Hey, I'm Matt Burschell, comedian, writer, and floating head you may or may not have seen on your FYP. I'm starting a brand new podcast. Wait, don't swipe away. It's called That Sounds Like a Lot.
You know that feeling when you check your phone, read a few headlines and think, that sounds like a lot. I can't do this. Well, I can. I'm going to get into it every Friday.
You can watch on YouTube or listen wherever you get your podcasts. I'm going to start by breaking down whatever insanity is happening in the world. Then I'll sit down with a comedian or actor or writer or honestly, anyone who responds to my DMs. This is not the place to get the news, but it is a place to feel a little bit better about it.
That sounds like a lot coming May 1st, part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Hi, everyone, this is Pivot from the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. And I'm Scott Galloway.
Let's get straight to the biggest TV event of the summer. The season finale of Divorce? No, nobody watches that. Who watches that?
People who've been divorced. I've been divorced. I don't watch that show. It's pretty good.
Try again. What happened yesterday in Washington, D.C.? Yeah, I know. But you know what freedom is?
Bill Maher had a great term. He was talking about the happiest nations in the world. Seven of the 10 of them are socialists. And it's not only happiness isn't about what you have, it's also about your freedom from certain fears.
And in these socialist countries, they are free from the absence of knowing, okay, your wife has lung cancer, which is awful, but then you have freedom from the sphere of, well, that also means I'm going to be bankrupt. But the reason I bring this up is that a definition of freedom, in my view, as the week goes by, and you haven't thought about your leader. And I think about all these autocratic nations that are constantly in their population's face all the time. And I think about the leaders I admire, Merkel, Thatcher, Obama.
And you know what they all had in common? They weren't in our fucking face every day. We didn't have to think about it. Margaret Thatcher was.
Margaret Thatcher, oh, no, months would go by that you wouldn't have to think about Margaret Thatcher. Whereas what is it literally with Trump? It's like my 8-year-old when he doesn't exercise, and he's just like, okay, he started taking his brother and, you know, eating detergent, like, look at me, look at me! Anyways.
All right, look at Robert Mueller. Guess what? It was about Trump. I'm sorry to tell you, but it was important testimony, especially because, according to the New York Times, quote, Mr.
Mueller has made little secret of his belief that the public has not fully grasped the elaborate and targeted nature of Russia's attacks on the 2016 elections that were detailed in his report, nor has the government taken sufficient steps to address or prevent such an assault from occurring again. Amid all the politics, to me, that was a critical step. 100%. It was like, you know who Gary Larson is, that cartoonist?
And he talks about what you say to dogs. Ginger, go get the ball. Ginger, what Ginger hears. Ginger, blah, blah, blah.
Ginger, blah, blah, blah. And all I could hear was a bunch of blah, blah, except for two things. One, a guy who's been standing watch for our country for literally 50 years and who very smart people from both sides of the aisle have decided we should keep this guy standing watch. He has probably more respect, more credibility, more domain expertise than almost anyone trying to protect our country.
And his opening statements were, look, folks, distinct of the politics that are about to unfold here, what the Russians have done here is one of the most concerning things I've seen and all Americans should be very focused on it. And the second thing I heard was when Representative Buck asked him if the president could be prosecuted after he left office and the answer was yes. Anyways, those are my two jesters. Well, okay, let's talk about the Russians, because I think that's, I just had a very long and interesting podcast with Larry Diamond, who's written a book called Ill Winds about the attacks by Russia and the incursions by the Chinese and American complacency.
One of the things that really struck me about the coverage of the Mueller hearings was not, was exactly that, the last part, American complacency. Everything was about whether he was addled. I think that was what many of the reporters were trying to get to. Is there something wrong with him from an age point of view?
I think that's what they were driving at. And also Trump, you know, sort of doing this ridiculous juvenile victory dance over it. So it got pulled and mired into politics. And the real point is the Russians are coming and they're here and they're still doing the same damage no matter who they're voting for, which is obviously Trump, which Mueller made very clear.
We've got to do something about this. Yeah, I just, I got so just personally, I found the term is I just found it so upsetting. Robert Mueller or Director Mueller, 73. I hope I'm.
He's almost 75, actually. He's 75. Okay, I hope I'm that. I hope I am that shaky when I am 75.
I hope I am that, you know, the fact that they would find purchase in saying anything disparaging about that guy, you know, here are some questions they should have asked him. Were you voted best athlete in your high school across three different sports? Were you after your friend was killed in the country province, did you decide to voluntarily enlist? Were you awarded the Medal of Valor?
I mean, this guy was decorated, shot in the thigh, returned, was awarded a commendation for bravery after rescuing a platoon member in a firefight that wounded half of his staff and then returned to the nation to continue to serve. You know, Devin Nunes, Sean Hannity, Chris Wallace, who find purchase and be critical in any way of Robert Mueller. Well, you know what? Captain Mueller has pieces of better men in his crap.
Okay, exactly. I don't have to eat people, Scott, but you're right. But what was interesting is it just got stuck. He got sucked away.
I was thinking this morning, this man who deserves a lot of honor has just been pulled down in the same ways. And, you know, I was watching Twitter about him and I was like, you know, they were hoping that he would be the savior. There was no savior in this except for the warning message, which he has, which is that we're getting played by the Russians, essentially. We're getting played by them beautifully.
And we're even pulling down people like this. So it was very, I felt sad. It was hugely upsetting. I had trouble even watching the thing.
Let's get to something happier. I listened to your three podcasts with the interviews of the presidential candidates. And first off, you're actually a fairly competent interviewer. I'll give you that.
You actually, you're pretty good. I mean, you still got some learning, but you're pretty good. So I'm going to just give you a viewpoint. So one, you know, I walk away feeling the same way about Senator Bennett.
If we're going to kick this guy out, we have, the only way to replace the president kind of mid-cycle or after one term is for something totally different. And in my view, Michael Bennett represents that because he's demonstrates brains, character, and empathy of which there seem to have been starts from the White House. But I just walked away the same. I walked away from your podcast with Andrew Yang, liking him more.
This guy, he is a clear blue flame thinker. I mean, that guy has some interesting ideas. And unlike some of these other yahoos that have jumped into the race because, you know, they're billionaires and white, I think he's going to inject into the bloodstream some very interesting conversations around ideas that we weren't talking about before. I learned a lot.
Universal basic income, $3 trillion, but a trillion and a half is already being paid. He talks about the multiplier effect, the fact that it could free people up to start businesses, focus on their health, and that it would be a net economic benefit. It really got me thinking. So thank you for that.
No problem. Shockingly, Mayor Pete was kind of my number two, my sort of mistress in the waiting, if you will. I came away, I liked Mayor Pete less. I thought he came across as a little bit awkward.
I don't like this, I forget what it is, he's proposing something almost for reparations, an act to provide reparations to the black community. I find that pandering and political because the bottom line is the black community has been slow to embrace the gay community or the LGBT community. So I found that a bit pandering and political. And I also think, I worry that anything like that only kind of fans the fuels of discrimination when we affirmative act.
I think affirmative action should be income-based, not race-based, which gets to the same thing, given that Latino and black households have an average wealth of $20,000 versus white households at $160,000. But anyways, I came away a little less impressed with Mayor Pete. Did you feel the same? I did, I did.
I thought he wasn't on his best. I think he doesn't have as much of a technology background, so it was harder because it was focused on technology. I think he was mixing up some stuff, some concepts. But definitely, I think he felt younger.
I don't It was a great discussion. It was a surprise. It's the wisdom of crowds that isn't fueled by an algorithm that's trying to figure out more engagement. And that is, I've always thought that social media is nicotine, which is bad for you, but not terrible.
It's addictive, but it's addictive like nicotine, but the delivery system, tobacco is what gives you cancer. And I've always thought social media is nicotine in and among itself. It's addictive, but not that bad for you. What the tobacco or the shit that gives you cancer is advertising, specifically the algorithms to encourage more engagement because unfortunately, tribal rage encourages more engagement.
But if you look at, you know what's a great example of what you're talking about in terms of the wisdom of crowds and self-policing of communities where there isn't an underlying rage machine through these algorithms to fuel more Chobani and Nissan ads is Wikipedia. I mean, technically speaking, Wikipedia should have been weaponized. Technically speaking, Wikipedia should be some sort of platform for voter suppression. But the community actually does a pretty good job of pursuing the truth and also recognizing when stuff is starting to breach into propaganda versus truth.
So unfortunately, I think advertising ruins everything. Advertising, that's your business though, isn't it? And now a word from ZipRecruiter. I'm going to do that in a second.
But this is not the same. I'm not weaponizing by reading it. Any other news you think this week? So I have a question for you.
And I wish I had some more leadership around this at the time because I thought about it and I was asked about it. And like everyone else, I felt like I had to have a gag reflex and start vomiting liberal shit. But do you think Senator Al Franken should resign? Oh, essentially, you're talking about this big story in the New Yorker this week by Jane Mayer about looking back at the people.
Yes, I thought it was a really gripping read in terms of how bad a crowd can go. A mob really can go against someone. And by mob, I mean politicians in Washington. I don't mean online because I think that was the very least of it.
It was a really interesting look at the fact that the person who accused him is a very sketchy personality. And unfortunately, he hit at the exact wrong time at this sort of Me Too moment. You know, a lot of people got pulled into that. I think he probably should not have resigned.
I think it should have gone through the process. You know, the Senate, whatever the process is for dealing with these kind of violations. And that would have been the best way and he probably would have stayed in office, would be my guess. You know, a little bit, maybe perhaps we're moving from the judiciary committee or something like that.
But no, the full resignation. And I'm surprised he did so and why, you know, why he did so. Obviously, he regretted it in this piece. But I think seven of the 10 people who called for his resignation said they were wrong, which was interesting.
Well, you know who kind of led the crusade and now she's backtracking from that. Gillibrand. That's right. So she could launch her seven minute run for president, which is about six minutes and 58 seconds into it.
By the way, talk about something. Talk about somebody who brightens up a room by leaving it. Senator Gillibrand is the least compelling senator in the United States Senate. Maybe with exception.
She's probably the least compelling person on the debate stage with the exception of de Blasio. You should run for president so no one ever to the mayor here. Literally, literally. I'm trying to find any individual in the city he oversees who suggests that you should run for president.
I think it was not like your mayor of New York, but there's gonna be debates this week. Are you gonna watch them? I'm supposed to be party. That's not any lamer.
I'm bored just describing it. Professor Giles, that's a debate party. Jesus Christ. That's pretty hard to sell that as compelling.
Oh, my God. What are these debates? Are they tomorrow? I don't know.
I think it's next week. When is it? Like soon. The debates are soon.
Whenever they're happening. I'll be somewhere else. You know, I'm going up to Seattle this afternoon. I'm going to visit Microsoft.
For what? Should I tell the people at Microsoft? For what? What do you have softy for the most valuable company in the world?
I'm gonna go visit the CEO at Satya. That's just people. So, yo, let's listen to you. Listen to the you.
Listen to the coy one. I get invited to important places. I'm not chit-chatting with you. Important people want to talk to me.
Speaking of which, Megan Rapinoe will be my 400th episode of Rico Decode coming up Monday. I know everyone's dying. She's fantastic. She's frigging fantastic.
I don't even, there's, what's the word beyond fantastic? She's smart. She's engaged. She's funny.
She's disarming, as she said she is. And she is correct. She could do whatever she wants, obviously. Obviously, she's been super focused on kicking balls into nets.
But a real, a real leader, I think. I ran into her. I ran into her at the Crosby Hotel. You did?
And I could not. Where were you? I was at the Crosby Hotel. It's kind of my cheers.
It's where I take everyone for coffee. And there's this, there's this incredibly in-shape woman with pink hair. I'm like, my gosh, who is that? I recognize that.
And the guy's like, that's that famous soccer star. I'm like, that's Megan Rapinoe. Why didn't you say hello? Because I was intimidated.
There's no way I'm going up to her. I wasn't gonna go, hey, I know Kara Swisher. Yes, exactly. That's exactly right.
She actually, when she showed up, she said she was super nervous to be interviewed by me. She was really scared. I bet. Oh my gosh.
She said it. She said it. Yeah. Yeah.
Anyway, she's an inspiration. She's incredibly impressive. What do you think she's gonna do next? Did you ask her that?
Yes, I did. It's all in the podcast. And she's not, she doesn't want to go into politics right now. I think that she could easily pivot into politics.
But she's writing a book. It just was announced, Anne Godoff from Penguin, is another well-known gay woman in publishing, is gonna publish this book of hers, which is gonna be about a lot of things. But I think she'll probably do the circuit. We'll see where she goes from there.
She has a clothing business called Reink, which is a sort of gender-neutral clothing. Neutral? Neutral? This is stuff you wear, essentially.
It's your clothes. No, no. My style can be best summarized as, I surrender. Okay, but anyway, she's great.
Or aging skateboarder. I'm going for the aging skateboarder look. I think she's in that zone. And she can mix and match and stuff.
Anyways, it's an interesting thing. She's gonna do whatever she wants. She's fantastic. Anyway, we're gonna take a quick break now, and so we can earn some money, not just Megan Rapinoe can earn some money.
But listen to that episode, Scott. You'll really like a lot. I'm Asad Herdadin, and this is America Actually. We're all talking to each other to see what did we do wrong?
What did we not see? I'm in Washington, D.C. this week to interview Ruben Gallego. He's a Democratic senator from Arizona.
And he's been thinking openly about running for higher office. But he's recently run into some hot water because of his connection to Congressman Eric Swalwell. I have to learn from this, and I will learn from this. But you know, for me, it's not a 2028 question.
It's about what it means to be a better first boss in my office and also a better senator to my constituents. This week on America Actually, we asked Gallego about predatory behavior in Washington, his plans for immigration reform, and more. This week on Net Worth & Chill, I'm breaking down the institution everyone's talking about right now but nobody actually understands, the Federal Reserve. With all the drama happening between Trump and Fed chair Jerome Powell, you're probably seeing headlines and wondering what any of this has to do with your money.
Spoiler alert, it's everything. I'll explain what the Fed actually is, why it exists, and how this one institution controls the interest rates on your mortgage, credit cards, student loans, and more. We're diving into why raising or cutting rates isn't just boring policy talk. It's the difference between affording a house or watching prices spiral out of control.
Plus, I'm breaking down the current controversy over firing Fed board members and why both Republicans and Democrats are freaking out about it because this fight isn't just political theater. It could mean real chaos for your wallet. Listen wherever you get your podcasts or watch on YouTube.com slash YourRichBFF. All right, Scott.
Yep, yep. Wins and fails. Wins and fails. I suspect I know what yours will be to this week.
What? Tell me. I'm curious. I don't think you're gonna guess either of them.
Or maybe you will. Do you want to fail or win? I would like a fail to start with. So my fail is more information regarding the actual settlement behind the $5 billion FTC fine against Facebook.
Granted, they thought, you know, you can see the narrative there. This is the biggest fine ever, beating their chest. But the reality is they've become a co-conspirator in what is supposed to be a countervailing force in private power. And one of the elements of the settlement that no one seems to be reporting on is that part of the agreement is the It's a crazy amount of sale.
It called attention to itself. It makes people scrutinize the business plan, of which you have scrutinized many times. It just gives tech a bad name. And they did it before Groupon.
Remember the Groupon sale? There was one. You know how that ended. Not well.
Not well. So your wins and fails? How much did you take out? Except for that nice apartment you have?
You take out a lot of money? For? You mean when I took out at L2? What do you mean?
Yeah. I did a secondary sale and then we sold the company. Yeah. Yeah.
OK. All right. OK. But I think it's fine to do that on some level, but but in the massive amounts.
I would say I was really enjoyed, as I said, this interview with C. Puffman, and I really enjoyed him talking about the thing I talked about. But he also when I interviewed him, we're gonna play a little clip. I asked him about what he thought about the inquiry, the DOJ inquiry and what he'd like to see in the way of tech regulation.
And here is what he said. What I love to see the government like after our largest competitors. Yeah, that'd be great. That'd be amazing.
OK. That's the best answer I've gotten for a long time. Look, there's it's a conversation. They're going to ask your largest competitors, but go ahead.
And honestly, I hope they do it for the right reasons. OK, I thought that was really smart. I think the right reasons were you don't do it because it's a partisan thing and that you do it carefully and thought out and not just because, you know, you're Ted Cruz and you think there's some conspiracy against conservative voices, but they do it in a smart way in order to promote innovation and do the proper kinds of regulation because companies like Steve is making the really good point. I think it was super smart about it that, you know, here's Facebook not able to handle its content problems and they're quantumly smaller and they're starting to handle it or trying to get a handle on them.
So I think he was trying to go against the argument that these too big to fail idea, which is, I think what big companies are promoting is just so much bullshit. And so I really enjoyed it. I thought that was a real win to think about it that way. And I hope people in in Washington understand how to do it correctly.
I'm not sure they can do it in this mental state, you know, I mean that they're in in Washington with the partisanship. That's a win. OK, a fail this week. There's so many things.
Just these hearings. It just didn't get through what needed to get through, which are the critical things. And we are going to continue to it just feels like this one upmanship with these idiot tweets back and forth. And it gives people a sense that, you know, you're sort of in an endless game of like Star Wars and this movie of Star Wars and Darth Vader keeps winning.
And so I think it takes the energy out of people for fresh new ideas. So I think that's that's the problem. I feel some days, you know, like you said, waking up. I don't want to hear about Dear Leader anymore.
I wanted to do something good. Yeah, so my win is Jane Mayer, this piece in The New Yorker. And I think it hopefully has catalyzed the important conversation we need to have around calibration around this issue. I was on Yahoo Finance last week and they had pictures and it said scandal.
And they put up pictures of all these CEOs who had been forced to resign. And one of them had been guilty of a consensual relationship with a woman who worked at a vendor, which was inappropriate. He didn't disclose it. Conflict of interest.
He was fired. And another CEO on the screen was inviting women into his office and then attacking them. And, you know, there's a difference. There's a difference.
And I feel as if we're finally starting. And also, you know, it's really Democrats who never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity. Who do you think the most effective voice against Donald Trump is right now in the Democratic Party? I don't know.
There's different ones. Different people are at different times. Who's the most effective? Nobody.
Nobody. I think Al Franken would be the most effective voice against Donald Trump right now. And what have we done? We had a guy who I don't know what he did, if he played grab ass, if he didn't, if he should be stripped at his committee or not.
Clearly, there was some inappropriate behavior. But the most effective voice against the guy who's been accused 21 separate times, 21 separate times. We have taken him out of circulation. And it's just what on earth are we Democrats thinking, removing Al Franken?
What on earth were we thinking? I just it's a talk about idiocy. Talk about shooting yourself in the foot and then sticking your gun in the mouth. Anyways, my win is Jane Mayer and her article in The New Yorker.
I thought it was a really thoughtful piece. Yeah, I was talking to the editor of Recode this week. Going back to stories is always like, did it really happen that way? And really doing the smart later take is something journalists don't do enough.
But I thought that was perfect. And Jane has done a lot of really amazing reporting on Me Too also. By the way, FYI, I know it's in New Yorker around the very serious behaviors by Harvey Weinstein and everybody else. Ronan Farrow did a whole bunch of that.
So anyway, so I agree with you. That was a great piece. Now, prediction, Scott, you sort of made one, but you were right twice. You were right twice.
Go on. Go on. I'm sorry. Say more.
First of all, Lion King made almost $600 million worldwide so far, even though it looks pretty creepy. Disney is review proof, as you said. So that is correct. What's the other one?
The other one was the gangster prediction. Let's pause for a moment. What did the big dog with the big dog is more thoughtful. The big dog just doesn't jump on the counter and eat that cupcake.
He thinks you're geopolitical, Scott. That's right. Geopolitical. Can we roll tape?
Let's go. It's difficult to it could be anything. It could be Russia deciding to, like, quote, unquote, a soft invasion of one of their neighbors. It could be another missile being launched by North Korea.
Another test. It could be the Iranians spinning up their uranium again. I mean, all sorts of stuff. I'm pretty sure it's not going to be Canada.
I'm pretty sure it's not going to be Canada. Justin Trudeau is not doing so well, but he might need something. Yeah, guys. That guy.
I don't know. That guy's great. Yeah. Anyway, he might need to do something.
Yeah. Might need to make some. Take over Minnesota. That's it.
Minneapolis is ours. Tomorrow belongs to me. Oh, good God. That's right.
So North Korea. Throw a Nazi. Justin Trudeau in Minnesota in one statement. Canadians are coming.
Tom Mendes is coming to the Barclay Center and he has me and my eight year old under a trance. That's a soft invasion. That's Putin coming to the Ukraine. Shawn Mendes.
There's no Canadian troops in Minnesota right now, but you know, bingo on this. Bingo. One of the predictions we said was that North Korea could launch missiles. Two missiles launched.
It's only going to get worse. And who was in Korea at the South Korea at the time? I don't know. The national security advisor, John Bolton.
My gosh, who has been saying don't cooperate. Talk about waving the middle finger in the face of the U.S. Oh my gosh. Yeah.
So anyways, people sense weakness and more to come. But my prediction was for this week. Prediction was by the end of 2019, we're going to see a spin, a large spin of a company that will be one of the 20th, not one of the 10 most valuable companies in the world. You're not going to be more specific because that's like a real wide one.
That's like saying someday you probably will have a heart attack or something like that. Give me a larger. Give me a specific one. I say it would be YouTube.
What do you say? That hurts my feelings. That hurts my feelings. I want a name.
I want a name. AWS. Regardless of what your your pal says. By the way, he has no influence.
Andy Jassy. Regardless of what Andy Jassy says, I think AWS is going to be spun. All right. I'm going to go with YouTube.
All right. So let's see what happens. There'll probably be something on Facebook. We'll see.
No, he's integrating the companies together so you can't pull them apart. He's like stitching them together with really. Yeah, they're encrypting it. And I think he's a genuinely a sociopath and doesn't think he thinks he's immune from any sort of scrutiny.
I don't think he's worried at all. Well, he did give a speech saying now, now we are accountable. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.
That showed him that showed him seven weeks of cash flow. Oh, my gosh. He must be reeling. Do you realize the stock went up $8 billion in value the day that time was announced?
The empire strikes back. That's it. I'm going to that's it. I'm using Instagram for four hours, not five today.
I've had it. I've had it. I put a picture. I put a Megan Rapinoe picture on Instagram.
I haven't been on there for six, eight months. And I did really just hinted. I'm going to listen to that podcast. I'm going to listen.
It's money. You'll love it