From Burn Pits To Bylaws: Inside VFW Riders And The Fight For Veterans

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:01):
War is a paradox.
It has the power to bringnations together, to inspire
heroism and sacrifice, and toforge bonds of camaraderie that
will span a lifetime.
But it also has the power totear families apart, to shatter
communities, and to leave scarsthat will never fully yield.

(00:21):
And for those who have served,the transition back to civilian
life can be one of the greatestchallenges they will ever face.
This is the typical life ofmilitary veterans, a world that
is both familiar and foreign tomost of us.
It is a world that is shaped byunique experiences, values, and
traditions of the military, andby the sacrifices and struggles

(00:42):
of those who have served.
But it's also a world that isconstantly changing as new
generations of veterans confrontnew challenges and new
opportunities.
Thank you for joining us at SoupSandwich.
Dig your foxhole, heat up yourMRE, and spend some time with
us.
This podcast is designed solelyfor entertainment and
occasionally informationalpurposes only, and is to be

(01:04):
regarded strictly as satirecomprising of veterans that
delves into their thoughts andexperiences in combat, as well
as their perspectives on variousaspects of daily life that may
be unsettling for certainlisteners.
This podcast is not suitable forindividuals under the age of 18.
The views articulated in thispodcast may not necessarily
align with those of the NationalVFW or VFW Department of

(01:27):
Michigan or VFW Post 3033.
Additionally, we kindly requestthat listeners refrain from
pursuing legal action againstthe creators or contributors of
this podcast.
In other words, please don't sueus.

SPEAKER_03 (02:04):
Quite a few months, huh?

SPEAKER_05 (02:06):
Four months.

SPEAKER_03 (02:08):
Summer's busy.

SPEAKER_04 (02:09):
Summer's busy.

SPEAKER_05 (02:10):
Yeah, yeah, we normally take the summers off,
but uh nonetheless, it's uhsomething that we try to try to
do during I call it the schoolyear.
So but anywho, what uh whatphone is that?
That that is a Google Fold.

SPEAKER_04 (02:30):
Google ping is like a mini iPad.

SPEAKER_05 (02:32):
Yeah, it's actually a little bit bigger than the
Samsung fold that they got outthere.

SPEAKER_04 (02:37):
Um iPhone's coming out with one of those next uh
next year.

SPEAKER_05 (02:42):
So yeah, it's a half an inch bigger than Samsung, I
think, but you know sizematters.

SPEAKER_03 (02:48):
That's what that's what your wife keeps telling
you, I assume.
Since we got two peoplewatching, she can hear us nice
and clear, it just texted her.

SPEAKER_04 (02:57):
So beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 (02:58):
She's watching on Facebook from good good tonight.

SPEAKER_04 (03:02):
It's uh good uh Apple uh microphones right there
working for you.
Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_05 (03:07):
All right.
So yeah, so anybody who let's doa real quick round robin.
I highly doubt it, but you neverknow.
There might be somebody newjoining us.
So if they do, um, my name isBrent.
I am the founder of the podcast.
The founder.
That's what we call him.
The founder.
He has to call me a lot of otherthings, but let's not go there.

(03:31):
Um not yet.

SPEAKER_03 (03:33):
I'm sure.
Definitely gonna get there.

SPEAKER_05 (03:36):
Definitely gonna get there.
Um currently I am the seniorvice commander of the Mount
Pleasant VFW Post 3033, uh,Barley Hannel, VFW Post 3033,
and uh all around cool guy.

SPEAKER_04 (03:51):
Um yeah, I'll attest to that.
I'll second that.

SPEAKER_05 (03:56):
Oh, thanks.

SPEAKER_03 (03:59):
Up to you.
Well, I'm Charlie Klein, um lifemember of Post 3033 here in
Mount Pleasant, Michigan.
Uh I'm the junior vice commanderof the post and uh the current
uh riders group director orstate president for uh the
motorcycle groups for theDepartment of Michigan, um which

(04:21):
we'll get into some of the someof the new layings uh that just
happened with our our VFW uhnational convention uh last
year.
That's gonna alter the ridersgroups a little bit, so but
we'll we'll dive into that alittle bit later.

SPEAKER_05 (04:36):
Cool.
Uh that's a lot of good news, sowe'll see how it is.

SPEAKER_04 (04:40):
Uh my name is Trey Porter.
Uh I am the uh Riders Grouppresident, uh member of Post
3033, and uh I'm the RidersGroup president of the Rise
Group at Post 3033.
For the time being, we'll seehow that how long that lasts.

SPEAKER_05 (05:01):
So they're firing him in the next election.

SPEAKER_04 (05:03):
I got 100% election coming up pretty soon next week.

SPEAKER_05 (05:07):
Oh, is it next week?

SPEAKER_04 (05:08):
Yep.
This weekend, actually.
This week Sunday, yep.
All right, so we'll see.
It's either me or me, Scott.
Oh, yeah, or do you, yeah.
But you're already the director.

SPEAKER_03 (05:23):
Nothing saying I can't be both.
Really?
Ah, please.
Besides, I'm gonna say no.
Um yeah, nothing on my plate.

SPEAKER_05 (05:33):
Cool.
Well, I'd like to talk aboutthat too.
A little bit about the writersgroup, but we'll get there.
Um so how about just a generalupdate?
I mean, it's been, you know,it's been probably about four
months, five months since we hada podcast.
I mean, you know, as a podcastorganizationally, I think we uh,
you know, we take the summer offjust because especially the

(05:54):
writers group is just it'sreally busy.
They like to go out and ride,they enjoy the weather.
I mean, this is this is fuckingMichigan, so we only get like
four months of good weather inthis state.
So, you know, take it while weget it.
Um, so I totally get it.
So for that, you know, we takethe summer off, and uh, you
know, for the most part, aroundthe school year is what I call

(06:18):
it.
Around the school year time, weuh we do the podcast.
So um this is the first episodeof the new season.
There's not really anythingspecial about it.

SPEAKER_03 (06:29):
This is like season four.
Yeah, is it?
I think this thing's been goingabout four years, probably.
Yeah, so three, four years.

SPEAKER_05 (06:36):
Yeah, off and on.
I'd say probably three.
So but uh we're having fun withit.

SPEAKER_03 (06:42):
Um I miss Tim up here, I can tell you that.
Yeah, we do.
Yeah, we do.
He was uh I actually drive whenI go up to the kids or something
like that.
Uh it's two two and a half hourdrive.
Oh I go way back in the archivesand listen to the Tim Tim and
God damn, he's cracked me up.

SPEAKER_05 (07:00):
Uh Tim uh Tim was the main reason behind our
disclaimer in the opening.
Um that was some funny shit forhim.
He always thought it washilarious, and I I laugh every
time that uh you know, the bitwhere it's like, you know, it's
occasionally informational.

(07:20):
Strictly satire strictly satire,occasionally informational.
Um but uh fucking focus onoccasionally.
That was that was that was agood addition on his part.
So um but yeah, we'll have to doa sound of freedom.
I totally I fucking forgot aboutit, man.
Should have done a sound offreedom.

SPEAKER_03 (07:41):
I already had one open before we got started, so
it'll be a sound of freedom nexttime.
So we'll get there.

SPEAKER_05 (07:45):
Yeah, we'll get there.
But a lot of time.
But yeah, so let's talk a littlebit about uh maybe some changes
to the podcast we were talking.
So um originally when we uh whenwe had oops, one so Mike keeps
saying waiting for a livesignal.

(08:06):
Are you on his Wi-Fi by chance?
Uh no, I am not.

SPEAKER_04 (08:09):
That might not I am I'm I'm on cellular though.
Yeah, it definitely works, butfull bars.
Okay.

SPEAKER_05 (08:16):
It just keeps saying that we don't have a live
signal, so anyway.

SPEAKER_03 (08:23):
Okay.

SPEAKER_05 (08:24):
Yeah.
If we cut out tab, let us know.
Um, we'll switch it to Wi-Fi.
But anyway, um, back to what Iwas saying.
So when we originally foundedthe podcast, um, and the the VFW
voted to support it um by youknow purchasing the equipment
and things like that, uh, theoriginal idea was to you know

(08:48):
keep it focused on veterans umand that kind of thing.
Um and I guess we kept to thatfor the most part.
Um it's called soup sandwich fora reason.
I mean, there's really noorganizational thing that you
know dictates what we talkabout, but um, but even more so,

(09:09):
I think we're gonna really gointo a mix.
So um, yeah, anything you wantto put in there?
Because it was me and you mostlytalking about it, Charlie.

SPEAKER_03 (09:19):
So yeah, you know, I I mean it obviously it always is
gonna depend on how many of usshow up any one time.
You know, when we get four,five, six people up here, it's a
great time.
Yeah, it's more of a partyatmosphere with a lot of
stories, a lot of BSing.
Right.
Less about uh necessarily it'sall about veterans because it
was when we served and thestories of you know uh the

(09:39):
comradeship with our ourbrothers or sisters out there,
right?
During our service period.
So we're still talking veteranthings, but um you know I don't
know if we want to kind ofdigress a bit some some
episodes.
Like I know you talked aboutreal estate things and stuff
like that.
I mean, um, you know, we couldhave people come up and talk
about mental health stuff.
We can have all kinds ofdifferent things, or they can
call in and do that as well.

(10:01):
So I know uh Harrison Post 1075,they're about 25, 30 minutes
north of us.
They just had uh a mental healthuh the state director um was up
there and just they just kind ofdid a uh I don't know if it was
a clinic or informationalsession or something.
I just kind of cut it on.
Uh Dave Dave Brinker does that.
Um great great guy, he's beendoing it for years and years,

(10:24):
he's passionate about it.
He was actually one of the guysthat attempted and it wasn't
successful, and now he is thethe director for mental health
and suicide prevention for forthe state of Michigan.
Yeah, nice.
Yeah, so he just retired fromhis job.
Um, so he's he's he's livinghigh on the hog, you know.

(10:46):
He's uh great, great guy, uhextremely passionate.
So, you know, I'm sure we couldget him to call in.
Yeah, you know, it's one ofthese nights.

SPEAKER_05 (10:54):
For sure.
We turn this fan off on this.

SPEAKER_03 (10:57):
Yeah, we can turn it off.

SPEAKER_04 (10:58):
Yeah, getting a little hot.
Yeah, well, yeah, but you're inhere with all this man meat in
here.

SPEAKER_03 (11:04):
Well, it is the Navy's birthday.

SPEAKER_05 (11:06):
Yeah, it is it was yesterday, yeah.
250 years.
So yeah.
It's a lot.
This I'm trying to figure itout, so yeah, he's a marine.

(11:27):
It takes a second.
Oh, that's changing colors.
There's the crayons.
Okay.
Is green your favorite crayon orno, blue.
Blue raspberry.
Well, okay.
Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_04 (11:38):
Met another Marine this weekend.
I was fucking with him aboutcrayons.
He knew exactly what I wastalking about.
There we go.
I never heard that until Ijoined the VFW's Marines and
Crayons thing.
Oh, yeah.
That was in the crayon eaters,man.
And I was in Iraq for uh threemonths straight with on uh well,

(12:01):
there's a lot of Marines on ourbase.
We didn't commingle too much.
We didn't talk much to them.
They didn't talk much too wellto be honest with you.
Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (12:09):
Um you have to stoop down to a certain level to talk
to them.

SPEAKER_04 (12:13):
Uh oh man.
Uh but uh uh yeah, that was thefirst time I ever heard about
this whole crayon thing was atthe VFW.

SPEAKER_03 (12:22):
We were the we were the literally the kids in
kindergarten eating the paste,right?
You know, that's that that's thethe the uh theory, that's what
it is.
So, all right, yeah, but no,we've had a lot going on.
I actually had the VFW coming uphere next weekend on the 25th.
Well, a week from this weekend,so two weekends technically.
Um, we have our truck retreat.

(12:44):
Uh so we set up tables.
Riders group usually has acouple tables, Pulse and
Auxiliary have tables, and wehave a lot of community members
that come in from outside thatset up a table, hand out kids
that come in, you know, hand outcandy and stuff, and people get
dressed up, and that's a goodtime.
So looking forward to that.

SPEAKER_04 (13:03):
Yeah.
Well, for those that don't know,and hopefully they do know, um
also uh we're starting cominginto darts season.
Yep.
So if you want to have a goodtime on a Monday or Friday
night, uh whether you play dartsor not, just come on up and
spend some time with everybody.
There's a lot of us up there, alot of people, not just us, but

(13:24):
people from the community aswell up there.
So come up there and have a goodtime and and uh spend a little
money.

SPEAKER_05 (13:31):
Yeah, that's it.
And you know, and another thing,another update, uh pretty soon
here, hopefully by I don't know,the end of November, I would
say, um, we're we're hoping toget uh lottery in the post.
Oh man, like Powerball and shit?
Yep, draw games, Powerball, allthat.
Um and I mean and just the drawgames, we're not gonna have

(13:51):
scratch offs and shit like that.
But yeah, uh but yeah, we'llhave we'll have the draw games
and and keynote and you know allthat.
Um so hopefully we'll get thatin as soon as we can get our
paperwork all together.
We're we're waiting on um somepaperwork left over.
Uh so did that get paid?

SPEAKER_04 (14:11):
Yeah.
Okay.

SPEAKER_05 (14:12):
Yep.
So uh but yeah.
Um let's roll into the writersgroup updates uh Mr.
Director.

SPEAKER_04 (14:24):
Uh me first.

SPEAKER_02 (14:25):
Uh go ahead.

SPEAKER_04 (14:26):
Well, I mean, I was gonna ask, what what exactly do
you want to know?
Uh now, and I'm I'll talk alittle bit about it, but Charlie
being at the state level knowsway more about it.
But transitioning into our owntype of organization, like the
auxiliary, like the the order ofthe cooties for the people that

(14:48):
that know who they are.
So right now we are strictly afunction of the post.
And correct me if I'm wrong orsaying something wrong, but uh
but now we're gonna branch off.
We still we're still there tosupport our posts, but we don't
answer them, right?
Right.
Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 (15:08):
So yeah, so basically the the way that I'm
understanding is it's it'll beformed similar to the cooties or
or the auxiliary.
So we're gonna have um, youknow, our own, we're gonna be
our own entity.
We still have to be sponsored bya post, a district, uh-huh, or
if they're gonna have adepartment level, uh, state
level, uh group, um, just likethe auxiliary can't just come

(15:32):
into a post and say we're gonnastand up an auxiliary, it has to
be voted in by the membership.
They're extremely hard to getrid of, right?
So it's it's not something totake lightly, right?
If if your post or your districtwants to have one.
Um, but the asset of having themis hugely important.
You know, when we're out thereriding, we're going to different

(15:54):
places, going to events, theysee us out there, and you get a
lot of veterans come up.
We've gotten couldn't even tellyou how many members that joined
our post or auxiliary, and orboth, you know, if it's husband
and wife, um, just because theyfound us out at an event, a
charity ride, and stop for thelunch and do the things, you
know, get gas, I mean, it allthe time.

(16:16):
So, you know, it's that thatmobile billboard going down the
road, as long as you're actingappropriately when you're
writing, it's it's it's a goodthing.
But I mean, typically everybodydoes.

SPEAKER_02 (16:25):
Right.

SPEAKER_03 (16:26):
Um, but um where we're sitting at right now, and
I had a phone conversation backin in August, right?
And I had all the the presidentsfrom the local local chapters
that wanted to be on the call umon the call where what we're
gonna do in the meantime, whilenational is getting set up, um

(16:51):
they have to get their theirbylaws done, they have to we
have to elect national officers.
There's a lot of things thathave to take place before our
group can technically be its ownentity.
So, um, because there's nobodyto apply to, right?
No, nobody to put paperwork towe don't even have the paperwork
to do that stuff.
So um in the meantime, the stateof Michigan um I had a

(17:13):
discussion with all thepresidents.
We're gonna continue to marchforward with the same issue that
we've had for the last 10 yearshere in the state.
Um we're still gonna be doingeverything that we've always
done, still participating, stilldonating, still volunteering,
still doing all those things onbehalf of the VFW, especially
the Department of Michigan, ourposts and our districts that we
belong to, uh to still showsupport, even though we know at

(17:38):
some point in the future.
I'm in a group, group me messageuh thing with all the other
state presidents, um, some ofthe national leadership people,
stuff like that, that are gonnabe there forming all this stuff
up.
Um so I'm I'm getting some otherinsight and kind of where we're
looking at, but it looks likenext convention, things will

(18:01):
really be driving forward.
They're gonna use this winner toredevelop the bylaws and and the
articles and the stuff like thatto incorporate based off the
input and feedback they'regetting.
Yeah, from from actual ridersgroup members, actual people
that ride motorcycles understandthe lingo, understand the um
older things that need to bedone in protocols and all those

(18:24):
different things for the rulesof the road that we ride on.
You know, guy never been on amotorcycle, has no idea what
it's like to deal with othergroups or other clubs on the
road they don't understand, youknow, where we have to do things
differently because as a group,when we come across the club,
it's a lot of times it's theirroads, we just share them.

SPEAKER_02 (18:42):
Right.

SPEAKER_03 (18:42):
It's their road, right?
We get allowed to ride on them,basically, right?
So we want to make sure we'redoing things appropriately and
correctly and things are set upthat makes sense to us.
Yeah, so it's it's it's gonna bea good good transition.
Um gonna be a lot of costinvolved, gonna be a lot of
startup and setup, and there'sgonna be a lot, but um at the

(19:03):
end of the day, it's nice for usto be our own entity.
Um, you know, we work so wellwith our post here in Mount
Pleasant, because I'm a I'm amember of the Mount Pleasant
group that that trays thepresident of.
We do a lot for our post.
And I don't ever think that'sgonna change.
Um you know, we don't have a lotof uh outside post membership

(19:24):
that aren't members of thewriters group that really do a
whole lot up there as far asvolunteer their time or try to
raise money or whatever.
The lion share is pretty muchthe writers group, both on the
auxiliary side.
I know the I know the auxiliaryladies are probably screaming
because there's a there's athere's a lot of there's a lot
of the ladies or and men thatare in the auxiliary that they

(19:44):
do volunteer and they do do alot of things, but you know,
when it on I would say it'salmost a 50-50 with the
auxiliary, but with the writersgroup on the post side, the VFW
side, it's it's like 90-10.
Right.
90% is done by the by themembers of the writers group and
10% is done by the generalmembership.

SPEAKER_02 (20:02):
Yep, right.

SPEAKER_03 (20:03):
You know, where the auxiliary is probably pretty
close to a 50-50, 60-40 typetype mix where you know uh their
general membership does probablya little bit more than the lion
chair and the writers groupladies help fill fill the gaps
when when needed.

SPEAKER_05 (20:21):
So wanna do a quick shout out.
If you're watching us live, Isee that my sister-in-law is
joining us.
So, Lindsay, thanks for joining.
Appreciate you.

SPEAKER_04 (20:31):
Hi, Lindsay.

SPEAKER_05 (20:33):
Um this is Trey and that's Charlie.
You don't need to worry aboutthem though.
Um but yeah, uh jumping back in.
I mean, I'm I'm obviously not amember of the writers' group.
I don't own a motorcycle oranything like that.
Um, you know, one of those maybeone days kind of thing.
Um but uh, you know, with ourpost being heavily supported by

(20:59):
our riders' group, like yousaid, you don't see that
changing, neither do I.
Um but you know, in the future,when when things really do get
organized and whatnot, do youthink you see the riders' groups
standing up more so as districtsor as posts?
Obviously, because you get astrong post like ours, for sure

(21:20):
they're gonna stand up a riders'group, but maybe especially
rural areas that are kind of fewand far between, do you see them
standing up districts instead?
And you know, supporting eachother, you know.

SPEAKER_03 (21:34):
So, how do you see it?
So, currently the way that it'swritten is any VFW member
essentially can be a member ofany riders' group.
You don't have to be a postmember in Mount Pleasant to only
ride or only join the MountPleasant group.
I could be, and I am a member ofMount Pleasant, I could join
Harrison, I can join Holland, Icould join Detroit if their

(21:57):
membership votes me in, right?
So just because I'm here and wehave a group doesn't mean I have
to only ride with that one.
So you we do have one district,uh Rogers Group, and a district
for the VFW for those that don'tknow, is like uh an area no
different than your uhcongressmen or senators or
anything like that.

(22:18):
Um they have two, threecounties, and that's you know,
or sometimes it might be tencounties, but uh VFWs within
those counties, that's adistrict.

SPEAKER_04 (22:29):
Um so uh but that is uh that's the way it is now.
Is it gonna be that way once wedo the changeover?

SPEAKER_05 (22:37):
Obviously, we don't know that, but I'm just I just
want to throw that out as aspitball and just kind of you
know right now.

SPEAKER_03 (22:44):
I believe they're gonna leave post district and
state or department groups.
Right.
I don't know that's gonna hold.
Uh right.

SPEAKER_04 (22:55):
So because hell they might join uh Harrison and and
Midland with us, you know what Imean?

SPEAKER_03 (23:01):
And yeah, so I don't think there's gonna be a
restriction on how many chaptersor how many groups we can have.
Right.
I think in the beginning therewas some scuttlebutt going
around that you can only there'sonly gonna be like seven or
eight per state.
Well, obviously you get smalllike Maryland, right?
Right.
Rhode Island, Connecticut, yeah,you know, like the whole ten
square miles of it.

(23:22):
They've got they they got twowhole posts or whatever, so um
you know it makes sense to jointhose, but here in Michigan,
right, we have nine, so I thinkwe're still gonna be able to
have nine.
I don't think we're gonna keepthem all.
Okay, I think there's gonna begroups that are just getting to
where they're aging out now,right?

SPEAKER_05 (23:38):
Without a lot of younger members that are riding
that are just probably gonnaunfortunately just go away and
do their own yeah, do their ownthing as as so nationally, you
said you're kind of in a groupme message with all the na all
the state presidents andwhatnot.
Nationally, what does thewriters group look like?

(24:00):
I mean, are there some stateswithout any?

SPEAKER_03 (24:02):
Are there, you know, or is there a pretty it it it's
actually more than half thestates from what I'm been
reading uh is has riders'groups.
At least one.
Um I think the last time I hadcounted was like twenty-nine
states um or so.

(24:23):
But um it's it's it's gonna be aa weird setup because like
there's the first VFW was an MCout in California.
They were able to keep their MCdesignation when any other group
had to be a riders group, whichis not a motorcycle club, it's a

(24:44):
group.

SPEAKER_02 (24:45):
Right.

SPEAKER_03 (24:45):
Um and then there's a a group that's out in
Colorado.
Uh they're called the Warriors.
They're kind of like an MCestablished type group.
I don't know if they'retechnically an MC, I don't think
they are, but they have thiswarrior designation that I don't
know how they got.

SPEAKER_04 (25:01):
Um I'm still trying to VFW Warrior?

SPEAKER_03 (25:04):
Yeah.
So they're run similar, very,very similar to an MC.
But I don't know, I don't thinkthey are an MC.
I think they're still a writersgroup, but they're really run
that way, and they want to beable to keep their designation
as Warriors.

SPEAKER_04 (25:20):
Right.

SPEAKER_03 (25:20):
And not do not have to be labeled as a VFW group.

SPEAKER_04 (25:24):
Right.

SPEAKER_03 (25:24):
They're the VFW Warriors, but yeah.
So there's there's some thingskind of going around I'm trying
to catch up on, but I'm not toofamiliar with everything because
I've just been concentrated onthe stuff in our state now.

SPEAKER_05 (25:37):
Probably a good idea.

SPEAKER_03 (25:38):
Well, you know, I mean you have big states like
Texas, and I think Texas was oneof the ones that that really
pushed this.
And I don't know, we work, we'vealways worked so good.

SPEAKER_05 (25:47):
What is it with Texas and independence, man?
Seceding from everything.

SPEAKER_03 (25:52):
I mean, we've we've always worked so well with our
pulse, it was hard to understandwhere these other ones are
coming from.
And I don't know.
I think at some point some ofthem probably were told, you
know, hey, your group will dothis and you will do this and
you will do this, or we'll getready.
So they always had that knifeheld over their head where if
you don't do everything that wewant you to do, we're just gonna

(26:13):
vote you out and you're gone.
And you won't have Ryan's grouphere anymore.
Right?
Go down the road and set it upsomewhere.
What about in Texas?
I that's that's kind of whatI've kind of gathered from.
I don't know that for sure.

SPEAKER_04 (26:23):
I I started riding legally in Texas.
And out there, it and and I wasI was not with any group.
I was in the military at thetime.
I was riding independent, ofcourse, and uh and I mean the
politics out there, yeah, butit's crazy.
Like with the Mongols and theCossacks and all of that war

(26:46):
that they had, and well uh Yeah,where I was where I was kind of
going to be.

SPEAKER_05 (26:50):
For a non-rider, can you translate for me?

SPEAKER_03 (26:52):
I'm I will.
I'm I'm thinking the reason whythey wanted to be broke off in
their own entity is so that thepost can't hold the knife over
the back.
Right.
You say if you don't doeverything we want, we're gonna
we're gonna knife you and youguys will be gone.
Right.
Where we know, like if we wantto try to get rid of an
auxiliary, that has to go allthe way up to the national
commander in chief.
We could we could vote them out,but they don't leave until the

(27:15):
national commander in chief saysyour auxiliary's defunct and
they're not doing what they'resupposed to do and get rid of
them.
We can't do that even as apost-membership.

unknown (27:24):
Right.

SPEAKER_03 (27:24):
I think that's what they're looking to do, and and
there must be something behindit.
I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 (27:29):
So in in Texas, and it this is pretty much
nationwide, too, is is uh youhave MCs motorcycle clubs that
um pretty much run the roads andand uh it gets deep and real
serious in Texas.

(27:49):
Uh it it does here too inMichigan, but I'm learning
anyways that it does.
But but in in Texas, it's man,they don't play.

SPEAKER_03 (27:59):
And this is this is the reason why I said, you know,
it's nice that our our newbylaws and activities,
procedures, all the things we'regonna do are gonna be geared by
people that ride motorcycles.
Because if you were sitting onthis committee and you're like,
oh yeah, we'll just make bylaws,and you have no idea what we
actually have to ride in or livein or deal with, right, when
we're on the roads, becausethese some of these groups, you

(28:22):
know, if you don't getpermission to pass them, and you
pass them, they will chase youdown the road, run you off the
road, and you won't be gettingback on the bike to ride it.
Yeah, you know what I mean?
So it's it's it's it's seriousenough that we we have to
protect each other andourselves.
Um so it's good that this isgonna be established by guys

(28:44):
that ride or women that ride,right?
That are so and that's actuallyspearheaded by our uh Kevin
Conklin.
He's our um our national rep umfrom he's right here from from
Michigan.
He was uh he's a past departmentcommander, I think it was three
years ago.
He was our department commander.

(29:05):
He rides here, he rides, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 (29:07):
In Michigan?
Oh, okay.
Yeah, I did meet Kevin over atuh yeah, he is in Michigan.

SPEAKER_03 (29:13):
And speaking of that, we're gonna be having uh
our fall conference here forDepartment of Michigan.
We held here at Mount Pleasant.
Yep, yep, yeah, which isawesome.

SPEAKER_05 (29:23):
I um the week of Halloween, what are we doing?
We're taking over Comfort Innfor our regional uh Comfort In
for the Comfort InfallConference.

SPEAKER_03 (29:34):
And we have we have a dinner at the VFW that Friday
night, too.

SPEAKER_05 (29:37):
We do, yep.
Halloween night.
We have a uh we have a dinner umhosting, you know, a bunch of
people and ladies and some ofthe post membership will be
there to um cook some food.

SPEAKER_04 (29:49):
I I'm assuming they're nixing um they're nixing
um darts at night.
Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (29:58):
Oh yeah, a hundred percent.

SPEAKER_04 (30:02):
Is there a district 11 meeting?
Is that gonna happen on the 2ndof November?
Probably not, right?

SPEAKER_03 (30:08):
Um excuse me.
Uh believe it still will.
Because we left midwinterconference on Sunday, and there
was the district meeting up inHarrison on that Sunday.

SPEAKER_04 (30:24):
Yep, I was at that district meeting, as a matter of
fact.

SPEAKER_05 (30:28):
Um I went to that meeting.
I thought there wasn't gonna bequorum.

SPEAKER_03 (30:37):
Well, a lot of us are down at those conferences
and conventions, so yeah.
A lot of politics when you ridea motorcycle.

SPEAKER_04 (30:42):
Yeah, believe it or not.

SPEAKER_05 (30:44):
I mean Well, and I mean I know I'm not dumb, you
know, growing up.
I've heard the stories of youknow the Hell's Angels and you
know all the all the big timeMCs.

SPEAKER_04 (30:54):
Um and the thing is, really isn't as bad as you that
that you thought it was, right?
It was sons of anarchy, yeah.
Right.

SPEAKER_03 (31:06):
We're not guys aren't shooting each other
riding all the time.
I mean everybody generally getsalong, everybody's out to have a
good time, everybody lovesriding the roads, but it's no
part of the road.
When you don't right, when youdon't go off protocols and you
don't respect others, right,then that's where the the issues
lie.
Right.
You know, that's that's whenthings become a problem.

SPEAKER_05 (31:27):
So and the other thing is putting yourself in the
other group's shoes.
They might do that, but why dothey do that?
They take it to an extreme,sure, but what's the reasoning
behind it?
You could argue that it'sprobably safety for their own
people.

SPEAKER_03 (31:41):
I hate to tell you, my drill instructors took it to
an extreme.
Oh, dude.
Hell yeah, they did.
But in there, and it's for areason, right?
It's to to teach you and andunderstand and respect and all
the different things.
So that's yeah, I mean, that'sthat's basically so that's
that's kind of what's gonnahappen over the next year.
Um, we're gonna continue here inMichigan to march forward and

(32:03):
still do the things that we do.
I'm still getting uh act becausewe are right now technically
separated.
But until we actually getaccepted to the national level,
we're like in this weird limbo,right?
So we're still sponsored by ourdistricts or our posts, so we're
still gonna do the do the rightthings to continue to march

(32:24):
forward, but uh technically asof right now, we're we're a
total separate entity, right?
We just don't exist anywhere,right?
So, you know, that's that'swhat's going on with that.
So the long story.
So part two of that story.
No, I'm just kidding.
That's your part.
You are, as Tab says, thefounder.

(32:46):
No, she says You are the founderof part two.
No, two parts, founder of twoparts.

SPEAKER_05 (32:52):
Yeah, founder of two parts, yep.
Two parts is my thing.
Yep.
I always have two things to sayabout a about a situation.
So Lindsay and Tiffany, uh, mybetter half, my sister-in-law,
and my better half are watching.
So hi Tiffany, thanks forwatching.
Um they could probably vouch forme always having two things to

(33:13):
say to something.
So that's where that nicknamecomes from, is two parts.
Um what's next on the agenda?
What else do we have to talkabout before Trey starts his
whole thing?

SPEAKER_04 (33:26):
What are you talking about?
My my whole thing.

SPEAKER_05 (33:28):
I know damn well what you want to talk about.

SPEAKER_03 (33:31):
I always want to talk about politics, but I mean
we can all stand up and say thePledge of Allegiance.
A Pledge of Allegiance to theflag of the United States of
America.
You fucked that up.
I was gonna say to it to theUnited States of America and
Donald Trump.

SPEAKER_04 (33:46):
And Trey Porter.

SPEAKER_03 (33:53):
You hot?
Hell yeah.
This uh fat man.
This that remote right there.

SPEAKER_04 (33:57):
This one?

SPEAKER_03 (33:58):
Yep, handed here.

SPEAKER_05 (33:59):
Not gonna lie to you.
The uh remote my four-year-old,I was you know, riding along um
in the car, had thefour-year-old in her car seat
back behind me, and she wastelling me about her day of
daycare.
This is Thursday or Friday, Ithink.
And then randomly she startsreciting the Pledge of

(34:19):
Allegiance.
Your daughter?

SPEAKER_04 (34:21):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (34:22):
Oh man, I remember she's four years old, so of
course she's mispronouncingstuff and it's cute as shit, you
know.
But she's got it down, man, andI'm you know, I'm all proud, you
know, tearing up.
Proud.

SPEAKER_04 (34:35):
So did I.
Like what my daughter came home,was reciting the Pledge of
Allegiance, and I was like Bigsoftness.
Yep, I know, right?
Uh with daughters, all rules areout the windows, man.
That's true.

SPEAKER_05 (34:49):
Yep.
Um, I got a uh I got a quickrequest that apparently we're
supposed to talk about ourfavorite bartender on the
podcast.
And uh, you know, you know, I'llI'll we'll we'll we'll talk
about her.
I think Trish is I think Trishis pretty cool.

SPEAKER_04 (35:06):
Are we talking about of all time?
Because from the top just thepost.

SPEAKER_03 (35:11):
Okay, just now all time or current bartenders.
That's what he's asking.

SPEAKER_05 (35:15):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 (35:15):
Current all time because past bartenders or
current.

SPEAKER_05 (35:20):
Um we can I guess we can do all time because I was
bartending for you know a littlewhile there, so I know I'm your
favorite.
Uh I don't remember youbartender.
Well, maybe it's because younever freaking came in.

SPEAKER_04 (35:33):
You should have let me know.
I'm wearing my crop top today,Jay.
Come in and see me.
Um wearing my okay.
I'll say my favorite bartenderof all time has got to be Merck.
There we go.
Merck is my favorite bartender.
John McMurtry, all-time favoritebartender.

(35:55):
Fucking Fabio himself.
Yep.
Fucking sexy Jesus.

SPEAKER_05 (35:58):
Who's yours?
Fucking Fabio.
I I'll never forget the day Imet Merck for the first time.
It was it was right after Timhad passed.
He had heard the news and hecame in and he just volunteered
his time to run the canteen forus, and it was awesome for him
to come in, but I'd never methim before.

(36:20):
And I was relatively new to thepost.
I was the quartermaster at thetime, and he was back behind the
behind the bar.
And I think I walked up to you,Charlie, and I was like, who the
fuck is Fabio?

SPEAKER_04 (36:33):
Like well, that nickname stuck, you know.
The thing, um, there was no loveloss between uh Merck and Tim.
Am I yeah, so there was and soMerck was kind of absent for a
while.
Uh, but when Tim passed away,it's you know, the thing is, he

(36:54):
it nobody witches that onanybody.
I don't care.
You know, I fucking hateCharlie.
You know what I'm saying?
But I don't want to see him passaway.
So I'm just joking, Charlie.
No, you're not.
It's fine.

SPEAKER_05 (37:06):
Hold on.
Emily said something, Brent isno one's favorite bartender
except yours, my produce.
I ain't nobody's fuckingprotege.
What the hell are you talkingabout?
What the hell is she talkingabout?
Let's be honest.
I only bartender for like asummer.

SPEAKER_04 (37:22):
Current bartenders, I'm gonna I'm putting my um in
McKenzie's batch.
You know what?
You know what?
My favorite, my I'm gonna saythis right now.
My favorite bartender of alltime, Emily Lackey.
There we go.
Oh yeah.
Where can she get back on theschedule, please?
Somebody put her on theschedule.
She's normally on Fridays.

(37:42):
I uh she hasn't been because wegot so many bartenders.

SPEAKER_03 (37:46):
You want to see credit to the ones that are
working on Sundays, I guess.
I don't know.
Yeah, I know.
So none of you guys willprobably remember Rona.
I do remember Rona.
I do remember.

SPEAKER_05 (37:57):
No, that was before my time.

SPEAKER_03 (37:58):
Rona was in there all the time.
She was a she worked um, soshe's my all-time favorite
because she was around for yearsand years and years and years.
She worked um as a cart girl atBucks Run in the summer.
And then she worked every day atthe post.

SPEAKER_02 (38:16):
Really?

SPEAKER_03 (38:17):
Yeah, she was there like 40 hours a week.
I mean, it was yeah, she was itwas crazy how much she worked.
I guess we were short onbartenders back then,
apparently.
So well, we didn't need a lotbecause she she wanted all the
hours.
It was her only job, right?

SPEAKER_04 (38:32):
She worked, she worked beer carton, and then she
worked there.
She was with Doc, her and Doc.

SPEAKER_05 (38:37):
When are you gonna do a shift?
We need to get you in a tanktop, you know, crop top, like
you were wanted me.
Yeah, I could do a cornrows.

SPEAKER_03 (38:45):
That's not what we wanted for you.
We saw that with you.
You didn't want it.
There's a difference.
Let's not get things confused.
Thank you, Charlie, for clearingthat up.
Give me that.

SPEAKER_05 (38:57):
You fucking steal my pretzel, you asshole.
But anyway.
Oh, she's gonna yell at me.

SPEAKER_04 (39:07):
I'm just kidding.
I don't have a favoritebartender.
I love you all the same.
Here we go.

SPEAKER_05 (39:15):
Oh man.

SPEAKER_04 (39:16):
So what happened?

SPEAKER_05 (39:20):
Emily sent me a Snapchat.

SPEAKER_03 (39:23):
She's at B dubs, yes, she is.

SPEAKER_05 (39:25):
You guys are all canceled, I'm unsubscribed.
Go for it!

SPEAKER_03 (39:32):
That's why I'm not bringing out any any new names.
So I'm staying staying totallyneutral with that one.
But yeah, Rona, Rona's just oldschool and she was there for
like, oh hell, I don't evenknow, five, six years, and I'm
talking this is like mid-2015s,all the way to like 2020.
You know, so no one knew her fora lot of years.

SPEAKER_05 (39:53):
Yeah, I think I I came in must have been 2021,
because yeah, I famous lastwords on my better half's part.
Um I was going through someshit, man.
Uh, you know, mental health andstuff, and just kind of lost.
And I'm not from this area, I'mfrom Grand Rapids originally.

(40:15):
And so when we moved up here.
When we moved, I moved up here.
I was working remote at thetime, so you know, but I didn't
know anybody, and I was justgoing through some shit.
And Tiffany was the one that uhhad said, you know, maybe you
should go to the VFW, you know.
Well, famous last words on thatone because he seemed to that.
Suck you in.

(40:36):
Suck you in.
So she's uh she's regrettingthat, but um no, it really, in
all honesty, she um thatrecommendation kind of set me on
a better track.
I mean, gave me a purpose, gaveme something to do, you know,
and and that kind of thing.

SPEAKER_03 (40:52):
Well no, you know, I'll say this like and I would
travel a lot for conferences,for work, and I always would go
to a VFW.
I felt safe.
I liked the camaraderie, I likethe people that are in them.

SPEAKER_04 (41:10):
How long have you been a member of the VFW?

SPEAKER_03 (41:12):
Oh, I don't think it says on your card when you join,
but probably 2008, 9, 10,somewhere in there.

SPEAKER_04 (41:21):
Damn, okay.
I um I VFW wasn't even on myradar until uh once I moved up
here.
Uh I was living in in the city,and uh I moved up here and Shem
was like, Come on, man, me tojoin the VFW.
Like, join the VFW.

SPEAKER_03 (41:41):
Here I am.
I don't I don't play cribbage.
I'm not 80 years old.
That's what everybody's whateverybody always thinks.

SPEAKER_04 (41:47):
Yeah, that's what I was thinking, like a bunch of
old ass men up there.
Yep, but uh even the old guys wegot, I love them to death.
Terry and Sensio, I'm talkingabout you.

SPEAKER_03 (41:56):
Terry's younger than all of us, right?
I know guy might be like 75, buthe runs circles around us.
Yeah, he is.
He does, he does.

SPEAKER_05 (42:05):
I'm trying to pull up my uh butt.

SPEAKER_03 (42:09):
No, we there's just it's always a lot of a lot of
good things, you know.
It's just like sitting up heretonight.
You know, it's just oh wow, it'sjust guys guys talking, and this
is the normal conversations thathappen at the VFW, you know.
It's not all sitting aroundplaying Euchre and stuff,
although we do do Euchretournaments, which are usually
pretty popular.

SPEAKER_05 (42:27):
Yeah, we haven't done one since I've been here.

SPEAKER_03 (42:29):
Uh Clippers, we're doing them.

SPEAKER_04 (42:32):
Well, you know what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna bring
a couple of PlayStations up andput some PlayStations over
there.
We're gonna draw in a youngercrowd with these PlayStations.

SPEAKER_05 (42:42):
Weller, you know, younger we that is just a
conversation that we have beenputting off and putting off and
putting off and just kicking thecan down the road.
But, you know, the future of ourpost, the future of really just
not just the VFW, but the thefuture of even the Legion.

(43:03):
I mean, like, well, you know,what what do you do when the
majority of our population isaging out?
I mean, the older guys are allVietnam, they're in their late
70s, early 80s, and this is thisis the real problem.

SPEAKER_03 (43:21):
I I went through it with with my parents.

SPEAKER_04 (43:24):
Was your father in?
Did your father serve?

SPEAKER_03 (43:27):
No, my grandfather did.
And he was a VFW member.
What happens, right, goes backto my dad's generation, so he's
75 like like Terry, um, or so.
Um but they would get out ofwork and they'd go down downtown
was the moose lodge.
Yep.
Get out of work, they'd go tothe moose lodge, have a couple

(43:49):
beers, come home.
Right?
My mom would she was working atCMU, she'd get out of work, take
me to practice, go home, startdinner, go back, pick me up,
bring me home, dinner was ready,dad come home, have dinner.
Well, anymore, that's not theway it works.
Nope.
The way it works is you get outof work, you go get dinner, I'm

(44:11):
gonna go home and cook dinner.
You know what I mean?
Yeah, you're gonna run the kidsaround to practices, you're
gonna do this, you're gonna dothat.
Well, you know, back in my dayyou had like soccer, baseball,
and you didn't play footballuntil you got to the middle
school and it was flag, and thenyou got to the high school and
it was tackle.
We didn't have like rocketfootball programs, we didn't
have soccer clubs, yep, wedidn't have 45 different

(44:33):
baseball traveling teams orsoftball traveling teams, like
the drillers they have here intown.
My nephew you played in a normalleague, and if you made the
all-star team, that was a bigdeal because it was everybody in
the league, and they just pick acouple kids off each team.
Right.
And you traveled like threeweekends and played little
tournaments, and that was it.

SPEAKER_05 (44:52):
My nephew's on a travel across team, but it's
it's a club sport, it's notreally sanctioned by the school
or anything, and so there's hethere's times that they've got
to go out of state to meetanother team that's willing to
participate, and it's just likeyou know, yeah, well, we didn't
know.
I'm glad you're participating insomething.

SPEAKER_03 (45:10):
We didn't have all these club hockey teams and all
this stuff that the kids havenowadays.
So you that we had a lot more asfathers or veterans, doesn't
matter if men or women, we hadmore time to spend.
And we're talking about agingout.
Well, typically people that are20 years old to about 40 years
old or or even 45 years old arehaving kids going all through

(45:31):
those stages, right?
You're having the kid at 20,right?
You're having your next one at23, 24, and your last one at 27,
28.
Well, by the time you go 18years from there, you're 50
years old almost.
By the time that last kid'sgraduating high school and
you're done withresponsibilities for the most
part.
So you're not we don't get20-year-olds or 30-year-olds
that show up to the post.
They're busy doing kid stuff.

(45:51):
Look at Roy tonight with twokids, you know, that are like
middle school, high school kids,right?
Yeah, I don't even know if youmight have one younger.
Yeah, one.

SPEAKER_04 (46:00):
I'm I'm pretty sure they're both middle school.

SPEAKER_03 (46:02):
Okay, I was I was gonna say some somewhere in that
age, so she's got another six,seven years, right?
Until his nights free up, freeup.
He's not baseball and wrestlingand soccer and baseball.

SPEAKER_04 (46:13):
Fucking 50 years old.
I got a six-year-old and athree-year-old.
God damn it, I'm gonna be 70.
Yeah, but damn you old fart.

SPEAKER_03 (46:21):
But no, but you see what I'm saying?
So there was just it was adifferent generation where you
know the guys would get out ofwork and they would go do what
they want to do, then they couldcome home.
That's what kept those postsalive.
Yeah, it's not that way anymore.
A dynamic of the householdschanged.

SPEAKER_05 (46:35):
My sister-in-law Lindsay said, forget the
PlayStation, bring theNintendos.
Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 (46:40):
Remember, but do you remember when also when we were
kids?
We would there was no fuckingstaying in the house watching
iPads or playing video games.
No, I mean, we would be outsideplaying with our friends and
people in the neighborhood.
Um, yep.
Absolutely.
So now we don't want our kidsthat really got like, you know,

(47:03):
you're gonna go outside and playbe gone for hours.
Yeah.
But I mean, this is a differentworld we live in.
100%.

SPEAKER_05 (47:09):
But and you know, and then here's the other thing
we're a different defin uhdifferent generation of
veterans, right?
So every generation's got itsproblem.
For for the Vietnam guys, it'syou know, it's like Agent Orange
and whatnot.
So there's a whole thing aboutadvocacy about those guys for
our generation post-9-11, maybeeven Gulf War, like Desert
Storm, Desert Shield, maybethat's uh I would say burn pits.

(47:34):
What do you guys think?
Probably burn pits as our burnpits and PTSD.

SPEAKER_03 (47:38):
Yeah, because see, and the and and the crazy, yeah,
PTSD for sure.
The the crazy thing is whenpeople think of burn pits, they
always go back to Vietnam whereyou're burning, you know, will
come out from under the latrine,right?
The port of potty, it's not.
It was it was the Iraqis, theydidn't pick up trash anymore.
No, right?
Like the sanitation departmentdid not pick up trash.

(47:59):
So could you imagine living hereand you know, at your house, and
no longer do you get trashpickup for seven years, right?
What are you gonna do with it?
You pile it outside and youlight it on fire, right?
You know, I mean that's you haveto get rid of it somehow because
it's just piling up and rottenand smelling and that was but
they and that was those are allthe things ABR was also burning
tons and tons of trash overthere, like our trash.

SPEAKER_04 (48:21):
Yeah, our trash.

SPEAKER_03 (48:22):
Yeah, they just have that because yeah, but I mean
when people think burn pits,they're thinking, you know,
someone's out there dumpingdiesel in a sewer.
That that wasn't burned pits.
I mean, that yeah, that washappening.
That was that was minusculecompared to the trash.

SPEAKER_05 (48:34):
Yeah.
So what I saw when I was inAfrica, um, I always say the
word of the country, djibouti,and everybody laughs because you
know, ha ha ha.
But that's the country I was in.
And uh the burn pit out there, Imean, the issue was it was the
base is trash, but it was alsoliteral um like camel carcasses,

(49:01):
like like roadkill and just theones that would just die.
They would throw them in theburn pits too.
They would throw randomchemicals.
It's literally, and it's just apit, diesel, they light it on
fire and they throw whateverthey need to in there.
Yeah, that's literally what itis.
Tires, tires, munitions, allthat, all that is burned, turned
to soot, and it's the benzene,and it's all the chemicals and

(49:24):
all that shit.

SPEAKER_04 (49:24):
So they I remember seeing the burn pits.
I mean I I can tell you this.
My uh my twin brother, uh, hepassed away from uh this rare
fucking type of cancer, and um,and we attribute it to the burn
pits from over there.

(49:45):
And um I remember when he whenhe first got cancer, they came
in like how old are you?
They were like they were like,How old are you?
And he was like, uh 40.
They were like this is uh thisis a type of cancer we usually
see in like a 75-year-old man.
Uh and they were like, You everdo steroids?

(50:08):
He was like, No.
I'm like the scarniest littleguy there is.
And they did um uh uh genetictest on his cancer, right?
They so they and they did like aDNA or whatever the fuck

(50:29):
sequence on it, whatever.
And uh they could tell that itwas environmental, not something
that genetic, not genetic,right?
So it was invite so it wassomething in the environment
that gave him this cancer.
Well, it was a fucking burn pitsover there in Iraq.
Um we joined uh my mother didit.

(50:50):
She joined some type of lawsuitthat didn't it never went
anywhere, of course.

SPEAKER_05 (50:54):
So and I think, and that's where I was going with
this was Sound of Freedom.
Sound of freedom.
I can't wait for it.
I can't wait any longer.

SPEAKER_03 (51:01):
Sound of freedom.
Tim wouldn't have waited at all.

SPEAKER_05 (51:03):
Yep.
Um so where I was going withthat was you know, every
generation's got its own thing.
So for us, obviously it's theburn pits, and then there's a
whole thing of advocacy aboutit.
Um, but what's unique about ourgeneration being post-9-11 that
people often forget is the waron terror has uh raged for 20

(51:31):
years.
And statistically speaking, 20years roundabout roughly, is the
definition of a generation.
Yeah, so there are people whoserved in the trenches, you
know, fluja and all the otherthe initial pushes into those
areas, 2003, whatever, are nowhaving children, and have those
children have fought in the samewar that they were a part of at

(51:52):
the beginning, which is fuckinginsane to think about, you know.
But so anyway, so you have anentire generation dealing with
these burn pits, dealing withthe PTSD and all the other
stuff.
You've got, you know, so notonly are you dealing with the
advocacy piece of yourgeneration and trying to get
help for those that need it anddeserve it, but you're also

(52:16):
trying to maintain our supportorganizations like the VFW and
the Legion and stuff, becausethese organizations are the ones
that you know lobbied Congressto give us the GI Bill so we
could get out and go to college.
I mean, you know, so when theolder generations are passing
on, we've only got post uhpost-Vietnam, we've got what

(52:44):
technically Cold War, but it wasmostly peacetime.
Um there was Panama.
There was yep, there was Panama,there was Haiti, I think.
But those those were small incomparison, those were not
full-on offensives.

SPEAKER_04 (53:03):
Um nonetheless, they're still vaccinated.
Haiti was a humanitarianmission.
I don't think a shot was evenfired in Haiti.
Okay.
And that was uh um theearthquake, you know?
It was an earthquake in Haitiand sent a bunch of people down
there.
My unit before right before Igot to my unit in in Fort Hood,
after I uh was done being adrill sergeant, right before I

(53:26):
got there, they had gone toHaiti and spent quite a few
months down there.
I wish I had been able to gowith them.
Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (53:34):
So as far as major offensives, as far as major
operations post-Vietnam werepretty limited to just Desert
Storm, Desert Shield, and andthe war on post-9-11.
I mean, and so with that, youknow, I did I did some research
not too long ago.

(53:56):
Total number of veterans uh forboth post-9-11 and Gulf War, um,
you know, shield and storm,round about 3.2 million.
3.2 million veterans out of atotal American population,
roughly 360 million.

(54:16):
So less than 1%.

SPEAKER_04 (54:20):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (54:21):
You know, and these people are the people that are
fighting to get their benefits,that are constantly going
through the bureaucracy and allthat.
And so when when I talk aboutthe future of our post, I think
about where we are in Michigan.
We are rural, we're inmid-Michigan.

(54:42):
There's not much going on aroundhere.
Closest VA, major VA, is uh anhour away from here.
Um, if you need anything higherechelon medical care, you gotta
go down to Ann Arbor, Detroit,Grand Rapids.
What about Saginaw?
Saginaw's an hour away.
Yes, right.

(55:03):
But it but they don't have likemade like cancer, oncology, you
gotta go to Ann Arbor for that.
They sent me down to Ann Arborfor an ENT doctor, your nose
throat.
Because they don't have one ofthose in Saginaw.
So it's like, you know, for thecare that they give us, I'm
appreciative.

(55:24):
I really am, but it's kind ofsegmented in a way, and it's
hard to break through it.
So I feel like when we'retalking about the future of our
post, you know, future of theVFW and the Legion and whatnot
in general, there's gonna be amajor advocacy need and demand

(55:44):
because we're already, they'realready struggling with the
veterans that are applying now.

SPEAKER_03 (55:49):
Well, I'm actually almost done with mine, so I I
applied, I think it was May 2nd,right?
Put in my initial claim.

SPEAKER_04 (55:57):
Your VA for VA.

SPEAKER_03 (55:58):
Yep, for my VA disability and conversation.
Put that in May 2nd.
It was like in September, firstweek or two of September, got
linked up with when myappointments are gonna be.
And it's nice.
Now what they did was they said,okay, uh, we're gonna do your
mental health PTSD evaluation.

(56:20):
You gotta meet with the shrink,you know.
And they gave me options likein-person or telehealth.
So I have to for the telehealthbecause I could get one like the
next Sunday, right?
Not have to travel to Ann Arboror Saginaw or wherever to go see
one.
Um so I did that, and thentomorrow I've got my physical
exam.

(56:41):
And then next Friday I've got myhearing exam.
So, and then and actually thegirl that did my uh mental
health PTSD, she was like, I'malso a rater as well.
I can't rate you because I'mdoing your I'm doing the exam on
you, so I can't rate you.
But just so you know, I that'swhat she does.

(57:02):
So um, as a psychologist, sothat's kind of cool.
Yeah, you know, and that wasabout an hour long.
So when we and I hope it workedout for you.
Another shout-out.
I hope it works out for you.

SPEAKER_05 (57:14):
Jake and Lindsay, Jake and Lindsay Bullis are
watching.
Awesome.
Thanks for joining us, guys.
Haven't seen you in a while.
Swing by the post pretty soon.

SPEAKER_03 (57:23):
Actually, just ran into them last week.
Oh, okay.
Oh, well, what's the Tuesday?
Yeah, it was last week.
They're at the post.
So um it was nice to see themagain.

SPEAKER_05 (57:35):
Yeah, so the VA is just barely getting through the
veterans that are currently inthe process of getting benefits
or have gotten benefits and andwhatnot, and we're experiencing
the things that we'reexperiencing, and that's what,
maybe probably not even half theveterans that are actually
eligible.

SPEAKER_03 (57:55):
I bet you it's way less than half.
You think so?
Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (57:58):
So so what are we gonna do?
I mean, they are 100% entitledto these benefits, they deserve
these benefits.
Well, so here's how do we how dowe access them?
Again, especially remember,think about us.
We're rural, right?
So if they're if they'redisabled, if they're elderly, if
they're they're not travelinganywhere, and and we're rural,

(58:21):
so not all places have decentinternet, so they telehealth's
not an option either.
So then what?

SPEAKER_03 (58:29):
You know, oh so we you we can't as an organization
reach out to every singleveteran that might be a need or
not a need.
It's it's up to them.
They decide they need help, theyshould be reaching out to
different organizations to findout what helps available, right?
I mean, it's not like you know,I know we don't have phone books

(58:50):
anymore, but they they found adoctor, right?
To be able to call or somebodyto be able to call.
So, you know, it's it'ssometimes it's word of mouth,
but sometimes you have to doyour own due diligence to a
certain extent to find outwhat's out there for you.
Yeah, but this is unfortunatelywhat well the stigma has done
its damage.

SPEAKER_05 (59:10):
The the stigma is that the VA sucks, it's
terrible, you know, and to acertain extent, it still does.
It's it's a bureaucracy, sothere's there's always going to
be some amount of red tape toget through.
But at the end of the day,comparison from now till before,
I think it is.

SPEAKER_03 (59:26):
Well, what ends what ends up happening is veterans
get out, and yes, they qualifyfor all these things, but they
might not necessarily need it.
Right.
So, for instance, you know, theyget out and they get a decent
paying job or good paying jobthat comes with good benefits
and everything, and they don'twant to go through the hassle of
going through that stuff, right?
Because they don't really needit.
Right.

(59:47):
So they're just like, yeah, whydo I want to deal with all that
bullshit when I'm good the waythat I am?
So they might not, you know,after years and years and years
and years, right, they mightfinally say, Hey, you know, I
probably should, just like Idid.
And I should have done this 20years ago.

unknown (01:00:02):
Right.

SPEAKER_03 (01:00:03):
Instead, I'm doing it now because I didn't need it.
I didn't want to go through thebullshit.
I didn't want to deal with allthe issues, the problems, the
horror stories.
The horror stories you hear,right?
So, you know, when I when I hearall these people talk about
universal health care and youknow all this stuff, I'm like,
if you walk into a VA facilityand you ask a veteran sitting
there, what do they think abouttheir free government-run

(01:00:24):
healthcare?
They're probably going to punchyou in the face.
Right.
Because of all the all themadness, you know, and of course
you're going to hear the halfpercent horror stories, you
know, people dying waiting forappointments and people not
getting the services they need.
You know, you're gonna you'regonna hear that anywhere.
Yeah.
Right?
It's like the horror stories ofan insurance company.
Oh, they denied, denied, denied,and prolonged this, and then

(01:00:44):
grandma died, you know?
Right.
Because they kept denying thisprocedure, this test, or
whatever.
Those oddities or raritieshappen all the time.
Right.
But I'm sure it's the same thingwith the the grand scheme of
things.
I mean, I'm I'm waiting monthand a half for an appointment.
I'm not saying if I called myregular doctor, am I gonna get
in within the next two weeks?

(01:01:05):
I don't know.
It might be a month and a halftill I can get in and see them.
You know, so that's where thewalk-in clinic, you know, the
ready cares and stuff like that,are your best bet when you're
sick sick.
Right.
You know, rather than going toyour primary.
So I mean, there's just it'sjust different, you know.
Right.
And I think there's people thatthat really need it and people
that just they don't really needit, so they're just not they're

(01:01:26):
gonna skip it.

SPEAKER_05 (01:01:26):
And that's and that's totally fine.
Um, I I I encourage people tomake that decision.

SPEAKER_02 (01:01:32):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (01:01:33):
Um, but at the end of the day, there's also a
couple groups of people.
The ones that go through TAPSclass who were never told they
know the VA exists, they knowthat that's where they're
supposed to get their GI bill,right?
But outside of that, you know,they might have in my TAPS
class, they mentioned VAdisability, but they likened it

(01:01:55):
to legitimate disability, likeyou know, Social Security
disability.
And it's not the same thing,right?
Yeah, you know, it's meant tohelp you augment, you know, the
issues that you have, and thereis a version that is like social
security disability, but it'sit's a completely different
thing.
And they don't know that that'sthere to help help them augment

(01:02:19):
their lifestyle when you knowthings are you know, you're on
the struggle bus.
But well, and that's what I'msaying is I want you to know
about these things andunderstand the thought process
and the mechanisms behind it,and let you decide do you want
to apply or just keep it in theback of your head.
That's totally fine.
I'm just saying the majorityeither don't know something

(01:02:43):
exists or have an old stigmathat may or may not still be
partially true, and they're notwilling to, you know, come out
and try it.

SPEAKER_03 (01:02:54):
So I know for students at Central Michigan
University, there's a there's aveteran resource center in the
basement at uh at the BoveeCenter.
And uh it's a phenomenally largeoffice staffed well.
So any veteran that's on campuscan go in there and they can

(01:03:17):
deal with the GI Bill, theycould deal with getting them
with the VSO for, you know, ifthey want healthcare or anything
else.
They have everything that youneed in inside that office.
It's pretty dang impressive.
I actually went in there justthe other day um and and met uh
one of the office guys.
He's he's actually a Marine.

(01:03:37):
Um and yeah, good, good, goodplace.
And it's good to see thatcampuses or or universities have
that access to students thatmight not know.
You know, yeah.
I mean, when they apply, whereyou veteran, yeah, they check
boxes, right?
Yeah, and GI Bill stuff and theysend some paperwork in, right?
But then there's a place forthem to go when they get there
for other resources that areavailable to them.

(01:03:59):
So I think, you know, and that'sonly obviously if they want to
go, right?
If they're seeking that out.
But but there is there is otherplaces for young veterans or
even middle-aged veterans, ifthe first time going to college
and they haven't used thosebenefits yet, um, to to go uh
get other information.

(01:04:20):
Right.

SPEAKER_04 (01:04:21):
So uh isn't that what you do?

SPEAKER_05 (01:04:23):
Uh you're you're a veteran um so my nine to five, I
am an academic advisor uh forour local community college, and
uh my assignment um is all ofthe military-affiliated
students.
So whether they're veterans oractive or reserve, or if they're

(01:04:44):
using, you know, they're adependent using a parent's
benefits or whatever the case,um, anyone, you know, veteran
affiliated, military affiliated,um when they check that box in
the application, theyautomatically get routed to me.

SPEAKER_02 (01:05:00):
Okay.

SPEAKER_05 (01:05:01):
So um, so I am the dedicated um advisor for them to
talk to.
How many, how many, how manystudents do you have?
This semester, I think I've gotlike I don't know, 60.
Oh my gosh.
So, yeah.
Specifically veterans, you know.
Right.
But uh But what about familymembers?
That that doesn't include familymembers?

(01:05:22):
That does include, yeah.
Oh, okay.
Yeah.
So um, but you also got toremember we're a community
college.
We're not 60's a lot.
Yeah, I mean, yeah.
But I'm thinking uh um I'mthinking, you know, these state
schools like you know, Centraland U of M and whatnot, they're
good, they're easily gonna havehundreds, if not thousands.

(01:05:43):
What?
Really?
Yeah.
I mean, they're huge.
They're huge affiliated.

SPEAKER_03 (01:05:48):
Well, we have like 14 or 15,000 students on campus
right now.
You know.
So I mean, I I couldn't tell youwhat I have no idea.
I'm just not even know if thatfor I've heard 14 or 15,000.
I don't know if that's accurateeither.
I mean, I could include global,could include online, could
include whatever, you know.
I have no idea, but yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (01:06:07):
And considering, I don't know if they still are
now, but central, um, when I wasactive, all of the base college
offices and stuff had a centralrepresentative working there.
And so, you know, I took acouple courses when I was on
active duty and um ultimatelydidn't really mean much, but

(01:06:30):
because they were basketweaving, yeah.
It was a couple we likehumanities courses, nothing,
nothing too crazy, but um, butyeah, so uh I think advocacy at
the post level and ourorganizations and colleges and
you know all these other things,I think is gonna become our

(01:06:52):
primary thing because as theseum older generations you know
move on and whatnot, it's it'sgonna be something that we're
gonna need to pick up thegauntlet and and carry forward,
which you know, with our lownumbers, I mean, like I said,

(01:07:12):
what I say I think it was like3.2 million between the last two
majors.
Vietnam by itself was 3.2million.
I think it was actually 3.5.
Damn.
But then again, they also hadthe draft.

SPEAKER_04 (01:07:25):
Yeah, so you know, but uh nonetheless, because um
our generation, we were a littlebit more efficient in our
killing capacity, you know whatI mean?
A little bit more efficient.
They need need to throw numbersover there.
Us, it was about this righthere.

SPEAKER_03 (01:07:42):
It had nothing to do with technology at all.
Yeah, absolutely.
Nothing.
No drones didn't play effect,laser guided bombs didn't play
effect, yeah.
None of that.
Nope, nothing.

SPEAKER_04 (01:07:52):
You're being sarcastic, right?
You know I am, yes, 100%.
Yes, that's why that's that'sthe reason why you don't need as
many, yeah, many boots on theground if you have technology,
yeah.
Because I'll tell you what, Imean, the the the shit I saw
over there, uh not just when Iwas over there, but um and the
technology we had was crazycompared to what I mean Vietnam,

(01:08:17):
it was there was no technologyreally.
I mean, let's be honest, like itwas it was straight up.

SPEAKER_05 (01:08:23):
Radio was the best radio.

SPEAKER_04 (01:08:24):
Yeah, yeah.
That was and they had that inWorld War II as well.

SPEAKER_03 (01:08:28):
So they still had guys like my grandpa running
wires between outposts.
Oh, in World War II?

SPEAKER_04 (01:08:33):
Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 (01:08:34):
Yeah, he was running a wire from one to the other so
they could talk.
Jesus back then.

SPEAKER_04 (01:08:39):
I remember um guys, the the 82nd, I was with the
82nd when I was in Iraq.
Um the first time.
And um they would send guys outthe wire.
Those motherfuckers would be outthere for weeks, weeks living in
the swamps, just patrolling thebase, like going around the

(01:09:02):
base, and and uh you would seethem come and and uh they have a
couple Iraqis fucking zip tiedand bring them in, they're
fucking covered in mud head totoe.

SPEAKER_05 (01:09:13):
And they probably stink.

SPEAKER_04 (01:09:15):
Yep, yeah, because they were living out the outside
the wire, but just waiting,patrolling, and and I mean I'm
talking about I'm not talkingabout walking, right?
Them motherfuckers were in thefucking swamps waiting, just
sitting there waiting for thatand man, it was amazing the shit
that that that some of oursoldiers do.

SPEAKER_03 (01:09:39):
I got to uh AJ says happy birthday to the Navy, by
the way.

SPEAKER_05 (01:09:43):
Thanks.
It's my 250th birthday, so I'mhappy about that.
Shut up, AJ.
Nobody asked you.
Um you know I got I got to meeta couple Navy SEALs when I was
active, and those guys are thoseguys are legit, man.

SPEAKER_03 (01:10:02):
Speed load drag.
Yep, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (01:10:04):
So officially when I was over in Africa, I was part
of uh um combined joint taskforce, uh 150 and 151.
So um I think 150 wascounter-piracy and then 151 was
counter-terrorism.
And so it's actually the thecounter-piracy uh version uh was

(01:10:27):
the one that actually rescuedCaptain Phillips.
Oh wow, yeah, a few years beforeI was out there.
So I was part of the same one,and uh got to see some of those
guys out there, and you know, umthey were nice enough to shake
my hand and saw them once andnever saw them again, but you
know, it was it was an honorbeing able to shake their hand.

SPEAKER_04 (01:10:52):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (01:10:52):
Knowing that those guys are out there patrolling
the swamps, doing all the shit,you know, getting all down and
dirty and making sure people aresafe.
I mean with us, it's yeah wereyou guys let me ask you, were
you guys your bases everrocketed or oh hell yeah.

SPEAKER_04 (01:11:14):
I I mean I got a um I got um uh combat action badge.

SPEAKER_03 (01:11:22):
He actually talked about it in one of the podcasts.
Oh, did you?
Yeah, woke up woke up and theywere like, Zark border.
Yeah, kind of getting uh shelteror whatever.

SPEAKER_04 (01:11:32):
Well bunker.
Yeah, yeah.
That was what that was that wasone of the times.
I mean, it happened fucking forme anyways, it happened a lot.
I'm talking about we weregetting fucking mortared all
Morderitaville, yep, all thefucking time.
All the time.

SPEAKER_05 (01:11:50):
So so we never got mortared, um, but the base had
the shelters because when I wasover there, it only had only
been maybe like two or threeyears since Boko Haram was doing
his bullshit out there, Muslimextremist and all this, and you
know, kidnapping people andmurdering them and whatnot.

(01:12:13):
And my daughter's calling so umthere was a time where the base
was attacked, um, and so becauseof that, they just left the
shelters there.
I mean, it would be dumb to takethem out, so just left them
there.
We had a couple drills andwhatnot, but uh the base itself
was never attacked while I wasout there.
However, um, when we were on theships, we were attacked.

(01:12:38):
Um, it wasn't anything crazy.
I wasn't in a firefight, but Ihave been shot at by a couple
dumbass pirates who thought itwould be a good idea to attack a
Navy warship.
Um moral of the story, don't dothat.
Yeah, definitely don't do that.
You're definitely gonna beoutgunned.

(01:13:00):
Um when you I was I was above uhon the weather deck, so Navy
terms, weather deck is anythingthat you know the sea can touch,
right?
So you're out there on the onthe deck, and I'm you know
looking at the sea, and I godown below just as I hear
gunshots, and I hear the tingting ting ting ting on the side

(01:13:22):
of the fucking ship.
You know, I've been there.
And you know, I don't know,about 30 seconds, minute goes
by, next thing I hear the 16 micmicrrrrrrr.
Um they shot the uh we again wehad the we had the seals with
us, they shot the engine out,put them dead in the water, and

(01:13:43):
we took care of that.
But yeah, but it was it was aninteresting experience.

SPEAKER_04 (01:13:48):
Those uh those guys are a different breed.
They are different.
The seals, which I've I've I'vecome across some seals in in uh
when I was in Iraq, uh met a fewof those guys, also the Delta
Force, like uh Delta Force,they're uh may Marsok.
Yep.
They're uh those Delta Forceguys are now is Delta Okay, so

(01:14:14):
is Green Green Berets are notDelta Force.

SPEAKER_05 (01:14:17):
No, no, no, but green berets are also kind of
their own thing, too.

SPEAKER_04 (01:14:23):
I don't really understand army speak well so
and I I I was in that world forfor a little while.
I was not Green Beret, I was notDelta Force, but I was there in
support of the the specialoperations, and that's when I
learned an appreciation andeverything like that for those
guys.

(01:14:44):
Um but they um so you got GreenBerets, right, which are special
forces.
Delta Force doesn't exist,right?
The government will neverconfirm nor deny the existence
of these guys.

SPEAKER_05 (01:15:03):
Um they do not exist.

SPEAKER_04 (01:15:06):
Yeah, they they don't exist.
They don't exist.
Um and they have their own Yes,they do.
Yeah.
They have uh they have their owncompound over there uh at Bragg.
No, they don't.
Right, yeah, they don't.
I should probably not say this,but but I mean this is common
knowledge, though.

(01:15:27):
This is not something that youknow I'm not something you can
find that shit.
Obsect tray.
Find it on the internet.
Listen, and and loose lips thinkships, baby.
I'll tell you this, that that umthere are a lot of things that I
even to this day that I won'ttalk about.
Oh, yeah.
That that I've seen, I've done,blah, blah, blah.

SPEAKER_05 (01:15:46):
Well, there's shit that I've seen that I don't talk
about.

SPEAKER_04 (01:15:49):
Well, it's not, it's it's it's not that I I can't.
I still respect that that thatum uh I guess uh um clearance
that you have.
Top secret clearance.
Your security clearance.
Yeah, your security clearance.
And uh and um they're like youcould never talk about this

(01:16:12):
shit.
So I I I don't 20 years laterhe's blabbing his mouth.
Um but I'm not talking aboutthat's the thing.
I know.

SPEAKER_05 (01:16:20):
Yeah, we don't we don't talk about operations, but
yeah, there's I mean, there'sjust and you gotta think about
it, it's it's not just you know,when you're talking about
classified information, you'renot talking about only
operations, right?
There's different things that itapplies to.
So and it could just be the factthat hey, you're having a
private conversation, and well,that's that's classified, you

(01:16:41):
know.
It's yeah.

SPEAKER_03 (01:16:42):
So when I was when I was in the Marines, we had we
had a back in my day, we had acouple couple different units.
We had the one that I was in,which was uh the fleet
anti-terrorism security teamcompany, and then we had Force
Reconnaissance, so um, or ForceRecon.
And then they developed theMarsoc, which is now converted

(01:17:04):
to the Raiders, which goes backto one of the first special
operations groups way back inVietnam were the Marine Raiders.
Um, but um, yeah, that's that'sbasically the I think Force
Reconnaissance is still around.
Um I know I know I know FastCompany's still around.

SPEAKER_05 (01:17:24):
Now that I think about it, didn't the Navy SEALs
technically get started rightafter or during Vietnam?

SPEAKER_03 (01:17:30):
I don't know when they got started.
Just before I we ran into them.
They'll look that up.
I'm gonna look it up.
When I was in Manama Bahrain uhfor Operation Southern Watch,
which was Oh, you've been toBahrain too?
Yeah, Bahrain buddies.
So um well, you were on thewhat's it called NSA, Naval
Security Activity?
Yeah, we only base we only hungout there for a little bit.

(01:17:53):
So when that first opened, wemoved into it, but we were in a
building called the ManaiaPlaza, which we owned had you
know uh basically lookout towersall the way around the corners
and all the way around theperimeter.
It was like an old hotel thatthe government bought, that's
what we lived in.
And uh the seals actually camein there for a couple days and

(01:18:14):
stayed in there.
And I was down in the gymworking out one morning and some
of those guys came in, and Itell you what, I see why they
seals swim, eat, and lift.
Right.
Those guys were killing theweights, dude.
Really?
And they're just like yeah, andthey're like, we're like, hey,
how's it going?
Like, who you with?
And they told us.

(01:18:34):
Right.
And you're like, oh shit, andthen a couple other guys come
in, and you're like, Oh yeah,that's legit because it's not
even doesn't look like any Navyguy that we know, right?

SPEAKER_04 (01:18:41):
You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_03 (01:18:42):
And then like they were literally there like a day
or two and then gone.
We didn't know they came in andwe didn't we didn't know they
left.
Yeah, not just that quick.
I mean, they probably just got acouple day break, you know, so
they came in and they were done.
They're constantly on the move.
I mean, it's came in and theywere gone, you know.
And but they were they were theywere cool, they're like, Who are
you with?
We're like, Oh, we're with FastCompany, like, oh shit, man,

(01:19:04):
that's cool.
Fuck.
We're out of Damneck, you know,which is in Virginia, that's one
of their one of their trainingfacilities, which wasn't far
from from Norfolk.
So we'd go to Damneck and trainin their buildings on their
equipment all the time.

SPEAKER_02 (01:19:15):
Right.

SPEAKER_03 (01:19:15):
So they actually have a building there, the size
of a Walmart, and they canchange that building over in 24
hours to be any embassy that theUnited States has in the world.
Damn.
Down to the couch, down to thepaintings on the wall, down to
where the doors are, and sothese guys, so if an embassy
gets taken over, these guys canliterally walk through it and

(01:19:38):
train, then deploy and actuallywalk through it.
So unless you know theterrorists move moving couches
around, right?
Yeah, yeah.
But you know what I mean?
I mean, that thing is laid outexactly the way the embassy is.

SPEAKER_05 (01:19:51):
Of course, there's no way that's gonna happen.

SPEAKER_03 (01:19:53):
But it's in it's impressive, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (01:19:56):
Um, the uh no way what's gonna happen.
Embassy getting taken over.

SPEAKER_04 (01:20:01):
Oh well, yeah, probably not.

SPEAKER_05 (01:20:03):
Probably not, but anyway.

SPEAKER_04 (01:20:04):
They'll blow it up though.
Well, that too.

SPEAKER_05 (01:20:07):
That happened uh but look at uh there's a YouTube
video about uh the new embassyin London, and I know that's an
exception because London, youknow, England is you know one of
our one of our uh yeah, it'srelatively safe, it's one of our
um allies.
But um just a quick follow-up onmy question of when the seals

(01:20:27):
were started.
So my assumption, because Iremember some of the oldest
seals that I you know rememberreading about and and hearing
about, um, and those guys weretrained by early V early Vietnam
era veterans, and so I just kindof assumed that you know that's
about when they got started.
It wasn't off by a lot,according to Chat GPT, thanks to

(01:20:51):
uh the uh Empire Collectivesponsored iPhone here.
Uh the U.S.
Navy SEALs were officiallyestablished January 1st, 1962,
by President Kennedy.
So, with uh Vietnam being about10 years later, I mean it wasn't
it wasn't too far off.

SPEAKER_04 (01:21:12):
Right after he died, yeah.
Yeah, so um I'm sure that's whenthey had their first major dust
up over.

SPEAKER_05 (01:21:18):
Now, of course, they have predecessors that go into
World War II and before that.
I mean, hell, we had the turtle,right?
The first submersible in theCivil War.
I mean, there's predecessors foreverything, but yeah, um I did
hear about that.

SPEAKER_04 (01:21:35):
The first the first submersible, like before it was
like a submarine was World Waror I mean during the Civil War.

SPEAKER_03 (01:21:43):
They fucking it was basically when he said the
turtle, I thought he was talkingabout his PFT run.
That was his nickname, theturtle.

SPEAKER_05 (01:21:53):
No, uh the turtle was it was basically a giant oak
barrel, bourbon oak barrel.
I mean, giant because it had tofit a man, right?
Right, but it was propelled bypedals, like you know, the
propellers.
Um and when when you sealed itshut and you went underwater,
you only had like half hour, 45minutes of air, then you had to

(01:22:17):
come up.
But the way it was used wasthere was a giant spike out the
front, and it had an explosiveat the end, so that they would
ram it into the side of a shipand then back out and get away,
and then eventually they yankedthe fuse and blew the fucking
ship up.

SPEAKER_04 (01:22:34):
So I wonder how um I wonder how damn like how fast
how fast could you go peddling afucking bourbon barrel?
How far away could you get?
Not very fast at all.
First you gotta get there, andyou only got 30 minutes of air,

(01:22:56):
right?
First you gotta get there, stickthe goddamn thing to the to the
to the boat, then turn aroundand then you gotta fucking
pedal.
Damn.
But maybe they would come upmaybe 100, 200 yards away from
the ship, and then that's getthe air going.

SPEAKER_05 (01:23:18):
Because you gotta remember this is this is before
submersible warfare.
I mean, you know, people on uhthe ships were looking for
swimmers, not torpedoes andwater explosives and submarines.

SPEAKER_04 (01:23:31):
So you ever been on a submarine?
I have not.

SPEAKER_03 (01:23:34):
Um I wanted to uh been in one, like an active duty
one, right, yeah, but neverunderway.
Okay.

SPEAKER_05 (01:23:42):
Um I've never been in one uh except for like the
USS Silver Sides and Muskegon,you know.
Right.
I've been in that, but no, I'venever been in an active duty
one.
Totally would have if I hadgotten the chance, but never
never got the chance to do it.

SPEAKER_04 (01:23:58):
Um I think maybe there's one person that's ever
been on a that actually servedon a submarine.

SPEAKER_05 (01:24:05):
To get your to get your dolphins, to get your uh
submarine uh submariner's pinand all that, um it's 100%
volunteer.
Obviously, because of thepsychological aspect of you know
being surrounded by tons ofwater.
Yeah.
Um for months at a time.
For months at a time.
No daylight.
No daylight, yep.

(01:24:26):
However, they do get the bestfood.
Do they?
Oh yeah.
Oh hell yeah.

SPEAKER_04 (01:24:31):
Don't they come up from time to time and get to go
out up in the every once in awhile.

SPEAKER_05 (01:24:36):
Sometimes you get to go up to the polar ice cap, and
you know, if the ice is thinenough, they'll sub, you know,
they'll surface and let peopleout.
And they've I got friends thathave played soccer on the polar
ice cap.

SPEAKER_03 (01:24:49):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (01:24:49):
You know.

SPEAKER_03 (01:24:51):
So yeah, we did a refuel, defuel in Pearl.
I think it was the ArizonaArizona, it was um can't think
of the name of the sub, but umanyways, uh part part of our
patrol was actually walking onthe walking on the sub when it
was at dry dock.
And you went down in it andstuff, checking badges of

(01:25:12):
workers that were in there tomake sure they were in the right
compartments and stuff likethat, and then back out.
So that was it.
So yeah, you didn't you didn'tget access to any secret
squirrel, even though we hadsecret security clearances,
right?
Right.
It was basically just the thegeneral clearance and stuff.

SPEAKER_05 (01:25:29):
You can have a um whiskey peat clearance and still
not have access to a lot ofthings.
Um have you ever heard ofwhiskey peat before?
No.
Okay.
Um Google it.
Chat GPT it.
Whiskey Pete clearance?
Yep.
Okay.
It's uh it's a version of thetop secret SCI, secure
compartmentalized information.

SPEAKER_04 (01:25:50):
P S S C I.

SPEAKER_05 (01:25:51):
Yep.
And uh Whiskey Pete is thespecific clearance you need for
presidential White House access.

SPEAKER_03 (01:25:59):
So what'd you have in Chat GPT it if you're just
gonna tell them anyways?
Whiskey what?
Pete.
Just to you know, just to givethem something to do.

SPEAKER_05 (01:26:10):
Yeah.
Whiskey Pete, um securityclearance.
Chat GPT is smart.

SPEAKER_03 (01:26:16):
It'll figure it out.
It is smarter than the guytyping into it.

SPEAKER_05 (01:26:21):
That's for damn sure.
So me too.
I had uh one of my chiefs, oneof my E7s, at one point when he
was an E4, he got to serve atthe White House as part of the
White House medical staff.
Um that was something that Ithought was cool as shit.
But it's a nickname.

(01:26:43):
To uh to my knowledge, that'sprobably the hardest for obvious
reasons, the hardest clearanceto get.
Um, and obviously it's byapplication only for you know
official purposes.

SPEAKER_04 (01:26:57):
Oh, Jesus Christ.
This is talking about whiskeyPete Pete Heggs Hag Seth?
How did you type in there, man?
What is a whiskey pete?
We ought to ask Jake.

SPEAKER_05 (01:27:08):
That's probably that's probably a good fucking
Yeah, Jake.
If you're still watching, cometo Charlie's shop.
You Lindsay, too.
Get get your asses over here ifyou know where Charlie's shop
is.

SPEAKER_03 (01:27:18):
There's only one person watching, it's probably
you.

SPEAKER_05 (01:27:20):
Yeah, either way.

SPEAKER_03 (01:27:22):
Did you mean says two?
No says two.

SPEAKER_04 (01:27:32):
I said, what is a whiskey pee?
Come on, you guys can't possiblythink that was a good choice.
Yeah.
For Secretary of War.
Why not?
The Secretary of War.
What was he?
He was a fucking major in the inthe reserves in uh in a Fox News

(01:27:56):
host.

SPEAKER_05 (01:27:56):
I was I was waiting for I was waiting for everybody
to get all upset about callingit Secretary of War, but at the
end of the day, I mean I was theit used to be the war
department.

SPEAKER_04 (01:28:07):
Yeah, before it was it is now, it's again.
It's war department now.

SPEAKER_05 (01:28:10):
Well that's what I'm that's what I'm talking about.
Everybody's like, he shouldn'tbe called Secretary of War.
Well, that's what it was fuckingcalled before we changed it the
first time.
So you know, whatever.
Doesn't really matter.
Um but anyway, how many peoplewe got?
Two.
My people probably got off whothey are.

SPEAKER_04 (01:28:33):
So it's a lot a lot has happened though since our
last podcast at worldly,anyways, you know.
Yeah.
Because god damn, when was ourlast podcast?
Like June.
Was it June?
Might have been May.
Look on Spotify and say it mighthave been May.
It had to have been May.

unknown (01:28:50):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (01:28:51):
June, we were June, July, August, September.
I mean, we're halfway throughOctober, so we're four and a
half months.
And I think we should.
I know we're busy in the summer,but I think we should at least
do one or two.
Maybe.
Yeah, I I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 (01:29:12):
What is the power to bring nations together?
To inspire heroism andsacrifice.

SPEAKER_03 (01:29:21):
January 2nd.

SPEAKER_04 (01:29:23):
Let me see.
This year.
January 2nd.
Are you kidding me?

SPEAKER_05 (01:29:28):
No, that's not it.

SPEAKER_03 (01:29:34):
Just don't go into my photos.

SPEAKER_05 (01:29:36):
What if I want to?

SPEAKER_03 (01:29:38):
Yeah, well, you're gonna see some something you
probably don't want to see.
Are you sure?
It's February 8th.
That's the problem.
I see the TikToks you sent me,and you probably do want to see.
February 16th, March, May.
Wait, oh no, that was 2024.
There you go, brother.

SPEAKER_05 (01:29:53):
How do how have we not done something since
January?

SPEAKER_03 (01:29:58):
Just letting you know, unless you got something.
You haven't downloaded.

SPEAKER_04 (01:30:02):
We did do one that got all fucked up, and we it ran
out of the thing ran out ofspace.

SPEAKER_05 (01:30:10):
Which maybe I have to upload that off of the old I
don't know.
I have it in my car, I think.
Anyway, damn.

SPEAKER_03 (01:30:19):
But yeah.
It's what's uploaded.

SPEAKER_05 (01:30:22):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 (01:30:23):
So been that long.
We need to get out of here.
Pushing it off, pushing it off,pushing it off.
People not showing up.
Because we tried to do it acouple times and we were the
only two that showed up, right?
Yeah.
So we didn't do it.
Hold up.
Wait, now me and him showed upone time and you didn't show up.

SPEAKER_04 (01:30:39):
Oh.
And then me and you showed upand he didn't show up.
Well, I was on a date.
You saw me that night, too.
So I was like, when you came by,I was like, I told my wife,
like, I'm glad Charlie saw me toknow so he knows that I wasn't
full of shit.

SPEAKER_03 (01:30:55):
This once again relies back to the issue on why
we struggle for membership atthe post because everybody's got
other lives to do.
Yeah.
Your life is not supposed to begeared around the VFW.
It's supposed to be in supportof the VFW, but not right,
right.
100% geared around it.
And that that shows becausethere's nights when we have six
of us up here, and there'snights that we have three.

(01:31:17):
Right.
You know, so I mean it's is whatit is, but we definitely need to
get get Jake up here.
Right.
So for sure.
And I wish they were still on.
Another Navy guy.
Another Navy guy.
Yeah.
Trust me, I'm I'm well, if RunRoyce here, at least I'm not
totally outnumbered.
I knew you guys are fucking Navyand you fucking Shem's ass up

(01:31:38):
here.

SPEAKER_04 (01:31:38):
But preacher's uh he's Air Force, so yeah.

SPEAKER_03 (01:31:43):
That is true.

SPEAKER_04 (01:31:45):
Yep.
So what do you want to talkabout?
What else?
I mean, it's not a good thing.
You want to get into yourpolitics.
But we have not done, we havenot done since January?
Yeah.
So let's last uploaded.
And that was what, January like16th?
Was it the second?

SPEAKER_05 (01:32:02):
January 2nd was the last one.
So secondly it was uploaded.
That might actually be adecision.

SPEAKER_04 (01:32:08):
Listen, since then, listen, Trump was not president.
Right?
Now we now we have a newpresident.
No, January 2nd, he would havebeen president-elect.
Yeah, he would have beenpresident-elect, but right not
officially president yet.
Yeah.
It was January 20th.
That was before January 6th.

(01:32:29):
No.
No, that would have been thelast time.
Two years ago.
That would have been four years.
Yeah, four years ago, January6th.
But still yeah, he wasn'tpresident last time we did.
Is this how your your facts areall gonna be four years off?
I've been drinking a little bit.
Forgive me.
So are you going to the bathroomor something?
No, I just want to stand up fora bit.

(01:32:50):
Um that's not a bad idea.

SPEAKER_03 (01:32:52):
I can only sit so long and then I guess.

SPEAKER_05 (01:32:54):
My ass is starting to go numb.

SPEAKER_04 (01:32:55):
I know.
How does Joe Rogan do it?

SPEAKER_03 (01:32:57):
I have no idea.
He's got that big ass comfychair and shit.

SPEAKER_04 (01:33:00):
Yeah, yes.
We need to uh I think we need tomove this over to put a round
table or something.

SPEAKER_05 (01:33:08):
Yeah, we need to do a round table.

SPEAKER_04 (01:33:09):
That's a good one.
I mean, I'm not trying to bag onyour shit here, but this is not
very comfortable.
I was I felt way morecomfortable when we were sitting
over there.
Do you remember that?
When I had the long table out?

SPEAKER_03 (01:33:23):
Yeah, I was a shorter table when we were all
sitting at the Yeah, we can dothat.
Yeah, it's just long, yeah.
I need a six-foot table.
Yeah, there's other ones likethat eight-footer long.
Is this attached to the wall?
It is.
Okay.

SPEAKER_04 (01:33:35):
I'll bring you a six-foot table.
I'll donate it.
Yeah, we can we pull thesechairs up.

unknown (01:33:40):
Okay.

SPEAKER_04 (01:33:40):
So what's happened since January 17th?

SPEAKER_03 (01:33:43):
Um country's going in the right direction.
Absolutely.
Just leave it.
Just leave it at that.

SPEAKER_05 (01:33:48):
According to you, we are fucking.
I haven't said anything.
Knee deep in the handmaid'stale.
What uh let me ask you this.

SPEAKER_04 (01:33:57):
What is your why don't upset I don't like the
hyperbole?
Why why do you why do you get soupset when people make that
comparison?

SPEAKER_05 (01:34:06):
Like because that it's it's completely based in
fiction.
It's a dystopian fictionaluniverse.
Have you ever read that book?
That has I don't care to readit.
I'm just I know enough about it.
Right.
I chat GPT'd it to get myself asynopsis.
Okay, so I'm familiar enough.

(01:34:27):
Right.
But it is ridiculous.
I just remember, remember.
And to prove to you that I kindof know it is a religiously
motivated, dystopian, futuristicnovel that, you know, there's
there's just a lot of bad thingsthat happen.

SPEAKER_04 (01:34:41):
Man, have you ever watched that show though?

SPEAKER_05 (01:34:43):
No, I've watched I've watched bits and pieces
that, you know, like reels andshit that have popped up on
YouTube.
Um, but it's it's to be quitehonest with you, it's disturbing
to me.

SPEAKER_04 (01:34:55):
I it is disturbing.
It is disturbing.

SPEAKER_05 (01:34:58):
It is disturbing.
But in what in what way is it?
Quick timeout, quick time out.
Yeah, but I also personally,like for PTSD reasons and shit
like that, I don't watchanything that's horrific, like
legit horror that's legit um,you know, anything like that.

SPEAKER_04 (01:35:14):
I just I don't it activates my but it's not really
horror though.

SPEAKER_05 (01:35:18):
It's no, it's not horror, but it's psychological
thriller.

SPEAKER_04 (01:35:21):
It is, and that's enough to trigger me.
It's more realistic than likefucking Texas Chainsaw Massacre,
you know what I mean?
Right.
And it's it is disturbing towatch.

SPEAKER_05 (01:35:30):
It is I don't I don't like the psychological
thrillers.
Um I mean there are some horrormovies that I like the original
It.
I watched that as a kid.
I used to, you know, but I meanwe're talking about but the new
version where it's like legitdemonic and the you know the CGI
is on point and stuff.
That that really that will fuckme up for weeks.
It really will.

(01:35:50):
You know, um so I don't watchanything like that.
I don't I don't watch Sawbecause it's again psychological
thriller.
Um I don't know.
It's just it's just me.

SPEAKER_04 (01:36:00):
So I and here's the thing.
I you don't know this how I feelwhen you became a Catholic,
right?
I I don't know how you what youdon't know uh this about me.
And and uh but when you became aCatholic and your religious
conviction, um I respect theshit out of it.

(01:36:22):
Thank you.
Like I when I see you saw you dothat, I was like very proud of
you.
I was like, damn, you know, umI'd love to have a religious
discussion with you.
Oh, buddy.
You know, and I I feel likepeople who have true religious

(01:36:43):
convictions, um, they sh theythey're they're respectable
people.
They should be respected.
And I respected the shit out ofyou when you made that decision
and you did that.

SPEAKER_05 (01:36:54):
So a lot of people thought I was crazy, so I I
appreciate that.
Why?
I well you know, and before wewe'll we'll stick on your topic,
but we'll go on this tangentreal quick, right?
Um, you know, historicallyspeaking, when you're talking
about religion, the oldestreligion, documentable religion

(01:37:16):
in the world.
Sorry.
Go ahead.
I'll miss it.
Almost dying.
All right.
Download.
Yeah.
It is the oldest documentablereligion in the world.

SPEAKER_02 (01:37:30):
Right.

SPEAKER_05 (01:37:30):
Um, everybody well, I guess I shouldn't say that.
Um Christian, Christiandenomination, I should say.
Okay.
Uh-huh.
Because I mean Hinduism andBuddhism and shit, like uh
Shintu, I think, is like some ofthe Eastern religions.
Obviously, they go backthousands of years, ancient
China, like so.
I'm not talking about them, I'mtalking about Christianity
specifically.

SPEAKER_02 (01:37:50):
Right.

SPEAKER_05 (01:37:50):
Um, the oldest documentable is the Catholic
Church.
Um, and that's where mostCatholics are going to argue
with you when you start talkingabout apologetics, which is the
study of defending yourreligion.
Right.
Is everybody's like, well,especially the Protestants, you
know, where does the Catholicismget its authority?

(01:38:12):
Well, we're the fucking oldest.
So explain that to me.
Like, right, if we're the oldestand you're the younger one,
where do you get your authority?

unknown (01:38:25):
Right.

SPEAKER_05 (01:38:25):
Like everybody is branched off of Catholicism at
some point.
And I I you're right about that.
And the word Catholic is notjust the name of a denomination.
The word Catholic translatedjust means universal.
So we are the universal church.
And if you read the NiceneCreed, we profess faith in one

(01:38:49):
holy Catholic and apostolicfaith.
Meaning it's passed down fromthe apostles, and it's
universal.
You know, and there's differentschisms, people, you know,
disagree and whatever, and thenthey you know they branch off
and whatever.
And but for the most part, untilthe Protestant Reformation, you

(01:39:10):
had 1,500 years of solidCatholicism, or until I think
it's 1047 when the EasternOrthodoxy branched off.
But other than that, you had asolid history for 1,500 years.
And then you mean to tell me forthe last five, all of a sudden,

(01:39:30):
you guys are right?
It all made sense to me.
Right.
Two plus two does not equal fourin this situation.
So that honestly, historically,is the reason why I converted.

SPEAKER_02 (01:39:43):
Right.

SPEAKER_05 (01:39:43):
Because everything else didn't pass the sniff test.
You know?
Well, and the modern day Biblecomes from Catholics, you know.
Um it was put together in thethird and fourth century.
So, you know, and that's whereit comes from.
But he's talking about like theApocrypha and like the extra
books that we added.

(01:40:03):
We didn't add them.
Martin Luther took them away.
But there's a difference.

SPEAKER_04 (01:40:09):
Catholicism came from Italy, right?
Am I wrong in that?

SPEAKER_05 (01:40:14):
I wouldn't say that it came from Italy.
Right.
Um, it is obviouslyheadquartered in Rome now.
Um, and I could get into some ofthe, you know, and I'd have to
do a little bit of research tomake sure I'm not talking up my
ass.
But there's there's an argumentto be made if you study the
Bible and you go from who was incharge at the time.

SPEAKER_03 (01:40:37):
Hi, Natalie.
Um Natalie, hey! says welcomeback.
Thank you.
Yeah, that's right, because wewould have had Ray up here that
night, so that had to have beenin January.
Was it January?
No, it was warm out.
He was up here up at thecottage.

SPEAKER_05 (01:40:52):
Yeah.
It had to have been May.

SPEAKER_03 (01:40:54):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (01:40:55):
Well, anyway, who must not have posted it.
Anyway, I'll work on that.
Um, so yeah, I mean, when youget to when you get to all of
that and you break it down,there's there's a lot of
symmetry in the Bible, right?
Um, and we're gonna get back toyour thing here, but I'll just
say perfect example.
Eve was blamed for being thedownfall, right?

(01:41:18):
Her decision caused original sinto occur, right?
Um always a woman's fault.
And but it was the man'sresponsibility to protect her.

SPEAKER_04 (01:41:29):
Okay.
He should have checked hisbitch, is what he's saying.

SPEAKER_05 (01:41:34):
Adam should have checked his bitch.
So, so but then everybody, youknow, one of the main arguments
against Catholicism is ourveneration of Mary.
All right, so the example isthat Mary is the new Eve.
She was the one that fulfilledby carrying Jesus, she was the

(01:41:54):
one that fulfilled what Evecouldn't do herself.
Right.
Um, which is why we venerateher.
Um, you know, and if the Ark ofthe Covenant carried the
original tablets of the TenCommandments, Aaron's staff, and
some manna from heaven, and itcaused the Ark of the Covenant
to be so holy that entering intothe tabernacle unworthily, God

(01:42:19):
struck you down.
How much more holy is Mary'swomb for carrying Jesus Christ
himself?

SPEAKER_04 (01:42:30):
Right.

SPEAKER_05 (01:42:32):
So there's there's those arguments to be made.
I'll get into that a wholenother time.

SPEAKER_03 (01:42:35):
But right, but we need to do a whole podcast just
about that.

SPEAKER_05 (01:42:38):
Basically, but you know, and it's really
interesting, and I'm I'm afreaking history nerd, and I
really went down a whole rabbithole, and that's well, you know
why I made the decision to made.

SPEAKER_04 (01:42:49):
Yeah, and uh like I said, um, back to what I was
saying, is I have a lot ofrespect for you in that regard.
Um and I'm glad you're doingwhat you're doing.
Thank you.
Because it's I'm sure it's goodfor you.
Thank you, thank you.
You should we've always knownyou're a nerd, you didn't have
to tell us.
You should probably take Charliewith you sometime.

SPEAKER_05 (01:43:10):
He might burst into flame.
I definitely give him some holywater third-degree burn.

SPEAKER_03 (01:43:17):
I definitely can't definitely can't even pull in
the parking lot.

SPEAKER_05 (01:43:22):
I um just kidding.
God loves you, Charlie.
He does.
He does.
That's true.
True story is all of us.
Anyway, but politics.
So let's get back to the I saythat to say this.

SPEAKER_04 (01:43:39):
I don't think your current um prescribed religion
uh or your politics, yourprescribed politics, don't
follow your religion and don'tfollow the teachings of Jesus.
Okay.
How so?

(01:44:00):
How so?

SPEAKER_05 (01:44:01):
Are you gonna jump into immigration?

SPEAKER_04 (01:44:03):
Oh yeah.
Oh yeah.
But I mean, just uh being adecent fucking human being,
period.

SPEAKER_03 (01:44:11):
Well, you're you're a real piece of shit, man.
I'm just no you're saying.

SPEAKER_04 (01:44:15):
No, that's not what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_03 (01:44:17):
You're telling him he's not a decent human being.

SPEAKER_04 (01:44:19):
He's been he's been led astray.
He's been run amuck.
They've been run amuck.
Run amok.

SPEAKER_05 (01:44:26):
I think you already know where I'm gonna go with
this, so I might as well justsay it now.

SPEAKER_02 (01:44:31):
Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_05 (01:44:32):
There is a fine line between open borders and a
reasonable program, which I willadmit our immigration program
fucking sucks and it needs to befixed.
It really does.
It needs to be overhauled,something needs to be done.
Um, and I I don't know ifCharlie agrees with me on that.

(01:44:55):
Um you know, if people want tocome here, fucking let them come
here.
Um, but they gotta do itlegally, and it's the it's the
jumping the border that reallygets me.
It's any other country in theworld.
You look it up.
I mean, your wife, she's fromPoland.

(01:45:16):
You ever Google pictures ofPoland's border and what it
looks like?

SPEAKER_04 (01:45:21):
Uh I I I know it's heavily fortified.
Uh I'll tell you why.
But it's a utopia.
You can't stop.

SPEAKER_05 (01:45:30):
The only reason I say that, and I don't mean to
drag your wife into this,because I respect her.
But right.
I'm just saying the countrieshave an inherent right to
monitor access to the countryfor purposes of security,
national security, whatever.
And, you know, at the end of theday, if people want to come and
immigrate to your country, youhave a right to dictate what

(01:45:54):
that looks like.
And there's countries down southlike New Zealand.
Trump wants to do it here, likethis golden visa, I think is
what he called it, where youspend so much money into the
economy and then they'll getbasically a free pass, you can
come in, whatever.
It's not us, it's not just himthat's saying that.
There are several countriesaround the world, New Zealand

(01:46:16):
being one of them, a lot of umSoutheastern Asian countries do
it too, especially Singapore,that do these kinds of programs.
So it's it's not an unheard ofconcept.
It's not, you know, I it's theit's the illegal immigration.
Because they're saying, and Ican't prove it, right?

(01:46:38):
But um, for argument's sake,let's just say the border was
completely open.
Does that leave us at adisadvantage for our national
security?

SPEAKER_04 (01:46:48):
If the border's completely open, hell yeah, it
does.
Yeah.
And uh I can tell you this.
And I think I said that I agree100% with with Trump when he
said build the wall.
Yeah, build it.
Yeah, because we should weshould should secure our
borders, right?

SPEAKER_05 (01:47:06):
Um and I'm not doing I'm not saying that to, you
know, for people to die crossingthe Rio Grande or anything like
that.
I don't want anybody to die.
They were coming to the UnitedStates because they saw the
United States for what it was.
We truly are the greatestcountry in the world.

(01:47:28):
We have our problems.
God knows we have our problems.
But in comparison, we've allbeen overseas.
We know what some countries looklike.
In comparison, are we better?
And the answer is yes.
That is why those people comehere, and that is why they're
willing to risk their life tocome in.

(01:47:51):
And yes, again, I I I can stillmaintain my opinion that they
need to come legally, but I canalso maintain an argument that
we need to make it a little bitfucking easier to get temporary
asylum.
Because at the end of the day,if they're here, they're here.
Let them fucking stay here.

(01:48:13):
You know, I I agree with whatReagan did.
That was pre-I was born in '91.
So it was I was I was afterReagan, okay?
God damn.
But yeah, I know, you'rewelcome.
So you're young, right?
Yeah, but I agree with whatReagan did.
There was this whole amnestything, uh-huh.
Right?
We when you talk about theseDACA children, all right.

(01:48:35):
I don't want them deported.
They came as a young kid, theyassimilated into this country,
they were not raised in theirold one.

SPEAKER_04 (01:48:45):
You you don't want them deported, yet this
administration that you supportis trying to deport them.

SPEAKER_05 (01:48:52):
Now, I don't know about that because in his
previous term, I remember himputting it out before he got
banned off of Twitter.
I remember him putting out thiswhole thing about how he wanted
he was trying to force Congress.
You know, you guys got sixmonths to figure out what to do

(01:49:13):
with this DACA program.
And originally it wascircumvented around Congress.
DACA was a I think it was anObama thing, wasn't it?
I'm pretty sure it was underObama.
Well, I think it was Clinton.
Clinton, wasn't it?
Clinton.
Anyone, it might have been butthere was no congressional
approval for that program.
It was all an executive actionand nobody really changed.

SPEAKER_03 (01:49:36):
It was Obama.

SPEAKER_05 (01:49:37):
So at the end of the day, I agree with the purposes
of the program, right?
I don't think a person who byfar was raised in this country
and you know English was theirprimary language growing up, or
you know, whatever.
Point is, is if they grew uphere from less than your

(01:49:58):
average, like I can't rememberfrom before when I was four
years old, right?
So if they were brought herearound that period of time and
they don't know a thing abouttheir country, it is inhumane to
send them back to a country thatthey have no fucking idea.
They don't have the streetsmarts to go back and be able to
survive and be safe.

(01:50:19):
Like, that is completely againstwhat I believe.
They need to stay here.
Well, but the stereotypical,illegal, middle-aged man who
jumps the border just because hecan, that's what I have a
problem with.
Come in legally.
That's all I'm saying.

SPEAKER_04 (01:50:40):
And there was a lot.
Yeah, there was a lot.
Sorry.
But but I think Does it makesense?
Yeah, it's a good idea.
Did my line get clearly drawn?
I my my the the father of mygrandchildren is an illegal
immigrant.
He was brought of yourgrandchildren.
Can't you just say your dad?
No, the father of mygrandchildren.

(01:51:01):
The father no, my grandchildren.
I have grandchildren.
I have a daughter who had kidswith an illegal immigrant.
So it'd be like a son-in-law.
Yeah, he's like my son-in-law.
Father.

unknown (01:51:14):
Oh.

SPEAKER_04 (01:51:14):
Okay.
He's a yeah.
He's an illegal.

SPEAKER_05 (01:51:18):
He's been a dude like generation ago.

SPEAKER_04 (01:51:20):
But he wasn't he was brought here when he was two by
his parents.
Yeah.
And he's been here ever since.
Now, he's had a couple run-inswith the law, everything like
that.
And I can almost guarantee youthat when Ice catches up with
his ass, motherfuckers aregetting deported.
Now, when I say he's had acouple run-ins with the law,
it's nothing, no felonies ornothing.

(01:51:42):
You know, he never did anyprison time or anything like
that.
Maybe a couple of misdemeanorshere and there, which he did as
you know as a teenager orwhatever.

SPEAKER_05 (01:51:50):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 (01:51:51):
Yep.
And he did his uh his his timeor whatever, and whatever he had
to do.

SPEAKER_03 (01:51:56):
And well, I've I've I've talked about this before.
So my niece married in a legaland he was brought here as a
kid.
But uncle, whatever, brought himhere from El Salvador.
So he got attorney here,deported himself back to El

(01:52:17):
Salvador for six, eight months,whatever it was, to get cleared
to come back here legally and bea U.S.
citizen.
So, you know, there's optionsout there.
They just don't want to do that.
You know.

SPEAKER_05 (01:52:31):
Well, and especially let's I really heavily want to
focus on this like DACAhypothetical, okay?
I totally agree with theself-deportation method.
I don't know legally, I'm not afreaking lawyer, I'm a barracks
lawyer, but um I don't knowimmigration law to that level,

(01:52:53):
right?
So I don't know what options areout there.
So it's great that he did that,but thinking about it from
specifically, like you know,coming here as a kid, again,
Street Smarts.
If you weren't raised in ElSalvador or Mexico or fucking
India or wherever the fuckyou're from, if you weren't
raised there, how are you gonnanavigate the country and

(01:53:17):
understand?

SPEAKER_03 (01:53:18):
Why is that our problem?
Okay, well, so there so theother thing I'm gonna say is
okay, you were you were broughthere as a two-year-old, and
you're now 32.
So in the last 30 years, whathave you done to provide or do
good for this the citizens ofAmerica?

(01:53:39):
Have you been productive?
Have you kept out of trouble?
Have you started a family?
Have you, you know, where areyou at in your lifestyle?
And If you're running around ina gang or you're getting
arrested all the time, or you'rea drunk driver, you're this,
you're that.
Get the fuck up.
Then right.
So that's what I'm saying aswell, right?
I don't have a problem becauseit wasn't up to the kids, right?

(01:54:02):
That got brought here.
Now, if they're if they're stillkids and they get they get
caught here with their parents,they get deported with the
parents.
Yeah, they don't just get tostay here.
You can't leave right your kidswithout parents, right?
So it's it's it's no different.
Well, you can because okay, sayI do something, I go to prison
for 10 years.
Right.
And I got a two-year-old.

(01:54:22):
What happens if the kid goes inthe system and I go to prison?

SPEAKER_02 (01:54:26):
Right.

SPEAKER_03 (01:54:26):
Right?
So there's no reason why wecan't leave the kid here.
Put the kid in the system, shipthe parent out, or ship the
adult out.
Well, I mean or the parent, orthe parent or the guardian at
the time has a choice.
It's one of those damn kids.

SPEAKER_04 (01:54:44):
The thing is, they are not deporting just
criminals.
They're deporting everybody theyget their hands on.
They're here illegally, right?
So they're criminals.
They came here.
That's a that is a uh comingacross jumping the border is a
civic, civil matter, not acriminal matter.
It's a civil matter.
Chat GPT.

(01:55:05):
Yep, chat GPT.

SPEAKER_05 (01:55:09):
You gotta download the app, man.
It's a lot better.

SPEAKER_04 (01:55:12):
Hold on.
Yeah, I I got the app righthere.
You gotta get you gotta get theapp, Charlie.
We're old.
We can't.

SPEAKER_05 (01:55:21):
We need to get an immigration attorney.
That'd be fun to have aconversation with.
Um but on just a principalbasis, okay?
Strictly this is thehypothetical, you know,
whatever.
Um I am silent.

SPEAKER_03 (01:55:43):
Federal misdemeanor.

SPEAKER_05 (01:55:44):
Federal misdemeanor.

SPEAKER_03 (01:55:46):
First time.

SPEAKER_05 (01:55:49):
When does it become a felony?

SPEAKER_03 (01:55:51):
Six months in jail.
And or fines for first offense.

SPEAKER_05 (01:55:55):
So if you're caught for the first offense, it's a
misdemeanor.
You come back and you do itagain, it becomes a felony.
Yep.

SPEAKER_04 (01:56:04):
And however, unlawful press, for example,
overstaying a visa, which iswhat a majority of these
illegals do, they overstay avisa.
It's a civil immigrationviolation handled through
decreasing courts and notcriminal court.

SPEAKER_05 (01:56:20):
So think about it this way, though.
So wait, okay, so ICE is theimmigrations and customs
enforcement agency.

SPEAKER_03 (01:56:27):
So we should just stop issuing visas.
If if visas are being abused,right?
Yeah, then we should stopissuing.

SPEAKER_04 (01:56:36):
Let me let me ask you this.
Let me ask you this.
Did you guys see what happenedin Chicago?
The fucking Black Hawkhelicopters and and people
kicking in the doors and shit ofthis apartment building.
I haven't seen this.
So ice came in on Blackhawkhelicopters, landed on the roof,
uh, also came through the thethe you know on the ground,

(01:56:59):
jumping through windows andshit, dragging black and brown
people out into the fuckingstreet, naked babies, naked
kids, zip tied to each other anddragged them out in the fucking
street.
So and and some of those peoplewere illegal.
A lot of them were black people,right?

(01:57:22):
Um I don't think I don't think,and and I've said this before in
here, I look at everythingthrough the lens of a black man
in America, okay?
That's the lens I see this worldthrough.
You're not black, you'reracially ambiguous.
That's the lens I see see thisworld through, right?

(01:57:42):
Um and it it is communities ofcolor that are suffering the
injustices and the and the uhand being dragged out of their
house for no other reason beingpoor and black in this fucking
country.
They weren't illegal.
They weren't illegal.
And you know what, you know whatthey heard ICE saying about

(01:58:04):
those naked kids that theydragged out of the fucking place
at two, three o'clock in themorning?
The ice agents said, fuck themkids.
So is is is that a policy, isthat something that you guys
agree with?
Absolutely not.
So wait a minute, hold up.
I listen, when you the policythat I would agree with you

(01:58:27):
elected Donald Trump, when youdid that, I knew that was gonna
happen.

SPEAKER_03 (01:58:32):
Okay.

SPEAKER_04 (01:58:33):
I knew it was gonna happen.
You didn't know it was gonnahappen, but you don't support
it.
You just said you don't supportwhat that kind of shit.
I knew that was gonna happen.

SPEAKER_03 (01:58:41):
I have no problem raiding an apartment building
that has illegals in it.
Sure, our our actual Americansare gonna get caught up in it
and have to go through a littlebit of hassle.
But here's my next question isif I'm there as a legal American
and I know someone's in mybuilding that's illegal and
they're doing these raids, guesswhat I'm gonna do?
They're an apartment 2C, they'rein apartment 4B, they're in

(01:59:05):
apartment 18A, right?
Don't kick in my door, kick intheir doors, right?
Community policing, it's nodifferent.
You look at the south side ofChicago, Walmart and Target
left.
Now people are bitching they'vegot to drive 30 minutes to go to
the grocery store.
Why?
Because they're tired of theirtheir stores getting ransacked,
robbed, and everything elseconstantly.

(01:59:27):
So they're billion-dollarcompanies leaving.
Why?
Because people in the communityweren't policing themselves and
let these stores get ransackedand robbed and everything else.
So out, gone.
Right.
And so all they had to do waspick up the phone and say, Yeah,
they're sitting on the cornerright now, these are the people
that are doing this or doingthat.
Get them rounded up, butinstead, I don't want to see

(01:59:48):
another.
Do you know why they don't doso?
So can it can I jump in?

SPEAKER_05 (01:59:51):
All right.
So we'll get we'll get to itbecause I I completely disagree
with these raids.
Um I have And I don't know aboutvoting for it.
I don't know about Chicago.

SPEAKER_03 (02:00:04):
I have no problem with Reds.

SPEAKER_05 (02:00:06):
And I do too, because I do know that people
are going to get caught up.
But here's the thing Chicago iswell within the 100-mile border,
um, a hundred mile zone of theU.S.
Do you know this rule?
It's basically the the the lawof stop and frisk and all that.

(02:00:28):
100 miles specific toimmigration is extended to 100
miles within the country.
Okay.
I'm pretty sure Chicago isoutside of that.
So because of that, I dodisagree with it.
I think it is inhumane tofucking do that shit at three
o'clock in the morning like it'sa fucking swap rate.

SPEAKER_03 (02:00:47):
I'm sure it is.
I gotta go all the way throughWisconsin.

SPEAKER_05 (02:00:50):
These these immigration, you know, actions
and stuff.
Yeah, I I do disagree because Ido believe that some of the
rhetoric has probably giventhese guys a little bit of a
little bit an inflated ego.
And, you know, and and they'rethey've been their rules of
engagement.

(02:01:11):
Think about rules of engagementwhen you guys were overseas,
right?
So everybody hates having theirhands tied.
And over the last over a decade,because we had Obama, we had a
very small thing about Trump,and then we had Biden for eight
years.
Alright?
No, four years.
Four years.

(02:01:32):
So we had um Obama for eight,Trump for four.
Trump for four.
Who was it?
Oh, Bush.
Okay, sorry.
Bush, Obama, Trump, Biden.
Okay.
Anyway.
The point is, um during theDemocratic years, they ICE

(02:01:55):
immediately gets handcuffs puton them.
They're not they're not allowedto do shit.
And and it's like Are you sureabout that?
No, because Obama, you know whatthey called Obama?
I believe the mass deporter.
The deporter in chief.
That's what they called.
They he deported a lot.

SPEAKER_03 (02:02:14):
But it's 230 miles.

SPEAKER_05 (02:02:17):
Okay, so it's well within the border.
I disagree with that.
A better way of doing it wouldhave been to do a 6:30 a.m.
raid, surround the building, andas people leave, you don't
fucking raid their.

SPEAKER_03 (02:02:32):
They're not they're not gonna leave.
They're gonna hold up in theapartment for the next two
weeks, and you can't justifyleaving all these officers out
on the street for two weeks.

SPEAKER_04 (02:02:43):
Then you then you um it you know what it was about?
They recorded all of that.
And they made a little fuckingmovie that they put on their
social media for the fuckingWhite House of people coming in
on black ha hawk helicopters andkicking in the doors.
It was a fucking production, iswhat it was.

(02:03:04):
It was like they're going afterOsama bin Laden.
Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (02:03:07):
Fucking so, and I I disagree with all of that.
I do.
You were saying that youdisagreed with me on the
religious aspect because I was Iwas violating my you know the
religious part of it.
Yeah.
And here's the reality.
The reality is that I do nothave to- I don't want you to get
offended by that.

SPEAKER_04 (02:03:26):
No, it's okay.

SPEAKER_05 (02:03:27):
I do not have to agree with everything that my
bishop says or that the popesays.
But as a faithful Catholic, Ihave to abide by the things that
they come out and say.
Right?
So um, if that's immigration,and we're supposed to help those

(02:03:48):
who are seeking asylum andeverything else, that's fine.
But notice what they are saying.
They are saying those immigrantswho are coming here to seek
safety and asylum, they saynothing about the illegal
immigration.

SPEAKER_03 (02:04:04):
The issue with the seeking legal asylum.
International law that isabused.
International law says you haveto go to the nearest country
that your war, right, or whatyou're being persecuted for,
isn't involved in.
So if you're in El Salvador,you've got to cross about four

(02:04:25):
countries to get to the UnitedStates.
Right.
Shouldn't.
Shouldn't.
Right?
You should go to the nextcountry.
So we should only be acceptingpeople from Mexico or Canada.

SPEAKER_05 (02:04:38):
Right.

SPEAKER_03 (02:04:39):
They are the only ones that are allowed to come to
the United States to seekasylum.
Right.
Right.
Not people from El Salvador,Chile, Brazil, Uganda, or
wherever else they're comingfrom.
Right?
That's it.
So this this whole seekingasylum for their safety thing is
a bunch of BS, they just want tocome here because we live
better.

SPEAKER_05 (02:05:00):
I think and it also has to do with our our
citizenship, which is still tiedup in the courts.
Um, if you're here and you'reborn here, you become a
natural-born citizen of theUnited States, and now you have
an argument to stay, even ifyou're illegal.
Um they're trying to take away.

But here's the thing (02:05:21):
look at how other countries do their
citizenship and how many arenatural-born citizens.
Or not other countries exactly.
We're America, and the argumentfor American citizenship has
never been natural born.

(02:05:44):
It is, in my opinion, based ondifferent documents and YouTube
videos that I've watched,there's this lawyer that goes
through and reads, you know,Supreme Court briefings and shit
like that, and explains thelegalese out of it.
Um, he's a pretty interestingguy.
But I watched several of hisvideos specifically about the

(02:06:04):
citizenship topic, and heexplains that back in the old
days there was this oneparticular case about the person
who was born here was thechildren of diplomats of another
country.
So he was born here, right, buthis allegiance was to his home

(02:06:25):
country.
And when you broke down the USConstitution, it doesn't say
anything about natural borncitizenship.
Right, it talks about where youhave your allegiance.
And so there was an argument tobe made there, and of course I'm
GPT that one.

(02:06:46):
Yeah, so I'm I'm paraphrasingsignificantly because he
explained it in a wholedifferent thing.
But um let's see, natural borncitizenship what I believe uh
hold on in the USA versuscitizenship based on primary

(02:07:17):
oops, allegiance.
Okay, excellent question.
Um two very different bases forunderstanding citizenship, one
in birth and one in law.
Um citizenship.
Um, citizenship acquiredautomatically at birth by virtue

(02:07:39):
of being born within a country'sterritory.
The legal foundation of theUnited States is um established
by the 14th Amendment, which wasratified in 1868, and this is
what he was talking about.
So listen to this carefully.

SPEAKER_02 (02:07:50):
Yep.

SPEAKER_05 (02:07:51):
All persons born or naturalized in the United States
and subject to the jurisdictionthereof are citizens of the
United States and of the statewherein they reside.
So the key point that they'regoing to be arguing at SCOTUS is
and subject to the jurisdictionthereof.

(02:08:13):
And the uh the I don't know ifit's prosecution or defense in
this case, or you know, whoever,but anyway, the people voting or
arguing against are saying,well, this diplomat's child was
in the United States, subject toour jurisdiction, and so he's a
U.S.
citizen.
Was he subject to ourjurisdiction?

(02:08:34):
He was here under a diplomaticvisa because of his parents and
their official business andtheir official capacity, and
every understanding was thatthey were going to return to
their country when theirassignment was completed.
So were they actually under ourjurisdiction?
They were subject to our laws,sure.

(02:08:56):
You know, but they were alsodiplomats, so they also have
diplomatic immunity.
So were they subject to ourjurisdiction?

SPEAKER_04 (02:09:06):
But we're not talking about diplomats, are we?
That's a good-looking koozie.
Lion's koozie.
Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_05 (02:09:13):
Um, but that's that's the argument.
And I kind of agree with that.
I'm not gonna lie to you.
I mean, if the Constitution sayssubject to the jurisdiction
thereof, you are subject to thejurisdiction of the United
States and its laws.
If you have diplomatic immunity,you're not subject to our
jurisdiction.
If if you commit murder in theUnited States, yeah, we may not

(02:09:34):
be able to prosecute you, but wecan declare you um oh, what's
that Latin term?
Uh hold on.
No.
Latin term for hold on.

SPEAKER_03 (02:09:58):
Well, I think that was one of the arguments they
were trying to make, is like,okay, if you're here Persona non
grata.
If you're here illegally and youhave a child, that child's not a
product of the United States,right?
Right.
Because you're not a product ofthe United States.
So they were here on an officialbusiness.

SPEAKER_05 (02:10:18):
Same with illegal.

SPEAKER_03 (02:10:22):
But that's what they're saying about the anchor
babies for illegal immigration.

SPEAKER_05 (02:10:25):
Right.

SPEAKER_03 (02:10:26):
Right?
You're not here legally, so thatmeans your child can't be born
here legally, even if they areborn here, they're still not
because you're not a U.S.
citizen, just because they'reborn here.
Right?
So I think that was one of thearguments they were trying to
make.

SPEAKER_05 (02:10:40):
And, you know, yeah, we go overseas and we have a kid
in another country, you know.
Um hold on.
So Your list of countries thatlist of countries that have

(02:11:09):
natural earth citizenship.

(02:11:29):
Okay.
One, two, three, four, five,six, seven.
There are seven legitimatecountries that have citizenship
by natural birth.
Um it lists the United States asone of them, but we will find

(02:11:49):
out if that happens or if thatchanges.
The other ones are Canada,Mexico, Brazil, Argentina,
Paraguay, and Liberia.
And it does say some CaribbeanLatin American countries like
Antigua Barbuda, um, but there'sa lot of caveats on that.
So many countries do not offerunconditional Josuli, which is

(02:12:12):
you know Latin for anyway, orhave significantly limited
versions of it.
Some countries permit birthrightcitizenship only if one or both
parents have legal residency.
The child remains in the countryfor a certain number of years,
the child requests citizenshipupon reaching adulthood, or the
law is designed to preventstatelessness, which is

(02:12:33):
horrible.
Um, there was a movie made aboutthat with Tom Hanks.
So, um, in Europe, for instance,most countries use just sanguess
citizenship by descent ratherthan unrestricted birthright.
So, like an Irish person here inAmerica, if they can trace their
ancestry to an Irish, you know,and I think there's a limit, I

(02:12:57):
think it's like to yourgreat-grandparents or something,
you could apply for Irishcitizenship.

SPEAKER_04 (02:13:02):
We used to do that with uh Italian citizenship.
We were working.

SPEAKER_05 (02:13:05):
And I think Italians still do it actually.

SPEAKER_04 (02:13:07):
Well, they they they took it away.
Oh, did they?
Uh just recently, because we hada grandfather, uh
great-grandfather, probablygreat-great-grandfather, that
was uh uh you have it they wouldhave to be not um they not
become an American citizen.
So I had one grandparent thatdidn't become a uh an American

(02:13:31):
citizen, and uh we could havegotten our Italian citizenship
based off of that.
But they've so done away withthat.

SPEAKER_05 (02:13:39):
So what are your what do you think about this
argument?
I think if and I I I hadmentioned other countries, and
you said we're not othercountries.
But here's the thing there issomething to say about how other
countries do it, you know, andif the vast majority of the 198

(02:14:00):
countries, 97 countries in theworld, if seven of them
supposedly, almost probablymaybe gonna be six soon, right?
If only six offer that, I thinkthere's something to say about
that.

SPEAKER_04 (02:14:13):
I mean, is every uh hold on a second.
Hold on one second, okay?
Hold on.
If every civilized country oradvanced country in in the world
provides their citizens' healthcare, should we not do it?

(02:14:38):
And provide our citizens healthcare?

SPEAKER_05 (02:14:40):
Every development's health care.

SPEAKER_04 (02:14:42):
No, no, no, no, every single one.
We do offer every single one.
No, we don't.

SPEAKER_05 (02:14:46):
It's not under a univ universal health care
system.
Uh-huh.
You're gonna argue this with aperson who's got a bachelor's
degree in health administration.

unknown (02:14:53):
Okay.

SPEAKER_05 (02:14:54):
Okay, the argument, what you're trying to say is
universal health care, correct?

SPEAKER_04 (02:15:01):
Right.

SPEAKER_05 (02:15:01):
But we have legal, we have law, right?
Mtella is one of them, theemergency medical, uh, emergency
medical treatment and labor act,I believe is how it's spell out.
But yeah, in emergencysituations, you're not allowed
to be declined, you know.
So um, and most places write itoff anyway, if you show up
anyway.

SPEAKER_04 (02:15:20):
Real quick, I want to uh Michael.

SPEAKER_02 (02:15:23):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 (02:15:23):
Uh so Michael, yeah, we're we do a podcast.
Uh and um and you're on ourpodcast right now.
It's veteran, it's veteranfocused, but we uh get into uh I
so my question is do you want todo you wanna add to uh this a

(02:15:44):
little bit?
Do you have the time?
Do you have the time?
But hold on a second.
I I gotta introduce you first.

SPEAKER_01 (02:15:51):
Okay.

SPEAKER_04 (02:15:52):
Okay.
So uh Michael, uh it's MichaelLeBune, uh, very good friend of
mine.
He was uh one of my soldiers.
I initially met him when I was adrill sergeant uh in Fort
Jackson.
I'm sorry, Michael.
And we both ended up at FortHood together.
I'm sorry about that, too.

(02:16:13):
We both deployed Iraq together.
Um and then um Michael went onto work at the um Michael
actually got a purple heart uhwhen we were overseas together.
Um then um he went on to work uhat the White House

(02:16:35):
Communications Agency for many,many years.
Oh shit.
Um under Barack Obama, and thenyou got out, you got your uh you
went to what what college didyou go to initially?

SPEAKER_01 (02:16:50):
Uh undergrad, I went to the University of Illinois,
Urbana Champaign, and then whereI got a bachelor's of science in
psychology with a focus onneuroscience and a bachelor's of
arts in philosophy.
And then I went to Vanderbilt,or where I got a Masters of
Divinity.

SPEAKER_05 (02:17:08):
Okay, so you're an overachiever.

SPEAKER_01 (02:17:10):
Now I'm at the now I'm at uh Minnesota Carlson
where I'm getting my master's ofbusiness.

SPEAKER_04 (02:17:15):
So um yeah, he's an overachiever, but I I you know
uh I'm very proud of Michael.
Um now that's those are legitcredentials.
So uh he um he his fatheractually uh performed my my
first uh wedding.
Uh his father was uh a pastor,right?

SPEAKER_01 (02:17:38):
Yeah, yeah, still is.

SPEAKER_04 (02:17:40):
Yep, still is.
Uh and uh Michael is also you'reyou're uh you were a um help me
out.

SPEAKER_01 (02:17:50):
I'm a clinical chaplain.

SPEAKER_04 (02:17:52):
Yep, chaplain.

SPEAKER_01 (02:17:53):
Um I'm ordained to the Christian Church Disciples
of Christ, and now I'm in umleadership, hospital leadership.

SPEAKER_04 (02:17:59):
Yeah, okay.
So legit.
This guy's legit.
So we're we're we're we'regetting into politics a little
bit here, and and um Brent, Ihave Brent here and also
Charlie, right?
Uh both veterans.
We're both all VFW members, anduh we do this podcast.

(02:18:21):
Um it's usually it's veteranfocused.
Um, but then we we're uh now weare getting in, and I've been
telling Brent, who's a devoutCatholic, um, how I was proud of
him for becoming a Catholic andand uh uh but I don't think that
his politics line up with hisfaith.

(02:18:43):
Right?
Is that fair to say?

SPEAKER_03 (02:18:46):
My my in the discussion I've heard, that's
that's fair to say.
Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 (02:18:49):
It's a pretty strange thing for you to say
unless you're Catholic, though,Trey.

SPEAKER_04 (02:18:53):
Uh okay.
Go ahead.

SPEAKER_01 (02:18:56):
You're you're an out-group member telling an
in-group member that he's notin-group enough.

SPEAKER_05 (02:19:02):
We're not Catholic.
That's the masters of divinitytalking right there.

SPEAKER_01 (02:19:07):
So um my point Also, the Catholic Church is like
divided 50-50.
Like 49% are on the left and 51%are on the right, and then every
four years it swabs.

SPEAKER_04 (02:19:19):
That's true.
Brilliant.
So um, I just wanted to get yourtake.
Being a uh uh I'd I'd lean onMichael.
Michael's like one of my bestfriends in the world.
Um, how much does he pay you?

SPEAKER_01 (02:19:36):
I'm still paying off my tab, don't worry.

SPEAKER_04 (02:19:39):
And uh, but uh spiritual matters.
I I uh I defer to Michael forthose so because I am not as
spiritual as he is, he grew upspiritual, right?
Right, he's still a spiritualman, okay.
Chaplain indeed.

(02:20:01):
So what is uh I heard so I Ithis is my take is that he likes
to interrupt, Michael.

SPEAKER_05 (02:20:09):
Sorry.

SPEAKER_04 (02:20:09):
I he knows.
He's known me years.
Um that I feel like the currentadministration uh is not
following the teachings of JesusChrist.

SPEAKER_01 (02:20:23):
Oh my god.
Yeah, obviously.
That's um they preach itunquestionably true.
They preach it, but they don'teven preach it.
So um there's well they pretendto preach it, I should say.
A couple things here.
I'll I'll just say this.

(02:20:44):
It's just like how you know thenationalist uh national
socialism was like the the NaziParty, right?
The National Socialism ofGermany or whatever.
Like when you see what Nazisdid, what like it was an
acronym, nationalist socialistsomething something.
Um but the Nazis weren'tsocialists, like the only thing
socialist about them was wastheir name.
And the same is true for the farright now in the in the United

(02:21:06):
States that like they areChristian nationalists, that is
the name of it, but there'snothing Christian about it.
In the same way, in the same waythat a tit mouse is a bird.
You know, it's neither a tit nora mouse, but it does have those
words in it, right?
So um the Christian nationalismis actually the worship of uh

(02:21:26):
it's actually the worship of thestate.
It it has nothing to do withJesus.
And if you watch their like,even if you go to these
Christo-fascist Christiannationalist churches, if you go
to their websites, if you listento their sermons, I do all of
that because I'm a button forpunishment.
But um they they almost neverread the words of Jesus.
In fact, they they almost neverquote the gospels.

(02:21:48):
Uh they they love to read theteachings of Paul, but they
will, they they they know verylittle, if anything at all,
about the teachings of Jesus.
Um that but but here's the thingit's that's too high a bar to
ask for any government becauseum if you wanted the like the
the the Democrats don't do thateither.
So they're they do a lot morelike taking care of the poor.

(02:22:09):
Uh you know, I mean they dobetter with that.
They they do want health carefor all, which the argument I
heard about healthcare for allis very disingenuous to say that
the emergency room covers that.
We're no it doesn't cover that,but it's but it's also
disingenuous to say every otherfree nation has it.
So our healthcare system is verysimilar to Germany's, where
basically our health care istied to our bosses.

(02:22:30):
And this is what to me, I thinkit's the craziest thing in the
world that we put the power oflife and death in the hands of
our bosses.
Because if they fire you, youlose your health care, which is
nuts.

SPEAKER_05 (02:22:39):
Unless you pay for Cobra, which is fucking
thousands of dollars a month.

SPEAKER_01 (02:22:43):
For that, right.
So um, but but if you were ifyou had if you designed a
country around the teachings ofJesus, you'd have to treat the
immigrant the same as you treatthe citizen.
You have no such thing as amilitary, and you would have
absolutely no no borderenforcement.
There would be no reason to dothat.

(02:23:04):
You would you would have to giveto the least among you uh the
most power and the mostresources, and uh all the rich
people would be exiled.
There's not a Jesus didn't evenwant that.
Jesus didn't want to be agovernmental figure.
Uh he he had opportunity afteropportunity after opportunity.
Uh in fact, that's a large lotof people think that's what

(02:23:26):
Judas was after.
So I would say Christiannationalism is very close to the
beliefs and the actions of Judaswho sacrificed the person Jesus
for the political figure thatthey want.
And that's precisely what we'reseeing Christianity do uh on the
on the right, uh certainfactions of it, especially,
especially anyone callingthemselves a Christian
nationalist.

(02:23:46):
And it's certainly uh what'shappening that's benefiting the
Republicans in this country andhas been since the advent of the
Tea Party.

SPEAKER_05 (02:23:54):
Can you go back to what you had said?
Um I was trying to chat GPT,because I'll be honest, I'm a
glutton for punishment with ChatGPT.
So uh, but I liked what yousaid.
You said if you designed acountry around the teachings of
Jesus, what did you say afterthat?
Because I I missed the the finalpart.

SPEAKER_01 (02:24:14):
I'm not sure exactly what my wording was, but I
wouldn't I I there certainly hasnever been um any state
government that's designeditself around the teachings of
Jesus.
The two are antithetical.

SPEAKER_04 (02:24:24):
You would give you would give the least among us
the most power.
Yeah, you would exile the rich.
Yeah, definitely.

SPEAKER_01 (02:24:31):
Whatever you do to the least among you, you do to
me.
And um the but overall, Jesusspends a lot of the a lot of
time throughout his life uhchallenging the the authority of
the state, challenging whetheror not the state has authority.
Uh he does this in prettysubversive ways, and ultimately
it's what gets him killed.

(02:24:51):
So Rome didn't kill him for noreason.
Um they killed him because hewas taking on the titles that
were supposed to be for Caesaralone.
And then when when asked like aquestion like uh, you know,
should we pay our taxes?
He tosses the coin to him, says,give unto Caesar what is
Caesar's, because Caesar's faceis on this coin.
And he says, and given to Godwhat is gods?

(02:25:12):
Well, to first century Jews,this would have been a very
clear statement that if you giveunto God what is gods, then
there's nothing left for Caesar.
You see, so every single partabout this amazing book.
It's called The Subversion ofChristianity by Jacques Elul,
who's a French thinker.
I think he died in like earlyaughts, maybe late 90s.
Um the subversion ofChristianity, where he talks

(02:25:34):
about how Christianity existsreally in the same way.
If you think about first centuryJews in Rome, they were
subversive.
Uh, except for there was afaction of them who were
siphoning power from the state.
And uh, those are the ones thatJesus is talking to when he
talks to the Pharisees and theSadducees.
Not all Pharisees were likethat.
He's talking specifically tothem.
Kind of like when I talk shitabout the Christians, I'm really

(02:25:56):
just talking about theChristians who are trying to
siphon power from you know farright-wing fascism.

SPEAKER_05 (02:26:03):
So um I'm not gonna get into the entire response,
but um I have a GPT that isspecifically designed um by the
rules that I've given it tofollow completely without ex uh
without um uh my expressapproval to follow the catechism

(02:26:28):
of the Catholic Church, all ofthe historical teachings of all
the various councils, such asthe Council of Nicaea, um, and
the writings that came fromthem, um, you know, the the
historical saints and whatthey've written, you know, X, Y,
and Z, blah blah blah blah blah.
Okay.
Um that, and I have two versionsof that.

(02:26:49):
One is like my serious literalquestions, and then literally
one that's called hyperbole,religious hyperbole, because I
wanted one that was serious thatI could refer back to, and I
wanted one that I could justmess around with.
Because being a formerProtestant, you know, there's a
lot of things I'm workingthrough.
So um, I'm not gonna go throughthe entire response to what I

(02:27:11):
had asked it about what you hadsaid, if you, you know, built a
country around the teachings ofJesus and so on and so forth.
But one section is labeled whata nation shaped by Jesus would
look like.
And it says, if you really triedto design such a society
faithfully, it would look likeless like a Marxist reversal of
wealth, and more like a fewthings.

(02:27:34):
Laws built on the dignity ofevery human person, and it
quotes the catechism, paragraph1930, protection of the
vulnerable, and it quotesparagraphs 2443 through 2449,
preferential option for thepoor, social structures that
ensure no one is excluded, astewardship of your wealth, so

(02:27:55):
those who have share, and thosewho lack received, with no
forced exile, and then authorityexercised as service, not
dominance.
Um, and it refers to uh Johnchapter 13 verses 14 and 15.
So um it tells me that that'sthe Catholic version of social

(02:28:17):
order drawn from Jesus'teaching, again, pursuant to the
rules that I've given that chat.
So would you agree or disagreewith that?

SPEAKER_01 (02:28:28):
So I disagree only that only in the sense that um I
mean I don't I don't disagreewith the thought experiment that
that's what it might look like.
Um I I I firmly disagree thatJesus would ever do such a
thing.

SPEAKER_00 (02:28:43):
Right.

SPEAKER_01 (02:28:43):
Um because just simply because states are rooted
in violent power.
Every law is rooted in violentpower.
My son is blowing up, I have togo.
But um, but but I certainly signme up.
I mean, if you find a way tohave a country run that way,
then absolutely sign me up.
I think that that it's takingdirectly from the Sermon on the
Mount.
Um anybody interested in inknowing what Jesus was about,

(02:29:04):
the Sermon on the Mount servesas a sort of greatest hits album
of like Jesus' most famoussermons.
So um, yeah, and it it spellsout a lot of that.
And you you look at that, if youread that, and then you try to
map it on to any of our nationalpolitics, it's embarrassing.
But it's also it's also not whatgovernments do.
Governments don't follow such athing.
It's like asking a corporationto care about poor people.

(02:29:27):
Corporations are designed tomaximize wealth for their
shareholders, right?
To maximize shareholder value.
So I I just think um I thinkthat when we're trying to follow
Jesus, uh, then we'reautomatically trying to live
peaceful lives and thegovernments are inherently
violent.
Um, if you don't believe me,just check out what happens to
Jesus at the end of the story.

(02:29:48):
So um I think uh, but yeah, Ithink I think your chat's right
about if we if we take thevalues of Jesus and then we try
to think about what they wouldlook like in national policy.
In general, I think what we canbest we can hope for.
Is harm reduction.
And um, for me, that looks likenot having masked federal agents
stealing people and shoving themin vans.
So um, hey, Trey, I love you.

SPEAKER_04 (02:30:10):
Love you, buddy.
I will call you later.

SPEAKER_01 (02:30:13):
Listen, when you send me a text like are you
busy, it makes me thinksomething is really, really
wrong, which is why I thoughtsomething is wrong.

SPEAKER_04 (02:30:20):
There is something wrong.
We'll talk about that later,though.

SPEAKER_01 (02:30:23):
All right, talk to you later, brother.

SPEAKER_05 (02:30:24):
All right, love you.

SPEAKER_04 (02:30:27):
So that was him saying, Don't say that again.
Uh that say, yeah, don't say areyou busy.
I don't know.
Me and him have a uh a love-haterelationship.
No, not a love.

SPEAKER_05 (02:30:38):
We have a love-love relationship, really, to be
honest with you.
Uh so I liked what he had tosay.
Um, but and I think we turnedour political discussion into
the religious one that I said wewere gonna have later.
Right.

SPEAKER_04 (02:30:51):
Um but I mean uh see my point in Let's go back to the
politics.
My point in talking about thatis is that this this policy that
this administration is isenacting is it's cruel.
It is.
It's not it's not what you'regonna take my seat.
Yeah, took the seat, yeah.

(02:31:12):
I don't think it's it's what andand I I'm coming at you from a
religious perspective because inmy mind, in my mind, you're
commented.
I don't know if he's watching.
You're a religious man.
So uh so uh that's why I gotinto that.
But here's what I think, and youguys might not believe it.

(02:31:36):
I I know you guys don't believeit, you don't see it.
Um I don't think that this wholeplan is about following the law
and you know doing what's rightand blah blah blah.
I think it's about keepingkeeping no keeping America
white.

(02:31:58):
I say, Charlie, you're laughing,but but let's look at who
they're going after.
Okay?
There are huge, huge amounts ofPolish uh illegal immigrants in
Chicago.
I haven't heard one fuckingstory about them going into a
Polish neighborhood andsnatching people out of their

(02:32:20):
fucking beds in the middle ofthe world.

SPEAKER_03 (02:32:21):
You know why you won't?
Because it's not polarizing.

SPEAKER_04 (02:32:25):
It's not polarizing.
That's the reason why you won't.
Just like how many.
Do you do you know who I'mmarried to, right?
I do.
Do you or do you not think thatshe's not plugged into that
community over there?
She is.
And they are not going in thosecommunities.
Why is that?
They're gonna break in firstMexican Americans.

(02:32:49):
The Mexicans that are here, theMexicans that are here, by and
large, are not breaking are notbreaking the law.
Are not breaking the law.

SPEAKER_05 (02:32:57):
No, I agree.

SPEAKER_04 (02:32:58):
No, I you know not more than not more than those
Polish people.
You know what the Polish peopledo?
They work in construction andother shit that we don't want to
do, that Americans don't want todo.
Mexicans too.

SPEAKER_05 (02:33:11):
Mexicans too, yeah.
Here's the thing.
Here's the thing.
We could go down all of thesenuances and all of this other
stuff.

SPEAKER_04 (02:33:18):
Have you heard Stephen Miller's speech at
Charlie Kirk's memorial?

unknown (02:33:23):
No.

SPEAKER_04 (02:33:24):
Have you listened to it?
Please, I beg you, I beg you tolisten to that speech.
How did you feel about uh andand and tell me we'll get to
that?
And tell me if that's not afucking Nazi rallying cry when
he's speaking at that, when he'sspeaking at he's talking about

(02:33:46):
we build things, you buildnothing.
Who's we?
Who's the we build things, youbuild?
Who's the we in this we buildthings and you build nothing?
I I can tell you because they'rethere are your interpretation of
what he says.
Uh not just my interpretation,but ex-white supremacists.

(02:34:08):
Said he is that is a uh uh aNazi speech.
If I ever fucking heard one,they always talk about how the
white race builds things andother races don't build shit.
That that is I I beg you.

SPEAKER_05 (02:34:26):
I'm not a white supremacist, so I don't know
what their ideality is.

SPEAKER_04 (02:34:28):
I'm not either.
But I beg you to listen to thatspeech and not think to
yourself, are you a coloredsupremacist?
No, I'm a I'm a personsupremacist.
Oh people.
So why did you take that awayfrom Charlie?
Charlie needs nobody wants tohear the Marine talk.
Charlie needs one there.

SPEAKER_05 (02:34:46):
No, um, we can go down all these nuances, and and
here's the thing this is thepart about politics that gets to
me is the the high theunsubstantiated hyperbole and
these what if nuances, um, this,that, and another thing.
Because you can talk about thoseuntil you're blue in the face,

(02:35:08):
until something actually happensin the Polish community,
according to your example.
And it's and it's just again,until something happens, it's
hyperbole and conjecture.
Um, and this is how most peopleargue politics.
It's by emotion and not by data,and not by you know, you know,

(02:35:29):
anyway, I could I could go onthat forever.
But specifically talking aboutyour argument of how politics
don't align with my faith, Italked to my chat GPT.

SPEAKER_02 (02:35:40):
I talked to my chat GPT.

SPEAKER_05 (02:35:42):
I because look, uh the reality is, and you know
this because of things that youknow, motions and and shit that
I've put down at the floor atthe post, I a lot of the time
cannot articulate myself verywell.
Um, and so Charlie is prettygood at words.
Um, so anyway, but this isgiving me the uh the substance

(02:36:06):
that I really can't come up withmyself.
Um, and I asked it, do mypolitics have to align with my
Catholic faith explicitly?
And the answer is um theprinciple is that faith must
inform conscience.
So, in the formation ofconscience, the word of God is
the light for our path.
That is the catechism, uh,paragraph 1785.

(02:36:29):
Okay, you are morally obligatedto let the gospel shape how you

view every issue (02:36:34):
life, justice, peace, the poor, the
environment, immigration,economics.
Faith is not a separate privatezone, it's the lens through
which a Catholic seeseverything.
So, which is why I called outthe um inhumanity of sending a
person who was raised in theUnited States and doesn't

(02:36:56):
remember their home countrybeing deported.
I called that out.
I called out the Black Hawkhelicopter invasion of some
random fucking building inChicago, both on a legal and a
moral stance, because I said thehundred-mile exclusionary zone,
and I also mentioned that Idisagreed with the 3 a.m.
fucking I don't like those evenfor a regular American criminal.

(02:37:20):
How many cops have died doingthese no-knock in the middle of
the morning fucking it's notsafe, and they do it under the
premise because oh, the person'sprobably sleeping, this, that,
and another thing.
We can easily overpower them.
I disagree with that becausethat's a power move.
The other thing is that personis legit gonna wake up in a

(02:37:43):
stupor thinking that somefucking robber, and this is why
it has happened, why cops havedied, they're gonna come in
thinking that their house isbeing invaded.
They grab their gun and theystart shooting.
Yep.
Alright, so I disagree with bothof those points.
Alright, so moving on.
But no political party fullyrepresents Catholic teaching,

(02:38:07):
not a single one, fully, whichis why he said, Michael said,
we're like 49% left, and youknow, and we switch.
That's why we don't fully dothat.
And we're supposed to allow ourconscience, our faith to inform
our conscience, right?
Do all of us no, right?

(02:38:27):
Right.
We're human, but you don't, butwe should, okay.
Next thing the church's pastorsdo not intervene in political
matters in favor of one or theother political option.
That's catechism, paragraph2245.
What they will do is they willstand at the ambo and they will
call out things that areantithetical to the church's

(02:38:51):
teaching.
Right.
The Chicago and whatnot.
All of it.
Oh well, he was the one thattold the American bishops to say
something about it.
So you know he's against it.
Right.
Okay.
Um, I'll get to that too.
The church does not endorseparties, she forms

(02:39:13):
consciousness, consciences.
Um, notice how we refer to thechurch as a she.
Just saying.
Um every party platform willcontain both morally good and
morally flawed positions, butCatholics can and often must
disagree on prudentialapplications on how to achieve

(02:39:33):
shared moral goals.
So you may be politicallyindependent, conservative, or
progressive as long as yourmoral hierarchy of values
follows the Catholic truth andnot party loyalty.
Do I believe in abortion?
Absolutely fucking not.
Because I believe that lifebegins at conception, and if
left to mature, by far, it willresult in a healthy baby.

(02:39:58):
I don't believe in abortion as auh birth control method.

SPEAKER_04 (02:40:02):
Birth control method.
I do believe in birth control asuh a medical uh right.

SPEAKER_05 (02:40:07):
Well, coming from a medic, right?
Right, uh an example of like anectopic pregnancy, right, where
it begins forming in a fallopiantube, that's a life-threatening
condition.
That's that's a completelydifferent thing.
Okay, yeah.
Um, but yeah, that we're notgonna get to the whole rule
versus wade, that's a differentconversation.
Uh Charlie's bored of ourreligious talk over here.

SPEAKER_03 (02:40:30):
I'm just soaking it in.

SPEAKER_05 (02:40:32):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 (02:40:33):
Stuff I have no idea about.

SPEAKER_05 (02:40:34):
So But here's here's the other thing.
Some issues are non-negotiablemoral absolutes in the church.
Okay, there are acts which, inand of themselves, independently
of circumstances, are alwaysseriously wrong.
That's the catechism, paragraph1756.
Examples include direct abortionand euthanasia, including
assistance in death and dying.

(02:40:56):
Um you know, uh physicianassisted suicide, whatever the
fuck you want to call it.
Um, and that is from EvangelumVitae, um, 62 and 73.
So popes and their scholarlyapplications, they usually write
stuff.
And it's it's titled a Latintitle, and you know, whatever

(02:41:16):
they all do it.
Anyway, that comes from one ofthose.
Intentional targeting ofcivilians in war.
Are you ready for the next one?
Yes, I am.
Racism.
And then redefining marriagecontrary to natural law.

SPEAKER_04 (02:41:32):
So racism, like that's uh like a non-starter,
like yep, no racism.

SPEAKER_05 (02:41:38):
And in if I if I ran out into insert city name inner
city, and I started yelling then-word, right, that is a moral
sin, and according to theCatholic Church.

SPEAKER_04 (02:41:52):
So how can you how can you justify your support for
this fucking administration?
They are clear, clear fuckingracists.
Clear.
I disagree.

SPEAKER_05 (02:42:10):
Uh I know you do.
They're okay.
I can just how you can agreewith an overall, right, and
disagree with certain pieces ofthe pie is the same way that I
agree and voted for Trump.
Right.
Because when I looked at Kamala,I saw an unelected bureaucrat.

(02:42:32):
Right?

SPEAKER_04 (02:42:34):
Well, uh no, uh, hold on.
You know where I'm going withthat.
No, you're talking about becauseshe was not uh and I agree with
this.
I agree with this.
She was not elected by the yeah,she was not primary.
He was, yeah.
Yep.
And I agree with that.
Like I when when they when theyfucking announces announced her

(02:42:57):
uh like uh on the nationalstage, like here's your
candidate for Democrat.
I was like, what the fuck?
Mm-hmm.
I would I thought for surebecause they were having the
Democratic National Conventionlike a a week or two later once
Joe Biden dropped out.
And I thought for sure that theywere gonna have a fucking vote
there, like who do we wantversus you know, who do we want?

SPEAKER_05 (02:43:20):
Now, Fox News would tell you that the reason why
they did it was because legally,according to election law, they
couldn't have access to thefunds that they had raised
unless at least one of theirnames was on, you know.
Who gives a shit?
You give the money back towhoever it is.
That's the point.
That's what they're trying tosay.
They're saying that they put hername on it as an unprimaried
candidate so that they couldhave access to the funds and

(02:43:42):
didn't have to give it back.
That was their argument.
Yeah, well, and I don't know ifit's true or not, but that's
beside the point.

SPEAKER_04 (02:43:47):
Suppose suppose I did hear that argument.
I did hear that.
And I think I agree with it.
If it's true, probably chat GPT,it we won't, but I I think that
is true.
Still, and then they should havehad a fucking primary, and it
would have been uh PresidentGavin Newsom that we uh he was
he's not gonna say, he's gonnabe next.

SPEAKER_05 (02:44:09):
Everybody's saying that uh what's his face?
Uh Pete Buttigieg is gonna bethe next state governor,
Michigan state governor, becausehe moved to Traver City.
Did he?
Yeah.
I completely disagree with that.
He's not fucking from Michigan,anyway.
That's beside the point.
Final uh bullet point in thatsection was redefining marriage
contrary to natural law.

(02:44:30):
I'm not saying that I hatehomosexuals or anybody like
that, but here's the thing thereality is this we all exist
because of heterosexualrelationships, that is natural
law.
Okay, that's what the churchbelieves.
Right, it believes that any uhrelationship outside of that is

(02:44:50):
contrary to the national law,national, you know, natural law.

SPEAKER_03 (02:44:54):
Adam and Eve.

SPEAKER_05 (02:44:55):
Not Adam and Steve equals you and me.

SPEAKER_03 (02:44:58):
Adam and Steve equals nobody.
Right.
Right?
That's what the church issaying, right?

SPEAKER_05 (02:45:03):
Yep, and it's just yeah.
So and it says these areintrinsically evil acts, no
political or economic calculuscan justify supporting them
directly.
Other issues that requireprudential judgment, you're
gonna like this.
Other issues that requireprudential judgment.
Questions like how to structureimmigration policy, criminal
justice reform, environmentalregulation, and taxation levels

(02:45:28):
or welfare design.
And then how you discern yourpolitical choices.
When facing elections or policydebates, the church suggests a
three-step discernment.
You inform your conscience byreading scripture, the
catechism, and the compendium ofthe social doctrine of the
church.
You weigh intrinsic evils firstby protecting life, marriage,
and religious liberty.

(02:45:49):
And then you assess prudentialissues, policies that
effectively serve the poor, thevulnerable, and the pursuit of
peace.
A well-informed quote, awell-inf a well-formed Christian
conscience does not permit oneto vote for a political program
that contradicts the fundamentalcontents of faith and morals.
End quote.

(02:46:15):
That's what they said.
So in plain language, yourpolitics don't have to match a
party, they have to match Jesus.
In one side's, if one side'sstance on life violates moral
law, and another's stance on thepoor neglects charity, your task
is to witness a Catholic bothand defend life and dignity,

(02:46:35):
faith and justice, order andmercy.
So it doesn't say I'm notallowed to.

SPEAKER_04 (02:46:41):
I just want to hold it.

SPEAKER_05 (02:46:43):
That's what she said.

SPEAKER_04 (02:46:47):
Not in your case.
So in in yeah, that's a badass.
I'm just saying, I'm I'm waitingfor Apple to come out with this
right here.
Now, uh, side note, okay,sidebar.
What are you on?
I don't know.
Chat GPS.

(02:47:08):
Uh sidebar.
Oh, here it is.
I am uh really enjoying thisconversation.
Just so you know.

SPEAKER_03 (02:47:16):
I know Charlie's like, oh god, just kill me.
I'm well just listening, man.
But um You guys are talkingabout stuff I don't I don't know
anything about, so I'm learning.

SPEAKER_05 (02:47:24):
So so it the church doesn't say that I'm not allowed
to check a box.
Well, in my case, filling acircle with a Sharpie.
But it says that I have to makea conscious decision.
When I did that, and I wentthrough that process, doesn't
mean that I have to agree withthe man the entire time.
In his first term, I hated thefact that he was fucking on

(02:47:46):
Twitter every five seconds.
It aggravated the shit out ofme.
I know, but it is that a moralfailing, though.
Like yes, because he ran hisfrickin' mouth on shit that
didn't need, you know.
Anyway, we're not gonna getthere.
But but he really like he reallydoes irritate the shit out of me
in a lot of ways.
Working in higher education,they and I noticed I'm wearing

(02:48:07):
my work shirt, and I probablyshouldn't be, but um, but
seriously, was this guy?
I wasn't I was I was thinkingabout that.
Like yeah, but too late, man.
Too late now, but yeah, you'reright.
Anyway, the point is is um takeit, take the other one off,
didn't you?
Yeah, no, um no, um what was Igonna say?

(02:48:28):
Oh, um in higher education, hecanceled a whole bunch of shit.
Doge did, you know, and there isa program called Trio, and it's
designed for students who arethey have to qualify in one of
three categories.
They have to be low income, theyhave to have disability, or they

(02:48:49):
have to be a first-time, likefirst-generation college
student.
Um, if they qualify under one ormore of those, they can apply
for TRIO and and have specialaccess to a success coach and
you know various other things.
It's a pretty good program, butit's grant funded.
And it wasn't until like a monthand a half ago that they found

(02:49:11):
out that their grant was renewedbecause everything at the
Department of Education has justbeen freaking put to a halt.
Completely disagree with that100%.

SPEAKER_04 (02:49:21):
Man, all these things you keep saying you
disagree with.
What do you think?
Do you disagree?
What do you agree with?

SPEAKER_05 (02:49:28):
What do I agree with?
Yeah, what do you agree with?
On a general level, again, wecan go to the nuances until
we're fucking blue in the face,man.
Yeah, but on a very generalbasic level, I do believe that
actions that secure our bordersare correct.
Securing our borders, I agreewith.
I believe, and and again, whenwe go into the nuance of those

(02:49:52):
that are already here, I believethat we should triage.
Triage.
The ones that are committingfelonies are up first.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Um, yeah, if because fuck yeah,he was saying who am I gonna
call?
I'm gonna say, you know,apartment 13A or whatever.
You want to know who I'm gonnacall?

(02:50:14):
If my neighbor, if, and this isa big if, if I know that they
are illegal, but they arelaw-abiding citizens, I ain't
gonna say shit.
I'm really not.
He's snitching on everybody.
No.
But if my next door neighbor isan El Salvadorian MS-13 gang

(02:50:35):
member who I know pedals drugsoutside, I'm fucking calling
that guy because I don't wanthim to be my neighbor anymore.
Fuck yeah.
I would too.
I would too.
I would too.
I am a human being and I canmake rational decisions, even
though I agree on a generallevel and not on every single
topic.

SPEAKER_04 (02:50:55):
They said prior to being elected, Donald Trump said
we're getting rid of the gangmembers.
He didn't say we're dead.
He got rid of a lot of them.
He didn't say we're getting ridof the fucking Juan down at the
Home Depot trying to fucking tryto just come put a fucking tile
floor in.
Yeah.
You know, and that's what he'sthat's what they're doing now.

SPEAKER_05 (02:51:18):
It's cruel.
But here's but here's the thing,and this is actually a point I
wanted to make earlier, and Iforgot about it.
Um if they are triaging thesepeople, and in the course of
doing that triage, they happento find Juan, they are
immigrations and customsenforcement.
They are bound by the rules ofengagement.

SPEAKER_04 (02:51:37):
There's no LS13 fucking gang members hanging out
at the Home Depot.

SPEAKER_05 (02:51:42):
They might be in San Diego.
They're not.
No, anyway, but seriously, thepoint though, is if they're on a
legitimate mission, they'rethey're triaging, you know,
these gang members, these drugdealers, these people that they
know are on the radar becausethey've been held in jail
before, whatever.
If they're on the radar, butthey in the process of getting

(02:52:03):
that person just so happen tofind Juan, they're bound.
Their job is to enforceimmigration, okay.
Even though he wasn't theirtarget.

SPEAKER_04 (02:52:12):
I I agree with that.
I I well, not I don't agree withthat, but I I get that.
I get it, I and I understandthat.
Um, but Juan, I mean, they weregetting they were getting like
we're picking on Juan.
Poor Juan.
Poor Juan.
They they were getting um the MS13 gang members in the

(02:52:33):
beginning.
And honestly, then they fuckingran out of they ran out of the
game.
I think they're all gone.
I think they're MS 13.
I think they're I don't thinkthey're gone, but they need uh
listen, they they uh not theyain't gone, they're hiding
because they know.

SPEAKER_05 (02:52:45):
Oh yeah, but here's but that I think that's the
point because it was all aboutrule and order.
No, it's not no well, yes, thepoint is immigration, the point
is deporting of the point,whatever.
But the overarching argument ofwhat he was trying to say was
rule and order.

(02:53:06):
If they are terrorizing yourneighborhood by selling drugs
and you know, fucking violenceand this, that, and another
thing, whatever, we get rid oftriage those people first.
By definition, you are going toget you know a safer
neighborhood.

SPEAKER_04 (02:53:23):
Not overnight, but because you still got the
regular local and here's anotherthing that we haven't even
really touched on is him sendingthe National Guard and the and
the military into cities.

SPEAKER_05 (02:53:37):
But they haven't done anything.

SPEAKER_03 (02:53:38):
When you have they have only protected federal
property, like mayors orgovernors literally saying we're
not gonna assist, we're notgonna help, we're gonna try to
obstruct what you're doing,that's a problem.

SPEAKER_04 (02:53:58):
But you don't see you don't see sending the
military into American cities.
The National Guard.
National Guard.
Okay, that's what they're hereto do.
Okay, uh not unless unless thegovernor of that state uh
requests it.
They're federal.
They have uh because DonaldTrump federalized them.
Which he has the authority todo.

SPEAKER_03 (02:54:19):
Right.
Because the governor of thestate will not have law and
order, they have he has everyright to do it.
You're under the umbrella of theUnited States.
Guess what?
If Illinois doesn't like it,succeed.

SPEAKER_05 (02:54:33):
Become the country of Illinois, which is never
gonna happen.
Do it if Texas can't do it,Illinois ain't gonna do it.
That's what I'm trying to say.
Because Texas will start afucking war.

SPEAKER_04 (02:54:46):
Here's what they need to do, right?
Instead of spending the money tosend in the National Guard and
all of that bullshit, send thatmoney uh to the local police and
let them police their owncitizens.
And here's another thing theycould do is invest more money
into educating these poorcommunities.

(02:55:10):
And this is where the problemlies.
Problem lies is is these kidsare not being educated.
Um they're not being educatedthe way they need to be.

SPEAKER_03 (02:55:24):
Why?
Because the federal governmentis because their education
dictates.

SPEAKER_04 (02:55:28):
I think because their communities are poor.
I think that's a social issue.
And schools are funded by what?
Tax dollars.
Right, but it's so if you have apoor community, how do you get
the funding for the teachers andeverything like that?
You you you realize that's anationwide issue.

SPEAKER_03 (02:55:47):
You realize that's spread amongst the whole state.
Yeah, no shit.
Because Clare does not haveenough tax base to have the
Clare High School.
Some of that money is comingfrom Grand Rapids, it's coming
from Detroit, it's coming fromBay City, right?
Some of it is they don't theydon't have enough to have they
don't have enough tax base inClare to have the school.
Some of it.
Well, right, so it's spreadamongst everybody.

SPEAKER_04 (02:56:08):
It's not divided equally.
No.
Is it divided equally?

SPEAKER_03 (02:56:12):
I have no idea how it's divided.
I can't tell you how it'sdivided.
I know that's a what it is.
Do you think that that that'swhat it is is the state comes up
and says, okay, we're gonnaraise$100 billion in tax revenue
that's gonna go to schools?
That's why you have a per pupilamount for your school district.
That's why count day is soimportant that students show up
because that's$1,300 or$2,500 orwhatever it is per student that

(02:56:36):
day.
That's how you get your revenue.
It's coming from the state, itain't coming from your local tax
base.

SPEAKER_04 (02:56:42):
Is there a reason why Troy Public Schools are the
best in the state versusGrasshield County?

SPEAKER_03 (02:56:48):
Yeah, probably because those areas they do the
same thing we do here in MountPleasant for actually building
schools or refunding schools.
We do special assessments,right?
That we all pay for.
We just passed another one acouple years ago when they just
got done doing a bunch ofremodeling and all this stuff.
It was another mill or mil and ahalf on our taxes, local taxes

(02:57:12):
to pay for upgrades to theschools.
So it's not what operationalcost, it was extra things that
we're gonna pay for.
Those communities could do it,right?
All those people could vote.
Hey, let's put another mil and ahalf on our taxes.
They don't want to do it.
And that's their choice.

SPEAKER_05 (02:57:28):
And then look at again, look at your community
colleges.
Your community colleges are notstate schools, they are funded
by the community, hence thename, right?
So when you are in districtversus out of district at a
community college, it is becauseyou either live or do not live
within their tax base.

(02:57:49):
We have at my employer, we havetons of students who live just
barely outside of a schooldistrict, but have to pay over
almost double, you know, andit's just because they don't
live in the right schooldistrict.
Right.
But that school district'staxpayers have to go and put

(02:58:12):
that on their taxes, and most ofthem don't want to.
So, you know, and it wasn'tuntil recently that Mount
Pleasant was in district.

SPEAKER_04 (02:58:21):
Uh some of the here we go.
I'm just reading this.
Some of the best Michigan schooldistricts that consistently rank
at the top include Novi, thatthat's often ranked number one
in Michigan, then Northville,Bloomfield Hills, Okamis, and
Troy.

SPEAKER_03 (02:58:38):
Those are all decently wealthy areas, too.
Yeah, yeah.
I wonder why.
Because they actually raisedextra money on their taxes for
those schools.

SPEAKER_04 (02:58:48):
Uh, because they have the tax base to do that.
Okay.
They have the the mu the fundsto do that.
And and on you think in on SixMile in Detroit, they have they
have the uh the funds to to togive the education that Novi

(02:59:09):
public schools give to theirchildren.

SPEAKER_03 (02:59:12):
Okay, so when are you when is when is Empire gonna
donate a million dollars down toDetroit to help them with their
schools?
So you can you can educate otherpeople's kids.

SPEAKER_04 (02:59:22):
No, you're not gonna no.
What we need to do is uh do atruly equal disbursement of
education and I disagree.

SPEAKER_03 (02:59:34):
That's why count day.

SPEAKER_05 (02:59:35):
I disagree.
So, but let me explain why.
We have all of these sources offunding, right?
We've got the lottery,supposedly, right?
Has this two billion dollarfreaking whatever fund, right?
And it's the same thing withanything else.
You know, when we're funding theroads and whatnot, we got this
gas tax and we got all thisother shit, right?

(02:59:57):
Supposedly, we're A good portionof our gas taxes don't even go
to the fucking roads.
How does that make any sense?
It doesn't.
So my argument is this if youwant publicly funded education,
which is you know publicschools, your local uh area, so

(03:00:20):
we'll take Bloomfield Hills,right?
If they can fucking afford it ona tax base, then they get to pay
for it.
If you are in uh maybe an innercity area, or you have a very
rural tax base who doesn'treally have for Grassett County,
Grassha County, whatever, theschool aid fund should be given

(03:00:44):
disproportionately on purpose tothose communities, not the ones
that can afford it.
I disagree with you.

SPEAKER_04 (03:00:53):
I disagree with you, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (03:00:55):
I think that really I thought you would I thought
you'd go for that one.

SPEAKER_04 (03:00:58):
No, I mean do you fully understand what I'm trying
to say?
I do, I do, I do.
Okay, I I do, but I think it'snot a child's fault that he was
born in Gratsett County and notin Bloomfield Hills.
So we're gonna take away fromthat child because he was born,

(03:01:20):
that child in Gratsett County,we're gonna take away from him
because his parents are fuckingbroke.
We're not taking a few.
I don't think you understoodwhat I was trying to say.
You I maybe you don't understandwhat I'm trying to say.
I say you take all that taxrevenue that's for schools, you

(03:01:43):
pool it all in Lansing, and thenit gets distributed equally to
every school district.
And they all have an equalamount of money, be it for
fucking building costs, forbooks, whatever the case is.

SPEAKER_03 (03:02:01):
It's distributed as equal as you can get.
It's based on per pupil in aschool.
Um, well, uh in a schooldistrict, it is.
That's why you have count day.
Uh-huh.
So if you've got a hundredstudents, you get X amount of
dollars.
You got a thousand students,guess what?
You're gonna get more becauseyour school's gotta be bigger,
you gotta have more teachers,you gotta have more custodial,
you gotta have more paper, yougotta have more pencils, you

(03:02:23):
gotta have whatever.
So it's as equal as it can get.
It's a per pupil cost,regardless if you live in Clare
or you live in Detroit or youlive in the UP.

SPEAKER_02 (03:02:31):
Right.

SPEAKER_03 (03:02:31):
It's based on per student.
So if that so if they ifDetroit's got schools that
should have uh 1,500 people inthem and they've got 500, then
obviously the school's gonna berun down because they're not
bringing the revenue in becausethere's only 500 kids there.
You're not gonna dump a milliondollars into a school for 500
kids when that million dollarsshould be spent on 1,500 kids.

SPEAKER_04 (03:02:54):
And I you know the thing is I cannot argue uh
intelligently with you aboutthis because I just don't know
enough.
But I will find out.

SPEAKER_03 (03:03:05):
Yeah, that's it's called per people funding.
And so and and I that comesdirectly from the state, and I
know about that.

SPEAKER_05 (03:03:11):
Um so you should, and so I don't work in K through
12, and so I wanted to make surethat you understood, you know,
at least to a certain degree,maybe a more um I don't know the

(03:03:33):
word, the more uppity of anarea, okay.
I do believe that uh maybe on aslightly progressive structure
they don't get as much fundingfrom the state because their tax
base is such that can affordcertain things.
I don't think that anythingshould be yanked away because I

(03:03:56):
don't really believe in aprogressive tax structure in the
first place, anyway.
I really don't, but there is anargument to be made that you
know if you have the money,there's a reasonable expectation
that you use some of it, right?
The ones that don't should getyou know a little bit more, um,

(03:04:19):
and that goes back to what I wassaying in that other chat GPT
about like a welfare design,right?
So anyway, um for fiscal year24-25, school aid appropriation
in the state of Michigan for Kthrough 12 was about$21.4
billion.
Okay.

(03:04:39):
In the state of Michigan, thereare 537 local school districts,
not counting charter schools orintermediate school districts,
ISDs.
Okay.
So if you divide divide that$21.4 billion over the course of

(03:05:00):
the uh school districts, you'regonna get just under$40 million
per district.
Evenly.
If a school district can't dotheir shit with$40 million, what
the fuck is their problem?

SPEAKER_04 (03:05:18):
We will come back to that.

SPEAKER_05 (03:05:20):
Okay.
All right.

SPEAKER_04 (03:05:21):
Well, this has been another great episode of In the
meantime.
I've sent you both a textmessage.
It's it's uh Stephen Miller'sspeech.
Okay, and I want you to listento that on your way home.
It's about six home.
It's about six minutes.

SPEAKER_05 (03:05:38):
All right, so thanks for joining us again at uh soup
sandwich.
Hopefully, you guys join usagain after having to listen to
this guy talk.
Um, so we appreciate you.
Thanks for joining us, and uhwe'll see you again soon
whenever we can get this guy tocome back.
All right, peace out.

SPEAKER_00 (03:06:04):
Thank you for joining us at Stoop Sandwich, a
podcast that explores thecomplex and compelling world of
veterans in the United States.
Through interviews with veteransthemselves, military experts,
and advocates, we'll dive deepinto the issues that matter most
to this community.
From mental health andemployment to the history of the
U.S.
military, the future of militaryservice, and everything in

(03:06:26):
between.
Whether you're a veteranyourself, a spouse or family
member of a veteran, or simplyinterested in learning more
about this community, thispodcast is for you.
So come with us on a journeyinto the heart of the veteran
experience and discover thestories, struggles, and triumphs
that have shaped our nation'sbrave after they've returned
home.

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