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CJP #71: Adam Baumell · Coconut Justice

• Carlos: Welcome back everybody. ⁓ like I said in the intro, Adam Baumel is here he's ⁓ his group is Neighbors, not Numbers Coalition ⁓ one of their big efforts is the Abolish ICE Pledge. Did I get that right? Adam Baumel: the ⁓ main primary, ⁓ I didn't realize ⁓ closed fifty two minutes ago the polls. ⁓ and we do actually have a candidate on the ⁓ in Maine second, ⁓ Paige Loud. So shout out Paige. ⁓ I really hope she does well tonight. She's in a tough race ⁓ and she's actually been locked out of some kind more progressive endorsements as well. Carlos: Hey, what's good? Neighbors Not Numbers is a coalition of organizers, and volunteers pressing candidates for Congress to publicly to abolishing ICE and building a humane immigration system in its place. Adam Baumel is the guy behind Neighbors Not Numbers ⁓ and Abolish ICE Pledge. Not just that, but he's also working on a documentary called Carter Country that tells a story about. ⁓ wow. Adam Baumel: You did indeed. You did. Carlos: Yeah. See notes. Notes ⁓ Yeah. Adam Baumel: A for effort. ⁓ no, that's not a thing. A for effort and for result. I'm such an a dad. ⁓ yeah. And I'm I'm like a you know, a thirty eight year old Jew over here doing this. I probably shouldn't, you know, do that. So it's it's really unfortunate the way things have kind of worked out. And I I can't tell you I'm super familiar with all the other candidates and their plat in their platforms, but I've I've had a decent opportunity to look into Paige's platform, and I can't imagine someone being more of like a New Deal Democrat, which is, I would say, pretty much, at least in my view, the gold standard of out of what I see a Democrat being nowadays. And Carlos: Be careful with those hand signals where I'm from you could get shot. How a small town banded together to get Jimmy Carter elected president in nineteen seventy six. This is my conversation with Adam Baumel. Before we get into it, remember to go to coconutjustice dot com to get you some clothes that I think would look good on you. Let's go. Ha ha ha. So you're from Florida? Adam Baumel: I am Carlos: Born and raised? Adam Baumel: Not born. ⁓ I was born in Atlanta in one of the largest ⁓ birthing wings in the country as far as I was told. ⁓ but we moved down to Florida when I was like two, so I never say I'm from Atlanta, but yeah, I I was raised in Florida. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: Yeah, she she li missed out on some of those opportunities, like our revolution and some the others, but yeah, it's unfortunate. Carlos: Yeah. Okay. Did you were you always in northern Florida? Yeah. Adam Baumel: No. ⁓ this is actually my first time living in Northern Florida. ⁓ yeah, I've been here since February. ⁓ and I've been working for the Department of Education, which has been a fascinating experience. Carlos: No. It's frustrating because we're waking up, but boy, if we could have done this like a year or two ago. Okay. But the good thing is that we're waking up. Adam Baumel: And Carlos: There's so many things that I can talk to you about right now. Just because I get to talk to like ⁓ Bernard Taylor, I get to talk to Yan Bailey, I get to talk to all these wonderful future representatives for Florida. Adam Baumel: But something I definitely want to call out, and I've talked about this a couple times. This is on the this is not associated with ⁓ you know, the nonprofit, but ⁓ you were wa I I imagined, because I think a lot of us were paying attention to the race in ⁓ Illinois, the primary, that Katabugazali was running in. So I wanna say there were like eight or nine candidates running. And it was there were three candidates who were viable. Like let's be Carlos: Mm-hmm. Explain to me why the hell a charter school, I believe it's a charter school, can go to a public school and just take a room and start holding class in said room. Did you hear? Adam Baumel: very transparent about that. There were three. It was Daniel Biss, it was ⁓ I think it was Lauren Fine, and it was Katabugazale. ⁓ Lauren Fine, of course, like completely in bed with APA. Daniel Biss was sort of like the APAC light candidate, you know, J Street, and then Katabugazale. But Katabou Gazale didn't win, and I'm saying this just very you know, putting it out there. She didn't win because there were other candidates I won't tell you I'm super familiar with that, but there's a very fascinating story if you ever watch John Oliver. ⁓ he has like ⁓ the show This Week Tonight. He covered the new school, which is based out of Sarasota, Florida. Like it's a beautiful part of Florida, it's like right on the water, and they kind of pri ⁓ prided pr were proud. I I don't know how the to say, you know, in the past. They had pride in Carlos: No. Yeah. Uh-huh. Yeah. Adam Baumel: vying for her left lane, running lower on the ticket, or I guess you could say lower ⁓ support-wise. I don't remember their two names, but there was another Muslim woman running. I forget her name, I think it was like Walla I for again, I forget. And there was a gentleman running. Between the two of them, they got about, I think it was eleven or twelve percent of the vote. There's no reason to suspect that. They had pride in being kind of like a like a really exploratory, like liberal arts ⁓ institution. And a few years ago ⁓ no, ⁓ university. And they're a public university, so it was actually affordable for students, but it wasn't super large. Like they don't have like really any sporting programs there or anything like that. But they had it was you ever seen the movie Accepted? Carlos: High school level, grade school level? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. ⁓ okay, okay. Mm-hmm. I don't think I have. Adam Baumel: A significant portion of that vote would not have gone to Katabuga Zale. And she didn't lose by that much to Daniel Biss. So the reason I mention all of this is in primaries or elections, it's mostly primaries, that there is no rank choice voting. We have to be far more strategic as a left flank of this party. Because the party's not going to do us any favors. They're not. With Justin Long, where they make up a fake college. This was a real college, or it is a real college. But basically they gave people students the ability to kind of craft their own degree programs and things like that. But it was like accredited. So anyway, a few years ago, they like overturned a ton of the senior staff and they brought in ⁓ a guy, I forget what his background is, but they're paying in like a million dollars to to be the the dean of this school that doesn't even have that many students. Carlos: Ha ha ha. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Okay. Adam Baumel: So if we work against ourselves and end up splitting votes because we can't consolidate, it's gonna set us back every single time. I think it's like a 1200 student student body. ⁓ like a ha like half of their faculty is left over the change that they've made. It's it's ⁓ it's a nightmare. And they're trying to make it a come off as like one of those like transitions from a liberal arts school to a, I guess, a conservative arts school, like a a platform that they want to be able to utilize for every red state. I know. I know. Carlos: every time. Adam Baumel: Like I'm I'm so grateful Chris Rabb got through it. Because there were a couple candidates in his race you could say were sort of left-leaning candidates as well. You never know. And I don't know if the party is setting like ghost candidates up. I don't know if that's the case. But ultimately, until the system becomes more conducive to having multiple left-leaning candidates running at the same time and actually getting the results you want, we have to find a way to have these conversations. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Everybody knows conservatives don't make art. Adam Baumel: And they gave scholarships to like seventy nine baseball players. They don't have a baseball team. And for candidates that are not viable to say, Okay, this is bigger than me. This is about all of us. And if I keep swimming upstream like a salmon going up the Mount ⁓ Mount Everest or something, you know, I'm not gonna get there. And I'm gonna prevent the others who are fighting for pretty much the same things I'm fighting for, they're not gonna get there either. Telling you, you gotta watch the you gotta watch John Oliver. It's it is wow. Carlos: A Florida, huh? So when you first moved to Florida, what what part did you live in? Adam Baumel: So we lived in South Florida. ⁓ we started out in North Miami Beach. ⁓ I when I was like four or five, we moved to Broward County, so like not too far from Fort Lauderdale, Hollywood, Prembrook Pines, if anyone recognizes those places. That's where I went to school. I s I stayed there through high school in some college. ⁓ the school I went to is ⁓ Broward Community College, at least it was when I was there. Now it's Broward College. Carlos: South Florida. Yeah. Okay. Adam Baumel: So we gotta be the we gotta be adults. We gotta acknowledge that the mission is bigger than any single one of us. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Uh-huh. Yeah. And if we keep playing those, ⁓ me, me, me games, it's going to look a lot like what we're looking at now with the Republicans being in control of everything. And they're just, it's, it's never been as far as I can remember, there has never been a Republican that took office. ⁓ nice. Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: ⁓ I joined the Navy at 21, was in the Navy from 21 to 25, moved to New York at 25, was there for like eight and a half years, fell in love, broke my heart. I moved back here. I don't know if you were asking for the whole life story, but Carlos: Hell yeah, you were. that hasn't left the office in shambles. ⁓ no, this is good. This is good. No, because I what basically what I was building up to is when I had Yen Bailey on the on the channel, I told her or I explained to her my view of what Florida was. And you basically you start as South Florida 'cause you're immigrant or you're young. And then from there you move up to Central Florida because you're too old for all the young people. Or maybe you're not gonna kick kicked out of the ⁓ Adam Baumel: Yeah, economics wise, foreign policy wise. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. job numbers wise, you know, when, when, when you realize that the Republican party would not mind the government falling apart because that gives them the power, the Democrats, they want all the people to vote and they want all the inclusion. They want all the, all the stuff. out of the country or something, you know, so you can relax a little bit. And then outside that, like North Florida is nothing but hillbillies and rednecks. Adam Baumel: And college students. But no, you're right. Yeah, the ⁓ Tallahassee, I think it's like a population of like two hundred and ten, two fifteen thousand around there. I think it's like eighty thousand are college students. 'Cause FSU's here and on FamU is here and a few other schools. Carlos: And college dudes Republicans just aren't like that Make that realization and vote accordingly like like their favorite guy Yeah Like their favorite guy said is your life better today than it was four years ago? Two years ago Yeah. Adam Baumel: They're kind of just given marching orders. Carlos: Holy cow. Yeah. Yeah. And and FSU is a is a legit learning institution. Adam Baumel: Yeah, I mean they're they're legitimately a good school, even though the I I mean the Heritage Foundation says every school in Florida's the best. The Heritage Foundation says every school in Florida's the best, the most freedom, all that stuff. But no no, it it is legitimately a good school. And and UF is a good school, but that's not in Tallahassee, that's in Gainesville. Unfortunately, every time I'm asked that question, it's never better. Carlos: No. Right. Right. And that's a frustrating thing, Even though they're surrounded by Floridians. Adam Baumel: But it's definitely not the same. It's not the same. You know, it's not a it's it's in it's a unfair equivalence, but yes. Carlos: That's right, they're down there. ⁓ Yeah, yeah, but you received a point. ⁓ We've been going for two and a half some odd hours. ⁓ You wanna give folks, ⁓ take the last few moments, however long it takes, to give people information about ⁓ Neighbors Not Numbers Coalition and the pledge and where they can find you, where they can follow up with. Yeah. Yeah. What is it about Florida politics? that makes that or that attracts people like Rick Scott and Donald Trump and a lot of the members of Donald Trump's cabinet. It just seems like they all come from Florida. all the work that you've been doing. Adam Baumel: Absolutely. And thank you so much for having me on, Carlos, first and foremost. so the mission we have, and I hate even mentioning this, but the mission we have to accomplish it, we need to raise money so we can create advertisements to inform voters of bad politicians who have supported ICE and are still supporting ICE. We need that to I mean, it's been a tax haven forever. I think that's a lot of it. And for people who have ever lived in New York, they know this, but people who haven't, it's constantly referred to as the sixth borough. So for a while New York had a larger population up until I want to say five, six years ago, or the last census. And ever since then, Florida has basically gained Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: get materials so we can also support candidates and other opportunities to make sure we get better candidates on the ballot and, you know, into Washington, DC. And the way we do that is of course through donations. And our and we are a legitimate five O one C four. I want to say that first and foremost, we're not like some fringe your money is is going to an American entity. We're not run by the Chinese government or something that they say other organizations are or whatever. the New York member of Congress, and now they have a larger population, because there's no state tax. And now they're potentially going to either eliminate or very much lower the property tax, which is another it sa it may sound great, but I think it's gonna have some very, very problematic, unintended consequences that people I think are just not thinking about. Carlos: Hehehehehe Adam Baumel: But ⁓ the way you can get to our website is www.triple and it's spelled out triple T-R-I-P-L E N as in November, C as in Charlie, so triplenc.org. And our website is far more than just you know like a a button to donate. You can look for the candidates that are on our ticker that you have the ability to donate to and support. Carlos: Yeah, so what what was what brought that about? Is it 'cause Ron DeSantis is nervous about losing his job? Or ⁓ Adam Baumel: No, he's he's limited. He's term limited, so he he can't even run for reelection. I think this is kind of like what he's seeing as like his last hurrah or something. And he's he's done some pretty aggressive things ⁓ in this last year, year and a half or so. Like he he really wants to go out with the bang. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: ⁓ you can look up the elected officials in your area to see if they've taken the pledge, which they have not yet. But we give you the resources to be able to reach out to those candidates. Because the only way this pressure campaign works is with just a massive amount of people coming together to make this collective action happen. That is the only way this works. And Carlos: And so he's he wants to lower housing taxes on real estate or on property tax. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But isn't aren't things like funding schools and things attached to this tax? you Adam Baumel: Property taxes. Yeah. They are. Which is a great reason why there's some extremely, extremely high end ⁓ areas where like high schools. So for instance, I don't know if you'd ever heard of Cypress Bay. It's in Weston Florida. It's an extremely well funded school. And they there was like an MTV show a while back. This is like ten, fifteen years ago. But like it and they're they're We know the people are on our side. Democrats, over three quarters of Democrats support abolishing ICE. A plurality of I believe it's ⁓ fourteen points for independence support abolishing ICE. Almost a quarter of Republicans support abolishing ICE. And these numbers are only gonna continue shifting more and more in favor of abolition. So what are you waiting for? Carlos: Mm-hmm. ⁓ Okay. Adam Baumel: Audio recording rooms are like professional, like this looks like it's a private high school and it's it's public. And it's because there's like multi-million dollar homes all over the place over there. But then you go to parts of Miami, you go to certain parts of Palm Beach, certain parts of Broward County where like homes are worth like $130,000. Well, not anymore, 'cause even shacks are worth more than that now, and they can't be insured, 'cause it's Florida. ⁓ but Carlos: I love it. Thank you. Thank you for taking time to come and talk to us and sharing more information about everything that you're Taking time out of your busy schedule to do so. Thank you for having the idea of creating a coalition that says this doesn't work. This just doesn't work. We got to rip this out. And, and, and Yeah. Adam Baumel: Those areas have schools that are basically falling apart because schools are funded based off of the homes in your area. So they don't kind of take at least not nearly enough from the higher valued areas to these schools. Carlos: they're spending so much money on ice when they could be spending that on education. Yeah. I'm I'm originally from Chicago and coming up through the public school system. and then when I was working my way through college, I worked at this high school in the good neighborhood. And I wanted to go to college at this high school. This this c this high school was amazing. They had five huge computer labs with Adam Baumel: Or even another idea as well, they could be putting a lot more immigration judges in place. Cause we have a massive backlog right now. If they hired a thousand immigration judges, which they easily could do with the money they're throwing away on on ICE agents, that backlog would would disappear not overnight, but they would disappear in a matter of who knows, months. Carlos: Yeah. what forty, fifty computers in ⁓ Every classroom had computer had at least one computer in it. Teachers were paid well. Those after school programs, all those things. All those wonderful things that make something like a a school beneficial to the community. Yeah. Adam Baumel: And that would that would it wouldn't make our system perfect, but it would make our system a lot better. Even just that, but that's not enough. But Carlos: That would help. Yeah. Yeah, we have to, we have to improve this system, but we have to take the pressure off the system first. Adam Baumel: Hundred percent. And the the I guess the main not the main, but one of the last things I wanted to say about like the Democratic Party, if you're to the right of Ronald Reagan on immigration, you're wrong. You're not a moderate, you're wrong. And Ronald Reagan in the eighties ⁓ passed legislation that anyone who was here for just under five years and had not committed any ⁓ violent crimes received amnesty. Absolutely. Absolutely. Carlos: So why be surprised and it's probably w I think we know the answer to this, but w i it's not that they're surprised, it's that they just don't care. Adam Baumel: Absolutely. Well, I mean the people who are paying those property taxes and making sure that their schools are like utopian, you know pieces of art essentially, they don't go to the other parts of town and see the other side of the coin, the other side of the story. So they have no reason to worry. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: Where have we gone? Carlos: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, we can add another two hours to that conversation. Is there a way to have them worry? Like what can we do besides complaining the same way we've been complaining for decades? What can we do to like wake ⁓ up or to or to force them to kick in something? Adam Baumel: I am no Carlos: We're gonna it up. We're gonna have, I'm gonna have you back on. We're gonna figure out a way to have you back on. ⁓ Just because I think everything that you're sharing is so important. ⁓ And I have friends up and down Florida that tell me all the stories about families getting picked up and just communities disappearing. Adam Baumel: Well, what I can tell you is I'm not gonna say it's all white people, and I'm a white person myself, so it's like not an attack on anyone here, but white people tend to notice when things start start ⁓ affecting them personally. So just to give you an example, like the the two murders that took place by ICE with Pretty and Good. Carlos: And that doesn't work. That's not gonna work. It's not. So ⁓ as a member of the Brown community, you for, thank you for number one, not being racist. then, and then number two, just like actually seeing the problems for what they are and moving in the direction of fixing it. ⁓ I know, Yeah. Adam Baumel: Those woke a lot of people up because they were white people. And you could say a lot of the same thing about the civil rights movement, but like when you were seeing video of like those fire hoses painted or pointed at like younger white students who had commuted down to Alabama or the other places where they were, you know, making some good trouble, that scared the crap out of people. Like they were seeing white kids getting fire hosed. So that's Yeah. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. minorities and majorities and everything and we don't communicate as clearly as we should and blah, blah, blah, blah. I want to take two seconds to say thank you for all your efforts ⁓ for helping the Brown community because Yeah. And even even more contemporarily, like within the last few weeks, we see we see how it's more than just ice, but ⁓ we see white folks losing the farm, losing their houses. We see white folks and now all of a sudden everyone is tapped in and they're starting to see the they're starting to see and I hate to say that. We dumb, not dumb, not dumb in a way that like we're dumb because we have members of our community that made full on songs about Donald Trump and all this stuff. And they didn't think that they were going to get picked up by ice and all this stuff. that's who they're, that's who they, they told you, they told you. White folks are okay with black and brown struggle. I hate to say that. I because it's such a tired. And if you didn't believe them, you have to believe the black community that has been telling you these motherfuckers have their finger on the scale. Frame of mind If you're tired of us complaining, imagine how it is feel imagine how it feels having to complain. Adam Baumel: And it's it's definitely not. Hundred percent. Absolutely. And I wanna be fair, 'cause it like there's definitely plenty of like folks out there who have more and do care. Like you're if you're seeing like the the crowds that are showing up to Delaney Hall, there's plenty of white people there advocating for the ⁓ the men and women in that facility that are doing their hunger strike and that are being subjected to, I mean, third world conditions. But that's it's not enough. We need everyone to show up. We need we we need like Carlos: All that to say thank you for everything that you've done, everything that you're doing. I'm a fan and ⁓ we're definitely gonna bump into each other again soon, I think. Adam Baumel: Hundred percent. Sure, and I I would love an excuse to come out to California instead of ⁓ just ⁓ laying low in Tallahassee. So maybe I'll find a way to ⁓ to come out to you know your neck of the woods, Carlos: Ha do that that'd be a great time all right Adam thanks again so much Adam Baumel: a unified strike type condition 'cause what we have is numbers. We don't have the money. We're and we're not going to have the money. Like the Elon Musks, like those like the billionaires, they can saddle up in their Ivory Castle. They're fine. But they'll notice once people all collectively say enough is enough. You too, Carlos. Thank you for having me on. Carlos: And with that everybody, we're out. Yeah. They've rigged it. Why aren't we there yet? Do you have a thesis? Adam Baumel: People are afraid. ⁓ they're afraid for the way it will affect them first. And unfortunately, if you look through history, like any time there's been like late stage capitalistic type situation, like if you want to look at like the last czar of Russia, things had to get so bad for people to rise up in a fashion the way they did, like the Bolshevik Revolution, things like that. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: Or like the French Revolution. Things had to get that bad. I'm not I'm not like looking forward to something like that happening. I wouldn't call myself an exel an accelerationist and but I've talked to plenty of people who are accelerationists. But Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Accelerating towards another civil war. Yeah. Adam Baumel: Yes. Yeah. Like think like if there's a little smoke in the Carlos: And that's just people that go ahead. Adam Baumel: There's a little smoke in like the ⁓ the kindling here, but they wanna put like a match to it. Because they see it coming. I don't think they want havoc necessarily, but they see they have it coming and they don't wanna wait for it anymore. Carlos: Yeah. Is it gonna be w another one of the north versus south things? Like what's it gonna look like in your opinion? Adam Baumel: it's hard to say. I I would say the biggest thing that we have in front of us, like in the near future, that could really do that. And I think it'll be a more class based than like a race based type situation, but it'll be if the Republicans somehow find a way to manipulate the elections so that they maintain the House. That will be what will do it. Carlos: ⁓ yeah. Adam Baumel: I mean, don't know if you're if you're tracking like the polling, and plenty of people don't track the polling, but like they see MSNow, CNN, they they they talk about polling on there. So like no one's like completely unaware. And it's one after another after another. You see Trump's ⁓ popularity sinking down to negative even among Republicans. So with all of that kind of stewing, and then imagine you take that environment. And essentially say, this was all fake. Republicans actually gained seats. How do you think that will go over? Because with all the things Trump was saying about 2020, and there are, you know, plenty of people who believe him, this will be like 70%, 80% of the population that'll be like, This is not real. We are not being treated as citizens. We are just pawns. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm I'm I mean which is someone needs to. You know what I mean? Someone needs to. ⁓ and and for as much as I try to during these conversations, I try to keep things a little bit more on the realistic, I can kind of see it bubbling up to like no one has patience for anyone anymore. No one has grace for anyone anymore. Adam Baumel: Doom and gloom is all you get from me today. Carlos: And when you when you have this turmoil happening and you have the most powerful person in the country like egging it on And it's not even th this is what's this is what just really frustrates me about the whole situation is is everyone is focused on him, but it's not him. It's this whole class. It's this subsection of the rich and powerful that they think that they can do anything and everything and they could just pay them their way out of stuff. But then you have the folks that do do that, but then they do Atrocities. They do gross things because they think that they're gonna get away with it. Adam Baumel: It's entitlement. They think they are owed. They think they are owed this. And the reality is a lot of where this entitlement comes from is just because they won some kind of like genetic lottery. That's all it is. It's a genetic lottery. Like Donald Trump won a genetic lottery. His father was worth what, like a hundred million dollars, whatever it was? ⁓ like a real estate mogul. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. It yeah, they got lucky. Yeah, but I'd I'd like to I'd like to I'd like to ⁓ remind people ⁓ his grandfather Donald's grandfather was a draft dodger from Germany. When he came here he was completely useless. He went up to the Yukon and started a brothel. That's how they made their money. Adam Baumel: Really? So what you're saying, and I hate to spin this in like a comical or humorous way, so why isn't Trump in favor of like sex work like being legalized? Like bring this back full circle. Carlos: Do it. 'Cause then because it why why would a drug dealer want you to legalize drugs? Adam Baumel: True. It's almost like the mob not wanting prohibition to get ⁓ eliminated. Carlos: Right. Right. I have my I have my what do the capitalists call it? My my lines of of of not production. I I guess the means of production, yeah, that's what it is. If you own the means of production and you have a product, their product was what you what we all know it was. Why would I want i i if I was a drug dealer, if I was a bootlegger, ⁓ anything like that, legger, not liquor, why would I want the government to interfere? I'm making all the money. Adam Baumel: Yeah. Life's pretty grand for you. Carlos: And especially yeah, especially with that group, if you were to legalize sex work, well, their sex work was even even worse than than sex work. Anyway, you're taking away even my opportunity to be able to record these people. And then there's my leverage. Like when you when you're forcing people to play fairly, they get upset. Especially if they've been rich their whole life. Adam Baumel: Well of course. ⁓ I forget if it was freakonomics or someone else, like mathem mathematicians who make documentaries or something else, but they did like an experiment where they had I think it was kids playing Monopoly, and they would give one kid like ten times as much money to start with. And they also gave them like a quarter of the properties, ⁓ like like all of it. Like basically set you up in a way where Carlos: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Adam Baumel: ninety nine point nine I mean to infinity out of out of a hundred will win. And the person starting with the normal thing, I mean, they may make enough to get on by, but they're never going to get out of their situation. It's basically like a cats like a caste system. Like we're go we might as well go back to ancient Mesop Mesopotamia at this point. And I mean, there's so many people with master's degrees and not just master's degrees and things you can't get a job in. Carlos: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Adam Baumel: but like legitimate master's degrees who can't get jobs in things they should be able to get jobs in. Carlos: Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: I mean, my generation, I would s or I don't know how old you are, I'm not trying to ask, you know, on the recording. But I'm thirty eight, so I'm like right in the middle of millennial. And I would say we are the first generation that really didn't I guess we weren't really aware that we were going to school for maybe not necessarily nothing, but for far less than the generations before us. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. I went to s I'm fifty four. I I say it a bunch of times on this channel. but yeah, I'm fifty four. I remember going to school in the seventies. And I remember I I even remember when they tried to bring the ⁓ the metric system up and and make that our system. I remember people getting upset, upset. but there's school itself was always different. Like back then a teacher could check you up against the wall if you're being a dick. You know? ⁓ parents didn't stick up for the kids the way that they do these days. Like the kids we all hear the stories of the parents getting upset with the teacher because the kid is an idiot. But Adam Baumel: Yeah. Carlos: Yeah, it was it was handled differently to the point where when you came home there was still learning on TV. You still were watching Schoolhouse Rock, you still were watching Electric Company and and ⁓ Sesame Street and all that stuff. Now it's just junk TV after junk TV after junk T and now you can put it on the iPod. Which ⁓ go ahead. Adam Baumel: Well don't even don't even feel that bad. When I was when I was coming home from school, you know, obvious in not the seventies, but in like the early nineties, the things that I was watching as like a five, six, seven year old, after I did my homework, so my parents, if they see this, they won't get upset with me, 'cause they were good parents, I would say. But hello. ⁓ but the things I'd be watching were like Power Rangers, or when I got a little bit older, I was watching like T R L, if you remember that. Carlos: Hi mom and dad. Adam Baumel: Like MTV, Total Request Live with Carson Daly. ⁓ my goodness. I'm so old. But like and like music videos were like the coolest thing, cause you couldn't you couldn't just bring it up on your phone because that wasn't a thing. So like seeing videos or VH1 remember the pop-up videos where they would pop up like Snapple type facts? Carlos: ⁓ yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, you had to wait for episodes. Yeah. Yes. I loved that show. Adam Baumel: They need to bring these things back. Carlos: Just learning, just pride in learning. It's crazy. It's crazy to see. How proud people are to not know things. And they and they Yeah. Adam Baumel: Joe Rogan. He kind of makes people feel and I'm not he's not the dumbest person alive. Like he's he definitely feels that kind of archetype of like blue-blooded man, you know, he's in good shape. He probably eats steak every single night, and his cholesterol's probably through roof. But he's taking his horse tranquilizers or whatever, who knows, whatever, junk science stuff. But he kind of like is like that man's man type of thing. And Carlos: He's not. Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: It wasn't such a bad thing early on before COVID. Like I remember he liked Bernie. It's like okay, I could he hold some very objectionable views. ⁓ at least at the time, I don't know how much those views have changed or not, but the whole Trump thing, he just completely shifted his whole personality. Carlos: Yeah, I remember that. He yeah. He that's where he sta and I still I will still watch him. I don't watch the the the fighter ones anymore and the the comedian ones I don't aren't my favorite. But I'll listen to him when he's like talking to doctors and scientists and historians and stuff like that. I still do appreciate his show, but it depends on who the guest is. You know? Cause there's always Adam Baumel: Course. Yeah, it's definitely case by case. Carlos: There's always something to learn from someone, you know. I'm not I'm not trying to defend him in any way. I'm not. He's a grown ass man with way more money than he he don't he's fine. Adam Baumel: ⁓ he's a absolutely fine. Carlos: Yeah. But but yeah, I don't even mind him testing things out with his body. Like if you're gonna take horse tranquilizer or whatever, like what are you taking it for? What did what happened? Like did your eyeballs fall out? All right, I'm not gonna do that. You know. Adam Baumel: Yeah, like give us an honest ⁓ review of what happened. 'Cause I th I think wasn't he pushing like ivermectin like early on with COVID? And that's not to say ivermectin doesn't have uses for human beings, it does. I've I wanna say I was prescribed ivermectin for like a fungal like face thing. My face is fine, it's also here. But Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: ⁓ and this is another story and you know, don't we we don't need to go down that path today, but like the VA of course they I don't know if you ever had to deal with like VA ⁓ s prescriptions, but they don't they don't give you everything. You have to ask for the right formulary to be able to get it. So I couldn't even get the ivermectin that I was prescribed. So I couldn't even tell you if it works or not because I never got it. Carlos: Uh-huh. Yeah. ⁓ boy. Yeah, no, V VA is the only reason I have health insurance. Yeah. It's that tough for working in the in the school department or education department? Adam Baumel: Me too. So it's not that I couldn't get health insurance through the state of Florida, and that's actually I don't have direct experience dealing with health insurance through them, but my best friend works like eighty feet excuse me, eighty feet down the hall from me. He has two kids, ⁓ his wife doesn't work, and there's different like health ⁓ situations that they're having to deal with and you know, single income. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: So mean it works really, really well for them, but they do take a portion out of your paycheck. And not sure how many people know this, but Florida is the lowest paying state for state jobs in the United States. And the DOE is one of the lowest paying agencies in the state of Florida. Carlos: ⁓ my god. Adam Baumel: So you're trying to bring home every cent you can, but not to do like the woe is me thing, just but I want to give you an example, and of course, like this affects so many people. But my lease for my apartment just ended a couple months ago. Actually, no, no, it was ⁓ this past month. And I was put in position where my rent was about to go up seventeen percent from the year before. My raise Carlos: And how much was your yeah. Adam Baumel: My yearly raise through the DOE was like three percent or something. So my my life this year technically is supposed to be worse than it was last year. And that's not including gas going up or well in my case diesel, because I have a diesel Volkswagen. It's not including groceries going up, which it has. It's not including all the things you want to do for fun going up, like flying somewhere, cause Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: We don't get cheap flights in Tallahassee because we have two airlines here, American and Delta, in a capital in Florida. Don't get me started on how silly that is. But this is something that so many Americans are dealing with. So I don't think this makes me special. This makes me like s like everyone else. Absolutely. Absolutely. Carlos: Yeah. Makes you understand, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I I Ugh I I I what am I trying to say? I got tired of trying to fit into a system that d obviously doesn't want me. I don't fit into corporate America. So all right, cool. So we push. ⁓ and then I have friends down in LA still. That are still in the movie industry and animation industry and all that stuff. They said, Hey, you ever think about coming back? And blah, blah, blah. I said, No, I don't want to come back. Because you work in an industry where they make you play with people's booty holes before you get any break. Before you get a big break. You got they like all this Me Too stuff, all this stuff that we see happening, like we're starting to see it crumble from the top. Because the people from the top have been applying that much pressure to where they're breaking society and they don't care. And the first thing they want you to do is play with their butthole and I don't want to. Adam Baumel: And to kind of compound what you're saying, I'm not sure it you know, it exactly aligns, but I think there's gonna be a massive reshuffling taking place in Hollywood. Just to give you two examples, like have you seen or heard about Obsession, that movie? Carlos: ⁓ yeah. Movie I think so, yeah. Adam Baumel: So it's in theaters right now. It's been out for like two months or so. So this movie, I think it was picked up by a twenty four. I might be mistaken on that. But they made it for seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars, which sounds like a lot to normal people, but for a movie, as I'm as you know, that's like nothing. And I think they've now cleared two hundred million. Carlos: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So Adam Baumel: Now on the other side of the coin, and I'm not saying this as a critic, because I enjoyed it. I really enjoyed the film. Like it's not like a masterpiece, but I saw Masters of the Universe ⁓ last week. And I really enjoyed it. I really did. But they made it for 200 million dollars. And the first week, weekend, they made fifty two million. And I think in the industry, they to be considered like a success or like not a failure, you have to double your budget, I think. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. ⁓ cool. Yeah. Adam Baumel: Unless that's changed. Carlos: No, I think you're right. Adam Baumel: So I don't think Carlos: You have to come out on fire for them to pay attention to you. Adam Baumel: And the thing is, unless you're making an avatar movie at this point, you're not making that crazy money in theaters. And I think I mean, I don't it's not just me saying this. Theaters w are working their way towards becoming like a special night out. It's not gonna be like, ⁓ it's Friday, let's go to the movies. It's gonna be like going to the theater like Broadway. It'll it's gonna get there. Like the food's expensive, you'll go like Cinnabar or whatever, you'll you'll get your drinks, you'll get your food, and it's gonna be like a night out. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Are do you guys have do you guys have the theaters yet with the recliners and stuff? Yeah. Yeah. And if you're gonna charge me that much, you better get me a recliner. Adam Baumel: That's where we're going. Thankfully. Thankfully. ⁓ absolutely. Absolutely. Carlos: Yeah, those small ass s seats. Like, no, I need some space. One hundred percent. One hundred percent. I've paid I've paid good money for some good naps. Yeah. Adam Baumel: But you better be well rested when you go, because you're gonna pass out. It's happened to me a few times. You've just paid twenty dollars for an hour and a half nap. Carlos: And that's just the nap. I'm not even talking about forty dollars for popcorn and another fifteen for a drink and yeah, like they done they did it to themselves and it breaks my heart because I love going to the movies. I love going to the theater. I love getting the popcorn and all the things. I love it. Adam Baumel: I even love going by myself. I mean I prefer to go with a friend or if I'm if I were dating someone, but I there's a a happy medium about their behavior that will e that will annoy me though. Like if they're asking questions every five seconds or they keep doing or I'll give you another good example. This is a weird stor well maybe not weird, but I was dating someone. We had only gone out like two times. Carlos: Me too. Sure. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Adam Baumel: Third date I brought it to the movies. It was to see I think that ⁓ that rock ⁓ vehicle. it's about Christmas and he's like trying to help Santa. It was kinda funny. It wasn't great, but it was kinda funny. The girl I went with didn't laugh once, and I felt uncomfortable the whole time. Every time I laughed, I'd look over and hope she was laughing, and she was never laughing. That was our last date. Carlos: ⁓ yeah. Yeah yeah yeah. Yeah. Ha ha. No. Yeah, I've had some I've had some like that. ⁓ I I went on a first date once and w the movie we went to was one of the nine eleven movies. Adam Baumel: Michael Moore or you're talking about like like a reenactment type? Carlos: Shit. Yeah, ⁓ did it have Nicolas Cage in it, maybe? It was one of those where there was like the firefighters and all the right. So either way, it was one of those nine eleven movies that reflected back and it so I'm sitting here next to this woman that I just met crying like someone stole my purse. Adam Baumel: Flight ninety three no, not flight ninety three. Carlos: That was our last date too. Adam Baumel: There there's a sanctity of a movie theater and there's like kind of like a a tunnel of where acceptable behavior lives. If you go outside that tunnel Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: You're not coming back. And I mean, this is at least a better thing to stress about than the stresses of real life. Because the stresses of real life, you can't really control them. You can only really control the way you react to them. You know, whether it's what's going on in the Middle East, what's going on with ice in the US, I mean what's going on with people starving everywhere, global warming. I mean, there's so many reasons to be depressed. So it's gotta find ways to yeah. Carlos: anyway. Yeah. Yeah. But but I want I I want people to to take that point and realize that things are very real and things are very touchy. But I also want you to understand that there the benefit of everything that's happening. For example, Adam and I are sitting here talking, sharing Thoughts and ideas and telling stories and laughing and and talking about crying. but we haven't been able to do this. We would have to, we would have to wait to see if if this conversation would unravel on CNN or meet the press or something like that. That's the benefit. The benefit is everyone is starting to tap in and they're starting to understand that. What's happening on C SPAN is directly affecting my life. And then, you know, you see all these this is the the Trump dance, my bad. you see, you see all of these ⁓ protests and stuff, and then you go to a protest and you're starting to meet people that think the same way. And you're starting to meet people that are tired of the status quo and how the path that we're on and how it just doesn't work. Adam Baumel: Absolutely. Carlos: And the and and we're able to get together and talk it out, come up with some ideas and and talk about this ⁓ ice pledge that that Adam is gonna talk about in a couple minutes and and all the movements that are happening and we're you don't have to go through like a Wolf Blitzer kind of thing. He's all his folks that show up there they pay to be there and whatever it is that they do. I don't know. But the fact that two normal guys can get together and now we're networking and then we continue to network and continue to bring attention to everyone else who's pissed off. Adam Baumel: Absolutely. I mean the exchange of ideas is what makes us human. It it it is. And I think that's a massive issue as to how we've kind of devolved to the point where we're at, 'cause we're so polarized now, and I'm I'm not saying there aren't reasons, of course there are, but we gotta find ways to communicate with each other. 'Cause we're gonna have to live with each other unless that civil war I talked about happens. ⁓ which I'm not like hoping for. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Ha ha ha. Adam Baumel: But i yeah, the Carlos: Yeah, I it's it's unnecessary. The the writing is on the wall. We see everything clearly. We see that it's not a right and left issue because people on the right, people on the left all basically want the same thing. We want clean water, we want kids that aren't idiots, we want people to afford groceries. We want we want to live a good life. The fundamental the fundamentals are there. It's just communicating with each other to say, hey, maybe rich people don't have your best interest in mind when they run for office. Adam Baumel: I mean they don't. ⁓ at least most I would say. I I think it i there's a possibility you can have other people's best interests in mind. Like I I was from afar and I'm not saying I think he was a perfect candidate, but I was polling for Tom Steyr in California. 'Cause I thought he was there you go. So I mean I don't need to convince you, but I mean Bacera, I think what is he getting supported by like every corporation under the sun? Carlos: Yeah. I voted for him. Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: And he's basically just was the the next one up after Swalwell, his whole situation. Carlos: Right. It goes to show you it's not just the ones on the right. We got creepy boys everywhere. Unfortunately. Adam Baumel: No? No? I would say they're probably less. ⁓ well, I would say in the political class it's probably less. In the billionaire class, it is not less. I would say it's there's no left and right in the billionaire class. Like they have their pet projects. but and and the people who play with the billionaire class, they don't really have a left and right. They have ⁓ you know, an up top and they have an everyone else. Carlos: Yeah. No. There is not. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, it's a game. At at a certain level, it's a game. ⁓ how how many of these chips can I collect? They're not they're not they're not worried about making the world a better place. They're not worried about making ⁓ clean energy, they're not worried about the air you breathe. It's a game. It's all a game of numbers. Adam Baumel: For for every Ted Turner, there's like a hundred Elon Musks. And how much you know about Ted Turner? He was like a genuinely decent guy, you know, who just built up his company from like nothing and he did so much humanitarian work and he just actually died, ⁓ I think was a few weeks ago. And actually only like a county or two away from where I am. And but the thing is, he's not the rule. Carlos: Yeah. Mm-hmm. ⁓ wow. ⁓ wow. Adam Baumel: of billionaires. He's the exception to the rule. Yeah. Carlos: He's the exception. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. I I want someone with a soul without the confinements of ⁓ without the financial confinements. That's what I thought that's what I thought Tom Steyr was bringing to the table. I thought, you know, people are like, ⁓ but he's a billionaire. And I know a lot of I know a lot of really good rich people that take pride in building companies that then feed and sustain families like other people's families. They that's their approach to life is we win. Right. But at a certain level or it takes a certain personality type like an Elon Musk to say, Hey, look, we can flip rockets, but yet we have American kids in the streets hungry, not going to school. Adam Baumel: There if he wanted to, he could completely eradicate at least one issue, like on his own, without any help from anyone else. And he would rather, you know, be a playboy, get a flamethrower, blow up another rocket, have another love child from his like thirty eighth baby mama or whatever, who knows even how many it is at this point. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Get a flamethrower. Yeah. These just we we call that ratchet behavior. Adam Baumel: Yeah. Carlos: yeah, I and that's that's what's ruining it for the billionaires. I don't have I don't have a problem with you Being a billionaire, if you are turning around to see who else needs help, not na and not another billionaire. You have to turn around and take a look at where you come from. Like Malcolm X said, all these people are slumlords. And everybody's used to working under a slum lord. Jared Kushner was, Donald Trump and Fred Trump were. Yeah. They're all slumlords. Adam Baumel: I mean Jared Kushner literally was. I mean Jared Kushner literally was. Mm-hmm. There's some stories from ⁓ I think Jared Kushner owned like a series of buildings. I'm not I don't know if it was only in Maryland, but I know there were quite a few in like ⁓ like I think parts of Baltimore. And there are some stories that are wow. Like they would do construction in spaces outside of apartments at like two in the morning so often that people would move out because they were rent controlled. And then when they'd move out, they'd do like a couple of little Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Adam Baumel: tinkering things and then they would jack up the rent. Carlos: Yeah. Is that I'm trying to remember, I think it might be called Dirty Money on Netflix. Adam Baumel: I think that might be where I saw that. Carlos: I think so too. and if you guys haven't seen it, there's a documentary series on Netflix called Dirty Money, and they they explain how Trump is just terrible. They explain how the cushioners are terrible. They explain how HSBC would deal with illegal activity just to get the money in their bank. Adam Baumel: And that's not even getting into the the three big ⁓ what is it, hedge funds? ⁓ what is it, State Street, ⁓ th the three at I BlackRock and there's one other one. And the three of them collectively basically own like half of our country. They have their hands in everything. And everything they own, the other two own pieces of the other one, what they own. So they're they're almost like an incestuous like trip like ⁓ Carlos: Black Rock. Yeah. Yeah. Ha ha ha. Adam Baumel: triple relationship with each other. Like they're just constantly in each other's shit with each other. Carlos: What is what is that called? That's not monogamous. There's a polyamorous. They're polyamorous. Adam Baumel: They're they're a tripod together. Carlos: Yeah, and then Adam Baumel: But yeah. Carlos: Add to the fact that all these folks are kicking in to the government so they can influence elections and they can influence decision making process. How how do we get money out of politics? Adam Baumel: I was gonna say, so when early we were talking about like billionaires and their existence and whatnot, I would say probably the main reason billionaires shouldn't exist. And I think in a perfect world, if billionaires existed, like you know, they were doing good things for people, they weren't trying to buy elections, sure, but that's just not reality. And the vast majority of them don't behave like the way we'd want them to. Carlos: Yeah. Right. Right. Adam Baumel: So when there's people like Elon Musk who can spend, I think what he spent like three hundred and fifty million on Trump. ⁓ Sheldon and his wife, ⁓ Adelson are both ⁓ dual citizens, and they basically gave Trump I think it was two hundred million dollars, with it being very explicit ⁓ quid pro quo that we want the West Bank to get annexed. That was what they paid for. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. No. Adam Baumel: And they even had Sheldon Adelson died, his wife, what is it, Miriam? I think it's Miriam Adelson. They had her in the White House. And Trump, you know, he does his little jokey stuff, whatever. And he asked her, like, ⁓ who do you care about more? Israel or all that two ⁓ who do you care more about, Israel or United States? And she said Israel, like in the White House. Carlos: Miriam, mm. Yeah. Yeah. Should I run again? Yeah. Yeah. And that's the same lady that said if you run again in twenty twenty eight, I'll give you another two hundred million, two hundred and fifty million, something like that. Adam Baumel: course, I mean they haven't finished annexing the West Bank yet. So the project's only started. Carlos: Yeah. As a Jewish guy, how do you see that? Like how do you how do you process everything that's happening in Israel? Adam Baumel: So a great deal of Jewish identity, and this is kind of it's rooted in oppression in the past. And I would say not as much of myself, but of my descendants, you know, ⁓ I don't know, three, four generations ago. We had family on my especially my mother's side, who never made it home from from the camps. And never again is a legitimate thing. Like and the fact the fact is Carlos: Mm-hmm. Right. Adam Baumel: But ⁓ and I'll I'll come back to that, but so it shouldn't be abused and used to basically say we deserve protection that others don't get. Like never again means never again for anyone. So that would mean that the the one that Turkey did to the Armenians, the genocide, shouldn't have happened. Like all these there's so many other Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: instances where governments have done these just completely indefensible things. I mean Japan to China in Nanking. There's so many examples. So it's not like we are necessarily special in that respect, but now we've basically spun this, and it's not even mostly Jews, it's mostly Christians, which is the most bizarre part. ⁓ people really don't realize how many Zionists That are not Jewish are in the United States. There's about five million Jewish Zionists, give or take, maybe less, maybe a little more. There's about 50 million Christian Zionists in the United States. Yeah, exactly. And they have like secret societies where they're like getting Supreme Court justices appointed. It's it goes deep. And it sound it sounds like a conspiracy, but it's not. You could track all of this. Carlos: Yeah. So the Yeah. And and go back to the convers not the conversation, but the speech that the this is what pisses me off about Floyd and their book banning thing. Ugh. There's so much information out there that you guys are getting banned from. And I'm not saying that the speech that that John F. Kennedy made where he talked about secret societies and stuff like that. I'm not necessarily talking about that, ⁓ that being banned, but he was telling you the the truth that there are these secret societies that do things. ⁓ well one of them they take kids to islands. There's another one, there's another one where they they invest and they buy Supreme Court justices. Adam Baumel: Epstein. Carlos: And then and then it's only obvious that they buy politicians, they tell you outright, and they're changing the rules. They're changing the rules that should benefit the citizens to only benefit a small subsection of the citizens, the rich people. Adam Baumel: Well of course. I mean, in many ways we are living in a uniparty system. So I'm calling this like a weather man who knows a hundred percent what the weather's gonna be, but like let's just say the elections go off without a hitch and Democrats take the House, even if they take the Senate, they're going to push impeachment, which I don't blame them for doing, but of course it's gonna die in the Senate like it did the other what, two times, three times, whatever it was. Carlos: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: 'Cause they're never gonna get the sixty votes they need. So that'll be like a few months long process to basically avoid pushing legislation to get through the House and Senate. And of course, very unlikely they will kill the filibuster, even though people want it killed. ⁓ basically the reason I say all this is they've had opportunities where they've had the the power to push legislation to get things done. But it's far easier to be at a position of weakness and say, I need your donations. Otherwise, we can't fight back against this oppressive force. Looking at you, Chuck Schumer. So when we retake the house and potentially the set, they're going to posture like they're doing good work. And I I hope I'm wrong. I I don't think I'm going to be, but that's what's gonna happen. And I really hope. when twenty twenty eight comes around and h potentially we have a Democrat in the White House, that this doesn't just get repeated in the same way that we wasted a supermajority in both houses with Obama. It was wasted. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah, for real. What's your real quick, ⁓ what's your what's your reasoning behind Or reasoning might be the wrong word, but when the Republicans when they have when they when the Republicans have control, they just they don't care. They tear everything up and they move fast and break things. And the Republi the ⁓ Democrats, they just sit there and do insider trading like I don't know Yeah. Adam Baumel: Inspiration. ⁓ They're process warriors. The Democrats are great ⁓ not all, but a lot of them are process warriors. Like look at the the criticism you're seeing from them on Iran. ⁓ you're seeing some Democrats and they're in Florida, at least one or two of them, and they're upset of the way Iran is going based on the process, the fact that it didn't go through the process of the House with like a war powers resolution. They're not pushing back on the fact that we're Carlos: Mm. Mm-hmm. That they're committing genocide. Adam Baumel: Exactly. Or the fact that they're destroying the global marketplace. Like this is completely unnecessary and created. And it's ⁓ what Israel's wanted for four decades. Carlos: Can you point to one thing that that that helps the decisions being made and how they're being made? Adam Baumel: ⁓ Well, I mean corporations y well, yeah. And it's not just them, like there's others as well, like DMFI, Democrat Majority for Israel is another one. Now they're making these like hokey packs. I know there was one in Illinois, ⁓ what is it, elect Chicago women or something? Or elect democratic women. That was an APAC ⁓ instrument, basically. Carlos: A Apex? APEC? Yeah. ⁓ really? Yeah. Adam Baumel: Because they know how toxic they are and they're not even getting candidates that they support to run on supporting Israel. They use that money to attack other candidates that they know are not supporting Israel on issues that have nothing to do with Israel. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: So like they they realize that the end is near in American politics for Israel. Because the thing is with Republicans, if you're under forty five, you're over it as well. It's this is just ⁓ it's it the time is the time is running out for them. So I think they're trying to do their their ⁓ their liquidation sale and get as much as they can while they still can from us. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. I can see that. I can see that. So how does that work though? Cause you have something similar. Whether it's APAC, DMFI, whatever, whatever, all these all these ⁓ organizations, how does that work? Do you do they have When I learn more and more about APAC, I I I think of like all the movie industry in in Hollywood and how there's a lot of Jewish folks down there and they're making a lot of money off of entertainment. So they then what? They give like ten percent of their salary to this group and and then they divvy it up amongst the politicians? Is that generally how it works? Adam Baumel: So I'm sure there are some like of these like more wealthy individuals that are giving directly to candidates, but like the thing is there's limitations depending on where you are. Like I I think if I recall, Texas has no limitation on how much you can give someone. Like you could give someone a hundred million dollars like right into their campaign account. ⁓ I mean j John Cornyn, I believe, was considered the best fundraiser for Republicans. And he's not gonna be in the Senate anymore. And Carlos: Mm-hmm. ⁓ Texas. Papa. Adam Baumel: I pff And I think he voted with Trump like ninety-four, ninety five percent of the time, but like he didn't want to roll over on the Safe Act, like, you know, so they could basically make it virtually impossible for people in ⁓ lower socioeconomic status to vote. 'Cause like we don't all have access to identification as easily. So he he wouldn't roll over on that and and ⁓ he didn't want to do the nuclear option with the Senate because then he thought it would have passed. So Carlos: ⁓ yeah. Mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: That was what backing ⁓ that Lunatic was regarding. ⁓ Ken Paxton. Oof. Shit show. I know people are getting upset about Graham Platiner, and and there's some valid reason to get upset about Graham Platiner's past. My biggest thing is the the mercenary stuff. ⁓ but Ken Paxton is significantly worse than Graham Platner is on his worst day. Carlos: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's more of the same. He's more of the same. He's more of this these business guys that go around and it a lot like what we've been talking about. They they think because they have a little extra money and they have this power, they think that they can get away with Weird things, and Paxton was one of those guys. He was one of those guys. Adam Baumel: I don't want to throw allegations around, but there was ⁓ I don't remember the guy's name, but I think this was back ⁓ a couple years ago. And it was found out that he had been engaging in sexual assault with underage like children. And Ken Paxson, as the I think it was the what, the state attorney general, he tried to give him like time served and one day for Carlos: Yeah. ⁓ Yeah. Adam Baumel: For raping children. I'm not even sure how many it was. And the judge was like, Nope, we're g he's gonna get sixty days, which still is not enough. But Carlos: Yeah. Ugh, I'm so I'm so tired of that. Adam Baumel: If if Talo Rico doesn't beat Ken Paxton in Texas, that's another thing that might people might be like, Whoa, whoa is this real? ⁓ yeah. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Like you d you you you legitimately have a church boy going against the dude that will do dirty things. Yeah. Like thank you. Adam Baumel: The devil. And the things he's attacking him over are the most silly things, like calling him a vegan, which like if you're a vegan, okay, whatever. More stake for me. ⁓ like Talafrico, they're started selling the shirts and people love it. Then they started attacking him over his like partners and they're like he's dating like gorgeous women. So like Carlos: Yeah. They're saying Yeah, and then he came out with like what this really cute girl's like Adam Baumel: Yeah. And ⁓ I I I don't like you're you're giving him a runway to look good in every way you attack him. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: But like the thing is it's really a lot of this is gonna come down to ⁓ if the black vote shows up for him. Like if Jasmine Crockett fully gets behind him and and supports him like authentically, he has a he has a good chance. But like the thing is, is she gonna do that? Carlos: Mm-hmm. Where is she No ⁓ so she hasn't Adam Baumel: I think she said like we're gonna work to get him elected, but like it doesn't seem like it's a full throated endorsement. 'Cause I think she feels like she was cheated, which Carlos: Okay. Yeah. Adam Baumel: I don't agree with. Carlos: Yeah. I I don't know I I know about what's been happening down there and I knew about Talerico and Jasmine and all the things, but I don't know enough about their the chemistry between those two and their campaigns to know if they're supportive of each other. I don't know that much. I hope they are. Yeah. Adam Baumel: Mm-mm. I would imagine at least generally, but I mean the thing is Crockett was kind of propped up as like almost like another AOC and then she ran off to Missouri and endorsed ⁓ the Apex Doge who knocked out Corey Bush. ⁓ I forget his name. He's got ⁓ like the super curly hair. ⁓ Carlos: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Adam Baumel: Don't remember his name, but yeah, he's the one who took I think he took like millions from APAC and knocked out Corey Bush. Carlos: Take a look real quick. Adam Baumel: Webster and is that the name? Carlos: ⁓ Wesley Bell maybe? Wesley Bell Defeated Incumbent R yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Adam Baumel: Wesley Bell. Yep, that's him. So Jasmine Crockett, like a week or two ago, went to Missouri and endorsed him. Like hand in hand. So th when you do things like that and you're supporting such despicable politicians, do you really so basically I I guess the reason I mention that is the criticism of her was was founded, it was warranted. Carlos: Yeah. I didn't realize that Corey Bush had gotten kicked out. I I wish ⁓ Hakeem Jeffries would get kicked out. He's just Adam Baumel: So speaking of that, the there was a really good candidate, and I'm I'm spacing on his name at the moment, which doesn't bode well for me calling him a really good candidate, but he was petitioning to get on the ballot to running as a Democrat in New York, in in his district in Brooklyn, and his petitions got challenged and he did not make the ballot. But he did take the pledge to abolish ICE. ⁓ Carlos: Was it was it I'm sorry for not even remembering. We we interact on Instagram if it's the one that I think is. ⁓ Vance Bostik. Yeah. Vance is amazing. Adam Baumel: Yes. Very nice guy. And he was energized. Like he was he was really doing the work. ⁓ and not only that, his pledge was probably one of the most viewed pledges that we've had. And that was significantly earlier on when we had a much smaller base, and we're still not like super big, but it people have a massive, massive ⁓ interest in getting rid of Hakeem Jeffries. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I I I don't I don't agree with United States leadership when they're up on state. Not that Hakeem did this, but I'm not convinced that he hasn't either. But like a Chuck Schumer, you're you're a leader of the United States and we have you on stage saying that Israel, your n Israel is your number one focus. Adam Baumel: wanna say I'm paraphrasing, but he said, I need to keep progressives supporting Israel, I think is what he said. I'm not even sure he said Democrats. I think he said progressives, which was Carlos: Then w then why are you here? Yeah. Yeah. I'm good. Adam Baumel: Like the thing is, do a thought a simple thought experiment. Imagine he said Russia or Japan I mean any country, it doesn't even matter. Like why is your main concern another country? Carlos: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Would McDonald's ever say, Hey, wouldn't you rather have a Burger King burger? Adam Baumel: Definitely not. Carlos: It's Yeah, it's ridiculous. It's and they're doing it. They're playing in our face. They're playing in our face. They're telling you that, ⁓ no, it's okay, things are fine, things are gonna be fine, things are gonna be great, vote for me, all this stuff. They get millions of dollars to run for Congress and take the seat. Your kids are going to broken down schools. Sorry, Hakeem. Adam Baumel: And they're gonna sh and to be clear, Chuck Schumer will show up and give his ⁓ you know, whatever stump speech he's ⁓ created for these events. And I could tell you this with from experience. I when I lived in New York and I graduated from John Jay, I forget what year it was exactly, I think it was twenty seventeen. He spoke at my my graduation. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: And it was the same speech I had actually heard like once or twice before that. I like he tells basically the same speech, I think. but so he he gives the lip service and that's unfortunately there's too many people that see him getting out and smiling and he's like friendly. He's very friendly to your face. But of course well nowadays, not necessarily I Carlos: Yeah. All politicians are. Adam Baumel: I would only say now like in the in the Trump era now, like the the lip service, like the plastic, yes. It's I mean, I would say that's the only thing I appreciate is I feel like people are less about being fake to your face now than they were. So but is it giving better results, like for what people want, or is it not? I remains to be seen. Carlos: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Now they'll cuss you out. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So you mentioned that Vance Bostick took the pledge and the pledge that we're talking about everyone to get you caught up is the abolish ice pledge. ⁓ what how did that come to be? Adam Baumel: Yes, sir. So ⁓ you would be a first hand account of this. Gavin Newsom, when he got reelected, what was it, ⁓ like two years ago as governor, one of his primary campaign promises was California single payer health care, or what would be a California version of single payer health care. A bill for California single payer health care got through both houses and got to his desk. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: He vetoed it. So that's not the only example, of course, of a politician making a promise that they roll back on when they have every ability not to, or the ability to actually enact it. So we're so used to hearing lip service, as I was mentioning before, and sloganeering and all these different things, like people saying basically whatever they think they need to say to get elected. I just thought this is one of the biggest issues of our time, and it's and Carlos: Mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: Of course, seeing people being ripped across ripped away from their families, people being put in what are essentially concentration camps. I don't know if you've seen Alligator Alcatraz, that's another shit show. ⁓ so seeing all of this going on and seeing politicians, not just Democrats, but well mostly Democrats, because Republicans will do whatever Trump says at this point. But seeing them just not doing nearly enough to Carlos: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: want to fix the situation. So I just thought, what can I possibly do as someone who is not a billionaire, who doesn't have all the access to politicians like others do? Carlos: You mean a member of the education department in Florida is not doing Scrooge McDuck? Adam Baumel: I definitely don't have a pool of ⁓ of gold coins to dive into. Do not, do not. It would probably hurt too. But I just forgive me, I'm gonna make a reference that is a millennial. Maybe other millennials will know. You ever watch the West Wing? Carlos: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Adam Baumel: So later on the show when ⁓ I forget the guy's name, he was running for president as Democrat, and he was getting killed in the polls, and he decided they only had enough money for one ad. And they decided I'm gonna look into the camera and be honest, authentic, and say, I approve this message because like it's actually me talking to you. So I guess you could say that was the inspiration for how like the way I wanted to make this a vessel to hopefully do some good. So that's kind of how we came to the point of having candidates who are running for federal office basically speaking into the camera, taking the pledge on camera, so you know you can hold them accountable. So, like let's say they get elected a year, year and a half, whatever from now, legislation comes up for abolishing ICE or restricting funding to ICE or anything like that to curb the scourge of ICE and they vote against it. Well we now have on video them saying, I will take this pledge with points one, two, three, and four, and they just violated that. They're gonna have hell to pay moving forward. They're not gonna be able to talk their way out of that like they have in the past for other things. And that's kind of the idea. Carlos: Yeah. Is there is there like a financial ⁓ benefit to them taking the pledge? Adam Baumel: So we do list every candidate on our ⁓ on our website. And I'll I'll of course give the website ⁓ link in a second, like you know, I'll mention it. But there is a scroll of all the candidates that have taken the pledge on our website. And so people have every opportunity to go to their and it's a direct link to their campaign page. So I don't know how ⁓ we don't track how many people go to our website, then go to their campaign page. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: But it is letting people know who has taken the pledge, who has made the bold decision to stand up for their neighbors. And I mean, who knows? Carlos: Awesome. So it's like a shortcut. It's a shortcut for people that are looking for a candidate in their area that are promising to vote to abolish ICE once they make it into office. Right? Adam Baumel: Correct. And I want to be very clear about abolishing ICE. First of all, we are not supporting open borders. That is like the number one question or cr I would say more criticism, not a question. Criticism that I see from I don't know if they're trolls or real people or not, who knows? And that's not what we're pushing for. We're pushing for a humane immigration system, but we still are gonna have a hum ⁓ like an immigration system. We still are gonna have some degree of enforcement. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: Non enforcement the way the American Gestapo is doing it. Yes. I mean both words of that, the American Gestapo. Like they're doing a lot of the same things the Gestapo were doing. But that that can't happen. ⁓ but where was I? Carlos: When you take your when you when you let me say this 'cause you just got done saying something that triggered a memory. the Gestapo, if you don't know, was basically Hitler's ice. Adam Baumel: I mean almost like identically. They would just grab people off the street, politicians, like Jews. Basically, if you if they wanted to make you a target, they were just gonna grab you, and there was nothing you could do. There was no due process, also happening. People were getting disappeared, also happening. People are being put in concentration camps, also happening. Some people, if they fought back, got killed, also happening. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Also happening. Also happening. Also happening. Yep. Adam Baumel: So Carlos: And this is what this is what this is what blew my mind when I learned that the Gestapo and the Nazis were that vicious after studying the American South. They took the lead or they took their lead from everything that we were doing to black folks here. Adam Baumel: Yeah, Jim Crow. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: Jim Crow. ⁓ The the amount of societies that kind of followed through with that kind of idea and just built upon it is wild. And we're still to this day, of course, still trying to put those flames out that still exist. Carlos: Yeah, and and South Africa was one of those. And look who's look who's buying up the country. That's Elon Musk, Peter Teo, all those guys from South Africa that grew up in apartheid. Apartheid is their way of saying Jim Crow. Adam Baumel: Well, not only that, they're ⁓ they're essentially trying to say the white Afrikaners are being genocided, first of all. That's come on. but I wanna say since Trump basically shut the border down, I heard Medi Hassan say this on the ⁓ PBD, ⁓ Patrick Bet David podcast. He said they've let in six thousand sixty nine people, six thousand sixty six of them are white. Carlos: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. From South Africa. Adam Baumel: Yes. Carlos: Ain't that crazy? And you're talking about a president whose wife is over here on a genius visa. What is it? The Einstein visa? She speaks like one and a half languages. Like it's not it's so weird. Adam Baumel: ⁓ something like that. I I contemplated watching the documentary that like they ⁓ made with Amazon. That was definitely money laundering, by the way. It was like eighty million dollars to make a documentary. And not to go too far off the rails here, but I'm actually producing a documentary right now and we're gonna make it for probably around fifteen to twenty grand, which is very little. But you don't need eighty million dollars to make a documentary unless you're going into space itself. Carlos: No, don't Yeah, yeah, yeah. One hundred percent. Yeah, especially if the person you you you're making the documentary especially if the person you're making the documentary about is still around. It's not like you have to like just ask her questions to ⁓ yeah and then you go ask her husband some questions. Adam Baumel: And she has all the access, like she doesn't have to pay for access for anyone. Like she has all the resources at her disposal. It's money laundering. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Tell me about your documentary. ⁓ Adam Baumel: Sure. And I will say my best friend that I mentioned earlier, his name is Bobby, the one who works like eighty feet down ⁓ the hallway from me. So he's actually the director, writer, the other pr well, one of the other producers, ⁓ but it's coming out this fall, so it's called Carter Country. And it's essentially the story of how a little town of about six hundred and fifty people lifted Jimmy Carter up to become president in nineteen seventy six. Carlos: Yeah. So it's possible. Adam Baumel: It was it was once when what was once possible, you know, of course could be possible again, but it was a very different society at the time. There's no social media, n you know, no cell phones, none of that stuff. But it did prove one thing. It proved that a community united with a central idea, with a purpose, can accomplish anything. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: And about ninety five percent or so of the of the town in some capacity worked on his campaign. Carlos: That's so nice. So cool. So it's again, it is possible. We have we have a lot of examples of when a community, whether it's a small town or an entire nation, if we wanted to make things better, we can. It's possible. Adam Baumel: So Collective action. It works. Carlos: Yeah. And stop stop letting all these rich folks that have everything that are laughing at you struggle stop telling them the stop letting them tell you what's possible and not possible. Adam Baumel: Well for one, the thing that they're most afraid of, like the the elite class, like the wealthy and definitely some at least some of the political elite, they're afraid of us getting on the same page. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: They are petrified of us being organized. Because organizing well is always gonna work better than spending money. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. 'Cause in because the community is focused on what needs to be fixed and they can then leverage the money to fix what needs to be fixed. Adam Baumel: But it's hard. I mean, there's there's a few examples that come to mind. Like AOC, I believe, was outspent like twenty to one when she won her first race. But she had a ⁓ like an activist background, she was an organizer, like she was not just a bartender, which there's nothing wrong with being a bartender, but you know, she actually lived in district, which her opponent did not. ⁓ spacing on his name, ⁓ Irish guy. But like her ki Carlos: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Ha ha ha. Adam Baumel: his kids didn't go to school in the district because the districts a lot of it is not it's the Bronx and it's ⁓ Queens. So a lot of that district is not like that nice. Like it it needs work. So but like the thing is this is just evidence that it can happen. But it's not easy. You gotta have someone who knows how to activate those people and once you do, anything is possible. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And collaboration with organizations like yours is huge too. So what you're doing is very valuable. Adam Baumel: Absolutely. We we are just one portion of what I would say are all the planks that quality candidates and representatives need to sufficiently serve the population, you know, serve us. That's what they're there to do. Like we shouldn't get caught up in like this vanity process that I'm sure many of them go to feel important or so they have like a a mouthpiece they can constantly speak into. But ultimately they're representing us. And that's the only way the system Effectively works. Carlos: Yeah, if you're struggling, there's someone to talk to to say, Hey, fix this something Adam Baumel: Absolutely. And they should be talking to you without doing this. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: Because we know, ⁓ I forget ⁓ Byron Donald is running for governor, just as another example. He at a private fundraiser, ⁓ it wasn't him, it was like I guess who was throwing it for him, was basically calling people in that room investors. And basically essentially saying Carlos: Whoa Adam Baumel: Yep. So like if Joe Schmoe, who's donated eleven thousand dollars to a candidate, calls you, they're answering the phone. They're not letting it go to voicemail. If I'm calling, which obviously I don't have their phone number like or cell phone number like Joe Schmoe does, I'm calling the office. Exactly. Carlos: Yeah. Cause you're not an investor. And they're not doing round tables anymore. Adam Baumel: And people No. ⁓ there's very few candidates. I mean, there there are there are definitely, I would say, insurgent candidates that are proposing to do more town halls. ⁓ we have a candidate in Arkansas. ⁓ I feel bad, I I f I'm forgetting names so much today. But there's a candidate in Arkansas who has done, I wanna say like five or six town halls ⁓ as a candidate. And his opponent, who's an incumbent, has done Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: I don't believe I've done any in years. So Carlos: And as a Republican. Adam Baumel: I believe so, yes. They feel safe. Wha I mean, what's the need to do more work if they don't have to? Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that it and you know what's funny? The more I talk to folks of means, the i it's them that says, ⁓ we don't need anything like a universal basic income or we don't need anything like that because it's gonna make people not wanna work. And I think to myself, bitch, you don't wanna work. Adam Baumel: Lazy. There a lot of these people didn't make their wealth ⁓ by any means of their own. They are just living off of what their parents, grandparents, well, definitely some many more years in the past than that, created. I mean Elon Musk didn't start with nothing, he started with millions. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. A gem mine. Adam Baumel: That's another story. But for every Oprah Winfrey, there's like I don't know, I think like ninety or ninety five percent of billionaires st like came from wealth. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. It y yeah. Oprah. We got n there's a couple of st there's a couple of stories in there too. But Adam Baumel: I gonna say, 'cause you live that she's from Illinois, right? Carlos: I think she's from ⁓ she's from down south, but she moved up to Chicago and when she when she moved to Chicago that's where that's where she took off. That's where she found her greatness. It it's listen, Chicago is the best. I know I don't live there anymore, but I don't even care. I'm I'm I'm allergic to the weather. But I love it there and ⁓ Adam Baumel: Gotcha. Gotcha. Gets cold. Carlos: And it's a it's a really good spot. Like Oprah moving there and staying motivated and blowing up the way that she does that she did is not a surprise to me coming out of Chicago. It's just everything is there. Adam Baumel: Yeah, I mean I do like the city, but I will push back on one thing associated with Chicago pizza. Carlos: Tell me. It depends. It depends. Adam Baumel: I'm not and but I wanna be clear when I say this. I'm not saying it's bad, it's different, but I don't think Chicago pizza, like the deep dish pizza, is really pizza. I would say it's casserole. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: Which is fine. I I have no issue with people liking it, but I'm a purist, yeah. Carlos: Right. Right. That's why we always tell people we always tell people it's kind of like going to the it's kind of like going to, you know, whatever whatever ⁓ roller coaster place you like to go to. You know, for example, just north of Chicago, there's ⁓ Six Flags Great America. You go to Six Flags Great America, you have to get on the American Eagle. You have to, right? Is it yeah? Adam Baumel: I'd been there. Carlos: Is the is the American Eagle like the craziest and ⁓ no, no, it's a wooden roller coaster. V you j but you just have to try it, right? So in Chicago, yeah, go ahead and have a slice of deep dish, but don't be afraid of the thin crust. Thin crust in Chicago is amazing. Adam Baumel: I mean the food in general is amazing. I I went to the Italian restaurant that Al Capone used to eat at. I don't recall the name, I think it was near the financial district or in the financial district. And I had one of the best veal parms I've ever had. Carlos: Yeah. Mm-hmm. ⁓ I w I almost said Scaramucci, but it's not that. It's I'll think of it. Yeah, that was also my mom's favorite spot. They closed it a little while ago. I don't think so. If it's the place that I think it is, I think it might be closed now. ⁓ but I could be I could be I could be wrong. ⁓ he also hung out at this ⁓ really cool jazz place up on the north side called the Green Mill. And they have like Adam Baumel: ⁓ it's not open anymore. That's that's a shame. Carlos: In that area, a lot of those buildings are connected by like secret tunnels and stuff. Cause Al Al Capone would be in the green mill and then the cops, you know, someone would say, Hey cops, and he'd run in the back and then go into one of the tunnels and take off. You know? Yeah. Green mill is still there, and I don't think that they've ever had syphilis outbreaks, so I'm gonna go ahead and say Adam Baumel: Whoa, that's cool. That could be where he got syphilis. The green mill. Well I'm not I don't I'm not trying to get sued by the green mill if they hear this I was joking, tongue in cheek. But but I think that's how he died, isn't it? Didn't he he died of syphilis in prison? Carlos: Is probably Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, Green Mill is a wonderful place. Syph yeah, Syphlis he yeah, he's he died out here in ⁓ in Alcatraz. Yeah. Wild. And if you go to Alcatraz, you go to one of the one of the one of the tours, it's I I highly recommend it. It's so cool. they have these little radios that you listen to and they'll they'll say, Come up here and make a right or make a left, and then they tell you about that little area, and then you go around and they tell you about that little area, and then they'll take you in and then they say, Look up and over there, and the number, blah, blah, blah, and the Adam Baumel: Crazy. Carlos: The gate at the ⁓ the cell is still open, but that you can see w his cell and everything. Yeah, it's pretty cool. It's pretty cool. Adam Baumel: That's wild. I actually went there ⁓ once or twice when I was in the Navy. They they brought our ship and I was on the Nimitz, so like a very famous ship, for its seventy-fifth ann or not s no, for the seventy fifth anniversary of the Golden Gate Bridge, they had our ship underneath the bridge and they took a photo. So if you were to look up USS Nimitz, ⁓ Golden Gate Bridge seventy fifth anniversary, I'm like an ant on the flight deck. Carlos: ⁓ nice. ⁓ sick. Ha ha ha. Well, first of all, thanks for your service. Even though it was even though it was the Navy, thank you for your service. Adam Baumel: Course. I was a seaman, yep. Carlos: What was it ⁓ were you in yeah, you were in Florida at this time. What was it that made you wanna serve? Or that made you enlist at least? Adam Baumel: So part of it was wanting to see the world. Part of it. ⁓ another part I I was in I was in eighth grade when nine eleven happened. So I mean I remember the class I was in, my teacher, Miss Will's class in sci it was a science class. I like I remember all that. Like that I feel like Carlos: ⁓ damn. Okay. Adam Baumel: Generationally, we have different moments that are like that. Like my for my mother, it's like JFK dying or or being assassinated, not dying. ⁓ well, he did die too. But so that's like our JFK. And I didn't necessarily grow up with that as the intention the whole time, but it kind of became an idea when silly enough, at a car show I went to. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: There was a booth and they had like swag or whatever, you know, they're giving up free stuff. And they were tell talking to a friend of mine at the time. We haven't spoken in years, but they were talking to a friend of mine and they convinced us to look into the process and one thing led to another. And I ended up signing up originally to be a reservist, but then they talked me into changing to active duty because my ASVAB score was high enough. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: Тобі а нуклер інженір. Carlos: Yeah. That a boy. Adam Baumel: Did not finish all the training for n being a nuclear engineer 'cause I do not love math. But they that's another story. But I didn't tell my parents because I knew they would talk me out of it. My cousin is actually the one who told my parents. Like a a few weeks before I was gonna go. It was yeah. Carlos: How did they react? Adam Baumel: My mom was petrified, my father was angry, and let's also be clear, as a young Jew, you don't join the military, you go to school, you get a white-collar job, accountant, ⁓ doctor, dentist, whatever. So I I was basically saying status quo, nah. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I it I'm I'm very similar. I I I don't like status quo, but my reasoning was I was tired of being poor. I was just like, This sucks, dude. And a recruiter said, You tired of being poor? I said, Yep. He said, if you go to the military when you get out, you get housing assistance, you get schooling assistance, all this stuff. I said and ⁓ he said, ⁓ you get health care, all the things. I was like, ⁓ Adam Baumel: G I bell. Carlos: G I boat, yep. I said, yep, let's do it then. Let's do it. Cause I could see at sixteen, I could see where starting to build that scaffolding was important. And being in the military and having health ⁓ health care and and school and all that stuff is part of the scaffolding. You know. and then, you know, I've always I've always loved the United States. ⁓ but then once you serve you're like, all right, cool. This is my home. I have to protect my home. I have to make sure that things go right. Yeah, and and and now talking to you guys it the i especially the the the veterans. I know for a fact that I did the right thing, even though for the first the first reason was 'cause I was poor. But then, you know, I fell in love with my country. And now I wanna do now I wanna do anything I can. Adam Baumel: It's certain. It certainly opens doors that you didn't have before, and I I very much understand why people do it. It is, but I will also say at the same time, it's a shame that people feel desperate enough to the point where that's your only option. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: I mean I I have no problem with someone wanting to join the military if that's what they want, you know, and they've done the due diligence to make sure, you know, to actually make an informed decision. Excuse me. ⁓ but if you're coming from like a poor neighborhood and you see that as your only way out, that's that's a shame. It really is. Carlos: ⁓ that's a reflection on leadership. I should Adam Baumel: And this is the wealthiest country in the world. Carlos: I mean and we know it's gonna work 'cause we're paying for healthcare and and education and and all the things over in Israel. Adam Baumel: We have we have every ability to make things work far better than they do. We w I mean there the money is there and money what is money even based off of at this point anyway? Carlos: I know. I know. It's not based on gold. It's not based on anything. It's based on, hey, I have this good or service. How much would you be willing to pay for it? Adam Baumel: It's not like it used to be, whereas like the butcher was the wealthiest person in town because they had the thing that everyone needed the most. Carlos: Yeah, yeah. Adam Baumel: I know if you've ever seen ⁓ Fiddler on the Roof. Carlos: Uh-huh. Yeah. Adam Baumel: They were trying to set her up with the butcher and he's like, I don't know, in his fifties or or whatever. She's like, I don't want to marry the butcher, I'm in love. ⁓ I'm such a Jew. Mention Fiddler on the roof. Carlos: It's a good one though. It's a good one. Yeah. I I ⁓ I'm trying to remember. I think we watched it in class once. And then I I watched it again later, not in class. 'Cause you know, when you went to class and the teacher pushed in the TV, you get a certain amount of time. So you get to watch filler on the roof at like twenty, twenty five minutes of a pop, you know? Adam Baumel: It's classic. Carlos: So if you remember yesterday hell yeah. Hell yeah. Adam Baumel: I mean it's time you're not spending doing work. Carlos: ⁓ so neighbors not numbers coalition. Adam Baumel: Correct. Carlos: How did that come about? Actually, before we go there, have you always been politically minded and politically motivated? Adam Baumel: I wouldn't say always, but I mean I would say one of the probably bigger turning points of my life was when I was actually in the Navy. And if you remember the Arab Spring in Egypt, all of that going on, and just seeing the unrest. And a lot of that had to do with the fact that their politicians just were not listening to them at all. Like Mubarak. And that's a state that has a lot of control over their people. And Carlos: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Adam Baumel: Like seeing people rise up in a way, ⁓ there's a really good documentary. I believe it's called The Square. If you haven't seen it, definitely recommend it. I I wanna say it's called The Square. But basically it's like the square, it's almost like their Times Square, like the busiest part of town, and they occupied it. And that's where I mean they were completely visible. So it spread around the country. Like there were times at which there were like hundreds of thousands of people congregating in the square, being a community, actually working together to try to make change. And it didn't make all the change they were hoping for because they ended up having like a phony election and different things ended up happening. Carlos: ⁓ man. Adam Baumel: It was a guy who basically ran the military, if I recall correctly. ⁓ but they they put them on notice. So seeing all of that happen and being in the military and seeing, of course, like other things that were wrong happening, I knew I needed to be more engaged. So when I moved to New York, ⁓ moved to New York in 2013, like August, went to school. ⁓ I got more engaged in my community when I moved to Bay Ridge in Brooklyn in New York, and I saw that we had a representative who was not doing town halls, like I mentioned before. And I started raising issues, and then eventually it got to a point where it like no one else is running against her. She like she's a Republican, there was no Democrat running. She wasn't opposed at all the cycle before, which is every two years. So I decided, fuck it. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: I'm gonna run. And it was really you know, like you dip your toe in the water. I dove. I dove in. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. How'd you do? Adam Baumel: ⁓ if I remember correctly, I got thirty nine point eight percent of the vote. Carlos: Yeah. It's not bad. You came in second. I know, I know, I know. Adam Baumel: So no shame. Well I I came in last, it's the same as the second. Yep. But I mean, I knew was a massively uphill battle. It was but I mean on election night, you there's a moment where you start to believe maybe this is possible. ⁓ just maybe. And that's the same year AOC got elected, by the way. Carlos: ⁓ wow, cool. Adam Baumel: So I mean her big election had already happened 'cause it was in the primary, so that had already happened months prior. So seeing that happen gives you hope that you might be that next Cinderella story. Carlos: Yeah, I can see that. I can see that. Adam Baumel: But but it it became clear within probably a fifteen, twenty minutes that it wasn't gonna happen. So, you know, I conceded and all that. But I mean Carlos: Yeah. Was there anything what's your biggest learning ⁓ thing, your learning issue, your learning point from running for office? Was it everything you thought it would be? Adam Baumel: It was everything I thought it would be and more. organization is everything. Like being organized and having people around you that you trust to have your back. And there were a handful of what I would call like super volunteers, like people who would show up pretty much every time I went out to do something. And without them, we weren't getting anywhere close to what we got. But the biggest thing with these elections is meeting people face to face. And that was the main thing we couldn't do. We didn't have enough volunteers to knock doors to to get to every part of the district. Because that's what would the that is what it would have required to get more competitive and to perhaps even win. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: But it was it was ugly, it was beautiful, it was everything. Carlos: No, because I get to talk to a lot of ⁓ grassroots folks and ⁓ You Ignorance is bliss and then when you like you said, you dive in, and then like the reality of you running for office is happening, you know, and I don't think that I think people on underestimate they underestimate how much work goes into running a campaign, but they also underestimate the potential they have to make change. Adam Baumel: Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, you really can come from anywhere to upend the status quo. It's not gonna be easy. You're gonna have numerous bumps along the way. It's really about how you bounce back. It's really what it is. And having those people behind you that are telling you, Don't give up, keep knocking doors, you know, because you're gonna be pushed back. Whether it's your own establishment of of your own party or whether it's in general, you know, like ⁓ businesses or or unions depending on where you are, or it could really be anything, but having enough people who are talking you up and motivating you and just want to get behind you, sort of like I mentioned with the documentary earlier, that's what it takes to have that Cinderella story happen. 'Cause AOC did not do it by herself. She had incredible field organizers having her back. And I guarantee you she would say the same thing. Carlos: Yeah. How do you get into how do you tap into that community though? Like is it is it ⁓ like once you sign the the papers or you get enough votes or whatever, are you are you invited into a a conference or a party or something like that and s they say, Okay, here's all the campaign managers are over here and all the you know, all the door knockers are over there. Or is it like you literally in the street saying, Hey, I'm thinking about running for office. Would you be my campaign manager? Adam Baumel: So it definitely depends on where you are. So in New York, there there's political infrastructure everywhere, especially if you're a Democrat. ⁓ but the number one place, at least in my case, that you start is at political clubs. So in my case, ⁓ there was a club called the Bay Ridge Democrats, and they're still around, they still do a lot of work. ⁓ there's actually a candidate running in that area for Congress that Carlos: Mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: was you know, was a good friend and we're still good friends. His name is Mike DeSillis. ⁓ he's gonna be running this cycle as well. ⁓ but he was one of those people that definitely motivated me to keep trying. And I was running on the state level when he was trying to run for Congress at that time as well. But yeah, Bay Ridge Democrats did so much work to help me ⁓ in that race because they were they were knocking on doors to get petitions signed. Which is one of the hardest things to do in New York. So we earlier spoke about ⁓ my goodness. I'm forgetting his name again. Vance Bostik, thank you. So earlier we were mentioning Vance Bostik, and he didn't have that organization behind him. That is why or I'm not saying he didn't have an organization behind him, but he didn't have as much. Carlos: Yeah. Advanced Bastic. Adam Baumel: as much of an organization behind them as as I was lucky enough to have in my case. That is why we made the ballot, because it's hard getting those petition signatures. It is very hard. And in Congress, ⁓ I forget what you need in New York. It's probably like thirty five hundred signatures around there. And a lot of people don't want to sign. They think they're being tracked. It's also if you're not a Democrat, you end up signing, it gets thrown out. There's all different ways they try to throw them out. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: ⁓ the reason Ba ⁓ Vance didn't make the ballot is because Hakeem Jeffery's team challenged his petitions and they threw out enough of them that he didn't make the ballot. Carlos: And that happens a lot. ⁓ I was talking to Chris Fields. He ran for Senate for New Jersey and he missed the signature ballot. or the signature whatever. He missed he didn't get enough signatures. Adam Baumel: New Jersey. Mm-hmm. It's probably far more, 'cause it's the Senate. Your your constituency is the entire state. So I mean he may have needed like seven, eight thousand signatures for all I know. And it's and ⁓ Cory Booker isn't is a very known quantity in New Jersey. ⁓ for this is not me complimenting him. I definitely have my share of issues with Cory Booker, but yeah, he definitely has a very powerful organization behind him. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. ⁓ and this is like for normal folks that when what w what we're s not saying in the in the in the in the sunshine is this is how the rich people stack the deck against younger, not as established, not as rich folks that are trying to run for office so they can do things like get money out of office, so they can so they get or get money out of politics, so they can abolish ice. These are the things that they're doing. They're stacking the deck in their favor. Adam Baumel: There's a reason why so many politicians are attorneys. And that's not to say the the skill set you develop as an attorney is not helpful as a politician. Obviously it is, especially if you're going to court and having to make your argument and all these things. But the main reason why the majority of them are attorneys is because let's say you're a partner in a firm, you don't have to take any cases and you're still getting your your salary. Carlos: Yeah. That's wild. Adam Baumel: So you could literally take a sabbatical from your firm for six, seven, eight, nine, ten, whatever months to run for office, and you're still getting a paycheck. And your firm will probably support you because they'll be thinking, you know, this return on investment and you have plenty of partners in there who can max out donations for you, you know, that could be a quarter million dollars in donations right there. Carlos: they might even support you. Yeah. Easy. And that we're not even tapping we're not even tapping into their friend group either. Adam Baumel: If if you're at a larger firm. And wealthy people have wealthy friends 'cause they hang out together. The guy in the the twelve bedroom house is not hanging out with ⁓ the guy who lives in a box. So Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. All those people that keep buying those goofy red hats are not getting invitations to Mar a Lago. Adam Baumel: No. He'll take their donations, he'll let them buy his crypto coin, but no, they're not invited to to the parties where who knows what's going on. Carlos: No I want to go back to neighbors not numbers. what is the what is that coalition's focus? Adam Baumel: So of course the first primary mission or objective, whatever you want to call it, is abolishing ICE. But that's only the first step. So but that first step has numerous steps internally in that step, or intra steps if you want to call them that. So the first thing we're doing is trying to get enough ⁓ people elected in the House and in the Senate. That we can form what you might even call a a caucus. I don't know if that's gonna happen or not, but we're hoping to get at least thirty to forty candidates elected. Or can or keep elected or you know, incumbents that are already elected. And we definitely have at least, I would say, somewhere between ten and fifteen elected officials right now in the House and in the Senate that support abolishing ICE. So Carlos: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: Keeping them where they are and adding hopefully another ten to fifteen, maybe more, is how this really builds a foundation. So once that happens, we're really gearing up for twenty twenty eight. Because in twenty twenty eight we have a presidential election. Our goal is to make sure we have as many Democrats and Independents, or even Republicans for all we know, running as candidates who have taken the pledge to abolish ICE. And that is what we're building towards. Carlos: How long has this coalition been around? Adam Baumel: So we formed, well I shouldn't say we, I myself formed ⁓ the Instagram page, which was the the outreach upfront about four months ago. So it would have definitely been beneficial if I had done this earlier. Carlos: Yeah, but you can't pick when ideas hit ya. Adam Baumel: True. Light like lightning strikes. What are you gonna do? Yeah. Thomas Edison with the with the ⁓ the key, whatever. ⁓ so it was about four months ago when that happened, and we or I have had help along the way and I have we have a board of ⁓ of members who are who are integral with what we do, ⁓ but we also formed the nonprofit about a month and a half ago. So we've only been an official nonprofit for about six weeks. Carlos: Yeah, yeah. Exactly. Benjamin Franklin. Okay. Well, congratulations on getting that certification. I know Adam Baumel: Thank you. Well, in Florida, they'll let you ⁓ form a business to do anything, I guess. So is at least what I hear. But but we've been we've been incredibly lucky along the way. Like I'm I'm someone who acknowledges first and foremost if I've had help from others, because very little gets done by yourself. So one of our our board members Carlos: Yeah, that's a good point. That's a good point. Adam Baumel: It was actually her ex boyfriend, but I'm assuming things ended cordially. He's the one who built our website. Carlos: ⁓ cool. Adam Baumel: And for people who don't know how complicated it is to build a website that needs to be as functional as what we needed it for, you can't just go on Wix and plug in some stuff and do all that. And there's still things that we're working on improving. so unfortunately it does not seem as if this is gonna happen at this point, but Ballotpedia has the most vast network of candidates that are listed on the internet. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Adam Baumel: You have the ability to pay for that access and to utilize their database, but it costs money. So it's about a thousand dollars to get access to that database. So that's one of the things we've been raising money for. It does not look as if we're gonna get there this year, but that is something we definitely absolutely would want for twenty twenty eight. Carlos: Yeah. And access to the database. The database is full of all the candidates that are running for office. And y Adam Baumel: Correct. And like every House race, every US Senate race, this is thousands of candidates. Carlos: Yeah. Okay. Okay. I can see where that'd be beneficial. Adam Baumel: Course, because one of the things that we're doing, and you could go on our website and like put in your zip code and see who all your federal level legislators are, you know, US Congress, US Senate. ⁓ you can see if they've taken the pledge, which ends up right now there's no sitting members of Congress or the Senate that have taken the pledge. That will change though. one of our ⁓ candidates who Let's just be clear. At this point, he is going to be the next member of Congress in his in his House ⁓ seat. ⁓ Chris Rabb took the pledge a couple weeks ago. So he's a warrior. We're so, so proud to have him. ⁓ and this is growing. ⁓ so I I knew the dominoes would fall as more and more dominoes fell. Like this is one of those kind of like snowball effects. So Carlos: Nice. Thank you, Chris. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Adam Baumel: We're getting more and more candidates that have that clout, that have that name recognition. And then building off of that is how you get the really big candidates. So, like just to give you an example, ⁓ we also got Angie Nixon to take the pledge. ⁓ and she's running for the US Senate in Florida. ⁓ we're currently targeting Abdul El-Sayed to take the pledge, ⁓ Graham Plattner, and there's there's other candidates as well, but those are some of our bigger Carlos: Mm-hmm. Nice. Adam Baumel: I guess you could say targets. Carlos: Okay. Cool. Yeah, this is literally community building. So when people normal folks, when people are talking on community building and all that, this is what we're talking about. Excuse me. Adam Baumel: Absolutely. The more 'cause the more ⁓ candidates and elected officials eventually when they win, that jump on board, the the stronger this gets. 'Cause it's almost like an army. It's it's a coalition that we're building here. Carlos: Mm-hmm. And and this is gonna sound dumb, but I'm I'm leading you somewhere. ⁓ why why abolish ice? Adam Baumel: It's broken. It's just fundamentally broken. Like if you have a house that is riddled with ⁓ termites, like it's in the foundation. It is everywhere. Or if you this is gross, unfortunately, I've lived in New York so I had this experience. If you have a bed with bed bugs, you don't clean the bed, you throw the bed out. Or if you have a bed frame that's like a wooden bed frame, like they are in there and they're not going away. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: You gotta throw the bed frame away. You gotta get a new bed frame. Maybe get a metal one next time because they won't get in there, the pups. ⁓ but let's go back to the house ⁓ metaphor. That's probably ⁓ a less traumatic one, even though it's probably also traumatic for people. So you have a a foundation that is just rotten at that point. Are you going to try to repurpose that rotten foundation? Or are you gonna knock the whole thing down and build it fresh, build it new? Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: Build it in a way where it's not toxic from its inception. Because let's be clear, the fact that we're seeing all of these things happening right now, right in front of our eyes, doesn't mean a lot of these just completely necessary acts were not already happening. Like Obama built cages and he got called out for it, and he deported many, many people, but he did it in a more subtle way. So Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: And every Democrat who's been elected has also increased the ICE budget pretty much one after another. That's how we're that's how we got to the point we're at. So Trump would have never been able to do all the things he's doing right now if it weren't for Democrats kind of laying the groundwork before him and other Republicans. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, and it's frustrating. Well, coming from the community that I come from, cops are cops are just fine whipping our ass. They're they're they're good at it. We're they didn't need any help. So then you went and you got some bullies to then roam the streets and you know I don't I don't it it pisses me off. It pisses me off. It pisses me off that folks think that it's okay to break up families like that, but then to to add complexity to my pissed offness, the fact that someone like me might be running or not running, but walking through the streets and some ice Guy says, You have a funny accent and they throw me in the car. Adam Baumel: It's it's like Carlos: And there's people and there's people that think that that's okay. I am a United States Army veteran. Number one, they're not just gonna take me like that. They're just not. We're gonna be on the news that night. And then let's just say let's just say they did successfully put me in the car and they did successfully do all those things. Now like my family doesn't know where I am. I might end up in Colombia or wherever the hell it is that they're sending people off to El Salvador. Like and you guys are okay with that? Adam Baumel: And they've Yeah. ⁓ El Salvador. Like the thing is, I keep see another thing I've seen from people who are just closed off entirely, like people who don't even want to have a conversation about this. They say, ⁓ I don't see you taking in the criminals. And the vast majority of undocumented people are not criminals. Because to be a criminal means you've committed a crime. The vast majority of un undocumented people have not committed a crime, they've committed a civil violation. Carlos: Yeah. Right. Yeah. It's the same as a speeding ticket. It's the same as a parking ticket. Adam Baumel: I I mean civil violation can lead to Exactly. And that's not to say perhaps, you know, they won't get deported or something like that. They'll usually get like a warning. ⁓ there's like different statutes and things like that. ⁓ but it's not being a criminal. And by the way, people who are undocumented and actually have committed like violent crimes, deport them. I'm not we're not trying to protect those people because they've committed violent crimes. Carlos: Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. Adam Baumel: But to paint with such a broad brush and to say everyone falls into that kind of bracket is just false. It's the vast majority don't. But they're being treated like they are. Carlos: And then you sit and you sit there saying that these people are criminals when they're not, not all the time, but they're not criminal and and even if they were criminals, you have loaded the government full of criminals. Rick Scott, your senator, was busted for the largest health care scam in American history. Why are you not trying to deport him? Don't get we don't even have to talk about the president. Let's not even talk about him. Let's talk about all of these folks. Let's talk about all these folks doing insider trading. You're not deporting them. Insider trading should be illegal. Adam Baumel: Why do you think, with everything going on in Iran, that you will see you can almost time it at this point. It's gotten to a point where it's almost like a self-fulfilling prophecy. But you can almost time Trump's truths, truth social posts, whatever they call them, I think they're called truths, ⁓ about the negotiating process and their BS. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: He I wanna say he has said that we are days away from a sixty day ceasefire, like sixteen times. Carlos: Yeah. Just like Iran has been two weeks away from having a nuke for like thirty, forty years. Adam Baumel: Forty seven years is the the thing they always say. But at the same time at the same time, while he's doing all this, saying these silly things, him and who knows how many, a handful of his wealthy buddies are buying and then dumping oil futures stock every time. Carlos: Yeah. And we're not even talking about all the scams that they could be doing in all these betting apps. Adam Baumel: ⁓ hundred percent. Hundred hundred percent. ⁓ 'cause like the thing is he's he's opened up an avenue where he can be as corrupt as he wants and there's no one to stop him because the party that is in control, 'cause like they are still fully in control of Supreme Court, ⁓ the legislature, well and of course the executive, because that's him. ⁓ if they're not willing to be a watchdog, then he can do what he wants. Carlos: Mm-hmm. It's clear he's doing it. Adam Baumel: Like if you have if you have a dog who's pissing and crapping all over your house, if you're not gonna stop them, they're gonna keep doing it. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: So he's pissing and crapping all over our country. Carlos: All over it. No, but it's it's it's apropos. It's exactly what's happening. He sees this this piggy bank and he keeps banging it on the side. You know, he's got it flipped it, he's got the little thing pulled out and he's like shaking it and he's hitting it on the side, he's doing all the things. Adam Baumel: But he's not taking his four hundred thousand dollar salary. Carlos: Because he's making billions on the side. I would you rather would you rather would you rather keep your three hundred thousand dollar salary or would you rather get a four hundred million dollar jet? Adam Baumel: Exactly. That is Carlos: That's an easy that I you said earlier you didn't like math, so I was just trying to Adam Baumel: I can definitely do that math. Carlos: Ha ha. Adam Baumel: But his I think his wealth has tripled since his second time in office. In less than two years, his wealth has tripled. But Hunter Biden, who granted, did bad things, not defending the behavior, I'm not defending what Joe Biden did with Hunter Biden, all that stuff, but it is this compared to Trump's this. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And and you're only comparing the two people. Their teams, like Trump's team is making so much money. Adam Baumel: Jared Kushner, ⁓ Steve Whitkopf, all these people. Ivanka. Carlos: What's his daughter, Ivanka? Ivanka? She's talking about this island that they just bought. Adam Baumel: I mean there I think you're gonna sort of kinda going back to when we first spoke about ⁓ where we might be going as society, why do you think Peter Thiel just fled to Argentina? Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: Why do you think Avanka is talking about some private island where they can hanker down, hunker down, whatever the saying is? So Carlos: Yeah. And the and the island has like nuclear proof bunkers. From what I understand. Adam Baumel: Like I said, I I hope one in one making two in this case doesn't actually make two, but again with that math, the math ain't mathing but but it's it's scary. I mean we I I don't have a crystal ball, but I it when you see people who have this much knowledge and information of the world around them as as much as Carlos: Yeah. ⁓ Mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: I mean the guy started a company that is based on like a negative force in Lord of the Rings. Palantir. Like he's that evil. He's so evil he named his company after an evil like orb. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's how dumb he thinks normal folks are. He's playing in your face. These folks are playing in your face in broad daylight. It's almost like I haven't looked into this at all, but it's almost like America's already broken and these are the buzzards that are just picking at the bones. Adam Baumel: ⁓ yeah. Well they're also the ones who are like recycling and pushing around the whole notion that it's immigrants who are the reason why you're having your issues. It's I mean, pick pick whoever you want. But in reality, the people who are most at fault are the ones who have the power to change it and choose not to. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah, 'cause they're still benefiting from it. Adam Baumel: Exactly. So one thing I will say, and this is not wishful thinking, I want to make that perfectly clear, but do you remember what happened with ⁓ Luigi and ⁓ the United Healthcare executive? I would say if things really go wrong with you know, with the election coming up and perhaps other things, that will be the first step. Carlos: Mm-hmm. ⁓ uhhuh. ⁓ Adam Baumel: People will be gunning for the wealthy. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: And it won't be just like people on the left. It'll be people on the right too. Carlos: No. And there it's you can see it happening. ⁓ people have been taking shots at each other because, you know, like we're accessible. Normal people are accessible. We don't live in fancy gated communities and we don't get our own private islands and stuff like that. We have to go to a community church. We have to go to community school. We have to do things out in public. So You know, when you're when you're taking a shot at a normal person, it's easy to get to a normal person. Adam Baumel: And you saw the way people reacted to it as well, right? Like Luigi was like hailed as like a hero to many people. ⁓ and not only and the wildest not the wildest, but a wild thing. I don't know if you saw have seen this ad yet. ⁓ I forget what I was watching when it was some streaming service. But I saw an ad a few weeks ago by United Healthcare, where they had like three or four Carlos: Mm-hmm. No it's Adam Baumel: People who are I I don't know what their roles are, but they're like, you know, working in the ⁓ the call center or whatever it is. And they're dealing directly with like policy holders and potential policy holders and they were like, ⁓ I love my job and I love helping people and I'm like, We're living in nineteen eighty four. Carlos: Hey, yeah. Mm-hmm. Ha ha ha. Yeah. Adam Baumel: Like, it's so they're trying to use a band-aid to cover like a gaping wound. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: And I couldn't help but it was all it was so insane I was laughing because I I didn't know how else to react to such absurd ignorance. Like that like this commercial is going to change people's minds after being happy that someone just murdered someone in cold blood. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. That used to be on your team. Yeah. If if if you can hear my voice and you have not read through that book, 1984, please do. It's a fun read and and it's a little it's a little shocking how you know today today's world is Adam Baumel: Yeah. Carlos: Is is nineteen eighty four. The way that they use marketing to have people vote against their own interests. Whoa, you don't want everyone to have healthcare. That's gonna make that's gonna make people think they want more stuff. You don't wanna give them education. They they're gonna read books. You don't wanna ⁓ And people like you know what? Yeah, that makes sense. Let's make everybody dumb. Adam Baumel: How dare you? It'll be like we're communists. You know what the literacy rate? Not to say everything works so well over there, but you know what the literacy rate in Cuba is? It's like ninety nine percent. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. The the that's where my dad is from. People talk a lot of shit about Cuba, but in Cuba When there's war, Cuba sends doctors. And recently they have said that they have something that looks promising against ⁓ with the fight against Alzheimer's. They make doctors you can go from kindergarten to your PhD to your doctorate to all the things for free because they think an educated population is more helpful than a group of dum dums. Adam Baumel: Monsters. Just monsters. Carlos: Exactly. Exactly. And and if you think about it, it's our fault. It's the United States' fault that they are communist. Because it was ⁓ there was an understanding between the United States government and Fidel and they say, Fidel, if you take over, we'll make you a deal. We'll buy all this sugar and all that money will go to you running your government. He said, Alright, cool. He takes over the island. He says, Alright, I got your sugar ready. And then the United States was like, Huh? No, we want you to act like this and like that and like this and like that. We know that this is the case because they do it everywhere. Argentina. Over in the Middle East, we want you to act a certain way to and Fidel said, I just put my life on the line, I'm not gonna do that. And then America said, Then we're not buying your sugar. And who was the other superpower? Russia. Adam Baumel: Russia. Carlos: So if your people are struggling and the superpower that's right next door says no, you go to the other one. Th think about it. It it truly is. If you are running a country, there are bigger countries, depending on the country, but there are bigger countries that are interested in your vote specifically in the United Nations. So America goes around and they they pummel you until you vote their way. China will lend you money and and make you you want to do improvements to your country and all this stuff, but then they'll lend you the money. And then if you don't pay, then they start claiming your country. Or these favors at the United Nations. That's that's how it works. That's how d you know, like Adam Baumel: I mean, I guess you might call that what soft imperialism, because it's not like we're launching like full scale attacks like with weapons and people, but like we're doing it through commerce and like basically freezing people out. I mean that's what we did in South and South and Central America like crazy. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that's what's Yeah. And that's what makes China ⁓ Dangerous is is it it it makes them formidable because they have manufacturing down. They have a government system that you don't have to wait for people to argue things back and forth. You have a group a small group of people that that say this is what's gonna happen, go do it. So they get things done. And they have all this financial backing to where they can go to a place and offer them. loans and stuff like that and improvements and stuff like that. They are they have been slowly but surely taking over the planet and nobody knows because they're doing it financially. Adam Baumel: While they're also not dumping so so much of their money into the military. Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: I mean the amount of money I I don't know, I'm sure it's changed. It's probably even worse now, actually. But the last I saw, we were spending more than the next eleven countries combined, and like nine of them are our allies. Or at least they're not considered advert adversaries. So I'm not saying we shouldn't have the ability to protect ourselves, but at the same time Carlos: Right. Adam Baumel: If we're concerned with mosquitoes, why are we building bazookas? Carlos: Yeah. Adam Baumel: Why aren't we building fly swatters or the the bug zapper things? Like we we're just overdoing it. And on top of that, to make matters even worse, the amount of money we're spending on our military, you could see how ineffective it is with what is currently happening in Iran. They are basically bringing us to our knees with drones. Carlos: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: with cheap drones. Their Shawhead drones, I think, are like $25,000 apiece. And they're taking and they're being ⁓ basically trading one for one with our missiles that are like, I don't know, one or two million apiece. And we only have so much. Like our stockpile is dr I think I think the last I read from like ⁓ Barak Ravid, who seems to get all the the insider information with Axios. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Right. Adam Baumel: ⁓ the last I read, it will take us somewhere between eight to ten years to replenish our stockpile. Carlos: Right. And and all the warmongers are are ⁓ watering at the mouth because that's all money in their pockets. Adam Baumel: And on top of that, like we we as a country have basically made a position that we are gonna defend the sovereignty of Taiwan towards China. How are we gonna do that when, you know, we can't even have the deterrent of those weapons? Carlos: Yeah. And how are we gonna do that when we're walking around claiming countries? Adam Baumel: And Carlos: China we're making it easy for them to take it. Adam Baumel: ⁓ there's only so many of those ⁓ fad, I think they're like radar, I wanna call I wanna say. We had to take the one from South Korea because the one we had in the Middle East was damaged. So South Korea now doesn't have as much protection against North Korea and against other potential enemies. So and what's going on right now is also making the whole Gulf realize that we're not there to have their back. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Ha ha ha Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: Because they're being attacked as a result of what we're doing. Obviously they're not they're not fond of Iran attacking them, obviously, but they know why they're being attacked. And they know they're not being defended. Yeah. Carlos: Mm-hmm. And it's not anything that they did. Yeah. Yeah. And ⁓ you can't you can't solve every problem with violence. You just can't. Yeah. Yeah. Cause linking linking what's happening in the Middle East with what's happening here, I I I I remind people imagine being at a wedding and drones come down and explode and and your entire family is killed. Adam Baumel: It's a cycle. It just begets more of it. ⁓ there You mean like what Obama did? Carlos: Yeah. And even now where you know, we're we we bombed a a school of a hundred and fifty give or take young young girls. Adam Baumel: Three times. Carlos: At what point are we going to realize that violence only creates more enemies? And then linking it back to your push, at what point do you think these ice agents collecting brown kids is gonna make me want to tap big back into this country? Adam Baumel: I mean, they're not not only that, they're also hiring from those communities because they're desperate. So like you're seeing nineteen, twenty, twenty-one year old Latinos getting hired to work with ICE because ⁓ fifty thousand dollar bonus, which I guess I don't think they've really gotten. ⁓ Carlos: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, they got tricked out of a bunch of money. F but Adam Baumel: And they're not doing legitimate background checks. They they've hired January 6ers. They've hired people who are like sexual predators. There was a journalist actually who ⁓ I don't recall her name. I I seem to not recall anyone's name, but but ⁓ she I forgot if it was like intentionally to write an article, but like she applied to work with ICE. They basically hired her without finishing her Carlos: Yeah. ⁓ Yeah. Ha ha ha. Adam Baumel: Or process. Carlos: ⁓ I saw that. I'd saw that. They just want if you're Yeah. Yeah. I remember seeing something I d I can't remember her name either, but yeah. I remember seeing that and just thinking they're gonna get someone killed. They're gonna get someone killed. Well Adam Baumel: She didn't even finish the process. Because I think they were supposed to do like a drug test and they didn't do it or a background check. Didn't do it. Well like the thing is, and the s the scary thing is, these ICE agents who've been working with like C D P and all this even before Trump, there's certain tactics they use to give themselves the plausible reason to have to shoot you. So as an example, ⁓ the Renee Nicole Good situation, that same officer had been involved in a situation like that in the past where he basically put his body just enough in harm's way to justify the need for lethal response. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And for normal folks, yes, there are people out there that will legally take a life just to see what it feels like to take a life. Adam Baumel: Course. And Yeah. There's plenty of them in Florida. Carlos: I've talked to those idiots. Yeah. There's a lot of ⁓ that I talked to were from there. I am so happy that you exist. I'm so happy that you you you you see what's happening and your instinct is to help. And not just not just like donating five bucks or all that stuff helps, but going the extra mile and like starting a f a full on organization to be like, hey, time out. This shit don't work. Ha ha ha. Adam Baumel: I'm j I'm f well, I will say this, not an excuse, just as an explanation. I'm neurodivergent, so I have ⁓ I guess you could say I'm inflicted with hyperempathy. Like when I see when I see the things going on, whether it's in our own streets with ICE or whether it's in the Middle East, in Gaza, like it's both incredibly distressful. Like I've been brought to tears. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: And I've also been brought to the point where I want to punch a hole through a wall, like at the same time. And not to say you shouldn't feel emotions like you should and you shouldn't bottle them up, but you should also realize what you can do. And if you find a way you can do something, if you choose not to do that, you're being negligent. You're being negligent as an American, you're being negligent as a human being. You're being negligent as a neighbor. Carlos: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: So I guess you could say that's kind of where this all came from. And when I first started this, I didn't know it was gonna get to where we are, and there's still so much more we have to do. There's so so much more. But if you told me like four months ago, and I had heard of Chris Rab, I believe, four months ago, because he was like running and he's he w he won the primary in the bluest district in America. If you had told me Chris Rab would have taken the pledge, I'd say you're out of your fucking mind. Carlos: Yeah. Ha ha. Adam Baumel: No way. No way. But every victory like that drives me to get past every defeat. Cause let's be also very clear. With these insurgent candidates, the vast majority of them are not gonna even win their primaries. Because it's hard. It's very hard. They're up against a mountain. And they have a better chance now than they ever have before. But it's still incredibly difficult. I mean Carlos: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: You you're probably in we're in the same chat. You've seen what the candidates running for Congress in Connecticut are dealing with, right? Carlos: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Adam Baumel: I don't think they've had a c ⁓ competitive primary for decades in Connecticut because the way they get on the ballot or yeah, like I think it's been like forty years or something, because you have to get fifteen percent of the delegates and there's like wheeling and dealing going on. It's sort of silly like the way the Iowa caucus is. ⁓ but like the thing is the elected official always has the ab the connections to make sure you don't get those delegates. Carlos: If not more. Yeah. Something ridiculous. Yeah. Yeah. Adam Baumel: And then you only have, I think, like a week or ten days to get the v the enough signatures to get on the ballot, and it just never happens. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah, I I did a I did a whole video with about three, maybe four of those guys. yeah, shout out to all of them. ⁓ Adam Baumel: So Carlos: It's heartbreaking when you see normal people cha uprooting their lives ⁓ to to go make change and they're doing all this stuff and they're the like you said, the mountain or the machine that they're up against is just this gigantic thing. And it's like For me I'm I'm I'm probably a lot like you where I see a situation, I feel the feels, and then I'm like, all right, what do I have to do? What can I do? ⁓ Yeah, and it's it but it is it is sad to listen to story after story after story of how the game is rigged and how you need way more money than you than you have to make a dent. But boy, when we finally find that crack and we finally start leaking some of you guys in that that ⁓ and shout out to courage candidates. ⁓ in association with everything that you're doing, courage candidates have promised not to take any corporate pack money. Adam Baumel: It's amazing. Carlos: Yeah. and you and your group and how they're they are promising to abolish ice and all that stuff. And and having the group of people that you can compare you have the grassroots people that are promising not to take pack money and they're promising to abolish ice and they're promising to do all this stuff for free. All they want is the job and the salary. They don't need insider trading, they don't need bonus checks from anyone, they don't need any of that shit. They just wanna do it because it's the right thing to do. Adam Baumel: We need more of those people to get elected.