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James Talarico’s Pastor Makes Shocking Admission · 3 Martini Lunch – Political Humor & Commentary

• 0:02
  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 Martini's coming up.
• 0:13
  Speaker 3: So glad you're with us for the Thursday edition of
• 0:15
  Speaker 3: the Three Martini Lunch. Jim Garrity is back today and
• 0:18
  Speaker 3: there's so much to get to. And Jim, we'll start
• 0:21
  Speaker 3: with the New York Times with yet another mea culpa that,
• 0:25
  Speaker 3: of course, always goes in the same direction. Something that
• 0:29
  Speaker 3: they messed up on their editorial page or something that
• 0:31
  Speaker 3: they messed up in the editing.
• 0:33
  Speaker 4: Process for a specific story.
• 0:34
  Speaker 3: I mean, the biggest ridiculousness we've seen from the New
• 0:39
  Speaker 3: York Times was probably the whole furor and resignation and
• 0:42
  Speaker 3: protest over Tom Cotton's op-ed back there in 2020. But
• 0:46
  Speaker 3: I got another doozy today as the New York Times
• 0:50
  Speaker 3: was reporting about the reaction in Israel about a new
• 0:54
  Speaker 3: documentary there. And it relates to the 10-7 terrorist attacks
• 0:58
  Speaker 3: by Hamas. And this is the paragraph that's got a
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: lot of people up in arms, rightfully so. And hat
• 1:06
  Speaker 3: tip to your colleague at National Review, Philip Klein, for
• 1:08
  Speaker 3: flagging this. Here's the paragraph in the original story. Israelis
• 1:12
  Speaker 3: are deeply divided over how to apportion blame for the policy, military,
• 1:16
  Speaker 3: and intelligence failures that preceded the attack and the war.
• 1:19
  Speaker 3: And here's the sentence. But Israelis still largely view themselves
• 1:23
  Speaker 3: as the victim of October 7th. The militants' attack killed
• 1:27
  Speaker 3: about 1,200 people in Israel and about 250 more were
• 1:31
  Speaker 3: taken hostage. And so, Jim, I don't know how else
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: you would interpret what happened on October 7th, 2023, then
• 1:37
  Speaker 3: the Israelis were the victims of all these Hamas terrorists
• 1:40
  Speaker 3: coming across the border and slaughtering people in the most
• 1:43
  Speaker 3: barbaric way possible and taking others hostage and treating them
• 1:46
  Speaker 3: unspeakably horribly, some of them for a very long time.
• 1:49
  Speaker 3: So once again, the New York Times is finding itself
• 1:53
  Speaker 3: having to make a correction here for something that should
• 1:57
  Speaker 3: have been caught well before it got published. The New
• 2:00
  Speaker 3: York Times Communications over on X says, we have added
• 2:04
  Speaker 3: the following editor's note to our recent coverage of the
• 2:06
  Speaker 3: Israeli government's reaction to the NAZA, or N-A-Z-A, documentary. Quote,
• 2:11
  Speaker 3: because of an editing error, an earlier version of this
• 2:14
  Speaker 3: article included a statement that was intended to convey Israelis'
• 2:18
  Speaker 3: perception of the government's military response to the October 7th
• 2:21
  Speaker 3: terror attack in relation to the attacks, but inadvertently suggested
• 2:26
  Speaker 3: that Israelis' experience as terror victims was a matter of perception.
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: It has been removed from the article. So, Jim, not
• 2:34
  Speaker 3: a complete shock that this got through the editors at
• 2:36
  Speaker 3: the New York Times. And I guess a editor's note
• 2:40
  Speaker 3: buried at the end is better than nothing. But if
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: you were playing fair here, this never would have made
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: it out in the first place.
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: Greg, way back in the days of the blogosphere, to
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: the bloggers taking on Dan Rather, the Pajama Hadeen, this
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: is back in 2004. The argument you heard from a
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: lot of mainstream media figures, particularly left-of-center mainstream media figures
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: who perceived the blogosphere as being largely right-of-center, was that
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: the mainstream media was better because it had layers and
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: layers of fact checkers. And boy, whoever said that, do
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: they regret that phrase? Because every time the mainstream media
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: makes a big glaring mistake, most of us would put, oh,
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: where are your layers and layers of fact checkers? And
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: by the way, there are some publications that do put
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: a lot of effort into that. Apparently, the New Yorker
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: used to be famous for it. Less tough on this
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: than they used to be. Didn't notice that, you know,
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: a whole bunch of stuff about Graham Platner.
• 3:31
  Speaker 4: But they did.
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: I don't know if they had layers and layers of
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: fact checkers on the idea that he was a Military
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: history buff who just never noticed that his symbol on
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: his chest was the symbol of Nazis, fine, whatever, the SS.
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: But I'm thinking also in particular of the example, every
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: conservative I know who has written for the New York
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: Times op-ed page. says that everything they say, there's like,
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: do you have a source for that? Can you put
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: a link to where you get that figure?
• 3:56
  Speaker 4: Where is that?
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: Nothing is taken at face value. And they feel like
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: it's a little bit like a proctological visit. Everything gets checked,
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: including the words and, the, and but, and if, and.
• 4:06
  Speaker 4: Stuff like that.
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: But on the one hand, if that's your standard, great.
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: But they've long suspected that left of center op-ed contributors
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: do not get subjected to the same scrutiny. I think
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: with sentences like this, where in these, if not layers
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: and layers of fact checkers and layers and layers of editors,
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: that sentence never read weird to them. That nobody was like, well,
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: wasn't it obvious that these Israelis would think of themselves
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: as the victims of the 10-7 attacks?
• 4:33
  Speaker 4: I mean, they were the... Victims.
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: Ergo, they would think of themselves that way. This is
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: not the Loch Ness Monster. This is not an impenetrable
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: mystery of why the Israelis would feel this way.
• 4:45
  Speaker 4: And you could even put.
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: The comma, Israelis, comma, understandably, comma.
• 4:51
  Speaker 4: See themselves as the victims of the 10-7 attacks.
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: And if you want to get into how the Israelis
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: responded after that and whether there'd been too much punishment
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: of the Gaza Strip, okay, fine, you can get into that.
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: But recognize that there's a reason they feel this way. Apparently,
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: this got through every single editor. As my colleague Phil
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: Klein observes, it's very hard to believe that's an accident.
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: It's very hard to believe that they're, you know, like,
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: This is your job to read the submissions of the
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: op-ed and go through it. And not just for fact checking,
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: but also like, is this a quality argument? Is this
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: a clear argument? Is this a persuasive argument? And I
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: just kind of don't see that. It's very hard to
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: believe that everybody on their job was just really bad
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: at their job that day or that they didn't on
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: some level agree that the Israelis make.
• 5:36
  Speaker 4: Too much of 10-7.
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: They're always posing as victims when they have done all
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: kinds of terrible things to Hamas and Hezbollah and the Palestinians, blah, blah, blah.
• 5:44
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think that's right.
• 5:45
  Speaker 3: There's certain people who just see Israel because they're more
• 5:48
  Speaker 3: powerful as the oppressor, no matter what the situation is,
• 5:51
  Speaker 3: even them being attacked and losing over a thousand of
• 5:54
  Speaker 3: their citizens. And like you said, there's kind of a
• 5:56
  Speaker 3: double standard in how the New York Times in particular,
• 5:59
  Speaker 3: but I think this is true in other media outlets
• 6:01
  Speaker 3: as well. They demand absolute verification for everything, someone leaning right.
• 6:07
  Speaker 3: will submit, but on the left, it's not the same
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: because when they do issue corrections, there's not a lot
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: of New York Times or CNN or MSNBC or whatever saying,
• 6:17
  Speaker 3: you know what, this story that was favorable to the right,
• 6:20
  Speaker 3: we just didn't get right. It actually wasn't as nice
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: to the right as we thought. It's always, it's always,
• 6:24
  Speaker 3: the errors are always, you know, denigrating the right or
• 6:29
  Speaker 3: in this case, Israel or, you know, it's the mistakes
• 6:32
  Speaker 3: always seem to go one way.
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I was going to say Sarah Palin did not
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: ultimately succeed in her libel suit against the New York Times,
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: but there.
• 6:39
  Speaker 4: Had been an editorial.
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: And by the way, for those wondering, you look at
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: most newspaper op-ed pages, the house editorials that don't have
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: a signature or don't have a name attached to them,
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: that is the editorial board of the newspaper or publication
• 6:51
  Speaker 2: itself saying, this is what we, our editorial board as
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: a staff believes, right? Then usually you have your letters
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: to the editor and then you have usually the op-ed
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: columns on the other side of the page. There was
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: a House editorial with the New York Times that said
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: the shooter of Gabby Giffords was motivated by a map
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: on her Facebook, on Sarah Palin's Facebook page.
• 7:11
  Speaker 4: That was not the case.
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: The shooter of Gabby Giffords was a cuckoo for Cocoa
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: Puffs lunatic who believed paranoid schizophrenic, who believed that punctuation
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: was part of how the government was controlling people and
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: stuff like that. And they never established any of that.
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: There had been something that looked like crosshairs or a
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: bullseye on her Facebook page, but nobody ever linked that
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: And I think what's fascinating is that everybody in the
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: New York Times remembered the controversy about, oh, did Sarah
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: Palin motivate this guy? None of them remembered the fact
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: that they didn't and nobody went back to check. And
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: so it just ended up as this assertion in one
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: of their editorials. She filed suit against it, won her
• 7:49
  Speaker 2: first couple of rounds, ultimately did not win. It's very
• 7:53
  Speaker 2: hard to prove libel or slander in the U.S. And
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: as a reporter, that's generally good news. But if it's
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: the government media talking about you, I understand why people
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: feel that way. Generally, you have to prove actual malice
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: or reckless disregard. Now, this to me felt like reckless disregard,
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: but apparently the judge felt differently.
• 8:09
  Speaker 3: In our profile of Jim Garrity, the line about him
• 8:11
  Speaker 3: walking around the neighborhood kicking puppies turns out not to
• 8:14
  Speaker 3: be true. We regret the error and we have taken
• 8:16
  Speaker 3: it out of the original story. Just Kujo.
• 8:18
  Speaker 4: Just one.
• 8:21
  Speaker 3: Maybe a couple of Patriot fans, but other than that,
• 8:24
  Speaker 3: it's not a problem.
• 8:25
  Speaker 4: All right.
• 8:25
  Speaker 3: Well, A lot more to get to here, but in
• 8:27
  Speaker 3: the meantime, let's talk about your business. And is it
• 8:30
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  Speaker 3: your business communication system. And for that, you need Quo.
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  Speaker 3: That's Q-U-O dot com slash 3ML. Music All right, Jim,
• 9:24
  Speaker 3: we are now on September 17th. Happy Constitution Day to
• 9:28
  Speaker 3: all who celebrate, which seems like a dwindling number of us,
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: but 239 years ago, they ratified it at the Constitutional
• 9:37
  Speaker 3: Convention in Philadelphia.
• 9:38
  Speaker 4: The states would then take it from there.
• 9:40
  Speaker 3: It's also Chuck Grassley's birthday, and contrary to popular opinion,
• 9:44
  Speaker 3: he was not one of the original signers of the Constitution,
• 9:46
  Speaker 3: but he didn't come around much later than that.
• 9:49
  Speaker 4: He is 93 today.
• 9:51
  Speaker 3: And doing much better than one of his younger colleagues,
• 9:53
  Speaker 3: as we'll talk about a little bit later in the
• 9:55
  Speaker 3: podcast today. But we are now uh, just about one
• 9:59
  Speaker 3: month and a half away from election day. And if
• 10:01
  Speaker 3: you live in Virginia, you can start voting tomorrow, which
• 10:04
  Speaker 3: is absurd, but that's a whole other conversation. Meanwhile, down
• 10:06
  Speaker 3: in Texas, we've got this, uh, tight matchup between James Tallarico,
• 10:11
  Speaker 3: the crazy Democrat and Ken Paxton, the ethically challenged Republican. Uh,
• 10:15
  Speaker 3: and so there, those are some of the reasons why
• 10:17
  Speaker 3: it's super close, but, uh, James Tallarico, ever since securing
• 10:21
  Speaker 3: the nomination, especially since Ken Paxton secured the Republican nomination
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: a couple months later in the runoff, has been trying
• 10:27
  Speaker 3: to pull away from this mountain of video of him just,
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: you know, saying the most crazy, socially whacked out things
• 10:35
  Speaker 3: like there are six genders and God is non-binary. He's
• 10:38
  Speaker 3: all saying, oh, no. This is all just me trying
• 10:41
  Speaker 3: to be provocative. I don't really think that. Of course,
• 10:44
  Speaker 3: there shouldn't be guys and girls sports if there's an
• 10:46
  Speaker 3: unfair advantage. I'm a reasonable guy. I don't know why
• 10:49
  Speaker 3: you're thinking this about me. Well, a couple of pieces
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: of evidence to the contrary. Not that we really needed it.
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: I think his mirage was pretty easy to see through,
• 10:58
  Speaker 3: but hidden camera with the pastor at James Tallarico's liberal church, St.
• 11:05
  Speaker 3: Andrew's Presbyterian Church, the Reverend Babs Miller. And Babs Miller
• 11:10
  Speaker 3: is not happy that James Tallarico is now moving away
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: from his far-left social positions. But, you know, as long
• 11:18
  Speaker 3: as it helps him win in the end, I guess
• 11:19
  Speaker 3: it's okay.
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: People are attacking Tallarico for saying that God is non-binary.
• 11:26
  Speaker 4: That's literally what he is. He went on Fox News
• 11:32
  Speaker 4: and walked that back.
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: Did you see that?
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he's giving some advice that I don't think he
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: should be following.
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah, because that's why, frankly, something that attracted me to
• 11:47
  Speaker 2: this church was like.
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: And I can guarantee you that once he gets elected,
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: he'll change his tune back to where he was.
• 11:56
  Speaker 4: Okay, but he has to kind of play this game.
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: Yes, that's what his campaign has convinced him of, is
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: that the Democratic Party is backing off. on their stances
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: on trans and all of this. And so his staff
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: is encouraging him to kind of do the same thing
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: just for the next 50 weeks or whatever days or
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: whatever days, I guess. I think it's bad advice personally, but.
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: If it helps him win, okay.
• 12:31
  Speaker 4: If it helps him win, okay.
• 12:33
  Speaker 3: And so James Tallarico has been trying to back off
• 12:35
  Speaker 3: from this, Jim, but you can do all the careful
• 12:37
  Speaker 3: rhetoric and statements and rehearsing answers to questions that you
• 12:41
  Speaker 3: want until you get an unscripted moment that kind of
• 12:45
  Speaker 3: puts you right back where you started.
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: Mr.
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: Tallarico, so nice to meet you.
• 12:48
  Speaker 3: Sorry, I broke my head.
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: I was there when you defended the drag.
• 12:51
  Speaker 4: Who's your favorite drag queen in Texas? Oh my gosh,
• 12:54
  Speaker 4: probably Alyssa Edwards. Alyssa Edwards? I love Marquise Mays. Thank
• 12:56
  Speaker 4: you so much.
• 12:57
  Speaker 3: Jim, that was a really quick answer. I don't know
• 12:59
  Speaker 3: any drag queens, and I certainly don't have a favorite one.
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: The one that he mentioned, there's video of that guy
• 13:05
  Speaker 3: teaching young kids how to be drag queens.
• 13:07
  Speaker 4: So this is.
• 13:09
  Speaker 3: getting creepier by the moment, but just having that instinctive
• 13:12
  Speaker 3: response pretty much undoes everything he's been trying to do
• 13:16
  Speaker 3: for the last few months on the cultural issues.
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: First of all, listeners, viewers, you should know that when
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: Greg said we should talk about this, I should point
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: out he said, who's your favorite drag queen, period. Like,
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: I thought that was the question. Who's your favorite drag
• 13:28
  Speaker 2: queen in Texas? An even smaller subset. And yet, so
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: first of all, breaking news that's just handed to me,
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: there are multiple drag queens in Texas. I kind of
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: would have figured that'd be a fairly small population, but
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: then again, it's a large state, so let's keep Austin weird,
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: as they say. And so, yes, so apparently he not only,
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: like he's evaluated this population and he's selected a favorite. Look,
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: first of all, If you're into drag queens, it's a
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: free country. Do whatever you want to do. But I
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: would point out that I wish those who want to
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: see gays and lesbians treated with respect understand and appreciate
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: not everybody's into it. Not everybody finds it as amusing
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: and entertaining and.
• 14:12
  Speaker 4: Wonderful as you do.
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: Not everybody's watching RuPaul's Drag Race. I guess that means
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: I know the name of one of them.
• 14:19
  Speaker 4: Guilty. You caught me.
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: But by and large, there are some people who are
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: into it and some people who don't find it funny
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: and some people who find it kind of vulgar. I
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: keep hearing people saying that drag is not sexual. And
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: maybe some aren't, but a whole bunch of them are
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: impersonating Dolly Parton. and they appear to be shoplifting basketballs.
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: So yes, it is sexual in some connotations, and there
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: are some people it's not their thing. In theory, there's
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: nothing wrong with the gay and lesbian pride parade. The
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: problem is that it always looks like these guys are
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: trying to do an S & M show. There is
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: a time and place for all sorts of things, and
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: when you decide to do that in the public square,
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: you cannot be surprised that a bunch of people react
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: negatively to this. When the image of the gay community
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: became These two nice guys who live down the street
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: and don't bother anybody.
• 15:09
  Speaker 4: They're just like us. They come to the neighborhood barbecue.
• 15:12
  Speaker 4: All of a sudden, attitudes change.
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: They stop looking like this outlandish, flamboyant, in-your-face, inappropriately sexually
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: in public type. Drag queens, look, I'm not going to
• 15:25
  Speaker 2: say it should be banned. I'm just going to say
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: you're going to have some sort of negative reaction to that.
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: And if you're James Tallarico and you're running for statewide
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: office and you decide, not only do you know one,
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: You answer it like that. You clearly, the right answer, oh,
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: you know, like didn't even go, here's the other just thing.
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: How many Texas drag queen votes, Greg, did he lose
• 15:43
  Speaker 2: by not mentioning them? How many people's feelings were hurt
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: by not, you know, he may have actually hurt himself
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: amongst this key demographic of dozens.
• 15:52
  Speaker 4: I don't know. I can't imagine.
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: I don't know how many there are out there. But
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: it's that, again, Ken Paxton, you have no excuses. You
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: have no excuses for not beating this guy like a
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: rented mule. There's absolutely no reason for you not to
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: be ahead. We've been hearing that you're lazy. We've been
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: hearing that you aren't doing the campaigning that you're supposed to.
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: We've been hearing that you're not a good fundraiser. Dude,
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: between this and the person saying, well, if it helps
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: him win, okay, and I guarantee you he's going to
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: change when she's elected. Like, these are God-given, no pun intended,
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: but these are gift-wrapped things you could put in ads
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: and to say, don't buy this talk that he's a
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: centrist and he's changed. Don't believe any of this kind
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: of stuff. He's the exact same radical he always was.
• 16:30
  Speaker 4: Ken Paxton. Chop, chop, get to work.
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: This is about as easy a target as you could
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: possibly hope for.
• 16:37
  Speaker 4: You have no excuses.
• 16:39
  Speaker 3: Contrary to David French, I don't think drag queens are
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: a blessing of liberty. I know that's been a debate
• 16:44
  Speaker 3: for a number of years now. We're going to have
• 16:46
  Speaker 3: to definitely disagree on that one. And keep the kids
• 16:49
  Speaker 3: out of it, for heaven's sake. Don't have them in
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: schools and don't have tutorials or whatever this guy is doing.
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: Library drag queen story hours. I've never understood why they
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: needed to be the ones... during the story. Is there
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: nobody else who can read the cat in the hat?
• 17:05
  Speaker 4: Really? Utterly ridiculous.
• 17:07
  Speaker 3: So in case you couldn't already tell that the James
• 17:10
  Speaker 3: Tallarico makeover, no pun intended, was a complete fraud. Now
• 17:14
  Speaker 3: you know for sure. So act accordingly, Texas voters.
• 17:20
  Speaker 4: My goodness.
• 17:21
  Speaker 5: All right.
• 17:21
  Speaker 4: Well, while you.
• 17:22
  Speaker 3: Try to protect your home state in this year's elections,
• 17:25
  Speaker 3: you also want to protect your actual home. And that
• 17:27
  Speaker 3: requires a contract with HomeServe. That's the best way to
• 17:31
  Speaker 3: buy peace of mind. I am telling you, we've been
• 17:33
  Speaker 3: customers for years, and whether it's making sure that if
• 17:36
  Speaker 3: your water line, your sewer line, HVAC, plumbing, water heater,
• 17:39
  Speaker 3: whatever it is, if they go down, you are not
• 17:42
  Speaker 3: going to be just hemorrhaging cash in terms of thousands
• 17:45
  Speaker 3: upon thousands of dollars, depending on which issue it is.
• 17:48
  Speaker 3: But if you sign up with HomeServe for just a
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: few dollars a month, once one of those things goes bad,
• 17:53
  Speaker 3: you just call them, they fix everything, and you don't
• 17:55
  Speaker 3: pay another dime.
• 17:55
  Speaker 4: You know, Greg, it's not just queens that are a drag.
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: I would put plumbing failures, HVAC breakdowns, and electrical issues
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: high on those list of pains in the butt that
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: are not covered by homeowners insurance. That's why you need
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: something like HomeServe. It's super simple. You just choose a
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: plan that fits your.
• 18:12
  Speaker 4: Needs and budget.
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: And when something on your list goes wrong, you just
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: call their 24-7 hotline. and they will get the repair
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: process started for you.
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: Your next costly home repair is already coming, so act
• 18:22
  Speaker 3: now and get protected with a plan through HomeServe. For
• 18:24
  Speaker 3: 50% less your first year, go to homeserve.com slash martini
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: to find the plan that's right for you. That's homeserve.com
• 18:31
  Speaker 3: slash martini for 50% less. Savings compared to renewal price,
• 18:35
  Speaker 3: void in Florida. All right, Jim, some good news here
• 18:44
  Speaker 3: in our third martini. Reuters with this particular version of
• 18:47
  Speaker 3: the story, the U.S. poverty rate edged down to the
• 18:49
  Speaker 3: lowest on record in 2025, while median household income hit
• 18:54
  Speaker 3: a record high. This according to the Census Bureau, 34.5
• 18:57
  Speaker 3: million people in poverty in 2025. That's still 34.5 million
• 19:01
  Speaker 3: more than we'd like to see, but the decline marked
• 19:03
  Speaker 3: the second consecutive annual drop in the poverty rate and
• 19:06
  Speaker 3: brought it to its lowest level since the Bureau began
• 19:09
  Speaker 3: tracking the measure. The poverty rate, the Percentage of people
• 19:13
  Speaker 3: living in poverty dipped half a percentage point to 10.2%
• 19:16
  Speaker 3: last year. The supplemental measure of poverty, which takes into
• 19:20
  Speaker 3: account non-cash government benefits and taxes, was at 13.1%. And
• 19:24
  Speaker 3: the median household income increased 2.6%. to $ 87, 460. So, Jim,
• 19:30
  Speaker 3: on the one hand, it's kind of a pleasant surprise
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: given how life's getting more expensive here. On the other hand,
• 19:34
  Speaker 3: I like seeing people celebrate the number of people on
• 19:38
  Speaker 3: assistance dropping. I remember in the early Obama years with
• 19:40
  Speaker 3: the financial crisis, After Effects, they were celebrating getting like
• 19:44
  Speaker 3: 47 million people on food stamps. And conservatives, of course,
• 19:48
  Speaker 3: were saying, no, the goal, the thing to celebrate is
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: getting people off that so they're self-sufficient.
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: You know, on our podcast, you know, almost every month
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: we'll do the unemployment rate.
• 19:56
  Speaker 4: Sometimes we do inflation.
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: And our attitude is when, you know, unemployment is going down,
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: it is good news for the country, no matter who
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: the president is or who's going to be perceived to
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: be getting credit for it. And when the inflation rate
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: is low, it's good news.
• 20:08
  Speaker 4: It's really been a long time.
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: In fact, I believe we're up to like 65 straight
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: months in which the inflation rate has been above the
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: 2% goal set by the Fed. You do the math
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: on that, we're coming into the category of like five,
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: six years, which is not great. But look, most days,
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: the economy is going to be a mixed bag. And so,
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: while we try to have a clear perspective on what
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: people are feeling bad about, cost of living is front
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: and center, high gas prices, people feel like they've been
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: squeezed for a very long time, inflation. Obviously, inflation is
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: much lower than it was at the peak of 9%
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: during the mid-Biden years. 3% does not feel great when
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: you've been really gotten used to 2%. I think we
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: got to get closer to 2% for things to feel,
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: quote unquote, normal again. Stock market's doing pretty darn well.
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: Most people's 401ks are doing pretty darn well. But then
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: the idea is like, well, okay, the people at the
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: top are prospering, but everybody else at the bottom is suffering. Well,
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: this is an indicator pointing in the opposite direction. Now,
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: does this mean everybody who's around poverty? Look, being anywhere
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: near the poverty level is still a pretty darn rough
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: way to live. One of the things I've looked at
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: when we talked about Medicaid spending. Medicare is for old people.
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: Think of Medicare, Mediscare. They always want to scare granny.
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: Medicaid is for poor people. is that the income levels
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: are set by the states, usually at some percentage of
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: the poverty level, and it's usually 200% in a bunch
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: of states. I believe New Jersey is at 400%, but then,
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: of course, things are more expensive in New Jersey. But
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: you look at that kind of stuff, generally, that's a
• 21:36
  Speaker 2: pretty darn low level of income. If you're at poverty level,
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: or even just a little bit above it, you're having
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: a rough time. So, lower poverty levels, that is good news.
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: I feel like when we make criticisms of the economy,
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: We need to be precise about that. A lot of
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: people turn to doomsaying. A lot of people say, oh, well,
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: I feel like we're in recession. Well, we're really not
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: in recession. We had one or two quarters that were negative,
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: but they were spaced out. They were kind of outliers.
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: Government shutdowns had a bit to do with that. You
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: look at all of this. The economy is doing, it's
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: a mixed bag, but it's doing pretty good. And it's
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: one of those things where we should be precise about
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: what's wrong with it, because that way we can have
• 22:11
  Speaker 2: more precise solutions about what we want to fix with it.
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: To the extent we want government to do anything, a
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: lot of times we want government to just get out
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: of the way, stop doing it.
• 22:19
  Speaker 4: The parts of the economy.
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: People are most frustrated by, health care, health insurance, cost
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: of education, cost of higher education, those are generally the
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: parts the government has the largest role in, and they
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: are distorting the usual traditional market effects of prices and
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: quality and supply and demand.
• 22:40
  Speaker 3: I think that's exactly right. And of course, you know,
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: compare health care costs now to before Obamacare. I think
• 22:46
  Speaker 3: you're going to be pulling your hair out, especially when
• 22:49
  Speaker 3: you look at deductibles and so forth. The comparison is
• 22:52
  Speaker 3: is a very, very stark. And so obviously hoping a
• 22:55
  Speaker 3: lot more people emerge from poverty and hopefully that number
• 22:59
  Speaker 3: keeps going down.
• 22:59
  Speaker 4: But happy to see a.
• 23:01
  Speaker 3: Record low and hopefully that'll continue. But when we come back,
• 23:04
  Speaker 3: we just talked about Mitch McConnell returning to the Senate
• 23:06
  Speaker 3: a couple of days ago. We finally saw him in
• 23:08
  Speaker 3: action a little bit yesterday, and let's just say the
• 23:10
  Speaker 3: result's not encouraging. All right, Jim and our chaser, Mitch
• 23:19
  Speaker 3: McConnell back on Capitol Hill. We saw him but didn't
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: hear him on, I guess it was Monday when he
• 23:25
  Speaker 3: first came back to the Senate. Yesterday, he was in
• 23:28
  Speaker 3: a markup for the farm bill and they're going through
• 23:30
  Speaker 3: all the votes. And I'm going to play the whole clip,
• 23:32
  Speaker 3: even though you're going to hear a lot of other
• 23:33
  Speaker 3: people voting, because it starts with all the Democrats and
• 23:36
  Speaker 3: they're all voting no. And then because I think McConnell's
• 23:38
  Speaker 3: the senior member of the committee, he gets to vote
• 23:41
  Speaker 3: first for the Republicans. And so he isn't quite sure
• 23:44
  Speaker 3: how to vote. I don't know if it's because of
• 23:45
  Speaker 3: all the Democrats that came before him or he's just
• 23:48
  Speaker 3: not quite sure what's going on here, but it took
• 23:49
  Speaker 3: two senators and an aide to get him to vote
• 23:51
  Speaker 3: the way they thought he wanted to vote.
• 23:54
  Speaker 5: Senator Warnock. Senator Welch. Senator Fetterman. Senator Schiff.
• 24:07
  Speaker 3: No by proxy.
• 24:09
  Speaker 5: Senator Slotkin.
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: No by proxy.
• 24:14
  Speaker 5: Senator McConnell.
• 24:16
  Speaker 4: No.
• 24:21
  Speaker 5: Senator McConnell.
• 24:22
  Speaker 4: All right. All right.
• 24:23
  Speaker 3: So there you go. It took Senator Hovind, Senator Bozeman
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: from Arkansas and an aide peeking in there today. No, no.
• 24:31
  Speaker 3: You want to vote aye for the for this on
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: the markup. So, Jim, we said it on Tuesday. You know,
• 24:36
  Speaker 3: it's just probably a few more days. They're going to
• 24:38
  Speaker 3: be in session before the election. And Still, the fact
• 24:42
  Speaker 3: that we were kept in the dark, I think we
• 24:44
  Speaker 3: know now why we were kept in the dark. His
• 24:47
  Speaker 3: condition was not good. And at the same time, Andy
• 24:49
  Speaker 3: Beshear decided to make the story about himself. And so
• 24:52
  Speaker 3: the Republicans are probably trying to fend him off as well.
• 24:54
  Speaker 3: But man, this is not a good look.
• 24:56
  Speaker 4: Oh, Mitch, get that man some cocaine.
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: Look, we all kind of suspected he was in rough shape.
• 25:04
  Speaker 2: That's really depressing to see. It certainly seems like he's
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: going to remain in that office until January 3rd when
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: the new senators gets sworn in. Certainly sounds like you
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: quietly said no.
• 25:17
  Speaker 4: He did at first.
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: Before having to be prompted by others, no, you want
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: to vote yes on this. Look, in all likelihood, he
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: probably could have and should have resigned. I think we
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: saw him freezing up on camera a couple of times.
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: That probably wouldn't have been a— and by the way, under
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: Kentucky law, he's required to be replaced by somebody of
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: the same party. So it's not like, oh, he had
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: to stay in office because otherwise Beshear would have appointed
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: a Democrat or something like that. And a really sad
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: end to one of the most distinguished careers in Republican
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: politics in the Senate. And again, we saw this with
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: Dianne Feinstein. We saw this with other senators who have
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: stayed way past their sell-by date, so to speak. These
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: people should be able to enjoy retirement. And, you know,
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: you really hate to see it. I guess he'll be
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: able to function between now and January. But there's still
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: going to be votes after the election. And it's just
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: not good to see the continuing rule of America's gerontocracy.
• 26:16
  Speaker 3: I don't know how well he's going to be functioning.
• 26:18
  Speaker 3: He's going to have staff, basically, I think, telling him
• 26:20
  Speaker 3: what to do here, unfortunately. Bashir's been weird about this, though.
• 26:24
  Speaker 3: In the Constitution, it says the governor has the power,
• 26:26
  Speaker 3: the state constitution has the power, to make the appointment.
• 26:29
  Speaker 3: Federal Constitution says that too. But then the Republicans passed
• 26:32
  Speaker 3: a law, not a constitutional provision, that said it had
• 26:35
  Speaker 3: to be a Republican. And Beshear has not only suggested
• 26:38
  Speaker 3: he's willing to just barge in and nominate a replacement,
• 26:41
  Speaker 3: whether McConnell resigns or not, but that he wouldn't necessarily
• 26:43
  Speaker 3: have to follow that law because the Constitution doesn't say that.
• 26:47
  Speaker 3: As the chief law enforcement officer of Kentucky, I think
• 26:49
  Speaker 3: he's on pretty thin ice there. And that's probably another
• 26:52
  Speaker 3: reason why this is happening. but uh it's just it's
• 26:55
  Speaker 3: just not good.
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: I've decided that i just don't want to follow that
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: law so i'm not going like you know no doesn't
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: really work that way plus the thing like now what
• 27:02
  Speaker 2: you traditionally would do in a circumstance like that is
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: that a governor would find all right who's the most
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: liberal republican i can find in the state of uh
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: uh you know in the state of kentucky and you
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: know who's our arlen specter who's our charlie christ who
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: we can put into that seat but uh Looks like
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: we won't have that problem. It'd be nicer if everybody
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: could just kind of say, OK, state law requires another Republican.
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: You find another Republican and everybody say the state is
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: able to have two fully functioning senators.
• 27:28
  Speaker 4: Too much to ask, apparently. I guess so.
• 27:31
  Speaker 3: And then Andy Barr would take over like, you know,
• 27:33
  Speaker 3: as soon as he got elected, I assume, to replace
• 27:36
  Speaker 3: the interim. So whatever. We only have a few days
• 27:39
  Speaker 3: left in the session before Election Day, but this has
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: not been a good lesson in transparency or... collegiality between
• 27:48
  Speaker 3: the two parties in Kentucky whatsoever. But it'll be over soon, thankfully. Anyway, Jim,
• 27:53
  Speaker 3: good to have you back. See you tomorrow.
• 27:54
  Speaker 4: See you tomorrow, Greg.
• 27:55
  Speaker 3: Jim Garrity, National Review. I'm Greg Karumbas of Radio America.
• 27:58
  Speaker 3: Thanks so much for being with us today. Please be
• 28:00
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• 28:02
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• 28:04
  Speaker 3: your five-star ratings and your kind reviews. Please keep those coming.
• 28:06
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• 28:08
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• 28:11
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• 28:14
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• 28:18
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• 28:20
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