Back to episode — Episode 970 Scott Adams - ObamaGate, COVID19 Fake News, Fake Polls and Fun
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the flu so you'll take it more seriously. So let's say that the new estimate is over 100,000 more deaths than the regular flu if you were to buy those projections. And I don't know that necessarily. What would you say? Oh, I changed my mind. I thought it was no worse than the flu when the information I was getting, which was flawed, was that the regular flu is 20 to 60,000. This one's gonna be ar…
← Previous segment →couldn't practice telehealth across state lines? Was there ever a reason for that? Was there ever a good reason doctors couldn't make a phone call across state lines? No, there was never a reason for that. So that rule just went away. Will it stay away? Don't know. I think there's a good chance of it.
But if it did, it could completely transform healthcare. You know, why would you go to a doctor if there's one right on your screen and you can just order your meds? Or you could go to Walmart and have the test that your doctor tells you to get. Yeah, just go to Walmart, tell them you need a 1-2-3 test. You go to Walmart, take a little blood, give it to your telehealth doctor.
I mean they're gigantic structural changes that are just going to sneak up on us. And it's because things changed and it opened up all these paths for entrepreneurs. So I think the golden age is guaranteed at this point. And that the coronavirus will be like its third act. It'll be the thing you had to get past for the good thing to happen.
Now I would argue similarly if you take World War II. Well, nobody would ask for a World War II in the same way nobody would ask for a coronavirus. It is true that World War II sort of rebooted civilizations and it did create all these new technologies that we built for mostly for military reasons. It gave us nuclear energy. I think it gave us radar, space technology, rockets.
So when you reboot civilization and you wipe away all your assumptions, and in the case of World War II you destroy half of your buildings, you can start over. And it almost always turns into an entrepreneurial surge because there's just new opportunities in chaos. So the golden age is coming for sure. 2021 is your start date for that.
Let me talk about all the bankruptcies. So we're seeing lots of airlines and other companies declaring bankruptcy. The first thing you need to know is that bankruptcy doesn't mean going out of business. It means that they're trying to get some relief from their creditors so they can maybe pay less or whatever and stay in business. So bankruptcy is a way to stay in business, not a way to go out of business. That's the first thing.
Secondly, there are a number of companies who are saying we're going out of business. So you'll see store owners saying all right, we're closed for good. What do they imagine? The coronavirus is over. The landlord has an empty shop and the person who's there is closed. They just walked away. What does the landlord do?
Well, if they're smart, they say the very best tenant I can have is the person who's already designed the space for exactly their business. So I don't have to put in a bunch of improvements and rip this stuff out to make it a different kind of thing. So I can rent it for someone else. The best bet for the landlord is say okay, I know you didn't pay me for three months and I know you can't pay me for another three months and you're still the best bet. Will you start up again?
So I think you're going to see that a lot of companies that think they were closed forever, because there were so many of them, end up being reopened. Here, let me say that clearly. If you are the only person who goes out of business and the rest of the economy is fine, you got a problem. You failed. When everybody else was doing fine, now you failed in your business. What does the landlord want to do? Get rid of you and get somebody in that business that can succeed so that they can pay the rent.
That's not this. This is massive failure that was nobody's fault. If you've got a potential tenant who was just part of a massive failure that was nobody's fault, that's your very best person to bring back as your next tenant. So I think you're gonna see a lot of businesses reopen. Nothing wrong with the business. It was just the situation. And as the situation normalizes, so too you would expect that at least the better businesses that should have stayed in business will revive. That's what I think.
Yeah, there are a lot of businesses that have never been busier. I tried to go to the bike store. My local bike store does bicycle repair and sale. Stores are open because they're actually transportation critical infrastructure. But you can't even get in a bike store in my town. You have to wait on the sidewalk and I waited so long I just gave up. So you can't even get in the bike store. So they're doing okay.
Will 2021 be the golden age if Trump loses? In a different way. I mean the entrepreneurs won't be affected by Trump losing so much. So probably entrepreneurially yes, politically no.
Why are dog parks closed? Well, I think same reason as, yeah, I keep seeing this. It always bothers me. You know, Fox News sometimes takes the easy-sounding political statement. So I saw last night that they were questioning why you could do some things but you couldn't play tennis. Do you not understand why you can't play tennis during a coronavirus thing? Is there anybody who is confused why tennis, where you're standing pretty far apart? Do you not understand why that would be bad? Because the whole point of tennis is you're continually touching the tennis ball that the other guy just had in his hand. That's like the whole game is holding a ball in your hand that the other guy just had in his hand.
You might as well make out with your tennis partner because I mean that's about as much exposure as you could possibly give to two people. You might as well just take your clothes off and snuggle if you're gonna play tennis. Because you're sweating, you're breathing on the ball and then you hand it to the other guy. It couldn't be a more perfect setting for spreading a virus.
Uh-huh. Yeah, well even if you wore gloves. Yeah, I suppose it might be able to help, I suppose. But still, you know, the virus would be flying off the ball and it's airborne, right? Every time you hit the ball, in theory every time you served and you hit the ball, the air droplets would come off the ball and into your face. So I don't think there's a glove solution.
So when I watch Fox News and they say these crazy rules that don't make any sense, why can you take a walk in the park or whatever but you can't play tennis? Well, there's a reason. There's a reason.
Here's the other one. You can walk on the be
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ach but you can't sit on the beach. And Fox News acts like they don't understand why that would be different. Let me explain it to you. If you're walking on the beach, you almost certainly are keeping social distance except for the person you're with who probably came from your house, right? If you sit on the beach, imagine a bunch of teenagers sitting on the beach. Are they going to socially dis…
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