Trump's (Second) First 100 Days

[00:00:06] If you're a California conservative, a libertarian, a moderate Democrat, believe in common sense, or just the sane person, this is the political podcast for you. It's the California Underground Podcast.

[00:00:27] What's going on, everybody? Thanks for tuning into another episode of the California Underground Podcast, the most trusted podcast for all things California. I'm your host, along with me as always is the is my trusted co's the best, the fastest researcher in the West. I almost stumbled over that, you know, even though it's one week.

[00:00:46] I was like, who's my host? I don't know. Yeah, even though we took a week off last week, it always feels a lot longer when you take a week off because it's two weeks since you've done the show. So yeah, but we're back. We had our Easter break. It was always good to take a little break, especially with spring break and all that stuff. So we took a little time off. But tonight, we have a lot of ground to cover. We're gonna be talking about AB 379, which is in the news.

[00:01:14] We're gonna be talking about AB 379, which is in the news recently. It has resurfaced regarding the purchase of children for sex. If it sounds familiar, it's because it was from last year and it's coming up again. Steve Hilton, the Fox News commentator or show host jumped into the race this past week. And tomorrow is Trump's 100 days, his second 100 days, first 100 days. But we're going to talk about that as well. So we have a lot to cover tonight. Camille, how are you doing tonight?

[00:01:43] I'm good. I apologize. Like, like you said, two weeks, one week off is technically two weeks since we've done this. So I feel so out of practice, like I suddenly don't know how to talk to a computer anymore. And so I apologize if I just stopped, if I just don't even know what I'm doing. So I wanted to ask you because either last time we were on or the time before that, I don't know, it's been a few weeks. You said you were starting the carnivore diet. I yes, I did.

[00:02:13] And I and then you had posted on your California underground Instagram account, like you did a whole carnivore shopping spree, I think, also. So do you mind giving us an update on that?

[00:02:28] Sure, two weeks in, I am down four pounds, did a body scan at our gym item. Don't ask me how it works. But you stand on this platform and it you hold these things and it sends electrodes through you. And I guess it scans literally everything from like muscle mass to skeletal mass stuff like that. And I actually lost four percentage points for like body fat percentage. So yeah, that's, that's the big one. You know, it's good to see like the body fat percentage is going down.

[00:02:56] And then it's also you're not losing muscle mass. It's losing that four pounds. So even better is the fact that like, I've noticed that I have like incredible energy throughout the whole day. And this is not a carnivore podcast. We're not turning into like Joe Rogan or something. But yeah, I've, I've noticed like incredible energy.

[00:03:18] I don't hit those afternoon slumps. I don't eat until like two o'clock. I'm not really hungry. And then, you know, I've, I've given up the sweets has been hard. Um, but I, I found a way around it. If you get like really good, high quality, like milk fruit, like when you have milk at night, like it just kind of like melted ice cream to me. So, um, it's a good trick and it's carnivore. So things have been going very well. I'm very happy with it. So, uh, yeah, that's my car.

[00:03:48] I'm going to ask a couple more questions. I know this is not, this is not a health podcast. We're not carnivore by any means podcast, but just, I think that some people would be interested in this. Um, are you doing hardcore carnivore? And this is not a judgmental question, but are you like carnivore or animal based?

[00:04:09] I'm definitely more carnivore. Um, I mean, it's, I I've incorporated seasonings and a couple sauces here and there, as long as they're like low carb, low sugar. I know there's some people who are like strict carnivore and they're like, Oh no, you can't even put like barbecue seasonings on your meat or something like that. Or you can't have like a little bit of steak sauce. And it's like, eh, if it's like low cow, like, or low carb, like it's okay. Some people are like, you can't have hot sauce. I'm like hot sauce. Like really? You can't have hot sauce.

[00:04:36] That's always going to be the, you know, the purity test, just like there's a relative. There's always that. And okay. So are you allowed to drink? I mean, you're allowed to do whatever you want, but are you allowed to drink alcohol? Is America, I can do whatever I want. Um, am I allowed to drink alcohol? Uh, this is over. Uh, am I, no one's stopping me. Okay. Um, and will you cheat on your diet at all?

[00:05:04] Sure. I think that's asking this in any judgmental form. I'm just, it's more like some people, some people are strict and use as a 30 day, like elimination diet. And some people want to do it more long-term. I want to try it more long-term to get longer term benefits. I know some people are like, I'm just going to do it for like 30 days and like cleanse and whatever. Um, but funny enough,

[00:05:29] actually now it's two weeks. I had like, so I did cheat yesterday and we had like leftover meat sauce in the freezer. We made pasta and I had a bowl of pasta with meat sauce and I felt awful afterwards. Like my body was just like, what is this? And like, like I could literally feel like the inflammation in my brain. And I was like, Whoa, this is weird. So. Yeah. My husband's been

[00:05:54] carnivore for nearly eight years, which I think, you know, this, I think you've seen him put down a few steaks, but, um, it's impressive. It's an impressive thing on his diet. He's all in for the cheating. Like, he's not like, Oh, I'm just going to have this little bowl of ice cream. He's like, no, I'm going to get like, I'm going to eat the tub and I'm going to eat, you know, a dozen cookies. I like, that's how he is. And then he's like, he won't sleep that night. And he's like the best sleeper in the world. Like he like falls asleep and sleeps for his like six, seven hours or whatever.

[00:06:24] He's up, ready to go, you know, but he like, he'll toss and turn all night. He'll like, he'll feel it. And he knows he's going to feel it. And so it is, it is interesting. But I asked specifically about the cheat question because you and I, along with some, our spouses and some friends have plans next month, we're going to go to a steakhouse, which, okay, easy to stick to carnivore at a steakhouse, but we have done, you know, we've gotten together a few times with us and our,

[00:06:52] our spouses. And we always go to a steakhouse, but we go all out. We do the steak and the bread and all the cheeses and the drinks and the dessert and everything. And so like, I'm kind of curious if you have a game plan. Well, I know the restaurant, I'm very familiar with the restaurant we're going to. I feel like I can navigate it. But also this is like my favorite restaurant in the world. So like, I'm yeah, if there's good bread on the table, I'm not going to not eat bread. Their desserts are

[00:07:18] amazing. They make this amazing like banana vanilla wafer pudding thing. It's like, so yeah, but that's, that's how you stay consistent. I think if you let yourself cheat a little bit and then sometimes you cheat and you don't feel great afterwards and you're like, well, this is why I don't eat this way anymore. So. All right. I don't, but I just thought people would be interested. You're going to have to update us again in like two or three weeks. And yeah, I'll give the update.

[00:07:43] Um, I already scheduled a doctor's appointment for next month so I can give the full update of like how my blood pressure, cause I told my mom about this and she's like, you know, that old school mentality, your blood pressure is going to be like through the roof. Absolutely. It's going to be funny to be like, no, my blood pressure is perfectly fine. Everything's going down. I've lost weight. So anyway, did that too. And his first doctor appointment, they were like taking things off like that they had concerns for him and they were like, so impressed. They were just like,

[00:08:13] every day we get to like have a patient come in and we're like, Oh, you like, this is not a concern, not a concern, not a concern. So I'm excited to see the results. So, um, all right, first up on the order, we have our cringe moment of the week. Uh, Gavin Newsom always looking to score a couple political points and set himself up for his run in 2028. Sometimes that leaves him to steal ideas

[00:08:39] from other people. Uh, and this one is going to sound very familiar when we, we watched the short clip, but as always, let's start off with our classic stinger for our cringe moment of the week. Um, let's pick this one. Let's go with this one. All right. So this is the video. We decide and you get limited choices. Please fire healthcare education. If you don't like the machine, you shake the machine, you kick the machine. And his argument was government needs to be a platform,

[00:09:06] platform thinking, and really radically changed my approach to the way I thought about government effective, efficient, more engaged, engaged government, not you vote. I decide two way conversations. So this engaged.ca.gov platform we've created first of its kind in the country, inspired by the work in Taiwan. It was kind of quiet, but I don't think the auto really mattered

[00:09:34] as much as well, if you, if you heard, but yeah, cause there was a lot of words out as a lot of his, he was really on the high hand gyrations and the movements that we know Gavin Newsom for. If you notice what his banner says under his podium, it says efficient, effective, engaged. The point of this press conference was to unveil, brace yourselves in California,

[00:10:02] that they're going to roll out efforts to figure out how to make government more efficient, to find ways to make the government in California, much more efficient, you know, much more 21st century. Now I'm doing the Gavin Newsom hands. How can you not have to watch that? It's very inspirational. I feel like the whole podcast. Am I presidential when I do hand gestures like this? Um, it's, I don't even know what's going on over here.

[00:10:32] Uh, so he is promoting this site and let me pull this up real quick. And I, I encourage all of our listeners and followers to check this out. This is his new thing. It's called engaged California. And this is what he's talking about. Engage.ca.gov. Tell your government how you feel about pressing issues. So they've opened it up so that you can tell the government directly how you feel. Now, anybody who's a fan of this show, I highly recommend,

[00:11:01] I know people are going to be like, well, I don't want to put my email in there. Uh, they probably, somebody probably has your email in the government anyway. So whatever, uh, put your email in and they're going to ask you about topics and you get to tell Sacramento what you think about specific topics. And I don't think they're going to be happy with the results that they get, especially Los Angeles fire recovery. That's going to be a big one. Um, but the thing I took away from this is,

[00:11:25] doesn't it sound like Gavin Newsom wants to doge his own state? Is that what it sounds like to you? Like he wants to make it more efficient and figure that out and kind of look into what's going on behind the curtain. What are your thoughts? Yes. Um, like you said before this, he's always one to steal someone else's idea. Doge became kind of popular. And a lot of people were calling for Doge California,

[00:11:56] but Gavin can never let someone else have the idea or the credit. So this, he loves to launch a website. You notice that there's always some new initiative. And it's like this new .ca.gov website, like go here for this, this. And it like, do you even know how many, like I feel like we have more websites than state legislators at this point. He is a big fan of the website.

[00:12:25] Whenever he unveils something or has a big press conference, it's always in relation to some big website rollout. And then people aren't like going to these websites anyway. It's not like people are just hanging out on these websites. I don't know how many people even care about this engaged, but it's something that he gets to put like a feather in his cap. Like, Oh, I did something. We got to launch this website. Does it move the needle? I don't know. Is anyone actually going to read your responses? I don't know, but it looks great. It looks great on his resume for 2028.

[00:12:55] He can be like, look, we were more efficient. And then he even said, you sent me the clip where he said, we were, we're, what did he say? We're doge, but better or something. Here, let me, you quoted it. So let me, let me just pull it up next. It was so funny. So he did a live conference today and it was at like the 42 minute mark. If anyone wants to go and like, see this on YouTube, it's California governor YouTube channel.

[00:13:24] And it's at 42 minutes and 30 seconds. And he does say, we're like doge, but better. Or okay. And then, yeah, literally that's what he said. Cause you quote, you in quotes, we're doge, but better. And then he goes on like a couple minutes later talking about Trump. And he quite literally says about something Trump is doing. He's just trying to score political points. It's like, that's all you do. Governor Newsom.

[00:13:53] That's like, I told you we need that as like our new sound clip. Like it just Newsom just being like, he's just trying to score political points. Like that's. That's basically his entire career has been scoring political points and wherever he can, he tries to score political points. So, uh, little cringe moment though. I told you it reminded me of like an SNL skit and what it specifically reminded me of is you guys remember it was over 10 years ago.

[00:14:20] The Jimmy Fallon just in some really hashtag skit. Or they're like when hashtags were the new, you know, trending thing or whatever. And so they were, they were like exaggerating or like hashtag this, hashtag that. And they kept doing that and exaggerating everything. And, um, and that's just like watching all his, his movements that just got so much more extreme, like his new sign language that he invented.

[00:14:45] I just felt like he was just like hashtag Doge, hashtag governor efficiency, hashtag Newsom, hashtag president, hashtag me, hashtag my hair, hashtag hashtag hash. Like that's just how that. He's just so obsessed with his hashtags. Um, yeah. But yeah, like that's just, it was reminiscent of that. Yeah, it's, uh, well, we'll see what, if anybody, I, I, I might actually do it just to let him know my thoughts on some topics.

[00:15:15] Um, again, I don't think he's going to read them. I don't think anyone cares what you submit. Um, I will say this to kind of sum it up. I wonder if him and Carl DeMio are going to have a little meeting about, you know, cause Carl wants to doge California as well. While you donate to his state assembly campaign, but that's a whole different story. Maybe they can work together and get Carl and Newsom in a room to doge California. My bet is neither of them are going to doge California. So I'm just going to, I feel pretty secure in that.

[00:15:44] I mean, if it goes the way of homelessness, then no, no, we'll have lost $50 billion trying to doge California. Nothing will have happened. So. All right. So, uh, moving on, speaking of governors and potential governors, Steve Hilton, who is a Fox news, former Fox news show host.

[00:16:12] He had his own show on Fox news and he had a podcast, uh, that was focused on California. And, uh, he has just jumped into the race as of last week. Uh, he had a big rally out in Huntington beach, uh, which I want to make a comment about that. Um, he had kind of been rumored that he was going to jump in. Uh, I mean, what, what, what else do we really know about Steve Hilton?

[00:16:38] He was an advisor to, uh, prime minister, David Cameron, who was part of the conservative party in Britain. And he was kind of lauded as this like really smart political strategist came over here, got a show. And here we are. Uh, I think he's only been a U S citizen for like two years. Not that that makes a difference. I mean, four to four, but it does make a difference. I mean, yeah, I mean. For the proper channels.

[00:17:03] And I think that like, that will probably resonate at least on the immigration standpoint of like, he, he did it legally. He spent here since 2012, just throwing a few more facts. Yes. Former Fox, uh, host. I think what happened was it was rumored he was going to run for governor, but he needed to. Wait for his contract with that, with Fox to end before he announced. And so then that, you know, that's, that's ended. He's, he's announced he's running.

[00:17:32] Um, he's lived in San Francisco since 2012. His wife is, um, she's like involved in a lot of big tech. I want, I want to say Uber and Netflix, but maybe I'm wrong. Feel free to correct me if anyone knows. Um, a lot of big companies that she's been involved with. So that's kind of who they are. I've actually never seen his life. I think I watched a little bit of, or people kept sending me clips of it.

[00:18:01] Cause when his show was on and obviously it's. You were California based show. People would send me a lot of clips of his stuff. Uh, I mean, his comments on California are not wrong. I think he has a lot of fair critiques of California. I guess he really likes California and it's not, it's not out of the realm. I mean, there is going to be this difference of, I guess.

[00:18:25] Now you have Bianco and you have Steve Hilton and Bianco is, he is a native California. Is that right? He is a native California. Did he move from somewhere else? But he's been here for like decades. Yeah. He's been here for like the majority of his long majority of his life. Yeah. Uh, so if you, if we're going to like, you know, California nativism, like who's been here longer, Bianco wins that by a long stretch. Uh, Hilton is new.

[00:18:53] He, you know, emigrated here from Britain. Maybe people don't like that. Maybe I don't know why you wouldn't like that. I mean, you elected Arnold Schwarzenegger and, um, he was not a native Californian. He'd been here a long time as well. Uh, I will say this, there, there are some things about Steve Hilton and this is the biggest thing that drives me nuts about his campaign.

[00:19:18] Why did you go with the slogan make California golden again? Why? Because I, I know that this really bothers you because I think you've mentioned it daily for like, since he announced it, it does bother me one, because I want to know who the people are who got paid a lot of money to go to Steve Hilton and go, Hey, we have a great idea for your slogan. Make California golden again.

[00:19:49] Wow. That's great. Because not only is it derivative of obviously Trump's make America great again. It's also a knockoff of somebody else's who ran four years ago or how many years ago? Yeah. She ran a special election that was already four years ago. Um, her name's escaping me. Sarah Stevens. Sarah Stevens.

[00:20:15] So Sarah Stevens had the same, uh, this was back during the recall, I think. So she was running and her whole slogan was make California golden again. Yes. Now I know it's like, she stayed politically active and she's trying to, you know, get a lot of people elected. Um, it's that's the still what she uses as her, it's not her campaign, but her, um, I mean, it is a campaign, but it's not like her personal campaign, but her campaign to get people elected.

[00:20:46] She's been using that. So, yeah. Yeah. It's just for, I pulled it up real quick, just so we can see. So this is her site, make California golden again. And that's Sarah right there. Um, she's still working in politics. Like she's, she's working to get more people elected, which is great. Good. Gold, right? She says make California. Oh, make a California gold. Yeah. So yeah. California golden. Right. Is that what his is? Is this a Berenstain bear sort of thing?

[00:21:13] Like where I remember as make California golden again. And now it's, now it's been Berenstain bears where it's make California golden. I swear it was make California golden again. And maybe she dropped it because Steve Hill. I don't know. I don't know. But I remember as make California golden again, uh, going with the whole golden state thing. That slogan does bother me. He basically has McDonald's arch. Make them golden arches again.

[00:21:42] Make McDonald's fries. Great again. Um, still waiting on the whole one. They're, they're going to start doing beef tallow for fries again at McDonald's, but whole different subject. RFK junior. Get on that as fast as possible. All fries, beef tallow. Make it bad. Make it happen. Um, yeah, it bothers me because one it's for a lack of a better term. I think it's, it's just stupid to use this slogan.

[00:22:08] Um, it's stupid because we've talked about this before on this podcast. No matter how you feel, and I'm sure there are listeners and people who watch this show who would think would disagree with me when I say Trump is poison in California. Now he did better in 2024, way better than he did previously in 2020 and 2016.

[00:22:35] That doesn't mean he's not poison because let's just look at the numbers again. I feel like we have to keep bringing these numbers up because they're so important. 25% of the electorate is Republican. 25% is independent. The rest of it, 49% is Democrat and a couple 1% or whatever libertarian or independent.

[00:23:03] If you're going to run to win a statewide election here in California, pissing off 49% of the vote is not going to work and possibly whatever. What's half of 25%. I don't know. I don't know the math. 12 and a half. Thank you. So 12 and a half percent of the other half. You're not going to win. Until I got on this podcast. At least somebody does. That's why I went into law. I don't know math at all.

[00:23:34] My dad on the other hand, I call him the human calculator. You can ask him a question. Knows it off the top of his head. But I just, I feel like that's maybe it's a strategy of I have to win the primary. So I have to shore up my base first. So that's why I'm going to shore up my base and be more Trump adjacent than like, let's say Bianco.

[00:24:01] But I feel like Bianco is not even trying to be Trump adjacent. I feel like Bianco is just kind of being like, you know, this is my slogan. Here's what we want to do. We want to fix California. What's his slogan? I don't remember. Is it like the sheriff's back in town or something? I know what it was like, only the sheriff can save us now. But I don't know if that's just something that people started quoting or if that's his slogan. It's going to bug me now. But from sheriff to governor protecting California. I don't, does he have a slogan? Maybe he doesn't.

[00:24:32] Maybe he doesn't have a slogan. Maybe he's just like, I don't need a slogan. I'm sure. I'm Chad Bianco. Yeah. I thought it was like something about him being a sheriff and like only the sheriff. I think that's just t-shirts they had at the rally. I think that was just like an independent merchandise thing, which is cute. It's catchy. Yeah. It's good amongst the supporters. So maybe that's the strategy is like, I need to corner that Trump vote in the Republican Party.

[00:24:59] But you've basically shot yourself in the foot in the general because they're going to be like, hey, Steve Hilton's Trump adjacent. Look at him campaigning with make California golden again. And he hasn't really shied away from his Trump connections. So I think it's, I think it's a dumb move right off the bat. Now, obviously, Steve, you're welcome to come on the show and explain yourself. We'd love to have you on and talk about this. Insulted his consultants. I'll ask him.

[00:25:28] I want to know, like, what was your thought about that? I think there was just an opportunity. And I think there is an opportunity right now for. Maybe a more middle of the road Republican. And I know people are going to push back and they're going to be like, no, we need someone who's really conservative. And it's like, really conservative is not going to wait in California today or next year. So you need someone who has to be a consensus builder if you want to get, you know, move on from a Democratic governor. I don't know.

[00:25:57] Those are just my thoughts. But Steve Hilton is more middle of the road. Now, why he's decided to attach himself to Trump via his slogan, I don't know. But he's definitely not a conservative and he's definitely closer to the middle. He is pro-choice and he is pro-gay marriage, which those are, Republicans are often both of those things too. But that's not a conservative thing. Whereas I think Bianco is very conservative and isn't afraid to, you know, announce it.

[00:26:26] He doesn't shy away from his conservativeness. I don't, apparently don't know how to speak. But Steve Hilton, while his slogan is Trump-ish, he is not conservative. Although I don't even think Trump's conservative. But, so he's more middle of the road. And then he even came out the other day saying, I'm running a partisan campaign or a nonpartisan

[00:26:56] campaign. I mean, sorry. Yeah. It's hard to say I'm running a nonpartisan campaign when you, your slogan is very much partisan. I just don't think there was a lot of thought into the slogan. No, I think that's the thing is I don't think it like we're like talking about it. Like it was so deep and thought out. I just don't think it was like, I think it was thrown out and they're like, oh yeah, that's catchy without really thinking of how that could be viewed as far as where he is on the

[00:27:26] political spectrum. Right. I think you could have came up with a optimistic, broad vision, like, you know, a new day in California. Not that's not the slogan, but like more of that kind of feeling of new day in California, like new dawn, like we're going to get better, like stuff like that rather than now you've cornered it to make it all about Trump. Let's take a quick look at some of his vision for California. So we'll pull this up real quick.

[00:27:55] So we were talking about some of the highlights, Steve Hilton for governor. We're in the yellow shirt. Make it golden again. Reduce taxes for workers and end bureaucratic war on business. Restore a California dream of a single family home for every family. Ensure the 100% of students meet state math and English standards. That's a good goal. I mean, those are good goals to meet standards like that's pretty good. Reduce taxes.

[00:28:20] I like this pro worker, pro growth tax reduction, no income tax on income under 100,000. Not bad. I'm sure it could be, you know, you got to start somewhere. Seven percent, 7.5 flat tax on earnings over 100. That's actually OK. That's much better than it is now. Which I think is like 30, 13% or something. Like it's a lot. Return to sensible spending.

[00:28:45] Over the last decade, government spending has more than doubled in California from 161 billion to 322 billion. Even taking a flash. I like return to sensible spending. I like that they use the word sensible because I feel like everyone, everyone is always throwing out common sense. And that, well, two words, those two words together. I feel like they've lost all their meaning because everyone just says that for everything.

[00:29:13] And so the fact that he actually didn't say return to common sense spending. Shout out to Steve Hilton and team for not using common sense. Right. Yeah. I like that. Return to sensible spending. And I guess common sense is subjective in the sense of some people may find this budget common sense. But it's just nice to see some new words. Yeah. You know, it's nice that it's not the same buzzwords over and over again.

[00:29:43] And the bureaucratic war on business. Last year, California's Democratic Industrial Complex. What's a nice term? California's Democratic Industrial Complex passed 1,200 bills, continue yet more ridiculous micromanaging regulation on top of 420,000 regulations that already exist. I think that's that's a very lofty goal like that sunset our regulatory codes. So regulations go away unless explicitly renewed.

[00:30:10] Dude, Idaho did this and managed to reduce regulation by 95 percent. That's actually that is a really smart idea. See, this is why I think the slogan gets to me is because if that's your opening salvo is that slogan. People are already going to tune you out. But these are good solutions. These are you know, these are not radical conservative solutions. They're very, I guess, middle of the road. Like, hey, these things need to be tackled. So let's tackle them. Introduce regulatory budgets.

[00:30:39] So state agencies remove existing regulations before introducing new ones. Require permit payback. So agencies that don't handle permits in a timely manner have to refund their fees. That's a good idea. Restore the California dream of a single family home for every family. Democratic housing crisis affects everyone else.

[00:30:59] Our worst in the nation homelessness crisis, of course, but also the cost of living, the ability for schools to recruit good teachers, business location decisions, even traffic and our environment as people have to commute for hours when they can only afford to live a long way from their place of work. It's time for a completely new approach to provide great homes for Californians. We need to directly tackle the main causes of housing crisis. Hitting housing taxes. Yes. Anti-housing regulations. Yes. And anti-housing lawsuits. Again. All great ideas.

[00:31:29] You know, these are these are good ideas. These are getting at the heart of what is what are the problems? Because most people don't want to address this when they talk about why is housing so unaffordable in California? It's all of this stuff. Right. And I do feel like this is nonpartisan. At least it should be. I don't see how it's not. Because, you know, you ask someone, do you want affordable housing? Yes.

[00:31:58] Do you want to pay more taxes for your house? No. Well, Steve Hilton. He agrees with you. Yeah. I mean, I think if you put this in front of most Californians, they'd probably agree with this platform and be like, yeah, this is a sensible platform. It talks about impact fees, charges that are supposed to cover the local impact of housing development. They've risen to astronomical levels. They estimate that fees can now make up nearly 20 percent of the typical house price.

[00:32:27] That's a lot. You know, 20 percent of the typical house price. You know, if you reduce that and get close to 15 or 20 percent of the house price down. Now, all of a sudden, you're talking about more affordable housing. Reduce anti-housing regulations. Oh, just basically all the stuff that goes into it. Like bureaucracies, agencies like the Coastal Commission. Let's get rid of that. Let's start over with that. Other bureaucracies like CARB or regional air quality bureaucracies imposing arbitrary nonsense.

[00:32:57] It's all a massive roadblock to building the housing we need. Stop the union's anti-housing lawsuits with CEQA. CEQA is a big thing that needs to be just thrown out and just completely trashed and start all over. Don't even start all over. How about we just trash it and move it on? Move on. And we just don't. We pretend that never happened. End the war on single family homes. Yeah. These are all good policies. Ensure that 100 percent of students meet state math and English standards. A grade for every school. Grade for every teacher.

[00:33:26] Reward the best teachers. Fire the worst. Oh, the CTA is not going to like that. That I feel like that's dangerous territory because I even though I agree like teachers should be held to standards.

[00:33:43] Like somewhere closer to you, and this is not an insult to any immigrants by any means, but, you know, you are in an area where there is a lot of immigrants from Mexico who are not like English. It's not their first language and a teacher having a 40 students, 30 students. And then if the majority of them are not English speaking and the teacher is English speaking, it's going to be like, it's not fair to that teacher.

[00:34:12] If their students are not at grade level just because of a language difference. Yeah. Like, so that's where I feel like grading the teacher does get unfair. Yeah. I mean. And certainly they should be held to standards. Absolutely. I just. I agree with that. The standards will have to be figured out. Need to talk about charter schools and over time introducing school choice like that. Okay. Protect parental rights. This is probably the most conservative part.

[00:34:41] This is kind of going along with the. Sorry. Do you want to say something? No, go ahead. Well, I, I think that the parental rights is also a triggering keyword for those on the left. Um, I think that we need to change the messaging on that parental. I don't, I don't know. I guess I don't know what the answer here is, what the solution is, but I do feel like you say parental rights and immediately the left is kind of turned off. And I don't know, somehow we need to change this message.

[00:35:09] And like I said, I'm not exactly sure what, but. I don't know. I just, cause I think, I think we've killed that message on the right and we need to reframe it. Yeah. It's, it's a, it's definitely a conservative buzz term. And I know it's Saturday. Like that's a. Parenting. Like maybe he used that word sensible. Um, so maybe advocate for sensible parenting. I don't know.

[00:35:37] I, again, I don't have the solution here and I'm certainly not running for governor, but I just. No. I feel like we're also. For parental rights, we need, we got to change that. Um, public safety. In many ways, public safety has become the defiant feature of Democrat run California and talking about prop 36. Uh, we will never have great jobs, great homes and great kids without public safety. Democrats love passing new laws thousands every year, but they're terrible at actually enforcing the law. We need to get back to the basic principle.

[00:36:06] This wouldn't will be interesting because I think if you're head to head Hilton and Bianco, I think Bianco is obviously going to have the edge on law enforcement or public safety having worked in it for so long. Um, but again, I think if you look at that policy plan and you showed that to somebody and said like, Hey, this is politician X, here's their policy. Uh, what would you say?

[00:36:33] Most people probably look at that and go, I agree with most of that. Yeah. I'd vote for this person, um, without knowing who it is. And again, the slogan, if they found out the slogan was make California golden again, they, they might kind of pull back on that. There was something else that I didn't notice. He didn't talk about was, um, I don't think it was on here. Was this, he might've said it about using like increasing our lumber and timber industry to like help with wildfires.

[00:37:03] That was something he was talking about as well. Yeah. I feel like he did say something about that, but I don't recall exactly what it was. I think it was an offhand quote about like, he wanted to increase the, the lumber and timber industry to help with wildfires, like clean up those forests. Um, I I'm surprised he could have jumped into the whole, I don't think either politician has really talked about the fact that how many oil wells California is sitting on and we don't produce oil. Like we could produce oil and we could make a lot of oil and refine it.

[00:37:31] We've talked about it a ton of times on this show. Yeah. Um, but neither candidates really jumped on that. And I think that's a golden opportunity. No, see, there I am saying golden opportunity, golden opportunity. I'm just kidding. Now it's embedded in my brain. Make California golden again. No, but back to the slogan real quick. I'm sorry. Finish your thought. And then I'll. That was my thought. Yeah. That was your thought. Okay.

[00:37:54] So I don't want to keep beating the slogan to death, but what, something I don't like about it is that it implies that California is not great. California is great. Our politics are not great, but the state of California is it's better than great. Like this is truly an amazing state and there's, you know, like we joke about how you can quite literally go surfing in the morning and then snowboarding that day.

[00:38:23] And, and you can't, yes, you can do those things. And then you could be in the desert that night for stargazing, you know, like it's a, it's a gorgeous state. We've got some great national parks. We've got miles and miles of coast. We have beautiful beaches. We have great weather. We really do have a lot of great people. And like, we've got some of the best food in the nation. I mean, this is, this is already this amazing state.

[00:38:52] And so I don't like the make it golden again. Like we haven't lost that. We've just sort of lost our way politically. We've gone, we've gone a little bit too far left in a, we've gone way too far left in a radical manner. And we, we just need to, I don't know. I don't know what his slogan should be, but I just don't like that. It implies that California is not so great. Yeah, no, I agree with you. And people who are in the chat, let us know your thoughts about Steve Hilton.

[00:39:20] If you have any thoughts, we'll bring them up on the show. Yeah, I agree with you. I, I, I think when you frame it in this idea of like, well, California is bad right now. Again, you come back to the numbers of 25, 25 and 49. There's a large swath of people in California who don't think things are that bad. Like they think like, yeah, there's some things to fix on the margin. And there's some things we could like, could be more affordable. Maybe we could buy a house, but they don't think it's like terrible.

[00:39:49] Like the, I think a lot of times you see the news from the right of people talking about California as if we're this dystopian wasteland. And it's like escape from LA with Kurt Russell, like it's, there's still a lot of beauty and wonder in California. And I think something that would make more sense as a, I'm just throwing this out there, like as a slogan would be like, you know, you don't want to say like, California is bad.

[00:40:18] So we have to do it and make it golden again. And what does that mean by make it golden again? Like go backwards. People don't like that. Like maybe something like unleash California where you're talking about, like, there's all this pent up, uh, ingenuity. There's all this pent up natural resources. Like people come here to start businesses. People want to spend money in California. They want to buy homes in California.

[00:40:42] But a lot of it is like the people in the population are tamped down by overregulation and a overbearing government. So funny story. Like we were, my wife and I were looking at, uh, just like a quick, like summer weekend trip. And I've, I've been saying this for a while. I'm like, I have not explored California enough. And there's a lot of beautiful places in California that I'm like, we could go and it would be a nice little weekend trip.

[00:41:11] And like, there's so many places and go to Yosemite. There's like Joshua tree. There's all these places. Uh, you know, we're not going to go camping. We're not camping people. We're glamping people, but we're not camping people. Just going to throw that out there. I'm not sleeping on rocks with no running water. Sorry. It's just not, if I don't have to, we've come far enough as a society. I don't need to sleep with no water. You're like, I worked too hard for this. I work too damn hard. I don't want to go sleep on the ground on the weekend. I'm sorry. Anyway.

[00:41:39] Um, I also don't want to buy like $4,000 worth of camping equipment to go set it up. And there's plenty of glamping spots where I can sit out on the porch of a nice cabin that has, you know, heat and air conditioning and running water anyway. So we were looking at like the big, like big sir. And we were like, well, let's go check it out. Maybe we'll book a weekend, but that's to your point.

[00:42:03] There is so much beauty and wonder in California, like making it kind of like, oh, it's already bad. Like we got to make it better again is kind of insulting. There's a lot of good in California. I believe there's a lot of good. That's why I think it's worth fighting for. And that's why we do this podcast every week. So I agree with you. Well, I'm going to read for governor and my slogan is going to be preserve California. Preserve California. Yeah. Okay. Like California is great. Let's just keep it, keep it going.

[00:42:32] Let's keep this party going. Yeah. That will be my slogan. It'll be Phil for governor. Let's keep this party going. Are we now running against each other? We're running against each other in 2026. You're so fun. Dang it. I want to go to the party. Yeah. Well, too late. That's my slogan. Phil Moriello for governor. Let's keep the party going. Can I go to the party even if I want to run against you? No. Sorry. Opponents aren't allowed. Okay.

[00:43:00] Maybe, maybe when you're, you drop out of the race, you can come join the party, but all right. Any other, any other final thoughts about Steve Hilton before we get on to our next topic? Actually, yes. Actually, yes. I, the, the, the race is early and I don't want any of this to be like misconstrued as I hate or love Steve Hilton. Right. I know you and I are never going to probably endorse any candidates on here.

[00:43:29] Um, and certainly things got kind of heated with conservatives being like, he's not conservative. We've already got Bianco. And like that, that's fine. Like all that is great, but it's early on. I have no idea who else is going to enter this race. And I need to like learn more about, about both candidates. And, um, we, I know we would love to have both of them back on Bianco back on, which we're friends with this team now. Like we'll, we'll probably have him back on, but, um, yeah, if anyone has, um, access to

[00:43:58] Steve Hilton, we would certainly love to have him on and, um, we may hate his slogan, but that doesn't mean we hate him. And, you know, we would love to hear from him and give him an hour here to discuss things so that we can all make better form decisions. Now who to vote for. So, yeah, I mean, we're, again, we're not gonna, it's so early in the race. I mean, we got like a year until they even go to primary. Like we have a primary election in a little, a little under 14 months, right?

[00:44:27] It's the beginning of June. Yeah. It's a long time until like, we're not even at a year until we have a primary election. And then not only that, there still has to be convention where they will then line up behind a certain candidate. Are they doing that? I don't remember. Are they doing that again? They were like. September 5th to the 7th in Garden Grove. So Orange County, California is the California. Yeah.

[00:44:57] Uh, convention. Yeah. Southern California. I think that sounds like a convention we may have to set up at as a live podcast. I've already got it blocked out on my calendar. Especially. Anyway, sorry. I'm wasting so much time blabbering on and we've got limited time to get to our very in-depth next discussion. So. Yeah. So yeah, just to round it out, we're just discussing, uh, we'll see. We got plenty of time until November when they nominate and we'll keep people updated. Who knows?

[00:45:27] Maybe there'll be another Republican who jumps in. I mean, I know there's other Republicans who jumped in, but like big Republicans, I guess you could say, you know, not like smaller Republicans, not small in stature, but you know, lesser known. Well, anyway, well, I should say well-known. Okay. Well-known Republicans who've jumped into the race. Okay. Switching gears. Speaking of a well-known Republican, uh, president Trump tomorrow is going to be in his first.

[00:45:57] Well, second 100 days as president. Now, if you don't know why everyone makes a big deal about the first 100 days, it's just kind of like tradition in DC of like, this is all your momentum. You've got a mandate. The people are behind you. They want to see like quick action. So there was like, it just kind of came about this first 100 days of this is how fast you get things done.

[00:46:24] Did you get anything done your first 100 days when the people were really behind you? Support starts to wane a little bit after a hundred days, they get a little critical. Have you completed a lot of your campaign promises? Um, it's a big deal. So it's a big marker. Trump was in Michigan tonight, kind of touting a lot of his accomplishments. We're going to discuss, I was actually on looking up to be on, uh, NBC seven. They brought me back for up for a panel. Uh, it was along with Laura Fink, who was a democratic strategist.

[00:46:54] We had a nice conversation. It was very civil. Um, and Catherine was the Catherine Garcia was the anchor. So thank you to both of you for having me on. That's going to be tomorrow. So I'll share the link. Oh, I thought I missed it. Cause you didn't share it. No, I'm sorry. I'm getting a little, I'm getting a little inside baseball. It was pre-recorded yesterday. So it's going to be part of like a bigger package they're doing for the first 100 days. Um, but yeah, I'll share that when it happens.

[00:47:20] So I feel like I've done a lot of research on Trump's first 100 days prepping for that. Uh, I don't know. Should we, you're just like, I did some research. I did realize. I did some conversation that I am so focused on California and, and I have been like most

[00:47:45] of my political, it's not political knowledge or career cause I don't have a career in it. But like, as far as like me paying attention and caring, I have always cared more about local politics in California than I have nationally. And I feel quite ignorant of national stuff. And I was even on the phone with my mom. You, we hadn't even discussed that we were going to discuss this tonight. And I was on the phone with my mom on Sunday and I'm like, I don't even know what's going on in the nation. I'm like, and people ask me because they just kind of.

[00:48:14] You know, assume because I want a podcast about politics and they'll like message me on Instagram and I'm like, I have no idea. And I feel so dumb and ignorant. And then all of a sudden you're like, we're going to talk about that. And I'm like, well, I guess I should go like figure out what's actually going on. So I apologize. I sincerely apologize for being so ignorant on this subject. I know I'll, I'll admit as well. Like if it wasn't for this NBC panel, I had to do yesterday.

[00:48:43] I, we probably would have discussed it, but probably I wouldn't have done as much in depth research as I had to. And it wasn't until I started doing the research that I'm like, man, I really don't pay attention to national politics. I mean, I have like a general idea of what's going on in national politics. Like, you know, I follow politics. I follow the news. I watch the news at work. I just don't have like a, like an in depth. Like if you want to sit down with me and talk about like California politics, I could talk your ear off, talk about bills, all that stuff. What's going on?

[00:49:13] What's happening? Who are the major players? I feel like there's a lot of stuff that I was like, okay, I'm, I'm kind of familiar with what's going on with this story, but I don't really know what's going on with the story. And then I don't know, like the poll numbers and the specifics and where the tax cuts and what's happening. I was, let's just say I was, I was using Grok a lot the other day to kind of get ready for my NBC panel. Cause I was like, I don't know where to start here. Grok, tell me what's going on with the tax cuts.

[00:49:41] Um, so I don't, do you, do you want to start with grading his first 100 days first? Or do you want to talk about subjects first? How do you want to, which do you think is better tackle? You start with subjects. Okay. I don't know that I could fairly give a grade and I, and I don't want to say that I didn't read anything at all. I just really feel like I don't have enough information that I, I would just be stupidly throwing out letters. So no, I don't want to do that.

[00:50:10] Um, all right, let's start with, uh, first 100 days. Let's talk about Doge. We can talk about Doge cause you know, Gavin Newsom is copying off of it. So, um, Doge, why not? I mean, it's so popular. Even Gavin Newsom's copying it. Uh, so Doge, we all know Elon Musk came in like a wrecking ball at the chainsaw, the whole thing. And he was every day telling people how much they've wasted.

[00:50:35] The one positive about Doge is it has opened the eyes of voters to how much fraud, waste and abuse there is in the federal government. I feel like most people who are in the know, no, there's a lot of fraud, waste and abuse, but I think Doge's biggest accomplishment was letting people know how bad it was. Like when they're going into USAID and they're telling people like, yeah, we spent 200 million

[00:51:04] on Sesame street in Iran. People are like, what? What? I'm sorry. What did you spend 200 million dollars on? And we're 36 trillion dollars in debt. That's true. Is that a real number? That's a real number. Yeah. I looked it up. I think it just came up on my Facebook memories today. I've literally never seen an episode of Sesame street in my life. That's well, if you're in Iran, you probably see a lot of Sesame street for 200 million dollars. That's why I've never seen it.

[00:51:30] But like, I don't recall my mom ever, ever putting that on for us. I watched a lot of Sesame street. I watched a lot of. My mom made me watch a lot of PBS reading rainbow was another one. Mr. Rogers neighborhood, you know, all the classics, nice little PBS classics. So I think that was its big accomplishment was letting people see who knit, who didn't really pay attention to it, how bad it was. And I think that kind of opened a lot of people's minds of how bad it is. And we got to do something about it.

[00:52:01] Doge went in with an ambitious goal to cut $2 trillion. Okay. I, you know, if anybody knows and follows the show, I would say $2 trillion is a nice, modest number to cut from our federal government. Probably could be a lot more. I mean, let's just be honest here. I think their final number was like. $95 billion or something like that was finally like at the end of the day, like what they could get past or like part of a budget plan.

[00:52:27] So like congressional Republicans aren't following through with Doge's recommendations. Right. I think that that's a big thing that people need to remember is that Trump can say and do a lot of things, but Congress has the power to really enforce veto, etc. So yeah.

[00:52:53] Congress has the power of the purse and people need to remember that it's all fine and dandy when Elon's out there and he's tweeting or X-ing or whatever the hell you call it. He's going on all the numbers and you see it. He's going on Joe Rogan, letting people know. It doesn't make a lick of difference until congressional Republicans actually start cutting it. And I saw an article today where congressional Republicans came out and admitted, well, you know, $2 trillion was an ambitious goal. We never really thought it was practical.

[00:53:21] It's like, oh, so now when the rubber meets the road and you're trying to pass a budget, now it's not practical. But when, you know, Elon was talking about it up until election, you were all rah-rah, Elon Musk, Doge, we're going to cut like everything. So it's always funny how like when people on the Hill and in D.C., once the rubber hits the road and they're like, oh, wait, you want us to actually follow through on our promises and cut $2 trillion from the budget? What?

[00:53:52] Like we have to make tough decisions that we're going to have to face backlash for? What? Like, no. Don't you understand? I want to be in Congress for the rest of my life. I want to die here. Like, I'm not going to make these decisions. So I would say that's and that's not really Doge's fault. I would say that that's not Doge. Like them finding all this stuff, telling people how bad it is. It's not their fault. Congressional Republicans are not going to follow through and cut that stuff. Correct. So what are your thoughts?

[00:54:21] Yes, absolutely. I agree with that. $95 billion is still a ton of money. I mean, start dividing that up by the states that need it. And that could actually go a long way. Although I don't think that giving any of that to California is fair because California is at its own fault for what it did. But it got itself in trouble. It's not up to the federal government to bail us out. I also want to remind people, you know, when we say we didn't elect Elon.

[00:54:51] No, technically, we did not elect Elon, technically. But this was one of Trump's promises. And we did elect Trump. And while I know, like you and I always get the, like you share a reel on Instagram. And we always get the, well, this is what you voted for. So deal with it. And you and I are like, we didn't vote for this. And so I totally understand that the Democrats are going to be like, no, we didn't vote for Trump. So that's not what we voted for. And the argument works both ways.

[00:55:21] But we didn't vote for Fauci either. And Joe Biden gave him that role. And so if you really want to get all mad at Trump for giving this role to Elon Musk, fine. But you also need to, you know, carry that same energy into other presidential elections, other presidents that are maybe on your team. And you need to, you know, be like, oh, well, we didn't elect him.

[00:55:49] So therefore, why does he have any say in our lives and what's going on? So no sympathy here for you. Like, so Elon Musk, he's got this role that Trump gave him. Well, Joe Biden gave Fauci that role. So it works both ways, guys. It's almost like people forgot that, like, presidents can appoint people to be a part of the White House. Like, and if you have a problem with, like, well, we don't elect people.

[00:56:19] Okay, well, we didn't technically elect, like, Caroline Levitt. And she's the press secretary. Like, you know, there's all these people who we technically did not elect when you elect Trump. But when you elect Trump, you sort of elect his cabinet of, like, people he says are going to be a part of his cabinet. Same thing with, like, Democratic presidents. They're like, hey, these are the people I'm going to bring along with me. You kind of elect those people with him. And so it's always funny that they're like, well, we didn't elect Trump.

[00:56:45] Okay, well, now we're going to go back through every administration and be like, well, we didn't elect this person. We didn't elect this person. We didn't elect, you know, with Obama, we didn't elect Rahm Emanuel who, like, was running around and, like, making backroom deals with everybody. But, you know, here we are. Like, I don't know. I don't know what to tell you. Like, this is how presidents work. So he has backed off a lot. I have noticed that the Tesla vandalism videos have gone down a lot. Maybe they figured out that there's sentry mode. I don't know if they got tired.

[00:57:16] Like, if they were just over it or if because he's now backed off. Like, I think that Trump is kind of like, I don't know. I feel like Doge is like, they did what they did. And now that's kind of just like they didn't get the two trillion and Congress didn't do anything anyway. And so moving on and everyone else moved on with it. I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. I think the goal was valiant. It was exciting in the beginning.

[00:57:46] Again, it's not Doge's fault that congressional Republicans didn't grow a spine and actually cut two trillion. Good and bad out of Doge. It was good to show the people. And if there's anything Trump is good at, he's good at creating controversy and making a spectacle that people can talk about. And I think Doge did that and it got people to pay attention.

[00:58:06] It also made Democrats look really bad by protecting the status quo of fraud, waste and abuse, which was an interesting position to put Democrats in of like, no, we're we want to defend the federal government spending all this money. And it's like, okay, you want to take that position. That's I don't know who's advising you, but that's an interesting position to take. All right. All right. Let's talk about something else that's big here in California. Immigration.

[00:58:34] Obviously, immigration cracked down really hard on immigration, which fair enough. It was one of the top things like economy, then immigration out of the exit polls in 2024. So it was like top three. Economy is always number one. Inflation and immigration. He definitely went hard. And this is a point I brought up. This is a point I brought up on NBC yesterday.

[00:58:59] Trump, I think, had an opportunity to do immigration two ways. He could have done it in a firm manner where he said like, okay, this is how we're going to do it. We're going to enforce the laws. We're going to secure the border. There's also the bombastic way, which appeases his base and is full of theatrics and is full of like, you know, going overboard and making headlines and all that stuff.

[00:59:28] He went the latter. And I'm not sure that was a great choice because there was the other day. The posters on the White House lawn. I'm just going to say I was not a fan. I didn't understand it. And I think you had an opportunity where you got a lot of people behind you on a controversial issue. A lot of Americans to support you to say, look, we want you to fix immigration.

[00:59:58] Those like soft Trump voters who supported you because of that, but are not diehard MAGA Trump supporters probably look at that and go, I don't I don't really like how that looks. And now you got to make these people like defend themselves at like the next cocktail party. It's awkward and they back off of it. And like this doesn't help. Like, and I think if you want it to go out and appease your base and make your base happy, then slam dunk a plus. You've done it. Like you've been bombastic.

[01:00:28] You did everything. I think you got sloppy when you were that bombastic. Hashtag MAGA. Hashtag Trump 2028. That's all another thing. We're not going to get to that. People are going to cancel you for that. You better say you're joking. I'm joking. I don't even know why that's a thing, but it is. I think it's just a trolling thing. I think it's. Yeah, I don't think it's. I think it just makes the left go crazy. And that's one thing he does really well.

[01:00:58] So I think that he kind of fumbled that opportunity. Now, yeah, immigration is down. The border secure. They are sweeping up a lot of people. Some people like two year olds getting deported. Not a great look. I don't think I know they recruit young with MS-13. I don't think they recruit two years old young. So I know this Kilmar Abrego Garcia down in El Salvador. That's a whole gray area. A guy was like involved in a lot of bad stuff.

[01:01:28] So I think it's kind of a mixed bag. Like he did what he wanted to do. He was very tough on immigration. Cracked down. Sent the message like we're not dealing with people crossing the border. Border crossings are way down. I can tell you like down here in San Diego, like crossing from TJ to back into San Diego is like completely different than it was. Didn't they actually close down an immigration center? Sure. They closed down a migrant shelter down here in San Diego because of Doge and everything.

[01:01:57] So, yeah, it's definitely that has worked. I think he could have gone about it a little different way and probably shored up that support for immigration. What are your thoughts? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So I actually, you know, we already talked about this earlier today because I had posted that on Instagram that I think that the signs looked trashy. And I got, like somebody literally messaged me. It was like, it's because of X, Y, and Z unfollowing. Thank you. Hashtag MAGA.

[01:02:27] I'm like, don't hit your ass. I'm allowed to say something looks trashy. But like whatever. And you're allowed to unfollow me. That's fine. But looks wise. Yeah. Now people have said that's where the media does a lot of their press. So they have to walk by that. And so there was kind of no way for them to get around not looking at that.

[01:02:51] And there is a part of me that for the people that do the worst of the worst crimes, I am kind of like, yeah, put them up in the public square. Like reveal it all. Like I am very much. That's my belief. I know it's illegal to do this. But if I, my old neighborhood, there was actually a registered sex offender that lived just a few doors down on like just around the corner. And I, um, apparently before we moved in, a lot of the dads had gone there and they were like, we know who you are.

[01:03:20] We're not harassing you, but we know who you are. And we're watching you. And like, I agree with that. Yeah. Like, Hey, you are a registered sex offender. We have kids and you're in our neighborhood. Um, we're watching them. I, I think that these people that are here and have committed these terrible crimes, like, yeah, put it, put it out there. Like shame them. Absolutely shame them. Even though I'm not like a person who wants to shame everybody. If you're a horrific person, it needs to be known. And so like, I get that.

[01:03:49] I just didn't feel like, I don't know. It just, it looked weird. Like I told you, I compared it to, um, to me, it just looked like the street corner. That's full of all the real estate signs and like garage sale signs. And you're like, just clean it up. It looks tacky. And that's looks wise, not even optics, just like physically looking at the beautiful white house, the beautiful fountain garden. And you see all these signs. I'm just like, I didn't like that. Yeah. Well, I, yeah. Statement.

[01:04:19] That's just a, like, it's just a, like, obedient on the decor. I didn't like it. Yeah. I just thought it kind of like, you know, the whole putting the pictures on. It just, I don't know what it is about it. I just looked at it. I was like, are we like rubbing their noses? I don't know what it is about it. Like, yeah, get the job done. Just do it. Like at night, just like have like their faces. Yeah. I don't know. It just, it rubbed me the wrong way.

[01:04:48] And I just feel like that was, he's chosen a path of how to do it. And I don't, I didn't agree with it. I was like, uh, like, eh, that's not, that's not a good look. These people need to be tried fairly. Like that's, you know, America's built on that. Um, yeah. And if they're guilty and if they're not from here, um, yeah, we shouldn't tax us. Taxpayers shouldn't have to, um, pay for their, you know, lifelong prison sentences.

[01:05:15] They should be sent to back to where they're from and their country can do what they will. Um, I'm all for legal immigration. All for it. Yeah. I have no, um, there was, I had another thought and I can't remember it now. I mean, well, you thought, oh, go ahead. I remember it. Yeah. I, uh, yeah. Speaking of like the rule of law.

[01:05:39] Also, if you're a judge in Wisconsin and you help, uh, someone who's out the back door, who is about to be arrested by ice. I also think you should face consequences. And I watched the whole video and like the whole story of that is wild. Like she literally helped him out the back door where the jury goes out the back of the courthouse. And then also adjourned the case without telling the prosecutor, like just adjourned it on

[01:06:06] her own, which is so wild that she was like, I'm just not going to call it. I'm not going to let the prosecutor comment on it. And hopefully he got out the back door and then they chased him down the block and caught him. So, and that's not, he was, he had a trial, but he was not even given a fair trial because that's, she, she actually prevented the fair trial from happening. Yeah. Because in fact, she probably, she probably hastened his deportation because of the fact

[01:06:33] that like he ran from the ice agents and then they had to go chase him and catch him. So, um, well, they had an administrative warrant for him anyway, for deportation in the score. But anyway, I just, I think like of our own criminals here in America, like plenty that we're born here and we, we got to get a handle on that before we can allow more criminals. Agreed. Yeah, absolutely agree. Enforce the immigration laws. And if you don't like it, elect a Congress who will.

[01:07:02] Um, all right, next topic, which we can, this is really kind of the last one because you have the big three, I think, uh, economy. Uh, Trump obviously elected number one exit poll issue in 2024 was the economy. He, uh, presided over a really good economy in his first term until COVID, uh, hastened probably by a lot of the tax cuts.

[01:07:26] Um, right now, I think he's kind of, it's at that a hundred day mark, you kind of got to make something happen. And he's, he's got these tariffs. He did this whole liberation day thing where it was all the reciprocal tariffs. And I understand the argument. I listened to a whole interview with Scott Besson and Tucker Carlson. Scott Besson explains tariffs way better than president Trump does because Scott Besson is

[01:07:55] actually smart man. Not saying Trump's not a smart man. I'm saying Scott Besson is smart. Scott Besson is smart on these matters that he can eloquently put them out. Trump is much more, you know, all over the place. He weaves his threads, not saying Trump is not smart. Okay. People we're going to get so canceled after this episode. Yeah. Uh, sorry. It was good. Yeah. Just going to run the, yeah. Just roll it all up. People are going to be like, I'm done with that podcast. They suck.

[01:08:22] Um, yeah, I, I get the whole point of tariffs. I get that. Like, it's not fair trade because of the fact that they're putting so many tariffs on our stuff. So what are we supposed to do? We're just supposed to sit here and take it. I understand that argument. I think there's a lot of uncertainty with the market of like what's going on with tariffs. And I think the administration's done a better job of letting people know like, okay, we got this deal. We're working with this country.

[01:08:51] Like China is still a whole issue with that whole trade war. Um, the uncertainty is not helpful. Tariffs could be useful. They could bring in more revenue. I think the big thing is the tax cuts. And I, that's something I looked up on Grok the other day. I was like, where are these tax cuts? And I, it says they're not slated to go into effect at the earliest, like July. So there are some big taxes. I don't even know when they're allegedly going into effect.

[01:09:21] So they're in like this whole budget reconciliation gray area. And they're going back and forth. The Senate and the House proposals are like, they want to cut 21% corporate tax rate down to 15, which would be like an enormous economic boom. Like if you cut 6% of taxes off corporations, huge economic boom. Um, I know they want to cut like other things like taxes on tips, taxes on overtime, which would also be like a great economic boom.

[01:09:50] Um, so they got to get the tax cuts. I think the tax cuts are the thing. Once they get the tax cuts done, you'll get a lot of companies. Again, it comes down to that uncertainty. Markets and financial markets don't like uncertainty. They can't plan for the year. If they don't know, is my tax rate going to be 21%? Is it going to be 15? Are my goods going to cost this much because of tariffs? Are they not going to cost this much because of tariffs? So there's a lot of uncertainty right now.

[01:10:17] So it may hurt for a little bit longer, but I don't know how much more like these independents are going to support Trump for waiting for the economy to get a lot better. Now, that's not to say once they pass the tax cuts and all of a sudden the economy takes off, he doesn't get that support back. But, you know, got to move a little bit faster. What are your thoughts? Yeah. Um, I see both sides of the tariff argument.

[01:10:45] Um, and, um, so something, okay. So on the one hand, since, um, since he's announced these, there have been like, uh, the drug maker, Eli Lilly has announced that they are going to bring. They're going to build four pharmaceutical manufacturing plants in the United States, which was supposed to create like 13,000 jobs in manufacturing and construction. And there's other companies that have announced similar.

[01:11:10] I trade world trade has obviously since like the beginning of the world and people in civilization, like world trade has been a thing. But I do question why in America in, in 2025, we don't have more manufacturing in our own products here. Like, why are we so dependent on other nations that we even have to impose these?

[01:11:38] Because again, it's 2025 and we've had, had tons of immigration. We've, we've been a nation for, you know, a couple hundred years and we've got some brilliant minds here. Why are, why is there not? And this isn't, again, this isn't even anti other countries. I'm just wondering why aren't we doing more as a country, as America here in America with production, with growing, with like, there's nothing we can't do at this point. So why aren't we?

[01:12:07] And I don't expect you to have the answer to that, but that's kind of like. I think a lot of it has to do with cheap labor. I mean, a lot of it has to do with cheap labor when you're paying someone in Vietnam or India or China a dollar a day, as opposed to what you're paying an American manufacturing worker. Um, there is that issue and how much more is it going to cost to, and there's a national security issue of manufacturing here in the country.

[01:12:38] And we saw that with COVID where if supply chains from China, where we get pharmaceuticals and chips and stuff like that, all of a sudden it's cut off because of COVID. Like what, what's America to do? Like, we're going to sit here. We're not going to get pharmaceuticals. We're not going to get, um, the, you know, the microchips that we need for our computers. That's a huge problem. I'm going to put on my tin hat for a second and think maybe it's not tin hat, but maybe it's just kind of looking in towards the future.

[01:13:06] I would not be surprised if years from now, cause it's still very expensive and they're still working at the Kings. If manufacturing returns to America because we are the leaders in AI robots. Okay. I think that, that could be the future of manufacturing in America. And I know that goes against what Trump wants to do, which is bring manufacturing back to help those jobs, um, and help Americans. Well, someone's got to build the robots.

[01:13:37] Someone's got, yep. Maybe you need people to build the robots, but I think if you can get people to, or you can get these AI robots to do a lot of repetitive tasks while also having. We're going to build AI robots. We're going to be built AI robots. We're going to get the AI robots. They're going to do the manufacturing and they're going to manufacture AI robots. Oh gosh. And then we're just going to be irrelevant. Then AI is going to build their own robots. They're going to take over the world. It's a good time for us to just end the podcast because like AI. We will need our own Schwarzenegger back as Terminator.

[01:14:06] Um, that's, I don't know. That's my thought on where we head with manufacturing. That makes sense. So. It does. I mean, technology wise. Yeah, that absolutely makes sense. Well, uh, I don't know how much of the tariffs, and this is one of those things where the messaging, I think was a little muddled with Trump. Where was the point of tariffs, we wanted to raise revenue and make California, make California golden again. Um, I can't, I can't help it now.

[01:14:36] It's not, it's stuck in my head. I guess it's a good slogan. It's stuck in my head. That's why he did it. See? Um, is to make us a lot of money or was the point to get them to the negotiating table? I guess both can be true at the same time. Uh, it's kind of like, well, what are we doing here? Are we doing it so we can raise revenue, reduce taxes, help with spending in the blow? Or are we doing it to get people to come to the negotiating table? I guess you kind of win both ways, whether they come to the negotiating.

[01:15:06] I, my feelings could be wrong, but I feel like that's what he was going for. Yeah. I mean, it could be just like worse. So what comes to worse, they don't make a deal. We're going to just make money. That's fine. You can do that. So, um, but yeah, I think on the economy, he's got to get going on. Well, egg prices are down, so that's a big win. Uh, and as someone who's on carnivore, we buy a lot of eggs. So I think I bought like five dozen from Costco and it was like $17. So that's pretty good.

[01:15:37] That's a really good. Now for five dozen eggs, that's a lot. Uh, like maybe three months ago would have been like $80. But anyway, yeah, I got to get that. You probably wouldn't even gotten eggs at Costco. Let's just be real. Uh, got to get those tax cuts going. So that's my final thing about the economy. Any other final thoughts? Well, are you willing to give a grade? Sure. I think I'm willing to give Trump. Wait, wait, hold on.

[01:16:05] Cause I want to actually frame this a couple of ways. Yeah. Did you just do the Gavin Newsom hula dance? What just happened? Yeah, no. Um, okay, but let me see. Cause I, I want you to give a grade personally, because I know that you are more right of center. Mm-hmm. And so obviously you were not like, yay, Kamala Harris. So I want kind of like you to give a grade personally.

[01:16:32] And then, okay, I don't even know how to phrase this correctly. So maybe I just, just shouldn't ask, but like, cause it works both of them or give your personal opinion. But okay. Okay. Grade it based on expectations versus reality. Results. Results. Thank you. I think I know what you're like personally, or like as someone who follows politics and does a podcast on politics. Yes. Yes. That's the second part.

[01:16:58] So like you expectations versus results and then politically speaking, maybe. Okay. Personally, I think, uh, I think personally, I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt. A lot of this stuff is out of his control. Doge and the cuts are out of his control. That's congressional Republicans. He can't do a lot of that. The economy and the tax cuts again, out of his control. And he can do as much as possible.

[01:17:26] We can, you know, bring Mike Johnson up to the white house every day and, you know, kick him in the butt to get these things done. Um, so I think there, I would give them a, probably a B minus. I feel like, yeah. And that's giving them the benefit of the doubt. Like he's, you know, he's made some mistakes. I think he got sloppy. Like, and I think he started off strong. I'm not a fan of like the executive order. A lot of the executive orders were also just to appease the base. Right.

[01:17:56] So I think it's handling of public education. Like he signed that, but until that hasn't done anything. Yeah. Yeah. And it like does the effect of like, people are like, oh, he's done these things. And it's like, oh, it makes headlines, but then it didn't go anywhere. Yeah. It doesn't really go anywhere. Um, the Gulf of America thing. Like, I'm not really sure why we renamed go. That's another base thing.

[01:18:22] I'd give them a B minus because I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt of like, it's only been a hundred days. We still like, which is like 7% of four years. So yeah, we still got a long way to go in, uh, Trump's presidency. And we haven't even hit the second pandemic yet that they probably have planned for him. Um, not joke, joking, joking. Hopefully there's not another world pandemic while president Trump is president. Um, I think politically I would be down a little bit more.

[01:18:51] Like I'd, I'd give them a C. I think a lot of it has been big promises at the beginning. Messaging has been a little sloppy. It feels like the agenda is kind of stalled out. Um, and it does feel like in the beginning, yeah, a lot was getting done and we were like, whoa, there's so much getting done with executive orders, but executive orders only go so far. They get blocked in court. And then you need to see this stuff happening on the legislative side. And I haven't seen that yet.

[01:19:20] So, um, we'll, we'll see. It's still only a hundred days and that's, you know, give them a C that's not bad. That's what average, I guess you could say. Yeah. It's not an F. I didn't say like, you know, it's an F administration's a complete failure. Even though I think that I don't have enough knowledge to have given grades, I would have probably given those same grades based on what I know.

[01:19:44] But, um, at the same time we say like, well, Congress, you know, has a lot to do with this and it does. But at the same time we have control. We Republicans have control of everything right now. And so the fact that we haven't necessarily delivered all these results is kind of like, well, cool. We, you know, our Senate Congress and president are Republicans, but this is resulting in what?

[01:20:09] But again, a hundred days is 7% of like 1,460 days. Yeah. It's, it's a lot. We still got a long way to go. I just like to see more stuff be signed into law, um, because he can sign all the executive orders in the world. It's at the end of the day, like the next president can come in and just overturn them.

[01:20:34] So, um, and some of the things he he's tried to do, you can't do by executive order. So, uh, while it looks great, I mean, you can sign all these things into executive orders. It doesn't mean those things are going like dismantling the department of education. Okay. That doesn't happen by executive order. So, uh, Oh, that was, it was the other thing he signed, like the voter ID, like national, like that. I don't, you can't do that by executive order. That's a constitutional issue.

[01:21:04] Like states have the right to set their, how their elections are governed. So, um, that was another thing that I was like, it looks good, but when you dig a little deeper, like it's not doing anything. Actually. So, um, so yeah, I give them a, I actually think it's funny that people get so riled up over him signing it. Cause it's like, it was a headline and nothing's going to happen. Yeah.

[01:21:32] I think that if you're a supporter, it'd be most disappointed if you're like, well, he signed this executive order months ago. Why is not nothing happening? Uh, probably cause you can't do that by executive order. So, um, if that were true, he could do anything. He'd lower taxes already. He'd be like, well, taxes are zero now. So yay me. Um, the fed, I I'd be interested to see, there's also the other things like the peripheral as well. I'm interested in seeing like cash Patel.

[01:22:01] Like what does he do at FBI? I'm interested in RFK junior at health and human services, uh, Tulsi Gabbard. Like he's picked a lot of really good picks, solid picks that I like. So they still have to get their feet under them and figure out what's going on at those departments. So, um, it, I feel like a hundred days is a hard barometer to kind of judge someone right away, but I'll say average, you know, see, I don't think it's been an A plus.

[01:22:29] I think there's a lot of stuff he still has to get done. So there's my thoughts. That's my Ted talk. Thank you. Thank you for coming to my Ted talk. I don't think we went way over, so I don't think we have time unless up to you for the, uh, yeah, I was just going to say, I, we completely missed on the AB three, seven, nine. Uh, we'll cover it next week. Um, it's a good story. I'm sure there'll be more news coming out, but, um, yeah, if you want to look it up,

[01:22:58] you can go AB three, seven, nine. What's happening there. There may be a new development, AB three, seven, nine, because Newsom just jumped into the whole thing as well. I probably should have refreshed, refreshed X because things probably already changed. Things probably already changed. Newsom has already jumped in and wants to do something about it, but I guess you'll have to wait till next week to hear our thoughts on AB three, seven, nine, because we had a lot to talk about tonight. See, when you take a week off, there's a lot you got to talk about. So any final thoughts before we sign off for tonight? Okay.

[01:23:29] Well, uh, with that, make sure you like, share, subscribe, review all that stuff helps with the algorithm helps people find us. Uh, and the best thing you can do that is to support the show. That is 100% free as you can share it with someone who you think would find this really interesting. And with that, we'll see you on the next one. Later.

[01:23:57] Thank you for listening to another episode of California underground. If you like what you heard, remember to subscribe, like, and review it and follow California underground on social media for updates as to when new episodes are available.