Transcript
Oh, stretch it out, stretch it out, and talked in a while. Welcome back live from your hateful bowl of shredded Dei flakes. That's a, that's a good return, right? That sounds delicious to me. It's a business pants Friday show here at May 15th. PayPal, does a very PayPal thing and makes me happy. I don't use PayPal anymore. Oh, people are drinking less gas. And the forever fake folks. He Warren Buffett. Oh yeah, he's still around. He's still executive cheer right. Berkshire Hathaway is. I mean he wasn't Howard and Susan Buffett are both on the board so like he's not involved, they doubt it. Our show today is being sponsored by free flow analytics, freefall analytics.com. The only platform measuring board power connections Before Christmas for free. Yeah. That's what I heard. That's what I heard. You know what? Let's not belabor any points here. You were away. Yep. Nothing got done on content while you were away, but good. I was building big things in a dark dungeon somewhere. Good. Let's just let's just come back and do a show. Are you ready? You know. Yes. I was gonna talk but I don't want to get. Okay, I'll just say I Googled Berkshire board. And the first link that comes up just says directors and offices of the company. Which makes you believe that its current right? And then you clicked on it? First of all, Charles Munger is still a vice chair so he still alive, I guess. Yeah. And then Warren is chair and CEO. Nothing about Greg Abel so I don't know, I don't know what's going on. Well, it don't like to update things, they don't like, yeah. They they have like a guy who's like 83 years old who learned HTML when he was 60 like updating that website. That's not exactly modern. So let's move on. Alright now, let's do it. Did you play? Oh, it's working. No, no, no, no, no. Story of the week. Yeah. Do we have any, what did anything happen this week? Just like all the the ticks I found well, hiking through beautiful Nova Scotia. My stories will will kind of land like ticks sucking your hopefully they're all the the meat allergy induced the Texas, the longhorn the meat, the Lone Star Meat, tick, or whatever, All right. No particular order because I know you're not gonna vote for this first one but I actually wasn't paying attention to the for the news while it's gone. So I'm just including things that I don't know. For good you just realized Trump trump this already happened. Maybe Trump is bringing Tim Cook, Elon Musk in a dozen other CEOs to Beijing for his Summit. So We got seven from Tech, you know, Elon Tim Cook Jensen Wong. Not Zuck though. Dina Powell McCormick from meta who we have already come as a she's like the the Trump whisper, Larry Fink's. Stephen schwarzman, Jane free blah blah blah diesel. I don't know. You gotta say anything to say about this. What I'm actually I'm a little curious. Like, so first of all, it's a six, it's a 17 hour flight from DC to, I assume the CEOs flew into Washington and then joined the president on the plane, except for Jensen Wong, who I read, they picked up in Alaska. I don't know what he was doing in Alaska so they don't even go non-stop like the president has to have a layover. That's true. What is What do they do when they get to China? Like, what are the CEOs doing? Are they did like, Tim Cook go, visit Foxconn and see how many, you know, suicides there were that day or isn't Tim. The only one that China actually likes because don't they Tim's? The only one who out of this list who's regularly? Not complained about China, right? Zuck used to say like what about China. I remember used to make everyone afraid of China, but Tim has been selling iPhone's forever in China, right? Yeah, well yeah. He also I think has like clamped down on anything that China said clamped down on, right? Like I'm pretty sure but it did anyone from like the Ellison? Nepo Clan go do we know? No, I don't see any media on this list. It's Tech, Finance, Aerospace, payments, and services, and Agriculture and biotech, you know, I just think it's great. That, you know, when we go talk to another world power that we're just bringing CEOs and no other representative from our society. I just think that says it all. I just like that. I like, it doesn't Larry think represent all the normal people. Isn't that the way that works? Yeah, where's Texas student? Texas be angry at, Larry Fink going, isn't he? The like leftist ESG, woke Munger? I don't know. You see this list though and it's like so depressing. I thought I saw a woman on here. Kelly, ortberg of boat, that's a man. No, sorry Jane, Frazier. That's definitely a woman. And then there's sort of a woman Deanna Powell McCormick is sort of a woman but she's there to represent sucks so I don't know. Yeah, she doesn't count. She's not a CEO. She's actually the only ones on CEO. So one. So we got one woman. We got a woman, right? It's not bad. Out of a list of like, like 17. It's pretty good. I mean, if you throw a dart At The Fortune 500, CEOs, you wouldn't hit a woman, wouldn't hit a woman so it'd be fine. This is actually representative. That's fine. That's the first story. Second Story. PayPal agrees. To 30 million dollar settlement with with Trump's justice department over quote illegal Dei, which makes me so angry. But well I almost picked this because I'm doing triggered know they're already triggered. So I guess this isn't respond. I don't know. Supposedly, this isn't response to, you know, PayPal. Daring to have a. An Economic Opportunity fund for black and underrepresented minority businesses back in 2020. I mean, you know, Again not like are they one of like 50 companies that in 2020? Yeah, George Floyd did the same exact. It's not like our, you know, country was built off the Free Labor of slaves or anything. I mean, that's not part of our history, it's not anymore at least, but so, You know, I don't want to go in all that. I mean, all that sucks. The Department of Justice sucks. Trump sucks. They're all idiots. They're racists. So but I want to focus on PayPal. I mean I'm not gonna I don't need to prove to anyone that the Trump Administration is racist. I mean, even they know they're racist. But right. I mean we're over this, right? That's why I didn't put it in trigger. Yeah, because they know like they know what this is about right. PayPal themselves are even worse, right? Like Okay, so let's talk about PayPal quickly, because I want to just talk about why, of course PayPal and they're saying that, you know, this could be a big precedent for other companies because You know, they didn't fight. They're folding, they're basically admitting not a president. All right, so here we go. There, independent shares, David Dorman. He represents 17% of board influence. According to freefloat, he is also a member of the Dell board. Where don't Michael and Dell Michael Dell and Donald Trump or BFF? Their buddies Johnathan christodoro. He's a former managing director at Icon, Capital Karl. And Dawn, old. Two old BFFs. Yeah, yeah. And then, of course, the, the background of PayPal is the founding Mafia the PayPal Mafia, the Great Name, That's all of Trump's BFFs. Now that I think about it must with Doge. David sacks was the AI and crypto Czar. And then, of course, Peter Thiel, basically created JD Vance, right? He molded him, In fact, all the money and it's, you know, it's not a great look because everybody hates it events. And then finally, there's even an Intel director on the board Frank Ury. He has 12% of board influence. I mean between Chris adoro, Euro, Yuri and Dorman. You have almost half of the board's influence, but he's been Frank Geary is the chair Intel but a direct response and of course Trump Just got his grubby hands on Intel earlier this year, right? He yeah, government now has a suppose. They still have a stake even though nobody knows what they're doing with it. Yeah, so that's PayPal. I mean, this is why I didn't get triggered and this is all. So why? I don't know that it's a precedent, right? Like this is basically Trump people paying Trump themselves, right? Like, this is, yeah. I suppose, I suppose you're right. I but that doesn't get Unearthed in the stories. You read, right? Oh, they make it sound like oh, they really. They're fucking the Dei, right? Like there really. But if we're on us, Of all the companies to do this. I mean, like, you'd expect, you know, like Chevron Exxon, PayPal meta, they're all gonna give like a million dollars, they're not. And they're not gonna fight, they're, they would never ever fight this. I'm just wake me up when somebody matters that actually either capitulates or fights. Here's what I missed this happened. Last week. Again, I wasn't really looking at the news that this is from Slate. The headline is, it was one of Doge's most absurd, abuses a court. Finally exposed it. So so somebody is fighting and that is the National Endowment for the Humanities. So they sued Doge last May. And finally it took a year but US District Judge Colleen McMahon. Of course, it's always a woman so really it's always sure issued a massive 143 page ruling basically saying that these it was a bunch of knitwits and it was a completely unconstitutional and their bunch of, I mean, I'll I think we've covered this before But essentially she said that the Doge staffers are dopest, they're they're actually wrote that down their Tech Bros with no background, the humanities and yet decided that they had the expertise to, to to, to guts to the right. They they somehow suddenly had this is the meritocracy at work, right? Yeah. I know nothing. But I can make all your own dopest the decision to cut grants to the Arts. I want to know where those dopes are. Those dopes should feel deep, shame everywhere they go. She didn't call him dope, but she did say that they were 20 something, with quote, zero experience in Humanities. So, again, there's your meritocracy Then there was the she pointed out the the woke filter essentially that they basically looked for anything with Dei, identity, culture and women and they just, they just got rid of it, right? They basically used chat GPT to cut Grant's, right? Yeah. Yeah. Which and she called it a tech quote, a textbook example of unconstitutional Viewpoint discrimination. Say that they hate that. Yeah. If you join the proxy countdown, show later, if you listen to that, all of the anti Dei anti-woke, proposals are all claiming, Viewpoint, just Viewpoint discrimination. One thing she pointed out the the one that really got her going was that I guess that they flagged and canceled a documentary about Jewish women's slave labor during the Holocaust. Because the AI driven filter focused on Jewish cultures quote and female voices, quote, and that was just too much that combination is Dei. That's just too much right too many minorities happening there at once. And, and it was, it was negative Nazi propaganda. They don't like that either. And then, she also pointed out, that Doge wasn't even her. It's not even a real government agency. That's, that's the thing that is crazy about this, right? It's not even real. It was made up. Well, the money's not going to is not exactly like they're gonna pay them now. Right, like that the lawsuit. Well, how do you say that? Well, it will probably eventually go to the Supreme Court, which will, obviously, shut this down. But why do you write how do you know? Well, how do you know, because they have an everything that they don't listen to anything. There are no, there's no rules. They don't care about the rulings. They just they just slowly play it, play it out. But actually the more interesting substory to the story is not the Doge part of the story is the use of Chachi to do these things. That like your name to use grok? Uh, well, first of all, yes they should have used grok but it sucks. Right. Like so they can't even probably use it. But Chad GPT in and of itself, you know, like does it flag its users for like, heinous shit? Shouldn't it have set like flagged every Doge user for, you know, like gonna looking for Nazis or or anti-Semitism or something? Yeah, keep dreaming. I'm just, I just like that GPT. The money didn't even go back to the treasury. Remember first, remember Elon Musk promised he's Gonna Save like, I don't remember the he keeps this ridiculous figure like three trillion dollars or yeah, trillion trillion dollars. Yeah, this this specific Act of horrible. Miss say quote, unquote saved 100 million dollars but it didn't go to the treasury. It got funneled into other projects, like the National Guard of American Heroes, different Grant. Yeah, which is all bunch of like wait, dude, statues. I mean this is just these guys it's just not even close to anything else worse and then finally that's my third Story the week and then finally my fourth one ah, this is from The New York Times and I thought it was important to catch this one for our show because Now, you didn't agree with me before about a precedent but these things do set precedents just like using AI as layoffs. Excused also sets precedents The times covering that the headline is, why too big companies? Just cut Paid Family, Leave. They focus on zoom and Deloitte. I'm not gonna go into all the details but they're basically just slashing benefits. They're just slashing benefits. For for really, a no reason there's no justification and in fact, Deloitte is even worse because they're reducing them specifically for their, for the, the poorer employees, the admission administrative staff, IT staff, the step generally, the earns less than the consultant. Well, they have, apparently, if you're running these companies you haven't made enough money yet. So you got to find a way to cut everybody who had anything that make their lives. Liverpool. If this isn't like a just a loud warning Bell that you that we need unions and all sectors. I mean, United Airlines flight attendants last week, finally ratified an incredible new package here at Deloitte Zoom It's just benefits that you would assume would stay forever are just suddenly roll back and I got a point out props to zoom CEO Eric Yuan, who controls the whole freaking company. Yeah, he's got, he's dual class here. There's no one else allowed to have a say on the stupid company, right? And I don't even know how they're still in business because there are literally 17,000 other ways to talk to each other on the internet with through a video. So I don't know how it's still a company but he also had a cute quote this week a headline saying I hate working five days. AI could shrink work weeks to three days in a major future shift. So he's he's doing one of these down below Hardy things where he's on one hand saying you were no longer going to pay if anything happens to you, there's no safety net. No but on the other hand you're going to have two days off and get paid less. Yeah. Because AI is doing your work for you. He's pretending like, he's one of the workers. He's like, guys, I'm with you. Like I hate you my right? Yeah. Those are my four dumb stuff. Honestly, that there was a story that you pulled about how Zuckerberg's employees hate him, because he's created like what he did, this AI avatar for himself and it's like everyone thinks it's an asshole and they and then they announced like that they were, you know, cutting staff and they did the way they did it. Like they announced all this, all this shit, they're just piling onto the employees just being Asked assholes like about everything like and and this is exactly what is happening here, right? Like there's no reason to do this, you just being assholes. It's like I should have been made these assholes the week. All right, so these are my four. Oh, I'm not gonna pick the D. The PayPal one. It's in summary. I had the CEOs in Beijing. PayPal Doge stupid and Paid Family, Leave gets. It's the last one. Yeah, it is too big companies cut Paid Family Leave. Yeah, because you're absolutely right. It's a canary in the coal mine. Every they have been preaching with this AI bulshit abundance that like, there will be great. Abundance must tells you don't even bother because pretty soon you're gonna we're gonna yeah, you're gonna be. Yeah, it's great. It's great, abundance. In the meantime that this is what they're actually doing. They cut 30% of their staff and say AI, they cut all your benefits. If you if you're still lucky enough to be around, right? Like and then they go out and say, Like dude bro it's awesome to work three days a week instead of five, isn't it? Yeah what's awesome. When you have dual class shares and you own the company, it's pretty great. But when like your grandmother is sick and you have to fucking leave work, because they're dying and the companies like sorry, we don't support that anymore for no reason. No, good reason. It's just, we want the money for, you know, Eric wants the money. That's the reason that's rolling back benefits. It just seems so morally wrong, right? You just assume That they would accrue, right? You would never go back just like you wouldn't lower the wages on people, right? We don't go backwards on. Well, the worst part, I really like how are we going backwards on benefits? It's not so much that we're going backwards. That's the worst part. The worst part is that the employees are all shocked, like The Meta employees were all shocked and they felt like totally demoralized. You work at a company that basically sells fucking attention and body dysmorphia and like, it's what what you do is one of the worst things you can do. And so, and then you're like shocked when they treat you like shit. Like these people, the executives. These billionaires do not care about any of you at all. You are a means to an end. I'm picking that one. All right, now I'm gonna fire it up. All right, let's do some good lists. So we make good time. Not really, let's move quick. Let's move quick. Oh yeah, I'm gonna go. You go first mine, sort of, I'm pulling a matte mascardi here, mine's kind of tongue and cheek. There's not a lot of room for two. Matt maskaeris it you have to choose who you believe here. If you believe the CEO, then it's good list. But I just, I just had to laugh. I just had to throw this somewhere in the show, so I I just put it here. Put it here, that's good because I just love dumb CEOs on a Chipotle CEO. Scott, Boatright. Tells customers to just ask if they want bigger portions after downsizing accusation. He said, quote, you should ask for a little more. We serve big, beautiful, bowls and burritos. Full stop no questions. Asked if you want more, just ask the team member. I promise you. There's never a team member on that line that's going to say, no. So, he's just saying, yeah, just ask, I mean this, I mean, this thing I'm sorry. I mean, it's like you're the boss said to give you small portions. Yeah. And, and what the hell is this? And then goes to the customer and says, oh we're not giving you smaller portions. If you just ask for bigger ones, I love that. I love it. This comes to from the okay, let's I want to set the path here for Scott Boatright, okay? The star Brian Nicholas for Starbucks, right? And chipotle is like, oh shit, like we love Brian Nichols, he's gone. This guy was the CEO, right? Which is he should be next in line. Yeah, next but no Chipotle had to make him in terms CEO for a while for several months, while they look for someone better and then and I'm serious. And then they put them in. Then they put him in the role and still, not even really a Top Choice. He's still his CEO pay issues, 886 to one. So he's making as much as the average employee. Like it 9 a.m. basically the first day of the year and yet he wasn't even there. They didn't even really want this guy. But anyway, just asked for more that just, this should be everywhere. I think, I think Zoom employees and Deloitte employees just, you know, they they cut the benefits know, just go back and say, no no, I want more weeks. I want to know, I want more worst part. The worst part about this is this the the instinct to make it your problem? Yeah. Like like everything. Is I tell you, I, but it's the same as like, you watch Fox News for 20 minutes and the things that they say are basically like, oh, you know, Liberals are destroying this country, prove me wrong and it's like always on you to figure it out and and prove someone wrong. This is like, oh you're getting less, just ask for more. It's it's like more you fix your problem and it totally speaking. One of the toughest things to teach young people, these days is to use their voice to ask for more. They're they don't, it's not that's not how the generations work its generation looks at their phones and they don't make eye contact. Much less talk, right? Like like this is again. How about you just you just give them more because yeah there's no right. Anyway. All right I got one. My good list is oil shortages? Yeah you're just like yours. There's two stories. First one was beard. Demand. Stumbles as Gas prices. Surged data shows isn't that like a double good like less drunk drinking, drunk idiots and less drunk? Idiots, driving, right? Like it's win-win. I love this. And the other one was oil. Shortages are even hitting colored snack bags, colored snack bags. Yeah, first of all, that Doritos or something. Or yeah, there's it was actually like like snacks and Asia, right? Like it was, they didn't show like Doritos. Yeah, but and and the phrasing like colors snack bags, both racist and confused. It's funny because I actually take the office opposite path because like, when I'm in the grocery store, One of my favorite tortilla chips for instance. It's in a clear bag. These beautiful like homemade Tache chips and a big clear bag. So yeah. Does that mean the colored snack bags are the ones that are disgusting. Like, what is these? Are the bags that like whatever they put inside the bag, they want you to buy it somehow? Yeah. They don't like it. See how nasty? Yeah. It's just, you know. So it's great because it's like maybe less snacking, right? Like they should have a picture of the snack box before and after and they're just black and white snack bags now. Now, apparently, so like that. I like that. Mine is the winner. I'm not so good. All right, let's do triggers. Trigger is of the week. Okay, so no asshole. Yes. No, he's just triggered me all though. They are just assholes, am I get to vote? Yeah, you definitely triggers me the most. I go ahead. All right, first up, this is gonna be the winner. I'm not gonna, you know, I'm not gonna leave the jury, but this is the winner Brett blundy. The Great Name you ever heard of Brett blendy? Only because, you know, I work here and I noticed the story this morning but I don't think I would have remember the name, but I do love the name. Brett blundy, sounds like blow up blow already. Yeah, sounds like something, a guy who comes to meetings, shirtless is what I imagine. He is an activist investor but really he's not an activist investor. He's the owner of Bebe. RCS and Australian, guy bbr's billionaires. He's a billionaire. He's a retail guy. He's, he's sells you know, fast jewelry, bulshit. In fact, he's, he made his billions by selling his company bras and things. Which what are the things I know the bras are, I don't, I don't know, the things are. But can you imagine getting a broad bras and things did? He just misspelled thongs? Like, I understand brought along songs, but what are things? Well, he's like pretzels. I don't really know, they weren't specific, but he sold bras and things to Hanes. Oh God. This is all just, we're just like everything you say. I imagine just trash piles. Like, what are they called those? Yeah, yeah. Like landfill, I just imagine landfill but they also it it's not just landfills, it's like what, what they send to like sub-Saharan Africa when your team loses Super Bowl, they send like they send bras and things and the old Super Bowl shirts that for the non-winter and shirts that lasts about eight months washing in a normal literally on your body wear them. Yeah, he currently chairs the company called lovisa. It's just a fast fashion jewelry business and he owns 13% of Victorious. Secret doesn't talk about okay. I didn't realize he was giant steak and he thinks he can run it better than it. Okay, run. Well, he's really disappointed, he's got Frozen things. Yeah, well, yeah. So we know everything about bras and things about everything in the world, really, really hold the thing. Yeah, he he bought a Victoria's Secret bought a company called adore me, which is an online retailer and names. Yeah. And and it didn't, it hasn't like panned out, super well. They've had some, you know, like earnings dropped some in the last year, and it's been kind of stagnant because honestly, like, how many bras do you need in reality? Like, I don't actually don't even know the answer to that. Now was standing. Brett blundy is very disappointed in Victoria's Secret. He's launched an activist. Can't campaign against Victoria's Secret. He's demanded as many as four board seats and as little as two, he's suggesting that you vote against the chair of the board. And he suggested that you voted against one woman who he claims is, the reason why they bought a door. Me. Her name is A Nancy nafisi know. It's Miriam Miriam nefesi. Yeah Miriam nefesi. I don't know why. She's just she's done online retail. He seems to think that she's the reason but it's it's me very much is like one of those. Oh you just pick a dart board, person a woman. All right, you're out kind of kind of approach to voting out but it's worth mentioning here that it's not exactly like Blondie's a billionaire, but it's not exactly like his company is doing super well Louise's one year market. Returns negative 22% compared to the Australian stock 200 is plus 4%. So he's underperforming his Market but he's busy spending money to buy Victoria's Secret. This is what triggered me that's a lot of context because as an Australian blowhard churring lavisa, first of all another white guy like L Brands was owned by a geriatric old white guy. Lex, what's his name? Wagged Wexner. Yeah, he's like he's cut up on the Epstein Falls, right? He's like a bro. Yeah bro, like like scumbag gummy like white guy's oh yeah, with money. Who may talk to women's clothing? Yeah. Right. Like he's another one of those. Here's the the levisa board, this free flow cover. Let me support the public. We do. We do. It's in blundy and well, I'll go through it blunt. It's Brett. Blondie himself, Mark, McGinnis, who's Deputy chair John chest? Who's the CEO? Good name. Chess route. Bruce Carter Bruce Carter. Yeah. Tracy blundy probably no relationship. I'm guessing It John Charlton, right? And say gin alt well. I mean you know Australia essentially is in Asia, you gotta have one. That's the problem. The thing to notice here is Tracy, blundy is no really Blondie's wife. Okay. Well that's a minor detail and sage and ALT then is the only woman on the board who's not Bundy. Of a company who sells jewelry to women. Yeah. Brett and Tracy owned. 40% of the shares. There are according to freefloat date of their zero, directors of Merit, on this board, except for blundy himself. And he only has Merit because he owns the company, that's why he's tagged. As having Merit, the executive team at La Vista includes John Mark, Victor, and Chris zero women on executive team. I mean, this all sounds very Australian to me. Blundy is targeting Victoria's Secret, whose board is a woman. We know that Donna James Hillary's super Irene Britt, Sarah Davis, Jacqueline, Hernandez, Rod, Little David McCray, little, something a Miriam. Nancy, our nafisi Lauren Peters and Anne Sheehan. Wow, there are two men on the board of Victoria's Secret. I thought you could say, there were too many women on the board. This is just women run companies in the entire database. We have should be. It's Victoria's Secret after all. But yeah, of course, he's so fucking women clothes. In fact, I don't think they sell. I don't think anything in the stores marketed directly towards like a traditional man, whatever. That means, well, not to wear, but I'll go, okay, sure. But Yeah, there's no Bud Light in there, right? There's no guns. The executive team of Victoria's Secret four women and one man, right? This is the ultimate mansplain. This is a billionaire Australian blowhard chest thumping into a room full of women telling them you fucking suck. I can do it better. And then And and so to Victoria's Secret credit, they've been trying to deal with blundy, which must be hard because he controls the whole year 13% of the shares. You said, so it's hard. Yeah, yeah, he won't shut up. In fact, this is what they said in a filing members of the board held a video conference call of Mr. Blundy they agreed to adding a mutually agreed upon director, they will allow his participation and review of the board of the company's Capital allocation. So when the board makes a capital allocation decision, they'll run it by him. They will enter into a long-term information sharing agreement. Know, negotiate that with Mr blundy and they will remove their shareholder rights plan which protects the company. So that you know, he could buy more shares and we won't get diluted like poison pill kind of stuff, right? Blundy said, not good enough. Really? He said he wanted all these things. He's now gone full activist and he wanted to be on the board himself, to which here's where it gets fully fucking triggered. Yeah, this is what the board had to write back to him. After this call the board delivered to Mr. Blundy the following letter explaining, its rationale, for rejecting his candidacy, and proposing a new framework for a mutual, a mutually agreeable. Resolution quote, the potential for significant reputation reputation on legal risk to Victoria's Secret arising from your pattern of hiring Executives with a history of serious allegations of sexual harassment or other misconduct with that and the reported and alleged instance, instances of harassment and highly inappropriate employee policies. He had fucking harassing employee policies, that occurred under your oversight at companies, you control or effectively controlled That's not good. This is the guy who's trying to tell the women you can run it better than them. Meritocracy. Lady. I I don't know anything about Victoria's Secret bras. I've never had to wear one. I mean I could but I just have not had the opportunity or desire to wear a bra from there. All right, come on, go. Come on. Say what you guys? Go buy a fucking bra from Victoria's Secret and tell Brett Blondie to shut his fat fucking mouth or Brett. Just like I mean you clearly have a background in this just why don't you just liquidate your shares? Get the cash? Make your own company compete with them? Do better do better. I mean what are you tart? Why you targeting that? I don't know. Run it with all male team. You just want to feel boobies all open it right in the mall, right next to Victoria's Secret, you can just destroy them. But for it, honestly, the headlines are not doing this Justice at all. Because, like, like they should say Australian white, male billionaire, who's cool sexually harassing women wants to take over underwear, store run by women, right? Like like that's how they should read. But they read like Victoria's Secret activists go you know goes goes full activist there's like if they make it sound like there's some transaction here. Meanwhile, you know every fast fashion would this is reminds me a little bit of Cracker Barrel. Uh, every fast fashion companies struggling retail struggling mall stores are struggling. So it's not like Victoria's Secret is the only one doing something wrong here. Well that hey, what makes me feel worse about it is? Last year, we covered how Victoria's Secret was under pressure from like the Trump Administration and conservatives to bring back the Victoria's Secret angels and like hot women. Get rid of all the fat people. You stop trying to sell to everybody with different body shapes. Just sell the hot women. They it was like that was a whole thing sounds like last year. Yeah, bring imagine Uncle Kracker wherever that was. Can you imagine just being a woman trying to run this company and sell to other women? You can't even be left alone, by fucking white guys, opening their big fat, stupid, mouths and telling you you're doing everything wrong. Just leave him the fuk alone. That's why it's great to his name is Brett. Blondie. He's a perfect name for that kind of Hard. All right, let's move on. All right, that's number one. Number two. And this one's shorter than you. Think it's Elon Musk and Sam Altman? Oh, I didn't even cover this. That this is the week two of the trial, right? It's the trial. In fact, I did read this morning or maybe you, you know what, maybe you're covering. Did you cover that doesn't apology about Elon going to China? You covered? Oh yes. Yeah. All right. So, so musk. First first, first Sam Altman accused musk of laughing at memes during important open, AI meetings and musk's China trip during open AI trial prompts apology from his lawyer for the CEOs apps. And here's the triggering part to me. This is a man-child. Kitty. Is there anything more man-child eat? Like this is Mom fold his socks. Does he eat Cheerios out of a frisbee in the morning? Which one's a man child musk or musk. Okay. Musk, you're being nice to Sam here. Well, I'll get to Sam next, okay? He's too fucking busy for the trial. Like, he wanted to go play in China with his friends. So he couldn't make the trial that he brought the suit. Again, it's his fucking trial. He wanted to, he doesn't care. I mean, he doesn't, and it's not. The thing is, he doesn't care, it's not consequential. I mean, right? It doesn't matter what happened. It doesn't matter is, well, this is so gigantic joke, this and, and he's such a fucking little baby. I mean, like, just as a reminder, this man child is the one who gets to choose whether or not the military has internet through. Starling you get to choose how to gut the government he did with Doge. He's trying to implant chips in your brain. Neuralink. He is he like, to be fair to be fair. Sam wants all those things too. I'm not saying Sam doesn't. I'm saying that Elon can do it now. Yes, you're right. but like the the story here was that during meetings with openai's team and staff In which they talked about making open AI, part of Tesla musk would stop for long stretches of time and force everyone to look at his phone at the memes. He was looking at during the services, he needs attention. Not the memes. He did he'd be like this. Funny, look at these. Look at this, he just needs to attention, he needs a spot. Imagine, I mean, this is why I don't fucking kids, but this is why for years. He's been manipulating the stock market by. He just constantly stands up and lies about stuff. He just needs attention. He wants people to love him by. We're gonna call Niece Mars by 2021. We're gonna have robots Everywhere by 2022. You know, everything he just live full. So full self-driving by 2023, just a liar, just a lot of is he a liar? But I just can't get over. I was so triggered by what a teenage like preteen fucking baby. He look look what the cat is doing, right? Like what is that? Like and then there's Sam Altman. And here's the headlines for Aultman this week, Sam Altman faces awkward grilling over toxic culture of lying. So while musk wasn't there, obviously the musk's lawyer was asking, Sam Altman. Are you a big fat liar? You know, well we know he is and everything points to yes. Yeah. But this story broke. Chat GPT told a 19 year old. How to mix drugs? His mother found him dead. The next morning you didn't not. That's the one where like the chat that the chat agent basically was like go for it. Dude. Kind of like it was like like, let's go, let's do it chat. So he was flagged by open AI again. This is the same thing as The Tumbler Ridge, like, killing massacres. When are we gonna flag the CEO of open? AI Samoa? What are we doing? Like so this kid was like interested in basically taking cocktails of drugs and was asking for recommendations on dosages and Chachi. Told them the recommendations of dosages to take for cartems, which is like a street available, like gas station. It's, I've seen this fucking horrible, like the the amount needed to OD on. This is like, you basically nothing, right? It's nothing. A trace and we're getting a gas station, really? You can get it again. Gas stations all over the country One near me. But mixing that with Benadryl or antihistamines or like why again really I mean this seriously, why are they not flagging the company itself? Why, why is Sam not flagged know? Because the only way anything happens, you might notice the thread here. The two things happening, are you have a lawyer apologize for the behavior of his client? You have a and you have lawyers who have to file lawsuits in order to for someone to flag the company doing heinous shit, there's no other mechanism anymore, you good lawyer to battle a company like that, you know, It reminds me that I think I saw an article not too long ago that one of the guys from friends died recently, I don't know. Yeah. Matthew Perry. Yeah. I think that the person who sold him ketamine went to jail for that. Like yeah. You drug dealers do sometimes go. I think the guy also the doctor for Michael Jackson. I think served time or what is Sam Prince. Why are they Executives open AI? This is a series. This is a serious man. I know you're sort of joking, but this is not joking. I was legit triggered by the fact that this trial is ongoing and this is the shit like we have a man baby with his finger on like whether or not we like bombs, get dropped and governments, get good and a man baby with his finger on whether your kid overdoses and someone has access to. Let's not forget and weaponry fucking shoot up a school and what they're doing right now is sitting in a trial room. Are doing about, who's a bigger liar? Who said, what to who when, oh, open AI should be a charity. Know, it shouldn't like what we're doing that the CEO CEOs, BFF, Donald Trump is the federal government is restricting States from regulating AI. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Okay. All right. Moving on me last option. Warren Buffett. Oh, he's still alive. Still alive. He's exact. I think he's executive chair at. I think you're correct. Okay, correct. Um, but let's put the folksy, you know, I'm just an old guy sucking on our Werther's original. He's done that like doing capitalism whatever like and he's always like that thing. We'll put it aside and I just saw like something on Reddit, like praising him because he actually gives his money away. But as we've established, she gives his money to the his kids Foundation. His kids Foundation. Yeah. Just unlike there's no actual real track record of him like doing anything to anyone that consequences? Yeah, go ahead. Well if you put that aside and you realize that he's a stone cold capitalist who's singing was I'm going to buy a company and then let management do whatever it wants. My My Philosophy is hands-off, I buy it and I only have Hands-On when I have to have an. I'm gonna let me run it, here's what? Triggered me, I saw this headline, I had to dive into it to figure it out but here's a triggered me. The headline was electric company says it's cutting off an entire town so it can sell all its power to data centers, that doesn't sound good. So there's a lot to hate in here because first of all the tech billionaires are building these data centers for AI. So already, I'm already fucking triggered by the data. I mean, they want to it's so bad. Not only, they want to take over towns. They want to take over the ocean, they want to take over space. Everything space, they want to be everywhere. And the only ones who win in the scenarios them, they get all you get all the shit. You get your job lost, you get less benefits. You like like everything sucks for you? Well, get all the money and they want to take it all. And I was gonna say, well, the culture is clearly a skeptical, but AI is clearly skeptical about social media, is clearly skeptical about everything. They're not too sure they want any of this. All right, go ahead. Yeah, it's a civilization clip talk receives what it is. The company involved. The Energy company is Envy energy. And NV Energy is a wholly owned subsidiary of Berkshire, energy by Warren Buffett. Is this in Nevada in the energy, it is Nevada. Okay? And and V energy, is the energy companies are largely regulated by a bunch of people. There's Municipal Regulators, there's all sorts of regulators, but first is the Federal Energy, regulator and Trump appointed the regulator at ferc. So you already have a trump appointee, overseeing a company owned by a billionaire, which there's no regulation that's that is deciding who gets energy and the one they want to give it to is Tech billionaires. So there's a lot to hate already. But the town, the town in question here, it's 50,000 people in Lake Tahoe. That's pretty big. I actually was imagining a smaller place, gets well, they get 20 million people tourists a year for skiing Tahoe's a huge like Resort town. I thought you could say there's a town of like 900 people know. This is 50,000 people. It's the same size as West, Hartford Connecticut where I live. They have to find a one year to find a new source of energy for their entire town because the the buffets Energy company decided to reroute all the energy. I mean this is like Center's. I mean this is like already you just describing a Disturbia to me this is this reminds me of like the movie I said watch the kid called Escape From New York. This is something like, but this is just crazy to me. What you're saying to me, like is water that far away. Are we gonna have to like figure out what they're already trying to figure out where to Get water in Nevada, right? Oh yeah. The chair of ferc is a woman named Laura sweat because Trump loves to appoint like young semi experienced women to positions where they will be deeply loyal to him. And she actually represented energy firms when she was a lawyer. And she extolled the glory of data centers. One of the, amicus briefs that her Law Firm wrote in 2024 was on behalf of NV Energy. Oh, she wasn't, she didn't sign the Amicus brief for self, but she worked at the firm that represented and V Energy. So, not to mention the fact that Ferg of the finds, they issued this year, 99 percent or for one company and it's an energy, efficient SEA company. And since Trump was elected, the finds that they've issued have either been blue States or Renewables at a two-to-one. Like all they do is Target, renewable energy and blue States. So Warren. Be as folks is you want but the people are fucked. Like I'd love for you to write in your next annual meeting letter. If you ever write another one you can tell them where you put, where you let your company put the power to their tasks and maybe they should just power themselves on seize candy. It's funny. Maybe that's what you should be doing. It's funny you tag this story this week because I also tagged a Berkshire. Hathaway related to story for the proxy countdown which was just so outrageous to me and You know, pointed out the fake folks in this of Warren Buffett. The, the CFO was stepping down. and, He is getting. For until 2037. He's getting a benefit up to 30 flight hours, a year on a specific jet. They even named the jet a net jet. So I don't even know what the hell that is. It's a private jet, I guess. And if he dies his wife gets the benefit. And it's just like, this is the fake folks of orange people. He was pulling power from a, from a town, from a toll. Do you can't have paid family, right? I know. So it's like, he is such a hypocrite anyway. All right. Those are your options. It's Brett blundy, husk Altman. And Buffett you thought I was gonna go blundy. Um, I was so triggered by Blondie. I the mansplaining to women. I'm with you. What? I fucking hate it. I'm with you but I, you know, I also don't the whole like Fast Fashion World of wish it would all just go. I, I wish we could get back to like You buy a really quality bra? That lasts years. So that, yeah, because women are really the victims of fast fashion, right? I mean, they're the ones just going and all the horrible makeup world. I mean, I was all on tiktok too, right? Social media wins from Fast. Fashion, we went on a way for a week and I was looking at the difference between the what I brought versus my wife. I brought deodorant and a toothbrush. Right? And we shared the toothpaste. Yeah. Because, you know, we're we're close. We sure to face your clothes. Yeah. Her side of the sink was like, 40 different things. I'm just thinking like these companies just prey on women. I mean, it's just like, yeah, they pricked. We had the same, we have the same bodies and skin, right? It's not different anyway. So I'm not going to pick blundy because I don't know. And I can't. Do you gonna be surprised where? I think I land, I can't Altman because I don't It despite the fact that we've been doing this for years and I think we're probably one of the best news, I don't know what you call us media organizations in the world that covers this. Stuff. Yeah, that covers Elon Musk and simultan regularly, right? I mean we we try to tell these stories regularly in the ramifications of everything. So I I'm proud of the work we do there but I don't know how to Attain this every week with these two. And I, and I don't really know how to wrap my mind around it anymore. And I don't, I don't know how to, like, even paraphrase these stories anymore. So I'm just gonna land on the fake folks of Warren Buffett. Because this is again, as I said earlier, this is It's just so dystopian that. I a corporation has the right to do this. I I guess I'm just I'm just and I know you're saying because The Regulators are put in place are corporate friendly, but I just can't believe it's not a mechanism in place that prevents this in the first, but the whole thing is just nuts to me and that it's Buffet. I mean, I'm sure Buffett doesn't know whatever. I don't want to hear that. I'm picking that one. I'm picking that. Yeah. All right, it doesn't matter. I get the pick what I want you to pick whatever you want. All right, let's go. Let's get headlines. Winners predictions and get out of here. We said we go fast, but I think we're only like four minutes ahead of schedule. Well, it's fast for us. I got the rest is fast for me. I don't have anything to me, sort of two. My headline is the week kids with fake mustaches can full high-tech age verification system. I love that that wins the week for me. I just someone somewhere is like, you factoring fake mustaches. Clip. Of course, I just like that. My headline is was way more recalls 3800, Robo. Taxis after glitch allowed some vehicles to drive into standing water. Yeah, it's not a glitch. There's no person driving by which they mean lakes and ponds. Yeah, you know, there was another one on Willow. I saw a few days ago, where I think it was in Houston. A lot of these not really in New England, but a lot of cities are full of like cul-de-sacs like the suburbs, they're horrible. There's a cul-de-sac everywhere, right? Which is like the for those of you who live in Australia. I think we used to have an Australian listener. Probably don't need more. Yeah, not anymore. A cul-de-sac is like a street that ends in a circle, right? And like a, I don't even know why but it ends in a circle. And but they said that there were several ways stuck in cul-de-sac, just circling because I don't know, they couldn't get out or they were lost or they couldn't figure it out. Anyway, it's the whole thing. I love that. All right, what's your winner for the week? My winner, believe it or not. Is a man named, Steve Ross. And again, I just I feel like I just needed to put this in somewhere but he really is the winner. I mean, Only Winners can talk this way. Steve Roth is the CEO of vernado Realty, Trust a company that we cover free flow. In our database, it's all available for free. He expresses support for fellow billionaire in the Citadel CEO Ken Griffin, right? Because Ken Griffin's, really having a big sad because mayor mum Donnie is trying to text billionaires with like multiple homes. Yeah. So they're having a big sad, but Steve Roth. He really wins for this quote, this week. I must this is a quote, I must say that I can consider the phrase tax, the rich, and he says, quote text the rich. I don't know why he needs to say it twice, because maybe he's a dope. He's just emphasizing. Yeah, I can consider the phrase tax. The rich win. Spit out with anger and contempt by politicians both here and across the country to be just as hateful as some discussing racial slurs. Oh he's really, I mean, good for this guy he took it all the way, right? I mean at least he said he was thinking. Yes, exactly, because we'll get you the n-word and Yeah, trying to tax the ultra wealthy saying, basically the same diff same, diffs? Yeah. Right. I mean, it's closed. Yeah. It's okay. Steve Ross, the way winner. Clearly a winner. My winner is lawyers, literally. Everything is a lawsuit now. Yeah, there's no America in America. Anything happens. Without it being a lawsuit, there's no accountability without a lawsuit, even the lawsuits themselves. So the Trump Administration is talking to the Department of Justice about settling. The IRS case, that was the Trump brought against his own government. Yeah. And the amount of lawyers it takes to do the settlement, even as a amazing, like that's good billable time there. Everything is, is just lawyers. They're winning. I should have been a lawyer. It's like, I just I lost prediction back to my Steve Roth mentioned Recall. I love doing recalls. My prediction is New York city, mayor mum Donnie. Asks, Steve Roth for just a little more and Roth replies. I'm not a fucking Chipotle Kami scum. Or just ask a double call back. I'm Donnie just ask just ask for a little more. They'll give it to you. You just give it to you. Yeah. The double text them just ask. That's it. Just ask I saw this headline. Chili's CEO wakes up at 5 a.m. runs daily and uses that time to generate ideas for the business ideas. I love that for chilling on his. Here's my prediction on his neck and his run on. Next Thursday. May 21st chili CEO? Kevin Hoffman. Yeah. Stops stops short. Just in the middle of the run and just says, out loud. What if the big crispy chicken sandwich was bigger? Perfect. That was like an idea. It's an idea. That's all he got. That's already. We are free floats. That was our shorter show is 40 seconds. Short of our normal show. We suck. Go get our proxy cow Down. Show we're back. We're back in the For the Long Haul. Here we go. Go get our proxy countdown show which also dropped today until then good. Bye.