Rupert, Russell, and a Looming Shutdown

25:20You know, every time I read these things, I'm like, are you kidding me? Like, how can, like, are you kidding me when you read the details in this story? Like, that they can't, that they just haven't figured it out yet. Anyway, we'll see what goes on there. We'll see. We deal with this a lot on boards. And it's a nuanced issue because I think if you have a big company where you're asking people to work intensely, I think relationships are going to happen. Sometimes those relationships blow up and there's a lot of emotion involved. But what my general view is once you get above a certain level, either in terms of seniority or in terms of compensation, your fly is up and locked.

25:59You take that shit off campus with non-employees. In this case, I have to say this guy went over and above in what the journal is reporting, at least, in terms of behaviors. Like it wasn't a relationship that happened at work. What was his role there? He's a CEO. I'm just saying, just read the story because I think it's even more so. It's not just, you know, I had a relationship at work and it didn't work out. It's unwelcome what he was doing. So I worked at several companies where the CEOs had affairs with their assistants. Bernard Louis just had to step down from BP. There's a lot of companies, including ones we talk about all the time.

26:34Anyways, the bottom line is above an executive level, it's awesome to be an executive. People think you're interesting. People laugh at your jokes. You get paid a shit ton of money. It's awesome to be executive. Once you're an executive, call it VPSVB, depending on the company. In my opinion, there are no consensual relationships. Boss, you get so many good things. But you put yourself in the company, and the power dynamic here is so fucking out of skew. Generally speaking, anthropologically, evolutionary, men will mistake kindness for sexual interest. and women will mistake sexual interest for kindness.

27:14And everybody is kind to the senior level managers who predominantly end up being men, oftentimes at an age where they're going through a midlife crisis. So it just sets it up for abuse where the individual, the guy, sometimes doesn't even know he's leveraging the power dynamic. In this case, I think he did. Well, yeah, this guy just sounds like a creep. But even my view is above a certain point, when you're making a certain amount of money or a certain level, The power dynamic is you have a lot of power. Let's make it really clear. From day one, you're fucking guilty if you have a relationship here.

27:46They've been taking people off. Bernard, Louis, definitely. That's right. But you got to have standards. Let me also go back so I don't come across a Puritan. All right. I just want to say you had nothing to say, but go ahead. Keep going. There you go. That's impossible, right? That's an oxymoron. Right, exactly. The dog. The dog's got to bark. I knew you would have things to say. The moon is out and you're telling him not to bark. I also think that work is a great place to meet and form relationships, including romantic relationships for young people. And one out of three people have had a relationship that started professionally.

28:18I go to weddings all the time of young people in my firms. And while you don't want Bacnellian, like people having sex in the closet, I think you've got to be careful about the party atmosphere you film at. That was a little like this, this story. There's a lot of tequila going on in this story. Anyway. But I think young people, I think it's a, what I tell people, especially men who tend to have an ability to, again, mistake kindness for sexual interest is you got to tread very lightly. And also, also, the likelihood you might get quote unquote fired in what you feel is an unjust decision goes up exponentially if you start a relationship with someone who is junior to you and has less power than you.

29:00I mean, there's a lot of nuance here, but above a certain level, take it off campus or you are guilty from day one. All right then. But creepy people still have got to stop. The creepiest people have to stop. There you go. Agreed. Okay. Let's get into our first big story.

29:18The Justice Department's investigation into Elon Musk's personal benefits from Tesla is bigger in scope than originally thought. That's according to a new Wall Street Journal report. Investigators are asking whether Elon was using Tesla funds to build himself a glass house. They're also looking, I can't believe that. They're looking into dealings between Tesla and other Musk-connected entities. There's a lot of interactions between all those companies. According to the journal, the new information shows that there's even more interest in what Elon and Tesla have been up to, and criminal charges might be in the mix.

29:47The glass house thing has been out there for a bit. They had these orders for glass that Tesla was paying for, and they didn't know what it was for. and then he may have since paid it back, but he does a lot of those. He borrows money from one place and puts it back after a while. Anyway, that's what the DOJ and also the SEC is sniffing around. The news here is they've been investigating Elon for quite a while, going back to 2017 with potential criminal charges. Could this be a major problem? A few weeks ago, he tweeted, there's no glass house, metaphors don't count, LOL. Built under construction plan.

30:22I'm not building any house of any kind anywhere, period. But then Walter Isaacson book actually mentions a glass house and then says, Elon, put off building it. So it's not that there is no glass house. It's not being built. So there was something being built. So he's sharing his plan. We'll get to his next plan. But what do you think of that? I mean, this is normal to look at these things. And they have such an intertwine. He has so many intertwined companies. Tesla workers worked at Twitter for a little while. He said they were voluntary, but then there was a charge. He's borrowed money from one of them to pay somewhere else, stuff like that.

31:01And, you know, the board is a rubber stamp, essentially, of Tesla, which is the only public company here. So he can do whatever he wants in his other ones. Based on everything I've seen, I don't think he's done anything wrong. And my sense is, look, to borrow money from one of your companies just to get a loan to go buy a media company, which you did at SpaceX, that's highly unusual. I think the board is not doing its job when they do that. But if the board knew about it. I think in this case, the CFO flagged it to the board and the board didn't like the glass house thing. That's what I understand.

31:37And the CFO has recently left, by the way. Well, okay, if the board did know about it, then the board should fire him, which they won't do. But if the board has set up a relationship where they're like, you've made so much money for all of us around the table, and we're either related to you or in your back pocket, unless they are making fraudulent disclosures to the SEC or lying on earnings calls or misleading investors, when you have a board that effectively, you use the term rubber stamp, which means he has a rubber stamp to do anything he wants, folks. So in my opinion, this is a shareholder issue.

32:11It's a governance issue. But I haven't read anything that is illegal. Yeah, we'll see. We'll see. I think it was interesting the CFO left. And he's in this story. He's the one that alerted the board. The board wanted him to pay the money back. And I think it would be nice to sort it out. And again, I'm not surprised that he intermixes his companies. I think that's what he does. And they let him do it. And he seems to pay back loans once he borrows it. But it is highly unusual. I think that's where we are right now. This is Eileen Jue, but it's Elon Musk. And so, therefore, we'll see. And I think they just have to, if they have charges, they should bring them.

32:46It's more and more evidence that this is a shitty board with boards with no governance. Okay, we knew that. But, for example, I think Apple's board decided to give, as a gift, Steve Jobs a Gulfstream. Yeah, that he was always wrapped up in all kinds of sketchy stuff around that. This is what I think is going on here. I think Elon Musk has stuck up the middle finger and been so disrespectful to so many government officials across so many agencies that, quite frankly, they're like, what am I going to do this weekend? I'm going to go on a fishing expedition. I think there are, I think anywhere they see the potential, people are human.

33:33And when he laughs and mocks the SEC and then someone, a whistleblower, someone says, this is an SEC violation, I would bet they are apt to run it down and see if there's a there there. Yeah, that's true. It struck me as political. I just want, I want to see the linkage. I want to see the linkage. It came very quickly after this CFO stepped down. So it just was interesting. Interesting. We'll see. You're right. I agree with you. It's probably a nothing burger. And he's very loose with the way he conducts his companies. And until the board does something about it. Okay. Okay. Well, and, you know, shareholders, you're right.

34:09The board and shareholders are the interested parties here. And, of course, the SEC certainly has a role if they want to look into it. But we'll see. Well, but this is an example. We talked about all the adjunct last week about how people are getting fired left and right for anything. at Discovery Time Warner, when you're making a lot of money and making shareholders rich, you know, oh, there's a dead prostitute. Oh, that was just a misunderstanding. I mean, it's just an entirely different game on the way up than on the way down. It is. So for today, Elon, we are going to give you a pass until it's proven otherwise, which I think is fair.

34:46I think it's fair. The board, you're still a terrible board. You're just a terrible board. It's a board of advisors. It's not a board of directors. Whatever. It's fine. Whatever. Whatever. The interesting thing that I think got a lot more backlash was sharing his plan to charge all ex-users a monthly fee for access to the platform in order to combat, quote, armies of bots. He certainly does have armies of bots. He revealed this in a live stream conversation with Israeli Prime Minister and Benjamin Netanyahu, where the two also spoke about anti-Semitism. Is he stirring the pot or do you think he'll actually go through this?

35:16He is adding a subscription would make it difficult for bots to create accounts because each bot would need to register a new credit card. He shared the plan would have a lower price tiering than the$8 a month for the X Premium subscribers. During the live stream, Elon also revealed some new metrics saying X now has 550 monthly users who generate 100 to 200 million posts per day. Who knows? No word from X CEO, Lindy Raccurino on any of this. But she is tweeting about London Fashion Week. She does like shoes. She's going to be at the Code Conference next week. I'm going to ask. I'm going to see what shoes she's wearing.

35:48She's coming to Code. Oh, yeah. Wow. Yeah, Julia Borstein is going to interview her. Really? I like Julia. Let's see if she cancels. I don't know. If this goes into effect, what do you think? Charging. I'm not giving him my credit card. But then he let me have blue, free, whatever. Let me. Look, I've always thought this was the right idea. But it's about the execution. And that is, I would charge people based on their followers. and their nonprofit status or their corporate, because you need a certain scale and base to give it its heartbeat. So anyone below, you know, you could, I think there's better ways to do it with bots, specifically age verification or identification.

36:27There's supposedly, there's all sorts of ways you could verify even using AI, if this is likely a bot or not. Traditionally, they haven't wanted to do that because the bots inflate the numbers for advertisers. Now, advertising is a shrinking business here. It's off 60%, But it's a much better business if you can move to subscription. So I'm a fan of this. I've been saying this forever. It's all about the execution. But it does feel like they're sort of, I mean, to be blunt, it feels like they're flailing. It just feels as if they're grasping between the different business strategies and Twitter blue, which was supposed to be subscription, but it ended up not being subscription and didn't get any pickup.

37:10I think it makes sense. I think Twitter is a niche that's deeply relevant to a small, actually a relatively small group of very influential people. That all screams subscription at me. Yeah, yeah, they'll pay. I don't think I will. I don't want them to have my credit card. I know it sounds dumb, but it makes me nervous. It sounds dumb, but it does. A lot of people said they're not going to pay. A lot of heavy users. If you really think about it, let's take your, you have 1.5 million followers? I think there are a lot of bots, but go ahead. I would bet somewhere between a third and two thirds are bots.

37:41Say it's a million. Your ability to put out clips from Pivot or excerpts from your book. I don't think it helps that much. I've seen the data. It doesn't, I get more uptake. It's worth 10 bucks a month. I would argue it's probably worth 100 bucks a month. Maybe. I don't know. I'd have to think. I just, I don't know. I just don't want to do business with them. That's all. No, that's a different talk show. I'm with you. You're talking to a guy who's addicted to Twitter and I haven't been on in three months. so you know because i'm just i love the term used i'm not going to paint this guy's fucking fence that's kind of how i feel right now i think i think they should probably charge but i think a lot of people are it's going to drop the numbers rather significantly if he actually can if in if he could actually do it oh like let's see he could have a nice little business doing it but certainly not a 44 billion dollar valued business that's a yeah that's over whatever or even 10 billion it's a little business then then it's a little business and if he does well and gives good stuff, maybe so.

38:34But it seems to me it's sort of turning into a text-based rumble, essentially. And he should buy you rumble, and then he can have all of them. And that's a business, whatever. They need media too. The meeting with Netanyahu, you know, they start off by sharing how he once told his wife that Elon was the Edison of our time. It only got worse from there, wrote an NBC reporter. The meeting was ostensibly about AI, but Netanyahu did ask us to take a stand on anti-Semitism. Let's listen to Elon's response. I mean, I'm sort of against attacking any group, you know, doesn't matter who it is. I'm, you know, this is, I'm in favor of that which further civilization and which ultimately leads us to become a space-baring civilization and where we understand the nature of the universe.

39:20So we can't do that if there's a lot of, you know, infighting and, you know, and hatred and negativity. So, you know, obviously I'm against anti-semitism. I'm against anti really anything that is, you know, that promotes hate and conflict. Well, okay. So in this week's episode of double standards for people based on their wealth or their background, let's play what if Elon Musk was a woman. Imagine a woman who, let's put her in a different industry that let's make some gender stereotypes. Let's say that Alana Musk was this incredible merchant who started a luxury conglomerate and became the wealthiest person in the world, which now the wealthiest person in the world is the head of a luxury conglomerate, Bernard Arnault.

40:11So imagine a woman who is the wealthiest person in the world, starts making anti-Semitic comments, starts accusing her coworkers of sex crimes, stops paying COBRA in insurance. Oh, and has 11 kids by three different women. So she's a lesbian. Go ahead. Keep going. I'm interested. Has settled out of court payments based on accusations of sexual misconduct and spreads conspiracy theories. They'd be calling this person Lady Hitler right now. They wouldn't be flying in Netanyahu to speak to her. I mean, seriously, just imagine for a moment a female CEO doing any of this shit. Yeah, Alana would be fucked.

40:58Oh my God. She'd be, the government would be all over. And then she says, I'm sort of against it. I'm sort of against, not completely. I think that's his verbal tics, but nonetheless. Yeah, I agree. Let me tell you, another person not learning any Lessons, the new CEO of Adidas, who recently said on a podcast he doesn't think Kanye West meant what he said in those anti-Semitic comments last year. This guy became CEO shortly after the Kanye instance, so he's dealing more with the fallout. Another line from the interview, I think Kanye West is one of the most creative people in the world, both in music and what I call street culture.

41:35And we lost that business, one of the most successful collabs in history. very sad. Honestly, it's like excusing his grown man. Oh, I don't think he meant what he said. I think he meant exactly what he said. I just don't know who is advising. I mean, this is an easy one. If anyone uses the word Kanye, you say the following. His comments were unacceptable. We immediately canceled the business. It cost us billions to cancel this business, and it was worth it. And we'll do the same thing again. And never say anything else. Never say anything else. Well, you know, you're so woke, Scott. That's so woke.

42:07I want to say what I want. I'm reasonable. I'm the CEO of Adidas. I make sneakers. You know, it's called Adidas. I know. The founder, Adidasler. Okay. Trackstar. Adidas has, I love Adidas. I know you do. I think if you think about Nike, and I love Nike, I love the people at Nike. I think they do an incredible job and they're super smart. Anyways, but Nike is about, and they both have amazing positions. Nike is about you didn't win silver, you lost gold. It's about individual achievement. It's about grit. It's about pushing yourself harder and throwing up and the monster jam from Michael Jordan.

42:42And that's a wonderful feel, sensation, and company. And it's very capitalist. It's very American. It's very kind of individual sport. Whereas Adidas is about track and team sports and the joy of sport and the French team that wins the World Cup. It's all about – it's more socialist. It's more feminine. and it's more about the team. And they're both just, I think these brands do such an amazing job in their merchandising. All right, let's get to this thing though. I think this is stupid. Look, he fucked, it was just stupid. Someone, he needs media coaching. Also protecting 50, men in their 50s from their stupidity and covering up for them is really one of the most fascinating trends that I did not see coming.

43:31Oh, I didn't mean it. They said what they said. Live with what they said. Anyway. Anyway. Toddler, adult toddlers. They are not toddlers. They are adults. Anyway, let's go on a quick break. We come back. Chaos in Congress as a shutdown approaches. And we'll take a listener question about college rankings.

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45:30Scott, we're back. It looks like we're headed for a government shutdown unless Congress can get his act together by the end of the month. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy is facing division with his own party, shockeroo, as he tries and fails to get the votes to pass annual spending bills or even stopgap funding plans. Right-wing GOP members are pushing back against McCarthy, arguing for lower spending and cuts to some federal agencies. Republicans have been meeting to try to get on the same page. It was one congressman puts it, it feels like Festivus, the airing of grievances. It seems like we go through this every year and the shutdown gets averted.

46:00It does seem like it could happen this time. The last government shutdown, longest in U.S. history, went on for 35 days from December 2018 to January 2019. One compromise here would be for McCarthy to say, screw you to the far right and work with the Democrats, which will, of course, end his speakership. But he can keep, the question of he can keep it, even McCarthy goes, gives into the far right. Those demands aren't going to be past the Senate. And then the center Republicans will have a problem and start working with Democrats. Everyone's frustrated on both sides of the aisle. Listen to the floor speech from Democratic Congressman Jim McGovern.

46:33The Republican leadership of this House is incompetent. I mean, they're so incompetent, it takes my breath away. They're letting the clowns run the circus. It is time the Speaker the House, develop a spine and stand up to the most extreme elements on the Republican side and actually sit down and negotiate an agreement that deals with the reality of our government. Well, yes, that's true. That was Jim McGovern. He's a Democrat. How do you think this plays out, Scott? What do you think? You're in D.C. You talk about this. Oh, well, I don't know. It's going to be terrible. I'm in the heartland of Marlebone, London.

47:12Yeah, you're the heartland. Yeah. It's going to be bad. There's some real burning insight. You know, the White House obviously said that the shutdown would undermine our economy and security. It's a bad idea. Air traffic controllers and TSA officers would have work without pay, travel delays. The Pentagon says that if the shutdown happens, U.S. military aid and training for Ukrainian forces would be disrupted. You know, it's stupid. It's so stupid. And their only job is to come to deals like this. That is their job, ultimately. So what the fuck? And Kevin McCarthy's in charge. So Kevin, what the fuck?

47:45Secondly, you're being held hostage by this group of people that now can take your job out. And at one point he'd said, go ahead, make my day, I think. You know, that was a little bit ballsy of him. I think they might make his day and vacate him. And then we'll get some lunatic in there. But I think the center Republicans may just turn around and do a deal with the Democrats. That's the Democrats are in a relatively good situation here, except it's ridiculous and appalling that they have to do this. I don't know. What do you think? It just feels like there's a faction of the Republican Party that shows up with a suicide vest.

48:17They're like, I'm willing, you know, I'm willing to blow us all up. Yeah, they don't like government. They just don't like government. Yeah, their job is they want to see a shutdown. And I do think there is a looming debt crisis. I do think my advice to the Democratic Party would be to not totally pivot, but be the party of cost cutting to start talking about how we need to spend less and we need to raise revenues because the debt, you know, the debt, we become way too comfortable with the skyrocketing debt in our nation. And there's this crazy notion that the deficits don't matter. Well, they matter a lot when they start mattering.

48:56We have to get our spending under control. I don't, it's just, But to do this, to do it this way, to – and the problem is the public isn't scared of it anymore. We'll have people come on and say the Navy will stop and no one believes in them anymore because we keep having these near shutdowns and no one feels it. So, you know – It shows government is incompetent once again. He's right. He's incompetent. He's incompetent to the task. And, you know, it's like Tommy Tuberville shutting down motions. Perfect analogy. It's just redonkulous. It's redonkulous. Agreed. You can't like take this guy out in the back and tell him to cut it out.

49:34They just don't have control over these people. They just, they're all these individual freelancers who are in it for their own fame and social media or whatever the heck they're doing. And they're all individual players and not a team. This is a team sport. And they have to come to, this is their job. This is their job. And for a portion of the Republican Party, they think their job is to self-aggrandize themselves at the expense of everyone. And it's stupid. It's just they look stupid. I think the White House should just sit there and let them do it, although they have a responsibility to fix it, too.

50:07But in this case, they don't have the tools because they're not running the House. But, you know, I think the Senate will stop them. And we'll see. And meanwhile, while this is playing out, guess what everyone's talking about over on Fox News and everywhere else is the uproar over the Senate dress code. This is what they can discuss, which is ridiculous. This week, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer loosened the Senate's dress code saying senators will be able to choose what they wear on the Senate floor. I will continue to wear a suit. Schumer did not mention Senator John Fetterman directly, but the rule change will allow the Pennsylvania politician to wear his trademark hoodie and shorts on the Senate floor.

50:38Fetterman said on Twitter, quote, if these jagoffs in the House stop trying to shut our government down and fully support Ukraine, then I will save democracy by wearing a suit on the Senate floor next week. He's having a good time with this thing, actually. He said to DeSantis, you campaign like I dress, stuff like that. I don't know. This seems stupid. but he can wear shorts if he wants. It wasn't until the early 90s that the Senate stopped enforcing the rule that women should wear only dresses and skirts while on the chamber's floor. Recent years, both the Senate and House have relaxed rules on sleeveless dresses.

51:07Honestly, everyone's in soft pants now, Senate. So I don't know why this is decorum. You know, someone made a joke of Joe Manchin, who was upset about it, saying, well, I'm so glad you wore a suit when you voted against the child tax credit. Like, it's just, I don't know. Scott, this seems stupid. Am I wrong? But I wear soft pants all day long for a decade, two decades now. Look, the chamber and the Capitol are one of the most photographed, you know, areas. That is one of the most iconic images of America. And I think it's really important to think a lot and invest in our imagery. I like, I love the way AOC dresses.

51:47I think she makes our government seem classy. I like the way, you know, there are, you know, I was, I interviewed Senator Chris Murphy yesterday on my podcast and it was late at night and he was in a suit and a tie and he looked great. I think it's, I think it's important. You know, George Hahn doesn't agree with you. You thought he might, but he's like, you know, he thinks a betterment looks good. I think most people dress in Carhartt shorts and hoodies. So I don't see why you have to get. Yeah, but that's not – I think the most important deliberative body in the history of mankind that is constantly being photographed, I think if you are representing our nation, I think you should make a real effort.

52:27And part of that effort is to look good. We disagree. We disagree. I think he looks just fine. I think that's his look. That's his look. And he looks fine. Yeah. I don't know. I just – everyone's – go to restaurants, people aren't dressing. This is a trend that's happened, especially since the pandemic, is people have lost the dress up, right? In everywhere else, in the office, in restaurants, in movies, used to dress up a lot more and people just don't. You want to represent 700 ,000 people and vote on the most important things in a democracy. Put on a suit. Let's see. I would wear my juicy couture.

53:04I'd be fine with it. Marjorie Taylor Greene is probably like, yay, I can finally dress the way I want. Same thing with Lauren Boebert. I sound so old, don't I? You do, honestly. I think with regular people, they're like, are you kidding me? This is what is occupying your time. This is what you get incensed about. The imagery is important. I think most people do not care. I think they're fine with Carhartts and the hoodie. I think he's playing it well, I'll have to say. They sound like old ladies like yourself. I don't care about his shorts. Scott does. Scott is incorrect. Sartorial, Scott Galloway looks really good most of the time when I see him.

53:37He dresses beautifully. Even his casual clothes are lovely. Thank you for saying that. That means a lot to me. That's because I'm representing you. I, on the other hand, am a slow, unmade bed, and I like it that way. My mother is always like, how do you ever get successful? Your mother looks great. She does, but she's always like— She has a tendency towards poochie. Poochie, Gucci, poochie. It's weird I even know that. It's weird I even know that. Yeah, all the oochies. No, I think it's poochie. Fiorucci's a designer from the 80s and 90s. No, it is poochie. She had a poochie dress. She had several poochie dresses.

54:04Anyway, I am a great disappointment to her in the clothing department. And it will continue. Oh, Kara, that's not fair. You're a great disappointment on several levels. No, I think it's just clothing. I think if I wore a dress, she'd be 100 % nicer about those things. By the way, in all seriousness, every time I speak to Lucky, she's in a bad mood. And she'll like occasionally at some point slip in and she'll be like, you know, I am very proud of her. She always tells me how proud of you she is. Not my clothes. Like begrudgingly. Yeah. Literally begrudgingly. I know. Well, you know, here we have it.

54:34I'm telling you, if I wore ribbons in my hair, everything would change. Anyway, and she has a point. She has a point just like you do, old man. Anyway, let's go to Listener Mail. You've got, you've got, I can't believe I'm going to be a mailman. You've got mail. The U.S. News and War Report shared its annual college rankings this week following a major overhaul. After the adjustment to the criteria, more than a dozen public universities climbed up 50 spots on the list. Though not everyone was happy about how things shook out. We have a Listener Mail question about one school's response. I'll read it.

55:04Hi, Kara and Scott. Once again, I'm first. I just want to note that. I'm a graduate at Vanderbilt University and used to work in higher education. Today, the Vanderbilt community received an email from the chancellor about the new U.S. News & World Report rankings that, frankly, could best be described as a childish meltdown. Scott, I'd be curious to get your take on the broader criticisms from elite universities who are now finding themselves struggling to manipulate the rankings by cutting admissions and hoarding endowment money. U.S. NWR rankings have always justifiably been controversial, but it strikes me that paying closer attentions to evidence of social mobility is a step in the right direction.

55:39Thanks and love everything you guys do, Connor. Oh, just, you know, Vanderbilt went from 13th to 18th, and the U.S. News is saying the rankings are more equitable with greater emphasis placed on social mobility and outcomes for graduating college seniors. Go for it. Rankings have been really damaging to America, and I'm not suggesting the U.S. News and World Report or Businessweek had any intention of damaging America, but still the broadest on-ramp to not even the middle class, but a higher income lifestyle is college. And it does matter if you get into an elite college, as much as we'd like to think it doesn't matter because we're so angry and upset about how corrupt U.S.

56:16higher education has become. It's still a degree certification from an elite American university is the best golden ticket to the chocolate factory ever invented, other than having rich parents, which by the way is inextricably linked to your ability to get into an elite college. And unfortunately, the rankings are essentially the litmus test for what defines as an elite college. And the worst thing that happened was the folks who came up with the methodology of the ranking decided that a low admissions rate or a high rejection rate moved you up in the rankings. So we all started studying to the test and raising prices to get the same, raising tuition, which we could do because we kept constricting supply.

56:56And guess what? Every time we constricted supply and rejected more people, we went up in the rankings, which created this vicious upward cycle of margins and profitability in this vicious downward cycle in terms of the impact on middle class America. And it's created this gestalt in higher education where we now think of ourselves as a fucking Birkenberg instead of public servants trying to reject as many people as possible. These rankings have done tremendous damage to America, and they are trying, to their credit, to course correct. And I think the most recent ranking for Forbes incorporated how many kids had Pell Grants, as yours truly did, to say that economic mobility is important.

57:34And it brings up an interesting question. Who are the most elite universities? Who are the best colleges in New York City? People would say NY and Columbia. But at the same time, the university, the college that takes more kids from the lowest quintile and puts them in the top quintile is actually Pace University. So these rankings really matter. Where I think they need to go is, one, incorporate more around social mobility. I think that is the whole point of college. Maybe look up who makes the greatest gains in social mobility, who has the most diverse student body economically, not racially, not gender.

58:12Because all we've done is reshuffle the elites and let in non-white kids who are from rich households. And also start just grouping the rankings. have quote unquote an elite basket and have 30 schools listed in alphabetical order, have near elite, and then have others. But when you start going, I can tell you firsthand, we have entire committees of people spending hundreds of hours trying to figure out how to get NYU from the Stern School of Business from 11 to eight. And it involves generally, well, how do we keep our admissions rate low? Well, they don't look at part-time. Well, let's let them more part-timers and fewer full-timers.

58:48And you start doing all these unnatural acts that are bad for kids and bad for households such that we can increase our prestige and answer the question we in higher education ask ourselves every day when we wake up and look in the mirror. And that is, how do I increase my compensation while lowering my accountability? And that is one way to turn ourselves into a luxury brand. And these rankings have helped us do that. And it's been so bad for America. Anyway, speech over. That's what I wanted from you. That's exactly right. I agree. I agree. And I'm glad these public universities came up and there were other criteria.

59:23What is valuable? What we say is valuable and what we don't say is valuable is very important. And social mobility and ability to get more kids into schools. What are the two highest rated public universities in the nation? UCLA and Berkeley. Berkeley. Fantastic universities. Anyway, hard to get into both of them, by the way. Anyway, that was an excellent answer. Scott, I'm just going to leave it at that because you know more than I do. One more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails.

1:00:16Thank you. Not all journalism is the same. Take The Guardian. Our coverage has something unique. Fierce independence. Nobody owns us or tells us what we can and can't say. So we're free to report the whole picture. We connect what's happening in Washington to the rest of the globe. Expose corruption wherever we find it. And give fresh perspective on everything. From wellness and soccer to culture, the climate and more. Read, watch and listen to The Guardian for free at theguardian.com.

1:00:54Okay, Scott, wins and fails. Win, I really, really, really love The Morning Show. This is in its third season. Very excited. Yes, I love the show. I love Jennifer Aniston Mean. I like Mean Jennifer Aniston. I think it's a really good show on Apple TV. And I know Ted Lasso gets all the attention, but I love The Morning Show. And Reese Witherspoon's in it. It's just a great cast. and Jennifer Aniston is the center of it and I think she's really interesting. I think since she's been Rachel, which I think sort of pegged her, she's a really interesting, interesting actress and it's about media and all kinds of, you know, it's a bit of a potboiler and a drama and like a soap opera, but it's also really, I'm always surprised by it and it's got an astonishing cast of people and people I didn't know and just, I really like it.

1:01:44Having a great time. I love it. I've loved it for two seasons. And I've only been just started watching the next season. I really like it. It deserves more attention. My fail is that so far only Will Hurd has released a policy plan on AI. He's the first Republican presidential candidate to do so. I wish we would hear more about AI from all the presidential candidates in detail. I know Biden's been doing a lot of stuff around AI. He has and released a whole bunch of different things. So I'm not going to bring him into it. But the Republicans really need to, the Republican candidates should have some sort of discussion about it.

1:02:21You know, they love talking about John Fetterman's shorts is what they're doing. And some of them, that's what DeSantis spent some time on recently, which is not what's important. But I think they should all have policy plans on. I'd like to hear what they have to say. And Will Hurd, former representative, is a tech guy, is a tech oriented guy. Glad he did it. Don't know if he's going to make the thing. He's doing okay in New Hampshire, a couple percent. But no one's going to get this but Donald Trump. But I think it's a good thing, and I think they all should. I'd love to hear what they have to say and what their ideas are.

1:02:54But they aren't, because they need to talk about John Fetterman's pants. They want to get in his pants. Okay. I can't think of a fail, so I'll do two wins because I'm in such a good mood. You know me. um sep kuss an american bike racer on the dutch team jumbo visma he and two of his teammates won the vuelta a españa on saturday after three weeks of racing in the pyrenees the first grand tour win for an american in 10 years and he's been a kind of a backup singer he's been one of the pips to other gladys knights for a long time um unlike other riders in the sport who kind of pride themselves on being a little bit intense and combative kuss is laid back he's very self deprecating, really optimistic.

1:03:39He's 5 '11", 134 pounds. You got to think about 70 pounds of that as lungs. And the win is, as other competitors lag behind, his only two rivals were his teammates, Rogach and Wiengegaard. And the trio, I love this. The trio stayed together during the final two mountain stages and finished together arm in arm at stage 20. And arguably the other two are stronger players, but bike racing is a team sport and they let Kuss win after six seasons of important but unrewarded work. So he finally got his moment in the sun and unbelievable support from the other two. Open quote, definitely the best man won, close quote, open quote, I'm very, very happy Cuss won.

1:04:20I'm super happy for Cuss and he deserves it so much. It was really, I thought it was really touching. My other win is 23-year-old Kelsey Russell is trying to address Gen Z's media literacy problem by literally, you know what she does on TikTok? What? Tell me. She does TikToks just reading the New York Times out loud. Ah! That's cool. And people love it. Cool. And she's this cool young woman and she's just doing TikToks reading the New York Times. I love the Youngs. Do you love the Youngs? I gotta say, I'm feeling good about the Youngs. I know everyone likes to shit on the Youngs but I think there's some really interesting 100%.

1:04:57We need less olds. We need to make room for more Youngs. There's some good olds, Scott, and we're gonna be olds, but I gotta say Ice Flow, hello. Although I'm going to go on a bit of a tangent here, but I've been pretty quiet. I think it's really powerful to envision your death. And I'll come back to this at some other point. I think it makes you less fearful and less anxious to really think through what it's going to be like. I think it's empowering. But anyways, I'm coaching this CEO and he's just working so hard. And I mean, his family is a mess. He's a mess. And he's just decided this is everything, this company.

1:05:31And investors love it because they love the fact that this poor young man is working 19 hours a day and has signed personal guarantees. And I'm like, you've got to sit down and envision the death of this company. You have to envision what happens if this doesn't happen. You're a fucking bummer. Okay, but this is where you are. It doesn't work. You have a wife that loves you. You have beautiful children. You have a little bit of money and by most people's standards, a lot of money in the bank. You're going to come out of this thing with an ability to raise money from other people because you've been a good man.

1:06:05You need to envision the death of this company and realize you're going to be just fine and stop putting yourself through this. And what I'm trying to get with this, imagine your worst fear. Imagine like the thing you're so anxious about and really try and envision it. And I can almost promise you, you're going to realize you could handle it and the sun would come up the next day. And it makes you better at handling whatever it is that's stressing you out. So envision your death. Wow. You know, I think a lot about that because of my dad's death. And I have to say, when someone dies at a young age, a parent dies, you do realize things can, you can get through a lot of stuff, you know, especially when you're young.

1:06:46Anyways, I think it helps to envision. I don't know where I'm going with this. Help me out. Reel me back in. No, I'm reeling you back in. Please envision your death, but don't die today. How about that? I'm just sitting around waiting for the ask answer. just waiting for the ass cancer. I will nurse you through that, Scott, till the very end. I appreciate that. I like that image. I like you pushing me. I like the idea of you pushing me around in a wheelchair. I know, it would be really funny. Or Lucky pushing me. That would be such a good reality show. Lucky will push you around. It's true. I love that.

1:07:14She's talking about someone who's going to make it well past us. She's a survivor, as they say. I'm telling you, we need to figure this shit out because we really need to be thoughtful about the world we leave to Lucky. I agree. It's true. Right. That went a total philosophical way. I wasn't expecting. We want to hear from you. Send us your question about business, tech, or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. Okay, Scott, that is the show. I'm so excited you're back again. We'll be back next week for more. Read us out. Today's show was produced by Lara Neiman, Zoe Marcus, and Taylor Griffin.

1:07:50Ernie Indertot engineered this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows and Mille Silverio and Gaddy McBain. Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Box Media. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. What is the biggest source of stress in your life? What is the event? What is the occurrence that is so terrifying to you that is stressing you, stressing your relationships? Well, imagine and lean in to that event. Imagine it happening. Imagine every detail of it. And guess what?

1:08:21You realize you're going to be fine. You're going to be fine.

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