Major General Mari Eder SPECIAL SUMMER ENCORE

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Thanks for listening to our upcoming podcast on Erskine Radio.
Very seldom do you run into somebody who has done
as much in the military as much in life as
Major General Mary kay Eder has done over the last
thirty six years in the Army, in both active and
Army Reserve, and to thank her for service isn't enough.

(00:27):
She served as the Deputy Chief of the United States
Army Reserve Deputy Chief of the United States Army Public
Affairs prior to being appointed Commanding General of the United
States Army Reserve Joint and Special Troops Support Command in
October two thousand and nine. She retired from the Army
in twenty thirteen. She's author of Leading the Narrative, The

(00:48):
Case for Strategic Communication, something we really need right now,
strategic Communication, her new book American Cyberscape, Cyberscape and the
Path to Trust. The book can help us discern what truth.
It can help us discern truth. And that is something

(01:09):
because when we've been talking about the COVID and now
you can distance three feet, and we're hearing all these
stories about this and that and the other. You're hearing
all these stories about one thing and another coming down,
and the one thing we're not hearing about.

Speaker 2 (01:25):
Is truth. It's whose truth.

Speaker 1 (01:28):
You can get one truth on one side, one truth
on another. The Washington Post, respected respected publication talking about
President Trump and President Trump was talking to the people
in Georgia and telling them, we want you to route
out those corruption there and all this, that and the other.
Turns out he never said it. They've backtracked it. But

(01:50):
once you put out a story, if it's a lie,
once you put out that story, the original story stands.
The retractions back on page sixteen or something. So the
truth is a very nebulous thing. It's very hard to find.
It's something we know. What is truth? Does it vary
from person to person? I care about truth has to be,

(02:12):
in my opinion, backed up by facts.

Speaker 2 (02:14):
What do you think.

Speaker 3 (02:17):
My boss used to say that truth was whoever got
there first with their narrative and their story. I don't
necessarily believe that. I think it's somewhere in the middle. Typically,
and there's always some piece that we're not quite getting
or understand it. The nuance that helps us really understand it.
And when we get so much truth that has been
it is not dumbed down, but it's reduced. For the

(02:39):
time frame in which we have to listen to it,
read it, or watch it. Then we're going to miss
all of that nuance and we don't quite get the
full picture. Now what you're talking about from the Washington Post,
what was that? Is it called we want this to
be true so badly we're willing to listen to something
and not vet it, then publish it and then have

(03:01):
to retract. Those are not journalistic standards for good journalism
for that type of a national level paper. And that
really bothers me that now I can't trust that you're
going to have done your due diligence in research for
a story.

Speaker 1 (03:18):
Absolutely, and the amount when you lose trust, then you're losing.
That goes to the very heart of America because you
say in the opening of your book, you say the
impact is not just institutional the ka effects individuals, families,
shared norms, very foundations of American civic culture are increasingly

(03:39):
at risk, all while technology continues to act as an accelerant,
speeding up societal change, challenging our abilities to keep pace
while controlling our responses. It was sort of like Mark
Twain said, be careful reading a medical book. You could
die from a misprint. Well, be careful reading anything on
the internet or watching any news, because it can and

(04:00):
certainly affect things and change things. Your check. A chapter
in your book is It's personal. Now, when you're talking
about it's personal, how was it personal to you?

Speaker 3 (04:12):
Well, what I'm talking about in this chapter is how
we've all been hacked in one way or another, whether
you have had someone hack your email, your social media accounts.
I found about six months ago that someone was impersonating
me on Twitter, my pictures, my name. But this was
somebody in Damasca, Syria. So I think it pays to

(04:36):
keep looking. And certainly I hadn't been checking for this.
The vigilance that is required now to protect our privacy
and our data is just constant and ongoing. And I
only found that because someone else told me. So now
I look.

Speaker 1 (04:54):
Incredible, incredible, And then your third chapter it gets even better.

Speaker 2 (04:59):
A war on reality.

Speaker 1 (05:01):
Now, I've heard them say, you know, people on the left,
especially say I think I feel and I believe. I
don't care what you think. I don't care what you feel,
and I don't care what you believe. I care what
the facts say. I'm more fact oriented. And as a
military person, you had to be fact oriented. You didn't
go off of what I believe. You didn't go off

(05:24):
of what they think. Where do the facts take you?
You tried to get right to the facts.

Speaker 2 (05:28):
Didn't you.

Speaker 1 (05:28):
And that's good communication when you can get to the
facts and you can argue with facts instead of I think,
I feel, and I believe, because that to me carries.

Speaker 2 (05:37):
Much more weight.

Speaker 3 (05:39):
Well, and you can't make important decisions based on those
kind of feelings either. You have to make it based
on solid data on what you need to do next,
so that you're able to have confidence in the decisions
you make. Particularly when we talk about some of these
technology issues. Do we let the kids play with TikTok
or with games on line when every keystroke can be

(06:02):
sending information to a company, whether it's in the US, China,
or anywhere else. And what about genealogy tests? Do we
do those? And then if you do, do you post
the results online? I think some of this is naivete
where particularly and this may be true in my family.

(06:23):
Older people do not have the thought to check on
some of these things, so they'll post things and then
wonder why they were hacked because they're not taking precautions
to protect their identity online.

Speaker 1 (06:37):
Happens to the older and also happens to the younger.
Both in both cases, they're naive. They don't realize the
dangers that are there. Dangers are lurking everywhere. Right now,
there's somebody trying to get something. You look at what
has happened with China. They've got the Chinese cultural centers
at all the universities. Look at what tik Tok does.
It's become a meeting place and a groundswell for people

(07:00):
who are at the pedophilia. You've got all of this happening,
and also all the information on TikTok was going back.
TikTok was going back to China. I mean, who do
we trust anymore? How do we know and how do
we trust? That's the question that I've been asking for months,
and I don't really know. I trust my own discernment

(07:23):
to a degree, but it's only as good as the
information you get.

Speaker 3 (07:28):
That's absolutely true, the information you get and what you
already know to be true. Where you have a beginning
suspicion that I'm not happy with these games or things
that say this app can track you on your phone,
I make them now say ask me every time so

(07:49):
that no one is following me online. I have the
ability now to have my IP address hidden so that
you can use your own address without somebody tracking your
location or making you more of vulnerable to be hacked.
None of these things are perfect either. You can still
have issues, you can still have problems, And certainly on

(08:11):
one of these social media outlets, I got a message
that said, hey, you ought to take a look at
this from a friend. I would have believed that if
I hadn't gotten five that read exactly the same way
from five different people. And then I realized, Okay, somebody's
been hacked here, right right now, get better at it
all the time.

Speaker 1 (08:32):
Yes, as a matter of fact, there's somebody who calls you.
They can spoof numbers, so even though it's a legitimate number,
it can be a spoof number. So the amount of
things that can be done technologically to convince you of
something's being true is just exponential now. Pew Research, July
twenty nineteen, Seventy five percent of the people in America

(08:54):
have little or no confidence in the federal government. That
is disturbing. That is more than disturbing. If they don't
have confidence in our own government that's supposed to be
of the people, by the people, and for the people.
Then that is really disturbing because I feel on my
own right and talking with Sydney pal where she said

(09:16):
we are now fascists and that's rule of buying four corporations.
We are under a corporate control of our government.

Speaker 2 (09:25):
I feel.

Speaker 3 (09:27):
I've looked at some of those same poles. I look
generally at the one from Edelman which each year talks
in a macro sense about our trust and institutions, whether
it's right government, business, media are non government institutions. And
then these other polls such as Pugh Roper, some of
the ones that come out in June that break that
down even further where our trust is how certainly the

(09:49):
trust in government has continued a downward slide, particularly in
the last twenty years. So what's happened in the last
twenty years The twenty four hour news cycle and then
we started carrying phones and having them attached to us
twenty four hours a day, so that we're constantly bombarded
with information, whether or not it is knowledge, it's something

(10:11):
very different.

Speaker 1 (10:14):
And I think we have to throw social media into
the mix too, don't.

Speaker 3 (10:18):
We we do, and most people don't actually make a
difference or a discernment between platforms and news media because
that's where they get their news is from social media.

Speaker 1 (10:31):
Right, right, and like like they say, anybody can say anything,
anybody can have an opinion, but it doesn't make it right,
It doesn't make it absolutely, it.

Speaker 2 (10:43):
Doesn't make it correct.

Speaker 1 (10:44):
And they also the other thing that we've got is
in the schools, and I've blamed the schools for a
lot of this. They're not teaching civics anymore, they're not
teaching about the Constitution. How do you know that you've
lost parts of the Constitution if you're not familiar with
the costs institution?

Speaker 2 (11:01):
Do people know.

Speaker 1 (11:01):
What the first Amendment is? That that's your right to
freedom of speech, that's your right the freedom of religion,
And under this pandemic, we've lost all of that. Now
this is the first Amendment. The second Amendment is the
right to bear arms without that that's put in their
second Amendment to protect the first Amendment. Excuse me, people

(11:22):
don't realize that. They don't realize what's in our constitution
and how it is to restrain the government and to
protect the people.

Speaker 2 (11:31):
That's what it basically does, isn't it?

Speaker 3 (11:34):
Absolutely? And I couldn't agree with you more about civics
and teaching it in schools because we've lost quite a
bit of that. So we have an entire generation that,
as you said, don't understand the basis of our democracy
and what it means. They may try to quote it,
but unless they've read it themselves, they don't know exactly
what it means. They don't understand the two party system,

(11:56):
they don't understand how Congress works, they don't understand how
laws are made. I don't know how all of it
comes together to create democracy and what that really means
for all of it. And we're in danger of losing
that unless we fixed our educational.

Speaker 1 (12:10):
System absolutely all the way from pre elementary school all
the way up through colleges.

Speaker 2 (12:16):
We need to be teaching civics.

Speaker 1 (12:18):
We need to be teaching not the fact that America
has done things wrong. Not the fact that maybe that
slavery was wrong, but we were the first country to
get rid of it, and we cost thousands and thousands
of lives to do away with it. Let's talk about
what America has done positive. We've been a positive influence

(12:38):
to the world and this has been critical. I believe
to what's going on is what America has done positive.
We are should be a force that people recognize as
a power, the example of our power rather than the
power of our example, rather than the example of our power.

(13:00):
Should be an example to the world, and we are.
But even to the American people, we aren't. That's what's
so disgusting. We'll talk about that much more when we return.
And the book is called it's an amazing book that
you've written, and it's called American Cyberscape Trials and the
Path to Trust, the Path to Trust. If we don't

(13:23):
regain trust, this country could be gone from enemies within
more than from without. We'ld be right back with Mary,
Editor US Army retired General Major General. I'm sorry, I
don't want to take away your title.

Speaker 3 (13:43):
No, just call me Mary.

Speaker 1 (13:49):
As Americans seek a stable economic direction during the health crisis,
many are predicting the rise and precious metals. Bank of
America's predicting gold to nearly double to three thousand dollars.
This will followed up by Citibanks called for two thousand
dollars gold this year. Gold is often the most sought
after investment during times of economic uncertainty, nearly forty million

(14:13):
jobs lost. I'd say these are uncertain as times can get.
President Trump as team are fighting an uphill battle, but
America will recover, no doubt have her. In two thousand
and nine, it took many investors seven years to get
back their gains they lost during the Great Recession. Is
your portfolio diversified with gold? Patriot Gold Group has the

(14:33):
logical answer the no fee for life IRA, where your
IRA or four oh one K can be in physical
gold and silver and you may be eligible for the
no fee for life IRA. Patriot Gold Group is Consumer
Affairs top rated gold IRA dealer four years a row

(14:54):
twenty sixteen through twenty nineteen, and Patriot you work directly
with an own and avoid paying inflated crazy broker fees.
Call today requests a free investment hit. We're very pleased
to have Patriot Gold as a sponsor. If you mentioned
the Erskine radio show, Patriar will give you twenty five

(15:15):
dollars off your first purchase, plus free insured shipping for
all your metal orders for twenty twenty. Willso have several
retirement account and saives. Call eight sixty six six three
five nine one five one. Get your free investment guide
today eight sixty six sixty three five nine one five one. Hey,

(15:36):
if you're driving, can't write down, You'll find links to
their website and their phone number on Erskinradio dot com,
Patriot Gold Group, your Wise Asset Protection Choice General. We're
in a real problem right now. People are paranoid, they're scared.
They're riding around scared. You've got older people who are scared.

(15:58):
You got younger people are scared. You got people that
I'm going to get this, I'm going to die from it.
You've got people running around, and we've got other situations
going on.

Speaker 2 (16:08):
We can't afford to live scared.

Speaker 1 (16:10):
The number of people dying from this coronavirus isn't that high,
and the chance of you getting it is not necessarily
that good if you take decent precautions. I've seen people
out and you've seen the same thing, driving down the
road wearing their mask. I've seen people out walking their
dog or running wearing a mask. I mean, these people

(16:31):
don't realize that fresh air is called fresh air for
a reason. But they have up ended their entire life.
And you've got a president saying and talking to people
and saying, well, if you get your shot, then you
can have people over for a fourth of July. Well,
I'm having people over for Memorial Day, and whether you
got the shot or not, it doesn't really matter to me.

(16:52):
I'm going to live life. It's not worth living in fear.
How do you feel.

Speaker 3 (16:58):
I really think that it's a personal choice and we
come to understand here is what we all need to do.
But unless you mandate it, it's not going to happen fully. Now,
can it be mandated within the military. Yes, I've had
every shot. There is problem there right once because I'd
got in a wrong line and I couldn't get back

(17:20):
out like TSA. So I got fifteen shots in the
own day. So what is one more to me? It's
just one more that I've already had other types of shots.
I've had everything from the Anthrax series to yellow fever
because of that line I got in. So I have
a different outlook on taking this than perhaps some others do,

(17:42):
including members of my own family, who say I'm not
sure about it. Well, I can understand that there's certainly
people who don't want to take the flu shot. I've
never had one more. Would I start now, well, if
you feel it doesn't work for you, okay, And the
only thing is does it affect someone else if you
are not if you haven't taken it, and that I

(18:03):
don't know, and I think none of us do. We're
still learning how this whole thing works. And there's a
common sense aspect to all of our communications that we've
had missing for quite a while. And if we come
back to well it seems like this, I don't really
know what it is, but I'm going to take one
step in this direction and see if it becomes clear.

(18:23):
I'm going to continue to ask questions, and I'm going
to continue to research and verify. We can't always do that.
It takes a lot of time to do fact checking,
to look up, well, where did this come from?

Speaker 1 (18:36):
Is it right?

Speaker 3 (18:37):
I mean, I've been through a number of fact checking sites.
What I'm worried about more than words sometimes now are
deep fake videos because they're getting so sophisticated. You can't
tell is that really Tom Cruise or is it your neighbor? Oh,
your face has been super imposed. That's worrisome, it is,

(18:58):
so how do you know?

Speaker 1 (18:59):
How do you know what is reality? How do you
know what the trust anymore. How do you know? How
do we where's our filter? Our filters are gone, They
are erasing it.

Speaker 3 (19:09):
I think we're at what we've called rock bottom in
terms of trust in this year. And so what happens
when you hit rock bottom is new systems start to sprout,
take hold, and have a little bit of a resurgence.
So what do I read now?

Speaker 2 (19:25):
In news?

Speaker 3 (19:26):
I read probably some substacts, newsletters where we're in the
person providing me information shows me exactly where they got it.
Here's who we talked to, Here's who we interviewed. Here
the original documents.

Speaker 1 (19:40):
So if I want to know, in other words, listen,
let's look at the let's look at the footnotes. Right,
look at the footnotes where it came from?

Speaker 2 (19:47):
Did you make this up? Or is this from somebody
I respect?

Speaker 3 (19:51):
Exactly? And tell me when you talk to them what
I really just like it when reporters interview each other.
So I want to know if that's what's happened.

Speaker 2 (20:02):
We see that all the time.

Speaker 1 (20:04):
You see the same headlines, the same talking points on MSNBC, CNN,
all of these talking heads that one person says somebody,
it's like they all watch each other isn't it.

Speaker 3 (20:16):
Five to seven stories? And that's all we get when
there's so much more out.

Speaker 2 (20:19):
There, so much more would be right back with Mary K.

Speaker 1 (20:26):
Edder, General Major General Mary kay Edar, US Army, thirty
six years in the Army, and the book is just
absolutely incredible. American Cyberscape Trials and the Path to Trust,
Path to Trust, get that we need to go on
that path. With nearly forty million jobs lost, these can

(20:54):
be very uncertain times for many as Americans seek a
stable economic direction during the health crisis. Many are predicting
the rise of precious metals. Back of America's predicting gold
to nearly double to three thousand dollars. Citibanks called for
two thousand dollars gold this year. Patriot Gold Group has
a logical answer, no fee for life IRA where your

(21:15):
IRA or four oh one K can be in physical
gold and silver. Patriot Gold Group is consumer affairs top
rated gold IRA dealer four years in a row. And
at Patriot you work directly with an owner, avoiding inflated
brokerage fees. Call eight sixty six sixty three five nine
to one five one get your free investment guide today.

(21:36):
And if you mentioned Erskine Radio show Patrear'll give you
twenty five dollars off your first purchase and free shipping.
That's eight sixty six sixty three five nine to one,
five to one. You always find links at their website
and their phone number on erskinradio dot com. One of

(21:56):
the quotes that you use in the book that you've written,
The American Cyberscape Trials and the Paths of Trust, is
you say, the very concept of objective truth is fading
out of the world. Lies will pass into history. That's
a quote I believe from George orwell.

Speaker 2 (22:15):
Isn't it.

Speaker 1 (22:17):
I think so?

Speaker 3 (22:17):
And that comes when, as you said earlier, we do
a correction. It's on page twenty four. But that's why
it's still important to make the correction, because it does
become history. Someone can use it for a research paper
one day and there it is that lie that nobody
bothered to correct and now it's fact for all time.
So that's one of the things that I continue to

(22:38):
impress on people who work with media, who I know
have to continue to press for correction. You have to engage.
We've been so very passive with all of the news
that we have coming at us we just let it
go by. We don't call it out if it's wrong.
We just yeah, yeah, there's just too much of it.
And I don't know if you see a lot of engage,

(23:00):
if you see people engaging with you, but you're talking
about opinion more. I don't think that news outlets are
getting the engagement and the response and the feedback that
will help keep them on the straightforward track. And so
we see people who don't realize they've done something wrong
until it's too late.

Speaker 1 (23:20):
If you're doing talk radio, you get a lot of
feedback from your listeners. If you're doing news on the
major networks on television, you don't get that feedback because
they're insulated. People become insulated. It's like people in Washington,
they become insulated. Now you've got you have people are
right now have no privacy, they have no optimism. Foundation

(23:42):
of democracy is on the business, the non governmental organizations,
the media, and the government. They're all in disrepute right now.
All of them are in disrepute. And when people don't
trust any of their major foundations, then we're in We
have shaky grounds. This is exactly what our enemies want
us to have happened this is exactly what we want,

(24:05):
they want us to have happened. Now, I want to
ask you a question, if you don't mind, about President Biden.
He had two ladies who became generals, very very qualified.
Both became four star generals, and one was Jacqueline van
Hobst who became Air Force Commander of Transportation, and Laura

(24:25):
Richardson became four star general. And she's in charge of
the Army US Southern Command, which is a major position
under anybody's command. To be in charge of Southern Command
a major major position in the military. But when he spoke,
he talked about military. He spoke about military operations, not really.

(24:52):
He spoke about giving operations to transgender He talked about
flight suits for pregnant women. He talked about hairstyles changing.
What is this that is nothing to do with the military.

Speaker 3 (25:06):
You no, it's culture. It is not performance. And they
are not promoted because of culture. They were promoted on performance.
And you can look at their resumes and see what
they have done. It's incredibly hard to get promoted to
these upper ranks in the military. Sure, and there is
no way that you're going to promote someone and put
them in a major position. If there is any risk

(25:27):
whatsoever that they are not ready and they could fail,
Neither of them are going to fail at what they're
going to do next. They are both totally prepared for
what it is.

Speaker 1 (25:37):
Absolutely they had to be better than most men to
get to where they were, There's no question about that
in my mind.

Speaker 2 (25:45):
Now, you wrote a book and you.

Speaker 1 (25:47):
Talked about the girls who stepped out of line, stories
of courage, sacrifice and grits and women of World War Two.
We had not only women who were in World War
Two who were very courageous, but we had those who
were at home. In the mind Gertie mccobbins, and she
ran her husband's business while he was all fighting and
without her and the background to here in the States

(26:08):
during World War two, a lot of people have had
nothing to have come home for. But people like Gerty
it was a chicken business. For goodness say, it is
something women don't generally do. And I had a lot
of respect for her. She's a lovely lady and became
a lovely older lady too, Just a wonderful person, very
intelligent and very very I had more respect for her

(26:30):
than they buy us can think of because she took
and ran his business, and you had a lot of that,
and you had a lot of people in World War Two.
But after World War Two, women became subservient for a while,
and that wasn't right either. But during World War two,
you're bringing this up and you're talking about what the
women did during World War Two. That was, in truth

(26:53):
the greatest generation for all people, especially for women.

Speaker 2 (26:55):
Wasn't it.

Speaker 1 (26:57):
Well.

Speaker 3 (26:57):
I think in World War Two there was no one
through that time whose life wasn't changed or affected in
some way by what went on. Whether they were at
home or whether they volunteered to serve, whether they ended
up living in Europe and work in the resistance. Everybody
had their lives change or affected in some way by

(27:18):
world and global events. And I think that today with
what we have in terms of military service, where it's
less than one percent in this country who serve, and
it means that there is lack of understanding about what
service means. I would like to see some type of
national service of some kind, I don't care what it is.

(27:40):
Have that gap year at eighteen, so you take a
year off before college. You can work on the trail
system for the Adalachian Trail you can join the military.
You can pick up trash at the side of the road.
It doesn't matter what it is, as long as it
is selfless and it is serviced, and it gives time
for I think, growing in maturity and responsibility before moving

(28:05):
on with life.

Speaker 1 (28:07):
During World War Two, we had one country, we had
one goal, we had one enemy. We were fighting together.
We were all Americans, no matter if you were male, female, black, white, Hispanic,
it didn't matter what you were. We weren't into all
of the divisions. We weren't into the categorization of people.
We were into we're all fighting together and we've all

(28:28):
got a role to do with this. We need to
get back to that that we're all Americans underneath the skin.
African American. Forget that Italian American, forget it. Just use
the term American. We're all American and we need to
fight for America, and we have common enemies that we
need to fight against. Have the enemies now are more

(28:49):
nebulous than they used to be. We had certainly have
a challenge with China. We have a challenge with North Korea.
We have a challenge with Iraq. We have rather Iran.
We have a challenge with that's happening where we're splitting
up in this country into divisions. This is not good.
What do you see coming of it? And how do

(29:11):
we bring trust back to this country? And how do
we bring unity back? And how do we bring back
a common good? These are things that we need to
have in this country.

Speaker 3 (29:19):
In my opinion, I think what we're starting to see
just a little bit is some of our institutions that
are seeing a need and fulfilling it. So where did
we learn about the Russian potential interference in this past election?
Was it from the intelligence community?

Speaker 1 (29:39):
Now?

Speaker 3 (29:39):
It was from Microsoft, right, So the business community stepped
in and did something that typically government would do. Now,
as part of my research for this, I found that,
excuse me, the FBI has created a series of courses
for kids from third to eighth grade to be safe online,

(30:01):
how to do safe surfing, how to be aware of
things like bullying or maybe even online trafficking. Whenever a
million kids have completed this now in schools all across
the country. I would never have thought the FBI would
be doing educational programs, but yet it's provided a resource
for numbers of schools that can't do it themselves. Or

(30:23):
hadn't and now it's a standardized thing. They can go
here and use it as a resource. I've also found
sheriff's departments making lists of apps for parents. Here's what
some apps are that if your kids are using them,
they could be at risk. So we're seeing lots of
smaller groups, institutions, businesses, government entities doing things that where

(30:50):
they see a need and their fillingness. And as far
as our trust peace with media, that too is education
and it's all engagement.

Speaker 2 (31:02):
Well, that's what we need.

Speaker 1 (31:03):
We need to step up and we need to work
together for the betterment of all Americans. And that's what
you're saying that we need.

Speaker 2 (31:10):
Now how.

Speaker 1 (31:12):
You end up with your book on the Road to
head and on the Road to head, we've got to
see what we're doing. How can we figure out how
do you discern truth? This is I know you're not
theologenies running through the lattern, So how do you discern truth.

Speaker 2 (31:28):
General?

Speaker 3 (31:30):
I do look at some of these sites, not necessarily
the fact checking sites for words. I'm looking at the
rise of institutions and groups such as the University of
Washington as a center called the Institute for Public Discourse
and what they do. There is a cross section across

(31:53):
the university. We'll look at deep fakes in video, misinformation
and disinformation, what it means, what it means in various countries,
what it's doing in Eastern Europe. So we're seeing more
in terms of educational availability of information on how to
discern and learn for ourselves.

Speaker 1 (32:17):
Okay, I think one of the things that we need
to do when we go to various sites and when
we're watching the news, you have to understand and look
at what their philosophy is. You have to look at
what they're trying to promote. Because all these people are
trying to grow up promote some type of philosophy, be
it left wing and right wing or right down the center.
They're trying to promote their own philosophy. Why are they

(32:40):
trying to promote that? You have to ask these questions
and then maybe you'll be able to get to the
truth if you determine what their agenda is when they're
writing or when they're speaking, what their agenda is, that's
very important and very critical. I'm very open to my agenda.
I'm for in America first agenda, and I love the country.

(33:02):
I want to see us get back to where we're
following the constitution. That's my agenda, I make no bones
about other people have another agenda. They want redistribution of wealth,
or they want this, that or the other.

Speaker 2 (33:14):
They have other.

Speaker 1 (33:15):
Agendas or in some cases their agendas pretty simple.

Speaker 2 (33:18):
It's just greed.

Speaker 1 (33:20):
So we have different agendas out there, don't we.

Speaker 3 (33:24):
We do. And when you talked about World War two,
you talked about community in which we had something in
common that we could talk about. No matter where you
went in a group or individually, you could talk to
others about how do you think we're doing with the
war in the Pacific, or what's going on in Europe?
What do we have in common?

Speaker 1 (33:44):
Today?

Speaker 3 (33:46):
It's very difficult to say, you're going to get off
an airplane in Chicago getting a taxi. What do you
have to talk about? Right? How do we have in common?

Speaker 1 (33:56):
It seems like we have a motto. We have a
motto in those country and people are forgetting it. E
plurbasunum from many one, that's what we are. People have
forgotten that for many we are one, and we need
to bring the many together as one. Quit being a victim,
Quit being sorry for yourself, Quit being all of this,

(34:17):
realize that we're all one. If we all realize that
we are working together for our unified oneness and same
thing that doctor Martin Luther King was preaching, that everyone
walk together, that we all work as one, and if
we can do that, we will return to the brilliant
city on the shore that we were meant to be.

(34:38):
But when we're divided like this, then we're in a
real bad situation. I think when we're divided and they
keep dividing us up, there's a lot of money to
be made by dividing us up at lots whoever wants
to take control.

Speaker 3 (34:52):
And the commonality is still there. We all want the
same things. He's a good family life future for our kids.
We all want the same things regardless of how we
think we should get there, and that is the building
block I think for us on this way back to
finding truth. We are aware of what our biases are,

(35:14):
our confirmation bias that we tend to seek out information
that tells us what we already think we know or
agrees with our beliefs, and we can be aware of that,
we can look beyond it. We can look at different
sources and you know, broaden our horizons if you will.
I am probably not going to read much on blockchain

(35:37):
or bitcoin because rightly, I don't understand that and I
don't need to right now.

Speaker 1 (35:44):
Now, sixty four percent of the people are for compute
research say they don't trust each other personally. I trust
my dog before I trust most people, because I come
home and see he's not judgmental, and he's very, very sweet,
and I know what he's going to do, and there's
a lot of trust built up there, and if you're

(36:06):
good to him, he'll.

Speaker 2 (36:06):
Be good to you.

Speaker 1 (36:07):
People are not necessarily that way. Organizations. We've had troubles
with churches stealing from churches, stealing from non governmental organizations,
fraternal groups stealing inside the government all over the place.
Is there anybody we can trust anymore in any position
of authority? An attorney, your pastor, you go right down

(36:32):
the list the trust. The only organization that is still functioning,
at least for right now that I've seen in this
country is the military.

Speaker 3 (36:41):
That's true, and there are problems within the military as well,
like there are in every institution, but right.

Speaker 1 (36:47):
But the military is functioning, functioning better than most of
the rest of the government, than most of the rest
of society right now because it has a line of
order and people for the most part have taken an
oaths up pulling the in the constitution, so hopefully they
a lot of them have read it.

Speaker 3 (37:04):
That's true. And because it's a value based institution that
polices itself.

Speaker 1 (37:09):
Internally absolutely absolutely, and to go in people have to
be wanting to do something right for the country. That's
another major plus. We'll be right back with Major General
Mary kay Edder and she's a fabulous person. Won't ask

(37:29):
her about another book she's written too when we get back.
As Americans seek a stable economic direction during the health crisis,
many are predicting the rise and precious metals. Bank of
America is predicting gold to nearly double to three thousand dollars.
This will followed up by Citibanks called for two thousand

(37:52):
dollars gold this year. Gold is often the most sought
after investment during times of economic uncertainty. Nearly forty million
jobs lost. I'd say these are uncertain as times can
get President Trump as team or fighting an uphill battle.
But America will recover, no doubt.

Speaker 2 (38:10):
He her.

Speaker 1 (38:11):
In two thousand and nine, it took many investors seven
years to get back their gains they lost during the
Great Recession. Is your portfolio diversified with gold? Patriot Gold
Group has the logical answer, the no fee for Life IRA,
where your IRA or four oh one K can be
in physical gold and silver and you may be eligible

(38:32):
for the no fee for life IRA. Patriot Gold Group
is Consumer Affairs top rated gold IRA dealer four years
a row twenty sixteen through twenty nineteen, and Patriot you
work directly with an owner and avoid paying inflated crazy
broker fees. Call today requests a free investment hit. We're

(38:56):
very pleased to have Patriot Gold as a sponsor mentioned
the Erskine Radio show patrearill give you twenty five dollars
off your first purchase, plus free insured shipping for all
your metal orders for twenty twenty. We also have several
retirement account and satives. Call eight sixty six six three
five nine one five one get your free investment guide

(39:19):
today eight sixty six sixty three five nine one five one.
Hey if you're driving can't write it down. You'll find
links to their website and their phone number on Erskinradio
dot com. Patriot Goldgroup your Wyse Asset Protection Choice. Yeah,

(39:42):
with all the military background and everything you've had in
writing these scholarly books, including Leave the Narrative, The Case
for Strategic Communication, American Cyberspace, the book for about the
women in World War Two, which is really fabulous, the
girls who stepped out of line, stories of courage, sacrifice,
and grit. Did you write a book called one thousand

(40:04):
and one Places to Peep Before you Die?

Speaker 3 (40:07):
Yes? I did.

Speaker 2 (40:08):
That's about That's not I was saying.

Speaker 1 (40:11):
Boy, I'll tell you I know some people I could
give that to because they're always stopping at every restroom.

Speaker 2 (40:15):
But no, it's not about that. This is about your dog, right.

Speaker 1 (40:20):
That's it.

Speaker 3 (40:20):
That's true. He doesn't read very well. He thought you
thought that's what the book said when it was one
thousand and one Places to see So he was he
was off a little bit.

Speaker 1 (40:32):
Now, Oh okay. A friend of mine wrote a book
as they have more cram He said, how to be
as nice as your dog thinks you are. We can
learn a lot from our animals, can't we as far
as dealing with life and dealing with things, because they
are not judgmental on people if you're good to them.
They'll be good to you. There's a lot of this

(40:53):
and a lot of you know, a lot of things.
It's like a dog is God spelled backwards? If God
was just like he readd the dog. Either way, they're
man's best friend cat. I'm not sure where the cat
fits in, But the fact of the matter is we
can learn a lot from them and that gives you
comfort and solace, doesn't it?

Speaker 3 (41:14):
It does. And this book was just a series of
letters that I adopted this little dog from an older
couple who thought he was too rambunctious, and then they help,
so they wrote him a letter and he wrote back,
and after a while it came to where I had
a bailing list of seventy five people getting these letters,

(41:35):
so I just assembled them into a book. So it
was a good experience in terms of editing, self publishing,
all of those things. But I still truly enjoy doing it.

Speaker 2 (41:45):
Are you surprised how well it's sold?

Speaker 3 (41:48):
Yes?

Speaker 1 (41:49):
Yeah, it's because the title is so good. The title,
it's just fabulous as well of those where you won't
buy the book just as have the title.

Speaker 2 (41:58):
So if people are.

Speaker 1 (41:59):
What's that book, well, so good. But the fact of
the matter is dogs trust. We can learn trust through them.
They also have discernment. We need to be discerning. We're
not taught trust. We're not taught logic. We're not taught
discernment in school. You're taught sit down, shut up, and
repeat back what you're supposed to be doing. We need

(42:22):
to have discernment otherwise, if you don't stand for something,
you'll fall for anything. We've got to have Americans taking
a stand and believing in certain values, and that goes
back to understanding God and understanding also what is in
the Constitution of the United States. We need to bring
that back in civics is certainly important. If we do that,

(42:45):
the road ahead could be bright, can't it.

Speaker 3 (42:49):
I think it can if we educate, we engage, and
we take steps to protect ourselves and our privacy until
we start to see there's some action taking with regard
to big tech and all of these internet things that
feed on our data and how it is used, then
we can have a way forward that we'll work for us.

Speaker 1 (43:10):
Are you thinking that they're going to do something to
rein in big tech to where we will have more
freedom and they won't be able to Oh, you offended
community standards because you wrote something against saying that you
thought the election was rigged, thought that the COVID vaccine
may not be good. You're not defending community standards, You're

(43:31):
expressing a viewpoint.

Speaker 3 (43:34):
Well, part of it, I believe is that they're using
artificial intelligence algorithms to make these judgments. One of my
friends on Facebook, when we were talking to our German friends,
said something about the rollout of the vaccine there and
my friends at oh bad America, and was immediately zapped
with a you can't say that kind of thing comments back.

(43:57):
So I think that's very heavy handed. It doesn't show
the human understanding or ability to discern what is actually
being said, and there's a long ways for it to go.

Speaker 1 (44:12):
But I also Twitter and Facebook don't give reasons.

Speaker 2 (44:14):
They just banned people.

Speaker 1 (44:15):
They don't even give reasons anymore.

Speaker 3 (44:19):
They don't. And in Facebook, in the last month or so,
it started its own supreme court, a group that will
look a group that will look at takedowns so you
can appeal if they took down a post of yours.
It doesn't look at stay ups, things that were left
there that people may complain about, So it's still a

(44:40):
social experiment. I'm not fond of the idea because it's
owned by Facebook, So how independent can it be?

Speaker 2 (44:48):
Right? How independent? Hey?

Speaker 1 (44:51):
I want to thank you for being on, and I
also want to recommend The American Cyberscape Trials and The
Path to Trust. We've got to be able to discern
the truth. This book can help you do it. General
Mary kay Eddar, thank you for being on, Thank you
for your service, and thank you for writing so many
great books.

Speaker 3 (45:12):
Thank you so much for having me here. I truly
enjoyed it.

Speaker 1 (45:15):
Remember all of our shows archived twenty four to seven
and nurs from radio dot Com twenty four seven. Go
up there and.

Speaker 2 (45:23):
Tell your friend thanks.

Speaker 1 (45:29):
Hey, thanks for listening to this podcast. We got lots more,
so let's be sure to come back.