ARE WE IN THE FOURTH TURNING? YES.

Finally! Brad discusses The Four Turnings Theory and that America is in the middle of The Crisis pase which is great news. The forecast for America is excellent!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
So it's November twenty twenty five. The General is not
with their first episode here in a long time. I
have met in General with me, but it's November twenty
twenty five, and this show. What I want to talk
about is the context in which we're living right now.
And put it. Put it into a theory that many

(00:26):
of you may be familiar with, and it's the Four Turnings.
And I think, and stick around here for a moment,
and you understand that there is a rhythm, a pulse
to how America seems to go on highs and then
come down to these lows, and then you know there's

(00:47):
a big rebound. Things get better, we build back better,
we've got highs again, then we go through some lows.
I just what we want to talk about, and I also
want to mention it's a fifth at the anniversary of
the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald. One of the greatest songs,
in my opinion, about the largest ship on the Great

(01:09):
Lakes at the time. The Big fits, and it had
an opportunity actually a couple of months ago, took up
to Lake Superior and see where the Big fits. The
Edmund Fitzgerald was trying to dock and Gordon Lightfoot's famous
nineteen seventy six folk song The Wreck of the Edmund
Fitzgerald just fantastic. But anyway, where are we? Where are

(01:32):
we right now? And one thing that keeps coming to
me is in the matrix, Morpheus tells Neo, you've been
living in a dream world. And if any of you
kind of start to feel this way that what's real?
What's fiction? What's ai? What I mean? Who do you

(01:55):
know to rely on? Where do you go to get
your dependable information? And so many elements of American society
that for most of our generation and the older generations,
so many elements of our society was presumed to be honest.

(02:19):
Our institutions were presented to us as being the bulwarks
of democracy and our republican freedom. Look at just what
we just came out of these how many days weeks
of a government shutdown? The votes were finally found to
reopen the government, But what really happened? Shutdowns aren't unusual

(02:41):
since twenty thirteen. By the way, there have only been
five formal budgets passed by Congress since twenty thirteen. If
you were running a business and you were in your
thirteenth year as CEO or CFO and you've only had
five formal budgets passed by your board. There would not

(03:01):
be activist shareholder takeover. He'd probably be in all kinds
of regulatory issues. You'd probably be getting sued. So don't
hire Congress to be your retirement planner. Everything at the
congressional level has been a continuing resolution, maintaining status quo,

(03:22):
spending without debate on priorities. All you see now with
these congressmen and senators is they walk up to a
mic and they rip the other side. No one's doing
their job, you know. I will say one thing about
Bernie Sanders. He has stayed true to who he is.
He's not changed. He's the same guy at one hundred

(03:45):
and fourteen as he was when he entered politics when
he was seventy six. Fetterman, Senator, Fetterman, new guy, the
guy sticking to his principles. Right, So there are some
beacons of hope out there. And I'm not necessarily agreeing

(04:07):
with Bernie Sanders' way of governing and redistribution of wealth,
but at least you know he's authentic and you know
what he stands for, and he's willing to go down
with the ship. But guys, there is no budgetary process.
There are what our grandfathers and great grandfathers would say,

(04:32):
there are interests. They would just call them these interests.
This is before lobbyists. There are these interests, these interests
that go to Congress with their handout and do whatever
they need to do to get enough congressman to vote
a line on him into a budget and then continuing
resolutions just to keep it going. You know, you hear

(04:57):
about the SNAP, the the welfare, the EBT card snap.
It's not the single parent working mother's society that's in DC.
It's it's big food, big grocery. They're the ones. They

(05:17):
want it because that keeps their consumer base broad and wide,
so there's more money in the system to buy their goods.
That's who's advocating for SNAP. The idea of a representative
Congress setting funding priorities that actually reflect America's wishes is

(05:38):
just fantasy. And there are multiple other major issues that
are being revealed that we've talked general I and I've
talked about on our show. Many other what previously we're
called the tinfoil hat wearing conspiracy theorists rabbit going down
the rabbit hole now being revealed, does huh yeah. Jim

(06:03):
Comey appears to have lied to Congress, made false statements
to Congress. He quote investigated Clinton's email practices but found
no wrongdoing. It's totally normal to destroy private email servers
carrying State Department emails in the use special software to
wipe the hard drives. Nothing to see here. We have

(06:26):
one investigation after another. The people we can't even keep track.
We're it now, We're up to what arctic frost? Is
that what they're calling this one the Steele dossier. People
need to go to prison over this. The Steele dossier
funded by the DNC and the Clinton campaign. Its allegations

(06:48):
were completely false, made up lies. And Donald Trump that's
when he'd say fake news, fake news, fake news. He
was derided calling it a hoax. John Brennan, one of

(07:09):
the highest level men in federal government with the highest
security clearances, told Congress that he hadn't seen the Steele
dossier until after the twenty sixteen election. That apparently is false.
We're now learning that Brennan recommended it be included in

(07:32):
briefings get feathered in. They also knew Joe Biden when
he was running for president and twenty they knew what
type of shape he was in. That's why they kept
him in the basement, almost no public appearances, and the

(07:58):
media enabled it. It took the June twenty twenty four
debate to destroy the lies that President Joe Biden had
all the wires connected. Now, not only do we realize
we had no functioning president, now we learned that he

(08:20):
wasn't even overseeing the use of the auto pen for
all these pardons, don't We can talk about COVID, the
COVID catastrophe, mass vaccines, vaccine injury. We can talk about
Hunter Biden's Barsmas salary, and our Ukraine policy during the

(08:41):
Biden administration. Why aren't these people in jail yet? We're
prison yet? Our media has put forward as the as real,
the most obvious distortions and lies to the American people.
But somehow, during their government shutdown, the nation was functioning

(09:02):
for almost all of us unless you wanted air travel,
or you were panicking over your federal job, or you
were panicking over your you're NGO's funding, or you're some
funding to an agency. But folks, we have been grossly
miss informed and uninformed, misled. We have been living in

(09:28):
a dream world where we imagine we have an actual
functioning central government headed by a president and Congress that
are acting out for the best interests of the people.
Then reality we have no budgetary process. Our politics is corrupted,
our media is as well. There's no more truth and honesty.

(09:52):
And guess what happens when you've got this type of environment.
A socialist, possible possibly communist, Shia Muslim mayor gets elected
to New York City campaigning to freeze city rents, to

(10:12):
make property taxes based upon white neighborhoods that can afford
more to pay more, and lowering taxes on black and
brown neighborhoods. Okay, free bus, fair to all writers, city
owned bodega's, small food stores operating as nonprofits. And the

(10:34):
people that voted for this free stuff are the ones
that aren't producing. We as a nation, how do we
get here? How did we get here? And that's what
we're going to talk about. We are in the fourth turning.
We are in the fourth turning. That's want to talk about.

(10:55):
After the break on brad Kopfel. This is for the
defense of the American people, welcome back to This is
for the defense of the American people. I'm at Triny
brad Koppel. Right now, America is on a wild ride
and we are not only are we going through a

(11:16):
just a time period that feels surreal. I can only
imagine in the older generations, the baby boomers, and they're
looking at this going what in the world has happened
to the country? Just what anything goes? And I don't

(11:39):
need to list the examples. You all see the examples
on the news. I've chosen to pull my head out
of social media as much as possible. I'm trying not
to pay attention to the daily retailed news. You just
don't know what's fact, you don't know what's fiction. It's
really hard. So I've gone back to history and I
go back and go, Okay, where have we been? Where's

(12:01):
America been in the past. That's similar to this, as
we say that history repeats itself, or at least at rhymes,
and there is. There are two historians named William Strauss
and Neil Howe, and they have a theory. I believe.
They wrote a book called The Four Turnings. The Four Turnings.
They're simple thought is that America goes through four mini

(12:30):
cycles every eighty to one hundred years, and the first
cycles called the High, and the High is after a
major crisis. Think about America right after World War two.
Strong families, strong communities, strong institutions, three TV channels. You

(12:51):
knew your neighbor's first names. Crime was low, kids actually
played outside. The country, had a clear direction LBG, I'm sorry,
I'll be Jay. Ike was in the white house. Life
wasn't perfect, but it certainly was stable. You could leave
your front door unlocked, and really the worst thing that
happened in the neighborhood was maybe your neighbor returned the

(13:14):
lawnmower without filling the gas tank. And the kids that
grew up in all that stability, well, they started asking
uncomfortable questions, which leads to the second cycle, the awakening
and Straussen Howe's theory is that in the sixties and seventies,

(13:41):
the kids that were raised in that stability have a
lot of extra time on their hands, and they start
they get a little restless, and they start to question, well,
why can't we wear jeans, why can't we dance? Why
can't I let my hair grow out? Let's protest and
protests are up. Music gets weird or fantastic, depends on

(14:03):
your musical taste. But every institution, from marriage to the military,
and the universities and corporate world all went under a
cultural microscope. And the whole culture of the late sixties
and seventies turned into this therapy session run by the

(14:26):
people least qualified to run a therapy session. And it
was you know, don't tell me what to do. Era,
civil Rights movement, Vietnam protests, women entering in the workforce,
three major moments in American history that really needed to happen. Watergate,

(14:47):
distrust in big institutions, and you know, you look back
at the style from the seventies and maybe it's coming back.
I don't know that styles like whatever's not on fire,
anything goes. And then the economy just tanks and Americans

(15:09):
are taking hostage in the Middle East, and we went
into this third cycle that Strauss and Howe referred to
as the unraveling. And we drift into the unraveling, and
this is the eighties through the two thousands. America. We

(15:30):
became a country of individuals dressed up in our tribes.
Trust declines, crime spikes, the media is just a circus.
CNN is everywhere, Cable is everywhere. Politics is now going

(15:50):
to be a hobby for people who just want to
yell professionally. Jim Traffickan, if you guys can remember Jim Traffickan,
so many examples, but politics just at the end of
the Reagan era politics, and I'm going to pin this
one on the Republican Party, and I can pin it

(16:11):
all the way down to several specific people in the
Republican Party in the late eighties and early nineties who
pulled the plug and it just became horrible. What became
acceptable to yell at each other in Congress or on
the news shows. Of course, culturally, we had the Wall

(16:35):
Street excess, we had MTV, the explosion of cable news.
The culture was getting fragmented. I grew up in this era.
It's a latch key kid. Society got loose. People stopped
going to church, Americans became more individualistic. Civic unity weakened.

(17:00):
Who's a member of the Elks or the Lions, the
Lion you know, you can rattle off several other but
that's down. And eventually all these little cracks in the
foundation they add to the fourth and final cycle called

(17:21):
the fourth turning the crisis, And in my opinion, the
crisis began around two thousand and eight the financial system
nearly melded down, and since then we've had hyper polarization
in America. We have had the economic shock associated with

(17:42):
that gave rise to the Tea Party movement, which gave
rise to Donald Trump and his new form of American
populism in MAGA, and the response to MAGA became this
rage politics. Meanwhile, the institutions, especially the educational institutions, that

(18:04):
were drifting left, they kept drifting left way out of
now that it's out of sight, they're hardly caricatures of
what they were. We learned during COVID that we kind
of knew nothing was made in America, But during the pandemic,
like Holy Cow, we have tremendous supply chain breakdowns. What

(18:29):
do you mean our medicines made on the other side
of the world. And I don't know about you guys,
but I got exhausted. I mean during the twenty one
twenty twenty one, twenty two, I just got absolutely exhausted.
And all those symptoms that I say start with the

(18:50):
Great Financial crisis of eight. If you apply these symptoms
to the fourth turning. It fits like a hand and
a nice glove. We're in it right now. But that's
great news. It's actually awesome news. And this is what

(19:12):
I want to talk about after the break. If we
are in fact in the fourth Turning, which I have
ninety nine percent confidence level that we are in, we're
going to come out of this even better than we
ever were. And that's what I want to talk about
after the break. Stick around six' TEN wtvn On. iHeartMedia,

(19:40):
hi thanks for tuning in to six y TEN wtdn
and for the. Defense To american, people you can always
find a show on demand and the purple podcast button
on your iPhone for the. DEFENSE a little picture of
me there on the front at my office and a
conference room TAKING i don't know fifteen years ago and

(20:01):
the general's out on this. Show wish you, Well, general
he'll be. Back no health, issues just ted some court
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vehicle be, smart Support, America support, local support like minded
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get up to chess round for us please or get
out Of che's, round depending upon where you. Are All,
Right i'm talking about the theory that's been out several,

(21:26):
decades AND i don't know that the jeneral AND i
have spent too much time talking about, this but it's
called The Four, turnings and the authors or the theoreticians
are last Named strauss And how and they, believe they
posit That america has goes through four. Cycles every eighty

(21:50):
to one hundred. Years they give all the examples up
up to the, nineties late, nineties and it's very. Persuasive
i'm picking up on this theory and looking at it
for where we are, now and without a, doubt we've

(22:11):
passed through what they call the high that would Be
america right After World War, two the fifties and early.
Sixties we moved through the, awakening and that would be
the sixties and, seventies part of the, eighties the unraveling
be part of the eighties and. Nineties and THEN i

(22:32):
submit that the, crisis the fourth, turning the fourth and
final before you get back to our Next american high
started with The Great Financial crisis of two thousand and.
Eight so here is the that's the bad. News the
bad news is it does appear as though we're SOMEWHERE
i would say fifty to seventy five percent into this fourth.

(22:58):
Turning this is the crisis era because the entire system
is straining, economically, politically, socially. Technologically and if you Follow
strauss And howe in the four, turnings WHICH i, do
this is the fourth. One the first one was The American,

(23:21):
revolution the second one was The Civil. War the third
one would be The Great depression Slash World war. Two
and every time the country hits this kind of, turbulence
the system doesn't. Collapse The american experiment doesn't. Collapse it
transforms and we learn from our mistakes and The american,

(23:47):
ingenuity The american, spirit That american pioneer, frontier The american work,
ethic it is not going to be. Eliminated in, fact
we start to look at the men and women that
espouse those, values that live those kinds of, lives our older,

(24:11):
generation our, boomers our older gen, xers and we must
model what needs to happen during this cross during this.
Crisis america is not going to, collapse but we. Are
but things are being torn. Down whether you Like DONALD.
J trump or, not he is tearing things. DOWN i

(24:35):
agree with a lot of what he's. DOING i don't
agree with some other things that he's. Doing doesn't. Matter
my political opinions and the political opinions of your neighbors
and the people down the, street doesn't. Matter it's all.
Irrelevant it's it is just absolute, static white. Noise we
need to start paying attention to the. Signal so where
are we today in this? Crisis we are watching a political,

(24:58):
realignment are we. Not we see the old left and
the old right breaking down almost. Gone the parties are.
Reorganizing you're seeing coalitions that used to be on the
left and The Democrat party moving to the, right moving
to The Republican. Party you're gonna watch Your Senator. Fetterman

(25:22):
he's been my dark horse here for two. YEARS i
would not be surprised to See fetterman renounce His Democrat
party affiliation and go. Independent new coalitions are. Forming old
leaders are getting the. Hook Nancy, Pelosi bye, Bye, schumer bye.

(25:44):
Bye and we've already seen some the old Guard republicans,
disappear and the culture wars are going to come to an.
End this happens every. Time but what we haven't had,
YET i don't think we haven't had yet is What
strauss And howe call the hinge. EVENT a hinge event

(26:07):
is something that forces the nation to choose a. Direction
it might be an economic shock like The Great. Depression
it could be a constitutional, showdown it could be a geopolitical.
Crisis whatever it, is it's going to Push america into
our next. Chapter it's. Coming it is absolutely, coming and

(26:31):
we want it to because right now we're Going it
just seems like everyone's going through, life busy head in the,
phone doom, Scrolling no one's paying. Attention congress clearly doesn't do.
Budgets they. Haven't, look they don't do. Budgets they don't
do what they're supposed to. Do and everything after the fourth,

(26:54):
turning a New america. Emerges after the. Revolution look what
we had after The Civil, war we had the industrial.
Evolution After World War, two we had the fifties and
sixties in the industrial revival Of, america And america became

(27:15):
the leader of the free. World history tells us that
the political system will crack under pressure and a fourth,
turning but a new consensus will form in THE. Us
we're right on, schedule. Guys with the election Of mamdani
In New York, city The Democrat party in total. Disarray

(27:37):
What Donald trump is doing with THE exe the executive,
power and whoever's going to come in behind him is
going to be a, younger very much a younger leader
of The Republican party and the leader of The Democrat
party is going to be very young as, well and
they're going to be very educated and be very. Charismatic

(27:58):
there's a realignment. Coming the establishment has been, dismantled The
Democrat Republican, party The binary is living on borrowed. Time
the uniparty is. Over the problem is The Democrat well
if it's a, problem but The Democrat party is a

(28:20):
coalition of people who don't have common. Ground The republicans
And conservatives and the. Moderates we have a, foundation and
it's the same foundation that this country was built. On
so what emerges after a fourth turning is you're going
to have one party that's based on, order, stability rule of, law,

(28:45):
borders demanding institutional, competents and the other party is going
to be the Reform, party, innovation social, modernization using more
tech to, govern think. Less it's not going to be
so much left versus right as it's going to be

(29:05):
the Responsible party and the Reinvention, party and we'll take
the best of both. Parties i've got some thoughts on
what the next decade could look. Like and it's. Exciting
it's actually. Exciting, hey if you're just jumping in joining

(29:26):
us on the. Show The general is out. Today everything,
Fine he's just chasing a case somewhere In Mcgammery. County
i'm talking about the Fourth, turnings and we've spent a
little bit time in the past talking about, this but
this is a more of a deeper. Dive we're in
the fourth turning and it's not a bad. Thing it's

(29:46):
going to feel, painful AND i still think there's going
to be a hinge event that's going to force the
end of The Fourth turning and we move in into
the Next american high and, politically realignment is already. HAPPENING

(30:09):
i think the distinctions between left and right is going to.
DISAPPEAR i think you're going to have a party of
law and order and you're going to have a party of,
progressivism and we're going to take the best of. BOTH
i think a big stage the octagon is going to

(30:30):
be a fight over federal authority and state. Authority, Welcome,
finally let's get politics back to the center and back
down to the states where it. Belongs there's going to
be a battle over executive. Power Is Donald trump using
and abusing his executive? Power that is a very legitimate.

(30:52):
Debate whether you're on the left and you can't stand
when he's, done on the right and you can't stand
what he's. Doing there's plenty of conservatives and libertarians that
do not like What Donald trump's doing in The White.
House there will be reforms on what an executive can.

(31:13):
Do look At Joe biden in the auto pen and
all these. Pardons we're awake. Now changes are going to
happen because the pressure is so. Strong there must be.
Change there will be election. Reforms we must know that
every vote is, counted not twice, once and we need to.

(31:36):
Know we need to have a set of rules that
you can't you don't get to vote In america if
fail in the. Blank you, know if you're here, illegally
you shouldn't be a lot of. It but we need
to have, rules, laws and national consensus on who gets to.
Vote there must be an end to law, fare period

(31:58):
AND i think that's going to art with the bar,
associations The American Bar, association state bar. Associations they are
going to need to drill down on the lawyers that
are concocting lawfare and driving, lawfare and then follow the.
Money there's going to need to be civil. Damages if

(32:19):
you're on the receiving end of, lawfare you should be
able to Get there should be deterrent if you're a
vexatious litigator and you're engaged in, lawfare you should be
on the hook for the other side's legal fees plus
maybe even what's called trouble damages to triple those damages right,

(32:42):
up or punitive. Damages the debt spiral must resolve one
way or the. Other our national debt is going to get.
Resolved AND i don't know if it's a matter of
pegging us back to the gold standard and then revaluing
to instead of thirty five dollars an ounce to four

(33:03):
thousand dollars an. OUNCE i, mean there's there are some
smart people out. There we can figure this. Out but
that's not. Optional there will be a restructuring Of america's.
Debt there'll be new physical. Rules we're already. Reindustrializing the
one thing That trump administration is doing amazingly well is

(33:24):
getting production back To. America we have way too many,
consumers not enough. Producers and producers produce, Jobs producers produce,
revenue producers produce a tax. Base and guess, what In
New York, city your producers are going to. Leave and
If New york goes the way Of New York, city

(33:45):
your state is going to is very it's on a shop.
Clock you have to protect. Producers producers in capitalism is not.
Evil it will work itself. Out but we have to
bring manufacturing back To. America we need to bring jobs

(34:06):
back To. America and that's What Donald trump And Scott
besson is. Doing what they're, Doing North america is going
to become its own supply, chain not just The United,
states But North. America we will become our own supply.
Chain and we're going to Slap venezuela around a little,
bit and we might Slap mexico around a little, bit

(34:27):
But North america is going to be its own hegemon
and its own supply chain and its own. Fortress critical
manufacturing is returning To. America energy independence is going to come.
Back nuclear is going to be back in the daily.

(34:48):
Conversation why it's a geopolitical. Necessity we're going to have
a new deal for our kids and our. Grandkids, why,
Well i've got four kids over Twenty too Many americans
are locked out of The american. Dream And i'm on
the top end of the socioeconomic. Strata And i'm telling

(35:10):
you right, NOW i can ONLY i JUST i don't
know how the other the great majority Of, americans how
they pay their, bills how they pay their, utilities how
you go to the grocery. Store forget about being able
to get a. Mortgage now we're talking about fifty year
mortgages just to be able to have a. HOME i

(35:30):
don't know HOW i feel about, that but too Many.
Americans we have screwed these kids in this younger, generation
and they've been locked out of The american dream unless
they're in financial advising or they're in some sort of
other occupation where you take other people's, money take your,
cut and do something with. IT i don't know whatever they.

(35:53):
Do it's these forces are, here they're, real they're, growing
and history tells us that these types of, social cultural
political forces make. Change we will, have whether The libertarians
Or Republican conservatives like it or. Not there will be

(36:17):
affordable housing. Reforms there will be some kind of wage.
Stabilization if prices are going to go, up wages need
to go. Up the problem is prices are going, up
but wages are not going. Up there will be an
infrastructure boom that's. Happening the government's going to the state

(36:39):
and federal government start to need writing checks and get
infrastructure booming. Again we've got bridges that need repaired and.
Replaced we need to go back to the village mindset of.
Apprenticeships grab that young, person that young, lateeen early twenties

(37:00):
and bring him or her into your. Shop whatever you.
Do i've got one now in a law. Firm bring them,
in let them apprentice with. You the twenty thirties are
going to look a lot more like the nineteen fifties
than the nineteen. Nineties AND i just believe that these,

(37:23):
cycles these four, turnings are, Good they're very. Healthy just
like winter brings us, spring what we're in right now
will bring us new. Highs AND i think we're going
to find we're going to go back to. Craftsmanship we
want goods and products and services that are not mass

(37:44):
made at the cheapest, priced at the cheapest. Cost we're
going to get back to, craftsmanship family, stability civic, duty
restraint on your, spending and this new narrative the next
decade and, two this New american narrative is going to be.

(38:08):
Awesome once this crisis. Passes the people don't want the static.
Anymore they want the. Signal and your gut knows your,
inner your inner soul knows what's right and what's, wrong
and we more of, us were focusing in on that,
signal and we're ignoring the. Noise