Real Coffee with Scott Adams - January 20, 2021


Episode 1258 Scott Adams： Biden Inauguration and How to Feel About it All


Episode Stats


Length

17 minutes

Words per minute

154.14706

Word count

2,719

Sentence count

193

Harmful content

Misogyny

1

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

I ve been off the internet for more than I ve been on it lately because I ve ve been flying. And flying during the age of COIDV is not easy. I ll tell you what it s like to try to travel during the Age of CoidV.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
00:00:00.000 Hey, anybody out there? You know, this is a big day. It's an inauguration. And I'm not entirely sure how many of you are going to be on this live stream, because it's the wrong time.
00:00:19.120 Well, better late than never, wouldn't you say? Let's try it. YouTube's having a little trouble connecting here. We'll see if we can improve that. Well, it looks like Periscope is outperforming YouTube today. YouTube's trying to reconnect.
00:00:34.560 Okay. You feel bad? Do you hear an annoying buzz, somebody said? I don't hear it. All right. So it looks like YouTube's not going to work. But we don't care about that, do we? I don't think we do. Hey, Bill. Good to see you.
00:00:56.480 All right. So I've been off the Internet for more than I've been on it lately, because I've been flying. So before we talk about politics, let me tell you what it's like to try to travel during the age of COVID. Not easy. Not easy. So we, Christine and I tried to squeeze in the honeymoon that we postponed because of the coronavirus.
00:01:23.200 And I am now in a, uh, uh, uh, many, many miles away from the United States. I'll tell you where I am when I get there. I've got another plane ride and another boat ride before I get to where I'm going. Um, um, if you think there's some buzzing on this, uh, I'm going to be ignoring everybody who says that.
00:01:44.740 All right. So, uh, whoever says there's buzzing on here, I'm going to start blocking you. Okay.
00:01:52.980 I can't do anything about it. I plug in the microphone. I turn it on. That's, that's everything I can control. So if you've got a problem with it, please sign off because I can't fix it.
00:02:06.320 All right. Um, and YouTube looks like it's not going to work at all. So let me turn that off.
00:02:14.180 Boom. All right. So the first thing you need to know if you're flying is I needed to, we needed to get a COVID test before we flew. Those were negative.
00:02:24.440 And then when you reach your destination in this particular case, um, I don't have a tan. This is, I'm just in the dark. I haven't even been in the sun yet. Uh, but when you get to your destination, they hand you another kit.
00:02:39.220 You have to test yourself four days later and then to get on the plane to come home, yet another test. So I'll have three COVID tests just for one trip. And I'm actually kind of happy about it.
00:02:50.440 I also saw some data that airplanes have such good filtration systems that the odds of getting something on the airplane is basically zero. So that felt pretty safe.
00:03:02.840 Now, problem was that I flew United. And if you've ever flown United, you know how that goes. You get there on time and then United says the flight is delayed because they always do.
00:03:14.240 And then half an hour later they say, ah, it's a, it's a minor problem. You know, uh, it's a little minor problem, but half an hour. And then four hours later, which is what happened yesterday, four hours later, they put you on a different plane because they give up.
00:03:32.120 But here's the funny part. The thing they were trying to fix for over three hours was a software problem. So the plane kept giving software errors and they would change things and reboot things and they changed the card and it would just give them new errors.
00:03:47.820 And then they would fix it. And then it would give them a new set of errors. All software. Now, how much do you think I wanted to get on that airplane and be over water for over seven hours on a plane that had never been tested because you can't really test the new software.
00:04:10.820 When you load it, you can tell if it doesn't give you an error, but all the other things gave errors. And what was that other error about?
00:04:18.980 So I would say that that was not an ideal situation. So I did about 12 hours wearing a mask yesterday, which if you have a little asthma, like I do, it's like being waterboarded, but, uh, it's worth it. Once you get there.
00:04:30.940 All right. Who wants the simultaneous sip? Who wants it? You do. All you need is a cup or mug or a glass. A canteen. No, a cup or a mug or a glass. Let's see if this will be the first time I'll try to do it by memory in a long time. A cup or a mug or a glass. Uh, does anybody know how this goes?
00:04:52.540 Canteen? Canteen? Jug? Flask? Something like that. Anyway, simultaneous sip. Let's do it. Go.
00:05:05.580 So, uh, I'm in a hotel that's the, just an overnight hotel before we end up in our actual destination. And, uh, so, so this is a four star hotel, but they have one employee.
00:05:18.700 So the woman who works the front desk, and there's only one of them, is sort of the only person. And she said, yeah, nobody else here. There's no porters. Nobody's going to take your bags. Just me.
00:05:31.360 All the restaurants are closed. No room service. So we got here at night. Couldn't get food. Uh, and they have one of those situations where you, you put your room key card in the, in a little unit right by the door so that, uh, that's the only time the AC and the lights come on is if you've got your room key in it.
00:05:49.360 So I walk in, I put my room key in it, and the entire unit just falls off the wall, off the floor. You know, the whole front part of it just collapsed as soon as I put my, my card in it just falls on the floor.
00:06:00.460 So, uh, so, uh, I'm having a, uh, four star, uh, uh, uh, vacation experience, which, if I'm being honest, closer to a two, because the coronavirus takes two stars right off the top.
00:06:17.740 But, uh, later today, we will be in a much better place. I'll tell you about it later. And that will be amazing.
00:06:23.960 Uh, a chalice. Yes, that was the other word. Can, canteen, jug, or flask? Well, I'm glad some of you remember it.
00:06:34.240 So I'm not so good at remembering things. That's why I'd never be a good actor.
00:06:37.280 Well, let's talk about Joe Biden. So, I'm going to be a little bit non-political, if that even makes sense. I'm not even sure if that's the thing.
00:06:46.040 Maybe I should take that back. But I'm not going to be going hard at Joe Biden today.
00:06:50.620 I feel like the country deserves one day where we just say, how about not today? Right? How about, how about one day we just be Americans?
00:07:04.300 And I'm not celebrating, you know, Joe Biden's victory or Joe Biden. I'm not celebrating that.
00:07:10.840 What I am celebrating is that we have a system which seems unstoppable by people, which is pretty amazing.
00:07:22.860 The system just grinds along. We may or may not have had an election that enough people think is credible, but I don't think it mattered.
00:07:32.540 We ended up with some kind of professional class politicians that have always been in charge, except for the Trump interlude there.
00:07:42.440 I don't know that it's the end of the world, because even Biden isn't going to be able to get everything he wants.
00:07:48.720 Congress will still push back. The public will push back.
00:07:51.920 When he tries to do things that Trump did better, it's going to be obvious, and that will limit what he can do as well.
00:07:57.940 So if you look at some of the things he's going to do, they're either trivial things or things that maybe can't get done.
00:08:08.420 So we'll have to wait to see how much damage he can do other than the executive orders and reversing some of the Trump stuff that he didn't like.
00:08:16.880 But here's the thing. I feel as if we've slipped into this place where politics is the politics of revenge and canceling the legacy of the last president.
00:08:30.900 It feels like that's the game now.
00:08:32.980 Now, of course, you'd have to blame Trump for doing it first, and so you can't really hold Joe Biden to a different standard.
00:08:40.800 You know, if he didn't complain when Trump did it and tried to erase Obama's legacy, it's hard to complain if Biden just does the same thing and tries to erase Trump.
00:08:51.840 So, you know, he didn't start it.
00:08:54.780 And, well, you know, I've got to say, I had a little exchange with Ian Bremmer on Twitter yesterday.
00:09:02.200 And he made a tweet, and I responded to his tweet saying that Trump's response to the election was terrible unless he was right, wouldn't you say?
00:09:17.520 Because how you judge Trump's insistence that the election was rigged depends entirely upon you knowing that it wasn't.
00:09:27.800 But how would you know that?
00:09:29.040 How would you know it was or was not rigged?
00:09:32.200 Have you ever looked at the source code?
00:09:34.560 And if you did, would you know what you were looking at?
00:09:37.340 I haven't, and I wouldn't.
00:09:39.340 Do I have any personal information about the system working perfectly or even being, you know, imperfect?
00:09:46.500 Well, everything's imperfect, but I don't have any specific proof of fraud or not.
00:09:51.900 But I also don't have any reason to believe that it was fair.
00:09:56.340 So this is the part that I would disagree with Ian, because he thought I was joking when I said, well, you know, Trump could be right.
00:10:06.080 Now, we're treating it as though the system has made a decision, and I'm happy with that.
00:10:11.980 I'm okay that the system grinds on, even if it's imperfect, because it's better to move forward than it is to fight forever about something you thought was wrong.
00:10:22.800 So I think what's good for the country is to move forward and then try to adjust.
00:10:27.520 Republicans will have another shot at it, a couple more shots.
00:10:32.100 And I don't buy into the theory that the Democrats will put a lock down on the government and make rules changes that will put them in power forever.
00:10:41.780 I feel as if there's too much pressure against that and that it would be too much of an overreach.
00:10:48.520 And therefore, Biden being a—the one thing you could depend on Biden is that he's a moderate.
00:10:53.280 So I think if it looks like a gross overreach, he's exactly the guy who wouldn't do it.
00:11:01.620 So you might be—you might have some safety there, at least as long as he's in office.
00:11:05.860 Don't know how that will last.
00:11:07.780 But here's the thing.
00:11:09.200 How can anybody say they're sure the election was good just because we haven't discovered any specific provable fraud?
00:11:19.440 Does that feel like that statement could be made?
00:11:23.280 Because I'm telling you, I don't know that it was fair, but I also don't know that it wasn't fair.
00:11:29.860 But more importantly, how the heck would I know?
00:11:32.980 How could I possibly know?
00:11:34.980 So there are two opinions that I consider stupid.
00:11:39.720 All right?
00:11:40.180 There are some opinions that you could be wrong, but you're being smart.
00:11:45.200 It's just that everybody gets—everybody's wrong sometimes, right?
00:11:48.400 So I feel the two stupid positions are 100% certainty that the election was fair and 100% certainty that it wasn't.
00:12:02.020 If you hold either of those two positions, I feel like that's stupid because you and I don't know.
00:12:08.800 How could we?
00:12:10.740 What would we look at as just citizens to know that that was fair or to know that it wasn't?
00:12:17.960 Now, if you put odds on it, I'd say that would be reasonable.
00:12:21.600 Let's say you were pretty sure it was fair and you said, you know, I'll put 95% on it based on my experience in life and things I've seen before.
00:12:32.040 However, if you said 95% that it was fair or even 95% that it wasn't fair, I would say to you, that's probably not the percentage I would put on it.
00:12:43.260 But at least you're talking logically.
00:12:46.020 You're acknowledging that it can't be known.
00:12:49.160 If you think it can be known, I don't think you should be in this conversation.
00:12:54.160 It feels like not a reasonable position.
00:12:56.600 Whereas Ruby Freeman, somebody says, I think the Ruby thing is one of the most unfair things that came out of it.
00:13:08.460 And I found myself defending Ruby because I watched the same video that you did and I didn't see anything even slightly worrying in that video.
00:13:16.380 If you think you did, that's probably confirmation bias.
00:13:19.960 Because all you saw was they counted as the votes and the people who know what's happening and how vote counting worked looked at it, every bit of it, before and after, all the way through.
00:13:31.680 And they said, all we see is vote counting, just the way it's supposed to be done.
00:13:35.720 So if you believe the Ruby story, that would be the least likely one to be true.
00:13:41.780 Along with the Venezuela part, that's least likely.
00:13:45.040 The Italian connection, very unlikely.
00:13:47.080 Anything's possible, but I would put a really, really, really low likely vote on any of those three things.
00:13:55.460 Somebody says she admitted it.
00:13:56.880 No, she didn't.
00:13:58.420 She didn't admit anything because there wasn't anything to admit.
00:14:04.680 And wouldn't you think by now you'd have some kind of a whistleblower?
00:14:10.840 Don't you think you'd have at least one whistleblower?
00:14:13.520 Because I think people have offered large sums of money for a whistleblower.
00:14:20.120 In fact, you could do that tomorrow.
00:14:22.080 If somebody said, all right, I'll, you know, let's say the Mike Lindell, the MyPillow guy, let's say, just hypothetically,
00:14:29.480 he said, I'll give you a million dollars for a whistleblower who has enough information to show that there was a problem.
00:14:36.720 Would he get any takers for a million dollars?
00:14:41.500 You don't think there was somebody, hypothetically, if somebody was involved in fixing an election, they wouldn't take a million dollars?
00:14:50.140 Because I feel like they would.
00:14:52.040 And probably people would offer a million dollars if they had the money.
00:14:55.520 So, that's another thing that's a dog not barking.
00:15:00.320 So, if you're looking for a reason to believe the election was not fraudulent,
00:15:05.080 the fact that no whistleblowers have come forward, given that there would be an enormous financial benefit to do so,
00:15:12.540 that would be, somebody says, and your life would be ruined?
00:15:15.880 Would it?
00:15:17.020 Would it?
00:15:18.020 You'd have a million dollars.
00:15:19.080 How many people would take that chance for a million dollars?
00:15:22.780 If you didn't have money, you know, you were just getting by,
00:15:27.280 I feel like you'd take the chance for a million dollars.
00:15:31.340 You know, remember, you were involved in a criminal activity in this hypothetical situation.
00:15:37.740 So, I don't know that there are too many criminals who wouldn't take a million dollars,
00:15:43.360 even if it caused them a little social anxiety.
00:15:45.860 So, that's something.
00:15:51.200 All right.
00:15:53.080 If you've watched, hey, Omar.
00:15:56.480 If you've watched any of the press coverage of Biden so far,
00:16:01.600 since, you know, about the time of the inauguration,
00:16:03.980 it's actually hilarious.
00:16:06.220 Because it's just a love letter to Biden and Harris,
00:16:09.720 and how wonderful Harris is, and her power suits. 0.56
00:16:13.420 There's even something about Harris' style.
00:16:17.340 And I'm thinking to myself,
00:16:19.120 I really don't think of Kamala Harris as a style leader.
00:16:24.580 Which is not an insult, because I'm not a style leader either.
00:16:28.420 Most people aren't.
00:16:29.660 So, I don't even consider that a criticism.
00:16:31.340 I'm just saying, if you were going to pick somebody to be your style symbol,
00:16:38.740 would it be Kamala Harris?
00:16:40.540 I don't know.
00:16:42.080 I'm not saying she dresses poorly.
00:16:44.120 I'm just not sure it's a fashion statement.
00:16:46.540 So, somebody says, I like the buzz.
00:16:54.960 All right.
00:16:55.820 There are too many complainers,
00:16:57.740 and not enough technology working,
00:17:01.160 so I'm going to cut it short.
00:17:02.780 But I just wanted to make sure I touch bases with you today.
00:17:05.760 And I will talk to you tomorrow.
00:17:08.360 I'll talk to you tomorrow.