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The Heartland Institute’s Donald Kendal, Jim Lakely, Justin Haskins, and Chris Talgo present episode 460 of the In The Tank Podcast. Vice President Kamala Harris, the presumptive Democratic candidate, has selected her running mate - Minnesota Governor Tim Walz. Nancy Pelosi and others in the media are trying to portray Walz as a moderate "heartland democrat," but is this really the case? The In The Tank Crew looks into Walz's record and policy agenda to show just how far-left he really is.
PRIMARY TOPIC - HARRIS/WALZ: A FAR-LEFT DEMOCRATIC TICKET
PRIMARY TOPIC - HARRIS/WALZ: A FAR-LEFT DEMOCRATIC TICKET
(video) Nancy Pelosi claiming Walz is moderate
(video) Nancy Pelosi asked Walz to “tone down” views on abortion
CotAE - What America needs to know about Tim Walz of Minnesota
CotAE - The High Cost of 100 Percent Carbon-Free Electricity by 2040
Energy Bad Boys – Green New Walz
https://energybadboys.substack.com/p/green-new-walz
https://energybadboys.substack.com/p/green-new-walz
National Review - Tim Walz Progressive Agenda Included Giving Driver’s Licenses, Free Tuition to Illegal Immigrants
NYP - Gov. Tim Walz accused of ‘massive overreach’ as VP pick’s COVID record slammed by critics: ‘Complete and utter failure’
Creators & Guests
What is Heartland Daily Podcast?
The “fire hose” of all podcasts produced by The Heartland Institute, a national free-market think tank.
Booyah. And we are live, ladies and gentlemen. Vice president Kamala Harris, the presumptive Democratic candidate has selected her running mate. Minnesota governor Tim Walz, Nancy Pelosi, and others in the media are trying to portray Walz as a moderate, just a, you know, middle of the road heartland of America Democrat. But is he really that?
Donald Kendal:We were gonna take a good look at his record, his policy agenda to show just how far left he really is. We're gonna be talking about this and more on episode 460 of the in the tank podcast.
Kamala Harris:I can imagine what can be and be unburdened by what has been. You know?
Donald Kendal:Oh, god. Yes. Welcome to the Think podcast. As always, I am your host, Donald Kendall. I say as always, but, that's not entirely true because I was not here last week.
Donald Kendal:Jim, I think, filled in for me as a host. I say I think because YouTube took our episode down because we had the goal of showing probably 30 seconds of Olympic footage, and we got copyright striked, and they took our video down. So if you wanna check out that episode and you missed it, you're gonna have to find the audio only version on iTunes. But, yeah, we got a lot to talk about today, and we have a full crew. I've got Jim Lakeley, VP of the Heartland Institute.
Donald Kendal:How are you doing today, good sir? He's muted. Classic classic Jim.
Isaac Orr:Boomer Jim strikes again.
Jim Lakely:Yeah. Yeah. On mute again. Well, you know, having Isaac Gore back in the podcast makes me nervous. You know?
Jim Lakely:He's a very much a loose cannon. So, no. I was trying to say that, I'm in a pretty crummy mood today. Not only we've been having some technical issues with our Streamyard, that irritated me right before we went on the air, but, the more I read about the stuff you need to read about to prepare for this podcast, which is how, leftist and radical the, Harris walls ticket is, and how our media is not reporting anything of substance on these on these 2. So, that's what you have to come to this podcast for.
Jim Lakely:But preparing for that got me pretty irritated, so we might have a good Jim Rant
Donald Kendal:or 2 today. Well, sounds good. And StreamYard, we love you. Don't don't take Jim's comments too hard there. Chris Talgo, also joining us, editorial director here at the Heartland Institute.
Donald Kendal:How are you doing today, good sir?
Chris Talgo:I'm doing good because I watched the first episode of Hard Knocks with the Chicago Bears, and I, I think Keller Williams will be inducted into the Hall of Fame, guaranteed. Yeah. I'm looking for the Bears to probably put up about 50 a game. Cable O'Loem's plugging and throw for about 6,000 yards. It's gonna be it's gonna be great great year for the Bears this year.
Donald Kendal:Well, see, I I'm not looking too far ahead. I'm still stuck on the Chicago white sox, which I think are just gonna be power into the top of the standings after their win the other day.
Chris Talgo:Well, they did just fire their manager, so I think they
Donald Kendal:are gonna exit. Turnaround.
Chris Talgo:Yeah. No. No. No. No.
Chris Talgo:No. This means that they're gonna they're gonna lose even more.
Donald Kendal:How dare you? Alright. Isaac Orr, you are the, what are you? What what's your title? You're the vice president of research at Always On Energy Research.
Donald Kendal:Isaac, we haven't had you on since, this new organization that you're a part of. Why don't you, why don't you say hi and tell us about it?
Isaac Orr:Sure. Yeah. Isaac Gore, vice president of Always On Energy Research, also a partial owner in the Green Bay Packers. So I thought Chris' little off the top thing was very adorable, like a teddy bear just chained up in the woods. Hope springs eternal down south.
Isaac Orr:And, so always on energy research is a, think tank that, Mitch Rolling and I founded. And, basically, what we are doing is we're making sure that everybody in the United States has access to reliable and affordable electricity.
Donald Kendal:A controversial statement in this, year of 2024.
Chris Talgo:What's what's wrong with you?
Donald Kendal:Yeah. How dare you? I mean, we're we're wind and solar only on this podcast. So you take your dirty coal and natural gas and get out of here.
Isaac Orr:Excuse me. It's a clean, beautiful coal, Donald.
Donald Kendal:That's good.
Isaac Orr:Yeah. And I I figured Andy's on vacation or something because he woulda had the Greta drop right there.
Donald Kendal:Good boy.
Isaac Orr:Good boy. No no shade no shade at the production value of this, though. I didn't mean it that way. I didn't. I promise.
Isaac Orr:Unfair you.
Donald Kendal:Before we get before we get into all of our topics, I always have that message that I put at the beginning of all of these episodes that, you know, for those audio only listeners that are catching the show probably on a Friday or later, why don't you leave a review for us in the Itunes? That would be greatly appreciated. It really helps out the show. And why don't you consider joining us a day earlier on Thursdays at noon CST where we are live streaming this on Facebook and YouTube and Rumble and x. And, when you do that, you can throw your comments and questions in the chat.
Donald Kendal:Maybe, we'll show your comments on the screen. Maybe we'll address your questions on the fly. Also, supporting the show is a little bit more difficult now that YouTube has demonetized us. So no super chats. Apparently, you can still do that on Rumble.
Donald Kendal:But if you wanna support the show, you can do so still by going to heartland.org/inthetank, and you can, you know, support the show with a few bucks there. And it's a good way to do it because YouTube won't take a 30% cut of those donations there. So support the show directly that way, or you could support the show just by hitting the like button, sharing this content, subscribing if you haven't already, or just leaving a comment under the video. All those things help break through the big tech algorithms that prevent content like this from being shown to more people. So gentlemen, Tim Walz, we're gonna talk about him, But I've been gone for a week, and, while I was on while I was on vacation on the TV in, like, the cabin where the Olympics wasn't really watching, but it was just on.
Donald Kendal:So anytime I would come back for whatever reason, I would see on the on the on the TV what event was going on. And, and this this brought up a conversation with me and Chris yesterday where I was talking about, like, just the, the events of the Olympics. Like, obviously, you've got your track and field, and you've got your, you know, the sprinting and basketball and some of the the weight lifting, some of, like, the wrestling, whatever, the the events that go back, like, a long, long time. But I was noticing, like, all of these different events while I was just periodically, like, checking in and seeing what was on TV. Or it was, like, handball.
Donald Kendal:Handball is an Olympic sport, speed walking, 3 on 3 basketball. Like, what what what is this,
Isaac Orr:guys? Didn't you love that episode of Malcolm in the Middle where Hal was a speed walker, Donald? I did. I did. That in and of itself merits Olympic consideration.
Isaac Orr:Thank you very much.
Donald Kendal:Jim, you're gonna say something.
Jim Lakely:You're you're forgetting the hottest new Olympic sport this year, breakdancing.
Donald Kendal:Yes. I was gonna get to that. Breakdancing, an Olympic sport now.
Isaac Orr:Is flag football an Olympic sport now too?
Donald Kendal:No. That's, I was also gonna mention that. That's debuting 4 years from now when they have it in LA. Is that where the
Jim Lakely:Really?
Isaac Orr:Series? Sure.
Donald Kendal:Flag football flag football is gonna be Olympic sport. I just wanna, like, meet I wanna meet one of these these, these athletes that, are gold medalists in flag football and just be like, oh, you're Olympic gold medalist. Wow. That's that's amazing. That's very impressive.
Donald Kendal:You know what event? Oh, a break dancing. What? Like, it's I don't know. It's it's I've never been, like, the biggest Olympics fan or whatever.
Donald Kendal:Maybe I'll check-in sometimes or watch some occasional, events or something like that. But, like, is it just becoming increasingly just like a farce? Is this, is this the world we are in in 2024?
Chris Talgo:Olympics is desperate for viewers, and they're desperate to, attract younger viewers. So that's why they are resorting to break dancing and all these weird sports because, like, you know, the the 3 and 3 basketball thing, I think, so, perfect because it's, you know, it's it's gimmicky in nature and reminds me of what I used to do, like, you know, in the driveway with, you know, my friends and now it's an Olympic sport. It's like, what's what's next horse?
Isaac Orr:Hackysack.
Donald Kendal:Yes. I wanna see I want to see if Frisbee golf the be in there.
Isaac Orr:But you know, they're actually probably going to happen. And, you know, Donald, I know you're throwing a lot of shade right now, but the United States of America does an exquisite job of inventing new sports that we can get gold medals in that nobody else cares about. Okay? And at the end of the day, it's only the medal count that counts, Donnie.
Donald Kendal:Do you know what's what should be in there?
Chris Talgo:Only the gold medal count.
Donald Kendal:Like, I feel like the floodgates are open. Like, anything could be in it. Like, I want battle bots to be in the Olympics. That would be dope.
Isaac Orr:That would be so cool. I mean, arm wrestling already should be if it isn't.
Donald Kendal:Oh, yeah. That one definitely should be. I wouldn't even question that one. Arm wrestling should be it.
Isaac Orr:Hardcore America right there. Absolutely.
Chris Talgo:I could be an Olympic floor hockey player. I really could. Well, I
Jim Lakely:haven't watched I watched I enjoyed I watched a lot of the tennis competitions.
Chris Talgo:I'm a big tennis fan, so
Jim Lakely:I was watching that. But, and I haven't watched actually a single event on track and field except for, I saw a replay or I saw an explanation on x on Twitter of the 100 meters, the 100 meter final in which the announcer thought that the runner from Jamaica had won, and he was going insane. Like, you know, the Jamaican has taken it, and then they show the replay. And the American, Noah, Noah Lyles, had leaned and, you know, had beat him by, you know, about the width of your thumb. And there was this great explanation on how, Noah Lyles was really slow out of the block.
Jim Lakely:He was in last place at 20 meters. He was in last place at 30 meters. He was in last place at 40 meters, and then he ran faster than obviously everybody else, the last 60 meters and just, you know, zoom came up and caught up. I mean, it was actually pretty fascinating and, to to watch that. But, yeah, I mean, the Olympics are pretty cool.
Jim Lakely:I have not yet watched the break dancing, though, but I do have the app. So I plan to, binge all the break dancing competitions, over the weekend.
Donald Kendal:Yeah. And and, you know, like like Isaac pointed out, seems like I'm throwing a lot of shade. I do have all the respect in the world for more of, like, the traditional sports, especially the ones that are just kind of, like, an objective standard. Like, you just hit the stopwatch when they cross the finish line. You know, the gymnastics, I also have, like, full respect for even though it's kind of like a subjective scoring method, which I can't really wrap my head completely around.
Donald Kendal:But, yeah, it just kinda blows my mind that I, like, turn I turn on the TV and handball is on. I'm like, I haven't seen handball since, like, 8th grade gym class, and now it's an Olympic sport. Maybe it's been Olympic sport for a long time, but, like like I said, I don't watch the Olympics.
Jim Lakely:Big in Europe.
Isaac Orr:What what clip did you guys show last week that got the the episode taken down?
Jim Lakely:The, x y chromosome athlete who beat the crap out of an x x chromosome athlete. I think if
Chris Talgo:I can
Jim Lakely:say it that way, we won't get, you know, slammed down again. Who knows?
Donald Kendal:I don't know. Yeah. We'll see.
Isaac Orr:I thought it was gonna be the pole vaulter.
Donald Kendal:If you don't know, don't look it up. All right. Let's get to the show here. So 2 weeks ago. We did an episode on Kamala Harris.
Donald Kendal:Episode. We covered just how much of a radical leftist she is. We we covered a whole bunch of different stuff. You have to go back and check out that episode, but, she was one of the only senators that supported the green new deal when it was originally proposed. That included 100% renewable energy by, I think, it was 2030, retrofitting every building in America to be more energy efficient, mass massive government jobs programs, income for those all of those that are unable or unwilling to work, universal health care.
Donald Kendal:Kamala Harris is also we showed clips of her talking about universal health care for illegal immigrants. She was determined to be the most liberal senator by GovTrack in 2019. I think it was gov track. This is all on top of just essentially being in favor of every other progressive proposal out there. So, you know, that and some other stuff just kind of highlights that she is pretty far leftist, especially during a year during the primaries that year when Joe Biden's biggest selling point was that he was kind of a moderate.
Donald Kendal:That that's what kind of got him over the hill past Bernie Sanders or whatever. Everyone kind of coalesced behind him because he'd be able to get that middle of the road American or whatever. Now fast forward 4 years, we got Kamala Harris, who, like I said, is like the most liberal senator, and that's saying a lot. That that that's saying a lot there. So and and again, we kind of covered everything of how that, came to be.
Donald Kendal:I think most people watching this kind of understand, but it seems as though the Democratic Party is kinda stuck with Kamala Harris. And perhaps it's possible there might be some shenanigans at the upcoming Democratic National Convention that could replace her.
Chris Talgo:No. No. No. No. They did the roll call vote.
Donald Kendal:Oh, it's over already? Yes. Okay. Great. So yeah.
Donald Kendal:I mean, we're, like, 90 we're 90 days away from the election. So even if even if that weren't the case, I thought it would be pretty unlikely that we would see anything kind of crazy go down at the DNC. So maybe maybe they would try to complement her far left tendencies with a more moderate running mate pick. You know, the I think there were certain names going around, but, but they picked, Minnesota governor Tim Walz as the running mate. And they're still going with the narrative that it's a moderate running mate pick.
Donald Kendal:So according to many in the media and other Democratic commentators and talking heads, Waltz is moderate, the archetypal everyman, everyone's favorite uncle. He's Midwest nice. He's folksy. Y. He's just a heartland of America Democrat.
Donald Kendal:Right, everybody? So, we're gonna be taking a look for the remainder of this episode at this Harris Walls ticket, and, see just how left wing they are and speculate what the administration might look like towards the end of the episode. And before we get into the details, though, I want, general reactions from all of you, about this announcement. I know while I was out of town, there was a lot of speculation going around about who Harris was going to pick. I think, was it like Josh Shapiro?
Donald Kendal:Is that his name?
Chris Talgo:Yep.
Donald Kendal:I always wanna say Ben. Josh Shapiro was out there. Former astronaut Mark Kelly was kind of at the high end of the list, but at the end of the day, it was Tim Waltz. So, Chris, I want your thoughts first. I think the announcement came in on Monday.
Donald Kendal:Was it Monday or was it early Tuesday? What was your
Chris Talgo:It was early earlier this week. I was completely taken by surprise. I thought by all accounts, she would go with Josh Shapiro, because first, she needs to win Pennsylvania. The democrats have to win Pennsylvania for them to have any shot in electoral college. Josh Shapiro is very popular in Pennsylvania.
Chris Talgo:He's a moderate governor. And, you know, she went she went with the the far left guy. You know, there's been a bunch of, you know, people speculating as to why she did this. I think, first of all, she thought that she would be upstaged by Shapiro because, when she, actually rolled out Tim Walz, it was in Pennsylvania, which I thought was actually pretty insulting to Josh Shapiro. And Josh Shapiro that day, gave a a speech, you know, to rally up the crowd before Kamala and Tim came out.
Chris Talgo:And I was watching that going, wow. This guy's really good. I mean, he can really, you know, get the, crowd in the palm of his hand, and he he had it. And, you know, a lot of people said that that Kamala Harris is very thin skinned and that she did not want someone with presidential ambitions who might make her, you know, look not not as good as he did, on the campaign stump. And she went with, Tim Walz because Tim Walz has flied outside.
Chris Talgo:I don't wanna be president, and he just wants to be vice president. And, also during the interview, people were saying that, Josh Shapiro was asking her, well, what what am I gonna be in charge of? And Tim Walz was saying, I will just do whatever you tell me to do. So he was, you know, definitely on board with whatever she wanted him to be. And, I think that it's gonna be a big mistake because I think, you know, if she if she wanted to win, she had to placate the moderates, but she didn't.
Chris Talgo:She doubled down because I think that she, you know, just wants to wants to appease the base. So I think this is gonna bite her in the end, and I think it's not gonna help her reach the, the independent, voters that she needs to to win. Because, you know, for all the talk about the polls and this and that, let's always remember that this is gonna come down to 6 or 7 states, and it's gonna come down to about 10,000 votes in each of those states. So why would she double down with a guy who's even more far left than her? And I'm well, I know we're gonna get into all the policies that he's, you know, been, preaching and, you know, enacting, during his career.
Chris Talgo:Why would she do that? Mhmm.
Donald Kendal:And I
Chris Talgo:think that that just goes to show that she's weak, that she's indecisive, and that when it comes down to it, she makes poor decisions. So I I was very surprised. I I if if someone would have would have asked me to put money in it, I would have thought Shapiro guaranteed by a landslide. So
Donald Kendal:Yeah. I will I will admit that, I really didn't have my, you know, finger anywhere close to the pulse of this, you know, this decision for their running mate for Kamala Harris. I kinda thought that she would go with the astronaut guy. I feel like that would get a lot of kind of, middle of the road voters, you know, like, out of the road. But but she can't
Chris Talgo:but she can't do that because he was he's a border hawk. And she was, you know, the border czar, and she so so she she painted herself, you know, into this corner, and she, I I guess, you know, had thought to herself, you know, and one other quick thing. I don't wanna, you know, just dominate this, this part of the segment. But, Josh Shapiro is Jewish, and Kamala Harris, like it or not, has a very big problem on her hand because she cannot go after, you know, the the people who who want, you know, peace in the Middle East because she has to she has to appease the Palestinian base in places like, you know, Minnesota, Michigan. So, you know, it's hard for her to say, hey.
Chris Talgo:Wait a second. I'm gonna put someone on the ticket that's that's Jewish and that actually thinks that Israel has a right to defend itself when that's not what she, you know, is apparently gonna be running on. So there's just another reason why I think she bowed to political pressure and, you know, went with her, you know, left wing candidate because that's what, you know, the that's that's what she's gonna run on.
Donald Kendal:Well, leave it to the astronaut to be a a hardliner against illegal aliens. Jim Langley. Jim Langley.
Isaac Orr:That was
Isaac Orr:a good one, Donnie. You didn't deserve that.
Jim Lakely:Yeah. Well, I have I have so many videos in the back end of the, of the studio here, that I can't even play any, sound effects, but you don't deserve a rim shot for that one. Oh, that's alright. When I when I when I heard that that she picked balls, though, I mean, I knew a little bit about him. First thing I thought, I was like, oh my god, they picked Isaac's boy up there in Minnesota, he's had to live in there.
Donald Kendal:That's why I'm saving Isaac the last
Jim Lakely:number. Yeah. He goes last, but, yeah. And and when I was looking up, clips that we're gonna play in this in this, in this pod, starting with the absurdity of Nancy Pelosi describing him, as a moderate and not a hard leftist as as his record shows. And his statements show that show that, what he is.
Jim Lakely:But, you know, the the reaction by or the the the our propaganda media is, like, pushing this idea that he's just like, you know, your MSNBC dad, you know, and and Kamala is your fun wine aunt and all that kind of nonsense. Yes. You know, so, again, you're gonna have to come to a podcast like this and others that we all enjoy to get the real story about, Tim Walz and Kamala Harris, in 90 days before the election. 90 days. She I mean, it's just it's just mind blowing.
Jim Lakely:4 weeks ago, Donald Trump was shot. His brains were almost splattered all across the stage in Butler, Pennsylvania, and it's as if it never happened. And now we're now we've got, you know, the fun, wine aunt Kamala and my MSNBC dad or uncle Tim Walz. That's what our media is pushing these days. It's disgusting, actually.
Jim Lakely:I told you I was gonna get mad. Here we go.
Donald Kendal:You should
Jim Lakely:just throw it to Isaac now.
Donald Kendal:I see. I know you're the most familiar with Tim Walz, one of the main reasons why you were invited on to today's show. Clearly, you weren't invited for your laughing at my jokes. But what were your first reactions when Walz's name was pulled out of a hat?
Isaac Orr:I was very surprised. I also thought Josh Shapiro was the more logical choice. And but I told my coworker, Mitch, like, hey. If it's Walls, we have to have an article up, like, tomorrow morning because, we have done more research on his energy record than anybody else. And I I am very frustrated with governor Walz just as a as a taxpayer.
Isaac Orr:So he gave out rebate checks to everybody, but I didn't get one. So or he had an income limited and, you know, just stuff like that where it's like, come on, man. I'm paying my taxes here. Come on, man. I'm paying taxes.
Isaac Orr:I want a little bit of that back. They, he and the Democrats in Saint Paul spent a $17,000,000,000 surplus in one single year. Mhmm.
Chris Talgo:And
Isaac Orr:so there's a whole bunch of stuff like that, and I'm I'm sure we'll get into this a little bit later. But, he hasn't even been a good governor in terms of just competently leading the state. Minnesota had the largest COVID fraud in the country. It was a feeding our future scandal. I don't know if you've heard of it, but Mhmm.
Isaac Orr:Almost a quarter $1,000,000,000 were given to these groups. They were defrauding the Minnesota Department of Education. They said they were providing free meals for kids during the pandemic, and it turned out that this was going to fund second houses, 3rd houses, luxury vacations, and things like that. And, there was a really interesting article in the Minnesota reformer, where they basically called him out and said he was afraid to actually prosecute these cases or not give these, these organizations money. So it's it's a disaster from a good governance standpoint, and it's even worse from an energy standpoint.
Donald Kendal:Yeah. The the energy thing is definitely something I wanna spend a pretty good deal of time on just because, you know, we've got you, energy expert on the show. Heartland is the, you know, energy kinda and climate centric, whatever primary is our bread and butter topics. So we're gonna spend a lot of time on that, but there is so much different stuff that we can spend time going over. I mean, just the fact that, again, this, like, knee jerk that he's, like, this middle of the road moderate guy.
Donald Kendal:Like it's immediately blown up that narrative by the fact that he was like endorsed or at least this pick was being celebrated by Elon, Omar and AOC and Jamal pulled a fire alarm Bowman. It's it's kind of a joke that like, you know, they've they haven't they haven't just, like, uniformly endorsed people, like, the squad members and all of that. So the fact that they were pretty happy to celebrate this, I think, is a little telling. But, but, yeah, there there's a lot to go over. There's a lot that we probably will just not spend any time on.
Donald Kendal:I know there's, like, accusations of, like, stolen valor.
Chris Talgo:No. No. No. Not accusations. That is a fact.
Chris Talgo:I've watched a lot of coverage on this yesterday, and this is this is an indisputable fact that he served 24 years in the Minnesota National Guard. And when they were deployed to Iraq, what did he do? He he he quit. He quit. He was in charge of a battalion.
Chris Talgo:So so right when they were about to be deployed, he quit, and he ended up running for, for, political office. And, the the people who went to Iraq who would have been under his leadership, have universally condemned what he did. And the fact that he has been on a on multiple occasions, you can check his, his bio on on his governor profile and even on the campaign website for Kamala Harris where it says that he's he served in wartime. That is just not true. There there have been many many, videos in in times where he has said and alluded to that carrying a weapon in war.
Chris Talgo:Not true. Not true. 1000%. And that just that goes to show that he is dishonest, and he does not respect, the the people. I mean, this is this is a big deal.
Chris Talgo:JD Vance is absolutely 1000% right to to hone in on this, especially because JD Vance, guess what, was in the US Marines and did deploy, to the Middle East after 911. And, you know, I've watched, some CNN and MSNBC last night saying, no. He didn't. He was just in communications. He was never, you know, on the front lines.
Chris Talgo:Not true. Not true.
Donald Kendal:Yeah. I was gonna say that we probably won't talk about that, but there you go. You got the you got the skinny
Chris Talgo:of it. I mean, how how can you how how can you how can you not address that? Because this goes to the core of his character.
Donald Kendal:Sure. No. No. The leaders
Chris Talgo:leaders don't abandon their battalion of 100 of people right when, you know, they need to actually go into a dangerous environment.
Donald Kendal:That's not a good thing. And I'm not I'm not even suggesting that it's not important. I just, you know, figure that we're gonna be spending more time on the policy stuff.
Jim Lakely:Right. You
Donald Kendal:know that there's no things and other kind of character things are out there. But One
Chris Talgo:other just one other quick thing on this. You know, he claims that he's a command master sergeant. Not true also. In order to be a command master sergeant, you have to go through 2 years of, of schooling, to get that to, like, earn that. He never earned that.
Chris Talgo:So he is he is claiming that he is a command master sergeant when he's not. He never was.
Donald Kendal:Interesting. So they're here just to drive home the the kind of that media narrative that they're they're trying to paint that he's just this middle of the road guy. I've got a couple of clips here that I think just they, complement each other so perfectly. So the first one, if we have this kind of queued up, is Nancy Pelosi, talking, I think, on MSNBC. I think it's like Morning Joe or something like that where she's dismissing the idea that Walls is some far leftist.
Donald Kendal:So if we have that video, let's go ahead and play it. It's a pretty short one, I think.
Kamala Harris:Tim Walz, I know very well. Let's say he served in the house. To characterize him as left is so unreal. It's just not what the question he's right down the middle. He's a a heartland of America democrat.
Donald Kendal:That's right. Right down the middle. Heartland of America democrat. I love how she
Chris Talgo:had to pause too. She is so white.
Donald Kendal:What? So then let's check-in her notes
Jim Lakely:there, you know? Right. Right.
Donald Kendal:So that's Nancy Pelosi once again talking about how it's it's just so right down the middle. So let's go ahead and play walls, that that one that's labeled Walls abortion. I think this is him talking at a rally, maybe a victory rally for all I know. Let's go ahead and play that clip, please.
Tim Walz:And my record is so pro choice. Nancy Pelosi asked me if I should tone it down. I stand with planned parenthood, and we won.
Donald Kendal:So so in one clip, you got Nancy Pelosi saying he couldn't be more down the middle. Couldn't be more down the middle. And then the other clip is him saying, yeah, Nancy Pelosi told me to tone it down on a portion, but screw her. It's just those 2 clips existing in the same universe is almost too perfect. So that's a that's a great great illustration.
Donald Kendal:So let's just go let's just start kind of marching our way through some of these policy stuff. A lot of this is kind of his record, but a lot of this is stuff that he supports and, you know, his agenda going forward. Let's start off with COVID since, Isaac, you already brought that up and, like, the big fraud and everything like that. So, you know, some he he basically governed, as with some of the worst and most authoritarian practices during the pandemic, and that's saying something. That's a pretty high bar.
Donald Kendal:School and business lockdown, very strict school and business lockdowns, forcing hospitalized COVID patients back into nursing homes. I think, and, Isaac, correct me if I'm wrong here, but, Minnesota was the worst state when it came to the fatality rate amongst senior citizens, and I think it was specifically because of policies like that. Did were we talking about this yesterday, or was that somebody else I was talking to? I
Isaac Orr:think it was somebody else you were talking to, but Minnesota had this really bad policy of sending, elderly people who had COVID that were in the hospital back to their nursing homes. And that's just a state law that's currently on the books. And, you know, governor Walz had emergency powers for a long time during the COVID pandemic, and I think that was definitely something where he definitely should not have done that because he's essentially Amazon priming people with the virus to an area where people are the most vulnerable. Vulnerable. So Right.
Isaac Orr:Right. I mean, that that was a huge oversight. And my colleague, John Phelan, when I worked at Center of the American Experiment, did a really good job of elaborating on you know, this is a this is a big screw up on the part of the Walls administration because he probably had the power, the emergency power to make alternative arrangements for that, and he just didn't.
Donald Kendal:Yeah. Yeah. No. That that was a ridiculous one. I I think Cuomo and New York did, like, a very similar thing.
Donald Kendal:I think we spent time years ago talking about that.
Isaac Orr:And Cuomo refused to use, like, the ship that had been sent up to New York. So I would I would argue that Cuomo did a worse job for that reason. And and
Chris Talgo:and the Javits Center. Remember remember they built that giant Javits Center?
Isaac Orr:Oh, no.
Donald Kendal:Yeah. I don't. But, there was also he was he was getting a lot of heat from from this. And I think we have the audio of this where they, they set up a snitch line. If your neighbors are, you know, going outside of quarantine or walking down the street past curfew or something like that, we're gonna set up a snitch line for you to go and rat out your neighbors.
Donald Kendal:And, I think we have the audio of that. If we do, let's play that, please.
Isaac Orr:Hello. You have reached the department of public safety stay at home hotline. The information you leave is considered public information. At the tone, please leave the following information, your name, your callback number, how the stay at home order is being violated, and where the stay at home order was violated. Thank you.
Chris Talgo:Let's also let's also remember that he, made it, he he basically came down on, churches and said, no. You cannot attend church services during COVID. However, he kept, you know, tattoo parlors and, other liquor stores, you know, open for business. So, I mean, there are so many things we could go on on his, you know, horrible COVID, you know, policies.
Donald Kendal:Yeah. There was a lot of terrible COVID stuff going around along around the country. So, you know, you could almost you can almost argue you can give them a pass for some of it, but, man, some of these things are pretty egregious. Jim, thoughts on any COVID stuff, or do you want me to move on?
Jim Lakely:I mean, we can we can move on from it. I mean, it it's I I found that clip, of the COVID snitch line set up in Minnesota, and it's I don't think every state had a snitch line. I think it would be I don't know. I don't think Florida had a COVID snitch line. And, you know, hearing that just kind of triggered me and brought me back to the absolute insanity that we all live through and that we've all kind of tried to put out of our minds because it's human nature to suppress traumatic events so you don't have to recall them and think about them and live with them all the time.
Jim Lakely:But, we did live in a world in which governments, government bureaucrats, and even governors were encouraging Americans to snitch on their fellow Americans for living their lives, for being outside in a park with your children, in the open air and sunshine, governments and people like Tim Walz encouraged you to to rat that person out and call the authorities and get them in trouble, perhaps arrested. And I have a couple other clips. One of them is, Tim Wall's, quite, totalitarian and anti freedom and anti American viewpoint on what free speech is, and also what his his idea of what his definition of socialism is. And while while while researching this, while reading more about about, governor Tim Walz, because I don't live in Minnesota like Isaac does, You know, kind of the angrier I got, not not so much, you know, his policies and his attitudes are very hard left. They're very anti freedom in almost every single way.
Jim Lakely:He we show one of those clips. He gets kind of shouty and, you know, and and, you know, growling at the you know, during rallies, which is fine. I like passion. Who doesn't? But our media is ignoring all of these things about him.
Jim Lakely:They are just propping him up as, like I said before, you know, your friendly MSNBC and, you know, someone who's gonna take care of you. And it it just and, again, it kind of makes me go back to think about, well, how does the media cover Donald Trump? Every single thing Donald Trump says is the end of the world. Every off the cuff comment that he might make or insult he may have for his political opponents is blown up like some kind of huge deal. Yet everything that Kamala and and Tim Walz has said in their record is completely unremarkable.
Jim Lakely:The media will not will not report on it at all. And in fact, they've now stopped reporting the fact that, Donald Trump very narrowly, if if not for a little turn of the head, would have been a day it would have been dead. We would have had a a a political, a candidate for president and a former president of United States dead on live television, and the media won't cover that anymore, doesn't talk about it. So I'm look. Look.
Jim Lakely:Tim Walz is a hard leftist. I'm not surprised that, Kamala I I think Kamala picked him for the reasons that Chris articulated. She does wanna be outshone. She apparently, by all accounts, from former staffers and others, that she has a very thin skin. She kind of has the characteristics of a very insecure person.
Jim Lakely:You might say the same thing maybe about Donald Trump, but since the media is not going to report on the actual hard left and antifreedom and and in some ways, tyrannical policies and outlooks of the democratic ticket right now, we're gonna do it.
Donald Kendal:Yeah. No. And you you kind of set up the waltz free speech one. I think this must be in relation to COVID. Right?
Donald Kendal:Because the misinformation thing in the media and the calls for dealing with misinformation really, if it didn't get its start in in during the COVID era, it definitely got propelled to like a whole another atmospheric level, during COVID. So yeah, this is a this is a very short clip of of Walls and his, position on free speech. Let's go ahead and play that clip.
Tim Walz:I think we need to push back on this. There there's no guarantee to free speech on misinformation or or hate speech and especially around our democracy.
Donald Kendal:Yeah. That's right. I would love to see the full context of that clip. I mean, obviously, you can't, like, defraud people and all of that. So there are definitely limitations on that.
Donald Kendal:But, to consider how loose everyone was playing with the idea of free speech during the COVID era, Little concerning little concerning clip there.
Jim Lakely:Well, I mean, let's let's be clear what and this is what's we we talk about this on this pod a lot and and, you know, it's the idea of misinformation. We thought it was kind of a joke when, when there was, like, a misinformation, disinformation board of some sort with the government, and you had the, you know, the the tyrannical Mary Poppins lady, you know, in charge of it and all this stuff. But, you know, let's actually be clear and serious about what's what's happening. You know, misinformation is anything, any speech that criticizes democratic rule. It was not misinformation, for instance, to lie about the Russia hoax or the fine people hoax or the inject bleach in your arm hoax, all those hoaxes about Trump.
Jim Lakely:That's not misinformation. That's allowed to be shared on social media. That's allowed to be shouted on CNN, but it's misinformation, to say, hey. Maybe COVID didn't come from bad bat soup somewhere at a wet market. You know, you know, maybe Biden is in an actual mental decline.
Jim Lakely:That was also called misinformation. Mhmm. And so yeah. And so, you know and it's actually right now, it's actually misinformation to say that, Kamala Harris wants to ban fracking. No.
Jim Lakely:No. No. No. No. No.
Jim Lakely:She changed her mind. So it's misinformation to say that she wants to do that. So a continuation of this sort of mindset is going to happen if Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are in the White House together in 2025. I don't wanna live in that world. I don't think any American should live in that world.
Jim Lakely:We should be able to say what we want and not have the regime label it as hate speech or misinformation, and then have be punished in some way for saying things that the regime doesn't like.
Donald Kendal:Mhmm. Yeah. I'm gonna I'm gonna power through some of these other policy things. Feel free to just jump in if you wanna comment, but I I do wanna, you know, dedicate, like, the last 20 minutes of this podcast. It's just the energy thing because I think that's probably the most important saving the most important stuff for last.
Donald Kendal:That's the theme of this episode. So, Tim Walz signed law making Minnesota a sanctuary state for children seeking transgender surgical procedures and hormone prescriptions. In, 2023, Wall signed a law banning conversion therapy, which also included prohibiting counselors from withholding recommendations for transgender surgical procedures or hormonal treatments for individuals experiencing gender dysphoria. Prohibiting counselors from withholding recommendations. That's a funny way of just saying mandating recommendations, but, you know, whatever.
Donald Kendal:We'll just word it that way. When it comes to illegal immigration, and there's Johnny
Chris Talgo:I'm sorry. But real quick, I need to, just expand on that. Here's here's what, Tim Moss also signed into law, as governor. A law that says if you're a parent and you do not abide by the recommendations, that, your child should have, you know, puberty blockers and such, the state of Minnesota can take your child away from you.
Donald Kendal:Oh, good. Yep. Good. That's that's that's the power we should grant the the state. That's fantastic.
Donald Kendal:Illegal immigration. In his 2018 gubernatorial race, Waltz advocated for Minnesota become a sanctuary state. He just wants to be a sanctuary state for everything. Advocated for driver's license for illegal immigrants. Actually, did he
Jim Lakely:sign that in the law?
Chris Talgo:Yes. Free tuition also for college.
Donald Kendal:Free college tuition for illegal immigrants. So, I mean, a lot of these things aren't necessarily reflective of being right down the middle of the road as Nancy Pelosi described. It seems like that's something a little bit more of a AOC squad type, proposals there, but, hey. You know, this is the world we live in now.
Jim Lakely:How about his
Chris Talgo:how about his reaction to the to the 2020 riots, which let's not forget, you know, originated in Minneapolis. Mhmm. How did, the governor of that state, react when Minneapolis was being burned And the mayor of Minneapolis, who I disagree with on most points, immediately was saying, we need the National Guard. We need the National Guard. Tim Walz waited days.
Chris Talgo:Tim Walz's wife came out and said, you know, not verbatim, but something like, I left the windows open because I just wanted to smell the the the, you know, the burning tires and such. Tim Walz actually came out when all this was happening and, you know, defended the, the riots. He totally defended it.
Donald Kendal:Right. Right.
Chris Talgo:He's not a leader.
Donald Kendal:I need a, we need a candle flavor or whatever scented candle of burning car tires and send it to her. That'd be great. My next whole page of notes here is just energy and climate stuff related. So, Chris or or or or anyone on the panel, if there's any kind of other policy area things that I'm neglecting here, feel free to jump in. Or otherwise, I'm just gonna get into energy stuff.
Jim Lakely:Well, I'll I'll just I'll just add that it's just it's this ticket is just perfect when it comes to that, George Floyd BLM Antifa riots. We had we we had the governor who let it who let it burn, let the cities burn for days days. And we have as a he's the vice presidential candidate, and the presidential candidate promoted a bail fund for those for those rioters. So it's like it's the one two punch of, of encouraging, basically, a revolution in the United States and a violent one on the streets are are now your 12 on the democratic ticket. Pretty wow.
Jim Lakely:What a coincidence.
Isaac Orr:Jim, those were mostly peaceful protests. Come on.
Donald Kendal:Mostly not fiery protests. Yes. Fiery, but mostly peaceful.
Isaac Orr:That was crazy. I mean, I lived in Minneapolis when that was happening, and, the thankfully, no houses were targeted, but businesses all over were targeted. Like, the the Walgreens just down the street from us totally burned out, looted. The grocery store that I used to go to when I lived in South Minneapolis, That was at the epicenter. That's right next to the 3rd precinct, which still hasn't been rebuilt, and they're still, like, wringing their hands about how they're gonna, you know, restore the police precinct over there, the target, and they burned down an affordable housing development that was going up, and a whole bunch of businesses on Lake Street, that were owned by, you know, Hispanic, Asian Americans, stuff like that.
Isaac Orr:They all got their stuff busted up too. So it was it was really bad for the community. And, you know, now there's a Raising Canes over there where the Wendy's used to be, so I guess they upgraded in that respect. But, like, it definitely should not have been allowed to go on as long as it was, as long as it did.
Donald Kendal:It's pretty amazing that that didn't didn't stop him from being, like, the the running mate. Like, that alone. You know? Like, the stolen failure thing that like, some of the other stuff we've already talked about. But, nope, he he might be the 2nd most powerful person in the world in a in a couple of, months.
Isaac Orr:And this is really the first time that Wallace has had to undergo any real media scrutiny because he gets treated with kid gloves here, all the time. So,
Jim Lakely:there's treated, but but kid gloves now. I mean, they're still not examining his record. It's amazing.
Chris Talgo:Well, that's true
Isaac Orr:of the mainstream media, but the, like, the national media apparatus is now singularly focused on him. So there is more of an opportunity. Like, groups like Center of the American Experiment, conservative media people in Minnesota have been on this case for a long time, but they only have so much influence. And now that the national people are suddenly interested in his record, he is having to endure more scrutiny or at least, hopefully, he will at some point here in the near future.
Donald Kendal:Right. Yeah. You got the Fox News and the Breitbart's and the Blaze Media and podcasts like this are all now having an excuse to talk about this guy. So go ahead, Chris.
Chris Talgo:Yeah. I was gonna say, you know, Isaac touched on this earlier, but he took a $18,000,000,000 surplus and turned it into an $8,000,000,000 deficit. And, Minnesota also has the 6th highest out migration rate in the country. When it comes to business climate, they have the 44th, worst business climate because of his taxes and regulations. I mean, he is a humongous regulator of businesses, fees, taxes, all sorts of rules, you know, pushed upon them.
Chris Talgo:You know, he took he took a Minnesota, which it was a, you know, a state in a, you know, healthy healthy place and has almost completely ruined it. And and and and because of that, he gets promoted. I mean, like, what is this? And I do I do think that over the next 90 days, this is going to come out, and he is gonna have to respond to this. I did see yesterday when, he was on on the tarmac in, Wisconsin that some of the reporters were asking about the stolen valor.
Chris Talgo:He just completely ignored them and just didn't answer the question. So I I I do think that this is gonna eventually have to be addressed. Let's also remember that Kamala Harris has not taken one press question in 18 days.
Jim Lakely:Right.
Donald Kendal:Right. You
Chris Talgo:well, that cannot be sustained much longer.
Donald Kendal:As for the surplus thing, I think that he was under the impression that they were filming the sequel to Brewster's 1,000,000, with that. So he was just trying to spend as much money as possible. Nobody laughs at my jokes. Okay. Let's go to energy policy.
Donald Kendal:Isaac, this is another excuse.
Isaac Orr:That one just wasn't very good. You you referenced an obscure one. I'm definitely a cheerleader for your jokes, Donald. But, yeah, let's get to energy policy.
Donald Kendal:Okay. So I think this is a good excuse for you to talk about another project that you are a part of, which is the energy bad boys substack. Why don't you why don't you talk about that, and, let's start going over your latest entry of that publication here.
Isaac Orr:Yeah. Absolutely. So Mitch Rolling and I, my, partner in crime over at Always On Energy Research, we started a substack last November, and it's called energy bad boys. So go check it out and subscribe. Energy bad boys dot substack.com.
Isaac Orr:And we recently wrote a piece called green new walls. Basically, everything you need to know about governor Walz's record on energy. And in short, what you need to know is that governor Walz has never seen a California energy policy that he has not tried to implement in the state of Minnesota. Right. And he's also really, a fan of bait and switch tactics.
Isaac Orr:So, like, when he was running for governor in 2018, he said, well, you know, I think we need to have a modest increase in the gas tax. And people were like, okay. Fine. We need to pay for our roads and bridges. He gets elected.
Isaac Orr:All of a sudden, he's proposing a 20¢ per gallon increase in the gas tax, which would have raised it by 70% and made us the 4th highest gas tax in the entire country. So, he eventually caved. Like, I don't buy that Tim Walz doesn't wanna be president someday. I know that that's kind of been something he that's out in the in the media. I don't personally buy that.
Isaac Orr:That's just my own personal
Donald Kendal:opinion. Buy that either.
Isaac Orr:He definitely yeah. He's incredibly ambitious, and he also wants to be taken seriously. And as a result, like, he has pretty thin skin too. So, like, during gubernatorial debates with Tim Walz, like, it is possible to get under his skin, and then he'll kind of lash back. But when the public said, no way.
Isaac Orr:We do not want a 20 cent gas tax increase. He did eventually back down, and they passed 1 this last legislative session that was indexed to inflation at a lower rate. But, he's been anti oil pipeline. He's been for, electric vehicle mandates. He wants to implement a low carbon fuel standard, which is a California regulation that will increase, gas prices and diesel prices.
Isaac Orr:And, also, he signed his 20 or his, 100% carbon free electricity mandate by 2040. And when Wallace is running for office, he said, you know, this this oil pipeline that needs to get replaced in Minnesota because it was built in 1968 and it's corroded and it's operating at half capacity for safety measures, He said, oh, well, you know, the Public Utilities Commission went through. They unanimously approved the project. They've been studying it for 4 years. I think that we should we should replace the pipeline.
Donald Kendal:Mhmm.
Isaac Orr:Few months later, he's elected, and he says, well, let's pump the brakes on that. So, he said that, well, you know, there's the law and the science. However, you don't just need a building permit to go forward. You need a social permit. And, like, on the campaign trail, he was mister follow the science.
Isaac Orr:And I'm sorry, but expanding the scope of, an environmental approval to include a social permit is the exact opposite of following the science. And he also, instructed his department of commerce to argue that the United States didn't need the oil from the pipeline. Like, that was another delay tactic that they used, and that looked incredibly short sighted in 2022 when Russia invaded Ukraine because line 3 is a huge oil pipeline into the United States. And when it was completed, we were importing more oil from Canada in that one line alone than we imported from Russia that entire year. So, he is, like and the reason that he was so, reticent to let that pipeline construction go through is because he was getting protested by anti line 3 protesters at his events, and he basically caved to their demands.
Isaac Orr:So there's a long track record of saying one thing and doing another, and there's another track record of, basically allowing the base to bully him into making decisions that aren't good for the state as a
Donald Kendal:whole. Mhmm.
Isaac Orr:And, then we had the blackout bill. So he signed this 100% carbon free electricity mandate. He campaigned on 50% by 2030, which is still liberal. Right? But it isn't, like, Green New Deal type stuff.
Isaac Orr:And Mitch Rolling and I crunched the numbers on this, this policy, and it's gonna cost over $300,000,000,000 through 2050 and increase, like, an average family's electric bill by over a $130 a month on average throughout the course of this. And, like, a lot of that's kind of back loaded, but, you know, Minnesota has already enacted had already enacted a 25% renewable energy mandate back in 2007, and that caused our electricity prices to increase more than 1 and a half times faster than the national average. So he's quadrupling down on bad policy. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting different results. So we've got some electricity insanity happening over, in Minnesota.
Isaac Orr:Did you wanna jump in, Donald?
Donald Kendal:Yeah. Yeah. Well, so just a couple of things came to mind. One is, you know, like, on this podcast, obviously, we've talked about Joe Biden and his energy policies and the stuff that he's pushing and the inflation reduction act and all of that sort of stuff. But, like, you know and there's some clips of Joe Biden talking about 1, 2, like, you know, like, we we need to phase it out.
Donald Kendal:We need to phase out fossil fuels. We're gonna get rid of it, all of this sort of stuff. But, like, when it when it comes down to, like, very specific questions with Joe Biden, he will say, like, well, you're we're still gonna need oil and gas for a while or something like that. But now we're switching to Kamala Harris who, like I said at the beginning of this podcast, was a big supporter of the Green New Deal. And they've got this guy, which, you know, I was reading through your your article, and you you talked about a lot of this.
Donald Kendal:But, 2018, when he was, like, pushing for the 50% renewable energy mandate by 2030. In 2019, he pushed for a 100% renewable energy by 2050. Does it say that he that he pushed that back? And, like, 2 years later, he was pushing for a 100% renewable by 2040? Yeah.
Donald Kendal:So, like, this is the new this is the new administration that we're talking about potentially. 2 people that are, like, wildly ambitious about removing all reliable energy and replacing it with, wind and solar. I mean, this this seems like a very and another thing, like, it's one thing for a, you know, senator from California to support something like this. Minnesota, I was just there. I know that it gets cold in the winter, Isaac.
Isaac Orr:There is a tendency for this. Yes.
Donald Kendal:There is a there is a precedent for the idea that Minnesota gets pretty darn cold up there. So when you're messing with people's energy prices, when it's like borderline or if not completely freezing, like 7 out of the 12 months up there in Minnesota, I mean, that's kinda saying something about your, you know, enthusiasm about pushing for a 100% renewable energy. That seems kinda crazy, Isaac.
Isaac Orr:I think it is kinda crazy, Donald. So, and the crazy thing was during this entire debate over the blackout bill, this is what we called his 100% carbon free electricity mandate. The Democrats in the legislature and governor Walz refused to legalize the construction of new nuclear power plants. That's currently illegal in the state of Minnesota. And, you know, you can say what you want about whether we need reduce our emissions or not, but making it making our grid run on wind, solar, and battery storage alone is the worst possible way to achieve those emissions reductions.
Isaac Orr:Like, it leads to much higher costs, and it leads to bigger risks of blackouts. So, and then the the Republicans in the legislature, offered amendments and said, hey. You know what? We understand you guys have the votes to get this passed, but how about we say if there's a blackout that results from this legislation, we should pause the implementation of the legislation, and they said no. Mhmm.
Isaac Orr:And then they offered an amendment that said, hey. If costs go up too much, we need to suspend this and reevaluate. They said no. So, like, it was damn the torpedoes, burn the bridges. This is the course of action.
Isaac Orr:And if you don't like it, too bad, so sad.
Donald Kendal:Right. Because you would think they'd be, like, very confident. No. This is gonna lead to blackout. Sure.
Donald Kendal:If you wanna put that contingency in there, I have at it. It's not gonna happen. Yeah. But, yeah. Right.
Donald Kendal:I I do wanna talk about EVs, but Chris or Jim, if you wanna have any comments about this 100% renewable stuff, hop in.
Chris Talgo:Well, first, I I I have to, comment on the fact that he is a huge fan of China, has been there 30 something times, has good relationships with, people in the Chinese Communist Party. So actually watching a report with Peter Schweizer, who knows a lot about this kind of stuff, saying that there are businesses and all sorts of, underhanded, things going on with him there. And the reason I bring that up is because, as Isaac knows, Minnesota has a pretty good, environment of, minerals and critical, elements and such. What did he do? He banned all that.
Chris Talgo:Who does that
Donald Kendal:who does that Right.
Chris Talgo:Who who does that who does that benefit almost exclusively? China. So I'm just I I just I I think we have to make that connection there. Not only that, but, you know, Donnie, something we've been talking a lot about. If if if these, you know, foolish plans for 100% renewable energy actually do take shape, what would happen to the, technology that's on the horizon, especially AI, quantum computing and such?
Chris Talgo:It's gonna be a total no go. The United States would, have a humongous, competitive disadvantage to China. So I, you know, I'm I'm not saying that he's a Chinese, you know, Manchurian candidate by any means, but you cannot you cannot discount the fact that this guy has a thing for China, has gone there 30 years, got married on the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. There's a lot of, like, you know, red flags, no pun intended, going on there.
Donald Kendal:Nice. Nice. Jim, comments on a 100% renewable? No. Alright.
Donald Kendal:I'm gonna go to EVs. So, Isaac, you have in your piece a little section about electric vehicles. It says in 2019, he instructed the Minnesota pollution control agency to enact California 0 emissions mandates. I think that's a nice little, illustration of what you said about how he hasn't seen a California energy policy that he didn't try to implement himself in Minnesota. But, again, Minnesota, it gets cold, dude.
Donald Kendal:It gets very cold in there. And I think in your piece, it talks about the problem with EVs don't work very well in Minnesota because the batteries are drained by up to 40% if people use heat the heater in the car, which I think, again, that's probably pretty common when it gets cold up there. And I know in the past, we've had you on talking about, plans to make, like, all the buses for, like, schools and city buses or whatever, electric buses or something. I mean, let's put aside the idea of them and the, you know, the the increased, likelihood of just, like, burning uncontrollably. But, we you also talked about how they'll just, like, basically die on the road if it gets too cold.
Donald Kendal:So, cool.
Isaac Orr:So what they do in order to prevent that is they put diesel powered heaters on the buses in Duluth and Minneapolis in order to keep the buses from losing too much charge. So and then they wanna do this with fire trucks too. And, yeah, I was like, oh, yeah. That's a brilliant idea. So Yeah.
Isaac Orr:A couple things. The Minnesota does have some of the world's largest undeveloped deposits of copper and nickel. It was the Biden administration that put the kibosh on that. So Walls has actually been pretty savvy when it comes to not, making his stance on minerals and, you know, mining very public. So that's where he goes back to his old sawhorse of, well, let's follow the science.
Isaac Orr:And if it says we can do it, let's do it. But he hasn't had to take a position on it because the Biden administration pulled the leases for Twin Metals, and they canceled a permit, a critical wetlands permit from the Army Corps of Engineers for PolyMet. So, he hasn't had to, actually take a position on that. If he did, then maybe we'd we'd know his true colors on it.
Chris Talgo:But but if he cared, he would have come out and said, I strongly disagree with this position just like that. True. I'm not saying that's wrong. I mean, just like many Republican governors have been doing across the board when Biden comes in and puts, federal mandates, you know, that that are, you know, not not in the best interest of of that state.
Isaac Orr:Yeah. We're in agreement on that for sure, Chris.
Donald Kendal:Right. Chris Christine says, so what is the green gain there exactly with the diesel generators and EV buses? Purely on the virtue signaling front, purely on the virtue signaling point. You you get some points for that. When it it comes to the actual environment, that's secondary for politicians and all of that.
Donald Kendal:Jim, v EVs. This this is something that, surely you could rant about. I'm just waiting for the footage of a, EV fire truck in an uncontrollable fire state with 6 other fire trucks trying to put it out. I know that's inevitable at this point. What are your what are your thoughts on any of this, Jim?
Jim Lakely:I mean, EV the the EV mandate well, first of all, I mean, again, you're starting to trigger me. All these all these memories are coming flashing back. I think it was just a couple weeks ago, mayor Pete, our com or the commerce secrete oh, transportation secretary, was on one of the Sunday shows, and he was challenged, that that there's an electric vehicle mandate. So there's no EV mandate. Again, more gaslighting is if when you raise the CAFE standards, when you demand that ordinary operating vehicles like your, Toyota Tacoma or your, you know, your GMC truck or even your your Honda Accord have to adhere to higher and higher and higher, mileage, you know, miles per gallon standards, that are absolutely technologically unachievable.
Jim Lakely:The only way you can get that get to that number through your fleet is by making electric vehicles, which they count as having 0, emissions, and, of course, they get it's not miles per gallon of gasoline because there's no gasoline in them. So if you bake enough, electric vehicles, then you can, then the government will smile upon you and you will not be punished by the government. And so, yes, that is an electric vehicle mandate because these companies would not be making as many of these vehicles as they are if not for the government making them do it. And now we are left with, you know, I think they they canceled making any more, the Ford F150 lightning. They don't make any more 2,024 models.
Jim Lakely:I think they stopped doing it halfway through, their planned run, and they still can't sell the ones they have. So they're just gonna keep them in storage and pop a 2025 number on it to pretend that it's an actually new model. But, you know, the these electric vehicle mandates, they don't make sense almost anywhere. They certainly do not make sense in Minnesota, but it's because I think some of our commenters here on the livestream, that they don't want you in a car at all. That's the whole point of of all of this, is to get you out of your car.
Jim Lakely:A car means freedom. Freedom means difficult to to govern. And, you know, the modern left, if they if their one goal is to make us, is to try to make us as easy to govern or rule as possible. And anything that increases our freedom gets in the way of that, and that's why, you know, the electric vehicle mandate exists. But if there's one place that it would should work the least, it it is in, the state of Minnesota.
Jim Lakely:And Right. You know, god bless you, Isaac, for living up there, but the people of Minnesota get the government they elected. And so and and hope you know, we're gonna see if the if America is gonna vote for this stuff.
Chris Talgo:I I I gotta just piggyback off that real quick, Donnie. Sorry. But, you know, I've been watching a couple of their, recent rallies, and one of the themes that they are really, honing in on is that they are the ticket for freedom. Now what they mean by that is they are talking about the freedom to abort children. But, I mean, talk about gaslighting on a unprecedented level that they are saying we are the party of freedom and the other guys who who are all about allowing you to choose what kind of car you drive, what kind of appliance you get, what kind of health care you want, like, on and on and on.
Chris Talgo:No. They're anti freedom. So Tim Wells is totalitarian, and it's just it's he you know, everyone's called calling him tampon Tim. They should be calling him totalitarian Tim because that much better, much more aptly describes him.
Donald Kendal:I Isaac Orr, any last comments on anything energy climate related?
Isaac Orr:So getting back to the electric vehicles, I do wanna flag this for the the folks at home. He did not have the ability to get that through the legislature. He exploited a an old statute that was passed in, like, the sixties in order to claim that he had the authority to impose these EV mandates on the state. So it is more rule by swamp. It is, the administrative agencies gone wild, and it's the same thing that's happening at the federal level with, EPA.
Isaac Orr:So this bodes really poorly for the reliability of the grid moving forward because if we have a Harris Walls administration, EPA is going to continue to kneecap the reliable power plants on the system and pretend that the wind and solar and battery storage is gonna be enough to help us, you know, keep the lights on moving forward, which just isn't true. It's objectively false. So, there there will be consequences for this election. Absolutely.
Donald Kendal:Yeah. Oh, yeah. I think that's that's, I mean, that's the point that we that's, like, that's the main takeaway of this, of this episode. But so what would it look like in America where Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are kind of running the show? A lot of terrible laughing by Kamala Harris, but we'll save those clips, Jim.
Donald Kendal:Don't get too excited. We're gonna save those clips. I'm sure we'll have to we'll use them in the future. But, one thing that I wanted to just kinda finish the show off is, oh, no. Oh, god.
Donald Kendal:Please don't. So I love how they call.
Isaac Orr:It's so great. Okay. Keep it going, Mitch.
Donald Kendal:Thank you. No no no no.
Isaac Orr:Like, don't let Donnie bully you. You're the you're the VP at Heartland. Don't let this underlink tell you what's up.
Donald Kendal:So there's a piece from the center of the American experiment that is titled what America needs to know about Tim Walz of Minnesota. It's a nice little companion piece to Isaac's, substack that he was talking about. But it's just kinda shows, some of the results for Minnesota under the reign of Tim Walz. So big increase in crime in Minnesota. Just kind of go through each one of these is like a chart, so just show the chart as I'm going through.
Donald Kendal:Big increase in crime during his term as governor. It has now increased past the national average. When it comes to education, reading and math proficiency average after average after previously outpacing it. When it comes to energy prices, that you're they are growing in Minnesota faster than the national average. You'll see in that chart that it's just basically just short of California, and that people are now leaving in droves when it comes to Minnesota.
Donald Kendal:Apparently, the cost of living is a little bit out of whack, causing people to probably head to warmer waters down south if I had to guess. So you could spend time on any of these links. All the stuff that we talk about is linked in the show notes if you wanna get a little bit of a deeper dive into some of it. But, gentlemen, we're already 6 and a half minutes long here. So if anyone has any final thoughts or anything that we may have missed when it comes to Tim Walz or Kamala Harris, feel free to
Chris Talgo:jump in. Yeah. Just real quick. I've we've all most focused almost exclusively on domestic policies. How about foreign policies?
Chris Talgo:Could you imagine Tim Walz and, Kamala Harris negotiating with, you know, the the the, you know, terrorists in in in Hamas or the Ayatollah or China or Russia. I mean, you know, Joe Biden sent Kamala Harris right before the invasion strictly to stop the invasion. What happened while she was in, Europe? Vladimir Putin invaded. How about how about how about the border?
Chris Talgo:Kamala Harris's only only responsibility was to, ensure that the border was, you know, safe and secure. How did that turn out? Mhmm.
Isaac Orr:Well, she did say don't.
Donald Kendal:Yeah. Don't go.
Isaac Orr:I mean,
Chris Talgo:it's just on every single thing, you know, they have both been an utter failure. And, you know, especially on the, the education, front. You know, school choice is a big deal, and it surely should be a big deal, especially in this upcoming election because our public schools are failing miserably. And Kamal Harris and, Tim Walz are completely, beholden to the teachers' unions and the, you know, Trump, Vance ticket. They are absolutely in favor of school choice.
Chris Talgo:Obviously, that's more of a state thing, but, the fact that at the federal level, you've got these 2 tickets in in direct opposition to something that, you know, Tim Benson just he's our educational expert. He just, wrote a new r and c. School choice popularity is at an all time high, all time high. And I think that, you know, the fact that Minnesota and California public schools are just horrible, because they are so adamantly opposed to school choice, especially with minority voters. I hope that really does resonate.
Donald Kendal:Really do. Isaac Gore, any final thoughts, comments about anything that we've talked about so far?
Isaac Orr:Yeah. I mean, if you want to learn more about other things that maybe we didn't touch on, this is in as much depth as you would have preferred, go to americanexperiment.org. That's my old stomping grounds. But if you want to give money to always on energy research, we are tax deductible, so you can go to aoenergy dot org and make sure to check out energy bad boys.
Donald Kendal:Absolutely. Jim Likely, final final thoughts. What what do you got to pitch?
Jim Lakely:Yeah. Well, we do have our, does have our benefit dinner coming up, our 40th birthday bash. It is at the Hilton Chicago on September 13th. Early bird tickets, you can get a little bit of a break on your ticket or table purchase if you go ahead and do that before, August 16th is the end of our early bird rate, but we would love to see a lot of our listeners. I will be there.
Jim Lakely:Donnie will be there. Chris will be there. All the heartland Heartlanders will be there. And so we'd love to meet you if you're a fan of the show, and see you there. It's gonna be fantastic.
Jim Lakely:And, of course, as I'm showing on the screen right now, our keynote speaker is the one, the only, the most man in Europe probably, Nigel Farage. He is probably the greatest, champion of freedom, in a political position anywhere on the other side of the Atlantic, and he's gonna come to this side of the Atlantic and, give a fantastic speech, and then he's gonna inspire us, in our fight for freedom. And we're also giving the Heartland Liberty Prize to Hillsdale College president Larry Arne. I know a lot of people that listen to this podcast and that that follow the Heartland Institute are also fans of Hillsdale. Larry Arne, is training, has been training generations of young people to appreciate what this country is, how it was founded, and how we can preserve it.
Jim Lakely:So it's gonna be a, one of our best benefit dinners ever. So I hope to see a lot of people that listen and watch this there. Go to heartland.org for more information as well.
Chris Talgo:That's as long as the city isn't burned down, during the DNC.
Donald Kendal:Yes. Yes. Big contingency there.
Jim Lakely:Yeah. Well, we'll be roasting marshmallow. We'll be roasting marshmallows outside on the still burning streets of Chicago after
Donald Kendal:the We'll open the windows so we can We'll be taking those fumes. Yeah. That's Right. That's right.
Jim Lakely:That's right.
Donald Kendal:That's right. Alright. Great. Thank you all for tuning in to this episode of the in the tank podcast. Join us every week for a new episode for those audio only listeners that are catching the show probably on a Friday or later.
Donald Kendal:Like I said, leave a review for us on Itunes. It'd be greatly appreciated. Also, consider joining us a day earlier at Thursdays at noon CST where we are live streaming this on Facebook and YouTube and Rumble and X. You can, join the conversation. Throw your comments and questions in the chat.
Donald Kendal:Maybe we'll show your comments on the screen. Maybe we'll address your questions on the fly. You could also support the show by, I think on Rumble, there's, like, a super chat functionality on there, or else you can go to heartland.org slash in the tank and, support the show monetarily that way. That way YouTube doesn't take a cut. And, plus, they demonetized us, so you couldn't us a super chat via YouTube if you wanted to.
Donald Kendal:And lastly what was I gonna say?
Isaac Orr:Go pack. Go. The bears still suck. Yeah.
Donald Kendal:Yeah. I forgot the rest of my spiel. Anyways, Jim Lakeley, where can the find people find you?
Jim Lakely:At jlakeley on Twitter slash x at heartlandinst. Also on Twitter slash x. Also, always go to heartland.org.
Donald Kendal:Oh, yeah. It was just the idea that, hitting that like button, sharing this content, subscribing if you haven't already, and leaving a comment all help break those big tech algorithms. Prevent content like this from being shown to more people. That's what I was gonna say, Isaac. Or where can the find people find you?
Isaac Orr:I already said that. Check out energy bad boys. Check out aoenergy.org.
Donald Kendal:Fantastic. Alright. Chris Talgo, what do you have to pitch today?
Chris Talgo:Harlo.org, as always, benefit dinner. Beautiful. Alright.
Donald Kendal:Alright. We are long. I can tell. Alright. Everyone, thank you all for tuning in.
Donald Kendal:We will talk to you next week.
Chris Talgo:Next week.
Isaac Orr:Turn that off.
Chris Talgo:He's a lion dog faced pony soldier.