Latest / Sid & Friends In The Morning / Vito Fossella | 06-25-26
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: Olive Garden is in trouble.
- 0:01Speaker 2: Olive Garden, that was the one they need to advertise
- 0:04Speaker 2: on w ABC if they want to.
- 0:06Speaker 1: Sing themselves exactly and get their pro Italian. But Italian Americans,
- 0:10Speaker 1: especially in the city and in New Jersey, if I
- 0:12Speaker 1: say Olive Garden, I don't go there. But they they
- 0:16Speaker 1: get so angry, They get so angry.
- 0:19Speaker 3: My opinion, it's brand x Italian food.
- 0:23Speaker 1: It's like uh McDonald's of oh no, McDonald's.
- 0:28Speaker 4: Yeah yeah.
- 0:29Speaker 5: I reson Augusta, Maine, and my wife asked the concierge
- 0:32Speaker 5: at the at the hotel, we need a good Italian rustlans.
- 0:35Speaker 5: I have a recommendation. She's oh, you're lucky, the best
- 0:37Speaker 5: one in the whole state.
- 0:40Speaker 1: Well at least she didn't say we have macaroni and cheese,
- 0:42Speaker 1: how about that? But all kidding aside, we are joined
- 0:46Speaker 1: now by another great Italian American, Vita Facila, the Borough
- 0:48Speaker 1: President of Staten Island, and uh Borough President Facila. We
- 0:52Speaker 1: have to ask you, you know, with these crazy elections
- 0:55Speaker 1: here in the Manhattan part of New York City, is
- 0:58Speaker 1: Staten Island prepared to be once again the citadel for
- 1:01Speaker 1: common sense decent Instead of running to Florida or Texas,
- 1:05Speaker 1: should they run to Staten Island.
- 1:08Speaker 4: I think you're can ask you if I'm gonna go
- 1:09Speaker 4: to Olive Garden as John and the judge. No, we
- 1:18Speaker 4: have They have Italian Italian restaurants in Staten Island, and
- 1:24Speaker 4: one's better than the other, so Olive Garden can't do
- 1:28Speaker 4: too well here. I think, uh, you know, listen, we
- 1:32Speaker 4: gott to just take a step back and really digest
- 1:36Speaker 4: what happened just a couple of days ago, and it's
- 1:39Speaker 4: for real, and I think what happened is frankly, the
- 1:43Speaker 4: other party allowed this to happen, and they allowed the
- 1:47Speaker 4: fox in the henhouse and they got walloped. And it's
- 1:51Speaker 4: not a good sign for the country in the short term.
- 1:55Speaker 4: Over the long term, as we all come to appreciate
- 1:59Speaker 4: socialism meets reality, it's wherever it took hold, it was crushed.
- 2:05Speaker 4: It destroyed people, destroyed freedoms that destroyed faith based people.
- 2:11Speaker 4: Everywhere it's been sort of allowed to creep in. It's
- 2:15Speaker 4: destroyed the countries that it took over, and it takes
- 2:19Speaker 4: time to root it out. But in the short term
- 2:22Speaker 4: it's it's rather destructive and the establishment politicians on the
- 2:28Speaker 4: other side allowed it, and they got their headhanded to them.
- 2:32Speaker 4: And I don't think it's going to slow down. So
- 2:35Speaker 4: in the short term, it's it's bad for the United
- 2:37Speaker 4: States of America that socialism is allowed at the table
- 2:43Speaker 4: because when you start to look at what they want,
- 2:46Speaker 4: it is corrosive and it hurts people, property owners. It's
- 2:53Speaker 4: all about class warfare. They want to destroy the capitalist
- 2:56Speaker 4: system that we enjoyed has made this country the best
- 3:01Speaker 4: in the history of the world. So we just got
- 3:05Speaker 4: to stand up and every once in a while you
- 3:07Speaker 4: got to say no. Like just recently, we had a
- 3:10Speaker 4: situation on Staten Island, a graduation for middle school kid
- 3:15Speaker 4: mid middle school kids thirteen whatever, twelve, thirteen years old,
- 3:19Speaker 4: and somebody wanted to disrupt the ceremony by in the
- 3:24Speaker 4: middle of it just displaying a flag to send the
- 3:27Speaker 4: political statement, and we said, no, you just can't do that,
- 3:31Speaker 4: because a graduation, like so many things for the families,
- 3:36Speaker 4: for a point of reflection, decorum, and every once in
- 3:42Speaker 4: a while you got to say no, we can't do that.
- 3:45Speaker 4: And I think the other party allowed the socialists in
- 3:48Speaker 4: far too long and they didn't say no, so ultimately
- 3:52Speaker 4: they won these primaries and now we're running major cities
- 3:56Speaker 4: across the country with disruptive, structive policies and the ordinary
- 4:02Speaker 4: folks who are getting up in the morning five five
- 4:04Speaker 4: thirty to go to work the other ones who are
- 4:06Speaker 4: gonna get hurt ultimately, and not the ones who want
- 4:10Speaker 4: free stuff every single day.
- 4:12Speaker 2: Vito Fernando Matteo here, how are you? I am great,
- 4:16Speaker 2: I am great, and I'm very proud of the Staten
- 4:19Speaker 2: Islanders and what you guys do there. You know, you
- 4:21Speaker 2: maintain your independence. You know you draw the line when
- 4:24Speaker 2: you need to draw it, and I commend you for that.
- 4:27Speaker 2: But I realized that you kept saying that other party
- 4:32Speaker 2: the other side. You never mentioned the Democratic Party because
- 4:38Speaker 2: now there's a takeover of the Democratic Socialist Party. Right,
- 4:43Speaker 2: let me ask you, what are you going to do
- 4:45Speaker 2: with the Democratic Socialist Party goes to Staten Island uh
- 4:49Speaker 2: and spreads the venom? But what what what are your thoughts?
- 4:52Speaker 4: Can they do that some of the First of all,
- 4:55Speaker 4: it's great to hear your voice, my friend. Uh. I
- 4:58Speaker 4: I my my, I really tried not to be a
- 5:01Speaker 4: partisan guy. I just stand up for what I believe
- 5:05Speaker 4: and what we should do for the people of Staten Island,
- 5:08Speaker 4: whether it's better schools, safe streets, safe communities, working and
- 5:13Speaker 4: supporting the men and women in the New York City
- 5:15Speaker 4: Police Department, supported in our first responders, fundamental things, and
- 5:19Speaker 4: that's how I've run my life. In the political world,
- 5:23Speaker 4: what the Democrat Party does is their concerns, not mine.
- 5:28Speaker 4: My observation is that they're making a big mistake long
- 5:32Speaker 4: term and the short term. There was a primary recently
- 5:35Speaker 4: in Staten Island for Senate incumbent, and the incumbent won handily.
- 5:41Speaker 4: I think she got more than seventy percent of the
- 5:43Speaker 4: vote because the people in Staten Island are sane. You know,
- 5:47Speaker 4: they have demonstrated common sense, John's favorite phrase for decades,
- 5:55Speaker 4: and we believe in each other. We believe in again
- 5:59Speaker 4: safe community. We don't you know, when defund the police
- 6:03Speaker 4: was the catchphrase of the century, we said, that's the
- 6:07Speaker 4: dumbest thing we've ever heard. So we do. You're right, Fernanda.
- 6:11Speaker 4: We do retain and maintain our independence against insanity and
- 6:17Speaker 4: stand up for common sense, and we will continue to
- 6:20Speaker 4: do so and support the hard working taxpayers who didn't
- 6:26Speaker 4: wake up. You know, they didn't wake up on third
- 6:27Speaker 4: Base and say I hit a triple. A lot of
- 6:30Speaker 4: them suffered like that like that. You know, their families
- 6:34Speaker 4: came here from all over the world, Italy, Ireland, whatever
- 6:38Speaker 4: the case may be. They worked hard, they sacrificed, they
- 6:43Speaker 4: were two or three jobs for their kids and then
- 6:45Speaker 4: their grandchildren. And they own a home, and they have
- 6:48Speaker 4: a job, they own a business, and they want they
- 6:51Speaker 4: want what's best for their kids and their families, and
- 6:54Speaker 4: we will continue to support those things. If there's another
- 6:58Speaker 4: group that comes along from other part parts of the country,
- 7:01Speaker 4: they come here when they're twenty five, A lot of them,
- 7:04Speaker 4: you know, they've probably never suffered a day of their life,
- 7:07Speaker 4: and all of a sudden they say, capitalism is terrible,
- 7:10Speaker 4: the US is terrible. We need to get out of
- 7:15Speaker 4: defund the Department of War, in other words, abolish the
- 7:19Speaker 4: Defense Department. These are insane policies. If implemented, they will
- 7:25Speaker 4: wake people up.
- 7:26Speaker 3: It's worse than that Veto. It's worse than that Judge Wainberg.
- 7:30Speaker 3: What did what did the Esperans a person that beat
- 7:35Speaker 3: say yeah, yeah, she.
- 7:37Speaker 5: Wants to abolish the Pentagon. Just totally get rid of
- 7:41Speaker 5: the old Defense Department, totally, totally abolishing veto.
- 7:44Speaker 3: I mean, I mean it was. It's just silly stuff.
- 7:47Speaker 5: No, well, it's all nonsense. And by the way, I'll
- 7:49Speaker 5: tell you what the big problem Vito, and you and
- 7:51Speaker 5: I go back decades and decades together. The big problem
- 7:55Speaker 5: is they have a momentum going on, and the momentum
- 7:59Speaker 5: is captured the young people who do not understand history,
- 8:03Speaker 5: they understand economics, they understand politics, they understand social cohesion,
- 8:08Speaker 5: so they have an ideology that's driving them and they're
- 8:11Speaker 5: the ones who are coming out to vote. The percentage
- 8:15Speaker 5: of voters in this primary is minuscule, and if you
- 8:19Speaker 5: look at the demographics that came out, they were the
- 8:21Speaker 5: young kids, and they were likely kids who had never
- 8:24Speaker 5: been raised here and understood the problems of the battle
- 8:27Speaker 5: days that you and I know when we were at
- 8:28Speaker 5: city Hall together about protecting defending the city and how
- 8:32Speaker 5: easy it is for the tip to go very very bad.
- 8:34Speaker 4: Your thoughts, No, I am blessed to have a relationship
- 8:39Speaker 4: with Judge Weinberg that goes back to the early nineties,
- 8:42Speaker 4: and one of the reasons jumped into politics and public
- 8:46Speaker 4: service was to write the ship of a city that
- 8:49Speaker 4: was going down the tubes. And you talk to a
- 8:52Speaker 4: young person about what it was like in Times Square
- 8:56Speaker 4: in nineteen ninety one, ninety two and across the city,
- 8:59Speaker 4: they have no clue. And now you look at it,
- 9:01Speaker 4: it's vibrant, it's alive. And if you allow it to
- 9:07Speaker 4: again corrosive policies to allow criminals on the streets, they're
- 9:12Speaker 4: just going to commit more crimes and do a bunch
- 9:13Speaker 4: of different things. And I go back with you, judge
- 9:16Speaker 4: with guys like Peter Vallone, who were sensible, common sense,
- 9:20Speaker 4: decent human beings who just wanted what's best for the city.
- 9:25Speaker 4: As opposed to what you're saying. Are younger people primarily
- 9:29Speaker 4: coming from across this country and perhaps the world, who
- 9:33Speaker 4: have never been punched in the face by reality, and
- 9:36Speaker 4: they just want this utopia that's never going to exist.
- 9:40Speaker 4: We can do it, we can. We're going to be imperfect,
- 9:43Speaker 4: but you got to work for it, you got to
- 9:45Speaker 4: strive for it, and you gotta earn it. We're talking
- 9:48Speaker 4: to We're.
- 9:50Speaker 1: Talking to Vita Paicella Borough, President of Staten Island, and
- 9:53Speaker 1: mister Vasella, you come from a political family. You know
- 9:57Speaker 1: politics very very well, and i'd like to ask you
- 10:00Speaker 1: to dig a little bit deeper into what you just said,
- 10:02Speaker 1: because you're talking about some people who may have been
- 10:04Speaker 1: supposedly on the other side of the aisle political opponents
- 10:07Speaker 1: from time to time, from the past and also the
- 10:09Speaker 1: recent past, who were still decent people who still maybe
- 10:12Speaker 1: we disagree with them on how they wanted to make
- 10:14Speaker 1: things better, but they did want to make things better.
- 10:17Speaker 1: I put it to you, as someone who's been watching
- 10:18Speaker 1: politics for a long time, do you have the same
- 10:21Speaker 1: inclination that I have that some of these people, including
- 10:25Speaker 1: Mayor Mom Donnie, including Diarisa Avilla Chevalier, are not actually
- 10:31Speaker 1: looking for a better America or a better city. They
- 10:33Speaker 1: are funded through this Act Blue and other sites by
- 10:36Speaker 1: the enemies of this country. I mean, I hate I'm
- 10:39Speaker 1: not trying to put a conspiracy theory out here, but
- 10:41Speaker 1: I don't think these people are actually looking for a
- 10:43Speaker 1: better New York or a better USA. I think that
- 10:46Speaker 1: they're funding and their support comes from outside this country,
- 10:49Speaker 1: people who mean us harm.
- 10:50Speaker 4: Sir, I agree. I think there are a lot of
- 10:53Speaker 4: people on the other side who supported these canidates, who
- 10:56Speaker 4: hate this country, who hate capitalism, who who hate the
- 11:00Speaker 4: act of the country defending ourselves and defending our allies
- 11:04Speaker 4: who stand up for those who want freedom and democracy.
- 11:09Speaker 4: In the Middle East, for example, there were those who
- 11:11Speaker 4: want to destroy the state of Israel, destroy it. Not
- 11:15Speaker 4: just we don't like them, they want to destroy them.
- 11:18Speaker 4: And we have an obligation to stand up for the
- 11:21Speaker 4: people who love freedom, who stand up for capitalism over communists,
- 11:26Speaker 4: and to support our allies. That's what good people, decent
- 11:30Speaker 4: people do. And yes, I served at the City Council
- 11:34Speaker 4: with Judge Weinberg and many others when he was there,
- 11:37Speaker 4: with Peter Malone. As I mentioned, I served in Congress,
- 11:40Speaker 4: and the one thing I would say the twelve years
- 11:43Speaker 4: I had the privilege of serving the people sat out
- 11:45Speaker 4: in Brooklyn. Some of my best friends were Democrats. They
- 11:49Speaker 4: were human beings. There were good people. We disagreed philosophically
- 11:53Speaker 4: on certain things, politically on certain things, but we worked
- 11:57Speaker 4: together for the good of the order and the common
- 11:59Speaker 4: good to make this country better. And now it's a war.
- 12:04Speaker 4: Everything you see it looks like there's a war between
- 12:06Speaker 4: people between You can't even associate with a Democrat if
- 12:11Speaker 4: you're a Republican vice versa. That is long term disaster
- 12:16Speaker 4: for the country and what it allows is a vacuum,
- 12:19Speaker 4: and nature poors a vacuum. So what do you get?
- 12:23Speaker 4: You get the major cities around the country are now
- 12:26Speaker 4: run by socialists who want to think and state clearly
- 12:31Speaker 4: everything is free. That doesn't work in the long term,
- 12:35Speaker 4: as they mentioned at the very outset and the short term.
- 12:38Speaker 4: It's a problem, and it's a big problem. And ultimately
- 12:42Speaker 4: actions speak much more loudly than words. And to John's point,
- 12:47Speaker 4: one of the key aspects of the platform with the
- 12:49Speaker 4: Democrats Socials of America is to defund the Pentagon and
- 12:54Speaker 4: the Armed services. And the most important thing government can
- 12:59Speaker 4: do is to protect the innocent people of this country
- 13:03Speaker 4: who just here we are on the two hundred and
- 13:05Speaker 4: fiftieth anniversary of the United States of America. It's the
- 13:08Speaker 4: greatest in the history of the world. And there's a
- 13:10Speaker 4: good chunk of the Democratic Party on the left who hated,
- 13:14Speaker 4: who want to see it destroyed. And I hope the
- 13:17Speaker 4: good people of this city, the state, in this country
- 13:20Speaker 4: rise up and crush it, crush it in its cradle,
- 13:24Speaker 4: because what they really want is destruction of the United
- 13:27Speaker 4: States of America.
- 13:28Speaker 5: Veto. There was a recent poll came out from CNN
- 13:33Speaker 5: of all places set as follows. In two thousand and
- 13:36Speaker 5: two thousand and one, eighty percent of the Democrats loved
- 13:40Speaker 5: and supported the country. Today is twenty nine percent. Amongst
- 13:44Speaker 5: the Republicans, ninety percent supported and loved this country in
- 13:49Speaker 5: two thousand and two thousand and one. Today it's ninety percent.
- 13:52Speaker 5: So what you have here is you have a falling
- 13:54Speaker 5: off of love of this country, of patriotism, of dedication
- 13:58Speaker 5: to the values of this country. And this is not coincidental.
- 14:01Speaker 5: This is funded a lot by our foreign enemies. Is
- 14:04Speaker 5: a group called Justice Democrats. Justice Democrats as foreign money.
- 14:10Speaker 5: It infiltrates from the Middle East Islamis And what they're
- 14:13Speaker 5: trying to do is they're trying to create schism in
- 14:16Speaker 5: this country and they're being successful. We're more divided today
- 14:19Speaker 5: than we've ever been in my lifetime, VEO. And it's
- 14:22Speaker 5: very frightening for that future of our children and grandchildren.
- 14:26Speaker 4: I can't disagree. I can't disagree, judge. And part of
- 14:31Speaker 4: it is this. We saw it a few years ago
- 14:34Speaker 4: with the Ivy leagues. Mi alma mater, University of Pennsylvania
- 14:38Speaker 4: got caught up in it with just blatant anti semitism
- 14:42Speaker 4: when they pretended to don't exist in the other ivs,
- 14:45Speaker 4: and ultimately, fortunately they prevailed that these presidents were asked
- 14:49Speaker 4: to leave. But there were decades of indoctrination of you
- 14:54Speaker 4: would talk to hate the country. Right, so you're graduating
- 14:58Speaker 4: some of these Ivy League schools and all you are
- 15:01Speaker 4: taught in let's say always, but a good message that
- 15:05Speaker 4: they were taught was hate the United States of America.
- 15:08Speaker 3: Veto let me interrupt one second, and then you'll go,
- 15:13Speaker 3: and we got take an eight thirty year break. The
- 15:17Speaker 3: thing that's coming up is, you know, let's go to
- 15:21Speaker 3: Democrats under Bill Clinton the country eighty percent of the
- 15:25Speaker 3: Democrats loved America. Bill Clinton loved America. This all happened
- 15:31Speaker 3: post Obama, and that is the secret during Obama, during
- 15:35Speaker 3: Obama and post Obama and Joe Biden. I don't blame him,
- 15:41Speaker 3: you know, I don't blame Joe bah I don't think
- 15:43Speaker 3: he knew he was here. And you know, people are
- 15:46Speaker 3: saying that was Obama's third term. I don't know who
- 15:50Speaker 3: was running the White House under Joe Biden somebody. I
- 15:55Speaker 3: think that we have to find out eventually who it was.
- 15:59Speaker 3: But people say it's Obama's third term. But but this
- 16:04Speaker 3: happened post Obama and and I remember what his wife
- 16:08Speaker 3: said about America, et cetera. And Fernando, what did you
- 16:12Speaker 3: want to say?
- 16:13Speaker 2: Listen, veto before we lose you, because I know we're
- 16:16Speaker 2: going to lose you soon. What can be done? And
- 16:21Speaker 2: can it be done? Can Staten Island have its own
- 16:24Speaker 2: mayor its.
- 16:25Speaker 5: Own city secession movement?
- 16:29Speaker 2: You know who changes it? The city Charter Commission, legislat
- 16:34Speaker 2: you know.
- 16:35Speaker 3: I mean you're dreaming for that.
- 16:36Speaker 2: No, listen, I may be dreaming, but the truth of
- 16:40Speaker 2: the matter is Staten Island is a different place.
- 16:43Speaker 4: You know.
- 16:43Speaker 2: It's it's a place that makes sense.
- 16:46Speaker 3: It's like it's like a suburban city.
- 16:49Speaker 1: Last words to you, Staten Island Borough President.
- 16:52Speaker 3: He's answer me last word.
- 16:54Speaker 4: So the short answer is we can't do it right now.
- 16:58Speaker 4: Perhaps so if these things continue, that statean is would
- 17:01Speaker 4: secceed to become its own county or city. But let
- 17:03Speaker 4: me just say this on the positive, I don't want
- 17:05Speaker 4: to make it all negative here. You know, I spend
- 17:08Speaker 4: a lot of times in schools. Just sweek alone, we
- 17:10Speaker 4: announce a new field and gymnasium building. I spoke out
- 17:14Speaker 4: of graduation for a grammar school. The kids are great.
- 17:19Speaker 4: The families that attend, that send these kids to school
- 17:22Speaker 4: a great people. Eight ninety ninety percent are so positive.
- 17:27Speaker 4: They blest and they belt out the national anthem. They
- 17:31Speaker 4: sing God Bless America the top of their lungs. We
- 17:34Speaker 4: just need to foster that and say this is the future,
- 17:38Speaker 4: and these other marginalized people go full circle, these wealthy
- 17:42Speaker 4: perhaps kids from all over the country who hate this
- 17:46Speaker 4: country in such a way. We need to grow these
- 17:49Speaker 4: young people to say you are growing up in the
- 17:52Speaker 4: best country in the history of the world. Crowd out
- 17:55Speaker 4: these nut jobs and crush them so they don't ruin
- 18:00Speaker 4: destroy this country. So we can be here another two
- 18:02Speaker 4: hundred and fifty years.
- 18:03Speaker 1: With a positive message. Thank you so much, Vera President
- 18:05Speaker 1: Vita Fasela. You will not be seeing him at Olive Garden.
- 18:09Speaker 3: And we'll be right back.
- 18:10Speaker 1: We'll be right back a lot of great guests.
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- 18:42Speaker 6: so you never have to wonder what the heck is
- 18:44Speaker 6: going on here