Episode Transcript
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Your list Saints KFI AM six fortyThe bill Handles show on demand on the
iHeartRadio app KFI AM six forty Liveeverywhere on the iHeartRadio app bill Handle.
Here Morning Crew. On a Friday, May nineteenth, some of the top
stories that we are covering. Hyundaiand Kia announced a two hundred million dollars
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dollars settlement over the security flaw whereYorkia or Hyundai was stolen and it became
a TikTok challenge. Hey, welcometo TikTok. And I'm gonna do a
story later on about that at sevenfifty. How we connect TikTok connects to
the border and the migrants, andI'll explain that. Now La City Council
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approved Mayor Basses Karen Bass's proposed thirteenbillion dollars city budget, and that is
unprecedented. This budget, first timethat La City has gone beyond thirteen billion
dollars in its budget. And shegot effectively everything she wanted. She is
in a honeymoon stage with the citycouncil. And there were a couple of
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spins on this one in particular,and the big issue and this is what
everybody's concerned with and that is homelessness. If you look at California, look
at who ran for mayor, PaulCaruso, Karen Bass. Paul Caruso,
a huge developer, a Republican,moderate Republican, and his primary campaign promise
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was I'm going to deal with homelessness. Karen Bass primary campaign promise, I'm
going to deal with homelessness. GavinNewsom, governor of California, I'm gonna
deal with homelessness. And you think, come on, how important is homelessness.
Yeah, I just drive down thestreet and see those tent encampments.
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It looked like an Arii showroom alongthe entire city with seconds old Rii tents
that they're selling for next to nothing. It is. It's a problem.
It's a huge problem. Okay,So now the biggest budget item is three
point two billion dollars to LAPD andthat's a pretty important I guess the biggest
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I think, so it's like twentypercent of the budget. And what City
Council President Paul Krikorian said at thecouncil built on the broad outline of the
mayor's proposed budget with certain amendments.But she basically got everything she wanted.
And here is where a huge amountof money. First of all, the
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budget increased eleven percent over last year. That's a big uptick in the amount
of money that the city is goingto spend, and a lot of it
where a huge increase affordable and supportivehousing is described at funding for more per
sinnel police police got a nice jump, firefighters got a nice jump. Unarmed
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mental health responder, yeah, we'regoing to that direction. Civilian staff,
and then needed investments in pedestrian trafficsafety, city infrastructure. It's pretty broad,
but you know, the city isno easy thing to run. I
mean when you talk about a thirteenbillion dollar business that's being run, it's
And also keep in mind that theseare not business people that run the budgets
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either. These are politicians. Andyou would think that this is a bureaucracy
that is being run. And lookhow difficult it is. You've got a
board of directors, the entire citycouncil that has to vote everything you do.
You've got a bureaucracy with tens ofthousands of employees, and what experience
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do you have in running any ofit? Zero. You come from the
legislature where you're one of x numberof votes it's a very interesting way we
do this. But then the samething happens, oh in England. It's
hilarious because you got the Chancellor ofthe Exchequer that is basically the treasury secretary
and they have guys that's at zeroexperience and money and it's a political appointment.
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Okay, So the big thing isthe homelessness issue because that has become
the number one item and her programinside Safe one hundred and ten million dollars
for motel and other housing, interimhousing forty seven million to acquire motels and
hotels to reduce future costs and homelessness, and then it goes on ten million
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for staff on going services, etc. The bottom line is the attention being
paid on the homelessness. And Ihave said over the years it has become
more and more and more of aproblem, and the more money we throw
at it, the bigger a problemit is seems to be. And how
do you deal with the homeless Andthere's two ways that it's going to succeed,
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where substantially homelessness what we dealt with, or three different ways in my
opinion, forcing people into mental housing. I mean, you can't do it
that it's illegal. They used tocal state Channel Islands was a mental facility,
or no excuse me, University ofCalifornia. Channel Islands was a mental
facility. They used to throw peopleagainst their will into mental facilities. Do
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we go back to that. I'mfine, I'm fine with that. And
then the other issue is a tonof money being thrown at it. I
mean astronomical amounts of money. Andwe're getting there, and the advances are
going to be incremental. And asI told you a couple of examples,
there was a time when it becameillegal for wood shakes in La County.
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You know, the shakes on theroof. They were all made of wood,
and that was a severe, severefire damage, and they passed the
law. There aren't any more.You know why, because roofs have basically
a life life expectancy of thirty years. It took thirty years, but we're
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there. Same thing with catalytic converters, it took an entire generation of cars
were there. Same thing is gonnahappen with hopelessness. It's going to take
a generation assuming we throw money atit. Now. A story that I
want to share with you about theLa Dodgers, The La Dodgers originally.
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I mean it's a gutsy organization.It really is. Nineteen I think it
was nineteen forty nine, was atforty seven or forty nine with Jackie Robinson
was the first black Major League baseballplayer and branch Rickey, who was the
manager at the time, brought himin. And there's a wonderful story about
that. That wasn't just a mistake. The Dodgers were looking for a black
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player, not forty seven, thankyou, looking for a black player.
I mean, there's a huge storybehind that, and you know, just
break through. I have to breakthroughwith the Dodgers. Dodgers all have always
been known as a baseball team thatwas ahead of the curve. Now they
also have something called Pride Night,a pro LGBTQ night with the Dodge,
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Syke Bat Night or whatever name.It's just something that becomes part of the
Dodger games. At Southern Californians goto and so as part of Pride Night,
they give an award and they weregoing to give a Community Hero Award
to the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence.This is, as they call themselves,
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a leading Edge order of Queer andtrans nuns. You've got it, a
bunch of gay people who dress upas nuns and talk about the rights of
LGBTQ people. You think it's alittle offensive to the Catholics, just a
little, And as you can imagine, there was tremendous backlash. A matter
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of fact, most of it outof state. Marco Rubio wrote a letter
Senator from Florida. You had proChristian groups, of course, or Christian
groups themselves. You had the CatholicChurch of course telling the Dodgers you can't
do this, and the Dodgers caved. And by the way, I'm not
making a value judgment here. I'mnot saying yay for the Dodgers or nay,
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or the Christian groups are right.What I will tell you it's pretty
offensive. And sometimes offensive works,and I think it's a good idea and
sometimes not. But these people dressingup as nuns really does target Catholics.
You know what if they dressed upas let's say, Arabs and war you
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know, fake explosive vests. Oh, that's not offensive at all, right,
come on, or fundamental Jews walkingaround with fake dollar bills and handing
those out to protest. No,I don't think that works. So in
twenty thirteen, twenty thirteen, tenyears ago, they held their first Pride
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Night, and at that time,Pride Knights were just weren't around, and
they are now. So at thispoint, the Dodgers have now developed a
reputation as one of the most gayfriendly organization in sports. So they invite
this group, They're going to givethem the award, a Community Hero Award,
and then as a result of thebacklash, they pull it. They
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go, no, thank you,We're sending our invitation and we sure as
hell aren't going to give you theCommunity Hero Award to the Sisters of Perpetual
Indulgence. So the La LGBTQ Centerhas removed a support for Pride Night for
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a cancelation of the entire event.If the Sisters are Perpetual Indulgence aren't reinstated.
So where is the statement from theDodgers. I've got it here.
It is, I got it statementfrom the Dodgers right, given the strong
feelings of people who have been offendedby the sisters inclusion in our evening,
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and in an effort not to distractfrom the great benefits that we have seen
over the years of Pride night,we decided to remove them from this year's
group of honorees, and that wasa statement release. Now I'm going to
give the Dodgers credit on that onebecause they put it. Just dealt with
it head on. It's not yournormal corporate BS speak. We hold the
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values of our fans to the higheststandards, like when someone is killed on
a plant, safety is our firstconcern. Yeadah, Yeah, they set
it out right. Hey, listen, we got nailed for this. Sorry
about that. In terms of theCatholic reference, we were nailed for this,
and we decided that we've got apull out of this. Why because
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of the strong feelings of people whohave been offended. Okay, now this
is and the immediately when I talkedto and I said, is this as
a result of what happened with antHauser Anhauser Busch, the backlash on that
one where it was for bud Light. And here's what happened. There is
a transnd gender and social media influencerby the name of Dylan mulvaney was hired
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by Anhuser Busch, an Heuser Buschand Heuser Busch to post and promote bud
Light's March madness a social media contestcampaign. Now is a Dylan mulvaney known
for any connection to basketball? Absolutelynot no connection. Just someone said let's
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hire Dylan. Dylan is an influencer. Dylan has ten million followers on TikTok.
Now, for those of you thathave ten million followers on TikTok,
you are doing pretty well. Letme put it this way. You're not
suffering in terms of monetary compensation.But the backlash was so tremendous that bud
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Light immediately lost twenty percent of itssales. Yeah, I think that's a
little bit influential. Her influence,Dylan's influence is far less than the backlash,
and so you have to be alittle careful about it, you really
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do. Disney has has been verypro gay and exactly what's happening in Floria
right now. The don't say gaylaw was passed in Florida. You can't
talk about gender identity or LGBTQ issuesanywhere from the first third grade in school,
and then they moved it all theway up to the graduating of high
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school. Disney comes out against it. Ronda Santis fights Disney, and look
at the fight they're getting into.Right now. So we're going to see
what happens with that one. Okay, Now I want to talk about TikTok
because the Internet. I have beenfascinated by the Internet and as many of
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us have, and it's extraordinarily powerfulfor the good and extraordinarily powerful for the
bad. And a quick story.We used to I used to endorse a
company run by a guy, CoreyHang, who is a visionary, a
genius when it comes to Internet andapplication and he has contracts with every federal
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enforcement agency you can imagine, doessoftware for them. And he was very
early on in the Internet. Herealized in the early nineties that's where it
was going to go. And Iasked him one day, Corey, you
know about as much as the Internetas anybody I can imagine, where's it
going to go? And he said, I don't have the foggiest notion.
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I have no idea. All Ican tell you it's beyond your wildest imagination
where it can go. Who wouldhave thought of TikTok? Who would have
thought of Facebook? Who would havethought of chat GPT? Years ago?
You wouldn't have thought. So letme tell you what's going on at the
border and how does TikTok? Howdoes TikTok apply to what's going on to
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the border. I'm talking about themigrants coming in May eleventh. As you
know, Title forty two ended.Title forty two is Trump reinstated. Ed
he came out of nineteen forty fourin which the government can say we are
going to stop migrants and not evenallow them to claim asylum, which by
law they have to be given thatright. Nope, it's a national security
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issue. And that was COVID.Well, COVID is over, and so
Title forty two disappears, and nowpeople crossing the border have to be heard.
You can't just throw them out ifthey claim asylum. They have to
be heard. They they have theright to own in front of an immigration
judge. They have a right tostay in the United States under law until
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they're hearing. They're hearing can beyears away, and they're allowed to work.
As you can imagine, people werelining up, I mean lining up
by the tens of thousands, hundredsof thousands, and a big part of
the information they received was through TikTok. TikTok was the method of communication.
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And there's one video, for example, viewed seventeen million times, claim that
starting May eleventh, the day fortytwo was over, migrants cannot be deported.
Oh they can, And of coursethe comments followed, my moment has
arrived. Is this true? Iwant to come and meet my mom now,
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seventeen million times. And what's happeningat the border and they're buying you
know what the coyotes are selling.What people are selling not only sell water,
not only do they sell food andcharge them for taking up going through
Central America and Mexico. They're sellingthem chargers and SIM cards. That is
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a huge industry. And on theother side of the border, of course,
the volunteers who are pro immigrant,pro migrants, are helping them out.
When someone comes across the border,and you've seen those, they give
food, they give shelter, Thereare churches and there are organizations that shelter
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these people before they move on.You know what they're doing, You're going
to see a lot of this.They're bringing in at the border, portable
chargers so people can charge their phone. Because that cell phone and the ability
to communicate not only through other people, but through these organizations that help migrants
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to family members back home, toorganizations that help people. Here's what you
do, here's what you say.Here is what happens at the border.
Here's what the government can do,what they can't do. All of that
is available through TikTok and other socialplatforms, but primarily through TikTok. And
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what happens is before they leave home. These migrants they often join Facebook groups
and why it starts even when they'releaving Facebook TikTok, but as I said,
primarily TikTok at the border. Nowas they leave home, it's other
social media and they are looking foradvice, they're looking for help. See
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that is the benefit to them.Now let's look at the negative. They're
exploited, they're vulnerable. It's mucheasier for coyotes because fewer people have to
be involved. I'll meet here's aGPS coordinate. I'll meet you here.
You don't have to have anybody there. They only have to be at the
back end. Here's the route youtake, and it's not on paper here
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it is. Here's your GPS goknock your socks off. I don't know
if they knock their socks off,but it's a great phrase. Or they'll
even give instructions. Here is thebus schedule, and here's the bus you're
gonna get on once you hit theUnited States, and here's how much it's
going to cost. That's what's goingon. I'm gonna talk more and more
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about how social platforms are affecting usand ways you don't even know, and
ways you can't even figure it out, and ways that all of a sudden
become part of our culture, partof our lexicon chat GPS GPT a year
ago that came up, who whatis that? Now? I want to
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talk about police. Steve Gregory iscoming aboard at eight o'clock talking about his
new unsolved and Steve is so connectedto the police department. As soon as
I saw this, or as soonas I knew Steve was coming aboard,
I said, okay, I wantto do this story. And this has
to be due with police agencies.Now we know that there is a real
problem with police agencies across the country. I mean, people don't want to
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be cops. People don't want tostay as cops. Don't want to stay
as cops. The burnout rate isextraordinary. The number of people that apply
is way way down, and italmost doesn't seem to matter how much police
get paid and it's a healthy salary, and what the pension is like,
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it's a healthy pension. And it'snot even the danger police. For the
most part, people that go intopolice work are not particularly frightened of danger.
I mean, it takes a veryspecial person to, for example,
show up at a active shooter siteand then just rush in, not knowing
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if they're going to get shot ornot. The one that just happened in
Texas where that kid was walking aroundwith this assault rifle and he the police
went straight for him and to theofficers got shot and he killed three.
So it's not the danger. Whatit is is simply how tough it is
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to be a police officer today.Police officers aren't particularly well respected, especially
after George Floyd murder and that abroad brush has now been used to paint
police all over the country by manypeople, and excessive forces now considered across
the board. Most police agencies youtalk to people are horrible places where civil
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rights are not considered. Okay,now, so with all that being said,
what are agencies doing particularly here Thisis a story about southern California,
particularly out of the Orange County Register, and it has to do with how
cops are being hired. There aren'tenough of them. There aren't enough people
that want to be police officers.Why are they paying nineteen dollars an hour
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at taco bell? There aren't enoughpeople that are willing to work there.
And so when you have a demandthat's higher than the supply, what happens?
Of course, you know, welcometo economics one o one. So
let me tell you what agencies aredoing in Let me tell you there aren't
too many people, or there aremany people that are both happy and unhappy
about this. So southern California particularlymore so than other places in the country.
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I'll tell you why in a minute. Law enforcement agencies desperate to fill
these slots because there's this exodus ofexperienced officers and of course a laggin recruiting
new ones. So how are theydoing it? How are they filling these
slots signing bonuses, big signing bonuses. For example, Inglewood forty thousand dollars
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bonus for a lateral transfer. Thisis a cop who has already gone through
the academy, has a few yearsof experience in another police department. That's
the best kind of cop to moveover. You don't have to train the
police officer. You don't need trainingofficers. No academy. Here's forty thousand
dollars just for academy. Graduate's thirtythousand dollars. You go through the academy,
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you walk out, you take yourpost exam, and you're now a
full fledged cop. Goodbye, I'mleaving. I'm getting thirty thousand dollars.
If you have a BA bachelor's degree, fifteen thousand dollars. This is all
Inglewood if you're a military veterans,ten Grand Long Beach, Riverside, Pomona,
El Monte signing bonuses. And theLAPD here where we are no,
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actually this is Glendale LAPD. WhereLAPD this is I'm sorry, Burbank,
which has its own police department.The LAPD has just jumped on the bandwagon.
And there, for example, offeringa thousand dollars a month for rent,
rent stipends for two years torrents,rent stipends, childcare subsidies for out
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of state candidates. Our forty hoursof vacation starting day one, and the
vacancies are across the country. Andwhy is it so terrible here in or
so much worse here in southern Californiabecause you have agencies right next to each
other. There's so many cities thatare right next to each other that a
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cop moving, for example, doinga lateral move where all the money is
or the most of the money isbeing paid, the police officer doesn't even
have to move right there and shot. They shop around. You know,
Inglewood is paying more. Look ata forty thousand dollar bonus. I'll take
that better pension on that one overthere. They literally shop around, and
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the competition is just killing the policedepartments. And I'll tell you what is.
And this I appreciate from police departmentsacross the country. They have not
lowered their standards, but they've allowedmore people to become cops. Were heretofore,
these elements disqualified you tattoos, youcouldn't happen before. Now it's fine
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having been busted for a misdemeanor,low level misdemeanor that was automatic. No,
well you can do it now.Marijuana use, drug use prior,
not now, but prior you cando that. But here's the good news.
The bottom line, requirements, psychological, physical intelligence all are maintained at
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the same level they always have been. And this is why there are so
few police officers that are admitted.About ten percent of applicants are admitted.
And even with those, that's theacademy. And then you have a huge
percentage that fail out of the academybecause the requirements are so stiff, which
is terrific. And why are theyoffering such huge bonuses. Well, to
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become a cop, okay, you'vegot your application, and then through the
vetting process, then the training academy, and to be sworn in that's about
a year. That's big money forany kind of institution, any kind of
agency or city or county. Andwe've got to Steve Gregory from now to
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the bottom of the hour. AndSteve Gregory, Oh, we have something
pretty exciting that I have been followinghim doing this for a while. First
of all, good morning, Steve, Good morning. Okay, so Steve
does Unsolved Saturday Night. You knowabout that. He's also a news person
here, can't say newsman anymore,a news human being that is Harry kf
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I. I I think have youbeen a I guess you've been around the
longest of anybody here, well,I mean except Chris. Yeah, yeah,
but Chris is a news director.Yeah. I mean in terms of
that, and then Carla, oureditor, she outpaces me by a few
years. But then then Krozer MichaelKrozer, Okay, yeah, okay,
I take it back. Well,let's put this way. I'm the longest
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standing reporter, okay, but notthe longest standing person in the news room.
So Steve does his series Unsolved onSaturday nights, the unsolved crimes that
he brings to the table. Steve, on top of that, does documentary
specials. He's one busy guy.And the documentary special that's coming up this
Sunday from four to six pm isabout anti Semitism. When I walked into
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his office, he has this bigwhiteboard in which he writes some of the
projects that he's both working on andin the future. And the first thing
I said, wow, anti Semitism, Steve, you gotta put me on
this. And what did you say? Absolutely not Bill, But I know
about this. Yeah, but everyone'sbeen listening to you talk about it for
years. It was time to putnew voices on. Oh okay, thank
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you for that. That was Iappreciate the grace and what you said.
But it's a couple of things aboutit. It's a lot in the news
because of the recent white supremust movement, and anti semitism was right on top
of that. It's been more antisemitism than it has been in years,
and it's just just a lot goingon. So let's just shrive into it
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and talk about what you've been willing, you know, in the impetus for
this was a press conference that Iattended at the Simon Weisenthal Center in downtown
Los Angeles, and that's when laPD Chief Michael Moore was talking about the
spike in hate crimes and as youmentioned, more specifically against Jews, and
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how it's really become not only aproblem with vandalism and people on the street,
you know, like hate incidents.There's a difference between in hate incident
and hate crime, and he talkedabout all of that. But then they
also did this piece on digital mediaand its role in social media and its
role in anti semitism and how thathas become just an explosive part of how
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hate has been able to just growglobally. So from that and I go
talk to Rob and our program directorabout it, I said, you know,
I really think we need to diga little deeper here, just just
make people more aware of it.So this has been one of those has
taken me a lot longer to dothan I thought, because the people I
wanted to speak with had scheduling issues, and then as I started to look
into it, some stuff that justwas very disturbing. And one of the
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voices that we have on this talksabout, imagine if Hitler had an Instagram
account, Yeah, and think aboutremember was it was now now I'm john
a blank. Was it Hitler thepropagandist from Joseph Gobbels Gobel Girbels. Yeah,
Gebbels was the propagandist, And hesays, managine if Hitler had an
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Instagram account and the propaganda machine ofthe Nazi Party had were on all the
social media platform And keep in mind, the Nazi propaganda machine under Joseph Goebel's
reached level. He basically invented modernpropaganda. Right, he was way above
everybody else. And you're right,it would have been consuming. I've never
half thought of that, but youwould be speaking German. We would be
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speaking German. Yeah, And that'sthe power of social media. So when
you take someone the mind of someonelike Hitler, and if you could put
it in the palm of everyone's hand. He said, that's the impact right
now social media is having on hate. So as we dug a little deeper,
we actually spoke to a man nameddoctor Michael Schumacher. And this guy
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is really intense and he is aclinical psychologist, but he is on loan
from the federal government to the LosAngeles County Sheriff's Department. He's a risk
assessment person and he specializes in hatecrimes. And in this cut here Michael
a I ask a little bit aboutthe groups, the hate groups that he's
worried about, and he sort ofsummarizes it. They're mostly looking to have
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outsized influence, which is one elementof say terrorism and influence. But what
they're trying to do is scare people. So it doesn't matter how many people
get hurt, even if they wereto do a violent attack, It matters
how many people are watching. Oneof the problems with our media cycle and
with the Internet is that everybody getsto see it, right, and so
their influence as far as people,but being aware of these hate, hate
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based ideologies in these groups is verydramatically enhanced and all you have to do.
Most of these are following, likethe al Qaeda isis playbook right.
They're recruiting online, they're talking online, They're disseminating their bilge and hate online
and most of it is not illegal. You said that groups like the GDL
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and other groups, local groups likethis, they don't scare you. What
groups scare you? The groups thatscare me. And I mean this is
another element of our swim India LAare the ones like the very old and
very prominent right wing militant groups outof Orange County. We have some of
that as far as I can tellup in the northern part of La County.
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That's a lot to unpack there.It's a lot to impact. Yeah,
that's a lot to impact where southernCalifornia basically is almost one of,
I guess headquarters of anti Semitism throughoutthe kind. I do not know that.
And when he said that to me, I was in shock. He
kind of dropped that bombshell because Idid not know there were two cells hate
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like hate crime cells, if youwill, in Orange County that had that
one at least had been there fora long time. I didn't know anything
about that in northern La County.Now, Schumacher is a clinical and operational
psychologist right now on loan to theLa County Sheriff's Department. He's in there
what used to be the Criminal IntelligenceBureau, but he's a Navy he was
Navy intelligence and so his job isrisk assessment. And then when I pushed
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him for a little information, ofcourse I can't talk about that. You
know, I wanted to know where, and you know where's and then you
could tell by looking at him heknew all the answers, but he was
not willing to give any of thatup. So that was a little bit
shocking. I didn't realize that thatwas so prevalent here because I had also
been told by law enforcement that someof the hate crime elements that are happening
in southern California are from outside influences. They're based in the Midwest, and
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then they have cells that are everywhere. But I didn't know we had homegrown
groups here. Yeah. Well,one of the things, you know,
I point out about an anti semitism, and historically when things get tough,
anti Semitism explodes. You're right,That's that's one thing I discovered too.
I didn't know that it's it's beenthat way. I mean historically it really
and if you look at how itebb and flowed during the pandemic. First
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of all, everyone went after Asiansand Asian Americans, blaming them for the
for the pandemic. And then whenthat kind of went out of favor,
then went back to Jewish people,right, And that's yeah, and when
they remember the Iranians when the hostageswere taken and Bania nineteen seventy, Muslims
after nine to eleven. Right,And but you always go back to anti
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Semitism because that is historically such animportant or a big part of our culture.
And then they're all kinds of reasonswhy anti Semitism. And you hear
everything from Jews are taking our moneybecause Jews, you know, they're good
with money. And there's a Ithink there is an education. Uh you
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know, Jews don't change tires.I've never changed a tire in my life.
This is why I got invented theauto clubs. But you know,
you just touched on something. Educationis the reason why anti anti Semitism exists.
People are uneducated about people, otherpeople and ethnic groups. And here
(33:46):
is and I heard this and thisabsolutely resonated. It makes all the sense
in the world. And that isJews are considered doing very well because there
are a lot of professionals. Goin the phone book or what used to
be the phone book and look underthe doctors. You'll see more Cohen there.
Then you can possibly imagine. Andwhy is that? Because historically here
is a philosophy. Jews were kickedout of virtually every place they have ever
(34:08):
lived, the diaspora, the Jewsgoing all over the world, and the
philosophy is, they can take awayyour property, they can take away your
homes, they can take away yourbusinesses. They can't take away your education.
They can kill you, but ifyou survive, you still have your
education and you take that with you. And boy, did that resonate?
(34:30):
That is you know, maybe Ishould have had you on the special.
Thank you very much. And thenand then I'll give you, you know,
you know the line that I've comeup with, what is the philosophy
of Jews? Here we go,they came, they killed us, let's
eat cheeks. Well, i'd liketo think that, you know, it's
it's interesting because I'd like to thinkwe're making progress. But then here's Rabbi
(34:54):
Abraham Cooper he's with the Simon WeisenthalCenter here in Los Angeles. We actually
start the program with him, andhe was a fascinating interview. This man
is called upon constantly by the WhiteHouse to help and this is Cooper a
he is. He kind of summarizesbecause we have such a large Jewish population
in Los Angeles and West Los Angeles. He talks a little bit about the
(35:15):
quality of life. We're not goingto make any progress until we can have
definitions that we're we you know,we can accept and we work together to
marginalize the people who want to destroyour society and are targeting minorities. And
in the case in our case,first and foremost, we are in Pico
(35:38):
Boulevard and we've got two hundred Jewishinstitutions and good restaurants in about two and
a half three miles. And theamount of effort that's needed when you come
to a Jewish house of worship youhave to go through airport security. Is
that the way life should be Ona Saturday morning or on a Friday evening.
(35:59):
My kids went to a Jewish school, Jewish day school. The security
was insane and we interview a principleof a Jewish School for the Special and
he talks about that too. Yeah, it's it's it's really frightening out there,
and especially you think we have we'rea reasonably enlightened society, but then
you have white supremacists out there whohate everybody, but you know for some
reason. Well, I gave youthe reasons Jews are targeted, and for
(36:22):
those of you that have not beento the museum, it's something you really
should go to. Well, andthen and then the exhibit, you're right.
So, doctor Michael Barenbaum is withthe American Jewish University here in Los
Angeles, but he was commissioned byUM the the Auschwitz, the Auschwitz Organization
(36:45):
to curate the traveling exhibit, theAuschwitz Exhibit that's going all over the globe.
And we were able to meet upwith him, Jacob and I who
Jacob co produces with me on this, and we met with him at the
Ronald Reagan Library because that's where theexhibit is now, and he gave us
a personal tour as they were settingup everything and unpacking all of these artifacts
(37:06):
from Auschwitz. And he's walking usthrough this thing and talking us through all
of this historical, historical significance.And I'll tell you something. It was
just we walked out of They're wipedout. We were wiped out and we
didn't get to see everything. Butwhen you walk up there and the first
thing you see is a train car, the real train car that was shipped
(37:27):
over here on a ship and thenby train and then by truck. And
it's a cattle car and it's acattle car that took people to camps,
right. And when you see thatcar out front, you just go wow,
yeah, I know it is real. It is stunning. And when
you if you ever have a chanceto go to ausch Fitz, if you
ever go to this at the Rain, and when you go to the Viasenthal
Center, it's really hard to acceptwhere humanity can go. H it really
(37:53):
is. And you're talking about theGermans, for example, and enlightened people,
very intelligent I mean obviously very highlyeducated people. And how did it
happen? I will tell you,And I know we're running tight, ye,
I'll tell you. There was achart that was displayed at this exhibit
that shows the German soldiers how toeffectively kill and execute Jewish people without ever
(38:16):
touching them. That was a chartscary. That's the kind of stuff we're
looking at. So the documentary specialis this Sunday night from four to six
pm, and it will give youa view of where people can go and
it really is disturbing. As Stevesaid, Neil, let's start talking.
(38:37):
Okay, Yes, organic foods.Do we even know what organic foods are?
They just hit sixty billion dollars forthe first time in sales. Yes,
there are different there. It ishard to distinguish sometimes because the word
is thrown around. However, thereare standards with pesticides, how they're grown,
(38:57):
and the way they're grown and readin the process. The interesting thing
about this bill because for the longesttime we talked about what I refer to
as the dirty dozen. The dirtydozen't are the ones that the produce that
I recommend people get organic. Idon't think you need to go organic for
everything as far as the protection frompesticides and the way it's grown. But
(39:22):
when it comes to the dirty dozens, you're talking about strawberries, spinach,
kale, colored greens, mustard,greens, peaches, pears, nectarines,
apples, grapes, bell and hotpeppers, green beans, blueberries, cherries.
These are in the Dirty dozen.These are the ones that if they're
not organic, get some of theworst types of pesticides and things that can
(39:47):
be harmful to you. So thosehave always been the standard. The interesting
thing about organic food sales hitting thisrecord in twenty twenty two, topping sixty
billion for the first time, theinteresting thing is not just about health.
One of the insights they're finding isthat organic food advocates are touting its sustainability
(40:10):
benefits. It uses forty five percentless energy and emitting forty percent less carbon
than non organic foods, according toColumbia University at a report that they did.
So it's kind of interesting. It'snot just for your own personal health
that people are making these decisions basedon the planet's health as well. Yeah,
(40:30):
I want to be a boogeyman here. And if you notice, and
I was just reading about this,I read a book about that sustainability and
all that, and it when youtalk about organic products, it's local products.
For the most part. You don'tsee organic grapes coming in from Chili,
for example, during the winter.And the boogeyman here are pesticides and
(40:55):
fertilizer. Yeah, without pesticize andfertilizer, the world would starve. It's
that simple mass production, especially overseas. If you can't do it with this,
the actual production diminishes so much thatyou're going to talk about people not
(41:15):
eating. What's made the world,the agriculture in the world so productive,
is are those two items? Justwanted to throw that out, not what
I'm saying, not that saying organicis not good, but don't derive something
that's feeding the world. Yeah,oh, this is something that we do
(41:35):
talk about on the show that evenGMO. It's like, well, you
know, there's a lot of placesthat wouldn't eat if we didn't have that
technology. We're going to see itmore. There's a balance between these things.
I don't buy organic everything, butwhat I do is I will buy
organic when it's something that I thinkis necessary under the circumstances. And here
(41:58):
in California we have the benefit thatwe have some of the most fertile soil.
But yes, if you get caughtup in the emotional hype of it,
you don't see the big picture.And that's a lot of the tugging
at the heart when it comes tothis new desire to band gas stoves and
all gonna be electric by the year, you know, twenty thirty five.
(42:20):
A lot of that stuff is heartstring stuff. But it is interesting that
this has changed and that people aremaking the decisions for both local health and
global health. If you don't likeGMO, you're never gonna touch anything made
out of corn again, that's yeah, it's pretty rare to find it be
corn that doesn't have GMO, andit's going to be. And I have
no problem with GMO personally, Yeah, either do I. I first of
(42:44):
all, I love preservatives and nitrates. I just think it makes everything tastes
better. Hey, I want towhat I want to do is and this
one just stun me. And wetalk about food that are stunts, just
straight out stunts, and then foodsthat maybe appear to be stunts, and
they've got some legs, one ofthem being Velvita introducing chocolate covered cheese.
(43:07):
So let's start with contradiction in termswhere in the same sentence you use the
word Velvita and cheese. Well,I don't even know if you can legally
say that, but yeah, soVelvita has They keep coming out with creative
things to stir things up, andthis is kind of falls into the category
(43:32):
for me. However, there's someother things that don't. So they've got
a partnership with a chocolate tear andthey are coming together to do this limited
edition Velvita infused shell shaped chocolate trufflesand they're stuffed with filling both of this
(43:52):
sweet white chocolate and creamy Velvita cheese. I don't think it's gonna taste bad
actually, if not taste of these, but white chocolate with Velvita cheese will
probably go together quite nicely. Iyou know, it's at twenty four ninety
five for a five pack of truffles. Yeah, it's a little pricey to
(44:13):
say the least. Yeah. SoI mean I happen to love cheese.
Fine Due with Velvita is cheese fond, don't. You could get it to
be a fun due if you leaveit in the car. This is only
available at Compartes CEO I love theway I pronounced at c O, M
p A RTS dot com and youcan get them there should you want to.
(44:37):
Now on the real side of things, MODELO debuts. It's spiked Aguas
Frescas and this is only in LasVegas for the time. And I was
in Las Vegas a couple weeks ago, and they're they're billboards and everything everywhere
for this and basic Basically it's thewonderful fresh, fruity aglas frescas that we
(44:58):
know. But it's sp of course, with the malt liquor that gives it
a four point five alcohol by volume, so it's about nine nine percent or
proof. And they're coming out withcucumber, lime, pineapple, hibiscus,
watermelon, all these flavors that I'mvery excited to taste. I think this
(45:24):
is a very popular category. We'llsee how they shine through it. But
that's you know, comparing and contrastingagainst the two. This is real and
going in hopes to be around forever. I don't know that the truffles with
velveta are long, Okay, Sohere I want to go into another.
(45:45):
Is this a stunt? And itsure seems that way. It's whiskey.
I want to start with the factthat Neil drinks whiskey, right, he
drinks whiskey. So Neil to misterwhiskey drinker, the Elvis whiskey and a
peanut, butter and bacon flavored whiskey. Your thoughts, well, I will
tell you know I've said this onthe show many times before. I'm not
(46:07):
a big fan of flavored whiskies.I find them to be artificial um,
even if they go together with theexception of a honey whiskey that they often
have at vomb Foss and Claremont.It is fantastic because you can see the
honey in there. You could getthe particles floating. You have to shake
(46:29):
it up so you know it's real. Now you like you like old fashions,
Yes, made out of whiskey andsugar and what else is in there?
Oh? When you when you're makingan old Fashioned, it's considered the
earliest. That's why they call itold their earliest cocktail. Right, So
you have a sweetener, okay,with a sugar. Then you have your
(46:51):
whiskey, and then you have yourbitters, your ango, your bitters or
your old fashioned bitters in there,and that's pretty much it. Okay,
some people add a little bit ofthis, a little bit of that,
but that's pretty much okay. Onelast one, and that is the Elvis
whiskey. The banana, peanut,butter bacon flavored stunt or not a stunt.
I think it's stunty. Most definitely, I would taste it. I
(47:14):
don't think it's anything that you're that'sgonna go too far. I think it's
a little stunty because bananas, bacon, peanut butter, all those go great
with whiskey. By the way,I just don't want them together. You
know that killed Elvis. I meanthat combination just killed him. The colonel
killed elve. That's correct too,all right, Neil tomorrow from two to
(47:36):
five pm on the Fork Report asfrom Morongo. Oh, that's right.
You're live at Morongo Casino Resort andSpa. That's just ninety minutes off the
ten from wherever you are. Yeah, it's a fun place to go.
Good time. All right, takecare of Neil. We'll talk, we'll
talk again. I'll catch you tomorrow. I'll be listening Monday. Right coming
up, Gary and Shannon. Oh, by the way, quick reminder tomorrow
(48:00):
not only is NEO one from twoto five, I'm on from eight to
eleven with Handle on the Law.Gary and Shannon up next, Gary,
what's on the menu today? Well, we're gonna call this in cephalitis Friday
and talk more about exactly what's wrongwith Diane Feinstein. More calls for her
to step down from her position inthe Senate and do something to try to
save her legacy. Looks like wethe United States could give permission, but
(48:23):
not F sixteens to Ukraine. We'lltalk about that, and of course late
in the show our nine news nuggetsyou need to know all coming up.
You've been listening to The Bill HandlesShow. Catch my show Monday through Friday,
six am to nine am, andanytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app.