The Downbeat on ninety seven to one the Freak. All right, thirty minutes
away, you Chube ready for Astros. Rangers need some nuggets that you can
take to your water cooler at work. You can impress Janna. You've been
thinking about Jana a lot lately, haven't you. You know you have Rick
or maybe your boss Luke, maybe you need to maybe you impress him.
Maybe he's not a sports nutting maybe you're not either. But you can go
up to your boss Luke and be like, hey, all right, this
is gonna be wild and tell you and you get act like you don't even
have to say that you heard it with us. That's cool if you do
want to spread the word about us, but you can just act like you
came up with it, yeah, instead of staying at the water cooler and
just you know it's awkward, Like that's getting cool out there. You know.
Whatever, the same stuff you do, We're gonna give you something good,
have something interesting, have something to offer, have something to give Luke,
and then guess what Luke might give you that big promotion over Janna.
I feel like we've laid out She's a bitch. Mike Soroy that's an old
Dan McDowell trick. I heard once that worked. Yeah, we're sewing the
seeds of love today for you, or sewing the seeds of promotion. Yeah,
so use that. No more bad small talk, everyone weathered. Okay,
great, up your small talk. Just listen to Downbeat and then Yeah,
you'll have everything you need and more. You have a lot that you
don't need to tons. We're giving you what you need every morning from six
to ten. You just have to weed through a bunch of stuff that you
that is completely useful, and we're sorry about that wasn't the case. Guess
what we're doing. Winging it. We're winging it. Absolutely, everyone is
winging it. We're doing our best. And so do I look like a
man that's winging it? Yes? I do, Yes, you do.
Some people that are successful they're winging it too, They just don't look like
they're winging it all the time. You look like a sports academy. Look
at this Rangers hat cowboys. You know. I happened to go to Towny's
Small with Malki yesterday because we had to go pick up some Baby Jordan's for
him, and I strolled by the uh the popular outlet lids. You scored
that, I scored me a damn Rangers cab. Okay, that just a
Ranger's logo. That's on the other side. Nothing over here. Your hat
games, dude, coming a long way in the last two weeks. I'm
look, I'm supporting I'm Ranger ready. Yeah, yeah, my Texas,
My Rangers. That the twenty one slow that is really good from fifteen years
ago. Hey, Danny, it's time and you have a tea hat on
too. Green. Yes, noticed that I'm supporting the mean Green. I'll
have a big game against Temple tomorrow that you can hear live here on night.
That's a Texas That's not a Texas Rangers hat. Oh, it's a
Texas Rangers, North Texas. Yeah, yeah, that's what I thought.
Yes, it's beautiful. Can I admit when I moved here in like six
I got here and you know, started listening to radio whatever, and I
just respectfully say that I actively know that that's the first time I heard that
University of North Texas existed. M h. I mean it's fun. I
mean, I'm sure that you know there's some college in Florida that you were
you know, he did they dominated Florida International in Florida Atlantic. For all
those years, I barely know those two existed. So I'm just saying you
haven't made your mark who me or the schools both, And now you consider
it's weird to just start taking shots at our partners now, But now I've
learned how big they are and how influential and important areasity of North Texas is,
and we are proud to carry their games every Saturday here on night won
the freak well one of the top jazz programs in the entire world. Of
course, I've learned that featuring great people like Nora Jones, Roy Orbison and
Dave Matthew's Ben saxophonist Jeff Coffin. So we'll see you guys out there tomorrow,
you and t I'm not gonna be there, but I hope they get
the big win against Temple. Let's buckle up here. The most important thing
in the world, Mike, Mike. Here's Mike, Well, normally the
most important thing in the world. We bounce back and forth, big mine,
and we wanted to make it. I guess when we came up with
it. Yeah, whatever, the big story is right, and then sometimes
we you know, make that a joke, and it's just something local that
you know, But sometimes if it's a big natural disaster, then it is,
you know, it's we bounce back and forth. Sometimes it's a waterslide
wedgie, Yeah, the world's biggest wedgie that that can fall into this place.
But the truth is, for long, over a week, it's been
this situation in the Middle East is by far the most important thing in the
world, and we've not really touched upon it. We we discuss why we
hadn't because we're stupid. Yeah, because we're stupid, And we could even
begin to do the situation justice by talking about it. But I kind of
want to take an angle on it because I will, you know, every
night I read about it, and I wake up this morning and that's all
I read about. And to ignore it is not exactly a service either,
even to like regular people, you know, like us. And it's sort
of the question of is it okay to not really understand it? Is it
okay to have the knowledge of it that we currently have, I think,
and I think the answer is yes, Like I think it's okay not to
fully understand it. And our current world it's weird because everyone on Twitter,
which can be a whole different conversation about how they pass information onto us.
And maybe it was a better source of information a couple of years ago,
and you know, or maybe they're refining it perfectly. I don't really know
that answer either, but it the way we get our news makes it difficult
to fully understand something as complex as this what's going on, and I do
not at all understand it. But when you see, like this morning,
the latest news is Israel is telling one point one million people to leave northern
Gaza because we're coming. And this is one point one people, many of
which are you know, families and children. And I saw something about the
percentage of children in the Gaza strip being incredibly high. Boy, what what
maybe thirty or forty percent or something versus the world average which is eighteen percent
something like that. I don't have the numbers right in front of me.
And Israel is so mad they're saying move out of this northern area. We
are coming, and they're amassing tanks at the border. Now I'm not in
any position to take, you know, explain any of this, but that's
what kind of hit me, is the guilt of the security that we have
or the luxury we have of not being educated on these conflicts, and is
that okay? And I think you're also in a unique position at what you
do for a living that we are not a political show, we're not a
political station. We are here to entertain, maybe to provide some local news
stuff like that sports, funny stuff, and to provide an alternative time.
Absolutely, because there's real stuff of which you can get in many many places
and people you know, Like you said, news is very different than it
was when we were kids. It's quite fragmented these days, and people have
many options when it comes to where they get their news, and if they
want to hear some nuts and bolt stuff about this this conflict, this war,
then they they're probably not looking to us for that information. So by
proxy of that, it's not incumbent upon us to spend our time gaining knowledge
and understanding about this because we still have a job to do every day,
and our job is not that So there's only enough disk space in your brain
and only enough hours in the day to consume the stuff that you need to
do to effectively do your job. Now, the conundrum, if you will,
is we probably need to know a little bit about this because it's pretty
damn big. Yeah, and we could be at the tipping point of involvement
where this country it does become local news. I've got a story that's coming
up in ding New's morning news. It has a very local connection to what's
going on over there that'll blow your mind. So it's a balance, man,
And I just don't know how much of this stuff is for our own
personal understanding or how much we need to even investigate more of it to talk
about on the air. I just don't know, because I don't think that's
really what our job is. No. I agree, but you're right when
it gets as big as this is, and it was huge from the minute
it started. But then they experts on this would argue, this has been
huge for decades and decades, and this has been what have you been looking
at in effect thousands of years? Yeah you know, yeah, I mean
this stuff goes back multiple centuries. I have a handful of Jewish friends in
Dallas, but in Miami I have a ton and this I mean either directly
impacts them or directly impacts one degree of separation their family that lives there,
you know, lives in Israel, and it feels like a bit of a
disservice to just completely ignore it because it's such a polarizing and incredibly important topic.
And look, this has happened. We've seen it happen on our soil.
We've seen debate and conflict over interpretation of religion and God and the extreme
levels that some people will do to I don't know, to make to hammer
their point home to defend that belief. The extremes that that certain groups and
certain people will go to is out of this world. It's unfathomable. But
we're dealing with here are people, you know, it's not necessarily. Look,
the collateral damage in this really doesn't have to do with the religious aspect
of it. It's about Palestinians and israelis not about Jewish people and Muslims talking
about human beings. And that's the thing to me that I find most tragic,
Like I just want to push the whole God thing out of it and
just look at this as a humanitarian situation. Well it's such and dude,
there's no you can't win because innocence are going to die. Innocence have died,
Innocence are dying every day. And now that Israel is making this push,
this retaliation push. Innocence are going to die. On the other side,
other nationalities are going to perish, and a lot of them will be
children. Yes, it does matter us too, because there are Americans over
there too as well. Yes, look at it that way, Yeah,
because that is very easy to go. Well, it's not us, so
it doesn't matter. There are a lot of Americans over there too well.
And now I feel guilt for that. For man, but what what if
I spend every hour of this weekend educating myself on this conflict? What really
changes other than maybe in this job, I could provide a little more context
for information, but don't learn the language of it. A bit sure in
the history, and I'd like to be educated on things, but this is
so complex that I feel like it's almost an impossible thing to jump into.
And really, plus we have all the instant experts on social media, yeah,
you know, who act like they've they've been all over this for so
long. So that's why the angle wanted to take is like, is it
okay not to be I mean, or even pretend to be educated on this
or god forbid an expert on it? Well, so that's a very interesting
because there's easy people and you can pick and choose information they find online and
go with it. I talked to when the Russian Ukraine War started, which
we feel like you know a little bit about it now, But back when
that started, dude, there was so much that I did not know.
There's still a lot I don't know about it. But I was doing podcasts
at the time, and I just got this professor on who's studied that region
so knew all about the conflict there, and talked to him for thirty minutes,
and by the end of it, I went, Okay, he spelled
that out for me pretty good. I'm glad I took the time to do
this, and I almost want to do this here, okay, because it's
like you need a briefing. The distinction is, though this did happen to
us in two thousand and one, and if this happened to us now,
if a militant group, a fringe militant group fired missiles into major cities of
the United States, it's all we would be talking about right now. Every
segment would be dedicated to that. We would be getting on X to discuss
the history of their views, how they arrived to these viewpoints, how they
assembled, you know, and were able to clandestinely put this whole operation together.
We would be dissecting this every day. We would likely spend Look,
we've been through it, man. I was there in two thousand and one
at the other station when those towers fell, and for two weeks, Mikey
number one, for a week we went commercial free. We didn't even air
spots at all. It was wall to wall. I was a producer.
I'm on the phone with not knowing my ass from my elbow at that job,
calling people from universities and trying to get you know, Middle East experts
on and terrorism experts on, to just get some context. That's what we'd
be doing if it wasn't America. But because it's so far away, we
feel somewhat I don't know, I don't know, distant from it. I
guess, yeah, insulated. Yeah, well yeah, And you're right,
absolutely right, but it's not that far and there are Americans involved, and
but for why should that really be the dip tipping point? Oh, there's
Americans there. Now I care because you're right that it's a humanitarian issue.
There's nothing quite like planes crashing into a building. Yeah, and that's insane.
But I mean, if you just take what happened last week, and
you know, if al Qaeda swooped down on paragliders into acl into Austin city
limits, I just started kidnapping and killing. I mean, I hate to
be such an idiot, but the music festival angle, really it reminded you
that because to a lot of people listening, I think most people listening are
sort of in the same category as we are. I think where you admit
that, look, I'm interested in this, I do care about this.
I'm not educated on it. I want to know more, but for lack
of a better term, it's kind of a whipping to try to educate yourself
on something that's so complex. But when you simplify it to these people are
at a music festival, well, that's something that's real normal, and they're
dancing and in the distance of a video you can see paragliders coming down.
I watched a video on how those paragliders work. That's yeah, so wild
as well. And I think unfortunately this thing with Israel telling them to clear
out of the northern portion of the Gaza Strip and Israel is zero effing around
right now. This is about to getting way way uglier and way way worse.
Now, whether that's warranted, I am not in a position to say,
but I just think we need to acknowledge this and prepare to have uh,
you know, a college professor on or somebody on next week unfortunately to
discuss it. Oh joh, I don't know. This might be too heavy,
so I don't know, but whatever, I'm gonna do it because I
have a friend who has family and the Gaza strip and just some text messages
that happened. Okay, so they're no words to describe what's happening. We
won't get out alive. This is what I'm sure of. This is there's
a ring of fire everywhere. Even if we told the whole world this,
words will not describe what's happening. No one would imagine this. Gaza has
been without electricity since two o'clock in the afternoon. This is two days ago.
Of course, electricity was cut off from hospitals as well. The entire
city has been paralyzed. I mean, that is what's happening, and that
is from you know, from it from a text to a friend here.
Yeah, yeah, you know who has family there That is nuts to me,
and there are and that's what I mean. That don't make you care
about it a little bit. It does. War sucks. We all know
war sucks, and this is But imagine not supporting Hamas and being somewhere in
northern Gaza Strip as a Palestinian and you know, Israel has all the military
might of the region and the backing of us are one of their closest allies,
which again I think is a good thing. But you're there, and
where do you go? You have nowhere to go, and there Israel saying
we're coming, We're gonna come. Flat in the entire northern half of the
Gaza Strip. I saw you have nowhere to go, no roads, no
hospitals, no infrastructure, no electricity, no communication. I someone you know,
expert who's covering this was basically saying, even if they're trying to destroy
Hamas, the amount of civilians there makes it really easy for Hamas to hide
right as well. So it's almost like, if you're choosing to do this,
you're choosing to do something that's going to take a long time and is
going to kill so many innocents. And did they know that? And they
may have known that maybe they don't care and why would Hamas do this thousands
of rockets and paragladder attack on Israel. I know, why be their beliefs,
and they have a divine right to do it, to take back their
land. But they know they're outgunned by Israel. Yeah, And does some
us know that they have the backing of you know, the Ran or Hesbala
and all this stuff. Maybe, and they also know the optics of it
and the cause and effect of it that they are going to lob these missiles
in there. They know that retaliation is inevitable, and retaliation is going to
involve innocent people, children being massacred by a counter attack, and they will
champion that. Look what Israel, did you know? Yeah? The children?
Yes, yes, good God. It's a it's a media war,
it's a political war, it's a religious war. It's a mess. It's
a damn mess. And we are so insulated from that from that stuff.
And most people, you know, and and a lot of our citizens,
our society in the last fifteen years has kind of been trained a good portion
of them to look at news what is being reported on television as fake,
as a lie, as not credible and they're getting their news sources on social
media from kind of fringe accounts that are showing maybe not the most accurate rail
of what's actually going on. So you can't win in this because the world
that we live in is so fragmented and so full of conjecture and misinformation that
you just it's like, yeah, let's just talk about Taylor Swift. It's
just easier as Americans to just talk about Travis Kelcey, which goes back to
the question of is it okay not to fully understand this because of exactly what
you just said, because it's too hard. It's too hard. Well,
yeah, but that's two texts on two text with people. One guess is
totally agree. I had to look up what has palacedine yesterday and I have
two college degrees, but this is this is one text I think is right,
and this is how I try to think about things. Sometimes says the
important thing is not to know it all, but don't run away because it's
overwhelming, And one hundred percent agree with that that it is so easy to
run away from it, for sure, and I don't want to run away
from especially when we have a job that we do get to discuss things,
and we can honestly discuss the fact that we're discussing it because we don't understand
it. And I do. Like I said, I think most of the
people hearing this right now fall some We're into that category. Something I was
thinking about last night when I'm walking around Town East Mall with my little two
and a half year old, and we have just such a false sense of
security about what day to day life is. You know, you're in an
air conditioned mall, There's hundreds of people walking past you at any given moment.
Everything's safe. It was fine, we had a great time, walked
to the car, drove home, no accident, we got home alive,
went to bed, everything was great. To knock that completely off balance,
can you imagine at the time I'm at Lids buying a Ranger cap for thirty
five dollars to how American to support my baseball team. A missile comes crashing
through that mall and we see, you know, hundreds of people just cut
in half. That's a wake up call. The people that live over there
are on edge dealing with that every day of their lives, no matter where
they live. We just don't get it over here. Until you experience that,
until you were maybe at ground zero and saw those planes, you don't
fully have a real understanding of what that feels like and what that actually means.
So I'm one of those people. I haven't experienced a tragedy like that.
No, it's fascinating and perhaps for the first time ever, we actually
discussed the most important thing in the world. Congratulations, good job, down
Beat, you did it, Mike, you did it. Magic, We
did it, and we can do it all together. We can do it
all together and counting up next. Come on, everyone's really thinking about Rangers
and astros. I mean, it's what it is, and actually I found
a ton of crap about it. And if I would have dove into this
conflict in the Middle East, I could have a ton of crap on that,
But I decided to go the baseball route. Tons of fun stuff about
Rangers and astros. Everyone needs to know that. You can take to your
water cooler next. I'm ninety seven to one. The freak