How Sports Betting Came For EVERYTHING

The Bitchuation Room

TYT Network

Comedy, News, Government, News Commentary

4.8 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 7 February 2026

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Want to bet on the U.S. invading Iran? Sure why not? You can do exactly that with prediction markets, the billionaire-backed platforms that gamble on the future while sucking your wallet dry. Francesca looks at the very recent rise of platforms like Polymarket and Kalshi which are now partnering with everything from awards shows to UFC fights, and even news outlets. After sports betting was legalized in 2018, the online gambling model that has lured many Americans in is expanding. This time to politics, culture and current events. You can now bet on how many deportations there will be in a year, or if Kristi Noem will keep her job. It’s as dystopian as it sounds but it’s having real-life consequences. People are losing thousands of dollars on these betting schemes, which are dubiously legal. Polymarket already paid out a massive settlement to the Commodities Futures Trading Commission in 2022 and is now facing a class-action lawsuit out of the Southern District of New York. But the platforms aren’t slowing down despite the legal hurdles. That’s in part thanks to Trump’s newly minted head of the Commodities Futures Trading Commission, who’s a former crypto lawyer, who wants to remove regulations. Kalshi CEO Tarek Mansour wants to ‘financialize everything’ and hopes prediction markets grow to be a trillion-dollar venture. The problem? They’re rife with corruption. Insider trading is everywhere in sports betting, and now that same cheating streak appears to be rearing its head in political betting as well. Beyond that, what does it mean when we stop being actors in the world around us and simply become gamblers? And what lengths could people go to to see their bets pay off? Black Mirror could never. Thanks to Andy Vasoyan, Brent Godin and Paige Oamek. *** See Francesca LIVE Saturday February 14th at 9:30pm Pasadena for New World Disorder: https://www.showclix.com/event/new-world-disorder-Valentines-Day-Edition-02-14-26-9-30-pm *** Support the show becoming a patron https://www.patreon.com/bitchuationroom and get exclusive perks. You can also be a member on YouTube, Twitch, or a paid subscriber on substack: franifio.substack.com. *** Get your union-made podcast merch: www.bitchuationroom.com *** Thanks to Paige Oamek, Andy Vasoyan & Brent Godin *** Follow The Bitchuation Room on Twitter @BitchuationPod BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/bitchuationroom.bsky.social Check Out The Bitchuation Room Podcast on: iTunes: http://bit.ly/iTunesbitchuation Google Music: http://bit.ly/GoogleBitchuation Stitcher: http://bit.ly/stitcherbitchuation Spotify: http://bit.ly/spotifybitchuation Find Francesca On: Substack: franifio.substack.com Twitter: https://twitter.com/franifio YouTube: The Bitchuation Room’s channel: https://www.youtube.com/franifio Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/franifio Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Franifio Insta: https://www.instagram.com/franifio/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Sanjeeves just received a decent bonus. Nice work, Sanjeeve. He knows he could invest all of the money, but he's seen a new watch he likes. He's not worried. With his HSBC Premier bank account and access to their financial advice service, he can get a personalised plan for the future and know how much you can spend a day. Everything's Premier when your bank account is. Search HSBC Premier. HSBC UK, opening up a world of opportunity.
0:23.1	For financial advice, you need minimum £100,000.
0:25.5	Other criteria and fees apply.
0:26.9	Financial and other eligibility criteria apply for HSBC Premier.
0:30.1	Hey everyone, let's jump back to looking at Polymarkets predictions.
0:33.0	All right, we are back now looking at those Polymarket predictions.
0:36.4	Memdani, Polymarket right now, 62% chance of winning this election.
0:41.3	Welcome back to the Grammys, potato.
0:45.3	If you had me saying potato on Polymarket, you just made a ton of money.
0:50.3	I'm not a betting man, or woman, but I'd say that the odds of you having seen the words
0:55.9	Polymarket or Kalshi on recent award shows, sporting events, or even the news, are fairly high,
1:02.8	especially if you've been watching CNN.
1:05.9	One of the best ways we can look at this is the prediction markets.
1:08.5	The chance that Trump buys any of Greenland by the end of
1:11.1	its term, on Friday, it was just 12%. Whoa, way up there now to 36%. According to the Calci
1:18.1	prediction markets, I'm going to spell Calci right like this. What are the prediction markets say?
1:23.0	Okay, so we see the 1.9, the 2.5, and the 0.1. So what is the chance for the month of January
1:29.0	we get more than 10 inches of snow in these cities? How is that the news? Snowfall forecasting
1:35.6	left to online betters? What happened to meteorologists? Did we defund those two?
1:42.6	Oh, we did? Why do I ask these questions?
1:46.0	Online betting is no longer contained to sports, but for about a year now has encroached into the world of politics and culture through platforms like polymarket and Kalshi.
1:56.0	In today's healthy political economy, you can now place bets on big events like, will Trump
	...

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