Patriotism, Flags, and Democrat Radicalism

On Wednesday's "Dan O'Donnell Show," Governor Evers flies the Juneteenth Flag as new polling shows pretty much no Democrat plans to fly the American flag this Fourth of July. Dan explains why that says something a lot deeper about the political and cultural divisions in this country than anyone believes. Plus, an exclusive new report from WILL highlights the major reason student test scores are so poor in Wisconsin—because new teachers aren't being adequately prepared on how to teach reading skills.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
We now know what is in the memorandum of Understanding
that the United States has signed with Iran. President Trump
makes it available to the entire world as he meets
with G seven leaders. What is the President's real strategy?
What is the Iran deal all about? What was Venezuela

(00:22):
months earlier really about. We will dive into that on
this the Wednesday edition of The Dan O'Donnell Show. Also
big new report from the Wisconsin Institute for Law and
Liberty on the dismal state of state education K twelve
education here in Wisconsin. This comes, of course, as the

(00:43):
state's second biggest school district, the Maddison Metropolitan School District,
asks for an eight point five percent increase in property
taxes on top of the single biggest one year property
tax increase in the past three decades thanks to Governor
ever is four hundred year veto that's coming up in
the five o'clock hour. But of course we have got

(01:05):
to get to the single biggest story in Wisconsin, and
I dare say across the world today the Juneteenth flag
has gone up above the Wisconsin Capitol. Now you think
I'm kidding, You think I'm being facetious and making fun
of glenor Eavers for his shameless virtue signaling, and of

(01:26):
course I am. But this combined with yet another poll
showing Americans patriotism dropping because of a distinct lack of
any affection or affinity at all for these great United
States coming from the Democrat Party. Just what percentage of
them are actually going to fly an American flag on

(01:49):
the two hundred and fiftieth birthday of this country coming
up in just a couple of weeks. All of this
ties together the increasing radicalism of the Democrat Party aready
from Graham Platner in Maine to Francesco Hong and Mandela
Barnes and the rest of the state party here in Wisconsin.
We are going to get to it all. And oh,

(02:11):
by the way, another chance to win a twenty five
hundred dollars bonus as part of our USA two fifty
k giveaway. Your next chance to win coming up at
five o'clock. We had a winner, Kyle in Brookfield late
last week on Friday afternoon. Let's get another winner. Let's
celebrate America with twenty five hundred bucks in your wallet.

(02:32):
If you would like to join the Dan o'donalds Show today, Carpetland, USA,
Flooring Center, Talk and text line always open four one,
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(02:56):
if you miss a single second of today's fora in
the broadcastints, please do like subscribe thumbs up, heart emoji,
poop emoji, whatever emoji. The Dan O'Donnell Show podcast on
iHeartRadio or wherever you listen to podcasts. Governor Rivers made
a very bold decision today. Sometimes when you're governor, when

(03:22):
you're a leader, you have to make the tough choices.
You sometimes have to sacrifice the good of some for
the good of the menu or the good of others.
It's just an unfortunate reality. So, with a heavy heart,
Governor Evers temporarily took down the Progress Pride flag, which

(03:47):
has been flying above the Wisconsin capital since June first
in honor of Pride Month, and replaced it with the
June teenth flag. In a related story, Ladies and gentlemen,
there is a June teenth flag. June teenth, of course,
the federal holiday that has been celebrated somewhat informally. It's
been a state holiday, but was finally made a federal

(04:09):
holiday two years ago under the Biden administration. June nineteenth,
eighteen sixty five, when the final group of slaves got
word that they were free, that the war was over,
and that slavery, now that the United States was whole
once again, was no longer lawful. So what Juneteenth celebrates

(04:30):
is when all people in America were finally free. Governor
Evers raised the Juneteenth flag, and I don't know if
there just wasn't room on the giant flag pole above
the Capitol, but he took great care to announce that
this is just temporary. We wouldn't dare to permanently take

(04:52):
down the Pride flag during Pride Month. So for just
a couple of days from today until the end of
the weekend, we're going to have the Juneteenth flag flying
instead of the Pride flag. What was kind of remarkable
about this ceremony today is that when he rose the flag,

(05:13):
when he ordered the flag to be raised above the Capitol,
Evers himself actually admitted, yeah, this is kind of just
pointless virtue signaling. In twenty twenty, I.

Speaker 2 (05:24):
Was proud to raise the Juneteenth flag over the Wisconsin
Capitol for the very first time in our state's history.
And I want to make this clear today as we
raise the Juneteenth flag over the state Capitol for the
third year in a row, I want to acknowledge that
I know a flag is not a policy solution, and
it's not an investment, but it is a message, a

(05:47):
message to black Wisconsin. It's across our state that we
celebrate you and that as a state, we are committed
to building a future that we dare to dream of
for our kids and our brand kids and generations to come.

Speaker 1 (06:02):
Bruh. That is literally the definition of a virtue signal.
We know this isn't actually going to do anything, but
it is a very public display that we are with you.

Speaker 3 (06:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (06:17):
Yeah, you know that the black white education gap in
Wisconsin is the single worst in the entire country. Sure
we know that, we understand that. No, we're not going
to actually do anything about it, even though I'm the
education governor. But look at the flag. The flag is
a symbol that we're with you Black Wisconsinites. Yet another

(06:40):
study education outcomes in this state single biggest racial discrepancy
in the entire country. In fact, black Wisconsinites on the
most recent NAEPA national testing standards, black fourth graders ranked
dead last in the country, dead last. By contrast, white

(07:02):
Wisconsin nights fourth eighth graders on both English and math
are actually doing pretty well. The discrepancy is embarrassing, But hey, hey,
the June teenth flag is flying. What an admission that
all this really is? The Pride flag. The June teenth
flag is an empty gesture. It's sort of like the

(07:25):
old Seinfeld episode where Kramer wouldn't put on the aid's ribbon.
That was a ripe source of comedic material thirty years ago.
Now it's sort of mandatory that every single Democrat wears
the not AIDS, but June teenth ribbon or Pride ribbon

(07:49):
flies the flag. It doesn't matter, and this is Democrat
politics in a nutshell. It doesn't matter what the actual
outcome of policies might be. To show that we care,
we have this very visible symbol to show all of
you what good people we are. Ultimately, that's what it's

(08:09):
all about. Now. I have, of course made my position
very clear. The only flags that should ever fly above
the Wisconsin Capitol, or any government building for that matter,
are the flags of Wisconsin and the flags of the
United States of America. Now, while Democrats have a different
flag for every single racial, ethnic, and even sexual orientation

(08:33):
based group that could comprise a portion of their voter base,
we have yet another study, yet another survey, another poll
that came out today that shows Dems won't even fly
the American flag. Earlier this week, NBC News reported that

(08:54):
just twenty nine percent of Democrats said they were proud
to be an American, that they were very or extremely
proud of their country. By contrast, ninety some percent of
Republicans are proud to be American. Well, now we've got
a Reuter's IPSOS poll reported on by CNN's Harry Enton

(09:15):
this morning that backs that up. Not only are a
staggeringly small percentage of Democrats not proud of their country
because of all of its supposed sins against those aggrieved
groups like African Americans, like gay people, trans people, and
all of the rest, not only are they not proud

(09:38):
of it, not only are they ashamed of it, but
just a tiny percentage of Democrats say they're even going
to fly the American flag on this America's two hundred
and fiftieth birth.

Speaker 4 (09:49):
Even on the basic level of flag, look at this,
Look at how we have an increasing polarization on this issue.
Will display the flag on July fourth? The American flag.
Back in July of two thousand and one, look at this.
You had sixty eight percent of Republicans, sixty five percent
of Democrats saying that they would in fact display the
flag on July fourth.

Speaker 5 (10:09):
You come over to this side of the screen.

Speaker 4 (10:10):
Republicans basically are where they were twenty five years ago,
rite sixty four percent. But look at that Democratic percent
absolutely plummeting. Just twenty seven percent of Democrats say they
will in fact display the flag on July fourth. Democrats
and Republicans in different camps, even on the simple question
of displaying the flag on July fourth, a polarization, a

(10:33):
split that simply put did not exist a generation ago.

Speaker 1 (10:37):
Twenty seven percent, just twenty seven percent, a little more
than one in four Democrats will actually fly an American
flag on July fourth, compared to about two thirds of Republicans.
Only twenty four percent of Democrats same surveys say they
want to celebrate America as a priority on July fourth,
you know, to to extol the virtues of the country,

(10:59):
reflect on how great the United States is. This is
following every bit of data that we have on this,
all of these polls. It started with the Patriotism Survey,
which is going to come out probably next week. They've
done it every year. It's a Gallop survey starting in
January of two thousand and one, and you also had Reuters,

(11:21):
you also had other polsters measuring pretty much since then,
who loves this country? How much we love this country. Now,
of course there was a massive surge in patriotism post
nine to eleven. But over the past twenty five years,
while Republicans their pride and their love for this country,

(11:42):
their belief in the fundamental greatness and goodness of America
has stayed remarkably consistent. Ninety percent say that they're very
proud to be American or extremely proud to be an American,
the exact same percentage as in January of two thousand
and one. The Democrat number has dropped precipitously. Now, we
talked about this on moch Day when the NBC News
poll came out. Harry Enton of CNN made a fantastic

(12:05):
point about that survey and why politics alone doesn't explain it,
I said on Monday, and I have maintained, and the
data sort of follows this, that Democrats are only you
see these small spikes in patriotism and love for their
country when a Democrat controls the White House. They only

(12:27):
love America when, in the words of Barack Obama, we
can reshape America in their own far left, socialistic image.
Enton said, that's not true because the first time that
Writer's Ipsos did this poll, the number was ninety percent

(12:47):
for Republicans in about eighty five percent for Democrats, and
it was taken in January of twenty twenty one. What
had just happened in November and December of two thousand,
probably the single most contentious presidential election in this country's history.

Speaker 4 (13:05):
What about this idea? Are you proud to be an American?
Extremely or very proud to be an American?

Speaker 5 (13:10):
Again?

Speaker 4 (13:11):
Look at this divide, a growing divide on this question.
Back in January of two thousand and one, ninety percent
of Republicans eighty five percent of Democrats. This was after
a very contentious two thousand election. Keep in mind, right
with George W. Bush coming into the White House. You
come over to this side of the screen. In twenty
twenty six, look at this again. The Democratic percentage absolutely

(13:33):
plummets to just twenty nine percent of Democrats say there
extremely are very proud to be an American. That Republican
percentage the exact same ninety and ninety the Democratic percentage.

Speaker 5 (13:43):
What is that?

Speaker 4 (13:44):
That's basically a third of the level that it was
just twenty five years ago.

Speaker 1 (13:49):
That's a fascinating point. Twenty five years ago, Democrats were furious.
They said George Bush wasn't elected, but he was selected
by the Supreme Court after the results came in from
a state where his brother happened to be the governor.
They were the original election deniers. We had to hear
King George. We had to hear he wasn't a democratic,

(14:13):
We had to hear how democracy was dead even a
generation at go. But Americans were still united. Democrats still
loved this country. Democrats were still proud of these What changed.
It wasn't politics. It's not just Donald Trump. Because Democrats
hated George W. Bush two and Democrats would have in

(14:35):
January of two thousand and one, had every reason if
it was just about them not controlling the White House.
If it was just about them not winning elections, they
would have been saying, hey, we're not proud to be
an American. Now you've got something totally different. In those
intervening twenty five years, you have seen a fundamental shift

(14:57):
in the message in coming from the Democratic Party, the
message in huming from mainstream media, the messaging coming from
pop culture. It is no longer a unifying message of yes,
we have our political differences, but ultimately we all value
the same things. Ultimately we are all one people. Ultimately
we all love this country and respect our neighbors. And

(15:19):
while we may fight it out in the halls of Congress,
we always have each other's back, says people. That changed.
What became mainstream is this neo socialist, racial Marxist messaging
that America has always been a fundamentally evil place, that

(15:42):
its original sin of colonialism, which brought about, of course,
conquests and slavery, actually led millions of people, all lefties,
to believe that America wasn't really founded two hundred and
fifty years ago with the Declaration of Independence. It was
actually founded in sixteen nineteen, where the very first slave

(16:03):
ships came ashore on the New World. The sixteen nineteen
project was part and parcel of what I believe to
be an organized neo socialist, racial Marxist plot to win
elections by dividing the American electorate, getting Americans at each

(16:24):
other's throats, convincing each different demographic group that they are oppressed,
that they can't possibly win in the rigged game that
is the American capitalist system, and the best that they
can hope for is simply voting for the people who
will right old wrongs, who will enact political vengeance upon

(16:47):
their oppressors and will give them the scraps from government
large s that they literally seize from the billionaires and millionaires. Well, unfortunately,
all of the most famous socialists in America are now millionaires,
Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders. So now we're talking about trillionaires

(17:08):
and billionaires. If we just seize enough money from the
people who are making more than you and redistribute it
to you, we will right old wrongs reparations. As an
idea that this idea that the American government, White America
should pay Black Americans for slave labor, that they should

(17:32):
without any real investigation as to who would be eligible
as the actual descendant of an American slave, just kind
of give out money. That was always sort of bubbling
in the black nationalist underground of the nineteen seventies through
about the nineteen nineties, it's now mainstream. Every couple of

(17:54):
months you'll have Aana Presley, a member of the Squad,
and a socialist congressmen from Massachusetts and the Congressional Black
Caucus come out and say, well, reparations. Now it is
now a mainstream plank of the Democrat Party's platform. This
idea that it is a civil right for biological males

(18:17):
to be in women's locker rooms, bathrooms, and sporting events
is something that nobody in human history ever thought was
a good idea. They are going against tens of thousands
of years of not just American history, but civilizational history
for entirely new, radicalized ideas, because they constantly have to

(18:40):
make the case that they are the freedom fighters fighting
for a new civil rights. There's nobody in America, nobody
who thirteen fourteen years after the Supreme Court legalized gay marriage,
who seriously believes, well, you know what, we're probably going
to have to go back that was taken away as
a sim rights issue. I don't see anyone of my

(19:03):
generation or younger really having much of a problem with it.
Sort of like, Okay, you know, gay people, what do
you want. We want to get married. We want to
have the exact same rights under the government that straight
couples have. Okay, yeah, fine, trans people, what do you want? Well,
here's a list. First of all, if you don't use
the pronouns that we identify and invent for ourselves, you

(19:26):
will commit a genocide upon us. And if we're not
allowed to be with your daughter while she goes to
the bathroom, well then you will be responsible for literally
killing us. Okay, that's a bridge too far. But Democrats
have thrown in with this because again, the trans community
needs to be coddled and needs to be made to

(19:49):
feel special by attaining the highest level of status in
liberal America, that is victimhood. Victimhood is a status if
the goal is to make people subservient to government, and
this is fundamentally socialist in nature. If the goal is
not to create the next Elon Musk, but to ensure

(20:11):
that Elon Musk the trillionaire does not exist, and we
take his money and give it out to the aggrieved
demographic groups, because of course they're never going to be
able to succeed for themselves in this rigged capitalist game
we call the American economic system. We will give them

(20:31):
subsistence living, we will allow them to not have to compete.
We will make them feel special. We will fly their
flag shamelessly, virtue signaling to them, give them their own
month in June. Never actually do anything, they never actually
have policies that succeed, but continually convince them that if

(20:53):
you don't elect Democrats, if you don't elect us, well
then there will be a genocide against you. It is
about as nefarious as it gets, and it explains kind
of everything. It's not politics per se. It is the
rise of radical socialism within the Democrat Party, a true
vein of anti Americanism, anti westernism that has infected every

(21:19):
aspect of the politics. In fact, one of our writers
over at the Heartland Post dove into just how far
left the Democrat Party has gotten by taking a look
at what some of the State Convention's resolutions were thirteen
years ago and what some of the resolutions were at
the State Party convention this year. It is night and day.

(21:43):
Dan O'Donnell's show, coming right back, Welcome back to the
Dan o'donald Show. It is conservative thought, not just talk.
And while Republicans have pretty much been consistent, not just
in terms of what percentage of them are going to
fly the American flag on the fourth of July, but

(22:05):
what percentage of them are proud to be Americans? And
on policy as well, there really hasn't been much of
a change, if anything, on actual policy. From George W.
Bush to Donald Trump, the two Republican presidents this century,
Republicans have actually moved to the left. Democrats have moved

(22:25):
so far to the left that it has infected every
single aspect of the body politic in this country, including
things that you would think would be independent of politics,
namely what people think about this country itself. Just how
radical has this party gotten? Well the Heartland posts. Megan Novak,

(22:50):
who also serves as the president of Americans for Prosperity Wisconsin,
went back and looked at the Democrat Party of Wisconsin's
state convention resolutions from thirteen years ago and compared them
to the resolutions that were approved just this past weekend.

(23:13):
Thirteen years ago, Democrats gathered in of all places Oconoma Walk, Yes,
Oconoma Walk, and adopted a set of resolutions that read
like the concerns of a party rooted in the kitchen
table politics of working Midwesterners, just with a different set
of policy ideas on how to fix those problems fair enough,

(23:35):
no back rights. Thirteen years later, they gathered in Madison
this past weekend to vote on resolutions that included abolishing ice,
affirming that transgender women are women, packing the United States
Supreme Court, and mandating that data centers generate one hundred
percent of their electricity on site, with at least seventy

(23:56):
percent of it from renewable resources. It's quite the leap
from worrying about minimum wage and reforming our immigration system.
In twenty thirteen, Democrats considered Resolution thirteen JHD one, calling
on Congress to enact comprehensive immigration reform that provides a

(24:19):
reasonable path to citizenship and social integration for workers, family
members of US residents, and young people raised in this country.
It was a mainstream position, the kind that Republican Senators
like Marco Rubio were willing to negotiate over. The language
was measured, the goal was a workable policy. The twenty

(24:40):
twenty six resolutions propose abolishing ICE and prosecuting law enforcement.
The draft resolution declares that the federal government created ICE
quote out of fear and racism, while also calling for
ending mass deportations, ending private immigration detention, and supporting the

(25:00):
prosecution of immigration officers for human rights violations. That's insane.
That's not a tweak. That's not an evolution. This is
a different ideological universe. In twenty thirteen, Wisconsin Democrats wanted
a working immigration system. In twenty twenty six, they want

(25:23):
to tear down the agency that enforces immigration. They characterize
it as a product of bigotry and potentially want to
criminalize its agents. Here's something else that's telling. The twenty
thirteen resolutions, all of them do not contain a single
mention of transgender issues, not one. This wasn't an oversight

(25:47):
or a deliberate omission. In twenty thirteen, it simply wasn't
on the agenda of a state Democratic convention kitchen table
issues were. In twenty twenty six, the Platform and Resolution
Committee recommended two resolutions, specifically affirming transgender identity and protecting

(26:07):
access to gender affirming care for minors. What wasn't a
Democratic party concern at the state convention level in twenty
thirteen is now a formal party resolution in twenty twenty six.
Why because you have a different group of Democrats. You

(26:28):
have radical socialists, the Bill Clintons and the Harry Reids,
and even the Chuck Schumers who were in charge of
the party back in the nineteen nineties and in the
early two thousand. Yes, I know Chuck Schumer is still
in charge of Democrats in the Senate. Because Democrats never ever, ever, ever,
ever relinquished power, at least not willingly. You had people

(26:52):
who were just I mean, look at what Chuck Schumer
was saying about immigration in nineteen ninety six versus twenty
twenty six. In order to in power in this radical party,
he has to sound like a completely different human being.
President Trump actually riffed on this for just a quick
second at the G seven summit in France today, saying

(27:16):
that Democrats are now led by koops like Graham Platinum.

Speaker 6 (27:21):
Republicans are coming up strong even before this. You know why,
they're seeing all these lunatics.

Speaker 5 (27:26):
Like the guy in Maine the swastika.

Speaker 6 (27:32):
Ten years they've been calling me a Nazi, and now
they have a Nazi running he's got a tattoo.

Speaker 5 (27:38):
I've been denying it for ten years.

Speaker 6 (27:39):
They know it's not so, but they've been calling I
don't think they can call it to me anymore, you
know what, one more.

Speaker 1 (27:45):
Yeah, no, they'll they'll still call you a Nazi, mister President.
They have radicals like not just Graham Platner, not just
the Washington d C. Mom Donnie, a radical socialist who
is going to be the next mayor of Washington, DC.
She won her primary last night, which basically means she's

(28:05):
going to be the next mayor. You're never going to
have a Republican mayor of Washington, DC. And everywhere, every
single place across this country where Democrats can nominate the
most radical candidate, the socialist candidate, they're doing so, including
here in Wisconsin, where Democrats just might have a Mom

(28:25):
Donnie slash Platner problem of their own in the form
of Francesca Hong. Are they now getting ready to rig
this primary for Sarah Rodriguez and push hon aside? Sure
looks like it right on Q as if it was

(28:45):
timed to what we're talking about here on the Dan
O'Donnell Show. Francesca Hong puts out on her official campaign
account a tweet affirming her support for trans rites and
how this is a huge issue for her. There can
be no negotiation. It's radicalism. It's something that the Democratic

(29:09):
Party thought so little of that they didn't even include
it in their twenty thirteen party platform. And folks, this
was into the second term of Barack Obama. I mean,
this was a party that was far more to the left,
even than the Bill Clinton Democrats of the nineteen nineties.
Megan Novak, a Heartland Post contributor also the president of

(29:33):
Americans for Prosperity Wisconsin, is a fantastic piece at the
Heartland Post Heartlandpost dot Com Not your Grandparents' Democratic Party,
in which she simply compares resolutions that Democrats voted on
as part of the party's platform in twenty thirteen versus

(29:53):
twenty twenty six. And Francesca Hong is a big reason
her voters are a big reason in that this party
is almost unrecognizable from thirty years ago and even from
the second Obama term. Do you realize that it wasn't
until big mouth Joe Biden. We should have known back

(30:14):
then that he might have been starting to lose his marbles.
It wasn't until Biden actually spilled the beans that we
learned that Obama actually supported gay marriage. It was such
a mainstream position to say marriages between one man and
one woman, that even Obama was for quote unquote traditional marriage.

(30:34):
The idea that we would have men in women's locker
rooms was at least he pretended to. At the first
of all, Obama clearly always supported gay marriage. If there
was ever a radical left wing position, Obama supported it.
But in order to get elected, he understood that the

(30:56):
party and broader American electorate were not with him on
this issue. Today's Democratic Party, they don't care. And now
they've got a big Francesca Hong problem, just as they
have a Grand Platter problem in Maine, a Zoron Mamdani
problem in New York, although they don't see it as

(31:17):
a problem because New York is every bit as left
wing socialist as he is. But what these candidates, what
these leaders, what these symbols of the Democrat Party are
doing is showing the rest of the country that this
isn't your grandparents Democratic Party, that this is now a
party for radicals. In fact, in the last couple of

(31:39):
days you heard President Trump in our SoundBite there in
the last segment sort of make reference to it. In
the congressional generic ballot, Republicans are doing very, very good.
There was a survey from I believe it was you
gov out a couple of days ago that showed on
the generic ballot, and what that means is the poolster
will simply ask if the election were held today, will

(32:01):
you vote for the Republican or will you vote for
the Democrat? Regardless of who it is that is actually there,
It's a generic question. Generic ballot. Republicans are only down
two in twenty eighteen. At this point in the cycle
on the generic ballot, they were down eighteen. You just
had a second poll out today shows Republicans are only
down five on the generic ballot. Again compared to other

(32:25):
big Democrat years twenty eighteen and two thousand and six,
the lead is timy. The reason for this as much
as Democrats are wild with hatred over Trump and are
gould to come out of the woodwork to vote against
his party. That's always the dynamic in a midterm election

(32:46):
after a new president takes office. And yes, we do
consider Trump a new president because of course he had
the four gap years that he took in between terms.
So Democrats are furious. Democrats could not possibly hate Trump more.
In fact, their one unifying sentiment because there is backlash

(33:09):
to the creeping socialism within the party, is their hatred
of Trump. So they are going to have tailwinds behind
them because the electorate is going to be anti Trump.
It is always anti incumbency, anti incumbent president. This is
just how we roll as Americans. But what they're running
into is the fact that Americans are taking a look

(33:30):
at the candidates that they're running, the Platiners, the Hongs,
and they're saying me, I don't really like Trump, I
don't really like the Republicans, but this is a bridge
too far. You want to know why Democrats were smart
enough to rig the twenty sixteen and twenty twenty primaries
against Bernie Sanders. It's because of that. Normy Americans will

(33:55):
still vote against the Kuks. And Tom Tiffany has a
fantastic catchphrase that I hope he uses every day from
now until election day. Wisconsin has a choice between common
sense and crazy. Right now, crazy has a comfortable lead.
Francesca Hong is going to be the Democrat nominee, if

(34:19):
Democrats don't rig this race, if they don't offer what
amount to political bribes to candidates like David Crowley, like
Missy Hughes and Joel Brennan to drop out so that
the non crazy vote will all gravitate towards the candidate
who I have long suspected they are going to try
to rig this primary for Sarah Rodriguez. Folks, you're starting

(34:44):
to see now after this straw poll, after the Democrat convention,
where clearly the word went out to the media. Because
now the Calshy betting odds, and this early in a
race where nobody has any real name ID except Mandela Barnes.
I don't put a whole lot of stock in Calshi

(35:04):
betting odds. But you now have Sarah Rodriguez as the
co favorite to win this nomination along with Francesca Hong.
How is that possible if in her own internal poll,
which she leaked last week ahead of the start of
the convention, Rodriguez was running a distant third. Well, it's

(35:25):
because clearly at that convention word got out. If we
nominate Francesca Hong, we are going to lose our voters
love Francesca. Our voters love the socialists Franny and Mandela Barnes,
but they're not going to win. They're going to Bernie Sanders,
Francesca Hong, whether she knows it or not. And ironically enough,

(35:47):
they're going to do against Mandela Barnes and in favor
of Sarah Rodriguez what they did for Barnes four years
ago in the US Senate race. They got his two
chief competitors, Alex Lazri and Sarah gov Luski to drop out.
God Luski essentially took a bribe. Okay, Sarah, you are
going to get secretary of State. You can run for

(36:07):
whatever position you want. Lieutenant governor. I believe she was.
The field was clearly cleared for her. There's no other
There's seven Democrats running for governor and not one of them.
You don't think Missy Hughes or Joel Brennan would have
been better served running for lieutenant governor pulling at one percent?

(36:27):
Of course it would have been. Of course, it would
have been smarter for them to do that, but they
couldn't because Sarah god Luski has promised no primary as
a condition for dropping out four years ago. She is
i believe going to use that as a platform to
run for the Senate in twenty twenty eight. Also part
of that platform they're going to promise Crowley's something They're
going to promise every other kit. They want this down

(36:50):
to Sarah Rodriguez and then Mandela Barnes and Francesca Hong,
splitting the socialist vote so that they can consolidate all
of the still socialist but not quite fire breathing and
let's face it, mouth breathing socialists, the more pragmatic Democrats
who understand that a Francesca Hong, just like a gram Platner,

(37:16):
is very likely toxic to a broader electorate. Now, what
I am wondering is how the Bernie brow wing of
the party is going to respond to yet another what
is Kirk Bangstad and his merry band of loons call
them corporate Democrats, yet another attempt by corporate Democrats to

(37:36):
rig the primary against the good hearted socialists. If I
were a fran fan, I would be ticked. I would say, hey,
what the hell are we ever going to have a
voice in our primaries? Folks, all of a sudden, betting
odds for Sarah Rodriguez, don't just shoot up after a

(37:59):
third place finish in our own poll. They don't, unless,
of course, the people who actually would be betting on
this sort of stuff, the insiders who know a thing
or two about how this is likely going to shake out.
And this, by the way, is my big, big problem
with prediction markets is there are people who and I'm

(38:21):
not saying that it's totally rigged that we already know
who the Democrat nominee is going to be, but there
are people for betting on the Oscar winners or whatever.
There are people who already you can bet on outcomes
for WWE. They're scripted. People know we're gonna step aside
for a break. Daily Trump date coming up after the
top of the hour news A big day at the

(38:43):
G seven in France. President Trump actually releases the memorandum
of understanding. It was first leaked to the Wall Street Journal.
The President then spoke following meetings with the other G
seven leaders. He is now back in Paris, where he

(39:04):
is taking part in I believe a state dinner or
he was. I haven't double checked his schedule before he
flies back home. There is going to be a signing
ceremony coming up on Friday, juneteenth, where Iran and the
United States will formally sign that memorandum of understanding. What

(39:27):
is President Trump's broader goal? How does Iran and Venezuela
and the heavy push into space and into AI and
big data and supercomputing all tight? How does this tie
in to creating America, owning the future? We will discuss

(39:47):
throughout this hour here on the Dan o'donald Show. Welcome
back to at four one, four, seven, nine, nine, eleven
thirty is our Carpetland USA flooring center, talk and text
line email DoD at iHeartMedia. You can watch the show,
not just listen to it. We are streaming live across
social media at Dan o'donald's show Instagram, Facebook, x and YouTube.

(40:10):
And if you miss a single second, please do download,
subscribe to, and listen to the Dan o'donald Show podcast
on iHeartRadio or wherever you listen to podcasts. Huge, huge
day today. Let's get you caught up with the daily
Trump Day.

Speaker 7 (40:27):
We're gonna win so much you may even get tired
of winning.

Speaker 1 (40:30):
Trump just keeps winning. It is a win for the administration.

Speaker 3 (40:34):
It's also a big win for the United States.

Speaker 1 (40:37):
We have to keep winning.

Speaker 5 (40:38):
We have to win more.

Speaker 1 (40:40):
We're gonna win more. The President, holding a press conference
at the G seven today, reiterated that the agreement that
has been signed, that has been agreed to. Again, I
am still amazed that world leaders can sign important diplomatic
documents with docu sign Nowadays, this has been agreed to,

(41:00):
but it is still just a memorandum of understanding. This
still does punt a little bit some of the finer
points that all of the broad issues have been agreed to.
In coming up in just a second, we are actually
going to go through the text of this memorandum of understanding. Yes,
I understand and fully recognize it is not the most

(41:21):
compelling radio in the world, but it is incredibly important
because there have been lies and just outright fabrications and
deliberate misinformation about what is in this agreement and what
is not and why this is a terrible deal for
the United States. Let me assure you that it is not. Again.

(41:44):
I still don't trust the Iranians at all, nor should
anyone to actually honor any agreement. But we will get
into exactly what's in this and exactly what is not.
So there is going to be an extension another sixty
days ceasefire to have aut some of these little details
under the broader already agreed to points and Trump stress

(42:06):
this is a memorandum of understanding. If Iran doesn't comply
and there is no more understanding, well you can pretty
much guess what happens.

Speaker 6 (42:15):
Then we'll be giving this out so you can read
it and you can see and it's a memorandum of understanding.

Speaker 5 (42:21):
If it doesn't get done in sixty days, it's air right,
we go back to bombing.

Speaker 6 (42:25):
You know, I don't want to do that because it's
so good, but we might have to because we're never
going to let them have a nuclear weapon. But they've
agreed not to and you'll see that very clearly in
the agreement.

Speaker 1 (42:37):
And now that agreement, thanks to the presidents and his
negotiating team's discussions at the G seven and in the
run up to all of this, it is also going
to be fortified and formalized by a UN Security Council
resolution with removing enriched uranium and enrichment capabilities of primary priority.

(43:02):
This means China, Russia, France, Britain, all of the Security
Council is on board with this. This is another thing
that separates this deal from the JCPOA known as the
Iran Nuclear Deal under Barack Obama. Of course, President Trump
spent some time blasting that, and he said, more broadly, look,

(43:26):
for forty seven years, other presidents have tried to achieve
what this administration has achieved and were unable to.

Speaker 6 (43:36):
Let Every administration for decades has sought to get around
to relinquish its nuclear ambitions, but the threat only got bigger.
The words got bigger and bigger, and stronger and bigger,
and nothing ever happened, and Iran got stronger and tougher.
If we didn't blow them up the first time and
then blow out those weapons, they would have been unstoppable.

(43:57):
This should have been what I'm doing, and what I
did should have been done years ago, would have been
much easier, much less firepower.

Speaker 5 (44:07):
But it wasn't.

Speaker 1 (44:09):
Now, of course, the Obama administration and all of the
Pod Save America bros who are now influence leaders on
the left, who are instrumental in crafting the JCPOA are saying, look,
we had an attempt to do this, We had the
Iran Nuclear Deal. Well, the big problem with that is
there was no enforcement mechanism and Iran got a whole

(44:32):
lot of unfrozen assets back immediately, the infamous planeloads full
of cash that essentially bought off the Ayatola and his
power base and allowed him to strengthen his iron grip
over the country. There is none of that in this deal.

(44:52):
Even though there have been deliberate lies about this for
three and a half days now, there is no thing
that immediately gives around any money on frozen assets, cash,
gold Booley, on anything. President Trump was asked about this
by Fox News reporter Peter Douson.

Speaker 8 (45:11):
You've been clear, President Trump. The United States is not
going to directly pay a rand. But the US is
going to let the Iranians start making billions of dollars
selling oil, accessing this recontrcy.

Speaker 6 (45:26):
Only only if they're doing things right. But only if Peter,
Only if we're not doing anything. We're not putting up money.
Only if they're doing things right, if they're doing things right.
If people want to investig and invests. But they had
this three hundred million dollar fund, it's only three hundred
billion dollar fund. It's only if they're doing things right.

(45:48):
Remember this also, when you talk about billions of dollars
they've had much more than a trillion dollars worth of
damage done. They got a long way. They'll be fifteen
to twenty years to rebuild what they have right now.
So they have to behave themselves. If they're not behaving,
they get hit again, you know, they'll be hit again.

Speaker 5 (46:08):
Because we can do it very easily.

Speaker 6 (46:09):
It's going to take a long way for them to
build back their anti aircraft SEF.

Speaker 1 (46:14):
And here's the thing, President Trump is absolutely serious. Is
there anyone who believes that the guy isn't going to
hit Iran again? Just like was there anyone who actually
believed that Obama was ever going to hit Iran in
the first place, or Biden or any other American president
George W. Bush included. Now, that is a big, big

(46:39):
potential deterrent that you've got a president who is, at
least in some measure in the eyes of the rest
of the world crazy. He's just crazy enough to go
in and take out Nicholas mcduroux in Venezuela. He's just
crazy enough to last summer take out the four tooh
nuclear facility and then come back in February and take

(47:01):
out the Ayatola something. After decades we were told was
going to lead to World War three. We've got a
peace plan. We forced at the tip of a sword,
or at the tip of a couple more B two
bombers over the skies of Tehran. We forced an enemy

(47:24):
that we were told forever was going to be impossible
to defeat. We thoroughly defeated them in what three months?
Three months we were told thousands it would require American
troops to have boots on the ground, thousands of Americans
would die. We did tragically lose about a dozen or

(47:46):
so American service members in plane crashes, helicopter crashes. This
was about as effective a military operation as it possibly gets. That,
ladies and gentlemen, is your daily Trump day?

Speaker 6 (48:02):
All right?

Speaker 1 (48:03):
What is actually in the memorandum of understanding? Anytime? My
friend Jay Weber now of the Jayweber Podcast, always says,
when it comes to sourced reporting about Donald Trump in
the mainstream media, wait a couple of hours or wait
a couple of days, because chances are the initial reports

(48:26):
are horribly and intentionally wrong, that leftists are spinning their
media allies to try to make Trump look as bad
as possible. And we saw that for days with the
memorandum of understanding. It is a fourteen point agreement that
the Trump administration has released now. It was first selectively

(48:51):
leaked to the Wall Street Journal. We've got a something
of a cliffs notes version, ladies and gentlemen. Fourteen points one,
the US, Iran and their allies agreed to immediately and
permanently end military operations on all fronts, including in Lebanon.

(49:14):
They kind of put in parentheses, looking at you, Israel.
Is Israel understands that Hezbollah, now that Hamas has essentially
been taken out, that Hezbolah, realizing that it's no longer
going to have its sugar daddy in Iran, is going
to try to make last ditch efforts to attack Israel.

(49:36):
So the Israeli military has been trying its best to
hit Hezbola targets as many as humanly possible to ensure
that there aren't some lingering radicals who are trying to
get one last attack in before the end of the party.

Speaker 5 (49:54):
As it were.

Speaker 1 (49:55):
Two, the US and Iran agree to respect each other's
sovereignty and territorial integrity and not interfere in each other's
internal affairs. This one in parentheses, looking at you Trump's
Truth Social account. Three. The US and Iran commit to
negotiating and reaching a final deal within sixty days unless

(50:19):
mutually extended.

Speaker 5 (50:22):
Four.

Speaker 1 (50:23):
The US will begin removing its naval blockade immediately and
fully end the blockade within thirty days. Five. Iran will
use its best efforts to ensure safe passage for commercial
vessels through the Strait of Hormuz for sixty days with
no charge. Six the US and regional partners will develop

(50:47):
a mutually agreed plan of at least three hundred billion
dollars for Iran's reconstruction and economic development. Seven. The US
will work toward terminating all types of sanctions against Iran,
including un IAEA International Atomic Energy Primary and secondary sanctions

(51:08):
that would be sanctions on nations that do business with
Iran by Iranian oil, for example. Those are known as
secondary sanctions.

Speaker 5 (51:15):
Eight.

Speaker 1 (51:16):
Iran reaffirms that it will not procure or develop nuclear
weapons and agrees to address its enriched material stockpile under
IAEA supervision. This is the one where you sort of
have to look behind the table to make sure the
Iranians don't have their fingers crossed behind their backs. Nine.

(51:37):
Until a final deal is reached. Iran will maintain the
current status quo of its nuclear program, while the US
will impose no new sanctions and deploy no new additional forces.
Ten the US Treasury will issue waivers for Iranian crude oil,
petroleum products, derivatives, and siated banking, insurance, and transportation services. Eleven,

(52:05):
the US will make frozen or restricted Iranian funds and
assets fully available for use. Twelve, the US and Iran
will establish an executive mechanism to monitor implementation of the
MoU and future compliance with the final deal. This, by
the way, is the big one. This ensures that Iran

(52:30):
doesn't just get three hundred billion dollars in cash. This
is where you got and you saw a much bigger
number sort of bandied about. But I heard after the
news of this agreement was sort of making the rounds
over the weekend that three hundred billion dollars, that Iran
was immediately going to get three hundred billion. No, it's not.

(52:50):
It gets nothing right away until it can, in stages,
demonstrate that it is actually complying with this deal. Thirteen
after signing the MoU and implementing key ceasefire, blockade, shipping
oil waiver, and asset release provisions, the US and Iran

(53:14):
will begin final deal negotiations, and finally fourteen the final
deal will be endorsed by a binding UN Security Council resolution.
All of those and again this was the cliffs notes version.
All of these are the broad deal points that still

(53:37):
require finer negotiation. The idea somehow that Iran was just
going to get money, which by the way, is suddenly unacceptable.
When Obama sent the palettes of cash to Iran, what
ten years ago or so, we were told, I can
remember talking about this on the air. We were told

(53:58):
that you need to do this because otherwise Iran has
no incentive to comply. Iran needs to have some of
its money back. So it's a good faith gesture. This
is just good negotiation. But now now if Iran gets
a single sense, then it's the worst deal in American history.
There's no way that Iran is ever going to comply.
It's just it's ludicrous. The same people that we're telling

(54:23):
us that the Biden administration releasing frozen Iranian funds in
August of twenty twenty three had no bearing on Iran funding.
This single worst terror attack committed by Hamas in Israel
in that country's history. No, no, no, they used totally
different money. But now we're told, well, if you unfreeze

(54:46):
Iranian assets, it would be the worst thing ever, because
Iran would be able to go right back to funding terror.
This is all well and good, and again it is
impossible to judge whether or not this is a good
deal until we can adjudge whether it's being complied with.

(55:10):
I have very serious doubts. But what I can tell
you is that what President Trump's ultimate goal is is
one that I think ultimately Iran is going to have
no choice but to go along with. Not because they're
going to be forced at the tip of a couple

(55:31):
of B two bombers, but because they're going to want
to folks. This all goes back to a speech that
the President gave within the first three months of his
second term. It was the outline. It was the blueprint
not just for peace in the Middle East, not just

(55:52):
for the Trump and new American foreign policy, but for
an actual step towards a more peaceful world in the
most volatable, volatile portion of the globe. We will dive
into that ultimately, how this is just a means toward

(56:12):
a broader and deeper end. Stay tuned Dan o'donald's show
back in just three minutes. Welcome back to the Dan
o'donald Show. The Memorandum of Understanding is just that it
is not a broad peace deal. It does have some teeth,
and it does get the United States to a position

(56:35):
that President Trump has wanted, that this country has wanted
for a long time. The one region of the world
that has been a massive, massive source of global instability
is now without its chief chaos agent, Iran. This is

(56:56):
a huge, huge step. And as President Trump said at
the g SE than today, the MoU is really just
part of what they want to fold into a broader
agreement across the Middle East.

Speaker 6 (57:09):
Is I expressed to the world leaders here this week.
It's my hope that the peace agreement will be the
beginning of a much larger deal all across the Middle East.
We're very close. Look at the job we've done on Gaza,
Look at Hamas. Amas has been very silent. You haven't
read anything about Humus, and we're trying to get them unarmed.

Speaker 5 (57:30):
You know, they grew up with the machine gun in
the hand.

Speaker 6 (57:33):
I think actually when they were born, they came out
with a machine gun in their hands.

Speaker 5 (57:38):
That's not the easiest thing. But they've actually behaved.

Speaker 6 (57:42):
Pretty well, considering this was not the lifestyle that they
were taught to have.

Speaker 1 (57:48):
What is this all aimed at? It can actually be
summed up in three words, three words that have sort
of defined President Trump's foreign policy and does fit in
with the broader American populist aims that a whole lot
of the what I will call woke right or nativist

(58:10):
nationalist right, or you could just say anti Israel right
and you would be just as accurate, have dismissed a
safer world is in the Americans' interest. It is the
best possible aim for a president to pursue a more

(58:33):
peaceful world that is all oriented towards one goal commerce,
shared prosperity. George W. Bush wanted to export democracy to
Iraq and to Afghanistan. Didn't really take actually fifty to fifty.

(58:56):
Iraq is a very functioning place right now, in no
small part because of the blood and treasure that America
spilled to get it there. President Trump has a different idea.
Instead of exporting American style governance, he wants to export
American style largeesss. American style capitalism American style success. He

(59:25):
went to Saudi Arabia as his very first state visit
last May in one of the first big things he
did in his second term. He met with the Crown
Prince of Saudi Arabia, He met with the Emir of
the Emirates. He met with every single Middle Eastern leader,

(59:47):
not to talk about how they need to change their
lifestyle or abandon Islam or embrace parliamentary or constitutional republic
democratic principles. Now, he said, look, we are going to
as only Trump can, we are going to all pursue
together the thing that binds all of humanity, a desire

(01:00:12):
for more, more success, more wealth, more prosperity for all.
We can have this, and all you need to do
is drive out the radicals within your own ranks. We'll
look the other way. If you have shall we say,

(01:00:34):
methods of doing so that maybe might turn American stomachs.
We won't get on you for how you're going to
do that. But if we all join together, and all
you have to do is to say Middle Eastern nations, hey,
this tiny little plot of land it does belong to Israel,
Recognize Israel, join the Abraham Accords, and you can have

(01:00:58):
wealth beyond your wife eldest dreams. It's known as the
commerce not Chaos speech. And it's worth remembering today what
ultimately the goal for the region is. It is to
allow the rest of that region no longer plagued by Iran,
united in fact, against any resurgence of Iranian iotola loyalty

(01:01:24):
or Iranian craziness, anti americanism, that sort of thing, to
all share in the broader goal of regional and global prosperity.
Here's President Trump. This was May thirteenth of last year.

Speaker 5 (01:01:40):
Before our eyes.

Speaker 7 (01:01:40):
A new generation of leaders is transcending the ancient conflicts
of tired divisions of the past and forging a future
where the Middle East is defined by commerce not chaos,
where it exports technology not terrorism, and where people of
different nations, religions, and creeds are building cities together, not.

Speaker 5 (01:02:02):
Bombing each other out of existence. We don't want that.

Speaker 1 (01:02:07):
I mean, if the United States needs to bomb a
problem regime out of existence, sits of course going to
have to do so. Iran was never going to sign
on to the Abraham Accords. Iran was never going to
buy into this agenda. So the United States, after years
of Obama and years of Biden trying to cowtow to

(01:02:31):
the Iranians. Trump elevated the Saudis, elevated the Amorates to
serve as the regional leaders, to try to isolate Iran
and to try to build a broader coalition by playing
to the innate. I don't want to call it greed,

(01:02:51):
because that's a pejorative term, but there's really no other
way to describe it. Greed is part of human nature.
If if you could make a trillion dollars like Elon,
you would of course do so. It's the same thing
even for people like the House of Saud, the Saudi
royal family, who already probably have collectively about a trillion dollars.

(01:03:14):
You always want more, You always want to be a
more powerful nation. You always wanted. What President Trump was
also doing was playing to the vanity of the leaders themselves, saying, look,
you're a new generation. You can stick in the same tired,
old patterns and have the rest of the world think
of you, perhaps correctly, as a fanatical backwater where no

(01:03:39):
self respecting tourists, self respecting hell tourist who cares about
his or her own personal safety would ever venture or
you could be like the rest of the world, like Europe.
Europe basically exists now as a tourist economy. If you've
been to Europe at any point in the last twenty years,

(01:04:01):
pretty much every major city, every major plate, it is
geared towards tourism, and not just any tourism, primarily American tourism.
Such is the wealth that we have in this country
that we export it everywhere we go, we elevate other nations,
even those that are also part of the First World.

(01:04:24):
Trump is saying, we can do that to you too.
He's also saying and doing something that is very, very
potent and very important on a geopolitical scale. Iran was
isolated in the Middle East. Now he's trying to isolate

(01:04:45):
the real threat to the United States and real threat
to freedom and global prosperity China, Iran, Venezuela, and and
the battle that is being fought right now over AI
and supercomputing and the technology of the future. That is

(01:05:10):
what all of this, what every single foreign policy move
that has been made in twenty twenty six, is all about.
We are going to dive into that and explain how
Trump is building America's future right before our eyes. When
the Dan o'donald Show returns conservative thought, not just talk.

(01:05:30):
It is the Dan o'donald Show. Welcome back to it.
What is all of this really about? Iran, Venezuela, the
race to space, the massive sudden push for the development
of AI, and the construction of data centers at massive,

(01:05:54):
massive scale. It is all about establishing America as the
unquestioned leader of the future. The only real threat to
the American century or the next American two hundred and
fifty years is, of course, China. China had a critical

(01:06:15):
ally in Nicholas Maduro. China essentially was bankrolling Venezuela in
exchange for influence in the hemisphere as well as cheap oil.
It was able to get tons and tons and tons
of oil from not just Venezuela, but oh, it's other proxy, Iran.

(01:06:40):
Now the United States has Nicholas Maduro in an American
prison and an American puppet. And yes, I know that
is a loaded term, but Dulcie Rodriguez, the Vice president
now leader of Venezuela, is an American puppet. She is
in power because she agreed to do everything Trump says,

(01:07:02):
and as long as she does she stays in power
and stays out of prison herself. If she doesn't, well,
then America uses its unparalleled, unrivaled technology to take her out.
President Trump actually talked about that today. He was laughed
at nine years ago when he proposed and then developed

(01:07:24):
a new branch of the American military called Space Force.
Would you believe Netflix even made a show making fun
of it called Space Force. It starred Steve Correll and
the guy who played House. I believe Correll, I know
was the star of this show. And was it Doctor

(01:07:45):
House was also in that show. Yeah, Hugh Laurie. I
don't know, it's been a while since it was actually
a reasonably charming show, but it was. I mean, they
did take shots. They were soft shots at Trump and
at the administration and how this was all just a
vanity project for him and Space Force was just this

(01:08:07):
idiotic agency that didn't really do anything. Trump lets something slip,
And what's amazing about Trump is he is just going
to kind of let stuff slip, Like a lot of
people think. The big movie out this week Steven Spielberg
Disclosure Day. A lot has been made over the last
couple of weeks about the UFO files, being released, and

(01:08:30):
that how the disclosure day about aliens is actually about
real disclosure that the government is going to make the
big announcement that we're not alone. Trump totally would have
in some random press conference let it slip that we've
been talking with aliens for seventy years. How do I
know that, Because just in the last couple of weeks

(01:08:54):
he has let slip that America has technology that was
just presupposed forever to be science. He did it again
today after the raid that took out Maduro. Trump basically
announced to the world, Yeah, we have got a weapon
called a discombobulator which will actually destroy your inner ear balance.

(01:09:16):
It'll make you bleed out of your ears. You won't
be able to stand up. And we use that to
take down all of Maduro's cards. And oh, by the way,
by the way, you don't we also have the ability
to completely shut down another country's air defense system. Isn't
that cool? Literally he said it. People are like kind
of people like you are following this stuff. I'm I'm

(01:09:38):
something of a futurist. I love speculating about and talking
about technology that that you know the world is going
to see decades from now. Well, it's here.

Speaker 8 (01:09:51):
Uh.

Speaker 1 (01:09:52):
Trump also today did the exact same thing. Now, we
always kind of knew, at least those of us who
want stood with Space Force was really all about the
weaponization of satellite and very high altitude technology, which, by
the way, just as an aside, UFOs almost certainly are

(01:10:15):
our military equipment that we just don't want to acknowledge
are our military equipment because we won't always have a
president in the Oval Office who might randomly say, oh, yeah, totally,
we have got aircraft that can move like a UFO
from a Steven Spielberg movie. Trump said today that one
of the ways that we're going to ensure compliance with

(01:10:36):
the Memorandum of Understanding is because we have satellites through
Space Force, which can basically pinpoint the words on somebody's
name tag.

Speaker 5 (01:10:50):
But I'm proud of Spaceforce because I started it. We
have Space Force cameras.

Speaker 6 (01:10:54):
On every single door, every sing well there are no
doors that've been pretty wash added, but every air that
if somebody walks in and he's got a badge with
his name owner like Mohammad Something, which is about a
fifty to fifty guess Mohammad Something, they can tell the
name Okay.

Speaker 1 (01:11:13):
First of all, First of all, can we stop and
appreciate how funny this son of a gun is. Mohammed's something.
You've got a fifty to fifty chance that someone in
Iran is going to be named Mohammed. That is a
quality joke right there. And I couldn't just let it
pass without acknowledging it.

Speaker 5 (01:11:30):
They can give you a sum. We can see things.
You wouldn't believe the quality of the stuff that we have.
That's why we've been so successful.

Speaker 6 (01:11:39):
That's why our blockade will go down to the animals
of history as being unbelievable.

Speaker 5 (01:11:43):
Nobody's ever seen a blockade like that. Just it's like
a steel wall.

Speaker 1 (01:11:48):
Now, why would that be Trump just told you because
it's our high altitude and satellite technology through space force
that is probably two decades if not more byhead of
the rest of the world world that we have got
cameras everywhere. Now, how are we powering those cameras? How
are we able to see everything everywhere all the time?

(01:12:10):
Because we have got an insane network of satellites, because
we are by far the world's leading producer of aerospace
and space technology, satellite technology partnering with the private sector. Yes,
the world's first trillionaire in Elon Musk, who delivered revolutionary,

(01:12:32):
world changing technology in the Starlight Internet satellite system that
can provide Internet. The Democratic Republic of the Congo was
playing today in the World Cup. The farthest reaches of
the Congo can have Internet access because Elon must can
point his satellite array at that area and all of

(01:12:52):
a sudden, you've got Internet access. We have the ability
to essentially monitor and strike targets from anywhere. How are
we doing that? Because we have mastered inasmuch as any
human being has mastered space, or at least the space
around Planet Earth at the satellite level, and now we're

(01:13:15):
going farther. This, ladies and gentlemen, is how we are fighting,
How we are winning, How we building the new American
century and I dare say the new American millennium. We
are fighting on the fertile battleground of AI. Why it
is such a big important deal for America to be

(01:13:36):
the global leader in artificial intelligence, and not just that,
but intelligent robotics that can be imbued with artificial intelligence
super computing. And the battle is going to be over
what is known as the compute the actual processing power.
So yes, guess what. That battle is also being fought

(01:13:59):
in farmlands across Wisconsin over data centers. I'm not saying
we need to have a chicken in every pot and
a data center on every farm, but i am telling
you that the battle against China, the war to establish
American dominance and a dominant America, ensures global peace and

(01:14:22):
prosperity because we are the world's foremost force for good
on this planet. It depends on us winning this race.
We have got a massive head start and we have
just took out China's ability to get cheap oil to
power the only area that it actually surpasses us, and

(01:14:45):
that's manufacturing output. They don't have the tech, they don't
have the innovation. They don't have the ability to develop
what we can militarily or for industrial, commercial, and personal use.
The battle is going on right now for the future.

(01:15:05):
It is against China. It is a war and the skirmishes,
the battles were in Venezuela, they were in Iran, and
now the battle that the real battle is over that tech.
You're listening to the dano' donald's show. It is a
tour de force of truth and it's coming right back,

(01:15:29):
Welcome back to the dano' donald's show. All of this, folks,
can't be seen as just a little military misadventures for
President Trump, or, as some on what's become known as
the woke right have labeled it, doing Israel's bidding. All

(01:15:51):
of this is aimed at China. All of this actually
is aimed at making lives better here in America, not
in Iran, not in Israel, not anywhere else. It is
about establishing American dominance, maintaining American dominance. First, choking off
the lifeblood of commerce from China oil by taking out

(01:16:16):
its two biggest oil producing proxies, Venezuela and Iran, Russia.
That's probably next Cuba. If I were Cuba right now,
I'd be looking real nervous. But the real battle isn't
being fought in Tehran or the strait of horror moves.

(01:16:37):
It is being fought in development. It is being fought
in entrepreneurship. It is being fought in the technology that
will actually power our future. That oil, yes, is literally powering,
but what is intellectually militarily diplomatically powering everything AI robotics,

(01:16:58):
super computing, and it is a war that Trump and
I hope all of you know America cannot afford to
lose just after five o'clock on a weekday. And you
know what that means? Your chance to win twenty five
hundred dollars in the two fifty k USA Giveaway. And

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now until Freedom Eve, July third, Friday, before the fourth
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(01:17:43):
celebrating by giving away one lucky listener across the country
twenty five hundred dollars. Kyle in Brookfield was listening to
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you need to do right now, go to our website.
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The summer travel season is underway. If your entry has
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right now. To go to our website, enter the keyword
travel to enter the contest for this hour. By the way,
the summer travel season is seeing a lot lower gas
prices than it did just a couple of days ago.
We expect the price of crude to continue to drop.
We expect the unbridled optimism surrounding the American stock market

(01:18:53):
to continue to surge. And folks, a lot of people
are talking about the possibility that AI is a bubble.
I myself have been accused of being overly optimistic, not
just on AI as an investment sector, but in AI
as not something to be feared, as in, like it's

(01:19:18):
going to destroy, you know, fifty percent of American jobs
or what some of the most pessimistic predictions have said.
I truly believe it is going to revolutionize and dramatically
improve human ability. That yes, you are going to see

(01:19:38):
the ability for an individual human to have a much
greater output in work capacity. That is going to lead
to some job displacement, There's no doubt about it. New
technology always does but the people who believe that somehow
this is a bubble, that that's somehow anthropic or open AI,

(01:20:00):
or some of these associated companies, especially the companies like
Nvidia that are the powers behind AI, the infrastructure behind AI,
the chips that power AI, that they're going to go
bust like pets dot Com. We were talking about this
a couple of days ago with Dave Spano of Annex

(01:20:21):
Wealth Management, and you take a look at the earnings
reports that are coming in from these AI from these
tech companies pretty much up and down the Nasdaq. Yes
it has been top heavy, Yes it has been AI heavy.
But the reality is is that this is not a

(01:20:42):
traditional bubble, and we have to start imagining what life
is going to be like if it's not. If in fact,
we have prosperity beyond anyone's wildest dreams, where we have
in and I'm not saying five years or even ten
twenty fifty years, that we have a totally reshaped American economy,

(01:21:07):
that we have the ability through artificial intelligence that is
implanted in humanoid robots or other smart robots, that we
are actually able to through deep investment in SpaceX mine
asteroids and get the riches of the cosmos. You realize

(01:21:28):
there are asteroids floating around in space in near Earth
orbit that are like made entirely of diamonds or lithium.
I mean, what happens if all of a sudden SpaceX
or any other company, American company is able to mine
all that. How does that change? We talk about rare

(01:21:51):
earth minerals, what if they're no longer rare because we're
getting them from space. You see where all of this
is kind of going. It is a brave new world
out there, and we stand at the precipice of everything changing.
And I know there's a lot of trepidation. There's a

(01:22:12):
lot of fear. I'm telling you. What does Sean Hannity
always say, He quotes the Bible. Let not your heart
be troubled, all right? Four one, four, seven, nine, nine,
eleven thirty on our Carpetland, USA Flooring Center, talk and
text linedod at iHeartMedia dot com. We are streaming live
across social media at Dan O'Donnell's show, YouTube, x, Facebook,

(01:22:35):
all of it. Dan o'donnald Show podcast also up on
iHeartRadio or wherever you listen to podcasts. Now stop me
if you've heard this one before. Schools in Wisconsin want
more money, and your property taxes are about to go up.

(01:22:57):
Madison Metropolitan School District, today, it was reported, has proposed
an eight point five percent increase in its property tax
levee for the upcoming school year as part of a
preliminary six hundred nine million dollar operating budget. This includes,
of course, salary increases for veteran teachers, paid parental leave,

(01:23:20):
additional school safety staff, and the expansion of community recreation
facilities near Westtown Mall. Property taxes for the owner of
an average home in Madison valued at roughly what do
you think the average home in Madison is valued at?
Just out of curiosity, what do you think you want

(01:23:41):
to get a you want to get a handle on
a how bad inflation got under Biden and b how
much Madison is just growing by leaps and bounds. Average home. Now,
that's a little high. My producer, Eric Paulson said, six
five hundred thousand dollars five hundred thousand. That is the
average home, average home in Madison. I'm not talking about

(01:24:03):
Dane County, City of Madison. Average Madison home valued at
half a million bucks. Property taxes rise by about three
hundred eleven dollars, or six point four percent. The increase
this from the Heartland Post, our new digital web initiative,

(01:24:27):
Heartlandpost dot com. Check it every single day, follow us
on social media at Heartland Post wion x, the Heartland
Post on Facebook, Instagram, and everywhere else. The increase follows
a twenty point four percent levy hike last year, the
largest in more than three decades, which came after voters

(01:24:50):
approved facilities and operating referenda in twenty twenty four. Not
only that, it followed the single biggest driver state wide
of property taxes going up, of course, the infamous four
hundred year veto. I feel like I have explained this
so much since property tax bills first went out in

(01:25:13):
January that everybody in my listening audience should be able
to follow along and recite this along with me. Governor
Evers in the twenty twenty three twenty twenty five biennial
budget used a grossly unconstitutional maneuver known as a Vana
White veto. A partial veto. Wisconsin gives its governors partial

(01:25:36):
veto authority over budgetary items, where you can strike individual
lines portions of a bill in order to essentially pass
a budget without everything that the legislature wanted in It
is a very very powerful tool. Voters in this state, though,

(01:25:58):
back in the nineteen ninety amended the constitution because Republican
Governor Tommy Thompson was using what we're known as Vana
White vetos, just like Vana White used to do on
the Wheel of Fortune game show, by crossing out individual
letters to make new words or sentences, or a Frankenstein

(01:26:19):
veto where you would strike individual words in order to
create a totally new sentence or paragraph and an entirely
new principle or idea or set of funding that the
legislature never intended. Governor Evers changed twenty twenty four dash

(01:26:41):
twenty twenty five by striking down a dash and a
couple of numbers to twenty four to twenty five as
in the year twenty four twenty five. So for four
hundred years, school districts are able to increase what's known
as the school property tax levy by three hundred and

(01:27:03):
twenty five dollars per pupil per year every year until
twenty four to twenty five. Any school district that does
so doesn't have to go to referendum. They don't have
to go to voters and say will you allow us
to do this? They can just do it. It was
immediately assumed, Okay, this is grossly unconstitutional. It's a van

(01:27:24):
of white veto. It's the worst sort of unconstitutional abuse
of the governor's partial veto authority. Nope, Liberal Supreme Court
upheld it last year. Last year was the first year
school districts could take advantage of the four hundred year veto.
Wouldn't you know it? Property taxes across the state go
up by the single largest one year amount in thirty years.

(01:27:50):
Thirty years? What have we gotten for it? Test scores
that are among the most bismal in the nation, and
a Department of Public Instruction that actually sent a bunch
of bureaucrats to a water park in twenty twenty four

(01:28:11):
to try to massage the cut scores and student standards
on the state Forward exam to hide the declining performance
from parents, from politicians, and from the rest of the country. Well,
national test scores showed that Wisconsin students are struggling. Coming

(01:28:32):
up in just a couple of minutes, we are going
to check in with the Wisconsin Institute for Law and
Liberty's research director, Will Flanders. They have put out a
brand new report. This is a Dan O'Donnell show slash
Heartland Post exclusive that ties the abysmal state test scores

(01:28:54):
to something that I will admit I didn't even think of,
but is an incredibly important factor. I was reading this
report with I was glued. Inasmuch as you can be
glued to a think tank report, I was glued to it.
They tie it to dpi's failure to teach teachers how

(01:29:17):
to teach reading. Will has a tremendous look at how
we move forward. We are actually going to talk to.
When I say Will, I mean Will the Wisconsin Institute
for Law on Liberty and also Will as in Will
Flanders coming up in just a second. It is, honestly,

(01:29:37):
it's something that I was just It's something that seems
so simple. We are not educating our new teachers in
how to better teach kids how to read it. I
think it's because we go to new reading curriculum every
couple of months. It seems in this state, instead of

(01:29:57):
just teaching core phonic based basics, we are turning out
new teachers who really don't have the skills. It is
a brand new report and It is entitled hold on,
I want to make sure since we're reporting this exclusively,
The Fort Gap, How inconsistent teacher preparation is fueling Wisconsin's

(01:30:22):
literacy and educator crisis. We will talk with Will's Will
Will Flanders coming up next here on The Dan o'donald Show,
a big exclusive and trust me something you are going
to want to listen to. Now to an exclusive up

(01:30:43):
right now at the Heartland Post Heartlandpost dot com. The
Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty, great friends of the
Dan o'donald Show, has put together a new report that
argues that the state's stagnant reading scores and ongoing teacher

(01:31:03):
shortages stem from the same basic root problem, inconsistent preparation
of new teachers in how to teach reading. The report
is titled The Fort Gap, How inconsistent teacher preparation is
fueling Wisconsin's literacy and educator crises. This is the opening

(01:31:25):
of a broader initiative called the Wisconsin Education Comeback, a
Roadmap for Students' Success Now. The first report centers on
Fort the foundations of reading tests Wisconsin requires for licensure
in elementary and middle school education. Childhood Adolescent Education Special ED.

(01:31:51):
It's designed to confirm that somebody wants to be a
teacher understands the five components of evidence based reading instruction,
phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension. And Will says, look,

(01:32:11):
we can look at the passage rates of this test
as something of a window into how well we're doing
preparing these teachers to actually teach students. And if you
don't have teachers who have a good basis in these
fundamental things, how can you possibly expect them to teach?

(01:32:34):
It is absolutely fascinating and I am honored to be
joined now by Will's research director, Will Flanders. Will be
honest with me, did you take the job at Will
because your name is Will?

Speaker 3 (01:32:48):
That might have been a part of It's why they
just call Meanders around the office.

Speaker 1 (01:32:51):
Okay, I was gonna say, like, is it ever confusing
when someone's calling your name, and like everybody looks up
and says, yes, this is a fascinating I don't say
this because you know you're on my show, but I
got this report and set you know, I never would
have thought of this. You know, we always talk about,

(01:33:13):
especially in inner city education, some of the big problems.
I have been for a decade now talking about and
harping on dysfunction in the classroom and how it's impossible
to learn if you've got kids who are, you know,
being not just rowdy but violent in class, and instead
of being suspended or expelled, they keep going back into
the classroom. That's something I never would say, Hey, you

(01:33:35):
know what we are on like generation number four of
people in Wisconsin who aren't particularly strong readers. Because this
has been an ongoing problem, a certain percentage of those
people are going into the teaching profession, and if they
don't have a solid foundation in phonics and the basics
of the English language, how are they supposed to teach it.

(01:33:56):
It is a fascinating look at what's actually going on
in these class So congratulations, this is a really groundbreaking report.

Speaker 3 (01:34:05):
Well, well, thank you. Yeah, I definitely appreciate that. And
it's sort of like a lot of our problems in society, right.
It goes back to what are young adults being taught
in our university. It's just like we've seen DEI and
things like that spread from the universities to sort of
envelop all of society. We've seen these bad reading practices
start at the universities with you know, professors who lom
onto the latest bad and then they disseminate that to

(01:34:26):
the next generation of teachers. And you know, as you said,
we've been dealing with this for twenty or more years
where teachers have been taught reading the wrong way. The
Ford Exam is you know, the good news is we
have this test out there that teachers have to take.
Be as you said at the beginning, that sort of
measures the extent to which are prepared to teach reading
in a proper phonics based science of reading way. But
we see really wide variation across the state and the

(01:34:49):
extent which our teaching candidates are able to pass that test.

Speaker 1 (01:34:52):
What is actually kind of amazing to me is some
of the discrepancies in who is doing well on this test.
I've of course got a brag as a proud alum
of Marquette University, nearly one hundred percent pass rate for
teachers new teachers who come out of the Marquette University

(01:35:16):
education program. UW o'claire is at ninety two percent. But
you've got Mount Mary University, forty five percent of college
graduates are passing this test. Milwaukee Teacher Education Center forty
one percent. That's troubling to say the least, and crisis

(01:35:39):
level because a lot of the teachers, especially in Milwaukee,
are going into schools where we most need to improve
those scores.

Speaker 3 (01:35:50):
Yeah, that's absolutely right, and even some of our larger
universities like UW Milwaukee is only the seventy one percent
passage rate. Now, you know, you think about and we
talk about student debt and the fact, you know, kids
are coming out of college, so in debt, if you
can't pass that test, you can't teach. You know, you're
not allowed to be in the classroom. So we have
twenty nine percent of kids they're going to UW Milwaukee
a major you know, wis conson university that aren't able

(01:36:11):
to be in the classroom because they can't pass this test.
And you know, particularly at the school like UW Milwaukee,
we were seeing a lot of those teachers that you
say want to go into the going to MPs go
into teaching in this area, a district where we have
under twenty percent proficiency in reading. So it's just a
sort of snowball effect. Generation after generation being failed by

(01:36:32):
the universities down to the teachers down to the next
generation of kids.

Speaker 1 (01:36:35):
What do you think the biggest reason for this? If
you think it's the university system, do you think it's
we've loosened standards?

Speaker 3 (01:36:47):
Do you?

Speaker 1 (01:36:48):
I just I how do you? How do you fix
this problem?

Speaker 3 (01:36:52):
Well, when you look at colleges of education, you get
the folks that go into education at the university level.
And I don't want to disparage everyone, because there's a
good folks out there, but you know, these are folks
that are maybe many years removed from being in the classroom.
And also we see, you know, across the board in
education schools across the country, they're very sort of they
like to glom on to the latest sort of sad

(01:37:14):
yep and moving away from phonics, moving towards these other
you know, non science of reading based systems really was
popular over the last twenty years. See have a lot
of professors in place that that's the way they learned,
and they're sort of attached to what they you know,
what they've built their dissertation on, what they've written papers on,
and they don't want to go back to this sort
of basic stuff that the evidence shows works, but it
doesn't align with what they've sort of learned in their

(01:37:36):
decades of experience.

Speaker 1 (01:37:37):
Well, and not only that, it's uh, who's got the
latest and greatest product to sell? Right, I mean that's
something that also isn't really talked about.

Speaker 6 (01:37:47):
That.

Speaker 1 (01:37:48):
The reason that a lot of these districts, DPI itself
has been careening from one model to the other is
you have got people in the education sphere, and I'm
not going to begrudge them for trying to make a living,
but they are just radically remaking how we teach teaching,
how we teach reading right, how we how we do

(01:38:09):
the and and instead of doing the stuff that has
been proven to work for oh, I don't know, several
centuries now, teaching the basic rules that you know, sort
of underpin the English language, we're going to things that
haven't been proven and aren't evidence based, but they're they're

(01:38:33):
the hot new thing, and I feel like that is
a bigger factor than we might think. Is this also
therefore a DPI and school district issue, not just an
individual teacher issue.

Speaker 3 (01:38:47):
I mean it absolutely is a is a DPI in
school district issue. You know what we've seen with the
implementation of Act twenty the science of reading bill is
that you know, DPI has dragged their feet at every
opportunity because the same sort of a nurse towards not changing,
towards not going to the back to the basics that
we talked about just now in the university's the system system,
and as a whold on DPI as well. And you know,

(01:39:08):
you have a union controlled bureaucracy yep, that doesn't want
to have to change the way they've done things. And
I think that's a story across the board in our
education establishment.

Speaker 1 (01:39:17):
Oh that's a massive that is that is a huge,
huge issue. And now we're seeing basically the Democrat establishment
from the Supreme Court to every single gubernatorial candidate at
a recent forum raised their hands when asked, are you
going to repeal Act ten? The Supreme Court is probably
going to do it for them before they even have

(01:39:37):
a chance. If one of them, heaven forbid, is elected
the legislature too, they want to hand even more power.
They want to hand the keys to this state back
to those exact same unions educational bureaucrats who have repeatedly
proven by the way that they are unfortunately not to

(01:39:58):
be trusted. I need to look, no further than the
infamous water park retreat where they you know, massaged the standard.
I mean this, this, I can't believe will and I
don't want to, you know, go too far afield here.
I still cannot believe that the water park scandal is
not a bigger scandal that they were cooking the books

(01:40:18):
on student test scores, on cut scores to make it
seem like students were doing a lot better. They do
this at the Chula Vista resort, spending three hundred and
sixty eight thousand dollars of our money. It's okay. My
family goes to the Dells like once sometimes twice a year.
I think we did the math on this. There were
eighty eight attendees. It was something like eleven thousand dollars

(01:40:40):
per attendee at the water park. I don't even think
I would know how to spend eleven thousand dollars at
a water park in the Dells. That's a methodist, I think, right,
let's that Yeah, yeah, right. I mean I would need to,
like I don't know, you know, get a house boat
and start living in the wavepool to spend that amount

(01:41:02):
of money. But this is the biggest This to me
is and it again all sort of fits in, as
you said, it all fits into. We have got an
educational bureaucracy at both the K twelve level and at
the college level that is less interested in turning out
students who are going onto the next grade or going

(01:41:23):
on to become teachers themselves, less interested in turning out proficient,
competent people who can go in and immediately do the
work at the level that's expected to them, and instead
a bureaucracy that is so self serving that it just
seeks to enhance its own money power and influence. And

(01:41:47):
that's a big, big problem.

Speaker 3 (01:41:49):
Yeah, And you can see the differen when we look
at states like Mississippi, which we never thought, you know,
in Wisconsin we'd be looking up towards Mississippi right as aspirational.
But what they did is they got some actual reformers
in place in their education establishment. They were able to
wholesale make changes and actually go with what works rather
than what the establishment wanted. And now when we look
at fourth grade and eight scores and reading, we're actually

(01:42:10):
looking up at Mississippi, which you know, people like Chris
Larsen want to testify. I couldn't believe that was the case,
but I shouldn't the data. No, we're actually looking up
at Mississippi now.

Speaker 1 (01:42:18):
In fact, a lot of states are. It's known as
the Mississippi Miracle. And what they did is simply a
going back to phonics based reading education and be And
this is the big one. If you can't pass what
is it third grade going into fourth grade? If you
can't pass a reading test, they hold you back and
there is no crying, there is no whining from the parents.

(01:42:41):
You do not move on to the fourth grade, all right,
And they say, look, if you don't have the basics
by now, you need to get them because everything builds
on it. And to have that the stones, frankly, to
do that, to stand up to parents and anybody else
within the educational bureaucracy, well we can't. You know, if

(01:43:03):
it's disparate impact. If we're holding too many black students back,
we look like racists. Well are they served by I mean,
we've got the biggest racial disparities in UH student performance
at the fourth grade level in the entire state. I mean,
this to me is just a it's a complete no
brainer all the way around. I can't believe it either.

(01:43:25):
But Wisconsin needs to follow Mississippi's model.

Speaker 3 (01:43:29):
Yeah, for sure. And then you know they're there are
other states like Louisiana, There other southern states that actually
have you know, more more friendly say governments and plays
across the border. So we say they're actually that are
moving past us as well. So well, you know, the
less likes to say we're some educational model up here,
you know, the progressive state, but we're falling to the
bottom in terms of proficiency. And you know, when we're
looking up at a state like Mississippi, you think that

(01:43:50):
ought to spur some change across the board. With no, no, no,
no insult Mississippi.

Speaker 1 (01:43:54):
But it's of an education Yeah. Forever, Mississippi has been
like dead last in everything, right, it's like personal fitness,
physical fitness education, all of this. Minnesota, Missus Minnesota. Minnesota
is also a national laughing stock for completely different reasons.

Speaker 3 (01:44:10):
But Missus like we are.

Speaker 1 (01:44:13):
Yeah, no exactly, but you know what, kudos to them
for saying, hey, here is a problem, here is a
clear fix, and we're going to do something about I
think a great first step will is this report identifying
the problem the fourth gap, how inconsistent teacher preparation is
fueling Wisconsin's literacy and educator crises. We have got a

(01:44:37):
story on it up. We have got a link to
the report up Heartlandpost dot com. Will Flanders is the
research director for WILL the Wisconsin Institute for Law on Liberty. Sir,
always appreciate talking with you again. Excellent report, great job,
and we do appreciate it.

Speaker 3 (01:44:55):
Thank you so much. Ever heard you.

Speaker 1 (01:44:57):
Too, my friend. This is the Dan o'donald show, so
it is intelligent discourse and a reverend fun We do both,
and we do both again when we come back. Dead
serious about this report from Will. I am very rarely,
I say, with no false modesty, truly surprised that I

(01:45:18):
had not thought of something as a root cause for
something in politics. This one. I just we're not adequately prepared.
We're not teaching teachers how to teach reading. I'm not
exactly sure how many more times I could use the
word teach in one sentence, but it is a very

(01:45:41):
very big problem Heartlandpost dot com, where you can also
find this fascinating first person perspective from We're not using
her real name, We're calling her Babie. A twenty five
year old uh self described Wisconsin girl through and through,

(01:46:06):
She writes, Wisconsin priced me out. Why I'm packing up
my life and heading to Kentucky. I never thought I'd
be the kind of person who leaves, she writes. I'm
a Wisconsin girl through and through. Packers on Sundays with
my dad, summers on the lake, cheese kurds at the
County Fair. Wisconsin isn't just where I'm from, It's who

(01:46:27):
I am, or at least it was this fall. I'm
loading up a moving truck and driving to Kentucky. Not
because I wanted to, because math doesn't lie in Wisconsin.
The math isn't working for me anymore. I'm twenty five,
I work in the automotive industry, no kids, no student loans,

(01:46:47):
no debt, doing everything right, and I still can't get ahead.
Wisconsin's income tax tops out at seven point six percent,
one of the highest in the Midwest. Kentucky's is a
four point five percent flat tax, and the state is
actively working to eliminate it entirely. Kentucky has also become

(01:47:08):
one of the fastest growing automotive manufacturing hubs in the country,
with Ford, Toyota and a booming ev supply chain creating
a real career upside for someone in my field. It's
kind of amazing. She then goes into what this would
mean in real dollars for her. We put together a
table showing, hey, this is how much this is going

(01:47:31):
to save over five years income taxes. It's about twenty
thousand dollars. That's a down payment, she writes, that's a
funded retirement account. That's three hundred dollars a month. That
should be building my future instead of padding a state
budget that keeps growing while my opportunities here don't. This

(01:47:52):
is the part that breaks me. My family's thirty minutes away.
We have Sunday dinners. After I move, they're an eight
hour drive away. My best friend since seventh grade is here,
my fish fry spots, my hiking trails, the coffee shop
where they know my order. All of it stays behind.
There are no tax savings that make leaving your people easy.

(01:48:14):
And I shouldn't have to choose. A twenty five year old,
working hard, living within her means doing everything right, should
be able to build a life in the state that
she loves. She shouldn't be forced to pick between her
family and her financial future. That's not a policy or
a personal failure. That's a policy failure. I'm not an anomaly.

(01:48:36):
I know seven people my age from my hometown who
have left or are leaving in the next two years
if things don't change. We're not ungrateful. We're just people
who have done the math and realized our state's leadership
values are tax dollars more than our presence. By the
time I'm thirty, I could own a home in Kentucky

(01:48:57):
by thirty five at real retirement account. Those aren't wild dreams.
They're just math. Math that works there and doesn't here.
I didn't leave Wisconsin, Wisconsin left me. I'll tell you
what if she doesn't want to leave, I think she's

(01:49:18):
got a future not in the automotive industry, but in writing.
Because that is a phenomenally well written column. It is
up at the Heartland Post. I am just about to
tweet it out BB a twenty five year old automotive
industry professional who is relocating from Wisconsin to Kentucky and

(01:49:43):
she wants to return someday. She's not even a homeowner
where we have seen property. Do you realize Wisconsin now
has the eighth highest property tax burden in the entire country?
Eighth highest. What are we getting for that? Some of
the best education because our school tax lees have gone
up so dramatically thanks to Governor Evers four hundred year Vieto.

Speaker 5 (01:50:04):
Of course not.

Speaker 1 (01:50:05):
We have seen utility rates skyrocket under Evers. Income tax
is high. You have got fees that are out of control,
sales taxes, especially in the city of Milwaukee, which was
just allowed to implement its own two percent sales tax.
You've got a half a percent sales tax that was

(01:50:28):
allowed for Milwaukee County because they can't get their financial
houses in order. Of course, Milwaukee County the most galling
I've ever seen. You've got David Crowley begging beg, oh
my gosh, we can't fund our retirement accounts. What does
he do the very first thing, very first thing or

(01:50:49):
excuse me, I'm sorry, not David Crowley, Cavalier Johnson, we
can't fund our This was the city level twenty twenty four.
First thing he does raises for everybody in Clo himself,
people like Bibie, they're being priced out. We always think, okay,

(01:51:10):
Wisconsin is way more affordable than say, Illinois or New
York California. Obviously, there are places that are way more
affordable than here. And I don't need to tell you
Kentucky has got way better weather, especially from January to
about April, than in Wisconsin. So there are a lot

(01:51:31):
of people who are making that difficult calculation saying, look,
there's more opportunities there because it's a better business tax
environment than here in Wisconsin's it's fitting, I think. Do
you remember what one of the very first things Tony
Evers did when he became governor? Anybody remember, Oh my goodness,

(01:51:56):
Eric Paulson, my producer, he got it. One of the
very first things Evers did, Scott Walker put on the
signs welcome to Wisconsin. He added a sign that said
open for business. The implication, hey, come here from Illinois.
One of the very first things Tony Evers did was
replace the open for business signs with Tony Evers Governor.

(01:52:19):
So it didn't say welcome to Wisconsin, open for business.
It said welcome to Wisconsin, Tony Evers governor. The implication
was Wisconsin is no longer open for business. And it's
kind of accurate. States are in competition with one another, businesses, people, obviously,
they're in competition with one another. States are in competition

(01:52:43):
for people. One of the ways that they do that
is by lowering the tax burden to get people and
businesses into the state. Democrats are never going to realize that,
and in fact, the best they can come up with
is in California and New York, they're trying to tax
the companies and tax the wealthy job creators who leave

(01:53:05):
the state. They're literally trying to have what is it
derisively called a U haul tax. Well, if Wisconsin wants
to go down that same route, by all means, elect
Francesca Hong or Sarah Rodriguez as your next governor and
along with them a Democrat legislature and will be Illinois

(01:53:28):
or New York before you know it. A lot of
people asking me where they can find that letter I
wrote A read I should say I most certainly did
not write the letter I Am not leaving you for Kentucky,
Ladies and gentlemen. It's called Wisconsin priced me out why
I'm packing up my life and leaving for Kentucky. You

(01:53:52):
can find it at the Heartland Post. It is more
than a website. It is the ones shop for I
always say, conservatives in this state, but for anybody who
cares about news and politics and policy. This is the
place you need to go. I can tell you I

(01:54:13):
have talked with a number of leaders of this state
who say, look, Dan, it's fantastic. We go to Heartland
Post every day. You should as well. We have got
the best writers, even a twenty five year old woman.
Do you realize I don't even know her name. I
literally only know her as Bebi. One of our other

(01:54:34):
editors took her story and she read it really, really
well written first person perspective about how the tax burden
in Wisconsin is just too high. You can find it
at Heartlandpost dot com. We will of course be tweeting
that out, posting on social media at nan O'Donnell's show,

(01:54:55):
across all platforms. I'm actually running out right now my family.
We're gonna go to a movie. We're seeing the Steven
Spielberg Aliens one disclosure day. Look, folks, I can't help
I am a sucker for all things aliens, and if

(01:55:15):
it's Steven Spielberg and look close Encounters e T. I
even liked War of the Worlds twenty years ago, which
is like Universe. Yeah, well, I mean they're not technically
legal aliens. Eric they're undocumented visitors to Earth. Let's go
on there. I'll let you know how it is when
I get back tomorrow. I've heard bad things, but we'll

(01:55:37):
see Dan O'Donnell's show back tomorrow