August 18, 2025 • 36 mins
Hour 2 of A&G features...
- Tariffs & consumer news
- US colleges & the UK immigration crisis
- Preference falsification & Gender Bending Madness
- Schedule for meeting with Zelensky
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 (00:01):
Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio of the
George Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe, Katty Armstrong.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
And Katty and He Armstrong and Yetty.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Concerned parents of incoming college freshmen are adding.
Speaker 3 (00:27):
Narkhan to back to school lists this year, along with.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
Condoms and Plan B.
Speaker 3 (00:33):
Wow, Condoms, Narkan and Plan B what Hunter Biden calls
a value meal.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Okay, later this hour, how about a little Marco Rubio
for you. He was on all the shows yesterday getting
the hell beat out of him, trying to explain Friday
and either you buy his explanation or you don't. And
then of course today, in case you weren't following the
news over the weekend, the biggest European leaders that exist
(01:05):
are going to be meeting at the White House with
Trump and Zelinsky and Jade Vans is going to be
there yelling at Zilinsky or something. Who knows what, but
that is quite a meeting that's going on at the
White House today.
Speaker 4 (01:15):
I wish Trump's golf buddy from Finland was gonna be
there because he's really got his ear, but I didn't
see him on the guest list. Maybe people are just
not mentioning him because he's kind of down the list.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
I saw the list and he wasn't on there. And
Donald Tusco Poland I was hoping it was gonna be there.
He's not gonna be there. But what's her name from
Italy that I really like? The Italian prime minister. She's
a hard ass. She'll be there.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Oh yeah, yeah, Okay, more on that to come.
Speaker 4 (01:38):
We'll play you some Marco Rubio audio and see if
you like. Jack and Mark Halpern and others have been
appeased by his words more or less, and that the
deal is in the works. They're working on it. It's midstream.
You can't judge yet.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
I'd say I've been talked down from complete disaster to
maybe fifty to fifty. I'm I'm on the side of
this was a good thing that happened on Friday. Yeah,
give it a piece like Hitler just it's fine. They
can live in it anyway.
Speaker 4 (02:06):
I thought we'd take a look more close to home
for a couple of things. Who's paying the tariffs at
this point, not consumers mostly, But it's interesting some of
those the economic numbers that were released at the end
of last week you get the like the number one number,
(02:28):
but some of the numbers behind the numbers are really interesting.
The producer price index rose almost one percent in the
month and three point three percent over the last year.
Consumer price data was much smaller. It implied that households
were not experiencing tariff induced price increases except in a
(02:50):
few services like medical care. But the producer price index
numbers tell us this partly because companies are paying higher
prices but have not passed them on to consumers yet.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
And is that because they're hoping this tariff thing will
go away and they and they don't have to.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
That's part of it.
Speaker 4 (03:09):
Plus they planned because they know it was telegraphed, so
they moved up lots and lots of imports and filled
the warehouses so their costs would be lower. But eventually
that stuff is going to run out. Producer price daddic
gets worse the closer you look. Goods and services both
experienced substantial inflation seven percent. That's confusing, but goods and
(03:31):
services related to business investment in particular becoming pricier, with
the cost of manufacturing equipment rising almost half a percent
in one month and related services four and a half
percent in a month, So the birds of the tariffs have.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
Not yet come home to roost.
Speaker 4 (03:47):
Anybody tells you what the effect is going to be
on consumers doesn't know what they're talking about. Probably nobody's sure,
so we'll just have to wait and see. Speaking of consumers,
I thought this is so interesting. We talked about this
once or twice through the years. Nobody's buying homes, nobody's
switching jobs, and nobody moves anymore. It used to be
(04:12):
the US, globally speaking, was like world famous for mobility.
We were the movinist people on earth. Wherever the opportunity was,
Americans would go, and most Americans moved every year to
pursue opportunities. Yeah, we talked about this in the early
(04:32):
twentieth century. Like all of those old timey pictures you've
seen of wagons loaded up to the sky with goods
in old timey urban highways or you know, streets and cities.
That was moving Day, which was a single day traditionally
in the springtime, where Americans would up and move. I
got to rEFInd that article. It was so interesting. But
(04:55):
a number of different factors, including just cultural norms. Folks
no longer move they don't chase from city to city,
state to state. US companies were often quicker to hire
and fire than employers and other parts of the world,
but that has stalled as well. Others slapped with golden handcuffs.
They have homes when mortgage rates are lower, have stable
(05:16):
white collar jobs, and don't want to leave them. Plus,
young people who don't land good jobs soon after college
usually just stay where they are waiting and never really
recover from those years of diminished turnings.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
I don't get that.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
I get if you're I get if you're making a
decent living, like not great, but okay, and you decide
I don't want to move because family situations, friends, all
that sort of stuff. That's a lifestyle choice. But if
you're twenty two and you ain't got nothing going on,
I'd go wherever you can find a good job.
Speaker 4 (05:53):
But that's that's just me one hundred percent. Partly because
it's an adventure. It's fun. I've done it many times times.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
It's cool.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
You ought to do it.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
It's also hard and uh yeah, and you get to
a new town and you don't know anybody.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
I mean, it's it has it's hard and about oh
whoa it's better in your mom's basement. I've done it
fifty times.
Speaker 4 (06:12):
So yeah, tough love, Jack, We need to slapping. Not sure,
Mamby Bamby's sympathy. So, uh, here's some stats for you.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
Now. You got to go back to the.
Speaker 4 (06:23):
Line like nineteen tens and twenties to have like those
mass movings that I was talking about every year. But
in the fifties and sixties, twenty percent of Americans would
move typically every year.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
One out of five every would move, you know, every year.
My family is one of them.
Speaker 4 (06:40):
Part of the slowing is that the US population is aged,
and so we're less likely to move as we age.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
But oh and two household earners. That gets a little
more complicated too. Sure we both gotta yeah, find your job.
Speaker 4 (06:53):
Sure, right, And this isn't a you know, this is
a bad thing and people should be condemned for it.
I mean, I think it might be, but it's okay.
It's just kind of an observation a change. So twenty
percent in the fifties and sixties, by twenty nineteen, the
year before COVID, it was nine point eight percent of Americans,
so a little less than half. Then you got the
(07:13):
COVID surge that was brief, but then in twenty twenty three,
only seven point eight percent of Americans moved, the lowest
rate logs since the US Census started records in nineteen
forty eight, and that number seems to have held steady
in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
And I come from a move in family. My dad
moved a lot.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
I lived a bunch of different places as a kid,
and then I've moved to tons, tons of times as
an adult.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
So I just I'm kind of built that way.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
So it's always interesting to me when I run into
people that you know, I'm sixth generation this or whatever.
You know, my I've been in the same area and
all your brothers and sisters, may everybody live there, And
I can see the tremendous advantage of that.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
Family wise, it would be awesome.
Speaker 1 (07:56):
Man, your kids have you have built in babysitters, Your
kids have all the cousins, nants and uncles by it.
Speaker 2 (08:01):
That's super cool. But oh yeah, as far as having
an opportunity job.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
Wise, I'm a big fan of going where they're hiring.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (08:13):
Yeah, indeed, so moving along to another Oh that's right,
I knew I had one more thought it's and they
profile in this piece in the Wall Street Journal a
lot of young families that are trying to like find
a bigger house because they're having kids or what have you.
And just the artificially low rates of covids and the
skyrocketing housing prices, just everybody's stuck. Well, we've talked about
(08:34):
that plenty of times, and the only thing that will
undo that is time. Final story, consumer oriented, Jack, you
love this one. France, So enlightened, so cultured France. They're sweltering,
sweltering under a heat wave this week, but the leadership
and climate schools are absolutely refusing to drop any of
(08:55):
their climate neutrality goals for whatever year in the future
they're talking about. And so the French government has gone hardcore,
suggesting energy sobriety, meaning don't use air conditioning. Air Conditioning
should be used only those who are very sensitive to heat,
elderly people who can't open the window at night, et cetera.
(09:18):
The rest of us should opt for a fan draw
the blinds, limit heat emissions from ovens, and if you
have to use AC, it has to be seventy eight
degrees or higher and only one room of your house.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
I'm tempted to tell this story. What would you say, Michael, If.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
It makes cha grin, leave it in, I will be
I got it. Advice, I have to be vague. You're
gonna be wanting more details on this. I know I
can't give them to you.
Speaker 4 (09:46):
I know you have to take off. Do you want
to do that before I can do the simply safe commercial?
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Yeah, let me tell you this story because you're gonna
want more details, like I said, Okay, and especially it's
gonna be especially astounding to you because you know how
few people are ever in my home. Yes, there was
somebody in my home, good lord, when California on one
of the days when California was like struggling with their
energy France like, because we have so much freaking green
(10:13):
energy that doesn't work, we can't keep up. Sometimes, right,
person in my home actually went to my thermostat and
turned it up because they thought it was so outrageous
that I was keeping it so cool in my home
when there are old people that may be dying if
the grid breaks down.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
And did they recover from their wounds? Why can't you
get your gun?
Speaker 1 (10:36):
I can't go any further with that story, but that
is amazing.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
So there are people that have that point of view.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
You're killing old people by keeping your house comfortable at
this temperature.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
Wow. Wow.
Speaker 4 (10:48):
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simply safe. There is a term we learned last week
(12:08):
that explains so much preference falsification and then a preference cascade.
Want to talk about that next stay with.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
Us Armstrong and.
Speaker 5 (12:22):
At least Gavin comes here. People ask me all the time,
why haven't you ever had Hillary or Bill Clinton on?
Why didn't you have Kamala on during the last campaign.
You think we don't ask. We ask these people every week.
They say no, it took eight years and a petition to.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
Get Obama on.
Speaker 5 (12:40):
And these are people all people I voted for.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
Think about that.
Speaker 5 (12:44):
They're afraid to come on the show of a guy
who voted for them.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
They Republicans.
Speaker 5 (12:48):
They show up when they do, they take their beating
like a man.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
Bill Maher on Friday night.
Speaker 4 (12:58):
He'd been talking prior to that about a story we
talked about the Democrat congressman who had daughters in sports
and said he didn't want the UH the daughters to
get beat up on the field, to play by boys
masquerading his girls, cause playing his girls, which some for
some reasons, some really mentally disturbed people take seriously and
(13:19):
think you can actually be the other sex.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
I mean, it is.
Speaker 4 (13:23):
It's borderline psychotic anyway, for defending girls' sports, this Democratic
congressman was called a Nazi by by a bunch of
you know, radical leftists, and was thinking, he's you know,
he's got to be thinking, man, am I in the
right political party? Anyway, mar went on, I would love to.
Speaker 5 (13:44):
Have AOC on the show and Mondamie and Elizabeth Warrenck,
but I can't subpoena the guests, and I can't fix that.
What the Democrats are scared of more than anything else,
I mean, obviously besides Gluten.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
Is being prime. I'm married from the far left.
Speaker 5 (14:01):
Even though most Democrats are not far left, they're mild,
mattered and moderate, at least at my bath house. If
there is one practical thing that Democrats can do right
now that would help them regain power, inspire your moderates
to vote in the primaries.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
Get that base excited. You have the numbers.
Speaker 5 (14:23):
After Congressman Moulton made his comment about his daughter not
getting run over. He added, but as a Democrat, I'm
supposed to be afraid to say that. Well, then change
what you're supposed to.
Speaker 2 (14:32):
Be afraid of.
Speaker 4 (14:35):
Yeah, well said I'm struck by the odd situation where
I mean, for instance, in Iowa, they've got a governor's
race coming out up in the Incomban is not running
on the Republican side, and so it's, you know, it's
a fairly wide open race and one of the leading
Democrats who's going for the job is a gun and
(14:56):
hunting enthusiast, proudly Christian. I'm trying to remember all the
different stances he had, very very Midwestern conservative, regular guy
who's running is Democrat, and the Republican Party's like, yeah,
(15:16):
this guy's a threat. He's a really credible candidate. He's
practically one of us. I mean, blah blah blah.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
I'd love to see more of that.
Speaker 4 (15:23):
I don't know exactly in what sense he's a Democrat now,
except that it's a brand and he perceives that there's
a better opening for him with that logo on his.
Speaker 2 (15:35):
You know, racing suit than the other one.
Speaker 4 (15:39):
Even though he's espousing beliefs that are utterly foreign to
so much of the Democratic Party right now. So I
don't what does it mean to say he's a Democrat.
I don't know exactly. Again, I just think it's a
branding thing. So can't wait for the next segment. A
big new study has some bad news and good news
for us. The good news is bigger than the bad news.
(16:02):
The bad news is that the college kids have absolutely
been bullied into agreeing with the neo Marxist postmodern party line,
and they do in huge numbers. The good news is
they don't mean it. They had to be bullied, but
(16:25):
they don't believe nearly in as big as numbers as
you might imagine what you think they do. So that's
really interesting. Can't wait to get to it. And it
relates directly to this story we were talking about last week.
I think it was last late in the show, and
I really wanted to get it on for you good folks.
The idea of preference falsification and then a preference cascade.
(16:46):
And this fella what is his name? It's a really
good piece. Oh that's right, Glenn Harlan Reynolds. He's a
professor law at the University of Tennessee. He's writing about
the immigration crisis in Britain and how the British government
has passed all sorts of draconian laws that would never
ever pass muster in this country because of the First Amendment.
(17:08):
But these laws that say you can't cause anybody discomfort
or or or issue speech that might incite race hatred,
it's all very very vague, and that's caused is something
called preference falsification, where it looks like everybody agrees with
(17:28):
for instance, the government stands because they've been made to
pretend to agree with that, but they don't. But you're
looking around and you're saying, I think this is madness,
and you know, rampant immigration from Somalia is a threat
to our way of life and our culture at all.
But I don't see anybody disagreeing with me. So I
guess I'm in a small minority. But that's because of
(17:49):
preference falsification. And then when people fight back against it
and say, you know what, I'm going to say what
I believe, whether I get in trouble or not, all
of a sudden everybody realizes, wait a minute, everybody around
me is believed what I believed all along. And that's
when you get what's called a preference cascade and people
are more open about it. Are we on the cusp
(18:10):
of a preference cascade and our universities could be stay
with us, Armstrong and getty.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
According to a new study, twelve percent of Americans fine
Sadney Sweeney's American Eagle ad offensive. The other eighty eight
percent are able to fit in jeans.
Speaker 4 (18:29):
Wow wow, Gottfeld, the mean boy in high school. So,
speaking of attitudes were supposed to hold you remember when
we were supposed to take seriously for about ninety seconds,
the idea that, oh, no good jeans, jeans, blue jeans,
jeans with blue eyes. But the white supremacy, but the eugenics.
These people, oh my gosh, they're so nuts.
Speaker 2 (18:52):
And here's the key.
Speaker 4 (18:54):
So few people actually agree with them. So we're talking
last segment about preference falsification, and I'll describe to you
exactly what it is. This is a great description from
Glenn Reynolds, who's a professor of law at University of Tennessee,
one of those southern universities where people are flocking now
(19:16):
because everybody realizes, oh, they like teach you stuff. There,
and don't just indoctrinate you into being a good Marxist
like the Ivy League. Anyway, So here's this description of
a preference falsification. It's a move usually practiced by authoritarian regimes,
but now democracies are catching on to it. The trick
(19:37):
is you make citizens pretend that they believe what the
government says, or what.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
The powers that be say.
Speaker 4 (19:47):
He's talking about immigration in Britain, and so the government
is the correct target. We're talking about education, so it's
more the administration, the professors and stuff. But anyway, the
trick is they make citizens pre tend they believe what
the administration says and fake their approval of what it does.
You promote marches and demonstrations and speech in favor of
(20:09):
the preferred positions, and you severely punish marches and demonstrations
and speech that oppose those favored positions. You give excuses
like stopping you know, racism or fighting hate speech for
shutting down any opposition. You may even have informers that
ferret out wrong think and report it to the authorities
or to employers or to third parties who will engage
(20:31):
in extra legal harassment if you do it.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
Right.
Speaker 4 (20:34):
You can have upward of ninety percent of your population
hating you and your policies, but doing.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
And saying nothing about them.
Speaker 4 (20:42):
Because everyone in the ninety percent thinks they're part of
a tiny minority, resistance will seem futile. This works until
it doesn't. The problem with preference falsification is that sooner
or later, some avenor development can make people realize that
what they've been told as popular is in fact very unpopular.
When this happens, this Duke University scholar Timika Ran writes
(21:05):
in his book Private Truth's Public Lives, the result is
a preference cascade. Let's when a large swath of the
population realizes their dissionent views are in fact widely held.
They become less afraid of the government or the administration,
or the professors or the media, and less hesitant about
sharing their true sentiments. And then everybody realizes, all of
(21:27):
a sudden, oh my gosh, not only have I not
been a designing minority all the way, all the time,
I've been in the strong majority.
Speaker 2 (21:34):
And by the way, we're right.
Speaker 4 (21:36):
And my prayer is that this is going to happen
at some point in the American educational system. Although my gosh,
They've got the teachers, they got the faculty, they got
the administration, and they're bullying the.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
Kids to wit.
Speaker 4 (21:50):
Really interesting Peace in the Hill by a couple of guys,
the researchers Forrest Drahm and Kevin Waldman, on today's colleg campuses.
Students are not maturing, they're managing. Beneath the facade of
progressive slogans and institutional virtue signaling lies a quiet psychological
(22:10):
crisis driven by the demands of ideological conformity. I first
read the right upon this from an opinion writer in
the Wall Street Journal. I'm very pleased to see this
as in The Hill, which is a very mainstream slash
left leaning, because you know, their readership is people who
(22:32):
work in Washington, d c. Generally in government or lobbyists
and on who depend on government, and that crowd tends
to be left leaning.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Obviously they like more big government.
Speaker 4 (22:43):
So the fact that this is being published in the
Hill and has gotten a bit of attention is very encouraging.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Anyway. So here's the story. Between twenty twenty three and.
Speaker 4 (22:51):
Twenty twenty five, these guys conducted about fifteen hundred confidential
interviews with undergrads at a couple of universities, Northwestern and
University of Michigan. We were not studying politics, We were
studying development. Our question was clinical, not political. Quote, what
happens to identity formation? Which is part of becoming an adult?
Speaker 2 (23:13):
Who am I? What do I believe? Right?
Speaker 4 (23:15):
What happens to identity formation when belief is replaced by
adherents to orthodoxy instead of painstakingly trying to understand the
world and coming to a set of beliefs, instead you're
just told you need to adhere to this point of view.
Speaker 2 (23:34):
What happens to identity formation?
Speaker 4 (23:37):
We asked, have you ever pretended to hold more progressive
views than you truly endorse to succeed socially or academically?
Speaker 2 (23:45):
You want to know what percentage said? Yes? Eighty eight percent.
Speaker 4 (23:52):
Eighty eight percent said they pretended to hold more progressive
views than they truly endorse to succeed socially or academically.
These students were not cynical, but adaptive. In a campus
environment where grades, leadership and peer belonging often hinge on
fluency in performative morality, young adults quickly learn to rehearse
(24:13):
what is safe. The result is not conviction or beliefs,
but compliance, and beneath that compliance, something vital is lost.
Quoting now from the authors, late adolescents in early adulthood
represent a narrow and non replicable developmental window. It's during
(24:33):
this stage that individuals begin the lifelong work of integrating
personal experiences with inherited values, forming the foundations of moral reasoning,
internal coherence, and emotional resilience. Oh my gosh, emotional resilience toughness.
When belief is prescriptive, meaning you're told what to believe,
(24:57):
and ideological divergence or disagreement is treated as social risk,
that integrative process stalls, rather than forging a durable sense
of self. Through trial, error and reflection, students learn to
compartmentalize publicly they can form privately. They question often in isolation.
(25:17):
Oh but remember what we were just talking about. With
a preference falsification and preference cascade, they only think they're
in isolation.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
Well, I guess they are in isolation.
Speaker 4 (25:27):
But sows everybody around them thinking the same things.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
So insidious.
Speaker 4 (25:33):
This split between outer presentation and inner conviction not only
fragments identity but arrests its development, and the dissonance shows
up everywhere. Seventy eight percent of the students told us
they self censor on their beliefs surrounding gender identity. Seventy
eight percent believe all that gender pending madness is madness,
(26:00):
but they got to be quiet. Seventy two percent do
that on politics in general. Sixty eight percent on family values.
I mean, that's a lot smaller number than the seventy
eight percent that are they're soft pedaling their views on
gender bending manners, But sixty eight percent on just general
family values are soft pedaling their views. Our college students
(26:25):
are so much more conservative and sane than you think
they are, partly because who gets amplified and applauded and publicized.
They're radical, lefty lunatic front. The normy kids just they
they're afraid, so they're quiet, and they certainly don't make
(26:45):
any noise, and if they do, they're they're punished or
ignored anyway. More than eighty percent so they had submitted
class work that misrepresented their views in order to align
with professors. For many, this has become second nature, an
instinct for academic and professional self preservation. Listen, maybe it
was because I was clueless or stubborn or something as
(27:07):
a youngster. But when I was in school and I
was in a political science, economics, pre law program that
had lots and lots and lots of the sort of
stuff we're talking about in it, I never once misrepresented
my view in order to align with a professor. Maybe
I didn't have a you at that point, but that's terrible.
(27:31):
To test the gap between expression and belief, we used
gender discourse, a contentious topic, both highly visible and ideological,
ideologically loaded, right the authors In public, students were echoed,
I'm sorry. In public, students echoed expected progressive narratives. In private, however,
their views were more complex. Eighty seven percent identified as
(27:53):
exclusively heterosexual eighty seven percent and supported a binary model
of gender. There's men and there's women, period. That's eighty
seven percent. Nine percent expressed partial openness to gender fluidity.
Seven percent embraced the idea of gender as a broad spectrum.
(28:16):
And most of these belong to activist circles. Practically nobody
believed there's fifty eight genders and you get to choose
what you are. Practically nobody seven percent. How different is
this from the perception we've all formed of what college
kids actually think because they've been psychologically battered into conformity.
(28:41):
I am not a violent man, but I swear to God,
I'd like to take a bulldozer to a lot of
our college campuses. Metaphorically, of course. Perhaps most telling, seventy
seven percent, and these are college kids said they disagreed
with the idea that gender identity should override biological sex
in domains such as sports, healthcare, or public data, but
(29:05):
would never voice that disagreement allowed. So of the eighty
seven percent that say, no, there's dudes and there's gals,
that's it eighty seven percent. All but ten percent of
those said I would never say that out loud. Holy crap.
(29:27):
These poor kids are bullied. It's Stockholm syndrome. They're terrified
to speak their minds II Karama. Thirty eight percent described
themselves as morally confused, uncertain whether honesty was still ethical,
if it meant exclusion, whatever that means. Authenticity, once considered
a good thing for all of us, psychologically, has become
(29:50):
a social liability, and this fragmentation does not end at
the classroom door. Seventy three percent of students reported mistrust
in conversations about these values with close friends. They were
afraid to even talk to their friends.
Speaker 2 (30:03):
That's that preference falsification. That's its direct fruit.
Speaker 4 (30:13):
They're sure they're friends, excuse me disagree with them, even
though eighty seven percent agree with them, They're terrified to
say anything out loud. This is not simply peer pressure.
It is identity regulation at scale. Being institutionalized, universities often
(30:34):
justified these dynamics in the name of inclusion, But inclusion
that demands dishonesty is not ensuring psychological safety. It is
sanctioning self abandonment. In attempting to engineer moral unity, higher
education is mistaken consensus for growth and compliance for care,
and the students know it's wrong. When they're given permission
(30:55):
to speak freely. Many describe the experience of participating is
not only liberating but clarifying. For students trained to perform
the act of telling the truth felt radical. Finally, if
higher education is to fulfill its promise as a site
of intellectual and moral development, it must relearn the difference
(31:18):
between support and supervision. It must recenter truth, not consensus,
as its animating value, and it must give back to
students what has been taken from them, the right to
believe in the space to become. I don't know how
exactly you can join this fight. Maybe it's by supporting
organizations or I don't know, podcasts, radio shows that are
(31:38):
fighting the fight. But man, we've got to win this
for the youngsters. They are being mentally and intellectually tortured
and bullied by these monsters, these monsters in their ivory towers,
and it's got to stop.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
End of screed. Stay with us.
Speaker 6 (32:01):
So in order for there to be a piece deal,
this is just a fact. We may not like it,
it may not be pleasant, it may be distasteful, but
in order for there to be an end of the war,
there are things Russia wants that it cannot get, and
there are things Ukraine wants that it's not going to get.
Speaker 2 (32:14):
Both sides are going to have to give up.
Speaker 6 (32:16):
Something in order to get to the table in order
to make this happen. That's just the way it is.
And I mean, as soon as we accept that that's
the reality.
Speaker 4 (32:23):
I think it's smart time capitulation. Neville Chamberlain.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
I think Mark went on, I think Marco went on
five shows yesterday.
Speaker 2 (32:32):
Man, that would be a long day.
Speaker 1 (32:34):
And whitcoff on two. More so seven shows covered by
the Trump administration explaining what's the right word, it's not prejudicial,
what's going on and what happened on Friday. So we'll
get into that more in an hour three what Marco
had to say, and you'll either agree with or you won't.
Speaker 2 (32:51):
But here's the schedule for day.
Speaker 1 (32:53):
And this is historic. This has never happened in world
history where you've had this many European leaders meeting at
the White House at one time. This has just never
ever happened again before. Now, part of it has travel
made it impossible up until.
Speaker 2 (33:10):
Seventies eighties, but still it's never happened.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
All these different European leaders are going to arrive at
the White House at noon today, White House time, south Portico,
White House, press pool, TV crew, still photographers only people
will be shouting questions. Of course, whether Trump answers any
or not is always completely up to him. But you
got macrona France, you got Starmer of Great Britain, you
got Mertz of Germany, you got what's her name from
(33:38):
Italy who is a testee buster herself and big on
supporting Ukraine. But anyway, all these world leaders are going
to be here. Then the President is participating in a
bilateral meeting in the Oval Office with President Zelensky of Ukraine.
(33:58):
That's just the President and Zelensky. The European leaders aren't
gonna be in there.
Speaker 4 (34:03):
Huh.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
So they're all getting there, but they ain't gonna be
in the meeting with Zolensky. It's gonna be Trump and
jade E Vance.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
No, you don't have the cards. Have you ever said
thank you? Jade Vance will be there. Uh So, see
how that goes.
Speaker 1 (34:18):
There is reporting that Zelensky's wearing a suit jacket without
a tie as opposed to his military garb.
Speaker 2 (34:25):
Since do you even own a suit? Became a thing?
Speaker 4 (34:28):
Lest o, my completely irrelevant. People are dying.
Speaker 1 (34:32):
It is completely irrelevant. But so that was news to
me that the Trump and Zelensky thing. I mean, so
all that talk about the European leaders are going there
to help Zelensky if he gets attacked, they ain't gonna
do any good when it's Trump, JD and Zelensky alone
in the Oval Office.
Speaker 4 (34:49):
Yeah, although obviously this strategy is for all of the
euro leaders to blunt any idea that Zolensky's being unreasonable
when he says Putin can't be trusted. They are going
to stand up one after the other and say everything
he says is lies.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
Right a half to remember that right after the bilateral meeting,
the President meets all the European leaders, and they're having
a meeting, a multilateral meeting with European leaders at three,
so a full two hours later. So, man, there's some
jazzy stuff that could happen today news wise. I mean,
it's I hope it doesn't go off the rails because
(35:27):
that wouldn't serve anybody. But it certainly the possibility exists
at a pretty high level for things to go off
the rails.
Speaker 2 (35:34):
Don't you think? Yes?
Speaker 4 (35:38):
Yeah, well I would say that there could be enormous
news made today in a number of different directions.
Speaker 2 (35:44):
You mentioned it last week.
Speaker 4 (35:45):
Trump has the reputation for being swayed by the last
person he talks to, and obviously the Euros plus Zelensky
are are anxious for that to happen, and it could
be they will sway him.
Speaker 2 (36:01):
I just I have no idea which way this thing goes.
Speaker 1 (36:04):
I don't either. I think we'll have a much clearer
idea what Friday was all about after today.
Speaker 2 (36:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (36:15):
Yeah, one thing that's guaranteed, the idea that news won't
be made. Yeah, there will be plenty of news made today.
And if you missed a segment or an hour of this show,
get the podcast Armstrong and Getty on demand
Speaker 2 (36:28):
Armstrong and Getty
Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio of the
George Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe, Katty Armstrong.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
And Katty and He Armstrong and Yetty.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Concerned parents of incoming college freshmen are adding.
Speaker 3 (00:27):
Narkhan to back to school lists this year, along with.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
Condoms and Plan B.
Speaker 3 (00:33):
Wow, Condoms, Narkan and Plan B what Hunter Biden calls
a value meal.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Okay, later this hour, how about a little Marco Rubio
for you. He was on all the shows yesterday getting
the hell beat out of him, trying to explain Friday
and either you buy his explanation or you don't. And
then of course today, in case you weren't following the
news over the weekend, the biggest European leaders that exist
(01:05):
are going to be meeting at the White House with
Trump and Zelinsky and Jade Vans is going to be
there yelling at Zilinsky or something. Who knows what, but
that is quite a meeting that's going on at the
White House today.
Speaker 4 (01:15):
I wish Trump's golf buddy from Finland was gonna be
there because he's really got his ear, but I didn't
see him on the guest list. Maybe people are just
not mentioning him because he's kind of down the list.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
I saw the list and he wasn't on there. And
Donald Tusco Poland I was hoping it was gonna be there.
He's not gonna be there. But what's her name from
Italy that I really like? The Italian prime minister. She's
a hard ass. She'll be there.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Oh yeah, yeah, Okay, more on that to come.
Speaker 4 (01:38):
We'll play you some Marco Rubio audio and see if
you like. Jack and Mark Halpern and others have been
appeased by his words more or less, and that the
deal is in the works. They're working on it. It's midstream.
You can't judge yet.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
I'd say I've been talked down from complete disaster to
maybe fifty to fifty. I'm I'm on the side of
this was a good thing that happened on Friday. Yeah,
give it a piece like Hitler just it's fine. They
can live in it anyway.
Speaker 4 (02:06):
I thought we'd take a look more close to home
for a couple of things. Who's paying the tariffs at
this point, not consumers mostly, But it's interesting some of
those the economic numbers that were released at the end
of last week you get the like the number one number,
(02:28):
but some of the numbers behind the numbers are really interesting.
The producer price index rose almost one percent in the
month and three point three percent over the last year.
Consumer price data was much smaller. It implied that households
were not experiencing tariff induced price increases except in a
(02:50):
few services like medical care. But the producer price index
numbers tell us this partly because companies are paying higher
prices but have not passed them on to consumers yet.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
And is that because they're hoping this tariff thing will
go away and they and they don't have to.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
That's part of it.
Speaker 4 (03:09):
Plus they planned because they know it was telegraphed, so
they moved up lots and lots of imports and filled
the warehouses so their costs would be lower. But eventually
that stuff is going to run out. Producer price daddic
gets worse the closer you look. Goods and services both
experienced substantial inflation seven percent. That's confusing, but goods and
(03:31):
services related to business investment in particular becoming pricier, with
the cost of manufacturing equipment rising almost half a percent
in one month and related services four and a half
percent in a month, So the birds of the tariffs have.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
Not yet come home to roost.
Speaker 4 (03:47):
Anybody tells you what the effect is going to be
on consumers doesn't know what they're talking about. Probably nobody's sure,
so we'll just have to wait and see. Speaking of consumers,
I thought this is so interesting. We talked about this
once or twice through the years. Nobody's buying homes, nobody's
switching jobs, and nobody moves anymore. It used to be
(04:12):
the US, globally speaking, was like world famous for mobility.
We were the movinist people on earth. Wherever the opportunity was,
Americans would go, and most Americans moved every year to
pursue opportunities. Yeah, we talked about this in the early
(04:32):
twentieth century. Like all of those old timey pictures you've
seen of wagons loaded up to the sky with goods
in old timey urban highways or you know, streets and cities.
That was moving Day, which was a single day traditionally
in the springtime, where Americans would up and move. I
got to rEFInd that article. It was so interesting. But
(04:55):
a number of different factors, including just cultural norms. Folks
no longer move they don't chase from city to city,
state to state. US companies were often quicker to hire
and fire than employers and other parts of the world,
but that has stalled as well. Others slapped with golden handcuffs.
They have homes when mortgage rates are lower, have stable
(05:16):
white collar jobs, and don't want to leave them. Plus,
young people who don't land good jobs soon after college
usually just stay where they are waiting and never really
recover from those years of diminished turnings.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
I don't get that.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
I get if you're I get if you're making a
decent living, like not great, but okay, and you decide
I don't want to move because family situations, friends, all
that sort of stuff. That's a lifestyle choice. But if
you're twenty two and you ain't got nothing going on,
I'd go wherever you can find a good job.
Speaker 4 (05:53):
But that's that's just me one hundred percent. Partly because
it's an adventure. It's fun. I've done it many times times.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
It's cool.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
You ought to do it.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
It's also hard and uh yeah, and you get to
a new town and you don't know anybody.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
I mean, it's it has it's hard and about oh
whoa it's better in your mom's basement. I've done it
fifty times.
Speaker 4 (06:12):
So yeah, tough love, Jack, We need to slapping. Not sure,
Mamby Bamby's sympathy. So, uh, here's some stats for you.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
Now. You got to go back to the.
Speaker 4 (06:23):
Line like nineteen tens and twenties to have like those
mass movings that I was talking about every year. But
in the fifties and sixties, twenty percent of Americans would
move typically every year.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
One out of five every would move, you know, every year.
My family is one of them.
Speaker 4 (06:40):
Part of the slowing is that the US population is aged,
and so we're less likely to move as we age.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
But oh and two household earners. That gets a little
more complicated too. Sure we both gotta yeah, find your job.
Speaker 4 (06:53):
Sure, right, And this isn't a you know, this is
a bad thing and people should be condemned for it.
I mean, I think it might be, but it's okay.
It's just kind of an observation a change. So twenty
percent in the fifties and sixties, by twenty nineteen, the
year before COVID, it was nine point eight percent of Americans,
so a little less than half. Then you got the
(07:13):
COVID surge that was brief, but then in twenty twenty three,
only seven point eight percent of Americans moved, the lowest
rate logs since the US Census started records in nineteen
forty eight, and that number seems to have held steady
in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
And I come from a move in family. My dad
moved a lot.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
I lived a bunch of different places as a kid,
and then I've moved to tons, tons of times as
an adult.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
So I just I'm kind of built that way.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
So it's always interesting to me when I run into
people that you know, I'm sixth generation this or whatever.
You know, my I've been in the same area and
all your brothers and sisters, may everybody live there, And
I can see the tremendous advantage of that.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
Family wise, it would be awesome.
Speaker 1 (07:56):
Man, your kids have you have built in babysitters, Your
kids have all the cousins, nants and uncles by it.
Speaker 2 (08:01):
That's super cool. But oh yeah, as far as having
an opportunity job.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
Wise, I'm a big fan of going where they're hiring.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (08:13):
Yeah, indeed, so moving along to another Oh that's right,
I knew I had one more thought it's and they
profile in this piece in the Wall Street Journal a
lot of young families that are trying to like find
a bigger house because they're having kids or what have you.
And just the artificially low rates of covids and the
skyrocketing housing prices, just everybody's stuck. Well, we've talked about
(08:34):
that plenty of times, and the only thing that will
undo that is time. Final story, consumer oriented, Jack, you
love this one. France, So enlightened, so cultured France. They're sweltering,
sweltering under a heat wave this week, but the leadership
and climate schools are absolutely refusing to drop any of
(08:55):
their climate neutrality goals for whatever year in the future
they're talking about. And so the French government has gone hardcore,
suggesting energy sobriety, meaning don't use air conditioning. Air Conditioning
should be used only those who are very sensitive to heat,
elderly people who can't open the window at night, et cetera.
(09:18):
The rest of us should opt for a fan draw
the blinds, limit heat emissions from ovens, and if you
have to use AC, it has to be seventy eight
degrees or higher and only one room of your house.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
I'm tempted to tell this story. What would you say, Michael, If.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
It makes cha grin, leave it in, I will be
I got it. Advice, I have to be vague. You're
gonna be wanting more details on this. I know I
can't give them to you.
Speaker 4 (09:46):
I know you have to take off. Do you want
to do that before I can do the simply safe commercial?
Speaker 1 (09:50):
Yeah, let me tell you this story because you're gonna
want more details, like I said, Okay, and especially it's
gonna be especially astounding to you because you know how
few people are ever in my home. Yes, there was
somebody in my home, good lord, when California on one
of the days when California was like struggling with their
energy France like, because we have so much freaking green
(10:13):
energy that doesn't work, we can't keep up. Sometimes, right,
person in my home actually went to my thermostat and
turned it up because they thought it was so outrageous
that I was keeping it so cool in my home
when there are old people that may be dying if
the grid breaks down.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
And did they recover from their wounds? Why can't you
get your gun?
Speaker 1 (10:36):
I can't go any further with that story, but that
is amazing.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
So there are people that have that point of view.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
You're killing old people by keeping your house comfortable at
this temperature.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
Wow. Wow.
Speaker 4 (10:48):
Guy who reaches over and changes your radio in the
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Speaker 2 (11:38):
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that's simplysafe dot com slash armstrong. There's no safe like
simply safe. There is a term we learned last week
(12:08):
that explains so much preference falsification and then a preference cascade.
Want to talk about that next stay with.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
Us Armstrong and.
Speaker 5 (12:22):
At least Gavin comes here. People ask me all the time,
why haven't you ever had Hillary or Bill Clinton on?
Why didn't you have Kamala on during the last campaign.
You think we don't ask. We ask these people every week.
They say no, it took eight years and a petition to.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
Get Obama on.
Speaker 5 (12:40):
And these are people all people I voted for.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
Think about that.
Speaker 5 (12:44):
They're afraid to come on the show of a guy
who voted for them.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
They Republicans.
Speaker 5 (12:48):
They show up when they do, they take their beating
like a man.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
Bill Maher on Friday night.
Speaker 4 (12:58):
He'd been talking prior to that about a story we
talked about the Democrat congressman who had daughters in sports
and said he didn't want the UH the daughters to
get beat up on the field, to play by boys
masquerading his girls, cause playing his girls, which some for
some reasons, some really mentally disturbed people take seriously and
(13:19):
think you can actually be the other sex.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
I mean, it is.
Speaker 4 (13:23):
It's borderline psychotic anyway, for defending girls' sports, this Democratic
congressman was called a Nazi by by a bunch of
you know, radical leftists, and was thinking, he's you know,
he's got to be thinking, man, am I in the
right political party? Anyway, mar went on, I would love to.
Speaker 5 (13:44):
Have AOC on the show and Mondamie and Elizabeth Warrenck,
but I can't subpoena the guests, and I can't fix that.
What the Democrats are scared of more than anything else,
I mean, obviously besides Gluten.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
Is being prime. I'm married from the far left.
Speaker 5 (14:01):
Even though most Democrats are not far left, they're mild,
mattered and moderate, at least at my bath house. If
there is one practical thing that Democrats can do right
now that would help them regain power, inspire your moderates
to vote in the primaries.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
Get that base excited. You have the numbers.
Speaker 5 (14:23):
After Congressman Moulton made his comment about his daughter not
getting run over. He added, but as a Democrat, I'm
supposed to be afraid to say that. Well, then change
what you're supposed to.
Speaker 2 (14:32):
Be afraid of.
Speaker 4 (14:35):
Yeah, well said I'm struck by the odd situation where
I mean, for instance, in Iowa, they've got a governor's
race coming out up in the Incomban is not running
on the Republican side, and so it's, you know, it's
a fairly wide open race and one of the leading
Democrats who's going for the job is a gun and
(14:56):
hunting enthusiast, proudly Christian. I'm trying to remember all the
different stances he had, very very Midwestern conservative, regular guy
who's running is Democrat, and the Republican Party's like, yeah,
(15:16):
this guy's a threat. He's a really credible candidate. He's
practically one of us. I mean, blah blah blah.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
I'd love to see more of that.
Speaker 4 (15:23):
I don't know exactly in what sense he's a Democrat now,
except that it's a brand and he perceives that there's
a better opening for him with that logo on his.
Speaker 2 (15:35):
You know, racing suit than the other one.
Speaker 4 (15:39):
Even though he's espousing beliefs that are utterly foreign to
so much of the Democratic Party right now. So I
don't what does it mean to say he's a Democrat.
I don't know exactly. Again, I just think it's a
branding thing. So can't wait for the next segment. A
big new study has some bad news and good news
for us. The good news is bigger than the bad news.
(16:02):
The bad news is that the college kids have absolutely
been bullied into agreeing with the neo Marxist postmodern party line,
and they do in huge numbers. The good news is
they don't mean it. They had to be bullied, but
(16:25):
they don't believe nearly in as big as numbers as
you might imagine what you think they do. So that's
really interesting. Can't wait to get to it. And it
relates directly to this story we were talking about last week.
I think it was last late in the show, and
I really wanted to get it on for you good folks.
The idea of preference falsification and then a preference cascade.
(16:46):
And this fella what is his name? It's a really
good piece. Oh that's right, Glenn Harlan Reynolds. He's a
professor law at the University of Tennessee. He's writing about
the immigration crisis in Britain and how the British government
has passed all sorts of draconian laws that would never
ever pass muster in this country because of the First Amendment.
(17:08):
But these laws that say you can't cause anybody discomfort
or or or issue speech that might incite race hatred,
it's all very very vague, and that's caused is something
called preference falsification, where it looks like everybody agrees with
(17:28):
for instance, the government stands because they've been made to
pretend to agree with that, but they don't. But you're
looking around and you're saying, I think this is madness,
and you know, rampant immigration from Somalia is a threat
to our way of life and our culture at all.
But I don't see anybody disagreeing with me. So I
guess I'm in a small minority. But that's because of
(17:49):
preference falsification. And then when people fight back against it
and say, you know what, I'm going to say what
I believe, whether I get in trouble or not, all
of a sudden everybody realizes, wait a minute, everybody around
me is believed what I believed all along. And that's
when you get what's called a preference cascade and people
are more open about it. Are we on the cusp
(18:10):
of a preference cascade and our universities could be stay
with us, Armstrong and getty.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
According to a new study, twelve percent of Americans fine
Sadney Sweeney's American Eagle ad offensive. The other eighty eight
percent are able to fit in jeans.
Speaker 4 (18:29):
Wow wow, Gottfeld, the mean boy in high school. So,
speaking of attitudes were supposed to hold you remember when
we were supposed to take seriously for about ninety seconds,
the idea that, oh, no good jeans, jeans, blue jeans,
jeans with blue eyes. But the white supremacy, but the eugenics.
These people, oh my gosh, they're so nuts.
Speaker 2 (18:52):
And here's the key.
Speaker 4 (18:54):
So few people actually agree with them. So we're talking
last segment about preference falsification, and I'll describe to you
exactly what it is. This is a great description from
Glenn Reynolds, who's a professor of law at University of Tennessee,
one of those southern universities where people are flocking now
(19:16):
because everybody realizes, oh, they like teach you stuff. There,
and don't just indoctrinate you into being a good Marxist
like the Ivy League. Anyway, So here's this description of
a preference falsification. It's a move usually practiced by authoritarian regimes,
but now democracies are catching on to it. The trick
(19:37):
is you make citizens pretend that they believe what the
government says, or what.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
The powers that be say.
Speaker 4 (19:47):
He's talking about immigration in Britain, and so the government
is the correct target. We're talking about education, so it's
more the administration, the professors and stuff. But anyway, the
trick is they make citizens pre tend they believe what
the administration says and fake their approval of what it does.
You promote marches and demonstrations and speech in favor of
(20:09):
the preferred positions, and you severely punish marches and demonstrations
and speech that oppose those favored positions. You give excuses
like stopping you know, racism or fighting hate speech for
shutting down any opposition. You may even have informers that
ferret out wrong think and report it to the authorities
or to employers or to third parties who will engage
(20:31):
in extra legal harassment if you do it.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
Right.
Speaker 4 (20:34):
You can have upward of ninety percent of your population
hating you and your policies, but doing.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
And saying nothing about them.
Speaker 4 (20:42):
Because everyone in the ninety percent thinks they're part of
a tiny minority, resistance will seem futile. This works until
it doesn't. The problem with preference falsification is that sooner
or later, some avenor development can make people realize that
what they've been told as popular is in fact very unpopular.
When this happens, this Duke University scholar Timika Ran writes
(21:05):
in his book Private Truth's Public Lives, the result is
a preference cascade. Let's when a large swath of the
population realizes their dissionent views are in fact widely held.
They become less afraid of the government or the administration,
or the professors or the media, and less hesitant about
sharing their true sentiments. And then everybody realizes, all of
(21:27):
a sudden, oh my gosh, not only have I not
been a designing minority all the way, all the time,
I've been in the strong majority.
Speaker 2 (21:34):
And by the way, we're right.
Speaker 4 (21:36):
And my prayer is that this is going to happen
at some point in the American educational system. Although my gosh,
They've got the teachers, they got the faculty, they got
the administration, and they're bullying the.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
Kids to wit.
Speaker 4 (21:50):
Really interesting Peace in the Hill by a couple of guys,
the researchers Forrest Drahm and Kevin Waldman, on today's colleg campuses.
Students are not maturing, they're managing. Beneath the facade of
progressive slogans and institutional virtue signaling lies a quiet psychological
(22:10):
crisis driven by the demands of ideological conformity. I first
read the right upon this from an opinion writer in
the Wall Street Journal. I'm very pleased to see this
as in The Hill, which is a very mainstream slash
left leaning, because you know, their readership is people who
(22:32):
work in Washington, d c. Generally in government or lobbyists
and on who depend on government, and that crowd tends
to be left leaning.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Obviously they like more big government.
Speaker 4 (22:43):
So the fact that this is being published in the
Hill and has gotten a bit of attention is very encouraging.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Anyway. So here's the story. Between twenty twenty three and.
Speaker 4 (22:51):
Twenty twenty five, these guys conducted about fifteen hundred confidential
interviews with undergrads at a couple of universities, Northwestern and
University of Michigan. We were not studying politics, We were
studying development. Our question was clinical, not political. Quote, what
happens to identity formation? Which is part of becoming an adult?
Speaker 2 (23:13):
Who am I? What do I believe? Right?
Speaker 4 (23:15):
What happens to identity formation when belief is replaced by
adherents to orthodoxy instead of painstakingly trying to understand the
world and coming to a set of beliefs, instead you're
just told you need to adhere to this point of view.
Speaker 2 (23:34):
What happens to identity formation?
Speaker 4 (23:37):
We asked, have you ever pretended to hold more progressive
views than you truly endorse to succeed socially or academically?
Speaker 2 (23:45):
You want to know what percentage said? Yes? Eighty eight percent.
Speaker 4 (23:52):
Eighty eight percent said they pretended to hold more progressive
views than they truly endorse to succeed socially or academically.
These students were not cynical, but adaptive. In a campus
environment where grades, leadership and peer belonging often hinge on
fluency in performative morality, young adults quickly learn to rehearse
(24:13):
what is safe. The result is not conviction or beliefs,
but compliance, and beneath that compliance, something vital is lost.
Quoting now from the authors, late adolescents in early adulthood
represent a narrow and non replicable developmental window. It's during
(24:33):
this stage that individuals begin the lifelong work of integrating
personal experiences with inherited values, forming the foundations of moral reasoning,
internal coherence, and emotional resilience. Oh my gosh, emotional resilience toughness.
When belief is prescriptive, meaning you're told what to believe,
(24:57):
and ideological divergence or disagreement is treated as social risk,
that integrative process stalls, rather than forging a durable sense
of self. Through trial, error and reflection, students learn to
compartmentalize publicly they can form privately. They question often in isolation.
(25:17):
Oh but remember what we were just talking about. With
a preference falsification and preference cascade, they only think they're
in isolation.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
Well, I guess they are in isolation.
Speaker 4 (25:27):
But sows everybody around them thinking the same things.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
So insidious.
Speaker 4 (25:33):
This split between outer presentation and inner conviction not only
fragments identity but arrests its development, and the dissonance shows
up everywhere. Seventy eight percent of the students told us
they self censor on their beliefs surrounding gender identity. Seventy
eight percent believe all that gender pending madness is madness,
(26:00):
but they got to be quiet. Seventy two percent do
that on politics in general. Sixty eight percent on family values.
I mean, that's a lot smaller number than the seventy
eight percent that are they're soft pedaling their views on
gender bending manners, But sixty eight percent on just general
family values are soft pedaling their views. Our college students
(26:25):
are so much more conservative and sane than you think
they are, partly because who gets amplified and applauded and publicized.
They're radical, lefty lunatic front. The normy kids just they
they're afraid, so they're quiet, and they certainly don't make
(26:45):
any noise, and if they do, they're they're punished or
ignored anyway. More than eighty percent so they had submitted
class work that misrepresented their views in order to align
with professors. For many, this has become second nature, an
instinct for academic and professional self preservation. Listen, maybe it
was because I was clueless or stubborn or something as
(27:07):
a youngster. But when I was in school and I
was in a political science, economics, pre law program that
had lots and lots and lots of the sort of
stuff we're talking about in it, I never once misrepresented
my view in order to align with a professor. Maybe
I didn't have a you at that point, but that's terrible.
(27:31):
To test the gap between expression and belief, we used
gender discourse, a contentious topic, both highly visible and ideological,
ideologically loaded, right the authors In public, students were echoed,
I'm sorry. In public, students echoed expected progressive narratives. In private, however,
their views were more complex. Eighty seven percent identified as
(27:53):
exclusively heterosexual eighty seven percent and supported a binary model
of gender. There's men and there's women, period. That's eighty
seven percent. Nine percent expressed partial openness to gender fluidity.
Seven percent embraced the idea of gender as a broad spectrum.
(28:16):
And most of these belong to activist circles. Practically nobody
believed there's fifty eight genders and you get to choose
what you are. Practically nobody seven percent. How different is
this from the perception we've all formed of what college
kids actually think because they've been psychologically battered into conformity.
(28:41):
I am not a violent man, but I swear to God,
I'd like to take a bulldozer to a lot of
our college campuses. Metaphorically, of course. Perhaps most telling, seventy
seven percent, and these are college kids said they disagreed
with the idea that gender identity should override biological sex
in domains such as sports, healthcare, or public data, but
(29:05):
would never voice that disagreement allowed. So of the eighty
seven percent that say, no, there's dudes and there's gals,
that's it eighty seven percent. All but ten percent of
those said I would never say that out loud. Holy crap.
(29:27):
These poor kids are bullied. It's Stockholm syndrome. They're terrified
to speak their minds II Karama. Thirty eight percent described
themselves as morally confused, uncertain whether honesty was still ethical,
if it meant exclusion, whatever that means. Authenticity, once considered
a good thing for all of us, psychologically, has become
(29:50):
a social liability, and this fragmentation does not end at
the classroom door. Seventy three percent of students reported mistrust
in conversations about these values with close friends. They were
afraid to even talk to their friends.
Speaker 2 (30:03):
That's that preference falsification. That's its direct fruit.
Speaker 4 (30:13):
They're sure they're friends, excuse me disagree with them, even
though eighty seven percent agree with them, They're terrified to
say anything out loud. This is not simply peer pressure.
It is identity regulation at scale. Being institutionalized, universities often
(30:34):
justified these dynamics in the name of inclusion, But inclusion
that demands dishonesty is not ensuring psychological safety. It is
sanctioning self abandonment. In attempting to engineer moral unity, higher
education is mistaken consensus for growth and compliance for care,
and the students know it's wrong. When they're given permission
(30:55):
to speak freely. Many describe the experience of participating is
not only liberating but clarifying. For students trained to perform
the act of telling the truth felt radical. Finally, if
higher education is to fulfill its promise as a site
of intellectual and moral development, it must relearn the difference
(31:18):
between support and supervision. It must recenter truth, not consensus,
as its animating value, and it must give back to
students what has been taken from them, the right to
believe in the space to become. I don't know how
exactly you can join this fight. Maybe it's by supporting
organizations or I don't know, podcasts, radio shows that are
(31:38):
fighting the fight. But man, we've got to win this
for the youngsters. They are being mentally and intellectually tortured
and bullied by these monsters, these monsters in their ivory towers,
and it's got to stop.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
End of screed. Stay with us.
Speaker 6 (32:01):
So in order for there to be a piece deal,
this is just a fact. We may not like it,
it may not be pleasant, it may be distasteful, but
in order for there to be an end of the war,
there are things Russia wants that it cannot get, and
there are things Ukraine wants that it's not going to get.
Speaker 2 (32:14):
Both sides are going to have to give up.
Speaker 6 (32:16):
Something in order to get to the table in order
to make this happen. That's just the way it is.
And I mean, as soon as we accept that that's
the reality.
Speaker 4 (32:23):
I think it's smart time capitulation. Neville Chamberlain.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
I think Mark went on, I think Marco went on
five shows yesterday.
Speaker 2 (32:32):
Man, that would be a long day.
Speaker 1 (32:34):
And whitcoff on two. More so seven shows covered by
the Trump administration explaining what's the right word, it's not prejudicial,
what's going on and what happened on Friday. So we'll
get into that more in an hour three what Marco
had to say, and you'll either agree with or you won't.
Speaker 2 (32:51):
But here's the schedule for day.
Speaker 1 (32:53):
And this is historic. This has never happened in world
history where you've had this many European leaders meeting at
the White House at one time. This has just never
ever happened again before. Now, part of it has travel
made it impossible up until.
Speaker 2 (33:10):
Seventies eighties, but still it's never happened.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
All these different European leaders are going to arrive at
the White House at noon today, White House time, south Portico,
White House, press pool, TV crew, still photographers only people
will be shouting questions. Of course, whether Trump answers any
or not is always completely up to him. But you
got macrona France, you got Starmer of Great Britain, you
got Mertz of Germany, you got what's her name from
(33:38):
Italy who is a testee buster herself and big on
supporting Ukraine. But anyway, all these world leaders are going
to be here. Then the President is participating in a
bilateral meeting in the Oval Office with President Zelensky of Ukraine.
(33:58):
That's just the President and Zelensky. The European leaders aren't
gonna be in there.
Speaker 4 (34:03):
Huh.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
So they're all getting there, but they ain't gonna be
in the meeting with Zolensky. It's gonna be Trump and
jade E Vance.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
No, you don't have the cards. Have you ever said
thank you? Jade Vance will be there. Uh So, see
how that goes.
Speaker 1 (34:18):
There is reporting that Zelensky's wearing a suit jacket without
a tie as opposed to his military garb.
Speaker 2 (34:25):
Since do you even own a suit? Became a thing?
Speaker 4 (34:28):
Lest o, my completely irrelevant. People are dying.
Speaker 1 (34:32):
It is completely irrelevant. But so that was news to
me that the Trump and Zelensky thing. I mean, so
all that talk about the European leaders are going there
to help Zelensky if he gets attacked, they ain't gonna
do any good when it's Trump, JD and Zelensky alone
in the Oval Office.
Speaker 4 (34:49):
Yeah, although obviously this strategy is for all of the
euro leaders to blunt any idea that Zolensky's being unreasonable
when he says Putin can't be trusted. They are going
to stand up one after the other and say everything
he says is lies.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
Right a half to remember that right after the bilateral meeting,
the President meets all the European leaders, and they're having
a meeting, a multilateral meeting with European leaders at three,
so a full two hours later. So, man, there's some
jazzy stuff that could happen today news wise. I mean,
it's I hope it doesn't go off the rails because
(35:27):
that wouldn't serve anybody. But it certainly the possibility exists
at a pretty high level for things to go off
the rails.
Speaker 2 (35:34):
Don't you think? Yes?
Speaker 4 (35:38):
Yeah, well I would say that there could be enormous
news made today in a number of different directions.
Speaker 2 (35:44):
You mentioned it last week.
Speaker 4 (35:45):
Trump has the reputation for being swayed by the last
person he talks to, and obviously the Euros plus Zelensky
are are anxious for that to happen, and it could
be they will sway him.
Speaker 2 (36:01):
I just I have no idea which way this thing goes.
Speaker 1 (36:04):
I don't either. I think we'll have a much clearer
idea what Friday was all about after today.
Speaker 2 (36:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (36:15):
Yeah, one thing that's guaranteed, the idea that news won't
be made. Yeah, there will be plenty of news made today.
And if you missed a segment or an hour of this show,
get the podcast Armstrong and Getty on demand
Speaker 2 (36:28):
Armstrong and Getty
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Joe Getty
Jack Armstrong
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