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0:16

morning Brew Daily Show, I'm Neil

0:18

Fryman. And I'm Toby Howell. Today,

0:20

after a decade of false starts,

0:22

is the self-driving era finally here?

0:25

Then AI has done more than make

0:27

Nvidia shareholders really rich. It's also made

0:29

consultants really rich. It's Thursday, June 27th,

0:32

let's ride. It

0:35

is here, the first presidential debate

0:41

of the election season. Tonight at

0:43

9 p.m. Eastern, Joe Biden will

0:45

square off against Donald Trump in

0:47

the first instance of a sitting

0:49

president debating a former president. And

0:51

that's not all that's unusual about

0:53

this debate. It comes months earlier

0:55

than presidential debates in the past

0:57

and neither candidate has participated in

0:59

a debate since their showdown in

1:01

2020. And there

1:03

will be no live audience. Microphones will be

1:06

muted when the candidates are not asked to

1:08

talk and they can't bring in pre-written

1:10

notes or props. So how can you watch?

1:12

Well, the debate is being hosted by CNN,

1:15

but the feed is gonna be shared across

1:18

most other networks and major news sites on

1:20

the internet. In short, it'll be hard to

1:22

miss. It'll be hard to miss, yeah,

1:24

first between sitting and former president, first debate

1:26

hosted by, presidential debate hosted by CNN

1:28

too. It's also the first debate that the

1:31

moderator will begin by saying, let's ride.

1:33

I'm just kidding, but Jake Tapper, Dana Bash,

1:35

we do give you permission to use

1:37

it if you want. Now

1:39

let's hear a word from our

1:41

sponsor, Yahoo Finance. Neil, yesterday Jensen

1:43

Hwang from Nvidia answered questions at

1:45

their annual shareholder meeting. The first

1:47

question related to the company's competition

1:49

as more companies gear up to

1:51

release products to challenge Nvidia's 80%

1:54

market share in AI chips. Please tell me

1:56

he named names and said Intel isn't even

1:58

close to matching them. He played it a

2:00

little closer to the vest, but I will

2:03

happily name names about where I came across

2:05

this information I will do it for you.

2:07

Yahoo Finance. You forget that we sit next

2:09

to each other all day and I see

2:11

your computer Toby I see the purple draped

2:13

all over it. Listen, they've got the news.

2:15

Okay, and we're in the news business Well,

2:17

I am glad you you are using our

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sponsors product because you are a company man

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And if you want to be like Toby

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and spend all of your time bathing in

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Yahoo Finance comm or download their mobile app

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to get it directly on your phone Yesterday

2:33

the Supreme Court made a pivotal

2:35

decision regarding the government's influence on

2:37

social media companies ruling in favor

2:39

of the Biden administration Let's

2:42

rewind to 2022 two states

2:44

in five social media users sued

2:47

federal officials for violating their first

2:49

amendment rights by being too heavy-handed

2:51

in Urging social media companies to

2:53

suppress certain posts related to kovat

2:55

19 vaccines election fraud amongst Other

2:58

things lower courts sided with the

3:00

states and users But yesterday SCOTUS sided with

3:02

the government bolstering its ability to seek removal

3:04

of what it might view as misinformation The

3:08

ruling comes with immediate significance the Department of

3:10

Homeland Security For instance can continue to flag

3:12

post they think might be the work of

3:14

foreign actors ahead of this year's election But

3:17

the ruling itself didn't dive as much into

3:19

the sticky first amendment rights that were at

3:21

the core of this case Instead

3:23

the court ruled that the users who

3:26

challenged the administration didn't have standing to

3:28

sue So the court kicked the can

3:30

down the road a bit when it comes

3:32

to the central question about what first amendment

3:34

limits apply to The government's influence on tech

3:36

companies But the fact remains that it does

3:39

give the government a free hand to talk

3:41

to social media companies This was a 6-3

3:44

decision with some of the conservative

3:46

justices going over to the liberal

3:48

side justice Amy Coney Barrett penned

3:51

the Decision and she said yeah the the

3:53

plaintiffs just did not have standing to bring

3:55

this case in the first place Which is

3:57

something that we've seen a couple times so

4:00

far on the Supreme Court's docket over the past

4:02

few weeks. She said that the government has not

4:04

caused their injuries. They have to meet two hurdles,

4:06

that the government caused their injuries and that there

4:08

may be injury

4:11

in the future. She said

4:13

that those two thresholds had not been

4:15

met. And one reason why is that

4:17

because social media companies were already policing

4:20

information, they were already taking down information

4:22

or suppressing posts that may not be

4:24

accurate and the government was just corresponding

4:26

with them about that particular thing. It

4:28

wasn't because of the government that they

4:30

started doing this. The government may have

4:32

had an undue influence through

4:34

these back channel email communications that were brought

4:37

up during the court proceedings, but she did

4:39

not make the link between the fact that

4:41

the government was talking to social media companies

4:43

and the fact that they were bringing down

4:45

posts. Right. The underlying issue

4:48

here though was how much power should the

4:50

government have to put pressure on

4:52

social media companies without kind of running into

4:54

some First Amendment issues. And again, I said

4:57

kick the can down the road because they

4:59

did rule on a technicality, but the result

5:01

of that ruling is that the government can

5:03

still have its hand in some of

5:06

these and urging social media companies to

5:08

take certain posts down. Again, I said

5:11

it has immediate consequence because we are in an election

5:13

year and one of the big things that the government

5:15

would love to do, the Department of Homeland Security would

5:17

love to do is say, wait a second, we think

5:19

some of these posts are coming from foreign actors. Can

5:22

we suppress them? Facebook, can we suppress them?

5:24

X. Can we have

5:26

national security search right away? But then

5:28

if you zoom out a little bit,

5:30

there's definitely a loud vocal majority

5:33

or minority of people who are saying

5:35

like, why are we giving the government so

5:37

much power over these supposedly third party institutions

5:41

that kind of act as gatekeepers of

5:43

information right now? And the

5:45

government would respond, look, we have First Amendment rights just

5:47

like anybody else. And for

5:49

centuries, the United States government and

5:52

the president has used their position

5:56

as the bully pulpit, it's called, to sort of

5:58

put their thumb on the scale. and just,

6:00

you know, they can talk just like anybody

6:03

else, so they would respond that we have

6:05

just a first man right, just like anybody

6:07

else to, you know, to sway information or

6:09

put our positions forward. And the interesting part

6:11

too is that some of the cases that

6:13

were mentioned in this case was the Hunter

6:15

Biden laptop story from early, or from the

6:17

late 2020 year. And

6:20

actually internal communications revealed from that story

6:22

showed that Twitter execs were very divided

6:24

on what to do with the company.

6:26

There wasn't some sort of influence from

6:28

the government and Twitter just kind of

6:30

rolled over and did what they said. It

6:32

was very contentious. There was lots of internal

6:35

documents from lots of different social media companies

6:37

revealed through this case. And that was another

6:39

one that I'm sure a lot of people

6:41

remember. Meanwhile, we just have two days left

6:43

in the Supreme Court's term. So

6:46

we should see another flurry of rulings.

6:48

And yesterday there was another big face

6:50

palm by the Supreme Court because someone

6:53

posted the opinion

6:55

for a medical abortion for emergencies

6:57

in Idaho ahead of time, that

7:00

wasn't a final decision. They posted

7:02

it yesterday and Bloomberg got their

7:04

hands on it. And

7:07

it said that the Supreme Court is

7:10

going to allow abortions in medical emergencies

7:12

in Idaho where most abortions are banned.

7:15

So that is one ruling that we kind of

7:18

already know a hint of because they

7:20

posted it. And that's not the first time this has

7:22

leaked from the Supreme Court. Remember back in 2022, the

7:24

Roe v. Wade decision was

7:27

leaked to Politico a couple months ahead of

7:29

time. Now Toby and I are

7:31

going to do our best BBC world

7:34

service impression and bring you the latest

7:36

headlines from around the globe, not in

7:38

a British accent, unfortunately. Let's start in

7:40

Bolivia where a dramatic coup attempt lasted

7:42

all of a few hours. Rebel soldiers

7:44

tried to storm the presidential palace yesterday

7:46

in what President Luis Arce called an

7:49

attempt to overthrow his socialist government. It

7:51

did not work. The soldiers dispersed and the

7:53

general who led the revolt was promptly arrested.

7:56

Still, it reflects pressure on the unpopular

7:58

government to fix a dire accident. economic

8:00

situation. Bolivia's natural gas exports have plunged.

8:02

Its central bank has run out of

8:04

reserves to defend its peg against the

8:06

US dollar. And the government is struggling

8:08

to pay food and diesel subsidies to

8:10

its people. Then again, this is

8:13

nothing new for Bolivia, one of the most politically

8:15

volatile nations in the world. Since

8:17

its independence from Spain two centuries ago, it's

8:19

experienced nearly 200 coups and revolutions.

8:22

You mentioned the word it was a

8:24

dramatic coup because it was actually broadcasted

8:26

live on television that you could literally

8:28

see President Arce confronting the former army

8:30

chief who was leading the coup as

8:32

he stormed up the presidential hallway. So

8:34

it was very much this real time

8:36

thing that was playing out. And to

8:38

make things even more dramatic, Bolivia also

8:41

has an election upcoming in 2025. So

8:44

expect to see more about the Bolivian

8:47

political situation unfolding. Next

8:49

on our international tour, a secret espionage

8:51

trial for Wall Street Journal reporter Evan

8:54

Gershkovich began yesterday in a Russian court

8:56

where he was put on display in

8:58

a padlock transparent box. Evan

9:00

has been in prison since March of last

9:02

year on charges that he was gathering information

9:05

about a Russian defense contractor on behalf of

9:07

the CIA. He the Wall

9:09

Street Journal and the US government say these

9:11

charges are complete bogus. He was simply doing

9:13

his job and that Russia is using Evan

9:16

as a political pawn. And

9:18

even as this trial gets going, Russia has

9:20

not been subtle about its intent to use

9:22

Evan as a bargaining chip. The Kremlin says

9:24

it's down to do a prisoner swap, perhaps

9:27

for former security operative Vadim Krasikov serving a

9:29

live life sentence in Germany. The US responded

9:31

that they aren't going to negotiate in public.

9:33

Of course, the backdrop to Evan's imprisonment is

9:36

crumbling relations between the US and Russia after

9:38

Putin invaded Ukraine in 2022. He

9:41

is the first journalist to be detained in Russia

9:43

since the end of the Cold War. Right. Gershkovich

9:46

faces up to 20 years in prison if

9:48

the court does find him guilty, which by

9:50

all accounts they will. Russian courts convict more

9:52

than 99% of

9:54

defendants who come before them. So you

9:56

hear the word sham trial thrown around

9:58

a lot, but it truly is in

10:00

Russia that it's most. just a sentencing

10:02

hearing, not an actual hearing before law.

10:04

There is also, just to say that

10:06

this does happen, there's another American corporate

10:08

security executive who was arrested in Moscow

10:12

for espionage in 2018. He is

10:14

now serving a 16-year sentence. So

10:16

there's very real possibility that Evan

10:18

does do prison time. Of course,

10:20

you're right. He does want to

10:22

be used as a bargaining

10:24

chip. The last time this happened was

10:26

in 2022 when the U.S.

10:28

exchanged WNBA star Brittany Greiner

10:30

for a arms dealer, Victor

10:33

Baut. So there is precedent for this,

10:35

and I'm sure that we'll see a

10:37

very similar situation with negotiations playing out

10:39

with Evan. Moving on, after a wave

10:41

of protests and an attack on the

10:43

country's parliament, Kenya's president William Ruto reversed

10:46

court yesterday and said he would not

10:48

sign a controversial tax bill into law.

10:50

The exact tolls of the protests are

10:52

still being tallied, but human rights groups

10:54

have said that at least 23 people

10:56

were killed with 300

10:58

injured after the police cracked down using

11:00

tear gas and bullets on protesters marching

11:03

on parliament. Some people did make it

11:05

into the building and set parts of

11:07

it on fire just an hour after

11:09

the legislation was passed. The bill was

11:11

intended to raise revenue through higher taxes,

11:13

which the government said was necessary to

11:15

pay down the country's debt and cover

11:18

the cost of infrastructure, but now the

11:20

president says his government will widen cuts

11:22

in spending instead. Neil, this was one

11:24

of the bloodiest days in Kenya recent

11:26

history with more protesters vowing to march

11:28

again today to call for the resignation

11:30

of the president and all members of

11:32

parliament who voted for this bill. Look,

11:35

Kenya needs to raise revenue. They have

11:37

80 billion dollars worth of debt. 27

11:39

percent of the revenue is collected is

11:41

going to debt service. They are just

11:43

they went on a huge spending spree

11:45

borrowing from China and other institutions in

11:48

the early 2000s to build roads, infrastructure, and

11:50

that has been, you know, overall

11:52

good for their economy. It is the fastest

11:54

growing economy in Africa. The problem is they

11:56

aren't bringing in the tax receipts to be

11:59

able to pay for it. to pay down

12:01

these debts. So that is what this whole

12:03

thing was about. They tried to raise taxes

12:05

to raise more revenue to pay off their

12:07

debts so they don't default, and

12:09

it has backfired. A part of the

12:11

issue too is that a lot of

12:14

the protesters did critique the lifestyle of

12:16

Ruto and his members of his administrations.

12:18

They've called on them to limit their

12:21

expenses. And so that's what Ruto did.

12:23

He did say that we will cut

12:25

back on our spending on travel, our

12:27

cars, our office renovations, the thing that

12:30

are conspicuously spending within the current administration

12:32

and institute more austerity measures. But

12:34

we'll see because this situation is unfolding because

12:36

a lot of people have said they will

12:39

continue to protest until they see the resignation

12:41

of this administration. And they have been led

12:43

by young people mostly. Those are the people

12:45

leading the protests. Finally, Julian Assange

12:47

landed back home in his native Australia

12:49

yesterday, a free man for the first

12:51

time in 12 years. The

12:54

WikiLeaks founder shocked the world when he

12:56

agreed to a deal with the United

12:59

States on Wednesday morning, pleading guilty to

13:01

illegally conspiring to obtain and disseminate classified

13:03

information. Quick LinkedIn bio

13:05

on Assange. He was a prodigy

13:08

programmer who in 2006 started the

13:10

site WikiLeaks, which published more than

13:12

10 million secret documents on everything

13:14

from internal Sony Pictures communications to

13:16

emails from Hillary Clinton's campaign manager.

13:18

A firestorm erupted in 2010 when

13:20

he published distressing video and confidential

13:22

documents around the US's military operations

13:24

in Iraq and Afghanistan, which is

13:27

one of the largest breaches of

13:29

classified material in the US military's

13:31

history. Facing espionage charges from the

13:33

US, he spent seven years hiding

13:35

out in the Ecuadorian embassy in

13:37

London and then five years in

13:39

British prison. Now after the plea

13:41

deal, he is back home. And

13:44

yet he is still as divisive

13:46

as ever cast by some as

13:48

a free speech crusader and by

13:50

others as a villain who put

13:52

lives at risk. Yeah. And

13:55

his wife, who is also on his

13:57

legal team was asked, is he going

13:59

to continue to reveal he's gonna continue

14:01

publishing. And she did not rule it

14:03

out. She called Julian Assange a very

14:05

principled person who is very beholden to

14:07

who he is. And so she said

14:09

that he will always defend human rights

14:11

and will always defend victims. So there

14:13

is a world where he just resumes

14:16

right where he left off, kind of

14:18

revealing and posting some of these sensitive

14:20

internal government documents. Up

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16:32

Consultants have been having a bit of

16:34

a rough go of it recently. McKinsey

16:36

has cut jobs amid a slowdown in

16:38

demand, and other firms have been shrinking

16:40

the size of their new partner classes.

16:42

But an unlikely savior has come to

16:45

bail out your favorite Patagonia-vested synergy drivers,

16:47

AI. Yes, after chat,

16:49

GPT came out last year. There has been

16:52

a huge demand from businesses wanting to know

16:54

what the heck this thing is and how

16:56

can it help me make money. Consultancies were

16:58

more than happy to step in. Boston Consulting

17:01

Group now earns a fifth of all

17:03

its revenue through work related to artificial

17:05

intelligence. That's pretty remarkable considering two years

17:07

ago, it was zero, and they aren't

17:10

alone. Outside of BCG, McKinsey, Accenture, and

17:12

even IBM's consulting arms are seeing sales

17:14

rise and are hiring in droves again

17:16

as companies try to navigate the age

17:19

of AI. Neil, consulting and

17:21

AI, they go together like you and

17:23

I. I saw this

17:25

firsthand yesterday because I moderated a panel at

17:27

an event that was exclusively about onboarding

17:30

new AI and guess who

17:32

was there, Accenture, IBM. So I saw

17:35

this firsthand how consultants are getting into

17:37

the game about deploying AI at businesses

17:39

because companies see this as a huge

17:41

cost saver, as a way to become

17:43

more efficient and lean to drive productivity

17:45

and it is kind of a confusing

17:47

technology with a lot of different applications,

17:49

a lot of ways you can do

17:52

it from regulatory things to

17:54

getting chatbots up for customer service.

17:57

Or just mining data, so there's a lot

17:59

of potential. applications here and the hype is

18:01

through the roof. So companies are desperate to

18:03

know what to do, but some of them

18:06

don't have the capabilities to send a dedicated

18:08

team to figure out how AI can help

18:10

them. So they're turning to these consultants and

18:12

the consultants are saying, come to Papa, come

18:14

to Papa. This is not the first time

18:16

we've made this comparison, but you have to

18:18

think back to the original tech boom, internet

18:21

boom in the early 2000s, where

18:24

businesses also stampeded two consultants

18:26

for counsel about, hey, what

18:28

is the internet? And I don't

18:30

know what a website does, but I need one.

18:33

And I think you're seeing a lot of the

18:35

same things from companies right now where they don't

18:37

fully grasp it. And so consultancies are more than

18:39

willing to step in and

18:42

hold their hand and say, this is what we can build.

18:44

This is what we can do for you. And

18:46

yeah, it is leading to record revenues for

18:48

them as well. It's so interesting too, because

18:51

literally earlier this year we were talking about

18:53

the slowdown, McKinsey laying off workers, there's just

18:55

not enough demand. These places are too bloated.

18:57

And then all of a sudden, here you

19:00

are, McKinsey said they're deriving 40%

19:02

of their business this

19:04

year from generative AI. It has just

19:06

been this massive boom for them. And

19:08

it's just funny too that, the

19:11

jokes write themselves too. Like it could be

19:13

the blind, lean the blind, or maybe the

19:15

consultancies are actually doing a very good job.

19:17

I know, because I don't know if they're

19:20

doing a good job. I mean, there's gonna

19:22

be hits and misses. One thing that we

19:24

just recently talked about was how McDonald's is

19:26

closing down its AI drive-through experiment. That was

19:28

done with AIBM as consultants. And now

19:31

after a few years that did not

19:33

work out, they were spitting, this AI

19:35

was spitting out ridiculous orders, you know,

19:38

a hundred chicken nuggets, nine iced teas,

19:40

bacon on top of vanilla ice cream.

19:42

So I think there is going to

19:44

be some growing pains here with how

19:46

consultants and companies work together to deploy

19:48

AI. It's funny too, because a lot

19:50

of AI companies are trying to figure

19:52

out how they can make money, what

19:54

their business model is. And yet here,

19:56

consultancies are making money, hand over fist.

20:00

Self-driving cars are a dream

20:02

that plenty of companies have tried to

20:04

sell us in recent years, most of

20:06

all Elon Musk at Tesla. But while

20:08

Elon was promising RoboTaxi on earnings call

20:10

after earnings call, Google's Waymo has slowly

20:12

but surely been bringing self-driving cars to

20:14

the mainstream. As of this

20:16

week, its RoboTaxis are now available to

20:18

all users in San Francisco, expanding its

20:21

ride-hailing service, which had previously only been

20:23

available to a select amount of riders.

20:25

Waymo has flown a bit under the

20:28

radar compared to other self-driving companies. GM's

20:30

cruise has made headlines for collisions

20:32

and accidents while Tesla's full self-driving

20:34

feature still requires an attentive driver

20:36

at the wheel. But Waymo

20:38

has slowly but surely expanded its operations

20:40

with plans to launch in Los Angeles

20:43

and Austin as well this year. Are

20:45

we sleeping on Waymo a little bit? Absolutely.

20:49

It's crazy to think that in Phoenix and

20:51

in San Francisco now, you can just take

20:53

out your phone and order a taxi that

20:56

won't be driven by a human. It'll be

20:58

completely a robot. We've been waiting for

21:00

this for decades. We've been promised this for

21:02

so long. There have been so many stops

21:04

and starts, but in two American cities, you

21:07

can call a self-driving car to take you

21:09

somewhere. It is absolutely incredible to think about,

21:11

but it's been this drip drip drip of

21:13

progress. So we haven't had this crowning moment

21:15

to say, yes, the self-driving era has arrived

21:18

and there have been so many, it's

21:21

always been one step forward, two steps back

21:23

for this industry, but this is a two

21:25

or three step forward moment. Yeah, part of

21:27

the issue and why this snuck up on

21:29

us and we're saying that Waymo slept on

21:31

is that New Salads aren't very good at

21:33

covering technological advances that take

21:35

a while to evolve over time. We're much

21:38

better at having something like chat, GBT drop

21:40

in and the entire paradigm is shifted and

21:42

suddenly NVIDIA is the most valuable company in

21:45

the world. When you compare it

21:47

to AI, self-driving has taken a lot longer to

21:49

materialize. I mean, Waymo is a 15 year

21:51

old company at this point. And then

21:54

also part of the reason why maybe

21:56

we haven't thought about self-driving as advanced

21:58

as it actually is. is that

22:00

we do cover most of the negative

22:02

news associated with it because there has

22:04

been a lot of negative news and

22:06

Waymo recently had some negative news as

22:08

well. They hit a poll in Arizona.

22:10

They've had to do a recall over

22:12

software. So again, it's been very bumpy.

22:14

It hasn't been smooth sailing. But

22:17

part of the reason why we're taking this moment to

22:19

say it's doing well is because you're right. That

22:22

is a pretty magical experience being able to call

22:24

a robo taxi in two major cities in the

22:26

US now. Finally, we are

22:28

going to Neil's numbers, the segment

22:30

where I share three stats from the week's

22:32

news that will be like instantly downloading all

22:35

of Ken Burns' documentaries into your brain. My

22:38

first number is a good news bad

22:40

news situation. First, the good news, pedestrian

22:42

deaths on US roads decreased in 2023,

22:44

according to a new

22:47

report by the Governor's Highway Safety Association.

22:50

Last year saw a 5.4%

22:53

fall in the annual number of pedestrian

22:55

deaths. The first decrease since COVID began

22:57

and certainly a step in the right

22:59

direction. Now the less good news, the

23:01

pedestrian death total of 7318 is still 14% more than before

23:07

the pandemic in 2019. Yeah,

23:09

COVID really increased the danger for

23:11

Americans walking on streets since emptier

23:13

roads allowed for more speeding, alcohol

23:15

use rose and traffic enforcement declined.

23:18

Between 2010 and 2022, the number of pedestrian

23:20

deaths in the US rose nearly 77% to

23:22

record levels.

23:25

But progress is progress and advocates hope they

23:27

can build on last year's encouraging decline. We've

23:30

talked about a lot of how bigger

23:32

cars have led to more pedestrian tests,

23:34

but truly the real concern when it

23:36

comes to pedestrian deaths is inebriation because

23:38

30% of fatalities involved

23:40

a pedestrian who had a blood alcohol

23:43

level that exceeded the legal limit and

23:45

then 19% involved a driver

23:47

above that limit. So it still is,

23:49

alcohol is probably one of the central

23:51

driving factors, as well as the fact

23:53

that the US is set up mostly

23:55

for cars, very little infrastructure to promote

23:57

walking or biking or any other means

23:59

of transportation. So a lot of factors have

24:01

kind of combined in this, but it

24:03

is good to see the numbers a little bit lower than

24:05

they were in 2020 and 2019. And

24:08

if you want to look at a city

24:10

that's doing it right, and there's perhaps a

24:12

model for other American cities to follow, it's

24:14

Hoboken, New Jersey. I mean, they haven't had

24:17

a traffic death from somebody in a car,

24:19

a cyclist, or a

24:21

pedestrian since 2017. They

24:24

are doing it so right. There's a mayor there

24:26

who said, there's this concept in urban planning called

24:29

Vision Zero, and it's basically eliminating

24:32

traffic deaths. And every city is

24:34

trying to do that, but Hoboken is doing it right.

24:37

And one of the biggest strategies that

24:39

they've employed is called daylighting, where you

24:41

remove parking spots from close to intersections

24:43

because that reduces visibility. And the idea

24:45

is that if people can see better

24:48

at intersections, then it will lead to

24:50

a decrease in traffic crashes. And that's

24:52

absolutely happened. There's other sort of things

24:54

you can play with in terms of

24:56

infrastructure and putting curb buffers

24:59

or just limiting speed limit,

25:01

that's also a big thing. But yeah, if you

25:03

go to Hoboken, they're absolutely crushing it in terms

25:05

of limiting traffic deaths. Shout out

25:08

Hoboken, good for them. My second number is

25:10

12 and two, which

25:12

is the New York Mets record ever

25:14

since Grimace throughout the ceremonial first pitch

25:16

at a game two weeks ago. Yes,

25:19

the McDonald's purple amorphous blob mascot is

25:21

being credited with single-handedly saving the Mets

25:23

season because before he threw out the

25:25

pitch, they were down in the dumps.

25:27

But now they're in the thick of

25:29

the playoff hunt. In fact, right after

25:32

Grimace sprinkled his magic vegetable oil on

25:34

the team, they won seven games in

25:36

a row. Grimace Mania is now

25:38

taking over the Mets universe at the game

25:40

against the Yankees Tuesday night. Multiple fans dressed

25:42

up as the mascot when they went to

25:44

the game, and kids at City Field asked

25:46

to take pictures with them when they were

25:48

shown on the Jumbotron, the crowd erupted. Even

25:50

McDonald's is getting in on the bit, updating

25:52

its Twitter avatar to show Grimace in a

25:54

Mets hat. Toby, before you say anything, I

25:57

just want to put my position forward. This

25:59

is all Grimace. is doing. I am

26:01

a firm believer in his mystical powers

26:03

and secondly it's probably not hyperbole to

26:05

say that Grimace is one of the

26:07

most potent forces in marketing today. Oh

26:09

100% remember the Grimace shake trend from

26:11

last year where people were just posting

26:13

these absurdist videos drinking the new Grimace

26:15

shake but I think what's very funny

26:17

is that this happened very organically even

26:20

though Grimace is a corporate mascot and

26:22

the Mets are a very big team

26:24

you just can't make up the fact that they

26:26

just really the data supports your position I mean

26:29

in 14 and 2 since Grimace threw

26:31

out the first pitch there's nothing you could point

26:33

to that said that there hasn't been a Grimace

26:35

effect so I'm 100%

26:37

on your side. You mentioned the people dressing

26:39

up as Grimace they were interviewed a little

26:41

bit and said I feel like I can't

26:43

take my head off ever because all these

26:45

kids think we are Grimace and if they

26:47

saw me removing my helmet it would kind

26:50

of scar them for life but I am

26:52

fully in on Grimace Mania as well. We

26:54

need a Gritty to throw out

26:56

the first pitch at the Phillies and get us

26:58

on a little wind streak here. My final number

27:00

shows how the recent Heat Dome has

27:02

sent Americans scrambling to book cooler 4th

27:04

of July vacations. It's had a real

27:06

impact according to booking.com 64% of American

27:10

travelers said that rising local temps

27:12

are pushing them to seek out

27:14

vacations with bearable temperatures and for

27:16

many bearable temperatures just means that

27:18

cool breeze coming off a lake

27:20

or an ocean coastal destinations and

27:22

ones that offer water sports have

27:24

become the number one vacation pick

27:26

with one third of Americans looking

27:28

for water-centric vacations and that's led

27:30

to a spike in interest in places like Panama

27:33

City Beach, Florida and Myrtle Beach which each saw

27:35

a 30% annual increase

27:37

in searches for the 4th of July

27:39

weekend. Should we start styling MBD bathing

27:41

suits? We should and I am totally

27:43

bucking this trend though because I'm cool-cationing

27:46

to St. Louis, Missouri which no lake

27:48

very hot there as well. I would

27:50

like to put forth my own vacation

27:52

trend though and that is race-cationing where

27:54

you sign up for a half marathon

27:57

or a marathon or a triathlon with

27:59

your friends. You go to the

28:01

destination, you do the race, you feel very

28:03

accomplished about yourself, and then you go and

28:05

have a good time. Would you wanna go?

28:07

Of course you would co-op this segment on

28:10

something that has nothing to do with distance

28:12

running and making it about distance running. But

28:14

quickly, give me your top beach town and

28:16

your top lake town. Well, my top beach

28:18

town is just where I live. I mean,

28:21

I live very close to Siesta Key in

28:23

Florida, also Bradenton Beach. I'm a Florida boy,

28:25

so I'll take those as my beach towns.

28:27

But my lake town is northern Michigan. You've

28:29

been to my cottage up

28:32

in northern Michigan as well. It is just

28:34

heaven on earth up there. So that's where

28:36

we should really go co-location. Let's

28:38

wrap it up there. Thanks so

28:40

much for listening and have a

28:42

wonderful Thursday. You can send all

28:44

of your questions, comments, and favorite

28:46

lake towns to our email, morningbrewdailyatmorningbrew.com.

28:48

Let's roll the credits. Emily Milliron

28:50

is our executive producer. Raymond Liu

28:53

is our producer. Olivia Graham is

28:55

our associate producer. Uchenwa Ogu is

28:57

our technical director. Billy Menino is

28:59

on audio. Hair and Makeup thinks the

29:01

Mets may never lose another game. Devin Emery

29:03

is our chief content officer, and our show

29:05

is a production of Morning Brew. Great show

29:07

today, Neil. Let's run it back tomorrow.