Real Coffee with Scott Adams - Episode 1039 Scott Adams： Talking With Congressman Matt Gaetz About All the Hot Topics, Then More From Me

00:00:00.000 Bum-bum-bum-bum. Bum-bum-bum-bum-bum-bum. Bum-bum-bum-bum. Bum-bum-bum-bum.

00:00:09.300 Hey everybody. Come on in. It's going to be one of the best coffees with Scott Adams of all time.

00:00:20.220 That's right. Representative Matt Gaetz will be joining me if our technology works the way I hope.

00:00:26.720 but first get in here get in here we got all kinds of stuff to talk about the world is spinning

00:00:34.120 around and things are getting out of control but between all of you and me and my upcoming guest

00:00:42.480 matt gates we're going to work this all out we're going to figure it all out before we do that though

00:00:47.360 what do we do first yeah that's right it's called the simultaneous sip and all you need

00:00:54.020 is a cup or mug or a glass a tank or chalice or stein a canteen jug or flask a vessel of any

00:01:00.540 kind fill it with your favorite liquid i like coffee and join me now for the unparalleled

00:01:08.920 pleasure the dopamine hit of the day the thing that makes everything better including the economy

00:01:14.460 including the coronavirus including racial divide it's all better a little bit just a little bit 1.00

00:01:21.660 and it happens now with a simultaneous sip go

00:01:24.180 uh-huh uh-huh that's definitely better all right let me uh check my technology here

00:01:37.420 all right in a moment we'll have representative matt gates join us i have a little update for you

00:01:45.600 while we're uh waiting for him to get on and the the technology is always you know a little uh hard

00:01:52.960 to navigate so we'll do our best here um i got a uh an update on uh carpe donctum and rahim kasam

00:02:02.120 two people who had been um temporarily limited in their twitter uh use for content uh in the case of carpe

00:02:13.040 dunctum uh there was a dcma request there's an official way that somebody can request copyrighted

00:02:19.400 material to be taken down but the question is even though it's copyrighted it's used in the concept of

00:02:26.320 parody so it's a little bit of a gray area and then there was rahim kasam who showed showed a video

00:02:33.580 that uh included the time of death of somebody and if a family member requests video being taken

00:02:40.980 down because of time of death uh then uh when that happens they uh they will take it down

00:02:49.980 now in both of those cases there i guess twitter is working with both rahim and carpe donctum

00:02:56.420 to see if they can get them back up and also within the rules now the question that i ask is why would

00:03:03.200 you ban the person instead of the content if you know there's just one piece of content that's

00:03:09.580 questionable why not just block the content and say hey let's talk about this content you either

00:03:16.060 have to remove it or we're gonna have to work something out and it turns out that twitter is

00:03:22.040 actually looking into that as well so i think what makes this feel like an attack on conservatives or

00:03:29.180 even individuals is that they block the whole account or they'll you know they'll limit the

00:03:34.600 account in some way because of one piece of content which feels wrong right like just the way that feels

00:03:41.140 like wait a minute if the content is wrong but everything else has been fine up till now why not just

00:03:47.920 block the content and then we'll work out what's wrong and apparently twitter is looking into exactly

00:03:54.020 that so there are some things upcoming that will be exciting in the twitter world but that that

00:04:00.740 continues all right let me see if matt has there we are let's add representative gates

00:04:11.060 and if our technology works which looks like it didn't he just disappeared

00:04:19.220 so um matt uh you just disappeared when i tried to select you so um try that again and as soon as i

00:04:28.260 see your indicator come on i'll i'll add you all right we've got uh there he is i'll bet you this will

00:04:38.720 work just great this time because as you know technology always works just the way you want it to

00:04:46.880 um looking better oh didn't work again this is the problem we had the first time we tried to do it

00:04:54.820 i don't know if it's a wi-fi problem or some other kind of technical incompatibility let's try one more

00:05:02.940 time um i've got my phone set up so if they text me to tell me what the problem is i'll know

00:05:09.920 we're back i imagine they're trying different devices and stuff uh to get this working all right

00:05:20.380 while we're uh waiting for that i wanted to um talk about an argument i've been seeing online

00:05:28.600 that i think about a lot and i don't think we're doing a good job of handling it let's add let's add

00:05:35.380 matt again watch this work representative matt gates i can hear you i think are you there

00:05:45.400 yes finally finally score let's do this um i feel like we've now got audio privilege we should

00:05:54.340 probably have to disclaim it yes i i feel a little bit guilty about this um first of all you have

00:06:00.760 started a new podcast called hot takes uh which is terrific um how's that going well i uh really

00:06:08.300 enjoy it i think that the news of the day really opens the door into the questions that we have to

00:06:13.820 answer in the congress of whether they're questions about the nature of speech in this country or really

00:06:20.360 what we see going on with an effort to i think dismantle america by trying to make us love her less

00:06:27.760 and i i am just unapologetically pro-american i think this is the greatest country ever but i think

00:06:34.100 the tactics that we see to try to uh deconstruct our history to try to take away a sense of national

00:06:42.000 pride are are far more dangerous than just you know the destruction of a statue i think they're

00:06:47.160 really trying to get to the destruction of the system well let's talk about that so i have not fully

00:06:51.940 bought into the the conspiracy that there's a master plan i i believe that there are probably

00:06:57.560 some people who think of it in the long term but what percentage of the protesters do you think have

00:07:03.160 a master plan versus they like the fun they're angry you know it'll burn itself out how do you break

00:07:10.420 that down the the master marxist planners versus the people who are just having fun looting and

00:07:15.400 protesting and and free speech i think that it it is uh driven by the money i mean i think that that

00:07:22.120 a substantial amount of the money that has existed for the infrastructure of these organizations uh

00:07:28.760 is fueled by a neo-marxist desire to um to shame america into a crouch both domestically and on the

00:07:39.240 global stage and i think that there is a general grievance movement that is out there you know they'll

00:07:45.160 show up and occupy wall street if you want them to they'll show up for a black lives matter protest if

00:07:50.220 you want to they're just sort of in for the grievance and i think that makes up a lot of the volume of

00:07:55.120 the humans but but the money is uh you know the the financial desire to see this this neo-marxist

00:08:02.520 revolution combined with sort of the corporate america um white guilt payoffs so who exactly is the

00:08:11.280 money behind this because it's hard to see anybody who could gain by more socialism because that basically

00:08:17.780 kills i mean that that is might as well throw your money in a big pile and set it on a fire who

00:08:23.260 who can make a who can make money by paying the united states to destroy itself well i mean i think 0.95

00:08:30.880 that there are foreign entities that that benefit from this i mean you we have seen some reports that

00:08:36.480 there have been venezuelans cubans that have tried to infiltrate some of the the leadership of

00:08:42.360 these organizations to try to um fuel anti-americanism and and so division and we know

00:08:49.340 beyond that there there are foreign influences in the black lives matter branding uh particularly

00:08:55.640 from russia and china they use these uh racial divisions to try to stoke more anger and tension 0.89

00:09:03.700 in our country but but i think that the that for the most part the call is coming from inside the house

00:09:09.320 i mean i think that that within our country there is there is a grievance culture and this is the

00:09:15.300 current manifestation how compatible do you think black lives matter leadership is with whatever the

00:09:23.220 antifa if you can even call it that any kind of leadership or at least leading voices do you think

00:09:28.460 black lives matter and antifa are even on the same page with each other i doubt that that is a

00:09:34.960 sustainable coalition uh or a resilient coalition right now they're sort of you know united around

00:09:41.360 a common enemy and sadly that enemy is our sense of national pride and national identity what those

00:09:46.700 groups have in common is that they believe that america being that shining example uh that america being

00:09:54.620 the best version of herself is uh is is damaging to to their sense of grievance how do you how do you 1.00

00:10:02.240 deal with the fact that um you know america as a brand we like to you know if you love your country you

00:10:08.540 like to put it in the best possible light but it is nonetheless true that america has a violent and

00:10:14.520 brutal racist past that got us where we are now how do you keep your brand and your love of your country

00:10:22.460 while still being honest about how we got here i think we could be honest about the fact that all human

00:10:28.760 history is full of identity-based violence full of brutality full of uh you know sort of human

00:10:37.440 competition and and the the negative impulses that that can create all of that said in a world of

00:10:44.560 relativism i'll take the united states and our development and our promotion of values and our

00:10:51.040 sense of inclusion over just about any other human society in all of human history because it creates the

00:10:57.420 the the unifying principle of prosperity and opportunity for people you know my my take on

00:11:03.800 all this and i want to see what you think about it is that when we focus on the problems we have

00:11:09.480 taken a sort of a loser mindset which is oh i'm i'm disadvantaged you've got privilege i don't etc

00:11:16.540 and while all of that can be true sometimes not but it certainly could be true um how does that

00:11:24.480 change the fact that all of us have an individual strategy and if everybody followed the same

00:11:30.180 strategy we'd all get pretty good results meaning pay attention in school don't have a baby when

00:11:36.240 you're 14 don't go on drugs you know work hard have have some you know additions to your talent stack

00:11:43.380 etc so they're fairly basic things to do that everybody can succeed which works actually better if you're

00:11:49.360 black frankly because if you knew that corporate america is literally begging for more people of

00:11:55.600 color because they need it i mean there's a lot of pressure on them so everybody has a three-lane

00:12:01.300 highway in america if they follow the same strategy why are we focusing on the problems and our

00:12:07.260 disadvantages which is just divisive instead of figuring out how to get better mentoring better

00:12:12.600 education better strategy because if everybody had a good strategy they'd probably all do well

00:12:18.300 i i think you're right i i agree that when we unify around the common opportunity that exists in this

00:12:26.420 country for for any who are willing to work hard play by the rules uh we we draw more people to the

00:12:32.080 cause but i i don't think that every um uh every sort of sectionalized group wants that unity i think

00:12:40.960 that there are that there are leaders in some groups of people and i'm not even talking about

00:12:44.620 you know racial identity i mean i think you see this geographically i think you see it politically

00:12:48.580 where people think that division sort of creates an opportunity within their movement for their own

00:12:54.340 advancement and for their own leadership but but i think that when you talk about focusing on on the

00:13:00.180 positive we also have to do that with americanism and so often like for example in the immigration

00:13:05.320 debate we're told oh well the way republicans talk about this is xenophobic it's racist my view is that

00:13:13.760 if if we instead focus on that positive the the wonder the exceptionalism that comes with being an

00:13:20.140 american something so worth preserving and being proud of that uh that that also can be a more unifying

00:13:27.000 call and unfortunately i think we we take the bait uh as conservatives not even as conservatives just as

00:13:34.300 people who believe in america we take the bait and grant the premise that somehow there is something

00:13:39.820 flawed with our founding and with our history and i think if we if we acknowledge that all humans have

00:13:47.980 uh complications challenges and multi-dimensions in our history but that ours is absolutely the best

00:13:54.380 that hopefully that can that can prevail but you know we surrendered the ground in schools so you know

00:13:59.920 probably you know 15 20 years ago scott and i think that we're starting to see the manifestation

00:14:04.680 of the um just the like the the egalitarianism that we embraced in in education and this this

00:14:12.720 cultural relativism you know when you look at base problems and you're trying to figure out all right

00:14:17.700 what's where's the big lever what's the most right impactful thing we could do it just all comes down

00:14:22.960 to school doesn't it i mean i know some people are going to say having parents but i'm not sure you can

00:14:28.960 fix the parent thing right away but the the school thing seems like something that the government

00:14:33.800 could fix if it focused on it it is the great equalizer my dad was superintendent of schools in the

00:14:40.400 community where i grew up he was never a teacher or a principal he was a business person that was

00:14:45.160 elected to the position because he thought that if we could improve the operations of our schools

00:14:49.780 that the outcomes would be better and ultimately they were but but the you know the i think

00:14:57.260 education associations the unions i think some of the you know social justice warriors that attacked

00:15:03.800 curriculum in particular made a lot of progress while we had our eye off the ball you know i mean a lot

00:15:09.060 of republicans over the last 15 20 years have been focused on how do we teach your kid coding while

00:15:14.700 the left has been worried about you know how we sand away the uh the founding values of america and i

00:15:22.380 think they they made progress in that regard you know there's something that you and president trump

00:15:27.320 and i have in common in terms of mindset unless you disagree with this which is even if i'm looking

00:15:33.380 at an optimistic future or let's say a rosy picture of america i do that strategically in other words i know

00:15:40.920 that when i put my positive thoughts into the universe i just get a better result even if they're

00:15:47.740 unrealistic and and i feel like that's just an intentional strategy but if you look at it

00:15:53.240 not as a strategy it just looks like you're loopy and crazy and you don't care about problems and you

00:15:58.260 don't care about other people but can you could you talk to that do is it is it a strategy or is it just

00:16:05.580 the way you see the world i think particularly with president trump i mean he believes that he can will

00:16:11.340 positivity into existence you know he believed that in business and he does that on the campaign trail and

00:16:17.100 yeah he does it in government it is infectious it is an infectious style of leadership to try to draw

00:16:23.880 people to their highest achievements and and president trump is unique in that he can at times

00:16:29.580 create a competitive environment in which people literally have to you know create more and more

00:16:35.520 optimism more and more progress more and more success just to stay at the table and i like that i think

00:16:42.000 that it it also breeds a meritocracy around the president and it's why frankly some people don't

00:16:47.960 last long you know if they're if they're unwilling to get get with that type of a of a leadership style

00:16:54.040 they find themselves out of the government as for me yeah i think we still have a lot to be positive

00:16:58.580 about and i think that we have to we have to frame our vision and our values in a way that draw people

00:17:04.920 to our cause look we might not want to admit it but the dominant political movement in america today

00:17:10.060 is this black lives matter movement and and you know the the way i think to combat the downstream

00:17:18.860 effects of that is to unapologetically embrace americanism and then as you've done on social media

00:17:26.060 push back against the tactics that just try to silence people i mean this whole this whole characterization

00:17:32.520 of white privilege is a racist characterization it's racist because it is telling someone because of the

00:17:39.820 color color of your skin you have a diminished contribution to make to our country and to our 1.00

00:17:45.580 conversation and and i just don't think that anybody should be told based on their background

00:17:49.880 or their skin color that that they have a diminished contribution to make now not many politicians are

00:17:54.520 willing to say that because they're afraid of being called racist or privileged uh for saying it but i

00:17:59.460 think that when you tell people the truth that is ultimately the most productive and most optimistic

00:18:04.940 thing you can do you know here's the way i put it you you come across a uh a kid in a well trapped at

00:18:11.560 the bottom of the well is the first question you ask how'd you get there because it depends how you

00:18:17.340 got there if you fell in the well one way i'm not going to help you but if you fell in the well the other

00:18:22.380 way i'll help you how does that make sense kids at the bottom of the well you don't care if he's black 0.99

00:18:27.500 you don't care if he's white kids at the bottom of the fucking well can you help him out right so and 0.98

00:18:33.720 and i think that we get lost in the past it's like well this kid got in the bottom of the well 0.99

00:18:38.100 because his parents were uh you know they were drug addicted and you know blah blah blah but this other

00:18:44.260 one had a history a legacy of uh racism and slavery that has rippled into the future which is a real

00:18:51.360 thing you know i don't think anybody would doubt that there's a ripple effect but once you're at the

00:18:55.720 bottom of the well and you're a baby it's just not your fault and and thinking about how you got

00:19:02.920 there is so unproductive when you should just say baby at the bottom of the well what can we do about

00:19:08.720 that all right uh what would you do about the uh the protests and the especially the the chop the

00:19:15.540 seattle place do you think the president should be more involved either verbally or with assets how

00:19:21.960 would you handle that look the bottom line is we can't let these things get set up because

00:19:25.640 once they are they do get fortified i mean there are a lot of guns in that place and let's just

00:19:30.260 have some honest talk about this guy we could march the national guard in there and take the chop the

00:19:35.280 chas over in a matter of moments but there would be loss of life and i don't know that this country

00:19:41.180 is ready to handle that and so i'm i'm grateful that in washington dc as they've tried to set up an

00:19:46.120 autonomous zone uh the the president the chief of staff have ensured that that will not happen

00:19:52.500 the weak leadership in seattle though can be contagious i think as americans look at what

00:19:58.320 is going on it affects our sense of security and safety and it also tells the permanent criminal

00:20:03.800 element that they have more latitude now they have more latitude in my town and in your town

00:20:09.580 because of what is going on in seattle now ultimately i i really do view it as more like

00:20:14.180 akin to the occupy wall street thing i think this ultimately fizzles out but if i were the mayor of

00:20:19.500 seattle uh there would be no way that anybody would be stopping the delivery of care and ambulatory

00:20:27.440 services and uh police to people who are in need i think it is it is infectiously bad leadership um

00:20:35.320 and i'm grateful that the president isn't allowing this to be set up anywhere else particularly in our

00:20:39.880 nation's capital but you would agree this is a really this is a tough one because as you said just

00:20:45.480 one death especially caught on camera as we know that that magnifies it it would just take one death

00:20:51.540 by a government gun and we're right back to square one so you know i don't know that anybody is smart

00:20:58.660 enough to know how long to wait how much force to put on it but i but i saw this interesting development

00:21:05.840 which is apparently the businesses will be able to sue the city and i always say if the government

00:21:12.220 can't work it out the insurance companies will because because ultimately ultimately everything

00:21:17.700 gets everything gets priced for risk and it just won't be affordable to be you know to be bad

00:21:23.740 government anymore just can't well but think about that think about the impact on the marketplace right

00:21:27.780 if my business interruption insurance risk profile is different because i'm in a liberal city

00:21:34.220 that is going to defund and dismantle the police and keep them from going in certain areas

00:21:39.560 then what will happen is it'll be easier to get necessary business interruption insurance

00:21:44.100 in places where you have strong leadership where the law will be enforced so what that will do is

00:21:48.640 create more blight more flight of capital out of these places and and frankly while that will

00:21:56.320 inure to the benefit of of states like florida it's not good for the country to to have such a

00:22:03.560 depressed sense of confidence in areas that have embraced these values you know i'm starting to

00:22:09.360 wonder if there aren't some urban areas that just can't be fixed in other words you know maybe you

00:22:15.040 just have to find a field somewhere and build a new city where you get things right from the start

00:22:19.980 do you think the urban areas do you think baltimore even can be fixed i don't know if there's any

00:22:24.880 amount of money you could put in there because the basic problem is that the leaders are too easily

00:22:30.320 bought if we can be honest if you're a mayor it's just too easy to be bought off by the wrong people

00:22:35.680 no it's so interesting you say that because right now as you and i are talking joe biden's team is

00:22:42.160 out there vetting all of these urban mayors for potential selection for vice presidency and i mean

00:22:47.320 my guess is that it's going to be very difficult for any of them to pass that because you're right

00:22:51.720 a lot of it is is pay for play in these urban cities and it's one of the reasons why despite very

00:22:58.140 high taxes despite a ton of money flowing in from the state and federal government quality of life

00:23:03.800 isn't really improving for the people right and so that begs the question well is the trump strategy

00:23:09.000 of like the opportunity zone the right antidote and frankly i've got some doubts about that like i

00:23:14.360 don't know if when you when you pit one community against another if that's really the role of

00:23:19.340 government like right if you're a wawa and you're deciding where to go build 50 stores is it really

00:23:24.680 right for the federal government to say well if you build them in you know community a instead of

00:23:28.680 community b we're we're designing that outcome to try to direct the flow of your capital so i think

00:23:34.920 i think time will tell whether or not the democrat strategy of you know building the largesse of

00:23:39.820 government abandoning your people and then just sort of being along for the ride for the for the

00:23:44.920 neo-marxist revolution is the right play or whether this this kind of trump play of uh opportunity zones

00:23:52.420 and and seeing if you can socially engineer economic success is the right way i mean i i think

00:23:57.460 ultimately the way every american society flourishes is when the uniquely american institutions

00:24:03.060 flourish when we have strong families when we have strong churches when we have empowered parents

00:24:08.660 with school choice uh you know and by the way in florida we just signed the largest expansion of school

00:24:13.400 choice in our state's history so we'll be a laboratory for that concept i think i think that's the

00:24:18.800 institutional strength is probably better than the government economic engineering or just the government

00:24:25.300 theft you know i i'm going to take the third path you know the as you laid it out there are kind of

00:24:30.820 these two general approaches i think the third path is let's be more organized about testing these

00:24:36.780 different approaches because you know i don't think anybody's smart enough to know what works that's the

00:24:41.560 problem right if we were smart enough we'd just be doing that oh that works let's just do that thing

00:24:46.160 we're all smart but see if you don't know you got to test it and then you got to make sure that

00:24:51.680 your test is really telling you what you think it is so it's got to be designed right but it seems to

00:24:55.880 me that you we should just be focusing on all right here's a place that's trying this thing

00:25:00.060 here's a here's a place that's trying the other thing we'll check back in six months or a year see

00:25:05.360 how it looks do more of that well and that that is the promise of our great federal system right but

00:25:10.460 but the problem is that you you drain that promise when you have corrupt people that now in some of

00:25:17.040 these urban areas are trying to externalize their conflict right like the mayor of seattle has a

00:25:21.140 problem in her own in her own community and so she blames donald trump for being a racist as as the

00:25:26.540 reason why and and and it's that that is the most unproductive i think way to resolve this rather than

00:25:32.040 the testing strategy you laid out you know if if i could fix the world it would look like this you'd

00:25:37.180 have teams of let's say consultant type people who could be brought in unrequested not forced in

00:25:43.160 to a city to say look we're just going to have this external team run your city for a year fix

00:25:49.420 things up get rid of the corruption because they're they're sort of uncorruptible because they

00:25:53.560 they're well paid and they come from somewhere else and at the end of the year we'll have a you know

00:25:58.160 have an election and try to put somebody in but the the big problem is that the money is corrupting at

00:26:03.480 the local level and if you have people who can be corrupted they will be i don't know that there's

00:26:08.840 anything that can be done about that so unless you bring in almost like untouchables and and yeah

00:26:15.340 i talk about it as like government in a box just bring in the government in a box with the intention

00:26:21.140 that it's like a chia pet just add water and your your government will grow well but but i think part

00:26:27.040 of part of that type of engagement requires fair free open honest discussion and debate and you know

00:26:33.060 i was listening to your intro scott about these these voices that have been taken offline and the

00:26:38.000 different dynamics and equities that are being balanced and i have to share i was quite taken

00:26:42.340 when i saw a tweet from a republican leader nikki haley recently that when she observed what was going on

00:26:49.020 online she was troubled by it but any more regulation would just put lawyers and bureaucrats in charge and 0.81

00:26:55.680 that that really is is uh a an equally bad ill and so she presumed that we just have to sort of sit back

00:27:02.900 and and uh accept the fact that free speech is eroded in our country and that's loser talk to me i don't

00:27:09.900 believe like i don't believe that we just kind of surrender to the cancel culture and just as we're

00:27:15.500 hearing and you know the social justice space now that it's not enough to not be a racist you have to

00:27:20.660 be anti-racist there's only two groups of people there's racists and there's anti-racists so i want to apply

00:27:26.500 that to the cancel culture i guess there's either the people who cancel or the people who uncancel and i want to i

00:27:32.820 want to do some uncanceling i think that even if people have said things that are controversial

00:27:37.500 or uncouth in an unguarded moment or or in an impassioned moment we ought to have the opportunity

00:27:43.960 to invite the best of the contributions people can make to our discourse and we should not be so frail

00:27:50.000 as a nation that we cannot hear things that offend us and then respond to it with more productive

00:27:55.540 speech so that's that's my riff on where we are on the cancel culture so so if there were some more

00:28:00.480 government uh let's say muscle or or regulation let's call it on the social media platforms what

00:28:07.500 form would that take what would that look like in your your preferred world i believe that so digital

00:28:13.760 media platforms availing themselves to the benefits of section 230 of the communication decency act

00:28:19.500 should require should be required to be transparent about the extent to which their platform truly is

00:28:25.520 content neutral and i think that you know there is the common carrier approach but there is simply a

00:28:30.700 a demand for transparency that can be built into the exoskeleton of the communication decency act

00:28:37.320 to say okay well you know if if you don't want these liabilities for being an aggregator or a curator or a

00:28:43.280 or a content developer then then you have to open the kimono and demonstrate that it is in fact neutral and

00:28:50.100 and i think an appeal process uh could be required by the government that uh that would shed a lot of

00:28:57.300 light onto the decision making that goes into what is promoted what is suppressed what is banned what is

00:29:04.040 allowed but a lot of these that we saw from the undercover uh project veritas video on facebook

00:29:10.220 that it's not so much company regular rules that are changing things but there are individuals making

00:29:15.900 judgment calls and there are lots of them how do you change that i think i think that if that process

00:29:22.580 becomes more transparent it will be easier to identify the the the sort of corrosive and rotten

00:29:29.760 places within it right now we don't even get a peek we're told these are private companies we don't have

00:29:35.060 to be in we don't we the government we the people uh really just have to accept whatever our silicon

00:29:41.580 valley free speech hall monitors tell us and and there is no mechanism by which to like vindicate

00:29:47.980 our own voice and i think that uh that you you get to that element of the people of the people who

00:29:54.520 are running it also i think there have to be consequences when folks like project veritas and

00:29:58.960 they are fantastic by the way when they go find these things out i think that there should be

00:30:03.500 investigations there should be reviews the problem scott just to be candid with you is that big tech has

00:30:08.560 bought off congress and it's not that hard to do because congress can't really act if a small group

00:30:14.360 of people are opposed to it so if you go and deploy you know three lobbyists for every u.s senator if big

00:30:20.280 tech goes and starts hiring the children and spouses of members of congress for jobs which by the way they

00:30:25.400 do all the time then it really retards our ability to demand the transparency that that would uh that

00:30:32.120 would fully realize our first amendment rights yeah i wouldn't mind seeing some kind of rule that says you

00:30:37.680 can't vote if your kid is involved in one of those companies i wouldn't mind that um and tell me what

00:30:45.280 given that uh police reform got stalled because literally nobody in congress you know wants this

00:30:51.940 wants the solution so much as they want the the issue apparently you know i'm accepting you from that

00:30:57.760 what what would you do to break the log jam and let me just throw this idea on top i think there needs

00:31:03.100 to be a national education about police and race just so we're all on the same page about what the

00:31:10.520 data is and what the options are what's the plus and minus for each of these yes on choke holds no on

00:31:16.740 choke holds and and talk it through would it help to educate the public so that the public can push

00:31:22.060 congress or is there a better way to get something done well right now in congress it is all virtue

00:31:27.680 signaling with very little virtue uh on the on the police on the police reform front uh i i would

00:31:34.360 uh support various repositories for the type of training data and information that you described

00:31:41.720 so that we are all singing out of the same hymnal you know now it sort of feels like people are

00:31:46.880 striking up different chords and different notes at different times uh but on the specifics of the policy

00:31:52.220 there are areas of agreement like i am not going to defend no knock warrants to me like if the

00:31:58.940 government is entering your home and they are not telling you why uh that is a problem and where i'm

00:32:04.400 from we have the castle doctrine somebody comes in your home with the intent to do you harm uh you know

00:32:09.020 you have the ability to respond with lethal force so i do think that there are ways to improve policing

00:32:14.700 uh like like changing the no knock warrant system but right now democrats don't want a bill they don't

00:32:22.800 they they want the ability to blame republicans and i think that that too often is just sort of where we

00:32:29.380 go to in in washington dc the the solution here scott is going to come i think still at the local level i think

00:32:36.340 you see places developing different technologies strategies on policing they work to different degrees

00:32:42.660 i think best practices will be copied you know around the country and hopefully that's a way to

00:32:48.320 to continue to improve the profession but i'm certainly not going to be a part of demonizing

00:32:52.300 demoralizing defunding the profession and the craziest thing about this bill the democrats have

00:32:57.420 it seems to want to put law enforcement at an equal level of force with the people that would terrorize

00:33:04.960 our communities like since when did we believe that we ought to go into a fight equally armed and

00:33:11.300 with like the gangs and cartels i mean i i want other people enforcing the law protecting our

00:33:17.820 citizenry to have an overwhelming advantage in force from those who would do us harm yeah you know when 1.00

00:33:24.060 we talk about eliminating the police i have uh surprisingly been open to the idea but only if

00:33:30.160 you start from scratch and develop a community with that expectation in other words you might have

00:33:36.620 less privacy more video surveillance you know more net more more you know neighborhood watch or

00:33:42.840 something but you couldn't get rid of the police entirely but i'll bet you could take it down 50

00:33:47.060 percent well my my view is informed by the vulnerable you know one of the one of the major moments in my

00:33:54.080 life was when i was nine years old and i was in the car with my mom who was in a wheelchair and she was

00:33:59.300 mugged and like we had to call the police and you know when when you're there with a mother in a 1.00

00:34:04.400 wheelchair you start to you start to realize how vulnerable some of some of us are and we need

00:34:11.500 strong law enforcement for the protection of the vulnerable and so i i'm heavily informed by that

00:34:17.580 and i'm so grateful for you know police that that respond in those circumstances where they're needed

00:34:22.360 all right so i don't want to take any more of your time because i know you've got a country to run

00:34:28.160 here uh it needs it needs your help i gotta say i've been watching a lot of people on tv on the news

00:34:35.640 and certainly on the uh the the republican side you are by far the best communicator the republicans

00:34:41.880 have there's nobody even close at this point um and i think that that speaks well for your for your

00:34:48.520 future so thanks for coming on uh congressman matt gates and uh make make sure everybody takes a look

00:34:55.520 at your podcast hot takes if you just google it you'll find out where that is anything else you

00:35:01.620 want to add matt just that i'm grateful to be on and hopefully next time i will take fewer than five

00:35:06.440 attempts to connect uh for a little coffee with scott adams but much appreciated my friend all right

00:35:11.420 thanks so much have a great day all right that was fun now a couple things i've got on my list

00:35:20.080 um there's a an argument that i've been hearing uh that conservatives make that i think is weak

00:35:29.040 now you know me i'm not taking the left or the right side on things i like to go with the argument

00:35:35.220 so it doesn't matter whose argument it is if it's weak i want you to know about it and the

00:35:41.220 argument goes like this so people will say hey the uh the black community in this country

00:35:46.120 is complaining about you know economic equality but say the conservatives can you explain that the

00:35:54.600 more recent uh black africans who have immigrated more recently are doing far better economically

00:36:01.980 and so say the conservatives it can't be because you're black because the africans are doing fine

00:36:08.620 but the people who have been here for a while are not now um of course one argument to that would be

00:36:15.960 there's there's a ripple of uh racism or disadvantage that's built into the system from slavery to today

00:36:23.380 that would be one response but i think there's a far more obvious response far more obvious

00:36:29.100 which is that if you're in another country whether it's africa or anywhere else

00:36:33.640 it's kind of hard to get to the united states how do you how do you immigrate to the united states it's

00:36:39.700 not easy so first of all you're going to be a capable person if you can even get to the united states

00:36:46.580 secondly you probably have to demonstrate they have some education um you know that you can support

00:36:53.960 yourself i don't know exactly what the rules are but my guess is that there's a self-selection process

00:36:59.640 right exactly i'm seeing it in the comments the people who are immigrating are self-selecting

00:37:05.700 because they're motivated and ambitious and they feel that the american system is suited for their

00:37:11.600 ambition if you told me it doesn't matter what country they come from doesn't matter what their

00:37:16.560 ethnicity is if you tell me i'm going to compare a bunch of people who made it to an entirely new

00:37:22.520 country learned a new language and were so motivated they thought they would go across the world

00:37:27.620 and fit into the system and work hard and succeed that group's always going to do well

00:37:32.940 there shouldn't be any surprise that people who self-select for motivation proper risk management

00:37:42.460 you know going to the right place where the energy is best all of that is predictive of success

00:37:49.100 so it has nothing to do with ethnicity it's a self-selected group who are motivated

00:37:53.880 every self-selected motivated group of any group is going to do pretty well compared to everybody

00:37:59.680 else so i would say that the argument of hey what about the people who came recently from africa doing

00:38:05.780 well it doesn't say what you think it says all right so i would i would drop that argument frankly

00:38:12.340 all right i'm seeing a lot of folks say as i said earlier in the interview or the conversation with

00:38:20.780 matt gates that a lot of people are saying that president trump is being too weak in this current

00:38:27.740 protester situation and i don't think that's demonstrably true so the thinking goes that

00:38:37.520 if he acts weak republicans won't respond to that they'll feel like he's not doing his job

00:38:44.680 but i do think people understand that the federal government does and should wait for the local

00:38:53.660 government to invite them in and when your federal government is trump and you've been accused of

00:39:00.460 being a you know a tyrant racist and that's your your one of your worst um accusations if you've been

00:39:10.680 accused of being a tyrant racist president do you want to send your military in unrequested 0.96

00:39:18.420 under requested being the important part to almost certainly kill somebody and almost certainly they're 0.94

00:39:26.340 going to be a person of color just because of the numbers of people in the area at least one and then

00:39:32.460 the whole problem starts up again so i think the people who say he should be acting strong

00:39:37.880 i'm not sure he has the options that you think and i think that it might be a far stronger play than

00:39:47.440 you think to simply let the energy dissipate because dictators don't do that racists don't do that

00:39:57.480 you know just just letting the temperature come down because you know once it comes down you've got a

00:40:03.900 new set of alternatives now in the case of the autonomous zone i think that's a special case

00:40:09.700 because uh you know they do set up a little bit of defense etc and here's how i would handle that

00:40:17.400 here's how i would do it if i were the mayor and i wanted to clean out that that area i might just

00:40:25.800 invite the public to do it for me now i haven't thought this through but just just bear with me for

00:40:33.240 a moment as men the advantage that the protesters have over police is numbers right the police have

00:40:40.820 guns and training and all that but the protesters mostly they just have numbers but they don't have

00:40:47.380 numbers compared to the actual population that lives there and the actual population that lives

00:40:53.340 there isn't really engaged they're just sort of hanging back but what if they all came to the street

00:40:58.840 and said we got your message we heard what you said and we're and there are going to be 10 000 of us

00:41:06.760 standing behind this line of police and we're just going to march with them and help them clean up

00:41:12.400 stuff as they clear the people out so imagine a model where there's you know a bunch of police

00:41:17.580 deeply outnumbered by the protesters who are in the occupied zone and behind the police are 10 000

00:41:25.520 citizens who are not armed and they're just there to clean up literally there to clean up and so the 1.00

00:41:32.060 police come in and just at every foot that they they gain slowly and as as non-violently as possible

00:41:38.880 directly behind them the citizens come in and reclaim the territory clean it as they go and it's just a

00:41:47.360 show of force basically but the show of force is just the number of bodies it's not that they're armed

00:41:52.640 or that they're violent and you'd want them to be completely you know uninvolved with the violence

00:41:57.900 um i got this idea from some small town in washington state where i saw a video of one of

00:42:05.040 the uh conservative ex-military people saying you better not try it in our town and his his explanation

00:42:12.320 of it was that uh however many protesters there were there were going to be more people from the town

00:42:18.240 and they're armed and and numbers matter right if you had a lot of people from the town relative to the

00:42:27.460 number of protesters well the protesters are going to you know behave themselves they're not going to

00:42:33.840 set up an autonomous zone so i don't know if that's a good idea or a bad idea but i thought i'd put it out

00:42:39.540 there um i tweeted this morning it seems to be pretty popular that if anybody who does these eight things

00:42:46.960 will be successful and anybody who doesn't just won't be which of these eight things are unavailable to

00:42:56.560 people of color all right i'll just read them and then keep in your mind can anybody do these things

00:43:03.280 or is it reserved for white privilege type people number one focus on a useful education i put the

00:43:11.560 word useful in there you know what that means right an education that has some commercial value so you

00:43:18.340 focus on a useful education which means you know get good grades and then you have a chance to go to

00:43:23.900 college stay out of legal trouble obvious stay away from drugs obvious now that that doesn't mean you

00:43:29.880 experiment you didn't experiment or you got drunk on the weekends i'm talking about becoming a drug addict

00:43:34.460 don't do that uh don't become a parent too soon build a talent stack you know assemble skills that work

00:43:43.180 well together to make you special and valuable um be useful to others this is the most unappreciated

00:43:50.880 one you have to create create a set of skills and a and a i guess a personality if you will that other

00:43:59.800 people say hey that could be helpful to me i would like that person as a friend i would like to mate with

00:44:06.320 that person i would like to hire that person i would like to buy from that person so become a useful

00:44:11.760 person you know what it looks like just be useful as opposed to being uh selfish all the time

00:44:19.340 favor systems over goals that's the longer description but a system is something you do

00:44:26.760 every day to get you closer to a variety of goals such as a system for your fitness a system for your

00:44:33.800 diet a system for networking a system for promotion etc so develop your systems they would be they would

00:44:41.320 be different for everybody but you have to have systems and then learn basic risk management now

00:44:47.360 that's sort of a general statement but a lot of people do things that just are bad risk management

00:44:53.980 i'll give the obvious example let's say you wanted to invest in stocks but you had never been taught

00:45:00.780 risk management so you say i've got ten thousand dollars i've saved up over the years i'll put it in

00:45:06.800 this one stock well that shows that you don't know risk management because that's just a bad idea

00:45:12.740 you never put all your money in one stock you you spread it around and hope that the winners cancel

00:45:19.200 out the losers so that's just one example but there are a million examples in life in which you can look

00:45:25.220 at and say okay if nobody told you the odds it wouldn't be obvious like the like the example of

00:45:32.040 diversification as soon as you hear it you say oh yeah kind of makes sense but if you'd never heard

00:45:38.580 the word diversification it just wouldn't be obvious it just wouldn't be obvious that you

00:45:43.460 should do it and and all of life is like that the the risks need a little bit of guidance to know what

00:45:51.020 makes sense and what doesn't so my contention is this that uh of course there are you know weird

00:45:57.640 exceptions if somebody has a health problem etc that those are obvious if you get you know if somebody

00:46:03.580 shoots you you know you may not have a successful life obviously but if you do these eight things

00:46:11.460 which of them are unavailable to anybody in this country there's nothing on this list that's unavailable

00:46:19.940 everything on this list is available to everybody and i don't know anybody who can do these eight

00:46:27.140 things which are not terribly hard because some of them are just don't do something don't do drugs

00:46:33.060 don't commit a crime it's not hard to not do things it's hard to do things sometimes but it's not that

00:46:41.740 hard to not do things

00:46:43.720 except for peer pressure etc i guess there's a new kind of racism lately

00:46:50.700 which is a weird kind when i say new i don't mean it never existed before but it's it's more

00:46:58.420 prominent it goes like this how often does a white person in 2020 you know june of 2020

00:47:06.840 where where a lot has changed about how we're thinking about the world even from last year

00:47:11.720 how many white people who are hiring or looking to work with somebody would be afraid

00:47:18.220 of working with a black person not because they were racist themselves

00:47:24.880 you know even though arguably everybody's a little bit racist because we're all biased

00:47:29.600 but let's just say it's somebody who has no history and no conscious thoughts of racism which is about as

00:47:37.340 close as you can get and that person has an option of hiring one of two people let's say they're both

00:47:44.760 both qualified both qualified does the white person in june 2020 say to themselves

00:47:52.220 that they're equally risky they don't think so because would you hire somebody that you think hates you

00:48:02.620 right it's one thing to not hire somebody because you are a racist very illegal immoral

00:48:11.840 it's you know it's one of the great evils right so if you're the racist that's pretty bad but what

00:48:19.300 if you say to yourself you know i watch television and if i were a black person in america i'd have an

00:48:26.460 attitude right now i'd i'd feel if i had been consuming the same media that everybody else is feeling

00:48:33.260 and i were black how would i feel about white americans in june of 2020

00:48:39.340 maybe a little bit of an attitude maybe a little contempt maybe a little thought that there's a

00:48:47.080 little privilege there maybe you think that you're a little bit more racist than you thought even a year

00:48:52.740 ago so is it reasonable or is it racist i guess it would be racist by definition so i answered my own

00:49:00.980 question but don't you think that there's a yeah i'm seeing in the comments that there's a little bit of

00:49:06.440 agreement there there's it's actually a new form of racism in which people will say i'm not a racist

00:49:13.580 but i'm pretty sure that if i hire a black person they will think i am why would they think that because

00:49:21.500 the black community is let's say reinforcing through black lives matter especially is reinforcing that 0.84

00:49:28.700 basically all white people are racist even if they don't know it think about that the message is

00:49:36.420 that all white people are racist even if they're not aware of it so would you hire somebody who believed 0.88

00:49:42.940 you were a racist i would not yeah well let me let me demonstrate my free speech here for a moment

00:49:50.040 if i had two candidates equally qualified and i have no racial animus or feelings or negativity of my

00:49:59.760 own at least unconscious level but i'm positive that the person i'm talking to let's let's say let's be

00:50:07.760 specific let's say it's a black candidate and i'm positive that this person follows the news

00:50:13.440 and is politically active what are the odds that that black person has a good feeling about me

00:50:21.560 as just a generic white person don't you believe that they think i'm a racist because i think that's

00:50:29.080 the message that black lives matter wants all black people to accept that all white people are racist 0.83

00:50:36.980 all the time but not always consciously i don't think i would hire somebody that i suspected thought

00:50:45.620 i was a racist am i wrong now by definition that would be racist and also illegal right wouldn't that

00:50:54.280 be illegal wouldn't i wouldn't i be sued for thinking that somebody would discriminate against me

00:51:02.000 that's different right so i'm not saying that this form of of racism didn't always exist but it went

00:51:11.780 from something i don't think i ever would have thought about even once let me put it this way two years

00:51:17.680 ago i wouldn't have thought of that it wouldn't have even been a a glancing thought across my mind 0.54

00:51:24.560 that if i hired a black candidate that black candidate would certainly not like me and would feel a little 0.51

00:51:34.560 bit racist i didn't think that two years ago that's something that black lives matter taught me 0.97

00:51:40.000 so while they're training let's say training and educating their own uh public let's say the the black 0.52

00:51:49.600 public to distrust all white people for being racist even if the white people don't know they're being racist 0.94

00:51:55.500 under those conditions have the black lives matter not taught white people not to hire black people 0.92

00:52:01.480 because that's what i'm hearing i'm hearing it would be bad for me to hire somebody who had a bad feeling

00:52:11.220 about me and they're being trained to have a bad feeling about me so obviously there's no you can't do that

00:52:19.140 legally so i don't recommend it it's not a recommendation it's a statement and an observation

00:52:25.680 somebody said something happened to hawk newsome but i don't i'm not up on that so i can't comment on

00:52:31.720 that um

00:52:33.300 and uh apparently tiktok has been uh reverse engineered so you know the app tiktok uh i don't know how valid

00:52:44.680 this story is but there was a story of an engineer who reverse engineers apps for a living so he's

00:52:52.740 reversed engineered lots of different apps but when he reverse engineered tiktok uh allegedly he found a

00:53:00.600 hornet's nest of obvious spy intention and things that were designed just to make you not know what it

00:53:09.420 does and that his recommendation after reverse engineering is that you should not have that app

00:53:15.860 anywhere near you because it's just spying on you and collecting your personal information

00:53:20.220 so that's somebody who reverse engineered it and he's quick to point out that he has also reverse

00:53:26.340 engineered i guess the twitter app some other apps and said that they don't have that

00:53:32.460 all right so if you're saying oh they're all the same twitter tiktok it's all the same apparently

00:53:39.120 not apparently not if you reverse engineer the twitter app you just don't find anything scary

00:53:45.460 it's just an app if you reverse engineer the tiktok app according to this one story i'd like a little

00:53:52.800 more confirmation when you hear one story from one source today in today's day and age you got to put

00:53:59.260 that little skeptical check mark next to it so put the skeptical check mark next to it but there's

00:54:05.300 one report that the tiktok app is just filled with spy spy code all right and obviously the chinese 0.99

00:54:13.440 government can control anything that tiktok does so you've got that um so the dod has said this for a

00:54:21.800 long time about tiktok well why is it still legal what why why can a child walk into your

00:54:29.160 house with a tiktok app and by the way you don't have any idea how dangerous that app is you might

00:54:36.420 find out soon but i don't think you've thought it through to know just how dangerous that is it's not

00:54:44.480 it's not a small thing it if you were going to size it let me let me put a size on it if you're going

00:54:51.080 to size the risk of the tiktok app compared to other dangers in your world what size would you put

00:54:58.980 on it i would put it the same size as um radical islamic terrorism no bigger no bigger because uh

00:55:08.920 terrorism probably doesn't have an option there's no real risk that terrorism will destroy the whole

00:55:14.620 country of america that's that's not really a possibility because the nature of it yeah probably

00:55:21.240 couldn't happen but uh could an app destroy civilization actually yes actually yes so if

00:55:31.360 you have an app just a piece of software that has the potential to destroy civilization you would

00:55:38.680 you would put it on the same level as uh let's say north korea having nuclear arms that that's sort

00:55:45.080 of a level so in terms of the level of risk uh it's the highest military level of risk should it be

00:55:51.900 weaponized and it can be it can be and in fact it's not even hard that's the problem the problem is it's

00:56:00.060 not hard if it were hard that'd be a different argument but it's not hard to weaponize it all right

00:56:07.060 um why is the government so slow to act with regard to tech well i think it's several things one is

00:56:17.080 you know lobbyist and money and money influence that's part of it maybe the biggest part part of

00:56:23.120 is that they don't understand how how many let me ask you this so i i just uh described to you the

00:56:30.720 following chain of events china can control tiktok because it's a chinese company their

00:56:36.740 algorithm can control what you see therefore they can make anything popular such as for example

00:56:42.520 oh how about a prank where people will buy tickets to or or sign up for the trump rally but not go

00:56:50.440 was that going to be viral by itself ask yourself would that have been viral just because some kid made a

00:56:59.860 viral video about hey we should prank we should prank the trump campaign on tiktok an app for

00:57:06.520 children you think that a political point a political thing was going to be the big viral

00:57:12.800 thing on tiktok an app for 12 year olds i don't think so but it could be it's possible but you don't

00:57:20.720 know now if it becomes popular on tiktok what happens it goes to snapchat so tiktok is

00:57:28.260 skews to the young people snapchat does too but snapchat also has young and older people at least

00:57:37.080 you know not old old but older so anything that's popular on tiktok will eventually become viral on

00:57:44.540 snapchat once it's on snapchat it's everywhere it's instagram it's facebook it's twitter so can the chinese 0.98

00:57:52.780 government send any message they want all the way through our social media network yeah easily it's

00:58:01.600 not even hard in fact we probably just watched it happen you just don't know oh i'm sorry i'm saying

00:58:10.860 tiktok instead of tiktok uh those of you who are accusing me of being a boomer you are so right 1.00

00:58:17.400 uh that i embrace it i embrace my full boomerism flaws and i do not apologize for them uh somebody

00:58:30.260 says there was no link on snapchat to trump's rally really you you can say with some confidence

00:58:39.280 that nowhere on snapchat there was uh any mention of the tiktok tiktok prank really

00:58:48.440 that's that's pretty knowledgeable of you that you know all of the things on snapchat

00:58:54.400 um but in any case whether whether that one moved to snapchat or not that's the obvious path

00:59:01.640 that other things could take all right i think that was all i wanted to talk about today

00:59:07.360 yes it is and i will talk to you later

Real Coffee with Scott Adams - June 26, 2020

Episode 1039 Scott Adams： Talking With Congressman Matt Gaetz About All the Hot Topics, Then More From Me

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