August 20, 2025 • 36 mins
Hour 2 of A&G features...
- CA redistricting & the hemorrhaging of the Democrat party
- It's National Radio Day!
- ADHD medications & kids mental health screening
- Kids getting braces & new baseball "trend"
Stupid Should Hurt: https://www.armstrongandgetty.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio, the George
Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Arm Strong and Jettie and he Armstrong and Getty.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
California's battle to redraw its congressional maps is headed to
the state Supreme Court. California Republicans call Governor Newsom's plan unconstitutional.
Newsom insists California is only responding to what is happening
in Texas.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Yeah, and it's gonna work. Yeah, what's gonna work?
Speaker 4 (00:43):
His response will what he's trying to do in California,
which I don't think he'll be able to do, will
look like a response to the awful thing Texas is
doing because of the way the mainstream media is going
to cover it.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Right, Okay, yeah, work on that level, I'm going to say,
because he's not going to get that passed in California. No, no, no,
but he will come across as the brain warrior for
stem values. Correct And what is the sound of very
few hands clapping? The Democratic Party is hemorrhaging voters. According
to the Liberal New York Times, the Democratic Party faces
(01:16):
a voter registration crisis.
Speaker 4 (01:19):
So this is a big splashy front page story today
in the New York Times. It is their lead story.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
And has the companion story with it, five takeaways from
the Times analysis of democratic decline. And I'm wondering, why
aren't the five takeaways in the main story. Why there
got to be two stories.
Speaker 4 (01:37):
And the fact that they're using words like hemorrhaging and disaster.
So I flip on Stampede, I flip on Morning Joe
MSNBC or ms now or whatever it is today ms now,
And they led with another one of those Republican town
halls where the Democrats show up and scream at the
scream at the person, and they portray it is all
(02:00):
across America. Republicans are on the back foot and this
and that, and I thought, well, and they went on,
and I thought, aren't we involved in a war in Ukraine? Like?
Speaker 2 (02:10):
Why is this your lead story? Now?
Speaker 4 (02:12):
I know they had to for their crowd, and everybody
in DC that's a Democrat watches that show. They had
to for that crowd have a response to this New
York Times story because this is such a big deal.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Yeah. Interestingly, it that what you just mentioned reinforces to
me what I think the greater narrative is, and that
is that people perceive the Democratic Party to be a
few very loud people who believe things I don't believe
at all. Right, and the town halls is a number
(02:48):
of people who are willing to bellow and shout down speakers.
You know why that narrative is out there? Why do
you suppose? Yeah, no kidding. So some facts and then
we can continue the discussion that Democratic Party is. The
Democratic Party is hemorrhaging voters long before they even go
to the polls. Of the thirty states the track voter
registration by political party. The other twenty don't ask your
(03:10):
party when you're register. But if the thirty that do.
Democrats lost ground to Republicans in every single one between
twenty twenty four, twenty twenty and twenty twenty four elections,
and often by a lot. That four year swing toward
Republicans adds up to four and a half million voters,
a deep political hole that could take years for Democrats
to climb out from the stampede. So it's a hemorrhaging stampede,
(03:36):
good lord. The stampede away from the Democratic Party is
incurring in battleground states. The bluest states, and the reddest states,
according to a new analysis of voter registration data by
The New York Times. I'm surprised it must be the
power of.
Speaker 4 (03:55):
The online world Twitter, TikTok and that, because I'm surprised
that a John Fetterman or whoever, who's more of a mainstream,
normal human being, but a Democrat hasn't been able to
stand up and shout down that very small, very out
of touch, but very loud segment of their party.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
Yeah. I think there's been a slow recognition process because
a lot of us on the right or just confused
moderate folks or whomever, have taken a while to realize,
oh my gosh, it's not a huge majority of people
that believes boys should be able to whoop up on
(04:38):
girls in girls' sports. It's practically nobody around here. Everybody
who's convinced that. You had to think that, and everybody
was afraid to say something. So, if you know, conservative
people and kind of centrist people took a long time
to figure that out. It's going to take forever for
Democrats to recognize that in themselves and say, yeah, you know,
the people we really need to stand up against to
(04:59):
win election. It's not the evil orange guy. And it's
not the mean, cruel Republicans who are trying to redistrict Texas.
It's our own lunatics. Here's some more facts. Few measurements
reflect the luster of a political party's brand more clearly
than the voters the choice by voters to identify with it.
Fewer and fewer Americans choosing to be Democrats. More new
(05:21):
voters nationwide chose to be Republicans than Democrats last year.
It's the first time that's happened since twenty eighteen. Democrats
actually still outnumber Republicans registered nationwide, but that is in
large measure because giant blue states like California allow people
registered by party and big red states like Texas do not.
Speaker 4 (05:41):
They only caveat I would throw into this story is
that both parties are much smaller than they used to
be because there are so many people that don't want
to identify with either party.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
Yeah, yeah, final note on this then I want to
jump over to the five takeaways because they are pretty interesting,
says an election analysis site head Michael Pruser. Who you
know if you're in politics in DC, He said, I
don't want to say the death cycle of the Democratic
Party but there seems to be no end to this.
There's no silver lining or cavalry coming across the hill.
(06:12):
This is month after month, year after year. It's an
unbroken trend line according to these people.
Speaker 4 (06:20):
So yeah, well that that's true till it's not. Yeah, exactly,
that's true looking backwards. But just somebody could emerge and say,
as a Democrat, we gotta get control of our borders,
and dudes can't be in a girls' sports and you know,
in a couple other things.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
There'd be all the like.
Speaker 4 (06:39):
Ninety percent of regular Democrats and a whole bunch of
people that are uncomfortable with Trump that would join onto
that immediately.
Speaker 2 (06:47):
Yeah, there's a bloke running for governor in Iowa. I
don't recall his name, but he's he might as well
be a Republican. He's running as a Democrat for some reason,
but he's again, he might as well be a if
you know, if they can get you know, the momentum
around that sort of democrat, all of these numbers will
change very quickly. But I found this very interesting. Nonetheless,
(07:10):
here are five big takeaways.
Speaker 4 (07:11):
Yes, I will interpret the last time before you do this,
come here. If you're old One advantage of being old
is you have seen both parties declared dead a handful
of times, yes, and then like a cycle or two later,
and they've been disappointed to find out that, like you know,
Frankenstein's Monster, they have risen from the grave, and then
they control all three branches, like within a cycle or two.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
So here are your five big takeaways. Democrats are losing
ground with new voters. Some of the decline was voter
switching parties, some was older Democrats died or people who
didn't vote for so long they fell off the rolls.
But one of the more striking findings is the trend
among newly registered voters from the Democratic Party. In the
last six years, many voters choosing to be political independence
(07:55):
by not registering with either, but of the people who
do choose between the two main parties, this is new
voters young voters. The Democratic share has been cratering. According
to the analysis. In twenty eighteen, sixty three percent of
new voters were Democrats sixty thirty percent last year was
forty eight percent. That is cratering. Battleground states are swinging
(08:18):
to the right. Between the twenty twenty and twenty twenty
four elections, dem Party lost its long held registration edge
in states such as Florida and New Hampshire. Uh that
means registered Republicans now outnumber registered Democrats in those states.
Speaker 4 (08:32):
You realize you tried to run a mummy, and then
when people caught on the fact that you had a mummy,
come and put in an idiot.
Speaker 2 (08:41):
I mean, that's a that's a bad look. With all
due respect to six foot four inch fully intact males
saying a woman and the university saying that's a woman,
which struck like ninety percent of America as effing lunacy. Okay,
running a mummy than a moron was really prove. It's
(09:03):
a good point, Jack. So if the current trend holds,
more states will similarly flip to those I mentioned. Nevada
briefly tipped into the Republican column this year, it's been
sea sawing in the months since. It's very very close.
Simply put, the Democratic edge in the swing states has
been vanishing. Five point three percent gone in Pennsylvania, three
and a half percent gone in North Carolina, four and
(09:25):
a half percent gone in Nevada. In Arizona, the only
swing state where Republicans held a registration edge already in
twenty twenty the GOP advantage has swelled by four percentage
points in twenty twenty four. There's more. The gender gap
is a growing problem for Democrats. Women have tended to
(09:47):
support Democrats at higher rates. Men have backed Republicans by
similar margins in the past, but the analysis the registration
data tells different story. Long story short, Republican strength among
men far outpaces the Democratic edge among women. Did I
mention this.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
I know a woman I was talking to the other
day who's hardcore. I mean, she she knows this would
never happen, but she says, you know, would fix everything
if they took away our right to vote. Women are
the whole problem, she said, We're the whole problem, a
whole bunch of emotional nut jobs that are causing all
these problems.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
I would She's never met women with that broad a brush. Certainly,
it is unquestionable, according to all voting data that exists,
that women in general tend toward more socialist policies and
less self reliance and that sort of thing. They uniformly,
(10:44):
not uniformly, in enormous numbers, vote for more government, more programs,
more spending. That is undeniable. If that leads you to
the conclusion your friend came to, it's an interesting conclusion.
I would not say those words out loud. It would
change the face of the Sorry, sweetheart. It would change
(11:06):
the face of the electorate and the government in a very,
very u in a much better way. Yes, Uh, WHOA
moving along? More younger voters are voting for our opting
for the GOP. The numbers look terrible for Democrats. Among
younger voters, people under forty five years old accounted for
sixty five percent of new registrations in the last seven years,
two thirds, and a once sizable Democratic edge among those
(11:28):
new younger voters has disappeared entirely. In twenty eighteen, those youngsters,
two thirds of them went Democrat. In twenty twenty four,
Republicans had an outright majority in new young voters a
couple more. Uh. It isn't getting any better for Democrats yet.
There's been some hope in Democratic circles that the movement
(11:50):
away from the party will reverse itself now that Trump
is back in the White House, a backlash to his
orange hitlerisms will show up on the registration rolls, but
it has not happened. And though it's still pretty early
across thirty states. In DC, there are now roughly one
hundred and sixty thousand fewer registered Democrats than election day
last year, and two hundred thousand more Republicans. Again, just
(12:15):
since election Day, one hundred and sixty thousand fewer Democrats
and two hundred thousand more Republicans. Wow, And that story
would be even bleaker for Democrats if New York and New Jersey,
which just held robust Democratic primaries for mayor and governor
that probably increased registrations, were excluded. Outside those two states,
(12:36):
Democrats are down roughly four hundred and thirty thousand registered
voters since November. Doldrums need a leader deep in sucitude.
They really do need a leader to emerge, an identity
to emerge. What are you people?
Speaker 4 (12:57):
There's some giant political news around what Elon Musk wants
out of the American electorate, but we could get Yes,
I'm going to join his new party. That's my plan.
A little bit later. We'll get into that, among other things.
Speaker 2 (13:12):
Stay here.
Speaker 5 (13:17):
A Danish woman donated her daughter's pony to the local
zoo to be fed to lions. Authorities intervened when they
realized it wasn't a pony at all, but a confused
and very lost Sarah Jessica Parker.
Speaker 4 (13:33):
Wow, wow, No, no, Greg, he just traffics in your
He just finds you not a try.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
He doesn't he thinks you are fat or ugly or
I don't. I don't think there's much better humor than that.
Speaker 4 (13:51):
Okay, So quick question. There's a story in the news
about a radio colleague, radio legend who we are friends with.
Do we talk about it or not on the air?
Speaker 2 (14:06):
Oh? Boy, I think you do.
Speaker 4 (14:08):
I think it's interesting with some sensitivity. Certainly, yes, given
the realities of it.
Speaker 2 (14:13):
Yeah. Yeah, especially on today, which I'm told is National
Radio Day.
Speaker 4 (14:19):
National Radio Day, You're gonna be talking about that during
the One More Thing podcast.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
Got some interesting info for you for National Radio Day.
Had a gent say, you know, you guys really ought
to be in the National Radio Hall of Fame, And
I said, oh, I'd forgotten there was one. I think
we should be.
Speaker 4 (14:40):
I mean, if you know, I don't. Yeah, it sounds
terrible to say out loud. Well, yeah, but I mean
what standard are you using like I use all the time?
Fairly low anyway, So San Francisco Bay Area. Ron Owens
(15:02):
legend in radio, and like, if you live somewhere else
and you've never heard of him, I get it. Back
when not everybody was syndicated all across the country, he
was like the biggest thing in the fourth biggest radio
market in America for decades. I mean, just owned the
town talk radio. And he's fallen upon some really really
hard financial times and declaring bankruptcy and stuff like that,
(15:24):
and a mess with his family and all these different
sorts of things, but just it's a big it's a
big radio story in the well, the number four market
in America.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
Yeah, it appears his daughter is half a nut and
fake the pregnancy and got her dad to endorse a
go fund me and a couple of other things. Because
poor Ron has Parkinson's and has survived four bouts of cancer.
He was always very kind to us, very generous to us,
and so we wish him well.
Speaker 4 (15:52):
His daughter faked a pregnancy.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
Yeah, she claimed that contestant on The Bachelor had impregnated her,
even lied under oath. She doctored a sonogram and a
pregnancy video and even lied under oath. She tried to
get former Bachelor style Clayton Etchart to take a paternity.
Speaker 4 (16:14):
Test had they been together.
Speaker 2 (16:21):
Court records in both Arizona and San Francisco show that
Laura had previously made similar allegations against three other men
since twenty fourteen, claiming each time that she either had
abortions or miscarriages. Oh boy, well, I.
Speaker 4 (16:38):
Never held Joe Biden to account for a hunter or
you know, if you have kids, you don't know how
your kids are gonna go.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
You just you just do not You do your best,
and anybody with multiple kids knows often they are very,
very very different from each other.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
You can have a role, you can have a role
in them going off the rails, but you don't always right. Indeed,
Elon was talking about starting a third party. He's not
going to now, but he is going to throw a
tremendous amount of money behind a one predicalar dude for president,
which is interesting. Among other things we can talk about
(17:17):
coming up.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
To Stay with It, Armstrong and Getty.
Speaker 6 (17:21):
Owe depot revealing plans to raise some prices because of
President Trump's tariffs. Executives announcing the decision after quarterly sales
reports came in lower than expected. John Deere says it
will lay off more than two hundred and thirty employees
at three factories because the demand for equipment is down,
calling it quote a challenging time for many farmers.
Speaker 4 (17:42):
So those are just you know, anecdotal stuff there. But
there's always the possibility that we're the biggest story in
America blotting out.
Speaker 2 (17:51):
Every other story.
Speaker 4 (17:53):
Is going to be tariff related here in a couple months.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
Yeah, I've predicted somewhere around the end of October we're
all going to be talking about that. I hope that's unfortunate.
I would love it if that's not the case. Oh yeah, here, here, Yeah,
I'd love to be wrong.
Speaker 4 (18:07):
So I got at least one kid that diagnosed with ADHD,
and the other one certainly might have it. And I
know how some people react to this with, uh, this
is just the way kids have always been, and now
(18:28):
they're putting a name on it.
Speaker 2 (18:29):
And I think there's some truth there.
Speaker 4 (18:33):
I think there is, too, depends on the kid, obviously,
I know in h at least one of my cases,
it's definitely not that.
Speaker 2 (18:42):
But right, there's so.
Speaker 4 (18:46):
Many different medications out there. And since it's interesting, I've
known a couple of really successful people scholastically successful people
that had ADHD and were able to focus better than
normal people in certain situations. That's one of the weird
(19:10):
things about ADHD. But like several fems I know who
have ADHD can drink coffee, like a big cup of
coffee before they go to bed. It helps calm them down,
stimulates calm them down. So energy drinks coffee. It's like
how you exhale and focus. And Riddlin famously is a stimulant. Yeah, yeah,
(19:33):
And so anyway, for all kinds of different reasons. There's
this giant Swedish study that's out right now. They followed
one hundred and fifty thousand people with ADHD for two
years on ADHD medication, and based on their analysis with
this very big study, the medicated group experienced an estimated
seventeen percent fewer suicidal behaviors, fifteen percent fewer cases of
(19:56):
substance abuse, thirteen percent fewer criminal convictions, a dozen percent
fewer traffic accidents compared to people that didn't take ADHD medication.
So I don't know if that informs anybody who's in
the you know, I'm not going to do medication for
(20:17):
my kid crowd.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
That's a tough Yeah, I just just because that is
something that improves outcomes, or so would seem from that study,
you know, with the usual grains of salt, doesn't mean
it's the best solution. That would be my my only quibble,
And again it varies kid to kid. But that's interesting.
I mean, if that's helping people be happier and all,
(20:40):
I'm in favor of it. I just I know. I
am certain I would have been diagnosed as a as
a boy with ADHD. Do you think the problem was
the pace of school was so slow it made me insane?
Speaker 4 (20:57):
But do you think it would have helped you if
you had something that would taken the edge of No.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
What really helped me was getting into a program that
lets you learn at your own speed. I loved it,
absolutely loved it, happy as a clam.
Speaker 4 (21:13):
And it didn't exhibit itself in any other ways.
Speaker 2 (21:16):
Oh, I don't think so, not that I'd have to
think about that for a while. There's also degrees, because
it's of course they do diagnosis is mild, moderate, or severe. Yeah,
And I want to make it clear I come to
this conversation humbly because every kid is different, and I
don't know your kid or your kid or your kid,
and and some people absolutely need to help. Well, yeah, well.
Speaker 4 (21:39):
That's the problem you have if you run into people
that have very strong opinions on this is a first
of all, I've had a very respected doctor get one
diagnosis and a different respected doctor have a completely different diagnosis,
And then what in the hell are you supposed to
do with that information?
Speaker 2 (21:58):
So they're guessing to a great extent.
Speaker 4 (22:01):
It's all on a continuum line between zero and a thousand,
and it's also combined with all the other personality factors
that you have that are somewhere in the range of
normal or not.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
So yeah, it's complicated. And their environment. Yeah, So, speaking
of kids' mental health, I absolutely love Abigail Schreier. She
wrote a couple of books, Irreversible Damage, about the unspeakably
cruel experimenting on confused adolescents who momentarily believe they're a
different gender because activists have convinced them that they might
(22:34):
be or that they are, and kids are so impressionable.
It led kids down what I've called the high speed
conveyor belt of activism toward irreversible damage to their bodies. Terrible.
She also wrote a book Bad therapy, which she references here.
I'm just going to read something she wrote briefly. Well,
I was writing my book bad Therapy. My middle school
(22:55):
age son returned home from sleep away camp with a
persistent stomach ache. I took him to urgent care, where
a nurse asked me to leave the room. I know
you love this Jack, so he could administer a mental
health screening tool put out by our National Institute's of
Mental Health. Afterward, I received a copy of the survey
and photographed it. Here verbatim are the five questions the
(23:16):
nurse intended to ask my son in private? And what
was the age of the kid? Again? Uh? Middle school? Okay?
In the past few weeks, have you wished you were dead? Two?
In the past few weeks, have you felt that you
or your family would be better off if you were dead?
Three in the past week, have you been having thoughts
about killing yourself? Why can't I be in the room
(23:38):
for these questions? By the way, because they don't want you,
the parent, interfering with they the government, getting the truth
from your kid. Four have you ever tried to kill yourself?
If yes, how when? And five are you thinking of
killing yourself right now? If yes, please describe.
Speaker 4 (23:57):
Keeping in mind, and I know more about this than
I I wish I knew. But keeping in mind, if
they declare your kid a threat to themselves, they fifty
one to fifty that kid, and your kid no longer
belongs to you. It belongs to the county. They are
in the government's control. You get no say at that point,
I mean zero.
Speaker 2 (24:16):
Say wow, So, Abigail writes, Children across America are being
asked these questions by doctors because this is explicit protocol
from the NIM. The National Institute of Mental Health asks
parents ask parents to leave so that you can administer
the following questions to kids age eight and up who
have not shown any signs of mental distress. There are
(24:36):
so many problems with this. The main one is kids
are wildly suggestible, especially where psychiatric symptoms are concerned. Ask
a kid repeatedly if he might be depressed, how about
now are you sure? And he just might decide that
he is sure, or she writes that.
Speaker 4 (24:54):
Yeah, be in a position at that moment that day
where they want attention.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
Sure, yeah, And she writes now. Thanks to Illinois Governor J. B. Pritzker,
tens of thousands of Illinois kids will be encouraged to
think of themselves as sick. Many or most will be
false positives. How do you freaking.
Speaker 4 (25:12):
Nutjobs think you're making the world better with this stuff?
I'll never understand it.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
I just think there are there is a huge share
of people that thinks in terms of feelings and not outcomes.
Does this make me feel? Does this sound good? Does
this seem concerned? And they don't even ask? All right,
every action has uh reactions, both intended and unintended. Let's
(25:43):
think about what they might be. Progressives don't say those things.
It's also a weird tendency on the left to uh
feel like there.
Speaker 4 (25:56):
I don't know if because they come from tend to
come from dysfunctional families or what it is, but they
kind of want it not to be true that there
are functioning families out there. Yeah, it bothers them that
sometimes we got it. If things are fine, I'm okay,
I don't need your help. They hate that.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
In a way, yes, because nothing makes them feel better
than helping. I just feel like to go back to
the great C. S. Lewis quote about the worst sort
of oppression is from do gooders, because they will never stop, right.
Speaker 4 (26:31):
I just feel like it's been more prevalent of people
I've known that were super progressive, that nobody's actually happily married.
That's no, they're all faking it or lying or you know,
there are no families that are okay just And I've
always thought.
Speaker 2 (26:46):
That it's so weird. Why do you have that view
of the world.
Speaker 4 (26:50):
So and if you have that view of the world,
you'd be more likely to want this sort of stuff.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
So, getting back to J. D. Pitt, Pritzker signing men
to tory mental health screenings for little kids in the
law and you're not in the room for it. That's unbelievable. Yeah, yeah,
And actually, Abigail Schreyer mentions, if basic literacy hadn't already
collapsed in Illinois, kids might pose spirited objections to Pritzker's
(27:17):
sales pitch, but in fact nobody learns anything in Illinois,
but her experience talking to parents of such kids right afterward.
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Go just hate this story you brought us, Yeah, sorry
about that, So, Abigail writes, I've spoken one hundreds of
parents of such kids. In twenty twenty four, I published
Bad Therapy and An Investigation into the surgeon adolescent mental
(28:47):
health diagnoses and psychiatric prescription drug use. Many young people
without serious mental illness nonetheless spend years languishing with a diagnosis,
alternately cursing it and embracing it, believing they have a brain,
convincing themselves that their struggles are insurmountable because of the
disorder's constraints. They meet regularly with a therapist or school counselor,
(29:08):
on whom they become increasingly reliant, losing a sense of
efficacy onable to navigate on their own even minor setbacks
in interpersonal conflicts. They begin courses of anti depressants that
carry all kinds of side effects, suppressed libido, fatigue, muffling
of all emotion, and even an increase in depression. Anti
anxiety drugs and stimulants given the kids diagnosed with ADHD
(29:29):
are both addictive and ubiquitously abused, and often that tragic
dissent begins with a simple mental health survey. Then she
tells the story of her son, and this is maybe
the key takeaway. If you haven't spent a lot of
time around kids. You don't know this. Kids are wildly suggestible,
especially where psychiatric symptoms are concerned. As a kid repeatedly
(29:53):
if he might be depressed, how about now are you sure?
And he might just decide that he is. Introduce gender
dysphorty into a peer group, and a swath of seventh
grade girls are likely to decide they were born in
the wrong body. Introduced testing anxiety or social phobia or
suicidality to them, and many teams are likely to decide
(30:14):
I have that too. There is a reason clinicians keep
anorexia patients from socializing unsupervised in the hospital. Ward anorexia
is a profoundly socially contagious mental illness.
Speaker 4 (30:29):
Wow, that is uh, I think obviously true and so troubling. Yeah,
testing anxiety is a great example. I mean they, I
think they talk about that in classes openly all the
time now, and they you know, if everybody gets a
free pass, yeah, and then of course, I mean who
who doesn't get anxious when you've got to test anybody?
Speaker 2 (30:52):
One more? Note in do you want to squeeze it
in an hour after the break, it's the guy who
writes the Giant Psychiatric Bible, The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual
of Mental Disorders for the edition. I'll just do it
real quick now, he says, mandatory school Mandatory school screenings
of kids for mental illness is great in theory and
(31:13):
terrible in practice. Yeah, most kids who screen positive will
have transient problems, not mental disorders. Mislabeling stigmatizes and subjects
them to unnecessary treatments while misdirecting very scarce resources away
from kids who desperately need them. Don't do it.
Speaker 4 (31:28):
Then you've got the added problem of some parents, I'm
definitely not this who love the idea of having a
kid who has some sort of special problem to get
to talk about and then everything.
Speaker 2 (31:38):
Yeah, us in centrol and it's various variations.
Speaker 4 (31:42):
That's brutally You have any thoughts on in this textas
four one five two KFTC.
Speaker 5 (31:51):
The Princeton Review, recently named Syracuse University of America's number
one party school, said people at Syracuse this is a school.
Speaker 2 (32:00):
Consumer.
Speaker 4 (32:03):
Oh my, so my son got My thirteen year old
got braces yesterday, and I was wondering what percentage of
kids get braces in the modern world. As we decided
at some point that everybody needs to have perfectly straight
(32:24):
teeth and they need to be as bright as the
sun in terms of whiteness. Yes, that's what we decided.
It's if you watch a movie from the nineties, all
the actors like not bright white teeth are just kind
of you know, John Travolta's got kind of yellowish teeth,
like people.
Speaker 2 (32:43):
Have normal colored teeth. Yeah, it's striking, and I love this.
This is my favorite aspect of modern movies. If the
you got a movie it's a Western, it's set in
eighteen forty, and you got a character who's a town
drunk who's dying of consumption. He's still got gleaming white teeth. Right.
Speaker 4 (33:07):
About seventy percent of kids in the US currently get
some sort of orthodonic treatment, braces being the number one,
and at least a third or only a third truly
need braces in the traditional sense, like it would be
(33:29):
a quality of life situation if you didn't get your
teeth straightened out. It's cosmetic in other words, for two
thirds of them, which you know, if we've decided, you know,
I had a person really berating me for the fact
that I hadn't got my son braces yet yet, if
we've decided that you gotta have straight teeth, is that
(33:51):
kind of like we use the example of the cracked
phone screen, that's like the modern day missing tooth, and
that's because nobody's missing teeth anymore.
Speaker 2 (34:03):
So, uh, are you are you?
Speaker 4 (34:05):
Are you really setting yourself aside as you can't be
part of even mid level or above society if you
didn't get your teeth straightened.
Speaker 2 (34:15):
I don't know what.
Speaker 4 (34:15):
I don't know what it's like out there. I have
straight teeth just naturally, so I don't know what it
would be like. I don't know how self conscious I
would be. Lots of people had crooked teeth when I
was younger, but like every kid has braces. And also socioeconomically,
depending on your you know, your social strata, the higher
you go up the income, the more. It's like one
hundred percent of the kids get bracest for even mildly
(34:37):
crooked teeth, according to this article, hence the social pressure. Sure, right, yeah,
so it's kind of self reinforcing. I'll be in Britain
next week, so boy, well that'll be interesting.
Speaker 1 (34:49):
Yeah, it's it's, it's it's it is interesting that that is,
it's not uniformly a Western society thing, and I mean
United States that leads the way in like needing to
have perfectly straight teeth for cosmetic reasons.
Speaker 4 (35:07):
And it's expensive and painful, but yet we do it,
and I just find it interesting.
Speaker 2 (35:12):
You know, we did it. I'm doing it. Yeah, it's
a conundrum. I mean, if you were a real activist,
you'd say, all right, this is an artificially imposed social norm,
a status Norman eminence front is Pete Townsend who just
turned eighty, of the who Pete Townsend of the who
is eighty? Good lord anyway as he would put it.
(35:33):
But if indeed it is a barrier to achievement, acceptance
stating whatever relationships? Yeah, and are you gonna die on
that hill? As people like to say, far as you can?
Speaker 4 (35:47):
And it's not even that. Am I gonna have my
kid die on that hill? Because it's not me who's
who's living with it? Right, So that's what every parent
is dealing with. But it's expensive, man, I'm shocked by
the price. Are you a baseball fan and I love
the baseball? Have you heard the new challenge? The viral trend?
Speaker 2 (36:08):
He says, rolling his eyes, nine beers, and nine hot
dogs in nine innings.
Speaker 4 (36:15):
Oh if I was younger, I'm all over that challenge.
Speaker 2 (36:17):
Oh what a day? What? Oh I yes, we got
to talk more about that.
Speaker 4 (36:23):
Armstrong and Getty
Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio, the George
Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Arm Strong and Jettie and he Armstrong and Getty.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
California's battle to redraw its congressional maps is headed to
the state Supreme Court. California Republicans call Governor Newsom's plan unconstitutional.
Newsom insists California is only responding to what is happening
in Texas.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Yeah, and it's gonna work. Yeah, what's gonna work?
Speaker 4 (00:43):
His response will what he's trying to do in California,
which I don't think he'll be able to do, will
look like a response to the awful thing Texas is
doing because of the way the mainstream media is going
to cover it.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Right, Okay, yeah, work on that level, I'm going to say,
because he's not going to get that passed in California. No, no, no,
but he will come across as the brain warrior for
stem values. Correct And what is the sound of very
few hands clapping? The Democratic Party is hemorrhaging voters. According
to the Liberal New York Times, the Democratic Party faces
(01:16):
a voter registration crisis.
Speaker 4 (01:19):
So this is a big splashy front page story today
in the New York Times. It is their lead story.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
And has the companion story with it, five takeaways from
the Times analysis of democratic decline. And I'm wondering, why
aren't the five takeaways in the main story. Why there
got to be two stories.
Speaker 4 (01:37):
And the fact that they're using words like hemorrhaging and disaster.
So I flip on Stampede, I flip on Morning Joe
MSNBC or ms now or whatever it is today ms now,
And they led with another one of those Republican town
halls where the Democrats show up and scream at the
scream at the person, and they portray it is all
(02:00):
across America. Republicans are on the back foot and this
and that, and I thought, well, and they went on,
and I thought, aren't we involved in a war in Ukraine? Like?
Speaker 2 (02:10):
Why is this your lead story? Now?
Speaker 4 (02:12):
I know they had to for their crowd, and everybody
in DC that's a Democrat watches that show. They had
to for that crowd have a response to this New
York Times story because this is such a big deal.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Yeah. Interestingly, it that what you just mentioned reinforces to
me what I think the greater narrative is, and that
is that people perceive the Democratic Party to be a
few very loud people who believe things I don't believe
at all. Right, and the town halls is a number
(02:48):
of people who are willing to bellow and shout down speakers.
You know why that narrative is out there? Why do
you suppose? Yeah, no kidding. So some facts and then
we can continue the discussion that Democratic Party is. The
Democratic Party is hemorrhaging voters long before they even go
to the polls. Of the thirty states the track voter
registration by political party. The other twenty don't ask your
(03:10):
party when you're register. But if the thirty that do.
Democrats lost ground to Republicans in every single one between
twenty twenty four, twenty twenty and twenty twenty four elections,
and often by a lot. That four year swing toward
Republicans adds up to four and a half million voters,
a deep political hole that could take years for Democrats
to climb out from the stampede. So it's a hemorrhaging stampede,
(03:36):
good lord. The stampede away from the Democratic Party is
incurring in battleground states. The bluest states, and the reddest states,
according to a new analysis of voter registration data by
The New York Times. I'm surprised it must be the
power of.
Speaker 4 (03:55):
The online world Twitter, TikTok and that, because I'm surprised
that a John Fetterman or whoever, who's more of a mainstream,
normal human being, but a Democrat hasn't been able to
stand up and shout down that very small, very out
of touch, but very loud segment of their party.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
Yeah. I think there's been a slow recognition process because
a lot of us on the right or just confused
moderate folks or whomever, have taken a while to realize,
oh my gosh, it's not a huge majority of people
that believes boys should be able to whoop up on
(04:38):
girls in girls' sports. It's practically nobody around here. Everybody
who's convinced that. You had to think that, and everybody
was afraid to say something. So, if you know, conservative
people and kind of centrist people took a long time
to figure that out. It's going to take forever for
Democrats to recognize that in themselves and say, yeah, you know,
the people we really need to stand up against to
(04:59):
win election. It's not the evil orange guy. And it's
not the mean, cruel Republicans who are trying to redistrict Texas.
It's our own lunatics. Here's some more facts. Few measurements
reflect the luster of a political party's brand more clearly
than the voters the choice by voters to identify with it.
Fewer and fewer Americans choosing to be Democrats. More new
(05:21):
voters nationwide chose to be Republicans than Democrats last year.
It's the first time that's happened since twenty eighteen. Democrats
actually still outnumber Republicans registered nationwide, but that is in
large measure because giant blue states like California allow people
registered by party and big red states like Texas do not.
Speaker 4 (05:41):
They only caveat I would throw into this story is
that both parties are much smaller than they used to
be because there are so many people that don't want
to identify with either party.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
Yeah, yeah, final note on this then I want to
jump over to the five takeaways because they are pretty interesting,
says an election analysis site head Michael Pruser. Who you
know if you're in politics in DC, He said, I
don't want to say the death cycle of the Democratic
Party but there seems to be no end to this.
There's no silver lining or cavalry coming across the hill.
(06:12):
This is month after month, year after year. It's an
unbroken trend line according to these people.
Speaker 4 (06:20):
So yeah, well that that's true till it's not. Yeah, exactly,
that's true looking backwards. But just somebody could emerge and say,
as a Democrat, we gotta get control of our borders,
and dudes can't be in a girls' sports and you know,
in a couple other things.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
There'd be all the like.
Speaker 4 (06:39):
Ninety percent of regular Democrats and a whole bunch of
people that are uncomfortable with Trump that would join onto
that immediately.
Speaker 2 (06:47):
Yeah, there's a bloke running for governor in Iowa. I
don't recall his name, but he's he might as well
be a Republican. He's running as a Democrat for some reason,
but he's again, he might as well be a if
you know, if they can get you know, the momentum
around that sort of democrat, all of these numbers will
change very quickly. But I found this very interesting. Nonetheless,
(07:10):
here are five big takeaways.
Speaker 4 (07:11):
Yes, I will interpret the last time before you do this,
come here. If you're old One advantage of being old
is you have seen both parties declared dead a handful
of times, yes, and then like a cycle or two later,
and they've been disappointed to find out that, like you know,
Frankenstein's Monster, they have risen from the grave, and then
they control all three branches, like within a cycle or two.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
So here are your five big takeaways. Democrats are losing
ground with new voters. Some of the decline was voter
switching parties, some was older Democrats died or people who
didn't vote for so long they fell off the rolls.
But one of the more striking findings is the trend
among newly registered voters from the Democratic Party. In the
last six years, many voters choosing to be political independence
(07:55):
by not registering with either, but of the people who
do choose between the two main parties, this is new
voters young voters. The Democratic share has been cratering. According
to the analysis. In twenty eighteen, sixty three percent of
new voters were Democrats sixty thirty percent last year was
forty eight percent. That is cratering. Battleground states are swinging
(08:18):
to the right. Between the twenty twenty and twenty twenty
four elections, dem Party lost its long held registration edge
in states such as Florida and New Hampshire. Uh that
means registered Republicans now outnumber registered Democrats in those states.
Speaker 4 (08:32):
You realize you tried to run a mummy, and then
when people caught on the fact that you had a mummy,
come and put in an idiot.
Speaker 2 (08:41):
I mean, that's a that's a bad look. With all
due respect to six foot four inch fully intact males
saying a woman and the university saying that's a woman,
which struck like ninety percent of America as effing lunacy. Okay,
running a mummy than a moron was really prove. It's
(09:03):
a good point, Jack. So if the current trend holds,
more states will similarly flip to those I mentioned. Nevada
briefly tipped into the Republican column this year, it's been
sea sawing in the months since. It's very very close.
Simply put, the Democratic edge in the swing states has
been vanishing. Five point three percent gone in Pennsylvania, three
and a half percent gone in North Carolina, four and
(09:25):
a half percent gone in Nevada. In Arizona, the only
swing state where Republicans held a registration edge already in
twenty twenty the GOP advantage has swelled by four percentage
points in twenty twenty four. There's more. The gender gap
is a growing problem for Democrats. Women have tended to
(09:47):
support Democrats at higher rates. Men have backed Republicans by
similar margins in the past, but the analysis the registration
data tells different story. Long story short, Republican strength among
men far outpaces the Democratic edge among women. Did I
mention this.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
I know a woman I was talking to the other
day who's hardcore. I mean, she she knows this would
never happen, but she says, you know, would fix everything
if they took away our right to vote. Women are
the whole problem, she said, We're the whole problem, a
whole bunch of emotional nut jobs that are causing all
these problems.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
I would She's never met women with that broad a brush. Certainly,
it is unquestionable, according to all voting data that exists,
that women in general tend toward more socialist policies and
less self reliance and that sort of thing. They uniformly,
(10:44):
not uniformly, in enormous numbers, vote for more government, more programs,
more spending. That is undeniable. If that leads you to
the conclusion your friend came to, it's an interesting conclusion.
I would not say those words out loud. It would
change the face of the Sorry, sweetheart. It would change
(11:06):
the face of the electorate and the government in a very,
very u in a much better way. Yes, Uh, WHOA
moving along? More younger voters are voting for our opting
for the GOP. The numbers look terrible for Democrats. Among
younger voters, people under forty five years old accounted for
sixty five percent of new registrations in the last seven years,
two thirds, and a once sizable Democratic edge among those
(11:28):
new younger voters has disappeared entirely. In twenty eighteen, those youngsters,
two thirds of them went Democrat. In twenty twenty four,
Republicans had an outright majority in new young voters a
couple more. Uh. It isn't getting any better for Democrats yet.
There's been some hope in Democratic circles that the movement
(11:50):
away from the party will reverse itself now that Trump
is back in the White House, a backlash to his
orange hitlerisms will show up on the registration rolls, but
it has not happened. And though it's still pretty early
across thirty states. In DC, there are now roughly one
hundred and sixty thousand fewer registered Democrats than election day
last year, and two hundred thousand more Republicans. Again, just
(12:15):
since election Day, one hundred and sixty thousand fewer Democrats
and two hundred thousand more Republicans. Wow, And that story
would be even bleaker for Democrats if New York and New Jersey,
which just held robust Democratic primaries for mayor and governor
that probably increased registrations, were excluded. Outside those two states,
(12:36):
Democrats are down roughly four hundred and thirty thousand registered
voters since November. Doldrums need a leader deep in sucitude.
They really do need a leader to emerge, an identity
to emerge. What are you people?
Speaker 4 (12:57):
There's some giant political news around what Elon Musk wants
out of the American electorate, but we could get Yes,
I'm going to join his new party. That's my plan.
A little bit later. We'll get into that, among other things.
Speaker 2 (13:12):
Stay here.
Speaker 5 (13:17):
A Danish woman donated her daughter's pony to the local
zoo to be fed to lions. Authorities intervened when they
realized it wasn't a pony at all, but a confused
and very lost Sarah Jessica Parker.
Speaker 4 (13:33):
Wow, wow, No, no, Greg, he just traffics in your
He just finds you not a try.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
He doesn't he thinks you are fat or ugly or
I don't. I don't think there's much better humor than that.
Speaker 4 (13:51):
Okay, So quick question. There's a story in the news
about a radio colleague, radio legend who we are friends with.
Do we talk about it or not on the air?
Speaker 2 (14:06):
Oh? Boy, I think you do.
Speaker 4 (14:08):
I think it's interesting with some sensitivity. Certainly, yes, given
the realities of it.
Speaker 2 (14:13):
Yeah. Yeah, especially on today, which I'm told is National
Radio Day.
Speaker 4 (14:19):
National Radio Day, You're gonna be talking about that during
the One More Thing podcast.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
Got some interesting info for you for National Radio Day.
Had a gent say, you know, you guys really ought
to be in the National Radio Hall of Fame, And
I said, oh, I'd forgotten there was one. I think
we should be.
Speaker 4 (14:40):
I mean, if you know, I don't. Yeah, it sounds
terrible to say out loud. Well, yeah, but I mean
what standard are you using like I use all the time?
Fairly low anyway, So San Francisco Bay Area. Ron Owens
(15:02):
legend in radio, and like, if you live somewhere else
and you've never heard of him, I get it. Back
when not everybody was syndicated all across the country, he
was like the biggest thing in the fourth biggest radio
market in America for decades. I mean, just owned the
town talk radio. And he's fallen upon some really really
hard financial times and declaring bankruptcy and stuff like that,
(15:24):
and a mess with his family and all these different
sorts of things, but just it's a big it's a
big radio story in the well, the number four market
in America.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
Yeah, it appears his daughter is half a nut and
fake the pregnancy and got her dad to endorse a
go fund me and a couple of other things. Because
poor Ron has Parkinson's and has survived four bouts of cancer.
He was always very kind to us, very generous to us,
and so we wish him well.
Speaker 4 (15:52):
His daughter faked a pregnancy.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
Yeah, she claimed that contestant on The Bachelor had impregnated her,
even lied under oath. She doctored a sonogram and a
pregnancy video and even lied under oath. She tried to
get former Bachelor style Clayton Etchart to take a paternity.
Speaker 4 (16:14):
Test had they been together.
Speaker 2 (16:21):
Court records in both Arizona and San Francisco show that
Laura had previously made similar allegations against three other men
since twenty fourteen, claiming each time that she either had
abortions or miscarriages. Oh boy, well, I.
Speaker 4 (16:38):
Never held Joe Biden to account for a hunter or
you know, if you have kids, you don't know how
your kids are gonna go.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
You just you just do not You do your best,
and anybody with multiple kids knows often they are very,
very very different from each other.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
You can have a role, you can have a role
in them going off the rails, but you don't always right. Indeed,
Elon was talking about starting a third party. He's not
going to now, but he is going to throw a
tremendous amount of money behind a one predicalar dude for president,
which is interesting. Among other things we can talk about
(17:17):
coming up.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
To Stay with It, Armstrong and Getty.
Speaker 6 (17:21):
Owe depot revealing plans to raise some prices because of
President Trump's tariffs. Executives announcing the decision after quarterly sales
reports came in lower than expected. John Deere says it
will lay off more than two hundred and thirty employees
at three factories because the demand for equipment is down,
calling it quote a challenging time for many farmers.
Speaker 4 (17:42):
So those are just you know, anecdotal stuff there. But
there's always the possibility that we're the biggest story in
America blotting out.
Speaker 2 (17:51):
Every other story.
Speaker 4 (17:53):
Is going to be tariff related here in a couple months.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
Yeah, I've predicted somewhere around the end of October we're
all going to be talking about that. I hope that's unfortunate.
I would love it if that's not the case. Oh yeah, here, here, Yeah,
I'd love to be wrong.
Speaker 4 (18:07):
So I got at least one kid that diagnosed with ADHD,
and the other one certainly might have it. And I
know how some people react to this with, uh, this
is just the way kids have always been, and now
(18:28):
they're putting a name on it.
Speaker 2 (18:29):
And I think there's some truth there.
Speaker 4 (18:33):
I think there is, too, depends on the kid, obviously,
I know in h at least one of my cases,
it's definitely not that.
Speaker 2 (18:42):
But right, there's so.
Speaker 4 (18:46):
Many different medications out there. And since it's interesting, I've
known a couple of really successful people scholastically successful people
that had ADHD and were able to focus better than
normal people in certain situations. That's one of the weird
(19:10):
things about ADHD. But like several fems I know who
have ADHD can drink coffee, like a big cup of
coffee before they go to bed. It helps calm them down,
stimulates calm them down. So energy drinks coffee. It's like
how you exhale and focus. And Riddlin famously is a stimulant. Yeah, yeah,
(19:33):
And so anyway, for all kinds of different reasons. There's
this giant Swedish study that's out right now. They followed
one hundred and fifty thousand people with ADHD for two
years on ADHD medication, and based on their analysis with
this very big study, the medicated group experienced an estimated
seventeen percent fewer suicidal behaviors, fifteen percent fewer cases of
(19:56):
substance abuse, thirteen percent fewer criminal convictions, a dozen percent
fewer traffic accidents compared to people that didn't take ADHD medication.
So I don't know if that informs anybody who's in
the you know, I'm not going to do medication for
(20:17):
my kid crowd.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
That's a tough Yeah, I just just because that is
something that improves outcomes, or so would seem from that study,
you know, with the usual grains of salt, doesn't mean
it's the best solution. That would be my my only quibble,
And again it varies kid to kid. But that's interesting.
I mean, if that's helping people be happier and all,
(20:40):
I'm in favor of it. I just I know. I
am certain I would have been diagnosed as a as
a boy with ADHD. Do you think the problem was
the pace of school was so slow it made me insane?
Speaker 4 (20:57):
But do you think it would have helped you if
you had something that would taken the edge of No.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
What really helped me was getting into a program that
lets you learn at your own speed. I loved it,
absolutely loved it, happy as a clam.
Speaker 4 (21:13):
And it didn't exhibit itself in any other ways.
Speaker 2 (21:16):
Oh, I don't think so, not that I'd have to
think about that for a while. There's also degrees, because
it's of course they do diagnosis is mild, moderate, or severe. Yeah,
And I want to make it clear I come to
this conversation humbly because every kid is different, and I
don't know your kid or your kid or your kid,
and and some people absolutely need to help. Well, yeah, well.
Speaker 4 (21:39):
That's the problem you have if you run into people
that have very strong opinions on this is a first
of all, I've had a very respected doctor get one
diagnosis and a different respected doctor have a completely different diagnosis,
And then what in the hell are you supposed to
do with that information?
Speaker 2 (21:58):
So they're guessing to a great extent.
Speaker 4 (22:01):
It's all on a continuum line between zero and a thousand,
and it's also combined with all the other personality factors
that you have that are somewhere in the range of
normal or not.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
So yeah, it's complicated. And their environment. Yeah, So, speaking
of kids' mental health, I absolutely love Abigail Schreier. She
wrote a couple of books, Irreversible Damage, about the unspeakably
cruel experimenting on confused adolescents who momentarily believe they're a
different gender because activists have convinced them that they might
(22:34):
be or that they are, and kids are so impressionable.
It led kids down what I've called the high speed
conveyor belt of activism toward irreversible damage to their bodies. Terrible.
She also wrote a book Bad therapy, which she references here.
I'm just going to read something she wrote briefly. Well,
I was writing my book bad Therapy. My middle school
(22:55):
age son returned home from sleep away camp with a
persistent stomach ache. I took him to urgent care, where
a nurse asked me to leave the room. I know
you love this Jack, so he could administer a mental
health screening tool put out by our National Institute's of
Mental Health. Afterward, I received a copy of the survey
and photographed it. Here verbatim are the five questions the
(23:16):
nurse intended to ask my son in private? And what
was the age of the kid? Again? Uh? Middle school? Okay?
In the past few weeks, have you wished you were dead? Two?
In the past few weeks, have you felt that you
or your family would be better off if you were dead?
Three in the past week, have you been having thoughts
about killing yourself? Why can't I be in the room
(23:38):
for these questions? By the way, because they don't want you,
the parent, interfering with they the government, getting the truth
from your kid. Four have you ever tried to kill yourself?
If yes, how when? And five are you thinking of
killing yourself right now? If yes, please describe.
Speaker 4 (23:57):
Keeping in mind, and I know more about this than
I I wish I knew. But keeping in mind, if
they declare your kid a threat to themselves, they fifty
one to fifty that kid, and your kid no longer
belongs to you. It belongs to the county. They are
in the government's control. You get no say at that point,
I mean zero.
Speaker 2 (24:16):
Say wow, So, Abigail writes, Children across America are being
asked these questions by doctors because this is explicit protocol
from the NIM. The National Institute of Mental Health asks
parents ask parents to leave so that you can administer
the following questions to kids age eight and up who
have not shown any signs of mental distress. There are
(24:36):
so many problems with this. The main one is kids
are wildly suggestible, especially where psychiatric symptoms are concerned. Ask
a kid repeatedly if he might be depressed, how about
now are you sure? And he just might decide that
he is sure, or she writes that.
Speaker 4 (24:54):
Yeah, be in a position at that moment that day
where they want attention.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
Sure, yeah, And she writes now. Thanks to Illinois Governor J. B. Pritzker,
tens of thousands of Illinois kids will be encouraged to
think of themselves as sick. Many or most will be
false positives. How do you freaking.
Speaker 4 (25:12):
Nutjobs think you're making the world better with this stuff?
I'll never understand it.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
I just think there are there is a huge share
of people that thinks in terms of feelings and not outcomes.
Does this make me feel? Does this sound good? Does
this seem concerned? And they don't even ask? All right,
every action has uh reactions, both intended and unintended. Let's
(25:43):
think about what they might be. Progressives don't say those things.
It's also a weird tendency on the left to uh
feel like there.
Speaker 4 (25:56):
I don't know if because they come from tend to
come from dysfunctional families or what it is, but they
kind of want it not to be true that there
are functioning families out there. Yeah, it bothers them that
sometimes we got it. If things are fine, I'm okay,
I don't need your help. They hate that.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
In a way, yes, because nothing makes them feel better
than helping. I just feel like to go back to
the great C. S. Lewis quote about the worst sort
of oppression is from do gooders, because they will never stop, right.
Speaker 4 (26:31):
I just feel like it's been more prevalent of people
I've known that were super progressive, that nobody's actually happily married.
That's no, they're all faking it or lying or you know,
there are no families that are okay just And I've
always thought.
Speaker 2 (26:46):
That it's so weird. Why do you have that view
of the world.
Speaker 4 (26:50):
So and if you have that view of the world,
you'd be more likely to want this sort of stuff.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
So, getting back to J. D. Pitt, Pritzker signing men
to tory mental health screenings for little kids in the
law and you're not in the room for it. That's unbelievable. Yeah, yeah,
And actually, Abigail Schreyer mentions, if basic literacy hadn't already
collapsed in Illinois, kids might pose spirited objections to Pritzker's
(27:17):
sales pitch, but in fact nobody learns anything in Illinois,
but her experience talking to parents of such kids right afterward.
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Go just hate this story you brought us, Yeah, sorry
about that, So, Abigail writes, I've spoken one hundreds of
parents of such kids. In twenty twenty four, I published
Bad Therapy and An Investigation into the surgeon adolescent mental
(28:47):
health diagnoses and psychiatric prescription drug use. Many young people
without serious mental illness nonetheless spend years languishing with a diagnosis,
alternately cursing it and embracing it, believing they have a brain,
convincing themselves that their struggles are insurmountable because of the
disorder's constraints. They meet regularly with a therapist or school counselor,
(29:08):
on whom they become increasingly reliant, losing a sense of
efficacy onable to navigate on their own even minor setbacks
in interpersonal conflicts. They begin courses of anti depressants that
carry all kinds of side effects, suppressed libido, fatigue, muffling
of all emotion, and even an increase in depression. Anti
anxiety drugs and stimulants given the kids diagnosed with ADHD
(29:29):
are both addictive and ubiquitously abused, and often that tragic
dissent begins with a simple mental health survey. Then she
tells the story of her son, and this is maybe
the key takeaway. If you haven't spent a lot of
time around kids. You don't know this. Kids are wildly suggestible,
especially where psychiatric symptoms are concerned. As a kid repeatedly
(29:53):
if he might be depressed, how about now are you sure?
And he might just decide that he is. Introduce gender
dysphorty into a peer group, and a swath of seventh
grade girls are likely to decide they were born in
the wrong body. Introduced testing anxiety or social phobia or
suicidality to them, and many teams are likely to decide
(30:14):
I have that too. There is a reason clinicians keep
anorexia patients from socializing unsupervised in the hospital. Ward anorexia
is a profoundly socially contagious mental illness.
Speaker 4 (30:29):
Wow, that is uh, I think obviously true and so troubling. Yeah,
testing anxiety is a great example. I mean they, I
think they talk about that in classes openly all the
time now, and they you know, if everybody gets a
free pass, yeah, and then of course, I mean who
who doesn't get anxious when you've got to test anybody?
Speaker 2 (30:52):
One more? Note in do you want to squeeze it
in an hour after the break, it's the guy who
writes the Giant Psychiatric Bible, The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual
of Mental Disorders for the edition. I'll just do it
real quick now, he says, mandatory school Mandatory school screenings
of kids for mental illness is great in theory and
(31:13):
terrible in practice. Yeah, most kids who screen positive will
have transient problems, not mental disorders. Mislabeling stigmatizes and subjects
them to unnecessary treatments while misdirecting very scarce resources away
from kids who desperately need them. Don't do it.
Speaker 4 (31:28):
Then you've got the added problem of some parents, I'm
definitely not this who love the idea of having a
kid who has some sort of special problem to get
to talk about and then everything.
Speaker 2 (31:38):
Yeah, us in centrol and it's various variations.
Speaker 4 (31:42):
That's brutally You have any thoughts on in this textas
four one five two KFTC.
Speaker 5 (31:51):
The Princeton Review, recently named Syracuse University of America's number
one party school, said people at Syracuse this is a school.
Speaker 2 (32:00):
Consumer.
Speaker 4 (32:03):
Oh my, so my son got My thirteen year old
got braces yesterday, and I was wondering what percentage of
kids get braces in the modern world. As we decided
at some point that everybody needs to have perfectly straight
(32:24):
teeth and they need to be as bright as the
sun in terms of whiteness. Yes, that's what we decided.
It's if you watch a movie from the nineties, all
the actors like not bright white teeth are just kind
of you know, John Travolta's got kind of yellowish teeth,
like people.
Speaker 2 (32:43):
Have normal colored teeth. Yeah, it's striking, and I love this.
This is my favorite aspect of modern movies. If the
you got a movie it's a Western, it's set in
eighteen forty, and you got a character who's a town
drunk who's dying of consumption. He's still got gleaming white teeth. Right.
Speaker 4 (33:07):
About seventy percent of kids in the US currently get
some sort of orthodonic treatment, braces being the number one,
and at least a third or only a third truly
need braces in the traditional sense, like it would be
(33:29):
a quality of life situation if you didn't get your
teeth straightened out. It's cosmetic in other words, for two
thirds of them, which you know, if we've decided, you know,
I had a person really berating me for the fact
that I hadn't got my son braces yet yet, if
we've decided that you gotta have straight teeth, is that
(33:51):
kind of like we use the example of the cracked
phone screen, that's like the modern day missing tooth, and
that's because nobody's missing teeth anymore.
Speaker 2 (34:03):
So, uh, are you are you?
Speaker 4 (34:05):
Are you really setting yourself aside as you can't be
part of even mid level or above society if you
didn't get your teeth straightened.
Speaker 2 (34:15):
I don't know what.
Speaker 4 (34:15):
I don't know what it's like out there. I have
straight teeth just naturally, so I don't know what it
would be like. I don't know how self conscious I
would be. Lots of people had crooked teeth when I
was younger, but like every kid has braces. And also socioeconomically,
depending on your you know, your social strata, the higher
you go up the income, the more. It's like one
hundred percent of the kids get bracest for even mildly
(34:37):
crooked teeth, according to this article, hence the social pressure. Sure, right, yeah,
so it's kind of self reinforcing. I'll be in Britain
next week, so boy, well that'll be interesting.
Speaker 1 (34:49):
Yeah, it's it's, it's it's it is interesting that that is,
it's not uniformly a Western society thing, and I mean
United States that leads the way in like needing to
have perfectly straight teeth for cosmetic reasons.
Speaker 4 (35:07):
And it's expensive and painful, but yet we do it,
and I just find it interesting.
Speaker 2 (35:12):
You know, we did it. I'm doing it. Yeah, it's
a conundrum. I mean, if you were a real activist,
you'd say, all right, this is an artificially imposed social norm,
a status Norman eminence front is Pete Townsend who just
turned eighty, of the who Pete Townsend of the who
is eighty? Good lord anyway as he would put it.
(35:33):
But if indeed it is a barrier to achievement, acceptance
stating whatever relationships? Yeah, and are you gonna die on
that hill? As people like to say, far as you can?
Speaker 4 (35:47):
And it's not even that. Am I gonna have my
kid die on that hill? Because it's not me who's
who's living with it? Right, So that's what every parent
is dealing with. But it's expensive, man, I'm shocked by
the price. Are you a baseball fan and I love
the baseball? Have you heard the new challenge? The viral trend?
Speaker 2 (36:08):
He says, rolling his eyes, nine beers, and nine hot
dogs in nine innings.
Speaker 4 (36:15):
Oh if I was younger, I'm all over that challenge.
Speaker 2 (36:17):
Oh what a day? What? Oh I yes, we got
to talk more about that.
Speaker 4 (36:23):
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