12-03-24 FULL SHOW - Jon Caldara Fills in for Mandy

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Mandy Connell Show is sponsored by Belle and Pollock
Accident and injury Lawyers.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
No, it's Mandy Connell and Dona on kam n FM.

Speaker 3 (00:15):
Got Way study the ninety three Many Connell.

Speaker 4 (00:24):
No sad thing. Four minutes after No, this is not
Mandy Connell. You lucky, lucky person. You. I'm John Caldera
filling in for Mandy. I don't even know where Mandy is.
I cannot know where Mandy is because of the restraining order.
But I'm sure wherever she is, she's having a good time.

(00:47):
And I get to be here scaring away her loyal listenership.
So I see this as a win win for me.
Give me a call three or three seven one, three,
eighty five eight five. Let's talk about what is most

(01:07):
important to you, my material happiness. Size does matter. So
it was what cyber Monday whatever this weekend was of bargains,
Da da da da dada. I bought myself a huge TV.

Speaker 3 (01:25):
I mean this was.

Speaker 4 (01:26):
This was one of those things where I'm thinking, you know,
I'm old, why don't I buy something for myself, which
I rarely do. So I bought a eighty five inch
television for like eight hundred bucks. Yeah, my kid's not

(01:47):
gonna eat for a while, but I'm gonna be able
to watch movies on a big, briggin' screen. I think
this is completely worthwhile. So how big is too big
for a television set? I believe the answer to that
is completely based on gender. That for the fairer sex,

(02:15):
big TV, well that's nice, where for men it's a necessary.
You have to have it, and you can't let one
of your friends have one that's bigger. Now, someday they're
gonna have a flat screen TV that is custom mounted

(02:35):
to fit every inch of your wall, and that'll be
almost good enough until they come up with something that
puts TV screens on all four walls, the ceiling, and
the floor and you can just go into there and
watch TV. Why do men love big TV so much?

(03:00):
Small electronics, big TVs? I am still amazed just by
the the technology. Do you remember the first time you
saw a flat screen TV? Now, not one of those
projector's screens, but an actual, an actual flat screen? It
was like, what is that? And it costs so much?

(03:24):
And then they got bigger and cheaper and bigger and
cheaper and bigger and cheaper and bigger and cheaper. Part
of my decision to buy big ass TV was our
new president coming in. Why because America doesn't build any electronics.
America doesn't build much of anything in the high tech space.

(03:46):
It all comes from China, Jana. And if Trump brings
forward tariffs, it sure seemed like sooner was a better
way then later to buy a big TV. Am I wrong?

(04:08):
Or is it just the longer you wait the better
it is? And part of me is like, good God,
what am I waiting for? My kid has enough stuff?
How about this? Then? I don't know. If you read
my column in the Denver Gazette on Sunday, please do
and it'll be in Colorado Complete Colorado tomorrow. How to

(04:31):
put this? I bought the most effeminate car there is
and I'm proud of it. So if you don't know
what I do for a living, I run the Independence
Institute and you're can go find us at thinkfreedom dot org.
Thinkfreedom dot org. And one of the things we've railed
against is cronyism. It's throwing money at particular special interests

(04:59):
at the cost of others that when government chooses the winners,
chooses the losers. In the marketplace. It's just wrong, and
that if a product is a good product, it will
sink or swim based on the value it gets to
give its customers. So I'm looking at this, and particularly

(05:26):
with electric cars, I think, how ridiculous is this? So
I'm sixty years old. I have never once in my
entire life, had a new car. I buy used cars.
I love used cars. I love used Japanese cars, especially

(05:47):
because you can buy them for cheap, you can drive
them to their drop and how to put this, the
chances they're going to get stolen aren't that high? Mummer?
In college, I had a dots in two ten. I
don't know if you know what a dots in two
ten is. It was a tunic can with four wheels.

(06:09):
It was a tiny little thing. I bought it for
five hundred bucks. And with that, my last time in
college and leaving college and starting a business and moving
around and doing things, that little five hundred dollars car
gave me as much mobility as anybody with Alexis. There's
no place that they could go. I could not follow.

(06:32):
I could do everything. It's the key to the American dream.
Mobility and then being a good you know, tightwad. I
kept it for eight years and sold it for nine
hundred and fifty bucks. That is how you do transportation.
That's how you do a car by My current sexy

(06:56):
car is a it's Ultima, and just like just like
the Dotson, let me tell you, the ladies like a
man in an Ultima. There's just something about a bald
guy driving around and rusted out old Japanese car that

(07:18):
just drives the ladies crazy. And so I get it.
I get it. And so I've been driving these these
chick magnetmobiles for my entire life again, because I know
what women like. The cracked windshield, the rusted paint, the
slow speed. You know, women look at that and go, hmmm,

(07:42):
he's mighty frugal. He's good with money. Mommy needs some
of that, And you know that's I get tired. I
get tired of women leaving their telephone numbers on my
windshield wiper blades. I've just had enough. So instead of
all this money for hot used Japanese cars, I thought,

(08:05):
why don't I let taxpayers buy me a car. I
WoT my own car. So I went off and bought Oh,
how to put it, Well, it's not really a car.
It's more of a golf cart with bluetooth. It's a
Nissan Leaf, the most effeminate of all car names. A

(08:28):
leaf A leaf. Now, before you ripped me apart on
why I bought a leaf, we lay out the case.
It was a thirty two thousand dollars new car or
golf cart with bluetooth, and I got it for fifteen grand.

(08:50):
It was fifty three percent paid for by taxpayers and
other cons Now, I take all my deductions when I
do taxes, I do all the legal things I can
to keep some of my own tax money. And so

(09:11):
I thought, why not, why not get a second car.
Most electric cars, by the way, go to people who
already have cars. They are a second car. Mostly they
go to white, upper middle class people who like me,
have a two car garage and only one car in it.

(09:34):
So we get all these benefits, we get all this
cronyism to support the green industrial complex. Let me lay
it out for you. On this thirty two thousand dollars car.
The Feds kick in seventy five hundred bucks. Seventy five
hundred bucks here have that money to buy this particular car.

(09:59):
And then the state of Colorado chips in twenty five
hundred bucks. Yes, the same state of Colorado that hasn't
the money to fix our damn roads. The same state
that has a governor who says we're gonna have to
cut one hundred million dollars from road funding next year.
That that that group is spending your money buying guys

(10:24):
like me toys. All right, so that's ten thousand dollars.
But wait a second, I saved seven seventeen thousand dollars.
Where did the other seven grand come from? And this
is the part of the cronyism that few people really get.

(10:44):
It's not a transfer of money from taxpayers to me.
It's a transfer from people who are buying cars to me.
Here's how it works. There are emissions standards that all
the car manufacturers have to follow in the United States.
That is, if they sell one hundred cars, the average

(11:08):
of tailpipe emissions from all of them have to add
up to x otherwise they have to pay huge fines.
That gives them two decisions to make. They can either
make evs and other cars and sell them at way
below cost, thus my leaf, and then they charge more

(11:37):
for the cars that people actually want. You know, the
ones that take gasoline and can go up hills and
you can drive more than one hundred miles without worrying
because you can find another gas station. All right, So
they have to they have to build these cars and
sell them at below cost so that they can sell

(11:58):
the other ones and above cost. You are paying much
more for your cars because the government mandates that they
give cars to me. This is how Tesla makes all
of its money. This is the other option a car
company has. If they're running out of tailpipe emissions, they

(12:21):
can buy pollution credits from their competitors. I'm Nissan. I go, well,
maybe maybe Toyota isn't using their allotment of emissions credits,
so I'll just call them. No, No, they've They've are
filled up on them too. Which car company has emissions

(12:44):
credits up the wazoo because none, none of their products
have a tailpipe Tesla. So as much the croniism that
Tesla gets, they get money when people buy their product.
Here's seventy five hundred bucks in Colorado. Here's another twenty

(13:04):
five hundred bucks. Here's the tax incentives to move your
facility here. But the big one is that in order
for Nissan and Toyota and Chevy and Ford to sell
the cars they want to, they have to give money
to Tesla to buy their pollution credits. So their job

(13:31):
is not to provide transportation or to sell cars. Their
main profit center is filling out this mandate from the
EPA that they can then sell pieces of paper to
their competitors. That's how they make all their money. And

(13:52):
because of all that, how to say, it's you bought
me a thirty thousand dollars car for fifteen grand, now
keep going. One, I got a couple options on the
car that cost me about another seven hundred bucks, so
you could knock that down. And buddy of mine when

(14:14):
he heard about it, when I said, oh, I better
grab one of those two because I want the battery
backup from my house. And he he paid like one
thousand dollars less than I did. One he didn't get
a couple of the options, but two he doesn't live
in Boulder, he lives in welld County. In Weld County

(14:34):
doesn't have a sales tax, saving him another eight hundred dollars.
So right now, if you wanted to, you could lease
a Nissan Leaf. Depending on the place to go to
for about five dollars a month for a two year lease.

(14:58):
Why all the reasons I just explained. So now I
ask you, dear Mandy listener, was it wrong for me
to do this? Was it wrong for me to cash
in on all this green cronyism? Now, mind you, this

(15:18):
is awful stuff. This is terrible stuff, and it does
nothing to help air pollution because most energy in Colorado
is produced by you got it, fossil fuels like coal.
Remember my new tagline for the coal industry. Coal It's

(15:41):
what Tesla's eat for dinner. Coal, It's what Tesla's eat
for dinner. Yes, So it's not like the air is
much better, just that instead of burning gasoline, my car
burns coal, my second car, which is a great emergency

(16:02):
car to have. Did I do wrong? I wrote this
column in the Denver Gazette and in Colorado Springs Gazette,
and amazingly several readers were incensed. They were how could
you do this? You're a hypocrite. You denounce these things
and then you take the credit three or three seven

(16:24):
one three eighty five eighty five seven one three eight
five eighty five. My feeling is, hey, I've been paying
these credits, and this is so ridiculous, just like taking
every deduction on my tax form. Sure, give me a
nearly free new car that I can tool around in

(16:49):
and use. When my fifteen year old Nissan Is is
in the shop, I now have a spare car. Give
me a call on this one three or three seven
one three eight five eighty five. Is it wrong? No,
the program is wrong. The fact that your tax money

(17:12):
is going not to core governmental services but to buy
middle aged, middle class white guys a toy they don't
actually need is wrong. So here's what I think might
happen in the coming year. In the coming year, they

(17:37):
might end some of these credits. Maybe Trump will get
rid of this seventy five hundred dollars credit. Maybe the
legislature won't be able to afford to throw in another
twenty five hundred dollars, and maybe they'll be tariffs. I
thought it. Get well, the getting is good. Let's go
out to Thornton three or three seven to one, three
eighty five eighty five. Tim, Good afternoon, you're with John Calder.

Speaker 5 (18:01):
Good afternoon, John. You're really low at this game of
working the system.

Speaker 3 (18:07):
I'll tell you that I'm low got my Yeah, you.

Speaker 5 (18:10):
Don't know how to play the game. Help me out,
because I just bought one in July and the total
cost out the door was seven hundred and eighty eight
bucks thanks to all the kickbacks and everything.

Speaker 4 (18:24):
What did you buy?

Speaker 5 (18:26):
I bought a Nissan Leaf?

Speaker 4 (18:28):
How did you get it to seven hundred bucks?

Speaker 5 (18:31):
I got the eighty one hundred from the State of Colorado.
I got fifty five hundred from Excel Energy.

Speaker 4 (18:41):
Yeah I got.

Speaker 5 (18:45):
I traded in an old clunker car which was totaled
a month before by the insurance company, and I got
six thousand dollars for turning that in because I'm considered
low income according to them. And then I got but
I did a lease or I did a financing through Nissan,

(19:06):
and they kicked in seventy five hundred. But then I
just paid it right off plus the other thousand that
the dealer gave me. My total bill walking out the door.

Speaker 6 (19:15):
Was seven hundred and eighty eight bucks.

Speaker 7 (19:17):
Oh, my lord, for a new leaf, for a brand
new leaf that was twenty twenty four leaf twenty twenty
five's mind.

Speaker 5 (19:28):
And wow, and it's the blue one that people wanted
to you know, how did.

Speaker 4 (19:35):
You feel about that when when you did it, you
understood that this is complete communistic social engineering. Run amuck.
Oh it's wrong, it is so.

Speaker 5 (19:47):
It is so stupid because I don't like electric cars,
but if you're going to give me one, I'm going
to get it. And I'm only considered low income because
of the way we do our taxes. I'm actually a
multi millionaire.

Speaker 4 (20:05):
Stop there, Stop there, stop there. You're a multi millionaire
who qualifies for low income.

Speaker 5 (20:12):
Yes, because of the way the investments are, with brim
of property deductions and everything like that, you would appreciation.

Speaker 4 (20:19):
Yeah, and so we you know, people are angry at
me for getting this car, you know, fifty five percent
off you bought it. You basically robbed them and took
a took a golf cart.

Speaker 3 (20:34):
Exactly, you know.

Speaker 5 (20:34):
And I tell my kids every.

Speaker 3 (20:36):
Time I see them, I said, thank you for paying
for my car, and.

Speaker 4 (20:39):
They said thank you for the free education and all
the other stuff. Well, sooner or later this bubble pops it.
Do you know? You just cannot keep giving away other
people's money. It's insane.

Speaker 5 (20:56):
The government somehow figures out how to do it, and
it's gonna bite us in the butt later on.

Speaker 4 (21:03):
So, how do you like your leaf?

Speaker 5 (21:06):
My wife loves it, but we don't drive very far
since we're retired.

Speaker 3 (21:10):
You know, So, isn't it? Isn't it? Like?

Speaker 4 (21:14):
How to put this? So? My daughter likes to name
our cars. We've got Mary, the Mazda, Nancy, and the Nissan.
And when she shaw when I drove up in this
testosterone filled leaf, she said, Dad, I think we should
just name it Summer's Eve. That's how manly this car is. Hey,

(21:37):
I got to run to a break, Tim, Thanks for
the call. Three oh three seven to one, three eight
five eighty five. Did I do the wrong thing? Would
you do the same in for Mandy? I'm John Calderre.
I keep it right here. You're on Kawa. Give me
a call. Three O three seven to one, three eighty
five eighty five. That's seven one three eight five eight five.
Let me just do a quick reset on this. I

(21:59):
have now become a crony beneficiary of corporate welfare, both
on the national and state level. Or to put it differently, hey,
you dupes, you just bought me a car. Yeah, it's
not really a car, it's a leaf. It kind of

(22:19):
looks like a car from a distance. If you squinch
your eyes. But it's not really a car. It's a
golf cart.

Speaker 3 (22:27):
But you bought it for me.

Speaker 4 (22:29):
You bought it for me because of insane regulation and cronyism.
Then let me break it down. I bought this thirty
two thousand dollars car for fifteen grand, and that was
even with a couple options on it could have saved
another seven eight hundred bucks on it. That that's just

(22:52):
how stupid this is. Now, that's seventeen thousand dollars saving. Listen,
that gift to me from you is because well, the
voters put in crazy socialists who want they're not socialists,

(23:14):
they're more fascists. They're giving money to private companies and
they're deciding who wins and who loses in a market economy.
They do it by doing it a couple of ways. One,
they throw ten thousand dollars worth of tax credit here,

(23:36):
free cash. Have the cash. Here's ten grand from the
state and the Feds. As our caller Tim said a
little while ago, Excel was throwing in money. Yeah, here,
I'll buy you the razor. You just keep buying the
razor blades. We call that electricity from fossil fuels. But

(24:02):
the final bit, and so few people understand this is
from government regulations. In order to stay under the emissions caps,
the tailpipe emissions caps, car companies have to give Tesla
gobs of money, Tesla gobs of money so they can

(24:23):
buy their pollution credits because their cars don't have tailpipes.
Mind you, all their cars still run on coal. That
doesn't matter. Three oh three seven to one, three eighty
five eighty five, seven to one, three eight five eighty five.
In business, there are what's known as push products and
pull products. Pull products are the products that customers are

(24:49):
pulled towards. They didn't know they needed to have this,
but I gotta have it. What's a good pull product?
You didn't even know you needed a smartphone or an
iPhone until Steven Jobs held one in his hand on

(25:09):
a stage and said, look, I can listen to music,
I can watch movies, I can make phone calls. And
then all of a sudden, you and I and everyone
else said I must have that, and people stand in
line to get an iPhone. At least in the early days,

(25:31):
they would camp out in front of the Apple store
to buy an iPhone. The product was so seductive, so popular,
people were just pulled to it because it changed their
lives and it freed them and it gave them more.

(25:51):
And then there's push products in the history of commerce.
I don't think there is a bigger push product than
electric vehicles. No matter how hard they try, this wonderful
conversion to electric vehicles doesn't really catch on. They are

(26:17):
giving them away. The government is putting so much money
in so much mandated regulation that car companies are giving
this stuff away, which means taxpayers and consumers are paying
for it. There's no free lunch. Whw there is a
free niece on leaf. There is no free lunch. There

(26:43):
is no bigger push product than electric vehicles. Now, you
might have one and love it, might work out really
well for you, spectacular. That's not the question. The question
is would you pay full price for this? If you
didn't get all the tax benefits, if you didn't get

(27:05):
all the rebates, if you didn't get all the cronyism,
if the company didn't need to buy Tesla's pollution credits,
would you pay full price for this? And almost always,
except for very wealthy people, the answer is no, especially

(27:27):
in a place like Colorado, where the winners are cold
and batteries don't last as long, and the roads go
up and down mountains which take the charge off of
your batteries. It's not a natural place to do it.
I mean, think of think of our friends in Wyoming.

(27:51):
Where would you drive an electric vehicle where? I mean,
how far would you have to go to find a charge?
And when you're driving four hours between towns, it's not
gonna work. It cannot work. There's one guy with a

(28:13):
Tesla set of the speed of a tesla. All right, John,
I'll race you in your car anywhere, and I'll win
in my tesla. You choose it. I said, all right,
let's race to Chicago. I'd win three o three seven
one three eighty five eighty five seven one three eight

(28:34):
five eighty five. Not to mention, when I bought this car,
I got the satisfaction of knowing that, you know, the
Chinese are destroying the environment digging for rare earth elements
to make the batteries, So you know, that was a
plus as well. Was it wrong of me? And nobody

(28:58):
who seems to want to answer this, was it wrong
of me to accept this gift that big green cronyism,
the green industrial complex is giving out. Should I have
stayed true to my limited government beliefs? Or was was

(29:25):
this the right thing to do? You tell me three
or three seven to one, three eighty five eighty five
seven one three eight five eighty five. Now there are
tax credits that I take on my on my regular taxes.

(29:47):
I put some money into a college fund for my kid,
and there's a small right off for that. I take
the right off. Is this a right off as well?
I'm John Caldera in for Mandy. Keep it right here.
You're on Koa. You know the weird scientist who points
up into the sky and says, I've done the calculations.

(30:11):
The asteroid is coming and it's going to destroy Earth.
You get you've seen the movie. There's a million movies
like that. Well, let me be that guy. Now nobody
believes the scientist, so let me be the policy wonk
that says the same thing, which is, there's an energy
crisis coming to Colorado and we're not gonna have enough

(30:34):
electricity because of this move towards feel good renewable energy. Hey,
there's nothing wrong with renewable energy, great, go for it,
But to commit Colorado to have one of it, all

(30:55):
of our energy is gonna come from feel good windmills
and solar farms. How to say this, There's an asteroid
coming to Colorado and it's not going to be pretty.
It simply cannot be done. It cannot be done without
fossil fuels. Fossil fuels make up what's known as the baseload,

(31:22):
because you see, the sun doesn't shine, the wind doesn't
blow every day. In order to power all this stuff.
In order to power all this stuff, you need fossil fuels.
As I said, Cole, it's what Tesla's eat for dinner.

(31:42):
Let's go up to longmontin talk to Craig. Craig, good afternoon.
You're with John Caldera, Hi, John, how you doing.

Speaker 3 (31:48):
I'm drodding if there is a market opportunity, maybe in
six months or a year or whatever. If you don't
like that test or if you don't like that Nissan anymore,
and the market value is X dollars and it's way
more than what you pay for it, would you want
to consider flipping that vehicle and making a profit off

(32:11):
of it.

Speaker 4 (32:12):
Absolutely? Matter of fact, I thought about a new car
twenty five gift from the Colorado taxpayers. I could just
drive that to some other state and sell it and
make some money, and then I could buy another car
and do it again, and do it again and do
it again. So that's all.

Speaker 3 (32:33):
That's that's my question.

Speaker 4 (32:34):
So yeah, money, would you would you do it?

Speaker 3 (32:38):
I certainly would because I personally am not a fan
of electric cars. But if you could make money off
of hate, selling, yeah it hate, maybe maybe maybe it's
worth it. And and then another thing is I wonder
I've often wondered now that Elon has sort of benefited

(32:58):
off of the crony capitalism or the crony welfare as
we often hate, you know that that idea, But Elon
has benefited from it for all these years. I wonder
how he feels about it now now that he's sort
of aligned himself with Donald Trump, and how he feels
about the How has Tesla's crashed over especially over recent years,

(33:22):
with you know, electric cars, you know, being a more
of a bust mar of a boom.

Speaker 4 (33:26):
Well, you know, they're still making money hand over fist
at Tesla. Again, it's not because they sell cars. It's
because they sell their tailpipe emissions credits because they have
no tailpipes, So all the other car companies have to
give them protection money in order to get those credits
so that they can sell the cars people want. Man,

(33:49):
what what a business model only predicated on regulatory scheming.
That's it pure corporate welfare. And it's not that the
taxpayers pay on that particular one. It's that consumers have
to pay. It's kind of like what Excel does when
it keeps putting up windmills and solar farms and then

(34:13):
charges you two, three, four times for all the generation
because they keep buying new ways to do generation and
you still have to pay off the mortgage on the
old one. It's be very clear Excel is not in
the power business. They're in the building crap and charging

(34:33):
their captive customers multiple times for it. It's a great
business to it is. Hey, thanks for the call, Craig.
Let's sneak up to Fraser and say he loo to
Rick Rick, good afternoon. You're with John Caldera tight on time?

Speaker 8 (34:47):
Hi John? Yeah, Just I'll make this quick.

Speaker 5 (34:50):
My wife and I bought an electric Volvo.

Speaker 8 (34:53):
She only drives a mile each way.

Speaker 5 (34:55):
To work and has a place to plug it in
at work, and we just love it for what we
do it for.

Speaker 3 (35:00):
What we use it for.

Speaker 8 (35:01):
It was great, but we never received a cent on
the tax credits, you know, for having an electric car,
because it was made in Sweden wherever the heck they.

Speaker 3 (35:11):
Built Volvos, right, that's.

Speaker 5 (35:13):
All John, Hey, it's a pleasure to hear you.

Speaker 4 (35:15):
Understand. Even if you didn't get a tax credit for it,
a direct tax credit, you got some indirect tax credits
because Volvo likely had to buy credits for the other
cars or sold that car to you for under its
value in order to have enough of its fleet be electric.

(35:38):
So even though you didn't see it in the price tag,
he was still there. Pardon me, I said.

Speaker 8 (35:43):
It's an absolute pleasure to hear you back on the air.

Speaker 4 (35:46):
Oh, it's always a kick. Thank you so much. By
the way, check out the Independence Institute. That's thinkfreedom dot org.
Thinkfreedom dot org. Sign up for my newsletter. It's free.

Speaker 3 (35:58):
It's great.

Speaker 4 (35:58):
Stay in contact. And also Colorado Gibbs Day is coming up,
and if you'd be so kind, if you like, I'd
love for you to help us out. It's great to
give money to a charitable organization that doesn't promote socialism.
Give me enough and all give you back my my leaf.
All right when we need you need to make a

(36:19):
break here, you're on right now, all right? I tell
you what, John Mark, stay on the line, will get
you after the news. I'm John Calderic. Keep it right here.
In for Mandy. You're on KOA.

Speaker 1 (36:31):
The Mandy Connell Show is sponsored by Belle and Pollock
Accident and injury lawyers.

Speaker 2 (36:35):
No, it's Mandy Connell. Don on KOA.

Speaker 1 (36:43):
Ninety one f M God.

Speaker 8 (36:48):
Study can the nicety prey many donald.

Speaker 4 (36:55):
Sad thing? I still can't believe they like girls do radio.
Sooner could be able to vote. I'm John Keldera. Give
me a call three or three, seven to one, three
eighty five, eighty five. But lovely and talented Bandy Connell
is off on a few days often good for her.

(37:15):
I want to take a few of the calls from
last Star, But also I want to ask what is
Biden's legacy, especially now that he has pardoned his son
for crimes he may or may not have committed. What
is his legacy? But first let's talk to Mark.

Speaker 8 (37:36):
Mark.

Speaker 4 (37:37):
Welcome, so glad to have you. You're on KWA.

Speaker 8 (37:40):
Are you doing John?

Speaker 3 (37:40):
Thank you so?

Speaker 8 (37:42):
John. I'm gonna go off subject ter a little bit
out for something at Yeah, you seem like you're real
calm and you get you know, you're cool, and maybe I.

Speaker 4 (37:50):
Don't like that this is Mark, this is going well.

Speaker 8 (37:54):
You might say, Mark, that's a little extreme, buddy, But
I would just want your opinion. I don't know all
the details about would work, but my idea is that
you you I don't know if we maybe we vote
this person in, but you create a matriarch and you
get one for each state, and it has to be
somebody that's like somebody. I don't know all the requirements,

(38:15):
but my idea is to have somebody that helps a
lot of people. They do a volunteer work, they've helped
nonprofit organizations succeed. It's got to be somebody that really
does things for people, that shows that they care about people.

Speaker 4 (38:29):
And they have valot're monarch like a king.

Speaker 8 (38:34):
No, I don't want them to be a monarch or
a king. I just want them to be like the elephants,
like a matriarch. And so the matriarch their purpose. The
only purpose would be is if somebody's breaking the constitution,
then they could say, look, you can't do that, Like
they can't go up there and shut that pipeline off
like they did. They can't go down there and open
up the border.

Speaker 4 (38:54):
I'm a little I'm a little hazy on the proposal here, Mark,
So let me see if I got it. The idea
is to have a matriarch for each of the fifty states,
and that matriarch is a woman I'm assuming chosen to
do what exactly and what authority would she have.

Speaker 8 (39:12):
So they only go around and they stop these politicians
from doing things that break the constitution or they're destroying jobs,
or like John, I want to know who has the
authority to go down there and say, okay, guys, we're
opening up the gates, and they let them all in. Basically,
they have too much power.

Speaker 4 (39:30):
What you're talking about is voters. So yeah, we could
have a matriarch who has dictatorial authority, or we could
stop electing people who abuse their power and make sweetheart
deals and let people across the border. Isn't that really

(39:53):
what you're talking about? Because I'm not too sure how
you would legally say, hey, lady, you're in con roll
of everything. Take it. Well, let's see, how would you
choose how would you choose this woman in your system?

Speaker 8 (40:07):
You know, I don't know. I'm not sure about all
the details.

Speaker 4 (40:10):
John.

Speaker 8 (40:10):
Just know we needs someone to stop these guys from
breaking the constitution, stop them from destroying jobs, stop them
from opening and closing the border. You know that just
needs to stop and use their problem.

Speaker 4 (40:24):
What you want, what you want as a wave of
the magic wand for the world to be the way
you want it to be. I want the same thing.
But there is no magic wand there is no person
who's going to do that. Unless we want a dictator
to take over and control it all. We're going to
have to do it ourselves. We're going to have to
vote for better candidates. We're going to have to instill

(40:48):
in people what the constitution is all about.

Speaker 8 (40:54):
Well again, John, I don't know all the details, or
are the requirements or what.

Speaker 4 (41:00):
Give me a name, Give me a name for Colorado.
Who would this woman be?

Speaker 8 (41:04):
Uh, you know, I don't know. I don't know.

Speaker 4 (41:07):
So y'all have thought this out at all?

Speaker 8 (41:09):
Well? I just know if we had this one nature
arch and I got it in my head that it's
it's you know, it's perfect. They don't go in there,
they don't control, they don't manipulate, they just walk and
they say, mister Polis, you're breaking the constitution here. You
can't do these things. Or they could walk into the
White House or Congress and say, guys, listen, this is
what you're objected. You have to work on this. You
can't you guys can't be shuffling money under the table.

Speaker 4 (41:31):
All right. So so you want your mother here and say,
the matriarch of Colorado, I don't know, John, just why
don't you ask her first before we go down this
rather silly road and see if she's interested in having
instead of the couple kids that you might have had,
including you, and having six million children that she's supposed

(41:53):
to keep an eye on.

Speaker 8 (41:57):
Well, see that's the specific John, when they.

Speaker 4 (42:01):
I'm an idea guy. I'm an idea guy. And the
guy who says, feed the mayonnaise to the tuna fish,
how you get that done? That's that's a you thing.
I'm an idea guy. All right, Mark, thanks so much,
great idea. We could also also just have Santa Claus
give us stuff. All right. So the question on the table,

(42:26):
what is Biden's real legacy? Reagan's legacy so many years
later is an incredible legacy Kennedy's an incredible legacy. Nixon,
Eh no, Carter, no Obama, depends on where you are.

(42:52):
But with the Biden four years of inflation, immigration crisis,
and wildly broken promises like I am not going to
pardon my son, only to go out and pardon his son.

(43:14):
As an aside, if I had any any power over
Donald Trump, I would say that one of his first
actions should be to pardon Hunter Biden. Now stay with
me on this one. Why Because it would signal that

(43:40):
the personal fights are over. It would signal that he's
willing to put bygones to be bygones. But now he
no longer has that opportunity, he has to to do it.
What Biden has done is he's opened the door and

(44:03):
for all sorts of presidential pardons. Apparently, apparently the Office
of Pardons or is some sort of department. I didn't
even know about this. They didn't even know about it.

(44:30):
Here's a little something from Americans from tax reform. Americans
sentenced for tax fraud receive a median prison sentence of
sixteen months. Hunter Biden will serve zero months thanks to
us that he's pardon hm. The average sentence for individuals

(44:56):
with tax fraud is close to a year and a half.

Speaker 3 (45:01):
Hmm.

Speaker 4 (45:04):
Glad to know he's just regular old Joe, good old Joe.
So I remember him promising over and over that this
wouldn't happen. I remember Biden saying, I'm not going to
do this. Why did Biden decide to do this? Because

(45:29):
it's his family and you probably pardon your kid too,
But it raises all these questions about Biden's legacy. He

(45:51):
went back. The President went back on his word, issued
a categorical pardon for his son Kiss weeks before the
scheduled sentencing on gun and tax convictions. What was going
to happen? Hm, After all this time, after all this time,

(46:19):
I was saying, we're not gonna do it. He does it.
What did Jared Polis say? This is a bad precedent
that could be abused by later presidents. It will sadly
charnish his reputation. That's what Polas said. He's right, He's right.

(46:42):
What a beautiful gift to Trump. What a beautiful gift saying, Hey,
you know all those people on January sixth, feel free
to pardon them. I'm pardoning my son. It's one of
the benefits of the job. One of the times I

(47:05):
agree with our governor. So, what's the legacy ten years
from now, you're talking to your grandkid and he says, Grandpa,

(47:28):
what were the Biden years all about? Really? What happened
during that time? Was he a great president? What's your
answer going to be. I think it's going to be
one of sympathy. I think it's going to be one

(47:49):
of looking back at the late president after he passes
and saying something to the effect of that poor old man,
he was abused. In fact, maybe it will be called
the elder abuse presidency, that this is a poor man

(48:13):
who has been used by the system that had handlers
all around him, and those handlers did the job of
protecting him and telling him what to do, including telling
him it's time to step aside. I heard the statistic,

(48:35):
and I don't know if it's accurate that throughout the country,
not in a single county, in all the counties across
the land, did Kamala do better than Joe Biden did
four years earlier, Not one county. What does that mean?

(49:04):
It means this poor guy, this poor guy I was
railroaded and a victim of elder abuse. I think that's
going to be his legacy. Let to go to Highland's
ranch and talk to Mike. Mike, welcome your John Kelderic
glad to have you.

Speaker 8 (49:24):
Hey, John, thanks for taking my call.

Speaker 6 (49:26):
So my question is this, and I've heard other people,
I think ask, but I haven't.

Speaker 9 (49:31):
Heard anyone answer it. So this blanket pardons since twenty fourteen.
I thought a pardon was.

Speaker 6 (49:38):
If you were like convicted of a crime and therefore
your pardon.

Speaker 9 (49:42):
I mean, if they determined that he was involved in
a murder, let's just say, is he pardoned from.

Speaker 4 (49:48):
That as well?

Speaker 8 (49:49):
I mean, I don't understand.

Speaker 6 (49:51):
How it can just be so overreaching when he hasn't
been convicted.

Speaker 4 (49:58):
Nixon was not convicted. There is no conviction there, and
so he was pardoned to get pasted a terrible time
in America's history. And I agree with what Ford did.
I think it was the right thing to do. Okay,

(50:20):
but it does remind me of a story. You know
what an indulgence is from the old Catholic Church. The
idea of an indulgence is that you could go to
the bishop and say, hey, I committed this sin and
I want to be forgiven. I want to go to heaven.
What would a cost for me to buy my way

(50:41):
out of the sin? And they would sell you an indulgence,
and then it's a way to make money for the church,
in a way for you to go to heaven. And
so the story is that a rich guy went to
the bishop and said, I want to buy an indulgence,
not just for all the sins I've committed, but all
the sins I'm going to When the bishop says, I

(51:02):
don't know, it's going to be a really expensive indulgence.
It's going to be this outrageous price, the firch guy says,
I'll pay it. So he's forgiven for all the sins
he will commit, and then pardon me. He turns around robson,
the bishop steals back all of his money and has
an indulgence to forgive him for it. That's kind of

(51:25):
what is happening right now with Biden. I'm not going
to give an indulgence a pardon, But now I am
what are you going to do? Kick me out of office?

Speaker 9 (51:37):
Yeah, but do clarify. I want to repeat the question
if he was accused of murders. It's a video came
up and.

Speaker 8 (51:45):
He prostitute died. It is in you know, in his
hotel room.

Speaker 6 (51:52):
Is he or is he not pardoned from that crime?

Speaker 4 (51:56):
I have to read it. I would think no. But
that's only from the federal aspect. So maybe the Feds
could not prosecute him for that murder, but the locals could.
The president cannot give a pardon for a crime committed
in Colorado that broke Colorado law.

Speaker 8 (52:19):
Right, I understand state law.

Speaker 6 (52:21):
I'm just understanding from a federal level.

Speaker 9 (52:23):
I mean just you know, I mean, could he be
absolved of that murder?

Speaker 6 (52:28):
And if there was any other Haines saying to.

Speaker 9 (52:31):
Come out, because I mean to go back to twenty
fourteenth pretty far, so there might be a skeleton or
two that we have.

Speaker 4 (52:37):
How many crimes your question is so dead on how
many crimes might be covered, how many federal crimes might
be covered?

Speaker 6 (52:46):
I don't know, that's my question.

Speaker 4 (52:47):
Yeah, I don't know. But man, would it feel good
to have a blanket pardon for everything you've done in
the last decade?

Speaker 3 (52:57):
Yes? Yes, I just didn't.

Speaker 8 (52:59):
I just can't.

Speaker 9 (53:00):
It's possible to go down that road the way the
way you know Joe Biden has, and it's I'm prep
it then, and but will it?

Speaker 8 (53:07):
Can it stand up? Can the Supreme Court shoot it down?

Speaker 9 (53:10):
Can they revoke the pardon?

Speaker 4 (53:13):
I don't think they can. Love to have some I
don't think they can. And I'll tell you what I
know the guy to ask. I'll talk to our scholar
on constitutional law at Independence Institute, Rob Naedleson, and ask
him that question. That would be a superb question. What
does this pardon?

Speaker 8 (53:31):
I would love to know?

Speaker 4 (53:34):
That would mean John, thank you so much. I appreciate it.
Isn't it just like Biden that you can do something
stupid and he'll bail you out. What I mean by
that is, think of think of what it's done for

(53:54):
for people who have student loans. You did this, you
knew it was going to put you into You did
it anyway. He signed on the dotted line. You knew
the rules. But don't worry. I'm going to let you
out so beautifully. Biden three or thirty seven to one,
three eighty five eighty five seven one three eight five

(54:16):
eighty five. I think in twenty years, looking back on Biden,
it's going to be hell. How to put it? This
sympathy President, all that poor old man he got used

(54:37):
and abused by the people around him, by his wife
who kept him in power, by the media who kept
saying always in perfect health, with all the staff that said,
oh no, he's so energetic, we can't keep up with him.
All that lying to keep him in a closet, to

(55:01):
make sure we never knew who he was, and then
and then to say, well, you know, Trump is just awful.
He breaks his promises. I'm sorry, Democrats, you can't hide
behind that when your president said I'm not giving my
son a pardon and then does, And it's so like

(55:24):
everything else. We're gonna we're gonna close the borders, but
we don't. We're gonna stand by the Israelis during their conflict,
but then we don't. We're gonna help Ukraine win this war,
and then we tie their hands. We're going to have
an orderly withdrawal from Afghanistan, and then people are falling
off of the wings of airplanes. Everything this man touched

(55:50):
crumbled because he's out of his element. So what will
his legacy be? It will be on par with Carter,
but with a different twist. I look back at the
Carter years and I go, what a decent, decent man,
what a nice guy who really tried his best. He

(56:16):
did a few good things, including deregulating transportation like trucking
and airlines, opened up a competition there, but overall a
mediocre leader whose legacy was that of incompetence. Biden's not
gonna be that much different. Biden will be Oh, that

(56:39):
poor old man. He didn't know what was going on,
and the people around him used him, including his wife
and his son. Can you tell me is there a
different view here when you look back at Biden in
fifteen years? What do you think people are gonna say,

(57:00):
thirty seven, eighty five, eighty five, I'm John Caldera in
for Mandy, keep it here, you're on Kowa. So I'm
trying to make sense of this pardon, and hmm, I
don't know if I can. Here's an analysis from Politico.
Joe Biden's broad reprieve for his son gives the President

(57:22):
elect new rationale for even more expansive pardons than those
he issued in his first term. In the sweeping Pardons
of Hunter Biden, Joe Biden did not just protect his son.
He also handed President elect Donald Trump a template to
shield his own allies and stretch the pardon power even further.

Speaker 3 (57:47):
Hmm.

Speaker 4 (57:48):
Legal experts say, I always love it when any article
says legal experts say, some say some say this. Legal
experts say Trump now has a fresh precedent and political
cover to issue expansive pardons, absolving his allies not only
of specific offenses, but even any undermined, undetermined, excutly crimes

(58:12):
they may have committed. With a single exception of Gerald
Ford's pardon of Richard Nixon. No, this is important. No
modern American president had ever issued such a broad grant
of clemency until Joe Biden's quote full and unconditional pardon
of his son. On Sunday night, a caller asked this question.

(58:38):
I think here's the answer. The younger Biden is now
effectively cleared of legal consequences for any federal law he
might have broken over a nearly eleven year period. See
that again. Anything this guy did during that period, he

(59:06):
can't be prosecuted on a federal level. Now locally, statewide. Absolutely.
Pltigo continues, those terms are so unusual and the process
leading to it was so secretive that the Justice Department's
Office of the Pardon Attorney. In other news, by the way,
there's an office of the Pardon Attorney. Anyway, the process

(59:32):
was so secretive that the Justice Department's Offense of the
Pardon Attorney, which typically advises the president on clemency issues,
was taken by surprise, according to a person who was
granted anonymity to disclose the details. In the final days

(59:52):
of Trump's first term, at least one close ally representative,
Matt Gates, requested a similarly sweeping pardon, according to congressional testimony,
but top White House aids made it clear it was
a non starter. Now that Joe Biden has crossed the rubicon,

(01:00:14):
legal experts and former Trump associates say it will be
harder to restrain Trump next time. He now has a
ready made rationale to follow suit when he returns to office. Now,
I remember other big pardons. I remember Jimmy Carter pardoning

(01:00:39):
draft dodgers. We forget about this one. So during the
Vietnam War, many Americans dodged the draft. They were conscripted
into the army, but didn't show. Many of them fled
up to Canada, live happy and fulfilling lives in the cold,

(01:01:03):
cold tundra, and then somewhere I'm trying to remember what
year mid mid season during Carter's reign, he offered a
blanket pardon to anyone who dodged the draft. Now, his

(01:01:24):
rationale was, just like Forge rationale, we need to move
on from this terrible point in American history and stop
looking backwards. So I'm going to pardon Nixon. Carter's rationale
was we need to heal the scars of the Vietnam era.
The difference is, there were a lot of boys who

(01:01:51):
would like to have dodged the draft, but they didn't.
Many of them were killed in act, many of them
gave up years of their lives enforced service to the
United States, And those people who broke the law just

(01:02:16):
came back in. I've got mixed feelings about that one. Again.
It is like Joe Biden. Yes, you took out all
these college loans for your degree in underwater humanities, and
now we're going to pay off one hundred and fifty

(01:02:37):
grand worth of your debt. What does that say to
everybody else who played by the rules. Same thing with
nine million people who pour into the nation illegally. What
does that tell the people who do it legally? And
what does this tell people that if your daddy is

(01:02:58):
the president, He'll get you out. Hmm. Let me go
back to this Politico piece. By the way, give me
a call. Three oh three, seven to one, three eighty five,
eighty five, they write, Trump, to be sure, took a
free wheeling approach to pardons in his first term, granting

(01:03:19):
clemency to cronies like former National Security advisor Mike Flynn,
longtime advisor Roger Stone, twenty sixteen campaign chairman Paul Manniford,
White House aid Steve Bannon. All of those pardons, though,
were tied to specific investigations and crimes those men have

(01:03:41):
been accused or convicted of.

Speaker 3 (01:03:47):
HM.

Speaker 4 (01:03:49):
Now, mind you, they're all also connected to investigations that
could have implicated Trump. So there's a reason there. So
during the campaign, Trump pledge to harness his power to
pardon even more aggressively. He promised to pardon many of
the rioters who stormed the Capitol. Almost immediately after Hunter

(01:04:13):
Biden's pardon was announced, Trump hinted and he might cite
it as justification for granting broad clemency to January sixth defendants.
On social media, he asked, does the pardon given by
Joe to Hunter include the seven or excuse me? The
j six hostages. Interesting thought, all right, three oh three,

(01:04:36):
seven to one, three eighty five, eighty five, seven to one,
three eight five eighty five. This has been such a
bizarre year, and I feel almost he says, almost sorry
for Joe Biden. I feel sorry sorry for a man

(01:05:01):
who is dealing with dementia maybe Alzheimer's, who has been
moved around and pushed around by people he trusts to
take care of him and take care of the nation,
who instead look out for themselves and use him like

(01:05:21):
a puppet. How would you? How would you describe this?
So I remember, I'm old enough to remember Nixon's resignation.
I'm old enough to remember Ford's pardon. I'm old enough
to remember Carter's pardon of draft dodgers. I'm old enough

(01:05:48):
to remember Reagan giving amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants
on the condition that there'll never be anymore amnesty. And
so it goes, and so it goes. Who will Trump

(01:06:09):
pardon now? Who will he say, oh, you're out of here?
I think pretty much anyone involved in the January sixth riots.
I don't think that's a great idea, but that's what
he's gonna do. Three o three seven one, three eight
two five five seven one three talk. Let's take a

(01:06:31):
quick breather. I'm John Caldera. Keep it right here, you're
on Kawai three three seven one three eighty five eighty
five seven one three eighty five eighty five details details.
I'm John Caldera in for Mandy. I love how the
Wall Street Journal put this. When it was all about

(01:06:52):
the pardon, they ended their editorial with this. In twenty twenty,
Biden promised a return to normalcy, defended Hunter's influence, hustling,
and claimed Hunter's laptop was Russian disinformation. Then he tried

(01:07:15):
to be fdr encouraged, encouraged the prosecution of mister Trump,
and gave his son a get out of jail free card.
The history books will not be kind, Yeah, they will

(01:07:35):
not be kind. What a what a sad end to
a pathetic presidency. What will you remember from the Biden presidency?
We'll stick out in your mind. You know, when I

(01:07:58):
think about Reagan, I think about mister Gorbachev, tear down
this row to this wall. I think about tax cuts
that reinvigorated an economy for decades. I think of standing
up to the Soviet Union and forcing them into bankruptcy.

Speaker 3 (01:08:22):
I think of.

Speaker 4 (01:08:24):
Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan and Pope John Paul working
together to destroy the evil of communism. That's what I
think of. If I think of Kennedy, I think of
some bad the Bay of Pigs, a lot of good starting,
the space race, tax cuts, the superb handling of the

(01:08:51):
Cuban missile crisis. These are the things that will stick
out in the history books for any president. For Trump, certainly,
January sixth is going to be a huge, huge negative
in the history books. But the greatest comeback in political
history in the United States. That's a little different. Will

(01:09:17):
what will Biden be remembered for? Will there be a
single success that Biden is remembered for? Or will it
be people falling off of planes as they try to
escape Afghanistan or nine million illegals pouring over the border,
or inflation or the woke police at full armaments three

(01:09:45):
seven one, three eighty five, eighty five. It's a head
on down to Castle Rock. Hey Brian, you're John Caldero. Welcome,
hey John Well.

Speaker 6 (01:09:54):
This will probably be the catstone of one of the.

Speaker 3 (01:09:56):
Most embarrassing presidencies in the history of our country more
so than more so than Nixon. Well, let me just
guide my point. Afghanistan was the worst military failure and
embarrassment in the history of America.

Speaker 4 (01:10:17):
No, I disagree. The ball as I got was let's
stay top.

Speaker 3 (01:10:22):
Well the fallest I goon. Though. Vietnam was a quagmire,
it was a spiderweb, it was complicated.

Speaker 4 (01:10:30):
I mean, you can go throughout we can go throughout
history and take a look at things from Pearl Harbor
to the Bay of Pigs. I mean, there are military
missteps throughout history. We can we can go through we
can go through all.

Speaker 6 (01:10:42):
Kay, let's say, let's just stay in the.

Speaker 3 (01:10:44):
Last forty years, thirty years. But but my point is
that's how we started. As presidency, he's been throwing money
at things. You've talked well about immigration mistakes.

Speaker 6 (01:10:57):
But it's interesting when you look at this pardon that
not only is it in his family, which is in
a complete embarrassment, it sounds like the Philippines or something
in Venezuela number one, number two. There's some conjecture that
he's actually doing it to protect himself because as all

(01:11:18):
this stuff comes out, as the DOJ gets cleaned up
and they actually go in and look at the laptop,
look at these issues, and actually bring white to it
that the big guy Biden would be implicated in some
of this, and so he's actually covering his own tracks.

Speaker 3 (01:11:33):
Which is really.

Speaker 6 (01:11:35):
Scary when you think of not only is he freeing
his family, but.

Speaker 3 (01:11:40):
He's also protecting himself. Yeah, you think about it that way,
it's it's.

Speaker 4 (01:11:45):
Taking cronyism and American politics go hand in hand with
every other government in the world, but never has been
so ridiculously latent that I have to do this as
as a father.

Speaker 6 (01:12:03):
It's my family. Yeah, exactly, it's my kid. You know,
that's just that just.

Speaker 3 (01:12:08):
Sounds like Amla Marcos in the Philippines or something going
on in Venezuela with Maduro. It's just craziness. We haven't
had that in America. I can't.

Speaker 6 (01:12:18):
I was thinking back, have you seen anything like that.

Speaker 3 (01:12:21):
Where you're pardoning your own family members? I can't. I
can't recall that in history.

Speaker 4 (01:12:25):
I can't either. Well, if you're the president's kid, life
life isn't bad. Life isn't bad, but it's it's it's
the saying one thing and doing the other that will
that will be remembered. I We're not going to see

(01:12:48):
helicopters carrying off people on rooftops in Afghanistan. He said that,
He said that just before we saw something worse, people.

Speaker 6 (01:13:01):
Plane's went up, there was a way to do it intelligently. Sure, sure,
it's arguable that we should get out of Afghanistan, but
do it first off. You know, he was telling them
when they're going to do it, and it's just idiocy
in a military situation. Number one, Number two, do it carefully,
save the air base, save the American, save the American interests,

(01:13:27):
and do it carefully, and then move out, move out
of the cities.

Speaker 4 (01:13:31):
And there wasn't that large in theF is. This man's legacy,
This man's legacy is ruined, and I feel I feel
sorry for the man. I honestly do. I got to
run thanks to the call. Three or three seven one,
three eighty five, eighty five. I'm John Calderic. Keep it here,
you're on KOA.

Speaker 1 (01:13:48):
The Mandy Connell Show is sponsored by Bell and Pollock
Accident and injury Lawyers.

Speaker 2 (01:13:53):
No, it's Mandy connella ninetym song guy.

Speaker 8 (01:14:08):
Two three many.

Speaker 4 (01:14:12):
Sad thing not bad. I don't have a bag song. Hey,
it's five minutes after. I'm John Caldera, Why did you
give me a call? Three or three seven to one,
three eight, five eighty five and run the Independence Institute,
Colorado's force for sanity and goodness and economic and personal liberty.

(01:14:34):
We've been around for nearly four decades. It's hard to believe. No,
I haven't been running it up that whole time. But
without Independence, we wouldn't have the Taxpayer Bill of Rights.
We wouldn't have the flat income tax. We wouldn't have
reduced that flat income tax from five percent down to
four point four percent. We wouldn't have competitively contracted services.

(01:14:55):
We wouldn't have term limits. We wouldn't have charter schools.
We wouldn't have concealed care permits. What Independence Institute does
as we take a long view of political change. We
don't just do shiny things and put something here and
something there and put all our money on one candidate
or one issue. Now, we build the infrastructure that's needed

(01:15:18):
to make sure victory becomes inevitable. And I want to
invite you to be part of it. Go to thinkfreedom
dot org. Thinkfreedom dot org. If you're so inclined, we'd
love to have your help on Colorado Gives Day next week.
You could do it beforehand and give us a tax

(01:15:39):
deductible contribution. Money you'll be giving helps keep Colorado free
and we'll fight the socialist hordes that have this temporary
I said, temporary hold on us again. Go to Thinkfreedom
dot o RG. Please join up. We'd love to stay
in contact with you. And, by the way, not alone.

(01:16:01):
There's a whole bunch of people in Colorado who believe
in personal freedom. You're not crazy. Also check out our
news service called Complete Colorado dot Com. Complete Colorado dot Com.
We aggregate new stories from around the state, mix it
in with our own stories, including my column and Mike

(01:16:23):
Rosen's column. I can give you a free place to
go and check every day to find out what's going
on here in Colorado. No, not Washington, here in your
own backyard. That's Complete Colorado dot Com. All right. So
I see this one little story out in Lakeland, Florida.

(01:16:45):
The only International House of Pancakes I hop. By the way,
when my kid was little, I told her that the
International House of Pancakes was called the International House of
Pancakes because the first restaurant was actually built out of pancakes.

(01:17:07):
Isn't it great when they're tiny and they'll buy anything? Now?

Speaker 3 (01:17:11):
Mind you?

Speaker 4 (01:17:11):
I also told my daughter that before nineteen sixty five,
the reason why all those photographs are in black and
white was that the world was in black and white
and they were just taking pictures of it the way
it was. In nineteen sixty five, they started inventing color

(01:17:32):
and people could put color on the things that they owned,
and that's where the world turned from black and white
to color, and the pictures just showed that. She didn't
buy that one quite as long, but I got it
for a little bit. What did you tell your kid?
What was the stupid thing you told your kid when
they were young enough to believe it, and still to

(01:17:56):
this day you never let them forget it. It's just
curious on that one three thirty seven one three eighty
five eighty five. Anyway, back to Lakeland, Florida, an I
hoop server said she was fired for feeding a homeless
man in need. Former I hop server Victoria Hughes, What

(01:18:17):
a great name. Victoria Hughes said she was fired just
for giving a guy food. She said she's worked at
in this I hoop location in Lakeland, Florida for thirteen years.
Oh what did she do wrong to work there for
thirteen years? And said that a man walked into the

(01:18:38):
restaurant on Sunday and told her he was hungry. Quote,
without a second thought, I bought the stack of pancakes
and gave him water. He bought. She bought the stack
of pancakes and gave him water. That's what she says.
She said she informed her manager about the situation and

(01:19:01):
his reaction caught her off guard. Quote he told me
the reason behind him being so upset was because it
could cause a loitering issue or a safety issue for customers. Uh,
adding that the man returned later with a family who
brought him in for another meal. So Hughes told the

(01:19:27):
station that she received a call from the manager and
was informed she had been fired, and when asked why,
he said company policy. So here's her quote. I need
my job, but I would still do it again. I

(01:19:47):
truly would. She said, I would still help someone if
I could. Firing her ro call. Don't you think she
gave a homeless guy food? Bought him food and let
him eat it in the restaurant? That seems that seems Oh,

(01:20:16):
how to put it not a fireable offense. I agree
with the manager. Please don't ever do that again, because
if you start giving the homeless free food, they will
turn our little restaurant into a soup kitchen, and they

(01:20:37):
will what homeless guy wouldn't want to eat? An eyehop.
So this makes I Hop look bad. But if if
they were giving away free food to the homeless, you
know what, they wouldn't be in business too long. People

(01:21:00):
want to dine with meth heads, drunks, and crazy people.
I mean, other than at your family Thanksgiving dinner. People
really don't want to do that. So the company that
owns it said, we are committed to providing an inclusive
environment welcome to everyone. As we actively investigate the situation,

(01:21:22):
we will utilize this as an opportunity to train our
employees on how to approach instances surrounding food insecurity. Blah
blah blah blah. Listen, you shouldn't have fired her unless
she did it again. Do you agree with me on this?

Speaker 3 (01:21:42):
One? Three or three?

Speaker 4 (01:21:43):
Seven to one, three eighty five eighty five, seven to one,
three eighty five eighty five Have you been in a
restaurant or worked in a restaurant when some hopeless guy
comes in wanting food or even wanting to use restroom.
If you're the manager of that place, if you're the

(01:22:04):
owner of that place, you send him out. You send
him out, and you send him away, because nobody's gonna
come to your restaurant if there are people shooting up
drugs in your bathroom, or if they're or if they're
sitting next to the paying customers. All right, three or

(01:22:26):
three seven to one, three eighty five, eighty five. I'm
John Caldera. Keep it right here. You're in kaway. Let's
see where should we Where should we go? Oh? Let
me go out to the Netherlands. I know it's a
long way to go for a silly story, but this
is this hits home, especially as I get older. Residents
of a senior housing complex have risen up in revolts

(01:22:51):
against a quote patronizing ban on alcohol in their communal
living area. Oh this is great. So there's an apartment
complex there that has forbidden quote strong drink such as

(01:23:12):
port and gin from the daytime area, including during group
activities such as bingo nights. Wine and beer and cider
will still be alive, still be loud. So the company
that runs the complex for seniors said the move was

(01:23:35):
designed to comply with quote local health policy and social
developments related to growing old healthily. Let me say that again.
They're saying we're doing this because of local health policy.

(01:23:55):
Uh huh, and social developments relate to growing old healthily.
My reaction would be fit me. I'm old and if
I want to have a scotch, You're not gonna stop me.
So people who live in this seniors complex slam the

(01:24:18):
band as patronizing and childish. Hmm. Some hung hand painted
banners from their balconies with slogans such as seventy eighty
ninety in charge of my own glass like that till

(01:24:43):
one of three sisters who's in their seventies said that
people just have a glass of wine or something with bingo.
Most of us don't drink at all. We want to
see how we're being nannied here, because nothing thing ever
happens here. People just have a drink on Friday afternoon.

(01:25:07):
This is the kind of nannyism, by the way, that's
gonna come here. Hmm. So the manager of the place said,
we have frequently heard from a lot of elderly people
in the neighborhood that they are wary of coming to
the meeting areas. I don't see it as being patronizing.

(01:25:29):
It's been shown that alcohol in general, and especially strong drink,
is really unhealthy. So we have to choose as a
well being organization whether you draw a line, and we
have to draw a line. Are you kidding me? There

(01:25:55):
are very few benefits of getting old. You can think
of some. I'd love to know it. One of the
few benefits is you do what you want to do.
At some point you go, you know what, I don't
care what you think. I'm going to enjoy my life.

(01:26:17):
And just because I live in this place doesn't mean
I can't have a drink. And I'm not saying you
can't have a drink in your own apartment. But good
God almighty, these are senior citizens who I would assume
enjoy each other's company, and a good strong whiskey is

(01:26:38):
better shared. In fact, it's a little sad when you
drink alone. It is a social lubricant. Now, nobody's forcing
booze down the elderly's mouths, but I think they've they've

(01:26:58):
earned it. I think they've earned it. If you live
in a retirement community, do you have these kind of restrictions.
Didn't you go to a senior facility so you can
act like, oh, I don't know a senior Do you
go to a place that by design doesn't have little

(01:27:20):
kids so you can enjoy the adult perks that come
along with life, including a good whiskey. You know, it's
one thing when government treats kids like little kids and
makes all their decisions. It's another when they do it
for adults. Or are they saying that elderly people just

(01:27:43):
can't make good decisions and for their own health? They're
doing this because I says it's been showed that alcohol
in general, and strong drink especially is really unhealthy. Then
don't drink it. If you don't think it's healthy, then

(01:28:07):
don't have any. But if we think it's okay, that's
up to us. This is, this is the beautiful progressive
mind at work, that my value structure should be imposed
upon you via rules and regulations three or three seven

(01:28:28):
one three eight five eighty five seven one three eighty
five eighty five. Is this becoming more and more of
a thing. I know this is this is far away,
but I just get a feeling that the elderly like
Joe Biden are easy to push around like Joe Biden,

(01:28:53):
and therefore it's easier to do what you think they
should do. That has forced them to live the way
you know they should live, like their little kiddies. This
is my big fear of getting old. We've got this
beautiful daughter who loves me so much, but she's she's

(01:29:14):
a nurse, nurse ratchet, and she doesn't even know who
nurse Ratchet is, but she knows it's not a compliment.
So Ever since I had a heart attack, she's on
top of me looking at everything I put in my mouth?

Speaker 3 (01:29:26):
What are you doing?

Speaker 8 (01:29:26):
Did you do this?

Speaker 4 (01:29:27):
Did you get off my back?

Speaker 3 (01:29:29):
Kid?

Speaker 4 (01:29:30):
And I have to tell her, you know, please do
not keep me alive longer than I want to be alive.
Anything here strike a bell three O three seven to
one three eight five eighty five. I'm John Caldera, and
for Mandy, keep it here Kawa three O three seven
one three eighty five eighty five, seven to one three
eight five eighty five. There's a story out of the

(01:29:53):
Washington Examiner, and I love this. California, God bless California
begins a special session to protect laws from Trump. This
is ludicrous. California lawmakers are back on the clock Monday,

(01:30:14):
feverishly working to Trump proof their state before President elect
Donald Trump takes office in January. Yeah. Democrats there hold
a super majority in both houses and decided that a
special session is needed. So Gavin Newsom, the presidential hopeful

(01:30:38):
in four years, called one, what's the purpose of the
special legislative session in California to prepare for the tyranny
of the new president? And it's beautiful. He's going to
ask lawmakers to approve twenty five million dollars in extra

(01:31:00):
funding to the AG's office to defend state policies in
court that Trump has already promised to target. This is
what's known in the business as show voting quote. We'll
prepare in detail with litigation strategy, said the AG. We

(01:31:22):
have a legislative strategy. We have thought in detail about
where and when we sue, and all want grounds and
we're working with our partners across the state. Oh good god, almighty,
do people really buy into this. It's it's silly to

(01:31:49):
see police and prisker in Illinois and Gavin Newsom become
the self policers for for democracy. Ah. Yeah, the democracy
is the guy who won the election is going to
be president. That's democracy in nimrods. Not only did he

(01:32:13):
win the electoral vote, he won the popular vote. So
it's kind of hard to scream he's a threat to
democracy when he won. He won. So what is California's plans?
They're going to safeguard policies on abortion, access, climate change,

(01:32:36):
and immigration. Oh, that's adorable. So Newsom says that the
state California will provide rebates to eligible residents who buy
electric vehicles if Trump ends the seventy five hundred dollars

(01:32:58):
federal electric vehicle tax credits. Hm hmm. So in other words,
the feds aren't gonna pay for it, we will quote,
we will intervene if the Trump administration eliminates the federal
tax credit. Doubling down on our commitment to clean air
and green jobs in California, We're not turning our back

(01:33:19):
on a clean transportation future. We're gonna make it more
affordable for people to drive vehicles that don't pollute. All right,
how many how many things are wrong in that statement?
How many? How many things are just crazy ass wrong?
Do you see you're not making it affordable for people

(01:33:41):
to drive electric vehicles. No, you're just stealing from other
people to give corporate welfare to the green industrial complex.
That's all. This is CRONYUSM plain and simple. Oh, but
it's it's for people to drive vehicles that don't pollute.

(01:34:07):
That's a really impressive argument if only it were true.
You see, electricity is made largely by fossil fuels that pollute.
Thus my new advertising slogan for the coal industry coal

(01:34:29):
it's what teslas eat for dinner, So they're not pollution free.
It doesn't make it more affordable. And here's the best
part think this one through. The federal government has has

(01:34:52):
a power that the states don't have. It's a terrible,
terrible power. It's to make money out of thin air.
That is, it can print up more money and go
into debt and put our kids and grandkids and great
grandkids into massive debt. States really can't do that. They

(01:35:14):
might be able to take out some loans, but they
can't increase the money supply, and they largely can't spend
money that isn't raised. So as companies and productive people
are fleeing California with its regressive or you'd say progressive

(01:35:35):
income tax right where you can pay up to thirteen
percent in state income taxes. The productive class are getting
out of Dodge. That's why Elon Musk moved Tesla to Texas,
where there is no income tax. So California is in

(01:35:57):
dire fiscal straits. They've been become addicted, just like Colorado,
to free money from the Feds COVID bailouts. So when
that ends, what are they going to do? So he
can say, we're going to continue and take the place

(01:36:19):
of those federal credits for EVS electric vehicles. That's a
wonderful thing to say. It's a difficult thing to do
because the money's not there. The Feds can say this
because they can make money out of thin air. They
can go into debt, and they've gone into debt so

(01:36:42):
much that this nation has never had so much debt.
We have more debt now as a percentage of GDP
than we did during World War two. Of course we're
not in a World war. We're in that much debt
on the federal level because we like to buy things

(01:37:02):
with our grandkids money, the greatest generational theft in history.
But California, Colorado, other states really can't do that. They
can't make up their own money. How about this fight.
California is also gearing up for the fight over immigration.

(01:37:24):
The state prohibits local police from helping federal immigration authorities
with deportation. Mm so what's the president going to do?
They can strip federal resources from democratically run cities if
they refuse to participate with ice. That's not a bad idea. Now,

(01:37:49):
Trump vowed mass deportations. A lot easier said than done.
What's just pushing this huge pushback from crazy politicians, including
Denver's own Mayor Johnston, who foolishly misspoke and said, well,

(01:38:10):
we got We're gonna put police on the border of
the city and county, and the Highland mommies are gonna
come out fifty thousand strong to stop them. I'm keep
in mind when when Trump talks like that, they say
he's inciting an insurrection. When Mayor Johnson does it, he's

(01:38:30):
just being compassionate. There is not much they can do
here except grand stand, fine, sue the feds. The Feds
don't have to give you money. And California is gonna

(01:38:51):
be eaten from the inside out, and I fear so
will Colorado Alight? Let's take a quick breather, this is
a fun day. Nope, Oh I can keep talking. Oh God,
bless now I got the permission to keep you apping
what everyone wants so badly. All right, let me add

(01:39:12):
to that fight, the next fight that's going to the
Supreme Court. I believe there are three major issues that
gave Trump victory. Inflation, runaway, immigration, and wokeness, particularly the
transgender issue that people. People were sick of the trans

(01:39:35):
issue being pushed in their kids' faces, and even more
sick of boys in girls' sports people who think, oh no,
that wasn't wasn't a big deal. Trump's platform called for
ending left wing gender insanity his quote, and he spent

(01:39:58):
more than thirty seven million dollars on ads attacking Kamala
Harris's support for gender rights. The slogan went, Kamala is
for they them, President Trump is for you. So up
to the Supreme Court goes the big case. They hear

(01:40:20):
it this week, will find out in six months how
it goes. But the issue is Tennessee's law from twenty
twenty three that forbids prescription of puberty blockers, hormone therapy,
or other medical treatment, allowing miners to identify or live

(01:40:41):
as the purported identity inconsistent with the miners' sex. End quote. Now,
this is something that would never fly in Colorado, but
half the states, let me say it again, half the
states have similar laws on the books to block puberty blockers.

(01:41:04):
To say, kids, while they're kids, cannot have their bodies
mess with until they're adults. I remember when the ACLU
cared about individual liberties. Well, the ACLU is on a
complete transgendered jihad. Their lead attorneys representing Tennessee transgendered youth hmm,

(01:41:35):
and their attorney will be the first openly trans lawyer
arguing in front of the High Court.

Speaker 3 (01:41:45):
She is a he.

Speaker 4 (01:41:49):
And she who's now a he will be arguing that
the new law violates the Fourteenth Amendments protection guaranteed by
discriminating against transgendered people, treating individuals differently because of sex.

(01:42:09):
I don't think they're gonna win this one. I don't
think there is a fourth Teenth Amendment equal protection argument
to be made. It says that everybody, regardless of their sex,
cannot get puberty blockers until they're eighteen. Once they're adults,

(01:42:30):
they can do what they want. Keep in mind, kids
can't get a tattoo without their parents' permission, they can't
take an aspirin in school without their parents' permission, and
the state intervenes when parents do not care for the

(01:42:53):
health of their kids. Is a puberty blocker a good
thing for a kid a bad thing? I don't know.
I do know that it causes irreparable changes to someone's body,
and when they are twelve thirteen years old, I don't
think anyone has the faculties to make such an important decision.

(01:43:21):
This is why we don't let kids get married, you know,
except in Mississippi. This is why we don't let kids
buy booze, you know, except the Mississippi. This is why
we don't let kids buy guns, enter into contracts, rent cars,

(01:43:41):
because they are not yet of age to make good decisions.
Their brain is still cooking. I understand this law. I'm
not certain if I support it or not. Is this

(01:44:01):
something that is up to the parents. Why do parents
put up with this? I'll tell you why parents put
up with it. Because the transgender to complex convinces parents
that there's a false dichotomy. Either you let your kid

(01:44:23):
change gender with surgery and puberty blockers and chemicals or
watch your kid die from suicide. As we all know
that that's a false dichotomy. There is another way. The
other way is you can live any way you want

(01:44:45):
after you're eighteen, when you're an adult, But until then,
it would be child abuse to have your body mutilated.
And trust me, I'm not a religious guy. I'm not
a the guy who's a Bible thumper. But I wonder
about parents who do this, and I get it. They're

(01:45:09):
scared for their kids' lives, They're scared for their kids' safety.
I get that. Is it the government's job to protect
these kids from parents who help them get mutilated? Is that?
Is that the thing?

Speaker 6 (01:45:31):
Three?

Speaker 4 (01:45:31):
Or three seven one three eighty five eighty five? So Tennessee,
in response to the ACLU lawsuit, says the law doesn't
discriminate based on sex because gender treatment is denied equally
to both males and females. I agree. The state's Republican
attorney general says the law is a measured effort to

(01:45:54):
protect children from irreversible, unproven medical procedures. The state argues
that untreated gender dysphoria goes away on its own for
most children and adolescents, for some individuals, gender identity remains
fluid for years, meaning that some people irreversibly alter their bodies,

(01:46:19):
only to later detransition to whatever extent possible.

Speaker 3 (01:46:28):
What will what will.

Speaker 4 (01:46:31):
The High Court do with this one? My suspicion is
that the High Court will say this is a state's
rights issue. There's nothing in There's nothing in the u
United States Constitution that says, you know, we better weigh
in on whether kids can can get elective surgeries. In

(01:46:58):
the same way, there's nothing in the Constitution guaranteeing a
right to abortion. That's why the Roe versus Weight decision
was a faulty decision. Whether or not you support abortion rights,
there's nothing in the federal Constitution that guaranteed it. Even
Ruth Bader Ginsburg knew it was a bad, flawed decision

(01:47:21):
that someday would be overturned, and in turn, some states
like California and now Colorado made sure that their abortion
rights are sacrosanct. It's now in our constitution. It's now
in our constitution. Abortion up to the moment of birth

(01:47:45):
is legal in Colorado. I'm not saying anyone's going to
do it at the moment of birth, but it is legal,
and now the state has to pay for people's abortions
if they're on Medicaid. Wild But that's how one state

(01:48:05):
decided to handle this. This one state, Colorado, has given
the most progressive protections for abortion in the entire country.
And my guess is when the Supreme Court says states
can outlaw, outlaw puberty blockers and surgery for kids, for miners,

(01:48:32):
you're gonna see a lot of states like Colorado do
the exact same thing for transgendered rights, putting in some law,
maybe even some sort of constitutional amendment saying this cannot
happen in Colorado. The Left is overplaying their hand on this.

(01:48:55):
Let me explain this one. Here's why Trump was elected.
Trump was elected for the same reason that bud Light
lost twenty percent of its market share. If you're a
kid in college or school, you know you've got to
shut up on the transgendered issue. Otherwise you could be canceled,
you get a terrible grade, you can be kicked out

(01:49:15):
of school for hate speech. At work, you cannot talk
about the trans issue because you'll be called a racist
and a hater. You'll be brought up on to hr,
you could lose your job. So you've got to you've
got to stand still and take it. But then you
go to the supermarket and you can vote anonymously against

(01:49:39):
bud Light. You know what else is an anonymous vote
voting for president? Don't think that Trump's victory wasn't also
a huge statement about woke trans movement in the United States.

Speaker 6 (01:49:56):
All right, we're out.

Speaker 4 (01:49:57):
I'm John Caldera. Check out Independence, go to thinkfreedom dot org. Mandy,
thank you so much, and keep it right here. You're
on Kobe