Real Coffee with Scott Adams - Episode 1727 Scott Adams： Free Speech, Canceling Student Debt, Elon Musk and More Fun

00:00:00.000 Good morning, everybody. How's everybody today? Good? Good? Would you like to enjoy something

00:00:09.620 called the Simultaneous Zip and start your day off in a way that, I don't know, is just the

00:00:16.180 best thing ever? Probably. Probably you do. And all you need is a cup or a mug or a glass of

00:00:22.360 tanker, chalice, or stein, a canteen jug or flask, a vessel of any kind, except for a Russian tank.

00:00:30.380 We'll talk about that later. Turns out that Russian tanks are a vessel that maybe not hold your coffee

00:00:37.880 so well. And would you like to join me now for the dopamine hit of the day, the thing that makes

00:00:46.400 everything better? It's amazing. Your oxytocin is already starting to rise. Are you ready for this?

00:00:52.880 Can it get any better? No, it cannot go.

00:00:59.360 Ah, yeah. It feels like a tickle on the neck. It's like a sneeze in the forest. It's like

00:01:08.080 your favorite food when you've been starving. That's how good the Simultaneous Zip is.

00:01:14.220 And believe me, if that is that good, imagine how much the content will delight you. Well,

00:01:22.980 more than I can even express. Let's talk about that. So I was accused of being insensitive for

00:01:30.300 making the following comment on Twitter, that now when I see masked people, if they're alone,

00:01:37.520 alone in the car or just walking alone somewhere, obviously just exercising, taking a walk.

00:01:44.520 I no longer think that those are cautious people or immunocompromised. I kind of think that it's

00:01:54.080 signaling some type of mental illness. Now, people said, you're unkind. You're unkind. No, I'm not. 0.68

00:02:01.640 I'm literally showing empathy. Maybe I don't do it well. Do I do it wrong? I'm showing empathy.

00:02:09.600 I'm not judging them or disliking them. I'm saying I'm deeply alarmed at how many people are,

00:02:17.100 in my opinion, my uneducated, non-expert opinion, are signaling an actual mental illness that probably

00:02:24.880 has great consequences in their lives. Now, I imagine a lot of them are germphobes. Imagine,

00:02:31.760 just imagine how hard it would have been to be a germphobe, germaphobe, going through the pandemic.

00:02:38.060 What could have been harder than that? I mean, that's like a disaster that was designed just

00:02:45.660 to torture a certain group of people, especially hard. So, no, I have only empathy for them. But

00:02:51.580 the shocking part, so this is not about, hey, you people take off your masks. That's been done to

00:02:57.780 death. So, I'm not giving an opinion whether they should take them off or not. That's their business.

00:03:03.640 I'm just saying that I'm alarmed at what looks like the most visible signal yet of mental illness.

00:03:12.160 Because a lot of mental illness is invisible, right? Unless you know the person personally,

00:03:17.700 you don't necessarily see it. You know, they're just walking down the streets and

00:03:21.820 the mentally ill look exactly like everybody else for the most part. But if they have to put out an 0.95

00:03:28.720 article of clothing that indicates they're in that group of people, which unfortunately is

00:03:33.740 gigantic, who are having serious life-affecting mental illnesses. And when you see it visually 1.00

00:03:40.280 like this, at least that's what it says to me. Now, some of you are saying, Scott, Scott, Scott,

00:03:47.000 they just left their mask on because they're walking from one place to another. No, I'm not talking

00:03:52.740 about those. I'm not talking about the people in the parking lot at the grocery store or actually

00:03:58.980 at the parking lot, let's say, the doctor's office. Yeah, I mean, they just walked out and

00:04:04.140 forgot to take their mask off. But for the most part, I'm talking about people walking for

00:04:10.600 recreation, just away from everybody. I'm talking about people in their car alone. I don't know.

00:04:18.520 I think that that is not a case of people who are immunocompromised, in most cases. I think

00:04:24.500 that's something else. Well, here's a new wrinkle in the DeSantis versus Disney thing. Apparently,

00:04:30.060 there's some kind of clause in their agreement where Disney got this special control over their

00:04:37.060 own territory. Apparently, if Florida takes over for Disney, they would also take over their debt.

00:04:45.320 So Florida would have to accept a billion dollars in debt that Disney itself was somehow satisfying.

00:04:54.400 And so I say to myself, huh, didn't see that coming. Now, I don't necessarily mean to think

00:05:03.980 that that means it can't work, because if it's a bond debt, then something is servicing it. So

00:05:10.960 I assume that they would get whatever is servicing it, as well as the debt itself. So you shouldn't

00:05:17.020 necessarily stop the deal, but it might slow it down, because they have to work that out. So

00:05:21.880 we'll see. Maybe there is some technical reason why this can't happen that nobody saw until now.

00:05:27.620 Let's talk about canceling student debt, which, by the way, isn't a real thing.

00:05:34.660 You don't really cancel debt. When you hear that word, people think, oh, hey, there's an idea.

00:05:44.400 Why don't you take this thing that's bad, this debt, and just make it go away? Just cancel it.

00:05:51.300 Cancel it's just a word. Just take out your books and just delete that number. Why not? Why not?

00:05:59.920 If it's bad, and you can cancel it, why wouldn't you cancel something that's bad? Right? Am I right?

00:06:07.260 It's as simple as that. How about death? Nobody likes death. Here's what I say. Cancel it. 0.92

00:06:15.640 Why don't we cancel it? Oh, if you're pro-death, go ahead and argue that point, you fascist. 0.99

00:06:21.940 Not me. I want to cancel it. How about cancer? We've been trying to come up with cures for cancer. 0.98

00:06:29.580 Done pretty well, actually. But there's still a lot that are incurable.

00:06:34.480 Until now, cancel it. Just cancel it. How about that?

00:06:40.840 The war in Ukraine looks like an impossible situation, doesn't it?

00:06:46.260 Not so much. Not so much.

00:06:48.960 Can anybody guess how I would fix the problem in Ukraine?

00:06:53.140 Take a guess. Cancel it. I'd cancel it.

00:06:56.540 Because when you cancel something, it just goes away.

00:07:00.860 It's kind of brilliant.

00:07:02.920 Are there any other problems we can just cancel and make them go away?

00:07:07.000 No. You're not canceling the fucking debt. 0.99

00:07:10.780 That's not a thing. You're just transferring it. 0.99

00:07:15.600 You're transferring it from the people who got the benefit and made the decision to take on the debt

00:07:21.660 to the people who paid off their debt or didn't go to college

00:07:25.600 or have similar problems of a different nature and don't need your problem.

00:07:31.100 That debt goes somewhere.

00:07:32.520 If the person who borrowed it doesn't pay it back, well, then the lender eats it.

00:07:40.340 I mean, it's sort of a less direct way, but the lender is still going to eat it.

00:07:47.500 Money doesn't just disappear.

00:07:50.840 I mean, debt doesn't just disappear.

00:07:54.040 Somebody loses.

00:07:54.880 And you know for a fact the bank will not be eating the debt.

00:08:05.400 I'm saying somebody eats all debt.

00:08:09.120 I don't know who it is.

00:08:11.280 In this case, I assume it's the taxpayer, right?

00:08:14.300 How could it be anything else?

00:08:17.060 Is there any model other than the taxpayer would eat it?

00:08:21.020 Now, it doesn't mean that they eat it as in a normal way.

00:08:28.260 It could be that it's just an asset they thought they have that they no longer have.

00:08:32.780 So if you say, I have an asset called people are going to give me a trillion dollars or 1.7 trillion.

00:08:39.680 So my asset is, I have this 1.7 trillion dollars that people owe me.

00:08:46.560 And then suddenly they don't.

00:08:49.040 You've lost 1.7 trillion.

00:08:51.020 In value.

00:08:52.720 And that's got to be taken into account when you figure out your total budget, etc.

00:08:57.400 Because that's money that's not coming in.

00:09:00.100 So, as long as we allow the people who want to do this to call it canceling a debt, 0.92

00:09:08.980 then all the dumb people are going to think, well, that's free. 0.93

00:09:12.020 Why not? 0.99

00:09:13.380 Well, let's get some of that cancellation going.

00:09:15.620 We've got to, it's got to change to, you know, move the debt to those who did not move it.

00:09:22.880 I call it a theft.

00:09:24.700 Because, you know, I get that it could be legalized, because the government, if they make it legal, then technically it's not theft.

00:09:31.480 But it's theft in effect, is it not?

00:09:36.380 It feels like it.

00:09:37.580 If it feels like theft and walks like a duck and talks like a duck.

00:09:43.600 Somebody said that to me online the other day.

00:09:47.080 If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it must be a duck.

00:09:52.300 To which I say, only if you haven't been alive for the last five years would you think that. 1.00

00:09:57.960 Today, if it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it's probably fucking fake news. 0.99

00:10:03.660 Am I right? 0.98

00:10:05.300 Things that look exactly the way they're supposed to be are almost always wrong now.

00:10:10.060 In the old days, if it looked like a duck and quacked like a duck, well, yeah, yeah. 0.93

00:10:15.400 I mean, there was a good chance that was a freaking duck.

00:10:18.780 But in 2022, you could take the DNA of the duck, and you still wouldn't be sure. 0.89

00:10:27.980 Because you'd be like, I don't know, who took that DNA?

00:10:30.880 Do we have a chain of custody?

00:10:32.720 I feel as if the DNA test of the duck might have been rigged.

00:10:37.780 Right?

00:10:38.440 So there's nothing we believe anymore. 0.82

00:10:40.520 So if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it doesn't mean a damn thing.

00:10:45.560 It means nothing.

00:10:46.400 Maybe it never did.

00:10:49.440 But it definitely doesn't mean anything in 2022.

00:10:53.560 All right.

00:10:58.020 Well, so here's, let me do a, I think it's called a steel man argument.

00:11:03.080 So here's the argument for canceling the debt.

00:11:06.420 You ready?

00:11:07.540 So I'm opposed to it.

00:11:10.200 But don't you think it's interesting to hear the best argument on the other side?

00:11:13.620 Would anybody find that offensive?

00:11:18.660 Because I know we like to, you know, play as a team.

00:11:22.280 All right.

00:11:22.440 Here's the best argument for canceling the debt.

00:11:27.240 Why?

00:11:28.540 Why did the people take on the debt?

00:11:31.200 Go.

00:11:32.500 The people who took on the debt, why did they do it?

00:11:36.020 Did they do it from something called free will?

00:11:39.120 Well, did they look at the situation and just like you did and I did in some cases, did they

00:11:49.100 make a decision and their decision maybe was different than yours, but, and now they think

00:11:54.160 they want to, they don't want to pay it back?

00:11:57.020 Is that what happened?

00:11:58.520 Well, here's my argument.

00:12:00.460 Do you know why children grow up to think that education is important?

00:12:04.480 Who told them that?

00:12:07.600 The system.

00:12:09.260 Sure, their parents told them that too.

00:12:11.620 Who told their parents?

00:12:13.820 The system.

00:12:14.820 The government.

00:12:15.740 Education system.

00:12:16.900 The education system tells people that education is good and that they should go get some and

00:12:22.200 they should go to college.

00:12:23.020 So, every one of those people who borrowed money from the government was brainwashed by

00:12:31.060 the government from childhood to borrow that money.

00:12:37.840 It's a better argument than you thought, isn't it?

00:12:41.740 I'll bet you didn't see that coming.

00:12:43.940 No, they were literally brainwashed.

00:12:46.160 I mean it literally, literally, literally, the way literally is actually supposed to be

00:12:51.680 literally used.

00:12:54.980 They actually were brainwashed.

00:12:57.820 Easy to prove.

00:12:59.560 I mean, you could get any expert to say, what happens when you take young children and consistently

00:13:07.040 tell them that education is good and the college is the best of all and it's so good that you 0.99

00:13:13.260 should do anything you can do to get there because don't even let money stop you, damn 0.99

00:13:17.580 it. 0.97

00:13:19.320 It's that good if you can do it.

00:13:22.300 Now, of course, not every kid is, you know, ideally suited for a college track.

00:13:27.660 So, those kids were brainwashed but it didn't matter because their track was not going to

00:13:34.320 go in that direction.

00:13:35.020 But for those people who were, let's say they had the capability to get good grades and the

00:13:41.120 capability to go to college, at least in terms of scholastic achievement, those people were all

00:13:46.860 brainwashed.

00:13:49.300 How many of them were told, you know, if you just get a good trade education and learn things

00:13:54.740 that you need to learn on your own, just as good?

00:13:58.000 Almost none of them.

00:13:58.980 Do you think there was any teacher in any school that said, look, kids, education is

00:14:04.840 highly, you know, highly prized in our society, but realistically, realistically, if you learned

00:14:11.740 a trade and it was the right trade and you worked hard, you'd do great because lots of

00:14:19.140 people do.

00:14:20.080 There are tons of people who just do great without a college education.

00:14:25.140 So, who told the kids that?

00:14:26.500 Was that a message that those kids were getting?

00:14:29.880 No.

00:14:30.920 They were literally brainwashed.

00:14:34.460 So, when brainwashed people get a loan, whose fault is that?

00:14:40.500 Is that the fault of the person who got the loan?

00:14:44.840 Well, you could argue that it's the fault of the system that hypnotized them and you and

00:14:50.420 I are all part of that system, especially if you're an adult.

00:14:54.060 If you're an adult, you are supporting the system that brainwashed children into getting

00:14:59.300 loans they can't pay back.

00:15:02.580 So, you do have some responsibility.

00:15:06.940 But wait, isn't that what the muggers say, too?

00:15:12.100 They do, don't they?

00:15:14.120 It's not me.

00:15:15.600 It's society.

00:15:17.020 I was born into a system that did not give me a fair chance.

00:15:20.940 So, what could I do?

00:15:23.460 Guess I became a mugger.

00:15:25.580 So, the counter to my argument, my excellent argument that children were brainwashed into

00:15:30.180 getting these is that, unfortunately, you can use that argument for just everything.

00:15:34.800 Everybody's brainwashed into everything because it's true.

00:15:38.420 It's literally true.

00:15:39.680 Again, literally used the way literally is meant to.

00:15:42.340 Literally true.

00:15:43.240 It doesn't mean there's an intention involved, but the effect is brainwashing.

00:15:49.760 All right.

00:15:50.560 There's no right answer here.

00:15:52.260 This is just a power play.

00:15:54.100 But I do wonder, what would be the benefit of getting this through before an election happens?

00:16:02.980 Suppose Biden and the Democrats are successful and they get this pushed through before the midterms.

00:16:10.240 Is there any point to it?

00:16:13.740 What would be the political point of doing it before the election?

00:16:18.280 Because, let's say young people are primarily the ones with these loans.

00:16:23.860 Have you met a young person?

00:16:28.680 Name a young person who gets a benefit already, and then months later, you say, hey, you already

00:16:36.140 got your benefit.

00:16:36.840 It's really basically the only thing you cared about.

00:16:41.240 But also, I'd like you to take a day off from work or whatever and go vote.

00:16:46.560 I don't think they care.

00:16:48.300 I think once they got their benefit, they're done.

00:16:50.900 I don't believe that's a reason to vote.

00:16:53.880 Do you?

00:16:54.980 Do you think people are going to say, oh, the Democrats gave me the one thing I wanted,

00:16:59.660 so I'd better vote for them?

00:17:01.380 No, they already got it.

00:17:02.400 But I'm not sure exactly how it works politically.

00:17:07.980 Are you?

00:17:09.300 Because it's not like passing the infrastructure bill or something like that, where you say

00:17:15.740 to yourself, oh, that's an accomplishment.

00:17:18.420 That's an accomplishment.

00:17:19.960 Oh, good.

00:17:20.500 You did something for the whole country.

00:17:22.280 That's good.

00:17:22.580 But if you just give something to somebody, and it's a one-time deal, well, then they just

00:17:28.320 have it.

00:17:29.540 It's no longer part of the decision-making, is it?

00:17:32.760 I mean, you want the competent leadership, but I think you would just call that a one-off

00:17:36.800 and say, yay, pocket the money, and you wouldn't change your vote one bit, I don't think.

00:17:44.000 All right.

00:17:44.440 Here's a statistic I saw, that three-quarters of the student debt is held by, do you know

00:17:51.540 the answer to this?

00:17:53.000 What demographic holds three-quarters of the student debt?

00:17:58.340 No, that's the wrong answer.

00:18:02.500 Women. 0.81

00:18:03.460 The answer is women. 1.00

00:18:04.200 So women are three-quarters of the student debt, which means that the Democrats will forgive 1.00

00:18:11.320 the debt.

00:18:11.760 If you were going to predict what the Democratic Party will do, all you have to do is look

00:18:20.700 at what's good for 75% of women. 1.00

00:18:24.080 And I feel like they're just going to be drawn to that.

00:18:27.720 It's going to be too important.

00:18:33.680 Yeah, maybe they'll forgive the debt for women only. 0.90

00:18:37.740 No white men. 0.83

00:18:38.620 Do you think it's fair that white men also get their debt forgiven? 0.70

00:18:44.760 Seems unfair, doesn't it?

00:18:47.780 Because I wonder what the racial composition of the debt holders is.

00:18:53.080 I'll bet it's mostly white, isn't it? 0.86

00:18:55.680 Am I wrong about that?

00:18:57.800 Is most student debt held by white people?

00:19:00.240 How come that wasn't reported?

00:19:08.720 Why is it that I saw an article saying 75% of it is women, but the same article didn't

00:19:14.860 mention the ethnic breakdown, which seems really, really important?

00:19:19.100 Would the entire thing be killed if the Republicans point out it primarily helps white people?

00:19:28.120 It kind of would, wouldn't it? 0.98

00:19:33.280 Yeah.

00:19:34.660 I mean, am I wrong?

00:19:36.840 Well, if the ethnic mix of student loans is overweighted with white debties, debtors, what do you call them? 0.95

00:19:51.700 Debtors?

00:19:54.300 Well, that can be interesting.

00:19:56.680 And it's very interesting that we are denied that knowledge when we're given such related knowledge.

00:20:02.280 It makes it look intentional, doesn't it?

00:20:03.980 It makes it look, yeah, debtors, thank you.

00:20:06.400 It makes it look intentional that we don't know the racial background.

00:20:12.320 It's weird.

00:20:14.080 All right.

00:20:16.140 I saw a comment from a Twitter user, Patrick Chauvinik, and he tweeted this, talking about

00:20:24.520 putting Trump back on Twitter, and he was pointing out it's not just a free speech issue,

00:20:30.760 that Trump was booted off Twitter for more than his opinion.

00:20:35.840 And this is the way Patrick says it.

00:20:37.820 He says,

00:20:38.960 It is worth noting that Twitter banned Donald Trump from the site in the immediate aftermath

00:20:43.380 of the mob attack he inspired on the Capitol on Jan 6.

00:20:48.220 It's not as though they just disproved of his opinions.

00:20:52.500 What do you think of that?

00:20:53.640 Do you think that Trump was booted off Twitter for his opinions, or was he booted off because

00:21:00.260 of inspiring the mob attack on the Capitol?

00:21:05.960 And does that matter?

00:21:09.060 Does it matter?

00:21:10.020 Well, here's what I tweeted back.

00:21:17.940 I said, this is the type of common misinformation that a Musk-owned Twitter could correct, you

00:21:23.960 know, potentially.

00:21:25.580 So I said, here's a fact check.

00:21:27.480 It is legal and appropriate to inspire a protest to demand an audit of an election that looked

00:21:33.700 rigged to about half the country.

00:21:37.140 Fake News calls that an insurrection.

00:21:40.020 Now, I'm going to say that Patrick Chauvinik is probably somebody who follows the news.

00:21:48.280 But if he followed the news that was, you know, right, I'm sorry, left-leaning, he would

00:21:54.580 think that there was an insurrection and that the president inspired that insurrection.

00:22:00.600 Correct?

00:22:02.160 And that would be the common opinion of people who consume CNN and MSNBC.

00:22:07.680 But it's not true.

00:22:12.120 It's just not the case.

00:22:14.480 The cases that Trump inspired, he inspired a protest, which is completely legal, it's

00:22:22.760 protected speech.

00:22:24.120 And the protest was to protect the election.

00:22:28.320 Because it was such a strong intuition that it had been rigged, and so obviously, from the

00:22:35.560 perspective of the Republicans.

00:22:37.580 Now, I'll agree that the courts have seen no evidence to prove that case.

00:22:43.180 The courts have seen no evidence.

00:22:45.560 You may have seen some evidence that you think proves it, but the courts have not.

00:22:49.500 So that's all I know.

00:22:51.700 I mean, I don't know if anything happened or not.

00:22:53.960 I just know that hasn't been proven in the courts.

00:22:57.140 But also, that doesn't tell you much.

00:22:59.940 It's just a true statement.

00:23:02.360 All right.

00:23:02.600 So, if you were Patrick, you probably did not know that although there were certainly

00:23:11.600 some bad actors in the group, had anybody ever explained to you that if it had been intended

00:23:16.920 to be an insurrection, it would have been armed, and it wasn't.

00:23:22.260 I mean, except for some clubs and some random stuff like bear spray, I guess.

00:23:26.740 If the plan had been an insurrection, there would have been weapons.

00:23:32.440 And secondly, how do you take over a country by occupying a building?

00:23:38.360 Like, whose news source ever explained that to Patrick?

00:23:42.480 Patrick, even if they had weapons, which they didn't, even if they had planned to take over

00:23:49.260 the country for which there's no evidence whatsoever, because 100% of what everybody was saying

00:23:54.800 is, hey, we think the election was rigged.

00:23:58.240 Can you give us two days to look into it?

00:24:00.940 I mean, that's what everybody wanted, right?

00:24:05.540 Now, whether that was legal or not is separate from the fact that they were trying to get it done.

00:24:13.460 And, you know, the entire thing was just completely different from the way the left portrayed it.

00:24:20.920 And I wonder if an Elon Musk Twitter could help people like Patrick, who are so poorly served by their media.

00:24:30.800 Now, I've said this before.

00:24:32.040 The people on the right almost always know the news on the left, because it's so pervasive.

00:24:38.960 The left-leaning news is everywhere.

00:24:41.480 And the news on the right tends to react to the news on the left.

00:24:45.600 So you've got a good balance there.

00:24:48.680 You see it all.

00:24:49.300 If you watch the right, you tend to at least be exposed to both sides.

00:24:53.500 But if you watch only the left, they won't even tell you that the Hunter Biden laptop is real.

00:25:00.780 You're not getting anything like the news. 1.00

00:25:03.080 You're just getting complete bullshit. 0.99

00:25:06.040 Now, that's not to say that the news on the right is all correct. 1.00

00:25:10.140 Nobody would make that claim.

00:25:11.380 But there's a real difference in how much their viewers are exposed to the opposite arguments.

00:25:20.900 All right.

00:25:25.580 So did I see in the news that the Biden administration is creating a ministry of truth?

00:25:32.600 I think it's a department, there's going to be a department in Homeland Security to create a disinformation governance board dedicated to, quote, countering misinformation.

00:25:50.060 Really?

00:25:52.580 Yeah, this is where the people like me who say, don't worry about the slippery slope, there will always be something that pops up to stop things from slipping too far.

00:26:01.920 Yeah, I mean, things always do go too far, but then they correct.

00:26:06.440 I would say critical race theory and some of that stuff is probably going too far, and it's in the process of self-correcting.

00:26:14.400 But I have to admit, I am actually completely surprised that we got all the way to the ministry of truth,

00:26:22.800 where the government will pretend to tell you what is true and what is not.

00:26:28.140 And I thought, honestly, I mean, it just looks like a joke, doesn't it?

00:26:35.600 Now, how can it possibly work?

00:26:39.020 And what would they do?

00:26:41.020 Because if what they do is fact-checking, that's not going to work, is it?

00:26:47.380 The government is exactly the entity you expect to lie, especially if they're associated with a political party.

00:26:55.980 You know, if they're associated with a political party, they should be the most lyingest people in the game, history suggests.

00:27:04.900 So when you take the most lyingest people, playing loosely with language here, and you say,

00:27:13.260 we'll take the people who are most definitely the biggest liars in the world,

00:27:17.100 we'll staff it with some people who have a history of actually some sketchy behavior when it comes to the truth,

00:27:24.220 just to make it have no credibility whatsoever, and we'll put it under the Homeland Security to make it sound scary and important,

00:27:32.760 to make it even sound more evil than anything we've ever done in the history of the United States.

00:27:39.900 I would be worried about this, except that it's so ridiculous, I don't know how anybody will ever take it seriously.

00:27:46.120 What I worry about is if it's more than fact-checking.

00:27:50.580 What happens if they start leaning on private companies?

00:27:55.080 Because what else is their mission?

00:27:58.100 Suppose they start leaning on Fox News and say, you know,

00:28:02.040 eh, the, what do they call them, the disinformation governance board has ruled that Tucker Carlson can't frame the issue that way.

00:28:14.240 What?

00:28:15.480 How's that going to go down?

00:28:17.540 What exactly does this entity do?

00:28:20.140 If they're either going to try to persuade private industry to say different things,

00:28:24.700 or they're going to be fact-checkers, and all of that's worthless.

00:28:31.000 How in the world could this work?

00:28:33.440 It's sort of mind-boggling, and I feel like it's just giving something to the Republicans.

00:28:43.000 There have to be some Democrats who still like freedom.

00:28:45.700 I have to think that this is the sort of thing that carves off another 1% of Democrats, or independents maybe.

00:28:54.660 Just, you know, this is like a 1% deal.

00:28:57.660 Like, you just lost 1% of your side with this, didn't you?

00:29:01.160 You don't think even 1% of the Democrats are looking at this and saying, uh, yeah, I kind of like Democrat policies, but, uh, the disinformation governance board?

00:29:18.840 Really?

00:29:19.300 Now, you say they're brainwashed, but I say, yeah, 99%.

00:29:26.760 But I feel like 1%, just 1% would say, ah, that's too far.

00:29:33.720 Maybe I'm an optimist.

00:29:37.620 Well, here's something interesting.

00:29:39.640 Chinese drone maker DJI, that's the biggest drone-making company.

00:29:43.480 So I think by far the biggest percentage of drones is made by this one Chinese company, DJI.

00:29:51.280 So the Ukrainians were using them, but now I guess there's a pullback because there was some glitch in the software that somehow gave Russians some advantage, some information about the drones.

00:30:03.900 And so, so China makes the drones, they sell them to their ally's enemy, that's Ukraine, but they actually work to help the Russians identify something.

00:30:19.860 So, yeah, it's pretty much exactly the way you'd imagine it would go.

00:30:24.980 So I guess they're, they're going to pull back from supplying them.

00:30:28.340 All right, so at this point, the Ukrainians do not have enough shoulder missiles, so they don't have anti-tank missiles enough, because they're not made anymore.

00:30:41.620 So whatever the world's supply is of those, probably the available ones are already being sucked up.

00:30:48.180 So they're going to run out of the good missiles.

00:30:51.580 They're going to run out of, I think, the Turkish drones, the good ones, you know, the big ones. 1.00

00:30:56.820 Their air force is probably down to not much of anything.

00:31:01.880 And now their drones, which were really sort of their secret weapon, may also be depleted.

00:31:10.500 I don't know how many they have, but they're not getting more.

00:31:14.080 So how does Putin lose this?

00:31:19.800 And it seems to me that Russia would be able to resupply better than Ukraine eventually.

00:31:26.820 In the short run, maybe not.

00:31:28.860 But eventually, I would think Russia would be able to get their supply lines up and running.

00:31:34.460 So I saw a retired General McCaffrey on Fox, I guess, say that he thinks Russia will basically own Ukraine in 90 days.

00:31:44.660 So 90 days, Ukraine will own, be owned. 0.99

00:31:48.940 What do you think?

00:31:49.500 Do you think Ukraine will go in 90 days?

00:31:53.940 Or do you think there'll be a permanent guerrilla force that'll be so powerful that Russia will always have to just stay in their little bases?

00:32:06.180 Yeah.

00:32:07.480 I don't know.

00:32:08.560 Well, if there's one thing you can predict about a war, it is.

00:32:11.820 What's the one thing you can predict about wars?

00:32:17.480 They always last longer than you think, don't they?

00:32:21.160 And they're unpredictable.

00:32:22.860 Right?

00:32:23.900 They're unpredictable in general, but the one thing you can predict is they never end when you think they're going to end.

00:32:30.960 So who knows?

00:32:33.040 And I wonder, who's going to pay for the rebuilding of Ukraine?

00:32:38.920 Isn't it better for the United States if Putin takes it over?

00:32:45.960 Sorry.

00:32:47.800 But I'll just ask an honest question.

00:32:51.660 If Ukraine, let's say, wins in the sense that they stay independent,

00:32:57.240 who's going to pay to rebuild them and then rearm them?

00:33:00.580 Isn't that us?

00:33:03.040 It's us, right?

00:33:04.640 Because who else is going to do it?

00:33:06.120 Ukraine doesn't have money, and we're not going to just leave them there as rubble.

00:33:09.860 Because if we leave them as rubble, they'll just get reattacked.

00:33:13.580 Putin will just take a year and go back and do it again, because it's just rubble by that time.

00:33:19.200 So it seems to me that if the United States and Europe win, meaning Ukraine survives, 0.59

00:33:27.240 that's going to be really expensive.

00:33:29.640 And what will we get in return?

00:33:31.200 What do we get in return?

00:33:36.020 I can't think of anything.

00:33:37.620 Can you?

00:33:39.860 I can't think of anything.

00:33:42.500 So now let's say that Russia conquers Ukraine and owns it. 0.95

00:33:47.880 Who pays for rebuilding Ukraine once Russia owns it? 0.92

00:33:53.920 Russia.

00:33:54.400 Well, you know, the part about the wheat is the cheapest part,

00:34:00.920 because that's just like tractors and roads and grain storage, right?

00:34:07.260 So I don't think that's like the big expense.

00:34:10.000 The big expense is 8 million people.

00:34:11.800 I mean, the whole economy is broken, basically.

00:34:18.300 So I hate to bring this up.

00:34:22.520 I hate to bring this up, but the United States is better off if Ukraine loses at this point, 0.99

00:34:28.820 because there's nothing left of Ukraine.

00:34:30.800 And if Russia broke it, they've got to buy it, right?

00:34:37.160 Yeah.

00:34:37.680 You broke it, you bought it.

00:34:39.860 So would the United States and Europe be better off if Russia is crippled by its conquest of Russia, 0.84

00:34:47.360 I'm sorry, of Ukraine, 1.00

00:34:48.400 even though Putin would get what he wants,

00:34:51.260 wouldn't it basically make Russia an ineffective fighting force for a long time?

00:34:58.020 Because they just wouldn't have the money.

00:35:01.140 And I think there would be a long-term move toward squeezing them out of the energy game.

00:35:08.180 So I feel as though the United States may have cynically played an unusually effective game here.

00:35:18.400 If our goal was to degrade Russia and just take them off the page,

00:35:25.920 if that was the goal, then it looks like well played.

00:35:33.800 But if that was not the goal, well, then it was just a gigantic mistake.

00:35:39.820 So I think we have to start asking a tough question,

00:35:43.940 which is, is the United States better or worse off if Ukraine loses?

00:35:52.440 And I'm not saying that, you know, I don't have empathy for the Ukrainians, 1.00

00:35:56.140 but I also don't know what's good for them.

00:35:59.020 I just don't know what's better for them at this point.

00:36:01.860 Well, I saw on CNN that Russian tanks have a little problem,

00:36:08.500 which is they're very exploity.

00:36:10.540 So there's a design flaw in the Russian tanks, say the experts,

00:36:15.120 where a minor hit on the tank will explode the munitions,

00:36:20.020 and then the munitions will blow the turret, you know, two stories in the air,

00:36:24.380 and obviously kill the people who are within it.

00:36:26.840 So it turns out that a tank is the least safe place to be

00:36:33.400 if you're in the Russian military,

00:36:36.360 because any kind of a serious hit on the tank makes it explode on its own.

00:36:42.000 And I guess the U.S. tanks don't do that.

00:36:44.620 I mean, I don't know how you protect munitions in a tank,

00:36:49.120 but I guess there's a better way to do it, and they do it the bad way.

00:36:52.200 Okay. So Russia might be losing a lot of tanks,

00:36:56.060 but do they need all those tanks to control Ukraine?

00:37:05.360 Scott doesn't like CNN. He loves it, they say on the comments.

00:37:10.460 Just the T-72s.

00:37:12.060 I heard that even the newer Russian tanks have the same design flaw.

00:37:19.360 The old ones and the new ones have the same design flaw.

00:37:22.200 That's what I read this morning.

00:37:25.780 All right.

00:37:33.820 Somebody's mentioning Elon Musk.

00:37:36.060 He should buy Dominion software next.

00:37:40.220 That would be interesting.

00:37:41.920 All right, let's talk about Twitter.

00:37:43.700 Do you believe that at Twitter,

00:37:48.120 people are quickly changing the algorithms and stuff?

00:37:52.860 So that nobody finds out what happened.

00:37:55.360 Do you think that's happening?

00:37:58.540 But you don't think that that would be easily discoverable,

00:38:01.580 that it had happened?

00:38:03.160 I did hear an insider report from Twitter

00:38:12.280 that suggests there's some sabotage going on.

00:38:18.260 But I don't know what that means.

00:38:20.700 Has anybody heard anything like that from insiders?

00:38:24.300 There must be plenty of people on here

00:38:26.060 who know somebody who works at Twitter.

00:38:27.600 Have any insiders said there's any sabotage going on?

00:38:39.600 Yeah, I'd be surprised if there were not any.

00:38:45.820 Rumors?

00:38:46.440 Yeah.

00:38:46.600 I don't know what that would look like.

00:38:50.340 I suspect...

00:38:51.940 I suspect that might be overblown.

00:38:55.200 It sounds like the sort of thing people talk about doing

00:38:57.460 but don't do.

00:38:59.080 Because it's just too easy to discover.

00:39:01.680 I can't imagine it'd be worth it.

00:39:02.960 When Clinton left office 0.99

00:39:08.740 and his staff took all the W's on the keyboards.

00:39:12.620 Yeah.

00:39:13.500 I mean, maybe little stuff like keyboards and stuff.

00:39:15.720 All right.

00:39:21.700 Let me get rid of this commenter.

00:39:28.180 Let me just make a general comment

00:39:30.760 for people who want to talk about my personal life.

00:39:35.160 Here's the thing you need to know.

00:39:37.340 When people get married,

00:39:38.800 it's usually because they both want to.

00:39:40.360 And when people get divorced, 0.87

00:39:44.480 it's usually for the better.

00:39:46.580 It's because something wasn't working.

00:39:48.680 It's not bad news.

00:39:50.160 It's not something that needs to be fixed.

00:39:53.060 It didn't need to be fixed before.

00:39:55.760 It doesn't need to be fixed now.

00:39:57.760 So, well, I appreciate that you have interest in it.

00:40:02.380 Don't assume there's a problem that needs to be fixed.

00:40:05.860 That there's no basis for assuming that.

00:40:08.040 Don't assume that we're not both happier.

00:40:10.360 Don't assume that everything isn't fine.

00:40:14.700 And remember, by the time that you hear about anything,

00:40:17.120 it's already old news to the people involved.

00:40:20.400 So by the time anybody not close to me

00:40:25.200 heard about any of this,

00:40:28.460 it was already something that we'd processed

00:40:30.860 for a long time, right?

00:40:32.700 So I'm fine.

00:40:35.180 I'm actually in a real good place.

00:40:37.140 And I think she is, too.

00:40:40.940 I don't know.

00:40:41.980 We don't really communicate.

00:40:43.680 But I think she's fine.

00:40:45.580 I think I'm fine, too.

00:40:47.040 So there's not really a problem to solve here.

00:40:50.480 So you don't need to be obsessed on that.

00:40:53.700 You can let that go.

00:40:55.220 Okay.

00:40:55.440 I see your questions,

00:41:03.160 and I'm not going to respond to them.

00:41:04.720 Just assume everything's fine.

00:41:07.580 It's fine.

00:41:08.980 Or will be.

00:41:11.900 Yeah.

00:41:13.920 I don't think either of us are suffering any loneliness.

00:41:16.340 I don't think any of us will be fine.

00:41:22.360 All right.

00:41:24.320 That's right.

00:41:26.240 Salisbury Hill.

00:41:28.220 And let's talk some more about Elon Musk's tweets.

00:41:36.100 What did he tweet?

00:41:37.540 I feel like I wrote it down.

00:41:39.100 I lost it somewhere.

00:41:40.980 Oh, he tweeted,

00:41:41.800 Next, I'm buying Coca-Cola to put the cocaine back in.

00:41:46.340 How much do you love him?

00:41:50.520 He just keeps making me love him.

00:41:53.060 Because he doesn't take seriously

00:41:57.080 things that should not be taken seriously.

00:42:00.760 And he does take seriously

00:42:02.300 the things that are most important,

00:42:04.900 like saving the planet

00:42:06.080 and extending consciousness into Mars and space.

00:42:11.300 I mean, he takes those things pretty seriously.

00:42:14.040 And then free speech?

00:42:15.540 Yeah.

00:42:16.340 I don't think anybody's taken free speech

00:42:18.040 more seriously than he is.

00:42:19.940 But when it comes to, like, the criticisms

00:42:22.020 of the, you know, how seriously any of this should be,

00:42:25.760 I like the fact that he doesn't take any of us seriously.

00:42:28.460 The stuff that doesn't need to be taken seriously.

00:42:30.980 That is just so refreshing.

00:42:34.680 Because what we're used to

00:42:36.000 is people being serious about non-serious stuff

00:42:38.940 and not being serious about really serious stuff.

00:42:42.540 He's literally the opposite of everybody on Twitter.

00:42:47.160 Am I wrong?

00:42:49.140 Because he takes seriously the big, big, big stuff like AI.

00:42:53.620 I mean, he's talking about artificial intelligence, you know,

00:42:55.880 being dangerous and bringing humans to off worlds. 0.94

00:43:00.800 And, I mean, that's the big, big stuff.

00:43:03.760 The important stuff.

00:43:06.100 And then, you know, somebody's joke on Twitter

00:43:08.600 and this little stuff.

00:43:11.140 Eh.

00:43:12.620 He just thinks it's funny.

00:43:14.580 That's exactly what you would want to emulate.

00:43:16.880 He had some other funny tweets.

00:43:21.400 And the thing that is really blowing my mind

00:43:25.280 is how many people he's responding to.

00:43:29.600 Have you seen that yet?

00:43:32.840 So he's responded to Mike Cernovich directly.

00:43:36.980 He's responded to a number of people

00:43:38.560 that you probably follow.

00:43:40.840 And they're not the biggest accounts in the world.

00:43:44.080 I mean, Cernovich is one of the biggest accounts.

00:43:46.880 In terms of influence.

00:43:48.880 And I just love how personal he's made Twitter.

00:43:58.380 Because you feel like, you know,

00:44:00.560 he's the richest guy around, right?

00:44:02.660 In the world, in the country, whatever it is.

00:44:04.980 So he's the richest guy.

00:44:06.720 He's doing the most, you know, important things.

00:44:09.240 But you could just tweet at him

00:44:10.560 and there's a pretty good chance he'll respond.

00:44:13.460 At least this week.

00:44:15.320 Because he's having fun with it, apparently.

00:44:17.860 And it's just sort of amazing.

00:44:19.840 Just watching it is just mind-blowing.

00:44:22.580 But you want to have your mind blown again?

00:44:26.520 Remember, Elon Musk is a promoter of the idea

00:44:30.160 that we live in a simulation.

00:44:33.060 He is probably the best example of it

00:44:35.140 because he lives it like it's a simulation.

00:44:38.120 It's like whatever he wants done,

00:44:40.240 he just makes it happen

00:44:41.120 and the simulation seems to give it to him.

00:44:43.800 Am I right?

00:44:45.740 But here's something that I always say

00:44:47.760 about the simulation.

00:44:48.620 It has code reuse.

00:44:50.200 It uses the same characters over and over again.

00:44:53.280 And the same themes over and over again.

00:44:56.080 What are the odds

00:44:57.060 that the two biggest stories in the news

00:44:58.980 would be Elon Musk

00:45:01.840 and whatever he's doing today

00:45:03.420 and Johnny Depp?

00:45:05.720 Right?

00:45:06.040 Those are the two biggest stories?

00:45:07.920 Seems like.

00:45:08.540 At least the ones that involve personalities.

00:45:10.300 Johnny Depp and Elon Musk.

00:45:12.960 And they both dated Amber Turd.

00:45:18.440 What are the chances of that?

00:45:20.780 That the two people

00:45:21.920 who are seeming to control

00:45:23.780 our consciousness at the moment

00:45:25.260 both dated the same person?

00:45:29.040 That Amber Turd?

00:45:30.080 That's weird, isn't it?

00:45:34.400 Am I right?

00:45:35.740 And apparently there's a name for this,

00:45:37.560 Eskimo Brothers.

00:45:40.020 Have you ever heard that term?

00:45:41.380 I had to look it up.

00:45:42.720 So it's like an urban dictionary slag.

00:45:45.860 Do you know?

00:45:47.940 So Eskimo Brothers means

00:45:50.480 when basically anybody sleeps together

00:45:54.300 just for warmth.

00:45:55.940 So it could be your brother,

00:45:57.960 it could be your brother's wife,

00:45:59.140 you know, it could be anybody.

00:46:01.080 So like anybody will sleep together

00:46:02.680 if you're cold enough.

00:46:05.460 So the Elon Musk and Johnny Depp

00:46:07.880 are Eskimo Brothers

00:46:08.820 because they both slept with Amber Turd. 1.00

00:46:12.780 Anyway.

00:46:21.180 They're Turd Brothers.

00:46:23.140 Yeah.

00:46:24.360 That's pretty funny.

00:46:25.300 So is there any story I missed?

00:46:33.520 I'm not going to look that up.

00:46:37.120 Somebody gave me something else to look up

00:46:38.940 and I don't think I'm going to look that up.

00:46:41.940 But I'm going to tell you what it was.

00:46:43.700 Upper deck?

00:46:45.100 What does upper deck mean? 0.97

00:46:47.800 Dammit, I've got to look it up now. 0.98

00:46:51.000 I know it's something filthy. 0.99

00:46:52.800 That's why I've got to look it up.

00:46:53.840 Okay.

00:46:57.100 Upper deck.

00:46:59.960 Is this going to be terrible?

00:47:06.640 Wait a minute.

00:47:07.780 I'm looking at your comments,

00:47:09.300 but does that really...

00:47:09.840 really?

00:47:21.100 Uh...

00:47:21.500 Uh...

00:47:21.900 All right.

00:47:31.100 Well, we'll let that go.

00:47:33.480 I'm going to assume that what I'm seeing here

00:47:35.340 in the comments is probably true.

00:47:36.740 Ha ha ha ha ha.

00:47:38.440 I don't know why that's so funny.

00:47:46.560 But it is.

00:47:48.120 That just comes out of...

00:47:49.480 Ha ha ha ha ha ha.

00:47:54.380 Uh...

00:47:54.940 Definitely don't look up rusty trombone.

00:47:57.800 Do not look that up.

00:47:59.720 Do not look up rusty trombone.

00:48:02.280 Let me warn you.

00:48:04.200 That's just a warning.

00:48:06.320 And trust me, if you don't already know what it means,

00:48:10.480 don't look it up.

00:48:14.160 Or a dirty Sanchez. 0.95

00:48:21.020 All right, I feel bad because I know I just made a bunch of you

00:48:24.320 look up horrible things that you'll now have in your minds.

00:48:28.340 Well, that's on me.

00:48:30.920 All right, is there anything else we need to talk about today?

00:48:34.220 Let's have a gratuitous simultaneous sip.

00:48:40.740 I'm going to look at your comments for a moment, shall we?

00:48:49.180 I'm from Florida. Try the seagull. Trust me.

00:48:52.940 Okay.

00:48:56.460 Oh, Elon Musk also tweeted that Truth Social was a terrible name.

00:49:04.120 And that it should be called Trumpet.

00:49:09.360 And the problem is that, you know,

00:49:11.700 I don't think Trump wanted it to be like a Trump-branded thing,

00:49:16.840 because I don't think that would necessarily have helped him.

00:49:19.140 So I disagree from a branding perspective,

00:49:22.500 but I agree from a naming perspective,

00:49:24.680 that Trumpet would, you know, would have been a better name.

00:49:33.560 My goodness.

00:49:35.280 Who wants me?

00:49:36.120 There we go.

00:49:39.600 Okay.

00:49:41.340 All right.

00:49:44.240 Yes, it's time for bagels.

00:49:48.340 War winners are invariably stronger after the war.

00:49:51.720 Okay, we have a comment that the winners of wars

00:49:57.000 are invariably stronger after the war.

00:50:00.840 Well, let's test that.

00:50:03.240 So invariably means historically.

00:50:08.480 And so let's take learning from history.

00:50:12.460 Is it true that the winners of war,

00:50:16.160 no matter how degraded they get when they win the war,

00:50:18.940 will end up ahead having won the war?

00:50:22.660 I would agree that that would be the long-term outcome,

00:50:27.100 because Ukraine seems to be valuable enough 0.99

00:50:30.060 that eventually Putin will be out of office,

00:50:33.320 or maybe we'll forget what horrible things he did,

00:50:36.620 and Russia will re-enter the economy at some point

00:50:40.940 and probably come out ahead.

00:50:43.800 I think I would agree with that.

00:50:46.020 So I'm going to agree with it on a concept level,

00:50:48.320 but I'm going to argue about the timing,

00:50:51.160 because I think as long as Putin is there,

00:50:54.000 or somebody who's Putin-esque, I guess,

00:50:56.980 I think that they will be economically degraded

00:51:01.640 in a way they would not have been

00:51:03.060 had they not won the war,

00:51:05.400 had they not entered the war at all.

00:51:07.620 So I'm going to argue that they will be worse off

00:51:11.100 for as long as Putin is there,

00:51:13.120 but I would agree with you

00:51:14.860 that having Russia and Ukraine together

00:51:17.820 probably makes a stronger Russia in the long, long term.

00:51:22.720 Let's say the 30-year term, I agree.

00:51:26.040 In the 20-year future, if Putin stays,

00:51:30.400 is, I think Russia's worse off.

00:51:35.780 But who can predict such things?

00:51:39.120 All it would take is a reversal on the sanctions,

00:51:42.140 and then nothing's predictable after that.

00:51:46.000 You forgot China's role.

00:51:48.680 I didn't forget it.

00:51:49.640 I'll put Zelensky in charge of Russia.

00:52:00.600 No, I don't think that'll fly,

00:52:02.880 because I think, yeah, that's not going to fly.

00:52:10.100 Russia would be fine because they have resources

00:52:12.180 the world needs badly.

00:52:15.020 True.

00:52:15.460 That's what keeps them from being completely dissolved.

00:52:20.820 But will not the Ukraine situation

00:52:24.480 cause people to work twice as hard,

00:52:27.280 maybe ten times as hard,

00:52:28.960 to have alternative sources to Russia's resources?

00:52:33.160 I say yes.

00:52:34.180 So I think that Russia may have the ability to sell,

00:52:40.140 but, yeah, I suppose,

00:52:42.380 I guess for decades there's going to be a market

00:52:46.500 for all the energy they can produce.

00:52:49.160 Maybe only the richest countries

00:52:51.880 will be the ones who have alternative sources.

00:52:55.080 They have their own energy and food.

00:53:03.580 That is correct.

00:53:05.060 So apparently Russia's pretty self-sufficient.

00:53:08.540 But if you take away their energy trade,

00:53:12.800 it's not the same country.

00:53:14.980 countries will work to avoid NATO's fears of influence.

00:53:25.120 Will they?

00:53:26.420 I don't know.

00:53:28.060 Not according to Peter Zandt.

00:53:29.980 What does Peter Zandt have to say about what?

00:53:33.060 I'd be interested in that.

00:53:35.020 The ruble is up.

00:53:38.440 Yeah, so the ruble's hanging in there.

00:53:41.040 Yeah.

00:53:44.980 When your printer doesn't work,

00:53:47.360 it's your network that needs to be reset,

00:53:49.060 not the printer.

00:53:50.520 Sometimes.

00:53:51.760 That is correct.

00:53:53.320 Yeah, I usually can identify

00:53:54.860 when it's the network problem,

00:53:56.780 and I will do both.

00:54:01.520 But that's a good point.

00:54:02.340 I should reset my Wi-Fi

00:54:06.020 just as one of the things to try.

00:54:09.120 All right.

00:54:09.520 Well, I've run out of things to say, clearly.

00:54:11.080 And although this was a highlight of your day,

00:54:13.840 and maybe civilization itself,

00:54:17.700 I think it's time that we take this to a conclusion.

00:54:23.900 And I don't know that you could be happier.

00:54:26.100 Could you?

00:54:27.200 No, you couldn't be.

00:54:28.640 You couldn't be happier.

00:54:30.100 Best thing ever.

00:54:31.380 All right.

00:54:32.260 Talk to you tomorrow.

00:54:32.960 All right.

00:54:33.980 All right.

Real Coffee with Scott Adams - April 28, 2022

Episode 1727 Scott Adams： Free Speech, Canceling Student Debt, Elon Musk and More Fun

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