Possible Unintended Consequences Of A Constitutional Convention

Hy and Christopher take on the possible unintended consequences of a constitutional convention this coming August. For example: there is a move afoot to get rid of the state income tax. Foster Campbell has a tax-swap idea that the powerful Louisiana Chemical Association would hate! However, an alternative is higher property taxes—which the voters would hate! (More on this below.)

Big political donors could give even more under a bill that is sailing through the state Legislature, but will it matter? House 906 by Rep. Mark Wright would raise contribution limits from $5,000 to $12,000 per donor for candidates running for statewide office and in the four biggest parishes, from $2,500 to $6,000 for candidates running for the state Legislature and in smaller parishes and from $1,000 to $2,000 for many local elections.  Due to the fact that SuperPACs can receive, unlimited contributions, Hy and Christopher speculate whether contribution limit should go up even further to $100,000– BUT equally that disclosure requirements should be almost instantaneous and online. The big flaw in the bill is that it retains the current reporting system, which takes weeks until you know who gave what money to whom.

President Biden and Donald Trump will meet for two debates on June 27 and Sept. 10, and they went around the Commission on Presidential Debates.  Is that because RFK Jr. might have qualified if the debates were in the fall?

Senate Bill 237, sponsored Sen. Thomas Pressly (R-Shreveport), would make it illegal to manufacture or sell products that contain any amount of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) in Louisiana unless they are licensed medical marijuana products. The measure would wipe out what some consider an established industry in Louisiana.  Is this ban the right move?  Christopher’s father had a better quality of life in his last months before his death on June 25 of last year because of THC, and the effort by the Louisiana legislature to outlaw it negatively affect many medical patients in their final years.

To conclude, we wax eloquent on the 40th anniversary of the Louisiana World’s Exposition, yet we posed the question why doesn’t Louisiana stage something that big again? Why has not the United States held a World’s Fair since 1984?  And does Louisiana need to plan for another to reap the tourist benefits for four decades? (New Orleans gained 25,000 hotel rooms and the Warehouse District out of the last one.)  Olympic Committee for New Orleans 2084 anyone?

Now, more on that tax swap idea.....

Oil Processing - Income Tax Swap?
By Christopher Tidmore

Unintended consequences of LA constitutional convention could give rise to unorthodox policy ideas

Approval of a potential Louisiana constitutional convention appeared logjammed in the LA House and dead-on-arrival in the State Senate until Gov. Jeff Landry relented on his insistence that it convene in May— and instead occur in August.  That concession allowed House Bill 800 to pass the state House with 75 votes, but it also underpinned the unpredictability of what could occur if a convention ultimately is convened.

The delegates to the 1974 State constitutional convention far exceeded their original legislative mandate. What Gov. Edwin Edwards first envisioned as a simple “cleanup” of the existing document ended up as a massive rewrite.  That truism that ‘no Governor, however powerful, can control a constitutional convention completely’ could prove equally true this year.  It might even provide a way to eliminate the state income tax in a fashion which would make Gov. Jeff Landry’s allies in the Louisiana Chemical Association howl.  Or at least, that is the populist proposal which LA Public Service Commissioner Foster Campbell proposes, tax oil processing in order to end income taxes.

The idea underscores the law of unintended consequences if the governor is granted his wish for a constitutional convention.  Landry has argued that the gathering would restrict itself to merely “cleaning-up” the fiscal provisions added by amendment over the last 50 years, which has rendered Articles VII and VIII almost as long as the original document.  The governor has also pledged to protect the $75,000 homestead exemption and the Minimum Foundation Formula for K-12 education. Moreover, by appointing 27 of the 171 delegates to the convention, Landry hopes to maintain an added measure of control.  (The remainder are the members of the state House and Senate.)

However, his proposed delegates are former speakers, senior statesmen, and distinguished Louisiana leaders, who might try to establish the legacy of a document that will affect voters for at least another 50 years.  They could easily exceed their original mandate, and the governor would possess no veto power over their work.  The final document would go straight to the voters, and the

Episode Transcript

(00:03):
Battles. The politicians, the dressed, the digitators and magicians are chuse to
see the money they did, don'tthere's nothing to fill the holes? Well,
then are filling their pockets bid holes, the politicians mounting down the road.

(00:24):
Everybody's with you for no moment.Corruption and dysfunctional, it's gonna take
you. Divide it ofvention and Godbless all out there. You are now
listening to the founders. So thevoice of the founding fathers, You're Founding
fathers coming to you deep within thebowels of those mystic and cryptic alligator swamps

(00:50):
of the Big Easy, that oldCrescent City, New Orleans, Louisiana,
and high up on top of thatold Liberty Cypress, free way out on
the Eagles Branch draped and Spanish mossis none other then you have s been
gary by by all the republic ChaplainHi mc henry with Christopher Tidmore. You're

(01:12):
roving reporter, resident radical moderate andassociate editor of the Louisiana Weekly at Louisiana
Weekly dot net. And Hi,we've got a fantastic show ahead. Of
course, we have to be turningto the ongoing legislative session a little bit
and Jeff Landry found out that noteverything can go his way. An effort
to weaken a lot of public disclosurelaws. In other words, essentially,

(01:36):
if this had passed, many manyareas of the open the sunshine laws and
the open meeting laws would have beeneliminated. Well, that died in the
legislature, and we're starting to seecracks in the power of Jeff Landry.
The question is how far those crackswill go. Another crack happened. We
have a two thirds majority legislature.But there had been an effort to stop

(02:00):
public sector unions from being able toorganize during work hours, and by organize,
I mean talk to one another andthe legislators. It looked like it
was going to pass very closely through. It essentially would have ended unionization in
public sector workers. You can thinkit's a good or bad idea, but
the idea that I can't tell acoworker page join a union, which is

(02:23):
what it literally was, was gagorder that also died because Republicans were in
the House joining Democrats said this isa little close to a violation of free
speech. So all of this isgoing on, and it leads one to
think what could happen in the upcominglegislative session. The law of unintended consequences.

(02:46):
Let me give you an example whatI mean by unintended consequences. That
a good example is what Foster Campbellsuggested on the Jim Angster Show Talk Louisiana
a little over a week ago.He said, you know, if you're
rewriting the constitution, you're not boundby anything that is called. So let's

(03:07):
say Jeff Landry gets his constitutional Convention, which is still as we tape,
this not a sure thing to getthrough the state Senate. But let's say
he gets it. The legislators itwould be constituted of one hundred and seventy
one members, and the legislators,along with the governor's appointments, do not
necessarily have to go along with whathe wants. Is one of the big

(03:30):
priorities right now amongst the governor's RevenueSecretary Richard Nelson, Well, that's getting
rid of the income tax. Andit's kind of how do we do this?
How do we pay for this?We're not the federal government. We
can't go print money, So howdoes Louisiana afford this? And one of
the ideas that's been brought forth isto bring forward property taxes. Louisiana is

(03:54):
allowed under the current constitution to levya ten mil statewide property tax. A
new constitution could levy more to replacethe income tax. Well, I hate
to tell you this, but Ithink it's fair to say, Hi,
you understand this better than most.An income tax in Louisiana, I mean,
a property tax in Louisiana is oneof the most toxic things you could

(04:15):
bring out, something that would betaxed outside the homestead exemption debt. On
arrival when Foster Campbell came out andsaid it is Look, if you put
it in a revenue neutral oil processingtax, and you do it in a
constitutional convention where you can get ridof the income tax parts of the constitution
so they can't put it back on, you end up with no income tax

(04:36):
and taxing industries a few pennies onthe dollar. The Louisiana Chemical Association usually
kills any effort a thought of thisin the legislature, and it takes a
two thirds majority to pass it.But writing a new constitution that would be
a revenue swap, it could actuallybe entertained. The oil processing tax is

(04:57):
essentially a tax. Right now,the Constitution says you can only tax oil
that is pumped in Louisiana a severancetax. You can't tax anything else.
An oil processing tax is basically atax on oil plants processing oil that comes
into the state. In the UnitedStates, it is effectively impossible in most
states to even build a chemical plant, and frankly, it's with EPA permissions.

(05:25):
Best case scenario it takes seven yearsto do one worst case scenario takes
twelve to fifteen. So the ideais Louisiana could go fifteen years without an
income tax and try to compete againstTexas and Florida before major economic damage is
felt. Whether that comes or aboutor not, I have no idea,

(05:45):
and to be honest with you,it probably won't. But the reason I'm
telling you this is Jeff Landry's startingto understand the law of unintended consequences that
you can put something up, butunless you're a god or a dictator,
you can't. Even the most powerfulgovernor can't control everything. And you have
a conscial convention that is undoing Pandora'sbox. The Houses said it would happen

(06:10):
in August. The Satate goes alongPandora's box maybe opened your thoughts high.
Oh my goodness, Chrisopher, Pandora. We don't need Pandora. That was
one wicked Greek goddess. We don'tneed her anyway. It's very interesting what's
going on. As always, politicsmakes for strange bedfeather fellows and also strange

(06:32):
events and the unexpected consequences, unintendedconsequences. When I was working with Human
Terrain in Afghanistan in twenty ten,we went Alphabet agency has attached the marine
corma background Junius Army Special Forces counterintelligence agent, and I was trained in
counterinsurgency and that is actually the missionof US Army Special Forces. That's the

(06:55):
green berets. We go in andwe can literally topple governments, can create
new governments. We can be verypolitical. We're called diplomats with guns,
and we've been very, very successful. So that from that background, I
was sent in to be an ConnorInsurgency advisor attached to r CT seven.

(07:16):
One of the big things we alwaysdid is we were making our plans for
our next venture, let's say,our next operation. We didn't just look
at the immediate results. We hadto look at the secondary and the tertiary
results. And we had to makeplans for any and every possible eventuality how
things might really fold out. Younever know to you really get into the

(07:38):
mission, and so you have tobe on your feet. You have to
be very adaptable. Trusted Landry isthat? Uh? You know, I
think he's a really good governor sofar like him. A lot voted for
him, of course, and butyou know he's let's just say this,
he is new on the job,and and all executive heads you can't avoid

(08:00):
it. They're going to learn whilethey while they work, and they'll get
better and better with time. He'llget better and better with time. So
it's gonna be very interesting to see. I the thing, we're very interesting
points, Chris fer I'm really gladyou brought this up. We all need
to know about this, because,after all, we live in Louisiana.
We need to find out about allthis. I have a few more thoughts
on it, and so here wego. What a great thought, Christopher,

(08:22):
for no income taxes for Louisiana.I like that. I think we
all do, and so we needto try to That's a brilliant insight about
you know, we have a lotof chemical plants here, folks, up
and down the river. We needto try to cash in on those chemical
plants. You know, they've beenin many cases, they've been riding for
free for a long time. Theyneed to start paying their dues. So

(08:43):
hopefully this will all work out.We'll be able to get raised some heavy
duty, serious taxes from the chemicalplants and at the same time drop our
state income tax could which could bringa lot of big, big money into
the state. Uh, people lookingfor you know, their headquarters and whatnot,
retirement areas for not paying taxes,income taxes. So maybe this will

(09:09):
work out. I hope it will. I hope they can figure it all
out and come up with a goodplan. It's a great idea. And
so we'll just see where it allgoes. Folks. We've got to just
see, watch, hope, pray, and see what's coming down. Christopher,
I'm looking forward to your next topic. Let's see what it's going to
be. And so, Christopher,if we got united, maybe we could

(09:30):
pull something off here. Huh.The people will leaves in all getting together
in a green wouldn't that be something? I mean, there's no telling what
we can get done, if wewould just all could learn to agree.
You got any thoughts on that,especially about how we can improve our political
situation make things go more smoothly,Tell me what you're thinking right now,
Christopher. Speaking of legislation from theHouse, there's a bill right now House

(09:54):
Built nine o six by Representative MarkWright that would raise the average CA campaign
contribution limits from five thousand dollars totwelve thousand dollars per donor for candidates running
for statewide office and in the fourbiggest parishes that would include obviously Jefferson and
Orleans, and from twenty five hundredto six thousand dollars for candidates running for

(10:15):
the state legislature in smaller and insmaller parishes from one to two thousand for
local elections. The idea is whenthe five thousand dollars limit was first published
under Buddy Romer. Five thousand dollarsin nineteen eighty eight is a lot different
than five thousand dollars is today,and it's very hard for candidates to raise
enough money. Civil libertarians and thoseworried about money and politics are against this,

(10:39):
but one of the interesting parts thatcomes out has very low opposition,
even Democrats and Republicans because the CitizensUnited decision, which we must remember was
filed by several people in Louisiana,including the former Republican chairman Roger Vilray.
They're the fathers of this. Whenit created the independent super packs, which

(11:01):
couldn't coordinate with the candidates, madecontributions unlimited and unreported, Suddenly people were
like, well, I only reallyneed to raise money made my basic expenses.
The super pac will do all theads. The idea is that this
has gone crazy. And I'm goingto say something very unliberal for a second,
but it's because I've worked in politicsmy entire career. Ciner Royo used

(11:26):
to point out when we were onthe air together and said, is as
far from a conservative as you canget. You can't keep money out of
politics. You can just change theway it gets there. Money will always
make it into politics. Disclosure iswhat matters, that you know very quickly
how much somebody gave. Is theresomething to be said for campaign limits?

(11:48):
If for no other reason, thenyou don't get hit up for millions of
dollars. If you're a person,I think it's a good thing. I'd
be fine if it were one hundredthousand dollars, frankly, as long as
the disclosure was made quickly. Andthat's one of the problems. I've done
campaign financial reports, and they arelaborious and take an incredible amount of time

(12:11):
and expense, But you know what, it let people know who were back
who was backing my campaigns, whenI ran for the legislature, so on
and so forth. It is reallyimportant we know who gives the money and
we know it quick. I wouldbe fine raising these limits if we had
online disclosures every couple of weeks andbasically we upgrade the state's website so you're

(12:35):
not filing forms and doing all thisstuff. You're just punching in I received
x A one hundred thousand from Xperson and it's instantly on the web,
not you know, you give twoweeks before the campaign and you find out
who gave them the money two monthslater. Now, let's do this.
Let's even go higher than twelve thousanddollars, or higher than six thousand dollars.

(13:00):
Heck, let's make it one hundredthousand dollars. But let's make the
disclosure pretty close to instantaneous every coupleof weeks, and let's upgrade the state
websites to make that easy to do, because that will have more of an
impact on our politics than anything else. The fact of the matter is,
if you're a rich person, youcan lend yourself a million dollars. If

(13:20):
you're a candidate that's supported by alot of outside interests losing a chemical association,
lobby, big unions, they cando super packs and put millions of
dollars and you can't coordinate, andthey can say anything they want. And
you have reasonable disclosure because the factis you could send a message and say,
hey, I don't like that messageand doesn't get on. Let's keep

(13:43):
it higher but disclosed. Don't eliminateall limits, but make it so you
know, if somebody wants to backyour campaign, they can, but we
know exactly who they are. Yourthoughts high, well, you asked Chris
fro do like full disclosure? Ithink it's of course very important. The
uh, we want to know whatare these people are doing. You know

(14:03):
they're going to be working for us, right there are quote public servants,
although they don't really I think understandthat. But we need full accountability all
the way through. And I believeyou know, Sunshine if you will,
is the best disinfectant that everything they'redoing, we should we should be able
to see what they're up to andhow they're how they're who's backing them,

(14:26):
and how they're doing what they're doing. I think it's very very important.
Uh. You know that's that's theproblem with so many problems, you know,
that we have in the world.Is one of the biggest causes or
problems of it is conspiracy, folks. Of conspiracy is a secret plan,
if you will, a secret plan. Now you know, not all conspiracies

(14:48):
are bad. For instance, asurprise birthday party, that's not a bad
thing. It's done in secret.It's a plan, a plot, if
you will, but it's for goodreasons. But I'm talking about conspiracies that
are for evil or that are forto attain power over whomever or whatever,
whatever group whatever's ao Uh to doit and and and do it nefariously if

(15:13):
you will. Uh, there thereare many conspiracies. Of history is filled
with them. I mean, youjust read Churchill'll read any great history and
you're going to find out that theworld is filled with conspiracies. The uh
if you don't believe them. AsJulius Caesar or Jesus Christ or Abraham Lincoln
or jfk Uh. They they willquickly tell you, yes, conspiracies are

(15:37):
very real, and uh again,in our jurisprudence, in the courts of
of America, they're literally probably severalhundred conspiracies, criminal conspiracies on trial,
you know that are being there.They're part of the trial that's going on
right now for at least maybe acouple hundred different trials around the country.
It's very criminal. Conspiracy is veryand that's what's eviling. But if you

(16:02):
shine the light on it all,it's a lot harder for these snakes to
slip around behind the scenes. It'sa lot harder for the slick willies to
pull off their crooked deals or thethe Biden criminal syndicate to continue to clean
out our tax money. So Ibelieve in shining the light on it all,
Christopher, I really do. Andso let's just see, uh hopefully,

(16:26):
maybe you know, that would bereally good. Maybe our legislators will
come up with a plan for this. And folks, as always, they
will, they act on us.If we ignore them, they're gonna do
what they want to do. Weneed to be on top of them.
You need to be calling them,writing them, emailing them, whatever you
do to communicate with your various legislativepeople, whether it's local, state or

(16:48):
federal. Very important that we stayin touch with them and they know who
we are and what we want.The more we do that, the better
chance we can get for good government. So, Christopher, I can't wait
for you next topic. And Iguess, Christopher, when I was young
and frisky and in college, wehad a saying drop out, tune in

(17:12):
and getting lighted, you know,open your mind. And and of course
that all had to do with thedrug culture of that time. A lot
of a lot of a lot ofmy friends, many of the kids from
that generation, friends and whatnot.Uh, they really blew their brains on
drugs. It was terrible. Itwas a big mistake. They were They
were wrong. They didn't know whatthey had been seduced by the college professors

(17:34):
and whatnot. And the and themusic, a lot of the music at
the time, and in fact,no one's mission. A lot of these
homeless people we work with her fromthat generation. Like they used to say,
if you remember the sixties, youweren't there, which is kind of
really sad, But anyway, it'sa new issue now and there is medical

(17:55):
marijuana. There's some good things comingout of uh marijuana and whatnot. Do
you have. I know you've donea lot of research over the years,
Christopher, and you've had some strongexperiences with it. Tell us what you
know about that. And I thinkthere's some current legislation about it right now.
I know you're on top of it, So tell us what you know.
Thank you, Christopher. One morelegislative matter that hits a little close

(18:17):
to home is a bill by SenatorThomas Presley, a Republican from Shreport,
Senate Bill two thirty seven that wouldbasically make illegal the sale of products of
any items that contain any amount ofTHCHC. This is essentially unless they're licensed

(18:37):
medical marijuana. THHC is the chemicalprocess behind marijuana. And the way this
worked is prior to twenty twenty two, we couldn't sell hemp in Louisiana.
The then speaker said, you know, let's do hemp because hemp has a
lot of uses besides you know,getting people high and making clothes, doing

(18:59):
in dust products. And this washurting our farmers. And the idea was
that if you you could have,as he said, so much hamp.
You need pounds of it to beable to get high on it. Because
hemp has very low levels of intoxicants. Well, there was nothing the bill
that said you couldn't concentrate the intoxicantsand the THHC. And that's how you

(19:21):
end up with the marijuana gummies,if you will, they're not actually marijuana,
they're concentrated chemical THHC that comes fromhemp. And so you have a
lot of these marijuana shops, youknow, these THHC shops all over town
and THHC drinks and so on andso forth, and people are like,
you know, this is horrible.Gen Mills of the Louisiana Family Form has
openly said he wants to kill anindustry over two thousand things, two thousand

(19:45):
outlets who are selling this stuff inLouisiana. I'm going to point something out.
Medical marijuana is not ubiquitous, andthe marijuana gummies as they're often known,
gave my father a quality of lifein his last months that none of
the medications that came from the doctorscould. This is personal to me.

(20:10):
On June twenty fifth of last year, my father died but for six months
before his heart was failing and hewould tell the doctors he couldn't breathe.
They didn't believe him. His heartwas not pumping enough oxygen into his blood.
Eventually we managed to convince him togive um to oxygen, but the
stress and pressure on it means thathe was always gasping for breath. Now,

(20:34):
my dad had not He had almostnever used marijuana. He tried it
once when he was in the militaryin the early sixties. This is before
the Vietnam warware was ubiquitous. Buthe'd tried it and he said it was
fine. He'd never used it.He liked his cocktail the evening, so
he was not opposed to intoxicants.But he would never have considered doing this.

(20:56):
But I had heard through some somedoctor friends of mine that THCHC gummies
would actually help him not only relaxand sleep, but breathe because the THCHC
has this effect on the heart whereit actually opens up the capillarias and the

(21:17):
blood vessels. It not only relaxesyou, but it actually helps you breathe
better. So I went to oneof these shops on the Magazine Street and
I bought the gummies, and Itold my father. He was like,
no, absolutely not. But he'staken all these meds and nothing was making
a difference. I started giving himin limited amounts these gummies. It gave

(21:38):
him a quality of life that werenot there, and they were no worse.
In fact, in his case,they were far better than having two
or three drinks, in fact,not even one. They did not make
him spacey. THCHC as a productis much safer than alcohol. I'm not

(21:59):
defending it intoxicant. I have nevertaken a marijuana gummy in my life.
Let me say that again. Ihave never taken a marijuana gummy in my
life. I have never taken aTHHC product. I've never drunkn a THHC
drink that I know of the sparklingdrink variety. And I am not a

(22:19):
recreational drug user. You don't usemarijuana any of that stuff. I'm saying
this to somebody who doesn't use it. THHC gummies made a medical difference to
my father, But he would nothave qualified for medical marijuana because his condition
of a failing heart was not oneof the scheduled conditions, and he wouldn't

(22:42):
have probably gone to it because Icould give him. He was able to
breathe in the last few weeks ofhis life, he was able to enjoy
himself because of those gummies. Hewas able to go to two dinners,
one for his best friend's birthday,Bill co and the other for his last
Father's Day and my in laws,and he could get through the evening and

(23:03):
with some degree of quality and faith. Now for those that to mister Mills,
who he and I have agreed onsome issues, disagreed on some issues,
and I think Gene Mills is agood guy, But I'm going to
point out something. It didn't work. Prohibition didn't work when pushed by mostly
what is today called the religious rightmoved. It just created an underground economy.

(23:26):
All we did with THHC was bringit into marijuana, basically into the
legal economy and tax that. We'vemade money on it. And yes,
shops have opened up, and Iknow that's offensive to some, and there's
one not far from my apartment inUptown, New Orleans. But it's also
has some effect. And if you'retaking a marijuana gummy or taking these THHD

(23:49):
products is far less impairing than drinkingthree drinking even one drink of alcohol,
much less three, and unless you'rewilling to say to the people of Louisiana,
no more alcohol, no more drinksthan saying THHC, which is actually
less bad for you physically than alcoholthe effects of alcohol and less impairing of

(24:14):
your mental facilities. Saying that can'tbe allowed is utter hypocrisy. You want
to put away an industry that franklyhas helped people. I hope no one
Hi would take an intoxicating effect.You know, I'd be a more I'd
give up everything. You know.The Mormons, as some people know,

(24:37):
I'm doing the show remotely from Utahright now. I'm in Moai, Utah.
As I do this show, I'vebeen on the road leading tours,
and I talk a lot about theMormons when I'm in Utah. And in
some parts of the religion I don'tparticularly care for, but other parts I
find intriguing. And I've always respectedthe Mormons' ability to not give up,
to give up all intoxicating effect elements. I said, I could be a

(25:02):
Mormon, except well, I can'tgive them coffee. I can't give them
caffee. That's my thing. Ihave to have my requisite three pots a
day. But the fact of thematter is, while I respect that attitude,
that's a choice, a personal choice. When you tell people that they
can't have something like a THHC thatcan improve the quality of their life,

(25:22):
then what you're saying or even toget intoxicated, and you're not and you're
leaving other intoxicants in the market.You're not being intellectually consistent. And I
hope the legislature votes down this bill. You may disagree, High, but
I got to tell you, withoutthose gummies, the last few weeks of
my dad's life would have been excruciating. Your thoughts, Yes, Chrispher,
I'm pretty much in agreement with youon this, and I think that you

(25:47):
know, if it has a medicalapplication for our healing, what's wrong with
it? You know, we takedrugs from the big pharma that come from
the petrochemical industry, most of itdoes. And we're talking about hard drugs,
strong drugs, prescription drugs, andthat seems to be, you know,
acceptable in our culture. I don'tlike them. I avoid them all

(26:11):
that I can. I don't believein them, really, but I know
they're they're part of the medical profession, and I don't see anybody howling about
that. So certainly, and ithas been proven that wine has a very
can have a very medicinal effect.Remember the Good Samaritan used wine to heal
the man that had been beaten upon the road. It has a positive

(26:33):
it can have a positive effect.And as far as medical marijuana and these
gumments, they're very mild. Imean they're very very mild. And so
I really don't see anything wrong withhim. And my goodness, look at
the benefits they gave your poor fatherat the end of his life. I
would certainly support that. I don'tknow who wouldn't. So you know,
the Bible talks about herbs that aregood for us, and you know the

(26:55):
Bible talks about trees that bring healing. So I'm all fort and and yet
I'm totally against the abuse of drugsof any kind of drug, whether it's
marijuana, you know, THHC,LSD, you name it. There's there's
a lot of different things out there, And so I think wisdom and moderation

(27:21):
should temper anything we we that weput in our bodies, and we should
be very very concerned to put thebest stuff and the right stuff in our
bodies. Uh, And God wantsus to take care of our health and
our bodies. And so I think, you know, yeah, I'm all
for it. Let let the medicalmarijuana role if you will. E though

(27:42):
I've never used it, doesn't knowthat I ever will, but I wouldn't
be averse to it. I thoughtit would help me for something. So
anyway, I think that's very interestinginsight you have on all this, Christopher.
But folks, it is time forus to take a break ski recovery,
re engagement. These are not justwords. These are the action steps

(28:06):
we at the New Orleans Mission taketo make a positive impact on the homeless
problem facing the greater New Orleans area. Did you know in twenty twenty,
homelessness in our community increased by overforty percent. We are committed to meet
this need through the work being doneat the New Orleans Mission. We begin

(28:27):
the rescue process by going out intothe community every day to bring food,
pray, and share the love ofJesus with the hopeless and hurting in our
community. Through the process of recovery, these individuals have the opportunity to take
time out, assess their life,and begin to make new decisions to live

(28:48):
out their God given purpose. Afterthe healing process has begun and lives are
back on track, We walk eachindividual as they re engage back into the
community to be healthy, thriving,and living a life of purpose. No
one is meant to live under abridge. No one should endure abuse,

(29:08):
no one should be stuck in addiction. The New Orleans Mission is a stepping
stone out of that life of destructionand into a life of hope and purpose.
Partner with us today. Go towww dot New Orleansmission dot org or
make a difference by texting to sevenseven nine four eight. Folks. Is

(29:34):
chappinghemc Interian. I'm here to tellyou about our ministry, LAMB Ministries.
We are an intercity ministry with aninner city focus and formula for inner city
folks. Please check us out.Go to our website LAMB n o La
dot com, Lambanola dot com,or just call me chappinhe mckenry at Ericode
five zero four seven two three ninethree six nine. Folks, this is

(29:59):
a very challenging man. In fact, we just had another recent event.
We have them all the time,actually, of one way or the other.
It's an exciting ministry. It keepsus, keeps us on alert,
keeps us going, keeps us manytimes on a hot seat. And we've
just recently had another tragedy in ourministry with one of our kids. You
know, we work with inner citykids. These kids had very challenging lives.

(30:25):
And this poor gal we've had noticedsince she was a kid, you
know, like ten years old.She's about nineteen now, and she just
had a terrible thing. She hada beautiful boy getting ready to be born,
and she was shot in the stomachthree times. The baby was just
about ready to be born. Youknow, it's nine months and she's going

(30:47):
to labor any day. And thehospital kept the baby alive for about a
month, but they had to letthe baby go about a couple of days
ago. So please pray for thisgal. She's a sweet, precious girl
and she's grieving greatly as you canonly imagine. She did survive, of
course, the incident. She's okay, but it's a real tragedy. So

(31:10):
these are the kind of things thathappen in our ministry. We need all
the help we can get. Weneed final support, we need prayer warriors,
and we need volunteers. So ifyou have any interest, please get
in touch with us. We've seen, oh my goodness, we've seen close
to five thousand kids come to Christand we've seen hundreds go on to live
very productive, in good, positivelives. So if you want an exciting

(31:30):
ministry, give us a call.We need all the help we can get.
And thank you so very very much. Folks. We're back and you're
listening to the Founder's Show and thischaplainhih mcinery and my partner will be on
chartye. But first I'd just liketo point out a few things and give

(31:52):
us a little insight to the restof the show. You know, everybody
likes a good fight. I guessyou could say if you are Irish,
as all saying the Irish, theGaels never met a fight they didn't like,
and the Germans never met a warthey didn't like. So if you
have any of that in your background, you might be excited about what's coming
up. We're talking about Jerry Springer. We're talking about full verbal body slams

(32:15):
coming up soon, folks, AndI'm talking about the coming presidential debate.
Yes, we've got we've got Trumpthe head jammer, head slammer, and
we've got Biden the stumbler, Yes, you know, the corn pop straight

(32:38):
razor, wandering lost in the woodsstumbler. So it's gonna be interesting to
see these two guys debate. It'scoming up. A lot of people get
excited about it. So finally JoeBiden threw in the towel said he would
debate Trump. There are two ofthem, maybe even going to be three.
Of course, they're all on Biden'sterms. Of course, the Democrats
have to control it all, whichmeans we're going to have if Trump will

(33:00):
probably be debating the moderator more thanhe'll be debating Biden because the moderator.
When Biden gets lost and confused,the moderator steps in and tries to help
him out, which is against therules of debate. But nevertheless, they
don't care about the rules, youknow, they're just they're they're they're totally
fanatical in their cause, if youwill, and so. But Trump panels

(33:22):
it well, So it's going tobe interesting looking forward to it. And
Chris Fhine know you've got some thoughtsabout this, So what are you thinking
about this up and coming debate.Well, it's official, Hi, We're
going to see a presidential Debate inless than two weeks. For those just
joining us, you can always hearThe Founder's Show with Hi McHenry and Christopher
tid Moore every Sunday from eight tonine am one to nine point five FM

(33:42):
w r n O and every Monday, Wednesday and Friday Friday, Monday and
Wednesday on ninety three point nine FMfifteen sixty am WSLA twenty four to seven
three sixty five at our website,The Foundershow dot com. But what we
recommend, folks is to get theiHeartMedia app. It's free, it doesn't
cost you anything. It is betterthan Pandora, better than satellite radio,

(34:04):
all these different both podcasting but alsomusical choices, musical plays, ats,
and most importantly, if you getit and you type in the Founder's Show
Founders with an S, you'll seehow and my ugly mugs come up.
Just press follow and our show willend up directly on your phone, directly
on your computer to listen to youat your leisure each week. Check out

(34:25):
the founder Show dot com or checkor down load the iHeartMedia app and tap
in the Founder's Show. But,Folks, the presidential debate may happen as
soon as a couple of weeks fromnow. CNN will host a debate in
Atlanta on the twenty seventh, ABCwill on the tenth, and we should

(34:46):
get confirmation in just a couple ofweeks that this is a go. It's
basically the Trump and Biden campaigns gottogether and went around the Commission on Presidential
Debates, which had wanted to todo debates in September and October, which
the Trump people and actually the Bidenpeople pointed out, Wait a second,

(35:07):
that's after people already voting. Itdoesn't matter. I mean, the election
starts at Labor Day for all intentsand purposes in many places, whether you
think that's a good or bad idea. And I will point out for all
those who are against early voting andin many cases mail in voting, we
had John Coovey on in here.All the data says that benefits older voters,

(35:27):
and invariably every election up until twentytwenty has benefited Republicans. But we're
not even debating that. You knowit's going to happen in this election period,
end of discussion. Whether you likeit or not, it's going to
happen. So what was the pointof having a debate in September, and
the two campaigns got together. Butwhat I find out we will see the

(35:49):
two face off, Biden and Trump, see what happens. But what bothers
me about this is the two campaignscolloded to keep Robert F. Kennedy Junior
out of the day debates. Nowwe have multiple third party candidates. What's
interesting about RFK is it's he's affectingboth candidates. Some people say he affects
Biden more than Trump. There's alot of evidence that he affects Trump more

(36:12):
than Biden. My guess is he'spretty much affecting both of them equally.
I mean, I think the datatends to show that. What's Biden's problem
is he also has Jill Stein andCornell West on the left, and so
he's affected a little bit more inthe polls than Trump is because he's got
additional challengers. If for those thatsay this is not fair, I point

(36:34):
out it's Biden's fault. Chris Christywas reading to run on the New Labels
ticket and Biden stopped any Democrat frombeing able to run with him, saying
it would hurt him. And whatwe're finding out now is that was a
stupid strategic mistake. But the reasonI'm saying about if we have the first
debate on June twenty seventh, whichis, by the way, before either
candidates nominated, if their official partycandidate, it's not absurd this whole process

(36:57):
has become if we have but wehave it on the twenty seventh and RFK
is not there. RFK by thatpoint will be on the ballots of almost
every swing state. He just goton the Texas ballot. He's being remarkably
effective. He's on Michigan, he'son in Hawaii, he's on about to
be in California. Had to redoNevada, but he'll be on that ballot.
He's going to be on major ballots. He's going to affect this election.

(37:20):
Will he be on all fifty Idon't know, but he'll be on
at least forty six. He's ontrack to have a guy who's at twelve
percent in the polls consistently, notin one variation poll twelve percent or better,
not on stage when he could affectan election is insane. You might

(37:43):
think he's a spoiler. Democrats havethought this for a long time. Increasingly
Republicans are because they realize he affectsTrump. The fact of the matter is,
do not have him get his viewpointsthat are attracting people from both parties
is a sin. But I shouldn'tbe surprised. Everybody blamed the Commission on
Presidential Debates, which always said youhad to be at Apartment of Polls statistically

(38:06):
win enough electoral votes and enough statesto become the president. That's directly possible.
Maybe that's the reason the campaigns gottogether and had early debates. They
didn't want the Commission on Presidential Debatesto put him in. Frankly, I
doubt they would have because they're duopolyFrank Farrenkoff, the former Republican, the
former head of the RNC, Andit's a duopoly. But you don't even

(38:30):
have to support rfk Junior to thinkin a democracy you should have more than
two choices. We're a free market. We ought to have more choices for
president than this. So why don'twe your thoughts high? Yeah, of
course I like that. We shouldhave have it wide open for debates.
And but you know, for thosewho qualify, really not little guys who

(38:51):
only can not even get one percentof the vote, it would take up
too much of the time. Andit's just they didn't make it. But
some of the big ones and JFK'swon them. I mean RFK is one
of them. He should be allowedin and so. But you know,
this is a result of having twobig parties that are pretty much running everything.
And in America now you've got somany rhinos. It's almost like it's

(39:14):
just one party, the Democrat Party, and they pretty much get what they
want. Look at the way they'veset up these debates, it's all in
favor of the Democrats. They've giventhem all the advantages from day one.
Trump doesn't care about that. He'sgoing to get in there. He's gonna
do a great job. But yeah, Christopher, it's there's not a lot
of really, there's not a lotof fair play and all this. So,
Christopher, I know we got somemore good stuff to talk about.

(39:36):
I can't wait to hear your nexttopic. Perhaps we could get off in
a lighter topic, something about mothernature, about you know, fairs and
fun things to do. So,Christopher, what are your thoughts on that?
I know you got some good ideas, some good thoughts about that.
I know you like to have agood time. Tell us about it,
Christopher, Well, Hi, yesterdayI took a tour group into Arches National

(39:58):
Park. It in the sunset outhours between five and eight pm, and
we watched the evening at light,the golden hours as it came across these
majestic ideas. And the funny thingis, you let your mind wander,
and I've thought about something that's aboutas far away from the incredible rock formations
of the balanced rock or the windowsof the world that I was looking at.

(40:20):
What I thought about was it's Thispast week had marked the fortieth anniversary
of the opening of the Louisiana nineteeneighty four World's Fair, the World's Exposition,
and that was an important portion.I was in the fourth grade,
in the fourth or fifth grade atthe time, and I was young,

(40:42):
but my parents and I went consistently. My mother was a passport holder.
We went multiple times fourteen fifteen,sixteen seventy, I don't even know how
many times. And I watched thefair I remembered very distinctly, and I
watched it go from all the internationalentertainers to running out of money and having
all the entertainers. But I watchedhow Louisiana came together. I remember,

(41:05):
you know, a lot of NewOrleanians were introduced to Cajun culture, and
sometimes for the first time we thinkabout, you know, things Cajun's ubiquitous,
but it wasn't at the time.I remember eating going to the German
pavilion and there were sure of peoplethat had people making boucharre. Cajuns from
Sorrento making bouchara and I said itwas a boucherat. It's hogshead cheese,

(41:28):
and I thought, oh, andI chased. It was one of the
most delicious things I ever had.My parents and I ended up going to
the Boucherat festival in Sorrento like twoweekends later because we learned about it there.
And I watched this incredible effort thatredefined created the Warehouse District as we
know. It redefined New Orleans andreally brought It was a terrible financial failure,

(41:52):
just like the World's Fair one hundredyears before, but it brought so
much attention, so much renewal intoLouisiana. Ten years ago, I was
talking to Mark Romang and I said, you know, we know how to
do a celebration for the thirtieth anniversary. Of course, those who don't know.
Mark was the executive director of thefair and the head of marketing,
and he said, you know,and maybe we should do something, you

(42:12):
know, the thirtieth anniversary and committeeand you know, Olympic community. And
it's stuck in my brain, theidea that New Orleans got together, that
state got together, did something ofinternational import and it has lasting effects,
forty positive effects forty years later.Chres Kabakoff and I talked about this twenty

(42:34):
years ago and he said, youknow, we keep talking about how much
money we lost. We never talkedabout how much money we gained because of
this. The repaired roads, thenew perspective, the opening of the river.
The river was something that you werebehind wharves, we really didn't know.
It was the fair more than anythingelse that opened not just the river
walk, but the whole perspective onthe river. And it was the last

(42:58):
American World's Fair. I'd gone tothe one two years before in Knoxville,
and I remember very well, andthat's one of the reasons our fair failed
because there was a lot of internationalattention in Knoxville, a lot of US
attention, and they didn't want ourfair compete. Vancouver happened a couple of
years later, but we haven't reallyseen a World's Fair in the North American

(43:20):
continent since then. Here's a littlething. They do go on. They
are going on all over the world, but we do not have them in
America because we basically think of themas a useless money sink, and I
think that's a wrong perspective. Webrought international perspectives. The International Pavilions were
in what is now the River Walk. They brought exposed people from all over.

(43:43):
We may have had half as manyvisitors as we thought we would do,
but it remains one of the greatsignal points in Louisiana history. And
I hope in twenty eighty four wehave something like the World's Fair again,
because it's kind of the way thatwe rank our city every one hundred years.
Where are we? What have wedone? And maybe maybe in twenty

(44:04):
eighty four we could have the Olympicsand New Orleans. That would be great,
but we shouldn't lose this idea thatwe could do something big to garner
the attention of the world. Andmaybe what we need is a festival that
celebrates all of Louisiana. We haveJazz Fest, we have the Music Fest,
they have the crafts, they havethe cultural perspectives. Wouldn't it be

(44:25):
great if we had the world comingto New Orleans again? Wouldn't it be
great if we invested for some bigpurpose and had the proceeds continue forty years
into our future. It's the fortiethanniversary of Louisiana World's Fair, of Seymour
To Fair waiving our wonderful Pelican andit still influences today. Maybe be smart

(44:47):
enough in you to do something we'rewith another forty years, and maybe we've
be smart enough by twenty eighty fourto do it all over again. Your
thoughts high. Let's do it,folks, Let's do it. Christopher.
I think it's a great idea.And I remember the word that World's Fair
very well. I went to itmany times. It's quite an experience.
And uh, I just had agreat time, many many memories. Many

(45:08):
have too many to talk about rightnow, but really had a great time.
And you know, it was onehundred year anniversary for the first one
in Louisiana, and we were thefirst electrified Worlds Fair before Chicago. Everybody
thinks that's when the electricity was firsthit. A world's fair, No,
the first one was the ones.We had the largest glass building ever built.

(45:30):
We had the largest building ever built. It's quite an experience, quite
a thing, and I was veryhonored to uh to know or learn that
my great grandfather's brother was a governor, Samuel Dougas mcginry. It was he
came under his administration. And yes, it lost money. They always seemed
to lose money. But you knowwhat, I think it brings so much

(45:51):
to the city into where wherever theycome. You know, they're there are
longer term positive economic results from themand so you know, and even immediate
for the businesses and whatnot. SoI'm all for a wells far Pa.
Let's let it rep folks, well, folks's time before our next commercial break,
we'll be back with a patriotic moment, gospel moment and a little testimony.

(46:21):
There's a new Swink gathering place forthe intellectually minded and it's at the
Garden District Bookshops brand new bar.Yes, you heard it correctly. There
is a bar in the historic GardenDistrict Bookshop at twenty seven to twenty seven
Britannia, ladies and gentlemen. Youcan come in from four to eight pm
in the evenings and have a cocktail, read a book, go to one

(46:43):
of our wonderful book events available.You can find out more at Gardendstrict Bookshop
dot com. Or you can doone of our great crafting events in our
five hundred days of Summer promotion.More to find out at Gardendistrict Bookshop dot
com. Of all these wonderful things, it's a wonderful occasion to go have
a cocktail, read a book,have your kids look in the kids section

(47:04):
while you're reading a history or novel. All of these available every evening till
eight pm at the Garden District bookShop. For more information go online at
Gardendistrict Bookshop dot com or just comeby twenty seven to twenty seven Pretena in
the historic rink over seventy places ofoff street parking in the evenings. The
Garden District Bookshop is open all dayand into the evening at eight o'clock at

(47:28):
night and be able to come inand have your evening cocktails. And remember
you can always do breakfast and lunchdownstairs the Chickory House. Great salads,
great soups, great sandwiches and agreat glass of wine if you want it.
All available at twenty seven twenty sevenPreten at the Historic Rink. Check
out Garden District Bookshop for more informationand tell them you heard it here in

(47:49):
the Founder Show. The place forflowers is Villari's Florist at one eight hundred
vil Era and two locations on theSouth Shore in the North Shore. Ladies
and gentlemen, it's especially the placeto flowers on Memorial Day. We're remembering
so many things, and you canget your flowers either by calling one eight
hundred VI L L e Uri oreven going in there Monday through Sunday New

(48:13):
Sunday hours of Villaries Floors from nineam to three pm. You can get
the flowers and deliver them. SpecialMemorial Day baskets, secral Memorial Day arrangements
all available at Villary's Florist, andthe baskets for Memorial Day parties are even
more spectacular than the flowers. You'vegot to give them a call. Two
locations on Martin Burman on the SouthShore and on Highway one ninety on the

(48:35):
North Shore. Give them a callone eight hundred VI L e Uri and
tell him you heard it here inthe Founder Show battles Tuhoo. Well,
folks are back. It's not timefor us to go into our chaplain.
Bye bye, patriotic moment where wejust take a brief moment to remind you
of the biblical foundations of our countryare Judeo Christian jurisprudence. Today, I

(48:55):
have a quote from Ronald Reagan.He said, teen eighty the time has
come to turn to God and reassertour trust in Him for the healing of
America. Our country is in needof and ready for a spiritual renewal.
He then went on to support aresolution that was signed by the House and
the Senate, supported by the Houseof the Senate, passed into law in

(49:20):
nineteen eighty three to declare nineteen eightythree as the Year of the Bible and
of its many wonderful statements. Intheir resolution, it says said that the
Bible, the Word of God,has made a unique contribution in shaping the
United States is a distinctive and blessednation and people went on to say that
because of the deeply held religious convictionsspringing from the Holy Scriptures led to the

(49:45):
early settlement of our country and itsongoing development. Folks. I think Ronald
Reagan and that generation certainly wanted tokeep God in government. But what about
God and you? Is He andyou do you need a renewal? As
Reagan he talked about, Well,now we're going to take just a short
while to show you how you canknow that you know that you know you

(50:06):
know God. And we're going todo that as we go into our chaplain
by by a gospel moment. Youknow, the Bible says, for God's
soul love the world. That's you, that's everybody, that he gave his
only begotten son, that's the LordJesus Christ. He's perfect God, perfect
man, all the way God andall the way Man. He gave his
only begotten son, perfect God,perfect Man. That whosoever that's you,
that's anybody, that's everybody, thatwhosoever believeth in him. What do you

(50:30):
believe? Well, you have tobelieve that He died for all of your
sins, all of them. Folks. From the day you're born and the
day you die, you tie insto your greatest sins. The Scripture says
his blood washed away all your sins, that he died for all your sins,
paid for them, so that youwouldn't have that sin burden. It
would be taken from you. Itwent on Jesus, and he handled it
and took care of it for goodon the cross, and then he rose

(50:51):
from the dead to win for youhis precious free gift of resurrection. Everlasting
Life says that whosoever believeth in Himshall not per it, not go to
hell, but have everlasting life.If you've never done this before, do
it now, folks. You knowJesus kept saying repent, and believe the
word repentance means to change your mind. And what it means is you can
no longer think that you're good enough, smart enough, righteous enough, rich

(51:15):
enough, or whatever you think youare, cool enough, holy enough,
whatever you might think you are tohelp God out, to go to heaven,
or to pay your way or whatever. You can do nothing, folks.
And the day you realize you're absolutelyhopeless and helpless without God, that
you can do nothing to pay foryour sins or to get you into heaven,
the day you've you find it you'rejust that helpless. You've just repented.

(51:37):
It is an an attitude of themind, It is a statement of
your heart. If you will whereyou know you can't save yourself. When
you've come to that point, thenyou've reached that point of humility where then
you can, like a child,put faith alone in Christ alone. If
you've never done it before, pleasedo it now. Don't wait till it's
too late, like the old countrysaying, like the script says, now

(51:59):
today is a day of salvation.Well, folks, it's also time for
our testimony time. We're just goingto take a brief moment to remind you
and give you a wonderful story abouta Christian who loved God and how he
came to know God, what Godmeant in his life. Time is short,
and I'm gonna get We're going totalk about Benjamin Franklin the day his
testimony. He was raised in astrong biblical setting as a kid, very

(52:22):
young kid, in Massachusetts, Boston, and then he came to pennsylvani where
he spent the rest of his life. He finded so many things, did
so many things a guy was.I mean, you could go on and
on about all the accomplishments of BenFranklin. He had quite an amazing life.
But you know he closed his lifewith these thoughts. He said,
I love God therefore for his goodness, and I adore him for his wisdom.

(52:46):
And then on his grave site,his gravestone, he wrote this.
He wrote his own epithetic. Thebody of Benjamin Franklin Printer, like the
cover of an old book, itscontents torn out and stripped of it's lettering
and gilding, lives here food forworms. Yet the work itself shall not
be lost, for it will be, as he believed, appear once more

(53:09):
in a new and more beautiful edition, corrected and amended by the author that
was Benjamin Franklin, by the way, a famous printer, as we probably
all know. So, folks,it's not time for us to close as
we close with them on Saint Martinsinging a creole goodbye, and God bless
all that they call you, welgoodbye. Please think we just wasted the

(53:43):
time, all three sable. There'stime for a real good bye.