Speaker 1: We had Mike Carbassi on the show last night to
Speaker 1: talk about the City of Fresno homeless Ordinance, which was
Speaker 1: supported unanimously left, right and center by the city Council
Speaker 1: from you know, Miguel Arius on the left to Gary
Speaker 1: Brettefeld on the right, and everyone in between seven and
Speaker 1: nothing on the city council in favor of the no
Speaker 1: Camping ordinance, basically making it misdemeanor to camp on public property,
Speaker 1: whether that's sidewalk, street, public parks, et cetera.
Speaker 2: Now, I think this is likely a good idea.
Speaker 1: I think the way that it's being framed and the
Speaker 1: way that it's going to be enforced, or the way
Speaker 1: that the city is saying that they want to enforce
Speaker 1: it makes sense. The idea is that the goal here
Speaker 1: is not necessarily to punish people. It's to offer people
Speaker 1: interventional services. And if you get interventional services, then you
Speaker 1: don't go to jail and you don't.
Speaker 2: Pay a fine.
Speaker 1: There are some people for whom, though, that stick might
Speaker 1: be necessary. I guess one of the things though, that
Speaker 1: I didn't quite understand, Now, why did it take until
Speaker 1: now for the city to pass this. Well, the city
Speaker 1: did pass something like this in twenty seventeen. The problem
Speaker 1: was that the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which is
Speaker 1: the federal circuit court that hears all of the appeals
Speaker 1: for all federal lawsuits that happen in California, Washington State, Oregon, Hawaii, Alaska, Nevada, Arizona, and.
Speaker 2: Idaho, and I think Montana, but Idaho.
Speaker 1: The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a ruling a
Speaker 1: couple of years ago about a similar ordinance passed by
Speaker 1: the city of Boise, Idaho, and the Ninth Circuit Court
Speaker 1: of Appeals said that this violates that such ordinances banning
Speaker 1: camping and penalizing homeless camping violate the US Constitution, that
Speaker 1: they violate the Eighth Amendment and its prohibition against cruel
Speaker 1: and unusual punishment. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal said
Speaker 1: it was cruel and unusual punishment to penalize someone for
Speaker 1: homeless camping when the city does not have enough homeless
Speaker 1: enough beds to shelter the homeless. Now, the Supreme Court
Speaker 1: just this year overturned that Ninth Circuit decision. It was
Speaker 1: just a couple of months ago, and actually just a
Speaker 1: month ago.
Speaker 2: And.
Speaker 1: On the heels of that Supreme Court decision saying, no,
Speaker 1: these kinds of laws are not unconstitutional. They aren't cruel
Speaker 1: and unusual punishment that violates the Constitution. You might think
Speaker 1: that they are wise or unwise, good policy or bad policy,
Speaker 1: but they don't violate the Constitution. So, as a result,
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, Gavin Newsom's issuing issuing executive orders
Speaker 1: saying that we should impose those kinds of encampment rules.
Speaker 1: And you've got the City of Fresno passing this encampment ordinance.
Speaker 1: The County of Fresno looks like it's going to try
Speaker 1: to introduce a similar ordinance. And I my instinct, I
Speaker 1: haven't studied the issue really in depth as a constitutional question,
Speaker 1: but my instinct is likely that, yeah, I'm guessing that
Speaker 1: these kinds of ordinances don't violate the Eighth Amendment. I
Speaker 1: don't think this is the kind of thing for which
Speaker 1: the Eighth Amendment was devised. I think the Eighth Amendment
Speaker 1: was devised so that no one would be hung, drawn
Speaker 1: and quartered, you know, the traditional British I think it
Speaker 1: was probably a punishment in other countries too, but the
Speaker 1: British punishment where you were halfway hung to death, and
Speaker 1: then they took you down, and then they ripped out
Speaker 1: your intestine, and then they chopped you into four bits.
Speaker 1: And it's a horrible torturous form of death. So I
Speaker 1: think elaborate torture is the kind of thing that the
Speaker 1: Eighth Amendment forbids, and so I was very supportive of
Speaker 1: this homeless I was supportive for the most part of
Speaker 1: this homeless ordinance on the grounds of, well, the city
Speaker 1: is saying we have these resources available and people aren't
Speaker 1: availing themselves of it, so we're tired of Basically, you had,
Speaker 1: you know, very moderate It wasn't fire breathing conservatives saying this.
Speaker 1: It was people like Tyler Maxwell, you know, saying stuff like,
Speaker 1: you know, we're running out of patients with the homeless
Speaker 1: community that we have all these we're offering these resources.
Speaker 1: They're not availing themselves of it. They're disrupting businesses, you know,
Speaker 1: we are we need to have this as a tool
Speaker 1: in order to ensure that homeless people take advantage of
Speaker 1: these resources. Okay, now, I will admit ninety you know,
Speaker 1: I'm going to acknowledge a decent opinion or a compelling
Speaker 1: case when I see it, no matter the source, and
Speaker 1: Marrick Worzowski, who, in spite of the fact that he's
Speaker 1: a very liberal guy, much more liberal than Night, has
Speaker 1: an interesting column about this question in the be Today.
Speaker 1: Camping and Fresno will soon be illegal. Where are homeless
Speaker 1: people supposed to go? And it gets to this question
Speaker 1: that was at the core of the Ninth Circuit Court
Speaker 1: of Appeals case as well as the Supreme Court case.
Speaker 1: It gets to this question of well, can a city
Speaker 1: really is it legitimate for a city to penalize homelessness
Speaker 1: when you don't have enough beds to house the homeless? Now,
Speaker 1: I don't know that we need a perfect one to
Speaker 1: one ratio of the Are this many homeless people in
Speaker 1: Fresno and there have to be this many beds before
Speaker 1: you can outlaw camping. I think realistically, enforcement of a
Speaker 1: measure like this is not like all two thousand, I
Speaker 1: don't know the exact number of In fact, I don't
Speaker 1: think anyone knows the exact number of homeless people in Fresno.
Speaker 1: There are various estimates from around three thousand to some
Speaker 1: pro homeless activists say that it's approaching ten thousand. But
Speaker 1: let's say there're three thousand people.
Speaker 2: I don't know that.
Speaker 1: You necessarily if you have three thousand homeless people, I
Speaker 1: don't know that you need three thousand beds. It's not
Speaker 1: like all three thousand people are going to be arrested
Speaker 1: at the same time and put in a shelter on
Speaker 1: the same day. But you need to have some capacity
Speaker 1: for people. And I commend Warzowski for actually giving his
Speaker 1: readers and me about to read this the actual numbers
Speaker 1: of what space is actually available. So he writes, the
Speaker 1: homeless crisis in Fresno must be out of hand. Hundreds
Speaker 1: of millions in state and federal dollars over the last
Speaker 1: five years didn't solve the problem, not even close. So
Speaker 1: the next step, shortly after our elected leaders received the
Speaker 1: Supreme Court and Governor Gavin Newsom's blessing, is cracking down
Speaker 1: on people who sleep or camp outside on public property.
Speaker 1: First an inadequate carrot, followed by the unnecessary stick. Right now,
Speaker 1: I'm not agreeing with all of his rhetoric here, all
Speaker 1: of the kind of argumentative way in which he's fashioning this,
Speaker 1: but let's stick with it. D My question today, Warzowski's
Speaker 1: question remains the same as it did in twenty seventeen,
Speaker 1: when the Fresno City Council approved a Brandow sponsored no
Speaker 1: camping ordinance that was subsequently shelved by the courts. Where
Speaker 1: are the people living in tents on sidewalks, vacant lots
Speaker 1: at canal banks, strip malls, and all those in between spaces?
Speaker 1: Where are they supposed to go? One place they won't
Speaker 1: be headed is a home shelter because there isn't room.
Speaker 1: The City of Fresno funds eight hundred and forty one
Speaker 1: beds for individuals experiencing homelessness, including domestic violence victims, youth, singles,
Speaker 1: and families. That number has skyrocketed since the pandemic and
Speaker 1: the conversion of numerous parkway drive motels. Still, the supply
Speaker 1: has barely kept pace with demand. Phil SKay, an assistant
Speaker 1: planning director who oversees the city's homelessness and affordable housing efforts,
Speaker 1: said those eight hundred and forty one beds are currently
Speaker 1: full and have been consistently full for the past several years.
Speaker 1: Throughout the day, beds are freed up at various shelters,
Speaker 1: resulting from people successfully finding permanent housing, being reunited with family,
Speaker 1: or entering programs. SKay said in other instances, Beds become
Speaker 1: available when people choose to leave the shelter and return
Speaker 1: to the streets, or when people are exited as a
Speaker 1: result of shelter staff enforcing shelter rules. How many beds
Speaker 1: become available on a day to day basis on average
Speaker 1: skaseet so we have about eight.
Speaker 2: Hundred and forty one beds.
Speaker 1: They're almost entirely full. About five beds a day become
Speaker 1: available and get.
Speaker 2: Filled pretty quickly.
Speaker 1: We've got a population of about three thousand, and again,
Speaker 1: the estimates vary, but let's let's take a conservative estimate.
Speaker 1: We've got about three thousand homeless people at emergency shelters
Speaker 1: operated by Fresno County. It's a similar story, except there
Speaker 1: are fewer beds available. The current total is one hundred
Speaker 1: and twenty six according to figures provided by county officials,
Speaker 1: and those are at capacity as well.
Speaker 2: So keep that in mind.
Speaker 1: War was ASKI wrights the next time a public official
Speaker 1: tosses out a misleading statistic showing six point two percent
Speaker 1: of more than four thousand individuals contacted this year by
Speaker 1: the city's Homelessness Assistant Response Team, quote accept services. It
Speaker 1: services is not the same thing a place to sleep
Speaker 1: out of the elements in harm's way. More often than not,
Speaker 1: services means speaking with a Paverrello House outreach team. So
Speaker 1: basically this is kinda I'm not saying I'm completely changing
Speaker 1: my mind here because I think some kind of intervention
Speaker 1: is warranted and I don't think the solution of leave
Speaker 1: these people on the sidewalks is good. But honestly, this
Speaker 1: is kind of expanding my horizons a little bit and
Speaker 1: making me think about this a little more intently. So look,
Speaker 1: as a constitutional question, I agree, probably an ordinance like
Speaker 1: this is not cruel and unusual punishment. I'm guessing that
Speaker 1: that's not really what the framers of the Constitution had
Speaker 1: in mind when the eighth of Amendment was adopted. Nonetheless,
Speaker 1: I think the question of that there is still, though
Speaker 1: the question of political wisdom and political prudence and justice
Speaker 1: towards these people who are human beings, and I don't
Speaker 1: want to lose sight of that. I think there is
Speaker 1: a tendency among conservatives because homelessness is a kind of
Speaker 1: liberal coded problem, i e. It's a problem that we
Speaker 1: have known for decades. Is most commonly associated with San
Speaker 1: Francisco and Seattle and very liberal controlled cities like that,
Speaker 1: there's almost a sense that homeless people that we should
Speaker 1: There's a kind of antagonism among conservatives towards the homeless
Speaker 1: in a way that I'm not always comfortable with, even
Speaker 1: just as a as a Christian and as someone who
Speaker 1: has frankly had my business massively disrupted by homeless people.
Speaker 2: Constantly.
Speaker 1: Where my building is for Right to Life Essentral, California,
Speaker 1: we constantly have homeless people loitering there, leaving garbage there,
Speaker 1: leaving syringes there. We had a homeless guy break in
Speaker 1: light a fire in the bathroom caused like twenty six
Speaker 1: thousand dollars worth of damage. Thank god we had insurance.
Speaker 1: So I'm not I'm not saying that all the homeless
Speaker 1: are saints by any stretch. I'm not unaware of the
Speaker 1: real problems that homeless persons cause for businesses, but they
Speaker 1: are human beings, and it's kind of this thing. I'll
Speaker 1: talk about this in the next segment. I think sometimes
Speaker 1: modern day Christians have this idea of the poor of
Speaker 1: our time being like at fault for being.
Speaker 2: I'll discuss that later.
Speaker 1: I think though we have to and maybe the way
Speaker 1: the city Council is approaching this is sort of saying,
Speaker 1: look like we have the means, the capacity. There's more
Speaker 1: hotels that are going to be available, maybe there's more
Speaker 1: housing available. We have all the Proposition one funding coming in.
Speaker 1: I know the Catholic bishops are trying to say, look,
Speaker 1: if you're going to have if we're going to create
Speaker 1: more mental health beds things like that via Proposition one,
Speaker 1: which was just past I think in the twenty I
Speaker 1: think just last year, no, just in the last primary election,
Speaker 1: if we're going to have all these homeless beds, then
Speaker 1: if we're going to have all these beds for mental
Speaker 1: health treatment, then this is something that should be utilized
Speaker 1: for the sake of the homeless. I guess we do
Speaker 1: really need to grapple with this question of is yes,
Speaker 1: it's probably not a violation of the Eighth Amendment to
Speaker 1: the Constitution, But is what we're doing actually fair?
Speaker 2: Is what we're doing actually.
Speaker 1: Just I guess I'm not sure what one hundred percent
Speaker 1: what the right answer to that is. When we return, though,
Speaker 1: I want to address two things. One how this problem
Speaker 1: got gets manufactured in the first place by the left,
Speaker 1: and two sort of the maybe a little bit of
Speaker 1: Christianity inside baseball, A little bit of sort of what
Speaker 1: a Christian approach to this should be. That's next on
Speaker 1: the John Girardi Show. A couple of thoughts about the
Speaker 1: homeless ordinance of the City of Fresno, passed with Merrick
Speaker 1: Worzowski's column in The Bee A little bit opening my
Speaker 1: eyes to really how little homeless shelter space we have
Speaker 1: relative to the number of homeless. You know, we have
Speaker 1: about eight hundred and forty one beds, all of which
Speaker 1: are kind of already capacity. You've got about three thousand
Speaker 1: homeless people. So if we're going to or charge people
Speaker 1: with misdemeanors for homeless encampments, how is that going to work?
Speaker 2: Exactly? Now?
Speaker 1: A couple of things to think about it. One is,
Speaker 1: do some of these some of these people are committing crimes, vandalism, crimes,
Speaker 1: drug crimes, et cetera, to such an extent that maybe
Speaker 1: this is just some This is an appropriate way of
Speaker 1: punishing or addressing them. But you are not charging them
Speaker 1: with drugs or with this or with that. You're charging
Speaker 1: them with camping. And is that fair? I don't think
Speaker 1: it's unconstitutional. I don't think it violates the Eighth Amendment
Speaker 1: prohibition on Cruel and Unusual punishment. But is this wise?
Speaker 1: Is this fair? Is this an appropriate response? I think
Speaker 1: the core problem here is we have no good solutions.
Speaker 1: We have no good solutions because these problems of homelessness
Speaker 1: are We're forced into this situation because of stupid policies
Speaker 1: by the left, the left obsessed. Why is it that
Speaker 1: it's always liberal leaning jurisdictions that have these huge problems
Speaker 1: with homelessness, and they just don't have these problems as
Speaker 1: much in conservative jurisdictions. Well, in conservative jurisdictions, they just
Speaker 1: let people build massively. They let people build lots and
Speaker 1: lots and lots of housing. They don't make it difficult.
Speaker 1: It's ironic that the places with the most nimbiism, not
Speaker 1: in my backyardism, are the places where are in the
Speaker 1: most liberal jurisdictions, the places where it's hardest to build
Speaker 1: new housing, whether it's low income housing, apartment housing, housing
Speaker 1: specifically for the homeless.
Speaker 2: All that stuff. It's always in liberal states.
Speaker 1: And it's liberal states like California that have processes like SEQUA,
Speaker 1: the California Environmental Quality Act that basically allows anybody to
Speaker 1: step in and file a lawsuit to stop some building
Speaker 1: project on the spurious basis of an environmental harm that
Speaker 1: it might cause. So everything costs way more. I mean,
Speaker 1: we've seen these stories about different California jurisdictions where it
Speaker 1: costs one million dollars per unit for a quote low
Speaker 1: income housing unit, like the absurd cost to build things.
Speaker 1: Of course, we're going to have all these homeless people.
Speaker 1: Of Course we're not going to be able to build
Speaker 1: enough low income housing, assisted living housing like or not
Speaker 1: assisted living housing, but you know Section eight kind of housing.
Speaker 1: Of course, we're not going to be able to build
Speaker 1: enough of this stuff. We're forced into this because of
Speaker 1: liberal California policies. And then our solutions are either do
Speaker 1: we use the mechanism of criminal law enforcement to get
Speaker 1: people off the streets, which, by the way, I'm not
Speaker 1: convinced that putting someone in jail is more punitive or
Speaker 1: worse than leaving them on the street. Frankly, that the
Speaker 1: jail is air conditioned during the summer and heated in
Speaker 1: the winter. Now, Warzewski's pointing out that the jail probably
Speaker 1: doesn't have enough room to take all these people either.
Speaker 1: The president of County Jail System doesn't necessarily have the
Speaker 1: space to keep all these people either. But I guess
Speaker 1: I'm just flum mixed. What else are we supposed to do?
Speaker 1: If it's we are locked in Fresno.
Speaker 2: This is the problem.
Speaker 1: We're trying to have a citywide solution for something that's
Speaker 1: really a statewide problem, and this band aid approach of
Speaker 1: arresting homeless people it shouldn't be what we have to do,
Speaker 1: but unfortunately, I think it's there's kind of no other option.
Speaker 1: I understand Warzowski's critique here. I'm sympathetic to it, but
Speaker 1: I don't know that there's a better solution out there,
Speaker 1: and it does lead me to this. I want to again,
Speaker 1: this is not a critique for every conservative. It's a
Speaker 1: critique of some conservatives. Yes, homelessness is kind of this
Speaker 1: liberal coded problem. We have homelessness in California because of
Speaker 1: liberal policies statewide. It's liberal cities that this stuff originated in.
Speaker 1: Now it's spreading all over California. We still, though, have
Speaker 1: to have this approach, especially for any of us on
Speaker 1: the right who are Christians of radical care and concern
Speaker 1: for every single human life, every single human being, every
Speaker 1: single human person. I think the work of entities like
Speaker 1: the Fresno Mission and others like it exemplifies this Christian
Speaker 1: attitude that we absolutely positively have to take that. You know,
Speaker 1: even I'll go to this extent. The guy who broke
Speaker 1: into Right to life of Central California last November. Some
Speaker 1: guy broke in to right to life of Central California
Speaker 1: last November. He stole a bunch of copper piping under
Speaker 1: the sink of our bathroom. He flooded our building. He
Speaker 1: caused about twenty six thousand dollars worth of damage with
Speaker 1: thankfully our insurance covered. They covered vandalism. He lit a
Speaker 1: small fire under the bathroom sink. Thankfully, thank god it
Speaker 1: was into the fire. So this guy's trying to steal
Speaker 1: copper probably means he's a drug addict.
Speaker 2: Even that person.
Speaker 1: Deserves a measure of human dignity and care and concern
Speaker 1: for where he winds up.
Speaker 2: I don't wish ill to that person.
Speaker 1: Maybe he needs to go to jail, probably because of
Speaker 1: the drug issues, plus you know, the vandalism stuff. Maybe
Speaker 1: he does genuinely need He probably genuinely needs to go
Speaker 1: to jail. But I don't just because homeless people do
Speaker 1: bad things. In many respects, it doesn't mean they go
Speaker 1: outside the parameters of Christian charity. I do think sometimes
Speaker 1: Christians have this sense that when Christ's talking about love
Speaker 1: for the poor, concern for the poor, when he's talking
Speaker 1: about that in the Bible, I think sometimes Christians have
Speaker 1: this sense of like, well, those people weren't poor because
Speaker 1: of their laziness or because of their lack of virtue.
Speaker 1: They were poor back then just because everyone was poor
Speaker 1: back then. Eh No, everyone lacks virtue to some extent,
Speaker 1: everyone sins to some extent. And Christ wasn't just talking
Speaker 1: about poor people who were virtuous that we need to
Speaker 1: have care and love and concern for them. In fact,
Speaker 1: he specifically talked about poor people who weren't virtuous and
Speaker 1: the need to have love and care and concern for them,
Speaker 1: such as the prodigal Sun. So the fact that someone
Speaker 1: is not virtuous, that they are using drugs, that they
Speaker 1: are this, they are that that does not mean we
Speaker 1: get to exclude them from the Christian attitude of radical
Speaker 1: love and care and concern for every single human life.
Speaker 2: And so I think it does mean.
Speaker 1: Yes, my inclination is that this homelessness ordinance passed by
Speaker 1: the city is the best of all bad solutions. But
Speaker 1: we still really need to examine our consciences and at
Speaker 1: a macro level and a micro level and grapple with well,
Speaker 1: what is the best and fairest outcome for how to
Speaker 1: approach the problem of these people who are sleeping outside.
Speaker 1: What is the best way of approaching it? And maybe
Speaker 1: you know I would I'm inclined to trust the judgment
Speaker 1: of all seven council members plus the mayor. I'm inclined
Speaker 1: to trust their judgment. But there is this problem that
Speaker 1: you know, we're going to offer them services. There just
Speaker 1: aren't many beds. There really just aren't many beds available,
Speaker 1: and I'm not sure what's the best solution for this.
Speaker 1: When we return the Catholics for Kamala campaign that's next
Speaker 1: on the John Girardi Show, there's a bunch of different
Speaker 1: Zoom meetups that are happening where it's basically people get
Speaker 1: on a live stream and talk about how wonderful Kamala
Speaker 1: Harris is and then get people to donate money to
Speaker 1: her campaign. There have been a bunch of nauseating examples
Speaker 1: of this which all of a sudden became racially segregated
Speaker 1: because first there were like, a Black women for Kamala Harris.
Speaker 1: But then they're they're they're emerged a white women for
Speaker 1: Kamala Harris zoom call, you know, live stream fundraiser thing,
Speaker 1: and then a white dudes for Kamala Harris zoom call
Speaker 1: fundraiser thing, and and these became about, these exercises in
Speaker 1: liberal coded ways of speaking about you know, privilege, and oh.
Speaker 2: You white people need to use our privilege.
Speaker 1: To listen to black voices, and you know, blah blah
Speaker 1: blah blah blah, give them money. I guess it's not
Speaker 1: the first time that Democrats engaged in all white gatherings
Speaker 1: talking about black people. Democrats were really big on that
Speaker 1: in the South the KKK anyway. So the most revolting
Speaker 1: of these that seems to be coming up on Tuesday,
Speaker 1: August sixth is a Catholics for Kamala Harris call Catholics
Speaker 1: for Harris.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: Agent Squires are intrepid producer of the John Girardi Show,
Speaker 1: loves it when I talk about inside Catholic.
Speaker 2: Baseball, So buckle up.
Speaker 1: This is about the dumbest thing I've ever seen, but
Speaker 1: it it is reflective of this steady, steady trend of
Speaker 1: the Democrat Party and its relationship with Catholics. It's precisely
Speaker 1: how absurd this is that I just want to highlight
Speaker 1: and certain kinds of old, older liberal arguments about ways
Speaker 1: to appeal to Catholics that are just completely out the
Speaker 1: door at this point and renders this so absurd. So
Speaker 1: let me take you back to when I was in college.
Speaker 1: All right, So I started at Notre Dame in the
Speaker 1: fall of two thousand and six. So I was in
Speaker 1: college during the two thousand and eight presidential campaign, the
Speaker 1: high water mark for millennial liberals, two thousand and eight Obama.
Speaker 1: For millennial liberals, it's like Camelot. It's like basically the
Speaker 1: way that boomer liberal politicians like Bill Clinton and John Kerrey,
Speaker 1: the way that they reminisce about the John F.
Speaker 2: Kennedy days, and.
Speaker 1: A lot of young liberals kind of found their political
Speaker 1: identity in Kennedy.
Speaker 2: Kennedy was like the hero. Oh, he was the icon.
Speaker 1: He was this inspiration for this whole generation of younger liberal,
Speaker 1: younger liberals who would go on to the very prominent
Speaker 1: roles in American public life, as you know, future members
Speaker 1: of the House, future senators. The Kennedy sort of the
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty Kennedy sort of campaign team. A lot of
Speaker 1: them would go on to bigger and better things. It
Speaker 1: was this real moment of youthful excitement, and two thousand
Speaker 1: and eight Obama was like that in many ways for
Speaker 1: millennial liberals, only much more cloying and stupid and annoying
Speaker 1: because it was all just a big I think the
Speaker 1: enthusiasm for Obama was in so many ways media manufactured.
Speaker 1: I think there was a lot of sizzle and not
Speaker 1: a lot of steak there. But Obama was genuinely inspiring
Speaker 1: for all these young millennial liberals and all these guys
Speaker 1: my age. It was particularly obnoxious. Liberal guys in particular
Speaker 1: my age would wear button up dress shirts and khakis
Speaker 1: and be very earnest and try to imitate Obama. Act
Speaker 1: like Obama, think like Obama. They loved Barack Obama so
Speaker 1: much they all wanted to be Barack Obama. And basically
Speaker 1: it was one of the most annoying. That sort of
Speaker 1: demographic was some of the most annoying people in all
Speaker 1: some of the most annoying.
Speaker 2: People I've ever encountered in politics.
Speaker 1: It was that kind of subset of earnest millennial Guy.
Speaker 2: Obama supporters anyway.
Speaker 1: Now, on top of that, as I was at a
Speaker 1: Catholic university, I was also encountering this massive movement of
Speaker 1: like Catholics for Obama, and all of these notreed ame
Speaker 1: kids who had Republican parents, many of them had pro
Speaker 1: life parents, who were all sort of talking themselves into
Speaker 1: some sense that voting for Barack Obama was actually something
Speaker 1: that was a more Catholic thing to do than voting
Speaker 1: for John McCain, that actually Obama was better on Catholic issues,
Speaker 1: that actually, basically they wanted to be part of the
Speaker 1: zeitgeist of two thousand and eight. They wanted to be cool,
Speaker 1: they wanted to be sophisticated. So all these young Republican
Speaker 1: children were rebelling against their parents by voting for Barack
Speaker 1: Obama and trying some way to find some way to
Speaker 1: sort of rationalize it. And a lot of the arguments
Speaker 1: being made was that well, Barack Obama cares for the
Speaker 1: poor so much more than John McCain and his support
Speaker 1: for the poor, his support for.
Speaker 2: Obamacares support for this, and that better social welfare conditions
Speaker 2: will actually lead to fewer abortions, and that Obama he
Speaker 2: doesn't have us diity to Catholics. He's all of these cloying,
Speaker 2: annoying liberal rationalizations that you know, you can put lipstick
Speaker 2: on a pig, but it's still a pig. Obama was
Speaker 2: aggressively pro abortion, he just was.
Speaker 1: Nothing's going to change that. As soon as he gets
Speaker 1: into office. He starts massive federal funding for embryo destructive
Speaker 1: stem cell research. He does this, he does that, He
Speaker 1: does all these executive orders for increasing abortion blah.
Speaker 2: Blah blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: His administration would be the one that winds up loosening
Speaker 1: restrictions on the abortion pill, massively increasing its accessibility. All
Speaker 1: this stuff happens, and over the course of the Obama
Speaker 1: administration it sort of becomes clear like this guy's not really.
Speaker 2: Doing anything meaningfully to advance the.
Speaker 1: Life issue, not at all. He's actively hostile to it.
Speaker 1: Here he is suing nuns. His administration going after communities
Speaker 1: of Catholic nuns. Why because in their employer based health
Speaker 1: insurance plans, they don't want to cover abortion or contraception
Speaker 1: because they're nuns.
Speaker 2: They're Catholic nuns. So here is his.
Speaker 1: Administration actively persecuting this group for this and all those
Speaker 1: two thousand and eight Obama people. They either had to
Speaker 1: embarrass it in an embarrassed fashion, admit that they were wrong,
Speaker 1: or they just abandoned a lot of those Catholic convictions
Speaker 1: and just came on went on to become ordinary humdrum
Speaker 1: obnoxious liberals. The Catholics for Biden thing thus became more embarrassing,
Speaker 1: more embarrassing than athletics for Obama had been, because we
Speaker 1: had the track record of Obama, which Biden had enthusiastically
Speaker 1: supported the whole time, only it was worse now now
Speaker 1: Biden flip flopped on the position that he and Obama
Speaker 1: had actually maintained of supporting the High Amendment. Biden, over
Speaker 1: the course of one week in twenty nineteen, shifted a
Speaker 1: position he had held for forty plus years prior and
Speaker 1: said he now opposed the High Amendment. The High Amendment,
Speaker 1: which is this rider that gets attached to federal spending
Speaker 1: bills every year since nineteen seventy six, and it basically
Speaker 1: says no direct federal funding for abortion. Biden had supported
Speaker 1: it for years, decades, and all of a sudden in
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen, when he realized he needed to win the
Speaker 1: Democratic nomination. He completely pitched it out and said, yeah,
Speaker 1: he supports federal funding for abortion, and the Biden administration
Speaker 1: has been a massively aggressive entity pushing for legal abortion
Speaker 1: every which way.
Speaker 2: They can.
Speaker 1: Decry his whole you know, his now defunct campaign was
Speaker 1: focused for twenty twenty four on restoring Roe v.
Speaker 2: Wade.
Speaker 1: Well, now we've got Kamala Harris, and it's even more embarrassing.
Speaker 1: Why Because let's go back in history. Senator Kamala Harris
Speaker 1: was a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is
Speaker 1: charged with vetting nominees.
Speaker 2: For federal judge ships.
Speaker 1: She was objecting to three different Catholic judges on the
Speaker 1: basis of their membership in the Knights of Columbus. All right, So,
Speaker 1: for those who don't know, Knights of Columbus is kind
Speaker 1: of like a Catholic fraternal order, kind of like Freemasons,
Speaker 1: but Catholic without like Freemasons, but without the weird socio
Speaker 1: political beliefs in conspiracy, some of which it's kind of
Speaker 1: conspiracy theories, some of which is not is weird anyway,
Speaker 1: It's basically and a Catholic fraternal men's organization. They provide
Speaker 1: life insurance and they basically, it's a group of men
Speaker 1: who provide various kinds of charitable support for the efforts
Speaker 1: of the Catholic Church in.
Speaker 2: A lot of different ways. I'm a member of the
Speaker 2: Knights of Columbus.
Speaker 1: Tons of Catholic men are members of the Knights of Columbus,
Speaker 1: and what the Knights of Columbus believe in is nothing
Speaker 1: different from what the Catholic Church believes in.
Speaker 2: If you object to someone.
Speaker 1: Being a member of the Knights of Columbus, you are
Speaker 1: in effect just saying I object to you on the
Speaker 1: grounds that you are Catholic. Harris opposed this for a
Speaker 1: number of Knights of columb for a number of federal judges,
Speaker 1: I think three different federal judges, was trying to object
Speaker 1: to them on what is purely religious grounds, the fact
Speaker 1: that they were members of the Knights of Columbus. Harris
Speaker 1: was trying as California Attorney General to force pro life
Speaker 1: pregnancy centers to post on the wall of the waiting
Speaker 1: room where women could go to get abortions. Actively supported
Speaker 1: and co sponsored this bill that was passed by the
Speaker 1: state legislature AB. Seven to seventy five that was so
Speaker 1: egregious that the Supreme Court struck it down as violating
Speaker 1: the First Amendment rights of pro life pregnancy centers. Harris
Speaker 1: when she learned of the David Dilyden videos about Planned
Speaker 1: Parenthood affiliates and other abortion providers selling the body parts
Speaker 1: of aborted children for profit. She got evidence of that
Speaker 1: with the undercover videos that David Delyden released.
Speaker 2: What did she do?
Speaker 1: Did she go after abortion providers or the middlemen companies
Speaker 1: for profiting off the sale of fetal tissue derived from
Speaker 1: aborted fetuses, which is a crime both under California and
Speaker 1: federal law. No, she aggressively investigated and charged David de
Speaker 1: Leiden with a bunch of crimes. You know, the guy
Speaker 1: who was the whistleblower who showed evidence of this illegal conduct.
Speaker 1: Catholics for Kamala Harris is about as insane. You know,
Speaker 1: this is an exaggeration, so exaggeration. It's Jews for Hamas,
Speaker 1: it's as insane as I don't know, Republicans for Democrats.
Speaker 2: It's it's dogs for cats. It's it's completely preposterous.
Speaker 1: Few politicians in American public life have ever positioned themselves
Speaker 1: in a more anti Catholic position than Harris. When we
Speaker 1: return the merciful return of football. Next on The John
Speaker 1: Girardi Show. Thank God football is coming back. I gotta say, folks,
Speaker 1: the Olympics ain't cutting it for me. Basketball wasn't cutting it.
Speaker 1: Baseball just doesn't cut it. I've missed football ever since February,
Speaker 1: ever since the Super Bowl wound up and my forty
Speaker 1: nine Ers lost. I just need football back. I want
Speaker 1: college football back. I want my Saturdays. I want Notre
Speaker 1: Dame Football to be back on the air so that
Speaker 1: they can agonize and torture me again and make my
Speaker 1: children cry. I want NFL football back on Sunday. I'm
Speaker 1: I'm tired of the Olympics. Simon Biles is great, I'm
Speaker 1: tired of seeing her. I'm tired of swimming. I'm just
Speaker 1: bored of all sports, in all television and all entertainment.
Speaker 1: I just want football back, and thank god football will
Speaker 1: be returning this month. We had a preseason NFL game
Speaker 1: last night. Notre Dame football is starting during the month
Speaker 1: of August. Thank God Almighty football is back. That will
Speaker 1: do it for The John Girardi Show. See next time
Speaker 1: on Power Talk