The Rod and Greg Show: Capture of Nicolas Maduro; Shirley's Reports and Legacy Media; Minnesota Fraud

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Well, my question is this, is it that they lacked
this country and maybe the world lack our supervision, and
so they just went crazy. Like I just think, you know,
things went a little haywire while we were gone, and
I think maybe if we were here as we are
every day, we can keep a lid on it. We
can help help people through it, we can talk about it.
I think everyone chills out. We leave, and then people

(00:22):
will run. They just go crazy. It is a world
we are listening to globally, so I know that we
do have a large audience. So I think maybe our absence,
it was like while the cat's away, the mice will play.

Speaker 2 (00:33):
And they played. Boy did they ever a lot to
get to. How are you ever? Buddy? Hello, Utah, We're
back from the holiday break. It is the Rott and
Greg Show right here on Utah's Talk Radio one oh
five nine can or s. I'm rodarka citizen Greg Hughes.
Listen live by downloading the iHeartRadio app. All right, I
want to start off the show today. I've got a
new name for the President.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
You tease me with this, and you kept it close
to the vest. You wouldn't tell me what it is.

Speaker 2 (00:56):
You know what it is. My new nickname for Donald Trump.

Speaker 1 (00:58):
What is do it?

Speaker 2 (00:59):
Donald?

Speaker 1 (01:00):
Donald?

Speaker 3 (01:00):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (01:00):
I mean think about this. How long have the Democrats
been talking about securing the border and taking care of
the border, right, all these big plans. Matter of fact,
before the election, We've got a new legislative piece of
that will really strengthen the immigration in this country today.
And it never came through, and they used it. Donald Trump,
as he said in his address to the nation, we

(01:22):
don't need new laws, we just need a new president.

Speaker 1 (01:24):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (01:24):
So Donald did it. He did, so it's do it Donald. Okay,
he secured the border. Now the Biden administration ups the
reward for getting rid of Nicholas Madurol. Yeah, talking tough,
We're gonna get rid of this guy. We're going to
force him out. Nothing happens. Donald Trump comes in and

(01:45):
guess what, we do it. So see that's why.

Speaker 1 (01:47):
I think I'm doing it. He says, if you can
do it without us, it's fifty mili. Now we're gonna
double it. And then he told Ruby, hey, don't give
that because we ended up doing it, so don't be
given out that real.

Speaker 2 (01:55):
War given that money. So see, you have do it.
Donald when you want something done in this anymore, you
turn to Donald Trump because he'll do it.

Speaker 1 (02:02):
He has a bias towards action. He is not going
to circle a situation, he's not going to sit in
and just it's not theater for him. He has a
bias towards action, or he's not going to think about it.
It's not worth his time if there isn't an actual
item that he's actually that You're that that he's considering.
And that's I gotta love it, especially in a town
like that where they do nothing. I mean, it is

(02:23):
something else to see this president move in the speed
in which he's able to do it.

Speaker 2 (02:27):
Yeah, they are used to action in Washington, DC. Yeah,
they just rag it out. I mean, how long have
we been talking about balancing a budget?

Speaker 1 (02:35):
Please?

Speaker 3 (02:36):
Really?

Speaker 1 (02:37):
They want Congress wants war powers acts when they can't
even balance a simple budget. You've got separate and equal
constitutional powers, Congress, of which you do none of them.
And then you want to take something as as as
serious as our national security, something that cannot afford hyperpartisanship whatsoever,
just American people and our best interests at heart, And
you want to do that when you can't balance you

(02:58):
can't get us a budget, you can't past one, you
can't do the fundamentally. You don't even have committee hearings
that are real. You don't have floor debates any when attends.
You do nothing. But all these war power acts, we'll
do that one. Oh we'd be an ash tray by
now if we left it up to Congress to figure
out when things got really ugly.

Speaker 2 (03:15):
Yeah, I mean, it's just crazy, and do it. Donald.
He did it. And like you said, Greg, I mean,
so I get I get up early Saturday. Okay, Ready,
go play a little pick a ball. And while I'm there,
I keep on seeing these text messages. We invaded. We
went after Maduro, right, yes, and I'm thinking, okay, what's
going to happen? And then the President announced he'll talk
at nine o'clock to the nation. Didn't talk till about

(03:37):
nine thirty. But that's okay, But you know he did that. Yeah,
we're all waiting to hear what he had to say.
But I think what we need to point out and
point out very strongly today, Greg, is the professionalism and
the expertise of the US military. There is not a
country in the world, China, Russia, you name it that

(03:58):
could have pulled this off. The way the United States
of America did it was amazing.

Speaker 1 (04:02):
And we have our listening audiences, though smartest listening on
all the land. So I might be repeating information that
you already know, but I think it's bear it's worth
repeating that Maduro lived in the middle of a military
base and the technology they're using, they would didn't spare
any expense. They were using Chinese defense technology, military defense,
and he was under the impression it was an impenetrable

(04:25):
and impenetrable military base. They came in and with zero
fatalities or casualties, and I think a couple were wounded,
but even the helicopter that was hit, they were able
to retrieve. They didn't leave anything behind. They got him overnight.
You contrast that with Herbert Walker Bush's going into Panama
to get Menuel Noriega twenty four thousand troops. Sadly, twenty

(04:49):
three US soldiers killed, hundreds wounded. It took them fourteen
days to get their hands on Noriega. This was done overnight.
And so you look at the swamp and all these
people complain about heg Seth and how he's unqualified and
he's just a you know, they just have so many
derogatory things to say about him. I think the man
understands he didn't want any casualties, and he felt it
because he'd been a soldier himself. And I think if

(05:12):
you look at Biden with Afghanistan withdrawal, when you look
at the chaos of our military during his just his
watch alone, and you look at the what is your point?
What the military has been able to do? What the
Secretary of War p heg Seth was able to do
with those generals raising kine bull. I love that guy.

Speaker 2 (05:30):
I just couldn't be proud those restaurants.

Speaker 1 (05:34):
I don't think he does. I think, you know, but
he loves that's the name he goes by. And I'll
call him general if he were in here. But I
but you know, I just think this is an incredibly
talented and capable cabinet and these generals are not like Millie.
I mean, Millie was such a admits he calls China
around Trump's back in twenty twenty. As they're changing, you know,

(05:56):
is you know, shift the power occurs, and so I
I just am I think that America's strength not only
are the things that happened in Venezuela, where they absolutely
necessary and we learned a lot through this. But I
think the rest of the country a Cuba especially, but
then Iran and China and Russia, they're all paying a
little closer attention.

Speaker 2 (06:17):
Right now, Well, let's get some audio. We've got a
lot of audio sound bites. No doubt, the star of
the weekend, other than the President and the US military
and what they did, has really been the Secretary of
State Marco Rubio. He's explained what the president is trying
to do in Central and South America. Here's one of
the sound bites that he talked about. What's this say?
This talking about? What is it greg that he.

Speaker 1 (06:36):
Yeah, he has given chances. What they're trying to say
is our first option was not to come in militarily
with Maduro.

Speaker 4 (06:42):
But I want to be clear about one thing. Nicholas
Mduro had multiple opportunities to avoid this. He was provided
multiple very very very generous offers and chose instead to
act like a wild man, chose instead to play around,
and the result is what we saw tonight. The other
message here is the following. You have a guy, like
many people around the world, they like to play games.
You have a guy who decides he's going to invite

(07:04):
iron into his country, is going to, you know, do
the confiscation of American oil companies, is going to flood
our country with gang members, is going to take Americans
prisoner and try to hold them for hostage and trade
him like he was able to do with a Biden administration.

Speaker 2 (07:18):
Basically, don't play games with Donald Trump with Donald will
not play games.

Speaker 1 (07:24):
There's more. I cut that off.

Speaker 2 (07:27):
Oh well that's okay, that's okay.

Speaker 1 (07:29):
Anyway, Yeah, so you got you got the hint there
that look and if you listen to Secretary of State
Mark or Ruby over the weekend, I think he's he
is so informative that he speaks plainly where you where
you just know it's he just bottom lines it. I
mean Margaret Brennan, uh, he beats her like a runned
mule every time. Y'all don't even know why she has
him on anymore, because he just he She asked these

(07:51):
questions there are absurd, but he basically lets everybody let's
watching know they're absurd.

Speaker 2 (07:56):
And Rubio had a great response because there are members
of Congress Democrats and covert why didn't you tell us
you should have let us know you were going to
do this.

Speaker 4 (08:04):
You can't congressionally notify something like this for two reasons.
Number one, it will leak, It's as simple as that.
And number two, it's an exigent circumstance. It's an emergent
thing that you don't even know if you're going to
be able to do it.

Speaker 1 (08:15):
You can't know.

Speaker 4 (08:16):
We can't notify them we're going to do it on
a Tuesday or on a Wednesday, because at some points
we didn't know we were going to be able to
carry this out. We didn't know of all of the
things that had to line up we're going to line
up at the same time in the right conditions. You know,
it had to be at the right place at the
right time, with the right weather and all things like that.
So those are very difficult to notify. But the number
one reason is operational security. They carried this on very

(08:40):
in harm's way, and frankly, a number of media outlets
had gotten leaks that this was coming and held it
for that very reason, and we thanked them for doing that,
or lives could have been lost.

Speaker 2 (08:49):
Yeah, that's New York Times. New York Posts both had
this story, but they held it because of the sensitivity
that they had.

Speaker 5 (08:55):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (08:55):
Yeah, and from what I were saying, the weather wasn't
cooperating with this. As a matter of fact, from what
I have read so far, Greg, you may have seen
it differently, is the President did not make that decision
until sometime late Friday afternoon, and apparently the forecasters were saying,
there's a window here in the weather. If you're going
to do it, do it now, and he decided we're going.

Speaker 1 (09:14):
Yeah. So they could have been as early as in
December where they would where that operation was going to
take place. But I tell you that landing those slow
moving helicopters into that military base where that whole place
was shut down, all electricity got turned off, just turned off,
it is quite the demonstration, quite the mission.

Speaker 2 (09:32):
Well, we've got a lot to say about this today
and we'll get your reaction. Great to be back with you.
It is the Rotting Greg Show right here on Utah's
Talk Radio one O five nine kN RS. Utah Congressman
Mike Kennedy scheduled to join us next on talk radio
one O five to nine KNRS. The US stock market
just hit an all time record high today, under President

(09:53):
Trump yet again following the arrest and capture of Maduro.
Of course, the Democrats panicked, the experts lost again. Market
is at its highest level ever.

Speaker 1 (10:02):
I heard the dollar was strengthened too. I think the dollar,
the value of the dollar went up too. This is
just such bad news for Democrats. I mean, they have
to support Maduro, the dictator that shouldn't be that we
don't recognize as the leader of that country. We got.
They support Somali fraud in Minnesota. They just have all
these different, you know, bad guys that they have to make,
you know, they have to defend because it's Trump who's

(10:24):
going after it.

Speaker 2 (10:25):
Yeah. Well, one of the issues that's been raised over
the weekend the President, of course, authorizing the capture of Maduro.
He appeared in court today, pleaded not guilty and said
he's innocent, he's a decent man and still considers himself
president of Venezuela. Oh okay, I want to let you
know that.

Speaker 1 (10:42):
Good luck with that.

Speaker 2 (10:42):
Well, what about the legal issue of all this? Joining
us on our Newsmaker line to talk about that is
Congressman Mike Kennedy from Utah's third congressional District, Congressman, how
are you Welcome back to the Rod and Greg Show.

Speaker 3 (10:54):
Great, thanks for having me on LLOS. How are you today?

Speaker 2 (10:56):
We are doing just fine. Your thoughts on what happened
over the weekend and Saturday morning, Senate, our Congress.

Speaker 3 (11:02):
God bless America, God bless our military forces. There's not
a military on the planet I could have done this. No,
there are no casualties. And it was a precise extraction
of a narco terrorist and a dictator. And the world
is a better place as a result of this. This
man is being brought to justice, and I think we
should all be proud of our military. It's an outstanding
performance that they just demonstrated that might empowered the United

(11:24):
States military and every terrorist, every dictator around the world
is having second thoughts about their terrible actions, not only
in their own countries but around the world.

Speaker 1 (11:35):
I know that the Democrats and the leadership in the
House and Senate, in the swamp, they're going to make
hay of this, and they're going to complain without regard
to the facts or any real precedent. But you know
you've heard that, You've heard them say that this is
this is on President. It's never happened before. I think
we can remember very quickly instances bipartisan from both presidential

(11:56):
from Republican and Democrat administrations where action has been taken.
What do you say, though there are war part powers acts?
Congress needs to be brought into the loop on what's
going on. Where do you stand, Congressman on that process?
Are you do you? Are you comfortable with what you
know right now? Is that a meaning that's going to
come do? What's running through your mind as a member

(12:18):
of Congress watching the administration do what they're doing.

Speaker 3 (12:21):
We've seen this already with Manuel Noriega back in the
late eighties, and we have precedents that went through our
judicial system reflecting that the president has Article two powers
that allow him to do these sort of things to
protect our people. We know that this man is a
narco terrorist. We know that he's been working with the
cartels and actually in charge of a cartel to bring

(12:45):
lethal drugs into our country and destroy our young people.
And so for the president to take this kind of
action is not unprecedented. It's the sort of thing that
has been done before, and we should take it seriously.
In Congress, We're going to be brief tomorrow. We're all
back in town tomorrow and we'll get a briefing from
the President as well as his administration on this. And
I'm entirely supportive. When we're in a war circumstance, the

(13:08):
Congress needs to weigh in absolutely, But in this case,
to protect the American people. He's been Nicholas mcduro has
been under indictment since twenty twenty. I mean for five years.
This man has been under indictment. No one's done anything
about it until President Trump, a decisive man who actually
finally took action on this terrible man's behaviors. He says
he's a decent man. To believe that in our court,

(13:31):
oh my goodness, strike that from the records.

Speaker 2 (13:35):
US. Will let me ask you, this congresson what is
the next step? I mean, if you are going to
advise the President or Marco Rubio, they've got to have
in the back of their mind how they're going to
do this. But what would you recommend they do or
consider doing.

Speaker 3 (13:52):
They've been negotiating with Maduro for months, trying to get
a peaceful resolution to give that guy, get him out
of the country and get somebody else place. And they've
already sworn in. Their vice president is now the president.
So that is the plan in my opinion, with advice
guidance from obviously the administration the president. But they need
to stop behaving the way that they've been behaving. And

(14:14):
if this vice president is willing to even stand down
and be somewhat decent on the world stage, this isn't
going to be a problem. President Trump was not. This
wasn't something that just showed up yesterday. This has been
months in the workings. Of course, the first administration they
had to deal with Nicholas Manduro as well, so this
is not a surprise for months. We've been working with
that guy. He refused thinking that he was dealing with

(14:36):
Joe Biden instead of Donald Trump, and he's paying the price.
But it's one of those things that they got their
vice president sworn in now as president, and they should
know that if they're not going to behave then there
may be further consequences. President Trump's trying to take action
and Vlatimer Putin and Jijing Paint understand that as well.
These people around the world. Neither of them obey the laws,
international laws, and in this case, we are adhering the laws,

(15:01):
taking the action to protect American people, and I'm proud
of our military and proud of our president for doing that.

Speaker 1 (15:06):
We're speaking with Congress and Mike Kennedy, who again member
of Congress. We're talking about the the US actions in
Venezuela apprehending Nicholas Maduro. Let me ask you this, Tim Burchett.
I think he's a congressman from Tennessee. He posted on
Saturday morning after the news broke that this has happened,
that he was very happy to see this happen because

(15:28):
there's a lot of pressing issues, not just with what
Venezuela is doing by way of fentanyl and drugs that
they're bringing in this country, but there's what he described
as even a proxy war where you have countries like
China that's dependent on the oil that comes from Venezuela,
and that one of the benefits of having the you know,
the oil stop and the sanctions enforced and seeing this

(15:50):
happen is that they may not they might not have
the kind of oil that they would need to be
able to invade Taiwan. You have Cuba who's almost colonized
Venezuela with how many people they have there controlling that country.
I didn't what I probably wasn't aware of China, Russia, Cuba,
even Iran, how much present, what kind of footprint they
had in our hemisphere in Venezuela. Was this one of

(16:14):
these quiet things that you knew through being, you know,
maybe briefings, but couldn't talk about, or were you surprised?
And how much ground are the enemies of the United
States have combined in such a close and close proximity
to our country.

Speaker 3 (16:28):
I've been deeply concerned about the Chinese Communist Party and
it's infiltration of Central and South America. The trip that
I took, which included Panama as well as Brazil, there
was China presence everywhere. I saw libraries built by China,
they had Chinese characters on the outside. I saw roads
and bridges that were dedicated to China that they had
paid for in that money. That's the Venezuelan connection of

(16:51):
Venezuelan oil would go to China and China's money would
come to Venezuela to fund drug cartels and send that
those drugs into our country to destroy our people. And
in that case, we are we are striking in a
fashion on a Chinese Communist Party when we are disabling
Venezuela and it's ghost tankers from sending oil on the

(17:12):
embargoes and against our efforts to keep that from happening,
that that oil is not going to China anymore, and
China is going to have to do their calculations Iran
as well. Understanding that these foes of ours internationally when
we strike in our hemisphere. I mean, that's the other thing,
Rod and Greg that we need to understand. This is
in our western hemisphere. This is not that far from

(17:34):
our borders, and these enemies of ours we need to
deal with the home front before we start going anywhere else.
And so so I'm very supportive of what has happened,
and I'm not invested in a nation building We've seen
how that goes in Iraq. I am not interested in
that at all. But let the people decide they need
to have an election in Venezuela and we should disempower

(17:56):
our adversaries throughout the world. That's what we're doing in
Venezuela by taking the oil shipments away from China.

Speaker 2 (18:02):
Congressman has always great chatting with you. Appreciate your insight.
I know we'll be talking more down the road. Thanks
for joining us this afternoon.

Speaker 3 (18:09):
Greaty to be with you, fellas Hey.

Speaker 2 (18:10):
Congressman Mike Kennedy and it was, oh, who am I
think it besting? The Treasury Secretary said, we much prefer
to go after him with economic issues instead of bombs
and missiles. And that's exactly and they went after him
to get rid of that. But now the issue is
the economic situation and he's right. China, from what I understand,
gets sixty percent of its oil from Venezuela. That's going

(18:32):
to have an impact.

Speaker 1 (18:33):
On also the rare minerals. They have one of the
largest posits in the world.

Speaker 2 (18:36):
Yeah, they sure do. All right, more coming up the
Rod and Gregg Show and Talk Radio one oh five
nine Oka. Nicholas Maduro and his wife were in court today.
They both pleaded not guilty. He said he is a
decent fellow. Yeah, yeah, he's a decent guy. And he
still considered himself president of Venezuela.

Speaker 1 (18:55):
The Nile anxious to river in Egypt.

Speaker 2 (18:57):
That's for sure. That's for sure. Now. Another one of
the huge stories that happened what we were on commercial
break was this this video that surfaced an investigative journalist.
You know, he's a freelancer, Nick Shirley, we've had him
on the show. Yeah, he's one of Utah Zones. A
matter of fact, my son taught him when he was
in high school at David High School. Yeah, small world,

(19:19):
isn't it? But that thing blew up? Well, how did
this YouTuber scoop the legacy media on this story? Because Greg,
that's exactly what he did. Yeah, he and it didn't
look overly hard. It didn't look like he had to
really go deep undercover to do this. No, knocked on
a few doors and asked a few questions. It was
that easy. Well, let's find out how we did it.

(19:40):
Joining us on our Newsmaker line right now is our
good friend Terry Jones, the editor of Issues and Insight.
They wrote about this today. Terry, how are you welcome
back to the Rotten Greg Show and happy new year
to you.

Speaker 6 (19:51):
I'm great, Thank you very much for having me on.

Speaker 3 (19:54):
Terry.

Speaker 2 (19:54):
How do you think he did this?

Speaker 6 (19:57):
Well? I you know, I hate I hate to sound
simplistic here, but this was old fashioned gum shoe journalism
where you actually go out and look at something and
knock on doors and ask questions. And and take and
gather evidence. This used to be sort of routine for newspapers.

(20:17):
To you, they deployed legions of these people would actually
go out in the street and report things. That's how
they drummed up news. And now they have it spoon
fed to them by political groups, and nobody wants to
do original reporting anymore. And so as a result, when
a scoop like this happens, everybody goes into a panic,
especially the people in the media.

Speaker 1 (20:38):
You know, Terry, I'm a recovering public servant. And when
we talked about childcare and child care facilities and even
the licensing of them, it made its way to our
state legislature and its laws. And there was a certain
amount of square feet, there's there's windows. There's just a
certain climate that or environment that our statutes in Utah
are sensitive to. For kids. You look, a picture is

(21:00):
worth a thousand words. I'm looking at the one from
your column where where Nick Shirley's The name of the
center is called the Leering Center. Okay. If that doesn't
tell you the place is on the wrong track, I
don't know what does. It's a it's a center block
wall with not a single window, in it. I think
just a picture alone shows the absurdity and and the
fraud that's going on in that state.

Speaker 6 (21:23):
Yeah, yeah, it's it's absolutely ridiculous. And and uh you know, yeah,
get capturing these empty rooms and these people uh sort
of uh you know, glazed over stairs watching TV and
in the rooms that it was obvious there's something here
going on here. And it's not in any meaningful sense

(21:43):
of the word daycare. I let you're talking about daycare
for unemployed some Aleague immigrants.

Speaker 7 (21:49):
Uh.

Speaker 6 (21:50):
And it's you know, it's it's an absurdity and and
you know, how how do we how do we keep
this from happening in the future again? You know, a
major story like this, This story has been breaking in
slow motion. People don't realize this for two years now,
because the federal government has been looking at this for

(22:11):
you know a long time, and I think since twenty
twenty two. But of course under the previous president nothing
was going to be done about it. Well, now things
are being done about it. They're at there, you know,
they're issuing the indictments, they're sending ice people there, they're
they're doing all sorts of things. And you know, two
weeks ago, a federal prosecutor in Minnesota estimated, you know,

(22:37):
nine billion dollars in possible fraud in that state, and
that's not a huge state population wise, and Trump threw
out a number just a couple of days ago, said
eighteen billion possibly. So we don't know how big this
thing is. But you know, when you multiply this around
the country, you know, from industry to industry, a lot

(23:01):
of these helping carrying industries and NGOs and things like that,
they've been on the government paycheck for a long long time.
They've been getting, you know, subventions of money from the
federal government and from state governments millions and billions and
billions of dollars, and there's no accountability for how it's used.

(23:21):
And we find out now that some of this Somali
money might have been going to terrorists. You know, it's
kind of kind of frightening. We've let this get out
from under us. But the media don't show any sort
of really intense interest in following this. They seem to
want it to just go away and go back the
way things are, but it's not going to happen.

Speaker 2 (23:43):
Terry, do you fear that the media will have even
less interest in this story now and now that Tim
Wolson says he's not seeking reelection, he's not going to
run for a third term, is the legacy media saying, well,
he's gone stories over blah blah blah. Do you see
that happen?

Speaker 6 (23:58):
Yeah, certainly from the minutes Soda angle, I could definitely
see that happening, because, you know, let's be honest, the
big journalist organizations in Washington, d C, in New York
and Los Angeles and even Chicago don't give a fig
about Minnesota. What they cared about was that they had

(24:20):
a governor who ran for vice president, who was thinking
about running as president in twenty twenty eight, and of
course they were all interested in the political ramifications of that.
But now that that's gone and that story is finished,
my guess is CBS, NBC, ABC, PBS, all of them

(24:42):
will will sort of abandon this story and let it
fall by the wayside, and it'll be left to centrist
in conservative media outlets to do the dirty work and
keep looking at it and following it up on it.

Speaker 2 (24:56):
Yeah, Terry is always right chatting with you. Thank you.
Terry Jones, editor of Issues and Insights, and Terry just
mentioned PBS. Apparently the Corporation for Public Broadcasting is going
to dissolve. They announced today they're done.

Speaker 1 (25:09):
Liberally said they were going to privately find what happened. Yeah,
I guess those nngo's kind of dried up. All that
all that tax para money they were getting their hands
on went away went all right?

Speaker 2 (25:19):
Moore, coming up, It is the Rod and Greg Show
on Talk Radio one O five nine. kN arrests a
little bit more on this Nick Shirley video. Yes, that
went viral and everything. You know, this is so typical
of the Democrats. Instead of attacking the message or saying,
let's let's dig into this a little bit, they went
after Nick Shirley. They attacked him every which way you
could out there, and they went after this kid. And

(25:41):
this kid simply went around, knocked on some doors and
asked questions. A journalist could do that. Now. The interesting
point about this, Greg, and we talked about this during
our show meeting this morning. There's a reporter by the
name of Jay Coles. Now Jay, as some of you
may remember, Jay, I worked with him at KSO Radio
a number of years ago. He went worked for Channel
five and Channel two. His wife at the time was Rebecca.

(26:04):
I'm trying to remember Rebecca's last name. She was a
weather forecaster over Channel four. They had an opportunity to
go to Minneapolis and they moved there right and Jade's
been there ever since. He's an investigative reporter now for KSTP,
which is one of the bigger, more powerful television stations
there in Minneapolis Saint Paul. He did greg the exact
same thing that Nick Shirley did. He went to some

(26:26):
of these adoption or these daycare centers, knocked on doors
and didn't get any response. So you want to add
validity to what Nick Shirley found out with his investigative journalists,
just look at the Jay colesbeats and it's basically the
same thing. So you know everyone's attacking Nick Shirley, Well,
he's not a legitimate journalist. He doesn't have the training

(26:47):
that's required for a journalist bs bsbsbs.

Speaker 1 (26:51):
And you know, of course, when they get shamed that
it was that easy to find the Leering Center. You
just have to see Learing Center and you know it's
not a serious operation going on there. And then you
see the receipts of how much in the millions they're
getting and it's an offense. It's taxpayer dollars being stolen.
So the leering Center is just not a serious place
and so it doesn't take a lot to report that.
You guys have to actually go to the facility. But

(27:13):
the CNN over the weekend, I watched it over the holiday.
We know what they did. They would they just they
had on camera the reporter at a desk with a
phone calling these places and going are you real? And
they say yes, and they say thank you, okay, and
she just kept recording this. So she'd looked at the
camera and say, we called five to six of these

(27:34):
so called illegitimate places and spoke with the proprietors and
they confirmed that they are real.

Speaker 2 (27:41):
Huh.

Speaker 1 (27:42):
Well, again, if the leering Center is real, it shouldn't
be because the leering center is not where you want
to send a kid in a center block wall, you know,
box that has no windows and you know that the
kids could see outside. And it's again, I just don't
think leering is something we should be supporting with these
little kids.

Speaker 2 (27:58):
Did they go to any other center or just it
on the phone?

Speaker 1 (28:01):
They sat at a desk, Lazy journalists, Yeah, it's it
was amazing. Did did you hear that? So then they
had the one guy who owns one of those, he's
gotten millions for these this day care center, and he's saying,
we have documentation, but it we've been broken into. It's
all been stolen. And what someone's smart on the internet
did and I can't find it right now to know

(28:22):
what he was wearing. Designer glasses. His eyeglasses were in
the thousands of dollars in terms of value. So I
mean just the things that they keep wearing. These the
people that own these these daycare centers, they kind of
show they've got a lot of run around money, a
lot of it.

Speaker 2 (28:38):
They sure do. All right. When we come back, we'll
talk with a member of the Salt Lake County Council
from Venezeuela get his reaction to the events of the weekend.
That's all coming up our number two of the Rotted
Greg Show on Talk Radio one O five nine. Kay Nr,
it's great to be with you again.

Speaker 1 (28:55):
I think I gained ten pounds. They saw each other.
You look it, Yeah, thank you. I think I got
carb face going. ID No, it's you don't have the kid.

Speaker 2 (29:04):
It is true.

Speaker 1 (29:05):
It's like I got stung by a bee and I
have an allergic reaction. I got to get it all off.

Speaker 2 (29:09):
So your New Morning you were telling me, Wow, I
got to get off. I'm impressed. Wow. A lot to
get to well. Of course, in the story that everybody
is continuing to talk about, of course, is what President
Trump did when it comes to uh Nicholas Maduro in Venezuela.
He was in court along with his wife today facing
charges in New York City. Pleaded not guilty, said he

(29:32):
considered himself still the president of Venezuela. And he said
he described himself greg as a decent fellow.

Speaker 1 (29:40):
Yeah, let's ask around, surely, should we?

Speaker 2 (29:44):
Yeah. Well, joining us on our news macer line right now,
we want to get local reaction from people who've lived
in Venezuela now live in the United States. And joining
us on our news macerline is Carlos Moreno. He is
a member of the Salt Lake County Council from Venezuela. Carlos,
how are you welcome to the Rod and Gregg Show.

Speaker 7 (30:02):
Girl, How you doing guys? Thank you for having me today.

Speaker 2 (30:05):
What is when you first heard this news on Saturday?
What was your initial reaction Carlos.

Speaker 7 (30:12):
A miracle, A miracle, like we you know, this is
tal it has been so powerful in Venezuela and he
has you know, under he's got regime. He has like
a hundred of thousand people uh, killed by him, you know,

(30:33):
by by his regime, by hunger, by oppression, by told
to by many kinds of things, kidnapping, and this is
this is for the Venezuela people. This is a miracle.
And we really we applowed President Throng and we applow
the administration to do this especially you know, it's it's

(30:54):
a threads for the United States. But at the same time,
it's uh, it's crazy for then is evil for the
Venezuelan people having the regime in governments.

Speaker 1 (31:06):
Carlos, I've heard I appreciate you coming on the program
to give us maybe it's just kind of your perspective.
I've been told that the people that are living there currently,
people that have relatives that are living there, is they're
reaching out and reaching out by phone. It's still a
dangerous place and people do not feel safe to actually
express how they feel over the phone, even to relatives.

(31:27):
And they're saying, you know, they just say, I can't talk.
I can't talk right now. Is it a is it
a more dangerous place or less dangerous place in Venezuela,
do you think right now or is it just in
a transition period in cuch an efficient period.

Speaker 7 (31:40):
But in the same time, really, with this kind of regine,
you never.

Speaker 2 (31:44):
Know what is going to happen.

Speaker 7 (31:46):
You know, of course we have the head of the
villa is Nicolas madurovs. But so many massias or so
many criminal activities are inside Venezuela. We are you know,
I don't know. You guys maybe know, but you know
who is published co war?

Speaker 5 (32:02):
No?

Speaker 2 (32:03):
Yes, yes, yeah, yeah, we sure do.

Speaker 7 (32:07):
Yeah, it's an article or terrorist true. And his dream
was became president of Columbia to you know, to to
make become president of Colomba to traffic drugs. That was
his reale. The venice, the Venezuela reging become the dream
of published go war, you know, the venezuelaviging become that

(32:29):
dream that you can use the all the forces, all
the all the logistics of a government in this of
any state to traffic drugs.

Speaker 1 (32:40):
Uh.

Speaker 7 (32:41):
That's why it's a president of the place right now.
It's a transition. It's a transition moment. We never know
what could happen with this kind of We can't this
kind of criminal activity of criminal people in.

Speaker 2 (32:53):
Chaz Carlos, we had heard I want to get a
description from you, if we can good about how difficult
daily life in Venezuela became. We have seen stories of
store shelves empty, no food available. We'd heard stories of
Maduro stealing medicine for children and putting in other places.

(33:14):
I mean, the daily life of a typical Venzeuelan in
that country leading up to what happened on Saturday. What
was it like?

Speaker 7 (33:22):
Why? That's why you have a nine media Venezuela immigrants
all over the world.

Speaker 5 (33:29):
You know, you know.

Speaker 7 (33:33):
Somebody somebody asked me the same question, and I told
I told this person, imagine that you are in the
hospital with your child, and imagine that the power we
have a chop down on the powerre we have this
dishue down and you don't have power for one week.

(33:53):
This is a life in Venezuela. You don't know what's
going to happen. You have a lot of food, you
have ninety percent of extreme poverty, you have a lot
of corrosion in the military for if you do. Sometimes
I when I'm tweeting something, I said, well, thank you

(34:13):
God for being an American, and I'm being an American
because if you can do, if you tweet something in
Venezuela and to bother the government or to to say
something against the government, you could you could be in
jail in just a couple of hours. You know, as
you never you're never going to see your family. And
that's the daily the daily days for Venezuela. That's why

(34:36):
these people uh uh you know, that's why this population
befare became homeless in other countries, the living inside Venezuela.

Speaker 1 (34:48):
I think it will be important for the people that
I did not know this till Saturday, that the largest
exodus of people out of a country, second only to Syria,
is Venezuela. So you have, so you have. I don't
know if it's millions, I don't know what that number represents.
But the people that have fled for their lives out
of that country because of Maduro, and and those that

(35:08):
would live here in the United States, even maybe yourself.
I think the voices in a non partisan way, one
that's not you know, if it's Trumpet's bad, and if
it's or Trumpet's good, but just Venezuelans speaking from the
heart about how important it was that this man who
wasn't the illegitimate president of that country was finally dealt with.

(35:28):
I think it'll I think it'll be powerful for people
to hear. Do you do you since that happening, I've
seen images of it. I hear you're joining us today
on the show. Do you think there's going to be
a rise of Venezuelan's speaking in defense of the actions
that the president has taken?

Speaker 7 (35:43):
Oh no, oh no, in.

Speaker 1 (35:46):
Favor, in favor of in favor.

Speaker 7 (35:50):
I want to say that community in the United States
is celebrating. This is a party, friends, This is a
party of freedom. J donh haves any idea the meaning
of freedom in Venezuela, in Venezuela and immigrant Carla, Yeah.

Speaker 2 (36:12):
Yeah, Carlos. One last question for you. The numbers have
ranged from eight million to nine million people Venezuelans leaving
their home country and going elsewhere for safety. If the
country stable license and if there's new leadership and if
there is democracy there, do you think people will go
back to their home country?

Speaker 7 (36:29):
Of course, you don't have any idea, you know, out
of the history of Venezuela. Venezuela are no immigrants that
I want to make this clear. We don't have the
needs in the nineties to get out of Venezuela for
any reason. The reason who we get out of Venezuela.

(36:50):
We are no immigrants. We was a powerful country in
the past, rich country. Everybody just take vacation in Europe,
in America and come back to any But I want
to I want to just say, one war to create
these chaos. Social Liso, Yes, Socioliso is the most evil

(37:11):
or communism is the most evil political ideology, and he's
here in America and we need to come back that
crazy political ideology. Socialism creates all these chaos, all these
all these economic collacts in Venezuela. Uh you know what,
And that's why we have had this massive migration of
Venezuela all over there.

Speaker 2 (37:34):
Carlos, it's been quite a weekend for you and Venzuelan's
not only in this community but around the country and
around the world. I know we'll be talking more down
the road. Thanks for joining us tonight.

Speaker 7 (37:45):
Thank you have a Google guys, a thank.

Speaker 2 (37:46):
You Carlos Moreno. But that's all the county council. When
we come back, a couple of thoughts on Venezuela. Then, Greg,
I'd like to open the phones up to people tonight.
This's been another crazy weekend. We've seen the actions of
Donald Trump the US military. Wow, don't mess with the
US military, folks.

Speaker 1 (38:04):
A lot has happened all over gone.

Speaker 2 (38:06):
What's on your mind? Yeah, what's on your mind? Eight
eight eight five seven o eight zero one zero triple
eight five seven o eight zero one zero on your
cell phone dial pound two fifty and say hey Rod
or leaving some message on our talk back line by
downloading the new iHeartRadio app. More coming up on the
Rotten Gregg Show.

Speaker 1 (38:21):
This is with Farm Duero. I have to be able
to see and admit that I just became a slothful
I don't know couch potatoes.

Speaker 2 (38:28):
Do you want me to just keep on calling you
a fat boy?

Speaker 1 (38:30):
Yeah? Well, I think my face. I ain't even shaved
my beard off just so I could see all that,
you know, carb face and massed potato face. You know
in the mirror when I look at myself, You're just
a shamed You.

Speaker 2 (38:40):
Are fine shad Queen Bee said, hey boy, you're getting fat.

Speaker 1 (38:44):
No, she actually did. She hasn't. She has said that
she's okay, she's nice. But I, you know, it's a
good motivator. I I I considered, you know, self loathing
to be a great motivator to change my ways. So
all right, fat boy, I'm well on the way. Yeah,
I bring it on. I'm good, I'm good. But welcome folks.
What are your new New Year's resolutions? Do you have any?

(39:05):
Sometimes they feel like they're just so, you know, mechanically,
like everybody does it. You don't want to be part
of this. The sheeple that are just you know, they
have resolutions by January and they're gone it by February.
But this year I didn't even choose to. But I
have a totally different attitude about this new year this time.

Speaker 2 (39:22):
I know of someone and she talked about making New
Year's resolutions one time. She didn't like these long drawn
out ones. She selects one or two words, and that's
the word she concentrates on throughout the year.

Speaker 1 (39:35):
What would a resolution be in one word?

Speaker 5 (39:37):
Well?

Speaker 2 (39:37):
Like healthy? Oh okay, see what I'm saying. Yes, And
she was determined Kinder probably could, probably you and I.

Speaker 1 (39:46):
That's I'm never doing that one way. This is the
Kinder gentler version you're getting right here. You should have
seen one from ten years ago. Oh that's true. A
little more I've heard, but that's what she did. She'd
used one work.

Speaker 2 (40:00):
Yeah, it makes sense, one or two or three words
that she'd stare at each and every day and think about.

Speaker 1 (40:05):
I believe in systems, not not an end goal. So
because think about it, if I want to lose five pounds,
ten pounds, whatever, what do you do? You get to
the number and then you just start eating bad again. No,
I mean you have to you have to change your life, changer.
You have to change your system. You're right, your life.
There has to be a system, not an end goal,
like it has to be this weight number. This has
to so yeah, yeah, I'm set. I'm ready to go. Good,

(40:26):
I'm ready. Well, we'll track it all right. I want
to go back to uh talking about Venezuela. I hope
you listened.

Speaker 2 (40:33):
Uh your listeners out there caught a portion of the
Glenn Beck show this morning. Because everybody is saying, you know,
the administration saying this is not about oil. It's not
about you know, America has as much oil as Venzuela.
Let's be honest, right, you're pretty darn close to it.
But he said it is about oil because of the
impact it has on China and Russia. China and I

(40:56):
think I've got this right from listening to Glenn this morning,
get sixty percent of its oil from Venezuela, and in return,
China gives Venezuela money and they help build bridges and
schools and everything, and security and security, military security. Right,
So it is in fact about oil in the sense

(41:17):
that Donald Trump and what do you call it, the
don Roe doctrine. The doctrine basically said we will not
allow any influence in our hemisphere that is a threat
to the United States of America, which is wise, which
I subscribe to. That's what it comes down to. So
he sees Venezuela exporting all this oil to our number

(41:40):
one enemy out there right now, which is China, and
he says, we can't have that. Enough of this. We
are not, you know, and you've got a dictator who
is not fairly elected, right and who is helping the
cartels run that country into the ground. And Donald Trump
says enough we warned them, we invited him. They partly
leave the country, go live with Putin, go live with

(42:03):
Homony in Iran, but just get out, and he refused
to do so. He played games with the president, and
people around the world better realize, don't play games with
Donald Trump.

Speaker 1 (42:12):
Well, there's a there's a there's an incubation period that
happened here. So our guests and at the top of
the hour, Carlos Marino, he's a Salty County council member,
he's Venezuelan, and he talked about how wealthy of a
country Venezuela was in the nineties. They weren't looking to
leave at that country. They were they had all they
had natural resources. It was a country of wealth. People
did very well. Uh, the standard of living was high.

(42:33):
But when Maduro came in and brought socialism into that country,
they took away people's properties and their assets, and and
the place plummeted. And it did what history always shows us, socialism,
communism does it just it's the lowest common denominator, and
that lowest common denominator is not a good quality of life.
So you have a country where it is falling apart.

(42:54):
And even their ability. They were exporting in their heyday
three billion barrels I think a day they were now
that today they're at just a billion barrels just because
of their infrastructure. I'm sorry, not a billion, but a million,
three million a day to a million a day. So
what happens is you have Cuba. I heard Secretary of
Rubio say this that Cuba basically colonized then Azuela by

(43:17):
coming in there with so many of their people to
run that country. You have China's interests that are in there.
You have Russia's interests there there, you have Iran's interests
that are there. It became a proxy war that has
been described by these enemies of our state that were
combining all in that country to our demise. And so
they not only have oil, but they also have the
rare minerals that are becoming more and more important by

(43:39):
the day in terms of our technology and everything that
we're using. We it's the greatest irony that the liberals,
leftist hated the extraction industry. There's no greater extraction than
for rare minerals, and they have to admit that they
can't avoid that. But and so by way of deposits
of rare minerals and their natural resources of oil and gas.

(44:00):
That that and having the enemies of our state combining
down there, that place was heating up even more than
I probably appreciated. So it did take some decisive action.
And it used to be that Democrats would complain that
Trump didn't have the wherewithal or the backbone to do
something about the Maduro campaign back in his first term
or his regime. He does something now, and now they're

(44:22):
upset about it.

Speaker 2 (44:23):
Yeah, in the mid nineties, before Chavez and Moduro took over, Okay,
Thenzuela was the third most prosperous country in the Western hemisphere,
behind the United States in Canada.

Speaker 1 (44:36):
So how come all these prosperous socialists they how can
they romanticize socialism.

Speaker 2 (44:43):
You've got a socialist mayor of Seattle who today said,
we aren't going to prosecute drug cases anymore, open use
of drugs in this country. Fine in her city. Fine,
You've got Maduro what his housing mom, Donnie, Donnie, I'm sorry,
New York City Land actually said, hey, you know, if
there's no there's no such thing as individualism anymore, it's

(45:04):
all collectivism.

Speaker 1 (45:05):
Yeah, the frige. Look, the frigidity of rugged individualism will
be replaced with the warmth of collectivism. I don't know
that's so warm.

Speaker 2 (45:15):
I mean, it's not.

Speaker 1 (45:16):
If it is, it's like Haites, it's not, it's not.
It's not inviting. No, I don't think.

Speaker 2 (45:20):
You're ready America. All right, Moore, coming up? It is
the Roden Grag Show. Your phone calls eight eight eight
five seven o eight zero one zero, or your comments
on our talk back line. All you do is have
to download the iHeartRadio app, look up KNRS and then
you can see where you can leave us a message.
We'll get to your calls and comments eight eight eight
five seven o eight zero one zero on the Rod
and Grade Show.

Speaker 1 (45:40):
I really think we're in a window. I don't know
that we'll have a president, even if it's JD. Vance
or Mark Rubio or a or a DeSantis run de Santas. I.
This president's biased towards action, I think is second to none.
I don't know that you'll see someone who's looking to
move the needle and is and wouldn't be talking or
even thinking about an issue unless he plans to do

(46:00):
something about it. And that's and that is just so rare,
and I think we're just in a in a great time.
And then look, is he going to get everything right?
Nobody's perfect, so there's going to be times we wouldn't
But man, I think right now he is doing very well.

Speaker 2 (46:15):
You know, and there, let's be honest, there are going
to be some real challenges now in what we do
in Venezuela. Yeah, he does want a nation build. No,
he saw what George Bush did, says no, not going there.
Early critic of early critic. So I think it's a
delicate balance. But I think Marco Rubio is a key
I think he understands that region. You know, he's Cuban,

(46:39):
not Cuban born, but his parents came from Cuba, is
that correct, So he knows the culture and I think
he will be such a key factor in all of this.

Speaker 1 (46:48):
He will be, and he's a I think his leadership style.
When I when I listened to him since Saturday and
him described in the Secretary of State describing what's going
on there. When he ran for president in twenty sixteen,
I endorsed him. I got spent some time with him.
Very smart US senator. You know, he'd been the Speaker
of the State House in Florida. I think he's learning
right now so much from President Trump. I think that

(47:10):
he whatever he does by way of his he's a
young guy. I'd argue, whatever he does and by way
of public service, beyond this and this time that we're in,
I think he's going to be incredibly impactful and he
will have a greater bias towards action because of the
example of President Trump. And he's learned on the clock.

Speaker 2 (47:28):
You know, Andy, the thing I admire about him, and
there are other members of the administration Scott Bessen comes
to mind. JD.

Speaker 1 (47:34):
Vance.

Speaker 2 (47:35):
Also, they aren't afraid to go on these Sunday morning
talk shows, you know. And why they go on him,
I do not understand, because they know the hosts are
going to try and get him well. I want you
to listen to two soundbites, one from Face the Nation
on CBS yesterday and the other one from Meet the
Press as Marco Rubio confronted their questions.

Speaker 4 (47:52):
It's very simple, Okay, in the twenty first century, under
the Trump administration, we are not going to have a
country like Venezuela in our own hemisphere, in the sphere
of control and the crossroads for Hesbala, for Iran, and
for every other malign influence in the in the world.
That's just not going to exist. No more drug trafficking,
no more Iran has belave presence there, and no more

(48:14):
using the oil industry to enrich all our adversaries that
around the world and not benefiting the people of Venezuela
or frankly benefiting the United States and the region.

Speaker 2 (48:23):
Now, in that first somebody he was on Face the Nation,
Greg and Margaret Brennan, who's the host there. She started
off by saying, well, you got Maduro and his wife.
Why didn't you get five other people? I know, why
didn't you go after the five others? And he goes,
you realize how delicate an operation this was. We landed
a helicopter inside of Venezuela and Million military base just

(48:44):
a few feet from where this guy was. We're going
to do that all around the country. Are you kidding me?

Speaker 1 (48:50):
And he says, he said, can you imagine the howling
it would take place? If we took five if we
took the top person there, if we took four more,
if we stayed four more days to take for more people,
what would the Howling be like, and he's telling me,
he says Howling, he's talking about that about art.

Speaker 2 (49:05):
Yeah, yeah, yeah he is. And here's a military analyst
this on CNN. He's a senior military analyst. His name
is James Starveris talked about the military operation and who
was paying attention to us.

Speaker 8 (49:18):
Privately, they will be impressed with the military capability here.
I would argue, none of those three militaries could have
executed an operation like this. And again we just we
tend to just breeze by this. But the idea of
finding Fixing, kidnapping, taking him out alive with his wife,

(49:41):
no casualties on the side of the US, that's an
extraordinary military operation. So I think while there will be
a lot of public condemnation of the United States, predictably
from those three nations, privately they'll be saying to themselves, hmmm,
that's a very capable military.

Speaker 1 (50:00):
That's not a bad.

Speaker 8 (50:00):
Thought to pop up in Beijing, Moscow and Tehran these days.

Speaker 2 (50:05):
Yeah, he's talking about China, Russia and Iran's you think
they were paying attention, you bet they were.

Speaker 1 (50:11):
Well, not just that, but whoever sold or whoever traded
the military defense systems for Venezuela that was Chinese by
an origin. They must be saying, what is this like,
why did your stuff not work? I think China is
pretty embarrassed and probably shocked that this happened the way

(50:32):
it did. Did you catch that President Trump mentioned space Force, yes,
and said it was the worst time. I got to
imagine that was a cyber attack. I gotta imagine that
nothing was working. Although I got to say late late
Friday night, I did start to see some videos on
x where they they said there was explosions or something
was happening as I was going to sleep, So there

(50:54):
was some communication happening out of that country that night.
But yeah, so it it does. I think that you
saw when we attacked Iran's nuclear facilities and dismantled them.
I think there was a there was a collective gulp
that happened with our enemies, and I think that this
is another one of those collective gulps. They're going, oh okay,

(51:16):
because I think that if you thought that, I think
there's a pattern. Don't you see a pattern with President Trump?
Mess around and find out that's a nice way to
say it.

Speaker 2 (51:25):
I think it's a way.

Speaker 1 (51:26):
I think there's a pattern recognition. If we're watching that,
you just don't want to mess around, or you're going
to find out that he's not messing around.

Speaker 2 (51:34):
Well, I'm serious, yeah, And I think the most interesting
part of his nudes conference on Saturday was with General
Raisin Kane. Yes, because kin kind of explained how they
happened and what happened basically from what I'm and I'm
no military expert, but they basically cleared a highway, a
path for those choppers to go in and get Maduro.

(51:56):
And those choppers were flying one hundred feet above the
water going a breakneck speed to get in there, get
that guy, and get out of there. And that's they
so they kind of created this highway so they could
get in, get the guy, and get the heck out
of there. And you talk about the Space Force, every
every department, the Army, the Navy, you name it, we're

(52:17):
all involved in this operation. Talk about coordination, and everything
happened happened perfect, and we had a very narrow window
of weather to get in and out of here. That's
when the President said we got the window, and they
said it and said God bless them, go get them.

Speaker 1 (52:31):
And just contrast that with you know, with Jimmy Carter
when they tried to save the hostel. Yeah, they hit
the dust storm and all those planes went down into
the desert having not even gotten close to Tehran. There's
been disaster after disaster. The Afghanistan pull out was a
humiliation for our country. There's just you had a Secretary
of Defense back then, Lloyd Austin, who went under the

(52:53):
he was having a major surgery and didn't bother tell anyone. Yeah,
we had no Yeah, there was no next in command
in charge. The president didn't know his secretary of Defense
was incapacitated, and they didn't care. We had a Chinese
surveillance balloon that flowed across the contonel United States untouched
during his time. So if you look at from the
past or even recent military history of the United States,

(53:16):
it's not been glowing. And then to see it change
so strongly and so powerfully and so impressively under Trump,
it's I don't think you can ignore it.

Speaker 2 (53:25):
Well, just think about this. The attack on Irony and
nuclear facilities unbelievable, and this attack on Mordureau another unbelievable.

Speaker 1 (53:33):
Left even though out of Yemen they got they got
shut down immediately, and they'd been terrorizing everyone forever.

Speaker 2 (53:38):
All right, were coming up the Rod and Greg show
in Utah's talk radio one O five nine KNRS. I
hope you had a wonderful, wonderful holiday, Greg and I
and e Ray and Abby we all did.

Speaker 1 (53:48):
Yes.

Speaker 2 (53:48):
Abby was in Hawaii. She spent five or six days
over there.

Speaker 1 (53:52):
Yeah, she's living large and in charge.

Speaker 2 (53:54):
Yeah. You went to Saint George.

Speaker 1 (53:56):
I did. Yeah. The weather wasn't the greatest, but it
was nice.

Speaker 6 (53:59):
Skin.

Speaker 2 (53:59):
Well usually, you know, you wish Saint George would be
what about ten degrees warmer for time.

Speaker 1 (54:05):
As hot as it is in the summertime, it should
be warmer in these months. Yeah, because in the winter
it should be a little warmer because it's just unbearably
it's like fourteen ten easy.

Speaker 2 (54:16):
You see that note I sent from my liberal thinking
brother in Syracuse, New York. How my feet They got
four feet of snow in twenty four hours.

Speaker 1 (54:24):
Yeah, you can have it. This is why I'm totally
happy with global warming. I will take my carbon yeah,
carbon footprinting.

Speaker 2 (54:32):
Yeah, they were averaging anywhere from four to seven inches
an hour. Is that's a lake effect for Yeah, that's
lake Ontario, and that's what that's Buffalo and Rudsia. Matter
of fact, in Buffalo they had to ask people to
help come and shovel off the stadium so they could
see people come in and see the Bills game. And
that area of Buffalo and Rochester and Syracuse and where

(54:54):
I lived further north. You just get pounded with snow,
then you can do about it.

Speaker 1 (54:58):
Yeah, I'm reading a book, and the book the author
of the book in college, he got stranded in one
of these snowstorms and said, if I live through this,
because it was at night, I'm never I'm leaving. And
he graduated, got on a plane and he went to
California and never.

Speaker 2 (55:12):
Returned to Adams.

Speaker 1 (55:13):
That's it, Bill Bilbert, the Dilbert cartoonist. Yep, it's time
never living in this again. If I live, and he did.

Speaker 2 (55:20):
Yeah, you and I are admirer of cars. We like cars, right, yes,
Utah Auto X Bow, the International Auto ex Bow is
coming up. Let's see January sixteenth through the nineteenth and
right now we have a four pack of tickets to
give away cool to the Auto x Bowl. It's fun
to go see all the new cars.

Speaker 1 (55:39):
It is and you got you got concept cars that
are fun to see, and then you got the cars
that are coming out for the next year that are
always always fun.

Speaker 2 (55:46):
Yeah. Yeah, So we've got four tickets right now. We'll
take Color what number five you right?

Speaker 5 (55:51):
Oh?

Speaker 1 (55:51):
Ten? All right?

Speaker 2 (55:52):
Take Color number ten eight eight eight five seven oh
eight zero one zero. If you're caller number ten right
now eight eight eight five seven oh eight zero one
year old, you'll win a four pack of tickets to
the Utah International Auto Expo coming up starting on January
sixteenth at the Mountain American Expo Center in Sandy. Caller
number ten right now, eighty eight eight five seven zero
eight zero one zero. By the way, I don't know

(56:14):
if you saw this today, Greg quick note sendor Mark
Kelly from Arizona, Yes, Okay, advising troops along with several
other senators not to follow the illegal orders. Well, the
Defense Department says we've had enough of this. There are
taking steps now to downgrade Kelly's retirement rank and pay

(56:35):
in response to his November video warning the service members
not to follow illegal order.

Speaker 1 (56:41):
I think it's appropriate. I think there was that there
definitely was a plan in play there to try and
create chaos and he should be. It should be, it
should be dealt with, and there should be consequences.

Speaker 2 (56:54):
He takes that, says his department has initiated proceedings now
to demote Kelly, retired Navy captain to a lower rank
with corresponding reduction in pay. Kelly has thirty days to appeal.
Didn't he go into space?

Speaker 1 (57:07):
He did Space Shuttle?

Speaker 2 (57:10):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (57:10):
Actually, I think he went up in the space after on.
I think he went on four missions and one of
them was after his wife, Gabby uh was shot and
he went up in the space.

Speaker 2 (57:21):
All right, we's got another hour coming awa the Running
Greg Show right here on Utah. It's talk Radio one
oh five nine. Can or I stay with us. They
ain't got no snell, man, I mean they got to
get some stell.

Speaker 1 (57:37):
I don't care.

Speaker 2 (57:40):
Do you know how much money that industry pumps into
this economy.

Speaker 1 (57:44):
No, there are a bunch of liberals up there.

Speaker 2 (57:46):
I don't know what.

Speaker 1 (57:47):
It's like a different state up there. It's not like
you're not even in Utah when you go up there.

Speaker 2 (57:51):
Yes you are. It's just Abby lives up there.

Speaker 1 (57:55):
Well, Abby is different and she doesn't live quite there.

Speaker 2 (57:58):
She lives on the way she's close.

Speaker 1 (58:00):
She is, but she she's I don't include her in
that area that I don't I care about where she lives.
She's listening, you know.

Speaker 2 (58:09):
You know I thought you'd be different when we came
back from Halloween.

Speaker 1 (58:11):
Yeah, it's a new year. It's new year, new me.
I just got done telling you about all my my goals.
I'm going to lose all this this weight I gained
over the I just it's like I was stung by
a bee and I had allergic reaction. I swelled, and
I'm going to lose all that weight and I'm gonna
Did you.

Speaker 2 (58:26):
Really eat that much?

Speaker 1 (58:27):
Yes? Oh yeah, you know I was calories in, none burned. Okay,
I could watch.

Speaker 2 (58:35):
Any ball game.

Speaker 1 (58:37):
Yes. And by the way, the pop Tarts Bowl is
an awesome bowl. If your championship trophy can't toast pop tarts,
then I don't even know why you're playing, because the
championship trophy you can put the pop tarts in and
it toasts them.

Speaker 2 (58:49):
Really.

Speaker 1 (58:49):
Yes, the chair the trophy is a toaster and it
looks like a trophy, but you can have the little
tops you can put them in. I'm telling you, it's
a beautiful. It's such a fun bowl, you know, is
the most watched non playoff bowl game really, and yes,
of the holiday the most watched. They call themselves the
People's National Champion.

Speaker 2 (59:08):
Oh, they played Georgia Tech.

Speaker 1 (59:09):
They played Georgia Tech. It was a good game. B
YU was a little hindered going into that game, so
they'll have their j Well, they didn't have l. J. Martin,
the Big twelve player of the year. I hope not.
I don't know. Maybe I don't know yet. Don't don't,
don't be hating. That's a sad story. And then and
then Bear Bachmeyer was a bit immobile. His his ankle

(59:30):
was still was still gimpy, so he and then we
didn't have our great linebacker Jack Kelly, so we we
weren't at full and then we of course were down
by eleven at the at the fourth quarter. And then
they came back and they win, and America has deemed
them the People's National Champion. And they even made hats
of which I've sent away for they haven't arrived yet,

(59:51):
and made by the Pop Tart Bowl, by the way,
not by b y U fans. So I know you
if folks, if you could see the look of contempt
on his face. Now he is just so dismissive of
what I'm saying.

Speaker 2 (01:00:03):
But that was the most give me the same look
as I talked about the Utah game.

Speaker 1 (01:00:09):
No I've been You've softened me on the utes. I'm
not as well. I am anti utes, but I'm not
anti used, so I put up with it.

Speaker 2 (01:00:17):
I'll throw out an idea, why do we have bowl
games anymore when half the players don't show up anymore?

Speaker 1 (01:00:23):
Well that I mean, fact they don't show up anymore
is a problem. But I do like the bowl games.
I do. I hope they don't. We don't lose bowl games.
But I think this hole I'm going into the portal
that we've always wanted a playoff for the national champions.
It used to be whoever was the number one going
into the bowl games, if they didn't lose their bowl
game and they didn't play number two, automatically they would win.

(01:00:45):
That's what BYU scenario was. They were the number one
ranked team and the only team in college football that
hadn't lost. They played Michigan in the Holiday Bowl, won
that bowl game, so they're national champions. They didn't play
one versus two in the nineties. I think it was
the nineties they started the one versus two right ninety
eight or something like that, and then in twenty thirteen
they added four teams, and then we all argued whether

(01:01:06):
those were the two top four top fourt more than that.
Then we got to twelve. This is the first year
where you can actually argue because the top last four
team standing, only one of them was in the top four.
The other are five, six and seven seeds.

Speaker 2 (01:01:19):
No, yeah, and didn't the teams with the byes lose.

Speaker 1 (01:01:23):
All of them, but all of them but Indiana, Okay,
that's the only one. All the other teams lost.

Speaker 2 (01:01:29):
Ohio State lost, yep. Yeah, the other.

Speaker 1 (01:01:30):
Schools lost, Yeah, they did. So it's fun because you've
got Oregon, which was I think I think number five,
because Texas Tech was four. It went, it went, it
went Indiana, Ohio State, who was third, No, Oregon was fifth,
who was the third? Anyway, they lost two. So everybody
that's in right now, if you've done it the top

(01:01:52):
four teams in America, three of the four teams wouldn't
be in the playoffs right now, which is fun to see.
This will be the I think the first true national champion.

Speaker 2 (01:02:00):
Yeah in college football? Yeah, well, uh, I warned my
wife last night. We're sitting watching the Steelers game. I said, Darling,
I love you, but get ready. This weekend is going
to be crazy and shed Oh no, And I said,
Thursday night, you've got a college semi final. Friday night
you've got another college semi final, and then Saturday, Sunday

(01:02:22):
and Monday night you've got the NFL playoffs beginning.

Speaker 1 (01:02:25):
And maybe I started my weight loss journey. Usually you
think I'm in trouble. You should maybe trouble in the
first place. Is all these all these games? Yes, I
just said, you know, games three hours and if I'm
eating for three straight hours an hours.

Speaker 2 (01:02:38):
You don't have to eat for three stared hours.

Speaker 1 (01:02:40):
Times is nervous energy. You got to eat because you're worried,
you're nervous for the teams.

Speaker 2 (01:02:44):
How were you last night? I don't know if I
would have been anywhere near your house last night, because
you're such a ravid Steelers I am.

Speaker 1 (01:02:51):
And that game was a pretty rough game all the
way around. It was crazy, it is, and I I'm
so disappointed my team. I didn't know if losing it
would actually in the long term be better off. But
I can't cheer against my team. I have to want
to win. So yeah, that game was that game that
came down a two missed one missed extra point, which
then made it so that the Ravens could win, and
then they missed their field goal and then we won.

Speaker 2 (01:03:12):
It was just a wild game life.

Speaker 1 (01:03:13):
It's like, who didn't want to win that game? We
backed into that win, but that's all right. I was
happy to win it. And we'll have a home game
next week against on Monday night against Houston Texas.

Speaker 2 (01:03:22):
And is that why you got Aaron Rodgers? Never messed
with Aaron Rodgers. He was a Cowboy killer for so
many years. The Cowboys would be ahead last minute, two
minutes of the game, he marks the Packers down the field.

Speaker 1 (01:03:32):
And speaking of the Cowboys, what night do they play
or what day did they play in the playoffs?

Speaker 2 (01:03:36):
You wanted to say that they're you just you wanted
to rub that in.

Speaker 1 (01:03:42):
You know, for the entire NFL season, you have really
condescended the Steelers and talked about the Cowboys being superior
in every way.

Speaker 2 (01:03:48):
Yeah, well, can I just say one thing? It is
a shame, you know, and I've been kind of a
Dak Prescott fan kind of, but he's never won the
big ones. Yes, you know, and so I've been critical.
He had an unbelievable year this year. That's true, he
really did. I mean there was talking to him being
in the MVP race. He may still be then there,
but he had such a poor defense. I mean they

(01:04:11):
put up forty, you know, thirty eight to forty points
a game.

Speaker 1 (01:04:15):
But then you're didn't Jerry Jones kind of, he didn't
make it a wash this year. But don't they have
like eight hundred no draft picks.

Speaker 2 (01:04:21):
They've traded a couple of them away already.

Speaker 1 (01:04:23):
Yeah, because I heard they got tons of cap room
and they got a lot of they do have a
lot of draft picks.

Speaker 2 (01:04:28):
I hope you know. They need to get rid of
the defensive coordinator. I am checked the wires today. He
just needs to go.

Speaker 1 (01:04:34):
Yeah. Yeah. I think sometimes offensive coordinators and defensive coordinators
get more blamed than the head coach. I think head coaches,
you're not yet are immune from all this. You are
not happy with Mike Tomlin, I am not at the Steelers.
I think we are eight years without a playoff win,
and we the longest in mind.

Speaker 2 (01:04:52):
If they win this year, if they win Monday Night, and.

Speaker 1 (01:04:55):
I'm doomed with him forever, I'm gonna get you just
don't want him. I don't. I I think he's run
his course. I think every team and every coach has
a time where they need a fresh start. And I
think I think his nineteen seasons in Pittsburgh he's I
think it's I think that's enough.

Speaker 2 (01:05:09):
Harbaugh gun out of Baltimore.

Speaker 1 (01:05:11):
Look, I mean, I think Tomlin deserves to go before Habbaugh.
I love Harbaugh. I think even though he coaches the Ravens,
I think he's a great coach. So but no, they
talk about every coach you can talk about firing except
Mike Tomlin. He's a one coach in the NFL that
you're never allowed to say should be fired. I don't
know why. It's just you can't fire him because he's
had non consent. He's had consecutive non losing seasons, which

(01:05:32):
mean not winning seasons because eight and eight do they
count those? Take all the trophy, all the Super Bowl
trophies out of the case and just put a plack
up that Tomlin's never had a non losing season, because
that's I guess the greatest achievement in all of college
or all of NFL football. It's not a good one
for me. I likes. I like playoff wins and Super Bowls.

Speaker 2 (01:05:52):
It does make sense.

Speaker 1 (01:05:53):
Yeah, that's what That's what I grew up with. That's
how I was bred and high. That's all I knew.

Speaker 2 (01:06:00):
On those guys.

Speaker 1 (01:06:01):
This guy ruined it.

Speaker 2 (01:06:02):
John Stalworth, all those great teams, Jack Lambert, Jack Ham, great.

Speaker 1 (01:06:06):
Players, and then next generation Paula Malu. Yeah, James Harrison,
he was He was fun to watch, all that long
hair flying around around and it was fun to watch. Well,
if you know, if the conservative talk radio public policy
format doesn't work, we can just do it to sports.

Speaker 2 (01:06:24):
Why there may be people listening right now saying, did
they go to a sports talk show?

Speaker 1 (01:06:28):
I know, but you know it's in season. We're still
in that the heart of that season.

Speaker 2 (01:06:31):
Work gets really fun.

Speaker 1 (01:06:33):
Well, yeah, and it's at the heart of my New
Year's resolution and the new year knew me or all
the weight after lose, it's all footballs for this week.

Speaker 2 (01:06:40):
You know you should do that uber at where they
say football is all based on getting you deep more food.

Speaker 1 (01:06:46):
Yeah, obviously worked on me.

Speaker 2 (01:06:51):
It worked.

Speaker 1 (01:06:52):
You tried foods I never saw before. I just want not.
I'm sitting here, so it's in arms length. I'll eat it.
I'll try it.

Speaker 2 (01:06:57):
What do you eat normally when you watch football game?

Speaker 1 (01:07:00):
I ate the case so dip with the the chips, yes, okay,
and then I have and then we'll make Crystal will
make cookies with milk, and I'll have. Uh. There's all
kinds of rod. There's the world is my oyster. There's
all kinds when it comes to food. Oh yeah, there's
so many snacks, so many.

Speaker 2 (01:07:18):
Snacks, and you try them all.

Speaker 1 (01:07:19):
I eat them all. I don't try. I don't try.
I eat. There's no try. So yeah, no, it's it
was it's it was gluttony, I guess. But I went
on the scale knowing it was going to be heavy.
It was ten pounds literal ten pounds. Oh no, yeah,
And so then I came clean with it because I
want to shame myself into turning it all around.

Speaker 2 (01:07:40):
So how do we can I shame you?

Speaker 1 (01:07:41):
Yes, shamie okay, fat boy, you could say, like, And
I even shaved the facial hair off my face so
that you could see the fat face hiding behind him
Fuller it is. You can see just you are so.

Speaker 2 (01:07:54):
Easy to pick on.

Speaker 1 (01:07:55):
What you ever see those before?

Speaker 2 (01:07:57):
Yeah, I've seen them before. Okay, anyway, Denny, are we
making any sense in there? Denny's just laughing. I know
we are, you guys going to talk about anything worth while?

Speaker 1 (01:08:09):
Now it's time for a break, So I think we've
probably hit the first.

Speaker 2 (01:08:12):
We've note this one right, all right, more coming up
Rod and Greg with you on this Monday evening and
Utah's Talk Radio one oh five nine k n RS.
We all had a good time to just kind of
step back, but there was a lot of news going on,
and we've tried to catch you up on that as well.
I think the Venzeuela story is going to be a
continuing story for you know, depending what happens there and

(01:08:33):
if in fact we are able to secure or that
country I should say secure in free elections, because that's
what that's what everybody wants.

Speaker 1 (01:08:42):
There was a proxy war going on down there, and
the and in the countries that were combining against us,
so their enemies of the state is staggering when as
we talk about it in the day since that's happened,
it feels like a greater threat than I appreciated easily
before we went into the holiday break. And so I
appreciate this president. I appreciate his by towards action, and
I applaud the work they did. You know, people take

(01:09:05):
it take two. There's political risks that when people take
and they want to be loved and they want where
are the people going so I can lead them there?
In politics, you seldom see someone take a risk because
when you interrupt the status quo, there's you just inherently
find so many critics. You're going to find them partisan,
but you're going to find people that like the status quo,
profit off the status quot. They're going to attack you

(01:09:27):
mercilessly to put yourself out there and to do things
others aren't willing to do, and to interrupt the status
quo and spend political capital to do it. It's just
not what you see in politics. Sadly, you don't see
it very often. And this president, if he's not doing that,
I don't think he wants the job. I think he
only wants to do it for that reason.

Speaker 2 (01:09:46):
Truly, I would agree with you. I would agree with you.
We're hoping to get this person on the show today.
Her name is Christina Bojis. I believe she's a member
of the the Utah State Board of Education. Yes, and
she posted online she apparently represents District eight. I'm not
sure what area that covers. Great, I'm not sure either,

(01:10:06):
but she basically declared, without apology or hesitation, that she
will not seek reelection to the Board of Education, and
then she just rips on Yah. She goes after the
Board of Education and education in general in this state
with just a vicious attack. And we're hoping to get

(01:10:27):
her on today. Her schedule didn't allow. I know Eray
is working to get her on sometime this week. You
and I read this, and I think the point we
want to make. She raises several general comments. Shall we
say that, Yes, but it doesn't get into specifics, and
that's what I think we need to hear from her.

Speaker 1 (01:10:45):
I think she framed this letter. It's one of the
most hostile and angry and really but with great conviction.
Letters are announcements that she's not seeking reelection. You can
see a lot of these letters, well I'm going to
spend more time in my family, irioritize or even you
know that you know what I came and wanted to do.
There's not a climate for it's something that would dance

(01:11:06):
around it. She is saying. Not only is she saying
that the issues that that every parent should be concerned
about are not being addressed, or are being addressed in
a in a performative way or in political theater and
not genuinely, but she's saying, I'm not leaving because I
want to quit. I just don't want to be associated
with how wrong they are and what they're doing. I

(01:11:29):
don't want to have anything to do with it. And
at the end of her letter, she encourages every Utah
to take their kid out of the public schools. Yeah,
she says, you gotta get you gotta get them out.
They're not they're not serious about helping these kids, teaching
these kids, getting them to grade proficiency, all this, you know,
the sexualizing of kids that are going on in the
schools and introducing them to all these you know, adult

(01:11:51):
themed issues that that kids aren't supposed to be around.
She's saying that these aren't issues that they're taking seriously
at all.

Speaker 2 (01:11:58):
Yeah. Well, this one, this, that's what she wrote in
her post. She said, and this goes to what you
were saying, Greg, I will not play this game any longer.
I refuse to be a prop in the theater of
fake reform.

Speaker 1 (01:12:10):
Yes, ouch, and she she didn't just her criticism isn't
just towards her fellow board members. She says, the legislatures
no help in this area either. So it's a it's
a pretty fiery letter. I would like. The only thing
is it's a little if you're going to go throw
a mall tof cocktail in the building on your way out,
which is what she's doing. I would like some specifics,

(01:12:33):
name some names, give us an example of It's like,
I can tell you all about the fraud and and
and uh and in Minnesota with the daycare centers, but
you show me the leering center, just the sign and
I know and with with you know, the cinder block
building with no windows, and I can see with my
own eyes that doesn't work.

Speaker 5 (01:12:55):
Well.

Speaker 1 (01:12:55):
Give us give us that, give us a scenario, give
me a give me a give me an example that
I can really get my head around.

Speaker 2 (01:13:01):
Yeah. Yeah, And bringing to that, and you and I
have talked about this, Greg. There's a report on today
from the Kim Gardner Center Policy Institute up there at
the U. Nearly half of Utah's kindergarten through third grade
kids cannot read at a grade level.

Speaker 1 (01:13:17):
Now they're from K through three, they're learning how to and.

Speaker 2 (01:13:21):
What we say until you're third grade, and then from
then on you read to learn correct and if they aren't,
you know, learning how to read at those such critical
early stages, we're in trouble. Well, I was going to
red flag. I mean, this board member has a point.

Speaker 1 (01:13:36):
Well, the red flag for me is I went I
we believed, and there seemed to be the case that
if you weren't at grade level in third grade, you're lost.
Then you were then you had an individual education plan
it's called an IEP, and it's special education. Are you
telling me where they're going to put half of the
student population Utah's public school population into i EPs and

(01:13:58):
special LED they're not, which means they're going to have
these kids that are just really struggling, that are never
going to have those deficiencies addressed if they're not even
having an individual education plan. Which is the scary part
there is once you're in an individual education plan, the
odds not everyone, but the odds are you'll be in
that special education curriculum until you graduate from high school,

(01:14:19):
so it's not even that brightest prospect once you have
an IEP. But I just can't believe that they're going
to put half of the kids. I just don't think
there's enough special ed money or teachers to do that.
So are they given up on them? I mean, that's
a staggering statistic. Half of K through three are not
at grade level. They're learning how to read, so they

(01:14:42):
don't have to read in kindergarten, but they're not at
grade level on their way to learning how to read proficiently.

Speaker 3 (01:14:46):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:14:46):
Well, I saw this story. I think I was during
the break. Why are Southern states like Mississippi other Southern
states making progress in this reading challenge where other states
around the rest of the country not being able to
do it.

Speaker 1 (01:15:01):
One is they don't believe it. They've stopped social promotion.
If you don't, if you're not going, you're gonna get
held back.

Speaker 2 (01:15:05):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:15:06):
True.

Speaker 1 (01:15:06):
And I'll tell you what for a kid like me
with a single mom, where I was a fairal child
and wasn't ray you know, I was just on my own.
I passed my classes because I did not want.

Speaker 2 (01:15:15):
You to help them get so we hope to talk
to this board member there today. But boy, this this
is a report, a very concerning room. It is.

Speaker 1 (01:15:22):
It's very disappointing. And Utah was always saying, oh, your
demographics are so much better than the national averages than
they used to be, because everybody's white, or everybody's affluent,
or there's two parents in every home more so than
any other part of the country. And we do have
these societal advantages just from the culture of Utah that
used to lend itself to superior academic scores. And they
used to say, well, you know that's because of these

(01:15:43):
different things. It doesn't sound like we're in that category
of having superior student scores now as we used to
always be.

Speaker 2 (01:15:51):
Yeah, that's scary. All right. When we come back, our
good friend guys Shiroki will join us. We'll talk more
about what is happening and may or may not happen
in the state of Minnesota when it comes to fraud.
That's coming up on the Rodden Grag Show in Utah's
Talk Radio one oh five nine. Okay, a, alright, there's
so many big stories. Well, we were away during the
holiday break, of course, the big one happening over this

(01:16:13):
weekend with the removal of Nicholas Maduro and his wife
from Venezuela. Appeared in court today pleading not guilty to
the various charges being leveled against them. The other big story,
which it really started emerging as we were about to
take a break, was the fraud in Minnesota.

Speaker 1 (01:16:31):
Yes, it was, It's been out there. We had some
whistleblowers that were employees of the State of Minnesota that
finally got some traction to say, we've been trying to
bring this to the governor's attention and the state's attention.
That's our job. It's a state department. They had their
X page taken down, so it had some traction. But
over the holiday you had Utah z owned Nick Shirley,

(01:16:52):
who we've had on the program, really break one out
that Elon Musk retweeted over one hundred million views of
a forty two minute video and it seems like I
know there was other commentary before then, but that's where
I think people started to see it. That's where I
learned about the Learing Center. That's Learing Center was eligible
for such fun.

Speaker 2 (01:17:13):
Well joining us on our newsmaker line this year. His
thoughts on this. Our good friend Guys Shiraki. He is
a columnist at Broad and Liberty. Guy, how are you
welcome back to the Right and Greg Show? And happy
New Year to.

Speaker 5 (01:17:23):
You, Happy New York. Thanks for having me back. If
you want, we can go back to football. I was
listening earlier. I mean, as a resident of Philadelphia, I'd
be happy to talk about football, especially last year.

Speaker 2 (01:17:38):
But no, thanks for having me guy.

Speaker 1 (01:17:42):
I knew you're from Philly, but I wanted you to
say that you were so happy the Steelers beat the Ravens.
I mean, I thought you'd go there. But you know
what you know I like about Philadelphia. If you if
your coach doesn't win a Super Bowl, if you're you're
out of there. Peterson, You're out of there. I mean,
you guys even want to get rid of Sirianni this year.
You don't have any patience for anything but going to
the Super Bowl, which I respect.

Speaker 5 (01:18:03):
It's it's double edged, right, I mean, we are very
tough audience. But if you're a winner, you'll never you'll
never buy a drink, You'll never you'll never pay for
a tab and a restaurant. Again, there are people that
to this day. Look, I'm old enough to remember when
the Flyers ruled the roots in professional hockey. This day, yeah,

(01:18:25):
I mean to this day, if Bobby Clark walks into
a room, they'll get a standing ovation.

Speaker 2 (01:18:29):
So we're tough, we expect a lot.

Speaker 5 (01:18:30):
But if you if you win, we will never forget
Jalen Hurts, as much as we may harass them. Jalen
Hurts will be remembered forever in Philadelphia.

Speaker 2 (01:18:40):
Do you know how much of those hurts me? Guy,
because I'm a huge Cowboys fan.

Speaker 1 (01:18:44):
Do you don't how much it's suffering game?

Speaker 5 (01:18:47):
I heard?

Speaker 6 (01:18:50):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:18:50):
On the other hand, again, right, I grew up.

Speaker 7 (01:18:53):
Look, I'm old enough.

Speaker 5 (01:18:54):
I talked about the Flyers when they were Stanley Cup champs,
So I'm old enough to remember Roger Star and one
of the best you know, and all the look, I
mean all the years, the years of misery when the
Cowboys were winning Super Bowls, you know, two, three and
four a decade and the Eagles were winning two games.

(01:19:15):
It's nice to be on the other side of it.

Speaker 2 (01:19:17):
It is, guy, Let's talk about Minnesota. Your overall thoughts
as to as this story has developed, as we're learning
more and more the amount of money being talked about
the fraud that has taken place. Your general thoughts on
all of this, guy.

Speaker 5 (01:19:32):
Yeah, as you know, I look at some of these
issues and step back and say what's the bigger picture
and what are the lessons? And I hope that despite
the fact that Governor Walls is not running to re election,
that that doesn't dismiss things because there's some real issues here.
And I would stress, you know, to you guys and
to your listeners, if you live in Utah or if
you live in Pennsylvania, whether you're a Steelers fan or

(01:19:54):
an Eagles fans, all seriousness, this is a national story
because much of the dollars, many of the dollars used
were federal dollars. The dollars that were fraudulent we used.
I'll go as far to say that we're effectively stolen
from us. We're stolen from men and women going to
work each day in Salt Lake City, going to work
each day in Greater Philadelphia. Millions, if not billions, of

(01:20:17):
dollars are stolen. So let's not get over this. Let's
not look past the obvious, which is this was systematic fraud.
These are facilities that either didn't exist or were skeleton
you know, like movie Hollywood storefronts that didn't exist or
never had the number of children. There's a related story
about children with autism and how so many of the

(01:20:41):
fake children being registered at these facilities were told and
pretended to have to deal with autism. So there was
an even added dollars that were used. So first, let's
not forget it was fraud. And second, look, I think
that this reminds us that there are those people in politics.
There are politicians that want to make government so big

(01:21:02):
and touch so much of our lives that it can't
be audited. I mean, think about with Doge and some
of those folks, and they would find programs and say, oh,
we spent two million dollars in Africa teaching opera to children,
and we spent three million dollars here to teach about
lgbtqu or transgender in Zimbabwe. And folks, you know, I

(01:21:23):
remember even members of Congress here in Pennsylvania sort of
ridicular all this noise over two million dollars, all this
noise over nine million dollars. Well, see, when you had
that attitude, you think that government's so big, you pretend
that this money doesn't matter. And I think the last
point is this, and that's how I close my collumn.
All of the Democrats' noise in Washington and in Minnesota

(01:21:45):
about caring about working family, single moms, or people with
special needs or disabilities is unfortunately all too often fake
because the reality is, if you cared about working families
trying to get ahead, if you cared about single moms
trying to better themselves, if you care genuinely about children
with autism and their need for services, then you would

(01:22:06):
join in the outrage and you would say we're going
to get to the bottom of this and we're going
to try to recoup every dollar. Instead, they deny, they
off you skated, and they screen racism. So that tells
me they're not serious about the very people they alleged
to care about.

Speaker 1 (01:22:21):
Guy, Why is that the case? Is it a play
for is there a political power play that there's numbers
amongst these communities that assure them their elections. Is it
just filthy lucre or are they making money doing what
would be the cause? I'll tell you this. In politics
in Utah, if you if you have a politician that
is anywhere adjacent to a scandal they will grab clutch

(01:22:42):
their pearls and point their finger and say, can you
believe how bad that is? I can't believe that happened.
We've got to investigate, and they will run away from it,
and they will condemn it immediately. I'm seeing the opposite
with this. I'm seeing Democrats who are going to the
matt and doubling and tripling down on the fraud, defending it.
Why is that the pain?

Speaker 5 (01:23:02):
Yeah, it's a great question. I mean, my my sense
is twofold. One of these. One is that some of
these folks believe that they're unbeatable. And and you know,
as we always say, you know, power corrupts, and absolute
power corrupts absolutely. I think so some of them think
they're unbeatable. And the second is, as we've talked about
other issues on the show together, I think that sometimes

(01:23:24):
they're so focused on advancing in ideology that they're willing
to suffer short term pain for long term issues. I
truly think when you look what's happening in Minnesota, uh,
and it's become part of a larger debate about immigration,
illegal immigration, as you as you in this bigger picture,
about how many of those folks would like to remake America.

(01:23:48):
That's what's going on here. I think, in a sense
what you see is sort of reverse discrimination. They enabled
these folks because they were Somali. Somal here now wanting
to be citizens in some case and other cases already citizens.
And I think that the greater good there is they

(01:24:09):
want to show all of us that all of these
folks should be allowed in, and so they enabled it
and encourage it. So, you know, Greg, I come back
to that one. I think you're dealing with some Democrats that,
in some cases, like the mayor of Minneapolis, can't lose.
I mean, a Republican's not going to ouse these people,
so they move, they say more outrageous things. But I

(01:24:31):
think the other part is they want to advance the cause.
Why else would you defend men and women's sports on
an issue that every culster will tell you is unpopible
Because you're trying to advance an agenda. You're trying to
make people feel uncomfortable. It's why they so quickly ran
to racism and all that other stuff. And you know,
I didn't write the column because of racism. As I

(01:24:52):
always remind folks with a name like Shiaki, my folks
were not on the Mayflower. I am the grandson, I'm
the grants out of immigrants, but grant, my immigrant grandparents
were of the type that you know, cried when they
came to the United States, were grateful for the United States,
the opportunity to start fresh, and in many cases in

(01:25:13):
many ethnic communities with families that the turn of the
twentieth century, when there was a World war, they didn't
hesitate for a moment to go to battle and risk
their lives for their new country because they believed in
America that now you see you know, Somali flags wave. Look,
there's nothing wrong with being proud of where you come from,
but if the agenda is to advance another nation against ours,

(01:25:35):
So there's a lot here that affects all of us.
And it's not just about Minnesota, and it's not about
Tim Walls. It's about billions of dollars in fraud. But
it's about being taken advantage of and the very people
expecting you and I think we help with our tax dollars,
in fact, not getting help in others lining their pockets.

Speaker 2 (01:25:53):
Yeah, guy is always just great chatting with you. Apreciate
your time and happy New Year. I know we'll be
talking more down the road. Thanks guy, Thanks so much.

Speaker 5 (01:26:01):
Happy New Year.

Speaker 1 (01:26:02):
Thank you.

Speaker 2 (01:26:02):
That is Guy Shiraki joining us here on the Rodden
Gregg Show in Utah's Talk Radio one oh five nine Canteress.
A major development concerning broadcasting tonight. We'll tell you all
about that coming up next on Talk Radio one O
five to nine.

Speaker 1 (01:26:15):
KNRS is great and I think twenty twenty six is
shaped up to.

Speaker 2 (01:26:19):
Be starting off really interesting.

Speaker 1 (01:26:22):
It really is. You're listening to us on Utah's Talk
Radio one five nine Canters and I'm citizen in Hughes and.

Speaker 2 (01:26:28):
I'm Rod Arquette. Breaking news coming out of Washington to night.
And people have been talking about this, Greig for a
long long time. I know you and I have. But
the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which basically runs PBS, okay,
voting today to dissolve itself after fifty eight years as
an organization. Congress voting last year to pull federal funding

(01:26:49):
allocated to both NBR and PBS. So the corporation has
gone away. What that means for the local stations here,
I'm not sure at this point go away.

Speaker 1 (01:26:58):
To so yeah, I think they. I think that they've
always had a difficult time raising money. Even when they
got received federal funds, there was always this need for fundraising.
And we were told that if the federal funding ended,
the PBS would stay intact because they would just raise
more money. That's not happening, and so they're not competing
in the you know, in the free market, so to speak.

(01:27:18):
And what a sad thing because I think that maybe
you don't need it anymore with all the channels. But
I know when I was a kid and you only
had three four that I was raised on Sesame Street
Fred mister Rogers neighborhood was filmed and was broadcast and
in Pittsburgh, So when I was a little kid, they
used to call it nursery school, not daycare, and it
wasn't run by Somali's. I got to meet mister mcpheely,

(01:27:42):
you know, he came to our nursery school. I met
the characters, the people that were on Mister Rogers. When
I was a teen, we manned the phones in the studio,
so I got to see mister Rogers studio and answered
the phones for their tell for their fundraising. So I'm
not speaking from thirty thousand feet away. I actually benefited
from public television. I am benefited from I benefited from

(01:28:03):
their programming and their shows. That's how I learned my
abcs and my numbers everything else. But they destroyed it.
They became so partisan, they became they were not that
place where you were learning things, and it was a
safe place where kids could see something and learn things
and be get ready for kindergarten. Uh, it's it's just
a shame.

Speaker 2 (01:28:21):
My beef has always been, because I've been in broadcasting
all my life, yes some years now, has been why
are my tax dollars going to an organization that is
competing against me for our listeners. Now, the listeners to
this station are different from the PBA, but still, if
you want it, if you want to survive, do it
on your own, raise your own money, sponsor your shows,

(01:28:41):
do something like that. And that was my biggest beef.

Speaker 1 (01:28:44):
Yeah, and they they didn't like it. And the reality is,
look how they fired Wan Williams. Oh yeah, because he
just wasn't liberal enough for them. And Wan Williams if
he's a liberal, you know, but they just took a
side and they hated half America.

Speaker 2 (01:28:57):
So it looks like PBS NPR. Maybe going away all right.
That doesn't pit for us. Tonight, head up, shoulders back,
May God bless you and your family. We'll talk to you.

All Episodes

Episode Transcript

The Rod & Greg Show News

Popular Podcasts

Two Guys, Five Rings: Matt, Bowen & The Olympics

iHeartOlympics: The Latest

Milan Cortina Winter Olympics

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}The Rod and Greg Show: Capture of Nicolas Maduro; Shirley's Reports and Legacy Media; Minnesota Fraud

Episode Transcript

The Rod & Greg Show News .css-1q01m3q{margin:0 0 -2px 0;}

Popular Podcasts

.css-r6mb8g{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:1;overflow:hidden;}Two Guys, Five Rings: Matt, Bowen & The Olympics

iHeartOlympics: The Latest

Milan Cortina Winter Olympics

All Episodes