2 POGs Save the World Podcast
Two Army veterans—one left, one right—unite for the ultimate mission: tackling real-world problems with common sense, logic, and a healthy dose of military humor. 2 POGs Save the World isn’t your typical political podcast. Hosts Kj Bradley & Lance O'Neil bring unfiltered discussions, sharp debates, and tactical solutions to the chaos of modern society.
From politics and national security to sports and pop culture, no topic is off-limits. With battle-tested insights and zero tolerance for BS, these two POGs (Personnel Other than Grunts) prove that you don’t have to agree on everything to find real solutions.
Join the fight every Sunday at 8:30 PM EST, where the only thing sharper than the takes is the wit. Mission: Common Sense. Execution: Hilarious. Victory: Inevitable
🎙️ Listen. Debate. Disagree. Laugh. Take Notes.
2 POGs Save the World Podcast
"Tariffs, Tees, and the F-Word" (Because sometimes the only way to describe America’s direction is fascist... maybe.)
KJ and Lance go off the rails (with precision) on:
- Tariffs & Trade: Why your groceries just got more expensive—and who’s playing hardball with global markets.
- Stock Market Spiral: Historic losses this week—what's driving the downturn, and what it means for everyday investors.
- Protests Coast to Coast: From labor to liberty, why Americans are hitting the streets harder than ever.
- Is America Going Fascist?: KJ confronts the elephant in the room as civil liberties start looking real fragile.
- Golf Gets Political: Yes, even the quiet game on green grass isn’t immune to the culture war.
Tune in for bold takes, common sense analysis, and the kind of conversation you wish cable news had the guts to hav
GMA, what do you want to do tonight?
Speaker 2:The same thing we do every night. Pinky, Try to take over the world. Alright, yo, let's get into it. Try to take over the world.
Speaker 2:Try to take over the world and the world, mr Lance O'Neill, trying to take over the world. What's up? What's up? What's up, world? We are back, live and in full effect. Again. It is Sunday. Do you know where your folks are? Man, of course you do. We are right here with you, live and in full effect, for another edition of Two Pokes Save the World. This is your boy, kj Branson, and the world's greatest chaplain, mr Lance O'Neill. Chappy, how you doing, man.
Speaker 1:Good, it's all good, everything's good.
Speaker 2:Having fun. Everything is great. Everything is great. We are on our way back to God's country and I am so excited that the world is ablaze. Everybody's acting up and this administration leaves us with no shortage of topics. So let's say we dive in. Man, Are you ready to get to it this week?
Speaker 1:Sure let's go.
Speaker 2:We got a lot to talk about, so I will let you choose. We got the F word, which is absolutely. I think we're there yet, I'm ready to say it. We got tariffs. We got. What do we got? We got protesters going on this week and what else, man? So much is happening and while all of this is going on, stock markets crashing. We got tariffs, we got. We got people acting crazy being kidnapped off the streets by the authorities. We got people acting crazy being kidnapped off the streets by the authorities, and the POTUS is bragging about its golf tournament, which is, you know, par for the course. Where do you want to start? So much to talk about so little time. Where do you want to start?
Speaker 1:Did you just drop a pun and you didn't even know it? Probably, probably Because the president was talking about his golf tournament, which is par for the course. Bravo on the unintentional pun. No, way yeah, oh yeah, that was, that was really nice that is.
Speaker 2:That is that, yeah, that is peak dadism. Right there, peak dadism, we are in there that is.
Speaker 1:that is one of those nba plays where somebody just kind of gets fouled and just flips it up at the basket and goes in and it just goes in.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I can't take credit for it, man. I am glad we should have our usual crew coming back in the comments section so we'll give you guys a couple of minutes to log in, Excited to see you guys once again. Another great week, man.
Speaker 1:All right, so let's get to it and if you're not one of our regulars, still log in and make comments, of course, of course Liberty is sad to have all the fun making fun of us.
Speaker 2:I know, our shadow ban again from TikTok should be over here in about a week so we'll be able to post back on TikTok again. We get banned again for something. Yeah, man, we stay. For whatever reason, we stay banned on TikTok.
Speaker 1:But it's all good, because once we get when we come back, is that because of other people making comments that are inappropriate?
Speaker 2:Yes, our comment section gets a little excited, and then we'll get the.
Speaker 1:How does that happen? How do we get banned when other people who was it the NFL player that got fined for?
Speaker 1:he got fined for, like richard sherman, writing something oh, wow but the nfl player and then he was like I got fined for something somebody else said and then the nfl fined him for pointing out that he got fined for something that he didn't say. I read that this week. I started laughing. I was like that sounds like the NFL. Well, it's like the NBA right now. If you do the you know John Morant doing the guns that used to look sharpshooter Very normal thing. What are we doing? Like how is this? Oh, right in the veins. Oh, that's promoting.
Speaker 2:No, no, no. John Moran has a history of guns, so they kind of yeah, they're trying to get on him like hey, bro, you got to choose, Like I understand.
Speaker 1:But he healed was the same way, yeah, ok, so here's. Here's part of my problem with this whole thing, and this was not a topic we were going to talk about, but it'll go that way, okay, because you have a lot of people talking about John Morant got in trouble for what?
Speaker 1:For having an Instagram account and showing a gun during an Instagram account and then for showing a gun while he was at the club and flashed a gun or something right, Basically being an idiot. Okay, basically being an idiot, but he didn't do anything illegal. He didn't do anything illegal. He didn't threaten anybody with a gun. Why do NBA players not have the same protection of the Second Amendment as everybody else? And I understand there's the whole idea of well, you know, they're role models and the NBA is a private company and they can find them and I get that.
Speaker 2:I don't think it's so much.
Speaker 1:It's not that. Lebron James coming out when, a few years ago and he was he was saying Daryl Morey was an idiot because Daryl Morey, who at the time was the GM of the Rockets, supported the protests in Hong Kong. So yeah, there was a lot of it anyway.
Speaker 2:We're going to jump into it early this week. So young black men with guns are still scary right, Regardless of 2A Young white men with guns are scary. It's just different, right. It's different. When you have an influential African-American male willy-nilly flashing guns, you know all within his Second Amendment rights. However, it's just, it's a different reaction, right? I remember. I think back to the young lady who was graduating college little white girl graduating college with the AR-15 on her back and everybody was like oh that's so great, you know.
Speaker 2:But John Morant riding around in the car with the AR-15 on her back and everybody was like oh, that's so great, you know. But John Morant riding around in the car with the weapon that was registered to him is, you know, public enemy number one. And that's, you know, that's just propaganda man regurgitating itself into a new generation. But it's all right, we'll get over it eventually, my hope is anyway.
Speaker 1:So let me let me ask you about that, though, because I support both of them.
Speaker 1:I so let me let me ask you about that, though, because I support both of them. I think, if she wants to walk up there with an AR slung on her back and get her degree, great. And I think, if John Moran, as long as he's not threatening anybody, not committing, if, if John, as long as John Moran isn't walking out onto the court with his gun ready to threaten people I don't know how you necessarily play basketball with a carry concealed, but, like if he's not breaking the law, I this is the problem I have like when we're talking about white and black, I look at it and say it's american, he's an american citizen, he has every right to carry a gun. Now I will say this again I know the nba has their own set of rules, but, like to me, if I was the union, if I was the head of the union, I would be fighting that all day long, because, Let me ask you was he wearing his work uniform when he was brandishing the gun or was he a private citizen?
Speaker 2:He was a private citizen, right. But what I'm saying is that leads back to our conversation we were having offline all week, right, about how it's just a thing, right, it'll never dissipate, it just is what it is. And I was watching a clip I can't think of the dude's name. I was watching a clip of this guy and I got man, I got to go find his name. I think it's something Taylor or whatever. He is a Taylor. Yeah, I can't call him a white supremacist. He is a he's not.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he's a white, I don't know what you call him.
Speaker 1:I think he called himself a white race defender.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a white race defender or something like that, right. So I kind of got into him this week, right, and I was watching episode after episode, interview after interview of this guy and just listening to him talk. And the more I listen to him, the more I realize, like, man, I, I don't agree with you, but I understand you and I think I think you know I'm saying a lot of people kind of feel the same way, like hey, all right, cool, I don't want to be, I don't, you know, I'm not racist, I want you to, I want you to succeed. Hell, I want, I want us all to succeed, yeah. But here's the thing though we can't, we can't do it if we're constantly blaming each other, right. So here's what we're going to do you go that way, we'll go this way and we'll let it be. And I was sitting back like In theory sounds great, in practicality absolutely not. In theory sounds great, in practicality, absolutely not. We've tried that a couple of times.
Speaker 1:People just don't. They don't, but people don't know that front. I don't know if we had this conversation on the podcast or if it was just something we had during lunch, but we talked about this. I think it was during one of our lunches where I said around the Alabama, georgia, tennessee, mississippi, I guess, whatever I got it, that works Right. You know somewhere in the south, and we said we are going to build a city and this city is going to be for blacks, by blacks. That's who's going to live there. And what you and I have talked about is it's going to be for blacks, by blacks. That's who's going to live there, and what you and I have talked about is it's going to be black-owned businesses.
Speaker 1:It's going to be black-owned banks.
Speaker 1:The money is going to stay in the black community, da-da-da. And I was like, yeah, I think I brought it up. I was like, hey, yeah, do it, great, no problem. And what Taylor was saying was I have no problem with that, you want to go do a black city, black neighborhood, all that. And the problem Taylor has and this is kind of where I have the problem with it too is but if you turned around and said we're going to do this, a white neighborhood, and we're going to exclude people of color, well then it's suddenly racist. And I've always said if you change the color and it makes it racist, then it was always racist, and if you change the color and make it not racist, then it wasn't racist. So a black city only for blacks is OK, but a white city only for whites is racist. You can't have it both ways.
Speaker 2:I agree, but my whole, my whole counter is black people never made it racist. It was always Caucasians who made it racist. We've seen it time and time again. Look at all the race wars of the early 19th century, when black people had their own economies, had their own economic system. They didn't. Black people didn't burn it down. You know the race, white race right. The race riots were caused by black people. Riots weren't caused by black people. I think you would be hard pressed outside of California at the turn of the century, back when the BPP and all the other stuff was going down. Did you finally start seeing black race riots? Right? Everything before then was yeah.
Speaker 1:So the problem you have with that is it's chicken or egg, right, so, let, right, so. So let's look at, let's use one of the one of the easy ones Englewood riots of 1992. Sure, and you can say, okay, that was a black right. Was it a race riot? Yeah, I think you could qualify that as a race riot.
Speaker 1:Um now, was it really because of Rodney King? Was it really because of the police and the video and and the judgment? That was the catalyst of it, but probably what? What led to that was a disenfranchisement by young black man, nwa, coming out.
Speaker 1:That was, that was the heart of nwa coming out with f the police and all that stuff and and I remember, you know, reading about it, I was in Taiwan on my mission at the time, reading about this Holy cow, you know. But the Koreans, they were out there with guns up on their businesses shooting, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:And so it was like well, was that a race riot because of blacks or was it a reaction to unfair treatment by the white police? And that's where you can kind of go back the race riots of World War I, which is really an unknown. I remember when I was in San Antonio, I went downstairs in one of the chapels. This chapel in San Antonio on Fort Sam Houston was used as the courthouse for a, for a court martial or a group court martial against black soldiers that had gone from San Antonio. They were on leave. They went into Houston and there was some to do. You know, the white, the white people not real happy with the black soldiers going in and being loud and obnoxious and the black soldiers not being happy that the white populace wasn't real happy with them being there.
Speaker 1:And you know, so they're back and forth and then somebody, somebody gets stupid, somebody shoots and then suddenly there's firing back and forth and and you know there have been riots forever. But one of the things and this is where I pushed back kind of on you is that when you start looking at and and I understand, look historically and I got you, historically there's always been a problem, white versus black in America, especially right. But at the same time, if you look and you say the difference between 17 From 17, let's say, 1776, founding of the country to 1860, 100 years, not a lot of big changes, right, there was whites, there was slavery, pretty consistent 1860, well, but that was, I mean, they were treated very poorly, you know black people were treated like slaves.
Speaker 2:We didn't have much say in the matter, but yeah, yeah exactly, but that's my point.
Speaker 1:There wasn't a lot of yeah, yeah 1860 before 1860 was pretty stacked, but that was also, let's remember, it was also static for the rest of the world too slavery is not unique, it was not invented by americans.
Speaker 1:But in 1860 something happened. There was this consciousness, consciousness in America that originally fed off from England that said, hey, maybe slavery is not okay. And abolitionists started pushing saying, hey, slavery is not okay. There's a moral part of this. And when people start pushing the morality of saying, well, in the Bible it talks about slaves, yeah, but that's a bad justification. So we went to war. So we went to war. So from 1860 to 1960, ok, there was a slow progress for black people, not, not, it wasn't jumped up. And again, you and I we've talked about this and I I blame it absolutely on you know a bullet to the back of Abraham Lincoln's head. Yeah, I think our country is completely different with that. Ok, but now you go from 1865 to today. I don't think you need to jump that far. My dog is jumping from 1965 to today.
Speaker 1:I'm sorry. Yes, 1965 to today, there's just no. So if you're going beginning of America through 1860, 1860 to 1960, 1960 to now, there's no comparison. So I understand where you say, historically, black people in America have gotten the shorter than the stick, and I agree with you.
Speaker 1:But, I will also say, if you look at of 1960 forward, you really can't even compare 1960 to today. You can barely compare 2000 to today. It's only been 25 years and the case for everything that goes along with it, from the morality of it to just just take the dog out, please the morality of where we've changed as a society, how we've looked the election of a black president. Now I don't agree that we're post-racial, I don't think we ever will be post-racial and I don't think that post-racial is necessarily a good thing, just simply because it's impossible. I happen to agree with Taylor as far as what race is. You look at me and you look at you. You can't see what we're thinking, but you can see what our skin color is and anybody who says I don't see color is lying.
Speaker 1:It's now with how you react to color, that's different, I agree. But there are differences. There's clear skin, biological differences, that doesn't mean mentally we think differently it doesn't mean you're dumb, I'm smart, I'm I'm dumb, you're smart, right? It just means one of us genetically has more melanin in our skin and that's really about it, right.
Speaker 1:So that that's where I look at it and say historic. I understand the um, the average. I think it's fair to say this, because when you and I talk, you represent all black people of course I do the rules we've established right I've been elected duly elected, in a vote of, in a vote of one.
Speaker 1:And you know, and I understand when I say, hey, you know, this is kind of where the racial stuff. And you say, well, well, historically, and I get it, but I do think that it's unfair to really kind of say historically that we haven't evolved and we're not in a different situation than we were. Because On one side, you could say, well, white people have to prove it Right, and you and I have talked about this, you still have homework that you owe to people as far as what white people need to do. But I would argue, I would argue that white people over the last 40, 50 years have done a pretty good job about trying to integrate and trying to say, hey, we need to make this as fair as possible, we need to.
Speaker 1:We, when, when these idiots who come out in March and have the Klan flag or they have the neo-Nazi flags, you see just as many white people out there shouting them down, going you guys are bigots, you guys are insane, you guys are stupid, you need to. Hey, you know, grow up Right. And so I think, for the most part, I would say again, you and I have talked about this 5% of the right are crazy. I don't think it's even that. I think it's like 1% of the far right are really crazy and about 5% of the left are crazy. The difference is the left. The people on the far left are seen as leaders AOC, bernie Sanders, the people on the far right nobody is clamoring for a white supremacist on the right. We're not going boy. I really wish there was a smart white supremacist.
Speaker 2:About 65% of America. See November 2024. You think so, dude? Are you going to sit here and tell me that Stephen Miller and those guys aren't white supremacists? Knowing their background? I don't see it that way. Here's the thing I would encourage you to just go back and look at the background of some of the people in the administration. If you go back and look at it over the week or so, just go look at it and make your own decision on it. I like to call things as they are Right. You said, hey, give, give it time, give it, give it time, let it, let it play out Right. Well, we've given it time, we let it play out Right, and everything we've seen since January 2025 has been an attack on minorities. 25 has been an attack on minorities. Just this week, just this week, the POTUS signed an executive order to strip funding from the African-American Museum in Washington DC because he said it's racially insensitive and it's an attack on race division. Like come on.
Speaker 1:Now hold on. What did the executive order say? It said to present a more fair and objective history. Telling of history, right? Because if you go back and you look at how much money was thrown at the woman who did the 1619 project, right, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, it's completely different.
Speaker 2:No, no, you can't do the 1619 project, right? No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, it's completely different. No, no, you can't. Don't do the 1619 because because then you're changing the subject. The African-American Museum. Have you ever been there? By the way, I have, ok, yeah, amazing, amazing exhibits to include. They erased, they ordered the deletion of the slave records. Why, for what purpose? For what purpose? For what purpose? Like you, we, we, can sit back and say, oh well, maybe this, that and the other on the executive order, but I'm not. I'm looking past the executive order, I'm looking at the actual actions. Right, when you see, so, when you see these accidents that keep happening in in arlington, right, you'll say, oh, one thing, or maybe one or two things, that's's an accident. But we literally have a four month systemic pattern of accidents happening to minorities, especially the African-American community, and then we sit back and say oh well they're not they're not racist, it's just it's an accident.
Speaker 1:So so here's my question is Are is it? Is it? I'm trying to think how to say this when these errors, when these overreaches are being done and then they're called out for it, saying wait a minute, jackie Robinson, why are you deleting Jackie Robinson from this? When Jackie Robinson was, I mean, pretty, he was more than just black. Right, he was also a World War II veteran, a war hero. I'm not sure if he was a gold medalist, I believe he was an Olympian though, but Jackie Robinson, I mean, even if nothing else, just being the first African-American in baseball, considering the history of baseball, personally, I think that's enough of my favorite athletes because of that. And so if somebody goes out and deletes that because of the misreading or misunderstanding of some of this stuff because I think you're right in terms of what you said was DEI is going to be used as the boogeyman, it's going to be used as the excuse, right, and it has been right. But there's a difference between true DEI and somebody happened to be a person who happens to be of color, right? You don't delete Rosa Parks because she happened to be black. You know, if somebody is pushing and saying you know Rosa Parks, we're deleting her because all she did was write a bus. It's like well then, you're an idiot, you don't understand history.
Speaker 2:Or you got the, you got the sec def deleting black metal honor recipients because he called them DEI hires and again.
Speaker 1:But that's my point. And we go back to this and we say, when DEI, when they pushed, and they said DEI, there was a knee-jerk reaction in the military that said we can't do anything now, we can't do Black History Month, we can't do Polynesian History Month, we can't do this, that and the other Right. And they, they overreacted, they're like oh, we've got to take down the black medal of honor. So there's a there's this misinterpretation, though, that DEI is racial, and I think that was where you had people coming in and using that. And, like you and I have said this, you said to me tell me what the president said, not what you think he said Right.
Speaker 1:And I don't think I'm so, I don't think I'm the only one. I think you've had people on the other side going well, gosh, dei means anything. Black Not not really, because, let's be fair and you got on me last week for this my personal motto is never underestimate the stupidity of people. There are a lot of dumb people in the military. There are a lot of very smart, very skilled, very talented people in the military too, but a lot of the dumb people do dumb things and a lot of dumb people go in and they take action without thinking about it. So you could very easily I got you.
Speaker 2:That's a deflection, because when you have the Secretary of Defense calling Black Medal of Honor recipients from World War I and II, dei hires, it's a little hard to expect the troops not to then take that and say, okay, well, we got to remove it. I didn't see that quote. Yeah, matter of fact, I'll go get it for you, I'm not saying you didn't. No, no, no. I told you how I felt about SecDef. He was in over his skis from the get-go and he's proven time and time again to be an absolute idiot.
Speaker 1:One of the things that he also One of the problems with the SecDef in terms of the things that he also one of the problems with the SecDef in terms of the media also is that everybody's freaking out like stuff like his tattoos and all that it's like. I mean, it's a Christian tattoo, it doesn't. It's used. It was used, as you know, to show that you'd been to Jerusalem. You support, you know Jerusalem and all that stuff.
Speaker 1:But I mean the KKK was a Christian organization, so it's like Well, if you want to go with that, the KKK was also a Democratic. The KKK was like 95 percent Democrats, right.
Speaker 2:And. But see, here's the thing though we say that, like we don't know, that the party switched Right, like I saw. A matter of fact, I got into a conversation with a guy this week about it. Right, he was like, oh you know, the Democrats this, that and the other, the Democrats are upset. I've never seen some he was quoting some meme about he'd never seen Democrats so upset since they took their slaves. And I said that's pretty cool. But let me ask you this If that's the case, then when Democrats were saying, hey, we're going to take down our slave monument, who was complaining about history, not heritage?
Speaker 2:Was it Democrats saying it was history not heritage, or was it conservatives and Republicans? Then, at some point, you got to acknowledge the fundamental switch of the parties. Right, we can't sit back and say, well, democrats, you know, we freed the slaves from Democrats. Yes, you did. Yes, you absolutely did. However, the 1960s happened and the whole switch of conservative conservatism happened. Right, the Southern strategy changed everything. It did Right.
Speaker 2:So now you have and I'm not even defending Democrats, because I have to take Malcolm X's advice on this and say that the biggest threat is a Democratic liberal, because at least with a Republican or a conservative, you know exactly where they stand. They're going to tell you hey, this is what I'm for. I don't care whether you like it or not, this is what I'm going to vote for. But what you'll have with Democratic liberals and I think 2024 was another shining example of it You'll have Democratic liberals in public, out doing protests like they did today, everybody's out complaining and everybody's out fun in this unity thing.
Speaker 2:And then you'll go back and you'll look at the voting records, what they do in private, and you'll see that they vote overwhelmingly for the same bullshit. So it's like all right, we see you protesting, we see you having all these these, these outward displays of we're unified and we're tired of this stuff. But when it comes, when it matters, when it comes to voting for policy that affect real change, when it comes to electing officials who can actually enact change, we see time and time again that doesn't happen. So it's just, it's just another microcosm of a bigger issue and it's like all right, we hear it, yeah, we see it but it's bullshit and I digress.
Speaker 1:I don't understand. No, no, I get it. I think, though, that so part of the problem, realistically, is the individual versus kind of the group think and what gets pushed for the group think, because I, again, I have have, I've been on this earth for 52 years, I've lived every, every side of the world, right, yeah and um, but if I say the the most racist interactions that I've personally observed or been personally part of have been black people towards white people, I get pushed back on like, well, black people can't be racist, okay, how about bigoted then? Or using racial slurs? I've seen stuff where I was in Connecticut and we were standing in line. I come up to the express lane, it's, you know, 10 or fewer, or whatever. It was 15, 10 or 15. Grocery market, right, and I get behind a lady, a black lady, and she had more than 15.
Speaker 1:And I'm not in a rush, I don't care Like it's, like whatever Lady behind me, lady behind me she comes up and she's looking and she kind of goes. I mean not real loud or anything she kind of goes that looks like more than 15. I kind of turn and just kind of shrug Lady in front of me turns around.
Speaker 2:Who are?
Speaker 1:you, you're going to look at me, you're going to, you're going to, and then drops, then drops the cracker. Oh, you just saw a white honky cracker who just came to me. You just got and I was like whoa, hold on, whoa, whoa, whoa.
Speaker 2:Why are we there? Why are we there? Why are we there Immediately? Why are we there?
Speaker 1:There's nothing Calm down, and so and part of the thing to me was, like her saying, and this is where I've always said if you're always looking for racism. You're always gonna find racism. Yeah, not to say there. It's not to say there aren't racist things. But a woman behind me looking, going there's more than she's going through a line with more than 15 things. That's probably not racial. It's probably somebody who's annoyed that she's in the line blah blah blah and it's like, oh yeah, she had more than 15 like it's that conversation, remember?
Speaker 2:we talked about seeing, seeing different colors and hearing a different conversation. Yeah, what you guys heard was, oh, she's got more than 15, but I'm sure know what that black woman heard was a completely different conversation than she reacted to. Seth, there you go, though.
Speaker 1:If you're always looking for racism, aren't you always going to find racism, though? And I understand what you're saying is just because I don't hear the racism doesn't mean the racism's there right, yes and no.
Speaker 2:Here's the thing, right? Here's the thing. White people have become adept at saying we're post-racial or racism a big deal, that that is the go-to everywhere, what black people do. And I will tell you, saying that black people can't be racist, as a candidate, saying I don't see color, it's just bullshit. Right? Some of the some of the most racist people I know are older black men from the South, because experiences, experiences, have traumatized the hell out of them. So it's just what it is. But my point is what was it going to see? That line threw me off. What I was saying was what I'm saying is post-racial society.
Speaker 2:Here's how you get past it. Right? You go into any chat room, go on to any chat board or any article or whatever. You go into any chat room, go on to any chat board or any article or whatever. The first thing you start hearing about is old times were better, when we can hang them by trees or get nooses or you know all these racial epithets and stuff. Right, and I think we talked about this earlier.
Speaker 2:You can't. You can't say don't judge me because of the sins of my father, right? A lot of people like to say, oh well, I'm not, you can. Slavery happened so long ago. I didn't own any slaves. I didn't hang nobody in a tree. You can't blame me for it, right, which is absolutely fine and agreeable. But here's the problem. You can't go back and then get into your message boards or have these conversations and stuff and talk about hanging people and then not expect people to have a visceral reaction. It's like okay, if you want to get post-racial both sides, if everybody wants to get post-racial, it's not that hard. Just stop doing racist shit. It's really that simple.
Speaker 1:I'll tell you right now I don't see those comments. Maybe we're just going in a different place and that's fine, but I will say this If I those comments, I I, maybe we're just going a different place and that's fine, but if I but I will say this, if I saw that, I mean at the very least I reported. I mean I don't know x or whatever, you know what you do now, but I think that's. I think that goes also back to the anonymity of the keyboard warrior it does.
Speaker 2:A lot of people have been. A lot of people have been been found out about it. Like matter of fact. What was the one? Um margaret and I hate picking on margaret taylor green, but she's just so easy her ex-husband just got in the hot water because some muslim teenagers was off in a parking deck praying off to the side minding their own business. He pulls up in a tesla and just starts to berate these teenage girls like nobody's business. Go back to your country. Why you got to do this out of public. Did he film it? They filmed it. They filmed it. They didn't know who it was, they just thought it was some weirdo.
Speaker 1:It doesn't matter.
Speaker 2:That's the point I'm making. You get in these comfortable spaces where you don't think nobody else is around and all these these these crazy racial things come out, like the girl, the girl in Washington DC. She was a what do they call them when they she was a lobbyist, a lobbyist for for help, a lobbyist for for help. But at a hockey game, sitting at Texan with another consultant talking about all these negative stereotypes, about how blacks carry disease and black you know all these other stuff. But here you are. You're a lobbyist for African-American health and a lobbyist.
Speaker 1:This was a white woman saying it. Yeah, this was a white woman. At a hockey game.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Wait, wait, wait, it wasn't a black person.
Speaker 1:No, no no, but I'm saying this was not a black person at a hockey game. Wait a minute.
Speaker 2:I love hockey, when Atlanta had a hockey game.
Speaker 1:I'm just trying to see if we get any.
Speaker 2:I'm just trying to see if any of the comment sections don't realize the yeah it is going to be, yeah, bananas, but no, the point I'm making is, it's real simple, to not do racist shit like you have hard that. You have hard data. You're a lobbyist for african-american health, but here you are thinking that you're safe having a personal conversation and you're texting all these you you know you're passing all these false narratives about African-Americans, which is ridiculous. Bro, just don't be racist. It's not that hard.
Speaker 1:So okay. So here's, here's kind of my question for this. I wonder what percentage of white people aren't racist and what I mean when you say and I'm just going to caveat that don't do racist things, right? I wonder what percentage of white people don't do racist things, because I'd probably put it seriously, like at 99%, but it's that 1%. It's kind of like the police. That is extremely optimistic. Well, listen, I'm just kind of making the point, though I don't know what the number is.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Personal experience, whatever Experientially. Okay, let's go experientially. It's kind of like the police, right? The police every year have something like 100 million interactions in this country and you know things go good, things go bad and the percentage of actually bad police work where they've actually done the investigation and they found the police officers were actually doing something wrong. It was a bad shooting, it was a racially motivated arrest, but whatever it is, it's something like one out of every 100,000 or 150,000 interactions.
Speaker 1:It's very, very small, but those are the ones that we always see. So I wonder if a lot of it is simply because when something like that happens and you can go the same way for African-Americans, right. So if you say, well, the vast majority of African-Americans aren't doing anything wrong. But then the one story of the track runner who's going around the track with the baton and she smacks the other black girl upside the head, of course everybody goes oh my gosh, did you see that? And then you have some people come out and go.
Speaker 2:well, what do you? Expect and that's what you go.
Speaker 1:I expect somebody. First of all, I expect somebody, a runner, not to hit another runner with a baton. My thought wasn't like well, she did that because she was black. Well, the other runner was black too. Should she have done it? Of course not. They can't control themselves. Well, the other runner was black too. Should she have done it? Of course not, they can't control themselves.
Speaker 2:It's the animalistic nature.
Speaker 1:Right, there you go. So it's the well, white people shouldn't give ammunition to come out and say, hey, this is where, just like black people, well, black people shouldn't do anything to make them. And that's the thing there's. Also, we're at the point in this country, I think, because of the Internet and because of cell phones, there really is no forgiveness for just mistakes.
Speaker 1:Now there was the one this week and, depending on how you read it, you have a black athlete, track and field athlete, who is in the tent, who is receiving some form of treatment for some injury. Yeah, White kid comes in and says something like move. The black kid says no. The white kid says, well, hey, I need to sit down. The black kid says, well, you're going to go ahead and make me. And the white kid touches him or pokes him, and the black kid says do it again, go ahead, punch me. And now the question is the white kid, did he actually punch him or did he you know, okay, you know punch, or was he actually? It didn't sound. The way it read didn't sound like it was actually like punch to injure.
Speaker 2:It was more like oh, okay.
Speaker 1:And then the kid pulls out a knife out of his bag and stabs the kid, the white kid, and goes running away right.
Speaker 1:So now you have this well was it the white kid antagonizing the black kid? Was it the black kid? Why did the black kid have a knife in his bag? And the problem with this whole thing is then it becomes this racial thing. And I've seen on Twitter, I've seen, you know I certainly could be called racially insensitive tweets. I saw one meme where it was like it was like a demon kind of crawling out of the grave and it was me coming after my family members after I'm stabbed by a black guy and saying don't make this racial. So it's like are you saying, if you get stabbed by a black guy, you want your family to make it racial? Like what? And I saw that If that's what you believe, I mean good for you, but that's kind of a shitty thing to do.
Speaker 2:You know how the media likes to do things right, let's war game it a little bit. Had that been a white kid who stabbed that black kid out of self-defense, let's say they would have dug into that black kid's background extensively. They would have got his third grade picture. No, had they been switched, they would have grabbed his third grade school records where he was suspended from school and said see, he has a history of violence, right, I mean they would have learned extensively. So what you see here is the media doing. What the media?
Speaker 1:sure, because I think the media is, um, genuinely not only unhelpful but dishonest, and and the reason I say that is you and I have talked about this a little bit the, the trayvon martin, um, not just the whole situation, but I'm only going to talk about the, the background picture. You remember when that all blew up?
Speaker 1:and they talked about Trayvon Martin and then they showed a picture of Trayvon and Trayvon Martin when he died I believe was 17. He was almost neither. He was okay 17, but the picture that they showed around was him as a seventh grader when he was like 13. Was him as a seventh grader when he was like 13. And there's a very big difference between what young men look like when they're 13 and when they're 17. At 13, most kids are 13-year-old. Boys are just kind of skinny and young looking and most of them don't even have any peach fuzz and they're just very in general 13-year-olds do not look threatening at all 17-year-olds I've been in these high schools. I see 17-year-olds with bigger beards than I can grow and I mean these are young men okay at 17.
Speaker 1:And the media turned around. And again the media, by the same token, did the same thing with OJ. You remember when the OJ, when they had his, his mugshot, they actually darkened OJ's mugshot to make him look more menacing. So the media is very dishonest kind of as a whole, depending on, depending on which way they want to do.
Speaker 2:How do?
Speaker 1:we want to make this look bad? Do we want to make the black kid look like more of a victim, or do we want? To make the black guy look like he's more of the criminal.
Speaker 2:Or do we want?
Speaker 1:to look the white guy. So it's really dishonest and as far as celebrity, the problem with the self-defense was we don't know who was self-defense for who, though?
Speaker 2:That's the question. Self-defense for who? Well, they both have claims of self-defense. You have the victim saying that, hey, it was completely. I know, I know what I'm saying. The victim's family is saying, hey, it was completely, yeah, we had a conversation, but he overreacted. Then, at the same time, you got the accused family saying, hey, man, I got these two guys coming up to me. I have a right to defend myself. So that's where, yeah, it's going to play out in court. It's going to play out in court, obviously, but and that's what the videos, the videos. And but at the same time, kj, you also I don't necessarily know if it's liberal blacks defending unjustified killing we, we don't know if it's unjustified, we don't know, and that's important and this is one of the other problems.
Speaker 1:So we talk about when we have video. It's important, it's great to have video, but how many also times. How many times have we seen videos that it's like?
Speaker 2:Which have been manipulated.
Speaker 1:Yeah, here's where the fight starts, here's where the video starts and here's where the video stops. All we get is this little clip, this 15-second clip of somebody freaking out and throwing a haymaker or whatever In both ways, like oh my gosh, I can't believe this guy did that, or I can't believe this guy reacted the way they did that. But we only have this little snippet because that's, you know what was the site that used to show all the fights on when the internet first started going?
Speaker 2:I don't know. I remember E-Bombs World and Bum Fights was fun and Bumfights right.
Speaker 1:So that's what they would do also, and that's where we're at. We're at where you take the clip and then you can manipulate it into just about anything, and the media and you and I I've told you how many times, whether it's racist, whether whatever I blame the media and its coverage, probably 95% of the time, because we just don't get a fair viewpoint of any of this stuff. So we're talking about the. We haven't gone to it, but we'll go to it now the protests that happened this weekend against Trump, right? So even that has been from what I've seen and I will readily admit I've seen very little. I'm not big on protests. I think protests again are a look at it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think they're virtue signaling, for the most part, protesting against Trump eight weeks after he was elected. Okay, good for you. What are you going to change? Hands off our stuff. What stuff? What Like what? Tell me hands off what you don't get to change it. You know he was elected in the next elections, not for another 22 months, so great Go ahead and do that, say that is the media.
Speaker 1:So I I have this guy on twitter that I found that he uses and I think I said it to you and and aj, but he uses the, the metadata, to look at these protests and how many people are actually.
Speaker 1:They're using the gps and the um oh yeah yeah, right, yeah, so chicago, like today, it was there's 30 000 people in in Chicago who were protesting against Trump and he went and he said well, actually it's about 9,000. And of those 9,000, we've been able to track like 40% of the 9,000 have been at least five left-leaning rallies and another 20% have been at four of them. So it's the same people that are going out. None of this, from what I can tell, none of this is grassroots. You had Schumer come out last week and, unintentionally, I think, he admitted that the Democrats were the ones who were pushing for other Democrats to go out to the town halls that Republicans were holding. When he said something like you know, we've got our Democrats out there at these town hall meetings not to let these Republicans get away with things. It's like dude, like, do you hear what you're saying? You're saying the quiet part out loud.
Speaker 2:I mean town halls are open to everybody.
Speaker 1:It's not like, it's not like, it's not like, oh, like.
Speaker 2:Once they become elected as a Senator, they they regardless of party affiliation. They're the state's Senator, so you can't you know what I'm saying. If I'm a Democrat, if Lindsay or Tim were to have a town hall, I would go, because I'm still a constituent, even though I'm not a Republican. Even though I'm not a Republican, they're still my senators.
Speaker 1:But there's a difference between you saying that Lindsey Graham is going to have one and saying, hey, I want to show up and go, versus somebody going from the Democratic Party and going and getting whatever online cheat codes they use to get all the tickets, and then making sure you're giving them out to all the instigators. And that seems to be what's going on in a lot of cases.
Speaker 2:Not everything.
Speaker 1:Of course, not everything, but you know what I? I'm kind of with you, though, like and like. If you're a Republican and you show up and you do a town hall, first of all you need to be prepared for it to be. Nobody goes to a town hall and says you know what? Guys, you've just been great, keep doing what you've done. I drove all the way from Augusta, I drove all the way into Atlanta for this town hall just to say you've been doing just a bang-up job and keep it going. Nobody does that, whichever side. So if you're going to have a town hall, you have to expect it to be hostile. But at the same time, you know, I just kind of again, I think there's with these protests and everything I just kind of laugh, because I've sent you a couple and don't get me wrong, republicans do this too.
Speaker 1:There's this flip flop. I've sent you videos of Schumer talking about how terrorists back in 1995. Oh, terrorists would be the best. We need terrorists. And Nancy Pelosi going oh, terrorists, man, you know what we, you know what we did in this country. We need some terrorists. And then you have, you know, bernie Sanders in 2019 going oh, terrorists, man, you know what we, you know what we need in this country we need some terrorists. And then you have, you know, bernie Sanders in 2019 going, oh you know, having these open borders. This is just horrible. We need to stop these open borders. This is a threat to our democracy. And then five, four years later, it's racist to say we can't have these open borders. So and again, republicans are just as bad. These are two sides of the same coin. That said, I just I look at it again. Aj pushed back on me, you pushed back on me.
Speaker 1:Well, what about all this stuff Trump's doing and I go. We're two months in policy-wise now. You don't have to appreciate, and I give you credit. You've said look, I've never had a big problem with Trump, I have a problem with the people around him and that's fine. I appreciate your opinion on that, but I think you have a dishonesty again in the narrative, especially from the mainstream media, when the headlines are Dow has the worst two days in history and you say, okay, so the Dow dropped, whatever the number was 2,000, 2,500 points whatever it was right.
Speaker 2:Sure.
Speaker 1:But that 2,500 is something like 3%. Okay, I was working at Fidelity Investments in the mid 90s when it dropped something like 900 points in two days and that was like a 7 percent. So you could say it's been the worst two days, but not really Well, liberty, whatever it was, I don't know the exact numbers, but I'm just saying it's been. Depending on how you look at it, it's not the biggest. These are not the biggest drops in the history of all time. They might be the biggest numbers as far as dropping 5,000, 5,000. But let's see the market's at 40,000. Did it drop 8,000? I don't even know. I don't know.
Speaker 1:My little tiny bit of stocks. I just leave them as is. I'm not going in, I'm not doing anything with them. I will tell you they're there to be invested.
Speaker 2:I will tell you, I've looked and I'm not. I mean, it is what it is, man. There's not much I can do about it. I'm not going to sell. You know what I'm saying. I'm going to ride the wave.
Speaker 1:No, you shouldn't, Because again most of this stuff will come back you know, at some point it's going to come back.
Speaker 2:Do you think that I've seen some stuff that I thought was interesting? Yeah, you can definitely buy the dip.
Speaker 1:Have you seen the? There's an argument that the tariffs and some of the economic stuff that Trump is doing is super unpopular by the extremely rich. And if the stuff that he's pushing were to work If the stuff that he's pushing were to work and we don't know yet, but if it were to work it would be much more beneficial to the middle class and to the lower class, the more poor, versus those people in the stock market. And that Trump at this point is like I don't give a crap what the stock market does, I want to bring back manufacturing into this country and I want people to be able to. And so that's kind of the argument at this point. I don't. I honestly I don't know how it's going to go. I don't know if that's Trump's intention. I hope it is. I hope the intention is let's bring back manufacturing.
Speaker 1:I've said for a long time, I've said this way before Trump. I was saying this 20 years ago If you want to solve probably 90 percent of the trade issues we have in this world, in this country, is you just do a mirror tariff. Whatever China charges up on tariffs, you charge for China's. You charge for China's If they are going to charge 100% tariff for cars going from the US to China. You tariff 100% of cars and manufactured auto parts coming into this country.
Speaker 2:I'm not smart enough to comment on any of it.
Speaker 1:Down 5%.
Speaker 2:The whole tariffs thing. Obviously you ask 10 economists, you're going to get 10 different answers Right. Ultimately, we hope it's going to work. That is a way that I don't necessarily know. If that's that's the way, I don't even think that's the way he was looking at it, but if it works out that way, he'll take the credit for it.
Speaker 2:I just don't. I don't believe that's his intent. What Trump has never been? Well, trump's never really been a middle class champion. I get just his mouth has said that. His mouth has said it. His mouth has said that. His mouth has said it. He's you know, he said it. However, his, his actions as POTUS 45 and then now POTUS 47, it's just it's. It's not lining up Right. We can, we can go off. We can go off.
Speaker 1:I thought real wages for 45 were pretty darn solid. Is that not what the number showed? I could have sworn that show that's what the number showed for 45 were pretty darn solid. Is that not what the numbers showed? I could have sworn that's what the numbers showed for 45.
Speaker 2:Nope. And then even with the tax cuts that are trying to be permanent, become permanent now, like you got the initial dopamine push of the middle class getting hit, but ultimately it benefited the upper 1%.
Speaker 1:Can something benefit. Let me ask because here's the problem with the economics that I have as a whole how the narrative kind of goes, when, when it's being pushed as the the super rich, the middle class and the poor, because there's there's really no such thing as the upper middle class anymore. Right, because even rich people who make a million dollars a year, even though normally you and I would go, wow, a million dollars a year, but, they don't pay the resources or taxes.
Speaker 2:We can get into that later.
Speaker 1:But what I was going to say was so you've got you. The idea that's pushed by the left is that billionaires are taking money away from middle class and poor people, and that's not what the economy. The economy is not a pie that if the richest of the rich take 90% of the pie, there's only 10% of the pie left over for the middle class and the large. The economy is a pie factory that will pump out as many pies as anybody needs.
Speaker 1:And my argument has always been because I'll have people say well, why do you defend billionaires? Why do you defend the super rich? You're not ever going to be super rich and the reason I say that is I don't have a problem with anybody making money. I want anybody who can to make money. I was talking with Heather. Actually, we had an idea for an app. Anybody app developed or I am, maybe because I have a really good idea for an app that I think would actually make a lot of money, but because I can't do it.
Speaker 1:But let's say I did.
Speaker 1:Let's say I was able to do that. As long as I'm not stealing money from somebody else. I don't like Bill Gates politics at all. That said, Bill Gates made his money by writing code or improving code, improving on computers, personal computers, Windows, da-da-da-da-da. And people said I'm going to give you, I'm going to take my money out and I'm going to give you $150 of my money because I want what you made and Bill Gates and how many people of outside of? Huh, I can't right now. Sorry, Go get your mom Shut the door. I'm doing my podcast. We're doing this. This is live. This is the fun of doing the podcast. You got an 11-year-old coming in. I need help with the puppies. I'm doing my podcast. We're doing this. This is live. This is the fun of doing the podcast. You got an 11-year-old coming in. I need help with the puppies.
Speaker 1:I love it, so I have no problem with somebody going and making as much money as they possibly want.
Speaker 2:Look, george Soros.
Speaker 1:I think George Soros is a horrible human being. He made all of his money basically on foreign money manipulation. He was betting the markets right, but as long as he didn't do anything illegal, Warren won't.
Speaker 2:I'm going to give you a different perspective. Right, and I completely agree with you, and we got enough data now to know that Reagan's policy of trickle down economics was a complete disaster. It does not work. Rich people, when given the option to give back, tend to hoard more. That's just, that's not me. That's just, that's a science. I'm sorry, but I'm going to give you a different perspective. Right, if things were proportional, it would make sense.
Speaker 2:But what happens is you have everybody's benefiting Right. You have the ultra rich, the super 1 percent. They are benefiting from society, and then you have a middle class who's benefiting from society, and then you have a lower class or lower middle class. It's lower middle class and in poverty. Everybody benefits proportionally right. So you got the guys that are in poverty they benefit from social services right, they're the ones that's going to take up the bulk of social services right. You got the people in the middle class Right. I'll get to that in a minute. Hold on again, not true, but we'll get to that in a minute. So the point I was making is is this right, you have the middle class right. Who bore the brunt? Between 70 and 85 percent of the tax tax burden? Right. They pay between 70 the middle, between lower middle class, upper middle class and middle middle class. They pay between 70 and 85% of the tax burden in the country.
Speaker 1:Are you talking about federal income tax? Yes, no, yes, who no?
Speaker 2:Who.
Speaker 1:The top 5% in America pay something like 75% of the taxes.
Speaker 2:No man. Matter of fact, I'm going to pull it up.
Speaker 1:The bottom 50% of Americans it's like the bottom 49% of Americans pay zero in federal income tax. The rich pay a shite load of the taxes in this country. Let's see, let's see, let's see, let's see, let's see. And it's not even close. Now here's part of the problem with the way the taxes work, though, in federal income tax, but still pay a higher percentage of their paycheck, as small as it is in taxes, because of things like sales tax, gasoline tax, et cetera. Right? So if you're a guy who's only making 50 percent or fifteen dollars an hour but you have to pay when you go fill up your gas tank on your forty dollar gas tank, you have to pay $10 worth of taxes Then your percentage is higher than somebody who's paying more. And that I don't believe I'm wrong. I'm pretty sure I'm not wrong.
Speaker 2:Hold on, because I'm going to pull it.
Speaker 1:There you go, liberty, just posted. It.
Speaker 2:No, that is incorrect, sir. Where'd you get that from? That is incorrect, sir. Where'd you get that from? That is incorrect, sir. Where'd you get that from? Because I'm looking at it right now the average income rate by group top 1% pays on oh yeah, chat GPT. Nope, you're right, chat GPT, not it.
Speaker 2:So, listen, according to the government data, top 1% pays about 26.1% of federal income taxes. That's as of 2022, 26.1%, that's the top 1%. Then you have the 1% to 5%. They pay an additional 18%, right, but then, depending on how the stats break because that could be upper middle class to a different site right. So, if you look at anywhere from 5% to 50%, right, Because you got 14.3% for 5% to 10%, 10.7% for 10% to 25%, 7.7% for the 25% to 50% and then the bottom 50, which are the guys in poverty they pay about three point seven percent on average. Reason why is because they get most of the tax return. They don't really put in a lot because they're on government services. So it's true that they accounted for the most taxes, but they don't pay the most taxes. Does that make sense?
Speaker 2:the most taxes but they don't pay the most taxes. Does that make sense? Say that again the top 1% we're talking about the elite of the elite. They pay between 25% to 30% taxes as of 2022. Average federal income rate tax rate by income group. You go down the line which is the upper middle class, like I was telling you. Upper middle class, the lower middle class, that is your, your anything from, let's say, the top one percent is, you know, the elite of the elite. Everybody else, from from one to 50, pays roughly 47 to 50 percent, and then the bottom three pays about four percent because they're the ones that's getting all the social services so.
Speaker 1:So this comes, this comes into the magic of the, the numbers and the statistics and all that.
Speaker 2:Right, okay, because this is where they only contribute about two to three percent.
Speaker 1:That's exactly what I just said but the easiest example is this when warren buffett says my secretary pays more in taxes than I do. And this is where perception matters. Right, because warren buffett, his salary is basically nothing. He doesn't make a salary. What he does is he invests. And what is the rate of taxation for investment? Do you know what it is?
Speaker 2:No but you're right, I know you're right, but I don't know the exact numbers.
Speaker 1:Okay, so capital gains taxes are 15%, right? So if Warren Buffett makes $100 million out of that $100 million, he's paying taxes at a 15% rate. So he makes $100 million, he's taxed $15 million. Right, so he paid $15 million in taxes. Right, so he paid 15 million in taxes. Meanwhile his secretary who I have no idea how much she makes, but I'm guessing she does pretty well, let's again do a nice round number.
Speaker 1:Let's say Warren Buffett is super generous to his number one personal assistant, who's been with him for 30 years, who has always taken care of her, and he pays a salary of $10 million a year. Right, let's say $10 million a year. Okay, because she's in the top 1% tax bracket, she's paying in federal taxes. I believe it's the high end, is somewhere around 47%. Now, my numbers are not exact. No, no, yeah, estimating Right, right, so she's paying around. Let's just round it off in 50%. Okay, I know that's not exactly right, but let's say it's 50%. So by that math, she's paying 5 million in taxes. So the argument is well, she's paying 50% in taxes, so she pays way more than Warren Buffett. But then when you look at it and say, well, warren Buffett paid 15 million in taxes. She paid 5 million in taxes. Who paid more in taxes? Well, warren Buffett did, but that's part of the problem about how it all goes and how you look at and why money comes through and how it all goes through. Yeah, you showed me that.
Speaker 2:I want to post this I can't read it. I got you. I'm going to read it to you Right.
Speaker 1:I'm going to pull it up on what you said, though.
Speaker 2:So go ahead.
Speaker 1:I'll read it on my own, because I'm not going to be able to.
Speaker 2:Ultimately, it goes back to that you know the rules right. You know there's just like in baseball, there's rules and then there's rules right, the real rules and the unwritten rules.
Speaker 2:Right, and money and taxes has a set of rules and they also have, you know, unwritten rules. And I think this chart I saw, I saw this week, is really cool because it talks about so, at the poverty level, like I was talking about, they don't have the income to invest. Their all of their money is to be spent, so that's why they can never get ahead. The middle class, who carries the brunt of the weight of the of the economy, they have to manage their money. Sure, they can invest here or there or splurge a little bit here and there, but they don't really have the access to take advantage of the tax code, whereas the wealthy wealthy like you were bringing up with Warren Buffett they have the ability and access to take advantage of the tax code. So while their company is bringing in billions of dollars, technically they don't make that money at all, you know. So it makes sense, but ultimately it's not distributed equally Right and to say that it is is fallacy, it just is.
Speaker 1:This is an argument that has gone back a couple of hundred years, if not longer, in the free market, because you can say well, why did? Why should Rockefeller make all this money? Should rockefeller make all this money? And I don't know if you sent me that. I I know you, you had it there, so I'm going off of what you said, and I don't have the paper in front of me, if you send it to me, I'll I'll be able to read it I got you okay, so so this is an argument that has gone back um for quite a while.
Speaker 1:I mean this, this argument actually goes way back, even further than that. It goes back into Royal England and some of those things and France and all that.
Speaker 1:But so if you're saying, well, ok, why did Rockefeller? Or why did these super rich guys? Why did they get to make this money? Why is it fair that they made this money? And the answer is, well, if you're the one who's investing in the initial, now how they got the capital where they came from? Some of these guys just worked their butts off. A lot of those guys were not.
Speaker 1:Now there are people who get. You could say, trump is somebody who has handed his money, at least the seed money. Sure, that's not true of everybody. So when you have these guys and they're the ones who are pushing and say, well, I'm the one who's putting the money up and so I hire people and you are, simply, if the poor are willing. Now, again, historically it's very different because unions and such. But well, why don't the poor get anything out of this? Well, because the poor are trading their labor for a paycheck. They're saying I am willing to.
Speaker 1:And you can say, well, poor people don't have a job. They have to take whatever job they want. Okay, well, c'est la vie. That's why education is the way it is. It's unfair. The world is unfair, right, but ultimately, if you want to have a fairness and you want to have everything equal across the board, then what you're going to have has already been tried and it killed over 100 million people in the 20th century, and that was Marxist-Leninist communism everybody's equal everybody has the same opportunity, and even then it was unfair.
Speaker 1:That's even communism in london was unfair, even though they'll turn around, oh and then, oh no. What about malice?
Speaker 2:malice did it different.
Speaker 1:No they killed just as many. If mal killed tens of millions of his own people as well, right? So, no matter what the situation, the problem with all of this comes down to people. Now, you and I both know in the military it's very, very unfair, because you can have two people join the military and they both get put in the same MOS. They both are assigned to do the same job. Let's use something simple. Let's use nothing super special assigned to do the same job. Let's use something simple. Let's use nothing super special.
Speaker 1:Let's just say, like military police, right, and those two will be treated the same way in terms of, at least to start, they're going to be the same rank. They're both going to be privates, they're both going to get the same paycheck. They're both going to get the same barrack room. They're going to get the same benefits. They're going to get the same things right barrack room. They're going to get the same benefits. They're going to get the same things right.
Speaker 1:But eventually one is going to and sometimes it's fair, sometimes it's not. One is either going to get ahead and the other's not. Through hard work, sometimes and we've seen this sometimes the person who works hard, it stops working hard because he goes. Why am I working my butt off and all this stuff when Private Snuffy over here he calls out sick, he doesn't go into work, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I'm the one who I'm reliable, and so when there's a problem they call me and not him. So now I'm doing even more because I'm a good soldier and I do all that stuff, and then at the end of the day he got promoted.
Speaker 1:Social yeah, we've seen that in society quite a bit right and so and that's where I look back and I say life is unfair yeah nobody.
Speaker 2:and just to be clear, I'm not making a case for government redistribution. What I'm saying is what I'm saying is right now, the middle class is carrying an unproportionate tax burden to the benefits that they're getting, and it's just not sustainable. It's not sustainable and we'll find out.
Speaker 1:It's been not sustainable now for 250 years.
Speaker 2:No, hell, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, when you're talking about capitalism.
Speaker 1:When you're talking about capitalism, though, that's something that they've been arguing right up front.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but again, capitalism idealistically, if done correctly, works because the strength is in the middle class and everything is paid proportionally. What you have here is a bastardization of capitalism, where the top 10, let's say 10 percent is taking advantage of the capitalist nature of an economy and leaving the brunt of the of the bills to the middle class. That, of course, is not sustainable.
Speaker 1:Do you remember, during the 2015 debates between Hillary and Trump, Hillary started going off on Trump and saying do you really trust this billionaire who manipulates the tax code, who hires accountants to not have to pay his taxes, to not pay his fair share? And Trump said yeah, why wouldn't I? If you have a problem with it, fix the tax code, Don't get mad at me.
Speaker 1:You're the one who's been in congress. Your husband was president. Right, you've been in the senate. If you have a problem with the tax code, you should have fixed it right, and that's why people love trump right back then I I honestly believe that was the turning point of the 20 2016 I agree, I agree and that's why I'm telling you.
Speaker 2:That's why I'm telling you trump is not a champion of the middle class, because four years plus this new reign, no results. We got to go because we are way behind time. We'll come back to that later.
Speaker 1:I never worry about what our pre-list of what we're going to talk about is.
Speaker 2:I know we got to get the videos going. Is there something we got to get to? Okay, no, no, no, no, no. We're going to run this video and then we'll come back and we'll talk about it.
Speaker 1:Just real quick. This is one of the problems with that sense. Facts, it's like that. I don't know which one you're talking about. Facts on which part?
Speaker 2:Hold on, here we go. I believe, Mr President, my name is Pick, or you can accept the fact that this city is headed for a disaster of biblical proportion. What do you mean biblical?
Speaker 1:What he means is Old Testament.
Speaker 2:Mr Mayor, real wrath of God type stuff Fire and brimstone coming down from the sky, rivers and seas boiling.
Speaker 2:Forty years of darkness, earthquakes, volcanoes, the dead rising from the grave, human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria. I get the point, all right. So, with that being said, that video is apropos because where are we? The stock market is winning, I think. I think BOTUS is looking at the stock market is winning. I think, um, I think potus is looking at the stock market like his golf game. Right, the lower the stock market goes, the more we're winning, and I don't think that's the right way to look at this thing. I think he's. I think he got it backwards.
Speaker 2:So we are in a, we are in a a bit of a tumultuous time and I know we kind of hit about it. But where do you see this going? Where do you see the bottom going? Like I, I looked at my stocks and stuff, which is fine. I'm always buying the dip in the curve or whatever, because I'm in it for the long run.
Speaker 2:But I think it's unfair for a potus who ran on on being the economics guy and being the, the guy that says hey man, our economy's in the dumps. You know this, this, that administration has put us in the worst place we've ever been in and I'm the guy to fix it. And then it turns around in less than 90 days completely shit cans the economy. We went from being in a bull market or in a bear market to a bull market anyway. In a bull market, or in a bear market to a bull market anyway. But it OK.
Speaker 2:So here's the thing. Hold on Before we get started. Here's the thing. Let's say he does bring back manufacturing, right. Let's say he does bring back. Let's say it works out. How long does it take to to move a manufacturing company from overseas to the United States and then get that company built up? And get that company built up and running and then get the company hired, right. And then, oh, by the way, the minimum wage in this company is not a livable wage. That's keeping up with inflation. So even if they do put people in the factories, they're not going to pay them a livable wage to be able to pay. So they're still going to be on welfare. So it's a lot of stuff. So when we say he's trying to bring back manufacturing home, that's not what the hell he promised the people, right?
Speaker 1:But I disagree with a couple of parts of your premise To say that you're going to have people who are going to be getting paid minimum wage Hold, hold on, hold on, hold on.
Speaker 2:Okay, what is the minimum wage in this country? Matter of fact, it's not like we didn't have a huge debate for the last.
Speaker 1:It's like 725.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and statistically, minimum wage is not kept up with inflation over the last 25 years. Liberty, I hate to disappoint you, brother. You're missing the point. My brother, what I'm telling you is wages are not at a level that is keeping up with inflation. My brother, no, wages do not go up on supply and demand. That is incorrect. When you have legislation that's set to mandate for minimum wage and tell the company, hey, you only have to pay this amount. We have studies have shown that companies and corporations will only pay that amount. So, yes, it's a legislative issue. Now if they came back and said, ok, cool, we're going to tell you that the recommended minimum wage is whatever 20% gross GDP or whatever. All right, just making up something. Yeah, I got you, you've been an employer and you didn't base pay, but you are not the rule, you are the exception to the rule. Liberty, that's what I'm saying. You can't take personal experiences. Go ahead.
Speaker 1:Okay, hold on my turn. Sure have, at it.
Speaker 1:Minimum wage in America seven dollars and twenty five cents. This is from USA Facts, which is not a conservative site. This is one of those fact checking sites, the left. Sure. In 2022, one point zero two million hourly workers earned at or below the federal minimum wage Now, below the minimum wage. You know those are going to be people who are here illegally and not being paid enough. That 1.02 million hourly workers is 1.3% of all hourly workers. Sure, so when you say if factories are going to come back, minimum wage is there to pay people who have no other skills, sure, who need to learn how to have a job. Mostly teenagers, for the vast majority. You definitely have some people that can't get a job anywhere else, like you know, because of circumstances, choices, choices in life, you know, maybe a felony, and so they can't get a job anywhere else, but for the even now. You come down here to Augusta and you see billboards at McDonald's starting at twelve thirteen dollars an hour.
Speaker 2:Because, because, because minimum wage and living wage is two different things. We're talking about two different numbers wage and living wage is two different things.
Speaker 1:We're talking about two different numbers. But again, states have individual states can have different minimum wages and if a state wants to do that, they can do that right. But at the same time the marketplace determines your worth, right? So my daughter, who's 18 years old, she goes out, she gets a job, she works at that job, she's making. She was making like eleven dollars an hour, not real great. She says OK, I'm not real happy with where I'm at. She goes and applies at a different place. She applies at Starbucks. She goes from about eleven dollars an hour to about sixteen dollars an hour because Starbucks was able to look and say here's the experience she has. She's able to do some things that somebody that I don't know and don't trust doesn't have a job job record. I'm going to hire them for more. So when you're talking about fight, things like manufacturing, you're not going to be having people who are making seven, 25.25 making steel and that's again. You have unions and things like that, right? No?
Speaker 2:you don't have unions, but the administration is busting unions. That's what I'm saying. You guys, you can't talk out of both sides of your neck. The administration is anti-union, so we can't have those union protections. That's going to guarantee our wages.
Speaker 1:Okay, georgia is a non-union state. Do you think the manufacturers down the road, the Hyundai factory right down the road, are making $7.25 an hour? No, of course not. They're making probably more than I am. Why? Because it's a skill you get in and you still get. They don't want people who are coming in who have no skills. You still have to pay for a skilled job and you're going to have.
Speaker 1:Now I agree, manufacturing coming back in this country is going to take some time, right? So let's say what? What do we want to build back here? We want to have more steel. We want to have more aluminum. We want to have more precious metals. We want to have more refineries. We want to have more steel. We want to have more aluminum. We want to have more precious metals. We want to have more refineries. We want to have more, more, more, more. Right, because we want to be able to.
Speaker 1:But I'll say this one, the most important one. To me, the most important thing that needs to come here is chips. If you don't have microchips, you're screwed, and right now it's something like 90% of all microchips are made in Taiwan. What happens if China decides to go in and militarily repatriate Taiwan to mainland China? Do you think the Chinese are just going to be like, hey, great, now we'll keep the market in? No, they're going to take advantage of the market, because that's what everybody does. They're going to take advantage of the market because that's what everybody does, even communists, right? And China is a? China is actually a hybrid between state control, which is a dictatorship, and A market economy that that takes advantage of the global market. But what you don't want to do is you don't want to be, you don't want to rely on China for something like chips. So within the now I don't know if this number is right I saw I remember Piers Morgan had somebody on that reference this number. So I have to go huge grain of salt Right.
Speaker 1:But she said it was something like since the election, there's been a commitment.
Speaker 1:Now, commitment is also a dirty word, because you can commit whatever you want without necessarily delivering Something like $1.2 trillion in manufacturing back into this country since the inauguration. But I've also again commitment versus actually doing it, and this is where the time comes in and this is where I say we have to wait and see. When you're talking about these tariffs, are they actually going to last? Are they negotiating tools? If we're able to bring manufacturing back into this country, is it going to be in an isolationist form or is it just going to be in a self-reliance form? Are we doing some things that make sense, like allowing ourselves to use the energy that's here in this country, one of the things I personally would love to see? I think we need to make it a priority to generate an oil shale refinery. Priority to generate an oil shale refinery because we have more oil shale with Canada, but we have more than Canada, but from the Rocky Mountains all along the Rocky Mountains, there's more oil shale in the Western US and Canada than anywhere else in the world.
Speaker 1:Now, I believe it was the guy who started JetBlue, neiman, so he's been very successful with a couple. He was talking about how to build a refinery to refine oil shale into petroleum products. The average refinery costs something around $500 million, but it's something like over a billion dollars for an oil shale. But we have more, but you just can't do it because of the red tape and because of the things that are going on with the government. So I think there's stuff there. I think we have ways to do this. Is that, given time, that some of the things that he's proposing and some of the things that he has is pushing for will lead to positive outcomes? And that's where we always are, no matter who the president is. When Biden came in, I hope that what Biden did like did I think the build back better was going to work.
Speaker 2:No, but did I hope it did?
Speaker 1:Of course, because I think the Build Back Better was going to work. No, but did I hope it did? Of course, because I wanted this country to be more healthy? The Reduce Inflation Act Inflation Reduction Act yeah, Did I want it to work? Of course I want every policy. If Nancy Pelosi comes out and says I have a policy that I think will help America, I want that to pass if I believe it'll help America. Right, and I think that's what most people do. But I think the problem right now is we are in a knee jerk reaction and part of the problem is because Trump set it up for this. When Trump said and you and I talked about this a couple of weeks ago when Trump said I'm going to end the Ukraine war on day one.
Speaker 1:Well we're not day one anymore, we're on day 65 or 70, and that war is still going.
Speaker 1:So when Trump is saying here's what you can expect well, you know what Then you're setting up the wrong expectations. And, liberty, I understand, I don't disagree with you, liberty. The question and this I think I speak for most people is that while most people, most reasonable people, hope that the tariffs are going to help the middle class, not everybody is convinced and in part and this goes back to the media I read something from Greg Easterbrook, our friend Greg Easterbrook about the economy.
Speaker 1:He had a big article this week about the economy and resetting the American economy right, why would we do that? And he quoted Paul Krugman. Now, paul Krugman is a Nobel Prize winning economist, who won the Nobel Prize a couple of decades ago in economy, and the problem is he has become a caricature of the left, of the academic left, who goes out of his way to say things that are just anything, anything Republican, evil, anything that is proposed by the right, bad Right. And so when Paul Krugman says, hey, tariffs are not good for the economy, I dismiss Krugman out of out of hand because of how his politics, because I don't trust Krugman is being real. I don't trust that Krugman is being on Right and so that's. I worry that that's that has is the norm.
Speaker 1:Like, I don't know who to trust on tariffs. I don't know if Trump and his economic team are going to be right. I don't know if the Heritage Foundation who's pushing tariffs or whatever, is going to be right. I don't know if the left is going to be. I don't know if the Foundation, who's pushing tariffs or whatever, is going to be right. I don't know if the left is going to be right. I don't know if the economist that Rachel Maddow I'm sure has had on her show? I presume, because I don't watch Rachel Maddow I'm sure. But you know, when I see clips of the View talking about how bad tariffs are, that makes me believe that oh yeah, okay, I'll support the tariffs because the View are a bunch of cackling whiny women that are more driven by politics than anything else.
Speaker 2:Again, you ask 10 different economists, you're going to get 10 different answers, right, it's just what it is. All I can go on is what's happening now, Right? And you say, wait and see, wait and see. But to be honest with you, you know those, those, those guys 60, 70 years old who are counting on that pension. You know who had ideas of retirement. So what you what you're facing is a bunch of cataclysmic events all at one time and you keep telling. You know, you're telling people to be patient, be patient, be patient. Right. But I have over 50,000 people who've been relieved of their duties by this administration, Right, Couple that with I now have just sank the shit out of their 401ks so they have no retirement. I just told them to take voluntary retirement. Most of them are able enough to cash in their pensions. But oh, by the way, I just crushed their fucking pensions. And I'm telling you, hey, it's going to be okay, it's going to be okay, which is great in theory. But you can't call the mortgage company and tell them hey, hold tight, President's bringing back manufacturing and it's going to take a couple of years. You can't call your electric company and tell them hold tight. Hey, I know you need your money this month, but hold tight. My pension doesn't have any money in it and I don't have a job. But Trump says everything's going to be all right In theory, of course you want it to work, but had Trump ran on the fact that, hey, I am going to sink the shit out of the economy and I'm going to fire a bunch of you guys and oh, by the way, it's going to take me a couple of years to build it back up so for about for about six months on the conservative side, you guys are going to be eating shit.
Speaker 2:I don't think he'd won in the landslide. I don't think it would have been close. But what he did was said hey. What he said was hey, I'm going to bring us back to economic prosperity. Your food bills are high, your electricity is high, Everything's high, and I'm going to fix it. And it's going to be the greatest economy day one. Right, that's what he was elected on, and so far he's done the exact opposite.
Speaker 2:And instead of people holding them to account, they're saying oh, it's fine, it's okay. My pension is shit, it's okay. I got fired because, ultimately, I'm betting that he knows what's best for us, Right, and like my granddaddy used to say I'm old Southern boy. Like my granddaddy used to say I'm an old southern boy. My granddaddy used to say wish in one hand and shit in the other one, and see which one fill up first. What you have from this administration is a bunch of wishes and hopes saying that it's going to get better, but you got a bunch of the society right now. Who's freaking hurting? They can't retire because their pensions are shit. They don't have a job because they was counting on that paycheck that they was working on. They don't have that anymore. So where do they turn in the country? Where do they turn in the country?
Speaker 1:Let me ask you something about that. Sure, okay, let's say what's a good number to go off of somebody that's retiring. Should we say a million dollars in stocks and retirement.
Speaker 2:I think it depends on the family size.
Speaker 1:Yeah it depends on the family size.
Speaker 2:Give me a number I can go off of. We can do it. A million, a million is fine.
Speaker 1:Okay, a million. So if you're a million dollars and we said the stock market went down by 10%, right, okay, sure, and you're probably doing it on an annuity, so you're doing a million dollars, hopefully, you're getting. Your return on investment is somewhere around $70,000. Now, your $70,000 that you're living off of that's 7%, okay, you get taxed 15% of that, so that's another almost $11,000. So, instead of 70,000, you're probably living off around $59,000, plus social security, whatever else, right, sure. So if the stock market goes down, that 10%, so from 59,000, 10% of that, you're down to about 54,000. Okay, can that cause short-term pain, short-term hurt? Yes, of course, sure.
Speaker 1:And what you just said, though, is there's a lot of people who say, hey, I still trust that the guy because the older people voted for Trump, that's where Trump won Was right Was the over 50-year-old. Okay. So if they're saying, hey, I'm okay with it. I trust that this is going to come back. I'm willing to tighten my belt and I'm willing to eat ramen for a couple months instead of going out and having steak or eat less or whatever. Sure, you know, I'm going to be careful with my, because this is going to help my country and this is going to help my kids and my grandkids, then I don't, you know you're you're always going to have some people who are unhappy. You know who's protesting right now. I mean, go look at those protesters. Those aren't old people, those are young white liberals who are going out doing anything they can to say oh, trump bad, trump bad, trump bad.
Speaker 2:I mean, yeah, we talked about that, but it's not just that, right? So you're saying that 50, that fifty nine thousand dollars, that you know that number. Let's say 60. Right, ok, 60 is. 60 is a decent number, right, I'm, I'm, I'm supposed to be Right, but what I have is that 60 grand, which looked like this three months ago, is now looking like this because I'm paying more for fuel and paying more for my medicine. He just cut the. He just cut the caps for Medicaid medication. So what you have is you have a bunch of policies that are going against what he promised, right? So, because I was cool at 60K, because I know I'm only going to pay $200 a month for my medicine, because the Biden administration capped medicine prices, right? Or I knew that Medicaid or Medicare is going to supplement, you know $300 a month, so I was going to use that $300 to pay for utilities, or you know what I'm saying or groceries or whatever. Now that's cut away. So now that $60,000 window I had is shrinking with every executive order that comes out.
Speaker 1:So Okay so. I think Liberty. I think Liberty just hit the nail on the head with that last comment I think Liberty just hit the nail on the head with that last comment, what? And this is true both ways, okay, don't get me wrong, this is true both ways. If this was Harris doing all these things, you would have Republicans freaking the F out, republicans freaking the F out.
Speaker 2:Do you think a Democratic president would have been able to get away with a third of what this administration has done? Sure, let's be honest, let's be honest, let's be honest, let's look at this honestly. Do you think a Democratic president will be able to get away with a third of what this administration has done? Absolutely, oh no, now we're not being honest.
Speaker 1:The last administration got away with us wearing masks that were made out of t-shirts and convincing people that, going outside, you should be arrested for, even if nobody else is around you. If you're on the beach surfing, you should be arrested for, even if nobody else is around you. If you're on the beach surfing, you should be arrested wait wait, wait.
Speaker 2:Because you're not allowed to go outside, you should be arrested. This administration has a actual department that's kidnapping and arresting people off the street. What are we talking about? There's a difference between, hey, you probably shouldn't do that and hey, we're gonna snatch you up off the street and send you to fucking venezuela, because I mean, no, they weren't here illegally. They took their visas from them I understand.
Speaker 1:Okay, now hold on. That's a whole different thing wait, no, no, we're talking.
Speaker 2:We're talking about the allowance of the administration.
Speaker 1:Hold on, because now we're conflating different things here. Right, this goes back to who is a. You can be here legally, okay, so that says students, that you can have a green card. You can be here legally on a student visa. You are here as a guest of the United States government that at any point can say you know what you're out. That is true. It's just like somebody that's at a right to work state. If you work in a right to work state and your boss says you know what, I just don't like you, you're fired. They have the right to do that. So if a country says you're here on a visa, which is your legal document to be here, and then the country says you know what, never mind, we don't want you here anymore, they have the right to revoke that visa and say GTFO, they have the right Now if you're talking about a US citizen, that is sounding extremely fascist.
Speaker 2:my brother, I know.
Speaker 1:I know what you're saying away from it.
Speaker 2:That is sounding extremely fascist, my brother.
Speaker 1:It's not, I will agree with you.
Speaker 2:If you're talking about illegal versus legal, if you're talking about somebody who is a United States citizen, I am telling you the biggest case right now, the guy that's in the Venezuelan prison right now, who was married to a US citizen, who cleared all the protocol. He got picked up, sent to Venezuela. He was cleared and got sent to Venezuela and the judge said, hey, you know what? That guy should be brought back, man. You guys did that wrong. Instead of bringing them back, what the administration did is they doubled down on it and they filed a stake for him to stay in Venezuela. We're talking about kidnapping students off the streets for emails that they wrote, man. We're talking about stripping South Sudanese people of their visas because they didn't respond to your tariff in time. Let's, let's, let's, let's be clear god, this is not american at all. None of this is is in line with american ideas. This is more dictators than anything else.
Speaker 1:Hold on you've got people who are in Minnesota who are supporting, supporting what's her name? Omar, or whatever um who comes out and basic, who who basically says, hey, this is not American, when it's the law and American law right. You have people who say you know what? We want to set up Sharia law in America, not not what the law says says a separate sharia law is that people?
Speaker 2:is that any different than wait? But I'm gonna ask you, though, is that any different than the christian nationalists saying that they want this to be a judo christian country?
Speaker 1:and if they're saying, if they're saying I want to set up a separate court system that keeps things in the neighborhood, and we deal with it here, according to the Bible.
Speaker 2:And I'm saying is they're not setting up a separate court system, they're using the US court system. As a Judeo-Christian Judeo-Christian yes, man, we're talking about. Listen, man. We are so far from American ideas with this administration. It's ridiculous, man.
Speaker 1:What would a Judeo-Christian court use as their primary document? I'd assume the Bible Right? Do you hear anybody arguing that we should have a court set up that is strictly judging, based on the rules and laws that are in the Bible?
Speaker 2:Yeah, what's the girl Bundy?
Speaker 1:She said she wants to follow the Bible To dish out criminal justice law.
Speaker 2:Bundy, you got your boy in the FBI who said it in podcasts. I haven't seen it. Well, I'm telling you All of these guys, hell you got, I would disagree with them. And I would disagree with them the same way then I sent you the interview where the deal the Hexeth was saying the same thing, talking about, if you, about making Christian schools mandatory, because that's how you Change society.
Speaker 1:Hold on. He didn't say mandatory, he said he wants it to be. He wants to. He said he wanted it to make available for anybody who wanted to do it.
Speaker 2:No, no, no. I'm talking about Hegseth, when he gave that interview in his book yeah, where he was talking about raising the next generation of Christian warriors to defend the country.
Speaker 1:And he said that's why we want them going to homeschool and we want them to be allowed. If that's what they want to do, he didn't say it should be mandatory to go there Okay, if that's what they want to do, he didn't say it should be mandatory to go there Okay, let's say I will give you that. Let's say, and I disagree with it, I don't think that that's what it should be. I don't think we should be using the Bible to have the law set out according to the Bible.
Speaker 2:I don't think it should be done. Didn't Oklahoma make it mandatory? Didn't Oklahoma make it mandatory that all the students have to read the Bible in school? Matter of fact, they got pushback because they was buying them Trump Bibles at like $75 a Bible.
Speaker 1:I don't think that's what it was. I don't think it was. Everybody's mandatory has to read the Bible.
Speaker 2:It was a Bible has to be in the classroom.
Speaker 1:Available in the classroom. No, has to be in the classroom. Available in the classroom.
Speaker 2:No, no In the classroom. Yeah, they put it in.
Speaker 1:But having it in the classroom. You're having that part of the curriculum or two different things.
Speaker 2:No, no no, everybody has to. Part of the curriculum. Go back and look, man, it's a part of the curriculum. But what I'm saying is. What I'm saying is there is no different, there is no difference. Right, we can't, we can't, we can't be upset, we can't be upset at Muslims saying, hey, well, if you guys are going to push this Christian judo ism stuff on us, well, we want our own stuff. Right, how is how? Is one thing right and the other one not? How is it?
Speaker 1:So a couple of things Now. First, I'd have to see what it means to have a Bible in class. Does that mean a Bible available in the class versus they have to teach from the Bible? I'd be real curious. The second thing is Thaddeus. The idea of separation of church versus state has been so fast backwards in this lot in this country for almost 200 years. The original church versus state was one of the founding fathers I believe it was jefferson was writing to friends of the baptist church or something like that, and it was look, we need separation of church and state. The reason separation of church and state, the reason separation of church and state, is because we need churches to be protected from the state, not the other way around. The intent was never to say oh well, you know, churches shouldn't be involved at all.
Speaker 1:We need to completely. No churches can be in any schools, any government building, blah, blah, blah blah. It was what we can't have. Is the state telling the churches what to do, and we will not have a national religion. We're not, because when the country was founded, you remember, maryland was a Catholic state. Yeah, that's why it's called Maryland. Okay, pennsylvania state, that's why it's called Maryland Pennsylvania. All the Quakers went to Pennsylvania because they're like, hey, we don't fit with the Puritans up in the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
Speaker 1:We don't really fit with some of the others down south, so they were allowed into. Okay. So all the states kind of had their own religious preference and that's where people went. The Puritans went to Massachusetts, quakers went to Pennsylvania, catholics went to Maryland, et cetera, right. So as they got together and they framed the Constitution, they said we're not going to have and I don't know, correct me if I'm wrong, I think it was the First Amendment that said we're going to let people practice religion however they want, right. So that's saying we are not going to establish a federal national church. Okay, it doesn't say it. There was never an intent to say if you guys want to have prayer, well, it's kind of silly to say, because public schools didn't really exist in 1776 right but right.
Speaker 1:But if they said, hey, we're going to have the legislature and if people want to come in and have a prayer in the legislature before we start the session.
Speaker 1:Okay, cool, whoever wants to do it. Whatever, that's no big deal. We've had that happen. We used to have prayers in the legislature, but it got to the point where it was twisted to say separation of church and state. Ah, completely separate. Now, that said, that's why we're now having this argument, this debate right now, is whose church, whose religion? What should be in there, what shouldn't? Personally, look, if you want to go to BYU BYU as an individual, privately owned university and BYU says if you want to graduate from BYU, you have to have, as part of your graduation, out of your undergrad, you have to have a total of 12 religion classes. I don't think it's 12. I think it's six, maybe it is 12., maybe it's one a year. You have to have 12 hours in Book of Mormon studies Okay, so that's part of it. You have to have, or scriptural studies, whatever it is, okay. So religion. And if BYU wants to do that, awesome, cool, great, private school. If the University of California, berkeley, says we want to do that, no, because it's a public school Right.
Speaker 1:Not okay, and that's where the difference is. Now, if Oklahoma schools resist the order to teach from the Bible in the classroom, okay. So I will say right now if the Oklahoma state is saying you have to teach out of the Bible, first of all I'd love to know what parts of the Bible they're requiring. Because are they teaching out of Leviticus that you will not eat shellfish because it's unclean? Pretty silly. You know, I personally don't think the Bible should be used as much as I use the Bible and all that. I don't think the Bible should be used as a primary source, unless it is a history class. Now then the question becomes does Oklahoma say you have to require everybody to have a religion class because? And then what do you do? Do you do it as Jewish class? Do you do it as Christian? Who's leading it? Is it Baptist? Is it Evangelical? Is it LDS? I don't agree with requiring religion classes for high school graduation either.
Speaker 2:Do.
Speaker 1:I think it's a good idea in some ways Sure, but it opens that can of worms. So that's also why comma. I also think that things should be done at the local level and that's where I say, if Oklahoma wants to pass a law for the state of Oklahoma that says every school will instruct their kids on the Sermon on the Mount, let's say we're going to say every school has to require a Sermon on the Mount class. If you don't like what's going on in your state, you have every right to move, and I understand the argument is I shouldn't have to move. Okay, got it. I don't know what the rules are. As far as opting out, I know in certain states, like my daughter, just this last week they had the what do we call it? For fifth and sixth graders. These days You're becoming a young lady and a young boy, so we need to have the separation of class video and all.
Speaker 2:Do we know what?
Speaker 1:we're talking about.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Okay yeah, my daughter didn't want to go so as parents we have the right to opt out.
Speaker 1:I don't know what Oklahoma has, I don't know what the rules are, but that is the beauty of this country. If you don't like what's going on in your area, I'm not going to move. I'm not. I'm never living in Minneapolis. I think there's too much crazy stuff going on in Minneapolis. I'm not moving to California for that reason either. We would love to move to California Probably the best weather in the United States. The geography is awesome. There is so much good stuff about it. Right, california is incredible, except for the politics and except for the liberalization of the state, and I'm not going. I know somebody who's going to move there and isn't necessarily for or against, but we'll see how they do there. I don't know, maybe they'll love it, but I don't want to go back to California. Spoiler alert.
Speaker 2:I don't think we will, because what's going on in the state.
Speaker 1:Oh, okay, have your orders changed?
Speaker 2:No, no, no, so I didn't want to. We're going.
Speaker 1:Have your orders changed. No, no, no, so I didn't want to.
Speaker 2:We're going. I don't think it's going to be an enjoyable experience.
Speaker 1:We'll see, so I didn't want to throw it out there. Kj's getting moved to California against his not against his wishes at the needs of the military.
Speaker 2:There, you go.
Speaker 1:There, you go there, you go, right. But at the same time, if you really didn't want to move, you had the right not to move, right? I mean you could, your wife could resign her commission, she could, whatever, okay. But that's one of the beautiful things about this country is, even though we have 50 states. That's why, to me, the 10th Amendment was brilliant, and I understand the historical argument is without the 10th Amendment we don't have the Civil War and blah, blah, blah.
Speaker 1:But I think at the time, that was the whole point is we want to limit what the federal government is requiring to do, and so if you don't want to live in California, you don't have to live in California. Now I think that part of the problem that we have is that the federal government has done some things that are unfair and make it really stupid and really difficult. Like when we were talking about Obamacare back in the day, obamacare really didn't lower any prices for the medical service. It extended insurance Great. I love some of the things about Obamacare in terms of like, if you're up to 26 year old, you can stay on your parents insurance, if you're going to school, and all that. I thought some of that stuff was great. But one of the things it didn't do is it didn't address things like insurance companies being able to compete across the country.
Speaker 1:So if you're living in California and you have an Alabama insurance company who says, hey, we'll provide you insurance, cool, and we've got lower prices because we haven't had as many issues, you could have purchased from Alabama. But because of how the commerce laws work, you couldn't do that. So just to kind of full circle this whole thing. I think part of the problem is that we have so much red tape. We have so many problems at the federal level.
Speaker 1:We have I want and I understand this comes with casualties I want a lower number of people working in the federal government. I want a lower input by Washington DC. I want red tape to be cut down. Where we can have manufacturers and people will go to the extreme. People will use argument ad absurdum right, which is to say they'll take it to the most extreme level and they'll say well, if you want to get rid of all red tape, that means you're okay with 10-year-olds going in and working in coal mines. No, I mean, there are certain regulations that are certainly fine and certain safety regulations that are certainly fine.
Speaker 2:Didn't Florida just propose a law to have teenagers go work?
Speaker 1:So we were yeah, you and I and KJ were talking about that. It depends on what the rules are, because it was about them being able to work overnight and some of those things. And then I don't know what exactly the rules are. But again, if you have a teenager if I work overnight as a parent and that's the shift I'm on, and my kid wants to have a part time job, and so he wants to work overnight in homeschool, why couldn't he? I mean, I don't know it goes to the parental thing night in homeschool. Why couldn't you? I mean, I don't know, it goes to the parental thing. But before that the rules were, you didn't allow children to work past like 10 o'clock, I think, at night or something like that. So I personally just think it gives more freedom to the parent. Are you going to have some people that abuse it? Of course you're always going to have some people abuse. There's always abuse at every level for different things, but those are taking the exceptions for the norm, okay. So I just think that when we're talking about a lot of this stuff and we're talking about Trump, we're talking about the rules, we're talking about those things.
Speaker 1:Personally, I will always fall on the side of personal freedom. I will always fall on the side of personal freedom. I will always want personal freedom and personal choice to be the default as a libertarian. To me it comes down very simply as a libertarian, my rights extend out until they bump up against somebody else's rights. Okay. So as a libertarian, if I want my kid to go to a private school that teaches the Bible, I should be able to have that. Do I think it's fair for another kid to have to be taught the Bible? No, sorry, I don't. And that's where some of those things. But that's also the nuance of it, because then you have certain people say, well, this has to be taught, that has to be taught. Da da, da, right. But that's where you also take a step back then and say, all right, why should I have to pay a certain amount every year in state taxes to a school system that I think is failing?
Speaker 1:or teaches things that I don't think they should teach.
Speaker 1:Or, like Utah, just passed a law a couple of weeks ago that said basically no gay pride flags in government buildings, and I think they want to extend it to schools, or they're trying to extend it to schools Right, think they want to extend it to schools or they're trying to extend it to schools, right. And I have a lot of people you know, friends, in Utah, and they're freaking. Oh what? This is just another example of Trump and I sit there and go well, hold on. Would you be okay if a teacher hung a Nazi flag up in their classroom?
Speaker 1:Of course not, again, ridiculous example right, got it, but why are we doing flags that are in the classroom? To begin with, like to me, you should have the US flag, state flag, and that's really about it. And then you have even on the right, you have the people that are ridiculous the ones that have the everybody. What is it? Everybody's welcome here and all the little kids, crayon color kids that represent, and everybody's welcome here. And so you have the extremists. Goes the wrong ways oh you have to take that down.
Speaker 1:That's leftist propaganda. It's like saying everybody is welcome here. Is not leftist propaganda. Like, isn't that the point of Christianity. Chaplain, I'm going to go religious here for a second.
Speaker 2:The whole point of Christianity the whole point of what Jesus taught was we're all brothers and sisters, we're all supposed to love each other.
Speaker 1:Love the neighbor as thyself. You know, if you love yourself, you're supposed to love your neighbor too. Love God, number one commandment. Love God, second one, like unto it. Love your neighbor as yourself. So you have a lot of Christians who forget those parts.
Speaker 2:It's not a different Jesus.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a different Jesus. So, ultimately, I would like a situation. I would like a world. I would like this country to be dominated by people being able to get a good job, this country being able to rely on its own products and not at the whims of other countries to include fuel from Saudi Arabia, from Mexico and from Canada, Because, remember, Saudi Arabia is not our number one oil. Number one oil comes from Canada and Mexico, Saudi's third behind our own.
Speaker 1:I'd love to see us have nuclear power plants. I would love for us to have chip you know, a chip processing plant. I would love every car to be built in America. I would love every job. I would love unemployment to be at 0.0%. I want everybody and anybody who wants a job to be able to work, and the people who are able to get a job but just don't want to work. I want them to struggle, Because you know what you should struggle. If you can work and you choose not to, that's on you. That's not on now. I also want a safety system for the people who legitimately can't work, People who are disabled, people who are elderly. I don't want any elderly person to not have food on the table and to be struggling for their heating bills and die in their house because it's too cold.
Speaker 1:I don't think any kid in America should be hungry. I don't think it's a radical idea to allow charities to be able to come into the schools and provide meals to kids. Should it be government funded? Sure, why not? We're already spending $15,000 a year on their education. In fact, it includes $2,000 or $3,000 a year on a bowl of cereal, and if you can't feed a kid for 180 days on another $2,000 out of that $15,000, I mean, really we can't do that. So I think that what we have to really do is we have to. We have to get away from all the media brush fires. You know where they zoom in on.
Speaker 1:Look at this fire, let's go Look at how much is getting burnt. And then they zoom out and it's like you know one little thing, one little smoke, or the or the maybe the better example is the weather forecaster, or maybe the better example is the weather forecaster they're standing there and you know it's oh my gosh, the flooding, and it's up to their hips, and then two guys go walking behind them. It's like what are you doing in that hole? You know why are you standing in that hole? There's like this much water on the ground, right. So, and the crazy thing is, I think last thought, and then, kj, you can finish.
Speaker 1:I think that the vast, vast, vast majority of americans want each other to do well. They want each other to be happy, would rather have a friend who is of a different color than an enemy. They want to be able to trust that the government is going to just be out of their way when it needs to be, but there when they need it, like insurance. I want my government to be like insurance. I don't want to have to worry about my government until I need it and the rest of the time, stay away. And if I have always true and it's not as true of the insurance company as it is of the government, and that's where a lot of the problem and that's why we go back to the media and we go back to our representatives and we go back to but on the lowest level. I think the vast majority of us are good people who really do want just the best for other people and the best for our families and want things to get done Right.
Speaker 2:And when it's not done right.
Speaker 1:We struggle and we want to yell and scream and, and you know, instead of and we want it done now too. That's the other thing. We don't want to wait for manufacturing to come back. We want manufacturing to be here tomorrow. We want the stock market to rebound yesterday. Goodness forbid, the stock market goes down. We're already well over two hours.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we just hit the two-hour mark. This one's run long, All right. Final thoughts 340.1 million people in America as of 2024. That means you got 340-something opinions on how to run this country the best way Easily right.
Speaker 1:We're the only ones that are right.
Speaker 2:I know right. Ultimately, man, it just comes down to you know, the world is a better place when you get along with others. Man, find that commonality and just use that as a theme this week. Man, go out, find something in common with somebody you typically wouldn't do. Yeah, chappie said it best. Man, keep the government out of your business until you need them. We'll see how that works out. As always, we're going to pray for the administration and hope that things get better. Other than that, see you boys next week. Man, we are out. Liberty, thanks for stopping by. Have a great week.
Speaker 1:We'll see you guys next week we outtie Gee Ray, what do you want to do tonight?
Speaker 2:The same thing we do every night. Pinky, Try to take over the world. Alright, yo, let's get into it. Try to take over the world.
Speaker 1:You're preaching freedom. Try to take over the world.
Speaker 2:And bring Chaplin in the world and brings Chaplin in the world. Take over the world.
