Can DOGE Fix the National Debt?

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Any examples used are for illustrative purposes only and do not take into account your particular investment objectives, financial situation or needs and may not be suitable for all investors. It is not intended to predict the performance of any specific investment and is not a solicitation or recommendation of any investment strategy. [00:00:18] Speaker B: This is another Money Show. Get set for another hour of the latest financial information and economic news affecting your bottom line. J.R. and Anthony are committed to helping more Americans like you optimize their inc. Reduce their tax risk and reach financial freedom. So let's start the show. Here are your hosts, Anthony Correo and J.R. rochford. [00:00:43] Speaker C: Here we are, your hosts, Anthony Correo and JR Rochford, taking a break from our day to day as financial advisors with Rochford and Associates, fully independent fourth generation family office right here in the greater Phoenix area to bring you information you may not find on those other financial radio shows. We are aware the last thing you need is another money show, but we appreciate you being here. [00:01:03] Speaker D: Wow, you sound kind of subdued today. What's up, Anthony? You okay? You feeling good? [00:01:07] Speaker C: What? [00:01:08] Speaker D: Are you feeling okay? [00:01:09] Speaker C: That was as chipper as usual. [00:01:11] Speaker D: No, no, no, that was a little bit more low key. That was a little bit more subtle. But we're okay. We'll jump right into it. Let's start out like we usually try to do with a quick shout out. So we had a listener, I don't know how loyal, we haven't really spoken with her yet, but she emailed, a woman named Marcy who listens, had a question for us. So thank you. I mean, we really, really look forward to your emails, your calls, if you're listening this week. Marcy, thank you so much. Hopefully you dug into the information you were looking for and it was as interesting to you as it is to us. So our goal on this show is always we want you proactive, not reactive. We want you prepared, not scared. And we bring you all of these things every week so you can research as you see fit or you can just find this entertaining and move on and look forward to hearing us next week. So we in our office, we do financial planning. If we can ever help you, if we can be a second opinion. I was working with somebody this morning who's got a tsp. He'll be listening. He's a regular listener. And with the tsp, he sent me a new letter that the head of the TSP put out. And it was interesting because it was like five, six pages and the focus was on the fact that even if you separate from Service, you can feel free to leave your TSP there. And we're, we're going to have a little more in depth conversation on this. But yeah, I mean, it's like most workplace plans, if you have an old 401k, some of the companies make you move it. They give you like 90 days or 180 days to move it. Most do not. They want it sitting there. When you're making money, they are making money along with you. So most of them, they will just ignore it like they have been while it was there. So. But you can cash out your retirement plan, your tsp, whatnot, you can leave it there, you can move it to an ira, you can do a hybrid of those things. And that is part of what we do week in, week out. We help people figure out what's best for their situation. One person, one couple, one family at a time. So as much as this show might be interesting on a couple different levels, don't forget we also do, you know, family practice. We do financial planning during the week. With that said, and we're honest. I know usually when somebody says that you have to run, but we are honest. We, our focus is always on planning over products and education over sales. And I mean that. So why don't we do this? Why don't we jump right into it? The Dow, I mean the financial markets. Are you watching things, Anthony? There's, there's, you know, once again, I've said this over the years, but there's some cracks in the financial markets. You know, we're, we're watching gold very closely. It seems like there's a short squeeze coming on gold. I don't know if they're getting to, you know, ready to revalue gold. The last time they valued it was when Nixon took us off the gold standard. And I believe it was valued at $42 an ounce. Well, today it's at about 29, I don't know, 2950. It's, it's nearing in on 3,000 an ounce. So if they revalue gold in this country and they talk about how much we have, they could basically say, yeah, well, we're 36 trillion in debt, but we have trillions in gold. So the debt is not as impactful as it was. So this is interesting. I'm trying to keep my ear on Joe Jaquin show over at Our sister station, 10:10am I'm trying to find information, but gold is acting different. So a lot of gold coming into this country right now, which is unusual. What else? Let's See here. Yeah. The Teflon Dow, you know, the 30 company Ponzi scheme as it is. That's kind of interesting to watch right now. [00:04:56] Speaker C: Well, I haven't really done much in the last few weeks. It went up once Trump got into office and kind of stayed flat since. [00:05:03] Speaker D: Yes. But it's watching the daily swings, it's moving a little more unusual. And I mean, I've been saying that we are so overdue for a correction. You know, a market that primarily only goes up even during the largest black swan event in the history of our country, in the world. It's not healthy. I mean, things need to change. Companies change, people change. You know, this, this is a machine. And I always focus in on the Dow because it's just surprising how few people that I meet know that it's only 30 companies. And when one underperforms to their standards, they remove it and put another one in. The last one was Walgreens. One of our country staples was taken out and Amazon was put in. And a lot of people don't know that. If it's, you know, this system, every single Friday in this country, the Dow, the S and P, the Russell, the Nasdaq, they have an influx of money. When I'm Talking about the TSP and, and your old 401k and your current 401k, they take money out of your paycheck. Whether you get paid every other Friday or bi weekly or bi monthly or whatever it is there, there's a huge influx of money into these stocks and bonds. So that, that helps this thing float no matter what happens. So I just know that when you look at the world and it's no less settled than it was at the end of 2024, end of 2023, whatnot, everything is uncertain and yet the market is staying up there around what, Dow? 40, 44 something thousand. Yeah. Sooner or later. I'm sorry, Sooner or later I will be right. I know, Anthony, you relish in the fact that I'm wrong, wrong, wrong forever. But sooner or later a broken clock is right. And I just, I feel like it's, it's a common, you know, all the stuff I'm reading right now. I mean, the gorilla in the room is Elon Musk and Doge and obviously we're going to get to that. But I mean, I just, man, I want people know what you have. Watch your stuff. Sam, just put the debt clock up on the, on the screen, the national debt is at 36, 4, 75 trillion. Picture a number with 12 zeros. Yeah. I mean, it's hard to fathom. So it's not slowing down. What is a little bit promising? The Doge. So the Doge clock that they recently added is already at $90 billion. It's only been three weeks that this Doge has been in place, and it's already at 90 billion, billion of presumed savings. You know, well, we might as well jump into Elon Musk right now. I, as, you know, Anthony, look for articles, I watch videos, you know, I scour social media. Watching Facebook right now, man, what up? You know, we're. We're as polarized with Musk as we are with Trump. And it's interesting, when you watch Mad Maxine Waters and Chuck Schumer, when you watch the people that are upset, the people that are millionaires, multi, multi, millionaires on a government dime, it's wow. So these people have a problem with us trying to right the ship, the financial ship. You know, listen to Chuck Schumer. Listen to him in front of the podium. I don't know if it was yesterday or whatever, talking about, you know, we, we, yes, there's problems. He finally admitted that there's problems. But he said something like, you know, we need to, we need to, you know, cut things, but you're taking like a meat cleaver to do it. You've been in office since like 1975 or something ridiculous. And now you're admitting that we have problems and they need to be fixed. But don't do it so extreme. I disagree completely. Chuck, if you're listening, call me. I need to talk to you about something. We need to throw every system on its head. It's too late. If you have a toaster and it's not working properly, you do one of two things. You fix it or you throw it away. It is way too late to fix this financial system in our country. It is time to throw it away. Elon Musk is throwing it away. We're going to get rid of all this stuff. We're going to rebuild. We're going to start over. We're going to have a more streamlined government. And I, believe me, I look at all your posts. People talking about Musk is evil, talking about Musk as a liar. You know, there's one woman that basically is saying, you know, Trump is the Antichrist. I don't know. That's way above my pay grade. All I know is that I've been in the financial services industry for going on 30 years. And about 20, 25 of those years, I thought something's wrong. I thought people should do more Roth IRAs. I thought people should spend less, save more, pay down debt, do certain things. And I looked at the big picture and I was like, oh my gosh, we've got a government that is so out of control with the reckless spending worse every year. And I'm looking at both sides of the aisle. It needs to be shaken up. And that's what's going on right now. So it's very interesting. You know, some of these, some of the politicians, I'll call them, it's incredible. It's incredible. Some of their net worth. I poked around a little bit. Oh, by the way, Anthony, I want a little follow up to last week's show. You, you found it hard to believe that Bernie Sanders took like 1.9 million from pharma money. Did you get a chance to look further and see if that is true? [00:10:25] Speaker C: Yeah, I mean it didn't take much. It's by the way that they categorize it. If you work in a medical field, if you are a nurse and you donate to the pack and that money gets to Bernie, then they count that as the healthcare field. So not necessarily big pharma or any of these people. It could be an individual. [00:10:51] Speaker D: Okay, that's funny because I'm going to send you a chart later today. I'll text it over to you that I found yesterday. And it showed because I mean, taking kickbacks, I mean there is a lot to it. It's like, well, did they get it into their reelection campaign? Did it go into their pocket? So I found a chart and this is from OpenSecrets.org if you have some time, poke around on OpenSecrets.org it was kind of a rabbit hole. I spent way too much time on it anyway. Healthcare campaign contributions. So this is a spreadsheet and right on top is Bernie Sanders the total campaign contributions from 1990 to 2024. So I realize this is a, a big swath of time. 23193451 so he's taken a total of 23. If this is correct, my presumption is it's been vetted and verified. I wouldn't even know how to do. [00:11:47] Speaker C: So there was more to that. Did you read why they. Because even the article that says that it's all BS said referenced all of their data and says that there's more to it than that. So I would love for you to be right. I would love to just start hating all politicians because of this. But there's more information than just reading one article and seeing broken pieces of. [00:12:07] Speaker D: Data, which why I'm as I wanted you to dig in like you apparently have. I mean, this thing itemizes the breakdown on that 23 million. It shows pharmaceuticals and health products 1.9. The numbers on the articles I'm finding are matching up. So I think it's more factual than not. Pharmaceutical manufacturing, 800,000. Health insurance and HMOs 1.8 million. Hospitals and nursing homes, 2.7 million. Medical devices and supplies, 451,000. Medical societies, 12 million. Nursing associations, 3 million. It breaks down different areas that he's taken money. And obviously when you look up the guy's net worth, he's only worth on paper around $3 million. But this is showing that he's taken in 23 million. So my guess if this is all factual, is that there's just tons of money flowing everywhere, but it's never flowing everywhere with the mainstream American. The rich are getting richer, the poor are hovering, the middle class are shrinking. These people that represent me and you and the one and only Sam Davis are filthy rich. And one of the things, when I started looking into a little bit more, I focused on Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders. I focus a little more on the ones that are the most vocal on how we all need equality and screw the rich. Some of these slime balls. The number one net worth I found, and this is just from Wikipedia, which is normally generally thought of as a left leaning publication. So what I found, list of current members of the United States Congress by wealth. The number one by far is a Republican named Kevin Hearn, that they're saying his net worth is roughly $361 million. So Rick Scott, number two is a Republican, 259 million. So I'm not just picking, you know, people on one side of the aisle. Mitt Romney is up there with 174 million. Nancy Pelosi. [00:14:13] Speaker C: But can all these people have businesses before? I mean like Bushes were career politicians, but they had an insane amount of money before they got into office too. [00:14:23] Speaker D: And let me ask you a couple questions like let's just focus on Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Nancy Pelosi. Yeah, yeah. I mean Paul Pelosi, they have huge, massive real estate investments. A lot of these people do have a couple questions for you. First of all, then why do they need to represent the people for an entire career? They have successful businesses. [00:14:46] Speaker C: Go do your thing different. Are you talking about term limits now? But what does term limits have to do with. [00:14:53] Speaker D: Oh, I would love term limits. I mean that that'd be. That would help me not worry about this so much. I mean, I think, you know, rich people, poor people, all kinds of people should represent the American people. So term all this is easy to. [00:15:04] Speaker C: Stop electing them, Stop voting. [00:15:07] Speaker D: Exactly. Exactly. I mean, amen. That seems to be the only way to get them out. You just rolled in Mitch McConnell in a wheelchair to vote against RFK Junior as our help. [00:15:18] Speaker C: Didn't we. Didn't we lose a politician to a. Oh, my God. A memory care facility. Was that a couple episodes going on for six months? [00:15:27] Speaker D: Yeah, we brought that to you a few months back. Oh, yeah. It's insane. You know, Dianne Feinstein, another one who's way up there family now because she has since passed worth gobs of millions of dollars and all I'm getting at. I really think the moral compass of this country is completely, completely broken. I mean, the old thought of right is right, wrong is wrong. Whether somebody's looking or not has really escaped these politicians. And it is a rabbit hole. One of the things that I had a little bit of trouble with when I started digging into these, you can go to 10 different sources and find 10 different numbers of their net worth. And I just found it interesting. A lot of them, the more you poke around, you find ranges that seem pretty tight. You know, Bernie Sanders worth 3 million. And Bernie is the champion for the rich should pay their fair share. Bernie, what is rich? I mean, I'm guessing, apparently it's anything more than you have. [00:16:22] Speaker C: Well, isn't this the same argument for Elon Musk? Let's cut waste, let's cut grants, let's cut all this stuff to the corporation bailouts with all the incentives he's gotten over the years. [00:16:33] Speaker D: And I said, both sides of the aisle. I mean, Elon Musk, what are you going to do as the richest man on the planet? What are you going to do with it? I mean, you know, Bill Gates wants to de. I mean, presumably allegedly. I've heard he wants depopulation. He wants to buy all the land and change their food. And I mean, I don't know good or evil, I don't know what these people are gonna do with it. I'm not saying no to Elon Musk. You know what I love about Elon Musk? Right now? He's doing what I have screamed about since I've known you, Anthony. I've said everything's unfair and we need to fix it. And that's what he's doing. Is he personally, should he be worth you know, he'll be our first trillionaire. No, I think it's absolutely ridiculous. I, I, I really, I mean, and. [00:17:11] Speaker C: He doesn't even have all of that money. He's definitely rich, but he's got share value. And the shares of Tesla should never have been worth what they earned today. [00:17:19] Speaker D: Correct. And, and I know, I mean, that's more of financial. I, I just, I listen to, you know, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren are probably my first favorite too. I listen to them on their equality of wealth. Elon Musk is not out there saying we should all be even. You should tax the risk. He's rich. He knows it. He's smart. I think he's way beyond normal smart. So he's not even grasping what a lot around him goes on. But Bernie Sanders is out there saying tax rich and it's bad if you're rich, but you're rich. [00:17:49] Speaker C: Elon Musk isn't saying that he's got money coming in. That happens when you have money coming in. [00:17:55] Speaker D: You lost me right there. [00:17:56] Speaker C: I mean, he's made money like congressmen get paid pretty decent. And he's been in that for forever. So you can only spend so much. So he has money coming in. It adds up. [00:18:08] Speaker D: Congressman, you said they get, you know, one of the things on Wikipedia, it starts out with something position and it has the salary. Speaker of the House, that was Nancy Pelosi, 223,000. Senators and representatives, 174,000. That is better than the average salary in the country. I grant that, I give you that. I can tell you what I mean. You know, Barack Obama, he was president. That one's worth four hundred and something thousand a year. Barack Obama on, on this net worth site. I was on this one. [00:18:41] Speaker C: And none of those are ever that accurate. [00:18:45] Speaker D: Yeah, and that's why I said that. I said if you, you start digging, you'll find a range to narrow in on it. They, they vary widely depending on the source. But I know that Barack Obama was fairly young person, you know, made 450 or whatever grand a year for the eight years he was president. But he's worth 70 million. What you're saying, Anthony, is that's a great living. They can put that money away and save more than they spend. The millions that they're worth doesn't match up with their salary. You know, we know a lot of people that make really good salaries. How many people, Anthony, have you met? You've been in the financial services industry almost seven years. How many people have you met worth 3 million or more? Not that many. I know other financial services firms are buying demographics lists and they're doing lunch seminars and they're finding ways to get at these higher net worth clients than we are. So shame on us. Good on them, because you and I don't have a boat and a lot of them do. But I can tell you something, I mean, it doesn't add up. The, the, the, I want you one day to understand the slime that is our government. The under the table dealings. Nancy Pelosi with her insider stock trading. Do you think Paul Pelosi would be as wealthy as he is on his private businesses if he didn't know what regulations were coming? I would say no, of course not. And I think it's just foul. And I think for the first time in 50 years, it's all coming up to the surface. I think that whole thing we heard Trump's first term drain the swamp. This time we're actually seeing it. And these people that are screaming, Maxine Waters, holy cow, These people that are screaming, I want all of them audited. They spent four years saying, you show us your tax records, Trump, we need to audit Trump. Let's audit you. Let's, let's go a little further. Trump's, I mean, you know, he tried to defend himself, but he didn't seem to be non transparent. He didn't seem like he had that much to hide. These people do I feel I want to audit Maxine Waters. I want to audit these people. Chelsea Clinton, she's another one I looked up. They're saying she's worth 30 million. You're the daughter of Bill and Hillary, so that's got to be worth something, 30 million. And now it's coming out just the last week that apparently as they're digging into this USAID, Chelsea Clinton was awarded $84 million. Well, what I found was she was worth 30. So now you're saying Chelsea Clinton, who is 45 years old, by the way, she's under fire for possibly, possibly allegedly, whatever you want to say, taking 84 million of U.S. aid. I mean that I don't know if all of a sudden, Chelsea Clinton, who one day will be our president, of course, you know, really, she's worth 120 million. I cry foul. I just think this is so dirty and I don't know. Nancy Pelosi, Nancy Pelosi, they're saying is, you know, her salary is 223,000, she's worth 120 million. I just can't do the leap that they make good salary. So they. They have money. They deserve to have money. They work hard. Now get out. Something seems dirty. Remember last week I said to, you know, take these politicians if. If they're treasonous and hang them? That was a little extreme. I did get a little feedback on the. On the text. I got a little feedback that that was a little extreme. Well, I don't know. I mean, I started looking up. I did an online search, 18 U.S. code 2381 on treason, and it still stands. This is what it says. Whoever owning allegiance to the United States. Correct me if I'm wrong, but that's our elected representatives and appointed officials. Whoever owning allegiance to the United States levies war against them or adheres to their enemies, given them aid and comfort within the United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason and shall suffer death or shall be imprisoned not less than five years and find under this title not less than $10,000 and shall be incapable of holding any office under United States. This was. The statute was from June 25, 1948. And it basically is saying I'm on the right track. You know, you're selling out our country for your own personal gain. That is financial treason. You're giving secrets to the Chinese. That. That is. How else do you say it, but treason. I know, I know. I mean, a lot of what I say is extreme. I understand that. I'm just in shock by what's going on in our country. And I think a lot of things are going to come out. I was reading a X this morning. Jesse Waters. $43 million on a gas station in Afghanistan that had no customers. 1.5 million to promote LGBT Jamaicans. 4 million for trans Siberians. Isn't that an orchestra? Man, even. They got in on this. 5.5 million for gay rights in Uganda. 17 million for Vietnam inclusion. 25 million to promote green transportation in Georgia. 1 million for Arab and Jewish photographers. 8 million to teach Sri Lankan journalists how to avoid binary gender language. 120 million ended up in the hands of terrorists. That's where the USAID has been spending your money. Democrats have been. Well, it's all of them. But Democrats have been sending your tax dollars to all kinds of crazy places like George Soros, Prosecutor Fund, and even worse, the media political risk. Politico received $26 million over the last four years from the federal government. The White House says it's all getting doged. I don't know, Anthony. I know that I am tinfoil hat. I know that I'm conspiracy theory. I know all that. But that doesn't make me wrong. You know, the thing my mom said when I was a kid, just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get you. For a long time I've thought everything about the direction of our countries is wrong and foul. And now I'm getting to see it. And some of the hatred, it shifted. The Trump hatred seems to have waned. Now it's the musk hatred. You know, I saw a funny little meme this morning talking about Trump derangements in them, and now there's. There's Elon derangement syndrome. So now people are getting ed. So interesting. Yeah. And one more thing, and I know where you and I see it a little bit differently. I know that it might be here nor there for the show. I just find it interesting. It's a good time to look up your representatives and what they're worth. Here's a X. Nancy Pelosi, annual salary 223,000. Net worth 202 million. Mitch McConnell, annual salary 200,000. Net worth 95 million. Chuck Schumer, annual salary 210. Net worth 75 million. Elizabeth Warren, annual salary 285,000. Net worth 67 million. All I have to say is, you know, I've been in the job looking at people's financial statements for going on three decades, and I see some that have a lot of money. I don't see. It's not normal. So. And Mitch McConnell, by the way, you know, you brought up term limits. Oh, good night. Get these people away from the country. Anthony, you're young. We've seen a shift. You know, correct me if I'm wrong, but RFK was a Democrat from a Democratic family. He came over to Trump's side within the last 18 months. You know, Joe Rogan. [00:26:25] Speaker C: Yeah, but the Russian asset was also a Democrat. [00:26:28] Speaker D: Yeah. Do you believe for one second she was a Russian asset? [00:26:31] Speaker C: Not at all. I just, I think it's hilarious how much they. I don't know. The Democrats turn on one another. If you're not Democratic enough for them, if you don't. I mean, I have said it before, I'm a registered Democrat. I don't like the Democratic Party at all. [00:26:46] Speaker D: Well, and, and you don't like either party, which I admire. [00:26:48] Speaker C: That is also very true. [00:26:50] Speaker D: So, and Sam, we're correct. Sam said Trump used to be a Russian asset, too. That is 100% correct. So right before the election, I started reading he was going to be a Chinese asset. So we will see what kind of asset he is. This year. [00:27:03] Speaker C: North Korean, right? [00:27:05] Speaker D: North Korean. At least be South Korean. So why don't we do this? Let's take a break because we have to get to the articles that, you know, I look so much forward to every week. Thank you so much for being with us. You know, we greatly appreciate it. Please give us your show ideas, questions, set up a time to sit down with us and see what we really do during the week. So 623-523-0444 or you can email us at teamnothermoneyshow.com and we will be honored to help you in any way we can. We'll be right. Oh, one last thing. Keep helping us with the YouTube channel. We're gaining subscribers. We're making Joe Rogan nervous. So make sure you like and subscribe and get the word out for us. We appreciate it. We'll be right back. [00:27:47] Speaker B: This is another Money show, except this one's different. This one's actually fun. [00:27:59] Speaker A: Remember, all of Junior and Anthony's listeners receive a free financial consultation just for listening to the show. Visit anothermoneyshow.com to learn more and schedule an appointment. Thanks for listening to another Money show and subscribing wherever you listen to podcasts. [00:28:14] Speaker D: Welcome back to another Money Show. Thank you so much for being with us. As you know, we're on every Saturday at noon right here at 9:60. The Patriot. They re air our show Sunday at 1. If this is a little much to take in, catch it again. And wherever you find podcasts, you can find us. You can find us on our website, anothermoneyshow.com so you can find us all over the place. Do a little Internet search. So during the break, we, Anthony and Sam and I discuss things a little bit. We're kind of hoping that Sam plays a little bit of it because I think it was more interesting than our actual outlined scripting. [00:28:49] Speaker C: You're already talking to the audience again and not just talking to me. [00:28:52] Speaker D: My job is to talk to the audience. I don't want to talk to you. I talk to you enough during the week. Good. I talk to you during the week. I want to talk to the audience. I have people that text me and they. And you know, it's funny because I don't think I've said this to you in a while. There's a whole bunch of people listening that kind of take sides. I mean, you know, some of them. Oh, I know. [00:29:10] Speaker C: Hilarious. [00:29:10] Speaker D: We had one show up at our West Valley Men's networking this week. If you're a man by the way if you're a man listener, yes, we are sexist. If you're a man and you want to meet us in a casual setting, we meet the second Tuesday of every month at Throne on 67th Avenue a little bit north of Bell. And we do a casual happy hour. No dues, no speakers, no commercials. Just get to know each other and have each other as a resource if ever needed. So that's how we consider it networking. But there's also Pepsi and beer and really good food. So come and join us. Anyway, back to everything. I want to do another follow up. I asked you if you dug into the pharma kickbacks and so forth for Bernie and et cetera. I said I was going to read normalcy bias this week. I want to make sure people are familiar with that term because I think it is very pervasive. I think a lot of people different levels and, and not. I think a lot of people are stuck in normaly bias. It's. It's been the number one psychological term I've heard in my life. [00:30:09] Speaker C: But what about just evolution and things changing because things change. So your normalcy bias is also based on things stay the same forever. [00:30:18] Speaker D: It's not that way. All everything cycles. I, I've, you've heard me on this show say if you're having a great day, don't get too cocky. Tomorrow might suck. If you're having a really bad day, hang out. [00:30:25] Speaker C: How do you differentiate between a normalcy bias and just acceptance of things that are changing versus the natural path of things changing? [00:30:35] Speaker D: I think we put blinders on. I think we, I think everything's so overwhelming we're not sure how to deal with it. I think the greatest thing that's happened in my lifetime in this country is happening right now around me. You know, our conversation during the break. I mean, I think that if, if right now we are tearing down walls to see exactly what's going on inside of them. This, this is so great. I'm not sure you know how much of during the breaks conversation Sam will be able to play, but I can tell you something. One of the analogies I gave is the boat. If you've got a boat and it's slowly sinking because it's taken on water, are you better off to use a bucket and dump out the water or fix the hole in the bottom of the boat? Like him or hate him, I just don't care. Trump, you know, Elon Musk, you know, soon to be rfk. Congratulations this morning he finally made it without the support of Mitch McConnell in his wheelchair. We are finally. We are finally addressing the swamp that this country's become over the last 50 years. Yes. Under both sides of the aisle. So I don't know. I love it. And normalcy bias, it transcends things cycling. It transcends everything going on around us, you know, during all of this uncertainty with the stock market. I looked at it this morning. Dow was up like 134 right before we started recording the normalcy bias, you know, and let me read the definition, because maybe one or two people listening will be like, oh, yeah, no, that makes perfect sense. So normalcy bias is a cognitive bias which leads people to disbelieve or minimize threat warnings. Consequently, individuals underestimate the likelihood of a disaster when it might affect them and its potential adverse effects. The normalcy bias causes many people to not adequately prepare for natural disasters, market crashes, and calamities caused by human error. So it's also known as the ostrich effect. All that I get at with the normalcy bias, you have to see that the world is changing. [00:32:37] Speaker C: How is the ostrich effect different than the boy who cried wolf effect, where it's, I'm just going to cry that everything is awful and everything's bad until it actually happens. So it's not like things have been bad forever. It's. [00:32:49] Speaker D: It's the exact opposite. It's 180 degree opposite. The boy that cried wolf is me. You know, everything's bad. Everything. The sky is falling, Chicken Little, Everything. [00:32:57] Speaker C: Isn't that your normalcy bias? Like, you're stuck. I didn't say I'm not accepting. [00:33:01] Speaker D: I. You've never called me out on it. I'm. I've never said I'm not subject to normalcy bias. I know one thing, you know, as and I. I won't be too graphic here. If monkeys fly out of my butt, as they used to say decades ago on Saturday Night Live, I will not be surprised. What's the bottom line of me bringing up normalcy bias over the, you know, three years? Be prepared. Don't be scared. Be. It ties into our show beautifully. You know, what you have said over the years, why do you get so worked about it? There's nothing you can do about it. You're right. There's things I can control and things that I cannot. I cannot control elections. My little part is to vote and hope it counts. You know what I can do? I can pay down debt. I can put away some hard assets I can have. You know, I mean, I heard A commercial literally this morning from the government on the radio, 960 the patriot. I heard it on that said, you better have a go bag. It was from either FEMA or Homeland Security. And it said, you should be prepared if something happens. I was like, holy crap, that I've been saying that for 20 years. I actually heard it on the radio this morning. I wish I would have listened more closely. You know, I just, all of a sudden I was like, oh, what did I just hear? My whole thing, control what you can control. You know, what do we do day in, day out, Anthony? When people do come in the office, we look at financial statements with them, we talk to them, we explain what a will or a trust is and what it might do for them. We explain what a personal liability umbrella policy is and how it might affect them. We explain healthcare. Get, you know, if you, if you need your own healthcare, get it through a broker. Don't just go to a company. We. All of this stuff that we do is to help people be prepared. Not scared, proactive, not reactive. If you understand normalcy bias and you think everything's gonna be okay forever, and then one day it's not. That's. That's where it's problematic. So we can help you optimize your situation and then you don't have to worry so much about it, you know? Last night your mom watched the Masked Singer. I guess it's a new season or something. Luckily, I was not home, so I did not have to hear any minute of it. By the way, before the show started today, Sam had a really, really good idea. Let's put some skin in the game over the Masked Singer. Like put some really interesting people under those masks. Not these, you know, has been or wannabe stars. Let's put some power behind it. I believe Sam recommended Jeffrey Epstein, who did not kill himself. Maybe he's still out there. Yeah, I want to put like Chuck Schumer, Maxine, water. I want to. Let's double down on all of the noise some of these people are making. Sam, wonderful point Sam put up on the screen. I think most people are too busy making it through the day to care about much else. Hey, we're busy. We have kids, we have work, we have grandkids. We have stuff to do. We want to plan on that vacation next summer. We're so. There's so much going on. We live in this crazy fast, instant gratification society. We have social media. We're. We're jealous because other people went to the, you know, this and they went to that and you didn't. And you're sad. There's so much going on, it's hard to make sure you've done the best thing you can for your situation. So I have no idea where we got there. You know what? We're getting rid of pennies. How's that for a segue? Did you read about that? It costs, it costs $0.03 to make a penny. So when I talk about it with nickels, though, nickels, 11 cents to make a nickel. So that's coming. So, you know, and then I read, you know me, I mean, even pennies, I'm reading articles on pen. So one of the things that I read, yeah, $0.03 to make a penny. And then nickels are not far behind because they take 11 cents. It said in this article only about 20% of all transactions are in cash. So whether the Fed now in executive or order 14067, whether or not we go to a central bank, digital currency, which is actually less likely than it was six months ago. So if we go that direction, 80% of all the transactions really won't be affected. I mean, if bitcoin becomes the currency of the world or dogecoin or something does, it's only going to affect 20%. I found that interesting. And by the way, are pennies going to increase in value? Because if you go into most homes in this country, they have an old water jug filled with change. So this is interesting. You know, we've talked about it for years. People when I was new in the industry, they talked about getting rid of pennies. They're just a hassle factor. And now it's coming. So we are changing every single thing in this country. And I say bring it on. Let's. I don't want to run out the clock today. I've got a few things to get to. Let's talk a little bit more slime and then we'll move on. Because, Anthony, you sent me more articles than usual, so. But I want to get to a couple. One is on the 12th of February, by the way, if we didn't say so earlier, we are recording today on Thursday, February 13th. So from yesterday, letters, this is on MSN.com, letters to the editor. $500,000 for three months work. What was Mayor Karen Bass thinking? This just. It's really quick, but it piqued my interest. Can anyone explain how a seemingly intelligent person such as Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass can also have such remarkably poor judgment? Says here Steve Soboroff, appointed to lead The City of LA's recovery effort after last month's fires, appears to be a successful businessman. Yet Bass approved his salary of nearly half a million dollars to be funded entirely by charitable organizations for three months work. Did it not occur to her that the charitable donations for that salary should go towards assisting all the folks who've lost every single thing in their lives? Eventually, Bass reversed course and said Soboroff would work for free. Oh, that's nice. But I'm not sure what was worse. Bass at first approving the salary or sober off accepting it. Talk about a race to the bottom. So that was. [00:38:51] Speaker C: Well, I mean if they're. If he's going to do work, you should be paid for your work, right? That's capitalism. But 500 grand, like that's obscene. [00:39:00] Speaker D: 500 grand for three months? Yeah. And I guess I look at like if you're a successful businessman and you're worth a lot of money. I don't know. Sometimes be a good person, be a good steward of others resources and don't take it, say no, I'm going to do this for free. I'm going to take three months of my life pro bono and help people that are victims of this fire, whether intentional or not. Another article for you. I'll just get to a little bit of it. This is also from MSN.com on the 11th of February inside FEMA's sickening history of misspending billions of taxpayer dollars and going largely unchecked. The Federal Emergency Management Agency has mismanaged tens of billions of dollars over the years, according to numerous government reports into its spending. The government agency's response to Covid hurricanes, floods, housing, migrants have all come under fire for being wasteful and going largely unchecked. As the newly created Department of Government Efficiency, the doge, has been sent in to analyze the spending. I love the doge, by the way. The most recent audit of the embattled disaster response agency claimed it mismanaged nearly 10 billion during the COVID pandemic between 20 and 23. FEMA even approved a grant of 1.1 billion despite it only being supported by a single piece of paper with no itemized costs. The January 30th audit by the Department of Homeland Security's Office of the Inspector General found the request was also not prepared by a licensed professional engineer or cost estimating professional, according to the 36 page report. Let's see. Anything else important here? No, it's the same old stuff. It's just another example of why we need what we're seeing right now, anything important on this one? Here's from zero hedge. On 11 February, Doge investigating feds whose net worths have exploded after Samantha Powell. I'm sorry, Power bombshell. Doge head Elon Musk said on Tuesday that Doge is going to investigate federal employees whose net worth have exploded despite their comparatively low pay. Ooh, Anthony, it's like I wrote this for you. It's like I wrote you a Valentine's Day card and this is what I wrote in it. The announcement, which came after President Donald Trump signed an executive order calling on federal agencies to work with Doge, follows a bombshell report. Wait till you hear this. That Samantha Power, former head of USAID. Former saw her net worth explode, slowed to $30 million despite an annual salary of under 250,000. We don't know why. Where. I know why you should bring me on Doge. I have a good idea how all this stuff is going on. We don't know why. Where did it come from? I think the reality is that they're getting wealthy at the taxpayer expense, Musk said on Tuesday. All right, Musk, now you just went down a rung on my ladder. You are now Captain Obvious to me. Power of former ambassador and I think he was being sarcastic. Power of former ambassador to the United nations under President Obama, was sworn in as head of USAID in May of 2021. Reported a net worth of between 6.7 and 16.5 million in January 2021. On her disclosure form. Her net worth now is estimated as high as 30 million. According to the website Biden's Basement. Says here, if we had to venture a guess, access to information from the Treasury, USAID and the Office of Personal Management run through Palantir's intelligence apparatus will quickly unravel. Graft, isn't it? Grift graft hidden through multiple layers of organizational fog. Meanwhile, there's the issue of lawmakers who have become unbelievably lucky when it comes to growing their net worth, you know, via insider trading. Nancy Prose is high on that list. She made 16 trades apparently last year worth a profit of 37 million. So that's pretty cool. That's pretty good investor. She blew away Warren Buffett last year. We brought that to you. So in July, a bipartisan group of senators, including Josh Hawley, came to an agreement on a renewed effort to ban members of Congress from trading stock. Congress should not be able to make a buck, Hawley said at the time. There is no reason why members of Congress ought to be profiting off the information that only they get. All right, so I just read an article that's the same exact thing I've been saying. Anthony, I was surprised how many articles you sent me this past week. I mean, usually I'm in charge of all the articles and you send me one here and there. Do you mind if we get to a couple of the ones you sent? You can explain to me your thoughts on them. Watch your guru from the 10th of February after pausing. BRICS Saudi Arabia invests 600 billion in. [00:44:11] Speaker C: The US yeah, fascinating that some of these, you know, supposed Brics nations are changing course now that Trump's in office. I don't think this article gets published. If Kamala had gotten elected. [00:44:26] Speaker D: Amen. One of my confusion points with this didn't Saudi Arabia, we had a 50 year compact with them to use the US dollar to trade oil and they took us off that about, I don't know, three or four months ago. [00:44:40] Speaker C: I know there was conflicting stuff on that where it wasn't actually, it was more of a gentleman's agreement and not anything actually written into a contract really. [00:44:49] Speaker D: See, I didn't know that. I thought it was a formal. [00:44:51] Speaker C: There's a lot of missing information in a lot of these articles which. [00:44:56] Speaker D: Yeah, and don't forget, if you read an article, the stuff that I bring you every week, you're getting somebody's opinion. One of the reasons that I really pride myself on trying to find two or three sources that corroborate each other is I know everybody's entitled to their opinion. I know what the opinions are like. I want to make sure I'm on the right track. I don't want to bring you stuff that has holes in it, or at least glaring holes. I do not remember that the Saudia pact was a gentleman's agreement. But it's interesting because it actually seems like, yeah, maybe we are going to fix this country and it's swampy ridiculousness. Maybe we don't have to worry about the BRICS nations taking over the world reserve currency as much as we did. Maybe everything's going to be okay. You want to hear a very rare bit of optimism from me? I mean, when I read that article, I was like, wow, Anthony sent me something that I actually, this is great news. I mean, we're bringing a bunch of gold. Back when we started out talking about a squeeze, we're bringing, we're repatriating gold right now hand over fist in this country. They're saying like, you know, watch London. I don't know where it is right now, but I printed an article for last week about they're not having as much gold as they thought they would because we're taking it all back. It was interesting. The one thing about this article. Let's see here. Therefore, after pausing BRICS Saudi Arabia plans to invest $600 billion in the US over the next four years. Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman told the US President Donald Trump that the kingdom wants to invest that amount and expand trade. MBS said that the investments would create unprecedented economic prosperity for both Saudi Arabia and the U.S. however, the kingdom did not detail in which sector the 600 billion will be invested. They did not make it clear if it would be invested in the private or public sector and provided little to no information on how money would be deployed. So I'm on a wait and see to see over the next months and years how Saudi Arabia being more of a partner affects us and are other nations going to follow suit and be less likely to replace us as the currency? We'll see. You sent me another article From Reuters on 9 February. Trump says US may have less debt than thought because of fraud. That's super interesting too. Says here Trump says some treasury payments might not count. The US debt is currently more than 120% of GDP. Congress will have to raise the debt ceiling this year. The US President Donald Trump said on Sunday his administration was examining the US treasury debt payments for possible fraud and suggested that the country's 36 trillion in debt load might not be that high. Amen. That's another very positive thing. [00:48:00] Speaker C: He gives no real proof in that. He's just saying that that could be so we'll have to see how this turns out. He says a lot of things, but I just thought it was interesting statement I find. I imagine it's enough to drop it under, you know, 120% debt to GDP ratio, but we'll see. [00:48:19] Speaker D: Well, and anything we can do to help the future for you and Sam and Jay and Nick for the future, I'm all ears. If we get the GDP, you know, the explosion from 120 down to 110, it's something, I mean, it's something, you know. How do you eat an elephant? One bite. No, how do you. You don't eat an elephant. How do you skin a cat? You don't leave the elephants and the cats alone. So in this article, Trump has tasked Elon Musk with an ambitious overhaul of the federal government, sparking street protests in Washington and accusations that Trump administration is breaking the law. Yeah, the Law. The law was doing so well. We're on the right path. Musk's DOGE has disrupted operations at several federal agencies and raised privacy and security concerns while accessing sensitive payroll and spending records. Give me a break. Every day you hear about breaches and hacks and you know the Chinese, apparently that we brought this to you a couple months ago, hacked the Treasury. You're worried about Musk having access to your Social Security number. I got news for you. Familiarize yourself with VPNs and, and the dark web and you can find anybody's Social Security number. So I wouldn't worry about the security concerns anyway. So this article, it's another optimistic article for me because it's saying maybe we're not in as bad shape as we thought we were if we get to the bottom of all this, maybe if we bring enough gold back to this country and where I'm really, really keeping my fingers crossed, I hope we go back to a hard asset backed dollar. I hope we go back on the gold standard and, and it's worth whatever I hope they valued at 3,000 an ounce and we go back to that. So I'm kind of excited. And let's see the other article you sent me. You sent me a couple more. Fed NEARS QT CROSSROADS as excess liquidity evaporates. So Orlando, Florida. This one is Reuters on the 10th. A key measure of excess liquidity in the financial system is evaporating rapidly once it disappears, further reduction of the Federal Reserve's balance sheet. Quantitative tightening could trigger a potentially worrying decline in bank reserves. And I'm not sure why you sent this article. That may be true, but once there is no excess liquidity sloshing around the system, liquidity drained by quantitative tightening will have to come from bank reserves. The cash banks keep on hand at the Fed. That oils the wheels of inner bank lending and underpins confidence in the financial system. We have been shouting in my office for decades, there's no money. There's lines and zeros. I haven't brought it up in a few weeks because there's been more to talk about. Thank you very much, Mr. Musk. There's been more pressing issues. The FDIC, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, has roughly 1.1% of insurance in the coffers to what's, you know, covered accounts. There's no money. We're on a fractional reserve system in this country. In March of 2020, the government said because Covid is such an unusual occurrence, the banks don't have to keep any money. In reserves, there's no money. So if we have a problem with liquidity and we are relying on the banks to step forth, it ain't going to happen. They're going to close the doors, the banks. We're going to have a modern day run on the banks, which we've actually been in a slow one for the last four years. We are in deep trouble. And I don't, I mean, I read this article twice trying to figure out exactly what they were trying to get me to know. It's just saying, you know, we're sounding alarms. Right? [00:52:13] Speaker C: Well, it doesn't make any sense. I was kind of the, I don't know why they're talking about, you know, the repo market and that the repo market is dying down. And that's a bad thing. The repo market means that a bank hasn't positioned themselves well enough to handle their assets overnight. So they have to trade with other banks because they don't have enough liquidity. So they're trading assets to another bank who have excess liquidity because they can't take responsibility for their own actions in the normal place of business. So I don't know how that's a bad thing and how, I don't know how cutting down the Fed's, you know, resources when they've what, like doubled in the last four years, like, how is doubling in the last four years good? How is any of that a good sign? So it's coming back down to where it was before, which was still probably too much, but that just means that it's going to be harder for them to keep the manipulation going that they're already doing. So that was the whole, I mean, I don't, I don't know enough about any of that to truly grasp what's happening. I mean, this whole system works as long as we have fake money to run it, like any Ponzi scheme. So I think they're just complaining that they don't have as much as they used to to keep this train rolling. [00:53:36] Speaker D: So, and Reuters can be a genius saying, see, we put out an article on 10th February 2025 letting you know it's coming. Yeah, no, it's all a big Ponzi scheme. The entire country, all of its smoke and mirrors. I just noticed today you're wearing a white T shirt and I'm wearing a black T shirt like good cop, bad cop, good rep, bad rep. So it makes perfect sense. But welcome to my side here. You look at you saying none of it makes sense. It's Ponzi scheme. [00:53:59] Speaker C: Right on everything. It's just how we get there. That's where we differ, that is. And I don't complain as much. Anyways, that's it for today's show. If you like what you heard, you have questions about any of these topics today or want to sit down with us to review your personal financial situation. And you can pick who you want to talk to. Do you want to talk to me, who's uplifting and kind, or do you want to talk to J.R. pick me. [00:54:24] Speaker D: Pick me. Yeah. [00:54:25] Speaker C: I mean, honestly, if you, if you reach out to us, you'll get stuck with both of us anyways. You get to see all of this in person, which we have had people come to us from the show and they have found it funny that everything we do on air is what we do in appointments as well. But anyways, reach out to us team at another money show.com find us on the web. Schedule appointments with us right from the website. Another money show.com give us a call. 623-523-0444. That number again, 623-523-0444. There's no minimums to sit with us. There's no cost for appointments. Nothing to lose by getting a second opinion on your financial situation. We'll see you again next Saturday at noon right here at 9:60, the patriot and re airing on Sundays at 1:00pm thank you. [00:55:16] Speaker B: Thanks for listening to another Money Show. You deserve to work with a private wealth management firm that will strategically work to protect your hard earned assets. 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