Latest / Coconut Justice / CJP #74: California Voting

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CJP #74: California Voting · Coconut Justice

• Carlos: Welcome back everyone. And as promised, we ⁓ go ahead and ⁓ say hi to Sparky Mitra. Sparky, say hi to everyone. Sparky Mitra: Hi y'all. It's really awesome being here. Cefore X. Plosives: Well Sparky Mitra: I ran for Congress in California's district, which was in San Diego, and I'm really excited to be talking about ⁓ ballot access and how to make the progressive movement and ⁓ move forward and how to really change things for the better for all of us. Carlos: ⁓ yeah. I'm excited. Welcome back to the channel. Lauren Colin. Cefore X. Plosives: ⁓ yeah. loren: Thank you, Carlos. It's a pleasure to be here. yeah, I ran for Congress here in California thirty-four, just up the road from Sparky. And yeah, excited to talk about ballot access, ⁓ not just for progressives, but for independence in general and how we, you know, start to use imagination to reimagine ⁓ what a government for all can look like and then ⁓ talk about what the courage it will take to actually get us there. Carlos: Yeah. And welcome back. C4 explosives. I I was gonna make ⁓ I was gonna make fun of the fact that you're the only one from Florida and it just goes to show you that people from California are generally better. Cefore X. Plosives: What's going on everybody? ⁓ glad to be here as always. Damn it, man. I I hey when we had her I I remember that. I'll bring that up to B T next time. Is that all right, that's cool. I got you, bro. Carlos: Hey, don't you know that there's like social media braveness? I can talk all my trash as long as you guys are over there and I'm over here. Well, we wanted to get together to talk about California voting and California ballot access and all that stuff. Because on the news, ⁓ you know, we got we got this dude out here who just so happens to be running the country and is Cefore X. Plosives: Keyboard warrior. Carlos: Talking trash about voting and the voting system and all that stuff. So we got came together to address that. and I think it's really helpful that both Lauren and Sparky were running for office. So they've learned quite a bit. And I know that Lauren has some things to get off his chest. So you wanna chime in? Like ⁓ Hey, what's good? The process of voting in California has been in the news lately, and that's why I decided to bring on some of my friends that actually ran in this last election. Sparky Mitra took a break from earning her PhD to run for Congress for California's 50th district, which is San Diego. Lauren Collin is back on the channel after running for California's 34th district, which is LA. What were some of the things that you what are the the preliminary things that you were learning when you were trying to get folks out to vote? C4 Explosives joins me in this conversation with Sparky and Lauren to discuss voting in California. Before we get into it, remember to go to coconutjustice.com to get you some clothes that I think would look good on you. Let's go. loren: Yeah. ⁓ you know, we definitely live in the world of a two party system and they have their machines. ⁓ in California in general and certainly in Los Angeles, you know, it's really a one party state. ⁓ and Democrats control everything. ⁓ I know, you know, I I received I think at last count I'm at thirteen hundred thirty five votes. You obviously anyone could go look it up the exact number and say, ⁓ is this? ⁓ but You know, I think that's the thirteen hundred thirty-five people I was able to speak to directly about the independent movement and why voting for an independent isn't just a one-off, but we want to elect enough independents to deny both Democrats and Republicans a majority. Here in deep, deep blue, I mean 34 is the twelfth or thirteenth blueest district in the country, it resonates, right? ⁓ but then the second part, which is probably an obvious lesson. So the lesson is that message resonates. That's great. ⁓ but the second part's probably super obviously Lauren duh, but still you have to learn it yourself, right? Is just the role money plays, right? Like it's hard to raise money unless you are within the machine. And even so my competitor, ⁓ Angela ⁓ Torres Gomez, ⁓ who came in ⁓ sorry, not Gomez, sorry, that's Jimmy Gomez. ⁓ Angela Torres who came in second, ⁓ and will face Jimmy Gomez, ⁓ You know, she early on got ⁓ part of the Justice Democrats money, which is the psychiatrist, it's always butcher's name, the guy from San Francisco who ⁓ you know, says he he helped make AOC. Well, right, she like she got that bucket of money, which was great for her, but it's really that money, more than anything, is what let her win because even that left left side of the Democratic Party still has an infrastructure. So it's not just like do you have a message? Yes, you have a message. Do you need money? Yes, you to have money. But then you actually have to the build the infrastructure to get the money, right? So people love the idea of independent when they hear it, but no one's ever vo ⁓ donors are historical. Right, donors have even given to a party, so they've given to Democrats, they've given to Republicans, or they've given to their friend that one candidate. And they'll only give to that candidate or to that party. So in the independent movement, we're really starting from scratch, which is to build the base of donors. And then the next part of that also was, you know, it's really while it was great in the independent progressive spaces I think Sparky and I were kind of both overlapping a lot in, you know, there's a lot of ⁓ People who've come forth to kind of create endorsements out of the blue this cycle, which is really great. But the endorsements, especially in a city like LA, where people really listen to, for better or worse, DSA, or we have this ⁓ endorsement thing called not not endorsement, but a voting guide called Knock LA, which is definitely the progressive and super progressive left, or even some of the leftist part of the city, ⁓ they're they still have their own versions of what power is and what they've worked for all these years. So even as a it's truly as an outsider, you can't get into that. So I had some really great endorsement interviews and they were like, wow, this is amazing. And every single one of them, of course, still chose a Democrat. So it was really interesting to see just how much ⁓ people long for change, talk about change. When presented with the opportunity for change, they just go back and do the same thing. So it's I know like how do we how do we take like that's what that's why to me that word courage is so important. Because again, we can't we can't just not We can't say we want something different and then do something the same every time and go, Huh, I wonder why it didn't change. Carlos: they have like they have like full on meetings and interviews to see if they're willing to sponsor you? loren: Endorse, yeah. Yeah. I I I totally enjoyed I enjoyed the endorsement process. ⁓ but again, I already I knew the results before I went in every time. And that's the f that's the the sad part, I guess. Carlos: Or endorse you, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. That's the part that Yeah. Sparky, did you find it similar to Lauren's ⁓ experience? Sparky Mitra: ⁓ I do think my race was a little bit different, ⁓ because I I was the Progressive Democrat in my race. ⁓ but so so ⁓ but I will say in terms of endorsing so I I I definitely want to piggyback off of what was said about ⁓ the money that's involved. 'Cause I did get DSA's recommendation in my race, but endor an endorsement from DSA comes with money and a recommendation does not. And I think that a lot of that is with like that perceived viability of a candidate in a race that is in ⁓ that has an incumbent. And so and so maybe the struggle's not exactly the same, but there's definitely I think a lot of overlap between the two. and that's something that we saw throughout ⁓ in terms of endorsement processes here as well. So yeah, so rec we honestly did get most of like the recommendations from ⁓ kind of most progressive organizations in our city. and even like more broadly. But when we went into like the Democratic Club spaces, ⁓ who those are rough, y'all. Those are so rough. ⁓ 'cause cause there was ⁓ and there was actually a moment that went ⁓ I wouldn't say viral, but it definitely got publicized in the San Diego community at our biggest Spanish speaking club. And this was the club where my endorsement was being considered. ⁓ but they had a conversation after that about another race in Chula Vista, about one of their school board members. And there was in my opinion, a very valid critique that ⁓ one of the Chula Vist like this member that they were considering friendly endorsing, ⁓ which all I have a problem with that process in and of itself. But d a person that they were friendly endorsing, ⁓ she works for DHS and in like the era of ice raids, I mean there was this very valid critique of, hey, can we like pull back a little bit, reassess and actually evaluate beyond just like friendly endorsing someone who we've endorsed in the past? And ⁓ and then there was ⁓ a big blowout essentially where ⁓ Someone who actually ended up who actually works for the person I was running against. he ended up calling these Spanish speaking voters like racist against white people and like all this all this garbage, right? All this bullshit. And ⁓ and and like to me that's awful, right? Like y you know that you have this power and people aren't even like Carlos: Ha ha ha. Sparky Mitra: courageous enough to say that, hey, like, get out of this space. We don't like what you stand for. They're just asking for a re-evaluation, and even then you have like this kind of like foot on people's necks and you don't want to move it. ⁓ that particular interaction was recorded, so we did face some repercussions, but ⁓ but most of these interactions aren't. And ⁓ there's so many other spaces like the young the the young dumb Club in our county is ⁓ is filled with staffers of like these incumbent candidates and ⁓ and young people like trying to get ahead, right? ⁓ but they push through like friendly incumbent endorsements so quickly and and they don't even have to like consider every candidate in a race. They don't even have to like think like they don't even have to bring it up to their general body, they don't even have to bring it up to their executive board. They could literally be like, hey, this is a candidate. I don't care if I work for this candidate, but this candidate is someone who I really stand behind. Let's push their endorsement through. So so yeah, so ⁓ there's there's so much, there's so much bullshit that happens and th those decisions actually do make an impact because they decide like ⁓ what mailers these organizations send out and put money behind, and like that's like tens of thousands of dollars worth of support in one way or another. And ⁓ Cefore X. Plosives: But we're like a chance to start. Carlos: Hm. Yeah. Sparky Mitra: And yeah, it it can be very detrimental to to ⁓ to ⁓ to an outside voice, kind of being successful. Cefore X. Plosives: Two loren: I had crazy interactions early on. First I want to correct. It's Angela Gonzalez Torres who came in second in the race. So I want to say her name properly and give her props. ⁓ but early on a year ago, it's funny because Google is like, you met these people a year ago. So it's a year ago this week when I really got serious about my campaign. I'm like, ⁓ yeah. it was about a year ago. I went to my first Democratic Club meeting. and so many of the people there were like, We're tired of the Democrats. But Carlos: Yeah. loren: We're we're even thinking of our i what our club leaving. And actually I know a different club, which called the Field the Burn San Fernando Valley, which was a democratic club, which left ⁓ and became an independent club. So like it can happen. ⁓ but it was all talk, right? ⁓ and then they all fell in line. our biggest democratic club in ⁓ the district is called ⁓ EAPD. ⁓ they didn't endorse in this race because they really disliked Jimmy Gomez, but they couldn't swing themselves to vote for Angela. either, but again, because to be a club, which again makes sense, right? I'm just but it's just when you start to live it and learn it and see the choices we've made and why we start to get boxed in, like, well, there's a club they couldn't endorse outside the club. So I might have been their favorite. Just it wouldn't have mattered, right? So our largest club democratic club in this district chose not to endorse, which is just a shame, right? But also it got me Most recently into a deep dive into why do we have primaries at all? Right. I think so much of being a human being, but also being an American is we just assume everything's always been this way. We always mistake ⁓ the accident of our birth for how it just should be. Like, ⁓ I'm an American, how lucky? ⁓ who knew? Right. ⁓ my parents, my parents were born. I was born in the right country and my parents are the right religion. It's amazing, always, right? yay! Cefore X. Plosives: ⁓ Carlos: They stayed out of the sun just long enough. loren: yes, all those ⁓ Slavic Jews from Ukraine were like ⁓ but it ⁓ you know basically we have primaries that that they're the the system's not even 120 years old. It started at the turn of the century in Louisiana because the then Democratic Party, not our current Democratic Party, but the then Democratic Party Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. loren: was having such a hard time of backroom dealing that they came up with this transparent way to backroom deal. Right? Like and and this idea that our state so what what I'm a big fate fan of and and you know maybe this becomes part of that our conversation, having looked at like all the different things of like what works, I think California's open non party non open nonpartisan system is great. We've removed the party's Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. loren: From the legal electoral process, right? Like people still get endorsed by parties, and that's as Sparky said, like money, flyers, door knocking, all these things that are super important. But again, they're private organizations. They should do that privately. In like forty-six of the other states, that's not the case. Alaska seems to have done it best at the moment. They have open nonpartisan ranked choice primaries where the top four go on to the general election to be chosen by ranked choice voting. Right. My goal and what I want to do is I want to take that and then Oregon and Utah's hundred percent mail in voting and make that national. I think if we did those two things, take Alaska's system and Utah and Oregon's hundred percent male in voting, and we made that the movement of our time, I think we would see real change in this country. Cefore X. Plosives: ⁓ wow. Isn't that what democracy should be? Right? You know, you get to actually pick who you want instead of what they decide for us. 'Cause like in Florida in Florida, like the Democratic clubs, they can't they can't p get back a candidate. You know, they're they're very like, ⁓ we can't say anything, but we really do like you. Right? And then we found out in in Connecticut, like the the ⁓ the delegates are are stonewalled by the incumbents. You know, and and then you know the next thing you know you're you're a couple votes shy, then they have like this crazy like signature restrict ⁓ restrictions and things like that and like next thing you know good candidates fall to the wayside right and then we r we really notice that you know w I'm gonna ask Lauren like like all Dems aren't created equal. We all we we could see that. You know, they're backed by dark money and there's a lot of there's a lot of things going on that we don't really what that we're trying to get rid of. You know, we we'd rather a Dem in there but we need the right Dems. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Cefore X. Plosives: Right. ⁓ so Lauren, what it what is it like? 'Cause ⁓ out here, Republicans have like this machine, this workshop, you know, the young Republicans and the the all these things, right, that are in place and like they have you go out here, you you learn classes and you go out and you know, campaign and and canvas and like you know, you're training like the next sinister person. What is it like running as an independent? Like is there is there Places that you can go to, like resources that say, Hey, this is how you do it and here's some syllabus. You know, like what it what is the process of front end of the independent Gotcha. loren: There's not, but we're making them. We're making them. ⁓ so there were a few groups out there that ostensibly were trying to either create a new new third party, which is like forward party. ⁓ there's a group called Independent Center, ⁓ which when you look into it, ⁓ is really ⁓ a whole bunch of, you know, never Trumpers from the Republican Party and Libertarians who didn't have a home. And so like and and they both Carlos: Yeah. loren: Both forward party and independent center believe in this mythical middle of America. And it just doesn't exist. There's no, there's certainly a median voter. And we can talk about voters all you want. That's a whole other conversation about like you have one conversation and a voter will tell you two totally conflicting things that they want. And like, well, I can't help you. but as far as like power goes, right, they they think there's this mythical middle. But that mythical middle. Carlos: Yeah. Sparky Mitra: Yeah. Carlos: Mm-hmm. loren: Especially when you look at like who Independent Center brings together. ⁓ it's still like mostly white, mostly male, mostly older. And I'm, you know, getting into that older category myself. ⁓ so like having Sparky and people like Angela Run and Sarah Rascone in our district. She's running for state senate. Like, that's really great. ⁓ but I helped early on recognizing like understanding it didn't take me to the lose the race to know money was an issue. It was in January. I'm like, we're not getting any money. ⁓ so I helped create the independent candidate network. ⁓ and right now it looks like we're gonna have eleven members ⁓ who will be on the ballot, ⁓ one right in and ten officially on the ballot in November. And we're gonna go as the rest of the primaries and and others find out directly if they're gonna get on the ballot, hopefully to expand that. ⁓ but our goal over the next now four and a half months, half it's we've already lost two weeks since the election here, ⁓ is just to help people raise money. ⁓ I think candidates have a pretty good idea of what it takes, even first time candidates. ⁓ Carlos: Mm-hmm. loren: Of going out, meeting people, knocking on doors, like the the playbook, I think is the same. ⁓ but what the support that we don't have is that we're not on an island. So ⁓ independent candidate network's not just about raising money, ⁓ Mike. It's also about making sure that independents understand like we have just are there to support each other. ⁓ so you know, this is the first time I think of the 52 races, 22 or 23 races in California had at least one independent. One of them was bogus because it was ⁓ I think California six ⁓ what got you know redistricted because of Prop 50. So the current sitting Republican decided, ⁓ I better become an independent. and so he's bragging. And again, then forward party like holds him up as an independent. Well, no, he's a Republican who has to run against another Republican and now a district that didn't exist 12 weeks ago or 16 weeks ago, that now exists, that has a plus D majority. And so he's like, Carlos: Ha ha ha. loren: Know doing this BS thing, he was in the lead till the end. I actually think he ended up not coming in the top two, but I haven't double checked. ⁓ so I think it's gonna still be a D and an R in that race. But even if it's a D and an independent, it's really a D and N R, right? Like he just did it for political purposes. one other independent got about five percent of the vote. All of us other independents, ⁓ throughout the state, top to bottom, got between one and one and a half percent. Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. ⁓ Carlos: wanted to address a bunch of things, but I'm gonna start with one of the big things that people thought were wacky about the way California does elections is the timing. So we have election day and then we have votes being counted after election day, but then some people count before election day. Sparky learn whichever one of you want to describe the phenomenon that is actually counting votes in California and why why the approach and why folks have nothing to fear when it comes to counting votes. They might be. Cefore X. Plosives: Are they still counting? loren: ⁓ technically they have till July seventh. Technically till July seventh. Carlos: Okay. Sparky Mitra: Yeah, for San Diego County it's still July second. So yeah, yeah, yeah. ⁓ I I I think like technically like we have unofficial results now, but they'll certify them, yeah. Like Lauren said on July second. ⁓ but yeah, so they yeah, they for I actually think it like I could be c incorrect, but like f when and when I last read and it has been a minute. Cefore X. Plosives: ⁓ wow. loren: Second, sorry, thank you. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Sparky Mitra: It has like one of the most secure electoral processes. and it is no like California is known for taking longer than a lot of other states. But but I yeah, no, I I do think it's like perfectly secure. I mean I I I it I mean California, a lot of our ballot actually a majority of our ballots come in through ma like they're mailed in. ⁓ I think around sixty percent of our ballots are mailed in. ⁓ Carlos: Mm-hmm. Sparky Mitra: And and so yeah, counting that versus people coming to the polls on one day or like d during an early voting period and then election day is like very different. And ⁓ I actually think that the longer voting kind of vote counting period is probably as a result of verifying all of those votes, but because it is more accessible to vote, ⁓ than in a lot of other places and definitely not enough, but ⁓ Carlos: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Sparky Mitra: But I I I think that that long process is because it is more democratic than a lot of other places. But that's my like initial two cents. Cefore X. Plosives: It's not because they want the kincos and loren: It's Sparky Mitra: Yeah, it's not. Carlos: Right. They didn't in they didn't inject a bunch of Chinese printed ballots, none of that stuff. loren: Well so like I said, so most of our you know, we're we're at eighty six percent of eligible voters are registered to vote. And that's because for decades now we've had ⁓ the motor voter law. So when you go to the DMV, change your license, whatever reason. You t in fact, it's actually now any government agency. You apply for E D D, you apply for your business like whatever. If you touch a state computer system, you have the opportunity to register to vote. ⁓ What that means though is if you do register through the state system computer, your license signature becomes your official ballot signature. And if you still do it by a mail and card, then your mail and card, and then they scan your card. And so what I learned, this was part when I had to turn in my 60 six my 40 valid signatures. ⁓ and had to turn it, you know, because I paid, I I guess Spark E probably paid the $1,740 as well. Right. So we can talk ballot access also, right? So in California, very briefly to get on the ballot. With House of Representatives, ⁓ it's one percent of the salary for one year of that position. So one percent was seventeen hundred forty dollars and 40 valid signatures turning in a maximum of 60. ⁓ although I think I turned in like 80 and still only got 47, right? ⁓ because and this is true about turning in those signatures and how they count the ballots, which is they're like you can go check right now, there's a special terminal in the LA County Registrar where you can take your signature petition sheet and And look each person up and you can compare their signatures. So what's happening in California is there's literally a human being hired by each county, because our counties run our elections that takes in California when you get your ballot and you seal it, you have to sign it. And if you don't mail it or someone fills out your ballot for you, they also have to sign it. But the important signature is yours, right? And so there's literally a human being that takes out of the box your unopened envelope, and before they open it, Carlos: Mm-hmm. loren: They compare it to your signature of what you gave them either on the card or for your driver's license. And then they determine if it's good or not. And then they'll open it. If they don't open it, then it gets cured and it's a whole that's the other thing. If they can't verify it, they don't just toss it. You actually have a period of called curing, right? To the to look up. You get a text or an email to follow your ballot. You can go online and track your ballot. ⁓ so like I dropped my ballot off. The night before the election, so June first, I dropped it in the Chinatown box just around the corner from my house. It was counted before the end of the day on election day, June second, right? Which I thought was really amazing. I was expecting it to be like towards the end. But to back what Sparky said, again, like the idea that we have to have immediate results and that immediate is more secure than actually counting everyone and verifying every signature. Like, no, it's just insanity. I could are there ways we could potentially make it go faster? Could they start the process earlier? Sure. But don't start the process earlier to rush things. ⁓ and so again, I I think California does it really well. ⁓ there's things we can certainly improve, but every vote counts. And to what you said, ⁓ Mike, that's what we should want. Carlos: And that's and that's right. And that's where you need to be careful whose message you're less you're listening to. The same guy that is questioning the elections in California is the same guy who continues to call it a failed state, yet we're the fourth largest economy in the world. Cefore X. Plosives: Exactly. Carlos: Pay attention to whose whose information you're listening to. And then they're gonna go and compare California to places like Florida. I'm sorry, but you have criminals in your national government, Florida. You can't tell me Rick Scott is a good senator, Florida. You you just can't. Cefore X. Plosives: Mm-hmm. Just ⁓ There's a gauntlet of corruption going on over here, man. Sparky Mitra: Yeah. Carlos: just get out of here. Which which brings me to Lauren, you had said rank choice voting. Can you break that down for folks so they understand the difference between what we're doing now and what actually rank choice voting is? And there's an actual movement behind it. loren: Yeah. so we have single seat districts, right? Everyone runs for one district. You technically don't have to live in your district in most states. ⁓ but you just have to live at least in the state. and the winner of that is determined by first past the post. And if there's a primary election, it's just who at right w whoever has the most votes wins. It doesn't have to be fifty percent. ⁓ although some states and their primaries do have weird rules. ⁓ So for the most part, is there's three candidates running, there's ten votes, one candidate gets four votes, one candidate gets three votes, one candidate gets three votes, ⁓ the person with four votes wins. Even if you asked the people who voted for the second and third candidate who their second choices might have been, and their second choices might have been not the first candidate, but the second and third candidate, right? So the preference of those ten voters was not for the winner. The preference of those 10 voters was for either the second or third person. ⁓ but the winner won by getting less than 50% of the vote ⁓ mathematically and also less than the preference of of that district. So what rank choice voting does, and it's one of many proportional vote counting systems, is basically it lets you score your voters or rank them, right? So in a race of three, ⁓ you would rank this person's first, this person's second, this person's third. And then in the first round, if one person has over 50% of the vote, they win. Yay! if in the that first rounding, we only want three people, so we'll say this is a general election, there's just three people. if after that first round no one has more than 50.1% of the vote, then they drop down to the second tier. And the third person's eliminated, right? So that person at the bottom is eliminated, they're no longer counted. So now just a race between the top two. Well, now we add up everybody's second choice. And it's possible that when you add up that second choice, ⁓ you still added the first choice, but then the second choice gets added on. When you add up that second choice, now the second what was originally the second place winner might actually have been the preference of the district. And assuming they come out top, when you count second choices, then they win. So that's ranked choice voting. ⁓ there's other things that are truly called like proportional voting, which is pretty awful. It's like When you're at the office and everybody's like, What do we want on our pizza? Like pepperoni, mushroom, right? And everyone's like raises their hand. That's probably not the best way to elect. But I think there is another thing called star voting. ⁓ so there's still a possibility mathematically, and maybe Sparky's probably like way better at statistics than I am. So maybe she could like dive deeper into this. ⁓ but statistically with ranked choice voting, you can still that second person could still actually not be the ⁓ preferred representative of all the voters in the district. Carlos: Yeah. loren: Star voting ⁓ starts to eliminate that because instead of ranking someone, you can give you give points on one through ten. So say you have like five people, ⁓ you know, you give the f your favorite ten, ⁓ you give two people fives because you think they're equal, you give one person a three and another person nothing, and then they literally add the scores up each round at each round until someone gets to 50%, they cut the bottom people. ⁓ that adds complexity to the voter, right? Like People in Burbank where they do rank choice voting, which is one city over, apparently like almost never rank a second person, right? Because they don't know, right? So it has its own issues, right? It sounds great, right? From a from a statistician's standpoint, it sounds great. But from a person in the voting booth, well, they actually don't understand how to rank, right? So like my preference is star voting because it's the most likely voting method to get the preference of a district elected. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. loren: It's also the most complicated for the voters' perspective. What the hell am I supposed to do here? So but if I had my Trothers, I would just choose ranked choice voting today. Carlos: Yeah. Cefore X. Plosives: Sounds like a fantasy football draft. Like I'm ranking my quarterback. loren: Yes. Carlos: Yeah. loren: And Sparky, you part of are you part of like Cal R C V or any of those? Like have you joined any of that or? Sparky Mitra: I have not I mean in San Diego we have ⁓ an organization called the Justice Workshop that is doing really great work on trying to trying to make everything in the county rank choice by twenty twenty eight. ⁓ and I'm just like titled to the medal about that 'cause I I wanna see that so bad. I was I didn't vote there because I was still registered in California, but when I was doing my masters, I was in New York for Mamdani's primary. Cefore X. Plosives: I mean it's ⁓ Sparky Mitra: And ⁓ and I mean like he was really good, right, about ⁓ and the thing is like it it needs to be more of a team sport too. Like he was always really good about boosting up other progressive candidates in his race that he was running against. and ⁓ and so like that increased public knowledge about ranked choice voting too, right? Like it it allowed the public to know that, hey, I don't even have to like fucking rank Eric Adams if I don't want to, right? Or Andrew Cuomo. And so, ⁓ but like I feel like like exactly what Lauren said, like a lot of times we don't even know that we have an option that we have. And ⁓ and even like for Riden campaigns in California, right? Like a lot of people don't know that exists. ⁓ I know we had a Raiden campaign in the Eric gubernatorial race, we had one in we had one in a congressional race just south of me in San Diego as well. And so ⁓ but like But there's so little effort, ⁓ because it often feels like a zero sum game, especially for people who are like, ⁓ I just care about being an elected or I just care care about my next political move, rather than, hey, like it would be like really great for the entire movement, ⁓ and for actual working class issues if we gave we told voters what their actual options are and how to maybe make sure even if their first ⁓ first ⁓ choice isn't there that their second or third choice is at least somewhere in the running to advocate on their behalf. But ⁓ but yeah, so so like I'm much more invol I would definitely want to hear from you about about like some of the initiatives that you mentioned, Lauren, 'cause honestly Justice Workshop is the ⁓ one that I'm most familiar with, ⁓ just in our county. loren: So California, it was either two sessions ago or three sessions ago. Again, which is amazing. Like, you know, I'm I am not a Democrat and I talk bad about them all the time. ⁓ but Carlos: Democrats talk man about Democrats all the time. loren: Yeah. But props to the Democrats of the state of California. They actually put on Newsom's desk, it was like I said, it was either two years ago or three years ago now, ranked twice voting for the state. And he vetoed it, right? Because Sparky's point, he's only thinking about he's not thinking about the best interests of the people of California. He's thinking about Gavin's next best interest, and that meant voting no. ⁓ so it's still happening at the state. ⁓ Carlos: Yeah. loren: The city of Los Angeles, and I'm sure your national voter the national listeners are are gonna be excited to hear about the local, local politics of the city of LA, but we just went through this thing called charter reform. The city council put together a group of concern citizens, so the charter reform commission. They had a whole bunch of recommendations, including expanding the city council, including ⁓ rain choice voting. And my gosh, the people in charge decided both times to keep their power. So they're like, we need to keep studying. ⁓ We should increase the c the the the number of ⁓ council districts. It takes more votes to win a council district in the city of Los Angeles ⁓ than it does something like thirty-two Senate seats. Or thirty is right in thirty two states. Okay. ⁓ maybe it was right. ⁓ whatever. It's a ⁓ lot. Carlos: Yeah. loren: and so and so they said we have to keep studying that, and then they said we have to keep studying ranked choice voting, right? So whenever the powers that be actually have it in front of them, they vote no. ⁓ so there's again, there's a few cities that have it. I know Burbank next door does. ⁓ but Cal R C V is the big organization here that got it onto the governor's desk once. ⁓ I think the way forward ⁓ is to combat what's actually gonna happen here in November is we actually are gonna have a ⁓ A voting initiative sponsored by the Republicans to basically curb mail-in voting and to, you know, va to have ID when you vote and stuff like this. ⁓ it's the only hope the Republicans have here to get anyone out. ⁓ so I think the answer might be A, we have to defeat this Republican initiative in November, but I think the way going forward is use our progressive era ⁓ direct democracy in California and just put it on the ballot to have R C V and let the people decide. Carlos: Yeah. Cefore X. Plosives: So I got a I got a quick question. Like I'm looking at it and it says nineteen twenty nine they decided there was gonna be four hundred and twenty five representatives. And the population is not anywhere close to what it was in nineteen twenty nine, but we still have the same amount of representatives. What what are you guys' thoughts about expanding representatives and you know going forward? I mean, since we're talking about voting, I mean, more options Tighter tighter representation within communities, even though they're gerrymandering everything with a a Sharpie with an eraser tip on it. You know, like it's you know, what do you guys think about that? loren: You wanna go Sparky? Sparky Mitra: ⁓ I can maybe go after you, but no, I would love to see that stuff. loren: Okay. ⁓ I ran on it uncapping the house. ⁓ as part of the independent candidate network's platform. If you join independent candidate network, you agree that we have to fix the house and one of the ways to fix the house is to uncap the house. ⁓ and exactly like you said, Mike, ⁓ basically nineteen twenty nine, you know, so from the first election of seventeen eighty eight, seventeen eighty nine, 'cause it took two years to run the very first election after the constitution was signed. Um and the constitution was very specific. There will be One representative for every 30,000 people. Now, of course, when they count 30,000 people, the 800,000 slaves, ⁓ enslaved people are counted as 3/5 person. The other thing in Article One, Section One, that's the biggest wink wink of them all, is who can vote for the House of Representatives, which is the only direct democracy in the country at the time, ⁓ according to the largest house of your state. ⁓ Virginia was unicameral and the other 12 states were bicameral, but what they all knew is that to vote in any of those 13 states. You needed to be a white man, 21 years of age, who had property. So the whole pool of eligible voters in 1788, 1789, when it was one representative in Congress for every 30,000 inhabitants, not counting i Indians, ⁓ was 13% of the population. And not even 13% of the population voted, right? Only 13% of the population qualified as white male. Carlos: Ha ha ha. loren: 21 and older with property. So right, again, the long, long, long, long arc of our country is really that, right? Voting. ⁓ in 1920, so every year, every ⁓ every 10 years with a census, the ⁓ count grew, Congress grew with the country. It went from 30,000 to 10 years later, ⁓ 60,000 reps per person. ⁓ by the time we got to 1929, ⁓ when they fixed the house. ⁓ by law at 4 ⁓ 35 was 250 000 people per rep. ⁓ since 1929, right, the population's increased threefold. And by look, ⁓ my gosh, it's amazing. The representative to rep ⁓ population is also threefold, right? So now it's like 770,000 to ⁓ one representative. Except for Wyoming, where they have a population of 520,000 people and they have one whole rep. Right. So they're they're Wyoming's not only overrepresentative in the Senate, they're over overrepresented in the House. But then you get states like Delaware that get screwed. They have a population of like 1.1 million. So they're just under the threshold of getting a second. They only have one rep. Right? So Wyoming's overrepresented, Delaware's underrepresented, Texas is underrepresented, Florida's underrepresented, California, of course, is the most underrepresented. So there's basically two kind of ways to do it. One is Carlos: Yeah. That's wild. Cefore X. Plosives: ⁓ well. Carlos: Yeah. loren: My simple preferred way is just triple the size of the house so you get back down to the representation of r and as someone who ran, and Sparky you can certainly speak to this, right? You there's no way you're representing 760,000 people. It's just impossible. It's a joke. It's not even a pain, you just can't meet them. You can't engage with them. I literally walk outside. I have the smallest geographic district outside of any of the districts of New York in California 34. I could literally walk 90 minutes. Carlos: Yeah. Way too many opinions. loren: Or no more than two hours from one end to the other, right? There's no way to engage with the people of the district, though, right? Because there's just you can't do it. So I would just triple the size of the house. It's 1,491 members. We can meet under a tent. We can meet on Zoom. The other way is called the Wyoming rule, which is basically it gets you almost to the exact same place. Wyoming gets two representatives, which means that they basically have 250,000 per person. Carlos: Yeah. Cefore X. Plosives: Okay. loren: So it's basically the same thing. You'd get to 1400 some representatives. You wouldn't even have to worry about gerrymandering. I mean, you talk about like California or just the city of Los Angeles, and we should do the same thing with our city council. Like you couldn't gerrymander ⁓ let's see, California is 10%. So we'll say there'd be roughly 130 representatives from California, right? You can't gerrymander 130 districts in California. They'd just be little squares. Los Angeles would suddenly see a massive Latino majority representation. Because you can't cheat anymore. But also even Latinos in this city and across the state, you know, get lumped into the same box. The Latinos of ⁓ of Boyle Heights are not the same as the Latinos of Puquima and Van Nuys. Like they have different things that they need and different was that? Was that? Exactly. Well yes, right? And so instead of like lumping them and saying, like, this is the Latino vote and this is the Latino population. Carlos: Or Corona and Riverside for that matter. They're different. Or Corona and Riverside for that matter. Yeah. loren: No, and and part of our gerrymander here in California, or I keep saying California, in the city of LA, we actually don't have a racial gerrymander, even though that's what the council got in trouble four years ago. We have a homeowner gerrymander, right? Like so our number one, our candidate who's running ⁓ Nithi Raman, who came in in the top two in the primaries running against incumbent bath Karen Bass, when they redistricted her, they literally said, We're gonna give her all the renters. Or sorry, we're gonna give her all the homeowners because the homeowners hate she speaks for the renters. So we're gonna well they literally changed all of the fourth district. And she still won when she ran two years ago and still won with over fifty percent of the vote, right? So it's not just like is it's while we can have a whole conversation about race and how it is all about race in this country. Sometimes, especially in places where there are you know majority minority race ⁓ or or ethnicities, it it has to transcend that. And when we get to the right number of represent representatives, then we can transcend the idea of race. And actually say, Hey, what's best for me in my neighborhood, in my family? And yeah, we have to increase the size of the house. Sparky Mitra: No, absolutely. I mean I I I totally agree. I'm very jealous of the ninety minute walk from end to end this thing, I will say. It was better. It was before better before prop fifty. And then after prop fifty, our district lines just became insane. And so, ⁓ yeah, no, our district ⁓ loren: Ha ha ha ha. Sparky Mitra: I used to not have a car and ⁓ this race made me learn how to drive again. So it was so I was like ⁓ my 'cause also like our transit so my district does go from like San Diego proper and then it goes all the way to like Ramona, Poway. It goes even further to like Valley Center, which is all like rural ⁓ loren: Yeah. Carlos: ⁓ The sacrifices you've had to make. Cefore X. Plosives: ⁓ No. Sparky Mitra: land and ⁓ and The the i in the very first part month of my race, I ⁓ after I jumped in, I was like taking the bus and first of all the buses came every two freaking hours and even on weekdays and and like with that like the whole trip was like four to five hours and I was like this is so impractical, y'all but so yeah, no I totally agree like if if if if if if ⁓ if there was more representation for for the folks, like so that like they could actually like first of all, like so that representatives can be reachable. ⁓ but also like it makes it easier to represent the folks that you're supposed to be representing too. So so I I definitely think like I ⁓ I honestly haven't thought that much about an expanded house but ⁓ but I I'm very much in support of something like that. Carlos: Yeah. Sparky Mitra: Especially especially 'cause like we already have like a huge representation problem and we we're seeing like these gerrymanders getting worse and worse. I mean, just just like ten days ago I was in Memphis, ⁓ after their gerrymander in Tennessee and that's horrendous, right? Like Memphis went from being like one district to three and just horrendous. And so and so I think like I think Carlos: Yeah. Sparky Mitra: Any way w which we can make that of course like not do that, but also make it harder to do would be lovely. And I I do think like having more representatives ⁓ would just make that harder to do, like make it harder for bad actors to act in bad faith. ⁓ I think that ⁓ I think particularly for California though, I am not at all surprised Newsom vetoed like statewide RCV because he also like I mean when I th I belie I I believe like when he was mayor, he the person who came in second place was a Green Party candidate. They weren't they weren't like from one of the two major parties. They weren't a Republican or So like he he he se he's seen the possibility of someone getting too close to him that is a progressive, that is that doesn't really think the way like an establishment candidate thinks and can garner enough support. So I think I think he He knows that that d that power is there in California and he's like not willing to willing to ⁓ bend to the will of the people, I guess. But ⁓ but ⁓ but yeah, that does not surprise me at all. ⁓ but yeah, no, I'd I'd I I'm so excited to see see Californians push that forward and kind of make it make it the gold standard. 'Cause yeah, we have so much like going for us, but I know like Lauren mentioned Alaska's system. ⁓ I mean, implementing that system, and then keeping like the things that we do have going for the state, I mean, that could be amazing. And then increasing representation in the house specifically would be great. I mean, I have a lot of problems with how s the Senate representation is in general. So but ⁓ but even in the House I I definitely think it could be more representative and I think expanding it could definitely be a path forward on that. Carlos: Yeah. The reason I like the way California does their voting is because California wants to hear from as many people as possible. And then you go to these other places and they're gerrymandering and they're limiting and they're cutting off and they're not funding and they're doing all the tricks to not hear from you. So either way you look at it, because I've had discussions with the right-leaning folks, and they say, We don't need to, we don't need all these representatives because you know you're gonna fill the house up with all these dummies and they're not gonna make any decisions and all this stuff. It's just not the case. You need you need more refined information. You need more data to be able to run the country the proper way. And who's delivering the data, if not you guys? So if you're delivering data for almost a million people, that data's not gonna be as accurate as if you take those million people and split it up into two and three different groups. then you can clearly have the data clearly make an argument for at the end of the day, what what what it boils down to is how are we going to spend all this money that we have to make this place better? And we have folks in this country that would rather hand the keys of the bus off to someone who is unfortunately power hungry and la la la. They'll do all the tricks to remain in power. But I I have a firm belief that the way California does it is the opposite of that. We want to give the actual power to the actual people. And as a representate a representative government, we're loading you with every all the information we believe that Lauren needs, that Sparky needs to go make our life better. We need more of that instead of some some crook that has convinced a bunch of people to give him a bunch of money so he can buy some lawn signs and and and and Facebook ads. loren: Yeah, we we we we Carlos: So you folks that are listening to the way, California's ruining the way that they do this and that, it's not the case. It's the opposite. California wants to hear from you. They want to know how to make things better. And yeah, we got some crooked folks. Everybody does. But that's where this independent and this grassroots thing kicks in. Like these are these are folks with new ideas because the old ideas, it's only obvious they don't work. It's only obvious. Cefore X. Plosives: They worked for that one. loren: It started, you know, again, it's the foundation of this country, right? Like we didn't start with a constitution, we started with the Cefore X. Plosives: Again, it's the foundation of this country. loren: Federacy of the American States, right? Or the Confederation of American States. and the states were truly independent. They had their own power. The problem was that they kept having ⁓ uprisings of regular citizens, and they found they couldn't put the uprisings down by themselves, nor could they pay back France. So, like, two for one, we'll consolidate, we'll make a great central power, and we'll be able to pay back our debts to get collectively, and we'll be able to put down rebellion. And the very first thing President ⁓ Washington does is there's the whiskey rebellion in Pennsylvania over taxes. They have to pay tax on ⁓ their beer and their whiskey, or actually more tax on their whiskey than their beer. And they're destitute farmers. We don't understand how poor America was up to World War II. How poor the average American, and again, when we say average, probably talking white America was before World War II, right? So in 1790, whatever, the whiskey rebellion, Washington gets on his horse. Carlos: Yeah. loren: Puts down his hat as president, goes as commander-in-chief and general leading the army to suppress the people. This is the founding of the country. This is what we're celebrating in what 11 days? 14 days. Right? And we don't, and we don't like, and America's like, yeah, freedom! No, Washington wrote to suppress the guy who's literally making whiskey in his still in his backyard. Cefore X. Plosives: Happy birthday, America. Carlos: Two hundred and fifty years of oppression. Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. loren: And didn't want to pay a tax on it. Let's go buy a Jeep. Carlos: Yeah. Sparky Mitra: Ha ha. loren: Dumb, dumb. I know it's not great to call voters dumb if you're running. ⁓ so that's always been it. It's always been about who votes, who represents. And the Republicans in the right always give it away. ⁓ I cannot know who said it, but it's a very famous quote that came out before the last election, right? We need the right people to vote. You mean you need the white people to vote? Like we know what you're we know what you're saying. And Carlos, it was weird for you to be dancing around it for a second, right? Like they're talking about the white majority that's shrinking every year and clinging on and desperate to maintain that majority. Carlos: Yeah. loren: Which math says they're not going to unless they deport a hundred million people, ⁓ that they're the only ones, right? They they they want a ⁓ if not a slave state, at least an apartheid state, right? ⁓ and apartheid states usually aren't a majority of one group suppressing the minority, it's the minority suppressing the majority. And that's unless things change, that's where we're headed. ⁓ and to me the problem with the Democratic Party is it's whistling past the graveyard pretending that that's not happening. Right? They don't talk about it. Jimmy Gomez does not talk about that. Angela Gonzalez Torres does not talk about that. Chuck Schumer, Jeffries, do not talk about that. This is why I've not been a Democrat my whole life, because this is the real fight. And they don't want to fight it. They want to pretend. They hoped that demographics would do the dirty work for them. Demographics will get you the numbers. It won't get you the victories because Sparky Mitra: Mm. loren: You get the victories by writing the rules. And right now it's still this minority or soon to be minority of white people whiting writing the rules. And we have to think about how we're going to challenge that and what we've done in the past to change those rules, right? It's great to be on a podcast, but being on a podcast isn't gonna change those rules, right? What is it gonna be to actually step up to create the change, to get people to have the courage, to understand, to even pay attention, right? So, like ⁓ it's cool in California. We were afraid, and I was super afraid, I was like voting's gonna be in the tank. We actually got up to 40% of registered voters voted in the primary California, ⁓ which is way above our 27% average. But when you take eligible voters, right, because 86% of what California's eligible voters are registered, when you do that math, that 40% drops down to 33%. So we're still talking, Carlos, even though in California we make it as easy as possible, literally. Everybody gets a ballot. Carlos: You register and they mail you a ballot. loren: They mail you a ballot, right? 20 million ballots went out. ⁓ you gotta return it. Right? If you don't return it, you you've you've given up all that power. You right? So there's this disconnect between but there's a disconnect between making it easy and then still participating, right? So to me it's it's again, it's all of these things have to happen at once. I don't trust the politicians, which seem to be most of them that always have the one answer. And maybe it's because I come out of Carlos: You don't even have to put a stamp on the damn thing. They make it easy. Yeah. loren: creative and product management. It's like one's all the answers, right? Like we have to make voting easier, but we also have to make people want to participate. We have to make sure that it's easy to participate. We have to make sure your vote does get counted. Right. Like it ha is it one of them? No, it's all of them. But until people care, it's kind of like, I don't know what to do, man. We're an option. Sparky was an option. I was an option. But if you don't want to participate and you don't want to take that option, then you know, we're stuck. Carlos: Yeah. Sparky Mitra: I also ⁓ I think you're muted. loren: ⁓ you might be muted or we don't hear you C four. What were you saying, Sparky? Sparky Mitra: ⁓ I was just gonna say that ⁓ wow. Y'all so scattered brain. ⁓ like I I very much y I I very much also think that like we don't have like the muscle memory for ⁓ for like political participation. Carlos: Yeah. Sparky Mitra: Right? And like for us, like for us the muscle memory is goes as far, at least like right now, as like, ⁓ showing up to like a No Kings protest one time and and ⁓ I and like that's better than like what it was before. Yeah, but like it's definitely not there and and I think like I think like like I know people always say like the very cliche thing of like politics is like Carlos: Aha ops yeah. Sparky Mitra: like not a spectator sport, which I agree with, but it's like very much a contact sport. Like you have to be participating in it. And ⁓ and ⁓ like I I even look at ⁓ and th there's like things I disagree with and agree with, but like I'm Bengali by nature, so I was like very in tune ⁓ by like my birth and so I was like very in tune with like the political revolution that happened in Bangladesh. And there's like a lot of other oppression that came out of it but ⁓ Carlos: Yeah. Sparky Mitra: ⁓ aga against like religious minorities, but but a lot of the upheaval came from ⁓ like this practice of being against ⁓ like a moneyed elite and constantly pushing back against that. And I just don't think we have the muscle memory. Like I think we're building it, but w like we either have to be faster or harder or both of in kind of pushing that forward. Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah, okay. Carlos: I remember in the seventies, ⁓ people were able to speak about politics and not be at each other's throats. And I think through the years they've turned it into more of the NFL or the WWE or whatever, where everything is so ramped up and they're they're convinced that ⁓ if you vote the other way, the entire planet is gonna fall apart. We have to understand that communicating with each other about something as important as the government who assists your life. And the people that are in government having this power that are defending you from corporate leaders. And those are the guys that are willing to work you to death for their benefit. Those are the guys that are pulling the strings and and ⁓ even even creating these secret little clubs like Peter Thiel's dialogue, you know. Like there are people actively trying to dismantle the government and trying to get you to disengage from something as important as the way you live your life. And they have you convinced that watching these these dating shows on Netflix and and on regular TV is the way to go. And they're distracting you from The literal way you live your life. And this is what I like about this younger generation. Everyone is ⁓ more connected. and they're not looking at money the same way. The relationship with money is different. But yeah, you know, we keep talking about these these groups that are being created. You know, Lawrence mentioned about two or three, Sparky mentioned two, three. but then we also have like these really secret shady ones, you know, the ones that exist in the shadows, like a dialogue. And those are the folks that are trying to convince you that that like taking care of each other is a bad idea. Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. Carlos: What can And and I don't want to say the Democratic Party because we have an independent here, but what can people that aren't driven by the bottom line? What are some of the things that we can do or point out or or or whatever some some ideas that'll help tap the the the not rich people back in and have them understand the game that's being played? loren: you know, when I started this race, ⁓ one of my favorite lines, and and it'll be my favorite line for a long time, for better or worse, is ⁓ we have to change our culture before we change our politics. and you know, while there might be secret groups out there, there's a lot of not so secret groups. I mean, the Heritage Foundation isn't the heritage of ⁓ black people running free. Right? It's a heritage of enslavement. Carlos: Yeah. That's true. That's true. What's the other one? The Sisters of the Confederacy or the Daughters of the Confederacy? Those goofballs? loren: and ⁓ the Brussero program and right, yeah, and yeah, and you know, it's th they they think the Trail of Tears was the trail of manifest destiny, right? Like it's a it's it's two Americas, right? ⁓ Carlos: Yeah. loren: There's the not so project twenty twenty five is not a secret. I mean, it's literally written out that they want to build a white America and they will do whatever they have to to do it. And we're witnessing it right now. And they have a literal tool in the White House who happens to also be a racist, who cares more about himself. The fact that he gets to enrich himself and be a racist is like Trump's like he's in heaven, right? Like, ⁓ wow, can't can't beat this. ⁓ can't beat death either, man. ⁓ Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. he's cheating it every day though. loren: And so like this it's out in the open. And then we have super or ⁓ these eval evangelical churches, right? Like white Christian nationalism does not hide. What happens is we have we ignore it at our own peril. We have, you know, all politics is identity politics. There was Matt Stoller's thing from 20 years ago, and you know, someone online yesterday on threads was like, This is still true today. ⁓ you know, it's the Democrats attachment to identity politics. Democrats don't do identity politics. Black Americans don't do identity politics. Latinos don't do identity politics. White Christian nationalists do identity politics. And we all have to live with our BS. It's their afraid. It's their cowardice, their fear. So what was true for, I think, from the the counter cultural or our countercultural revolution of the post war world in the 50s and the 60s was it was cool to stand up. For people's rights. And then as we really got towards the cusp of everyone having rights, then we get the counter counter-revolution, right? The reaction to it. And honestly, what this weird cultural thing happened where now it was actually cool to drop the N-word or say the R word or to wear your whiteness as a badge versus we had really done a good job of shoving it away and making it shameful. And I think There's you know, and and in in the anti racist world, if there's a couple camps of it, but I think in the the more clear-eyed camp, right, it's not the work of minorities to do the anti-racist work, it's the work of white people to do the anti-racist work with other white people. And that's not happening. And I don't I I mean, I wish I could figure it out. I'm I'm kind of trying to, but how, right? How do you wake up honestly that ⁓ i i it was what Dr. King said, right? Like the really scary part is that. Is that centrist moderate who thinks they're not racist, who looks the other way, right? The Reconstruction ended not because the North won. Reconstruction ended because people in Boston wanted to be able to trade again with someone in Richmond. And so they shook hands, and the the black American, whether they were in Richmond or Boston, got the shaft, right? Their needs became second. So I mean obviously there was Jim Crow and then there was the civil rights movement. Cefore X. Plosives: Mm-hmm. Carlos: Yeah. loren: I think we read just epig Obama and then this is his backlash, the combination of, ⁓ my God, that was a black president, and ⁓ my God, the demographics are real. White people are 15 years out from being a numerical, not majority in this country. And we're seeing the last gasp of this white America, but there's not a there's not a because the left breaks up into these two camps of classes, you know, leftists. Cefore X. Plosives: Okay. loren: Who believe in class first, or if I don't talk about race, it'll go away. We don't talk about race. And we need to talk about race. It should be the conversation every day. People are we talk race too much. No, we don't talk about it enough. And that's the cultural change is until we recognize that each one of us is a human being, each one of us has dignity. That's the most important thing. Then we can talk tax rates and whatever. Cefore X. Plosives: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Carlos: Mm-hmm. Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. Carlos: Enough. Yeah. loren: Can even talk immigration rates, but until we talk about or our empire, right? Our empire doesn't benefit us anymore. Mr. Smith over there would agree. There you are, Mr. Smith. Our empire doesn't pay for itself anymore. Like it's time to get rid of our empire. But we've got a 400 plus years of racism to deal with. Until we deal with that, Carlos, I'm just afraid again, it's gonna be more of the same. So the cultural changes, not to keep minorities doing the hard, hard work, because they are, I mean, they have no choice, but how do we finally get Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. Right. loren: a majority of white America to get on the ship of you know what's most important? You call yourself a Christian. Why don't you do the Christian thing? Why don't we make it about dignity and love? Try it. Try it. I dare you. I double dare you. Try loving everybody. Try it. Just once. It won't hurt you. Cefore X. Plosives: Mm-hmm. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. Cefore X. Plosives: I I think what Carlos: Don't do that, they're gonna limit your bathroom time. loren: Yeah. Cefore X. Plosives: think post like post World War II, like when the the rush of ⁓ the civil rights movement and the suppression of like the white nationalists and KKK and all that, all they did was they figured out how to network. Right? And they the what they decided to do was okay, we'll we'll integrate into everything. And then what happens is as as we're we're on paper, we're trying to you know be all one, you know, you America, you know, we're uniting, you know, black and brown, everybody. It's feeling good for a moment, right? We're supposed to be. But in in the meantime, as as Democrats or progressives, we're we're splintering. Right? And now all of a sudden you see ⁓ with with Trump in in power and this racism being ⁓ the key component to everything right now. It's all coming to surface. All the racism is coming to surface and all the groups that are coming out Carlos: Melting pot. Cefore X. Plosives: are all linking together and they're all everywhere and all of a sudden there's this spider web of just like hatred. And then that that's pretty much what we're doing. And what we need to do is as progressives and Democrats and just people who love people, we need to do what Albania did. Like there a million people went and took the streets. That's forty three percent of their population, right? We could get what, seven million in the streets, which is barely what, ten percent? Not even I don't you know, like we need to actually do what Carlos: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Cefore X. Plosives: what they did so well and network with all all the groups that were all the coalitions that we're with together and find find the links and attack everybody to at at at the same time. You know, and that and educate voters. Educate the people in the process. If we can't do that like Carlos: And we know it works 'cause look at what look at what ⁓ the Proud Boys and ⁓ and ⁓ Oathkeepers and all those knuckleheads. They all came together like a team and and attacked the Capitol like a bunch of dum dumbs. Let's do that, but ⁓ but like tens of thousands of people like come and like like feed babies. Cefore X. Plosives: Oathkeepers, like they all came on G shitty adventures assemble and they did. Right? Adopt cats. Carlos: Just walk up and hug homeless people, the tens of thousands of people hugging homeless people, picking them up off the street, give ⁓ a sandwich. Cefore X. Plosives: Something, something. Carlos: So that dumb shit that they did that day on January sixth or january seventh, that's not the answer. That is not the answer. Sparky Mitra: Mm. loren: Treason is not the answer. Carlos: Thank you. It boils down to one word. Cefore X. Plosives: And and the protests are great. The protests are great, but like you you you leave you leave after a couple of days and then what? Like it needs to there needs to be more. Carlos: And that's where and that's where these these little glu groups supplement the movement. And I'm not talking dialogue where they, you know, they had classes on how to start your own cult. Why don't we why don't we do something like that, but like classes on again, how to feed homeless people? How to help people how to help people that are struggling with their mental health. loren: There was another post today, you know, Where's the Democrats Tea Party? But it's a historical, right? You know, I grew up in South Orange County. It is now ⁓ mostly blue. I so you you can't even call Orange County purple anymore. I it's blue. There's like one, I think, Republican. ⁓ well there'll be one Republican maybe, ⁓ after ⁓ there will be 'cause two Republicans are out of the top two in one district. So there'll be one Republican in all of Orange County, which growing up, I mean, r they literally birthed Nixon, although he was born in Whittier. ⁓ And Reagan, right? They th and and the John Birch Society, right? The KKK had to go in hiding, so we talked about they got shamed so they went to hiding, so then we got the John Birch Society. ⁓ Once the Civil War ended, it's not like the South folded. They're like, we're gonna take the long game. Once the Great Soci ⁓ not the Great Society, once ⁓ FDR ⁓ what was that? ⁓ once we got like social security and all that, right? The wealthy and taxes went up. The wealthy were like, again, we're not gonna fight for this tomorrow. I mean they tried, they tried to coup, but they failed. ⁓ right, they took the long game. The Tea Party Carlos: Mm-hmm. loren: was the outgrowth of the Heritage Foundation and the John Birch Society over 60 years or 50 years, right? And billions by billionaires. One of the things like there's this joke, you know, ⁓ I was talking to another progressive who's really trying to kind of do things like you're doing Carlos and from the the content standpoint and get people excited. He's like where's that where's that lefty billionaire, right? Where's ⁓ I should know her name, Bezos ex-wife, ⁓ right? Like she's doing good with her billions. Right, but at the end the day, she's still a billionaire. Even as fat, I mean she's giving it away as fast as she can, it's still growing. Right? Mackenzie. Sorry, McKenzie Scott, right? ⁓ but Mackenzie Scott is not gonna give to a left progressive that's going to raise taxes. Because at the end of the day, there's no good billionaire. Right? They're gonna give to the causes, they're gonna Carlos, she's gonna give to the cause that you just said, which is let's feed the homeless, not let's solve homelessness by taxing the billionaires. Sparky Mitra: Yeah. Carlos: Crazy. It's crazy. Mm. Yeah. Right. Right. loren: Right. So the left and progressives and just regular human beings have this problem of well, we have the better ideas and we why well we have humanity, we don't have the money. So it's not just organizing, but it's organizing ourselves to raise the money when we don't have it all. Right. It's just this this I was talking about the structural issues of being an independent, just the structural ideas of everyday Americans who want change. We're set up against a system that is ridiculously bought and sold. And again, it always has been. It's not like it's new. It might be more concentrated, but we also know, again, sometimes it gets so heavy it falls over, right? We're back to the 1890s, we're back to the Gilded Age. Out of that Gilded Age came the progressive age, right? This won't last forever. And I think that's where most we talked earlier about people make the mistake of, you know, I was born at the perfect time in the perfect country, the perfect parents of the perfect religion. ⁓ they just don't know their history, right? Like there's going to be something after this. I don't pretend to know what it is. But I know there's going to be something after. It's how do we shape it? How do we take it now so it becomes what we want to see? Revolutions don't usually end the way the revolutionaries started them. The revolutionaries don't end the revolution, right? The revolutionaries are almost always ended in all of history by someone else. So it's not even necessarily the important part to be the revolutionary. You want to help make sure the change happens, but you want to make sure when that change happens that you get in front of it. Carlos: Mm-hmm. loren: And you lead it to a place where we want it to go. And right now I just don't see, as Sparky was saying, you know, people want to do two hours on a Saturday. I don't know where I don't know what's gonna cause the urgency. Something will cause the urgency, but we haven't seen that moment yet. Carlos: Let me ask you guys, do you think all of these social programs like affordable health care, like libraries, like funded education, ⁓ like ⁓ universal basic income, all those things, do you think we would have that if we were majority white? Or I mean we're already majority white, but if If the Heritage Foundation got their way. Would we also then have universal basic income? Would we also have no? loren: Do you want to go Sparky? Sparky Mitra: I think yeah I can go real quick. I I I I think like maybe not in ha how they currently exist, but I do think there is very much a reality where if if the country looked more like how they they want it to look that they would be more willing to be like, ⁓ this is 'Cause like I think right now they like ⁓ basically make it so that it's like an us versus them kind of mindset, whereas like, ⁓ if like certain social programs are given to literally every person, ⁓ somehow it's benefiting the other more than like the white conservative, right? But I I do think there is like a world where ⁓ where it would be kind of like like where the parties would kind of restructure to a way where it was like ⁓ there was like a more like white like there was like a more social program centered like kind of white perspective but I will say like like that has always existed there's always been like this like nationalistic way of thinking about progressive policies as being for just like my people quote unquote ⁓ like that's literally what the Nazi party was also ⁓ so ⁓ so so like so I definitely think that is a possibility. As it currently exists, I genuinely think like it is very much overrun with like the billionaires kind of dictating what they want. And so like like right now, if you ask me if in the sap of a finger like the demographic demographic makeup of the US became different, if suddenly, like they would stand for these things for their people. I don't think I don't think they would. But Carlos: So greed would be greed would be more powerful than racism. loren: Well, I think in your world in your setup, right, there would be you're talking if we were basically removed racism. I agree with Sparky. I think we were still founded again, 'cause look at our founding, right? I mean, it was a white country. You know, I mean they not that they would call themselves white, right? They would still call themselves English or whatever, right? But looking back, we'll call it it was founded as, you know, white people. But that white people was an arist an aristocracy. Right. It might have started with some people leaving a boat so they could have their own weird Christian values because the conservative Christians on the continent thought that they were too too conservative, right? Like you all need to go somewhere else and be even weirder. Right. ⁓ but they were again like his historically, yeah, they landed on Plymouth Rock, but they were f immediately followed by the people with the charters and the money, right? And the landed aristocracy immediately took over from New England all the way down to the southern end of Georgia. ⁓ Carlos: Yeah. loren: Florida didn't exist. It was, you know, French and then Spanish and whatever. ⁓ I guess it was always Spanish. It was never French. Was Florida French? Can't remember. ⁓ so try not to think about it. but the landed aristocracy always took over. So I I agree with Sparky. Like based on our history, would we be like ⁓ Norway and and Sweden and Denmark? No, because I think we were founded on this aristocracy. Should we? As a pluralistic diversity is our strength. Individuals, individualism is amazing as long as you get to lead your life and everybody else around you gets to lead their life, no matter where they come from or what their background is. And we should be more like Norway. Yes. Like that's to me, that's the goal. Like, you again, if Sparky's like, if we stamped our fingers, would it change? No, but if I could stamp my fingers, the change I would be is we would be this pluralistic diverse. Carlos: Yeah. Sparky Mitra: Okay. loren: society of social democracy of Norway and and Germany and healthcare again it's not like universal healthcare. The the stupid thing is it costs more for the worst results, right? We spend a third more money to die earlier of more diseases. On the hope that I might get a miracle drug because I'm 79 years old and I'm the most powerful fat fuck in the world. That was the news today if you guys maybe already saw Sparky Mitra: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Carlos: Yeah. Ha ha ha. Sparky Mitra: Mm-hmm. Carlos: I refu and I refuse to go for walks. loren: If you eat mc eat mcburgers all day. Like, yeah, I mean that's the world I the world I am trying to create, Carlos, is is that world. I want the multicultural diversity is our strength, open borders, people want to come here. We accept everyone. ⁓ it doesn't matter if you came over on the Mayflower, it doesn't matter if you family came over ⁓ at the bottom of a slave ship, it doesn't matter if you crossed the border, it doesn't matter if you flew in here, you know, wearing the gold gold jewelry from an emorite. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. loren: This should be the place where you get to make yourself and where you can become a billionaire. And we're not gonna tax your billions, we're gonna make it so that you pay the same as the rest of us. And by paying the same as the rest of us, we're gonna have the things the rest of the world has that makes them healthier and happier and wealthier. Carlos: That's been my my complaint or my stance this whole time is I honestly I don't I don't care if you are a billionaire but what good is being a the the billionaire but you live in a slum? Cefore X. Plosives: What's that? Carlos: You're a billionaire, but the trains don't work. You're a billionaire, but there's no bullet train. There's homeless people. Like your house is trash, dude. So what good is having all that money if you're all you're gonna do is complain about the homeless people? If all you're gonna do is complain about the traffic, if all you're gonna do is complain that flights are getting rerouted and and are being ⁓ delayed and all that stuff. I don't understand the fascination of being the coolest kid on the block when your block is a horseshit. Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. It's the the the root the root of it all, right? It's just it's just greed. You know, and then and then you faction into racism and, you know, whatever you want you Carlos: And that's where and that's that's the question, right? Well, for me, going back to ⁓ my question about this, is you know, we look at the Nordic countries and they seem to work a little better. Size of the country, whatever, whatever. We we as an a ⁓ a member of the United States, supposedly the richest country in the world, supposedly where you come to make things happen. Sparky Mitra: Mm-hmm. Carlos: We can no longer say, ⁓ the size of the countries really does matter. No, fuck off. It doesn't. It doesn't. The size of the bombs and the amount of bombs that we're throwing over there in the Middle East, I think that dictates a little bit of why the fuck our education system is underfunded. It goes into it goes into understanding why we don't have a lot of immigration lawyers, a lot of immigration judges that'll help the backlog of Sparky Mitra: Mm-hmm. Cefore X. Plosives: Sides. Sparky Mitra: Exactly. Carlos: of what we're gonna call illegal people that are here illegally. We continue to to nominate these folks from all these fancy schools and throughout history these fancy schools have done nothing but give us these secret societies, give us these these ⁓ I'm not gonna say that because it they they they're they're not the perfect babysitting place, if you know what I mean. That island. You know what mean? That. Like there's a lot happening. And these secret societies are doing that. They're the ones that don't know. They're the gluttonous ones. They're the ones that eat all the food. They're the ones that touch all the people. They're the ones that so when the hell is a secret society of like Jesus believers that don't want to do all those things when they're going to come out and be like, hey, look. I understand, I understand that your pastor over there, he's saying all those wonderful things, but we lost we lost faith in him when he came out with those daisy dukes on Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. Carlos: You know what mean? It's crazy that we continue to vote for these people simply because they have more money for lawn signs and ads and dumb shit. And they're not doing anything. I'm telling you, I've been on this planet for 54 years and we complain about the same thing for 54 years. Cefore X. Plosives: Mm-hmm. Carlos: We can't continue to vote for the same people that don't listen. Cefore X. Plosives: The representatives that don't represent us. Carlos: So how is it that I'm supposed to pull myself up by the bootstraps, but your punk ass doesn't? Your punk ass has a dialogue where you guys can learn about your sex life and you guys can learn about starting cults and dumb shit. Sparky Mitra: Mm mm. Carlos: It's so it's so frustrating. And then I introduce people to Lauren. Hey, look, Lauren is independent. He's hella smart. He's done things with technology that you won't see till tomorrow. All these wonderful things. And people like, nah, he doesn't have enough lawn signs. Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. Yeah. Carlos: And people will straight up look at a white dude that has his hand in their purse and they say, Yes, white dude, I like your hand in my purse. I'd rather that white dude's hand in my purse than that brown dude's hand in my purse than that black dude that and duh God forbid, we have a woman running. Cefore X. Plosives: Mm-hmm. And it's not even that their hands in their purse, the black and a black and brown representative, their hands on their back saying it's okay, I'm gonna pull you through the fire. Nah, nah, take my money. Carlos: Yeah. Yeah. I don't I don't I don't get it. So for me, my part in creating this ⁓ podcast and trying to educate people in the way that this stuff works, because there's not a lot of people that take two seconds to take a look at what it takes to run as an independent. Independent means you're doing this shit by yourself. Like Cefore X. Plosives: I'll get it. Carlos: And in Florida, if you're a Democrat, you're basically running as an independent. loren: Hopefully not for long. Sparky Mitra: Ha ha Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Carlos: So I I guess I guess, you know, that's probably that's probably where it attaches to what Lauren was saying ⁓ earlier about changing the cultures. We have to change the culture. Sparky Mitra: What is it Carlos: Nothing against white dudes. But like they don't always have the they don't always have the answer. And then this bullshit that we have to live through just because we put Barack in the office. Now you guys are attacking the Capitol and doing all kinds of dumb shit. Like running through the streets, picking up people that look like Sparky and me? Are you crazy? It's crazy. It's crazy that people think that it's okay. It's crazy that people I've seen people wearing t shirts that say I don't care he's a ⁓ if he's a pedophile. I'd vote for Trump. Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. Sparky Mitra: Yeah. loren: It's all identity politics. It's all identity politics and they identify with pedophiles. Carlos: We have to change the culture we the Yeah. Cefore X. Plosives: ⁓ it's so terrible. Carlos: It's wild to say. It's wild to say. Cefore X. Plosives: But I love him. That's what I'll say. I I said it in the last w that last podcast, they love being in an abusive relationship. They love it. They love to get beaten down. They love to be have a dominant and to be a submissive just being told what to do. And I I I I've never understood like I that's why Carlos and I like we get along, man. We're not we're not types to if if we're gonna break bread, we break bread with everybody. Sparky Mitra: Ha ha Carlos: Yeah. Cefore X. Plosives: You know, and and if they're f such believers, like even the even the crumbs from the bread that fall onto the floor are worth so much, right? But they want those too. They want us, I want everything. And they're o and the people that are following them are okay with it. Carlos: ⁓ no, there's people that there's people that would stomp on those crumbs just to keep you from having them. Cefore X. Plosives: And you can't and break your fingers. Carlos: That's that's a big part of it. It's not that they'll leave the crumbs, is that they'll step on the crumbs to keep you from eating. loren: racial hierarchy, yeah. And keep themselves from eating. If it meant they didn't get to eat either. Like Swarky was saying earlier, right? Like we'll stop themselves from eating. Cefore X. Plosives: Yes. If I can't have it, you will starve. Carlos: Crazy. And then they hang their hats on that chair. And then these idiots go to church every weekend. Cefore X. Plosives: ⁓ loren: Or mistaking if you can have it, I will start to make sure you can't. So it's again it's it's it's it's it's not it's it's human, obviously. It's certainly not rational, which is why I would never say human beings are rational. ⁓ I mean again, we we we have ration, but we don't we have rationality. ⁓ but that's not how we make decisions. We make decisions emotionally. David Hume got that much right. Cefore X. Plosives: I got a I got a question. I w I wanna kinda shift something real quick. So like when I was looking at at California, right? It seemed like all right, you guys had you had it all lined up. Gavin Newsom's gonna run for president. Eric Swalwell's gonna step in and be the be the one to take over. And then everything went out the window. Shit hit the fan. What what what was it like after You know, Eric Eric's like, I gotta I can't be a part of this 'cause I've done some dirties. Like all of a sudden like the whole game the whole game is up in the air. The play like the s ⁓ the ⁓ succession plan is is gone. Like what what was what was that like? Sparky Mitra: I think for me, like, ⁓ I don't know, I I was always like I don't know, I feel like I'm an equal opportunity hater when it comes to these folks, but ⁓ just ev even before. ⁓ but but even now like when I look at the race, ⁓ when I look at the race, I see that ⁓ Like Becerra being in the top two, right? Like I very much think his answers during his debates about ⁓ Newsom did great on homelessness. ⁓ like that's like no one agrees with him. Not Democrats, not Republicans, not Independents. Literally nobody is on the same page as him about that. Even if they voted for Becerra, even if they voted for Newsom in the past, like but I do think it is very much of The way he's talking about it very much lends itself to ⁓ like ⁓ Newsom still being president and supporting him. So I I think like I think the plan is still there. I think like th they've put the r people they want in place to kind of still carry carry out their plan. It just just looks like a different flavor of the same plan that like the establishment wants. But that's yeah. loren: Yeah, for me I never understood the Swalwell coronation early on. Also like Steyr trying to buy his way on. Like, I just I don't know how he still got so many votes. I just how how Democrats in the state decided that they could vote for a billionaire like that. ⁓ and I had friends working on his campaign who were like, no, he really is this guy, and he really is this progressive, and he's the only one who's really progressive. I'm like, yeah, I'm gonna write in my friend who's an official write-in for governor, because Carlos: Yeah. loren: Yeah, I think you're all whack. I I just don't think this is who represents us. But then millions and millions of Amer ⁓ Californians turned out again to, you know, f that muscle memory is I voted blue before, I'm gonna vote blue again. I voted for Bacera most likely in one of his statewide races, I'm gonna vote for him again. If I'm a Republican, you know, there's only I'm gonna get behind the one R that I think is even possible. And you know, when we add up all the numbers, it was still like 75, 25% Democrat to Republican in the state. So it's not like Hilton has a chance. And that's kind of the sad part about being in a one party state, right? Whether it's Florida or California, ⁓ you live in a dictatorship, right? And it's weird because the people keep choosing the dictatorship over and over again. They could do something different, but they don't. Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. Yeah, people keep using it. Carlos: Yeah. loren: So again, I'm I understand the world we live in. I'm not so insane as to think that I alone can change it. ⁓ but I do think that there's a lot of work that people can do, ⁓ and Sparky's doing and and you guys are doing, and I'm doing the people at ICN are doing, to show, to demonstrate that there is another way. But you have to you have to want it. You can't just Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Carlos: Yeah. loren: We can't just be complaining and comfortable. And if we are, again, like then we know what the world looks like. It looks like this. If we want to complain and do action and try and take a risk, my argument ultimately about risk taking is I don't think it can get worse. Like, what do you what ultimately are you afraid of? What comfort are you afraid that that's gonna disappear? So I think California ended up with the safest, the most boring, the most corporate, the most centrist Democrat. Cefore X. Plosives: That's all. loren: And that's what a primary is supposed to do. So the primary system worked. Congratulations, California. Cefore X. Plosives: Could they handle like a Mamdani guy in California? Or was there even a candidate? loren: Again, I it's always weird. No no I mean, to me stuff like that's always weird to say someone is an individual generational talent. Where's your where's your generational talent? It's like saying, How come, you know, ⁓ the Timberwolves don't have a a Kobe Bryant? or, you know, Where's where's the next tiger? Like generational talent is generational talent. So Mundani is Mundani, he's very special, he's very unique. Cefore X. Plosives: ⁓ loren: Will that person rise in California? Well, sure, if they're born here, they move here. ⁓ maybe once Sparky's done with her dissertation at Sparky, you know? Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah, there you go. Sparky Mitra: I'm blushing y'all. Cefore X. Plosives: Hundred percent. loren: Mm-hmm. Carlos: But I think that's what's important about ⁓ leveraging social media in the right way. Is making those connecti connections, maintaining those connections, you know. ⁓ I I have a bunch of friends in in the LA area that I told about Lauren ⁓ you know, and now in San Diego, Sparky's down there. and ⁓ and yeah, just leveraging social media to the point where like having the adults leverage social media because we'll have conversations about voting in California. We're not gonna sit here and do a pie tod a Tide Pods challenge, you know? and and and reaching out to the folks that Probably a lot like me that they've been around this whole time and they see things that just aren't changing and it's everything is stagnant and the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer and you feel alone because you go to work and then you come home and you don't have the energy or money to go do anything. So you can't network and you're not listening to the neighbors because they're dicks and all this stuff is happening. But if you just take two seconds and create content. And have a conversation about California's approach on voting and make it make sense. People be like, ⁓ okay, cool. And then you get to talk about Mom Donnie and how when he took over, it didn't turn into hell and the buildings are still standing. And it's incredible how that works, right? And it's cool, like if you have a lady that comes in and she does the job and she's just as good, if not better, than the dudes that you continue to vote for. We have to share those stories and and share and expand on these ideas. Cause I have goofy ideas too. And I get to talk to folks like you guys, and you guys would be like, Well, that's not gonna happen because this and this and that and that and that or it's a great idea, this and this, that I've seen a couple of people write down some of the things, some of the weird things that come out of my brain. I've seen it. You know, but that's that's just it. We have to s we have to maintain that relationship and maintain the communication. To be like, hey, this is what we're going towards. And then when someone shows up with some stupid ass ideas, you're like, get out of here, swallow. All right, let's go ahead and bring this one in to a landing. Lauren, ⁓ actually let's start with Sparky. Sparky, please let folks know. take about a minute or two, whatever, however long it took. Let folks know who you are, what you've done, and where they can find you online to maintain a relationship. Sparky Mitra: Yeah, for sure. Thank you so much, Carlos. And thank y'all so much. This is awesome. ⁓ so yes, I'm Sparky I was a congressional candidate in San Diego, but we're just getting started. Y'all can find me at Sparky Mitra dot com and my handle is still Sparky for Congress on Instagram. and and yeah, so like I Lauren mentioned my dissertation, I am an engineer by trade My work is in engineering proteins t ⁓ for applications in sustainability and ⁓ brain imaging imaging and neurobiology. So those are the two applications I work on. ⁓ and I'm doing my PhD, but I I took a little step back to give people another option, a third way in San Diego. And hopefully hopefully that movement is pushed forward and I I'm excited to be a part of that and excited to join all of y'all here. Carlos: Awesome. Thank you so much for taking time from being a PhD candidate, running for Congress, doing all the things. ⁓ but she lives in San Diego. Don't feel bad for her. Lauren, how about you? loren: Carlos, it was great being here. Mike, it was a pleasure to meet you. Sparky as always excited to ⁓ have the opportunity to share the stage with you and your vision and ⁓ and know that you know you're gonna help make the change that this country needs. ⁓ with my ⁓ first campaign under my belt, ⁓ my immediate focus is with independent candidate network and helping. ⁓ we officially have 10 candidates ⁓ on the November ballot ⁓ in the general election across the country. in rural, urban, and suburban areas, we'll have one writing candidate. ⁓ perhaps ⁓ in the next couple months we'll get to actually a few more candidates. But my focus is on helping them raise their money, helping educate the country that ⁓ there really is a pathway to power for independence, that when we elect enough independence to deny both Democrats and Republicans a majority in Congress, that is the first step we take to get our government back. And then again, it's going to happen everywhere. You know, we have very conservative people in this group who are running in very conservative districts and we have very, very progressive People running in progressive districts, but they're the right people who are independent of the parties, who will not be attached to parties, who will not be attached to donors, but who will represent the people. So I'm really excited to continue that work at Independent Candidate Network. I have updated all of my handles from Lauren Collin for Congress to Lauren the Independent, ⁓ L-O-R-E-N, the Independent. ⁓ so you can find me across all of your social media channels there. ⁓ and then yeah, actually something we touched on earlier, which is really maximizing our democracy. So not just independence, but ⁓ you know, how do we take the models that work? Like we said, what works here in California as far as voting, getting people registered, ⁓ even to actually just universal hundred percent registration. ⁓ how do we take what works in Alaska, which is open nonpartisan primaries with ranked choice voting and and top three ⁓ moving on? How do we take what works in Oregon and Utah, which is hundred percent malin voting and how do we get at that so it's all fifty states ⁓ and how do we uncap the house. So those are kind of my my three prongs of ⁓ I guess my my my trident ⁓ uncapping the house, maximizing our democracy, and using those two things to get independence elected. Carlos: I love it. Thank you for taking time. ⁓ thank your wife and your kid for lend ⁓ for lending you to us. loren: Yes. I have I have a seven week old that I think is gonna be mine for the next few hours and I'm very very gracious for ⁓ for my wife to have given me this opportunity. So I'm gonna go hang out with a baby for a little bit and watch some soccer, some football. It's not the worst thing. If you're gonna be a new dad, I recommend doing it every four years during the World Cup. Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. Carlos: Yeah. Cefore X. Plosives: There we go. Yeah. Sparky Mitra: Congratulations. That's awesome. loren: Have your kid have your kid in the late spring. Carlos: C four f C four, final thoughts? Cefore X. Plosives: There you go. ⁓ thank you both for coming on the show. ⁓ I think your work after the results is going to ⁓ pay dividends. I mean, that just shows how truly committed you are to making change, right? ⁓ being a grassroots candidate is phenomenal, but you didn't get the results doesn't mean you fall away to the wayside and go about your business and enjoy your baby and not everybody else, you know. ⁓ I think and in the age of social media, showing that consistent message that you're still here, you're still relevant, you're still fighting for the people that you were trying to represent. And hey, I'm still here. Let's let's keep let's keep joining together. And I think that's so important right now. ⁓ attached to hope, just because like I said, if you didn't win the race, it doesn't mean that their hope disappears. It's still there, it's still yearning. And I appreciate what you guys are doing and still doing and continue to do. And ⁓ I look forward to ⁓ helping out as much as I can and you know, Carlos I love I love what Carlos is doing here on the channel, man, and ⁓ I'm down for it and continue to push these efforts for you guys. We're all for it. So thank you. Carlos: Yeah. That's it. good people need shit talkers on their team and that's what we do. And I love I love your approach. I love both of you guys. I love your approach. I love your your people first approach. And that we can definitely do things better. It's not not money first. If you build if you look at the NFL, they invest in the players because they understand that the players are what makes the best product possible. And we need to start approaching as a country, we need to start approaching our product. players in that way. Stop letting stop letting people tell us that we're dumb and stupid and lazy and all that stuff. That's ridiculous. Thank you all so much for taking time to come and be my friends today. And with that, everybody, we're out. Cefore X. Plosives: Yeah. Peace.