Glenn and Stu discuss the ongoing government shutdown, noting the unusual lack of media coverage about people affected by it, which they attribute to Democrats being responsible this time rather than Republicans. They argue that mainstream media bias protects Democrats from political pressure, making the shutdown likely to last longer. The conversation shifts to broader economic concerns, including rising gold prices as a sign of global instability and speculation that major financial changes may be coming.
Transcript
Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors
GLENN: And, of course, the government shutdown, still continues to throw people out on the streets.
STU: It does.
GLENN: Well, I haven't seen any coverage on that.
STU: You know, I haven't seen any either. It's weird. How many of these have we been through, Glenn, over the years? An uncountable amount.
GLENN: And before they even start, they're at the food banks going, there's not enough food in the food bank. These people will be starving within, you know, two days.
STU: Yeah, if you happen to have a fetish for single moms, great way to find them: Watch the shutdown coverage. They'll always find new single moms in your area.
GLENN: Yeah.
STU: That are about to have their economies crushed because of his oncoming government shutdown, every single time, except this one. This one, I haven't met anyone yet.
GLENN: So true. So true.
I have. I listened to the New York Times last week.
STU: Okay.
GLENN: And they were talking about how much they love the military.
STU: Oh.
GLENN: And how --
STU: That's believable.
GLENN: And how they're concerned they are for all these military moms who are now struggling to make ends meet, even though the president paid the military and the -- the Republicans continue to keep presenting a bill that says, pay the military.
STU: Right.
GLENN: We can argue about everything else. You've got to keep national defense going, pay the military. And they won't do it.
STU: Democrats keep rejecting that one.
GLENN: Yes, over and over again.
STU: And that kind of leads me to my thesis here, Glenn, tell me if you think there's anything to it, which is the reason we haven't met any of the sob stories that we always meet during government shutdowns, is because this one, the, quote, unquote, Democrats are responsible for it. Normally, they blame the Republicans for it. This time, it's almost impossible to come up with a coherent argument to make that happen.
GLENN: Correct. So may I express this a different way?
STU: Sure.
GLENN: The mainstream media is just a propaganda organ for the Democratic Party.
STU: Oh, yes. Maybe that's it. Maybe that is it. Because I'm fascinated by that. I've always found that to be kind of silly. Right?
You can always find individual people who are going through a tough time, based on any policy, right know
GLENN: You close it for three days. It's not been -- isn't this the longest shutdown in history, I think?
STU: Not yet. No. But it is -- let's see if I --
GLENN: Since when. Since when. I've not seen one go this long.
STU: There's one in Trump's administration, that's gone 35 days I think. Which was the record. The longest record was 35 days. Kalshi has a market on this, to see. Which is interesting. Fifty-five percent chance it goes over 35 days.
GLENN: Oh, I think he could go through Christmas.
STU: Well, it's hard to -- you think Christmas?
GLENN: I mean, the Democrats are -- as long as the Democrats will not negotiate, I mean, the Republicans keep saying, okay. Look, we'll fund it. And let's just go, but we're not adding new stuff. And we're not cutting laws that were just passed. You know what I mean?
STU: Hmm.
GLENN: So we'll just fund this, and let's just continue to work it out. They won't even do that. It's like -- Friday, I think was the 12th vote they had held. And Democrats were just like, nope!
STU: And they were promising votes on their stupid health care requests.
Like they're trying to give things.
GLENN: Yeah. We'll give you the vote on health care.
STU: What will stop this, right?
The only thing that stops these things are perceived political consequences.
And so right now, what you have is a situation where in theory -- like, in theory, they can -- maybe the American people decide, it's the Republican's fault, it's Trump's fault. But Trump is not typically, like, a guy who folds to that type of pressure.
At times, he will give to his own side.
Like, you know, he said stuff like, well, take the guns first.
Then we will have the trials.
And then the Second Amendment people were like, no. It's not the right order there.
And to his credit, he listened to his constituents.
Sort of changed on that.
We've seen situations like that. Very rarely though, do you see, hey, the media is complaining a lot about Donald Trump. He will change what he is saying.
If anything, it makes him double or triple down.
GLENN: I think they wanted to have the No Kings.
Remember, they kept saying, "We will get to the No Kings. We will get to the No Kings," talking about the government shutdown on the No Kings thing.
That wasn't the point of the No Kings thing.
STU: Right. It wasn't being covered at all.
GLENN: The Democrats got no gain out of that.
STU: No. And that's the other side of this.
Which is, typically the way this might work, is Democrats start this over a policy concern. Like Republicans have done this.
They started a shutdown over a policy concern.
And at some point, when it doesn't seem like the policy concern will be resolved.
They start feeling pressure, that they are the ones holding the government closed. They start feeling the government pressure.
And they fold. That's usually what Republicans wind up doing in these situations.
The issue here is, number one. They're not getting any pressure from the media.
That's not being built at all.
There's no pressure from the Democrats to fold on this issue.
The only pressure that exists from the Democrats is to hold the line.
Because what they're getting is pressure from their left flank, saying, hey. You guys better not give in to Donald Trump.
So the length of this shutdown, seeming could be a very long, long period.
Because really, the only crack you're seeing right now are -- I will say, some on the right. Who are saying, actually, we should give a bunch of subsidies for Obamacare.
There are some on the right doing that. That is, I think, the only crack we've seen on either side so far.
GLENN: I would really like to see in this time, somebody in the Republican side, making the case about Obamacare and freeing up the medical system.
STU: Yeah. Right.
GLENN: Why -- why do they not have another plan?
This is the time. This is the time.
No, I shouldn't say that. Every day, since 2009, has been the time to have this plan.
STU: Yes.
GLENN: And they -- they just -- they never do it. They never do it.
STU: Bits and pieces of stuff. That's not what their desire is.
GLENN: I talked to Dr. Oz. I know --
STU: This is a very strange sentence. But go ahead.
GLENN: I know. I talked to Dr. Oz. And I know at HHS, they are working on plans to dismantle a lot of this stuff and put the free market back in charge. But they're doing it at the state level. I've got to have him back on. Because, I mean, nobody paid attention to this. I had an interview with him. Just, everybody paid attention to the other thing he was talking about -- oh, the -- the -- the jab. Why would we would -- you know, why we would partner with, what was it? Moderna, or who it was recently, for the drugs -- or, Pfizer for the, you know, drug discount. Everybody paid attention to that. In that same interview, he was talking about going to the states and tying their money, their government funding for Medicaid, and Medicare, tying that directly to ending this hostage situation, with, you know, no insurance over state lines. Once they allow the whole -- the whole country and insurance companies to offer plans over the whole country, the dynamics change entirely. The -- financial incentives. The payouts. Everything changes. And that's supposed to be happening in the next 30, 40 days. And we would see it in the next year. I would love to see them start to come up with new plans. Why do you have this face? Looking at me.
STU: No, I'm -- I'm listening to you.
But also, looking at just something I'm noticing, on -- on these markets for how long the shutdown will last.
GLENN: Yeah.
STU: So it has been -- like I'm looking at over 40 days, for example.
It has been a slow and steady rise. Like, at the beginning, it was a 10 percent chance it would go over 40 days. Slow and steady rise, all the way up to a 55 percent, 57 percent chance as of five hours ago. The last five hours, it's dropped from 57 to 38. Now, famously people -- there's a lot of people on these markets. A lot of people who know a lot about these things in these markets. We saw a -- a -- we have seen many things happen.
GLENN: Uh-huh.
STU: Like, who is going to play -- who is going to play -- who will win the Nobel Prize was one of them.
Person who was not barely listed at 1 percent suddenly in the last few hours, kind of shot up.
Somebody who knows something. Was in there, buying, buying, buying.
All of a sudden, multiple of these markets, more than 35 days has also dropped from 70 percent, as of five hours ago.
GLENN: I've not seen anything in the news, at all, so that's inside information.
STU: It could be. It could be. It could just be somebody guessing. That's a big bet to guess.
These markets have decent liquidity.
Kind of -- kind of interesting, Glenn. I don't know.
It could be absolutely nothing. This market has had over $13 million bet on it.
You know, how long these things go. To move them, sometimes could be a lot of money. Yes.
GLENN: That's a lot of money.
The other thing. What is gold? Is it still at 4325 today? It was this morning. I mean, that is --
STU: 4363.
GLENN: 4363.
STU: I mean, you want to talk about a chart that is consistent. I mean, it's consistent up movement from the beginning of 2024, till today, but really rocketship up in the last three months.
GLENN: This is the world saying, things are changing.
That's the -- that's the -- the thing you have to take from that, is the world is saying, the financial center will not hold, as far as the -- the way we have set up the entire world with America being the -- you know, the big mover and shaker.
You know, when -- when Biden went in and said, we will take all these assets from Russia. He violated that system.
We're no longer going to let them use the SWIFT movement. All of that began this unraveling. Something is happening. This is big money saying, something big is coming. And I want to be prepared for it.
And it's disturbing. You should keep your eye on gold. That is a disturbing sign of instability. I can't at this point go any further than that. And I hope that it slows down or stops or reverses itself.
We do not want 5,000 that are gold. You know, and there -- I mean, Goldman Sachs came out I think last week, 6,000. Was it six or 7,000-dollar gold? In the next year!
