Latest / Normally / Normally Podcast: Rescue Mission Miracle, Iran Tensions & Student Loan Escape Scandal

Transcript

Normally Podcast: Rescue Mission Miracle, Iran Tensions & Student Loan Escape Scandal · Normally

0:06
Speaker 1: Hey guys, we are backing normally, so we normally taking
0:09
Speaker 1: for wedda the news just weird.
0:11
Speaker 2: Kathrin am awful week of being very normy by checking
0:15
Speaker 2: out of the news.
0:17
Speaker 1: I love checking out of the news. I am Carol Markowitz.
0:20
Speaker 1: We held down the fort here at normally while Mary
0:23
Speaker 1: Katherine was you know, touching grass, living her life whatever.
0:27
Speaker 1: Bridget Fetesy filled in on Wednesday and she did a
0:30
Speaker 1: fantastic job.
0:31
Speaker 2: I mean gonna be hard to top her.
0:33
Speaker 1: Thanks a lot for jea welcome back, Mary Catherine. She
0:37
Speaker 1: also celebrated Mary Catherine celebrated her birthday over the weekend
0:41
Speaker 1: on Easter Sunday and wrote a really beautiful post on
0:45
Speaker 1: X about it, and you should definitely go check it out.
0:48
Speaker 1: Happy birthday, Mary Catherine.
0:49
Speaker 2: Thank you very much. I had a lovely day with
0:51
Speaker 2: my family.
0:53
Speaker 1: It was a wild weekend. It was really a lot
0:57
Speaker 1: going on your birthday Easter Sunday, and then of course
1:02
Speaker 1: the rescue of the down F fifteen weapons systems officer.
1:07
Speaker 1: The pilot was of course rescued right away on Friday.
1:11
Speaker 1: And then the weapon systems officer are a wizzo, as
1:14
Speaker 1: I'm told he is called on the Google was missing
1:18
Speaker 1: for twenty four hours plus, and it was really touch
1:22
Speaker 1: and go on X whether or not he was recovered,
1:26
Speaker 1: and we were all obviously holding our breath and very afraid.
1:30
Speaker 1: But we woke up on Sunday morning to news from
1:32
Speaker 1: the White House saying he had been you know, found
1:37
Speaker 1: and was alive and was on his way home.
1:39
Speaker 2: Ah, you're saying he was lost on Good Friday and
1:42
Speaker 2: found on Easter Sunday. Crazy, what a story I was. Again,
1:50
Speaker 2: I was sort of checked out and clued into the
1:53
Speaker 2: end of this story, so I missed the suspense in
1:57
Speaker 2: the middle, which without that it is astounding what our
2:04
Speaker 2: military is capable of astounding. We have these.
2:08
Speaker 1: Super fan haters on X, which I appreciate so much.
2:12
Speaker 1: I really do think it's the haters that keep us going.
2:16
Speaker 1: But we got some comments like why haven't you and
2:20
Speaker 1: I commented on him while he was missing, and for me,
2:24
Speaker 1: I was holding my breath and praying, And that's why
2:28
Speaker 1: I wasn't going to comment on something that I was
2:31
Speaker 1: hoping played out in a positive fashion and was praying
2:35
Speaker 1: real hard that it wasn't going to play on in
2:37
Speaker 1: a negative fashion. So what was I supposed to comment on?
2:40
Speaker 1: You were you know, again touching the grass.
2:44
Speaker 2: Also, this is such an interesting reaction from people, and
2:46
Speaker 2: we're going to go through the details of this rescue.
2:49
Speaker 2: But in the moment where one of our service members
2:53
Speaker 2: is lost in a foreign and hostile country we don't
2:57
Speaker 2: know where and possibly could be dead, I'm like you, Carol,
3:01
Speaker 2: I'm just praying that this person is returned safely, and
3:05
Speaker 2: we know that the stakes are high. There was an
3:08
Speaker 2: interesting moment from Tim Kaine, who is my Virginia senator,
3:12
Speaker 2: a Democrat, who tweeted, we are trying to rescue a
3:15
Speaker 2: downed American and around excess excess boasts about no quarter,
3:20
Speaker 2: no mercy at acting stupid rules of engagement. I mean,
3:22
Speaker 2: we have to hope that Iran follows the humanitarian laws
3:25
Speaker 2: that US leaders now dismiss. Okay, right, So he's mad
3:28
Speaker 2: that the guy has lost, except he's mostly mad about politics,
3:31
Speaker 2: it sounds like. And then Guy Benson points up, no
3:34
Speaker 2: update has senator? Is this a disappointing outcome for you, Renny?
3:39
Speaker 1: And he's also assuming that Iran is going to be
3:43
Speaker 1: humanitarian towards our guy.
3:46
Speaker 2: Or that followed rules.
3:48
Speaker 1: Yeah, like Iran pays for hamas have you seen what
3:53
Speaker 1: Hamas did to the people that they captured on October seven.
3:57
Speaker 1: You think that they're going to get our down officer
4:01
Speaker 1: and treat him nicely, and they might not because of
4:03
Speaker 1: Pete Hegseth like being blustery.
4:06
Speaker 2: Come on, no, it's it's a ridiculous point of view.
4:10
Speaker 2: And I one of the things I love about being
4:13
Speaker 2: conservative is that I can have uncomplicated and joyful feelings
4:17
Speaker 2: about the birth of babies, about America being great, and
4:21
Speaker 2: about American military dominance, and a pilot and other the
4:27
Speaker 2: weapon services we excuse me, weapons systems officer being rescued
4:31
Speaker 2: in valiant style from hostile territory. I have uncomplicated, excited, joyful,
4:39
Speaker 2: glad feelings about that.
4:41
Speaker 1: It's really funny that you say that, because I also
4:43
Speaker 1: noticed that the whole you know, woke right, whatever you
4:46
Speaker 1: want to call them, they are clearly having these complicated
4:50
Speaker 1: feelings where just recently, when they were firmly on the
4:53
Speaker 1: right and they were normal, they wouldn't have been even
4:56
Speaker 1: if they didn't support the mission in Iran, they would
4:59
Speaker 1: understan in that getting the officer back would be amazing
5:03
Speaker 1: and like a moment of joy. And they're just so
5:06
Speaker 1: perplexed and confused about where they're supposed to be. I mean,
5:10
Speaker 1: Joe Kent shared a nonsense post from drop site which
5:13
Speaker 1: is like this Russian propaganda paid site, quoting Iranian propaganda
5:19
Speaker 1: that claimed that the US was trying to kill the
5:22
Speaker 1: lost pilot, and he was like, and I pray for
5:25
Speaker 1: his recovery. Well, which is it is the US trying
5:28
Speaker 1: to kill the pilot or are you hoping for his recovery? Like?
5:30
Speaker 1: What are you sharing here? And I think that confusion
5:34
Speaker 1: is really obvious in a lot of people. They don't
5:36
Speaker 1: know what they're supposed to feel anymore because they are
5:40
Speaker 1: rooting against the mission, they're rooting against the president, and
5:43
Speaker 1: the rooting against the country.
5:44
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, it's hard. I don't want to mince words
5:49
Speaker 2: about it, because it seems fairly obvious that that's what's happening.
5:52
Speaker 2: That for someone like Kane, who may have updated in
5:56
Speaker 2: the meantime, but did not update quickly and excitedly about
5:58
Speaker 2: this for Kane, and it was ideologically inconvenient and politically
6:03
Speaker 2: inconvenient that this didn't turn out badly. Right now, there
6:07
Speaker 2: are some also who say it did turn out badly
6:09
Speaker 2: because you lost an aircraft and then you lost two
6:11
Speaker 2: other aircraft leaving you had to spend all this. Yeah,
6:15
Speaker 2: we spend all of that to get one airman back.
6:18
Speaker 2: That's what we do, right. Yeah.
6:21
Speaker 1: It's just the last few days have been like being
6:25
Speaker 1: in a super patriotic movie. I mean, in fact, the
6:28
Speaker 1: whole Trump administration so far has been, for me, very
6:32
Speaker 1: patriotic movie.
6:33
Speaker 2: Coded.
6:35
Speaker 1: You just feel like raw, raw America in so many
6:38
Speaker 1: different ways, and it's just it's been amazing to watch.
6:42
Speaker 1: I think that people don't get that we would have
6:45
Speaker 1: rooted for the same outcome if Joe Biden was president.
6:49
Speaker 1: I remember being devastated about what happened in Afghanistan to
6:52
Speaker 1: lost military members there, and had that gone successfully, I
6:57
Speaker 1: would have been happy, and it wouldn't have been hard
7:00
Speaker 1: to be happy. It's not what we do. We root
7:03
Speaker 1: for our servicemen and women, we root for our country.
7:05
Speaker 1: It's not that complicated.
7:07
Speaker 2: I think we have a longish clip from Trey Yanks
7:11
Speaker 2: reporting from the Middle East about this operation, and it's
7:15
Speaker 2: going to give you about three minutes of explanation, but
7:18
Speaker 2: I feel like we need it and we want it,
7:20
Speaker 2: so take it away. Trey.
7:22
Speaker 3: It was a daring rescue operations. Sources both in the
7:25
Speaker 3: United States and here in Israel have described it to
7:27
Speaker 3: Fox News as one for the history books. We can
7:30
Speaker 3: exclusively report. It was on Saturday morning that the CIA
7:34
Speaker 3: was able to confirm and locate the missing airmen.
7:37
Speaker 1: The CIA was.
7:38
Speaker 3: Concerned that this was a trick by the Iranians to
7:41
Speaker 3: try and lure in US special forces and attack them.
7:45
Speaker 3: But once they were able to use advanced technology to
7:48
Speaker 3: confirm not only that this was the identity of the airmen,
7:51
Speaker 3: but also the location, that message was delivered to the
7:54
Speaker 3: Secretary of War and the Joint Chiefs Chairman and ultimately
7:57
Speaker 3: the President, I am told by a senior US official.
8:00
Speaker 3: You look at the timeline here. It was late Thursday
8:02
Speaker 3: night into Friday when that F fifteen E fighter jet
8:05
Speaker 3: was shot down over the skies of southwestern Iran. The
8:08
Speaker 3: pilot of that jet was recovered on Friday by US
8:11
Speaker 3: special forces, but that weapons systems officer had to spend
8:15
Speaker 3: up to two days evading Iranian capture. They activated that
8:19
Speaker 3: emergency beacon. It was confirmed by the CIA, who at
8:22
Speaker 3: the same time was running the deception campaign, and then
8:25
Speaker 3: ultimately it was the President, I am told who made
8:28
Speaker 3: the decision, and within twelve hours there were US forces
8:31
Speaker 3: on the ground inside of Iran conducting the rescue mission.
8:34
Speaker 3: As it relates to the CIA deception campaign, I am
8:37
Speaker 3: told by a senior US official, the CIA leaked through
8:40
Speaker 3: multiple sources that they were trying to move a valuable
8:43
Speaker 3: package out of the country through a maritime xfil This
8:46
Speaker 3: was meant to draw the Iranians away from the area
8:49
Speaker 3: where the US crew member was located. I'm told that
8:51
Speaker 3: deception campaign worked coupled with the fire from the air
8:54
Speaker 3: and those drones targeting anyone who approached this area. There
8:58
Speaker 3: was that major concern as the clock was ticking and
9:01
Speaker 3: they were searching for this missing US crew member. Now
9:04
Speaker 3: the Wall Street Journal Today is reporting the complex mission
9:07
Speaker 3: quickly ran into problems, officials said. As the US redirected
9:11
Speaker 3: aircraft in the region to help with the mission, some
9:13
Speaker 3: planned targets, including missile launcher sites, were left untouched that
9:17
Speaker 3: allowed around to fire more weapons than usual in recent days.
9:20
Speaker 3: Officials said. The first attempt to rescue the airman had
9:23
Speaker 3: to be aborted. Two eight six helicopters took small arms
9:26
Speaker 3: fire from the ground, wounding the crews in both aircraft
9:28
Speaker 3: and requiring them to land safely in Kuwaiti airspace. Now,
9:32
Speaker 3: as this was taking place, the Israelis were watching closely
9:35
Speaker 3: and coordinating behind the scenes. Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Ett
9:38
Speaker 3: Yahoo said this overnight quote. I spoke earlier with President
9:41
Speaker 3: Trump and personally congratulated him on his bold decision and
9:45
Speaker 3: a perfectly executed American mission to rescue the down pilot
9:48
Speaker 3: from enemy territory. The President expressed his appreciation for Israel's help.
9:52
Speaker 3: I am deeply proud that our cooperation on and off
9:55
Speaker 3: the battlefield is unprecedented and that Israel could contribute to
9:59
Speaker 3: saving a brave Ama American warrior. So Bill and Dana,
10:02
Speaker 3: this speaks to the coordination not only between the Americans
10:05
Speaker 3: and the Israelis.
10:06
Speaker 2: But also the US military.
10:08
Speaker 3: I spoke with sources here and they said the credit
10:10
Speaker 3: belongs to the US military. This was what they described
10:13
Speaker 3: as an excellent coordinated operation to use the willpower and
10:17
Speaker 3: the fighting force of US Special Forces, coupled with the
10:20
Speaker 3: intelligence apparatus of the United States to go deep into
10:23
Speaker 3: enemy territory with more than one hundred US Special Forces
10:27
Speaker 3: and rescue this F fifteen crew member over the weekend.
10:31
Speaker 1: It's just so amazing. I can't get over what a
10:34
Speaker 1: complicated operation it was and how flawlessly it was executed. Again,
10:39
Speaker 1: the idea that we lost planes or something, This is
10:42
Speaker 1: what we do to get our guide back. This is
10:45
Speaker 1: what America is. We've sort of forgotten that. And I look,
10:49
Speaker 1: no one is more surprised than me that it's Donald
10:52
Speaker 1: Trump bringing it all back to us and making us
10:56
Speaker 1: feel like we're in like Iron Eagle or Top Gun.
10:58
Speaker 2: But here we are.
11:00
Speaker 1: You know, this guy Paul and laterner on X posted
11:05
Speaker 1: twenty twenty six, has given us some iconic images and
11:07
Speaker 1: he posted a picture of Jack Hughes with the American
11:10
Speaker 1: flag and I Artemis taking off. And then Jesse arm
11:13
Speaker 1: who's at the Manhattan Institute, he posted missing two of
11:18
Speaker 1: my favorites, and it was a police officer jumping over
11:21
Speaker 1: the fence to stop the bombers in New York City.
11:25
Speaker 1: And then also Maduro on the plane back to the US.
11:29
Speaker 1: Those four images, and it's only April. It's just it
11:32
Speaker 1: hasn't been that long. It's just incredible year. Our two
11:36
Speaker 1: hundred and fiftieth year feels so insanely pro America and
11:41
Speaker 1: just patriotic. My kids are like, you're always saying that
11:44
Speaker 1: you're very patriotic, but I have extra patriotic right now.
11:48
Speaker 2: No, I mean again, it is so fun to be
11:52
Speaker 2: excited about these moments. That's to be excited about this,
11:56
Speaker 2: to hear about a man who is perhaps you know,
12:01
Speaker 2: near death, hiking a seven thousand foot cliff line to
12:06
Speaker 2: hide himself and use the proper technology and all of
12:09
Speaker 2: his training to make sure that Americans can find him
12:12
Speaker 2: while the Iranians cannot find him. The CIA working in
12:17
Speaker 2: tandem with the military and doing what it's supposed to do,
12:20
Speaker 2: the military doing perfectly what it's supposed to do. And
12:23
Speaker 2: then there are people who say, like, oh, you think
12:26
Speaker 2: this is a success. You lost these two guys over
12:29
Speaker 2: hostile territory, and then they were extracted using all this money,
12:31
Speaker 2: and you had to blow up to sea one thirties
12:33
Speaker 2: on the way out because they stalled and you didn't
12:35
Speaker 2: want to give them over to the enemy. One, if
12:38
Speaker 2: you're spiritually American, you understand that of course that's what
12:42
Speaker 2: we do. We do no man left behind. We like,
12:44
Speaker 2: this is what we do. Two. I would just like
12:47
Speaker 2: to remind everyone that seventy plus aircraft were left at
12:51
Speaker 2: Bagram in Afghanistan seventy plus. Yeah, aircraft, that doesn't even
12:56
Speaker 2: count all the other things. Okay, and some of them
12:58
Speaker 2: were disabled, but like, what are these people doing running
13:05
Speaker 2: down in operation that rescues an American hero without casualties
13:11
Speaker 2: except for the C one thirty. By the way, this
13:13
Speaker 2: is another marker of our greatness and prosperity that we
13:18
Speaker 2: have an air force that has many, many, thousands of planes.
13:22
Speaker 2: We're not like Britain with seventy nine.
13:24
Speaker 1: I don't know what the actual number it is, you
13:26
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying, right, somebody posted like, yeah, it's
13:28
Speaker 1: because this is not our entire air force, like it's yours.
13:33
Speaker 1: But this is like the people over things thing that
13:36
Speaker 1: you tell your children, like in a fire or in
13:39
Speaker 1: a dangerous situation, don't care about your things, don't care
13:43
Speaker 1: about anything but people. You save the people. This on
13:47
Speaker 1: a larger scale is what we're all about, and it's important.
13:50
Speaker 1: It's an important lesson. You don't want to be the
13:52
Speaker 1: kind of people who won't save your fellow countrymen because
13:56
Speaker 1: you're afraid to lose a plane. Who cares about that plane?
13:59
Speaker 1: Lose all the plane and get the person back.
14:01
Speaker 2: By the way, when you are acting as a normy
14:04
Speaker 2: who's checked out of the news cycle, and you check
14:06
Speaker 2: back in for the glorious rescue of this person. And
14:10
Speaker 2: then someone tells you and it eventually dawns on you
14:13
Speaker 2: that people are having a negative reaction to this. Your
14:16
Speaker 2: normy brain goes, I'm sorry, what right? How? How?
14:21
Speaker 1: How So Thursday and Friday we're passover, the first two
14:26
Speaker 1: nights to pass over, so Orthodox Jews were offline. I
14:30
Speaker 1: am not Orthodox, I was very much online. And then Saturday,
14:33
Speaker 1: obviously is another day that Orthodox Jews are offline. So
14:36
Speaker 1: it's three days of Orthodox Jews being offline. Ron Coleman
14:39
Speaker 1: comes back on on Saturday and says, what did I miss?
14:43
Speaker 1: Redste's sums it up for him. He's like, blue Sky
14:46
Speaker 1: thinks Trump is at Walter Reed, which is another insane
14:49
Speaker 1: gosh all, Like he is hospitalized for sure. He hass
14:53
Speaker 1: not golfing today. Therefore he is in the hospital dying
14:57
Speaker 1: right now. It's like we're at war, we're missing one
15:00
Speaker 1: of our officers, like he is working on it. I
15:04
Speaker 1: don't have to love Donald Trump, you don't have to
15:06
Speaker 1: care about him.
15:07
Speaker 2: Don't be crazy.
15:08
Speaker 1: Anyway, Red Ste's Blue Sky thinks Trump is at Walter
15:11
Speaker 1: read no one knows if the down pilot was rescued
15:13
Speaker 1: or not, not the pilot but the weapons officer and
15:16
Speaker 1: now or not thanks to slap engagement accounts. And the
15:19
Speaker 1: Artemis shitter is out of order again, which, well.
15:25
Speaker 2: That's Artemis in the next segment. No, it's I just
15:29
Speaker 2: am am blown away by several operations. I mean Midnight Hammer,
15:36
Speaker 2: the first bombing run and Iran the Venezuela extraction of Maduro.
15:42
Speaker 2: And this all three done without loss of personnel, which
15:47
Speaker 2: is shocking. Yeah, and that that doesn't that doesn't dismiss
15:52
Speaker 2: that there have been personnel that have been lost in
15:53
Speaker 2: other parts of the Iranian engagement. But to do those
15:57
Speaker 2: three things, yeah, so close to absolutely flawlessly.
16:03
Speaker 1: Yeah.
16:03
Speaker 2: Again, having been betrayed by so many institutions over the
16:08
Speaker 2: past fifteen years or so, it is inspiring to see
16:13
Speaker 2: them work this way exactly.
16:15
Speaker 1: And look, this is airing on Tuesday, which Donald Trump
16:19
Speaker 1: has declared power Plant and Bridge Day in Iran.
16:25
Speaker 2: Speaking of Donald Trump's special qualities, I would have appreciated
16:30
Speaker 2: a different kind of Easter post. Just one out there,
16:33
Speaker 2: thanks sir.
16:34
Speaker 1: So he posted Tuesday will be Powerplant Day and Bridge
16:37
Speaker 1: Day all wrapped and won, and Iran, there'll be nothing
16:40
Speaker 1: like it.
16:40
Speaker 2: Open the f and.
16:41
Speaker 1: Straight you crazy bastards are you've been living in hell?
16:43
Speaker 1: Just watch Praise Be to Allah President Donald J. Trump.
16:47
Speaker 1: A lot of people didn't like it, even a lot
16:49
Speaker 1: of my conservative friends didn't like it. I like it.
16:52
Speaker 1: I don't care. I like it. He comes off as
16:54
Speaker 1: absolutely batshit crazy, and Iran does not know what to
16:58
Speaker 1: expect from him, Like, who knows what this guy is
17:00
Speaker 1: going to do? He can have power Plant Day and
17:02
Speaker 1: Bridge Day beyond Monday. They don't know what's coming.
17:06
Speaker 2: Is Praise be to Allah the new Thank you for
17:09
Speaker 2: your attention to this matter. Maybe no, the cultivation of
17:16
Speaker 2: the Madman theory overseas certainly is helpful, and the ongoing
17:21
Speaker 2: threat to the straight off her moves into the world
17:23
Speaker 2: economy is of course perilous. It is why you know.
17:29
Speaker 2: I think Donald Trump is convinced to continue fighting to
17:35
Speaker 2: get some kind of agreement from whoever is the last
17:39
Speaker 2: man standing after we continue to lop off people from
17:43
Speaker 2: the top of the regime. I did to hear some
17:46
Speaker 2: reports about this rescue that locals were helpful by protecting
17:51
Speaker 2: the area, that this American had hidden himself, which is
17:55
Speaker 2: again inspiring, because this is one of those situations where
17:58
Speaker 2: the country that we're bombing, many of the people inside
18:01
Speaker 2: the country were bombing are very happy, in fact, happier
18:03
Speaker 2: that we're doing it than Americans are in some cases.
18:08
Speaker 2: But I do think, you know, we're still in the
18:11
Speaker 2: what comes next phase and he's trying to communicate to
18:15
Speaker 2: whoever's left in charge, right, we will continue.
18:18
Speaker 1: I'm crazy, don't mess with us, like is the communication,
18:22
Speaker 1: and I'm mostly here for it. Really. Look, I don't
18:26
Speaker 1: always love the Trump crazy tweets. In fact, I barely
18:29
Speaker 1: often do, not especially on holidays and times the.
18:33
Speaker 2: Holiday ones get me. I'm like, can we just do
18:37
Speaker 2: two separate ones, the crazy one and the normal.
18:40
Speaker 1: I'm just a regular one. But I like this and
18:43
Speaker 1: I think we're It sends a you don't know what
18:47
Speaker 1: to expect from me message about the Strait of hermos
18:51
Speaker 1: I read this interesting thing that I just wanted to
18:53
Speaker 1: share with our listeners. Antonio Garcia Martinez was a really
18:56
Speaker 1: great follow on x He tweeted a research port about
19:01
Speaker 1: the the Strait of her Moos. Here's what he writes.
19:03
Speaker 1: Hilarious on the ground reporting from the strait of her moves,
19:06
Speaker 1: showing way more ships transitting than commonly believed. Because everyone
19:10
Speaker 1: is believing the AIS transponder data, the fishing boats fifty
19:14
Speaker 1: miles off the Oregon coast turn off their AIS to
19:18
Speaker 1: avoid disclosing their best spots. I had to sail through
19:21
Speaker 1: them at night and discover the hard way. A lot
19:23
Speaker 1: of people manage lots of money, and I've never spent
19:25
Speaker 1: a day at sea. I have never spent a day
19:27
Speaker 1: at sea, so I do not know what the AIS
19:30
Speaker 1: transponder data, whether it's real or how it works or whatever.
19:34
Speaker 1: But apparently there are more ships going through than we
19:37
Speaker 1: are led to believe.
19:38
Speaker 2: So yeah, I have heard that from several people. And
19:41
Speaker 2: I have spent, you know, several days on a bass
19:44
Speaker 2: boat in my life, so I think that I love it.
19:48
Speaker 1: My favorite song right now is bass Boat by Zach Ryant.
19:51
Speaker 1: Very very good. All right, We're going to take a
19:54
Speaker 1: short break and be right back with.
19:56
Speaker 2: More American greatness.
19:58
Speaker 1: America, America all the way, America all the time. Be
20:02
Speaker 1: right back. We are back on normally where in a
20:09
Speaker 1: few minutes when we're recording this, the Artemis is going
20:13
Speaker 1: to round the moon? Is that am I saying that correct? America?
20:18
Speaker 2: I think that's correct.
20:19
Speaker 1: Okay, it's been incredible. I'm not a space person. I'm
20:24
Speaker 1: really I have never been like super fascinated by space.
20:27
Speaker 1: But I am all in on all of these people.
20:31
Speaker 1: The four of them are just amazing and magical and hilarious,
20:35
Speaker 1: and I can't get enough.
20:36
Speaker 2: They are great. I am a Victor Glover fangirl, and
20:39
Speaker 2: I only regret that I have not spent many more
20:41
Speaker 2: years being a Victor Glover fangirl, because apparently I could
20:44
Speaker 2: have earlier, and I just missed it. I again was
20:47
Speaker 2: a little bit checked out, and my husband luckily flagged
20:50
Speaker 2: this for the kids and me and said, like, come
20:52
Speaker 2: watch the launch now. I will say I am of
20:55
Speaker 2: the exact age as you are as well, probably although
20:58
Speaker 2: you had just come to America maybe around this time.
21:01
Speaker 2: I'm of the exact age to be very traumatized by Challenger,
21:05
Speaker 2: and so watching a rocket launch does not feel as
21:09
Speaker 2: magical to me, I think, as too many other people.
21:13
Speaker 1: Yeah hold my breath for sure. I mean yeah, I'm right, very.
21:18
Speaker 2: Nervous about it. So but I came up to watch
21:21
Speaker 2: with my kids and I wanted to experience it and
21:23
Speaker 2: then I think, perhaps because of Challenger, I'm not that
21:27
Speaker 2: interested in space. It scares me. I have no desire
21:30
Speaker 2: to go. I'm not a person who wants to be
21:31
Speaker 2: on Blue Origin at all. No, thank you, Jeff Bezos,
21:34
Speaker 2: if you were looking into me, I'm gonna no. I
21:38
Speaker 2: don't want to do it. I have no desire, but
21:40
Speaker 2: I like that other people do. I'm excited that they
21:42
Speaker 2: do that me too. However, then you, like you said, Carol,
21:45
Speaker 2: you start digging into this and just the absolute beautiful
21:49
Speaker 2: enormity of it, and the character of these people who
21:53
Speaker 2: are on this craft and the dangerous thing they're doing,
21:56
Speaker 2: and they're beautiful families. And also this came. I looked
22:01
Speaker 2: back at the Jared Isaacman timeline, and I don't remember
22:06
Speaker 2: if you and I talked about this on normally, but
22:08
Speaker 2: he's his nomination to NASA Administrator administrator was a little
22:12
Speaker 2: bit hinky for this reason. So he was nominated really early,
22:17
Speaker 2: when like right after Trump took office, like in December
22:20
Speaker 2: of twenty twenty, or right after he was elected, before
22:23
Speaker 2: he was even in office. He was on the list early,
22:27
Speaker 2: and then he got knocked off the list later in
22:30
Speaker 2: April or May of twenty twenty five because of the
22:33
Speaker 2: fight that Elon and Trump got in because Isaacman was
22:39
Speaker 2: close to Elon and he had donated to some Democrats
22:42
Speaker 2: in the past, and Trump was like, nah, I'm not
22:44
Speaker 2: with him. So he's out. Duffy ends up stepping in
22:48
Speaker 2: as acting NASA administrator and maybe wanting to fold it
22:52
Speaker 2: into Department of Transportation, and a bunch of space guys
22:55
Speaker 2: were like, no, no, no, let's not do that. Let's get
22:57
Speaker 2: Isaacman back in. So Isaacman comes back to talk to
22:59
Speaker 2: try at the end of twenty twenty five, and he's
23:03
Speaker 2: renominated in December of twenty twenty five, at which point
23:08
Speaker 2: Trump says, the day he's voted on and confirmed, we're
23:12
Speaker 2: going to the Moon by twenty twenty eight, and then
23:14
Speaker 2: how many months later, four months later, they're on their
23:18
Speaker 2: way to the distance of the Moon. Yeah, with a
23:20
Speaker 2: plan to be back on the Moon in twenty thirty.
23:24
Speaker 2: And I just think that's that's.
23:27
Speaker 1: Amazing, It's incredible. I you know, my youngest son is
23:33
Speaker 1: super into this. He's the sport do you want to
23:35
Speaker 1: talk about. He's just not the one I thought would
23:39
Speaker 1: be like obsessed with this, but he cannot get enough.
23:42
Speaker 1: He wants to see every video, he wants to see
23:44
Speaker 1: every picture, he wants to hear every story about the astronauts.
23:47
Speaker 1: And I'm like, do you want to be an astronaut?
23:49
Speaker 1: He's like, not at all, but this is really cool.
23:53
Speaker 1: He's pinn so you know, he was like, I want
23:55
Speaker 1: to be an astronaut. That would be totally normal. But
23:57
Speaker 1: he's like, no, thanks, I just want to watch from here.
24:00
Speaker 2: Well, and I just think like Isaacman specifically has been
24:02
Speaker 2: involved in commercial spaceflight. He's been to space a couple
24:05
Speaker 2: of times. He came into NASA with a desire to
24:10
Speaker 2: restructure and make things work efficiently and in concert with
24:15
Speaker 2: private companies, and the fact that we're probably going to
24:18
Speaker 2: have people on the moon before Newsom creates a mile
24:24
Speaker 2: of high speed rail, like just.
24:28
Speaker 1: Yeah.
24:29
Speaker 2: Again, having been betrayed by many institutions and thinking the
24:33
Speaker 2: government is generally kind of crappy in so so many ways,
24:37
Speaker 2: it's nice to see these things happen.
24:40
Speaker 1: Well. Success is really amazing to see. And again, would
24:45
Speaker 1: you and I have been rooting for this any less
24:47
Speaker 1: if Joe Biden was president, no president, we would be
24:50
Speaker 1: just as excited that this artemist two crew are going
24:53
Speaker 1: to be the first people ever to see the dark
24:55
Speaker 1: side of the moon. Like, that's crazy, that's amazing, that's
24:59
Speaker 1: us doing it. We're so awesome, Like, how could you
25:02
Speaker 1: not love this country? How could you not love our
25:05
Speaker 1: ambitions and the way that we want to do everything.
25:08
Speaker 1: It's just it's awesome to be an American. I would
25:10
Speaker 1: have felt the exact same way if a Democrat were president.
25:13
Speaker 1: The fact that a Democrat is not president is neither
25:15
Speaker 1: here nor there to me. It's just amazing to see
25:18
Speaker 1: this happen. Well, Donald Trump deserves the credit he does.
25:22
Speaker 2: He does. And by the way, part of the NATO discussion,
25:26
Speaker 2: as Trump got mad about NATO allies not letting us
25:29
Speaker 2: use bases and airspace, I think warranted. Some of the
25:34
Speaker 2: conversation came from Europeans saying basically like, look look at
25:40
Speaker 2: the audacity of these people, like we run it down,
25:44
Speaker 2: we make fun of it, we hold it in contempt
25:47
Speaker 2: while they protect us.
25:48
Speaker 1: But look at what they're doing, right, And that's those
25:52
Speaker 1: are our Europeans, you know exactly.
25:55
Speaker 2: And then you know they popped to the top of
25:57
Speaker 2: the algorithm for me, I'm sure, but it's a real
26:01
Speaker 2: thing that we own the seas for a reason. We
26:07
Speaker 2: are able to do things and hold ourselves to standards
26:12
Speaker 2: or try impossible things on purpose as a national spirit.
26:17
Speaker 1: With celebrating that that's what we should be doing. It's
26:20
Speaker 1: just again such a patriotic year, turning two point fifty.
26:23
Speaker 1: This country's amazing, We're doing amazing things. I'm just very
26:27
Speaker 1: very high on the country right now. And again, any
26:30
Speaker 1: American listening to this should feel the same way. I
26:33
Speaker 1: don't know that anybody should be feeling differently if they
26:37
Speaker 1: are politically not aligned. I just it's amazing. Mark and
26:41
Speaker 1: Dreason tweeted, I have never been so bullish on the
26:44
Speaker 1: United States of America. That's exactly how I feel.
26:48
Speaker 2: Can we real quick to close this out? Just play
26:51
Speaker 2: a minute or two of Victor Glover The Reason I'm
26:53
Speaker 2: a fangirl now. He said several profound things, but he
26:57
Speaker 2: was asked as they were flying past Earth from above
27:01
Speaker 2: over Easter, if he had any thoughts about, you know,
27:05
Speaker 2: the world and life and existence, and without preparation, he
27:09
Speaker 2: had this to say.
27:11
Speaker 4: I'm glad you brought that up, though, I think these
27:13
Speaker 4: observances are important, and as we are so far from
27:16
Speaker 4: Earth and looking back at you know, the beauty of creation.
27:19
Speaker 4: I think the for me, one of the really important
27:22
Speaker 4: personal perspectives that I have up here is I can
27:26
Speaker 4: really see Earth as one thing. And you know, when
27:28
Speaker 4: I read the Bible and I look at all of
27:30
Speaker 4: the amazing things that were done for us who were created,
27:33
Speaker 4: it's you have this amazing place, this spaceship. You guys
27:38
Speaker 4: are talking to us because we're in a spaceship really
27:40
Speaker 4: far from Earth, but you're on a spaceship called Earth
27:43
Speaker 4: that was created to give us a place to live
27:46
Speaker 4: in the universe and the cosmos. Think maybe the distance
27:49
Speaker 4: we are from you makes you think what we're doing
27:52
Speaker 4: is special, But we're the same distance from you, and
27:54
Speaker 4: I'm trying to tell you, just trust me, you are special.
27:57
Speaker 4: In all of this emptiness. This is a whole nothing,
28:00
Speaker 4: this thing we call the universe, you have this oasis,
28:03
Speaker 4: this beautiful place that we get to exist together. I
28:07
Speaker 4: think as we go into Easter Sunday, thinking about, you know,
28:10
Speaker 4: all the cultures all around the world, whether you celebrated
28:12
Speaker 4: or not, whether you believe in God or not, this
28:15
Speaker 4: is an opportunity for us to remember where we are,
28:18
Speaker 4: who we are, and that we are the same thing,
28:21
Speaker 4: and that we got to get through this together.
28:23
Speaker 1: Just gorgeous. It's so well done, and he sounds so
28:28
Speaker 1: deep and wise.
28:30
Speaker 2: I love it.
28:31
Speaker 1: Well.
28:31
Speaker 2: He's got quite a resume, and he has a lovely
28:33
Speaker 2: wife and four daughters, and just so lovely to see
28:37
Speaker 2: people animated by good things, doing seemingly impossible tasks. And
28:43
Speaker 2: thank you for using all your training to inspire me.
28:46
Speaker 2: Both American military service people and astronauts love it.
28:51
Speaker 1: I am.
28:52
Speaker 2: He, by the way, is also a veteran. He's a
28:54
Speaker 2: US Navy captain.
28:55
Speaker 1: Amazing, Keep winning America. Where's vooting for us? All the way?
29:00
Speaker 1: We'll be right back with more on normally.
29:06
Speaker 2: All right, we are back on normally with I mean,
29:09
Speaker 2: really the exact opposite side of the coin from the
29:11
Speaker 2: people who are doing impossible things. The New York Times
29:14
Speaker 2: reported this weekend on a segment of people who student
29:20
Speaker 2: debt burdened them so they moved abroad and stopped paying.
29:26
Speaker 1: They took out loans for a product and then didn't
29:31
Speaker 1: pay for them, and we're supposed to feel sorry for them.
29:35
Speaker 2: I like the passive voice. They were burdened by the
29:39
Speaker 2: loans they took out. It opens with this poor woman
29:44
Speaker 2: who I'm going to be mean about. Amanda Lin Tully.
29:48
Speaker 2: She graduated in twenty seventeen with a master's degree in
29:51
Speaker 2: historic preservation from the University of Oregon sixty five thousand
29:55
Speaker 2: dollars in federal student loans. So that's us guaranteeing it
29:59
Speaker 2: and no offers in the conservation field, No kidden? Are
30:03
Speaker 2: there not a ton of jobs in historic conservation anyway?
30:09
Speaker 2: Less than a year after graduating, was Tully made a
30:11
Speaker 2: drastic decision. Less than a year she moved to Prague,
30:14
Speaker 2: where she completed an internship, and defaulted on her loans.
30:17
Speaker 2: She hasn't made a payment in over seven years. Well,
30:19
Speaker 2: it must have been very burdensome financially, Carol. No, let
30:25
Speaker 2: me tell you how much she was paying per year
30:29
Speaker 2: or per month. Sixty bucks.
30:31
Speaker 1: Yeah, that sounds a weight she could not bear.
30:35
Speaker 2: Miss Tully was on an income based repayment plan, which
30:38
Speaker 2: allows mini borrowers to have their remaining debt forgiven after
30:40
Speaker 2: twenty years of making qualifying payments. She was paying sixty
30:44
Speaker 2: dollars per month when she defaulted. This amount to many,
30:47
Speaker 2: The New York Times says may seem manageable, but for her,
30:50
Speaker 2: it remained psychologically brundsome.
30:54
Speaker 1: Sorry, she was so psychologically burdened. Of course we're all
30:57
Speaker 1: going to have to pay Bagcarlan for her.
31:00
Speaker 2: So now I'm psychologically burdened by the sixty dollars per
31:03
Speaker 2: month I could be using for like juice boxes or
31:05
Speaker 2: whatever the heck I need to buy.
31:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the thing. It's like New York Times will
31:10
Speaker 1: never say in these pieces the colleges that promised them
31:13
Speaker 1: something they couldn't deliver should be the ones paying for this.
31:16
Speaker 1: It's always like, how terrible is this system, and that
31:20
Speaker 1: the rest of us should just forgive them, forgive these loans.
31:23
Speaker 1: Even though people, you know, they live at home, They
31:25
Speaker 1: don't go to schools that have fancy brand names, they
31:28
Speaker 1: don't go into degrees that sound ridiculous and are ridiculous.
31:32
Speaker 1: They work during college. All of that people do, and
31:36
Speaker 1: they end up graduating with no debt, only to pay
31:39
Speaker 1: off this lady's debt because she defaulted on it.
31:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, I made the decisions that allowed me
31:46
Speaker 2: to be debt free, right. I didn't go to a
31:48
Speaker 2: super expensive school. I didn't take out a bunch of loans.
31:51
Speaker 2: Those were decisions I made when I had other things
31:53
Speaker 2: on the table, and now I end up covering for
31:57
Speaker 2: people who didn't make those decisions because they decided, well,
32:00
Speaker 2: someone else will pay it for me. Right, And by
32:03
Speaker 2: the way, there's already been a break for four years
32:07
Speaker 2: from payments because of COVID, which was illegal to begin
32:11
Speaker 2: with and shouldn't have happened. Yeah, and at some point
32:16
Speaker 2: I believe it is our friend bridget Fetese, and I
32:19
Speaker 2: will censor myself a bit. Who's like, you're being a
32:22
Speaker 2: whiney bee. You just need to suck it up and
32:25
Speaker 2: pay your sixty bucks. Now, some of these people were
32:27
Speaker 2: sold a bill of goods, as you say, by the colleges.
32:31
Speaker 2: They would not have been sold this bill of goods
32:33
Speaker 2: had we not made all college loans federally backed, which
32:37
Speaker 2: would mean that then banks would have a reason to
32:40
Speaker 2: judge whether these loans were worth giving to people who
32:42
Speaker 2: might not get jobs, and then they might not get
32:44
Speaker 2: as much money.
32:45
Speaker 1: Right. Right. We've just become this culture where everybody has
32:49
Speaker 1: to go to college and it costs a lot of money,
32:53
Speaker 1: and it's not worth it for a lot of people,
32:55
Speaker 1: Like when my kids even half engaged with the I
32:58
Speaker 1: don't know if I want to go to college. I'm like,
33:00
Speaker 1: I'm listening, like, well, what are we thinking? You know,
33:04
Speaker 1: and every kid is going to have a different path.
33:06
Speaker 1: I think that we need to get off of this
33:09
Speaker 1: everybody has to go to college thing. College is very
33:12
Speaker 1: rarely about education anymore. It has almost nothing to do
33:16
Speaker 1: with what field you're going to work in. It just
33:19
Speaker 1: it never translates into making a lot of money unless
33:22
Speaker 1: you go to one of the top top schools, and
33:24
Speaker 1: you could only go there if you really have the
33:26
Speaker 1: money to pay for it. Because if you don't have
33:28
Speaker 1: the money to pay for it, you're you're going to
33:29
Speaker 1: set yourself up to have this massive debt and count
33:32
Speaker 1: on the rest of the country to pay it for you.
33:34
Speaker 1: It's just not for And I.
33:36
Speaker 2: See reels occasionally or tiktoks where people sort of gripe about,
33:41
Speaker 2: for instance, immigrant parents who are hard on their kids
33:44
Speaker 2: and say, if you go to college, you can go
33:46
Speaker 2: in these three degree areas.
33:48
Speaker 1: That's it.
33:48
Speaker 2: But that's the right decision. You're you're making a calculation
33:52
Speaker 2: that my kid is going to go in a law
33:54
Speaker 2: degree or an engineering degree or medical because those will
33:58
Speaker 2: pay back what I am investing. How you should think
34:01
Speaker 2: about it?
34:02
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm writing something about about colleges right now. I mean,
34:05
Speaker 1: I you know, writing is hard, guys. Writing is really hard,
34:08
Speaker 1: especially when it's like for your substack, which I feel like,
34:11
Speaker 1: you know, no deadlines means I can write this forever.
34:14
Speaker 1: But about what colleges should be about. And the fact that, yeah,
34:19
Speaker 1: my parents were like, these three professions are the ones
34:22
Speaker 1: that we would like for you to go into. And
34:24
Speaker 1: because I chose something else, I did do myself a
34:27
Speaker 1: lot of damage. I did get into debt. I had
34:30
Speaker 1: a lot of problems setting up my life because I
34:32
Speaker 1: went into a career that my parents didn't understand. So
34:36
Speaker 1: you could take the chance you can, but it's going
34:39
Speaker 1: to come with some hard moments.
34:41
Speaker 2: Or like, by the way, at the end of this
34:42
Speaker 2: article is a guide to better managing your money from
34:44
Speaker 2: the New York Times things.
34:45
Speaker 1: Guys.
34:47
Speaker 2: I think the ship has sailed for many of these folks.
34:50
Speaker 2: But the main thing is, like, you want to spend
34:52
Speaker 2: less than you make, and you want to not burden
34:55
Speaker 2: yourself with giant, giant loans that you then skip out
34:59
Speaker 2: on it. Yeah, this is not what I don't understand.
35:02
Speaker 2: This isn't an indictment of America. This is an indictment
35:05
Speaker 2: of the people who haven't paid the lungs.
35:07
Speaker 1: Right, absolutely, I have no point. I'm like America should
35:10
Speaker 1: do something about this, like the schools should do something
35:13
Speaker 1: about it. New York Times should pressure the schools to
35:15
Speaker 1: do something about it. They have these giant endowments, they
35:18
Speaker 1: take federal funds. They should not let their students flounder
35:21
Speaker 1: like this. I agree. Well, thanks for joining us on
35:24
Speaker 1: Normally Normally eres Tuesdays and Thursdays, and you could subscribe
35:27
Speaker 1: anywhere you get your podcast. Let's get in touch with
35:30
Speaker 1: us at normallythepod at gmail dot com. Thanks for listening,
35:33
Speaker 1: and when things get weird, you act normally.