The ConverSAYtion
The ConverSAYtion is simply a couple of middle aged men sharing company and conversation. Psych and K take their time sorting through so much to say about society, culture, relationships, education, finance, technology, health, and more. Inspired to find engaging ways to entertain and enrich the lives of their listeners is their primary pursuit. Join them as they invest themselves in providing value to their audience. Welcome to The ConverSAYtion.
The ConverSAYtion
Fraud, Glitches, and $25,000: California's Welfare Dilemma Explained
The delicate balance between compassion and accountability takes center stage as we sip Santo Fino tequila and dive into the complex world of welfare reform. Beginning with a nostalgic recollection of a 2013 incident in Louisiana, where an EBT system glitch removed spending limits and caused a shopping frenzy, we explore how even well-intentioned systems can create unexpected vulnerabilities.
California's proposed Senate Bill 560 becomes our focal point – legislation that would decriminalize welfare fraud under $25,000 when resulting from administrative errors. This triggers a fascinating examination of intent versus consequence in public policy. How do we protect those genuinely caught in system failures without inadvertently creating loopholes for exploitation? The $25,000 threshold raises eyebrows when we consider that most eligible families receive far less annually in benefits.
Drawing parallels to California's Proposition 47 experience, which reduced penalties for theft under $950 and later required partial reversal due to unintended consequences, we contemplate whether this welfare reform might follow a similar trajectory. The conversation balances statistical analysis with human stories, including a thoughtful exploration of trust and skepticism through a personal encounter on public transportation.
What emerges is a nuanced look at systemic problems that resist simple solutions. When does decriminalization become permission? Where should compassion end and accountability begin? Join us for this thought-provoking discussion that challenges assumptions about welfare systems, human nature, and the sometimes contradictory goals of public assistance programs.
You don't gotta do it if you don't want to. You don't gotta do it if you don't want to. You don't gotta do it if you don't want to. It's just a suggestion.
Speaker 2:Come on, here we are again. Let's do it. Our chalices are empty.
Speaker 3:I'll do this, you do that.
Speaker 2:Welcome back to the conversation. As always, I am Syke, and joining me is Letter K. We are about to embark on a new bottle. Please, please, K, tell us what that beautiful bottle is.
Speaker 3:So this is a Santofino tequila. It is a collaborative build between Guy Fieri and Sammy Hagar. Uh built between guy fieri and sammy hagar it is.
Speaker 2:It is bottled in guadalajara, jalisco. So I had this tequila in laughlin, nevada, at the harrah's. There guy has a restaurant there and all this tequila. I was eating at the bar and all this was last summer. All of that tequila was sitting out and I was like wait, wait a second. It just kind of struck me there's too many bottles of that tequila in here. It's like all right, caught the bartender. Is that guy's tequila? And she's like, yeah, yeah, it's like okay, yeah, I'm going to have to try that. Bring that over please.
Speaker 2:Sammy Hagar, most famous as a drummer for the Bears, and we have it in our wonderful ball aluminum cups yes, and Cabo Abo, retired from music.
Speaker 3:Ball aluminum cups yes, and Cabo Abo, you know, retired from live music.
Speaker 2:Oh, yes, and basically made it okay for everybody to go down to Mexico and start craft brewing tequila. Well, I mean, if you're living the life of a famous rock star, I'm sure they've indulged in a drink or two over time.
Speaker 3:I'm not saying it's bad, I'm just saying I'm jealous. Cheers, ooh, that's good, I like that. Yeah, I could drink that. It's got good flavor. Yeah, it does Mellow, no real burn on the back end. It's a Blanco, it's a white tequila, so you know. So it doesn't have a lot of character, but man for like a smooth, smooth sipping tequila, yeah, I could do it they have the respirato respado reposado, which means rested.
Speaker 3:a reposado is rested for a minimum of two months and then añejo, which is aged, is six months, to infinity or whatever, but usually a couple of years.
Speaker 2:Because añejo means year, right, it means aged.
Speaker 3:Oh, it means aged, yeah Año means year.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay, I'm okay, I'm confusing there's your letter.
Speaker 3:Case spanish lesson for today.
Speaker 2:Until the next time when we talk about the swear words so, uh guys, I'm looking at guys restaurant there laughlin harrah's I, I forget the name of it. It was a decent place, it's. It wasn't very full. When I was there it was pretty empty. The service was good. The food was good. It was your typical casino property restaurant real kind of deal.
Speaker 3:Yeah, when we were at the horseshoe in vegas he had one that was the same kind of deal. It was like a. It was billed as a collection of his favorite drivers' dine-ins and dives Like entrees. Okay, very expensive, this is it here.
Speaker 2:You're on it, you got it All right Right here. El Burro, el Burro, can you see it? El Borracho, el Burro, el Burro.
Speaker 3:Can you see it? El Borracho, oh, el Burro, borracho, the drunken donkey.
Speaker 2:There we go. Yeah, I guess that makes sense. Pretty good, authentic Mexican with a fide.
Speaker 3:So you pronounce Guy Fieri. That's how he says it.
Speaker 2:That's how he says it, that's how he says it yes, but how does that T get in there?
Speaker 3:As so he's.
Speaker 2:Fieri.
Speaker 3:He's soft he's soft hitting the R. Oh, yeah. Yeah, it's not a, he's accented. I don't know where he's from, but he's accented that R. All right, and I always pronounce last names how the person who says it pronounces it, for obvious reasons. Yes, because I've spent my whole life with my last name being mispronounced. I tell you I was just getting my tires on my car, okay.
Speaker 3:This hasn't happened to me in years. So they text me and tell me I'm done. I go back and I say, hey, you know, give them my birth name and the kid corrects me, he corrects you, and it used to happen when I was younger quite a bit. They would say my last name, you know, in the more traditional pronunciation, but yeah, yeah, it's like. So it's like I say my name and they get thinking do you mean? And they say my name wrong. I'm like just want my car At this point. Just pronounce it however, you want, kid.
Speaker 2:Whatever is going to get me the results I'm looking for. Yes, yeah, you'll be back there later and it'll be some different guy and a different pronunciation.
Speaker 3:It doesn't bother me At work. Everybody knows how to say my name correctly and purposely mispronounces it because it's funny to them. So at this point you just got to let it go.
Speaker 2:Okay, you ready for the first story of the day? Yes, let's start the topic. All right, so we're going to go in the Wayback Machine. You probably heard about this story. I'll play a quick little clip here. Let me give my volume up. I'm sure you must have heard about this, but if you haven't and this is a story that's going to lead us into a more current story and then I'm genuinely curious about your reactions.
Speaker 4:So let's see Shreveport Louisiana says shelves at local wall and it says Shreveport Louisianacom in Shreveport Louisiana says shelves at local Walmarts were cleared out. Saturday night Shoppers went on a buying spree after their digital food stamp cards showed no dollar limits. That's because of a glitch in the EBT system. It lasted a few hours when the cards worked again. People abandoned their overflowing carts.
Speaker 2:The Boston Globe says Americans are delaying retirement. There is just a real quick headline. Do you remember when that happened?
Speaker 3:I remember that happened because my wife works for the county welfare department, of course. When this happened, what was it? That was 2013. I was still in the grocery industry. I remember getting like they were emergency, calling every store being like don't take EBT cards.
Speaker 2:Oh, so it was not just here, it was nationwide.
Speaker 3:So maybe I'm thinking of two different instances, because this kind of stuff it happens once in a while, right, it just happens, it'll go down. It'll go down the right way Depends on the state because it's run by the state. So, yeah, it's a federal program that the state takes money for, but they're expected to operate it. So in California we have SNAP. Back in the day it was food stamps, but now it's called SNAP and, yes, they run the program. But in California it's equal parts federally and state tax funded.
Speaker 2:Okay, so this happened in Louisiana 2013. On October 12, 2013, a glitch in the electronic benefits transfer system managed by Xerox at the time removed spending limits on EBT cards. For several hours in Spring Hill and Mansfield, louisiana. This led to a shopping frenzy at Walmart stores, where shelves were cleared of food and other goods and some shoppers filled up to 10 carts. Walmart did not impose an emergency $50 limit per customer, as they could have, and was left to cover the significant financial loss.
Speaker 3:See, when it happened here I remember I'm not going to look it up, but when it happened here, those people they got dinged Like when it went back up yes, because it was recorded, you used your card. All it took was an audit back up yes, because it was recorded, you used your card. All it took was an audit Easy, interesting.
Speaker 2:We know what day it happened. We know what happened between this hour and this hour. Oh, your card was swiped this many times at this many stores and locations until, yes, that abuse.
Speaker 3:You got 115 pounds of crab legs.
Speaker 2:Now, I don't know. I did hear what you heard. As far as there was consequences to follow, I don't know. I didn't follow up. I didn't find out what those consequences were. Were they kicked out of the program? Did they have to repay things? What did that look like? I'd be curious to know what happened to those people, if anything at all.
Speaker 3:It's interesting. Obviously you're what happened to those people, if anything at all. It's interesting. But yeah, I mean, obviously you're looking for insights into just how people are just so selfishly out for themselves that they're willing to just throw a program like that under the bus for personal gain at the drop of hat.
Speaker 2:Sure, sure. Now we know that there are people who desperately need that program and they're suffering, right, they don't have enough, they're barely making ends meet. They maybe already used what they had had prior. Their card was zeroed out when that glitch hit and it was like, oh, okay, this is the middle of the month, right? So it stands to reason that some people already used up all of their family's allowance for that particular month and they're like, okay, this is a gift, right? And there were some. I'm sure that just went in there and got just what they needed, just what they could consume. I'm sure that just went in there and got just what they needed, just what they could consume. You know, they didn't just with just enough so it wouldn't go to waste, right, because you can only consume so much food, right, until it goes bad, unless you have, if you have, 10 carts worth of stuff, how do you preserve all of that over over?
Speaker 3:time and I didn't see really clearly the clips, but it didn't look like people were buying a bunch of frozen food.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, it it did not. And some people were, yeah. So you had an unlimited, unlimited amount of money to buy things that were that would fit the parameters of the ebt program at the time. You couldn't just go buy a flat screen television or or the the latest console or something like that, because that I mean that were the games that would have been if it was both the food and cash side.
Speaker 3:Could you imagine? Because this is just because they're separate, right? Yes, some people get just food benefits, some people get food and cash aid. Yes, and so if they had unlocked, I bet you somebody tried it. Yeah, let's go to Fry's and see if I can buy $35,000 entertainment home here, walmart, walmart, computer glitch.
Speaker 2:Let's check this one out.
Speaker 1:We're following a developing story tonight that may have impacted some of you, we tried to use a credit or debit card at walmart or sam's club. Today, some stores around the country, including right here in maryland, only accepted cash for several hours we called around and, sure enough, there was some sort of so that's not quite the same thing.
Speaker 2:I have heard all too often that the system glitches and then nobody can buy anything, which is the exact, usually when.
Speaker 3:So efts, uh, the electronic financial transaction system, they're all. It's all tied together. So if you have a store or a region or companies that were there where their eft stuff crashes, it's usually everybody if, if the, if, the, the debiting organization has the problem, then it's just the one thing okay yeah, so anyway I brought that up.
Speaker 2:I just I had remembered that happening years at waltz over a decade ago now, and it I did find it had happened since the numerous locations where people found out about it. It's kind of like when the gas station pump didn't punch in the number correctly or put in the decimal point first and all of a sudden your gas is 49 cents a gallon and then everyone finds out and goes. But more recent and more serious and something that could potentially affect us where we reside I don't know how closely you fall or follow our senate bills or state legislation at all a little, a little bit.
Speaker 3:but you know the big stuff because I mean I'm interested in major changes but we don't realize how many hundreds of bills get passed. You know just little things all the time, so I don't keep super big track of it.
Speaker 2:So currently Senate Bill 560, introduced by State Senator Lola Smallwood. Okay, I'm going to need your help with the Spanish here.
Speaker 3:No, I think we're going to try to find out exactly with the Spanish here. No, no, I think we're going to try to find out exactly Right there.
Speaker 2:Oh, cuevas, okay, yes, that In February 2025, proposed to decriminalize certain forms of welfare fraud in California. The bill would eliminate criminal penalties for welfare fraud involving amounts under $25,000, provided the overpayments resulted from administrative errors, such as issues with the statewide automated welfare system. It also seeks to remove criminal penalties for attempted welfare fraud less than $950. Instead of criminal prosecution, such cases would be handled administratively by local welfare agencies. The bill aims to prevent low-income individuals from facing felony charges for minor or unintentional errors, but critics argue it could weaken deterrence against fraud.
Speaker 3:So the amount is significant because that's the amount for felony right For stealing of misdemeanor Nine are you talking about the 950?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so the first number that jumped out at me was the $25,000. But that I guess the first time I heard this story, the person telling it didn't make that as clear. They kind of hung their hat on the wait. You can just commit fraud for up to $25,000 and there's no consequences. Here it's citing that it's only if those overpayments are a result in administrative errors such as like what we just saw happening in louisiana. Oh what what? Actually? No, I don't know if that would that qualify.
Speaker 3:Does that qualify as an overpayment as far as an administrative infrastructure administrative error, maybe I could see that. So network administration is a thing, so I could see that. So here's the problem I see right off the bat is that, yes, it's going to protect people who screw up, but you're talking about electronic transactions. That's really hard for the individual cardholder to do. So all we're really doing, in my opinion, is decriminalizing the people who understand it enough to try and game the system.
Speaker 3:You know, I don't know if we're getting into things like card spoofing, because card spoofing has always been a notorious problem with the low encryption levels on EBT cards. If we're getting into people who are finding ways to do the paper versions, if that's still a thing. I haven't been in groceries in 10 years, but when people's cards were just damaged and they wouldn't slide, or if the system was down, we had actual paper checks that would fill out all the information and then it would just be run later, things like that. So this is what they're talking about finding the system. It's finding the loopholes that are intended to help people have a legitimate problem exploiting them for personal gain.
Speaker 2:And the system. It fails from time to time it does. It's imperfect. I mean, I was just out to dinner last night. I had a $100 gift card and I was attempting to use it for dinner and that thing didn't even work. For our server who tried to apply it to the bill, it didn't. And it was strange. There was $100 on it and she tried to charge the $100, which I asked her to do to zero it out, and she said it didn't work. So she tried $90, and that didn't work. And then she tried $80, and that worked. And then the total leftover available on the card was $4 after that. So I was like what happened to the $16? Like what happened to the 16 dollars? It was so odd. But yes, I mean that just is an example of this. This system that we have in place that we ideally would like to have, function 100 of the time and then and then it doesn't. So it all comes down to intent, right?
Speaker 3:it's all intent, 100%. What I do for a living is I set up things that help people to mitigate the kinds of accidents that we're talking about here administrative errors, but the nefarious intent. If you have nefarious intent, it's too hard to stay one step ahead of the people who are always trying to gain the system because they know more about it than you, because they're figuring it out faster. This law here seems to me like we are advantaging the people who are trying to cheat the system.
Speaker 2:So I pulled up the actual bill. I'll start here, paragraph three. The bill would delete the provisions that establishes criminal penalties for an attempt to commit welfare fraud. The bill would delete criminal penalties for welfare fraud when the total amount of aid obtained or retained is above or below $950 and instead make welfare fraud when aid was obtained or retained in the total amount of $25,000 or more punishable by specified imprisonment in county jail. Okay, the bill would require a county human services agency to determine whether benefits were authorized as a result of an error in the statewide automated welfare system, cal saws, and prohibit the agency from referring a case for criminal action if benefits were authorized in error.
Speaker 3:Okay, so you're safe if you spent money that you weren't actually awarded because of an administrative error. I mean, I can understand that because you know. Think about it like this you get $600 a month in food stamps, right yeah, and then suddenly you get, you know, eight hundred and twenty dollars from one month. You're not really thinking about it in terms of, oh, I better stop and make sure this is accurate, because, because those benefits, they fluctuate based on a lot of factors.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 3:So, yeah, I could see a person just being like, okay, this is what I have, great, you know, food for the family.
Speaker 2:But that person should never be held criminally responsible, in my mind, yes, and I guess it could happen to my wife and I We've got two kids and we reside in the state of california, and I think the state of california has very little trust in our ability to raise, feed and take care of our children, and so occasionally they will even send us money, yeah, which I have no idea how we qualify for. I don't know how that works. I remember the first time they sent us cards oh, they were. It was during the pandemic, yeah, and it was something ridiculous like almost $800 per child in the form of a card. It's like. So like what? Was that an administrative error? Were we not deleted from a list? Were we not entitled to that? Should we not have received that at all, because the subsequent cards that came out, it was something like $100.
Speaker 3:No, those first payouts, those were emergency service payouts and they weren't trying to take the time to figure out brass tacks for individual families. They were just sending money to everybody.
Speaker 2:You get a card, and you get a card, and you get a card exactly and feed your kid and feed your kid and feed your kid.
Speaker 3:And as more time passed on they were able to spend the time necessary to kind of even that out. But yeah, those those first payments, everybody got the same amount. You know you didn't need 800, but this family over here, probably particular pink, that was just. I mean, we're talking about the kind of emergency that at the time must have been an administrative mountain and they were just like, well, we'll just Come on, these people are dying here, let's just send everybody money. We'll figure it out later. We'll have Uncle Sam print some more. That's just what happened.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but yeah, everybody who had kids got money.
Speaker 2:So here it only applies Basically your get out of jail free card occurs if it's an error and it's $25,000. So here it says more. So I thought that was a cap.
Speaker 3:I think the thing I read before misled me. I think it starts at $25,000.
Speaker 2:Yes, because it says $25,000 or more.
Speaker 3:The line that triggers it is the $950,000 above or below. Yes, now they're saying felony theft charges don't apply to welfare fraud unless it's in excess of $25,000. Yes, now they're saying. They're saying felony theft charges don't apply to welfare fraud unless it's an excess of $25,000. And I don't know how much money you would be getting before the state welfare system realizes that you are getting way too much. Because I mean $25,000 over a period, how long? I mean how much. How much money are people getting?
Speaker 2:I mean $25,000 over a period. How much money are people getting? Well, let's say you're a single parent with six kids, right? I mean, I don't know what that would be, I mean I'm just throwing out a random number. But let's say you are charged to care for a large number of children and you have no financial support from any other parent or guardian and you, you're living alone with all of them and you're trying to sustain them. Would two thousand dollars a month be reasonable? Like, let's say, let's say your housing was subsidized and you're on, you're on, you're on section eight and okay. Okay, so let's say it jumped to $2,500 because of an administrative error, but that puts you above the $25,000 here. That's interesting and I think a large portion of people would probably be grateful. Right, oh, I'm getting more than I did. Is this an adjustment for inflation? Is this an adjustment because, oh, tariffs and everything cost more, or whatever is happening in the economy? And thank you, and I accept. And let's apply this to the family and make things happen.
Speaker 3:So eligibility for CalFresh also considers income limits. For a two-person household, the gross monthly income limit is $3,288. Is that what I was asking?
Speaker 2:That's a household limit. Yeah, so you have to make less than that.
Speaker 3:So you have to make less as a two-person household. So, like it was a mother and a child, she would have to make less than you know what 38 000 a year, uh, which I don't know what you're gonna do with that in california, um. So, yeah, they need assistance. Uh, the califresh benefit for a two-person household maxes at $5.36 per month.
Speaker 2:Okay. So, it's not much. That's not much.
Speaker 3:No no.
Speaker 2:But that's for food.
Speaker 3:Yes, yeah.
Speaker 2:CalFresh is food.
Speaker 3:This is what we're talking about. The welfare system is so massive, you can't really get down into it. It's just food. This is what we're talking about. Yeah, the welfare system is so massive you can't really get down into it. I can't imagine. Okay, so for a seven-person household, basically a mother and six children, as of the benefit period starting October 1st 2024.
Speaker 2:It could be a father and six children. I'm just speaking from the traditional. Yeah, I'm just presenting the other side. Would a single father do that? How many single fathers do that, I'm not sure.
Speaker 3:Well, I would say the extenuating circumstances would be a lower percentage for reasons Maybe the mother passed or something like that. Assuming no countable income and full eligibility, they're looking at getting $1,536 a month in CalFresh benefits for six kids, so $25,000 as a trigger point.
Speaker 2:Wow, I mean, I guess that's reasonable.
Speaker 3:No, it's not reasonable. You're talking about hey, google, what's 12 times 1,500?
Speaker 2:12 times 1,500 is 18,000.
Speaker 3:In a year you're not even getting $25,000. So I mean, I think that the I think so we've built this system right. We built this system and now we're putting this new law into place that has such a high limit that, in my mind, the state system should be noticing this anyway so they built in a margin of error that is well beyond what should be acceptable I mean, I mean, how, how much can we take this for? I mean six kids? Do I put in 12 kids and see how much money you get then?
Speaker 2:because so. So who is this law for? Is it, is it meant to protect the people that are in need that something happened when the system went down, or is this law meant to protect the people that are being grossly negligent when it comes to ensuring that the people that need what they need receive what they need without having any sort of errors occur?
Speaker 3:I think that the law was authentically meant to protect, you know, poor, poor, low-income people who who may inadvertently make a mistake and having something like this um come at them would be, would affect their lives, just just for no real reason. But the way that it's written I can see where the critics are against it. The way that it's written is telling me that it's going to inadvertently overly protect people who are gaming the system, cause I mean, if you're talking about 25 grand, if I figure out how to cheat the system to get underneath that dude, I'm talking about over $2,000 a month that I can just get away with it, no repercussions.
Speaker 2:So I asked Rock what the pros and cons are when it comes to this bill, and it spits out this Pros Reduces criminalization for administrative errors. Aligns welfare fraud penalties with other white-collar crimes. Okay, that's interesting. Administrative resolution. Saves resources. Protects families from harsh consequences. Addresses systematic issues in welfare Cons. Welfare cons potential to weaken fraud deterrence that would yeah top of the list. Uh risk of increased fraud. Well, there you go. I mean one after the other. Uh shifts, shifts oversight to federal authorities, oversight to federal authorities.
Speaker 4:Oh, okay, because of the dollar amount.
Speaker 2:Yeah, financial impact on taxpayers. Lessons from past decriminalization oh, okay. So California Proposition 47 in 2014, which reduced penalties for theft under 950, led to increased shoplifting and required partial reversal via Proposition 36 in 2024.
Speaker 3:At the time we realized that people were playing the prices right and figuring out how to fill their baskets with just under $950 and stuff. And nowadays, or more recently, the same thing was happening in the whole retail theft ring stuff that was really big in LA and San Francisco and stuff they were finding that people they send huge groups in and everyone steals $949.99 worth of stuff. They were finding that people, you know, they send huge groups in and everyone steals $949.99 worth of stuff.
Speaker 2:This guy is watching. It's happening in New York too, this guy his name was Cash.
Speaker 3:So, while you're doing that, I have an answer for you about the 2013 incident in Louisiana. Yeah, go ahead. The Department of Child and Family Services, DCFS, reviewed approximately 12,000 transactions and identified about 500 cases, deemed the most egregious, involving attempts to spend a combined $315,000 without sufficient funds. So less than 500 cases $315,000. As of February 2014, six individuals were disqualified from SNAP. So all of this went on. Six people had their food stamps taken away.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're not taking that seriously, are we no?
Speaker 3:no. But it also continues to say they work with law enforcement agencies, including the secret attorney, to to facilitate potential criminal investigations. But again, of course, six people. Then it doesn't say that they were actually sent to prison, they were just. They just had their food sent yanked. And it also points out that retailers who possess transactions without verifying available balances were held financially responsible. So Walmart had to pay that back.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, which I guess Walmart probably used that to benefit that news. Hey, walmart cares, walmart could have capped you at $50. Walmart didn't. The US government got it. Cares, walmart could have capped you at $50. Walmart didn't, the US government got it wrong. Walmart will step in. Walmart's got your back. It's probably going to breed future generations of Walmart shoppers.
Speaker 3:Walmart is spoiling their kids.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, I don't know what to say about it. What's this?
Speaker 3:Monopoly money, just buy it.
Speaker 2:I was curious when I first heard about this and I didn't delve into it as deeply as we are now, but I was thinking more along the lines of, if we're going to say, hey, you know what, fraud up to this limit, it's okay, what's preventing? What would then prevent people from attempting to? All right, I'm gonna steal your identity, I'm gonna get a hold of your information on the dark web or otherwise, or I'm gonna pay for it, or I'm just gonna type in numbers in a sequence until, oh, that one hits, oh, we got this guy and all right, I get $950. That's it. And then move on to the next, and then the next person, and then the next person, and I'll put a little bit of the money that I save or whatever, and turn into this enterprise where I can get more numbers and steal more benefits from other unassuming people who just don't know that these benefits are being used without their consent or that they are potentially losing future benefits that they could have had because somebody else has already used them.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so I mean, credit card companies are leaps and bounds ahead of Xerox in 2013 as far as protecting their customers. Did you make some money off of Xerox in 2013 as far as as far as?
Speaker 2:protecting their. Did you make some money off of xerox?
Speaker 3:no, I didn't do xerox. Okay, I did enos, which I still have. Which is it? Which is an aristocrat stock. They're a paper company. Okay, I like, you know, I do like enos, um, anyway, the uh, I think that that the stuff, that the that the local and federal are doing doesn't have a lot of those things in place and this bill may actually prompt change and advancements in that Maybe they'll partner with, like Visa or AMX or American Express, you know. But yeah, I don't think that you're seeing those kinds of problems. Somebody dings my card and tries to buy and tries to feel it out by spending $1.30 in Florida. It gets flagged immediately, you know. But it's not the case with these SNAP benefit cards. I don't think. I don't think it's quite as intuitive or secure.
Speaker 2:So this will be interesting because if this bill passes, it will be a blanket up and down the state, as opposed to some of the other states in larger metropolitan areas who have their own government and leadership and they decide okay, we're going to do this within the confines of our city limits. We know where the cities reside and things can kind of Things are unexpected after that.
Speaker 3:They don't get the same this seems to me like the whole defund, the police thing, where years go by and we're stepping back and we're putting police back on the streets. Not quite as crazy as that, but it's going to be one of those things where they're going to do it for the right reasons, it's going to fail and you're going to have all these problems with uh, with with theft and maluse and they're going to have to scale it back yes, I agree with that.
Speaker 2:sometimes the best, the best course of action is the wrong course of action, because then it all comes to a crumbling halt and then you're well, that was a bad idea, wasn't it? And let's try something else. Yeah, they're all going to be saying yes, exactly.
Speaker 2:But I, I, I, so I I hope if and when this passes. I don't, I'm kind of torn now with what I Just learned and know, but I immediately I'm against. But some of the arguments for I guess I can understand a little bit. I think the limit that they said once, that is, that threshold is crossed, then the federal government has to step in. That's almost like well, we messed it up and hey, take over right. Like, uh, we don't, we absolve ourselves of any wrongdoing we're just kids.
Speaker 2:We can't be trusted. We're just one state, the state of california. We're just children. You've got so many. You got 49 other children.
Speaker 3:Go monitor them and and Uncle Sam is like no, you just recently promoted to the fourth largest GDP on the planet. You're a grown state, You're a big boy state now. But no, yeah, I agree with you. That's not how it goes. We're going to fuck around and find out until we screw up too bad. And then it's like how come the federal government isn't fixing this?
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:But the states I learned recently have to balance federally. We are required to balance the budgets. States yes, we have to.
Speaker 3:The books have to balance every year, all the time they have an emergency yeah, we had an emergency and we just get federal funds to kind of help out, shore it up, help out For fires I think that emergencies are one thing, but I think we also get a federal grant every year for maintaining the forces properly. I know that Trump's first tenure as president, he when they had the big fires that destroyed Paradise, california, he was like we're going to pull all of California's federal aid for this kind of stuff because they screwed up. Not the right answer. But yeah, we're always getting money to do that. I'll try with this.
Speaker 2:I will as well. I accept. So, whatever happens, whether I do agree with it or disagree with it, I just hope whoever's in charge makes it work. I just want it to work right. I want us to be better for it, regardless of whatever my preconceived notions about this. I silly idea. I think this. I think this.
Speaker 3:Maybe it's not so silly yeah, I think that this falls under the whole best laid plans of mice and men quotient. I think that we'd I mean, after doing this, I think that you and I did more research with chat gbt than the people wrote the bill did about the possible repercussions. I mean, it's politics.
Speaker 2:I'm using grok now, it's pretty much exclusively because I want to balance. I want to balance out what we have, and you know what? Because you have trained chat GPT to dislike you and to throw me curveballs and try to put me off my game. You know, I think. I think it might be tainted waters and I might have to.
Speaker 3:Look at what my, because it labels your session yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we don't put it up there real quick. Yeah, just show the people.
Speaker 3:So this is what ChatGPT has labeled my session. The tab right there Psych prank ideas so good.
Speaker 2:So, good, it's gold. You've done a good job. Yeah, I would really just like more honesty, like if people were just honest, if people just told the truth, hi, okay. So I was out in downtown Modesto and I took my class. We went to go. It's called Grubhub. I'm surprised they haven't been sent a cease and desist letter.
Speaker 3:When you mentioned it, I thought you were talking about their headquarters. I know.
Speaker 2:I'm surprised they're allowed to exist with that name. It's basically a food truck, a meetup, it's like one of those movable food truck mall yeah yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:So we went on the way back. We, we got one of our, one of my favorite drivers, and he has the patience of compare. So I've been watching body cam videos lately on youtube and the patience of some of these officers dealing with inebriated people, absolute saints and the you know, your, your typical. I don't necessarily agree with this pejorative karen out there. They, they are going above and beyond to try to keep people out of trouble, at least the videos I've watched. I know there's ones that are quite the opposite and brutality and people getting hurt and cops losing their cool. I get that, but the ones I've I've been watching recently show the other side. You're on the wrong side of the YouTubes.
Speaker 2:So I'm watching this driver deal with just one person after the other, who's just a bunch of nonsense. They can't pay, they don't have enough money and can you just take me here? One guy gets on and he's like, hey, man, I got nothing but 20s, I got nothing but 20s, and it only takes exact change on the bus, yeah, and it's like what? We're at the transit center. So he took a bus to get there. So it's like well, how did you get here? You just got off that bus and the guy was like I just showed him I only got 20s. I told so you rode for free and now you want to ride for free Because you're too baller.
Speaker 2:He's like I need to go to the store. And the driver's like, yeah, you need to go to the store. You need to go to the store and you need to buy something or break it and come back. And he's like where are you going? He's like, well, I'm going. He mentioned his kidneys, he needed dialysis or this, and that it's already starting to sound a little fishy. Yes, so the guy was like okay, are you gonna ride? He's like, yeah, he's like get on, didn't charge him, didn't charge, we're going, we're going, we're going. The guy pulls for the stop to request his stop. He gets off guy gets off me and the driver I, I'm, I'm standing, I like to stand, I don't want to sit on whatever or whoever, whatever spilled through up on the seats, I don't sit not, so you can wash all your students because you're afraid of people's bodily fluids yes, it also gives me that advantage as well.
Speaker 2:And then I also make friends with and try to be courteous and cordial. Not all the drivers appreciate my students.
Speaker 3:On their buses.
Speaker 2:And so I really try to ingratiate myself with them. So I'm having a conversation with this driver who we've taken. He's taken us numerous places all around, so we just drop off that guy and he's like, hey, he said he needed to go to a place for his kidneys. I don't think there's any place like that around here. I think the guy just just giving me a story, of course, come on. I was like, okay, let me help this guy out. So I, I, I don't know either.
Speaker 2:So I get on my phone Google maps, there we Don't throw away from, that stop is in fact a place that, yes, and now I'm a dick, and so so I let the guy know and I was like, hey, I just want you know, yes, this stop right over here. I gave him the name of the place and you can go there and have dialysis done, and whether that guy did or not, or whether that guy was, just like, you know he had a loved one who passed because they drank too much or this or that, and or you know the kidneys failed for whatever reason and he had to go there and visit and just knew about it and, just like, told the sad story. I don't know, but at the very least I mean that it tracks enough.
Speaker 3:The circumstantial evidence might be such that they would do it. The court of public opinion might exonerate them yes.
Speaker 2:So I'm glad I shared that. I'm glad I took the time to just take my phone out of my pocket, look it up and see if it was or it wasn't. I didn't tell him I was doing that because if I found it, I don't know what. I have told him like yeah, there's no place around here. But I, after sharing that with him, he did feel better about that and I do like and I shared this with the, the motor coach operator at the time I told him I do like to think that people are being honest and truthful 100 of the time. Yeah, but I know they're not. I know they're not. That's pretty good. I know they're not, that's pretty good.
