Aug. 15, 2025

Deric Gilliard - 4 Long Years Working Under The Trump Administration

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Deric Gilliard spent 4 years working for HHS under the Trump administration's 1st term. Deric wrote his book 'The Longest Four Years of My Life', where he details his experiences from the perspective of a Black Man.We had a great discussion which crossed barriers and tackled issues of the underserved communities to racism and racial stereotypes.

Watch the Video Episode:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLuNOPNg9R8&list=PL-wX3htUmL_HdCn1l45wuElnbB7fqs-B6



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WEBVTT

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Where to go after a few few reschedules trying to

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make this happen. Absolutely technical difficulties in the beginning. Anyway,

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we're here. I appreciate your time, uh because you're time different,

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so you're ahead of me. I know you're more like

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in the evening right now, So appreciate that. Uh. You

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caught my attention because I saw that you had that

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new book that that's out. Obviously you see that right

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up there on your screen. However, my finger works, which

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is great because I think it's it's relevant to what's

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kind of been happening, and I really wanted to get

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a first time account from somebody who served under the administration. Uh,

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your tenure was during his first term, and we are

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talking about Trump as everybody should know that. It's where we're going.

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And it's also pretty much all over all over the

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back cover of your book and everything, uh, twenty five

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years and that you that you uh serve right, what

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was what? All this was interesting? I want to I

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want to touch on this too, Derek, if you're okay,

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was your time with HHS. I am going to want

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to get your opinion on Robert Kennedy. What do you

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think of that?

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Absolutely.

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We can go a lot of a lot of ways here,

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but anyway, I do appreciate your time, your your you're historian,

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you you you served in health and human Services, you

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served under the Trump term, You got a lot of experience,

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man a lot of knowledge. So I'm hoping we have

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a great conversation. I'm pretty sure I will. I've watched

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some of your other interviews. There are great a lot

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of a lot of knowledge, a lot of history. So

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that's awesome. But let's let's let's start. Let's start with

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why you felt behooved to write this book, and and

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I think it is relevant because with everything's going on

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right now, it seems like in the Maga movement to speak,

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so to speak, that there's a riff now, like people

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are losing a little bit of trust for maybe thinking, hey,

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promise is made not kept, et cetera. And you may

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have a little insight from your perspective serving under the administration.

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So if you can, why don't you expand on why

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you want to write the book? You already wrote it,

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but what was the motivator?

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Yeah, And to be honest, George, this wasn't something that

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I wanted to do. Now my first book was I

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would consider a labor of Love and just if you

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don't mind me mentioning. Before I went to AHHS, I

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served as the communications director for the organization started by

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doctor King, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and he led

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that until his assassination in nineteen sixty eight. And then

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my oldest son started having seizures out of the blue.

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We couldn't figure it out. There's a little organization that

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covered me and didn't give insurance for my family and kids.

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I had to go get coming out of the cold

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and get a job that did and that's what led

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me to AHHS. But this administration, George was very different

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than any of the others I began with Clinton. So

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I worked the last two years of Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump,

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and Biden and this was a singular seminal experience and

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I could tell it was going to be very different immediately,

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and being a historian and a journalist, I said, I

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need to start writing this down. And it was tough

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for a lot of reasons. It was tough because it

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shook my belief and understanding and concept of who and

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what America is. Because it was just a very different animal,

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and so I knew that it was going to meet

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with a lot of challenges, a lot of people were

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not going to be happy with it, And I think

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he has this. I would say an arm of his

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support is fairly fanatical. I knew that there were imminent

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dangers that I would be risking personally and also the

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people that I cared about, you know, because hey, he

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released six thousand of them from from prison a few

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months ago.

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So lots of things that I thought about.

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But as somebody who again had been mentored under the

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UH the people that served for and with Doctor King,

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I understood I had I felt I had a responsibility,

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and I felt because I was in a unique position

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to write and tell some of the things that I

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experienced and seen and how some of his policies impacted

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people not in the DC Beltway, but out in the

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real world, particularly here in the eighth Southeastern States, where

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which is one of the heartland the center points of

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his support. You think because ike in examples, the way

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Obama had designed Obamacare, the Affordable Care Act, it was

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supposed to be something that all eight states would used

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to expand Medicaid to provide health insurance for people in

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many instances who never had it, and but seven of

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our governor eight governors were against it. They were conservative,

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they were Republican. Even though they had fantastic health insurance,

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they weren't concerned about getting their people health insurance. And

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in many of the instances, some of his base who

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were actually poor white people, and they're more poor white

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people on Medicaid than there are poor black people, quiet

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as it's kept and Latinos, you know, yeah, you know

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what I'm saying. So so they instead of voting, they

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voted against their own best interests to vote with the

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wealthy white guy that was in the governor's mansion, and

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so they didn't expand Medicaid. And so those are some

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of the kind of issues that I dealt with. And

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so I felt compelled as a as a historian and

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a journalist to chronicle this time because I thought it

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was unprecedented in the modern era. So I just started

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keeping a bunch of notes all the things I had

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to write, all of the people I interacted with, and

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I knew I couldn't write it while I was.

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In you know, still in the government.

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And so it's taken a long time because again I

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knew there will be a lot of challenges to it.

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So it's heavily footnoted and heavily resourced, and I think

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it's it's a pretty good viewpoint or encapsulation from three perspectives.

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And I write from the perspective of being a black

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man in America as being somebody who's a Christian, a

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person of faith, and thirdly, somebody who leans into justice

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and believes that you know, this, this, this country, this

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melting pot of a country we had, has been largely

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built by people who you know, have come from all over,

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whether they were brought here, brought here against their will,

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or they immigrants it here. And so I think that

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that's the true America. And I thought that for those reasons,

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and so the history, I thought this was a book

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that would basically be in history departments, African American studies,

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social studies, all these public policy departments. But of course,

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because of the current president's assault on DEI and blackness

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and other things, you know, colleges can't touch it. So

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I'm in a in a strange place. But I did.

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I did it because I thought it was an important

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thing to do, and I was well placed to do it.

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And so somebody had to gotcha. Well, that's a lot

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of reasons. Honestly, it's a lot of reasons. So did

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you did you feel that the administration of the time

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was literally going out of the way to put a

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stop to access to those in need at that time?

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Absolutely? Absolutely? Uh.

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You know, he had the Republicans and largely Donald Trump

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had tried over seventy times in courte to quote unquote

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to overturn the Affordable Care Act. Their whole thing was

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replace and repeal it. They got something better, then we're

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going to kill this and bring in something better.

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And they failed every time.

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And the most famous time was when John McCain got

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up out of his deathbed and you know, when he

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was suffering from cancer and came to vote and he

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did the infamous thumbs down and that was the deciding factor.

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But you know what we find, George, Historically, it's hard

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to take something away from people once you give it

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to him. I think when Medicare first came out people

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a little over sixty years ago, people didn't think it

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was going to be important, it was going to last then.

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And now, of course there's an assault on Medicare, just

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like there is Social Security and Medicaid. All of these

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things are up up in the air in terms of

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how much of there them are going to survive, and

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so I that that was a real big part of it.

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Got it.

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So the the the assault on Medicare. Let's because when

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this originally rolled out, Affordable Care Act, you you worked

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on the inside, So maybe you can enlighten me more

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and what exactly they didn't like. I mean, I have

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a great idea. I'm going to tell you from my

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perspective that I was an entrepreneur for many years and

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had to pay my own health insurance. So I have

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a different view on the whole Affordable Care Act. The

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way it affected someone like me was a lot different,

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But doesn't mean that I don't think everybody should have healthcare.

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So I just want to throw that out there. Just

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we may have different takes on this based on our experiences,

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is what I'm going to get at. So as far

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as as far as what happened there with the administration,

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I'm gonna admit this Trump is a hammer. He's not

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he's not He's not good at he's not good at

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putting a plan together and saying this is how we're

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going to get there. He's just like, no, we're doing

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this now, and this is happening, and then everybody just

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got to figure out how they're going to make it happen,

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and a lot of people do get left out. So

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you know, we have to we have to at least

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admit that, right. It's it's it's not a perfect way

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to run the country, admittedly, and it's not an easy

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thing to deal with, and you dealt with the firsthand.

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So while I can see what he's doing in this term,

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he's done some good things, but now it's like he's

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turning back the other way, and people are kind of like, hey,

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what's going on. I thought you said this, but now

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you're doing the other thing. And so that's why, you know,

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when when you had this book, I'm like, okay, I

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really need to know your perspective, like what did you see,

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Like what did you witness firsthand? And what you stated

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in terms of why you wanted to write the book.

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We're all very valid reasons. I mean, from your perspective,

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everything that you went through, I get it. Now, can

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you explain more to me though the attack on Obamacare,

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Like what was it specifically they were trying to do?

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Because I I was part of the whole thing. When

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we're we're all going through it, right. We want to repeal,

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we want it, we want we write it, we want

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to redo it. But do you know from your perspective

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from working, I mean you were at HHS at the time,

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I'm assuming, so what was it they didn't like?

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Like?

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What about it? Were they really trying to dismantle?

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So there were a couple of things in particular, I

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think one was everybody, whether you were male, even part

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of that. If you chose not to get your health insurance,

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you were assessed essentially, it's like attacks and a lot

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of men didn't like that because they felt like, well.

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I'm never going to get pregnant.

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So like there was something called ten essential Health Benefits,

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and one of them made sure that women's part of

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it was that women could get healthcare and have access

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to all that went into pre natal and postnatal. And

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the guy says, well, some of the guys said, well,

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I'm not going to have a baby, why should I

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pay to help support women do that? So that was

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one concern and people felt, like a lot of them

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that hey, I can choose not to have health care.

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I don't have to and so it was based on

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all these people in being part of the pot, and

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so if people could choose to pull out of the pot,

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they had to pay a penalty. And people felt like, well,

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nobody should be able to tell me I have to

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have health care. It's almost like with the vaccines. Okay,

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a lot of people said, well, look, you're telling me

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if I'm going to go here and be in this environment,

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I can't come there if I don't have a vaccine

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card that says that I had a shot. So I

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understand how people would have an issue on both of

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those fronts. I do because part of being American, I

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think a lot of people say is that you can't

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tell me what to do and what not to do.

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If I choose not to, then I have that right.

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Well, I do understand and have a respect for that perspective.

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I also know that the only way we can help see.

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One of the key things about the Affordable Care Act

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was the part of the tenant central health benefits. It

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was really designed to do preventative care because a lot

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of people in this country who are uninsured would wait

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until they were like half dead, and then they dragged

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themselves to the emergency room, and that care always costs

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three to four times as much because it was acute care.

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You were trying to keep people alive, whereas if you

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have preventative care, you can maybe catch cancer early.

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You can see signs.

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Where you can treat people for obesity, you can prevent

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strokes and heart attacks. So a lot of that was

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what that was designed to do. And you know, you

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have a lot of people, and I'm sure you have

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run across some of these. They're essentially the working for

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and they work every day. Maybe they have a couple

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of gig jobs. Maybe they park cars and they wait tables,

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or they do hair, you know, they do different things,

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but they don't make enough money to have a place

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to live, have transportation, you know, to have insure their car,

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and have health insurance. And so you're putting people in

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I'm not sure we're putting people, but people are in

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a position and in many instances, george' these are the people

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who who make our economy go. You know, they're the

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ones that do things that most of us don't want

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to do. And it makes me think about the immigrant population.

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You know, we're rounding up all these people and most

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of them have no criminal record, have you know, nothing

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that they've done wrong. But they're doing work that most

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Americans are unwilling to do. They're laboring out in the

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hot sun, you know, harvesting our crops, and they're you know,

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cutting our yards and building and doing all these things.

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And so, I you know, that's that's that's when you

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mentioned that, a lot of people said, well, I knew

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it's going to do this. I didn't expect him to

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do that. And I think that some of those are

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what's going on. But yeah, so those were the two

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big objections. Men didn't think that they some men didn't

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think it was fair for them to be charged to

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pay something that they couldn't they were never going to

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benefit from personally. I mean, they could have a wife

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or a girlfriend or something they got pregnant, but they

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weren't going to have to do that. And secondly, they

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didn't like the tax that they had to pay if

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they chose not to get it right.

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Yeah, well, and I think you're correct on that sentiments

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because look where nation were born on rebellions. So what

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you said earlier, I agree with you. And I think

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when Obama, I think when the Affordable Care Act became

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Obamacare when it first rolled out, I think intention was fine.

283
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I understood it, Uh perspective is what it did, and

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disagree what it did. What I noticed is it really

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eventually price fixed the insurance industry. And here's where I'm

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going with that. No matter where you go to try

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to get a quote, all of a sudden, your price

288
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is the same, no matter what market you go to.

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The only people that were able to benefit from Obamacare

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were those that met a certain threshold in where you

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were within a certain threshold of poverty level. If you're

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self employed, you're pretty much screwed. You didn't really get

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any benefit. It kind of changed that recently. I noticed

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you do get a little something now, even for your

295
00:16:36.919 --> 00:16:39.440
self employed, but it's nowhere near what it used to be.

296
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I remember before the Obamacare thing kicked in, and this

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is before my business was like full time kicked off.

298
00:16:45.799 --> 00:16:47.799
You know, I still had other jobs, but I remember

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my insurance used to be pretty low. Then after Obamacare,

300
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it was like, there's no way I can afford it.

301
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It made no difference to me. Now that was not

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everybody's situation. But I'm just giving the perspective from self employed,

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like entrepreneur and I understand why we needed it for

304
00:17:02.720 --> 00:17:04.319
those that didn't need it, Like if you're at a

305
00:17:04.319 --> 00:17:07.839
certain level of poverty, yeah, you know you need that.

306
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I get that, but it didn't really benefit everybody as

307
00:17:10.359 --> 00:17:13.039
a whole, and especially when it came down to the pricing.

308
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And again I'm not making this up. I mean, you

309
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can go to any marketplace right now, punch in your information.

310
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Doesn't matter if it's under you know, like a California

311
00:17:19.839 --> 00:17:22.039
government website. It doesn't matter if it's Obamacare or whatever

312
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it is. The insurance industry right now, no matter what

313
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when it comes to healthcare, you're going to get the

314
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same price for the package regardless. And that trickled into

315
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other parts of insurance. But we're talking healthcare right now.

316
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That's my perspective. By the way, it's just what I experienced.

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So this isn't really like an argument against you. It's

318
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just this is kind of what I went through. And

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I think a lot of people that were in my

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situation saw that. I think that's what they were opposed to.

321
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It didn't really seem like a free market anymore. It's

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what it was. I forgot what year it was when

323
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they were supposed to make it an open market, and

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that never really happened either, especially in California. So when

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we're in California, I was allegedly supposed to be able

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to say, Okay, well, if the markets are open, I'm

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going to go see how much health insurance is in Washington.

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For example, they have an insurance company in Washington. Great,

329
00:18:05.240 --> 00:18:06.799
I can get a quote from them if they'll still

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cover me where I live. Never happens. As soon as

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you put your information, the IP catches you, says, oh

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you're in California, kicks me right back to the other website.

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So where's the open market? So I think the frustrations

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were really more that stuff. I don't think anybody was

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really against you know, people in need getting actual care.

336
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I know I wasn't. I thought it was a great idea,

337
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Like I said, at first, I was like, yeah, this

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just makes a lot of sense. And from my perspective, yeah,

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if I didn't want health insurance, why should I have

340
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to pay a tax? Yeah, you know, I think that's

341
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a bit minor in comparison. But I think where the

342
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sticking point was is when people realize, like, this is

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supposed to be cheaper and more affordable, but I'm not

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really seeing it. And again, that was when you got

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past a certain threshold. So it wasn't applicable to everybody,

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but those that were in a certain spot where your

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employer regards so much we're getting paid, you weren't going

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to make you know, you weren't going to get affordable healthcare.

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School districts are a perfect example of that, right, a

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lot of school districts, they don't always get a good

351
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negotiation when it comes to healthcare. So it's like, okay,

352
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healthcare for you, great, this is how much it is.

353
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But if you want your spouse, it's literally double now.

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So it's a thousand for you, will cover eight hundred.

355
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But if you have your spouse, now it's sixteen hundred

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for her plus whatever you're paying. And people in that

357
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situation didn't really get the advantages. I don't believe. So again,

358
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just a counterpoint just.

359
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Makes sense because and I think that everybody sees it

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from their perspective first exactly you can see it beyond that,

361
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but I mean the main thing is how does it

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impact you and your family? And I get that, and

363
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so part of I think the problem too is it

364
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was imperfect. There's no question about it, I think, and

365
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I don't know if you realized this, but seven presidents

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before Obama had tried to pass some form of universal

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health care and for some reason it worked out with him.

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But then the goal should have been, Okay, let's all

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work together to make this better. Like you said, we're

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small businessmen and women are struggling here. What can we

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do to level upon a field so they benefit from

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it too? And but there wasn't that kind of collegiality.

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Like Mitch McConnell of Kentucky at the end of the

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Senate leader at the time, he said his mission was

375
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to make Obama one term president. So I'm saying instead

376
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of them coming together to work on making it better,

377
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you know, then there was this fight to kill it,

378
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to make it, you know, ineffective. And and that's and

379
00:20:47.160 --> 00:20:49.440
that's I'm not even saying that's a Republican or a

380
00:20:49.440 --> 00:20:53.279
Democratic name, but I'm saying that's something that that really

381
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because in the end, you want the people to benefit.

382
00:20:56.680 --> 00:20:58.920
Yeah, I agree with you, I do, and the and

383
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that's what we wont you, right, there were multiple presidents

384
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who tried to do this, but they weren't able to

385
00:21:02.759 --> 00:21:06.799
make it happen. But I thought it was a good idea.

386
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But like all good ideas, once it gets into play,

387
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you got other people start getting their fingers in their

388
00:21:12.400 --> 00:21:14.200
hands into it and it starts becoming something else. So

389
00:21:14.200 --> 00:21:16.079
I'm not even gonna blame Obama for any of it.

390
00:21:16.599 --> 00:21:19.319
He had a great idea, is just as time went on,

391
00:21:19.359 --> 00:21:21.839
it kind of became something else. I think that's kind

392
00:21:21.880 --> 00:21:25.640
of what led to it. But you know, I do

393
00:21:25.680 --> 00:21:28.960
see where the perspective is is that, yeah, he's attacking

394
00:21:29.200 --> 00:21:33.000
you know, Trump at the time was attacking it without

395
00:21:33.039 --> 00:21:35.359
any cause or just cause. Was just like, I just

396
00:21:35.359 --> 00:21:37.480
don't like Obama, so I'm just gonna repeal everything he did.

397
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And there was a lot of truth to that. By

398
00:21:39.160 --> 00:21:39.640
the way.

399
00:21:40.319 --> 00:21:43.039
Yeah, you remember, I don't know if you remember.

400
00:21:43.119 --> 00:21:46.599
At the well, they call it it's the dinner that

401
00:21:46.640 --> 00:21:48.119
the journalists have every year.

402
00:21:48.160 --> 00:21:48.960
It's a big dinner.

403
00:21:49.160 --> 00:21:55.119
I think, yeah, they spoofed the president, but he actually

404
00:21:55.119 --> 00:21:58.160
Trump was in the audience and he said he pointed

405
00:21:58.200 --> 00:22:00.240
out that Trump was the one that came up with

406
00:22:00.400 --> 00:22:04.279
the birther theory. You know that he wasn't born in America,

407
00:22:04.319 --> 00:22:06.680
and I think you could see trouble over there steaming

408
00:22:06.720 --> 00:22:09.799
at him, and I think he had. I guess I

409
00:22:09.839 --> 00:22:12.079
can say it's an adult program. I made a heart

410
00:22:12.160 --> 00:22:14.920
on to destroy Obama and his legacy after that. I

411
00:22:15.039 --> 00:22:17.960
just really do, because you can tell he's a punitive

412
00:22:18.119 --> 00:22:21.000
He's a kind of guy that's go. He's revenge as

413
00:22:21.079 --> 00:22:24.240
high on his priority list as we can see now

414
00:22:24.279 --> 00:22:27.240
with some of these people he's going after. So yeah,

415
00:22:27.279 --> 00:22:29.240
I think that was part of it. I really do.

416
00:22:30.200 --> 00:22:34.480
I hear you, man, that's but that aside. I mean

417
00:22:34.519 --> 00:22:38.480
that that that that was definitely I think a mis

418
00:22:38.960 --> 00:22:42.839
understood situation came to the Obamacare. My think, my thing

419
00:22:42.839 --> 00:22:45.839
with the whole deal is now everybody says, you know,

420
00:22:45.839 --> 00:22:50.480
they're gutting Medicaid, it's not really being gutted. It's they're putting.

421
00:22:50.599 --> 00:22:52.960
They're putting certain stipulations in there. Now you have to

422
00:22:52.960 --> 00:22:54.519
work so many hours if you want to keep it.

423
00:22:54.559 --> 00:22:56.440
For example, and it literally when it breaks down. I mean,

424
00:22:56.480 --> 00:22:58.720
I could work two hours a day and get Medicaid

425
00:22:58.839 --> 00:23:01.519
if I can. It was really forty hours a month.

426
00:23:02.079 --> 00:23:04.640
It wasn't a lot to ask, but you know it

427
00:23:04.680 --> 00:23:07.720
can be for those who literally are completely immobile. So

428
00:23:08.039 --> 00:23:10.759
what about those people? Right? Some people literally can't leave

429
00:23:10.759 --> 00:23:15.480
the house, So it does hit those people. When the

430
00:23:16.160 --> 00:23:20.920
Affordable Care Act came out, a lot of people don't

431
00:23:20.960 --> 00:23:23.279
even realize or think about this because people do have

432
00:23:23.319 --> 00:23:25.359
short memories and it's all about likes, clicks and whatever

433
00:23:25.359 --> 00:23:29.160
the news cycle is. But Obama actually, let me ver effect.

434
00:23:29.200 --> 00:23:32.559
I don't want to lie to you. Let me see. Yeah,

435
00:23:32.680 --> 00:23:35.119
seven hundred and fifty billion dollars was actually taken for

436
00:23:35.279 --> 00:23:38.960
Medicare when the Affordable Care Act was being rolled out,

437
00:23:39.039 --> 00:23:42.240
and then taxes were raised by a trillion pay for it.

438
00:23:42.599 --> 00:23:47.000
Now we understand why, right, you're trying to change things

439
00:23:47.400 --> 00:23:49.599
and morph it from you know, you're relying on this

440
00:23:49.880 --> 00:23:54.480
certain service, correct Medicaid, and they were trying to put

441
00:23:54.559 --> 00:23:56.920
some of what was offered there into Obamacare. So I

442
00:23:57.039 --> 00:24:00.200
understand it, but we also have to understand that, Know,

443
00:24:00.640 --> 00:24:05.640
it wasn't just one present presently Trump who's targeting Medicaid.

444
00:24:05.680 --> 00:24:07.759
I mean there was many presents before that tried to

445
00:24:07.799 --> 00:24:10.599
do something with medicator even with Social Security. I mean

446
00:24:10.599 --> 00:24:11.799
they're even trying to get rid of it. And it

447
00:24:11.880 --> 00:24:15.519
wasn't just Trump who did it. I'm not a trump Trumper,

448
00:24:15.559 --> 00:24:17.240
by the way, I'm just pointing things out, So I

449
00:24:17.240 --> 00:24:19.440
just want to understand that that I hope you don't

450
00:24:19.440 --> 00:24:22.160
feel that's what I'm doing here now. But I'm just

451
00:24:22.200 --> 00:24:24.759
trying to go over the facts, especially when it comes

452
00:24:24.799 --> 00:24:26.920
to the immigration side, which we can touch on later.

453
00:24:28.240 --> 00:24:29.720
But you know, I don't want to veer too far

454
00:24:29.799 --> 00:24:32.559
off from your book because I also want to get

455
00:24:32.559 --> 00:24:35.160
to a lot of the information you have in what

456
00:24:35.240 --> 00:24:37.880
you experienced. We can touch on the other topics later

457
00:24:37.880 --> 00:24:40.680
if you'd like, but getting back to what you wrote,

458
00:24:40.720 --> 00:24:43.200
so I see what you were saying about how you

459
00:24:43.240 --> 00:24:44.599
know when he came in, he was just he was

460
00:24:44.599 --> 00:24:46.240
like a bull in a china shop. He's just like, no,

461
00:24:46.319 --> 00:24:49.200
we're doing this now, And you know, I get hit

462
00:24:49.240 --> 00:24:51.240
the intentions, but he was also leaving a lot of

463
00:24:51.240 --> 00:24:53.880
people to figure it out and go like, what's next? Right,

464
00:24:54.400 --> 00:24:57.279
all of a sudden, my healthcare it's in question, is

465
00:24:57.319 --> 00:24:58.799
it isn't it? Like a lot of people didn't know

466
00:24:58.799 --> 00:25:03.440
what's going on. The other things that he did that

467
00:25:03.519 --> 00:25:06.440
you saw, like what else did you experience firsthand while

468
00:25:06.480 --> 00:25:09.920
working in the administration that was really like a red flag?

469
00:25:09.920 --> 00:25:12.599
Feel like, oh, this guy's this guy's nuts, right.

470
00:25:12.759 --> 00:25:13.519
Sure, he's sure.

471
00:25:13.920 --> 00:25:16.519
So one of the things they kept talking about how

472
00:25:16.559 --> 00:25:17.799
bad Obamacare was.

473
00:25:18.039 --> 00:25:19.000
It was terrible.

474
00:25:19.039 --> 00:25:22.680
It was terrible, and they waited till a couple weeks

475
00:25:22.720 --> 00:25:26.440
before open enrollment, so every year there's an open enrollment. Now,

476
00:25:26.480 --> 00:25:29.839
by the way, they cut open enrollment to less than

477
00:25:29.839 --> 00:25:33.079
half of what it was his first year. And the

478
00:25:33.119 --> 00:25:36.039
other thing they did they slashed all the advertising and

479
00:25:36.119 --> 00:25:40.000
promotion to between the third and a half of what

480
00:25:40.119 --> 00:25:44.480
it was, and they prevented our offices from being out

481
00:25:44.599 --> 00:25:49.279
supporting the navigators and the federally qualified health centers. The

482
00:25:49.960 --> 00:25:54.519
people who were out messaging and helping people. The real

483
00:25:54.720 --> 00:25:58.240
people who most needed to help George tended to be

484
00:25:59.000 --> 00:26:02.319
the elderly, the people who were less educated, who were

485
00:26:02.400 --> 00:26:07.440
less computer savvy. Those are the people because health insurance

486
00:26:07.480 --> 00:26:10.559
is pretty complex and so those people needed somebody to

487
00:26:10.640 --> 00:26:14.480
hold their hand and walk them through it. So those

488
00:26:14.480 --> 00:26:18.720
are the people who were going to suffer from not having,

489
00:26:19.039 --> 00:26:21.680
you know, some help from people. And then there were

490
00:26:21.720 --> 00:26:24.480
insurance agents too that help, and of course they were

491
00:26:24.480 --> 00:26:26.960
doing it and making money, but the other people were

492
00:26:27.000 --> 00:26:29.279
doing it because they were just contracted to do it

493
00:26:29.400 --> 00:26:31.880
or they thought it needed to be done. So that

494
00:26:32.079 --> 00:26:35.519
was a real problem because For example, I spent a

495
00:26:35.519 --> 00:26:38.200
lot of time in the state of Mississippi. We had

496
00:26:38.240 --> 00:26:41.079
eight states in the southeast. I was responsible at the

497
00:26:41.119 --> 00:26:44.519
time for four of them. Mississippi was our poorest state.

498
00:26:45.240 --> 00:26:48.440
It was a state that was the least educated, the

499
00:26:48.440 --> 00:26:54.079
most health disparities, It was the blackest state because and

500
00:26:54.119 --> 00:26:57.240
it had the deepest messiges of Jim Crow and slavery.

501
00:26:57.640 --> 00:27:01.799
So there were so many people there who had helped

502
00:27:01.839 --> 00:27:07.680
build over several generations the wealth in this country who

503
00:27:07.839 --> 00:27:10.680
had never had health insurance. And so for us to

504
00:27:10.720 --> 00:27:14.480
not be able to go in and support the mayors

505
00:27:14.559 --> 00:27:17.880
and the county commissioners and people like the Children's Defense

506
00:27:18.000 --> 00:27:23.599
Fund and the National Baptist Convention and the NAACP, those

507
00:27:23.640 --> 00:27:26.079
people who were out there helping people. A lot of

508
00:27:26.119 --> 00:27:28.640
those were doing and weren't getting paid, but they thought

509
00:27:28.680 --> 00:27:31.160
it was important. And so for them to tell us

510
00:27:31.200 --> 00:27:34.920
we couldn't go out and help those people, I thought

511
00:27:35.079 --> 00:27:37.759
was I thought there was problem because it was still

512
00:27:37.799 --> 00:27:40.119
the law of the land. Now, if you had overturned

513
00:27:40.160 --> 00:27:43.039
it and you said no, and hey, no, makes sense.

514
00:27:43.119 --> 00:27:47.359
But to me, how could we defy the law because

515
00:27:47.400 --> 00:27:50.559
you didn't believe or didn't support the system, but you

516
00:27:50.599 --> 00:27:53.400
couldn't overturn it. But you still told us we couldn't

517
00:27:53.680 --> 00:27:54.119
try it.

518
00:27:54.559 --> 00:27:58.119
Okay, So I'm trying to understand your so he at

519
00:27:58.160 --> 00:28:00.680
the time it was still as North Urn.

520
00:28:00.799 --> 00:28:01.599
So that's right.

521
00:28:02.400 --> 00:28:04.960
But at the time they were instructing you, guys.

522
00:28:04.599 --> 00:28:06.440
Not absolutely.

523
00:28:06.759 --> 00:28:10.400
In fact, In fact, one of the key moments, George

524
00:28:10.680 --> 00:28:16.160
was I had to write a letter an email after

525
00:28:16.200 --> 00:28:19.519
what they told us at a meeting. So there are

526
00:28:19.559 --> 00:28:22.079
ten regents in the country. Our region is based out

527
00:28:22.119 --> 00:28:25.480
of Atlanta, and we'd have a meeting usually every week,

528
00:28:25.519 --> 00:28:27.839
and they told us on this meeting they've been hinting

529
00:28:27.920 --> 00:28:30.920
at this, hinting at this, that we were not going

530
00:28:30.960 --> 00:28:33.000
to be able to support we were no longer to

531
00:28:33.079 --> 00:28:35.839
be able to travel and support the people who were

532
00:28:35.880 --> 00:28:39.599
doing it enrollment events and promotional events to help people

533
00:28:39.680 --> 00:28:43.200
understand what had changed. Every year there was some changes

534
00:28:43.279 --> 00:28:47.680
in the law in terms of eligibility, in terms of

535
00:28:48.799 --> 00:28:53.000
who could help you know all of these factors, and

536
00:28:53.079 --> 00:28:57.359
so people who weren't eligible last year were eligible this year.

537
00:28:57.400 --> 00:29:00.200
And by the way, one thing everybody loved about it

538
00:29:00.039 --> 00:29:02.079
it was that you could keep kids on their health

539
00:29:02.079 --> 00:29:06.119
insurance up until a certain age. I can't remember now

540
00:29:06.160 --> 00:29:08.799
that so the people who are still in college could

541
00:29:08.799 --> 00:29:11.480
still be on their parents' health insurance. And that was

542
00:29:11.519 --> 00:29:14.640
something that was loved by both sides of the aisle, remember,

543
00:29:14.720 --> 00:29:15.720
So that's what they did.

544
00:29:15.920 --> 00:29:18.039
Yeah, I remember sixteen, then it went to eighteen, and

545
00:29:18.079 --> 00:29:20.240
then I think it went up to like twenty two.

546
00:29:21.119 --> 00:29:23.359
Yeah, twenty two or twenty three. Yeah, it was, yeah,

547
00:29:23.359 --> 00:29:25.880
it was. It was in the twenties, that was. It

548
00:29:25.920 --> 00:29:30.039
was in the twenties, and so everybody loved that basically.

549
00:29:30.119 --> 00:29:32.880
But so so they told us, for example, I would

550
00:29:32.920 --> 00:29:36.279
have a call in several of our markets. So for example,

551
00:29:36.319 --> 00:29:39.160
I'd have a call with the with the group out

552
00:29:39.160 --> 00:29:43.039
of Montgomery called Alabama Rise, and all of these sister

553
00:29:43.200 --> 00:29:45.799
communities in the whole state would be on that call.

554
00:29:46.319 --> 00:29:50.519
And along with me, I'd have the experts from CMS

555
00:29:50.960 --> 00:29:56.680
from PERSA, the Health ret Resources Services Agency. They fund

556
00:29:57.359 --> 00:30:00.599
and undergird the federally Qualified Health Centers at people don't

557
00:30:00.599 --> 00:30:03.400
know in America, forty percent of the primary health care

558
00:30:03.920 --> 00:30:08.160
provided in this country comes through the federally Qualified Health centers,

559
00:30:08.440 --> 00:30:12.240
and there's some in most communities, and people can go

560
00:30:12.359 --> 00:30:17.079
there even if they're unemployed or underemployed and get primary

561
00:30:17.079 --> 00:30:20.319
health care services based on a sliding ski. If you

562
00:30:20.559 --> 00:30:22.839
fee scale, if you make a little money, you pay

563
00:30:22.839 --> 00:30:23.359
a little money.

564
00:30:23.359 --> 00:30:24.640
If you don't make any money, you.

565
00:30:24.640 --> 00:30:29.559
Still get served and it helps not overwhelm the hospitals.

566
00:30:29.920 --> 00:30:31.920
So these people would be on the phone and if

567
00:30:31.920 --> 00:30:34.400
they ran into a problem, there was a glitch on

568
00:30:35.319 --> 00:30:39.200
a healthcare dot gov or something wasn't working, then my

569
00:30:39.359 --> 00:30:42.039
experts would be there with me and they'd hear it

570
00:30:42.119 --> 00:30:44.240
and they'd take it down and then the problems was

571
00:30:44.319 --> 00:30:46.480
we'd get back to the people with a fix or

572
00:30:46.559 --> 00:30:49.279
go back and fix it on our end. So there

573
00:30:49.400 --> 00:30:52.359
was that kind of communication, and we'd have that every week,

574
00:30:52.960 --> 00:30:55.680
because every week there was a different three theme this

575
00:30:55.799 --> 00:30:59.960
week or let's say this month maybe Latin American money

576
00:31:00.160 --> 00:31:03.359
next to me might bee lgbt Q plus month next

577
00:31:03.440 --> 00:31:07.160
May maybe UH focus on veterans of me, you know,

578
00:31:07.319 --> 00:31:10.559
focus on small businesses, and focus on African American.

579
00:31:11.400 --> 00:31:13.720
So all of these kind of different.

580
00:31:13.559 --> 00:31:18.200
UH the the UH the various like the aai P,

581
00:31:18.480 --> 00:31:25.119
the Native American and Asian American Pacific segment of the community,

582
00:31:25.160 --> 00:31:28.440
and so all that communication was stopped. In fact, I

583
00:31:28.480 --> 00:31:31.799
worked with the lady at CMS centers for Medicare and Medicaid,

584
00:31:31.839 --> 00:31:35.880
and they funded a lot of the they funded the navigators.

585
00:31:36.480 --> 00:31:39.920
And she told me because she wouldn't even they would

586
00:31:40.000 --> 00:31:42.400
send her stuff that we were supposed to send out

587
00:31:42.440 --> 00:31:45.200
to our partners, all of these partners, I tell you

588
00:31:45.240 --> 00:31:47.599
that will be on these calls. And she told me,

589
00:31:47.799 --> 00:31:50.359
I'm not sending anything out because I got two kids

590
00:31:50.400 --> 00:31:53.000
at home who like to eat. Now, I send it

591
00:31:53.000 --> 00:31:55.440
out anyway, because I said, if I'm going to get

592
00:31:55.440 --> 00:31:59.240
fired for obeying the law law the land, then I'm

593
00:31:59.319 --> 00:32:00.720
just gonna have to get fired.

594
00:32:01.480 --> 00:32:03.440
Almost got fired a few times.

595
00:32:03.160 --> 00:32:06.000
And everybody, everybody back then felt like they were working

596
00:32:06.079 --> 00:32:08.440
under threat threat of losing their.

597
00:32:08.839 --> 00:32:11.960
Absolutely absolutely so is a lot of the same things

598
00:32:12.000 --> 00:32:15.640
that are happening now, but this is on steroids. In fact,

599
00:32:15.720 --> 00:32:20.960
one time they told our CMS counterparts in Atlanta that

600
00:32:21.119 --> 00:32:24.359
run the regional office that supply work with all of

601
00:32:24.359 --> 00:32:28.319
these eight Southeastern states, and that would be nursing homes,

602
00:32:28.400 --> 00:32:32.759
that would be assisted living facilities, all of the hospitals

603
00:32:32.799 --> 00:32:35.440
come under their care, all of those any any of

604
00:32:35.480 --> 00:32:41.640
those entities, And they told somebody called her office run

605
00:32:41.680 --> 00:32:44.680
the Trump administration and told them to throw everything out

606
00:32:44.759 --> 00:32:48.119
that said had Obamacare on it. We were to destroy it,

607
00:32:48.319 --> 00:32:51.920
all of the materials that we passed out and used

608
00:32:51.920 --> 00:32:55.079
to help educate people and inform people. So what we

609
00:32:55.160 --> 00:32:57.799
had to do, George. We had to call everybody in

610
00:32:57.839 --> 00:33:01.480
the Metro Atlanta sister community and said if you meet

611
00:33:01.599 --> 00:33:05.640
us down here on the corner, because we'd rather give

612
00:33:05.680 --> 00:33:08.519
it to you and let you use it than to

613
00:33:08.680 --> 00:33:14.119
destroy it. And it was perfectly good, but they didn't

614
00:33:14.119 --> 00:33:16.079
want to have it. So those are the kind of

615
00:33:16.119 --> 00:33:20.640
things that in terms of that that we had to

616
00:33:20.680 --> 00:33:21.160
deal with.

617
00:33:21.559 --> 00:33:23.880
And I'll tell you this is interesting, George.

618
00:33:23.960 --> 00:33:29.799
The day the Healthcare DOCTUV website launched, the first, very

619
00:33:29.839 --> 00:33:37.079
first day of the Affordable Care Act was live, was

620
00:33:37.119 --> 00:33:41.000
the very same day that the government shut down, and

621
00:33:41.039 --> 00:33:44.240
so the website you probably don't remember this, but it

622
00:33:44.279 --> 00:33:47.559
was crashing left and right. It was just being overwhelmed

623
00:33:47.880 --> 00:33:51.240
and the Republicans were loving it because it was looking bad.

624
00:33:51.319 --> 00:33:53.799
It was terrible, and so of course.

625
00:33:53.599 --> 00:33:56.480
I was at the time had a designation that we

626
00:33:56.599 --> 00:33:58.000
still had to work everybody.

627
00:33:58.079 --> 00:33:59.759
Most of our employees were sent home.

628
00:34:00.079 --> 00:34:02.240
We had to work through it, and of course we

629
00:34:02.279 --> 00:34:05.720
couldn't tell our side of the story or the supportive

630
00:34:05.839 --> 00:34:08.079
side of the story, and so they were just getting

631
00:34:08.159 --> 00:34:11.679
lambassad But that was that was one of the crazy things.

632
00:34:11.719 --> 00:34:15.920
And another crazy thing, if we can go here was

633
00:34:16.079 --> 00:34:19.440
I think that he terribly mismanaged COVID.

634
00:34:21.960 --> 00:34:23.159
Uh you know what I mean, I mean.

635
00:34:23.119 --> 00:34:26.239
Go wherever you want. Yeah, I mean, I'm not one

636
00:34:26.280 --> 00:34:27.800
that will not talk about stuff.

637
00:34:27.960 --> 00:34:31.519
I mean, so I think that we when we really

638
00:34:31.559 --> 00:34:34.480
needed a statesman in the White House, we needed somebody

639
00:34:34.559 --> 00:34:37.440
like church Hill or FDR. Because you know, in the

640
00:34:37.559 --> 00:34:41.480
darkest of moments in this country, you need a statesman

641
00:34:41.519 --> 00:34:44.199
who will say, listen, we're in for a hell of

642
00:34:44.239 --> 00:34:47.880
a fight. This is going to be you know, we're

643
00:34:47.880 --> 00:34:50.000
going to lose a lot of people. We got to

644
00:34:50.000 --> 00:34:53.440
come together, there was one and deal with this. But

645
00:34:53.760 --> 00:34:57.119
you remember, he kept saying, well, it's just going to disappear.

646
00:34:57.239 --> 00:35:00.679
It's not that bad. You know, you can check bleach

647
00:35:00.800 --> 00:35:03.440
and you know, you can do all these kind of things.

648
00:35:03.440 --> 00:35:07.440
And so hundreds of thousands of people died that shouldn't

649
00:35:07.440 --> 00:35:15.880
have died because he wouldn't take COVID seriously. And of course,

650
00:35:15.920 --> 00:35:19.119
you know when he finally got COVID, you know, we

651
00:35:19.280 --> 00:35:21.440
know he had the very best of medicine and the

652
00:35:21.599 --> 00:35:24.280
very best of care as a president, and so, yeah,

653
00:35:24.320 --> 00:35:27.119
he's a president, and so I just thought he was

654
00:35:27.239 --> 00:35:32.840
extremely irresponsible. So so much of my book focuses on

655
00:35:32.920 --> 00:35:38.360
these communities, particularly the ones the least, the most vulnerable communities.

656
00:35:38.800 --> 00:35:42.559
In many instances, they were like the margareant workers who

657
00:35:42.679 --> 00:35:45.719
already you know, most of them, many times they lived

658
00:35:45.760 --> 00:35:48.719
in a you might have six or eight of them

659
00:35:48.760 --> 00:35:51.920
in a one or two bedroom apartment. You know, they'd

660
00:35:52.000 --> 00:35:55.280
ride to work together. So they had no protection, and

661
00:35:55.320 --> 00:35:57.239
they didn't A lot of them didn't have health care,

662
00:35:57.280 --> 00:36:00.039
They didn't have a place they could go, and so

663
00:36:00.159 --> 00:36:03.000
they were ravaged people that worked in these meat plants

664
00:36:03.119 --> 00:36:07.840
and these supermarkets. You know, they they just didn't but

665
00:36:07.960 --> 00:36:10.760
they had to be. They weren't like me because I

666
00:36:10.760 --> 00:36:12.360
got to where I could go home and work and

667
00:36:12.400 --> 00:36:14.559
sit in front of my computer like we're doing now.

668
00:36:14.599 --> 00:36:17.119
You know, they were the privileged people and they were

669
00:36:17.159 --> 00:36:20.960
the most vulnerable. And also the people that trusted him,

670
00:36:21.079 --> 00:36:23.400
who said that, well, this isn't real, this isn't going

671
00:36:23.480 --> 00:36:27.880
to happen. So I chronicled dozens of stories, some of

672
00:36:27.920 --> 00:36:31.960
them are best deathbed confessions because they people have said, well,

673
00:36:32.039 --> 00:36:33.679
you know, I didn't think this was real. I didn't

674
00:36:33.719 --> 00:36:36.000
think this was going to have could actually happen to me,

675
00:36:36.519 --> 00:36:39.960
And so I just thought he was very irresponsible in that.

676
00:36:40.119 --> 00:36:43.119
And and what we're going to have in the next

677
00:36:43.159 --> 00:36:45.239
couple of years, and I think it's going to start

678
00:36:45.239 --> 00:36:48.000
this year, George, because all of these people that have

679
00:36:48.119 --> 00:36:52.239
been fired at the CDC, all these people at the

680
00:36:52.360 --> 00:36:57.039
NIH who've been sent packing, and asif the organization that

681
00:36:57.920 --> 00:37:06.599
that of doctors, who who suggests what kind of vaccines

682
00:37:06.960 --> 00:37:11.000
are viable and safe? All of those people, twelve or

683
00:37:11.079 --> 00:37:14.239
thirteen have been replaced. He fired all them, and most

684
00:37:14.280 --> 00:37:16.639
have been replaced. We're talking about Robert Kenned. He had

685
00:37:16.679 --> 00:37:20.199
been replaced by all these vaccine skeptics. And so what

686
00:37:20.239 --> 00:37:23.239
I'm saying is you've seen we've had a resurgence of

687
00:37:23.679 --> 00:37:26.840
measles that's worse than thirty years we thought we had

688
00:37:26.840 --> 00:37:30.280
eradicated measles. That's just the beginning of it. Wait till

689
00:37:30.320 --> 00:37:33.920
the flu and covid comes back with a vengeance in

690
00:37:34.000 --> 00:37:38.039
the fall and you have nobody messaging against it and

691
00:37:38.119 --> 00:37:42.440
telling you to protect yourselves and the vaccines are safe.

692
00:37:42.480 --> 00:37:46.280
And that's an option, so it's gonna be interesting. And

693
00:37:46.320 --> 00:37:47.400
this is just year one.

694
00:37:47.719 --> 00:37:52.280
It is the thing with see Robert Kennedy, he's flip

695
00:37:52.320 --> 00:37:55.320
flopped a lot two on vaccines. You know, he was

696
00:37:55.360 --> 00:37:57.400
completely anti vACC and then he was like, well, no,

697
00:37:57.480 --> 00:38:00.320
I'm four vaccines that are proven. I just don't want

698
00:38:00.440 --> 00:38:06.840
unproven vaccines or untested which makes sense. And then, uh,

699
00:38:06.880 --> 00:38:09.599
the COVID vaccine was was a strange one because it

700
00:38:09.719 --> 00:38:13.000
was very rushed. Okay, and now I'm not an anti VAXX.

701
00:38:13.039 --> 00:38:15.880
If it works and it's proven, then yeah, give it

702
00:38:15.880 --> 00:38:19.599
to me. But the thing with the vaccine, and I

703
00:38:19.599 --> 00:38:20.880
know you know it's because you live through this and

704
00:38:20.920 --> 00:38:23.159
you're on the other side of it, but it was

705
00:38:23.239 --> 00:38:25.599
it was very unproven. It was rushed, and I'm gonna

706
00:38:25.599 --> 00:38:27.360
tell you right now, I know people who died from

707
00:38:27.400 --> 00:38:30.519
getting the vaccine. I know people in the military that

708
00:38:30.800 --> 00:38:32.719
took the Johnson and it was like it was like

709
00:38:32.760 --> 00:38:36.840
a hot shot. So yeah, there was problems with the vaccine.

710
00:38:36.920 --> 00:38:38.920
And now we have studies that are released to actually

711
00:38:38.960 --> 00:38:42.320
say well, now, if you get it, you are under

712
00:38:43.039 --> 00:38:47.719
a risk of myocardar myochi dieters. I can't even talk

713
00:38:47.760 --> 00:38:51.039
right now, but basically the enlarge heart syndrome right, which

714
00:38:51.079 --> 00:38:53.320
a lot of young people are getting. I do not

715
00:38:53.400 --> 00:38:55.159
know why I can't pronounce that word, was so strange,

716
00:38:55.480 --> 00:38:58.559
But anyway, so these things are true. And then Fizer

717
00:38:58.719 --> 00:39:01.440
just had a settle not in the US, but with

718
00:39:01.519 --> 00:39:05.559
multiple countries overseas due to the adverse effects that they

719
00:39:05.920 --> 00:39:09.639
completely denied. So, yeah, there were issues with the vaccine.

720
00:39:09.679 --> 00:39:13.800
But did the vaccine work in some cases? Sure, I

721
00:39:13.880 --> 00:39:16.280
just don't think it was thoroughly tested and that was

722
00:39:16.320 --> 00:39:19.599
what the apprehension was for most people. The problem, though,

723
00:39:19.880 --> 00:39:22.639
which is what I agree with you with, is that

724
00:39:22.800 --> 00:39:26.239
this did. This did stir up the whole anti vax

725
00:39:26.960 --> 00:39:30.000
movement in general, and now we're dismissing things that do work.

726
00:39:30.039 --> 00:39:32.079
Like you said, the measles vaccine. Well, I'm sorry, but

727
00:39:32.119 --> 00:39:34.800
that does work. You know, the flu vaccine works. There's

728
00:39:34.840 --> 00:39:37.079
things that do work but we can't get rid of.

729
00:39:37.159 --> 00:39:38.800
I mean, what do we want to do reintroduce polio

730
00:39:38.840 --> 00:39:40.599
because we don't want to take a vaccine. That's stupid,

731
00:39:40.960 --> 00:39:44.719
makes no sense. But I think the apprehension was like, hey,

732
00:39:44.800 --> 00:39:49.599
here's COVID. Never had it pandemic? I mean, happens every

733
00:39:49.639 --> 00:39:51.360
what every so many hundred a year. Last one was

734
00:39:51.360 --> 00:39:54.119
a Spanish flu, and then here we are, we don't

735
00:39:54.159 --> 00:39:55.760
have a solution. Then all of a sudden, it's like

736
00:39:56.199 --> 00:40:00.559
send it out. Okay, we could put some of that

737
00:40:00.599 --> 00:40:02.599
in the Trump administration for not vetting it, But at

738
00:40:02.599 --> 00:40:05.199
the same time, it was like the whole world needed something,

739
00:40:05.599 --> 00:40:07.679
and we can't deny that a lot of everything that

740
00:40:07.760 --> 00:40:10.039
was going on was also under the advisement of Fauci.

741
00:40:10.119 --> 00:40:12.760
I'm not gonna even not talk about that because that

742
00:40:12.840 --> 00:40:16.559
was a truth. But as the president, he could have

743
00:40:16.559 --> 00:40:19.159
put his foot down. So I don't really have an

744
00:40:19.159 --> 00:40:21.119
answer for that. You know, It's like there's it's a

745
00:40:21.119 --> 00:40:23.159
double edited sword here. It's like, on one hand you

746
00:40:23.159 --> 00:40:24.920
have some truth. On the other hand, like both things

747
00:40:24.920 --> 00:40:27.679
could be true at the same time, right, but both

748
00:40:27.679 --> 00:40:29.599
of them don't necessarily mean they were the right solution.

749
00:40:31.000 --> 00:40:32.400
It was not a good time for any way to

750
00:40:32.400 --> 00:40:34.920
live through. So you did have the people who caught

751
00:40:34.920 --> 00:40:39.519
it that they got the bad version of COVID, and yeah,

752
00:40:40.119 --> 00:40:43.519
people did die. I have a story on COVID because

753
00:40:43.639 --> 00:40:46.000
I'm I'm my business. I'm in the entertainmentdustry. I do

754
00:40:46.039 --> 00:40:49.880
I do a vent production okay, and we all got

755
00:40:49.920 --> 00:40:52.800
it before. We got it in twenty nineteen. Okay, we

756
00:40:52.840 --> 00:40:56.360
got it in about October, because I remember this. Everyone

757
00:40:56.440 --> 00:40:58.360
was getting sick. Everyone was like, hey, it's this weird

758
00:40:58.400 --> 00:41:00.639
flu going around, and everybody's flying in over so we're

759
00:41:00.639 --> 00:41:03.719
like doing like these conventions for like just throwing like

760
00:41:03.719 --> 00:41:06.360
Sam Sung, Sony whatever, and so they're flying people in

761
00:41:06.400 --> 00:41:09.079
from overseas, and then all of a sudden, these large

762
00:41:09.079 --> 00:41:12.239
conventions that are like they're scheduled out a year in advance,

763
00:41:12.239 --> 00:41:13.760
all of a sudden they're just dropping off. And was like,

764
00:41:13.840 --> 00:41:16.920
what's going on, And everybody's saying, well, there's this flu

765
00:41:17.000 --> 00:41:19.599
going around. Well I got it, and I got it,

766
00:41:19.679 --> 00:41:20.679
and I didn't know I had it. I thought it

767
00:41:20.760 --> 00:41:22.880
was a regular flu, and I worked through it on

768
00:41:23.079 --> 00:41:25.199
every damn medication you think you would take for cold

769
00:41:25.199 --> 00:41:28.719
from October through December. I had it for that long.

770
00:41:28.760 --> 00:41:31.119
I just couldn't shake it. And then all of a sudden,

771
00:41:31.400 --> 00:41:35.239
the announcement comes from January, well really around February, right,

772
00:41:35.519 --> 00:41:38.239
and they're like, oh, by the way, this is what's

773
00:41:38.280 --> 00:41:40.960
going on. It's a pandemic. We're like, what you know,

774
00:41:41.039 --> 00:41:43.159
we're already going through this and nobody knew it. But

775
00:41:43.199 --> 00:41:46.199
we're working so hard and busting, you know, working through

776
00:41:46.199 --> 00:41:48.800
it that we didn't we didn't even like register what

777
00:41:48.840 --> 00:41:54.079
it was or what was happening. Uh So once it hit, Yeah,

778
00:41:54.280 --> 00:41:56.400
I you know the way Trump handled his shirt, like,

779
00:41:57.840 --> 00:41:59.639
could he have put his foot down? Could he have

780
00:41:59.679 --> 00:42:02.440
been more apprehensive instead of just trying to say, hey,

781
00:42:02.480 --> 00:42:04.519
this is nothing. Everybody did think it was a flu

782
00:42:04.599 --> 00:42:06.639
back then, but at the same time, it was evident

783
00:42:06.679 --> 00:42:08.119
that it was more than a flu because the whole

784
00:42:08.119 --> 00:42:11.519
world was getting infected by this virus. So yeah, he

785
00:42:11.519 --> 00:42:13.519
could have definitely taken it a lot more serious at

786
00:42:13.519 --> 00:42:18.880
that particular time. And the speed of getting the vaccine out.

787
00:42:19.239 --> 00:42:22.000
We can argue whether that was necessary or not. I mean,

788
00:42:22.079 --> 00:42:25.360
but the reality is it wasn't vetted, it wasn't tested,

789
00:42:26.199 --> 00:42:28.960
and that's why people were apprehensive. That's why a lot

790
00:42:29.000 --> 00:42:32.639
of us were. But from my perspective, I'm not anti vacs.

791
00:42:32.840 --> 00:42:35.239
I'm not going to be that idiot. Right, there's vaccines

792
00:42:35.280 --> 00:42:37.920
that are proven that you just take. They work. When

793
00:42:37.960 --> 00:42:41.320
it came to Robert Kennedy, I get what he was

794
00:42:41.320 --> 00:42:43.599
coming from in terms of health because there are a

795
00:42:43.639 --> 00:42:46.679
lot of adverse health conditions or things that can happen

796
00:42:47.320 --> 00:42:50.800
from certain vaccines. I mean, the biggest part we have.

797
00:42:50.840 --> 00:42:52.480
I don't think it is really our vaccines are food,

798
00:42:52.599 --> 00:42:58.119
quite honest. But because of that, combined with what Robert

799
00:42:58.199 --> 00:43:00.760
Kennedy was saying in the beginning, is what led to

800
00:43:00.760 --> 00:43:04.800
this anti vaxx movement. It's a stupid thing, it really is.

801
00:43:05.440 --> 00:43:07.360
And things are happening. Like you said, all of a sudden,

802
00:43:07.559 --> 00:43:12.559
we have measles. You know what's next, Olio, Like these

803
00:43:12.559 --> 00:43:14.559
are things we shouldn't have. We have proven vaccines that

804
00:43:14.559 --> 00:43:16.440
can take care of it. So I'm in agreeance with you,

805
00:43:16.880 --> 00:43:19.880
But I also needed to, from my perspective, clarify a

806
00:43:19.920 --> 00:43:22.920
little bit of what happened during that period. And I

807
00:43:22.920 --> 00:43:24.920
mean we're not even to talk about health. We can

808
00:43:24.960 --> 00:43:27.800
even get into people who lost their businesses, lost their jobs,

809
00:43:27.800 --> 00:43:30.719
their livelihood. You know, the way the government acted even

810
00:43:30.760 --> 00:43:35.599
after Trump under Biden. So that whole time period was

811
00:43:36.239 --> 00:43:38.760
excuse the wording, but was a shit show for everybody

812
00:43:38.800 --> 00:43:43.079
on all aspects. It really was. But I think you're correct,

813
00:43:43.119 --> 00:43:46.679
and Trump could have been a lot more cautious about

814
00:43:46.679 --> 00:43:48.760
things in the beginning and taking a little bit more serious.

815
00:43:49.079 --> 00:43:51.079
I mean, I understand he didn't want to create panic,

816
00:43:51.199 --> 00:43:53.480
because that's when you're in the government, that's what you

817
00:43:53.519 --> 00:43:55.559
want to do, I think, right, but you don't want

818
00:43:55.559 --> 00:43:58.039
to create panic. If he was to say, hey, this

819
00:43:58.119 --> 00:44:01.400
is very serious, we all can possibly diet, et cetera,

820
00:44:01.519 --> 00:44:03.800
it would have been it would have been just instant,

821
00:44:04.239 --> 00:44:06.480
like forget about it, like we were just been upended.

822
00:44:07.239 --> 00:44:09.599
I would disagree. I would disagree because a lot of

823
00:44:09.800 --> 00:44:12.880
a million people died. Yeah, I've COVID, like I said,

824
00:44:14.079 --> 00:44:18.519
so it was very serious, and particularly for people who

825
00:44:18.519 --> 00:44:21.960
were highly vulnerable, and some of us had some protections,

826
00:44:22.079 --> 00:44:27.119
and so we I think they were sacrificed, honestly. And

827
00:44:27.280 --> 00:44:30.360
I think as a leader, your responsibility is to say,

828
00:44:30.519 --> 00:44:34.480
this is the real situation. We need to do ABC

829
00:44:34.679 --> 00:44:36.760
and D. And they say, I don't have all the answers,

830
00:44:36.760 --> 00:44:39.360
but I want everybody to know that this is serious.

831
00:44:39.519 --> 00:44:43.079
I just don't think that was there because and and

832
00:44:43.199 --> 00:44:47.760
you know, I understand people and their businesses, and so

833
00:44:48.000 --> 00:44:51.639
at some point we have to decide what's the most important.

834
00:44:51.679 --> 00:44:56.480
Is it saving lives or is it is it keeping

835
00:44:56.519 --> 00:44:59.360
businesses open? Or is there a balance that we have

836
00:44:59.480 --> 00:45:04.000
to seek that can preserve both, and there was a

837
00:45:04.119 --> 00:45:07.679
there were funding too, and and there's questions and you know,

838
00:45:07.760 --> 00:45:08.519
we can tell.

839
00:45:08.400 --> 00:45:10.599
That's that's a little bit of a different conversation. But

840
00:45:11.079 --> 00:45:13.199
I agree, I agree with what you said. You know,

841
00:45:13.280 --> 00:45:16.280
he could have been let's just say presidential, because he's

842
00:45:16.320 --> 00:45:19.559
not presidential. He he could have he could have done

843
00:45:19.559 --> 00:45:21.559
a lot better in his messaging.

844
00:45:23.239 --> 00:45:25.199
But you have to care, You have to care about

845
00:45:25.239 --> 00:45:27.880
people for that. Do you think he cares about people?

846
00:45:28.320 --> 00:45:30.440
It's hard to tell, you know, one one day he's

847
00:45:30.480 --> 00:45:32.719
the most carrying guy in the nexus, like, hey, you know,

848
00:45:32.840 --> 00:45:33.679
screw you.

849
00:45:33.679 --> 00:45:35.880
You know, I would love to see one of those

850
00:45:35.920 --> 00:45:38.840
instances where he's the most carrying guy, because I personally

851
00:45:38.920 --> 00:45:41.679
haven't seen that. And if you can, you can know,

852
00:45:41.840 --> 00:45:47.320
I know, really I don't see compassion in this man,

853
00:45:47.480 --> 00:45:48.719
and I could be wrong.

854
00:45:49.639 --> 00:45:53.159
Well we can only hope, uh that you're wrong, you know,

855
00:45:53.199 --> 00:45:56.599
because if he is really as an incompassionate, if he's

856
00:45:56.679 --> 00:45:59.840
if he's basically just some cold hearted lizard, that that

857
00:46:00.039 --> 00:46:02.360
could be a very bad thing in certain situations for sure,

858
00:46:02.719 --> 00:46:06.119
you know, And if if he becomes reactionary, especially what's

859
00:46:06.159 --> 00:46:10.000
going on in the geopolitical stage right now, uh, we

860
00:46:10.039 --> 00:46:13.400
can get into a whole lot of trouble, right, you know.

861
00:46:13.480 --> 00:46:16.280
And and right now he was trying to avoid wars.

862
00:46:16.440 --> 00:46:18.400
He's not we're not really in one, but we are,

863
00:46:18.480 --> 00:46:20.480
but we're not, like that's that's a whole different deal.

864
00:46:21.000 --> 00:46:23.119
But but two wars.

865
00:46:23.159 --> 00:46:26.960
Actually, yeah, well this is my wheelhouse. So we can

866
00:46:27.000 --> 00:46:29.599
go on with this for a long time. But let's

867
00:46:29.679 --> 00:46:33.119
let's let's let's both agree on this. I think in

868
00:46:33.159 --> 00:46:35.280
the beginning he didn't take it serious enough when kme cover,

869
00:46:35.840 --> 00:46:38.159
I agree with you, And I think the whole anti

870
00:46:38.280 --> 00:46:43.400
vaccine came from the apprehension of taking something that wasn't tested,

871
00:46:43.679 --> 00:46:46.119
is what it was. We can't deny we didn't need

872
00:46:46.199 --> 00:46:47.159
something though we did.

873
00:46:47.760 --> 00:46:51.960
But and it actually west tested, but they didn't have

874
00:46:52.960 --> 00:46:56.199
a year, right right, you know. And and I'll tell

875
00:46:56.239 --> 00:46:58.079
you this, George, you probably wouldn't know this. We have

876
00:46:58.199 --> 00:47:00.199
been preparing for a pandemic.

877
00:46:59.719 --> 00:47:03.800
For you years. It's always part of the of the plane.

878
00:47:03.880 --> 00:47:06.199
It's always part of Yeah.

879
00:47:05.599 --> 00:47:07.360
You do, but a lot of your listeners won't.

880
00:47:07.360 --> 00:47:10.000
Oh no, yeah, correct, Yeah, a lot of people don't

881
00:47:10.000 --> 00:47:13.639
realize that. Yeah, it was interesting, man, it was definitely interesting.

882
00:47:14.039 --> 00:47:14.199
You know.

883
00:47:14.239 --> 00:47:16.519
I can't imagine how it was working under the administration

884
00:47:16.599 --> 00:47:18.679
at that time. I mean, and especially God, Like I said,

885
00:47:18.719 --> 00:47:20.880
some guy who's I mean, you're used to You're used

886
00:47:20.920 --> 00:47:23.480
to very stately people, and then this person comes in.

887
00:47:23.559 --> 00:47:26.000
It's it's like, what are you doing?

888
00:47:26.480 --> 00:47:30.119
You'll appreciate this George Uh every morning, So I'm a

889
00:47:30.199 --> 00:47:32.960
late night person, I'm using that an early morning person.

890
00:47:33.199 --> 00:47:35.360
About four.

891
00:47:36.000 --> 00:47:40.079
Uh, this thing would go off and I subconsciously start

892
00:47:40.440 --> 00:47:44.760
groping for my phone on my nightstand to look to

893
00:47:44.800 --> 00:47:46.679
see what he's tweeted out that night.

894
00:47:46.760 --> 00:47:49.000
And I'm gonna have to react to the next day.

895
00:47:49.400 --> 00:47:50.000
You know what I'm saying.

896
00:47:50.840 --> 00:47:54.159
That was what he did, right, That was how he communicated. Yeah,

897
00:47:54.239 --> 00:47:56.840
and usually when you think about it, let's let's bring

898
00:47:56.920 --> 00:48:01.760
in the history has done that as a nobody nobody

899
00:48:01.800 --> 00:48:04.559
And guess what, I think he'll agree with this. Had

900
00:48:04.679 --> 00:48:08.760
had they been able to take his twitter, his phone,

901
00:48:09.119 --> 00:48:12.800
he would have had two consecutive presidencies because I mean,

902
00:48:12.840 --> 00:48:18.519
he created enough turmoil himself to lose narrowly that first time.

903
00:48:18.719 --> 00:48:21.559
You know, he would have had to, you know, because

904
00:48:21.559 --> 00:48:24.239
he shot himself in the foot, like in Georgia when

905
00:48:24.239 --> 00:48:27.800
he called up and said, I just need eleven thousand

906
00:48:27.920 --> 00:48:31.480
and how many votes? Yeah, so you know these these

907
00:48:31.840 --> 00:48:36.360
and the thing about Kennedy to me is he's not

908
00:48:36.480 --> 00:48:41.360
taking a medical course, has no medical degrees. And he

909
00:48:41.559 --> 00:48:47.320
told the Republican Senator Kennedy out of Louisiana that he

910
00:48:47.320 --> 00:48:51.199
would not dismantle this task force, and one of the

911
00:48:51.199 --> 00:48:53.519
first he just did it. A couple of weeks ago.

912
00:48:53.559 --> 00:48:56.360
He dismantled that task force. So he straight up lied

913
00:48:56.559 --> 00:48:59.280
about what he was going to do. And I don't know,

914
00:48:59.320 --> 00:49:02.679
we've never had that's somebody that had no medical pack background.

915
00:49:02.719 --> 00:49:04.440
I'm not saying that he doesn't know anything, and I

916
00:49:04.440 --> 00:49:09.280
don't I'm not saying that some of his beliefs don't

917
00:49:09.280 --> 00:49:12.760
have some truth to them. I think that, you know,

918
00:49:12.920 --> 00:49:16.800
everything doesn't have to be one hundred percent straight scientific

919
00:49:16.840 --> 00:49:17.880
and medical.

920
00:49:18.039 --> 00:49:20.960
But you can't be able to rely on people smarter

921
00:49:21.079 --> 00:49:24.039
than you, right, absolutely, Yeah, you know I'm with you

922
00:49:24.079 --> 00:49:26.079
on this. I mean, you've got to rely on your advisors.

923
00:49:26.079 --> 00:49:28.559
You can, you can have the ability to manage and supervise,

924
00:49:28.639 --> 00:49:30.079
but if you don't have people around to them know

925
00:49:30.119 --> 00:49:33.880
more than you there or are specialists that you refer

926
00:49:33.960 --> 00:49:37.400
to or defer to. What's the point, yes, it doesn't

927
00:49:37.440 --> 00:49:39.239
make any sense. You need to take all the information

928
00:49:39.480 --> 00:49:41.599
and you need to get it together. You need to

929
00:49:41.639 --> 00:49:44.280
go through it, extrapolate it, and go all right, based

930
00:49:44.280 --> 00:49:47.119
on everything's going on. Even using scientific method as you will,

931
00:49:47.800 --> 00:49:50.199
you can go based on the patterns and everything we're

932
00:49:50.199 --> 00:49:52.119
getting out of all these tests, this is the direction

933
00:49:52.199 --> 00:49:56.000
we need to go. It's but you can't wing it.

934
00:49:56.159 --> 00:49:56.719
You can't.

935
00:49:57.119 --> 00:49:59.199
It's like, I don't know if you remember this is

936
00:49:59.320 --> 00:50:01.960
about to it months ago, but the city of Milwaukee

937
00:50:02.039 --> 00:50:05.480
called the CDC because they were having this huge land

938
00:50:05.559 --> 00:50:08.360
outbreak in their school systems.

939
00:50:08.760 --> 00:50:09.800
They called the CDC.

940
00:50:10.559 --> 00:50:14.239
Okay, they called the CDC, and the CDC couldn't send

941
00:50:14.280 --> 00:50:17.719
anybody because he had come in and fired everybody that

942
00:50:17.800 --> 00:50:23.519
does lead remediations. So those are the kind of things.

943
00:50:23.880 --> 00:50:26.480
You know, our safety nets are just being ripped away

944
00:50:26.519 --> 00:50:29.000
from us, and there's gonna be a price to pay

945
00:50:29.280 --> 00:50:32.039
because in the end, we're still gonna have to end

946
00:50:32.119 --> 00:50:35.800
up paying for all these people who just yeah, but

947
00:50:36.480 --> 00:50:38.920
there's nothing preventative going on.

948
00:50:39.480 --> 00:50:41.440
And so those are some of the issues.

949
00:50:42.440 --> 00:50:44.679
And then it's like what was happening Dan is we're

950
00:50:44.679 --> 00:50:48.639
getting repeated now under his term they didn't learn the lesson.

951
00:50:48.559 --> 00:50:51.880
And on steroids because now he has a roadmap project

952
00:50:51.880 --> 00:50:54.639
twenty twenty five. Do you know that the guy that's

953
00:50:54.679 --> 00:50:56.760
over oh PM and I'm trying to remember his name,

954
00:50:56.800 --> 00:51:00.960
who's the principal architect of Project twenty twenty five wrote

955
00:51:01.000 --> 00:51:03.960
that every time a federal employee walked in the door,

956
00:51:04.079 --> 00:51:05.840
he wanted them to feel terror.

957
00:51:07.400 --> 00:51:10.920
Now what kind of human being says something like that.

958
00:51:11.199 --> 00:51:13.679
Yeah, I'm I'm familiar with Uh. I didn't read through

959
00:51:13.719 --> 00:51:15.599
the whole twenty twenty five, but when all this was

960
00:51:15.639 --> 00:51:18.400
going around, I looked into it and it's like, on

961
00:51:18.440 --> 00:51:20.840
the surface, the whole thing was it has this landing

962
00:51:20.880 --> 00:51:23.039
page like oh, we're training the future leaders, and then

963
00:51:23.039 --> 00:51:25.960
it was really a book or roadmap of how to

964
00:51:26.000 --> 00:51:31.280
turn everything conservative and keep power. And yeah, I don't

965
00:51:31.360 --> 00:51:33.159
I don't agree with the book or at tactics. I

966
00:51:33.159 --> 00:51:35.639
know J. D Vance just says that he the stones

967
00:51:35.760 --> 00:51:38.159
or doesn't doesn't support it. I don't know if there

968
00:51:38.199 --> 00:51:40.400
was an actual connection between what Trump's went in twenty

969
00:51:40.400 --> 00:51:42.719
twenty five, though they've never really made that connection.

970
00:51:43.639 --> 00:51:46.400
But I mean, I think I think you, I must

971
00:51:46.440 --> 00:51:49.039
suggest you go back and read it and you will

972
00:51:49.039 --> 00:51:52.280
see a clear connection, because I think that's a roadmap

973
00:51:52.320 --> 00:51:53.119
that they're following.

974
00:51:53.679 --> 00:51:55.079
It could be I'll look at it.

975
00:51:55.239 --> 00:51:55.480
You know.

976
00:51:55.519 --> 00:51:58.079
I'm not opposed to it, you know, I just don't

977
00:51:58.239 --> 00:52:01.039
think that they've ever made that connection. But at the

978
00:52:01.039 --> 00:52:03.519
same time, who knows, Man, you definitely could be correct.

979
00:52:03.559 --> 00:52:05.559
I I could look into that and see what's happening.

980
00:52:06.280 --> 00:52:09.519
So hey, it's all about learning things to get educated, right,

981
00:52:09.679 --> 00:52:10.840
I don't want to stay in the dark.

982
00:52:10.719 --> 00:52:12.519
Here, That's right, That's right.

983
00:52:12.639 --> 00:52:18.440
Yeah, Let's let's move on to what else you experienced.

984
00:52:18.559 --> 00:52:21.400
And you know, obviously everything everything that happened with the

985
00:52:21.440 --> 00:52:24.239
way they were handling health care, for example, which greatly

986
00:52:24.519 --> 00:52:26.519
impacted you because that's what you did. We're working for

987
00:52:26.679 --> 00:52:30.000
HHS and trying to help people through this time period

988
00:52:30.039 --> 00:52:34.800
this change. What about the and I'm bring this up

989
00:52:34.800 --> 00:52:36.920
because I did see it on some of your description

990
00:52:37.079 --> 00:52:40.400
and your about the book. What what was going on

991
00:52:40.480 --> 00:52:43.559
in terms of how you thought or how while a

992
00:52:43.559 --> 00:52:47.199
lot of people did that the Trump Trump himself maybe

993
00:52:47.199 --> 00:52:48.960
I don't know if it was the entire administration, they

994
00:52:48.960 --> 00:52:52.119
were actually believed to be racist or a lot of

995
00:52:52.119 --> 00:52:54.760
things they said were racist or came across that way.

996
00:52:55.519 --> 00:52:55.679
And.

997
00:52:57.159 --> 00:52:59.639
I see how because he has no damn filter, he

998
00:52:59.679 --> 00:53:03.000
doesn't ye And I can see how that was taken

999
00:53:03.119 --> 00:53:05.920
back then because look, there's a lot of times we're like,

1000
00:53:06.599 --> 00:53:08.800
what did you say? And then now he's trying to

1001
00:53:08.800 --> 00:53:11.920
turn the corner. But then I don't know. You can

1002
00:53:11.960 --> 00:53:14.559
explain it better I think than I can. But because

1003
00:53:14.559 --> 00:53:18.320
you've experienced it from your perspective, what did you what

1004
00:53:18.440 --> 00:53:22.840
did you experience, what did you feel? And what did

1005
00:53:22.840 --> 00:53:24.800
people tell you? More important, because I'm sure you got

1006
00:53:24.840 --> 00:53:27.920
feedback from people that you worked with and what they

1007
00:53:27.920 --> 00:53:29.679
heard and how things were happening and what they what

1008
00:53:29.719 --> 00:53:30.800
they heard in the communities.

1009
00:53:31.480 --> 00:53:33.880
Sure, yeah, I'll say this.

1010
00:53:35.159 --> 00:53:40.280
You know, when the justice marches really grew in intensity

1011
00:53:40.519 --> 00:53:49.039
after George Floyd's killing h Breonna Taylor arm Marbury, a

1012
00:53:49.159 --> 00:53:53.639
much of largely unarmed black men and police stops, and

1013
00:53:53.719 --> 00:53:58.159
particularly the public execution of George Floyd nine minutes and

1014
00:53:58.199 --> 00:54:05.039
forty seven seconds captured broad daylight, which brought a broad

1015
00:54:05.159 --> 00:54:10.079
range of Americans out into the streets. Well, for us,

1016
00:54:10.199 --> 00:54:14.960
we had the only all black career staff, the four

1017
00:54:15.000 --> 00:54:19.280
of us that worked for the appointee, and I've worked

1018
00:54:19.280 --> 00:54:25.800
with three different appointees under the Trump administration, and he

1019
00:54:27.280 --> 00:54:32.559
made that the Justice Marches be about patriotism in the flag.

1020
00:54:32.719 --> 00:54:35.199
And it was not about patriotism in the flag. It

1021
00:54:35.320 --> 00:54:39.519
was about the overpolicing of honor on black men. And

1022
00:54:39.599 --> 00:54:43.159
so when like Kaepernick took a knee and that became

1023
00:54:43.199 --> 00:54:46.079
a thing in the NFL, what did he say, Fire

1024
00:54:46.119 --> 00:54:47.159
those sons of bitches?

1025
00:54:47.239 --> 00:54:47.440
You know?

1026
00:54:47.599 --> 00:54:50.480
He said, And he said when you arrested people, he

1027
00:54:50.639 --> 00:54:54.519
wanted them to be treated roughly. And so that's why

1028
00:54:54.719 --> 00:54:59.119
I questioned his humanity. I don't know if you know

1029
00:54:59.239 --> 00:55:02.719
that back in to day his family has been charged

1030
00:55:03.519 --> 00:55:09.360
numerous times for discrimination in housing in some of their

1031
00:55:09.400 --> 00:55:14.800
properties in terms of how they you know, discriminated against

1032
00:55:14.920 --> 00:55:18.239
against black people. I think he and so for us,

1033
00:55:18.559 --> 00:55:22.320
for me, some of the things I saw, I could

1034
00:55:22.360 --> 00:55:24.159
not help. But I had a job to do and

1035
00:55:24.199 --> 00:55:25.960
I did it. I did it well, but I could

1036
00:55:26.039 --> 00:55:29.079
not help but take some of that. Personally, I think

1037
00:55:29.119 --> 00:55:32.039
he's the most divisive president that we've had in the

1038
00:55:32.039 --> 00:55:37.440
modern era. Latinos were rapists in THEEVESE and the China

1039
00:55:37.519 --> 00:55:42.960
virus and the this thing against the squad and the

1040
00:55:43.000 --> 00:55:45.920
black the black led black black bron cities.

1041
00:55:45.960 --> 00:55:48.239
He was very, very divisive.

1042
00:55:48.800 --> 00:55:51.800
I don't remember anything that he did or said that

1043
00:55:52.000 --> 00:55:56.519
was unifying. And he was he was people want to

1044
00:55:56.519 --> 00:55:59.280
say stupid. I think he's brilliant in what he does.

1045
00:55:59.360 --> 00:56:04.920
He's he's magnificent in being divisive and othering, making people

1046
00:56:05.719 --> 00:56:09.519
see the other as the enemy, somebody else's enemy. And

1047
00:56:09.599 --> 00:56:11.599
so for us, for example, one of the job of

1048
00:56:11.760 --> 00:56:17.159
responsibilities we had was to try and locate and vet

1049
00:56:17.679 --> 00:56:22.039
places that were willing to house these unaccompanied children in

1050
00:56:22.079 --> 00:56:26.159
these camps from people that were separated from their families

1051
00:56:26.199 --> 00:56:28.880
at the border. And I can see both sides of

1052
00:56:28.920 --> 00:56:32.039
the immigration issue, I really can. I do think there

1053
00:56:32.079 --> 00:56:36.639
needs to be a process and a procedure, but I

1054
00:56:36.679 --> 00:56:40.519
also think that we can treat people as human beings.

1055
00:56:40.800 --> 00:56:42.719
And I think that people who want to come here

1056
00:56:43.000 --> 00:56:46.679
ninety plus percent of them, probably ninety five percent of them,

1057
00:56:46.800 --> 00:56:50.199
only want to work hard, live a free life, and

1058
00:56:50.280 --> 00:56:53.320
make some money they can send home to their families.

1059
00:56:53.320 --> 00:56:56.480
That's most people. And so we're rounding up them up

1060
00:56:56.519 --> 00:57:00.400
in the they're running in the fields away from police now,

1061
00:57:00.440 --> 00:57:03.440
and they're just they're at parks and they're you know,

1062
00:57:03.599 --> 00:57:08.079
at landromats, working in car washes and they're getting rounded up.

1063
00:57:08.079 --> 00:57:10.199
And most of these people and they don't get a

1064
00:57:10.199 --> 00:57:12.840
lot of the benefits, but they still have to pay taxes.

1065
00:57:13.199 --> 00:57:16.920
So for me, when I saw the treatment of some

1066
00:57:16.960 --> 00:57:22.079
of these people, it reminded me too much of slavery.

1067
00:57:22.159 --> 00:57:24.599
It reminded me too much of the Jim.

1068
00:57:24.400 --> 00:57:29.280
Crow era where people were mistreated because they look differently.

1069
00:57:29.360 --> 00:57:33.840
And to me, what makes America great is the diversity

1070
00:57:33.880 --> 00:57:36.920
that we have. And it really is a multi melting pot.

1071
00:57:37.000 --> 00:57:40.000
And I'll tell you this, George. I think a lot

1072
00:57:40.039 --> 00:57:41.719
of white America and not a lot of it, not

1073
00:57:41.800 --> 00:57:44.440
most of it by any means, maybe a third of

1074
00:57:44.480 --> 00:57:48.559
it is really concerned because this is becoming a minority

1075
00:57:48.639 --> 00:57:52.880
majority country and supposedly right around twenty forty two ish

1076
00:57:53.400 --> 00:57:55.840
it's going to be that. And I think that for

1077
00:57:55.960 --> 00:58:02.239
some people who live in these monogamous, these homogeneouses, they

1078
00:58:02.280 --> 00:58:05.280
live in a society that's all white or all black

1079
00:58:05.400 --> 00:58:08.880
or all you don't ever have an interaction with other people,

1080
00:58:08.880 --> 00:58:12.719
and it's easy to demonize him and make them out

1081
00:58:12.800 --> 00:58:15.000
to be the boogeyman and the bad guy. And I

1082
00:58:15.039 --> 00:58:18.159
think that there is this element of white America that

1083
00:58:18.400 --> 00:58:24.239
is afraid that they will be treated like other people

1084
00:58:24.559 --> 00:58:27.880
have been treated in the last you know, one hundred

1085
00:58:27.880 --> 00:58:32.039
and fifty two hundred, four hundred years. And so there's

1086
00:58:32.079 --> 00:58:37.119
that fear and nobody wants to share power or share

1087
00:58:38.360 --> 00:58:42.880
you know, control. But that's the country where we're moving

1088
00:58:42.920 --> 00:58:43.880
towards rapidly.

1089
00:58:45.440 --> 00:58:49.840
Gotcha, Well, there is a there is a there is

1090
00:58:49.840 --> 00:58:53.039
a power dynamic. There's going to be a shift. But

1091
00:58:53.119 --> 00:58:55.760
I don't think it's kind of come from the black

1092
00:58:55.800 --> 00:58:58.039
community or the Latino community. Is going to be coming

1093
00:58:58.079 --> 00:59:00.599
from those from the Middle East that are coming into

1094
00:59:00.639 --> 00:59:06.039
the United States. Just look at statistics. They're birthing at

1095
00:59:06.119 --> 00:59:08.440
a rate that it was two to five times more

1096
00:59:08.480 --> 00:59:09.719
than any other culture or.

1097
00:59:09.760 --> 00:59:14.360
Race period, really more than Oh yes they are. So

1098
00:59:14.960 --> 00:59:17.599
I'm learning to see we got all big will.

1099
00:59:17.760 --> 00:59:20.599
Yeah, if anything, it's gonna come from from that side.

1100
00:59:20.639 --> 00:59:23.239
But you know, what you said earlier is very correct.

1101
00:59:23.239 --> 00:59:26.760
If you're if you're living in a community that is

1102
00:59:27.159 --> 00:59:30.760
all white, all brown, you're not doing yourself a service

1103
00:59:30.800 --> 00:59:34.000
because you're not you're not really connecting with other cultures

1104
00:59:34.000 --> 00:59:35.440
and other communities whatsoever.

1105
00:59:36.119 --> 00:59:36.320
You know.

1106
00:59:36.400 --> 00:59:39.559
I I've always had a different take because you know,

1107
00:59:39.760 --> 00:59:44.039
white there you go. But you know, when I grew up,

1108
00:59:44.079 --> 00:59:46.239
I I was a minority. So the schools I went to,

1109
00:59:46.639 --> 00:59:49.039
I was around all the gangs, all the Mexican gangs.

1110
00:59:49.360 --> 00:59:51.400
My friends were black, they were brown. I didn't have

1111
00:59:51.440 --> 00:59:54.039
a lot of white people around me. I was the

1112
00:59:54.119 --> 00:59:56.119
one in fights every day. I was the one getting jumped.

1113
00:59:56.199 --> 00:59:57.719
I was the one going through all that stuff. But

1114
00:59:57.719 --> 00:59:59.960
it didn't make me hate anybody. You know, my friends

1115
01:00:00.000 --> 01:00:02.480
we're all Indian, they're all they're all people from Mexico.

1116
01:00:02.719 --> 01:00:05.360
I have black friends, Like, it doesn't really matter to

1117
01:00:05.400 --> 01:00:07.119
me your skin color. But I also think that's a

1118
01:00:07.159 --> 01:00:08.599
lot that has to do with a lot of the

1119
01:00:08.679 --> 01:00:10.840
gen X, the way they grew up, the way I

1120
01:00:10.880 --> 01:00:15.119
grew up. Our generation didn't care. We we we were

1121
01:00:15.199 --> 01:00:19.639
all thrown together because at that time we interacted with everybody.

1122
01:00:19.679 --> 01:00:21.840
We didn't we we didn't we didn't grow up to

1123
01:00:21.960 --> 01:00:24.559
think that we should treat anyone else differently because of

1124
01:00:24.599 --> 01:00:28.039
how you looked. But somehow we got back to that

1125
01:00:28.719 --> 01:00:31.360
now and I don't understand why or how that happened.

1126
01:00:31.639 --> 01:00:34.599
Well, I think it's very comp fosters that kind of

1127
01:00:36.079 --> 01:00:39.960
belief and kind of again, there's it's fear mongering. It's

1128
01:00:40.039 --> 01:00:45.400
like with the Willie Lynt back during the President Reagan era.

1129
01:00:45.639 --> 01:00:49.039
You know, you you can you can demonize people, and

1130
01:00:49.079 --> 01:00:52.400
you can put fear in people. There's this element anyway,

1131
01:00:52.480 --> 01:00:55.000
and especially one of the things about you and and

1132
01:00:55.199 --> 01:00:57.840
and as you grew up, George, you'll you'll say this,

1133
01:00:57.840 --> 01:01:01.239
It is true. I'm sure because you spent time with

1134
01:01:01.280 --> 01:01:02.559
all these different kind of people.

1135
01:01:02.679 --> 01:01:04.079
You all saw each other's people.

1136
01:01:04.159 --> 01:01:06.719
You I mean, you all pretty much basically all wanted

1137
01:01:06.760 --> 01:01:10.039
the same thing. And you see the humanity and other people.

1138
01:01:10.079 --> 01:01:12.639
But if you don't know them, it's easy for somebody

1139
01:01:12.679 --> 01:01:15.400
to paint them a different way. And one of the

1140
01:01:15.440 --> 01:01:20.800
things that became normalized during the Trump administration was do

1141
01:01:20.840 --> 01:01:28.480
you remember Mikelly and conwell way she talked about alternative facts. Now,

1142
01:01:28.519 --> 01:01:32.199
things are true or they're not true, but you know so,

1143
01:01:33.119 --> 01:01:35.159
but that that was you know what I'm saying, Come on,

1144
01:01:35.239 --> 01:01:36.920
what the hell is an alternative?

1145
01:01:38.159 --> 01:01:39.679
I agree with you, that doesn't make me sense.

1146
01:01:40.000 --> 01:01:43.519
And so yeah, so so I'm saying now you almost

1147
01:01:43.639 --> 01:01:45.559
don't know who or what to believe.

1148
01:01:45.679 --> 01:01:46.599
And think about it.

1149
01:01:46.639 --> 01:01:50.400
Back during the Spanish Flu just over one hundred years ago,

1150
01:01:50.480 --> 01:01:53.719
now one hundred and five years ago, you could see

1151
01:01:53.719 --> 01:01:56.639
pictures in New York and big cities where people were

1152
01:01:56.679 --> 01:02:01.800
lined up for miles to get that because they believe

1153
01:02:01.920 --> 01:02:05.519
their government and they trusted Who do we trust Now?

1154
01:02:05.880 --> 01:02:08.760
I'm saying we got the where you don't trust anybody,

1155
01:02:08.840 --> 01:02:12.280
and that's a scary thing to be. And so what

1156
01:02:12.320 --> 01:02:17.920
we found historically, George, is that great societies usually aren't

1157
01:02:17.960 --> 01:02:21.800
destroyed from without, it's from within. And I can see

1158
01:02:21.800 --> 01:02:25.079
you can see us headed that way.

1159
01:02:25.360 --> 01:02:28.719
Yeah, they killed themselves. Same thing with the Greeks, you

1160
01:02:28.760 --> 01:02:32.960
know it was it wasn't outside influence. Yes, the uh.

1161
01:02:33.360 --> 01:02:36.199
The thing that's crazy to me about racism, this is

1162
01:02:36.239 --> 01:02:38.360
what I hate is you see it all the time.

1163
01:02:38.639 --> 01:02:41.320
You can get two babies, you can film them different

1164
01:02:41.320 --> 01:02:44.280
skin colors. They're babies. They will play and interact, they

1165
01:02:44.280 --> 01:02:44.920
don't even care.

1166
01:02:45.119 --> 01:02:46.760
Yeah, absolutely, it's.

1167
01:02:46.639 --> 01:02:49.280
The influence as they grow up that makes them that way.

1168
01:02:49.320 --> 01:02:52.360
And it's sad that as humans that that even still exists,

1169
01:02:52.400 --> 01:02:55.599
that we would even have these biases and and and

1170
01:02:55.639 --> 01:02:59.280
inflect into a young mind that you're supposed to look

1171
01:02:59.320 --> 01:03:01.679
at this other person and different. But I can understand

1172
01:03:01.679 --> 01:03:04.840
it too, because if you're if you're unfortunate to be

1173
01:03:05.440 --> 01:03:08.679
of the race where you're always getting beaten and looked

1174
01:03:08.719 --> 01:03:11.119
down on your whole life, and throughout generations, it kind

1175
01:03:11.159 --> 01:03:13.760
of does carry over. You have that distrust. So it's

1176
01:03:13.800 --> 01:03:16.000
like trying to fix that. I don't even know how,

1177
01:03:16.079 --> 01:03:18.159
but it's it's just as a There's a topic that

1178
01:03:18.599 --> 01:03:23.119
I discussed with another person a few months back, and

1179
01:03:23.159 --> 01:03:25.320
we went down this whole road and we were just

1180
01:03:25.559 --> 01:03:28.239
scratching our heads as like why can't why can't we

1181
01:03:28.280 --> 01:03:32.800
get rid of this way of thought? Like why it

1182
01:03:32.960 --> 01:03:35.039
just it would be so much better if we just

1183
01:03:35.400 --> 01:03:39.000
looked at people as people, period. And I'm really just

1184
01:03:39.119 --> 01:03:40.880
tired of you know, when I just when I think

1185
01:03:40.880 --> 01:03:43.159
things are settled, I open up, you know, acts for

1186
01:03:43.239 --> 01:03:45.679
the news is like headline you know, another racial like

1187
01:03:45.840 --> 01:03:48.760
come on, or are we still doing this? It's it's

1188
01:03:48.760 --> 01:03:51.559
so stupid. Are we not past that? It doesn't make

1189
01:03:51.599 --> 01:03:52.119
any sense to me?

1190
01:03:53.599 --> 01:03:55.760
I'd like to ask something to you that you would

1191
01:03:55.800 --> 01:04:00.119
have better insight than me, maybe, And that is there

1192
01:04:00.199 --> 01:04:03.400
seems to be this singer syndrome of this angry young

1193
01:04:03.400 --> 01:04:03.880
white man.

1194
01:04:04.440 --> 01:04:05.400
Yeah you know what I mean.

1195
01:04:05.559 --> 01:04:11.599
And and I think that it's like, for example, black

1196
01:04:11.599 --> 01:04:14.719
people in this country, and I'm talking in broad terms,

1197
01:04:14.840 --> 01:04:19.199
but have been uncomfortable for kind of forever in a

1198
01:04:19.239 --> 01:04:21.639
lot of ways. You know, nobody comes over this country

1199
01:04:22.199 --> 01:04:24.719
to be like a black American.

1200
01:04:24.800 --> 01:04:25.079
We're not.

1201
01:04:25.320 --> 01:04:29.119
We're only the model if it's athletics or entertainment in

1202
01:04:29.159 --> 01:04:32.079
some instances, but nobody cut that's not the goal. But

1203
01:04:32.800 --> 01:04:36.880
I'm saying, but yeah, so now though, when things might

1204
01:04:36.920 --> 01:04:40.760
get a little tough for young white men who basically

1205
01:04:40.920 --> 01:04:44.119
have been at the top of the pecking order for

1206
01:04:45.559 --> 01:04:48.599
you know, ever since Custer Road out west.

1207
01:04:48.920 --> 01:04:50.559
You know, it's it's, it's it.

1208
01:04:51.119 --> 01:04:54.800
And then I think you see that raige being exposed

1209
01:04:55.039 --> 01:04:59.039
in some of these incidents that we have, And I

1210
01:04:59.159 --> 01:05:03.000
just wondered if you any thoughts about that, because it's it's.

1211
01:05:02.639 --> 01:05:05.639
I kind of well, I do, and I don't because

1212
01:05:05.679 --> 01:05:08.159
I'm not necessarily young anymore. I guess I'm in that

1213
01:05:08.239 --> 01:05:11.519
mid mid part right right. But I could see the

1214
01:05:11.559 --> 01:05:13.880
frustration from both sides. I mean, the same thing that

1215
01:05:14.039 --> 01:05:17.639
frustrated the black men for being, you know, held back.

1216
01:05:18.199 --> 01:05:20.880
You know, think about the time when you know, black

1217
01:05:20.920 --> 01:05:22.840
men were very successful. There was a time they were

1218
01:05:22.880 --> 01:05:25.159
able to do whatever they wanted to do. And make money,

1219
01:05:25.480 --> 01:05:27.880
and then the mortgage companies were redlining them, so you

1220
01:05:27.880 --> 01:05:30.039
couldn't even buy a house, you know, or you couldn't

1221
01:05:30.039 --> 01:05:32.920
get in a certain district or in a certain area,

1222
01:05:33.119 --> 01:05:36.280
you know. So I think the frustrations are are shifting.

1223
01:05:36.320 --> 01:05:38.639
Now it's not as bad for white people. But I

1224
01:05:38.679 --> 01:05:43.280
think what happened, and what you're saying is that I

1225
01:05:43.320 --> 01:05:47.800
think the newer generations, they weren't brought up under that. Okay,

1226
01:05:47.840 --> 01:05:50.239
they're just being exposed to what they're told is going

1227
01:05:50.239 --> 01:05:53.679
on or what happened, and I think there's an older

1228
01:05:53.719 --> 01:05:57.199
generation that will not let it go and all of

1229
01:05:57.239 --> 01:06:00.000
these these these these feelings and everything just getting drug

1230
01:06:00.400 --> 01:06:02.239
and they don't know how to deal with it. And

1231
01:06:02.320 --> 01:06:07.159
so it's I think that possibly not speaking for everybody,

1232
01:06:08.239 --> 01:06:10.119
possibly some of the some of the younger white men,

1233
01:06:10.119 --> 01:06:13.480
as you're saying, maybe they do feel frustrated because they're

1234
01:06:13.480 --> 01:06:15.400
trying to do the right thing, but every time they do,

1235
01:06:15.519 --> 01:06:18.119
they're being reprimanded for not doing the right thing the

1236
01:06:18.280 --> 01:06:22.599
right way, and and there's no place for them, they feel,

1237
01:06:23.119 --> 01:06:26.360
you know. But then that's also the sentiment for anybody

1238
01:06:26.360 --> 01:06:29.599
of any color economically right now, you know, you can't

1239
01:06:29.599 --> 01:06:31.679
afford to buy a home no matter who you are.

1240
01:06:32.199 --> 01:06:34.920
But when when it comes to the racial argument of

1241
01:06:34.920 --> 01:06:37.280
what we're talking about in terms of race, I think

1242
01:06:37.360 --> 01:06:39.559
I think what it is, they just they just feel

1243
01:06:39.599 --> 01:06:43.760
that there's nothing they can do that'll be right. Okay,

1244
01:06:44.360 --> 01:06:46.440
if if if you want to confront a person of

1245
01:06:46.480 --> 01:06:48.880
color about something, if they have a let's let's just

1246
01:06:48.880 --> 01:06:50.280
be on. I don't care what color. If you're doing

1247
01:06:50.280 --> 01:06:52.880
something stupid, why can't you be corrected? Why can't you

1248
01:06:52.880 --> 01:06:56.239
just say hey, you know what? And and I don't

1249
01:06:56.239 --> 01:06:59.119
think a white, young white kid can do that. They

1250
01:06:59.159 --> 01:07:02.199
if they see a black or a brown person or whoever,

1251
01:07:02.320 --> 01:07:04.679
did you see a mexicanos like, well, ma, way guy,

1252
01:07:04.800 --> 01:07:06.440
I don't know if I could actually comfortably go over

1253
01:07:06.440 --> 01:07:08.559
there and you know, say something, because all of a

1254
01:07:08.559 --> 01:07:10.639
sudden it's like, oh, you're being a racist? What are

1255
01:07:10.639 --> 01:07:13.440
you doing? And that's what's been going on. So I

1256
01:07:13.440 --> 01:07:14.000
can see.

1257
01:07:14.599 --> 01:07:19.599
And I think that's I think that's partly a generational thing, George.

1258
01:07:19.679 --> 01:07:22.519
And what I mean by that example, like say, if

1259
01:07:22.559 --> 01:07:25.800
I'm riding downtown to an event or something on the

1260
01:07:25.800 --> 01:07:29.400
bus and if I see these young guys and they're

1261
01:07:29.480 --> 01:07:33.320
usually black, guys in where I live in Atlanta, you know,

1262
01:07:33.360 --> 01:07:37.199
one of the black cultural mecas, and they're you know,

1263
01:07:37.519 --> 01:07:39.960
pants are halfway down their butt and they're cutting. And

1264
01:07:40.360 --> 01:07:43.199
I'm there with my wife or my daughter. I wanted

1265
01:07:44.039 --> 01:07:48.280
to ask them to can you have some respect? But

1266
01:07:48.480 --> 01:07:51.239
you know, I might get shot or cut, you know,

1267
01:07:51.280 --> 01:07:56.880
and so I where As thirty years ago they say

1268
01:07:56.800 --> 01:07:58.960
it is there my bad too and so, but today

1269
01:07:59.039 --> 01:08:01.639
I may get cussed out or jumped on or anything.

1270
01:08:01.719 --> 01:08:05.599
So yeah, I mean, you're right, that's the society that

1271
01:08:05.639 --> 01:08:06.679
we have devolved to.

1272
01:08:06.840 --> 01:08:10.119
Unfortunately. But well, I will say, and I'll ask you this.

1273
01:08:12.159 --> 01:08:15.840
I haven't seen It does happen every once in a while,

1274
01:08:15.880 --> 01:08:19.439
but you don't usually see young black guys going into

1275
01:08:19.720 --> 01:08:25.840
grocery stores killing twelve people in the churches, in the kmarts,

1276
01:08:26.199 --> 01:08:29.680
into these places that's into synagogues.

1277
01:08:30.159 --> 01:08:31.960
That's what I'm talking about.

1278
01:08:32.319 --> 01:08:35.039
That whereas you know, I'm not happy, and and hell

1279
01:08:35.119 --> 01:08:38.000
I'm gonna you're gonna you're not gonna be happy either.

1280
01:08:38.079 --> 01:08:39.720
That's a yeah.

1281
01:08:39.600 --> 01:08:43.880
I can address that a bit. First off, we already

1282
01:08:43.880 --> 01:08:51.199
know white people are crazy, so whatever. But no, I

1283
01:08:52.159 --> 01:08:53.760
don't know if this is true in the black community.

1284
01:08:54.479 --> 01:08:57.079
But with white people, let's just be honest, they're hooked

1285
01:08:57.119 --> 01:09:01.760
on pills. Period. I think think pharmaceuticals is the issue.

1286
01:09:02.279 --> 01:09:06.640
You for saying that, because that's that's relevatory to me.

1287
01:09:07.359 --> 01:09:10.680
Every kid, most any white family. You go to a

1288
01:09:10.720 --> 01:09:14.359
doctor if they have if they're not interested in what

1289
01:09:14.399 --> 01:09:16.039
you're showing them, or they're not doing some a certain

1290
01:09:16.039 --> 01:09:18.039
way right now, they all of a sudden they got ADHD,

1291
01:09:18.039 --> 01:09:19.960
they have something else. They want to put them on

1292
01:09:20.000 --> 01:09:22.199
a pill. Then that that pill has another effect, and

1293
01:09:22.239 --> 01:09:23.960
they want to put them on another one. I think

1294
01:09:23.960 --> 01:09:29.800
we're in this, this this very strange cycle, a perpetual

1295
01:09:30.319 --> 01:09:33.399
manipulation of the chemistry of your brain. To be honest,

1296
01:09:33.960 --> 01:09:36.640
and this this goes way. I mean, this goes back

1297
01:09:37.520 --> 01:09:39.239
a long time. And I'm sure you know this. You

1298
01:09:39.319 --> 01:09:41.600
probably already know this. You're just letting me talk. But

1299
01:09:41.960 --> 01:09:44.760
the reality is, I think that's what's going on when

1300
01:09:44.720 --> 01:09:46.239
you when you're talking about like, why is it always

1301
01:09:46.239 --> 01:09:49.199
the white person these young white kids. I think they're

1302
01:09:49.239 --> 01:09:51.960
just medicated. They're so medicaid and their brains are just

1303
01:09:52.000 --> 01:09:55.479
so rewired from being all these medications. I don't recall

1304
01:09:55.520 --> 01:10:00.359
personally from the black friends I have. They traditionally aren't

1305
01:10:00.399 --> 01:10:03.920
really about medicating with pills. From my record, like, I

1306
01:10:03.960 --> 01:10:05.800
don't know if I'm right on that, but I never

1307
01:10:05.880 --> 01:10:07.960
saw a bunch of bottles like if it was diabetes

1308
01:10:08.039 --> 01:10:10.079
or maybe a heart pill. But it wasn't like, hey,

1309
01:10:10.119 --> 01:10:11.760
you need to take this for your attention deficit or

1310
01:10:11.760 --> 01:10:13.640
you need to take that. I didn't really see that,

1311
01:10:15.039 --> 01:10:16.840
And I'm not sure if I'm correct. I mean, maybe

1312
01:10:16.880 --> 01:10:18.640
you can tell me, but I think it was more

1313
01:10:18.760 --> 01:10:20.960
on the white side that they were just like, oh, yeah,

1314
01:10:20.960 --> 01:10:22.800
I give me that pill, I need this. Oh my

1315
01:10:22.840 --> 01:10:25.520
son is crazy. He just he won't sit still, he

1316
01:10:25.560 --> 01:10:27.279
won't read the book. He doesn't want to do math. Well,

1317
01:10:27.319 --> 01:10:29.520
who wants to do math? Like come on, you know?

1318
01:10:29.960 --> 01:10:31.600
But I think that was part of it. I think

1319
01:10:31.600 --> 01:10:33.520
that's a big part of it. And then you combine

1320
01:10:33.560 --> 01:10:35.760
that with what we were talking about earlier to where

1321
01:10:35.920 --> 01:10:38.479
they're feeling like where's my place. I can't be a

1322
01:10:38.479 --> 01:10:43.039
white man anymore. I'm feminized, right, I can't. I can't

1323
01:10:43.039 --> 01:10:44.840
be a man. I have to act this way. I

1324
01:10:44.880 --> 01:10:47.399
have to be a feminized person. I'm not talking about transfer,

1325
01:10:47.479 --> 01:10:51.319
just saying like how you act, and it's I think

1326
01:10:51.359 --> 01:10:53.399
all of that just comes to a head. It really does.

1327
01:10:53.439 --> 01:10:54.800
And I think that's why you see more like the

1328
01:10:54.840 --> 01:10:58.399
white kids going crazy. It's it's a combination of the pharmaceuticals.

1329
01:10:58.600 --> 01:11:01.479
They're over medicated, they don't don't know their place, They

1330
01:11:01.520 --> 01:11:03.840
got to be super careful on how they interact with everybody.

1331
01:11:03.880 --> 01:11:06.640
They don't have anywhere to turn, and then boom, you know,

1332
01:11:07.000 --> 01:11:09.439
fu was ignites and then they just blow up. So

1333
01:11:11.119 --> 01:11:15.239
it's not always just specific to white kids. But we

1334
01:11:15.479 --> 01:11:17.680
got admit, I mean the majority, yeah, I mean that's

1335
01:11:17.680 --> 01:11:20.560
what's been happening. But we just we just had, you know,

1336
01:11:20.600 --> 01:11:22.159
a group of Middal Easterns to go ahead and shoot

1337
01:11:22.199 --> 01:11:26.640
up a Christians Christian church. We just had a guy

1338
01:11:26.640 --> 01:11:29.760
from Iran try to burn Jewish people in Colorado. You know,

1339
01:11:30.840 --> 01:11:34.000
there's crazy everywhere. But what you're talking about with the schools, yeah,

1340
01:11:34.000 --> 01:11:36.279
you're right. I mean, you can't deny that it's always

1341
01:11:36.279 --> 01:11:39.359
a white kid with a gun. Why. I think a

1342
01:11:39.359 --> 01:11:40.800
lot of it has to do with what I said,

1343
01:11:41.319 --> 01:11:44.760
I really do you know, the white child, the white

1344
01:11:44.880 --> 01:11:48.399
kid going back. I think it's all the pill stuff

1345
01:11:48.399 --> 01:11:50.920
I started later in my generation. I think it just

1346
01:11:51.000 --> 01:11:55.279
came down to just being in this cycle of we

1347
01:11:55.319 --> 01:11:59.479
need to medicate them. We can't deal with this kid. No,

1348
01:11:59.479 --> 01:12:02.000
nobody really did long term studies of the side effects,

1349
01:12:02.000 --> 01:12:03.520
and now that they know them, they don't really want

1350
01:12:03.520 --> 01:12:05.600
to back off because now the pharmaceutical industry is making

1351
01:12:05.600 --> 01:12:07.079
too much money on it that I could stop it.

1352
01:12:07.600 --> 01:12:11.279
I I had, I had another guy on here that

1353
01:12:11.479 --> 01:12:14.520
was a DEA agent, and we actually had a discussion

1354
01:12:14.520 --> 01:12:18.039
about this, and he echoed everything I said and more. Uh,

1355
01:12:18.119 --> 01:12:20.840
everything started with a big pharma and and we actually

1356
01:12:20.840 --> 01:12:22.720
had some of the same discussion, you know, in terms

1357
01:12:22.760 --> 01:12:24.560
of what you just asked me, and he believed the

1358
01:12:24.560 --> 01:12:27.199
same thing. He's like, it's it's medication, you know, it

1359
01:12:27.239 --> 01:12:29.079
really is. He said, if you look at the if

1360
01:12:29.119 --> 01:12:34.439
you look at the statistics of when certain diagnoses of

1361
01:12:34.600 --> 01:12:38.880
conditions came out, it all started way back when the

1362
01:12:38.880 --> 01:12:42.520
pharmaceutical industry took hold. You know, it's all started during

1363
01:12:42.600 --> 01:12:46.960
during the opioid epidemic and ever since then. Sorry, white

1364
01:12:47.000 --> 01:12:47.520
kids are crazy.

1365
01:12:47.600 --> 01:12:48.199
It just happened.

1366
01:12:48.640 --> 01:12:51.880
Just what happened. And and he discussed this whole thing.

1367
01:12:52.239 --> 01:12:54.960
And I don't know if this this necessarily crossed over

1368
01:12:55.000 --> 01:12:57.279
into to to the black culture or you know, the

1369
01:12:57.279 --> 01:12:59.800
Black community or or the Asian community, I'm not sure

1370
01:12:59.800 --> 01:13:03.159
that they are on medication and pills as much as

1371
01:13:03.359 --> 01:13:04.359
the families are.

1372
01:13:04.560 --> 01:13:05.840
Yeah, you're right, You're right.

1373
01:13:06.119 --> 01:13:08.039
And I will say one of the things that I

1374
01:13:08.119 --> 01:13:11.079
think Trump did try to do well and put a

1375
01:13:11.119 --> 01:13:16.439
lot of energy in to was addressing the opioid epidemic.

1376
01:13:17.600 --> 01:13:20.319
I mean, it's just totally out of control, and COVID

1377
01:13:20.960 --> 01:13:27.119
exacerbated it because people were alone, and it made a

1378
01:13:27.159 --> 01:13:31.000
lot of things worse, even like human trafficking because you know,

1379
01:13:31.520 --> 01:13:34.039
you couldn't go out and interact and so it was

1380
01:13:34.079 --> 01:13:37.880
easier to keep people controlled and keep people medicated and

1381
01:13:37.920 --> 01:13:40.479
all of those things were kind of on steroids.

1382
01:13:40.920 --> 01:13:45.000
Well, everybody was depressed. Yeah, they were turning too something.

1383
01:13:45.000 --> 01:13:47.520
If they weren't turned to alcohol, they were turned to pills.

1384
01:13:47.760 --> 01:13:51.199
You know, for the it's either that or marijuana, right,

1385
01:13:52.159 --> 01:13:55.680
you pick your poison. But alcohol is more than poison.

1386
01:13:55.720 --> 01:13:58.760
But you know what I'm saying. And so it really

1387
01:13:58.880 --> 01:14:01.720
that did exacerbate. It really did not make things better

1388
01:14:01.880 --> 01:14:04.880
at all. So that was that was a very bad period.

1389
01:14:04.920 --> 01:14:07.319
But yeah, I think I think we have a real

1390
01:14:07.399 --> 01:14:11.520
opioid epidemic. I think that the reality is you know,

1391
01:14:12.199 --> 01:14:15.399
one one pill literally it chemically rewires your brain. It

1392
01:14:15.439 --> 01:14:19.039
does it either is meant to suppress something or it's

1393
01:14:19.119 --> 01:14:22.600
meant to add and make your brain produce more period

1394
01:14:22.800 --> 01:14:25.279
you know, is it made to affect your nervous system

1395
01:14:25.359 --> 01:14:27.760
or suppress your nervous system. Like everything you do to

1396
01:14:27.800 --> 01:14:30.079
your body, when it comes to this, there's going to

1397
01:14:30.119 --> 01:14:33.119
be a reaction that may not be positive over time,

1398
01:14:33.199 --> 01:14:35.039
and now you have to take another pill to counteract

1399
01:14:35.079 --> 01:14:38.039
that one. There's just too much junk in our bodies,

1400
01:14:38.119 --> 01:14:40.000
you know, all the way from our food to to

1401
01:14:40.000 --> 01:14:42.359
to Like I said, OPI ways, and I don't want

1402
01:14:42.359 --> 01:14:44.720
to get stuck on this, but I'm I'm thinking that

1403
01:14:44.720 --> 01:14:48.760
that is a very valid reason as to why you're

1404
01:14:48.800 --> 01:14:51.960
seeing people act the way they do. I really do.

1405
01:14:52.079 --> 01:14:54.520
Oh, thank you that that that's helpful. That's helpful.

1406
01:14:54.960 --> 01:14:56.560
It's just like some of them might come down that

1407
01:14:56.680 --> 01:14:58.359
some of that may come down to parenting.

1408
01:14:58.399 --> 01:15:00.239
And of course there's lots of there is that too.

1409
01:15:00.560 --> 01:15:04.279
Yeah, there's lots of things to challenge on parenting, certainly

1410
01:15:04.359 --> 01:15:07.439
I know in the black community. So but yeah, a

1411
01:15:07.479 --> 01:15:09.720
lot of that because it's like, well, let me just

1412
01:15:09.760 --> 01:15:12.439
do this. I don't have to deal with that. Yeah,

1413
01:15:12.439 --> 01:15:13.520
I'll tell you what.

1414
01:15:14.600 --> 01:15:16.560
I'm sorry, I was gonna say, we can't deny the

1415
01:15:16.640 --> 01:15:20.720
kids lately, uh or or even in honestly, even in

1416
01:15:20.760 --> 01:15:23.039
the white Community's just be quite honest, a lot of

1417
01:15:23.079 --> 01:15:25.279
parents when they were working, they really weren't giving the

1418
01:15:25.359 --> 01:15:27.960
kid as much attention as as they wanted. And then

1419
01:15:28.000 --> 01:15:30.840
there was also, you know from my general gen X right,

1420
01:15:30.880 --> 01:15:32.960
and then all of a sudden Millennials. It's like the

1421
01:15:33.079 --> 01:15:37.279
gen xers when they had kids, didn't raise them the

1422
01:15:37.279 --> 01:15:39.399
same way, same way like let's say we were raised

1423
01:15:40.239 --> 01:15:42.079
and then it was like, well now you're now you're

1424
01:15:42.079 --> 01:15:45.119
caddling and panpering your child. Now you're not supposed to

1425
01:15:45.119 --> 01:15:47.520
punish them. You can't hit them. Look, because there's between

1426
01:15:47.560 --> 01:15:51.000
hitting and beating, all right, a little smack that's a

1427
01:15:51.039 --> 01:15:52.359
lot different than taking the belt.

1428
01:15:52.399 --> 01:15:55.359
And I mean, this is brutalized and we're not talking

1429
01:15:55.359 --> 01:15:57.720
about brutal no, no, no, no, no, talking about correcting.

1430
01:15:58.159 --> 01:16:01.680
We know what's wrong and what's right. And so combine

1431
01:16:01.720 --> 01:16:05.039
that with the timeouts, the count to ten, the thirties,

1432
01:16:05.520 --> 01:16:07.920
then you have the kids because there was no punishment,

1433
01:16:07.920 --> 01:16:10.880
there was no correction. Then they're challenging the parent. The

1434
01:16:10.920 --> 01:16:14.600
parent can't correct the kid. Now you have CPS come

1435
01:16:14.640 --> 01:16:16.680
in and take you away if you even raise your time,

1436
01:16:16.800 --> 01:16:18.920
if you even say that your kid's not the gender

1437
01:16:18.960 --> 01:16:21.239
they believe, they separate you from your kid. Now, at

1438
01:16:21.319 --> 01:16:23.119
least in California they can do. I don't know if

1439
01:16:23.119 --> 01:16:26.399
it's that way in all fifty states, but it's insanity.

1440
01:16:26.600 --> 01:16:28.760
I mean, what's the point of being a parent if

1441
01:16:28.760 --> 01:16:30.640
you can't be a parent, you know? And then now

1442
01:16:30.680 --> 01:16:32.840
you have the school system that is the parent. The

1443
01:16:32.840 --> 01:16:35.199
state wants to be the parent, you know. And all

1444
01:16:35.239 --> 01:16:38.520
the things that we're talking about are not Republican or Democrat.

1445
01:16:38.880 --> 01:16:42.119
And the one things, Derek, that I am very tired of,

1446
01:16:42.399 --> 01:16:46.920
is politicizing everything. Can we just talk about people and Americans? Like,

1447
01:16:47.119 --> 01:16:48.960
I don't care what side drew on, It's not a

1448
01:16:49.000 --> 01:16:53.680
team sport what you guys want to get another point? Democrats? Okay, Republicans,

1449
01:16:53.720 --> 01:16:56.840
Look what I did, slammed. Who gives a damn doesn't

1450
01:16:56.840 --> 01:16:59.079
benefit the American people. We all have to live in

1451
01:16:59.119 --> 01:17:04.840
the same damn country. Tree does the policy work? Yeah,

1452
01:17:04.920 --> 01:17:06.720
And that's the way I look at it. You know,

1453
01:17:07.119 --> 01:17:09.560
I'm not Democrat anymore. I was a long time ago.

1454
01:17:09.640 --> 01:17:12.399
But I think when the party started going too far

1455
01:17:12.560 --> 01:17:15.439
off the deep end, I was like, it's never really

1456
01:17:15.439 --> 01:17:18.000
not for me. And then you know, I became more conservative,

1457
01:17:18.479 --> 01:17:20.840
But then again, I'm not. I'm not far right mag either,

1458
01:17:20.880 --> 01:17:23.039
you know. I'm like, you know, you got to have

1459
01:17:23.119 --> 01:17:24.479
check some bounds. You got to be able to hold

1460
01:17:24.479 --> 01:17:27.479
people accountable. Did I like some of the Trump things

1461
01:17:27.520 --> 01:17:29.640
Trump did? Yeah? Most people do like some things he does.

1462
01:17:29.680 --> 01:17:30.600
Do we like everything he does?

1463
01:17:30.600 --> 01:17:30.680
No?

1464
01:17:30.800 --> 01:17:31.600
Is he presidential?

1465
01:17:31.680 --> 01:17:32.039
Hell? No?

1466
01:17:32.560 --> 01:17:36.000
You know, honestly, you could lover hate Obama. But the

1467
01:17:36.079 --> 01:17:39.359
guy was great at his presentation. He knew how to speak,

1468
01:17:39.359 --> 01:17:42.000
he knew how to present himself. You know, there's things

1469
01:17:42.000 --> 01:17:43.960
he did that I can't agree with, especially when it

1470
01:17:44.000 --> 01:17:47.520
came to these USAG drones indiscriminately killing people overseas getting

1471
01:17:47.520 --> 01:17:49.880
the wrong targets. He killed entire family that was getting wet,

1472
01:17:49.960 --> 01:17:52.640
you know, married, you know, kids in cages. I'll just

1473
01:17:52.640 --> 01:17:54.920
just be honest to start with him, acl you tried

1474
01:17:54.960 --> 01:17:58.079
to sue him for that? So what did he do?

1475
01:17:58.119 --> 01:18:01.199
Bad stuff? Sure? But we did we ever have a

1476
01:18:01.199 --> 01:18:05.399
perfect president? No? Absolutely not. You know that nobody's infallible.

1477
01:18:05.399 --> 01:18:07.760
We're all human. We're all going to be human, We're

1478
01:18:07.800 --> 01:18:13.479
all going to be subject to influence, right, we're all

1479
01:18:13.520 --> 01:18:15.720
going to cave in. Hopefully not. But I mean, let's

1480
01:18:15.720 --> 01:18:17.399
be honest, if someone waves one hundred million dollars in

1481
01:18:17.439 --> 01:18:19.319
your face, most people are just saying, I'm I can say, no,

1482
01:18:20.640 --> 01:18:23.159
we don't have a perfect person. I mean, the presidency

1483
01:18:23.239 --> 01:18:27.640
is a popularity contest. Seriously, a lot of people that

1484
01:18:27.640 --> 01:18:30.119
are that are getting elected don't have the credential they

1485
01:18:30.159 --> 01:18:33.800
need to lead an actual nation. Like literally, so what

1486
01:18:33.840 --> 01:18:35.520
you're a mayor for a little bit doesn't mean you

1487
01:18:35.520 --> 01:18:37.239
could lead an entire nation. And all of a sudden

1488
01:18:37.239 --> 01:18:39.840
you're talking to putin no, no hold on. You know,

1489
01:18:40.199 --> 01:18:42.520
it's ridiculous how we elect our presidents.

1490
01:18:43.000 --> 01:18:47.079
Or you are you had a popular TV show right

1491
01:18:47.600 --> 01:18:47.840
or that?

1492
01:18:48.079 --> 01:18:52.199
Yeah, I'm in agree with you. It's it's it's crazy.

1493
01:18:52.199 --> 01:18:54.920
It's like everybody is like, we took our politics and

1494
01:18:54.960 --> 01:18:59.720
how we elect our present based on high school popularity.

1495
01:19:00.079 --> 01:19:01.640
Just what it really feels like. It's like we didn't

1496
01:19:01.640 --> 01:19:04.640
really evolve past that. It just doesn't make any sense

1497
01:19:04.640 --> 01:19:07.439
to it really doesn't. I hope that we can evolve,

1498
01:19:08.399 --> 01:19:11.079
hopefully soon, given given all the tension out there in

1499
01:19:11.119 --> 01:19:14.720
the world. We can we can hopefully like grow up

1500
01:19:15.800 --> 01:19:18.399
and and and treat everything like actual adults instead of

1501
01:19:18.840 --> 01:19:20.840
you know, figuring like kids in the playard.

1502
01:19:21.199 --> 01:19:24.119
I really do, yeah, And I agree with you about

1503
01:19:24.159 --> 01:19:26.119
something you mentioned on medicaid.

1504
01:19:26.199 --> 01:19:27.319
I think if you.

1505
01:19:28.960 --> 01:19:31.880
Are in your right mind and physically you're capable, you

1506
01:19:31.920 --> 01:19:34.399
should work. Because I don't want to go to the

1507
01:19:34.439 --> 01:19:36.319
grocery store and I got to pick out a few

1508
01:19:36.319 --> 01:19:38.520
items because I got a little bit of money, and

1509
01:19:38.560 --> 01:19:41.239
I see somebody come up with a full cart and

1510
01:19:41.359 --> 01:19:44.560
they whip out there be meat guard and you know

1511
01:19:44.640 --> 01:19:48.640
they're sitting at home and fully capable. But I do

1512
01:19:48.680 --> 01:19:52.119
think we need to make provisions further vulnerable and for.

1513
01:19:52.119 --> 01:19:54.439
Those who, yes, are are at risk.

1514
01:19:54.760 --> 01:19:58.079
But one of the things that that that unfortunately we're

1515
01:19:58.119 --> 01:20:01.479
going to see unless there are some real changes in

1516
01:20:01.560 --> 01:20:04.479
the big beautiful Bill, is that we're going to see

1517
01:20:04.520 --> 01:20:08.159
a lot of rural hospitals close, because we've already been

1518
01:20:08.239 --> 01:20:13.119
seeing that, and now that's what every state is saying

1519
01:20:13.159 --> 01:20:15.880
in some states are a lot more rule than others. California,

1520
01:20:15.920 --> 01:20:18.680
I know you have your areas of rural areas, but

1521
01:20:18.760 --> 01:20:21.439
I know you can like you can drive like from

1522
01:20:21.479 --> 01:20:25.319
city to city to city and just like almost yeah

1523
01:20:25.760 --> 01:20:29.159
in some places, but you think about where you know,

1524
01:20:29.239 --> 01:20:32.640
and and I'm not criticizing this, I'm wishing this wasn't

1525
01:20:32.640 --> 01:20:36.560
the case. But much of President trump space is in

1526
01:20:36.600 --> 01:20:42.319
these rural, mostly rural states like Mississippi and Alabama out west.

1527
01:20:42.479 --> 01:20:46.720
And these people already have so few hospitals and if

1528
01:20:46.720 --> 01:20:48.720
some of those clothes, what are they going to have

1529
01:20:48.760 --> 01:20:51.560
to do? Drive two hundred miles And women have to

1530
01:20:51.720 --> 01:20:55.319
cross state lines because of the laws against you know,

1531
01:20:55.399 --> 01:21:00.119
to prevent women from getting healthcare. And so these are

1532
01:21:00.119 --> 01:21:01.880
some of the things that are I think are gonna

1533
01:21:02.079 --> 01:21:04.439
unfortunately get worse before they get better.

1534
01:21:04.520 --> 01:21:06.359
And well they'll test us.

1535
01:21:06.600 --> 01:21:09.520
Did you experience any of that in any degree during

1536
01:21:09.520 --> 01:21:10.920
his first tren Oh?

1537
01:21:10.960 --> 01:21:13.520
Absolutely absolutely, yeah, absolutely.

1538
01:21:13.720 --> 01:21:16.920
Uh there's a I know here in our region we

1539
01:21:17.079 --> 01:21:21.720
lost well us here in our state, like three three

1540
01:21:21.840 --> 01:21:26.119
rural hospitals, and I know that there were well over

1541
01:21:26.159 --> 01:21:29.359
a dozen that have clothes in our eight southeastern states

1542
01:21:29.439 --> 01:21:32.720
and several right now, all right, risk and the cuts

1543
01:21:32.720 --> 01:21:36.479
in medicare are gonna they're gonna make several more clothes

1544
01:21:37.079 --> 01:21:40.000
and so it's it's gonna be it's gonna be a

1545
01:21:40.079 --> 01:21:45.159
challenge for an area that already were challenged. And a

1546
01:21:45.199 --> 01:21:48.640
lot of times public transportation, you know, is not there

1547
01:21:48.680 --> 01:21:50.520
for people. You can't get on the bus to go

1548
01:21:50.600 --> 01:21:55.359
downtown to the Level five trauma hospital. That's the safety

1549
01:21:55.399 --> 01:21:58.760
in that hospital with your you know, eighty miles from

1550
01:21:58.840 --> 01:21:59.960
your nearest hospital.

1551
01:22:00.159 --> 01:22:02.479
So yeah, those those were some of the issues. And

1552
01:22:02.520 --> 01:22:04.119
one of the other things that he did.

1553
01:22:03.960 --> 01:22:07.239
Have a real focus on was like on workforce development,

1554
01:22:07.319 --> 01:22:11.960
trying to to to see where there were nursage, shortages

1555
01:22:12.039 --> 01:22:15.880
of nurses and shortages of obg y ns and these

1556
01:22:15.960 --> 01:22:19.359
kind of kind of issues. And that's something that we're

1557
01:22:19.399 --> 01:22:22.399
going to continue to struggle with and to struggle within

1558
01:22:22.439 --> 01:22:24.720
the last and with the Biden administration, they're going to

1559
01:22:24.720 --> 01:22:27.239
continue to struggle with. But I think that there has

1560
01:22:27.319 --> 01:22:33.159
to be a lot of intentionality and a desire to

1561
01:22:34.359 --> 01:22:37.399
plug some of those gaps. And that's what where my

1562
01:22:37.560 --> 01:22:41.520
concern is is is that even on the radar, because

1563
01:22:42.359 --> 01:22:44.760
you know, it's gonna be a lot of cuts to Medicaid,

1564
01:22:44.880 --> 01:22:46.960
a lot of cuts. I mean they're talking about if

1565
01:22:46.960 --> 01:22:49.720
you if you cut social Security, you know, people work

1566
01:22:49.840 --> 01:22:53.439
your whole lives on the premise that this is what

1567
01:22:53.479 --> 01:22:56.520
you're going to get at the end. So we'll see

1568
01:22:57.000 --> 01:23:00.079
that's that's you know, there's an insistence.

1569
01:22:59.520 --> 01:23:05.279
That solid security has been mishandled by every administration, Okay,

1570
01:23:06.039 --> 01:23:09.520
and that's the unfortunate truth. You know, it was supposed

1571
01:23:09.520 --> 01:23:11.119
to be a safety in it when it was first enacted,

1572
01:23:11.920 --> 01:23:16.119
and it became people's retirements because honestly, you know, throughout

1573
01:23:16.119 --> 01:23:17.600
the years pensions went away.

1574
01:23:17.640 --> 01:23:22.159
You can't even very few people have a pensiancy these days.

1575
01:23:21.920 --> 01:23:24.520
Right, and so your four owing k ain't could to

1576
01:23:24.560 --> 01:23:27.239
pay out forever if you have thirty more years to live,

1577
01:23:27.279 --> 01:23:29.399
good luck on stretching three or four hundred thousand dollars

1578
01:23:29.520 --> 01:23:32.279
is not going to happen. Just do the math. So

1579
01:23:32.279 --> 01:23:34.319
solid security is a big issue. But the big issue

1580
01:23:34.319 --> 01:23:36.960
we have with it is the government or Congress decided

1581
01:23:36.960 --> 01:23:38.880
to use a slush fund. They reached into it too

1582
01:23:38.920 --> 01:23:42.000
much thinking nobody would notice. And let's just be honest,

1583
01:23:42.039 --> 01:23:43.680
over your lifetime, I mean, I'm not gonna do the

1584
01:23:43.680 --> 01:23:45.079
math in front of because I'm horrible at it on

1585
01:23:45.119 --> 01:23:48.399
the spot, but you know, let's just say, over your lifetime,

1586
01:23:48.439 --> 01:23:50.439
you paid you know, over a million or two million

1587
01:23:50.439 --> 01:23:54.680
dollars right over over your lifetime. You didn't, you didn't

1588
01:23:54.680 --> 01:23:58.560
earn any interest on it. Yeah, and then the government

1589
01:23:58.560 --> 01:24:01.760
tells you what you're allowed to take on, how much,

1590
01:24:01.920 --> 01:24:03.840
at what age, and if you take it at a

1591
01:24:03.840 --> 01:24:06.039
certain age too early, they penalize you and take more

1592
01:24:06.039 --> 01:24:06.680
away from you.

1593
01:24:06.880 --> 01:24:07.359
That's right.

1594
01:24:07.840 --> 01:24:09.560
Tell me how that works, because you know, damn well,

1595
01:24:09.600 --> 01:24:14.119
they're earning interest on those accounts, they're not just holding it.

1596
01:24:14.760 --> 01:24:17.159
But yet we don't benefit from it, and we don't

1597
01:24:17.159 --> 01:24:18.840
have a sales to whether or not we can put

1598
01:24:18.880 --> 01:24:22.119
into it or not. That doesn't make any sense.

1599
01:24:22.560 --> 01:24:23.800
Yeah, I agree, I agree.

1600
01:24:23.920 --> 01:24:27.000
And then not to give people the option of going

1601
01:24:27.600 --> 01:24:30.159
the private route where they know they can invest their

1602
01:24:30.199 --> 01:24:33.000
money and make more, that's that's terrible.

1603
01:24:33.199 --> 01:24:34.800
And and and I believe me I have.

1604
01:24:35.079 --> 01:24:38.079
I'm in that boat because I started collecting such security

1605
01:24:38.079 --> 01:24:39.319
a couple of years ago.

1606
01:24:39.439 --> 01:24:40.720
So my father too.

1607
01:24:40.840 --> 01:24:43.840
Yeah, yeah, you know, yeah, because all of us we

1608
01:24:43.920 --> 01:24:46.600
think about our parents and our aunts and uncles and

1609
01:24:47.039 --> 01:24:51.119
people who you know, who trusted that system, and so

1610
01:24:51.159 --> 01:24:54.760
the system is failing us, no question.

1611
01:24:54.479 --> 01:24:57.800
It's unfortunate. I don't even know how we fix it

1612
01:24:57.880 --> 01:24:59.680
at this point. Is if you even fix.

1613
01:24:59.600 --> 01:25:03.479
A well, I think one thing we can certainly do,

1614
01:25:03.560 --> 01:25:05.800
and you're right, it may not be, but is at

1615
01:25:05.880 --> 01:25:10.680
least give people an option of investing in their money

1616
01:25:10.720 --> 01:25:14.760
in that system, or at least or maybe part of

1617
01:25:14.760 --> 01:25:17.439
it in the system, and giving them some flexibility to

1618
01:25:17.520 --> 01:25:20.119
do some things in the in the in the marketplace,

1619
01:25:20.239 --> 01:25:23.279
you know, to uh and and I think if we

1620
01:25:23.319 --> 01:25:25.119
don't do that, but yeah.

1621
01:25:24.960 --> 01:25:26.479
It's it's gonna take a lot.

1622
01:25:26.560 --> 01:25:29.159
It's gonna take a lot of agreement, which is something

1623
01:25:29.199 --> 01:25:31.880
that we have very little of, right, I think a lot.

1624
01:25:31.720 --> 01:25:35.239
Of that Derek started in the school system because I mean,

1625
01:25:35.279 --> 01:25:38.920
they don't even teach homech anymore in most places, that's true.

1626
01:25:39.079 --> 01:25:40.920
I mean most kids don't even get out and knowing

1627
01:25:41.000 --> 01:25:43.359
how to cook, wash your clothes unless her parents teach them.

1628
01:25:43.800 --> 01:25:44.239
That's right.

1629
01:25:44.279 --> 01:25:45.720
You know what my mom would tell you if she

1630
01:25:45.800 --> 01:25:47.800
was here, She goes, I wouldn't letter touch my clothes.

1631
01:25:47.800 --> 01:25:50.479
I washed my unclothes, you know, I'm so big about it.

1632
01:25:51.000 --> 01:25:52.640
And I loved cooking, you know, was just it was

1633
01:25:52.680 --> 01:25:55.239
just a weird thing. But but in school I did

1634
01:25:55.279 --> 01:25:57.520
have some homech like I was introduced to, like it

1635
01:25:57.600 --> 01:25:59.880
was required to take a class you can choose for

1636
01:26:00.000 --> 01:26:03.000
regardless whether you liked it. So I was always drawn

1637
01:26:03.079 --> 01:26:05.720
to cook, and so you know, hey, I became decent

1638
01:26:05.760 --> 01:26:09.119
at that. But what they also didn't do, even though

1639
01:26:09.119 --> 01:26:11.520
they had on me in my time and I'm sure

1640
01:26:11.520 --> 01:26:16.760
in your time, is they never taught finances though. So

1641
01:26:17.600 --> 01:26:19.840
you know the option, as you said, to be able

1642
01:26:19.880 --> 01:26:24.119
to invest in an account outside that you could put

1643
01:26:24.159 --> 01:26:27.279
into and let it grow and mature over time. You know,

1644
01:26:27.279 --> 01:26:29.199
there's many ways you can do it. And I'm not

1645
01:26:29.199 --> 01:26:30.840
gonna advise anybody. I'm just saying there's ways you can

1646
01:26:30.880 --> 01:26:34.880
do it. Look into it yourself. But they don't teach that.

1647
01:26:35.159 --> 01:26:36.920
They don't even teach you how to balance your checking,

1648
01:26:37.439 --> 01:26:40.239
you know, your bank account. We have a society of

1649
01:26:40.319 --> 01:26:42.600
kids coming out that don't have a real concept of

1650
01:26:42.640 --> 01:26:47.279
how to handle and manage money, and so how are

1651
01:26:47.279 --> 01:26:49.600
we gonna how are we going to be able to

1652
01:26:51.039 --> 01:26:53.119
assume that they would be able to make the right

1653
01:26:53.159 --> 01:26:55.920
decisions for themselves. I'm not saying the government should do

1654
01:26:55.920 --> 01:27:00.680
it for them, but there's no reason at all that

1655
01:27:00.960 --> 01:27:03.279
this should not be part of their education. They should

1656
01:27:03.359 --> 01:27:06.960
understand that there's a thing called taxes, and this is

1657
01:27:06.960 --> 01:27:10.279
how this works. You know, this is what happens when

1658
01:27:10.279 --> 01:27:12.680
you're earn a wage this think about budgeting, like they

1659
01:27:12.680 --> 01:27:14.920
don't teach that anymore. And I know it sounds very elementary,

1660
01:27:15.399 --> 01:27:17.800
but you know, our kids are a future, right, as

1661
01:27:18.199 --> 01:27:20.560
I said, If they're not coming out together end with

1662
01:27:20.600 --> 01:27:22.960
this knowledge, If your parents aren't teaching them because they're

1663
01:27:23.000 --> 01:27:24.479
too busy working and trying to keep up with the

1664
01:27:24.520 --> 01:27:26.560
bills they have just to make sure the kids can eat,

1665
01:27:27.479 --> 01:27:30.560
then they're just going to come out of the household

1666
01:27:30.840 --> 01:27:32.359
and they're gonna be stuck in the same cycle that

1667
01:27:32.399 --> 01:27:34.680
most of us were. Because most of us didn't know anybody.

1668
01:27:34.680 --> 01:27:37.319
We're just like, oh, yeah, this is what happens. You

1669
01:27:37.359 --> 01:27:40.199
take it out automatically. Great, it's going to be their formulator. Cool,

1670
01:27:40.439 --> 01:27:42.760
I got so many hours and we earned this much. Okay,

1671
01:27:42.760 --> 01:27:45.039
you go to retire. Then wait a minute, what happened?

1672
01:27:45.039 --> 01:27:46.479
Why I'm only getting a quarter? What you told me

1673
01:27:46.880 --> 01:27:49.560
doesn't make any sense. So I think I think a

1674
01:27:49.560 --> 01:27:51.640
lot of what you said is correct, But we need

1675
01:27:51.680 --> 01:27:54.640
to start teaching it at schools. They got to be

1676
01:27:54.680 --> 01:27:56.199
exposed to the idea of it.

1677
01:27:58.279 --> 01:28:03.079
Yep, you're right. It's like up and.

1678
01:28:03.680 --> 01:28:07.520
Some auto mechanics, some basic classes that that just don't

1679
01:28:07.520 --> 01:28:12.800
get taught anymore. Some some instances where that's changing because

1680
01:28:12.840 --> 01:28:14.600
a lot of kids they don't even know how to

1681
01:28:14.680 --> 01:28:17.079
do basic maths. It's like if you put them if

1682
01:28:17.079 --> 01:28:19.039
they're going to work at Burger King or one they's

1683
01:28:19.479 --> 01:28:23.000
they can't even give you the proper change if she

1684
01:28:23.159 --> 01:28:26.840
doesn't tell them because they're so used to the calculator

1685
01:28:26.880 --> 01:28:28.079
doing it everything for them.

1686
01:28:28.159 --> 01:28:29.760
Yeah, it tells you, tells you what to do. It's like,

1687
01:28:29.760 --> 01:28:31.119
here's your mountain, here's what you get back.

1688
01:28:31.479 --> 01:28:34.640
Don't even have mom and Dad's phone number because it's

1689
01:28:35.039 --> 01:28:37.560
it's not the machine that.

1690
01:28:37.159 --> 01:28:41.560
So yeah, well I'm reliant. Yeah well, yeah, me too.

1691
01:28:41.760 --> 01:28:43.680
I have a good friend that tells me, yeah, don't

1692
01:28:43.720 --> 01:28:45.239
don't be so reliant on that.

1693
01:28:45.720 --> 01:28:48.319
So, yeah, we've got work to do, George.

1694
01:28:48.119 --> 01:28:48.600
Yeah we do.

1695
01:28:49.680 --> 01:28:49.960
Well.

1696
01:28:50.239 --> 01:28:52.840
Look, I don't know if you want to keep going

1697
01:28:52.880 --> 01:28:55.399
on on all of this, but I I personally think

1698
01:28:55.439 --> 01:28:56.880
we covered a lot of grounds.

1699
01:28:56.960 --> 01:28:59.800
We did. We did, we did. I'll tell you this

1700
01:29:00.199 --> 01:29:02.039
probably about twenty years of my life.

1701
01:29:02.199 --> 01:29:02.960
Sure, I vote.

1702
01:29:02.960 --> 01:29:05.920
I voted Republican more than I did Democrat. I believe

1703
01:29:05.960 --> 01:29:10.640
in a lot of Republican principles. I believe in. I mean, hell,

1704
01:29:11.079 --> 01:29:14.239
Lincoln was a Republican and he wasn't flawless, but he

1705
01:29:14.279 --> 01:29:17.640
did flip free the slaves. And it was the Dixiecrats

1706
01:29:17.760 --> 01:29:21.840
that the Southern Democrats that fought against integration and.

1707
01:29:23.520 --> 01:29:24.399
Inequality.

1708
01:29:24.560 --> 01:29:27.399
But and then I finally got to the point where

1709
01:29:27.920 --> 01:29:30.439
it dawned on me that you can't just care about

1710
01:29:30.479 --> 01:29:32.600
the kid and the womb and not care about them

1711
01:29:32.600 --> 01:29:34.880
once they get here. So I think it's you know,

1712
01:29:34.960 --> 01:29:37.800
there's there's there's there's issues on both sides, and I

1713
01:29:38.800 --> 01:29:42.000
see those issues too. So I think we're we're a

1714
01:29:42.000 --> 01:29:45.319
really good country when we can move more towards the

1715
01:29:45.359 --> 01:29:49.079
middle where there's uh, you know, I mean there's always

1716
01:29:49.159 --> 01:29:52.920
room for debate. But yeah, extremism on either side is

1717
01:29:52.960 --> 01:29:54.039
not good for us.

1718
01:29:54.359 --> 01:29:57.720
I think it takes people doing what we're doing, just yeah,

1719
01:29:57.800 --> 01:30:00.960
talking and having the conversation and not being afraid to

1720
01:30:00.960 --> 01:30:01.560
say things.

1721
01:30:01.600 --> 01:30:02.359
You know, that's right.

1722
01:30:02.560 --> 01:30:04.720
I mean, you need to be respectful, but we should

1723
01:30:04.760 --> 01:30:07.319
be able to at least discuss it absolutely, you know,

1724
01:30:07.359 --> 01:30:09.039
and if it's defensive, hey, you let me know. I'll

1725
01:30:09.079 --> 01:30:10.560
let you know. Good, you know, we'll deal with it.

1726
01:30:10.640 --> 01:30:13.359
But there's no reason not to have the conversation.

1727
01:30:13.760 --> 01:30:16.159
And usually when we talk, we find that we have

1728
01:30:16.199 --> 01:30:19.640
a lot more in common than we do. Uh that

1729
01:30:19.640 --> 01:30:22.159
that that that the things that divide us.

1730
01:30:22.800 --> 01:30:24.680
No, this has been good. I appreciate it to it.

1731
01:30:24.760 --> 01:30:26.840
Yeah, And you know why I think that is the

1732
01:30:26.880 --> 01:30:30.239
case they're Derek, is because I think in the end,

1733
01:30:30.359 --> 01:30:32.239
you know, just just humans in general, we all want

1734
01:30:32.279 --> 01:30:35.039
the same things. We want to say, Shelter. We want

1735
01:30:35.039 --> 01:30:35.680
to be able to live.

1736
01:30:35.920 --> 01:30:39.079
Yeah. Yeah, I want to earn a decent living and

1737
01:30:39.159 --> 01:30:42.720
live and be able to respect one another. And you know, yeah,

1738
01:30:42.800 --> 01:30:46.039
that's that's that's the real American dream right there.

1739
01:30:46.359 --> 01:30:47.640
That's what we need to get back to.

1740
01:30:47.760 --> 01:30:50.079
I mean, that's right, that's right, that's right where there's

1741
01:30:50.079 --> 01:30:52.000
a lot of self correcting that needs to be that.

1742
01:30:52.520 --> 01:30:55.079
Well, hey, you know what, you've had it on the

1743
01:30:55.119 --> 01:30:57.439
screen the whole time. I'm horrible at this. My brother's good.

1744
01:30:57.520 --> 01:30:59.880
He does the finger thing. But just tell everybody about

1745
01:30:59.880 --> 01:31:02.840
your book where you can get it and uh, where

1746
01:31:02.840 --> 01:31:05.479
it's available, because I mean, I think I think it's

1747
01:31:05.479 --> 01:31:08.239
worth reading. I mean we need to we need to

1748
01:31:08.279 --> 01:31:09.920
hear these perspectives. We really do.

1749
01:31:11.079 --> 01:31:14.039
Sure, well, thank you, George. Yeah, you can get my book.

1750
01:31:14.119 --> 01:31:16.880
I would suggest that, and I don't know, maybe you

1751
01:31:16.920 --> 01:31:22.920
can put this like overview on your on your site

1752
01:31:23.000 --> 01:31:25.239
or something, but I would tell people to go to

1753
01:31:25.600 --> 01:31:27.880
h Of course, you can google me and it'll take

1754
01:31:27.920 --> 01:31:31.359
you when the options will be my website, which is

1755
01:31:31.560 --> 01:31:36.479
www dot Derekgilliard dot com, and you can find out

1756
01:31:36.479 --> 01:31:38.399
a little bit more about me there. You can also

1757
01:31:38.439 --> 01:31:42.640
get it in Amazon at Barnes and Noble. Uh pretty much.

1758
01:31:42.760 --> 01:31:45.520
Uh yeah, those would those would be the real good places.

1759
01:31:45.560 --> 01:31:47.920
But go to my website. Google, just google me. It'll

1760
01:31:47.960 --> 01:31:50.920
take you to my website and you'll learn about what

1761
01:31:51.000 --> 01:31:53.600
motivates me and why I thought this was an important

1762
01:31:53.680 --> 01:31:56.560
story to tell. And we'll watch it and see how

1763
01:31:56.560 --> 01:31:58.960
it unfolds, and it's it's gonna be interesting.

1764
01:31:58.960 --> 01:32:01.279
But I've enjoyed it. Awesome.

1765
01:32:01.399 --> 01:32:03.960
I appreciate your time. I do and and again, it

1766
01:32:04.000 --> 01:32:07.000
took a while to get this to happen, but I

1767
01:32:07.039 --> 01:32:08.720
think it was worth it. It was a great conversation.

1768
01:32:08.800 --> 01:32:11.479
I think everybody that Jesus is going to get something

1769
01:32:11.520 --> 01:32:14.000
out of it for sure. And I'm gonna encourage people

1770
01:32:14.039 --> 01:32:16.840
to buy your book. And yes you could. You can

1771
01:32:17.479 --> 01:32:20.439
just google Derek and you can easily find. It comes

1772
01:32:20.520 --> 01:32:22.399
right up, so he's not hidden.

1773
01:32:23.159 --> 01:32:25.520
Absolutely, absolutely, thank you, my friend.

1774
01:32:25.640 --> 01:32:28.560
You are welcome. Thank you, sir, Appreciate you, right, sir,

1775
01:32:28.680 --> 01:32:29.079
thank you.

1776
01:32:29.680 --> 01:32:45.279
Great night. Your content feel attention behind redemption UH stance

1777
01:32:45.600 --> 01:33:10.479
on do
Deric Gilliard Profile Photo
Deric Gilliard

Author | Historian | Speaker

Deric A. Gilliard retired in 2022, after 25 years as a federal communications lead working for political appointees in the Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump, and Biden administrations.

Prior to his work as public affairs advisor to the HHS regional directors for the eight southeastern states, Gilliard served as the national communications director for Dr. King’s organization, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.

Gilliard also worked in communications for two HBCUs and wrote for USA Today, Time, the Wichita Eagle-Beacon, and was an editor for the Atlanta Daily World. Gilliard is currently working as a consultant to develop a National Park Service monument to honor and memorialize the contributions of the 1961 Freedom Riders.