Latest / 775 Alive / Ep021: Bridging the Gaps

Transcript

Ep021: Bridging the Gaps · 775 Alive

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[Music] Welcome to the 775 Alive podcast, your rural Nevada headquarters for decoding politics, economics, and general global shenanigans. I'm Crystal Newton, your business strategist, breaking down why Nevada's hustle is stronger than a sagebrush root in a windstorm. Here with my trusty co-host, Scott Gavorsky, PhD historian, here to explain the smart lessons of history, even if we are likely to ignore them. Grab your boots for a wild ride through today's most important news.
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Scott: Hey, welcome back to 775 Alive. Once again, opposite sides of the state. I'm back up here in Elko to deal with some uh some events uh that we have going on this week up here.
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Crystal: The split. It's not east west this time. It's north south.
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Scott: South, right? Yeah. A little different. You're still down to Vegas, right?
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Scott: Crystal: A pigeon carrier anymore. Yeah. Yeah. It's what over 400 miles between us right now. So, um yeah. So, what we're doing is you know, we talked a little bit about in the Moms for Liberty episode about coming down and visiting. You know, one of the big points here of this podcast is bridging that gap across a whole range of sort of divides, but the big one's rural and urban. Um so, you know, last couple weeks I was down in Vegas doing some meetings with Crystal. Crystal's got some other stuff going on. And just we figured we'd share a little bit about what we've been up to uh in our initial stages here to to, you know, unite Nevada as it were.
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Scott: ton of different types of Republican groups and conservative groups and we got to take a sampling if you will and and a lot of them well all of them were very gracious and they were very happy to see us there. We were welcomed. It was awesome. So I kind of want to lay out the pitch that I gave to all those groups. Um, we talked about how rural counties have some of the highest voter turnout in the country. We talked about our new lithium industry and how powerful that could be for Nevada. Um, and then we really did take a turn to ask Clark County Republicans, what are we doing to win next year's midterms? What are we doing to win back the Nevada legislature? And we had some very interesting conversations, some very stimulating conversations. But my big takeaway, and I think yours too, Scott, was we were a little shocked to see how little people understood about this new industry coming in. Every took a little bit of a pause and you could see the gears turning. They're like, "What?" And I'm like, "Hey, listen. This is a global market. We have a chance to take it over. Nevada could be the new Silicone Valley of lithium." And it really comes down to Clark County and Washoe County Republicans.
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Scott: Scott: One minor thing, I think it's Silicon Valley. Silicone Valley something else that Vegas is . . .
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Scott: Crystal: Did I say Silicone? thing because cause part of talking about bridging this gap was the fact that you know we sat down with Caleb Cage, oh, a month or so ago and talked about the lithium loop that Governor Lombardo's been pushing. Aand in some ways this is an industry that's going to unite both northern and southern Nevada in a way economically it has not been united before. Right. We've always had this weird sort of economic split. Uh but what's so interesting about it, and this uh came from our sort of last joint discussion with a group called the Las Vegas Conservative Town Hall, right, who were who were very gracious. Thank you Daniel and Jeff for having us down and letting us talk to a group. Um and unfortunately, it happened to occur on on September 10th, which we'll talk about here later was um you know, of course, the assassination of Charlie Kirk. So, we were dealing with that. But what was so interesting talking about them is we mentioned the lithium loop and there hadn't really been a lot of discussion down here apparently about that. Um but what was so interesting is once members thought about it for a member of this discussion group we got into it they're like well are they talking about workforce development are they talking about training are they talking about bringing in sort of ancillary high-tech industries and the answer is yes right this is exactly what we talked about when uh we had the conversation with Caleb and this is one of the big benefits of this and I think it shows a strength to this lithium loop concept um that even we're coming into an audience cold and this is not an audience you know this isn't engineers this isn't minor this isn't people who who live this stuff 24/7 uh immediately saw where these connections and where the buildout of this industry really could help them. Uh and that was very very encouraging to see. Yeah, I think everyone has heard of lithium and I just kind of we're not trying to make this a show about lithium, but just a quick recap. We we're the only state in the United States that has all seven parts of the lithium supply chain. We have inventors here that are going to make the intellectual property for this entire industry worldwide, which is another stream of revenue that is extraordinary. But most importantly, we're we're known for gold mining and that's a raw material that we can't really tax that much. It's not an end user consumable. And lithium we're turning into products that can actually be consumables, which will generate tons of tax revenue. So, I really wanted to drill it home to Clark County Republicans. this really does kind of lean on your guys's strategy going into the midterms. And I guess to flesh out that idea a little bit, I am concerned that if we have a super majority legislature, of which we're very close, um that the Democrats might make it very hard, if not impossible, for this industry to flourish. And yeah, and and that was something else talking about this in terms of of the political dynamic. You you just mentioned a little while ago that we have some of the higher voter turnouts in the country in the rurals. And one of the things that happens when we're down here uh at a series of these meetings is the Nevada Secretary of State of course releases the voter registr, the updated voter registration numbers. So if you look at active voters that is people who uh have voted recently or just recently registered um the 15 rural counties the 775 minus Washoe County in Reno uh are about one in 10 voters in the state. A little little more than that but not much right. Um for and we talk about Republicans though, we're 18 1.5% of active registered Republicans. That's one in six. Yeah. Um but then we also have a large percentage of nonpartisans that tend to vote half or 2/3 when they vote um towards the Republican side. And that's why in the 2022 midterms, for instance, we we turned out about one in five votes that were cast for Governor Lombardo, right? So we're we're batting at double our thing. But what was interesting is looking at those numbers is when you compare it to what's going on in Clark, the 15 rural counties effectively are negating the Democrat registration edge there in Clark County, right? And I think that was interesting for them to hear because everything they're doing is now seen as sort of just a direct additive vote in the Republican um Republican tally, right? We're we're counterbalancing their deficits. Well, and I think it was kind of eye opening for them to see people from rural counties come down and interact with them and to show that we are that concerned. And I'm like, I I don't know. We can't get much better on our voter turnout. We're doing everything we can as rural counties to make sure we don't lose this legislature. And I think it was kind of eye opening for them to see us down there and really asking around like what are we doing? What's the plan here, guys? Right. Um yeah, and and again mentioned they were gracious. It's always, you know, it's always sort of surprising. Um I gave there's a clubs consortium down here that uh Pauline Lee oversees with the Nevada Republican Club. They get together once a month. That's a club. Oh yeah. Oh no. It's very very big and very active to the lunch. What was it? Lieutenant Governor uh Stavros. Yeah. Lieutenant Governor Stavros Anthony. Um and it's a musket stop. Uh the clubs consortium that met the following week is a little smaller. It's it's really the leadership of the various clubs around the area and some of the consultants and campaigns and whatnot. And uh Paulina actually asked me to come in and speak. Um some of you have read my article series or some of see some of the stuff here. I'm very interested in these rural communication networks. Yeah. Right. And um today Pauline Lee was asking you how she can help bridge the divide between rural and urban Nevada. and she was actually super concerned about generating a commercial that rules would find offensive, which I really appreciated. She's like, I don't want to like make something hokey or something. She's like, how do I make something for the rurals? And I just appreciated being asked that. Well, you were asked the question, but I appreciated that she asked the question. Well, yeah. No, and this is this is important because, you know, again, one of the things we're going to have to talk about is is understand how to talk to each other. Uh, and that's one of the things that came out of the club's consortium that it it caught me off guard because we talked about this a little bit. uh I think when we did the public media uh episode um so Eureka Elco and White Pine counties which is mainly northeastern Nevada um is not in either the Las Vegas or the Reno designated market area or DMA for television broadcast. We're actually in the Salt Lake market. In other words, you know more about the person running for governor in Utah than you do in Nevada. Precisely. Not to mention a whole range of other stuff because they can't advertise. And and when I mentioned that at this club consortium, people literally gasp. I mean, audible gasp because they did not realize how disconnected because of a decision and these are set by Congress, right? So, this is literally something that's going to take an act of Congress to fix and there's not a lot of appetite. But that opened their eyes and understanding why we don't seem in Elko, this is something we've heard for years up here. You don't seem to be talking about the same stuff we're talking about in Vegas. Well, we, you know, a lot of times we're not able to follow that closely. um because you know we're being flooded uh with with Salt Lake news and it's a different perspective. Um I also appreciated the audible gasp. Thank you for caring so much. Right. I mean, no, it was really shocking for a lot of people to hear that because, you know, and again, these are people that are active in the state political um, you know, circles and, you know, understanding that there's a fundamental infrastructure problem that we're trying to deal with out in the rurals um, you know, is something they really needed to hear, right? And, um, but, you know, that got us into a lot of conversations how we could how, you know, approaches to doing this. Of course, I was a big promoter again, uh, rural radio. uh absolutely huge right in this type of stuff. I do want to bring up um these these are probably gonna the rest of this episode's probably going to be full of contentious things. So, I'm just going to let everyone brace themselves. I because normally we just talk about the flood, right? Well, I wanted to talk about um the Jill Douglas episode incident at the town hall group because I think there's a lot we can pull out of that. Um and then I also wanted to talk about what Alex Slack talked about. She brought up two subjects I really haven't heard conservatives talking about, but it's just we're kind of at the beginning of the trend line in talking about these two subjects. And that is feminine uh what do you call it? It's not toxic masculinity. It was toxic femininity. Yeah. Subject and um Muslims taking over public office. And like again, these are all kind of subject matters that make your stomach clench just a little bit. But I think there's some important stuff we pulled out that I would like to share. I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, some of this stuff is is very relevant to some of the issues we've seen over the last week as well. Yeah. Yeah. So, one of the things going on in the state party was um an effort to kind of solidify all support between our or behind our governor, lieutenant governor, and comptroller. Is that what Andy Matthews is? Yeah, he controller. Controller. So, there's an effort to, you know, get behind them and pre-endorse behind the primary, which has been a little contentious for some counties. People aren't sure if they really want to do that. I don't know if you want to speak to that, but it did lend itself to what happened between Jill Douglas and um was it Matthew Winterhawk? Yeah, Matthew Winterhawk. Um yeah, so WinterHawk Winterhawk. Um but the uh yeah, so just on the endorsement issue, this is something that's been contentious for years. Uh and the argument is that the the sooner the sooner Republicans back behind a candidate that can avoid uh both expensive and destructive primaries, right? That's what they're that's what they're doing. Um now, one of the things, of course, most of you probably know I'm I'm chairing the Yoko County Republican Party. And one policy I've inherited u that's in our bylaws and we're going to continue is we actually don't endorse uh Republican candidates during the primaries at all. and that you know as a party and uh the chair and vice chair so myself and and my colleague um we don't issue endorsements now party members can as long as they just make it clear it's not on behalf of the party and what this does is this this is twofold one it created a lot of problems um uh in years past right one faction of the party wanted to support this candidate another faction wanted to support that candidate um you know and it just it just it just leads in our opinion um to a lot of content attention. Um that's really not necessary. Um the other part of it is also of course you you know we actually want to see the candidates, right? Because we have a lot of views up there that uh a lot of issues that really aren't aren't widely shared, right? And um um so you know getting them up here if if we endorse right out of the bat, you know, people just sort of walk away and that's that's very problematic. Um but yeah, you're right. there is a push among uh a lot of the both the county parties and the state party uh to issue these early endorsements of candidates in order to try to clear the field right and this is going on not only at the at the state level gubernatorial and the controller level um although I don't really think anybody's risen to challenge Andy Matthews um and of course we got to throw Stavros Anthony in there and I don't think anybody's really emerged uh to challenge him either um but it's really the the governor's race right is it just it's just the one Matthew Winterhawk Well, no, there's there's uh there's two or three other candidates. I haven't had a chance to meet him. Of course, we had a lot of conversations with Matthew. If you followed our Facebook page, he happened to be in Winnamaka and uh come out of the Walmart and and and saw our banner. We don't. Well, you're you're missing the whole story because we were at this town hall and there was this contentious interaction between Jill Douglas and Matthew Winterhawk. And it was quite a back and forth and I will flush that out in a second. But the the funny part of that story was almost immediately after that town hall, it's like he hopped into his car and did a tour of all the rural counties and one of the stops he stopped in in in front of one of our signs to do a what do you call it? A short, right? Yeah. He did he did a little reel on Facebook. It just happened. like we've just met that guy. Um yeah, and this is this is uh of course just to clarify, Jill Douglas was recently elected um chair of the Clark County Republican Party. Yeah. I wanted to little background before we described what happened because I really do think Jill Douglas deserves a lot of credit. She took over uh the Clark County Republican Party and it was a quite a contentious vote. him and her and Jesse Law have kind of different factions and so it's a really tough job for her and I saw her speak a few times before with that interaction happened. So I got a chance to build up quite a bit of respect for her. Um and I don't need to necessarily agree with someone's platform or viewpoint to respect them. But I I respected the position she held and and the difficulty of that position. And I wanted to make sure to say that before we described what happened because it is a little like whoa that we were at the town hall with Alex Slack and we'll go into that later. Yeah. And this was the uh the uh conservative town hall group in North Las Vegas which Patricia and Garland Brinkley uh sort of run down there in Vegas probably are familiar with their talk with a conservative podcast and radio show on KSHP. Yes. Down there every week. So they're in the big leagues with their radio. They're under like regulations and they had you call into their show just the other day, right? They didn't have me call in. I voluntarily called in. There was an interesting discussion um that that paralleled some the um some debates we were having on I just did a local radio show on some of the the the recent debates about political violence up here in Elco. And I just happen to have all this stuff fresh and um got through the lines and we're able to talk to them, their guest about it. So, we were at the town hall and we were talking about these two new brand new contentious things which are um basically Muslims taking public office in an alarming rate and then also toxic femininity. These were just two things I'd never heard people talk about. And so that was the subject matter when Jill Douglas stood up, got the microphone, she turned to Matthew Winterhawk and she's like, "Can you tell everybody if you've ever been a registered Democrat?" And Scott and I were sitting right in between the two. We're like, uhoh. Yeah. We we were we were like in the line of fire just how it I mean literally just how this sort of happened. But it's very exciting. Down and it took me a little while to figure out like it's tied in with that pre-endorsement thing of like we're trying to get everyone out of this race so that we don't have to deal with any um contention or competitors which you know it's like but if you want to win that is the move to make. Well yes yes yes and no. Again, I I I disagree with that and I, you know, what whether Clark County Republican Party wants to do, that's that's on theirs and, you know, we'll support him as a fellow Republican party. Um, but, you know, part of part of the issue, um, I had, and this isn't this isn't, you know, this isn't bad about the the two people involved, right? Um, so issue number one is is I really think this is a problem where we're trying so early to get down to one candidate. Again, the argument is this is what the this is what the other side does, right? So, we're just following their playbook, but I I think what that does is curtails a lot of issues we probably could be discussing. And traditionally, um and and my take I'll just say upfront uh one of the things we tend to see in these types of challenges um even when there's very contentious uh 2022 again the Joey Gilbert versus Joe Lombardo debate, right? A lot of times in these rural counties, there's there's really not the these it it's clear who's going to be the leading candidate. They usually clear 50% plus of the hurdle. But what the fear is is that everybody else is is so mad that they don't vote. Um and we don't see that, right? We don't see that at all in the rural counties. You know, once that primary is over, we actually see the voters coalescing um behind the candidates, right? Uh which is exactly what we do with our party. you know, once somebody wins the primary on the Republican side, 100% behind him, no question asked. Uh so, you know, one of the things a lot of these candidates actually end up doing is bringing up a new perspective uh that might be of interesting to people, but what we find is is they really draw off very few votes. Um, in terms what I'm concerned about is these type of inner party struggles tend to be exactly the ones that actually end up turning off more people who don't want to be associated with this sort of what they perceive as inner party fighting um that we actually need. We lose more voters because they're mad at the party, not just Republicans, but also when this gets out uh to nonpartisan voters who who might be interested in some of this stuff, but then they hear, "Well, there's a party keeping somebody from speaking. You know, the heck with it. I'm just not going to vote." That's actually what I think is more damaging out here in the rurals. Yeah. And now that you mentioned it, I and I think the other issue if I could um again, right, um I think one of the problems we're also going to have is we are seeing a lot of shift over here from the Democrats to the Republican side from various voting groups. Now, should we be taking somebody who's recently changed party um affiliation as sort of our flag bearer? That's probably a discussion we need to have. But I think we need to have a serious debate that, you know, if we really are going to welcome these people into the party, that that welcome needs to be um not necessarily free of scrutiny, right? But well, we can't hold them by him and treat them like sort of secondass Republicans because at one point in an earlier life, they had been Democrat, right? Um we should be applying the same standard. So I think this is this is some stuff we've got to work out internally on this matter. Yeah. And it's not just new Republicans. Um, one of the things I was able to discover, I I've been kind of I've been pushing on this Nevada legislature thing non-stop, as you know, it's like my that's my north star is always remember this legislation, this legislature is out of balance. It's out of balance. And I'm like, why is no one talking about this? And it was always in the back of my head. I'm like, how come Republicans don't talk about this? And this trip to Clark County, I got a chance to talk to a lot of people. And I think I did get to the bottom of why they don't talk about this. And it lends itself to what you're saying about incorporating new people and having this platform that and and trying to get over the infighting. Well, it seems like in 2016 we had control of the legislature and we raised taxes and ever since then we've had a split in the party and it basically went Republican and independent, right? And so in general, we don't need to just accommodate for new people. We need to offer a bridge back for the old people, right? I don't I don't think Republican independent's probably the way to do it, but the Republican vers rhino, right? The Republican in name. Yeah, that's what it seemed like to me. And I almost wondered if that 16 legislature that passed that the tax raises were rhinos because I it just shocked me to hear the Republicans voted for a tax raise. I'm like, sound right. Yeah, but you know, there was a lot of stuff that's went on that and I actually think that the the long-term trauma, if one will of the of the 2016 tax thing, people throw it out, but I think more what's driving uh some of the laws of the legislature, gerrymandering plays a huge role, right? There there's a real problem when you have a state that's basically 50/50 and Democrats have 75% of the seats because of how they redrew it at the last legislature. That's that's one of the issues that we're having. Well, not quite 75% but yeah, close to supermajority status. Um, that's a problem. We're going to have a ballot question, right? The no vote Nevada team has um um put forward a ballot question. So, in a couple weeks, we'll be talking about that. And I'd like to propose uh having uh Dr. Sandre Cosgrove on as a as a guest at some point to talk about that. But I think it's also sort of a problem. Again, I think there is a lot of internal friction that's actually going on. And I think it is is actually more pronounced in some of the urban counties than it is the rural. Yeah. Right. And I think that's I I don't I don't think I don't think our colleagues in the urban areas don't understand the supermajority. I don't think that's what it is at all. I think No, I think they understand it. I just think the reason they don't talk about it is because this kind of horrible thing happened in 16 and no one wants to talk. Like you bring up the legislature that someone can always say back to you, you had it and you messed it up. So like I now I get why people don't talk about it. That's what I'm saying. Well, nobody talking about this except for me. I'm like the only one idiot running around going, "Hey, if only Republicans had the legislature, right?" Well, and I I think I think and this is something I think we're seeing is that, you know, in an effort to repair these various splits, because I do think there are multiple splits in the party. Um, one of the things we're going to have to do is is really focus on not only the theme of unity, but there's a lot of organizational groundwork that needs to be done. Um and you know this is this is one of the problems we've seen particularly since 2020 where we've had a lot of um um groups sort of rise up here right so we've had this group up here in Elko that's been pushing for election integrity and basically what they discovered is holy smoke you know political political activism and political organization takes a lot of effort and time and energy and you know you've got to really get people lined up and I think what we're finding is that you know recognizing it is it is incredibly hard and I think what we're starting to find is that these groups are starting to burn themselves out to a certain extent and they're now more willing to talk with each other because they realize not only that they need to unite to win, but they need to unite to share the burden, right? Because this this is overwhelming if you're trying to do it with a group of 15 or 20 people here or, you know, a couple hundred there. Um, it it quickly becomes overwhelming. All right. Yeah, I was excited to hear hear both Jill Douglas and Pauline Lee really drill down on a campaign like how are we going to reach people? How I mean they're doing everything from giving little gift bags to newly registered Republicans to organizing door knockocking campaigns which I think is one of the most important things. I know my biggest obstacle when I was in a liberal area and taught that Republicans are very scary people. Don't talk to them. they'll talk you into some kind of crazy madness. So I like our biggest obstacle is actually just having a conversation with a Republican. And at the minute I had a conversation with Republican, everything in my world changed. And I was like I if there's some way the Republican party can get out there and actually meet face to face with people, we wouldn't be so scary. There's nothing really to be scared of. We're just using logic and common sense, right? And and again, you know, this is one of those things that doornocking has been proved. I mean, this was a lot of strategy that was um um sort of foregrounded or really deployed in 2008 for the first Obama uh election run. Uh and surprisingly slow. So, there's there's a lot of concern that it might not play out. And of course, in rurals where we have much more dispersed population um can't really do it in rurals, but definitely here in the urbans you could, especially if it's not a hot weather month, right? Summertime, you can't be walking around door knocking. But I think that the idea of not only having a strategy, but but going through the technical or tactical organizing, if I could use some military language here, this tactical organizing of how you're going to do this, how you going to approach that? Now, granted, again, going back to the the this and I don't really want to call it an incident. Um I I think it is an example of some of of some of the divisions in the party we probably need to talk a little bit more about. Uh but that being said, I think one of the things is um at least from my perspective is it was really interesting to see um that we have now some significant groups in Las Vegas um that are talking about this outreach in very tactical terms what we're going to do. Um, and I was also pleased that, you know, we had a couple conversations with these various group about what we're doing out in the worlds and seeing a a tremendous amount of overlap, right? And that's one of the things I think that's vitally important is that we're across the board in these different dynamics starting to pick up on the same uh sort of approaches which is just going to make us more effective as we can learn from each other. Oh yeah, absolutely. I know we're having a debate in Washoe County. I think Washoe County Republicans are putting on a debate at the end of September between David Filippo and Cody Whipple. Right. Right. A lot of people the last two weeks. I'm trying to keep up with it all. Well, and this is this is this is the congressional district 4 debate and the or congressional district 4 is sort of interesting um in the fact to do with wash out which is why this is so interesting. Right. Well, yeah, that that's another story, but uh generally for for our basic uh mission here of this rural Nevada divide, that's so we have two congressional districts, CD1 and CD3, that are both largely constrained within the Clark County area, right? They they might go out to some of the outlying rural areas in southern Clark. U but they're predominantly sort of urban, heavily urban uh precincts. Of course, CD2, which we're in under Representative Mark Amodei, that's Reno and most of the northern rurals. Yeah. Right. Um but CD4 actually crosses those. So a large part of the voting population is is there in Clark County is there in the Vegas area. U but it actually encompasses um Mineral, Esmeralda, and Nye counties as well. So, so these four rural counties, not to mention the northern rural parts of Clark County, Mesquite and whatnot are encompassed in this district where uh Dave Flippo and Cody Whipple um are both having interestingly to to step across these two sets of divides, these these two different environments to reach out. Yeah. And we're talking about doing different stuff and it is a little bit uh of a different thing for those two candidates to go to Wow to have a debate and that's that'll be interesting. You had breakfast with David, right? Right. Right. Yeah. And was he Was he awesome? Well, yeah, of course. I mean, you know, they're they're both you into an endorsement. No. No. Um and and I explained that. Uh no. Well, we were actually we we actually had a long breakfast on a whole range of issues. Uh of course, one of one of the things I was sort of doing was um you know, we were discussing some of the the possibility of tribal outreach, right? Uh because the tribal areas are much more pronounced here in the north. There are some in the south. Las Vegas Indian Colony, uh, Moapa Band of Paiute. Um, not to mention the huge number of non-N Nevada tribal members there in Las Vegas, probably about 50,000 people. So, you know, we're really talking about, you know, sort of the tribal stuff and some of the other stuff that's going on. Um, and, you know, Cody and I have talked about similar issues as well in the past. That's that's not that unusual. Um, you know, particularly for somebody like me, you know, in some ways doesn't have a dog in a fight. Um, I haven't I haven't yet met Cody Whipple. Does he walk around with a cowboy hat on? Oh, he does sometimes. Uh, I will say Cody's been a frequent visitor up here for years. He comes up for the horse races around our our county fair up here in Elko because it was a big part of um even that southern Nevada ranching culture there in Haiko and and area where he grew up. Um so, you know, that that said, it's not um you know, it's an interesting it's an interesting set of debates and and you know, I've I've enjoyed talking with both of them u over these last couple visits. Yeah, I mean all all politicians are interesting people if you think about it. Like the average person doesn't think to themselves, I'm going to run for office. That that's special person. So every single one of them are very unique people. I just don't I'm a little on the cowboy hat because James Settlemire's already taken that place in Nevada. He's the one that wears the hats. Well, you know, I had to I I I had to wear the hat down and and you know, one of the things and and you know, one one of the comments that got put down when people met us in person was not realizing that I actually stand 6'8, right? Yes. And uh so you know showing up at 6-8 with a cowboy hat and all of a sudden people want pictures of the rural county chair they came down to Vegas and remember to put the hat on. Right. Um but that being said experience we did meet some people that have seen the podcast and they've watched it and they walk up to you. They know so much more about you and the way you think than you know about them. Right. Like you're a friend and you're like who are you? But it's it's a great experience. They're actually very supportive after we met with all the groups in Clark County. I think our our downloads and views went through the roof. So, they're definitely supporting us, which is right. And not and and not all the groups. Let's I mean, you know, we were only down there basically 8 days. Um, of course, you're you're still down there, but eight days. And uh you know, this is not going to be something um we this isn't the end of the conversations we're going to have, right? No, we're just this is pre-season. This is Yeah, this is this is a preseason stuff. And the Super Bowl, right? Right. And one of the things we're going to see is we've been part of what we're doing here is lining up a series of guests to come on to the podcast and and talk about some of these issues. Uh so over the next couple months, you're probably going to see more and more guest interviews, which is one of the things we've always really wanted to do, right? Um so there. But she wanted to talk a little bit about Alex Slack. Alex Slack. Um she is from the Turning Point USA organization and she gave um she had the speaking position at the first town hall that we went to. The second town hall we were the speakers. And so it was kind of cool to see it modeled first. But Alex Slack, she's I think she's about four years younger than me, so same generation. And she had two kind of well, correct me if I'm wrong. I think these two topics stuck in my head because they were so unique and I had never heard a conservative talk about these things yet. I might just be behind the times, but um there is a line that's starting to get concerned about Muslims taking office and changing laws and um doing it at kind of an alarming and somewhat strategic pace that makes we're starting to take notice and we're just a little concerned. It's not it has nothing to do with ethnicity or religion or any kind of feeling of hate towards these people. It's more of like if you got enough of them in a city and change the laws, you could literally create a zone that our law enforcement couldn't get into. It could be kind of a strange thing happening. So, she touched a little bit about that. I don't know if you want to comment on that before I move into toxicity. Well, no, this and and yeah, I'd like to because we've seen some development. It'd be interesting. And again, just to remind viewers, uh, uh, both Crystal and I, in our undergraduate days did a lot of, um, uh, studying sort of in Arabic and Arabic cultures. Um, a lot of time with Arab people, right? Um, yeah. But where it's coming out, I think that's sort of interesting. Of course, we have uh, Governor Abbott in Texas just releas uh there's a town in Mex or Texas that tried to uh impose Sharia law. Um, we have, uh, somebody who seems to be a a staunch supporter, Sharia law, potentially running for for mayor of Minnesota. Uh, we've got, uh, Dearborn, Michigan, um, that started adding Arabic uh, language um, identification to their police uniforms. Um, and you know, this is this is becoming sort of an issue um, in part because one of the things that's popping out is the argument on the other side that it's um, sort of illegitimate for Christians to promote their beliefs in the public sphere. And we've been having this debate for years. Um, but now we have another religious group that's arguing the same thing, right? Um, I actually don't think it's going to go very far. And the reason is um I I'm I mean one of my my big complaints for years is we've evolved into a system where there's not a lot of local authority left. And this is going to this is going to come into a real problem if they're trying to do stuff. They're going to get some some real push back. And I don't think it's going to fly because you're not going to be able to say, "Okay, your local town, you can have Sharia law and we'll just push the Constitution to the side." That's just not going to fly. I don't think. Um, but I do think it's interesting to look at in the fact that again, particularly since uh the assassination of Charlie Kirk here on September 10th, um, that there's a lot of concern now about supposedly quote unquote religious rhetoric uh, in the public sphere, right? And you know, a lot of it's driven towards ideas of Christian nationalism. Um, and it's going to be a huge debate we're going to have what what what makes Christian nationalism bad, but efforts to push Sharia law. Okay. Right. Um, that's I was thinking like the liberal side's gonna have a tough time with this because there's so much about getting God out of everything. And I'm like, well, Muslims worship a god, too. Well, but but you got to get that god out, too. Well, yeah. Let's take an interesting example of this. And I'm going to apologize because you you brought it up and I didn't do um but there was the actress who won the Emmy uh we just had the Emmy awards who got out there and spoke on a pro Palestinian position. uh and then her she didn't like acknowledge anybody for the win or anything. She just used her speaking position to be pro Palestine and a couple like two other things. Well, you know that that's perfectly accept. I I could care less about that. Yeah. Yeah. What was interesting about it though is she makes that speech which gets picked up on some of these Hezbollah or Hamas affiliated media in the Middle East and one of the things they did is they actually censored her dress because she was showing bare shoulders and cleavage. Right. This is Hollywood, right? And and a lot of people are saying this is this is quite ironic, right? Um, we're going to see more of those we're going to see more of those debates cuz I I'm I'm not sure you can make under say the 14th Amendment an argument that okay um we're we're not going to allow a city council to display the Ten Commandments because that's government uh forcing the law but we're going to allow them to throw out their law book and base it on Sharia law uh which is coming out. I mean it's just not going to happen. Um it's not going to be a fun debate, but I think the end the result of this is is it's going to be much a hubbabaloo about nothing. Um and again, we've seen this this was one of the complaints about Catholics when they start immigrating into the United States in huge numbers in the 1830s through the 1860s. Um so this is this is, you know, part of our our sort of regular debate. Um, and and to be honest, I'm not as alarmed by it as as Alex is. But, you know, I'm not either cuz I I recognize that the the cultures and ideas that we have now took thousands of years to develop. And that's one of the things when you when you change things really quick and you come up with a fancy new narrative and you change all the rules, it could work for a little while, but eventually you start hitting the spots where it's like, "Oh, that's why we didn't go this direction as a civilization. Oh, that's why we didn't go." because you start to it starts to cave in on itself. You can say Christians are bad, but you can't also say Muslims are good. It's like you have to weigh out logic and common sense, which is why that's what core belief of conservatives. But it takes thousands of years to get to a place where we're at and we're like, "Okay, this is why we do things this way. It's not because it sounds fun. It's because it's been proven over time." And so too worried because I know all these weird narratives are going to fall on themselves eventually. Wow. And I I don't want to say it's weird narrative and I I'm you know I'm not also a fan of the the opposite the sort of the Rousseauan inspired French model that one should become naked as they say come naked to the public sphere right that any type of personal identity needs to be left at home that's unrealistic as well but again this is something you need a balance in society which is why we're so upset with liberals is because you like you need both sides you need both opinions you need both perspectives to make life work Right. Right. And this is probably something the other side. And this is probably something we need to b back on and do a full episode on because there's some interesting dimensions here that are going to be emerging over the next couple weeks and months. Yeah. Yeah. So, the toxic femininity. Toxic femininity. That's one you're going to leave to me, right? Yeah. For the most part. So, I this is something I kind of began to think in the last few years in in my mind. I'm like the female side's gotten kind of way out of control in some ways. And I'm wondering I was like, am I the only one that's noticing this? But it was one of her big points. She came up and she talked about toxic femininity. And it's like this constant harping on men to not be so masculine and not be so toxic. And it's kind of turned our society into this like listless kind of body that doesn't quite know how to take a direction because that's really like the male energy, right? Is is to take hold of something and put it in a direction. And then females are more like we try to ruffle or unruffle the feathers and make it all nice. But there's a there's a play between the two and that masculinity part's been taken away and all of a sudden we've seen, you know, in education kids aren't performing as well. Crime rates gone up. we have we're passing social infrastructure packages at the federal level instead of actual infrastructure things and we're like I think we've gotten a little off course and so she's kind of it's kind of this new concept of toxic femininity. It's like it's really nice but it's so nice that everything's rotting and falling apart. Well, I was happy to hear her bring it up because I'm like women we need to leave some room for men to be men and do what they do. Well, and that's, you know, there there is some truth to that, right? Um, I think a lot more of it is is a a a far more questionable argument. I would put this way. Um, that a lot of it is tied a lot of that discussion has been tied to issues such as fertility figures and this great uh replacement. I mean, this was something we talked a lot about is of course um there was a big census study that just came out about um you know, about half the counties in the United States, right? uh have more people over 65 than they do children under 18. Yeah. Right. Um and fertility is below replacement level. Um now this is this is not the the levels are probably um unique but you know this is a debate that western societies have been having uh going all the way back to the 19th century and some of it has been our country. Yeah. It's not just our country and yeah well within the western tradition these have taken some very dark turns. Right. Um, but I think it's interesting that one of the things again about this, uh, that was so interesting was being able to talk to people because, you know, I've mentioned over the years talking about our two counties, Elco and Humble being the youngest county. Uh, and some of the people that are tuned into this are like, "Yeah, you you guys actually have fertility rates that are surprisingly high uh, for rural counties or for US counties, right?" Um, and there's some issues on that. So, that was a that was another interesting thing that I haven't really seen is urban people paying attention. Um, now I think part of the problem we're going to see about this, um, whatever we think about fertility rates, uh, I think there is a very fine line between fertility rates and sort of promoting the same stuff that promotes that that gets Margaret Sanger involved in the 20s, the eugenics movement. I think it's a very dangerous fine line uh, sometimes to talk about this. Yes, we we can't keep continuing to tell young males that they're they're worthless to society, which has been a message that basically has come out. Um but at the same point you know we don't we need don't need to be telling women to avoid toxic femininity you need to be back in the home in the kitchen and barefoot and pregnant. I think you know that there there is a space and a recognition of individual choice to make. It's unfortunate that it's got to the place where women feel like staying at home and raising a child is the least you can do with your life. And you can have whatever opinion you want. It's my opinion that that's the most important job in the world. But I mean it it shouldn't be the case that women think they're failing if all they are is a mom. Like that shouldn't be the case. But also to tie it back to the Muslim thing, Alex pointed out that Muslims are reproducing at a factor of eight kids per couple. Whereas Western society is less than two per couple. So we're not even keeping with our replacement rate. But even worse, there's a whole group of people that would love to take over that is they're reproducing way faster than we are. So they have the people to do it. And it was like there's some we've got to grapple with these issues and it and there's no like easy way to to take a line and not make a bunch of enemies because you say like you like you said you don't want to tell women to stay home and raise kids but right and and we don't want to cascade all those wanting to take over the world. I mean come on you don't want that either. Yeah. But right but there is these dynamics although I I think you know alarmism aside one one of the things we're seeing globally is since the '90s there's been a global decline uh in fertility rates right yes some groups are still higher than others but you know this the the Malthusian apocalyptic stories that came out with uh right the population bombix population bomb in 1970 and all this type of stuff haven't come to pass um just like Malthusianism didn't play out in the the late uh 18th and early 19th centuries as Thomas Malthus has proposed it would um get prize for using Malthusium twice, right? Oh, I could use it a lot. That's freaking great. Well, and it's again, this probably makes another episode because there's an interesting connection between Malthusian thought and uh some of the arguments that that Karl Marx ends up making in the Communist Manifesto and later capital. Um but again, u as part of the debate, yes, it was interesting to hear that perspective. um you know we don't have to agree but that's why you have these conservative town halls or any type of town hall is to hear other sides that you don't agree with. Well and that that is the point right is like uh there is some things that you're not going to want to talk about. There is some subjects where taking a stance is going to be problematic no matter what you do but it is important to hear all the different voices. And I I think this is kind of my segue to Charlie Kirk and we can talk about him a little bit and what he was trying to do, but that is the whole point is sometimes you're going to say offensive things and you're not going to be on the right side of things, but you're not going to know unless you can talk it out. And if you don't feel like you can say what you need to say, we'll never really get to where we need to get as a culture. So, and that's one of the things Charlie Kirk really really pushed on was he wanted he really he wanted to encourage people to defeat him. He was looking for someone to defeat him, right? And like that's kind of along the lines I've taken that too is I I don't have so much of a problem with being wrong because every time I'm wrong, I realize I'm learning something new and I'm getting better. So, I actually get a little excited when I'm wrong or disproven. And except for the case of you because I'm always wrong with you. You're so smart. That's nonsense. I'm like, "Dang it. That's nonsense. I just have a lot of opinions from you. I likewise. I mean, you know, that's the whole thing with Charlie Kirk was he was she's trying to encourage people to grow and and figure out what parts of your thinking are off and which are on, which are valid, which are not. And um it just sucks that we're in a place where the other party thinks it would be better that we didn't speak at all. Well, and that's and that's really the the real problem is shutting down uh that conversation. And I think that's part of what come out uh of a lot of this. I mean, you know, debates about political violence. One of the things we saw since the assassination, it's like, well, you know, we have all these these ceremonies and candlelight vigils. We just had a a big one up in Elco um um last Saturday night. Um and um you know, the the arguments, why don't we come out for Melissa Hortman, right? The Minnesota Democrat that was shot. You know, this is this is preferential and whatnot. Well, the the problem is there are there are some differences. One, um, you know, at no point does recognizing one person obligate you to recognize somebody else. I don't know where exactly that comes from. Um, but but I do think there is a problem. Charlie Kirk, polarizing or not, was a national figure in a way. Melissa Hortman wasn't, right, and her colleagues who got shot, too. Um, two, we're not really as sure about. We're not sure of any of the motives um um in that, but I think it's fairly clear to say I I'm not sure Hortman and that series of assassinations in Minnesota uh was aimed to shut down a debate. Right. Right. We we don't have clear things. It's, you know, some people are arguing it's right-wing, other people are arguing that it was about extending health care to immigrants, which she actually voted against. Right. Um but but this was a name that a general way to shut down debate as as many people in the Charlie Kirk situation on both sides see right a lot of people saw the assassination as a way to silence political debate. A lot of people on the left saying the reaction is moved at um trying to silence the debate. Truth is we shouldn't be silencing the debate at all. At the end of the day discourse is always always always preferable to bloodshed and violence. Right. Yeah. And I mean our founders recognize that too. Um we used to live under a monarch and there was basically you're handed down the foods. They they decided what foods you're going to eat. They decided what got planted. They decided what the narrative was that was acceptable. When we got here we were like you know there's only one way to really know what's going on with everybody in a country and that is if everyone is allowed to speak their mind and then we can try to get ahead of problems before they become a huge problem. What happens when you can't speak is the problems become enormous to the point of catastrophic before you can recognize them. So, it's important that everyone can speak their mind all the time, even if it's complete nonsense. We need a a good random sampling of how people are feeling to run a country. And well, I I did want to tackle this notion that this hate speech and labeling our our side hate speech and words are violence. I really think there is a legal argument to be made that we embedded into our constitution. freedom of speech because we decided that it's okay for everyone to speak their mind. So I don't know how they can continue on with calling anything violent speech. This it's basically you don't agree with it then it's violent. No, what the what the argument is I think is actually much more pernicious and again I would direct this against some of the arguments on the right as well. um speech, qua speech, speech is itself I is protected by the first amendment and it should be however offensive that speech is, right? Um when it crosses over into action, right, which is the definition of violence, um yes, then by all means there there probably is something to do um right um there is an action that society or government should be taking, right? Uh to police that. The problem is, I think part of what's going on is this is another one. Nobody thinks that the US is ever going to dump the freedom of speech out of the First Amendment. But if you start saying that these categories of speech are actually violence, you're creating that these categories of speech are actionable government. Yes. To to legislate. And I think um that's a way to sidestep an issue I think that's going to be very dangerous across the board and we we shouldn't even be dealing with. Um, and I think that's that's one of the things that's going to end up coming out of this is having to have a a much more um a much more hopefully fruitful discussion on where those lines are. Now, of course, there's also the problem that, you know, incitement the violence, you know, speech that incites violence doesn't doesn't is not protected under the the nobody wants it. The question is what does that mean? If you say something months later somebody does something, how do you make that connection? Yeah. Um, and that's something that's going to be hard for us to to sort of um police as well. Uh, I mean, my argument is is is anytime the government's involved in this stuff, it it's not going to work. It's not to anybody's benefit, right? It's it's much better for civil society to work through these issues and then tell the government how they want to act through their representatives. Well, the the real solution, the the solution that we we need that's going to be long-term and lasting is to have an oppo opposing viewpoint in our school system. So, we've covered this a few times before, but specifically in the Harvard episode where we talked about the the liberal ideology and then I went to to turning point and every conservative college student raised their hand when they were asked if you know were you graded differently because of your conservative viewpoints. And it was really alarming to me to realize that only one viewpoint was being taught in college and in fact others were not only being rejected but being labeled as hate speech. Super problematic. And the only way to fix that problem is to get conservatives a voice on the college campus, which is what Charlie Kirk designed Turning Point USA to be, was to open up an organization in each college that would allow conservative students to have a place to go and feel safe to speak their mind and then hopefully grow large enough to be able to speak back to the liberal side. Now, what has happened in 48 hours since Charlie Kirk's death, 32,000 new college chapter applications were submitted to Turning Point USA. So, I and I really really do not want to celebrate in any way what happened to Charlie Kirk because I love that dude. Um, but the problem was essentially fixed. So, you can celebrate. I Yeah, I'm not I'm not sure. college students now have a place in college and they have a voice and that that's enough to balance out the liberal side. Well, we we'll have to see on that. Now, the thing I remain concerned about is I absolutely uh somewhat agree that there there is a bubble chamber effect, not just on in college campuses, but in a whole range of stuff. social media. Governor Spencer Cox of Utah um you know made the tour of the morning talk shows this previous weekend and that was one of his big points is that these social media bubbles really just reinforced viewpoints don't allow that freak change of ideas. The problem is you know how do you police that without the government becoming so overwhelming right? You need to police it. You just need conservative students enough of them pushing back on the liberal ideology to where liberals are like oh there is another viewpoint. That's all we need to happen. Right. Right. But there there's a lot of people on the right arguing for policing this somehow, right? Uh and and you know, a lot of people Yeah. No, no. A lot of people at even stuff. Well, I can give you an example that I utterly sort of disagree with. And again, being a former college professor, you know, having a lot of this thrown at me, but you know, there's this there's this image circulating on um Facebook that purports to show how deeply embedded this quote unquote leftist ideology has been um um on race, class, and gender. Um, this is supposedly a syllabus reading list from 2010, uh, that list all this this sort of race, class, and gender readings, just page after page after page of this, uh, that ends up with the Communist Manifesto. And I'm like, see, this is, um, this is, you know, evidence of how deeply embedded this is. And then I look at it and I'm like, this is for a junior level or 300 level course that a major would take in sociology on race, class, and gender. What the hell else are you going to read? Yeah. I mean, we we could argue and I don't necessarily I've I've actually had read uh in my own background a number of these pieces. Um you know, I have a problem with some of them. There's others that I thought would have been, but you know, under under any type of freedom of academic inquiry, there's nothing wrong with this because the class is focused on race, class, and gender. Now, if they say we're not going to allow these things to be taught, but these things we are going to allow to be taught, then you've got a different discussion. But again, I think one of the problems we're going on is these echo chambers are creating some some weird misunderstandings across the board. Um that that you know, we really need to take a step back and have some fuller conversations about this. Yeah. And we do need to recognize people are going to be emotional for a while and they will come back to their senses and restricting speech. No conservative would would land on that in the long term, you know, right? Um yeah, and I think we're in for a rough rough period and it's sort of interesting. I'm I'm curious to see because you know and I think an adjustment period Scott. Yeah. Well Well and that's actually something that's worthwhile remembering is that you know again as a country this is not the first time we've been in this situation. Oh yeah. Right. there there's been a lot of other issues um that have divided and even you know one of the things and you and I have had a difference on this but but in some ways the political violence we're seeing now I I could I can point to you know three or four other periods in US history that have had um even worse uh sort of political violence, right? Not that it justifies it, not that it's a good thing to go through, but but it is something that's going to happen. I did, to my credit, I did um do a little bit of research on the assassination of Martin Luther King because I thought there would be quite a few parallels. Maybe not between the two men. In some ways, there are, but also just the place we were in society and where how we dealt with it afterwards. It it kind of seemed like a similar time in history where the same thing was getting played out. Yeah. Well, I think there's a whole range of other issues that were going on in the in the 60s that are influencing this. um you know cuz you know the Martin Luther King assassination can't be studied in isolation right we have the end of the assassination there's a range of other stuff in my mind he got shot because he was too successful at speaking what he was saying which is the same as Charlie Kirk well I I think James Earl Ray, the guy who shot him, is just a racist bigot I mean it's that simple shot Charlie Kirk was probably a terrible person in some way too but I'm just trying to shoot someone to stop a speech stepping right Right. And and and again, this is this is different, I think, than some of the other stuff we saw. I mean, ironically, one of the things I'm thinking about was it 74, 75 when Squeaky from takes the shot at Gerald Ford, right? This is this is somebody who they're not aiming to take down political speech. This is about getting Charles Manson sort of freed. And then you have the Hinkley assassination of Reagan that seems to be bound up with a whole range of mental illnesses. Um I mean the these things are difficult but what we can allow it to do is is stop these conversations across the board. Yeah. Yeah. And I I kind of wanted to if there is something you want to do as an a like people watching this um you know I thought of something really quick and really easy um you can go to TurningPoint USA website and subscribe to their email or go to one of their social media pages and follow them. I think it sends a powerful message to grow that organization as fast and big as possible to show the other side that it didn't really stop us. It it made us grow bigger. And you know, if there's one thing you could do, it would be to add to their social media following or or subscribe subscribe to their email, show up to an event, like support them. This is very a very good movement and it's really going to counterbalance our colleges and the ideology. So try to keep it going for Charlie. Right. Well, and and and that's well said. Although, you know, I would also encourage people that really seriously just start looking a little bit more widely. I mean, nothing against Turning Point. I don't think Turning Point's in any threat of shutting down. Um, you know, I I not saying they have a clear future forward, but you know, uh I don't think they're actually under threat of shutting down. Uh but, you know, the the conversation has to be more than Turning Point. It has to be more than uh some of the some of the stuff coming out of the Democratic left. We need we need far more conversations. um you know, you don't want an assassination to give the other side a gain. And so my biggest thing is I just want to show them it did not stop us. Well, they're they're arguing the same thing with a martyr ideology. Um but yeah, what grows like they got 32,000 chapter new chapter applications in 48 hours that just grew that organization exponentially. I don't know how you're liberal and call that a win. Yeah. I'm well I'm not either but um one of the things that's going to be interesting out here in Elko and and again you and I have talked about this is that you know we had set up this uh constitution event that's coming up right where the Democratic party here in Elko the Republican party and the Independent American Party are all going to get together and hold a joint discussion on the constitution and it's going to be interesting to see what the turnout is on that because this was something even before Charlie Kirk um the the tragedy there that this was aimed at something to promote these sorts of conversations at the community level, these sorts of conversations in a way that are going to be uh hopefully far more fruitful and let us sort of find those commonalities. That's what needs to happen. Yeah. Is get back to the traditional commonalities we share even though we might have very pronounced policy differences. Yeah, I believe that is September 17th, Constitution Day. Constitution Day is September 17th. We're doing the event on September 18th. Okay. uh just scheduling issue, but uh and I have to point out how awesome you are because you got the other side to to agree to a debate, which is awesome. And that is exactly what Charlie Kirk was trying to do. Well, no one else in Nevada's been able to put that together. So, kudos. Yeah. And I I would encourage them to do so. Go for it. But we told everyone we told were like, "We have a debate with the other side." They're like, "What?" Like, including the lieutenant governor who's like, "How did this happen?" Right. Uh, we live next to each other. We can't afford to hide behind our fences and lob grenades at each other. We actually have to get along with the other side. Well, and like I said, all I did was ask. I just reached out and asked, "What do you think about doing this?" And they're like, "Yeah, this is a great idea. This is this is something we really ought to be doing." And again, all this this precedes the the tragedy of September 10th with Charlie Kirk by a wide margin. Right. So, it's an interesting it's it's going to be interesting to see what turnout is. And of course out here in the rurals, you know, as well because you have the same problem in Humboldt. There's there's always 20 things scheduled the same day from city councils and county commissioners are sort of like, "Oh, which event do I go to?" So, um, but no, this ought to be a lot of fun. And maybe next episode we'll I'll I'll give a little blurb and tell you how it went. Okay. Okay. So, in the meantime, you know, uh if you want to extend on what uh Crystal was just saying, uh don't just follow TurningPingoint USA. Follow us here at 775alive.com. If you have some questions or something you want us to sort of follow back up on, uh shoot us an email at info@775alive.com. Uh until then, I'm Scott Gavorsky and I'm Crystal Newton and we'll see you around the 775. [Music]