Hi, I'm Frank Kudla.
And I'm Jaan Keppler.
And this is the Two Minds, One Journey podcast.
Your weekly stop to hear relatively ordinary people, ramble, rant, discuss everything from
arts and sciences to current affairs and politics.
We don't think of ourselves as controversial, I guess who doesn't.
But we do have opinions, not all of which will be warmly greeted universally and not
always that agree with each other.
That's the Two Minds.
We've been in a common journey now for over two decades.
It could be a need for self-validation or sheer hubris, but we thought we might have
something to say and share.
If we're lucky, something original will occasionally come through the mics.
And experience loses much of its value if it's not shared, so hang on.
That's good.
Before we go any further, I want to address the question, why, without any broadcasting
or podcasting experience, and no background in journalism would we try to launch a podcast?
Well, I'll be the first to admit, and I think Jen would agree, we've gotten out in front
of our skis on this one.
We felt that the middle needed a voice.
Today so much is extremely polarized with everything being black or white.
There are extremist shouting at the top of their lungs, while there's a massive quiet
majority in the center that sees shades of gray but lacks a voice.
Hopefully we can be that voice.
Okay, that's the noble reason we give for starting this adventure.
The truth is that the genesis of two minds, one journey, is a simple discussion, one evening,
about a week ago.
Jen still works while I'm retired.
At the end of the workday, Jen likes to sit and unwind before dinner, and I'm anxious
to talk to anyone that'll listen.
This is some politics are our primary topics.
This night the focus was on a certain controversial political figure.
We have differing points of view on this person, but in talking we realized we agreed on much
more than we disagreed.
Jen blurted out, we should have a podcast.
What I heard was, you can buy podcasting equipment.
I love tech gadgets.
Without much thought, I was on Amazon buying books and podcasting, then on the B&H app
buying microphones, headphones, adapters, and cables.
We were committed, or as Jen said, we should be committed.
I do have to let Jen know this.
I've been keeping it quiet most of the day, but I got a little bit enthusiastic.
It might have been irrational on my spending last night.
I put a deposit down on a time share in Gaza.
Oh my gosh.
Yes, yes.
So we're back fresh from a trip to Trader Joe's this morning.
Jen's idea was to go on Super Bowl Sunday.
It wouldn't be that busy.
It'd be the one day we'd actually be able to get a parking space.
We actually did.
We got a real Rockefeller right outside the front door.
The store was not particularly busy.
We loved Trader Joe's.
It was a good way to kick off the day.
Absolutely.
I don't know if you want to dive in real deep right away or not, but I was thinking we'd
talk a little bit about the topic that seems to be at the top of the news.
I watched the Sunday morning news shows this morning.
I was talking about the voluntary deferred resignation.
That's what it is.
It's a deferred resignation where you get eight months of pay if you stop working and
they offer it to most of the government employees.
And apparently about 65,000 people have taken it.
I wanted to ask Jen because she's still working.
If she had the opportunity to take such a deal, would she take a deal like that now?
Or would you take a deal like that?
No, I actually wouldn't because I want to work for longer than that.
So I mean, yeah, I would not accept that.
Yeah, well, my theory in this too is that it was a little bit hand-handed.
Jen has a different opinion.
Well, I should actually speak to Jen rather than just speaking to the audience.
But I feel that the good people are the ones that took it because they can easily get jobs
and they can double up on their salary for that eight months.
But I know you feel it differently.
Yeah, I do.
I mean, to me, it seems logically, I think if you were concerned that you would potentially
be losing your job through the process of the going through Doge and all that stuff,
that I definitely take the money and run, at least you get like eight months' worth
of severance.
So it seems to me it's people who probably feel like they're not going to be around for
the long term.
Yeah, yeah, I still think they should have offered it in a selective or meritorious way.
They should have offered it to the people that they wanted to get rid of and not necessarily
offered to the people that they should be keeping.
Just offering it to everybody across the board, you run the risk of losing the guy that knows
how to turn the lights on.
Well, yeah, I mean, and that's kind of my concern with the whole thing is just, it seems
like it's more of a numbers game.
Like how many people can you get to accept this versus you have departments that are
some are more productive than others, some are more mission critical than others, and
focusing that way.
So it's, yeah, it is rather haphazard.
Yeah, and I think everything else they're doing, they're kind of using a cleaver rather
than a scalpel and assessing things first.
Unless they did pre-assessments before he came into office, I don't think they would
have had access to all that information.
You wouldn't, yeah, I don't know, you wouldn't think so.
No, I think they're just, like you said, it's just a game of numbers.
They've said a percentage and said they're going to cut this much, and they're just cutting
this much, whatever, whatever.
And we'll find out how good or bad that is long term.
Yeah, I'm eager to find out whether one of our daughters works for the USDA started about,
oh gosh, about eight or nine months ago.
So she's a relatively new employee, and so far she's been safe.
Her department hasn't, she hasn't gotten the letter, but I'm a little bit worried about
the cutbacks.
I haven't heard them go after the USDA yet, but.
Well, at least she got in before they put the freeze on hiring, actually.
Yeah, I guess with the freeze on hiring, yes, she'd have no, she would have had no opportunity
to put her degree to use.
Yeah.
The other thing that bothers me is, it seems like everything is being labeled that they're
getting rid of, or what they're doing for the sake of, is that they're eliminating fraud.
And in some cases, sure, there can be fraud, and I'm sure there is, with different services
and stuff, but it just seems like everything is being identified as fraud, which would
be something that someone's doing intentionally, and not getting rid of redundancies, or cutting
out some of the fat that's in government.
And I think if it wasn't labeled as fraud so much, it would be maybe less upsetting for
some people, because it just seems like they're, you know, not necessarily doing something
wrong, there's just redundancies.
Well, I think one of the things by calling it fraud you can do is then you can point
a finger, because somebody did something wrong.
I could see there being fraud in Medicare, or some fraud in Social Security, I'm sure
there's a few people that do more than just bend the rules, but I don't think it's really
that widely spread.
I think there are things that we shouldn't spend money on that we do spend money on,
but that's not fraud.
That's just a bad legislative decisions.
Right.
And it's like this is making it more, you know, and good versus evil kind of thing.
So I think it makes the, maybe the folks going through it feel a little bit more virtuous,
because they're weeding out fraud, and that have been perpetrated on the American public
when that's not necessarily the case.
Yeah.
In all cases.
I think you're right.
I think fraud is being spread around.
They're painting with a very, very broad brush.
But we'll see how it turns out.
I don't totally disagree with the direction that they're going in and where they want
to get to.
I do believe there is a lot of fat in government.
I think when they get to the DOD, they'll find quite a bit, although I'm conflicted
about having Elon take a look at the DOD, because he's got billions of dollars of contracts
with them for SpaceX and his satellite program.
So I'm not sure if he's really the best watchdog to have.
His checks will get cut first, and then everybody else gets paid.
Yeah, right.
And everybody else will get let go.
Yeah.
So I have to screw with what we're going on.
I just have concerns about how they're doing it, because I just think it's being done really
heavy-handedly.
Right.
And very quickly.
And obviously, there was a lot of preparation before the inauguration and everything, especially,
you can tell by the executive orders, the amount.
And it just kind of feels like throwing a bunch of against the wall.
And they'll end up seeing what sticks are.
In some cases, it could be, I think you even mentioned this earlier, it could be subterfuge
that they're trying to look shiny over here doing certain things like USAID while a lot
of other stuff is happening.
So I have issues with the personalities, and I know you know that, and you don't necessarily.
And it's not that I disagree with all the policies either.
It just doesn't seem like there's a lot of oversight.
Yeah.
No, it's a little bit concerning.
Like I said, I've got to agree with the direction.
I just am concerned about the methodology that's going into it and how they're doing
it.
But I guess we'll just have to wait and see.
It looks like a lot of this is going to come down to the courts.
And it seems like the legislative branch, Congress, has been neutered.
They just, the report, has been brought.
That's a nice way of putting it.
Neuter, a nice way?
Yeah, it's a nice way of putting it.
Yeah, well, they've been, yeah.
That's what it really has happened.
And so the judicial branch is the only one that's really pro-riding guardrails for this.
And I know there's been a number of rulings at the lower court levels, mostly in liberal
districts.
I think that's where they filed most of these, the attorneys general filed most of the suits.
But things have been put on hold, which, until they review the information a little bit more
deeply.
Most of the stuff is going to end up in the hands of the Supreme Court, which of course
was stacked when Trump was the 45th president of the United States.
So I mean, it almost seems like it was a master plan to me to get the judiciary lined up first
time around and then second time around, push the gray areas of the law.
And I'm not a conspiracy theorist.
I was just, it's just one of those things that just came to me.
No, no, but I mean, that makes sense because it's the three branches are executive, legislative,
and judicial.
So yeah, legislative or a bunch of weenies and executive is going 100 miles an hour.
And then the judicial, I don't know.
But whatever happens, at least things are going to change.
And there are going to be things that get done.
And I'm sure a lot of them are going to be good.
Yeah, I think there are going to be some good things.
I think the declaration, or not the declaration, what is an executive order?
Getting males or biological males from participating in women's sports.
I think that was a good thing.
It seems like the NCAA has agreed with that and is taking steps.
And I mean, if there's some schools that still want to do that, that's fine.
They're just not going to get federal funding.
I think it's Title IX.
So I think that's a good one.
I was just wondering, with the number of executive orders that were written, who actually, or
was signed, who writes those things?
I mean, they can't just be one page.
I know he looks like he's signing just one page in the book.
But that can't be the entire executive order.
Well, you'd hope not.
I don't know.
He uses like a big crayon or a Sharpie to sign him.
So yeah, maybe it is more than one page.
But oh yeah, they clearly had a favorite.
Whatever.
Yeah, we're prepared for this and had them written up almost as if there was a game plan
book.
Yeah.
I wonder what that would have been.
Well, I do want to apologize for the sound.
We haven't gotten our studio set up correctly.
We'll invest a little bit more in some equipment if Jan permits it.
But we'll get better at the, well, the content might make it better.
I think Jan said that.
The content might not get better.
But the sound will get better.
So if you can put up with it the first time, hopefully it'll be more enjoyable the next
time.
Yeah.
So I think we've pissed enough people off for the day.
We'll be back next week.
I think we're going to be talking about AI.
We have to do a little bit of research on it.
That's obviously the other hot topic with deep search.
Was it deep search?
Not deep seek.
Deep seek.
Yeah.
Kind of upset the market.
So we could go, but we'll have some, we'll have some thoughts on that next week.
And in the meantime, have a great Valentine's Day.
And I hope your team won the Super Bowl.