300: The 300

Hello Liberty Levers and welcome to the Liberty Mic Podcast. Broadcasting from an undisclosed

location in the heart of Dixie. I am Michael and I'm here with Liberty Larry.

I also don't know. Don't know. Okay. How are you? Pretty good. Good. Good. My arm's not

follower of me. That I'm very happy for you. Yeah. This is this is this is something. It's lasted

longer this time. So, you know, I had a good like, I don't know. I suppose almost six months were at

like I had some flare ups, but they kind of came and went. Yeah. Yeah. It only last like maybe five

days and it wouldn't be too bad. The worst one was at Christmas, which was terrible time for that

to happen, but of course, you know. But I only lasted like five days. I only had a couple of days

where I look like I have Tourette's walking around moving my arm in weird directions while I'm

talking to people. We're more than a week now. Yeah. I was going to say we were talking about

this on last week's podcast. Yeah. So, we're at least a week. Yeah. So, I'm pretty tired of this.

I do think it's a little better, but only mildly. Yeah. I'm when I wake up. I feel well not totally,

but better. But yeah, I've actually been able to sleep in my bed several nights in a row now,

which that's an improvement for a little bit. That was that wasn't happening. Yeah. I still wake up

over and over again in the night, but and I I'm a person that moves around a lot in the night.

And I there's only like one comfortable position, which makes it more difficult to sleep anyway.

Yeah. And I'm in and it's on the access. Like none of this is really helping.

But like then I go to the office. I sit at a computer for six hours and that'll help.

No, not at all. And that's this kind of how this has gone so far this week is that I go to the

office and then I work for as long as I can stand it. I'm sitting there and then I come home and

work where I can be more reclined. Yeah. And the boss me is not real thrilled about that. But

I'm all I'm here. You got to do what you got to do. All I'm here and this work is causing this.

This may be a workman's comp issue. No, no, no. It didn't it didn't arise from work.

Yeah. If I sit upright at my computer here, it does the same thing. It's still though.

What probably did it with some stupid thing I did when I was a repel master back when I was like

20 years old. Yeah. Because I did a lot of stupid things on the top of a repelling tower when I was

all by myself. Yeah. Sometimes going from the top to the bottom real fast. Yeah. So I,

uh, yeah, I blame my own idiocy mostly. Yeah. Still that. Still sucks. Yeah,

young and stupid. Oh, well, um, it does body wears down. Yeah. You'll learn some day. Oh,

believe me. That day is upon us. Yeah. I already pay him for some of that.

Well, um, there's one news topic. Yeah. Really? I mean, or there should be, I guess, uh, there's,

okay. It's like right on the edge of my mind. There was something that I was like, people should

be talking about this, but they're not. And now I can't, I can't think of what it is though.

So we're not going to talk about it. It's probably not. Unless I come up with it sometime during

the course of this podcast. Yeah. Um, I don't have any notes, obviously on it or, or you would

look to those. Yeah. I would know what it was at the very least. Making notes is a good thing.

Yeah. I only had like a little bit of space at the bottom of the page. And I didn't want to start

a new page. Yeah. Nothing worse than having notes for one podcast on two pages. So then you

got flip, right? Yeah. Exactly. And then you can, you can hear it a little bit on the mind.

That's just distracting. Yeah. I want people focused on my words. There you go.

Um, okay. Well, uh, we're still fighting with Iran, even though they're totally and utterly

defeated. Yeah. Yeah. Um, and they're still doing, uh, fair bit of damage around them,

even though they're totally and utterly, utterly defeated. And they have no armed forces left

to speak of. Yeah. According to our president. Um, no army, no navy, no air force. They did

manage to shoot down an F 35, but they, you know, we completely controlled the skies.

Other than that one plane, right? Other than that one plane. Of course, the, the war department said

that they didn't actually shoot down a plane. That that's a myth that the, I mean, it is an F 35.

So it might have come down. It might have done the fight. Yeah. Right.

But, uh, everything that's going wrong, um, the US says that, well, Iran didn't do it though.

It was, there was such a terrible laundry fire on a carrier this going to have to come back to

the US for repairs. That seems like a bogus story if I've ever heard one. Right. I mean,

I'm just saying, like, come on, guys, you can do better than that. Like, uh, so, um, who knows? Uh,

the, the, what is the first casualty in war is the truth, right? Both sides are lying about

everything. Yeah. Um, casualty numbers are, are probably being under reported on both sides.

Uh, or over reported done on either, yeah, the other way. Yeah. When they're, uh, saying what

they've done to the enemy, um, they're, they're, it's hard to tell what's going on.

Uh, all we can talk about is what the effects have been so far. Now, I will say, um,

um, there's, I don't know, we can say that this, it's hard to say what really happened in this

story, of course, but, um, Trump did openly threaten power production in Iran.

If they didn't, uh, capitulate, I guess, I'm not sure what his expectation was.

He wants all outs are under last I heard. I mean, that, but that story,

his, he changes his tune a lot. So I mean, I was the last I heard. Um, so Iran responded in kind

by saying, Hey, if you start attacking our energy infrastructure, we're going to attack energy

infrastructure in every state that hosts US forces. Yeah. Um, including desalination plants,

which, uh, I was going to say that was the big one was the, the, the desalination with the

water. Yeah. Um, because a lot of those countries are completely dependent on, well, not completely,

but like 90% plus, I heard 95% for some of those countries. Yeah. Um, so, but on, on average, I would

say probably 90 plus percent of the fresh water in the Arab countries comes through desalination.

Sounds like a desert. It does, doesn't it? Yeah. Yeah. Just say it. I'm, uh, reminded of the old, um,

Sam Kinnison act about how to solve world hunger and hang out through it because it's pretty

vulgar, but it's hilarious. So say, look it up. Oh, yeah. Sam Kinnison on world hunger. I'm sure

you can find that on YouTube. Oh, yeah. Um, anyway, uh, so then Trump backed off, um, with the claim

that we're in talks. Now, through the other side of his mouth, he's saying, uh, we've killed all

their leadership. And then when they got together to get new leaders, we killed all of them too. So

there's nobody left. Yeah. So who are you talking to? And I heard a clip where he was talking about

exactly that and that, um, he, it was, I forget what the question was. It was something along the

lines of who was, who we were talking to or whatever. And he's like, well, the people were talking

to seem like they're in charge. Like they say they're doing stuff and then that happens. Like,

so we're assuming they're the ones that are in charge. It's like, that doesn't exactly jive

up. I mean, very easily you could be talking to people that was in the room with other people.

And it's not really the people in charge at all. Yeah. And if you can't name anybody that you're

talking to because they'll be killed, then they're probably not, they don't have a lot of control.

Yeah. I would, I would say that's pretty true. And that would fit in with your theory there too.

Because if you name people and they get killed, maybe it's because they're leaking information,

not making decisions. Not making decisions. Yeah. Um, at any rate, Trump said that they,

that we're in talks. We're negotiating. And it was progressing well. And so therefore,

we're not going to destroy their energy infrastructure just yet. Yeah. As long as the talks

continue to go well, then Iran released a statement saying, we don't know what he's talking about.

There's no negotiations going on. Trump is negotiating with himself, which I thought was

pretty funny, actually. Yeah. Because I think Trump does a lot of negotiating with himself.

I think so too. Um, and the truth is like, why would, why would Iran enter into negotiations with

the United States? And certainly, why would they stop anything that they were planning to do

because they were in negotiations with the United States? Because the United States has proven that

we don't stop our militarism because we're negotiating. Exactly. I mean, we've used it for cover.

Exactly. Exactly. So put you at ease while we're setting up our bombing runs. I mean, we've done

this twice to this country already before a war started. Yeah. Within a year. We've done it

twice within a year. Yeah. Exactly. So I don't know why they would would consider the US a good faith

negotiation. Anyway, on the other hand, like you hear stories about how, well, Israel continues to

escalate whenever the US is in real talks with Iran because because the US is a good faith

negotiator. In fact, the Joe Kent said something like that. Yeah. Um, I don't see that the US is a

good faith is negotiating in good faith. Yeah. I don't know that Iran is either. But, um,

and actually, on this point, I said last week that they haven't done anything to put

doubt in any of the claims that they made before the war. Yeah. But something happened. They attacked

a US installation in the Indian Ocean that was 4,000 kilometers away. And they had put, they had

self-imposed 2,000 kilometer limit on their missile systems. Yeah. All right. So I read some about

this. This is actually kind of interesting. First off, apparently in the 12-day war that

restriction was relaxed in Iran, like officially and publicly. Yeah. I was not aware of that. Second,

it turns out that the missile that they used is actually one of their missiles that has a 2,000

kilometer limit. Yeah. With its regular payload. Oh, really? So what they did was they put a smaller

payload on it. Like a lighter one? Yeah. Okay. So less weight on top of it travels farther.

Also less boom, right? Yes. Also less boom. Okay. So that's the explanation of that. Yeah.

I, it means that obviously though that they are capable of firing farther than the limit that

they've imposed on themselves and are willing to do so. But doing less damage at the same time.

Yeah. Yeah. But depending on the target, like I said. Yeah. Doesn't necessarily matter. So

and then we've got, you know, a bunch of Marines and real troops moving over there.

I mean, it's going to be less than like 5,000 troops. I don't know what exactly we expect to do

with 5,000 troops. Of course, the talk is an invasion of Carg Island and takeover of Carg Island.

Oh, really? Yeah. Which is their, I guess their distribution point for Iranian oil. Yeah.

I don't see how this is feasible. I mean, like you may be able to land a bunch of Marines on

the island and take it and take it. I don't think you can hold it. But you can't hold it. Yeah.

I mean, I don't see how you could. Yeah. I mean, this is where people like our military is not

invincible. Like, I mean, that people don't like, they have that we're on their turf. Yeah.

The island is 15 miles off the coast of Iran, which means it is well within range of artillery,

missiles, and drones. Yeah. Can all. So there's also something like 20,000 civilian residents

of the island. So this could be messy in terms of international. What would the word be?

I want to say relations, but that's not right. Yeah. That's not exactly what I mean. Image. There you go.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It could be messy in terms of international image if we go and take the

silent and kill a lot of folks. Yeah. I mean, I don't think that we would go there and start

slaughtering folks. I think that it would be accidental. But oh, yeah. Well, I'm not saying

it would be, but even accidental is going to be a problem. Right. Right. So I don't know how that

could be. And while this is all going on, a bunch of US officials keep saying, and I keep hearing

it over and over again, no boots on the ground, no boots on the ground. We don't have any boots

on the ground. Nope. There's no boots on the ground. We do seem to have our toe in the water.

I was going to say Trump has hinted at boots on the ground. I mean, I say hint at that. Like,

he said that it's on the table. Yeah. We're like, we're like sitting on the edge of the pool,

testing the temperature or something. Like, toes in the pool, not, not boots on the ground

yet, though. Yeah. I just don't know how long that'll last. And that'll be a huge mistake, too.

The further we go into this, the worse it gets. Like, there's no winning here. Yeah.

Or I say no winning. There's no good outcome. Put it that way. That's right. Right.

Now, this is something that I had meant to mention on the last podcast. And I didn't. So now I can't

and other people have been talking about this. Or at least I've heard other people talking

about this since then. So now I can't claim that it was an original thought of mine, although it was.

Yeah. It is that it does seem that the US is trying to limit

energy coming from anywhere, but the US. Okay. That the like, we're okay with the

Straits of Hormuz being closed. Yeah. It doesn't really bother us that much. And on that point,

this is a way for Iran to make even more money. And they probably have already, because there

have been ships that have gone through the Straits of Hormuz. But instead of going like right

around the bend on the on the west side, like they usually do, they've been passing between

to Iranian controlled islands. Oh, nice. That reportedly the IRGC is using as a kind of,

I would say a way station, maybe. Yeah. Yeah. To visually identify that it's the ship that they

have permitted access. And the if this isn't already happening long term, this is a great solution

for Iran is to just charge a toll. Yeah. Yeah. Just well, and those ships I'm assuming are going to

China too, right? Not all of them. Not all of them. Yeah. I mean, a lot of it's going to Asia, but

but there's some of it that goes to Europe too. It goes kind of all over the place. Yeah.

You know, remember it's it's 20% of the global energy supply passes through the Straits of Hormuz.

Yeah. I just I knew they were picking and choosing though who they were letting through and who

they weren't. I just I assume that they were sending everything to China. But yeah, I don't know if

that's true or not. I mean, I don't know either. This is an easy way for them to extract

payments from nations or businesses or whatever that needs to use that channel. Yeah. Yeah.

And truthfully, almost no matter what they charge, it'd be worth it.

Yeah. I mean, think of how the value of the oil on these tankers. Yeah. So anyway, I do think that

this is about controlling world energy supply. Now we can't control Russia. Russia is a huge

source of energy. Well, we've been trying though. I mean, but yeah, we have tried our best

to sanction to prevent their their energy supplies from going really just to our allies, which is

which is kind of shooting yourself in the foot. Yeah. Exactly. Well, it's them shooting themselves in

the foot. Yeah. They've really suffered some some hard winners and whatnot over this deal. Yeah.

It's had a big impact on business in Germany. You know, I don't know why they go along with it,

although they aren't entirely. I mean, like a lot of these countries are still importing oil from

Russia, oil and gas from Russia. Not so much gas because all the pipelines have been destroyed,

I think, at this point. But anyway, they are still importing energy from Russia. And that was

something that Trump had complained about sometimes in his complaints about NATO. I remember him. So

but you know, you need the energy. Yeah. And then of course, the other big source of oil in the

western hemisphere is Venezuela. Yeah. Well, we control that now. Yeah. So and that oil supposed to go

are usually goes to Cuba, right? Part of it. Yeah. I mean, it's like we had a lot of sanctions on

Venezuela and oil too. So the countries that were importing Venezuela and oil are the countries that

are antagonistic to the United States. So I saw something about that that we had stopped

Venezuela from allowing oil to go to Cuba. And that so now they're having like power outages

and like all of these issues in Cuba. Yeah. And that Russia had had planned to send like a tanker

over. And then there was like some congressman, I don't remember who it was, was threatening to

like have that tanker like bombed. That sounds like a Lindsey Graham statement. But who knows?

I don't know if it was him or not, but it was somebody had like that idea was floated that we can

allow Russia to to yeah, to do this in our hemisphere or whatever and drastic issues. We can't

allow Russia to provide energy relief to a country in our hemisphere. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly.

Those people need to die. Yeah. Well, and it's it, but this all goes back to Marco Rubio.

We're such the we're such a great nation. Yeah. Yeah. Because this that's I mean, that's that's

what Marco Rubio wants. Like that's the regime change that he wants. Yeah. Um, so. Wow.

I have the idea of starving a people to rise up against their government or turn in the lights out

on them until they rise up against their government. You know, you got you got a little bit of a hint

of it in Iran. Yeah. But it wasn't enough there. It won't be enough in Cuba either. And certainly

once you start aiding somebody in this and an overthrow of their government. Well,

that everybody else stands up because nobody wants to be ruled by foreigners. Yeah. Exactly.

That's just that that's human nature. You can't really fight that. Yeah.

So, uh, anyway, I I do think that this a lot of this is about controlling the global energy supply

or as much of it as we can, limiting energy that comes from other places for the benefit of

US energy producers and and their stock value. Yeah. And so forth. And of course, the value of

their product itself. There is a problem with this long term. I'm sorry, I have to sit back

to keep it. It's that Tourette's. All right. Uh, the problem is that as fossil fuel energy prices

rise, you have just raised incentives to develop alternative energy sources. Yeah.

Which I'm not opposed to. But that goes back to the government interfering in the market and

tipping the scale. Yeah. But I mean, for the without any kind of recognition of market forces

themselves. Yeah. Like the that as prices rise demand, um, demand is reduced and there's pressures

put on the market to find an alternative. Yeah. Yeah. And that's what will happen in the long run.

I mean, there's already been a lot of a lot of time and energy and money put into developing

alternative energy sources. Um, and if you if you, I mean, oil prices are about $100 a barrel

right now. Like, and my understanding of because of the way the supply chains and the, um,

the refining and so forth works, uh, my understanding is if they stop the war right now and, um,

everybody just started pumping like crazy. Yeah. It would still take the better part of a year for

the for the market to stabilize. Yeah. Yeah. Um, and, you know, and us to get back to, you know,

what $60 barrels of. Yeah. Yeah. Um, but it's a hundred now and the longer this goes, the,

they're not putting a lot of dent into it by, uh, a bunch of nations releasing their strategic

petroleum reserves and, um, trying to push up a production of the places where

productions still. The friendly places. Yeah. Still available and so forth. Like,

you know, I can't remember the exact numbers and this is obviously something that I should have

written down, but it was something like that we are short something like 15 million barrels of

oil a day and that all of these things that they're trying to do to make up supply only comes to

about two million barrels of oil a day. Yeah. You just, you can't make that up through squeezing.

Yeah. Um, so you're still lowering the, you know, annual production by a number of percentage

points, probably less than five percent, but that's a lot. Yeah. Yeah. I got a needy cat at my feet

now, too. Um, so I don't know. This is a, this is a real can of worms that Trump has opened

that he shouldn't have. And I don't know how he was convinced. Um, you know, I, I, I think part of

it is for the benefit of Israel. I think that we have our own strategic interests here. I think

a lot of that is, um, limiting China's energy supply. And I think a lot of it is, um,

trying to assure a greater market share for American energy. Yeah.

Um, you know, for the benefit of those businesses. So and his own family's interests in energy.

Yeah. And the, the big problem is is the, the people like we the people aren't benefiting from this

at all. Like there's no good that comes from from this for us. Right. Um, I mean, as the inflation

is going to hit, we're spending more going in the debt further. Um, it's just there's no, no

shining light. Yeah. Um, and it, you know, as we discussed a few weeks ago in, uh, it could start

affecting food supply. Yeah. I mean, those, uh, the longer this goes on, the more likely that

that scenario we laid out starts to play out. Yeah. I know it, you can't stop it. Like it's this,

just that's how markets work, man. Yeah. I, and I don't think people really realized how much, um,

of our economy is based on petroleum and petroleum products. Oh, yeah. Or is dependent on

petroleum on the, yeah, petroleum products. Absolutely. I mean, beyond the energy costs of

transportation and electricity and so forth, um, the, you know, petroleum products are in plastics

and fertilizers and, um, uh, textiles and all kinds of things. It's everywhere. Yeah.

Um, what else you want to talk about? Cause that's, I don't want to talk about that anymore. Um,

don't know. We're only like a half hour in. We get, yeah. We got to fill some time here. Um,

man, I don't know. I don't know that I've gotten really much else.

Trying to, I wonder if you all can hear this chirping cat here. I've always wanted to record her

actually because she has a interesting, uh, vocalization. It's different. Yeah. I'll say that.

Yeah. Uh, the other one has an interesting vocalization too, but it just sounds like a wine.

Hers is like this kind of chirpy, truly thing that she does. Uh, okay. Let me, let me, uh,

let me look back through my notes here, um, a couple of weeks because I know that there was some

economic thing that I wanted to talk about at some point and we kept putting it off and now I don't

remember what it was, but if I can find it, we can talk about that. Sorry about for the,

sorry for the unprofessionalism. We'll cut the sound in post. Uh, even though we won't.

Yeah. Um, let's see. Uh, I do have big plans for, um, for tax week, by the way. Oh, really?

Yeah. I, there, there'll be an economic discussion there too, but, um, I'm, I'm trying to do, uh,

so I have to look at a calendar. I might be out of town that week. Oh, oh, no. Well,

then it'll just me be me sighting statistics. That'll be nice. That'll be fun, right? Yeah.

Sure. Everybody will really appreciate that. Oh, oh, yeah. This is it. Equity and new tech.

Oh, do you remember me talking to you about that? Okay. vaguely. Yeah. Yeah. So, um, in this particular

discussion, they were talking about, uh, the, um, some new, I'm going to go with the, uh, word,

bionic, uh, medical treatment stuff. So you, you see some of this already, right? Mostly in, uh,

hearing aids where they have a device that literally plugs into their skull. Oh, really? I mean,

I'm not, I'm not surprised, but no, I haven't seen it. Really? Okay. Well, um,

because I knew it was, I know it was heading that way at one point. So there's more of these kind

of things that are being developed, uh, they, they also do stuff for Parkinson's where they put a

little chip in your brain, um, to help control the, um, the effects of Parkinson's, um, or the symptoms

of Parkinson's. The, uh, so there's like more and more of these things are being developed. And

I was listening to a podcast where they were discussing, um, some of these developments and, and how,

like essentially bio electronic stuff. Yeah. But one of the things that they said about it,

uh, this is podcast set in the UK. By the way, so this could explain maybe part of it.

Because, you know, they're going, they're, they're, they're farther down the socialist line than we are.

Yeah. Is that they, they said that we have to make sure that as we develop this technology,

um, that it doesn't go to benefit just the rich and that we need equity in the applications and, um,

the availability of this new tech. So, well, that's interesting. And I said, that's stupid.

Well, because, I mean, just think about it logically, um, I mean, how many poor people you know

are out and around in Teslas 10 years ago. Yeah. Actually, Teslas are pretty inexpensive. Like

out the low. Now, but that's what, that's kind of my point, though, is that like when Teslas first

came out, like that was not your average person went and going and picking a Tesla up. Right.

But your average person absolutely will pick up a Tesla now. Yeah. 4K TVs when they first came out.

Same thing. Uh-huh. Um, the, the truth is that, uh, almost every technology when it's new is

available just to the rich. And it's available just to the rich because prices are high because

supplies are low and it's still an in process or in progress. Usually it's not ready for prime time.

Yeah. Um, and I mean, there's exceptions to that. But like generally speaking, like you're the,

the rich people are kind of the ones that are like, testing it out. Yeah. And so they are the ones

purchasing these things and putting the money into the system that's used to develop the technology

further and to, uh, increase supplies in the long term. Yeah. All new technologies go to rich people

first. And the money that the rich people give to the technology developers is what helps them

develop the technology further to iron out the bugs to improve the supply chains to improve the

manufacturing process to increase supply to lower prices so that everybody else can get it in the

future. Exactly. And the medical industry is no different. Exactly. Um, although it's trying to be.

Well, yeah, it is trying to, I mean, I guess it's a different scenario when, you know,

healthcare is free for everybody. Like, I mean, I'm not saying I agree with it, but I mean,

that would be the reasoning. Are there, that would be their argument. Uh, I mean, I suppose,

and then the state pays for all of this, but I don't see, you know, people in the UK go to other

countries, wealthy people in the UK go to other countries to get treatment for things. Yeah.

Because they can't get treatment in the UK for it or they can't get treatment within a reasonable

time frame in the UK for it on under the National Health Service. Exactly. Um, this is actually far

more common than you would suspect, although everybody keeps praising the National Health Service

and these other, like, I remember listening to somebody else talk about that they were in Germany

for a semester or something like that. And they had some kind of illness that they went in,

and like, it was great. She, she didn't have to pay a cent. Um, she went through. She got her

medicine. She didn't have to wait very long. It was all like boom, boom, boom, everything's done.

She didn't have to pay a cent and she got her illness treated. Yeah.

That works great when it's something common. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, on these National Health Services,

these state run health services, if it's everyday kind of ailments, um, if it's colds and flus

and things that are, yeah, uh, traumatic injuries like that and so forth, like they're great for

that stuff. They are. It's true. Yeah. Um, when you start getting into like more rare forms of

illness, they're not. Yeah, especially if you need a MRI. Well, and this was something that I was

going to bring up when we were talking about earlier, you're saying that the medical system is

no different in terms of being a market. I think the MRI is a really great example of how our

health system in this country has become not a free market. Yeah. Um, because oh, yeah,

I'm not arguing them. That's what we have here, by the way. Yeah. Um, it's far from it.

Because other technologies and technologies in the healthcare field that are outside of the

insurance and, uh, and state pay systems, yeah. Um, are at the, the prices continue to go down. Yeah.

But MRIs continue to get more and more expensive. Yeah.

And you have to wait forever and you have to go through a bunch of rounds of insurance approval

before you can do it anyway and so on and so forth. And this is something that really should be

widely available at this point. This is an old technology. I was going to say it's not new at this

point. Um, but for reasons of controlling the market, uh, central control of the market,

those prices haven't gone down. Yeah. Um, which is always the problem with central control.

Yeah. And what's really bad is this, the same system that's messing up our healthcare for people

is in the process of doing the same thing for your pets too. Um, dude, it's, it's expensive

to have a pet. Um, yeah. Once I saw pet insurance starting to become kind of prevalent. Yeah.

I was like, Oh, no. Yeah. And it's, it's, it's affecting the market, man. Like, um,

we have had pets all my life. And I mean, I know some of that's just due to inflation,

but I'm telling you, getting stuff done for your pet is expensive. Yeah. Um, I mean, there was

a time where my annual visit with the cats, uh, with two cats, yeah, was less than a hundred bucks.

Now it's more like somewhere between two 50 and 400. Yeah. I mean, I, we did the math earlier.

And like I'm spinning the grand on my dog a year. Um, it's just, but you gotta do it. You

gotta take care of them. But and I also don't have pet insurance. So yeah. Um,

well, I have been like seriously considering moving from the kind of traditional medical insurance

that I have to one of those, um, crowdfunded, yeah, crowd source systems. Yeah. Um, I think that

that's, I'm feeling more and more like that's the way to go. And if for no other reason,

just because it puts pressure on the traditional insurance system to stop cheating. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, we, you know, we talked, you think they're so profitable. They have a system where

the incentive for all parties involved, except for you, the patient is for prices to go up. Yeah.

It's, it's beneficial for the insurance system for prices to go up. It's beneficial for the

healthcare system for prices to go up. It's beneficial for the physicians themselves for prices

to go up. Um, the only person in the system that it's not beneficial for the prices to go up is you

the patient. Yeah. And, um, and they have all these systems that incentivize it like even outside

of that without without going too deeply into this whole thing. Like the business, um, provided,

or employer provided health insurance, which has been a huge push by the government, um, is to make

insurance, uh, come out of your employer. Yeah. Um, like one of the things that's done by the

health insurance companies, these, these insurance companies that that provide these

insurances, these group insurance plans, um, is that they take a percentage of what they saved

the company supposedly. So the high prices and then their low payments that more than cover the

cost of the service. Yeah. Um, the difference between the, like the larger, the number is that's

the difference between those two, the, the charged amount and the paid amount also, um, creates

income revenue for them. And the larger that number is the more revenue they get. Yeah.

So anyway, um, I don't want to spend a whole lot of time on that. Actually, I don't want to spend

a whole lot of time on anything my arm hurts. Yeah. Uh, uh, but it's a little scam. Oh, anyway,

the point is that new technologies need to be available only to the very wealthy at the

beginning if you want them to progress. Yeah. It's just how, it's just how it works. Um, like

interested, uh, wealthy people that like, like the new toys that are early adopters that are

looking for something to invest in in the future, et cetera, those are the people that it should

be available to first. Otherwise, the technologies don't really get off the ground. Yeah. If you try and

make it available to everybody, if you take away the profit incentive, yeah.

And you take away the, the revenue itself, um, because in the beginning, the supplies are low,

then you, the technology never really gets developed. It gets, it gets trashed before it gets started.

Yeah. Our stagnates and doesn't get any better would be the worry. Yeah. You know, well,

that, that's less of a worry than it just disappearing. Well, yeah, I guess, uh, I mean, nobody wants

the first iPhone anymore anymore. Yeah. Well, yeah, exactly. Plenty of people wanted the first

iPhone when it was the first iPhone. Yeah. And some people were able to afford it. Yeah, exactly.

And it got better as it went. Yeah. They're still expensive and then got progressively worse,

I think, but that's a, that's another conversation, I guess. Yeah. Well, you know, there's, um,

it's created a different kind of incentive now in the market. So now the, the market for iPhones

isn't so much about the quality of the iPhone. It's like a status thing. Yeah. Having the new

thing, having, having an iPhone, specifically. Yeah. Um, I know you're not in the dating pool,

but you would be surprised like how frequently, um, not having an iPhone is, uh, a deal breaker.

Oh, really? I can't imagine. Yeah. Oh, your text message came up green, done with you.

Oh, wow. Yeah. No, that, that is wild. I was, I would not have guessed that one.

Luckily for me, last girl I dated seriously was Korean. So it was Samsung all the way.

So Samsung all the way. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. Oh, strange world. Yeah. I know. I know. I don't get it.

I, um, I have an SE3. Yeah. I like it. I went in and I said, I want the smallest iPhone you have.

Small, give me the smallest iPhone you have. And that was it. And it's like twice the size of

my first iPhone still. But, uh, but everybody else thinks that I've got some old piece of junk phone.

Like, no, no, it was made in 2023. It's, yeah. Like it was brand new in 2023. And I can't wait to

like come out with another new one that's like this size. Yeah. Although I like this one fine.

So I'm not like in a hurry to change my mid range on, on screen size. Like I don't want this,

I don't want one quite as small as yours because I do feel like that for me, that's a little too

small. But I don't want the biggest one either. Um, I just. Yeah. Um, well, I, I don't understand.

So, uh, my friend at work calls the big ones, Fablets. Yeah. Yeah. And I, I don't understand that at all.

But maybe it's because I don't watch movies and TV and stuff on my phone. I just, I don't,

like I very rarely go to YouTube even on my phone. I do a lot of stuff on my phone,

which is the reason I want it decently sized. I'm not watching movies or anything like that.

But I do watch videos periodically or, you know, something quick and small. Um, but I knew a guy

that carried, he just carried a tablet. Yeah. He didn't even, it wasn't like a regular family.

He had, he just carried around the tablet. Yeah. I used to have a tablet too. Yeah. And I did like that.

Oh, yeah. I mean, I enjoyed having a tablet, like having a tablet was really nice. But, uh,

but I don't need both. And if I'm only going to have one, I want the smallest fun they got.

I considered at one point dumping the smartphone altogether and going back to like a flip phone

or like a dumb phone and then just having a tablet around. Yeah. Um, but I never followed through

on that. It is convenient to be able to like pull stuff up when I'm like need to or want to do.

You can totally the other way. You have the watch like you're never disconnected. Exactly. I like

the watch. I like the watch a lot. That would actually be a problem with going that direction

because I'm so used mainly for the text messages. I like to be able to like look at my text messages

without looking at my phone. So yeah, I, he, he had to charge the watch before we sat down.

And I was like, Oh, okay, we'll make it through that. So without you being distracted. Yeah.

The phone's still sitting right there. So there's that. I haven't heard it go beep or

buzz on the table or anything this whole time. So it's been lighting up. Yeah. Oh, it never stops,

man. Then that's the problem with this stuff is it never stopped. You should go put that on the

coffee table like where my phone is. Well, then then we'd be completely cut off. I know. If the

epoxy looks happened, we wouldn't even notice. If the poxilex? Yeah, exactly.

The poxilex. All right. Look out the window and see zombies walking by. Yeah. I mean, I think that

if the apocalypse happened, there's a window right there. I think we would know through the window.

You don't need a phone to tell you this is the apocalypse. Fair enough. In fact, if your phone

tells you the apocalypse, it's the apocalypse. It's probably not. It's probably not. It's probably

a false alarm. Yeah. An exaggeration hyperbole. All right. Well, we're talking about nothing now.

So we may as well go ahead and yeah, wrap wrap it up. Yeah. Well, I know we talked about Afro

man last week, but I just wanted to close out on just a real quick thing. He's teased a whole bunch.

I don't think he's actually going to do it. But he's been teasing that some of his shows that he

might run for president. And he has before hasn't he has. He actually filled out paperwork in 2024.

But he didn't he didn't follow through, but he filled out the paperwork. So I'm just saying

half room and 2028. Is that what you're saying? Well, I'll hear him out.

Not saying he's got my vote, but I'm listening, man. Like I'm just saying.

Well, I tell you, I've seen some clips from the court case since then. And I really enjoy it.

Yeah, it's yeah, it's it's fun, man. Like I don't know. It's one of those. I don't know. Yeah.

The guy he's pretty sharp. He's sharp. And like I say, and he's on the right side of things.

Like at least as far as the yeah, obviously the one that's affecting him personally. He's

pretty good on. Yeah. Which is the reason I say if he decides to run them listening. Fair enough.

Fair enough. Well, it wasn't a quick war. And it's not done yet. Yeah. And they they said

the White House said that they had a four week timeline for the war. Yeah. What week are we at?

Three. Three. Okay. So it's wrapping things up. Yeah. Yeah. So it'll be done next week.

Clearly. Yeah. Well, and truth be told, like Trump holds the cards here. Like he could pull

out of this thing and say wipe his hands of it. That's not holding the cards. That's folding.

Still, I mean, you fold you fold in the cards you hold. Yeah. Well, I mean, he can do it. And

and I this is why you weren't very good at poker. No, I suck at poker.

If you fold the cards is because you weren't holding the cards because you're losing. You expect

to somebody else was holding the cards. That's why you fold that's fair. But at any rate, like he

can he he is fully capable of just walking away from this thing. Like I can see him doing that.

And just declare him victory the whole way. Yeah. I'm having a harder and harder time seeing him do

that now. Yeah. What I can't well, all right. It depends on if you count this. Yeah. I can see him

getting some of the other Gulf States riled up about this because some of them are getting

riled up about this and getting involved in the war against Iran and then the US stepping back from

active militarism and just giving them weapons. Like we're doing in Ukraine. Yeah, just stir

the hornets nest and run away. Yeah. But given plenty of weapons so they'll kill each other.

Yeah. Yeah. And so we can sell them and make the money. Right. The whole the whole.

Because that's really beneficial for the whole nation. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Yeah.

What their grimmons everywhere. Yeah. Yeah. And everybody works for a military contractor. So

yeah. It's great for the American economy. The government steals money from you and gives it to

a few select companies. That's obviously good for the American economy. And then those companies pay

those people. So like it's a circle. Right. The small percentage of people that actually work for

that. Exactly. No. Who knows? It's Trump. You just don't know. But that's that's to me that seems

not what you laid out. But him just walking away is the best case scenario. Yeah. I think the

closest thing that will we will we may see to that is what I laid out that he gets enough other

countries involved in the war. And then we just step back and give them armament. Yeah. That's

not good. Yeah. I don't support that. Oh, I don't either. I'm not advocating. I'm just saying.

Making the prediction. Yeah. All right. Well, here we go. We did

manage to talk for a few more minutes and make it see. We are heading to the

Alabama State Convention. Alabama State Convention. Yeah. The Libertarian Party of Alabama State

Convention in Mobile. Yeah. There's a social tonight at Fairhope Brewing Company in Mobile.

Yeah. Mobile. Gotta practice that. Like I sometimes I feel like I'm giving people like

bombing targets when I do this kind of thing. So yeah, there's a social tonight and then business

tomorrow. If you are a member of the party, you should definitely show up. If you're not a member

of the party, you can still show up. And if, you know, like if you're just kind of curious,

if you want to talk to some interesting people, there will be interesting people there.

Definitely find some interesting people there. You will find some very bright people that are

willing to talk about politics all day long. Yeah. And that's true. I mean, they are that like,

yeah, for me, they're like the height of intelligent people that want to talk about politics.

Yeah. You're not going to, if you go to a Republican thing, you're not going to find a lot of

intelligent people that want to talk about politics. But you will have a Libertarian Convention.

I think that if you go to a Republican convention, you probably find intelligent people that want

to talk about politics. The problem is that you have a hard time finding people who can talk about

politics intelligently. Ah, okay. That may be fair. Yeah. That may be fair. Because they've been

drinking the Kool-Aid too long. Exactly. They're not, they're not questioning everything like us

libertarians. And yeah, we're going, we're going to the Fair Hope brewery. What is it called again?

Fair Hope Brewing Company. Fair Hope Brewing Company. So we don't serve Kool-Aid. We serve beer.

We serve beer. And hopefully one. And hopefully one. Because I don't like beer. Hopefully

spirits. Because I would prefer to drink spirits over wine. But pretty sure they're not.

I'm pretty sure it's going to be a beer night. Yeah. Oh, well. Um, maybe a nothing night because I'm

taking meds. Ah. But maybe not. We'll see, right? All right. This time for real, we're wrapping it up.

We are planning to be here next week. Uh, in the meantime, you can follow us on Facebook. You can

subscribe on iTunes, YouTube, pod being, uh, like and share, comment, subscribe. Um, click all the

things. Bells, whistles. Yeah. Hold on yards. Um, and uh, you can always email me, Michael

at the LibertyMic.com. If you got some insight, you got some criticism. You just want to chat.

Doesn't matter to me. Yeah. Um, I do my best to answer everything. So feel free.

And we'll be back next week when we finally get this right. And in the meantime, try to stay free.

Life short, live free. Ciao. Later.