PBD Podcast
Trump's "Sh#thole" Countries, Paramount's HOSTILE TAKEOVER + Dems Affordability HOAX? | PBD Podcast | Ep. 698
10 Dec 2025
Chapter 1: What is discussed at the start of this section?
Did you ever think you would make it? I feel I'm supposed to take sweet victory. I know this life meant for me. Adam, what's your point?
The future looks bright. A handshake is better than anything I ever signed.
Right here.
You are a one-on-one?
My son's right there. I don't think I've ever said this before.
Okay, we have a fair warning for the audience today. Folks, we warned Adam in advance. Whatever you do, don't ask our guests today about climate change. We've told them 50 times. I said, don't play this BS game. Because when you talk about climate change, he loses his shit. The man just came from visiting the Pope six weeks ago. Don't mess with him. He's in a very good place.
We have the one and only, the entertaining... Dan Pena in the house. Dan, great to have you on here.
My pleasure.
You look amazing. Thank you very much. Yes, okay. All right, so we've got a lot of things to go through. There's a poll that we're going to cover today that is shocking, absolutely shocking, that CNN played, Harry Enten, that Tom was just talking to us about this a minute ago, of what demo the president has lost that's had the biggest plus-minus just in the last 10 months That is very concerning.
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Chapter 2: What are the implications of affordability on the younger generation?
Okay, Fed is expected to deliver a third straight rate cut this week amid labor concerns. I think it's going to happen sometime today, this afternoon. Americans suddenly more optimistic, slightly about the economy. That's a Forbes story. Ray Dalio says Middle East is becoming a Silicon Valley of capitalists. David Ellison promised White House sweeping changes at CNN if they allow them to.
Paramount to buy up Time Warner, which I think that comes with it. Jared Kushner back fund is part of the Paramount Warner Brothers bid. There's some new stories that just came out that Tom's going to be sharing with everybody. Saudi, Qatar, and Abu Dhabi want to put billions into Paramount and Warner Brothers. Why? We'll explain to you why. Tom's definitely got a breakdown on that.
Mamdani fake Miami Realtors report, 166% spike in inquiries from wealthy New York City residents. New York City luxury buyers reportedly flood Miami Beach real estate market after Mamdani's mayoral election. Home delistings. Ready? Delistings surge as sellers struggle to get their price. So I put the house on the market, and I'm going to delist because it's not selling.
And my realtor says, it's been on the market for 320 days. Let's take it out for two months, put it back on as if it's only been on there for one month, and change the price a little bit. Gen Z is obsessed with renting. Big short Michael Burry is doubling down and defending his call for a stock market bubble and predicts a Netscape fate for open AI. Thank you.
And then we got a couple other stories that were leaked yesterday that came out. JP Morgan Lake warns of higher costs for 2026. And a few other things I will definitely get into in regards to cars. The idea of the tiny cars. I don't know if you guys have been following this tiny car story. Not tiny dancer.
The president wants to introduce tiny cars in America, but it's a problem because it's very complicated on how to introduce these tiny cars. Rob, later on when you can pull up the tiny car stuff. But having said that... We are roughly three weeks away from 2026. Once a year, we host a business planning workshop. I want you to watch this video. It's this Friday. We go through a 200-page manual.
If you haven't yet registered for it, this is your last chance. Watch the video. Go ahead, Rob. Business is a lot like Jenga. Every piece matters. You need a vision. Just carefully. You need capital. You definitely need capital. Ooh, this is hanging on one piece here, by the way. You need the right team, for sure. You need sales.
As good as this looks, if your foundation isn't built on a good business plan, you know what happens? No! The whole thing crumbles. If you have big plans for 2026, On December 12th, I'm hosting an event called the Business Planning Workshop, where all day we go through the 12 building blocks of writing an effective business plan. So this doesn't happen to you.
If you haven't yet registered, click on the link below. Let's spend an entire day together on December 12th. Looking forward to seeing you there. All right, we're going to put the link below. Go get registered. December 12th, we'll be with you guys. Bring your teams, bring your family.
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Chapter 3: How does Trump's messaging affect perceptions of immigration?
You wanted to get into business. What do you think is going on here? You think, is it messaging? Is it actual issues? Is it actual things that's bothering that younger audience that's sitting there wanting to get their life started and saying, hey, man, we got to do something about this? What do you think is going on?
Yeah, I have to agree and disagree with you, Dan. So first of all, the job thing, yeah, I agree. You have to viciously attack that issue. You have to apply like crazy. I did a lot of crazy things to get here, and I can tell that story. But when it comes to affordability, it's just an objective fact that it's a much different situation than it was when you were, say, my age.
Because the cost of living, think about how much money we added to the economy just in the last five years alone. We doubled the size of the money supply. So We always talk about how it took two years of an average salary to buy an average-priced house in the 70s. Today, it takes nine years of an average salary to buy an average-priced house.
I know exceptional people are going to make it happen no matter what, but it's like the Pareto Principle. 20% of people are above average and 80% of people are just average people. When those people can't get by with just food, housing, and energy, those basic things, that's when you risk socialism.
Because I think the real pillar of a society, the foundation of a society is a strong middle class. And if you don't have a strong middle class, then you start to have these socialist tendencies. So that's why I think we're seeing what we're seeing in New York and Miami. And I don't think Trump is handling it well because he's kind of gaslighting by saying that the issue doesn't exist.
It is a fact that it takes more than half of an average salary to pay for the basic essential things to live. And that's not a good situation.
Well, excuse me, I'm not aware that it costs half. That's 50 years ago for me. I just turned 80. I'm not using that as an excuse. But the numbers, every generation has a reason why they're not happy with where they are economically, going back to 1900. And the fact that Trump is one year younger than I am, And a lot of the people that advise him are almost his age. It's a different reality.
It's surreal. And he's got his Kushner, who appears to be a very bright guy, but he's a billionaire. I mean, these guys that are advising him aren't. 30 years old, struggling to find jobs.
That's a very good point. That's a very good point you're making. And a lot linked to the commerce. I really like the point that you're making because sometimes, you know, you'll have people around you around your age
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Chapter 4: What is the significance of the Paramount and Warner Bros merger?
Okay, so that's the clip that he's talking about. Is this the talk yesterday, Rob? Go ahead.
I said it the other day, and a lot of people misinterpreted this. Oh, he doesn't realize prices are coming down very substantially. But they have a new word. You know, they always have a hoax. The new word is affordability. So they look at the camera and they say, this election is all about affordability. Now, they never talk about it. They never talk. Thank you very much.
They say I'm not allowed to run. I don't know what the hell that's all about, but that's OK. He said four more years. You see the new hat. We have four more years.
By the way, while he's saying this, gas prices dropped to the lowest in December 2025. And the last time they were this low. which is around $3 right now, December 2025, was four years ago when Trump was president in 2021. That's gas prices, right? But what I want you to think about is what he just said right now a minute ago. Dan said affordability could be a messaging issue.
And then the other part also Dan said, which is you may need some of the younger audience around you to get a pulse and see what they're going on. What is it right now, national average gas price? Rob, can you go a year ago to see what the national average was exactly a year ago? uh of where was that but this is what i want you to think okay so give me actual ideas
Because the part about the house, it took three and a half times your salary to buy a house 40, 50 years ago. It takes eight, eight and a half times your salary today to buy a house. That's a real number. Say those numbers again. Okay, it took around three and a half times your salary to buy a house 50-ish years ago. Okay. So you're making 20 grand a year. You could buy a house for $70,000.
That's three and a half times. Today, it's taking seven and a half to eight and a half times salary. You're making $70,000 a year. Do the math. $450,000, whatever you want to put there, right? $560,000. So those are real numbers. Car prices in America. Sky high. First time, $50,000 is the average car price, right? But then the income is not going up at the same levels. What do you do?
Trump asks you just purely cameras off. You're just talking. What do you think we can actually do? Not messaging. What do you think we can actually do to address a few things?
So as far as individual economy or the affordability?
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Chapter 5: What insights are offered about the hostile takeover of Warner Bros?
And he spoke up. Then a consortium of large institutional investors from, tell me we've heard this word, Qatar and Saudi, and... Abu Dhabi. Abu Dhabi came up and said, well, we've got plenty of money and we could put it behind. So all of a sudden, it's like you're at a gang fight and five guys with a lot of money stand up... you know, behind Ellison and Skydance and says, we're backing him up.
You know, two guys going to fight in the street, Pat. Hey, man, I'll kick your butt. Who's backing you up? And all of a sudden, these guys stand up. We're backing him up. And that's kind of what you have here. Now you've got him, people saying, do you have the ability to do this at 31 share? That and more. So that's where we are right now.
Chapter 6: What financial strategies are discussed regarding Netflix's potential actions?
But it's very interesting. This is how the hostile takeovers work. And you got guys like Mario Gabelli going to the microphone and saying, I'll take the hostile offer. It's better for my shareholders.
Yeah, so Saudi, Qatar, and Abu Dhabi are going to put up $24 billion, which is 2x what Ellison's are putting up, $11.8 billion for the takeover. And having Kushner involved, this is, Tom, this is almost making it. So then here's the question. You're in the Netflix boardroom. Netflix, just a week ago, not even a week ago, four days ago, three days ago, they're like, this is over.
We're picking it up. They came out of nowhere. They're celebrating, yes, we're going to get all this new stuff on Netflix now from Time Warner. It's going to be a great catalog. What do you do now if you're Netflix? Who are you calling?
Chapter 7: How do the speakers view the impact of looks on career advancement?
What influence do you have? Who's on your side? Who are you going to call that doesn't like those Abu Dhabi, Saudi, Kushner? Who are you calling if you're Netflix? Or are you just saying, guys, it's over?
You've got to ask yourself if you're Netflix. How bad do we really want this asset at this point? I mean, we want it bad, but are we willing to pay this much to get it? And what was the price really going to be to us in terms of operational leverage and the interest on debt that we're going to have to pay? We want this bad, but do we want to pay that kind of a price long term to operate it?
That's the question for Netflix. You know, as everybody has looked around, I mean, the rational eyes in the room, and I think I'm among them, have said, you know what? I kind of like Warner Brothers Discovery here with Paramount. I kind of like Netflix, which is now very huge. And I kind of like Disney.
Chapter 8: What are the implications of rising home delistings in the current market?
And I kind of like the three of them competing each other for the consumer. I kind of like that. I'm not sure I want Netflix to get even bigger. So, you know, and I think I'm one of the rational guys, in my opinion.
You know what I would be looking at right now from Netflix? I'd be looking at Bob Iger, okay? Because the perfect case study is who has done this in the past before? Or it's only one guy. And that's Iger. What did Iger do?
He bought Star Wars. He bought this.
He bought Marvel. He bought everybody. One by one by one, he was going around buying everybody. How did that do? Did it work out? Maybe it did work out. Maybe it's the woke stuff that didn't work out for them. But when you think about what's in the Time Warner catalog, Top three largest library in Hollywood. You got DC Universe. You got Harry Potter. You got Lord of the Rings. The Hobbit.
The Matrix. Mad Max. The Conjuring Universe. Stephen King's library elements. Godzilla. Lego movies. Creed. Then you have the old school stuff, The Wizard of Oz, Casablanca, Singing in the Rain, Rebel With a Cause, Ben-Hur.
And then you have the HBO, because that comes with it as well, Game of Thrones, which is legendary, Soprano, Succession, The Wire, Euphoria, True Detective, Sex and the City, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Boardwalk Empire. And then you have a couple other things. You've got Real Sports, Hard Knocks, decades of award-winning documentaries that... HBO is done. On top of that, you get Friends, the series.
You get The Big Bang Theory, Young Sheldon, ER, West Wing, Gilmore Girls, Pretty Little Liars, Supernatural, Two and a Half Men, and then additional, The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, Final Destination, Nightmare on Elm Street, Rush Hour, Blade. By the way, if I keep going here, you're going to sit there and say, are you freaking kidding me? So how many chances...
Is Netflix going to get to buy a catalog this big that they just fit into it?
Well, this is why, one, and this is why it's now a public hostile takeover with an open bid. Are you saying it's done? I don't think it's done. I think ultimately... Ultimately, Paramount wins because they're in startup mode and they'll be more willing to take a little bit of pain and go forward. And I believe Ellison is a longer term thinker.
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