May 11, 2026 • 47 mins
Not just from Jim Rose and me, but from Sen. Ricketts, a Regent candidate, and lots of your emails and Talkback Mic messages. (Our "Official Conspiracy Theorist, Lucy Chapman, was restrained by a team of professionals who kept her busy with the UFO files dumped over the weekend.)
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thank you for being with us, and good morning. That's
Lucy Chapman. You just heard from Craig Evans as well.
I'm Scott Vorhees. Jim Rose is right here. What is
everyone's level of concern about the now seventeen Americans exposed
to the Hunt of virus who are currently at the
University of Nebraska Medical Center. Because I'll tell you the
(00:22):
national media you can't measure how little they care. The
national media is like, oh my gosh, we're bringing people
who are exposed to the Haunt of virus into America,
where they're going, Omaha, oh okay.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Bring you tired, you're hungry seeking the right to be
free and be quarantined. If you get nailed with a virus,
that's us. That's our new state modo. But that's the
huddled masses of infected hunt of viruses.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
All right, Let's also define this one. I have always
heard and said haunt of virus. Now you've got some
people in the media saying haunt a virus. Can we
at least agree on a pronunciation going forward? What do
we like, what do we want? Who wants to step
up and be chief pronunciator this morning?
Speaker 3 (01:11):
Haunt? Well, Jim. Okay, I say, I like haunted too. Jim.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
You are always pronouncing things to be true even when
they're not, do you.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
And if they're not true at the time, they eventually
become true. A haunt of virus to me, I don't
have it yet. Well, now you're saying Haunta virus. I
could call them the Houthi virus, but that would that
would involve militants in the Middle East.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Yeah, okay, well we we don't have that dynamic in
town right now. Well, not that I know of. So
we have these these officials who are here. But when
you're talking about being quarantined, that's not exactly what happens.
Some people are like, wait a second, they're gonna be
monitored and then discharged. They're not going to be quarantined.
(01:56):
What we're hearing from CDC is that none of the
seventeen Americans aboard the ship who are now here in
Omaha as of the last few hours, have tested positive
for the virus. They don't. There's one American who tested
(02:17):
positive but doesn't have any symptoms, and he's in the
Nebraska or she is in the Nebraska biocontainment unit separate
from the quarantine unit, but it says federal officials currently
do not plan to mandate quarantine when they arrive in Nebraska. Now,
that doesn't mean that they come out and say, hey,
(02:38):
let's go get a bite to eat here. I heard
the zoo is really nice. It's not like stop by
the med center every once in a while and we'll
take your temperature. They're receiving health evaluations now, and they'll
either stay in the quarantine unit or return home, where
they'll essentially be on they're not using the term house arrest,
(02:59):
but they go home and then they're on house arrests,
monitoring their own symptoms for forty two days while remaining
in contact with local health officials. In fact, there's one
the symptomatic person I mentioned before is going to be
in the biocontainment unit, and then at some point we'll
be transported to Washington, d C. You think you've had
(03:21):
a bad layover, this is Spain to Omaha, back to Washington,
d C. I don't know the timetable on that individual.
But for people to say, why can't we have like
a remote island somewhere where we take people with things
like a new strain of the hantavirus that spreads from
(03:42):
person to person, which apparently we've not seen before. Is
there any possible way we can have that go to
you know, an island somewhere, or Grand Island, maybe not Omaha. Well,
you know that we have this unit at the med
Center and it gets used all the time. Casey says,
good morning, team, Why is this a story? There have
(04:04):
been eight hundred and ninety cases of the haunt of
virus in the last thirty years.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
Stop the fear mongering.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. It's Monday morning. It's very
early on a Monday morning. Why are you yelling at me?
Don't yell at us yet, Scott atkfab dot com. You
can email as well via the Zonker's custom was inbox
here on news radio eleven ten KFAB. I expect that
(04:30):
the emailer here. I'm not sure where Casey gets the
number eight hundred and ninety cases in the last thirty years.
I imagine it's higher than that. I imagine it's a
lot higher than that. I mean, looking here at the
year twenty twenty five, there were two hundred and twenty
some cases of the haunt of virus in I think
this might be just in the America's not in the
(04:53):
United States, but yeah, in in mostly South America, particularly
Argentina two hundred and twenty nine cases, fifty nine deaths.
You don't want the haunt of virus. Now, they say, well,
this particular strain, we're concerned about it because maybe it's
spread from person to person that generally doesn't do that.
Usually you get the haunt of virus when you go
(05:15):
and you start rolling around in rat droppings, which you know, hey, however,
you spend your weekends your business. But so obviously the
concern is, do we have a new strain of this
particular virus, Why are they coming to Omaha, And what
do you mean they're not going to have to quarantine.
They say that they'll be monitored and assessed and then
(05:36):
go home for a self monitoring period of forty two
days where they check in with healthcare workers. And people say, yeah,
but if this is a deadly disease and we're counting
on people to do the right thing, I don't trust
people to do the right thing when they say, all right,
(05:57):
you might have a disease that could kill humanity, as
we know, so go home and don't go walking around. Okay,
I can go to Walmart, though, no, no, no, no,
let's review go home and don't go walking around all right,
other than when I go to the nursing home to
visit my dad. You're not getting this, So we're trusting
(06:18):
people to do the right thing. That's obviously a concern
when you start looking at it that way. But this
is not the first time Omaha has been the hub
for a deadly strain of virus that could kill us all.
We have the Ebola in and out of here more
often than the Berkshire Hathaway meeting. This happens not like
(06:40):
you know, every single week or anything. But certainly there
are people who have come to Omaha. They've been in
this particular biocontainment unit in this area of un MC,
and you don't usually hear about it, and they come
here and say, yeah, I think I got a mild
case of the ebola. And they said, all right, we'll
(07:03):
have a seat and we'll we'll take a look. And
this happens. This is the This is like the federal
National Quarantine Unit right here in Omaha, Nebraska. And certainly
there are people here in Omaha who say, but I
don't want a national quarantine unit because I live here
(07:24):
and my kids and grandkids live here and I don't
and my or my kid works at the med center.
These guys are not walking up and down the halls,
you know, getting a little exercise. They are in quarantine.
And then but you said that they'll go home, yeah,
when they feel like it's safe. But even then, they're
(07:46):
kind of having themselves quarantine. And we just have to
hope that all these people know what they're doing. Isn't
that what it's always about, hoping that everyone who makes
the decision lives their life knows what they're doing. Lucy,
you've got a bigger concern and have been hit by
an oncoming car and traffic today and getting the haunt
of virus based on true these people coming here to Omaha,
(08:07):
and and I love your critical thinking.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
Thank you?
Speaker 4 (08:09):
All right?
Speaker 3 (08:10):
Do you feel better? I mean it didn't feel bad.
Speaker 4 (08:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:13):
Now I'm not driving home today.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
But let's get on to sports brief because we have
some celebration to a note in this edition of the
eleven to ten KFAB Certified Transmission Sports Brief, here is
Jim Rose.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
Okay, Scott, good morning, everybody, Even though Iowa isn't very good,
there was pressure on the Husker baseball team this weekend,
and Nebraska didn't blink. Swept to the Hawkeyes three straight,
clubbed them yesterday in the finale, eight to six. After
the dreadful performance of the played a week ago. Coach
Will Bolt was pleased with the offense.
Speaker 5 (08:44):
Well, we had for thirty thousand of our best friends
behind us on this one, so that that certainly helps.
We obviously turned the tide offensively, and you know, put
a lot of pressure on Iowa a whole weekend, and you
know just kind of felt inevitable that we had another
big inning coming in that game, and you know, it's
good to see us finish the.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Off Huskers scored thirty three runs in front of capacity
crowds inch The Huskers back up to fifteenth in the
RPI with three games against Minnesota. The Gophers aren't horrible.
They're not very good hitters, but a decent staff. They
only have two top fifty wins prior to that trip
up there. Nebraska is playing Creighton at schwab Field midweek. Meanwhile,
it's good to be Husker softball. Big Red captures the
(09:23):
Big Ten Tournament on Saturday, and was named a top
four national seed for the coming NCAA tournament that means
hosting all the way to the College World Series, Go Toronto.
Speaker 3 (09:33):
Ravel says, we aren't surprised.
Speaker 6 (09:35):
We've been having the same message in preseason, during the season,
as we've gotten into postseason, and now as we get
deeper into postseason, and it's a message that has really
resonated with our team, and we just we need to
just stay with it. Like I've told you guys all along,
we want to be boring.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
The Super Regional starts on Friday. Huskers are hosting South
Dakota in the six to thirty game at Boland Stadium.
The other side is Louisville versus Grand Canyon State Big
League Baseball. Yesterday afternoon and last night, the Royals did
not complete that sweep against the Tigers. Detroit gets game
three six to three. The White Sox over Seattle, Twins
beat Cleveland, the Los Angeles Angels six to one over Toronto,
(10:13):
Tampa Bay four to one over Boston. Baltimore beat the
A's two to one National League winners from Miami and Philly.
The Giants, Braves, d Backs, and Padres Italy played, Texas three,
the Cubs nothing, Milwaukee four, the Yankees three, Reds five,
Houston zero, Omaha nine, Indianapolis nothing. In NBA playoff action,
that's it for the next and Sixers. New York wins
(10:36):
Game four one forty four, one fourteen. So that's a
four game sweep of the Sixers. They're out and onto
the finals goes New York, Minnesota one fourteen and San
Antonio one oh nine. That series is tied up at two.
Hockey playoffs Anaheim and gold and Vegas. The Golden Knights
are tied up at two to two after four games
after Anaheim wins Game four four to three, and in
(10:57):
Game three Montreal six.
Speaker 3 (11:01):
I s y am I.
Speaker 2 (11:02):
Nebraska and Illinois football will not be playing for the
TGIF Trophy the Big Ten Conference and announce we're playing
them again on another Friday night this year. Oh goody
November fourth, think that November sixth. It's the November sixth
or November fourth, November sixth, down in or over in Champagne, Illinois.
So I guess high school sports doesn't matter in Illinois
or Nebraska sports. His news on Nebraska's news weathern traffic station.
Speaker 1 (11:26):
The term fear porn is trending in the Zonkers custom
was inbox this morning, Scott atkfab dot com.
Speaker 7 (11:35):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
In this context, Michael emails and says, how about we
not give this latest virus that frankly stupid people contracted
while bird watching in an Argentina landfill any oxygen. We've
seen this boring movie. And another thing, how in the
hell did seventeen Americans managed to wind up on some
(11:57):
pathetic cruise ship from the Netherlands to even remotely chance
and exposure to some rare virus. Enough of the fear porn,
as I said, fear porness trending in the Zonker's custom
woods inbox. Fred emails and says, am I the only
one who finds it odd that not one single video
(12:17):
of someone on that ship complaining or giving details about
being stuck on the ship. Call me skeptical, but I'm
calling bs on anyone even being on that ship floating
lab more like it. Let me guess wear two masks
stay ten feet apart. No symptoms is a symptom, super spreaders.
We're all gonna die for the eleventy billionth time. That's
(12:39):
from Fred said to Scott A kfab dot com. Well,
we're talking about this because, as Lucia points out, Omaha
was the lead story on Fox this morning at six o'clock.
We have the nations. We're good at communicable diseases here. Yeah,
well we're really good at that. We're good at not
(13:01):
having the alleged communical communicable diseases be communicable. We want
to contain them. It's not called the communical I'm to
have a trouble with this one set. It's not called
the communicable disease unit. It's called the containment unit.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
Yeah, but we're good at if you've got a communicable disease,
we want you here. So just roll into town. Just
please wear a mask and rubber gloves. That's all we ask.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Now, I don't if you've got to if your stuff
full of ebola, you want to be in Omaha. I
don't blame people like the couple of emails I read
there from saying, oh, come on, this isn't a big
deal because Omaha, to your point, Jim has been able
to prove time and time again with ebola or whatever,
that we can contain some of these deadly diseases, viruses,
(13:48):
whatever and not have it suddenly start spreading all over town.
We've done a really good job at that. That's why
Omaha is the nation's national quarantine unit. I also don't
blame people say things like, why is the national quarantine
unit in the middle of America? Why not on some
remote island? What are they doing over there on Epstein's Island?
(14:09):
Why not do it there? Which is a fair point.
And as far as this, like, wait a second, these
guys are gonna be off the cruise ship where apparently
people were getting this handa virus, and everyone is now
the pronunciation guides are all saying hantavirus, So I'll switch
and go with hantavirus. But people are saying, well, people
(14:32):
are getting this thing and then their heads were blowing up,
But why are we allowing them to go home? I
understand where people are leery about that, because both when
it comes to the coronavirus, you had some people who
got tested positive for COVID and we thought, well, that
person's a goner, and then they shook it off like
(14:52):
it was a mild hangnail and it wasn't a big deal.
And so therefore, when there ends up being something like
a disease that could wipe half of us off the
planet in an instant. Then people are not going to
heed the precautions because you personal responsibility and human nature
(15:13):
being what it is. There'll be people like those who've
been emailing, going, ah, this isn't a big deal. I
was told to put a mask on as stupid. And
then people will say, all right, go home, don't go
out and monitor yourself for forty two days. And unless
someone is incubating the worst virus the world's ever seen,
who suddenly is just writing the subway all over New
(15:35):
York City and saying, oh, I thought I was fine.
Speaker 3 (15:38):
You know.
Speaker 1 (15:38):
So when we have to rely on human nature and
self responsibility for other people, that's when we get very
very leary because we don't trust other people. Well, we
can't trust the government, you can't trust the health organizations.
After what happened with the coronavirus, the coronavirus was made
out to be the black plague, told that people would
(16:01):
bodies would be stacked up like cordwood on street corner,
and none of that ever happened. It was very very
contained and it didn't cost people many lives that weren't
already had one foot on a banana peel and the
other one in a casket. So the people that really
struggled with the coronavirus had about four or five other
major problems when it hit them. Now, I'm not saying
(16:21):
that those who got sick didn't get really sick, but
this notion that this was going to be the bubonic
plague all over again was just crap, and it was
It was designed to derail the economy to make sure
that Donald Trump was injured up before the twenty twenty election.
It was a chance for school systems in the teachers'
union to get a whole bunch more money, and it
(16:43):
crippled the economy. And right now we have a bunch
of sixth graders that can't add two and two together
because they were cut out of public schools for a
whole year and asked to be online when their teacher
was online. It didn't work. It was a disaster.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
It'll cost this country trillions of dollars, say nothing of
the impact on families and communities and everywhere else. So
I understand if people are going, oh, yeah, I keep
it moving. I've heard this one before, because everybody said,
oh look out now, man, you gotta stay inside. You
got to pull the shades down and the covers over
your head for the next two months or you're gonna die.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
Jim, you just gave an excellent bit of twenty twenty
hindsight when it came to COVID and what it bec
was saying it at the time, but you weren't saying
it in those first two weeks to flatten the curb.
When President Trump came out and said, all right, we
got to deal with this in two weeks, stay inside,
he kind of did, because the Corona virus was in
(17:38):
the same department continued to use that phrase as things
like SARS and mers and sars and mrs. Because we
didn't have a million people get these viruses and then
take a look at the morbidity rates and all the
rest of the stuff. These things were connected to a
(17:58):
ten and thirteen percent death rate, respectively. And so when
they were looking at that information at the very beginning
for this particular COVID coronavirus, and they're like, wait a second,
this isn't the same family and stuff. With a ten
percent death rate, we could lose ten percent of the population.
They had to do. They had to shut everything down.
(18:19):
I don't blame anyone for any decisions they made early on,
just like when it comes to the hantavirus, you don't
want it now. I don't blame anyone for saying, like,
all right, let's make sure these particular cruise ship. And
when they say cruise ship, this is some boat of
bird washers that went down to antarcticas they thought that
(18:40):
was a good idea. Find whatever. I don't blame anyone
for being extra cautious on this. But you are one
hundred percent right when you talk about what it became.
And I'll add this bit of gravy on to that serving.
You just gave us the number of people, the very
large Archer percentage of people who want all of that
(19:02):
to happen again. They want all the restrictions, they want
all the behavior changes. They want to stay home from work.
They the kids certainly want to stay home from school.
They want disruption, they they want all these gas guzzling
vehicles off the road. They want all of those things again.
And there are certainly those in positions of power who
(19:23):
are looking at this going, oh boy, now, it's important
not to let it become that. My concern though, on
the other side, of that is, if we actually get
something that could kill us all, you'll have people like
you and me out there going, ah, I forget it,
I'm not going to do any of this stuff. And
then you know, but thankfully the people at un MC,
they're not walking around going I don't need to wear.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
This hazmat suit. This is all a bunch of bunk.
Keep that darro. But yeah, it's fine, and let them out.
Let them go to the zoo.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
You know, they they have they're very specially trained professionals.
And I am glad and honored that Omaha has this
place so we can take people to bring them here
to potentially save lives, because that's what I would want
to happen to you.
Speaker 2 (20:04):
And of course, but it's there's a difference between addressing
an acute pending need, which is what the UNMC people do.
When somebody comes in and they're at the ninety percentile
of abola, that's when they swing into action. The problem
was the reaction to that coronavirus was so off the charts.
(20:26):
You remember they had GM overnight switch from making cars
to ventilators. Yeah, and then we found out that the
ventilators actually did more harm than good.
Speaker 3 (20:35):
This is in twenty twenty.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
You think we'd advance a little bit, but no, it
became a political football. And I remember Ben Sas standing
up in front of the United States Center, What are
we doing here? Why don't we just load money into
an airplane and fly over cities and drop it. All
they had to do to keep from crippling the economy
and destroying the employment quotion and ratio in our country
(20:57):
was to simply say, we're covering payrolls for the next
month and then you're back on your own. Instead, what
we did we paid people to stay home, We paid
companies to fire people. We had the Los Angeles Lakers
getting thirty five million to support their payroll. The Los
Angeles Lakers, this is and they still didn't get web
(21:17):
they and they still didn't get into the playoff.
Speaker 1 (21:20):
Now, let's think about this. You're on the ship. You
feel fine, you want to get back to your life.
You've got stuff to do, you got people to see,
and you don't want to infect anyone. But at the
same time, you're like, look, I've been I got off,
I was on this ship here a week ago. I
don't have any symptoms. You're telling me I got to
stay home for forty two days. You sprain me down
(21:43):
with some some sort of solution. You send me to Omaha, Nebraska.
You tell me, hey, you're fine, and this particular hand
to virus strain does not spread easily between people. The
rest of the public remains low. But we still want
you to go home and stay home for four two days.
Can they do that to you?
Speaker 3 (22:04):
Well?
Speaker 2 (22:05):
Ah, who's the jurisdiction, Who gets to decide? Who makes
the decision? Who's the medical judge? We went through this before,
doctor Anthony Fauci. Do we want doctor Anthony Fauci back
up here?
Speaker 1 (22:19):
No?
Speaker 3 (22:19):
Probably not.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
So is there a legal precedent for keeping somebody in
there now? I mean, you can probably make a case that, hey,
you don't want to be out there running the bases
a chwab Field before the Nebraska Creton game given what
you have, But.
Speaker 3 (22:33):
But you don't have it.
Speaker 1 (22:34):
You haven't tested positive, you haven't tested positive, you don't
have any symptoms.
Speaker 3 (22:39):
Seems to me you have legal ground to say, Well,
you can just pound.
Speaker 1 (22:44):
Sand, sure, but stop being a talk radio blowhard for
just a moment, which is difficult for us to do
what we do here. They tell you look, we think
you're fine, but just in case we're wrong, please stay
home for forty two days, and if you die, let
us know. And you're thinking, well, I think I feel fine.
I want to go for a walk. But at the
(23:04):
same time, if I'm wrong and they're wrong, and I
go out there and I get this into my community,
that people could get sick, people could die. They told
me to stay home for forty two days. Maybe I'll
stay home for forty two days if you're if you're wrong,
people die, what do you do? I don't you don't
stay out? They told you to stay home.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Yeah, I say, but if i've but if I haven't
tested positive for it, and if I don't have any symptoms,
I'm going, well, I think your test is flogged, flagged
to see you later.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
I think that if they really have concerns that Jim
Rose is so sick that he might kill us, all
that I would prefer you stay there in the bio
Containment Unit at UNMC. I don't understand this business about
I go home because if Jim feels like I'm fine,
I'm going to go out and I'm going to go
take in a ballgame and sit down and pass everyone's
(23:56):
peanuts to each other down the row, and it turns
out up wrong. You were much sicker than we thought.
We got a false negative on your test. You didn't
You didn't leave your house, did you?
Speaker 7 (24:06):
No?
Speaker 1 (24:07):
Except when I went to Walmart, and then I got
on the subway, and then I got on an aera
and went to a ballgame, and I went to my
kids school and a few other things. Except for those things,
I stay home. If if they have concerns that you're
a public health risk, they should lock you away, I'll
let everyone respond to that again via the inbox.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
Again, who gets to be the health judge.
Speaker 2 (24:31):
It's like the people who say, you know, we need
to have red flag laws for people when it comes
to guns. Okay, who gets to decide whether you're capable
or incapable of handling a gun? A former girlfriend she
gets to decide, or a step mom she gets to decide.
That's what I mean. You start taking away people's rights
(24:52):
like this, it's a slippery slope. If you can make
a sound case to a reasonable person at this guy
should not be allowed out in public because of X
y Z medical reasons. If you can make a case,
a strong case to a reasonable person, that's one thing.
But these arbitrary deciders. Oh, I'm gonna decide for you
(25:15):
whether or not you can drive a car. I'm gonna
decide for you whether or not you can own a handgun.
I'm gonna me what qualifies me because I have this?
I don't know, That's what I mean. We either have
a free country or we don't. Let me know your thoughts.
Scott at kfab dot com. By the way, I hope
you had a wonderful Mother's Day if you had a
(25:36):
chance to spend it, either with mom or with a
with your your kid's mom, or just in wonderful memories
of these people.
Speaker 1 (25:45):
I hope it was a nice time for me. My wife,
the mother of our children. She loves traveling and she
loves nature, and I probably shouldn't. She's not probably listening
to this point in the morning, So I don't mind
telling you. I got a great deal on a bird
watching excursion on a Dutch cruise ship.
Speaker 3 (26:07):
So we set her up with that. That's going to
be a lot of fun, and you would have to
see her for forty two days.
Speaker 1 (26:13):
The well, she'll quarantine at home. The here's how serious
people here in the Zonker's custom what's inbox? Are taking
all of this? Scott atkfab dot com. Dave emails and says,
come on, people, it's all a scam. Bird watching Suddenly
a virus, Suddenly medical research in Omaha. National TV viewers
see a streetcar going in Omaha. People say, wow, Omaha's
(26:35):
getting a streetcar. Stod did the streetcar at a boy
so she can run again for mayor and win the
election when she runs again. Come on, people, wake up,
so Dave says, this is all orchestrated by Jeans Stothart,
host of the KFAB comment line. Later this morning at ten,
so that Omaha can be shown as having progress in
(26:56):
national news reports. Another helpful email here on signed says,
just burn all their clothes and put them on the
reality show Naked and Afraid in Omaha.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
That's good.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
I'd probably watch that on the public Access channel. To
talk more about this situation at UNMC within the Nebraska
University system, we got someone running for the Board of
Regents District one competitor ahead of tomorrow's primary. Brent Comstock
joins us here on news radio eleven ten KFAB.
Speaker 8 (27:29):
Brent, Good morning, Good morning, Scott, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
Absolutely, we had someone else in this race on this
program a while back here, so wanted to give you
a certainly equal time. But just like we talked about
with that candidate, we talked about the news of the
day there that had to do with Nebraska Medicine and
the potential takeover. We'll leave that in the past and
talk with you here, Brent about what do you think
(27:52):
about UNMC having the National Quarantine Unit. Some people in
Omaha say, why are we bringing these deadly diseases right
here to Omaha, Nebraska?
Speaker 3 (28:02):
What do you think?
Speaker 8 (28:04):
Yeah, it's a great question, and the public has right
to be concerned. I can tell you two things. Number One,
I've toured those units a couple of months ago, had
the opportunity to go through the National Quarantine Unit. It's
the only federally funded unit of its kind. And I
think that the thing that I would relate to the
public is the team at un MC and Nebraska Medicine.
(28:25):
They're ready. You know, these quarantine units on the pictures
they kind of look like sterile hotels, but when you
look behind the scenes in the details, I mean, their
ventilation systems are separate, their trash systems are separate, so
it's not like they are just sitting in Omaha a
holiday in. They are sitting in a specifically designed facility
(28:47):
so that the disease does not spread. And the second
thing that I would add to that is it's incredible
for us to be a national and global leader in
public health. Having this, this research facility, this quarantine facility,
these biocontainment units here is an asset not only to
(29:07):
our city and to our state, but it's a global asset.
We saw that during the Eubola crisis, we saw that
during COVID, and so I think, you know, the public,
it's right for them to say what's going on, and
I would relate to them that not only is Nebraska
medicine and U and MC ready, but we are a
national and global leader in that and that's a great
opportunity for our city, in our state.
Speaker 1 (29:26):
I wanted to pick your brain in a couple of
other issues while we have you here, Brandon. One of
them is college affordability. I've got a kid in college.
A lot of people do. Just had graduation across the
NU system here over the last few days, people are
still graduating from college even as expenses go up, and
is this just something that parents across Nebraska can expect
(29:48):
to pay more when we said our kids to deerl Nebraska.
Speaker 4 (29:51):
You.
Speaker 8 (29:53):
I think rising cost is something that we see everywhere, right,
But one of the things that we've got to do
a better job of and that we've been and paigning
about for the last years. How do we link affordability
to job creation? How do we link it to acceptance
of jobs in the state. And I think one of
the hardest parts about having a great graduate of the
University of Nebraska system is how do you keep them here,
(30:16):
keep them in the state, keep them in Omaha, Lincoln
or Greater Nebraska. Because that contributes to our tax space,
which allows us to have a better strategy for increasing
appropriations coming from the legislature. So I think it's a
necessary evil on one part. On the other part, I
think we need to link the legislature. We need to
link private business and workforce development together to figure out
(30:38):
how do we keep those costs competitive with other top
tier institutions in the Big ten and elsewhere, whether that's
through internship programs or increased scholarships from private partners, or
job placement programs to make sure that those students get
a job that they can have and stay here in Nebraska,
(30:58):
which is a great opportunity to to help contribute to
our economy.
Speaker 2 (31:02):
Let's talk sports for a minute. How familiar are you
as a candidate with two things one the Memorial Stadium
project and two name, image and likeness funding?
Speaker 8 (31:13):
Familiar enough that I get asked about every day on
the trail.
Speaker 3 (31:19):
Yeah. Well, so.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
Nebraska football is fighting off people for its top two recruits.
This will come down to a bid war. We're going
to have to up the price for guys that we're
already paying. We're already paying a high school kid to
come here. Where is this What policy do you want
the university to adopt? Because at some point we're going
to get to a stage where that's it. This is
(31:42):
as far as we go without federal legislation or a
collective bargaining agreement.
Speaker 3 (31:46):
Where are you on this issue itself?
Speaker 7 (31:49):
Yeah?
Speaker 8 (31:50):
I think you bring up an interesting point and important
point that so much of this is lodged in what
does the federal government do? One thing that I have
been adamant about from the beginning of this is that
you know, if we're going to pay these student athletes
like they are working employees, despite the fact that it
has been very clear that that is not how the
NIL contracts work. We need to put contract terms in place.
(32:13):
You would not go into a job and say, well,
if I decide tomorrow that someone's going to pay me
something else somewhere else, that I would just jump ship,
leave and expect to take all of the dollars with me.
And the wild wild west of NIL right now is
that we are training these young people. Yes, they're athletes now,
but in two or three or four years they're going
(32:34):
to be contributing members of society. And what message does
that send to them, that, oh, if you get a
little money elsewhere, you pack up and run and you
leave whatever you've started behind. That is not the function
of a land grant institution university system where our primary
job is educating people. So NIL is inevitable. The federal
government has a lot of work to do to get
(32:56):
that in a place where it's more palatable across the
board for every type of higher education institution, particularly those
in conferences like the University of Nebraska. But we've got
to think harder about contract structures so that we can
train these people to be leaders beyond playing on the
field and on the court, and contribute to contribute to society.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
Brent Comstock is a candidate for regent in District one.
That's where Tim Clair was ruling with an iron fist
for several years. You can find him on social media
ruling that iron scene. If you're paying attention, you can
find Brent on social media and on his campaign website.
Comstock for Regent dot com Brant. Thanks a lot for
(33:39):
your perspectives today, and good luck to you and your
fellow competitors and tomorrow's primary.
Speaker 8 (33:44):
I appreciate you guys. Take care, have a great week.
Speaker 1 (33:46):
Go to the Zonker's custom woods inbox and the talkback mic.
That's anywhere you are on our free iHeartRadio app, you
can touch that microphone icon and send us a message
with your own voice.
Speaker 4 (33:58):
Good morning, Scott.
Speaker 3 (33:59):
I just had a question.
Speaker 4 (34:01):
Why would they put that viral containment center right smack
dab in the middle of the nation in Nebraska, where
if it gets out it can go in all directions.
Why not put it down in Key West or up
in the Aleutian Islands or something like that. It just
seems to be like somebody wasn't thinking.
Speaker 1 (34:21):
Well, the other people in the Aleutian Islands in Key
West had a vote, and they all decided Omaha was
the best place for it. And they said, put it
on an island somewhere, and they said, well, here's Grand Island.
Speaker 3 (34:31):
Put it near there.
Speaker 7 (34:32):
No.
Speaker 1 (34:33):
Look that you can get on a plane or public
transportation from any point anywhere in the world, apparently, and
you can spread in all directions, as we've seen from
the few people on this cruise ship out of Antarctica.
So I think that there are a lot of people
who are rightfully, very pleased to have the National Containment
(34:54):
Center to potentially save lives, as we have done with
ebola in the past and now the hantavirus. Please an
honor to have that in Omaha. Do I love it? No,
because I live here, my kids live here, my family,
my friends, we don't work too far from there. And
I get nervous when they say, yeah, this is very,
very deadly. That's why we're gonna watch these guys for
a few days and then tell them to go home
(35:16):
for forty two days and just check in with us
from time to time and try and resist the urge
to go to a ballgame or Walmart, you know. I
hope they know what they're doing, because we've got this
here in Omaha, and if we're gonna have it, might
as well use it.
Speaker 3 (35:31):
They know what they're doing.
Speaker 2 (35:33):
It's a very very cool, awesome facility they have over there,
and it's world class.
Speaker 3 (35:40):
There's nothing else in the world like it. I'm glad
they're here.
Speaker 2 (35:43):
It gives Nebraska gives you, and OL gives Nebraska meta
UNMC gives Nebraska medicine a lot of national kudos. Yeah,
as long as no one comes here and they all die,
As long as somebody does leave the door open or
they don't throw away one of those gowns that's soaked
with this virus, probably safe.
Speaker 3 (36:01):
That's fantastic.
Speaker 1 (36:03):
I think that they have very large egos over there
in Nebraska Medicine. I think that they do, which is
why they don't want to look bad. No, they want
these people to all come out of their happy, healthy
and smiling after the predetermined amount of time and go
skipping about their merry way. That's what they want, So
I hope that's what we get.
Speaker 3 (36:21):
They skip about their merry ways. That's what we do.
Caring somebody from.
Speaker 1 (36:26):
Ebola, well or the hunt of virus. Yeah, Joe emails
and says Scott, these mouse virus people that came to
ol Maha hopefully did not come in via United Airlines.
I have a trip later this week. That's from Joe. No,
they were on Spirit Airlines. That's why we had to
run that thing down. No, they didn't come on any
of the commercial airlines. Also, have some respect. You're referring
(36:50):
to these people as the mouse virus people. That does
make me think about five years ago and a couple
of months we knew the people's names who were here
in Omaha for the coronavirus back when we were like,
what is this coronavirus thing? And then someone said it's
the common cold, you liar, It's not the comp Oh,
(37:11):
it is the common cold. It's a variation of the
common cold. But anyway, we had the people here with
the COVID at the containment unit at Nebraska Medicine, and
we had like check ins with these guys. They're doing
Facebook live videos and letting us know how they're feeling.
And there was that one guy who was a bit
of a national celebrity there for a week or so.
Speaker 3 (37:33):
I don't see.
Speaker 1 (37:34):
Anyone doing that here with the with this hantavirus outbreak. Now,
thankfully the people are all coming here, they're not sick.
We've got seventeen people that got here in the middle
of the night, transported to Nebraska Medicine around five am,
so seventeen of them. All but two are asymptomatic. They
(37:58):
don't have any signs of being sick. One American tested
positive doesn't have symptoms be tested positive. He's at the
Nebraska or she is at the Nebraska biocontainment unit, separate
from the quarantine unit where the rest of the exposed
passengers are treated, and then the symptomatic person will be
transported to Washington, d C. Which is weird. I thought
(38:19):
we had the place where if you've got the bad virus,
you come here and you're fine. Why are we sending
them to DC? And as far as why we're sending
them anywhere near Omaha got emails like this as well.
Doug says, time to move. If this is the kind
(38:39):
of leadership we have, maybe it's time to rethink my options.
I don't want to live anywhere near a community that's
willing to bring in people with a horrible, terrible, disease.
I don't care how safe they say it is, how
great their facilities are, how much protocol they have. Every
disease has the potential to do and be something new,
do something different, never seen before, etc.
Speaker 3 (39:00):
Time to move. That's from Doug. Doug, don't move.
Speaker 1 (39:03):
Nebraska has been leading off several of the national and
even international newscast today as we welcome on here, Senator
Pete Rickett's not exactly the thing that you want to
have tied into your home state, But if my family
got sick with something like a hantavirus, I would want
them to be in good care from professionals like it
(39:23):
Nebraska Medicine here in Omaha. Senator, good morning. What are
your thoughts on UNMC being ground zero for HANDA virus containment?
Speaker 7 (39:34):
Well, good morning, Scott. You know the UNMC and the
bio containment facility, the quarantine facility, it really are world leading.
When I was governor, you may recall that we evacuated
COVID patients from the Diamond Princess. We also took in
Americans who were taken from Abola from Africa, and the
BioC containment center and the quarantine center just did a
(39:55):
fantastic job of taking care of those folks. They were
able to help those folks they had both to survive.
The quarantine on COVID was absolutely successful, and so I
have no doubt that they will be able to handle
the hunt virus, which frankly is not as communicable as COVID,
and you know, it's obviously a dangerous disease. But I
(40:18):
have all the company the world that the folks who
come here we will taken care of and that UNC
is going to do a fantastic job with them.
Speaker 1 (40:24):
There are those who say, why would we bring this
to the middle of America, especially right here in our community,
not just leave it on the cruise ship for someplace
on a remote island. To that, you would say, what.
Speaker 7 (40:36):
Well, the professionals that you and MC are again world class.
So they will make sure that the folks are quarantining
in the safest way possible, and that if they do
develop any sort of symptoms that they can be followed
up on right away. And certainly if anyone do come
out untavirus, still have the best care in the world
to be able to survive that. So, look, this is
(40:58):
just a resource we have in Nebraska. Really is world leading,
and it's just fantastic that we can help people and also,
you know, just something that really drives the innovation on
the campus.
Speaker 1 (41:12):
Talk about affordability here. No reasonable person wanted Iran to
have nukes. It seems like by the President's statements that
we have decimated their opportunity to do so, set that
back for several years. Yet gas prices continue to go up.
A lot of Nebraska's are filling up for well north
of four dollars a gallon right now, diesels closer to six.
(41:35):
That's going to make a lot of things raised in
costs before too long that hasn't already. What are your
thoughts on affordability and what we're continuing to do in Iran, Senator.
Speaker 7 (41:47):
Yeah, certainly the increasing gas prices puts pressure on everybody.
It's something that is verty additional pressure for folks especially
you know, price and the grocery store went up twenty
percent under Joe Biden administration, with Joe Biden administration to
forty year high inflation, and those grocery prices didn't really
come back down, and so this just adds to that.
(42:09):
We need to balance this off with what we're doing
with regard to national security. You know, a country that
can't death to America can't be allowed to have a
nucle weapon or a missile that reach the United States.
They're very close to having both. You know, they've told
us they've got enough material for ten bombs. That means
they got more because they always lie to us, and
they demonstrated a few weeks ago is they've got a
(42:30):
missile that can reach Paris or London, which means they
are not far away from having a missile that reached
the United States. And they've killed tens of thousands of
their own people. You've got to believe they killed millions
of ours. So this is really really dangerous when they're
going and while we have certainly set them back, they
continue to pursue this agenda of trying to create a
(42:50):
nuclele weapon, and that's why the presidents continue to pursue this.
So we've got to balance off these national defense stuff.
Speaker 3 (42:57):
You know.
Speaker 7 (42:58):
I think one of the things that we can also
do is keep promoting some of the things we can
do here as far as homegrown solutions, one of which
is biofuels. You know, I actually, you know, just sold
up on ten over the weekend at IV and safety
and five cent a gallon. So I think that, you know,
we do have some homegrown Nebraska solutions here that can
can help out offset some of these increasing costs.
Speaker 2 (43:20):
Jim Rose Pete, What do you think is going to
happen when the President of China and the President of
the United States meet later this week.
Speaker 7 (43:27):
Well, China is the source of the instability we see
all over the place. You know, just take about think
about Iran. China buys like ninety percent of their energy
and providing them weapons. But China has also been the
ones that have been providing materials to Russia. Right, So
they're out there trying to create instability everywhere we look.
And so I think that the President is going to
(43:49):
continue to take a hard line with them. I think
one of the things the President's going to have to
do is tell them they're going to live up to
their obligations. If they say they're going to do a deal,
say for example, buy soybet' Fromust, they got to buy them.
Means what's happened in the first Trump administration. You know,
the president was able to kind of deal, you know,
the Phase one trade agreement, and as soon as President
Trump was out of office. The Chinese are nicked that
(44:11):
they're actually terrible trade partners. So I hope the President
goes in there and really takes a hard line with
them with regard to trade and the economic instability and
some of the predatory things that they're doing. And then
also we need to start looking at how we can
diversify our export markets. I'm going to be shortly introducing
a bill called the Market Act, which will require USBA
(44:32):
and our US Trade Representative to start looking at how
we can mitigate our dependence on sending exports to communist
China and finding other markets to be able to help
offset the loss of that market and see if we
can't make that up in other countries like Sate, Indonesia
or Malaysia, countries in Southeast Asia. They're young and growing
(44:53):
and have bigger populations as well.
Speaker 2 (44:55):
Because right now they're getting, as you mentioned, all of
their oil, almost virtually of it from the Straits of
Horror Moves, which have a gate locked gate on it.
So what about buying American oil? Do you see that
as happening out of this meeting. Trump likes to sell stuff,
he likes to cut deals, So do you think that's
going to happen. And if so, what impact do you
(45:15):
think that'll have on them making good on that Phase
one trade deal.
Speaker 7 (45:19):
Well, I certainly think the President is going to try
to offer to do that. But here's the deal, right,
Hi Jiping is a dictator. He's a stalinist mouse guy.
Like we haven't seen some stolen them out. The only
difference is he hasn't killed tens of millions of zone
people yet, but he would doing a heartbeat hold on
to power. And what he wants to do is replace
us as the world power. He's not going to want
(45:40):
to buy our oil because he can't replace us as
the world superpower if he's buying our oil, So he's
not going to want to do anything. In fact, he
looking at other industries like semiconductors. He's spending hundreds of
billions of dollars to become independent of the United States
and our Western allies from this conductor's supply chain. In fact,
(46:01):
I've got again some bills like the Match Act. These
are byparers and bills by the way to cut off
selling some of the semiconductor manufacturing machines to China. So
if they can't manufacture there on semiconductors. So they are
trying to become independent from us because they want to
dominate us. She just picking a victory. He tells, dictators
(46:22):
tell people they're going to do. He told up. You
should take him very seriously.
Speaker 1 (46:26):
Senator, appreciate your perspective and all these things this morning.
Thank you very much for joining us, and good luck
in tomorrow's primary.
Speaker 7 (46:32):
Thank you very much.
Speaker 3 (46:34):
Running every two years.
Speaker 1 (46:35):
He's running against a lot of people in the primary.
They thought is the anti Rickets vote would probably be
divided up, and he has a good path. But this
is not the Rickets dan Osborne fight. That's not till November.
Should these people make it out of their respective primary?
Question is will he split the vote in the Shore
Ricketts household?
Speaker 3 (46:52):
Yeah, oh yeah, that's well.
Speaker 1 (46:54):
That we'll see all that goes as well tomorrow's primary
election day. That Senator Pete Ricketts here in eleven ten
your favorite
Thank you for being with us, and good morning. That's
Lucy Chapman. You just heard from Craig Evans as well.
I'm Scott Vorhees. Jim Rose is right here. What is
everyone's level of concern about the now seventeen Americans exposed
to the Hunt of virus who are currently at the
University of Nebraska Medical Center. Because I'll tell you the
(00:22):
national media you can't measure how little they care. The
national media is like, oh my gosh, we're bringing people
who are exposed to the Haunt of virus into America,
where they're going, Omaha, oh okay.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Bring you tired, you're hungry seeking the right to be
free and be quarantined. If you get nailed with a virus,
that's us. That's our new state modo. But that's the
huddled masses of infected hunt of viruses.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
All right, Let's also define this one. I have always
heard and said haunt of virus. Now you've got some
people in the media saying haunt a virus. Can we
at least agree on a pronunciation going forward? What do
we like, what do we want? Who wants to step
up and be chief pronunciator this morning?
Speaker 3 (01:11):
Haunt? Well, Jim. Okay, I say, I like haunted too. Jim.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
You are always pronouncing things to be true even when
they're not, do you.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
And if they're not true at the time, they eventually
become true. A haunt of virus to me, I don't
have it yet. Well, now you're saying Haunta virus. I
could call them the Houthi virus, but that would that
would involve militants in the Middle East.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Yeah, okay, well we we don't have that dynamic in
town right now. Well, not that I know of. So
we have these these officials who are here. But when
you're talking about being quarantined, that's not exactly what happens.
Some people are like, wait a second, they're gonna be
monitored and then discharged. They're not going to be quarantined.
(01:56):
What we're hearing from CDC is that none of the
seventeen Americans aboard the ship who are now here in
Omaha as of the last few hours, have tested positive
for the virus. They don't. There's one American who tested
(02:17):
positive but doesn't have any symptoms, and he's in the
Nebraska or she is in the Nebraska biocontainment unit separate
from the quarantine unit, but it says federal officials currently
do not plan to mandate quarantine when they arrive in Nebraska. Now,
that doesn't mean that they come out and say, hey,
(02:38):
let's go get a bite to eat here. I heard
the zoo is really nice. It's not like stop by
the med center every once in a while and we'll
take your temperature. They're receiving health evaluations now, and they'll
either stay in the quarantine unit or return home, where
they'll essentially be on they're not using the term house arrest,
(02:59):
but they go home and then they're on house arrests,
monitoring their own symptoms for forty two days while remaining
in contact with local health officials. In fact, there's one
the symptomatic person I mentioned before is going to be
in the biocontainment unit, and then at some point we'll
be transported to Washington, d C. You think you've had
(03:21):
a bad layover, this is Spain to Omaha, back to Washington,
d C. I don't know the timetable on that individual.
But for people to say, why can't we have like
a remote island somewhere where we take people with things
like a new strain of the hantavirus that spreads from
(03:42):
person to person, which apparently we've not seen before. Is
there any possible way we can have that go to
you know, an island somewhere, or Grand Island, maybe not Omaha. Well,
you know that we have this unit at the med
Center and it gets used all the time. Casey says,
good morning, team, Why is this a story? There have
(04:04):
been eight hundred and ninety cases of the haunt of
virus in the last thirty years.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
Stop the fear mongering.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. It's Monday morning. It's very
early on a Monday morning. Why are you yelling at me?
Don't yell at us yet, Scott atkfab dot com. You
can email as well via the Zonker's custom was inbox
here on news radio eleven ten KFAB. I expect that
(04:30):
the emailer here. I'm not sure where Casey gets the
number eight hundred and ninety cases in the last thirty years.
I imagine it's higher than that. I imagine it's a
lot higher than that. I mean, looking here at the
year twenty twenty five, there were two hundred and twenty
some cases of the haunt of virus in I think
this might be just in the America's not in the
(04:53):
United States, but yeah, in in mostly South America, particularly
Argentina two hundred and twenty nine cases, fifty nine deaths.
You don't want the haunt of virus. Now, they say, well,
this particular strain, we're concerned about it because maybe it's
spread from person to person that generally doesn't do that.
Usually you get the haunt of virus when you go
(05:15):
and you start rolling around in rat droppings, which you know, hey, however,
you spend your weekends your business. But so obviously the
concern is, do we have a new strain of this
particular virus, Why are they coming to Omaha, And what
do you mean they're not going to have to quarantine.
They say that they'll be monitored and assessed and then
(05:36):
go home for a self monitoring period of forty two
days where they check in with healthcare workers. And people say, yeah,
but if this is a deadly disease and we're counting
on people to do the right thing, I don't trust
people to do the right thing when they say, all right,
(05:57):
you might have a disease that could kill humanity, as
we know, so go home and don't go walking around. Okay,
I can go to Walmart, though, no, no, no, no,
let's review go home and don't go walking around all right,
other than when I go to the nursing home to
visit my dad. You're not getting this, So we're trusting
(06:18):
people to do the right thing. That's obviously a concern
when you start looking at it that way. But this
is not the first time Omaha has been the hub
for a deadly strain of virus that could kill us all.
We have the Ebola in and out of here more
often than the Berkshire Hathaway meeting. This happens not like
(06:40):
you know, every single week or anything. But certainly there
are people who have come to Omaha. They've been in
this particular biocontainment unit in this area of un MC,
and you don't usually hear about it, and they come
here and say, yeah, I think I got a mild
case of the ebola. And they said, all right, we'll
(07:03):
have a seat and we'll we'll take a look. And
this happens. This is the This is like the federal
National Quarantine Unit right here in Omaha, Nebraska. And certainly
there are people here in Omaha who say, but I
don't want a national quarantine unit because I live here
(07:24):
and my kids and grandkids live here and I don't
and my or my kid works at the med center.
These guys are not walking up and down the halls,
you know, getting a little exercise. They are in quarantine.
And then but you said that they'll go home, yeah,
when they feel like it's safe. But even then, they're
(07:46):
kind of having themselves quarantine. And we just have to
hope that all these people know what they're doing. Isn't
that what it's always about, hoping that everyone who makes
the decision lives their life knows what they're doing. Lucy,
you've got a bigger concern and have been hit by
an oncoming car and traffic today and getting the haunt
of virus based on true these people coming here to Omaha,
(08:07):
and and I love your critical thinking.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
Thank you?
Speaker 4 (08:09):
All right?
Speaker 3 (08:10):
Do you feel better? I mean it didn't feel bad.
Speaker 4 (08:12):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:13):
Now I'm not driving home today.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
But let's get on to sports brief because we have
some celebration to a note in this edition of the
eleven to ten KFAB Certified Transmission Sports Brief, here is
Jim Rose.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
Okay, Scott, good morning, everybody, Even though Iowa isn't very good,
there was pressure on the Husker baseball team this weekend,
and Nebraska didn't blink. Swept to the Hawkeyes three straight,
clubbed them yesterday in the finale, eight to six. After
the dreadful performance of the played a week ago. Coach
Will Bolt was pleased with the offense.
Speaker 5 (08:44):
Well, we had for thirty thousand of our best friends
behind us on this one, so that that certainly helps.
We obviously turned the tide offensively, and you know, put
a lot of pressure on Iowa a whole weekend, and you
know just kind of felt inevitable that we had another
big inning coming in that game, and you know, it's
good to see us finish the.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Off Huskers scored thirty three runs in front of capacity
crowds inch The Huskers back up to fifteenth in the
RPI with three games against Minnesota. The Gophers aren't horrible.
They're not very good hitters, but a decent staff. They
only have two top fifty wins prior to that trip
up there. Nebraska is playing Creighton at schwab Field midweek. Meanwhile,
it's good to be Husker softball. Big Red captures the
(09:23):
Big Ten Tournament on Saturday, and was named a top
four national seed for the coming NCAA tournament that means
hosting all the way to the College World Series, Go Toronto.
Speaker 3 (09:33):
Ravel says, we aren't surprised.
Speaker 6 (09:35):
We've been having the same message in preseason, during the season,
as we've gotten into postseason, and now as we get
deeper into postseason, and it's a message that has really
resonated with our team, and we just we need to
just stay with it. Like I've told you guys all along,
we want to be boring.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
The Super Regional starts on Friday. Huskers are hosting South
Dakota in the six to thirty game at Boland Stadium.
The other side is Louisville versus Grand Canyon State Big
League Baseball. Yesterday afternoon and last night, the Royals did
not complete that sweep against the Tigers. Detroit gets game
three six to three. The White Sox over Seattle, Twins
beat Cleveland, the Los Angeles Angels six to one over Toronto,
(10:13):
Tampa Bay four to one over Boston. Baltimore beat the
A's two to one National League winners from Miami and Philly.
The Giants, Braves, d Backs, and Padres Italy played, Texas three,
the Cubs nothing, Milwaukee four, the Yankees three, Reds five,
Houston zero, Omaha nine, Indianapolis nothing. In NBA playoff action,
that's it for the next and Sixers. New York wins
(10:36):
Game four one forty four, one fourteen. So that's a
four game sweep of the Sixers. They're out and onto
the finals goes New York, Minnesota one fourteen and San
Antonio one oh nine. That series is tied up at two.
Hockey playoffs Anaheim and gold and Vegas. The Golden Knights
are tied up at two to two after four games
after Anaheim wins Game four four to three, and in
(10:57):
Game three Montreal six.
Speaker 3 (11:01):
I s y am I.
Speaker 2 (11:02):
Nebraska and Illinois football will not be playing for the
TGIF Trophy the Big Ten Conference and announce we're playing
them again on another Friday night this year. Oh goody
November fourth, think that November sixth. It's the November sixth
or November fourth, November sixth, down in or over in Champagne, Illinois.
So I guess high school sports doesn't matter in Illinois
or Nebraska sports. His news on Nebraska's news weathern traffic station.
Speaker 1 (11:26):
The term fear porn is trending in the Zonkers custom
was inbox this morning, Scott atkfab dot com.
Speaker 7 (11:35):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
In this context, Michael emails and says, how about we
not give this latest virus that frankly stupid people contracted
while bird watching in an Argentina landfill any oxygen. We've
seen this boring movie. And another thing, how in the
hell did seventeen Americans managed to wind up on some
(11:57):
pathetic cruise ship from the Netherlands to even remotely chance
and exposure to some rare virus. Enough of the fear porn,
as I said, fear porness trending in the Zonker's custom
woods inbox. Fred emails and says, am I the only
one who finds it odd that not one single video
(12:17):
of someone on that ship complaining or giving details about
being stuck on the ship. Call me skeptical, but I'm
calling bs on anyone even being on that ship floating
lab more like it. Let me guess wear two masks
stay ten feet apart. No symptoms is a symptom, super spreaders.
We're all gonna die for the eleventy billionth time. That's
(12:39):
from Fred said to Scott A kfab dot com. Well,
we're talking about this because, as Lucia points out, Omaha
was the lead story on Fox this morning at six o'clock.
We have the nations. We're good at communicable diseases here. Yeah,
well we're really good at that. We're good at not
(13:01):
having the alleged communical communicable diseases be communicable. We want
to contain them. It's not called the communical I'm to
have a trouble with this one set. It's not called
the communicable disease unit. It's called the containment unit.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
Yeah, but we're good at if you've got a communicable disease,
we want you here. So just roll into town. Just
please wear a mask and rubber gloves. That's all we ask.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Now, I don't if you've got to if your stuff
full of ebola, you want to be in Omaha. I
don't blame people like the couple of emails I read
there from saying, oh, come on, this isn't a big
deal because Omaha, to your point, Jim has been able
to prove time and time again with ebola or whatever,
that we can contain some of these deadly diseases, viruses,
(13:48):
whatever and not have it suddenly start spreading all over town.
We've done a really good job at that. That's why
Omaha is the nation's national quarantine unit. I also don't
blame people say things like, why is the national quarantine
unit in the middle of America? Why not on some
remote island? What are they doing over there on Epstein's Island?
(14:09):
Why not do it there? Which is a fair point.
And as far as this, like, wait a second, these
guys are gonna be off the cruise ship where apparently
people were getting this handa virus, and everyone is now
the pronunciation guides are all saying hantavirus, So I'll switch
and go with hantavirus. But people are saying, well, people
(14:32):
are getting this thing and then their heads were blowing up,
But why are we allowing them to go home? I
understand where people are leery about that, because both when
it comes to the coronavirus, you had some people who
got tested positive for COVID and we thought, well, that
person's a goner, and then they shook it off like
(14:52):
it was a mild hangnail and it wasn't a big deal.
And so therefore, when there ends up being something like
a disease that could wipe half of us off the
planet in an instant. Then people are not going to
heed the precautions because you personal responsibility and human nature
(15:13):
being what it is. There'll be people like those who've
been emailing, going, ah, this isn't a big deal. I
was told to put a mask on as stupid. And
then people will say, all right, go home, don't go
out and monitor yourself for forty two days. And unless
someone is incubating the worst virus the world's ever seen,
who suddenly is just writing the subway all over New
(15:35):
York City and saying, oh, I thought I was fine.
Speaker 3 (15:38):
You know.
Speaker 1 (15:38):
So when we have to rely on human nature and
self responsibility for other people, that's when we get very
very leary because we don't trust other people. Well, we
can't trust the government, you can't trust the health organizations.
After what happened with the coronavirus, the coronavirus was made
out to be the black plague, told that people would
(16:01):
bodies would be stacked up like cordwood on street corner,
and none of that ever happened. It was very very
contained and it didn't cost people many lives that weren't
already had one foot on a banana peel and the
other one in a casket. So the people that really
struggled with the coronavirus had about four or five other
major problems when it hit them. Now, I'm not saying
(16:21):
that those who got sick didn't get really sick, but
this notion that this was going to be the bubonic
plague all over again was just crap, and it was
It was designed to derail the economy to make sure
that Donald Trump was injured up before the twenty twenty election.
It was a chance for school systems in the teachers'
union to get a whole bunch more money, and it
(16:43):
crippled the economy. And right now we have a bunch
of sixth graders that can't add two and two together
because they were cut out of public schools for a
whole year and asked to be online when their teacher
was online. It didn't work. It was a disaster.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
It'll cost this country trillions of dollars, say nothing of
the impact on families and communities and everywhere else. So
I understand if people are going, oh, yeah, I keep
it moving. I've heard this one before, because everybody said,
oh look out now, man, you gotta stay inside. You
got to pull the shades down and the covers over
your head for the next two months or you're gonna die.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
Jim, you just gave an excellent bit of twenty twenty
hindsight when it came to COVID and what it bec
was saying it at the time, but you weren't saying
it in those first two weeks to flatten the curb.
When President Trump came out and said, all right, we
got to deal with this in two weeks, stay inside,
he kind of did, because the Corona virus was in
(17:38):
the same department continued to use that phrase as things
like SARS and mers and sars and mrs. Because we
didn't have a million people get these viruses and then
take a look at the morbidity rates and all the
rest of the stuff. These things were connected to a
(17:58):
ten and thirteen percent death rate, respectively. And so when
they were looking at that information at the very beginning
for this particular COVID coronavirus, and they're like, wait a second,
this isn't the same family and stuff. With a ten
percent death rate, we could lose ten percent of the population.
They had to do. They had to shut everything down.
(18:19):
I don't blame anyone for any decisions they made early on,
just like when it comes to the hantavirus, you don't
want it now. I don't blame anyone for saying, like,
all right, let's make sure these particular cruise ship. And
when they say cruise ship, this is some boat of
bird washers that went down to antarcticas they thought that
(18:40):
was a good idea. Find whatever. I don't blame anyone
for being extra cautious on this. But you are one
hundred percent right when you talk about what it became.
And I'll add this bit of gravy on to that serving.
You just gave us the number of people, the very
large Archer percentage of people who want all of that
(19:02):
to happen again. They want all the restrictions, they want
all the behavior changes. They want to stay home from work.
They the kids certainly want to stay home from school.
They want disruption, they they want all these gas guzzling
vehicles off the road. They want all of those things again.
And there are certainly those in positions of power who
(19:23):
are looking at this going, oh boy, now, it's important
not to let it become that. My concern though, on
the other side, of that is, if we actually get
something that could kill us all, you'll have people like
you and me out there going, ah, I forget it,
I'm not going to do any of this stuff. And
then you know, but thankfully the people at un MC,
they're not walking around going I don't need to wear.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
This hazmat suit. This is all a bunch of bunk.
Keep that darro. But yeah, it's fine, and let them out.
Let them go to the zoo.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
You know, they they have they're very specially trained professionals.
And I am glad and honored that Omaha has this
place so we can take people to bring them here
to potentially save lives, because that's what I would want
to happen to you.
Speaker 2 (20:04):
And of course, but it's there's a difference between addressing
an acute pending need, which is what the UNMC people do.
When somebody comes in and they're at the ninety percentile
of abola, that's when they swing into action. The problem
was the reaction to that coronavirus was so off the charts.
(20:26):
You remember they had GM overnight switch from making cars
to ventilators. Yeah, and then we found out that the
ventilators actually did more harm than good.
Speaker 3 (20:35):
This is in twenty twenty.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
You think we'd advance a little bit, but no, it
became a political football. And I remember Ben Sas standing
up in front of the United States Center, What are
we doing here? Why don't we just load money into
an airplane and fly over cities and drop it. All
they had to do to keep from crippling the economy
and destroying the employment quotion and ratio in our country
(20:57):
was to simply say, we're covering payrolls for the next
month and then you're back on your own. Instead, what
we did we paid people to stay home, We paid
companies to fire people. We had the Los Angeles Lakers
getting thirty five million to support their payroll. The Los
Angeles Lakers, this is and they still didn't get web
(21:17):
they and they still didn't get into the playoff.
Speaker 1 (21:20):
Now, let's think about this. You're on the ship. You
feel fine, you want to get back to your life.
You've got stuff to do, you got people to see,
and you don't want to infect anyone. But at the
same time, you're like, look, I've been I got off,
I was on this ship here a week ago. I
don't have any symptoms. You're telling me I got to
stay home for forty two days. You sprain me down
(21:43):
with some some sort of solution. You send me to Omaha, Nebraska.
You tell me, hey, you're fine, and this particular hand
to virus strain does not spread easily between people. The
rest of the public remains low. But we still want
you to go home and stay home for four two days.
Can they do that to you?
Speaker 3 (22:04):
Well?
Speaker 2 (22:05):
Ah, who's the jurisdiction, Who gets to decide? Who makes
the decision? Who's the medical judge? We went through this before,
doctor Anthony Fauci. Do we want doctor Anthony Fauci back
up here?
Speaker 1 (22:19):
No?
Speaker 3 (22:19):
Probably not.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
So is there a legal precedent for keeping somebody in
there now? I mean, you can probably make a case that, hey,
you don't want to be out there running the bases
a chwab Field before the Nebraska Creton game given what
you have, But.
Speaker 3 (22:33):
But you don't have it.
Speaker 1 (22:34):
You haven't tested positive, you haven't tested positive, you don't
have any symptoms.
Speaker 3 (22:39):
Seems to me you have legal ground to say, Well,
you can just pound.
Speaker 1 (22:44):
Sand, sure, but stop being a talk radio blowhard for
just a moment, which is difficult for us to do
what we do here. They tell you look, we think
you're fine, but just in case we're wrong, please stay
home for forty two days, and if you die, let
us know. And you're thinking, well, I think I feel fine.
I want to go for a walk. But at the
(23:04):
same time, if I'm wrong and they're wrong, and I
go out there and I get this into my community,
that people could get sick, people could die. They told
me to stay home for forty two days. Maybe I'll
stay home for forty two days if you're if you're wrong,
people die, what do you do? I don't you don't
stay out? They told you to stay home.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Yeah, I say, but if i've but if I haven't
tested positive for it, and if I don't have any symptoms,
I'm going, well, I think your test is flogged, flagged
to see you later.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
I think that if they really have concerns that Jim
Rose is so sick that he might kill us, all
that I would prefer you stay there in the bio
Containment Unit at UNMC. I don't understand this business about
I go home because if Jim feels like I'm fine,
I'm going to go out and I'm going to go
take in a ballgame and sit down and pass everyone's
(23:56):
peanuts to each other down the row, and it turns
out up wrong. You were much sicker than we thought.
We got a false negative on your test. You didn't
You didn't leave your house, did you?
Speaker 7 (24:06):
No?
Speaker 1 (24:07):
Except when I went to Walmart, and then I got
on the subway, and then I got on an aera
and went to a ballgame, and I went to my
kids school and a few other things. Except for those things,
I stay home. If if they have concerns that you're
a public health risk, they should lock you away, I'll
let everyone respond to that again via the inbox.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
Again, who gets to be the health judge.
Speaker 2 (24:31):
It's like the people who say, you know, we need
to have red flag laws for people when it comes
to guns. Okay, who gets to decide whether you're capable
or incapable of handling a gun? A former girlfriend she
gets to decide, or a step mom she gets to decide.
That's what I mean. You start taking away people's rights
(24:52):
like this, it's a slippery slope. If you can make
a sound case to a reasonable person at this guy
should not be allowed out in public because of X
y Z medical reasons. If you can make a case,
a strong case to a reasonable person, that's one thing.
But these arbitrary deciders. Oh, I'm gonna decide for you
(25:15):
whether or not you can drive a car. I'm gonna
decide for you whether or not you can own a handgun.
I'm gonna me what qualifies me because I have this?
I don't know, That's what I mean. We either have
a free country or we don't. Let me know your thoughts.
Scott at kfab dot com. By the way, I hope
you had a wonderful Mother's Day if you had a
(25:36):
chance to spend it, either with mom or with a
with your your kid's mom, or just in wonderful memories
of these people.
Speaker 1 (25:45):
I hope it was a nice time for me. My wife,
the mother of our children. She loves traveling and she
loves nature, and I probably shouldn't. She's not probably listening
to this point in the morning, So I don't mind
telling you. I got a great deal on a bird
watching excursion on a Dutch cruise ship.
Speaker 3 (26:07):
So we set her up with that. That's going to
be a lot of fun, and you would have to
see her for forty two days.
Speaker 1 (26:13):
The well, she'll quarantine at home. The here's how serious
people here in the Zonker's custom what's inbox? Are taking
all of this? Scott atkfab dot com. Dave emails and says,
come on, people, it's all a scam. Bird watching Suddenly
a virus, Suddenly medical research in Omaha. National TV viewers
see a streetcar going in Omaha. People say, wow, Omaha's
(26:35):
getting a streetcar. Stod did the streetcar at a boy
so she can run again for mayor and win the
election when she runs again. Come on, people, wake up,
so Dave says, this is all orchestrated by Jeans Stothart,
host of the KFAB comment line. Later this morning at ten,
so that Omaha can be shown as having progress in
(26:56):
national news reports. Another helpful email here on signed says,
just burn all their clothes and put them on the
reality show Naked and Afraid in Omaha.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
That's good.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
I'd probably watch that on the public Access channel. To
talk more about this situation at UNMC within the Nebraska
University system, we got someone running for the Board of
Regents District one competitor ahead of tomorrow's primary. Brent Comstock
joins us here on news radio eleven ten KFAB.
Speaker 8 (27:29):
Brent, Good morning, Good morning, Scott, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
Absolutely, we had someone else in this race on this
program a while back here, so wanted to give you
a certainly equal time. But just like we talked about
with that candidate, we talked about the news of the
day there that had to do with Nebraska Medicine and
the potential takeover. We'll leave that in the past and
talk with you here, Brent about what do you think
(27:52):
about UNMC having the National Quarantine Unit. Some people in
Omaha say, why are we bringing these deadly diseases right
here to Omaha, Nebraska?
Speaker 3 (28:02):
What do you think?
Speaker 8 (28:04):
Yeah, it's a great question, and the public has right
to be concerned. I can tell you two things. Number One,
I've toured those units a couple of months ago, had
the opportunity to go through the National Quarantine Unit. It's
the only federally funded unit of its kind. And I
think that the thing that I would relate to the
public is the team at un MC and Nebraska Medicine.
(28:25):
They're ready. You know, these quarantine units on the pictures
they kind of look like sterile hotels, but when you
look behind the scenes in the details, I mean, their
ventilation systems are separate, their trash systems are separate, so
it's not like they are just sitting in Omaha a
holiday in. They are sitting in a specifically designed facility
(28:47):
so that the disease does not spread. And the second
thing that I would add to that is it's incredible
for us to be a national and global leader in
public health. Having this, this research facility, this quarantine facility,
these biocontainment units here is an asset not only to
(29:07):
our city and to our state, but it's a global asset.
We saw that during the Eubola crisis, we saw that
during COVID, and so I think, you know, the public,
it's right for them to say what's going on, and
I would relate to them that not only is Nebraska
medicine and U and MC ready, but we are a
national and global leader in that and that's a great
opportunity for our city, in our state.
Speaker 1 (29:26):
I wanted to pick your brain in a couple of
other issues while we have you here, Brandon. One of
them is college affordability. I've got a kid in college.
A lot of people do. Just had graduation across the
NU system here over the last few days, people are
still graduating from college even as expenses go up, and
is this just something that parents across Nebraska can expect
(29:48):
to pay more when we said our kids to deerl Nebraska.
Speaker 4 (29:51):
You.
Speaker 8 (29:53):
I think rising cost is something that we see everywhere, right,
But one of the things that we've got to do
a better job of and that we've been and paigning
about for the last years. How do we link affordability
to job creation? How do we link it to acceptance
of jobs in the state. And I think one of
the hardest parts about having a great graduate of the
University of Nebraska system is how do you keep them here,
(30:16):
keep them in the state, keep them in Omaha, Lincoln
or Greater Nebraska. Because that contributes to our tax space,
which allows us to have a better strategy for increasing
appropriations coming from the legislature. So I think it's a
necessary evil on one part. On the other part, I
think we need to link the legislature. We need to
link private business and workforce development together to figure out
(30:38):
how do we keep those costs competitive with other top
tier institutions in the Big ten and elsewhere, whether that's
through internship programs or increased scholarships from private partners, or
job placement programs to make sure that those students get
a job that they can have and stay here in Nebraska,
(30:58):
which is a great opportunity to to help contribute to
our economy.
Speaker 2 (31:02):
Let's talk sports for a minute. How familiar are you
as a candidate with two things one the Memorial Stadium
project and two name, image and likeness funding?
Speaker 8 (31:13):
Familiar enough that I get asked about every day on
the trail.
Speaker 3 (31:19):
Yeah. Well, so.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
Nebraska football is fighting off people for its top two recruits.
This will come down to a bid war. We're going
to have to up the price for guys that we're
already paying. We're already paying a high school kid to
come here. Where is this What policy do you want
the university to adopt? Because at some point we're going
to get to a stage where that's it. This is
(31:42):
as far as we go without federal legislation or a
collective bargaining agreement.
Speaker 3 (31:46):
Where are you on this issue itself?
Speaker 7 (31:49):
Yeah?
Speaker 8 (31:50):
I think you bring up an interesting point and important
point that so much of this is lodged in what
does the federal government do? One thing that I have
been adamant about from the beginning of this is that
you know, if we're going to pay these student athletes
like they are working employees, despite the fact that it
has been very clear that that is not how the
NIL contracts work. We need to put contract terms in place.
(32:13):
You would not go into a job and say, well,
if I decide tomorrow that someone's going to pay me
something else somewhere else, that I would just jump ship,
leave and expect to take all of the dollars with me.
And the wild wild west of NIL right now is
that we are training these young people. Yes, they're athletes now,
but in two or three or four years they're going
(32:34):
to be contributing members of society. And what message does
that send to them, that, oh, if you get a
little money elsewhere, you pack up and run and you
leave whatever you've started behind. That is not the function
of a land grant institution university system where our primary
job is educating people. So NIL is inevitable. The federal
government has a lot of work to do to get
(32:56):
that in a place where it's more palatable across the
board for every type of higher education institution, particularly those
in conferences like the University of Nebraska. But we've got
to think harder about contract structures so that we can
train these people to be leaders beyond playing on the
field and on the court, and contribute to contribute to society.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
Brent Comstock is a candidate for regent in District one.
That's where Tim Clair was ruling with an iron fist
for several years. You can find him on social media
ruling that iron scene. If you're paying attention, you can
find Brent on social media and on his campaign website.
Comstock for Regent dot com Brant. Thanks a lot for
(33:39):
your perspectives today, and good luck to you and your
fellow competitors and tomorrow's primary.
Speaker 8 (33:44):
I appreciate you guys. Take care, have a great week.
Speaker 1 (33:46):
Go to the Zonker's custom woods inbox and the talkback mic.
That's anywhere you are on our free iHeartRadio app, you
can touch that microphone icon and send us a message
with your own voice.
Speaker 4 (33:58):
Good morning, Scott.
Speaker 3 (33:59):
I just had a question.
Speaker 4 (34:01):
Why would they put that viral containment center right smack
dab in the middle of the nation in Nebraska, where
if it gets out it can go in all directions.
Why not put it down in Key West or up
in the Aleutian Islands or something like that. It just
seems to be like somebody wasn't thinking.
Speaker 1 (34:21):
Well, the other people in the Aleutian Islands in Key
West had a vote, and they all decided Omaha was
the best place for it. And they said, put it
on an island somewhere, and they said, well, here's Grand Island.
Speaker 3 (34:31):
Put it near there.
Speaker 7 (34:32):
No.
Speaker 1 (34:33):
Look that you can get on a plane or public
transportation from any point anywhere in the world, apparently, and
you can spread in all directions, as we've seen from
the few people on this cruise ship out of Antarctica.
So I think that there are a lot of people
who are rightfully, very pleased to have the National Containment
(34:54):
Center to potentially save lives, as we have done with
ebola in the past and now the hantavirus. Please an
honor to have that in Omaha. Do I love it? No,
because I live here, my kids live here, my family,
my friends, we don't work too far from there. And
I get nervous when they say, yeah, this is very,
very deadly. That's why we're gonna watch these guys for
a few days and then tell them to go home
(35:16):
for forty two days and just check in with us
from time to time and try and resist the urge
to go to a ballgame or Walmart, you know. I
hope they know what they're doing, because we've got this
here in Omaha, and if we're gonna have it, might
as well use it.
Speaker 3 (35:31):
They know what they're doing.
Speaker 2 (35:33):
It's a very very cool, awesome facility they have over there,
and it's world class.
Speaker 3 (35:40):
There's nothing else in the world like it. I'm glad
they're here.
Speaker 2 (35:43):
It gives Nebraska gives you, and OL gives Nebraska meta
UNMC gives Nebraska medicine a lot of national kudos. Yeah,
as long as no one comes here and they all die,
As long as somebody does leave the door open or
they don't throw away one of those gowns that's soaked
with this virus, probably safe.
Speaker 3 (36:01):
That's fantastic.
Speaker 1 (36:03):
I think that they have very large egos over there
in Nebraska Medicine. I think that they do, which is
why they don't want to look bad. No, they want
these people to all come out of their happy, healthy
and smiling after the predetermined amount of time and go
skipping about their merry way. That's what they want, So
I hope that's what we get.
Speaker 3 (36:21):
They skip about their merry ways. That's what we do.
Caring somebody from.
Speaker 1 (36:26):
Ebola, well or the hunt of virus. Yeah, Joe emails
and says Scott, these mouse virus people that came to
ol Maha hopefully did not come in via United Airlines.
I have a trip later this week. That's from Joe. No,
they were on Spirit Airlines. That's why we had to
run that thing down. No, they didn't come on any
of the commercial airlines. Also, have some respect. You're referring
(36:50):
to these people as the mouse virus people. That does
make me think about five years ago and a couple
of months we knew the people's names who were here
in Omaha for the coronavirus back when we were like,
what is this coronavirus thing? And then someone said it's
the common cold, you liar, It's not the comp Oh,
(37:11):
it is the common cold. It's a variation of the
common cold. But anyway, we had the people here with
the COVID at the containment unit at Nebraska Medicine, and
we had like check ins with these guys. They're doing
Facebook live videos and letting us know how they're feeling.
And there was that one guy who was a bit
of a national celebrity there for a week or so.
Speaker 3 (37:33):
I don't see.
Speaker 1 (37:34):
Anyone doing that here with the with this hantavirus outbreak. Now,
thankfully the people are all coming here, they're not sick.
We've got seventeen people that got here in the middle
of the night, transported to Nebraska Medicine around five am,
so seventeen of them. All but two are asymptomatic. They
(37:58):
don't have any signs of being sick. One American tested
positive doesn't have symptoms be tested positive. He's at the
Nebraska or she is at the Nebraska biocontainment unit, separate
from the quarantine unit where the rest of the exposed
passengers are treated, and then the symptomatic person will be
transported to Washington, d C. Which is weird. I thought
(38:19):
we had the place where if you've got the bad virus,
you come here and you're fine. Why are we sending
them to DC? And as far as why we're sending
them anywhere near Omaha got emails like this as well.
Doug says, time to move. If this is the kind
(38:39):
of leadership we have, maybe it's time to rethink my options.
I don't want to live anywhere near a community that's
willing to bring in people with a horrible, terrible, disease.
I don't care how safe they say it is, how
great their facilities are, how much protocol they have. Every
disease has the potential to do and be something new,
do something different, never seen before, etc.
Speaker 3 (39:00):
Time to move. That's from Doug. Doug, don't move.
Speaker 1 (39:03):
Nebraska has been leading off several of the national and
even international newscast today as we welcome on here, Senator
Pete Rickett's not exactly the thing that you want to
have tied into your home state, But if my family
got sick with something like a hantavirus, I would want
them to be in good care from professionals like it
(39:23):
Nebraska Medicine here in Omaha. Senator, good morning. What are
your thoughts on UNMC being ground zero for HANDA virus containment?
Speaker 7 (39:34):
Well, good morning, Scott. You know the UNMC and the
bio containment facility, the quarantine facility, it really are world leading.
When I was governor, you may recall that we evacuated
COVID patients from the Diamond Princess. We also took in
Americans who were taken from Abola from Africa, and the
BioC containment center and the quarantine center just did a
(39:55):
fantastic job of taking care of those folks. They were
able to help those folks they had both to survive.
The quarantine on COVID was absolutely successful, and so I
have no doubt that they will be able to handle
the hunt virus, which frankly is not as communicable as COVID,
and you know, it's obviously a dangerous disease. But I
(40:18):
have all the company the world that the folks who
come here we will taken care of and that UNC
is going to do a fantastic job with them.
Speaker 1 (40:24):
There are those who say, why would we bring this
to the middle of America, especially right here in our community,
not just leave it on the cruise ship for someplace
on a remote island. To that, you would say, what.
Speaker 7 (40:36):
Well, the professionals that you and MC are again world class.
So they will make sure that the folks are quarantining
in the safest way possible, and that if they do
develop any sort of symptoms that they can be followed
up on right away. And certainly if anyone do come
out untavirus, still have the best care in the world
to be able to survive that. So, look, this is
(40:58):
just a resource we have in Nebraska. Really is world leading,
and it's just fantastic that we can help people and also,
you know, just something that really drives the innovation on
the campus.
Speaker 1 (41:12):
Talk about affordability here. No reasonable person wanted Iran to
have nukes. It seems like by the President's statements that
we have decimated their opportunity to do so, set that
back for several years. Yet gas prices continue to go up.
A lot of Nebraska's are filling up for well north
of four dollars a gallon right now, diesels closer to six.
(41:35):
That's going to make a lot of things raised in
costs before too long that hasn't already. What are your
thoughts on affordability and what we're continuing to do in Iran, Senator.
Speaker 7 (41:47):
Yeah, certainly the increasing gas prices puts pressure on everybody.
It's something that is verty additional pressure for folks especially
you know, price and the grocery store went up twenty
percent under Joe Biden administration, with Joe Biden administration to
forty year high inflation, and those grocery prices didn't really
come back down, and so this just adds to that.
(42:09):
We need to balance this off with what we're doing
with regard to national security. You know, a country that
can't death to America can't be allowed to have a
nucle weapon or a missile that reach the United States.
They're very close to having both. You know, they've told
us they've got enough material for ten bombs. That means
they got more because they always lie to us, and
they demonstrated a few weeks ago is they've got a
(42:30):
missile that can reach Paris or London, which means they
are not far away from having a missile that reached
the United States. And they've killed tens of thousands of
their own people. You've got to believe they killed millions
of ours. So this is really really dangerous when they're
going and while we have certainly set them back, they
continue to pursue this agenda of trying to create a
(42:50):
nuclele weapon, and that's why the presidents continue to pursue this.
So we've got to balance off these national defense stuff.
Speaker 3 (42:57):
You know.
Speaker 7 (42:58):
I think one of the things that we can also
do is keep promoting some of the things we can
do here as far as homegrown solutions, one of which
is biofuels. You know, I actually, you know, just sold
up on ten over the weekend at IV and safety
and five cent a gallon. So I think that, you know,
we do have some homegrown Nebraska solutions here that can
can help out offset some of these increasing costs.
Speaker 2 (43:20):
Jim Rose Pete, What do you think is going to
happen when the President of China and the President of
the United States meet later this week.
Speaker 7 (43:27):
Well, China is the source of the instability we see
all over the place. You know, just take about think
about Iran. China buys like ninety percent of their energy
and providing them weapons. But China has also been the
ones that have been providing materials to Russia. Right, So
they're out there trying to create instability everywhere we look.
And so I think that the President is going to
(43:49):
continue to take a hard line with them. I think
one of the things the President's going to have to
do is tell them they're going to live up to
their obligations. If they say they're going to do a deal,
say for example, buy soybet' Fromust, they got to buy them.
Means what's happened in the first Trump administration. You know,
the president was able to kind of deal, you know,
the Phase one trade agreement, and as soon as President
Trump was out of office. The Chinese are nicked that
(44:11):
they're actually terrible trade partners. So I hope the President
goes in there and really takes a hard line with
them with regard to trade and the economic instability and
some of the predatory things that they're doing. And then
also we need to start looking at how we can
diversify our export markets. I'm going to be shortly introducing
a bill called the Market Act, which will require USBA
(44:32):
and our US Trade Representative to start looking at how
we can mitigate our dependence on sending exports to communist
China and finding other markets to be able to help
offset the loss of that market and see if we
can't make that up in other countries like Sate, Indonesia
or Malaysia, countries in Southeast Asia. They're young and growing
(44:53):
and have bigger populations as well.
Speaker 2 (44:55):
Because right now they're getting, as you mentioned, all of
their oil, almost virtually of it from the Straits of
Horror Moves, which have a gate locked gate on it.
So what about buying American oil? Do you see that
as happening out of this meeting. Trump likes to sell stuff,
he likes to cut deals, So do you think that's
going to happen. And if so, what impact do you
(45:15):
think that'll have on them making good on that Phase
one trade deal.
Speaker 7 (45:19):
Well, I certainly think the President is going to try
to offer to do that. But here's the deal, right,
Hi Jiping is a dictator. He's a stalinist mouse guy.
Like we haven't seen some stolen them out. The only
difference is he hasn't killed tens of millions of zone
people yet, but he would doing a heartbeat hold on
to power. And what he wants to do is replace
us as the world power. He's not going to want
(45:40):
to buy our oil because he can't replace us as
the world superpower if he's buying our oil, So he's
not going to want to do anything. In fact, he
looking at other industries like semiconductors. He's spending hundreds of
billions of dollars to become independent of the United States
and our Western allies from this conductor's supply chain. In fact,
(46:01):
I've got again some bills like the Match Act. These
are byparers and bills by the way to cut off
selling some of the semiconductor manufacturing machines to China. So
if they can't manufacture there on semiconductors. So they are
trying to become independent from us because they want to
dominate us. She just picking a victory. He tells, dictators
(46:22):
tell people they're going to do. He told up. You
should take him very seriously.
Speaker 1 (46:26):
Senator, appreciate your perspective and all these things this morning.
Thank you very much for joining us, and good luck
in tomorrow's primary.
Speaker 7 (46:32):
Thank you very much.
Speaker 3 (46:34):
Running every two years.
Speaker 1 (46:35):
He's running against a lot of people in the primary.
They thought is the anti Rickets vote would probably be
divided up, and he has a good path. But this
is not the Rickets dan Osborne fight. That's not till November.
Should these people make it out of their respective primary?
Question is will he split the vote in the Shore
Ricketts household?
Speaker 3 (46:52):
Yeah, oh yeah, that's well.
Speaker 1 (46:54):
That we'll see all that goes as well tomorrow's primary
election day. That Senator Pete Ricketts here in eleven ten
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