Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:14] Speaker B: Hello, welcome to the Call It Like I See it podcast. I'm James Keys, and in this episode of Call It Like I See it, we're going to react to Ray Dalio's YouTube video Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order, and consider how much stock we can take in such a highly reductive look at the rise and fall of empires over the last 500 years, particularly as it relates to the current US standing and trajectory in the world.
And later on, we're going to take a look at the frustration some in the media, like Bill Maher, have been expressing lately about the way obesity has been reframed as something to be proud of as opposed to something to try to improve upon.
Joining me today is a man who, because of the moves he makes, has pockets that keep growing in size. Tunde. Ogonlana Tunde, are you ready to show us why the name Daddy Fat Sacks fits you so well?
[00:01:14] Speaker A: I'm not sure I can answer that without incriminating myself, sir.
I suggest you just keep moving.
[00:01:22] Speaker B: How about that?
Now, we're recording this on August 22, 2022. And now we saw, we did we start this. We saw an NBC News poll the other day, and it indicated that 58%, or nearly three out of five Americans, think that the best days are behind in the U.S. now, our society is very negative at the moment, and people are notoriously prisoners of the moment. So you can take what you want from the actual poll.
But a few months back, Ray Dalio, the billionaire investor and hedge fund manager, published a video entitled Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order that looked at 500 years of history and the rise, peak and fall of several major empires, including the American empire, and went through the kinds of indicators that really define the cycle and where the US May be in that cycle. So this video, which is based on Dalio's book by the same name, adds some context and perspective to a question like whether the best days are behind the US and so from that context, we thought it would be cool to look at, take a look at and discuss.
So to get us started, Tunde, what do you think of this overall premise? The concept of historically repeating cycles with identifiable phases. And what stood out to you most in Dalio's telling of this?
[00:02:45] Speaker A: Yeah, no, this was great. It's going to be tough for me to say what stood out most because several things stood out. So I'll kind of COVID a little bit of that. But just to get it going here, I really liked the way he kind of set it up and described this idea of cycles because, I mean, we did a book review on that probably two years ago now. On the.
[00:03:10] Speaker B: It was a while ago. Yeah.
[00:03:11] Speaker A: Idea of social cycles.
[00:03:12] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:03:13] Speaker A: And what I like about the way Dalio puts it is he's very clear that the way it came to mind was history rhymes, doesn't repeat. Exactly. And his point was that through his research and breaking down the research of others, he's found that there are these similar cycles, specifically with three empires, the Dutch, the British, and the US over the past 500 years. However, what I found interesting is he actually, through his research, said he could find the same patterns in many empires going back to the Roman Empire.
[00:03:48] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:03:49] Speaker A: So. So what I think came out of a lot of that to me, when he got into the cycles, because I like how he equated that with empires have a life cycle similar to an individual human.
[00:03:59] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:04:00] Speaker A: That you could say an average human kind of lives 80 years.
But we know that averages are averages. That's really. Some people live to 100, some people die at 40. And so the length of time of an empire isn't necessarily the best way to judge it. Just like the length of time of a human being's life.
[00:04:16] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:04:17] Speaker A: What you want to look at are certain metrics within that space of the health of the condition of that. In the case of a human. Right. That human's body, some of those stats, the data, their mental health, all that. Right. So that's what he's saying, is that empires have measurable data points as well. And I think that, to me, is what stood out a lot, is that he's able to break down these data points. And then to your point, as we'll talk about later in the discussion, is we can look and see where we think we are as the United States in comparison maybe to other empires and in comparison to where we fall within the Data points today versus maybe 50 or 100 years ago.
[00:04:52] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. It actually was a granular. Way more granular than kind of rise and fall type of speak over an overall arc. But it's like, okay, well, how are you doing with this factor? How are you doing with that factor? And how those factors play kind of tell you at more, you know, more context, more perspective on where you are. And I thought of the book that we did previously also that that was the New Golden Age by Robbie.
[00:05:17] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:05:18] Speaker B: And, you know, in terms of the social cycles and so forth, and you've raised a good point on this as far as how the kind of the living memory Plays a role in this. Like, as people who live through certain experiences die out, then what ends up happening is that we end up reliving or the same type of pressures kind of take us in a different direction because the people that have been there and seen that and may be able to counteract it before it happens, once they're gone, then it's easier to slip back into certain things. And so it can. There can be certain cycles that. And Dalio does talk about that. I'd say, for me, the biggest thing. Well, the overall idea of the cycle, I was more skeptical in the Golden Age, I thought the new Golden Age, the Batra book, I was more skeptical because I believe he presented it as more rigid that these generations, so to speak, or these types of people, these warrior types of people that, like that one follows the other each time and so forth. And so I like Dalio's construct in that overall, if you watch all 45 minutes, you could walk away and say, hey, this is pretty reductive, and I'll talk about that a little bit later. But I thought the way he got granular with it gave it more credibility. And what stood out to me the most, I'm sure you would appreciate, is the. The reserve currency, the idea that, like, I'm familiar with it now in the U.S. but the Reserve currency being something that happens organically. It's not like, oh, we just set this like this. But no, because we are so prominent everywhere, everybody does business with us because we have a strong military and we. And then also because people know we'll be here tomorrow, that it happens organic or it can happen organically to people like, oh, I want to hold their money. I want to do business in their money, because I know it's not going to be a revolution tomorrow, and then this stuff's going to be worthless. And I'm sure you can appreciate that because that's one of the things you talk about a lot in terms of the strength of our economy and how that plays into that.
[00:07:07] Speaker A: Well, it's fascinating because you're right, going back to just before the reserve currency point you made was, because I'll come back to that in a sec. Is that's what I liked about how he compared the lifespan of an empire to a human lifespan, which is because he says it specifically, that there's a lot of inputs that happen over the different stages. So he talks about the youth, the infancy stage. Right. When we're young, just like when an empire is young, there's certain things that happen based on Whether it's in your life, based on your parents, your siblings and your school environment. And in the empire would be based on geopolitical conditions, things like that. Then there's the kind of middle age or when someone is able to really support themselves.
And the same with an empire. It has its kind of peak period. And then there's the decline, which is in human beings. That would be the senior part of life, the older age, where your body is in decline and your mind's in decline. And then the empire is a similar thing. The empire's in decline. So what I found interesting with the reserve currency, because you're right, 100%, it's a lot of things you mentioned right. To me, I thought of things like liquidity, the U.S. because everybody trusted the U.S. what got us the reserve currency status along the way to the getting to the peak of being the top empire right now, you know, over the. Let's say post World War II was number one missteps by others. So you got to acknowledge that. And then also the fact, and this is another thing that I know we'll get into a little bit later in this discussion, which is the strength of the United States laws, things like the representation of title and private ownership allowed others with assets and wealth around the world to want to find its home here. Because those things, at least at the time, weren't as strong in other places.
Let's say immediately Post World War II, Europe was flattened and the world hadn't been global yet, to the point where areas like Africa, Asia, the Middle east were ready to absorb big banking systems and property ownership, and they didn't have the infrastructure. So America was one of the havens for global wealth. And that helped us propel post 1950s and all that. So that got me thinking of something like the decisions that leaders make. Because I thought about it. Think about who we've talked about in the last couple years. United States, China and Russia has been on the rise, Right? But I thought about it when we talked about the reserve currency, where a decision by someone like Vladimir Putin to invade his neighbor earlier this year took Russia literally off the table from being anything in an empire discussion.
[00:09:50] Speaker B: Because as far as being like a reserve currency.
[00:09:53] Speaker A: Correct. That's my point. When we learned from Dalio that it takes these multitude of factors, not just military strength, not just this or that, right? That's when I thought about Russia, I was like, man, because of the sanctions and the fact. And this is where you get into a little bit more technical stuff with reserve currencies. Right. Like the United States hurt Russia so much more economically than it ever could physically through doing things like refusing the US treasury, refusing now to allow the Russian. Russia as a country and its large corporations to pay its interest on its bonds back in US Dollars. Because remember, like you said, dollars are the world's reserve currency. So other nations, large corporations, would be still confident to lend Russia money to continue its own economic expansion if they knew they could get paid back in dollars. But because now that's not the case, and the ruble has been destroyed because no one wants to touch rubles, it'll be harder for Russia as a nation to get financing going forward. And this reserve currency thing helped me really see that for now. Like, I was like, okay, this is an example of a leader just. He stepped in his own stuff right there. Because this is gonna damage his country for generations, much more than if we just went in there and invaded them right now.
[00:11:06] Speaker B: Yeah, well. Cause it's a reliability piece. And that really, like I said, I thought, you know, I'm aware of reserve currencies. And I thought, oh, okay, well, yeah, it must be something that's kind of dictated from the top down. But it really does seem like it's one of. Like, it can be once you get to a certain level of strength. But the idea of the fact that you're reliable, that you're. That your money, your value is not gonna fluctuate, that you're not screwing around with it in ways that are funny, that makes. It makes people want to use that as a reserve currency. It's not something that you're forcing on people, but it's like, okay, because of the setup that you have. And so what this talks about, really, in this video, and then presumably the book. We didn't look at the book, but we looked at the video, is you can follow this on minor empires, maybe regional ones, but what it really talks about and big, because we're talking about things like reserve currency, is. Is kind of the big dog in the world at a given moment. The person who's doing the most, because one of the things that allow you to be a reserve currency is that you do business with people all over. So everybody touches that type of currency, so to speak. And so that context, I think, is important because the rise and fall of, quote, unquote, an empire doesn't necessarily mean, in the context that we're talking here, where you're going to be nothing, and then you start to rise, and then you fall, and then you're nothing again. Because the the empire that preceded the United States that fell is Great Britain, you know, and so, and they still, they're still around, they're still a, a viable, relevant nation, but they're just not the top dog anymore like they would have been in the 1800s when they are the ones that set the terms for how everybody did business. So that kind of rise and fall, it's not like it's a rise and fall. You, you, ashes, the ashes, dust the dust type thing, you know, which I thought was important to realize as we talk about as we go through this.
[00:12:52] Speaker A: Well, yeah, I've thought of that as well and I think that's a very good point, which I actually want to, want to stay on for a second here because let's say the British Empire kind of ended somewhere between the early 20th century and the nail in the coffin was post World war. World War II.
[00:13:09] Speaker B: After World War II cites it as, you know, the debts from World War II, they just couldn't continue as the top dog in the world.
[00:13:17] Speaker A: And so, I don't know, maybe the British pound at the time was the world reserve currency until after the Second World War. But to your point, I've always felt this, like Great Britain is still one of the top nations to live in today. So one of the things that stuck out to me though, going back to the metrics that he cites in terms of the health statistics like we talked about, right, As a human being in our lifespan, we have things like cholesterol and, and oxygen levels and height, bmi, body mass index, all those kind of stats you can look at whether someone smokes or not, so on and so forth. Well, some of them that he cited in Empires are leadership capabilities, education levels, character and determination, rule of law, corruption, resource allocation, efficiency, openness to global thinking.
[00:14:07] Speaker B: Well, that's all of them. Those are the ones.
[00:14:08] Speaker A: Well, no, I was going to add here too, where he cites in another part of the discussion, which is things like the ability to have a succession plan for your leaders, you know, to have an infrastructure that is not just one king and then when he dies, it's either a whole war or something or just a whole new system takes over. You got to have this infrastructure that leaders can step down even if it's through death. And then someone else can quickly take up the mantle with the country not going through some huge, you know, disturbance. And so what he gets at is based on the kind of, if you were to look at a sliding scale of a high or low, and those different metrics can tell you that the Health of an empire.
[00:14:50] Speaker B: So, but I think that, but those kind of over. There's an overlap there between what you're saying as far as the secession plan versus that. Because I think the secession plan was more of a mechanism that has to be in place. But these things I think are at a higher level than that in terms of like, if you get these things right, you will have the ability to have secession because you'll have high rule of law, you'll have civility, you'll have things that allow those types of things to take place. And so, but I do want to move to the next section because one of the defining characteristics of this entire, what you call, I mean, just this video, but just this concept, what he's talking about is dealing with changing world order. So he's talking about really the transitions and where the transitions happen. He defines a general arc arc for each great empire, so to speak, starts with the Dutch, then he goes to the British, then to the Americans. And then right now, I mean, you know, not to spoil it, but what he has is the Americans post peak and so not still going up. And so, and he has, he has an indicator for China rising, so to speak. Well, not so to speak, in fact.
And so but each, each of these has an arc. Now the US Arc isn't complete, you know, and the China arc is still, you know, coming up. It's not even up to the top and yet anywhere but this general arc is what he shows for each one. And so what do you think he calls this? The big cycle, so to speak, behind the rise and fall of empires. So I'm going to ask you a broad question. Just what do you think of the big cycle? He identifies whether it be about how the transitions happen, where there's one on the decline and one on the rise. Like the Post World War II U.S. rose and surpassed Britain, Great Britain, because one was declining and one was rising. So you have those transitions, but just also just the individual arc for one empire itself to either direction basically is what I'm saying. If you want to talk about the transition.
[00:16:48] Speaker A: Yeah, no, I think it's interesting because I generally like we've been talking about. Right. I generally think he's onto something with these cycles. I think this is where again, we can cherry pick out what we want depending on if, you know, and this is where I think Americans kind of, we get caught in our own mental trap. Like, like I just, I get amazed how robust our country is in comparison to any other country in the world. And Americans are still so Insecure about the position of our country. And I can appreciate that you got to be on edge, so you don't want to be complacent. But I think that we need to look at certain things because you're right, like his definition of the downward side of the mountain. Right. That the kind of declining empire would be things like financial busts and economic downturn, printing money and credit, you know, debt and political restructuring, things like that. Well, we had a civil war right. In 1860s that. That slowed us down for a little bit, but we kind of got back on our feet right then. We had an economic.
[00:17:49] Speaker B: That was prior to the peak. So conceivably we were rising before then and rising after then.
[00:17:54] Speaker A: That's my point. And then if you look at we had. We actually kind of caused through the 29 crash and the way that the Federal Reserve behave afterwards. The Great Depression in the United States would then spiraled out to being a world global depression in the 1930s. So that's an example of financial bust and economic downturn. Printing money has been happening since. You know, that's why I love how he did a good thing on the gold standard since 1973. We got off the gold standard and then he gave me some new information. I didn't know that the same thing happened towards the end of World War II in 43, that we went off the gold standard for a little bit then and printed a bunch of money to take care of the expenses of World War II. So my point is, is that he. He points out parts of the downturn in empires, which I do believe are part of the cycle. But I think like we've identified. You can kind of have these mini cycles within a larger cycle.
[00:18:51] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:18:51] Speaker A: So. So an example of like. Because that's what he said, right? That the.
The way that countries change externally and empires change externally through war and conflict, but the way things change internally within a nation would be either through a hot civil war for real, or some huge cultural shift that may not be caused by war. So.
[00:19:16] Speaker B: And he pointed to the New Deal and.
[00:19:18] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
[00:19:19] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:19:19] Speaker A: So I think that that's where it caught me reading that part, seeing that part. Like we're in another phase of change in this country and it's up to us as Americans. Do we see it as a total collapse and decline? Because we are seeing certain things that he's citing is happening now, like printing money, like economic ups and downs. Or can we look back and say, well, this stuff happens periodically throughout the empire's history and this is the thing I'm looking around at who else is out there in the world and including China. And I'm saying, man, no one's got it still. So as bad as a house, we look like on this block, we're still the empire, we're still the best one.
[00:19:58] Speaker B: I think you raise a really good point there because, I mean, you kind of knocked me off, you know, knocked me off my block for a second.
[00:20:05] Speaker A: Because, like, I try and do that. AUDIENCE. I'm very proud when he acknowledges it.
[00:20:10] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:20:10] Speaker A: All right, keep going.
[00:20:12] Speaker B: This is very. If you think about it, the time we're in now, like the civil rights movement and the women's rights and all that, the war protest, 60s, 70s, that was conceivably during the peak of America, and that America was the United States was able to deal with all that while still maintaining primacy economically, militarily, around the world is remarkable. And so having that kind of strife, having that kind of reshuffling of things internally, doesn't necessarily mean that things have to go down from there if you're able to handle it internally. But that's where you get back to those factors that we talked about, where, you know, you talk about the leadership capabilities, the education levels, the character, rule of law, corruption. The better positioned you are with those things, the more you can withstand when. When. When friction happens, so to speak. And so I thought that was. I think that's a really good insight, basically, that even, like, people say, oh, 58% of people say, oh, US is on the decline. But what would people have said in 1969 about.
[00:21:17] Speaker A: Exactly, exactly. Before. Think about, then we were in Vietnam War. All that negativity that we can think back.
[00:21:24] Speaker B: All these people just got assassinated by.
[00:21:26] Speaker A: King Robert F. Kennedy. Yeah. Then you had Watergate a couple years later with the distrust in government, the church committee hearings about how bad the CIA was killing people. So, yeah, I mean, that's what I kind of think. That's, to me, why history is so important for us to know as Americans, because then we might calm down a little bit, that this moment in time is not that different than other moments. And actually, we seem to be doing a lot better than they were. Like, as much as we fear things like violence today, I mean, there's not three. Think about it, there were three lynchings a week on average through the decades of the 60s. That ain't happening right now.
[00:22:05] Speaker B: Well, that always. That's always the. Whenever I see the. You know, because the NBC News poll had a couple of points that are Things that it asked people. And anytime I always wonder, like people answering those questions, it's like, man, people will say things were much better before. They just don't. That kind of stuff just might register to them. Like, you know, like back when they were turning fire hoses on people and burning stuff and burning crosses in people's yards, that's when, that's the time we're, we're looking back for. But I don't want to get off of that or I don't want to stay on that. What I wanted to mention also though, the importance of then I think Dalio, which this is notably, this is a billionaire hedge fund manager. The importance he realized that the New Deal was in our society and how that set us up. It was that type of structure from our government that really set us up for this shooting to the moon, basically. And I've always been a big believer that the New Deal did create, that created the largest middle class history of the world. I mean it did a lot for our society that had never really been done, you know, from the standpoint. And that doesn't mean we've talked about this, doesn't mean you can just do exactly what was done then. But what was trying to be accomplished and what they tried to accomplish is worthwhile. But the fact that that is what America's peak didn't occur after the Civil War. It didn't occur after World War I. It didn't. It occurred after the New Deal put it, one, put Great Britain in a place where they could, they borrowed so much money that they just weren't able to become the top dog anymore. And two, as you said, you don't see people that are around that are poised to be able to take the mantle right now. It made the US poised to take the mantle to go up to the top. And I think that that's something we can learn from still today.
You gotta be able to do good. The New Deal was about doing good by people.
It's called the New Deal because it was new from the Square Deal, which was Teddy Roosevelt. If you work hard, you should be able live a good life. The New Deal is just doubling down on that. And so, and I think so, so little of what's happening in our government basically is about those things which underlies the problem. That's why people are upset and pessimistic and all that, because they don't see the government showing people that government works. So I think there's a risk that we have here because perhaps our government structures aren't set up to push us in the right direction right now. But I mean, ultimately the overall arc, my point being is that it's impossible to know like you, it seems like even from Dalio's examples, you can't tell where you are in the arc until after the fact.
[00:24:32] Speaker A: That's why. Well, but that's what I liked about his example. Like the analogy of a human lifespan, right? Yeah, because there are different, like I'll give you an example. Like my father, my wife's dad, he smokes a pack a day. The guy's 85 years old. He's been doing this for 60, 70 years. I mean, he's been smoking like that. Somehow his genetics just are able to keep carrying on. Most people smoking a pack a day for decades wouldn't be alive at this point. Right.
So I think that that's just a small example that you could have two empires with similar things going on, but one will survive it, one won't. For whatever other factors might be.
[00:25:13] Speaker B: Just for reasons that may be beneath the surface. Is your point. Like there's a reason, you know, exactly.
[00:25:18] Speaker A: Like we don't see it. Like I don't see why my father in law is able to survive this long smoking cigarettes at that level and other people don't. But it's, but clearly there's something under the surface that makes his body different than someone else's reacting to cigarettes. And so I think that's why I gave the example earlier about like the decision of someone like a Vladimir Putin, right. By, by doing what he did. And you could say the same thing about Adolf Hitler or certain other aggressive type of dictatorial type of leaders where they make these moves without really obviously maybe consenting their whole population.
Those tend to be their downfall because it's just a move that was, it just wasn't a good move. And what it does is it prevents then that nation from continuing to march to that point where they could become an empire.
[00:26:09] Speaker B: Well, but I think that one of the key things I took away here is how the things you do before you're even sniffing empire status are the kinds of things really that allow you to grow large enough to really do it. And so for example, in the video he makes the point several times that education is a key piece and it's technical education, but it's also education on things like civility and being able to deal with your fellow citizens and so forth. And so, and also education that involves teaching people work ethic. And now he gave that. That doesn't all necessarily have to come from a public school, like some of that can come from other institutions, religious institutions, you know, any type of institution. But that has to be somewhere ingrained in the society that people are learning. And this was a mind blower to me in the sense that we need to make sure that people somehow, some way are learning not just how to add two plus two, but how to, but how to deal with one another in a civilized way and how to have a work with the value of work ethic. And if you're not teaching people that somehow, some way, whether again, if the religious institutions aren't doing it, then you got to come up with some other way if you want the nation to succeed. But that, that needs to be a conscious effort or at minimum something that's being tracked by someone consciously and say, okay, yeah, these other institutions are taking care of that. So maybe we focus our energy elsewhere or these institutions aren't, so maybe we got to focus more energy. Here to me was something that was very revealing. But ultimately, if you're not, if those things aren't happening in the initial stages, then you're going to have a failure to launch, at least from an empire standpoint anyway. Because without the population that's equipped to push things forward from a productivity standpoint and to keep. To not be at each other's throat over every minor disagreement, then you're not going to the top anyway.
[00:28:01] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean that's. I'll come back to that for sure. But what I wanted to get at just the last thing before we move to the next part that broke down, that stood out to me most or one of them. That's why I know there were several was also like you said, because it kind of brings me back to this idea of the living memory.
Because what he says is that with rising empires, usually you have things like a lot of immigration people coming to that country starting from the bottom up. And so what you have is a different, like you mentioned type of work ethic. People that are really, you know, they come from somewhere else, they want to hustle. And then he says inevitably down the road, several generations later, for several, for many reasons. One is because the empire has greater productivity, which then helps to have a higher, higher wages for their labor force, which then leads to a better lifestyle, a more wealthy lifestyle. And what does wealth create for most people? Not everybody, but I'd say the majority of people are a little bit fatter on their waistline, is complacency. You know, when you, when you don't have to worry about where your food's coming from, where your next paycheck's coming from, you get a little bit complacent. And I think that's his point. As far as when the empire starts to decline, that is happening as well, where you have this kind of the labor force and everyone is kind of a little bit too fat and happy. And what's happening is there's these competing empires, the smaller guys, they've got the lower wages, they've got a labor force that's coming up, so on and so forth.
[00:29:32] Speaker B: I think that's actually a bigger part of it, actually, that he identified. Yes, you're correct that he does identify the idea that with more prosperity there is potentially less work ethic built in, particularly amongst generations. But the other thing, I think that is just we've, we've lived through this where the, the, your standard of living goes up and so therefore the wages that you want are higher. And these other up and coming countries, their wages are lower. Like you, they, they are happy to work for a quarter of what the people in, in, you know, the, the, the empire would, would begrudgingly work for. And so because of that, that, that, that disconnect right there almost naturally leads you. Actually, I would say the thing that I would give the biggest credence to, the overall arc. Again, understanding the arc is very reductive, but the overall arc is that the things that happen in the, in the rise, if they happen a certain way, lead to the peak. Yeah, but the things that happen in the peak tend to seem to lead to the fall because you're the reserve currency and your currency is valued higher than currencies that are valued lower. They're workers. You can, you can get more labor from them. And so you pull that out of your own people or you do, you do less with education. I do want to get to the next section.
[00:30:51] Speaker A: Let me just stop you on that one real quick, because that is a perfect observation of where we are now on the social spectrum here, of the populism. Because think about what you're saying is the outsourcing creates an environment that then can be exploited by people at home who want to say, look, you no longer have a job, some other person took it.
[00:31:17] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:31:17] Speaker A: So it's almost like an inevitable.
[00:31:19] Speaker B: Yeah, we're living through that. Where one, we saw the economic justification of it come about and that it wasn't necessarily the, like just super sinister. Like that's actually cyclical. But then you see people pay attention to it and then like say, hey, try to Take advantage of that. And so. Well, so with that all said, you know, I do want to kick it right back to you. Do you buy that the US Is in its decline phase, you know, as defined by Dalio's construct? And when I say decline, really what it is, is he did have. When you looked at the overall arc, he had our peak over, and it was still near the peak, but it had. The arrow was not pointing up, it was not pointing sideways, it was pointing down from the peak. And so. And also just. And with that, do you think you buy that we're in the decline phase? And what do you think. What things do you think are the biggest impediments that we're dealing with now, if that is the case or whether that's the case or not, what are their biggest impediments to extending the peak?
[00:32:15] Speaker A: So are we in the decline phase right now? I don't know. I mean, I know a lot of Americans feel like we are and all that, but I do think we delude ourselves, like you said. I mean, I'd rather be alive today than 20 years ago, 30 years ago, 50 years ago, or 100 years ago. And it's not just on one subject. I say that. I just, you know, it's. We live a good life right now, all of us. Right? It's. It's, you know, we got electronics, we got technology, we got this, we got that. But long story short, so I don't. So that's why, to give you a straight answer, being honest, I don't know where we are on the cycle, because we actually cited some very important things. We had a civil war on the way up that was 10 times worse than today. I mean, that was. That's the largest amount of casualties in any war in US History still.
[00:32:58] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:32:59] Speaker A: More than Vietnam War to. More than World War II. More. More people died fighting each other in this country than in any other war we've ever had.
[00:33:05] Speaker B: So we had a great depression right before we became the top dog.
[00:33:09] Speaker A: But think about it. We're a country by 1789, and by 1865, we have a civil war. So that's what I'm saying. Like on our. Within our first hundred years, we had a massive issue right then, like you're saying. Then we got, you know, I wouldn't count World War I because we came in at the end. But, yeah, we had World War II, which was serious. We had the Great Depression. We had the 60s, which was the cultural revolutions, you know, and we have stuff going on now that's uncomfortable. But that doesn't mean we're in decline. And it's gonna mean that we're a third world country in two years and someone else has taken over, gonna invade us. That's why I say England's a good example. And that's why I like even the title of his book, the Changing World Order. He didn't say it's the end order. He just said these things are changing. That's all. So getting the answer specifically, if we go back to leadership capabilities, education levels, character determination, rule of law, corruption, resource allocation, efficiency, and openness to global thinking, I would say that right now in the United States, my opinion, we're still relatively strong on three of them, but we've become very weak on four of them. So that's not a good. If I'm looking at just straight stats and not trying to delude myself that America's fine, I would say that that's not good. That we're a little bit below 50%.
[00:34:24] Speaker B: Yeah. And I want to say that that is really, I think the value here is that granular piece because again, the reductive. Are we on the decline or, like, there's not much to really take from that. And that's why I started with that NBC News poll, because it was like, you don't really know. I said earlier today just that and answered. My answer to the question is like, you don't. I agree with you. You don't know, like, from this. I don't think that Great Britain KNEW they were 10 years away from being no longer the big dog in 1935. You know, they didn't know that or, like, so I don't think that. But see, and they may. They went through things in 1895 or, you know, whatever that may. Have people been questioning, oh, no, is this. Is this the end for us as far as being the top dog out there? So I don't think it's knowable whether or not you truly are, but I agree with you and I look to those exact same factors and saying, okay, well, we have a problem here with several of those. You know, like a honest to goodness. When we're talking about corruption in our government, we have an honest to goodness problems.
[00:35:21] Speaker A: Well, that's where I was going at.
[00:35:22] Speaker B: Okay, yeah, go ahead, go ahead.
[00:35:23] Speaker A: Yeah, that's what I was gonna say. So when I'm looking at the first three leadership capabilities, I think we have a problem there. And it's not because I agree or disagree with either Republicans or Democrats. What I'm saying is the country, both sides of the voter base have lost faith in the leadership in this country. Generally everyone.
[00:35:42] Speaker B: I would say it also, that is the corrupt that relates directly to the corruption. You know, like in the sense that people can see the disconnect from what people who politicians either talk about or what people are doing, you know, the people they take care of, so to speak in relation to what it is.
[00:36:01] Speaker A: We're in worse shape than I thought because I had corruption as one of the ones that were doing a little bit better than the rest of the world.
[00:36:06] Speaker B: Oh really? Now I think we're not perfect. We don't even question the level of corruption as well. Like I don't think this gotten so bad that we don't even like we assume that politics is supposed to be pay for play, you know.
[00:36:18] Speaker A: But I think, I think, look, I think money and power is always gonna have that type of relationship. No matter. There's no way to stamp that out. I think we still have. If you look at our corruption generally in comparison to many other large nations, it's actually not as bad.
[00:36:32] Speaker B: I mean see now I think that that thought process is the reason our corruption cause we don't even know if you compare us to first world like democracies that work. We're much worse than how much money dictates like citizens United States. Well that's a different way around.
[00:36:47] Speaker A: Well, let me put it this way.
I would say this. They definite. Maybe we have a different definition of corruption which we don't have to spend too much time on here. But the idea is that. Because what I'm getting at is things like, you know, whether you have the Russian kind of oligarchy system or in China where there's. We've done the story. There's so much corruption on the local level. They got buildings falling over and all this because literally the developers just paying some local councilman a few million bucks and they literally looked a whole other way building a 100 story high rise. And I'm saying that type of corruption thankfully hasn't happened here at that level.
You're right. In comparing us to a Sweden or something else. What I would say is our corruption I think is a little bit more upfront. Things like lobby.
[00:37:30] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:37:31] Speaker A: Like. Like lobbying and all that. I would say yes, if you want to define that as corruption and yeah, for sure.
[00:37:35] Speaker B: Well, because I'm looking at it more as a quid pro quo thing. Yeah, it's like yeah, I give you money for this and then therefore you look out for my interest here regardless.
[00:37:42] Speaker A: Of what you believe in, you. Or I could go register with the government and actually be a federal lobbyist for some group of companies. I didn't look at that as the same type of under the table corruption. But you're right in the sense of allowing money to influence political decisions. Of course. I mean, I'm not going to deny that. Let me.
[00:37:59] Speaker B: But let's not get bogged down in that.
[00:38:01] Speaker A: But the other one I had on that was lower than I'd like to see it. Education levels, you know, number one, you know, good education from elementary, you know, on up teaches kids to do what? Critically think. Right. We've talked about the idea that, you know, the lack of teaching civics for the last two or three generations has allowed many Americans to not really understand how our own system works and therefore they can be led astray into believing certain things, which then creates more conflict and, and disruption to our discourse internally.
[00:38:35] Speaker B: Yeah, and, and then Dalio makes this very clear. The reason he talks about these kinds of things, whether it be the education, all that, it's to establish a common purpose, you know, and that's what if you're not doing these things, it's not, you're not just doing them because they're fun to do or whatever, but you're, you're giving your people a common purpose, a common theme to build around. And if you don't, that takes ongoing effort. That's not just something that you do and then it's there, you know. And so I mean, even to the concept or to the, to the full, like in our country of democracy, like a lot of times we expect people to have an affinity or for an allegiance to democracy just as an abstract. And some of us do, but that everybody's not going to just automatically always say democracy over anything else. It's like, oh, democracy. Or if democracy is not delivering for me, they may not stay in that. So being able to build kind of the common purpose and a morale that can be that people can rally around, that's something that these factors are things you can help, they can help lead towards that. So I do want to keep moving though, man. I mean, because honestly, this is a 45 minute. 45. It's a 45 minute video on a book that's much longer.
[00:39:45] Speaker A: Big fat book. Yeah.
[00:39:47] Speaker B: It's well done though, in the graphics they use. It's really well done. So I mean, we would definitely recommend people check it out.
[00:39:53] Speaker A: And you know, just one last thing too. I think one thing that that video is great, that this is where I think everyone wants to point a finger at either someone else or some reason why we're on the decline. And I think this Ray Dalio did a great job of saying there's so many factors and so many things involved with rises and falls of this that we're all kind of foolish when we all try and pick these one or two things.
[00:40:14] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:40:15] Speaker A: Oh, it's just because of this that America is in this bad place, man. There's a lot of things.
[00:40:19] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:40:19] Speaker A: And a lot of them can work out for us or against us going forward. Like, we can't even tell, just like we said with an individual's health. So.
[00:40:27] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. Because we're in the middle of the storm and so we can't necessarily see what direction everything is. But why. Yeah. It there is the abstraction that's built off of the unknown, and then there's some metrics to look at as well. But yeah, it's still not saying it's an exact science, you know, because anything with human beings, you know, it's just not going to be an exact science.
[00:40:47] Speaker A: Don't get me started.
[00:40:49] Speaker B: So. But I do want to. The second topic we have for the day recently, and you shared this with me as far as on Bill Maher show a week ago, that where it was some pushback basically on there's been a recent push. And I think this is. This isn't a straw man or anything like this. We've seen this around and specific examples can be cited just to reframe obesity. Like, we know the United States has an obesity epidemic problem. Whatever. There's a lot of people that are overweight and the percentages get really hot. And there's been an effort to reframe this more as something to be proud of as opposed to something that's an area that needs to be. People need to improve upon or people need to feel bad about or something like that. So what's your thought? And basically Mar and then some others we've seen are pushing back against that. Like, hold on. This is something that's not healthy. We shouldn't be so accepting of the behaviors that lead to this or the result that is this. And so what's your thought on that kind of that push and pull that we're seeing in the culture?
[00:41:55] Speaker A: No, I think it's interesting. It's a difficult topic because I think I'll say this to set it off. Right. It's kind of like when we had our discussion about transgender people. I think generally I would default to I'm not here to discriminate against anyone. I'm not here to make fun of anyone or put anyone down. And the obesity topic is difficult because sometimes we get into these conversations and I can appreciate that someone that's obese, that might be listening to relatively slim in shaped guys talking about obese people could feel like they're getting kind of beat up upon. So I want to be very clear in this conversation that that is not the intent of either of us. And you know, there are important things to discuss when discussing obesity and general human health. And one thing Mar said which you know, is something I've thought of in my head and it's a funny joke, but it's kind of. It's that kind of joke that's funny, it's true to it. He says, how many obese 90 year olds have you ever seen? And I think that says something because what it basically is saying is that people that tend to live longer lives, meaning they're probably generally healthier, we don't see people who get to these later stages of life really having all this excess weight because generally being obese, I'm not talking about being overweight now. That's why I want to be clear, being obese carries along with it a lot of other potential health things that can become big health issues like type 2 diabetes, like heart disease, like all this kind of stuff. So the idea of, I would say this, the idea of promoting now a culture that might have started out of a response to society putting thin people in everyone's faces all the time. I can appreciate that there's obese people that may feel like they want a community and say, hey, look, I'm a human being too. That's what I'm saying. I'm not here to make discrimination against obese people. But what I think is you're right to point out that something is unhealthy is not trying to make fun or anything about people. And I think that the culture that is maybe promoting obesity as something that should be sought after and that people should be just saying, hey, it's fine to be obese. I think that would be like saying it's fine to be a heroin addict because I don't want to offend drug users. Like at some point we know that things are unhealthy.
[00:44:26] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. I think that this comes in at that intersection between trying to. Trying to offer show people dignity, trying to show people trying not to. I think the way it's discussed a lot of times is not a very helpful way to discuss it, because a lot of times it is about, oh, this is, this is, you know, this person's fault, this is this, this. And there may be, there's always some level of personal responsibility with anything, but there's oftentimes a system behind things. And that, I think, is a lot of times the issue that is, is overlooked with this. And so I can appreciate the, I know that people, you know, with a weight problem, so to speak, experience a lot of, of negativity being directed towards them. And so I can appreciate the thought process of, well, let's try to support them, let's try to, to do better for them, their psyche and so forth, and not make them feel like they're constantly being attacked. That said, like, I am concerned when people push on science, so to speak, or push on and say, okay, well, then you're getting too far, basically when you say, well, no, it is perfectly normal to be like this. It's not. But that being said, and here's where I think the overlooked piece is for that many people to be obese, particularly relative to what they were. If it's 33% of adults in the United States that are obese, that's not just a bunch of people having personal failings. Like, otherwise there would always be 33% people obese, you know, and that's just because it's not like people are just less responsible now than they were 50 years ago or whatever. I think the scale of the problem reveals that we're pointing at the wrong culprit. If it's that systemic, then it's probably something about our system that is doing it. And so whether you're trying to, to, to add moral support by saying things that may be scientifically dubious or you're attacking people because of things that they have some level of control over, but they're also part of a larger overall system that you're disregarding totally. It still is missing. Like, well, hold on, why is this happening on this scale? It's not just that there's a third of the people just can't control themselves. There's something more going on there. And so until we can get to that piece, I don't think either end of the mocking end or the end that tries to make people feel like they shouldn't even be, they shouldn't come out outside, or the side that says, hey, this is, you know, exactly how you should want to be, you know, this is, we should all try to look like this. Neither one of them are helping us get towards the root of this so that we can try to address the situation and bring, bring a better situation out. Because if we can address whatever is the systemic issues going on, then we can do better by everybody.
[00:47:14] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, it's interesting because you're absolutely right. I mean, look, in 1962, the statistics were that 23% of American adults were obese and, you know, kind of the 2017, 2018 range, just obese, not overweight, just kind of clinically obese, that number was at 42.4%. So in 60 years, we've basically almost doubled our just obesity. Now when you add overweight and obese, here are some stats just from a more recent period. I was amazed to see this incline like you're saying. So in 97, overweight and obese was 39.4% of the US population by 04, that grew to 44 and a half percent. By 2007, it was 56%.
By 2010, it was 65%. 17% of American children were considered overweight or obese in 2010, and 63% of teenage girls became overweight by age 11.
And then that's a system problem. Like that's not exactly. Yeah, and they were estimating that by 2020, which maybe the stats aren't out yet, that three quarters of the American population would be obese. So you're right. That's what got me looking at then like our food, all that kind of stuff. Because it's funny you say that like if you look at, if anyone looks at any sitcom or movie, let's say prior to the 1980s, right, everybody was thin. I mean, it's not, I'm not saying that again, out of any like knock to obese people. What I'm saying to your point is clearly there was a change in our society from how we dealt, not only how we dealt with food, but how food was able to be given to us. You know, the regulations about sugars and fats and, you know, all these things I'm reading about. You know, there's literally we're going to war every time we go to the grocery store with an army of psychologists, scientists, you know, the amount of money that these like General Mills and Kellogg's and these big food companies spend on scientists that study how to make the sugar molecule or the salt molecule a certain way so it dissolves in our mouth. And they were saying that like it takes a cigarette 10 seconds to hit a person's brain for the stimulative effect. That's the addicting part.
It's microseconds because the tongue, it was interesting. Sugar and salt. It's microseconds because of the way that the nervous system absorbs information from the palate of the tongue. Interesting that we're just designed because it's food. And that's what they said in this thing I was reading that human beings have been addicted to food for 4 million years, meaning because we need it to survive. The problem is now, you know, it's like our corporations have. Are in the point in our human history and have figured out how. It's kind of like where the news and all this stuff has gone. Right. It's figured out how to just manipulate us to keep us hooked.
[00:50:11] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:50:11] Speaker A: But I guess the news and social media is making us drive against each other and culturally and have, you know, hopefully not a hot civil war. But what the food industry is doing is just killing us slowly.
[00:50:22] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:50:22] Speaker A: By making us more and more obese. Now think about it. Three quarters of Americans.
[00:50:26] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:50:26] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:50:27] Speaker B: That's basically the work that you just laid out.
[00:50:29] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:50:30] Speaker B: In 60 years.
[00:50:31] Speaker A: Yeah. Go from 23% to, you know, so.
[00:50:34] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, so to me, I think that the kind of the argument that we're seeing back and forth is a distraction because there's something happening. And I mean, I think you probably just identified what's happening here is that the people selling us food have basically made it a science on how best to make us addicted to it and how to change our bodies so that we want to eat more. Because that's the other thing about it, remember? And when. When you eat certain foods, it makes you more hungry. It makes you want to eat more. And so they're stimulating. Not just foods that are going to make you want to eat more, foods that satisfy your brain in the same way a drug does. But, I mean. So we're basically the guinea pigs on this experiment to try to make food companies as most. As profitable as possible.
[00:51:20] Speaker A: Yeah, that's what I was gonna say, actually, to tie back into the first conversation we had. That is an example of where I would say, like the American corruption. Right. That's why I don't think of it as corruption. Cause it's all legal. It's all lobbying. It's lobbying. And what they do is. But think about it. We had a former first lady in the past decade who actually tried to say, hey, people should eat healthier. She had a garden in the White House, and she actually started trying to promote people reducing their sugar intake. And the response from industry, I'll never forget, was playing on Americans emotion of not wanting to be told what to do by the government and the individualism that we all have in our culture. And it. And I remember seeing commercials on TV of government's trying to tell you how much sugar you should have. Don't let the government tell you, you know, and those things work and it's enough.
[00:52:10] Speaker B: Well, because those are a science designed to play on our human nature.
[00:52:15] Speaker A: Psychology.
[00:52:15] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly.
[00:52:16] Speaker A: It's just. It's just interesting that, you know, because that's what I started thinking. Like when you looked at, you know, they said in 2016, the cost of just forget about overweight now. This is just obesity, overweight. You could probably grow this to a much larger statistic. But. Or number I'm about to say in 2016, they said specifically obesity cost the US economy $260 billion that year in like, healthcare and unproductive stuff. So again, we sit here arguing about what the government's gonna spend money on here and there.
But, you know, and that's why I started thinking, like, what is the role of government in regulating anything?
[00:52:55] Speaker B: Well, before you go to that. Cause I do wanna talk about that, but I wanted to. There's a. Like, we talk about the psychology of this stuff. And what I wonder a lot of times though, when I see the people who try to make it accepted, like, hey, be obese, it's okay, be you. That's body positivity and all that stuff. I wonder. Clearly they believe that or the underlying belief, whether they consciously believe this or not. But clearly the underlying belief there is that if it is otherized, then people will shun them. If you otherize it, if you don't try to make it accepted, then people are going to catch hell for it, basically. And so they're saying, okay, they're making a decision whether they truly believe it or not. Again, I have a problem when people start trying to change science to try to make people feel better, but they're making a calculation that people will treat these people poorly unless we start trying to change the narrative that this is perfectly normal. I just wonder if they're right or not, because I do. See, I recognize there is a problem with people treating people very poorly because they're overweight. You know, But I don't know if that's the right solution. But I just. I wanted to get your thought on that, though, just real quick. Do you think that people are capable of showing people dignity if it's not something. If we don't get this message out that knowing it's wrong that, hey, this. It's perfectly normal to be like this. Like, is that a necessary evil, basically? I don't mean evil in that in a literal sense, but is that a necessary thing or. Because are people just wired like that if you.
[00:54:31] Speaker A: I don't think they're wired like that. I just think because, you know, it's a much different topic here. So I definitely don't want to step on myself. But if you look at transgender. Right.
Like you said, there's a science that defines what's biologically male, biologically female.
[00:54:47] Speaker B: Yeah. There's chromosomes.
[00:54:49] Speaker A: And so whether people want to believe or accept certain things. Right. You're going to have other people that say, no.
You can say that you act like a man or woman or you feel masculine or feminine, but, you know, a chair is neither male or female, but a chair can be designed to look masculine or feminine based on the culture that the chair is being presented to. Right? Yeah, but science says that in biology, there's, you know, unless you're an amoeba or a single celled organism, then there's two sexes.
[00:55:20] Speaker B: Well, yeah.
[00:55:20] Speaker A: And people trying to change that.
[00:55:22] Speaker B: Gender is kind of a defining characteristic of sexual reproduction. Animals that reproduce sexually versus asexual.
[00:55:28] Speaker A: Yeah. So what I'm saying is people really trying to tell people not to believe that anymore is not Seem to be met with, you know, much support. Right. And I think that it's similar to. And that's where I'll stop on transgender, because I feel myself about to step into a mess. But. But that's where I would say with obesity, I think the science has settled that being obese versus not being obese is. Is. There's, There's. The science has settled that it's unhealthy and it's gonna hurt the individual that's obese. And then it has a cost to society, like we just mentioned. So, I don't know, put it this way.
Do I support that I've seen on Victoria's Secret or swimsuit, you know, Sports Illustrated swimsuit, that they have women now that aren't literally stick figures. I think that's good. I think we should celebrate that women's bodies can be diverse or men's bodies, Men don't have to be built like Thor. Right. That you can be okay and be attractive and not be, you know, have 2% body fat. But I don't think that then promoting obesity as something that just, hey, this is a fine way to live because it's. It's. That's what I thought about When I thought I'm reading all this stuff about. Because I'm reading about all the health thing that I said, the type 2 diabetes, and I started wondering like, well, how, how's, how's the sugar and salt and different than tobacco? Especially when I read that part about the way the brain reacts to it and the addictive nature of. Yeah, shouldn't have. If the government got in the business of regulating tobacco first by not allowing, let's say, tobaccos to sell ads in comic books back in the 50s and 60s to get kids to stop, and then within 30, 40 years, because you and I are old enough to remember smoking on airplanes, smoking in restaurants, smoking in office buildings, they don't do that anymore because regulations came to say this is unhealthy. So at some point that's why I wonder, okay, so probably this is just the only way to stop this because just like cigarette smoking, people won't. Not enough people will stop it themselves. Because it's addicting on purpose. Yeah, the companies make it addicting. So then we may have to have some government intervention that says either the companies can't make the food that addictive or they can't make the same kind of portions or something to help people control themselves to be able to not consume this stuff.
[00:57:39] Speaker B: I'm sure that sounds great, but you asked Michelle Obama how that'll work out for them. And you know, like, that's again, that's our legal corruption because the food industry has the.
[00:57:47] Speaker A: That's why you just need someone not named Obama trying to.
[00:57:50] Speaker B: That's the answer to the question, actually, I think, and this plays in any scenario, this is where, this is one of the places where we can see the. If, if you're not teaching civility, then I do agree. If you don't consciously try to teach civility in, in your society, then I can see where someone would come to the conclusion that, hey, we're doing this to save these people because if not, people are going to treat them so poorly that they're going to, you know, like it's going to make their lives miserable. So we're going to try to put this narrative out there because people aren't. People aren't civil enough in our society to not, if they see this other, to not give them a hard time. So, I mean, I think the answer there needs to be. This is another reason why, again, looking at the previous part, why the education is not just, it's not just science and math, even though that's very important, it's also civility. It's also work ethic. It's these soft factors that I think we've overlooked completely. We've kind of taken for granted that they came in in other ways. And whether it be in family structures as well, you know, like stronger family structures, put these things in as well. And if we've overlooked that, that plays out in our society in a lot of ways. And then you end up in these scenarios where, yeah, people are talking things that are kind of nonsense scientifically to try to create a more inclusive society. Like, we should be able to have an inclusive society yet still not talk things about things that are nonsensical, scientific. Like, it shouldn't be one or the other. Like, either we got to ignore the science or we got to ignore the science in order to have a civil society. Like, no, let's just teach civility. So. But I think we can wrap from there. We appreciate her for joining us on this episode of Call It Like I See It. Subscribe to the Podcast Rate It Review us. Tell us what you think. Until next time, I'm James Keys Tunde. Lana all right, we'll talk to you next time.
