Matt (00:01.397)
Hey everybody and welcome back to the Latter Day Lens. I'm your host Matt, with me as always is Sean and nobody else this week Sean, it's me you and the sky so blue.

Shawn (00:13.014)
that's good. It's because I've got a bone to pick with you and I want all the attention and I want all the focus. Yeah, got a bone to pick with you.

Matt (00:20.947)
Okay good, this is good. First I need to know though Sean, is the sky so blue where you're at?

Shawn (00:25.634)
You know, in San Diego, it was always so blue. And then they once a year go, it's going to rain. Everyone beware. Almost like it's an earthquake or something. And it is definitely raining and life shuts down for a little bit. That's really hard. I know it's hard. You don't understand how hard.

Matt (00:32.619)
Ha

Matt (00:38.209)
Wow, I'm sorry, Sean. I have blue skies. I have blue skies for the first time in a month, so I have the opposite sensation. It's been cloudy and windy and chilly. Like we would call it chilly. When we went running yesterday, it was 42 degrees with like 16 mile an hour winds, so that was good weather. Oftentimes it's like 20 degrees. So.

Shawn (00:45.934)
What's it been there?

Shawn (00:52.878)
so...

Shawn (01:01.806)
Jeez. Wow.

Matt (01:07.713)
40 would call it chili. You guys would probably call that cold, huh?

Shawn (01:10.648)
Well, but you're not in a constant threat of an earthquake like we are, so, you know, there's pros and cons.

Matt (01:14.057)
Yeah, that's right. That's right, Sean. We're close to the Yellowstone caldera. So we're in constant threat of a volcano that's gonna destroy everything. Yeah, Mm-hmm, that's real.

Shawn (01:25.154)
Really? Is it real? Okay, okay. Well, this isn't a competition, Matt. We're not trying to one up each other, but I didn't know that.

Matt (01:31.681)
Hahaha

Hey, we had a listener write in. I actually think, I'm like more around 50 % sure it was Mark that wrote in, but a listener wrote in and said, I love Mark. You need to have him more often. He is always right about everything he says.

Shawn (01:48.718)
You're only 50 % sure that that was Mark?

Matt (01:51.263)
I mean, it's, it sounds like Mark, it sounds like the kind of thing he would write in, but I don't want to accuse like maybe he's got, you know, he told us he was doing some dating. So maybe there's somebody he's dating that started listening and she was like, I really like this guy. And she wanted to let us know.

Shawn (01:53.71)
That's true.

Shawn (02:03.374)
Yeah, and if it was an independent listener, we don't wanna, you know, silent their voice. So we'll just assume that it wasn't Mark, and we're gonna give that voice to, you we're gonna give credit to that voice. So we also love Mark.

Matt (02:10.219)
Yeah. Yeah.

Matt (02:16.971)
Somebody, yeah. Yes, we do. I don't think he's always right about everything he says, I do. Mark is kind of coming into his own. I met him as a professor, but that would be more than 10 years ago. But there's always this sort of like deference that people kind of show me that makes me feel uncomfortable. But Mark has clearly abandoned all deference to me and he feels free to say whatever he thinks.

Do you really have a bone to pick with me, Sean?

Shawn (02:49.644)
Yeah, I do because you're lately you're all over the world. You're all over the internet. You're all over YouTube. You're all over news. What was the news article you were in?

Matt (02:55.649)
you

Matt (03:02.465)
I was in two of them in the Deseret News last week, yeah.

Shawn (03:05.486)
to and then your speech on stage with an apostle about the AI conference and I didn't get invited any of it. Like I'm not in the audience, I didn't get to like guest speak on some of the news articles. Like I thought we were a team here and I feel sad.

Matt (03:10.073)
yeah.

Matt (03:14.059)
Yeah.

Matt (03:25.057)
Sean, I am so sorry for not including you in all of that. I'm gonna try to in the future. Do you know what, I actually, feel bad I didn't talk about the Mission Stories podcast. I should have, it wasn't even on my mind with Elder Gong, but I should have let him know.

Shawn (03:38.126)
You're talking about on all of the media you've done, you feel bad you didn't talk. mean, too little too late, but you know, thanks for at least admitting you didn't talk about it like you should have as your central message on all of it.

Matt (03:48.521)
Yeah.

Matt (03:54.431)
Yeah, I really should have.

Well, I mean, like when you're just chatting with, I should have like, when I was just chatting with Elder Gong said, hey, have you heard of the Mission Stories podcast? I know you're not allowed to promote things, but like you really should have a listen and just give me some feedback, what you think.

Shawn (04:12.706)
next time, next time you do that. We had this kid who just got back from Angola talk and how, dude, Matt, it was so exciting. He's talking about how he's opening up new provinces and he's sneaking on buses to go open up new areas. Does that sound familiar, Matt Miles in Mariupol, Ukraine? And there were so many similarities to what you and I experienced in Ukraine.

Matt (04:32.541)
Yeah, yeah.

Shawn (04:39.296)
And it was just so exciting. He's like, dude, we were baptizing 200 people a month and there's, you know, we'd go into these villages and at first they would like stare at us like, what are these people? Like it was so brand new bringing the gospel into these new areas. He said in one area, this police chief would give them like hassle them. And eventually they just kind of built a rapport with him. And eventually the guy got baptized and like eventually his entire neighborhood got baptized. Like really, really fun, exciting stuff. So yeah, yeah, go listeners.

Matt (05:04.373)
Wow.

That's really cool.

Shawn (05:08.034)
Go listen to Mission Stories, because there's some really cool stuff on.

Matt (05:11.017)
I have a son on a mission right now who has a story. I don't know if you'd want to share it on your podcast, but he went on exchanges with his district leader, because you know, he's a new missionary and sometimes you need to get trained by your district leader. And it was a rainy day. And so they went to the church building and the district leader took a nap for most of the day. And then they went back to the apartments where his companions were with the district leader's trainee and they were playing Dungeons and Dragons. I wonder if that's the kind of story. I wonder if that's the kind of story.

Shawn (05:28.436)
Shawn (05:37.079)
WHAT THE HECK THI-

Matt (05:40.853)
You're like for the mission stories podcast. That'd be kind of fun. Like.

Shawn (05:43.8)
mean, every now and then, I like to be a little judgmental and get my fists up or my hands out. And I like to slap people in the face for some of those stories. So yeah, yeah, that's fine. We could show. Are you serious? That's what he's going through?

Matt (05:47.913)
haha

Matt (05:57.985)
man, and that's just like the most recent of many stories. Yeah, his, his, well, I'm not going to, I shouldn't share all of the dirty laundry of my son's mission, but his, his stories wouldn't be the kind of positive stories you would want to promote on your podcast, I think.

Shawn (06:12.27)
But you know what? guess sometimes that's really good for people, right? Like, I mean, there were times on our missions, right? Right? Do remember when I got sent to Harkov, the city of Harkov? And I don't know why they were just kind of goofing off there. And our mission president was like, Sean, go, I'll give you authority to do whatever you want there. Go clean house. Go make them feel bad. And I'm telling you, Matt, I was the only one working, it seemed like. And they didn't like me. They didn't like me at all. And I had to like, what does the scripture say? Kick against the pricks. That's right. They were pricks. That's right. That's right.

Matt (06:19.489)
Mm-hmm.

Matt (06:33.376)
Yeah.

Matt (06:39.541)
Yeah.

Shawn (06:42.734)
and had to kick him. But, but, but, do you think that's what the scripture means? But I had to, but I'm really grateful for those experiences that I was the only one fighting against everybody and they didn't like me because it, it, strengthens your resolve. So hopefully your son's getting that kind of a, okay, I gotta make choices here.

Matt (06:43.211)
That's hilarious.

Matt (07:01.089)
I mean, it's tough for him because he's a junior companion, right? This is only his second companionship. But he did have an interview with the mission president and the mission president's like, you know, I feel like you were called to this mission to kind of help set an example and things like that. And so I do think it's good for young missionaries to sort of feel empowered sometimes. And sometimes they need to have a conversation with their mission president who can empower them a little bit. But yeah.

Shawn (07:15.052)
nice

Shawn (07:24.462)
There it is, there's the mission stories story. Well done, that's perfect.

Matt (07:28.255)
Hey, I turned it around. Well, let's get into the topic of this podcast. Sean, our listeners are probably anxious to know what the thought provoker topics are this week.

Shawn (07:36.974)
Yes.

Matt (07:38.989)
All right, we're gonna start with the, the Republican party looks like it's in trouble to me. Not only did they lose big in the election that happened a couple of weeks ago, but many of the people who supported Trump in the last election now disapprove of what he's doing. So the economist does these weekly polls, they do them state by state, they look at all the various demographic groups. The only group where their approval rating of Trump today matches where it did on election day

is uneducated, less than college educated white males. They're about the same today as they were on election day. Every other demographic group has declined in their approval of Trump. And there are only a handful of states in which more people approve of Trump than disapprove of him. Utah and Idaho are on the short list of states where more people approve than disapprove.

Shawn (08:30.222)
So did you just cluster together Utah, Idaho and uneducated white males? Is that what you just did?

Matt (08:37.779)
No, no, no, no. No, I'm just like, I'm just reporting the demographics, right? No, because clearly Utah and Idaho isn't less than college educated white males. Like there's a highly educated population in both of those states and plenty of women. But for whatever reason, those are two, there's only like five states like Kansas, I think Alabama. There's only like five states where overall in the state, more people approve of Trump than disapprove. So this is the question.

Shawn (08:53.518)
sorry.

Matt (09:05.961)
Is this because Trump is doing things that are good for members of our church? And it's like members of our church love Trump because he's being good to us, or is there something else going on?

Shawn (09:15.95)
Before I give you my opinion, can I ask you for some clarity on the premise? When you have like some midterm elections or the, it was mostly just governor. It was all governor elections, right? Now, do typically, since I've got my political scientists on here, typically do those reflect what will happen in other elections, right? Just the fact that it's mostly Democrats that became governors.

Matt (09:19.574)
Yeah, yeah.

Shawn (09:45.272)
Does that have any bearing on like the, is that like good indications of what happens in other national elections in Congress, elections, all that.

Matt (09:54.517)
Well, okay, so I'll get a little technical. What typically happens is in a presidential election year, you have about 60 % voter turnout. People get really excited to turn out and vote in a presidential election. And then in a midterm election, when there's not a presidential race, you typically get voter turnout in like the 30%. So when you're trying to figure out, if you're an elected official and you're trying to figure out what's gonna happen in the next election, you can look at polls, because polls will tell you

what the population thinks, but you also have to look at turnout, like who's coming out to vote, because when we see polls that suggest somebody's gonna win and then somebody else loses or somebody else wins or they win by more than what you thought, it's because the turnout is different than what you would normally expect the turnout to be. So in these elections that just happened in North Carolina, no, in New Jersey, Virginia,

and then the New York mayoral race, there's a couple of things you look at to try to like predict what's going on with the electorate, the people that vote in the United States. So the first thing is New York. The New York mayoral race had higher voter turnout than has been in a mayoral race in like 30 years. that tells you that...

Shawn (11:13.568)
Was it at the levels of a presidential election? Was it at 60 %?

Matt (11:17.365)
It was higher than 60%. Yeah, it was huge in New York. So that tells you, something going on in New York, like Democrats in New York are super excited to vote. But the other thing you can look at is you can look at at the precinct level and you can say, in this particular precinct, what percentage of them voted for Donald Trump last time and what percentage of them voted for the Democrat socialist candidate this time. And in New York, what you can see is,

Shawn (11:19.118)
Mmm. Mmm.

Matt (11:47.381)
The counties that voted for Donald Trump in the last election, the precincts that voted for Donald Trump in the last election, mostly voted for, not Mamdani, for Cuomo. So what you can say in the New York mayoral race is that mayor did a lot to excite Democrats in highly democratic areas, which got huge voter turnout and led to a huge victory for him.

Shawn (11:58.606)
Come on.

Shawn (12:14.51)
okay.

Matt (12:15.391)
but he didn't appeal to anybody across the aisle. But what you can say in New Jersey and in Virginia is you can do the same thing and you can say, okay, in each of these precincts, what happened to the people where they voted for Trump last time? What does that electorate look like this time? And what happened in each of those states is like a precinct that was plus 4 % for Donald Trump.

Shawn (12:18.457)
Okay, gotcha. He just got it.

Matt (12:43.361)
went Democrat this time. So, so what's happening to members of Congress right now is they're like, okay, so basically what this means is if I won my last election, if I'm a Republican and I won my last election by 7%, then it's going to be close for me. It's going to be within 3 % this time around. If everything's like those counties were right, or those precincts were. So that's, that's kind of what people do is like, you really don't know who's going to vote.

So when you see an election, you say, okay, it's not about did the Democrat win or did the Democrat lose as much as it's about, I can look precinct by precinct and see what the voters did. So a year ago, they voted for Trump. This year, they voted for Democrats in the close ones. If it was a huge victory, it didn't change that much, but it's about 4%.

Shawn (13:26.424)
Hmm. That's

Those are the key insights you wanna take. Okay, so in that case, you've looked at all those and you're concluding that yes, is problem for Republicans because a lot of those local elections did kind of sway Democrats, is that correct?

Matt (13:49.057)
Yeah, there was a 4 % swing for Democrats in the last election. And the other thing that you can tell from survey data is that Latinos are not happy with Trump, right? Latinos that might've voted for him in 2024, they're not happy with him right now. as...

Shawn (14:06.582)
And that's, and we could get into that and why we think that is, but that's not your question. Your question is why did you don't, know, state, are they saying in strong supporting Trump? Yeah.

Matt (14:13.569)
Yeah, yeah, as the whole. Yeah, because in 2016, Utah stood out as a state where they were largely Republican, but they didn't like Trump very much. But now it seems like as the country is moving away from Trump, Utah and Idaho are sticking with them. And I just wonder like, why is that?

Shawn (14:33.806)
So I've only got like I tried I tried to find some latter-day lens here I tried to find any any good information all I've done is come up with four disconnected Ideas, I don't know man. I don't know why that would be for I'll just shoot it shoot him out I don't know. Maybe Utah's were affected more by the Charlie Kirk situation Maybe because it was in their backyard. Maybe it's because we're sensitive to assassinations our prophet Joseph Smith was assassinated

Matt (14:56.359)
Yeah.

Shawn (15:02.54)
Maybe they're like, you know what? The left is really gone overboard here. So I don't know. We need to be anti-left. That's a bad idea. I don't, I don't.

Matt (15:09.939)
I like, well, I would, it would be like rally around the flag, right? It would feel like it would be like they're attacking us. That makes us like our site more. Not that we hate them, right? But.

Shawn (15:18.63)
And just, but Utah, and it has nothing to with Idaho, but Utahns are smarter than that. They know that just because it happened in Utah doesn't mean that that, I don't know. So that's probably not a very good, yeah.

Matt (15:28.907)
Well, pause on that real fast, Shon, because I'm hearing from my students like crazy, crazy conspiracy theories about Charlie Kirk. And I think a lot of my college students don't know where to get accurate information, but these are the things that I've heard them say. So one, I sense that there's this big split between the Candace Owens and the Tucker Carlson crowd about who's to blame for the Charlie Kirk shooting. So there's a lot of like, was Israel involved and sort of stuff. Then.

Shawn (15:56.696)
Stupid.

Matt (15:57.471)
The other thing I was told is that there's a lot of people that believe that JD Vance and Charlie Kirk's widow are having an affair and they're like in love with each other. Yeah, so what I'm saying is like that, when you say, they should know better, I'm saying like college students who are majoring in political science, who actually they're pretty well-informed, really don't know what to make of all of this Charlie Kirk stuff because of the information that's out there. I would say misinformation.

Shawn (16:21.1)
Gosh, dude.

Okay, that's weird. mean, that goes to my second maybe idea. I tried to find data about what kind of media sources are most Utahns and Idahons, Idahoans listening to. So maybe the second idea would be it's really just the media they're consuming, right? They're only hearing the Fox News reporting on what's going on in the world. So they're getting a skewed idea and they're like, no, no, Trump's doing great. Everything's wonderful.

I don't know, is that possibly it? It can't be it, right? There's probably, there's gotta be a good mix of media that most Utahns and Idaho people are listening to.

Matt (16:55.637)
Hmm, it's possible. It's possible.

Matt (17:04.029)
No, no, no, Well, so then what you're saying, both of those things that you're saying would say it's not religion that's making them like Trump.

Shawn (17:13.198)
Well, those are two things and definitely would have nothing to do with the religion. Absolutely not. I mean, the other, like kind of mixed with those two, my third idea was maybe because, so Trump is not conservative at all, not even close, but he is very anti-left, right? And he, he, his marketing campaign is basically look how extreme the Biden administration, even the Obama administration were. They took our country down the path of, you know,

Matt (17:26.219)
No.

Matt (17:30.71)
Yeah?

Shawn (17:41.75)
really liberalization and here are the six or seven things that have really gone wrong. And in marketing, he's like, I'm just going to rant and rail against that, but he's not conservative, but maybe because the Utahans and Idaho, how do I say Idaho, Idahoans? Okay. Maybe Utahans and Idahoans are like, okay, he's not conservative, but he is more anti-left and we're more conservative. So we're to go for him. And he's so basically he's not the other guy. He's better than the other guy. And right now look at New York.

Matt (17:55.209)
Idahoans?

Shawn (18:10.178)
The other guy is really extreme left. Is that maybe what it is?

Matt (18:12.627)
Mm-hmm. I have a different take. I don't think it's that. I think it's that if you look at like what people are upset about, if you say, okay, what was the message that these people campaigned on? Both the socialist in New York and the more moderate Democrats in Virginia and New Jersey, all of them campaigned on like pocketbook issues where they're like, the economy's not getting better, things are more expensive.

Shawn (18:17.198)
Okay. Okay.

Matt (18:41.577)
Life is tough and Donald Trump doesn't care. And do you know where that doesn't matter as much? Utah and Idaho, because they both have really strong economies. They're, okay. I think that's what it is. I think that if you're in Utah and Idaho and things are tight, you can get a home equity loan, because you have a lot of equity in your home. Or the equity in your home makes you have some wealth, right? You could sell your home and move to something cheaper and a.

Shawn (18:43.118)
Costa Living, Oh, okay.

Shawn (18:49.774)
That was my fourth one, Matt! That was my fourth idea! Ah, wow.

Matt (19:10.369)
I just think people in Utah and Idaho aren't hurting as much and the economy is really good. It's easy to find a job in Utah and Idaho.

Shawn (19:17.29)
you get the points because you confirmed my fourth idea. You did on the first one.

Matt (19:22.547)
Okay. Well, listen, well, listeners would love to hear what you say. I, I don't think there's a religion thing. I think you agree Sean. There's not a religion. Yeah, I don't think so.

Shawn (19:31.822)
There's no way. There's no way someone could justify... I mean, guess I shouldn't... Yeah, okay.

Matt (19:36.671)
Well, I mean, our listeners could. We have a lot of listeners that could justify the stuff Trump. Yeah, sure. I do think that there's still a group of people out there that believe that Trump was like, I hate to say ordained of God, call. No, no, but seriously, Sean, when he gets shot at and doesn't die, there's a group of people that are like, this was divine intervention so that he could lead us at this time. And unless you have

Shawn (19:42.402)
the religious. Okay.

Shawn (19:52.662)
Knock it off. No way.

Matt (20:05.333)
a strong compelling reason to say, well, maybe not, then why would you change your mind from that position? Yeah.

Shawn (20:11.586)
I see, I see based on the assassination attempt. Okay, well that goes back to my first one. If Utahns religiously or historically are, or members of the church are super-uber sensitive to assassinations, our prophet was assassinated, then okay, then that would make sense. Okay, then I take the points back because I am my first option. Yes, okay.

Matt (20:26.241)
Okay, so okay. All right. I'll give you the points for that, Sean. I like that one. Okay, next up. I put a link to this graphic that shows the history of the debt of the federal government. So if you look at

Shawn (20:43.276)
I mean, you did it. Yeah, you wanted this. You chose some sexy topics this this episode.

Matt (20:52.188)
I'm so excited about it. Sean's like, oh please, why do have to talk about this stuff? But I think this is something you're passionate about, So over the last 200 years, the debt, the federal debt has grown from almost zero. In 1835, there was zero federal debt. Now it's $37.6 trillion.

Shawn (20:54.592)
Good.

Dead.

Okay, we'll try.

Matt (21:16.673)
Do know what the whole US GDP is? If you like add up everything in the entire US economy that's produced, but maybe it's like 40 trillion. Like we owe as much as a country as we produce in the entire country. Yeah.

Shawn (21:23.534)
What is it?

my gosh.

Shawn (21:30.83)
Every year. That's pretty sick. That's insane.

Matt (21:34.689)
After World War II, the debt grew a lot, but because the economy grew so fast, we paid it off after World War II. But in the last 25 years, especially 2008 and 2020 financial crises, the debt has grown crazy. And we're expected to add another $1.8 trillion in just interest payment debt by 2035. So I think...

I think our budget is $8 trillion we spend in the federal government. So this puts a major strain on the country's budget. The fact that we're paying over a trillion dollars, almost $2 trillion in just interest payments. So last week we talked about personal debt. My question for you, Sean, is it just as immoral for governments to spend money they do not have as it is for people? Ronald Reagan said this, by the way, in Ronald Reagan's first inaugural address.

Shawn (22:23.842)
Ha ha!

Matt (22:30.335)
He said, a family can put itself into financial trouble by spending money it does not have. Why should we think the government is any different? So that's the, Ronald Reagan said that. So that's my question. Should we think? Yeah.

Shawn (22:40.53)
did Ronald Reagan say that, huh? So that's fiscal conservatism, right? Is that the heart of fiscal conservatism? That's what a Republican used to think. is that right? Yeah.

Matt (22:51.403)
Yeah, yeah, that's right. But is he right about that? That just like a family will get in trouble by spending beyond their means, a government could do the same.

Shawn (23:01.622)
Okay, I've anticipated what your answer is because to me the obvious answer is and the way you've set it up is to lead me to say, of course man, look at the principles of the gospel and let's apply that to our nation. But I'm pretty sure that you would be like, no, there's deeper schools of thought in academia. Yeah, you smiling, I know it, I know it, right, right?

Matt (23:19.945)
It's not academia. Yeah, there's a different way of thinking about it. Yeah.

Shawn (23:23.246)
I know. So I had to do that research. So, but you're to have to explain it to me, man, because there's some economic schools that argue that the government's goal is not to balance the budget. The goal is to balance the economy and debt is a instrument to do that. And if it is there, and because unlike a, an individual or a family where there will be a day of reckoning, right? There's, there's eventually for an individual, a day of reckoning where I do have to settle up. I have to pay what I owe or it's trouble.

Matt (23:27.732)
Okay.

Shawn (23:51.734)
or as problems, or if I die, that debt gets handed down or whatever. Whereas in a government, there's no end. There's no end. There is no day of reckoning or responsible end I have to shoot towards. Therefore, there's no reason to ever balance that budget. I've heard those schools of thoughts. Am I on the right track or no?

Matt (23:56.245)
Yeah.

Matt (24:08.927)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Here's the way I would explain the school of thought as it pertains to government. I'll use my friend who's a business owner as an example. So I had a friend, he was a civil engineer and in the 2008 financial crisis, he got laid off and he decided that instead of trying to find another job as a civil engineer, he was gonna start flipping homes, but he didn't have any money to flip homes. So he goes to his dad who had a line of credit and he's like, dad,

If you give me money from your line of credit, I'm gonna buy these homes in foreclosure for cash, I'm gonna fix them up, I'm gonna sell them, and then whatever profit I get, I'll give you 50 % of what I get." And he's like, I think I should get 70 % of the profit. He's like, okay, fine, whatever. I have no other option. So his dad's getting 70 % of the profits. And all his dad is doing is fronting the cash and my friend's doing all the work. After a while, he's like,

Shawn (25:05.134)
What you change your attitude when you said that? Change your attitude a little bit. Okay, go ahead.

Matt (25:06.293)
Don't you think I've been doing a pretty good?

After a while he's like, don't you think I've done a pretty good job? Can we maybe switch this up to where it's like 50-50 or maybe I get to make a little bit more? So then they changed the percentage. And then eventually he said to his dad, you know what dad, I don't really need your money anymore. I'll take it if you want. But what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna give you 8 % interest. Any money you give me, I'll just pay you 8 % interest and you'll just get that regular 8 % interest from me.

and I'll get cash, either use my own cash or other people's cash. And his dad's like, look, 8%. He wasn't getting money from his home equity line of credit anymore, right? He had his cash. He's like, I'll give you my retirement at 8%. I trusted that you'll pay me back 8 % and I can't get that anywhere else that's as safe. And then, so then he started taking that 8 % and then all of his friends and family are like, hey, can we give you our money too for that 8 %? And so that's how he finances his business, right? So on the one hand you say, well,

debt, but on the other hand, if you can turn that debt into like wealth, then it's good for everybody involved. And you wouldn't say, this guy's now he might overextend himself, right? If he takes on too much debt relative to his assets and he's not managing it well, then he could get in trouble, but it's not the debt itself. That's the problem. It's how the debt is managed and whether the debt is used for good purposes that matters more. Right?

Shawn (26:32.696)
Are you, that's what you're saying the government does?

Matt (26:34.953)
So in the United States government, what we used to have before the 1970s is we used to have gold stored in a safe and for every dollar we had, we had gold to back that up. But in the 1970s, we said, we don't need, our reputation as the US government is so good, we don't need to have gold to back up our currency anymore. We're gonna have the full faith and credit of the United States government back up our currency. And so,

We basically then become like any other consumer that's out there who's trying to borrow money from people. And then whether or not they wanna buy our debt is completely dependent on what they think of us as a country and whether or not we're gonna pay back that debt. And you the other beautiful thing we can do? We get to print our own money. So if we have too much, like if we don't have enough money, we don't have to borrow money anymore. We can just print more money. And the only problem with printing more money,

is if people say, there's too many of these dollars out there, they're not worth that much. But again, the value of the dollar isn't necessarily how many of them have been printed, but how much people want them. So it's a totally different situation than an individual family trying to make their, trying to pay their bills and trying to make ends meet. Because individual families can't just print their own money as much as they want, and then tell people, hey, trust us, our money's good. And as long as people want those dollars, then they'll be just fine.

Shawn (27:58.9)
All of this is your explanation of economics in the United States and how governments treat and own and operate money and you're saying this is all to prove that no that government shouldn't be held at the same standards as individuals and Therefore Matt what the amount of debt that the United States occur? Incurs is okay. It's not no problem

Matt (28:19.199)
It's not how much debt we have, it's how much people trust us to pay back the debt that we take on. And so that's why.

Shawn (28:26.126)
So you think we're on the right track? You think our government is doing a good job with it and it's okay to incur this much debt?

Matt (28:30.913)
Well, that's why in 2008, in that financial crisis, that's why we had so much more debt build up because we had to prove to the world our banking system will not crash. You can trust the financial institutions of the United States. And European Union, who said, we're gonna be really, really strict and austere and we're gonna teach those banks a lesson and we're gonna let them fail so they know never to do that again, the Euro crashed as a currency.

So the fact that we're willing to print money and prop up our financial institutions is actually what keeps us financially strong, even though it means we have a lot more debt.

Shawn (29:09.592)
Wow. Wow. And there's no end in sight because there's no day of reckoning for a government.

Matt (29:19.425)
The day of reckoning comes if ever the people of the world decide that they don't want dollars anymore. So the day of reckoning for us comes when people decide they like cryptocurrency better than US currency.

Shawn (29:32.674)
Yeah, so that's obviously a discussion out there. So why shouldn't that affect your answer then to this question of, yeah, it's wrong for the government to be doing this because potentially, eventually, the US government loses control as the dollar being the world's, you know.

Matt (29:54.325)
Yeah, it's a risk we face, but the people who want crypto, it's not really because they trust crypto more than they trust the US government. It's because crypto's unregulated and you can't track it and you can't put sanctions on it. So it's all the bad actors of the world that want crypto. So what I would say to people, my take on this, and it's not the question, my take on this is if you're really worried about what happens in the world and the good of the world, don't spend your time worried about the

Shawn (30:01.644)
Yeah, that's right. That's right. That's right.

Yeah, that's right.

That's right.

Matt (30:22.623)
the debt that the government has, stop buying crypto, stop supporting the alternative financial system that's both gonna hurt the United States in the end and lead to greater immorality and criminal behavior in the world.

Shawn (30:26.094)
Hahaha!

Shawn (30:35.822)
Interesting, okay good, that's a latter day lens we can land on in this one. Points to you. You're gonna get people mad.

Matt (30:39.723)
That's my take on it. Stop buying crypto just because you think you're gonna make money off of it.

Shawn (30:45.07)
You're going to get people mad. listeners are going to say like a lot of people love crypto.

Matt (30:49.747)
I know they do because they're making so much money on crypto. But what you do when you put money in crypto is you say, well, I don't trust the US government. I'm happy to let that financial system crash. And then guess what's gonna happen to you when the dollar crashes and the US government crashes. You'll have a bunch of crypto and you can hang out with all the thugs of the world that have all their crypto money.

Did you ever see the TV show Ozark, Sean?

Shawn (31:16.08)
Yeah, I did, but I didn't get through it.

Matt (31:18.229)
Yeah, but it all starts out with them trying to launder money, right? And why is he trying to launder money? Why do you have to take all of that cash and launder it into a bank somehow? Because we have financial regulations to stop drug dealing and human trafficking and all that stuff. So now I don't have to clean the money in a bank instead of doing money laundering. I just go to some ATM and buy crypto and just dump a bunch of cash in a machine and buy crypto.

Shawn (31:21.997)
Yeah.

Matt (31:46.143)
That facilitates criminal activity around the world. So we should stop doing that.

Shawn (31:49.55)
So the moral of story is that all of you listeners, any of you who own crypto, you are a criminal. Yep, you're criminal. And stop it. No, they are because they're claiming.

Matt (31:56.769)
Not a criminal. I'm not saying they're supporting an institution that facilitates criminal behavior. I own zero crypto. Instead of buying crypto, I bought some Monsanto stock and I just watched it die and die and die. But I feel good about myself. I feel happy inside like I'm doing good things for the world.

Shawn (32:06.409)
you just sound like a boomer. You're just an old man.

Shawn (32:20.386)
Ha ha!

Shawn (32:24.27)
Yeah, you're not supporting the criminals here. It's just a dummy.

Matt (32:27.809)
We're actually paying. We're actually paying out like lawsuit money to people that we've harmed because we're doing the right thing.

Okay, Sean, this one, it's a similar topic to ones we've talked about in the past, but I wanna know, it's a little bit different take on it. Okay, so there's two stories that came out in the last month. One of them is that Rick Perry, who was the governor of Texas, and he was the energy secretary in the first Trump administration. And then there's Elon Musk, who he was part of Doge, but he was also a consultant on some defense projects. Now each of those are trying to get

government contracts. So in the case of Elon Musk, he just secured a $2 billion Pentagon satellite deal for the Golden Dome project. And Secretary Perry and his son founded a firm called Fermi, and they hold shares worth hundreds of millions of dollars. And there's gonna be a project that they showed to the current energy secretary called the President Donald J. Trump Advanced Energy and Intelligence Campus. And they're set to get

hundreds of millions of dollars for this project. So the question I have is this, does the fast and successful move by these companies due to political connections and the former officials influence that they have, does it help the country because obviously these people have expertise or does it hurt the country by promoting unfair and wasteful spending?

Shawn (33:59.064)
mean, on the one hand, you explain Trump and all of his cronies and his friends who are profiting of all of this. On the one hand, don't you kind of like Matt that they're so arrogant that they're not even bothering to try and hide it? Like, don't you think that the secret combinations that take place, these guys are too arrogant to do that. It's like, okay, we're just out loud gonna just show that we're just rewarding each other and giving each other contracts, right? I mean, on the one hand, it's good that it's out in the open.

Matt (34:10.465)
You

Matt (34:19.636)
Yeah.

Matt (34:24.745)
Yeah, that's true.

Shawn (34:28.211)
They don't even care.

Matt (34:29.417)
Like I'm not, I'm not equating the behavior to this, but it's like in Helaman where they would like have these secret trials and put the profits like sentence the profits to death and whatever. And they weren't even trying to hide it anymore. Right. It was just out in the open. were just blatantly openly showing everybody the way they were.

Shawn (34:40.76)
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, don't, wouldn't the other have that than, to have all these secret combinations going on that we don't even know about and all this underworld of corruption in our government.

Matt (34:53.855)
Okay, but do you think that what they're doing is wasteful or do think it's helpful?

Shawn (34:57.75)
Okay, so to the question, I think there's one factor to determine here. Are the people that are getting awarded the contracts, whether they're buddies or there's a connection or not, do they have merit? Are they good at what they do? That's the biggest question to me. Like if you look at Elon Musk, the man has merit. The man has done incredible things for the world. He's an inventor. He's a very smart business person.

Matt (35:10.325)
Hmm.

Matt (35:13.953)
Yeah.

Shawn (35:23.98)
He knows how to make things happen and he does things very, very well, better than most people. So if there's merit, then I think you can judge it on that. If there's not merit, right? Like when you look at Jared Kushner or whatever the name is of the son-in-law of Donald Trump, Kushner, you first look at that guy and just go, okay, it's nepotism. Like that guy's getting his placement because he's the son of the, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Matt (35:37.705)
Yeah, Kushner. Yeah.

Shawn (35:47.404)
And then other people are like, well, wait a minute, look what he did in Israel with Hamas. Look at the peace negotiation that he implemented. That was him. He gets credit. So our people, don't know if I agree with that, but people would say he has merit. So to me, it's all about merit.

Matt (35:47.444)
Yeah.

Matt (35:58.721)
Mmm.

But do know how we usually determine merit in a capitalist system? Through competition. There's a competitive process, right? Where you put out a bid and someone else puts out a bid and everyone puts out a bid and then a nonpartisan group decides.

Shawn (36:14.178)
Matt, that's not, hang on, hang on. You can't talk, you're talking two-faced here. You're talking about the government. The government doesn't ever behave, never does behave in a capitalist principled way. No, they do not. Are you kidding me, man? I have viewed and been a part of many government contracts. There's no capitalism involved, not at all. And it goes back to, it goes back to,

Matt (36:26.165)
Sure they do.

Matt (36:33.493)
And...

Shawn (36:39.884)
Our buddy Milton Friedman. love Milton Friedman. Why do you always bring up Milton Friedman? You think he is the coolest guy.

Matt (36:41.281)
I actually do. I really like Milton Friedman. do like him.

Shawn (36:48.49)
Okay, good. we can, we can together.

Matt (36:50.187)
There's just a quote of his that you use that I don't like. When I'm spending someone else's money, I'm the most wasteful.

Shawn (36:53.73)
The money, the use of money.

Yes sir, but that's the truth and that's what I was about to bring up. Yeah, the government goes, okay, we've got to hire someone to do X. And when anyone, I don't care if it's government or if it's your brother or you, when you use someone else's money and your job is to, like an award, right? When you're spending other people's money on other people, you're way looser with it. You're way less concerned about it because there's no accountability.

And so in this situation, government is always operating in that sense. Whenever I view contracts, they're not trying to get the best deal. They're not trying to save money. They're not trying to be most productive. They're not even focused on merit. They're focused on let's get this off our desk.

Matt (37:39.445)
Yeah, well, so then they're doing something wrong. That's morally wrong. I, I, you can look at the, the, if we say the latter day lens, there's the council on the disposition of tithes, right? The church brings in billions of dollars in tithing every year. So the church is spending other people's money. And I think, I mean, I've never, I haven't been invited to the council on the disposition of tithes, but that's the first presidency quorum of the 12 apostles. And I

Shawn (37:43.022)
But that's how it happens I think in the majority of the time.

Matt (38:09.323)
think the presiding bishopric I think is in there and I think someone in the Relief Society might be in there. I think that they probably do a really good job of spending other people's money and and they have a policy that the church only goes into debt for things where it like makes financial sense as an investment or something like that but they always stay within their means. They're always trying to to do the right thing with other people's money and I think that it's reasonable for us to expect our government to do the same thing.

Shawn (38:38.734)
I think it's naive to think that they would ever do the right thing. You can't compare a group of people who have been called of God, who have been qualified and called of God. These are prophets and apostles. These are people who are disciples of Christ, been personally handpicked, who have these relationships with Jesus Christ, with the Almighty God. So they're being led and guided on how to treat money. I wouldn't even say it's their own merit.

Matt (38:52.875)
Yeah?

Shawn (39:07.906)
their own merit that makes the use of the money good. I would say that they are just loyal to their father in heaven and have developed these relationships and God is guiding them in what to do with that money for the most part, right? There's some decisions that obviously they make, but.

Matt (39:21.761)
But Sean, back in the day when I was young, I think it was before we had any children at all. My wife and I were elected to be the head of our homeowners association. I know.

Shawn (39:30.732)
What? Why haven't you told me, dude? This is huge. can't, congratulations, Matt.

Matt (39:37.673)
I put it on my resume, but nobody ever asks me about it. But our job was to collect the dues, right? The homeowners dues. And then we were supposed, there were some bills that we had to pay. And we tried to be very frugal with the money. Cause we're like, this is our neighbor's money. Like someday these buildings are going to need to have some repairs and some, right? So we noticed that the people who were in charge of it ahead of us, they hired their buddy to do all the landscaping.

And, we felt like that person was getting paid way too much money. So we fired this person's friend and it was all scandalous, but we were trying to manage their money, other people's money in what we thought would be the best way. And it made some people mad. I made some people happy. And I think the same thing's true of like city government, city councils, mayors. think there's a lot of good people out there working in government that are aware that it's other people's money. And so that makes them more cautious about taking care of it.

because it's not their money. They're trying to do what's best for everybody with other people's money.

Shawn (40:40.47)
I guess that's a worldview that you and Milton disagree on. Yeah, you think that people are altruistic when it comes to spending other people's money. He believes that it is impossible because there's just no accountability attached to it.

Matt (40:43.698)
That's right, I disagree with him.

Matt (40:54.433)
But I know for a fact, Sean, I know for a fact that if you and a bunch of our buddies from the mission, we all put in a pot of money and we're gonna go on a trip. And I said, okay, Sean, you're planning the trip for us. I know for a fact, you're not gonna be extravagant and waste all of our money, because that's not how you are. So to me, it's less about whose money it is than it is about the person who's, like their disposition. Like all things equal, I put my wife in charge of managing the pool of money, because she doesn't waste money and I do waste money.

Right, it's about the person.

Shawn (41:24.012)
I mean, but that, but you're in your wife has merit there, right? So I do agree that it does depend on there's it doesn't, it is affected in large part by the merit of the person that has the money. So I do agree. in your original question, when it comes to, for example, you know, I don't know, I can't speak to the other guy, but Elon Musk. Yeah. I think the guy has merit. So I don't think we can argue that this is, I guess I don't think it's corrupt, right? Because the guy has.

Matt (41:45.941)
Wasteful. Corrupt.

Shawn (41:52.894)
And our listeners may have issue with that, but I think that's one thing. But then the other side of it is I have no problem scrutinizing the way that all these work because yeah, even paying Elon Musk the millions of dollars that that guy gets paid is probably a waste. Yeah. yeah. Because I don't like the government. Yeah. But again, this is libertarian viewpoint, right? I'm not defending the millions and billions of dollars that Elon Musk gets.

Matt (42:08.497)
tell me more, tell me more.

Shawn (42:22.648)
But if you're going to do it, pick someone who has merit and he does.

Matt (42:26.463)
Yeah, it's hard for me to think of anybody out there who could build the satellite golden dome better than Elon Musk because he has so much experience putting things in space like his in, he has a proven track record. So even if someone came in and said, I can do this cheaper than Elon Musk, I don't know that I would choose that person because I wouldn't know that I could trust that they could actually do it cheaper. Yeah. Yeah. I give you the points for sure. Okay. Here's the big question.

Shawn (42:49.006)
So I get the points because you just agree with the merit thing.

Nice.

Matt (42:55.585)
Now for our listeners who don't know, I'm a little bit fat. I'm a little bit, I would call myself obese. So.

Shawn (43:01.998)
It's not, no, you're, I mean, what are you, 6'3"? You have plenty, your weight matches your height, you're proportionate to your height.

Matt (43:04.769)
6-3 and and

No, no. My BMI is in the 30s, maybe 40s. No, I don't know what it is. But I started taking Ozempic about a year ago and I lost 40 pounds. So I'm less obese than I was before, but I'm still considerably obese. Anyhow, you just have to know that when I ask this question because I'm a fat guy. People need to know I have a little bit of a bias here. Okay. So the US government...

Shawn (43:15.662)
Okay.

Shawn (43:20.846)
Huh?

Shawn (43:28.85)
You're making it, you're taking it, okay, you're bringing in context. Okay, okay, okay.

How come you never reveal all the other biases that you have with all these questions? Why did you pick this one?

Matt (43:41.921)
The other ones become obvious as we talk about it, but if listeners, they haven't ever seen me, so they wouldn't know. Matt's fat, of course he hates this. So the US government has directed visa officers to use common chronic illnesses like obesity, cancer, and diabetes. I said it like the dude from Milford, Wilford, diabetes, as new reasons to deny visas to foreigners.

Shawn (43:46.286)
okay.

Shawn (44:06.914)
Diabetes?

Matt (44:12.149)
This change is part of a plan to keep people out who might need expensive medical care and become a financial problem for the country. In October of 2020, President Oaks said, the United States was founded by immigrants of different nationalities and different ethnicities. Its unifying purpose was not to establish a particular religion or to perpetuate any of the diverse cultures or tribal loyalties of the old countries.

Our founding generation sought to be unified by new constitution and laws. And then he said, knowing that we are all children of God gives us a divine vision of the worth of all others and the will and ability to rise above prejudice and racism. And so here's my question. Is denying a visa to obese or chronically ill people consistent with the principles taught by President Oaks? Right, because the assumption-

Shawn (45:04.302)
I love it. That's a great question. Sometimes...

Matt (45:08.533)
The assumption here is that if you're fat and you have a visa, you're going to become some kind of a strain on the financial resources of the United States. But visas are for people that want to visit family. Visas are for, I have to get a visa every time I travel to another country. So if other countries were to do the same, I could no longer travel to other countries because I'm fat.

Shawn (45:14.316)
Yeah, right. That's right. Yeah. That's the,

Shawn (45:31.63)
Well, I love that most of the times in the questions you pose, I love that it's really hard to decipher. Okay, well, I don't know where Matt stands on this. But then in some of these, for example, this one, you just can't help yourself. You go, here's what the prophet said. And then he asks the question, like, do you disagree with the prophet?

Matt (45:45.035)
Yeah.

Matt (45:48.523)
Hahaha

Matt (45:53.129)
No, no, no, no, cause maybe it is, because the prophet says we should rise above prejudice and racism. Marco Rubio is talking about chronic illness and obesity and cancer and stuff. that's not racism as a reason to keep people out. yeah. Okay. Yes, that is prejudice.

Shawn (46:07.182)
Well, that's prejudice, but that is prejudice, right?

Look, look, I, it's been over the years as I've watched people, politicians mostly try to justify their view of immigration. It's been really interesting whenever it, when the, when the discussion shifts towards, we want the, you know, we want the world's greatest in America, right? We want to gather the world's smartest and we want the people that are, I always, bothered me because this was like, so you don't want, then you don't want like,

Matt (46:41.47)
Americans to be great.

Shawn (46:43.636)
Well, not only that,

Matt (46:45.299)
the huddled masses, the poor, the tired.

Shawn (46:48.77)
Yeah. Like what happened to America is a place of opportunity and the American dream that Sam would always preach. It's not just for those who have already achieved the American dream to come and grow in the American dream. I love that, that we can invite those who struggle, those who haven't had opportunities, get over here. Like, I love that I live in a city that is close to the Mexican border. And I love with my whole heart that it is full of.

people who like, dude, Matt, in this past mission prep series that I was teaching, we go through and we talk about one of our principles talks about anxiety and how you're going to deal with hard things on your mission. And so here's some scripture based ways to deal with your, your hard things. And so I just randomly like went throughout the room and says, right, everyone of you kids who hasn't served a mission yet, you're going to share one thing that has caused you anxiety and stress and all the kids are going through it. And there's all typical like teenager stuff. And then we get to this kid.

And we go, okay, have you ever had anxiety? He's like, yes. Okay. Well, what was yours? Cause this one just talked about how she didn't make the team. And this one talked about how a friend was mean to her. And he says, well, when, my family and I lived in Tijuana, um, the cartel, uh, held us all up at gunpoint and stole our restaurant and basically says we work for them now. And so we had to flee the country overnight and get out. I'm like, what the heck? I'm like, oh my God, compared to the rest of us who were born and live in America.

Matt (48:05.905)
Matt (48:11.541)
Wow, that's crazy.

Shawn (48:16.993)
That's true craziness. And I love that this family has been able to come to America and find a new life for themselves and get opportunity. So no, I'm with you, man. I think it's horrible that we would say to anyone, we're going to judge people and only let in people that we deem righteous. That is so prejudice and so anti-American.

Matt (48:19.435)
Yeah.

Matt (48:28.161)
Yeah.

Matt (48:40.425)
Yeah. Yeah. And I, I the quote from president Oakes, think that the part that touches me is we do believe that the constitution is divine, right? But he says the purpose was not to establish a particular religion or perpetuate cultures or loyalties from previous countries. I feel like a lot of times as a country, we say to other countries or other people, you should want to be like us.

which by the way, we're so diverse, I don't even know what that would really mean, right? And if you don't wanna be like us, then you shouldn't come here and you don't belong here. And that's not consistent with the gospel of Jesus Christ. By the way, if we were gonna say you have to look like us, we probably would say you should be obese and have diabetes, because that is, we're more that way than any other country in the world, right? If you ask people in other countries to describe Americans, they would probably say obese with diabetes.

Shawn (49:11.523)
Yeah.

Shawn (49:29.518)
You're welcome.

Shawn (49:36.878)
That's funny.

Matt (49:37.961)
It is kind of interesting. And the other part that kind of makes me sad is I know that Spain as a nation, they have free healthcare and they encourage people to come to Spain as tourists to take advantage of their free healthcare. And that costs them money as a nation. But to them, they're like, healthcare is important enough that we want people to come here and get their medical needs taken care of. And I feel like that's who we used to be as a country.

We used to be as a country, the people that would say, come here and let us help you make your life better, because we know that you're gonna help us make our country better. And it feels like in a lot of ways, we're not doing that anymore. And so that I think is.

Shawn (50:18.21)
Yeah, but I think you got to be smart with the way you approach that mindset, right? Like if you and I agree that the latter day lens is, America has been a blessed land and we don't, we're not supposed, like when we're out as missionaries, we're not prejudiced against someone who's overweight or has diabetes or someone who is struggling. No, we are trying to find and invite all valuable, beloved sons and daughters of God to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

And so if America is that land of opportunity, we need to have the same attitude, but we have to be smart. Like I think that the Democrats were so unwise in the way that they potentially approach that. I'm going to assume that that was their motive, but if that's their motive, you don't just, you don't do it the way they did it. It's so backfired and was so ineffective. So you have to be wise in the way you approach how you affect that. Don't you think?

Matt (50:46.336)
Yes.

Matt (51:11.329)
I don't know about that, but I, this is what I would say. This family you described from Tijuana, let's say that they did have a whole lot of medical needs and a whole lot of problems. And they came to the United States, not just to flee the drug lords, but also cause they needed some medical help. Like I have every bit of confidence that the goodness of who they are as people is that they would come here. They would probably take from the system more than they're giving to the system initially.

But in the long term, they would end up giving back more to the system than what they're taking from the system. And this is my experience with most immigrants. Like even if we have to do a whole lot up, they require a lot of upfront costs from us as a nation. What they give to us as a nation long-term, far outweighs the cost that came in those initial stages as we're helping them get back on their feet.

Shawn (52:05.046)
Yeah, mean, that's, I mean, anecdotally, it's probably a, a mix, but I like that we wouldn't judge that. I like that we don't predetermine that, right? Like, let's give everyone an opportunity to, do that knowing that some won't, but that's okay. That's okay. Right.

Matt (52:10.463)
I don't- yeah I know that there's-

Yeah.

Matt (52:21.301)
Yeah, but every immigrant I've ever met, and I've met a lot of them, and also most foreigners I've met, they have a stronger work ethic than most of the people I know that are native born.

Shawn (52:33.326)
Okay, hang on. I can agree with you there, but my point about, yeah, but what you don't do is just let all people and anyone, just millions of people, uncontrolled and unregulated, just come crazy into the country without any, yeah, you know what mean? Like the Biden administration shot itself in the foot with that.

Matt (52:52.244)
I see what you're

Matt (52:57.953)
There should be some kind of a criminal background check, right? Make sure that you're not like a terrorist. Yeah, okay.

Shawn (53:00.236)
Yes, there should be some order. There should be some order to it. Like the Democrats, if their motive was what you're talking about, then I commend you, Levi Barnes, I commend you. I like that. I love that. I'm with you on that. But your party failed so miserably in the way they tried to execute that, that it backfired. Like you gotta have some order to it, right?

Matt (53:24.577)
yeah. Okay. If Sean is asking for regulation, I think I'm going to get behind that. We're going to have that be the last word. Hey, thanks for joining us this week. Everybody. If you have any comments, let us know. Otherwise we'll talk to you again next week. Have a good day.

Shawn (53:31.0)
HAHAHAHA! Dang you! Dang you, Matt!