Speaker 1: It's night Side with Dan Ray on w b Z
Speaker 1: Boston's new video.
Speaker 2: Nicole, you're one of the kindest people I know. Calling
Speaker 2: today's stock market troublesome. I get another T word for it, terrible.
Speaker 2: Have a good weekend, Nicole.
Speaker 3: I am.
Speaker 2: Don't look at your for one k whatever you do.
Speaker 2: My name is Dan Ray, and Nicole is one of
Speaker 2: the nicest people in the world, never mind nicest people
Speaker 2: at WBZ, but she really is. I'm not necessarily nice.
Speaker 2: I'm the talk show host and I'm not bad, but
Speaker 2: I'm not as nice as Nicole. We're headed for four hours.
Speaker 2: As Nicole said, all the way up until eleven fifty eight.
Speaker 2: My name is Dan Ray. As I said, I am
Speaker 2: the host of Nightside, heard every Monday through Friday night
Speaker 2: from eight until midnight. Rob Brooks, the producer of this program,
Speaker 2: is in the control room. I'll set to take your calls,
Speaker 2: but not until nine o'clock. During this hour, we will
Speaker 2: have four guests. We're gonna learn about TikTok, gonna talk about,
Speaker 2: you know, all the other stories that are around today,
Speaker 2: including bird flu, something else to worry about, distracted eating,
Speaker 2: and the LA wildfire scams. It's not bad enough to
Speaker 2: have the wildfires, but now I have to deal with
Speaker 2: the scam artists, so we'll deal with it, don't worry.
Speaker 2: First up this hour, I'm delighted to welcome Mark Milton.
Speaker 2: He's an attorney with one of my favorite organizations, the
Speaker 2: Liberty Council, and Mark Miller, welcome to night. Said, how
Speaker 2: are you, sir? You damn the Liberty Foundation, the Pacific
Speaker 2: Liberty Foundation. My mistake. You're going to talk about TikTok
Speaker 2: argued in front of the State Supreme Court today. I
Speaker 2: didn't listen to the arguments, but from all that I've heard,
Speaker 2: the justices seemed disinclined to save TikTok, which I'm sure is.
Speaker 2: It's a confusing case for many people who do not
Speaker 2: live and die like TikTok. Why did you set it
Speaker 2: up for us? Give us a quick law school brief,
Speaker 2: if you will, of the parties and the interest at hand.
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, I think that's a great way, you know,
Speaker 4: to set it up, Dan, you know a law school brief.
Speaker 4: This is a perfect law school hypothetical where you've got
Speaker 4: national security national defense. On one hand. The federal government
Speaker 4: says that China to a company called Byte dance bite.
Speaker 4: The Chinese company that answers to the Chinese government controls
Speaker 4: an American company, TikTok, running this app that are children
Speaker 4: or grand children like to use, and they adjust what
Speaker 4: are you know what Americans are watching and viewing on
Speaker 4: that TikTok app based on their own secret algorithm, and
Speaker 4: they so that's their content. And then separately they're pumping
Speaker 4: in the information that the users have all their data
Speaker 4: back to China. At least they could. China can demand
Speaker 4: that Byte Dance give China government the data that TikTok
Speaker 4: is collecting. And so you've got content mediation, content description
Speaker 4: on the internet on that app that can be adjusted,
Speaker 4: and the government is saying we think that content is
Speaker 4: bad because they can be adjusting. And so you get
Speaker 4: pro Chinese government information on the app as opposed to
Speaker 4: your cat videos. And then separately the data being collected
Speaker 4: from the users. You know, you're a young American and
Speaker 4: maybe that data could be used to blackmail them in
Speaker 4: the future. That's just as capital set. On the other hand,
Speaker 4: you've got free speech and not only did you have
Speaker 4: TikTok there. Arguing to President Trump's former Solicitor General, No Francisco,
Speaker 4: but also another attorneytum Fisher, represent a couple of users saying, we,
Speaker 4: like you know, we engage in free speech here. This
Speaker 4: is not a national security risk. Maybe you need to
Speaker 4: tell the users that they might have some sort of
Speaker 4: risk that needs to be disclosures, that China will get
Speaker 4: your information or could get your information, but that it
Speaker 4: is overstepping the First Amendment to shut down the website
Speaker 4: or the app altogether.
Speaker 2: You get an A plus from for briefing here, councilor
Speaker 2: so just in terms of background, Congress in a bipartisan fashion,
Speaker 2: something that really happens bill signed by the President said
Speaker 2: that basically the owners of TikTok have to sell to
Speaker 2: American owners by I guess it's a week from Sunday,
Speaker 2: the nineteenth, or TikTok will be taken down in the US. Now.
Speaker 2: I don't know how physically they can take down TikTok
Speaker 2: or block TikTok, but I'm assuming if they say they
Speaker 2: can do it, they can do it. The reports I
Speaker 2: heard today and I didn't listen to the to the arguments,
Speaker 2: were that the majority of the justices seemed very skeptical
Speaker 2: of the First Amendment argument. And seemed somewhat inclined, perhaps
Speaker 2: to support the legislative action the build that was passed
Speaker 2: by Congress and signed by the President.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I was a little surprised, Dan, because I that's
Speaker 4: how I interpreted the or argument as well. And I
Speaker 4: say surprised because the lower court had said the lawless
Speaker 4: constitutional that in fact TikTok could be shut down or
Speaker 4: before you know by Dans could be forced to sell it.
Speaker 4: And so if the lower court said that, why would
Speaker 4: the Supreme Court rush the case up? Now you could
Speaker 4: argue they rushed it up because of that January nineteenth deadline,
Speaker 4: but they could have taken action, They could have stayed
Speaker 4: the case. In fact, the dupotent Justice lawyer was parlical.
Speaker 4: I admitted that court could have just stayed the case.
Speaker 4: He didn't have to rush for that January nineteenth deadline.
Speaker 4: But they rushed the case up, had briefing over Christmas
Speaker 4: for just a couple of weeks over the holidays. And
Speaker 4: so you sort of usually suggest the Supreme Coourt doesn't
Speaker 4: like the lower court decision because why would it get
Speaker 4: involved if they think the lowered court decision was correct.
Speaker 4: But nevertheless, I was a little surprised because they did
Speaker 4: seem very skeptical. Maybe the best example would be Justice Corsa,
Speaker 4: where he just said, look, you know, you might have
Speaker 4: young Americans using this data, using this app, and now
Speaker 4: their data is being collected future trying it could blackmail
Speaker 4: them if they are leaders in government, maybe they work
Speaker 4: in the FBI or CIA, or they are elected a
Speaker 4: business and you know, you can imagine that that our
Speaker 4: young people would you know, be doing things that they
Speaker 4: wouldn't want the world to know twenty thirty years later,
Speaker 4: some things they did as kids, as young adults, And
Speaker 4: so that was Gorsas perspective, and for the most part
Speaker 4: it did seem to be where the court was landing
Speaker 4: that there's nothing that vilely tree speech to force a
Speaker 4: Chinese company to divest itself of an American company. The
Speaker 4: Chinese company, by dance, has no First Amendment rights. Maybe
Speaker 4: TikTok has some degree of rights, and maybe those users do,
Speaker 4: but do they have a right to demand a particular app.
Speaker 4: In fact, Justice Thomas even said, look, if you could
Speaker 4: just say a user can object to a divesting order
Speaker 4: of a big business to a smaller business, then why
Speaker 4: couldn't we have stopped the AT and T breakup. And
Speaker 4: then I know you and I are old enough to
Speaker 4: remember the AT and T breakup, and you know, would
Speaker 4: we have been able to sue and say, well, gee,
Speaker 4: I like to use AT and T as my long
Speaker 4: distance and local phone provider. Of course not that was
Speaker 4: a big deal of the eighties. No one thought that
Speaker 4: was a free speech violation. These people who want to
Speaker 4: use TikTok and certainly make their little TikTok videos, their
Speaker 4: cat videos or whatever they do on other apps besides TikTok.
Speaker 2: How many people in America use TikTok? I have no clue.
Speaker 2: I mean, obviously it's got to be millions. I get that.
Speaker 2: I'm not a tick. I'm on Instagram, I'm on Facebook,
Speaker 2: I'm on Accident, all of that. TikTok's not my thing.
Speaker 2: How many TikTok users are we talking about here? Soon?
Speaker 4: The number the number I heard bandid about at the
Speaker 4: oil argument today, Justice so that my own At one
Speaker 4: point she did half of all Americans. The lawyer pushed
Speaker 4: back on that, but the number was one hundred and
Speaker 4: twenty million. The lawyer said, well, just because there's one
Speaker 4: hundred and twenty million downloads of the app doesn't mean
Speaker 4: it's one hundred and twenty million different users. It's kind
Speaker 4: of what he said. But bottom line, a lot of
Speaker 4: people are using it. And I can tell you as
Speaker 4: a father of four children, three daughters, they all use it.
Speaker 4: All four kids, three girls and one boy. They're on
Speaker 4: that TikTok all the time, just like you might be
Speaker 4: on Twitter. I know I'm a dick the Twitter myself
Speaker 4: or x.
Speaker 2: Uh yeah, I gotta tell you, I'm really not. I
Speaker 2: I do it only because of my business, which is
Speaker 2: to promote my broadcast. And when I finished my career
Speaker 2: in the in broadcast, I'm getting off everything. I gotta
Speaker 2: tell you. I mean, it's a It destroys your time,
Speaker 2: and I think all of us spend much too much
Speaker 2: time looking at these stupid screens. And uh maybe they
Speaker 2: maybe they would do young people real quick question the
Speaker 2: the three liberal justices on the Court, Kagan, Sodomara and
Speaker 2: Quintanji Brown Jackson, are they disinclined? Is this decision going
Speaker 2: to essentially be decided by how the six so called conservatives,
Speaker 2: including Judge John roberts Sheep, Justice roberts Coe.
Speaker 4: I think you could see a unanimous decision. I think
Speaker 4: all the justices maybe you know, maybe in that Justice
Speaker 4: Corsicch was maybe the most sympathetic to the arguments of.
Speaker 2: If he's asking questions like that and he's the most sympathetic,
Speaker 2: I think they're in trouble.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Well, the most liberal, the liberal justice is Justice Kagan
Speaker 4: was very skeptical. She and Thomas Bolt very skeptical of
Speaker 4: the TikTok argument. Justice Jackson was trying to stay to
Speaker 4: the lawyer for TikTok and Old Francisco. She was saying
Speaker 4: to him, I think you're making a long argument, which
Speaker 4: usually isn't a good sign.
Speaker 2: She's not a good not a good time. Heay, Mark,
Speaker 2: I appreciate it. I appreciate the analysis really good. I
Speaker 2: wish when I was in law school I had your
Speaker 2: abilities when when Professor Dennis Aronowitz would call on me
Speaker 2: and when you weren't prepared, it'd show you the door.
Speaker 2: It's a great law professor, though, Mark, appreciate your time tonight,
Speaker 2: and we'll we'll be following this closely. I'm assume we're
Speaker 2: going to get an expedited decision here. This is not
Speaker 2: going to be decided on June thirtieth.
Speaker 4: I ume absolutely because of that January nineteenth deadline, they're
Speaker 4: either going to make a quick decision and write a
Speaker 4: longer opinion later, or maybe they will just stay the
Speaker 4: case and we'll get an opinion later. But either way,
Speaker 4: we'll know in the next week or so what they're
Speaker 4: going to do.
Speaker 2: It's great, Mark Miller, have a great weekend. Mark Miller
Speaker 2: from the Pacific Legal Foundation, a great organization, legal organization,
Speaker 2: ladies and gentlemen. They do incredibly good work. Pacific Legal Foundation.
Speaker 2: Check them out. We'll get back on to talk about
Speaker 2: something that is equally problematic, and that is the rise
Speaker 2: of bird flu. We have a doctor, Chief of Division
Speaker 2: of Infectious Diseases at Brigham and Women's Hospital, doctor Daniel Kritzkis.
Speaker 2: He's gonna join us at on bird flu. Right after
Speaker 2: this break. This is Nightside. My name's Dan Ray. You
Speaker 2: listen to WBZ Boston's news radio. You can always download
Speaker 2: the iHeart app now the new and improved iHeart app,
Speaker 2: and listen to us twenty four to seven from all
Speaker 2: corners of the globe. Back on Nightside after this.
Speaker 1: Now back to Dan Ray live from the Window World
Speaker 1: Nightside Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2: Well, as if we don't have enough things to worry about,
Speaker 2: now we have something else, bird flu. Doctor Daniel kritzkis
Speaker 2: he's the chief division of Infectious Diseases at Brigham and
Speaker 2: Women's Hospital. Doctor Kritzkas, thanks so much for joining us
Speaker 2: here on nightside. Bird flu. It sounds horrible. It's been
Speaker 2: around longer than most people realize. What's the deal.
Speaker 5: Yeah, so this is an infection that has come and
Speaker 5: gone over the years. We've had epidemics in the past.
Speaker 5: It's often associated with, you know, large poultry farms, and
Speaker 5: then occasionally spills out into other kinds of animals, as
Speaker 5: recently we've seen in cattle. Fortunately, we've seen a relatively
Speaker 5: small number of cases in people, less than seventy cases
Speaker 5: in humans. But it does have the potential to be severe,
Speaker 5: as we've seen recently from this one death in Louisiana.
Speaker 2: Now here's my first dumb question, and as I say,
Speaker 2: I get paid to ask questions dumb or otherwise? Is
Speaker 2: this the same as avian flu?
Speaker 3: Or?
Speaker 2: Is it? Yes?
Speaker 5: And bird flu and avian flu are essentially the same thing.
Speaker 2: All right, Okay, good enough, So we get that out
Speaker 2: of the way. Okay, So this like another problem that
Speaker 2: we had a few years ago called COVID. Apparently emanates
Speaker 2: from China. Came from China. I guess what more than
Speaker 2: twenty years or was first diagnosed or spotted isolated whatever
Speaker 2: the verb is in China twenty or so years ago,
Speaker 2: Am I right?
Speaker 5: I believe that's correct. The original outbreak of a v
Speaker 5: and or bird H five and one influenza was picked
Speaker 5: up in the poultry markets in China, as you say,
Speaker 5: about two decades ago.
Speaker 2: Yeah, sort of a similar pattern.
Speaker 4: Now.
Speaker 2: I do know that we've had one case that ended
Speaker 2: in a fatale and ended in a death guy down
Speaker 2: in Arkansas. If I'm not mistaken.
Speaker 5: Correct, I thought it was Louisiana, but Arkansas.
Speaker 2: We'll flip a point on that. When you are right
Speaker 2: on that, I get those Southern states mixed up. So
Speaker 2: he was hanging out with poultry. I guess it was
Speaker 2: some some some sort of a farmer. So do we
Speaker 2: need to I think, I guess what I meant.
Speaker 5: Well, So, I think what it highlights is that this
Speaker 5: is a potential occupational risk when we have large numbers
Speaker 5: of animals, will be they birds or or cattle or hogs,
Speaker 5: or whatever being raised in very close quarters that there's
Speaker 5: the opportunity for viruses to spread among the animals if
Speaker 5: it gets introduced in some way, and then the workers
Speaker 5: who are in contact with those animals are at risk
Speaker 5: of acquiring infection. Fortunately that's uncommon, but it is a
Speaker 5: potential risk.
Speaker 2: How long do you think we would we will know
Speaker 2: if this is something that's going to blossom? Is there
Speaker 2: sort of a period of once you have your initial
Speaker 2: outbreaks from an infectious dease disease point of view that
Speaker 2: if it doesn't really bloom within their days or sixty days,
Speaker 2: it's likely to die in the vine? Or what? Are
Speaker 2: we looking at it the short run? Also maybe the
Speaker 2: longer run.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's hard to say, because I think that the
Speaker 5: issue here is not so much the kind of seasonal
Speaker 5: activity as we see with typical influenza, where we know
Speaker 5: that we're going to see an increase in November December
Speaker 5: and will peak sometime in January February, and expect the
Speaker 5: cases to tail off into March and April. Here, the
Speaker 5: issue is really going to be what is the activity
Speaker 5: in these large animal farms. We need to be doing
Speaker 5: surveillance among poultry farms and cattle ranches and the like
Speaker 5: to see what's how frequently is this being picked up
Speaker 5: in these animals, because that's what's the potential risk for
Speaker 5: spread into the human population.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the other question is how does it get spread
Speaker 2: amongst the bird population. I'm assuming that people who have
Speaker 2: chickens or turkey farms, they I assume they're not mingling
Speaker 2: their their flocks with other flocks, particularly with something like
Speaker 2: this going on. How does it get spread?
Speaker 5: Right, That's a great question I would again, I'd have
Speaker 5: to assume that part of the problem is birds fly,
Speaker 5: not chickens, of course, but other birds do. And avian
Speaker 5: influenza is not limited to poultry and other commercial birds,
Speaker 5: but it is found in migrating birds. And so as
Speaker 5: those birds fly, you know, north and south, as they migrate,
Speaker 5: there's the opportunity for them to spread the infection and
Speaker 5: in their i guano, they can spread it potentially to
Speaker 5: birds that or poultry that are being farmed for food consumption,
Speaker 5: and it ultimately gets introduced into those large commercial operations.
Speaker 2: Are there any species that are more susceptible to this
Speaker 2: disease that we should be particularly cautious of?
Speaker 5: Well, I do think we have to really worry about
Speaker 5: chickens and ducks and geese because those are the populations
Speaker 5: that we have the largest concentrations of. And there's a
Speaker 5: big distinction. In some bird species, the virus may not
Speaker 5: cause symptomatic infection, so these birds can serve as carriers,
Speaker 5: and in other birds or species, the virus may cause
Speaker 5: illness and you see die offs in the population.
Speaker 2: Is there any sort of a cyclical aspect to this,
Speaker 2: meaning when at first, every once in a while you
Speaker 2: hear about something that comes around every four or five years,
Speaker 2: or every seven or eight years, there's nothing that's cyclical
Speaker 2: about this. It's just always there, but it pops up
Speaker 2: more often for some reason that obviously it's difficult to trace.
Speaker 2: Is that accurate.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's a great question. We know that when we
Speaker 5: see cyclical things happening in the human population, it's because
Speaker 5: when there's a large outbreak, a lot of people become exposed.
Speaker 5: They then get immune, and then over time the immunity wanes,
Speaker 5: and then as they become less immune, there's the opportunity
Speaker 5: for another cycle. It's not so clear how that's working
Speaker 5: in the animal population. There must be something similar to
Speaker 5: that going on, and a bunch of birds get infected,
Speaker 5: they eventually die off, the infection becomes less prevalent, and
Speaker 5: then some new birds get infected and it starts all
Speaker 5: over again. But I'm really speculating there.
Speaker 2: Well, let me just say this, your great interview. You've
Speaker 2: answered all my questions and none of them, as you know,
Speaker 2: are prescripted, because I'm just thinking outside the box, like
Speaker 2: trying what people would And you're a great interview and
Speaker 2: I really thank you for your time tonight, particularly on
Speaker 2: Friday night, and I thank you for what you do.
Speaker 2: You know, infectious diseases traditionally over the centuries have devastated populations,
Speaker 2: and obviously COVID was a devastating problem in the world.
Speaker 2: And I just want to say thanks very much for
Speaker 2: what the medicine that you practice, because it's so very critical.
Speaker 2: Doctor Daniel Coriscus, I really mean that. Thank you so much.
Speaker 5: Well, you're You're very welcome. I'm much appreciated.
Speaker 2: Right, we'll talk again, and you're at the great hospital,
Speaker 2: one of the great hospitals in the world. Brigaman Women's right,
Speaker 2: good night, good night. When we get back, going to
Speaker 2: talk about something we can control. I'm going to talk
Speaker 2: with Richard Sema neuroscience Semma. He's a neuroscientist and brain
Speaker 2: Matters columnist for the Washington Post. We're going to talk
Speaker 2: about distracted eating. All of us know about distracted driving.
Speaker 2: Now we're going to learn about distractive eating, which also
Speaker 2: can be harmful. We will explain right after the news
Speaker 2: at the bottom of the hour on Nightside on our
Speaker 2: Friday night. As we head into the weekend, maybe a weekend,
Speaker 2: it'll be nicer than we perhaps could have anticipated a
Speaker 2: few days go.
Speaker 1: It's Night Side with Dan Ray on Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2: Next up, we're going to talk about distracted eating with
Speaker 2: Washington Post columnists. He is the neural scientists and brain
Speaker 2: Matters columnists for The warp Hole. Richard, is it Sima
Speaker 2: or Sema?
Speaker 6: It's Sema? And how are you?
Speaker 2: I'm doing great. I'm doing great. So distracted eating, obviously,
Speaker 2: I think most of us can identify with that. Why
Speaker 2: Why are people, I guess all of us eating in
Speaker 2: a distracted fashion?
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 6: So, distracted eating, as it sounds like, is whenever you're
Speaker 6: eating and doing anything else, You're maybe on your smartphone,
Speaker 6: you're watching TV or even socializing and or at work,
Speaker 6: and I think part of the reason that researchers think
Speaker 6: this is on the rise as well. Food is more accessible,
Speaker 6: a lot of processed foods. It's take on the go,
Speaker 6: you can have a you know, at your dusk. But
Speaker 6: at the same time, we also have more distractions and
Speaker 6: more ways of doing work or other things than the goes,
Speaker 6: such as the smartphone. But unfortunately, the research shows that
Speaker 6: when we are distracted, we not only eat more food
Speaker 6: and it's associated with more weight gain, but we also
Speaker 6: don't taste the food as much either. Yeah, yeah, now
Speaker 6: I hear you.
Speaker 2: So is this a phenomenon of the twenty first century
Speaker 2: and we've all learned how to multitask. You're talking on
Speaker 2: the phone, you're working on your computer, and your stuff
Speaker 2: in your mouth with stuff that probably isn't good. Is
Speaker 2: that just that we're all trying to do more things
Speaker 2: within the same limited period of time. I assume that
Speaker 2: is so, But tell me I'm wrong.
Speaker 6: Yeah, well, I think like certain things have become easier, right,
Speaker 6: Like we have screens, we have TV, we have smartphones.
Speaker 6: But you know, like back in the past we also
Speaker 6: did eat with other people, which technically is a distraction too.
Speaker 6: You know, you're talking you're like, you're trying to listen
Speaker 6: to conversation, you're abe ata party. But the interesting thing
Speaker 6: about that is socializing as a distraction doesn't seem to
Speaker 6: be associated with like, you know, this increased in increase
Speaker 6: in BMI or increase in eating. And a researcher I
Speaker 6: talked to about this was, you know, who did this
Speaker 6: kind of study. So that might be because you know,
Speaker 6: when we're talking, we're usually not eating at least polite
Speaker 6: to do so, and you know, it means we're probably
Speaker 6: slowing down. And I think that's the through line of
Speaker 6: why distracting could be so unhealthy is.
Speaker 3: That you know, we know that.
Speaker 6: If we eat faster, we chew less, we tend to
Speaker 6: eat more. And the reason for that is because we're
Speaker 6: not able to sense how ful we're getting because it
Speaker 6: takes about twenty minutes or so for our guts to
Speaker 6: produce these signals, these hormones that tell us we're getting full,
Speaker 6: and if we're doing something else, we are less likely
Speaker 6: to build to like really listen to those signals. And similarly, yeah,
Speaker 6: I'll go.
Speaker 2: On, how long has this stuff been studied? I mean,
Speaker 2: I grew up in a time when families actually had dinners,
Speaker 2: and we tried with our kids to have as many
Speaker 2: family dinners as possible, but it became more and more
Speaker 2: difficult with both parents working on is this Is this
Speaker 2: a fairly new field of study, by the way, I.
Speaker 6: Think it's become more you know, there's a lot more
Speaker 6: interest in it because yeah, it's it's harder now to
Speaker 6: have sit down dinners with the whole family. But also
Speaker 6: I think it's you know, started around the time like
Speaker 6: TVs became more like prominent, because that's another way of
Speaker 6: getting distracted. And the research like that suggests is like yeah,
Speaker 6: like you know, sitting down to eat with others as
Speaker 6: a family, that seems to be healthier. But if you're
Speaker 6: watching TV while doing it, it does also plan too
Speaker 6: this oh we're eating more because like we're doing other
Speaker 6: things too, you know issue. Yeah, so's it's like it's
Speaker 6: still a you know, growing field, but it seems really
Speaker 6: consistent what they've been finding, which is, yeah, you're not
Speaker 6: you know, like paying attention to your food. You're not
Speaker 6: enjoying it as much, and as a result, you're eating more,
Speaker 6: probably more than you wanted to if you were not
Speaker 6: as distracted.
Speaker 2: You know, I'm probably a good person to be studied,
Speaker 2: because when I get up in the morning, my wife
Speaker 2: has gone to work, the kids are they've grown up,
Speaker 2: so I'm My best meal of the day is breakfast.
Speaker 2: I make myself breakfast. I focus on what I'm doing,
Speaker 2: I enjoy it, got the coffee going, and I have
Speaker 2: a real newspaper, a print version of a newspaper at
Speaker 2: the dinner at the breakfast table, and I sit there
Speaker 2: and I eat cereal with fruit and orange juice and
Speaker 2: vitamins and coffee, and I read the morning newspaper. No
Speaker 2: one bothers me. No one bothers me. I kind of
Speaker 2: put the phone away, and then when I finish, I
Speaker 2: get ready for the day, which is involved prepping for
Speaker 2: the show. I do four hours a night, to be
Speaker 2: honest with you, which is five nights a week. And
Speaker 2: at six o'clock at night, I got a sandwich and
Speaker 2: I'm kind of listening to the nightly news because God
Speaker 2: forbid that I would miss a story. I mean a
Speaker 2: big story that I got on and missed it. And
Speaker 2: I'm also trying to do the crossword puzzle and a
Speaker 2: couple of other things just that, and it's like it's
Speaker 2: a different world from eight nine o'clock in the morning
Speaker 2: until six o'clock at night, and I hadn't really thought
Speaker 2: about it until I spoke with you Richard. Now I'm
Speaker 2: going want to I'm going to try to change. I'm
Speaker 2: going to try to make night more. My wife still
Speaker 2: isn't home for dinner, so five nights a week I
Speaker 2: eat breakfast and dinner alone. Okay, And obviously I'm really
Speaker 2: distracted because I'm thinking about the show at six o'clock
Speaker 2: in the morning. You know, it's I know, I'm going
Speaker 2: to be on the air eleven hours, but it's way
Speaker 2: off in the disner. Do you can you identify with
Speaker 2: that as as a as a journalistic You must have
Speaker 2: define right.
Speaker 6: Oh, definitely. I am definitely guilty of like eating out
Speaker 6: my dust, you know, like you know, I have coffee
Speaker 6: for like just getting awake instead of actually enjoying how
Speaker 6: it tastes or the food. Right, Like, you know, there
Speaker 6: is a sense that, yeah, we feel like we should
Speaker 6: be always doing something else and that maybe our relationship
Speaker 6: with food is that it just gives us fuel versus like, yeah,
Speaker 6: some of these meals like deserve to be savored, you know,
Speaker 6: like these your breakfast you probably like maybe like notice
Speaker 6: it more and it's a joy right to start the
Speaker 6: day that way, whereas your dinner is more like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 6: you have to get this done. I don't want to
Speaker 6: be hungry later. But you know, like we could take
Speaker 6: a few minutes or at least like having time to
Speaker 6: be more mindful and you know, try what researchers are
Speaker 6: called mindful eating, which is different practices of drawing your
Speaker 6: attention back to the food, back to the senses, back
Speaker 6: to how you're feeling about it, and not only you know,
Speaker 6: like it's like a sort of like you get two
Speaker 6: bus pluses at least, right, you're not only eating more mindfully,
Speaker 6: like probably less than what like you would overeating when
Speaker 6: you're distracted, but you're also like, you know, actually taking
Speaker 6: the time to enjoy you know, what someone created for
Speaker 6: you and what like I don't know, like one of
Speaker 6: the best parts of being human, I think is even
Speaker 6: something nice and actually being there for it.
Speaker 2: Two other things like this morning, I took my time
Speaker 2: and I made myself blueberry pancakes, and I love real cakes,
Speaker 2: but it was just it was a great breakfast meal.
Speaker 2: The other thing, and I don't want to get religious
Speaker 2: on you here. But here's a thought. And I'm you know,
Speaker 2: a little religious, you might be a little maybe not,
Speaker 2: you know, very really do people pause before they eat
Speaker 2: and just say a proved things. But we used to
Speaker 2: do that as families, and that made you focus on
Speaker 2: the food a little bit too.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think maybe this goes this is something broader.
Speaker 6: Like what you're sort of alluding to is like, you know,
Speaker 6: our attention is so scattered, there's so many things competing
Speaker 6: for it. But it's also like are you really there
Speaker 6: if you're not you know, actually trying to like, you know,
Speaker 6: take that moment to acknowledge yeah, like this is great
Speaker 6: food like something like that, but also you know, actually
Speaker 6: find finding that attention to experience it fully. Yeah, it's
Speaker 6: it's it's difficult, but I think this type of research
Speaker 6: shows that, like, yeah, there's benefits not only to our
Speaker 6: health but also like our ability to enjoy life.
Speaker 2: I guess, no, I know, And I'm now going to
Speaker 2: say I'm going to take a couple more minutes in
Speaker 2: the morning and enjoy my breakfast even more, even if
Speaker 2: I simply say good food, good meat, good God, Lit's
Speaker 2: eat Okay.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, And I think, yeah, I think that's a
Speaker 6: good practice, especially if you like I think one thing
Speaker 6: I've noticed is like people do have these rituals, but sometimes,
Speaker 6: like you, it becomes routine again, right, you just say it,
Speaker 6: but you don't really and you know, that's that's the
Speaker 6: paradox is being human.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 6: It's like you, once you've got a routine, you sort
Speaker 6: of wanted to, you know, be as efficient as possible,
Speaker 6: versus maybe part of the point is taking the time.
Speaker 6: And that's that's the that's.
Speaker 2: The one of being human real, Richard. Time is the
Speaker 2: most valuable thing we have when you really talk about it,
Speaker 2: because no matter how much money you have or whatever,
Speaker 2: you can't extend the time too much. Richard, I enjoyed
Speaker 2: any mean to get philosophical with you here, but your
Speaker 2: article and your comments really caused me to think, and
Speaker 2: I hope it caused some them the listeners to think
Speaker 2: as well. I really enjoyed it. You've been a guest before.
Speaker 2: Love to have you back again. Thank you so much.
Speaker 2: Have a great weekend.
Speaker 6: Yeah you too, This is lovely, Thank you, thank.
Speaker 2: You, Richard. Talk So when we get back, we're going
Speaker 2: to talk about scams where people are trying to take
Speaker 2: advantage of the Los Angeles fire victims throw them in
Speaker 2: jail for fifty years. As far as I'm concerned, We'll
Speaker 2: be back on Nightside with Lieutenant Formal Lieutenant Randy Sutton,
Speaker 2: and he's going to talk about the scams that are
Speaker 2: in play tonight even as we speak. As we as
Speaker 2: we speak, will be back on.
Speaker 1: Night Side now, back to Dan Ray live from the
Speaker 1: Window World lat Sight Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2: Brandy Sutton has a retired police lieutenant, founder of the
Speaker 2: Wounded Blue. Randy, you may not remember me, but you've
Speaker 2: been on the show a couple of times. Welcome back
Speaker 2: to NIGHTSID.
Speaker 3: How are you, sir, fantastic man, Thanks for having me.
Speaker 2: You're very welcome you night You're here too. You're here
Speaker 2: to warn people about a lot of scams that are
Speaker 2: now circulating because a lot of us here in the
Speaker 2: New England area are looking to try to help out
Speaker 2: people in Los Angeles. The devastation of this, this this
Speaker 2: this fire, this inferno that has eaten up neighborhoods is
Speaker 2: just unimaginable. So how do we avoid scams and yet
Speaker 2: maybe do something to help these poor these poor souls.
Speaker 3: Well, this is a great question with with this incredible devastation.
Speaker 3: And I'm you know, I'm in Las Vegas, so I'm
Speaker 3: very close to uh to this situation. Especially in my
Speaker 3: capacity as the founder of the Wound the Blue. I've
Speaker 3: been literally in conversations with police officers who have been
Speaker 3: involved in this. In this this horrendous situation, many officers
Speaker 3: are losing their homes as well while they're out serving
Speaker 3: the community. So this is this is unprecedented in our history,
Speaker 3: the scope of this tragedy. And and Americans are very
Speaker 3: very you know, compassionate people. They want to help when
Speaker 3: when there's a situation like this, they want to get involved.
Speaker 3: And and of course the easiest way to get involved
Speaker 3: is to make donations to help to help the people
Speaker 3: who have been affected by tragedy. The problem is, how
Speaker 3: do you know who to trust. I give you an example.
Speaker 3: I I was reaching out to various police agencies in
Speaker 3: the air to determine who what charities are actually going
Speaker 3: to be functioning in this in this regard, and I've
Speaker 3: had some difficult times locating the proper charities to utilize.
Speaker 3: But what will happen is the scammers will be out
Speaker 3: and about they will be doing social media posts. They
Speaker 3: will be setting up fake websites. And the problem is
Speaker 3: if you if you want to give, you have to
Speaker 3: be your background. You have to do your own work
Speaker 3: to make sure that these are legitimate antithies because they
Speaker 3: will pop up you. You will be getting texts that
Speaker 3: that say that you know they represent an organization. Don't
Speaker 3: ever answer a text because there are so many scams
Speaker 3: involved with just opening the text message, which leaves you
Speaker 3: open and susceptible to h to malware to get your
Speaker 3: personal information. Big So you've got to be very very
Speaker 3: careful and you have to be your homework. If you
Speaker 3: if you see you get solicited, the chances of you
Speaker 3: being solicited by a legitimate charity or minimal, so unless
Speaker 3: you know who they are. For instance, American Red Cross
Speaker 3: Disaster Relief. The charities that have been around for a
Speaker 3: long time, they do great work. You've got to do
Speaker 3: your homework.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know one of the things that I do,
Speaker 2: and I have family members who are police officers or
Speaker 2: former retired police officers, I should say, and I get
Speaker 2: really angry because you get the telephone calls and from
Speaker 2: you can tell it's a boiler room because you can
Speaker 2: hear voices in the background. Yeah, these guys, come on.
Speaker 2: You know, there's Bob. You know, Bob Jones. I'm with
Speaker 2: the United Federation of the Police Association of American and
Speaker 2: we're hoping you might be able to make one hundred
Speaker 2: dollars contribution to help us out. And I'm the ideal
Speaker 2: with one question. I say, oh, I'm looking forward to
Speaker 2: making this donation. Bob, can you tell me what are
Speaker 2: the administrative costs of your charity? Because they have they
Speaker 2: will all these these these these groups give five cents
Speaker 2: out of every dollar raised to some police actual police agency.
Speaker 2: I mean if that by giving five cents, they keep
Speaker 2: out of jail. Okay, because there's no regulation that says
Speaker 2: the administrative cost you know, have to be no more
Speaker 2: than ten percent or no more than twelve percent. So
Speaker 2: you literally you'll give you you'll donate one hundred dollars.
Speaker 2: Five dollars will go to some uh, you know, some
Speaker 2: legitimate police charity. Uh. And so that's that's the first
Speaker 2: thing that I do. And invariably they'll say, well, we
Speaker 2: don't really keep our track of that record, And I say, well,
Speaker 2: why should that one hundred dollars, Why shouldn't I take
Speaker 2: my one hundred dollars and walk down to my local
Speaker 2: police station and write the check and give it to
Speaker 2: the to the sergeant on the front desk. And at
Speaker 2: that point they hang up on you. So yeah, And
Speaker 2: I think what has happened is that they they assumed
Speaker 2: that most people want to support police. Uh And that's
Speaker 2: and of course great charities that this is a perfect
Speaker 2: example that you're talking about now, whose heart doesn't go
Speaker 2: out to what we see on television these I've never
Speaker 2: seen scenes like this in my life. I know that
Speaker 2: you had that fire in Hawaii about a couple of
Speaker 2: years ago, which was devastating as well, but that was
Speaker 2: in a much smaller area. Uh And and did put
Speaker 2: fewer people. This is unbelievable. I assume Randy, that you're
Speaker 2: I've been to LA, but I'm not nearly as familiar
Speaker 2: with that as I am with East Coast cities. But
Speaker 2: does La ever recover from this?
Speaker 4: Oh?
Speaker 3: I don't know, I mean, no one. It will never
Speaker 3: be the same. You know, there are historic structures, hundreds
Speaker 3: of them, homes that you can never recreate. I mean,
Speaker 3: history has been lost here. Not to mention the lots
Speaker 3: of animals. It's it's it's it's like an apocalypse. And
Speaker 3: I literally not not an allogous spoke to California Higerate
Speaker 3: Patrol officer who we have helped in the past, and
Speaker 3: his home is in jeopardy, and he was telling me
Speaker 3: that they uh that they caught a guy pouring gas
Speaker 3: lean onto the fire just hours ago.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so they made this arrest of this one guy.
Speaker 2: Now my question is, could have he been someone who
Speaker 2: started the fires or was he just you know, pyromaniac
Speaker 2: who got excited, saw some flames and decide he was
Speaker 2: going to add his ad to it. But wouldn't it
Speaker 2: be interesting if we find out that these fires were
Speaker 2: started by humans?
Speaker 3: Well, I think we are. We are definitely going to
Speaker 3: find that several of the fires have been started by humans,
Speaker 3: Several people have been taking into custody, and then then
Speaker 3: you have the leaders besides yeah, I mean, this is
Speaker 3: where you see the best of humanity and the worst
Speaker 3: of humanity. And one of the things that we're doing
Speaker 3: with the Wounded Blue is we are going to put
Speaker 3: a fund together to help officers who have been displaced
Speaker 3: by the fire. So we're actually and and we are
Speaker 3: a real legitimate charity. And by the way, one of
Speaker 3: the things that your listeners, if they are confronted or
Speaker 3: were exposed to a pitch by a supposed charity, ask
Speaker 3: for their nine nineties. This is something that very few
Speaker 3: people know about. Nine nineties are the tax forms that
Speaker 3: every charity is required to show the public. And then
Speaker 3: and if you ask for their nine nineties, they have
Speaker 3: to show it to you. If they won't, they're not
Speaker 3: real ready.
Speaker 2: Let me real quickly. We got about thirty seconds left.
Speaker 2: I'm sure some of my listeners would love to make
Speaker 2: a contribution through the Wounded Blue Give us your website.
Speaker 2: How can people get in touch with the Wounded Blue
Speaker 2: to make a contribution?
Speaker 3: No Wounded Blue dot org. That's no Wounded Blue dot org.
Speaker 3: And if you want to contact me personally, I'm Randy
Speaker 3: at the Wounded Blue dot Org. I'll to handle any
Speaker 3: conversations and I'll give you as much information as I can.
Speaker 2: That is great, Randy Sutton is always thanks very much. Again,
Speaker 2: as they say, we love having you on. And I
Speaker 2: know you do a lot of these around the country,
Speaker 2: so you can't remember every station you're on, but I've
Speaker 2: remembered you every time because as I say, I have
Speaker 2: police in my family right.
Speaker 3: Appreciate it. Anytime you need me, you just call me.
Speaker 2: You bet you're Randy at the Wounded Blue dot org.
Speaker 2: Or you can just google the Wounded Blue dot org
Speaker 2: and make a contribution that will get to where you
Speaker 2: want it to get to. Randy Sutton, thank you so much.
Speaker 2: Have a great weekend. I know it's going to be
Speaker 2: busy for you, but you're doing God's work. Thanks, Randy,
Speaker 2: appreciate it.
Speaker 3: My pleasure. Thank you so much. You're welcome.
Speaker 2: All Right, we get back right after the nine o'clock news.
Speaker 2: We are going to talk about this devastation in Los
Speaker 2: Angeles and uh there there have been some arrests, but
Speaker 2: we're gonna I want your reaction to this. This is
Speaker 2: unimaginable what I have seen, and I'm sure what you
Speaker 2: have seen. Uh, let's let's talk about it on the
Speaker 2: other side of the nine