Episode 39- Civil Discussion or Civil War

Rich discusses how partisan politics and a stark ideologically divided country are putting us on the brink of a major civil conflict.  Rich also discuses the hypocrisy of the MeToo movement, the FBI, and Voter Integrity. 

Transcript

spk_0:   0:05
Welcome to the podcast. The Common Bridge with Richard Helping Rich is a successful entrepreneur in the technology, health and finance space. He and his wife, Leslie, are also philanthropist, with interest in civic and artistic endeavors, but with a primary focus on medically and educationally underserved Children. My name is Brian Druker, and from time to time I'll be the moderator and host of this podcast like to welcome everybody back to the common Bridge has been a while since I've seen you rich, but we talked every week, which is great How you bet,

spk_1:   0:35
Bryant. I think under the circumstances pretty well. Course I miss seeing my family as often in person, and I have missed interacting with the people that are involved in both the philanthropic part of our life and the remaining business. But I think you know, we're getting through this and course, you know, is an older American. We have some advantages and some disadvantages, but, you know, there is lots of creativity going on. I'd like I'd like to also promote the life concerts that are being streamed on YouTube by our local celebrity, Jeff Daniels. If you haven't seen just show lives a great chance to see it. And it's all free. A za fundraiser for the Purple Rose Theater. There are lots of other entertainment and food venues, and I just really think it speaks to the creativity of the country that we live

spk_0:   1:27
on. A local front that's really national, gets a lot of national coverage. We've had a lot of turmoil. Now, as we try to open this economy back up and we've seen it in our home state of Lansing, your home state of Michigan and our capital of Lansing. Got he got. I have thoughts on that. What do you see? I mean, are you seeing the, um this is a common bridge. I mean, are you seeing that the Democrats side is more about staying at home and being healthy and the Republican side more about the economy and trying to open it up for Do you see some because of the bad things coming out of this? How do you see this?

spk_1:   2:00
Well, I just don't agree with the premise of the question or that that kind of divide and I look in this Yes, in a broader level and approaching warned you about this before we got on today. But I really believe that if we don't get a pivot to civil conversation, we will go to a civil war. And if I have any talents, it's about being able to synthesize a lot of inputs and say something's tracking in a direction. What's the next logical step? And frankly, I don't like it. I'm hearing an increasing other ring and and folks referring to other members of our society is those people and saying things like, Well, we ought to ban them or hey, don't listen to them or making inflammatory and derogatory statements And the tragedy is that we could have healing moments for dialogue. But I just see this further descent into division and left to its conclusion. It'll end in a civil war instead of a civil dialogue. And look, I think there are people from all sides of the political spectrum that wants something different, and I want to say with you, no good purpose, not because they think they can win a division. But I remember some years ago then President Barack Obama was addressing the graduates at the University of Michigan. One of our daughters

spk_0:   3:34
remember it Well,

spk_1:   3:35
yeah, he was one of our daughters was graduating from School of Education that year, and President Obama he spoke to the the grads and the guests. The cross, so large had have it in the big House football stadium was the venue, and he pleaded with everyone to seek broad and diverse sources of information and opinion. If memory serves me correctly, he suggested both Rush Limbaugh and the Huffington Post, along with major newspapers and news channels that he name. In contrast to that, we have people that are being valued and devalued based on how the partisans can use them, and how the eyeball and click hungry news outlets are inflaming them. And, you know, we can have policy differences, and I'm sure that, you know, President Obama and President Bush had policy differences. Yet I don't recall them attacking the voters of the other party, and I don't remember Senator McCain. And then you know, President nominee Obama attacking the voters, and so that really concerns me because policy differences can get resolved. But once you start going after people or institutions or basic fairness or evenhandedness, it can't end in anything other than a catastrophe. We should be having some civil conversations and, if not agreement around four things. So So, first of all, how do we deal with the pandemic and all of its implications? That needs to be non partisan, you know, date is coming in. Secondly, we've had Joe Biden presumptive nominee. You know Brett Kavanaugh. Contrast that with that. The me too movement, you know, and the overhang around the 2020 Election and the differences in the treatment are stark, an astonishing. We should be able to get to some common method of treatment and fairness. We've also have this rolling revelation about the conduct of our own FBI in our Department of Justice. And if there's anything we need to agree on, it's equal treatment under the law and non political law enforcement, you know the implications of one party states that control the spying mechanisms and the law enforcement, and then also integrity of voting. We all share in making sure that we have a voting system that includes everyone, makes it easy for people to vote once and and and not and not more than that, Um, and I think that's within reach, but I don't hear much discussion about this. But anyone Each of these four things the pandemic, the Biden, Cavanaugh, me to the FBI, the Department of Justice, integrity of voted these are things we should truly be together in. And in each of these examples iconic, it could only be explained away by hoping that one would always be empowered. So you wouldn't be able to say certain things about any of these topics unless you believed you and the people that you affiliate with, we're always going to be in power. You'd never want to shoot to be on the other foot. So look as an eternal optimist, I'm really hoping we can move off the partisan and the emotional reactions and move towards some thoughtful consideration and just some evenhanded fairness, not start talking to each other to civil way.

spk_0:   7:02
But where would that happen is, I mean, if I keep getting back to the common bridge and not to be a smell of promoter of this job. But when you first pitched this show, I think that's what you wanted to do what you have been doing. But outside of I'll patch on the back here, your numbers have exploded in the last 30 days for listenership. But how do we get that? Bigger. So so there is a common discussion because right now people are going into their corners and they're listening on Lee to their own Verdy Pacheco's that that that their own trainers and in their own voices they don't vote in the middle of the ring and ask the other guy how he's doing. They go back to their own corner and asked them how they're doing right. How do you How do you think we go about doing this?

spk_1:   7:44
Well, I I think that, you know, for the common Bridgette's keeping the brand promise and the brand promise is that each episode we're going to have someone something for everyone to dislike. So no matter where you come from politically or otherwise, expect to come here to find something that you dislike. And I worked really hard to make sure that that happens.

spk_0:   8:08
I think you're doing because the mail bag you're doing well in that both sides which

spk_1:   8:12
okay, good, yeah, and and people, you know, send me notes and messages along the way, and I make sure they understand if you look if you want to demagogue ideologue ah, hyperpartisan. There's lots of places you can go for that. You can pick your newspaper. Based on that, you can pick your cable news outlet and so forth by that again, President Obama said at the time. A cool to Rush Limbaugh, but also Hagel read The Washington Post, and vice versa. Right? If you stay in one of those camps, you're only going to get one outcome. And again, I believe that the way we change this is that we demand better behavior from those that we elected on a better product from the people who are supposed to be reporting to us. Now I look, I am not a deeply educated scholar, but I am told that I have lots of people that I know that I go to when I need to know different things. And I'm told that Socrates spoke of the virtue of intellectual excellence and that hope was centered on the belief that the mission and the virtue of excellence in education called idea was the training of great leaders who were listen to this morally responsible for guiding the citizens whom Socrates thought were too easily swayed and tricked by demagogues who knew how to manipulate the masses. Socrates believed it takes a riel captain to guide the ship.

spk_0:   9:49
That's that's powerful.

spk_1:   9:50
I believe it is, too, in this stand. Part is this. Half the populace seems to think the other half is being swayed and tricked by a demagogue, but cannot see how they themselves are also being misled. Right. And that's why we get the results that we have today, a deeply divided country, an unresponsive government and a media industry that fosters the emotions over reason. And when you take those elements to its logical conclusion, it is indeed civil war.

spk_0:   10:26
You know, it's interesting you bring that up to cause, you know, prior to the Civil War, we had situations. Obviously there was the abolition movement, but they're also in the north farmers who they get. They get credit for being abolitionist. But really they were farmers. That was saying, Look, it's an unfair market, you know I don't get free labor, but you do. So there was a lot of let's end slavery because of that, but also we started to see some divides. And what you're telling me is you're seeing some similar divides. The seeds of similar divides now is. Am I correct? And what you're what you're laying out here?

spk_1:   10:59
Absolutely. So let's let's look at the Civil War. So the slavery of other human being we can and should all agree it is wrong. It's an absolute And yet, at that time, in 18 60 there was such rank. Or about that it got down to K. Ning's in the U. S. Senate. But beyond that, all of those states that seceded negatively mentioned Abraham Lincoln's election in their articles of causes or declaration of causes about why they were leaving the union. The notion of not my president isn't hat without precedent. George is specifically their declaration causes says this. The party of Lincoln called the Republican Party under its president, name and organisation is of recent origin. It is admitted to be an anti slavery party, and Georgia says and look. The material prosperity of the North is greatly dependent on the federal government and that of the south, not at all. So we're leaving. And in terms of swing public opinion, Mississippi, in its declaration of clauses, said it has enlisted its press, its pulpit and its schools against us until the whole popular mind of the North is excited and inflamed with prejudice. Now you can take what Georgia was saying at the time about the duly elected president and what Mississippi was saying that hate you're all lined up against me and your inflaming prejudice against my very essence and overlay where we are today. And yet at that time, as you pointed out, that there were northerners who look at this cynically. But all of the Southern states had union loyalists, and they mostly were made up of either mountain people or small farmers, those people that did not own slaves. They were more in favour of a policy of freedom. So at least in that war we had a cause. And we had a policy that people were four against again. Slavery, primarily some states rights. But now we have people against people. President Trump is duly elected, and there's demonstrations, not against the policy, as you know, like for example, we experience growing up during the Vietnam War. It's a policy that people demonstrated against wanted our government to change. People wanted to protest the results of a duly elected government. And that gets me into, you know, when I think about the election itself, we do not have to deal with false choices. And a false choice is trump versus by Republican versus Democrat. You know? Hey, if you don't vote for, you know, one or the other you to vote for Whomever the speaker is is opposing,

spk_0:   13:48
right? We hear it all the time. That's right.

spk_1:   13:50
We have balance. We have voices to demand both better candidates and better behavior from those we elect to serve. So we all need to show up and vote, but we don't need to feel compelled to vote for either.

spk_0:   14:02
So is, is this the primary environment? Then finally, for ah, legitimate third Very

spk_1:   14:10
well. Look, that's a tall questions. And there has been times in our history where third parties have done rather well. But today 1/3 party would only make sense if there was a chance of winning 270 Electoral College votes. Look, the Democrats Republicans have entrenched themselves on and used laws to make it difficult for 1/3 party. So right now you look at the two largest of or the most prominent of the third part is the Libertarians in the Green Party. As of today, I looked it up this morning. The Libertarian is on the ballot in 35 states, plus the Plus Washington D. C. And they're gonna try to get on off 50 this year. The Green Party is on the ballot in 22 states, but that is half of the 44 they had in the last election cycle. But the issue is this brain. The Republican and Democrat controlled boards of elections in the states set the requirements for ballot access. And guess what?

spk_0:   15:09
It's convenient, isn't it?

spk_1:   15:10
It right, because it requires signatures on the Titian's. We have Corona virus rules that are thwarting that and running out the clock. So a, you know, could a platform like a libertarian or a Green party get on the ballot in all 50 states and elect a unity ticket that wouldn't be in keeping with their more ideological view of the world. That's a long way to get there. Yeah, and if you were recalled, Donald Trump was sought as a candidate from the party that Ross Perot had founded. Yeah, and in what Trump concluded back then, he said that you have to run as a Democrat or a Republican to win. And remember, Trump is not a party guy.

spk_0:   15:55
No, not at all. Yeah,

spk_1:   15:56
and he I'm sure he would have run on the Democrat ticket if he thought he could win there. Now you and I both were active during the last time. There was a strong third party that was in 1992 and the results of having that third party in there. The results of the election will changed. Lapsley Absolute absolute Ross Perot George H. W. Bush would have won the Electoral College in a landslide. Absolutely, but Perot took off enough votes to swing it to Bill Clinton. Bill Clinton got 46% of the popular vote. Bush and Perot got 53.2% of the popular vote. But the end result is that we had a Democrat versus a sitting Republican president at that time.

spk_0:   16:44
It's right, and we never would have heard of Hillary Clinton either, right?

spk_1:   16:47
Ho ho, Hold not touching delicate list way okay and that you know that their focus Let's go. Let's go on

spk_0:   16:57
with the virus. A lot so much for that. Okay, um, let's talk about Corona virus. We've been doing it for the last. This is the eighth week now, word were in week eight. You know, this started out by. Let's try to make sure people stay at home because we don't want to overwhelm the health care system. We gotta be careful of the hospitals because the numbers of the CDC was bringing up in the world Health that, you know, we could have two million people in hospitals overnight. Now that hasn't happened. You and I both know people. I'm married to somebody in the health industry in Detroit, and there are a lot of empty bets. The old Cobo Center. It hasn't been used here in Detroit. Everything we thought, what happened. And a lot of that probably has to do with some sort of sheltering in place. But now the narratives change. Now it's become something else. What? Your thoughts now about that, um, you know, do we stay locked down for another six months? Do we stay away? Or how is that going to affect the economy? And where do you stand on that?

spk_1:   17:54
Well, you got a lot of questions in there. Let's let's kind of back up to the first time we talked about Cove in 19 and at that time he said, Look, there's more unknowns than knowns, and let's hope the conversation that we're having in a month or two is. Did we do too much versus Oh, no, we didn't do enough. So there's the first headline. And today there are still more unknowns than knowns. The data is coming in. It's largely encouraging. And let me just touch on a little bit of that. First of all, the good news is that the health care industry has rallied. Helped A listers got to hear Brian Peters talk about what was going on, and now we have the capacity to deal with the outbreak, and certainly it's look. It's the combination of policies to prevent the spread and relentless resupply, and that's had a good result for the moment. Now people on the front line are exhausted, as you would expect, and hospital finances have been wrecked but make no mistakes. Lives have been saved from Cove in 19 deaths, and this could have been one of America's frankly finest moments where we put our differences aside and unite like we did on September 12 2001. But we're starting to see, you know, around the Corona virus, some bad behavior we've seen. Rescue package is loaded with pork. We've seen yet another attempt to reward high incomes by repealing the limits on the state and local taxes. We see states looking to resolve their pre existing financial problems on the back of the Corona virus. But we've also seen some good news. Workers are coming to the forefront from his Amazon warehouses to meatpacking plants that workers are saying, Wait a minute, you need to treat us better for health and safety and better working conditions. Yet I've seen pundits okay expressing disdain for workers without college degrees and the way there voting and yet at the same time praising our front line workers who drive trucks, working grocery stores and the like. And as I'm reading and watching this, I'm saying, Don't they understand? Those are the same people. You tell me I'm essential. I'm a hero and I'm going to work every day, and then you tell me you think I'm too dumb to know who to vote for and all I can conclude is that your political view is coloring how you value me. And look, there's a professor 11 Stanford. I watched some of his YouTube videos over the weekend. He gives really good analysis on Cove. In 19 statistics. He had been on CNN. He went on Fox News. Now CNN won't happen back because he appeared on Fox. So, like again, it's one set of numbers. You know, it seems like we all should listen to him. Yeah, and, ah, the infection rate numbers, which I got a little data on here I share with you. I did some analysis myself, but there's no doubt that now that Cove in 19 is perhaps on the downside, perhaps for this wave that we have an enormous public health cost to these. Stay at home orders or locked down. So we want to frame them. You heard milk Mac talk about suicides, domestic violence, alcohol consumption. We now know that addictions and other medical conditions are being left untreated, including heart attacks, cancers and even appendicitis.

spk_0:   21:29
I heard that

spk_1:   21:30
I don't want to go to the ER and ambulance runs in one of our major systems here Locally. That four times the number of runs to pick up deceased people. So it wouldn't people talk about reopening the economy. The economy again is a thing. Serves us. It's not a goal in and of itself, but it's It's a means of, you know, making sure that we're whole housed and fed and educated and transported in the best way possible. And we're paying a terrible public health costs at this point. But you also you look, we have people have spent decades building of business. They're getting wiped out in a few months. And look, I can tell you as a little bit a startup entrepreneur in the amount of effort that it's required to do that if you're a 20 something or 30 something in your energized versus trying to do that as a 60 something. So we got a small, dry cleaner, built a business with sweat and sacrifice, and now may be looking at an old age with extreme want and mawr. Currently, we've got no Airbnb entrepreneurs that suddenly have their entire business dried up. Yeah, and so when we look at this social current age, although this the public health costs that I just mentioned. And these economic costs, which will ripple into public health costs, can't get people to focus on the numbers. So, a little more than a week ago, I took apart the CDC dot gov numbers and went into some state Health Department numbers. This is on April 20 and I calculated that based on the ratio of reported cases versus actual cases, that the fatality rate is someplace between 0.26% or 0.1%

spk_0:   23:16
rich, that that's lower than blue. That's lower than influenza

spk_1:   23:19
it is. And look at the high side. It could be as much as 1.65 percents. Okay, again, bear bear in mind, these numbers are impacted by people getting treatment and by the pace. But what we know today is this If you're under the age of 45 you don't have any underlying health issues, if you become infected, the most likely outcome you're never gonna know, you know you're not gonna have symptoms. The next most likely outcome, you're gonna have some symptoms, but you're not going to require medical attention, right? And the next most likely outcome is you're going to get In fact, it needs some medical attention and recover. So you have to. Sarah is our policy right now where we had to hit it with a sledgehammer. Should the party policy now be something like If you're under 45 you don't have underlying health issues and you're not going to be around people that are aged or have underlying health issues? Maybe you could go back to teaching school. Maybe you could go back to work. And there's growing coverage of this notion that you know Bill Gates, Center Front Center, on this, that what we need is more centralized control and surveillance and gosh, maybe certificates of recovery and vaccination if you want to travel and we'll have APS on your phone to track their movement and who you've been near you Yeah, yeah, and right now there's not a vaccine developed. But gosh, let's all go out and get one rich. What about the

spk_0:   24:51
economic front? Is there any good news out there?

spk_1:   24:54
Absolutely. Look, the economic engine, you know, free market capitalistic economies demonstrates why and how it works. Note that Venezuela didn't spool up to supply the world, but the cos inside of these capitalist economies have been ableto pivot to make needed goods and to meet demand in enemy was a cautionary part of this recall that the governor of New York asked for 60,000 ventilators. Yeah, and he didn't need is playing New York. I'm inside New York works, right? You need 500 or something. You think you're gonna be hard to get your order 2000. Hope you get the 500 maybe get an extra 500 that you can trade that just just New York be in New York. That it that's what us in under a centralized command and control economic a lot of resource is would have been developed to that production. And I recall when the Soviet Union was in existence that there were talking about a manager of a factory that made nails. And when they gave the manager and incentive by tonnage, the factory produced enormous nails like spikes, right? Yeah. And they said what they said, Well, way we really want to get it in center by volume. Well, they started coming out looking like thumbtacks. And and that's the beauty of the capitalist system that there has to be a willing consumer on the other side of that production. And if there's not that that production capacity seizes and it gets repurposed for something else, it's and it's called creative destruction and MPs. That's one of the reasons that healthcare economics don't work in a purely free market economy. And then I've spoken about this right other times,

spk_0:   26:47
and there's some outside forces to you Explain to me a few weeks ago just that the side kind of fun that, uh, that New York and General was kind of, uh, a mess to begin with. You start looking at the numbers that they bring in from the first aid package, which I think came around a 13 to 17 billion of that money. And they also have, you know, two and $3 million lobbyists in Washington to make sure that the numbers in New York are getting enough attention, such that that those monies come back into New York. And you were skeptical that all that money wasn't necessarily going to the crisis. Um, do you think that you know we need 60,000 ventilators? We have. We're marking every death is a Covad death. Do you think that There's some of that in there that's boosting the numbers for a place like New York to be able to get more funds from the government

spk_1:   27:37
will all say about that is this. We can't based national policy on the special conditions of New York any more than we could base tax policy on out layer like Paris Hilton or someone like that. New Yorkers, New York And it's a place unto itself that we need to support New York. It's part of United States of America, but you can't base our national policies on what's going on in New York.

spk_0:   28:04
Yeah, all right, well, let's let let's turn a little bit now. Um, we talked earlier in the podcast about protests. Um, you know, I know, I know you're an advocate of the First Amendment, but how do you think? Tell me more about about the protests where you think they do it doing this right? And how you think they're doing it wrong?

spk_1:   28:24
On a broad scale, Americans have a right to peaceable assembly a right to petition our government in a right to protest. Hopefully, it's about a policy that could be changed and and I do notice that there's been protesters at state capitals and elsewhere that air protest ing a policy. They're not protesting a person or an election result. You know, most of them have a legitimate point of view. No. But you look, of course, in any gathering there's always knuckleheads, and we don't. We've seen the highly publicized pictures of protesters with these rifles slung over their shoulders. I'm looking at this. I'm going. Really? For what? I mean, what's count the ways? That's idiotic, All right. And I won't get him all here because of the interest of time. First of all, how are you going to find a safe shot in that mass of people? Okay, you're talking about, you know, a very high powered weapon where that bullet travels a long way. And who are you planning to shoot? OK, and here's the other logic. If you really truly feared the government, you wouldn't make yourself the number one target by carrying a rifle. Right? Because we know rules of engagement to take out the highest threat first. And guess what you've got. State, please. Sharpshooters who can call the corner of the postage stamp they're going to shoot from hundreds of yards away. Okay. If they wanted you down, you're down. Okay? Fatally, I hate I don't I don't get it. But you know. Okay, so maybe someone needs to explain that to me. I hope Lister e mails me and says, this is what we needed to carry your rifle. I don't know, like, doesn't carry a bullseye on your head. I don't look, the Democrats and I tried to get one of the guys that actually signed this on the show. He said he was comin in, and I haven't heard from since then. Ihsaa. They censored a member on elected member of their own party. And here was her crime shed a case of Corona virus. And it responded to Clark wine. And she gave credit to President Trump for making you're aware of it, and they, like, came down on her for not supporting her

spk_0:   30:45
party's right here. Yeah, that's right. It's

spk_1:   30:48
like, what's the alternative? And, you know, and I watch people go long and hard about this drug core coin is not effective where it's dangerous. And I'm thinking about we've been using it for a long time for lots of things and, as of last week, the FDA commissioner Stephen Hahn. Dr Stephen Hahn. So there are many tests going on, and he said there were quote double digit number of tests wasn't specific on the number, But he said that there were two areas that we're looking promising. One of them was early stage of the infection on the other was actually prophylactically. So prevention. So again, one of those unknowns in a vast sea of unknowns that we just don't know how much how this stuff works. You know what type of patients it works for doesn't work for anybody. We just We're still trying to figure that out. Sure, and look at. Of course, we've all heard the news that from December has been approved for experimental use, okay and that that's maker Gilead Sciences. They donated their entire stock that they have to have 1.5 1,000,000 doses to the federal government. But look in the meantime, everybody, please wash your hands. Practice safe show social. Distancing a mask is not a bad idea. I was with some folks over the weekend. One of the guys had ah, and 95 mask on that he'd gotten from construction work, and it was great. You're wearing this, but we're staying six feet apart. And he said no. He said this is helping my seasonal allergies. If I have this time, I don't have to take Claritin. So we've discovered this along the way. So good for him.

spk_0:   32:26
Right? Right. Um okay. I have you here and to be criminal with me now for asked that some of Jeremy crazy talk to me a little bit about Biden, and I'm gonna bring back cabin on this because I think it's the same darn thing. And the me too movement.

spk_1:   32:41
All right, Well, look, I'm gonna step back and look at the broad strokes of the election in just one or two ways to be in this. A little reported story is that the state of New York canceled its primary and they canceled the primary, and they handed the delegates to Joe Biden. Now Bernie Sanders would have done pretty well in state of New York. And Bernie Sanders has said his intent is to continue to gather delegates to influence the party at the convention. Okay. Yeah. Bernie's a little annoyed that he's not getting that chance and I'm watching this and going who is advising the establishment of the Democrat National Committee? Do they think they can again dis the folks that have supported Senator Sanders? And so when I think about advisors, I want who is advising Joe Biden to run on a platform of being America's moral leader? I mean, look, he's got a I'll be facetious about this. A hands on style of dealing

spk_0:   33:48
with played, well played.

spk_1:   33:50
He's, he's looking. You go back over his record that he sold his Delaware house toe a banking executive for a over the market valuation as a son, getting jobs, banks and getting overpaid, his son getting millions off the Chinese while he was a vice president. And then you have right Brisman and and I mean, there's not There's a 1,000,000 ways to do a platform. Sure, sure, Joe Biden is the moral compass. I just I think the attack surface is way too great.

spk_0:   34:25
What about me too? How do you see me too? Because I bought in hook line and freakin sinker in 2016 and realized I was wrong. I was old. I'm getting too old. These people are right, I'm in now. I'm a little upset. So you tell me.

spk_1:   34:38
First of all, the treatment of women has not been good and and we are making incremental improvements and the, you know the process continues, and, you know, I think the you know, leaving Harvey Weinstein out of it for the moment. But when you look at the two people that have been most prominent, that's Joe Biden and Brett Kavanaugh. If you look at the underlying facts is only four possible outcomes. They're both guilty there, both innocents and victims of false accusations or one is guilty, and the other a victim or vice versa, right? But the broader looks the treatment of both cases. There were over 700 articles and columns written about Brett Kavanaugh and 1000 a medium Mansions. And this is the story that this virgin, who was aged 15 to 17 at the time, depending on which story his accuser was telling that day, attempted a rape at an unknown place and let later went on to be involved in serial rape parties while in college. And this is crumby of certain guilt continued while corroborating witnesses that the accuser provided flat out said it didn't either known nothing about it or she's wrong. Compare that scant coverage of a 51 year old senator again with that handy reputation, having committed by his own definition sexual violence on a young woman in his employ, and that the reporting victim made contemporary reports to several people, including her mother, and listen to the New York Times defense of their coverage. Why did they delay two weeks to report on Joe Biden? Well, executive editor Dean Beck read, whose again been recorded as thinking his mission is to destroy This current president said that Cavanagh was part of a running hot story, t who was a figure who was already in the public Forum. In a long way, it was, How is Joe Biden and not a running hot story who's in the public eye? I mean it. Just come on. And look, if if Biden was a student under his own rules that Tar Re could file a claim of assault, Biden would have no right to know the specifics. The evidence that was provided, who was charging him, who was a witness and no right to question the accuser And if again applying Biden standards. A college administrator would decide the issue in private judge. Jury executioner. Okay. And so if you remember the sound face senators and the pious reporters, I want to say smearing. But I treating Justice Cavanaugh under this banner of absolutism, believing all women, even when there's not only zero evidence and conflicting information there is. It's really inexplicable how Joe Biden was treated so it again speaks to We will continue to get that kind of reporting as long as we consume it, and and that's what we need to do now. I think she had a pretty I think she had a pretty fair job. I was encouraged by that. I did watch it start to finish as it was alive. She did try several ways to pin Mr Biden down to a commitment to search the records that he has stored at the University of Delaware. I mean, she went at that several different ways, never worked. She could have made it a little stronger, maybe by running the clips of the senator Biden pressing Need a hill during the Clarence Thomas hearings.

spk_0:   38:38
You're right, Yeah, yeah,

spk_1:   38:39
he's probably got a Pulitzer Prize for journalism. She's the title nine reforms that I just mentioned. I just feel bad for the women and all the people who have been used as tools in this, when the right answer would be an evenhanded policy, you know, and then let people decide for themselves. If sure Brett Cabin, who did as a teenager what he was accused of doing, then you've got a first wall say, Do you believe it? Second of all, doesn't it affect whether he should sit on Spring Port? OK, Similarly, Joe Biden, do you believe it? And does it affect his ability to service president United States, but not to try to show shade it and insult people's intelligence like that? And I know if you saw this lately, but now they're trying toe float. The idea that the Bernie Bro's are the one that put the story out about Tara Reid for for Biden, and we know now that the Bernie Bro's never actually existed. It was a

spk_0:   39:43
all right made

spk_1:   39:44
up thing. I mean it. Anyway, it's crazier. Why'd we get on this topic anyway? This is OK. You know why? Because if you believe either side, we end up in civil war.

spk_0:   39:54
All right, so when we first started this right, you also talked about the FBI, and that'll be the last thing we touch on today because I know I've kept too long already, but are, you know, maybe we get voter integrity to, But what did you want to say about about the FBI and what we're finding out now in the investigation in the early investigations on the FBI and that Trump

spk_1:   40:14
Look into that. And I think we need to get a real expert on this, and I've got some calls out on this. But in February, the judge in general, Michael Flynn sentencing, postponed that sentencing on a charge of lying to the FBI and the reason being that the the court was convinced that there was exculpatory evidence that the FBI to help withheld. And now what we know is that the FBI, from their own records, showed that Jim Comey personally ordered a breach of protocol and sent agents to the White House, one of them Peter Stroke, and to interview the incoming national security adviser, General Michael Flynn, and one of the agents Bill pre step in his nose. He says, Well, what's the goal here? Is it the truth or to get him to say something we can charge them with or to get him fired?

spk_0:   41:11
Yeah, yeah, that's that. That's actually

spk_1:   41:13
it is like, Wait a minute. When did we have the FBI trying to get people in an administration fired and look at? Remember at the time, the FBI already knew that the entire premise off the Russian collusion story was false. They knew at that time that all of the Russian disinformation in this so called seal dossier was fake, but it was used to spy on citizens and a candidate and tow launch a two year investigation, knowing that the results would be no collusion. James Comey's own words, he said. I took part of this steel report so that a special prosecutor could be hired and he got that I would not want to see the candidacy of Joe Biden treated this way. I would not want to see the candidacy of Bernie Sanders treated this way. I wouldn't want to see the candidacy of Donald Trump being traded this way. And if you know whoever becomes president at the end of the next election. Whether we reelect the president, we have, or we, we have a new president. The FBI's conduct is just outrageous, and we all benefit from an FBI, a Department of Justice and intelligence services that are free of political pressures and biases. You know, I think we all want equal protection under the law, and if you want it, you have to give it. And as you look, I'm not a fan of this president. I don't believe that America said. We want a guy like Donald Trump in the Oval Office. I don't think anybody said he's the best qualified person, but that doesn't excuse this kind of abuse like that. You mentioned you mentioned voter and integrity, right? And I'm gonna just go real quick here, voting by mail. Some states use it. It's different than absentee voting. It is subject to fraud, and some wants to know well how much fraud. It's like asking how many cases of Corona virus are there, because if you're not testing, you can't count. But I think the solution is simple, and I'm maybe I shouldn't be surprised. It's not being suggested. We could all have an app that has a unique identify are associated with it. That takes a picture of the person casting the vote. Okay, Or in Chicago, the headstone casting the vote. I'm just kidding about that. Thea Thea the end. And then you have the, you know, facial recognition databases that we're all exposed to anyway and comparison to see if you know Rich Help. His face was used to cast 26 ballots someplace.

spk_0:   43:44
Yeah, you and I both agree that technology is there, but that's not really the argument.

spk_1:   43:48
Absolutely. And and then the notion of disenfranchisement and such yeah, is over for people that don't have access to devices and things that relatively inexpensive to set up voting centers. And you're all voting off the same technology everybody gets to cast a vote. It would make the politicians have to respond. Everybody not hope for a low turnout election. It would be really a step in the right way for democracy.

spk_0:   44:17
Sure, so anyway, to react that this has been a great podcast is this has been a lot of fun. It's one of our longer ones, but I think everybody's gonna find it's worth it, you know? How do we exit this quagmire. I don't get out of this.

spk_1:   44:28
First of all, I'm kind of glad you like the word you use the word quagmire.

spk_0:   44:33
I knew you would.

spk_1:   44:34
That's what the Vietnam War became for us. Ah, and weirdly, some people are using the U. S. Casualty count in Vietnam in the number of Corona virus deaths as a means of bashing people they don't like. But we do have to exit it. And I'll use Socrates once again. Who said Listen to your common sense, not the rhetoric of leaders. Quit going by what people are telling you to think. What do your own experiences tell you? My experiences tell me that we have a generous and compassionate country and that we live up to those ideals every day. Don't let anybody drag us down

spk_0:   45:12
like it rich as always. Thanks so much for spending time that this is great. I hope we didn't exhaust you. It's been a long one. But hey, thanks a lot. And, uh and we'll see you next week

spk_1:   45:22
by Brian. I look forward to it. All right, you be good. Stay safe. Wash your hands.

spk_0:   45:26
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