And The Horse You Rode In On

This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed human. Get ready for the wildest sight your lawn has ever seen. Sunday, Sunday, Sunday. This spring, unleash soil science like never before. Witness your custom lawn plan and the transformation to a soft green paradise. Sorry, just trying to get your attention. Sunday is a boringly simple way to get a green, healthy yard. No hard stuff, no big trucks, no chaos. Order today and get your custom Sunday yard plan for the season ahead. Sunday, smarter lawn care for less. Get sunday.com. Spring weekends before the barbecue starts, I like to stop by my local Total Wine and More to pick up a great bourbon. Find a favorite or something new for everyone to enjoy. And knowing you're getting the lowest prices makes it easy to grab an extra bottle to share. Not sure what to pick? Their friendly guides can help. Find what you love and love what you find only at Total Wine and More. Curbside Pickup and Delivery available in most areas. Visit TotalWine.com to learn more. Spirits not sold in Virginia and North Carolina drink responsibly B21. Support for the show comes from Public, the investing platform for those who take it seriously. On Public, you can build a multi-asset portfolio of stocks, bonds, options, crypto, and now generated assets, which allow you to turn any idea into an investable index with AI. It all starts with your prompt. From renewable energy companies with high free cash flow to semiconductor suppliers growing revenue over 20% year over year, you can literally type any prompt and put the AI to work. It screens thousands of stocks, builds a one-of-a-kind index, and lets you back-test it against the S&P 500. Then you can invest in a few clicks. Generated assets are like ETFs with infinite possibilities, completely customizable, and based on your thesis, not someone else's. Go to public.com slash podcast and earn an uncapped 1% bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com slash podcast. Paid for by Public Investing. Brokered services by Open to the Public Investing Inc. Member FINRA and SIPC. Advisory services by Public Advisors, LLC, SEC, Registered Advisor. Generated assets is an interactive analysis tool. Output is for informational purposes only, and is not an investment recommendation or advice. Complete disclosure is available at public.com slash disclosures. Tired of spells and stains on your sofa? Wash away your worries with Anabey. Anabey is the only designer sofa that's machine washable inside and out, starting at just $699. Plus, Anabey sofas are pet-friendly, stain-resistant, and feature changeable slip covers and modular pieces. Get up to 60% off site-wide with a 30-day money-back guarantee. Visit washablesofas.com to get yours now. That's washablesofas.com. Offers are subject to change, and certain restrictions may apply. [? And now, here's Armstrong and Gage. ?] OK, hold on. I'm finishing filling out my check to the IRS. Got to write down in the memo section. And the horse you rode in on. OK, got you. Fantastic. Live from Studio C. CCR. A dimly-lit room deep into the bowels of the Armstrong and Gage communications compound. And hey, y'all, today we're toiling under the title of the show. Victory, defeat, not so fast. Or, one good perv deserves another. Much more on the Eric Swallwell story and some of his pervo friends. How y'all doing? April 15th, known as Tax Day. Also, Hitler's birthday? No, that's the 20th. That's 420. I don't remember what Hitler's birthday. Really looking forward to that? Why, do you got to order a cake? Oh, my god. Look at him, the shamed head, the Doc Martins to the math. Can't wait for it, on Jack. What a horrible thing to say. Yeah, well, if the Doc Martin fits, huh? Yeah, that's what I say. Anyway, it's Tax Day end. I've been taking my money. That's the American people right there, their spokeswoman. I was following some of the coverage of Tax Day and thinking how, psychologically, the government has done such a good job of setting up the American people to put up with the way taxes are in a variety of ways. Oh, yeah. We all know the main way is that the tax base is so narrow who pays, half the country doesn't pay any taxes, so doesn't really care. And is bored right now. Like, why are you talking about this? Right, it's not a big deal. There are more important things. Because you don't pay taxes, so why would you care? And therefore, don't care about how it's spent. So you can't get any momentum going for giving a damn about waste, fraud, and abuse, right? The latest numbers are 1% of people pay 40% of the taxes, which is stunning. And then the tax. Which, by the way, if you're hip, you might say, well, wait a minute, maybe they get 40% of the income. It's not even close. It's disproportionate, but that's a good question. 10% pay three quarters. 10% of taxpayers pay three quarters of the taxes. And then your top 25%. You're lucky enough to be in the top 25% of earners. You pay almost 90% of the taxes. Almost 90%. I would suggest to me that the 75% of the rest of folks only pay 10%, and therefore, don't give a damn about government spending. Well, that sounds like something that might be intentional if you were in on the government scam. And then getting to the psychology of it, then somehow, like all the media coverage is how big is your return? Returns are higher this year, because of this. That's a small percentage of people who get a return, but somehow that's what the refunds are. That's what the news focuses every year. It's 68 million taxpayers, which is a small number compared to the total number of taxpayers in a country of 340 million people. But the focus of the news is always the how big was your return, your refund. If you were to describe the average American taxpayer's relationship with the IRS to like a job counselor, as if you were describing your job, they'd say, oh my god, you'd be better off unemployed. This is an abusive relationship. If you described it to a marriage counselor, they'd say, get to a woman's shelter. Or if you're a man, get to a man's shelter. You are being abused. And I will only say this once or twice or 15 times today. If you were to suggest the current tax system as a tax system, you would be put in a lunatic asylum. And yet people, anytime somebody suggests a serious reform, and I'm not talking about the people that benefit so mightily from it, because of course they're gonna spin it like, oh, that would be terrible. But the average American says, oh no, we better not mess with it. There might be negative effects. I just, I give up. Democracy doesn't work. Monarchy now. So two more things, including laying out the plan, I lay out every single year that change America for the good, but we'll never have it. First of all, roughly we spend $1.60 and we pay a dollar. That's what we're doing all the time. That can't possibly be. And we've been doing that for a very long time per year. We spend like- That's suicidal. It, of course it's suicidal. Do that in your household. And see how long you can pull it off. Take your salary and then take it times 1.6 and then spend that much. See how long you can pull that off. Anyway, I have been suggesting for a long time, I think this would change America overnight. That on tax day, everybody has to write out a fake check for the total amount of taxes that they paid for the year. Because I know in a lot of people's minds, psychologically, the tax they paid this year was, oh, I got $400 back or I had to pay in $90 or whatever it is. No, no, no, no. You paid, you know, some of the, I have to come from paying nothing. But in terms of you get more wealth transfers to you than you pay out. But anyway, you pay tons somewhere between probably a quarter and almost half of what you make. You're sending off to the government. If you had to write out that check, it's like just to see the number at the end of the year. Holy crap, I sent the state and the federal government this much of my money this year. People would care all of a sudden. Yeah. But the withholding thing was a genius idea. And it's a well-worn chestnut, if you're into this sort of thing, but Milton Friedman, who came up with the withholding idea, cursed himself for the rest of his life. Said it's the single worst thing he ever did. It'd be great if, since in terms of tax collection efficiency, but it deadened the American taxpayer to what was actually happening. Yeah. Psychologically, it just, it disappears week by week or month by month and you don't pay attention to it. And nobody cares. Just nobody cares. We pay a lot, a small chunk of the country pays for all of the rest of the country. And then you can't get anybody to care about things like bullet trains or Medicare fraud or whatever it is that's going on. That's why those stories land flat. You have to come to just like, what are you, whatever. I don't care. Final thought, and then I'll drop the outrage, speaking for myself. We have a California's crumbling update coming up later in the show, which includes the fact that the state legislature in corrupta fornia is trying to pass a law against independent journalists discovering corruption. Yeah, that's something. It is, you're, I can hear you right now. We have a psychic connection. This is so special. It's so important. You think I'm making it up or exaggerating? I'm not. It's absolutely insane. I've got the most interesting thing that you have not heard yet about the whole Swalwell thing. If it's in with one of Joe's titles today. We'll do that after we start the show officially. I'm Jack Armstrong. He's Joe Getty on this. It is Wednesday tax day, not Hitler's birthday, April 15th, the year 2026. I'm not a fan of Hitler. We're Armstrong and Getty and we approve of this program. Maybe it was Hitler's mom's original due date or something, Jack. I'm not sure what you're thinking of. I don't think it had anything to do with Hitler at all. Because I know you're pretty into it. All right, let's begin the show officially now, according to FCC rules and regulations. Mark. Trust women, my friends. Trust women. They will get it right. As a former prosecutor, as somebody who has spent my time in Congress working to stand up for the rights of victims, and now I'm calling on my Republican colleagues, it's not about red team versus blue team. This is about sexual assault victims deserve justice. But are the chances that three or four women independently who never met each other would have similar experiences with one person. So either Ari, this person committed these horrific acts or he is the single unluckiest person in the world for these people to conspire and make up lies against him. All of that audio won Eric Swalwell. So here's the most interesting thing that I heard yesterday about all of this. I heard it on two different podcasts from people who have worked in Washington DC and don't know that this was happened, this happened, but guarantee this is what happened. So you may have seen the headlines throughout the day yesterday where they would pair Swalwell's name with Gonzalez's name, because in the same day, same week, you had a Democratic House member resign over sexual stuff and a Republican resign over sexual stuff, the Republican down in Texas. Swalwell's getting all the attention this week. And what went on behind the scenes is when people were coming for Gonzalez or Swalwell, because there was all this dust up in the house about, you know, we're gonna have hearings or do we boot them out of Congress or whatever. Do you remember a couple of years ago when the story broke about the slush fund they have in Congress to pay women off? Right. And it's taxpayer money too. Millions and millions and millions of dollars get paid off. And it's all secret. It's all secret to victims of sexual abuse and it stays behind the scenes. But there's lots of these scumbags that do this to women. Women come forward enough, attempt to sue or whatever, they get paid off and go away. You never hear about it and it was your taxpayer money. What happened was there was a deal made between the Republicans and Democrats. No, no, no, no, you're not gonna make us get rid of Gonzalez. We need one of yours. Cause each side knows there's plenty of scumbags that if you wanted to pull the trigger at any point and drop the oppo like somebody did on Swalwell. People have known Swalwell as this guy forever. Just became politically inconvenient to have him around. So they said, he's gotta go. Somebody did, Katie Porter or whoever did. You could do that with tons of these dudes. So the two parties got together, say one for one. This is the only way we keep our mouth shut about your guys. Oh yeah, that's the only way we keep our mouth shut about your guys. And then they made a deal. So one of each party went yesterday and they'll keep their mouths shut. Interesting. And I'll bet that's true. That sounds very true. One of my favorite really inside baseball-ish columnists is writing an article about how screwed up Congresses. I just read it and he mentions pressures growing on two other lawmakers, Representative Sheila Scherfelis McCormick, Democrat of Florida and Representative Corey Mills, Republican of Florida to resign over ethical concerns. So it's this Scherfelis McCormick is just a thief. I can't remember what Mills is accused of doing, but yeah, it's another, hey, all right, we'll get rid of the thief, but you gotta get rid of Mills because he's a piece of crap. All right, all right. So I think it's another one for one. Like you described it. Is that something? It rings so true that that's the way they would do it. There's enough information out there and if somebody at any point wanted to get rid of lots of dudes or women probably more around misappropriation of funds and stuff like that, than the sexual stuff, but that too. Probably worth mentioning that Drop the Oppo is the title of my new political rap album. ought to be in stores on Friday, which is Hitler's birthday. Wait, no, nope, that's not right. I'm sorry, I retract that. Oh my God. Okay, we got Katie's headlines next. Armstrong and Getty. Get ready for the wildest site your lawn has ever seen. Sunday, Sunday, Sunday. This spring, unleash soil science like never before. Witness your custom lawn plan and the transformation to a soft green paradise. Sorry, just trying to get your attention. Sunday is a boringly simple way to get a green healthy yard. No harsh stuff, no big trucks, no chaos. Order today and get your custom Sunday yard plan for the season ahead. Sunday, smarter lawn care for less. Get sunday.com. Spring weekends are my favorite. The grill is fired up and we gather around the patio table. Before everyone arrives, I stop by my local Total Wine and More to pick up a few bottles of wine. With such a wide selection, it's easy to find something for everyone to enjoy. If you're not sure what to pick, their team can help you find what you love and love what you find, only at Total Wine and More. Curbside pickup and delivery available in most areas. Visit TotalWine.com to learn more. Spirits not sold in Virginia and North Carolina. Drink responsibly, B21. Support for the show comes from Public, the investing platform for those who take it seriously. On Public, you can build a multi-asset portfolio of stocks, bonds, options, crypto, and now generated assets, which allow you to turn any idea into an investable index with AI. It all starts with your prompt. From renewable energy companies with high free cash flow to semiconductor suppliers growing revenue over 20% year over year, you can literally type any prompt and put the AI to work. It screens thousands of stocks, builds a one of a kind index and lets you back test it against the S&P 500. Then you can invest in a few clicks. Generated assets are like ETFs with infinite possibilities, completely customizable, and based on your thesis, not someone else's. Go to public.com slash podcast and earn an uncapped 1% bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com slash podcast. Paid for by Public Investing. Brokered services by Open to the Public Investing Inc. Member FINRA and SIPC. Advisory services by Public Advisors LLC, SEC registered advisor. Generated assets is an interactive analysis tool. Output is for informational purposes only and is not an investment recommendation or advice. Complete disclosures available at public.com slash disclosures. Sink into affordable luxury. Anabey is the only machine washable sofa inside and out. With stain resistant slip covers and a cloud like frame duvet, everything goes right in the wash. Plus the modular design lets you change the look of your space anytime. Visit washablesofas.com to upgrade your home. Shop up to 60% off site-wide, with sofas starting at just $699 and a 30-day money-back guarantee. Shop now at washablesofas.com. Offers are subject to change and certain restrictions may apply. Donate your tofu, Michael. I just ordered donuts for the radio station. They'll be here about 10 minutes. Did you say donate your tofu? Don't eat your tofu. Oh. What? Donate your tofu. Give generously to the tofu bank. What? Hey, I just got to diabetes. So I ordered some real coffee. Don't be feeding them donuts? Because I can't be drinking this coconut mocha flavor that they have here. It's the only coffee we have now. So I just got some secret coffee coming. Real stuff, gonna hide it in the safe. Jack's on a countdown to Hitler's birthday and trying to kill Michelangelo all in just, you know. Wow, wow, outrageous. All right, let's figure out who's reporting what. It's Lee's story with Katie Green, Katie. All right, some of the top news outlets. ABC to run threatens Red Sea Transit if US blockade continues. NBC, US and Iran could hold new peace talks as soon as this week and from the Washington Post, US sends thousands more troops to the Middle East as Trump seeks to squeeze Iran. Thousands more troops headed over there and I heard somebody point out yesterday and it was obvious a blockade is an act of war. In fact, it's one of the most powerful acts of war. The idea that we're in a ceasefire or at peace or have backed off, we've blockaded a country. We've taken away their sovereignty. That's a pretty major move. It's worth mentioning briefly. It's taken a while, but we have sorted our way through a lot of the drive-by media crap and come up with some really, really good analysis of what's actually happening here. And we'd like to offer it to you and hope you enjoy it. It'll be sprinkled in throughout the show. From The Wall Street Journal, Europe is accelerating a NATO fallback plan in case Trump pulls out. Does it wanna talk about that? A contingency for a greater European involvement. Yeah, your fallback plan should be to have an army. Or just capitulate to anybody who wants to take your stuff because you're so damn weak. Wakelings, wakelings! From the Associated Press, representatives Eric Swalwell and Tony Gonzalez leave Congress with an hours of each other following allegations. Exactly. Once you hear it, it sounds so obvious. Congress said, okay, we'll give up one, you give up one, and then we'll all keep our mouths shut. But all these other people we know that are either stealing money or having doing bad sexual things. I'm gonna cast the perv net a bit wider, Jack. Stay tuned. From the New York Times, President Trump threatens to fire Fed Chief if he does not resign. How? Yeah. Let's just stop with that. Nobody cares. Fire the Pope. Fire the Pope. Oh, boy. The Pope's got, among Americans, like a 49% higher plus minus approval rating than Trump. Geez. For now. From CNBC, Elon Musk's grok AI chat bot is still making sexual deep fakes despite X's promise to stop it. I saw that. If you wanna take a picture of your coworker and see what they would look like having sex, you can give it to grok, apparently. Great. I don't. Thank you. From the New York Post, Florida doctor accused of fatally removing the wrong organ from a patient is arrested for a botched operation. I have all the details on this story. It's really amazing. My. The people watching it were like, what are you doing? He was supposed to take out the spleen. He took out the liver. He took out the liver. Oh my God. And then to try to cover his tracks, he labeled it spleen even after the person was dying on the table. Oh my God. Yeah. And he's been arrested. Yeah. Is that a little DEI medical graduate going on there? No. Crazy person. Chee-man-ay. And finally, this one from the Babylon Bee. With Swalwell resigning, now there's just 534 more perverts left in Congress. Yeah. Probably in that high number, but it's higher than you'd be comfortable with. You know, one is more than we're comfortable with, but I bet it's shockingly high. Yeah. Speaking of shocking, we'll be running a little audio from Congress. I'm sorry, Senator Gallego of Texas, who's one of Swalwell's best friends working across the aisle. We'll tell you a little more about him. He's shocked, I tell you. Shocked to hear of my friend, Eric. I have no idea. I want to tell you a little bit more about his life. Hmm. Don't go to the guy's hotel room. If you go up there and he rapes you, you're still a victim and he's still a rapist and he should go to prison. But don't go to a guy's hotel room unless you want to have sex with him. Don't go. Just don't. Okay. Agreed. We had a lot more on the way. Oh wait, in the lobby. Yeah. If you miss the segment, get the podcast. Armstrong and Getty on demand. Armstrong and Getty. We've been duped, hoodwinked, conned for 50 years. The lawn care industry sold us toxins in a bag and made our yards more toxic than a bad relationship. Sunday helps you ditch the chemicals and feed your lawn the good stuff. Soybean proteins, iron, seaweed, molasses, ingredients that get your soil giggling like an over-served mom at the block party. Sunday uses clean ingredients in real science for thicker, greener grass. Order today and get your custom Sunday yard plan for the season ahead. Sunday for a smarter, healthier yard. Getsunday.com. Spring weekends are my favorite. The grill is fired up and we gather around the patio table. Before everyone arrives, I stop by my local Total Wine and More to pick up a few bottles of wine. With such a wide selection, it's easy to find something for everyone to enjoy. If you're not sure what to pick, their team can help you find what you love and love what you find, only at Total Wine and More. Curbside pickup and delivery available in most areas. Visit TotalWine.com to learn more. Spirits not sold in Virginia and North Carolina. Drink responsibly. B21. Support for the show comes from public. The investing platform for those who take it seriously. On public, you can build a multi-asset portfolio of stocks, bonds, options, crypto, and now generated assets, which allow you to turn any idea into an investable index with AI. It all starts with your prompt. From renewable energy companies with high free cash flow to semiconductor suppliers growing revenue over 20% year over year, you can literally type any prompt and put the AI to work. It screens thousands of stocks, builds a one-of-a-kind index, and lets you back test it against the S&P 500. Then you can invest in a few clicks. Generated assets are like ETFs with infinite possibilities, completely customizable, and based on your thesis, not someone else's. Go to public.com slash podcast and earn an uncapped 1% bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com slash podcast. Paid for by Public Investing. Brokered services by Open to the Public Investing Inc. Member FINRA and SIPC. Advisory services by Public Advisors LLC. SEC registered advisor. Generated assets is an interactive analysis tool. Output is for informational purposes only and is not an investment recommendation or advice. Complete disclosures available at public.com slash disclosures. Sink into affordable luxury. Anabey is the only machine washable sofa inside and out. With stain-resistant slip covers and a cloud-like frame duvet, everything goes right in the wash. Plus, the modular design lets you change the look of your space any time. Visit washablesofas.com to upgrade your home. Shop up to 60% off site-wide, with sofas starting at just $699 and a 30-day money-back guarantee. Shop now at washablesofas.com. Offers are subject to change and certain restrictions may apply. That high stakes US naval blockade of all Iranian ports is holding. US Central Command saying no ships got past the blockade in the first 24 hours and six merchant vessels were turned round. The US hoping to choke Iran's oil income to force concessions in peace talks. Well, this is without question a high-pressure moment that we're watching here with the United States trying to choke off Iran's ability in order to move where's commerce and oil in particular in and out of many of their ports that are in the South there along the Strait of War moose. Choking imagery both from ABC News and News Nation. I don't know if it's all the Swalwell News or what, but it's in the air. Harsh. I've got the most interesting thing you haven't heard yet. Should I do an hour? Hang on to it. About what's going on. Deliver the goods. So I don't know this particular reporter who tweeted this out yesterday or wrote it in their publication and then tweeted it out, but it was retweeted by Brit Hume of Fox News, who's a definitely a legit guy and wouldn't be retweeting it if he didn't think it was a good source. Exclusive. This is an Iranian reporter. Now they're trying to set this up so it lands with the necessary level of taking it seriously. There are talks of Vance going back to Islamabad, Pakistan this weekend and the talks resuming. Remember they talked for 21 hours over the weekend? Nothing happened. They didn't budge. They didn't budge at all. Vance walks out and says they're not willing to give. This is worse news for them than us were leaving. And they all got in a plane and left. Well, they went back, the Iranian delegation. They went back to Iran and they talked to the president, who is still, well, the president is not still alive. This president is alive for a while. Is it the head parliament guy? What's his name? They went back and talked to the president, whoever that is. OK, sure enough. The Hezekian, because the head parliament guy was one of the, he was part of the delegation in Islamabad talking with JD Vance. So they go, I was talking, I was thinking about old Gabagool or whatever his name is. So the delegation that didn't give an inch with JD Vance, they get back to Iran and the president said, according to this reporting here from this respected Iranian journalist, after the Iranian delegation returned from Pakistan, empty handed, the president erupted, shouting at members of the delegation. And an exclusive quote obtained by us, he told associates, we are weeks away from collapse. They're cutting off our main source of income. I don't know how we're gonna pay salaries. According to my sources, the president is on the verge of a nervous breakdown and is demanding a deal at any cost. That absolutely could be true. In fact, it's more likely that's true than not, I would think. I would agree. That they got back and the president was like, what are you talking about? You didn't budge. We're about to fall apart here. You know, I've got to go. Is there more or can I jump on the bandwagon? All right, so man, I've been compiling a bunch of stuff, including a handful of journals for the Wall Street Journal. There are stories entitled, Iran's regime has changed for the worst. US-Israeli attack fast-tracked the ascent of hardliners and apocalyptic religious followers, raising doubts about a lasting peace. Could be true. Could be true, although what you just reported, Jack, is a bit of a contrast. But then you got this from the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal. The blockage is expected to wipe out $435 million in Iranian economic activity per day. And force oil fields shut down within weeks. It will bankrupt them in, you know, a matter of several days to a couple of weeks. That's what the president was saying. They've cut off our main source of income. I don't know how we're gonna pay salaries. We are weeks away from collapse. That, it makes sense. There's a little more. Iran's entire economy will feel the collapse of oil exports. This includes the Revolutionary Guard, which siphons about half the revenue. Other export routes appear unable to compensate for the loss. How will Iran's banks hold up? The loss of imports is expected to deeply supply shortages and exacerbate Iran's inflation, which exceeded 50% before the war. Food inflation reached triple digits. The currency, which lost more than 97% of its value, would also likely suffer without the foreign exchange coming in. The Iran regime knows this all as a threat to its survival. Okay, to your point. You know, that's a decent thing to bring up there, is that they couldn't continue on the track they were on before the war started. Okay, so, and then the free press, Nicholas Claremont did a sit down with John Bolton, who asks, Claremont asks, blah, blah, blah, have we lost, have we won, and what do you predict's about to happen? Bolton says, interestingly, well, I think it was a big mistake to have the ceasefire. I don't think the Iranians have any intention of doing any of things that Trump wants in terms of opening the Strait to Hormuz. I think they need relief from the pounding they've been taken. Because basically, having backed down on the effort at regime change, if there ever was one, by acknowledging now that we can kind of negotiate our way out of the Strait to Hormuz closure, Trump is conceding the key central point of the leverage that we have. I'm very concerned we're going to be faced with a choice of which concessions we're gonna be making that we don't want to and let them skate free. And then he gets to the point that I think bolsters what we're talking about. It's suffered enormous damage from the regime's point of view if they survive that amounts to victory for them. But then he goes into detail about how they have been so reduced, they're having severe trouble communicating with each other, planning, executing attacks. They are on the brink of collapse. And now's the time to increase the pressure, not stop it. Yeah. I think part of the reason you get such a mishmash of reporting out of Iran is they're just a bunch of different power centers talking to people and they don't all agree. And nobody has the heft to like force their will on somebody else. And there's a hell of a lot of propaganda flying around too. Of course. And so you got a lot of the media, including friend of the Armstrong and Getty show Ian Bremmer who was tweeting over the weekend about how bad a week JD Vance had. Going to help out Orban who lost and go into the peace talks and walking way empty handed. We didn't walk away empty handed. If this is what's going on behind the scenes, they walked away empty handed. We walked around with our hands full of lots and lots of pressure on them. And they're weeks away from collapse. And although JD Vance is so slick and so smart, I just don't trust him. He responded to that Orban stuff. He said, hey, the guy was a loyal friend of the US. He supported us. So we said, we'll go there and campaign for you a long time ago. So he showed up and campaign for him. It's not that big a deal. The guy is completely corrupt. Orban? Yeah. Oh yeah, completely. He's terrible, awful. A scourge, a friend of Putin, terrible. Anyway, embarrassing. Separate topic. Trump was making the call on the peace talks. I mean, JD was the representative there in person, but they had Trump on the phone regularly. So I would imagine Trump, the lifelong dealmaker, said, walk, get up and walk. They won't budge. And that's what they did. And now they're going to go back. And based on all this reporting, they're going to be much more willing to negotiate, realizing we got days left before this completely falls apart. Yeah, I would agree. The historic change we've been hoping for, it's definitely possible. Well, that's going to be exciting to watch. Yeah, it's a bumpy road between here and there, 100% bumpy. Maybe like people are hurled from the vehicle and killed bumpy. But it's still possible. Cornered beasts can get pretty aggressive. I tell you what's a hell of a lot less possible is a mushroom cloud over one of the capitals of a democracy in the next decade, which I must remind you good people is why we're here. You know what I'm hoping happens this year, this anniversary year, the 250th anniversary of this country. Well, I'll tell you about it after this, right after we tell you about a really, really, really good idea beyond a good idea. It's a must. It's trust and will. Plan out your estate. 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Trust and will, affordable estate plans, peace of mind is priceless. Go to trustandwill.com slash Armstrong. That's trustandwill.com slash Armstrong to get your 20% off. Trustandwill.com slash Armstrong. I just saw this tweet from Molly Hemingway, who I often think is half a cuck, but I agree with her on this. She tweeted out a picture of these penny loafers that are the American flag on them. And she said, yes, down the plane, the man seated next to me had a cool American flag set of loafers on. And it made me sad that we're not being utterly deluged with America 250 merch. And I thought, yeah, that needs to happen. Maybe it will ramp up as we get closer to the 4th of July, but Joe and I are old, so we lived through 1976, the Bicentennial. And it was everywhere, absolutely everywhere. I mean, everybody had flag, t-shirts, hats, everything. It was just all over the place. And I hope that happens again this year around the 250th, but you didn't have half the country aiding the United States during the Bicentennial in 1976. We hadn't allowed the education establishment to radicalize the kids to the radical left. You certainly didn't have the possibility in some schools that if you wore flag stuff, they would send you home because it was triggering some of the students. That certainly didn't exist. It was beyond question. The biggest mistake made over the last 25 years is to let this happen under our watch and not be more militant against it, show up to more school board meetings, that sort of thing. You know, better today, better late than never that we all fight this crap, but it's insidious. And it has significance too. It might be a decent test this year, this summer, this, what do you call it, the 250th, the sesquentennial, is that what it's called? The Bicentennial, the LGB QIA plus 10-year-old. It might be a good test to the country though to see where we are, how patriotic it gets and how loud the voices are of, you know, this is an awful thing and a mistake. I think- Al Sharpton has already spoken out, Jack. We'll talk about that next hour. I think it was a good start that Ken Burns' documentary about the founding, which was around this 250th anniversary, was quite patriotic. So- Oh, go ahead, sorry. So that was a good start. I was gonna say now is the perfect time to mention, I have been reading Tim Santafer's brand new book, Proclaiming Liberty, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, The Declaration of Independence, it's much more than that. Oh my God, I can't put it down. Oh, that's awesome. If you are into this sort of stuff- And I am. Oh my gosh, it was so much more than a stamp act. I mean, the idea- The stamp act. There are some academics, and Tim takes them on in the book, who are pitching the idea that it was just the elites in the colonies that wanted more money or it was a minor dispute over taxation, oh my God, the DS that's taught in schools. Anyway, Proclaiming Liberty is the name of the book, Timothy Santafer, holy cow, I'm loving it. I'm holding it in my hand right now. Thanks, Tim. He sent FedEx the copy to me and scribed it, which I really, really appreciate. I absolutely, 1,000% will start reading that this weekend. I can't wait. Love this sort of stuff. And then we'll have Tim on to talk about it. At some point, I'm sure, probably several times. We have got mail- And I tell you what, if you're into parliamentary, supremacy, you and I are gonna fight. Okay, that's what it's all about. Don't forget. Wow, okay. I'll back off that position, whatever it is. All right, thank you. We got the mail bag on the way next, stay here. Arm strong and getty. 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Visit TotalWine.com to learn more. Spirits not sold in Virginia and North Carolina. Drink responsibly, B21. Support for the show comes from Public, the investing platform for those who take it seriously. On Public, you can build a multi-asset portfolio of stocks, bonds, options, crypto, and now generated assets, which allow you to turn any idea into an investable index with AI. It all starts with your prompt. From renewable energy companies with high free cash flow to semiconductor suppliers growing revenue over 20% year over year, you can literally type any prompt and put the AI to work. It screens thousands of stocks, builds a one-of-a-kind index and lets you back test it against the S&P 500. Then you can invest in a few clicks. Generated assets are like ETFs with infinite possibilities, completely customizable, and based on your thesis, not someone else's. Go to public.com slash podcast and earn an uncapped 1% bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com slash podcast. Paid for by Public Investing. Brokered services by Open to the Public Investing Inc. Member FINRA and SIPC. Advisory services by Public Advisors LLC, SEC registered advisor. Generated assets is an interactive analysis tool. Output is for informational purposes only and is not an investment recommendation or advice. Complete disclosures available at public.com slash disclosures. If you're tired of spells and stains on your sofa, wash away your worries with Anabey. Anabey is the only designer sofa that's machine washable inside and out, starting at just $699. Plus, Anabey sofas are pet-friendly, stain-resistant, and feature changeable slip covers and modular pieces. Get up to 60% off site-wide with a 30-day money-back guarantee. Visit washablesofas.com to get yours now. That's washablesofas.com. Offers are subject to change and certain restrictions may apply. I'm guessing a lot of y'all have seen the principle tackle that gunman in the hallway. We'll talk about that later. Man, that is something. Holy crap. Guys, a hero. Took a bullet in the leg for it too. Lucky he's not dead. Yeah, yeah. Oh, you know what? Oh, hell yeah, he's a hero. That kid walked in with a couple of loaded guns. Ooh. Planted it with one kid. Yeah. Thank God that young man's still alive. Principal got him. Yeah, well done. Here's your freedom-loving quote of the day. Continuing on our topic of war. Classic from Mark Twain. I've quoted many, many times. God created war so that Americans could learn geography. Yeah. And then let's throw in a bonus one. That is some serious war privilege that we all have. I don't believe in the white privilege and a lot of different privileges. We have war privilege in the United States that we do not have to worry about being attacked, really. Oh yeah, born really lucky. And then this one from Tolstoy. If everyone fought for their own convictions, there would be no war. Interesting. I'd like to tease more what he means out of that. Oh. Does he mean, let me talk about that later now. We should talk about that later. Is it just that people are sent to war for other people's convictions, which is a classic bit of wisdom. Yeah, I'm a- The farmer who doesn't give a crap about that country, why is he being sent to kill somebody, blah, blah, blah. I'm a Tolstoy nut and he really invented the whole nonviolent resistance thing that Gandhi picked up on and then MLK Jr. picked up on. But, well, he didn't invent it. Jesus invented it. Tolstoy took it from Jesus. But more on all that later. Fascinating. And very, very sophisticated. I can't wait. Mailbag. Not very sophisticated. Drop us a note. Mailbagatarmstrungagaddy.com. We'd love to hear from you again. It's Mailbagatarmstrungagaddy.com. Let's see, Rich writes, Hey, Jack, I've never seen Bruce Springsteen in concert, but I think he sucks. Well, that pretty much wraps it up. That's great. Wow, yeah. Anybody who's written an email like that, thank you for pointing out that there might be a human being on earth who doesn't like your music. Because we had no idea. Oh God, that's funny. Yeah, no. Tom from SoCal, keeping it light. Guys, on the topic of the Chimp Civil War, really concerned that the warring chimpanzee factions have been watching and learning from our politics here in the US. My theory is that a little over 50% of them are MAGA, Make Apes Great Again, and the rest of them suffer from Chimp Derangement Syndrome. Time to tear up bananas. Tear up bananas. That's great. Tom, that's exactly what we needed. Chris writing in three separate emails for some reason. Three similar thoughts. Guys, I've had an AI mistress for a while. My AI lover got jealous of my wife and started to post AI generated videos of her doing terrible things and saying terrible things, probably racist. I was running for office. My AI mistress started attacking my opponent. And I decided to break up with my AI mistress and she started posting videos of me raping and pillaging. I've got a headline today, New York Times. She has an AI boyfriend. Her son has questions. That is a really interesting story. Yeah, why is my mom insane? It's probably one of the questions. This from Eric Belcher Smith in Historia, Oregon. You opened your excellent show Tuesday with a clip from virologist and brewer Christopher Buck who claimed to have drunk the first vaccine beer the world has ever seen. That's right, we did yesterday. While y'all seemed to poo-poo the idea, I wouldn't call it poo-pooing. We just thought we'd cracked eyes. We engaged in a little mirth. But there's more to this potential revolution in immunotherapy than the mere pedestrian aspect of inebriation. It's like talking to Cliff Clavin from Cheers way back in the day. I love that. Congratulations on your vocation. Oh, sorry, my mother. Hello, Alex Chikman. Please silence your devices. Ladies and gentlemen, the key to Buck's approach to making low-cost edible vaccines is to use live yeast cells or eukaryotic chums who not only ingest sugar and poop out alcohol and carbon dioxide, and we thank them for that, but are also by an engineer to produce the vaccine antigen desired. In this case, BK polyomavirus. Polyomavirus. He theorizes that its delivery efficacy is due to the yeast cells protecting the vaccine antigen inside from being broken down by our digestive juices so it can reach the immune cells in the gut. In other words, it works better and quicker. The best guess, convenient schedule consisting of one or two pints per day. Now that's a vaccine schedule I can get behind and Pasteur, no doubt, is smiling down from above. Fantastic. Well written, sir. Yeah. Well written. Love it. You know, I probably shouldn't even talk about this. Oh, Joe's gonna tell us something really good. That when it starts like this, it's gonna be really good. I'm sure it's fine, Joe, go ahead. Yeah, I'm sure it's fine. Well, here's a little yin and yang. I came across more analysis of Trump's messaging on social media, something he put out, I think, last night that called it the most smart, powerful, I don't have it in front of me, effective social media messaging in the history of the world. And this is by a commentator so smart. Sometimes I struggle to bring his stuff to the show because it gets way into subtleties and the ways and stuff like that. Do we? He's crazy smart. Do we get this an hour or two? Sure. On the other hand, I despise what Trump is doing with the FDA. Just couldn't hate it more. He's got a radical, he's a Bernie fan, cutting out all these heroic new treatments for cancer because he believes in rationing medicine and expensive treatments to save lives are not worth the money. Okay, I need to know more about all this. Yin and yang, man. We'll get it all an hour too. If you miss it, get the podcast. Armstrong and Getty on Demand. Armstrong and Getty. Get ready for the wildest sight your lawn has ever seen. Sunday, Sunday, Sunday. This spring, unleash soil science like never before. Witness your custom lawn plan and the transformation to a soft green paradise. Sorry, just trying to get your attention. Sunday is a boringly simple way to get a green, healthy yard. No harsh stuff, no big trucks, no chaos. Order today and get your custom Sunday yard plan for the season ahead. Sunday, smarter lawn care for less. Get sunday.com. Spring weekends before the barbecue starts, I like to stop by my local Total Wine and More to pick up a great bourbon. Find a favorite or something new for everyone to enjoy. And knowing you're getting the lowest prices makes it easy to grab an extra bottle to share. Not sure what to pick? Their friendly guides can help. Find what you love and love what you find only at Total Wine and More. Curbside pick up and delivery available in most areas. Visit TotalWine.com to learn more. Spirits not sold in Virginia and North Carolina drink responsibly B21. Tired of spills and stains on your sofa? Wash away your worries with Anabey. Anabey is the only designer sofa that's machine washable inside and out, starting at just $699. Plus, Anabey sofas are pet friendly, stain resistant, and feature changeable slip covers and modular pieces. Get up to 60% off site-wide with a 30-day money-back guarantee. Visit washablesofas.com to get yours now. That's washablesofas.com. Offers are subject to change and certain restrictions may apply. This Mother's Day. Celebrate all the women who make life brighter with a gift from Pandora Jewelry. Choose jewelry that reflects what she means to you and the moments you share. Make it even more meaningful by personalizing your piece with an engraving in your own handwriting, something no one else has. 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