Just a Guy

David (00:00) Did you know that sometimes the most dangerous thing you can do to a powerful person is remind them that they're just human? This week starts with tariff refunds, which sounds boring enough to be federally regulated as a sleep aid, but underneath it is something much more familiar. What happens when losing a legal fight gets treated not as a normal part of government, but as humiliation. Once every court ruling becomes disrespect, every advisor becomes a mirror, and every loyalty test gets passed, power feel less checked and more chanted. And that's where things get weird. This is Shrinked the Nation. Let's go. David (01:13) All right. Hey, I'm David. I a board certified psychiatrist with over 20 years in the military. early in the morning drinking coffee, but I do have this coffee cup. Rob, if you can see it, a aggressive message for direct tie back to the fact that you made me wait half hour here before we started this episode. So nice little quiet fuck you. Rob (01:30) I I did. Yeah. Hey, it's Rob. Rob. I'm starting my day with a quiet fuck you from David. So thank you for that. I got 26 years in the field of psychiatry and about 30 years in the field of the military. And David's angry with me because I kept him waiting. David (01:37) to start my day and yours. You made me wake up early keep Yeah. So I've had lots of coffee now. Let's just probably get. Rob (01:57) I did. could have given you the warner last evening probably. sleep in 30 more minutes. it's not my fault you're on a stupid time zone. David (02:04) Yeah, it would have been nice to have gotten a warning prior getting up. I probably wouldn't have to be honest. would have probably still woken up. didn't even, my alarm didn't even go off. I just got out of we'll sweep that onto the subtle digs at you for the rest of this Rob (02:20) being passive aggressive, David. That's cool. I'll be completely oblivious to it. You just keep doing it though. David (02:22) I it's a Okay. there've been some news stories anybody who has been living with their head in the sand, there were tariffs that were initiated last year. Some of the tariffs were implemented under the IEPA, International Economic Emergency Powers anybody who wasn't aware, the Supreme Court struck those particular tariffs that was the hit at Donald Trump. But now, just recently, Customs and Border Protection has started to accept electronic refund applications. for the tariffs that were paid. And now we're finding that several major companies to... seek out the refunds, which was asked of Donald Trump, his thoughts on those while he was on, believe CNBC live. And his was essentially that he would remember those who chose not to seek out refunds. So there we go. It's interesting for a lot of reasons, Rob (03:19) Yeah, you know, I think for the challenges that come with bureaucracy, one of the benefits of bureaucracy is that it depersonalizes certain things that bureaucratic systems function as they do, not because of interpersonal relationships, but because and rules and laws. dictate what they do. And what we're seeing here is the softening of that, are ostensibly at least a nation of laws. there's, an ideology, there are laws that support said ideology. And this is yet another example of this sort of interpersonal, driven behaviors that not the realm in which governments or bureaucracies function best. David (04:04) many the Supreme Court. And one of the big questions I think that was posed even while they were looking at it was, well, what the hell is going to all the tariffs that were already this deemed not appropriate? answer is now you can apply for bring you the day the Supreme court decision was announced, If I remember the response that Donald Trump took it very personally. very Supreme Court had ruled against him this is just a remnant of this particular administration that I feel like I have to remind people of the behavior that was there because there's been so many things that have happened since then. that are just beyond the norm that we're used to this level of politics, that you got to go back and be like, yeah, remember that he held this press conference where he was becoming very unhinged and he was upset made accusations about the Supreme Court being in the back pockets of foreign so that happened. he was opining throughout that speech that he was going to have all these other ways to implement the tariffs. So it was clearly a humiliation for him have lost Even though I think a lot of people maybe would have expected that the International Economic Emergency Powers wouldn't apply to tariffs, especially since Congress has the authority to implement taxes, which a tariff is tax. Rob (05:23) little thing that we call the Constitution. Yeah. David (05:26) in all fairness, we haven't heard much from Congress lately. You kind of forget about them being third equal branch of the government because they just, they're not there. Rob (05:34) Are they? David (05:35) they're supposed to be, right? Rob (05:36) Well, you know, the first, I guess, fascinating thing, this kind of ties into what we spoke week, which was the sort of the illusion of movement that doing something feels like winning, feels like success. And what happened way, way, way back, way back in the dark days of February of 2025, they came out, they announced tariffs under really odd, know, their justification for them had more to do with trade deficits and you know, any industrialized or advanced nation such as ours is gonna have a trade deficit with most countries for. Reasons that are pretty straightforward. They don't have much money We do so we want stuff. So we're going to have a deficit with them because we're gonna be pulling in the stuff they make and They just don't have the finances to take on the stuff we make at any rate. It was a big deal got a lot of attention it gave this illusion that something was happening And so often in politics, when you talk to people about what they hate about politics or what they hate about governance is that this sense that nothing happens, because everything happens slowly. And there's so many checks and balances and it ends up feeling like nothing's happening. It's you go out west to some of the state parks, over a millennia, though, The wind and the dust creates these wonderful landscape it doesn't happen quick. And that's kind of the nature of our government. Nothing happens fast. It goes slow and it's supposed to go slow. It's supposed to have checks and balances. There's supposed to be debate and disagreement. And that's the structure that keeps us on the rails. This felt really fast. we're doing something. Even though most economists said this is dumb. this is a tax on the American people. This is not serving a purpose beyond that. But what we got was illusion of movement. And then what really happened is over time, wheels of government move slowly, the wheels of the judicial system move slowly, and it was completely invalidated. But interestingly, Trump's they got shut down got some attention, not nearly as much as the original tariffs. And then now here we sit these companies apply to get money back. it's getting almost no attention. There's no public attention to this. So what stuck, was the appearance of movement, even though it was utterly illusion success, movement, whatever. And here we are, kind of right back to where we began with this big pot of money that now companies are scared to ask for. David (08:14) made a lot of mean all of agree with you. You point because I was talking really slow. No, no, it's fine. No, because I think you made different points. It wasn't the point I was going to be would say I agree a lot of what you said. mean, I think there's some nuance to some of the things that you said, which isn't. Rob (08:16) Not all of them worth a damn. I'm sorry. David (08:29) It's not a bad anybody is sitting in their car screaming like, ah, what about X, or Z? Well, I guess it wasn't really a point of everything you were talking about. Like not all economists agree that it was a bad Not, I mean, some economists who really liked the idea of terrorists didn't like necessarily the way that it was implemented. Just kind of like a flat across somebody appeared to use AI to up with a what the trade deficits were based off of. you know, kind of probably faulty calculations to come up with the percentages. he did back off a lot of immediately stock market was impacted by the fact that people were kind of worried about the tariffs. yeah, the sense of movement and I agree with you I and I don't really think about that perspective of the fact that the sense of movement still kind of exists that memory in the back of your mind of like, well, this happened, something changed. The fact that it's kind of getting totally glossed over, it didn't have the same And so that sense of movement still sort of exists. What's interesting at this point is sense of humiliation, that sense of loss still very much exists in the back of Donald Trump's mind. And so for him to publicly state that he will remember those companies who do not accept the refunds, backhanded threat. It is what it feels like. a type of things you would expect to hear wise guy, right? Like, yeah, we got a long memory. But why? we know what, he's made this threat, it's a humiliation for him. What drives that for him damaging thing to politicians so used the winning and the just to get to that level, know, the loss of elections, but normally win most they know that that's the game of the system is that you're not gonna win 100%. In fact, think it was even Ronald Reagan would say, for everything, but we'll take 70 they were all about compromise. And they knew that in this grand scheme of the federal government because there are those checks and balances in those different arms, that you're not going everything. clear our tens of listeners, Donald Trump's tariffs didn't all get down. It was just the IEPA So it's not that all the tariffs went away. It was just this one subsection of the tariffs. if we're being honest, amount of refunds is like $166 billion, which to you and me, that's a ton of money. But to our federal government, budget of DHS is like 200 budget for Rob (10:54) I'll take it. David (11:02) the military is damn near a trillion dollars. So $166 billion coming in through tariffs, like that's not even a fraction, reasonable fraction of why does he care that much? I mean, we can talk about why he even thinks tariffs are going to be like, save the country from a money perspective, because they're just not, it's a tax on the people. But billion. Rob (11:06) Mm-hmm. David (11:26) surrounding at the federal level. Rob (11:28) is. if we want to roll back to that, that sort of a fascinating thing to settle in on tariffs because it is such minuscule and it's a I mean, it's a ton of money. It's a ton of money to you and me and our tens of listeners. The idea of someone handing me a hundred and whatever billion dollars. my gosh. You know, it's it's beyond my imagination what in the world I could do with that. but from U S government standpoint, it's not that much. And it was never going to be, and it was always going to impact. You and I, tens of listeners, they average Joe was going to affect them way more than it was going to affect any of these companies. well, no, that's not entirely companies, David (12:09) Small companies, Large corporations, it wasn't gonna matter. If you're Apple and you're worth trillion dollars plus, if you're Nvidia and you're worth three trillion, billion dollars, two billion dollars, you're like, whatever. To stay in the good graces this administration, who gives a shit? the question it bother him that? Rob (12:12) Yeah. Yeah. David (12:30) the question I think we should dig into. On this show, on what we do, and we're supposed to be doing, is asking that question and hopefully answering that so people can go, so why does he care about this rounding error? Rob (12:43) yeah, let's dissect that a little talk about normal and then we'll talk about what we normal is that an administration would have vetted these ideas through their legal department. They would have gotten opinions. They would have went through the process of is the likely outcome in the long term. most legal experts would have said, ultimately this is gonna play out with a Supreme Court and they're gonna deny this. So why invest in it? Why do it? So that's normal. Normal usually, involves the vetting and the sense of what the outcomes are going to be, second and third order effects, which we have killed in terms of Iran in our last several episodes. But that's not what happened here. that's the first starting point, I guess, is avoiding the normal checks and balances that normal administrations have. me with that one, David. Why did he just David (13:43) See, I guess that's where my thought process, and this is, I mean, I think why having a discussion with you is so helpful. I don't see him as avoiding normal checks and balances. I see him as feeling like they apply. And I think to there's a subtle difference to that. It's not somebody who sees that checks and balances exist and says, well, if I can just skirt it, I win. because that implies somebody views those checks and balances as And I think what I'm seeing and you, you know, challenge it please, if you need to, but What I'm seeing is somebody who's kind of buying into the unified executive theory and then song. so the unified executive theory is this idea that the constitution gives the president this sort of ultimate power over the executive branch and that they can use the executive branch to just sort of be their instrument to do whatever they want. But what I think we're seeing, is that he's taking this to a new level where it's not that the executive branch is an equal within the system. It's that the executive branch is in charge of the entire federal and the other two branches are really there to support his decision making, not challenge And so I don't see him as trying to skirt the challenge of the other branches. I don't see him as trying to avoid their authority. I see him as not valuing that authority as being equal or even valid when it doesn't agree with him. Like they're not doing their jobs. Rob (15:16) Mm-hmm. David (15:17) if they question the truth is, think Congress has this, right? Congress has to his decisions. They very rarely challenge If put into a position to challenge they will typically avoid the vote. didn't want to vote on tariffs. bring people back. At the time that the tariffs were implemented, there was the ability for at least have to vote on whether to continue them or not because they would have had to have challenged that vote within a certain number of business days. if somebody had brought it to the floor and what they ended up doing was turning off the clock on were actual business days so that they never had to bring a vote to have to show which congresspeople were for or against the tariffs because they didn't want to show the world or themselves or him how they would actually vote on tariffs. don't know that it's just him. I think Congress is helping this. think a lot of Court's decisions, a lot of them do go in his favor, but they're using the shadow docket to do where they don't have to explain why they're ruling in that direction. They just do it. And it's a... Interesting. mean, it's just fascinating. Rob (16:25) So, all right, to our tens of listeners, yet again, I'm gonna tell David he made a good point. It's a rare, rare experience. Doesn't happen often. When it does, I'm always a little bit gobsmacked. Like, gosh, so much smarter than he looks. At any rate, David (16:30) HAHAHA! It's like watching a monkey type out Rob (16:43) An infinite number of monkeys on keyboards will eventually create art. at any rate, cause you're right, I oversimplified it. I said they didn't think about the second and third order effects clearly did. You know, whether you agree with their politics, whatever, there's enough smart people there that I'm sure the second and third order effects were discussed. the potential risks were discussed. David (17:06) there are economists who can make Orrin Cass is one of them who would make an argument, a very decent argument as to why tariffs can be beneficial to our country. now typically it's targeted tariffs. He will bring in the would be the best way to do it to target things, because the chips act. that was bipartisan, and it was very effective and it very helpful to our country. is the ability for tariffs to be beneficial when used in a controlled manner. So that's the big caveat. Now, not all the arguments are sound or they start to then caveat into well, but it's not possible to do it exactly that way. so just throw that out there. Sorry. Rob (17:44) No, concur with you. And that's, think, we can get locked up because We can justify this. David (17:50) It's like to untangle spaghetti at this point. There's just so many just say there was a good dish and move on rather than talk about each fucking strand pasta. Rob (17:54) Well... And, and we can absolutely get locked as intelligent, thoughtful individuals, justify abnormal in terms of normal. let's think about Donald Trump as a reality TV star. where he found his success. And I realized he had, I mean, he was a billionaire and whatever, but. you know, he's the PT Barnum of humans his self aggrandizement has been the key to his success and You know, he started back in the 80s doing this when he would you know call into gossip newspapers or gossip magazines and Drop tips that he's dating beautiful women David (18:36) anonymously, yeah, anonymously diamond himself out. Yeah. Rob (18:40) Yeah. So, the second and third order effects were probably discussed and probably discussed at length, we see is that the first order symbolic victory means more David (18:56) But why? And I think that's okay. Yeah, I get that. We get that. I mean, it's he wants to win. he doesn't like to lose. Rob (19:05) Symbolically win. I'll give you another, I mean, real straightforward, we've already talked about this. The symbolic victory of having someone else's Peace Prize given to you. That's symbolic. It means nothing. It is purely symbolic. And the symbolic victory, now, let's reel back, let's talk about David (19:07) yes, yes. Yeah. Rob (19:28) Narcissism. I'm not making a diagnosis here, folks. I'm staying well within the bounds of the Goldwater Rule, but let's say theoretically, usually involves an individual who at their core does not feel good, does not feel good enough at their core. And what they end up projecting to the world is their sense of perfection, their sense of what power, what success, what... being good person looks like. To narcissists, symbology counts way more than reality because fundamentally at their core, of this is real. None of what they're showing the world is truly real. It's symbolic, all of it's symbolic. It's the look, it's the appearance. mean, why does every woman in the Trump ecosystem end up looking the same because it's what he thinks looks like appealing. So it's all symbology and these victories not real. And that's what counts more to him. And if you look at his life and his career, symbolic victories have always counted more. And it's a reason why he's had six bankruptcies. And yeah, he comes out the other side still the victor because, know, the way business works, you can go bankrupt and actually be wealthier for it. David (20:44) or maybe disagree with you a little bit, can't argue with what you're saying about narcissism that's how those function. where I want to challenge is that the symbolic victories appear to becoming more real to this administration. And what I mean by that is reminded of a quote from a movie that I loved when it came out. still do if I were to watch it. But There was a line in 300, you remember movie, before this battle is over, the world will know that even a god king can bleed. these responses from him. Rob (21:11) I do. Yep. David (21:24) is that it's more than a humiliation, it's more than a loss. It's this temporary in his mind confirmation that the power that he views himself to have isn't absolute. when the Supreme Court strikes down your policy as being illegal. And then you come back and try to find a way to make that decision by the other branch moot. it appears that he wants that humiliation, that loss to be erased, whether it's through their power, just not existing or not really applying because it's just, well, you can get your money back or Maybe you don't. Rob (22:03) All a leader in the conventional sense, what we've come to expect of our leaders, some of them, is that they'll ask, what are the downstream effects? This administration style, it doesn't necessarily prioritize what are the downstream effects. It seems the question that's asked is, Who will look weak if I do this or don't do this? A conventional leader will say, what happens if this escalates? This administration says, can escalation force others to bend to me? A leader will say, what's the institutional cost? This one says, can I turn fight itself, the fight for the fight sake, into proof of strength. Conventional leadership would ask, what do the experts warn? This one says, are these experts trying to limit me? It's a radically different structure than what we've come to expect of conventional leadership versus this leadership. And this leadership really does end up being shows of force. shows of strength, shows of power, symbols of power are what actually drives it. It's not the actual you and I and our tens of listeners, if we're engaged in a project and we want the end state to be whatever the goal of that project is, whereas this administration, like, say they're gonna cut the grass, I don't know. This administration would more prioritize being outside in a muscle shirt than the actual completion of cutting the grass. It would be the show, not the outcome. David (23:37) agree that the narcissistic tendency... is there and certainly started there with need for the symbolism of strength. What I fear I'm seeing is the evolution of that to a belief that all of that strength Now it's symbolic to you and I because we see that it's temporary, right? But for the person who is living it, at the top, becoming more and more real. unified executive theory, this belief that you are in charge of being the leader of the country, the leader of the free world, things are no longer symbols. starting to be this deeply held belief that if I say it, it will be so. And so when there any kind of pushback to that, it's no longer, well, yeah, okay, maybe I'm not allowed to do that. No, it's not I'm not allowed to do that. You just took a swing at God. You just took a swipe at the king. And look, your swipe maybe cut me, but it's self-healed. what is interesting, but also concerning to me, is that it seems to be evolving. It's evolving into something more than just I'm winning through symbols. It's I'm winning because Rob (24:46) yeah, it's David (24:55) Of course I'm winning. I am everything. Rob (24:58) Well, I mean, the unified executive approach is deeply concerning. don't think anyone developed a well thought out ideology on the unified executive based on the constitution, based on law, based on history. they really started with was a goal to achieve certain things and whatever their ideology is. And then they build a structure around it to justify that. And then it just so happened, we ended up electing a leader who fit that. Not that, I mean, I don't believe for a second, Donald Trump has read deeply into the unified executive theory of government. It just so happens he lives it. his personality style. And here's the, I guess, the issue with second order effects. They require patience. They require abstraction. They require institutional imagination. They're boring as hell. They're just boring and they take time. this administration, this individual is not a patient individual. He's not gonna wait for these long-term outcomes you have to look into the future. You have to wait for, you have to be patient for. It's just not going to happen. it's cognitively real, but it's emotionally less vivid. And what he prioritizes is the emotional vividness, the emotional intensity. So it's not, you know, what's the long term effect? it's the immediate image that is most important to him. You know, I hit back. I impose tariffs, I show strength, I made them pay. cosplay, no doubt. But I mean, even to this day, like the reality TV element of him, how many times have you seen him giving a press briefing where they catch him and he's like, well, you're gonna have to wait find out. You're gonna have to tune in later. He's constantly doing cliffhangers, constantly. David (26:43) Well, I guess... But he spent the last 25 years of his life in perceptional world where people were perceiving him to be something that he with his reality show, they couldn't use his boardroom to shoot the show because it was so shitty. They had to create a set, him. and they made him appear to be a great businessman when he had been a huge failure every business that he had been part of. But the perception was, and on this TV show, that was a reality TV show, was that he was this great businessman, and so he was projecting out. And I think it started that it seemed to be that way. seeing over time is what's concerning to me, is that it's like, this video, or maybe several, I don't know. but where a magician is like sitting there and most of the audience is in on this, but there's like one person they pull from the audience, know, randomly who is not. And the magician puts a blanket over them and then goes, okay, I'm going to make you invisible. I'm going make you disappear. he pulls the blanket off and everyone in the audience goes, not there. And the person is like, thinks they're invisible. so the person is just like, mystified but they start to walk around and they're like, ⁓ my God, can see me. And they start to behave in this way. move something and then laugh about it because the person will be freaking out. They'll pick up a cup and the people in the audience are just playing along with it. But it becomes real to that person. And they start to believe in themselves. guess that's what I'm this evolution of his behavior that is going from Well, everyone is telling me I have this power to, holy shit, I have it. Because everyone around him has acquiesced so much. Like he's been surrounded by sycophants, a yes man to the point where if he says it and they do it and the thing starts to happen, he becomes infallible in his own mind. And so when the Supreme Court strikes down policy that he implemented and was very confident in, And they say, well, that's not legal. Then all of sudden the reality to him is like, shit, maybe I'm not invisible. Maybe, crap, this audience can see so he has to self correct. He has to change it to, no, wait a minute, we can fix this. And so without cognitively doing this, because I don't think he's not thinking about this way. I think what he's seeing is I can get that power back through the actions of others. Rob (29:01) So you're hitting at a Jungian concept. So the Jungian archetype concept and the archetype that we're actually smacking around, one that is incredibly popular. I can't tell you how many movies book series are based on this archetype. It's the archetype of the average individual, the weak person who has an internal ability that no one knows and that they then discover. And think of Harry Potter. So this is the Harry Potter archetype, we'll call it. This poor orphan child who's mistreated and demeaned and has no authority, no power. And the whole arc of that series is him coming to understand that he had all this power internally. Now imagine, yeah, I know, I know, David (29:46) Holy shit spoiler alert Robbie Jesus. Rob (29:49) if you look at at least my understanding his life, Trump's life, not Harry Potter's life, that, think there's evidence to support life in which, I guess he had a very domineering father who had high standards and at any rate And then you look at all of his bankruptcies what happened with those bankruptcies is that the downside to the bankruptcy, he learned how to socialize that, it became everyone's problem. It became the government's problem. They bailed him out. Bankruptcy, that's the nature of bankruptcy. It was, don't pay my workers. They underwrote the failure, but the upsize was personalized that learned failure could be monetized if the story was controlled. Life became about a that wasn't really him. So, yeah, you start to get high on your own supply at a certain point. You start to actually believe, my God, I have power, I have authority, smart, I know things other people don't, because everyone's telling you that. And any hint, that you're not truly invisible has to be smoothed over quickly. has to be a defense to that because internally, you know you're not invisible. You know you're not. But when you start to believe you are, people keep telling you you are, which is a beautiful analogy actually, when you have these hints that you're not, you smooth them over. And that's what happened with the Supreme Court, that all this power that he thought he had. all this whatever authority that he thought he had got challenged and he had to throw a temper tantrum to smooth that over. He had to regain the story. David (31:20) What's the arc of this? not gonna be able to predict the future any more than I could or anybody else. But I'm getting at there is we've watched this person who's nearly 80 years old at the latter end of his life, start to I'm not in his I will carry. I don't know what he thinks. seeing behaviors that he is starting to get that supply. it's so big, it's so global effects. is this going? Because feel seen this evolution happen before, and I will call it out. You see this in high control groups always get this kind of like inside look, Rarely the evolution of a leader within a high control group be something that you can witness in real time unless you're part of the group doesn't become something that the public even cares about until late in the process when things start to become really problematic for the then all of sudden There's documentaries, books, there's exposés, all that. But we're watching in real time, this evolution of what appears to be his own belief in himself, that is... Rob (32:30) Right. David (32:31) incomprehensible. Rob (32:33) he confuses domination with strategy. It's the short-term win, it's the appearance, his incentive system rewards drama over competence. those kind of are the baselines here that we're dealing with, is that it's drama, the drama over the ultimate competence and dominance over a long-term strategy. The issue is, certainly he's driven to be on the stage, in the front of the class. The problem is that when you get in that position, it's so much harder to continue to pretend to be something that you're not. And time plays out that confusing domination strategic outcomes or you're prioritizing drama, that drama is gonna win for a little bit. Ultimately, the lack of a strategy starts to stack up. And we're seeing it now. We're seeing the incompetence. We're seeing exhaustion with the drama. when they first came into administration took drama good to a lot of Americans because it was the illusion of success through movement It was just lots of shit at a certain point people just get tired of drama miss Joe Not because you necessarily felt like maybe you didn't think you did a great job. It doesn't matter. What you did feel is I don't have to check the news every morning to make sure the goddamn world's still turning. every morning at 5 30 when I turn on the news, I'm thinking what crazy shit happened since I went to sleep. That drama gets exhausting and we're all going to get exhausted. And then the incompetence. The fact that domination is really the key rather than a long-term strategic outcome, the incompetence starts to stack up. And here's the scary thing. I mean, really in the short term, in the next year, two years until we're done here, the incompetence will stack up. it's always gonna be someone else's fault. So the cabinet's gonna have incredible turnover, just like in the first administration, someone has to be to blame because this incompetent decision after incompetent decision has to have some drama associated with it to justify it, some dominance associated with it so that I'm still winning, I'm still a winner, People are gonna get tired of it. election cycle up, we're probably going to see some massive it's not necessarily because people are now all of sudden more Democrat versus Republican. It's just, they want something different. So different is, is the democratic side. Next election, it's probably also going to shift people are just going to be so exhausted with this. Where I am. perpetually anxious about though, is that that incompetence That lack of strategy has downstream consequences. Insulting our allies, threatening to take Greenland, doing the kinds of craziness that is happening, which is a show of dominance, does long tail. And that tail, we're going to be paying for for years. in years and years recapturing the trust of the world. Right now big buff guy at the bar who might punch anyone at any time convincing the world again, we're a trustworthy stable, word matters. Not just now. long term. And we've always done that. I'm not even making the argument, we've always made great decisions, that we've always done the right things. But we have deprioritized drama. We have been stable. Each administration along the way stuck largely a worldview with prior precedence. been consistent. and now all of sudden we have shown the world, it's not exactly how it works. You can get one inconsistent person in and it can really mess things up. We're gonna pay for this for decades. And internally, a book called, I think it's called The Fifth Estate or something along those lines, but it talks about the day-to-day jobs that major governmental agencies do, like the Department of Energy and its control of nuclear material, the critical importance that competence, competently doing the damn job plays in the function of our day-to-day life, so much so that we don't even know, we don't even think about it. go to your tap, you turn on the water, you're pretty convinced you can drink don't have to think it through. You don't have to ponder it. We just do it. You know, we go to a restaurant and we eat the food. confident we're probably not gonna get diarrhea later system except if you, Other than Taco Bell, but then you expect it if you eat a Taco Bell. That's your fault. That's on you. David (36:56) Obviously you're not eating a Taco Bell, yeah. poll there. I mean it's the reward. Clean out. Rob (37:04) But clean out, But we are so confident because the underlying mechanisms are there that we don't even have to think it through. There are so many things that happen in this government that we just take for granted. We don't even know that they're happening have been so good at it. And because of the incompetence, the lack of prioritizing competent individuals in these roles, we'll pay for that too. I mean, the downstream consequences of this administration are difficult to even breaking shit that has never been broken. So we're gonna have to a decade just figuring out what's broken we can fix it. David (37:46) yes, I agree. make an argument that that is a feature, not a bug of this administration. I mean, that was the purpose of Doge was to break a whole bunch of shit. Did it save money? No, it cost the government. billions of dollars to do what Doge did. it was under the guise of making things more efficient, making things cheaper, but the way that they went about it was very expensive. But what they accomplished and what the original goal was, was to break enough that it had to be rebuilt at some point with the hope that it would be rebuilt in a very specific way. of Project 2025 the federal government so that it could be rebuilt into a specific image. And I you're saying that it's going to have to rebuild, but I think that a big part of the purpose. The thing me in the the man is nearly eight years old. He is not going to live forever. But as he goes further and further down this path of behaviors that appear to be belief that his power is greater and greater in inalienable. seen the escalation of that. implementing tariffs across the board. when they're struck down, needing to rebound from that by saying, I didn't get cut, look, I'm not cut, I'm not bleeding. actually, it's real. They said it's not legal, but as long as people don't ask for the money back, then my tariffs still stood and I'll put in new ones. But then it was, prevented eight wars to now he's attacked what seven countries or something. mean, there's the board of peace that you sit on while you're simultaneously Rob (39:31) I'm making a case for the Peace Prize, Izzy. David (39:38) escalating and whatever. seeing is this escalation so go, go to what happened was we cut off the head of the serpent by going in and swiftly taking, Maduro out, right? And what happened there was we're gonna take Maduro out, which he did, and it was easy, right? It was easy in his mind. and we talked about this before, what was he gonna do? Was he gonna leave the administration, like was the goal really regime change, as he said, or was it I just wanna show that I've done something? And what would they do? they basically said the person who was left, do what I say. and you're good. Just be friendly to us and you're put a new person And so then he saw, I can do this in Iran as well. But Iranians just not the kind of people who are going to just switch because you said so. I think the hope was. that the people were rise up and take over. And that didn't happen, but the escalation of it was so much more. so that's what I'm worried about, Rod. That's what I'm concerned about. That's what I'm seeing is this escalation of this belief that whatever he does is infallible and then just fix the back end when the God King bleeds a little bit. You didn't see that. It wasn't blood. Rob (40:39) So, well. he's living rent-free in my noggin. And actually pissing me off a little bit because I spend way too much time trying to just make sense of this and piece it all together. But what I've come to is that he has catastrophe-trained David (41:06) to bring down. thanks for that, yeah. Rob (41:08) Yeah, you know, we want to keep it at a fifth grade reading level. It's not grandiosity grandiosity metabolized through failure. So when you look at his life there's lots and lots and lots of failure, failure after failure after failure, largely because of what we just talked about, which drama over consequence. And that's what happens, but he comes out the winner each and every time. And you had mentioned this, I think last time, that he ends up coming out the winner. So he has trained himself. And I don't even know if he's thinking this through. I think it's more a feeling. He's like feeling his way, failure actually ends up making him more grandiose. The problem is, is running a casino and it fails, and you come out the other side, you know, $100 million richer you basically didn't pay anyone and you stole the money and you're like, bankrupt, debt free. That's one thing. But for a country, for us, for the United States, the arc here is failure. then coming out the other side somehow with a story. that he's still grandiose and it wasn't his failure, socialized failure. The failure gets socialized. we're all absorbing this. We're absorbing the gas prices. We're absorbing the cost of tariffs. We're absorbing the cost of this war. We're absorbing these things totally socialized. It's not falling back on him. It's his decisions, but it's not impacting him. David (42:36) So where I see the difference in what you're saying, the only disagree I would say look at through a different lens because I think yes, through most of his it was him boosting up himself, not necessarily purposely, but just through every failure was escalating for him because he came out. clean on the other side. the difference is now is that it's not him elevating himself now. And this is where I see the similarities to a high control group. Because it's not that the leader elevates themselves. It's that the leader has followers who elevate the leader. with each loyalty test, which is really what we're seeing with the tariffs thing with each loyalty test that people go along the followers say, okay, the leader is asking me to not talk to my family anymore. So I won't that strengthens the leader. Right. That builds up the leader. And so what we're seeing is, and we've seen this for over a year, that there's these loyalty tests and with each success in the loyalty test, because you don't need all the followers to follow. You just need some. But every time something outlandish or a violation of morals or ethics or just norms occurs and the leader survives in that leadership role. It just strengthens the leader more. And it isn't necessarily the leader who is strengthening themselves. it's the activity of the follower. Now the leader starts to believe it. And that's where you'll see that arc over time where the leader goes from having some followers who believe the vision, who believe the story, because the followers want the easy answer. simple answer. be helpful. It's the easy answer the tough questions the followers want that And as the leader guides them down the path of this is the easy answer believe this follow this structure as the followers go along with it and they get deeper and deeper into that vision The leader gains strength, but then at some point There's a switch in the leader where the leader goes from knowing that they're bullshit, they are just offering up an easy solution to a complex problem and it probably won't work, to where as their followers follow along with them, they flip start to believe it themselves. And it becomes a reality for them. And that's what I think we're Rob (44:55) Yeah. David (44:59) That's the why at this point is that I think what we're starting to see not him desiring more power. It's him having been experiencing more power Congress has not done anything. The people around him are telling him, this is great. Keep doing this to the point that it starts to become his reality. it's no longer, I think I might be invisible. It's holy shit, I'm actually invisible and nobody can see me. And if somebody of looks at me and I see that, wasn't real because I am really invisible. then it starts to into why am I am I so special and nobody else is? And it's because a higher power, gifted that to me. And then eventually it becomes because I am the higher power. worried about is that it's going in that direction. Rob (45:37) Mmm. Well, me too, and I concur with gaining power is a second order effect. It's a downstream effect that some strategy and some planning. It's real tempting. It's real tempting. And I see this all the time on news pundits, et cetera, who want to pretend that Trump is stupid. And he's not. He's not stupid. He doesn't ignore second order effects because he's stupid. too simplistic. He ignores them because his psychology is built around order domination. life has taught him second order consequences are paid by somebody else. So the priority is that first order domination, looking powerful, making people bend, embarrassing others. getting them to pay homage give him fealty and sit around in a cabinet meeting where every one of the secretaries has to open up with a tribute to the great leader, embarrassing themselves. I mean, it David (46:36) fucking reality are we in right now, because every, you're, you're right, because I think in North Korea, he's the Supreme Leader and he's appointed by a guy. Yeah, so you're right, that's where it's going. Rob (46:39) be like North Korea. tell really reminds me of. There's a great video of Saddam Hussein when in Iraq, and he's in the parliament. And these guys all of a sudden realize, oh shit, he is now in control could kill any of us. And they each stand up and pledge their loyalty to him. And he's standing there with his arms crossed just watching. time news footage of a cabinet meeting have to start off by basically telling the leader that they have the biggest penis in the room and it smells of lavender and cedar and all stunning. But you just said, don't power for power's sake David (47:20) Sanowen. Rob (47:26) takes strategy, that's a second order effect, power. It is the dominance upfront. And when he sits in those cabinet meetings, it's the dominance that he exerts over all of his secretaries when they pay fealty to him. And that's the first order effect, and that's the most important. David (47:43) the thing I want to highlight is that it begins with control. It begins with dominance. And then if left unchecked, because I think one of the most important things to a leader in a high control group is the inner circle that helps to continue elevating and kind of handles the stuff around them that might challenge their role as being supreme leader. That inner circle is really important, but as that control and dominance starts to evolve, or de-evolve, I suppose, into this belief system that everything that has been said about this person being divinely put there, it starts to become reality in their mind. It becomes their the takeaway point here is why does it get to that point? the simplest, possible explanation I have is because the person who is going through that is human. Which by the way is probably the worst thing for the leader to acknowledge and accept is that because they're human. you or I were put into that position where all of our whims our desires anything that we say affirmed appreciated loved People are just telling you wow, you're so great. You're so smart Everything that you do is right You will start to believe it yourself You will eventually Become that in your own mind as well if you were surrounded all day, Robbie, by people who told you that you were the second coming of Christ, and you were like, okay, well, if I'm Christ, me a Pepsi. And they brought you a Pepsi. Well, I'm being nice, but okay, go get me a Diet Coke. And that person brought you a Diet Coke. And then you're like, okay, go invade Iran. And they're like, yes. Rob (49:19) Diet Coke. David (49:29) eventually... you would start to believe it too. the worst thing to tell Donald Trump would be, you know you're just a guy, right? You know you're just an 80 year old man. You are you are not one of the tallest presidents. Yes, you are a very tall man. your not tan. You have, you are balding. Like your ridiculous. It's been ridiculous your entire life. People make fun of that a but it doesn't matter. you are just a human man. You're damn years you go on these massive tirades that people completely check out for. In fact, probably one of your that people tend to not listen to you. Rob (49:45) for him. David (50:05) you're just a human man. That would be terrifying to him, I think, to have that conversation. You're just a guy. Rob (50:09) You know he has those moments though. Everyone has those 3am moments. David (50:14) Yeah, we do see this truth social post, right? He goes on these tirades for hours and hours. I think he's having that transition of belief because in the daytime, it's all better again. I And honestly, I wish people would stop trying to kill Rob (50:23) Mm-hmm. David (50:27) He's got to be the most assassinated, attempted president at least. people got to to shoot this guy. come on people, let's just Rob (50:31) Possibly. I concur. David (50:34) but stop, stop it people. Stop trying to assassinate him. Just stop. Rob (50:38) There's no place for violence in a democracy. There's just no, there's no role for it. David (50:42) No, I mean, but that, no, it's ridiculous. Like all of it, like nothing about American politics is worth, murdering anybody for, to be honest. Like we talk about this shit, but like, come on. That's, it's, it's ridiculous. All of that, but. Rob (50:50) Agreed. I concur. David (50:56) end stop at assassination attempts and move to a prescription. Rob (51:02) enough, my prescription is actually directed to great leader. He's got to stop treating the federal government like a leveraged casino with a nuclear service room. He can't keep walking up to the blackjack table, betting the mortgage, betting the supply chain, betting the Strait of Hormuz. and then declaring himself a genius because the rest of us got stuck with the tab. David (51:26) no, you're not wrong. I wish you would have said craps table because it's a roll of the dice my prescription to his cabinet, which is you got to the fake invisible guy down the path of him believing that he's invisible. it might benefit you being in the inner circle. but gosh, it hurts everyone else. we need a president who understands that he's fallible. and a big part of that is just people telling him that he's not any good leader knows that they need somebody in the room or somebody's in the room to challenge their you can't formulate a full perspective, good plan. If you don't know the counter arguments and that's kind of where we're going. stop viewing this human being as anything but, cause that's what he is. And maybe that's going to be from now on is Donald Trump is just another guy. Rob (52:15) Just a dude. David (52:15) I once said, an old just an old man. Rob (52:19) As my kids would say, bruh, he's just a bruh. David (52:22) Yeah. I mean, they'd say boomer. They'd be like, he's just some boomer. That's what they'd say. He's just some, he's just some boomer. it's gross. Anyway. Rob (52:25) That's true. That's absolutely that's absolutely He does love the 80s. He loves the 80s. He talks about them all the time. David (52:33) I'm surprised he doesn't want to bring back soda shops. Rob (52:36) Yeah David (52:36) We gotta bring back the soda shops. Back in my day. Rob (52:38) Right. That's how we make America great again. David (52:41) That's right. I think we've talked this to Although I'm sure there'll be more of it in the future because I don't think this regular old man is going to go anywhere for a while. But hey, you know, thanks for sticking around. Appreciate any likes, subscribes, shares. Rob (52:44) We have. David (52:57) I think we're going to update the website here shortly at some point. just make it a little bit, I don't know, up to date, new, fun. So check that out at some point That's about it. Anything else, Robbie? Rob (53:08) Nope, I think we killed it. David (53:09) Yeah, we did. All right. Well, let's cue up that music and we are out.