Speaker 1: What up is muting? You checking out the Cruise Show podcast.
Speaker 1: Make sure to subscribe, rate, and share Cruse Show Real
Speaker 1: ninety two three, LA's new home for hip hop. This
Speaker 1: is my guy right here, Stephen J. Klueback. What's something man?
Speaker 1: How are you? Man? We're in the era of get
Speaker 1: a clue? It's fun, isn't it? Feel me? Absolutely, We're
Speaker 1: gonna bring back humor. Bring back humor, simple solutions for
Speaker 1: a better life for all of us. Man, That's what
Speaker 1: it's about. Man.
Speaker 2: The Hollingback Youth Center is honored to present Stephen J.
Speaker 2: Kluback with the twenty twenty five on Migos Delos Neils Award.
Speaker 2: This is major congratulations, Thank you sweet award.
Speaker 1: Man. That's that's great. I'm not one for honors. It's
Speaker 1: all about the kids. Yeah, it's all about the kids.
Speaker 1: The kids are our future.
Speaker 2: Why why are children so special to you? I mean,
Speaker 2: I know you have children, right and they're adults, I
Speaker 2: believe at this point, But why are kids so important
Speaker 2: to you?
Speaker 1: Well? There are future and you know I've always been
Speaker 1: a father that teaches integrity. We don't lie. Tell me
Speaker 1: the good beat the ugly. We'll fix it. There's always solutions. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and you know, teaching them humanity service, giving I remember
Speaker 1: when they were kids, I used to make them clean
Speaker 1: out their their closets and their room and I said, okay,
Speaker 1: what do you have that you played with in a
Speaker 1: little bit, Let's put in a bag and we're going
Speaker 1: to go down to the hospital and give it to
Speaker 1: kids in need that are sick right now. And I
Speaker 1: wouldn't just have it delivered. We'd go together and they'd
Speaker 1: see the smiles on kids' faces. That's what it's about,
Speaker 1: isn't it. Yeah, it's giving back service, rolling up your
Speaker 1: sleeves and giving man.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean that reminds me of what we do
Speaker 2: for cruise cares. You know, at the end of the year,
Speaker 2: we get a bunch of toys together for a bunch
Speaker 2: of kids, and we help out the boys and girls
Speaker 2: clubs and you know, and it reminds me of why
Speaker 2: kids are so specific. I have children as well, young ones,
Speaker 2: but I didn't grow up having too many friends, right
Speaker 2: for whatever reason, and finding those kids with not that
Speaker 2: many friends because of their circumstances or because of how
Speaker 2: they look or how they feel inside, those are the
Speaker 2: kids and that's a lot of kids. You know, those
Speaker 2: are the kids that really need us. They're all special
Speaker 2: and they're all over the world. But you know, in California,
Speaker 2: we've forgotten about an important component part of who we are.
Speaker 2: We're all customers and we got to start taking care
Speaker 2: of our family first here in California. Yeah, yeahdred percent.
Speaker 2: Your start was unique, right, So you got started with
Speaker 2: negative twenty million dollars. Well, you were in debts that.
Speaker 1: Came that came about. No. I started off as a
Speaker 1: young kid. I was a busboy at one of my
Speaker 1: dad's developments, and then it was a waiter, a dishwasher.
Speaker 1: I learned how to cook, you know, not not I
Speaker 1: remember Lucille except told me don't mash those pancakes too much,
Speaker 1: or don't mash the burgers as before. Smash burgers. Now
Speaker 1: it's now, it's now, that's it. Did you create the
Speaker 1: smash berger? I didn't create the same. But I'm a
Speaker 1: good cook. I love cooking. You should try my chiliver
Speaker 1: in or so I'm good. I used Wahaka and Kesso Fresco.
Speaker 1: We're pulling up to the house. Man, listen, fun no poetry, key,
Speaker 1: that's right. Hey, how did it feel to be honored.
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, being you know with the Dodgers
Speaker 3: and and and you know, I mean it was like,
Speaker 3: how did that feel to be just in that same
Speaker 3: pocket with them and and being that being so synonymous
Speaker 3: here in Los Angeles.
Speaker 1: Well, you know, look, Boyle Heights is where it all
Speaker 1: was started. It was the Inner City Games. You got
Speaker 1: Danny and Priscilla who work hard with with the Holland
Speaker 1: Back Youth Center, and the Inner City Games then morphed
Speaker 1: into after School All Stars with Governor Schwarzenegger. He wasn't
Speaker 1: the governor at the time, but and it's become this
Speaker 1: great institution of providing youth services that schools can't provide
Speaker 1: for those that are in need, that need community to
Speaker 1: have interaction and around sports and it's health and it works.
Speaker 1: So I'm very honored and proud to be involved. It's
Speaker 1: on the twenty ninth, and you know, I've been down
Speaker 1: to Holland Back numerous times. I love being down there.
Speaker 1: And when we do it, during Thanksgiving we have turkey
Speaker 1: drives and during Christmas we have toy giveaways. So it's
Speaker 1: just a full impact for the community. Social impact. You know,
Speaker 1: profit businesses is one thing, but there's something called social profit.
Speaker 1: That's what this is. This is impactful to the community.
Speaker 1: So you know, I'm a businessman but a philanthropist, so
Speaker 1: you marry them both together and you end up with
Speaker 1: something beautiful which we could do for the state of California.
Speaker 2: Man, absolutely, How tough is that being doing philanthropy and
Speaker 2: politics and you know, and giving so much of yourself.
Speaker 1: How difficult is all of this? You know, it's the
Speaker 1: most gratifying thing I have to do. It's not a job,
Speaker 1: it's a passion. I wake up. I'm so excited a mission.
Speaker 1: It's a mission because you know, I've done well in
Speaker 1: business and I've done you know, I studying to be
Speaker 1: a doctor, didn't do that a surgeon. I ended up
Speaker 1: going into shopping center development throughout California. I think going
Speaker 1: to hotels, hospitality, where I learned everyone's a customer, my team,
Speaker 1: our customers. Everyone in California should feel the same way.
Speaker 1: And now politics, policy, which I've been involved with on
Speaker 1: the federal level, state level, local level, and I'm bringing
Speaker 1: that back to California. And it's not difficult. It's fun
Speaker 1: and everything is fixable and solvable. You know what it's
Speaker 1: going to be, don't I realized. I realized there are
Speaker 1: those that need to leave that have not fulfilled our expectations,
Speaker 1: and new people that have to come in and lead.
Speaker 1: Now's the time where we have to be real and
Speaker 1: thoughtful and non vatrollic with one another and look for
Speaker 1: performance and results. Sure, have you always been a leader?
Speaker 1: Have you always? Were? You always a leader as a
Speaker 1: kid as No, I was kind of introverted until I
Speaker 1: became a bodybuilder, And there it is.
Speaker 2: You found it there because it's discipline, discipline, and company
Speaker 2: and education and integrity.
Speaker 1: Right, discipline, education, integrity. So yeah, the confidence I found
Speaker 1: my confidence because no, I was a shy kid. I
Speaker 1: was a shy kid. I was not the guy invited
Speaker 1: all the parties. And I'm still not one for parties.
Speaker 1: I'm here to serve. I love serving, you know, it's
Speaker 1: just unique in me. I dig it. I love it.
Speaker 1: I love chaos. I love complicated. I love situations where
Speaker 1: they say you can't do it and we get it
Speaker 1: done and then we see all the happy faces. And
Speaker 1: I don't want the trophy either. I want other people
Speaker 1: to get trophies. I want to create great leaders. Right.
Speaker 1: Speaking of trophies.
Speaker 2: So you go up there to accept your award and
Speaker 2: there's obviously a speech involved, right do you go over
Speaker 2: the speech?
Speaker 1: Is it just straight from the heart? Dude, I can't.
Speaker 1: I can't read a teleprompter. I'm so dyslexic. I'm as
Speaker 1: authentic as it comes. People say to me all the time,
Speaker 1: what are you going to talk about? I'm like, I
Speaker 1: don't know. You got to feel the moment. I got
Speaker 1: to see the crowd, got to see who we're talking to,
Speaker 1: because look, that's about customer service. I got to know
Speaker 1: who you are. I gotta know who I'm talking to,
Speaker 1: and it'll just come naturally from the heart, with passion
Speaker 1: and warmth and love, and that's who I am.
Speaker 2: That's the way it should be. Man, sidebar, did you
Speaker 2: get your real idea? I've got my real life. I
Speaker 2: had to take my test.
Speaker 1: I haven't gotten it yet. Garcia has had it for
Speaker 1: By the way, if you have Global Entry, which I
Speaker 1: was involved with at the federal level and I ran
Speaker 1: tourism the United States, if you have Global Entry card,
Speaker 1: that's actually real ID and you don't need really and
Speaker 1: you don't need tsa pre check and spend that extra
Speaker 1: eighty five bucks because you got global entry. So if
Speaker 1: you have global entry, you are good to go. Don't
Speaker 1: let them think that you need a new real ID
Speaker 1: for a driver's license if you already have global entry.
Speaker 1: So there's a lot of ways to passport too. So
Speaker 1: if you have global ID passport, you can go get
Speaker 1: a real ID when you get it. But if you
Speaker 1: don't hate me there one of those, you better get
Speaker 1: your real ID.
Speaker 3: How do you do all this with a smile on
Speaker 3: your face? Because you stop by here, I mean half
Speaker 3: a dozen times just in the building. You come by,
Speaker 3: you say hi, you know, you just joke with us,
Speaker 3: have fun. That's rough out there, I mean yeah, I
Speaker 3: mean there's got to be pressure in what you're doing, Like,
Speaker 3: how do you do it all with the smile.
Speaker 1: I've been beaten up, banged up, pushed around so many times.
Speaker 1: I fight the fight I'm used to look. I lead
Speaker 1: with love. But I'm self made man, you know. I Yeah,
Speaker 1: you said, I started with negative twenty million because my
Speaker 1: father went bankrupt and I bought the bankruptcy, you know,
Speaker 1: in the mid mid of my life. And I never
Speaker 1: wanted him to be embarrassed because I respected him till
Speaker 1: the day he died, so you had to pay that
Speaker 1: back before you even got started. Well, I paid that
Speaker 1: back in the interim of because I wanted my father
Speaker 1: to have respect, And you know, I grew up with respect,
Speaker 1: responsibility and showing results because we're proven by that. But look,
Speaker 1: how do I enjoy life? I mean, we have to
Speaker 1: have humor. We all go through rough patches. I get that.
Speaker 1: You know, you become who you are, your own brand.
Speaker 1: And I love what I do. I love my life.
Speaker 1: I love people, and I want everyone to do well.
Speaker 2: For someone young listening watching and they want to enter
Speaker 2: politics and they want to be you know, they want
Speaker 2: to be a business person, right, what's quick advice for them?
Speaker 1: Quick advice is get up early, stay late, go to
Speaker 1: work or the running nose. That's it. Just show up
Speaker 1: and always have integrity. Everyone makes mistakes. Nobody's perfect. You
Speaker 1: make mistakes, raise your hand. I make mistakes. I raise
Speaker 1: my hand. I laugh at myself. Never point a finger
Speaker 1: at anybody else. If you're a leader, you're going to
Speaker 1: become a leader. You take responsibility for everyone's actions. You
Speaker 1: are leading, and then you give the trophy to the others.
Speaker 1: And that's how I run my life. That's why I'm happy.
Speaker 1: And I watch these other leaders why they failed, because
Speaker 1: you know what, when they fire other people and blame
Speaker 1: other people, they're the problem. Stand up, have the brass
Speaker 1: balls and say, hey, I take ownership of this. Everyone's
Speaker 1: on my watch, okay, and I see this. And if
Speaker 1: you're raising money, make sure that money is given to
Speaker 1: the folks that need it. Sure, and the costs are
Speaker 1: as effective and efficient as possible, and there's transparency. When
Speaker 1: you start hiding things, that's where I get nervous. When
Speaker 1: leaders start pointing fingers, I get really nervous. Go look
Speaker 1: at our city. Yeah, we see it all over man.
Speaker 1: Well then let's let's let's really let's call it the
Speaker 1: way it is leadership. Yeah, no, for sure.
Speaker 2: You know, now more than ever, a lot of young
Speaker 2: people worry about what they're going to look like struggling.
Speaker 2: And you know, you never really love a struggle. You
Speaker 2: only see the success on Insta.
Speaker 1: Okay, well guess what, so you're gonna have to struggle
Speaker 1: and get a couple of Uh, you can't keep the struggle, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: it's important. You got to get beaten up, a little bit,
Speaker 1: punched around a little bit falling a pothole. Just don't
Speaker 1: break your leg, hit that guardrail a little bit, that's okay.
Speaker 1: No the assignment, No, the assignment, have riz risk.
Speaker 2: And then and more importantly, slay it, yep, and don't
Speaker 2: crash out.
Speaker 1: You don't want to crash out unless you're by yourself.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, solo you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: No one's watching it is not an iPhone.
Speaker 1: And then by the way, new one. Wel so always farm,
Speaker 1: always farm. Yeah you didn't know that. You gotta stream.
Speaker 1: You gotta go on twitch, man, And now you got me.
Speaker 1: I don't know what twitches.
Speaker 2: Yeah, now you'll know. So it's just a streaming network, right,
Speaker 2: it's a channel.
Speaker 1: It's funny when you know I was honored by the
Speaker 1: farm workers because I do a lot of work to
Speaker 1: protect farm workers those that need Could you believe farm
Speaker 1: workers have a food bank? Now? In what world would
Speaker 1: you think that in Arvin, California there's a food bank
Speaker 1: for farm workers that work at the current county Bakersfield area.
Speaker 1: In what world? That makes no sense? So I'm in that.
Speaker 1: And when I'm talking about togetherness, you want to hear
Speaker 1: my little Spanish correct me if I'm wrong. All good,
Speaker 1: Let's go. That's right, my man. Yo, he looks over it.
Speaker 1: I want to make sure I'm pronouncing it right. I
Speaker 1: think I'm not. Okay, I'm just like doing good. He's
Speaker 1: doing great, doing good. It's funny because I'm sitting in
Speaker 1: a meeting on my worldwide hotel company, and I was
Speaker 1: in Espana and then I'm done in Mexico. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: I'm sitting in meetings and everyone's talking in native language.
Speaker 1: Because I'm always culturally well irrelevant. I want to always
Speaker 1: fit in, you know, not like this Trump stuff American
Speaker 1: army boom boom. No. Culturally you'll take care of your allies,
Speaker 1: take care of your friends. And you know, they have
Speaker 1: these conversations and then all of a sudden, I go no,
Speaker 1: and they go, does he understand what that we were
Speaker 1: talking about? And yeah, I understand like one hundred percent Spanish,
Speaker 1: I speak like sixty sixty five. I'm working on it, yeah,
Speaker 1: leaning into it. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Sure, No, You're doing great. It's coming from the heart.
Speaker 2: You can tell it's genuine always yeah, always, always, Well, congratulations.
Speaker 1: I love you guys. I love you too. I love
Speaker 1: the show. Love you guys.
Speaker 2: You stop by all the time. You're always welcome. You know,
Speaker 2: the door is always welcome. I mean, I'm sorry, he's
Speaker 2: always open for you, and you're always welcome to stop
Speaker 2: by and you know, say what's up. It's always great
Speaker 2: to you know, to catch up with you.
Speaker 1: You guys are brothers. Thanks for the books. You're welcome,
Speaker 1: by the way, the book, by the way, by the way,
Speaker 1: that book. So we're launching the book at Barnes and
Speaker 1: Noble June seventh, eleven a m. The Grove. Stephanie Rule
Speaker 1: is going to be interviewing me from MSNBC and that
Speaker 1: should be exciting, and we invite everyone to come. So
Speaker 1: that's June seventh, eleven AM Barnes and Noble, the Grove.
Speaker 1: Be there. I will be there, signing books, answering any
Speaker 1: questions you may have in different languages, well, pretty much
Speaker 1: in Spanish, right, definitely? What about the song? Can I
Speaker 1: mention that song? Oh? One hundred percent? You got to
Speaker 1: listen to this song California, get a clue. It's on Spotify,
Speaker 1: It's on iHeartRadio, and I think other marketing channels too.
Speaker 2: Yep, hey man, congratulations, best of luck to you. We're
Speaker 2: here if you need us.
Speaker 1: I love you. Guys, we appreciate it. Thank you for
Speaker 1: the honor.
Speaker 2: I'm grateful always, brother always, Cruise Show Real ninety two
Speaker 2: to three. Hey Jack your rich from the Cruse Show.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to the Cruise Show podcast.
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