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That that little theater is kind of
sweet. It's like they do little I

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mean they do little plays. Not
little, I mean they're actually regular,

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full sized people doing full size plays. But it's a little theater. Not

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what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your

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country, Mister Gerbatcheff, tear down
this wall, read my lips. It's

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the Ricord Shape podcast with Peter Robinson. Oh nope, sorry, it's not

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Stephen Hayward sitting and for Peter rob
Long and New York. I'm James Lilex

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and we talked to Ian Rowe about
affirmative action, the Supreme Court and what

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to do about our schools. So
let's savosels a podcast. I was found,

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by my observation, in a much
more secure place, and now the

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investigation has progressed, and so so
they're saying the West Executive Inference. It

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is also next to West Executive Drive. That's where, for example, the

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Vice President's vehicle is parked. Welcome
everybody, Welcome to July. Well,

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come to Ricochet podcast number sixty nine. I'm James likes Minneapolis. Rob Long

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is in Gotham. We presume Stephen
Heyward sitting in for Peter Robinson and Stephen

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where are you? I know that's
a vital importance for everybody to have the

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theater of the mind of this show. You are where I am at my

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usual location on the central coast of
California and wondering why Peter Robinson hasn't figured

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out that they have telegraph service in
Wyoming. Now, yes, we should

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be doing this show by telegraph with
Peter. It would be great. And

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although we'd have to tell them to
stop every every sentence or so, that

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would be kind of fun. A
guy in a motorcycle, just women whizzing

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up to Peter's door every minute and
a half For the next question, Well,

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gentlemen, it's been a big week
fourth over, but the fourth delivered

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something of a bombshell of firework.
I'm sorry with this decision about the government

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and social media. Now we've all
we all know what it is, right,

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I have this injunction and says that
they can't put pressure lean on the

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social media companies to combat disinformation.
And much of the disinformation that they were

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worried about, of course, turns
out to be information, actual truth,

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actual truth. My question is,
because I brought this up to somebody who's

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a lawyer and who was completely uninterested
in what actually had been what the result

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of this was. You know,
our good friend friend of the show,

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doctor j was one of the right. It was one of the guys that

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said, we know what happened to
him with a shadow banning and the rest

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of it. But the person who
whom I was speaking saying, well,

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what did the government do exactly?
And I'm saying, well, you know,

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they coordinated, they strongly suggested,
he said, But did they force

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them to do any of these things? You know? And you can say,

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well, you know, they don't
have to force you necessarily, they

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can just sort of strongly suggest and
that's enough, or is it? I

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mean, is the fact that the
government and the social media companies were colluding

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and the social media companies were doing
the bidding of the government, Is that

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in itself something that the courts should
look at if there is no specific leaning

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on them and making them do things. I'm just throwing this out Devil's advocate,

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right, and you guys are smarter, so go ahead and take it.

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Well, I you know, I
think you got to crack down.

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I'm really hard. You got to
hit them really hard over the head.

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You got to like punish people,
you got to fire people, You got

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to wrap some people in you know, tars and feathers and send them out

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into the town square. For two
big reasons. One big reason is that

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they were wrong. That they were
absolutely wrong. Half the disinformation they claimed

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disinformation about COVID was in fact not
disinformation. It just was counter to what

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they wanted you to know. And
the second thing is is that because we

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have now entered this bizarre part of
the culture where people are believed that they

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know exactly how you're going to react, that is that was the heart of

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the COVID problem. Was that the
government, all of the government, from

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the very top in the Oval Office, all the way you know, through

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Fallacy and burks, all the way
into a lot of the states and the

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Public Health Administration bureaucracy, they thought, well, we can't tell you anything.

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We can't tell you the truth because
you'll you'll draw the wrong conclusions.

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And so this wasn't an attempt to
um in their minds, this was not

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an attempt to control us the way
we think of people controlling like animal farm.

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Right, They're trying to help us. They wanted to make it better

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for us. They were trying to
make it us safer, and they thought

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we were too stupid to know how
to do that ourselves. Right, And

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that is what that is why you
really need to crack down hard on these

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people, not just because they were
wrong, but because their impulse was wrong.

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And you know, the truth is
that you know, two, we've

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had two or three giant or maybe
more giant policy disasters in the past twenty

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years. Right, probably more right. He had a war with Iraq.

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It was a foolish war. We
had a financial collapse which was really created

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by the same kind of arrogance,
and then we had COVID And I don't

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see anybody being taken out in the
town square and fired Like I didn't see.

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I remember arguing somebody, some financier
in two thousand and eight about you

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know, the bailouts. Well,
what do you want to do? You

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want to see people selling apples on
the street, Like, yes, exactly,

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I want to see as Greenberg had
a AIG and a bunch of other

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people selling apples on the street.
I want them broke. What do you

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want to see? You want to
see the full scale, complete top to

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bottom scouring of the FDA and the
CDC and the NIH and and our and

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our system of funding laboratories. Yes, that's exactly what I want. I

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want. I don't want anybody to
go to jail. They didn't do anything

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illegal, but they were incompetent and
they should be fired. And what do

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I what do I want? Do
I want to what's your name Biden's first

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press secretary's name? Do I want
her to be publicly shamed and vilified?

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Yes, that's exactly what I want. I want. I want an example

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to be made of people who made
errors of this kind. Well, Stephen,

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back to my question, do you
think that there was anything there was

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a question? Was there? I
mean, I agree with Rob, I

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agree completely, and I too would
love to see these things happening. Although

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probably the fruit monopoly in New York
is as such as it would be difficult

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for these people to find produce,
So maybe letters or something that fell off

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the truck. But what do the
government do exactly that that the courts have

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stand that the courts can step in
here and say that they did something that

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was against the law. Was what
the government did against And again I'm Devil's

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advocating here. I'm not saying what
they did was right, but was it

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against the law. Did they do
anything, did they twist arms that they

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force people or was this sort of
I mean, Twitter and Facebook were leaning

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into this in a lot of ways
because they, like Rob said, shared

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the desire to do us, to
do well for us, a tyranny for

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our own benefit. Yeah, look
the James, the federal government, actually

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state and local government do this too. They have long ago mastered the standard

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line of the organized crime syndicates.
They say, nice little company you have

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here, shame if anything happened to
it. And that's what went on here.

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I read the entire opinion. It's
one hundred and fifty five pages,

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double space, and it's a district
court opinion. So remember that at that

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level of the legal process, the
court is establishing facts. So over one

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hundred pages of this is a narrative
of what happened and who said what,

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and it's absolutely devastating. And although
there was no direct orders given or maybe

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one or two I'll give you,
I'll give you one sentence in the opinion

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in a minute, were there was
lots of what the judge characterized as blatant

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coercion, suggestions, threats, and
intimidation about Gee, we might have to

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revisit section to thirty, which gives
the social media company's immunity. Uh.

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And so that you know, there's
it's on page ninety seven. If anyone

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wants to look, here's one quote
from a White House to one of those

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social media companies. Cannot stress the
degree to which this needs to be resolved

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immediately, Please remove this account immediately. That doesn't sound like a suggestion,

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recommendation. Please could you review this? That sounds like a command. And

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so the legal point, when you
finally get to the end of the opinion,

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turns on the government could only be
justified in behaving this way if there

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was a demonstrable injury to the American
public. But in fact, these people

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were telling the truth, right,
and and so there there's the injunction against

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further communication. I agree with you. I agree this was this was wrong.

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And I think the account that they
were trying to get down was what

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was a parody account of Joe Biden's
granddaughter or something like that one of them.

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Right, but but but but and
again, I know I'm gonna be

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taking the wrong way. I'm not
defending this in any way. It was

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possible for Twitter to say, here's
a bag of sand and a hammer,

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this is not what we do exactly. They didn't, but it was possible

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for them to say so. So
at no point in this whole I mean,

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yes, you're precisely right when you
say it's the old Luigi Ricatti and

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money Python saying nice army base you
guy, um Michael Paylo my favorite.

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But but there, but they didn't
walk in and pull plugs. They didn't

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walk in and tikti dikty tick hack, you know, right, but they

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did they didn't have to. But
I'm just, I just I'm answering the

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question that my friend had about you
know, why does this matter? You

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know, what did they what it? Actually? Did they do? I

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don't know? Now do we do? We want the government to be able

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to go to Twitter and Facebook and
say, hey, look we got an

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isis cell here. We want some
access, we want you to throw I

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mean, we want that too.
Well, the opinion specifically exempted legitimate national

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security concerns may and maybe it was
foreign threats and foreign misinformation disinformation so forth,

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So there is an exception carved out
for national security. But I think

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but the point you make James is
Worth reiterating they were pushing on an open

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door. I mean, one mild
concern you can have as well if the

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government gets out all the wokey's at
Twitter and YouTube. I mean, we're

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missing Peter today. But we saw
his uncommon knowledge gets censored from YouTube.

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Probably the government did that. I
think YouTube may have taken it upon themselves.

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By the way, I mentioned one
one little small victory and all this

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um gosh. A year and a
half ago, John, you and I

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had Richard Epstein come to give a
talk at Berkeley Law. He gave his

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and you know, he got off
on the wrong foot on COVID the beginning

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and backtrack, but yeah, he
gave his very strong attack on masking and

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all the other mistakes we made,
and we always post these guest lectures on

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YouTube. They took it down,
and to their credit, the General Counsel's

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Office at UC Berkeley contacted YouTube and
said, we're going to sue you because

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we're you know, we're a were
public university. You are censoring a government

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institution. And they put it back
up. But of course Berkeley, you

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see the University of California has to
have to bring that kind of pressure on

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YouTube. Take god, can I
take another like a hundred thousand foot for

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you, even higher than fifty thousand
of you is that we have entered up

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time in I think culture where everyone
on both sides is terrified of telling their

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devoted audience the truth. Like you
saw that in the Fox News emails.

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Oh my god, we can't tell
our audience the truth that Trump lost.

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We have to lie to them and
let them down easy. And you see

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that in all these emails with Twitter
and Facebook, in all those places,

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like well, we can't tell people
what's really going on. A Fauci actually

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says it in his memoirs. We
could. I couldn't tell you the truth

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about masks because you wouldn't be able
to handle it. And there's this attitude

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and you can see it. You
can see it in politics, you can

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see to meet in all these media
consultants, this attitude that we have mastered

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public opinion management. Oh, we've
mastered it. And it is the one

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thing that these people are terrible at
and they insist that they're good at it.

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The truth is that and that the
sad part of it has happened to

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silic value because the beginning of the
look Value, Vidom, all these social

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media networks. The idea was freedom, freedom, crowd the wisdom of crowds,

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that a free exchange the good stuff
will rise to the top. All

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that, all that was a complete
I mean, there's an article of faith

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for people who started Twitter and Facebook
and all those things with a freedom and

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it I mean, was it ten
years? In ten years, they have

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also convinced themselves that they are capable
of shaping and honing and managing public opinion.

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And that is just dumb. You
can't. Not only is it wrong

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and illegal and you shouldn't happen in
immoral and not befitting sovereign citizens of a

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great republic. Not only is it
insulting to those citizens, but it's also

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stupid. You can't do it.
You cannot manage you are no one is

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smart enough. If they believe me, If if people knew how to shape

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public opinion, First of all,
I would be a lot richer because every

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single one of my TV shows would
have been a giant hit. But all

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Holly would be much better. It's
it's the thing that you can't do.

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And these arrogant, arrogant, bureaucratic
fools believe that they can, and I,

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you know, it really is.
I mean, I keep I mean,

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I'm not arguing for some kind of
divine intervention here, but I keep

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thinking that the universe or God or
whoever you believe in has been trying to

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send us a signal for twenty years, which is, stop trying to grow

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a brain, Stop trying to think
you can figure over the app, stop

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trying to control everybody, and we
just are not listening. What is the

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point of going to all these elite
institutions and getting a good degree, in

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going into government if you can't improve
the world. Because that the whole model

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is based on the idea that a
technocratic, enlightened delete will be able to

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guide in shape society to our benefit. Now, in the early days of

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the Internet, you go back to
you you know you're talking about Twitter,

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Rob, You go back to the
very beginning, go back way when they

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plug. The first thing in the
prevailing idea was that the Internet interpret censorship

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as damage and routes around it.
That this whole, big, disvast,

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distributed network of information would I would
inevitably self correct. And it did.

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It did. We were able to
get things out, and we were able

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to get different narratives out and we
were able to stay free, which is

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kind of great and I like that. But now you're right, we have

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the people who want to shape and
manage, but we have a good sign.

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As chaotic as Eon Musk's stewardships of
Twitter may have may be to some

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people, Frankly, I don't tell. I can't tell with the difference between

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what it was people, the ads
are worse and some stuff is interesting,

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00:14:41,759 --> 00:14:46,519
and it's still far better than any
of the alternatives because it's a vivacious,

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kaleidoscopic conversation. We had this week
the launch of Threads, which was the

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meta version of this. So now
we have about nineteen Twitter clones out there

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that you can spend your time on
truth social which either you guys have been

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00:15:00,840 --> 00:15:03,440
there, oh no, yeah,
okay, Well I've been there and it's

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00:15:03,559 --> 00:15:07,519
yeah okay, and I've been on
Threads and Threads is absolutely nothing and it

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00:15:07,639 --> 00:15:13,360
seems to be filled with Zuckerberg simps, which is really bizarre. I cannot

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cannot imagine wanting to be an orbiter
for this barely humanoid creature, and it's

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very boring. There's nothing going on
there. Twitter remains this place where it's

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boisterous, and it is still what
we need to get this stuff out.

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So I'm hopeful at the end of
this, between this injunction and between the

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00:15:33,399 --> 00:15:41,759
continued you know, calamitous slapping,
throwing pots and pans and hammers mess that

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Twitter is, that we still are
able to get our message out past these

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technocratic minders. But if we do, we have to freedom. The problem

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00:15:50,039 --> 00:15:54,159
with freedom is it's messy and ugly. Right, So all the people arguing

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00:15:54,200 --> 00:15:56,879
that Twitter is, you know,
free, they also have to contend with

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the fact that Twitter is at present
a pornography delivery device. So you say

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00:16:06,360 --> 00:16:08,080
that never pops up in my feet, I mean that's because you're not looking

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for it. But if you look
for it, it's there and it doesn't

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00:16:10,639 --> 00:16:14,320
and and the and the and the
user age for Twitter is thirteen so and

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twitters and a normal So you so
that you either decide that Twitter needs to

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crack down on that as if it
could it's a giant fire hose, or

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00:16:21,559 --> 00:16:23,879
you need to say I have to
be more careful about what I put inside

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my window to look at where I
have to be careful about when my kids

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are looking at um. But there's
no there is there is no uh,

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00:16:33,759 --> 00:16:38,559
there is no way to to thread
the needle for freedom and free exchange of

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00:16:38,679 --> 00:16:44,200
views without any kind of interference by
government, which will eventually become coercient.

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00:16:44,240 --> 00:16:48,879
It always does. And um,
personal vigilance like personal and the irony for

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00:16:48,919 --> 00:16:52,519
me is like the perfect example of
this of why I will always vote for

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00:16:52,600 --> 00:16:59,039
personal vigilance and people is that during
COVID, it was the people predominantly who

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00:16:59,080 --> 00:17:04,559
were right. They they're intuition was
correct, and they're you know, the

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00:17:04,599 --> 00:17:11,759
administrative betters from the White House on
down were wrong. And I mean,

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00:17:11,799 --> 00:17:14,240
I'm not making an ad here for
Rod de Santis, but you could if

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00:17:14,240 --> 00:17:17,920
you like, you could say Brian
Kemp of Georgia. Both of those governors

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00:17:18,119 --> 00:17:22,559
chose a different path and they were
both correct. Well, if I could

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00:17:22,559 --> 00:17:25,720
wave a one to make the future
better, it would be this. All

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00:17:25,720 --> 00:17:29,000
the smartphones that we have would not
be able to be used by somebody without

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00:17:29,000 --> 00:17:32,079
a retinal scan. The retinal scan
would be tied to your birth certificate,

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00:17:32,079 --> 00:17:33,799
and until you reach the age of
eighteen, you would not be allowed to

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00:17:33,799 --> 00:17:37,079
own a smartphone, and you'd be
banned from social media entirely. It would

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00:17:37,079 --> 00:17:40,200
do us all a world of good. But Rob's right, I mean,

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00:17:40,200 --> 00:17:42,400
the government is still if you want
to if you want a good, good,

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00:17:42,519 --> 00:17:47,400
clean Internet, you're going to need
the government. Unfortunately, as we've

256
00:17:47,480 --> 00:17:51,119
learned, well, you know,
do you want the government looking at where

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00:17:51,160 --> 00:17:53,279
you went? Hard to keep track
of the extent to which the government is

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00:17:53,279 --> 00:17:56,720
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big deck, right, You've seen it

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in your Twitter feed, you hear the

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slash Ricochet and we thank Express vpn
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now we welcome to the show.
Ian Rowe, co founder of Vertex Partnership

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00:19:37,119 --> 00:19:41,960
Academy, is a new network of
character based international baccalaureate high schools in the

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00:19:41,000 --> 00:19:45,039
Bronx he's a the co founder of
the National Summer School Initiative and a senior

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00:19:45,039 --> 00:19:52,319
fellow at AIE and the author of
Agency Welcome to the show. Hello,

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00:19:52,720 --> 00:19:56,160
how are you good? How are
you good? I hear conversations about pornography

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00:19:56,240 --> 00:20:03,000
on the internet conversation earlier. Yeah, I hate to tell you that my

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00:20:03,160 --> 00:20:11,720
beloved Internet is filled to the brim
with smut. And you shared some sobering

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00:20:11,720 --> 00:20:15,119
statistics. People are worried about the
fallout from the Supreme Court decision on affirmative

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00:20:15,160 --> 00:20:19,319
action, race based affirmative action.
And here's what you tweeted quote. If

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you are concerned that the decision to
end race based affirmative action will result in

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00:20:23,000 --> 00:20:29,079
less Black students in college, consider
this. In twenty fifteen, eighteen percent

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00:20:29,119 --> 00:20:33,960
of fourth grade black kids read at
or above proficient defined by the National Assessment

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00:20:33,000 --> 00:20:37,640
for Educational Programs aka the National Nations
report Card. In twenty nineteen, only

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00:20:37,759 --> 00:20:42,200
fifteen percent of that same cohort,
now in eighth grade, read at or

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above proficient levels. Now in twenty
twenty three, it's very likely that less

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00:20:45,440 --> 00:20:49,319
than twenty percent of that cohort of
black high school seniors is reading at proficient

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levels. Truth is we have to
confront is that stronger families and more school

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choice have to be part of the
story so that our kids can compete on

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equal footing far before college applications are
on the table. So is that going

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00:21:04,200 --> 00:21:10,119
to happen? I'm sorry to be
the sobering one with actual data. I

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00:21:10,200 --> 00:21:14,599
know that they're suar, you know, losing, you know, losing a

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00:21:14,680 --> 00:21:18,880
gasket because race based affirmative action is
no longer and for good reason, it's

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unconstitutional. But we cannot afford to
get distracted. You know. One other

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00:21:23,319 --> 00:21:29,480
piece of information, one other data
point is that the college board that administers

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the SAT exam each year publishes what
the scores are across racial lines, and

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00:21:36,799 --> 00:21:41,079
for typically elite school's, top tier
colleges, you've got a score between the

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00:21:41,160 --> 00:21:48,559
fourteen hundred and sixteen hundred range to
be really considered for admission. Right well,

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00:21:48,599 --> 00:21:52,119
of the about approximately one hundred and
seventy thousand black students that took the

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SAT in the year twenty twenty one, only one percent performed between the fourteen

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hundred and sixteen hundred range. That's
part of the reality, that's part of

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00:22:06,400 --> 00:22:10,079
the data that we have to confront. You know, I run schools.

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I run public charter schools in the
heart of the South Bronx because I want

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my students to know two hard things. These are almost all low income kids,

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almost black, you know, all
black and Hispanic students. I want

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00:22:22,720 --> 00:22:26,839
them to know that they can lead
a self determined life and that they can

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00:22:26,880 --> 00:22:30,559
overcome barriers that are going to be
inevitable. But at the end of our

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00:22:30,640 --> 00:22:33,759
education, we need to know where
they need to know that they've earned it,

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00:22:34,599 --> 00:22:40,799
that they can actually legitimate compete on
an equal playing field. And the

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distraction, well maybe the benefit actually
of the decision confirmative action. It will

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put now in stark reality what is
actually happening within our CA to twelve system.

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I'm a drob long thanks for joining
us. I want to have about

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00:22:57,759 --> 00:23:03,839
the Vertex Partnership ademys in a minute. But something struck me about the coverage

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00:23:03,000 --> 00:23:07,039
of the Supreme Court decision, which
is that one of the things that people

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00:23:07,160 --> 00:23:11,480
kept saying with a kind of a
you know, subdued sneer, is you

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00:23:11,519 --> 00:23:18,920
know that Clarence Thomas, he's one
of the chief beneficiaries of affirmative action,

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and isn't that part of the problem
is though whenever they want they can just

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00:23:25,519 --> 00:23:32,279
point to you and say, well, you didn't really qualify. Isn't that

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00:23:32,920 --> 00:23:37,079
the heart of the problem with with
the way the way the left treat s

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00:23:37,079 --> 00:23:42,400
affirmative action? Oh yeah, I
mean I I posted an additional tweet a

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couple of days ago. Now it's
been viewed I think nearly one point two

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00:23:45,200 --> 00:23:49,799
million times that that said. You
know, in the future, maybe the

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00:23:49,839 --> 00:23:56,359
benefit of this Supreme Court decision that
black kids accepted it to elite colleges will

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00:23:56,400 --> 00:24:03,359
say thank you for actually make a
decision that removes the perception that I was

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00:24:03,160 --> 00:24:07,359
gained this position solely based on my
skin color. It is interesting to note

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00:24:07,559 --> 00:24:12,480
that former First Lady Michelle Obama,
in response to the Supreme Court decision,

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00:24:12,960 --> 00:24:19,119
posted this about her own experience at
Princeton University. This is what Michelle Obama

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00:24:19,200 --> 00:24:26,279
said, quote, I sometimes wondered
if people thought that I got there Princeton

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because of affirmative action. It was
a shadow that students like me could not

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shake, whether those doubts came from
the outside or inside our own minds end

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00:24:40,559 --> 00:24:47,599
quote. That is part of the
grinding self doubt that many black and other

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00:24:47,640 --> 00:24:53,599
minority students who were talented always carried. With them and carry with them because

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00:24:53,960 --> 00:25:00,000
of the implementation of affirmative action and
the perception that you're only there right because

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of your skin color. But before
we get past this, because what I

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00:25:03,680 --> 00:25:06,720
was, we talked about this little
last week, but you weren't here for

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00:25:06,720 --> 00:25:11,160
that. But one of your thoughts, I was struck by the two kind

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00:25:11,200 --> 00:25:17,400
of tent poles of the decision where
their opinion written by Katangie Brown Jackson and

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00:25:17,440 --> 00:25:21,200
they could and the opinion written by
Clarence Thomas, like they live in two

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different worlds. They because I think
they do, right, I think they

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00:25:23,920 --> 00:25:30,559
Clarence Thomas, rural Georgia, single
parent family, raised by his grandparents,

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00:25:30,920 --> 00:25:34,200
didn't. I don't think he had
indoor plumbing until he was at a certain

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00:25:34,240 --> 00:25:40,680
age, you know, disrespect to
Katangie Brown Jackson. Two parent family.

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Father was a lawyer, mother was
a probably school administratorum entirely different background.

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I mean, I mean not even
close. I mean in a way,

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I sort of and I think Michelle
Obama had kind of a similar upbring.

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00:25:55,920 --> 00:25:59,599
And what I understand their argument is
like, well, you know, a

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00:25:59,680 --> 00:26:03,759
white kid with that background, that's
every it's all Is it all likelihood that

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00:26:03,759 --> 00:26:07,759
the white kid working hard would also
get to those colleges. That it doesn't

359
00:26:07,759 --> 00:26:11,920
seem like that was the race of
deciding factor here. But what do you

360
00:26:11,960 --> 00:26:15,759
say to people who argue, Okay, well we have to have some kind

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00:26:15,839 --> 00:26:18,559
of affirmative action, but it should
be based on um. But well,

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00:26:18,599 --> 00:26:22,839
I've long argued that adversity was the
word, right, well, not adversity

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00:26:23,079 --> 00:26:26,480
because because there actually now is a
medical school, I believe that it's it's

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00:26:26,519 --> 00:26:30,640
creating a diversity score and so now
there's going to be a the you know,

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00:26:30,799 --> 00:26:34,440
the grievance Olympics. I said adversity. I think that was the term

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00:26:34,480 --> 00:26:37,680
they used to No, no,
no, no, there is a there

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00:26:37,720 --> 00:26:45,400
actually is a methodology around adversity,
which which I have issues with some reasons.

368
00:26:45,640 --> 00:26:48,240
No, I have long argued that
if you have to have affirmative action,

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00:26:49,240 --> 00:26:53,839
it should be based on economic class
and race, because I think most

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00:26:53,880 --> 00:26:59,519
Americans would agree if you're from a
low income background and you've achieved academically,

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00:27:00,079 --> 00:27:04,200
if there is to be a leg
up within the admissions process to elite schools,

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00:27:04,519 --> 00:27:10,039
that I think most people would agree. Economics should be the barometer.

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And you know, and if you
actually look at the data from the Harvard

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00:27:15,440 --> 00:27:21,799
case, nearly seventy percent of the
black students that have been admitted under the

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00:27:21,799 --> 00:27:26,640
affirmative action program. We're upper middle
class kids, right, you know,

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00:27:26,880 --> 00:27:32,880
you know, oftentimes immigrants from West
Africa and Nigerian and Caribbean. So even

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00:27:33,079 --> 00:27:37,599
under the current administration of affirmative action, race based affirmative action, it has

378
00:27:37,640 --> 00:27:41,960
not been benefiting the people that I
believe that most of us think should be

379
00:27:41,960 --> 00:27:47,359
benefiting from some kind of preference treatment, and that should be kids from low

380
00:27:47,400 --> 00:27:48,960
income backgrounds. Okay, So that
that leaves been my next question, and

381
00:27:49,000 --> 00:27:52,720
I know Steve wants to jump in, So here's my just just one before

382
00:27:52,720 --> 00:27:59,079
we keep go over we go to
the actual the schools. Your argument seems

383
00:27:59,079 --> 00:28:04,160
to me to be we are focused
on entirely the wrong thing. We're trying

384
00:28:04,160 --> 00:28:11,160
to fix the problem way too late. Back problem starts at K through twelveth

385
00:28:11,200 --> 00:28:14,640
K through six K through three whatever. It is even earlier if you talk

386
00:28:14,680 --> 00:28:18,839
about family structure. But ye,
okay, yeah, why do we spend

387
00:28:18,880 --> 00:28:27,039
no time talking about that? I'm
trying, Okay, no, affirmative Race

388
00:28:27,079 --> 00:28:33,960
based affirmative action is what I call
a back end band aid. You know

389
00:28:33,279 --> 00:28:38,519
the reason I run schools is that
I want our students to know that they

390
00:28:38,559 --> 00:28:45,680
don't have to be dependent upon some
kind of preferential treatment based on an immutable

391
00:28:45,759 --> 00:28:52,920
characteristic, in this case race.
We have to have an educational system that

392
00:28:53,319 --> 00:29:00,880
is truly providing equality of opportunity in
terms of a good education choices within your

393
00:29:00,920 --> 00:29:07,319
neighborhood, regardless of income level,
regardless of rays, regardless of zip code.

394
00:29:07,839 --> 00:29:11,359
That's where our attention needs to be
focused. And again, maybe one

395
00:29:11,440 --> 00:29:18,720
benefit from the Supreme Court decision it
puts that into stark reality. Yeah,

396
00:29:18,759 --> 00:29:21,839
Ian, it's Steve Heyward out in
California, where, among other things,

397
00:29:21,920 --> 00:29:25,119
I'd like to say, I'm an
inmate. And you see Berkeley, and

398
00:29:26,680 --> 00:29:30,720
you know the comment Rob brought up
about people think Punch Thomas benefited from affirmative

399
00:29:30,759 --> 00:29:36,839
action. I believe he graduated sixth
in his class of five hundred students at

400
00:29:36,880 --> 00:29:40,599
Holy Cross, and yet we make
the assumption about MRIs. Critics make that

401
00:29:40,680 --> 00:29:44,200
assumption about him just a quick story
to cheer you up a little bit,

402
00:29:44,319 --> 00:29:47,559
but it shows the problem. One
of the five best students I ever had

403
00:29:47,839 --> 00:29:52,599
was the black girl who got the
only perfect one score on any of my

404
00:29:52,640 --> 00:29:56,759
exams. Ninety nine percent talently.
L Sad came to me asking for a

405
00:29:56,759 --> 00:29:59,920
recommendation for law school, which I
was delighted to do. I asked her

406
00:30:00,039 --> 00:30:02,839
where do you think of applying and
a straight age student, of course,

407
00:30:02,880 --> 00:30:06,319
needless to say, and she names
a bunch of second tier law schools,

408
00:30:06,359 --> 00:30:10,200
good places. But I said,
with your scores and grades and obvious abilities,

409
00:30:10,319 --> 00:30:12,680
you should be applying at Harvard,
Yale, Stanford, Chicago, etc.

410
00:30:14,839 --> 00:30:18,240
She's a soft spoken young lady,
and she said, well, yeah,

411
00:30:18,240 --> 00:30:22,519
but I feel like I might only
get in as an affirmative action admittance.

412
00:30:22,839 --> 00:30:26,319
It broke my heart, right,
And of course, you know what

413
00:30:26,400 --> 00:30:29,680
can I say? Accept? Oh, you must not think that I have

414
00:30:29,759 --> 00:30:32,519
seen your work. You can go
toe to toe with the best of them.

415
00:30:32,799 --> 00:30:34,200
And by the way, the happy
ending of the story is she did

416
00:30:34,319 --> 00:30:37,440
end up going to an ivy League
school on a full right scholarship and did

417
00:30:37,640 --> 00:30:41,720
very very well. But that is
the this is the message that gets sent.

418
00:30:41,799 --> 00:30:45,599
By the way, this has becomes
overpower. Okay. One of the

419
00:30:45,599 --> 00:30:49,000
things that Chief Justice Robert said in
his majority opinion was, you know,

420
00:30:49,039 --> 00:30:53,519
Harvard could alleviate this difficulty they're having
by simply getting larger. They've got all

421
00:30:53,519 --> 00:30:57,640
this money. The population of the
country has expanded by one of one hundred

422
00:30:57,640 --> 00:31:03,480
million people since Baki and Harvard has
not really changed in student body size or

423
00:31:03,559 --> 00:31:06,200
Yale or any of the others,
and he set Harvard declines to do so.

424
00:31:06,759 --> 00:31:08,440
The other thing they might do.
In addition, if they don't want

425
00:31:08,440 --> 00:31:11,920
to for whatever reason, the other
thing they could do is they could emulate

426
00:31:11,960 --> 00:31:15,079
what Hillsdale College has done and emilate
you. In other words, they could

427
00:31:15,119 --> 00:31:19,480
create competition for Vertex Partnership academies.
Hillsdale has their charter schools all over the

428
00:31:19,480 --> 00:31:23,759
country. Correct, how about the
IVY Leagues? Do the IVY League academies

429
00:31:23,799 --> 00:31:30,400
around the country to try and recruit
minorities qualify them for elite schools or any

430
00:31:30,440 --> 00:31:33,200
schools for that matter. And they
could raise a ton of money from the

431
00:31:33,200 --> 00:31:37,400
alumni to do that, and they
decline to do that. Also, not

432
00:31:37,440 --> 00:31:41,640
to mention, they could use their
endowments. So the reasons the reason I

433
00:31:41,720 --> 00:31:45,640
like the direction of that idea is
that it's now getting to the heart of

434
00:31:45,680 --> 00:31:49,759
the issue, which is how do
we improve the preparation of all students.

435
00:31:51,200 --> 00:31:55,000
Yeah, according to the Nation,
the National Assessment for educational progress. Less

436
00:31:55,000 --> 00:31:59,599
than of all American kids are reading
a grade level, so this is not

437
00:31:59,680 --> 00:32:02,599
only an issue with black students.
So a few days ago Roland Friar,

438
00:32:04,480 --> 00:32:08,519
Great Economists, actually had this idea. He proposed that all of the top

439
00:32:08,519 --> 00:32:14,720
tier schools, the ivs, the
uncs of the world should use the power

440
00:32:14,759 --> 00:32:20,559
of their endowments and or raise additional
money to launch upboards of a hundred public

441
00:32:20,680 --> 00:32:27,839
charter schools in their localities. They
could launch high schools and middle schools potentially

442
00:32:27,880 --> 00:32:35,240
serving cumulatively fifty thousand kids, low
income kids from their localities to build a

443
00:32:35,319 --> 00:32:40,039
pipeline of talent either for their own
colleges or universities or heaven forbid, they

444
00:32:40,039 --> 00:32:45,480
create a public good by just creating
more talented kids. To me, that

445
00:32:45,599 --> 00:32:52,079
is a solid idea that is responsive
to the data that I shared at the

446
00:32:52,119 --> 00:32:58,039
beginning of this call, because that's
where our attention should be. Not the

447
00:32:58,200 --> 00:33:05,920
virtue signaling in this back end band
aid not checking the box because accepted a

448
00:33:05,960 --> 00:33:10,079
black Nigerian student who's had a phenomenalation, and now you say, well we're

449
00:33:10,240 --> 00:33:14,799
you know, we're doing right by
black kids in this country. That's the

450
00:33:15,079 --> 00:33:24,119
hollow hypocritical, cynical virtue signaling that
hurts the larger effort to create upward mobility

451
00:33:24,200 --> 00:33:30,279
for all students. So Ian,
we have only mentioned you're a school initiative,

452
00:33:30,319 --> 00:33:35,079
the Vertex Partnership Academies. Tell us
a little bit more about this because

453
00:33:35,079 --> 00:33:38,200
I know nothing about it actually,
and you know, what's your strategy,

454
00:33:38,279 --> 00:33:42,880
what are your keys to success?
How does it work? What's the takeaways

455
00:33:42,880 --> 00:33:45,960
for us? Yeah, thank you
for asking. So for a decade I

456
00:33:45,079 --> 00:33:51,079
ran public charter schools in the South
Bronx and Lower East Side of Manhattan.

457
00:33:51,640 --> 00:33:55,079
These were elementary and middle school so
they only went through eighth grade, and

458
00:33:55,160 --> 00:33:58,640
you know, we did a lot
of phenomenal work, but at the end

459
00:33:58,640 --> 00:34:01,720
of eighth grade, the question where
do the kids go next? And in

460
00:34:01,759 --> 00:34:07,159
places like District twelve in the Bronx
where we just launched Vertex Partnership Academies as

461
00:34:07,159 --> 00:34:15,960
a high school, only seven percent
of kids that start ninth grade four years

462
00:34:15,079 --> 00:34:20,880
later graduate from high school ready for
college. So think about that. That

463
00:34:20,960 --> 00:34:25,559
means ninety three percent of kids start
ninth grade and either drop out or they

464
00:34:25,559 --> 00:34:31,639
actually do earn their high school diploma
but still cannot do reading nor math without

465
00:34:31,679 --> 00:34:37,639
remediation if they were to go to
college. And so that's the context that

466
00:34:37,719 --> 00:34:45,000
exists in the Bronx in Brooklyn,
in Chicago, in parts of Los Angeles,

467
00:34:45,800 --> 00:34:49,199
all over the country. Even if
you have the benefit of a strong

468
00:34:49,280 --> 00:34:55,079
elementary and middle school education, there
just aren't enough high quality high school options.

469
00:34:55,519 --> 00:35:00,519
So we endeavor to launch a new
kind of high school virtues based So

470
00:35:00,559 --> 00:35:07,920
it's organized around the cardinal virtues of
courage, justice, temperance, and wisdom.

471
00:35:09,360 --> 00:35:14,159
At the end of your sophomore year
of high school, you'll actually have

472
00:35:14,199 --> 00:35:19,239
a choice of pathways that you can
choose a pathway that will lead you into

473
00:35:19,679 --> 00:35:24,119
a high performing university or college,
or you can choose what we call the

474
00:35:24,239 --> 00:35:30,400
careers pathway, which means that you
have the opportunity to still take academically rigorous

475
00:35:30,400 --> 00:35:36,119
classes and though time would be made
that you could do an apprenticeship in your

476
00:35:36,239 --> 00:35:39,440
junior and senior year of high school. So imagine if you had the opportunity

477
00:35:39,480 --> 00:35:44,400
to apprentice at a New York City
based hospital where you could learn how to

478
00:35:44,440 --> 00:35:50,400
become a phlebotomist taking blood, or
work in a computer science arena working at

479
00:35:50,440 --> 00:35:55,559
Amazon. So we're building those relationships
now where a high school student could earn

480
00:35:55,599 --> 00:36:01,079
an industry credential with labor market value, meaning at the end of four years

481
00:36:01,079 --> 00:36:06,159
of high school, they could get
a job in a particular arena. Again,

482
00:36:06,199 --> 00:36:10,639
the other thing that this Supreme Court
decision hopefully highlights is that maybe a

483
00:36:10,679 --> 00:36:16,880
college degree shouldn't be the only option
considered at the end of four years of

484
00:36:16,960 --> 00:36:22,239
high school. So there's a lot
of opportunity hopefully that this decision will shed

485
00:36:22,320 --> 00:36:28,840
line on. We've chosen to build
an institution that we hope can grow into

486
00:36:28,840 --> 00:36:34,159
a model for what the rest of
the country can achieve. This row,

487
00:36:34,199 --> 00:36:37,400
it's a great guest who anticipates my
next question and answers it and then sort

488
00:36:37,400 --> 00:36:39,760
of leaves me flapping my COM's wondering
what to say. You're absolutely right as

489
00:36:39,800 --> 00:36:43,840
a question of whether or not everybody
needs to go to college. In a

490
00:36:43,840 --> 00:36:47,000
perfect world, they spend their elementary
years getting the basics, in the middle

491
00:36:47,079 --> 00:36:52,280
years being introduced to more substantial topics, and then the high school solidifies it

492
00:36:52,320 --> 00:36:54,239
all, caps it off, and
they're ready for the world. But we

493
00:36:54,239 --> 00:36:59,079
always assume that college is the next
obvious step, and that anything below that

494
00:36:59,119 --> 00:37:01,079
is somehow demeaning or giving up on
that one. Actually, you're right,

495
00:37:01,440 --> 00:37:08,880
phlebotomy, computer science, electrician,
plumbing. These are virtuous professions that are

496
00:37:09,199 --> 00:37:15,880
they're absolutely ness that are necessary.
And do we have a cultural bias though

497
00:37:15,920 --> 00:37:20,400
that needs to be shaved away and
massaged and deluded that unless you're going to

498
00:37:20,480 --> 00:37:23,679
college, you're really not successful,
that that that we've given up on this

499
00:37:23,760 --> 00:37:27,960
generation of people because we're not sending
them to college. I would almost look

500
00:37:28,119 --> 00:37:31,280
at declining college and romans among certain
groups as signs that they've got it.

501
00:37:31,599 --> 00:37:35,719
They understand that this is just a
lot of money for a credential. That

502
00:37:35,800 --> 00:37:38,280
doesn't mean you're a smarter person,
you're able to do these things. So

503
00:37:38,360 --> 00:37:42,960
how do we sort of work on
that cultural shift without sounding like a bunch

504
00:37:42,960 --> 00:37:46,559
of you know, uh, you
know, bloodyed philistines who don't care about

505
00:37:46,559 --> 00:37:50,480
book learning. No, no,
it's it's a very good point, even

506
00:37:50,559 --> 00:37:54,079
within our high school. So we
just launched in twenty twenty two with freshmen,

507
00:37:54,159 --> 00:37:58,519
so ninth grade, and this upcoming
year will be at ninth and tenth

508
00:37:58,559 --> 00:38:00,639
grade, So at the end of
next year years when students will be choosing

509
00:38:01,079 --> 00:38:06,400
their pathway, either the diploma pathway
or the careers pathway, and we're going

510
00:38:06,440 --> 00:38:08,639
to do a lot of work to
ensure that all the students know that the

511
00:38:08,760 --> 00:38:15,599
choice that they're making is of equal
stature. There is no stepchild relationship inside

512
00:38:15,679 --> 00:38:20,800
careers. It's still a rigorous academic
path, but it's just at the end

513
00:38:20,840 --> 00:38:27,440
of four years you'll have you'll be
equipped with the credentials that could be very,

514
00:38:27,599 --> 00:38:30,480
very valuable. One thing that's interesting
is that there's a good amount of

515
00:38:30,559 --> 00:38:36,119
data. MDRC, a great research
firm, did a study that shows that

516
00:38:36,639 --> 00:38:44,280
particularly for low income boys, those
that leave high school into meaningful work over

517
00:38:44,320 --> 00:38:49,719
those course of those next few years, much lower interaction with the criminal justice

518
00:38:49,719 --> 00:38:54,599
system, much lower levels of non
marital births, higher rates of actually if

519
00:38:54,599 --> 00:39:00,199
they go to college, higher rates
of college completion. So there's actually some

520
00:39:00,400 --> 00:39:06,880
value even if your goal ultimately is
to get kids into college. Right working

521
00:39:06,920 --> 00:39:10,039
for a few years, coming out
of high school with a meaningful industry credential,

522
00:39:12,159 --> 00:39:15,039
can you can have your cake and
eat it too. And so so

523
00:39:15,599 --> 00:39:21,920
we very much believe that high school
because this is not part of the general

524
00:39:22,079 --> 00:39:27,320
education reform discussion, but we think
high school needs to be to become the

525
00:39:27,400 --> 00:39:34,559
place where we now have multiple pathways
where college for all is not the default

526
00:39:36,280 --> 00:39:40,239
pathway. Yeah. I don't know
if you're familiar with the getting Rob Henderson,

527
00:39:40,239 --> 00:39:45,039
who's been writing about that. He
grew up in California and sort of

528
00:39:45,039 --> 00:39:49,639
the Central Valley. I think as
a foster kid or adopted something trouble trouble

529
00:39:49,719 --> 00:39:52,280
high school. Somebody said, well, you joined the Air Force, so

530
00:39:52,280 --> 00:39:54,679
he said, I better do that. It's either that or jail. And

531
00:39:55,199 --> 00:39:59,199
then he eventually after the Air Force, think at twenty four, he became

532
00:39:59,239 --> 00:40:06,840
a freshman year and he writes really
brilliantly about how how different his experience was

533
00:40:07,079 --> 00:40:09,960
as a twenty four year old.
Obviously that's pretty old to go to be

534
00:40:10,000 --> 00:40:15,599
at undergraduate, but he's he's convinced
he got more out of it because he

535
00:40:15,719 --> 00:40:19,880
had more questions, and he had
more experience, anymore discipline, and he

536
00:40:19,960 --> 00:40:22,920
got he got his money's worth out
of that education, where I think a

537
00:40:22,960 --> 00:40:25,840
lot of eighteen year nineteen year olds
just don't get their money's worth. Yeah,

538
00:40:27,039 --> 00:40:30,719
And just as it relates to to
boys in particular, there's a lot

539
00:40:30,719 --> 00:40:32,760
of, you know, emerging evidence
that young men are having a different,

540
00:40:34,360 --> 00:40:38,880
different challenges in the matturation process and
there's something to be said about high school

541
00:40:38,960 --> 00:40:45,679
being a place for more hands on
learning, job engagement where you you know,

542
00:40:45,760 --> 00:40:47,079
and an apprenticeship you got to show
up, you know, you have

543
00:40:47,119 --> 00:40:55,719
to make icons to do things that
enhanced responsibility and accountability. And so as

544
00:40:55,719 --> 00:41:00,519
we think about that aspect too,
I think many advantages. And again,

545
00:41:00,639 --> 00:41:06,519
all of this is starting with the
Affirmative Action court decision. My hope is

546
00:41:06,519 --> 00:41:10,199
that we don't obsess over again the
back end band aid and think about what

547
00:41:10,280 --> 00:41:15,280
are the ways we need to acculturate
all of our kids right in the pathways

548
00:41:15,280 --> 00:41:17,039
that can lead to a life of
flourishing. And you're in the middle of

549
00:41:17,079 --> 00:41:20,880
that right now. So I have
two questions for you. A question,

550
00:41:20,920 --> 00:41:22,360
and then I have a request which
you may not be able to answer.

551
00:41:22,480 --> 00:41:29,519
But here's my question. How much
BS do you have put up with as

552
00:41:29,519 --> 00:41:35,559
a percentage during the day or during
the week from the people in the education

553
00:41:35,880 --> 00:41:40,480
establishment or whatever you want to call
it. Who are I mean, the

554
00:41:40,519 --> 00:41:45,840
polite way to put it is unsupportive, but I think probably the more honest

555
00:41:45,840 --> 00:41:47,079
way to put it with like would
just like you to go away, to

556
00:41:47,119 --> 00:41:52,199
shut up and go away. Yeah, yeah, there there are a few

557
00:41:52,199 --> 00:41:57,480
people who would like me not to
put forth the argument, right, but

558
00:41:57,679 --> 00:42:07,440
you know what, I have a
I have a here's the thing. When

559
00:42:07,519 --> 00:42:12,920
you hear data, for example,
where only seven kids in this district in

560
00:42:12,960 --> 00:42:15,960
the Bronx graduate from high school ready
for college, some people look at that

561
00:42:16,000 --> 00:42:22,000
and say, see, that's the
proof of structural racism, structural barriers,

562
00:42:22,519 --> 00:42:29,239
and it's an oppressive system and end
of story. And so that's why we

563
00:42:29,280 --> 00:42:32,199
need things like reparations, or we
need increased funding, or we need government

564
00:42:32,239 --> 00:42:39,480
intervention. And so I see that
same disparity and share the concern that we

565
00:42:39,519 --> 00:42:45,480
should not live in America where the
district in one of the poorest sections of

566
00:42:45,480 --> 00:42:49,559
our country, where only seven percent
of kids are graduating from high school ready

567
00:42:49,559 --> 00:42:55,400
for college. So I try to
find a common cause. We both deeply

568
00:42:55,559 --> 00:43:02,800
care about that disparity. It's just
that my prescription is different. Right,

569
00:43:05,039 --> 00:43:08,280
Well, then let's have more school
choice, Let's have stronger families, Let's

570
00:43:08,320 --> 00:43:14,840
have ways in which young people can
choose better educational environments so that they're not

571
00:43:15,360 --> 00:43:19,039
having to depend on this back end
band, permative action, or any other

572
00:43:19,400 --> 00:43:23,039
of these interventions, which are by
the way, proven over time not to

573
00:43:23,119 --> 00:43:29,320
be the vehicle to achieve the wide
scale upward mobility that we all want.

574
00:43:29,960 --> 00:43:32,920
So for all those people who don't
like the arguments that I advanced, look,

575
00:43:34,440 --> 00:43:37,679
look, I'm with you on the
issues, but let's talk about the

576
00:43:37,760 --> 00:43:43,119
solutions. Because Okay, so aren't
working. So how long you've been running

577
00:43:43,119 --> 00:43:46,719
the schools? So since twenty ten, I've been running public charter schools.

578
00:43:46,920 --> 00:43:51,400
Okay, so that is Dauns twenty
twenty three, that's K through twelve.

579
00:43:51,239 --> 00:43:53,639
You've you've seen You've seen K go
to through twelve. Oh yeah, no,

580
00:43:53,760 --> 00:43:58,559
I mean we have kids. You
know, when I took over the

581
00:43:58,559 --> 00:44:00,719
network of schools I let in twenty
ten, and that included kids who were

582
00:44:00,760 --> 00:44:06,599
already in sixth grade. So I've
seen our students now graduate from college schools

583
00:44:06,639 --> 00:44:12,400
like Yale and you know, and
you know Tough and Howard and you know,

584
00:44:12,519 --> 00:44:16,480
very inspiring. So here's what I'm
gonna ask you. What's in the

585
00:44:16,519 --> 00:44:21,000
past month. Say, I'm just
gonna pick month. What's been the most

586
00:44:21,039 --> 00:44:25,000
inspiring thing that you've heard from a
former student, or from a parent,

587
00:44:25,159 --> 00:44:32,559
or from somebody in your community that
makes you remind you that you're on the

588
00:44:32,639 --> 00:44:39,880
right track. Wow? Um,
well, uh let's see a few different

589
00:44:39,920 --> 00:44:44,320
things. Um, I told you
it was going to be a little bit.

590
00:44:44,440 --> 00:44:46,760
Yeah. We we just finished the
first year at Vertex Partnership Academies.

591
00:44:46,920 --> 00:44:53,800
Was our inaugural class of ninth grade
students, and um, we we we

592
00:44:53,880 --> 00:45:00,880
recently took a trip to Washington.
We took a group of students to Washington.

593
00:45:00,920 --> 00:45:04,960
Actually, we took another group of
our students to Annapolis to the US

594
00:45:05,079 --> 00:45:13,920
Nagorhood and in this case, it
was almost all girls and they had an

595
00:45:13,920 --> 00:45:17,679
opportunity to interact with the astronauts.
It was it was a it was a

596
00:45:17,679 --> 00:45:25,400
convocation for the new incoming class of
astronauts at NASSA, and the students talked

597
00:45:25,400 --> 00:45:36,159
about the fact that they had never
ever envisioned a possibility like that for themselves,

598
00:45:37,480 --> 00:45:39,840
and yet they just said, wow, now that I've seen it,

599
00:45:39,880 --> 00:45:45,039
I'm like, wow, I met
an astronaut, and this person who they

600
00:45:45,039 --> 00:45:49,280
were able to talk to about what
their life was like when they were fourteen

601
00:45:49,360 --> 00:45:53,679
years old, shared stories of the
doubts that they had, the challenges that

602
00:45:53,719 --> 00:45:58,679
they had. And so for these
students, these Vertex Partnership Academy students,

603
00:45:58,800 --> 00:46:05,639
when they talked about that, now
it's almost it's it's like, um it,

604
00:46:05,880 --> 00:46:12,639
the success has been demystified for them, it's like a fail had been

605
00:46:12,679 --> 00:46:15,199
taken off. So that's certainly one
of the most im I gonna share other

606
00:46:15,239 --> 00:46:19,039
stories too, but that's not that's
just one. But I kind of want

607
00:46:19,079 --> 00:46:22,039
to hear I mean for two reasons. One because I feel like I always

608
00:46:22,039 --> 00:46:24,199
get more inspired when I hear somebody
doing great stuff and then there's a story

609
00:46:24,239 --> 00:46:28,639
behind it. But two because it's
the fourth of July and this is a

610
00:46:28,679 --> 00:46:35,480
great patriotic story about how we can
renew and refresh and and o country.

611
00:46:35,639 --> 00:46:38,440
And by the way, for what
it's worth, when we designed Vertex,

612
00:46:38,599 --> 00:46:45,559
we were thinking about these two pathways
of university pathway or career pathway. As

613
00:46:45,599 --> 00:46:50,360
a result of the trip to Naval
Academy and some work I had done with

614
00:46:50,400 --> 00:46:53,719
West Point years ago, we're going
to have a third pathway and it's going

615
00:46:53,760 --> 00:47:00,679
to be military. We're going to
want to and again of equal statue right

616
00:47:00,119 --> 00:47:04,119
at the end of high school.
We want our students to know that by

617
00:47:04,119 --> 00:47:12,159
the way, you can get a
world class tuition free education, and institutions

618
00:47:12,360 --> 00:47:17,000
like West Points, like the US
Naval Academy at Annapolis and we should be

619
00:47:17,119 --> 00:47:22,880
encouraging our kids to think about that
as a as a way to serve their

620
00:47:22,920 --> 00:47:30,559
country with honor and dignity and respect. That's what we want to do,

621
00:47:30,960 --> 00:47:35,159
serving their country, honor, dignity, respect. These are words like across

622
00:47:35,239 --> 00:47:39,920
to vampire for some people. Oh
my gosh, Roll, thank you for

623
00:47:40,000 --> 00:47:43,320
joining us, Tod. Anybody want
to learn a little bit more about this,

624
00:47:43,360 --> 00:47:45,360
of course, why don't you go
to Amazon and pick up his book

625
00:47:45,440 --> 00:47:51,440
Agency Agencies. That's the word.
Just google agency and RWE and you will

626
00:47:51,480 --> 00:47:53,760
find it. You'll read it and
you'll learn and certain thank you for coming

627
00:47:53,800 --> 00:47:58,159
and best of luck. All right, that was great, thanks guys,

628
00:47:58,800 --> 00:48:01,360
Thanks you, Hane, And it
is inspirational. I liked the idea that

629
00:48:02,039 --> 00:48:05,719
you know, you don't have to
go to college. And I say that

630
00:48:05,719 --> 00:48:08,000
as somebody who was more who was
of course absolutely intent that my daughter has

631
00:48:08,000 --> 00:48:14,440
to go to college, right and
a tremendous expense and all the rest of

632
00:48:14,480 --> 00:48:16,960
it. I'm glad she did.
She's gainfully employed, and if she wasn't,

633
00:48:17,039 --> 00:48:21,320
oh lord. The only thing is
is that she lives an expensive part

634
00:48:21,320 --> 00:48:24,719
of the country, really expensive,
and it's got roommates and the rest of

635
00:48:24,760 --> 00:48:30,239
it and one dinky little air conditioner
that tries to move the Corpora's East coast

636
00:48:30,280 --> 00:48:35,440
air around. The good thing is, though, and it's a really good

637
00:48:35,440 --> 00:48:39,000
thing, is that she's got the
bowling branch of sheets. Now it's summertime

638
00:48:39,000 --> 00:48:42,519
and it's hot, and you think, I mean, can you manage it?

639
00:48:42,599 --> 00:48:45,400
If you're just you know, some
post college student can't aford anything better,

640
00:48:45,480 --> 00:48:49,719
Or you've got your first job and
you're still using the finnel sheet,

641
00:48:49,800 --> 00:48:52,679
the fannel sheets that you had in
the wintertime. No, no, no,

642
00:48:52,679 --> 00:48:57,199
no no. So that's why you
need well high quality things. And

643
00:48:57,239 --> 00:49:00,159
again when you're starting out, you
need a high quality air condition a if

644
00:49:00,159 --> 00:49:04,519
you need a high quality bed to
keep you RESTful, you need high quality

645
00:49:04,559 --> 00:49:07,400
items like a coffee maker so that
you stay perky at your job. And

646
00:49:07,519 --> 00:49:12,880
as I mentioned, of course,
high quality sheets. It's almost an investment.

647
00:49:12,960 --> 00:49:15,599
Really start investing in your best sleep
with bowl and branch. They make

648
00:49:15,679 --> 00:49:21,480
only the sheets that gets softer with
every wash, the only ones on the

649
00:49:21,559 --> 00:49:24,239
planet I think they do that.
They feel buttery and breathable right out of

650
00:49:24,239 --> 00:49:28,400
the box on night one, and
they keep getting softer and softer for years

651
00:49:28,440 --> 00:49:30,800
to come. And I said,
yes, years, because they're going to

652
00:49:30,880 --> 00:49:34,239
last that long for you. They
have for me. Bowland Branch signature hemmed

653
00:49:34,280 --> 00:49:37,719
sheets are best seller for a good
reason. They may be the only the

654
00:49:37,800 --> 00:49:40,840
highest quality one organic cotton threads on
the planet. And they're the only sheets

655
00:49:40,880 --> 00:49:44,599
that, as I said, get
softer with every wash. And as I

656
00:49:44,639 --> 00:49:49,199
say, every time I do this, they're all impromptu, and I don't

657
00:49:49,239 --> 00:49:52,800
cut these in advance, and I
can speak with absolute truth and assurance that

658
00:49:52,840 --> 00:49:54,559
my sheets are incrementally softer than they
were the last time that I had them.

659
00:49:54,559 --> 00:49:57,960
You can't say that about any others. And believe me, I don't

660
00:49:58,000 --> 00:50:00,880
think the other guys even try,
because they've just seated that whole part of

661
00:50:00,880 --> 00:50:02,880
the market to B and B.
Boldon Branch sheets are loved by millions of

662
00:50:02,880 --> 00:50:07,800
sleepers. And as we know,
four counting four US presidents and used to

663
00:50:07,840 --> 00:50:10,719
be three remember that. Yeah,
we've been doing this so long, it's

664
00:50:10,760 --> 00:50:15,440
now four. Best of all,
though, thirty night worry free guarantee offered

665
00:50:15,440 --> 00:50:20,000
to you by Bowling Branch with free
shipping and free returns and all orders and

666
00:50:20,039 --> 00:50:22,719
I think you know, well orders
in the US. I think I say

667
00:50:22,760 --> 00:50:28,000
this because they know that Nobody who
sleeps on these sheets one night is ever

668
00:50:28,039 --> 00:50:31,079
going to send them back sleep better
at night with Bolden Branch Sheets shot their

669
00:50:31,079 --> 00:50:35,079
annual summer event. Now to get
twenty percent off your order for a limited

670
00:50:35,159 --> 00:50:37,679
time only, use the promo code
Ricochet at Bolding Branch dot com. That's

671
00:50:37,719 --> 00:50:42,639
Bowland Branch b O L L A
N D Branch dot com. Promo code

672
00:50:42,880 --> 00:50:46,039
Ricochet. Exclusions do apply to see
that side for details and we thank Boland

673
00:50:46,079 --> 00:50:52,000
Branch for sponsoring this the Ricochet podcast. Well Winston meets up good like a

674
00:50:52,400 --> 00:50:57,239
meetup should, as Jo went.
You know what, when I was a

675
00:50:57,320 --> 00:51:00,760
kid and my my my, my
uncle smoked Winston's. He was a Winston

676
00:51:00,880 --> 00:51:06,519
man, and I had had an
aunt somewhere smoked Salem's. When I first

677
00:51:06,519 --> 00:51:09,920
realized there was actually a town named
Winston Salem, I couldn't. I couldn't

678
00:51:09,960 --> 00:51:13,599
figure that out. It was like
Lark, Marlborough or something like that,

679
00:51:13,679 --> 00:51:17,400
or you know, Parliament of Kent. But I guess that's where the names

680
00:51:17,400 --> 00:51:21,599
came from. And you don't have
to smoke to live there, and you

681
00:51:21,639 --> 00:51:23,800
certainly don't have to smoke to go
to the meet up. But here's Rob

682
00:51:23,840 --> 00:51:27,119
Long to tell you all about it. Yeah, I'm sure I remember.

683
00:51:27,159 --> 00:51:30,719
Like my thing, my grandfather smoked
Winston's and my grandmother smoked something and I

684
00:51:30,719 --> 00:51:34,000
can't remember. It was again a
Silverton. Winston was a good cigarette.

685
00:51:34,039 --> 00:51:37,079
It was a silver hack. I
remember. We had to go and I

686
00:51:37,119 --> 00:51:39,880
had to get to find them all
the time, try my cigarettes. Which

687
00:51:40,920 --> 00:51:45,719
she'd sit there in the morning and
you know, eat her breakfast and make

688
00:51:45,760 --> 00:51:50,000
me breakfast when I was staying with
them, and she'd smoke a cigarette and

689
00:51:50,039 --> 00:51:52,880
she did the New York Times cross
root puzzle, which is kind of like

690
00:51:52,920 --> 00:51:55,559
what I do now every day.
But I do still have a cigarette,

691
00:51:57,000 --> 00:51:59,440
all right. So speaking, that
was my own memory. I'm in the

692
00:51:59,440 --> 00:52:01,880
memory banks here, so sorry about
that. Speaking of meetups, the great

693
00:52:01,880 --> 00:52:05,559
thing about being a member, Ricochet, aside from being part of the club

694
00:52:05,599 --> 00:52:07,639
online and being able to join conversations
and start your own and just sort of

695
00:52:07,639 --> 00:52:12,639
generally shoot the breeze with like minded
people, even if it's not about politics.

696
00:52:12,679 --> 00:52:15,199
Almost especially it's not about politics,
I think Ricochet said, it's best

697
00:52:16,000 --> 00:52:20,079
we also meetups. We like to
get together, and there are some meetups

698
00:52:20,079 --> 00:52:22,880
coming up and we would like to
join us. If you're a member,

699
00:52:22,880 --> 00:52:25,639
please show up. If you're not
a member, please join Winston Salem next

700
00:52:25,679 --> 00:52:30,400
weekend July fourteenth through sixteenth, Portland, Oregon July eighteenth, so that's also

701
00:52:30,480 --> 00:52:35,039
next week. The German Fest meetup
in Milwaukee at the end of July July

702
00:52:35,119 --> 00:52:37,559
twenty eighth to July thirty and in
Cookville, Tennessee, Labor Day weekend.

703
00:52:37,559 --> 00:52:43,800
That's I think September first through fourth. All the details of these meetups are

704
00:52:43,800 --> 00:52:45,679
on the site ricochet dot com.
Please go and check them out if you

705
00:52:45,719 --> 00:52:49,599
want. We tend to meet up
and for some reason these meetups don't work

706
00:52:49,639 --> 00:52:52,079
for you, the summer meetups.
Here's what you do. You just put

707
00:52:52,159 --> 00:52:54,119
up a post and the member feed
and say hey, how about a meet

708
00:52:54,199 --> 00:52:59,480
up here at this time, and
people will show up because Ricochet members show

709
00:52:59,599 --> 00:53:01,679
up. That's the part of the
fun of being in the club. I'm

710
00:53:01,719 --> 00:53:05,320
going to try to ring something in
New York in the autumn. I don't

711
00:53:05,320 --> 00:53:07,000
know quite yet when, but we'll
have to do another New York meet up

712
00:53:07,000 --> 00:53:08,760
in the auto of The last New
York meet up was so much fun.

713
00:53:09,199 --> 00:53:15,159
Um So that's that is the full
That's all the pitch I'm gonna give you

714
00:53:15,960 --> 00:53:20,400
if you don't think after we listened
to Ian wrote to speak or last week,

715
00:53:20,440 --> 00:53:22,000
we have the best guests, We
have the best conversations on the way

716
00:53:22,000 --> 00:53:25,159
of If you don't think that this
for you, I don't know what to

717
00:53:25,199 --> 00:53:30,039
say except you're wrong, and join
us anyway because we need the money.

718
00:53:30,440 --> 00:53:34,320
But please, whatever you do,
come to Ricochet, check us out and

719
00:53:34,400 --> 00:53:37,360
see if it's for you, and
please join because we would love to have

720
00:53:37,440 --> 00:53:43,599
you brand. I'm wondering what the
silver pack was. I know, remember

721
00:53:44,000 --> 00:53:47,039
I don't remember any silver cigarette with
silver. Was it silva? I was

722
00:53:47,079 --> 00:53:51,880
thinking of silva things? Is possibly
what it was with the silva thins um

723
00:53:52,000 --> 00:53:54,480
uh it? Well she was the
ath all smokers, so it could have

724
00:53:54,480 --> 00:53:58,920
been. It could have been silver
things. Was this the late sixties early

725
00:53:58,960 --> 00:54:01,599
seventies, Well it's the seventies,
it's not yeah, yeah, I would

726
00:54:01,599 --> 00:54:04,960
say that, yeah, okay,
could have been that could have been Benson

727
00:54:04,960 --> 00:54:07,519
and Hedges. But the study event, the study, the study of cigarette

728
00:54:07,559 --> 00:54:10,880
packs is a fast anything for me, The graphic design, the history of

729
00:54:10,920 --> 00:54:15,320
it, oh yeah, the way
that Lucky went to war, Lucky's gone

730
00:54:15,320 --> 00:54:20,159
to war, which actually find fasting
the idea, you know, the idea

731
00:54:20,199 --> 00:54:22,519
that cigarette packs would rebrand themselves for
the conflict, which, which you know,

732
00:54:22,599 --> 00:54:25,559
is the way of telling you how
all in that thing was. Well,

733
00:54:25,639 --> 00:54:28,639
gentlemen, before we go, is
there's something that has happened in the

734
00:54:28,679 --> 00:54:30,360
last week? Did you absolutely have
to get a few chests to talk about?

735
00:54:30,719 --> 00:54:34,719
If not, of course I can
prompt you. But I can imagine

736
00:54:34,719 --> 00:54:38,519
that Stephen has let this week go
by without something nettling you, getting under

737
00:54:38,519 --> 00:54:43,400
your epidermis, any gripe you want
to you want to vent before we go,

738
00:54:44,079 --> 00:54:46,760
Well, the whole packet of cocaine
found in the White House is really

739
00:54:46,800 --> 00:54:51,840
astounding getting attention. Yeah, where
was it found? Now? Today?

740
00:54:51,880 --> 00:54:55,800
I think it's moved to the attic
of a big Bathroomison, Well, I

741
00:54:55,840 --> 00:54:59,320
think the last version I've heard,
But you're right, it seems to change

742
00:54:59,320 --> 00:55:01,679
by the moment. It was found
in the cubbies where you leave your cell

743
00:55:01,679 --> 00:55:05,760
phones and personal items if you're going
to the situation room, which is a

744
00:55:06,199 --> 00:55:08,599
you know, a no cell phone
zone in the White House messages by there.

745
00:55:08,599 --> 00:55:12,480
I've been there once twenty some years
ago when Bush was president. And

746
00:55:12,679 --> 00:55:15,719
it's not an early open to the
public. It does get a fair bit

747
00:55:15,760 --> 00:55:19,559
of traffic. But the odd thing
to me is this, I remember back

748
00:55:19,559 --> 00:55:22,440
in the Reagan years, and Rob
may remember this. Reagan was so concerned

749
00:55:22,440 --> 00:55:27,119
about leaks that I think it was
when McFarland was a National security advisor,

750
00:55:27,239 --> 00:55:30,159
they were going to do polygraph tests
to find out who was leaking. That

751
00:55:30,400 --> 00:55:34,880
ended. I think drug test too. It was drug tests and polygraphs on

752
00:55:34,960 --> 00:55:37,840
leaks. And I think it was
George Schultz put an end when he went

753
00:55:37,880 --> 00:55:42,000
into Reagan and said, the day
you require a drug test for me or

754
00:55:42,039 --> 00:55:45,119
any cabinet members is the day I
resign. And then Reagan back down.

755
00:55:45,119 --> 00:55:47,039
And also so the point is is
that they're saying, gosh, we may

756
00:55:47,079 --> 00:55:52,159
never know whose it is or how
it got there. If I'm running a

757
00:55:52,199 --> 00:55:54,480
white house that had to be evacuated
because of this because the old white powder

758
00:55:54,519 --> 00:55:58,679
problems from twenty years ago, I
want to know who did it because there

759
00:55:58,760 --> 00:56:01,280
might be a real problem there.
The fact that they're the immediate line is

760
00:56:01,320 --> 00:56:06,119
gosh, we can't figure this out. You know are the FBI has been

761
00:56:06,159 --> 00:56:09,159
able to pinpoint people who are in
the Capitol on January sixth from granny footage

762
00:56:09,159 --> 00:56:12,920
and you know this and that,
and we can't figure out how this got

763
00:56:12,920 --> 00:56:15,039
in the White House. Uh,
this is everybody logs into that part of

764
00:56:15,039 --> 00:56:20,400
the White House and put your names
on. It's ridiculous. It's always it's

765
00:56:20,480 --> 00:56:22,960
hunters. That's my point, right, yeah, right right. I mean

766
00:56:23,880 --> 00:56:27,519
I think the best thing to be
in the White House right now is a

767
00:56:27,599 --> 00:56:30,599
coke addict as long as hunters around, because you can probably get away with

768
00:56:30,719 --> 00:56:32,039
murder. No, you can do
whatever you want. You know, you

769
00:56:32,039 --> 00:56:37,039
can shoot up rowin there. I've
got to be a hunter us. What's

770
00:56:37,039 --> 00:56:39,199
interesting to me, of course,
is that the White House. I don't

771
00:56:39,199 --> 00:56:45,039
know right now what it is the
past month or two six months, maybe

772
00:56:45,039 --> 00:56:46,800
it has changed. But certainly if
the first year the Biden administration, maybe

773
00:56:46,880 --> 00:56:52,599
in the first year to a half, there were extensive COVID protocols, like

774
00:56:52,639 --> 00:56:57,599
the extensive ones. I mean they
started obviously under under Trump, but I

775
00:56:57,599 --> 00:57:00,960
mean they continued under Biden, where
you couldn't go into the overlaps, you

776
00:57:00,000 --> 00:57:05,559
can't go in the West Wing without
being tested that day, that that minute,

777
00:57:05,639 --> 00:57:07,800
Like there were there were people would
go I would have a meeting with

778
00:57:07,800 --> 00:57:09,360
the President, they would go and
sit in a room and get a COVID

779
00:57:09,440 --> 00:57:15,159
test. And then wait and then
go in. So there there is definitely

780
00:57:15,199 --> 00:57:20,480
a testing regime, and there is
it's it's they are perfectly willing to have

781
00:57:20,519 --> 00:57:24,480
an administrative state sort of like lockdown
that that house, and that both the

782
00:57:24,519 --> 00:57:30,920
residential part and the office part.
So it isn't as if, I mean,

783
00:57:30,960 --> 00:57:37,199
it isn't a loosey goosey place,
right. So their inability to um

784
00:57:37,559 --> 00:57:42,800
identify the owner of this cocaine is
an inability by choice. Put it that

785
00:57:42,840 --> 00:57:45,559
way, UM. In the same
way of their inability to sort of fully

786
00:57:45,559 --> 00:57:53,000
prosecute influenced battling UM in this administration
is an inability by choice. It wasn't

787
00:57:53,000 --> 00:57:57,280
sobody suggesting at one point, oh, well it is located close to where

788
00:57:57,320 --> 00:58:02,039
the Vice president's car is part.
Oh yes, we're going to try to

789
00:58:02,079 --> 00:58:07,920
pin some stuff on her man.
Somebody said somebody gamed this out on Twitter

790
00:58:07,960 --> 00:58:09,960
and said, okay, well,
what they're trying to do here is to

791
00:58:09,960 --> 00:58:13,400
get it is a pinned on the
Kamala Harris. And then after it's been

792
00:58:13,440 --> 00:58:15,880
blamed on her, she resigns.
Gavin Newsom is appointed as Vice president.

793
00:58:16,239 --> 00:58:21,000
Joe Biden resigns for health reasons or
demandia Gavin Newsom is the new president and

794
00:58:21,119 --> 00:58:24,760
runs as an incumbent and has all
of the incumbent virtues in powers and strengths,

795
00:58:25,239 --> 00:58:30,760
and I'm thinking, well, that's
absolutely ridiculous. Probably that's certainly Gavin

796
00:58:30,840 --> 00:58:36,159
Newsom's dream journal right there. That
is exactly how he's like, I have

797
00:58:36,239 --> 00:58:39,559
to say, but somebody brought Gavin
Newsom like, um, I think Gavin

798
00:58:39,639 --> 00:58:44,519
Newsom is. I don't know how
to put this because I don't think he's

799
00:58:44,559 --> 00:58:47,559
smart, but I think he's smart. I think what he's doing right now

800
00:58:47,760 --> 00:58:53,239
is really really smart. He is
not running, but he's running, and

801
00:58:53,320 --> 00:58:57,280
he's just kind of doing this thing
where you go, I'm available, I'm

802
00:58:57,280 --> 00:59:00,119
available. Hey, I'm looking at
me. I'm available. He's staying in

803
00:59:00,199 --> 00:59:05,599
shape. You know, he's like
he's like the boyfriend in waiting, you

804
00:59:05,639 --> 00:59:07,079
know, He's like, I'm not
gonna let myself go. I'm not gonna

805
00:59:07,079 --> 00:59:10,519
do any I'm just gonna stay in
part of the fray. I'm gonna campaign

806
00:59:12,119 --> 00:59:17,599
against as if I'm campaigning, and
I'm going to campaign relentlessly against the Republicans,

807
00:59:17,639 --> 00:59:22,079
which I think is a very very
smart move. So I'm just surprised

808
00:59:22,119 --> 00:59:27,519
that a guy who's so dumb and
has like is so unable to run California

809
00:59:27,599 --> 00:59:30,159
and it is so wrong about everything, is so smart about this, But

810
00:59:30,440 --> 00:59:34,920
I guess that defines a lot of
politicians. The word that defines him is

811
00:59:34,920 --> 00:59:38,639
inevitable. Well, I'm serious.
Last inevitable candidate we had that she didn't

812
00:59:38,679 --> 00:59:42,760
do so good. Well. The
other thing, the other word that applies

813
00:59:42,760 --> 00:59:44,880
to him is vain. Rob I
I agree with you about it. He's

814
00:59:44,880 --> 00:59:46,639
being very shrewd in a certain way, but he's also very vain. But

815
00:59:46,760 --> 00:59:51,320
I am absolutely I have no knowledge
of this from any sources, and I

816
00:59:51,320 --> 00:59:54,239
haven't really tried to find any,
but I'm convinced that he has a campaign

817
00:59:54,360 --> 00:59:59,440
in waiting ready to spin up to
full speed in twenty four hours. Notice,

818
00:59:59,480 --> 01:00:01,440
ye you know, if Biden takes
a tumble down the steps of Air

819
01:00:01,480 --> 01:00:06,719
Force one, it couldn't happen any
moment now, right. I think I

820
01:00:06,760 --> 01:00:09,920
think that would finish him, or
I think it is not impossible that what

821
01:00:09,960 --> 01:00:15,440
does the July come around October November? If Biden is still looking what am

822
01:00:15,440 --> 01:00:17,440
I say, Biden looking shaky,
He's not gonna get any better. If

823
01:00:17,440 --> 01:00:22,480
he's looking even worse, I think
there's a fifty fifty chance Newston decides to

824
01:00:22,559 --> 01:00:24,280
run anyway. No, I think
you're right. I think it's like the

825
01:00:24,280 --> 01:00:29,199
Spielberg version of War the World.
There's a bunch of lighting boats and cylinders

826
01:00:29,199 --> 01:00:34,000
and drypods start to rise from the
ground in every part of the country,

827
01:00:35,119 --> 01:00:37,920
more in sorrow than an anger.
Right, that will be He'll run right

828
01:00:37,960 --> 01:00:42,760
exactly. Thank you's great American for
his service. But we're taking the car

829
01:00:42,800 --> 01:00:46,159
keys away from Grandpa, picking the
fallen mantle up and uh and kamala Harris.

830
01:00:46,360 --> 01:00:50,079
I'm sorry. It's a pity that
you won't be able to join me

831
01:00:49,880 --> 01:00:52,000
in the new effort, but something
will be good. They don't like each

832
01:00:52,000 --> 01:00:55,360
other. I mean you ask anybody
around the Beildy Bay area arrivals for a

833
01:00:55,400 --> 01:01:00,280
long time. So if there's no
love loss there, well, I would

834
01:01:00,280 --> 01:01:05,159
love to see De Santis versus Florida
versus Newsoman, because Florida versus California,

835
01:01:05,280 --> 01:01:09,039
each with their own Disney World place
is a great lesson for us. It's

836
01:01:09,039 --> 01:01:12,880
a it's a stark, it's a
lustrative, it's revelatory. I want to

837
01:01:12,920 --> 01:01:15,440
have that, I really do,
but I also want to do the thing

838
01:01:15,480 --> 01:01:19,599
here that we do sometimes Steven when
Peter isn't here and that's we get out

839
01:01:19,679 --> 01:01:22,800
in an hour. Is that okay
with everybody else? Yeah? Yeah?

840
01:01:22,880 --> 01:01:27,119
Can I just tell a Gavin Newsom
story to get us out of funny little

841
01:01:27,119 --> 01:01:29,920
Gavenu story which may or may not
be true? Too good a check,

842
01:01:29,960 --> 01:01:32,239
okay? So the story is always
the rumor, is always this rumor.

843
01:01:32,280 --> 01:01:37,400
The Gavin Newsom when he's mayor of
San Francisco was having an affair with a

844
01:01:37,920 --> 01:01:42,840
woman who was at that point working
at a fancy fish restaurant in the Financial

845
01:01:42,840 --> 01:01:47,280
District, and she was a hostess
there, and the manager complained to the

846
01:01:47,280 --> 01:01:50,840
owner of the restaurant saying, look, people are just coming in right now

847
01:01:50,840 --> 01:01:52,360
and just sitting the bar because they
want to check her out. They've heard

848
01:01:52,400 --> 01:01:55,519
the rumor, they want to see
her. And the owner of the restaurant's

849
01:01:55,519 --> 01:02:01,480
solution was, okay, fine,
move her to two days and Wednesdays because

850
01:02:01,480 --> 01:02:05,760
those are slow nights for us.
So if people want to come in this

851
01:02:05,880 --> 01:02:08,159
restaurant and sit at the bar and
drink, I'd rather have him come on

852
01:02:08,159 --> 01:02:12,119
a Tuesday on a Wednesday, which
are slow nights. Let's pick up our

853
01:02:12,159 --> 01:02:19,079
Tuesday Wednesday and it totally worked.
It totally totally worked. So there is

854
01:02:19,159 --> 01:02:25,239
one there's one economic effect of the
Gavin Newsom administration that actually benefited working people

855
01:02:25,440 --> 01:02:31,480
all over everywhere, and that was
his choice of girlfriend. So that's the

856
01:02:31,519 --> 01:02:37,960
story. I'm sticking with it.
Well, keep that in your pocket so

857
01:02:37,000 --> 01:02:40,519
you can bring down the administration at
the appropriate time. Yeah, right,

858
01:02:42,559 --> 01:02:45,280
thank our guest. Of course he
can go buy his book agency. We'd

859
01:02:45,320 --> 01:02:47,800
like to thank Bowland Brand. We'd
like to thank Express VPN for joining us

860
01:02:47,840 --> 01:02:51,599
and for sponsoring us. We'd like
to thank you if you're a Rocouchet member,

861
01:02:51,639 --> 01:02:52,960
and if you're not, would it
kill you? Would it just kill

862
01:02:53,000 --> 01:02:55,840
you to pony up a little bit
and find yourself on the side of the

863
01:02:57,480 --> 01:03:01,039
smartest and the sharpest and the best
civil center right conversation you're gonna find on

864
01:03:01,039 --> 01:03:04,239
the internet. Yeah, you can
go to Ricochet, you can read the

865
01:03:04,280 --> 01:03:07,440
whole thing, you can get the
podcast. But the member side is,

866
01:03:07,880 --> 01:03:12,920
you know, to where the fun
happens, the hugging, the fighting,

867
01:03:13,000 --> 01:03:15,159
the shouting. It's family. We're
all family anyway. It's been fun,

868
01:03:15,559 --> 01:03:21,079
Stephen, thank you and always a
pleasure as it certainly is. And by

869
01:03:21,119 --> 01:03:22,519
the way, if you like Stephen, that's the reason to give us a

870
01:03:22,519 --> 01:03:27,000
five star review on Apple Podcasts.
I didn't mention that I should, and

871
01:03:27,039 --> 01:03:28,960
I must. And if you like
Rob, same thing, if you'll,

872
01:03:29,360 --> 01:03:31,079
if you like me, you know, whatever, reason give us each one

873
01:03:31,119 --> 01:03:37,400
point seven five stars and somehow that'll
five. Yeah. Thanks. Will see

874
01:03:37,440 --> 01:03:40,159
you next week, maybe Stephen,
see you next week, maybe Rob.

875
01:03:40,199 --> 01:03:44,840
I hope we'll see everyone though.
In the comments at Ricochet, four point

876
01:03:44,840 --> 01:03:49,480
out next week, Happy fourth,
Happy fourth. Yeah it's so late,

877
01:03:49,519 --> 01:03:52,719
but you know still, I said, the whole week is the fourth of

878
01:03:52,800 --> 01:04:00,880
July. It's Independence Day week.
I believe Ricochet. Join the conversation