Armstrong & Getty On Demand

A Cat With A Neck Tie?!

36 min
Apr 8, 202610 days ago
Listen to Episode
Summary

Armstrong & Getty discuss a college student who uncovered a massive cyberattack using residential proxy networks, Iran-Israel ceasefire negotiations amid conflicting statements, U.S. military spending comparisons, and California's controversial gender-affirming care policies affecting minors.

Insights
  • Residential proxy networks, ostensibly for legitimate privacy purposes, are widely abused by criminals and AI companies to circumvent security measures and gather training data at scale
  • Effective intelligence gathering sometimes requires emotional intelligence and cultural fluency (memes, informal communication) rather than aggressive interrogation tactics
  • Iran ceasefire negotiations involve multiple competing power centers with conflicting interests, making it difficult to distinguish between official positions and spoiler factions
  • California's restrictions on therapeutic exploration of gender identity in minors may prevent identification of underlying issues like autism, trauma, or mental illness
  • U.S. military spending advantage over all other nations combined is partially offset by higher domestic costs and European dependency on American security spending
Trends
Cybersecurity threats from distributed networks of compromised consumer devices escalating in scale and sophisticationAI training data acquisition increasingly reliant on circumventing automated traffic detection through residential proxy networksGeopolitical negotiations with fragmented state actors producing conflicting public statements and difficulty establishing single negotiating authorityYouth gender-affirming medical interventions proceeding without comprehensive mental health evaluation or exploration of alternative diagnosesGenerational shift in online communication norms (meme fluency, informal tone) becoming critical skill for intelligence and law enforcement workEuropean military capability gaps widening as NATO members prioritize social spending over defense infrastructurePurchasing power parity disparities between U.S. and international defense spending creating measurement complexity in military capability assessments
Companies
CloudFlare
Internet service provider that experienced unprecedented DDoS attack comparable to combined populations of UK, German...
Nokia
Detected hundreds of thousands of devices launching increasingly powerful DDoS attacks through residential proxy netw...
iHeart Media
Podcast network distributing Armstrong & Getty On Demand show
The New York Times
Published Artemis 2 distance story using unconventional measurement comparisons; reported Iran's 10-point ceasefire b...
Wall Street Journal
Editorial board member Jillian Melchior reported on NATO drone war exercise in Estonia
University of Southern California
Implemented gym access restrictions barring men from certain facilities to accommodate women and non-binary gym users
People
Benjamin Brundage
College senior who uncovered massive cyberattack network (Mirai/KimSufi) through Discord investigation and meme-based...
Johnny Skinner
Testified before California legislature about irreversible harms from puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones receive...
Dr. Marcy Bowers
Admitted on video that puberty blockers followed by cross-sex hormones result in no orgasms and stunted genitals
Lish Kozlowski
Argued against bill barring transgender athletes from girls sports, claiming gender binary is colonial export
Scott Wiener
California legislator present during Johnny Skinner's testimony on gender-affirming care restrictions
Jack Armstrong
Co-host of the show discussing geopolitics, cybersecurity, and social policy
Joe Getty
Co-host of the show providing analysis and commentary on current events
Donald Trump
Posted on Truth Social clarifying Iran ceasefire negotiations involve only one group of meaningful points discussed b...
Pete Hegseth
Discussed Iran ceasefire negotiations and suggested conflicting statements come from non-governing factions
Jillian Melchior
Wall Street Journal editorial board member who participated in NATO drone war exercise in Estonia
Bruce Springsteen
Performing concert tour in San Francisco and Los Angeles; hosts discussed his political messaging during performances
Max Weinberg
E Street Band drummer who worked as drummer for Conan O'Brien's show between tour dates
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Referenced for his famous farewell address warning about military-industrial complex and distrust of Pentagon
Quotes
"It was just a bit of just asking over and over again, then being like a bit unserious."
Benjamin BrundageCyberattack investigation segment
"I'm a 23 year old gay man who's never had an orgasm and may never experience one."
Johnny SkinnerGender-affirming care testimony
"Numerous agreements, lists and letters are being sent out by people that have absolutely nothing to do with the USA Iran negotiations."
Donald TrumpIran ceasefire discussion
"Gender binary is a colonial export and not an immutable global truth."
Lish KozlowskiGender policy debate
"When you throw politics into it, it ruins that. So don't do that."
Jack ArmstrongFinal thoughts segment
Full Transcript
This is an I Heart podcast. Guaranteed human. Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio, the George Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty. I'm strong and getty. And now he is. I'm strong and getty. The Artems 2 reached 252,756 miles from Earth. Or, as the New York Times helpfully put it this morning, if you took 22 inch dock zones and laid the nose to tail, you'd need 728 million dogs to cover the distance. If you took one of the dock zones on a brisk three mile per hour walk, you'd need to walk for more than 84,000 hours to get there. Man, Americans will do anything to not use the metric system. Wow, Colbert. Re-embracing being funny. That's a good joke. I've never quite understood why everybody thinks that's a better way to give you an idea of distance. That's if you stacked pancakes, you'd take 8 trillion pancakes. Can't wrap my head around that. That doesn't help me any more than miles. Right. More than eight. I just get dizzy. Too many pancakes. It is funny. If you laid dollar bills end to end and stretched around. We'll do anything to avoid the metric system. That's pretty funny. That is really funny. Hey, come up. Here's your latest update. We'll get to this later. What's going on with the ceasefire? Iran has halted traffic in the Strait of Hormuz, according to CNN. And Trump has said, no, fire on Hezbollah is not part of the peace deal. That's a completely separate thing. So he's on board with Israel attacking Hezbollah, which to me means this ain't going anywhere, but we'll see. Coming up at the bottom of the hour, a truly powerful gender-bending madness update. I'll present this without comment. Colorado's free healthcare program for illegal immigrant pregnant persons and children costs seven times more than budgeted. There you have it. All right. So this is an interesting story and kind of inspiring in a way. I think maybe you first need to understand the way this computer hack, it's a college student who stopped a massive, massive computer disaster hack. Hackers. Hackers. I hate hackers. Has to do with residential proxy networks. And there are dozens of companies around the world that run these networks that are made up of your phones, computers, video players. Their processing power is, sometimes you sign up for this many, many times you don't, is used like in the dark of the night by res proxy companies that ran out access to internet connections on the devices to customers who want to look like they're surfing the internet from a genuine home address. It's kind of similar to a, what do you call it? But it's abused like crazy around the world. I didn't know that. So one of the many books I've read about AI, one of their worst case scenario chapters, was AI harnessing all the power in all our computers and everything like that. Right. In a way that I'd never didn't know was possible or never thought of, but I didn't know companies already do that. Yeah, that's a great illustration of what that is. Yeah, indeed. So, so you want that anonymity. It's useful for people who want privacy or for companies that want to masquerade as regular people to test out internet features. For instance, for a particular region or scrape the web for data, AI companies use the networks to get around blocks on automated traffic so they can gather large amounts of data to train their models. And then there are customers who want to hide their identity because their tickets scalping, defrauding banks, calling in bomb threats, stalking child exploitation, hacking or espionage. So in other words, it's, it can be legit, but it is just abused like crazy by really evil. So that primer aside, or do you say primer? You got this college student at the Rochester Institute of Technology in Rochester, New York, Benjamin Brundage. That sounds like a character in a movie. Really does. He was closing in on a mystery that even seasoned internet investigators had left them baffled and a cat meme helped him crack the case. So a network of hacked devices was launching the biggest cyber attacks ever seen on the internet. Biggest one ever. It had become the most powerful cyber weapon ever assembled large enough to knock a state or even a small country offline. And investigators didn't know exactly who had built it or how. And Brundage, who's a tech student and a computer whiz, had been following the attacks to between classes and was conducting his own investigation. And in September, the college senior started messaging online with an anonymous user who seemed to have more knowledge than a person ought to have about the attack. You're close to getting to a portion where you could just start quacking or barking. And I would understand it as well. What's going on here? We need a young person to explain this story to Jack. Okay, so anyway, college kids aware of this giant super cyber attack and is intrigued. I want to know how they did it too or how they were about to do it. So he's chatting on discord with a bunch of, you know, hackers and programmers and computer whizzes and he comes across a guy you see or a human who, wait a minute, how does he know that Brundage started to think? But he didn't want to come. He wanted more information because he thought I'm onto something, but he didn't want to come off as too serious. So he shut down the conversation. Then every now and then he'd send a funny gif to lighten the mood, including a cat's owner adjusting a necktie on a cat. That's hilarious. This guy's, this Brundage chap, his savvy, his emotional intelligence is what really impressed me about this. He'd think a cat with a necktie. I know. These are odd times. Cats are so formal. But if things were starting to get serious, he'd say, yeah, gotta go. He'd cut it off. Then he'd send a cat freaking gif for Jeff. Brundage was fluent in the memes, jokes, and technical jargon popular with young gamers and hackers who are extremely online. He says, quote, it was just a bit of just asking over and over again, then being like a bit unserious. At one point he asked for some technical details. He followed up with a cat meme, a six second clip that showed a hand adjusting a necktie on a fluffy gray cat. Brundage didn't expect it to work, but he got the information. It took me by surprise, he said. Did the cat have a wedding to go to? It's not clear to me, but the cat is wearing both the black necktie and a white collar. Eventually the leaker hinted that there was a new vulnerability on the internet. Brundage, who was 22, would learn it threatened tens of millions of consumers and as much as a quarter of the world's corporations. As he unraveled the mystery, impressed veteran researchers with his findings, including federal law enforcement, which took action against the network a couple of weeks ago. A researcher at a giant computer company that does this sort of thing, joked at one point that the entire internet could go down if Brundage spent too much time studying for his exams. Wow. Wow. How crazy is that? So savvy is that kid. Someday the whole internet's going to go down or all of airline, a major, major attack somewhere in the world or all over the world. And it might be China or, as Trump famously said, some 300 pound guy in his basement. Just knows how to do it. Yeah, especially given the nature of this, the joining together of the devices that I was talking about, the residential, what you call it. It was a couple of years ago that Nokia's sensors had picked up a series of increasingly powerful cyber attacks coming from devices that hadn't previously been considered dangerous, called distributed denial of service or DDOS attacks. We've all heard of those, I think. They were massive floods of junk internet data designed to knock websites offline by overwhelming the data pipes that connected them, sometimes launched by extortionists or even business rivals. But Nokia saw hundreds of thousands of devices joining in these attacks. One unprecedented attack later in the year on internet service provider CloudFair was quote comparable to the combined populations of the UK, Germany and Spain, all simultaneously typing a website address and then hitting enter at the same second. Wow. Yeah. The network which would become known as Kim Wolf, which sounds like an anime cartoon for adolescent girls, seemed to be using residential proxy connections to launch its attacks, giving it the potential to do massive damage. The basic message was be afraid, said one computer expert. Anyway, craziness. I've got a chat GPT being sued over something, another one of those kind of stories. This time around a school shooter who may have gotten its advice from chat GPT. On how to pull off a school shooting? Right. Did that happen or not? And you got the gender-bending madness. We had a lot this hour. I hope you can stick around. So Trump with a true social post just a few minutes ago that might help explain what's going on with the confusion. Because a lot of the things being said about the supposed ceasefire deal don't add up. So something doesn't square, right? So Trump posted this. And I have lost it. Well, that is unfortunate. I will find it in seconds again. Yet another kink in the quest for peace. Here it is. Jack's misplacing of the analog. Oh, here. Trump said just a few minutes ago, numerous agreements, lists and letters are being sent out by people that have absolutely nothing to do with the USA Iran negotiations. In many cases, they are total fraudsters, charlatans and worse. I don't know what's worse than a fraudster or charlatan or what the difference between those two things are. They will be rapidly exposed after our federal investigation is completed. There is only one group of meaningful points that are acceptable to the United States. And we will be discussing them behind closed doors during these negotiations. In other words, that all the stuff that you're hearing about, this is Iran's plan, this is our plan, they don't match everything. Trump's saying that's not true. You're hearing all this kind of stuff and it's crap. But they'll be negotiating something behind closed doors. And Hexeth said early Iran's lying about all kinds of different things. So my guess would be on this is that there are separate groups. We're dealing with some group that thinks that they're in charge in Iran. And there's some other group that doesn't agree with that group in Iran, different power center that's putting out all this information to try to blow up the deal. Yeah, yeah. That'd be my guess. Yeah, I think the bottom line is there's just so much uncertainty and so much conflicting information. The best you can do is lay out these few possibilities might be happening, but it's impossible to choose a favorite. We just don't have enough info. I came across this the other day. I thought it was interesting in terms of the world in war and that sort of thing. Most of my life it was a fact that the United States spent more on its military than every other country in the world added together, which was always a stunning fact to me. That is how you end up with being the supreme power on planet earth. When you've spent more on your military than in the other country added together. When I was originally thinking about that, learning about that when I was much younger, it was without the understanding that Europe lives off of our military. So they don't have to. Right. But China started spending more money on their military. So that is not any more completely true. But next year's budget, if we go through with the 2027 budget, it will once again, we will be spending more on our defense than every other country in the world added together, including China and Russia. That's something. Is that what we need to do to continue to have the dominance that we have? I don't know. Who knows? All right. It's a great question. Don't forget a lot of those defense dollars go to keeping the economic might of the United States intact because there's a rules based international order more or less. More or less, about as best as you can get or hope for. The entire world, other than us, this year spent $1.16 trillion, a little over a trillion dollars. We spent $921 billion, a little under a trillion dollars, which is stunning. And China makes up about a quarter of a trillion. Wow. A lot of countries just... It's all there. Incredible spending lately. It's still that much less. A lot of countries just do not spend that much money on defense. And because I'm re-listening to this book about when Eisenhower was president, man, he really, his famous speech that he gave going out the door about the beware of the military industrial complex, he really, really, as a guy had been in the military his whole life and run it at the highest level, did not trust the Pentagon to not always present the worst case scenario and try to convince legislatures that we absolutely got to have this weapon. Give us the mic because it's the only thing that's keeping us from the Soviet Union overruns. And I fully didn't trust the generals to not give him the straight scoop on that sort of stuff. All our Congress or the senator. Yeah. Or yeah, of course he didn't trust the politicians, but he also didn't trust the generals to not be honest with him. Yeah. Wow. That's the great push and pull of warfare. There's always profiteering, always. Well, and yet not all war exists to help the profiteers as some people would have you believe. Right. Yeah, man, figuring that out as a democracy, how hard is that? Because you'd have people in the Pentagon, generals, whatever, who fully believe you need this expensive weapons program, who think we probably don't need this, but it'd be better to have it than not. And then people that absolutely know we don't need this program. But you know, my home district cares about it or whatever and everything in between. Right. I'm not how you deal with that. So getting back to the total expenditure on the military, there's like what's the dollar cost? And now it's the currency. Some there's a principal in economics. I can never remember for some reason I've got a mental block, but that $1,000 in China buys you the same thing as $4,000 in the United States. And their wages are one quarter, but their buying power is roughly equal if you measure it in this way. So it could just be that everything's more expensive in the U.S., including our armaments. I don't know exactly because it's an international market. I have a feeling there's something in there, but I'm too old and lazy to relearn all those formulas they tried to teach me. Second note, there's an opinion piece written by Jillian Melchior, who was her credential, London based member of the Wall Street Journal's editorial board. She went along with a NATO drone war exercise in Estonia and came away thinking we're making progress, but we are nowhere near ready, especially the European military. What I was going to say earlier was they dependent on our security dollars, our military spending to protect them. And what really pisses me off is that they spent those savings on the magic beans of socialism and net zero climate crap. And now they're helpless. I hope we're spending our Pentagon dollars wisely. We got some damn shocking stuff for you next. Armstrong and Getty. Try and keep our eye on the ceasefire. If anything happens, we'll let you know. Still a lot, a lot, a lot of unknowns. But first, it's a gender bending madness update. So I kept hearing about this thing called their loco. We're in a brave new world. First of all, just a brief mention that as I said earlier today, the forces of neo-Marxism, postmodernism haven't paused a bit. They're forging ahead. They're trying to grow all this stuff. They're just hiding it better. Here's the University of Southern California has a new initiative. They're using men will be barred from using parts of an on campus gym to make women and non-binary gym goers feel more comfortable while working out. The Student Assembly for Gender Empowerment pushed for the new rules in partnership with the Lion Center, a recreational facility controlled by the University. See, a ban one of the two sexes from being in the gym to help the third through fiftieth versions of genders. Yeah. You got a combination of real women and fake women saying, I'm not comfortable working out among men. So okay. All right, super. Great. And then you've got this human, a woman I believe who is presenting as a man, Lish Kozlowski is a Minnesota state representative, arguing against a bill in Minnesota that would bar boys from competing in girls sports. If you've been in a coma or were in a cave or perhaps a Apollo mission and just getting back to earth, yes, some states let boys play in girls sports if they claim their girls here is the representative talking about how gender binary was brought to these lands. Gender binary is a colonial export and not an immutable global truth. We do exist and have existed since time immemorial. Simple facts. It's a simple fact. A colonial thing. Okay. Wow. Settler colonialism. That's the gender binary as part of that. That's actually how the whole neo-Marxist thing works. It's, it's, you just claim each one is the other one and it's all a web of horrors and you've got to be against all of it. The eternal omnic cause. I wish you luck with your imagined view of the universe. So on a less humorous note, this is a young man by the name of Johnny Skinner. And we will let you tell his story. He was actually testifying in front of the California legislature, interestingly enough, trying to bring some sanity to blue state activism, trying to twist troubled kids minds and convince them that your problem isn't that you're autistic or you're sexually assaulted or you just misfit, you're alienated, whatever. Maybe you have some mental illness problems. That's not your problem. The problem is you're the wrong sex and we're going to help you hear it. School. We have somebody you'd like to talk, we'd like you to talk to and let's not tell your mom and dad about it. So Johnny Skinner is, uh, is testifying against that or yeah against that. Go ahead, Michael. Good afternoon. My name is Johnny Skinner. I'm here representing GenSpec. When I was young, I was a feminine child and I discovered trans influencers online. They said, change your body and your life gets better. Don't and it gets worse. Or as my doctors told my mom, I would commit suicide. The medical and mental health providers didn't bother to ask why I felt the way I did. They poisoned my body with blockers and hormones, arresting my puberty and messing with my development. The result, I'm a 23 year old gay man who's never had an orgasm and may never experience one. Let that sink in. All right, he goes on. I was rendered an orgasmic because once you say you could be trans, that's a full stop. No exploration as to why is allowed even if you are a struggling kid. The former president of WPATH, Dr. Marcy Bowers, a California surgeon who had performed the surgery for jazz gennings at 17 admitted on video that puberty blockers followed by cross-sex hormones results in no orgasms and stunted genitals. SB 934 guarantees that more people will end up like me. The walking but wounded. By the way, if you haven't seen this video with a Scott Wiener standing there watching this poor guy talk to him, dude, explain yourself. This sick perverse Scott Wiener. Yeah, one of the worst people in government, certainly. Mr. Skinner goes on. Just ruled in a rare bipartisan decision that laws like this are unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination. This bill is an attempted workaround that will be used to silence therapists who could have helped me avoid the irreversible harms to my body and the loss of my sexual function as is the same for many others. So today I ask you to extend some empathy to survivors like me and vote no for this bill. Thanks. All right. As I've said before, I know a therapist who says she has talked a number of young people out of going down the trans road quite quickly and easily. And she knows other therapists who immediately you're off to the doctor. Yeah. Just you know, you don't even question that it could possibly be anything other than trans and let's start the medical stuff. And as we discussed in the wake of the Supreme Court oral arguments the other day and the ruling, the activist transgender crowd call even sayings to what like what your therapist friend would say. What do we talk about the other things going on in your life and what's troubling you and maybe hold off on a minute for the transgender thing and just let's talk. They call that conversion therapy and outlaw it. California is trying to keep it outlawed even getting to the bottom of its autism. You're a victim of something. It's a mental illness problem, whatever. They're trying to outlaw that it's beyond sick. Why are people moving away from California? Well, it's housing is expensive. No, it's crap like that. It's unconscionable. And Gavin runs for president. He's going to have to answer for some of that stuff. Well, I would love the conversation to continue before more kids are victimized. It's just it's horrifying to me. It's a gender bending madness update and it's sick. Yeah, it's funny. It's cute. Yeah, you're sexy. 430 days as a woman. Shilling for Bud Light. All right. Well, we could take a break now. Cleanse the mood a little bit. Everybody take a deep breath. Need a mood cleanser. A little mood cleanser? And come back with more cherry fair. I feel like I need more coffee. A little short of manic. So I got to get just a little more coffee. It's my favorite feeling. I've either had too little coffee or too much. I don't know which. Jack Armstrong loves coffee. I do. Okay, we got we'll finish strong next. Declaring victory and that we're hearing from the Islamic Republic of Iran from Iranian state media and some of these scenes of Iranians out in the streets of Tehran waving their flag. In some cases, burning US and Israeli flag. And there is still some skepticism out there. Iran's National Security Council put out a statement saying that quote, our hands remain upon the trigger and should the slightest error be committed by the enemy, it should be met with full force. So that's the most negative view of what happened in the last 18 hours. According to Trump and Pete Hegzeff, those kind of statements are coming from the people that aren't in charge, I guess is the story. And the headline just out in the New York Times Iran leases, releases 10 points. It says our basis for ceasefire talks. But Hegzeff, I'm guessing those include the, well, you tell me, what are the 10 points? Is that the hard line stuff? Much of it consisted of maximalist demands that look difficult, if not impossible, to reconcile with US aims. Okay, so here's the question of the day. Who's releasing that stuff? Because Trump and Hegzeff are saying that's not who we're talking to. We're not talking to those people. Oh boy. We're talking to different people that are actually in charge. I don't know whether that's true or not. Well, this is a familiar problem to anybody who studies areas of upheaval, whether Africa or the Middle East or whatever. You're talking to one faction, but the other factions get a say. I'm not suggesting I think Trump and Hegzeff are lying about that. I think they are talking to somebody and working out a deal. Whether or not that entity actually has the ability to hold on to the country and end up being the government, who knows? Well, and even if they clearly can do all those things, we're in the period where the other factions are desperate to communicate the opposite. Sure. So they'll be putting out statements like I just mentioned. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. A period of upheaval for sure. Some serious Game of Thrones stuff going on there. Oh, yeah, complete with severed heads. And so the bad guys, the people that want to blow this ceasefire up, they want, they're happy that Israel's still shelling Hezbollah probably, and they want this all to fall apart. Yeah. Either because they want to run the country someday, or they're actually religious nuts and think this is the end times for them. Right, yeah. Weird beards. Well, and it's worth mentioning in this TikTok world that if this shakes out over the course of the next five years and sane people end up in power, that will be a remarkably quick and positive outcome. History-wise. Yeah, I would say so. So, as I mentioned earlier. I'm so glad I'm an American. Oh, no kidding. I was watching this video from Israel. Did you see the woman where the woman gets out of her car and a shell hits nearby and it knocks her down? She gets up and walks on because, you know, that's life there. There's so many parts of the world where that can just happen. And we, you talk about privilege, this privilege or that privilege, we have ain't going to get bomb today privilege. I never have to worry about it. Not a chance in hell some other country sends a missile near me or my loved ones. That's some privilege. Yeah. Speaking of war, I mentioned earlier on the show, I'm going to do Springsteen Concert, Springsteen in the East Street Band Monday night, San Francisco. As he's doing. Did you not hear that email I read to you earlier? That's that. Some woman emailed simply said, Springsteen sucks. Well, he does not suck. It's the entire email. Thanks for your input. His political speeches suck. His music, the non-political music, does not suck. But, and he's going to do some of both. But, he's doing the West because he's doing, and then a couple of shows, two shows in Los Angeles, I think two shows in Los Angeles, which will be huge impact. What's your, what, if you go into a Springsteen Concert, what song do you most want to hear? I know Born to Run is the, he puts that in part of the finale. I've been looking at the set list so far. I could live without seeing, hearing that again, but, you know, it's a classic. Yeah. I've always loved that song. Oh yeah, it's cool. That's an interesting. And I'm glad my kids will get to see it. You know, it played live. Yeah. It's a part of music history. I mean, there are very few acts, I was trying to pitch this to my kids. There are very few acts that have been as big a deal for live concerts at Springsteen. Grateful Dead, Springsteen, maybe the Stones? I don't know, are they big for their live shows? Oh my God, yeah. Okay, so maybe those three? Is there anything that's, I don't know what else would be in that category. No, no. I mean, in the history of music. Yeah. Yeah. Going back to cavemen, banging on rocks. So what song do I have to think about that for a little while? I don't know. I like freaking love Rosalita Live. Yeah, he's not doing that. Which is generally the band intros or was for many years. Yeah. He did that on the tour when I saw him 20 years ago, and that was pretty awesome. He's not doing on this one, but he's doing a couple of the other big horn section, sing along classics. You know, he had to knock that one out so he could fit in the freaking streets of Minneapolis. That one's gonna, I'm gonna actually have to leave my seat and go to the bathroom during that one. You've got to have a long talk with yourself. Don't start drinking again. It could drive you right to the edge of sanity. I'll bet it's going to be worse than you're even picturing. He opens with war because the videos are out there and he goes out there and he gives a long speech about. Peace and this and that. And the last thing we need is war and they launch into it. And it sounds cool because you've got that giant horn section and you know, the whole thing. Shut up, you hippie. Shut up, you hippie. That's what I'll chant for my seat. With all the other people who, if they bought them, you know, aftermarket spent more than $1,000 for their seats. You know, that's just hilarious to me. The hippie socialists playing to people who have to spend four figures for ass seats. Or obviously, by definition, the elite of this country. And they will walk off stage and curse capitalism to each other without any awareness of the irony. That's the amazing part to me. And get into separate private jets as they fly to Los Angeles for the next show. Yeah. Yeah, I just, I just, I look at people like that almost. Like a dog. I can kind of communicate with them, but not well. I was showing a video of the Portland show to my oldest son. You could probably guess what he said. That's the guy from the Sopranos. That's right. And say exactly right. It's hard to not see, still and think, hey, Tom. I don't know, Tom. Oh boy. How happy are those guys to get to play again and make whatever money they make off of this whole thing? Oh yeah. They just, they just spent in the last 50 years of their lives waiting around sometimes for years of time. Hey honey, did the phone ring? No, the phone didn't ring. I thought I heard the phone ring. Thought it might be Bruce announcing another tour. No. Okay. Guess I'll just go back to whatever it is do when I'm not touring. Or you pick up the phone and it's Bruce and he says, hey, how are you doing? Yeah, I'm gonna, I'm taking a couple more years off. It's, you know. Oh yeah, boss. That's fine. As I totally get that. I understand it completely and you hang up the phone. Oh no. No, back to the Home Depot and put on the orange apron. Wow. You think what's his name? The other guitar player works at Home Depot in between? Tour. It's Will's, Will's, Gary W. Talent, the bassist. I could go on. Admit me chorus to this history. Who prologue like your humble patients pray gently to hear, kindly to judge the final thoughts of Armstrong and Getty. At least Max Weinberg had that job drumming for Conan all those years. Yeah. Remember when we used to talk to his daughter? Yeah. She was a reporter for ABC, wasn't her? Yeah. She's terrific. Never got to meet the mighty Max though, unfortunately. Here's your host for final thoughts, Joe Getty. Hey, Michael, lead us off. Let's get a final thought from everybody on the crew. I'm thinking about this whole charging a toll for ships to go through. Are they going to set up toll boosts out in the sea where these ships got to line up and like show them? Hopefully, you can get a fast track sort of thing. Yeah, a fast track type of thing. Exact change only. Katie Greener, esteemed newswoman as a final thought, Katie. I'm like a broken record, but we talked about in and out earlier. So I'm going today. I can't help myself. Well, you're pregnant, so you're eating for two. Free pass. So get a double double double. Yeah. Jack, a final thought for us. I liked that in and out had a big sign on their door prior to Easter that we we are. I mean, it was a very religious statement. A little sign on their door about honoring Jesus and resurrection and blah, blah, blah. And we're going to have everybody the day off and they were completely closed on Sunday. Yeah. Yeah. My final thought is to gifted and talented and popular musicians. You bring joy and escape to people who have hard lives. When you throw politics into it, it ruins that. So don't do that. I know you want to. There's lots of stuff I want to do. Don't do that. Maybe for the crowd that agrees with them, they enjoy it. I don't know. I don't want to hear it even if I agree with it. Shut up, you hippie. I want to hear the water section. Shut up. Armstrong and Getty wrapping up another grueling four hour work day. So many hippies to thank. So little time. Go to Armstrong and Getty dot com for the hot links. Katie's corners, pick up some A and G swag. Drop us a note if there's something we ought to be talking about or you have a point of view that needs to be heard. Email us mail back at Armstrong and Getty dot com. We will see you tomorrow. God bless America. Armstrong and Getty. The White House is already calling this a win for President Trump. So is the Iranian regime. President Trump forged this moment. Iran begged for this ceasefire and we all know it. What comes next, especially militarily? The president of the United States is not one to mess around. So there is still this tension that exists here. Iran has been a threat to the United States and the free world for 47 years. No longer. Armstrong and Getty.