LLP #116: Trump's First 100 Days In Office

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Ever wonder what happens when patriots confront the machinery of power? This episode dives deep into America's current political climate through a uniquely personal lens, beginning with Eric's surprisingly contentious Disney World vacation (who knew Mickey Mouse could be so political?) before tackling the substantial question on everyone's mind: How effective has Trump's first 100 days actually been?

We examine the administration's approach to immigration enforcement with its triage strategy focusing on removing criminal elements first, while questioning whether the promised defense of Second Amendment rights has materialized beyond "the bare minimum." As Eric puts it, "I'm not going to say they've done a fantastic job, but they haven't done a terrible job either."

The conversation takes a fascinating turn as we explore what happens when vocal critics of government institutions suddenly find themselves running those very systems. Have figures like Kash Patel and Dan Bongino encountered realities behind the curtain that have tempered their reform ambitions? "Can you really go back to that world once you're inside the belly of that whale?" Eric wonders.

Perhaps most compelling is our examination of tribalism in American society—how ideology increasingly dictates reality rather than evidence, and how difficult conversations are shut down through accusations rather than engaged through reason. "Hate is a very low rent emotion," Eric observes, highlighting how easily legitimate questions about power and influence get dismissed through character attacks rather than addressed on substance.

As we navigate these complex waters, we ultimately circle back to personal accountability in an age where blaming faceless institutions has become the path of least resistance. Join us for this unfiltered, thought-provoking discussion that challenges both right and left while inviting listeners to question their own certainties in pursuit of a more nuanced understanding of American liberty.

Link to Article:
ATF lied to convict sailor now serving 20 years in prison for selling legal gun parts
https://saf.org/special-report-atf-lied-to-convict-sailor-now-serving-20-years-in-prison-for-selling-legal-gun-parts/

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome back everybody.
This is Eric and Matt and thisis Life, liberty and the Pursuit
, your beacon of freedom and theAmerican way of life.
Tune in every Monday for a newepisode as we dive into the
world of liberty and what makesour country great.

Speaker 2 (00:14):
Boys and girls, welcome back.
This is Matt and Eric here withLLP, and we're back with a
brand new show this week.
Today is April 28th and I hopeyou all are healthy and happy
and doing well, and we are back.

Speaker 3 (00:28):
We are back and it's going to be a great episode.
Guys, please watch this one,because this one is going to be
great.

Speaker 2 (00:33):
Absolutely Well, I just got back from Disney World.

Speaker 3 (00:38):
I've been.
It can be very challenging.
When's the last time you wentto Disney World?
Probably, I think, about a yearor two ago.
We went as a family with ourdaughter.
It was her first trip to disneyand it was, you know,
surprisingly, my first trip todisney as well as an adult.
You know, growing up we didn'tget to do those.
It's really expensive, man.
So we didn't get to go it wasexpensive.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
I was surprised how much it cost to get in the
tickets.
I was I was kind of blown awayLike Whoa, holy moly.
You know I I never reallyconsidered Disney world like
something I wanted to ever likego and do.
You know, I kind of did, kindof didn't, cause, you know, you
got a universal studios downthere and I guess that's more of
an adult vibe Cause, you know,the roller coasters are scarier

(01:18):
and it's just kind of moreoriented towards just a wide,
you know, group of people ratherthan than just children, where
it seems like Disney's kind ofgeared towards towards kids.
And it's crazy I caught so muchflack on Twitter.
I posted a picture of me atDisney World and everyone's like
, oh, you're supporting the wokepeople and you're supporting
this and that, and I'm thinking,gosh, I'm just trying to have a

(01:39):
little fun, I mean.
I don't get it but but look, youknow, there it does have that
vibe.
It does have that kind of wokevibe.
It's kind of weird dude, youknow you're.
I don't know about when youwent, but but when I went down
there this week, like I don'tknow, there was this kind of
overbearing vibe, of sort ofwokeness in a way.
Like you know, the characterswould walk around and have you

(02:03):
know the some of them would haverainbow colored clothes on and
things.
So there was still someimplication there that they're
trying to kind of push that alittle bit.

Speaker 3 (02:12):
You know, I went with my family before like any of
that happened, or really beforeI got pushed out.
I didn't recognize any of that.
You definitely could tell thatDisney wasn't really trying to
push any of that DEI stuff,cause when you went to visit the
princesses with my daughter,the princesses were ethnically
correct.
They didn't go out of their wayto to make it to to make

(02:36):
anything different, like guesswhat?
Like those princesses werecorrect to like the skin color,
hair color, you know.
So everything was exactly what.

Speaker 2 (02:49):
You know it's funny.
My girlfriend brought up areally good point when we were
walking around and she she saiddo you notice how all the little
girls are walking around doneup like princesses and they just
choose their favorite princess,you know, and you see, like a
little black girl dressed up asCinderella, or you see, you know
white girl dressed up as asJasmine, and you and you think,
like they just they just goingto pick the princess that they
want to be, it doesn't matter,like anyone can just be whatever
princess they wanted, and Ithought that was kind of

(03:10):
humbling.
It was nice to see that.
You know, children are nottarnished by the idea of hatred
or violence or the you know theydon't understand the world in
the way of this overallworldview that we all get kind
of biased by and we get, youknow, we're thrown into this
sort of trap of knowing andchildren don't know they're just

(03:32):
innocent and pure and there'ssomething so really cool about
that to see that.
You know, I was comparing it toLas Vegas because I actually
came back with some crud yeah, Igot sick on this trip.
I, I mean I came back feelinglike I was in the seventh circle
of hell.
I mean, I'm talking it could bethe coup.
There's no telling what, itcould be the flu.
But I felt like shit the firstday I got back and um, anyway, I

(03:54):
was making comparisons ofDisney being like Las Vegas for
kids, because you know the kids,you know, towards the end of
the day they start getting tiredand they're walking around
looking like they're drunk, youknow, and like in Vegas, you
know, people are actually drunk.
So it's like it's so weird tosee that, like these, these
young people, you know when,when they're kids, it's the same
mannerisms like they're tiredand they're going to kind of act

(04:16):
tired.
And you know, when they get oldthey get drunk and they act
drunk.

Speaker 3 (04:19):
It's just it's interesting to observe the
behavior of children compared toadults.
Well, it's interesting becauseif you go to Epcot, you will see
legitimately drunk peopleeverywhere because they're
drinking themselves around theworld.
So they have this challengewhere you can stop at every
country in Epcot and they sellbeer from that country.

(04:41):
So there will be people thatwill take it upon themselves to
see if they can drink a beerfrom every single country
represented epcot.
I think it comes out to be likeit's, it's I don't know the
exact number, it's really hot,it's a lot.
And people.
They don't make it, man, likeyou see them like passed out,
like they're walking.

Speaker 2 (04:57):
They get kicked out, not the first person that told
me that epcot is kind of likethe adult version it is.

Speaker 3 (05:02):
Epcot is totally the adult, is where the adults go.

Speaker 2 (05:05):
And actually go back down.
I tell you I was pricing outthe multi-park pass, right, yep,
and to visit all the parks, andI think they kind of tried to
trick you a little bit, dude,because they were wanting to
charge I think it was like $500for a pass for a single day for
all the different parks.
But there's no way that you canvisit all those parks in a

(05:25):
single day.
We spent the entire day at themagic kingdom and it still
really wasn't enough time.
We could have spent anotheranother day just there.

Speaker 3 (05:33):
So it just seems kind of there there is an art.
There is an art to visitingdisney, disney world.
All right, like you have topre-plan, you have to download
the app, you have to get theGenie, the Lightning Lane Genie
app.
I'm telling you, man, if youhave to plan for like a week and
you can park, hop, you'll go.

(05:54):
Hey, we're going to hit tworides at Magic Kingdom and while
we're waiting for our Geniepasses, or Lightning Lanes or
whatever they call them now,we're going to hop over.
We're going to take the tram,we're going gonna hop over.
We're gonna take the tram,we're gonna hop over to, you
know, epcot, have some beers, Igrab lunch, ride a certain ride

(06:14):
there and then hop back over tothe animal kingdom and then
we're gonna go like this.
So there is an art to it.
And if you plan accordingly andyou are hustling because you
did, you probably notice thatguy, people are always running.
They're always running whenyou're there, so they're
hustling, they're moving realfast because they're trying to
get to certain places I wasreally surprised how busy it was
.

Speaker 2 (06:30):
I mean, there's a lot of people there and I know that
, um, with you know it is aholiday week, you know easter
was sunday and everything, so Iwould imagine there's probably a
lot of people out of school orwhatever.
But you know, I was surprisedhow busy it was and it seemed
like every time I would go tosomewhere like universal, it
just didn't seem like it wasquite so busy.

Speaker 3 (06:46):
But anyway, it was a fun trip and I wanted to talk
about it a little bit and um,before you get into the next one
, I'm just going to say realquick um, for any type of
veterans out there, you do haveaccess to military discounts
with those tickets.
So, guys, if you're watchingand you're a veteran, discounts
with those tickets.
So, guys, if you're watchingand you're a veteran, go to

(07:12):
Shades of Green, which is a DODresort located on Disney
property.
It's the only DOD resort Ifyou're disabled or service
connected, you can apply.
You can get discounted roomrates, discounted tickets,
everything.
It's great, shades of Green.

Speaker 2 (07:24):
Nice, check it out, good to know out, good to know,
good to know.
Overall, it wasn't a badexperience, I would say.
You know, the rides are notreally as much of a thrill type
of thing as orlando.
It's really more geared forchildren, which, which obviously
you know.
And I was surprised at magickingdom as well, I kind of
expected the park to be larger.
It really was not as big as Ithought it would be like.

(07:44):
You know, if you hustle andwalk fast, you can walk a lap
around that entire park andprobably better park 15 minutes.
It's not a real big park, Inoticed.
And yes, the lines wereextremely long that's the lines
and um, I just thought that thesize of the park and the amount
of people that were there, itjust seemed like they were
cramming a lot of people into areally small space.

(08:05):
You know, it felt like I don'tknow, it was very crowded no, I
agree overall it was a fun tripand I'm glad I went.
And, um, you know, of courseit's a, it's a gun-free zone.
You can't carry firearms.
And inside of disney which Imean with that many, you know
children running around.
I can certainly understand whyyou wouldn't want people running

(08:25):
around with guns.
But I mean, I'm of course ofthe mindset that if you can
handle your stuff and keepyourself in order, you should be
able to carry wherever you want.
But in that type of situation Imean gosh, some of the adults I
saw, I don't know if I'd wantthem having a gun, they seemed
like they were a little on edgesome of them.
I don't know if I'd want themhaving a gun, they seemed like

(08:47):
they were a little on edge someof them.
But traveling down to Orlando,of course, I took my camper down
and I haven't had that thingout in a while and that was fun
and you can take whatever gunsyou want on the road.
And I like taking the camperwhen I travel versus flying,
because you can travel withwhatever guns you want.
You can take whatever food youwant, I don't know, it's just a
little more private.
That's just my preference.
But again, everyone's differentin what they want.

(09:08):
So today's episode y'all we aregoing to kind of dive into
Trump's first hundred days.
I know that's probably whatsome of you are here for.
We're going to discuss a lot ofstuff about guns as well on
today's show, but I wanted totalk about my trip this week
because that was just somethingthat was going on.
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Speaker 2 (11:10):
So, um, I know kind of the talk of the town, at
least this week.
Uh, today is the 28th of april.
This week's talk has reallybeen, uh, centered around
trump's first hundred days andhow things are going, and, um,
the man is certainly drawing alot of scrutiny from from many,
which, of course, I mean he'sTrump, he's going to, he's going
to do that.

Speaker 3 (11:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (11:30):
Just by nature of who he is.
He's a very sort of go gettertype of person, very aggressive
personality, you know, and Ithink, especially for his age,
he, he really does not give acrap and I kind of like that.
I like Trump's sense of bravado.
You know, he is very much apresident's president, he's a

(11:51):
people's president.
He's the kind of guy that youknow he marches to the beat of
his own drum and he does what hewants and he projects power,
and I think those are allpositive traits in a president.
And you know, there's a lot ofthings that have gone down in
the first hundred days.
I mean tons of executive orderssigned, which, you know, matt,
I don't know how I necessarilyfeel about the power of the pen

(12:13):
being, you know, used so heavily, because it seems like it
becomes this pendulum where theprevious administration uses the
power of the pen and then theincoming administration has to
use the power of the pen evenmore to counteract some of the
things that the previousadministration used the power of
the pen for.
So at what point do we go?

(12:35):
Hey, yeah, we understand thatto undo a wrong, we have to
sometimes do something to undothat wrong.
But at what point do we say?
You know, hey, this is notreally how our country's
designed to operate, this is nothow we're meant to operate to
just have this pendulum of thepen, so to speak.
And that would be my first, notreally criticism, but just

(12:57):
point of contention to discussthe amount of executive orders
that have been necessary for himto sign.

Speaker 3 (13:02):
Well, I mean, executive orders have always
been a thing.
Every president that has comein has started off with EOs or
executive orders, and a lot ofpeople get confused.
They look at an executive orderlike it's gospel.
As soon as that EO is signed,it is now in place and it's

(13:22):
being executed.
And that's not the way that itworks.
So an EO is basically thepresident saying this is what I
would like to do.
Now I'm signing this as a.
I'm vouching that if you guyswere to pass this in the House
and the Congress, it would havemy approval.
I'm not going to veto.

(13:43):
It is him saying if you were topass this law or this executive
order, I would not veto this.
And that's fine.
He's going to sign it and itstill has to go to the House.
It still has to go to pass thewhole legislative and judicial
system before it takes effect.
And you could write a hundredEOs and it still has to go

(14:06):
through the process.
And he's just again.
He is just saying that if thiscomes to my desk after it passes
the house, the Senate, thejudiciary, judiciary committee,
all that, I will approve it.

Speaker 2 (14:19):
There's no worry of a veto.
They are essentially directives.
They are essentially directivesthat say hey, you who works for
me, this is what I want you todo.
For instance, we'll talk aboutSecond Amendment for a minute,
you know.
So we discussed briefly in aprevious show Well, actually
this has been about a month agoor so that I did the episode on

(14:39):
the regular Iraq veteran channel.
If you guys don't know, we postthis podcast in video form over
on IRAC veteran 8888, theYouTube channel there.
So if you want to see our uglymugs, you can check that out if
you wish.
But also we post this podcaston everywhere you can find all
of your podcast forms spotters,stitchify, apple podcasts, etc.

(15:00):
And be sure to leave us amessage if you have any
questions as well.
But but you know we, we putthis up on video form over there
and I made a video on thechannel talking a little bit
about, uh, trump's executiveorder on the second amendment
and directing pam bondy, uh, ourattorney general, our new ag,
pam bondy, which you know peoplehave some mixed feelings about
pam bondy, which you know I madeclear in that video right um to

(15:24):
you to essentially have a lookat all of the things that the
Biden administration done forthe Second Amendment against the
Second Amendment, all of theirdirectives, and go, hey, what
can we scratch instantly, whatcan we just essentially ignore?
And directed her to essentiallyput together a dream team, if
you will, a document that kindof says, hey, this is what we're

(15:46):
going to pull back on instantly.
We saw that revocations were upan extreme amount for FFLs.
That has been addressed.
It looks like Pam Bondi has,you know, pressured whether
pressuring Kash Patel orpressuring whoever to pull back
a little bit on, obviously pullback on the revocations which

(16:08):
you know they were hemming upFFLs for some of the stupidest
things.
So it looks like they've pulledback on that as well as some of
this, the overall enforcement.
I mean, when you look at allthe things that have happened, I
mean they went after DexterTaylor over 3D printing, which
he's still in prison right now,and that and that's terrible to
me, like I think what they didto Dexter Taylor is absolutely

(16:29):
egregious and terrible andthere's no reason that man needs
to be in prison.
Why is he still in prison?
Why hasn't the call been madeto hey, we need to have a look
at this and see if we canexpunge this record and free
this guy Because he didn't breakany laws.
You know Also that free thisguy because he didn't break any
laws.

Speaker 3 (16:46):
you know um also that other navy veteran that they
hemmed up over having uh what,the rpg tube that was inert um
and uh that and it was a bunchof like, uh, uh, like I think it
was world war ii parts kits, um, like there were parts kits,
essentially a completely normalthing.

Speaker 2 (17:02):
uh, there are websites uh that sell these
parts kits and they're totallyfine to order.
You can build it into a SimAuto.
If you're an SOT you can buildit into a machine gun.
There is nothing wrong withselling parts kits instead of

(17:24):
saw cut and I think there's a.
There's certain restrictions onthe amount of saw cuts that
have to be or the amount oftorch cuts that have to be made
and at certain angles, and theycan't include the barrels.
There's all these kind of dumbrestrictions that they've placed
on imports of parts kits thathave made it a lot harder to
build that gun out.
I mean, the old school kitswere saw cut kits and those saw
cut kits you can just get awelding fixture, a jig, and just

(17:46):
line the saw cuts back up andweld it back together and you
have a live barrel and put itback together and you've got a
functional machine gun, I mean.
Or you could build it into asemi-auto closed bolt, like I
know Pioneer Arms did with thosePPSH-43s.
That's a real popular closedbolt semi-auto that you can
still get now because the partskits are so prevalent and cheap

(18:07):
and easy to build into asemi-auto.
So just because someone has aparts kit doesn't mean they have
to build it into a machine gun.
They can build it into asemi-auto.
From what I understand, withthis RPG, the ATF was able to
somehow fire a I think theyfired a tracer round or, you
know, a spotter round.

(18:28):
Yeah, so, in case you guysdon't know, um, the way this
works is, um, an RPG does have asite on it.
Okay, a lot of them haveoptical sites and the way that
those sites are sort ofcalibrated and, um, zeroed, if
you will Okay, they do requirezeroing is with a spotter round.
Okay, so, whether it's arecoilless rifle or even an AT4,

(18:51):
okay, our own AT4 has a ninemillimeter conversion device
that fires nine millimetertracer rounds.
Okay, that's for training, justlike that.
The RPG also has the ability tofire a spotter tracer in order
to, you know, help you verifywhere the sights are and things
like that.
Now also has the ability tofire a spotter tracer in order
to help you verify where thesites are, and things like that.
Now, will this RPG handle a fullpower warhead and not explode

(19:11):
in the operator's face?
That the ATF was able to cobbletogether?
Highly doubtful, okay, it stillhad the weld broken.
I think there's a spot in therethat has to be demilled in
order for it to not be able tofire a live round.
If you fire a live RPG out ofthis RPG that the ATF claims
they were able to make liveagain, you're going to kill the

(19:33):
operator.
The gas forces are going tocome out of those spots that
were torch, welded or torched inthe tube and you're going to
get a giant burst of fire inyour neck and no telling what
else.
It's going to definitely harmyou.
Now, just because they wereable to pop a little 762 by 39
tracer round out of theredoesn't mean it would handle the
power of an actual RPG nowherenear nowhere near it right.

(19:57):
So that's what you know.
It wasn't Matt Hoover, it wasthe other gentleman.
I'll put that in the a link inthe description box below to an
article to give you more of anidea of what's going on with
that particular sailor.
But he was going to gun showsand selling parts, kits and
things like that and wound upgetting hemmed up and he's in
jail now over this bull crap.
So there's tons of things likethis that are going on that you

(20:21):
know.
Here are gun owners, you know,going to the table and saying
look, you know Trump claims tobe a pro to a president.
You know, if you look at hisposition on bump stocks, you
know banning bump stocks.
Of course people say, well, noone cares about bump stocks.
But that's not true.
You know it.
It it opens the gate for otherexecutive orders to be abused,

(20:41):
which Biden did.
Biden did the whole frame andreceiver rule thing.
He did the brace ban.
I mean there were tons ofthings that Biden was able to do
.
He's like oh well, trump usedthe power of the pen.
I'll just use the power of thepen.
So right now, what we see inTrump's first hundred days is
that you have to give creditwhere it's due.
You know, pam Bondi, I don'treally consider her to be an

(21:04):
extremely strong 2A pick interms of an AG, but she has
pulled back on some things andyou know they seem to be doing
the best they can within thetime frame so far to.
You know, give at least someplatitudes to gun owners, you
know.
So I'm not going to say they'vedone a fantastic job, but they

(21:27):
haven't done a terrible jobeither.
It's just kind of.
It's like maybe they're doingthe bare minimum is the kind of
feeling I get out of it.

Speaker 3 (21:34):
I could see that.
I could see that, um, andthat's kind of how I felt as
well, I would, I would say, thesame exact feeling with Bongino,
patel and Bondi.
They're all just there rightnow.
They're occupying a cabinetseat right now.
That's about it.
And I think that, and it'sinteresting, the two people that

(21:56):
have done the most wouldprobably be Musk and and gabbard
.
Those two have probably donemore in the first hundred days
that that uh trump appointedthan bondi, patel and cash.
I'm gonna go back real quickwhen, so, playing devil's

(22:20):
advocate with the bump stock ban.
Now we had the rise of frts.
I find it interesting that whenthat happened, like which came
first, the chicken or the eggscenario.
So it's like, did the frt comeout of the bump stock ban?
So it's like, hey, you guyswant to do the bump stock ban

(22:42):
this is just me for just pickingyour brain for pure curiosity
like, hey, we, they ban bumpstocks.
What's something else we can do?
And then you had the rise ofthe frt and I mean the frt is no
joke, man.

Speaker 2 (22:55):
I mean it does work, it definitely works well, one
thing I'll say is that, um, allof this crap wouldn't be
necessary if they just left usalone about this is true you
know, I, I think that if acompany decides to come out with
a product, let's just say itskirts the edge of legality,
whether you know?
okay, the ATF has frowned uponthe FRT for some time.

(23:16):
They frowned upon bump stocks,they frowned upon braces, they
frowned upon it, but they couldnever quite say that it was
illegal in the sense of the waythe laws are written, that it
violates the NFA or anythingRight.
And they just tried to hem upsome guy over a CC Scorpion with
a brace on it and they'retrying to say that it's
simultaneously a rifle and apistol.
Yeah, that's not possible.

(23:39):
You know, according to the GCA,according to all the rules that
dictate these things, accordingto the GCA, according to all
the rules that dictate thesethings, there is no way that you
can, something can be a rifleand a pistol simultaneously.
So the ATF, under Bondi'sdirection, they dropped that
case.
Of course, it did receive a lotof scrutiny from the media and

(23:59):
from gun control pro-gun groupssuch as GOA and NRA and and so
on and so forth.
Okay, um, and you know many ofus who are very vocal bringing
this, this, uh, hypocrisy up, um, so, overall, I mean, I, I

(24:21):
trust Patel.
I do think that he is a goodguy.
I mean, you know, looking atsome of his you know previous,
you know things he's talkedabout a lot of the interviews
he's given, I mean I at some ofhis previous things he's talked
about a lot of the interviewshe's given I mean I feel like
he's a pretty base guy.
I feel like he's pretty on ourside overall.
I mean he seems like the kindof guy that shares the same
values as many of us and heseems to be very pro-gun.
He did say that he wanted toturn the FBI into essentially a

(24:42):
museum on the first day, amuseum to the deep state.
Has that happened?
I mean, it's been 100 days now.
That certainly has not happened.
So I wonder and of course thisis just you know the way my
brain works, I try to think ofthese things, matt I wonder if
he got behind the curtain andrealized like, wow, there's some

(25:02):
very powerful intelligenceassets at our disposal here.
Um, you know, maybe he realizeshow deep the rot really is when
you get inside of that systemand you, you know what they know
.
Can you really go back to theworld that you were in before?
I mean, okay, so the cash Patel?
Who was this?

(25:23):
You know jovial.
Hey, I'm pro gun, I'm, you know, I'm one of you, I'm wearing a
ball cap and the interview, likeyou know, I'm, I'm this, I'm
that.
Hey, I'm going to turn and I'mjokingly going to turn the FBI
into a museum to the deep state,the treachery of the deep state
.
Can you really go back to thatworld once you're inside the

(25:43):
belly of that whale?
Can you really deliver on whatyou promised you would deliver
on?
I don't believe.

(26:11):
So thought, how do you reconcilethe way you feel about what you
see as a patriot, okay, someonewho you convinced all of the
people within your circle?
I'm one of you, I'm a patriot,I love my country, I hate the
corruption, I hate the deepstate, I hate whatever it is.
You think you're appealing tothe masses, right?

(26:33):
How do you reconcile tellingthem that you're going to do
something and realizing just howdeep the rot on the inside is
and realizing, holy crap, thismight be so much larger than me
and so much larger than what Ihave the power to do that I
might've actually made somepromises that I might not be
able to keep?

Speaker 3 (26:54):
I 100% believe that's the case.
There is no way.
And of course I'm playingdevil's advocate, Of course, of
course, but I think you nailedit.
You get behind the curtain andyou realize how large of a think
about it.
You're head of the FBI.
You are head of the largestsurveillance apparatus in the

(27:14):
world.
I mean, you have the ability tosee, hear and do pretty much
anything you want.
There's a reason the buildingis named Hoover.
The guy that made it famous didexactly that.
He was able to grab and holdpower over presidents and he
didn't even have to worry aboutbeing the president.

(27:35):
He could control world leaders.
He could control the president,senators, everything.
And I mean, I'm not a tinfoilhat kind of guy, but you're
talking about guys thatabsolutely had disdain for the
FBI.
Both Kash Patel and Bonginoboth spoke about it.
Bongino, most notably on hispodcast, had disdain for the

(28:00):
pretty much the entiregovernment industry apparatus.
We haven't heard anything outof either one of them for the
first hundred days.
And these are guys that weresaying they're going to
completely change the system,they're going to go in there and
they're just going to wreckingball the entire apparatus.
No, I don't believe it.

Speaker 2 (28:18):
It I think it got good to them and it's going to
be very interesting to see Ithink the the fact is is they
got into that system and theydidn't realize what they're
really getting themselves into.

Speaker 3 (28:29):
And maybe that's you know the saying that absolute
power corrupts absolutely callme a cynic, but we'll'll revisit
this in a couple of years.

Speaker 2 (28:39):
We'll revisit it in a couple of years.
But the point is I'm not sayingthe power is absolute.
Let's talk about the use ofsome of the power that's been
taken on in the first 100 days.
One would be a reallyhot-button topic now is the
deportations.
Yes, sorry y'all, I'm a littlesick.
The mass deportations, ok, andTrump has run into some speed

(29:04):
bumps and hurdles with thesedeportations.
You know he wanted to.
You know, deport I believe hewas saying between eight and
twelve thousand people per dayunder these policies.
And, of course, you knowvarious courts have tried to
strike down his deportationorders.
In fact, kash Patel justbrought up in a tweet today that
they arrested a judge who wasfound to be an obstruction of

(29:26):
justice, of trying to get in theway of some of these
deportation proceedings andthings.
So there are judges within thesystem who are essentially using
their positions for politicalpurposes.
Right, they're not looking atit from the standpoint of, oh,
I'm simply going to look at thelaw and decide if something's
legal or not.
No, no, they're going.
I'm using my position as apolitical springboard to further

(29:50):
my political goals.
Or to, you know, exert my youknow willingness, my political
willingness, on the people thatI'm over okay.
And that becomes a big issue,right?
Many people were looking at AmyBarrett and her appointment to
the Supreme Court and like, okay, she's uber Christian, you know

(30:12):
she, you know whatever.
Okay, she's very Christian,she's very right-wing, you know
she, you know whatever.
Okay, she's, she's veryChristian, she's very right wing
.
Um, you know, she adopted abunch of children.

Speaker 3 (30:21):
So it's like, oh yeah she was warm on two way.
She wasn't like super two way,but she was warm on two way.

Speaker 2 (30:27):
I think a lot of people were just kind of
thinking oh boy, here we go.
You know Amy Barrett is goingto be this extreme right wing.
You know every single thing theright wants.
She's going to just be in stepwith it.
That hasn't necessarily beenthe case.
I mean, she's been a littleflighty on a few issues,
primarily, you know, 2a, whichhas a lot of people concerned, I

(30:48):
mean.
So you know it's just one ofthose kind of difficult things
where you choose someone for anappointment like that, whether
it's bringing in Gabbard andBondi and Patel and all these
other people thinking, okay,well, if we change the
leadership, things are going toget better and there's going to
be an actual change in the waythat these organizations operate

(31:09):
.
Or saying, well, if we get inthis Supreme Court justice who
is, let's say, leaning thisdirection politically, well then
, in theory, you know, we're notgoing to see any of this kind
of egregious left-wing crapgoing through.
That doesn't always hasn't beenthe case.
You know Justice Roberts hasn'tbeen incredibly.

Speaker 3 (31:29):
You know, dependable right Barrett hasn't been
dependable well, I, I think, youknow, I think barrett was was a
a good I'm gonna say goodchoice, but she was a choice
that was good enough at the timebecause she was, she wasn't
super right wing she, she, shewas somebody that trump could

(31:51):
get through.
That wasn't gonna get, wasn'tgoing to be automatically
written off, right.
They were saying, okay, she'swarm on two-way, but those that
were in support of the two-waydidn't expect her to just jump
into dissent if anything cameacross the docket, like if a
case came up, she wasn't goingto just dissent with those that
support the left.

(32:12):
So that's what I mean by sayinghey, she was good enough at the
time.
Has she done anything thatreally has brought any attention
to herself?
Not really, but that's who's tosay what can happen?
Like you said, we have a lot ofimmigration stuff coming up.

(32:34):
They're trying to deport sevento 10,000 people.
What?
Trying to deport 7,000 to10,000 people?
What is it a day?
7,000 to 10,000 people a day?
That's not nearly enough.
At the highest point, 200,000,300,000 people were coming
across the border a day.
Yeah, a day.
200,000 or 300,000 people a daycoming across the border
undocumented.

(32:54):
And we're trying to stop 10,000people a day coming across the
border undocumented, and we'retrying to stop 10 000 people a
day.
That's like that is insane, Imean.
I mean I suppose you have tostart somewhere.
I I think it's awesome, dude.
I think that if you were goingto say, hey, what has trump done
in the first hundred days thatyou support a hundred percent, I
would say immigration.
The way that he's towing theline on that.

(33:16):
He's not letting the media oranybody try to sway him.
He's making the right decisionson that.
I believe it.
You know everybody's screamingoh, they don't have due process
when they're getting deported.
They didn't use due processwhen they came in.
If you didn't use due processto come in, you don't get it on
the way out.

(33:36):
That's reserved for Americancitizens, yeah.

Speaker 2 (33:39):
They don't have rights.
As much as I hate to say thatbecause what our country was
founded under, you know the theoverall principles of of how our
country was founded.
You know it it it is hard to toeven make that statement as
American to say, oh well, thatperson doesn't have rights.
But the truth is, if you breakthe law coming here, you don't
have rights, we're going to getyou out of here If your first

(34:01):
act is to break the law to comeinto America.

Speaker 3 (34:05):
That says something you don't get the privilege.
Well, it's disrespectful tothose that did choose the right
path.
And I mean, I have a ton ofSpanish friends from all over,
both Mexico, Central America,South America, and they get
upset because they're like, hey,these people that are coming in
they didn't go through the sameprocess as we did and they get

(34:27):
access to the same stuff.
So I know a guy that spent$10,000.
It's an expensive process.
He spent, it cost him $10,000and it took him, I want to say,
seven or eight years to gothrough that process.
And I mean, what does that sayto him?
I know, you know, he could havedone it for free.

Speaker 2 (34:45):
I know, I mean my, my girlfriend's from Brazil.
You know she's American citizennow and she went.
She went through everything theright way, went through the
correct process and, yeah,there's going to be some
short-term pain involved intrying to go through the process
the right way.
Yes, it takes a lot of time.
Yes, it's a lot of bullcrap,it's hard, it sucks and you know
, for the people who do it theright way, it's a slap in the

(35:06):
face to them, who you know theygo through great personal risk
and they take great personalfinancial risk, sacrifices and
sacrifices in order to, you know, become a legitimate American
citizen is not easy you know, so, you know, I think that the way
that it's being handled is asgood as Trump can do right now.
I mean short of.
I mean, and I think that theyare sort of looking at this from

(35:28):
a sense of triage and saying,okay, we're trying to find MS-13
gang members, it's like.
So if you are going to belimited on the amount of people
you can get out of here, atleast make it the worst people
you can find.

Speaker 3 (35:40):
That's right.

Speaker 2 (35:41):
So at least they're approaching it from a standpoint
of triage.
And I think that even somethingthat the left is guilty of is
that they're going to sit hereand say well, this MS-13 gang
leader or whatever he is I meanwe're not talking just a rank
and file soldier, we're talkingsome leader of a major player in

(36:01):
this organization got roundedup and deported.
And the left is crying theircrocodile tears about oh, he
didn't have due process, andyada, yada, yada.
It's like wait a minute, wait aminute.
So you're going to sit here andtell me that we rounded up the
worst of the worst, firstcriminals.
I mean, we're talking legitcriminals and we need to talk

(36:21):
just average every day.
you know, thug, we're talkingpeople with tattoos and all this
sort of stuff.
Not that tattoos mean you're abad person or anything, but you
know hey.
I mean we're talking guys withhand tattoos, neck tattoos,
tears.

Speaker 3 (36:35):
I mean come on Like royally terrible people that
have meaning within the gang,Like they are gang affiliates.

Speaker 2 (36:41):
They have meaning within the game and they have
skin in the game and they havedone bad things.
I mean, look at all those MS-13guys that took over that
apartment building.
What is it?
Colorado?

Speaker 3 (36:49):
Yeah, it's Colorado.

Speaker 2 (36:51):
Come on Like you're rounding those people up first.
So at least they're approachingit from the standpoint of a
reasonable amount of triage tosay, hey, we're going to get the
worst of the worst first.
You know, get the worst actorsout of here first, and I think
that's a smart approach.
If you are limited on how manyyou can get out, you need to get
the worst out first.
So I think overall they'rehandling it right.

Speaker 3 (37:11):
Doesn't Colorado have like pretty restrictive gun
laws?
They?

Speaker 2 (37:15):
just passed an assault weapons ban again.
Well, they've been trying for along time.

Speaker 3 (37:19):
They finally got it through.
I would tell MS-13 to try to dothat in Georgia and see what
happens.
They'll get annihilated.

Speaker 2 (37:26):
They always do it in a place that has strict gun law.
Yeah man, it's just crazy.
I mean, I could go on and onabout immigration and about
replacement theory and thingslike that, but that's not really
what I want to talk about inthe context of today's show,
although I think it's importantto touch on immigration and the
deportation of these illegals.

Speaker 3 (37:45):
Well, I'm glad you brought up that.
One particular case is KilmarGarcia.
This is who you're talkingabout.
And yeah, he was not anAmerican citizen, he was El
Salvadorian.
What is it?

Speaker 2 (37:57):
El.

Speaker 3 (37:57):
Salvadorian.
Yes, that guy, and you know hehad a deportation order.
They sent him over, he gotrounded up.
He already had a finaldeportation order.
He was already scheduled to bedeported.
They just kind of expeditedthat for him, at no charge, I
might add, sent him over there.
Bukele um said, hey, he's oursnow, he's El Salvadorian.

(38:20):
El Salvadorian, that guy um,and they put him in one of their
super max gang prisons.
And I don't know if you guyshave ever seen those prisons,
dude, they're not fun.
Those things are crazy.
They have cell, they have cellblockers, they're jammed.
There's no cell service, signal, internet, nothing.

(38:41):
It's like a black hole.
You go in that place.
It's a black hole.
The guards wear masks so youdon't know anybody Like super
locked down.
I mean Bukele has done a lot ofthings right but, brother, he's
done a lot of things wrong inthe way that he did it too.
I mean it's, it's.
It's a tough row to hoe as faras like how he got there,

(39:03):
because he turned that countryfrom being the most dangerous to
one of the most safest, but themanner in which he did it was
totally what you would see outof, like you, you know, a
socialist dictatorship country.
It's like it's hard to swallow,like the results are there, but
I can't agree with the way thatit went about.

Speaker 2 (39:23):
He had a very good meeting with Trump.
I think it was last week or theweek before.
You know, last few weeks he hada meeting with Trump and, uh,
and they seem to get alongreally well and, and that's the
scary part, yeah, that's that's,I agree.
I mean, the results are there,but, gosh, at what cost.
I mean, I'm not saying thesepeople aren't terrible, I'm not
saying they shouldn't be lockedaway but, uh, a lot of good

(39:44):
people got swept up in there aswell.

Speaker 3 (39:46):
It is scary you know, but sometimes things are
necessary that and that's thehardest thing to, that's the
hardest thing to like.
Grasp is like that, like uh,look at the results, like just
look at it yeah, but man well,we'll see how it works out in
the long term for el salvador,you know.

Speaker 2 (40:03):
And well, they're building more prisons, so
they're building more prisons.
You know, we're gonna see howthat plays out, but um, overall
I think that the way they'rehandling that is not too bad.
The 2a stuff could be better,but at least we have a little
bit to hang on to and, you know,we are getting some gains in
the courts, which is great.
You know, guns really are, inmy opinion, the end-all do-all

(40:27):
to everything that makes ourpolitical system operate even
close to the way that it'ssupposed to operate.
The First Amendment gives youthe right to say what you want.
The Second Amendment gives youthe right to defend what you say
, and without that defense,without us being able to stand
toe to toe with the people whowould oppress us, you're really
nothing more than a subject, andI think that it really puts

(40:50):
people in a dark state of mindto think of it in that way,
because people are so blind toall the things that go on in the
world around them that theyjust have their head in the sand
and they keep their head downand do their job and they go and
do whatever they got to do.
And you know it's easy to justget wrapped up in the day-to-day
minutia of survival and notthink, wow, what is the greater

(41:11):
political play that is unfoldinghere in front of us?
We'll switch a little bit tothis whole anti-Semitism thing
and look, I've been catching alot of flack on Twitter.
Okay, I know I've been catchinga lot of flack on Twitter for
some of my you know views onIsrael and some of the you know
questions that I've asked aboutvarious things.

(41:32):
Okay, and my concern and Ibelieve is a very legit concern,
a legitimate concern that Ihave every right to have, is
that when we look at Trump, youknow he has a very, very, you
know, I believe, an unhealthyrelationship with Israel.
You know we're a little bit toodeep in those folks' pockets

(41:55):
and, again, not to put theconspiracy tinfoil hat on,
that's never the goal, of course.
I want to know, logically,data-wise, I want to know the
real deal, I want to knowexactly what's going on.
Like, were all of these peoplecompromised in some big Mossad

(42:15):
honeypot operation, right?
When you look at Epstein okay,bondi held back the Epstein
report under concerns ofnational security, right?
Okay, well, who's nationalsecurity?
Us or Israel, and who has theirasses in the sling?
Okay, who has the Americans'asses in the sling over this

(42:40):
whole thing?
Okay, I'm not going to sit hereand point any fingers and say,
oh, this person's compromised,that person compromised.
But someone is, someone clearlyis, and someone is clearly
compromised at the level thatour attorney general said, okay,
we cannot release thisinformation to the public
because our very own leadershipcould possibly be implicated.

(43:03):
Maybe themselves, maybe someonethey know, maybe someone that
they go.
Well, we can't allow thosepeople to get arrested or in
trouble.
Who knows, could it be someupper echelon of society who's
pulling the strings, and maybethey're getting protected.
And again, I hate to draw theseconclusions, but the point that

(43:25):
we have to kind of bring upwith that is that, in the big
scheme of things, at what pointis our government actually being
ran by us and not othergovernments around the world?

Speaker 3 (43:37):
Well, that's a great question to ask.
And then you can also ask, likewhat is Israel providing the US
that would cause us to provideso much support?
Or what are they holding overour heads?
Well, that's the question thatwould cause us to provide so
much support.
What are we getting?
Or what are they holding overour heads?
Well, that's the question.
So you asked the first question,which was you know, why is this

(43:58):
happening?
What do they have over ourheads?
And then the second question isif you just use, you know, if
you're just looking at the,let's just say, the Socratic
method, and you start askingquestions well, what are they
giving us?
We're not trading a tremendousamount with them.
We're not importing atremendous amount of anything

(44:20):
from them.
It's really a one-way street.
It's us giving to them.
So why such a good relationship?
Why is the relationship sostrong that it brings us to
where we're at right now, whenwe have trading allies that have
we trade more heavily with, say, japan, korea, taiwan, gdp-wise

(44:43):
that we don't even treat themthat great, we don't support
them that much?

Speaker 2 (44:48):
Well, I think that I speak for a lot of people when I
say this, and again not tryingto draw a ton of scrutiny, but
the point is is that I believethat all of this money that
places like AIPAC are pumpinginto the US government to sort
of buy these politicians shouldmake a lot of people
uncomfortable.
I mean, trump was given $220million by AIPAC.

(45:10):
What does that, that buyingIsrael?
I mean, look, I don't have adog in this fight.
My only dog in this fight isreally trying to know, trying to
discover why it seems that ourgovernment is being ran by these
people.
I mean, and if you startlooking and again, if you start

(45:31):
asking questions, oh yeah, allthe bots come out and all of a
sudden, you're the worst person.
You're this, you're a Nazi.
You know the government.
You know, every day, it seemsBondi is making posts that
involve anti-Semitism.
You know, trump has talkedabout fighting anti-Semitism.
Kash Patel has made posts aboutanti-Semitism.
Kash Patel has made posts aboutanti-Semitism.

(45:51):
But what about us?
We're the people that voted.
So what about the people?
What about the people who livehere, the inhabitants of this
country?
What about us?
What about you know?
How do you make amends withthat, because it seems that this
anti-Semitism is sort of thehot word.
It's the escape clause of anargument where someone can just

(46:13):
say well, instead of me bringingany data to the table or me
bringing any type of consensual,real, you know thing of
substance to this argument, I'msimply just going to label you
as someone who hates me.
But that's not logicallyprofound at all.
That doesn't help anyone.
All that does is just deflectthe lack of information they're

(46:37):
giving you onto.
Oh well, you simply have thatview because you hate people
like me.

Speaker 3 (46:42):
But that's not true, yeah, it's the easy out.

Speaker 2 (46:44):
Yeah, it's an easy out.
It's not coming from a place ofhate, or oh, no one hates
anyone.
We just want to know.
I just have questions, that'sthat's all.

Speaker 3 (46:53):
You have to think this country was founded on
asking questions.
Right, I have questions.
Why do I have to pay this tax?
That's all it is.
Why am I paying more for this?
Why?
Why do I have to pay a tax?
Why is this?
You know, tea tax.
Oh, we're going to throw thistea in the harbor Like that.

Speaker 2 (47:09):
The basis of our entire country was built around
simply asking questions yeah,everyone wants to sort of
convalate this whole thing to mebeing anti-semitic simply
because I question israel.
But but the the issue is is Istill have questions that that
are not, and just answer thequestion.
Just answer the question.

(47:29):
I'm not concerned about whatyou think, if I hate you or not.
It's clearly.
I don't hate anyone, I justhave questions.
Anyway, the point is, witheverything that's going on in
this sort of geopoliticalsituation, I mean I know we can
talk about tariffs too.
I mean, trump has been quiteeffective with using the
strategy of tariffs and it isworking Now there.

(47:53):
Effective with using thestrategy of tariffs and it is
working.
Now there's going to be someshort-term pain from these
tariffs and then we're seeingthat Egg prices have gone up,
not down.
That was a huge thing.
That Trump was running on waslike oh, we've got to get the
egg prices down.
How do you appeal to theaverage person?
Well, guess what?
Everyone goes and buys eggs,right, I mean gosh.
But then they say, well, well,egg prices aren't going down.
So people go.
Well, the tariffs aren'tworking.

(48:13):
Trump's policies aren't working.
He's, he's doing this, doingthat, but the truth is there's
gonna be some short-term painthat we're all gonna have to
just bite off a piece of thatshit sandwich and and deal with,
unfortunately, and but we'reall gonna have to suffer a
little bit to really know ifthis plan has long term teeth or
not.

Speaker 3 (48:34):
That's right.

Speaker 2 (48:35):
And you know that's part of it.
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Speaker 3 (50:17):
Yeah, great, great company, great product.
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (50:20):
I mean, I'll begin getting back to the subject at
hand by saying, matt, that theissue that our society is really
going through the most is notokay, you know, let's say black
and white people, or Christianand Jewish people, or people who
are in disagreement with eachother.

(50:40):
The problem is this tribalismwe discussed in our first show
or it might have been the secondshow we did about tribalism.
Tribalism is not a bad thing.
Human beings for thousands ofyears have gathered together and
shared common ideals and goalsand adhered to those goals for
their better survival.
I mean, we know that that's notwrong, no one's wrong to band

(51:03):
together and, you know, intotheir groups.
But I think what society reallydoes begin to fall victim to is
there is so much information outthere.
You're on social media andthere's just this constant
barrage of stimulus, all thestuff coming across your feed
all the time, and it's like youget this serotonin hit.

(51:25):
You're getting this instantgratification of knowledge, what
you think is knowledge, but thetruth is it can be
indoctrination, it can be falseinformation, it can be a lie, it
can be something that someone'strying to get you to feel
hatred towards another person,and hate is a very low rent, a

(51:46):
very low rent.
Emotion.
Hate is easy.
Hate is really easy to just go.
Well, I hate this.
Therefore, I, you know I don't.
I don't like doing math.
Therefore, I don't want tolearn how to do math.
It's just easy to write thatoff.
You don't want to receive newinformation because your brain
has already made the decisionthat, whatever neural pathways
are established, it's alreadygoing to.

(52:07):
I already know this.
This is my reality and I and Irefuse to change my reality for
anyone.
And that's the issue, matt ispeople.
They fall victim to their ownbrains, like they literally have
an issue with receiving newinformation and going.
You know, maybe my opinion onthis has changed right, if you

(52:29):
look at tweets of mine from twoor three years ago, for instance
, in relation to the Jews, let'ssay Israel, you know, I
remember there was a tweet froma few years back where I said
hey, the USS Liberty was anaccident.
They apologized for it.
Why does everybody make a bigdeal about it?
Okay, that's an astuteobservation for the present

(52:51):
information that I have.
But as I receive newinformation, I'm then forced to
come to terms with my own viewson the subject and go well, wait
a minute we see all thesedocuments from the CIA and the
State Department.
Now we have a greater pictureof what's going on and we go.
Well, wait a minute, they werewarned.
There was this prompt.

(53:11):
So I'm not trying to just usethat particular example as a
scapegoat.
I'm simply trying to say thatas someone gets more information
into their, into their, theirdatabase, you have to then kind
of process that information andyour mind has to change.
You can't, you know, fallvictim to complacency for your
whole life.
You, you know you're the personyou are when you're 50 or 60

(53:34):
years old, is not going to bethe same person you are when you
were 20.

Speaker 3 (53:37):
Well, that that's true, but that would require you
to be open minded, and mostpeople, I would like to believe,
are open minded.
You're able to.
You're able to receive newinformation and new facts and
alter your opinion and changeyour opinion.
But lots of times, just growingup in the social media realm,

(53:57):
especially with youngergenerations, they're locked into
not being able to change theiropinion or not wanting to lose
the argument.
And what you'll see is, even ifyou bring to light information
that genuinely contradicts theirbeliefs, they're going to say
they're still going to disagreewith it and that's because they

(54:19):
don't want to quote, lose theirargument.
And you can see this when, um,if you're watching just regular,
you know YouTube videos about,you know word on the street man
on the street videos, you'll seethat.
You'll see that uh, host baitthem by saying something so
astronomical that it can't betrue and they're going to

(54:40):
disagree with it just for thefact that they don't want to
lose the argument.
And once you do that, you'vealready lost because you've
shown and proven that you're notwilling to accept reality, that
you're just saying, you're justdisagreeing with whatever that
person said to toe the line todisagree with them, and that
happens more often than not,especially when you start

(55:01):
getting into the political realm.
You could put all the facts onthe table.
Everything will contradict whatthey're saying and they won't
believe it, even with the factsthere, and you know.
Unfortunately, that's the caseright now.

Speaker 2 (55:15):
And with statistics it's very easy to manipulate
data to come to a certain youknow end goal of what you're
trying to achieve with that data.
You know a certain narrative,so to speak, and I think that
the escape route again becomes,it becomes those hot, key terms
when we say oh, you're a racistmatt all the time well, if you
you disagree with me because I'mdifferent than you, you're a

(55:37):
racist.
Or if I'm jewish, you disagreewith me, you're an anti-semite,
there's always a label thatthey're going to place to attach
hate to you.
Because hate is the low rentemotion.
Hate is easy for someone to go.
Oh well, this is obviouslycoming from a place of hate.
Therefore, everything you sayis now null and void.
Nothing you can say is going tohave any logical bearing in my

(56:00):
process for changing my mindhere, because you're coming from
a place of hate and that'salways the low tier, smooth
brain, low hanging fruit thatsomeone is going to go for.
And I think when you find thetruly logical people out there
who are willing to have a realconversation on very
uncomfortable things, I thinkthat's what our society has had

(56:21):
a really big issue with isthey're too comfortable.
They are not capable of comingto the table and having a
discussion about somethingthat's very uncomfortable,
something that's uncomfortable,something that makes them feel a
certain way when they're evendiscussing it.
To even say the wordanti-Semitism, to even say the

(56:42):
word Holocaust, to even say thatany of those words elicits a
feeling of immediate guilt orimmediate oh my gosh, I'm not
allowed to say that.
I'm not allowed to speak thatway.
That's wrong.
We should never put ourselvesin a situation where we make
others feel that they can't cometo the table with a legitimate
grievance and discuss what's ontheir mind.

(57:05):
And hey, if I'm wrong aboutsomething, then by all means
enlighten me.
But no one's calling me wrong.
No one's calling me a liar.
All they say.
All they can say is I hatepeople and you know that's just
not good enough for me.
I'm not willing to accept thatas a reality of the conversation
that's really happening here.

(57:25):
And I think, when we look atTrump's 100 first days, the
reality is that there's a lot ofcoping going on on both sides
of the political equation.
There are people on the leftand right who are coping really
hard.
You know many on the right feelbetrayed by some of the
decisions that Trump has made.
Some people on the leftbegrudgingly agree with Trump,

(57:47):
but you'll never hear them say,oh, trump was right here or he
wasn't.
So there is a separation inpeople's minds.
They will never want to admitwhen they're wrong.
They never want to have thehumility to admit that they made
a mistake or maybe they had thewrong view on something, and I
think, as Americans especially,we have to be more open-minded.
We have to be willing to cometo the table and go look, we are

(58:09):
a multicultural, multifacetedcountry of mixing pot of
different cultures and ideas andif you're truly going to
consider yourself an American,you have to be willing to take
those into account and say, okay, what's going on here, like I'm
going to take all theinformation available to me and
then I'm going to make a logical, educated decision based on the

(58:31):
facts, the data, the statistics, the history, you know, the
real reports, the black andwhite documents.
I mean, that's the truth I careabout.
And I think that when we lookat Trump's hundred first days
and all the things that he'sdone, I think it's just
important to kind of realizethat you know he's not going to
make everyone happy.

Speaker 3 (58:51):
It's impossible to make everyone happy.
Well, it's impossible becausethere's a group of people that
didn't support him when hebecame president that are
actively rooting for him to fail.
And when you look at it thatway, when you say I'm actively
rooting for someone to fail,that means you're rooting for
the American economy to tank,you're rooting for the American

(59:15):
tariffs to succeed and prices goup, inflation goes up, interest
rates go up.
That's what you're rooting for,all in the vein of saying see,
I told you Trump is a badpresident and now all this stuff
proves it.
So all along you were rootingfor this to happen.

(59:36):
Just again what we just talkedabout to hold your argument.
So you didn't lose the argument.
You can go back to your familymembers and say, see, I told you
the government is in shambles,the economy is in shambles and
Trump is a terrible president.
I was right.

Speaker 2 (59:53):
That was the, that was the universe.
And the thing is, is this notthe gotcha moment that you think
it is?
Exactly Because here you arestruggling to pay your bills?
I mean, many people arestruggling to even just pay
their bills and they're livingpaycheck to paycheck.
But yet do you think for onesecond that if things go
completely to hell and back,that someone like Trump isn't
going to be on his golf coursesmoking cigars and eating Wagyu

(01:00:14):
steak and not having a care inthe world and hanging out with
his grandkids?
I mean, come on, like thereality is, it doesn't absolve
you from the actual task ofsurviving in this world.
Like they are not responsiblefor your future.
They're not responsible foryour success or failures.
You are and you can't blamesomeone for that.

(01:00:36):
Yeah, they might be acontributing factor, obviously.
Yes, the way your governmentoperates is a huge contributing
factor to how the worldultimately around you works, but
it's still on you and I thinkthat people should definitely
have sort of a stoic view oftheir existence.
I'm not saying give up and justcrawl into a ball and die.
I'm saying that stoicismrequires us to.

(01:00:58):
You know, we affect change onwhat we know we can affect
change on and the things wecan't affect change on.
We're not going to let thatoccupy our.
We're not going to let thatoccupy us.
We're not going to let thatstress us out and bother us Like
we're going to.
We're going to change what wecan, what we know we can change,
and then things we can't.
Yeah, we'll work towards it,but we're not going to get blown
out of proportion about it.

(01:01:19):
We're going to be realisticabout our expectations.

Speaker 3 (01:01:22):
Well as of right now, that first hundred days, trump
is sitting right at around closeto a 50, 50 approval rating.
So whether it's 50% of the USapproves, 50% disapproves, or
whether it's like I think it'slike 48, 52-ish around about
there, we're just going to roundit.

(01:01:44):
You know it's going to be alittle rough going forward, but
I believe in what's going on.
You know, I believe in thethings that he has put in place
and hopefully we can kind ofturn the ship, because it's a
big ship and it doesn't turnquick.
You have to turn it and youhave to wait, you have to try to
maneuver it, we have to try toturn it, but the end result is
we have to right the ship andthat takes a little bit of

(01:02:07):
sacrifice and a little bit ofbeing uncomfortable.

Speaker 2 (01:02:10):
Yeah, and we're gonna have to throw some things over
the side of the ship.
Oh yeah, and that's a greatanalogy, because it it is so
very true that that it is a slowship to turn.
We're talking generations,sometimes decades, I mean.
However many amount of time.
It could be 30 years, 40 yearsbefore you really see the true
ramifications of a certainseries of actions, and and when

(01:02:30):
those actions are so far polaropposites of each other.
It's like, oh, we overturned alittle bit, well, let's overturn
back, and now we just oh, we'rejust going back and forth.
So you know, we have to avoidthat.
We want to make sure that,whoever we do elect, that we're
all working towards some kind ofa freaking common goal that we
can all agree on and agree thatthis is the direction we need to

(01:02:53):
go.
And that can be hard.
How do you do that in such alarge multicultural society with
so many different backgrounds,so many different religions?
I mean, obviously, everyone hasa different goal.
Ultimately, everyone has adifferent goal.
Think it's important to rememberI think that people tend to
lose sight of this that peoplewe want to ultimately believe,

(01:03:14):
matt, that people are good andhumble, and they are In fact, I
I just you know ran into asituation the other day when I
was traveling.
I forget what it was exactly,but you know, you're always, you
know, reminded of the good thatpeople can do in the smallest
little ways.
I'm not saying that peopledon't have good intentions

(01:03:36):
overall, it's not about theintentions.
But people ultimately onlyreally care about the world they
live in, their own littleprivate world that they have a
view of when the cards are onthe table, y'all.
That's what you have to kind ofremember in the back of your
mind.
So when you see all of thesetribes within the United States,
these people who they all fallinto their own little, you know,

(01:03:59):
banner All right, oh, thisperson's, whatever Right, they
all fall into their own banner.
It's important to remember thatultimately, people are only
going to really care about theirown personal goals in life and
in order for us to, you know,exist as a nation and try to
have some form of concise andorganized goal together.

(01:04:22):
You know that's not a simpleconversation, it's very
difficult, and when you look ata president, I think everyone
wants to point the finger.
He's the person that someonecan just go oh, all my problems
are because of him.
All my problems are because ofTrump.
But the reality is no.
Your problems are a result of alot of damn things that the
average person probably won'tever even be able to make sense

(01:04:44):
of.
Even if you put it all on agiant whiteboard and said here's
how all the dots connect youraverage person, they would not
be able to recollect, they wouldnot be able to make some form
of concise decision.

Speaker 3 (01:04:57):
Well, it's easy to place blame on something that
you can never change.
So if somebody says, oh, it'sbecause of Trump, well, that's
easy to scapegoat somebody thatyou can never, you can't change
that and nothing you say or doright now is going gonna change
the fact that you're in a badposition because of your own
decisions.
Like you put yourself there,not Trump, but you're placing
the blame on and I'm just usingTrump as an example I don't, I

(01:05:20):
mean not, but now you have a,you have a person you place the
blame on that you know willforever be there and you can't
change it.

Speaker 2 (01:05:32):
And place the blame on that.
You know will forever be thereand you can't change it.
And you know, I think peopleyou know try to use it as an
attempt to wash their hands ofthe accountability.

Speaker 3 (01:05:39):
That's what it comes down to.

Speaker 2 (01:05:40):
That's really what it comes down to.
No one wants to be accountable.
No one wants to go.
You know what?
I struck up all that debt.
I got that student loan.
It was me that signed the paperand got the student loan.
It was me who took out thecredit card debt.
It was me who bought a house Icouldn't afford.
It was me who bought tooexpensive of a car that I
couldn't afford.
No one wants to look themselvesin the mirror and go.

(01:06:01):
You know what?
You put yourself in thatsituation to some degree and
that's a very difficult thing,bro.

Speaker 3 (01:06:08):
Let me tell you real quick about that.
The student loan forgivenessthing you want to talk about mad
.
You don't understand how mad Iwas.
I worked so hard to pay thosestudent loans off early.
I was like I'm not going tolive in debt, I just like
sacrificed, I paid my studentloans off and it was a sizable

(01:06:28):
amount, all right.
And then when Biden was like oh, we're going to forgive you,
don't know I was ripping my hairout.
I was like do you mean I couldhave just not done that and just
not had to pay?
So I was a little upset.
I'm kind of glad they'rebacktracking on that.
Now I understand there's peoplethat are in a bad way.

(01:06:49):
Again that now I understandthere's people that are in a bad
way again.
They signed for those loans.
I signed for my loans, I paidthose loans off.
But man, that was that pissedme off bad they.

Speaker 2 (01:07:00):
They could say tomorrow, matt, that we're gonna
forgive all the credit carddebt.
And you better believe, if Ihad any credit card debt I'm not
no way I'd still pay it becausethat that you know.
If you you took that out, thatyou made that agreement, yeah,
you're obligated to that You'rea person of your word, you're
going to pay that money back.
It's just the right thing to do.
Even if the government said, oh, we're just going to forgive

(01:07:21):
this student loan.
Oh, we're going to forgive thecredit card debt, oh, we're
going to forgive your mortgage,wouldn't matter I'd still,
because you made that agreement,you agreed to it, you know.
So this has been a great show.
I really hope that you guysenjoyed today's show.
We went a little bit over ontime, but I tell you what.
It was a fantastic show and letme know what you think.
You know we dove into a lot ofdifferent topics.
I know we kind of scratched onsome different areas.

(01:07:44):
Let me know what you think andyou know, always make sure that
you're leaving your comments forus.
We'll read through them and tryto answer some About every
other show or so we'll dive intosome comments and things.
So we are looking to have someguests on the show eventually.
We're kind of getting ourworkflow back in order and
getting things with the showtogether, and I am still doing

(01:08:04):
some work on the studio here,but we will eventually start
bringing in some guests, whichwill be a lot of fun.
And, matt, I really appreciateyou and I know we've got another
show to cut today.
Sometimes we cut more than oneshow in a sitting.
It just depends, but I alwaystry to tell you off.
We do, because I like to betransparent about that kind of
stuff.
But anything else, matt, beforewe leave today, any final

(01:08:25):
thoughts.

Speaker 3 (01:08:25):
No, it was a great conversation.
It's always exciting when wecome off of a little mini break
vacation and we have a lot ofstuff built up that we want to
talk about, and that's why I cansee them a little scattered,
cause we're all just kind of allover the place there's nothing
wrong with that, but I reallyappreciate everybody's time.

Speaker 2 (01:08:39):
I hope you enjoyed today's show.
We'll see you next week on LOP.
Remember, every Monday on theIraq veteran YouTube channel.
Also, everywhere you can findall your favorite podcasts.
We're everywhere.
Make sure you leave us a goodreview.
It helps us show up in thesearch results better.
So thank you so much.
Many more on the way.
We'll see you soon.
Bye everybody.

Speaker 1 (01:08:59):
Thanks for listening to Life, liberty and Pursuit.
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Have a good one.