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Transcript

Playing Spoiler, Hopefully · Crosstabs

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Clear to engage.
• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: Time on target, five mics, out.
• 0:05
  [music]
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_02: Star Trek says, beat me up, Reagan.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: That's a pretty good indication of why Star Trek is subpar or not superior to Star Wars.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: It's just silliness.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, Richard, are you a Star Wars or Star
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_02: Trek guy?
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, definitely Star Trek.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, if you want to talk about silliness,
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think there's anything sillier than Jar Jar Binks.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: You're not 100% wrong.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: You're not 100% wrong.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_02: However,
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_02: with the advent of AI,
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_02: I feel like we're moving more towards the Star Wars scenario with all
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_02: the drones fighting each other.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it could be.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_01: We're getting very close to that.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: Well, we're here with Richard Burke, who, among other accolades, is a Libertarian Party member.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: And do you have a title within the party?
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, I'm currently the state vice chair.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: The state vice chair.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: So there's a chair and then the vice chair and probably a treasurer and a secretary
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: and all those things.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: And so and you're here to tell us.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: So you've been on the podcast before and you've talked about how there's a split in
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: the Libertarian Party.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: And you might just bring us up to speed about where that split was when we left.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: And then it sounds like maybe some of that has been resolved.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: And then the Libertarians also just recently had a convention.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: And then so we'll talk about that after.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yep, that's right.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_01: When I was here last time,
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_01: the Libertarian Party was being controlled by a group of people
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: who unilaterally attempted to change our entire organizational structure bylaws
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: without notice of the member outside of convention through
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: a state committee resolution.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_01: And the Oregon Secretary of State would not get involved
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_01: because they're not supposed to be involved in the internal governance system.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: The National Party was involved.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_01: It went to court.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_01: A half a million dollars was spent.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_01: What a mess.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: But it finally got resolved in October.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_01: The court ruling said that our judicial committees get to make that decision as
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: to who's right and who is wrong.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: And the National Judicial Committee decided in our favor.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_01: And by our, I mean,
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: the group that believed that we should be operating under the structure approved
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_01: by members and properly noticed convention.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_01: And so our chair,
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: Sonia Feintag,
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_01: was Able to tell the Secretary of State and they accepted her explanation.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_01: And so we now have our party back, so to speak.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_01: And so with that, we've gotten around to doing political work and trying to be active.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know,
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: when you're a minor party,
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: you're not going to win partisan races,
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: but you can impact the outcome of Of partisan races.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: You can't always win, but you can sometimes decide who does win.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_01: And you can sometimes get concessions on various forms of public policy.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: And we were able to do a lot of that.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_01: For the first time, we cross-nominated a Republican.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_01: So Christine Drazen is now both the Republican and Libertarian candidate for governor.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_01: We also did that in the fourth and fifth congressional races.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_01: So respectively,
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: Patty Adair and Monique Despain are now the Libertarian as well
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_01: as Republican candidates for the congressional districts that they're running for.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_01: And there were also a bunch of other Republicans that we nominated, Brad Hicks.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_01: This is one of them that comes to mind.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: Anna Munson, a number of those.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: And of course,
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_01: there was a slate of registered libertarians who got the libertarian nomination
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: in races.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_01: I personally tried very hard to make sure that we stayed out of races
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: that were contested unless we could somehow give an advantage to the Republican.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the case in Christine's race.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: We believe that by not running a libertarian candidate,
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: And unofficially,
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_01: outside of the party structure,
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_01: providing support to Brett Smith,
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_01: the Pacific Green Party candidate,
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: we might be able to pull a couple percent off of what Tina Kotek would get.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: And that could be enough to put Christine in striking distance.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know how accurate these polls are showing her four points up,
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_01: but if they're accurate, another two points can't hurt.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: I would guess that they are accurate.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: And the change really in strategy is highlighted by the fact that your chair,
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: Sonia Finetech,
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: ran in a race against Lori Chavez Dreamer and Janelle Bynum just a couple
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: of years ago,
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: and now is chair of the Libertarian Party that is actually supporting
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: and endorsing some Republican candidates.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: That is actually a pretty huge shift.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: It's a big shift.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_01: The two values that have been fighting for primacy in
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_01: the Libertarian Party is political accomplishment and emotional affirmation.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_01: And that's basically how the two factions in our party line up.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_01: And the political accomplishment thing is ascendant.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_01: One interesting thing that's happening right now is that there are some
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: of our members who are very concerned about the National Guard.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_01: They support a movement called Defend the Guard saying that
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_01: the president cannot Federalized the National Guard without a declaration of war.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: And one of them,
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_01: Will Hodges,
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: decided to run in House District 52, which is a very sensitive district.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: But he is now offering to withdraw from that race if Christine Drazen,
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_01: Monique Despain, and Patty Adair were to sign off on aspects of Defend the Guard.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: So that is another way to...
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_01: Move policy forward without actually winning elections.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: And then in the spring,
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: we're going to be working very hard to elect people to local nonpartisan office
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_01: to build a farm team and start building networks of volunteers and donors
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: so we can start to then Run credibly for like city council races
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_01: and county commission races.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know,
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_01: I think that if we ever get to the point where we could elect three
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: or four state representatives,
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: as we've done in other states,
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_01: we could be in a position if we had roughly even governance between Republicans
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_01: and Democrats to be the tail that wags the dog.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's sort of the long term strategy.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: But for now, it's November of six that we're looking at.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_01: And we want to see a Republican governor.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_01: We want to see a, you know, get rid of the Democrat super majorities.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_01: And having divided government gives us space to operate.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: And so that is basically our strategy going forward.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: And it's a very pragmatic strategy.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_01: We're called trade.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_01: Those of us who follow the strategy are called traitors by the purists.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: Linos, libertarians in name.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_01: Linos, I like it.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_02: Of course, of course.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, we take that heat just like people do in every political party.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_02: Did your group,
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_02: because I wasn't at the hearing,
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_02: I know those are the meetings,
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_02: sorry, hearing, meeting, whatever you want to call it.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_02: It seems like there was a bunch of discussion in regards to the Green Party or
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_02: the Christine thing.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_02: And then you guys ultimately settled on cross-nominating Christine.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_02: Do you think that like ultimately the Libertarian Party just aligns
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_02: a little bit better with or was that more the Linos stance
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_02: that you thought cross party in nominating Christine gave her a better edge
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_02: than giving it to the Green Party to just just to peel off more votes?
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_02: Or did you really just believe that Christine was just a little bit more valuable
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_02: because Libertarians are going to align more with Republicans?
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, what we were looking at was trying to find ways to maximize the votes that
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_01: the Green Party gets,
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_01: because we know that the votes are going to come at the expense of Tina Kotak.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: So we were thinking, how could we elevate Brett Smith, the Green Party nominee?
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_01: And we thought maybe by cross-nominating him that we would be able to accomplish that.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_01: But what changed the dynamic was that another...
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: A third party,
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_01: I forget if it's the progressive or another one,
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: also nominated a candidate for governor.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_01: And so that meant that Brett Smith was not unique anymore
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: and there really wasn't anything to gain by cross-nominating Brett Smith
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_01: because we couldn't cross-nominate the other one as well.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_01: So we decided that it would be better if we cross-nominated Christine.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: We're more ideologically aligned With the Republicans anyway.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: And Christina has been really good about reaching out to us.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_01: And we're,
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_01: and I think that that makes us more relevant by cross nominating
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_01: a major party candidate.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_01: And also, if she happens to win, we'll have her ear.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know,
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_01: she'll owe us one,
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: especially if the margin of victory is less than what Brett Smith is able to win.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_01: So we figured that this was a pragmatic way to go.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: Those who call us Linos, we respond by calling ourselves pragmatarians.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: And so that works, too.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_02: So with all these acronyms,
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_01: that's right.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_00: I agree, though.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: I think that there's a lot of risk in cross-nominating and having
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: a Pacific Green Libertarian candidate.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I don't know how much crossover there is in the ideology of those two parties.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_00: There might be some,
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_00: but I think any indication that Libertarian voters get that they have,
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: because they're going to think that that's a true candidate of theirs,
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: whether that's true or not, it's hard to ascertain.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_00: But when it's when it's cross nominated with a major party candidate,
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: at least they know there's if you're a voter, there's no true libertarian here.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: So my choice really is between Drayson and Kotick.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: I was always in favor.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I was always in favor of cross nominating Drayson.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_01: But I, you know, until very late in the process, I believed it was impossible.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_01: I believe that it just wouldn't happen at a candidate nominating convention
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_01: and nominating Brett Smith as the The Pacific Green would be 100 times better than
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_01: the Libertarians,
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_01: you know, some crackpot raising their hand and running a separate candidate.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_01: Totally.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_01: So we thought that Brett Smith would fill the spot so that we didn't have that scenario.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_01: But when the other candidate came into the race...
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: It began to be possible that Christine Drazen could win in our nominating convention.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_01: And once that looked that way, I and others spoke in favor of that.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so it caused a little internal grief, but I think it was the right move.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_01: And we have to start being pragmatic.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_01: We've got less than 1% of the electorate that's registered here.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_01: And I think there's probably between 5% and 10% of the electorate
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_01: who are ideological libertarians but are registered with Republicans and Democrats
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_01: because they want to vote in the primary.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, how can we mobilize and leverage those percentage?
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_01: So when you're this small and you're underfunded,
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_01: you just pull every lever you can think of and hoping that,
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_01: you know, a couple of circuits cross and you're able to get some tractions.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: Well, the first step is ending the infighting and you guys have done that.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_00: So then you get to move on, which is great.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's right.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_02: But in relevancy matters to, I mean, look at what the DSA is doing to the Democratic Party.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, they're literally upending the entire Democratic Party.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_02: Talk about the tail wagging the dog.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, that's just, it's just wild.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_02: And it's weird because they're embracing it.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_01: They're not really
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_02: fighting it.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_02: They're just saying...
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, we can say the crazy shit out loud now?
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, well, they're terrified.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_01: You remember that cartoon where Sylvester had a bucket of water and he was trying
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: to get rid of the water and he threw it, but he got countered by a tidal wave?
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: This is what the Democrats were afraid are going to happen to them.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_01: You know, that if they fight the DSA, that they're going to get mowed over.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't think that's true.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_01: I think that any political strategy that stems from fear is already doomed.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you've got to be careful.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_01: You don't want to be reckless, but don't act out of fear.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that the moderate Democrats are acting out of fear.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm really proud of our group because we're not acting out of fear.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: Our group is acting out of possibility and optimism and the fact
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_01: that Doing these things,
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_01: while sometimes counterintuitive to our more ardent members, makes us relevant.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_01: And I mean, think about it.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_01: At our little nominated convention,
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_01: Christine Drazen,
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_01: Monique Despain,
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_01: and Patty Adair were all physically there,
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_01: along with folks like Brad Hicks and others.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_01: And they don't show up if you're irrelevant because their time is just too valuable.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_01: And so just having them there says we're relevant.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_01: And that,
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_01: of course,
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_01: helps us with recruitment and donations and getting people to volunteer time.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_01: Because if they think you're relevant, they'll do more than if they don't think you're relevant.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_01: So this is a good cycle for us.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, there are a lot of ways to move policy without winning partisan elections.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, that's the best way.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_01: But there are other ways.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_01: And those are the levers we're trying to press this year.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_02: I like it.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_02: I think a strategy that is,
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_02: especially for the Libertarian Party,
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_02: if I put myself in your shoes,
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_02: I would look at this as a better strategy than the whole ideological kind
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_02: of FU strategy that they try to go.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_02: And Republicans have the same problem, right?
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_02: We have the theorists on the far right that are,
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_02: they usually went to the Constitutional Party or something like that,
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_02: which no longer exists.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_02: But I think what you see,
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_02: and I have a lot of friends that are I think that are self-described libertarians.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_02: I think to your point,
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_02: they're probably registered ours, but they really kind of consider themselves.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_02: And we usually kind of put that in the, well, I'm conservative.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_02: I want small government.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_02: I don't want anybody in my back, but I'm socially liberal, right?
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_02: That's kind of maybe like a...
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_02: A bigger way of saying what the Libertarian Party kind of stands for,
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_02: for the most part, basically do what you want to do in your house.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_01: It's an overgeneralization because,
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_01: there are people,
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_01: I remember my first national convention, I saw two people standing together.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_01: One of them,
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_01: they almost look like Amish people,
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_01: very conservative, nothing socially liberal about these people at all.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_01: they were pro-life and All of these other things and standing right next
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_01: to them was some ridiculous hippie right off Mount Shasta in a Moomoo.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: You know, they probably, you know, believed in all these goofy things.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_01: And what I thought was interesting is that their beliefs were totally opposed to each other.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_01: But what made them all libertarians is that they didn't believe it was the role
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_01: of government to impose their values on other people or
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_01: to have other people's values imposed upon them.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what united them politically, even though culturally it couldn't be farther apart.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_01: And so there are a lot of people, I think, in Oregon that feel this way.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, we haven't given them a strong enough reason to register Libertarian.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_01: And that's okay.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: And so we've tried to be inclusive.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_01: And that's why people can pay $50 a year in LPO dues without changing their voter registration.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_01: And they get a vote at our business conventions in March.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_01: For the ideologically pure,
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_01: we make sure that they understand that the candidate nominating conventions,
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: only registered libertarians can cast votes.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_01: So these votes for Christine Drazen,
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_01: Patty Adair,
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_01: and Monique Despain,
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_01: and Brad Hicks, and others all came from registered libertarians.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: There were not Republicans voting at this convention.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_01: And I think this shows a step toward political maturity,
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_01: which has been part of the Libertarian Party's problem.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: They've been politically...
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_01: I think they're starting to come along now,
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_01: and they understand that the path to relevance is not always a straight line,
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: that sometimes backward steps go with forward steps.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I think this is a big change of thinking of the LP,
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_01: and I think it's going to lead it You know, we don't see Republicans as the enemy.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_01: We see statists as the enemy,
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_01: whether they're Republicans or whether they're Democrats or anything else.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: And if you're not a statist,
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: no matter what letter is next to your name, the Libertarian Party is your friend.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_02: You hate the uni party as they like to call sometimes the D's and the R's, right?
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_02: You know, to the point where you're a statist.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_01: So.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's about freedom and responsibility.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_01: They're two sides of the same coin.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_01: Freedom without responsibility is license, and we don't support that.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: You've got to be responsible for your actions.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_01: Take as many freedoms as you want, but you've got to be responsible for your actions.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_02: But not allowing President Trump to have access to the National Guard is that big of
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_02: an issue,
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_02: or is that just a side issue with one candidate that
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: It's Defend the Guard is
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_01: a big part of the movement.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_01: They had booths and parties and all this kind of stuff at the National Convention.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_01: And it isn't that they don't want the National Guard to participate in wars.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_01: It's that they don't want the National Guard to be federalized unless there is
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_01: a congressional declaration of war.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_01: The Defend the Guard people say that if you have a congressional declaration of war,
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: then yeah, federalize them.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: Go nuts.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: But You know, but it's not a clear issue.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_01: Like, for example,
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_01: when they were debating this part of the Constitution,
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: the original draft said that Congress was responsible for making the decision
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_01: whether or not to wage war, not declare war.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_01: They changed it from declare or they changed it from wage to declare.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, people are saying that Trump by attacking Iran, he didn't ask for a declaration.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_01: He's just waging it.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_01: And they believe this constitutional amendment doesn't apply because of the use of
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_01: the word wage versus declare.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_01: I get that.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_01: I get that the United States needs to be able to respond quickly to immediate threats.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_01: But I think that we have a very capable and adequately sized federal force to deal
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: with those kinds of situations.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_01: So the president should be able to wage war.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: Using federal troops and resources,
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_01: but if it becomes a larger conflagration,
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_01: then a war should be declared,
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_01: and then the state national guards could get involved.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_01: That's sort of how we see it.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_02: That makes, I mean, from the war standpoint, I'm on board.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_02: I just think that also the ability,
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_02: like FEMA's had to federalize national guard troops in regards to national disasters
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_02: and things like that,
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_02: and I feel like if you kind of paint everybody in Into too tight of a box,
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_02: it gets a little bit harder.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think that it does that.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_01: Defend the Guard does not prevent National Guard from being used
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_01: for natural disasters and those kinds of things, but for combat.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_02: And ice.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_02: We can't use them for ice.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_02: That's not a problem.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: I think you could use them for ice.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: The difference is it's domestic.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_01: It's not foreign.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_02: It seems like that's where the fight was really in the ice stuff, right?
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_01: In that case.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_01: Now, there are probably people in my party who would take it that far.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_01: But that's not what we're asking Drazen or Monique or Despain to sign on to.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_01: The Defend the Guard pledge we've asked them to sign is limited to overseas conflicts.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't talk about things like ice or natural disaster.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_02: Is that like one of your guys' top?
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_02: What's the other top issue that libertarians want?
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_01: A big one is fiscal responsibility.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_01: I don't need to convince you that we are spending recklessly,
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_01: both at the state and federal level.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_01: We need fiscal restraint.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: One of the things in Oregon or an Oregon-specific issue that we talk about is PERS.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: And our position for years has been one that the gubernatorial candidate Tom Cox
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_01: in 2002 talked about,
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_01: that what we need to do Is move all of our employees
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_01: at least grandfather employees so that all new state employees get a 401k plan.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_01: And what we do is offer buyouts for people who are on the PERS plan
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_01: to get cashed out to get out of PERS and whatever we can't convince
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_01: the people we can't convince those things to do.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_01: We have to abide by the contracts that are signed.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: So what you do is you just stop the bleeding first and And then you figure out,
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_01: okay,
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_01: to retire all of the PERS debt and fulfill the contracts will cost this much money.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_01: And then you bond it and pay it off over 30 years or something like that.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_01: While all the new people that come in and eventually replace
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_01: the PERS workers will be on 401k plans or whatever they call it for
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_01: the public sector, 501b or whatever they call it.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_01: But you get the idea.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's a self-sustaining program that's...
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: Define benefit plans basically where it's like you get this much money.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: To invest as opposed to or a defined contribution plan as opposed
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: to defined benefit,
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: which is what we have now,
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: which is we have a lesser version of tier one,
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: tier two purse,
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_00: but it's still you're guaranteed to make this much of your salary
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_00: after you retire based on a calculation.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: Now, this is this is an Oregon issue related to fiscal responsibility
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_01: that libertarians have supported for a very long time.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_01: You know, taxes, there shouldn't be an income tax in the state.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_01: We would love to see, you know, a lot of states are able to pull it off.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_01: We should be able to pull it off too.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, we see property taxes as a form of extortion.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: Tony Soprano comes up to your building and says,
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_01: give me $500 a week or I'll blow up your restaurant.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_01: Here in the county say, give us this much money a year or we're going to take your property.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_01: Fundamentally, there's no difference in that.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so there are other ways to pay for police, fire, schools, those kinds of things.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_01: Some cities in Arizona have private fire departments.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_01: You have a subscription.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_01: You pay every month.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_01: It's built into your house payment.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_01: And if you don't have it,
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_01: let's say you pay off your house and you let the insurance go,
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_01: they'll still put out your fire,
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_01: but you'll get a $20,000 bill or whatever it costs to put out the fire.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_02: Isn't that still kind of a form of extortion then?
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, isn't that?
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_01: Well, no,
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_01: it's the difference there is that if you don't pay for the private fire insurance,
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_01: you're never going to lose your land.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_01: Nobody's taking it away from you.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: It's just that you don't have insurance anymore.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: It's like having a car and not having car insurance.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_01: No one's going to take the car away from you.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: OK, but if you crash your car, no one's going to pay to fix it.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: Same thing with the private fire department.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_01: No one's going to take away your house if you don't pay for the private fire insurance.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but your house is going to burn down or,
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_01: or shall I say in states where they do this or in cities where they do this,
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_01: they will come out and make sure that your fire,
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_01: your house's fire, uh,
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_01: doesn't spread and,
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_01: make sure life is saved,
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_01: so pets and people get pulled out of the fire,
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_01: but you know, they're just going to do the minimum unless you are a subscriber.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_01: And so, um,
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: There are a lot of things you can do to change the tax structure of this state,
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_01: to lower the taxes.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_01: Fewer things that the government can do, like selling the Tillamook State Forest.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_01: We've been talking about that for a long time.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_01: Selling the insurance company safe for a couple of billion dollars.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_02: Well, now they want to rate it.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_02: They don't want to sell it.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: They want to rate it.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah,
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_02: that's what happens.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_02: They want to raid the money.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: They do.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_01: And what else can we do?
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_01: New Zealand for a long time privatized their Department of Transportation.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_01: Their costs went down remarkably.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_01: Take a look at the Oregon Department of Transportation.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_01: They've got over 5,000 employees.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_01: Line them up along the road.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: They should be able to maintain them with hand tools.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_01: And we're not going to ask anybody to do that,
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_01: but we're just paying too much for too many things.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_01: And Basically putting up signs that say to investors, go away or get out of Oregon.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_01: And the Libertarian Party, these are the kind of things we would like to see changed.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_01: And now that we've got,
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_01: I think,
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_01: more politically responsible leadership,
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_01: you're going to hear us talking about those things more.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: One thing we want to change on election reform is that we're getting tired of paying
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_01: for your candidate selection processes.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: Political parties are private organizations.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_01: And the Republicans and the Democrats,
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: they have a state-funded and state-monitored primary that non-affiliated candidates
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_01: and third-party candidates have to pay for.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_01: Why?
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_01: We're thinking that a good reform would be to not top two or jungle primary.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_01: We hate that.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_01: But just have it set up so that every political party has to design,
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_01: execute, monitor, and pay for its own candidate selection process.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: So you can do a vote-by-mail election.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_01: You can do an internet election.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_01: You can do conventions like we do, caucuses like Iowa does.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: You can throw darts at a dartboard to decide who gets the nod.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't matter.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_01: But whatever it is, every political party pays for its own candidate selection system.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_01: And as the number of non-affiliated members grows and becomes the largest block
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_01: of voters, that's going to become increasingly appealing.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think that's a bad idea.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_02: I think that if we're going to block and not have an open system where you can vote
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_02: for whoever on Primary day,
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_02: right, or election day, and we're going to keep it as a closed system.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_02: I think there's some validity in saying, well,
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_02: if you want a closed system to elect your people to move forward,
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_02: then you pay for it.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_02: Why should the state have to pay for it?
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's right.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_00: I think part of the reason that it sounds unfair and where I disagree is because
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_00: the reason that this political process is the way it is now is because parties used
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_00: to choose candidates in ways that the voters found unfair in the sense
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_00: that it was only reserved to top level people and there was rampant amounts
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_00: of corruption.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_00: So you decorrupted the process by forcing it into a place
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: where every registered voter that was a member of that party was allowed
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_00: to participate.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_00: Now, are there ways that that could be adjusted?
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: Sure, definitely.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: But I think wholesale saying that the parties have
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_00: to run it themselves does drive you back down that road some ways.
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_00: And so I think maybe the parties just need to be more involved in the pay for's.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_00: I think that there's a lot of potential for that.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_02: But wasn't the independent party?
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_02: So then in that thinking, that way of thinking, I think the independent party is corrupt.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that they do.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_02: No, they are.
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_02: So with that similar thinking,
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_02: then they should have Their party should do their stuff at the same time Republicans
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_02: and Democrats.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and I think the question has always just been, where do you lay that cutoff?
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_00: Because the cutoff for that is between minor and major parties.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: So when they were a major party, the state did run their elections.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_00: And then I think what happened was we raised the threshold for major party.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_01: And the independent party asked for that because they wanted to go back to the old system.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_01: They did.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yep, they did.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so it's like, look, you're a private organization, independent, libertarian, Republican.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_01: You're a private organization.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_01: You're not a government entity.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_01: You are going to choose candidates, pay for your own process.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that that is capitalistic.
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_01: And small r, Republican, as can be.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_01: And if some parties decide,
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_01: you know, they want to play King of the Mountain or Thunderdome, it's up to them.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_02: Two men enter, one
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_02: man leave, right?
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_02: We'd have more male candidates.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I'll tell you,
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_01: if they become corrupted,
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_01: like the backroom smoking deal,
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_01: With today's internet and all of that other kind of stuff,
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_01: people would catch on to that real quick.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_01: And I think there'd be a real political cost to having something like that.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_01: Back in the smoke-filled room days when you lived on a farm
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_01: and could pick up one channel on your radio,
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_01: I think you could get away with it a lot more than you can now.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_02: The only reason why I'm probably,
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_02: or not the only,
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_02: probably another reason why I'm forward is because think of
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_02: the slippery slope argument now of Them being in, now,
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_02: everybody,
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_02: when they need to be in control of campaign finance,
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_02: they need to be in control of voter registration,
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_02: they need to be in control, like,
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_02: there's so many things that have gone into private organizations,
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_02: running their own elections, I mean,
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_02: at the end of the day,
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_02: I think, yeah,
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_02: I even think general elections should have,
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_02: be able to have more than two candidates in general, I mean, why can't
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you do.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_02: Five people run for a state house seat, right?
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_02: It just seems silly without even having a party nomination.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that's what Nebraska does.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_01: They have a nonpartisan unicamical legislature and running for
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_01: the state legislature is like running for water board.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_01: But, you know, that's one way you can go.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_01: I don't have a problem with the state running the general election and having.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I agree.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_02: They have to do that.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_02: What's that?
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_02: They have to do that.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_02: They have to run the general election.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't have a problem with there being minimum standards to become a political party.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_01: The process that I'm advocating essentially There would be no major parties or minor parties.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_01: There would just be parties that are big and parties that are small.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know,
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_01: they would each nominate their nominees who would go to the general election,
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_01: which would be a state monitored system.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_01: Because after all, the people that go to the general election ballot, they're just nominees.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_01: They're nominees.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_01: You know, proposed.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, so that's something that we're going to be working on.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_01: We think that it'll take several legislative sessions for that to bite.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_02: That's good.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_02: I think there's some merit in it.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_02: And I think,
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_02: if the Republican and then Republicans could have their primary in January
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_02: and Democrats could do theirs in freaking August if they wanted to,
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_02: because we know Democrats need to wait till the end because they got
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_02: to figure out all the all the shit that come out of the closet first
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_02: before they They do their primaries.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_02: We have until August 25th.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_01: Minor parties right now.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_01: I imagine that would be a universal deadline for any political party.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_01: But I'll tell you, what I think would be awful would be if we had a top two jungle primary.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_01: Having districts with two Republicans,
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_01: two Democrats,
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_01: or if one district is so Democrat that the Republicans or Democrats don't even try,
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_01: you might get a third party candidate.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_01: And some of those races.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_01: But, you know,
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_01: I think that that kind of a system would be very destructive to the idea
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_01: that you should have a variety of perspectives to choose from.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_01: But we're going to get that if we don't make a change,
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_01: because the number of non-affiliated voters is now,
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's now the largest block of voters in the state of Oregon,
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_01: and it's continuing to grow.
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_01: And these people are not going to be sympathetic to state-funded primary elections
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_01: for political parties they don't belong to.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_00: It grows artificially because everyone's automatically registered to vote.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_00: None of these people are paying attention.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_00: That's why I say NAB stands for not actually voting.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_00: These guys aren't even paying attention.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_00: They just toss their ballot as soon as it gets here.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_00: They do not have any interest in being registered,
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_00: but they also aren't going to take the time to go to the state and deregister
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_00: or even check the no box.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_00: that's the one part of the whole argument I get is that they're an increasing part
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_00: of the electorate, but only because of dumb policy choices that have been made.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_00: If we hadn't have done voter, most of them would still be unregistered people.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_01: Well, let's say you're right.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_01: Let's say that half of the non-affiliate voters aren't voters at all.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_01: Or even let's break it down further, a third.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_01: The fact is that that's a big number.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_01: And both Republicans and Democrats,
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_01: and I would guess the minor parties too,
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_01: are given population electoral growth relative to electorate growth, they're losing.
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_01: The numbers are dropping.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_01: And the NAV voters, even the ones that are voting, it's a big block.
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_01: And so what I'm saying is,
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_01: if you do not want to have a jungle primary, you need to get ahead of it.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_01: You need to get ahead of it before the NAV block is so large that the Republicans
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_01: and Democrats and minor parties will lose control of the issue and we end up with
• 35:46
  SPEAKER_01: a jungle primary.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that this- Like California,
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_02: basically,
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_02: like just for the listeners,
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_02: like California,
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_02: where you get somebody like Spencer Pratt, well,
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_02: what happens is he just gets X'd out in a jungle primary
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_02: and two Democrats move forward to the general And you basically lose any sort
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_02: of conservative voice at all in that discussion.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_02: And now it's who can give away more free shit to people in L.A. to win the mayor's race.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want to see that happen to Oregon.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_01: And Oregon is primed to be plucked by people who love jungle primaries.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_01: And so I'm hoping that both of you will join me in proposing and advocating for
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_01: an electoral change like this.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_01: All these pledges.
• 36:31
  SPEAKER_01: To save our process.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_00: Not to destroy it.
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_00: Turnout in the 2024 general election among non-affiliated was 56%.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_00: So about half of them are voters.
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's not bad.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_01: It's not bad.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_01: That's still a big herkin number of non-affiliated voters.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you get about 600,000 of them that are engaged.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_00: So they would be the third largest political party after the Democrats and then
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_00: the Republicans, essentially.
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_01: Right, right.
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_02: Of voters, of actual voters.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_01: Remember how...
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_01: Remember how much smaller it used to be 20, 30 years ago?
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_01: It was much, much smaller.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_00: I used to be a lot smaller 20, 30 years ago.
• 37:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 37:16
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks, Richard.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_02: This was enlightening to have you on and talk about your guys' process.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_02: I think it's cool to see.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_02: I think there's a place for third.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_02: Third rail candidates,
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_02: third party candidates,
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_02: whatever, cross party nominations are good if they're for a reason.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's neat to see the Libertarian Party actually having some real leadership there.
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's great.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_01: Well, once you take the aluminum foil hats off, you can actually get something done.
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I mean,
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_02: there's a few issues the Libertarian Party still holds on to that I just think seem
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_02: to be kind of silly.
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah, yeah, I would agree with that.
• 37:58
  SPEAKER_01: I would agree with that.
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_02: And generally speaking, I like I like less taxes.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_02: And I kind of tend to agree with you on the whole idea that income taxes,
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_02: I just hate regressive taxes,
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_02: pay off your property taxes,
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_02: or get rid of property taxes and income taxes,
• 38:13
  SPEAKER_02: those You know, all those do is a tax people on being successful.
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's just horrible, you know, thing to do.
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_02: I think sales taxes and,
• 38:23
  SPEAKER_02: you know, taxes along those lines, like, you know, paying fees to go do stuff.
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_02: It's stuff I'm choosing to do or buy makes more sense than, you know, stuff I'm forced to do.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_01: in Ukraine,
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_01: we own a small piece of property that my wife inherited from her grandmother.
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_01: And they have a system there where they do have property taxes.
• 38:46
  SPEAKER_01: They're very low.
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_01: But if you don't pay them, they don't take your property.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_01: They never take it.
• 38:55
  SPEAKER_01: You're there for as long as you want to be.
• 38:57
  SPEAKER_01: What they will do is Make an assessment on your property when you sell it.
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_01: But even that is capped,
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_01: so you're never going to be in a situation where you sell your house
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_01: and you don't get any money.
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and if a country is screwed up as Ukraine is, can pull that off.
• 39:16
  SPEAKER_01: We should be able to do it, too.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_02: And they do that in wartime.
• 39:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, they did in wartime.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we're going to be there.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_01: My wife and I are going to go to Ukraine on the 25th of this month.
• 39:29
  SPEAKER_01: You can't fly into Ukraine.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_01: You've got to fly into Warsaw or someplace like that.
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_01: And then you take a bus or a train.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_01: And we're going to go to Kiev for a few hours.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_01: Hopefully it'll be in daytime.
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_01: Enough time to connect.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_01: With a bus to Cherkasi and then the little village of Mihaljevka,
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_01: where the property is, which population 600, you know, so it's not a hot target.
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_01: And it's about 800, 700, 800 miles from the front line, so we should be okay.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_01: But it is going to be interesting to see the impact of the war firsthand.
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 40:08
  SPEAKER_01: I'll try and visit a couple of political offices while I'm there, but I can't resist.
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_02: Wow.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_02: Well, good luck.
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 40:19
  SPEAKER_01: And thank you for having me on.
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_01: I really enjoyed talking with you guys.
• 40:22
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_02: Wow.
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_02: That was hopefully stay safe in Kiev.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_02: That would be,
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know if I'd want to go there right now,
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_02: flying drones and all that sort of stuff.
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_02: You know, that's pretty wild.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody we both know,
• 40:38
  SPEAKER_00: the Chief Prosperity Officer,
• 40:39
  SPEAKER_00: actually did that trip like a year ago, when it was probably more dangerous.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_00: But I agree, I wouldn't go.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I'm sure he had a delegation, being a Chief Prosperity.
• 40:49
  SPEAKER_00: No, he went on his own.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_00: No, I think it was a delegation trip, actually, now that I think about it.
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, speaking of, where are they now?
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_00: We have a quick update.
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_00: So do you remember not that long ago when Lori Chavez Reamer resigned as
• 41:12
  SPEAKER_00: the Department of Labor head, as the Secretary of Labor?
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_00: Well, supposedly,
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_00: and this was according to the White House at the time,
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_00: Stephen Chung, 47, tweeted that she had left to take a job in the private sector.
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_00: And that was in April.
• 41:30
  SPEAKER_00: We now know That Lori Travis Dreamers just tweeted.
• 41:34
  SPEAKER_00: She's become a senior advisor at Think Big Public Affairs.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_00: So I don't know what their painter.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know where job is, but apparently it's better than being the secretary of labor.
• 41:46
  SPEAKER_00: Unless, of course,
• 41:47
  SPEAKER_00: the scandal was true and she was pressured into resigning and they made up a reason
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_00: for her to leave, which I have no way of knowing if that's true or not.
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_00: But.
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_00: This is where she ended up.
• 41:59
  SPEAKER_00: So.
• 42:01
  SPEAKER_00: Be interesting to see what comes from it.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_02: I never know if she's done PR before, so I guess good for her.
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I mean, I'd imagine she's did a lot of speaking engagements.
• 42:13
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, if that's what they want her to do.
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, there's lots of different things to do in PR.
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_00: PR is just sales, really.
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_00: You're just selling things not directly.
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_00: You're selling ideas.
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_02: Sure.
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_02: Sure.
• 42:29
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, we'll find out what happens.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_02: You know, whatever.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_02: I guess once you're
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_02: a presidential appointee to a cabinet, I mean,
• 42:43
  SPEAKER_02: whatever happens, no matter what, there's some value out of that to any firm, right?
• 42:49
  SPEAKER_02: There has to be some value to be able to say that you have a cabinet secretary on your PR.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 42:57
  SPEAKER_02: I don't really care who you are.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_02: So when you think about it from that perspective,
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_02: like if you were to say,
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_02: hey, Reagan, we're going to have a cabinet secretary join our consulting firm.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_02: You're like, can't imagine that's bad.
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_00: No, and this is what happens with Congress people all the time.
• 43:16
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it makes sense.
• 43:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's the type of exit that you do.
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_00: I am just surmising that it's possible that it's not a more attractive job
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_00: than Secretary of Labor.
• 43:27
  SPEAKER_00: And it's only something you do after you're forced out of your job.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_00: Now, it may not be.
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_00: It might be such a great job.
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_00: And being Secretary of Labor may be a total headache.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_00: However, I also just pulled up this headline.
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_00: It says that the Labor Department Office of Inspector General is still investigating
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_00: the Claims against former Labor Secretary Lori Chavez de Riemer eight months after
• 43:51
  SPEAKER_00: the allegations for surface.
• 43:54
  SPEAKER_00: The Department of Labor Inspector General Anthony Despacito told Bloomberg Law
• 43:58
  SPEAKER_00: in May that the investigation was complete and the report would be finalized by
• 44:01
  SPEAKER_00: the end of June.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_00: But the IG's office official said last week investigators are still working on
• 44:07
  SPEAKER_00: the probe with no estimated completion date.
• 44:11
  SPEAKER_00: So we haven't heard where where they're at.
• 44:20
  SPEAKER_00: We'll keep an eye out, obviously.
• 44:22
  SPEAKER_00: Hopefully we'll hear how this ends eventually, but not today.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and I'm sure we'll never hear how that ends,
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_02: so it seems like all those things just go away.
• 44:36
  SPEAKER_00: They typically do.
• 44:38
  SPEAKER_00: The other headline that I saw,
• 44:39
  SPEAKER_00: I don't have a link for it right now,
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_00: but the board that's supposed to be working on their report
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_00: for universal health care, that was due September 15th.
• 44:47
  SPEAKER_00: And magically they pushed it back to December 1st.
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, again,
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_00: surmising,
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_00: there's no way to know,
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_00: but there's just a major election that takes place between those two things.
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_00: And the only thing that I've left to figure out
• 45:00
  SPEAKER_00: with universal health care really is how to pay for it.
• 45:03
  SPEAKER_00: And so maybe they don't want to slap a giant tax here.
• 45:07
  SPEAKER_00: On a big report and say universal healthcare right before the election.
• 45:11
  SPEAKER_00: They want to do that after the election.
• 45:12
  SPEAKER_02: Kind of like that Hillsborough moratorium on data centers that was 120 days.
• 45:17
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, right after the election.
• 45:19
  SPEAKER_00: And I saw a headline that there was, and that's fascinating to me too.
• 45:23
  SPEAKER_00: I saw another headline that said there were a couple of data center projects
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_00: in Hillsborough that still got submitted days and hours before they did that.
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_00: Which makes me think that somewhere, somehow...
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_00: At least one person engaged in the making of that decided that they were going
• 45:43
  SPEAKER_00: to leak it to certain people that had projects maybe.
• 45:46
  SPEAKER_00: Or maybe these people submitting their projects just got lucky.
• 45:49
  SPEAKER_00: Usually not, but it's always possible.
• 45:53
  SPEAKER_00: Better to be lucky than good.
• 45:55
  SPEAKER_00: So anyway, fascinating stuff all around here in government.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, well,
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_02: speaking of Hillsborough,
• 46:02
  SPEAKER_02: there was some news that we wanted to chat on and we can probably end on it too for
• 46:06
  SPEAKER_02: the day because we went a little long with Richard.
• 46:07
  SPEAKER_02: But even though people just love to hear us talk, I'm sure.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_02: But you wanted to talk about Senator Solomon.
• 46:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so there was a situation where she's at a public event.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_00: I think it is described as a public forum.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_00: Where a guy named Pedro Garcia Balderrama allegedly got up,
• 46:34
  SPEAKER_00: launched himself into a diatribe,
• 46:36
  SPEAKER_00: grabbed Solman's Glasses off of her face and threw them in the bushes.
• 46:42
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm assuming this is an outdoor event.
• 46:44
  SPEAKER_00: So anyway, he gets arrested on disorderly conduct, too.
• 46:48
  SPEAKER_00: He's not held.
• 46:48
  SPEAKER_00: He's released.
• 46:50
  SPEAKER_00: But one of the crazy things about this is so you see,
• 46:53
  SPEAKER_00: of course, legislative leaders, they send a press release.
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_00: Republicans, Democrats alike saying this is unacceptable and and we can't have this.
• 47:02
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not Oregon style debates.
• 47:04
  SPEAKER_00: Meanwhile,
• 47:06
  SPEAKER_00: Myrna Munoz says,
• 47:08
  SPEAKER_00: quote, I'm so concerned of the jump status quo politicians jump to.
• 47:14
  SPEAKER_00: Due process is dead if this person is publicly condemned for throwing some glasses
• 47:20
  SPEAKER_00: while we are being raped, caged, kidnapped.
• 47:23
  SPEAKER_00: And then in all caps, we have been fighting to stop political violence.
• 47:29
  SPEAKER_00: And so, again, I'm just like.
• 47:32
  SPEAKER_00: You're a teacher.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_00: That works for the Oregon, for an Oregon school district.
• 47:39
  SPEAKER_00: Like who is caging and kidnapping and raping?
• 47:45
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, in Oregon and not being arrested for it.
• 47:48
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, I'm certain she's talking about things that aren't even occurring in Oregon.
• 47:53
  SPEAKER_00: So it's just, it's so odd.
• 47:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's so strange.
• 47:59
  SPEAKER_00: But at the end of the day, it shows you who the DSA people are.
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_00: And they don't have American values at their core of a debate and decorum.
• 48:10
  SPEAKER_00: They are ultimately more interested in political violence and,
• 48:16
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 48:16
  SPEAKER_00: defeating and crushing whoever they perceive to be their oppressors than having
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_00: a political and policy debate ever.
• 48:25
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, one, I mean, good for, I'm surprised Solomon's still doing town halls.
• 48:33
  SPEAKER_02: I wouldn't be.
• 48:35
  SPEAKER_02: I wouldn't be.
• 48:36
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, that was the first thing that jumped out.
• 48:37
  SPEAKER_02: I'm like, what is she doing doing town halls?
• 48:40
  SPEAKER_00: 100%.
• 48:41
  SPEAKER_02: But that just goes to the character of the person.
• 48:45
  SPEAKER_02: I think Janine literally cares about her community.
• 48:50
  SPEAKER_02: And then seeing the tweet or the post that Munoz did totally tells you the character of her.
• 48:59
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 49:00
  SPEAKER_02: And in my mind...
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_02: That could not be a wider gap than I've ever seen amongst one party.
• 49:10
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 49:11
  SPEAKER_02: Of the character of those two individuals.
• 49:15
  SPEAKER_02: And the Munoz sisters are a bane on the existence of the legislature.
• 49:21
  SPEAKER_02: And it's not going to get any better.
• 49:24
  SPEAKER_02: And it's going to be horrible in that building with those two always virtual signaling members.
• 49:32
  SPEAKER_02: Always running to the aid of criminals over victims.
• 49:37
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 49:38
  SPEAKER_02: Always running towards open borders over law and order.
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_02: Drugs over, you know, just common decency.
• 49:47
  SPEAKER_02: And they are DSA on the umpteenth degree,
• 49:52
  SPEAKER_02: and it's going to be horrible for us to have to deal
• 49:55
  SPEAKER_02: with their stupid virtual signaling crap every single time somebody else opens their
• 50:00
  SPEAKER_02: mouth that disagrees with And they want Pedro to show up there and accost Solomon
• 50:08
  SPEAKER_02: and rub it in and tell her, you know, she's a POS and all that sort of stuff.
• 50:13
  SPEAKER_02: And everything you say is just wrong.
• 50:15
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that that's what they want.
• 50:17
  SPEAKER_02: They want destruction.
• 50:19
  SPEAKER_02: They don't actually want political debate.
• 50:22
  SPEAKER_02: They want destruction of America.
• 50:24
  SPEAKER_02: And we have to realize that they want to destroy our system of governments,
• 50:28
  SPEAKER_02: our systems of How we've had political debate over the years.
• 50:33
  SPEAKER_02: They probably don't like the fact they're town halls.
• 50:37
  SPEAKER_02: They don't like anything that has to do with sitting around having a discussion
• 50:41
  SPEAKER_02: because if you don't believe the way they believe, then you are dead to them.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_02: Everything else doesn't matter.
• 50:48
  SPEAKER_02: They're basically anarchists for the sake of it.
• 50:51
  SPEAKER_00: They'll attack anybody too who cancels a public event or puts security on it because
• 50:55
  SPEAKER_00: of this saying that they're cowardly and
• 50:57
  SPEAKER_02: Refuse to meet with people.
• 50:59
  SPEAKER_02: It's just horrible.
• 51:02
  SPEAKER_00: They claim to want a basic safety and standard of living,
• 51:06
  SPEAKER_00: but they don't believe in it for everybody else.
• 51:09
  SPEAKER_02: No.
• 51:11
  SPEAKER_02: It's really horrible.
• 51:12
  SPEAKER_02: I think that it's good to see a lot of the Democrat lawmakers,
• 51:18
  SPEAKER_02: a lot of them stood up and condemned it and stuff,
• 51:21
  SPEAKER_02: but they're not condemning it like you and I just condemned it.
• 51:24
  SPEAKER_02: It's like...
• 51:26
  SPEAKER_02: Political violence.
• 51:27
  SPEAKER_02: There's no place for political violence.
• 51:30
  SPEAKER_02: You know what?
• 51:33
  SPEAKER_02: I would be so pissed.
• 51:35
  SPEAKER_02: Where is the leadership on condemning Munoz
• 51:42
  SPEAKER_02: for her rhetoric and the shit,
• 51:45
  SPEAKER_02: the dribble that came out of her mouth in regards to it?
• 51:48
  SPEAKER_02: I'd be condemning that because that is horseshit, man.
• 51:52
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 51:53
  SPEAKER_02: And that's the kind of thing.
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_02: And if you allow stuff like that to happen,
• 51:56
  SPEAKER_02: what happens is that you just kind of keep wedging out that Pandora's box
• 52:02
  SPEAKER_02: or whatever it is,
• 52:04
  SPEAKER_02: where you become afraid because now all of a sudden the next person says, well,
• 52:09
  SPEAKER_02: it doesn't matter what my political decorum is,
• 52:10
  SPEAKER_02: I can say whatever the hell I want, you know, and...
• 52:14
  SPEAKER_02: And then it just gets worse and worse and worse.
• 52:16
  SPEAKER_02: And then all of a sudden they're going to be throwing tomatoes at the legislators
• 52:21
  SPEAKER_02: while they take floor votes.
• 52:25
  SPEAKER_02: Where does it end?
• 52:26
  SPEAKER_02: And I just think you got to have political decorum and parties got to police themselves, man.
• 52:32
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, it always seems odd to me.
• 52:34
  SPEAKER_02: And this happens a lot on both the right and the left that it's happened over the years.
• 52:39
  SPEAKER_02: And I could probably lay out a number of
• 52:43
  SPEAKER_02: These things that happen is when somebody goes through some sort of issue,
• 52:48
  SPEAKER_02: internal issue or whatever,
• 52:50
  SPEAKER_02: it seems like the party that it happens to,
• 52:54
  SPEAKER_02: more people in the opposite party are there to say, hey, are you okay?
• 52:57
  SPEAKER_02: Are things happening versus people in your own party?
• 53:01
  SPEAKER_01: And it's just,
• 53:05
  SPEAKER_02: it's pretty wild that way.
• 53:06
  SPEAKER_02: That's my pivot guy.
• 53:08
  SPEAKER_02: Hopefully my pivot's working out, Reagan.
• 53:09
  SPEAKER_02: I need to grow some grass.
• 53:11
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 53:15
  SPEAKER_02: I just really think that we need to put a stop to this.
• 53:19
  SPEAKER_02: We talked about it earlier.
• 53:21
  SPEAKER_02: I'll finish with this thought because I'm all over the place on it.
• 53:25
  SPEAKER_02: The point I want to put on it is the Democratic Party is allowing the DSA to take them over.
• 53:33
  SPEAKER_02: If they don't put a plug in this crack, they're going to lose the entire power structure.
• 53:41
  SPEAKER_02: They want to be in charge.
• 53:42
  SPEAKER_02: And at some point, normal people are going to say, you people are crazy.
• 53:47
  SPEAKER_02: And now I'm going to finally vote Republican and you can call us Trumpers and MAGA all you want.
• 53:52
  SPEAKER_02: But at some point, people are going to say it's enough and the pendulum is going to shift.
• 53:57
  SPEAKER_02: So if you want to be in control, you better tap down your crazies.
• 54:01
  SPEAKER_02: And right now your DSA crazies are kind of getting crazier.
• 54:05
  SPEAKER_02: So.
• 54:06
  SPEAKER_00: And that's it.
• 54:07
  SPEAKER_00: Parties have to police themselves because at the end of the day,
• 54:09
  SPEAKER_00: the Republicans can put out as many statements as we want about this,
• 54:13
  SPEAKER_00: but it doesn't have an effect as when Democratic leaders stand up and,
• 54:17
  SPEAKER_00: like you said,
• 54:17
  SPEAKER_00: specifically condemn Munoz,
• 54:20
  SPEAKER_00: specifically condemn Thousand Friends,
• 54:23
  SPEAKER_00: specifically condemn the people that are bringing forward this.
• 54:27
  SPEAKER_00: Actual hate speech as opposed to just condemning and saying we don't agree
• 54:31
  SPEAKER_00: with these Republicans and therefore it's hate speech.
• 54:34
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 54:34
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's that's what's got to be done.
• 54:36
  SPEAKER_00: But I have real leadership to do that.
• 54:38
  SPEAKER_00: Both parties severely lacking often in that category of real leadership.
• 54:43
  SPEAKER_02: It really is.
• 54:44
  SPEAKER_02: It's a it's important.
• 54:48
  SPEAKER_02: You know,
• 54:48
  SPEAKER_02: that that we maintain because I think that's part of what freedom is and our,
• 54:52
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 54:53
  SPEAKER_02: our constitutional republic and everything we built on is like Have
• 54:56
  SPEAKER_02: the political debate.
• 54:57
  SPEAKER_02: It's fine.
• 54:59
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe we're better at it,
• 55:00
  SPEAKER_02: Reagan, because we're in the minority party and we've been for a long time.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_02: So we're kind of used to losing.
• 55:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 55:06
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, guaranteed.
• 55:08
  SPEAKER_02: Losing the political argument.
• 55:11
  SPEAKER_02: But I just think that Democrats got to learn a little bit more when you're in power.
• 55:16
  SPEAKER_02: And if you want to stay in power, you need to police your crazy left.
• 55:21
  SPEAKER_02: And you're not right now.
• 55:23
  SPEAKER_02: And it's going to bite you in the ass.
• 55:25
  SPEAKER_02: And it might cost you the governor's race.
• 55:27
  SPEAKER_02: And that's what you're seeing.
• 55:29
  SPEAKER_02: You're seeing craziness kind of taking over the politics or the policies are taking
• 55:35
  SPEAKER_02: over the politics,
• 55:37
  SPEAKER_02: which could cost you the governor's race in a Trump midterm,
• 55:42
  SPEAKER_02: which I wouldn't think would be possible.
• 55:45
  SPEAKER_02: It may not still be,
• 55:47
  SPEAKER_02: but it looks more possible every day we see more about this DSA stuff and Al-Sayed
• 55:53
  SPEAKER_02: and all this sort of craziness that's happening nationally.
• 55:56
  SPEAKER_02: I think this has got to be swinging,
• 55:58
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 55:59
  SPEAKER_02: not swinging in big chunks,
• 56:01
  SPEAKER_02: but it's got to be itching away at people to say,
• 56:04
  SPEAKER_00: geez, I just can't vote for Democrats anymore, right?
• 56:08
  SPEAKER_02: So I hope, but we'll see.
• 56:11
  SPEAKER_02: I could put out Pedro Garcia-Balder's cell phone number and let everybody call him.
• 56:17
  SPEAKER_02: But that would not be right of me, would it?
• 56:20
  SPEAKER_00: Nope.
• 56:22
  SPEAKER_00: It would not.
• 56:22
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 56:23
  SPEAKER_02: So funny.
• 56:24
  SPEAKER_02: I looked up his voter stuff on there.
• 56:26
  SPEAKER_02: It calls him a swing voter.
• 56:30
  SPEAKER_02: But he's only voted ever once in the general election in 2018.
• 56:35
  SPEAKER_00: That sounds exactly like the type of people we're dealing with right now.
• 56:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's the good part about these ones is,
• 56:41
  SPEAKER_02: you know, they tend to not be, I mean, he doesn't qualify as a one of four voter.
• 56:48
  SPEAKER_02: Good times.
• 56:49
  SPEAKER_02: All right, man.
• 56:50
  SPEAKER_02: All right.
• 56:51
  SPEAKER_02: I'll get back to your wildfire meetings and all the other stuff that I'm sure you have going on.
• 56:55
  SPEAKER_02: I'm going to go back to chewing some more smoke.
• 56:58
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 56:59
  SPEAKER_00: Get that pivot fixed.
• 57:00
  SPEAKER_00: You can grow grass and defend your house if need be.
• 57:04
  SPEAKER_02: Well, at least it's dirt now.
• 57:05
  SPEAKER_02: So I got that part.
• 57:06
  SPEAKER_02: I got a pretty good firelight around it.
• 57:08
  SPEAKER_00: There you go.
• 57:10
  SPEAKER_00: Awesome.