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New “American Dream?”, Silver & Somalis crash Coffee w/ Captain #1,062
Recorded: Dec. 29, 2025 Duration: 2:12:21Space Recording
Short Summary
In a lively discussion, participants explored the latest trends in the crypto space, including token launches, partnerships, and the integration of NFTs with social media. The conversation also touched on the importance of community engagement and the evolving landscape of financial advice in the age of cryptocurrency.
Full Transcription
I don't even need to be the professional.
Last fight on me, brah, brah, brah.
Started off with a bitch.
Now I got coin.
I see where y'all going.
In poppin' web one.
Hella hoax on web two.
I was living a dream. Now I'm on web three. and it is what it seems, top in the pyramid schemes, I'm tellin' ya, I'll sell you a percentage, y'all ne. I'm riding in the 1920s, Model T Ford.
Car, era, Lord.
Call me Levi, playing on the keys, boy.
And I'm about to put my gloves on.
If I said it, then I meant that.
Yeah, I like that one.
I'm about to get that.
Crash that whip for the drumsticks, whiplash.
I'm about to get them all.
Are you with that?
In a white boat, surrounded by blue.
I want one, but I got a cop too.
I want to fly high in the sky. Arms out wide, trying to soar. I want one one but I got a cop too I wanna fly high in the sky, arms out wide tryna soar
I burn one but I got a cop too, I wanna fly high
This Bobby, cracking the pavement, Whitney Bobby
Ima, Saki, Bomb, Hiroshima, Nagasaki
Bruce Wayne been a dog, and I keep it 101
Cause I'm feeling kinda spotty, sippin' on some rock
And I'm sippin' on octane, the only thing around my neck
Is the blockchain, bitch
Now I got coin, I'm telling you, I'll
sell you a percentage on Nebula, shout out to Viz, yo, set it up.
NFT, Twitter, blockchain, TM with the ghost and we ballin' like the brown jay. Crypto, crypto, we can make a trade, get the memo. Outro Music We rockin' Ethereum in her teeth I just went and copped me a half bass Man, I gotta shout out the boys
Started off with a bitch
Now I got coin
I see where y'all goin'
Been poppin' since web one
Hella hoops on web two
I was livin' the dream
Now I'm on web three
And it is with the seams
Toppin' the pyramid schemes
I'm tellin' ya
I sell you a percentage on Nebula
Shout out to Vince, yo, set it up
Freakin' them all to choose one.
But they got knowledge to move, son.
I'm shocking in shades with my brother in suits.
Yeah, them blues is coming.
Even though it's hard to pick.
Eeny, mighty, moe.
Soda on the mix.
No biting lips.
It's time to go.
Index number one.
No thumbs up.
You got to scroll.
Looking at the ghosts in studio.
It's time to go.
Had a helmet on by myself until I met a mask that wanted to have a face off.
Had to bring my chainsaw.
Full ticket gas in the'm driving my brakes off.
I'm a one but a different kind of steak sauce.
Welcome to Coffee with Captain, powered by ApeCoin, where we dive into all things crypto,
NFTs, web free and cutting edge technology.
Remember, nothing here is financial advice.
Early stage.
So grab your coffee and join cap and see for today's conversation
welcome to the future
welcome to coffee captain gmgm thanks so much for joining us every done so do his favor drop some
gm in the chat down below then head up top smash that like repost the bookmark on the space greatly
appreciate it warms up the algo and does us a real solid quick mic check if i could i got it like
last second there of the intro song it cut out on me for like three seconds i think everything is fine but uh
you still check outputs if you once the lag gets through to the audience if you give me a thumbs
up or a hundred just let me know you can hear everything okay on spaces it would be great
greatly appreciated and then i see rdl over the chat. Looks like we're good to go on audio spaces.
YouTube, Abstract, if you could let me know, we are good.
RDL says yes, thumbs up.
And just waiting on Teacher Katie or Booching there over in Abstract to let us know the same.
But I think if we're live in YouTube, we should be live on Abstract as well.
So we will get rolling here.
Hope everyone had an awesome holiday weekend.
Enjoyed your Christmas.
We were live audio only on Thursday and Friday.
If you missed us, back to our regularly scheduled program today.
We'll be doing a full week, 8 a.m.
We may go, we'll see how the week plays out.
We may go a little bit lighter on the 1st, just depending on what the news looks like,
what the audience looks like, with it being, I suspect many of you, myself included,
will be up a little later on New Year's Eve,
watching the Buckeyes win.
Certainly, I'm sure that's at the top of everyone's mind,
speaking of football, not Buckeye-related.
But we got a quick quote open.
I got like 60 seconds left to quote open.
So I got to hit on the man, the myth, the legend.
I mean, I can't even say his nickname on the show,
but Mr. The one and only Mr. Brock Purdy gave me hope, gave me hope.
I thought it was pretty much drawing dead in my dynasty league,
my 20 year plus dynasty league defending champs there.
It's just a super competitive league. It was 16 teams.
We whittled down to 14 but it is
like extremely deep rosters taxi squad salaries like it's it's super nerd fantasy football and um
one last year would be my first back-to-back ever championship i'm in the finals this year
started off with a pretty bad showing on uh thursday night had aman raw and justin jefferson which in
a 14 team dynasty league it's it's two two stud wide receivers they combined for like 22 points
and um playing against puka and olave and olave by the way is is beating me or is the biggest
score i'm going up against anyways going into last night um got a pretty good trio of qbs golf purdy and stafford and i've been
streaming them all year pretty well i didn't hit it perfect but i got most of stafford's blow up
weeks i've got purdy last week i went purdy this week because it was i couldn't be posting purdy
for the last couple weeks and not not ride him in the finals and it was birthday he had turned
turned 26th over the past week so birthday purdy in the finals also
playing against puka so i didn't want to cancel out stafford with a there's just no scenario where
stafford goes off and puka doesn't also go off so uh long story short i fell asleep last night
woke up to a glorious replay of purdy just going off once again 24 for 33 303 yards three passing touchdowns two more rushing touchdowns
the man is elite i've been saying it and he continues to prove me right um maybe the best
run ever for a fantasy football playoffs the last three weeks have just been absolutely incredible
10 touchdowns the last two weeks combined here's where we sit going into tonight if you're i know
everyone is also just like sitting on the edge of your seats can't wait to see how this turns out we've got 1400 and uh 14 points so it's it's
think of this league the scoring is like a 10x so it's like they quote like 141 points pretty good
week um barkley didn't do much jjf and amon rod didn't do much mcbride did his normal mcbride
output as the best tight end in the league i I had Kittle going into last night and fortunately picked up Tongis earlier in the day to just in case Kittle sat, Kittle did sit.
Tongis responded, pretty solid performance from any tight end, let alone a backup.
And this is a flex league, so I could have went two running backs or three wide receivers,
but decided to sit Mason, Wilson, wasn't going to play Cooper Cup,
Matchy, Lameda also was out last night for being sick.
But Purdy and his 500-point or equivalent of like a 52-point for regular fantasy scoring
brought me back, gave me hope.
We're out leading.
This is the team I'm playing in the finals
so called 141 to 133 up about nine eight points uh heading into tonight i do have mevis
the harrison mevis the rams kicker the only player left on my opponent who i've got a slight lead on
is puka nakua so a sweat nonetheless um i'm a dog still, but I assumed I'd be going down tonight.
I was going to need the kicker to outscore Puka.
The fact that I have a slight lead, and because the 49ers win,
the Rams are no longer playing for anything.
Like, in last week, in the fourth quarter, when they were leading that game,
they were playing for a one seed in the division and a one seed.
Now the one seed, regardless of the Rams outcome tonight,
it's coming down to the 49ers Seahawks game this coming Saturday.
So Rams playing, I guess they might be playing for a seed,
but, and Pook is also playing for the receiving title.
So I'm still a dog, but there's hope.
It makes tonight's sweat a fun one.
And thank you, Mr. Brock Purdy.
That's it.
That's all I've got for quote open material today.
Poppy, I saw you jumped up,
but it's giving me the X glitch.
Looks like you're on stage,
but doesn't look like you're on stage.
And that doesn't mean anything the most to you,
but GM, if you can hear me.
I don't think so.
Maybe take a quick lap if you can hear.
It shows you the speaker.
Now you're back at the listener.
That's what I figured.
But again, in all seriousness, I hope everyone had an awesome holiday weekend i ate way too much and had another breakfast this morning i think i'm gonna have to fade breakfast
the rest of the week i need to get this is my challenge is i've been getting fed these these
delicious breakfasts as of late and um i'm normally a faster normally i don't eat lunch until like
one or two o'clock.
I don't eat dinner.
And then I won't eat from, we'll say if a late dinner,
even it'd be like seven o'clock at night.
I won't eat again until like one, two the next day
in the afternoon.
And now that I'm on this breakfast kick,
I am just feeling all kinds of full, like 24.
I prefer the leaner feeling.
There we go.
I think I got it working now.
Looks like X is back.
But if you haven't done so again,
give us a quick like,
repost a bookmark on the space.
Greatly appreciate it.
Warms up the algo.
It does us a great solid.
We are live over on Abstract
as well as YouTube.
All those are pinned up top.
And as always,
never do financial advice in the show.
Crypto is risky.
Never do financial advice.
Just for some fun,
some information,
maybe a little bit of education
along the way.
Some fantasy advice.
I hope we started Brock Purdy and fade Pukuduku tonight.
We're rooting for punts and field goals, and that will be it.
Before we get into news of the day, trending topics, and we have a lot.
What a weekend.
We'll say crypto adjacent.
Financial markets for sure, and interesting stuff nonetheless. But before we get into all that,
let me first give some love to the art, courtesy of the one and only Imlo, the holiday badge. You've
got a couple more days to mint this thing. If we do any giveaways, we're probably going to do it
on the 31st. So maybe some foreshadowing there.
Do it that what you will. No, any expectations are good. Just go with this to show you've been here throughout the holiday week when everyone else checking out, taking time off, show that you,
even if you took a day or two off, show that you were at least riding with us through the holidays.
You can head to op.xyz slash claim. That's op.xyz slash claim and mint their code is cwc holiday i'll also drop it in
the chat here in one second and uh shout out to everyone who's been in i think we're approaching
100 mints which through the holiday season not bad op.xyz slash claim and code CWCHOLIDAY or direct link below should also work.
We'll get that pinned up top here in about 10 seconds.
Go get that before you get on with your day.
I mean, we'd love for you to hang out the whole show with us.
Again, a big, big news.
I think today is going to be interesting.
I think today is going to be, or not.
Trying to think the order of operations to go with this,
these headlines this morning.
You get a little bit of foreshadowing in the pin post up top,
one in from the holiday code. Allegedly a bank collapse last night. It's still rumored and it
doesn't look like it is confirmed per the AI overlords and them doing some additional research.
But I'm just going to start with this one because it is just a rumor and not really much else to say on it other than there's a rumor.
So let me pull up the actual post and we will get into the bank, the alleged bank collapse.
Silver futures surge to a record $83 and then plunge 10% in minutes.
Doesn't, that's odd.
Interesting.
And then we had around that same time, David Parker puts out a post that says,
a bank just went under.
As this story is written, it's 11.01 a.m. Eastern time.
So this is last night and yeah, December 20th.
So last night, 11 a.m. Eastern yesterday.
I thought I first read this as a I first read this post as it was 11 p.m. last night. It was actually 11
a.m. yesterday when this was reported. It says, a systematically important bank, a major player
in silver futures, failed to pay its margin call by 2 a.m. and was liquidated by the futures
exchange at 2.47 a.m. U.S. time. The reports are concealing the name of the bank,
but it's confirmed that overnight the Federal Reserve was forced to pump another
$34 billion into the banking system through its emergency overnight repo facility. This $34 billion
on top of the $17 billion, which had to be pumped in two days ago on Friday morning,
the bank involved is described as one of the largest players in the precious metals
derivatives market, blew past every risk limit,
breached every covenant, and exhausted every line of credit. Again, this is a rumor.
I'm not trying to incite any of your run on banks this morning, nor do I have that power anyways.
I think it's interesting that this comes out with the dramatic 10% drop in silvers in minutes, silver are futures in minutes. And we'll be interesting to
see what comes to this today. Either the rumors will be dispelled or things could get really
interesting this week. So that was kind of like the first, when I wasn't the first, that was a
piece of news. And again, thinking order operations here
because kind of two ways we can approach this
the rest of the conversation.
I'll show you the silver chart if you missed it.
It was also interesting to say the least.
Looking for the chart.
Yeah, here we go.
Wild looks like a meme chart, or I guess as of late, a Bitcoin or ETH chart on Monday morning at 9.30 a.m.
today. Breaking silver extends losses to drop below $74 an ounce, now down 12% from its high
seen just 12 hours ago. The chart is one for the history books. So you saw the massive run-up,
even got a God candle followed by this immediate death candle or another pump up, another sell-off we're down to again 75, $74 an ounce down from it whipped up to $84 an ounce,
which if we're talking 74 cents to 84 cents on a meme coin and a big deal,
it's like another day in the office. We're talking silver.
Yeah.
That just you combine this with the potential bank going under,
shaping up to be an interesting, interesting streets in the market to further compound things.
And then we're getting a little hot and heavy here off the bat.
What do you mean the bank is out of silver? Is it Bill's house or Fred's house? Yeah, right.
What do you mean the bank is out of silver?
Is it Bill's house or Fred's house?
Yeah, right.
Bank not out of silver, but they were playing the futures game apparently and got margin called.
So here is.
If you were on X this week and you saw it, if you haven't been on X, I'll show you here in a second.
One of the most viral posts of all time on this app.
Last I looked, I think it was over 110 million views.
Expose interview from Nick Shirley,
who has since this viral post created a account on Zora
or on base and one or two or three meme coins over there.
I think raked in about 40K in royalties,
which based on this 100 million plus post, you might get that in just Elon bucks alone.
This is when I say order of operations and where I don't know exactly which direction to go next in terms of the order of operations, because I actually think both are they're not related, but I think they are related.
And that's that's going to be my.
I guess alpha on the show,
I guess take on the show.
Before I get into the Nick Shirley piece where he exposed over $100 million
in Somalian daycare fraud in Minnesota.
Yes, you heard that right.
Over $100 million in Somalian daycare fraud in Minnesota.
It's awful. And it's,
it's just the tip of the iceberg. I'm near certain of it. I've already had, I mean,
you've also seen on the timeline from the state of Washington to over 500 Somalian daycares with no addresses, like just crazy stuff. You're also talking about an industry that's supposedly or supposed to be pretty regulated.
A lot of reporting, a lot of auditing, and it just doesn't happen by accident.
This is not just people making mistakes or missing.
It is hard for me to believe this is not without actual fraud at a government level at some spot. I'm not saying
at what level, I don't know, but we've already seen it following the report from the Minnesota
fraud. We've seen reports from Washington state, as I mentioned, 539 Somali language child daycares.
Maybe some of them are legitimate. Most of them that they don't even have a street address or a
working telephone number, probably not a legitimate daycare. Same thing in Columbus.
I have friends in Columbus, Ohio. There's been rumors of Somalian fraud and stuff going on in
Columbus, Ohio for quite some time as well. Seemingly now it's probably not just rumors.
And this is not, I have nothing against Som million people. It's just stating factual information that's come out over this weekend and maybe is disgusting to me, my personal viewpoint on this.
This isn't a right or left thing.
This isn't a Republican or Democrat thing.
This is a rampant, fraudulent ring that likely things like this are occurring on both sides.
I'm not saying the politicians are the ones committing the fraud
in some cases they probably are it's going on on there's no consequences thus far now there has
another another fraud case in minnesota also is um for a food um not feeding america that's that's
actually i think a good one hopefully. Another food drive organization has been,
the Fed's investigating and like 50-some arrests and millions.
It's like the trust, speaking for myself,
the trust in the U.S. systems, the governments,
the organizations, the entities that oversee this stuff has eroded to near zero.
It's really, really bad. And to me, what's more dammy, what makes me not lose hope, but again,
just have really disgust is the word I come to is you have this expose that's hard to dispute at
this point. And we're not seeing any of the, I haven't seen yet,
any of the mainstream media run with this.
And this is clearly captured attention.
Like I said, it's one of the most viral posts ever
on this app.
I will pin it up top in a second.
It's long, it's like 42 minutes.
So don't go run away and watch it now. But as of this, as of right now, 110 million views and
the TLDR, here's the full 42 minutes of his crew exposing Minnesota fraud. This might be one of
his most important work yet. We uncovered over 110 million in one day. Like it shared around
like wildfire. It's time to hold these corrupt politicians and fraudsters accountable.
We all work way too hard and pay too much in taxes for this to be happening.
The fraud must be stopped.
The fraud must be stopped.
I agree.
It is disgusting.
And it's not just this.
At the same, like simultaneously, there was a report in California that I believe the DA, let me, let me, I don't want to misquote here. Let me,
let me get the correct numbers. Cause this was the, I believe that the California
district attorney talked about how many billions of dollars that have been lost in taxpayer dollars.
Like it's just, it's unacceptable.
States, federal governments, municipalities,
they should not be losing millions, let alone billions,
let alone tens of or hundreds of billions of dollars.
If they were any private entity, they're fired and
probably getting criminal charges thrown at them. Someone needs to be held accountable for this
stuff. And until that happens, I've got real concern, genuine concern for our country. It's
an awesome country.
There's a lot of great things here.
This just makes no sense to me that this stuff continues to go on.
You hear about it time and time again, and seemingly no one gets in trouble, not even
hand slapped.
Cap, am I up here?
Yeah, we got you now.
Give me a second.
I'll finish this thought and land the plane.
Yeah, I know.
You're good.
You're good.
I just want to make sure I was up here.
You're good.
It's just, it disgusts me like it's just this is how i genuinely
feel we're gonna we're gonna tie this all to crypto markets and longing degeneracy and
why i think part of this that we're seeing at a government level at all levels, not, I shouldn't say all at a lot of levels. It's like, I I've, I'm in my
mid forties. I've not done, I've got things I need to accomplish in life, but I've done. Okay. I I've
got a, a, by most traditional standards, a successful life. I'm happy. I'm excited about
my future. I'm not worried about AI taking my job. I am very empathetic to other people. I mean,
even myself, my age, people, my generation, younger generations who are seemingly quickly
losing hope with the quote unquote American dream. And I'm not saying it's because of daycare fraud. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying it's the information, the evidence that has been provided by a 23 year old kid on YouTube
is extremely damning. And as more information comes out, there, there was articles on this
Somalian daycare fraud as far back as 2018, alluding that it had been going on for five years then.
And just no one does anything about it.
No one gets in trouble.
Yet if I send Poppy a $600 Venmo payment
and he doesn't claim his own on his taxes,
we're probably both getting thrown in a cage
or at least having to get an audit.
It's crazy.
And I'm not saying don't pay your taxes,
I'm not saying don't pay your taxes, pay your taxes, do things by the book. It's crazy that
pay your taxes, do things by the book.
the amount of fraud, crime, again, on both sides, one side is going to talk about Trump and his
family using crypto to grift or extract from the people. The other side is going to talk about
Somalian daycares extracting from the people. It's both sides are bad. And when I see no one getting in trouble for
this stuff, it's it's cause for concern. Like what, what are we doing when it's this obvious
that a 23 year old with a camera can expose this stuff? Are well, like, I feel like i'm taking crazy pills like who's protecting the people who's
it's wild to me to think that under the the ginsler regime the gary ginsler regime
and the war on crypto actually felt like we might have been like i didn't like it i didn't like the
idea that i might be viewed as like in a crime organization because I host a crypto podcast.
I might have to leave the country because the politicians are coming to war on me and us.
But at the same time, at least they were seemingly attempting to stop some of the grift, attempting to stop some of the exploits and straight up crime.
Like this stuff is so damning, so obvious. I have some attorney
friends, I mean, group chat, a lot of them are in Ohio. They just, after this stuff came out
of the weekend, they started on some, some quick searches that you find the exact same thing in
Columbus, Ohio, Somalian daycare centers, no working phone numbers. You go to it. It's like a,
a dive bar in a strip plaza somewhere.
There's no kids. Like, it's just like, this stuff is rampant. And I truly believe it's,
we've just begun to see the beginning. I told one of my friends, like you, you need to go,
you got some of the playbook, make sure they just gave it to you. Go hop in your car, drive around
today and go visit every, every daycare in the city within, you know, around two 70 and just
document what you find.
I mean, I'm sure there are some legitimate. And for those I feel, because like I said,
it is a industry that's full of regulations, full of audits, especially when you're getting
government aid, you're supposed to jump through a lot of hoops. In fact, I've seen a few long
form articles on this app to where people gave up on starting a daycare because it was so regulated.
And yet they're like, I feel like an idiot if i just was
left curving this and an iq of 67 i just would have did it and not worried about the regulations
and i'd be doing not not that they'd be committing fraud but they had started the business they
wanted to start very disappointing and without going off on the rant about Somalian daycares.
More is going to come out on that.
That's not over.
I don't know if the American dream is dead.
It seems to be dying.
And I think this is the perfect segue into
where the new American dream,
and it's not a great one,
but title together,
we are at the heart of it. I need a good title.
I meant to change something very click beating from the jump,
but I failed to do so. So I will, I'm going to,
I'm going to talk about one more thing. I said,
I'd post that Nick Shirley post. I will pin that up top. And then, um,
there's some Shirley joke to be made here.
I dropped the ball with having a, a very much a dad joke.
I should have,
I should have prepped and asked chat for help on.
Surely this isn't,
this can't be true.
Can it?
that's not good.
It's not what I was thinking,
not what I was looking for,
but it's all I had in my,
my brain.
That's not large enough to figure out how to commit a daycare fraud,
at a large level and not get caught.
a kid,
it's a joke.
It's a bit.
so I pinned that up top.
The other article in like, in all seriousness, this is a good one that is good for, I think good for all times. It's especially relevant now and I will tie it all together.
Oh, by the way, the Lur learning center, here's another one I'll
pin up top. It just expanded on the fraud to make you more disgusted for those of you that went
through the pandemic and did things by the book, whether you took a PPP loan and paid it back,
or whether you chose, you didn't need a PPP loan, so you just didn't take one
because you didn't need it and you let others who thought did need it. The Somalia Learning Center, yes, it was a learning center that didn't even spell learning correctly.
They took out a $108,000, 673, $108,000 PPP loan in 2020 and a $106,000 loan in April of 21, both of which were fully forgiven. So on top of the, you know, getting funded for a non
functioning daycare, they took out about a quarter million dollars in PPP loans.
In Minnesota alone, there is 42,000 NGOs that handed out $120 billion per year. I'm sure some
of that's legitimate. I'd hate to see good programs get
wiped out. I'm at a point and I'm not normally one that would say you need to wipe everything
out and start from the ground up. It's getting to the point, like it's so rampant. I don't know
the path forward other than blow it all up. Stop, stop funding these, these daycares until you figure out which one's legit. They're laughing
at us. There's articles from 2018 that they said it's like a money glitch. Somalians are saying
this is like the free money glitch is you open a daycare. The post I really want to talk about
though is, and how I think this all ties together. It's not just because of this. Let
me, let me, let me be very clear with that. This is not the only reason while the American dream
might be dying or the old version of the American dream. You know, you go to school, you work hard,
you get good grades, you get a degree, you get a job, you work for a company for 20, 30 years,
you buy your home and appreciates andates and you can retire happy and healthy.
That dream is, I'm not saying it's dead, much more challenging than it once was.
And I think a combination of factors, one, be it government bloat, rampant fraud, and funding NGOs seemingly without any sort of checks and balances on many cases
is leading many to feel they can't make it in the traditional sense of the American dream.
They're looking for alternatives. And this article is a really good read. It's long form.
So don't read it now. I will do my best to try to summarize it here. But again,
if you were on X over the past couple of days, you probably saw it.
Ciceless? Ciceless? And I want to just quick TLDR this, Poppy, and then I'll let you get in here and take whichever direction you'd like.
Ciceless had this to say. Again, I'm not going to read the whole article, but for those of you on Spaces, I did put it up top, go bookmark it, go reference back to it later. The quick TLDR, he calls it the prison of financial mediocrity.
It says, I'm not a stock picker. I worship at the altar of a large breadth of low confidence.
And then in parentheses has 53 equal to or less than 53% win rate bets. He's playing on the margin. He's honey, honey,
edge, honey, V and, and volume game where he knows if he wins 53% of the time, it's going to,
it's going to print, um, goes on to say, but I'm absolutely betting on the house that long
degeneracy is the prevalent socioeconomic theme of the coming century.
It's why people above the age of 40 will recommend you get better at your job and increase your salary,
whilst everyone else seem to be ignoring exactly that and desperately clawing at something,
anything that can give them a shot at outrageous success.
The easiest thing to sell to a crowd like this is quote unquote hope.
And when you understand this, you understand the rise of casinos in all forms, DEXs, prediction markets, et cetera, and the rise of trading gurus,
business gurus, courses, and of course, sub stacks. The setup. One doesn't need to be locked
up to be imprisoned. There is a generation walking around with invisible bars. They know that life
exists, the house, the stability, the reward for showing up and doing the right thing for 30 years.
They know people have it.
They just can't imagine how to get there.
Not that it's hard.
They literally can't construct a realistic path from where they are to where they're supposed to end up.
Their traditional path to wealth accumulation is closed.
Not difficult, closed.
Where boomers hold 50% of the national wealth while comprising 20% of the population, and millennials hold 10%
despite being the same share, the gain reveals itself to be fundamentally broken. The latter
got pulled up, and it's not like the boomers wanted to do this. Asset price inflation just
happened to benefit those who already owned assets. But the effect is the same, the collapse
of the traditional bargain. The implicit deal used to be simple, show up, work hard, stay loyal,
you'll be rewarded, companies offer pension. Tenure meant something.
Your house appreciated why you slept. The system worked if you trusted it. That deal is dead.
Staying in a company for 20 years is now a career liability, not an asset. Wages grow 8% while housing costs doubled and debt payments for young people increased 33%.
The math doesn't support patience anymore.
Looking at the bigger picture, I used to think it was bad, but with the advent of AI and the economic impact they're going to have, even with current technologies, I think it's only going to get significantly worse.
When the system stops rewarding patience, people stop being patient.
Call it rational adaption. He goes on to talk about the push and pull and how modern society, you know, he talks
about Maslow's hierarchy.
Food is cheap.
Basic shelter exists.
Safety, healthcare, baseline employment.
Not guaranteed, but accessible enough that young people aren't fighting for survival.
So now that they're not fighting for survival, they instead are going to the casinos.
Baseline, I know I can survive.
My food and housing is going to be covered.
I may as well.
I've been saying it for a while.
If we get a STEMI check in 2026, I think a lot of those STEMI checks are going straight
in the casino because the people getting them, most, most, not all, most are not worried
about food and basic shelter.
They already have it.
And two grand is not going to help them change their lives if they just put it into food and basic shelter.
But if they put it into one of the casinos and they catch lightning in a bottle, now all of a sudden they can finally achieve what used to be the American dream.
I'm going to take a beat there.
There's more on this.
I've got more thoughts.
Sorry for the deep and heavy conversation. I just, I haven't felt exactly like this. I'm not like a, I'm not a big government fan. I'm not a government
fan. I don't, I'm not a fan of either party. I did not vote in the last presidential election.
I thought both candidates were not great. And it's disappointing that those were our best
two options or the two options presented to us.
So I consider myself apolitical and I do my best not to let things outside of my control bother me.
As someone who has children, it's concerning.
And for whatever reason, this Somalian daycare expose in Minnesota, it really did a number on me and my feelings and on the state
of our, really our country, apologize to those who aren't in the U S primarily because as I said,
it's been suspected for a while in some cities and you've seen grumblings of it. You now articles
will prop it up that were written in 2018 and no one did anything. It's disgusting that it's just been, people are at best turning a blind eye to the fraud and corruption. At worst, they're not only enabling it, but participating in it.
That said, Poppy, go and get in here. Take it with your name, direct you. Sorry for the long one, I bought along this morning, but felt the need to get that off my chest.
GM, GM.
Yeah, this Somalian fraud thing is all over the timeline.
Actually, as you were talking,
I just went to the timeline and everything is right there.
Front and center.
It looks like it is probably worse outside of Minnesota, actually.
Um, like there's a post here that there's over 539 registered, uh, daycares in Washington state.
Most of them don't even have addresses. Um, and then there's other comments of people saying
they're in Ohio and here and there. So yeah, it's, it's, uh, it's interesting, but it is, it is kind of a dual side issue
because look, at the end of the day, the Pentagon has failed their financial audits
for like the last 10 years, um, where they can't even account for trillions of dollars each year.
I think I was reading in like 2023, they couldn't account for half of 3.8 trillion.
And this has been an ongoing thing in Congress put in place, you know, mandates for them to be financially audited every year.
And they have failed
since like 2016 or something crazy. Uh, and then, then you can just look at,
at, uh, political officials like Nancy Pelosi, who, but it's on both sides again, where,
I mean, their net worths, you know, literally skyrocket and they're making, you know, a hundred K a year,
150 K a year. Um, but their net worths go to, you know, 20, 30, a hundred mil. Um, so it's,
it's pretty widespread. And, uh, you know, people are like, Oh, it's crime season in crypto. It's been crime season elsewhere. And this is what Elon, I think, was trying to do with Doge.
I think I sent something to you specifically, Kat, where Elon was saying the biggest fraud loophole in the United States is non-government funding fraud.
So people taking advantage of these huge allocations, grants,
you know, pockets of money that maybe nobody is overlooking.
Very interesting.
I also, I might have sent you cap simultaneously.
As you're talking, there's a post pop-up.
That's a bit of a tinfoil hat conspiracy
about JP Morgan traditionally being short, silver,
and shifting to a very large, long position towards, I guess, in recent time frame.
I saw something that said December 27th, but I'm assuming, you know, let's say in the last few months,
they shifted to a very large long position but have apparently been pretty short silver
traditionally now again i don't know how true that is but it's it's a post that's going viral
and doesn't really have uh too much pushback so i try to i try to look at that right because some
of this stuff on x people posts you can look in the comments and see it being debunked or see the
community notes this one didn't have too much of that um though there were some questions raised so
it's uh the silver thing is interesting but i do agree with you that the fraud bubble is is big
it's attached to politics there's a lot of conspiracies about that woman who was killed. She voted against it
in Minnesota. And then, you know, she was killed. There's just a ton of rabbit holing. And I know
that's not the full direction I want to go this morning either, but it is interesting, you know,
how top down this stuff probably is.
Yeah, it's, again, it's disgusting.
A few people chiming in on the chat that are familiar with the daycare industry.
It's supposed to be very regulated, especially if you're getting any sort of funding like this.
There are, maybe not every state, most there are check and balances that are supposed to prevent this stuff from happening.
Back to the article, it follows up, why grind for 20 years toward a promotion that might not exist in 10 years?
Maslow Trap, when you can survive but can't get anywhere, something breaks.
You're not desperate enough to accept a deal, but you're blocked from deals that actually matter. The cognitive bandwidth that would have gone to survival instead goes to frustration and searching, looking for any path that might
lead somewhere. Career progression isn't just income, it's purpose, identity, the feeling that
your work matters. Financial security isn't just money, It's the freedom to take risk, travel, build, create. When these paths close and the timeline to achieve them shrinks, the pressure has to go
somewhere. These prisoners need a way out. And by God, they need a way out now comes in agency in
the casino. I first saw it in the L1 crypto and dismissed it as a fad. Then I saw it in NFTs.
And then again, and again, an entire shit show betweenfts and perp dexes and meme coins and now the obvious obviously the prediction market super cycle the same young
people who can't imagine grinding at one company will absolutely grind for months learning crypto
trading they will pour hours into understanding prediction markets to understand the very economy
they believe wholeheartedly to be rigged the same person will dismiss traditional investing as an
inside game will bet their rent money on a meme coin. Why? Because the casino is the only place they feel agency,
the only place where their decisions might actually unlock the next tier on a timeline
that matters. Traditional career path, your manager got promoted for being there first,
not for being good. And your whole department might get automated anyway. Stock market,
sure, you can earn 10% annually and afford a house in 47 years, assuming your job still exists.
The crypto, prediction market, sports betting, the research actually matters here.
Conviction pays. Even an imagined edge like yours, not something you're waiting for someone to grant
you, you're placing bets where your judgment directly determines your results. The house
edge exists. Most people lose. I think most people understand this, but they're playing,
not waiting for a future that might never arrive. The people preaching for these people to stop
gambling have failed to understand the predicament of the prisoners and always assumed a kind of
intellectual superiority that you have a negative edge. My position is that I think
gamblers absolutely understand that. The ones who say gambling is bad, you should stop are almost
always the ones speaking from privileged position of being in financial upper class. They see a way
out, they see a path. So they espouse the goodness and kindness of God on staying on the path.
For many in prison, gambling is their salvation, and you are literally telling
them to accept a life of eternal damnation. This is why they rebel against you. This is why your
well-intentioned advice falls on deaf ears. I know some of you may be thinking some of this
is hyperbole, but I think it's spot on, and it's only going to get more pronounced. He goes on to
say, prediction markets, Polymarket and Calci did 10 billion in volume in November alone. Combined annual volume is
approaching 40 billion. In 2020, it was essentially zero. The growth rate is vertical.
Sports betting, legal sports betting went from 248 million in 2017 to 13.7 billion last year.
It's going to be much higher this year. If I were to guess
Gen Z and millennials account for 76% of betting activity. Think about that. Gen Z's and millennials,
which you earlier said only possess 10% of the wealth as the older boomers. It's not the boomers
hitting the casinos and gambling their disposable income. It's the Gen Z's and the millennials
gambling their rent money, or maybe their savings.
I'm not saying they're rent money.
Not all are gambling their rent money,
but they're not investing
because that path doesn't seem realistic for them anymore,
for many.
Even despite these sportsbooks booming,
they still rose 7% year over year.
TransUnion reported,
identified these gamblers as speculators,
urban renters, heavy user of crypto apps, concentrated in mobile trading platforms,
young people locked out of traditional wealth building, seeking asymmetric payoffs in the only
markets that offer them. It's sad. And I to think I'm AF we're going to critique or bring up an issue.
What, what is the potential solution? What is the path forward? Unfortunately, I'm,
I don't know on this one other than there has to be some accountability people that are,
and it's not just the NGOs and government fraud.
That needs to be, the corruption needs to be stopped.
So hard stop.
Whatever side of the spectrum you're on, if you're a centrist, if you lean left, if you lean right, it doesn't matter.
You should be against government fraud and corruption.
It's just, this is not a political issue.
It's not a sexual orientation issue.
It's not a racial issue. It's just right and wrong.
And all sides should be against stealing money from taxpayers to enrich
themselves and their friends.
There's just like, this is,
I feel as if the most straightforward statement ever made here.
And yeah, I'm probably upsetting some people.
I'm not, that's not my intent.
It's just, it is what it is.
Like this is wrong.
Zonka adds in the chat.
I know two things are different,
but my first job out of school was in government contracting.
We literally submitted applications to win the chance to complete projects.
The amount of hoops we had to go through is insane.
Just have a chance.
Yet the fraud happened unchecked wild.
Yeah.
It's, there's so many hoops and balances to attempt to prevent corruption, to prevent
this.
And that it's not like, am I disappointed with the fraud and corruption?
Yes.
I'm much more disappointed that it seemingly has just went unchecked.
And I don't know if it changes.
That's where I'm losing hope.
Like, there should be massive infetorogations, not just in Minnesota.
There should be in Columbus.
There should be in the state of Washington.
You should see every major media news publication
speaking on this today.
I doubt they will.
That's what's, that's, what's equally disgusting as me.
They're all in on it.
Seemingly.
I feel this as someone who's in my mid forties.
I can't imagine how younger generation feels like they're really fighting this up for battlefields.
Like, how do you, how do you win when, if the media is not going to report on something
that is so apparently blatant i know
they're just allegations and accusations at this point really attempt to think at that think about
this go watch that 42 minute video and come out of that saying oh oh, that's all just rumors.
None of that's substantiated.
It's all just hearsay.
I don't think you can honestly do that.
I just think if you're being real honest with yourself,
you're going to watch that video and you're like, wow, this fraud is rampant.
And then you're going to look at some of the other damning information that's public now.
And like, how is this happening?
It's very frustrating and i i think the
if we don't want to call it fraud if we don't want to call it
that mismanagement if we're going to be very friendly like the overall government mismanagement in
probably many of these states it's probably actually at some level in all 50 states in the
u.s some of the ones that are now becoming very public it's the ones mentioned i was still trying
to find the the uh the article on the state of california and um it was in the billions already, like from, uh, man, I know there's,
there's, I know I got a good article. I'm just, I'm still looking for it. So
I don't want to just, there's a lot of articles on this and there's some that are, I think,
embellishing a little bit and making it more grandiose. I'm trying to find the actual thing from the government of California that basically confirmed this, but it's over $50 billion with a B that has been, that's essentially vanished. 70 billion is, is, is the number I'm seeing here, but I'm still looking for the actual
article. So I'm not misspeaking. Um, anyways, I would like to move on from this. I just,
I do feel they're related. I feel that, okay, yes, it was, here it is a 92page report by the California State Auditor. Again, California State Auditor found that over $70 billion in taxpayer funds have been lost,
including $2.5 billion in snap fraud, $24 billion in fighting homelessness, and $18 billion for a high-speed rail.
Still haven't found the original article.
Those seem like the same numbers I read from the actual article that cited the California auditor.
Again, if this is the state auditor
that's stating these numbers,
like, okay, now what?
Who's getting in trouble for this?
Who's getting fired?
Who's, I mean, I'm not looking for people
to be thrown in a cage,
but there has to be some consequences.
It's very obvious that this isn't right to anyone that's looking at this stuff objectively.
You can't make this stuff up.
It actually, if you saw it without the actual evidence, you probably would say it was just an engagement farm.
It's just a conspiracy theory because it's so wild.
There's no way that's real.
We can say innocent and too proven guilty,
but I unfortunately don't have confidence that the guilty parties are going to
actually see real consequences.
Now they probably stopped their, their grift.
We probably stopped seeing fake daycares in our centers open,
but will anyone ever like have any real consequences?
Will there ever be any repercussions or restitution? I would, you would think, yes, it's, it's got to
be. And I, I personally, I don't, I'm not holding my breath that that'll happen. There's just been
too many things from, I mean, not, I don't even want to go to the Epstein list, but there's not been a single arrest made. That's crazy.
If all this information and yet no one,
no one knew is getting in trouble after all this stuff.
You just sit, you go through,
come through all this information and there's not enough there that only people
or Epstein and his wife, there's only two people that go down for this.
It just makes no sense. And this isn't conspiracy theory stuff this is like hard
data that's now public information it's like if yeah it's just it's very frustrating and i think
compounds everything else in the economy and in jobs and everything else at that financial prison
of uh or i should get it the correct, the prison of financial mediocrity.
I think it's all compounded. You're just like this, this stuff when you, when we're
in addition to that navigating systems that seem to be rife with construction, you know, corruption
and fraud, like, dude, if I'm, I mean, actually I couldn't say if I'm a 21 year old kid, I,
for the most part, I am going the same route. I am going the route of betting on myself and hunting edge. Now, I'm not just gambling. I have my buckets, but I also take swings with my asymmetric bucket because I feel it's better here than, and I living proof, I was looking at an investment property in contract and I'm deciding to walk
away from that tomorrow.
It was supposed to be closing day and it just, it's not worth the risk.
It's not worth the risk,
the cash you'd have to outlay for potentially to squeak out a decent little
return and go, I mean, maybe it's just this market and this market's been getting hit
harder lately, but go look, if you haven't done this recently, go look in your home market,
pull up, just pull up Zillow and start first, not with the homes for sale, start with rental
homes in your market, like standalone homes, not apartments, standalone homes.
And just look at them,
see who owns them. Because if it's anything like here, you'll see that the majority,
not some, the majority of rental homes on a market are owned by a few entities, institutions,
whether it's BlackRock or one of their subsidiaries, Tricon, Home Partners, Main Street. There's several.
If I were to throw a ring of like, say, 30 miles where I'm at,
I'm pretty confident in saying over 50% of the rental homes,
probably more, are owned by these entities.
Now, it's a capitalistic country.
They're free to buy whatever they want.
It's exasperating the issue.
They're buying these homes.
Most of the homes that are selling are going to these institutions.
They're not going to individual homeowners in most cases.
And they're, dare I say, manipulating the market, the floors.
You know, you look at the, the, there's more,
there's one of the first times in history, there's more sellers than buyers by the tune of, I don't know, the number I just saw is like half a million.
Demand greater than supply.
Well, I'm not an economist, but normally that tells you the price should come down.
The prices are barely coming down.
Why?
Because these institutions, they don't need to undercut their floors.
The ones you see coming down, the ones you see accepting offers way below ask are the individual
homeowners who they want to move or they have to move or they're a forced seller. The institutions
aren't forced sellers. And again, it was just one subset, one sector of the market, but it was
again, sharing a personal example. It just, the risk doesn't seem worth the reward because
the bottom may not be in. It very well could be catching a falling knife.
Unknowing how this plays out, it just doesn't, it's no longer the quote unquote
American dream that many of us, my age grew up, whether that was your aspiration or not.
I mean, I've been a hardwired entrepreneur from a young age, but the traditional American
dream is, is changing.
And I think part of the, so I'm not going to say it's that I still think it's one of
the greatest countries, if not the greatest country in the world, I'm grateful to be an
American. I, I, I appreciate my freedoms, even some that I may challenge across state lines from
time to time. I digress. I do wholeheartedly agree that the traditional American dream that many have known to aspire to achieve,
like a new hope needs to be created.
New dream needs to be created.
Maybe it is AI.
Maybe it is universal basic income.
Maybe it is the air of abundance that some are saying,
AI is just going to lead to so much productivity, so much efficiencies,
that everyone's going to be wealthy or rich or living beyond their means.
The other doomers would say that it gets worse because of this technology boom and more jobs get lost and the downward spiral has begun.
I don't know.
But if it's not something to do with automation and AI and an air of abundance, which, you know, again, you listed some really compelling
cases on this.
I think I shouted out a percent on the show last week about his recent interview with
the all in guys.
And it's very bullish for 26.
Basically, the TLDR, the foundation that they've attempted to lay this year is now in place.
And next year, you start seeing the impact on the economy, you know, better
rates and, and, um, growth and et cetera, et cetera.
I just, I still think the gap, the void today, like I'm like, Poppy, even if both you and
I went, I would say untraditional routes in our in our careers, unless I'm mistaken, I don't think you've worked for a large corporation for 20 years of your life.
Do you agree, though, that we had a – those of us born in the 80s, even I would say 90s for sure, we – if someone asked you what is the American dream? You could probably define it at least
loosely what that the American dream was. Is that, is that fair?
Oh, I think there was like a visual depiction of it, right? You always have like the white
picket fence, little house, family, a couple of kids, dog. Like that was always the American
dream visual. Uh, that was, you know, just too good to be true probably for most,
or too simple for today's society with social media.
It's much different now.
What is it though?
If you go ask 100 Zoomers, what's the American dream?
I don't even know what answer you get.
I don't even know what one of the answers you get,
let alone the same answer multiple.
I think the next generation,
well, you can't speak for all,
but they're immersed in streaming,
gaming,
and that culture says Lambo, right?
When Lambo,
I think that's probably most
Zoomer and Crypto's goal, right? Is when Lambo. So, I mean think that's probably most Zoomer and Crypto's goal, right?
Is when Lambo.
So, I mean, that's probably, now that you say that,
if you go ask a kid, what's the American dream?
What do you aspire to do?
What do you want to be when you grow up?
I bet you're right.
The top answer probably is a streamer, a content creator.
Gamer, streamer.
Yeah.
And I think part of that, because they've seen,
they see a path to a agency, their results,
their production mattering and a quicker path to where at least, I think even many know it's unlikely.
Many probably believe it's extremely rare and hard, but they think that's a more realistic path than going to get a job at a big corporation and maybe working there for 30 years.
Is that fair?
I'm catching up here a little bit.
One thing that, quick interjection,
not unrelated, but maybe some magic internet money.
I believe Lighter, TGE is supposed to go live today.
There was some rumors thinking it would hit maybe already.
It is not
yet um uh joey distracted me with some other news completely unrelated so i'm not gonna go there
right now not your fault joey i'm just i was this is why i don't try to catch up to the war room it
gets a little over the place um yeah just just a while time g Gary, GM, welcome to the stage. What brought you up this morning, sir?
Yeah, GM, GM. So I have a 17-year-old and he did not live with me for many years. He lived
with his mom and he moved in back in August and he launched a coin on PumpFun and made 20 grand
and did the normal stuff. But for him and his friends, which many of them have visited,
it's about freedom.
It's not about going to get a job,
but it's about having personal freedom
to spend your time
the way you choose to spend your time.
And I think that that's where
more and more people are going.
I think AI is going to help us get there.
But I think that more people realize
that going to college, going in debt,
getting a job and working for 40
to 50 years, they've watched their parents suffer and they're not happy with where that is. My son's
mom lives in a subdivision and all the houses look the same. And he said, that's his worst hell.
He never, ever, ever wants to live like that. And I think a lot of kids have watched their parents
try to live the American dream.
And it's just not the dream. You know, you're, you're working, you're, you're getting cancer,
you're dying. All these things are happening. And I think the next generation wants something a
little bit different. And I think freedom is going to be a bigger driver. Yes, they want money. And
yes, they want a Lambo and yes, they want all those things, but they don't see the path to get
there is to get the job and, and grind your ass off and get into a promotion
schedule that maybe eventually when you're 50, you can get enough money to do that.
They think the path is very much independent on their own, going in and building their own
dropshipping or building their own streaming or whatever that freedom path is for them.
But I think that's where the youth is going to shift a lot to.
Yeah.
Well said. I think you's where the youth is going to shift a lot to. Yeah. Well said.
I think you're right.
I think while some may aspire to achieve the Lambo and the mansion, I don't think that's all.
I think it's certainly aspirational for some.
I don't think it's all.
I think you're probably right that freedom and their time freedom most are viewing that as
more of a priority meaning if the 21 year old zoomer can trade crypto and prediction markets
and not even be great at it but they can grind out you know one month they make two grand the
next month they make five grand the next month they lose 500 bucks but then the next month they
make seven grand and the next month they they make 100 bucks in the next month they make four grand and like they'd rather do
that and pay their bills and have in in have that upside potential be it the whole time they're doing
it on their schedule and their time.
I think, I think you're right.
I think time freedom is probably the dream for most of the younger generation.
And most don't see a path to that working for someone else at an entry level job that may not exist in a few years.
So good on the kids wise.
I was one who didn't, you know, I bought the American dream hook, line and sinker when I was in high school and God bless my parents are incredible people.
They instill a lot of morals and ethics and values in me and be forever grateful for the upbringing I had.
Incredible parents.
I was not born with a silver spoon in my mouth and my parents taught me the key to success was go to school, you get good grades.
I did it.
I was nearly a straight A student in high school. I got one B and got a full ride into Ohio State. It's directly enrolled into
their school of business, which is, it's not Ivy League, but the business school was like a top,
I don't know, at the time it was like number 13 in the country. And to get in as a freshman was
a big deal. So full ride at Ohio State, living the dream on my way or so I thought. And as I got into
my senior year,
I saw a lot of my friends graduating with these prestigious business school degrees. And they
were moving to Chicago and living with three or four roommates and they were waiting tables or
bartending. And I just so happened I was selling cell phones part-time instead of bartending
and had at the time moved into management and was making more while I was still finishing up school,
like would push six figures. And then even I
dropped out my final quarter because I got a promotion into a six figure income that I didn't
know any friends that had just graduated. They're making six figures out of school, except a few
that were in finance, but most using, weren't using their degrees. They couldn't get jobs.
And this is in, this is in 2003, 2004. This was pre-housing crisis. Things were still quote unquote good or perceived as good by most outsiders.
But what I saw was most of my friends that were graduating weren't using the degrees and were taking some entry level job in hospitality somewhere.
And so I dropped out of school my final quarter and I never looked back.
order. And I never looked back. And even though I was working for someone then, I was also being
mentored by a few self-made individuals and got turned on to a different way of thinking and knew
that working at that time was a means to my ends of becoming an entrepreneur and just going into
business for myself. Eventually would do it in the wireless business. And I had been self-employed
for since 2008, minus the short stint that I had to finish and run out in corporate America.
But it wasn't by, I mean, it was by choice, but not, wasn't the planned goal.
It just ended up being part of the outcome.
I digress.
While I think it's good that the younger generation shifts their vision of the American dream
from go get a degree and work for someone else for 30, 40 years. I think it's good that they're looking for something different. I'm concerned that the casino is, and or even
content creation is the default as, as a leading, like it's hard to make a living creating content.
You know, 1% of the people will probably do it. You can get, you can go hyper niche,
like what we've done here and, and show up and work every day and work hard. And eventually you
might start being able to monetize your content. Most won't ever monetize their content, never
enough to pay their bills, let alone live that, that next tier of life. The casino, same thing.
Most people will lose at the casino. and the only way they're going to win
is they play long enough and then when they do hit win what big win they take chips off the table
and most that hit big in the casino don't take chips off the table because by that point they're
addicted to the casino uh case in point i'll share an article in the war this one about an attorney
who has won some of the largest supreme Court cases ever is now facing prison time because he was a degenerate gambler that didn't pay his income tax per the, per the, per the charges.
Guy couldn't walk away from the casino, didn't need to play the casino anymore, but just couldn't, couldn't walk away.
and that's you're talking someone who's an educated successful individual uh practicing
attorney at the highest level you know was was losing seven eight figures in poker games
so you see that and you're telling me the average 21 year old that's never had a job like that that's
never made more than you know that's never had a salary job. They think their jobs consist of serving bartending and, and you know,
driving Uber.
Like there's going to be a lot that are going to be pulled into the casino.
Most won't ever win and most will never get ahead like that.
So it's my, my ass.
I'm hoping Vaughn front and has something sage here as I'm going to step away
for a quick 20, 30 seconds after handing the mic.
What, what do we backfill backfill the old American dream with?
Which some of us can recognize that's probably been broken for a little while.
It's just now it's no longer, someone said earlier that it was a false dream.
And I think it was a dream for many, many years.
Maybe you could argue for our generation or Porsche generation, it was a false dream. And I think it was a dream for many, many years. Maybe you could argue for our generation or Porsche, our generation. It was, it was, it was fake, but I also know some
friends who have done very well for themselves. They've accumulated millions of dollars in that
worth working for someone else. They're very happy. It may not be the cookie cutter subdivision.
You just described Gary, but they, they live in a, you know, they're all their homes in their
subdivision are million dollar homes. And they've never thought about going into business for themselves.
So there are ways.
There has been ways.
I do think that that path is narrowing and few and fewer people are going to achieve that.
And I would go as far as say, especially those that aren't in a specialized AI hedge, you know, I think, you know, I used to say doctors and attorneys, you know, that,
that route of education made sense. Now I don't know, like there's a world where
that demand goes down and it's only the best of the best of the best because they're able to be
far more efficient with AI, you know, paralegals. I would, you know, I would run as fast as I could.
I would be, I would be actively working for my new career.
If I was a paralegal today, no offense. It's just, I don't see how they exist in five years with,
with LLMs doing what they are today. So all that to be said, Von Fronten, GM, welcome message.
Take whichever direction you like. I'm hoping you have, after you take whichever direction,
like I'm hoping you then have an answer of what all of us and the younger generations should be
viewing now as the American dream and what we, what's an alternative to the younger generations should be viewing now as the American Dream.
And what's an alternative to the casino?
If we are long degeneracy,
I agree with the original poster, unfortunately,
but I would like there to be at least an alternative
so that everyone doesn't feel
that's their only path to the American,
or the dream life is the casino.
GM, sir.
GM, GM.
I feel like I always get the pass the mic while Cap always refills his coffee.
So happy to play that role.
So I came up when Gary was talking because I wanted to build on, I think, some of his thoughts.
And a couple others came up along the way.
So I'm a recovering corporate American.
I was sold the bill hook, line, and sinker.
I went to school, got good grades, went to college, got less good grades.
But got an MBA, went to law school, have a ridiculous amount of student debt to show for it,
went and worked 20 years, and
financially speaking, did good, right? And it was fine. And it could have continued to be fine,
and it would have been just that, fine. There's nothing wrong with it. I don't think there's a
lot of people I know that are
incredibly happy. They find a lot of fulfillment, a lot of purpose, a lot of financial rewards,
everything. They go and they work, and that's the thing that they use to ascribe value to
themselves, right? And for a long time, it was me. I was the same way. And then a couple years back, I just kind of hit this turning point where the thing for me wasn't just about time freedom to where Gary was saying, or maybe just a different angle on this.
But it was like, I wanted to enjoy what I was doing.
And not necessarily follow my passion the way that the Steve Jobs graduation speeches would say,
but it's like, I just wanted to enjoy what I was doing, and I wasn't enjoying what I was doing
anymore. And so that's when I started this journey that started to lean more into entrepreneurship
and building and finding things that I enjoyed. I may not be passionate about it.
Hell, I may not even be great at it yet. But it was something that if I can find a way and still
make things work financially for my family, then that's how I want to spend my time. Because the
thing that scares the crap out of me, and I've seen this, I've seen this in my own family,
I've seen it with friends, I've seen it with mentors that do the whole, just got to work to retirement, just got to work to retirement. They work 30,
40 years. They get to, they retire, they're in their 60s. They maybe get a few good years and
then their health starts to go to shit. And so this prize that was at the end of the tunnel for
them is very, very short-lived. And that was the thing that scared the crap out of me. I was
like, what am I waiting for? Nothing is guaranteed. So let me find time to go enjoy what I'm doing
and do so responsibly. Do so not putting my family out in the streets or anything, but
find a way to enjoy it. And that's where I think a lot of the kids are getting to
way earlier. I mean, I talked to my son. My oldest is 15.
He talks about setting up a, you know, basically a, lack of a better term, like, you know, youth basketball network when he graduates to, you know, have gyms and run youth sports leagues and kind of provide the coaching that, enjoys and he wishes that he would have gotten earlier in life and kind of be that thing. He's looking at an
entrepreneurship type of mentality, not a casino, not a YouTuber, not a TikTok or whatever, but he
is looking at how do I find a way to do something I enjoy? What are the steps I need to take?
find a way to do something I enjoy? What are the steps I need to take? And that's where I see
the alternative to the casino, whether your casino is content creation, crypto trading,
actual casino. I see a lot more people talking about like, how can I just go build something
myself? Because the tools that they have available to them with AI make that actually look achievable. Like I think about it when I was a kid,
like we were messing around on really crappy websites.
I was like, I can't start an internet company.
I can barely make something in AOL press throwback for anyone who was using
that back in the nineties.
But now they look at it and there are, I mean,
like you can't open up the internet without finding some video or some
article about how to create your, I mean, like you can't open up the internet without finding some video or some article about how to create your completely fully functional web app that will generate 10,000 of revenue a month in 30 days, right?
There's video after video of that.
So it is empowering them to get really, really bold and saying, hey, by the time I'm ready, I mean, I've got a 15-year-old,
I've got a 12-year-old, I've got an 8-year-old. Jesus, by then they'll probably just say something
and speak it into existence and be able to run a business with that. So all of that to say,
I still think the American dream is there for some. I think there will be a certain segment
or segments of people who will choose to pursue it.
Either they enjoy it, or it may just be the risk profile that they're comfortable with.
They want the stability of the corporate job, and that's fine, and there's nothing wrong with that.
I think there will definitely be the people that go to the casino because they are the ones that believe that they can hit big.
They will become the Mr. Beast of the world.
They will become the person who hits it big on trading or whatever.
But I do think that entrepreneurship or just,
and not entrepreneurship of let me go build some eight-figure,
nine-figure exit, but just let me just go do something
that makes me enough money to live the life that I want to live.
And I have the tools now to go figure out what that is.
That's where I see this third path coming out of.
And that's the path that excites me.
It's the path that, full honesty, at the age of 43, I'm taking.
And I think the tools are only going to get better and better
to make that path easier and easier for people of all ages.
Well said.
First of all, I'm proud of you.
Congratulations on the new journey.
And I don't know.
I've never asked you this question personally.
Maybe it's pure coincidence.
Maybe you took some inspiration from him.
But I can't help but think your newfound entrepreneur journey has done a little bit to inspire your kid and kids and their entrepreneur journeys.
Is that a fair assessment?
Good question.
I've never asked them.
I do have my eight-year-old because we actually got some shipping that we got to do today.
My eight-year-old came in while Gary was talking earlier and asked me if we're getting those Vanga shipments out today.
So I definitely see it in him.
The 15-year-old, I haven't asked him about.
But he's in high school, like careers, what do you want to do, stuff like that.
So it's funny.
He's being fed, and I say this, it'll sound bad, it's not.
But the typical, let's go find what career you want to be, to go find what college you
want to go to, to get the major to go do what career you want to be to go find what college you want to go to to get the major to go to go do that career right and and it's but and the system for that is set up to be
like go get a good corporate job he is sitting there kind of bucking that trend of like i don't
know if like i mean he said like you know an arc being an architect sounds cool to him right but
you when you hear him talk about basketball and sports, he gets super excited.
So I don't know.
He's actually the one that is the least involved in my entrepreneurial journey.
My younger two are very much involved and want to help and want to be part of it.
But I do see when him and his friends talk, most of them are not talking about what company they want to work for or what field they want to be in. They talk in a way of like, what is the thing that I want to go do?
And maybe there is a corporate path to do that thing. But if there's not, I think they're just
going to go do the thing they want to do, whether they have to build it themselves or somebody else
has already built it for them. It gets me excited, man. It really does. I, for a long time, since I,
not only if I found my own entrepreneur journey, but since I just became a
ardent beater of that drum and like my kids, both my one just graduated college. The other
is going to school next year. I think college is important. I think I learned a lot in college about life skills and social skills.
And I, I, my, I swear I first started growing my network that would impact me for the rest of my life.
There's a couple, I think of like two, three high school friends that I remain in touch with.
that I remain in touch with.
And I guess it played a part in my professional career,
like small part, but not like directly
like some of my college friends
and their associates and acquaintances have.
So like college is important,
more so for the life skills and social skills
and growing up, being able to grow up
as independently with
still having that safety net to some degree.
I've always encouraged my kids to go to school, but I've never once told them that that's
the key to success.
I've never once told them once they get their college degree, you're set for life.
Like they, they, they have never once heard that out of me.
And I think more people our age and especially younger are probably raising their kids similarly
to where they may, Hey, yeah, you should get a job. You should work. But while you're working
for someone else, you should be looking at multiple streams of income. You should be
exploring your passions. You should be finding a way to do something in the evenings, weekends,
or maybe it is
take that entry-level job serving.
So you have some income coming in, but build, build your thing.
Go do the thing you want to build.
Maybe it's just my circle of friends who I'm sure I've self-selected to some degree there
without a doubt.
Even my friends who have done well in the corporate world, they most are also either, they're either a entrepreneur
minded or they're investors and or speculators, gamblers, right? Like even my friends who have
done well by way of W2 salary income, I don't think I know a single one who doesn't also
have their asymmetric bucket as they should, right. But I don't know any of them that are just piling away a hundred percent of
what they earned into a S and P 500 by way of a 401k is most,
most are actually far more degenerate than I,
because they have,
you know,
the 50 K a month coming in,
they can,
they can take big swings and if they go,
they're still fine.
Let's go back to them on front.
We'll get Gary back in here. Yeah, I think go, Oh, for the year, they're still fine. Let's go back to them on front. They'll get Gary back in here.
Yeah, I think the, um,
I just lost my train of thought.
Go back to Gary.
I'll come back.
Yep.
We were talking, um, parents, our generation and younger,
not selling the same American dream that many of us grew up with.
Oh, yeah, yeah. Sorry. You're talking about college is when I raise my hand, right?
I'll say I went to a lot of school.
And whether or not that school results, you know, pays off from an ROI standpoint of like, did I actually
make enough to pay off, you know, the tuition and then some, who knows? And whether I can attribute
it to the education that I got, who knows? What I will say, I mean, as a parent, like, I want my
kids to go to college, not because it's like, hey, that's what you need to be a job. That's what you
need to be successful. But I do think there is value in education. Now, does it need to be an Ivy
League school? Can it be a state school? Can it be community college? Can it be vocational? I mean,
I think there's a lot of ways to get education, but I do think there is value in expanding how
you think and being able to look at any situation in life from multiple perspectives. So I will say I value it
from that side. I value the machine in that regard. But to the point that you were making
earlier that I wholeheartedly agree with, to say that going and getting good grades and going to
college and getting good grades and getting a job and working in that same job and working hard for the next 20, 30, 40 years will generate the same level of success as it did for the previous generation.
I don't think that's, it's not the only way and it's definitely not as reliable as it
once was.
Yeah, well said.
I wholeheartedly agree. Go ahead, Gary. Get back in here.
Yeah, so first off, my son was smart. He stabled like 50% of the money that he made at 250 whenever Solana was at 250.
So I taught him that what goes up always comes down, and he's stabled, and he was smart, and he was able to save some of his money.
He's stable and he was smart and he was able to save some of his money.
The other thing is since he doesn't want to go to college, and I'm not a huge fan of college,
we helped him get a job working for one of my former clients because he wants to get into AI and he wants to get into sales.
So I have him, he's working full-time job as a sales development rep doing AI automations on Instagram and stuff with a very solid like 36k based salary and commissions
so he can spend a couple years learning while he's getting paid, doing a good job,
so then he can go build what he wants. So I believe that a lot of kids might take a path
if they're given that to where they can go down. And it's almost like I told him to treat this like
an internship. So let's go work. Let's work hard. Let's figure
out what it's all about for a couple of years, make some money, put some money aside, use that
money to go do bigger, better things. So I think that that's one of the paths that we can lead our
youth to is yes, college is great if that's your path, but there's other paths that will get you
equally as successful and you might be able to make money along that journey as well. So he's
like working
in the self-publishing world. The company does north of 10 million a year and he's doing sales
development on Instagram, helping them grow that. So I think there's a lot of paths for today's youth
if they want to get a career and work for a couple of years while they're trying to figure it all out.
Yeah. In a weird way, like
maybe this is one of, I'm not saying it's the singular moment, maybe this is one of,
I'm not saying it's a singular moment.
Maybe this is one of the moments
that a lot of the younger generation
that aspire to create content
see a fellow Zoomer
that didn't just start creating content,
to be fair,
but put out a well done,
taking an approach of a journalist and put out a long form piece of content
that went extremely viral.
And the proverbial can of worms has now been opened.
You're seeing so many others with excerpts now that, Oh,
this isn't just Minnesota.
I do. I think this week we'll see,
I'm not saying it's going to be all 21 year olds or 23 year olds or everyone
Nick is, but I think we'll see this week.
We'll see similar exposés on probably Columbus, probably on Washington,
probably on California,
all the ones that have already been called out in follow-up at the Nick Shirley thing. Because to having some simultaneous
conversations here, but one is none of this was actually news. It was in the New York Times
in November and saw reports this month ago. But someone on social media did a better job
reporting on it. It's my opinion. And I think the reason that people haven't been talking about this until now is it took a Zoomer who understands social
content, understood attention and how to get it and put out a video full of seemingly factual
information. Unless the whole thing is doctored and the whole video is AI, it's hard not to pay attention to it because it was essentially sensationalized
by social media.
Whereas what are the traditional media outlets doing?
They can see their ratings.
They can see their numbers.
Why aren't they doing this sort of reporting to begin
with and then first of all like i'll share a post that got shared from from uh pomp who says
one of the big takeaways let me let me share that as i read it and then i'll pin it up top here in
a sec one of the big takeaways uh from nick shirley's successful video is not that mainstream
media is asleep at the wheel,
but rather, because a lot of people said, where's mainstream media? I probably said that incorrectly this morning. They have been reporting on this stuff.
But rather, YouTubers understand how to deliver information much better to the internet generation.
For example, CBS has been covering the Minnesota fraud scandal for weeks.
Did you read it? Probably not.
Did you even know CBS or New York Times were covering it? Most likely not.
I don't – raising my hand here. I don't read – I don't watch CBS News.
I don't read the New York Times.
It's because the packaging of information is more important than the substance of the information sometimes.
because the packaging of information is more important than the substance of the information
sometimes. The media never had to learn how to cut through the noise because they had a monopoly on
distribution historically. A regular citizen couldn't take over a TV station or newspaper
years ago, but now anyone with an iPhone in some free time can compete in the free market of ideas
and content. Nick Shirley showed he understands how to deliver content better than mainstream media.
There are thousands of others like him out there with the same skill set.
The legacy media wasn't completely asleep at the whale.
They were just riding a horse rather than a Ferrari.
They never stood a chance to own the story once YouTubers got the case.
I recently watched...
oh man i'm drawing a blank on the name of the movie um it stars the the incredible hulk
Oh, man.
I'm drawing a blank on the name of the movie.
not as the hulk but the character who plays the hulk um it's in the boston globe and their uh
their journalism their expose on the you know the catholic church spotlight spotlight yes thank you
the, you know, the Catholic church spotlight. Yes. Thank you.
Real journalism.
I think a lot and good, like,
and I'm sure that stuff is still taking place to some degree today.
It doesn't seem like it because in today's world, that same,
if you've seen the movie spotlight, not to get off on that tangent,
it's probably another touchy subject where is that happening today and if if they were to rewrite
spotlight in 2026 like it was based on true stories they could do it let's say it was a
they just they took the same plot line and redid it it's not going to be in the Boston Globe. That story would be retold by way of
exposing it on social media, YouTube, X, et cetera. Katie, GM, thank you for helping me with
my trivia question. I didn't know it was going to be a trivia question today. And welcome to
the stage as always. Looking forward to your insight here. Good morning. This American dream
is right in
my home right now because I have a 21-year-old senior in college and I have a freshman in
college. The senior is looking to go to grad school and the freshman's really getting into
business. But one of the things that we've talked about a lot is what are you going to do? What do
you want to do? I'm very like, my husband is very old school. And he's like,
you have to do this to make the money. And I am of the opposite realm where yes, I colleges were
very important to me, I think they should go for even socialization, you come out of college
different than you go in. I mean, there's no saying that isn't an expensive education for some
for sure. But I think there's definitely value. But in talking a lot with my kids and fiscal responsibility, a lot of these parents aren't setting their kids up
for even traditional fiscal responsibility. Like I have my kids in a high yield earning savings
account. They have credit cards, but lots of their friends have no idea how to save money,
how to budget money. I think there's like a big divide at this point.
So even moving into this American dream, none of these kids have any savings to go into even
putting into a house and housing market, forget it. There's nowhere for them to go. Rent an
apartment. It's expensive. I think it's a big divide at this point. Yeah, well said. it is a big divide and i mean a i think you your kids are likely uh
i mean have an edge that some may not because they have
balance in both sides of the perspective both paths um options and i think that's
also a net positive is not thinking like this is the way to success.
And like, this may sound extreme to a younger generation. Like when I was younger, when I
started my entrepreneurial career, it was like a dirty word. Like entrepreneurs were like,
not looked at favorably in the most part. It wasn't until me, maybe it started to shift that way a little bit when I,
you know, towards the late two thousands of 2010, but for a while it was like,
it was not like today it's, you know, people have in their bio, you, you would have had it in your
bio back then you would have had, you know, I don't know. A lot of people are inflated a title
of what they are doing at the
job, the business they own. But that certainly has begun shifting. And I feel today it's like
the shift is complete. Like it's most view it as like a, a wise passport. Go ahead, Katie.
Right. And I agree. And I agree. And this is what the conversation I have with my kids,
because I am an entrepreneur. I never realized it until I got into NFTs and crypto. I mean, I am total entrepreneur, I've collected things over the
years. And so it's been like an awakening for me. And I talked to them a lot about these things.
And my husband doesn't do anything with kids have anything to do with crypto. Like I said,
he's traditionalist old school. So this is all my own thing that I talked to my own kids about
I've opened them, they are they have like crypto wallets that they can have someday. I have their name on ETH. Like I'm trying to expose them to these
things. And my youngest is I can see an entrepreneur. She doesn't know it yet, but she's in business
in college. So I can see that I'm at least planting that seed for her to even pursue that.
But the other thing I wanted to tell you is when we talk about AI, a lot of these schools are
pushing them not to use AI.
And I keep telling her to use AI.
And they've had professors ask them, what do you think about using AI in the classroom?
So it's definitely a conversation to be had right now, but a lot of these kids aren't utilizing it.
And I tell my kids, you have to learn how to use AI.
Yeah.
Again, salute to you as a parent because it just seems so obvious to me that those, if they're not using AI, they're falling behind.
It's like we said on here, it's like AI might not take your job, but someone using AI probably is.
Like, why would you not want them to use?
And I understand, oh, they could cheat.
I think it's just because they don't understand how to use AI.
So they don't know how to teach it. So I think, again, there's another divide right here for these kids who are now just in school.
And AI is just, it's another thing for teachers to learn or for professors to learn on top of all the other things they have to do.
And that's a whole other, that's a whole other issue for me.
But, you know, it's an important time.
It's a very cyclical time where people are going to have to be learning new things. It's, you know, so. What I like to ask you, Dr. Put you on the spot.
So my apologies, but same, same question I had earlier. Like what,
what, I mean, I should ask you this, what do you think your kids would describe as the quote unquote American dream today? You know, it's interesting that you asked me that because
the other part I was going to talk about is relationships aren't like they used to be when
we were young. These kids aren't dating like we used to. They're all Snapchatting each other.
They're meeting each other for the first time. It's just not the traditional get married and
buy a house. So it's an interesting question. My kids really don't know. Like they're like,
I have no idea. I know I want to make money. I want to do something successful,
but there's no vision at this point of where they want to go or what they want to do. I think it's
fleeting at this point. And as a parent, kids close to the same age, that's concerning. I know
it's not like, oh, it's over. It's absolutely concerning to me. Absolutely. Because they just
don't have those foundations that we had. And I say communication is lacking. They're all texting each other. They don't know
how to talk to each other. It's a big issue. You could say, oh, the last version of the
American dream wasn't for me. I didn't want to go work for a corporation for 40 years of my life.
And my success in life being bad on that corporation and them choosing not to lay me off when they did a restructure
and that my pension still actually be worth something when we got to that age.
I didn't choose that route, but it was at least a vibe.
It was a viable path for many.
Maybe it wasn't a viable path to, to wealth and financial independence, but it was a path.
It was a path to homeownership.
It was a path to retirement at a, you know, you may think 65 is old, but, and I do agree
with Von Fronten.
Unfortunately, a lot of times it's like the end is nigh when people hit retirement age
after working their entire lives.
Most are unhealthy and not happy, out of shape, overweight, et cetera.
At least there was a path that did work for a lot of people. You could say the majority of people,
the path worked as described. It didn't lead to extreme wealth or early financial independence,
but if the dream was, I'm summarizing here, but if the dream was
home ownership and safety and security for your family, home ownership and healthcare and groceries
and they weren't going to starve, they weren't going to be out on the street, that absolutely
existed. I think basic shelter and food is still absolutely exist,
but I don't think that that same path to what we did describe as the dream
still exists. And the fact that they're just unknown, there's like,
I don't even know the path. I don't know what we, like, I'm a parent.
I don't know what I should tell my kids to do. I don't.
Exactly. Same.
It's scary. Like I have a kid that's going in and people ask like,
what's she majoring? I'm
like, I don't know. And thank God she doesn't. Like, I don't want her to say, oh, this is exactly
what I do with the rest of my life right now. It'd be like maybe the, one of the worst times
in modern history to say, this is what I'm doing and not being willing to deviate from that because
our world is changing fast, not five years or eight years from now, like a year from now,
it could be extremely different as it relates to the job force and opportunities.
And that's what I say to my kids. I don't know what the jobs are going to be when you're ready to get a job because things are changing so quickly. They're in such an influx
period of things that are changing that it's hard to say. And it's hard, you know, it's hard as a
parent to be like, I don't know what to tell you. You have to pave your own path. So it's definitely
difficult. It's a difficult conversation. Like my younger one will
say, I want to buy a house. She's going to buy her house by herself. So at this point, she has
some goals, but they just don't know. The future is so unsure at this point with all the things
that are happening now that it's hard to say. It is hard to say. At least our parents, even if
they didn't believe, and I genuinely, mine did believe in it. Even if they didn't believe that that was the path to success, if they didn't believe that was the right,
at least they could look at us with a straight face and tell us and encourage, hey, go do this
thing. This is what you should be doing. And it was directionally accurate.
And if you think of in this period where these kids are watching other kids that are living in
million-dollar homes, they're watching this reality of kids that are their age living a totally different life than they can ever imagine.
You know, they're seeing all these people celebrate all these wins and things like that.
You only see their wins.
I say to them all the time, you got to take that with a grain of salt because they're not showing you their losses or what they're doing on, you know, in real life.
Yep. No, exactly right.
I should have mentioned that when we were talking about the long form long form article, uh, we post up top the prison of
financial mediocrity because that, and he does hit on that there as well, but that's
that just amplifies the issue that just exaggerates the issue. Just like
the, the, the fraud and corruption at government levels amplifies the issue and maybe doesn't eliminate hope for all, but it does for some.
And it mitigates hope for others.
Just, just as that, that it's like same thing here. It's like, it's.
Yeah.
And just one, one more, one more thing just to mention now, this is the life.
This is the world that they live in. My daughter goes to Providence college.
She was a mile and a half from the shooter two weeks ago. So this is her and her nine roommates
had to hole up in their house, up in the top floor and hunker down for two days, not knowing
that there was a shooter around. So, I mean, this is the life our kids are living.
Gives me chills. It is scary.'m i'm trying to not sound like
choosing my words carefully as i possibly can here i as i've said i'm not done i'm not
financially independent i i'm not i'm fortunate i don't believe i'll ever have to take a job or
have to work for someone again,
because not because of what my 401k, my savings, my crypto holdings are, not because of what my current net worth is, but rather my belief in myself and my ability to make money,
my belief in myself and the ability to solve problems, my ability as an entrepreneur, when I see a problem,
I can close the gap. And I've done that multiple times to give myself that success. I also am not,
I'm so bearish on things that could get wiped out by e-commerce giants and AI that I'm not going to
go all in on one of those, you know, one of those areas. So while I'm not like, I don't
lose sleep over what, what the workforce looks like, what jobs look like in the next five to 10
years, even though I'm like, I'm, there's not many scenarios where I'm not working for the next
decade. I just knock on wood. I'm hopefully working on things that are passions and I do it
because I enjoy it, not because I have to. I, I, I'm glad my youngest is not starting college
until next year. Cause she at least has some time. Like it sounds really bad probably, but I've this
first time consciously having the thought out loud that she's got at least five years before
she's got figured this out. Like the world's going to look a lot different in five years. So just go into it with flexibility
in mind and knowing that your path, your journey is likely to change many times throughout life,
but even before you get out. And she is not that anyone asked, but she is going into it right now.
Her lead as a, that wouldn't be a major,
it'd be a continuation.
So her undergrad major is still TBD.
She's going to wait and talk to the college counselors
for guidance, but she wants to do something
with pediatric physical therapy.
So physical therapy for kids
and not have to do the full med school route,
not have to stay in school forever and be encumpered with as much debt, but still do something that is presumably experiential. I know
not probably the proper choice of words, but it requires human interaction for the most part.
AI might likely assist and help, but at least for the next couple decades i don't i don't think robots are going to
entirely place doctors and physical therapists might help might be a bigger part of it but i
still think there's going to be a need for human interaction there and like i said if not like i'm
so i'm supportive of her i'll be supportive whatever she wants to do it if it's something
she says dad i really want to be a paralegal, I would probably actively try to show her the downside of that risk,
but I wouldn't not support her.
But my long winded rant of saying like,
I'm glad I got,
I'm glad she's got five years.
Cause man,
I don't,
I don't know.
Like,
I really don't know.
My oldest is an artist.
So it's like,
things are weird, but she's for her life. She's done gig, you know, whether it's
not, not DoorDash, but the other one, whether it's gig work like that or bartending doing
things to bring an income while she's pursuing her passion i think
she's embraced that life in in her you know her path well before now well before ai and all this
other stuff my youngest i like i don't i'm glad she's got the buffer because i don't know it's
and that's that's an awkward spot as a parent is not having a clear even suggestion on what your kids should do. for yourself, probably have a, have a, have a day job, have a gig, have something that's not solely reliant on whatever you're building, whatever your passions are, because that's hard.
And you don't want to not be able to pursue those passions because you had to go pay the bills much
easier to continue to pursue passions because your bills are paid for by whatever job or gig you have.
But even, even like that, even the, okay, you should build a business in this
industry. I don't know. Like it's just world is world. The world is weird. And as stuff like this
weekend, while it not be new information per se, I do believe it was presented in a new light and got a lot more attention. And so for me,
well, like I said, I had heard of this specifically Somalian daycare fraud for a while. I think
partially due to there's a large population in Columbus. So it's just a little closer to me than
maybe normal. But I wasn't, and this is wrong. I should have been upset with the fraud. It's on me.
I should have said that's wrong.
Someone should do something about this,
but I'm not one who worries about things that I can't control.
And that was one I just viewed outside my control.
Clearly wasn't outside my control.
I could have done a Nick Shirley expose and drew more attention to it because
that's what it needed. It didn't, it didn't need pointed out.
It had been pointed out in many cases. Now,
is there going to be more uncovered as a result of this? Yes, absolutely.
But what's, I think, for me, the difference in having loosely been aware of this sort of stuff is probably taking place, albeit I didn't imagine it to be the magnitude that it is.
And not that I've seen any of the recent articles from CNBC or the New York Times, but having seen some of this stuff in the past,
thinking it was like, okay, that's an issue.
I just, in my naive head, I said, Oh,
then someone's going to take care of it now. Oh, they,
they published an article. The, the local authorities,
the feds, someone's going to come in and resolve this.
Someone's going to take care of this. That's the big frustrating moment for me. That's the big
aha moment for me is that this stuff is not only being reported on, it's so widespread.
The material amounts, and I know it also takes time. Like the feds have an insane hit rate because
they do a really buttoned up job when they choose to bring charges. Like, good luck. You ever get,
you know, sued by the feds. It's, it's your, your probably odds are better in the mean point to see
no exaggeration. Um, so I get, it takes time to rip, to build, you know, ironclad cases.
So I get it takes time to build ironclad cases.
This is earliest document was at least 2018, if not earlier.
So here we are seven years later and it's still taking place.
That's my disappointment is it's either negligence and just not doing proper jobs in their positions.
They're just spread too thin.
They're focused on other things that aren't important.
This is important.
Misappropriation, misuse of tax dollars is important,
especially at this magnitude.
So whether they're just negligent and not doing a good job,
and then they should be replaced,
or it's malicious and they're involved, and then they should not only be replaced, there should be real repercussions and consequences.
One of the two, if not both, needs to take place.
Otherwise, it's just eroding more and more trust.
And I do think there's good programs.
Circling back to homeownership, there's some good government assistance for first time home buyers. That's a good thing. It's just the
young, I think many are, I don't want to say giving up or losing hope. Someone said that the
dream is dead. I don't think it's dead, dead but it's it's like hanging on the vine like
it's something needs to change soon and i really do think so much of this stuff that's been in
the news whether mainstream media or documented with i i i certainly see verifiable evidence
now in the age of ai because i i don't think it, I think at this point, if it was
AI generated, it would have been, it would have been proven. Like it would have been already been
called out after a hundred and some million views, but that's in the range of outcomes,
maybe small, but in the range of outcomes, like none of that's real. I hate to think like that.
It's just, I probably, how you should think by default in today's age is whether it's,
you know, the first article that we talked
about with a bank going under last night it's probably just a rumor it's probably not true
it's probably just engagement farming uh it's easy to do that via text a little more challenging to
do it via video but in today's world a lot of these videos can be almost indistinguishable from
actual footage so uh tread with caution.
I saw blue, we got blue come up
and then cool chick blue GM.
Welcome to the stage.
Hey GM, GM.
I was gonna comment on the college piece.
I have a 19 year old and he's a phenomenal artist,
phenomenal artist.
He got to do a couple of things
with different NFT projects just in our space.
And now he's in college.
I'm paying the bill, but I don't know what I'm paying for.
Because honestly, it's like you have to know what AI is.
You have to know either how to prompt or you have to figure out how you're going to wire it in the
background or have something where it's kind of like not centralized and you're just doing your
own thing but it's quite challenging and scary especially for the fieldies and when I was younger
I was an artist and everybody pushed me to architecture because they're like, you'll be able to survive and pay and live.
And architecture is like 90% math and kind of just like redoing old properties.
And it's just like, what are they going to school for when, very simple to DoorDash here in Georgia,
there's a lot of little robots driving around delivering people's food, not humans.
You know, Waymos are driving, so there goes the Uber guys.
And so it's just like, it's very challenging.
And a lot of the universities across the United States are not equipped for this type of technology.
There's maybe three schools that are really focused on AI and crypto.
And it's like some of the schools information are kind of behind and some are kind of trying to figure it out. But 90% of what's going on,
most of these kids or young adults, their jobs are going to be replaced.
Amazon is about to release a fully functional robot delivering your packages. So, I mean, in Florida, there's AI,
like, trucks, little AI-8 police trucks that are being, like, started and branched there.
So it's just, it's very, very scary. But also, just thank God, like like our kids have us that are in this field to kind of be able to tell
them hey this is what's going on because half of our country doesn't know what the other options
are um and heaven forbid you have like resources or a family that doesn't know anything about
technology or what's happening um so yeah it's something to really try to figure out and serve through.
Because it's like, what am I paying for?
Yeah, good question.
But I think just in asking the question, you're probably ahead of most.
Versus, and I'm not, please, I'm not taking any shots at any parents
if you're putting your kids most versus, and I'm not, please, I'm not taking any shots at any parents. If you're putting your kids through school respect, I just,
at least you're not doing so blindly thinking that, Oh, whatever,
they're going to get their degree and then they're going to immediately get a
job and they're going to be set. Like that, that is at least you're,
you're thinking critically about it and even not having the answer or not knowing.
you're thinking critically about it and even not having the answer or not
knowing.
We got, we got, we're going to go cool chick neck next before I want to read a couple of
comments in the chat. Boachin says, as someone working with college students for the past six
years, it's vastly different what the goals and mindsets are from when I graduated college. All
I can do is be better than the system that hasn't adapted to the current state of the world
and bring in life experiences and real world understanding to those willing to
listen before they graduate. Salute to you as well. Yeah, you can't even tell them to put their
head down and work anymore as the current jobs are not what the future is going to be. You're
likely right. So some of the smartest people or some of the smartest things to tell your kids is
to learn finance and computers and that they will always have access to financial freedom through that route. Other jobs that are
hands-on and need human back and forth and talk eye doctors medicines will also be no AI takeover
type jobs. Yes, I agree to some degree. I do think there is, I think we're a ways off before they're all replaced, but I think even a lot of jobs that,
I mean,
I was in on the 26 last week,
I was in a doctor's office with my same daughter.
She had a small fracture of her finger.
She's doing fine.
She got a brace off her splint off.
So she's excited about that.
I think we were there for two hours and we talked to the doctor for maybe
three minutes. There was an X-ray involved.
So there was a little bit of time back and forth,
but that was less than five minutes start to finish.
I don't know. Maybe I can't make that system more efficient,
but I have a hard time believing it can't. I'm not saying it's
replacing doctors. I just, I think things, I have no expectations of the future other than it's going
to be very different. And I do think things like robots are going to play a big role. AI is going to play a big role. I said last week, I,
for the first time thinking about stopping any DCA on Tesla stock and looking
to buy a second Tesla in 2026, making that part of the goal,
the financial goal for next year, not because I need another car,
but if we do actually achieve not just full self-driving
unsupervised, but the robo-taxi model, I agree.
I think you're right.
I think the robo-taxis will replace a lot of Uber drivers.
I would rather today, today, right now in this current version, I would much rather
drive in a full self-driving Tesla, have it drive for me than drive in a random Uber driver
that I have no idea their background or their driving record.
I'm not having like close calls and Ubers,
but I just,
it's random to roll the dice,
taking,
putting my life at the hand of a stranger.
Who's not really other than their state driver's license test.
Hasn't really,
you know,
proven to anyone that they're a good driver.
Different changes. The, is the only thing I'm certain of and i just think the rate of change even that even though i'm certain of change i think i'm probably even also
underestimating the rate of change so it's what what we do know is
well, we don't know this.
I believe that communicating, speaking,
without substituting your own thought with the LLM,
meaning not saying you don't ever use AI
to help you proofread or craft something
or get the thumbnail for the video you just cut.
I do believe that I actually think unique, original human thought
becomes increasingly valuable as more and more AI proliferates the timelines
in the social feeds.
I also think in real life experiences, experiential retail,
you might've heard me say once or twice on this show, become increasingly important as our world becomes more online, more connected digitally.
I think those things, those areas, now it's hard.
I'm not saying go open up a retail store.
If you open a retail store selling widgets, you're DOA.
Not only do you probably never make profits a single month, as soon as you do, like you're not, not only you probably never flip, you know,
make profits a single month, like as soon as you do, if you hit it big, especially,
you know, someone's going to start up an Amazon fulfillment store and take you out,
take, you know, take both your legs out from under you because they've got far less overhead
and they're delivering the same product, if not better same day or next day. Like, it's just like,
it's not, it's not retail, but I think the human interaction experiential experiences and shopping and content that is challenging to create without
a human original thought. I think that wins. It's just hard to package that in a prescriptive,
here's the steps to success in the day and new society and the new,
the new American dream that you do this, this, and this,
you're guaranteed this. Like, I don't,
maybe this is a good thing that there is no seemingly a guarantee,
just like the old one wasn't a guarantee,
but it did work for a lot of people. It just had a ceiling.
I think maybe this isn't the worst thing that we don't have a prescriptive path to success at this age.
And maybe that means more, not just younger generation, more people, more humans choose to pursue things that they're passionate about, choose to choose to do things that enable their time freedom.
That's not a negative. That's a big positive from, in my opinion, I just,
for someone who is long degeneracy, someone who is in the crypto streets,
the sports betting streets, I don't think most people should be in this.
Like it's not, most people will be net losers. I like to think I have an edge in most things I do. I don't think most people should be in this. Like it's not, most people will be net losers.
I like to think I have an edge in most things I do.
I don't at all.
I certainly don't.
And I'm self-aware enough to realize that, but it's still fun.
And if I don't have a edge that I'm confident in,
I just throw it on my volume to something that I am okay if it goes to zero.
I've also been in these streets for two decades and learned my, my tuition was in the form of
some L's or round trips. And that's, again, I just, I hope there's many, many more alternatives
than just the casino as, as we shift. We lost Cool Chick.
Cool Chick, if you want to get back up here, my apologies.
I was going to go to you next to take us home.
But no pressure, no obligation if you can't make it back up.
We'll do this while I wait, though.
We'll see if Cool Chick wants to join us.
And then I'll get you all out of here, send you on your way.
As I do that, though, quick reset.
If you've not yet grabbed the holiday badge, go do that now.
Get some fire art.
Maybe some goodies come from it.
Don't minute for the expectation of goodies.
Just go minute for some fun art courtesy of Emlo and show that you were here throughout the holidays
when a lot of people checked out.
That is pinned up top.
You can also just go directly to op.xyz slash claim and code CWC holiday.
Old Hatter adds, if you don't think big tech companies are coming for all the jobs, you're not looking enough moves down the line.
Uh, they may attempt to come for all the jobs. I just think that humans will still, I think today, many of them still appreciate human interaction.
Just look at the,
the,
how much negativity there is towards AI slop in the comments and pretty much
all AI gets,
gets labeled as AI slop now because you've identified it as a,
that's AI.
Like there was a,
I'm not going to singling him out because he's on the stage.
There was another article shared that it was fine. It was, it was fine it was a fine article i'm pretty sure it was ai generated
which again it's okay it would it could have been it could have been the poster's original thought
that he copied into an llm and had them had them refine it and craft it again it's fine it's okay
most meet it with a negative interaction,
if not outright vitriol and disgust or ignore a lot,
just ignore if it,
if it tips them off that it's AI,
many will just ignore it and not go a step further.
To me,
that's enough of a proof of concept or enough of a proof point that human
to human interaction is still very much so desired.
And I think as this stuff gets harder to distinguish,
which what's AI, what's human, because that's going to change. Like I think as this stuff gets harder to distinguish, which what's AI,
what's human, cause that's going to change. Like I'm surprised it hasn't already, but
in 2026, you probably see the M dash eliminated from all AI responses because everyone knows
if it's, if it's got an M dash or two in there, it's most likely generated by an LLM.
If it gives the, if this isn't this, this is that statement, that's probably, that's become another telltale sign of AI.
It's just, if you're in there every day, there's certain language that it uses, it's going to get better, it's going to evolve.
This is the worst they'll ever be, presumably for most models.
And people won't be able to, that'll be limited.
It'll be harder and harder to sell. Therefore, I think once that happens, even more people are going to seek out the human to human interaction,
seek out the third place that's not work or home, some place that can interact with other human
beings in real life, not in a metaverse. Cool chick. Welcome back to the stage GM ticket,
whichever direction you like, and then we'll, we'll get everyone out of here.
like and then we'll uh we'll get everyone out of here gm i'm feeling like super blessed um
listening to some of the comments about kids and college and and careers my daughter is 24
and may will make two years since she graduated college with honors. And she has wanted to be a veterinarian since I can remember.
Like, I don't ever remember her wanting to be anything else.
And I guess maybe three months after she graduated,
she got a job with a veterinarian.
and she's been a vet tech since.
And she's been a vet tech since.
She's trying to go on to further her education to be a veterinarian,
but we'll see what happens.
There's no veterinarian schools in our area,
so it's an out-of-state option, which is really super difficult to get into.
But I cannot get her into crypto.
Like I've tried so many times and her minor was art.
So she loves art, but she still doesn't really like the whole NFTs
or she just don't want anything to do with crypto.
But I had also, I trade stocks a little here and there.
And a few months ago, she showed me her portfolio.
She had actually got on Cash App and been buying stocks like I had showed her.
And she has a better portfolio than I do, like 10 times better.
So I was so proud that, you know, she had actually listened
to something that I had said, and, you know, bought stocks, but she's like, we're kind of
night and day, she has to do it on her own terms, you know, she doesn't want to follow my footsteps which I'm glad but you know I would love
to get her into crypto just a little bit but seeing her in stocks that was like you know
really really made me happy and that that she had actually listened to a little something I had said. So, but, you know, it is difficult.
I think that, like, the kids nowadays, like, everything's so different.
Like, there's no parties that you go to.
You know, everyone talks to each other through a phone.
We didn't have, you know, cell phones until I was, like, a little older.
So it was like when we were younger, we had to go track our friends down.
You had to go get out and drive and find them.
That's like driving.
She didn't even want her license until I think it was her last year of college.
She finally got her driver's license.
But now she drives everywhere.
But it's just different. It's a different time.
And she never mentions AI. I don't even know if she messes with AI at all.
Well, I appreciate you sharing. And again, congrats on the parenting because ahead of most
and you nailed it. It's got to be on their terms.
There's not one right or wrong, but expose them to options.
You know, you showed her crypto, you talked about NFTs,
you talked about stocks.
She chose to go that route and it sounds like she's hit some W's.
And when she's hit a few W's, like there's confidence grows,
she can continue to do that. And I's, it's, and I do, I am hopeful that more of the younger generation also still continues to
invest in trad fight, continue to invest in equity stock.
And I think they are while we want to talk long degeneracy and the casinos.
I mean, that's another version of the casino,
but it's a little more proven and has a track record and strong history over time, especially if they're not talking penny stocks, but rather blue chips, mag seven, or even just S&P 500.
You zoom out, it should be a wise investment.
I think it'll turn a lot of the younger generation off because they're not going to turn $100 into $100,000 overnight.
And they're probably not going to do that in sports betting or dfs or meme coins either but there's a path to doing so there they've seen others do it
unfortunately way out of line with what's real if they're viewing their social media to your point
in all these areas you see people posting their wins not their l's even some of the post big wins they're still down because they took more l's to get there it's they're always chasing that that one up or you know the
the 100x the thousand x the 10 000x that is just not realistic in traditional equities but
still a a very i would say better than savings account.
You know, it doesn't matter what interest rate or any, if any, they're getting on their
savings account at their traditional bank, at least showing them all these other options.
And then it's going to be on their terms, their time.
And maybe they come around to some of the others at a later date, but, you know, educate
you know, educate them, let them know what's out there. And I'll reiterate, maybe not having
them, let them know what's out there.
what is a consensus prescriptive path to success is a good thing. It might actually encourage
people to pursue their passions. If they want to be a vet, go be a vet. It's awesome. It's one of
the options on my youngest as well. Big love of animals. And I do think that's one. Now I think
AI will help this. Like, I
think it'll help make doctors more efficient and effective. I think same thing in the world of
veterinary medicine. But I still think there'll be that desire to interact with the human, at least
for a while. Good show today, little atypical show, but wanted to stick with the theme of being
authentic and genuine. And this one over the weekend, and like I said, the news is very disappointing, disgusting.
I think it's even more discouraging and disappointing that we haven't seen any action or very little action from the powers that be.
Traditional media has, a couple at least, have ran with the news.
Not done so in a way that garners attention from the masses.
In a journalistic approach, in this case by way of video like just really well done and i get that we could we could defend oh well
i don't know i just i really am struggling coming up with a a defense of all the because
you would think at least one of them would have been to this somalian daycare fraud story as was the,
the Boston globe was to spotlight. Is that right, Katie? The spotlight. Yeah.
The spotlight was the division of the Boston globe. That was the researchers,
the ones that were like the,
the hardcore journalists who went out there and uncovered stories.
I'll go back and read the other news articles that have been published on this.
They kind of missed the mark or they didn't double down. They weren't a spotlight of their
respective organizations enough to where they got the attention of the masses. And the fact that
this stuff has been known for so long and there's not been, I don't think, proper action taken,
it's disappointing. Hopefully it drives change. Hopefully one of those positive changes, it does inspire more Nick Shirley's. It inspires one of him in every city and helps get this stuff cleaned
up. Again, however you think about the reporting of this, however you think it's been handled,
I hope we can all agree it's fraud and corruption is not good and it would be a net positive to get it, if not eliminated, at least addressed and mitigated and instill in the public some confidence that the crime, the corruption is not turned a blind to, or certainly not aiding and participating.
Like right now, I think that is a, is a massive, there's a big gap there in terms of the confidence
and trust.
And I don't think that's a good thing for many reasons, but a lot of, a lot of, uh,
went all directions this morning.
We will be a little more succinct tomorrow a little more data driven
and a little more focused on crypto and web3 specific topics outer lumen is going to be
joining me again on tuesday the link is pinned up top if you haven't yet done so go go hit that
reminder i would appreciate it as we play everyone out uh big thanks to uh von fronten and cool chick
and blue and teacher katie and uh gary uh poppy appreciate everyone who jumped up on stage and shared their thoughts on this.
Help me think through some things.
And while this wasn't like,
what should we, what should we minting today?
It very much was at the core of Coffee with Captain
when this show started 1,062 episodes ago.
It was what happened last night,
what happened over the weekend that's on my mind.
I don't want to go read 18 discords
or 10 articles on this.
Let's talk through it.
And it was helpful talking through this.
It was probably going to weigh on my mind
a good chunk of the day.
Now I feel like I said my piece,
was able to talk through it
and go on to have a productive Monday
as I hope all of you will as well.
We'll be back tomorrow.
See you all then at 8 a.m. Eastern time.
And as Steve was saying, I hope you all have a wonderful, wonderful day, everyone. .
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