NASA’s Artemis II And The Case For National Greatness

America is aiming for the Moon again, and I can’t stop thinking about what that says about us. NASA’s Artemis II isn’t just a headline about rockets and astronauts, it’s a test of whether we still believe in building big things that take courage, skill, and time. We talk through the mission, why a lunar base and even a nuclear powered path to Mars matter, and why “America will never again give up the Moon” lands as more than a cool quote. 

Then we snap back to life on the ground: the federal shutdown, TSA workers stuck without pay, and the political fight over DHS funding and ICE. I break down the argument over who is holding what hostage, why incentives matter in negotiations, and why the TSA itself has become a symbol of expensive systems that frustrate people without delivering results. 

From there, we move into Texas: new Senate committee chair appointments, concerns about entrenched committee power, and why “red state” problems can still be created by Republicans who do not act conservative once they get comfortable. We also dig into school choice and Texas Education Freedom Accounts, including why a major Christian school supports the idea but refuses the money over fears of future audits and rule changes that collide with religious autonomy. Finally, we cover the landmark verdict against Meta and YouTube over addictive design and what it means for parents trying to raise kids in a screen soaked culture, before closing with the Ken Paxton and Kelly Hancock clash tied to TEFA litigation. 

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Transcript

Welcome And Artemis II News

SPEAKER_13 0:00

Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen. I'm your host, Michael Wilson, and you're listening to the Lone Star Conservative brought to you by Texellent AC Service. You guys might have heard was that was that sexist? I've been told that that's a sexist line saying you guys, and because that doesn't include uh females. You guys and ladies, I'm hearing updates uh that NASA is going back to the moon for the first time in what half a century? Uh we kind of gave up the moon, which is pretty sad if you think about it. Uh, but apparently NASA's Artemis II moon mission is planned to launch in less than a week. I think a week from yesterday is the planned launch. And for the first time in 50 years, we're gonna have a crewed rocket that's gonna fly around the moon. Uh, they're gonna launch four astronauts on a 10-day journey around the moon before coming back to Earth. NASA administrator Jared Isaacman, listen to this quote. Jared Isaacman said, This is the most important human spaceflight mission in more than half a century, sending astronauts farther than ever before. America will again, will never again give up the moon. I'm sorry, I just think that's such a cool line. You know, when when men of of greatness say a sentence that's so quotable, like you look back at a lot of kings and Christians and what have you, and I don't know how they do this. Because all of my quotes are just kind of me talking. I don't know if you could listen to what I'm saying and pull out some sort of, wow, listen to the the truth in that single sense. Like obviously I'm preaching the truth, and I like to think I do pretty good at it, but I don't think I have many quotable moments. But somehow, these men that do actual great things, they seem to just, I don't know where it comes from. I don't know if they're like prepping this out in their head. I I don't know. But they seem to manage all of them to have things you can say that they said centuries later and just think, wow, that is a baller sentence. That is a great statement. This is kind of the America will never again give up the moon. I never would have said that sentence. I I cannot picture myself, other than quoting this guy. I could never picture myself, I believe that the moon should be ours. We're the greatest country in the history of the world. We should, of course, have the moon. It should be, we got there. It's ours. We keep it. Finders, keepers, losers, weepers. Sorry, Russia. Like it's our it's our moon. And I would have said it like that. I'm not sure I was capable of producing a sentence like America will never again give up the moon. It's pretty incredible stuff. Uh, but NASA administrator uh Jared Isaacman also provided this detailed assessment of NASA the day before yesterday, uh, saying that it's going to bolster the moon mission. They're also going to affect the Houston-led Gateway program, as well as two local companies that are developing commercial space stations. Isaacman, uh confirmed as NASA's leader back in December, wants to accelerate the pace of course at which NASA innovates and launches big missions that explore the moon, develop new technologies, and simulate off-planet economies. Which, by the way, what's the point of NASA if they're not doing that? I mean, space exploration is, can I just say, I I the best word I think I can use is very cool. It's one of those things that once you reach a certain level, it's like playing a board game or a video game, any sort of game at all where you level up. You kind of get if you've ever played a video game at all, you've you've had this happen. Other than like a lot of the new battle royales, a lot of the old games, especially, by the end of the game, you had more weapons, more inventory, your health was your health bar was much higher than it was at the beginning of the game. And of course, you were a better player. And so by the end of the game, you were doing things you never could have imagined you did at the start of the game. That's kind of NASA in the real in real life. We never would have imagined 200 years ago we'd be reaching the moon. Here we are. And that's something I think that's worth something. I mean, look how much we spend on the welfare state. I think it'd be much better to spend that on things like adventure and exploration and discovery. Those are great aspects of Western civilization that we care about those things. We care about discovering what God's given us to explore. Obviously, God made it possible with physics. He could have made physics, they made it impossible to create a flying object. That is certainly something God could have done. Didn't do that. He gave us the means and the ultimately the equipment and the resources to build things that could that could go off planet. These are things that we're allowed to explore and should explore, uh, to see the grandeur and the glory of God displayed among the stars. I think that's great. I think it's awesome. I think it's very cool. I think it's worth something. Uh but it's also awesome that finally NASA, which I don't want to say has been defunct, but has just not been NASA for a long time, is finally doing the things that NASA should be doing. The moon, other planets, the stuff that uh private companies have had to do basically on their own if they wanted to do this sort of stuff. And now NASA's getting back into it, a very good use, I think, of what America should stand for. But I want to tie this in because it's six days from now. NASA is going to launch four astronauts toward the moon. The mission is called Artemis II, and it's a 10-day mission. It's crewed by a guy named R uh Reed Wiseman. It's going with Victor Glover, Christina Cook, and Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen. And they're going again further from Earth, I think, than any human has traveled since 1972. 54 years. That's how long it's been since men went to the moon. And we're going back again. I know we live in a cynical age. I get it. We've got inflation, open borders, cultures, the border situation is much better than it was, by the way. Plenty of reasons to be frustrated with the direction of this country, but moments like this remind you about what America and American exceptionalism and American greatness can look like. What makes Western civilization great isn't just what we believe, though that is the precursor for all of this. It's what we build. The Greeks gave us philosophy, the Romans gave us law and roads, the British gave us representative government, common law. And America, one of the great things America did was give us the innovation for the moon landing, the strength and intelligence to do things like that. This rocket, which is the space launch system, is going to lift off from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, carrying the Orion spacecraft on a free return trajectory around the moon and back. It is a machine that most of us, I mean, it would be incomprehensibly complex for most of us, built by American engineers, assembled by American workers, launched from American soil, and three out of the four of them are American astronauts, and it's Canadian, I'll call them North American, close enough. And this isn't just a victory lap. Again, NASA held what they called an ignition event just a couple days ago, announcing plans to send astronauts to the moon every six months, build permanent habitable infrastructure on the surface of the moon, and eventually establish a continuous human presence there. They're committing$20 billion in the next seven years to build a base on the moon, which sounds like a lot of money. But again, compared to what we spend on worthless infrastructure projects and welfare projects, it's a drop in the bucket. And they're developing a nuclear-powered spacecraft that's going to be aimed at Mars before the end of 2028. Again, a lunar base and a nuclear spacecraft to Mars in our lifetime. Now, critics will say, well, China's trying to do that too. And they're right, China is wanting to land astronauts on the moon by 2030, which is exactly why this matters. Western civilization doesn't get to pause and rest and wait around. You either lead or you follow. And for 300 years, the West has led because it refused to stop reaching for further greatness. And that's what Artemis II is. It's a reach. It's America saying, we have not finished. We're not done discovering. We're not done building. We're not done, let's say, winning. So I would say this is something worth watching to tell your kids, your grandkids, like this, this is what wisdom western civilization does. This is what Western civilization looks like when it remembers what it is. That we are the explorers. And you can go back, you know, there is actually, and you can find it on YouTube, and I'd highly recommend everyone listen to it. It's actually a great segment. I know it's been made into a meme. It's actually a great segment from Alex Jones on the greatness of the West. And he says, you know, your kids are listening to Justin Bieber and they're forgetting what being part of Europe, Europe, and then part of America is and was. He's talking about Magellan and Christopher Columbus and Sircumnavigating the globe, and how how men used to desire greatness and discovery, and we used to value those things. And I think it's frustrating because in the midst of all this cultural entanglement and foreign conflict and frustration over government policy, we kind of lost sight of that. We've been so busy with so many things that we've kind of lost sight of what the West was good at, what we've been great at. And this is another example of that greatness. Finally, that we've really had as an example of it, you know, as greatness in a very long time. And people throw around the word greatness a lot. Politicians use it, athletes use it. Greatness is not comfort. Greatness is not safety. Greatness is the decision to do difficult things when the easy thing to do is just kind of sit by and not worry about it. We don't need to go to the moon. We're not we're not gonna get really anything out of it. I don't know what the return on investment is here. But think about what we've done as a civilization, not what textbooks say about it, what we actually did. I mean, again, you look back a few hundred years ago, men got into wooden boats and crossed an open ocean they'd never seen to a continent they didn't know existed. No GPS, no weather radar, no guarantee they were coming back. In fact, there was, I don't want to say the guarantee, but there was a lot of, a lot of critics who said they would not be coming back. And they went anyway. 150 years after that, a generation of Americans looked at the bloodiest war in human history, a war that killed 600,000 of their own countrymen, and they fought it to the finish because they believed in what they were fighting for. Uh, you also have a kid from rural Ohio who grew up, his name was Neil Armstrong, who stepped off a ladder onto the surface of another, another pl a different world from ours, and said, one giant leap for mankind. Not one giant leap just for him or for his family, but for we as people. And right now, in this moment, when half the country is being told that our best days are behind us, that the system is broken, that civilization itself is something to be ashamed of, that our history is something to be ashamed of, uh, that we should not honor our ancestors, we should not be proud of our history. NASA is pointing a rocket at the moon again. And it's not for nostalgia, right? It's not this is not just me giving you a boring history lesson. It is an answer to everyone that tells us that America cannot be great ever again. Because we're building, we're gonna build a I mean, I I cannot I cannot adequately describe how cool it is, at least to me, that we're planning to build a lunar base that people can live at. I cannot describe how cool that is. Or that we're going to point a nuclear-powered rocket at Mars. How how unbelievably cool that is. And it's it really is what greatness looks like. And it looks a lot like it always has. American, determined, and completely unwilling to quit in the face of adversity, difficulty, and danger. And uh, as I've said before, these are actually massive cultural victories. I know that, you know, a lot of our victories we feel like come from legislation and from policy and all these sorts of other things. But I think that this is another one of those reminders that America is great. I know we've we've given up a lot of that on the altar of comfort and convenience and complacency, and we've seen the results of that. They've not been good, by the way. It's not been exciting. And now we're living in a time where we're seeing a return to that. Where we're we're getting to see the outcome of the pursuit of greatness, something that America used to know a whole lot more about than we do today. Especially someone who didn't get to see the original space launch, or someone who didn't get to be around when we were on the moon, this is certainly one of the most exciting trips in history in my in hidden in history for me to to actually be a witness to. This is something that certainly will be will be viewed by me and should be viewed by everybody. Because again, these sorts of moments are worthy of celebrating, of being proud of, of of looking at our accomplishments through what God has given us and saying, of course it's for the glory of God, and it's to witness the grandeur of his creation. But this is something that we're doing. And I know other countries are trying to do it too, but we're winning, as we do, by the way, as as America's done for a long time, we're winning. And it's it's it's awesome. I mean, there's just no real other way to describe it other than to say that it's it's phenomenal and it's exciting. And it should be, it should be hopeful and energizing. And the biggest thing is that it should be a reminder of that greatness that we're we used to be so well known for, of the innovation and the progress, not in the wrong direction, but in the right direction. Not just with AI and robots and driverless cars and post-apocalyptic food that makes you fat and unhealthy and hospital-bound, like in the movie WALL-E, but actual greatness, actual discovery, a sense of adventure, a sense of believing there are things out there that we need to discover that God's put out there for us to discover, by the way. Those things weren't created unintentionally. As I pointed out, especially as Christians, right, this isn't all the result of just random evolution, that stuff just kind of happens to be out there. Maybe we could go see what's up. You know, we we live in a place that as Christians, we know God created everything with intent. And so the fact that there's other things out there tells us, you know, there might be something worth seeing. And I'm not talking about alien life, right? That's not the direction I'm going with this. I, I, you know, I'm I'm merely talking about seeing what God's put out there for us to see. Going and seeing what God has shown us through his creation and for his glory. And we used to do that a lot. That used to be one of the main goals of mankind, especially in the West, was to discover, was to be adventurous, was to be manly and masculine and determined and to pursue that greatness. And we kind of gave that up. We're like, oh, but oh, you know, we just we just spend so much money and all these bad policies, this, that, and the other. We get so caught up in all the evil and this and that, which by the way, still needs solutions, and we're gonna have plenty of time dedicated in this show to going over all of that. But unfortunately, we we kind of sacrificed our pursuit of greatness on that. We said, no, we got to fix all these other things, and I guess we'll just put by the wayside what America was great at. No, no. Let's let's discover again. Let's regain our national identity of masculinity and a sense of adventure and a sense of the desire for doing great and achievable things, or things that we might see as unachievable until we do them. Again, if you'd have told a guy 500 years ago, yeah, you know that the moon out there, we've been there. We're gonna put a lunar base there. We're gonna be able to put men there who can live there. We're also using nuclear power. What's nuclear power? No, we're gonna use nuclear power to get to Mars. That planet up there, we're going there. Would have been inconceivable, unbelievable to them. And and that is part of what America is really good at that sort of innovation, that sort of progress, that sort of fearlessness in the face of admittedly terrifying things that we must succeed at. And we're the greatest at it, we're the best at it. We've always been the best at it, we're gonna keep being the best at it. And uh, even though I'm a return to the golden age, this is part of that, is these sorts of cultural wins where we say one night once again, America is not gonna just sit idly by, twiddle our thumbs, and say, well, let's fix this one policy. No, let's let's be great. So as the partial federal government shutdown stretches into its now 40th day, I think 41st day, maybe the day, the Houston Police Officers Union is reaching out to TSA employees at Houston area airports, highlighting career opportunities at the Houston Police Department. The union's message encourages Transportation Security Administration employees who have been working without pay due to the shutdown to consider a career switch. In a statement addressed directly to TSA workers, Houston Police Officers Union President Douglas Griffith said, quote, keeping our airports safe is important work. If you're looking for better job security, better pay, and the opportunity to make a real impact in a community that appreciates you, HPD is hiring. And we have two airports you can be the police at if you miss being around long lines of irritated people. Uh and of course, he said the Houston Police Officer Union would gladly accept members of the TSA who want to have a better career. Tired of long hours with intermittent pay, come to the police department where you are respected for your hard work and paid regularly. Now the recruitment push comes as Houston Area airports continue to face, as we're well aware, staffing challenges. TSA checkpoints at both uh George Bush and Hobby have seen long lines and growing frustration among travelers. For frontline TSA agents, the consequences are more personal. Many, of course, are struggling to pay bills, while Congress remains deadlocked over funding for the Department of Homeland Security. Many political leaders and bacterians, of course, just blamed each other for the responsibility for the situation. And the TSA, by the way, themselves released a statement calling the crisis the Democrats shutdown. I will say, the TSA knows what's up. And everybody really does. I've said this basically every day of the show that this has continued on. It's not like we're sitting around and, you know, this could be really either, but anybody's fault. I mean, it's just a budget, you know, debate and there's negotiations, and neither side's really willing to budge. And so really it's it's both both people's fault. It's both sides' fault, it's both political faults. But that's not true. In this case, it's very obvious who's at fault. It's very straightforward. We are asking for the same funding we've been getting. We want ICE to continue to be funded so they can continue their operations on immigration enforcement. And the left is saying no, we don't want to fund ICE. We're willing to fund DHS, and we're willing to fund certain facets of DHS, like the TSA, but we're not willing to fund DHS at all until we move forward uh with defunding ICE specifically, with defunding immigration enforcement specifically. And of course, Republicans are saying, yeah, that's a no-go for us. That's something the American people have called us to do. That's something we've been doing for a long time. In fact, that was a main voting issue for a lot of people, and it is our responsibility to do that, and we're not going to give up that funding because you don't want to do it anymore. This is entirely on the Democrats. It is very obviously on the Democrats. And so hopefully people will continually wake up to that, and it's going to be a big push to say, even for the Democrats, to say, look, you are jeopardizing federal workers and their pay, their ability to feed and house their families. And we understand your intent here. It is to deal with the immigration crisis, and we know how you feel about illegal immigrants. You seem to care more about them than you do American citizens. But at some point, people gotta feed their people gotta work, people gotta eat, right? Now, obviously, kind of attached to that conversation, should also be a conversation. I mentioned this yesterday, a conversation about the, shall we say, survivability of the TSA in general. Uh the Transportation Security Administration has not been good, I would say, for quite some time, but ever. Since the moment that they started doing their job. And that's not an indictment on the workers, it's an indictment on, of course, the the agency itself. The agency itself is one that's useless, broken, and dysfunctional, and and basically uh just uh an abysmal failure by any metric that you want to apply to it.

unknown 21:45

Right.

Shutdown Pressure TSA Hiring Pitch

SPEAKER_13 21:45

If your metric is cost, failed at that. If your metric is uh successful protection, failed at that. By any available metric, uh it's not good. Right. And we all know that. We're all very well aware of that. That's not really very debatable. At all. Um, we have the the direct evidence to know that. We have the studies to back that up. We understand fundamentally that they're not doing a good job, not because the workers aren't doing the best they can, but because the system is designed that way. It's designed to be a failure. That's why they have like a 95% failure rate at the actual detection of bombs and guns. They're they're not actually doing the very thing they were created to do. They're just a massive expensive inconvenience. That's literally all they are. They're it's it's a it's a completely worthless agency. And I think it'd be a good idea if every Houston area TSA agent went and joined HPD or some other organization instead. And we just say, you know what, fine. If the Lions are gonna do this, the Democrats won't fund them, and we just won't have a TSA. It's like a win-win for everybody. People are getting paid, no one's not getting paid for work that they're actually doing. We're not spending money on worthless endeavors, that money can go elsewhere, extra funding to ICE, maybe, ramping up more infrastructure projects, more immigration enforcement, et cetera. And uh we can we can use that money to the best of our ability rather than again funding an agency that historically has just not been worthwhile whatsoever. And so, of course, you know, this this has become a whole big mess. And I know the Democrats want everyone to believe that it's the fault of those on the right, it's the fault of people like me that are calling for further immigration enforcement, and we should be willing to come to the table and negotiate. But no, there are things you should you can't negotiate with terrorists, right? There are things you cannot negotiate on. You know, if we're trying to pass a budget for the city, and one of the things we need to pass for the budget is that our roads desperately need fixing. If we're gonna have people driving in to Houston, we desperately need to fix the roads, and the left comes in and says, Well, we're not funding the road project. And if you don't if if you don't negotiate with us to not fix the roads, then we're not gonna pay the salary of those we have employed in in the Houston Police Department. That's under the same banner. It's infrastructure and safety. We're not funding the police department or the fire department uh until you agree not to not to fix the roads. We would rightfully say we're not we're not agreeing to that because the roads need fixing, and we're not gonna be held hostage by you to not do the things that we're called to do as a city. That's insane. That is outside of our ability to do. We should not do that. We're not gonna negotiate with you on that. There's things we can negotiate on. This is not one of them. And the federal government needs to keep saying the same thing. I understand that it's frustrating for travelers, it's frustrating for TSA agents. I do understand all of that. But again, if we if we just let the Democrats keep doing this, like this is like letting a strike work. If you let these sorts of things work, then what inevitably happens is not only did you now lose because you weren't willing to be strong-willed and dedicated to the cause, but now, of course, you have given Democrats even more power because now again, they know that you're not going to stand in their way from whatever they want to do. Despite the fact that they are the minority, and we elected a Republican Congress and a Republican Senate, and we have a Republican in the White House. If they think that they can hold these things hostage and win their negotiations because of that, same thing that we did in Texas when we let them just leave and face really no penalties for breaking quorum, it's the same thing. You've now incentivized that behavior. You told them that works, it's successful, it's politically expedient, and enjoy your your vacation while we do literally nothing to you in response. And we've got to stop playing that game because they're gonna win it every single time. And instead we have to say, We're not budging. Come what may, we we can see how you guys enjoy it uh in in a year from now when you have no TSA agents showing up to work anymore because they just can't manage it, and our system is just completely broken down and nobody can travel. See how that goes for your your side of the stuff. See how that goes for policy. Because we're not gonna budge. We're we're unwilling to do that. That's what we've got to do. With that being said, we get back from the break. We're gonna jump over to an announcement coming out uh for the Senate committee appointments. Uh Lieutenant Governor Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick has now come out and he's made uh these these 2026 Senate committee appointments, which fills, of course, leadership gaps left by the departure of a various number of senators. We'll talk more about those committee appointments when we get back from the break. As always, if you would like to text into the show, the number is 713-779-5978. That's 713-779-KYST. I'm your host, Michael Wilson. You are listening to the Lone Star Conservative. We'll talk all about those Senate committee appointments after the break. Stick around, we'll talk soon.

SPEAKER_05 26:47

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Permanent Committees And Power Creep

SPEAKER_13 31:04

Select committees this year, due in part to the departure of four senators who held chairmanships. Now, Patrick appointed a total of seven new committee chairs. Here's some updates on those names. State Senator Angela Paxton out of McKinney is replacing Senator Phil King as chair of the Senate Committee on Economic Development. State Senator Donna Campbell will fill the chairmanship of the Senate Committee on Education, left vacant by Senator Brandon Creighton after he was appointed Chancellor of the Texas Tech University system. State Senator Kevin Sparks will fill the chairmanship over the Senate Committee on Natural Resources, left vacant by Senator Brian Birdwell, who is leaving for a post in the Trump administration. State Senator Adam Hinahosa will replace Senator Campbell as chair of the Senate Committee on Nominations. State Senator Tan Parker will replace retiring Senator Robert Nichols as chair of the Senate Committee on Transportation. State Senator Phil King will fill the chairmanship left uh over the Senate Select Committee on Homeland and Border Security, again left vacant by Birdwell. And State Senator Brent Hagenbuck will fill the chairmanship over the Senate Select Committees on Veterans Affairs following Senator Kelly Hancock's appointment as acting comptroller. So a lot of this kind of moves around and switches and shifts. The Senate also enveloped the subcommittee on higher education into the existing committee on education, the name of which has been modified with the K-16 moniker to clarify that it also covers collegiate affairs. So it's K through 16. It's not just elementary through high school. It also includes all facets of tax education from pre-K from kindergarten all the way up to last year of college. I will say that those two topics have also been separated for 2026 with Senator Paul Betancourt chairing the Committee on Higher Education. The Senate Select Committee on Religious Liberty was also newly created by Patrick and is chaired by King. Additionally, Patrick announced that the Senate's interim select committees will become permanent standing committees at the start of the 90th legislative session in January of 2027, and that chairs appointed to the select committees will remain in their positions. Which I'm not sure how I feel about that, uh, and not selecting new people. Given the inevitability that some of these people become sort of entrenched figureheads of these committees who don't want to retire, don't want to give up any of their power, don't want to move positions, and you wind up with this sort of entrenched government bureaucracy where we don't move people around and we don't replace people, and that's just your committee now for the time that you're in. I don't think that's a great idea if that's what we're talking about, and it seems like that's the direction that we're trying to kind of move things. I actually think that that might be the worst idea imaginable because we want everything possible uh to make sure that they're aware that their ability to influence things is fleeting. We don't want them to to feel like they have legitimate power of their own. We need them as much as possible, every single one of our politicians, to be aware that their quote unquote authority only exists in so far as they are a representation of the people. And the more ubiquitous power you give them, without changes, without shifts, without letting them know, hey, this is a privilege, not a right that you have, the more that they sort of b start to believe that that is their power of their own accord, and they start to use it that way. Happens with a lot of politicians, unfortunately. And it's directly an indictment on what politicians are supposed to be and what they're supposed to do in regards to the will of the people. Especially here in the state of Texas, where we have massive issues with Republicans, because again, being in Texas, we're still a relatively red state, right? They want to believe that we're turning blue and purple and all this. And yes, we have our various issues with big cities, like in Houston, like in Austin, like in Dallas. Obviously, those are existent issues. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that there aren't issues that we need to address head on and deal with to make ourselves even more, you know, conservative as the years go by. But I do want to highlight and say that right now we are very Republican, which means a lot of the issues that we have in our state are caused by Republicans who aren't really very conservative at all. We might call them rhinos. Republicans who are only Republican insofar as they have an R next to their name, not because they actually achieve conservative ideals or stay in line with the party platform or follow the will of the people. They just know they can win elections if they run as a Republican, and so they do. And then they get in and they do a whole lot of things that most of us would look at and say, that doesn't feel very conservative at all. In fact, that feels very moderate. Maybe so far moderate that I might even consider it moderate left. Happens all of the time. A lot of the reason why that's allowed to happen is because these people start feeling like their power is is in is vested in them by their own authority, that they just are the power, like they are the ruler, they are royalty and nobility, and that's not true here in America. They are representative of the actual power. We the people are the ones who possess the power, and they're just called to represent us so that we don't have to all as people go every single time there's any sort of policy claim and vote on it. Right? We're not gonna go for every single bill that comes up and have every person in Texas voting on what that bill should be and what it should do. It would not be tenable, that would not work, it would not be successful. No one's gonna show up five times a week to go vote for every new bill that comes out. It can't work that way. And so we need representative government in order to function efficiently. But that also means that those who are in representative government are actually representative and they understand where their power comes from, who their power comes from, and what that power calls them to do, how that power calls them to act, that it's authority with responsibility that gives them the authority in the first place. And I actually think that saying these are permanent standing committees and that chairs who are appointed will remain in their positions, I think that that's exactly the wrong direction for our state to start heading. I actually think that again, that that that seems completely counterintuitive to the goal of successful representative government, especially given that we already have these various issues where we know last year we had committees who were standing in the way of good bills uh on a variety of of of bases, right? We we had we just talked over the last couple days uh about a bill that would have ended, you know, to you know, illegals receiving the ability to go to our colleges, which could have been stopped. But why wasn't it? Because there was a personal issue with the author of the bill. Or you have bills on anything from gun legislation to pro pro cho uh pro-life policies, abolitionist policies that never see the light of day because the people in these committees that ultimately get to hear these bills first, shoot them down. Never give them the ability to be heard. Don't put them on the agenda. And giving these people more power is the exact wrong answer. It should be less, actually. It should be punished for that, actually. With that being said, we get back from the break. It is the bottom of the first hour, which of course means when we get back, we're gonna be talking all about the weather, updates for today, the rest of this week, that's today and tomorrow, what we see going on over the weekend, and uh maybe, maybe some changes coming next week. We'll talk more about all of that coming up in the next segment. As always, if you would like to text in, let us know your thoughts on any of the stuff we're talking about, or maybe some things that we're not talking about, things that you want to hear more about that I haven't reported on, that you want to hear, a story you saw a headline for and say, hey, what happened with this? Feel free to text in at 713-779-5978. That is 713-779 KYST. You're listening to the Lone Star Conservative. I'm your host, Michael Wilson. I'll be right back with the weather to wrap up the first hour of the show after the break.

SPEAKER_06 38:48

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SPEAKER_04 39:18

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Houston Weather Warm And Dry

SPEAKER_13 42:53

So if you've enjoyed this week's weather, if you're enjoying the warmer temperatures and the heat, then today's forecast is going to give you some smiles. It's going to be happy for you. A strong ridge of high atmospheric pressure over the southern plains is going to bring this similar warmth and generally quiet weather to Houston. Afternoon highs that are expected to reach the mid-80s. Early morning clouds or patchy dense fog will give way to partly sunny skies by first, you know, by by by the afternoon, especially by around three o'clock PM. Despite a cloudy and humid start to the day, no rain is in the forecast. In short, it's about as pleasant as we can get in in late March for being out and about with warm, dry, and calm conditions. Bottom line, if you're gonna be anywhere in the Houston vicinity, make sure that you're I mean the main recommendation is just make sure that you're drinking plenty of water. Despite it only being March, an increasingly high spring sun angle can uh, you know, obviously result in dehydration, all those sorts of things. We're getting into the time where I gotta let people know hey, don't forget, you gotta drink water. It's not a The winter anymore where you can just go on no water. You gotta you gotta drink. Nevertheless, I will say that uh as we're getting into the seven-day forecast, recent seasons are reinforcing similar trends. The as you look at the setup for today, it looks at you know the heat that we're seeing, the temperatures in the mid-80s, the similar temperature that we're getting tomorrow, very similar to today, by the way. Saturday might present a slightly better opportunity in terms of humidity. I think daytime temperatures behind a late week cold front could drop below 80 degrees, closer to a range that's that's a little more comfortable, especially for this time of year. But that that is the expectation, at least for now, that this is this is the temperature that we're gonna grapple with. This is what we got to deal with. Uh, as I'm looking out at this last, really the last week, we're in the last week of March. The beginning of April was a week from yesterday, so we're six days away from the last uh from the first day of April now. You know, we're we're having highs in those mid-80s. We're gonna have uh a few days that maybe drop down into the upper 70s, low eighties rather than the mid-80s. And then we're gonna be in April. And uh right now, at least according to the monthly forecast, April is shaping up to also be relatively warm. Now, a lot of the temperatures in April actually look like they might end up being a little cooler than a lot of March has been, shockingly. A lot of April actually looks to be uh a little bit more moderate. At least right now, and of course you can't you can't take the monthly forecast as gospel, or at least you shouldn't. It's a major guess. Probably more educated than mine would be, but it's still a major guess. Nevertheless, April has a lot of days that are barely scratching 80. A lot, a lot of April, at least right now, appears to be in the upper 70s and low eighties for most of the month, according to current predictions. So, of course, we get more into that. Uh, we'll get updates every day, as I mentioned at the at the last segment of the first hour of the show. We'll talk all about those updates. With that being said, when we get back from the break at the top of the next hour, we're gonna jump over and we're gonna be talking a little bit about this Christian school who hosted a pro voucher rally, but says that the program, the school voucher program, compromises its biblical rule. We'll talk about what that means when we get back. Text in 713-779-5978. You're listening to the Lone Star Conservative. We'll be right back at the top of the next hour.

SPEAKER_08 46:34

From deep in the heart of Texas, it's Houston's God-loving patriot, the voice of reason. This is the Lone Star Conservative, Michael Wilson.

School Choice Support With Caveats

Christian School Rejects Voucher Oversight

Second Amendment No Compromise Pitch

SPEAKER_13 47:10

So we have had a lot of updates coming out regarding school choice here in the state of Texas. And you guys know I was a big proponent of school choice. And I said it a a myriad of times, but I want to be clear. You know, that doesn't mean that every school choice program that's ever passed is going to be good or perfect or without its various issues. Right. There are a lot of conservative families who don't want to take the money from the voucher program. They feel like inevitably it's going to be used as some sort of power grab to determine what you're teaching your kids. You can look at the North, look at them Yankees up there. If you want to see that happening. And I think that's a reasonable conclusion to say that you're a little concerned about it. I I think that's fair. I think it's certainly reasonable that you're not, you know, just it's I don't I wouldn't go out paranoia, but that you're not just kind of sitting there thinking everything will always be fine and there's nothing the government can do to me. I think it's wise uh that we're cautious approaching some of these policies and some of these agendas and saying to ourselves, you know, is this worth, is this money worth that? Especially like if you're homeschooling, you're thinking to yourself, I have this concern that maybe this is going to be used one day to have a level of control over the curriculum that I teach my children, what I'm required to teach them more than they already do, you know, it's$2,000 a year. Is$2,000 a year worth, would you pay$2,000 a year for the government not to tell you those things? A lot of homeschool families certainly would. And so if that's a concern for you, just don't sign up. But I think in general, school choice, regardless of that concern, is a positive good, right? Because you look at it and you see that we have a disastrous government school system that has been undeniably a cataclysmic failure, has failed by every available metric, as we'll say about the TSA as well. Uh, but education has been just terrible from test scores to general critical thinking skills, uh, reasoning, logic, philosophy, math. And I know, I know, you know, this is one of my other problems, by the way. We talked about I talked about AI with uh Todd Starns yesterday, our mid our midday show host. And I was I was talking about the fact that there are a lot of good uses for things like AI, and that technological progress can certainly be good, but it can also be used for bad, right? You you have a lot of these AIs that are now being used to unfortunately create things like child pornography. Absolutely disgusting stuff. And, you know, that happens. I also think one of the major issues, somebody did actually an excellent kind of analogy. I don't know if you guys have noticed, but I'm a big fan of analogies. I don't know why. I just think it kind of adds a level of depth to our understanding of things to kind of use analogies to kind of draw us in and show us another another angle of an argument. I think analogies are great. One of my favorite things to do. This analogy was quite excellent on this sort of technological progress. You know where dogs came from? You know the dogs we have uh that'll sit on the couch next to us, watch a movie, want to go on walks, want to stay by us, get pets. You know where those came from? Because they weren't originally like pet dogs. You look at you look hundreds and hundreds and thousands of years ago, wasn't really a thing. Where did they come from? Well, obviously, you know, not macroevolution, but microevolution, you know, through breeding and through consistent changes, you had wolves. This is largely where a lot of our current dog breeds uh have come from. They used to be wild, they were not domesticated creatures. And what happened? Well, the leading theory is, of course, that over time, uh, you know, we'd leave food out and the wolves would eat some of this food. And then we realized that we're like, oh, well, we'll leave them some food. And before you know it, the wolves got pretty comfortable around human beings. And in fact, many of them not only got comfortable, but started expecting food from human beings. And then before you know it, eventually they're completely reliant. How many dogs have you seen that? You know for a fact there's no world where they're out hunting on their own. There's no world where they're self-sustaining. You've you've seen the wiener dog, you think you let that thing go in the backyard and it's ever gonna survive more than a week. You're just you think the golden doodle is just gonna make it. It's not gonna happen. It's not gonna happen. We all know that. And that's because they became reliant on something to do what they were good at doing for them. That's not necessarily a bad thing, right? A lot of us are very happy that there are domesticated dogs. I I have a German shepherd. Very happy that that dog breed exists. They're very loyal, they're very protective, right? And and uh they're very easily trainable if you're willing to put in the time and dedication to that, right? There's a lot of good benefits that come from owning a dog, man's best friend, for a reason. But from the dog perspective, when you look at it, right? You used to be these mighty creatures that needed no assistance from anyone, and now you couldn't possibly survive on your own. You require the aid and the assistance of human beings for your survival. You rely on us. And that's kind of a very good picture into the technological progress of AI. Is art I hate calling it AI because again, I've said this before, but I just want to clarify, it is not artificial intelligence, depending on what you mean by intelligence. If you mean by intelligence that you have a good memory, right, because even their ability to play chess, the reason they're so good at chess is they're very good at memorizing outcomes. They're very good at memorizing board placement, and so they of course can be very predictive because of their ability to memorize, but it's all just information, right? If you have somebody who's uh has a you know a photographic memory, it's kind of the same thing. They're very they're very you know informed, knowledgeable perhaps, but I think intelligence is something much deeper than that, at least as we use the term, the ability to actually think. And AI cannot do that. They want to tell you that it will be able to eventually, maybe, maybe we'll see what it gets to. But as of now, AI has no ability to think. This is why almost all the AIs, they're they're all trained on already existent data, right? Which we all are to a degree, to what education is. But our ability to think is not predicated on that data. If the data changes, we don't really change in terms of the way we think. We just change about what we necessarily believe. AI is different because even the way that they quote unquote think is based on training data from social media, the internet, all the things they're given access to learn. So they're not they're not thinking the way that we do. They're not forming comprehensive and cohesive thoughts. They're just vomiting up essentially what they've learned. That's it. And the education system has largely created that. And so that's one of the dangers. But nevertheless, that's that's where education is at, right? Is that kids are now even the the quote unquote smart ones are just very good at vomiting up information. They rely heavily on computer systems and what have you. And we're we're developing a generation of people who cannot critically think. And you can see that by looking at a lot of the protests from young people. You if you've ever watched a Charlie Kirk video where he's been on campus, you can see this displayed very clearly where these young people cannot seem to form a thought other than what they're just told to think. They seem relatively incapable of producing genuine human belief of their own accord, saying, Hey, here's what I believe and here's why. They'll say, Here's what I believe. And then you challenge that, and they don't really know what to do with it because they don't challenge themselves. They've never been challenged. They don't know how to think about things, they just believe what they're told. And that's that's been a comprehensive issue coming out of our public education system. And that's one reason why I do like and support school choice largely is because I think it gives other alternatives, available alternatives, to parents who want their children educated better, more efficiently, uh, who will come out being critical thinkers who are actually intelligent human beings. But one of Houston's top Christian, top-rated Christian private schools uh hosted a rally for the School Choice Vouchers Plan back in 2023. But administrators now say that if they participate in the$1 billion program, it would amount to government entanglement incompatible with the school's Christian mission. Uh this Cyprus Christian school lend leader told Fanleys in a private video, uh, which was obtained after reporting on the school's voucher status, they would not join the program in order to retain biblical rule. School leaders feared joining the state funded program could open Cyprus Christian to state audits, new testing requirements, or even one day forced to comply with rules on gender or sexuality that conflicted with its religious beliefs. And so they've come out and they've said our school bylaws require that every part of CCS, Cyprus Christian School, our curriculum and missions, employment, discipline, and the way we've informed students must be governed exclusively by biblical doctrine and scripture. The Text Education Freedom Account program, while well intentioned, requires something we simply cannot accept, and that is ongoing government entanglement. Now, the video presents an unusual argument about a program that has been touted as a way to expand faith-based education, particularly among Christian schools, by writing state dollars for families to use on tuition. Private Christian institutions were central to the push for Texas' voucher program, cheering on the GOP priority as a way to make their services more accessible to an everyday Texan. The school's opposition, again, is notable because they're one of the ones that held a rally for the program. They're eligible, but they're choosing not to participate in the program at all. And it's it's pretty wild because you'd expect at least that if you're going to hold these rallies and be supportive of the policy and the program, that maybe you know you'd you'd then justify being a part of the program. That would be at least expected. But they're coming out and they're saying uh rather than you know concerns about financial aid or the program's early stages, how successful it'll be, how efficient it'll be, you know, how that money will actually work, it's none of those sort of technical difficulties. It's none of those sort of technical issues that's kind of giving them pause. In this case, uh they're they're saying the participation could lead to forced compliance with public records requests, documentation of enrollment, or audits of financial data, and new admissions policies or testing requirements, as has happened in states like Louisiana, could be added to the program in later years. And now you're already in the program, and so you're expected to comply with those added requirements. And they're saying we don't want the government telling us how we must pursue education. That's the whole point of this. And so in the video, the the leader said the bottom line is public funding introduces external leverage, compliance, obligations, and audit authority that can and certainly will expand over time. This level of oversight is simply incompatible with full autonomy. Now, of course, uh they also referenced a program in Colorado where he said religious schools that accepted public funds were required to comply with rules related to gender, identity, and sexuality. While there is not a universal private school voucher program in Colorado, you know, they uh there is a universal pre-K program where private preschools receive public funds. And last year, an appeals court ruled that children could not be forbidden to enroll in Catholic preschools based on the sexual orientation of their parents. In other words, if you're a Catholic or you're you're a Christian school and you say, you know, I am not gonna accept students who have, say, say you say, you know, transgender parents or homosexual parents, that just I that those are not the children that I want attending my school. I don't think that they have the prerequisites necessary to be a part of this environment and culture. You should have the full authority to say that. And yet in Colorado, the court has now told them, no, you can't deny them entry. You gotta let them come into your school and then have an influence on all the other kids that are attending your school. And so I I I right now under the law, Texas cannot enact policies that alter a school's curriculum, admissions practices, standards, and institutional values like religion. Uh and the law does not necessarily reference whether a school could be subject to audits or public records requests, but they're saying they're talking mainly about future concerns with the program itself. With that being said, I I have a couple of text-ins. The first kind of highlights this, what we're talking about right now. It says lots of homeschoolers believe the same as the Christian school, which it is exactly the point, right? That you're concerned ultimately about your enrollment in the program, then predicating the state's ability to govern how you educate your children. And I understand that concern. And you know what? If you have the ability to homeschool your kids and you don't need the funding, then awesome. Don't take the money. That's totally uh you're not required if you're a homeschool family with kids to take the money. That's not a requirement. You're not obligated to do that. Just don't do it. It's pretty straightforward. Don't take the money. That's if that's a concern you have, don't do it. Totally fine. This Christian school has the full authority to say, yeah, we're not going to enroll in the program. We're not interested. We don't, we don't want some of the things that we we feel like could come later. Maybe will, maybe won't, but we don't feel like it's it's something that we're willing to do. That's a totally fair position to hold. In fact, I I quite understand it. You guys know, as a conservative radio host who is constantly warning about the dangers of government and the threat to our way of life and the threat to our freedoms and our rights, I'm I'm big on that train. And so I certainly understand the argument here. I get it. I think it's a very fair thing uh to kind of to kind of tackle and grapple with, and to say, you know, I'm not sure that this is how I want my kids educated. And I'm not sure that I can be in good conscience enrolled in this program that I feel like is one day going to lead to that sort of oversight. We got another text and it says, a friend said she had relatives who recently graduated from high school. She said the school had students start the day watching CNN. I got this response from a former Tech CNN computer professor. Quote, CNN gives schools free access to CNN's student news program, which includes curriculum-ready explanations of complex topics. Example, CNN's slant. And yeah, this is that's what I'm saying. Like I get it. Right. If you, if you're in that position, by the way, thank you guys for the text ins. I appreciate it. Thanks for being involved in the show. I get it. That sort of stuff is happening in public schools, and people, a lot of people are looking at this program and saying, you know, I don't ever want that being a requirement for how I educate my kids. That's the reason that I chose homeschooling or private schooling, is that I wanted more authority over how my children were educated. I wanted more leeway in what they were taught and how they were taught it. And so I don't want any sort of government involvement whatsoever in the way that I do that. And so then then don't be involved in the program. I think that's a totally fair position to hold. And I get it. Again, it's totally understandable. We can see over and over that our legislators seem to desire more and more power, more and more influence, more and more control over our day-to-day lives. We see that in a variety of aspects. And here on the here at the station, we fight against that basically every day. Uh even with our partnerships, we're choosing to fight back against that. In regards to the Constitution, in regards to our rights, in regards to parental authority, uh, anti-LGBTQisms, pro-immigration policy, pro-immigration enforcement, right? We're pushing back against a government that would not do its job correctly, that would violate what we're supposed to be doing as Americans, that would violate our rights. And it's not just in response to homeschooling or the school voucher program. Obviously, it's happening all across the board. Which is why it's also essential while we're on this topic that you join with our sponsor, Gun Owners of America. Gun Owners of America is fighting this exact same fight, but on a different front, specifically the front for your Second Amendment rights. The right to keep and bear arms, which the Constitution says shall not be infringed, which is why GOA heavily believes in the concept of no compromise, no negotiations, no backing down, no saying, okay, we'll give you this if you give us that. No, no, no, no tit for tat. We're not playing that game. No compromise. That is what the Second Amendment guarantees. And we're going to fight for that. And they do that, of course, through campaigning for good candidates and by nature against bad candidates. They do that, of course, through lobbying inside sessions to make sure that the bills that would extend your rights or give them back to you, uh, you know, are fought for, are voted on, are passed and put into law. And of course, bills that would violate your rights further are shot down or stopped in their tracks. They also are willing to go into lawsuits against government tyranny and government policies that violate those rights, as they're doing right now. And if you would like to become a member, it is an annual membership of$25. You can go to goahahouston.com for that membership. That is goahhouston.com. Again, it's$25 per year, which allows them to continue those operations to push back on tyranny, to push back on oppression, to push back on violations of your God-given constitutionally enshrined rights, to verify and to make sure that our Second Amendment rights, which shall not be infringed, are not infringed. Again, that is G-O-A-Houston.com. With that being said, when we get back from the break, we're going to jump over because a jury has now found Instagram and YouTube liable in a landmark social media addiction trial, uh, which I'm sure is going to get appealed. I think Meta even put out a statement, but Meta and YouTube are gonna have to pay millions in damages to a 20-year-old woman after a jury decided the social media giant and video streamer designed their platforms to hook young users without concern for their well-being. This decision, which came out yesterday, is a first-of-the kind lawsuit, which could influence, of course, the outcome of thousands of similar lawsuits accusing social media companies of deliberately causing harm. We'll talk more about the deals of that outcome when we get back. Text in at 713-779-5978. One more time. That is 713-779-KYST. You're listening to the Lone Star Conservative. I'm your host, Michael Wilson. We'll talk all about that landmark case after the break.

SPEAKER_05 1:05:44

Patriot Talk 920 is your Houston base camp for the America first movement. I'm Todd Starns, and join me weekdays at 11 on Patriot Talk 920 and online at PatriotTalk920.com.

SPEAKER_18 1:06:00

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SPEAKER_13 1:06:28

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Platform Design Versus Parent Responsibility

SPEAKER_13 1:10:17

After more than 40 hours of deliberations, a majority of jurors agreed and awarded her$3 million in damages. Jurors later recommended an additional$3 million in punitive damages after deciding the company's acting with malice, oppression, or fraud in harming children with their platforms. The judge has final say over how much damages are awarded. It is the second verdict against Meta this week after a jury in New Mexico determined the company harms children's mental health and safety in violation of state law. Meta, which is of course the parent of Instagram and Facebook, and Google-owned YouTube, issued statements disagreeing with the verdict and vowed to explore their legal options, which includes appeals. Google spokesman Jose Castañada said the verdict misrepresents YouTube, which is a responsibly built streaming platform, not a social media site. A meta spokesperson said teen mental health is profoundly complex and cannot be linked to a single app. Meta bears 70% of the responsibility, while YouTube shoulders 30% of that responsibility. The jury determined that Meta and YouTube knew the design of their operation, of their platforms, was dangerous or was likely to be dangerous when used by a minor. They also agreed that the platforms failed to adequately warn of that danger, further contributing to the harm. Only nine of the twelve jurors had to agree on each claim against each defendant, and two jurors consistently disagree with the other ten on whether the companies should be held liable. The jurors also decided that Meta held more responsibility for harm to the plaintiff. The jury said Meta shouldered again 70% of that responsibility, and so that was that was signaled in the break round uh the bake the breakdown, where you had$2.1 million of that three million coming from Meta, and the other$900,000 coming from YouTube. Uh TikTok and Snapchat both were a part of that case, but they both settled before the trial actually began. They were like, we don't want to deal with the trial, we'll just pay you off and move on. Uh the plaintiff was on social media all day from the age of six years old. Jurors listened to about a month of lawyers' arguments, testimony, and evidence they heard from KGM, as well as meta leaders Mark Zuckerberg and Adam Massouri, YouTube CEO Neil Mahan and this girl, KGM, since she began using YouTube as a child at age six and Instagram at age nine. She also told the jury she was on social media all day long as a child. Lawyers representing this girl, led by Mark Lanier, were tasked with proving that the respective defendant's negligence was a substantial factor in causing that harm. They pointed to specific design features they said are designed to hook young users, like the infinite nature of feats that allowed for an endless supply of content, autoplay features, and notifications. The jurors were told not to take into account the content of the posts and videos she viewed because tech companies are shielded from legal responsibility for posted content, right? It is a public site where people can post things and they can't be held liable for everything someone ever posts. Obviously, that would not be that would not be a successful model. So it's not even about what the technical content was, but the existence of the access to the content in general. And so Meta argued, of course, that the mental health struggles were not connected to her social media use and pointed to her turbulent home life. Meta also said not one of her therapists identified social media as the cause of her mental health issues, but the plaintiffs did not have to prove that social media caused the struggles, only that it was a substantial factor alongside those struggles in ultimately causing harm. YouTube focused, of course, more on the content side of things, the nature of their platform, arguing that it's a video platform akin to television rather than a social media platform. They also mentioned her declining YouTube use as she aged. According to their data, she spent about one minute a day on average watching YouTube Shorts since its inception. YouTube Shorts, which launched six years ago now, is kind of like Instagram Reels or TikTok, where it delivers short form, these vertical videos with the infinite scroll feature. That of course the plaintiffs argued was addictive, where you're consistently just scrolling to the next video and the next video. And before you know, it's called Doom Scrolling among the younger folks, where you're just stuck in a doom scroll. You just scroll endlessly and you lose track. It happens to a lot of people. You lose track of time, you don't realize where did my two hours go? Have I really been on social media for two hours? Yes. Yes, you have. And so lawyers representing both platforms, all supported their safety features and guardrails. Uh, nevertheless, this case could end up influencing others. Uh Sarah Krebs, a professor and director of Cornell University's Tech Policy Institute, says the reason why this case is consequential is not the individual case, but the way that it's a bellwether test case that might guide the resolution of other lawsuits. She said, so there are thousands pending. So the concern if you're a social media platform is as this case goes, so might these others. I think the reason why they would be concerned, and I've seen this analogy with the tobacco lawsuits, is that once you have this type of verdict in one case, it opens the floodgates for so many more, which now you're gonna have a ton of litigious people because the number of people who have inevitably been harmed, right, by their social media use are now gonna have basically an open call for massive lawsuits against these companies. You're gonna have multi- I guarantee you, you're gonna have massive amounts of these sorts of big lawsuits against these companies, uh, where, you know, lots of people are involved, high stakes, and they say, hey, yeah, I was certainly harmed. And and inarguably they were, by the way. I don't want to deny that. They were harmed. But I want to get into this just for a moment from my point of view, because I have two different directions that are not mutually exclusive. They're both true at once, and we got to address them. The first, of course, is that it is quite undeniable that these companies have caused immeasurable harm, not just to our youth, but to be basically people of every age who have been caught up in their usage of social media. And of course, they designed it that way. They they can talk all they want about safety and guardrails and how their intent was never to get anyone addicted. It literally is. How do you think these companies make money? The more time that you spend on social media, the more money they make from their advertisers, their sponsors, and their investors. That is how every business works. They want as many users to spend as much time on their platform as is humanly possible. That is literally the goal. That's why things like short form content exist. Because it starts with, well, it's short content. I'm not gonna spend 30 minutes watching a YouTube video. I'm gonna spend, you know, each video is like 15 to 60 seconds. I'm not gonna spend long at all. Before you know it, when you scrolled a hundred videos and you realize you spent two hours instead of 30 minutes on a single YouTube video, even though it was short form content, you can you can see the addictive nature of it, right? Where it's easy to just keep scrolling. And so that's that's inarguable, right? Even if you're a big fan of personal responsibility, which you know that I am, it also is undeniable that these companies are intentionally doing that. Now, whether that means that they're liable for it and the jury was right or wrong is a whole different conversation. But at least the main argument that they are causing harm and are doing it intentionally, that's true. I I I I just don't know what else to tell you. It's now been shown true in court, but it's also just basic common sense obvious. Their goal to make money is to get as many people to spend as much time as possible. That's what they do, that's their whole job, they're very good at it, and now they're trying to pretend that's not what they did. But it is. The other side of this, which I actually think is more important, is a reminder to parents, grandparents, and really and to children, which is screens are not generally great. And what I mean by that is not that there's not good things about them, or that it's a problem to be on social media, or that it's a problem to watch things on YouTube, right? I I I grew up in a digital age. I'm young enough, you know, I was certainly watching YouTube. I I remember the really the first I really got into the gaming side of YouTube. There's people that will I my mom never understood this. She would ask me somebody, why are you watching someone else play video games? Isn't that boring? Wouldn't you rather just play the game? I said, Yeah, playing the game is fun. It's also like watching a movie. Somebody else is playing it. I'm not watching it to play the game, watching it because I like the guy's not like there's a face camera on and they're reacting to stuff. It's like watching a film, it's watching a reaction video. It's quite entertaining. And I was watching that at 13, 14, 15 years old. One of the YouTubers I actually was one of the first YouTubers I ever watched. He still puts out videos and sometimes I'll I'll check him out, click on him, watch it, uh watch a few minutes of one of them. I still find some a level of entertainment in that. But the reason I say all this, say I have personal experience with it, I can tell you that the amount of time that a lot of people, myself, have certainly been included on that list, spend on these platforms is incredibly bad. Just gonna put that out there, it is incredibly deteriorating a lot of ways, right? We the the guy that I've talked about before, uh who I just mentioned, he's had to put out multiple videos saying this is becoming sometimes a parasocial relationship. If you don't know parasocial is when it's sort of a one-sided relationship, girls who fall in love with serial killers is an egregious example of it, but it happens all the time on uh where people will fall in love with or feel like they have a personal connection with someone who's does not know they exist, has never met them, has never heard of them. It's a one-sided, kind of freaky relationship. But it happens to a lot of people because they spend so much time watching these people, they start to think that they get to know them. But there's a whole lot of other contributing factors to this. And the reason I bring all that up is to say, regardless of the liability or the way they alter their platforms or the money they have to pay, that's not gonna change the ultimate truth, which is that ultimately the responsibility for this largely falls on the parents. You know, your your daughter was watching YouTube at age six. What are you doing? I'm gonna say my kids have never watched YouTube. They have some great Spider-Man stuff on there, right? Mickey Mouse Clubhouse is on YouTube, fun stuff. And it's fine in moderation. But if you're spending hours a day on these platforms at age six and age nine, there's a real issue that comes directly from parental involvement saying, yeah, there's there should be a time limit on this stuff. Yeah, this is not, this is for fun and for entertainment, and it's not your life. And we're not gonna spend all of our waking moments, you know, viewing screens and using technology. We're also gonna go play outside. You know, it turns out our moms are right. Go outside, get some fresh air, put your toes in the grass, climb a tree, get hurt, right? Have a fun time outside in nature. Stop looking at a screen that's eight inches from your face. Uh worst choice imaginable. And social media, especially when you look at uh, with the inception of TikTok and Instagram reels, YouTube shorts, Snapchat stories, all these different formats from different apps, but they're all the same thing where you're scrolling endlessly is especially bad, especially for children. And the biggest piece of advice I can give is not to the big companies, it's to our sorts of listeners, where I say, just don't. Just just don't put your kids on it. Just keep your kids as far away for as long as possible, and have real conversations explaining why you do that, right? I know a lot of answers say, why why can't I do that? Well, because I said so. That's a good answer. You are the authority figure, and you need to make that clear. Even if you don't have a reason, you are the authority figure. You don't have to have a reason that makes sense to them. That's that's good. But you also should have real conversations with your children and your grandchildren about, hey, here's why, right? Here's why we we make these decisions. It's in your best interest. Here's what's happened. You can even point to this lawsuit and say, they're paying millions of dollars because of the harm they're causing people who get addicted to these platforms. You don't want that to be you. Because three million dollars may feel like a lot of money, but it's not gonna make up for the years of your life that you lose because and and and the continual ramifications in your life of essentially being addicted to these products. Now, with that being said, uh we still have a couple segments left. When we get back from the break, we're gonna jump over because Kelly Hancock and Ken Paxson are now clashing amid this lawsuit into the school choice program. Paxon has now called on Kelly Hancock to be replaced after the acting comp troller criticized the AG's handling of a lawsuit over the program. Uh some drama going on at our state level. We'll talk more about the details of that when we get back. If you would like to text in, as always, the number is 713-779-5978. That is 713-779-KYST. You're listening to the Lone Star Conservative. I'm your host, Michael Wilson, and I'll be right back after this short break.

SPEAKER_05 1:22:41

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SPEAKER_15 1:22:56

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Why is my Medicare supplement so expensive?

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My prescription drug plan sucks.

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SPEAKER_04 1:25:42

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SPEAKER_00 1:26:12

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SPEAKER_13 1:26:44

Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen. I'm your host, Michael Wilson, and you're listening to the Lone Star Conservative brought to you by Textile and AC service. We got a few texts in. They gotta go into this. It says, I think they definitely made them addictive. That's how they make their money for adults as well as children. But parents allowed their children on social media when they gave their children smartphones, so shouldn't they be at fault more than the social media giants? I believe they used the cigarette case argument to win. Gaming is addictive, food is addictive, pretty much all alcohol is addictive. I hate seeing all the little kids in their stroller on iPads, so could every person out there sue them? And the answer to that question is basically yes. Now you'd have to show in your case that there was harm. And the monetary relief would be relatively related to that, right? So if you your first experience with social media was at 16 years old and you were on an hour a day, you're probably not going to get nearly as much money as the person who was on it at nine years old who was on it for twelve hours a day, right? It it is a case by case basis as to whether you have enough standing to sue and the extent of that particular lawsuit. But yeah, almost everybody has a level of standing uh to sue. And the reality is that this is exactly what I was talking about. Like, yes, we should actually hold our social media companies and companies in general more accountable, right? Food is addictive. We should have a real conversation about making America healthy again. I'm big on that train and saying, hey, you know what? These things, these additives we're using here in America, we shouldn't be, we shouldn't even be allowed to use them. They're essentially toxic and poisonous to human beings. There should be stricter regulation. Same with like when we talked about snap benefits. Should those really be able to be used for candy and soda? I mean, ultimately it's you and what you want to eat, but come on, man, that's not healthy. It's not good. We shouldn't be doing that. I think those are real conversations. Same with gaming, all these other sorts of things. I mean, there are so many games that have faced massive lawsuits for their addictive nature. And I think it presents a dual sort of reality. Again, these are not mutually exclusive. I want to make that clear. I'm not coming out and saying that we don't bear the responsibility that it's just the fault of those social media giants. Sue them to no end. Not what I'm saying. They should be held accountable, right? Because whether or not you're you're pursuing being popular or uh, you know, monetary success, it does not justify some of the creation of some of the way that they they go about doing this, right? There there should be a line on what they're willing to do to increase the number of users and the time of users being on their platforms. And they should face a level of responsibility and regulation as to what that looks like. There are things that are inarguably bad, and we have the obligation and the opportunity as a country. It's not just big government, right? It's we the people saying that's bad for our country, it's bad for the kids of this country, and those things should not be allowed. Right? Make it 18 plus. We are content with that. We have rules on things like pornography, or at least we should. We have rules on certain books, or at least we should. We have rules on a lot of things. Voting, drinking, right? We have rules, and they're not always followed, but to a large degree they are. That's why we have laws. And I think it's totally fair to say at least one easy step we could take is saying, hey, social media requires that you be 18 years old to have an account to use this, and that we have measures for making sure that that's the case. And at the same time, I agree with you, this is a level of personal responsibility. Parents are ultimately the authorities in their children's lives. And if you have an issue with this, and you should, keep your kids off of social media. Don't give them smartphones, don't give them iPads to entertain them, right? We we we we we have to understand like these are decisions that parents are making, that they should make different ones, right? It would be a good thing to say, hey, we're not gonna give our kids iPads when you go out to eat, they're gonna sit down in their chairs and they're gonna eat, and sometimes they're gonna be a little louder, sometimes they're gonna be, you know, I don't want to say, you know, raucous, right? You still have authority to say, hey, you gotta act right when we're in public. But that's going to mean that sometimes, you know, they're antsy, and you as a parent have to deal with that. And it's so easy to say, hey, here's an iPad, watch this, or play this game to get them, you know, off your back. Part of being a parent means they're on your back. And that that that's that's part of the course. And you should not you should not subjectify your kids to screens in order to have no level of responsibility. That's insane. And so those things are not mutually exclusive. We can hold social media companies accountable while also saying that parents are the ultimate authorities, and and here's what we should promote as a culture for parents to stop doing all of this. Because of that, we gotta go to the break. In the last segment, we'll talk about this drama between Ken Paxton and Helly Han Kelly Hancock. Helly, Helly Hancock, Kelly Hancock after the break. We'll talk all about the details of that. If you'd like to text in, this is the last opportunity to do so. The number is 713-779-5978. That is 713-779-KYST. You are listening to the Lone Star Conservative. I'm your host, Michael Wilson. And I'll be right back to wrap up the show after the break.

SPEAKER_06 1:31:40

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SPEAKER_04 1:32:10

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Paxton And Hancock Clash Over TEFA

Closing Thoughts And Sign Off

SPEAKER_13 1:35:38

Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen. I'm your host, Michael Wilson, and you're listening to the Lone Star Conservative brought to you by Texellent AC Service. So in a letter dated two days ago, Hancock raised concerns about alleged terrorism ties among certain schools seeking to participate in the Texas Education Freedom Accounts program and urged additional legal action. The letter follows a recent federal court order extending the application deadline for families and requiring the state to provide Islamic schools access to apply while lawsuits over their eligibility proceed. Hancock appointed specifically to Houston Quran Academy, one of the schools the courts has temporarily allowed to participate. He said, at the time the order was issued, scant evidence had been presented to the court, and it was not aware that the school had documented ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. Hancock wrote adding that both Governor Greg Abbott and President Donald Trump have designated the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization. He asked in this letter for Paxton to take several steps, including presenting additional evidence to the court, pursuing revocation of corporate charters for any schools with those documented ties to terrorist organizations and taking broader action to prevent such entities from operating in Texas. He said the court cannot protect against threats it does not know exist. And Paxton then just responded with fire and brimstone on X. He said Kelly Hancock is a never Trumper and an incompetent loser who is an embarrassment to the position of chief clerk that he holds. And by the way, the verbiage I'm getting from Paxton on this, given how I'm usually a Paxton backer, kind of tells me that there's stuff going on behind the scenes other than this letter. I would imagine this letter is not the first time that Paxton is hearing from Hancock, and he was already well aware of this. Usually public letters are just the public-facing things that come out for us to see when more's going on behind the scenes, behind closed doors that we're not privy to. And that almost certainly seems to be the case, just given the level of response. If I wrote a letter to somebody and I said, Hey, I'm urging you to do this, if I wrote a letter to my boss and I kind of post it to social media and I say, Hey, I'm encouraging you to approach these sponsors. Here's what I think we need to do. I think this would be a great place for our company to go. And he responds saying, I can't believe I ever hired you. You're a terrible radio host. Why in the world are you all these sorts of things? I think it'd be fair for everyone to say, What is going on? Because clearly Matt Velazquez did not just go off on his morning host for Michael just encouraging him to do these things. I think it would be fair to say something else is happening. Uh he said, to protect Texas tax dollars, I'm officially calling for Governor Greg Abbott to immediately replace him with the person Texans actually voted for to be Comptroller, Don Huffeines. And so Paxton's post also referenced Hancock's role in his 2023 impeachment, writing that Hancock failed to take me down during impeachment and that his career is over. The exchange comes amid a an ongoing legal battle uh over the TEFA program, which has drawn attention over questions of eligibility standards and the state's authority to exclude certain schools. I think they've had over 229,000 students who have applied for the program, exceeding more than doubling original projections. But I imagine that it is not as straightforward as Hancock said, hey, go to the court, make sure they know. And then Paxton said, You shouldn't lose your job. I I just maybe that's what happened. I I can't speak to it. It's speculation, but I imagine more is going on behind the scenes that we'll hear about at some point. In the meantime, that will do it for the show today. Thanks everyone for tuning in. You've been listening to the Lone Star Conservative. I'm your host, Michael Wilson. Lord willing, I will be back bright and early for the last morning show of the week tomorrow at 6 a.m. In the meantime, enjoy your Thursday. Get some time outside in the sunshine, enjoy the heat, and Godspeed.