Speaker 1: This is Dan Caplis and welcome to today's online podcast edition
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Speaker 1: fighting very effectively for.
Speaker 2: The American Way. Let's go straight to the VIP line.
Speaker 2: Welcome Congressman Gabe Evans. Feels good to say that to
Speaker 2: The Dan Caplis Show. Congressman, how are you doing good?
Speaker 3: How are you doing today?
Speaker 2: Very very well? Thank you for that, and hey, grateful
Speaker 2: for the time. I know you are absolutely buried and
Speaker 2: you're getting off to a very fast start there. But
Speaker 2: having been a black Hawk helicopter pilot, I just know
Speaker 2: you have invaluable insight into what you can see and
Speaker 2: not see at night flying in a situation like this,
Speaker 2: So anything you could share there would be appreciated.
Speaker 3: Well, first of all, I mean, this is just an
Speaker 3: absolute tragedy what happened out at Reagan National Airport in Washington,
Speaker 3: and so our hearts go out to the friends, the family,
Speaker 3: and of course the victims who perished in that accident.
Speaker 3: You know, I spent almost ten years flying black Hawk
Speaker 3: helicopters here in Colorado and overseas in the combat zone.
Speaker 3: I was a black Hawk helicopter pilot and Command company commander,
Speaker 3: air mission commander, and Aircrew Training Program commander. So I've
Speaker 3: seen this from a few different perspectives and spent a
Speaker 3: lot of time flying around, you know, in and amongst
Speaker 3: a Denver's airspace, which is top five upmost busy airports
Speaker 3: in the nation. And so, you know, as the news
Speaker 3: started to come out about what happened, I had a
Speaker 3: couple of thoughts to go through my head. First of all,
Speaker 3: this is happening at nighttime under night vision goggles. Night
Speaker 3: vision goggles is actually one of the most challenging modes
Speaker 3: of flight for rotary wing aircrews. Right now, your normal
Speaker 3: vision is about one hundred and thirty degrees top of autumn,
Speaker 3: and from left to right it's about two hundred degrees.
Speaker 3: Your field of view, your standard issue night vision goggles
Speaker 3: are like looking through toilet paper tubes. It's about a
Speaker 3: forty degree field of view, which means that even under
Speaker 3: night vision goggles, your field of view is like less
Speaker 3: than ten percent of what it is. I know right now,
Speaker 3: with all of us just looking normally around and you
Speaker 3: lose a little bit of depth perception also with the
Speaker 3: night vision goggles. So in dense airspace like what's around
Speaker 3: Reagan National Airport, even if that Blackhawk helicopter crew is
Speaker 3: talking to air traffic control, which it sounds like it was,
Speaker 3: and air traffic tells them, you know, be advised of
Speaker 3: company traffic, it's entirely possible that that crewe just because
Speaker 3: of the limitations of night vision technology, potentially misidentified which
Speaker 3: aircraft they were being advised of.
Speaker 2: Congressman gave Evans her guest. Now, Congressman, I assume they
Speaker 2: need to be wearing these night vision goggles for training
Speaker 2: purposes because it seems like a dangerous restriction in that
Speaker 2: kind of busy airspace.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so it sounds like what was happening is a
Speaker 3: check ride. So to be a helicopter pilot for the
Speaker 3: United States Army is years of work and training and
Speaker 3: there is a long laundry list of tasks that you
Speaker 3: have to be proficient and responding to. It's actually called
Speaker 3: a CTL commander's task list. And when I was an
Speaker 3: Aircrew Training Program commander, I was the officer that had
Speaker 3: oversight of those commander task lists and everybody who flew
Speaker 3: on my aircraft to make sure that they were meeting
Speaker 3: all of those different criteria. All the way I make
Speaker 3: sure somebody meets that criteria is once a year, they
Speaker 3: have to sit down for a pretty exhaustive examination that
Speaker 3: includes both oral knowledge written knowledge, and then you actually
Speaker 3: have to go out and put it into practice flying
Speaker 3: with an instructor pilot and show that you still have
Speaker 3: the technical and tactical proficiency to be able to employ
Speaker 3: the aircraft. So, if that's what's happening on this particular flight,
Speaker 3: this is a It's one of the most complex missions
Speaker 3: that there are, and it's designed to be complex because
Speaker 3: this is the test that proves they're not you're capable
Speaker 3: of effectively employing that aircraft.
Speaker 2: Wow. And at that point, Congressman, because obviously the pilot
Speaker 2: and whoever's testing the pilot, they know their visions restricted.
Speaker 2: Are they relying on air traffic control at that point?
Speaker 3: And so this is where this is where we're all
Speaker 3: in on one team. When you're up in the air,
Speaker 3: you know, we would brief this every time we took
Speaker 3: off of once we get into the air. The only
Speaker 3: thing that matters is physics, and so we all have
Speaker 3: to work together as a team. Pilots, you're true chiefs
Speaker 3: in the backseat, air traffic control other airmen who are
Speaker 3: also flying and operating in that same airspace. And so
Speaker 3: it's an incredibly complex system. And realistically, the United States
Speaker 3: has done a fantastic job of managing all of the
Speaker 3: things that could go wrong and all of the human
Speaker 3: error that could intrude into a situation like that with
Speaker 3: a program that's been around and refined really for the
Speaker 3: last half half century called Crew Resource Management, and it
Speaker 3: is a formalized training program that is designed to make
Speaker 3: sure that pilot's, aircrew, air traffic controllers are all able
Speaker 3: to work together, exchange mission critical information, conduct airspace surveillance,
Speaker 3: and then check and crosscheck each other so that accidents
Speaker 3: don't happen, even when you're operating in a dynamic, high risk,
Speaker 3: rank structured environment. And so we really do have an
Speaker 3: exceptional track record of safety in aviation. But even so,
Speaker 3: it's still an incredibly complex environment to operate in, and
Speaker 3: just a couple of seconds of loss of concentration or
Speaker 3: focusing on the wrong thing still can unfortunately result in
Speaker 3: these terrible tragedies.
Speaker 2: Congressman Gabe Evans kind enough to be with us hee
Speaker 2: a black Hawk helicopter pilot during his years of service
Speaker 2: to the country. Now, sir, how fast would you guess
Speaker 2: that helicopter was moving at the time.
Speaker 3: The typical cruising speed for a Blackhawk helicopter is one
Speaker 3: hundred and twenty nine. We measure speed in knots air speed,
Speaker 3: not as like one point two miles an hour, so
Speaker 3: depending on your altitude, somewhere around one hundred and thirty
Speaker 3: miles an hour. Now, I have not ever personally flown
Speaker 3: in the Washington DC airspace and a black Hawk helicopter,
Speaker 3: so it's possible that there could be air speed restrictions
Speaker 3: when you're flying. It sounds like there's a rotary wing
Speaker 3: corridor that follows the Potomac. It's possible that there is
Speaker 3: an air speed restriction, But typically the Blackhawk helicopter is
Speaker 3: operated between eighty and one hundred and twenty knots, so
Speaker 3: ninety two one hundred and thirty one hundred and thirty
Speaker 3: five miles an hour.
Speaker 2: And I don't know if you've seen the new angle
Speaker 2: video that it new to us. You probably saw it before.
Speaker 2: That's just being made public that appears to show the
Speaker 2: helicopter flying straight at the plane. For I thought one
Speaker 2: reporter said, twelve or thirteen seconds, have you seen that angle?
Speaker 2: And if so, what do you make of that?
Speaker 3: So I haven't seen that angle, And really there's what
Speaker 3: initially pops to mind is, again, there are so many
Speaker 3: different things that you have to monitor when you're flying.
Speaker 3: The division of labor in the cockpit is typically one aircraft,
Speaker 3: one pilot who's operating the aircraft. They're the ones whose
Speaker 3: hands are on the control. They're controlling air speed, altitude, pitch,
Speaker 3: yaw roll, all of the things that you're doing to
Speaker 3: actually fly the aircraft. Then you have the non flying pilots,
Speaker 3: so they're monitoring radios, they're monitoring airspace, they're thinking ahead
Speaker 3: to whatever the next step is in the mission. And
Speaker 3: then you have your back seaters, your crew chiefs, who
Speaker 3: are continuing to provide a variety of other tasks, things
Speaker 3: like airspace surveillance. If you're carrying a load, they're in
Speaker 3: charge of the cargo. If you're in a combat situation,
Speaker 3: they're in charge of the machine gun. So that whole
Speaker 3: crew is working together to be able to operate that
Speaker 3: aircraft and again under night vision goggles dense airspace, the
Speaker 3: risk of what we call, you know, target fixation or
Speaker 3: tunnel vision, focusing on one thing instead of being able
Speaker 3: to maintain your scan and your situational awareness is something
Speaker 3: that's an ever present risk. And not just for pilots.
Speaker 3: You know, again, we're a team with air traffic control.
Speaker 3: They can see a lot of the same things that
Speaker 3: we see through what it's called a transponder, which allows
Speaker 3: air traffic control to specifically and uniquely identify aircraft, be
Speaker 3: able to see their altitude, be able to see their speed,
Speaker 3: and so it really is a team to be able
Speaker 3: to safely operate in the national airspace system.
Speaker 2: And my last two questions, you've been so generous with
Speaker 2: your time, and you have this unique expertise, so we
Speaker 2: want to try to tap it all. Speaking of air
Speaker 2: traffic control at that point, to you, as a layman,
Speaker 2: I would think that air traffic control would be screaming
Speaker 2: at both of those pilots and would have some type
Speaker 2: of process in place. And wouldn't there be an onboard
Speaker 2: collision alert system on the Blackhawk as well as on
Speaker 2: commercial airline So.
Speaker 3: That system is called t CAST Terminal Collision Avoidance system.
Speaker 3: It's installed on all the airliners. It's required to be
Speaker 3: the limitation with t casts, so t caass can see
Speaker 3: all of these other transponders. To operate in the airspace
Speaker 3: that's around these busy airport's Class B airspace, you are
Speaker 3: required to have a transponder on and operating as an
Speaker 3: airliner is coming in for landing. However, it's the aircraft
Speaker 3: is facing an airport where there are of course lots
Speaker 3: of other planes taking off and landing, and so the
Speaker 3: sensitivity of TEA casts actually steps down because you know,
Speaker 3: you don't need the system freaking out and telling you
Speaker 3: there's a bunch of planes ahead. Well, yes, I know
Speaker 3: that I'm going to land at the airport, so at
Speaker 3: below about one thousand feet and then around five hundred feet.
Speaker 3: There are designs in the TCAST system where it steps
Speaker 3: down its sensitivity just so it's not blaring at the
Speaker 3: pilots as they're executing this critical mode of flight, you know,
Speaker 3: landing in an airport.
Speaker 2: And thank you. That's really interesting and something I'd never
Speaker 2: heard before. Final question, why would there be a black
Speaker 2: cop training mission at night between these three major airports Dallas, Reagan, Baltimore.
Speaker 3: We had to do that all the time here in
Speaker 3: the Denver air space. Interesting, if you are going to
Speaker 3: operate that aircraft, you know, for myself as a pilot
Speaker 3: in command, once I take off, I mean you're almost
Speaker 3: like a a ship's captain. You have a tremendous breadth
Speaker 3: of authority to be able to do whatever it is
Speaker 3: that you deem necessary to protect the lives of your
Speaker 3: crew and respond to any emergencies or contingencies. And so
Speaker 3: that just what we call airmanship, good decision making. That
Speaker 3: airmanship is something that's evaluated. And so if you're going
Speaker 3: to be operating in you know, the Denver metro area,
Speaker 3: you're going to be operating in the Washington DC area,
Speaker 3: you know, moving VIPs. That's a mission set that I've performed.
Speaker 3: You have to be able to show your competence to
Speaker 3: be able to perform in that environment. And there's really
Speaker 3: no other alternative to evaluate your mission effectiveness other than
Speaker 3: to actually go out and fly the mission.
Speaker 2: Well, thank you so much, Congressman for sharing your expertise.
Speaker 2: I've got to tell you, you know, I around a
Speaker 2: lot of expert witnesses. I watch a lot of on TV, etc.
Speaker 2: I've never heard anybody explain these things better than you
Speaker 2: just did. So thank you for being here today and
Speaker 2: look forward to the next conversation.
Speaker 3: Well, I really appreciate it. Thanks for the time, and
Speaker 3: again our hearts go out to the friends and the
Speaker 3: families and the loved ones.
Speaker 2: Amend that you take care, sir that his Congressman gave Evans,
Speaker 2: who obviously has been a black Hawk helicopter pilot, appreciate
Speaker 2: his expertise. You're on the Dan Kapla Show.
Speaker 4: And now back to the Dan Taplas Show podcast.
Speaker 2: We usually come back with music. I don't know what
Speaker 2: that was. Is there an industrial accident back there or
Speaker 2: what something.
Speaker 4: That I'm interesting? You might say that it's the song
Speaker 4: is called Helicopter.
Speaker 2: Okay, see hey do they have an English version?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 5: That was it? Oh it was that kind of an
Speaker 5: English proto punk band. Gotcha, Kelly would hate this music.
Speaker 5: So I'm glad alexis here right now.
Speaker 2: It's I have been murdered. Well, and thank you Kelly
Speaker 2: off today. Thank you Alexa for being here. Thank you
Speaker 2: to Congressman Gabe Evans who joined us in the last segment.
Speaker 2: And I was saying to the congressman. You know, I
Speaker 2: work with a lot of great top experts from around
Speaker 2: the country in my lawn job, and obviously watched these
Speaker 2: experts on TV. These aviation guys, I've never heard better
Speaker 2: than we just heard in that last segment with Gabe Evans,
Speaker 2: who's an expert operating Black Hall helicopters. He's piloted them
Speaker 2: for years, including here and overseas, and he just added
Speaker 2: so much insight into you know, what it's like in
Speaker 2: the cockpit, particularly in those kind of situations. So if
Speaker 2: you get a chance, if you didn't hear it, go
Speaker 2: back in the podcast, Texter Dan Wild. Gabe Evans is
Speaker 2: a stud So glad you got elected. Great interview. Dan.
Speaker 2: If the TCA system or whatever downgrades near airports, well
Speaker 2: then we've got to keep army helicopters in night vision
Speaker 2: goggles away. Someone said, common sense. I learned so much
Speaker 2: in that interview, and what Congressman Evans was telling us
Speaker 2: was that, you know, these warning systems, collision warning systems
Speaker 2: are downgraded in sensitivity as you get closer to that
Speaker 2: airport runway because there are so many other planes there
Speaker 2: and they don't want the pilot being bombarded with these
Speaker 2: warnings because the warnings are triggered by transponders on other aircraft.
Speaker 2: So fascinating to know that. Not not very comforting, I
Speaker 2: think for anybody, but fascinating to know that Dana plane
Speaker 2: just hit them all in Philly. Text are correct. That's
Speaker 2: what the headlines have been. Now we're seeing some headlines
Speaker 2: saying near mall, some headlines saying further from all. Everybody's
Speaker 2: saying a small plane. The fireball that's visible in the video.
Speaker 2: Then if it's a small plane, single engine, small plane,
Speaker 2: the big fireball, I'm guessing is because of what it hit.
Speaker 2: You know, must have hit cars or something else with accelerant,
Speaker 2: you know, with some type of fuel to have that
Speaker 2: big of fireball. But apparently single engine, small plane and
Speaker 2: having grown up Ryan, I mean literally just off the
Speaker 2: end of the runway at Midway Airport in Chicago on
Speaker 2: the southwest side. Plane crashes, not major commercial crashes, but
Speaker 2: plane crashes just seemed like a fairly kind of routine thing,
Speaker 2: normally small planes. But there was that one big commercial crash.
Speaker 2: You would know this because you're like, you're like the
Speaker 2: original AI but that crash south side of Chicago, bunch
Speaker 2: of Watergate figures were on all right, Yeah, that was
Speaker 2: on the flight path to our house. If that plane
Speaker 2: had stayed in the air another second or two, it
Speaker 2: would have been right there. But what year was that,
Speaker 2: because yeah, that was the one big commercial crash in
Speaker 2: our neighborhood.
Speaker 5: I remember there was a Northwest Airlines crash in Detroit
Speaker 5: and only one little girl survived.
Speaker 4: Everybody else died.
Speaker 5: Her mother had covered her, her mother's charred body had
Speaker 5: protected the little girl.
Speaker 4: And she lived. She's in her thirties now, maybe forties.
Speaker 2: Man. We were so close to the end of the
Speaker 2: runway that literally, if we were flying in, family would
Speaker 2: come out on the back porch to wave.
Speaker 4: So I remember you remember when you tried to sit on.
Speaker 2: The right side of the plane because then you could
Speaker 2: see our house down there.
Speaker 4: Did you see Wayne's World the movie? I must have.
Speaker 4: There's a there's this great scene.
Speaker 5: I think it's Chicago, Illinois, and Wayne and Garth are
Speaker 5: literally right we were talking. They're on their car watching
Speaker 5: the planes fly overhead. So but I know it's true
Speaker 5: the question that I had, and I'm so glad that
Speaker 5: you asked, and thank you for doing that. Dan was
Speaker 5: so in Chicago. You've got o'haran Midway two airports. Yeah,
Speaker 5: Detroit only has one. We're we're talking here, and I
Speaker 5: just flew into Dullest to go to the inauguration. There
Speaker 5: are three three major airports, all within striking distance triangulated
Speaker 5: from one another, Dullest, Reagan in Baltimore, which isn't that
Speaker 5: far away either, And Representative Evans underscored to us, Yeah,
Speaker 5: you got to be able to fly black Hawk helicopter
Speaker 5: under those conditions.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I thought that was one of the really interesting
Speaker 2: things he said. Everything was actually but that they, as
Speaker 2: I understood him, they make it a point to go
Speaker 2: out into those most challenging environments to train because you've
Speaker 2: got to have that airmanship ability. And it is when
Speaker 2: you think about it, Ryan, right, I mean, what happened
Speaker 2: the other night completely preventable, cannot be allowed in America.
Speaker 2: But the fact that we have all these aircraft in
Speaker 2: the air all the time, and it's been how many
Speaker 2: years now since we've had a major disaster now, way
Speaker 2: too many near misses. Yeah, and obviously the system needs
Speaker 2: to be upgraded, but almost a miracle that we don't
Speaker 2: have more of this.
Speaker 5: But how much of this blame lies at the feet
Speaker 5: of Pete Budha Judge, who was horribly unqualified for that
Speaker 5: position Department of Transportation.
Speaker 4: We all know that, and he was a DEI hire himself.
Speaker 5: He was a mayor of South ben Indiana, had no
Speaker 5: experience in the field. We had not enough air traffic controllers.
Speaker 5: This is being widely reported. Then this is to blame
Speaker 5: one person was doing two persons people's jobs. Feel very
Speaker 5: bad for our air traffic controllers. But the question remains,
Speaker 5: why were they turning away qualified white male applicants just
Speaker 5: because they couldn't make diversity.
Speaker 2: Highers, Which is as I'm sure you intended, the perfect
Speaker 2: transition into our next guest, because this is a guest
Speaker 2: you probably have not heard anywhere else. Grady Block Mountain
Speaker 2: States Legal Foundation. They are not newcomers to this. They
Speaker 2: have had a class action suit in the works for
Speaker 2: a while representing I think over a thousand folks who
Speaker 2: wanted to be air traffic controllers and say they were
Speaker 2: denied because they're white. And so this lawsuit it's been
Speaker 2: certified for class action status. Will get the details after
Speaker 2: the break, but it comes down to this, right listen,
Speaker 2: It may well be that the most qualified air traffic
Speaker 2: controller in America. That one individual the pinnacle of the
Speaker 2: profession may be black, maybe a woman, maybe Latino, maybe white,
Speaker 2: maybe whatever. But the point being that when it comes
Speaker 2: to that position, or any position, it should not be
Speaker 2: based on race, as doctor King said, it should always
Speaker 2: be based on merit. But clearly, and whether it's a
Speaker 2: direct cause here or now, we don't know. We'll left
Speaker 2: to find out over time. But clearly, the left, clearly
Speaker 2: the left has been in many ways, many many ways,
Speaker 2: including legalization of drugs, and we have no idea if
Speaker 2: that was a factor here has been lowering the standards
Speaker 2: in America, lowering the standards of competence, lowering the standards
Speaker 2: of performance. That has to be replaced across the board.
Speaker 2: You're on the Dan Kapla.
Speaker 4: Show, you're listening to the Dan Kaplis Show podcast.
Speaker 6: I would say that I'm so sorry. Oh maybe people
Speaker 6: are getting detect children. I don't understand. I'm so sorry.
Speaker 6: I wish I could do something that it can I
Speaker 6: don't know what to do. I'll try everything.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Selena Gomez so deeply disturbed there. Well, one thing
Speaker 2: she could do is be grateful that President Trump is
Speaker 2: removing criminally legals, because criminally legals prey on everybody, including
Speaker 2: other people here illegally. Hey, let's go to the VIP line. Here,
Speaker 2: we've got Grady Block with us, very very important guests
Speaker 2: from Mountain State's Legal Foundation on this lawsuit, which has
Speaker 2: been important from day one, but now has taken on
Speaker 2: this added importance in view of the horror the other
Speaker 2: night in Washington, d C. Grady, Welcome to the Dan
Speaker 2: Kapla Show.
Speaker 7: Hey, Dan, thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 2: Well, this to me, both as a lawyer, talk show host,
Speaker 2: and American citizen, etc. Is so fascinating and important. Would
Speaker 2: you please give people an overview of this class action
Speaker 2: case pertaining to air traffic controllers and people who wanted
Speaker 2: that job.
Speaker 6: Absolutely.
Speaker 7: So, it's kind of an interesting case back to the
Speaker 7: late Obama Biden administration. So we are representing nearly one
Speaker 7: thousand members of this class that were discriminated against by
Speaker 7: their race by that administration. And basically what happened is,
Speaker 7: you know, they were wanting to be air traffic controllers.
Speaker 7: They went to school, they did all the right things,
Speaker 7: They graduated from a program that had nearly one hundred
Speaker 7: percent success rate, and placement for being an air traffic controller.
Speaker 7: And what happened was there was a class about a
Speaker 7: thousand people and the Obama Biden administration looked at it
Speaker 7: and said, you know, this looks a little bit too
Speaker 7: white for us, so we're going to revise all the
Speaker 7: metrics for getting into this. Instead of going with the
Speaker 7: program that they used to do, they switched to a
Speaker 7: different questionnaire that effectively gerrymandered the hiring pool. So these
Speaker 7: thousand people that were representing were excluded because of this
Speaker 7: new test that they implemented that essentially just discriminated people
Speaker 7: against them for their race.
Speaker 2: It's so wait a second, you're telling me you've got
Speaker 2: this pool of applicants generally considered qualified. It's where they'd
Speaker 2: drawn from in the past, largely to fill these air
Speaker 2: traffic control jobs. And that the is it the Obama
Speaker 2: Biden administration that then came in and changed the game
Speaker 2: because they didn't like the skin color of the applicants.
Speaker 7: That's exactly right. So this was back in twenty twelve,
Speaker 7: twenty thirteen when all this happened. We actually filed the
Speaker 7: suit in twenty fourteen, so this goes back quite a way.
Speaker 7: It's been going on for quite some time, but that's
Speaker 7: exactly what happened. They had a very qualified pool and
Speaker 7: they didn't like the color of their skin, so they
Speaker 7: changed the tests. Jerry mannered these people out of their
Speaker 7: expected jobs, effectively ruining their lives. You know, there were
Speaker 7: people that went to college, got degrees, took this test,
Speaker 7: invested thousands of dollars based on this previous test, and
Speaker 7: then they just had it all pulled out from under them.
Speaker 2: Oh my lord, Well, it sounds like I haven't read
Speaker 2: the pleatings, etc. But it sounds like an incredibly strong
Speaker 2: case that that's taken on an added national importance. Right now,
Speaker 2: what's the defense?
Speaker 7: So the defense is interesting right now? You know, the
Speaker 7: main thing we're still in discoveries. We haven't actually gotten
Speaker 7: to the true merits of the case. But the interesting
Speaker 7: part right now is that in the late Biden administration
Speaker 7: they had asserted privilege over about fourteen thousand documents and
Speaker 7: basically trying to sweep the entire thing under the rug.
Speaker 7: You know, there's been some settlement discussions, but nothing really
Speaker 7: truly fruitful. But yeah, it's definitely coming to light now
Speaker 7: for sure.
Speaker 2: Well, and so right now it would be the current
Speaker 2: administration that would be engaged in settlement discussions, right.
Speaker 7: And right, which is it's a very quickly moving target here,
Speaker 7: because you know, the administration just got into office, so
Speaker 7: you know, I'm not even sure if they were truly
Speaker 7: aware of all this happening right now. They definitely are
Speaker 7: now wow. But yeah, that's one thing that's really interesting
Speaker 7: thing is you know the change in administration. You know,
Speaker 7: President Trump could come in and order a very very
Speaker 7: different course of action here than the Biden administration.
Speaker 2: Well, right, and it would seem that he's very very
Speaker 2: sympathetic to your cause. And I'm just trying to understand
Speaker 2: how a defense in this case, But based on everything
Speaker 2: you've told this Grady Block, our special guest from Mountain
Speaker 2: States Legal Foundation, how any administration could ever try to
Speaker 2: justify this, could ever try to justify hiring for any
Speaker 2: position based on the criteria of skin color. It seems
Speaker 2: the opposite of doctor King's core principle and American law.
Speaker 2: But then beyond that, for this position, I mean, this
Speaker 2: is like a heart surgeon, right, You've got to have
Speaker 2: merit above all in that job.
Speaker 7: Yeah, absolutely, you're right, man. You know, this is something
Speaker 7: that is clearly capable of creating very serious, dangerous situations,
Speaker 7: you know, in a way at AA, sorry was playing
Speaker 7: politics with public safety really here, and you know doctor
Speaker 7: King said it. Justin's Clarence Thomas said it. The constitution
Speaker 7: of boris classifications based on race, and that's exactly what
Speaker 7: was happening here, and it's really unfortunate the situations that
Speaker 7: it's causing.
Speaker 2: Well, you guys do a lot of great work Mountain
Speaker 2: States Legal Foundation. Can you tell folks a little bit
Speaker 2: about it and if they want to support it, what
Speaker 2: they can do.
Speaker 7: Yeah, absolutely so, Mountain States Legua Foundation. It's in Denver, Colorado.
Speaker 7: We operate all over the West, but really all over
Speaker 7: the country or a nonprofit public interest firm and pro bono,
Speaker 7: which is one of the great things. Our clients love
Speaker 7: our rates. So we do all sorts of law. You know,
Speaker 7: we do free speech claims, we do Second Amendment work.
Speaker 7: We've got a couple active waiting period cases in Colorado
Speaker 7: and New Mexico right now. We do a lot of
Speaker 7: natural protection work and we're very accessible via social media.
Speaker 7: If you can also check out our website anytime at
Speaker 7: MS legal dot org.
Speaker 2: Well, I appreciate everything you guys do, and I'm going
Speaker 2: to dive into the pleatings over the weekend. How do
Speaker 2: I pronounce it? Bri I g I d A. Is
Speaker 2: that brigit up? Brigita v dot bridget bridgidarly.
Speaker 7: It was a bit of a source of confusion early on,
Speaker 7: but it's definitely bridget Okay. Yeah, the pleetings are fascinating ones.
Speaker 2: Yeah, courage. Now I'm going to dive in and then
Speaker 2: tweet them out, but would love to stay in touch
Speaker 2: with you as this unfolds. I think it's important on
Speaker 2: so many levels, and starting obviously now with making sure
Speaker 2: we have the most competent people possible, you know, and
Speaker 2: if that means every air traffic controller is a person
Speaker 2: of color, or is a woman, or is white, or
Speaker 2: is this or is that it just needs to be
Speaker 2: the most qualified.
Speaker 7: Person, absolutely, Daniel hulf percent right. Really the important thing
Speaker 7: here is safety, and that's I don't think anybody cares
Speaker 7: about the race. People just want to be safe when
Speaker 7: they're flying.
Speaker 2: Amen to that. Well, Hey, thank you keep up the
Speaker 2: great work and we'll talk soon.
Speaker 7: Yeah, thank you so much, Dan, Thanks for having.
Speaker 2: Me take care of that is a grady block fascinating.
Speaker 2: Just can't wait to dive into those pleadings. He just
Speaker 2: can't anywhere in America. You can't be hiring based on race.
Speaker 2: It's just fundamentally un American and crazy. And this guy
Speaker 2: led the way he hit it right.
Speaker 1: I have a.
Speaker 5: Dream my poor little children.
Speaker 4: One day live in a nation where they will not
Speaker 4: be judged.
Speaker 5: By the color of masks skin, but by the content
Speaker 5: of that character.
Speaker 7: I have a dream.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's all about Merrick, right, that was at the
Speaker 2: core of Doctor King. So how now do you have
Speaker 2: you know, the Joe Biden's and the John Hickenloopers and
Speaker 2: the Michael Bennett's and the Jared Poulis's and the Al
Speaker 2: Sharptons out there saying, oh no, it can't be about
Speaker 2: Merit can't be about merit. It has to be about
Speaker 2: what color you happen to be born?
Speaker 5: Great text here to go to break with too, Dan
Speaker 5: asking the Dems hired eighty seven thousand IRS agents, but
Speaker 5: not enough air traffic controllers.
Speaker 2: Right right, And this next one, Dan Selena Gomez needs
Speaker 2: to be taken into custody and deported. She has renounced
Speaker 2: her citizenship, which she never should have had. No listen, No,
Speaker 2: I don't agree with any of that. Here's the point,
Speaker 2: and that was the crying Sabrina Selena Gomez we played.
Speaker 6: I just want to say that I'm so sorry.
Speaker 2: Oh maybe I just love to get around and have
Speaker 2: the conversation. Where does that come from? Okay, where does
Speaker 2: that come from? Where does it come from, whether it's
Speaker 2: Selena Gomez or John hicken Luberg, Jared Poulis and Mike
Speaker 2: Johnston or any of them. Where you put the rights
Speaker 2: of somebody who's not only here illegally but then is
Speaker 2: committing other crimes, you put the protection of that person.
Speaker 2: I had, of the safety of Americans. You put the
Speaker 2: protection of that person I had, the safety of women,
Speaker 2: I had, of the safety of everybody, including I had
Speaker 2: of the safety of other people here at Lee Because
Speaker 2: you got two different kinds of people here illegally, right,
Speaker 2: You got those here illegally you shouldn't make, shouldn't have
Speaker 2: come illegally, but they're here illegally, but they're not committing
Speaker 2: any other crimes. And then you've got those here illegally
Speaker 2: who are committing other crimes and often commit those other
Speaker 2: crimes against other people here illegally.
Speaker 4: So is this.
Speaker 2: How can any thinking person say the thing she's thinking
Speaker 2: and saying? It just shows you you don't care about
Speaker 2: innocent victims. You put criminals committing criminal acts on a pedestal,
Speaker 2: and you don't even care about people here illegally who
Speaker 2: aren't committing other crimes. I mean, this is like utter madness.
Speaker 2: You're on the Dan Kaplas Show.
Speaker 4: And now back to the Dankaplass Show podcast.
Speaker 2: Then understand Seleena Gomez brought to tears by the thought
Speaker 2: of criminals people who have actually committed criminal offenses after
Speaker 2: being illegally but separately committed criminal offenses, now being deported
Speaker 2: brings her to tears. Remarkable, Why not the tears for
Speaker 2: the innocent people who are the victims of these criminals.
Speaker 2: But hey, I want to get onto this Philly crash.
Speaker 2: I'm getting a bunch of text this one though, Dan,
Speaker 2: I think we're winning too much, too fast for human
Speaker 2: brains to keep up with. But then on the crash
Speaker 2: with multiple textures saying, no, Dan, it's not a small plane,
Speaker 2: et cetera. It's not a single engine plane. It's this
Speaker 2: or that. The sourcing that I rely on in fast
Speaker 2: breaking stories like this, and it's not perfect. I've just
Speaker 2: found it to be probably the most reliable in quick
Speaker 2: breaking stories are the local media. So here I go
Speaker 2: to the Philadelphia and Choir, for example, and they're reporting,
Speaker 2: they're quoting the governor, they're quoting Federman, et cetera. And
Speaker 2: then the FAA reporting is two people on board. We
Speaker 2: have texters saying two pilots, two doctors, one patient on board,
Speaker 2: and air ambulance, and that may turn out to be true.
Speaker 2: I'm not saying a Texter is wrong. I'm just saying
Speaker 2: the reporting right now in the Philadelphia Enquirer is two
Speaker 2: people on board and a lear Jet fifty five, which
Speaker 2: CNN is describing as a mid size jet, and that
Speaker 2: might explain the size of the fireball. When the initial
Speaker 2: reporting was a small single engine aircraft, then my assumption
Speaker 2: was the fireball was probably caused by whatever it's struck
Speaker 2: on the ground. But if you've got a SCNN says
Speaker 2: a mid size jet, then at that point and shortly
Speaker 2: after takeoffs, so there's going to be a lot of
Speaker 2: fuel on board, that might explain that the amount of
Speaker 2: damage done on the ground. But at this point, at
Speaker 2: least FAA is saying two people on board and at
Speaker 2: this point jet confirmed as a lyric Jet fifty five
Speaker 2: shortly takeoff. I don't know, it may turn out to
Speaker 2: be confirmed later that it's an air ambulance with more people, etc.
Speaker 2: But we'll keep you posted as we get news on
Speaker 2: that tragedy we did have if you weren't with us.
Speaker 2: Congressman gave Evans with us earlier so impressive as a
Speaker 2: former black Hawk helicopter pilot in the military. As he provided,
Speaker 2: he took us inside the cockpit of a black Hawk,
Speaker 2: and he did a great job of explaining the very
Speaker 2: limited vision available to those pilots because they'd have their
Speaker 2: night vision goggles on as part of the training, and
Speaker 2: so compared to you and me looking up, looking down,
Speaker 2: looking sideways, they'd have a very very limited vision. He
Speaker 2: described it as a tunnel like as you can picture
Speaker 2: these two tunnels protruding from each eye on the night
Speaker 2: vision goggles, and so very really helped understand that. So
Speaker 2: obviously the question was, well, why are they wearing stuff
Speaker 2: like that and why are they doing that kind of
Speaker 2: training in the middle of three major airports. The Congressman
Speaker 2: pointed out that no, that is done on purpose, because
Speaker 2: these pilots have to have the highest level of airmanship,
Speaker 2: and so they have to train under the most demanding conditions.
Speaker 2: And the Congressman was making the point that so much
Speaker 2: of this training goes on for so many years without
Speaker 2: any kind of mishappen and he emphasized obviously that this
Speaker 2: is a horrible tragedy, but it was just great to
Speaker 2: have that perspective from inside the cockpit. Let's go to
Speaker 2: the phone lines. Talk to Rosio. You're on the Dan
Speaker 2: Kaplis show. Welcome Rosio. Well, long time, long talk.
Speaker 4: I like to say that this was coming long ago.
Speaker 2: Remember in the nineteen nineties when they were talking about
Speaker 2: doing the trophies.
Speaker 3: For everyone ordeal, Well, they enrolled that into the.
Speaker 5: DEI, and that's why we're seeing well people getting picked.
Speaker 2: Fascinating point, Razio, and thank you for that. Listen, this
Speaker 2: lowering of standards which is largely the fault of the
Speaker 2: left in America, and I understand people tie it to
Speaker 2: DEI conversation. Hey, we just had somebody on from Mountain
Speaker 2: States Legal in a class action representing a thousand people
Speaker 2: who are saying we were qualified to be air traffic
Speaker 2: controllers and we didn't get the job because we were
Speaker 2: white pursuing to Obama policies. So you know, those are
Speaker 2: legitimate questions that have to be answered. This is America.
Speaker 2: Nobody should be discriminated against in a job search because
Speaker 2: of the color of their skin. But going beyond these
Speaker 2: very important issues of racial discrimination, we have a lowering
Speaker 2: of standards in America, and I believe the Left has
Speaker 2: been primarily responsible for that in multiple different ways. We
Speaker 2: need to be having that broader conversation because America has
Speaker 2: always been about we prided ourselves on excellence. We prided
Speaker 2: ourselves on being great and cutting edge, and whether we're
Speaker 2: a janitor or whether we're a CEO, you know we are.
Speaker 2: We're Americans. We're going to be the best, and the
Speaker 2: Left in so many different ways has been tearing that
Speaker 2: down because the left doesn't want America to be a
Speaker 2: great country. Right here, listen to this. This is Barack Obama,
Speaker 2: the same guy who's at issue and the Air Traffic
Speaker 2: Controller lawsuit.
Speaker 7: No world order that elevates one nation or group of
Speaker 7: people over another will succeed, No balance of power among
Speaker 7: nations will hold.
Speaker 2: So Obama said it to the United Nations. He didn't
Speaker 2: want America to be better than any other nation. No,
Speaker 2: we are, and that's who we were meant to be.
Speaker 2: And so, whether it's through the mass legalization of drugs,
Speaker 2: whether it's through all this other stuff the left's doing,
Speaker 2: they've just been trying to make us mush lower our standards. No,
Speaker 2: we're Americans. We've we've got cross party lines. We've got
Speaker 2: to be elevating standards. Excellence has to be the again,
Speaker 2: and so we'll talk some more Monday about how to
Speaker 2: do that in other ways. Also, Ryan, thank you for
Speaker 2: all your great work. Alexa. Great to have and always
Speaker 2: so nice to see you. You are one tough Umbras.
Speaker 2: Join us Monday on the Dan Kaplas Show.