this is some, this is a dude in his house with his gun, which is the most legal thing possible, unless he was a felon,

Ben: 55:33

Which he isn't,

Gene: 55:34

which he isn't, so, cop's wrong, he's right, end of story.

Ben: 55:39

Except qualified immunity and a lot of people are saying otherwise. And I, it, quite frankly, man, you know,

Gene: 55:45

who the hell's saying otherwise?

Ben: 55:47

a lot of the right. A lot of the boot licking right.

Gene: 55:52

That's crazy.

Ben: 55:54

No! No, back the blue, baby! Back the blue!

Gene: 55:58

Eh, nobody's back in the blue.

Ben: 56:00

A lot of people are.

Gene: 56:04

No, no, no.

Ben: 56:06

Yeah, yeah.

Gene: 56:09

That makes no sense. This is a clear cut case of a cop going off on a hair trigger with no business doing it.

Ben: 56:18

Oh no, no, you know, I, I will send you videos. In fact, Mo posted them the last night. Of a black conservative going in and defending the cop there's always, there's obviously some domestic violence situation going on. Like he makes a shit ton of assumptions. It's like, even if there is irrelevant, the cop should not have done what he did, period. But here, here's the thing. There is a large contingent of the conservative faction that are back the blue bootlickers. And I have a huge problem with that because I don't, I don't care who you are is not a good thing. And

Gene: 56:58

it's not that power is not a good thing. Power in the hands of dumb people is not a good thing.

Ben: 57:02

yeah we're all dumb. Anyway

Gene: 57:04

Half of us. Anyway.

Ben: 57:06

oh, Jesus. What it comes down to is this was a very, to me, tragic story. He leaves behind a family and everything else. Not, not like his kids, I don't think, but

Gene: 57:20

He looked very young.

Ben: 57:21

23.

Gene: 57:22

Yeah.

Ben: 57:23

Like, this, this is a tragic day. That cop needs to be arrested, needs to be charged, not just fucking on administrative leave. And if he's found innocent, he's found innocent. That process needs to go. He cannot hide behind qualified immunity for this. And,

Gene: 57:41

Yeah. He did not, in my viewing the video, he did not act in a professional manner. He

Ben: 57:49

he acted as he's been trained to out of officer safety.

Gene: 57:54

Yeah. Exactly.

Ben: 57:55

I, I do want to, while we're on the topic, I, I want to mention a book that everyone should go read and that's

Gene: 58:02

Ben's book reviews. Go

Ben: 58:03

Rise of the Warrior Cop.

Gene: 58:06

Mmm.

Ben: 58:06

It's, it's a Whitehead book. It's very good. And John Whitehead, libertarian thinker, writer, author, fantastic gentleman. You know, go read it. It, it, it's the warrior cop mentality, which is, this is an example of. Is a huge problem in our policing system, and has to go.

Gene: 58:27

Yeah. Yeah. And it's, I also at the same time will say that We always hear through social media about the worst cops. Like, no one's forwarding and getting videos of a cop that's just doing exactly what a cop should be doing. So keep that in mind as well.

Ben: 58:56

Yeah, one thing I'll say is, I, I, more and more believe that there are no good cops.

Gene: 59:01

Yeah, I've said that for a long time. I don't think there are good cops, but there are bad cops that follow rules.

Ben: 59:07

yeah, and the reason why I say I don't believe there are any, there are good cops anymore is because every cop has seen some dirty shit, and they either have not reported it, or they just let it be, and that then makes them the banality of evil.

Gene: 59:23

Yeah. That was, But it's a tough one because how do you get people that don't have a cop mentality to go work and be a cop?

Ben: 59:37

again, I don't, I would, I would argue this is where the private sector steps in and we

Gene: 59:44

I does that there's no difference in private sector would attract the same individuals.

Ben: 59:49

Yeah, but the private sector has to be more responsive to its customers.

Gene: 59:54

It does. But what if the customers want that type of cop,

Ben: 59:59

Then they get what they deserve.

Gene: 1:00:01

but somebody else is getting shot, not, not the guys that like that type of behavior.

Ben: 1:00:06

Eh we'll see.

Gene: 1:00:08

You're seeing it right now. I mean, like you're saying, you got a bunch of you know, back the blue people out there that think this is exactly normal and correct. So they're in favor of this. So if it was private, be no different. They, they would be happily paying for that type of service.

Ben: 1:00:27

I don't know, man.

Gene: 1:00:28

So it it's, it's a, it's not an easy problem to solve because. People go into certain fields because they're attracted to something within those fields. Could be just a lot of money for some people. They don't care what they're doing as long as they're making money. But for most people, I think there's some kind of interest in that field. And the people that end up going to police academies Are generally the ones that would have been criminals had they gotten caught when they were in high school.

Ben: 1:01:01

yes.

Gene: 1:01:02

I know I'm saying a very blanket statement, but it's more true than wrong.

Ben: 1:01:06

At the very least, they were the bullies.

Gene: 1:01:08

Oh yeah, yeah. They, they were not the people interested in the law. By any stretch. Cops are not interested in the law. Cops are interested in enforcement. That's where they derive their pleasure from, is being able to confine people to tell others what is right and wrong, and I think the South Park Cartman character summarizes this pretty well. Absolutely perfectly with respect my authority. That is the driving factor of a cop.

Ben: 1:01:43

yeah, and you know, do you ever watch, have you ever watched much Ron White?

Gene: 1:01:50

Mm mm.

Ben: 1:01:51

So Ron White, great comedian he has this joke about bouncers who get off on bouncing and watch Roadhouse and jerk off all day. And I, that's the kind of same mentality.

Gene: 1:02:03

Mm hmm.

Ben: 1:02:05

Speaking of comedians. Dude, funny thing fuckin happened this, this week. Did you see the guy blow up on Twitter about the Joe Biden joke? You didn't see that? Okay, so this comedian, he's doing stand up. He's pretty unknown. He's at the Laugh Factory, and he's doing some tours, but he doesn't even have a YouTube special or anything, but he's doing stand up, and one of the one of his stand up jokes got leaked and posted, he didn't even post it on his own YouTube, but he eventually did. But it, it has blown up, and he's asking the audience, you know, he's doing some audience interaction improv, and

Gene: 1:02:47

stuff. Yeah.

Ben: 1:02:49

Ah, some hilarious stuff though, but he starts talking to this one guy and he goes, what's your job? I work in the Biden administration.

Gene: 1:02:56

see that. Okay. I thought that I didn't realize that what we were talking

Ben: 1:03:00

Yeah,

Gene: 1:03:01

see. That was, that was pretty

Ben: 1:03:02

hilarious. Yeah. What's your job? To wake him up?

Gene: 1:03:06

Huh. But the guy's actual answer is so much funnier.

Ben: 1:03:10

Yeah, I go to the South to try and campaign for Biden. What?

Gene: 1:03:15

And to get the South really,

Ben: 1:03:19

I know you like Trump, but Biden, come on. Yeah, the whole thing was hilarious,

Gene: 1:03:25

I'm, I'm shocked. The guy said that. I mean, what the hell are you thinking? Admitting to the fact that you're, you're a, a Biden political campaigner.

Ben: 1:03:35

I mean, you know, apparently he's a true believer.

Gene: 1:03:39

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I, this day I don't, I mean, I guess those people exist and that proves, you know, that OSHO statements about retardation, but how in the hell can anybody after four years of Biden, almost four, anybody honestly think that he's a good president, you give lip service to I'm sure, but true believers out there. How retarded do you have to be

Ben: 1:04:13

Pretty fucking retarded.

Gene: 1:04:16

like beyond small bus retarded?

Ben: 1:04:20

Yeah, yeah, this is unable to function on your own, retarded. Yes.

Gene: 1:04:25

This is just somebody who's parenting television. Zero brain activity.

Ben: 1:04:32

Yeah.

Gene: 1:04:33

basically, you could be unplugged and there would be no difference. It's a, it's amazing. I think there could be people that voted for Biden who've now seeing the. Error of their ways and you'd have to admit that well, at least he wasn't Trump. But yeah, he sucks.

Ben: 1:04:52

So, I had an interesting conversation an uncle of mine, who I hadn't talked to in quite some time,

Gene: 1:04:59

Hmm.

Ben: 1:05:00

accidentally Oh, we're getting some heavy, heavy rain, so if you hear something, that's what it is. We got I got a phone call from him, and it was accident, it was an accidental dial, but called him back and talked to him for a little bit. And this guy is a lifelong Democrat. He's always kind of leaned Trump ish, but just because he got after Obama was kind of moving in the, okay, this is getting to be a little nuts. Couldn't vote for Hillary. Didn't vote for Trump, but couldn't vote for Hillary. And I don't know if he voted Biden or Trump, but he's moving, you know, in the, hey, this is getting a little nuts direction. But lifelong Democrat. And I was shocked when he said, pray for Trump because what they're doing to him and everything else, you know,

Gene: 1:05:48

Mm hmm.

Ben: 1:05:49

has, he is making statements and gone more MAGA than I would. Right. Which is pretty significant shift over time.

Gene: 1:06:00

Yeah good. That's a good thing.

Ben: 1:06:04

Oh, I, I just, I you know, I think what you're going to see, if we have any sort of honest election, you're going to see the president that got the most votes in U S history, then get the least.

Gene: 1:06:16

Mm hmm. I Yeah, honest election being the key words there.

Ben: 1:06:22

Yeah, if we haven't.

Gene: 1:06:24

hmm, which I think If we were, you're absolutely right. The odds of us having one of those is almost zero. So we may end up with Biden getting more votes than there are people in the U S

Ben: 1:06:40

Oh,

Gene: 1:06:41

to absolutely ensure that, you know, I'm constantly seeing stories about new bags of votes found in blah, blah, blah, like there are. They're still finding boxes and crates of election ballots in different states three years later. I, I don't, I don't know what to tell you dude. That's the other thing that I feel like if you leave it up to the states, they fuck up

Ben: 1:07:11

I think the federal government fucks up plenty.

Gene: 1:07:14

They do fuck up plenty, but I feel like if we're writing the Constitution, I think the elections for federal offices cannot be trusted to the states to decide.

Ben: 1:07:29

Okay.

Gene: 1:07:30

have to have, if you want a fair election, you have to have something that is recording the votes in the matter. Where you can examine that later. You can't just have a computer coming up with numbers. Yeah. Paper ballast is, is one, not the only way to do it, but certainly one way

Ben: 1:07:50

other thing I would say is a public vote versus a private vote.

Gene: 1:07:55

Yeah. And I'm actually on the side of the, the public one myself, but not everybody. I get it. Some people. Are afraid of that. They don't want

Ben: 1:08:05

don't fucking vote.

Gene: 1:08:07

Yeah, but then you have exactly that tactic being utilized by pressure groups that want to keep a certain person in office. It's to intimidate people that may not vote for him and threaten them and get them to just not vote. I mean, I think the idea

Ben: 1:08:22

how about this?

Gene: 1:08:24

is for that reason.

Ben: 1:08:25

okay, how about this? You go to vote, you are given your ballot ID number, and all ballots are traced, and you then can vote, and your ballot is made public. All ballots are made public. So you can go look and see your ballot and how it was recorded.

Gene: 1:08:50

Yeah, I, I think that's a good, that's a good idea. Wouldn't even cost a lot much, honestly, to do. Mm hmm.

Ben: 1:08:56

Now, Scantron, Scantron results, done.

Gene: 1:08:59

Mm hmm.

Ben: 1:09:00

And a picture, and here's what I'd say, the scanned in and counted results versus the picture of the And if I have my ballot ID, I can go look up an individual ballot and see and say, yep, that's exactly what I intended, or, hey this miscounted

Gene: 1:09:17

Yeah. So the, the way that the ballots were done. At the last selection here in Austin technically speaking, I thought was pretty well done, which is you use a computer to run and select people on your ballot, the computer prints out a piece of paper with all the selections that you

Ben: 1:09:37

human readable.

Gene: 1:09:38

human readable with a barcode on the bottom. So that's machine readable as well. And then you look at it and if there's any mistakes. It hasn't officially been filed as your vote yet. You could bring back and say, Oh, I marked the wrong thing. Something's goofy. Give me another ballot, destroy this one. And then only once you've gotten the paper printed ballot and you looked it over and you're like, okay, this looks good. Then you bring it to a scanner and you stick it in there. It sucks it in. And at that point, your vote is recorded,

Ben: 1:10:10

And not only that, the paper copy is kept.

Gene: 1:10:13

kept, it's not destroyed. Exactly. A paper copy goes, just spits out the scanners back and into a box. Exactly. That process seemed like a good process to me. There's other issues, like the line was probably about 250 people, which is insane. Nobody has time to wait that long to vote.

Ben: 1:10:32

Yeah, our lines are not like that here, but we use the same process.

Gene: 1:10:36

Yeah. So there are certain issues. The other thing I would say, and I know this is, this would be controversial, but I would say no absentee ballots. Either you go vote or you don't have a vote.

Ben: 1:10:49

I can get along with that on with.

Gene: 1:10:52

way too easy to cheat using absentee ballots.

Ben: 1:10:55

Okay, I can get along with that with really one exception for whatever reason on election day you are out of the country.

Gene: 1:11:06

Um, I mean, it happens. Look, you're out of, you're not available to do a whole lot of different things. I don't see why this should be one of the things that, that is different. You may be

Ben: 1:11:18

Should voting be compulsory and mandatory, you know, we, anyway, we are spending, we are spending way too much time on this topic.

Gene: 1:11:26

I it's an important topic and we're in an election year. I think it's appropriate.

Ben: 1:11:30

Okay. I think that there's a lot of other things going on that is equally important.

Gene: 1:11:35

what?

Ben: 1:11:37

Some of the horse faced Stormy Daniels stuff that's going

Gene: 1:11:41

one's watching that shit, dude.

Ben: 1:11:42

I mean, I think this is

Gene: 1:11:45

And by no one, I mean me.

Ben: 1:11:47

shit. Oh, jeez.

Gene: 1:11:51

I just don't care. Who cares? It's, it's, it's so irrelevant.

Ben: 1:11:57

Okay.

Gene: 1:11:58

Wait, what do you care about Stormy Daniels?

Ben: 1:12:00

I mean, So, her testimony and what was said, and the way things go, A, is just I mean, she just opened herself up to another civil lawsuit. Because she's already lost, and said certain things, and signed certain papers, and now she's contradicting that. So, Trump's going to sue her again.

Gene: 1:12:23

Who cares? Fine. I don't care. It's like, the one thing you can't argue is Trump created this problem for himself. He had to fuck her. He just had

Ben: 1:12:36

think he did. I don't think he did.

Gene: 1:12:39

Whatever he did, he had to then give her a check for.

Ben: 1:12:44

That, or she's just an extortionist, and it was a small enough initial amount of money that, okay

Gene: 1:12:49

he did something. Okay. I don't care what it is, but she's not some random person he's never physically met.

Ben: 1:12:58

I mean, he's physically met her, and there's probably enough that she could come up with a reasonable story, but that doesn't mean that he did anything necessarily wrong.

Gene: 1:13:06

I know, but no, I didn't say he did anything wrong. I'm just saying he did this to himself. If you, if you don't, if you're going to run for political office, don't hang out with prostitutes.

Ben: 1:13:20

Yeah he wasn't intending to run originally, I would say.

Gene: 1:13:25

Yeah. Either way I think that obviously the Democrats are using this and leveraging as much as they're capable of, just like they did with that that crazy woman that pretended to Trump rape her.

Ben: 1:13:38

E. G. and Carol, yeah. We also need to talk about the impeachment of Joe Biden.

Gene: 1:13:45

yeah. So all I know about that as you can tell, I'm, I'm woefully

Ben: 1:13:50

You've been playing video games too much, so you

Gene: 1:13:52

Not too much. I've been playing just the right amount because none of this shit matters. I just.

Ben: 1:13:57

it totally matters.

Gene: 1:13:58

it's so doesn't matter. So Joe Biden, who shouldn't be the president in the first place, incidentally, before I forget, cause we'll talk about it next time. When we get back to the topic of the constitution, I want age limits on both sides. I don't want people who are too young. I also don't want people that are too old serving as the executive.

Ben: 1:14:20

I can agree. But also, you know, that lifetime 10 year. So if you spend 10 years as a representative, sorry, you can't run for president.

Gene: 1:14:31

Yeah, I agree with that. I'm totally on board with that.

Ben: 1:14:34

So you got to choose what you're going to do.

Gene: 1:14:36

yeah. Although, I would make the presidential terms five years, so you can have two terms within ten

Ben: 1:14:41

that's fine. That's fine. I'm fine with

Gene: 1:14:44

Mm hmm.

Ben: 1:14:46

Anyway,

Gene: 1:14:49

So, so, go ahead. Tell

Ben: 1:14:52

Biden getting impeached for literally what they already impeached Trump for, which is going to be hilarious. Because both sides are going to be making the opposite Both sides are going to be making the opposite side of the argument that they were.

Gene: 1:15:05

I don't think that's even true. I think the Republicans argument is, you guys opened the can, and therefore, we're just following your lead.

Ben: 1:15:12

Right, but arguments at the time when Trump was impeached over not delivering aid to Ukraine is that it's the president's right and so on. The Democrats said, no it's not. Now, the Democrats are going to be saying it's the President's right, and the Republicans are going to be saying, no, it's not, and the Senate has to bring

Gene: 1:15:29

take on this?

Ben: 1:15:31

my take is the President has the ability to do whatever he wants with foreign policy. Congress can allocate money. It is up to the executive whether or not to spend it. The executive is limited by the amount of money that Congress allocates that they can spend, but does not mean they have to spend it.

Gene: 1:15:50

Goddammit. That's exactly what I'm thinking. We have no disagreement on this.

Ben: 1:15:57

mean, it's the foundation of our system, but

Gene: 1:16:00

Yep.

Ben: 1:16:01

yeah, so the, the other thing I would say here, though, is the Senate has to take it up. Like, if articles of impeachment are passed the right now they've been filed if they pass the house, the Senate has no choice, but to take it up now they can acquit they can drop it really quickly.

Gene: 1:16:18

Yeah. Which is what they're going to do.

Ben: 1:16:20

But they have to do that.

Gene: 1:16:22

Yeah. Yeah.

Ben: 1:16:26

Just, you know, just like this police officer. I, when I say he needs to be charged, that doesn't mean he needs to go to jail. He needs to be found guilty. I still believe there's a presumption of innocence but he needs to, that presumption of innocence needs to be that, okay we're going to go through it and look at this and go from there.

Gene: 1:16:47

I think the video is pretty conclusive.

Ben: 1:16:50

I do too, but a jury needs to look at it, and a trial be, be had before he, he's totally condemned. Now I will say, qualified immunity has to go,

Gene: 1:17:02

Yeah. That is the worst possible thing that we have relating to cops in this country is qualified

Ben: 1:17:09

It's not just cops. It, Joe Biden, the, the, we have inherent qualified immunity for all of government, which is a problem.

Gene: 1:17:21

Yeah. And, and especially since, you know, government removed an awful lot of qualified immunity like things after Enron. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, cause we used to have a version of that for corporations

Ben: 1:17:34

Right.

Gene: 1:17:35

and they're like, this is, yeah, we can't have this, the individuals are responsible. So if you're, if you're one of the executives.

Ben: 1:17:42

To jail.

Gene: 1:17:43

you can go to jail for decisions that, that you make in your company. It's like, okay, then the government has to play by those rules too.

Ben: 1:17:51

No, no, no, we can't do that.

Gene: 1:17:54

So I don't know, man, I, I think clearly the main reason for the Trump stuff is to keep his focus away from campaigning, which I don't think it's working, but I will say for a guy. That's in his nineties, like Trump.

Ben: 1:18:10

Not in his nineties.

Gene: 1:18:12

I know, but it's fun

Ben: 1:18:13

in his seventies.

Gene: 1:18:15

It's he's fucking old. It is, it

Ben: 1:18:17

than Biden.

Gene: 1:18:19

guy's just dead already. He's a living dead. But it's, it's stressful. It, that stuff adds stress that reduces the person's life and makes it more difficult for them to have energy to do anything else. So the fact that Trump's. You know, still managing to still get out there and put out mean tweets is pretty impressive. Given the additional stress that they're generating on, on top of the stress of running in, in general, but it's not a, it's, it's a. It's an evil thing to do to an old man, frankly. Like, I would have no problem with them doing that to Vivek. You know, because he's Indian. Do

Ben: 1:19:07

God.

Gene: 1:19:08

want to talk about Ann Coulter's little

Ben: 1:19:11

Sure, we can. So, set it up.

Gene: 1:19:14

my god, this is, I can't believe this dumb bitch opened up her mouth like that. Ann Coulter, who I've never been a fan of, but she seems to be the darling of the New York Republican crowd. She was being interviewed. She was actually on Vivek's show, not interviewed. I guess they were just talking, whatever, whatever format it is. It's not quite an interview format. And she, she started,

Ben: 1:19:41

It's, it's about a, it's like an interview format as Jordan Peterson

Gene: 1:19:45

yeah, yeah. It's a conversation. Yeah. And Whatever the topic previous, I'm not sure, but what came up was her essentially saying, you know, when you were running, I, I agreed with you the most out of all the candidates. Cause she's not a big fan of Trump either of all the candidates. And you know, you, you had some very good things to say, but I could never vote for you because you're Indian. And my jaw just kind of went, and then. She proceeds to explain herself and justify saying that this country has never had a president who wasn't a wasp every president since the first president has. English Anglo Saxon blood in them. And I am just not comfortable with having somebody who is not a wasp in the office of president of the United States. And Vivek is taking this an extremely good temper. Like he's not shocked. He's not arguing with her. He's trying to be polite. He doesn't just go, you're the problem with. The Republican party lady. It's people who think like you he doesn't say all the things I was thinking of saying. And he, instead, he just tries to kind of coax out of her. Like, that's an interesting way to think. Why do, why do you think that? Yeah. And

Ben: 1:21:22

you're wrong, but why do you

Gene: 1:21:23

yeah, his point is basically I don't know. I kind of think meritocracy is the way to go. Not somebody's skin color lady, but and she is old enough to be his mother. It's just amazing to me that somebody that's in the public eye would it's okay to say something. I mean, even if she truly believes it, which I think she does, how do you not realize that your beliefs are bad?

Ben: 1:21:53

Because of, I mean, most people don't believe their beliefs are bad. What do you mean?

Gene: 1:21:58

She literally is admitting to this guy that's sitting right in front of her. That she thinks just like the woke liberal crowd, the most important thing a person has is the color of their skin, what they were born into. And has nothing to do with who they are.

Ben: 1:22:19

Yeah.

Gene: 1:22:20

That's her position. what the Democrats accuse Republicans of being. While in reality, the Democrats. Generally have that

Ben: 1:22:30

she is the definition of a racist.

Gene: 1:22:33

She is an absolute racist. I mean, there's no two ways about it. She is talking to somebody who she readily admits she agrees with and considers to be intelligent, but would never bring herself to vote for him because. Of where his parents came from. He's American. She doesn't vote for him because his parents came from India. And then she keeps digging that hole and says you know, if if your child married a, a wasp and then had a kid, so they were like diluted half Indian and half wasp, I would consider voting for your grandchild. Oh my God, this woman is beyond stupid, but I've never liked her. So it really, for me, it just kind of reminded me

Ben: 1:23:28

she's,

Gene: 1:23:29

of how stupid she really

Ben: 1:23:30

but she's also very right in a lot of ways,

Gene: 1:23:34

a prolific writer that is parroting conservative viewpoints. She's dumb cunt. Same thing when she was on Tim pool, every position she took could have been and had been taken by a liberal on Tim pool. Cause you know, Tim tends to be a little more in the libertarian

Ben: 1:23:52

Yeah, yeah, but like, for instance, when she was on Bill Maher and said, of the announced candidates, Donald Trump has the most, you know, like, she does get some things right here, and isn't.

Gene: 1:24:02

she might get some things right, but she's a dumb cunt.

Ben: 1:24:06

We'll see you next Tuesday too, Gene!

Gene: 1:24:10

What's next Tuesday.

Ben: 1:24:13

See you next Tuesday. C U N T cunt. Mm hmm.

Gene: 1:24:17

Oh, sure. I meant the other kind, but yeah. it's a it's amazing. I hope her career dies as a result of this, frankly, because anyone that can take somebody that just said what she said as authoritative on any topic, he's got a screw loose in their heads.

Ben: 1:24:37

Yeah, I don't like Ann Coulter.

Gene: 1:24:39

It's not even an issue of racism for me. It's the stupidity factor of doing that and thinking that's an appropriate thing to do. How can you argue for meritocracy and then act in a completely opposite manner and tell somebody, I don't really care if you're smart or if I agree with you, I care more about the color of your skin.

Ben: 1:25:04

I don't disagree

Gene: 1:25:05

It's amazing that there are people out there that will still. You know, pay money to listen to her views. Anyway, that's my rant for the day. I just she's been around since I was a kid, dude. She's gotta be like in her late sixties.

Ben: 1:25:24

She's getting old.

Gene: 1:25:27

That's it's crazy. So,

Ben: 1:25:30

I sent you a link.

Gene: 1:25:33

You sent me a lot of links usually, which one? I don't see anything.

Ben: 1:25:36

It's in the Zoom chat.

Gene: 1:25:38

Oh yeah. I can't see the zoom dude. Yeah. I thought you would send it in signal

Ben: 1:25:42

Why can't you see the Zoom?

Gene: 1:25:44

because that's running on the Mac and I have that whole monitor turned off right now. Do you want me to look? I can turn it back on. Hold

Ben: 1:25:51

Why would you have the monitor on the

Gene: 1:25:53

It's called a screen saver, dude. I I don't look at the computer screen when we're talking.

Ben: 1:26:00

Do you use screensavers?

Gene: 1:26:03

Yeah.

Ben: 1:26:03

I'm just ordering some tamales and figured I'd share the link

Gene: 1:26:07

Oh, you sent the link to Tamales to me.

Ben: 1:26:12

So anyway,

Gene: 1:26:13

me a pic. Send me shit on zoom, dude. Don't send me stuff on or not on zoom. Send me stuff on, on signal, not zoom.

Ben: 1:26:19

yeah, but then that would mean I'd have to install Signal on this laptop.

Gene: 1:26:22

Oh my God. How do I even

Ben: 1:26:25

Tamales highly recommend to anyone they ship nationwide. They're awesome.

Gene: 1:26:29

Oh, you got frozen tamales?

Ben: 1:26:31

Yeah, yeah, they ship them.

Gene: 1:26:33

Why don't you just get a local tamale? You live across the border from Mexico.

Ben: 1:26:37

Yeah, these are down in the Rio Grande Valley, and they are some of the best tamales I've ever

Gene: 1:26:43

I'm not a fan of tamales whatsoever. I don't think they taste good.

Ben: 1:26:47

Oh my god, then you have not had these tamales.

Gene: 1:26:50

I haven't. No, I know exactly what it is. I don't like the, like the filler might taste good. I don't like that crap that the outside is made from. Was that corn flour shit or something? I don't know what it is.

Ben: 1:27:00

These are amazing

Gene: 1:27:01

I've had plenty of tamales. They all taste like shit.

Ben: 1:27:05

Alright. I, I, I, okay.

Gene: 1:27:07

Hey, you like tamales? More power to you. Great. But I don't like that. What, what is that shit made of? It's like corn starch or something,

Ben: 1:27:15

It's cornmeal.

Gene: 1:27:16

Yeah. That not meant for human consumption. It's meant for animal consumption.

Ben: 1:27:21

Yeah, you're the kind of guy who doesn't eat grits either, so.

Gene: 1:27:25

Although I love grits. You're totally wrong on that.

Ben: 1:27:27

Okay literally the same thing.

Gene: 1:27:29

No, not made of corn.

Ben: 1:27:32

Grits are 100 percent made of corn.

Gene: 1:27:34

They're totally not made of corn.

Ben: 1:27:36

You're wrong.

Gene: 1:27:37

No.

Ben: 1:27:38

Yes.

Gene: 1:27:40

All right. I'm going to have to look this up. No, I've had grits plenty of times. It tastes good. This does not.

Ben: 1:27:47

Ground corn! Grits are made from ground corn!

Gene: 1:27:51

Dent corn. What the hell is dent corn?

Ben: 1:27:53

Ground.

Gene: 1:27:55

No, it says dent corn. I'm looking at it right now.

Ben: 1:27:59

Anyway, Gene, you're wrong. It's okay. It's okay to be wrong, but don't challenge a southerner on his grits.

Gene: 1:28:06

Huh. Huh. So, what's the difference between grits, polenta, and cream of wheat?

Ben: 1:28:12

Lots.

Gene: 1:28:14

Mm hmm.

Ben: 1:28:15

One is delicious. The other two are

Gene: 1:28:18

So, Italian is basically, er, polenta is Italian grits.

Ben: 1:28:22

No. Wrong.

Gene: 1:28:25

nope, that's, I'm looking at an authoritative website that is

Ben: 1:28:29

Published by yourself.

Gene: 1:28:31

Who cares who it's published by? Huh. And Cream of Wheat is the original grits. There we go.

Ben: 1:28:38

No, cream of wheat is not the original

Gene: 1:28:40

That's what originally started off before people started eating corn. Mm hmm.

Ben: 1:28:45

No.

Gene: 1:28:46

So, anyway

Ben: 1:28:47

Yeah. Anyway, you're, you're wrong.

Gene: 1:28:49

Congratulations on enjoying Animal food? I guess, I guess different folks for different tastes.

Ben: 1:28:57

Oh, man. I gotta tell ya, I, I like like a good shrimp and grits. Oh my god.

Gene: 1:29:03

Yeah, I've had shrimp and grits. Tastes good. It does not taste like tamales.

Ben: 1:29:08

Okay. You just, you're still wrong. It's

Gene: 1:29:11

Mm hmm. Yeah, and I, I, I've definitely had tamales because my housekeeper used to bring me tamales.

Ben: 1:29:19

So, you you sent me the Y Files episode from last night, very excitedly.

Gene: 1:29:26

Did you watch it?

Ben: 1:29:27

Yeah, yeah, I watched

Gene: 1:29:28

pretty good, huh?

Ben: 1:29:29

Yeah, I, I think you missed the ending based off of your statements.

Gene: 1:29:34

I did not watch the ending yet, so don't spoil it.

Ben: 1:29:37

Yeah okay, yeah. It, it was good. It was good.

Gene: 1:29:41

Yeah. No, I, so I think we have different perspectives on eugenics.

Ben: 1:29:46

Yes, we do.

Gene: 1:29:48

Yeah. No, and I know that. I mean, my, I, I tend to have a fairly unpopular perspective, but I think eugenics is a good thing.

Ben: 1:29:58

Says the person who has no kids and doesn't have to worry about the world they grew up in, yes.

Gene: 1:30:03

Yeah. I mean, there's a reason I don't have kids.

Ben: 1:30:06

Yeah,

Gene: 1:30:07

I have all of your

Ben: 1:30:08

a eugenic standpoint, they shouldn't exist.

Gene: 1:30:11

Huh. That's not about not existing. It's a, there's a,

Ben: 1:30:16

You, you just wanted to avoid the forced sterilization, so you did it yourself.

Gene: 1:30:20

yeah, yeah, there you go. I think given an opportunity to improve, I think it is silly not to.

Ben: 1:30:29

I, I disagree. I,

Gene: 1:30:31

Yeah. That's why I said we have different perspectives on it.

Ben: 1:30:34

I don't think that

Gene: 1:30:36

not in favor of forced eugenics.

Ben: 1:30:38

But that's what it has to devolve to. That's, I mean, you can't progress

Gene: 1:30:43

I mean,

Ben: 1:30:44

unless you're forcing everyone

Gene: 1:30:46

no, no, you can, you can diverge as a species and become two species and advanced one that learns how to fly and the other one that's, you

Ben: 1:30:56

And

Gene: 1:30:56

on the ground

Ben: 1:30:57

dies off

Gene: 1:30:59

with a stick.

Ben: 1:31:00

you know. Okay

Gene: 1:31:01

And I, I think that in a lot of ways I think eugenics is an easy topic to really represent. Negatively and dystopian Lee, if that's a word because you can't, you know, it's the whole Frankenstein thing. So it's the idea that you're, you're able to mess with humanity in a manner that's unnatural and, and it is unnatural. It's true. But when you're intellect evolves to a certain degree where you could actually be. Change yourself by design rather than by randomness. I think that's a, like, that's a good thing.

Ben: 1:31:45

I guess. Anyway, it's a episode worth watching. I'm not going to spoil it too much since Gene hasn't seen it,

Gene: 1:31:52

I watched about two thirds of it. That's as far as I got last night before I fell asleep.

Ben: 1:31:56

Yeah, huh. It was, it's worth watching.

Gene: 1:31:59

Of them are worth watching. That is my favorite show on YouTube.

Ben: 1:32:02

Not all of them are worth watching. There are some that are just dumb.

Gene: 1:32:05

No, I think that all the episodes are really good. Heckle fish. I just like, I can't get enough heckle fish.

Ben: 1:32:13

Huh. I mean, I tweeted at you a picture of

Gene: 1:32:17

You did. I thought that was hilarious. You, you're like, is heckle fish driving? I'm thinking, what the hell are you talking about? Then I, I see the video, I'm like, oh, I get it.

Ben: 1:32:26

It's a camel in the back of a car.

Gene: 1:32:28

the back of a trunk. Yeah. And, and Gertie's has relations with a camel, or sorry, I mean, heckle fish has relations with the, and heckle fish is a goldfish and Gerie is a camel. And don't ask me how this is actually works, so,

Ben: 1:32:47

Anyway, the whole point was a joke on a joke on an inside joke, and it took Gene a second to

Gene: 1:32:52

Yeah.

Ben: 1:32:52

it.

Gene: 1:32:53

No, it's, it's, I, I got it. It was funny. You know, hecklefish used to be a ski instructor in college.

Ben: 1:33:01

How so?

Gene: 1:33:02

Exactly.

Ben: 1:33:05

Okay.

Gene: 1:33:06

Exactly. I, I really do wonder, like, is there a more fun job than being hecklefish's voice?

Ben: 1:33:15

Oh, I think that, what do you mean, that's

Gene: 1:33:17

I, you literally are saying all the shit that nobody gets to say.

Ben: 1:33:22

Right, but it's just, it's his internal personality,

Gene: 1:33:25

Yeah. Yeah. But it's just the It's the zero filter version, right?

Ben: 1:33:33

It's fun to watch your traffic, especially when we're doing this, and where all it's going.

Gene: 1:33:38

Network traffic.

Ben: 1:33:39

Yeah.

Gene: 1:33:40

Oh, where's it going?

Ben: 1:33:42

Mainly, the vast majority, if I'm looking at the flows dashboard connections, the vast majority is going to Zoom, obviously, right? That's the most data going out. Zoom.

Gene: 1:33:52

Oh, yeah.

Ben: 1:33:53

But, you

Gene: 1:33:54

Oh, I thought you were doing like trace routes to see where it goes.

Ben: 1:33:58

Oh, no, no, no, no, I'm, I'm looking at the actual

Gene: 1:34:01

Oh, okay. Okay. Okay.

Ben: 1:34:02

Firewall. Anyway. Alright, man we had some audio problems on a couple episodes, but sounds like we got those fixed.

Gene: 1:34:09

Hopefully it was the weirdest thing. And I,

Ben: 1:34:12

You want to talk about that real quick before we wrap up?

Gene: 1:34:14

Yeah. It looked like zoom generated multiple files for Ben. And it wasn't like, here's a half hour clip of Ben, and then here's the next hour long clip of Ben. These were both full length, like two hour long clips. Or not tracks, not clips. So, you have my track, two hours. Then you have Ben track one, two hours. Ben track two, two hours. And so, when I, when I grabbed them, I just grabbed one of those tracks. I'm like, ah, it must be a repeat. And when I, you know, listened to it, as I was editing it, I'm like, yep, I can hear Ben. I didn't listen to the whole damn thing. I just listened to the beginning of it. And I heard him talking. But apparently, Like, one of those tracks had a half hour of Ben at the beginning, and nothing after that. The other track had the rest of Ben during that conversation. But nothing, it was totally quiet in the beginning. So I merged all of those tracks together. And then re uploaded it. And so the version that anybody downloading

Ben: 1:35:21

Now.

Gene: 1:35:22

we noticed, after we were told would get a version that sounds normal because tracks are merged. But it's the weirdest thing because I would, I guess I'd never expected Zoom to create multiple tracks of the same person for the entire duration. Cause I, I've seen it where like, if somebody comes on and they drop off and they reconnect. You end up with a different track. So this is a weird, weird bug.

Ben: 1:35:52

And it's one of those things that we we're not so narcissistic as to listen to, you know, we might spot check, like Gene was talking

Gene: 1:35:59

Yeah, I'll

Ben: 1:36:00

sure everything's good, but we don't sit there

Gene: 1:36:03

five to ten minutes. That's about

Ben: 1:36:04

sit there and listen to ourselves talk, so.

Gene: 1:36:07

So we appreciate people that bring it to our attention.

Ben: 1:36:10

Yes, please do.

Gene: 1:36:11

Yeah, and Ian, not only did that guy reach out to you and then post on X, but he also reached out directly to Darren because he has an email. Apparently people don't know what our email is. Ben, what's your email?

Ben: 1:36:24

It's all over the place and you can find it at namedben. com, but it's dude at namedben. com is my email

Gene: 1:36:33

So, feel free to email Ben with any technical audio issues. And then he'll, he'll let me know. Alright, we will see y'all in a week.

Ben: 1:36:44

Yeah.