Latest / Fist Full of Dirt / FFOD338 : A Conversation with Governor Phil Bryant

Transcript

FFOD338 : A Conversation with Governor Phil Bryant · Fist Full of Dirt

• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Fistful of Dirt, the official podcast of Masiok Properties.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: Whether you own a small farm, lease land, or just love hanging in your backyard.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: We're all about the outdoor lifestyle and how to get the most from your time in God's great outdoors.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: Now here's your host, Ronnie Cuz Strickland.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_02: Semi-Live from the Camo Cave.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_06: Semi-Live.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_02: Still looking for that first cold front, Laureen.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_06: Oh, well, it may be a minute.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_02: It ain't happening much, is it?
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_06: No, it dropped down into the 80s, and y'all y'all was like, I made chili.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_06: I was like, we're ridiculous.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_02: I ate that chili four times.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_06: The last time was the best time because she made some sort of like burritos out of it.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_06: It was really good.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I had one last night, and I said, and I don't know what she did.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_02: She had chili and cheese and crunched up something else and then put it in a burrito and folded it, put it in the air fryer, and I I bit into one of those things.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_02: I said, okay, it's official.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_02: That that right there is going on the list.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_02: That's how you handle chili right there.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_06: Put that in the rotation.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's uh really looking forward to that.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_02: Bad news got a picture of the hog this morning.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_06: It was such a pretty picture, too, like a sunrise.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_02: In the daylight.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_06: I know.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_02: But he had disappeared.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I told everybody I was gonna get him.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_02: Wait, he ain't been around.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_02: Three weeks, three and a half weeks.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_06: He went dark.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know if there's such a thing as a nomadic pig, but I think we have a nomadic pig.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_02: I keep looking for sign, and uh I think he's just nomadic, but it is what it is.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_02: So I got something for him.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_02: I just gotta slow down enough to get it.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_02: So uh got a uh pretty cool guest today.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know that I've ever had him on the podcast.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_03: I don't think so.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_02: It's our former governor Phil Bryant, who has actually been one of my turkey hunting buddies for a long time.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and he was such a great governor.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_02: We we've been blessed in Mississippi.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_02: We get bad raps from time to time, but we've we've had some great governors who made wildlife conservation part of their administration.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_02: Nobody more than Governor Bryant.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna ask him about he had a wild one of our best wildlife management areas as far as where it's at and all that named after him.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_02: And uh that's a pretty cool deal, but he is a special guy.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I may have told his story, I don't know.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_02: But uh he came up to go turkey hunting one time with me and Toxie, and we met him out at the cabin, the fam Toxie's their family cabin out there, which is phenomenal.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_02: Such a cool spot.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_02: And uh anyway, he got there I don't know, mid early afternoon, and uh he had a couple of highway patrols when somebody else was.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, it's like when we did the the hunt in Nebraska with the governors and all that kind of stuff.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_06: It was the summit.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, them people like that just can't go nowhere.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_06: No, they roll with security.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_02: And uh anyway, we got out there and we, you know, we was planning supper and all that stuff, and I saw him out there talking to uh the highway patrolman, the other guy.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_02: One of them was a big dude, like an NFL player, very friendly but stoic.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_02: And Governor Bryant was talking to him, and uh anyway, he came over to me and he he said, uh, the governor's sending us home.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_02: He, you know, he said everything would be all right.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_02: And he looked me straight in the eye and he said, You in charge?
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, Yes, sir.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, okay.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_02: And everybody got up and left.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_02: And Tyxon and we're inside.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_02: I went to the house and got an AR-15 into my glock.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_02: And I said, I'm spending the night in the cabin over here.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_02: I slept on the couch like I was a security guy.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_02: Nothing happening on my watch.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_06: I'm not gonna let my new friend down.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_02: But he is he is he's such a wildlife guy, ex law enforcement, and uh and I'm I'm gonna talk a little politics to him because he's he's always been such a grounded, down-to-earth, nice guy.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_02: And anybody in politics just gets hammered.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_06: That's right.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_02: And one of the questions I want to ask him is what does it take to be a public servant these days?
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_02: Because boy, he's been a good one.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_02: But every time I think about Governor Bryant, I think about Turkent.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_02: We had a great Turking out last year.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_02: That's right.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_02: Uh called him and he he's still pretty busy.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_02: Kind of hard to run him down, but I want to get caught up on some issues and all that kind of stuff.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_02: 99% of them are wildlife related, not always in Missy, because he's done a lot of stuff for the current administration.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_02: With FEMA and all that, we're gonna we're gonna find out some stuff.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_02: Doesn't hurt to stay present and stay up to date on some political issues.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_02: So that's what we're gonna do.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_02: We're gonna go visit with one of my old turkey thug buddies, Governor Phil Bryant.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_02: I'm ready.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_02: All right, Governor, I've already done an opening of that, and boy, they're gonna they're gonna think you're one of the greatest people on the planet, but you know me, I'm a fan.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_02: And I always have been because I follow politics.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_02: Always have.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_02: And when you find one at that level who has that wildlife conservation mindset, it's just it's special.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_02: And I, you know, I want to say up front, thank you for what you did for Mississippi and everything through double terms.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I was blessed.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_02: Pretty much unopposed at second term.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_02: But I got I got some questions, and I told the governor, I said, I send, and it's not just him, I send questions ahead of time.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_02: Because I want people to know two things.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_02: Number one, I prepared a little bit.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_02: Number two, I don't want to be confused with a journalist.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: I don't blame it.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_02: So the last thing you want to hang around.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_01: The most uh unlike uh folks uh in large part that there is.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_02: So I guess I guess they got a job or two.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_02: We ain't going down and we ain't going down and leave them alone.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_02: My first question, and I've been dying to ask you this, is have you had time to visit the WMA that bears your name?
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_01: You know, only to drive in.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_01: I was there the day that we opened it, and um I I've just drawn uh uh uh uh drove past there, but no, I haven't.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and I want to go spend a night.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: I want to take my grandchildren.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: Uh when we were kids, we would go to filler with my dad and my uncles, and he had an old army type tent we'd put hay in, and we'd spend a week up there deer hunting.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_01: And we just thought it was the greatest thing in the world, build up big bonfires, and you know, there wasn't many deer in those days.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: I killed a little old spike, which in those days you could.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, okay.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_01: It was meat.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: About twelve.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_01: That's exactly we were meat hunting, uh, and uh I just remember my dad and them were so excited about killing a spike.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but yeah, I want to uh to be able to go and uh my grandchildren experience that overnight staying outside, and uh but I haven't been there, but I'm very proud of it.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_01: And we were riding our Harley Davidson's up to the Delta um about two years ago, and all of a sudden I passed and saw the sign, and I tried to point to my fellow riders and they like, yeah, big deal.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_02: Whatever.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, whatever.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_02: I I'm kind of familiar with that part of the world.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_01: Good hunting.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I'm telling you that one's primo right there.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_02: How how did you find out that that was gonna happen?
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_02: Did somebody just come to you and tell you?
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, because I always resist it.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_01: I I just don't like the naming, particularly when you're still on this earth.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_01: I think that ought to be something um that happens uh in honor of you afterwards.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_01: But uh yeah, um Wildlife Fishers and Parks called one day and said we're gonna open this up.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: We'd like for them to come up here and do it, which I always love to do.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it I may have found it out that day.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_01: Really?
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_01: I think they came in and go, like, you know, your name's gonna be on the side.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I just remember it was very uh late in the stage, too late for me to do anything about it.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_01: It's probably why they did it that way.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's exactly yeah, because I would have resisted.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_01: But if there's one thing you want to get named for, that's it.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_01: That's it.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you just think of the generations, hopefully, of families uh and kids that you know we lived in a neighborhood when I was young, after we moved from the Delta to Jackson.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_01: My dad was a a veteran of World War II, so we moved into one of the VA uh neighborhoods, and never kid had the same little house.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_01: We didn't have any land to hunt on.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_01: So we'd go to the National Forest to hunt.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_01: And I I I realized soon into that with supporting uh wildlife on this that we've gotta have spaces where kids that live in neighborhoods can go and hunt.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want it to be just guys that are wealthy that can go buy land and have a hunting camp.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: And the rest of us try to find a place to go.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: So we made that and many others across the state for people to go enjoy.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_02: For me, it was the home of Chidden National Forest.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_02: Only place I ever hunted until I was 30 years old.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know what I would have been without that.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_02: So access is a big deal.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_02: So and and I I know that's why the Mississippi Department of Wildlife Fishers and Parks was such a big fan of yours because that was a high priority during your administration.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_01: It was.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: It was one of the top things that we did to develop areas that for hunting and fishing and those opportunities, but also just just bring attention to what wildlife fisheries and parks are are doing.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: Uh our state parks needed a lot of support.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, uh those just uh thousands of people a year come and enjoy those and and look the economy we're gonna talk a little bit more about it, but the the effect of the economic development for wildlife uh in the state of Mississippi is billions uh of dollar industry.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_01: And it could go away in just a couple of generations if we don't promote it.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_02: If you watch the news, you realize it could go away in one vote.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, exactly.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_02: Some people have lost their mind.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_02: Uh out there in Utah, Oregon, where they there's gonna be a uh a vote out there on whether they're gonna make hunting and rodeo and farming, cattle farming illegal.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like it does not surprise me.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_02: It's unbelievable.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_01: I I went turkey hunting in Colorado, uh, had a mountain lion uh decide that she wanted that turkey more than I did.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: I gave it to her.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I heard that thing roar, and first thing we saw I had a guy hunting with me at Nosey area, and and we saw the cub.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_01: He said, Look right there.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: And that little cub was playing in front of us, and and uh all of a sudden that roar, and boy, that little cub stopped and headed to mama.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_01: And I looked at him, he said, We probably need to back out of here.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_01: I said, Yeah, they didn't have that turkey.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_01: They can have that.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_01: But what a beautiful country, but a a democratic administration there that it it just does everything they can to deter um wildlife hunting and fishing in uh out in Colorado.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_01: It's uh it's it's unbelievable.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_02: We ain't going there.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_02: I want to talk I want to talk about Governor Bryant.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_02: There you go.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_02: I know you, and I I can remember before I I wanna I want to hear about your background, but I know you when you were you you you didn't really make a hard run for governor.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_02: You just kinda it just kinda happened.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_02: I love that, but I can remember you sitting up there with me and Toxie with your cowboy boots and your blue jeans on, talking about what your your your thoughts were on conservation.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_02: And it's good because I mean we needed to hear that.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_02: Mississippi's pretty big time in that world.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_02: Cremos and Monsiok and all that.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_02: But I want you to tell the listeners who I hadn't had you on here how you grew up.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_02: I want to hear about law enforcement, where you were raised, and all that.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_01: So I was born in the Delta, a little town called Moorhead in Sunflower County.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and I still have relatives there, and so I talked to my cousins and family up there.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: Not as many, obviously, the old folks have have moved on.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh my brothers and I were up there not long ago trying to find that we had a little home out in the middle of the cotton field, like most people, and it had changed so much.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: Finally, my oldest brother said, There's the road, and we were off highway three looking for it, and so sure enough, there there it was.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_01: So uh a little Delta boy with a southern cross is a yellow dog, and I grew up there.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: At some point my dad got sort of tired of fighting the Delta in the mid-1960s.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_01: There was a uh there was a drought and uh it just really devastated that area.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_01: So we picked up and moved to uh to Jackson to Rankin County first and there for a while and then to uh South Jackson when I was about ten years old.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_01: My dad found a VA neighborhood.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_01: He served in World War II and uh as a Navy CB and and so we bought a house where everybody's dad was a veteran.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_01: And so we had always hunted from I I can remember as just a probably four years old, uh, one of my uncles killing a wild boar in his cotton field that had been under the house knocking the pipes out.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_01: And we woke up early one morning and there was a rustle, and he was trying to get his 30 aught six, and I'm going like, oh, I gotta see this.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: And we ran to the little back door on the stoop, and there was that big old hog out there, and boom, he let that 30 aught six go and roll that hog.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_01: And this is something I learned about hogs.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_01: That hog got up, big old Russian boar, and started running towards us.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he after a full hit with a 30-06.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_01: And he bolted that rifle and dropped him again.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_01: So we always hunted, hunted the Delta.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_01: Um we would rabbit hunt, which was you know, fast food is what I tell people, but rabbit hunting was big.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_01: My granddaddy had bird dogs back when they were Bob White.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we could drive down.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_01: I remember driving down dirt roads and stopping and seeing the Bob White cross in front of you.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_01: My granddaddy would stop like let him go.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we're not gonna run over them birds.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and so we grew up hunting and fishing and in the bayous and uh you know, sitting on a plastic uh bucket and fishing the bayou.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_01: I mean it was but it was all you brought everything home.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: And my dad would always say, You don't kill anything, you're not gonna eat.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_01: And so there and in South Jackson we tr we wanted to carry that on, so we'd go back uh to the National Forest up in the Delta uh around Fiddler and and hunt there and uh wherever we could find uh land that people would let us hunt on legally uh we would sure do it.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_01: And uh it helped uh m I remember mother got a chest type freezer once and uh I killed that little little doe, a little deer, a little spike, uh up in the Delta, and and we we took it to a friend of ours that was a butcher, had it wrapped up in white paper, and we were just so proud of it.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: It was it was part of it.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_01: So I I never lost that.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_01: Uh grew up there in South Jackson, ended up going to Hines Community College, and we would carry, you and I were talking earlier.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_01: I always had a shotgun in the back of the truck, and we would go uh dove hunting in the afternoon that duh during dub season.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_01: We had a fellow there that after school.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_01: After school.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_01: As soon as we got out of class, he would say, All right, you boys, come on out here, just pick up your shells and don't drop anything, but you can you can hunt these doves, and we'd go out there and dove hunt and and have a cookout.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_01: We'd get enough of them together, we'd call our buddies together, like y'all come over.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_01: We got some dove.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_01: A dovebreast, especially, ain't it?
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, sir.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_02: It is the fillet mignon of the air.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_02: I get it.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_02: And boy, now if you got caught with a gun on a school campus, you'd be in prison for 20 years.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_01: And it'd be national news.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, especially if it's yeah, somebody that's uh and then and then we'd hunt uh we'd go fish these pines.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_01: People would have little pines that give you permission to fish, and you'd uh catch a mess of brim and and go have a brim cook, and everybody would come and you'd fry up that brim.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_01: That was a you know, that was a big deal.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_01: We'd get enough of it together to invite our friends over.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_01: So I think you still do that.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, of course we do.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_02: I got a I was lucky enough to meet one of your grandsons.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_02: We were looking at a pocket knife and he was his eyes were just glimmering.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_01: He cook it off, didn't he?
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_01: How cool is that?
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: That's cool.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: He's a good fisherman, too.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_01: He can he can fling an artificial bait.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_01: Now he can take that rubber worm, and he was he was fishing yesterday.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh quick story, and I'll leave Alana won't be one of these uh grandpa.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: We had church last night, and he had muddied up his shoes at the at the pond, and so I gave him a really nice pair of shoes that I have.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_01: And he went to church on them.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_01: He comes in.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_01: I'm I'm I come home, I had to run down to the farm, do something.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_01: So then Deborah comes in, I goes, Where is Henry?
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, he's fishing.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_01: I said, Oh, good, he'll be fine.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_01: And then it hit me.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_01: He's got my$150 shoes.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: Got my church shoes on.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_01: And I run down there in the side by side, and sure enough, he's over there in the mud just flinging that rubber worm.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_01: I said, Boy.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: Doing what he's supposed to do.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_02: Pop, I caught one.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_02: How cool is that?
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_02: But you know what?
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_02: I feel bad for kids that don't have that.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_02: They if you gotta expose it to them, and I'm not gonna go down that cell phone thing and all that.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_02: I want you to tell me first about when you decided to get into law enforcement, because that's a special thing to me.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_01: I always wanted to.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_01: I I don't know there was not a time that I did not want to be a law enforcement officer.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you know, we watched Gunsmoke, we watched John Wayne.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_01: What what what really got me is they were always the good guys.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, they were always the guys that was fighting for the underdog that were catching the bad guys, and y y you know, you I just grew up watching that and never lost it.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_01: And just I just thought, you know, wearing that badge would be I knew a couple of police officers and constables and things when we were small.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I couldn't wait and I found out Heinz Community College had a degree in police science.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_01: And no one in my family had ever gone to college.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_01: No one.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not talking about immediate family, I'm talking about extended family.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_01: We never even uh heard of uh going to a university or dream too far.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, it was, it was.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_01: I was changing tires at Big Ten Tire Company uh the summer after I got out of high school.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: Wow, and I got a little postcard at uh in the mail at my mother's home that said, You too can go to college.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I got my 55 Chevrolet and drove down Highway 18 and signed up at Raymond uh to go and join that uh uh get into the police science program.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_01: Two years there, transferred to uh Southern Mess uh at the criminal justice program there, and um had an opportunity to come out and go to work at the Hines uh County Sheriff's Department, uh went through DEA training, worked undercover narcotics cases for uh almost two years, and um then worked homicides, um on patrol.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I spent sixteen years doing fire and arson investigations.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so I dug a lot of burned up buildings after that.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_01: And so um I spent a good deal of my life and then of course uh later on became state auditor, which is uh law enforcement investigative authorities on that, so eleven years there.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_01: So I I'm I always considered myself and still do as part of the law enforcement community.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_02: Well, you got a badge, you had one, it's got the number one on it.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_02: I know.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_02: I would love to have one of them.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_02: They're pretty hard to get.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_02: That's the highest lawman in the state.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_01: I used to tell people, they're like, I want one of those.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_01: I'd say you spend three and a half million dollars, get seven hundred thousand votes, you can have one of those.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_01: That's all it takes.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_02: Quick story Eddie Briggs, when he was a lieutenant governor, you know, he's he's as bad as you on Turkish.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_02: He's a turkey dog.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and I he won't, me and him went turgent one morning, and I drove down here where he lives, and we were going somewhere down toward Utica, and he was flying.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_02: We was running a little bit late, and he got pulled over, and he he opened his wallet and just put his hand out with that badge on it, and that cop hit that badge with his thing and got on his PA, and he said, uh, sorry about that, Lieutenant Governor, have a good day.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_02: And we took off again.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_02: And I looked at Eddie and I said, Eddie, I got to have one in badges.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_02: He said, I need one.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think you're gonna be able to get one of them.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_02: I just I just love that.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_01: But it's uh what great work being in law enforcement.
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_01: And and today I know I was listening to Sean Tyndall, the commissioner, on a radio interview yesterday, trouble they're having uh finding young people that want to get in, because I mean you walk up to a patrol car now, they let the window down four inches, stick the iPhone out.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_01: What do you want?
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, what do you want?
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_01: And it's just it it's a different world.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: So but it was some of the proudest um days that I had and the most fun of being in law enforcement.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_02: As it should be.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm gonna tell you something that the governor wouldn't tell you himself.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna brag a little bit.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_02: We we started this thing, and it's and the paint's still wet on.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_02: I ain't had a lot of time, but it's called Seoul.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_02: Sportsman organized for law enforcement.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_02: And I was just in passing talking to the governor about here's what I'm gonna do, we're gonna raise some money to buy equipment, stuff like that.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_02: And he was the first person and he wrote me a personal check.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_02: You were the first person that ever had that ever put any money into Seoul.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_02: And we we've raised almost$150,000 in the government.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I want to do that again.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_01: Well, not worth no, that's just uh you know, wildlife and law enforcement, it don't get any better than that.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_02: Well, there's and there's thousands of things out there for the military, as there should be.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_02: But you start looking for stuff that's done for law enforcement, and there's there's not a lot.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_02: And when I threw that out there, I got inundated.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_02: Like, how can I help?
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_02: And it was all law enforcement people.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_02: And I was like, look, don't want your money.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I want to get some money from these other people.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_02: Big highlight for me, I got some uh money coming to the Houston, Mississippi Police Department.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_01: Isn't that great?
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_02: We're gonna make a presentation to them in August.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_01: And see small PDs.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we weren't that large at Hines County SO when I got there.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_01: I think there were about eight of us.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_01: And you you know, I remember when we got our first bulletproof vest, and it looked like something I think was an old Army surplus from the Vietnam era, had metal plates in it.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and you couldn't wear that thing in the summertime.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_01: We just didn't have anything.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_02: I'll tell you how serious it is, and I was blown away by this.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_02: And we we raise the money and we we give it to a a group called Spirit of Blue.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_02: That's all they do, is and the number one request for what type of gear, I thought it would have been body armor, something like that, tourniquets.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_02: If they want a really good tourniquet, they have to buy it themselves.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, Never thought about that.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and it's like it's like, man, are we dealing with frontline military?
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_02: That's a scary thought.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_02: But that we buy lots of tourniquets, and that's a sad state right there.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_01: Well, if you worked and we had to work everything, but if you're working traffic and you get to those wrecks, uh unfortunately, people believe that you're medically trained.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_01: And we weren't given any medical training in those days as a deputy.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_01: So you had to kind of go out on your own because when you walk up there and there's a family in there and they're bleeding and they're hurting and they're saying, Please help us, you you you learn pretty quick how to be able to do that.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_01: That's why they want something.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_02: That's why they want them good tourniquets.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_02: Of course, that's a scary thought.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_02: Of course.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_02: When did the thought of governor even enter your mind?
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we had we all laugh about it.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_01: I've got two older brothers and one's past, but we didn't we never even met governors.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, he was a little boy from the Delta, and uh, you know, my dad was a mechanic.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_01: We we just um we never even dreamed of it.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_01: So um I I had an opportunity to join an organization called the JC's, which was a junior chamber of commerce, and I think about it often because they were there were hundreds of thousands of young men.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_01: It was a young men's leadership organization.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_01: And you would go out and work projects.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_01: We whoever needed help, we would go.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: We would sell tickets to the fair and programs at college uh football games to be able to raise money to give away.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_01: So anybody that needed help, we could give some money away.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_01: And and that organization gave me an opportunity to find out about leadership.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_01: We had a speak up program, and I thought there's not a lot of things I can do in life.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not a good athlete, and uh I I I don't know which way I'm gonna go, and all of a sudden they had this speak up and I got to go up and have a public extemporaneous public speech one night, and they said, You can do that.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't know it.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_01: I said, like, oh yeah, I'd I can make public speech.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_01: The hardest thing for people on the planet to do.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: The one thing that most people are frightened of and intimidated by is public speaking.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_01: That's the only thing I could really do.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: And then uh with the JCs, I had an opportunity being selected to go to the White House to meet Ronald Reagan in 1986.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_01: And it was just um amazing.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um and I took a bus to the White House and remember getting out, walking up to the gate and saying, I'm here to meet the president.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_01: Like, sure you are.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: And they looked and go like, Oh no, here's your name.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, these other JCs and you y'all.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_01: Not just a president.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, Ronald Reagan.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I came back then and um and just said, you know, I really uh would like to serve.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_01: I I love law enforcement.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_01: I was in with INS and doing fraud and arson investigations and as this is good.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_01: I mean we're stopping a lot of really bad guys, uh, but I wanted I want to make a difference.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I ran I was in Rankin County by that time, Deborah and I had moved we and had our first child and it it it just it was a compelling feeling of trying to make a difference.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_01: Go do something good for the collective people that you care about.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and I ran for county supervisor and thank goodness I lost.
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_01: Uh or I might have been I might have been over there being president of the board of supervisors and rang the county.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_01: But uh the next year the people who had worked on the campaign that defeated me came to me and said, We want you to run for the House of Representatives.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: You didn't need to be a county supervisor, we want you to run.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_01: And it was the same year 1999, Kirk Fordhouse was running for governor, Eddie Briggs was running for lieutenant governor, and I was running for the House of Representatives, all of us running against incumbent Democrats, and um we all won.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we all were elected that year, and so uh in 199 I'm I'm sorry, that was 1991.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, 1991.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I remember walking into the Capitol as a newly amended House of Representatives member and just thought it was the greatest thing I'd ever didn't think about I'm not gonna this this is it, I may spend a couple of terms here and um and then of course our friend Kirk Fordyce, uh we had a state auditor that had had some trouble paying his taxes, like forgot to do it.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uh uh had to leave office as state auditor, and Kirk uh called and said, I want you to do that job, and after some reluctance I had to take a$10,000 a year cut and pay to Right out of the gate.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_01: So I had to go explain that to a a young mother that we were about to take a ten thousand dollar a year cut.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: But it's been um eleven years of state auditor, and that's when it began to I began to think, you know, the Republican Party in Mississippi it has to continue the success that Kirk has put in and the leadership that's necessary for a conservative.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_01: People forget that we were dominated by Democrats for a hundred years.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh there were a lot of my old blue dog Democrats.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_01: Let me tell you, they became liberal really quick.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and so I ran for lieutenant governor, I was elected that one term there, and then uh Haley Barber was in his last term, so there was an open run.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_01: So it was there was nobody in the governor's office.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_01: And um gosh, I prayed about it intensely.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um because I was to the uh I was at the age maybe late forties, early fifties, maybe fifties, and realizing if I lose that election, it's gonna be what do you go with a fifty-year-old guy out, you know, trying to find a job.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_01: You rolling some dice.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, big ones.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but the good Lord said, I remember praying one night, and the good Lord said, Look, I I sent you here for this purpose, and I sent you people and that can't have already said they're gonna support you if you run.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_01: And it was kind of like the old joke, the guy on the house in the flood, and he said, you know, I sent you a helicopter and a boat, and you know, trying to save you.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like, Lord, I prayed you saved me and I drowned.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I sent you a boat and a helicopter.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_01: You got the message.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_01: You got the message.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_01: So I got the message and uh was uh elected.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_01: I was looking the other day, I think it was by sixty-one percent of the vote in in that election, and then four years later, sixty-eight percent of the vote.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_02: Which is unheard of.
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_02: It is people We've had such a blessing, good run in Mississippi of governors.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_02: Uh-huh.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_02: And if you're not in that conservative mindset, I'm sorry, you probably ain't listening to this anyway.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_02: But man, it was just like back to back to back.
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_02: And and we're gonna talk about Mississippi, and I don't do it a lot on here, but it's uh it's kind of a sleeper state.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_02: Very, very proud.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_02: I talk about our Department of Wildlife Fisheries Parks everywhere I go because I've been around other ones, and I just hadn't run into a bad one.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_02: There may be one here somewhere, but one of the best in the nation.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_02: You know, old timer builds knives with durability in mind.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_02: They also want it to be a tool that is comfortable enough to work with day after day.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_02: Since the beginning, old timer has made knives for those who don't rely on others to get the job done.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_02: I love that.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_02: Old timer built for generations.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_02: You know, there's nothing I love more than teaching my grandkids how to be better woodsmen.
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_02: The Onex app helps me do that in a way that makes sense to them.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_02: They're all about apps and that phone.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_02: Using Onex to set optimal wind on stands that should or shouldn't be hunted on certain winds makes it easy for them to understand that, hey, a north wind blows from the north, not to the north.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_02: Using that little slope angle layer when teaching them how to read topographical maps with the color-coded shading makes it a lot easier to explain to them what tightly static tofu lines mean.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_02: Bottom line, Onex Hunt makes learning fun for those young ones and still helps me find success in the field.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_02: It's an easy-to-use platform, and even I can do it.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_02: I suggest it for any age outdoorsman.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_00: You're listening to Fistful of Dirt with Cunt Strickland.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_00: Presented by Mossy Oak Properties.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_02: Now, I'm gonna ask you some more specific questions, but I got grandsons that are kind of grown.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_02: My oldest granddaughter's, she graduated from Mississippi State, now she's working on her doctorate, and I got one that's a sophomore, one that's moving in next weekend.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_02: And they all follow politics.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_02: I personally think they're smarter than the the the older generation.
• 32:51
  SPEAKER_02: They're so focused on that stuff.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_02: And a daughter that's been around it.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_02: Oh look, Amy, she she knows more about politics.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_02: Lauren, who produces this podcast, she stays down that rabbit hole.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_02: And I love being informed, and they keep me informed.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_02: And and I want you to be honest and and say what kind of mindset, what kind of character would a person have in this day and time to be a public servant at that level, because it takes it takes quite it takes an iron constitution, in my opinion.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_01: To be a conservative, because the first thing you've got to realize is the um the media in large part is going to be in opposed uh or going to be opposed to a lot of the things that we think are normal.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_01: Come on.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we think it's normal to have a secure border.
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we think it's normal to have men as men and women as women and not have them in the dressing rooms and you know that that that's the type of thing that uh w we we think it's normal to want to protect the unborn and nurture that life and and not destroy it.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_01: And these are things that the uh the the left and much in the media just have uh uh a total uh disbelief that we even think that way.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, it's tough.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_01: And then uh you you've got everything on the internet now, so it's all internet warriors out there.
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_01: But I think the desire to help people and to make a difference uh is so strong that I I I I see some really good people.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_01: I see some people announcing the running for governor.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_01: We've got some great people in in the state that that are willing to pay that price.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_01: I used to tell young people who come in and want to talk about running for office that that that's the price that you pay to serve.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_01: And you're gonna have to go through all of that, negative campaigning, uh uh and and the other outrageous things will be said about you and your family just so you can get in there and work your tail off to make Mississippi a better place to live.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's it.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_02: That's it sounds simple, that's quite a price.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_02: Did you ever in your wildest dreams think you would ever have to have a conversation about which bathroom to use?
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_02: I I can't get past that one.
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_02: I just really can't.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_01: But and and and men playing in girls' sports.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_01: Oh.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, this this this is a big deal with them.
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_01: And then you know, it it's even worse.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_01: Parents who will take their three-year-old and transition that child to another sex.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_02: It's it's it's it's it's just unbelievable.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, New York City.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_01: It was America's city.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_01: I know Governor, I mean Mayor Giuliani well, and um he did such a great job.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_01: 9-11.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_01: Now we've got a Muslim communist mayor.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_01: Self-proclaimed.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean, I'm not saying anything bad about him.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_01: I would.
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_01: If somebody said something like that, you know, about me, I'd fight you over it.
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_01: But he goes like, nope, that's me.
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_01: That's me.
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_02: It's very sad.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_02: But all right, I don't ask you.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_02: I'm I'm trying to stay on this because we we from time to time get a bad rap.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_02: And Lord knows I've been blessed.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_02: God has blessed me so much.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_02: I've been everywhere hunting, fishing, filming all this stuff.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_02: Mississippi's got a phenomenal opportunities from the Northport down to the salt water to all that kind of stuff.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_02: But I'm gonna ask you that in a minute.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_02: But first, and you can only run for two terms, which if that wasn't the law, we would be campaigning right now.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_02: Any uh you had said that second run, you were pretty much unopposed, and you got to do a lot of wildlife stuff.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_02: Did you leave anything on the table that bugged you?
• 36:42
  SPEAKER_02: Any regrets in your administration?
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_01: You know, there were some things that we uh that doesn't sound real sexy, but uh looking at reforming government.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we have we've got hundreds and hundreds, I knew the number at one time, and uh uh of agencies, boards, and commissions that just overlap.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_01: And and uh I was trying to consolidate government, and no one wants to do that.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, the legislature didn't want to do it, those agencies sure didn't want to do it, but th this government is too large, um that it could be run uh much more effectively uh than it is now.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_01: And it's not anybody's fault.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_01: I won't say it's the governor's fault, believe me.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_01: I fought mightily uh to try to get in performance-based budgeting, just to say, well, look, you come in and you show me what you're gonna do with the money that you give me, next year you come back and show me that you did that, and I'll give you some more money.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_01: I.
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_01: So, yeah, uh uh trying to cut red tape, trying to organize and downsize government, trying to put performance-based budget in, we just couldn't get that done, and it still haunts me.
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_01: And I I hear people today, Lieutenant Governor Hosman talks about it, uh performance-based budgeting again comes up.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Philip Gunn, who's a speaker, was big on that.
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I uh neither Philip Gunn nor I nor Tate Reeves could pull that off.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_01: That's how the deep state is real and it exists even in Mississippi.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_02: We're gonna talk about that in a minute because you gave me the best lesson I ever got on how politics actually worked.
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_02: But I want you to talk just a minute.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of hunters and fishermen listen to this thing a lot.
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_02: And I want you to talk about your Mississippi and why I think Louisiana's got the coolest thing ever, the sportsman's paradise.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_02: I think that I think that should be our hands.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_01: That used to aggravate me.
• 38:40
  SPEAKER_02: Tell me about the opportunities here from we got them like nobody else down on the Gulf Coast up to the Delta.
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_02: What what part of the hunting and fishing Mississippi are you really proud?
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_01: I I just love it all.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_01: I love that salt water.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_01: We were out a couple of weeks ago uh trout fishing down uh off uh the Gulf Coast, and it's just so beautiful uh down there.
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that there's there's just nothing um that is wrong about the outdoors.
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_01: There's just uh from from the healthiness, from walking, and you and I know, I mean, even turkey hunting, but when you're turkey hunting in Colorado now, I I wouldn't trade it from Mississippi.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_01: Our turkeys are much better, but I mean you're up and down those mountains.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_01: I I had to tell them, look, I'm 71 years old, and the guys with me went, You're 71?
• 39:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 39:29
  SPEAKER_01: They said, Oh, we'd take it, we would have taken it easy.
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_01: No, no, no.
• 39:32
  SPEAKER_01: I'm okay.
• 39:32
  SPEAKER_01: I'm okay.
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_01: Y'all got thin air out here, but beautiful territory.
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_01: But uh just just that from the out uh from getting out in the great outdoors.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_01: But Mississippi has everything.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, rivers and streams.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_01: Look, little local ponds.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you can go to a little pond like mine.
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_01: I got, you know, three and a half pound bass in there and sit put your grandbabies out there and then just uh uh uh enjoining it.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_01: I had turkeys coming across my backyard till a coyote showed up.
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_01: I had to trap a coon this week.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh he was getting in my garbage.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_02: How many governors out there know how to trap a coon?
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_01: Well, and lucky, you know, my uh I I had to release him, so I drive drive him down toward the home of Cheddar River and and and release him, uh, which is always an interesting thing to do because he wasn't happy.
• 40:23
  SPEAKER_02: I just had some people at my house that were from Norway.
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, it was kind of that soccer thing.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_02: Got to meet him and they just went on and on.
• 40:32
  SPEAKER_02: They'd been to three or four different and they just wanted they're talking about the food and all the WMAs and all that.
• 40:38
  SPEAKER_02: I have entertained thousands of people from Mossy Oak and Primos in there.
• 40:43
  SPEAKER_02: Man, I didn't know that about Mississippi.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_01: How how many times have you prayed in a deer stand?
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_01: A bunch.
• 40:49
  SPEAKER_01: Oh bunch.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_01: I mean you crawl up in there in the dark, you know, and you get set down on a good cold morning, and you just have to go to the Lord and say, just thank you.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_01: This is just the time that I really love too is uh, you know, go in about three o'clock in the afternoon and you're in the deer stand and it's almost dark and it's really cold, and you gotta get out and cross that plowed field, you know, and the trees and the sun's setting.
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_01: Man, that feeling is just the best in the world.
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_01: You're all bundled up, toting your rifle out, maybe you got a deer in the field.
• 41:25
  SPEAKER_02: And and if people hadn't ex i enjoyed that, then they need to I tell you one of the And this is just me personally, one of the coolest things about Mississippi if you like to hunt and fish is our our laws are common sense laws.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_02: Not everybody loves the game order, and I get it.
• 41:42
  SPEAKER_02: That's okay, that's you.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_02: But as far as common sense laws, bag limits, season dates, and all that they talk about it.
• 41:50
  SPEAKER_01: It works as good as y you you could imagine.
• 41:53
  SPEAKER_01: That that 11-year-old you just met, I took him when he was nine, and uh a seven-point came out, and uh the day after that was Thanksgiving afternoon, I believe, uh, down in in Kapia County near my place.
• 42:07
  SPEAKER_01: And about a hundred yards of my 270 Browning, he double lunged at seven-point.
• 42:13
  SPEAKER_05: Put him down.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_01: Man, I'm telling you, of course, he runs off and he's like, Papa, I missed him, I missed him.
• 42:18
  SPEAKER_01: I said, like, oh no, excuse me.
• 42:20
  SPEAKER_01: I saw the old deer squat down when he fired, and I said, He's laying out there.
• 42:24
  SPEAKER_01: And sure enough, he's old dry creek bed there.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_01: He was laying.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_01: But the the just the guttural yell of excitement when he saw that deer.
• 42:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I got him, I got him.
• 42:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I mean you you just can't he'll never forget that.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_02: Never ever.
• 42:41
  SPEAKER_02: Um I you know, I I'm I'm like you, I'm a pretty positive person.
• 42:45
  SPEAKER_02: I get a lot of young people with a round my grandkids and all that.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_02: And I can see him, they have aspirations.
• 42:51
  SPEAKER_02: They really do, and I'm fired up about that.
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_02: Some of them with social media seem to be a little worried about criticism.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_02: I say, look, that's just gonna come.
• 43:01
  SPEAKER_02: That's just gonna happen.
• 43:02
  SPEAKER_02: That's it.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_02: And the higher level you reach of whatever it is, the more it's gonna.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_02: You are always really good at handling that or just ignoring it.
• 43:12
  SPEAKER_02: Give some advice to a youngster, maybe say, you know what, I may join the JCs or I may want to run for Congress.
• 43:18
  SPEAKER_02: How do you handle that criticism?
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_01: Because it's coming.
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_01: You you just have to well, the best thing I learned is uh to read your Bible.
• 43:27
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 43:27
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, there's nobody in there.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_01: Look at Jesus.
• 43:30
  SPEAKER_01: My goodness.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, the Pharisees, the top lawyers and and brilliant minds of the laws, which they had hundreds of at that time, are following Jesus around trying to catch him.
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, he they he's he's beaten, he's crucified, he's spit on.
• 43:48
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, i if if that happened to Jesus, uh then you ought to be able to take a little of it yourself with his help.
• 43:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but you you look at Moses, I mean what Moses finally And says, Lord, just kill me.
• 44:02
  SPEAKER_01: I had enough.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_01: I can't stand these people anymore.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I'm just reading about Joshua and beginning a study in in uh uh uh in Judges.
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_01: We finished last night our study in in church, or began our study on Romans, so poor Paul.
• 44:18
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, he's beaten thirty-nine times rides, he's uh shipwrecked, he's snake bit.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_01: That's all trying to get to Rome so he can go to trial.
• 44:27
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, so I I used to say I got a lot of reason to complain.
• 44:32
  SPEAKER_01: My dad was a 17-year-old young man that left Sullivan's Hollow uh and uh Smith County to go on fight a war in the South Pacific.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, you want to say, Oh, well, this is too tough, they're talking bad about me online.
• 44:47
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the whole Japanese Empire was trying to kill him.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 44:51
  SPEAKER_01: And he was uh uh you know, had never seen a ship in Smith County.
• 44:56
  SPEAKER_01: All of a sudden he's over there island hopping.
• 44:59
  SPEAKER_01: So I I just always try to put it in context of look what other people are going through.
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_01: Deborah and I would go and visit the children's hospital and uh and she of course was in the uh medical industry for thirty-eight years and medical health care and healthcare and she'd walk right into those rooms and go up and she'd know what was going on and I'd have to stop and just catch my breath.
• 45:23
  SPEAKER_01: See that child laying in that bed with those tubes and things in him and so I I always just said, you know, look look at what others are going through and all I've got to put up with is just nonsense.
• 45:36
  SPEAKER_01: But it it's it's tough sometimes.
• 45:38
  SPEAKER_02: It is nonsense.
• 45:40
  SPEAKER_02: It takes a special person to do what your wife and those people do.
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_02: It does.
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_01: I I'm not good at it.
• 45:49
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I emotionally when you get heartbroken.
• 45:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 45:52
  SPEAKER_02: And I don't know if you I don't know, uh God just touches certain people to do that.
• 45:57
  SPEAKER_01: You do.
• 45:57
  SPEAKER_02: Thank goodness.
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_02: My favorite, my favorite part of the I quote this all the time when I'm doing talking, because uh I say my my favorite passage is Hosea 11.2, where he says, The more I called to them, the further they went away.
• 46:11
  SPEAKER_02: And I related to Turgant and I said, See, God, God understands.
• 46:15
  SPEAKER_01: He does.
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_01: I like Isaiah.
• 46:17
  SPEAKER_01: I Isaiah, I believe it's 8.6, where I heard the voice of the Lord calling, uh who shall we find and who shall we send?
• 46:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 46:25
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, Here I am, Lord, send me.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_02: Send me.
• 46:29
  SPEAKER_02: Send me.
• 46:29
  SPEAKER_02: I don't want to go too deep into this, but I went and spoke to the sportsman's caucus.
• 46:34
  SPEAKER_02: You know, they had a fish fry night.
• 46:36
  SPEAKER_02: Sure.
• 46:36
  SPEAKER_02: At that time, Mississippi had the biggest sportsman's caucus.
• 46:40
  SPEAKER_02: And and uh anyway, I don't know, you weren't there.
• 46:43
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know if I even told you this story or not, but it was a big crowd.
• 46:46
  SPEAKER_02: And Amy, my oldest daughter, had put that together.
• 46:49
  SPEAKER_02: She said, Pop, I want you to come speak.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_02: She was doing, she's runs in the political circle.
• 46:53
  SPEAKER_02: I said, Hey, I'm uh whatever you need.
• 46:56
  SPEAKER_02: And we got in there and she's she's looking at me and saying, Now look, this ain't the MWTF, this ain't the turkey crowd.
• 47:01
  SPEAKER_02: I said, Relax, I got it.
• 47:03
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
• 47:04
  SPEAKER_02: And anyway, they I got introduced and I got up there and I wanted to know I was politically motive thinking.
• 47:09
  SPEAKER_02: And I said, you know, I just got through turkey hunting with Governor Bryant and it's that hunt we had up there at uh Dwight Griffin's cabin.
• 47:17
  SPEAKER_02: I said, Man, we had a great hunt.
• 47:19
  SPEAKER_02: And I said, now he didn't get a turkey because they came in too far to the left.
• 47:25
  SPEAKER_02: And buddy, it was crickets.
• 47:28
  SPEAKER_02: Oh and I looked at it, and Amy, she had her hand, she would just put it, and look, I tell that story where else people just howl.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_02: But and uh she got through, she said, I told you this wasn't the NWTF.
• 47:40
  SPEAKER_02: But anyway, I was talking to you about it on another turkey hunt about you know, there's some good laws, we we need to get this passed, and you explained to me how hard and what the process is to take a good idea and get it through the House and the Senate.
• 47:54
  SPEAKER_02: Give give just give me a little overview of how that's that's exactly when I came in in 1991.
• 48:00
  SPEAKER_01: I thought, well, I've you know, everybody's gonna think like I am, everybody's gonna want to support law enforcement, everybody's gonna want to support uh hunting and fishing, and no, they didn't.
• 48:09
  SPEAKER_01: It did not mean a lot to them at all.
• 48:12
  SPEAKER_01: And uh we fought every step of the way uh of gains, and and then we began to realize you just look today and you you mentioned the the left coast out there.
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 48:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um hunters are bad about not getting involved in the political dynamic of their states or their nation.
• 48:29
  SPEAKER_01: They're the worst.
• 48:30
  SPEAKER_01: They're the worst.
• 48:31
  SPEAKER_01: And I never realized that I got involved in the first Trump campaign pretty seriously, and uh Don Jr.
• 48:38
  SPEAKER_01: uh and I got to be friends, and he's a hunter.
• 48:40
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, he's a good shot, he's a big time hunter.
• 48:43
  SPEAKER_01: And uh there was an organization called Hunter Nation, and it's grown.
• 48:48
  SPEAKER_01: But we found out through doing polling that there was only about 32 percent of people who had hunting and fishing license that went and voted.
• 48:56
  SPEAKER_01: Sad.
• 48:57
  SPEAKER_01: It was just shocking.
• 48:59
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we gun rights, I you know, a lifetime member of the NRA, I was president of the Sportsman and Governor Sportsman Caucus.
• 49:06
  SPEAKER_01: I'll tell you a funny story about that one day.
• 49:08
  SPEAKER_01: But uh all of the things that that that hunter and fishermen need uh to government either stay out of or support them on, they they they were losing because politicians were saying they don't vote.
• 49:25
  SPEAKER_01: Hunters don't vote.
• 49:26
  SPEAKER_01: They're in a deer stand in November, they don't care about voting.
• 49:28
  SPEAKER_01: And you talk to them and they go like, ah, it doesn't make a difference anyway.
• 49:32
  SPEAKER_01: You we have got to turn out every hunter and fisherman that we possibly can.
• 49:38
  SPEAKER_02: Hunter Nation's done a great job with that.
• 49:40
  SPEAKER_02: Because they they they they gathered all the data and and you read the data and go, that can't be right.
• 49:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's right.
• 49:46
  SPEAKER_02: I know less than thirty percent in those states is shocking, but it it takes an army.
• 49:52
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah and you're right, most politicians, if they know that group of people don't vote, they don't care about the biggest thing.
• 49:59
  SPEAKER_01: And and the socialist democrat, the liberals organizing on these college campuses, um uh down to to the last little blue-haired girl, and we're out there saying I ain't no need me voting.
• 50:13
  SPEAKER_01: You're gonna lose everything you got if you don't.
• 50:15
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 50:15
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's just the simple truth.
• 50:17
  SPEAKER_02: It it is, and it's like, you know, if it ever comes to a referendum.
• 50:21
  SPEAKER_02: That's why when I was producing TV, I w I would my goal was to entertain the hunters, but my thoughts were if his wife's sitting there or his kids, I don't ever want them to have to turn their head.
• 50:32
  SPEAKER_02: I wanted to think, man, those hunters are good people because one day it may come to a referendum.
• 50:40
  SPEAKER_02: And there's like twenty twenty million people that do it, and ten million that are adamantly opposed.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_02: Well, there's three hundred and fifty million in the middle that don't have an opinion.
• 50:50
  SPEAKER_02: We need their vote too.
• 50:51
  SPEAKER_02: That's right.
• 50:52
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and think how many we're losing.
• 50:54
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I look at the generation of my children, and when I was that age, I everybody knew what hunting.
• 51:01
  SPEAKER_01: Everybody knew what fishing.
• 51:02
  SPEAKER_01: There's probably only half now.
• 51:04
  SPEAKER_01: If that.
• 51:05
  SPEAKER_01: If that.
• 51:05
  SPEAKER_01: And they're playing like pickleball.
• 51:07
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 51:08
  SPEAKER_01: What what what's pickleball?
• 51:09
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know what pickleball is.
• 51:11
  SPEAKER_01: They don't have guns.
• 51:12
  SPEAKER_01: And you look, this is a$1.4 billion, at least$1.4 to$1.6 billion industry, it just in the state of Mississippi.
• 51:21
  SPEAKER_01: But you start taking those away and the Baz Pro Shops, the Mossy Oaks, they start going out of business.
• 51:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and it don't take long.
• 51:30
  SPEAKER_01: It don't take long.
• 51:31
  SPEAKER_01: So we better be vigilant.
• 51:33
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 51:34
  SPEAKER_02: I was gonna ask you, did I don't think people are aware of the the financial impact that hunting and fishing has.
• 51:42
  SPEAKER_02: I think some of them are.
• 51:43
  SPEAKER_02: Look, I I personally think the vast majority of the people in the country are good, conservative, common sense people.
• 51:49
  SPEAKER_01: We'd like to believe that.
• 51:51
  SPEAKER_01: You won't hear from them.
• 51:52
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 51:52
  SPEAKER_02: They're never on the news or anything else.
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_01: But to try to get, as you said earlier, try to get that bill uh uh drafted in the legislature, through the House Represent out of committee, through the House of Representatives, over to the Senate, out of their committee, back to the Senate floor is extremely difficult.
• 52:08
  SPEAKER_01: And if you don't have a group of people that they've got to go back home and talk to.
• 52:13
  SPEAKER_01: I I used to spend a lot of time uh hunting and fishing and listening, uh, and tractor supply, and it wasn't nearly like it is now tractor supply is everywhere, I love 'em.
• 52:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 52:23
  SPEAKER_01: Uh hardware stores, uh uh gun stores.
• 52:27
  SPEAKER_01: You you you could you could hear people then, but if you don't hear from them and I'm up there trying to get a bill passed uh supporting hunting and fishing or helping fund wildlife, and the legislature goes, Well, I never hear from 'em.
• 52:41
  SPEAKER_01: I don't ever hear from those guys.
• 52:42
  SPEAKER_02: And that bill's dead.
• 52:44
  SPEAKER_02: Instead of complaining, get you some signatures together.
• 52:47
  SPEAKER_02: That's it.
• 52:48
  SPEAKER_02: Everybody looks at everybody looks at those.
• 52:50
  SPEAKER_02: Get you a petition and get a thousand dollars.
• 52:55
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 52:56
  SPEAKER_01: Who's your state senator?
• 52:58
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 52:59
  SPEAKER_01: But they were complaining of fussing about them.
• 53:02
  SPEAKER_01: Loudest one out there.
• 53:03
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 53:04
  SPEAKER_02: We uh I'm gonna kind of cut this short because I know you're busy.
• 53:08
  SPEAKER_02: I we've kind of touched on a couple of things, but uh we managed to squeeze in another turkey hunt this past spring, but we it was hard.
• 53:18
  SPEAKER_02: You were busy.
• 53:19
  SPEAKER_01: I was busy.
• 53:20
  SPEAKER_02: You were very busy, and just on a personal note, I want to know what Governor Bryant's been up to because you've been out of office for a while, and you man, you were here and there, DC back.
• 53:30
  SPEAKER_02: What's going on?
• 53:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know, we started this firm we're at here today.
• 53:34
  SPEAKER_01: It's called BSS Global.
• 53:35
  SPEAKER_01: And and when I left the governor's office, I thought, what do I really like to do?
• 53:39
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I loved economic development, growing the state, bringing businesses here.
• 53:43
  SPEAKER_01: You were good at it.
• 53:44
  SPEAKER_01: We had a lot of success and a lot of people helped.
• 53:47
  SPEAKER_01: But so we started a firm here, this sort of a private economic development group.
• 53:52
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we helped a lot of Mississippi companies, but companies uh literally all over the world.
• 53:56
  SPEAKER_01: So we involved in that.
• 53:58
  SPEAKER_01: The president asked me uh to come and serve on the president's FEMA review council.
• 54:03
  SPEAKER_01: Uh he saw what happened in North Carolina and and the Biden administration, to no one's surprise, had uh had turned FEMA, the the premier emergency management organization into a social duck justice uh agency.
• 54:20
  SPEAKER_01: Imagine that.
• 54:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 54:21
  SPEAKER_01: So we were housing illegal immigrants with FEMA money in the Roosevelt Hotel in New York.
• 54:28
  SPEAKER_01: We were burying people, mostly inner city people, that the death certificate said COVID.
• 54:33
  SPEAKER_01: If you said you died of COVID, we would pay for your funeral.
• 54:39
  SPEAKER_01: We the the National Flood Insurance Program was twenty-eight billion dollars in debt.
• 54:45
  SPEAKER_01: Twenty-eight billion dollars in debt.
• 54:46
  SPEAKER_01: With a B.
• 54:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, with a B.
• 54:48
  SPEAKER_01: So the President said we need to get that straight.
• 54:51
  SPEAKER_01: We I spent a year working on that, um uh working uh with uh now Secretary Mark Wayne Mullins, who's a great guy.
• 54:59
  SPEAKER_01: He's one of us now.
• 55:00
  SPEAKER_01: The Secretary's getting that straight.
• 55:02
  SPEAKER_01: So I did that.
• 55:03
  SPEAKER_01: Um I've uh the Secretary then of education said we'd like for you to work with and be a member of the National Assessment Governing Board, which does the National Report card because of the Mississippi Miracle.
• 55:14
  SPEAKER_01: Now known how we educated our third graders to read and how we're leading the nation.
• 55:19
  SPEAKER_01: We went from number thirty to number nine in national education uh uh attainment.
• 55:25
  SPEAKER_01: So I agreed to do that.
• 55:27
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm in and out of Washington much more than I ever wanted to be.
• 55:31
  SPEAKER_01: And so I tell them they're the busiest unpaid jobs I think I've ever had.
• 55:35
  SPEAKER_01: Well, bless your heart.
• 55:37
  SPEAKER_01: You're a servant at heart.
• 55:38
  SPEAKER_01: Well, it lets me serve and um and hopefully make a difference.
• 55:43
  SPEAKER_01: Well continue.
• 55:45
  SPEAKER_02: I appreciate your time.
• 55:46
  SPEAKER_02: You gotta talk about serving.
• 55:48
  SPEAKER_02: You gotta hold me two or three days this coming spring.
• 55:50
  SPEAKER_02: You know, we try to do we try to slip out and do that all the time.
• 55:54
  SPEAKER_01: I have had surgery on both eyes, uh uh cataract surgery on both eyes.
• 55:59
  SPEAKER_01: I knew I couldn't see well, but I didn't know how bad it was.
• 56:03
  SPEAKER_01: And if you think you're trying to see through a scope and you got cataracts, uh I I would tell all the hunters, uh and I noticed it when I started missing things, and you you you need to go to the eye doctor.
• 56:15
  SPEAKER_01: If you can't see it, you can't hit it.
• 56:17
  SPEAKER_01: That's what I have found out.
• 56:19
  SPEAKER_01: The technology now is crazy.
• 56:20
  SPEAKER_01: My wife just had that done.
• 56:22
  SPEAKER_01: It's the best thing ever.
• 56:23
  SPEAKER_01: I've got new lens under my eyes, and like I looked and went like, oh, that tree's got leaves on it.
• 56:30
  SPEAKER_01: Outpatient surgery.
• 56:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, in and out.
• 56:33
  SPEAKER_01: That's it.
• 56:33
  SPEAKER_01: That's crazy.
• 56:34
  SPEAKER_01: So, yeah, they're they're in trouble again.
• 56:37
  SPEAKER_01: Look, we gotta we gotta make it a mission.
• 56:39
  SPEAKER_01: Do it, Governor.
• 56:40
  SPEAKER_02: I I can't thank you enough for your time.
• 56:42
  SPEAKER_02: I know you're busy.
• 56:43
  SPEAKER_02: We uh so proud of uh of your administration in Mississippi and and uh our Department of Wildlife Fisheries Parks, but I've all comes from the top.
• 56:51
  SPEAKER_02: Well, and I I hope we can line somebody up because that governor's race is coming up.
• 56:56
  SPEAKER_02: So it's gonna be important.
• 56:59
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you, cuz God bless you and yours, Governor.
• 57:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, sir.
• 57:01
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for what you do.
• 57:03
  SPEAKER_06: If you enjoy listening to Fistful of Dirt Podcast, then you've probably heard.
• 57:07
  SPEAKER_06: Give us a rating, leave us a review if you like it.
• 57:10
  SPEAKER_06: Well, if you like it, here's what you can do: open your iTunes podcast app available in the app store if you don't already have it on your phone, and type in Fist Full of Dirt.
• 57:20
  SPEAKER_06: Make sure you're following us, scroll down through the episodes until you see ratings and reviews.
• 57:26
  SPEAKER_06: Tap the stars to rate the show and click write a review if you'd like to leave us a comment.
• 57:31
  SPEAKER_06: The good ratings help us out and ensure that more people will be able to discover the podcast.
• 57:36
  SPEAKER_06: Thanks for listening.
• 57:38
  SPEAKER_06: We'll see you in seven days.
• 57:40
  SPEAKER_02: Man, he is well spoken.
• 57:43
  SPEAKER_06: It's it reminds you why it's so important to elect people that have some of the same passions and interests that you do, because they're gonna take care of that stuff.
• 57:52
  SPEAKER_02: My favorite question and answer I asked him was about uh you know, there's all kinds of great wildlife legislation that gets put forth and you look at it and go, Well, that's just good common sense, blah blah blah.
• 58:05
  SPEAKER_02: And I had him explain why and what it's gotta go through to get to be made into law.
• 58:11
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
• 58:12
  SPEAKER_02: It's a process.
• 58:15
  SPEAKER_02: It ain't just, you know, uh conservative wildlife conservation type legislatures.
• 58:21
  SPEAKER_02: There, you know, there's people all over the board.
• 58:23
  SPEAKER_02: And it kind of makes you appreciate what has to happen to make all that work.
• 58:29
  SPEAKER_02: Another reason I'm such a big fan of Hunter Nation, oh yeah, Keith Mark and group.
• 58:35
  SPEAKER_06: Our voice.
• 58:36
  SPEAKER_02: Man, he that he's an amazing guy, number one.
• 58:40
  SPEAKER_02: Number two, he can get into any senator's office.
• 58:45
  SPEAKER_02: He he stays so much in DC, does all this voluntarily, he won't take a dime from them.
• 58:52
  SPEAKER_02: But that's kind of that's kind of where the battles are gonna be fought.
• 58:55
  SPEAKER_06: Now it is, yeah.
• 58:57
  SPEAKER_02: You would think, you know, ten or twenty years ago, fifty years ago, man, hunting and fishing, all that wouldn't would never be a referendum in the voting booth.
• 59:07
  SPEAKER_02: But now I mean you're already starting to see it.
• 59:11
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah, and there there's a rabbit hole you could go down if you wanted to, about how, you know, grants and funds and scholarships and you've got to pay attention to who you're electing and what their lifestyle is.
• 59:24
  SPEAKER_06: Because there are people that don't like what we do.
• 59:27
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 59:28
  SPEAKER_02: You just want to grab 'em by the shoulders and shake them and say, What happened what what happened with you?
• 59:33
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 59:34
  SPEAKER_02: Why why are you um it's it's unbelievable.
• 59:37
  SPEAKER_02: Back to Hunter Nation, you know, the whole thing was formed by g their their sole purpose was to getting hunters to vote.
• 59:46
  SPEAKER_02: And and Keith Mark brought it home to me.
• 59:48
  SPEAKER_02: He said, That's why politicians aren't paying attention to our needs, because we don't vote.
• 59:53
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 59:53
  SPEAKER_02: And and man, if you hadn't joined Hunter's Nation, go to Hunter Nation.org and and just sign up and and they'll keep you posted and abreast of what's going on.
• 1:00:04
  SPEAKER_02: And you gotta do that.
• 1:00:06
  SPEAKER_02: You gotta know who's running, where they stand on the Second Amendment and wildlife and all that kind of stuff.
• 1:00:12
  SPEAKER_02: Because uh, you're talking about banding together, that's where we need to band together.
• 1:00:16
  SPEAKER_02: So go check out Hunter Nation.
• 1:00:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um one thing I did mention, I think I mentioned this on the podcast, is uh we're about to make a presentation.
• 1:00:29
  SPEAKER_02: You know, we we started Seoul Sportsman Organized for law enforcement.
• 1:00:35
  SPEAKER_02: And hadn't had I don't have time to work on it all the time, but we've raised some pretty good money and made and what we do is we donate that money to whoever spirit of blue, cops, concern of police survivors, and all that.
• 1:00:48
  SPEAKER_02: And we're about to make a presentation to our local Houston, Mississippi Police Department.
• 1:00:55
  SPEAKER_06: How cool is that?
• 1:00:56
  SPEAKER_02: That is cool.
• 1:00:57
  SPEAKER_02: I'll make a bunch of posts, probably gonna do a video.
• 1:01:00
  SPEAKER_02: I love it.
• 1:01:01
  SPEAKER_02: And we've done tons of stuff for other places.
• 1:01:03
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of times it's a ballistic vest, uh, tourniquets.
• 1:01:07
  SPEAKER_02: Tourniquets is the number one thing and all that.
• 1:01:10
  SPEAKER_02: But it made me think of the first person that ever made a donation when we got this thing legitimate was Governor Phil Bryant.
• 1:01:19
  SPEAKER_06: I didn't know that.
• 1:01:21
  SPEAKER_02: Personal check in his office at the governor's mansion.
• 1:01:25
  SPEAKER_06: I did not know that.
• 1:01:26
  SPEAKER_02: First person to ever do it.
• 1:01:28
  SPEAKER_02: And it's odd when we started Seoul, you need to go check out SoulAmerica.org.
• 1:01:34
  SPEAKER_02: There's a place to donate.
• 1:01:36
  SPEAKER_02: And I got when we started that, I got inundated from people, and they were all law enforcement people.
• 1:01:42
  SPEAKER_02: Wanting to make a donation.
• 1:01:43
  SPEAKER_02: I can I said, look, we don't want your money.
• 1:01:45
  unknown: Right.
• 1:01:46
  SPEAKER_02: We want everybody else's money.
• 1:01:48
  SPEAKER_02: And uh I love seeing people get their vest or those uh lights they put on their shoulder, beacons and tourniquets and stuff like that.
• 1:01:58
  SPEAKER_02: And it's sometimes it's not about the money as it is as much about the message.
• 1:02:04
  SPEAKER_02: We appreciate you, we're thinking about you and all that kind of stuff.
• 1:02:07
  SPEAKER_06: So I want you to be safe.
• 1:02:09
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, Governor Bryant's one of the good guys, and there's a bunch of them out there.
• 1:02:12
  SPEAKER_02: We're actually pretty lucky right now, governor-wise.
• 1:02:14
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah, we are.
• 1:02:15
  SPEAKER_06: We back-to-back champions, in my my opinion.
• 1:02:18
  SPEAKER_02: Gotta get that Senate straight in the House, and we'll be good to go.
• 1:02:22
  SPEAKER_02: So y'all get out and pick out your people and make sure you pull them levers in the midterms, because that's very important.
• 1:02:30
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 1:02:31
  SPEAKER_02: Back to the hog.
• 1:02:32
  SPEAKER_02: I I I have a plan in place.
• 1:02:35
  SPEAKER_02: So much going on right now.
• 1:02:37
  SPEAKER_02: I know.
• 1:02:38
  SPEAKER_02: Cranky started high school.
• 1:02:40
  SPEAKER_02: I made a post about that, and people are like, What?
• 1:02:43
  SPEAKER_06: It's just wild to even think about it.
• 1:02:47
  SPEAKER_02: Matt starts Cranky started high school last week.
• 1:02:50
  SPEAKER_02: Matt started college, his freshman year this week.
• 1:02:55
  SPEAKER_02: Walker starting his sophomore year.
• 1:02:58
  SPEAKER_02: Uh-huh.
• 1:02:59
  SPEAKER_06: And Sissy Avery, she's in her doctorate program going into I think her second year of her continued education.
• 1:03:06
  SPEAKER_02: Blink of an eye.
• 1:03:07
  SPEAKER_06: I mean, the baby just started high school.
• 1:03:10
  SPEAKER_06: That is I don't want to talk about that.
• 1:03:11
  SPEAKER_02: Your baby's almost six foot two oh five, though.
• 1:03:14
  SPEAKER_06: He's I don't want to talk about that either.
• 1:03:17
  SPEAKER_02: The only thing that depressed me, because I and I made a post and put a picture of him up and said, Hey, grateful to be here to see it.
• 1:03:23
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
• 1:03:24
  SPEAKER_02: But when his voice changed, it was like Oh, I know.
• 1:03:28
  SPEAKER_02: That's it.
• 1:03:28
  SPEAKER_06: This the baby's not the baby anymore.
• 1:03:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, his voice got deep and I was like, Dang.
• 1:03:34
  SPEAKER_06: He's a big guy.
• 1:03:34
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, big guy.
• 1:03:35
  SPEAKER_06: He's gonna be bigger than his big brother, I think.
• 1:03:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, who knows?
• 1:03:39
  SPEAKER_02: He's still growing.
• 1:03:40
  SPEAKER_02: He eats like a dang truck driver lumberjack.
• 1:03:43
  SPEAKER_02: But anyway, hope you enjoyed the visit with Governor Bryant much as I did.
• 1:03:48
  SPEAKER_02: I I love staying current.
• 1:03:50
  SPEAKER_02: We all need to do that.
• 1:03:51
  SPEAKER_02: So let's do that.
• 1:03:52
  SPEAKER_02: So from me and Laurreen up in the Camo Cave from Mossy Oak and Mossy Oak Properties, God bless every one of you people.
• 1:04:00
  SPEAKER_06: We'll see you in seven days.
• 1:04:07
  SPEAKER_00: Find your favorite place.
• 1:04:10
  SPEAKER_00: Visit Mossyoak Properties.com.