Death Note Vs Havana Syndrome

[00:00:01] Speaker A: Now wait a minute. Now wait a minute. [00:00:03] Speaker B: As you loyal, patriotic, dedicated, thoughtful, knowledgeable and ready, of course, to vote. Listeners know there are many ways to express yourself through voting. I want to Talk today about two high schoolers, or, sorry, four. Four high schoolers who in 2008 were suspended from a school in Gig Harbor, Washington for having their own death notebook in which they had written the name of President George W. Bush. Now that. That is voting. [00:00:48] Speaker A: To be fair there. They're too young to vote. Like I think that was the problem. They were just in trouble because they were too young to vote. [00:00:55] Speaker C: Just lower the voting age and then you'll have fewer death notes. I don't get it. [00:00:59] Speaker A: You're right. Vote. [00:01:00] Speaker B: You know what's great is that here on this podcast, you don't have to be any specific age to vote. You can vote right now. We're all going to vote together. [00:01:08] Speaker A: It's the most important election of our lives. [00:01:11] Speaker C: This election, which will be, I do. [00:01:13] Speaker B: Truly believe, the most important election of our lifetime. [00:01:17] Speaker A: This is the most important election of our lifetime. [00:01:20] Speaker C: This is the most important election. Don't you you hear that? [00:01:24] Speaker A: This is the most election in our lifetime. [00:01:28] Speaker C: I certainly think it's the most important election of my lifetime. [00:01:31] Speaker B: This is the most important election of our times. [00:01:35] Speaker D: Politicians say every time, this is the most important election. [00:01:38] Speaker B: This one's really that important. I'm Kennedy Cooper. With me as always, we've got Brandon Buchanan who may or may not be able to speak right at this second, but he's here. And we've got our in house statistician Andrew Fields. Andrew, say hi. [00:01:53] Speaker A: 2 plus 2 equals. Equals 3. If you. Equals. Sorry, 2 plus 2 equals 11. If you're using base 3. That is absolutely actually a true math fact and you'll hate me for it. [00:02:07] Speaker C: More like base three. [00:02:08] Speaker B: Brandon's waving at us from the voting booth, by the way. He is here. He's just. He's casting his vote right this second. He'll be here in a moment. And we've got a wonderful guest today. We've got Lenore from the Socialist Shelf, a delightful podcast about books that I've been on and you should listen to Lenore say hi. [00:02:25] Speaker C: Hello. My name is Lenore Taylor Olson, like Kennedy said. I co host a podcast called the Socialist Shelf with my good friend and comrade Jacob Dallas Main. We yap about books from our perspective as socialist organizers here in the Atlanta area. We had Kennedy on our show to talk about the Alchemist. It was a banger of a time. Y' all should Go listen to that. [00:02:46] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. Lenore, you got anything else you want to shout out in your world, people? Yeah, anything like that? [00:02:51] Speaker C: Yeah. I am rare and radiant on blue sky. I'm also, of course, the Socialist Shelf has a website, Socialistshelf.com we occasionally do. I say occasionally there'll be more. We have, like, poetry, we have essays from ourselves and also comrades, about, you know, organizing socialist history, all that. I want to do an essay series at some point on S.M. sterling, the alternate history author. That'll happen any. Any year now. [00:03:20] Speaker A: All ask you, Lenore, is I know you're radiant on blue sky, but what's your username? [00:03:28] Speaker C: Believe it or not. [00:03:30] Speaker D: Whoa. [00:03:33] Speaker C: Oh, God, that took me way too long. I don't even celebrate 420. [00:03:38] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. By the way, happy Weed day, listeners. [00:03:41] Speaker C: Yes to all who celebrate. [00:03:43] Speaker B: Yes to all. [00:03:43] Speaker A: That's the thing going on today. [00:03:47] Speaker B: Well, RFK Jr. Is going to make you start celebrating weekday soon, so get ready. [00:03:53] Speaker A: I don't like. I don't. You've said words I don't like. [00:03:58] Speaker B: Yeah, Socialist Shelf. Great, great times, as mentioned. And you know, I would say that writing a book is one of the most powerful votes you can cast. [00:04:14] Speaker C: Yeah, no argument there. No, Jacob's actually done it. [00:04:18] Speaker A: Like, J.K. rowling really put in her vote when she made Harry Potter, made millions, and then funded a campaign against trans people to get the UK Supreme Court to rule against them. Like, that was a powerful vote. Let's be honest here. [00:04:35] Speaker C: Oh, God. She. She needs to. Yep, yep, yep. Just. Just fill in the blank with whatever tickles your fancy. [00:04:46] Speaker B: You know, my current take on J.K. rowling is that we're all getting Last of Us did by the black mold in her house. The black mold in her house is deciding the future of society. That's even scarier in some ways than it being a person. [00:05:02] Speaker A: Are you saying the black mold is voting? [00:05:05] Speaker B: That's right. Mold can vote in 2025. Thank you. J.K. rowling. [00:05:11] Speaker C: He is breeding heretofore unseen strains. [00:05:15] Speaker B: Well, speaking of black mold and things that can kill you, this is a terrible transition, but we're here today to talk about Death Note. [00:05:22] Speaker C: I thought you were going to do. Speaking of breeding. [00:05:26] Speaker A: No, no, absolutely. I mean, Death Note is somehow better than that topic. [00:05:34] Speaker B: Yeah, Death Note sure is a. It sure is a creative work of all time. Certainly has had a profound influence on culture. Definitely. We just said, you know, writing a book is potentially a way of casting a very powerful vote. Well, Death Note was a very powerful vote. It has led to Many people committing crimes, you know, most of them unsuccessful, to be clear. You know, these amateur criminals did not get very far. But pretty funny that many of them wrote down somewhere along the way. Here's a list of everyone I hate in a book called Death Note. No one will suspect that, you know. [00:06:16] Speaker A: The real Kira would praise Death Note like this and point it out. But maybe they know this and they're trying to throw me off my guard. [00:06:25] Speaker D: The real. Hmm. [00:06:27] Speaker A: Is this truly the real Kira? [00:06:30] Speaker C: The real Kira could be any one of us. [00:06:33] Speaker A: The real Kira would say that. [00:06:36] Speaker D: I think that Death Note and I appreciate the sudden hush when I arrived here. First of all, thank you for holding my place. [00:06:43] Speaker A: Your presence is fantastic. [00:06:45] Speaker D: Yeah, the thing, I think that the reason why Death Note is so popular is because. And yeah, you can call it edgy, it's just something everybody relates to. They all want the ability to point at someone in society and say, the sky gone. And then you just wave a magic wand and it happens. This was just a crime drama that takes that idea and brings it in, into real life. And it has a lot of tension episode to episode. I mean, things happen all the time in Death Note more than you can say for many shows. [00:07:24] Speaker A: I mean, I've had people stumble upon the live action Death Note. Like it could just live action terrible. But also just because they like the concept and they want one. [00:07:37] Speaker C: The live action Japanese films do do interesting things with the rules. Like I defend them on that front, but they're very, very janky. I agree. [00:07:48] Speaker A: You know, the real Kira is only likes the anime. [00:07:51] Speaker B: Yeah, live action anime adaptations are still a. Still kind of a fledgling art form that. Still making its way, but not, not all bad all the time, per se. Yeah, Death Note, very interesting. And, and yeah, it's definitely. It is a fantasy with a lot of appeal and it's written as a cautionary tale. Like, yes, this is an appealing fantasy, but is it really a good idea? I think is a, you know, actually pretty solid philosophical core for this kind of story. And anyone who says that this isn't a fantasy they would want is lying to themselves. And you know, you might think, well, I don't want to kill a bunch of people. Yeah, of course most people don't, but if, if, if there was a book right now that you could write Elon Musk's name in and something would happen to him, people would be lining up. There would be a line of millions, millions of people long, trying to write their name, trying to write his name in that book. They wanted his Name. [00:08:48] Speaker A: Not their name. [00:08:49] Speaker B: Yeah, his name. [00:08:50] Speaker C: His name. If there was just a, like, punch in the dick note, like, I guarantee you that would be like, a majoritarian position in society. [00:08:57] Speaker A: Can I get my punch in the dick note? [00:09:02] Speaker B: I feel like a punch in the dick note wouldn't even be controversial in America. [00:09:06] Speaker C: If you don't have a dick, one will be assigned to you for the purposes of the punch in the dick note. [00:09:10] Speaker B: Yeah. If you. If your name gets written in the book, a dick temporarily appears. What? Why do I have a dick? And then you realize, oh, you're about to get punched in it. [00:09:24] Speaker A: Nancy Mace. [00:09:26] Speaker C: Ah, glorious. Glorious. Yeah. Yeah. I. It's. It's probably the piece of media that has occupied the greatest territory in my mind since it dropped. I was like, 13 when the show started airing. Caught me at the perfect time. Fast forward to now. I have Lindell Taylor tattooed on my arm. Like, I'm currently rereading it about halfway through at this point. Like, it's. It's just. It's a staple. It's just an institution. I love it. I love my gay detectives. I love my rules that cover, like, all the scenarios that you could never cover in the book. It's. It's a grand old time. [00:10:04] Speaker A: I will say when, like, I heard a lot about Death Note, I didn't think much about it recently. A friend tried to get me into it. I've watched a few episodes. I shocked that Death Note is so short given how much of a hold it has had on pop culture. [00:10:20] Speaker C: Well, and it makes up for that in, like, the sheer. The sheer number of times the story has been told. Right. Because there's the manga, of course, there's the anime adaptation. There's also the live action films, both in English and in Japanese. You got a live action TV drama. You got a musical now, which is actually pretty fire. [00:10:39] Speaker B: Okay, that's awesome. [00:10:41] Speaker A: I'm murdering you by writing your name. I don't know. [00:10:46] Speaker C: That's actually like, you've basically paraphrased the song. That's. That happens when Light finds the Death Note. [00:10:52] Speaker A: Amazing. [00:10:54] Speaker D: We love it. [00:10:55] Speaker B: Also, it's. It's dense storytelling. There's a lot of stories that kind of ramble on and on, but Death Note definitely comes at you hard and fast, both in the anime and even in the manga, which is. Breathes a teeny tiny bit more, but is actually still pretty punchy. [00:11:13] Speaker C: No, I agree. I agree. It's paced, surprisingly. I. I remember it slowing down. Like, when you have Light and L handcuffed together, that whole bit. But like, honestly, it. It's. Yeah, you're right. It's pretty. It's pretty breezy. It's. It's. It's at a pretty. Not a breakneck pace, but like, there's always something going on in contrast. [00:11:32] Speaker A: Just so you understand my perspective, I'm a huge One Piece fan. [00:11:37] Speaker C: Let's go. [00:11:40] Speaker A: You want to watch over 1100 episodes to get caught up? [00:11:44] Speaker B: Yeah. As much happens in one episode of Death Note as like a hundred One Piece episodes. [00:11:52] Speaker A: There are two separate instances where Luffy is drowning for several episodes consecutive effort. [00:11:59] Speaker C: Oh my God. That's wonderful. Open up the book. He's still drowning. Still drowning. [00:12:04] Speaker B: I've said it before. I'll say it again. As a Dragon Ball Z fan. Every time I think about watching One Piece, I think about how slow Dragon Ball Z is and I go, there's no way. There's no way anything could be slower than that. I can't do it. [00:12:17] Speaker A: Wano is currently a part 16 JoJo anime length. The entirety of one saga is all of JoJo. Steel Ball Run is coming, though. [00:12:31] Speaker C: That's true. I'm excited for that. I need to catch up. [00:12:34] Speaker B: Yeah. Good times. But we're not here today to talk about all of anime. We're here to talk about very specifically, the subject of weapons that can harm you from a distance, used against you by somebody who you can't see, somebody you don't know, but they've got your number and they're gonna take you down. And of course, I'm talking about Havana Syndrome. [00:13:01] Speaker A: Oh, no. [00:13:03] Speaker D: Oh, yeah. [00:13:05] Speaker B: Yeah. So, Lenore, have you heard about Havana Syndrome? [00:13:09] Speaker C: I heard. I've heard. It's. I suffer now and again, especially the morning after my. My. My 31st birthday. [00:13:18] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:13:19] Speaker C: Yeah. No, it's. It's. It's. It's. Heretofore unseen technology developed under. Under incredible sanction by. By the fiercest enemies of. Of America. [00:13:30] Speaker B: Yeah. By a country that spends less than 1% of our budget on military stuff, which is just wow. [00:13:36] Speaker C: Like, efficiency, man. [00:13:38] Speaker A: Wow. Their. Their scientists are geniuses. Geniusi. [00:13:42] Speaker C: Unironically. Yeah. [00:13:45] Speaker B: So this is a number of health incidents reported by U.S. and Canadian government. Officials describe stuff as disabling cognitive problems, balance issues, dizziness, insomnia, and headaches. Havana Syndrome has not been officially recognized by any medical body whatsoever. And in spite of that, our US Government passed a. A package providing relief to sufferers of Havana Syndrome. Let's give it up for the Power of Voting. [00:14:26] Speaker A: Vote. Vote. Vote for a fake disease. [00:14:30] Speaker C: You too can get Bailed out from your debilitating hangover if you just believe so. [00:14:36] Speaker A: I will say, as the statistician who has to pretend to do actual science stuff on this from time to time, that I found a article, which is a literature review of 150 scientifically published articles on Havana Syndrome, concludes that there's something going wrong. Calling it Havana Syndrome. There isn't. The evidence. All these research articles have a small sample size and it ends with the sentence, this syndrome should be considered and investigated as a health concern and not as a political issue. [00:15:15] Speaker C: Let's go. [00:15:16] Speaker B: Incredible. [00:15:17] Speaker C: Ah, democracy. [00:15:18] Speaker D: I was gonna ask, are we sure that Havana syndrome is 100% fake? It seems like it's something, but not enough to give it a brand name. [00:15:30] Speaker A: Like it's 99.99% fake. Chance of being fake. [00:15:36] Speaker B: A 0.1% chance of being real. Huh? [00:15:40] Speaker A: That means it's real. Let's bring out the conspiracy theory. [00:15:45] Speaker C: I mean, if I had a notebook that afflicted people with, like, headaches and whatnot, I would know which group of people to hide that in. [00:15:51] Speaker A: Oh, it's funny you say that. Let us continue, Kennedy. [00:15:55] Speaker B: Yeah, let's move right along here. Yeah, it just seems like, I don't know, seems like Havana Syndrome is maybe a scheme. But imagine if it was real. Imagine if there really was a ray gun. You could point at people from hundreds of feet or maybe miles away, I. [00:16:16] Speaker C: Don'T know, rotating it in my mind. [00:16:19] Speaker B: And give people headaches, nausea, dizziness, cognitive impairments. That wouldn't be a meaningless power, would it? I mean, it's hard to say exactly if it's as good or as bad as the Death Note. But we're going to say whether or not before the end of this podcast. [00:16:37] Speaker A: Vote, vote, vote. [00:16:40] Speaker D: It's definitely something. I mean, you've got to use it carefully because the goal is to give some sort of genuine cognitive co experience, even if it's just getting sick. Like, if this was people who are out of revival and you gave them all Havana Syndrome, they'd know that they'd experience something. You know what I mean? This is your way of making a. A sensate, but for a large group of people, and maybe you could blackmail them with it, or maybe you could use this as some sort of enlightening experience. It really does depend a lot on the ingenuity of the person using it. Obviously, Havana Syndrome is more about the imagination than death. [00:17:24] Speaker A: Maybe the real Death Note was inside us the whole time. [00:17:27] Speaker C: It was the friends we made along the way. [00:17:30] Speaker A: I think The Death Note is the opposite of that, actually. [00:17:33] Speaker C: Enemies we made along the way, we. [00:17:36] Speaker B: Killed along the way. I like the idea of a church where they're like, how, you know, God is real and is speaking to you is. You're getting the runs. You're getting the. We get the runs in mass. [00:17:51] Speaker C: Wasn't there some kind of like. Like, connection between, like, oracles and, like, epilepsy or something, like, historically? [00:17:57] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, there's definitely been a number of. A number of cultures, historically, around the world that have celebrated various unexplained, at the time, illnesses or disabilities as, you know, divine teaching at the time or, you know, whatever. [00:18:18] Speaker C: Joan of Arc. Yeah. [00:18:20] Speaker D: Yeah. Aren't there myths about hot girls having stomach aches on Twitter? [00:18:24] Speaker C: I. That's not a myth. I can. I can confirm. [00:18:29] Speaker D: I love that all of you jumped out there. That's not a myth. Oh, yeah. [00:18:34] Speaker C: I've lived that. You kidding me? [00:18:36] Speaker B: Yeah. Joan of Arc, you know, really good counterpoint to RFK saying that autistic people will never have jobs or get anything done. [00:18:47] Speaker C: You can free an entire country from the English. Yo, Jonah. [00:18:50] Speaker A: Arc had the best job. Joan of Arc had the best job. You can quote me on that one. [00:18:59] Speaker B: Getting burned at the stake. No, never mind. [00:19:03] Speaker A: That was her getting fired. [00:19:05] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:19:07] Speaker B: Editor, insert a derogatory sound effect. [00:19:12] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I love the idea of a derogatory sound effect. [00:19:21] Speaker B: So, yeah, I already hinted at this, but I. I really am just gonna ask you now, is the Death Note or the Havana Syndrome ray gun stronger? Now, keep in mind that as soon as you start using the Death Note excessively, people catch on to you. It's just. You can't just have people die. [00:19:39] Speaker D: And, you know, Light was very dumb early on. He did narrow the suspect list. He could have gotten away with it a lot longer. [00:19:48] Speaker B: He could have. But still, if there's enough unexplained, especially deaths of important people. Because let's be honest, who are you using the Death Note on if not important people? I mean, yes, some people are going to settle some petty disputes, but realistically, most people, if given the Death Note, are just going to write the name of the current US President into it or something like that. Much like the school students in Washington that we mentioned earlier who wrote President George W. Bush into their death. [00:20:19] Speaker A: Their. [00:20:20] Speaker B: Their. Their ideal Death Note. [00:20:22] Speaker C: The obvious use case. Yes. So here's a. Here's a controversial take. I think, depending on the application, a Havana Syndrome note could actually be stronger than the Death Note. And I'll tell you why. Because A person can only die one death, right? You can have multiple Havana Syndrome events, to our knowledge. It can't kill you. It's not fatal. So that means that, you know, there's much more value, I think, in blackmailing somebody over time with that than just, you know, killing them once and they're done. Because eventually the specter of death is going to lose its luster. [00:21:02] Speaker D: We have real evidence that. Excuse me. We have real evidence that the Havana Syndrome people were able to get money out of the federal government. We all made fun of them for doing it, but we just know for a fact that they had a definable impact on reality. [00:21:18] Speaker A: Maybe the real van extension was the money we made along the way. True. [00:21:23] Speaker B: Okay, but also, it is canonical that if Donald Trump had the ability to buy the Death Note, he would. [00:21:32] Speaker C: That's true. That is. That is something that happens. Listeners in the One Shot manga that came out in 2020. It comes down to a bidding war. The Death Note gets auctioned on Twitter because the guy who finds it is like, well, I'm not going to fucking use it. They'll find out who I am and kill me. So he's like, yeah, I'll just auction it off on Twitter. It comes down to a bidding war between the United States and the People's Republic of China. And, yeah, Trump buys it for $10 trillion. [00:21:58] Speaker A: Wow, that's canon. [00:22:00] Speaker C: Well, but crucially, crucially, by this time, the Shinigami King has heard about this and is like, okay, this is not how it's supposed to go. New rule. Whoever sells the Death Note, like, on conclusion of the deal, the seller and the buyer die. So Trump finds out, and he's like, I don't want to die. I'll just refuse the Death Note. But fake like, I have it and just won't use it. [00:22:22] Speaker A: That is. That's what Trump would. That's what Trump would do. [00:22:26] Speaker C: It's very Trumpy. Now if he had a Havana Syndrome Note. Yeah, I think all bets are off. [00:22:32] Speaker D: I think with the Havana Syndrome note, we shouldn't assume that you're going to be clandestine just because you haven't killed anybody in the United States. There's just a huge backlog of amateur mystery lovers that love to, like, look up any kind of mystery that's anywhere short of, like, the cops being involved. You'd have every True Crime podcaster looking into this Savannah Syndrome shit from around the world, and I bet that, like, 100 of those can probably make up 1L. [00:23:07] Speaker C: You'd have, like, three subreddits tracking this person down within a week. [00:23:10] Speaker B: But also, I don't know, I also feel like with the right disinformation campaign, you just have countless scores of people online saying you're making it up. It's not real. It's all in your head. You know, I mean, look at how large of groups were able to discount. [00:23:28] Speaker D: You could pay for bots to throw the trail off. You could pay a PR firm, especially when it's small. You know, you could, you could do it. But I'm just pointing this out as a thing that you'd really be thinking about. [00:23:42] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. And I mean, the Death Note, it does kill people. That's pretty strong. So I don't know, it seems a little tough to say exactly which one is stronger. I think, I think I have some clarifying questions which could help us though. Here's our next vote for us to cast. What's the highest office that the Death. The power of the Death Note could get you elected to? Assuming you have no other real special qualities or negatives. Right. You're just like an average schmuck, all right? You work at. You're a high level manager at a Target or a. You work at a fake copies at a law firm or some. And find the Death Note. [00:24:28] Speaker D: Do I have a special level of courage? Are you saying is this like a pure Bruce Almighty situation or is. Is this player gonna threaten to use this Death Note? Use this Death Note? Are they gonna be ruthless? I guess that is a big modifier. [00:24:46] Speaker B: I mean, I think within your, within your mind, they can kind of play it how you want, but just. They don't have any other. You know, they're not especially charismatic. They don't come from wealth. They don't have a large group of political connections going into this. They just have the Death Note. What's the highest office you think you could get elected to? [00:25:08] Speaker A: House. [00:25:09] Speaker B: With Death Note and very little else going for you? [00:25:13] Speaker A: My votes for House of Representatives. [00:25:15] Speaker B: House of Representatives, Really? [00:25:18] Speaker A: I feel like once you get into the Senate, you're. You have to be in some limelight. But there's a lot of House members. You don't fucking know their names. My House Representative is Nikki Butinski. You've never heard her name. You wouldn't have heard her name without me. Like, I feel like you could remain under the radar just enough to avoid getting caught. [00:25:40] Speaker C: That's, that's, that's true. There's. [00:25:42] Speaker D: I bet we can find out statistically which office has a lot of uncontested races, because somewhere in that range. There are probably a lot of races where one person just leaving just does enough. Like, I would bet there's a Public Service Commission seat I can win somewhere with a death note. [00:26:02] Speaker A: Oh, I see where your mind is. Yeah, No, I see where your. [00:26:07] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:26:08] Speaker A: Like. [00:26:08] Speaker C: Like some. Some kind of. Some kind of office. I learned not long ago that some municipalities have elections for. For like city coroner. Right. The person who handles all the dead people. [00:26:18] Speaker A: Correct. I don't want to say too much because there is a bit of a confidentiality thing, but in my own job, I have had experiences with foreigners and how different of an impact they can make depending on who's in. Yes, it is. Can be an elected position. [00:26:40] Speaker C: That's fascinating. That's like, like it's, you know, to, you know, just to brush with that. That position, you know. Yeah. I have no. I have no idea of the ins and outs of that, but I feel like I could get elected to that position or any other, like, minor functionary in a city quite easily with the death note just by, you know, killing the right person. My opponent in the race, perhaps. Because. Yeah, a lot of these things are uncontested. [00:27:06] Speaker B: I was going to say, like, if you. If it's anything where it's relatively easy to get on the ballot, then even if you're not getting the votes, doesn't really matter if you have one opponent and it's relatively easy to get on the ballot, you just kill them close to election day and then it's too late for anyone to do anything but elect you, basically. [00:27:25] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:27:25] Speaker C: Yeah. I mean, not that. Not that there haven't been dead people who have won elections in this country. There's a handful of those. [00:27:32] Speaker B: Yeah. You can't kill them too close to election day. You have to kill him with like a couple of weeks out and you have. So you've got time to, like, give some speeches and like, kind of like rally the community around the idea of, well, I guess this is all right. You know, if you do it like two days before the dead person just maybe beats your ass in some cases. Right. [00:27:52] Speaker C: I was skeptical of the House of Representatives hypothesis, but I'm kind of coming around to it. [00:27:58] Speaker B: It. [00:27:58] Speaker C: Because, like, I mean, look how long it took him to. To grab Luigi Mangioni. Right? [00:28:03] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. And even then we're not 100% sure if he's the right guy. There are some indiscrepancies that's on. [00:28:10] Speaker C: Yeah, that's on the state to prove. Absolutely. And there's every reason to believe he didn't he didn't do anything. [00:28:15] Speaker B: But. [00:28:15] Speaker C: Yeah, no, like it's, it's, it's even less of a paper trail, shall we say, using such a, such a note. I think, I think the FBI would be pretty baffled depending on how much resources that they threw at it. I feel like you'd start to be under a little heat. Yeah. Once you got to the Senate or to like a governor position, I feel like they, they, they throw a lot. [00:28:41] Speaker A: Of money at that, like, for reference sake. Last year there was a House representative who we found out for months she wasn't showing up because she was in an institution. She had. She was very confused. People put her in her home and it turns out she's an elected official. And it took us months to find that out. [00:29:03] Speaker C: Oh my God. Or, you know, like that or like fucking like Matt Gaetz does all his shit out in the open. [00:29:09] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:29:11] Speaker C: No, there's so much you could get away with as an elected official in, in this country. [00:29:14] Speaker B: Yeah. I'm kind of buying House of Reps. What were you gonna say, though? [00:29:17] Speaker C: I don't know if you could get to be president, like with this, with the, with the power of the Death Note, with the power of Kira, but you could, you could get, you could definitely vote on a few very important laws. [00:29:28] Speaker B: Yeah. I think once you reach too high, the problem is, see, for like a smaller election, like we were saying, you could probably just kill one person and make it work. And since. And if you do that cleverly with the Death Note, then it's just, oh, this person just died in their sleep mysteriously. So weird. Right? But if, if like, if you're like running for president and like eight people on the opposition's team, you know, died in their sleep mysteriously in the last six weeks, people are going to start to ask questions. [00:30:03] Speaker C: That's true. Yeah. And like the Death Note can manipulate the manner of death. It doesn't have to be a heart attack. It could be an accident. It could be like a longer term, like disease. But you know, the very fact that of people meeting like mysterious ends is going to raise some eyebrows. Now is there anybody in the US like intelligence states on the level of an L or a near or a mellow? I personally don't believe it, but you know, there's certainly people who believe that, that they're, that they are such a person. I think persistence alone. [00:30:39] Speaker B: Murderer in the US as smart as Kira. [00:30:42] Speaker C: That's true. [00:30:43] Speaker B: You've got a. It's a level playing field, I think. [00:30:46] Speaker C: Although that is that is something Kira would say. Just, just throwing that out there. [00:30:50] Speaker A: The real Kira would point that out in order to. For me to accuse another Kira. But maybe they were making a real accusation. [00:31:00] Speaker C: That's true. The real Kira wouldn't be so obsessed. You're right. With deflecting. Deflecting. You know, the possibility of his existence. You know, because that would just be suspicious. [00:31:10] Speaker A: But would the real Kira be a socialist? [00:31:13] Speaker C: No. [00:31:15] Speaker D: The real Kira would eat a chip and then eating another chip. [00:31:23] Speaker C: No lights. [00:31:24] Speaker A: You're right. [00:31:25] Speaker C: No lights are liberal 100%. [00:31:28] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. [00:31:31] Speaker B: Okay. We did Death Note. What's the highest office you could get elected to with the power of the Havana Syndrome ray gun? Is it lower or higher than the Death Note? [00:31:41] Speaker C: Oh, you're going straight to UN Secretary General. I feel like there's so much more you could do with mild inconvenience. That's just deniable enough. You know, everybody has a hangover now and again. [00:31:56] Speaker B: I do. I don't know about President. Like, I still think that might be out of reach, but I do think Senate is now in your grasp. If you've got the Havana Syndrome ray gun. [00:32:06] Speaker C: I mean, we, I mean we talk a lot about how, you know, John Kennedy and Richard Nixon, like, you know, public opinion hinged on one of those men being really good at TV and one of those being just an absolute uncharismatic ghoul. Just, just reproduce that effect. Right. Just be debating somebody who can barely like keep it together because of, you know, you wrote their name down and then just keep doing that. [00:32:29] Speaker B: And also hit the moderators with that while you're at it. [00:32:34] Speaker C: Just everybody around you gets, gets, gets, gets, gets got by the aura of Sock. [00:32:39] Speaker B: Yeah. Everyone around you just is spewing gobbledygook and you sound like a genius. Actually, maybe you could become President with the Van syndrome. [00:32:48] Speaker C: Reyka, I, I holy. I wholly believe in that. Yes. [00:32:52] Speaker B: I think, I think it depends just on like, how, how much control you have over, like, can you focus the beam? Can you turn it into a cone? Can you hit 100 people at once? You know what I mean? Like, there's some factors like that that I think we'd have to into the nitty gritty of. And I don't know if we want to. We probably don't have time for that. But depending on exactly how powerful or exactly how restricted, maybe President is within your grasp. If you've got the Havana Syndrome ray gun. Maybe. [00:33:25] Speaker D: I think that you have. I think for this because it's such a specialized Power. I think you have a full Green Lantern level of control. You can go as far as the eye can see. You're like Magneto. [00:33:42] Speaker C: No, that's true. That's. That's actually a really. That's actually a really good parallel the, The, The Green Lantern thing, because, you know, the only constraint there is your imagination. Imagination. And of course, there's rules. There's a ton of rules for the Death Note, but constraints drive creativity. [00:33:58] Speaker D: So if somebody has just the perfect plan to become president with the Havana Syndrome gun, then so be it. [00:34:05] Speaker C: Well, I mean, you would just have to make sure your. Your campaign slogan isn't all according to Keikaku. That would be suspicious. [00:34:11] Speaker D: I. I think you could get to a, to a, to a New Hampshire State House. You know, I think UN Secretary General, somebody mentioned it's a small election. You only need to. You could probably get elected Pope with a Havana Syndrome gun. Imagine that at the conclave. [00:34:28] Speaker C: Pope Kira the First. [00:34:29] Speaker B: Oh, wow. Oh, you could definitely. [00:34:32] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. [00:34:33] Speaker B: This is a step down from some of the things we've mentioned, but I think it's interesting enough to mention you could definitely be the DNC or RNC chair with the Havana Syndrome ray gun. [00:34:43] Speaker C: No question. [00:34:44] Speaker B: Yeah, no question at all. You could. You could easily acquire. Which is actually a position of considerable power in this country. So that's kind of interesting. Yeah, I kind of. I'm kind of coming around to the idea that the Mana Syndrome ray gun is. Is the, is the green. The Green Lantern ring for politics, if you can really imagine, you can do it. [00:35:08] Speaker C: And it's not illegal to give somebody a hangover. [00:35:11] Speaker B: Technically, yes. [00:35:14] Speaker A: Not yet. Not yet. [00:35:16] Speaker C: The laws are written in blood. [00:35:19] Speaker B: If any anime character from any show or manga that you've seen or watched could have invented the Havana Syndrome ray gun, who would it be? [00:35:30] Speaker C: Oh, boy. [00:35:31] Speaker A: Here's my answer. Hello, Perry the Platypus. I have created the Havanator and will take over the Tri State area. [00:35:40] Speaker C: Okay, I. I've never seen Phineas and Ferb, but I know just enough about Dr. Doofenshmirtz to agree with you There. There is a show and we're gonna get nerdy with it here. There's a show called Al Noah 0 where, like, it's all about taking down, like, large mechs and mech pilots with. By exploiting, like, very specific scientific weaknesses. I think there's a Monster of the Week episode in there where our main character, this high school kid Inaho, comes up with, oh, this guy's one weakness is debilitating hangovers we're just gonna take him down from inside. He's invincible otherwise. [00:36:18] Speaker B: Brandon. [00:36:19] Speaker D: Yeah. So this situation, I really think about it being just a great stealing tool. I think a lot of the cast of Bacchano would be happy to use a tool like this. Also, the cast of. Dang it. What's that? Gambling. Anime. [00:36:44] Speaker C: Oh, Kakegurui. [00:36:46] Speaker D: Yeah. What's her name from? Kakaguri would love a Havana Syndrome gun. In fact, she'd probably use it on herself. [00:36:56] Speaker C: Oh, yeah, no, you're absolutely right, actually, because Yumeko Jabami thrives on, you know, not just gambling, but like gambling in suboptimal situations and winning. Anyway. [00:37:06] Speaker A: True. [00:37:07] Speaker B: My take is a little fellow named Arsene Lupin iii. I think. I think that he would invent the Havana Syndrome gun and use it to steal the Mona Lisa, probably or something like that. [00:37:24] Speaker A: Oof. You've got a point. You've got. I'm still sticking with Doofenshmirk, but you've got a point. [00:37:29] Speaker C: I don't know why I thought. I don't know why I thought you were going to say he was going to give the Mona Lisa Havana Syndrome. [00:37:34] Speaker B: He'll do that too. That would be a part of the. That would be one of the comedic gags of the episode, would be like, oh, even the painting's looking sick now. And you look at the painting, it's making a face. [00:37:48] Speaker A: Lupin. The thing. [00:37:50] Speaker B: Okay, great. Good answers there is. So imagine that there is a death Note congressional hearing. All right? We've got to determine whether the Death note is real. Who's on. Who's on the death Note Fact finding committee from our current Congress want everyone to pick at least one person from our current pack of Congress. That make a good case? [00:38:16] Speaker A: Actually, no. I don't know. [00:38:18] Speaker C: Here's the question. Like, does anybody on this facts finding committee have to use the death notes or are they getting like some. Some criminal on death row to. To use it? [00:38:26] Speaker B: The death note exists. [00:38:28] Speaker C: Okay. Okay. Let's see. [00:38:32] Speaker D: I'd like John Kerry to be on this. On this thing. [00:38:38] Speaker B: I'll. You know what? I'll. [00:38:39] Speaker A: He's still. [00:38:39] Speaker B: Yeah, I did say it had to be current, but I. You know, we do often allow historical on this. Fine. Anyone who's ever been in the House of Reps. Fuck it. [00:38:48] Speaker A: Okay, I will. [00:38:49] Speaker D: Alive, he can be part of a special council. We just need somebody to represent, you know, the liberal State Department. Order here. Anyway, keep going. [00:39:01] Speaker A: I will mention a current Senator, Bill Cassidy on the Republican side. He is a Doctor he does have some concerns about health things. Not enough to deny RFK of getting in the position because he wants to win the election more than when he wants to help people. But his, his posts generally are about health and people dropping dead all of a sudden would get his attention. [00:39:31] Speaker C: I feel like, I feel like, you know, and this is, you know, my home state bias showing, but Raphael Warnock, I feel, would, would have a pretty easy ticket onto such a committee. You know, he's a, he's a reverend. He's a man of God, you know, except when he's voting for the Lake and Riley act, he is somebody who would be well positioned to talk about the, the morality of this, of the Death Note. Right? He would be on the news circuit, like, talking about, you know, life and death and why one person shouldn't hold power over it. I feel like just for the optics, you would see a lot of him. [00:40:06] Speaker D: I also think that Warnock staff has probably actually seen Death Note and he'd probably listen to them. You know, there are enough people in the state of Georgia that somebody would, would say, here's how the Death Note works. And he'd listen to them. You know, even if the Death Note doesn't officially exist in this timeline, someone would figure it out. [00:40:30] Speaker C: You know, I'll tell you what, Warnock's. In my experience, Warnock staff, as opposed to Ossoff, actually picks up the phone. [00:40:38] Speaker A: How do you pick up a phone? [00:40:41] Speaker B: Really makes you think Many, many representatives are asking this. I'm gonna add into the mix. I think Katie Porter would be, would be a, a natural fit for, you know, she'd be getting out the whiteboards and just writing, you know, numbers down. Here's how many people died mysteriously in the last six months in this localized area. [00:41:11] Speaker D: It's funny that, that none of us are taking. None of us want Trey Gowdy, none of us want Ken Starr, none of us want any of their Republican prosecutor type people because they were all just so bad at what they were doing. [00:41:27] Speaker B: Just to be clear, I chose a. [00:41:29] Speaker A: Republican, but I chose a Republican doctor who sometimes let his conscience, not all the times he voted rfk and sometimes lets his conscience choose his choice. [00:41:40] Speaker D: You, we all would have been willing, I think, to choose the Republican if we thought that they were really going to get the job done. I, I just, I'm just seeing a gap in Republicans we trust to find the Death Note. Those guys can barely find the sun on a hot day. [00:41:56] Speaker B: I mean, maybe we go more back into the past. Like, I think if John McCain was alive, he might be interested in finding out about the Roosevelt, be interested in. [00:42:06] Speaker A: Finding the Death Note. [00:42:09] Speaker C: Teddy Roosevelt famously got a start as a cop. You know, like, could be actually. Do you know, what do you know? Republican, I think would definitely make an effort. Is James Comey right? And because, because he has, he has a, especially like his worldview, he has a personal stake in proving, you know, whether this thing is a tool of judgment or not and whether it ought to be or not. We talked about on the socialist Shelf. We talked about. James Comey is a writer of crime thrillers now in his twilight years. And so we talked about his first book, Central park west, and we get a little bit into his backstory. If you read his first memoir, I believe he says that, okay, I studied, I studied religion in college. I got a PhD in this shit. I believe James Comey believes that we live in a less religious society in general. And so people need something other than the threat of eternal damnation to keep them in line. And in James Comey's estimation, of course, this is the overwhelming and arbitrary power of the US State. [00:43:10] Speaker D: Why do you want him to find the Death Note? [00:43:12] Speaker C: Oh, I don't want him to find the Death Note. I just believe he'd make the effort. [00:43:15] Speaker A: He gets a participation ribbon. [00:43:19] Speaker D: I think, I think Rand Paul might try to find the Death Note. But we're really reaching. We're really reaching. [00:43:26] Speaker A: I do think Rand Paul would try to find the Note. I don't think he would like, contribute to the efforts in a meaningful way, but I think he would try. [00:43:37] Speaker C: He's, he would definitely, he's, he's on the list for funniest person. [00:43:42] Speaker B: Yeah, I think Rand Paul, I think he would not immediately jump on, but as soon as it got a little popular, he would suddenly act like he'd been into it the whole time and that he was like a, a voice of reason or something. Oh, yeah, good takes, good takes. [00:44:04] Speaker D: I got one more, I got one more name. And this is a, this is, this is a retired politician. But Hillary Clinton, of course, would be self motivated to, to find and retrieve the Death Note if you had God. [00:44:19] Speaker B: Okay, but she wouldn't be on the fact finding committee. She would be paying a shadowy group of, of people to find it faster than Congress. [00:44:30] Speaker A: What if the information to find the Death Note was deleted in her email? Oh, my God. [00:44:38] Speaker C: Clint Clinton body count spike suddenly. [00:44:42] Speaker A: That's why she deleted the emails. To hide the knowledge of the Death Note. [00:44:47] Speaker B: I have information that will lead to the arrest of Hillary and She's writing my name in the Death Note as I say that. [00:44:54] Speaker C: The fucked up part is she'd probably write down, like, exactly the way that Gaddafi died IRL into the Death Note. [00:45:01] Speaker B: Wow. Okay. Which American politician introduces a bill to financially compensate the families of the cure occult victims? [00:45:10] Speaker C: Sanders. [00:45:11] Speaker A: Sanders, Brandon. [00:45:14] Speaker D: So bad for American politics that we're naming one person to give restitution to murder victims, and it's the same guy. [00:45:25] Speaker A: Wait, are we talking about Bernie Sanders? Are we talking about the governor of Arkansas, Sarah Huckabee Sanders? [00:45:39] Speaker B: I assume we were all talking about Sarah Huckabee Sanders episode. [00:45:43] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. [00:45:44] Speaker C: I feel like this would be a rare moment of bipartisanship. [00:45:48] Speaker D: Yeah, I think. I think that there. There becomes some bipartisan. I think there's always money in the government for victims. [00:45:57] Speaker C: Unless you're a 911 first responder. [00:45:59] Speaker A: Listen, here's how Bernie Sanders can win in 2028. [00:46:04] Speaker C: 1% of all the oligarchs are writing 99 of all the. The names down on the Death Note. That's a serious, serious imbalance. It's unconscionable. [00:46:15] Speaker B: Argue that the Death Note should be used responsibly by society as a group a certain number of times per year. I think. [00:46:26] Speaker C: I don't like to say. I think we can all agree that there are some people who deserve to have their names written down more than others. I don't think we. We need to let this thing get out of control. There needs to be reasonable restrictions on the power of Kira. [00:46:38] Speaker D: That's pretty good. That's pretty good. [00:46:40] Speaker A: Alberti could win in 2028. Thank you. This is how he's gonna win. [00:46:44] Speaker B: So we know that if you're just not a special person with any connections, that having the Death Note is not going to make you president. But what if you got kind of close to being president? I'm talking specifically about Kamala Harris. What if Kamala Harris had the Death Note, but she can't write the name Donald J. Trump in it? Specifically, she cannot kill Donald Trump with the Death Note. Okay. She can kill other people, but she cannot kill Donald Trump no matter what she does. All right. If she has the Death Note but can't kill Donald Trump, can Kamala Harris become president in 2024? [00:47:28] Speaker C: Okay, so. So not. Not from right now, but 2024. Okay. Okay. [00:47:32] Speaker B: Yeah. In the last election. [00:47:35] Speaker C: I mean, again, it depends. [00:47:37] Speaker B: The Death Note, since she was a prosecutor in California. [00:47:40] Speaker A: Mm. [00:47:41] Speaker C: I think it depends A, on how close to the election, B, on who she takes out. See how public she is with it. Because I feel like there's a, there's a not insignificant swath of the population that could be swayed by, I don't know, this or that, this or that scary enemy of the United States kicking it. Right. [00:48:05] Speaker A: The consultants would never let her tell anybody. The consultants would make it clear she can. She has to make it the biggest secret. Not even Walt. Tim Waltz would know. The consultants would never let her leak that information. [00:48:19] Speaker C: No. [00:48:19] Speaker B: Certainly not even telling the consultants. Again, she's had this since she was a prosecutor in California. [00:48:25] Speaker C: Okay. I feel like at that, at the point, if she's a prosecutor and she's got the Death Note, would she be aiming that high? Wouldn't. Wouldn't she want to like, try her hand at governor first? [00:48:35] Speaker B: No, we, we're assuming that she kind of basically stays on her current trajectory and that she's rarely, never used. [00:48:47] Speaker A: Like she stumbled upon the chance of becoming president by being vice president, which wasn't upgraded for where she was before. [00:48:55] Speaker B: And I'm thinking that she's rarely or never used the death note before the presidential run. She's always considered it like, like she just kind of like as soon as it came into her possession, she like locked it in a safe and, and she, she doesn't. But. Well, but, but, but now she's like, I'm facing the existential crisis of Donald Trump, but as soon as she goes to write his name in the death note, one of those weird creepy demons appears and is like, you can't write Donald Trump. [00:49:33] Speaker C: Well, I think, I think Kennedy, you do hit on something. You do hit on something very important, which is that she has the uncanny ability to hold an incredible advantage in her hand and to piss it away. Right. I'm thinking right now of, you know, her people's internal polling never showed her ahead. You know, there's any number of positions that she could have forcefully taken on the campaign trail that she did not re Palestine, re trans people in the United States, re the, the minimum wage, which I think she only mentioned like twice. So I think if she has the death note and the opportunity to kill Elon Musk and everybody on Twitter and Blue sky and whatnot is screaming at her to do it. She'll weasel it out with some like, faux principled, oh, I can't do it. It would be wrong. It would put me on his level. And then Trump's like, whatever, and he just, you know, coast to victory the way that he did. I believe you could get a serious, like, non voting portion of the country on Your side. If you just point to one oligarch like Elon Musk and say, that guy's going down, and then he does. [00:50:42] Speaker B: So I have a take. I do think there's a path to victory for Kamala Harris with the Death Note. And what she has to do is use the Death Note to kill Joe Biden in 2023. [00:50:54] Speaker C: Landslide. 50 state landslide. [00:50:56] Speaker A: Oh, God. Like we would. Oh, God. We. None of us would remember what the word tariff means at this point. [00:51:08] Speaker C: I mean, that was. That was her greatest advantage, was that she was not Joe Biden. You know, that's. I feel like that's just the next logical step. [00:51:14] Speaker A: Here's the thing. Nothing would fundamentally change. [00:51:17] Speaker C: That's true. [00:51:21] Speaker D: I think that she'd be able to pull it off just because she'll have so much prep time. She'll have a lot more prep time to. To get a promotion at a job. You know, Kira wanted to bring the world justice. He had a much more ambitious goal. I. I think that if Kamala Harris wants to just get a promotion at work, win a popularity contest, I mean, not to mention there are. There are people that could be manipulated inside the government, people that can be manipulated inside one of Trump's court cases. There's just lots of room to either use the Death Note or threaten to use the Death Note. So there just seems to be a lot of leverage, a lot of leverage that can be used there for somebody who has time to prepare and has the Death Note on them. [00:52:16] Speaker C: No, hard agree. There's so many angles you can come at this from. [00:52:19] Speaker B: All right, to round out our discussion here, finish off our votes so we can all head home, I want to ask everyone of all. You can choose, of all politicians in US History, anyone you like, who do you think would be most and least responsible with the Death Note? [00:52:41] Speaker C: Least responsible, I gotta say, J. Edgar Hoover immediately comes to mind. [00:52:46] Speaker A: We give him so much power in the first place. [00:52:49] Speaker C: He was in his. He was in his place for decades. He spent his entire life in the, you know, national security quote, unquote, states, you know, breaking up unions and left organizations, all that sort of thing. I think he would go absolutely bug with the Death Note as far as. As far as most responsible. God, I mean, you have. You have a real rogues gallery of. Of warmongers and murderers and freaks in. In the White House. We gotta. We gotta expand our sort of search. We gotta cast our net a little wider. [00:53:23] Speaker B: Yeah, you might want to go for a slightly lower office, but let's see. [00:53:28] Speaker C: Nobody, none of the Presidents, certainly none of the vice presidents even. Let's see, I mean, canonically, right. The most, the most actually canonically the most responsible politician with the Death Note is Donald Trump, who refused to use it in the, in the one shot manga. [00:53:48] Speaker A: You know what, you're under blind, but you're right. [00:53:52] Speaker B: He's not actually responsible if you misuse not using it. [00:53:58] Speaker C: That's true. That's true. [00:54:00] Speaker B: This is Donald Trump we're talking about. I just feel, I don't know, he might be able to make something horrifying out of not using it. [00:54:09] Speaker C: You'd have to, you'd have to go for like somebody who tried and, and was kind of locked out of the US State for just, you know, various, various reasons of their political bent. So I'm thinking, I'm thinking like a Eugene V. Debs, right, who ran for president from a prison cell and still got like 6% of the vote. Not an insignificant number at the time that he did it. You know, I think somebody principled like that who is too radical and, you know, too populist to be allowed into the government would be somebody who is most responsible with this thing. You know, this is the enemy's weapon. We, we do not need it. We will not use it. [00:54:46] Speaker D: I think obviously to trust with the Death Note, if you have to pick someone, you would pick Barbara Lee, who was the only person in Congress to vote against Authorizing war after 9, 11. If you're gonna bet on anybody, bet on Barbara Lee. [00:55:05] Speaker C: That's a really good point. [00:55:07] Speaker D: Yeah, for sure. [00:55:08] Speaker C: Barbara Lee or Jeanette Rankin, the representative from Wyoming, who was the only person to vote against entering both world wars. [00:55:18] Speaker A: He was also the person who entered the legislation that ended up in the amendment that allows women to vote. [00:55:26] Speaker C: That's true. So that's your, that's your political spectrum on one end. On one end, Jeanette Rankin. On the other end, J. Edgar Hoover. [00:55:34] Speaker D: Yeah, yeah. There are so many people that you just wouldn't, wouldn't want to have the Death Note. And honestly, it probably is some random house toad who doesn't have the charisma to go up any further, but it's just that like imagine Newt Gingrich with the Death Note. [00:55:57] Speaker B: Donald Rumsfeld with the Death Note. We know what kinds of thoughts are in his head now. [00:56:03] Speaker C: I will say, I will say, like you have to take into account as well, some of these people are like true believer, like religious nut jobs and they might be stayed if they get the warning that, okay, the person who uses this Death Note can neither Go to heaven nor to hell. I think if they're true believers, that might. That might sway them. [00:56:23] Speaker B: That's kind of interesting. [00:56:26] Speaker A: I think. [00:56:27] Speaker D: I think very few of them are true believers. [00:56:30] Speaker A: What if George W. Bush actually had a Death Note and that caused everything that happened? [00:56:35] Speaker D: Oh, gosh. [00:56:36] Speaker B: Second death note has hit the. Okay. [00:56:42] Speaker A: Yes. [00:56:43] Speaker C: 9, 11 note. You write down a building's name. [00:56:46] Speaker A: Is this ending plug time for our special guest. [00:56:49] Speaker B: I've got my final hot takes here, which is. I think the worst person in U.S. history to have the Death Note would be Andrew Jackson. He would be settling personal fees with it and genociding whole groups. It would just be a bad time. [00:57:02] Speaker A: Oh, it would be super genocide. [00:57:05] Speaker B: So I don't. I think he would be probably the worst person in history that could possibly have a Death Note. I think the most responsible person. This is a hot take, and you'll love this one, Andrew. I think the most responsible person Death note would be J.B. pritzker. And allow me to make my case for why. Because being a billionaire is like having a Death Note. [00:57:31] Speaker A: My governor. My governor. Mike. Yes. [00:57:33] Speaker B: Being a billionaire is like having a death. All right. You could take that giant stack of money and you can write someone's name on it and just destroy them. Right. Like, we agree on this. Yeah. You could do all kinds of crazy stuff with a giant stack of money. J.B. pritzker. I'm not saying he's by any means perfect. What I am saying is that he has clearly chosen to reject just like, you know, doing nothing but snort cocaine off of people's butts all his life or things like that that he could do with his big stack of money and has instead made some attempt to do something relatively good. Like, I truly believe that in J.B. pritzker's own mind, he probably thinks that he's doing good pretty much all the time, whether or not. [00:58:23] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. Like, I just want to make the clear. I moved to Illinois in the year 2019. That was the first year J.B. pritzker had power. I moved here for grad school. The only real disadvantage I could think of was the famously, Illinois had a bad government. Corrupt. We went without a budget for over a year. Very bad. I was not actually expecting a governor who did good things. And, oh, yeah, I had to come into terms with how he was also billionaire. Yeah, he probably needed the money in order to get into the position. Like, yeah, that's going to be like J.B. pritzker. Holy crap. He's a good governor, aren't four of. [00:59:08] Speaker C: Your last six governors in prison. [00:59:10] Speaker B: Something like that. [00:59:11] Speaker A: I know at least two. I know at least two that were pardoned by Trump. Could be more. I don't want to take. I should probably dig more into the history. I don't. Illinois. [00:59:23] Speaker D: That sounds accurate. [00:59:25] Speaker A: Has gone out of his way to get the corruption out. He has tried to change the tax code, which is in the Constitution. It needs a vote. And in 2020, the vote failed because nobody trusted the government to lower most people's taxes. He's put his own money to raise his taxes so most people would lower those. Yeah, he's not perfect. [00:59:49] Speaker B: Like. [00:59:50] Speaker A: Yeah. Disclaimer. But like, good Lord. J.B. pritzker. [00:59:54] Speaker B: Yeah. I think. I think you can trust a billionaire who has chosen to do relatively good things with their billionaire status with the Death Note more than most US Politicians. [01:00:07] Speaker D: You don't know what he's been doing with the cocaine long before you met him going into office. [01:00:12] Speaker B: Oh, he's definitely Death Note. I'm not saying he's not gonna use it. [01:00:18] Speaker A: Like. My most hypocritical political take is, I strongly believe in term. In term limits. In most governor term limits are two terms. I strongly believe in it. No. Pritzker can have a third term. I don't see a problem. Why would I see a problem in that? [01:00:35] Speaker B: Well, I think. I think we're done voting. I think we voted our hearts out. Lenore, how do you feel right now? You feel democratic? [01:00:44] Speaker C: I feel like I've. Yeah, I feel like I've done my civic duty. It's, you know, it's a similar feeling to whenever I, you know, I vote dutifully here in the state of Georgia. And it's a similar feeling that I have whenever I write in my cat. [01:00:56] Speaker A: For Georgia Secretary of State in your swing state. Please keep voting for my sake. Please keep voting. [01:01:03] Speaker C: Listen, if I know one thing about my cat, it's that she's incapable of rigging an election. [01:01:08] Speaker A: Yeah. That's fair. [01:01:09] Speaker C: I feel like she would bring. Shiloh, would bring some much needed gravitas to the office. [01:01:16] Speaker B: We need. We need dignity restored. [01:01:19] Speaker C: Isn't that right, Shiloh? [01:01:21] Speaker B: Well, thank you so much for voting with us today. Thank you so much, listeners, for joining us. Voting along at home, in the car, at work, in the bathroom, wherever you are. [01:01:33] Speaker C: Thank you for having me on. [01:01:34] Speaker A: You better be listening to us in. [01:01:36] Speaker B: The voting booth, and we'll see you next time. [01:01:40] Speaker C: Take care. [01:01:41] Speaker A: Bye 3 ever. [01:01:42] Speaker D: Bye. [01:01:43] Speaker B: Bye. [01:01:49] Speaker A: Thanks for listening.