Showdown
Showdown Episode 97 7-5-24
(upbeat music) - Welcome to Showdown, I'm Mark Casein' and we've got a couple of stars in the studio tonight. First of all, Felicia, I know Felicia Hampton but okay, you got the Mitchell in there so I made sure it's on the screen. - Okay. - Okay, so you know, Felicia. Okay, you wanna make sure you're right up to that microphone so you wanna... - Okay, can you ask your me okay? - Yeah, yeah, that's very good. And Ray Hartman, how are you? - I'm great, thanks for allowing me to be Felicia's understudy here. - That's right. Now, do we call you Congressman Hartman? - You could, it might be a little ahead of you. - Might be a little ahead, but... No, listen, I think personally, despite the fact that I want you to win, I think you're gonna win. Well, I mean, you know... - I hope you're right. - Well... - I mean, I don't, you know, I've just gotta win the primary first, which I'm hoping to do, but I think that I happen to agree with you that we have a very good chance because of, quite frankly, the situation in our country. And particularly, as opposed to women and their healthcare and their reproductive freedom. - I think that's... - And abortion rights, really, very simple. And that's not my only issue, but it's one that definitely makes this a very different landscape. - Yeah, and I understand you saying, which everybody does, abortion rights, but the truth is that that's not really the major issue. I mean, the major issue is that you've got thousands of women who are trying to have children and who have their water break. I mean, this happens all the time. And, you know, if the water breaks, then the sterile environment is breached. And if you don't have a doctor to take care of it, you've got chaos and maybe a dead woman. And so the whole thing is that they need to get past this mess because the abortion problem has created this mess that is allowing women to die when they're just trying to have children. - And not only that, even you made it as far as getting to the nine months and to the delivery, but there are some women who are not even able to carry the child for a term. - Oh, right. - So they might have a miscarriage. And so what is happening that even when a woman has a miscarriage and they know that this unborn child has died in uteral, then they have to go through a series of steps, a series of doctor's appointments before they would even consider giving this woman a procedure, a DNC, a removing of that dead fetus or that dead tissue from this woman's body. - 'Cause they're afraid they're gonna, the doctors are afraid someone's gonna put them in jail. - Or afraid, that's another thing. - So it's a greater issues in just saying, oh, we have, we want abortion rights. Nobody wants the right just to say, I want to go and abort a baby. It's greater than that. It's more issues on the platform. It's women's healthcare. It's mental health, imagine, and I'll say this super quick. Imagine you miscarry a child and now you have to go to two or three doctors appointments to have an ultrasound to determine if there's a heartbeat. And okay, now they're saying, okay, the baby is not viable, the baby is not alive, but you have to go to another appointment. And so mentally, what is that doing to me? To my mental, emotionally, what am I going through? And then you carry the risk of possibly coming septic with this dead tissue in your body. You understand what I'm saying? So we're dealing with health issues of a woman. - Yeah, and I know nothing about this, but Ray, here you are, you're running. - Well, yeah, first of all, I think I said, started with women's reproductive health freedom. And I just said abortion rights as part of that, which I don't back off with saying, but in this particular environment, there are two other elements to this issue that, because the Republicans who have run successfully, I think, against abortion rights for a long time are the dog that caught the bus, because there's two big issues that really need to be discussed. One is contraception. - Yes. - And the fact is I'm running against someone who voted against the right to contraception. In 2020, 22, and claims, well, she voted, and Wagner voted against the right to contraception act and has, well, if you ask her, she says, "Oh, no, I'm fine with contraception." When you get down to the actual vote, she's not. - Sure. - And then the other is IVF. And IVF, which is, I think you started, you know, so many women and families and, of course, women, obviously, trying to have, start families, and they need in vitro fertilization to do it. It's a wonderful thing that everyone, everyone should be in favor of, but if you take the literal rhetoric of the anti-abortion movement, it's kind of hard to justify what we, normally, most normal people say, is discarding embryos. If you're taking the position, and I couldn't believe she said it out loud, but she did, Nikki Haley, before she bailed on the race, said, "I believe embryos are people." But I'm still fine with the Porsche IVF, which, of course, you can't believe both, really. And once they open that, they do not want to talk about, and frankly, none of us do either. Nobody wants to get into this. We'd all like it to go away. But if you're going to base a policy on the thought that all embryos are people, it's kind of hard to justify IVF. And the rest of us are going, "Huh?" You know, and so that's really, they're bringing in a lot of people who even some who consider themselves pro-life, let me be clear. If your religion teaches you to be pro-life, by all means, I'm not here to argue-- - Absolutely. - I'm not gonna argue about your religion. I respect it, live your life as you want. But when we're talking about legislating, and we're talking about asking all women who may or may not share that definition to be governed by your religion, now we're in a different place. And so that's how I look at it. And so many women, I know, who are independents and Republicans, are like, not down. And you also mentioned, rockin' doctors in Missouri, we're not far from being in a place where, you know, one of the things we're having is a real brain drain here, because practitioners, young people who wanna go into gynecology, who wanna go into women's healthcare, or any kind of healthcare, are gettin' the heck out of state. - Well, they better. - They have to because to practice their life-saving work, they risk goin' to jail. I mean, they literally risk it. Not, you know, until a couple years ago, they kind of, we talked about nightmare scenarios, and this could happen. No, no, they ask me to risk it. And so, these people, oops, I press a button. - No, you're all right. - These folks, and that's a big thing here in Missouri, and out of the other states, I will tell ya, there's no question, no ambiguity. You know, after getting to say the words "I," the word "I," when they ask me about, "Do I want housemen, excuse me," speaker of the house, Hakim Jeffries, which has a nice ring to it. Once I get to say yes to that, I think the next thing we've gotta be talkin' about is re-establishing the baseline freedom that Roe v. Wade provided for women for the previous 50 years, until the Dobbs' decision. And there's a lot of other stuff to do, a lot of other work to do, but that's where I be start. - Yeah, and one of our listeners here, Bendy King, has written and asked, aren't these issues up to the individual states? Well, that's an interesting point, because Kansas, which is about as conservative as they come, just had their Supreme Court say, forget it, all these restrictions have gotta go in Kansas, so Kansas, which is conservative, is saying no. And here's the other thing, Bendy, if you're listening to really what we're saying, if you're gonna get yourself all wrapped up in abortion, you're gonna have a problem here, because if somebody that you know has a pregnancy, and let's say four months into the pregnancy, there's a miscarriage, there's the water breaks, whatever happens, and a doctor has gotta let that woman die, is that what we're doing? - That's what it sounded like. - Yeah, can I, we don't respect your car. Anyone, please, there's a possibility, as a God forbid, that the Republicans win the House, the Senate, and the presidency. Anyone naive enough to believe that with that trifecta, they are going to say, you know, this is a states rights issue, we're gonna leave it to the states, is very, very naive. They will under absolutely, whether it's, they don't need Project 2025, or whatever they wanna do, they will outlaw abortion nationally if they control the three, those three, if they control the House, the Senate, and the presidency, they will, they will outlaw abortion, at least at some level, and anyone that thinks, oh yeah, we're talking states rights. Yeah, wait to see what happens if they get off that kind of control. - Yeah, by the way, Meagan, who is on the board right now, is also, and she's conservative, and she is saying, really, we wanna make this a political issue? I mean, isn't this a medical situation? - Yeah, and then you also look at too, like in the situation where there is a rape, a sexual assault, or in a situation where there's possibly incest, and the child is a minor, and they end up pregnant, there is no clause, there is nothing that allows someone in that type of a situation to even have an option. They must carry that birth to full term. There is no option. In one of the states, there was a young child that was nine years old, that was involved, in a situation where she had to travel to a different state in order to have an abortion, and so I think she had the abortion at age 10, and then went back to her state, and they were trying to charge the doctor. They were trying to charge the doctor, so, you know, this is something we just need to address. - Well, and here's the other thing, and this goes right to raise campaign. You can argue this, you can try to make it a political issue, but in the end, women are not going to say, kill me and my children, they're not gonna say that, they're gonna say do something to put this in the hands of a doctor where my family is safe, and all these people who wanna make this a political issue, well, they can think something's going to happen, but this is an 80/20 issue in the United States, and if you wanna be on the 20 side, go for it. - Well, and I was campaigning earlier this week, and talked to some Trump supporters, which I like to do, I find it interesting, and the one of them, and they are, it's interesting, 'cause, of course, they, I just get, what is it about Donald Trump, 'cause they described themselves as Christian conservatives, I said, what does his conduct at all seem like that of a Christian conservatives? And they basically pivot to that thing, look, we don't think he has any morality whatsoever, but he gets us what we want. That's exactly what they said to me. He does, well, he gets us what we want. Okay, so I didn't wanna fight about that. I said to the guy, I gotta ask you, in Missouri, if we're talking about not having an exception for rape and instance, and I said, I don't wanna be too personal, so I don't have to be necessarily your family, but what would you really think? That God forbid someone's daughter gets raped, whether it's by a family member or somebody they didn't know, you really, you know, let's say it's a little kid, doesn't matter who it is. You really want the state, the state government or the federal government, to tell that child, she's gotta bear the rapist seed. And he looked at me right there, I said, yep. And I'm like, all righty then, and that's not an 80/20 issue, Mark. That's more like a 95/50. Now, I will say this, reproductive freedom in Missouri is not an 80/20 issue. Certainly, contraception is, an IVF is probably closer to 90/10. Sure. I think the actual basic pro-choice pro-life divide is probably 60/40 in the state, more than like 70/30 in my district and from our Poland. And so it's not, and I totally think this is a time to respect people who are pro-life and just say, look, we understand how you feel, but look at what Dobbs has done. Look at where we are right now. Look at the real life human beings that are risking their lives to escape their own states. Look at the doctors that are looking at jail time. This is no longer hypothetical. And think about whether this is really the best way for us to go. We need to try to not yell at each other so much and try to understand, I respect you if you have this other point of view, but look at what the consequences in real life terms are of these policies, and maybe we can kind of take a step back. Yeah, let me even broaden this out a little bit. You know, you and I, Ray, are the same age, and we've been around for some time. Some time. And back in the late 1960s, early 1970s, in California, I used to drive around, and I saw cars that all said impeach Earl Warren. And, you know, the fact is, this is where this thing is going. The people who are on Donald's side, who are part of Leonard Leo and that Federalist Society Group, they want to get rid of Earl Warren's decisions. They want to stop everything that was done to move this society towards fairness and equality, which, you know, it's not just women's issues. I mean, it goes even, there are people who think that Miranda is too much, because, you know, you got criminals who might get out of jail because the police didn't follow the rules. So, I mean, they're in religion and so forth. So talk about that, Ray. I mean, you know this very well, right? I don't know. I don't remember that far back. Well, actually, there's a re-litigation going of the Great Society in the '60s. You could argue, in some cases, it's going back to the New Deal, that it's going back to Frank Condellaro. Absolutely. And even the establishment. I think one of the things that I talk about is if you think Social Security and Medicare are that safe, you're not listening carefully. You're not reading Project 2025. There's a, again, and I, look, I don't want to demonize Republicans. I used to work for one in 1970s. Yes, it did. One of the best public services states ever seen. I come from a place where I'm not really a, I do, I have to admit, I've been a proud Democrat for 17 long weeks. But having said that, I'm not that partisan. And I'm worried about the fact that what was a serious political party has been taken over as basically a Trump call, I happen to think at the base of it, really, is more a desire. To me, the common denominator's desire to recreate this country as a white Christian nationalist dominated country. I think it's mostly driven, if you really get to its essence, by race, and by the fact that what is the numbers at 2050, it'll be, whites will be in the minority first time. And I think that drives a lot of it. But I also think there's always been some resentment to the, quote, permissiveness of the great society. And I happen to think that there's a lot of people that if you put the 64 Civil Rights Act to a vote, wouldn't vote for it. I mean, it just won't absolutely. But having said that, I think most reasonable people, particularly if we don't just scream, call them names, understand that we don't really want to go back there. We don't want to, we do not need, and I think the worst of Donald Trump, personally, is the degree to which he is, well, I mean, these calls him my fascist uncle. To the degree he's willing to do the standard, fascist playbook, let's put it that way, which is demagoguery based on the others, and based on fear, xenophobia, and fear of immigrants. That is so, it's almost mundane as something dictators all over the world have done. So yeah, I worry about that. I do think that most Americans, including Republicans, you know, don't, they don't want to get rid of social security. They don't want to get rid of the basic core of the great society. And remember, in the 90s, Bill Clinton's presidency, we did address some of the definite failings of the welfare program, and they were reformed in a bipartisan way. It wasn't fun, it wasn't, it was messy, but there were changes. You hear two people all the time talk about the welfare program as if it was the one in the 64 when it isn't. And so, you know, I mean-- - Bill Clinton said he'd fix it, which he never did. - Well, but I understand, but the point was it was modified to ways that when you hear people talk today, you would think it was unchanged since 64. And my point is, we need to come together and, but I don't think that the, I think the folks driving this kind of anti-New Deal, anti-great society movement, have an agenda that is not really shared by the people that are following it. - Yeah, and I'd like the two of you to comment, but I'll go with Felicia first, 'cause you and I have been talking, Ray. But, you know, Ray brought up the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which has just had its 60 year anniversary a couple days ago. And, you know, how do you feel, Felicia, you know, you're living this, so talk about it. - I just feel like we still have a lot of work to do. We are still fighting for some of the same issues that we have been fighting for since 1964 and beyond before. There's a lot of work to do. And I see someone put in a comment that they wanna go back to that time, before that time, he said, "I do," and that's when he felt like America was great for him. If he was living at that time, I don't know, 'cause I don't know how old this person was, but make America great again for who? Because from what I can see, my people, black people, it was, when was it great for us? Women didn't get a right to vote into 1920? When was it great? - 1920, yeah. - Yeah, 1920. So when was it really great? Like, come on, we're probably living our best time now in America, so when we say we're gonna make America great again, what are we really talking about? We're still fighting right now, trying to just, for women to have the right to say that this is my body and let me do what I wanna do with it. We still, in a time where the men are inside of the capital deciding that they wanna put the knee on our neck, on our fallopian tubes, where are we making life great again? Explain to me that. So in civil rights, we're still fighting for the same issues. Go ahead, Ray. - I can't, left my glasses, not my tie, I did all kinds of things to say. I'm not reading the comments. Somebody said that they liked it back. - They said I do, and you were saying, "Look, you said once to go back there, "who wants to go back there?" And they said, "Somebody said I do." - Well, I commend that person. I mean, it'd be nice if we know that, but I mean, I commend somebody's gonna be willing to say it. - I don't think we should pretend that no one wants to go back. And again, I'm not trying to make this a race war. The point is that we cannot deny that what's driving the culture war are the ethnic changes and the demographic changes in our country. And maybe, I mean, look, just to be clear, I don't really hate white guys. I mean, I don't love 'em. But I mean, I'm not too down on white guys being one, but, and I don't traffic in the language of the left about guilt and privilege. I just don't, that's not my style. I don't, I'm not, I'm not a bit, you know, I'm not apologetic for being a white guy. But I think that we need to understand that we ain't going back. And we don't want to go, we shouldn't want to go back. And even for those, we're not going back. And I think that's what's driving a lot of the culture war, but I really don't believe the American people are going to stand for that. And again, I'm, I become, you know me, Mark, I used to be considered one of the most liberal guys in town. And now I'm, I'm not attending the run as a centrist, but I find myself, I ain't woke, that's for sure. And so, you know, people have to, my attitude is I am who I am and people can accept it or not. But, but, you know, I, I don't, I wish we, I really wish having said all the things we said. I would, Felicia, we really would rather not be talking about, we'd rather be talking about the things that unite us and rather than things that divide us. I agree with you. - And by the way, I have a caller here which you guys aren't going to be able to hear right now 'cause I got it in the headphones. But go ahead and make a quick comment and we'll, I'll bring it to the, to the group. - Okay, that's weird that you can't get it here. Now hang up on you if you don't stop, say something. - Yeah, so what Ray just said, we ain't going back to, you know, the whole thing that Trump is pushing, that it doesn't even make a difference if he can succeed or not. He's gonna push the fact that make America great again, we're gonna go back to what you guys, what, what we want and forget the, he said the rest of the country, you know, the country's not gonna go for that. - I don't know, on November I believe it's a possibility that Trump could win, but the only other thing I wanted to say is that one big problem is when you look at religion, religion is coming into it more so and more so. - Okay, good point. So we'll get off of that. And here's what, here's what the, the comment is. That yes, that there are people out here who think that that going back, you know, in time is gonna make America great again, but this idea that religion is one big part of it, that they really want to somehow create some new rights for religion. What do you think? - I'll let you take that one. - I think it's an argument actually as old as the country. I mean, in before the country with the Puritans, if you want to go back to the, which we probably don't need to do in the 17th century, there has been a tension over the subject of religion in this country, and obviously most of the wars in the world's history were fought over religion, really going back to beginning of the country. And there was, one of the things, and I don't want to get too far off track, but the founding fathers were not a man of it. They were as divided in a lot of ways as we are today on political issues. I was reading and I didn't do this, I probably should keep my mouth shut. But did you know that the first, after the first July 4th, the first celebration was in '77, it wasn't '76, the first time fireworks and stuff, did you know throughout the '80s and '90s, particularly the '90s, the 4th of July celebrations were held separately, that the Democrat Republicans, which was one party, and the Federalists were the other, hated each other so much that they had separate July 4th and things, and there were differences of opinion about the role of religion. So, I mean, there are a lot of, these issues go way back, and we always look back, and I always hear these Supreme Court just talk about the originalists and the, they didn't, they had vicious debates. I mean, not to mention that the sitting vice president killed the sitting secretary of the treasury in a duel, in '18, and didn't leave office, by the way, even though he was indicted for murder in two of the 13 states, didn't leave office, okay, just stayed out of those two states. So, my point being, we have a history of this, so that religious stuff's gone back. I think what we're seeing now is, under Trumpism, a resurgence of religious, a desire to turn this, specifically into a Christian country, specifically. As somebody who's not a Christian, I am not okay with that. And they pretty much said it, and Trump, even at some meeting that they had, said that he was gonna guarantee tremendous power for Christianity, which as if Christians are suffering. Who's doing something to Christians? - He's a great Christian scholar though. - Oh yeah. - He's into two Corinthians. - Yeah, and he's got a Bible with his face on it. - Two Corinthians. - Here, by the way, here's a book for you. This is a brand new book, and it, right to the issue that you just brought up, it's called The Hamilton Scheme. It's brand new, but it's got William Hoagland. He's a famous historian, an epic tale of money and power in the American founding, and it brought, it's exactly what you're talking about, Ray, right to the point of what you just explained. - The divide was over the agrarian folks who were the, originally, I guess, Democrats, and I mean, the parties have switched sides. The agrarians versus Hamilton and the kind of a leadist moneyed interest. The Federalists, this was not a country that they, we all seem to think there was like this kumbaya session, and again, I have nothing to respect for the founding fathers, don't misunderstand, but let's not mythologize, let's not make them into something they were, 'cause it's, in a way, it helps to know that we come from that, and I say we, to your point, there were people like, oh, black people that were not part of the conversation, and Jews didn't exist in the country. I mean, there were a lot of groups of people that weren't part of the conversation, but it helps to understand that we've always been a country that's part of the beauty of democracy that has different points of view. - And one of the things that they said at the time that is the founding fathers was that democracy was part of the problem in this country, and when they said democracy, they were meaning the mob. That's what they were fearful of. - So, yeah. - And the great Frederick Douglass is late as the 1850s, whatever he was saying, he was not, this is not our, why would we celebrate for-- - Right, famous speech. - You know what I mean, it's just like, that are, I forget exact words, but it's like, this ain't our celebration, what do we celebrate? Okay, so let's do a little capitalism here just for a minute, and that is, let's talk about where we can go to first, let's talk about dinner. You know, dinner at Winties, and Winties is just down the street, it's at 18,000 Chesterfield Airport Road, and the food there is fabulous, but on top of the food, I can tell you that I talked to Ben, and he's one of the, he and his wife run it, and we're definitely looking at doing some kind of an event, where we bring in people to meet with Ray Hartman. - It'd be fun. - Yeah. - Appreciate that. - So, that's at Winties, and Winties is, again, 18,000 Chesterfield Airport Road, they've got wings, you know, everybody loves wings except me, I don't eat wings, but I'll tell you, I love baby-back ribs. - Okay. - Yeah, they are great, and they've got those, and they've got onion rings, and they've got patty melts, and hamburgers, and pizza, and salads, and everything you can think of. It is a great restaurant, super environment, and we're even gonna drag Ray down there. And-- - Yes, go ahead. - Yeah, go ahead. - Is it open tonight? - It is. - And do they have some? - Do they allow you to take the ribs home to someone? - Yeah, I'm sure they do. - I think I know where I'm going for dinner. - Yeah, especially if you-- - You don't have to drag me. - If you've got-- - But you can come along and buy it. - Yeah, exactly. - But if you've got connections-- - I know, I think you just made my dinner. - Exactly. And then also, if you happen to be in Defiance, Missouri, you know, and I like this thing of being Defiant anyway, but if you're in Defiance, Missouri, they got a new one that just opened up out there, 29, 99, South Highway 94, and all of it is the same food, it's all great, and it is Wendy's. Okay, so if you're interested in jewelry, how many of you are interested in jewelry? - You haven't throw some hearts up if you're interested in jewelry? - Well, anyway, a great place to buy jewelry is on Hampton, jewels on Hampton, and that is 4506 Hampton in St. Louis. Al and AJ are the two people, the dad and the son who run everything, they've got cases and cases filled with jewelry there, and it's just a fabulous place to buy jewelry. They also buy and sell coins as well as jewelry, and in addition to the fact that they design things for you very creatively, if you want them to do it, or you can tell them what you want, and they'll do it for you. But aside from that, you spend a whole long time there, and then you're trying to walk out, and you look at your watch because you know you've been there too long, and your watch isn't working. Guess what, they fix watches. So, jewels on Hampton, there it is, 4506 Hampton, and then, of course, the great place to buy suits and ties, I know Ray just mentioned he didn't bring his tie. Yeah, well, that's okay. But again, Ray, when I tell you, this is a $5 tie, that's ridiculous. It is. That's ridiculous. And the ties are $5, and they're gorgeous. They're beautiful designs, they're silk, and everybody that I tell says, really? Where is that again? Yeah, it's a great place. And also, if you're getting married, they also are famous for taking care of wedding attire. That's at the St. Louis suit company in Clayton. They're on the corner of Forsyth and Central. They are terrific for men's clothing. There you go. Okay, so we're back here, and let me say a couple of other things, right? Well, I'll start with Project 2025, which you've brought up a couple of times. And, you know, I always say, you're not gonna get a lot of people to read that 900-page document. I'm sure that's why they've got a 900-page document, it's the scare people away from it. But these people are up to crazy things. And if you look at page 731 to 741, that's 10 pages, which somebody could look at, and it is all about how they want to eliminate the Federal Reserve. And by the time they get through explaining what they wanna do, it's exactly what you said, Ray. They wanna wipe out the New Deal, and they wanna go right back to the gold standard and every other idea that led to the Great Depression in the first place. Well, I've read some of, I didn't read that, and I came away, and I haven't read it. Probably, if I'm running for Congress, I need to make it my homework just like, because it is important. And I've read, seriously, passages, quite of many pages. And I will say that the way I came away from is it has struck me as ironic. The guy I worked for as a Republican governor, Kippon, to his credit, did a lot to bring in to patronage. And I'm talking about the wrong party right now, it was patronage. And I came away really with a feeling that a big part of this project, 2024, was to not only emasculate the federal government, but to replace civil servants and people who are there because they care about the government and they're loyal to the people and loyal to their professions with people who are loyal to whoever the president is at that point. And essentially replace merit and civil service with the equivalent, what we call a patronage, where they make all these civil service positions political. And to your point, I mean, I had got to that point, but there's a great, the basic idea, and this has been a dream of the Heritage Foundation and others for a long time, is to emasculate the federal government. And really without anything in its place and change it very much. You put that in the hands of someone like Donald Trump and it's a very frightening prospect for the country. And I'll say one other thing. Donald Trump used, he's not an independent thinker. He doesn't have a real philosophy. That's why the Republican party platform will once again, either not exist or be basically written in crayon. - Well, it'll be projects, 2025 is the problem. - That's the thing. The way he took the federalist society's list of Supreme Court nominees and other judges and just basically, just rubber stamped and guided his judicial appointments at all levels by the federal society, he's gonna probably, there's this frightening thought that he might do the same with Project 2025. So, I don't know, it is something people ought to know more about. - I can tell you this, that I know that there are some young teeny teenagers that kind of concern about Project 2025. Teenagers, 15, 16, 17 years old that have read up on it and have some major concerns about it. So, there's definitely some concern that we definitely need to hope, it never comes to light. - Yeah, and by the way, of course you're the executive producer of the Freeman Bosley Junior Radio Show, Felicia. And I'm wondering, what's Freeman and some of the other guys, maybe Anthony, Shaheed, what are all they saying about Project 2025, anything? - We haven't really delved into Project 2025. - Okay. - We've really been dealing with the election and bringing in a lot of elected officials right now. So, we haven't really delved into 2025. We've just been dealing with some local issues and just getting, just dealing with August the 6th. - Okay. - Get out and vote, get registered. - Yeah, everybody's got to vote. Doesn't matter what side you're on, you got to vote. And one of the people here asked the question. - But let me say this, I bring up the youth because, again, 15, 16, 17 year olds, you don't commonly hear them speaking about politics, about legislation. And for them to come to me and have a concern, and their concern was the LGBTQ issues. And I was like, what? That's in there because I haven't read it, right? And this was what, you know, their concern was. So, I will read it, and I don't know about all 900 pages of it, but. - A good politician who's saying yes, I've read it. I have read how many pages. - Well, I'm not a politician. - But, yeah, no, I'm saying you are. - I am an educator with some students that had concerns. - Good luck to you. No, I mean, I think it's good that you, I mean, we really, we really have to do that. I mean, it's, on one hand, it will be irrelevant if Donald Trump does not get arrested, but it'll be extraordinarily relevant if he does. - Yeah, one of the comments on here was, is that there ought to be a podcast in which each episode read one section of Project 2025. - Yes. - That's right, I liked it. - Interesting idea. - You're a producer. - Yeah, and one person also asked, isn't the Federal Reserve privately owned, which it is, but it's actually a quasi-governmental agency, meaning that it has responsibilities and obligations like federal government agencies. So, yeah, all this talk about it's privately owned, forget it guys, because it's got a legal role to play. - Mm-hmm. - Okay, so, you know, some of the other things, there's this guy, Kevin Roberts, you know that is, from the Heritage Foundation? I mean, I didn't know who he was, I never heard of him before, but listen to what he's talking about. He's saying that there needs to be a second American Revolution, that's one thing, and then he says, it could be bloodless if the left will allow it. I did see that. - What do you think? - It's a threat, I mean, it sounds like a man. I saw that, I did see that quote, and he, it was pretty hard not to take that as, you know, either we do this our way or the hard way, you know what I mean? It was a direct threat to people, and keep in mind, a lot of you out there listening to this show may not think of yourself as on the left, but in the minds of these people, you're on the left. - If you're a moderate, this is one of the things that drives me crazy, 'cause I know so many friends of mine are Republicans, and I know I keep saying it over and over, I'll continue to say it. I'm not about demonizing Republicans writ large, and I have too many good friends who are Republicans, and they are not the rhinos, folks. The rhinos are the Trump cult, and the folks like this gentleman who have hijacked the Republican Party, it's as simple as that, and they think, when they talk about the left, you know, they're talking about Liz Cheney and Adam Kinsinger too, you know, they're not just talking about, you know, people who are, you know, radicals on college campuses, and I think it's important to understand that, if you're in the center, if you consider yourself a moderate, you better believe these people think you're on the left. - Yeah, and moderate, and some of the instances is tolerated, because to my understanding, their agenda right now is to remove the progressive and replace the progressive Democrat with a moderate Democrat, and so that's what we see with this Cory Bush, Wesley Bell election, removing of the progressive Democrat the same way they did with Jamal Bowman to remove of the progressive Democrat and replace with the moderate Democrat. Why, because they felt like there's someone that they can more so work with, you know, when I say they, the Republican Party. So you'll see that the funding for the moderate Democrat sometimes come from Republicans, from those same funders that are funding Donald Trump and are funding Josh Holly, so moderate is someone to your point, you might be on the left, but they can tolerate you. - Yeah, you know, all this business about who's funding what? Can be very complicated. Certainly there's a problem with what's going on with Clarence Thomas right now. We know he's received two and a half million dollars in gifts over the last 20 years, and the rest of the court combined, every other judge, justice, during this entire time, they've brought in 250,000 worth, because this guy Crow is, you know, dumping money on Clarence Thomas for all kinds of bizarre ideas, which in fact, amazingly enough, it could even affect interracial marriage, which amazingly enough, Clarence Thomas is married to a white woman, but I guess he didn't notice that lately. Yeah. - Okay, no, you don't have, I mean, I don't have, honestly, I'm very sad and with what's happened with the Supreme Court. I mean, I think it is fairly safe to say, it's a reflection of our times probably, but the length to which the Supreme Court has, forget about the rulings themselves, which we shouldn't forget about, but just the fact that the six, I guess you really have to comment, Republican justices of the Supreme Court have so dutifully executed Donald Trump's delay strategy. I mean, reasonable people can disagree about any, you know, if you read Supreme Court decisions, which are very accessible, these are bright people on both sides. It's not like there's automatic answers, our sides right there, so as well, but it's pretty hard to argue, and I did wait through the decision recently. It's the most recent one on. - Immunity. - On immunity for Trump, and I thought that the dissents by Justice of Sotomayor and Katanji Brown Jackson were just remarkable. And you know, and Roberts wrote the main opinion, but the fact that they waited six, what, seven months, and they didn't have to, and not a word was written that could have been, this could have been easily adjudicated five, six years. - Easily. - Five, six months earlier. - Yeah, they were, it's hard to argue. We could, again, people can really, shouldn't respect each other's positions. It's hard to make a case for why they would have waited to the very last day, almost the last minute of the last day that they could act on this, when there was nothing about this that needed to wait till July 1st. - Well, and the ridiculous part of it is, is that if tomorrow morning, Joe Biden said, I think it's time, in my official capacity, to order that Donald Trump be murdered. - No, don't say that. - And no, I'm just saying. - Yeah, good, that's a good hypothetical. - The Supreme Court would approve it. I mean, it's part of what the Supreme Court has said. In your, in fact, they asked that question, and the Trump people said, yes, that Seal Team Six can do it. - It wasn't quite about that. You got to be careful 'cause we don't want to talk about it. - Yeah, that was kind of deep right there. - Yeah, I will say this, I was saying, I'll just, I will say this, the question in reverse, I like the point I had that really bothered me at the debate, which was not a great night for our side, was I wanted somebody to ask Donald Trump, if he felt that President Joe Biden, 'cause he made a reference to prosecuting Biden, and I said, I wanted him so badly to ask, and I'm not second-guessing the moderators to tough time, but I wanted to so badly to say, would you agree that Joe Biden is immune from any and all responsibility or liability, culpability for any action he had as president? Would you guarantee right now that Joe Biden, when he walks out of the presidency, doesn't have to worry about being indicted, doesn't have to worry about going to jail. - Because of your principle of presidential immunity, I would have just died to see that question. - By the way, Joe, you want to throw up on the screen here for us, Donald Trump's latest statement, this was from yesterday, this is where Donald is. Generally, he's been quiet. - What did he have for a second? - Well, okay, we're getting it up here. - Oh, okay. - Okay, okay, it's a little small, but I'll read it. Happy 4th of July to all, including to our highly incapable president who uses prosecutors to go after his political opponent, who choked like a dog during the debate. So let's stop there. Is that any way that people should be talking about each other? - No. - I mean, why are the people that think this is okay? But you know what, Americans, and for as I'm concerned, we look at social media, we are so rude to each other. You know, we are so rude to each other, and this is what gets your likes up. This is what your ratings up, you know, just being rude. And so continue on, because right now, your ratings are going up, why? Because this is what America loves to feed off of. Not all of us, but enough of us, that this would get the numbers out. So continue on, read on. - Yeah, I'm sorry, Joe, you can take it down. I'm not gonna read it. - No, no, no, no, no, read on, because the people want to hear it. - Well, it's course, it's what we are. - It's all like that. - Yeah. - You know what I'm saying? - Same horrible thing. - Because we are so used to being so cruel to each other. - Horrible things about Kamala Harris. - Yeah, I mean, we're used to being so rude to each other. There is no, there's limited harmony. And that is my concern. We want to talk about division. You know, we have to divide us up by gender, and divide us up by race, and this is just a divided country. And we're supposed to be united. And I'm just wondering, at what point will we become united? We're working towards it. We talk about civil rights. We talk about Jewish and blacks and LGBTQ. What, when will we become united? - It's a great question. - That's what we're striving for. - Yeah, it's well said. - But we get so excited. We get, you know, even, I'm with the new real SEO news. When I go in and I bring in information that's positive, ratings are very small. You know, I could probably get a few views. But if we put on there, oh my gosh, we found somebody in the river, all the numbers go up. I mean, we get everybody following, we get 150 shares, you know, millions of views. And I'm not, I'm not playing millions of views. You speak on something positive, and guess what happened? Burly, someone was shared. You might get a like, because Donald Trump, he knows to tap into what we are, what people are liking. They love the garbage. They love the trash. And what I'm seeing in our election at the local, at the state level, in the national level, is a lot of trash talking. It's sad. And that's my take on it all. - I don't know if I want to follow that, 'cause it's well, very beautifully stated. I would add this. I speak to a lot of, which is, I'm not gonna, what you said stands out and so on. I'll add my own experience as a politician, I guess, or a political candidate, I should call myself. Speaking mostly, like, democratic groups so far, I wanna, they buy out there, once they invite me to a bipartisan thing or a Republican thing, I'm ready to come. But speaking to Democrats, one of the things that Democrats are most receptive to them, is I tell them, 'cause I have a lot of criticism of Congresswoman Ann Weck, and her job, she does. But I say, very specifically, if you're looking for somebody to hate Ann Wegner, you're looking at the wrong person. I don't hate her, she's an American, we have different views, I don't question her intentions, I don't question her motives, and if you're looking for that, I'm not your guy. I'm not, and it's not like I'm trying to be, you know, to vacillate, because the views I have, for example, on reproductive freedom are not, I don't bend them, I have my views and I stick to them, or LGBTQ rights, or whatever we're talking about. But I'm with you, I wish we could get to a place where it's not, our side is, you know, is good, therefore, yours is evil. You know, I just don't, I'm just not into that. It's a, I guess my model is the TV show I was on for 37 years, Donnie Brook, where we argued loudly and passionately talking over each other and all that, but at the end of the day we're, and really disagree, but at the end of the day we're family. - That's it. - And that's how, that's my model, when I run, that is actually a big part of, you'd be surprised, I'm not out there, I've talked about some things today, but I, you know, to me, the issues, I think people want that, and I'm hoping to win partly because I'm not gonna be part of the partisan silo, and I'm gonna be, - You're, you're a policy. - That's not who I am. - You debate policy, and that's the question. - And you were great friends with Dugan. - Oh, he was one of my best friends in my entire existence, Martin Dugan, and Martin and I could not have disagreed more. In fact, I tell people that, you know, he died about 10 years ago at 93, and I'm sad that he's not here to vote against me, but, 'cause he was, but no, we were very close friends. And that's my model, I mean, it is my model, and it's not patronizing anybody, it's actually what I think. I believe my views strongly, I'm willing to defend them. I, of course, love to debate Ann Wagner any time anywhere. I actually was using any time anywhere, any subject, any moderator, and then I'll be down to Trumpton's stories. And I didn't see him for being, believe me. Mark Casein would be a great moderator for Ann Wagner and I. - Oh, yeah. - And, but I've offered it to a right-week conservative host. I said, believe she could, seriously, any conservative host, and I'd love that. I think it's a sign of disrespect, not to contradict what I was just saying. I do think it's a sign of disrespect, in our case, of our race, that we've got a congressman who's been off us 12 years, and never once debated an opponent. And it's not disrespect to the opponent, it's disrespect to the voters. And I don't think that's inconsistent, whatever I said, with what I just said about not hatin' her. It's just, that's the realm that we ought to keep things in. And all I said is, I think it's disrespectful, and that's how I look at it. - And I think you make a great point about something else, which a lot of people might be afraid of, but if you're moderating a debate, you owe it to the audience to be fair to both people. I mean, period. I mean, there's no pushing it one way or the other. It's just, it's not right. You know, you gotta realize now, unfortunately, we're in a situation where we've got people in the media being described as the enemy of the people, which makes me insane, because clearly they're not. In fact, it's so essential that we have a free and open media. I mean, the whole country was based on that. - Yeah. - I mean, it's what, it's parcel, what are I saying before, about the language of dictators. I mean, whether you're talking about immigrants poisoning the blood, which is, quite frankly, right out of-- - Who's out of Hitler? - That's Germany. - Who's out of Hitler? - I mean, he talks about his language. - Right. - And fake news, actually, is a phrase that has a German equivalent that the Hitler used, and certainly the enemy of the people is broadly speaking a common right, whether it's, forget about the emotion about Hitler, it's a common dictator's go-to, is that the media are, have to be demonized, because while the media is hardly perfect in our country, in any respect, that is the place, whether it's on the right or less silo, where, theoretically, you're getting facts that aren't necessarily filtered, and dictators don't like that. - Yeah, but the New York Times and the Washington Post, which are liberal, both tell on themselves when they make a mistake, and so does the Wall Street Journal, which is on the right, and so good newspaper people tell on themselves, I mean, that's just the way we do it. I mean, you know, now, if it's the National Enquirer and you've got David Pecker, well, that's a little different story. - Yeah, I agree. The Wall Street Journal is a terrific newspaper, and it's on the right, and as I say, there's different gradations on both sides of that, but I always tell people, if you wanna really be informed, read the other side, you gotta read the other side. I tell journalism, whatever it is, I mean that. And again, I don't wanna overstate this, but it's what I really believe. It's easy to, if all you read is what's in your silo, you're missing a lot. - Speaking of the other side, I think that we need to really take a look at that there are a number of youth, and especially black youth, black male youth, that are deciding to flip to Republican, a number. I've been hearing this, and so I spoke with someone today, and I'm like, well, why? And he sent me 10 links on why, 10 video links on why. - And off of TikTok, probably. - Not TikTok, it's you two, but nonetheless on why, this is something that we need to look at, that this is what's going to be a defining factor for this election, not just local, not just at the state level, but the national level. And reaching the young people, knocking on the door and reaching the young people, the young women, the young men, and especially the young black men, and getting their vote, and reaching out, and if you want their vote, you know what I mean? - Yeah! - Everybody want their vote, right? - Well. - And reaching these young people, they're gonna make a decision, and to define a decision for the votes, this election, I believe. - Yeah, and I predict, by the way, and I've been saying this all year, that in this election, the black vote is going to be about 8% for the Republicans. 8, 9, 10, 7, maybe. I mean, this thing is gonna change so dramatically, and anybody wanna comment on the interview tonight, and how that might affect what's happening? Joe Biden. - Oh, his. - It's seven o'clock tonight. - I'll tell you a minute, I'll interview you now. - No, yeah. - Well, Felicia-- - Well, listen, Felicia had no, she makes sense. No, I am. Well, look it, black men and women, if I may say, I think have to say, I mean, I always think it's funny when we say like, there's some assumption that black men and women should do anything in particular. They make decisions just like anybody else does. - Yeah. - This is white men and women. They make decisions based on the information and the-- - That's for them, for them, and I've heard the same thing, Felicia said, just the last week about a couple of young black men who, you know, in a workplace who feel in the 30s, pretty much the same thing. And, you know, I don't think that should be puzzling to people, people make that, whether they're white or black really doesn't make a difference, in terms of that. I don't-- - I was gonna say another population, and I don't know, we have to wrap up, but another population is a small business owner. - Sure. - To my understanding, small business owners are stating that they did much better with their taxes, their business taxes, underneath the Trump administration than they did with this current administration. So I don't know, because I don't own a business, but with me being in the media, this is just the conversation that I'm hearing. And so these are some of the things that we need to address and try to figure out, you know, what do we need to do? - Okay, and what we need to do is get out of here and remember that we're here because of Wenties and the St. Louis Sioux Company-- - This is a small business. - And Jules on Hampton headed to Wenties, right? - There you go, absolutely. And I, for obviously Ray and Felicia and Mark Kason, this is Showdown. - Showdown.