Latest / 3 Martini Lunch – Political Humor & Commentary / New Poll Finds Democrats' Shocking Reaction to the Idea of Trump Dying

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New Poll Finds Democrats' Shocking Reaction to the Idea of Trump Dying · 3 Martini Lunch – Political Humor & Commentary

0:03
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Three Martini Lunch. Grab a stool next
0:05
Speaker 1: to Greg Karambas of Radio America and Jim Garrity of
0:08
Speaker 1: National Review.
0:10
Speaker 2: Three martinis coming up.
0:14
Speaker 3: Really glad you're with us for the Tuesday edition of
0:16
Speaker 3: the Three Martini Lunch. Grab a stool, a lot.
0:18
Speaker 2: To get to.
0:18
Speaker 3: I think there's a little craziness in all of our
0:21
Speaker 3: martinis today, honestly. But let's start with this poll, courtesy
0:25
Speaker 3: of the Center for Strategic Studies, not to be confused
0:28
Speaker 3: with CSIS, the Center for Strategic International Studies. You know,
0:33
Speaker 3: you see a lot of polls this time of year.
0:34
Speaker 3: Who are you going to vote for for Senate governor?
0:36
Speaker 3: All that sort of thing. But sometimes you actually get
0:39
Speaker 3: questions like this exclusively of Democrats. The question is, if
0:42
Speaker 3: you woke up tomorrow morning and saw the following news headlines,
0:45
Speaker 3: how would you feel? President Donald Trump has been impeached
0:49
Speaker 3: and convicted by both houses of Congress and been removed
0:51
Speaker 3: from office among Democrats. Plus 80. They would feel good
0:54
Speaker 3: about that. That's not a huge surprise. Using the 25th
0:57
Speaker 3: Amendment to the Constitution, President Trump has been declared unfit
1:00
Speaker 3: by a majority of his cabinet and removed from office.
1:02
Speaker 3: Plus 77. They'd be happy to see that. President Donald
1:06
Speaker 3: Trump died overnight in his sleep is the premise. Plus 40.
1:11
Speaker 3: 55% feel good about that. 28% not sure, of course.
1:16
Speaker 3: And then a small pittance would not want to see that.
1:19
Speaker 3: To safeguard the Constitution, quote unquote, a group of U.S.
1:22
Speaker 3: military leaders have removed President Trump from power and assumed
1:25
Speaker 3: control of the United States, plus 32. 59% would love
1:30
Speaker 3: to wake up on the Democratic side and see that.
1:32
Speaker 3: Only 28% think that would be a bad thing. And
1:36
Speaker 3: then lastly, President Donald Trump assassinated while speaking at a rally. Thankfully,
1:41
Speaker 3: that's a minus 12, but they still can't get to
1:44
Speaker 3: a majority of Democrats who would think that's a bad thing.
1:46
Speaker 3: 32% thinks it would be very negative, which is the
1:49
Speaker 3: highest category. But 32% overall would see that as positive,
1:54
Speaker 3: 43% negative, and 25% of Democrats still have neither positive
1:58
Speaker 3: nor negative feelings about this. So, Jim, I mean, when
2:02
Speaker 3: you can't even get a national consensus on that one,
2:06
Speaker 3: the left has really gone off its rocker here.
2:09
Speaker 4: Yeah, and I've got to be perfectly honest, Greg. Out
2:11
Speaker 4: of all the responses, the second most shocking one are
2:15
Speaker 4: the number of responses that if President Trump were assassinated tomorrow,
2:18
Speaker 4: how would you feel? But one in three Democrats.
2:21
Speaker 2: Are like, meh.
2:24
Speaker 4: I can almost understand the, ah, thank goodness, that's one
2:27
Speaker 4: less thing to worry about, all that kind of stuff.
2:29
Speaker 2: We know these guys really hate these guys.
2:30
Speaker 4: To be kind of nonchalant about a presidential assassination, you'd
2:35
Speaker 4: like to think, the whole country really, really shocked when
2:38
Speaker 4: JFK was assassinated in 1963. The whole country really, really
2:42
Speaker 4: shocked and horrified when Reagan was shot in 1981. The
2:45
Speaker 4: idea of people saying, ah, well, what's new with the Kardashians?
2:48
Speaker 4: That really strikes me as a sign of a deeply
2:51
Speaker 4: troubled country. But even more so, Greg, there was actually
2:56
Speaker 4: less positive feelings about Trump dying in his sleep than
2:59
Speaker 4: a military coup. But, you know, and these people apparently
3:03
Speaker 4: never saw seven days in May. The other thing I'm
3:07
Speaker 4: sitting here thinking here, like when the question goes to
3:10
Speaker 4: safeguard the Constitution, a group of U.S. military leaders have
3:13
Speaker 4: removed President Trump from power and assumed control of the
3:15
Speaker 4: United States. please tell me that the pollsters on the
3:19
Speaker 4: phone at least sounded sort of sarcastic when they said
3:22
Speaker 4: safeguard the Constitution. Because a military coup is just about
3:25
Speaker 4: the most unconstitutional thing that you can do. For the
3:29
Speaker 4: number of people who say they support the 25th Amendment,
3:32
Speaker 4: you know, look, I'm always inclined to look at the
3:34
Speaker 4: positive side, Greg. This is what happens when you're a
3:37
Speaker 4: Jets fan. I look at that, that's a great start
3:40
Speaker 4: for Democrats for Vance. That's a great start to indicate
3:43
Speaker 4: that there are Democrats who are just itching to see J.D.
3:46
Speaker 4: Vance become the president of the United States. Also, in
3:49
Speaker 4: a very strange way, maybe Democrats for Hegseth with the
3:51
Speaker 4: military coup scenario. They're really itching to see. Obviously, most
3:56
Speaker 4: Democrats hate Hegseth as much as they hate President Trump.
3:59
Speaker 4: But I feel like I've been hearing ever since January
4:03
Speaker 4: 6th that Republicans and conservatives hate democracy, that they're against
4:08
Speaker 4: our Constitution, that they want a military dictatorship. that they're
4:12
Speaker 4: a cult of personality, and sometimes these criticisms are valid
4:16
Speaker 4: here and there, but this indicates that there's a significant
4:20
Speaker 4: chunk of the Democratic Party that wants to see Donald
4:23
Speaker 4: Trump removed from office, and they really aren't choosy about
4:27
Speaker 4: which way it is, to the point where assassination is
4:30
Speaker 4: barely considered more negative than positive in this survey of,
4:35
Speaker 4: I believe, 683 Democratic voters. Not a particularly small sample size.
4:40
Speaker 4: This is not a fringe viewpoint. It is now a
4:42
Speaker 4: semi-mainstream viewpoint that we really want to see Trump gone
4:46
Speaker 4: before January 20th, 2029. And we don't really care how
4:49
Speaker 4: it shakes out.
4:50
Speaker 3: No, it's utterly ridiculous. And they're just as crazy on
4:54
Speaker 3: the issues. It's now plus 59 that the next Democratic
4:58
Speaker 3: president should expand the Supreme Court. Plus 30 that Democrats,
5:02
Speaker 3: when they retake the Senate, they should end the filibuster
5:05
Speaker 3: in order to pass more legislation. But I bet they
5:08
Speaker 3: didn't feel that way at the beginning of this Congress.
5:10
Speaker 3: I don't know why that would change. Billionaires should exist,
5:14
Speaker 3: minus six. I don't know if they want genocide or
5:17
Speaker 3: just to steal all their money. Democrats should move to
5:20
Speaker 3: the right on transgender issues, minus seven. The only positive
5:23
Speaker 3: one here, the Senate should be abolished, minus 46. So
5:28
Speaker 3: they're apparently opposed to that at the moment, probably because
5:30
Speaker 3: they think they're about to take the majority here.
5:33
Speaker 4: It's a strange message in the middle of a midterm election.
5:37
Speaker 4: Elect our guys, donate to our candidates.
5:39
Speaker 2: And then once in office, we will abolish the chamber.
5:42
Speaker 3: And as always with the Democrats, democracy, as Gavin Newsom
5:44
Speaker 3: has said, is on the line. The future of democracy
5:47
Speaker 3: hangs in the balance, but only if their side wins.
5:50
Speaker 3: If democracy ends up with the Republicans still in charge, well,
5:53
Speaker 3: that's not okay. uh that's that's that's their hypocrisy on
5:57
Speaker 3: that all right well uh if you responded to this
6:00
Speaker 3: poll and are on one of the uh really whacked
6:02
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6:12
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6:15
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7:12
Speaker 3: we got a new episode yesterday of kind of an
7:15
Speaker 3: odd thing in politics. You would think that President Trump,
7:18
Speaker 3: given all the things he has to say about other Democrats,
7:21
Speaker 3: some people in his own party, certainly the media, as
7:23
Speaker 3: we've seen in recent days, would have nothing but invective
7:26
Speaker 3: for New York City Mayor Zoran Mamdani, the avowed socialist,
7:30
Speaker 3: you know, just they could not be more different other
7:33
Speaker 3: than the fact that they're both living in New York
7:35
Speaker 3: City or Trump used to live in New York City.
7:38
Speaker 2: Maybe that's it.
7:38
Speaker 3: But yesterday, Trump was In New York, he's there, I assume,
7:41
Speaker 3: for the opening of the UN General Assembly, but he
7:43
Speaker 3: spent time with Mamdani at Gracie Mansion and they came outside.
7:47
Speaker 3: And this is what Trump had to say about the
7:49
Speaker 3: New York City mayor.
7:50
Speaker 5: Thank you very much, Mr.
7:51
Speaker 4: Mayor.
7:51
Speaker 5: I've been at Gracie Mansion. We were discussing quite a
7:54
Speaker 5: few times over the years, a lot. And it sort
7:57
Speaker 5: of feels like a home and it's a special place,
8:00
Speaker 5: a very special, a beautiful place when you go inside.
8:04
Speaker 5: And I've seen it with numerous different mayors. And I
8:08
Speaker 5: said some great ones and some not so great ones.
8:10
Speaker 5: So hopefully you're going to be a great one. I'll
8:12
Speaker 5: be able to say you're going to be a great
8:13
Speaker 5: one and you're off to a start.
8:15
Speaker 3: And so, Jim, you know, Elise Stefanik was planning to
8:18
Speaker 3: run for governor against Kathy Hochul. And then shortly after
8:22
Speaker 3: Mamdani got elected last year, Trump has him to the
8:24
Speaker 3: White House. And instead of Being this really tense situation,
8:27
Speaker 3: he's just lavishing praise upon Mamdani. And it wasn't long
8:31
Speaker 3: after that, Stefanik's like, I don't think I'm going to
8:34
Speaker 3: stay in this race if all Trump is doing is
8:37
Speaker 3: heaping praise on Mamdani when I'm trying to tie Kathy
8:40
Speaker 3: Hochul to Mamdani because she ultimately endorsed him last year.
8:43
Speaker 3: So what is behind Trump's at least public, you know,
8:47
Speaker 3: very positive statements towards Mamdani all the time?
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Speaker 4: The only, the best explanation I can come up with
8:53
Speaker 4: is that Trump as a New Yorker is very into
8:57
Speaker 4: anybody else who's popular in New York at this time.
8:59
Speaker 4: He loves celebrities, and Mamdami is the hot new thing
9:02
Speaker 4: in Democratic politics these days. If you might say, oh, Jim,
9:06
Speaker 4: give him a break. You know, presidents meet with New
9:09
Speaker 4: York City mayors all the time. Yeah, that part is true,
9:11
Speaker 4: but this is actually the first time the president of
9:13
Speaker 4: the United States has visited Gracie Mansion since Ronald Reagan
9:16
Speaker 4: did it in 1981. He's presenting a giant check to
9:19
Speaker 4: Ed Koch and Mario Cuomo, for those to give you
9:22
Speaker 4: a reminder of just how old we all are, the
9:24
Speaker 4: father of Andrew Cuomo. Now, Trump's presidencies overlap with Bill
9:28
Speaker 4: de Blasio and Eric Adams. He met with them, but
9:30
Speaker 4: he never did a joint press conference, in addition to
9:33
Speaker 4: never visiting Gracie Manchin. And if you remember, this is
9:36
Speaker 4: actually the second press conference he's done with Momdami, the
9:39
Speaker 4: other one in the Oval Office. Now, compare the way
9:42
Speaker 4: Trump talks to Momdami with the way he talks to
9:45
Speaker 4: Vladimir Zelensky.
9:46
Speaker 2: In the Oval Office, or.
9:48
Speaker 4: Canadian prime ministers or a whole bunch of other folks,
9:51
Speaker 4: there's something kind of strange going on here. Yes, they
9:55
Speaker 4: discussed Sunnyside Yard, which is this rail yard in Queens
9:58
Speaker 4: that they want federal assistance to rebuild, handles Amtrak, New
10:02
Speaker 4: Jersey Transit, Long Island Railroad. But what really stuck out
10:05
Speaker 4: to me, Greg, and I write about this in today's
10:07
Speaker 4: Morning Jolt, so there are three competitive U.S. House races
10:10
Speaker 4: in the New York City area, 3rd District, 4th District,
10:13
Speaker 4: and 17th District, and in all three races, the Republican
10:18
Speaker 4: candidate is trying to tie his Democratic opponent to Zoran Mamdami.
10:23
Speaker 4: And the messaging is explicit. You have to vote against
10:26
Speaker 4: this Democrat because he's going to try to enact the
10:29
Speaker 4: policy of Zoran Mamdami and the socialists, right? This is
10:33
Speaker 4: also a big issue in the governor's race. And this
10:35
Speaker 4: is very much what Bruce Blakeman's message against Kathy Hochul
10:40
Speaker 4: has been. It's like, you know, if you say no
10:42
Speaker 4: to socialism, say no to Hochul and Mamdami. So at
10:45
Speaker 4: the exact moment when every Republican in the New York
10:48
Speaker 4: City area is trying to say, don't vote for the Democrats,
10:51
Speaker 4: they're just like Mamdami, and Mamdami is just the worst,
10:55
Speaker 4: Trump chooses to go to Gracie Mansion, hold that happy
10:58
Speaker 4: little press conference. And it's interesting, he says, you're off
11:01
Speaker 4: to a start. He doesn't say you're off to a
11:02
Speaker 4: great start. But overall, the tone of it, it's very funny.
11:07
Speaker 4: Trump didn't have to do this. He chose to do this.
11:10
Speaker 4: And he did it in a way that I think
11:12
Speaker 4: really steps on the messaging of New York area... Republicans.
11:16
Speaker 4: I don't see what he got out of this. I
11:18
Speaker 4: don't see what the upside is. I think Trump is
11:20
Speaker 4: just at a stage where he's just going to do
11:22
Speaker 4: whatever he feels like doing, and that is only going
11:25
Speaker 4: to align with the interests of Republicans very often. But hey, Greg,
11:29
Speaker 4: I'm sure things will be better later this.
11:30
Speaker 2: Week when he meets with Xi Jinping. Maybe so.
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Speaker 3: I mean, Mamdani's kind of a little bit of a
11:36
Speaker 3: chameleon on this because he smiles and does, you know,
11:40
Speaker 3: you would expect someone when he's with Trump. And then,
11:43
Speaker 3: you know, 24, 48 hours later, he'll be bashing Trump
11:46
Speaker 3: from stem to stern. But he figures, well, if I
11:48
Speaker 3: can get a few federal dollars out of whatever I
11:50
Speaker 3: want to get done here, I'll play the game. I
11:54
Speaker 3: don't remember Trump necessarily, once they're not together, going on
11:58
Speaker 3: a screed against Mamdani. So maybe it's just a New
12:00
Speaker 3: York City thing, but it's very odd considering Mamdani's presence
12:03
Speaker 3: and and prestige in the party right now. You'd think
12:06
Speaker 3: you'd want to knock him down a peg. But, you know,
12:08
Speaker 3: 12 months ago, we were thinking that, well, Mamdani might
12:11
Speaker 3: win this mayoral race, but he's going to be an
12:13
Speaker 3: albatross around the neck of every Democrat next year. Yeah.
12:16
Speaker 2: Right now, that doesn't seem to be the case.
12:18
Speaker 4: No, not just not, does it? Greg, if only people
12:21
Speaker 4: had voted for three martini lunch guests, Curtis Lewa.
12:24
Speaker 2: That's right. That's right.
12:25
Speaker 3: The opportunity was there to get somebody who actually loves
12:28
Speaker 3: New York City onto the into Gracie Mansion. But not today.
12:33
Speaker 2: Not happening.
12:34
Speaker 3: Most of the people who don't like Mamdani went for Cuomo.
12:36
Speaker 2: All right.
12:37
Speaker 3: When we come back, a little bit of a follow-up
12:41
Speaker 3: on what we talked about yesterday with Nicole Hannah-Jones and
12:44
Speaker 3: her daughter in failing public schools.
12:48
Speaker 2: All right, Jim.
12:51
Speaker 3: Yesterday, our first martini was about New York Times columnist
12:55
Speaker 3: Nicole Hannah-Jones, author of the 1619 Project, of course, admitting
12:59
Speaker 3: that she probably made a big mistake by sending her
13:01
Speaker 3: daughter to failing New York City public schools while she
13:04
Speaker 3: was trying to make an ideological point that, you know,
13:07
Speaker 3: everyone's got to put their kids into public schools or
13:09
Speaker 3: they'll never get better. Well, that didn't turn out to
13:12
Speaker 3: work so well. They did not get better. Her child
13:14
Speaker 3: now resents her and they're finally putting her in a
13:16
Speaker 3: much better school. But there's other things that have been
13:19
Speaker 3: revealed since this column came out over the weekend. One
13:24
Speaker 3: is this comment from Nicole Hannah-Jones a number of years
13:27
Speaker 3: ago about why she's so confident about putting her child in,
13:30
Speaker 3: right now, failing New York City public schools because, Jim,
13:33
Speaker 3: she works for the New York Times. So if there's
13:35
Speaker 3: any problems, you can bet they'll be dealt with real quick.
13:38
Speaker 1: A New York Times reporter in a high poverty school
13:41
Speaker 1: changes the school, right? There's certain things that just are
13:45
Speaker 1: not going to happen in that school. I can go
13:48
Speaker 1: to that school and say there's a problem and it
13:50
Speaker 1: gets fixed immediately.
13:52
Speaker 2: Apparently not.
13:52
Speaker 3: Apparently not. Because by the time she figured out what
13:55
Speaker 3: was going on, her child was just getting shuffled along
13:58
Speaker 3: in math and language and everything else. And about a
14:00
Speaker 3: decade down the drain, she's now way behind her peers
14:03
Speaker 3: at this new school. So that plan did not work out.
14:07
Speaker 3: And Jim, as you have recently flagged, the New York
14:10
Speaker 3: Post pointing out that her husband, her husband, is connected
14:15
Speaker 3: to the New York City public school system. In fact,
14:16
Speaker 3: he's the contracts committee chair for the New York City
14:19
Speaker 3: public school system's panel for educational policy. And at the
14:23
Speaker 3: same time, he's been hit with an ethics complaint for
14:26
Speaker 3: shamelessly plugging his new bookstore and bar at a recent
14:28
Speaker 3: public education meeting that he helped run. So Jim, it's
14:32
Speaker 3: just amazing that with this parent who could make changes
14:36
Speaker 3: on a whim at the New York Times and a
14:38
Speaker 3: parent who literally has the power to make changes in
14:40
Speaker 3: the New York City public school system, A lot of
14:43
Speaker 3: big problems went unnoticed for quite a while here.
14:46
Speaker 4: Yeah, when I found that this morning, Greg, but first
14:48
Speaker 4: of all, I'll talk about the video in a second.
14:49
Speaker 4: But first, do you feel like the story takes a
14:52
Speaker 4: very different connotation when you find out that her husband.
14:56
Speaker 2: Has a position?
14:58
Speaker 4: It's not like he runs the entire school district, but,
15:00
Speaker 4: you know, contracts chair for the public education panel.
15:02
Speaker 2: That's not nothing.
15:04
Speaker 4: In terms of influence of how New York City schools
15:07
Speaker 4: perform and have what their policies are. So do you
15:11
Speaker 4: kind of feel like this is your fault tone to
15:14
Speaker 4: her husband? I don't know what things are like in
15:18
Speaker 4: that house, but you just kind of get the feeling of, oh,
15:21
Speaker 4: she's not just criticizing New York City public schools. She's
15:24
Speaker 4: criticizing an institution her husband works for. All of a sudden,
15:29
Speaker 4: that is a very different... If I write something extremely
15:32
Speaker 4: critical of Mrs.
15:33
Speaker 2: Garrity.
15:33
Speaker 4: That's an unusual set of circumstances. If you suddenly say, ah, Mrs. Karambas,
15:38
Speaker 4: her employer is doing a terrible job. That's a very
15:41
Speaker 4: unusual tone to take. And no, we're not talking about
15:44
Speaker 4: what our wives do today. So one, that was a
15:47
Speaker 4: little bit strange. The second thing is, I really wish,
15:51
Speaker 4: it's unbelievably naive to say, well, the fact that I
15:55
Speaker 4: am sending my kid to this school means it automatically
15:58
Speaker 4: will get better because they fear critical coverage in the
16:00
Speaker 4: New York Times.
16:02
Speaker 2: I wish that were the case.
16:03
Speaker 4: I wish that simply by virtue of writing where I write,
16:06
Speaker 4: the schools that my kids go to are always going
16:08
Speaker 4: to do a great job because they're afraid that, you know,
16:10
Speaker 4: heavens to Betsy, what happens if Jim Garrity writes something
16:13
Speaker 4: very critical.
16:13
Speaker 2: About our school? That's not really how things work in
16:17
Speaker 2: the real world. And I think that's a little bit
16:18
Speaker 2: of naivete to that.
16:20
Speaker 4: I also think we should point out that people have
16:23
Speaker 4: been studying education reform for a really long time. And
16:26
Speaker 4: the conclusion that you can find schools that are beautiful,
16:29
Speaker 4: wonderful success stories Back when I was writing about Bobby Jindal,
16:32
Speaker 4: I think it was 2011. It was after Occupy Wall Street.
16:36
Speaker 4: And we went to Psy Academy in New Orleans. This
16:39
Speaker 4: is where they had gotten devastated by Hurricane Katrina.
16:42
Speaker 2: A lot of damage.
16:43
Speaker 4: A lot of people moved out. This was a heavily
16:45
Speaker 4: African-American neighborhood. This was a lot of kids who were
16:48
Speaker 4: being raised by single parents and stuff like that. The
16:50
Speaker 4: school had been featured on Oprah. Every kid, it was
16:53
Speaker 4: held to exceptionally high standards. Every teacher at that school
16:56
Speaker 4: had the banner of where they'd gone to college. And
16:59
Speaker 4: the expectation was to each one of those kids, you're
17:02
Speaker 4: going to go to college. It was a beautiful story.
17:03
Speaker 4: I loved writing about that place. But it was just
17:05
Speaker 4: one of those recognition that we found once you find
17:08
Speaker 4: something that works at one school, it's very hard to
17:10
Speaker 4: get it to replicate at the next school. You have
17:13
Speaker 4: the question of parental involvement. What's the situation in the
17:16
Speaker 4: kid's home? Teachers be the first to tell you, I
17:18
Speaker 4: only have access to the kids for six hours a day,
17:21
Speaker 4: seven hours a day. Maybe you get up to eight
17:24
Speaker 4: hours if you get to after school programs and stuff
17:26
Speaker 4: like that. They can't undo any damage that is done
17:29
Speaker 4: in the previous number of hours. They can't go home
17:32
Speaker 4: with the kid and make sure the kid does his homework.
17:34
Speaker 4: They can't go home with the kid and make sure
17:35
Speaker 4: that mom and dad aren't fighting. They can't go home
17:37
Speaker 4: with the kid and make sure the kid's getting a
17:38
Speaker 4: decent number of meals. Make sure that the kid has
17:40
Speaker 4: books to read at home. You know, teachers only have
17:44
Speaker 4: a certain amount of influence in that circumstance. But I
17:47
Speaker 4: just kind of think that there's this, it's interesting where
17:51
Speaker 4: she's kind of saying my presence and my status are
17:54
Speaker 4: going to make this school improve. And here we are
17:57
Speaker 4: several years later, and it's very clear that the school
18:00
Speaker 4: did not improve. I don't know if, as some people
18:03
Speaker 4: were joking on X yesterday, sorry, honey, I can't check
18:07
Speaker 4: your algebra homework because I'm too busy writing the 1619 project. Again,
18:12
Speaker 4: and I've joked on other podcasts, but when Tucker Carlson
18:15
Speaker 4: said that algebra was all a... I don't know if
18:17
Speaker 4: he was saying it was a neocon conspiracy or the
18:20
Speaker 4: Islamists were behind it or something.
18:22
Speaker 2: He's like, why are X and Y.
18:24
Speaker 3: Probably the Zionists, not the Islamists.
18:25
Speaker 2: The Zionists.
18:26
Speaker 4: It was a Zionist conspiracy and all that stuff. Look,
18:29
Speaker 4: algebra was right around where it started getting hard. And
18:31
Speaker 4: I was not as much able to help my kids
18:33
Speaker 4: with their math as they used to be. And let's
18:36
Speaker 4: face it, they're going to go to mom for that
18:37
Speaker 4: first anyway. But just kind of this recognition that like.
18:42
Speaker 4: This didn't happen overnight. And it's one of those things
18:45
Speaker 4: where there probably were a bunch of times, but also
18:46
Speaker 4: it's this recognition. Nicole Hannah-Jones notices the teachers aren't correcting
18:51
Speaker 4: the math problems. The teachers aren't correcting the grammar and
18:54
Speaker 4: the spelling and stuff like that. Like, unfortunately, there are
18:57
Speaker 4: bad teachers in this world. Teachers unions do a lot
18:59
Speaker 4: of effort to make sure that those bad teachers don't
19:01
Speaker 4: get fired. And there's such a thing as tenure where
19:04
Speaker 4: you cannot get fired short of like, going after a
19:07
Speaker 4: kid with a chainsaw in shop class. So, that's a
19:11
Speaker 4: big part of the problem. And there's a chart going
19:14
Speaker 4: around that demonstrates, you look at the teachers' union strength
19:18
Speaker 4: and literacy scores, there are a handful of blue states
19:22
Speaker 4: that have good scores. But generally, that upper quadrant, it's
19:25
Speaker 4: all red states. And that lower bottom quadrant, New York, Hawaii,
19:29
Speaker 4: and one of the others, it's a bunch of blue states. Unfortunately,
19:32
Speaker 4: teachers' unions are an impediment to student achievement. There are
19:35
Speaker 4: a whole bunch of teachers unions are going to hate this.
19:37
Speaker 2: I'm sorry. That's what the data is indicating.
19:40
Speaker 4: And I noticed that aspect was not in her essay
19:43
Speaker 4: because I think it was too hard a truth for
19:45
Speaker 4: her to bear.
19:46
Speaker 3: So what you're saying, though, even though she didn't directly
19:48
Speaker 3: mention her husband in the column, she's saying that's my
19:52
Speaker 3: husband is a little bit different than the way Taylor
19:54
Speaker 3: Swift was yelling. That's my husband after Travis Kelsey scored
19:57
Speaker 3: on Sunday night.
19:59
Speaker 4: Now, since you saw that, Greg, you know what she
20:02
Speaker 4: was doing is she was pointing to that, right?
20:04
Speaker 2: The ring. She was pointing to the one ring that
20:06
Speaker 2: the Chiefs won without the refs.
20:10
Speaker 4: Sorry kansas city listeners it's we we joke because we
20:14
Speaker 4: love and we're bitter because you keep winning.
20:17
Speaker 3: Jim's still mad about the call on sauce gardner that's.
20:20
Speaker 4: Right that's right you guys in the taylor swift game
20:24
Speaker 4: she had just started dating travis kelsey back then was
20:26
Speaker 4: not passing her parents.
20:28
Speaker 3: All right i know this is going to shock you
20:29
Speaker 3: but when we come back more fraud in minnesota All right, Jim,
20:38
Speaker 3: we know about a ton of fraud in Minnesota, but
20:40
Speaker 3: now there's even more. But apparently they're getting a little
20:43
Speaker 3: bit better at discovering it before it gets too far
20:45
Speaker 3: out of hand. This is from KARE, Channel 11 NBC
20:49
Speaker 3: affiliate in Minneapolis. The Hennepin County Board set aside $ 2
20:52
Speaker 3: million in March for local businesses that they say were
20:55
Speaker 3: affected by Operation Metro Surge. That's the ICE surge there.
20:59
Speaker 3: To apply for grants ranging from $ 3, 000 to $ 10, 000 each.
21:03
Speaker 3: But once applications for the Small Business Recovery Fund started
21:06
Speaker 3: coming in, The commissioner, Jeff Lund, says an overwhelming number
21:09
Speaker 3: were fraudulent. Quote, the fact that people, after all this fraud,
21:13
Speaker 3: felt they could apply and get away with it, I
21:15
Speaker 3: think is a problem because there's clearly no fear out there.
21:19
Speaker 3: He says that next stage, the nonprofit reviewing applications for
21:23
Speaker 3: the county found applications obviously fabricated using AI and applications
21:27
Speaker 3: copied and pasted across multiple businesses. And essentially, the county
21:32
Speaker 3: paid $ 500, 000 to legitimate businesses that could confirm were eligible.
21:36
Speaker 3: But that was only 82 businesses out of the 300
21:40
Speaker 3: applications they received. He says, until we get it where
21:44
Speaker 3: people fear things, they're going to keep doing it. And
21:45
Speaker 3: now they've shut down the program. So again, they've caught
21:48
Speaker 3: it a little bit faster here. But Jim, fraudster's gonna fraud.
21:52
Speaker 2: Less than a third. Less than a third were deemed legitimate.
21:56
Speaker 2: Overwhelming number.
21:57
Speaker 4: First of all, yes, good for them to check before
22:01
Speaker 4: they send the checks out. Traditionally in Minnesota, they send
22:04
Speaker 4: the checks out and then some years later they do
22:06
Speaker 4: an audit. Oh my God. You know, 47 businesses are
22:09
Speaker 4: in one location and things like that. So, good for them. Two,
22:13
Speaker 4: I think this does indicate, like, if you're Michelle Tafoya,
22:17
Speaker 4: if you are the state house speaker out there who's running, like,
22:21
Speaker 4: you should be emphasizing this. You should be emphasizing when
22:24
Speaker 4: they say, oh, the message from Peggy Flanagan and the
22:26
Speaker 4: rest is, oh, we took care of it.
22:28
Speaker 2: No, they did not.
22:29
Speaker 4: Nobody is afraid of fraudulently applying for grants. Nobody's afraid
22:33
Speaker 4: of trying to grab some of that public money. If
22:36
Speaker 4: you're a Minnesota voter, I don't understand how you can't
22:38
Speaker 4: make this, if not your top issue, it's got to
22:40
Speaker 4: be high up there because you're getting fleeced and you've
22:43
Speaker 4: been fleeced for many years now. And you can't expect
22:45
Speaker 4: to get to change with the same old people and
22:48
Speaker 4: the same old party running things as they always have.
22:50
Speaker 2: Unbelievable.
22:51
Speaker 3: Unbelievable. But that just keeps going. Jim, have a great day.
22:55
Speaker 3: See you tomorrow.
22:55
Speaker 2: See you tomorrow, Greg.
22:56
Speaker 3: Jim Garrity, National Review. I'm Greg Karumbas of Radio America.
22:59
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