Showdown
Showdown Episode 94 7-1-24
(upbeat music) - Welcome to Showdown, I'm Mark Casein. And it is Monday, July the 1st. So as we move ourselves through summer, you might feel like it's just sort of a lazy quiet summer. We sure had a debate and that was supposed to be fireworks. Well, it wasn't exactly, however, in the last couple of days, end of last week and today. While it may not seem like that big of a deal, the Supreme Court has done some things that are beyond unbelievable. But I want to put it into perspective in a way that would help maybe people like me to understand part of it. And then people on the other side to also understand what's actually going on here. And I'm going to describe it this way. I'm going to first go all the way back to 1954, 1954 is when Fred Vincent, the previous Supreme Court chief justice died and he was replaced by Earl Warren, who had been picked by Dwight Eisenhower. And Eisenhower thought he was getting a typical conservative. This was a Republican governor from California. I've talked about this before. In the end, Eisenhower said this was the biggest mistake he made in his entire life. So fast forward to 2024 because after the 20 years of Earl Warren, which dramatically changed the way we live in the United States. In fact, let's not fast forward yet. Let me go back to the 1954, 1970s period. When I say it changed the way we lived dramatically, for example, they took God out of the classrooms, public schools had to stop anything related to religion. Couldn't teach the Bible. Couldn't teach 10 commandments. Couldn't teach anything. Couldn't start the day with the Lord's prayer, which often that was the way schools began. Couldn't do that anymore. 1954, of course, black people were treated fairly and given the opportunity to be free in the United States in ways that had never been so. Not even after the Civil War. Reconstruction, which had a lot of good things for black people. A lot of black people got elected to offices. Yes, but in 1876, I talked about this in the past, Rutherford P. Hayes came in and said, "Guys, no more federal troops protecting black people, "come and get 'em." And the Klan and the Nazis and everybody else did come to get black people at that time. But of course, this is the Jim Crow period in the United States, but you fast forward now from that to 1954 and suddenly all of this changed. America had to live differently. Black people had to be treated fairly and that was resisted big time. White people weren't gonna have it, they hated it. They did not want black people anywhere except for back of a bus or a train or somewhere isolated, segregated, that's it. Now, it's not just that. Yes, the Civil Rights Revolution, that was part of it. The end of religion in public places, that was part of it. But still more, the sexual revolution began as a result of birth control pills and all kinds of changes, believe me, it was a different time. Well, guess what? It's not happening today in reverse. Those bad people, they're pushing back. They wanna go back to where they were. But we'll talk about that later. Right now, we're gonna talk about something far more uplifting. Brother Dennis, how are you? How are you doing, sir? Hey, you know, I'm doing great. Man, busy as ever, but glad you're here. And of course, you're from the Urban League, right? That's right. Okay, and 10 years with the Urban League with working with Michael McMillan. And of course, he really gave you a tremendous opportunity to do some things. He did. To try to change the world in some positive ways in St. Louis. And we're gonna talk about that. The name of your program, tell me about that. Well, save our son's program started in 2014, first class started in 15th of January, where I was instrumental in being able to place the first three participants that had come through the program. And our extraordinary CEO, Michael McMillan, he really sought after an economic solution to a age-old problem that said African-American males and other individuals who have become incarcerated at the background were three to six times it's likely not to be hired versus the counterparts of any other ethnic group or any gender group. Yeah, and that's a major problem for sure. But unfortunately, I wanna even extend it beyond that. Because, and I've talked about this many times over the years and even recently, I came from the stock market, the stock brokerage business. And I can tell you, I can tell you in the early days when I first became a stockbroker advisor back in 1970, I was well aware and always talked about the fact that the securities business kept black people out. I can tell you. Definitely, definitely. Very few black advisors. Okay, now, could there have been black advisors? Well, of course there could have been. I mean, what'd you have to do? You go to school, you learn about it, and you get a job. But this was intentional. Black people were intentionally kept out of this business. Now, here we are, and we've done a lot of things in this country, positive, we know that black people are not treated that way anymore in a lot of different areas. But, I assure you, in the securities business, it is still very difficult for black people to get big positions. Very tough. Correct. And it's. And I would say that's over. In most corporate sector occupations, there's a little bit of racial disparities and gender disparities, there's always gonna be prevalent. Yeah, no question about it. And I can tell you too, that, like for example, if I say that, the first thing that's gonna happen is some white guy, or let's say it better. Some old white guy is gonna say, wait a minute. The chairman of the board of American Express was a black man. Well, okay, that's one. All right, all right. We need it to be true, not the exception. Right. It's totally marginal. And that's really the, you know, I guess the ideology of a devout bigot that would think that just because one person that's made some segue in society, that that's just something that you can make a blanket statement for all. But there's really no sense of inclusion nor equity, you know, because we spoke on equality from the civil rights bill, but as we move past it in modern times, it seems that we need more equity and more opportunity to actually be, you know, a concerted effort made towards bringing more people of diverse backgrounds and of color and to, you know, this thing that we call capitalism 'cause it's for everybody, it's an American thing. Yeah. And sadly, we know that, like you say equity, you know, diversity, equity and inclusion, I mean, those are like dirty words. In 2024, I mean, for white people. Yeah. I mean, they've gone berserk with this all over the country and they're determined to stamp it out. No. Yeah, it was very convoluted right now. You know, diversity and inclusion and equity, that tends to, you know, overextend beyond the traditional minorities who have been, you know, for centuries, marginalize in this country. And now they pretty much convoluted with a lot of other different groups that kind of take the focus off of what, you know, the real focus of it is, is just trying to get African American males someplace in society because we've already led the campaign when it comes to anything negative, as far as being the most incarcerated, as far as being the most to be laid off from a job or not to reach some type of educational benchmark. So it's high time that, you know, we allow us to store, you know, being able to lead the race in some of the more positive aspects of this country. Yeah. And I had an opportunity a few days ago to speak to a group of about 50 young people actually going into high school. They were at the Y over on page. So I know you know where that is. It'd be five, five pages, yes, sir. There you go, okay. And, you know, you know, Jake Henderson? Yes. Yeah, so Jake is the one who pulled all this together at the Y and I've worked with him with, you know, Missouri youth in government and we'll be doing a lot more of that this year. And I know this is sort of overlapping with you all. I mean, these are people that you work with. Yeah, yeah. So I have a great opportunity to speak to these 50 young black kids and we had a great conversation. I mean, it was amazing. And when I say it was amazing, I was supposedly there to talk about careers, but it wasn't about careers. It was about how do you see yourself in the world and what kind of a person do you wanna be? How do you wanna identify yourself in society and think about how you can use that in order to fit into the world in a way that will eventually get you a job? Right. So yeah, talk to me about something like that in terms of your kids. Definitely, well, as you alluded to Mr. Case and that in order to be a man, you must see a man. And if we don't have representation that's adequate enough for those young black youth to be able to see and visualize how really can they for certain put themselves in the picture of prosperity. And that's one of the main reasons that, you know, working at Save Our Sons has really been a blast for me because it allowed me the autonomy to be very creative and unconventional in my pursuits of trying to reach this young population, this high school age population and even going as far as talking to the young children who are in third grade because, you know, as you know by the third grade map testing scores, they can kind of pre-detect, pre-determined how many prison cells that they're gonna need because it's a direct link to a lack of education, a lack of having resources and opportunity, it oftentimes leads you down the road to crime. So what I'm able to do working at the Save Our Sons is I've been partnering with the Ferguson, School District for six years now. I'm at the McClure North High School and we're doing a class that's Save Our Sons, but it's a hybrid of a class because we interject a program that I co-founded with my partner, Blake Ash, we call the Institute of Urban Capitalism. And we not only talk about, you know, how to get a job because that's pretty much the first wrong of the ladder. On being successful, it's knowing how to dress for success, knowing how to speak and articulate your strengths or your weaknesses in a professional setting. We also talk about life skills and talk about, you know, how to become a good capitalist in this country or the Whiffam Clause, which is W-I-I-F-M and it stands for what's in it for me. So we oftentimes speak on racism and things that impact African-American males, but we don't use it as dogma. We more or less talk about the facts of it and let it be known that racism only can really work if you allow it to seep into you and how you respond to racism is really the end factor of, you know, how we get up with mobility in your life to be able to be able to take, go against those odds and utilize mentors, you know, bidding to all the people who are professional in our community that we need mentors, you know, and me and my partner have been doing it for six years, but of course, every movement dies if you just have a head. So we always would like to plead to the community to step in, you know, even if you don't have children as a man, you owe a certain civic responsibility to your community, mentor for these young men who are losing their way, a lot of pop culture icons or causing our kids to go astray from what's really moral decency. And today I think it's a crime almost to, you know, have moral decency and have some sort of spirituality because everything gets so politicized. But what we're able to do in that program is teach these kids how to think like a capitalist. There's a mantra that we teach them every day that says, I am a capitalist, only I protect my interests. I measure success and failure in dollars and cents. I never stop seeking opportunities and I never stop building relationships. And within that thought process that really equates, you know, what success is about in the American dream to having a good character, that constitutes credibility, integrity, and accountability, teaching a young man how to own up to their mistakes, not using external sources for why they didn't, you know, quite make the mark because no one's perfect. So we give them room to make errors, but at the same time not just having kids listen to a speech but getting them engaged and getting them to open up, doing role playing events to where we teach them how to talk to a loan officer. If you ever wants to get in the situation where you had a small business idea and you wanted to present that to somebody that could possibly fund your entity. So we think about the business plan that it takes, the executive summaries, elevator speeches, teaching them how to have an assertive attitude. And it's a thing that says that well-spoken people often make more money. So when we emphasize those sorts of things, you should really see Mark Howe. It really galvanizes those participants in the class. We stay with them for the entire school year and we give them our own, you know, certificates at the end of those classes. And a lot of times they don't just drop off because these are kids that are already been identified as youth that will not go to the four to six year traditional college, you know, program, but maybe we can get them to get into the trades program or maybe we can spark that idea that lets them know that they still need some sort of education to become entrepreneurs. So it's always more than one way and that's the beauty of America, that you don't have to be a blue blood or you don't have to come from a royal family to a massive sort of wealth. And, you know, we got to stop telling kids that it's okay to just get props and just get big respect, but you have to have some kind of paycheck at the end of the day 'cause, you know, capitalism will always be here so we might as well learn how to play the game. - Yeah, well, all that's for sure. And one of the things that I've said for a long time is that if you're looking to end crime and if you're looking to build resources and wealth in the black community, that one of the ways to do that is to aim towards building an army of black PhDs because I can tell you right now, black PhDs are, first of all, they'll never commit a crime because PhDs don't do that, you know? And plus, you educate people to that degree, I know it sounds extreme to some people, but on the other hand, you know what they do with their kids? The same thing. They both-- - Oh, definitely. Yeah. 'Cause, you know, the PhD goal is a high lofty goal for some, but at the same respect, we're at a point in this country where we need to teach moral decency. And, you know, once you reach a point of moral decency and having these good characteristics where you can earn trust and understand what your word is about having credibility when you're telling people you can do something or you can't, you know, we can't put the court before the horse. We have to teach people how to assimilate into society because that's what I run into as a big problem when I'm dealing with the reentry population of a gentleman who are their father's age and older is that we expect them to just hit the ground running. But if you haven't been having an example, if you haven't had access to resources or whatever system that works or does not work, pretty much institutionalizes young people and people who have been incarcerated on this is who you are. You failed us, we won't give you a second chance. So we really need to speak to the spirits as well. Let's talk about the educational aspect because, you know, a man can't live off bread alone. So he needs that word as well, you know, to kind of have a holistic approach. I've always been an advocate for having a holistic impact on individuals and, you know, educating them to all facts, not just, you know, the engineering and the STEM and technology, but understanding economics, understanding what civic pride is about, understanding what it means to be in a country that says we the people, you know, because if we don't feel like we're a part of the system or part of this country, then it's very hard to get on any type of pursuit if you feel ostracized. - Yeah, and I can tell you too, that the times when Mike McMillan has come up to Cardinal Ritter to talk to my students, my government students, every single time, he says the same thing to the kids. I know that they're not all taken advantage, probably none of them are, or very few, but he says, look, he says, I've had this done to me and I'm willing to do this for you. And here's what it is. - You got my phone number, here it is. You call me up and you say, McMillan, I need your help. Do something, help me. - Obsess a bit. - Okay, yeah, and he says, you may think I'm saying it, I don't mean it, but I mean it. He says, if you do it, he says, you are going to be very pleased and surprised. Now, I know they're not doing it, okay? I know they're not, but he's trying, you're trying, I'm trying, we're all doing everything we can to reach out to you. - We need a total community, Mark. You know, it's just like the teacher's struggle in the education system of trying to get those messages to get home, but if you don't have any parents at home that's on board and on the same page, then you don't typically have their reinforcement. - That's right. - And that's exactly what we need. We need people to advocate, we need sounding boards. Even if you don't have the PhD, you have the influence in you to inspire a young person to achieve that said goal. And like you said, Mr. McMillan is one of those great guys and it's a dying breed actually, because not a lot of people that reach his height of success that will still be easily accessible. A lot of people that reach his level tend to have assistants sitting next to the assistant that'll block those calls and screen them, you know, but that makes it kind of unrealistic. But that's what it's been a real honor to work for the Urban League, where he's strategically highest people that are from the community, not just an industry plan, if you will, but a person that comes home grown from the community as a vested interest, and he's gonna answer those phone calls. He's gonna make some of those house visits. And you know, and actually take somebody by the hand and walk them through it, 'cause everybody needs some kind of guidance, man. And I don't believe that it's nobody, no matter what social, economic background they have, that someone didn't perhaps forego something to give you an opportunity to be successful. - That is absolutely 100%. And part of it is like what you said as far as what's in the home. And that's why, you know, by growing this highly educated class of black people who then have kids, and then bring their kids into the same world, hey, that's what we need. And it can be done, I know lots of black PhDs, lots of them. - Me too. - Me too, intergenerational. That's what we need, an intergenerational network of individuals who use the old for wise counsel and the young people for all these new movements. You know, as in the Bible it says that young men have visions and old people have dreams. And we have to find a way to meet in the middle because there's a serious gap and a divide in those generations where some of these great elder statesmen in our community are dying with all of this useful and invaluable information in their minds. We're never being able to have some student or apprentice or someone that can at least shadow these guys or at least take a note down to see how they made it to the top. And that's what I think we're really missing. You know, coming from Matthew Sticky Boys and Girls Club, that's the way I grew up and that's the way I strive to be in my pursuits today. It's, you know, just try to give back, man. If I haven't helped anyone, I don't feel like life is really as sweet as it really could be, man. - Yeah, no, that's right. And I love the Urban League for this and for empowering people like you to get to the kids and to help them to grow as well. Yeah, so important. And, you know, one of the questions that I ask these kids over at the Y is I ask them, how many, when they go to school in the fall, how many could say that they're excited to be in the classroom? And, in a quarter. - Curly. - Ains that. - Go ahead, say it again. - They're probably more angst than excited. - Yeah, yeah, they're not excited. They all said, you know, in the schools that they attend that they've said, yeah, the schools aren't bad. They said, but, no, they do not go to school in the morning thinking, wow, I cannot wait to get into that classroom. And if we're not doing that, then there's a problem. I'm talking about us. We need to make a deal that way to them. - Yep, it's a total cultural problem, you know, because like I said, if it's not the rule, and it's only the exception for, you know, a lot of African American households to push their kids to be excited about education and excited about, you know, enrichment, then we're gonna see that paradigm shift of individuals who underplay themselves. They become a self-check. Racism doesn't have to work, you know, why? Because racism has already got into the brains who works like a cancer, and it keeps you as a self-check to where you don't see what's in it for you. You don't realize, you know, the time that you're wasting is basically counting you out, simply as a person doesn't know how to stand up and be counted when the Census Bureau comes through, you know, different communities. And they don't realize that if you don't be counted and you don't get with the program, then those are resources and things that won't hit your community. And that's the way that we have generational poverty happening the way it is in this country today. It's like, it's a learned behavior. We need to unlearn a lot of things. And, you know, educate these parents as well, 'cause the parents and grandparents are getting much younger these days and have far less, you know, good influence on these kids. - Yeah, let me ask, what can people do to help you all at the Urban League? What would you say to somebody watching that thinks, "Gee, I'd like to help." What could they do to help? - Well, as our president and the CEO would say, "We need your time, your talent, and your treasure." Whatever, you know, that you can make, you know, available to the community through this agency, we are open doors to all of that, whether that's a person that has job opportunities if you're a business owner, to be able to make some entry-level jobs. There are a lot of felony-friendly jobs as well, because me working in re-entry, you know, second chance hiring opportunities is always near and dear to my heart. But the Urban League always wants to get the messaging out. We need parents that want to support these initiatives, because if we have more people requesting this sort of help, then it will be our obligation to find, you know, funding to have these same programs. So we can only be as good as the community that we serve. So if you have jobs to make available, if you want to work for the Urban League, you can always hit ulsto.com on the career section, where we're always hiring people for these different exciting programs that we're running. If you just want to simply join the Urban League Guild, that's another auxiliary program where you could be a part of community outreach and community development initiatives. We have the Federation of Black Units who work really closely in the inner city under the leadership of James Clark and a work with Farrah God, Shegog. They're known for mobilizing African-American communities. They just had a Black Wall Street that was very successful in the community of Wellston. We have the Clean Sweep Initiative. If you want to get a part of something that was formerly like Operation Brightside, then we have those available, too, under the Public Safety Initiative at the Urban League. So there's really many things. You know, we have the Gaylors, the Salute to Women. We have the Urban Expo that is really coming up next month. It's going to be very big. We're giving away book bags. We're giving away household products, all those amenities that kind of makes the house into a home. We're having a big job fair, where we're going to be doing soft interviews. So it's just a number of things that anyone could do. You know, refer a friend. If you know someone looking for a job, you know someone down on their luck who's been incarcerated, you can actually tell them to come and see about the Save Our Sons Reentry Program. So it's really an endless a plethora of our good social and community services that you can get from the Urban League. Just please tell a friend and sign up and join the Urban League's mission, our Whitney M. Young Society. That's another great initiative for our Fortune 300, Fortune 500 type of individuals who want to have a philanthropical heart and give back to some of those initiatives because without resources, we fall to the wayside. So, you know, that's pretty much my spell. - Yeah. And I want to emphasize again another name that you brought up and that's James Clark. And it's really kind of interesting. If you look back far enough in time, about 30 years, you will find that a lot of these people were attached in various ways to the Freeman Bosley administration when Freeman became the first black mayor in the city of St. Louis. - Absolutely, yeah. - Absolutely, he and Helen were partners. They were buddies since they were teenagers and they were actually molded to be these leaders that you see today. So it really makes me want to emphasize that even more that the leaders aren't just created out of thin air. These leaders are mentored and developed and pointed in the direction where they can be successful. And since they both had that type of tool list to help them in their path, they've helped literally thousands of individuals in the same way. And that's how the Urban League is built. It's off neighbor, helping neighbor. It's off of real people with real community and servant hearts. They really want to make the best changes in their community. - Yeah, and by the way, I have an individual that I am aware of who is a convicted felon. And no, he's not black, but he is a white guy, but he's a convicted felon. I don't know, maybe you could help Donald Trump. He's gonna need some help. - Man, I'm willing to help anybody who's the starting position of this world. And I do help my white brothers as well. You will probably see over the past three or four years since 2021, when I came to the transition center of St. Louis, it used to be just African American males that were in the say of our son's reentry. But now I would say it's 65 to 70% Caucasian brothers that are in there. Because the truth of the matter is, when you become incarcerated, you're basically a felon, a fellow minority. And you get to see what real discrimination looks like. So that's not a person, whether they're from the rural areas of Missouri and Crystal City are. They're from the projects, the concrete blocks of downtown city. They want good things in their lives. No one really wants to be living a life of crime. And I don't speak a black or white agenda, but I talk about, you know, united agenda. I'm talking about a human battle, because, you know, what's good for us is gonna be good for our brothers next to us, you know? So that's really what it's about. Well, let's see if we can incarcerate Donald over at Rikers. And then after that, we'll try to bring 'em to you. And maybe you can help 'em out to reenter society. It would be a good thing. Yeah, that'd be very helpful of you. Yeah, you know. Hey, listen, I really appreciate the time. Brother Dennis, you're always a good friend and a friend to everybody at the Urban League. And as you said, ulstl.com, right? That's correct, that's correct. Okay, ulstl.com, okay. Yes, we are looking for exciting people who care about their community in a real way. Okay, and don't forget too, I've got this big event at Washington University, a student town hall meeting coming up on September 21st, I sent you the flyer, but I'll remind you, we get into the new school year and you've got those students from McClure North, I know. And then I've got my good friend, Isaiah Melendez, who's at McClure High School and many others around town. And we're gonna bring together a really cool group of kids to come and talk about where we are in September as we head towards one of the most important and consequential elections in our history. Yes, please believe it, please believe it. I had to be a part of it, man. And before I go, please, if you're interested in what I'm teaching those kids in the Ferguson Forest School District, go to the IUC.org. That's my personal webpage, where I talk about my capitalism curriculum. It's very, very impactful. And again, we're always looking for volunteers who are interested in joining this movement, 'cause there's a movement of capitalism and it's more American than apple pie. Well, that's another thing we can talk about too. You know, I have many students these days that come to my classroom at Cardinal Ritter and each day, they just wanna know what the stock market's doing that day and get an idea about where stocks are and what's going on and how it could affect them and what can they do. And maybe we can help bring some of that to some of your students as well. - Man, I would love it, man. You know, a great idea would be to bring Wall Street to St. Louis, to Middle America and set up, you know, workstations, computer labs where young people can actually actively participate in the stock exchange. That would be an awesome idea. So I'm hoping I'm speaking that into an existence for another program that we can possibly, you know, get off the ground. - We will talk about that and with Zoom, they don't even have to go anywhere. We can get them on Zoom. They can get together with other students and we're just coming up with an idea here. We'll work on it. - That's right. Love this energy, brother. - Brother Dennis, thank you. - Yes, sir, great. - Okay. - Thank you. - You bet. - Okay, so Brother Dennis from the Urban League. Let me talk to you about what you can get for dinner in maybe a half hour, 45 minutes, even later. It's all okay. You can go to our very, very good friend, Ben. And he is, of course, it's so funny, you know. Joe's in there waiting for me to, okay. I'll say it, okay. Wenties, yes. Wenties is an 18,000 Chesterfield Airport Road and they've got great food. You'll love it. First of all, they're the wings and everybody loves the wings, not me, but that's all right. Everybody else, you know, like 300 million people in America eat wings and not case. And what can I tell you? But everybody does and they're really good at wenties. Now they have smoked meat. They have hamburgers and cheeseburgers and patty melts and pizza, excellent pizza at wenties. They've got my favorite. Babyback ribs and onion rings. That's great food, along with all the other things I've mentioned. At wenties, it's all great. There's a lot in there that's really healthy. They've got great salads. It's just a fun atmosphere. Everybody that goes to wenties loves it. They love the food. They love where they're eating. They love the people. Go to wenties. And beyond 18,000 Chesterfield Airport Road, there's also the new wenties, which is the Roadhouse in defiance. So if you go there, it's 29.99 South Highway 94, same great food that you can get at wenties here in Chesterfield Valley, but you can go out there to defiance and continue to eat all that great food at wenties. You'll love it. Now, if you're interested in jewelry, 4506 Hampton in St. Louis is the place that's Jules on Hampton. And I promise you, whatever you're looking for, you're gonna find it at Jules on Hampton. They have cases and cases and cases of jewelry, really nice items that you can just go in and look and see what you can find there. Now, if you have things that you wanna design yourself, well, you can do that at Jules on Hampton. You can take it into Allen AJ and tell them what you want. They'll help you to put that together. Or if you say, look, I'm interested in your creativity. Allen AJ will help you with that as well because they are extremely creative and very terrific at designing jewelry. They will buy and sell coins and jewelry at great prices for everybody involved. And on top of it, when you're through at Jules on Hampton and you're ready to walk out, you might look at your watch to see what time it is. And oh my God, the watch doesn't work. So what are you gonna do? Well, you're gonna go to Allen say, please fix my watch because they do it and they're very good at it. And you know, if you have something really excellent, a great piece that you just wanna make sure is safe, take it to Allen AJ and they'll repair it at Jules on Hampton. Now, when it comes to great clothing, St. Louis Suit Company is the best. They're at Forsythons Central in Clayton and they've been there for 29 years. They have the best suits, the greatest sport coats. And I can assure you that in 2024, the new fashion is sport coats, that's a big thing. And personally, I've got my suits. I've got some sport coats as well, all bought at the St. Louis Suit Company. And I've gone out and picked up some brand new jeans and I can wear different jeans with my suit jacket, with my sport coat, because that's now fashionable. And then you'll wear that with your chucks. And I mean to tell you, everybody thinks you are really cool. That's just what's going on in 2024. So if you wanna fit in, you wanna look great, go to the St. Louis Suit Company. Don't forget the ties. Those ties are $5 and I promise you, they are fabulous ties, beautiful designs. They're silk and that $5 price is just beyond belief. And every time I say to somebody, hey, this tie is $5, they look at me and they go, really, where's that place again? So that's the deal. Central and Forsyth in Clayton, go to the St. Louis Suit Company, see Jay and Nick, they are great people. And also don't forget, if you're getting married or if you're going to a wedding and you need wedding attire, same thing. St. Louis Suit Company is the place to go. They're the experts in St. Louis when it comes to wedding attire. St. Louis Suit Company in Clayton. Okay, so let me back up now to where I was when I briefly started this discussion which I'll undoubtedly take into tomorrow as well. But I wanna make this point because it's really important to understand a lot of conservatives were just as angry about the way the country changed in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s as we are by what the Supreme Court and some of these right-wing cooks are doing today. There was a widespread belief that the commies were coming to get us. They were creating this sexual revolution. They were causing us to have to deal with black people in our places of work and where we live. I mean, there were all these white people. They were so happy with Jim Crow and keeping black people out of the lives of white people in America. And this was really a major change. It really upset people. One of the cases was a loving versus Virginia where the loving family was allowed to get married, white and black couple. And we used to put people like that in jail in America. But no, when the Supreme Court changed it, suddenly, this is fair game. Everybody can be together. Well, there were a lot of people back then that didn't like it. And you know what, in reverse, it's the same thing today. People like me who are talking about diversity and equity and inclusion, like we just discussed with brother Dennis, believe me, we're very upset because we can see it going back to those days. I mean, it'll never get there. But we can see the effort. It's being pushed that way everywhere you look and it's happening at the Supreme Court. It happened this week in a way that is so profound that there's just no question. People like me very upset in the same way that the right-wing kooks were very upset when we started changing social conditions in the 1950s, '60s and '70s. When we talk about culture wars, this is what we're talking about. These were people that were trying to change America's culture. Take religion out of public arenas where government was in any way connected because the idea was, you know, separate church and state. The Supreme Court said it. They meant it and they've put it into effect for all of these years. But believe me, it's even deeper than that. Take Miranda. You know that when somebody is arrested, the police are supposed to read them their rights. Believe me, that came out of Earl Warren, 1962, Miranda. This was not something in the Constitution. The rights are in the Constitution, but the Supreme Court said it's not enough just that people have their rights. When they're arrested, they need to know what those rights are. Brown versus Board of Education, black people had to be allowed to go to school with everybody else. Created a lot of bad feelings. You had federal troops that had to show up at schools in order to let black students in. And, you know, it wasn't like the Supreme Court said, this is gonna be the new way we do it. And everybody said, okay, if the court said it, then we'll just do it. Uh-uh. They fought back everywhere they could. Now, here we are in 2024. And what have we done? We've ended affirmative action. Because again, it's this culture war aspect to all of this. The people who have been so upset for 50 years at the way our society has changed. Well, they're pushing back. They've got a couple of people on their side that are pushing with them very hard. Naturally, Sam Alito and Clarence Thomas. They're leading the way. Yes, Clarence Thomas is black, but a lot of people in the black community think he would like to be white. Sorry, he can't be, but he can certainly be supportive enough of white rights to get, you know, white billionaires giving him millions of dollars for the kinds of opinions that he has brought to the court. So yeah, you know, the people on my side, we're not so happy about any of this. We don't like it at all. We see this as reversing the very best of what the United States had become. We felt that the United States was beginning to follow a lot of the language that came out of the founding of this country. But for this other group, about half of our country, almost, they look at it as something else. They look at it as their lifestyle was crushed, their ability to crush other people, to keep immigrants out of America, to keep black people out of schools and restaurants. Women, they shouldn't be voting. What's that about? And healthcare for women? Hey, we've got to stop that. That's just promoting the sexual revolution anyway. You know, all of this is what's going on today. It's an attempt to reverse everything that Earl Warren did when Eisenhower said that it was the biggest mistake he ever made in his life. And I promise you, that is what is going on. And let me start again with something that was done late last week. And that was the end, the reversal of the 1984 decision, the Chevron decision, because that created something called Chevron deference, where we, in a very progressive way, said that agencies all over the United States, FCC, FAA, EPA, IRS, FBI, everybody, all of these administrative agencies, they were the experts. Let them make decisions about the best way to implement laws when Congress has been in any way uncertain about how they wanted it to take place, let these agencies make those decisions. And for 40 years, that's how we've lived. Now, I understand we overturned Roe v. Wade, and certainly Donald did promise that, and he delivered it. But it's so much more complicated, because this is all part of this project 25, 2025 business, which is essentially an attempt to rewind everything that was done by Earl Warren and his courts in the '50s and '60s and '70s. This is an attempt to go back to another era in US history, an era that many of us are very upset about. We think it's very harmful to the country, but there are others who are dreaming of the day when black people don't have to be in our schools anymore, when women don't have to vote anymore. I mean, maybe they're not gonna get it as far as they'd like it, but they're gonna push it as far as they can get it. And let me show you something, and let's see if we can do a little work here on the screen and help you to see what I'm talking about. So if we can bring up the MSNBC migration chart with Ratner in there. Okay, so yeah, you can't see Ratner, that's okay, you don't need to see him. Here's what you got. This was this morning on MSNBC, but these charts have been everywhere. I've talked about 'em over and over, and we've got an article on my website at talkstl.net, and if you go in there and read the article, it will tell you all about the charts that I'm showing you right now. And let me explain what this is. So first of all, the three lines on the left are violent crime in the United States, and the dark blue line, and remember, I'm colorblind, but I think I can handle this, that dark blue line is, guess what? American citizens, people who grow up in the United States, born in the United States, and they commit crimes at the highest levels, violent crimes. And then you go down in the middle, and I guess that's purple, I think, I don't know, whatever it is, that one is legal immigrants. Those are people who have migrated to the United States and are properly documented, and they're legal, and they commit the second highest level of crimes. And then the third, which I guess is yellow, I'm gonna say, or green, something like that, that one, which is way down at the bottom. What a surprise, those are undocumented immigrants. Those are the people who are crossing the border who Donald says are destroying our country, that they're murderers, that they're drug users, they're selling drugs, they're tearing our country apart. Now, you see the numbers. This is from the United States government, you know, this is us, these are our numbers, and you can see very low crime among the undocumented, those people that Donald says are coming over here and causing chaos, absolutely the opposite. They're coming over here and just trying to find a place to live in a way to exist outside of the horrible countries that they've come from, and that's the first numbers. And then the next set of numbers, you can see again, these are different levels of crime, different kinds of crime, and in each case, American citizens, people born here, grew up here, lived here, they commit the highest level of crimes, and then below them are the legal immigrants, they're legal, they've been here for long enough to start to learn from real Americans how to do the bad things, and then of course, in the second group, the crime among undocumented immigrants is so low, you can't even see it on the chart here because of the way I took the picture. And the same thing on the right-hand side too, you can see that again, every aspect of crime, most committed by people who are living here, who are born here, American citizens, people who we can't get rid of, and then the people that we wanted to deport, or at least the Donald wants to deport, that's some legal immigrants under certain circumstances and certainly the illegal undocumented immigrants, they commit the least crimes of anybody. So you can go around in life and believe, you can pull that off, thank you very much Joe. If you wanna go around in life and believe that immigrants are destroying this country, and that we need Donald, and we need a wall, and we need everything that we can get to keep black people from Africa out of here, the ones that Donald says are poisoning the blood of America, well you can see the numbers, none of it is true, it's not even remotely true, it's not even close to true, but Donald says it, and then some crazy person on his side actually believes it, because I guess they don't wanna look at the numbers, but the numbers are clear. Just like I've pointed out that there are people, and I mean this is even including progressives, 75% of America thinks the crime is at an all time, 50 year high, when the truth is, again, same government statistics, all of our crime overall is at a 50 year low, while people are walking around, crying and screaming and threatening and having all these problems over the crime that they think is coming to get them, the truth is it's dropping off rapidly, and everything that's being said about it, all it's doing is stoking fear among people in the United States, but it's fear that's unfortunately it's unwarranted, they don't know what they're talking about, and let me also say, and I'm gonna go to some, I got some great language to read to you, but we're gonna deal with that tomorrow, but I will tell you that one of the places that you need to look at is what's happening in Europe, because in France over the weekend, there was an amazing victory in the French election for the far right neo-Nazis, and these are people who really, and this is what's being talked about all over the world today, first of all, they won in the European Union a month earlier, and then Macron called a special election, hoping that he could really get rid of this mess and show that the French people don't want it, and instead, he got exactly what he didn't wanna see, and this was the first round of voting, there's another round of voting that's coming up next weekend, and I know that Macron is pushing hard to try to use this brief period of time to encourage people, and this is what he's trying to point out, that this, what they voted for is a return to what they called, during the Nazi era, the Vichy government, and the Vichy government was a government that was run by collaborators with Hitler, this was a Nazi government in France, and it dominated all the way through World War II until World War II was won by our side, by the democracies, and then, of course, in France, the person who was most revered for his work against Vichy was General Charles de Gaulle, and de Gaulle, of course, became the president of France, and was, was and is highly respected and regarded throughout the French society. Unfortunately, though, this right-wing illness that is coming into other countries throughout Europe, as well as, unfortunately, the United States of America as well, all this neo-Naziism is coming across the world, and unfortunately, this time around, the United States is catching this disease at the same time, it's very disconcerting. We'll talk more about this tomorrow, and I'll do some reading for you as well at that time. Right now, though, I just wanna remind you, Wenties and Jules on Hampton, and, of course, the St. Louis Sioux Company in Clayton. Those are all important people for us. This is Showdown, I'm Mark Casein.