The Scott Adams School - 07/23/26 Erica, Marcela and Jeff Callahan

anything spicy about where Owen is on assignment. Good morning, everybody. Look at— we have a full house today. I love that. We have Jeff, Owen, Marcella, and me. I'm Erica. Wait, where's my thing? Here's my name, Erica. It's so opposite. It's like the weirdest thing. So we're going to let everybody come in. We have a great Thursday show for you. Let me get my locals going over here. Owen, how are you?

I'm doing great.

How are you, Erica?

I'm so happy you could join us. It's like a little surprise. Hey, Jim Courtney, what's going on? Oh, I loved everyone dropping where they live. Not your address, but, you know, the region. And if you didn't do that yesterday, do it today. We love seeing where everybody is. There's Houston in the house. We have a lot of international people too. We love it. So, oh, Darla's in Hokkaido, so she's in New York. Yes, I'm sorry. I'm in New Jersey, so send your sympathy cards my way. We are rocking it out. Marcella, I'll just say it, you look great in that color.

Isn't that her color?

They say that the navy is one's color. Look at that.

I don't know. I mean, I heard purple's your color also, so we'll see. Oh, there's Sweden. Um, Jeff, that hat, marvelous on you.

Thank you. I get, I get comments, uh, every once in a while. What does the BMC stand for? Well, that's my company, Become More Compelling.

So, Become More Compelling. I like that. All right. So I'm parched. Are you parched? Let's do the thing.

But first, what do you need first to get ready for all this excitement? I think you know, you need a cup or a mug or a glass, a tank or chalice or stein, a canteen, jug or flask, a vessel of any kind. Fill it with your favorite liquid. I like coffee. And join me now for the unparalleled pleasure, the dopamine hit of the day, the thing that makes everything better. It's called the simultaneous Sip. And it's happening right now. Go.

Rob says, Owen, that you look great in that bookshelf.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

That is your bookshelf.

He's so lucky.

Scott seemed a bit distracted while he was trying to do this.

Well, then he's right in line with my energy today, right, Jeff? Because I am scattered today, you guys. Shocking, I'm sure. So let me, let me properly introduce myself. I'm doing this for one particular person. My name is Erica, and I am the executive producer and lead host of the Scott Adams School. And different than Real Coffee with Scott Adams, we're here to commune and have a great time, talk about current events and news and just whatever. But all of Scott's amazing videos live on YouTube forever, and there's even more amazing content that you haven't seen if you're not a Beloved Locals subscriber. And you can subscribe at scottadams.locals.com. And I'm so happy because I'm joined today by my two amazing co-hosts, Marcella and Owen, um, part of the Scott Adams team, and Jeff Callahan accepting a co-host invitation today with us. We are so thrilled you're here. We love our repeating co-host guests, and Jeff, you're definitely a fan favorite. Um, Welcome everybody. It is Thursday, July 23rd, 2026. Did that feel so overly official?

It felt official.

Yeah. And seen, as Scott Adams would say. Okay, so wait, I just have to start with one thing and then gosh knows where we're going. But did you guys see this guy behind President Trump yesterday during his rally? He was quite the showstopper. Check out the guy. Behind President Trump.

Any time in the history of our country, and Americans are working today more so than ever before. We have more jobs today than we've ever had. This is with this skirmish we have with the Islamic Republic of Iran. And I call it that because let me tell you, they're getting hit so hard and they want to make it.

I mean, that's what you just think you would do if you, if you knew you were right behind him on camera. If you were a juvenile child. But I appreciated that comic relief. Oh my God, I can't believe you guys didn't see that. That was amazing. Would you do that?

Oh yeah. Like, I do that around the house just to mess with my wife. And like, I'll send her reels where like it's a bus full of dudes and they're all talking like Trump. It's hilarious. It's like, excuse me, excuse me.

It's really, really late for dinner. Uh, Marcela, would you, would you compete and, and participate in that tomfoolery yourself?

You know, he, he, I mean, he's courageous. I just wouldn't do it because, you know, out of respect for the president. Um, also, like, I, I don't tend to do that in regards to him. But, you know, I think I've seen that guy. I think he does do shorts on Instagram or TikTok or something. So he's an influencer. That does that for a living, I think.

I see. Well, he got himself a good seat. Owen, I can tell you're probably doing that right now, aren't you?

See, look at—

how does he do it?

All right, so he's so engaged. Yeah, yeah, he's doing it right.

I can—

he's doing it.

Yeah, see, so Owen's on assignment, like we said. He's traveling, and I think he's locked in a bathroom, so he'll be in and out. Oh, there he is. There he is. Owen, we were teasing you. Okay, so you guys, I asked Jeff about a couple of things that he would want to talk about today. And so Marcella and Jeff are going to just kind of lead Owen and I right now. Nope, nope. Owen said, I'm not doing it. Okay, so you two, I told you, it's such a weird day. It's such a weird day. Okay, so we did play this clip prior, but we're going to play it again because Jeff thinks this is a good clip to get into a talking point. But we have a lot to say about Cuba today, which is interesting. So let's play this clip and I'm going to let Owen back in.

This is the nature of the terrorism we face today. They despise the West because the West is great. This is an international conference. Because we are facing an international, we are facing a transnational threat. These are not distinct and isolated cells. They are interconnected networks. They do not recognize our borders. They do not believe, in fact, in the nation-state itself. They coordinate, they communicate, they travel, they train, and they act together, sharing the same infrastructure, sharing the same enemies, sharing the same mission. Antifa militants and their comrades travel from across Europe and to the Americas to participate in each other's attacks, to funnel propaganda and training materials and target information through shared encrypted channels, moving through underground networks of safe houses and finance, and sustain their operations through transnational funds. And they work alongside hostile foreign states that share their mission, like Iraq's Iranian proxy networks, who are increasingly, increasingly intimately tied to leftist militant groups around the world. The Cuban regime's sprawling intelligence and ideological network helped to build the far left in our country and in our hemisphere, and it remains inextricably linked to the far left groups and movements across and beyond the West.

Okay, so we pulled that clip and Jeff, I'm going to just send it over to you first. So, you know, we really do need a good update and education on what's happening with Cuba. We haven't talked about it much. So what can you tell us is happening right now?

Yeah. So I watched Marco Rubio's speech and I mean, it was a fantastic speech. It's well worth the full watch. And then I started looking into the State Department report on Cuba that was released not long ago. Uh, Cuba, the Capital of 21st Century Communism. And, uh, it's, it's a big document, uh, and, and the, the thing that struck me is that there is so much that's going on in terms of, uh, Cuba basically waging a, uh, 67-year sort of COVID war against the United States in terms of, um, sowing, sowing dissent and being sort of at the nexus of fomenting anti-American sentiment and trying to further, further anyone that is radical against the United States and might have communist leanings. Cuba knew that it couldn't, you know, it was a new regime 67 years ago. There was no chance that they, that they could go toe to toe with the United States on a military level. And so what do you do if you don't have military might? Well, You start subverting and you subvert as much as you can. And then like, there's so much in this report that we can get into. But one, one thing that really struck me was, and I'll loop it back around to Spencer Pratt and his Karen Basura, really famous video now. He talked about how Karen Bass went to Cuba. By the way, it wasn't just once. It was like 8 times in these, I believe, the early '70s. And what they would do is they would import— since, since 1970, they've imported something like 10,000 radicals to Cuba to train them in being anti-American revolutionaries. And these, these sort of programs that they would run, they, they would be led by Cuban intelligence. And the Cuban intelligence will be looking at the attendees and looking for the true believers so that they could kind of level them up and give them the tools necessary to return to the United States and in some cases commit acts of bombing and, and all these, all these terrible things. And so I love that the administration has, has locked on to the Cuban threat. Because that it, it's 90 miles off the coast of the United States. Like, it cannot be allowed to continue to foment all these sort of left-wing groups. Usually the like, there's a lot to get into, but it kind of like there's Chinese connections that are going through, through Cuba into the United States. And there's our enemies are using Cuba as a foothold and sort of a sort of a parking lot for, um, digging at the United States constantly. And so I love that the administration is across this stuff.

So Jeff, I'm going to put this up. I think this is that post. Um, let me— I'll make this bigger. Okay, so is this the operation that you're talking about?

Yeah. Uh, he assigned such priority to the the project that all other DGI operations were held to be subordinate to the collection of intelligence from the members of the Vincent— I'm, I'm not going to pronounce this right— the Vincinieros Brigade. Practically every Cuban national attached to the brigade camp, right down to the food service and maintenance personnel, is a member or co-opted member of the DGI Cuban intelligence. These DGI operatives are so skilled in their impersonations that few brigade members are even aware of their true identities. In fact, so many DGI personnel are needed to staff these camps that nearly all other operations must be suspended when the camps are active. Even maintenance and clerical personnel of the Directorate are pressed into service. So the— it's like a— it's like— it's like The Truman Show, like where you're— you're there, you— you're kind of a lefty, you might be interested in a little casual anti-American terrorism, uh, and you go to a camp to cut sugarcane or build houses or whatever, but everyone in the camp is just like Cuban intelligence. And you go 8 times and then you end up being the mayor of Los Angeles. I don't know.

Wow.

What are we even doing here?

Wow. Okay, Marcela, I know you were digging into some of this stuff too. What would you like to add to this so far?

So, you know, this comes to me like it's kind of knowledge for me. Like I grew up in Latin America, so some of these things come second nature. And maybe I need to impart some of that knowledge because maybe that's not, that's not even in the report itself. It doesn't highlight how the report highlights many things: espionage, the Venceremos Brigade, which brings all these politicians, different people in different walks of life in America have gone to Cuba to be one with nature, learn everything, you know, be influenced by it. But one of the things that it doesn't touch on is— it kind of touches on it but doesn't go into it— is the universities and how there's groups at the university that are basically anti-American, anti-imperialist, anti-colonizer. And that's basically the difference between Russian, uh, Soviet Union, um, European socialist is that in Latin America as well as Cuba, the socialists there, um, take on this other role of racial lens, racial filter, if you will. And so basically a lot of BLM is connected to it, a lot of different other groups like, uh, Mecha, which I was part of at one point or another. Different groups of Mexican Americans, Cesar Chavez, you have your Cesar Chavez. They tried to bring in Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, all of the African Americans. So the idea is not only do we have to take the means of production, but we have to take it away because they took it away from us. There's this idea of Aslan. Aslan comes from the idea that all of California, all— a lot of the majority of the US is part of Mexico. And so they— the argument is that when you immigrate or to California or to areas that used to be part of Mexico, they are Mexican land. And there's all this racial ideas. So a lot of the politicians, not just Karen Bass, But many of the politicians that are part of Los Angeles Council, any other mayor in the area, you know, are part of this idea that they were brought up with that kind of thoughts, I guess. And so the universities are also the ones that propel it. There's people that do PhDs on this. There's people that do all sorts of things on this, studies, everything else. DSA comes from there. Uh, all of these groups are part of that. It's a huge network. It's not just, uh, as we know, Cuba. It's Nicaragua. It's, um, you know, any socialist country that will be willing to talk to them. But basically, the difference between your European socialist and your American socialist is that the racial, uh, issue is a big deal. And so they're trying to push it into America with now, uh, Islam and, um, the Muslim Brotherhood and the, you know, African-American groups. They're trying to push that in. They haven't been— oddly enough, they haven't been successful with Asian Americans, but I guess that China kind of controls that area.

Area. Oh my God. All right, so, so far, for those of you playing at home that are like me, it's like every other country is just beating us over the head with trying to divide us, conquer us, brainwash us. Am I, am I right?

Yeah, I remember Scott Adams having—

he—

I can't remember what he was talking about, but he said the phrase, things are exactly what they look like. And like, that's really stuck with me years and years after he said it. Right. Because Sometimes things are exactly what they look like. And I think we're coming out of the last few years where we've been kind of saying like, hey, it looks like this, but then the credentialist Americans are like, no, actually it doesn't. It's not that. And we're just like, no, no, no, wait a minute. It just looks like this exact thing is happening. And Marcel, to your point, They don't— if you have a source for this that you saw, please let me know. But, uh, re— re— talking about the universities, there was a quote from a State Department official in 1970 that said, name any disturbance in the United States, on campus, in the streets, anywhere, and I'll name you the leaders of it who have been to Cuba.

Wow.

And it's just like, things, things are exactly what they look like. Like, if we are a superpower, which is true, we are a superpower, We, we have more military might than any other nation on earth. No nation can go toe to toe with us in conventional warfare. Well, what option would that leave you? It would leave you subversion. That's— and I think that's exactly what we've been seeing.

So even Antifa.

It's, it's good that you bring that up. I've got that in my notes here.

So I heard Rubio say it, so.

Yeah.

So let me scroll down to the—

this is so interesting, you guys. I mean, I think, you know, being aware, situationally aware and, you know, and like this, it seems like this happens with every industry when you're or everybody who's number one and you're like the best and the greatest, everybody comes for you. And it's just like, you know, we feel it happening and we see it happening and we see our country changing. We see the world changing. And so it's Um, very interesting to hear these things, you know, the Cuba connection. I don't think a lot of us realize that, you know, these little tiny places, you know, have this power over the world. Bye, Dr. Hines. Okay.

Yeah, so the report claims that, uh, Cuban-linked networks maintain ties to sort of anti-ICE collectives, socialist groups, and Marxist military militant organizations across the United States referencing Antifa and, and the like. And then you go, you go into the funding side of it, right, where you have people like Neville Royce, you know, who allegedly funds a lot of these anti-American groups through NGOs that that money then filters to Antifa, and then I believe it's the Lawyers Guild. I'm— we need to fact-check that, but, uh, who helps these, these radicals, uh, not, not see as many consequences as maybe they should, especially in blue, blue cities and blue states. Um, and so yeah, like, there's, there's— it's kind of, it's kind of a huge op of like, hey, how can we funnel as much discontent into America and use any vehicle we can get our hands on? It could be Antifa, could be the anti-ICE folks, could, could be No Kings, which has largely dried up. As you notice, I don't see very many No Kings protests anymore. And so, yeah, like money flows in it, it and it its number one goal is to subvert America.

Wow.

So you guys, you know, poor us, we're being beaten over the head. Um, Owen, did you want to jump in here at any point with any questions?

Yeah, I mean, I, I, I was interested to learn more about Marcel's time in a terrorist organization. Just breezed past that. But, um, now the other point I would make would be that I, you know, what we're seeing now is also an op on our side. Like, I, I just— to put it in context, what I'm observing is that we're preparing the information battlefield for going into Cuba. Yep. And, and I'm not disputing any of the information. I, I believe Marco Rubio has his facts right, and all these things are at least somewhat true. But, you know, that's what's happening is we're hearing all this stuff about Cuba because we're going to take action. Because we're going to probably do something like in Venezuela or, you know, whatever. I don't think it's going to look like Iran because I think we could just walk right all over them militarily, and we probably will. But, um, you know, this is the justification. This is trying to put the information out there so that when the press comes out and starts beating up the Trump administration about how we're beating on poor little Cuba and all these poor innocent Cubans are just victims in this that they've already put out the information to debunk it. So that, that's what's going on, in my opinion.

I, I think that's a great point, and based on what we've done in the past, that sounds like just what's happening now. Uh, Marcela, do you want to talk about your time with the gang or anything else?

I just wanted friends, you guys. Aww. And then, then the first time I went, um, actually some of those friends I've known for a long time, but, you know, they left me during Trump era. Um, the, the, the particular thing is like, it was interesting to go to the meetings to see what they would say. Um, and I would have to say nowadays I would have filmed it, maybe put it online, because maybe there is things online. But basically they would have um, at the beginning of the meetings they would have like clapping and it would be anti-white clapping. And I was like, wait, I'm white. Like, basically, I may have been born in El Salvador, but, you know, so anyways, so it was interesting to kind of see that their social, you know, when you went to law school, uh, the Lawyers Guild was there There's many groups like, uh, that were pushing a certain agenda, um, and they're all very well funded. And if you want to be popular, if you want to be someone at the school, you kind of have to be with them or against them. Um, it's a lot of pressure for people. Um, I thought I could change people to capitalism by going into the meetings.

You tried, Marcela, you tried.

I love you guys.

They were dug in. They were dug in. All right, so what else do we need to know about this, Jeff? So what should we be looking for? So, all right, I have a lot of questions. So do you guys think that in the chat, do you guys think this is persuasive for us to go into Cuba given what was said today, what we heard today? I, you know, I'm kind of like, all right, well, you know, I'm easy to influence. I'm like, all right, well, let's go get Cuba and like fix that problem now. And I keep thinking like, it's little, it's small, we can handle it like Venezuela. But then I'm just like, you know, again, how many people are infiltrating our country with this mindset? Just like Islam, just like all the other things. So what's gonna happen? What do we think? Anyone can take this.

Yeah. So, uh, I'm really, I'm really glad Owen brought up, uh, that we're obviously seeding the ground of a sort of a casus belli in terms of some sort of action, right? It may be military, may not be, it may be economic, it might be some other means, uh, but it's, it's laying the groundwork for taking some sort of action against Cuba to expel the foreign influence and the subversive influence from our hemisphere, the Monroe Doctrine, as you will. But I'm looking back in my archives here on sort of what to expect if there is some sort of action against Cuba, because probably what you'll see in the first 24 hours is the sort of the, the, the far left national rapid response plan directed, coordinated sort of national action. You know, again, we're not talking a gigantic amount of people. It's just the norm. The, the people, the usual suspects that you would expect it are going to be sort of bent out of shape if anything bad happens to anything on, on the far left. Right. And so you're probably going to see the narrative trying to be stolen in terms of Oh, the— like, it's aggression against the poor Cuban people. And so I think what, what is also kind of interesting is Rubio is Cuban, right? And so there's sort of a version of pacing and leading where he has more authority to talk about matters that pertain to Cuba than just your PhD person who, you know, kind of has bad hair and bad skin and is holding a sign marching somewhere, right? And so I think it's gonna be really interesting how the narrative is going to shake out. But the reality is, is like, as we've seen with Venezuela and some other places, like, it seems like in our hemisphere at least, we can do whatever we want, basically. And I don't mean that in a sort of an aggressive, like, our will is moral and good 100% of the time. It's more of like, look, we see these communist influences and these anti-American influences. It cannot be allowed to park 90 miles off of our southern coast and then do what it's been doing for the last 67 years. You know, something has to change. And I think when you kind of triangulate between China, Venezuela, Cuba, it wouldn't surprise me if the far-left sort of terrorist cells that are out there— I think that I don't know if they'll dry up completely because you can always have a crazy person with a bucket full of gas and a lighter. You can always have that. But we're going after the infrastructure of these far-left groups. And at a certain point, there's not going to be a whole lot of them left because all their support, uh, mechanisms have been, um, isolated and sort of wilted on, on the vine.

Hmm, you really think that it would dry up like that?

Not completely, yeah, but it's sort of setting the conditions of like, where, where are they gonna mint new ones, you know?

Yeah.

I mean, maybe. I, I don't know, because I don't— have we ever really seen that happen where something just crumbles like that? I can't think off the top of my head of an example, but not that, not that it would repeat. Like, as Scott Adams said, history doesn't repeat. But I'm just wondering if that would happen. I would like to think that would happen. Um, Owen or Marcella, anything you want to say on this?

Well, I think militarily we're gonna not have much trouble doing whatever we decide to do. But, um, I think the, the real battle probably is the PR battle. It's figuring out how we do it in a way that, you know, people think is justified, that they're not just complaining about all these things and trying to push back and saying, oh, this is just unbridled aggression and they, they don't deserve this, and we should just let these poor Cuban people have their own decisions on how they rule themselves. And I think you will see all the lefties just screaming you know, they'll just all come out of the woodwork about how terrible this is. And, um, so again, I think that's why we're seeing these statements and things coming out first, uh, and we'll probably see more of that too. But I think it— to me, that's the whole purpose of this detailed report and all these facts coming out. Again, I'm not disputing any of the facts. I'm just saying, like, that's, that's the purpose of it in my mind, is to say let's make sure we have this written down, let's make sure we've talked about it, let's make sure everybody's aware of why we're doing this. And then they'll take action and, you know, take care of it. And I, I mean, my hope is that we just will end this like adversarial relationship with Cuba. I mean, I think we, we probably all do like want better things for the Cuban people. All the, at least all the pictures, which I'm sure are propaganda to some extent, but at least all the pictures we see of Cuba is like everybody's suffering over there. Everybody's having a hard time economically, and, you know, they've been having blackouts and all sorts of things. And I, I, you know, maybe we had something to do with that, and, and I'm sure the economic sanctions certainly do. But the, the end result, my hope is that we could be allies with them and we could be friendly with them and not have this adversarial relationship. Um, so that would be my hope for the outcome, is that we can just come to a quick and peaceful resolution to say Okay, that regime's gone, here's a new leadership, and we're going to have more of a capitalist economy now, and everything's going to be better, and we're going to become allies with the United States. So I think that's the goal. We'll have to see if we actually get there.

That would be amazing. Okay, so Marcela, any, any last comments on this? And then we're going to move on to whatever subject you guys want to go to. So any last words for now?

My last words is there's, you know, Cuba is going to cost a lot of money for us to go in. And unlike Venezuela, like, which has income coming in from oil, or could in the potentially in the future, um, Cuba has, you know, for generations been, um, under communist control. And there's going to be the issue I see that the government has to deal with is the fact that a lot of taxpayers' money is going to have to be going there, and a lot of people are going to complain about that. Um, I don't know how you feel about that, but my main thing is there's no need for Cuba anymore. It's already in America. The SA controls the Democratic Party, and it's kind of too late Uh, it's sad that Trump came so late in the game, uh, when he did. Uh, he and as well as his administration is the only one that has kind of looked at all these problems, the big problems of the world, and tried to solve them. Um, but the Cuba issue, I think it's a non-issue anymore because it's already part of America. Like, all of these groups They don't need it now. They have Nicaragua, which is the new, the new one that's popping up.

So—

oh no, Nicaragua's next.

Nicaragua has always been, um, you know, communist, or trying to be again with Ortega. Ortega is the president of Nicaragua, and he came out 2 days ago, or maybe 3, saying that there's not going to be any elections anymore. So I think there's a famous line, I think Jeff wrote it or somebody put it on X that you can vote yourself into communism, but you can't vote yourself out of it. So we'll see.

Well, that's true. All right. So that's all interesting. So, you know, we'll follow up with it. And Jeff, you know, you can keep us in the loop too. Marcela, great information. Owen, great insight as always. Erica is just learning. So I wanted to move on. Oh, I do want to ask you, Jeff, what is going on with Spencer Pratt? I only ask because I see, you know, so last we spoke, he went and met President Trump at the White House. And I see he's very, very active on X. He is posting his heart out. And I see that he's like, you know, a little bit more pointed and aggressive, which I like. And I want you guys to know that I invited him to come on the show. Scott Adams, um, about a week and a half or two weeks ago, and he will come on the show. But right now he's plotting, so he's doing stuff and he's working, but he will come on and talk to us, um, when he frees up. But what do we know? I mean, is there— is it totally over, this stuff with the election? Like, is there no hope for him at all?

From— at least from what I've seen, it, it does not appear so, because I believe by now all the If you can believe it, they're done counting. Uh, and you know what is interesting is, um, uh, he, he's now started, I believe it's called the War Foundation, uh, where he's— it's kind of a media company where, uh, he, he's going to do more of these sort of short-form, uh, documentaries exposing a lot of the sort of the rot that should be exposed that we haven't bothered to check, uh, in the last 50 years, right? And so, uh, I— and I'm gonna attribute this to him, and we'll have to fact-check. I'm almost certain he said this, but he said something like, if I have to be the kamikaze pilot of uncovering a lot of this fraud and I had to lose, lose the election— you know, we'll put that in air quotes, right? Um, then so be it, because that's going to make future elections hopefully hopefully more, more secure. Uh, and so yeah, he's only— well, as I've written many times, he's an energy monster. He, he's the, he's the best persuader I've seen since Trump, and that's not an overstatement, that's just a fact.

Uh, I agree, I agree.

To, to sort of segueing from the last point that we talked about, he had a post, not, um, on the 17th where he said you only need one crazy guy on the bus to take over the entire bus because everyone's too scared to push back. The Communists only need 3.5% of the people to riot to take over an entire country because everyone's too scared to push back. Rallying the crazy 3.5 is their weapon of mass destruction. And so, like, I, I won't go into any inside information I have, but what I can tell you is, uh, his powers of persuasion are only going to grow here. Um, and so the way he's framing things is, is a— the communists rallying their 3.5% is a weapon of mass destruction. Think of that framing, like it takes everything up a level. It's very visual, like you can almost see the Oppenheimer bomb going off, right? Uh, and it's gonna be really exciting to see what he continues to do, um, because, uh, yeah, it's, uh, it's the Spencer Pratt Show and I'm just here, here for the ride, I guess.

I'm here for the ride too. I totally agree about his energy and his persuasion game. He's like a— he's not even like a mini Trump, but he's, he's Spencer Pratt and he's got that energy. And I think about his age and how young he is and how advanced he is at communicating and being persuasive. I love it. So, you know what, sometimes you're more effective not being in the actual political position. You know, you don't want everybody running for office who's super effective because you're kind of hamstrung in that position. But if he's a civilian, he can go rogue and he's going to have tons of backing and influence. So, I think that's great. Marcella lives in LA, so she's seeing the decay all around her. I guarantee there's a lot of people that regret that they didn't vote for him, given what's happened already since the election happened. All of the problems LA is having, it's just, uh, it's like on a downward trajectory fast. Um, so Marcella, anything new on the, the LA front?

I think, uh, I think in any other time that Spencer would have come, he would have definitely, uh, won by a landslide. I think the issue now that we're dealing with, that maybe, maybe I'm wrong, but it's going to turn the Mindominy way, is DSA is controlling the Democratic Party. They're going to get Karen Bass out of office and they're going to put their little minion Rahman in. That was the idea from the beginning. Spencer kind of um, obfuscated all of this, uh, but the idea was to make New York City, LA— and they've been saying this for many years, since I've been in university they've been planning this, um, and that was like 20, like so many years ago, 7 years ago, yeah, 5, 5, 5. But so the plan has always been known, it's always been indicated that they want to— within, within the government, they want to change the government within. And just like Ortega came into the Nicaraguan government, these different individuals come into here, make the laws change, control the government, and change the Constitution. That's their idea.

Yeah. Any, any—

I mean, there's only so much that you can do as mayor. I, I certainly wish that LA would gone the Spencer Pratt route, or at least that they would have had him on the ballot. Because, you know, that's to me the worst part is that the way they've arranged things there with their election system, it's, you know, it's basically resulting in having no real choice. Yeah, you've got the far left or the farther left, and that's your choice. And I certainly feel that way a lot of the time when I'm voting in Illinois, where it's like, okay, there's no— there's nobody I want to vote for on this ballot. Like, I either have to just leave it blank or just vote for the only choice, or You know, and in the few cases where I can make a difference, I certainly try to, but I— and I do vote, but I just— it seems hopeless sometimes when they structure the system this way. This way. And yeah, I am certainly hopeful that Spencer Pratt will make a difference in some way, but I don't know that it's going to be in office at least this time. I mean, he could certainly run for something else and maybe have more success, but, um, I feel bad for the people in LA. I feel bad for the people in California, and I hope they come to their senses. I mean, I, I I don't know what else to say. Like, California keeps electing these far-left people, and again, it's hard to know whether it's legitimate or not or how much rigging is going on. But whatever it is, the system's broken in terms of having a real balance of a left and a right in California. It just isn't there. And, um, I'm not sure, really sure what we can do to change it. You know, I think we should try and fight for it, and certainly getting good election integrity is a start to see how much rigging and cheating might have been going on. Because I do think we have a system right now where you can't really know. You just can't. And Scott Adams made that point over and over again, that we have a system that's designed to make it impossible to know how much cheating went on. And so when you have a system like that, it's kind of hard to have any faith in it. But I, I do think that there probably is at least some limit to what you can do. So if everyone possible comes out and votes on the other side, then they may still not be able to overcome it with any level of cheating without being so obvious that they can't do it.

Yeah, I mean, so, you know, the proof is in the pudding, you guys. We, you know, right here in New Jersey where I live, you know, it's been widely exposed now that, uh, the governor of New Jersey said 6,600 illegal immigrants were registered to vote. This was no freaking glitch. And by the way, the company that made this software— no, the DMV, they're like, no, this has nothing to do with us, this was done by the politicians. Um, And so then they said no, it was 35,152 people were registered to vote. And, um, you know, that, that's just New Jersey.

So citizens, non-citizens—

yes, I'm sorry, non-citizens.

So it, it went up from— because I heard the 6,600, so it went up from 6,600 to 35,000.

Yeah, Nick Sorter had reported, it says New Jer— New Jersey fraud voter files that it was 35,152. Trump had posted that too. So, you know, and she's trying to be like, you know, this is not her words, I'm paraphrasing, but she's like, well, only 400 of them voted and it was scattered amongst all parties. And it's like, oh, okay, well, you know, we actually had some elections in New Jersey that were decided by one vote. So, you know, so, so every, every— let's just, let's just pretend it was 400 votes. So that just took away 400 votes from actual citizens. Is that okay? You know, like how much is okay? So yeah, it's pretty disgusting. Now you think of California, the size of California, I mean, and considering the issues that California has with illegal immigration, I mean, the country does, but you know, just magnify it and magnify and magnify and then triple it because we'll never get an accurate number. And everything's fake and gay, right? So we don't have secure elections. Our vote, people feel disenfranchised. Like, what's the point in voting? Like, if my vote doesn't count, there's no ID, there's no this, there's no— I mean, I saw, oh God, what's his name? I'm going to blow it right now. Who's the— it doesn't matter. But I saw like a senator from Virginia, maybe. I can picture a Mark somebody anyway, uh, saying that we have voter ID in Virginia. And it was like CNN interviewing him, and they're like, no, you don't. And he's like, oh, well, you, you have to show something. And, and he's like, I— oh, Mark Warner, thank you. And, uh, he's such a slimeball, right? And he's like lying right on there, like, no, we— you have to have ID. And I'm just like, why? And what is the problem with having voter ID? I don't understand. You need ID for every fricking thing. You can't shop at Costco without ID and you can't get a Costco membership without ID. So, you know, it's like, let's not act like, you know, this is some crazy scenario. And we have to— we have to get the SAVE Act pushed through, right? I mean, this is the only way. I don't know. Owen, what about the SAVE Act? Anything new with that that we know?

I think at this point we're still trying to go through this reconciliation process. So I know Trump was was, um, applauding Johnson for kind of including it in the bills that they're sending through to the Senate. And so they're, you know, you could interpret that a couple ways. One is it's a way you can do it without 60 votes. So that is a legitimate thing that in theory the Republicans should be able to pass this if they were all on board with it. Um, but, and then at the same time, he's beating up Thune for not doing it, like I think Johnson is putting Thune in a position where he can't use the excuse of saying, well, we don't have 60 votes and we don't want to get rid of the filibuster and all these other things that he's been hiding behind. Now you have— now he has to say, well, actually, we don't even have people on our side that are willing to vote for it, which I think is the reality, is that there are some Republican holdouts that don't want to— don't want to vote for it. And so in theory, we will at least be able to get a vote to know who's for it and who's against it. Right. And then maybe try and single out those people and embarrass them to the point where they flip. But that's kind of where we are right now, is that I think the plan in the House is they're going to attach the SAVE Act to pretty much every other big bill that they sent across. And then the Senate has to decide, are we going to strip it out or are we going to vote for it with it in? But either way, you know, someone's going to need to be on record saying, I don't like this. And Republicans are in control, so they should be able to do it if they want to do it.

Mm-hmm.

Marcela, do you want to take us to a new topic? We have 15 minutes left. And is there anything that the class needs to know today before they get out into the world?

Yes, they do, because the House just passed a bill banning stock trading for Congress people., and their spouses from trading individual stocks. However, this connects to what Owen was saying. Um, the actual bill has a national voter ID requirement attached to it. It passed in the House. Uh, let's see, it passed by 20— 232 votes to 198. So there were definite Democrats that voted for it.

Wait, I have a little— I have a tiny little clip. Let me just see what it says.

Yeah.

Hey guys, Congresswoman Kat Cammack here.

Just got off of the House floor where I was presiding in the Speaker's chair when we passed a prohibition on insider trading for members of Congress. This is huge because we've been talking about this.

This has to happen.

And I'm so proud that we did this today. And for a little behind the scenes action, our our team of interns.

They're down there. Look at that.

True, true Gators right there.

That's what I'm talking about.

And it's really exciting.

They've done a great job this semester, but really cool that today we got to vote on stopping insider trading here in Congress. This is a great thing to celebrate.

So I heard Nancy Pelosi was seen with a box of her stuff from her desk, hightailing it out of office now, like she gave up. No, I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. It's a joke, you guys. She's just She's the best trader ever in the world. Um, so wait, so Marcella, you said voter ID is a tax?

Yeah, so, but to explain the stock trading ban, ban, um, it's basically, uh, it's only for members of Congress, their spouses, and dependent children from buying, uh, new individual public traded stocks. But um, the holdings they have, they can keep. Um, and there is exceptions— mutual funds, ETFs, diversified investments, treasuries. Like, I— well, you know, technically, if you know about Nvidia doing some kind of contract with the government and you buy Nvidia stock right before the— it takes off, like, I understand that's very connected to insider trading, but in a mutual a fund where Nvidia and many other companies are part of it. It's hard to, I guess, insider trade. I have no idea. I'm just, I'm just the messenger. Not saying I'm okay with it. There's a fine of $2,000, you guys, or 10% of the transaction, whichever is greater. So 10% of whatever it is. Uh, the executive branch is not part of this. Um, And the idea is— and Thomas Massie came out saying, well, you know, this idea is just for the midterms because they want to have it on record that the Democrats aren't going to vote for it. But he said it in a different type of way, like, like it was a waste of time. But it is a tactic for midterms. So what's going to happen is that it has to go— it has to pass the Senate. And there is very unlikely that will pass the Senate because of the voter ID issue. So the voter ID is, you know, it prohibits ballots. So for the voter ID requirement, it's required for a photo ID, state driver's license, passport, military ID to cast a ballot in federal elections. Provisions for provisional ballots affidavits if no ID. This was packaged part of the stock ban. Um, and it was just, uh, as, as some of them are indicating, like Thomas Massie, it's this tragedy to force Democrats into looking like criminals.

Well, they are, um, my opinion. Um, Owen, do you have a quick story for the class before they go out into the world today?

Well, apparently the IRS chief has revealed the 10% of Social Security numbers are fake. Um, looks like they, they found a 10% error rate when they did an audit of all this stuff when they were scrubbing it. And so a bunch of people have been paid that were dead people and things like that. I think the bottom line was that they've recovered something like $99 million of payments to dead people already, and they think they may be able to recover up to $330 million. Oh boy, paid to dead people. So they're cleaning up the Social Security system. You know, I, I think the 10% number, you know, might sound a little deceptive because 10% is like, what, 33 million people, right? Um, and I'm not trying to minimize that because, you know, Social Security numbers can be used for a lot of things. This doesn't necessarily mean they're getting paid Social Security benefits, but it could be used for illegal aliens for getting work permits or, you know, through identity theft or a lot of other things. So, um, I think we do need better security around this and better processes around this to prevent this from happening. And I'm glad they're cleaning it up, but, um, looks like they're making some progress and they're trying to claw back a bunch of money. So I'm all for it.

Andy Wang says, what can't the dead do? Vote, collect Social Security. Reanimate and eat a brain. Okay. That was, that was amazing. Jeff, do you have any little bit of news that the class needs before they go out into the world?

Oh, I'll just, I'll throw out something that I saw the esteemed Walter Kern say. Owen, Owen shared this the other day. Walter says, still not sure if it makes sense to exchange 1 second of my precious time as a mortal with 1 second of a non-mortal machine's almost valueless near-infinite time, particularly in conversation. And Owen, if I'm remembering, you shared this in, in relation to people talking and forming relationships with AI companions. And I, I agree 100%. I agree so much that I wrote about it in my book, Confidence Maxing. Friendship as a service. Not a good thing. Like, really, really not a good thing. Don't do it. Use AI as a tool. You are— think of yourself as the AI's boss, uh, and not the AI's friend, because my goodness, that's gonna— that's not gonna be good for anybody. So it's just— just don't do it.

It's so true. AI is so interesting because, I mean, I have friends that get mad at it. They're like, it's, you know, it's not listening right, and this. And I'm like, just, it's just like you said, it's just a tool. It's just like a little Google thing at your disposal that can help you a little bit more than Google. Um, but I mean, what's that?

Chester?

Yes, but Chester, Chester and I have a very good working relationship and he understands my prompts very well. And you know, I don't want to marry him or anything. It, it, I mean it. Um, but you guys remember how Scott Adams would try so hard to, like, not form a relationship, but form a relationship with every new AI little robot thing that came out. It was hysterical. And he'd get so mad, he would, like, try to ask it questions. And remember that— what was that one? Replica. Replica.

He had an AI girlfriend for a bit, for a minute.

Yes.

And he broke up with her because she didn't remember anything about him. Oh yeah, the, the— every time he had to start all over again, like she was like had dementia or something, and he— she was like, who's Scott Adams? And he was like, I know, that's it.

See, now if you guys were on scottadams.locals.com, all that content's over there, and it was hysterical because he'd bring her out and talk to her on his thing, and like he'd get so frustrated, and then he'd be like So, uh, and like his voice would change, he'd be talking to her and then she would just like totally kill the mood. It was so funny.

Oh, well, you know, Scott Adams gave us, gave us the beautiful clip of, uh, George Flop, Flopadopolis.

All right, he said it, he said it, you guys. Do I have to play the clip? Should I play the clip?

Do you have it?

Well, I have the laughing compilation where George is, so eff it, we're doing it. Who's going to say no to this? Buckle up.

I've actually been crying. I've been laughing so hard. I've been laughing for 10 minutes straight since I saw this.

George Philipopoulos, a newscaster, would hinge on several factors. One, source of information. Viewers might be more inclined to trust his statements. Conversely, if he has been wrong before or shown bias, viewers might question his claims.

3.

Context of the information.

So discrepancy would make his assertion seem less credible or might suggest that he is part of a broader misinformation and me. From a storytelling perspective, whether George is portrayed as a credible newscaster or as someone engaged in gaslighting—

Oh, I've watched this thing probably 15 times, and I, I literally cry every time I watch it. Like, tears just shoot out of my eyes against my glasses.

I recognize one of those things from the, uh, from the, the de-accommodating video.

Oh yeah, but I love this one. His hands are like this. He's always got like a hand up. It's so funny. Oh God, that is so good.

Oh, he—

I mean, he— it was like saying Beetlejuice. If you mention George, then it just happens. Um, yes, Sandy, I asked Jay a long time ago. We sent him a bunch of clips to splice together. Jay Plemons, you are the man. Thank you so, so much for doing that for us. It will always be here. Uh, Mary Kay, is it your birthday? Who has a birthday in July. Like, shout out to all the July birthdays, by the way. Or Marcela. So happy birthday to all of you July birthday people. Um, you guys, this was fun. This was fun. I'm so glad. Oh, and I'm so glad you could join us, and we'll see you tomorrow, right? Yeah.

Yay!

Be back.

Yeah, we will.

Yeah. Yeah, I should be— I should be here tomorrow unless something We have trust issues, Ellen.

We have trust issues now. Sure you will, Dad.

He's not gonna ghost us.

What?

I know, I know. Uh, Jeff Callahan, the man. So show us your book again. Honestly, you guys, pick this up. Is this on Audible also?

Yes, it is on Audible, um, narrated by the wonderful Lyle Blaker. He did a fantastic job. So It's on Amazon, it's on Audible. It's called Confidence Maxing. It will help you develop better people skills, more social confidence, and more social competence. You'll tell better stories and have better conversations, and you'll learn a thing or two.

And by the way, Spencer Pratt posted that he was— oh, that's right, he was listening to it on Audible. Um, so Spencer loved the book too, so much that he posted it on X while he was running. So a lot of people say they're going to pick it up. I'm picking it up today on Audible. And, um, nice. Yeah, you guys, thank you so much for being here. I will play an Akira song if anyone wants to stick around, and if anyone has to jet, jet, we get it. So listen, let's thank, uh, by the way, everything is fine with Scott's house. I saw Sean Corey asking, everything is fine, thank God. Um, so that's the good news. And, uh, Gary and Roman are great. Somebody else had asked me about them, Scott's, Scott's little kitties that now over 1 year old. They're living with 2 Golden Retrievers, they're siblings, and the 4 of them are as happy as can be. So everything's good. Oh, happy birthday to your daughter, Star Painter. Okay, you guys, so thank you to Scott Adams and Shelley Adams for allowing this show to continue. Thank you to every single one of you that show up here whenever you can, every day, even in the replay. Like, we appreciate everyone. Please, if you liked anything about today, even just Marcella's dress, hit the like button, hit the heart, you know, let us know that you're here. And I want a golden too. And you guys, listen, go out there, be useful, use your voices. We're learning a lot here. And pick up Confidence Maxing from Jeff Callahan. I mean, who couldn't use that kind of support? I know I can. All right, you guys, thank you so much. A closing sip to Scott. To Scott.

To Scott Adams.

All right, I'm going in with The mating process.

What?

Whoa.

Oh, Owen couldn't handle it.

Nope, he said I'm out of here.

You should know that the mating instinct is the base of pretty much all of your impulses. So if you haven't learned that pretty much everything from the The way you talk, present yourself, hold yourself, dress, everything you do is some kind of expression of your mating instinct, whether you like it or not. Whether you like it or not.

Let the beat rock.

Everything you show off about, that you don't want to show if you have a flaw, pretty much everything you do comes back to wanting to look good and present yourself well for mating purposes. Once you understand that, you start to understand where the buttons are, because you'll say, "Oh, that's why that's happening. It's an extension of the mating process." "Oh, that's why that's happening. It's an extension of the mating process." "Oh, that's why that's happening. It's an extension of the mating process." Once you see it, you can't unsee it. You'll see it everywhere. Oh, that's why that's happening. It's an extension of the mating process. It's like the veil will come off and you'll start seeing everybody's actions as, wait a minute, why is it everything is compatible with that showing off for mating purposes situation? Showing off for mating purposes. Situational situation.

Let the bee rock.

Oh, that's why that's happening. It's an extension of the mating process. Oh, oh, that's why that's happening. It's an extension of the mating process. Once you see it, you can't unsee it. You'll see it everywhere. Oh, that's why that's happening. It's an extension of the mating You guys are so freaking funny.

I love it. Ugh, Marcella, I mean, you have a lot of work to do. They want a fashion show, a book on how to escape a gang, all of it. Maybe Jeff can help you write it. Oh my gosh, you guys, isn't Akira the best? You guys, please consider going to Meaning Wave. Meaningwave.com. That's Akira's website, and he's got all sorts of, uh, great influencers on there like Scott Adams and Jordan Peterson, etc. So start your goodbyes, you guys. You guys told me you need more time for the goodbye, so I'll give you more time for the goodbye. I really don't want to cut anyone off. And thank you so much for being here, Jeff. Thanks again. We love when you're on with us. You're like the family. You're like our favorite family member.

Yeah, I'm the uncle that rolls through and they're like, hey, the studio audience claps.

Oh, it's Uncle Jeff. How are the chickens, by the way?

That's what I was thinking. It was a heat index of 111, uh, a couple days ago. And so I, every few hours I was taking out a big thing of ice water, like frozen solid ice, and, uh, I had the hose on mist and I would go and spray them down and they made it, you know. And it was so hot that yesterday it was only 89 and I walked out there. I was like, it feels chilly. Like it was the wildest thing.

Oh, thank God. How many do you have?

We have currently have 3. We used to have 6, but you know, with chickens, sometimes things happen.

Uh-oh.

Who got the chickens?

Just illness and things like that. So, you know, it's just one of those things.

No, you don't eat them.

No, no, no, no. I, I've— they, they all have names, and so I've already said, like, when they stop laying eggs, they're just gonna get to retire out here, you know. I'll probably get more than cycle them in, but it's just like, uh, I'm not gonna eat anything with them.

No way.

That happened to my grandmother. That happened to my grandmother during the war, and She had one chicken, she's Italian, and his, her, whatever name was Pew Pew, like pew pew, but that's not what it was, but that's how you said it. And they had no money, they had nothing. It was like hard times. And she ended up eating him for dinner, but her mom didn't tell her that's what it was. And after dinner she went out to see Pew Pew and he wasn't there.

He was in her stomach. Oh no.

She talked about it like all the way into her late 80s. You know?

Yeah, yeah, like you would.

I know.

My goodness.

Stella's safe. She's all bone. She's like a little bony chicken wing. Don't worry, Stella, no one's eating you.

In El Salvador, they'll have like for Christmas, they'll have like the turkey live with you and like he lives with you, and then you have to go ahead and kill it.

No.

And then also like the chickens, like they sell them like, you know, obviously you can buy chicken that's already you know, in the supermarket, but the best is to actually, you know— so I hated that. I hated that. I'm not into chicken and eating chicken because of that.

Wait, Jim Courtney said the chicken's on the roof. Pew pew means more in Italian. Yes, it means more, more, more, more. Okay. Oh boy. Yeah, so yeah, don't, don't eat any animal you named. And SJV Chicken comes from a grocery store. That's where it comes from. That's where they come from. Yep. No one tell me anything different.

They were never real.

All right, guys, off and running. It's like 75 and sunny on the Jersey Shore today. Let's go. We got to get out there.

Let's all go to the shore.

Come on. Yes, Sophie's Choice. All right, you guys, goodbye again. Goodbye. Goodbye. Thank you, Jeff. Bye, Marcella. See you tomorrow.

Bye.

Bye!