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Unknown A
All right, guys, so Jon Stewart on his show the other night tackled the Doge question and the Elon Musk question. And let's just say he's not buying it. He's not buying it. He has some ideas of his own on how to get rid of waste, fraud and abuse, but he is not buying what Elon selling. So let's dive in and we'll break it down as we go here.
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Unknown B
See, it seems that Doge is struggling a bit to get its footing from made UP claims about $50 million of taxpayer money going for Gazan condoms to billions in Social Security payments to dead people. A claim that turned out to not be real. Despite what you've heard, we have millions.
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Unknown C
And millions of people over 100 years old because they're obviously fraudulent or incompetent. But if you take all of those millions of people off Social Security, all of a sudden we have a very powerful Social Security with people that are 80 and 70 and 90, but not 200 years old.
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Unknown B
True. You can't argue with that. If only it were happening, but it's not happening. We're not paying millions and millions of dead people Social Security. And even if there was a 200-year-old man walking around, he wouldn't need Social Security. He'd still be in Congress, guys.
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Unknown A
By the way, on that point, there was a report that just came out that Democrats don't know how much they're going to be able to fight back against Republicans in Congress because so many elected Democrats are ancient and dying and they can't like, make sure everybody shows up on the same day in the House of Representatives. Stop and think about that, bro. Stop and think about that. I mean, this is. And Ken Klibenstein's been on this like a hawk. A new video every day. The other day there was some politician who was giving a speech and literally collapsed on the floor. I think it was at. In a state house, to be fair. But I mean, this is what we're witnessing, right? Like the Geron. The Gerontocracy is a real thing happening.
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Unknown B
Cutting money shouldn't be this hard. I'm starting to think that we as a country don't understand where the real waste, fraud and abuse in our system really is. Maybe the savings we gleaned from cutting VA nurses and iguana STD studies isn't where the real money is. Let me see if I can noodle. You know what? Let me join Doge. I'm gonna see if I can noodle some ideas here. I want to get down some certain ideas I want to do. Get the. There we go. I got that. Let's see what I can do here.
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Unknown A
The other super important point, guys, is that everybody needs to understand we had official, proven ways of going after actual waste, fraud and abuse. That is the whole point of the inspectors general. Trump fired them in his first week. He fired them. So if he actually cared about getting rid of waste, fraud, abuse, he wouldn't have fired them. The fact of the matter is he's okay with that stuff. As long as him and his robber baron buddies are getting wealthy, they want to loot the Treasury. And guess what? If they were to loot the treasury in front of independent inspectors generals, they would be like, hey, they're looting the Treasury. So that's why he fired them. Now there's not only that, there's also the gao, Government Accountability Office. They do, they are granted congressional authority to do the thing that Doge is pretending to do.
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Unknown A
Doge is not cutting waste, fraud and abuse. They are killing the regulatory agencies that check Elon's ass. That's what they're doing.
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Unknown B
So we're looking to save taxpayers some money. And I know, let me think, we got the studies that are done. Or oh, how about we just take $3 billion in subsidies we give to oil and gas companies that already turned billions in profits. How long did that take? Oh, wait, how about we just close down the carried interest loophole on hedge funds. That's $1.3 billion a year. Oh, how about we stop the 2.
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Unknown A
Trillion carry interest loophole is something that like uber wealthy Wall street assholes exploit. And he's like, if we close that, we raise billions dollars we've given to.
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Unknown B
Defense contractors to build a fighter jet that blows when everybody knows the next war is going to be fought with drones and blockchain, whatever that is. Holy shit, bro.
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Unknown A
It's noteworthy to point out, right, that they still haven't touched the Pentagon yet. They still haven't touched the Pentagon. They got rid of Cancer Research for Children and the Department of Education and the cfpb, the anti scam police and FAA officials, flight safety officials, they got rid of all that and cut in those areas before they even touched the Pentagon. And you want to know why? Because Elon's one of the biggest subcontractors for the pentagon. Elon's taken $20 billion in U.S. taxpayer money. Now, is he returning that with interest and saying, hey, I believe in small government. I don't like getting this money. That's socialism. I'm a welfare Queen. No, he's not doing that at all. He's not doing that at all. And at the same time they were saying we're going to do an 8% cut to the Pentagon. What happened? Just yesterday the Republicans passed their budget resolution which includes a $100 billion increase in military spending.
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Unknown A
They are liars. They are frauds. Everybody needs to get this through their head. The 5% of the time where they say something that might in theory sound they are lying about that thing. They are lying about it.
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Unknown B
I just saved us billions of dollars in 11 seconds. Just call me Big Balls. I'm sorry, I'm being told that that nickname is already taken. Well, can I get a doge nickname? Disturbingly low hanging Balls. Really? Like you've never heard of grass. How would you even know that? Oh, I'm sorry. But see, this is where the real money is. The real money. The money our free market ish system uses to prop up corporate profit at the expense of the taxpayer. Pharmaceutical companies get everything from our government. Tax breaks, research grants, patent extensions worth billions of dollars. And what do we the people get for it? The highest drug prices in the western hemisphere and for some reason the possibility of an infection in our perineum.
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Unknown A
By the way, there was an article about that that like every new medicine created for decades was created with US taxpayer money funding university research. And so in other words, our tax dollars fund the new medicines that are created. And then pharmaceutical companies swoop up the rights to those drugs that we just created with our money and they price gouge us on the back end. So you pay for it up front and then you get price gouged for it on the back end. Again, this is a scam. The way the system works is a scam. What we should do is nationalize Big Pharma completely and get rid of the profit motive. That's what we should do. By the way, Mr. Maha, make America healthy again. Who's super anti Big Pharma? He's against nationalizing Big Pharma. Shocker.
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Unknown B
Why would you take a drug that would give you an infection in your perineum? And why are they telling us about it at dinner time? But you know what's so horrible about our system now? And the corruption that lays within it. We're so numb to it, we actually tout tiny cracks in that exploitation as victory President touting the first ever negotiations with pharmaceutical companies to lower the cost of 10 drugs. And today I'm proud to announce Medicare's recent agreement with all manufacturers on all 10 drugs selected in the first round of negotiation. Oh, can it be? The companies we subsidize with billions of dollars are allowing us the privilege to negotiate the price of 10 of their drugs. And 10 is all of them. Right. It would be embarrassing if it was a small drop in the bucket and that the American people didn't expect that we should negotiate for all their drugs because we've already paid for it with our subsidies earned money.
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Unknown A
So that was Kyrsten Sinema, by the way. That was all during the negotiation for Build Back Better. And in the original Build Back Better bill, they had negotiating for all drug prices. And Kyrsten Sinema took It was either 500,000 or a million dollars from big Pharma. And then she flipped and she said, I'm not in favor of negotiating for any drug prices. And believe it or not, guys, even Joe Manchin, one of the most conservative Democrats, was like, I'm in favor of negotiating for all the drug prices. So one bribe to one senator killed it. And then they were able to pry out of her, okay, let's at least negotiate for some. And it starts with 10, and then it goes up every year. But, yeah, this is the problem, right? And this shows just how much corporate money in politics, big money in politics, just how much it rigs the system against all of us.
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Unknown A
That's what happened. It was Big Pharma money bought Kirsten Cinema, and that's why we ended up in this position. It really is that simple. It really is that simple. And by the way, when I first saw this, this Jon Stewart piece, I thought that this was part of the bit that, like, he broke the glass, and I thought it was a glass made of some fake glass, like sugar or some shit, right? But no, that's a real glass. And he actually broke it and he actually cut his finger to the point where he needed stitches, as you're about.
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Unknown B
To see here, privileged to negotiate the price of 10 of their drugs. And 10 is all of them, right? It would be embarrassing if it was a small drop in the bucket and that the American people didn't expect that we should negotiate for all their drugs because we've already paid for it with our subsidies. Are you safe? Come on. I'll be going to the hospital soon. What we do at pharmaceutical companies is like the worst shark tank deal ing history. Well, we're asking for billions of dollars of your money. Oh, what do we get 10% of your company? No. Do we get a discount? No. What do we get? Have you checked your perineum, by the way?
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Unknown A
This is the stuff that Elon Musk and Trump will never change. They are bought by the corporations and the robber barons. This is the system that the corporations and the robber barons love. That's why you don't see Trump tackling this. You don't see Elon Musk tackling this. Instead they're cutting off cancer research to kids.
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Unknown B
Don't blame the corporations. They are profit seeking psychopaths that need the lowest wages and the cheapest raw materials to drive their highest profits. But why do we, the taxpayers, subsidize their psychopathy? That's the waste, fraud and abuse in our system. That's it.
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Unknown A
So in other words, he's going after the corporate welfare and saying this is the problem in our system and the corruption is the problem in our system. Which means what? Of course Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security and home heating assistance and food stamps. Of course those things are not the problem. In fact, those government programs are beloved. Well, guess what Republicans just decided to slash last night in their budget resolution. They did an $880 billion cut to Medicaid, which basically destroys Medicaid. They did a $230 billion cut to food stamps. It just passed the House the other day. Now, hopefully it doesn't get passed in the Senate, but they're going to use budget reconciliation. So if they can get 51 votes, it's a Raps. I mean, it is. We really are in like colossal backlash bodies in the streets slash revolution territory. If some of these things get through, we really are.
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Unknown B
We should be going after not the fantastical over generous terrorist condom allowances in another program.
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Unknown C
$50 million plus another $50 million for condoms for Hamas. You know about that? $100 million for condoms? Condoms. Does everybody know what a.
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Unknown B
You delivering the speech in an elementary school?
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Unknown A
Why wouldn't that? Was that okay? That was one of the stories too. That shows just how much of a pathological liar Trump is. It went from $50 million in condoms to Gaza, then they changed it to $50 million in condoms to Hamas. Then they made it $50 million in condoms to Hamas that they used to make bombs. And then Trump made it $100 million in condoms to Hamas. Like, it's like lie inflation. He does. This is how you know this dude truly is a psychopath, truly is a pathological liar, truly has no connection to the real world and just says what he thinks is convenient for himself.
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Unknown B
Capitalism is by definition exploitative. It's how it operates. That's fine. But then government's role should be to Ease the negative effects on Americans of that exploitation, not subsidize that treachery with our money. We're getting at a diddy party and they're making us buy the baby oil. I want, I want doge to work. I want better efficiencies. I want to get rid of the Alphabet agencies that don't do enough, make the Pentagon pass an audit. But we are doging in the wrong place if we want to really change the system. Companies like Walmart, McDonald's make billions of dollars in taxpayer subsidized profits, yet many of their hard working employees need taxpayer subsidized public assistance. Airlines get billions in bailouts that they use in stock buybacks and bonuses. But if you're on food assistance, you're not allowed to buy hot food with it because apparently heated entrees are for winners.
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Unknown B
We are subsidizing the very system that makes workers lives harder in the first place. All in the name of freedom and liberty. But the greatest restriction of freedom in this country is isn't DEI and pronoun pressure. It's poverty and struggle and the government's role.
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Unknown A
I'm not done telling you, man, this dude would win it all in 2028. He had a take the other day that got people angry, I think legitimately. So, you know, they cut this clip of him answering audience questions and he basically was like, look, we gotta be careful not to be too hyperbolic and not call Trump a fascist basically every day over every issue. That was his take. To be fair, I think that take was recorded a long time ago, but they just like re released it recently. I think if you have that conversation with him now, he might think differently about just how aggressively you go after Trump and just how much you call him a fascist. But having said that, people were legitimately angry over that take, and I happen to agree with people criticizing him over that take. But look, he has all the instincts.
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Unknown A
He has all the instincts. He has the right ideology, he's funny, he's charismatic, he's controversial, he, he's edgy, he gets the bigger picture. I mean, this is a phenomenal segment right here, what we're witnessing.
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Unknown B
But the greatest restriction of freedom in this country isn't DEI and pronoun pressure. It's poverty and struggle and the government's role. I'm not done, you bastard.
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Unknown A
See, I'm curious what you guys think of that, because when I saw that, I thought, no way that's fake. It almost looked like the color of the blood almost looks a little off to Me. But it was real. This was real.
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Unknown B
It's fine.
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Unknown A
I thought it was part of the bit. I thought it was part of the bit.
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Unknown B
The government's role should be to end the corruption that enables that exploitation. That's what the Democrats should be doing every day. Every day. Every day at 5pm sharp. The Democrats should go live on Facebook and do the People's Audit. Find the absurdities and the remedies in our exploitative system. Get someone like AOC or Jasmine Crockett or Chris Murphy or anybody that doesn't sound like they're complaining. Why? There's no more frozen yogurt at the cafeteria in the Villages. I'm sorry, you have no real. And we need something more than shouting. We need to do something constructive to anchor our hopes. A new acronym for a new age. It's not maga. It's something more like Make America Not Governed in obviously negative. Aboard. Aboard. Aboard. I'm kidding. No vigilantes, but do something.
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Unknown A
Oh my God, he nailed it. That was. See, what did I say? I told you. He's controversial, he's edgy, he presses all the right buttons. He literally just did a Luigi joke. He's got it. He's got all the tools. He's 100% right too. He mentioned the Pentagon there, guys. The Pentagon failed seven different audits. The. The audit before this one, they could not account. I believe the number was 61 or 63% of their money. They couldn't account for it. They couldn't account for it. All of the waste, fraud and abuse and grift is in the Pentagon. Our welfare in this country is warfare. We have a meager social safety net. But Raytheon and Lockheed and Honeywell and all these big defense contractors, they get a colossal amount of money thrown at them. And by the way, there are jobs tied to the military industrial complex in 50 out of 50 states.
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Unknown A
We have baked into the system being imperialist warmongers. We have to get away from that. The only disagreement that I have with him is even the entire conversation of like, oh, we would cut spending better. We will outdo the Doge people. The one thing I don't like about that is it concedes to the right wing framing in a sense that the conversation that we should be having is about cutting, when in reality the conversation we should be having is about we want to expand Social Security, we want to expand Medicare to make sure we have Medicare for all. Like, we want to focus on making the positive argument. Hey, government can be harnessed for good things. And in fact, the last time we had a Social Democratic president, it was FDR. He won the presidency four times. At his peak, he had 80% of the House and 80% of the Senate.
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Unknown A
He was beloved by the American people. And the Republicans had to come up with term limits to try to kick his ass out of there and have a prayer of winning another presidential election ever again. Right? So that's the argument we should be be making. Flip this on its head. Fuck your whole conversation about cutting. I'm not interested in cutting right now. I'm not interested in austerity. It's true. We should massively cut the Pentagon, like 50%. That's true. It's true. We should cut off the money to, you know, the big oil companies, the subsidies to them, as Jon Stewart points out. All that is true. But we need to flip the dialogue completely and make clear you guys are psychopaths. We have record income and wealth inequality right now and you're talking about cutting. We should be talking about Medicare for all. Expanding Medicare. That's what we should be doing.
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Unknown A
We should be talking about increasing Social Security. I want a Social Security for all system. I don't know why everybody shouldn't get a Social Security check when this is one of the most phenomenally successful government programs ever. It took the senior poverty rate from 30% to 10%. It's a massive W. And we need to expand that to everybody. The idea that we have any child poverty in this country or any poverty period is disgusting. That's a choice. It's a choice. Remember when they did the expanded child tax credit and like that, they slashed the child poverty rate nearly 50%, literally like that, with one policy change, expanded the child tax credit and boom. And what does that tell you? That tells you, hey, if they wanted to get rid of it 100%, they could have. But instead, what happened? It had a sunset provision on it.
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Unknown A
It went away. Uh, they didn't bring it back up. And, you know, file this under one of the many reasons why the Democrats ended up losing. But what Trump is doing right now, what Elon is doing right now, they. They have officially done a robber baron coup. They are implementing a fascist system. They're going to do severe austerity for you, and they're going to have their wealthy buddies elute the Treasury. That's what we're witnessing. Hey, y'all, do me a favor and like and subscribe. It helps out big time in the algorithm. Click the bell as well for notifications when videos drop. And watch that video on screen right now. You know you want to.