Trending Makes Me Feel Good 10/20: Snap Specs, Gambling, Midterm Elections

Hello, the internet, and welcome to this episode of Trend It Makes Me Feel Good. Courtesy of Donaghy Kirby on the discard.

Wait, what's that from?

Bust It Makes Me Feel Good. Bust It Makes Me Feel Good.

Oh, I see, I see, I see.

I see what I've said. Busting makes me feel trans. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

That was perfect. That was perfect.

The busting is really the key part of busting makes me feel good. We know. We know. My name is Jack O'Brien. That over there is Mr. Miles Gray. Oh, man.

I just took a sip of real poorly made matcha drink.

By you?

Yeah. Yeah.

You trying to hand stir that shit? I don't know what I was doing, man. I shouldn't even call it matcha. It's just some shit I'm drinking that's green.

I needed a motor to get my matcha cooking.

I almost got Vietnamese coffee today, and that's the only coffee that gives me existential dread.

And I was like, no, no, no, no, you can't do that.

I take it all the way into the abyss. Yeah. Well, this is the episode where we tell you what is trending. How has You Can See Everything been sitting with you? Have you had more thoughts, more conversations about it? It's weird.

The thoughts I have are I'm just replaying things in my mind over and over.

The full frontal nudity... Oh, actually, no. We shouldn't talk about this. Oh, yeah, yeah. That's right. We're trying not to spoil it for people. The full frontal nudity... The full frontal nudity... That is being talked about around there. I won't say who's full frontal nudity. I've had more thoughts on that. I just actually go to the theater.

I've gone to see it four more times and I just leave right after. Everyone's like, wait, what's this guy's deal? You know, it's like, what time did this show start?

You're like, oh, okay. So I'm not going to see it for.

Another 15 hours. I'll be right back. I'll be right back. I can get in there for that. Just pop in. Yeah.

All right.

And I'm out. Okay. Good to see.

I mean, no, the thing that I've been thinking, it's just like the visuals have been replaying in my head a ton, which is interesting.

Oh, yeah. The visuals are very cool. All right. What's new, Miles? I missed yesterday. I missed a chaotic Blake and Crofton episode. I actually haven't heard it. You guys got to so many stories. How did that happen with a Crofton episode? Dude, it's just... You know, man, you run a tight ship. They respect the form. You know what I mean?

Those two guys, if anything, they respect the form like jazz musicians.

They know how to play. They know.

I just, I show them the chart and they know they play in between. No, no, it was great. It was great. It's always, it's always just funny too. I think that was the second time we've had that grouping of me, Blake and Crofton, or maybe the same, but I remember that that was like the first time was the first time Blake had actually really interacted with Chris.

And he was like, man, he's like, he's like that guy. He's like so funny.

He's like, we're, I'm surprised I haven't met him before, but I think because they were leaving L.A.

Around the same time.

But anyway, here we are. Here we are, Miles. The thing that's trending is Snap. That was yesterday, okay? Right here, right now, we're talking about Snap or Snapchat, depending on how old and close to death you are.

For the living dead among us, it's, I guess, Snap now. It's not Snapchat.

But, yeah, you know, they've just unveiled a brand new pair of augmented reality glasses called Specs. And I'm like augmented reality glasses in this economy.

You sure about that? I mean, maybe that's why we need our reality to be augmented.

Is that what we're clamoring for right now? Or augmented reality glasses? Um, they are so bulky. Did you see the picture of them that I put in there?

Yeah.

They're so bulky.

They, they make the fucking, the glasses that the old man worn up look like fucking tiny hacker glasses.

Yeah.

These things are so conspicuous.

They're like half, the up old man glasses and half 3d, like the avatar 3d glasses. Remember when like avatar came out and it was like, Oh no, these aren't your grandpa's 3d glasses. These look like they have computers inside them because they're so bulky.

Um, and they're, and you can hear the cooling fan go off.

Basically.

They're so big.

I say everything's computers. It's amazing. Um, and, I guess the thing that I'm also curious. Cooling fan inside your glasses is really funny.

What do they even do?

Well, I'm sure they do. It's Terminator heads up display, right? That's the thing.

I'm looking at their website. The first panel they have are like all these different lenses you can use. One of them is just a fucking Harry Potter shit. Like you put them on and it's like the Elder Wand is in front of you and you like pick it up and like you just like move your hand around and do that.

Isn't this what we've been through this, I thought? That's very virtual reality coded. What was the Apple product that was going to change how.

The Vision Pro.

Vision Pro. Feels very Vision Pro coded. Well, that's the thing.

The Vision Pro had more computing power than this one. There was another fucking activity lens thing you can do, which is like you're playing basketball, quote unquote, but really there's like a... Remember the dip video? I put my hand up on your hip. And it was just like that weird digital animated thing.

Yes.

Or if you remember the Closet World commercials. The very second I saw that, I said, I want to take that motherfucker to school on the basketball court. That was my first thought.

He's never going left.

I know this guy never going left. Is that what you're playing? Something that looks like that on the basketball. Yeah. And you're just like, you put it on. And I guess it presupposes you are at a basket.

You have your own basketball court, not getting in the way of other people, just trying to play basketball with humans because you're wearing glasses. where a fake defender is in front of you who can in no way influence what's happening in the physical world right um with a scoreboard so again really fucking weird nonsense application another one was just doing like a really like god damn this seems.

Like real like 1980s version of vr right like it feels like they've gone all the way back to the beginning Well.

It's like, it's, it's these really early ideas.

Yeah. Yeah.

And it's just like, like, it's like.

When they were like doing like lawnmower man, like movies about virtual reality where it was like, and then you're like in this world and you're running around and it's like, well, yeah, but you're, you, you just have glasses on. So you're not really running around unless you're like putting an IV drip of some sort of hallucinatory drug in my vein. Like, I'm not going to feel like I'm running around or unless I'm on some weird, like treadmill that goes in all different directions but it feels like they're just like back there where they're like they haven't thought about the physics or.

Like I feel like you know right now it feel like there's a ton of these products like it felt like this with that weird AI assist Biden administration where people the vibes were still like only say fucked.

Yeah.

And now we're fully into a fucked up economy. People are becoming are so cynical. Consumer optimism is in the fucking toilet. And they're pushing out these things that are for like lifestyles that people don't really live right now. You know, like, I don't know, like with that AI assistant, it was like, well, you're a person with a fashion brand on the go that you have to keep track of.

Like the way they're even marketing, they're marketing it to people that are just not really real anymore. Or the kinds of like, it feels like, like nineties or aughts advertising. Like you got to show them the lifestyle they want to aspire to. And motherfuckers are trying to aspire to afford fucking groceries. So you're jumping way ahead. Like I'm a fucking dad. I'm a busy parent.

I work.

You couldn't fucking find one thing that would maybe appeal to like a very broad category of people.

But again, I think with something this high tech, they're aiming.

They're inside the bubble of Silicon Valley where everyone's like, God, I just love the fact that I can pop into any cafe and somebody's going to be coding, like vibe coding.

Yeah, exactly.

That means nothing to me outside of your world. They did a good thing though, right? I could see like this becoming a thing just because like Snap to me always feels like it's like the Gen Z slang of technology and that it's like intentionally... Difficult for older generations to understand and so like it has that barrier So I mean it the price point I'm assuming is going to prevent what I'm about to say But if it was something that like people were able to afford like I could see them just finding their own stupid use for it that is Is not what marketers had intended.

You can watch them on TV. I'm trying to figure out what, how much it costs.

Wi-Fi. Okay.

With that, do I need a prescription?

No.

Add to cart.

Oh, okay.

So they're $ 2, 400.

Oh yeah.

These are going to be on every.

Oh yeah.

That's going to slip back real nice. Fucking 24. What the fuck are you talking about? It's so frustrating, man.

Like people like there are so many goods being made for just a type of consumer that doesn't exist. And the other thing, too, is like I think with the marketing pretty genius and like the very cynical like marketing way where they're like, all right, man, how are we going to make these chunky fucking augmented reality glasses look cool? Oh, we hire Robert Downey Jr. to be in a totally inconsequential like role as honorary chief customer experience officer to be like hey man remember Tommy Starks dude.

That feels so out there like we've gone through a full life cycle where like the guy we thought was Tony Starks turned into Nazi you know yeah yeah yeah like that's We're well past that. If these had come out right on the heels of seeing Tony Stark interact with Jarvis for the first time, maybe people would be like, damn, son, where'd you get those? I feel like this is a little bit behind. It ain't even doing Jarvis shit, dude.

It's like everything's like, hey, man, you want to look like you're having a bad acid trip in a fucking coffee shop?

Yeah, that's the other thing.

Then holler at your boy over at specs, bro.

Shout out to Toby Stark. Can't seem to get past is that they make you look so fucking stupid. Yeah. Every, every iteration that they've done so far.

Um, and just like, why do you, why do you come up with devices that people can afford?

Yeah.

I mean, I think it's a reflection that like a lot of the people who are making this stuff, they are living a completely different sort of pace of life. where they're like i'm flush with cash from working in tech that like i have time to be like how could i optimize like my like matcha tea ceremony thing with like the prompts up in my glasses so i don't have to keep looking at my ceremonial book i got in kyoto on how to do it right it's just like a fucking different yeah so anyway um check out the toby stark's glasses um for 2400 dollars.

I'm sure they'll find a way to like tie it in with the gambling economy. Actually, I like that. That was something that I hadn't fully, uh, there's this article by this guy, Max reads that, uh, Max read. And I was going to say, yeah, You doing? Max Reeds. You going Uncle Jim on us right there? Max Reeds.

And the Times about how basically, like, the... How interwoven all, like, the gambling economy is with all culture now. Yeah, right. And it kind of, like... I knew that, like, Drake had that, like, stake... you know, tie in that he was doing. I didn't realize steak was like the entire foot, like reason for kick.

Yeah.

Like that steak is also how we have like clavicular and Aiden Ross.

And because of people running that are like, dude, the kind of culture I'm trying to promote that's in line with this, it won't, it can't happen on Twitch.

Right.

Like it keeps getting banned. So then they're like, well, then we'll make our own infrastructure.

Yeah.

Um, I mean, I think I should have known like hearing Australian people and English people like and abroad, especially as it related to sports were like, because when it was just hitting over here, like, wait till you see what happens, man. Like everything's going to be gambling. Every team's going to be sponsored by gambling. Every stadium is going to be everything's just going to be have this like haze of gambling over it.

Yeah.

I didn't really like, so true. Like casinos, lotteries, sports betting is a $ 643 billion global industry. That's just like the standard, like gambling bait, which is like twice all other forms of entertainment come out, like music, video games, film industry. So it's just like, yeah, once, once the NBA has had a taste of that, You know, like once every form, everything that like used to be, remember when the NBA playoffs were like brought to you by that's like some tie in with like Draymond green, like being in the car with the.

Bad boy scene with like Martin Lawrence, like turning around really bad editing.

They'll do that. But like that shit is nothing like peanuts compared to what they got now. Like it's going to be so hard to extricate any of these companies from, I think it's like, yeah, we're about to see election night brought to you by like these prediction markets.

And I mean, think about how many news organizations already like calcified too, and how much like they're even want to integrate that, like how CNN was doing about talking, like what the betting markets were saying about like geopolitics as if, I mean, yeah, maybe they, people are doing incentive trading. So maybe that's why you're looking at it, but really it's about getting more people to, you know, like normalize that kind of prediction market.

But he, he like talks about how like there, there's a new Nate silver book that like where he separates the world into the village and the river. And the village is like us idiots who don't talk about Bayesian economics. And like the river are people like him who like gamble and win and like use their wins to justify, uh, feeling completely superior to the rest of us and like this is basically located in silicon valley like this is how silicon valley freaks think about the world they are like the masters of the universe who take giant swings at big like paydays and with and with but like the ones who don't with then like it that's the thing it's like inevitable in a world built on like gambling,

there are going to be a handful of people who take big gambles and win just because of sheer luck. Because of probability. That's how probability works. And the people who take those big gambles and win and then are able to use those winnings to like tilt the board in their favor, like they've tricked themselves into And a lot of other people into believing that like, that means they are like a million times better than everyone instead of winning in a system that set up to make sure that one person is a million times more lucky than everyone. And now they've like remade the world to be a giant casino in which they and other wealthy people get to be the house now. So they can just keep hard codes, hard coding this like, winner take

all like casino model into the fabric of reality.

Um, I mean, I think we're seeing like the constant versions of that, you know, tech, you know, Silicon Valley and like the tech, right. insist that something is the future i'll say broadly tech right like with ai and people are kind of like following along but then.

Also crypto is just this too or.

Just even think like with ai right they're like no you're gonna love you're gonna love it and now more and more people like the majority of people like man it's kind of a fucking headache like when i'm using her practically at a company and so it's so they're there if they were wrong about that and neat like techno fascist right guys who have like pete hegseth's ear that were saying like and they were probably they were propping up this argument that like we need to have this live streamed execution like it's it's vital for our culture that we do this and again they ended up going walking into a fucking culture where people like what the fuck are you talking about dude.

No culture clash after culture clash between these psychos and the rest of.

The world yeah yeah And they fundamentally have a bad read on what Earth is or needs. And we're just going to constantly have these micro, or not even micro, these cultural fucking car wrecks where they're insisting something is the way to go when it's actually completely wrong.

And in some instances, they might be right.

But right now we have a lot of examples that are just kind of like, well, this is, this is why we're.

Getting more like, did, were they going to take bets on, like, I saw somebody do a, there's a really funny stream. I wish I had the guy's name in front of me who, where he was like doing a, he's like, this is coming to you from big bets.com. And, uh, I've got, you know, we, we've got odds that he's going to slump to the left after he's executed, like at 55%. And, um, I, uh, was like that seems bad but also inevitable inevitable like i wonder is that why they wanted it or did they just want it because there's something that appeals to them about there being this like encoded violence that everybody has to watch because.

They want like hyper masculinity to be like the fucking norm yeah they you know like and it also overlaps with two like like evangelical like Christian right too because they are also kind of on these same things like they're all like they're they want to fucking talk about like violence being the answer to this thing with like men at the top of the pile it's all just sort of like a cultural thing that they're like yes yes yes yes masculinity Number one, all of this is because everyone's.

Pussified or some shit.

And so anything that can sort of be like, Oh, if, if, if someone's like, Oh no, that's too much. That's then to them, that's the enemy. So, but it, it, live execution then they're like oh that's then we have to push back against that or people like we need to have empathy because like i think that's the first thing they see is people responding to their barbaric bullshit with like disgust yeah and they're like oh so that's the problem yeah so that's the thing that we have to push back on every fucking time.

Um let's take a quick break we'll come back we'll talk some midterms we'll be right back And we're back.

We're back.

Speaking of Nate Silver, he's taking a look at his Bayesian priors. He's updated the model, Miles.

I'm looking at my Richard Pryors.

And he has determined that the Democrats have a 75% chance of winning the Senate. And that means that that's true because he's part of the river.

And that means we have a 75% chance of Republican fuckery then. I think it's really what you have to look at those odds as being. Right now, oh man, the Republicans continue to be in disarray. They're in the process right now of excuse making and figure finger pointing as they brace themselves for a potential inversion of power on Capitol Hill. According to Politico, the White House is blaming candidates. I'm just going to read this from Politico. Quote, everyone is bracing for President Donald Trump's ire if the party loses big in November. House Republicans are planning to accuse the Senate side. Trump political aides have taken to directly calling campaigns they feel aren't performing well enough. National

GOP operatives are quietly furious at lackluster candidates who didn't do enough to prepare for a tough year despite early warnings. And some GOP candidates are pointing the finger back at their own party committees. None of this is actually talking about what the problem is.

Yeah, that there's some overall. Yeah, it's just it's like looking at individual people and being like, this guy sucks. There seems to be an overall trend here. I don't know what.

If you ever watch a show like Bar Rescue, you know, shout out to my political icon, John Taffer.

Yeah.

Or Hell's Kitchen.

Or even, or I was trying to kitchen nightmares or Tabitha's salon takeover where people go into struggling businesses. There's always like so many times you have a manager who has left the place a fucking mess and is blaming the fucking employees.

Yeah.

Why is it fucking worse?

Like, dude, cause you don't pay the fucking bills and we don't even have enough product to fucking run this place. And it's like the exact same thing. The manager, the owner is blaming the workers for the fucking the environment that he has created for them to work in. And none of them are actually saying the thing, which is this guy's like this line is so funny. National GOP operatives are quietly furious at lackluster candidates who did it.

Despite early warnings, we warned you.

You knew Trump was going to shit the bed, okay? You knew he was going to start a war.

What did you do about it, dude?

How did you prepare for that?

Oh, what do you want me to do? Say he's a fucking idiot? I mean, that's the only thing I can think of.

Oh, no, shut the fuck up, man. No, not that. Jesus.

Um, so yeah, they're spineless.

Um, and there's so many articles being written about this Russia deal and how they can't believe what Trump's done.

Then fucking impeach him. You idiots.

Right.

Stop fucking hiding behind this dumb shit. So that's the Republican side.

Yeah.

The, the Democrats must just be, uh, you know, seeing a path forward that there is a lot of energy behind the, you know, democratic socialists and just, you know, leftist policies and getting excited and just following that energy all the way to the bank. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

That you'd think, right?

Well, we got to check in with one of our favorite characters down in the bayou.

You might know him as Nales Nosferatu. We know him as James Carville. He doesn't want Democrats to take the House If it means DSA members Have a seat at the fucking table That's where he's at right now.

That's what he said He said he'd rather Republicans Yes, he was.

On Bill Kristol's podcast saying this.

Bill Kristol, again, like a never-Trump Republican.

So these guys are pretty much the same person.

You know what I mean? They're just so middle-of-the-road, you know, status quo people that they're like.

Now we are best friends.

So this is James Carville saying, he's going to say some stuff that doesn't make sense and we'll kind of harsh through it because there's one line he says about Pepto-Bismol, but I have no idea what he means by that.

It could be an old folksy colloquial thing. But here's James Colville.

However, I.

Would be disappointed if it comes in at two or 25 House seats.

For the Democrats.

That would almost be, I would.

Rather the Republicans keep the House by five than the Democrats win by five. Because if that happens, they're hostage to the DSA. Hakeem cannot move. There's no place for him to go. Even if you have a close Senate, Fetterman would keep Schumer Pepto-Bismol all night. So I think this is one of these races where.

Margin Fetterman would what?

Fetterman would Schumer the Pepto-Bismol all night.

Fetterman would Schumer the Pepto-Bismol all night. Place for him to go. If you had a.

Close Senate, Fetterman would keep Schumer Pepto-Bismol all night.

I think because Fetterman is basically a Republican, the stress of being the leader in the Senate.

He would keep Schumer drinking Pepto-Bismol all night. He would keep Pepto-Bismol all night with a side of Hydrox. isn't seen as relevant. And instead on some like Republican podcast with terrible lighting, looking like a fucking backlit, like he's in witness protection.

He's just such a fucking ghoul.

This guy, he has no, this is what this, I mean, this is truly what like, like white male privilege is at the highest level because completely obscured for James Carville, what the stakes are for anyone else. And also including his like class, but, He is looking through this narrow, old, white guy, neoliberal lens and looking at this moment as merely an exercise in maintaining the status quo and not allowing parts of the left wing to enter the Democratic Party politics.

They're going to get some big ideas. They're going to get some big ideas.

Completely not even seeing the stakes for the people that live in this country.

He doesn't even acknowledge that. His whole thing is like, oh, man, this election.

For him, the election is, I hope Hakeem Jeffries is able to still, you know, keep the Democratic Party going backwards.

That's where James Carville is at.

That's how he sees the stakes. We got to keep up all this momentum from Hakeem Jeffries. And it's also crazy, bro. Like, think about all the time. Oh, see, that's the problem. They got these left-wing radicals. They run a third party. And then they split to vote. And then the Democrats, they need to run.

They would fucking yell at people to the left of the Democrats that they should have been running as a Democrat to not split the vote.

Yeah. Vote blue no matter who. Unless it's you. Right now, it's vote blue. You know what? Let's just let the Republicans win. Because I don't want the blue to win. Somehow. Okay.

Okay, Nosferatu.

Go back in your fucking coffin and just shut the fuck up. I'm glad people don't really, like, listen to James Carville anymore. But just, like, it's just so funny when his noisy ass pops up and just going.

And, I mean, voting has begun in Texas, right?

Yeah, in many places. But, yeah, we talked about Ohio last week, Texas this week. Look at Buku. Buku votes out there in Texas.

A lot of people voting. A lot of early votes. So right now, I'm sorry, now I've become James Carville.

The early voting began in Texas and started off with a threat from the U.S.

Attorney down there. This is a U.S.

Attorney, Aaron Reitz. He posted a video on Monday when early voting began. Okay, he said, quote, if you violate federal election law, I will hunt you down and prosecute you. Election day is Tuesday, November 3rd. We'll see you out at the polls. This is from the U.S. attorney's office. Then he went on to fucking say, this is cool, Vine, too.

He said, it means no crooked local election administrators. They have a duty to prevent illegal voting, and I'm here to make sure they do their job.

Yeah, for sure, dude. For sure, for sure. Yeah, yeah.

No, you don't worry.

Don't worry.

Because if illegal voting isn't a fucking thing, you fucking idiot.

I will hunt you down and prosecute you. Election day is Tuesday, November 3rd. Is that him basically saying, like, don't vote early? I don't know what the fuck. Doesn't it feel like that when he says, if you violate federal election law, I will hunt you down and prosecute you. Election day is Tuesday, November 3rd. I think it was like, there was like....

Had to like just just shoehorn in the fascist threats out of nowhere. It was probably like, hi, I'm Aaron Reitz, the U.S. attorney of Texas, blah, blah, blah. Just wanted to remind you that elect the election day is November 3rd, whereas this was like, hi, I'm fucking Aaron Reitz.

You will fucking die if you fucking attempt to vote. You fuck with November 3rd.

Think at the end of the day all of this is for the purpose of setting the tone at every level whether that's from the government from conservative media to really have people be receptive to misinformation around the election results so if you have people already getting out ahead and being like don't you fucking dare then they'll be like.

Didn't we didn't we say don't you dare and then they dared so Yeah.

But why do we think they're scared? Because I feel like some of the numbers might indicate that it's looking bad for them.

It could be scary days.

Well, I mean, first of all, too, like on the generic ballot, Democrats are outperforming, I think, by almost 10 percent to Republicans. And now like the D triple C is like they're they're like licking their lips at districts that Trump won by 10 points in 2024. There's some gets in here. But with Texas specifically.

Right. They had massive.

Early voting turnout. And records are being broken all over the state.

Dallas in particular, I just want to point out, it said at 730 Central Time, this was Monday, Dallas County has recorded 75,834 votes, which is 232.6% of its 2022 midterm first day total. and 134% of its 2024 first day total, meaning that the voter turnout for the midterms on the first day of early voting is better than what it was in a presidential election.

That's insane. That's pretty fucking... I mean, that's like unprecedented, right?

I mean, midterms are pretty low turnout affairs. So to have this kind of turnout, I think, is the kind of thing that would make the elder at the White House be a little bit nervous, if he's even capable of that.

But he might have a plan anyway, so we don't know.

And Bayou Nosferatu. Everybody's nervous. Everyone's nervous out here. All right. Those are some of the things that are trending on this Tuesday, October 20th. We are back tomorrow with the whole last episode of the show. Until then, be kind to each other. Be kind to yourselves. Get your vaccines while you still can. Get your flu shots. Don't do nothing about white supremacy. And we will talk to you all tomorrow. Bye-bye. See you later. The Daily Zeitgeist is executive produced by Catherine Law. Co-produced by Victor Wright. Co-written by J.M. McNabb. And edited and engineered by Brian Jeffries.

Trending Makes Me Feel Good 10/20: Snap Specs, Gambling, Midterm Elections

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