Tran Girlismo Apr 15, 2026

Episode 11: The Geopolitical Shapes Place

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Concept

car insurance

Car insurance is what you pay so that if something bad happens—like an accident or theft—the insurance helps pay the bill. “Full coverage” usually means you’re covered for more than just basic liability.

Concept

car getting stolen

Car theft is when someone steals your vehicle. If you have the right insurance coverage, it can help you recover financially after the theft.

Term

full coverage

“Full coverage” usually means your insurance covers more than just other people’s injuries. It often includes protection for your own car if it gets stolen or damaged.

Car

Dodge Omni

The Omni is a small car model from Dodge. It’s the kind of vehicle people might talk about because it’s older or connected to a specific interest. The podcast is using it as a joke or theme.

Term

gas

They mean the price you pay for gasoline at the pump. If it goes up a lot, driving anywhere costs more money.

Concept

electricity transmission lines

These are the big power lines that carry electricity from power plants to homes and businesses. They’re how electricity gets from far away to where you live.

Car

Infiniti QX80

The QX80 is a large luxury SUV meant for comfortable rides and space. It’s the kind of vehicle people talk about when discussing big, powerful versions. The podcast is referencing a hypothetical high-performance take on it.

Concept

700 horsepower

Horsepower is a number that tells you how powerful the engine is. Higher horsepower usually means the car can accelerate more strongly.

Concept

rebadged Nissan products

“Rebadged” means a vehicle is essentially the same platform and engineering as another brand’s model, but sold under a different badge and usually with different styling or trim. The speaker is criticizing Infiniti for relying heavily on Nissan-derived products.

Concept

platform share

Platform sharing means two different cars are built on the same basic “skeleton.” It helps companies make cars faster and cheaper.

Term

burnouts

A burnout is when you spin the tires while the car is stopped or moving slowly, usually to make smoke. It’s fun-looking, but it can wear out tires fast and may be illegal.

Concept

tax and title

When you buy a car, the price you see online usually doesn’t include everything. Taxes and title/registration fees are added on top, so the total cost is higher.

Term

four wheel drive

Four-wheel drive means the car can send power to all four wheels. That usually helps with grip, so it can do more dramatic driving moves safely (like donuts) compared to a car that only powers two wheels.

Brand

Chrysler

Chrysler is another major American car company. The speaker is using it as part of a comparison group for brands that haven’t been doing great lately.

Term

Brent crude

Brent crude is a type of oil that the world uses as a price reference. If the price jumps, it can make fuel and transportation more expensive, which can affect car costs too.

Concept

mpg

MPG (miles per gallon) is a measure of fuel efficiency for gasoline vehicles. The host cites an “Atlas mpg” figure to contrast with EVs, implying that conventional fuel economy is still a key selling point for some buyers.

Term

EVs

EVs are electric cars. Instead of using gas, they run on electricity stored in a battery.

Company

Tesla

Tesla is one of the best-known electric car companies. The speaker is saying Tesla’s influence changed how everyone else thinks about EVs.

Concept

tendency of the rate of profit to fall

This is an economics idea about why companies’ profits can get harder over time. They’re using it to explain why businesses might make decisions that don’t feel great for customers.

Concept

electric cars

They’re talking about electric cars and who’s making the best ones. The takeaway is that some less-famous companies might be doing a great job with EVs.

Concept

tariffs

A tariff is basically a tax on imported products. If steel and aluminum get taxed more, car companies that use those metals can end up paying more, and that can make cars cost more too.

Concept

Nürburgring

The Nürburgring is a well-known race track in Germany. People often watch races there on TV, and the speaker is referencing that kind of racing coverage.

Brand

Ferrari

Ferrari is a famous Italian car company that makes high-end sports cars and races in Formula 1. The hosts are basically saying Ferrari is doing great right now.

Concept

F1

F1 is the top level of open-wheel racing. They’re saying the test car looks like it mixes ideas from F1 with other race categories.

Concept

public comment

Public comment is a chance for regular people to share their opinions before a plan is finalized. Here, it’s about a rail plan in Washington.

Company

Burlington Northern Santa Fe

BNSF is a big freight railroad company in the U.S. If they own the tracks, their freight schedules can limit when and how passenger trains run.

Concept

Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix

That’s a car event in Pittsburgh for classic race cars. People who love older cars go to watch them and meet other fans.

LIVE

All right three two one

Yeah, I was about to say I was just like wow we're really holding this week, huh?

Hello, and welcome to episode 11 of trans girlies. Well the only automotive podcast where one of your hosts is so fucking mad at the

Rabbit dog of the country America that she lives in she's decided to pick up Maoist standard English as a second language. I

The other host is gonna stage an intervention because nothing gets commuted some more made fun of than a Maoist

White people trying to do Mao shit

Hi, I'm I am that host. I am Victoria Scott my pronouns are she and her and I'm here with my co-host

Hi, my name is Duran Hoffs that are my pronouns are she and her

Victoria what a fucking nightmare fucking week

Yeah, you know, we've been I've been trying really hard at least to be like all right

I'm back in the States from my you know whirlwind European tour that still I can't shut up about you know again being an embarrassing

American

I'm gonna just pretend things are going back to normal

There is there is something that I've wanted to talk about in the show for a while

Which is I there is a possibility that in the near future. I might end up with a car again

It is a car

That I would love I don't want to go into details because I was waiting to like get the car and do pictures

Oh, I had a whole story planned. I had

This this like big kind of like surprise thing for it that I wanted to launch with the show

but the thing is see is the car is in another state and

You know the podcast is doing well

But it is still my only source of like my income my wife, you know works

But like we don't make a ton of money

So I'd like to have like a relatively stable foundation if I'm gonna pick up the major expense of a car all the gas

It needs and car insurance, which I'm doing full coverage this time after having a bit last time by my car getting stolen

Correct, it turns out that it is impossible to plan any aspect of your life when you live in the United States of America in

2026

And so I feel like we have to discuss the fact that

There is no tangible future whatsoever for basically anybody on earth right now

Because it turns out that the Omni crisis has consumed my my specific hobby

Of the wanting to buy a shitty old car

the Omni crisis has consumed your

Your ability to plan because you have horrid horrid anxiety my dear friend

It's hard to plan. I have the flight

To go to another state. I have to drive through a bunch of states where they've recently they're flirting with making it like actually

Unarrestable offense to piss in Idaho

Which is a problem for me because I need to drive through Idaho to get back here from most states because I live in Washington

Which shares a land border?

And go the long way come on

I know but then I have to drive through California where gas is currently $6 a gallon and in a month. It might be 10

Because we we you know, I have the notes here

I've been writing them down through the week and they changes every fucking five minutes

So they're pointless at this point when I wrote the notes the first time Brent crude oil spot-pricing

To not futures but like present like give me oil right now was a hundred and forty four dollars a standard barrel

Which was an all-time high higher than when Russia invaded Ukraine higher than coven higher than the great financial crisis

Because Trump had promised that he was going to wipe out Iranian civilization

And everybody had that fun day remember Tuesday where everybody was like, ooh, are we gonna use nuclear weapons?

Maybe we're just gonna destroy every power plant for a city for a country of 90 million people

And no one can stop him cool. This is great

So, you know that that's spiked oil prices then they came way way back down like to a day later because he and unilaterally

What could go wrong?

Yeah, the straight was open and then immediately Israel decided to go back to massacring people in the southern southern Lebanon and killed like 300 civilians

Just leveled entire apartment blocks because they were like you can't stop us

Because no one can stop us because that's the world we live in is no one can stop them

They're right. Nobody has the political will or the the moral backbone to stop them

But Iran was like you can't do that that was in the ceasefire and it turned out that there was never actually a ceasefire written

There was not a single document. There was a version in Farsi and there was a version in English and they didn't match

And one of the first vibes based ceasefire

I think we've ever like the most vibes based ceasefire since like that story from World War one where they just played

Soccer with each other, which I don't I don't think that's true

I don't think that's true like if that's true

World the world is nicer than I like to think but like I don't think that story is true. I don't

All those guys were hamburger meat

In a bayonet charge, you know what I mean?

Yeah, one of the things about World War one that many people said was that like, you know

It was really a chill time of a good time for everybody involved. It didn't make anybody become a weird fascist

Nobody everybody was like that was a fun time. We should do it again sometime, which is why they had a second one

I'll see you again in twenty five years

David this this this ceasefire that didn't exist

Lasted for all of like 12 hours two ships got through but it was enough for the market to be like

Oh, it's fine and get an oil went down to like oil futures again and not spot price

But like oil futures went back down to like ninety two dollars a barrel

Which is still thirty dollars more than it was three months ago, but it was it's

Normal for whatever normal is and now of course this morning my wife every morning this week

I roll over my wife beats me awake every day because she just naturally wakes up at 7 a.m

No matter what barista barista power

Barista power. Yeah, so I roll over and she's like did you read yet? And as I'm like bleary-eyed

Looking at my phone. I'm like, oh god. What did he do this time? And she's like, oh, yeah

We're we're blockading the Strait of Hormuz ourselves now and I was like what you you're joking surely you're joking

I'm I'm half asleep. I am hungover because I did I scanned film for 11 hours yesterday

And I just like got carried away drinking the chemicals. Why were you hungover?

Well, thank you. What was it gonna scan sober come on?

Okay, sure. Yeah, have you ever operated a plus tech 120? It is the most mind-numbing activity in existence

You kind of get us hell right now

Honestly, I was pretty it was pretty cathartic and I was with a friend's place

So it was it was fun, but I it's I went to bed at 1 a.m. Cuz I scanned literally for all day

Mm-hmm. I was standing until 12 30 in the morning. I

Really, I think the best way there's two ways to describe our current moment

Through memes and media as Americans are want to do it's either burger or cultural reference

And I'm gonna hit you with the cultural reference

Do you remember the episode of Futurama where they find the robot who has the paddle wheel inside her?

And if she runs out of water, she's gonna die and every like 30 minutes or so

She just starts screaming that this is this is it this time's for for sure

This does feel like what the oil market is doing

We're running out of oil

Like the ships are finally getting here that we're finally going to stop get living in a world in which commodities magically manifest in front of our eyes I

Don't think so nothing ever happens Victoria. That's like nothing ever happens like that's the

Tuesday day full of anxiety. What happened nothing

Like the wars will happen the horrors will continue unabated, but nothing

Significant is going to like

Here's the thing, right? It's like this is the realization I have when I was like watching all this is I'm like I

If we had nuked Iran, I probably would have woke up the next day and continued with my stupid meaningless life

That's where I like this podcast does pretty well

I would continue like flipping light switches and electricity would flow from like the dams built in the

1930s through the transmission lines that cut all the way across the Cascades

Directly to my home where I can get electricity

And I could have gone to the Trader Joe's and I could have bought coffee that was imported here from Brazil

And you know made my little my little stupid little coffees in the poor over coffees in the morning

And so I am under no illusions that like as an American

I am directly impacted by any of this shit because I like I am not the key focus here

We kill we've already killed 2000 people in Iran the Israelis have killed

I don't even fucking know how many people at this point where it's gonna take a generation to count all the dead

From the past what four years at this point and bipartisan consensus that they get to kill whoever they want

So I'm not and I am not trying to center myself. I am putting this in the episode

I wanted to talk about this simply because I don't know how much longer I can magically flip a light switch and electricity

Comes to my home through like the you know for free basically

I mean it costs money, but like we do not live in a depression era mentality

Like my grandparents grew up with that, you know my great-grandparents migrated here because there was no food in Greece

Different kinds of material scarcity mindset and like I don't know how long can I keep making coffee for I?

Don't know it certainly wouldn't be unprecedented in world history for an empire to fall and stop being able to source coffee like

You know your

Yes, Jordan. Did you see the did you see the post earlier today where it was just

Someone going like basically the Iranians told JD Vance to go fuck himself and his

His demands and I just have to imagine there was someone across from him

Going like so like what gas is eight dollars?

Eight dollars a gallon over the summer. Do you think they're gonna put you in a nice prison?

Like do you think they're gonna put you specifically in one of the good ones like do you think you even think you're gonna make prison like again

My rant from the other episode

Duncan doughnuts America does run on Duncan if coffee disappears. We're doing January

6600 word word

We're doing January sixes that we haven't even conceived of before

I don't know. I mean it's like water the field of

Progress with the blood of tyrants so we could get our little treats back in order

I don't know. It's just like I you know and this is kind of like it's coming to a head with this car thing

I spent like an hour talking to my mother-in-law earlier like hey do you have some advice for me because I you're like

Wiser than me. You are like, you know, it's she's a bit why are you giving me that look she's a very sweet lady

No, no, no, no, sorry. Sorry. Sorry. I almost I almost accidentally closed to the tab that you were in

I I did a weird trackpad mistake for a second and I was I was making that face because I was worried I was

I was about to leave you

And so like on one hand, I'm like genuinely sick to my stomach that we keep killing people

Yeah, and I can seemingly do nothing to stop it because I think we're gonna have bipartisan consensus that like killing people in the Middle East is fine

That's just been the status my whole life through both parties

Nobody seems to have the appetite to say hey actually maybe we should not do this and that would be what I'd actually like

So I'm not getting that and I'm just gonna be sick about it forever and that I should be like don't get me wrong

That is

I think that comes with being American is you just should feel kind of sick all the time about all the people this country

Berries for no goddamn good reason

But on the other hand

Like I've been carrying that for years. That's you know, that's

Feeling very direct and but it is not a new feeling she has

The entire time I've known her

On the other hand though

Yeah, the other hand though

This whole like so three like in a month and a half from now if I'm going to go fly out to pick up a car

And drive it over 2,000 miles home. I don't know what the laws are going to be like in the state of Idaho

Um or anywhere else for that matter, but Idaho is the really risky one right now because they've got like a

really it's like

genuinely not looking great there, uh, which I knew was going to be the case

Why I moved to Washington, but like Idaho is looking dodgy. I don't know what gas is going to cost

I don't know if like I imagine air carriers are going to have to cut back some flights and cancel a bunch of shit

If jet a ends up doubling again, uh in the next like

Two months, which it very well could if we cut off 25 of the world's oil supply

Overnight that's just you don't like

There is a basic supply and demand thing here and like, uh, the because other countries have the ability to preserve

Their domestic supply. I think it's going to be more serious in the u.s. Where we can refine less of our way

Doesn't matter. It doesn't fucking matter. I why do I know all this?

So I can go buy a $3,000 car. I'm doing the math on things that is just I have no power

And I am going insane

And I don't know how you wake up every day

And I send my I send my stupid little emails and I make my dumb little pour over coffee

And I just do not know how to keep functioning normally

That is why I put this in because I imagined lots of people who are listening

feel similarly

I've told you personally often about how I reached these depths of despair

Often and I'm not numb to it now

But in fact it well, it's just like

I where you

Where you are led

We're both at the point where I you know getting out of bed is pretty hard, but also

Yeah, I at least for a long time. I at least had a day job. I quite liked which I

As of this recording did and you still have that day job, which is great. Um

And like I I love my life my my little life here is so delightful. However

It's really hard to get out of bed in the morning. Uh, it's really hard to

There's a lot during the first Trump administration. I had to learn about how to consume news in such a way

That did not

Make me go on a grippy sock vacation

And I I I'm still using all of those tools, which is how I stay. I like micro dose it

Uh rather than just mainlining it

but like

You know, I have to cling to things like

Orban eating shit in a landslide in Hungary

I have to I have to take these things such as like, you know what?

Like are things going to get rough for us here in America? Yes

But also we're losing this we're losing this we're getting our pants beat diplomatically and that's

It's hi beepo. Uh, it's in fact good that this is happening because I I just see this administration

They are going through the death spiral of

They can't even do the Nixon administration, right? Which I'm not saying Nixon even did the Nixon administration, right?

But like this is what happens when you like are as bad as Nixon, but somehow you're a sober man

You know, this is sober dementia man rather than a guy who was so drunk all the time. He was wiretapping himself

And thankfully last time I checked Henry Kissinger is still dead. So that's true

He is if people want to keep tabs on that just to make sure

If these people take axes I can't say that never mind

I I was thinking about it and I was like, nope. All right. They would time to reel it back in what I will say is this

Uh, there is a bottle of very nice champagne in my fridge for when it happens

And the promise of it happening

Is all that keeps me going sometimes not even because I think it will lead to material change

It will make my life better or stop the pogroms against like, you know

immigrants the united states or

To curtail the rise of ice or help with trans rights or stop our domestic policy of killing literally

Any person trying to build a better world?

in the middle east or global south

But I do think that I could use the celebration, uh, and it will be fun

Because I think that broadly that will probably fracture America in a way that we'll never recover from

Which that that like this interregnum is what's killing me, right? Like

The beast the beast is lurching and dying and bleeding out and I'm like damn. That's crazy

I what am I supposed to do? I'm waiting for it to stop breathing. Oh my god. Yeah, but this I swear to god

I just I don't know

I don't know because like

There's comfort in that every single generation of humans has thought that they had the world is ending around them

Every every generation of humans is arrogant enough to assume that we are seeing

I thought my country was gonna kill like five million people this week

And I really did too for a couple hours and then I realized nah

Like no because once there are certain things that we could do that we'll still have global

repercussions. That's one of them

You know moose has been closed for a month though

Yeah, and that's not like this ship. It's not good

But you know what yeah, I hate to say this is the problem

You can't sail the log way around we did it for oh, we did it for a while around this

You can't sail oil out of the Strait of Hormuz

Other without

If it's blockaded the 25% of the world's oil is just stuck in that

Very oil rich region of the world

Gas will be expensive for a while. We'll start refining more of it at home

We need plastic. This is what I'm saying, right? It's like we don't need plastic. We like plastic

There there are two schools of thought here, right? There is

Nothing ever happens or we kill five million people either of those could happen tomorrow and the day after and the day after

Um, both of us we could both be wrong. We could we can't both be right. That's for sure

Uh, one of us one of us is either right or both of us are wrong

I just I don't know how to survive to the 1980s

Barely this is yeah, but we did

We we did but also like that's kind of like a when the long run we all die and it's like yeah, that's true

I I need to know whether or not I can get an airplane and drive across the united states

in a month and a half

And or whether gas is going to be

$12 a gallon and Idaho is going to have bounty hunters rolling around with like technicals with tranny seeking missiles

Those aren't real free band name, by the way

Yeah, you should yeah. Yeah, uh, those aren't real

If maybe look into the quote on what shipping a car would be

That's too much

It's more than the car's worth. It's more than the car's worth

The gas you put in it might be more than the car's worth by the time we get there. It's a

Anything you do is more than the car's worth, you know

Uh, anyway, this is the uh, this is the this is the jordan and vicky geopolitics 20 minutes

Yeah, it's the uh, it's the uh

You and I are the perfect yin and yang of very similar women, which uh

I know one of my one of the things I say is we're different women. The thing is we're not that different

I just have to look at the bright side or I would have ended it years ago

And you are better at just keep going in the like oh god. It's all over

I live in the worst so back

The glass is half of all will be will be fine

No, I I am the type of the amount of water the glass never changes. It's fine

I'm the type of person who read kamu and was like damn this guy's spittin

I love staring into the maw of my meetinglessness

Uh, and just like my complete lack of power and then just getting

A little probably too close sometimes, but also I you know, I'm honest with myself about

All of this gesturing to life broadly the other thing that I think is worth mentioning here

That's driving me batshit insane

Uh to bring it back to the show

Like a sensible topic

Have you seen did you see the thing that I posted in the show notes about the infinity executive?

Yeah, well to be fair one. I have to imagine being one of the chief executives at infinity

Must be like being one of those japanese soldiers in the middle of the pacific who don't realize the war is over like what?

Hey, how many I don't know how many things it fit like are they still selling the g 37?

What are they doing?

I have such a great foray into that but just to click get everybody up to speed

I'll post it in the show notes as well, but um

The drive got a scoop this week

Joel fetter wrote a piece up about an infinity executive. It was specifically

tiago castro

who told the drive

that

theoretically the company would like to build a 700 horsepower qx 80

Um, and this is kind of like yeah, but this is one of those things where it's like

What world are you living in like and this is the bridging these gaps?

I wrote an article like a couple years ago about it was called the the emperor's large luxury suv

About the dissonance between living in the material world where people are harmed

And in the corporate world where like next quarter is all that exists and profit is literally your god

Because I think that americans worship money

and

So like it's really like nobody knows what's going to happen corporations have decided okay

Well, let's pretend nothing is happening that worked that works great until it doesn't and somebody else has always left holding the bag

So fuck it

the america taxpayer

taxpayer rather

yeah, um, so I would like to uh in in the in the spirit of uh

Perpetual ridiculous optimism. Let's do a review quickly of what infinity does what they're making and where they're going

Oh god, uh, so it's all rebadged nissan products which already not great not great

Uh, the qx 80 last got a refresh sometime

It was the qx 80 brand new in like 2015

No, no they refreshed it more recently. Okay, because I was about to say I was like one of those is what ran me off the road on my aprilia

Scooter many years ago a lady was texting and driving and rather than me getting flattened by a qx 80. Oh shapesplace speaking of

One of the highlights of this week. Yeah

Yeah, uh, a wonderful wonderful person. Uh, Nathan made us a song

Uh that we will put at the end of the episode baffling baffling was incredible. It was so good

I cackled like a maniac

I did too. I was also deeply that's the other thing where the this last week has felt unreal for a variety of not fun personal reasons

And also I got very sick

So I was just and my wife was in chicago without me

So I was just kind of

home in the uh alone

And you were in the victoria scott thought zone

Yeah, because uh, I was having nightmare fever visions any time I fell asleep. I

Tuesday night or tuesday before before the the truth nuke rather than the actual nuke got dropped

I spent a lot of my day wandering around with my camera because I took a mental health day from work for

Not mental health reasons. Yeah. Yeah, that's yeah, that's um, yeah

I uh

I then had a lovely night with my wife and then

Uh as uh, she goes to bed before I do and then I go, huh

I'm really freezing cold

That's weird because it's 70 degrees of the house and then I was just like, uh, maybe I'm just having like a reverse hot flash or whatever

And then I go sit down at the basement

I am in

A hoodie and sweats under a blanket with a space heater pointed at me shivering

Beepo around me and I'm just like, well, she doesn't feel hot

Like I don't I don't know what's wrong. And then yeah, I spent several hours shivering in bed and then I was just like

I'm probably finding that I wake up the next morning

dying um

So that's that's how I spent our horror uh geopolitical week. Um

Where did I get started on that was that there was a point about infinity in there? I think uh

Well, I was just gonna say you were you were saying you were doing kind of bleak this week

Yeah, it's a bleak week. But yeah, this is one of those things where I'm just like, uh

To be an infinity executive must already have the sort of cognitive impairment of like getting kicked in the head by a horse

so like

That that's like worse than being a regular automotive executive or even worse than being a regular nissan executive at this point

Like I have to imagine I was making clear decisions as my brain was boiling away and I was hugging a toilet bowl

Uh about as much as this guy being like, yeah, we can put 800 horsepower in a qx 80

Well, yeah, because I wanted to say like the the thing about the qx 80, right?

I wanted to talk about infinity's product strategy and we got into you hugging the toilet bowl

Which is like to be fair

There so there there's sensible plan is to add one model per year

Um over the next couple of years to become like, I don't know lower volume boutique

What everybody's doing, which is there are fewer people with money. So let's sell to them instead of selling to like poor people

Yeah, uh jerk off motion fart noise. Um, astin martin spending 300 million dollars developing a car for one guy

Yeah, did you see that?

No, that's not in the notes

Yeah, I know I this is just like a

Fuck it's stupid stupid world. We live in anyways. Yes infinity

Um infinity, uh, you know it's being part of nissan you would assume like okay

Well, they must be like planning to make e v's in some way like that seems to be where the market's going

And nissan makes the leaf which was the first mass market e v ever built

They should have made they should have made a nice leaf like lexus did make a nice prius

I know the little lexus prius the ct 200 h that thing fucking rocks

I've got to let beepo out of the room. I'll be right back. You go you go off. Okay. Okay. I'll keep going off. Um

So, you know nissan dominated global e v sales for most of the 20 the 2010s

Until they were dethroned in 2020 by tesla with the model three

But they had this massive lead over the entire like automotive industry

Which they squandered basically for an entire decade and never developed in infinity

Kind of neglected the leaf for a while in favor of the nissan aria

Which is a very solidly mediocre suv

Which they then canceled sale american sales of this year to focus on the new leaf instead

Which apparently is good again

But the thing that I would ask you is when has anybody besides the two of us talked about the nissan leaf in the past?

about our four years, let's say

Oh, yeah, what's used? What's you said four years? I immediately go, uh

Uh, the last time I saw

The leaf nismo ever come out

in the us

Don't think it did. No, it only was a japan only thing. I think they were filming an ad for it in austin

That's the only reason because I saw somewhat

I that really cute thing that I forgot they still do for car commercials where it is driving around a city

But by driving around a city, it's on a flat bed

Yeah, drive it around. We'll ask to get the reflections and stuff

Uh-huh

But yeah, so after last episode I was looking at used leaves there

They are either not working or they're in good enough shape that they're expensive again

Yeah, well, that's what happens with gas is

An average of four fifteen or whatever a gallon it'll be like six dollars by the time this episode comes out

But in any case, so you would think like infinity would be like, okay

We you know, they had it planned to enter an eeve and into

production in

2025 when they unveiled a concept coup

Evie in 2023

Um, it was supposed to platform share with the electric maxima both of those cars don't exist

Um, yeah, that is that is a shapes place uh for neeson executives

Um, so you might say well, how is infinities relevance doing?

Uh infinity recovered quite well from the global financial crash in 2008 and they reached a record high

Sales of 150,000 vehicles give or take in the us in 2017

Which is pretty solid like all things considered

That feels late last year

Last year they sold 58,000 cars in total

Uh, which is about a hundred thousand less than they sold, you know

Eight years before. Yeah

Uh, I know capitalist, but that seems like it might be a problem if you need to grow things. I don't know

Uh line go line not supposed to go down line line's supposed to go up mods

mods

my juice

I spilled my profits jute mods mods

That is what if you want to talk about like the big three bailouts of of oh

Like it is mods mods. I spilled my juice. Where are my profits?

And it's just like look you could have more juice, but I need you to here's a gun and you've got a shoot potty act in the head

Oh rest in peace

Infinity ended last year with two cars

They had the qx80

Yes

They had the qx80 the full size body on frame for your suv that is a Nissan armada

Or I think it's an armada. Yeah, it's not let me I wrote it down somewhere in the notes. Hang on a second

If it's not the armada, I don't know what the fuck it is. I think it's I think it's the armada. Yeah, it's the it's the armada

Um and the qx60 which is a rebadged pathfinder. I think

Also a three row suv

well

So, okay, when did the

Wait, wait, wait. What?

They added a third car this year to their lineup. Okay. It's the infinity qx65

Which is the identical copy of the qx60, but instead of being at it looking like an suv it has a

Coupé roof line

It's more svelte and it's missing a row and it has less cargo space, but it's an identical drivetrain that nobody likes

Um, so that's a third vehicle

It's it you may notice all of these cars are gas only they don't have a single hybrid even

Um, I had to check I really was like maybe they're doing crazy shit over there and we're just not appreciating it

Because it doesn't happen sometimes. Uh-huh. Sometimes a car company makes really good stuff. It just doesn't get noticed

No, they are just not making cars. Um, so you would say

Yeah, you would say okay

Next year they're gonna add another car. They've announced it is definitely a car

So perfect time for like the infinity leaf, you know, call it like a maple or something

Fancy or like wood grain leather upholstery

infinity version of the leaf

No, um, it's gonna be a sports sedan revival of the q50

If you remember that car, which which was the g 37, right?

Which is the g 39 successor which were

Gee, whatever the hell they were at and then then yeah the g 37 because uh, the 35 the svp of us marketing and sales

Castro bought a g 35 is his first car when he moved to the us a couple decades ago

And it's convinced him that like they needed to get back in touch with their like sports car routes

Which is crazy to me because like okay, so this week I went out and got dinner

Um with with my girlfriend Liz, right? We went to uh, we went and got dinner together

We were sitting at the bus stop waiting for it to take us home and like two kids

I felt really bad actually afterward because like a all blacked out

Uh, infinity g 37 on like knockoff ebay wheels

Dark overly dark illegal tints led everything like, uh, you know, you could tell the coilovers were cheap slam

Dish slam dish

Uh, it was you could tell the coilovers were cheap because the way it bounced over bumps

It rolled past us stopped at a light and inside where I swear to god children driving it

Like it was like it was like a 16 year old who had like just grown his first facial hair

And like they weren't doing hot dog shit

They weren't doing anything mockable

But I did kind of laugh because it was just the perfect reveal of like, ah, yes the the

The g 37 has been passed on to the next generation of enthusiasts

Time out

Hot dog shit

Hot dog in it, you know

What do you

That's a new one for me. They're like doing burnouts or you know

Heavy lead footed throttle work or whatever. Okay. I've never heard that referred to hot dog in it

I was about to say is this like dragging in your car or you're trying to put your dick in the exhaust or something

No, hot hot the hot dog in at dictionary.com the active one who hot dogs

The performance of intricate daring or flamboyant stunts

Sure. Yeah

You know like

It was first the origins come from the 1960s

Okay, all right, so so the stuff you had at the vault with you got a got a got a got

That's true. Yes. Yeah

It came up a bunch on my talkies. I don't know why you haven't heard it before

My radio programs

Yeah

Describing the fawns hot dogging another motorcycle trick

Yeah, I like I don't know

I guess in my mind the infinity lineup has been frozen in that like 2017 because I'm like, well, they make like the hatchback

That's really like a cla underneath

No, they make the they make the coop. I I was like they're selling q 60s, which is like the the

The coop of the q 50. I'm like, oh, they're gonna sell that forever like

They he's on has made

Oh god, what is uh

Vr 38s. Is that their six cylinder?

Well, the v3 v. Okay, so uh the vr. 38 d e t t

Is there is the gtr motor?

Okay, what's their regular v6 that's been in everything since the dawn of time?

You mean the vq the vq

Yeah, the vq. I think the successor motor was the vg, but they don't do that anymore the uh the motor that's in the

60 and 65 is a turbo four. I think

That makes sense. Oh my god. I didn't I didn't I don't

Qx 60 engine. Yeah, two liter four cylinder

Uh, it was originally a vq 35 de and then they dropped that in favor of the turbo probably for

Yeah, it's a kr 20 d et now

uh because they

Wanted to um meet automotive emissions and fuel economy standards

And it's due to nissan's push to transition its vehicle line ups to 100 all electric vehicles by the 2030s

They should get started on that well to wait a copy that's still on their website, right?

They just never forgot to tape. Oh, okay. That's a wikipedia and its citation is uh

An article from gm authority

Yeah

Source

I was trying to figure out. Okay, then okay, so they've

I was like

There's a 26 twin turbo that is in the the z

And by new I mean, I think it's a detuned gtr motor

Oh, yeah that thing. I don't remember where that comes from. Don't quiz me. I saw one for real the other day

I was shocked

Posted on the trend grillesmo blue sky account because I was so surprised to see a non

Nismo z

There's like three of them that roll around to pittsburgh. They're apparently uh

Millennials are bought or not millennials. Gen Xers are the ones who are buying those by the way

Well, gen X is the only one who has any money and it was a car that came out in the 70s. So uh, that makes perfect sense to me

Mm-hmm

In any case

The so so you would think after all this they're like, okay

Um, you know, the the earliest planned hybrid is the year

2028 um

Because that's going to be a Nissan road with an infinity badge apparently that's the discussion

Um, cool

But in the meantime, tiego castro told the drive that uh

They kind of they they want quote. They're looking at like a performance line

Uh qx80 and so he said quote when we look at the performance line one the qx80 today has 450 horsepower

So we want something that is significantly better. So should we have 700 horsepower?

Ideally we can get 700 immediately or is it better to have something in between? That's the discussion right now timing is key

And quote

Sure, man. Yeah, you know, what's a very like easy way to get like

Really impressive horsepower numbers and also like cut down on your global emissions. Maybe if you made them EVs you stupid mother fuckers

Just

Re-badge it with the like

What is the infinity symbol even supposed to be because it's not like it's not the infinity logo

It's not like the symbol for infinity. No, it's like a well, it's I don't I don't actually know

It's like an oval with a triangle cut out

Yeah, it's an oval that like is already compromised, which again is infinity's whole deal

Nissan doesn't even like

Stella and I I our our nissan centra is a reliable highway miler who is like

Does it really cause us problems? But like

According to nissan and this is again, I am reading from wikipedia. I usually do more research than this

But jordan just keeps asking me questions. I really want to know the answer to

According to nissan the infinity logo is a stylized representation of a road extending to the horizon and of mount fuji

Reflecting its japanese origins

It's an American only car company

Like right like they said they only sold infinities in north america, right?

Cuz i'm pretty sure yeah

In the forza games

Do you know what they badge infinity as?

In american automaker

They call that shamerican. Yeah

Uh, they apparently have sold some in europe

At some points, but I don't know if they currently are selling them in europe

Um, they don't sell them in russia and belarus anymore

Why would happen?

Yeah, I don't

They're in november of 2021. They said there would be a hundred percent all electric by 2030

So that's a cool

Let's just i'll give them the rest of this. I was about to say i'll give them the rest of i'll give them all of

2020-60 even though we're a quarter in already, but like yeah

Speaking of timing being key, right? Like um, it would it

Just the just the qx80 right which is a full-size body on frame

suv

Um, I looked this up because I was curious without destination

And like tax and title and all that it is $83,750 starting price starting

It's starting price that is what it clocks in at

Yeah, yeah, yeah, uh

It which I guess like if you think of it and here's the thing right you must expand your mind

And go into you have to shift into automotive journalist brain because this is what I did for a long time

That's still like it's still like

That's like $10,000 less than the starting price of lx i'm pretty sure

What does the lx start at now?

I don't know. What does a land cruiser end at?

Yeah, the lexus lx

Starts at $108,450

So this is really actually kind of a bargain and this is the thing

This is why I went insane right is because I've I I've never I

Take most of my 30s based on my current earnings potential to be able to afford one infinity qx80

And I think I would spend the money differently. Also, uh, it gets an epa rated combined 17 miles per gallon

Are you allowed to sell things for the numbers that low? That's not like a ferrari

I thought that you just couldn't do that anymore because Americans would like

Fucking do a fucking walk in a do the fucking abe simpson thing and just walk in throw their hat down and then pick it up

Hello. Oh my god

Being attacked by beep beep

But putting her uh putting her back so she's front declawed but not back declawed. I would never declaw a cat

This is a previous owner thing. Uh, so she doesn't really know what to do with her backlog

Anyways, that's a long way of saying that she just pierced my tit with

Yeah, but anyway, that's just I just thought it'd be fun to do an infinity episode because we're ragged on like every car manufacturer here

And infinity is kind of like it almost feels bad

But like it still doesn't feel bad enough. I wouldn't do it

You know, okay

So can I I'll I'm gonna this is uh, this is I'm not still sick, but I am frazzled

Uh, because I didn't really sleep last night for a lot of reasons, but uh, so I'm pretty out of what are you doing?

She keeps trying to get down and then I go, okay

I'm gonna let you down and then she's just like actually throw myself over mama's shoulder and go limp

Throw myself over mama's shoulder and go completely limp

Uh infinity there was a time and I think the early 2010s

where infinities were like

Cool and desirable and really seemed to be pushing things

Forward yeah, it was like it was in the air in the upswing

It was that exciting

It was the it was the uh, the the absolute peak of nissan

And infinity right before if things started to fall out and then of course the carlos goad of it all

But like do you remember the q-50 orouge concept?

Which was the nissan gtr driveline in a pretty handsome sedan?

Yes

Yeah, I do one sebastian battleobos murdered me in one of those

Really?

Yeah, he was doing trying to hate crime situation or no. No. No. No. He's a very sweet very uh gay friendly man

Okay, good

No, he was doing uh, he was trying to do four wheel drive bird out doughnut things and then it hooked up for a second

And it did lunge towards exactly where I was in the crowd at the moment

I think friend of the show or at least friend of mine elizabeth blackstock was also like might have been in the car for part of that demo run

Uh, but like that was if they had put that into production

That would have been such a cool thing and then you know

Their design language was actually pretty

Good for a while. I thought the q-50. I thought the q-50 was a perfectly handsome little thing

Well, you know, it's funny you mentioned. Yeah

It's funny you mentioned the arouge because the they they did actually put out a design concept of a qx-80

With a gtr drivetrain in it. They had a thousand horsepower

So I guess that's like gonna be their priority trick forever. It's like the hellcat formula, right? Take a gtr drivetrain

Drop it and something else

The nissan juke are

Was the sickest thing that they those fucking sick perverts at nissan

They whoever greenlit that and I think they sold I think they ended up at first

I think they were not going to sell it to anyone and then I think they sold

five to like

Various sickos and perverts who we would love to say like I was gonna well

I don't know about that because I think it was all like saudi and barady royal families, but

Look man, like I you gotta let me have a drink and you gotta be cool trans women, but you can still come on

I would love to pick the salt in the brunette's brain about his car collection. Let's be real here. He's not allowed to talk about it

Well, he's gotten a lot of trouble

Break break the radio silence and come on the show and talk about like why you expect like a wagon Rolls Royce's with tan interiors

Sorry, I just thought about uh

I just thought about us somehow getting a royal family member decapitated or something and I'm like, ah

Is that how we make our first real news headlines?

I don't again my main goal is to not cause any actual harm with

Generally my existence, but the very least the show

uh-huh, uh-huh um

Yeah, I just I I

nissan's like

Nissan is up there with dodge and chrysler in terms of

Car brads that are really skating on

Decisions they made 10 years ago

Yeah, and none of their new decisions like

I don't

I know that nissan is trying to go through a bunch of revivals stuff, but like

river wind like

Grypper went Honda was going to buy them basically for the bloodlust of defeating their long lived in me and then

Are we are we talked about this there there's there's the moment where the guy the head of uh, Honda was like

What do we gain from by nissan like he

The post nut clarity and he was like wait a second. I don't want this at all

You all have how much debt I don't want that

Like I

I don't know if nissan a nissan will ever be desirable again, which really sure they say they're making a new g

The last gtr was in production from 2006

to two years ago

which is

Okay, also

My from when I turned 10

To 28 I had that car. I had that car my bedroom wall and I desperately

Desperately wanted to write a story about it when it was canceled because it meant a lot to me

and I could not for the life of me get my hands on one because

I don't think they drive they just didn't

I don't know if they I don't know I've never driven one. I was really curious

It was like a very important car to me and like they just it was like

It out with the smallest saddest whimper, which is not in my opinion what it deserved. I thought it was cool

I will go out there on the record as a gtr. Enjoyer

Oh, I think it's a really cool car

I just think they kept it in production far too long because like even with the like oh, well, yeah

Yeah, even with like the iphone style

slight advancements year over year that they were doing or whatever like

I don't know. Yeah, I have a gtr 17

it's

I hate to be like I hate to

Just echo like uh, it's too electronic. It's boring. I never found it engaging to drive like it was driving. Yeah, I've driven one. Yeah

Not on track, but on some backgrounds in austin

Okay, rich people this was the thing about having a bunch of rich people friends in the austin car scene is people would throw me keys

Uh, because I was I was a young well to do not well to do that's not true

I was a very broke little twink who uh people seem to enjoy a lot. Um

But like that's uh, that's how I I didn't get like at hootiverse

Like the only person getting press cars usually was like gucker in california

I got a handful but like, um

Most of my cool things I I've driven are people threw me keys or I was like

Helping with a thing and I got to drive something

But yeah, the gtr was like

It felt long in the tooth when I drove one and that was 2018 and they kept making it for six additional years or whatever and i'm just like

It's it's a real like come on grandpa. Let's get you let's get you inside like there was

997

One and two

997 I know one 992 they did three generations of 9 11 in the gtr's lifespan

There were I don't know how you remember the model codes for those things

430

458

488

296

There were five different mid-engine for like it's just you think about all the things that happened

well the g like

america's full decline basically happened in the lifespan of the nissan gtr

And this is just where I go like I don't

They had so much time during the bush administration and died just in time to see trump elected again

They had 20 years to figure out what they were going to do for the r

Like 36 and they're still just like yeah, we'll make one eventually

Don't rush us. Don't worry about it. It's like you're worst procrastinating friend and you're go and go for you're like

I'll body double with you. Do you need me to like make these phone calls for you? They're just like we'll do it eventually

It's fine

I hate I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. Well, it don't worry you can

You might be able to get a 700 horsepower qx80. I should also note that like reading through this article

I don't think there's like a ton there. I think it was kind of like yeah

We might we might do a high performance version someday because like everybody's doing performance versions

And we have 700 horsepower capable motors sitting around so we could just toss one of those in

I don't know if I'd take this like a definite thing, but it was just so funny to be like

When I read this article it was

10 minutes after I saw the headline that's the spot price of Brent crude hit $144 a barrel

And I was just like it's so funny

Being rational I hate

I hate being able to read. This is awful. Why would you curse me with this? I don't want to

Possess this knowledge

I used to think you had to be really smart to run an odd like an automaker

Like right that's a good growing up you assume that like these people are like, you know, I

I talked with my father about this a while ago where I felt really um

There was a part of like covid that was really comforting

Because it made me realize that no one actually has any idea what they're doing at any point

Like maybe five percent of humanity truly has their shit figured out and those are like

Usually hopefully people like doctors, you know

But

Yeah

Did you see

That or bond made the

The

And gesture when J.D. Vance was like stopping for him. They were like sharing a stage and

Apparently Vance was talking about like a landslide win for Orbot and Orbot literally just does the like the hand wavey that like the

I'm like that's

We're built different here in America. Um speaking of not knowing what the fuck you're doing. Yeah. Yeah, this is where I hit you with the second one

Yep

Volkswagen is pausing production of the ID for in America. Who could have seen this? I'm sorry. It was the ID Tiguan now

Because they were gonna change the name to ID Tiguan remember from like episode six

It's so funny. I don't think so. I don't think they've actually changed the name

They're just like now we're gonna cut this out because we need to build more atlases in Chattanooga

Um, which I should have put this in the notes. I'll just look it up right now

VW Atlas mpg

Up to 20 city 27 highway

So, yeah, that's that's like

Nobody wants EVs guess we'll go back to making gas cars now not to be like I I have been pretty down on EVs as like a

I think it generally like I'm I would say that for the auto industry I skew a bit progressive, right?

And I've been pretty down on EVs largely because of like the structural problems that make them

Not feasible for a lot of people in america that I get lack of access to charging, etc, etc

Yeah, you know the fact that like we let tesla run the space and now we're like, oh no

Well, they run all the space so we have to abide by there. It's a mess for

mostly private industry commons raking

Reasons, um, but it is really funny to watch everybody just be like, well, we get we didn't really want to do this anyway. I fuck it

Let's just

We were making so much money

Unlike making

Volkswagen atlases and they keep people in the showroom. So that was all I had. I had no other points for this

I literally just wanted to laugh at them

Um, because I hate Volkswagen

I just I

They don't make any like thank god. They still make the golf, right?

My no, they don't make the golf. First of all, they only make the gti and the golf are they don't make a regular golf

for normal assholes like me

You're making a face like you so they're just

I was wearing eyeliner, so I didn't want to do this, but oh shaped place. It's gonna ruin your eyeliner

Oh my god, like what do you mean? They don't make a regular golf. They just what's the gti based on then?

It's just a gti

They might have a global golf. They don't we don't get one

Oh god, they stopped it with like the the mark seven generation

Like the normal golf. Yeah

Is this like when I was looking at subarus the other day to

I used to be so plugged in of what every single auto maker was producing and now it's just just assume

Assume every showroom is worse than it was five years ago

It's crazy

We cars

Cars line went up forever on how much better cars were getting all the time and then something happened

And I hate the word and shitification because I think it is a really hand wavy way to talk about like

A lot of structural problems that are not

Inherent I like to call it the the tendency of the rate of profit to fall

But yeah, like it's

You know, it's it's like

American companies have a legal obligation to try to make the maximum value for shareholders

It's not a thing. They want to do it as a thing. They are well, they do want to do it

But it's a thing they were legally mandated to try to do so. Yeah, you know a lot of these bad business decisions bad

Uh business decisions. I threw quotes over that last bad. Um

Are all just because like

Some asshole thinks that it is the way to make the most buddy at any like

For the next quarter for the next three quarters. Yes

Yes, I feel like auto makers

I feel like auto makers used to be able to look into the future a little bit more

And now it's just I have

In my career, I spoke to people whose job it was to try to forecast long-term demand after like a decade

I actually remember speaking to somebody that I was like, dude, how are you going to deal with the collapse of american society?

And he was like, I don't know yet

And that's when I was like, oh shit. You really do try to uh predict like 10 years out in the future

We are the only person at this like incredibly fancy dinner

This automaker is taking us to is in the same page as I am sick. Cool. One of my uh, and we just

You ever been to the art museum the modern art museum in houston, texas. Yeah. Yeah

Okay, you know how they have the rothgo chapel. Yeah, of course and you just sit you sit in the room with like eight

12 foot high black canvases

And I don't know about you. I when I went there I had

One of the most profound emotional breakdowns of my entire life

Like it was it it like being able to know the future in any way just feels like you're permanently placed inside that room

Where you're just like, hmm. I don't I can't tell exactly what's moving me to my core here, but it's not good

You would deal really poorly with like a a sensory deprivation tank. I think

Oh my god, yeah, I think if we just started taking inputs away from you you would freak the fuck out

Because I thought I found the rothgo chapel like yes moving but like

Kind of relaxing

Kind of nice. Oh my god. Oh, I walked out sobbing from a panic attack

We gotta get you

help

I'm on meds. It's me doing well. We gotta get america. Um, that'll help you. Um

But like I just anyway that that feels like what the future is like it just feels yeah, I um

Think about uh, how I'm pretty sure people in disney knew coven was gonna happen before coven happened

Because do you know disney has a global intelligence officer?

No, but that's that tracks, uh-huh

That was a job posting they got put up a while ago and people went, huh?

And I'm like, yeah, that makes sense. I don't know. They're they're like, uh, but you know, bob auger happens to retire retire

Put up this new guy

Takes eats all of the coven shit and then bob auger's back. That's crazy

Uh, like I don't know. I feel like automakers aren't aren't even that clever anymore because it's just like no

I don't

I don't know who's in charge of volkswagen right now

But I don't envy him

Assuming it's a man probably I it almost I don't I I knew this at one point because it was a big deal

Uh, well you look that up one of the

Oliver bloom

Is he not german? I don't know

Yeah, he's was born in bronze bronze. Yeah bronze quag bronze shag

Bronze fag germany

Bronze fag ah

He he was a

He's got a degree in mechanical engineering

Cool, and he worked at the body shop and he worked doing planning for body shop and painted outie

Worked his way up. I guess but he is a guy you are correct. Cool. Uh

Do you think how much do you think he's just staring at a bottle in the middle of his room?

I don't know at at I I think this is a point where every automaker

Needs the space that I saw that toyota voter sports had in cologne

All right, have I told you this story about what's in the middle of their factory in cologne? No, there is a beautiful beautiful

beautiful

Traditional japanese garden in the middle of this industrial area in germany, and it's a really nice little courtyard

Because akio would go there and change smoke cigarettes when he was stressed out

If he was in germany visiting them and he got stressed out about anything

He would just go to the little courtyard and change smoke cigarettes in front of like a maple like a

Like a red maple and just look at the koi fish and just change smoke

And i'm gonna be like that is that is what a this the leader of an automaker should be doing

Like every single one of them needs a beautiful place to just go and go like fuck man fuck man

Fuck man like what are we fucking doing? It's all over like

Genuinely, thank you

A bunch of phone makers that we never heard of over here are making the best electric cars

Anyone's ever seen and they're doing it seemingly at no effort

Like yeah, and I it's just like oh, yeah sure sell me an id4

No, you won't yeah, I don't want one

yeah

Yeah, again a vehicle which exists to soak up the lease deals of the pre-tax credit

Uh collapse environment, which is now gone forever

While it woke I I'm sorry because I I have I have a third topic for us, but it's also a downer

That's our podcast

Because jordan was sick. We have nothing fun. I wrote the notes entirely

Which means that it is time to suffer with me

This is we I'm taking you all to the mind palace in which I stare at the Rothkoch chapel

And we are going to look into the void together

so against this this

What was that what was the thing that Bernanke said irrational exuberance against the irrational exuberance of vokes wagon and

infinity in the world of material realities where

Supply and demand are actual things that like dictate whether or not you can get things

You cannot have a thing that doesn't exist. You even pulled from the ground and shipped through a straight

Ford is currently paying three billion dollars extra in aluminum tariffs because of president deals

That's a big rubber victoria

Yeah, it is so uh because um

Commodities have to be manufactured. They do not exist in like the the

imaginary realm

What could say like as a fetish in the sense that like it's just something that suddenly magically is given value

There's a factory in oswego new york that supplies 40 percent of the american auto industry's aluminum and it basically burned entirely down last year

Uh, they are still trying to fix it

They had like two fires. It didn't take out everything, but it took out enough of it that they can't supply a ton of aluminum

So ford had to go overseas because if you remember from a couple years ago

They changed the f-150's body to all aluminum to save to theoretically make it more fuel efficient

Yeah, remember that

I've only you saw how that cookie crumbled. Do you do you idealist motherfuckers?

Yeah, you poor fucking saps

And it's it is the best the f-150 is I think for the 27th straight year or something

I don't fucking know. It's been forever. It is still the best selling vehicle in america

They basically sell as many of them as they can pump out every year

Um, and because they are trying to smooth over uh tariffs supply shocks or whatever you want to call it

Um, they're trying not to jack up prices a ton

So they have gone to the trump administration for tariff relief related to aluminum

Because they have paid this extra through the I think they've paid two billion and they're on track to pay another billion in access tariffs

Be like because they've had to go overseas for it

Uh, and the trump admin is just like we don't fucking know you you don't go here, which I think is great

To to go on your knees groveling to a man whose mind is complete soup

And be like hey, so we helped to get you elected presumably in some way

I mean, I think the other automakers were more on board, but like

You know they they walked him through their plants. They had they sent somebody to the stupid fucking round table where, uh

They call he called like people from somalia horrible things like they're all in the tank, right?

And he's still like i'm sorry. I'm not picking up that call who the fuck is for it. I don't know that is

Um, I just think it's funny. He he thinks that the forward is still trying to do some sort of business plot

Which I I wish we would can we do a business plot?

No, I I I told you I last episode I don't want capitalism back

Like the right wingers can't keep that one

According to the wall street journal article that broke this story, which is what I will be

I will be obviously putting this in the show notes

But uh quote automakers and other users of steel and aluminum products could be on the hook for even higher tariffs in the coming months

Under recent changes. I don't even know what changes. They are. I literally can't keep track

Um many finished products containing aluminum and steel will be subject to a 25 duty on the full value of a product

Instead of the 50 levy on just the value of the metal. Oh, good god

Yeah

Hey, people who actually use your f-150 for like work stuff. Your new workflow. We're not talking about you 25 percent

25 percent cost like because I am sorry

If it's 50 on just the value of the metal, maybe you can make up through that for like economies of scale, you know

Which is again still three like just again still like three billion three billion dollars. I'm just playing this back online

In the meantime like yeah your f-150 your f-150 will cost if not you 25 percent more

They're gonna cost someone 25 percent more and that's gonna be

Eventually like what is an f-150? I feel like we're asking the question. What do cars start at right now?

But I'm gonna look up. What is an f-150 like a basis fuck f-150 start at right now

I would also like to shout out. Um, so trump has been to the ford plant this year

Uh, we

You gotta call the pedophile protector by king thomas saboola who again as far as I know still has his job

Uh, and the president his brain is mush. So I think

Thomas saboola victory

How much is an f-150 cost you're making your face?

It's so it's not as bad as I thought it was. Um, the 2026 f-150

starts at

39 330 so let's just call it 40 grand

So sure, you're okay. It's with tariffs next or later this year 50 starts at 50

Well, here's the thing right is that like global economic collapse and the the uh, the

Implosion of the american petrodollar means it's gonna be really hard to guess what uh, why is this still here?

Well, because the f-150 lightning is like they they like to keep it on the website as a reminder of

What we once had what woke one brought us

Well, I can ask ford ai to search local inventory for one. Oh my god

Oh my god

Shapes place shapes plays

Thanks for the helpful hint that your fort mustang gt3 is not a street legal car that I can buy from you. Thanks fort

Thanks buddies. Um

Anyway, that's that's that's the victoria scott written episode. I mean everything is bad

Everything's not great, but also like

It is

It's really a great, uh, germans of fake language as we've uh talked about a little bit on the the show account

Because I was trying to check the times for an nls race while I was sick

And I got flashbacked with nerbergring tv saying proudly that we're suckin dick

Which I know that's not how it's pronounced

But uh, I love that german fort. We're looking for you for in like a job hunt comp

context is we're suckin dick

Uh, which to I say the nerbergring could say faggot. It's fine. Uh

But like I

Shorted proud is one of those great concepts. That's that was a delayed reaction. That one took you a second to process

Yeah, I just I'm just I was trying to like may have some kind of come back and I couldn't I just laughed

uh, uh, uh, uh like

I don't like

It is one of those moments where I feel like every single automaker

Is in a point of crisis even if they're still like doing good

except for

And this is going to sound crazy because of the history of these companies

Somehow all of the italian high-end boutique auto bakers seem to be fine. Yes, they're doing great. Ferrari's Rolls-Royce is

Absolutely killing it right now. Ferrari stocks incredible

Aston martin got this this isn't worth like a full show note because uh, no actual details exist about the car

Aston martin was testing so

Insane amalgamation between an lmp1 car or the the valkyrie and an f1 car at silverstone

Yeah, that sounds right and it's apparently people like oh, maybe it's like a limited model

Or maybe it's like a new like maybe they're replacing the valkyrie for like hypercar

Maybe they've decided that actually like it's not worth doing the valkyrie because without a hybrid. It's just kind of like

It's it's a one-off for one guy

And because you can exist off of that as an automaker like

as an automaker like

yeah

scare quotes on automakers a good

Aston martin doesn't make money and will never make money and it is actually imperative that the british state should owed aston martin

Therefore it's like a public good like it's fine

As as uh extremely cool, dude, uh, and one who person who gets it matt ferro wrote in an editorial for uh, rodentrack this week

I think

automakers are just increasingly like well, shit

Why would we bother making a thousand cars that we make a hundred dollars on we could make 10 cars that we make a million dollars on

That's we make way more money that way and like that is again. This is like

The problem with capitalism as a model because this is naturally the incentive

No single person is like has caused this scenario to crop up

But if you let people accumulate enough wealth, this becomes like the incentive

And so everything is like this it's increasingly like either you roll around in your like 15 year old shit box

That you maybe can't afford to put gas in uh, or it's like it's like you live in a world in which everything is catered to you

luxury dining is awesome like luxury hotels are awesome

But you know the yacht industry is booming rolls. Royce is taking more personalized commissions than they've ever done

They've got like an entire fleet of artisans in house to like make

People's fifth and sixth rolls Royce's customized to exactly their whims

They've got paint colors. They've got entire paint colors locked down for specific families

Yeah, like it's just they the the comfort that these people

Live in while the rest of us are increasingly pushed to the margins

Are insane and I guess that's I think part of I guess if you want to tie the whole episode together

That's part of what drives me batshit crazy because the people who run these corporations

See themselves as part of the set of people who will be doing well forever

And so do not treat the like threat to destroy a civilization is a serious one that will impact them

And I see myself as much more in common with you know

Average people a palestinian whose you know house was destroyed, uh, you know any any imperiled person on earth

I'm like I fundamentally sympathize with and and empathize with them because like that's you know

If your net worth is not eight fucking figures

You have more in common with your local unhoused person in your neighborhood than you do

That's correct billionaire and I said eight figures

Like I'm in the world. I would even go to push to nine at this point. Yeah, because guess what like I seven finger like seven figures

That's like a you're a dentist who did okay for the rest of your life like a million dollars. Yeah, not it's because

Also, like get cancer and don't have insurance

Yeah, and you will very rapidly find out how fragile everything is and it's just I don't know as somebody who has been in that

Like ridiculously precarious situation repeatedly throughout my life

Um, it is impossible to not look at like the model of we can simply

We can simply kill whoever stands in our way and not be like this is horrifying

This can't be allowed to stand and then sit at home and be like, what do I do?

Um, and I mean, I guess like the best strategy

I have that I can legally suggest is that if you work at Ford and Donald Trump comes through your workplace

Call him a pet a file call him a pet a file protector

It makes it really upset. It makes it really sad

It may he gets so mad and you literally can keep your job that that is the one thing I can suggest

Uh on this show and not

Because everything else I can't say this is the problem too is I can only bitch about things

I can't actually say what I think should be done because we're way out of the zone where I could say that shit

And if you work for Ford tell your dealers to stop putting mustangs in malls

They're sad they want to roam free

Don't fence me in that should have been when I realized I was getting quite ill is when I was like

Putting a hand on the Mustang in the mall and developing empathy for it because it cannot be outside

Yeah

shoving a Cinnabon into the bonnet

It was a it was a great post though. Thank you. I my brain was already boiling. I think

I think there's always things to look forward to

Sure, there's a thing that I look forward to and I think about an onion article as a uh, I

I will do I I have I have ridden my bike for miles while thinking about the onion article

About lowering Donald trump into the grave never to be seen again. Like I I've held to that onion article for so long. I um

I know

But that guy wrecked my fucking entire 20s and is on course to do it again for my 30s

Yeah, yeah, and of course like he didn't wreck it personally

Like I mean I still got married and I like, you know had many joyous moments. We met my life continued

But like I am so goddamn tired of having to live my life like this a quarter mile at a time

I I um I I I've made a therapist really sad a couple years ago

Oh, no, and then that's when you know, you you won. Uh, you've defeated him

in the

In the uh, is when I just said I stopped making five year plans because every time I put one together

It has become a recipe to hurt my own feelings

Yeah, basically

So my five year plan is to be dead

We've got to get you we've got to get the higher than that. Uh, so, uh

Victoria

I think that's an episode and boy. Howdy. I hope so. Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah

I have shout outs. I haven't had something out on the cover really quick. Good. Thanks. Um, because

Yeah, good thing again life continues on

Um, I wanted to shout out my my new friend Eve and her dad for bringing a really cool 66 4 to f 150 or f 100 rather

Um to the port of Seattle so I get cool pictures with it with my new friend Sula

They're really cool because I got shot up. I got shot on four by five. I'm so excited to see those

But like yeah, I posted the digital ones and they were really cool and it was just it was it was her birthday

We went and you know hung out afterward. It's really nice lady

Um, and it was just it turns out it's cool to model with cars

Who knew somebody should do a book about that. Yeah, weird. That's that's really weird. Victoria. Yeah, um

Eve does make music. I don't know if she's got any currently up, but I'll I'll check and if she does I'll put it in the show notes

Um, because she it was really it was really just cool to meet her and like get to like

Feel adjacent to car culture in some kind of way besides like pointing and laughing at Volkswagen tripping over itself

Um, and then the other thing that I wanted to cover is a reader

Uh emailed me this week to let me know that um, this is just relevant for people in washington

The state of not the district of colombia

There is a state rail plan that was added for this year and currently it is open for public comment and

It is there's an article from the urbanists that kind of like it goes into more detail about sort of a call to action on it

but basically, um

If you're familiar with our regional rail the sounder, which again every time it comes up. I have to say that is the name

I thought you were I genuinely I thought you were joking last time it came up. That's why I did it like I was just like

Yeah, that's a good singer. Uh, no, that's crazy. That's crazy. What it's called. It's a f 59 ph

Painted with sounder and big block letters all capitals

Yeah

It has dedicated sound transit actually owns some of the rails the point defiance bypass

Which is familiar with the podcast while there's your problem. I did an episode about that

Um, it doesn't matter specifically just know that they own some tracks somewhere

But most of their trackage is owned by a burlington the northern santa fe

And freight rail in this country is a goddamn disaster and the freight rail takes priority

And dictates a lot of the ways that sounder can operate which is part of the reason why as I have bitched about on this show

I think last week or two weeks ago

We get regional rail that is like just a commuter service that sucks

And we don't have any like possibility of having a service that is like an actual like

Urban connector that could serve to like thai bellingham and seattle together or seattle in portland or even

all of those cities all the way to vancouver

and so

I if you're if you're living in the state and you care about this kind of stuff

You should go to the washington state rail plan, which I will of course link

And in the public comment you should tell them to give soundtrack that they should prioritize getting dedicated trackage

So we can have regional rail

That like runs at higher speed than freight allows or runs more often than burlington northern will allow us to

And uh, yeah, also if you see stuff like this in washington, or I suppose in pittsburgh specifically that is uh

You know a call to action where we could maybe do something good in the world. Please send it to me

I love doing that. I love to tell people like hey, you should be aware of this and you should go check it out

Because I'm very depressed and doing good things is the only way that I can get out of bed every day

So this helps. Uh-huh. I um

Yeah, if we can ever if we as a podcast can ever use our platform for good

Please let us know because we would love to yeah, I can't do everything on here

Um, but I will try. Yeah. Yeah, we can't make we can't

look

We'll see what happens at the free of 250

Uh, but I I can't I don't think we could I don't think we could do a whole hell of a lot. Um

But I I do think that this is worthwhile and also like

genuinely

I am going to ask

Everyone who listens to this show and has a part in it

Uh, including you victoria

Go do something with the people in your life who help you get out of bed

And talk with them and see how everyone's doing because I feel like this is one of those weeks

Where all of us have to keep going through the motions

And I think it is becoming

Increasingly difficult to do so

Uh, and yet some of these people wake up and they're like, you know what?

I'm gonna get up. I'm gonna put on my shoes. I'm gonna walk into an interview. I'm gonna say 800 horsepower qx qx 80

It's how they function. I missed the step where he also like probably uh, this might be libel

This is a parody parody parody. He probably drank like

Four fingers in jack before saying that and he was just like no one will take me seriously like that 800 horsepower qx 80

Whatever

So yeah, uh, do something with the people you love start a new creative project

Go out and enjoy this spring and this summer and

Just be safe. Uh, if you're not feeling safe, there are people in your life who want you to be okay and care about you. Um

Yeah, this is true create a third space do uh, I'm gonna just start doing the eric andre show the move to philly

Get six or seven rubates make salsa together

If just just do something

Um, I I spent a lot of this weekend laid up wishing I could be going out and doing things. So

Uh, because I know I will say like going

Going out and doing pictures with uh, sula and eve was really fun. It was very enjoyable

Uh, the photos and I did I did develop the role of pictures even though I didn't scan them yet

And I did get cool ones. So I um, I was very thankful to see you were scared some of your scads from your texas laika

Uh, and now unfortunately, I saw how nice media format looks that I went

What's the texas like uh going for these days and would you believe it? Not that much money for a uh,

a weird cool vintage camera

They are relatively cheap for how absolutely great you could buy 10 of them for the cost of one x pan

10 of 10 of them

Just walk around with like 10 different cameras each load with a different film

Slip a fucking disc because that thing's heavy as fuck. Uh, yeah, uh

I also was going to say um, one of the last thing is that, you know, we have

Our our we have our loyal patreon subscribers, which are allowing me to survive, which again, I deeply appreciate. Thank you for that

Which I might I might need to be relying on here soon too depending on

We we are trying to we are trying to get subscribers up because now it may be a two trans women supported

Supporting podcast versus just a one, but you know, we'll get there when we get there

Um, but we have our $15 tier, which is that I read out your names

uh as a thank you

For like just helping me pay rent and being a big fan of the show

You have to god damn it. I was trying to buy him shirts to you

We also this is probably the last episodes that's going up. Well, the shirt pre-order is still live

Oh, yeah, but I was gonna read it. I mean like, yeah, we do have shirts

Pre-orderable at store trans trans girl ismo.com

I will put those in the show notes. I those pre-orders close for 20 and then they

I ship out all the shirts

So order by then because that's when the pre-orders close and that is the order

I am sending to the local shop that is making the shirts because again

I believe in trying to

De-fetishize my commodities as much as possible. So I can't ship in here mother fuckers

I did try to look for like union made shirts, but it isn't really difficult and becomes rapidly

Expensive in a way that I was like, I can't

Single-handedly do this at this stage of my career, but I will try to very hard

Next time make us more popular and I can be more ethical about my my make the American apparel man less of a pet like a creep

So American apparel never goes away

But I wanted to read up the names. Yes, so

all right, um

I wanted to say thank you to selectrick

Who is Liz?

I think I can just say that. I don't think she'll be mad at me for blowing her cover. Well consider gets your blue sky username

I don't think so. Yeah

Um, Josh J

John Russell

Crystal Storm, which is a really cool name

Finn Springs

Gavin Gattis who I believe wrote that very nice review about us. I do believe I do believe

Yes, they did that really good reviewer podcast when it dropped and we we hope to continue to be good to vindicate them

Gatrian Lenker

Pete I'll sparing vaginoplasty

Which is an amusing one to read out. I notably underscores underscores

I really love seeing the overlap in our patreon subscribers because killjapes bond also reads out there

Where wherever could we've gotten this idea from?

Devin reads out these names on a killjapes bond and I also hear dev

Giggling through p. I'll sparing vaginoplasty

It's a great name. It's a great name. Um wings

Wingsmith

Nathaniel Hubble who wrote our song I believe

Which we will play at the very end of this because it's great. Yes. Hopefully we won't get copyright struck for the love boat theme song

I don't think we will I don't think anybody's out trolling for like

parodies of the love boat theme song

This is the username. Uh, thank you to I victoria scott. Love porches and hate trains, which is an incredible bit

Get fucked

Victoria

I know exactly who that is and yeah, that's right. Everybody point and laugh

Um, thank you to princess Reese promises not to bark at loud noises. I also struggle with this. I understand completely

Thank you to will dexas

Jerry at homo gamer agenda.com

Nice. Yes. Also incredible. Uh, chris heppner and uh, asher in

Thank you all so much. I really deeply appreciate people signing up for this tier because again

I pay rent with it and maybe jordan will soon too. So we'll see

what the what the uh commercial appetite is for

two trans women talking about cars, you know

depressing

In one last point of view last note. That's just incredible

Hey, thank you to everyone who has legitimately reached out with places that uh, I am spending part of this next week

Legitimately reaching out to venues in DC

However, I just want we're doing the live show. I want to try to fuck it. Yeah, absolutely

Let's don't let your dreams be dreams. I wish Shia LaBeouf was a better person because that quote's incredible

Shout out to the hero who let me know that comet pinkpong pizza. Yes that comet pingpong pizza

Is apparently a venue

How

Fucking holy, honey. Would it be to be the t-girl car podcast doing a live show at

Q and on source material

Comet pingpong pizza. I I really uh

We got to call brace Belden and see if he'd come out as a guest for it. Yeah, sure. I uh, I

Oh, I'm so pumped. I um, I really want to make this happen. Um

Uh, also, um, I'm just gonna throw this out now

Uh, because I want some fans to keep me

Keep it in my mind. I'm doing I'm saying this out loud is accountability not uh saying something that will happen

I'm gonna do a meet-up at the pittsburgh vintage grand prix

this summer

Oh, cool. Okay. I I I I figured uh

Two trips for the show and one summer might be a big commitment for you miss ma'am

Uh as uh, we don't know what we don't know what jet fuels gonna cost tomorrow. Um

And uh, there's no train linking the great state of washington and the uh, great

question mark state of pennsylvania

Transsexual paris pittsburgh's incredible and that's why when I become a mayor of pittsburgh

I will lead our secession for both pennsylvania and the united states

It'll be like a be like a vatican situation. Yes, I I will be transsexual pope of uh, uh

pittsburgh pittsburgh, uh name again like new york

By the time this happens we'll have already had at least one schism

So it won't be that big of a deal. They threatened the pope apparently another one. I know

We didn't even have time to get into that nonsense because I try to leave catholic bullshit to the catholics, but

I've been gritting my teeth a lot this episode like my jaw hurts

Like I'm sorry this episode. Well now it's an episode we can end it this episode felt like uh,

I'll probably stop my recording after I say this but this episode did feel like uh,

You know the thing they spin astronauts around in to like see when they black out

Yeah, I feel like a job. I feel like a fighter pilot just kind of graying out in the

Fucking

I love doing this this this podcast makes this stupid country so much more worth it

Shakes

Your flickering friends

Watch them glow

As the empire ends and shapes

Will soothe all your pain

Anytime

The world breaks your brain

The shapes place

Just press those fingertips to your eyes

The shapes place

When something deep in your psyche sighs

You can take off your glasses and enter a field of light

With shapes

Like shimmering stars

Forming dazzle lines

On free production cars

Its shapes

Until woke to its shapes

0:00

95:02

Episode 11: The Geopolitical Shapes Place

car insurance

car getting stolen

full coverage

Dodge Omni

gas

electricity transmission lines

Infiniti QX80

700 horsepower

rebadged Nissan products

platform share

burnouts

tax and title

four wheel drive

Chrysler

Brent crude

mpg

EVs

Tesla

tendency of the rate of profit to fall

electric cars

tariffs

Nürburgring

Ferrari

F1

public comment

Burlington Northern Santa Fe

Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix

About this episode

Original notes