FM Talk 1065 Podcasts
Alabama Policy Institute's Stephanie Holden Smith - Jeff Poor Show - Wednesday 9-18-24
[MUSIC PLAYING] Moving back to the Jet Force Show, the shock 10065. They just stay with us on this Wednesday morning, text line 2513430106. You need to be in touch with the program. All you need to do is text, and we got a bunch to get to there from some nefarious actors, I would say. It's not downright evil. Still a couple of the program produced Talk93.1. In Montgomery, Joey Clark, that's about an hour from now. And then two hours from now, now 11 o'clock hour, our senior United States Senator Tommy Tuberville will be able to stay right where you are. We're joining us now on the line. She's always a pleasure to bring on my next guest. She runs the Alabama Policy Institute, Stephanie Holden Smith. Stephanie, good morning. How you been? Good morning. I'm doing well, and I'm pretty impressed. You got Coach Tuberville to call you on his birthday. Oh, I know you know what? I'm going to have to wish him a happy birthday, aren't I? Yeah, you may have to think. Oh no, that's not likely to happen. Hey, let's start here. And I kind of-- you and I taught a lot about gambling this last legislative session. You're not sure. But it was kind of funny. The Republican Party itself had-- they've kind of sat on the sidelines. I suspect one of the leadership roles within the Republican Party were vehemently or stridently anti-gambling expansion. Maybe they were pro-lauter-y at best, but they were certainly pro-casino gambling. I mean, anti-casino gambling. And now, a little behold, I think this is important what they did with that resolution of just putting something down, a marker down, to say, hey, we as the party are not 40 for casino gambling. I don't know any of this matters if these lawmakers look at this and they say, oh, well, well, I'm going to-- but it's to me, we needed this. We needed to know where this party was on this issue. Right. Yeah, so it's interesting because there's kind of the internal the external here. The apparatus of the Alabama Republican Party is an elected body. For the most part, there are appointed people that are part of that committee, but for the most part, the folks that serve on that committee are elected in the primary every four years, just like other elected officials are. And so it was interesting to me that one, that the party has not really opined on gambling, specifically, a whole lot in the past. And then, two, that the decision was made to put that resolution forward, specifically, about the expansion of gambling. And then, three, that the vote was so decisive. It was not close. I think it was-- you probably have it in front of you, but I think it was 74% of the people that elected body said, we're for this resolution against the expansion of gambling. And I mean, this is like one of the biggest issues that the legislature has dealt with, right? Like, this is they have-- we've talked about this so much. What does it mean to be a Republican now? And that needs to be defined when it comes to this issue, I think, because you have a super majority Republican legislature trying to ram through a-- what I think is a very, very-- I don't know, reckless at best, a pursuit of gambling in Alabama. And I mean, is that really where the Republican Party should stand for? Right. It's a foundational question, I think, is a question that you're asking. And I routinely say that I'm against the expansion of gambling for several different reasons. Some are practical, some are moral, but they're mainly ideological. As a conservative, expanding gambling in the state expands government. It expands the structure of government, and it expands the budgets of government. And so from a limited government perspective, even if you're pro-gambling, from a limited government perspective, it's pretty clear that the expansion of gambling is an expansion of government. There's also the free market question, because every single one of these bills that have been presented since 1999 takes winners and losers. I mean, we're credit to the Siegelman bill that was actually voted down by the people didn't do that. It was more of a free market approach, except for the fact that the big winner was the expansion of state government. And so-- but these bills that we've been debating for the last 20 plus years actually name locations or counties or specific entities that state government is knighting as legal or illegal. And so it's not a free market. It's not answering a free market question either. So you've got a situation where our Republicans for free markets, like they say they are, are they for limiting government and increasing freedom, it's become kind of a strange question to ask. It's not just the subject that we're asking those questions on either. But I do think it's important that that elected body made it very clear to the general public and then also to legislators who represent them in Montgomery. The Republican Party in the state of Alabama is not for the expansion. Well, I'll tell you what, though, and this is the assumptions that they operate of. This just premise that we sure could use that money in Alabama. Alabama's lasted education. Alabama doesn't have this. Alabama doesn't have that. And therefore, we should legalize gambling or any other vice. And you hear the pro marijuanaers say in this too, I reject that. I don't believe that. I don't believe it is a revenue source that comes with so many strings attached, so many societal costs. Go take a trip to Biloxi, Mississippi, at the homeless encampments, if you don't believe me. But let's look at the return on investment here. And let's stop saying that. I mean, 'cause it's just, I don't think it is true. - Right, and we're talking about an industry that doesn't produce anything. Really, the only thing that the gambling industry produces decides you could make the argument to the positive that it produces entertainment. But on the negative side, really the only thing that the gambling industry produces besides money for the people running the gambling industry are societal negatives. Increases, human trafficking, increases addiction, increases, you know, joblessness, increases, all kinds of negative things on society. And so when you're doing the calculation of, quote, how much money it was bringing into state coffers, even if you are very optimistic about gambling and ignore all of those negatives to society, it's still not very much money, depending on which type of gambling you're talking about. - Right, I mean-- - And then on the other side, do we need more money in state governor? - Well, let's be honest about what this is, Stephanie. And this is me talking, the people that want gambling that are investing the lobbying dollars and the ad campaigns and all the marketing, they don't care about government coffers. Somebody is going to get rich off of this. It is a special interest play here to make somebody wealthy. And that's why, like, you know, you can try to say, explain this to my listeners, but like, yeah, they will sell you on all of these ideas and how good it's going to be and how great it's going to be for the state. But why are they doing that? Are they just doing it because they have some kind of philanthropic idea about government and government getting more money to do more good? Or no, there is a profit incentive here. And you need to be like skeptical of that. Maybe they're right, maybe they're wrong, but at least know that they got skin in the game here to financially benefit. Well, on some of those are inside the state, but a lot of those are outside of the state. And so you're creating a situation where state government would be setting up a structure that taxpayers would pay for out of our taxpayer dollars to set up a structure so that out of state gambling moguls can make money and take it out of the state. So the whole argument of, you know, well, this money is going out of state. If you look at, you know, car license plate, just the other side of the border on one side or the other is still there. It's just a matter of if the money goes outside of the state on the front end or the back end. - Joined by Stephanie Holt Smith, the ABB policy institute here on the program. We'll move on from gambling to Justin Bogey. Interesting column out. And I wonder if Alabib is, we're just kind of, this is the legacy that we inherited and we're gonna be stuck with, but like this idea and you hear this all the time, right? That, you know, we're so lucky to, we're so fortunate to have this appropriator or that appropriator. It's so awesome that we get so much money from the federal government. We need to be kissing the ring of Richard Shelby or whatever, but I mean, this federal government dependency, it hasn't really bore fruit. I don't think in ways that we maybe have been sold over the years. - Yeah, and the frustrating thing about the level of federal dependency that the state has is that there's no understanding that that brings chemicals with it. Man, if you recall, you know, recently in the last year or so, I guess it may be a year and a half ago now, the Biden-Harris administration actually threatened Alabama schools with taking away lunch money for needy kids if they didn't allow boys in the girls' bathrooms and vice versa. So, you know, we're pretending like the money that the state of Alabama and the entities in the state of Alabama hate don't have any bearing on the way they live. And that's just false. So, you know, we have the situation with NIH funding, go into UAB, we have, you know, basically all of our universities taking a lot of federal money and that federal money has chemicals, it has strings to it. And so, you know, the difficult thing for us, you know, from that Alabama policy institute perspective is that there's very little transparency with those grants on the state level. And it's difficult to know where all the money is coming from and what all those chemicals are. And so, that's part of a project that we're working on at API, which is we're calling it the federalism project. And it's one of those things we are trying to figure out the pots of money that are coming into the state and how it impacted the people of the state in a very practical way. - Well, we got like kind of baptized on this. Stephanie, the whole COVID vaccine discussion, right? And the Biden administration say, hey, if your place of employment gets 80 kind of, you know, government work or government contracts by executive order, we will, you are hereby going to get the vaccine or will withhold your federal money. And look, I mean, there was, you know, questions, can you do that? Oh, no, but a lot of these, especially some of these defense contractors are like, all right, we don't want to deal with it. We don't want to fight it. We don't have the time for this. We just want to make sure to check clears. You will go get the vaccine or you will go find another job. And I mean, that was the reality. And then that is like an example. Like when you have a federal government dependency that you are beholden to somebody somewhere and perhaps in a circumstance like that where you do have your rights violated. - Yeah, 100% and it's one of those things I think especially during COVID, most people who don't work in those areas don't think about it on a daily basis. But how far down those strengths go? Because you had a situation where even vendors and suppliers of those organizations were being pressured to also mandate the vaccination because they were worried that they wouldn't get their bills paid. So it became apparent, a lot of things became apparent during COVID, but it became very apparent that, you know, it's pretty easy to pull those strings and a state that is pretty dependent on federal money. And so, you know, we're trying to make sure that people know and understand that federal money is not free money. One, because there's no such thing as free money. It's all someone's money. And then also, you know, that those big checks and the big announcements of, you know, hey, isn't this fantastic, we got this money. Aren't always opted for the people about them. - Finally, Stephanie, let's talk about this. Your big event coming up here. You got Ben Carson coming to speak at your event. Give us the details. - Yeah, we're really excited about it. Next week, it's September 26th up in Birmingham. And then in Candy Carson are coming in town. They have written a new book about the family being the cornerstone of society and how promoting families and doing it better. If Alabama and America could do a better job at paying attention to what is good for families, then we would have a better state and a better nation. And so we're excited about him coming in town. We've had a fantastic response. I will say after, you know, talking to people for about the last six months without bringing him in town, I've had not one negative comment. It's clear to me, and I'll tell this, I'll tell this to him when he comes next week, it's clear to me that he may be one of the most well-respected people in the nation that people consider a politician because he's such a good and quality man. He's done so many things with his life. And he's got, you know, the quintessential American story of, you know, coming up through poverty and becoming, you know, a position, a brilliant position who is safe, countless lives, and then shifting gears to public service. And so we're really excited about having him back in the state of Alabama. And it would encourage anyone who, any of your listeners who want to make the trek that please join us. - And if they want to find out more about it, point them in the right direction. - Sure, you can find the information on our website, which is alabamapolicy.org. And they're the tab there for the 2024 annual dinner is the tab that you need. - Stephanie, we always appreciate your time. Let's talk again soon. - Absolutely. Thanks so much, Chef. - No problem. Stephanie Holden Smith of the Alabama Policies II. We'll be right back. This is the Jeff Moore show on FM Talk 106.5. ♪ There's no in the middle of you ♪