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In The Audit, comedian Dave Anthony and screenwriter Josh Olson audit a variety of online classes, docuseries, and other media products created by noxious political figures and boil them down to the good stuff. By which they mean… the bad stuff.
With the rise of MasterClass, TED talks, and celebrity biographies, the country’s political elite are bombarding us with information so we can be just like them. But who has time to devote to all that self-congratulatory navel-gazing?
That’s where The Audit comes in. Dave, Josh and a rotating coterie of guest hosts will consume depraved educational content for the time-pressed listener, then regurgitate a short-form review detailing the sociopathy and insanity baked into the messages. It’s like listening to someone present a book report — except all of the authors are deranged lunatics who are poisoning American culture.
[AUTO GENERATED TRANSCRIPT]
Josh Olson 0:00
Don't
Dave Anthony 0:04
just go just go just listening over to the audit with Dave Anthony and another guy
Josh Olson 0:12
that would be me
[MUSIC] 0:28
back to class, grades or if they fail but alas, to take your home while you got your Trapper Keeper around on this agent jam should name it this is a
You're getting Audited...
Josh Olson 1:18
This podcast is brought to you by the lever the award winning reader supported investigative news outlet. If you'd like to support our show, there's a bunch of ways you can do it, go to lever news.com/audit First, you can become a paid subordinate to the lever. This is gonna give you access to our bonus content as well as the lever premium podcast feed with extended interviews tons of special bonus content, there are other shows. But if you'd like to, you can also just make a one time contribution that goes to me and Dave and our druggies at the carova milk bar. You can leave us a tip at libre news.com audit, you'll see a button for the tip jar that'll take you to our Venmo page or just go to our minimal page. We are at the audit and Venmo under businesses. You can also follow us at the audit podcast and email us especially if you have because there's so many of these going to end things we have not been able to watch all of them. No, we want to if you find particularly egregious and hilarious, Praeger you clips, you want us to take a look at them. Send them to us at the audit podcast@gmail.com Dave will watch all of them. He loves this. He loves these things. Right? We always like talk a little bit about what's going on in the world. The week we're recording this just so you know that we didn't record these a year ago. We've got we got a presidential race. We got Donald Trump versus Joe Biden. Which is brand new, it's a novelty act. I'd have no idea. Yeah. People are very excited. Lightning round. Trump Biden, Who's Who do you pick? Who's gonna win? How much? How excited are you? Does it really in the long run matter? Because they're both so great.
Dave Anthony 3:01
It's good to have. It's good to have people voting against a death cult by being a death cult.
Josh Olson 3:09
Yeah, well, I've just never seen this level of excitement in general amongst Americans. There are parties, I can hear him now. The know is this is
Dave Anthony 3:23
this is a dead. This is a a dead a democracy. Like, it's astounding to me that if I'm a member of a party, which I am a member of neither of these parties. But if I remember of a party, and I looked at my field, and I said, Oh, nobody likes my guy. Sure they do like him, but they're done. They don't want him anymore because they have concerns one of the concerns being currently we have a senator in our Senate who has just terrible dementia. And when we voted for her she didn't.
Josh Olson 4:04
Well, sorry, are you pretending to be someone other than we knew
Dave Anthony 4:08
she didn't have on the list that we vote for? No, she wasn't gone in her last election.
Josh Olson 4:12
She was stumbling. But
Dave Anthony 4:15
there's a very big difference between now and then she doesn't know where she is anymore.
Josh Olson 4:19
She clearly had her hand on the doorknob the last time she ran she is now there's an or walked through it coming back. Okay. Right.
Dave Anthony 4:28
So the fact that a lot of Americans have that as a concern. We shouldn't be electing 80 year old people to be president. But also when a guy says I'm not gonna run, I'm gonna run once. I'm not gonna run again. And then he does that's a problem. When that guy clearly lied to everyone under 40 and said things like I'll cancel the student loans will take care of The environment, a lot of things that were not true, most of those. So he's alienated a lot of voters. The worst being the union members. I don't know how, as a member of that party, you go, yeah, this is the guy. I just I watched it, and I don't know what they're doing. I don't know.
Josh Olson 5:25
What's crazy to me, because there are people who claim to be and I'm a big fan of in politics sort of take people, at their, at their son, take them take them at their word. When they tell you they're enthusiastic about a candidate, it's like, okay, there's a percentage of you that are. However, we know for a fact, there are so many polls that numbers keep getting worse, the majority of Democrats don't want them to run. But say for the record, by the way, just to be really clear, Dave and I, we would happily live in a Joe Biden presidency for the rest of our lives. We love the guy. He's a beautiful man. He's kind, he's compassionate, his policies are everything we could possibly ever want. But we don't matter, because the majority of Democrats and the overwhelming majority of Americans don't want him to run. And you got Trump, who's got this thing going on where I guess the majority of Republicans want to run, but I think, at least as many if not more, Americans don't don't want him to run.
Dave Anthony 6:19
And a big chunk of Republicans now don't want him to run. He's not like, he's not like sweeping the table like
Josh Olson 6:24
he did before what he would win the primary,
Dave Anthony 6:27
easily would win the primary, but that doesn't. If you've lost 25%, you have a problem.
Josh Olson 6:32
Exactly. But historically speaking, and this, I guess, I'll give them credit, because the one thing these people always do is they keep it interesting to keep it new, historically speaking, even though they're a minority party, when your Republican candidate has a lot of enthusiasm behind them. And your Democratic candidate does not your Republican candidate wins. Take a look at 2016, for instance. So I again, loved her, I would happily live under hers, her administration for the rest of my life. But Hillary Clinton was a historically unpopular candidate. People did not like are they but people did like Trump. Fewer people, but that's all you need. If you're a Republican, that's how you end up, they keep winning every election, they've won the 21st century they have, they've lost the popular vote. But this time, you have something a little bit different. Because even though there's wild and enthusiasm for Joe Biden enthusiasm for Trump is is balanced out by the fact that a lot of Americans really fucking hate him. I guess what I'm saying is, for once, I think that formula is not as ironclad as it used to be. And it could be anybody's game.
Dave Anthony 7:46
There has to be fun. There is no, there is no formula, there's no formula. People can say all kinds of different things. But there's a bunch of factors in this that have not really been there before. And the biggest one is COVID. Right?
Josh Olson 8:06
The last election was unique because of that.
Dave Anthony 8:08
And everybody who thinks that that's not a thing anymore. 52% of voters believe we're still in a pandemic. So you can say it's not over. But
Josh Olson 8:21
again, for the record, Dave and I both very much believe we are not COVID is over. And we will be happy to continue living in Joe Biden's America without COVID. So we're not taking a position here. We're just giving you facts, folks.
Dave Anthony 8:35
Now I've said this, I've been saying this for a little while. To get me to vote for your candidate, your candidate has to have not specifically put my child's health and safety in harm's way. And unfortunately, there is no candidate in this race that has done that. So you can say. So now we've gotten to the point where we're the other guy is worse, has now gotten down to the other guy is less worse by actively being okay with my child being harmed. So you've lost me. I'm not I'm not voting for either one of these guys. I'm just like, you can't. Because where are you a man who forced my kid into school? Yeah, unsafely.
Josh Olson 9:27
You know, I agree. But here's here's where I check out a little bit in the best way. I think it's because one of the mistakes people make you see on social media all the time is like, you're gonna argue with me about my position. And so that's going to have some impact on the election. Here's another reality about Dave and myself. We live in California. I am going to illegally vote for David Anthony nine times he's going to illegally vote for me 15 times and guess what Joe Biden's gonna win California. So it doesn't matter if you reach him or you reach me the question I have.
Dave Anthony 9:59
Let me say this Yeah, go ahead. If we lived in Michigan, yeah. And the vote was down to one guy. And that guy was me. I would not vote for either one of them.
Josh Olson 10:11
Right? That but this is what I'm asking. Because let's also factor at California. Let's also factor in the fact that we are too dipshit to a podcast, we spend a lot of time thinking about this stuff, who are who are terminally online and follow it who know people? What is your sense of, you know, as you say, the majority of Americans still believe that COVID is a thing. Are they actively connecting that to the current administration? And are they actively pissed about it? Or are they is a lot of people I know, somehow aware of the fact that it's still going on but refusing to connect the dots?
Dave Anthony 10:45
Well, there's, there's there's all those that's a whole group of those are different people. Is there a large group of people who are angry? Yeah, there are
Josh Olson 10:56
out there still, but a lot of them I've seen a lot of them are still blaming Trump. A lot of them are angry. Nope,
Dave Anthony 10:59
nope, nope. Nope. There's a large group of people who are who are left or liberals who are angry at Biden, there is a large group of people you just described. There's, yeah, there's different large groups of COVID. You just described, Ron I described another. But if you're immunocompromised? How are you going to vote for Joe Biden? Do you want to live in your house for another four years?
Josh Olson 11:24
I know. I know three people who fit that bill, who are going to vote for him? Yeah.
Dave Anthony 11:31
Well, those people but those people, those are the people you're talking about. But then I'm talking about the people I know who aren't going to, like I know, I know people who aren't, because yes, they
Josh Olson 11:43
I'm wondering like is there you know, if we know anything of has there been polling on that? I mean, all they know how,
Dave Anthony 11:52
right? No, they will not pull on it. They absolutely will not, this is something they're not going to pull on because the business interests, the political interests, nobody wants to know. And they so they're not going to ask the question. They're never this question is never going to be asked. Right. But there is a there is a large, even if and people are saying how large even if it's just 10% you just lost the election.
Josh Olson 12:18
But that's if they go home, they're certainly not gonna come out and vote for Trump.
Dave Anthony 12:22
No, that's not we're talking about. Yeah. That's not how Democrats lose elections, but they lose by losing elections by people staying home. Yeah, yeah, I have a friend who I served with and I've been serving with for years. And he's a big political science major big politics guy big liberal. And we talk all the time when we're out surfing in and he knows all the problems and he knows all the issues and and he just goes Yeah, but I'm still gonna vote for him. And today we were surfing and he said yeah, I might start doing what you're doing from now on. And I said what and he goes just focus on the city council meetings Yeah. You're losing people left and fucking right and you they just don't realize it this election is the no one knows what's going to happen. It is a it is a epic clusterfuck of it's like all the chickens coming home to roost, all of them picking old people to be your your guys having rapists having just the most corrupt fucking people not listening to your constituents telling your constituents to fuck off. Like the
Josh Olson 13:40
running running a guy who's actively prosecuted for crimes. Yeah. It's like
Dave Anthony 13:48
this, the whole thing is just it is such a fucking shit show. And people who are like, Oh, but I like Biden. Okay. So you're, you want Roe versus Wade to be leet you want abortion to be illegal. But But 100,000 cops on the street to prosecute people and, and, and go after women who are getting illegal, but you also for that, like, you're the whole thing. You brought that
Josh Olson 14:19
up. And that's the interesting thing that we saw in the last the last go round. Clearly, clearly, as you know, as expected, but but to a greater degree than that, you know, the gutting of row had a major impact on election. Day. That is the thing where people actually were like, Oh, I'm I'm going out and I'm voting against hold hold on. So that's a factor too. But yeah, what
Dave Anthony 14:45
but yes, but what the other big factor in the last presidential election was what? It was COVID Yeah. So now what so now where are we? There's always been this thing in this country where they're not always but for very long. Long time where the right there's a particular issue and the right goes hysterical. And so you can't as a intelligent person, you can't have a discussion. Because the right has created hysterical position. And and you can't just go like, No, we need to do this with jobs or whatever, because they're over there. They're irate gay people, whatever the fuck you're doing. Well, that's what COVID is now. Right? The rights hysterical and some of the left. And you can't just sit down and talk about it. And I feel like that's sort of the case with a lot of stuff with Biden, you just can't have any sort of conversation about these things. Someone brought up Fauci on one of the dollar pages were and they were like, look, the guy's a saint. And they went through all this stuff. And I was just like, it's complicated. And I'm not going to discuss it with you, because the right wing is like Fauci. He's got devil horns. Right? And the Democrats are like, he's a saint. No, he's a, it's it's a nuanced thing. He's got some problems. He did some things that were not great. He's done some things that are very good. It's very fucking complicated. But you cannot have that discussion. You can't have any of these discussions.
Josh Olson 16:24
No, that'd be and it's a little it's one of those subjects where if you want to know someone who is a fanatic on either side of that particular discussion, it's like, I'm out. I know, grown people who like, he's there are songs about him that they like to sing about how wonderful he is. And, you know, I mean, what a study is just like, I can't if there's not a human being who's taking any of this shit, seriously. But yeah, but no, it's just that all this stuff is factoring in. And in a weird way, as much as I would say, this is a whole different thing. It's also kind of the whole, it's also kind of the same thing. It's 2016 is in 2016. The fact was, Dave called it early. But I would say the most of each party. I've never seen this before. The Democrats ran, as far as I'm concerned, the one candidate who could possibly lose to Donald Trump. But the Republicans are the one candidate who could possibly lose to Hillary Clinton. And we're kind of in that situation. Again, we've just arrived here in a very different way, with much more complicated factors feeding into it. But it really is anybody's guess, at this point. And that's fucking insane. You should be able to without hammering my beloved Democrats on my beloved Joe Biden, and every good thing they stand for, and oh, my god, sweet, sweet, sweet Nancy Pelosi, you should be able to clobber any of these guys, you should be able to take Trump out in your sleep, you should be able to take Ron DeSantis out in your sleep. It should not be difficult. We know how to do it. And yet, here we are. And then of course, the question is how much of this is just feeding the media? Because of course, if we were in that situation, if we were running somebody who just clobbered Donald Trump in their sleep, they have come up with programming for the next couple of years.
Dave Anthony 18:07
I mean, I can't tell you how many, because I live in you know, lib, lib town. Yep. And I cannot tell you how many of them have said to me, I cannot believe Biden is going to run again. No, all of them haven't met. There's only two Democrats I know who are very excited about Joe Biden running again, but most of them I know none. Family members to family members, but most of them are like my sister texted me this morning. emitted by denounced and she was like, Well, who the fuck am I supposed to vote for? You? They've lost so many, just standard Democrats all my life who vote D. And a lot of those people are just like, What the fuck am I supposed to do with this? What do you want me to do? Like this is this is worse than 2016. Because this just goes to show they don't give a shit about their own constituents. Every single policy choice. Biden made about COVID went against what Democrats believed. Masking airplanes across the board. Every single fucking thing. Democrats believed 80% the other way. Yeah. So he had gone against
Josh Olson 19:27
sending people free tests. I mean, that was, yeah, the snow he's gone
Dave Anthony 19:31
completely against his base. So well, this is just the crazy selection to me. I mean, I really think like, we have very much a Reagan situation in that. He doesn't care what he's doing in there. He likes playing president. The guy's running it our businessman CITES is Zeiss. Zeiss could be could be in Reagan's cabinet. He's a terrible, terrible human being. And he's the Chief of Staff. And as soon as he started it, he got over and took over. Then they're passing, then they're getting Willow through. They're doing all this shit. All the terrible business stuff. As soon as that guy got in there, it flipped a switch. And it was like, tell every constituency to go fuck themselves tomorrow. So I don't know what it's going to be like, I also don't know, like, in the age of COVID running old people for office, I'm sorry, it's stupid. You could that candidate becomes several times yeah. Like that can it could die or just or just get some terrible condition. He could have a cognitive issue tomorrow from COVID You can't run old people during COVID. Get your mind over it. Like
Josh Olson 20:36
I'm sorry, I won't have I do mine will never have cognitive issues. I don't worry about that. Yeah. It's not a thing.
Dave Anthony 20:42
But it's like, you know, if you want to live in a world where you want to click COVID Xover that's great. But you can't do this. You don't get to have 80 year olds run for office anymore. You're done. ageism I don't give a shit. It's their fucking it's their immunity issues. That's excise. It's a fucking die. So Don't run. Don't run a fucking old person. If you're gonna act like COVID Fine, fuck off. It's stupid. It's idiotic. And you know, the way everything has gone. So the way every single thing is played out over the past 10 fucking years, that whatever is going to happen, it's going to be really bad. And it's going to be right before the election. Whether Joe has a fucking stroke, or he gets COVID or whatever the fuck happens. You know what's going to happen to the Democrats because they set themselves up for this shit. By not taking care of business. And taking care of business means getting rid of Joe Biden, and getting someone slightly young in there. It doesn't matter if it's Pete. Pete would make pizza same things, Biden. Just fucking throw one of your hassles in there. I don't care. But it's just crazy to watch this.
Josh Olson 21:48
Yeah, yeah. And now it's getting weird to with. It's frustrating, because, you know, there's a lot I like about Marianne Williamson, she's obviously not going to win. I don't think she thinks she's gonna win. I think she's involved in a project that is building a hopefully a coalition over the years, and I have to get over the part of me that doesn't think we're going to be around for that. And it to me, it's pointless to get it. You're going to conversations with people like what she doesn't stand a chance. Right? That's not the point. It's frustrating that she won't be able to get up and debate Biden, because I think she do incredibly, but then there seems to be this other cog that they've thrown in. And I see a lot of people on the left on the actual left, kind of not getting it or claiming not to get it but RFK Jr. and Marianne Williamson are not the same thing. I said this the other day, and it has since been borne out. RFK Jr's campaign is being financed massively by right wing interests. He Yes, it is. He is first and foremost an anti Vaxxer. And I'm talking oh, gee, I'm talking back back in there. The old days pre COVID. There is a body count to his stupidity. He is dangerous fucking lunatic. And I am completely fine with not allowing him on a stage no matter how much of a how much of a polling interest they buy for him. But it gets tough then because how do you how do you do that? How do you say the Democrats should have debates? They should put Marianne up there with Joe Biden, and they should not put RFK up there? Because he's crazy.
Dave Anthony 23:20
No, they should put them all up. I'm just looking from Josh. You don't get to babysit anymore. If everyone wants to be this fucking dumb. Let them be this dumb. Like if everyone nots event people don't want to take the vaccine, if they don't want to take vaccines, let them Yep, it doesn't, it doesn't matter anymore. If they want to have debates and go up there and say don't take the vaccine. Go for it. We live in a country where it's every person for themselves, there is no government looking out for my health and safety whatsoever. So they can go up there and say whatever shit they want anymore. It doesn't fucking matter. He should be on the stage. She should be on the stage. And the fact that you have an 18 year old and you don't want him to bait in a primary and he's gonna have to debate in the fucking general is maybe the dumbest thing I've ever seen in my life. As far as elections go,
Josh Olson 24:12
meanwhile, I get Trump not wanting to trouble I'm not gonna fucking debate why should I it's like that's at least the thing with Trump is that he's always upfront being the most dishonest you would be who's ever run for office? He's also weirdly the most honest. Trump's like, Why
Dave Anthony 24:26
has he has the majority of support of Republicans? Right? He, the problem is, Joe Biden doesn't,
Josh Olson 24:34
doesn't No, no, it's a it's a huge so it's a problem. And you know, how emotionally if you're gonna, like, pay attention to it, it has to turn into
Dave Anthony 24:45
and you know, we're gonna have to sit through another election where they're gonna pretend like, you know, democracy is on the line. And it's like, you can't How many times do you get to do that? You I tried three times, four times, five times like how How many
Josh Olson 25:00
important election of our lifetime coming up at support election of our lifetime? If you care about democracy, you'll give us money? You'll give us money.
Dave Anthony 25:07
Yeah, they're gonna, they're gonna run into a real problem, because I think a lot of people in the left are out. Yeah, just like I say, just like I say, you have to explain to me why I should vote for someone who puts my child in harm's way every day of his life. With then you have to now explain to people who are under 25 Why should I vote for a guy? Who's going? Who's ending? My ability to live on this planet? No, it's not like these aren't, these aren't hard questions. These are, these are just very basic things that your your candidate is running to make the planet worse. And he can say I got stopped by whatever, it doesn't matter. You're you're doing Willow, you're passing, you're selling leases for oil all over the place you're doing, he's doing all kinds of shit. Like, if you're doing that now you you have to explain to them why they should vote for you, if you're going to end the planet for them. Like what it's, it's really crazy to just, these are just very basic things. But these are arguments I had about Hillary to like, very pro fracking, very pro all that. And I just kept saying, like, why would I vote for someone who doesn't care about the planet that my child is gonna live on. But now, but now I'm down to no longer the future. Like, I want my kid to be healthy. And he and if he goes to school every single day, you know, that could go away. Because he doesn't have fucking, you know, air purifiers and they don't they're not taking tests, they don't have masks, and you can put a fucking dog at the front door and have them sniff people they can find COVID Like, there's so much so many fucking things you could do
Josh Olson 26:51
aren't nothing is not our dog actually knew my wife had COVID and whatnot.
Dave Anthony 26:55
Yeah, dogs know people have COVID It happens all the time. Like it's like, we know this. There's there are schools using dogs. So it's, you know, there's a lot of stuff they could be doing, and they've decided not to do any of it. So it'd be very interesting. I mean, he Biden clearly won because of COVID last time and and it wasn't that it wasn't like it was a huge blowout. It was close. So I don't know what to say.
Josh Olson 27:23
Well, like on that note, then let's let's go back to punching far right, shall we? We're getting into the fun stuff at Prager you. This week. We're doing education and their kid shows. Their amazing, amazing Goumri kid shows and our guest is Betsy lOn. She's a public school educator in Los Angeles, a chapter leader in UCLA, and a DSA member she led her school site in the historic joint SEIU 99 and UCLA strike, that one record breaking wage increases in common good demands. She's appeared on Chapo traphouse. today to discuss education, politics and union organizing, and has written about it for Jacobin magazine as well, you should check out our articles that great. She's organized along with other union members around school board elections, statewide propositions, city councils, and some guy named Bernie Sanders. So this is our delightful, deep dive into Prager, US children's entertainment.
Dave Anthony 28:19
Try not to throw up
[MUSIC] 28:28
if you finally had enough of him being college, left wing, get yourself a real degree from Prager University.
Josh Olson 28:47
Well, it's interesting because there was a word. You know, we're getting into kid stuff. This week. We're getting into the documentaries in the shorts and everything. And the game show. The Praeger you is the towards children. And honestly, God, there's a word that's been in the news a lot lately, and it kept just flooding through my head every time I watch this. You can't stop hearing the word groomer as you want. I mean, this is doing
Dave Anthony 29:15
Yeah, you realize you realize you know, conservatives always scream about what they're doing. Exactly. Right. As you watch these videos, you go Oh, right. This is they're doing this. That's them doing this? Yeah, yeah.
Betsy Long 29:30
Yeah, totally. It's usually blamed on teachers like teachers or groomers. I mean back with like, Harvey Milk when he was in office. It's like groomers was thrown around then with the gay community. Now groomers has been thrown around teacher you know, when they were integrating bathrooms black men and being bathrooms with children it's the same it's all the same every single thing that conservatives against you know, it's the same argument your your Yeah,
Gotta wait. But this feels extremely like what a groomer would do with me would be to make these really, really bizarre videos for children. That, honestly, I don't know any child that would want to watch. Yes, let's be
Josh Olson 30:15
thinking, Yeah, cuz so many of the videos that they make. The numbers are astonishing when you look at the, you know, and I don't know for sure if the numbers they run on their site are correct. But you know, you check with YouTube, and there's just like, millions and millions and millions of hits. But when you have hundreds of 1000s
Dave Anthony 30:37
Yeah, and even then I would, you know, I have, I have a kid who's 13. So I've been through all of the different levels of what he would watch. I don't I can't imagine any age at which he would have wanted to watch any of this. It's very boring. It's very, like, very almost 1970s style animation talking. It's not how kids absorb anything anymore. So I don't know how effective that is.
Josh Olson 31:06
What also reminded me, Dave, when when, forgive me, Betsy, I'm about to speak old with my friend here. Don't remember kids. There we had this we had we just had TV. And Saturdays were great Saturdays when you get up in there was just wall to wall cartoons. But Sunday, you're screwed because we still the weekend? Yes, it was early, like go and play or anything and hang around the house. And the only thing on it looks vaguely like a cartoon was Davey and Goliath, which was this claim ated show about a little kid and his dog. And it was Christian. And they would go off and they would learn cricket. You know, they've learned lessons about Christianity. And it was so goddamn boring. But you know, if you were a kid, it was like, I'm like Jones and man, I needed to animate it at least and you'd sit there and you'd watch this stuff. You want to blow your brains out but you would watch it and I got a little bit of that old flavor watching some of this stuff. Dave did you
Betsy Long 32:02
Yeah, yeah, I was thinking of I grew up in the 90s and we watched VeggieTales like that that's a big Christian details but if I were to watch like side by side one of these videos and then one of the veggie tale videos, that detail they have bright colors, there's lots of movement there's fun catchy songs like even though it's kind of preaching the same Christianity thing at least VeggieTales was interesting and like you could kind of dance around this is like there's no soul there's no music there's no there's really no fun yeah, like I just don't sense any one is having a good time
Josh Olson 32:46
there's a certain kind of this that oh god let's go to this one first because this is amazing and there's nothing there's no corollary in the adult videos at Prager you for what is the guess or mess It's a Prager you
Dave Anthony 33:06
show it's really this is pathetic
Josh Olson 33:10
it's a it's a slime time is actually isn't that the show? The Nickelodeon show? But but for conservatives.
Betsy Long 33:17
It's really this one made me think the most like what pervert like this is a perverted thing to do is to be like let's take Amy let's take the topic of Amy Coney Baron. Let's force Let's force some kids to read this book about Amy Coney Barrett and then we're gonna make them touch gross things if they get questions wrong about Amy Coney Barrett.
Josh Olson 33:43
Let's let's let's check out the opening. It's amazing.
[VIDEO] 33:45
Welcome to guests are met the game show by Prager you kids. I'm Noah and in this show if you answer a question fast and correctly, you avoid getting totally gross and mercy. Your are your messages for today. Slimy goo, mustard, Marshmallow tar and feathers. Pickled you spray mystery X silly string dog food secret messes and the pie in the face
Dave Anthony 34:16
I mean I don't even know what's happening it's just it's terrible It's like someone kind of watched Nickelodeon but didn't write. It's just like they heard slime. They've seen a lot of Joe Rogan on Fear Factor. They're kind of working some issues out
Betsy Long 34:42
Yeah, yeah. Someone's just lightly watched Fear Factor and lightly watched Nickelodeon slime time live and they're like
Josh Olson 34:55
it's not just any Coney Barrett it's they've had to read the Praeger you book Oh Right yeah. On her. And and then yeah, and then they then they get into it.
[VIDEO] 35:08
Before we play. Amy Coney Barrett is the fifth woman to serve on the US Supreme Court. Very I was raised Roman Catholic and has a large family of seven children. Before being nominated to the court. She worked as a lawyer and law professor. Justice spirit considers herself an originalist meaning that the court should decide cases based on how the Constitution would have been understood at the time it was written.
Josh Olson 35:33
I want to call that out for us because it was really interesting, because they they you know, it seems to me that the average child, if you explained that to them, that philosophy to them, because they boil it down in a very simple way. And I think they they phrased it in a way that does not do their case very much good. Your child's gonna go. Well, that's kind of dumb.
Dave Anthony 35:57
I don't think there's anybody you can explain that
Josh Olson 35:59
you've changed in the past. Yeah.
Dave Anthony 36:01
Yeah, no, it's, it's always been a really, that Scalia thing has always been just completely bizarre to me.
Josh Olson 36:08
But there there are ways I know, it's completely bizarre, but there are ways that they phrase it that don't just immediately call out it's It's insanity. I mean, that was just a pure distillation of what's wrong with originalism. Of your seven year like, what the five I didn't know anything about iPhones.
Betsy Long 36:24
Yeah, yeah. But I mean, like a seven year old may not be able to be like, Oh, I understand that. They didn't use to have iPhones a seven year old charge, just like, Oh, that's weird. Weird. Yeah, this this video. And, and the rest of the videos too. Like, there's so many times when they use like the identity politics approach, like she's a woman. Yeah, we love her. And then they go on to list things that are like, Oh, that's bad for women. Like but your set your child, I guess. So you're supposed to think, just believe what you what you hear? Yeah, I don't think it's I don't think it's going to be effective, which at the end of the day, watching all these, which gave me a certain type of illness that I can't describe. I was also feeling like, you know what, no one, no one's watching this and having their hearts changed, you know?
Josh Olson 37:23
Because it's hard to get this data and we are actually looking at it. Like, where, where are these videos specifically being shown because you know, a lot of the other all the other ones are being shown in schools all over the country, but who is showing this stuff to kids? And I have to imagine the places that are shown to kids who are already pretty heavily indoctrinated into this stuff. You know, sure. Yeah. Betty Shabazz relation is how you teach currently, what what grade level?
Betsy Long 37:49
I work with elementary school students. So I'm an out of classroom teacher and I basically work with, with children from age three, to age 12.
Josh Olson 37:59
So you know, a thing or two about this stuff.
Betsy Long 38:03
Yeah, I know. And I know a lot about attention spans. And none of these these shows are these episodes with any of their attention. Yeah, but I but I can. I can imagine like, an uncle like a conservative uncle trying to show their nephew and nieces these these shows and be like, See, isn't this good? Right? And then just like, not landing, for sure,
Josh Olson 38:29
but let's hope Yeah. The funny thing too, is that, you know, I mentioned a couple times, I remember sending Dave early on to this, he sent him a link to a video on Prager and he was like, Oh, this is one of the kids ones. It was like, No, it's not, they're all kind of pitched on. If you got a chance to watch any of the adult ones. They're all kind of pitched towards children. They seem to be the way they talk to you, but then you get to the kid stuff. It's really patronizing. And, yeah, I can't I can't get past that. Like what kid? You know, we have an infant here. Now I imagine he would sit and watch these for 10 minutes because he can, you know, look at his toe for 10 minutes, but I don't know that he'd absorb anything beyond the lights of the colors. But yes, he's waters let's let's do some gameplay here. Because, and I'm constantly falling like I keep imagining, you know, imagine this stuff being done in North Korea, and it all starts to make sense.
[VIDEO] 39:23
Are you ready to play the game? The youngest player goes first. Now everybody get your hands into the bowl. You're not allowed to take them out for the entire game. If you do you lose a point. First question goes to Reagan. What is Amy Coney Barrett's highest professional achievement. a United States Senator, be justice of the Supreme Court, or C Advisor to the President just to serve the Supreme Court. That is correct. She was Justice of the Supreme Court. Very it was nominated to the Supreme Court by President Trump. To replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the President said that Barrett was a woman of unparalleled achievement, towering intellect, Sterling credentials and unyielding loyalty to the Constitution. Lucy
Josh Olson 40:17
is this slide, you're lucky to get? Rich slides
you get the picture.
Betsy Long 40:37
There's a certain type of torture to listen to the sound of Yeah, I
Josh Olson 40:40
like the sound. That's why That's why
Betsy Long 40:43
that's the opposite of ASMR.
Josh Olson 40:47
I don't know much to say about the game show really beyond what I mean. It's just kinda
Betsy Long 40:53
it's a low energy game show. Like they're just standing there with their hands and bowls, and then asked extremely boring questions. And then the kids are just excited to have gross things to touch. I don't know. Like, it also seems like they probably have some stage parents. You know, these are not Yeah, children that whose parents maybe they either didn't know what they were signing their child up for? Or they didn't know. That's a
Josh Olson 41:20
Yeah, one way.
Dave Anthony 41:22
I know. It's people. The community of Prager, you.
Betsy Long 41:30
Yeah, Who names their daughter Regan?
Dave Anthony 41:32
Yeah. Yeah, that's pretty big giveaway.
Josh Olson 41:38
Are you big fans of The Exorcist? That was one of those. Both both are bad things. Well, let's give him a little more substance. I just thought that was a fun one to kick off, but and they have so many different series for kids. And the animation is all pretty rudimentary. It's a little bit better than what I could do on a Mac, but not significantly. And we've we've tried to find out who does this stuff. This is not I mean, Betsy, Betsy, lives in LA, she can back me up. I'm sure that, you know, in this town, you know, anybody who if you're an actor, and you're on podcasts for five minutes, you're trying to get it on your IMDB page. But seemingly no one involved with the Prager, you animated stuff has made the effort to get because you can't find this stuff anywhere. I don't know. Who's producing these. I don't know who's directing them. I don't know who's writing them.
Dave Anthony 42:33
Yeah,
Josh Olson 42:33
I'm guessing union
Betsy Long 42:38
that I was gonna say most, most likely, in a different country being exploited in some way. Yeah.
Josh Olson 42:47
And I'll say it's been a long time. But I don't know when I started in the business. Yeah, I mean, every year you're working on Union at the beginning, because you're still in low budget stuff. potentially get in. You know, you could go Prager you wasn't around. But you know, you could wake up on Monday and end up doing you know, Prager you kind of video for three days. And then on Thursday, you're working on a porno, which I love the idea of porno crew shooting these Prager U vids somehow just makes me happy. But I don't know. But they usually do this thing around the world. And ostensibly there to teach kids about the world they live in. But let me give you some of the other titles you picked an interesting one because some of these others I thought were even more kind of overt. Which way this one kind of more fun but like North Korea learning the truth. What happens when Yong Tae song starts to discover the extent to which the communist government is oppressing him and his family. Israel Shara prays for peace teacher middle and high school kids high school kids. High School Can you imagine about Israel, a young country that has flourished in technology and diversity, while constantly fighting just for its right to exist. In this episode, tweens and teens will meet Shira, an Israeli girl who will soon serve in the military to defend our country she's proud to do so but also prays for a day when it will no longer be necessary. And we're going to look at is Venezuela. VVS life under socialism meet meet Vivi and her family who must live with the hardships that socialist policies have brought upon us once thriving country in South America. What's the right way to teach kids about throughout the world? That's I mean,
Betsy Long 44:36
I would say step one is don't use passive voice with America's involvement Yeah, let's let's start there. Let's let's call out what specific countries and specific actors do based on fact and evidence. Yeah, I'd start there. But according to this, you know this episode Seven minutes of why socialism will always fail is seven minutes of why Venezuela is just another example of that and all shucks, they shouldn't have nationalized the oil industry. You gotta let the private oil companies run their business. Do it ever do it?
Josh Olson 45:20
They know what you're doing. Yeah, yeah.
Betsy Long 45:23
It's it's just, it's ridiculous. Because if, you know, I grew up with a friend who was from Venezuela, and even they were just like, Yeah, we had to go because things were really bad. I think, you know, it wasn't great. But he'll also be able to tell you that America was involved.
Josh Olson 45:43
Yeah, I want to get into that a little bit more as we get to the end of this one. But but we should start let's let's meet Vivi, our fictional animated character.
[VIDEO] 45:52
Meet VVb. She lives in Caracas with her mother and grandmother. She loves to listen to music and dance, but her favorite hobby is making jewelry. She used to sell her pieces in the market. But now no one has any money for jewelry anymore. BVs father's say Sr. had to move to Miami, Florida, where he works hard trying to earn enough money for both himself and his family in Caracas. They rely on the valuable American dollars he sends back to help pay for food and a place to live. Lita, his BBs grandmother, and she remembers the more prosperous days of the 1960s and 70s. Venezuela was a country of hope and opportunity. But by the time DBS mother Maria was born, a sense of unease and uncertainty had crept in, with a growing divide between the rich and poor. Sadly, for Vivi, Caracas is now a place of desperation. These without electricity and running water, sometimes turn into weeks, the fear of violence is always present. And having enough to eat is a challenge when the nation's currency is all but worthless.
Dave Anthony 47:10
What a sad tale of socialism.
Josh Olson 47:14
It seems like a weird way to introduce kids to another country.
Dave Anthony 47:17
It's really It's This isn't like, what kid is going to be like, Oh, that's interesting. It's so you know, I do a History podcast and the thing that people like it, but as we get into stuff that isn't taught in schools. And this is like the worst version of how you would teach history, or anything to kids. It's there's nothing engaging. It's just, it's like the peanuts voice mob. It's
Josh Olson 47:49
terrible. And then the death squads.
Betsy Long 47:57
Yeah, it it's true, I agree, there's no engagement, like when you're presenting a lesson to children, what you want to do is first, you know, you want to bring up their previous knowledge, you want to activate their prior knowledge by something they can relate to, for example, let's do a lesson on Venezuela, we're gonna want to first connect the students with Venezuela with something that they share maybe in their culture, so that could be related to music could be related to food could be related to those like shallow aspects of Venezuelan culture, you could get kids really into it by playing a song or music or presenting food or, you know, talking about a day in the life of a child in Venezuela. And then you can go into the, you know, more academic side of it, but in the end, this is so condescending towards Venezuela, like, Oh, shucks, they almost had a good thing, but then it became really bad because of socialism. And I also like that in the video, it's like, oh, there's not enough food to eat. There's economic issues. People have to travel long distances to go to work. Have you been to America? Like we have capitalism and we have all those same problems. So it's just hard to it's hard to hear that and be like why is it that there but not over
Josh Olson 49:31
here? People People who live that way live that way? Cuz they're lazy and bad. Over there, they live that way because it's socialism. But yeah, I mean, let's let's let's keep going. I want I want to find out what happened. Why why why did everything change?
[VIDEO] 49:47
So how did the discovery of a natural resource like oil transform VVS country from a once profitable agricultural nation into a poor, desperate and chaotic mess? Well, Well, initially, things went very well for the country, as privately owned international companies were invited to drill for oil. The profits were evenly split between the government and private companies like Shell and Chevron. But when the price of oil dropped in the 1980s, the country lost its primary source of wealth. In a desperate state, that people voted for socialism, and to nationalize the oil industry,
Josh Olson 50:29
that's gonna that's gonna go badly.
Dave Anthony 50:30
I mean, one of the things that people don't seem to understand about countries like Venezuela is, you know, the racism that's factored in, which is like, the light skinned people are doing very well, and the dark skinned people are not. And in this particular case of Venezuela, the poor people were mostly indigenous people, and they were getting absolutely fucking nothing from this deal. And when the when socialism came in, and they took over suddenly, poverty and everything else, and literacy and everything else went up amongst those indigenous people, suddenly, we're doing much, much better for some reason. That's a, you know, that's something they knit. What
Josh Olson 51:21
went down? Well, poverty went
Dave Anthony 51:22
down, but you know, the education and everything else and the ability to get food and, you know, they were distributing free food and they were they were the literacy went way up and all these things, you know, went up, but that's not that. Absolutely never, for some reason comes up in these kinds of videos.
Betsy Long 51:42
Ya know, and I love that moment in the video when it says, shell and Chevron will do.
Josh Olson 51:54
Come on screen read the room, right? Wait, where are you that like you? Like you should not just you should just not say the names. Like that's that's bad, right?
Betsy Long 52:05
It's like, oh, yeah, I know. Shell and Chevron. I give them all my money a couple times a month. They're my favorites. I am so loyal to those companies. What? Yeah, totally.
Josh Olson 52:20
Like, it also made me wonder like, Are they ready? I don't I do not keep up with Star Wars. But I feel like there has to be some one of the TV shows or something where, like, does the Empire make propaganda geared towards kids? I would love to see it, you know? And that's what Darth Vader came to town and everybody was happy.
Betsy Long 52:39
They have they have their own Praeger you.
Josh Olson 52:42
Vader you
Betsy Long 52:48
I also this video. This video is about Venezuela. And it's for children. And we're talking about oil. How do children How do children feel about oil?
Josh Olson 53:02
It's really well not not in the Praeger you world. You don't want to you want them to feel good about oil? I mean, that's part of the
Dave Anthony 53:07
too but they don't they don't give a shit. I mean, that's the thing. But back to these are children. They don't you there's nothing that's interesting. They have no idea how to talk to children, nor did they sit down and find a conservative who works in education or understands child psychology to be like, hey, what would interest them? How can we how can we use this as propaganda? This is they can be making this video for dogs. It's just not anything that anyone is going to take in.
Betsy Long 53:42
You know what, that's why they might have so many views. People leave
Josh Olson 53:52
Oh my god. I've just I'm looking to see what age they think. Yeah, they think these are for sixth grade, sixth grade and up sixth
Dave Anthony 53:58
grade. So sick by sixth grade. They're watching things like Twitch where there's one video playing and another guy in the corner telling you what's wrong about it. They're watching Tic TOCs where there's two people debating on either side, or just constant cuts mash cuts smash cuts match. This is absolutely not in any way how young kids absorb anything anymore.
Betsy Long 54:25
Yeah, totally true. Like the the attention span is not just like you have 10 seconds. It's you have 10 seconds and then also there needs to be something else going on in the background. Yeah.
Josh Olson 54:36
So you're also a little bit you're not you can't be reached by this stuff. I was going to horror movies man. We were reading we had a teacher and I remember being taught we read Moby Dick in sixth grade and I was starting to recognize what girls were and you know who's like you're not thinking about this stuff.
Betsy Long 54:54
Well, I do want to say it because this is a not a visual medium. The little girl In the video Vivi, I think they they like make her look really pretty and attractive, which is disturbing because she's a child. Yeah. In the video, like, I think it's like she's been she's been gasified. And it's, and it's like, is that how they think they're getting those sixth, seventh and eighth graders to watch this video? Oh, she's kind of pretty. No, she's a child. Yeah, she's a child.
Josh Olson 55:29
So let's, let's see, how did this how did they explain socialism to these these strange mutant children who apparently be entertained by this?
[VIDEO] 55:36
Socialism is a system where citizens do not own anything individually. And the government controls are distributed,
Josh Olson 55:43
not socialism. That's not,
Dave Anthony 55:46
that's not like so so someone can just walk over and take your coat, I would like to believe that prison. This somebody just comes in and takes your coat. I this is mine now are ours. This is ours. So I'm using it like it's the
Josh Olson 55:59
government takes my coat because this belongs today.
Dave Anthony 56:04
Yeah, it's, it's really crazy that there, but honestly, the adults making this might believe that.
[VIDEO] 56:12
In socialist countries, there is often plenty of money for the government to collect at first, by taking over private businesses and taxing the people, then they spend some on the basic services that they promised. And because those in the government have all the power and control over the money, the controlling elites get to decide what citizens can buy, where they can live, and how successful they can be.
Dave Anthony 56:40
Okay. There's, I mean, it's just, yeah, my favorite thing is that
Josh Olson 56:47
person keeps having hits, we need her to stop having hit, she can't have hits anymore.
Dave Anthony 56:51
But the success thing is really funny, because success to them only means money, how they're just simply talking about how rich it they're not talking about success. They're not talking about, you know, writing a book and being popular and getting, you know, academic success or anything else. They're just simply talking about how much money you can make. And that's all that's all. Like, you cannot become a crazy billionaire and a country like Sweden, because they're going to tax the shit out of you. Which is fine, because then that money gets distributed. But that's a that's like they're wording it in such a way that's like, say what you want to say you can't you can't become disturbingly rich crushing other human beings in the process.
Betsy Long 57:39
Yeah, there's a limit to the number of assets you can own, and the number of people you can exploit. And that's a problem for concern. Yeah, it really is.
[VIDEO] 57:52
Very quickly, the money runs out hold on resources or
Dave Anthony 57:57
the money run out.
Josh Olson 57:59
Because because the government took it all,
Betsy Long 58:01
no, but because the Venezuelan Government didn't know how to manage all of the nationalized. So you know, things that they have,
Dave Anthony 58:10
there's something that happened in Venezuela when the money ran out. And that was capitalist taking money in trucks out of the country. So that's one of the reasons the money ran out because they were fucking with the money supply.
Josh Olson 58:27
It literally ran out
Dave Anthony 58:33
these this is the problem with any video that any conservative ever makes on socialism is they never they never go Okay, so here was this thing where they tried to essentially make things much more equal. And then outside forces came in and kept trying to fuck with it. That's the thing they never say, constantly being fucked with by assholes.
[VIDEO] 58:59
Yep. Hands corruption escalates. And eventually, all socialist countries face serious scarcity of basic needs, such as medicine and food. The people who get less and less while the politicians keep their fancy lifestyles, every country that has tried socialism ends up with these problems. But then
Josh Olson 59:26
I can we've recently discussed one that although actually don't come later, but yeah, China Chinese doing all right.
Betsy Long 59:35
I just kind of came to mind the, the research in Cuba that has allowed for Cuba to create its own vaccine. And unlike like, no acknowledgement of any like trade limitations, or oh up, America refuses to sell medical equipment to countries that are socialists like no mention of that. It's just Oh, shucks, they have a hard time finding things. No, it's because America, we have decided we're not selling to them. And so we're cutting them off. We're starving them out.
[VIDEO] 1:00:17
Sweetland hope their results would be different. under socialism, the people of Venezuela were promised reforms that would fight inequality and lift them out of poverty had sounded like a great idea. But unfortunately, the government had no idea how to run the oil business and things got worse.
Betsy Long 1:00:39
It's complicated.
Josh Olson 1:00:50
Yeah, it's crazy and then didn't want so Hugo comes in the me takes control the oil companies taxes goes up, taxes go up, corruption, corruption goes up. Then they get to this part here. This is pretty interesting. This is interesting more than about what they leave out than in what they put in.
[VIDEO] 1:01:11
When the price of oil crashed again, Chavez was desperate to keep spending money on his free programs. So he put the government back in control of the oil industry. He experts who left Venezuela, and unqualified people took over their jobs. Anyone who's questioned, Chavez was fired. And soon, many more experts from all industries were leaving the country to a heavy tax was imposed on every business that was left and VBS family had to shut down the coffee shop they had owned for generations. As for the corruption, Chavez promised to end, it only got worse to
Dave Anthony 1:01:52
people tired over them, and they were set on fire.
[VIDEO] 1:01:57
Chavez refused to hold a free election. And when the people tried to vote him out, he would not give up power.
Josh Olson 1:02:05
Now what are they
Dave Anthony 1:02:08
don't know which piano it was?
Josh Olson 1:02:13
Because there was a recall attempted failed.
Dave Anthony 1:02:16
Yeah, they're being they're being there's different elections that they're talking about. So they could be, you know, grabbing from any one of the elections. That happened. Right.
Josh Olson 1:02:25
And then well, there's also the attempted coup in 2002. Which the app? Oh, who's that group? Who's that group? CIA was, was backing that against? So we Yeah, what are they talking about? That he didn't allow elections? Because? Are we sure that even happened?
Dave Anthony 1:02:47
Well, there were. Again, you know, you're talking about forces that are, you know, people come in, and they're all capitalists, and then they say your elections fucked. I mean, it's, it's just nonsense, like, how do you trust any of it? I mean, essentially, the people who come in are supposed to be like, it was other socialist governments who were overseeing it. It was fair. But as I recall, Jimmy Carter's people were on the ground. And they called it a fair election. I might be wrong about that. But that's what I recall.
Betsy Long 1:03:17
There's just lots of things in the video that are either not true, or just so vague, that it could be one of many things that have occurred, like,
Josh Olson 1:03:28
Yeah, I mean, they do that a lot. And they do throughout, you know, and they'll do it though. I've always had one recently, where they're like, oh, a recent study showed and then, you know, it moves so quickly that it doesn't occur to you to go Wait, wait was recent study in one way? And were like attribute? Oh, can you give us an attribution? These don't they'll just claim. Yeah, stuff or merge things together? Yeah. Yeah, I don't know what else to say about this.
Dave Anthony 1:03:58
I mean, here's the reality about Venezuela. You can't do it in a five minute video for children. You can't do it for a five minute video for adults is an extraordinarily complex situation. Because, you know, of trying to bring socialism, trying to nationalize the resources, trying to lift all these people out of poverty while having to fight the elites in power who then cut the United States and usually just go to Florida and start a propaganda fight while you're fighting the right wing, right wing people from all over the world also right wing governments who sanctioned and froze all of their assets and stole their money. You know, doing stuff like the acting like they're trying to bring food in when they're trying to bring weapons in over bridges and having Rubio talk about it, but you know, it's so fucking complicated. It is. It is in no way. Are you able to do this And but they'll try. I mean, this was this was like a, I mean, this is like a second, a two year olds fantasy of how you could explain things like it's just insane. Whatever this was,
Betsy Long 1:05:14
yeah. It's and I thought it was just so weird the use of the word experts. It's like it felt racially coded. The experts left Venezuela, from the gas companies. And I'm just I'm like, and then more experts left, like, what do we mean are talking about like, academic elites, or just high people
Dave Anthony 1:05:41
who were probably work for Shell and right, I mean, that Exxon and whatever, like, that's probably
Josh Olson 1:05:48
because they are so fixated. They keep hitting the idea that Yeah, but then the government didn't know how to run an oil company, because it takes expertise, which I'm willing to believe it requires a decent amount of experience to do that properly. But it also
Betsy Long 1:06:02
i Yeah, so
Dave Anthony 1:06:04
it also takes a lot, it takes a lot of extra work to try to run those oil fields and those, that oil infrastructure, because they're sanctions on now. And they can't get the parts they need. So that is, you know, so they're trying to put it together with band aids. So that's a big part of the expert thing.
Betsy Long 1:06:23
Yeah, and I would, I'm curious to see, like, I agree, I think that the experts that left were, you know, people high up at Shell or Chevron. And then who's left are the workers. And at the end of the day, who runs these refineries, who runs these things? Its workers. So I would say, yes, you do need experts, of course, but like I just said, like, you know, at the end of the day, whether it's Chevron or the government running something, it can be run well, just saying the government's gonna run it doesn't mean it's gonna be horrible. And I think that's just like the assumption here. It's like, if Chevron runs it, it's gonna be great. Come on kids. We love Chevron.
Dave Anthony 1:07:05
I mean, the thing about the government are running it'd be horrible is the government is us. It's the people so you're literally saying it can't be run well, because we're running it so fuck off. It's the dumbest thing you can say and also have we not had now at this point, millions and millions of examples of how private companies should not be running things we can start with P G, whose leaders should have been executed if we're going by our standards of the death penalty. And you know, there's just so many examples of how private business does not do it. They're really fucking bad. Yeah, they're really really bad at it.
Betsy Long 1:07:51
I grew up in the South and like near the Gulf of Mexico and all the oil spills even the ones that didn't make the papers like there was constantly issues even here in California, you go to the ocean, you go to certain areas you're getting tired on your feet, just after swimming in the ocean for a day so it's very clear Yeah, I I don't think anyone's convinced from this video again, I'm just like, maybe if someone lived under a rock or in a conservative bubble, they would be like Oh, sure. Totally. And what child
Josh Olson 1:08:26
convinced what child is still watching at this point?
Dave Anthony 1:08:30
Yeah.
Betsy Long 1:08:31
Oh my god. No. Oh,
Josh Olson 1:08:34
God, I wonder how he socialism failed.
Dave Anthony 1:08:38
Yeah, the kid who was falling for it is the kid with no friends
Betsy Long 1:08:47
Yeah, so my heartbreaks let's get you some friends maybe
Josh Olson 1:08:57
well, let's move on to something cheerier the This is amazing. We got we got a few of these these these books, these autos tails. You know, I've watched a couple of the other ones aside from what we're doing today and auto is a dog that gets taken around historical events by young young Dennis Prager. Just to talk and it's like nothing happens though. It's like I'm they act like they've got this great character. There's no he's not an interesting he doesn't he just goes back in time and ask people questions. That's about it. Prager. You can go back in time and like save humanity from killer robots or anything. It's just
Dave Anthony 1:09:34
so how many how many kids does Dennis Prager have?
Josh Olson 1:09:39
I mean, that he knows of Whoa.
Dave Anthony 1:09:45
We know I know he has at least a grown son right but
Josh Olson 1:09:49
was the grandson who's like doing a but
Dave Anthony 1:09:51
this because because the things that he the things that he does like this Autozone is auto it's what You would do if you've never been around children really like you, or you or you just have no like awareness of what a child wants or is interested in. Because yeah, I don't know how you make this knowing anything about kids. So it just makes me wonder what his relationship was
Josh Olson 1:10:22
like with Yeah, well, he's gonna read a book one of these books himself later, we'll get into some of that, but this one and I let lets you need to hear what we're reading this week. And this time, we actually have a writer.
[VIDEO] 1:10:38
Welcome to autos tales. I'm Jill. And today we're reading remember the lady's written by Calista Gingrich
Betsy Long 1:10:52
she's writing now you know, she didn't write a single word of this book.
Josh Olson 1:10:59
Oh my Oh, I bet she did. Even worse than you think he forced the force them so yeah, First Lady throughout history. I gotta give you the bio a trigger warning. I need to issue before you go into it. I looked into this. I almost bought this book and I'll tell you why in a minute. We get to the end. But this is from the only negative review on Amazon. There's only a handful reviews, but the only negative one. Even though this book is published in late 2017. The book ends with the Obamas there's a picture of Mrs. Trump but no right of how disrespectful and disappointing I would like to return this book.
Dave Anthony 1:11:51
Wait. The book was written by who?
Josh Olson 1:11:57
Calista Gingrich
Dave Anthony 1:11:59
so did the Gingrich's hate the Trump's or are they?
Josh Olson 1:12:07
Yeah, yeah. Cuz though he's. He's a never Trumper isn't it? Is he never Trumper or No, didn't? I think I don't think it's murky.
Dave Anthony 1:12:14
I don't think he isn't never Trumper
Betsy Long 1:12:18
What about Prager, you?
Josh Olson 1:12:19
I don't know. Oh, Praeger, you big on Trump. They love. Love Trump has written at length about how it's not actually, he hasn't actually turned his back on every moral precept. He's been preaching for 30 years. But, you know, oh, he's a neighbor of Donald Trump to Joan of Arc. Dennis
Dave Anthony 1:12:38
Prager lives near me, I think, Oh, wow. He lives in the town. He has four kids.
Josh Olson 1:12:49
It seems to be that Gingrich is ya know, the game which was like Donald Trump. Okay. So yeah, interesting question. But, so the Yeah, I mean, you you you pick this one. But you were you were? Did you God before we get to sort of the modern era, are there any first ladies that jumped out at you in this thing? Or,
Betsy Long 1:13:10
um, I do just want to say this video. And this book. Again, super boring. Just like, no child. Child's watching this child's reading this book.
Dave Anthony 1:13:20
I would I would go beyond that. I think for an adult for this is one of the worst videos I've ever seen. Produced in my life. It's, it's just a total void. It's a void it there's nothing in this. It's just like this. This was a first lady. She made dinners. And that's kind of how far it goes. You're like, Oh, she made dinners. Oh, cool.
Josh Olson 1:13:46
Well, let's let's hear like for instance, here's here's Nancy Reagan.
[VIDEO] 1:13:50
Nancy Reagan left her life as a Hollywood star for a stage with a brighter Spotlight by far as a wife. She had Ronald's listening ear and encouraged him in his elected career. While First Lady Nancy launched a major campaign to put an end to a problem that caused much pain. She wanted Drug Free Schools where children could grow and urged young Americans to just say no
Betsy Long 1:14:16
I loved that section oh wow, you go girl girl boss you've got your husband's ear good for you. But also like the same now the just say no campaign that was in schools like that was my childhood. The carpet at the elementary school entrance said just say no. Like it was everywhere. I mean, I grew up in the South but it was just everywhere. And we had you know, those typical like cops coming to school tell us not to do drugs all that so this campaign the just say no campaign extended for a long time. and was super ineffective everyone
Josh Olson 1:15:03
did not. Yeah,
Betsy Long 1:15:04
don't you're using everybody tried
Dave Anthony 1:15:06
using past tense it's back. It's back with a vengeance. That's yeah. isn't really yeah, my kid my kid started getting just say no stuff in fourth grade. And I asked him which drugs and he said what drugs and I said so you don't want aspirin we had a long discussion about what drugs and how stupid it was actually how stupid it was that you would just blank statement. Just say no to drugs. Like it's really one of the dumbest things ever
Josh Olson 1:15:39
do it like a bobcat had a routine way back when no matter how you sit here, you sit in a hotel room just like miserable. And, you know, there's, there's he's got a syringe full of heroin in one hand and a gun in the other. And he's like, I'm gonna use one of these tonight. And he turns on the TV and there's a T reg is going to say no. And he's like, Oh, silly. Fucking me. Why don't I take? Like, yeah, it was insane. And there's also what did it Yeah, I grew up outside of it. I wasn't I wasn't adult when it was happening. This was Dave. I mean, do you think it's just like being bombarded with no, a certain point? There's something kind of creepy about that.
Betsy Long 1:16:16
Yeah, I think it's, I think it's just the assumption that it's kind of the same conversation of like gateway drugs, like, Oh, if you were to smoke weed, then the next thing you know, you'll be doing heroin. And I think it's just like let's criminalize it was during like the war on drugs. So it's like, let's take this war on drugs to the kids. Right? Let's make sure the kids, I think it's an attempt to indoctrinate a little bit of brainwashing. Just like, let's tell kids to say no to drugs. And then maybe it'll work. But really, I think it's like a bad faith effort.
Josh Olson 1:16:57
Yeah, yeah. No, those ones but and he reckons a problematic figure in her own right. But,
Betsy Long 1:17:06
yeah, so mention of no mention of like the AIDS crisis. No.
Josh Olson 1:17:14
So Dave, I just want to test Dave because Dave does have a history podcast. Dave,
Dave Anthony 1:17:17
I just want to tell you, though, are you asked me this? I did. I did find his house. He lives pretty close to.
Josh Olson 1:17:32
Dave, if we just did Nancy Reagan. Who? Who's next?
Dave Anthony 1:17:35
Who comes after Nancy Reagan? Yeah, that's interesting. So after Nancy comes Barbara Bush, and then of course Hillary Clinton. So I'm we're going to dive into those pretty deep. As I recall in this video, just dive right in and really talk about them. Go ahead.
Josh Olson 1:17:53
Actually, we skip Barbara. Let me skip Barbara. And we skip we skip Hillary.
Betsy Long 1:18:03
Yeah. But yeah, there he is. In the drawing. Illustration, Hillary's there, but she's just like, kind of off to the side looking like a little weirdo. So it's so
Josh Olson 1:18:17
here's, yeah, it's and I would call it so I'm sitting here. And I'm like, Finally, I'm gonna go. I'm just gonna go with Prager, you. And imagine the Prager, you did not read the book. But I sat there. And this is obviously insanity, because I have $9 I could, I could take a $10 bill right now and set it on fire while we're talking. And I wouldn't even have to check with my wife about it. It's like that's, that's how rich I am. But it was $9 to buy the book and I thought I should buy the book and just make sure the book doesn't have Hillary Clinton in it either. I was just I can't do it. I'm not willing to spend my $9 on that. So as far as I know, though, she's not in the book.
Dave Anthony 1:18:54
Of course she isn't.
Josh Olson 1:18:57
And I gotta say every single one of us on this on the show right now and then I'm looking at I think we all probably feel pretty much the same way about Hillary
Dave Anthony 1:19:04
Clinton the conservative
Josh Olson 1:19:07
but let us if you're doing a book about First Lady's it's like times Man of the Year people always get upset like oh, he's terrible times Man of the Year is not about the best person of the year. Hitler was Man of the Year it the largest impact. If you're gonna do some first ladies. Yeah, you gotta mention Hillary. Yeah, you just have
Unknown Speaker 1:19:29
100% I'm sorry.
Betsy Long 1:19:32
She changed the job. Like she just
Dave Anthony 1:19:35
Dick Cheney changed the job of Vice President like she changed the job. Exactly. And made it much worse. So Right. Yeah. And that's why I think when I when I saw that, I think that's why they try to love that's why they dropped Barbara off because they didn't want to just have Hillary void. So they're like, oh, let's just, we'll drop her to so no one can complain.
Josh Olson 1:20:00
Well, yeah, but also what would you say about Barbara Bush? Did she ever met me? She was kind of
Dave Anthony 1:20:06
a pressure thing. Oppressive me. Yeah,
Josh Olson 1:20:10
we all the things you think about her kind of bad and there wasn't there wasn't a thing. There wasn't some big campaign or if there was it didn't take off.
Dave Anthony 1:20:17
Yeah, I don't remember there being anything like that.
Josh Olson 1:20:21
Yeah. Let's check in on Laura Bush,
Dave Anthony 1:20:24
Dennis Prager lives. He's an eight minute drive away.
[VIDEO] 1:20:29
Stop. Laura Bush was a daughter of the Lone Star State, a charming first lady. Her impact was great. This former school teacher was eager to lead a movement to teach every student to read. Laura traveled the country visiting kids in school, and help them to see that books could be cool. admiring her efforts, Ellis could tell that he and Laura would get along well.
Betsy Long 1:20:56
Wow. So she's the reason why America has such a high literacy rate.
Josh Olson 1:21:01
Yeah.
Betsy Long 1:21:04
Good job.
Josh Olson 1:21:05
I feel like a joke there. But I just I don't do it. To book her husband was reading. But oh, yeah. Yeah, I honestly, that was one of the things where I'm like, Oh, I guess I didn't learn I guess I was relearning that. I had forgotten that. That was her thing. Because so here's, as you say, it didn't it didn't really seem to have any.
Dave Anthony 1:21:27
here's me trying to try to get kids interested. If I'm doing this, Laura Bush became the first lady 30 years before she killed a man in a car. She also helped kids. Now the kids now the kids just the kids just set up and they're kind of interested in.
Josh Olson 1:21:51
That's right. But you have to make it.
Betsy Long 1:21:54
Yeah, no more rhyming.
Josh Olson 1:21:56
Yeah, yeah, I just.
Betsy Long 1:21:58
And I like this too, like, okay, Nancy Reagan. She's amazing for her just say no to drugs campaign, which honestly, was an extension of the war on drugs. Okay. Laura Bush, she made reading her focus, which was honestly just an extension of No Child Left Behind. Yeah. So again, these are not even about the ladies. These are just like, look at the projects that the ladies were given, that they were allowed to do with their limited capacity. Yeah. Which is again,
Josh Olson 1:22:29
another reason that it's funny that Hillary's not in here, because that was not her deal.
Betsy Long 1:22:36
Well, she broke the mold. The thing is, like, as much as I disagree with Hillary Clinton on most things, she did apps, you know, like a girl boss and broke through and ruffled feathers. And this book is just not interested in sharing that type of,
Dave Anthony 1:22:55
they can even take her down a bit by just saying, you know, she, she tried to tackle healthcare and failed miserably.
Josh Olson 1:23:01
Yeah, exactly like they. And then, obviously, Laura Bush then brings us to Michelle Obama,
[VIDEO] 1:23:09
Michelle Obama made great historic gains, asking children to stretch their muscles and brains, she challenged them to enjoy daily exercise. And lead by example, to their pleasant surprise, Michelle urged young people to get up and move and encourage them all to get in the groove. Ellis was soft, and he had to admit that with Michelle's advice, he could be more fit.
Josh Olson 1:23:34
Is that a little a little get the group is like just the little like old white people trying to know. It could
Betsy Long 1:23:43
be I mean, the the little animal mascot, Ellis is a small round elephant. So could be but I think this one was really like, level headed for some reason, like, because I've only heard like, conservatives criticize Michelle Obama because of her like school lunch changes that she
Josh Olson 1:24:06
could have gone for that. Sure.
Betsy Long 1:24:09
Yeah, they could have totally could have gone for that. Because I hear about that all the time. When I tell people I work in schools, they'll be like, Oh, the school lunches are terrible now because of Michelle Obama. And I'm like, No, I mean, they're just oh, I've always had been kind of terrible. Are they terrible? But now
Dave Anthony 1:24:27
they're okay. I can't I just it's just all yesterday, it's just like the school lunches are the least of our problems. Right, the you know, Bill Gates fucking has destroyed education with this goddamn fucking Common Core how to make everyone to a businessman bullshit like I don't fucking care about what they're fucking eating at this point. I want teachers to be able to teach.
Josh Olson 1:24:57
I t somebody that's coming a little later. You're gonna care about school lunches in about 45.
Dave Anthony 1:25:02
You know who else cares about school lunches? Josh. Dennis Prager has a Deborah Barsoum vote sign up in front of his house. She's a continue as a conservative running for this school district and locking
Josh Olson 1:25:15
you down looking at his house was a little bit
Dave Anthony 1:25:18
crazy to have first, I'm fucking going, I am going to get arrested outside of that house.
Josh Olson 1:25:28
Cutting all of this
so speaking of dentists, yeah. Oh, no, please go ahead.
Betsy Long 1:25:38
I was just gonna say, you know, as a teacher, I do care about school lunches. It's just we're nowhere in the national political sphere, we're going to solve the issue of school lunches. No, I it's just no, it's weird that it's brought up as a national issue when it's like, no, these are all different agencies running these lunch programs. And, and it's really
Dave Anthony 1:26:03
super complicated all the you know, you're talking about school boards, and and superintendents and what they value and what they don't and like, it's just like, why would you ever even think you could do anything about that?
Josh Olson 1:26:17
Well, let me let me ask because that's the question. And I am setting up something that's coming a little bit later. But what is the actual agenda there? Why is the right so fixated on school lunches?
Betsy Long 1:26:29
I think it's like ideologically, like there's no such thing as a free lunch, we shouldn't be giving away literally free food to children, their parents need to work for that money to pay for their lunches, they need to be independent. Just getting involved with school lunches, I think is a sign that you endorse the concept of school lunches. And it's it, it's like, no, this is America, we are individuals, you are responsible for your own lunch, you're responsible for your own pencils. The school shouldn't be providing that you're lucky that we give you a place to send your kid every day for six hours. Food are you entitled
Dave Anthony 1:27:09
there, I think that if COVID Hasn't laid bare if you haven't been paying attention, they used COVID. And the death of kids and teachers to try to undermine schools, they tried and pushed for schools to be unsafe. So people going their employees or kids would die. That is that is part of their agenda to to undermine public schools. And as the same thing goes for malnourished children, you know, my wife did, when she was going and getting her PhD, she volunteered at a at a program in East LA. And the kids, they don't have food. There's just tons of kids that don't have their parents can't afford to give them food. And they're fine with that. Because that means underperforming public schools, and also the kids who cannot get what they need fall behind in every way. Because they're malnourished, and their fucking brains are working. They're fine with it. They just had that debate. I think it was in South Dakota and one of the one of the legislators came out and said in a speech that we should not be feeding kids. And quite frankly, a lot of them don't want to eat is what he said. They're fucking terrible people on a level you can't even the fact that they get upset about whatever the fuck they're getting upset about. And they're the shit comes out of their mouths is so monstrous. You know, they're talking about drag shows, and they have a guy on their side going kids don't eat and they shouldn't. Like they're out of their fucking minds. They're the worst of the worst.
Betsy Long 1:28:58
Yeah. And I do, I do think like, yes, they're definitely out of their minds, but they're also following something that needs to happen for our, you know, our workforce. Something about being a teacher means I am basically helping to raise the next workers of the country of the state of the city. So if you've got a large amount of students who don't have enough to eat, are just grateful to get anything who never expect anything from the government or the community, then they're going to be either forced to work somewhere where they're wildly exploited, like an Amazon fulfillment center. They're not going to have the expectations of benefits or support or anything. And so we are literally training children to not expect anything from anyone ever so that we can put them in these really crappy jobs that hurt them and their bodies and their families and their communities. So it's it. It's like yeah, it's totally like insane people, but it fits in our economic system and it fulfills a need that unfortunately, we have. Yeah.
Josh Olson 1:30:15
Yeah. Let's, let's wrap up with Calista Boyd you guys follow Newt on Twitter because he's always posting pictures of the two of them. I stopped actually because her face real heart film they're they're genuinely terrifying and amazing. Yeah, nothing but yeah, back for for new.
Betsy Long 1:30:31
Smooth. This I love it. Yeah, smooth Calista, Calista is like so smooth. And then new is just they're just raw, new wrinkles and all it's truly it's iconic.
Dave Anthony 1:30:45
Breakers house is worth 2.5 million
Josh Olson 1:30:48
ladies he had met Wait, wait, wait, sorry. Cutting all this, he says is worthwhile. 2.5
Dave Anthony 1:30:52
million. That's all Yeah, that's it. It's on. It's on. It looks like it's on half an acre. Yeah,
Josh Olson 1:31:03
it's he should be rich. I
Dave Anthony 1:31:05
don't think he should be actually like, I don't.
Josh Olson 1:31:10
I mean, morally I'm expecting for this massive rift he's ready gauge with for 1000 years.
Dave Anthony 1:31:17
Yeah, no, I mean, Jesus. I don't know how much money they're keeping from this. grift you know what I mean?
Betsy Long 1:31:26
Yeah. Yeah, this every time you watch a video it says, and thank you. The reason we can have these videos is because of viewers like you. Please donate. Yeah.
Josh Olson 1:31:39
Constantly trying to Yeah, but they may like, like $20 million last year. They're they're making it. Oh,
Dave Anthony 1:31:47
it's going up fast. Yeah.
Josh Olson 1:31:50
Yeah. Nearly $75,000 PPP loan forgiven by the government to that was fun. Yeah.
[VIDEO] 1:31:57
Ellis thought about the First Lady's he had met, and the others he had not learned about yet. All have their own special talents and traits that they use to make the United States great. They comforted our nation in moments of need with offered leadership to help America succeed. Ellis was grateful for what the First Lady's had done. And now he understood, we should remember each one at the end. We love this book, because it shows us how America's First Ladies have served our country in very important ways by using their special talents, smarts and creativity. And these first ladies each took responsibility of being married to presidents very seriously. They volunteered their time and energy and made our country better each in their own way. We continue to honor and respect them and be inspired to make our country better in our own way too. Let's see if you remember from the book, which first lady reminded her husband to remember the ladies. Yes, Abigail Adams. Good boy. She was our second First Lady married to President John Adams. Now, do you promise to remember the ladies. Thank you for watching autos tails, check out some of our other stories to keep reading. Keep watching and keep learning like
Betsy Long 1:33:31
the mascot. The mascot is not good. No. The mascot is horrible. A child is going to look at that and be like that is so lame. That yeah, it's clearly an adult in a dog costume. And the only parts of the costume are the head and the paws. It's just a guy and then I cannot get over this and this comes up in the the Candace Owens video as well. Is that anytime they have a woman on the show? They're sitting in a chair. They're not wearing shoes. They're wearing brightly colored socks. Right and I find it really weird. It's just extremely weird to me.
Dave Anthony 1:34:19
Like makes you comfy why it makes you comfortable with them to have them around the house.
Josh Olson 1:34:26
No
Betsy Long 1:34:28
but Dennis Dennis wear shoes.
Josh Olson 1:34:31
You don't want to always wears a suit. Yes.
Dave Anthony 1:34:33
Even in socks
Betsy Long 1:34:40
I think it's really odd. Children. Like who was that for a I don't I don't think that really plays I think it's more it seems perverted like a foot
Josh Olson 1:34:51
I honestly i We if I walked into a room and I saw somebody was making their kids watch one of these or reorder these books, I would I would feel like it would be incumbent upon me to grab that child and run and then call the police. worse though, if you found this guy reading one of those books, it's the big dog himself, folks.
Speaker 6 1:35:19
Rough the rough. I'm Otto, my best friend Dennis and I are so excited. Spring has sprung up come the flowers. Out comes the sun. We're in such a happy mood. And there's Passover to said Dennis. Yes, I barked and Passover for Jews and Easter for Christians. Lots of good food for everyone. Otto Dennis continued, you've probably heard of the Christian Trinity. Father, Son and Holy Spirit. I know what Trinity means something that has three parts, I replied. That's right. Did you know that America has its very own Trinity? The American Trinity I almost shouted. Yes, Otto. It's
Josh Olson 1:36:03
yeah, so he didn't shout. He didn't. He almost shouted. He didn't say or shout. He felt joy. He's never apparently Dennis reads his mind is on. Yeah, he's not
Speaker 6 1:36:15
every American liberty, and God We Trust and E Pluribus Unum. What does that mean? I asked. That's not even English. Well, let's go and find out, said Dennis.
Josh Olson 1:36:32
So he's a terrible reader. And by the way, we have no information as to who wrote this particular book. And it's also hilarious that little Dennis has gray hair.
Dave Anthony 1:36:44
Oh, yeah.
Josh Olson 1:36:48
I don't know what to make of that. But then Benjamin buttons, really? You know, I kept thinking about this. Am I gonna say this? I'm like, I'm gonna say it because like, you're you're not this is not just Dennis Prager reading a book to his kids. This is like, he's your videos are produced professional. He's like, hey, I'll read the book and the kid happy to have me do it. And he's fucking terrible. And I gotta say, I'm, you know, I got a kid. Tomato. I read to him every night. I'm fucking great. You do different voices. I'm sitting here listening to this. And I never know who's talking because it's like, as a dentist or auto because they have the same stupid voice. It's like, just a little bit of inflection or something. You're gonna do the dog. Whoa, okay. I'm a dog now. Okay. And then I'm done. As I talk like fucking Dennis. It's just, he doesn't even do that. So I can't follow these conversations, because it's the same idiot. And there's no, there's no intonation. There's no pausing. There's no music to it. So he's just like reading words. Oh, god, he's bad. He's got other bad qualities. It's kind of dopey to call this. Jesus Christ.
Betsy Long 1:37:47
I know we can. We can do two things at once criticize his horrible beliefs and actions and also be like, you're bad at reading.
Josh Olson 1:37:58
Have you been to a child? Yes. Because I wonder if he wrote this down. Because it's, he is he there's a bunch of Prager videos on the American Trinity. And that's not a thing. I mean, that's not a thing that's like, yeah, it's really weird. You're, there's nothing you
Betsy Long 1:38:15
can ask you. I've never I've never heard of the American Trinity.
Josh Olson 1:38:22
This is Prager. Prager is trying to turn this this is his fetch. You know, it's like it's like he's trying to make it happen. It's like stop trying to make American true
Dave Anthony 1:38:31
Yeah, I think he is there's an American Trinity University.
Josh Olson 1:38:36
But it's probably religions. Yeah, I'm
Dave Anthony 1:38:38
sure it is.
Josh Olson 1:38:40
Yeah, well, like
Betsy Long 1:38:42
they the weird something really weird is like, it feels like a fetish fetish. Should zation of Judaism a little bit because we know they're Christian conservatives. So they say okay, Christian. Oh, I didn't know this. Yeah, this makes sense. This makes sense.
Josh Olson 1:39:06
Well, he tries to like he's like, Well, Christianity has a trail it has a Trinity and you know, Judaism does sort of two if it's like God, the Torah and you know, Israel.
Betsy Long 1:39:15
I know that. That the Jewish Trinity is I just, I feel like I so much has opened up in my mind. Yeah, he's Jewish. Oh, so God, Torah and Israel. Yes, Trinity. Okay.
Josh Olson 1:39:36
Yep. So it seems so they go to the Statue of Liberty and this is what they see
Speaker 6 1:39:45
them in the distance. We saw a big crowded ship. I grabbed them as his hand and gave it a good grip. The large ferry was full of people with broad smiles on their faces. They were of all different backgrounds, ages and races.
Dave Anthony 1:40:04
Okay, so the only thing that not
Josh Olson 1:40:05
in the book, they're all white in the illustration.
Dave Anthony 1:40:09
Well, yeah. The only thing he read was Dr. Seuss, because he's just trying to do Dr. Seuss and all these things, right?
Josh Olson 1:40:18
No, that's not the SUTI and cadence. There's not this.
Dave Anthony 1:40:21
Well, I know it's not the system case. It's his version of the Seussian. Cadence. Your ear? Yeah, he
Betsy Long 1:40:28
thinks he's doing Yes. He
Dave Anthony 1:40:30
thinks he's doing Dr. Seuss. Absolutely. Does he? Yes. Absolutely. Josh, you're, you're being way too wiry right now. Now think like a dumb old conservative idiot. And you're
Josh Olson 1:40:47
trying to say he's he's failing? failing?
Betsy Long 1:40:51
Yeah, for sure. failing.
Josh Olson 1:40:53
Yeah. Yeah. So
Betsy Long 1:40:55
it's just, it's just European. If you're coming to America, from Europe, it's a great experience for you congrats.
Josh Olson 1:41:09
Which make a point of calling out the fact they're all different races. And then the illustration is they're all white. I would love to have been there for the editorial discussions about that. They don't, then they go back to No, no, go ahead. What if nothing, they go back to 1768. And Valley Valley Forge. And this is when it starts to get weird because I'm like, this is a time travel story. Right? Like I'm back in time and they're bumping into all these folks.
Speaker 6 1:41:41
Look, then it's I said, That's George Washington over there. With his hands clasp, and eyes closed. It looks like he's in prayer. Dennis asked him Is the legend of your prayer at Valley Forge. True, replied Washington. Some say it's a myth. But I'll share it with you. Washington went on. Legend hasn't had when my troops couldn't take much more. I pray to God to help us win. The Revolutionary War. I asked has gotten
Josh Olson 1:42:15
not a weird way of talking about yourself. If this whole thing in the future, well, you're really praying Well, legend has it? This is what I did right now.
Betsy Long 1:42:26
It's like, no, are you praying or not?
Josh Olson 1:42:30
Like, he's like, he knows what the legend is. He's like this is now you look back and it's, it's crazy. It's like, it's like you don't go to Sarah Connor. And she's like, Yes, I will be saved by the Terminator. And you will impregnate me with John Connor. She's like, What the fuck is going on? You know what I mean? This is bad time travel writing
Speaker 6 1:42:48
been important since America start. Yes. And Washington. Faith in God has always played a big part.
Dave Anthony 1:42:57
Okay, whatever. So that's what they're trying to get across. That's what they want to get across. Yeah.
Betsy Long 1:43:03
They think God was was has been part of our country the whole time. Yep. Okay.
Josh Olson 1:43:12
Some now for some reason, this is weird. They sort of go to the well, they don't they get to 2002. And I was thinking about this, because this video was produced in 2022. They come across people who are all being sworn in as citizens now they are racially diverse. And but it's 22,002 instead of 2022. This is still happening today. Why? Why do you think why are they going to 2002 to show a bunch of immigrants coming here and being sworn in instead of just going back to today? 911 is what does that have to do with immigrants?
Dave Anthony 1:43:53
Well, post 911, we're still good. We still we still know even though they they, the brown people did that to us, we still invite them all in.
Betsy Long 1:44:06
I don't know. And these in this video, the look, look at all of these black and brown people who love America and who have confessed their love and have made the pledge and are so dedicated to our country. This is how you can be a good immigrant, as opposed to anyone else.
Josh Olson 1:44:25
Well, that's that's what I'm trying to get my sense of it and don't get me wrong is that they don't want to go to 2020 22 because they want to trade in this iconography of all these people being sworn in as Americans, but they don't want to do it anymore today. What I mean, they don't want to show all these people happily coming over here and being good citizens in 2022 Because that's a thing they're against. Does that make sense? Or am I because I can't come up with any reason to make it 2002 2002 is for all intents and purposes 2022.
Betsy Long 1:44:59
It could just because they're stuck in the time travel situation. Like
Josh Olson 1:45:09
so anyway, yeah, so they all take the oath, and now they're racially diverse.
Speaker 6 1:45:15
I'm proud to be an American. We heard one of them proclaim. Another said, it doesn't matter where you are from, or what you believe. If you love freedom and obey the laws, US citizenship, you can receive. Moved by the site, Dennis began to speak. He observed. That's one of the things that makes America so unique.
Josh Olson 1:45:42
You idiot. Can't. This makes me crazy. You can't be by the way and it messes up. You could. You could do this with a meter. It still works. You can't be so unique. You're either unique or you're not. That's it. That's all you're either one of a kind or you're not. That's one of the things that makes America unique period and a story you illiterate. Sorry, just a bug that he presents himself as a learned man. And there's a kid's book too, if you don't like it's one thing if you're doing you know, slang and colloquialisms but like, if you write a book for kids, you know, you gotta tell me I'm wrong, but he would want it to be grammatically correct.
Betsy Long 1:46:20
Oh, absolutely. It's really
Josh Olson 1:46:21
feel free to tell me I'm insane.
Betsy Long 1:46:24
I mean, you're, you're insane. But you're, you're a writer. So you understand the importance of language and using correct thing, especially when you're trying to teach children how to write their own books. When you want to teach children how to write their own things and tell their own stories. You do. Aim to be grammatically correct. Anyway, so then it sums it all up.
Speaker 6 1:46:48
This story happens to be my favorite to share with friends like you. Can Trinity is godly trust, liberty and E Pluribus Unum from any one or some of the most important ideas and values we can all learn from and lived. These ideas which became our mottos are also found on almost every coin and Bill in America.
Dave Anthony 1:47:16
Okay, let's start with E pluribus unum out of many one. Which fucking part of America is that? The most since the beginning divided country? Was that in the slavery days? Was that when women couldn't vote? Like when was the out of many one? It's the most it's the dumbest shit Yes, we wrote it on some stuff. That's all it is. Because there's absolutely no out of many one in this fucking country anywhere. If anything, it's out of many too big. This isn't working. Liberty
Betsy Long 1:48:00
Yeah, it's but it's it's on the coins on the coin. No, it's on the coin. And you know how often we use coins? Yes. We love our coins.
Dave Anthony 1:48:09
We're coin country Liberty think about the people who apply liberty to this country are so fucking unread and simplistic. From the beginning until now, right? You have slaves? Oh, we still have slaves. Yeah, it's still in the Constitution. It's called the 13th amendment. If you're in prison, you can be a slave. Yes, we still have slaves. And then you know you don't go into wage slavery and everything else it's there's there's Can you have liberty if your fucking health insurance is tied to your employer? Like what the fuck are you people talking about it's it's just so goddamn dumb. So these these mean things and the last one isn't God we trust? No, we don't. I don't fucking care. You see, you made up some sky. God, I don't fucking give a shit. It's not the 1200s Fuck off. I don't trust in God. It's the this whole thing he's got here is just it's crazy. And to him. They're the most important things to make America great. And it's just a pile of shit. It's really dumb. And you're right. He's the I tried to find it anywhere else online. He's the only guy doing this. Nobody else cares. At some point. When you're trying an idea and you've been banging at it for 15 fucking years and no one is catching on. Let it go old man walk away. This isn't a thing.
Betsy Long 1:49:44
Yeah, stop trying to make it a thing. And if like he had to, here's the thing he had to travel back in time in order to demonstrate an example of liberty, an example of God and a Example of American unity. And it's like Sorry, but if it's that much of a stretch to say that that is what our country stands for, and have always stood for. I don't think it's a good argument. If you can't, yeah, tell the story without traveling back to George Washington praying before battle. According to legend, that's not as pretty. That's not a solid argument. That's not a solid American Trinity. Like, keep trying. Yeah, keep trying those three. They're not I'm still hung
Josh Olson 1:50:30
up on the fact that George Washington knows how he's perceived in the future. That is a horse. He, it's Merlin and the ones in future can. Yeah, he actually lived great backwards in time, remember? So you know, everything was coming to Washington, like oh, yeah, New York common?
Betsy Long 1:50:47
Well, it's just like, are the Founding Fathers God?
Dave Anthony 1:50:51
Well, I mean, they're on the same level of God, to these people. They you know, it's one of the biggest problems is that you know, we have all these really flawed people coming up with this way we should live and it's failing miserably. But these people act they do act like they're gods. These Praeger types.
Josh Olson 1:51:13
Oh, do you think it drives us crazy every time he sees some Jumoke walking by any gods guns and beer t shirt because that was the first place I went to when I was thinking American Trinity that's everyone knows that. That's the real one Pluribus Unum
Betsy Long 1:51:32
the real that's the real American champ is guns and beer.
Josh Olson 1:51:38
Oh, Gods. Yeah, multiple gods. So let's get away from that. It's pretty terrible person. Let's go to it. Let's go early. The lovely the wonderful the morally unimpeachable Candace Owens.
Betsy Long 1:51:51
More girl. Power.
Josh Olson 1:51:54
That's right. We've discussed her in a previous episode and then feel addicted shit enough without having to go back into her but awful, awful, awful
Betsy Long 1:52:03
purchase to know. Just to know. Yep. Candace Owens is not wearing shoes. She's wearing socks for some reason. Okay. Don't worry about it.
Josh Olson 1:52:14
And she's doing a thing on the national anthem and the Pledge of Allegiance.
[VIDEO] 1:52:18
Ruff, ruff. Dennis and I are going on another big adventure. It's time we learned about patriotism, and why we love our country, the United States of America.
Josh Olson 1:52:30
I'm 12 years old. I'm like, Yeah, you go. I can't wait to hear this. That's a setup.
Betsy Long 1:52:38
Yeah, why? I love that collective. We're why we love our country. Yeah, that's an assumption.
Josh Olson 1:52:46
I'm just thinking about the stuff that I was like, I was really funny. Couple years ago, I bonded with a friend of mine. This conversation, we both realized that we were about 10 or 11. We were both obsessed with the Time Life Book of sharks. And both of us can practically recite the details of chapter two, which was like in the midst of all this sort of science and everything. Chapter Two is this grueling description of a guy who almost got eaten by a shark? That's right. Like that's what kids are. I'm sorry.
Betsy Long 1:53:14
That sounds awesome. We're gonna
Josh Olson 1:53:16
talk to you about patriotism. Like I got anything about a guy getting eaten by a shark because this is not,
Dave Anthony 1:53:21
you know, they have they still, they still have to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance and do the thing in the morning. And the other day, Finn was like some some do Yeah, the other day. It was like, Jeff doesn't do that. And I was like, Jeff doesn't stand up. And he goes, Nago. Good for him. What a great kid when I go to ask him why he goes, No, I go, you should ask them why. figured out that kids Awesome. Yeah, that's
Josh Olson 1:53:45
such a creepy thing to do to children is do it. It's like,
Dave Anthony 1:53:49
yeah, you know, I don't think they do this in other countries. As much as we do, I think they do in Australia, but you know, that's expected but but they do in North Korea, and that was, yeah, I think they don't do it. In like a probably a lot of European countries and whatnot. It's, we are very uniquely, you know, very, very into the flag to it's really creepy. Like we should probably go see a counselor.
Betsy Long 1:54:18
Yes, seek help. The the pledge in California. It's, it is part of like a regular routine, but it's really not enforced in any way. So if a teacher if a teacher in a classroom doesn't want to do the pledge daily, they don't. If there's like school wide assemblies, sometimes there'll be a pledge or if there's like a sports game, sometimes they'll play the national anthem to mimic basically a baseball game or you know, major league, but in places like Texas, not only do they have to do the national flag, but they have the texture pledge with which you Sure is definitely required and so this is where we see like every single
Josh Olson 1:55:04
beer actually I believe
Dave Anthony 1:55:08
I cannot say this enough if you are listening stop standing up for the for the any American whatever you're at a sporting event and they play the they play the national stop standing up and they'll stop fucking playing it because if if every leftist was was sitting down they would lose their minds and the only answer they have is to stop playing it just sit the fuck down
Josh Olson 1:55:34
yeah I just left this to my
Dave Anthony 1:55:37
left is better especially aren't gonna but you know there's a lot of people if you if you think it's dumb, just sit there and let them deal with the let them deal with it and they can fucking handle their little shit fit anywhere they want but they will in the end stop playing the goddamn things and they'll stop doing the Pledge of Allegiance because of a lot of people are sitting down. That's humiliation for them. They're going to stop it. And that's what we need. Is that to stop?
Betsy Long 1:56:00
Yeah, you can just play on your phone for a minute and a half and you're good.
Dave Anthony 1:56:05
I haven't I haven't stood for the Pledge of Allegiance yet. Last time I stood for the amount the Pledge of Allegiance for the national anthem. I was in college in UC Santa Barbara. It was a sold out basketball game. We were about to go into Iraq the first the Kuwait the first Gulf War, and everyone stood up and when the pledge that when the fucking national anthem ended everyone started chanting USA USA. And it was just me and and a woman student also sitting there and we just looked at each other and shook our heads and I was like, I'm never standing up again. For this fucking shit ever again. I never did.
Betsy Long 1:56:43
Good. Yeah. And I think that this video and the fact that Candice Owen is reading this book. Is is intentional, like with Colin kapernick. Yelling, and and just Yeah. And like Black Lives Matter demonstrating like, Hey, don't stand up for the pledge. Don't do this like, or the national anthem. And then oh, look, they found a black woman who would read this. Know about the importance of of standing for the national anthem and the pledge. It's not racist, because we have a person of color.
Josh Olson 1:57:21
So little Dennis and Otto somebody Yeah, they go back to the 50s and find themselves a bunch of school kids.
Betsy Long 1:57:29
They had to go back to the 50s. Yeah, they did. What that is such a classic like old white guy thing to tell your grandkids back in my day. Pledge. And then they're just like, yeah, just put that in the book. Perfect. Yeah. No, no, everyone,
Josh Olson 1:57:51
everyone knows it was the 70s. They were best on
[VIDEO] 1:57:53
their chairs. They looked up at the teacher with soft, quiet stairs. Time to say the Pledge. The teacher did start. The students stood up and put their hands on their hearts. I pledge allegiance. They all together did say Dennis, I asked do they do this every day? Yes. Then is said with his hand on his heart. It is how every day at school should start. President Dwight Eisenhower's picture hung on the wall. Who's that? I whispered in a voice Oh, so small. That's the current president Dennis answered with a smile. He added under God. The pledge. We've said this whole while. That's pretty important. I whispered back to my friend. So is liberty and justice for all. Like we say at the end, they went to their class.
Josh Olson 1:58:44
Okay, again, I whispered in a voice is so small, you just want to do. It's like saying I shouted at a voice so loud. It's like we got you the first time. Writers of these things are terrible. They're terrible writers.
Betsy Long 1:58:59
They're like, how can we convey that you're a very small, tiny child? We get it.
Josh Olson 1:59:09
But I'm I'm more interested in what happens next because Otto goes home and then he's he's had this epiphany.
[VIDEO] 1:59:15
Well, I never knew how much I loved our national anthem and the Pledge of Allegiance. Yes, said Dennis. Our flag with its red, white and blue stars and stripes is more than just a piece of cloth. It represents our country. And that's why we stand for it when we sing the national anthem and say the Pledge, I replied. We don't say the Pledge because America is a perfect place that is explained. We say the Pledge because America is a good place. And because it is our place, and we can make it even better. I barked. We've been doing that since 1776. God bless America. shouted Dennis. God bless America. Ruff, ruff.
Betsy Long 1:59:58
Okay, that's my favorite line. Oh, God bless America. Ruff, ruff ruff. Oh, but if the dog said it, it must be true.
Dave Anthony 2:00:12
The obsession with the flag is embarrassing.
Josh Olson 2:00:17
I mean, they try they're trying to inculcate these kids into this just kind of the swing keep thinking of like, you know, I don't know what life is really like in North Korea we have this kind of cartoonish sense could be true, but it just it feels like what we mock North Korea for 100% And that's what they're they're trying to create that same degree. I've just like blatantly ridiculous sentimentalized propaganda for children.
Betsy Long 2:00:42
Yeah, and again, this this book, boring.
Josh Olson 2:00:47
Boring, very boring. Well, let's let's get to which I want to say let's check this out.
[VIDEO] 2:00:54
The end? That was a great adventure.
Josh Olson 2:00:58
No, there wasn't no, that wasn't a great adventure. It
Dave Anthony 2:01:01
was a great adventure. Just like the last one was a great story. These are great fun stories and adventures. You're You're
Josh Olson 2:01:07
A Wrinkle in Time, regular times a great adventure man, Huckleberry Finn, you not hear about the frog. While Moby Dick is a great adventure. We would back to the 50s and watch a bunch of people do the Pledge of Allegiance. That's not even an adventure. Not a great Oh, we have time travel. This is what we fuck out.
Dave Anthony 2:01:26
If I could travel in time, I would go back every year and hear the Pledge of Allegiance.
Josh Olson 2:01:36
We have a time machine. Yeah, what's that? I did. I gotta go. 10 million things I'm gonna do when the time is. Yeah. Before I travel back in the 50s. To watch children do that I
Dave Anthony 2:01:46
would look at all the flags. That's what I would do. Travel back in time and look at every flag.
Josh Olson 2:01:53
Every year, I would kill baby Hitler day. Oh, that would be a great No,
Dave Anthony 2:01:57
get a flag. Watching you. There's a whole program for time travel, you can look at all the different flags. The versions. It's pretty great. was a great adventure. I would say the greatest adventure if I'm actually defining this.
Josh Olson 2:02:22
Oh my God,
Dave Anthony 2:02:22
these are relentlessly stupid people. I don't think they're serious. I think that they are just Grifters. This type of conservative people,
Josh Olson 2:02:32
they're they're reaching the reach on these things. Again, we don't know for sure where the kids videos but with the rest of the stuff they're doing the reach is horrifying. The amount of money they're making from these things is astonishing. The amount of money has been pumped into them by fiends with political agendas, especially anti climate. Yep. Your propagandist is astonishing. So it's like
Dave Anthony 2:02:54
a big thing about climate change is the more becomes obvious that climate change is happening. The more the climate change, fossil fuel companies have to invest in more outlandish, hysterical nonsense, because that that goes along with not believing in reality anymore. So so they they fund. It's not even misinformation. They fund hysterical misinformation, they fund a level of misinformation that is baffling. So tons of this money that's coming in to make things like Prager you is really pushed by people who just don't want fossil fuels to go away. But at the same time, they are completely undermining everything. And on a level that hasn't been seen before. Because the, that's the only way they can survive is to take a segment of the population and make them just spectacular idiots.
Betsy Long 2:04:01
Yeah, it's an I think something that gives me a lot of hope is that the children that I spend time with that at work, and like, my friends who have children, like climate change is very obvious and is kind of like if you talk to anyone who you know, and I don't recommend this, if you don't know, like someone who's in high school or middle school, like don't find a random person, don't do that. But if you don't, you know, like, just to be clear. Like, if you talk to any young person, they're extremely aware of climate change. They have lots of beliefs about what we should be doing. And there's lots of like, very radical young people. And so I see these like investing in this type of video is like a desperate attempt to try and disperse some of that energy. And I think it's luckily, at you know, best case scenario, this money just goes into this project and it's just wasted. Yeah. Because I think for the most part young people, they get it because they're living it, and they're seeing it. And it's not even gotten as bad as it's gonna get, like, so I think it's really it's really good that it's a good sign that they're throwing money at this horrible thing. Because they're fake. They're they're afraid. I don't think it is like a real threat to any any, you know, Chevron or shell or anything like that. I don't think it's like a real threat yet, but it is clear that there's it will be Yeah, I mean, we're not there yet. The
Dave Anthony 2:05:40
the boomers are dying and the old people are dying and they're really the ones that are holding up any sort of climate change solutions. But you know, everyone should know that the kids are on board and the longer you wait, the more brutal their reaction is going to be the more radical and swift their reaction will be to stop climate change so you can soft step all you want I ain't gonna Hi I'm gonna be on how fucking happens if you still have democracy they're gonna fucking come down you are so fucking hard so fucking hard
Betsy Long 2:06:13
yeah. Or just wait for you to die as a you know I think about Praeger you this whole situation this whole whatever production company whatever it is
Dave Anthony 2:06:25
propaganda company. It's probably propaganda
Betsy Long 2:06:29
like what happens when Dennis dies? Yeah.
Josh Olson 2:06:33
I'll be keep going. I mean, they've got they've got their stars. And you know, I think they'll keep chugging along and he'll be he'll the martyr him. They still they some of them, you know, some of the younger host talk about him and he's kind of Messianic terms. You know, imagine that I was a leftist until I listened to a Dennis Prager video. Or one of the dumber ones.
Betsy Long 2:06:54
Low hanging fruit. He's got a
Josh Olson 2:06:57
long drive climate change denying
Dave Anthony 2:07:00
he's got a gate and then a long driveway in the house is sort of back away from the gate. Where a gate looks easily jumpable
why wouldn't you put your house in a trust? What do you How fucking dumb are you star guy? Like, you put it in the fucking trust? If you're a rich guy, that if you're doing political
Josh Olson 2:07:34
videos like this, does he have 50 other houses?
Dave Anthony 2:07:37
No, he just lives in that one.
Josh Olson 2:07:41
Two and a half in LA and yeah,
Dave Anthony 2:07:43
northern northern LA. LA County.
Josh Olson 2:07:46
Very, very weird. So speaking of climate change deniers let's we're gonna wrap it up. This one is not for kids. This is about education. I think this would be fun. Betsy, we have not discussed explicitly this topic. I'm my bed. I know where you stand up. But yeah, well, school choice you want to you want to sort of fill us in really quickly on this before we get into the Praeger you.
Betsy Long 2:08:06
Sure? Yeah. So school choice is the phrasing that mostly conservatives use. And also, like, a lot of liberal people will also talk about school choice as if it's a good thing. The way school choice is sold to parents is Hey, your child is going to go to a school, don't you think that you should receive those tax dollars that would go towards your child's education? Don't you think you should be able to determine which school gets those tax dollars. And so in this video, you know, this person, this woman she's talking about that in that way that School Choice allows parents to have freedom to choose where they send their child to school, but in reality? Yeah, in reality, school choice looks like an underfunded traditional public school that is, you know, like in the neighborhood has to accept students from the certain area code that traditional public school has teachers, principals, nurses, the basics, and then what a parent would be able to choose between the traditional public school and another type of school could be a charter school, or it could be a private school. So there's kind of like three main categories of schools. Private School, I don't really want to talk about because that's private money. But if if school choice became a reality, which really means like school vouchers, school vouchers would allow parents to say I want my child to go to this private school and I want the time tax dollars that are attached to my child to follow them to the private school. So basically,
Josh Olson 2:10:05
that's cool. So, yeah, private school people who are going to private school and
Betsy Long 2:10:09
yeah. So then the, you know, that's one separate issue. But that's, that's not super common in California. But in other states, it's a big thing. Like that's already happened in certain places. Like I think in Ohio, you can get like a voucher and use tax dollars to pay for your private education. Like in California, it's more of like traditional public schools. And then there's charter schools. Charter schools are basically managed, most of them are managed by private management groups like KIPP. But then they'll receive federal tax dollars per child. School choice gives the illusion that parents actually get to choose between high quality schools and get to make the best decision. But in reality, how that looks is that a parent is given a really underfunded traditional public school, versus a really well funded charter school with lots of investors from the Walton Foundation, Bill Gates. A lot of lots of private equity is in charter schools. So school choice is a way for parents to feel like, Oh, I get to choose, but in reality, who gets to choose more affluent parents who have the time to apply to these schools, do the research, wait for the lottery, because a lot of charter schools get enrollment but don't have enough placement? So they'll put kids in a lottery drawing to see if they'll go to these charter schools. But at the end, there is not a significant sign that charter schools do anything better than traditional,
Dave Anthony 2:12:02
actually, the latest stuff coming in as the video wars.
Betsy Long 2:12:06
Yeah, well, Oh, yeah. If you if you correct for like socioeconomic status and everything they do worse. Absolutely.
Josh Olson 2:12:15
Yeah. Well, yeah, we'll definitely get to that. Because there's some studies cited here that we want to discuss. But yeah, so let's so this is Rebecca Friedrichs. She has big right wing anti teacher case in the Supreme Court that she lost that she's gonna talk about later. She's from
Dave Anthony 2:12:32
Orange County, by the way, Orange County, California, which is very rare.
Josh Olson 2:12:38
She's also a climate change denier, and she really, really, really doesn't like free lunch programs. I couldn't find audio that's unfortunately,
Dave Anthony 2:12:48
imagine being a teacher against free lunches.
Josh Olson 2:12:51
Here's here's on Tucker Carlson in 2019. In these community schools, we're giving children free health care, we're giving them free food, free emotional support, free emotional support, that's foul and by the way free political they
Betsy Long 2:13:03
should be charging the children
Josh Olson 2:13:07
free political indoctrination for their parents. And so if these unions in their friends their politicians get their way they would like our schools to be open 24/7 I don't know how elites to me but in her mind, they they do they want to replace the family and families raising their children with their own virtues. They want to replace the family with with our own virtues. They want to replace that with the state with Union controlled government schools. That's dangerous. That's communism when you think about it.
Dave Anthony 2:13:40
Okay, well, Union's controlling everything is a bit communist, but everything else she said is the rantings of a fucking idiot.
Josh Olson 2:13:50
Basically, correct. It gets so much better. Yeah.
Betsy Long 2:13:52
I also like what teachers union has been advocating for 24 hour school.
Dave Anthony 2:13:58
I mean, we
Josh Olson 2:13:59
imagine you do not spend anywhere near enough.
Betsy Long 2:14:03
I'm like, Who said we want to spend more time here? No.
Josh Olson 2:14:08
I'm going home. Now. Wait, I would like to be here all night with these kids.
Betsy Long 2:14:12
Yeah, I'm a public servant. Please treat me like it.
Josh Olson 2:14:18
The following year, she wrote an op ed in The Washington Times on teachers unions. This is gonna be painful for you, Betsy. I'm sorry, but you need to hear it. The NEA coordinated directly with the New York Times the Pulitzer Center, the Southern Poverty Law Center and Black Lives Matter to put 6019 in the hands of educators and activists. Their goal to assert a false but preferred narrative to advance a political agenda, blah, blah, blah, and now we get to the good part. They're re traumatizing and legitimizing a victimhood mentality, forcing a chip onto the shoulders of black Americans, and even mountains of undeserved guilt on those of white America. So she's saying and this is funny because I'm wondering Russia gate this is a thing you've heard from a lot of liberals do unfortunately. That that basically is the message is our blacks would be fine. If it weren't for. In this case, I guess commies telling them that things are bad here and the liberal nightmare was that it was Russians riling them up and making them think that bad things were happening in America. Yeah. So condescending that is or how racist?
Betsy Long 2:15:32
Yeah, this sounds like anti. She's just like anti CRT critical race theory. And it's like, okay, well, what's the problem with CRT? And I guess the critique is that white people feel real guilty.
Dave Anthony 2:15:49
Yeah. I mean, if anybody was involved in CRT stuff, like I went to some board meetings, and it was mostly just people ranting about CRT and then the board going, right. That's not what we do here. Right. That's not what we do. Yes, that's a bad thing. We don't do that here. Like, that's all it was.
Betsy Long 2:16:07
Right? Yeah, like, I Yeah, we had at our school, we had at least a few parents ask, do you teach CRT here? And our response was like, what CRT Yeah. And then they're like, oh, I don't really know. And we're like, oh, well, you know, if you hear more about it, let us know. But no, we don't. Well.
Dave Anthony 2:16:34
We had a we had a guy who was really big on on that. And I went up at a board meeting and explained that people who bring up the how communism is taking over who, when communism is not taking over at all, are fascists and then that guy stopped talking. That was fun. Our board meetings are fun. It gets better.
Josh Olson 2:16:58
That's that's better. We're getting into COVID. Now, folks, Laura Ingraham show and 2020 and clean the unions opposed COVID school clothes. Well, actually, this one, I get some audio. Let's let her tell us her issues. With this.
[VIDEO] 2:17:17
The unions are using the closure of our schools as a smokescreen, Laura, here's why. Sadly, these unions are actually using our schools to sexualize our children. And to train them in anti American ideology. They do this with a coalition of over 100 ad organizations, including, sadly, the CDC, Planned Parenthood and Black Lives Matter Incorporated. It is shocking what they're teaching our children online through virtual learning. They are teaching our children to sext to view pornography, they are hooking them up with online sex experts. So what they are doing is grooming our children for sexual predators to use them. This is child abuse.
Josh Olson 2:18:02
What in the classical sense so much better now than when I
Dave Anthony 2:18:06
went? In the fuck happened in this person's brain?
Josh Olson 2:18:09
What At what age 10 or 11? When when is the best age to start teaching a child how to don't evade this. I'm not gonna let you off the hook for this.
Dave Anthony 2:18:22
Timmy, it's it's, I'm gonna fuck you. Not? I'm gonna fuck me. It's,
Josh Olson 2:18:29
it's a cucumber. on us. The cucumber? Everyone knows that that
Betsy Long 2:18:34
this is this is so like that. That my My thing is just like there are I think there are valid critiques of our current public education system. And it's like this. Okay, that's not it. That's not it the problem? And I'm sorry, teachers, the majority of teachers don't know how to sext. The majority of teachers are just like, boring. normies like me, it's no, why would we be teaching that but also like, for any teacher who has spent time teaching remotely during COVID, trying to support the needs of children, especially like children and poverty while navigating COVID school closures to save lives. It was really hard. And so that like hurts my soul to hear that I'm being you know, talked about, oh, I'm teaching kids to do this and that and it's like, no, I was trying to teach them how to read over the internet and real hard.
Dave Anthony 2:19:42
The comment that they're sexualizing all of our children is just amazing, amazing thing to say, and not have anybody go can you explain that more? Like she just gets to say that I don't on a national news network and no one goes, Can you break that weird thing down that you just how are they sexualizing children
Betsy Long 2:20:03
do you do you have examples? Like, what are you citing citations are needed for this? Yeah, but I mean, it's yeah, it's it's true that like unions are very influential and communities. And so I see like, but it's just like not not in a sexual way. Like, have you been on strike? Have you been told?
Dave Anthony 2:20:28
not sexy at all? I've done it.
Betsy Long 2:20:30
It's no, no, I was just on strike two weeks ago, it was. It was not cute. And but it was, it's great. And you really get to talk to people, real people about what they're going through and their school experience and what parents really think about the school experience. And I'll say, I have never in my life, my 10 years teaching how to parent come to me concerned about their child, learning how to sext at school, and I used to teach middle school to like I, I've worked with all age levels. And it's just like, No, that's just not true. You sound insane.
Dave Anthony 2:21:11
Yeah, she sounds completely insane. And also, let's put out there unions were the only thing in our entire country that tried to protect our kids during COVID. That's it. Those are the only people who tried to make our kids lives safer. And now, everyone will find out how that didn't work out over the next few years.
Betsy Long 2:21:35
Yeah, I mean, we're gonna see the long lasting health effects of COVID on states that didn't have any, you know, precautions or safety measures. Whereas if you were in Los Angeles, UCLA, my art Union, we fought really hard to have explicit safety measures in schools that they're not insane. It was, you know,
Dave Anthony 2:21:59
basic. It was very, it was very, very common sense. Like, if someone in your class has has COVID. Now, everyone wears a mask for 10 days, like it's very, very, it was very sensible stuff.
Betsy Long 2:22:11
Yeah, things that they do in other countries. With colds with flu with it's, it's, but we are so like, oh, I want to do what I want to do exactly how I want to do it in America, that anytime there's an opportunity to do something as a community or solid Ristic such as wear a mask to protect your neighbor. People like this. Conservative babies put up a stink. But yeah, I'm, I'm glad that other people think that she just sounds ridiculous, because
Dave Anthony 2:22:46
it sounds crazy.
Josh Olson 2:22:47
Oh my god. Yeah. Yeah. So let's get into what is what is this completely? Not even remotely insane person to say on the subject of school?
[VIDEO] 2:22:59
What if schools had to compete for students in the same way that businesses have to compete for customers? With schools get better or worse? There's no need to guess in almost every state and city where there is competition today. educational outcomes improve often dramatically.
Betsy Long 2:23:19
Do you have any of that research available? Can
Dave Anthony 2:23:21
you drop that for us? Citations needed?
Josh Olson 2:23:28
Please. Yeah, people with their mindless worship of the market as though everything needs to be run like a business. The best way to run anything is like a business.
Betsy Long 2:23:38
What's crazy is that we've we've seen the privatization of every other good such as you know, health care is privatized. No one has any problems with our health care system, I suppose. Let's try doing that with education. How much debt do you want to go into in order to make sure your kid can read?
Josh Olson 2:24:01
Right? And then she talks about educational outcomes. But she's not clear what she's talking about. She just like they're better. And so I mean, she talked about test scores because there's no actual backup for what she's asserting here. But she's being vague enough that she doesn't have to a guess, which is the thing these people always do, but she goes on to explain school choice.
[VIDEO] 2:24:26
The Money Follows the student. Every child receives funding that their parents can direct to the school of their choice, public, private, charter or even homeschool. According to researchers at the University of Arkansas. In the most comprehensive study done to date, students in school choice programs saw their reading and math scores improved by 27% and 15%, respectively. Sounds like something we should get behind, doesn't it?
Betsy Long 2:24:54
I want to talk about those test scores. Okay, first of all, what's the assessment? That's pretty important. Different assessments are wildly biased against people of color against low income people like assessments. If you go to other countries, especially like Nordic countries, and you talk to them about standardized test scores, they will criticize you to the end of the day, like standardized test scores don't measure a student's knowledge or intelligence. But it does measure how much money their parents make, it does measure whether they're part of the like popular culture, aka, like, white community, because test questions are formulated with bias by people in academia, who work for like Pearson, or these huge companies that absolutely are not in touch with common people. And then second, in addition to critiquing whatever assessment they're doing, secondly, who are these children in this school, or the school system that is being measured here, because a lot of times, states that have school choice, they'll be like, the school districts in this school zones will be gerrymandered. So weirdly, that like, you get a certain type of child to enroll in a school, because they live in this area code, because the school district has been mapped out in order to include more affluent families, and to exclude families of color. So, you know, regardless of what the data says, like it's not national data. And I, I'm just so skeptical of anything on this website.
Dave Anthony 2:26:54
I mean, if they cite a study, or that came from a place, notice they don't even name the study. They just say where it came from. And you can be assured that it's the opposite of reality.
Josh Olson 2:27:06
Well, I'm but there was a study in New Orleans, for instance, that showed that voucher students did worse at new schools. There's an Ohio study that showed that there used primarily to segregated schools, the Washington Post and report in 2015, that here's the headline, millions of dollars in fraud and waste found in charter school sector. So I mean, there's a million like, Well, we found one. You know, you've got one study that says something that makes our argument, therefore, yeah, and I've heard 50 that say, You're wrong. I
Betsy Long 2:27:33
have teacher friends that teach in New Orleans, and I did my grad program. And a lot of it was looking at the difference between charter school performance and traditional public school performance. And for the most part, no major difference. But what again, like when you correct for socio economic status, traditional public schools do better, most of the time. But New Orleans, since Hurricane Katrina was totally privatized, like Disaster Capitalism style, Naomi Klein wrote about it, that capitalists moved in quickly, when they saw the school district was just in disarray, physically destroyed. And so they moved in. And now if you live in New Orleans, you have to send your child to a charter school. There's no traditional public schools left in the New Orleans Parish. And what that really means is that a whole new set of problems come up. So first of all, in New Orleans, they have school buses that are like the most expensive line item and New Orleans schools are for the school buses and gasoline. Because rather than send your child to a school that's near where you live, you're gonna go shopping for school anywhere throughout the city, and the schools provide transportation. So guess what, we're increasing fossil food fuel use, just to get these students to these charter schools because parents want the best for their kid no matter where they live. And if you're being told and sold on Oh, send their send them to this charter school, but it's across town. As a parent, you're gonna think I'm going to do as best for my child. And now you've got your kid using more fossil fuel to get further away when in the past you could just send their send your child down the street to a well funded traditional public school and have a better quality of life to not spend an hour on a school bus that's unconnected uncon air conditioned like
Dave Anthony 2:29:44
it also it also blows up community it destroys your community so the kids are now not you know, have a centralized location where they're all friends are and everything like that their friends are across town, blah, blah. It's it's a fucking disaster for community Yeah. I recommend everyone listen to citations needed did a podcast on charter schools? Everyone should listen to that? Everyone? Yeah,
Betsy Long 2:30:11
I think it was, I think it was actually their first episode.
Dave Anthony 2:30:13
Oh, was it? Yeah, that wouldn't surprise me. It's very early Yeah.
Josh Olson 2:30:20
Then she goes into union person double bevel.
[VIDEO] 2:30:23
But for millions of families in my home state of California, and in many others, school choice is not a choice. And there's one reason why teachers unions don't want. Teachers in California public schools are coerced to pay dues to the teachers union. True, we cannot be forced to join. But we are forced to pay the union.
Dave Anthony 2:30:46
Okay, welcome to a fucking union. So like, what do you think they are you gonna cry baby, you're getting shit out of that you're getting higher pay, you're getting days off?
Josh Olson 2:30:55
Because like most states, teachers, most states, teachers, unions, teachers in general, I do, right? Because even if you're on the union, you're still getting the benefits of the contract those unions for you.
Betsy Long 2:31:08
And if as a as a teacher, let's say because, you know, the way she's making it sound is like, Okay, you're going to be bamboozled into giving money towards a union, you don't agree with hypothetically, and this person that I've never met, never come across a teacher like this. But let's follow it to the end conclusion, you've got a teacher, they don't want to be a part of the Union. Okay, but then they still have to put a portion of their pay, which is like maybe, you know, $15 a month towards going towards the services of the Union. But guess what, in Right to Work states, you have to have your own teaching insurance. If you're a teacher in the state of Georgia, you have to have like, insurance for your teaching credential, in the case that you are sued in the case that something happens at the school, and you're found liable. In California, you don't have to get teaching insurance like you. That's what the union is for. Like, that's one of the purposes of our union is to support you when things go south, or when something bad happens to know that, hey, as a teacher, I don't have to have a lawyer on retainer. I have a union. And my union has really good lawyers, great. Like it's a service as well as, like, a movement. You know, like, there's, there's different aspects where you're
Josh Olson 2:32:35
cheap, though, right? You could afford to have a lawyer, you're just lazy and cheap. afford to have a lawyer on retainer,
Betsy Long 2:32:42
if I if I deserved a lawyer than I would have won, you know?
Josh Olson 2:32:46
That's right. So she just goes on and on about the evil unions for a while. And then she gets to the big question.
[VIDEO] 2:32:53
Why are most school choice options better? Because teachers at these schools are free from the union stifling work rules? In short, they're free to teach. And the administrators at these schools are also free to reward No,
Dave Anthony 2:33:06
no, no, everybody I know that's working in a charter school and No, no, absolutely fucking not no. absolute fucking bullshit. Just this pure fiction.
Betsy Long 2:33:18
The number of teachers I know that started off at charter schools, and have moved to LAUSD or moved to a traditional school district is one, it's 100%. Every single teacher, I know that who has ever taught in a charter school and had the choice move to a traditional public school or left the career entirely?
Dave Anthony 2:33:44
Yeah, that's right. Go
Betsy Long 2:33:45
go to if you go into a KIPP, if you go into a green dot, you're going to notice that Why are all the teachers between the ages of 21 and 30? Because they don't last teachers and charter schools have a turnover rate of about three to five years. And how good of a teacher can you be? If you're teaching for five years, and then you you check out you say, Nah, this isn't for
Josh Olson 2:34:14
me, right? It's also funny, too, for people who make so much play so much value on how much you're earning, all of a sudden, she's leaving that part out entirely. You're not union, you're free to do you're free to be yourself and you're free to you know, mention the fact that you're free to make it worse. You're free to have bad insurance. You're free. I
Dave Anthony 2:34:35
mean, the one person I know who is a teacher at one of the top schools in Los Angeles, like Spielberg's kids went there is the lowest paid teacher. I know
Betsy Long 2:34:47
a lot of private schools also have horrible teacher pay. Yeah, terrible, horrendous across the board. Yeah. And something else I wanted to, to address is The fact that teachers at charter schools are basically like, it's like they work in a right to work state. Yeah. Because you have, like, I've heard teachers tell me about oh, yeah, the administrator just stood in my classroom for three hours today, taking notes while I was teaching. Yeah, the amount, the amount of anxiety that they experienced was, was like, PTSD levels, unfortunately, and she left the field. And she was telling me about how stressful it is how she has like, there can be anonymous complaints from youth, from other teachers and students, and like, all of a sudden, you're having a good day, and you're in the office with the administrator and you're being fired. Yeah. And you have no idea what happened. Yeah, no, there's no.
Dave Anthony 2:35:58
And that's just not just teachers. I knew a guy who was a vice principal, a charter school, and at the end of the year, the guy was like, Okay, you're fired. And he was like, why he goes, I don't need to give you a reason.
Betsy Long 2:36:07
Exactly. Yeah. I had a I had a friend who was an amazing teacher. And she, she was on the track to become like an assistant principal at a charter. And then she went and got her master's degree. And then she decided she wanted to have a baby. And you know what they did? They fired her. Yeah. Because she didn't want to do the 24/7 focused on work. You want to have a baby and have a life and have balance, I'm sorry. And so she moved to a public school system, the traditional public school system and succeeded and thrived, like Yeah, luckily.
[VIDEO] 2:36:50
But teachers and fire bad ones the teachers unions don't like school choice, because it means less money and less power for them. That's why they'll say no.
Dave Anthony 2:37:02
Doesn't even make sense.
Josh Olson 2:37:06
Sorry, my head's exploding so Yeah, fuck workers like how dare they How dare they want more money and more power? I can't I can't I can't I mean, a union I'm even are both in the Writers Guild, we're we may be going out on strike soon. Because we want more money. And we want enough of those things.
[VIDEO] 2:37:28
You anything, do anything and spend any amount to stop it? Whether in the halls of the legislature, on the campaign trail back in pro union candidates, or on TV with sweet sounding commercials. During my public school teaching career, I have worked alongside many other teachers to reform the unions from within. Only when we realized that this wasn't possible. Did we take our case to a higher power, literally, all the way to the United States Supreme Court. The argument behind our lawsuit free drinks versus California Teachers Association was simple. Teachers should be able to decide for themselves without fear or coercion. Whether or not to fund or join a union. Unfortunately, in a split four, four decision, we lost
Dave Anthony 2:38:17
good it's just again, they're all so fucking selfish. Okay, there's tons of shit. I don't want to do that I have to do in America. There's endless fucking shit. How much of my money my tax money goes to pay for fucking bombs? Get the fuck over it. You goddamn babies. The shit you don't want to do that. You have to fucking do you giant fucking babies.
Betsy Long 2:38:45
Yeah, again, like, oh, wearing a mask is so hard. Yeah, I mean, remember, like,
Dave Anthony 2:38:52
do you want to hear? Do you want to hear a mask story about a teacher? In my kids school. There is a teacher at his grade level. And I knew she was a Trumper. And when they when they came back to school, I didn't send my kid because I didn't want my kid in the class with her. And the first day she had one of those see through masks, and I reported her and said yeah, this lady is wearing a mask that's not you know, approved. And then she took it off. And then about three months later, her husband got COVID She kept coming to school. She kept sending your kids to school. And at the end of that entire process. 76 kids were removed from school for quarantine. Because the dumbass right winger anti union teacher couldn't follow the fucking rules of putting on a god damn mask.
Betsy Long 2:39:43
Yeah. Makes you just look like a baby. A baby. Yeah, just crying. Oh, these workers want more money. It's like, yeah, we have to live here. We can't we don't just wake up at six. School. We don't sleep at school as much as children think that we do. We have homes, we have families, we deserve to be able to afford where we work. Yeah, brainer for me
Josh Olson 2:40:15
should be a no brainer for everyone. Unfortunately. It's not a guess. Is it not? I think it is. I think the problem is you have people like her the people she represents working very hard to disrupt the perception that understanding,
Betsy Long 2:40:32
and I really do like, I really do like what she was saying, though, cuz not really I hate what she's saying. But just just like, oh, yeah, we tried to, we tried to reform the Union from inside, but we didn't, we lost. And it's like, yeah, good story. Like, there's a reason you lost because what you were trying to do within the union was undemocratic, and didn't represent what anyone else in the Union wanted to do. Therefore, you did lose, and it went up probably higher, way higher than it should have gone to the Supreme Court. But it's, it's clear, like you lost because it's an unpopular opinion. Rather than reflect and be like, hey, this, you know, people aren't latching to this idea. They're not. They've seemed to like the union. Never once do you think, hmm, maybe what I'm preaching is incorrect, or wildly unpopular for reason
Dave Anthony 2:41:32
or undemocratic. The union is a democratic process.
Josh Olson 2:41:36
But that's not even these people are always the reason something like that. Yeah, I can't see like going into a union and trying it, how many people you're going to turn around, I mean, very few. But people like her, always backed by power and money. That's how a case like that ends up going to the Supreme Court, you know, and so they're always going to be able to make more noise in spite of representative minority opinion. But the concern is when people who are not fully involved mistake the amount of noise they're making, for some sort of democratic representation. When it's not, it's
Betsy Long 2:42:06
a vocal minority. But I, I will say like, in the past 10 years, there's been a shift. And I kind of would credit it to the selection of Betsy DeVos for the secretary of education by Trump. because prior to that, even like vote blue Democrats would always talk about the appeal of charter schools and charter schools have been, like safe ground for Democrats to organize around. Yeah, like Obama. There's so many other politicians that are Democrats through and through that have, you know, just been open arms with charter schools, including in Los Angeles, like we have more charter schools than any other place. And it's like, we're in a blue city in a blue state. But it wasn't until Betsy DeVos came out and was everyone was shocked and appalled by her as a person and as her connections to other evil people and corporations. And then she was pro Charter School. And I've seen a lot of people realize, Oh, it can't be good. If she's for it. Yeah. The past few years have been, it has been nice. Because before Betsy DeVos made it like a hot button. controversial topic. It was kind of like people were lukewarm about it. Oh, well, let's see what happens. It's experimental education. But experimental education should have some controls. At because we're dealing with human beings. And they're small children. And they grew up and they turn into adults. So yeah, we should be a little more cautious with their experiments.
Josh Olson 2:44:04
Well, I that what a great place to leave it, I think. But yeah, Betsy, thank you so much for joining us. And we apologize. This is what we do. We take people we like and respectively, force them to endure this.
Dave Anthony 2:44:17
It's hard horrible. We harm people. And yeah,
Josh Olson 2:44:21
we hurt we hurt them. We only hurt the ones we love.
Betsy Long 2:44:25
Well, I had I had a good time, even though this was this content was horrible. And just mostly lies in. But it is good to know what the enemy is saying. And I'll I'll be honest, it's not compelling. So that's cool. Yeah,
Josh Olson 2:44:44
there you go. We'll be back next week when we discuss Prager us take on the founding fathers. It'll be a blast. So remember, if you want to support us, you can go to libre news.com audit and sign up to become a subscriber or You can donate to our tip jar. Remember, follow us on Twitter at at the audit podcast, or email us at the audit podcast@gmail.com and our direct Venmo link is at the audit at Venmo under businesses. We'll see you next week. Good morning class.
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Today we're learning all about socialism, deviant sex and devil worship. And how cool
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