Rain, Hunger & the Systems We Ignore

In this episode of TMI, Tamika D. Mallory gets real about the messy state of American politics. She breaks down how today’s leaders are out of touch, lacking historical awareness, and often more focused on power and self-interest than actually helping the communities they claim to serve.    Tamika talks about what happens when leadership fails, how society starts to crumble, and why those who do understand what's happening need to step up, protect the vulnerable, and lead with strategy and purpose.

Tamika and Mysonne touch on the legacy of nonviolence inspired by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., while also acknowledging the real need to defend our communities when they're under threat. The episode also dives into everyday issues hitting people hard, climate change impacting cities like New York, government cuts to SNAP benefits, the healthcare crisis, and the growing moral and political divide. Tamika calls for unity, empathy, and real community care. Instead of getting caught up in distractions or fighting each other, she urges us to support one another and take meaningful action.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
I'm Tamika D.

Speaker 2 (00:00):
Mallory and IT Shit Boy, my Son it generally.

Speaker 1 (00:03):
We are your host of TMI.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
Tamika and my Son's Information, Truth, Motivation and.

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Inspiration, New Energy.

Speaker 2 (00:14):
What's going on, Tomika D. Mallory, It's going on.

Speaker 1 (00:17):
America is bugged out.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
But we're going to Hell of the hand basket.

Speaker 1 (00:22):
But we ain't because I ain't going with them.

Speaker 2 (00:24):
America is even to get out the ship because these
people going mad. Man.

Speaker 1 (00:29):
It's an interesting thing though, that, you know.

Speaker 3 (00:31):
I think that our current or the current leaders I
won't say our because I don't claim them, but I
think that the current leadership does not truly understand because
I don't know if.

Speaker 1 (00:45):
They've studied history or if they.

Speaker 3 (00:47):
Parcel out the parts that actually resonate with them, so
they may have left out how every time they try
to destroy other people for their own survival or their
own gain, everything falls out, like the bottom falls out.

Speaker 1 (01:04):
It never works.

Speaker 3 (01:05):
They always hurt, their people hurt, they suffer, and they
end up turning the world against them. And we have
seen this happen over and over again. And maybe they
don't care. Perhaps it's their intention wholeheartedly. Maybe they think
they have some new flavor or a new system or
new strategy.

Speaker 2 (01:25):
Maybe it's us, you know, you ever think like no,
because this is what I'm saying. We are so far
in a place that I'm that I be confused, Like
sometimes you know how you be like in a dream
and you you gotta pinch yourself or you be like, yo,
I need to wake up because this can't be real,

(01:46):
and this is how it is right now. So I'm thinking,
maybe it gotta be us, because there are so many
people that don't believe or acting like this shit ain't happening,
that we didn't Well.

Speaker 3 (01:58):
Someone said to me, I was on a thread with
a lot of important black folks, and when I say important,
I don't mean that they're any more valuable than anybody else.

Speaker 1 (02:09):
But they do a lot of big things.

Speaker 3 (02:11):
And we were all talking and I said, it feels
like not enough because they were saying it's time for
us to organize the next level of our resistance, right,
and so they were talking about what that looks like,
and I was like, do we really think that folks
are ready to move in that direction? Because I feel

(02:32):
like so many people around us are just not even
really paying attention and this person on the thread responded
that more people know than you think.

Speaker 1 (02:43):
They just have no idea what to do.

Speaker 3 (02:46):
And when people don't know what to do, they don't
even want to deal with the full reality of what
it is that they're facing. And so I said, you
know what, I have to not so much own but
accept that it is us because we have foresight that
we've been given that it's actually a calling. It's almost

(03:08):
like a spiritual spell, if you will. Like they tried
to say that Harriet was she was receiving or whatever
spells or under a spell, but it's not so much
that is that it's a spiritual thing that was happening
to her because God was given her vision to be
able to walk the planks that other men and women

(03:29):
could not lead. They couldn't walk it, and they definitely
could not lead it right. And so that spiritual gift
that we have helps us to see things beyond what
another person may or may not be able to see.
And even if they can see it, they have no
idea what to do with it. There were many people
on those plantations that said, we need to get the

(03:50):
hell out of here.

Speaker 1 (03:51):
Some of them sat and.

Speaker 3 (03:52):
Actually dreamed about what it would look like to get going.
But when someone came to them regularly talking about we
got to run, we gotta run, we need to leave
this and that other, you know, some of them, people
are like, man, I'm not getting ready to sit here
and keep going back and forth with you about this.

Speaker 1 (04:08):
This is our reality, this is where we are.

Speaker 3 (04:10):
I need to be able to make sure mass is
not raping my daughter or my son, not upsetting you know,
the the ma'am or whatever they used to call them,
the wife, or not creating any problems. I still need
to make sure they sneaking and reading, they're you know,
learning or whatever.

Speaker 1 (04:28):
I don't have time.

Speaker 3 (04:30):
To do that and focus on your far fetched idea
about what is next. However, when Harriet and others who
were ready for the move come along, you'll find that
more people are like, Okay, well god, dang it, let's go.
What's game what we're doing? And I think that that's
some of what we see happening right now.

Speaker 2 (04:49):
But I do hear some of that. There's a lot
of people that, like I see on social media, and
I just like to inform because you know, that's just
what I do. I post things that you know, I
do the research, and I said, Okay, look this is happening.
And then they come on and like, so what are
we doing? What's the next movement? Is like what are
you doing? So why are you posting this? And it's
like sometimes you just need to have the knowledge right

(05:10):
and we have to plan. We have to strategically plan.
I just want you all to know the shit that's
actually going on. So when people saying this ain't happened,
it doesn't happen, I want you to know this is
exactly what's going on. And I'm strategically saying, Okay, I
know that things have to be done. And like you said,
there's a lot of us that are on these dreads
and in these rooms having conversations with the thinkers and

(05:32):
the doers about what the next level of resistance is
going to be. And I've been just paying out in
my mia. I know what it is that I have
to do. I know that there's a contingency of men,
especially black men in this country that need to be
organized in a certain way. Young black men just need
to be able to understand where we are to protect
our communities, not even about anything about just protecting our

(05:55):
communities and understanding the duty and what is going to
take to do that. So and I know what that
is going to take. And every day I wake up
and it's like, Yo, I know what I'm being called
to do in this moment. But you know, so That's
why I was saying, like, is it us? Because sometimes
I be thinking, like, Yo, this shit is it just
can't really be real. Like everything in the last probably

(06:18):
eight years I've seen, like ever since the beginning of Trump, like,
I've been seeing this shit and I was like, and
I've been telling people, I don't know if people understand
the seriousness of it, and people like some people are
or whatever. And now every day it just moves more
and more towards what his divisions I've already been having.

(06:39):
So sometimes I'm like, maybe I'm just bugged on. Maybe
I just think some shit has happened and it's not
you know, maybe because what if you ever think, like
in an alternate alternative universe that you just we just
all wrong, like we just hold wrong.

Speaker 1 (06:52):
I know we're not.

Speaker 3 (06:53):
And see like Angelo, you know, co founder Until Freedom
for those people who don't know Attorney Angelo Pinto, there
have been many times in our threads where everybody is
arguing and or debating, discussing like what do we do?

Speaker 1 (07:07):
How do we stop this? That?

Speaker 3 (07:08):
And the third you know, and this is predating Donald
Trump's second term. This was during Biden, during other things
that had nothing to do with who's in the White
House specifically, but it could have been a state issue
right where we're talking about like how do you deal
with Daniel Cameron in Kentucky? How do you deal with

(07:29):
something voter suppression in North Carolina? And we would be
anxious about it and having large debate and Angelo would
always say, in his thought provoking ways, he would say,
maybe it's meant to burn down, Like we might be
putting ourselves through all of this anxiety for something that

(07:53):
we cannot save. And there was a time when, even
though I wholeheartedly understand it, I don't know, I don't
want to use the word resent, but it definitely gave
me chills that what do we do because what we
know is that in the midst of the devastation our
people will be harmed. There will be a lot of

(08:14):
people who won't make it. I mean, let's just put it.
You know, since we going back and we're talking about history,
even when you think of the resilience of our people
that came here or were forced here, were trafficked here
on ships from Africa.

Speaker 1 (08:33):
There were a lot of people who made it who
you know, our.

Speaker 3 (08:36):
Ancestors that figured it out. They made it across the waters,
through the worst times, and you know, and somehow another
they got to the United States and built and had
children and families. And we here, we are the lineage of.

Speaker 1 (08:53):
People who made it right.

Speaker 3 (08:55):
But how many of our people, the millions and millions,
did not make it. They died in that middle passage.
And that's the thing that chills my bones because I
know that while we understand where America is heading, we
know where it's going, and we know that we can
no longer build back what currently stands because it's done.

Speaker 1 (09:19):
It's over.

Speaker 3 (09:20):
A lot of people don't understand it. They don't see
it again, that vision. They may not be reading, they're
not that deep into it. But this thing is coming down,
and as it does, yes, we have to embrace it.
But you also have a desire to try to save as.

Speaker 1 (09:38):
Many people who don't know.

Speaker 3 (09:40):
That they're inside of a house and the house is burning.
You're trying to get them outside. You're trying to be like,
come on, let's get to safety. So there's a lot
that goes into having that vision, you know, and I
pray for us those of us who do have it,
because it's a heavy burden to walk around knowing that
what we currently see in front of us will and

(10:00):
we have to build whatever it is. And by the way,
they are hoarding all the resources that we have, which
is our tax dollars and other things that we have,
they're hoarding it for their own survival, so gettingpated.

Speaker 1 (10:22):
They already know where we're going.

Speaker 3 (10:24):
And so therefore the main work that is in front
of us is not the building, it is the waking
up of the masses.

Speaker 1 (10:38):
Right.

Speaker 3 (10:38):
The building part will happen because we are the most brilliant,
resilient people in the world.

Speaker 1 (10:44):
We are actually chosen people. So we will build.

Speaker 3 (10:48):
But you have to be able to get people to
get past selfishness, fear and just anger and frustration that
they have that they are carrying right fully distrust.

Speaker 1 (11:02):
I mean, we have all of that work to do.
It's a lot. It's happy for people who actually see
and know what's going on.

Speaker 2 (11:09):
Yeah it is, but you know we're here, you know,
And like you said, the universe talks to us. You know,
we're looking at these floods, floods of been happening. A
lot of our prayers go out to Jamaica, one of
my favorite places in the world. I love Jamaica. And
it's like, when you see the damage that's happened in Jamaica,

(11:32):
it was crazy, like you you kind.

Speaker 3 (11:34):
Of look like you got dressed today with your Jamaican
outfit on listen.

Speaker 1 (11:39):
I mean.

Speaker 3 (11:43):
In mind.

Speaker 2 (11:44):
You know my name Trevor, you name Trevor. Yeah, So
you know, much love and prayers go out to Jamaica,
the whole Caribbean. I know, Cuba, Haiti, they received or
experienced a lot of damage over I don't know the
toll of life's laws, but I know I'm just looking

(12:04):
how it tore down thing. It reminded me of Katrina.
You know, it gave me the same feel that happened
in Katrina. So you know, definitely our prayers going to
our brothers and sisters over there. And then this weekend
seeing that there was flooding inside of Brooklyn, and I.

Speaker 3 (12:24):
Was like, it wasn't just Brooklyn, it was all over
New York. Because even going towards look JFK. The highway
was shut down. People was walking with their suitcases trying
to get to the airport. You don't know because you
weren't here.

Speaker 2 (12:37):
I was not here, you know. I was on a pilgrimage.
Shout out to freedom. Together, we went on a five
day retreat in which we studied the principles of nonviolence
Kenya non violence by doctor King and his philosophy. It
was about good two hundred and fifty of us. So
he was on the Alex Haley farm. Shout out to them.

(13:00):
It's a beautiful farm. It's where he used to go
to write and think and just create. It's just the
energy there is just amazing. And I have to have
I have to admit I have a different level of
understanding and respect for King of non Violence, someone who
always was like, you know, I'm more Malcolm than King,

(13:24):
and I still believe in a lot of principles that
Malcolm had. But after really studying King of non Violence
and understanding the power and the mental strength that you
have to have, it's not even physical, it's there's a
mental strength, and it's pretty much a God type strength
because when we talk about the sacrifice that Jesus Christ made.

(13:46):
And that's if you follow Jesus and you're into the
Bible and you think about Jesus sacrificing itself on the cross,
right him saying forgive them for they know not what
they do. And you looking at that and you listen
to the principles of King of Our Violence. They're really
based in the level of discipline and love for humanity

(14:10):
that Jesus had. So there's nothing weak about it. Like
it's when you sit there and understand when you listen
to the principles, you know it is it is really
just like wow, this man had a different level of discipline,
and you see that he studied Gandhi and Threau and
people will actually put that into practice and just started

(14:32):
to live his life and created his own. What he
did was he took certain principles from them and then
he created created Kingion. Like he said, some of those
I don't agree with this, I don't agree with you know,
but these I want to take these principles and create.
And I said, you know what, when I listened to
King Our Violence, I said, that's something that I would

(14:53):
do with King of Our Violence. Because there are a
lot of principles that he have in steps in which
you would implem it right, and it would be and
it's powerful, you know. But the only thing that I
agree with, and I say that all the time, is
in order for it to work in my philosophy, your
opponent or the adversary has to have a conscience, right,

(15:20):
because without a conscience, then that person is is just
doing what he wants to you and he doesn't care.
So you're you're in king and no violence. You're going
You're trying to appeal to the humanity, to the God
and somebody, just the empathy inside of an individual that
looks at you and realizes why why am I harming

(15:41):
this individual that doesn't have harm for me? That's showing
me nothing beloved and you and and you you believe
that because you're a person of love, right it looks
when I when I think about it, for me, I'm
saying that can probably work because I would never want
to impose harm on someone who didn't want to harm me,
that showed me levels of love, that looked at me

(16:03):
and still regardless of what I was doing, was praying
for me until tell me they loved me. I could
never do that, But history shows me that our adversary.
Can history showed me that these are the people that
killed our babies and hung them out and busting their
heads open in front of the theater like it was

(16:23):
a movie. They don't have this level of empathy for me,
in my opinion. So I would take those principles and
say that would be my first step. See, I want
to create something called anti violence, the Misan principles of
anti violence. So I want to tell you I love you.
I want to tell you I want us to be

(16:44):
on the same page. I want to build a beloved community.
I want us to all grow together. I want us
to all live together. But the minute that you do
something to harm me and threaten my life, I want
you to know that I'm going to go one hundred
times more than you are.

Speaker 1 (17:01):
I don't know if you got the message.

Speaker 2 (17:02):
I did get the message, and that's what and that's
and that's one of the things that they taught us, right,
they said that this this this thing. And as much
as I learned that, maybe I might grow past that.
But at this point I've made a decision that I
love those principles right and and want to see those happens.
That's what I'm saying that would be my first step
to engage in that level of love for you, a

(17:23):
gape love. I want to love you. I want to
love you with this level of love that nobody else
has for you and show you that I'm your brother.
But the minute that you showed me that you're not
my brother and that you're willing to harm me and
take the life of me and my family and my friends,
then I need you to understand that there's nothing that
I'm not going to do to protect us, And a

(17:46):
minute that you showed me that you are a threat
to my protection of my life, I need you to
understand that I'm probably gonna be the worst thing that
you ever encounter. My friend, you always told me this,
and I never used to. You know, I never used to,
not understanding, but now understanding more. He used to say,
my alternative to violence is more violence, because the minute

(18:09):
that you know that I'm willing to be more violent
than you are, then you are less prone to be
violent with me.

Speaker 3 (18:16):
Well, I don't know if that's true, and I do
think that the purpose of the nonviolence principles is learning
that even when somebody is provoking you, you have to
be able to walk away, and that is not showing
them that they're more violent.

Speaker 1 (18:31):
I think that anything you cage.

Speaker 3 (18:33):
I'm sure even doctor King, as much as he believed
in the principles of king and our violence, which I
have heard, I have listened, I have gone to seminars,
and I understand to a certain degree, certainly not to
the extent of you and our sister Tiffany Lofton and
a sister Stephanie and others who were there.

Speaker 2 (18:53):
At the and I got my certificate.

Speaker 1 (18:55):
I got a certificate, definitely.

Speaker 3 (18:56):
And so I'm sure that even doctor King would say
that if he was in the room with a bear
and the bear was coming for him, he would try
to fight, figure out how to defend himself.

Speaker 1 (19:09):
Right.

Speaker 3 (19:09):
So I believe that, and he walked with security, right
because he knew that there were other people around who
could pay attention and try to avert or divert, divert
any situation that may have been coming forward to harm him. However,

(19:29):
where we fall short, and I say we because I'm
a part of that, is where the door is open
and we could walk right out of it, but instead
someone's words or actions make us respond in a way
that puts us at the same level that they're at.

Speaker 1 (19:47):
We have to be able, And I'm saying we because
I lack.

Speaker 3 (19:52):
I'm not. I know I ain't got it all the way.
I'm getting better, but I'm not all the way there.
That if that door is open and you are not
stopping me from leaving, my ego should not be set
up to say, what are other people gonna say? You
and I talk about this all the time. How's somebody
else gonna feel? What all the things that go through

(20:12):
our hearts and minds? How I'm gonna let you walk away?
That's the part of the principles is being able to
turn and go in the opposite directly.

Speaker 1 (20:23):
Because I think the first is.

Speaker 2 (20:29):
Nonviolence is the pathway of the courageous.

Speaker 1 (20:34):
I believe that the.

Speaker 2 (20:35):
Second principle is the beloved community is the future. The
third principle is to attack systems doing evil, not individuals.

Speaker 1 (20:52):
See I know some of it.

Speaker 2 (20:53):
The fourth principle is you must be willing to allow
experience pain without retribution in order to reach your goal.
The fifth principle is avoid internal violence of the soul.

Speaker 1 (21:21):
And external avoid That's what I was talking about. Walk
out the door and the.

Speaker 2 (21:26):
Sixth principle is the universe always leads towards the just,
towards the just, It always leans towards justice, or leans
towards those who are just.

Speaker 3 (21:41):
That's good. That's good stuff. You gotta say it over
and over again.

Speaker 1 (21:44):
I think as a black man, you are.

Speaker 3 (21:49):
Susceptible, susceptible. What susceptible susceptible?

Speaker 1 (21:55):
I don't know the words.

Speaker 3 (21:56):
Child two people attack, attacks on the spirit. People constantly
trying to take you out of your like take you
off your square. But that's not it. But what I
do mean is like to take you off of your
peaceful path. Like there's always Black men deal with this

(22:18):
every single day. I would imagine that other men deal
with it as well, right, I would imagine that this
is a thing that because men have been taught to
be protectors providers. Don't let nobody play with you. Somebody
you know does this that or this to you. It
is you're supposed to respond a certain way to let
them know, to let the universe know, to let the

(22:40):
world know. Like there's so many narratives that swirl in
the man's mind, and especially with the black man and
your experience for what you have gone through that you
may not have experienced, but it's a lineage, it's in
your blood right, and so to have those principles to
refer to it may not mean the most to day,

(23:01):
but there will come a time when it will.

Speaker 1 (23:03):
Kick in right at the moment when.

Speaker 3 (23:05):
You're supposed to be able to reflect on it for
your goal. And so I'm happy that you went. Glad
you took the time you had to be there the
entire time.

Speaker 1 (23:15):
There was no half cut, no short no being late,
no leaving early.

Speaker 2 (23:19):
None of that was and it was fulfilling, you know,
it was real fulfilling. It was times where we build,
we talked, we you know, we shared energy. There was
a healing space, you know, it was. It was a
lot of different spaces, you know, and I really appreciated it,
really appreciate.

Speaker 1 (23:38):
Glad you did.

Speaker 3 (23:41):
To go back to the point about the floods that
you weren't here for.

Speaker 1 (23:48):
So it's really.

Speaker 3 (23:49):
Sad because I think a lot of people do not
know that New York is literally an island. Like I
don't know if people are aware. I think when people see,
especially folks who don't live in New York and some
people who live here, one of the things that I
always have to remind myself is that there are people, families, children,

(24:11):
older people, younger people who live in certain places of
New York and they have never been to another borough.
They have never been to a beach, they have never
been they've never explored New York. Their community is the
extent of where they've been. If there's a hospital nearby,

(24:35):
that's where they've been. In the grocery store, you know,
remember the welfare office. You could go to the one
on one forty ninth. You only went to either Lower
Manhattan or Brooklyn when something.

Speaker 1 (24:47):
Was really really really really really.

Speaker 3 (24:49):
Going on, like your case was messed up and you
had to go to some you know, office far off
to go see a different level of management. But other
than that, they have a center in each borough, oh
that you could go to. You know, people did not
travel far out of the circumference of wherever they live.
So this idea that folks would know how much water

(25:13):
is literally surrounding the entire New York they don't.

Speaker 1 (25:17):
They're not all aware. We know because.

Speaker 3 (25:20):
We've been to the shores and the city islands, and
you know, we know, but everybody doesn't. And when you
understand that we're sitting in an island, and we're sitting
in a space where it is literally like sinking. By
the way they say that, you know that New York
is sinking. It's you know, every single day we probably

(25:43):
lose a little bit of ground and ain't enough to
make your lifetime or my lifetime where we just gonna
see it fall under. Not to say that, but it
still is. It's an island, it's on water. So and
the other day I was talking to Deputy Mayor Tiffany Raspberry,
and she was saying that every day the rain is

(26:04):
falling and it's more rain than the ground can actually handle,
like this is a national issue. I'm gonna say she
didn't say this. I'm saying it climate. I don't you
know whatever. Everybody else seems to not know that the
weather is literally telling us, as you said to Openness,

(26:25):
exactly what's happening in floods and rain and bad weather, fires,
it's all happening. So global warming is happening, like right
in our faces. But so there's more rain that is
falling then the drains can actually handle. The drains are
probably dirty. People throw stuff down there. You are probably
one of those people. Who just sees a drain, you

(26:48):
got a bottle, you got something else, you throw it
down there?

Speaker 2 (26:51):
People cleaning it in the trash though, if there's no
trash run, that's only talking.

Speaker 1 (26:55):
Okay, But but if you understand the severity.

Speaker 2 (27:00):
Ain't and most people that clean the stat they.

Speaker 3 (27:02):
Do clean it. But it's imagine my son. Every day, Yeah,
you have one or two people, and I don't know
if it's every day. I'm not sure how the sanitation
process works. But okay, here today and tomorrow, a few
people clean it. But all day long, people walking down
the street throwing this down there, throwing the rapper, throwing

(27:22):
then the like I said, the leaves, anything that's on
the street is blowing.

Speaker 1 (27:26):
Damn it.

Speaker 3 (27:27):
The rats is down there like crazy because you see
him coming up in and out of there.

Speaker 1 (27:31):
It's overloaded.

Speaker 3 (27:33):
Right, And so yes, do the does the sewage system
and all the drains and all of that need to
be clean, maybe more often and great and guess what.
Hopefully at the release of this particular show, it will
be may or Mom Donnie who's about to enter office
in January. But even under Eric Adams, right now they

(27:55):
have to deal with this. This is this is one
of those things, you know, it brings up well, let
me just finish this point. And so you got all
of these things that we as citizens don't even think about.
And then there's a flood. And now the flood has
claimed the lives of two people, two individuals, I think,
a forty three year old man and a thirty something

(28:17):
ye old man, one in Washington Heights, one in Brooklyn.
One guy was in the boiler room and the other
guy was in the They both were in their basements.
The other one was trying to go back and rescue
his dog. The water was at the level of like
a level of devastation. Cars under it, buses water halfway
covering them in Brooklyn and again in JFK. Now we

(28:40):
learn in Washington Heights if it is not an exam
like it's the sign of the times, it's showing you, yes,
there is maintenance, but there's also there are things with
our climate that's happening that is not like any other
time before. And you know this country and especially lead
the Republican Party, they mock it like it's not even

(29:03):
a real thing. So again it's one of those things.
It's just all just coming on down. So I was
getting ready to say though, that on the point of
the hopeful Mayor Mondannie. And this is another thing that
you know, Deputy Mayor Raspberry always says to me, it

(29:26):
is very very good to have ideas you need to
have for a big city like this and just in
the world that we're in.

Speaker 1 (29:36):
If you don't have a vision that you can.

Speaker 3 (29:40):
Get people excited and inspired about and get them to
work towards it, let me tell you something. If you
went out right now on a campaign to say, in
order for us to clean the drains in New York,
New Jersey and Connecticut, right, because that you gotta do
all of that, you know what I'm saying. If not,
it's gonna be a backup is it's never so if

(30:02):
you're gonna do all of that, right, we need to
raise ten dollars from every household and we're gonna put
these people to work somehow. I don't know how it works.
I don't know how you take private money and do
city work. I don't know how it works. But I'm
just given again big vision. We're gonna take ten dollars
from every household. You probably could go around and collect

(30:25):
money from people who don't even have a house because
guess what, people can understand that clearly, we're gonna clean
the drains, y'all gonna put people to work. I don't
want to see somebody else die in a flood. My
area is nasty with his soot always builds up. I
can get behind a vision that is big and bold,

(30:46):
and how they're gonna collect the money, We'll figure that out,
but right now, this have the vision, and it's a
good thing to have that. But the thing about it
is that I'm sure when the add administration got up
last week, they got up said, you know what we're
gonna do today. We're gonna deal with crime. We're gonna

(31:08):
deal with I don't know, you know, garbage pickup. We're
gonna deal with mwbes and get minority women owned businesses, like,
let's look at how they're doing with contracts. Some's going
on at LaGuardia, and you know, need to deal with
shootings that happened in wherever Harlem.

Speaker 1 (31:28):
Right, We're gonna deal with all of that.

Speaker 3 (31:30):
And there's a sex person, sex trafficker on the loops
and homelessness.

Speaker 1 (31:34):
We're gonna do all of that. And then there's a
flood and two people die.

Speaker 3 (31:39):
So there's one thing about running, but there's something else
about governing and really managing the day to day of
the system, just.

Speaker 2 (31:49):
The reality of the system. My mother always said, whenn'
make God laugh, you tell them your plans because you're
planning to go out there and do all this, and
then they just do all types of things curve balls.

Speaker 3 (32:00):
And I and I pray that that we support right
the new mayor, but particularly just.

Speaker 2 (32:09):
Think that we have to we have to manage our
expectations of what reality is. Right when you're talking about
one of the major cities in the world and you're
talking about government, there's so many different intangibles and things
that happen on a day to day basis that don't
make everything simple. So but I think I think leadership
has to be transparent in that right. I think that's

(32:31):
what we've lacked in leadership. I think our leaders haven't
always been Hey, this what's going on, and I'm trying
to do this and want to do this, but this
is going on as well, and then let you know
all the things that's going on able to highlight and say, look,
I know we said we're going to do this, and
this is the process to do it, getting this done,
And we're doing this as we speak, and we're doing
that as we speaking. Oh, we have to hold off

(32:52):
on this because this is happening right, being being very
transparent with people, so they just don't like, what is
he doing? Like, what's happening? He said he was doing this?
Why does this happen? And I think that's the level
of governance that it's going to take moving forward, because
people don't trust government. They don't trust none of this.
I believe, they just don't believe. They just don't believe
it's actually happening. So I think in order for us

(33:14):
in this time, anyone who wants to govern and being
in positions of power is going to have to have
levels of transparency with the people to where they feel
like they're involved every step.

Speaker 3 (33:25):
Well, you have to have transparency, and you also have
to respect the constituency and the constituents need to be
a partner. And I would say that also we as
constituents have to understand that it is our job to
vote and then push and that's the part. Like for me,
someone asked me the other day, Oh my god, you know,

(33:46):
y'all are so all over my Donnie, like he's just
gonna come and be some Jesus Christ, some savior. My
position is that I'm not looking for a savior, but
I'm definitely looking for somebody that's different. And I don't
believe he has a career spirit. I don't believe that
he has a morally corrupt spirit. And so I support

(34:06):
him one hundred percent.

Speaker 1 (34:08):
But I'm a protest my dooty too.

Speaker 3 (34:10):
I already know I am already one hundred percent sure
that there will be some issue that he will not
He and I or we and they the administration and
us will not agree on.

Speaker 1 (34:23):
They won't get it right.

Speaker 3 (34:24):
We will feel away and guess what, we're not gonna
be walking around like, well, we can't say anything.

Speaker 1 (34:28):
We didn't do that with Deblasio. We got Deblasio hired
as well.

Speaker 3 (34:34):
He was he finished his term, so we got him
hired as mayor of New York City. We got him elected,
and yes, being elected does mean that you're being hired.

Speaker 1 (34:45):
And guess what else we did.

Speaker 3 (34:47):
We made sure he didn't get hired for that presidential
spot because bruh, but no, and that's just what it is,
and that's what being a politician is all about accepting
that you're gonna have your day because you not gonna
get everything right all the time.

Speaker 1 (35:03):
So it is what it is. Let's it is.

Speaker 3 (35:06):
Let's talk about my thought of the day Snap benefits.
You know, let me just say that I I some days,
I don't know. I'm not in any way confused about
what is happening in the government in this moment and

(35:26):
why the government is shut down, and how the SNAP
benefits became a part of like sort of like a
bargaining chip, right, which is very very scary, right.

Speaker 1 (35:39):
Sending.

Speaker 3 (35:40):
Nina Turner said something the other day on her she
posted on social media. She said, federal minimum wage is
seven dollars and twenty five cent. People need SNAP seven
dollars and twenty five cent. Most people cannot afford to
take that. I don't know anybody that can pay rent
off of seven dollars and twenty five cents and they

(36:00):
have a job.

Speaker 1 (36:01):
So this whole.

Speaker 3 (36:02):
Notion that people are not working and that you know,
folks are just taking advantage of the system, and especially
that black folks are taking advantage of the system, it's
bs right. We know for a fact that two thirds
of SNAP benefit participants people who receive Snap Benefits food

(36:25):
stamps are white folks. Two thirds of recipients are white folks. Right,
so this is not a black white Latino. This is
a universal issue. Actually it's a class issue. But we
also understand that black people will suffer the worst consequences

(36:51):
of any situation that happens in this nation. Where other
people suffer, we suffer the worst. That is a fact
that has been studied. The scholars have told us. We
already know the data is in that black people have
what do they say, pneumonia when America gets a cold.

Speaker 1 (37:10):
That's just the way that it works.

Speaker 3 (37:13):
But still, in all we have to acknowledge that what
is happening in this moment with the Snap Benefits piece
is not just about one group of people. Now, I'm
not confused as to why it's happening. I know that
the Democrats have had to say no to reopen in

(37:34):
the government, not because they just don't have anything else
to do and they're looking for a good time.

Speaker 1 (37:40):
They are literally trying to stop this.

Speaker 3 (37:43):
Big, beautiful bill from proceeding where people lose their health.

Speaker 1 (37:49):
Care, Medicare and Medicaid.

Speaker 3 (37:51):
Now, the Republicans will tell you, oh, no, you know,
this is only about purging people that are not supposed
to have those benefits. Theyllgal that didn't have it in
the first place.

Speaker 1 (38:04):
We know that they are lying. We know they're lying.

Speaker 3 (38:08):
And the Democrats they are finally saying, we know we
can't let this happen because with people not having proper health.
But if you think, if you think that losing snap
benefits is bad, which it's terrible, it's not bad, it's terrible.

(38:30):
I don't know that people understand what not having health
benefits means.

Speaker 1 (38:35):
When grandparents do not have.

Speaker 3 (38:38):
Medication, when people can't get surgeries, when hospitals are closing,
when folks can't get their medical assurances, and the things
that mental health support services and medication and things that
they need. You are talking about sheer devastation. And you
know what folks would say, well, why didn't the Democrats

(39:00):
do anything? So they're doing it right now right And
unfortunately the two thirds or not two thirds people like
what they would say, what what like this? Then you
had the power to shut the government down, but you didn't,
but that.

Speaker 2 (39:15):
They should secuse you had healthcare, So why would they
have to show.

Speaker 3 (39:19):
The government know what I'm saying is that when healthcare
became threatened, right, if it would just go forward without
pushback from the Democrats, people would ask.

Speaker 1 (39:33):
Why didn't you do anything? Exactly right?

Speaker 3 (39:36):
So I'm saying they are doing something in this moment,
which is it is painful, and I know we know
many Democrats that Democratic leadership and others that are like.

Speaker 1 (39:46):
This is a painful period.

Speaker 3 (39:48):
But the Republicans have the full responsibility.

Speaker 1 (39:52):
They could negotiate.

Speaker 3 (39:53):
They could come back to the table and say, Okay,
we're going to take the health care portions, you know,
and put this as a set of side. We're going
to listen to the voices of the people who are
saying we cannot in any way fumble on Medicare and Medicaid.
It just can't happen. We cannot allow healthcare to be

(40:14):
cut as a part of this sick, demented mindset that
these people have that they don't care about taking care
of the people who are the most vulnerable in our society.
And a lot of people will say, well, I don't understand,
because you know, if all they're doing is purging people
who've just been on Medicaid for.

Speaker 1 (40:33):
A long time, they sn't need it. Now, well, I'm
just saying.

Speaker 3 (40:36):
They'll say, oh, if all they're doing is just purging
those people, they're getting rid of folks who are taking
advanceage of the system.

Speaker 1 (40:42):
I support that. But then it.

Speaker 3 (40:45):
Makes you have to ask the question, right, it makes
you it's so it's so.

Speaker 1 (40:50):
Crazy like your face and everything. No, no, no no, but.

Speaker 3 (40:55):
It makes you have to ask the question, who is
really taken advantage you have the system.

Speaker 2 (41:01):
It's just like it's like when we look at this
whole Elon Muskin doge, like they supposedly found all of
these people that were stealing this, and that we ain't
seen one of them. They saw they found billions of dollars.
They said, oh, we stole, they store, they stow, they stove.
We ain't seen one person that stole. They told us
billions of dollars came. Ain't none of us benefited from

(41:22):
the business. I don't know what's happening. Now, we had
another purge, right, you don't fire hundreds of thousands of.

Speaker 3 (41:28):
Federals, hire fire hundreds of thousands, thousands of left.

Speaker 2 (41:34):
You fired thousands of people. One hundred thousand people left there.
They was forced out either way. You told them either
you're gonna take this sever so we're gonna fight you.
Then then you fired some people. So there over it's
hundreds of thousand people lost their job. Money is gone. Right,
you supposedly found the doge cuts. Now you're telling us
about medical Well, I just want to know, if all

(41:55):
of this is happening, where's the money at where's all
the money that you the saving well the country?

Speaker 3 (42:02):
Well, the answer said, they would say that we're in
a deficit, right, they would say that, but they're not
telling you that. In the same big beautiful bill, which
is actually the big ugly bill, they're talking about cutting
taxes for the rich to the tune of trillions.

Speaker 1 (42:20):
Of dollars exactly.

Speaker 3 (42:21):
So and so as you cut, if you take the
cuts to the rich, right, trillions of dollars and reappropriated.

Speaker 1 (42:31):
That's what they's you can pay the health care.

Speaker 2 (42:34):
That's what you're gonna do with healthcare. The thing is
they're taking the money out of the healthcare to give
it to the billionaires. So if you've been getting all
this so this is what I'm saying. If y'all was
getting all this money and you found all of this
corruption and all this shit, first of all. Ain't nobody
been accused of anything. You ain't showed us nothing. You
just keep telling us that it's all this money. We
ain't seen none of it.

Speaker 1 (42:52):
We haven't seen proof of, sir.

Speaker 2 (42:53):
We haven't seen proof of any of it. Like you
keep telling us sh that we don't see pool. Everybody
is stealing except y'all. And only thing we see proof
of is that Trump has made more money in office
in the last nine months that he made in his
whole life. That's the thing that we that's the only
thing that we know that's true. And the rest of
the shit we don't know to be true. And then

(43:15):
when we talk about the stab benefits, I went on
my page the other because I'm so pissed off with
the people that's talking about go get a job, and
y'all want to live off the system and this and
that and you lazy and all this. In ninety percent
of y'all that I see doing this, I know y'all
lived off welfare. I know that y'all grew up in
the same projects that we grew up in the same communities.
That I know that y'all not farther moved from welfare

(43:36):
that your mother grandmother was on welfare and you went
to the free lunch like the rest of us.

Speaker 1 (43:41):
I'm getting it.

Speaker 3 (43:42):
And they still get talking as if.

Speaker 2 (43:45):
Some of y'all have the one check away. And if
you understood that most of the people on snap actually
have a job, right because the living wages that, like
you said, the minimum wage, you can't live off that,
nobody can avival.

Speaker 3 (44:00):
Well, you also have to have some INNY income in
order to receive certain degrees of the social services.

Speaker 2 (44:09):
There's no more of that. Look, when you applied for
they send you on job interviews. You like, you got
to be looking for jobs and they're not just giving
you free So this hole to people are lazy shit,
it's just and for me, it's like when did we
lose humanity? Right that we just wanted people to stop?
When did we move so far from humanity? Like I

(44:29):
wanted to have more so I could do more for
the less fortunate.

Speaker 3 (44:32):
But what I'm what, But this is the question that
I don't understand about people. It right, Why are you
not outrage that trillions of dollars will be going back
into the pockets or staying millionaires, pockets of people who
have billions of dollars, and you're so ready to demonize

(44:53):
the people who don't have much but a seven dollars
twenty five cent job, maybe even a twenty dollar hour
a job.

Speaker 1 (45:00):
Even twenty dollars an.

Speaker 3 (45:02):
Hour is not enough money for somebody to have an apartment,
to put their child in proper daycare or services, make
sure they could play a little football, little basketball, single
or play a flute.

Speaker 1 (45:15):
That is not enough money.

Speaker 3 (45:17):
So why is it that there is so much smoke
for the people on one end of the spectrum who
are the most vulnerable, the people who have the least,
the most underresourced individuals, And you're not upset that they're
cutting taxes trillions of dollars for people who already have

(45:38):
money and won't suffer a bit.

Speaker 4 (45:40):
I do.

Speaker 1 (45:41):
That's so hard for me to understand.

Speaker 2 (45:43):
I'm lost, Like, maybe it's me, Maybe I'm maybe I'm
so confused. Maybe this shit really makes sense in some
other places.

Speaker 1 (45:51):
No, I think that is an intern.

Speaker 3 (45:53):
It is very similar to what we were saying last
week about the story of a gk Owens, of a Owens,
the unfortunate thing that happens to all of us at
some point, and we have deconstructed it, but there are
other people who are living very, very ten toes down
in it. That we center the white man and his

(46:16):
riches or her riches as what needs to be protected,
and when it comes to us, we are prepared to
eat one another alive while we continue to provide cover
for those who are really stealing. So my thought of
the day today is that Donald Trump, his administration, and
the Republicans who support him, the MAGA community that supports him,

(46:39):
they are okay with the fact that this president is
building ballrooms, gold ballrooms for his pleasure where he can
wine and dine. Right. He also has sent twenty billion
dollars to Argentina that the rest of us don't even
understand exactly why that money is going there. They're cutting

(47:00):
taxes for the rich to the tune of trillions of
dollars and the little people, the grandmothers and other people
who will suffer tremendously, whether it be snap benefits or
medical benefits, healthcare, they're suffering.

Speaker 1 (47:15):
They will suffer.

Speaker 3 (47:16):
Even more, And you are more upset with the folks.

Speaker 1 (47:20):
Who are under resource.

Speaker 3 (47:23):
I don't want to say poor, because the people who
may be poor have more riches in their hearts and
their minds, and their souls and their spirits than the
folks who have all the riches in the world, all
the money in the world. Okay, but we have a
transfer of frustration that seems to lean on people with little,

(47:45):
and we just give so much grace to the folks
that have a lot.

Speaker 1 (47:49):
I don't understand that.

Speaker 3 (47:51):
It makes me really sad for us, and it also
speaks to this idea that this nation cannot continue to
stand as it currently is because we are literally snuffing
out We are suffocating the ones who need the help,
the ones who need the cuts, the ones who need
the services and the support, and we are allowing other

(48:14):
people to do exactly what you claim that you are
so upset about, for the people who are taking advantage
of the system and not watching the ones who are
doing the three card moli of taking advantage of you
every single day. Let me just say to those of
you who are really in tune and paying attention. When
Medicare is cut, you know what happens. Hospitals that you

(48:37):
would actually go to, they close, They have less services,
You have less doctors and others who are in the
medical field that are able to.

Speaker 1 (48:48):
Take care of you in case of an emergency.

Speaker 3 (48:52):
And just because you might not be going to the
hospital that takes the most medicaid, you might be going
to one that is leaning more in the midst a
care section. Right, more elderly people going into this particular hospital.
Guess what the if it doesn't close, the quality of
that hospital could go down to such that you don't

(49:13):
even have a hospital near you in case of an emergency.
This whole system will crumble when we do not have
the social nets that folks fought for. They knew what
they were doing. They put these things in place because
they knew it was necessary in order to hold up
a society that is as large, with as many people,

(49:35):
with as many functioning parts as what we have. And
it is very sad to watch it all fumble. Do
we need to clean up, Do we need to straighten
things out? Absolutely, But that is not what this administration
is doing. They are evil and they are trying their
best to hurt people and to reset this society to
being in a posture of taking care of white men

(49:58):
and their families and letting the rest of us be servants, slaves, dogs, dead,
or whatever else it is that can become to a
destitute people.

Speaker 1 (50:08):
That's just where we are, That's exactly what we are.

Speaker 2 (50:10):
And it said, I just I hate I hate watching
the moral decline, right, And I think that's what it symbolized.
That's what I wanted to say. That's what for me
I seen coming. Right. It wasn't about leadership, it wasn't
about government. It was that we were willing to elect

(50:31):
advocate for uplift people who have no morality. Right. I
was just watching. I was watching. Somebody put a video
of Obama just laying down with the kids playing. He
was on a rug with kids. Like. Obama was not
perfect by long shop. We have issues. He didn't do
this right, But there was just a sense of morality, yeah,

(50:54):
that he had. There was a sense of human beingness
like I don't even know if that's the word, but
there was humanness. There was human decency, right, And we've
we've moved so far from human and people say our
fuck that we don't and I actually care, like I
care about human decency. When Obama was running against Mitt Romney, right,
I wanted Obama to win. I was offered, but Mitt

(51:16):
Romney is seen to be a decent man. He was
a decent white man like I didn't have. I did
not see morally bankrupted. I didn't look at the man
to say this man is just e. We are in it.
We are in a space where people are in control
of America that are evil, They have evil spirits, their
natures are just not good. And the fact that people

(51:37):
can overlook that and put those people in position of
power to where they control bombs. Were they able to
control our you know, our foreign government, to foreign relations,
foreign policies, and relationships with other leaders that they have
no respect for. They don't even know how to have
regular decorum. They just have nothing that's presidential that's been

(52:00):
leadership unworthy and people to just have no morality. The
fact that we would we sunk that low.

Speaker 3 (52:07):
But people think that, do you know that, They're like, oh, yeah,
well that might be what we need.

Speaker 1 (52:12):
That he's showing what the true America.

Speaker 2 (52:17):
Sad. It's scary, sad. The rest of the ship I
don't care about. But when you put some money, like
I've always been a person that that hated bullies. I
hated like if your spirit, like I was just a
good sense of spirit, like I didn't get when I
didn't get along with you just from the beginning. It
was because your spirit was bad, Like I could just
sense a bad spirit. And we we are surrounded by

(52:40):
administration where people with just bad spirits they don't have
like I remember that Charlie Kirk said that empathy was
one of the weaknesses of an individual. To just think,
to really think about that, But I.

Speaker 1 (52:55):
Don't know if I agree.

Speaker 3 (52:56):
I disagree with him all the way because I think
that we as people of color, and particularly as black people,
we have so much compassion, so much empathy, so much
everything softness about trying to understand that he might be
saying it for a different reason. But I also feel
like we have to harden ourselves a little bit. We're

(53:18):
gonna have to to not care if there are people
who are are still selling products in a particular store
that we know they disrespected us.

Speaker 1 (53:28):
We're gonna have We can care.

Speaker 4 (53:31):
We exactly, we can care, but understand that, but we
sacrificed it for the great But the thing is, it's
not the lack of empathy, is being able to empathize
and then be able to say, Okay, for the greater good,
we have to sacrifice this.

Speaker 2 (53:44):
That's a different thing than having no empathy.

Speaker 3 (53:46):
Yeah, I agree, but no, no, well no to me, but
it's still so then let me let me go back
and rethink about that.

Speaker 1 (53:55):
I don't think that. I think I still agree that
the empathy is a week.

Speaker 2 (54:00):
I don't believe.

Speaker 1 (54:01):
I think so.

Speaker 2 (54:01):
I believe it's a superpower. I believe that.

Speaker 3 (54:04):
When you mean I want, I'm never going to probably
depart from it, right, But I sometimes feel like.

Speaker 1 (54:12):
It cripples us.

Speaker 2 (54:13):
No, But the thing is this, That's what I'm trying
to tell you, and that's why my my thing is nonviolence.
Is is in between Malcolm and in.

Speaker 1 (54:22):
Between Mard and both of them had lots of and.

Speaker 2 (54:25):
They did, they did. But the thing is the only
difference was once you identified yourself as a enemy of Malcolm,
he treated you like that. He wasn't trying to find
the middle ground. Once you once we know you the enemy,
you gotta state it.

Speaker 3 (54:40):
Well, it depends on which enemy you're speaking of, because
even when we watched the setup of him being murdered,
he had empathy for a man who was yelling out
to him, right, and that man wasn't being nice to him.
That man didn't come there and try to say, oh, brother,
I need your help. That man was talking crazy to
mouth and he's still in that moment had empathy. And

(55:03):
one would say that that was the moment when well.

Speaker 1 (55:07):
We know, for short, well this is a movie.

Speaker 3 (55:09):
I never studied anything that that proved to me or
that I paid attention to. That said, that was the
moment when they are sure that his boundaries and security
was being tested. But if we go by the movie,
it was in that moment that they were able to
see what will happen if I go in there and

(55:31):
just start bugging and wilding out right and talking shit
to me? Are they gonna shut me down, knock me
on the ground and drag me out?

Speaker 1 (55:38):
Or is he gonna give me audience?

Speaker 3 (55:40):
Because if he gives me audience, then we know that
the it's a sensitivity in the room, but it's it's always.

Speaker 2 (55:46):
But the thing is this, you can't lead with you.
You don't allow the people that you lead in to
have a dialogue with you. Right, So that's that's those
are levels of leadership. But but now if you watch
how they move, if you do that in one of
the rooms, now you're gonna see them fo our boys
going big, gonna be on you. You ain't get you
ain't getting fold with that. That's me. So that's what

(56:06):
I'm saying. There's a learned But I don't I never
think that empathy is a weakness.

Speaker 1 (56:09):
I appreciate that once.

Speaker 2 (56:12):
You identify something as a threat to you, then you
have to treat it as a threat. Right. So empathy
is not the lack thereof consciousness. I mean, it's not.
Empathy is not a weakness, you know. And I'm not
saying that we should allow our enemies to get close
enough to harm us, right. I don't think we should
have naivety either. We should not be naive, right. We

(56:33):
should also be aware of who we surrounded by. But
we also have to have empathy because we want that
level empathy. That means when you lack limpid empathy, you
can't really love. Right. If you don't have empathy, how
could you really love something? Right? Wow, if you don't
have empathy, that you lack compassion, well how do you
There's no I don't think there's any real way to

(56:53):
have love for something when you lack the presence of empathy.

Speaker 1 (56:57):
Okay, well, I'm not gonna argue you. I think that that.

Speaker 3 (57:02):
Is a good way to describe it, and that thought
about empathy really brings us to another topic, this the TMI.
And now you know, i'd be trying to halfway mind
my business because we have so much going on with
all of our work and projects and everything that we're
involved in, but I pay attention to what's happening in
the culture. And several weeks even maybe months now of

(57:30):
back and forth between Leila Ali the Great and Clarissa Shields,
who's also great, and I just wanted to say, as
I really, I just kind of read and listened to
all the commentary. I wish that both of those sisters

(57:50):
would just stop, don't respond to one another, don't say
anything else about one another.

Speaker 1 (57:58):
I understand that in.

Speaker 3 (58:00):
Boxing, it is part of the vibe of how you
pump up to whatever. And if they were to have
a boxing match in the next year or six months,
of course, everybody would have anticipated it from the back
and forth.

Speaker 1 (58:15):
So I get it.

Speaker 3 (58:16):
So people don't need to send me a whole bunch
of messages like you don't understand this is how boxing goes.

Speaker 1 (58:21):
I get it. But there is something about.

Speaker 3 (58:24):
The age dynamic of you know, Leila Ali being a
little bit older, different sort of category to me. And
I'm not talking about in terms of skill and talent.
I'm just saying just as a woman, and then Clarissa
being a younger woman.

Speaker 1 (58:40):
I just hate to see it. I hate to see it.

Speaker 3 (58:43):
I feel that it translates from what might be considered
just boxing talk to actual culture and how younger women
and older women are communicating with one another just in
every day. Like I see it the same kind of
stuff that goes on over there. I see it happening

(59:03):
on five or six other social media pages in a day,
where the lack of respect, whether it be elder, you know,
whichever direction, And it really bothers me, not even just
because it's a little bit of beef intention. It bothers
me because we are living in a society in this
moment where people literally have to wait to see whether

(59:28):
or not and now we know the government is going
to give you food, like whether or not people's tax
dollars are actually going to be repurposed for the things
that you need, the social services that our communities need.
It makes me cringe just to watch these two beautiful
sisters go back and forth and say whatever they're saying.

(59:52):
It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter who's right or who's wrong.
I got people I have this conversation in the group
chat with the girls. They like Clarissa's being disrescid respectful.
It has gone beyond boxing. Now she's being disrespectful. Then
I got people in the chat that's like, Leyla needs
to stop entertaining it. You know she's she's also being disrespectful.
Everybody has a different perspective to me. I don't care

(01:00:14):
who's right or who's wrong. I just want us to
be in a posture as a people of understanding the
weight of the seriousness of what's going on around us
and not allowing ourselves to be used as a tool
of distraction in the moment when we know that people
really need to be focused. Like if you could get

(01:00:35):
all these people to listen to you talk beef back
and forth, then damn it, sit down together and talk
about what happens when we need to provide mutual aid
in our community so that people have food and healthcare
services that you know, old stuff that Grandmama and them
used to do to take care of a sick person
who couldn't go to the doctor. That's just what I

(01:00:56):
feel like we got to call ourselves to in this moment.
And maybe I'm being too optimistic, maybe I'm being too idealistic.
Maybe I'm trying to take people out of their enjoyment
and their entertainment. But I just I feel, and I'll
just stop here, that we've enjoyed a lot and we
should continue to have some joy but our but we've

(01:01:18):
got to be a little bit more conscious about the
time that we're in.

Speaker 2 (01:01:22):
Listen, I don't really have much to talk. Those are
two women having their issues, and you spoke from especially
a black woman's perspective, you know, But I just don't
I don't want to be entertained like that. Like if
they was boxing, and if this was something to hype up,
and we knew they were trying to hype up boxing,
and then they was going back and forth, and I'll
be Okay, I want to see a boxing match. I
think they're both phenomenal athletes. You know, Leila is great.

(01:01:48):
I'm watching clarsuit move into the space of greatness right
now there's nobody and so I understand her perspective. You know,
she's constantly being prepared to the great So maybe that's
an issue she wanted to be able to. Maybe she
figured she could fight her, and I know she has
love and respect for her because she wouldn't and wanted
to fight her if she didn't respect it. She knows
she's one of the greatest ever, the greatest ever to

(01:02:09):
do it. So I understand all these things, but I
just don't want to be entertained at the detriment of
either one of them. Yeah, you know, And that's just
how I am. And that brings me to my I
don't get it. Like you said, we got so many
things going on that I don't want to see those
our legends going at each other. These two legends is

(01:02:30):
going beefing each other because we have Donald Trump. We
got that, I know, right, it's like Donald Trump. They
have blown up fourteen ships since September.

Speaker 3 (01:02:45):
And again back to your point, there's no ever, there's
no proof like you don't out back in the days
when the police would like they would say, oh, we
busted a drug ring and they have.

Speaker 1 (01:03:00):
The news, you see the drug on the table, and
sometimes it was fake lest they Yes, they.

Speaker 2 (01:03:09):
Don't even have to. This man has blown up fourteen
ships since September, killed more than sixty two people, including
nationals from Venezuela and Colombia, and nobody has had a
DAN court. They they told us that the ships had drugs. Yeah,

(01:03:30):
we don't know that the ships. We don't. And and
people from the Venezuelan government is saying that these were
regular ships people that just sales. This was out just
shipping them, I mean fishermen. They were just out at
the sea. And indeed they have blown up ships. I
have never looked I have never in history heard the

(01:03:51):
new ship like that. Where you saying these is drug dealers.
You ain't got one drug, you ain't got the deal.

Speaker 1 (01:03:58):
They're saying it got blown up.

Speaker 2 (01:04:00):
They're blowing them up.

Speaker 1 (01:04:03):
Drugs.

Speaker 2 (01:04:04):
Say they blew the whole ship up. To Meika, are
you listen to what I'm saying to you? Some of
them listen, that's what I'm trying to take. The ship.
They're not shipped. These as boats. These is little boats.
These is not ships. I'm saying that they're are probably
you could probably fit eight or nine people on these boats,
maybe ten, and they're going across the ocean. They're going

(01:04:30):
and all you see is boom. Now, ain't no drug
cartel that's smuggling Kelo after kilo, shipping it in on
the little ship, a little boat, a fishermen boat. What
how what might you you understand? There's no security behind it.

(01:04:52):
You on a little boat that's just going across, and
you got multi millions bills of dollars? What you think? Wow?

Speaker 3 (01:05:00):
But the people who transport don't have multi billions of Yes,
they do not, the people who transport.

Speaker 1 (01:05:06):
So what are you talking about.

Speaker 3 (01:05:07):
That's like saying that the people who stand on the
corner doing handing listen that they got they the.

Speaker 2 (01:05:16):
Drug kingpin who is sending it? You think.

Speaker 1 (01:05:18):
I ain't say that.

Speaker 3 (01:05:19):
I'm not saying that the drug kingpin does not have
millions of dollars. Yeah, but I'm saying that the little
person on the boat might just be carrying it on
their body, strapped up different places in the boat just
to get it across because the ships and the other
ways can't happen.

Speaker 1 (01:05:36):
Now, don't get me twisted.

Speaker 3 (01:05:38):
I was only I'm only getting into that to respond
to you saying it can't be true.

Speaker 2 (01:05:43):
I'm not saying it can't because that's what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (01:05:45):
I don't believe anything.

Speaker 2 (01:05:47):
I'm talking about the likelihood of me being a drug
cartel kingpin and me sending hundreds of kilos on a
little boat with two or three people.

Speaker 1 (01:06:00):
Well, I don't think what's.

Speaker 2 (01:06:02):
The likelihood of that happening? Listen, I don't and now,
and the thing is, we don't know whether it happened
or not, because you ain't even grabbed one of them
up and said okay, look, we grabbed him up, and
we found the hundred kilos on here right, and we're
giving you a warning. We just found Now if you
go across this water again, then this would this is
these are the consequence of it. You ain't did none

(01:06:24):
of that. You just blew up fourteen boats and killed
sixty two people, no due process. But are you kidding me?

Speaker 3 (01:06:31):
All I would say is that there's something else going on,
and I'm not saying And some people might look at
it and say they just being reckless. Again, look at
this evil he's trying to start a war with Venezuela.

Speaker 1 (01:06:44):
Maybe all of that's true.

Speaker 3 (01:06:46):
It's vengeful, its inciting you know, more violence, instigating a war.

Speaker 1 (01:06:54):
It could be all of that.

Speaker 3 (01:06:55):
But something in my spirit tells me this division we
started with that when the boats are blown up, something
else is happening that people can see. And that's what
I'll be waiting for you to.

Speaker 2 (01:07:10):
Yeah, because now now he's talking about he about to
start testing nuclear weapons again.

Speaker 3 (01:07:15):
Something's going on, something's happening. This is something that is
totally The thing is even.

Speaker 2 (01:07:21):
If it's not even it's so anti just the way
you the rules of engagement.

Speaker 1 (01:07:29):
In war, right, but he's against every rule of But
this is what.

Speaker 2 (01:07:33):
I'm saying, Like people love it, you can't love it
because there's going to be retaliation at some point. The
thing is this, with every bully, right, there's always somebody
that stands up to the bully. It's just always happened.
If you look throughout history, every empire that had the
biggest army and with the toughest they fell. They felt

(01:07:56):
because what happened is the people that they imposed, they
will upon that they lead. They just watched for the weakness,
and he just waited, and they just waited. They quiet
because they know that's one of the rules of the
principles of Doctor King. When he talked about it, he
said that nonviolence is more powerful than violence. It's more

(01:08:16):
of a sustainable, permanent solution. He said, because violence is
only powerful when you're in power. You only can impose
violence when you empower. The minute that you lose the
power and violence, you no longer have power, he said.
But nonviolence is a changing of the spirit, The changing

(01:08:39):
of the heart, is the changing of the mind. And
once you embrace that as a real remedy and a
real strategy, then it becomes who you are. It becomes
a way of life. And that was that was some
real shit. So when you think about it, like you
can rule somebody wrong as you think they think you
got more than them, all they gonna do is strategize

(01:09:00):
in the back room and said, look soon just like
we're not turning diddies. Okay, yeah, yeah, mat So you're right,
you're right. As soon as you Nicks went to sleep.

Speaker 1 (01:09:11):
Well, there's more to the story.

Speaker 3 (01:09:13):
And that's like one that I want to see how
it unfolds all everything that they're doing. We're gonna know.
Now maybe we won't know, but Casan and Blair will know.
The grandchildren will know, and they will be able to say, yeah, man,
we found out you know they did they were doing
X Y Z. They you know, I don't want to

(01:09:34):
be putting stuff out there that could get me in trouble.
But they what they accused others of they may be
doing themselves. Let me just say it like that.

Speaker 1 (01:09:47):
So there's that.

Speaker 2 (01:09:48):
So that brings us to the end of another episode
of Tamar. Yes, the number one podcast in the world.
We didn't know the podcasts. That's what I'm talking about.
I'm not gonna always be right to micke d marriage
is that gonna away be wrong, but we'll both always
and I mean always, always, always be authentic. P