Monday, January 24
· Headlines – NFL play-offs, Europe prepares for Russian invasion of Ukraine, antivaxxer rally in Washington, D.C., lawsuit over movie trailer
o Good description of the NFL – “The sport so good, we totally forgot about the brain damage.”
o Trevor thought doing a coin toss to decide possession in overtime was unfair – “Both teams should get a Bitcoin, and whichever side can explain why it’s not a scam, they should get to go first.”
o Great line – “Personally, I don’t think America is ready to fight Russia over Ukraine. I mean, America’s been fighting brown people for so long. Does it even remember how to fight white people?”
o I loved this bit – “After, ‘What shoes should M&M’s wear?”, asking whether vaccines are good is literally the dumbest thing people can fight about.”
o Oof, Robert Kennedy Jr. at that antivaxxer rally. Any hot take that begins “Even during the Holocaust, people could…” is bound to badly.
o Trevor, needless to say, was savage in response – “Yeah, the man is right. Who can argue? No one ever talks about how good Anne Frank had it. Free room and board. All the time in the world to write. Pretty sweet deal, if you ask me.”
o This was a great point – “I will say, though, crazy is relative. Because RFK may be saying wild shit about the Holocaust, but half the people he’s talking to don’t even believe the Holocaust happened.”
o Trevor had some interesting thoughts on “West Elm Caleb,” a guy who went viral after a number of women on TikTok realized they’d all had bad experiences with the same guy.
o On West Elm Caleb’s huge rise in infamy – “He just ghosted, and then, the guy’s viral on every newspaper in the country. And all I kept thinking was, the Uyghurs in China-- they should ghost someone. I’ve never seen them get this much coverage.”
o Some of the women involved have come out and opposed the vitriol West Elm Caleb has gotten, saying they only intended to tell a funny story about a bad date on TikTok – “But then the algorithm goes, “Ah, conflict!’ You know? It’s like the conflict monster.”
o In parsing through some of the behavior West Elm Caleb was accused of in the videos, Trevor wanted to distinguish between abuse and shitty behavior – “I don’t think all rejection is abuse. Life is about getting rejected, unfortunately. For everyone to get a yes, someone had to get a no. Every one of us here. The fact that you’re in a relationship with someone is because other people rejected them or rejected you. That’s the only reason we get there.”
o That said, he made zero allowances for the unsolicited dick pics West Elm Caleb sent – “Nobody’s day is made better by you randomly sending them your dick. You seen penises? They look like depressed old men.”
· Interview – Mindfulness expert Jay Shetty
o I wasn’t familiar with Shetty, but I really enjoyed his interview.
o In discussing his training as a monk, Shetty recalled a time when his teacher noted that, on a long train ride, Shetty only did his meditations during the stops – “He said, ‘Do you think life is peaceful like the stop, or is it difficult like the train?’”
o Shetty went on, “So that’s how monks think. Monks think, how can we be in the chaos, be in the clutter, but still look for stillness in that time?”
o Shetty didn’t continue on as a monk but now works to help bring mindfulness to the mainstream – When Trevor asked whether a mindfulness app to help you “disconnect” is a paradox, he replied, “I understand that people can’t just leave. They can’t just stop. Everyone has bills to pay. Everyone has lives to lead. Everyone has children or family, whatever it may be. So I think we have to meet people where they are, and to me, that’s what the apps do.”
o On what people don’t understand about meditation – “I think people are trying to quiet their mind. They’re trying to stop everything from happening. And meditation’s not about stopping—it’s about observing. It’s about sitting with. It’s about understanding. It’s about being curious.”
Tuesday, January 25
· Headlines – Biden cusses out reporter on a hot mic, China addresses COVID before the Olympics, changes to the SAT
o Trevor noted Biden’s difficult relationship with the press – “They nitpick everything he says. They challenge all of his decisions. And they even get their own room in his house, which is insane. Nobody else has to set aside a guest room for their haters.”
o Loved Trevor’s pushback against any claim that Biden and Trump treat the press “the same” – “I’m sorry, guys, no, I can’t accept that. I cannot believe that people would even say something so disrespectful about my man Donald Jujitsu Trump. First of all, he wouldn’t mumble that into a hot mic. No, he would scream that shit into your face. He’d be like, ‘Get that son of a bitch out of here! So rude! So rude! My crimes are my business.’”
o Truth – “This story gave me perspective, ‘cause Americans complain so much when a restaurant asks them to wear a mask, but then China will shut down your entire block because somebody bought Advil.”
o I enjoyed Trevor’s take on people who are against the SATs going digital – I liked the crack about how, before long, it was just going to be a Buzzfeed quiz called “Tell Us Your Favorite Ninja Turtle and We’ll Tell You if You’re Smart Enough for Yale!”
o I laughed at this description of Neil Young – “The dude who owns your dad’s CD shelf!”
o We looked at Young being prepared to pull his music off of Spotify due to the COVID misinformation on Joe Rogan’s podcast – “At the same time, though, Spotify should think about this. Think about who’s gonna leave a greater legacy. You know, in 30 years, what are people gonna be slow-dancing to at their weddings, a Neil Young ballad or clips of Joe Rogan being wrong about the vaccine?”
o I loved this tee-up to the Taylor Swift feud with Damon Albarn – “She’s been dropping albums almost every week, but according to that guy from that British band that wasn’t Oasis, she’s not putting in enough work!”
o This was Trevor’s advice to a YouTuber who got sued for libel by Cardi B – “If you’re going to talk shit about people, don’t print them as allegations. That’s libel. What you should do is add a beat. Now it’s a diss track.”
o Valid – “This really drives home that being an expert at one thing does not necessarily make you an expert at everything. Because Eric Clapton is an amazing guitar player. I’m just not gonna listen to him about COVID any more than I would buy an album from Dr. Fauci.”
· Interview – Comedian/director W. Kamau Bell
o Trevor and Bell joked about how he’s leveled up from coming on the show to talk about racism to now coming on the show to promote his docuseries We Need to Talk about Cosby – “Oh, you thought I brought the room down before!”
o When asked what drove him to make the documentary (and what encouraged him to keep going,) Bell replied, “I’m always drawn to difficult conversations. That’s kind of my thing. And because Bill Cosby was such a huge cultural, racial figure in my life, and so charted a path, that I was like, ‘That’s the path I should be on. Do good work, be a comedian, but also do good in the world.’ Like, a lot of Black folks, specifically of my generation and older-- we were just gutted to find about all these allegations.”
o This was an interesting point – “You can’t talk about American in the 20th century without talking about Bill Cosby. But you also can ignore all the things that have come out in the 21st century.”
o Bell discussed the difficulty of completing shooting on the same day that Cosby was released from prison – In talking about why he didn’t attempt to interview Cosby himself for the series, Bell explained that it was meant to be “a conversation about him,” exploring his legacy and reactions to the allegations within the industry and the Black community, and he added that to involve Cosby in the project would be a violation of the trust the survivors who participated placed in Bell.
Wednesday, January 26
· Headlines – Justice Breyer to retire, live-action Snow White remake, Joe Rogan questions the word “Black”
o I’d say this is a truth universally acknowledged for all older Supreme Court justices – “It probably isn’t fun being hounded all day by people screaming at you to retire.”
o Even though there are still 10 months before the midterms and the GOP rammed their previous Supreme Court nominee through with only 5 weeks until the presidential election, Trevor wasn’t so sure this was going to be obstruction-proof from Mitch McConnell – “It’s a longstanding Senate tradition that we cannot confirm a Supreme Court justice in a year where there’s a new season of Ozark on Netflix. We all got to watch it first and then process what happened.”
o Trevor’s take on classic Disney films – “They’re the reason we all believe in true love and all hate our stepmothers.”
o We looked at Peter Dinklage expressing doubt over the live-action Snow White remake – While Trevor acknowledged that he’s not a dwarf and never found the original animated film offensive, he said, “But I do understand what he’s talking about. I genuinely do. Because if that movie was called Snow White and the Seven Blacks, I mean, that would be weird. And you could tell me, ‘Oh, Trevor no, the Blacks are actually the heroes. It’s still a… it’s-it’s a great story.’ Let me tell you something. Yo, man, that’s still a white lady and her friendly Blacks. It still set off my spidey sense.”
o I laughed at this description of Joe Rogan – “King of podcasts and Aaron Rodgers’s personal physician.”
o The Joe Rogan clip in question concerned him and a white guest trotting out the old “well, no one’s skin is really white or black” chestnut – Trevor’s reaction was great, shouting, “Yo, this changes everything! This changes everything!” as he ran out of the studio. We heard a few sirens, then did a hard cut to Trevor back in his chair, glumly announcing, “The police said I’m Black.”
o This was excellent – “The thing these guys seem to be ignoring is that Black people didn’t call themselves Black. You understand that, right? It’s not like Black people were like, ‘We’re Black.’ No, in Africa, we have tribes, we have cultures—Zulu, Xhosa, Baganda, Igbo, Wakandans. But then white people got there, and they’re like: ‘Wow, there’s a lot of Black people here. Lot of Black people.’”
· If You Don’t Know, Now You Know – Stock trading among lawmakers
o There’s a new bill in the Senate that would discourage lawmakers from trading individual stocks – “By the way, this bill is quite a move for new senator Jon Ossoff. Think about it. The guy just got to the Senate, and he’s already coming after the wallets of his coworkers? It’s like showing up to prison on your first day and being like, ‘Hey, Warden, I think these guys are using spoons to dig something.’”
o The reason for this bill is to prevent insider trading among lawmakers. While it’s ostensibly illegal now (but scarcely enforced,) there were zero regulations on lawmakers’ trading habits for most of U.S. history – “So, if Thomas Edison testified behind closed doors, senators could just call up their broker going, ‘Dump all my shares in candles. That shit’s over, I tell you!’”
o In the ‘90s, studies showed that members of Congress outperformed the market by an average of 12%, while Warren Buffett only outperformed it by 2.5% - “Obviously something fishy is going on when members of Congress are doing better in the stock market than Warren Buffett! I mean, it definitely makes those fundraising emails even more annoying. ‘I need five dollars by midnight.’ Bitch, go talk to your E-Trade! What are you talking to me for?”
o In addition to being difficult to prove, current laws are insufficient because the penalties for violating them are so negligible – “Ooh. $200 is the penalty? I mean, look, I’m not math expert, but if I have to pay a $200 fine to make a trade that earns me millions of dollars, I feel like I’m coming out ahead.”
o This was a great line – “$200 is not a penalty, people. That’s the chip you throw to the dealer after you win the poker tournament. Hell, you lose $200 just carrying the million dollars to the bank.”
· Interview – Actor/comedian Rick Glassman
o Glassman was there to talk about his new series As We See It, in which he and his costars are neurodiverse actors playing neurodiverse characters.
o I really liked what he said about receiving his autism diagnosis as an adult – “When I first found out, it was like a superpower. I was so excited. All these obstacles that I had in my life that were unrelated, patterns kind of started showing themselves, and I was like, ‘Oh, my God, this makes so much sense.’”
o Glassman shared his love for the quote, “If you’ve met one person with autism, you’ve met one person with autism,” explaining that it took the pressure off of him to be a “spokesperson” for the whole community – “I don’t have to explain who I am. I could just be it and… I’m accepted or I’m not.”
o This was a really neat observation about his costars and their performances as their characters – “For every person that I met on set, I met two people with autism—their representation of it, and then who they really were.”
Thursday, January 27
· Headlines – Justice Breyer officially announces his retirement, Boris Johnson scandal over Afghanistan evacuation, Tennessee school board bans Maus
o Trevor had some words for the gnashing-of-teeth at Fox News over Biden’s plan to nominate a Black woman for Supreme Court justice – “Most importantly, being a Black woman isn’t the qualification. All right? Joe Biden is gonna pick a Black woman who is also qualified. These people act like Biden is just gonna show up at the mall and be like, ‘Yo, Shaniqua, come with me.’ ‘My name is Regina!’ ‘Uh, doesn’t matter. Just put on these robes. I need help with abortion.’”
o Boris Johnson’s latest scandal is an email suggesting he authorized the evacuation of shelter animals in Afghanistan while the U.K. was scrambling to evade people – “Yo, can I be honest? This is the most white people scandal of all time. You rescued pet before human beings?”
o This made me chuckle – “Now, Boris says that this whole scandal is ‘total rhubarb,’ so you can tell he’s stressed, because British people only bust out the obscure vegetables when their backs are against the wall. ‘Prince Andrew, what were you doing on Jeffrey Epstein’s island?’ ‘Oh, brussels sprouts, it’s not what you think.’”
o On banned books and “critical race theory” – “Basically at this point, if it’s not math, science, or how to hide from a shooter, they don’t think it’s appropriate for kids to know about.”
o Trevor explained why Maus’s format and narrative device is an effective way to teach students about the Holocaust – “It helps people process this event that’s unthinkable otherwise. I mean, it’s either a comic book or that Peanuts special It’s Genocide, Charlie Brown.”
· Main Story – In-person schooling during COVID
o Valid – “It’s disorienting not to know what each day is gonna bring. Are they gonna be in class? Are they gonna be home? Is the bullying gonna be in person or cyber? You need to plan!”
o To reduce COVID spread during Omicron, some schools have moved classrooms outdoors, including some schools in Maine and Wisconsin! – “Not to mention, these kids will be the first generation that can outflex their grandparents about how hard they had it. ‘I used to walk ten miles in the snow just to get to school!’ ‘Bitch, the snow was my school!’”
o With a severe teacher shortage due to infections and people leaving the profession, schools have been pulling in everyone from alumni to parents to the National Guard for substitutes. Trevor was surprised to learning that off-duty police officers are subbing in Oklahoma – “Wow. They’re using cops as substitute teachers? I guess that’s one way to get the Black kids raising their hands in class.”
o Meanwhile, school boards are struggling to balances the desires of parents who want their kids to be safe and parents who think masks will turn their kids into “tiny little Faucis” – “I’m home from school, Mom! And all the data supports me getting some mac and cheese right now.”
o These days, it’s just not a story about schooling without some footage of an unhinged rant at a school board meeting – “I mean, this does show you how often school boards get death threats screamed at them. Did you see how calm those people were? This woman is talking about bringing every loaded gun to school, and they’re like, ‘Time is up. Thank you. The next speaker is Jennifer Higgins, who has a proposal for burning down our houses. Go ahead, Jennifer, and please remember, keep it to three minutes.’”
· Correspondent piece (Ronny) – American football
o Ronny’s started a new segment on things that only Americans think are normal, and his inaugural piece was on American football – “Before the game even starts, everyone has to stand up and sing the national anthem together? Nobody else on the planet does that. We just assume everyone knows what country they’re in before the game starts.”
o This made me laugh – “Balls are supposed to be round, okay? That’s the main thing that makes it a ball. But in this insane sport, even the ball looks like it has brain damage.”
o The scoring system also confused Ronny – “If you ask me, a touchdown should be worth 100 points. The player deserves it. He basically dodged a mugging with a slippery almond in his hand.”
o Commercial breaks at football games allowed for a nice tangent on prescription-drug ads, which Ronny explained really aren’t a thing anywhere else in the world – “If someone needs a drug, their doctor will prescribe it. You shouldn’t have to ask them if it’s right for you. This doesn’t happen in any other part of medical care. Okay? There’s no TV ads asking you to ask your doctor whether they should cup your balls and make you cough.”
· Interview – Skier Lindsey Vonn
o This exchange, over whether Vonn’s life as an Olympic skier made her immune to the cold, was cute – “Why do you think I ski fast?” “To get out of the cold?” “Exactly. Literally! I make it to the bottom as fast as I can, I put my clothes back on.”
o Vonn was there to discuss her new memoir, and while they of course talked about her skiing career, they also looked at what followed that – Trevor noted, “One of the hardest things athletes face is the fact that their careers are essentially ‘over’ when life… sort of begins.”
o Vonn acknowledged a difficult transition after she retired from skiing, but she said, “I found new passions and new ways to challenge myself. I think that’s the most important thing. You know, athletes are very driven and goal-oriented, and we just need something to push ourselves towards.”
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