Episode 865 Scott Adams： Good Morning, Shut-Ins. Let's Sip!
Episode Stats
Length
1 hour and 23 minutes
Words per Minute
159.90054
Summary
In this episode of the podcast, I talk about the dangers of overreacting to a pandemic, and why we should be worried about what we don't know, rather than what we do know. I also talk a little bit about a recent article I read that I think is pretty good.
Transcript
00:00:06.600
Bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum bum
00:00:30.000
So I'm going to print out my notes here and enjoy the simultaneous sip with you because
00:00:43.860
And I know that your day will be better if you enjoy the simultaneous sip.
00:00:51.980
And all you need is a cup or a mug or a glass of tank or gel or a stein, a canteen jug or
00:01:02.340
And join me now for the unparalleled pleasure of the dopamine hit of the day, the thing
00:01:05.740
that makes everything, including the pandemic, better.
00:01:10.280
It's called the simultaneous sip, and it happens now.
00:01:35.660
And the reason for that is, well, I'm never prepared.
00:01:41.860
We'll go to the whiteboard in a minute, but let's talk about some things, some things that
00:01:46.540
I'm taking it as my personal mission to remove loser think wherever I see it.
00:02:00.660
It doesn't mean the person saying it is a loser.
00:02:04.380
And in this crisis, those faulty thinking styles could actually get us killed.
00:02:13.120
Literally, a little bit of bad thinking by the public could kill millions of people.
00:02:25.660
Online, I continue to see people say, hey, that swine flu killed half a million people.
00:02:34.280
We didn't close down the entire world economy over that.
00:02:38.480
So why would we close down things for something that's only killed a few thousand when the entire
00:03:00.700
To which I say, did you know that the atomic bomb doesn't kill people?
00:03:10.080
Because the first week that the atomic bomb was built, zero deaths.
00:03:18.540
The first week that the atomic, the very first atomic bomb was built, nobody died.
00:03:25.660
So that proves that atomic bombs don't kill people, right?
00:03:35.120
Because you know the bomb was going to be exploded over people, and later, a lot of people
00:03:44.620
Because I'm watching people say that the coronavirus has killed this relatively small number of people
00:03:53.640
compared to the population of Earth in its infancy, because people are pretty sure that
00:04:07.160
And we knew about it that it had a different viral signature, if you will.
00:04:12.520
And scientists apparently knew that you could stop it because it wasn't as viral, etc.
00:04:20.600
This one is way more viral, and scientists don't believe it's going to be as easy to stop.
00:04:31.940
But don't make the mistake of comparing the new thing that just started with the thing
00:04:38.100
that we have full visibility about, which had a completely different nature in terms of
00:04:45.900
So I keep seeing people doing this, and this sort of dovetails into the, there's an article
00:04:58.000
a lot of you asked me about, and a lot of you forwarded to me, and I think I was smart
00:05:08.760
You might prove me wrong, because I've been retweeting with a little less filter than I normally
00:05:15.900
Because I'm just trying to curate knowledge, and I might get some wrong, but I think I
00:05:21.080
held back, and it looks like some of the platforms are deplatforming that article.
00:05:26.420
It was a medium by a guy named Aaron Ginn, G-I-N-N.
00:05:31.620
And if I understand it correctly, he was like a marketing guy who understood marketing virality,
00:05:39.860
and then sort of backwards used those skills to be an epidemiologist, it doesn't really
00:05:50.960
And it was more of a don't be hysterical, this isn't so bad kind of an article, but apparently
00:05:57.460
the experts shot so many holes in it that it was actually deplatformed.
00:06:02.640
And if I recall, I think it got torn down before I could remind myself what it said, but I think
00:06:10.480
I think it was doing the analysis of the automobile is perfectly safe.
00:06:18.720
Because the week that the Model T was invented, no one died.
00:06:26.220
In fact, the entire first year of the automobile, you know, maybe only one person died, and maybe
00:06:35.120
So the automobile will never kill you, because the first week it didn't really kill many people.
00:06:40.880
So that's the analysis we're getting from people who are trying to inform our decisions
00:06:48.720
If you see anybody comparing the front of something to the end of something, run away.
00:06:58.160
I'm not seeing this being done by only dumb people.
00:07:01.960
I'm seeing this being done by people I can judge to be very smart.
00:07:12.700
The people who have not been exposed to good thinking styles, there's no surprise that they
00:07:21.340
But people who do know how to compare things are also doing this, and I don't know what's
00:07:31.920
I don't even have a good hypothesis for why a smart person would compare the beginning
00:07:36.740
of something to the end of a completely different thing.
00:07:40.620
So if somebody does, please explain it to me on Twitter or something.
00:07:46.560
Yesterday, I said, if the press doesn't inform us today, which was yesterday, about the supply
00:07:53.720
situation for the medical supplies in particular, we'd have to conclude that the press is broken.
00:08:00.020
Because it's sort of our most important question, right?
00:08:06.180
Is there anything that is more vital to understanding where we're at and where we could get to than
00:08:13.400
having a real clear picture of the supply situation as it's coming in?
00:08:20.500
So you'd have to capture the fluid nature of it and the fact that it might be small but
00:08:28.280
If you watched the press conference yesterday, and I know a lot of you did, the president
00:08:33.560
and his task force, you could see there was a major communication problem.
00:08:41.900
And I'm not going to say it's the fault of the people who were on the stage, the task force,
00:08:46.760
because they're not really, they're not graphic artists.
00:08:50.740
And you sort of needed somebody who was a graphic artist and a data visualizer to tell the story,
00:08:58.440
because it's a little bit complicated, but it's vital.
00:09:06.680
I'm on stage and you asked me, Scott, you know, you're the head of the task force.
00:09:23.800
We've got, you know, 5 million masks ordered and we've got, you know, 6 million on the way
00:09:29.220
and people are, you know, building factories and we're working with the public.
00:09:40.520
A raw number of masks is completely meaningless to the audience.
00:09:50.940
Some doctor was associated with a big hospital.
00:09:54.860
And I think it was somebody involved with administration.
00:09:57.060
So they knew the whole workings of the hospital.
00:09:59.460
And I saw a number of how many masks and gowns and protective stuff that they wear.
00:10:05.400
And if you didn't know it, they have to throw that stuff away after every use, every patient.
00:10:12.820
So a hospital could go through something like 40,000 masks in like a day or two.
00:10:19.620
So the number, the size of the need is so enormous that, you know, our normal common sense brains,
00:10:28.000
when we think of a hospital, if I picture a hospital, I go, okay, I'm picturing a big hospital.
00:10:32.940
How many people in that would be the medical people who need masks?
00:10:38.420
So then my dumb medical, non-medical brain goes, okay, maybe 2,000 masks, so you've got a backup,
00:10:48.520
would give you all the masks you need for a hospital.
00:10:54.560
The number of masks you need for just one hospital is probably in the hundreds of thousands
00:11:00.960
Now, I'm playing loose with the numbers, so I'm just trying to give you a sizing.
00:11:08.260
You know, if you come back to me and say, Scott, Scott, it's not hundreds of thousands,
00:11:17.380
That it's, they're gigantic numbers for just one hospital.
00:11:20.460
So, when your pros are standing on stage and they say, yeah, we got 10 million masks coming,
00:11:38.220
So, you see how immediately it becomes complicated and the story can't be transmitted from whatever
00:11:43.600
they know to whatever we, the public, would like to know.
00:11:51.300
This is just one suggestion and it's a way to visualize data.
00:11:59.900
These are just, you know, formats so you can see.
00:12:03.240
So, I, as a public, would like to see the information this way.
00:12:13.000
Now, if you've ever worked with data and explaining things to management and that sort of thing,
00:12:23.520
I was sort of a finance guy and I would put together PowerPoint slides like this and explain
00:12:29.560
where the budget was going and, you know, where our investment in technology was heading
00:12:33.740
and was a lease better than a purchase and that stuff.
00:12:36.660
So, it was my job to take a complicated situation and try to figure out the easiest way you could
00:12:43.160
put it on one page so that an executive who didn't know all the details could still get
00:12:50.280
Now, getting back to my point, it doesn't matter if it's accurate.
00:12:58.540
What we, the public, need to know is that the people in charge have a handle on this.
00:13:05.260
And that, in a general sense, are we looking at next week before we get stuff?
00:13:12.580
Now, if they tell you it's three weeks and it turns out to be five weeks, it's wrong.
00:13:20.920
You know, you're giving me some sense that you've got some control.
00:13:23.620
And by three weeks from now, I would have expected you to adjust your numbers every day
00:13:30.080
So, the three weeks from now, when I find out it was really five weeks, I'm not surprised
00:13:34.040
because you've been adjusting it the whole time.
00:13:38.980
I would take each item, let's say pills or ventilators or masks, and I would say,
00:13:45.020
what's the peak number that you need to get through what you imagine will be, you know,
00:13:51.260
Now, what you imagine as the peak will also change every day.
00:13:58.880
But just tell us, keep it simple, the next three weeks, which are the critical ones.
00:14:03.860
Tell us how many of each of this item we have now.
00:14:08.100
Tell us what that's going to look like in one week, two weeks, and then three.
00:14:12.580
Now, these are just example sizes, but I would imagine that the first week you can't get
00:14:17.960
your production up that fast, but maybe by the second week you're really cooking, and
00:14:23.300
then by the third week maybe you're just topping it off.
00:14:29.060
Now, if you show me this by category, do you feel more comfortable that your leaders can
00:14:39.980
understand the data and they have some sense of how to communicate it in a way that you'll
00:14:44.780
get? Now, again, if they give you this number and they change it tomorrow, I still have confidence
00:14:50.740
in them because I'm watching the entire chain of, oh, we learned something, we adjusted our
00:14:58.140
And I would feel that change in sort of real time because they do the, you know, they're
00:15:03.240
Okay. So, as long as they were honest with us and they said, look, we've got a lot of
00:15:08.220
balls in the air. I can't really tell you what that looks like, but, you know, I'm an
00:15:13.580
expert. I've been talking to a lot of people. I'm going to put a number on it because the
00:15:17.120
public needs a number. I think it's 3 million by next week. Turns out it's 5 million. Are
00:15:24.480
you less happy? Are you unhappy because your expert guessed 3 million, but you got 5 million?
00:15:29.340
No. No, you're happier. If you guess it's 3 million, but it's 2 million, well, you got
00:15:35.580
some questions to ask, and then you want to look at the next week's number. But anyway,
00:15:39.280
the point is, data visualization is a specific skill. It is unlikely that anybody on the stage
00:15:46.960
has that kind of talent set. It's a weird talent. But the government needs to get that
00:15:53.020
person. So, guess somebody on the team who can make a freaking slide that will show the
00:15:58.600
public what we're talking about. And again, it doesn't have to be that accurate. Just
00:16:05.680
give us a sense. Is this a one-week problem? Or is this a three-month problem to get enough
00:16:11.060
masks? I have no idea. I have no idea. But I'd like to. All right, enough about that. By
00:16:18.560
the way, this is just one more example of a remarkable phenomenon you're seeing everywhere.
00:16:24.220
And, you know, everybody's saying, you know, we'll never be the same after this. People are
00:16:29.840
saying, you know, life will never be the same. Well, I think it'll be mostly the same in terms
00:16:35.720
of the material, you know, stuff of life and going back to work. I do believe that we'll go back to
00:16:41.360
something that's pretty close to normal, same way we did after 9-11. You could argue that 9-11
00:16:47.140
changed everything. But the fact is, if you weren't waiting in line at the airport, it looked about
00:16:53.340
the same. You know, a few years later, life looked kind of similar. You just waited longer at the
00:16:59.120
airport for the most part. And I think that's where we're headed with this. Things will be largely
00:17:04.860
the same. But one thing that won't ever be the same will be that the people who lived through this
00:17:11.280
have an experience. And that experience becomes part of you. So we're all being rewired by the
00:17:19.420
experience to the extent that we're, you know, old enough to really know what's going on. And I don't
00:17:26.720
think that's bad. If you noticed today, did you notice that Al Sharpton tweeted that he had, I guess he
00:17:38.460
said in public that the president needs to do something about the homeless and people in prison
00:17:43.780
because they're especially at risk of the spread of the disease. And Al Sharpton tweeted that, I guess
00:17:52.000
to his surprise, the president called him and had a long conversation about those concerns. And Al
00:17:58.440
Sharpton tweeted out and he said, if the president can, you know, call a critic like Al Sharpton and work
00:18:05.340
with him, then the rest of you can too. It's a big deal. It's a big deal. So Al Sharpton, you know,
00:18:15.620
who is a bigger critic of President Trump than Al Sharpton? But today, Al Sharpton and President
00:18:23.580
Trump are the same person today. Today, you're the same person as I am. You know, our differences have
00:18:30.120
just melted away. You know, we even when you see you're still seeing people talk about politics,
00:18:35.080
right? You're seeing people talk about politics and, you know, president should have done this.
00:18:42.000
You know, and I do it too. But doesn't it feel hollow? Don't the conversations about, you know,
00:18:49.620
politics just they just feel empty? You know, they have a little bit of entertainment value, but
00:18:55.100
they're just empty calories right now. Because you and I and Al Sharpton and Representative Tlaib,
00:19:02.240
who I'm going to mention in a moment, are all on the same team at the moment. Now, anybody who doesn't
00:19:08.440
live through this will not have experienced this. And I have to say, as tragic as this is, I certainly
00:19:16.480
wouldn't hope for any kind of a crisis like this ever. But you can't deny that this is doing something
00:19:23.980
to us. I mean, it's almost like we're going to evolve differently or something. I mean, it's that,
00:19:30.880
to me anyway, it's that critical to the way we think. Now, it's possible we just snap back to politics
00:19:35.880
as usual, you know, the day we feel like we're past it. But we will always have this. We will always have
00:19:43.140
this. There will never be a day, let me put it this way. If Al Sharpton goes back to being, you know,
00:19:50.540
old Al Sharpton, and he's just, you know, we're past the crisis, and he just goes back to politics
00:19:56.000
as usual, I'm still going to love Al Sharpton. I'm still going to love Al Sharpton because of this.
00:20:04.980
Because of this day. Because he can't take that away. That actually happened. And that's who he is.
00:20:10.180
So you're learning, you know, you're learning who Al Sharpton is. At the same time, you're learning
00:20:15.560
who the president is. At the same time, you're learning who you are. So I will never think of
00:20:21.320
him the same. You know, I'll still disagree with his policies, but I'll never think of him the same.
00:20:27.140
So because at the moment, Al Sharpton is me. There's no difference. Speaking of dogs and cats
00:20:36.220
laying down together. So I tweeted yesterday, I don't think I've ever had less or fewer. I don't think
00:20:42.960
I've ever had fewer retweets for a tweet. I tweeted a suggestion from Representative Tlaib,
00:20:50.500
who, you know, probably most of you know, I've been critical of her. She's critical of the president.
00:20:58.300
You know, I'm not a big fan of her politics. It goes with what I'm saying. But she had an idea.
00:21:05.140
And I don't know if it's a great idea, or if it's not a great idea. But I liked it enough
00:21:09.600
that in the spirit of the crisis, I tweeted it out. And the idea was this, that since we're looking
00:21:16.520
at it, it looks like there definitely will be some kind of cash transfer to people who need to pay
00:21:21.640
their bills. So given that it looks like that's going to happen, the question is how best to do
00:21:27.300
it. And I set around the idea that we should just send out money to people and then rich people can
00:21:33.200
have it clawed back on their taxes, you know, because the government would know it gave it to
00:21:37.860
you. And then it would send you your taxes and say, we know you got it. So give it back, you know,
00:21:44.760
when it's tax time, but only for the rich people who didn't deserve it. And that would just be a
00:21:48.420
sort of a clean and easy way to get some money out there without the bureaucracy.
00:21:54.100
Now, Representative Tlaib had an idea that is in that field, which is instead of checks,
00:22:03.320
sending out a debit card. And here's the advantage of the debit card. Well, a few advantages.
00:22:08.440
One is that if you've got a debit card and you're going to the store, I think it would reduce the
00:22:13.360
number of things you touch. You know, you wouldn't be handing it to a human, you'd be putting it in a
00:22:17.780
machine. You know, if you use a glove or something to push your buttons, you know, you got that going
00:22:22.760
for you. So that's better than a check, probably. And having to go to a store or, you know, not
00:22:28.940
everybody has a phone, they can deposit it. But the other advantage, and I thought this was a big
00:22:34.620
one, is that if you need to do a second round, they already have the card and they just fill the
00:22:40.660
card. So the card would be, you know, a prepaid like debit card. Once you spent it, if the crisis is
00:22:47.400
not over, the government could just say, push a button, refill the cards, and you don't have to wait for
00:22:52.560
your check. It's just already there. Now, there might be some downsides of that, and that's really
00:22:58.620
not the point of what I'm saying. So I put it out there so people can wrestle with it. I don't know
00:23:03.120
if it's a good idea or a bad idea. There might be some, there might be a hidden downside that's not
00:23:07.560
obvious to me. But here's the point. Under any normal situation, I'm not going to be seeing an idea
00:23:15.660
from Representative Tlaib that I say, huh, looks like a pretty good idea. I'm going to forward this.
00:23:20.600
Because today, you know, I am Alice Sharpton. I am you. I am Representative Tlaib. I am President
00:23:31.560
Trump. And we are fighting this virus. And at the moment, we're all on the same side. This may never
00:23:38.700
happen again. You know, maybe in my lifetime. Could happen in your lifetime. But I don't know I'll ever
00:23:45.100
live through this again, where absolutely everybody's on the same team. Period. That's it.
00:23:51.860
I hate it when people say period, but sometimes it slips out. All right. And by the way, the same
00:24:00.360
graph that I was using for medical supplies, wouldn't you like to see that for toilet paper?
00:24:05.720
You know you would, right? Is it, do you feel, it's weird because when you're, you're the task force
00:24:13.540
and you're managing a crisis, you're probably not worried about the toilet paper supply, right?
00:24:19.940
Right? You know, you don't think that's the top priority. It's like, well, save the toilet paper.
00:24:26.780
You know, all people on deck. You know, let the hospitals fend for themselves. But we've got to
00:24:31.680
solve this toilet paper problem. And you're not, they're not thinking that. But I would like to
00:24:36.820
suggest that although the task force probably shouldn't be doing anything about toilet paper,
00:24:42.880
meaning the private industry is probably doing everything that needs to be done. I would imagine
00:24:47.740
that, you know, the people who make this stuff are cranking it down, chipping it, and it's just being
00:24:52.700
absorbed quickly. But fairly soon, we'll get to the point where the hoarders have done their thing.
00:24:58.020
And then we stop hoarding. But wouldn't you like to know, is that next week? Or is it in three weeks?
00:25:07.480
Because I don't know about you, but some people are starting to count their rolls, if you know what I
00:25:12.040
mean. Now, why do I even bring this up in the middle of an emergency? Isn't it the least important
00:25:19.540
thing? Nope. No, it is not the least important thing. Certainly, people can figure out their workarounds
00:25:27.000
and, you know, inconvenience, etc. But psychologically, this toilet paper thing has a much larger hold on
00:25:36.300
our imagination than common sense says it should. Because we're not virologists, we're not medical
00:25:43.620
people. We just need our toilet paper. We're citizens. And if you tell me that I can't get
00:25:50.480
another roll for, I don't know, give me a number. If you tell me I can't have a roll for a week,
00:25:56.440
a new roll, I'll say, okay, a week. I think things are under control. You know, if I could have,
00:26:03.680
if I can get those on the store shelf in a week, I'm not even going to think it was ever a problem.
00:26:09.200
But if you tell me it's three weeks, I got to start rationing. You don't, because you're,
00:26:16.320
you all hoarded. But, you know, some of us might need to start rationing a little bit.
00:26:21.120
And then I'm going to start thinking about it. And then it's going to be in my head. And then
00:26:24.680
somebody's going to send me a picture of an empty shelf. And I'm going to think it's the whole store.
00:26:30.060
It's not. It's just the toilet paper shelf. How many of you have seen the, the so-called empty
00:26:35.520
shelves pictures? Well, they take a picture of the toilet paper shelf that's empty. And then they go
00:26:41.160
to the cleaning supplies and maybe the rice and those are empty. And then you think, my God,
00:26:46.720
we're going to run out of food when the rest of the store has, you know, broccoli and pretty much
00:26:51.980
everything you want. So message to the task force. You don't need to be working on toilet paper.
00:27:01.060
Private industry's got that. You don't, you don't, we don't need any presidential decrees on toilet
00:27:05.720
paper. But just tell us the timing. You kind of need to do that for our, for our mental health.
00:27:13.200
It's a mental health question. When do you think the toilet paper will be back on the shelves?
00:27:19.040
Even more than the rice, because probably most of you have not dipped into your, your rice supply,
00:27:25.580
you know, your, your beans or whatever you got in your cans and whatever. You probably haven't
00:27:29.740
dipped into those because there's still food in the stores, but I'll bet you dipped into your
00:27:34.040
toilet paper supply, didn't you? I bet you did. But that supply, a little down. So directionally,
00:27:41.640
your government should tell you that even though on the surface, you'd think it would be the least
00:27:45.540
important thing. It just has a big hold on our brain. So let's, let's do something about that.
00:27:53.840
I, oh, here's some more good news. Elon Musk, as well as Tim Cook for Apple,
00:28:00.620
they're making ventilators. So it was confirmed that Elon Musk is not just tweeting and talking
00:28:07.400
about ventilators. They're making ventilators. And Apple's making them too. And quite a few. Now,
00:28:15.520
I don't know how many we need, but they're cracking them out. Other people are cracking them out.
00:28:19.420
You've seen a do-it-yourself, you know, directions for making your own ventilator with, I don't know,
00:28:27.640
parts you found or you find. So, you know, the opposite of the toilet paper story where there
00:28:35.500
was this, you know, a trivial thing that had a big hold on my psychology. This is the, the positive,
00:28:41.900
the other side of that, which is when you hear that Elon Musk is making ventilators,
00:28:46.720
don't you just feel better? Seriously. Well, if the, you know, arguably between Tim Cook and Elon
00:28:56.560
Musk, you have the two most capable manufacturers of physical items in the, in the country, in the
00:29:07.140
world, I don't know. I mean, don't you feel better knowing that they're fully engaged in this? I sure
00:29:14.240
do. But it does, it does raise one question, which I'm seeing over and over again. You know, I, I should
00:29:23.560
tell you, I have, I have two lives that are sort of operating simultaneously during this crisis. There's
00:29:30.040
the public part that you see and all the, all the stuff I tell you. But the moment I get off, I get off
00:29:35.640
of this Periscope. I'm going to be working for hours, uh, curating questions and, you know, can you
00:29:43.860
connect me with this person and answer this question? And, you know, uh, can you introduce
00:29:49.120
me? I've got a, I've got a thing. So there, there's a whole bunch of stuff that's, that's operating below
00:29:55.100
the, the public visibility. And that's a lot. Let me tell you, it's a full-time job. I, as soon as I
00:30:01.180
turn this off, it's all I'm going to be doing until the next time you see me on Periscope.
00:30:05.660
And I'm probably going to, you know, fall asleep in my bed tonight, like last night, you know,
00:30:10.820
connecting people and tweeting and stuff. So there's a lot going on, but one of the trends,
00:30:16.440
which I find alarming, but fixable is that when people are saying, you know, I have a source
00:30:22.980
for this or that supply, uh, if, if it has to be built or manufactured, the source is always in
00:30:30.140
another country. Uh, I have not yet identified an actual American company that's stepping up to
00:30:38.500
manufacture. There are a lot of American companies that have connections overseas or they, their
00:30:42.880
factories overseas. So there are American companies who are using foreign, um, assembly and manufacturing,
00:30:48.740
but it does seem as if this country doesn't know how to make things. We know how to engineer,
00:30:55.120
we know how to order things. We got good lawyers, we got good insurance, but if you need somebody
00:30:59.840
to slap together a factory and start assembling parts, it looks like we kind of don't know how
00:31:05.900
to do that anymore. Um, so we're going to have to look at that. And I, I'm sure that at this point,
00:31:11.520
the supply chain is coming home. So we'll see that happen. Um, let's talk about Joe Biden because we
00:31:21.340
have to, um, I'm watching other people. So it's not just me, you know, other, other smart people are
00:31:29.500
saying, um, where's Joe Biden? Where is Joe Biden? And here's my problem. Uh, you know, I, I think that
00:31:38.840
president Trump will coast to reelection unless we are surprised, unless there's something new that
00:31:44.880
comes up. I think he'll coast to reelection, uh, even, even with the crisis, even with everything
00:31:50.580
else. Cause you're going to, you know, we're, we're hearing enough of these Al Sharpton stories.
00:31:54.760
We're hearing, you know, governor Cuomo, governor Newsom saying that the president's doing the right
00:31:59.840
stuff and we're, we're going to watch some progress. I think the, the crisis will turn into
00:32:04.740
a positive for the president because he's a strong leader and you want a strong leader when you're in a
00:32:12.080
war. And I don't think people want to like, you know, get out of the canoe and change canoes in
00:32:17.920
the middle of a war. Right. So, uh, my estimation is that while the crisis can work, you know, both
00:32:25.360
ways, people will find something to complain about. You should have done it this way. But I think the
00:32:30.860
public is going to say, you know, he made some tough decisions, closing the airports and stuff.
00:32:38.440
And it was all hands on deck. He didn't, he didn't hold back anything once, once he was engaged.
00:32:44.100
I think he's going to get, he's going to get, uh, you know, a push on this, a bonus.
00:32:50.620
So unless it gets a lot worse and there's some way you can tie it to the government's actions in a way
00:32:56.220
that even the public would say, why'd you do that? Which could happen. Um, I think he's going to be
00:33:02.040
reelected, but here's my point. One of the benefits of our system is that you always have a
00:33:08.200
backup, small spare tire. So if you get a flat tire, you get a backup. Now in the course of the,
00:33:15.700
you know, regular governing, if your president is taken off the field for whatever reason,
00:33:21.820
you got a, you got a vice president. So that's a good backup. You know, vice president is a good
00:33:27.260
backup for a president, but there's another way in which we need a backup, which is the election
00:33:33.220
itself. So you want to have two candidates, ideally, where if, if one of them didn't win,
00:33:42.120
the other one wouldn't wreck the country. You know, it may not be the policies you like,
00:33:47.720
you know, maybe your taxes go up a little bit, down a little bit. Maybe you don't like that second
00:33:52.160
candidate, but they're not going to break anything. They're at least capable of doing the job,
00:33:57.500
right? We don't have that. President Trump is going to be running against, I don't know what.
00:34:07.500
I mean, Joe Biden is not even capable enough. And I think we can just say that as a fact.
00:34:13.240
I think we're beyond the speculating part. If Joe Biden were capable of speaking spontaneously
00:34:20.140
on camera to the country in this time of crisis, if he were capable, of course we'd see it.
00:34:27.480
Of course we'd see it. There is, there's no explanation during a presidential campaign,
00:34:34.400
and especially during a crisis, there's no explanation for why we don't see him. We see
00:34:39.040
Bernie, right? We've seen Pelosi. We've seen everybody. And they have some kind of BS excuse
00:34:46.460
about their, I don't know, they're doing construction at his house to turn it into a
00:34:51.100
studio or something. But he's got an iPad. I'm talking to the world. If I were running
00:34:59.720
for president, and this were the production quality, and I got a couple lights over there
00:35:05.780
and I just closed the shades, and I turned on my iPad, it's pretty good, right? I mean,
00:35:12.900
you know, at least I'm not doing the thing with my phone where I'm recording myself in portrait.
00:35:18.940
You know, at least I was clever enough to turn it sideways. And this is pretty good. If I were
00:35:24.420
running for president, I would just do this. I'd get a little iPad on my desk, face it, and turn it
00:35:31.480
on a couple times a day and say, I'm running for president. My name is Joe Biden. The president's
00:35:36.580
doing some great things. I'd like to see him do some other things here. And by the way, if I were
00:35:40.480
president, you know, you'd have better health care or something like that. It's kind of easy.
00:35:46.320
The hurdle that Joe Biden is not able to get over is so low that a child could do it. Meaning just
00:35:55.320
aim your iPad at yourself and turn it on. A child could turn on an iPod and aim it at their face
00:36:02.380
and broadcast to the world. How do I know that? Go to YouTube. On YouTube, there are infinite
00:36:09.700
infinite, seems like it, infinite children who have figured out how to do this. They put
00:36:16.500
the camera down, point it at themselves, turn it on, and you're live to YouTube. And Joe
00:36:22.540
Biden can't figure that out. We should stop, we should stop pretending. Whether you're a
00:36:30.660
Republican or a Democrat, remember this, these are strange times. You know, I'm Al Sharpton
00:36:37.080
today. But I'm also Donald Trump today. So it's strange times. And I'm actually a little
00:36:43.800
uncomfortable having the emergency backup plan being no spare tire. Because, you know, if
00:36:50.880
I'll just throw out some names to make my point. If John, let's say, let's say somebody else,
00:36:57.540
let's say, I don't want to put a name on it. Just, you know, pick a boring governor that you
00:37:03.140
think is doing a good job and is a Democrat, right? If the Democrats were running a boring
00:37:10.320
governor who just does a good job, I would say to myself, you know, I still prefer President
00:37:16.080
Trump, very clear preference. But at least we've got an emergency spare. You know, it's
00:37:21.840
a little tire, it only goes 50 miles, but it's not nothing. It's not nothing. And Joe Biden
00:37:27.240
is, I don't know how to say it more clearly, it is nothing. Joe Biden doesn't have the capability
00:37:34.240
of doing any job at this point. You know, he couldn't work at a 7-Eleven. And that's literally
00:37:39.360
true. I don't think he could handle a job at 7-Eleven at this point. Otherwise, you'd see
00:37:44.380
him on camera. So Democrats, I feel like you need to make the adult decision. And I mean this
00:37:53.040
in a nonpartisan way, I think whoever you run is going to lose. But, you know, do the
00:38:00.260
country a solid and run somebody who could run the country. And that's almost anybody.
00:38:06.160
Now, if you run Bernie, for example, I don't think he has a chance of getting elected. So,
00:38:13.420
you know, you might want to think of your own strategy there. But there are plenty of, you
00:38:18.680
know, moderate people who are still functional. You know, give us the emergency backup spare.
00:38:24.400
Trump's still going to win. But, you know, we're in an uncertain time. Anything can happen.
00:38:29.540
Give us the backup. All right. I asked people to tweet me questions again today. I did that
00:38:36.960
yesterday, and that worked out pretty well. So let's see if you've got any questions for me.
00:38:43.580
Bear with me, as my internet is very slow today. All right. So it looks like I've got 181 questions.
00:38:52.020
Some of these are going to be good. Ian says, can you speak about the trade-offs between the response
00:38:57.720
to coronavirus and the removal of civil liberties? Okay.
00:39:03.720
Ba-ba-ba-boom. And then he goes on about analogies. But I can answer this question.
00:39:09.080
Speak about the trade-offs between the response to coronavirus and the removal of civil liberties.
00:39:14.400
Well, here's why you need adults in charge. You need somebody to make hard decisions.
00:39:22.000
Fortunately, we do have a president who can make a hard decision. Imagine if you had a President Biden
00:39:28.000
and the experts told him to close the southern border. Could he do it? Don't know if he could.
00:39:36.080
Suppose you're the experts and you say to President Trump, you know, you ought to be thinking about
00:39:41.740
closing air traffic from Europe. Could he do it? Yeah, by the time you finish the sentence.
00:39:49.080
By the time they finish the sentence, he's on his phone saying, close air traffic from Europe.
00:39:55.080
So you have an adult in charge. People are appreciating that without saying they're appreciating it.
00:40:01.660
But we got the guy in charge who's going to make hard decisions all day long.
00:40:06.320
And you can trust that he will because you've seen it. Right. He has such a long track record
00:40:11.420
of doing things that, well, it's a tough decision, but I'm the adult in the room. I'm going to do it.
00:40:16.900
And I'm going to take the I'm going to take the heat. Could Biden do that? Could he?
00:40:22.800
It's a real question. I don't know if he could make adult decisions right now.
00:40:26.160
All right. So he had asked the tradeoff between civil liberties and
00:40:32.140
and the response to the coronavirus. I think the best answer to that is that it has to be
00:40:40.120
adult decisions. And if those adult decisions come down and they say,
00:40:46.320
Scott, I'm going to remove your civil liberties for a week. Just tell me why.
00:40:52.900
Just tell me why. Because remember, you know, this week I am Al Sharpton. But this week I am also
00:41:02.900
President Trump. And if either either of those people who are the same person at the moment
00:41:09.500
says there's a good reason why you should temporarily suspend my civil liberties, do it. Do it. You have
00:41:17.400
my absolute and complete support. Do it. Because the adults got to make the decisions. And if we trust
00:41:24.100
them, and I think Trump working with the experts is a very, very safe combination. I say just do it.
00:41:33.340
Because here's the thing I would trust. The thing that this country and lots of countries do it well
00:41:39.060
is we brainwash our youth. And in my case, I used to be a youth. The brainwashing, and I'm going to use
00:41:48.040
this in a positive term, the brainwashing that this country does to design the adults that get to run
00:41:55.360
the country is really, really good. And one of the things that we're all deeply wired, I'll say wired
00:42:02.380
instead of brainwashed. One of the things we're deeply wired by our system to appreciate is freedom.
00:42:09.400
So if this were some other country, you know, let's say a third world country, and the dictator
00:42:14.560
said, just for a week, I'm going to take away your civil liberties, would you trust that? No. No,
00:42:20.940
you wouldn't trust that. Because you think, oh, this is just the first step before we lose all our
00:42:24.920
civil liberties, and maybe it would be. But in the United States, we've got 370 million
00:42:32.720
wired, coded, brainwashed, designed, whatever word you want to put on it, human brains that aren't
00:42:41.660
going to put up with that kind of crap. So if you take our civil liberties away for a week with a good
00:42:48.020
reason, you'll get pretty good compliance. Two months from now, if the reason went away,
00:42:54.920
and we still don't have that civil liberty back, we're going to change things. We're going to
00:43:01.240
change our government. So there is no risk in the United States because the citizens are so well
00:43:06.820
designed. I mean, it's actually designed. It's brain design, if you want to put it that way.
00:43:13.000
So we are so well designed in this country that our government couldn't take our, at least an
00:43:17.480
important civil liberty away any longer than the reason for doing it remained. Now, you could argue
00:43:24.600
whether the reason has remained. And that will always be a gray area, but it won't be some sign of
00:43:29.440
approaching evil. All right, let's see. What's your estimate of the mortality rate? Well, you know,
00:43:40.760
the experts are lowering it all the time. I'm not going to give any kind of a dumb estimate that's
00:43:47.500
like, you know, cartoonist overrules scientists or anything like that. So I will defer to the
00:43:53.720
scientists. Do Greg Gutfeld and I have an understanding about material? And the answer is
00:44:04.840
we're friends and we think alike and we talk about a lot of this stuff offline. I use some of his ideas.
00:44:10.860
He uses some of mine. So yes, it is a fully, a fully friendly and ongoing situation. And I was
00:44:19.780
using Greg's examples yesterday, for example. So that's far more a case of two people who have
00:44:27.640
very similar thinking styles. We're both from Berkeley, both California. I mean, if you lined up
00:44:33.800
our opinions, they're going to be pretty close, probably 90% overlap. What do you do when your
00:44:40.920
DoorDash comes? Do you wipe down the containers? It's a good question. I'm not an expert on any of
00:44:47.700
these. So take anything I say with a grain of salt. The scientists say this. They say very clearly
00:44:54.720
that the virus lives on surfaces. They also say very clearly that that means you could get it
00:45:02.460
from surfaces. And it lasts quite a while on surfaces. But the scientists also say they haven't
00:45:09.760
confirmed any case where somebody just got it from a surface. Apparently the cases that they can track
00:45:17.460
down, there's always a person. They find a person. Now that person may have given it to them by putting
00:45:23.460
it on a surface and then you touch the surface. But the person is always identified as being in the
00:45:28.480
area for a while. In other words, I got it from my spouse. You don't need to ask, did he get it off
00:45:34.100
a surface or did it come from their mouth or something? You know the source was the person
00:45:38.960
and that's about as far as we can go. We don't know if it's because that kiss. We don't know if
00:45:43.500
it's because they shared a glass. We don't know. But what we don't have, and maybe we will, what we
00:45:50.920
don't have is somebody who's been isolated for two weeks and the only thing they touched was the
00:45:57.020
take care of food in a bag and then they got the coronavirus. I'm not saying it hasn't happened.
00:46:03.080
I'm saying we wouldn't know. But science is not saying that's identified yet. So here's my answer.
00:46:13.960
You can't take risk down to zero. That's not an option. And you've got to eat. I'm taking the trade
00:46:19.700
off that if I can keep my local restaurants and food businesses in operation, that's good for them.
00:46:26.680
I'm taking the risk that it's better than going to the store myself. I'm taking the risk that even
00:46:32.520
if I hired somebody to shop for me, which I literally did yesterday, a younger person with
00:46:37.680
a good immune system, and I gave a list that was sort of in and out, small basket, minimize the time
00:46:47.540
in the store and all that. So we're doing risk management. We're not eliminating risk. So the first
00:46:53.640
thing you should say to yourself is you don't live in a world where risk could be zero on the coronavirus
00:46:58.500
or anything else. But you can certainly take the choices that are available to you that are the
00:47:02.760
lower risk. So to answer your question, I pick up my bag from my front step. I have no human contact.
00:47:08.920
I pick it up from the bottom because I presume they probably talked they carried it from the top.
00:47:13.520
I get inside. I cut the exterior bag off it carefully, and then I wash my hands with soap.
00:47:22.360
Now, of course, the interior stuff could also have a problem. It's a non-zero risk, but I find that
00:47:31.940
an acceptable risk. Given that science is just not finding this direct path from objects to people,
00:47:37.840
we just know it could be, so stay away from it. Minimize it if you could. But I do what I can do,
00:47:45.040
and then I don't do what I can't do, which is I can't know what's on the interior contents. And so
00:47:53.020
I take that risk because it's better than the other risks. So I hope that's the answer.
00:47:59.320
Should the shelter-in-place be applied countrywide or only locally? I would say locally at first,
00:48:12.740
Somebody's saying thank you for the recommendation to watch the movie Ford vs. Ferrari. Yeah, a few
00:48:17.880
people have gotten back to me on this and said the same thing. If you're just looking for a good,
00:48:23.240
non-stressful, feel-good about America, America can do. If you're American and that's the vibe that
00:48:32.320
you want to feel, that movie really delivers. It's one of the best movies I've watched in a long
00:48:37.280
time because it never made me feel bad. It's hard to watch a movie that doesn't intentionally make
00:48:43.340
you feel bad and feel bad for the characters and stuff before they rescue the characters. I don't
00:48:49.100
like to go through the part where you feel bad before you get to the good news. I just don't want
00:48:53.200
to watch that movie. But this one, because it's based on real stuff, and even though I won't give
00:49:00.120
anything away, but it's not all good news all the way through, let me just say that, but it doesn't
00:49:04.640
make you feel bad at any point. It's just a well-made movie. So if you need a couple hours to get into a
00:49:11.340
different mindset to relax, that's a really good choice. Where can we find data on how the hospitals
00:49:16.900
are holding up? Well, apparently not from the task force. So that would be another thing that
00:49:22.720
the data visualizers should be doing on behalf of the task force. There should be a one-pager
00:49:28.860
that says, here are some of our metro hotels, here are some of our metro hospitals, here's normal
00:49:36.440
capacity, here's the maximum theoretical flexing capacity, maybe just for ventilators, maybe just
00:49:43.500
for ICUs, you know, you might need to break it down a little bit, but, and then change things as
00:49:48.760
you know what's happening. So we don't know that, I don't know if anybody knows that, and I doubt if we
00:49:54.420
saw the data, it would be presented in a way you could make much of it. So how to persuade others that
00:50:02.360
Fauci is on the solution side, and the disease is far more serious than the flu? Well, that's what I'm
00:50:12.360
working on, and the people who still think it's only the flu have to explain why we already see
00:50:21.040
hospitals being pushed past capacity. If it were the flu, hospitals would not be pushed past capacity.
00:50:31.680
If you notice anybody who's arguing it, just force them to think about that. Now the escape path I've
00:50:38.860
already identified is, they'll say, oh, but Italy is different. And they're going to say Italy has
00:50:46.040
old people. Italy, Italy is, in fact, I saw yesterday, a smart person say that Italy was
00:50:53.980
miscounting the number of people who were dying from coronavirus, and the way they counted it made
00:50:59.220
it seem like there were too many. So therefore, maybe we're panicking by looking at Italy, because
00:51:05.800
the way they're counting things is making it look like it's worse than it is. To which I say, what
00:51:11.580
the hell is wrong with you? The other thing we're clearly seeing in Italy is that their hospitals
00:51:17.500
can't handle the load. That doesn't happen with the flu. The only thing you should talk about when
00:51:25.000
somebody says it's just the flu, they're going to try to take you to numbers. Say, hey, they killed this,
00:51:30.360
killed that, didn't close for the swine flu. They're going to try to take you in that direction.
00:51:34.600
Don't do it. Stand firm and never leave this point. Hospitals are already overloaded, and we expect
00:51:44.540
10 times as much traffic based on the best experts' estimates of how this thing will evolve.
00:51:54.120
Some hospitals are already at capacity from this, and it will be 10 times bigger probably in a month.
00:52:02.720
That's what the experts say. Don't leave that point. The moment you leave that point, you're vulnerable
00:52:09.420
to lose your think, and people are going to be like, well, you know, it's different. Now, if they say, hey,
00:52:14.620
stop talking about Italy, that's, there's just a weird thing going on there. Say, China had to build new
00:52:21.220
hospitals. Tell me one other time that China had to build a new hospital in a week. Never.
00:52:27.780
And we also have American hospitals. New York City is getting close to capacity already,
00:52:34.480
and we're at the beginning, folks. We're at the beginning, and hospitals are nearing capacity.
00:52:41.040
So the people who say it's just the flu, don't leave that point. Hospital capacity, hospital capacity,
00:52:48.700
hospital capacity. Already numerous data points from Iran, New York City, Italy, China, South Korea.
00:52:59.740
Numerous data points. Don't leave that point. That's how you kill it. Kill the rumor that it's just the flu.
00:53:07.680
All right. Let's see what else we got. Is this a new normal for novel virus response?
00:53:15.960
Well, maybe. But again, there's a gigantic wildcard here. Two gigantic wildcards. One is how quickly can
00:53:26.280
we make test kits and labs that can evaluate the test kits? How quickly can we build an emergency
00:53:36.940
system for testing that's both product and system for getting it tested and getting back to you?
00:53:43.580
How quickly can we build that? But once it's built, will we always have that as our emergency plan?
00:53:51.640
Because the next time we have a flu, in theory, what we've learned from this one will allow us to just
00:53:57.580
pull the lever and say, all right, in three days, we're going to have, you know, a billion test kits,
00:54:04.520
or whatever this is the right number. So I think the new normal is that we won't, we'll be ready for
00:54:11.440
this war. You know, they always say you're always ready to fight the last war. And that's what bit us
00:54:16.560
in the butt this time, I think. But if you're saying, or will we not be ready for the next coronavirus?
00:54:22.900
Well, we're going to know a lot about these malaria, anti-malarial drugs that seem promising.
00:54:27.620
We'll know about the erythromycin cocktail. We'll know about the 10 other things in the pipeline.
00:54:33.540
We'll know about the vaccines. So my guess is, if I had to put money on it, it's the last coronavirus
00:54:41.580
pandemic. If I had to bet money. Now, if I put odds on it, I'd say 80%. I would say there's an 80% chance
00:54:53.340
you'll never see this again with, with this form of the virus, you know, or something, something in
00:54:58.920
its family. Because I think we will learn how to get it with tests and with meds and with vaccinations.
00:55:06.260
A year from now, we'll be in good shape. But we'll be recovered financially, at least somewhat well
00:55:12.540
before then. Next question. That's a funny question. I'll skip that one. Realignments from
00:55:28.300
high-density urban areas to more rural. I was kind of wondering about this, you know, the, just the
00:55:34.740
pure practicality of it. You know, let's say you said, hey, New York City, the only way we're going to
00:55:42.440
get to the other end of this. This is just hypothetical. I'm just, just brainstorming here.
00:55:46.260
Maybe somebody will have a good idea that's different from mine that is suggested. Suppose
00:55:52.140
you said to New York City, hey, hey people, if you have the capability to get out of the city,
00:56:00.080
get out of the city. You don't have to. But if you can, if you can find a place to pitch a tent,
00:56:06.580
you can find somebody in Nebraska and you've been tested. I suppose that would spread, maybe that
00:56:13.700
would just spread the disease when, never mind. It's probably too late to do social distancing in
00:56:21.200
terms of the city you live in, you know, temporarily going to the country for a few weeks, because that
00:56:25.820
probably would just spread it at this point. I would need an expert to weigh that, those options.
00:56:30.880
All right, Justin Hart asked this question. The death rate and disaster sold to us as a justification
00:56:40.640
for the shutdown are quickly collapsing. Does that matter? Justin, I got to check your, okay,
00:56:51.340
you're in marketing and sales. I don't want to be unkind, because I know you're a follower,
00:56:57.060
because you're, you know, you follow me on Twitter. So Justin, and I'm going to try not to be a jerk
00:57:05.440
about this, because I don't have anything against you, Justin. He shows the graph of, I guess,
00:57:11.940
what is it, the deaths? The fatality rate going down and down and down. So he's saying since the
00:57:17.080
predictions didn't pan out, you know, what do we make of that? Justin, the predictions didn't pan out
00:57:25.160
yet. And it's because we're flattening the curve. If we had treated this as business as usual,
00:57:35.340
things would be very much worse. So here's my recommendation to anybody who does not have,
00:57:42.800
I don't know, some kind of a background in the decision-making sciences. So if you don't have a
00:57:48.780
background in science, engineering, economics, perhaps, and you could think of several others,
00:57:53.320
look to people who do. So Justin, find somebody who's, you know, just somebody personally,
00:58:03.300
who's gone through one of those fields, and then show them your graph, and say, what does that tell
00:58:08.920
me? I think they're going to tell you what I told you, which is, that's the way it goes if we do
00:58:14.560
everything right. And that's the reason we're panicking, is to get everybody to do something
00:58:19.380
right. So the fact that, you know, we're getting some kind of control on this, shouldn't tell you
00:58:28.920
that we shouldn't have done it. That doesn't make any sense. All right. I'm trying to be kind about
00:58:34.200
that. But the people who did not have experience in decision-making, you really need to rely on people
00:58:42.360
who literally learned those skills. Let's see. Can Biden name his COVID-19 videos that he's not in
00:58:56.940
as his VP if they identify as female? Okay, that's just a joke. And by the way, I don't know if you saw
00:59:05.440
that a Biden campaign video was an expert talking about the coronavirus instead of Joe Biden. He
00:59:11.660
didn't even introduce him. That tells you everything you know about where Joe is. Whatever's happening
00:59:17.680
is not good for Joe. And I think they just need to make the adult decision and find a real candidate
00:59:23.400
there. How much overcapacity in supplies and equipment is the right amount for future pandemics?
00:59:30.520
Well, unfortunately, nobody knows that question. But I think the smarter approach is to have a
00:59:37.240
pipeline that can be quickly converted. So all of these factories that quickly converted into making
00:59:44.500
masks and stuff, they kind of have a template now. So there must be some kind of, you know, public
00:59:50.640
information about how to make these masks, etc. So I think the important thing is to know how to turn
00:59:55.800
the pipeline on quickly, not just having some in the emergency supply. Somebody said I've heard three
01:00:05.620
months. That sounds about right. Have we slowed down the spread? And by how much? I can't answer that.
01:00:12.680
Is there any truth to this, that the coronavirus is an intentional move to destroy the American economy
01:00:19.880
and ushering a single government, new world order and a digital currency? Is there any truth to this?
01:00:26.880
No. No, there's not. There's not. Let me let me say with complete certainty, there's no government
01:00:36.100
that would have done this intentionally. You know, it could have escaped accidentally from some government
01:00:43.040
facility, China. But there's no way that a rational person, and I think all the leaders of the countries
01:00:52.460
who could do this would be rational. There's no way anybody rationally did this as a strategy.
01:00:58.380
There are too many unknowns. The strategy is something you say, if I do this, it's going to lead to this,
01:01:04.680
this, and this. But this doesn't have that nature. This is just chaos. And, you know, you could tell
01:01:10.800
yourself, oh, maybe it's some anarchist who just wants to destroy the world or something. But even
01:01:16.580
then, they'd be taking credit. You know? So there's literally zero, zero, zero evidence of anything
01:01:26.140
but a very bad disaster that nobody intended. Let's see, what else we've got going here? Questions?
01:01:35.880
Why is our government saying masks don't work when it's obvious that they do? Basically, just
01:01:43.140
paraphrasing the question. And I think it's the same reason that Fauci is saying that hydrochloroquine
01:01:51.580
or hydroxychloroquine, I don't know the difference. But I think it's the same reason the government
01:01:57.060
is saying that the meds are unknown in usefulness. They're not really unknown. And nobody really
01:02:08.240
thought the mask didn't work. So remember, there are two things in this. There's the medical side
01:02:14.960
and dealing with the emergency, but they're also dealing with our psychology. So people like Fauci are
01:02:20.780
very aware that if they say the wrong thing, it's going to cause the wrong actions. So there is going
01:02:27.980
to be a disconnect. And I would expect more of it, not less. I would expect more of this disconnect
01:02:33.780
where the things they're telling you to do don't quite map with the things you know with certainty
01:02:40.260
to be true. And it's probably because the message has more to do about getting compliance in a way that
01:02:47.540
gets us to the end point best. I think it's a greater good. This is not one of those cases where
01:02:52.620
I'd be nitpicking the government, hey, you're lying to us, because I believe there are productive lies.
01:02:59.960
There are productive lies. I've never told you that your government should tell you the truth.
01:03:06.220
All right. For many situations, it's the preferred situation that you want your government to tell you
01:03:11.900
the truth. For many, you know, maybe 95% of the time. But there's a solid 5% of the situations where
01:03:19.240
the public would simply be worse off with a little bit more reality. Sometimes you might need to manage
01:03:28.140
the psychology, the mass hysteria, and it might take a little bit of shading of the truth. And maybe
01:03:34.360
you circle back to the truth later when it's safe. After this is done, I'm fairly certain that your
01:03:40.220
experts will say, yeah, we knew that wearing a mask would help the public, but we didn't have enough
01:03:47.360
masks. And I think that you're going to hear someday the experts say, yeah, we were sure a lot earlier
01:03:55.440
than we said about this medicine or that being effective, but we didn't want to cause a run on the
01:04:01.540
supply. I think that's what's going on. Thoughts on Candace Owens' stance? I don't know what it is about the
01:04:09.000
coronavirus. How do I choose a... Okay, I don't want to answer that one. Are there any doctors
01:04:22.840
saying this is an overreaction? Excellent question. Excellent question. So for those who say it's an
01:04:29.020
overreaction, find a doctor who's working in an infected area who agrees with you. Just one.
01:04:38.220
Just one doctor. Just find one doctor working at a hospital that's already seeing a bit of volume in
01:04:46.180
it, and let that doctor tell the world that it's not a problem. I think you've seen zero of that.
01:04:54.060
Somebody in the comments, I'm seeing that, you know, Dr. Drew are being mentioned. Correct me if
01:05:01.640
I'm wrong, but Dr. Drew has always been compatible with Fauci's recommendations. That's the end of
01:05:08.660
that story. If you can find me a counter to that statement, I'm not aware of it, but if you can't find
01:05:16.340
a counter, just drop it. Just drop it. If any doctor anywhere in the United States who was talking
01:05:24.340
about the coronavirus, and what they were saying was compatible at the time with what Fauci was
01:05:30.460
saying, and then it evolved with Fauci, because remember, Fauci didn't say we should close the
01:05:36.500
flights from Europe on day one, right? I mean, it took a while. He was evolving as information was
01:05:43.440
coming. So if any other doctor was evolving in the same way the number one expert in the country
01:05:50.580
was evolving, everybody's on the same page, doctor-wise. When do you think the recovery
01:05:57.420
process begins in terms of economy and containment? Well, it depends how you count it. The stock market
01:06:06.460
will recover as soon as we see that the trend is slowed or changing. So as soon as the stock market
01:06:13.840
notices that we're getting on top of it, it's a leading indicator. So that will be first.
01:06:21.080
And I think that the stock market will have some big up days and some big down days, no matter where
01:06:26.800
it's going in general. So I think that you're going to see maybe within two weeks, you're going to see
01:06:34.360
another, we've already had a kind of a stock market bounce. But in two weeks, if we get positive news
01:06:39.880
about the meds, the stock market is going to bounce back, not all the way. And when it bounces back,
01:06:47.760
it won't stay there. So you're going to see a wildly gyrating stock market that will respond to every
01:06:54.060
bit of new trend, new news. You should assume that in some country, they're going to get it under
01:07:00.440
control. And then it will flare back and then the stock market will react. But I think stock market
01:07:05.580
was first, you could see something of a beginning of a more up than down in two weeks when we know
01:07:12.600
we have some visibility on that. By the time we get test kits widely available, and you know,
01:07:21.780
I'm just going to use my common sense on this. I don't see us having enough test kits for a month,
01:07:27.680
even if we move heaven and earth. Because that just seems harder. But I think we'll have real
01:07:35.280
knowledge about pills and availability in two weeks. So I think it's a two phased recovery.
01:07:41.920
Phase one is getting pills at work, and maybe in some cases, young people, so long as they live
01:07:47.700
where there's access to the pills, and it's an efficient system to get them to them. I think
01:07:52.840
they'll go back to work sooner. So we'll have something like a half recovery or a three quarters
01:07:58.720
recovery, maybe in a month, because those people who went back to work will start getting things
01:08:04.120
going. At the end of the month, I think you're going to see the testing come online hard to the
01:08:11.960
point where you see the beginnings of these 60 plusers, you know, having a get in a jail card that's
01:08:18.900
starting to form. And at that point, it's going to look like we have a clear path.
01:08:24.700
So those are two things, the efficacy and safety and availability. Availability is really high on
01:08:31.600
the list, but I think we can solve that of the pills, the different kinds that we know work,
01:08:36.420
or I hope we know work. And then the test kits. So it's a two phaser. And I would say that
01:08:44.360
you'll see people released from prison as soon as the pills are available for them and just young
01:08:52.700
people. Here's my guess. I think in two weeks, we're going to get guidance about when we'll be
01:08:57.820
released. In two weeks, within two weeks, could be one week, we'll get guidance, which could change.
01:09:06.360
But I think the government will start to get in a position where they say,
01:09:09.820
here's where our plan is forming. And you can't fault the government for not having a solid plan
01:09:16.180
because we're still gathering information. But if they say, we're looking at, you know, this is our
01:09:23.500
back to work date, and we've got a plan to feed people until then. But as soon as the government
01:09:31.020
starts saying, you know, we're going to aim for this date to get this many people back to work,
01:09:36.220
you're going to feel like the momentum changed. Because we've been in full retreat, right? Every
01:09:42.920
time there's an announcement, it's a retreat. And as soon as that changes to, okay, here's a retreat
01:09:53.700
over here. But we also made some progress over here. And then it's going to be more progress than
01:09:58.740
retreat. I think in a month, it's going to be basically nonstop good news about human
01:10:06.220
human ingenuity. You know, you're going to have your Tesla ventilators, you're going
01:10:10.360
to have your pills, you're going to have your test kits, etc. So month is the longest for
01:10:18.540
Somebody asked this question. I don't know the answer, but it's an interesting question. If you
01:10:30.620
had two people, one is infected, and one has symptoms, you know, coughing, etc. And one does
01:10:38.040
not. And they both go out in public, let's say to different parts of the public. Which one would
01:10:43.860
infect more people? Someone who had no symptoms, or someone who had obvious symptoms in public?
01:10:51.020
Interesting question. I think it would depend entirely upon the nature of that public gathering.
01:10:56.360
Is it a restaurant, or is it just a crowd, or whatever? But you could easily imagine that the
01:11:01.100
person with no symptoms would take fewer precautions, and would be less easy to identify as someone to stay
01:11:07.920
away from. If you see somebody who's coughing, you know, you're running hard in the other direction.
01:11:12.980
If you see somebody who's not coughing, well, maybe you think this is a one time you should shake hands.
01:11:22.860
What are the actual real changes needed for health, for health care independence from China?
01:11:28.060
Mostly supply chain, I think. I think it comes down to that. Just making stuff here, or making stuff...
01:11:36.220
I mean, I could imagine making it in Canada, or Mexico, gets you close to the same degree of comfort.
01:11:44.560
Now, you might say to yourself, I don't know, does Mexico give you comfort?
01:11:48.700
And the answer is yes. Because our military would just go in and take over those factories,
01:11:54.520
if anything funny happened, right? So, we can't do that with, you know, China. If China said,
01:12:03.200
we're going to withhold your meds, what are we going to do? We're going to go without meds. But if
01:12:08.660
Mexico said, ha, ha, ha, United States, we're going to withhold your meds unless you do what we want,
01:12:16.260
well, we'd have the military who would be marching across the border and surrounding that factory in
01:12:21.540
about 10 minutes. So, you don't have to move it to the United States, but you need to move it into
01:12:27.120
the neighborhood, if you know what I mean. You know, and Canada would be equally safe,
01:12:31.220
not for military reasons, but because we, you know, we know we would work productively with them,
01:12:42.060
Can Congress make April and May rent and mortgage payments? Zero.
01:12:45.480
Because the theory being that it's easier for the landlords and the banks to absorb the losses.
01:12:52.940
You know, I've thought about that, but I'm not smart enough to connect all the chain of cause and
01:12:59.420
effect. So, there's an, it's an appealing suggestion and it would go like this. If you're paying rent or
01:13:05.640
you're paying mortgage, you just don't pay for two months, period. And, and then it just starts when,
01:13:11.840
when things go back to normal. Um, that might actually be a good idea. It's, it's good enough
01:13:19.640
that I'd like to have an economist wrestle with it and tell us, because, you know, you've got,
01:13:25.280
uh, and I know in my own life, I know people whose only income might be the, the several rental
01:13:31.660
properties that they have. So, for the several rental properties, those people do not pay rent means
01:13:38.300
that at least the one person that doesn't have an income that month. So, I don't know, you'd
01:13:44.040
have to do the math, but I wouldn't rule it out. Um, uh, looking at some of your questions
01:13:53.840
are funny. Uh, why is San Francisco allowing Chinese airlines to resume flights to San Francisco?
01:13:59.960
What? What? What? Is, is that true? San Francisco is allowing Chinese airlines to resume flights
01:14:11.560
to San Francisco? Really? Now, I don't know about that story, but I'd have to assume that
01:14:18.200
they have, of course, considered the risk. And of course, there must be maybe a quarantine
01:14:25.380
or testing. Maybe, maybe they're using some of their limited testing to test people right
01:14:30.740
away before they send them into the public. I don't know. So, I don't know about that story,
01:14:36.480
but, uh, it's worrisome. Um, should they, should they address or debunk the Medium article at the
01:14:47.740
presser? Yeah, you know, so there, I mentioned it, there was that, that Medium article that was
01:14:53.240
going around that's being pulled off of platforms for being, you know, grossly, um, grossly damaging,
01:15:01.980
I think, because it's, it's just not good information. It's not, it's not put together
01:15:06.860
in a way that's helping the public. Should the presser debunk it? Maybe so. Maybe so. I don't
01:15:13.480
know that they need to, uh, mention it by name, but it got so much attention. Maybe so. Yeah. Uh,
01:15:21.100
it could go either way, but I think maybe so. Um, husband asks, why can't used masks be put in
01:15:28.760
paper bag, sit for a week until germs are dead and be reused by same person? Um, I don't know.
01:15:39.540
I don't know. Good question. I've heard that if you put the germs in heat or not the germs,
01:15:48.600
the virus in heat, uh, and I've heard numbers, who knows if this is right, but 133 degrees for 15
01:15:55.960
minutes, you know, two days in a row. And, and it would, it would kill, you know, just the second
01:16:02.000
day just to do any mop up in case there's some left. But, um, if you had a dry sauna and you took
01:16:10.120
your used and badly infected mask, and you just put it in your dry sauna and just ran that thing
01:16:16.100
for a day, would it kill it? Don't try this at home because you could end up getting yourself
01:16:22.960
killed. I'm not advising it, but I'm asking somebody saying a freezer. Now I see in the comments
01:16:30.980
debunked. So here's, let me give you the common sense answer because I can't answer you
01:16:37.000
scientifically. The common sense answer is, uh, there are a lot of doctors and scientists
01:16:44.680
involved in this question. I'm pretty sure they would have tried that. I'm pretty sure that
01:16:54.140
we would know that. But just in case, just in case, let's float that question. There must be
01:17:01.580
enough people on this periscope that somebody has looked into that who has a scientific background
01:17:06.900
and can tell us, no, no, no, Scott, you would either ruin the integrity of the mask. That's
01:17:12.400
possible. Or you would, um, you know, you don't want extreme temperatures because the integrity of
01:17:17.220
the mask would change and then it just wouldn't be a mask. Um, or maybe they've tested it and you
01:17:23.440
just can't get rid of the virus. I don't know. I mean, we've been told that a virus doesn't live
01:17:28.480
more than how many days or how many hours, depending on the material. So your husband's question
01:17:35.160
is really kind of excellent. And just curiosity alone, I'd like to know the answer to that.
01:17:42.120
Uh, somebody says, Google it. Um, can somebody do that? Why don't you Google it for me and see
01:17:49.480
if anybody's answered that question. It's a really good question, but you have to think that with this
01:17:54.000
many experts looking at a mask shortage, if it were that easy, I feel like we would have heard that by
01:18:00.420
now, but you never know, right? You never know. Um, uh, let's see. Thoughts on the coronavirus
01:18:11.100
affecting the cartel supply chain, including fentanyl. Well, as many of you know, this is
01:18:18.800
kind of personal to me because my stepson died from an overdose, including fentanyl. And, you know,
01:18:25.920
I, I blame China for creating it and sending it to Mexico and the Mexican cartels for selling it.
01:18:32.440
And of course I blame the Mexican government for being essentially owned by the cartels.
01:18:38.440
Now, interesting side note, Philippe Calderon, who was president of Mexico, I don't know, 2006 to 2010,
01:18:50.160
he actually follows me on Twitter. So I just noticed that the other day because I think he liked
01:18:57.020
something I did. And I thought, I wonder if he follows me on Twitter. So the ex-president of Mexico
01:19:02.060
follows me on Twitter and, uh, you know, you'd probably ask yourself, well, will that, will that
01:19:08.740
control the things you're willing to say? Well, watch me. The, the government of Mexico is clearly
01:19:16.460
owned by the cartels. So if you thought it would stop me, now you know. Um, uh, and by the way,
01:19:26.060
I'm not blaming Philippe Calderon personally. I'm just saying that at the moment it's, it's so obvious
01:19:33.220
that we don't need any confirmation. Um, any reports on massive, massive ramping up of U.S.
01:19:41.540
testing gear and stuff? Um, no, no. And that's, that's exactly why we need a data visualizer to be
01:19:48.460
part of this. Um, looks like I'm running a little bit long and, uh, I'm going to end it here.
01:19:55.620
Why don't we just freeze the stock market? You'd have to ask somebody smarter. I don't, I don't know
01:20:04.020
do, do, do, do, do. What is the first industry that will decouple from China? Well, the priority
01:20:08.540
will be meds and pharmaceuticals. I don't know if it will be first, but it will be certainly be the
01:20:13.040
priority. Um, when will we be able to open businesses? I think we're talking a few weeks
01:20:22.640
as in a month and maybe sooner for some selected businesses, but it will be, it'll be phased. It's
01:20:30.000
not, uh, I don't think there's even the slightest chance that you wait 18 months to open your
01:20:35.840
business. So if you're worried about that, no chance. And I don't think there's the slightest
01:20:41.380
chance things will be closed for a year. I put both of those as zero because we're, we're playing
01:20:48.580
some brinksmanship. We're not crazy, right? Brinksmanship is that you take your economy,
01:20:55.560
you know, right to the edge, but you don't break it. You know, you, you stress it as much as you think
01:21:01.560
you can, but it's just to get ahold of the, you know, get a, get on top of the virus, but you don't
01:21:07.500
break it. If we're still doing a lockdown a year from now, we're broken. So what you can trust is
01:21:14.100
that everybody knows that. I mean, that, that calculation is top of mind for every person
01:21:19.200
involved here. So this reminds me a little bit of an old Star Trek episode where the captain,
01:21:26.420
Captain Kirk is asking, uh, the engineer, chief engineer, Scotty, uh, Captain Scotty, if you'll give
01:21:33.640
him warp nine, and you know how that conversation goes, you know, Scotty, you know, give me warp nine.
01:21:39.280
And then Scotty goes, I cannot give you a warp nine. Captain, the ship is only built for warp eight.
01:21:45.440
We can't handle it. It'll start, it'll come apart at the seams. And the captain will say,
01:21:51.020
give me warp nine. And Scotty will say, hi, hi, hi, captain. And then Scotty somehow makes it work.
01:21:58.640
So we're sort of trapped in a Star Trek episode in which, you know, the warp drives our, our economy.
01:22:08.240
And right now that economy is sort of at warp nine in terms of, you know, danger to the structure,
01:22:16.000
but we're not going to go to, we're not going to go to warp 10 because even Captain Kirk doesn't ask
01:22:23.580
for warp 10. But what you should expect is that on the atomic, I'm stuff, I'm sorry, on the economic
01:22:31.440
stuff, however scared you are now, you're going to be way more scared because doing the right thing
01:22:39.980
and doing the wrong thing look exactly the same for a while. So doing the right thing and the wrong
01:22:45.240
thing will look like keeping the economy closed for a few more weeks. Right thing and the wrong thing
01:22:50.880
are the same for those two weeks. It's what you do after that. That's the difference between the
01:22:56.240
right thing and the wrong thing. So we are not doing the wrong thing now, for sure. For sure.
01:23:04.180
Because we're not going to break the government, or I'm not going to break the economy in a few weeks.
01:23:09.980
But if we're having this conversation in a month, then you're going to have to ask yourself,
01:23:15.320
is Scotty or Captain Kirk on the right side. But, you know, there are a lot of adults in the room
01:23:22.020
making those decisions, and I think we'll be fine. And I will talk to you again later today,
01:23:26.200
not sure when, but before you go to bed. And I will talk to you later.