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The Political Trailblazer You Need to Know · None of Your Business Podcast

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  There are bureaucrats in Albany who decided how you are going to
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  educate your children. They know better than you, and
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  I'm telling them that no, you know better than them.
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  None of your business, Oshi. None of your business, Michael.
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  It's the None of Your Business podcast hosted by Michael
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  Anoshi. Welcome back everybody to
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  another amazing episode of the None of Your Business Podcast.
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  Today we are joined by my friend, my politician, my
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  neighbor, Reb Bencian Aaron Weeder.
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  It is an honor to have you here with us.
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  But she this is the first time you've ever met Mr. Weeder.
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  His name thousands of times I've seen pictures of.
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  Him, but you didn't go out to vote.
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  Many, many years. But I've never actually met down
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  personally. I've never actually spoken to
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  him, so I'm very excited. Did did you vote in the last
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  election? I, I typically vote for the
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  local village politics for that, those types of things.
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  But listen, you know, I'm here to get sold.
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  I'm here. To see if I'm going to.
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  Expand my my voting with the assembly.
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  Are you a rabbi? Well I I went to Kailu but
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  unfortunately anyone that gets indicted they all of a sudden
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  become a rabbi. It's true.
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  All the non Jews, they think that you know, everybody's a
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  rabbi, all Jews. Especially the post when they
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  talk about a Jew, it's a rabbi. This.
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  Like I'd like to clarify to all of our listeners that are not
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  familiar with this, that to become a rabbi, you need to know
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  how to keep kosher very, very well.
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  The difference between meat and milk and mixing it together and
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  the laws that are attributed to those thousands of laws, so many
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  different laws. It doesn't make you a certain
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  type of person, a personality, or it doesn't make you a leader
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  of a congregation. It's a yeah, it's a degree in.
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  Understanding and even after you have a degree, you still have to
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  do what they call a shimmers. In other words, you have to be
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  sort of an intern for another rabbi for a nice amount of time
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  to know how to actual put all of that knowledge into practice,
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  right. So it's, it's, it's an extensive
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  process. Speaking of, I'm I'm curious,
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  what kind of degrees do you need to be a politician?
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  Well, some would say how to promise and not keep those
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  promises, unfortunately. But it's like any other
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  profession. You really have to love what
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  you're doing. And it's very, very, very tough.
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  All those, you know, blink stuff you see on TV as being a
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  politician, that's only about 10 or 20% of the job.
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  There's much more to it and it's very grueling and grinding to be
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  a politician. Everybody thinks they can be a
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  politician. Everybody thinks they have it in
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  them well. At home, I'm a politician.
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  I mean, with my friends, I'm a politician, right?
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  You haven't you? Have in business, I'm a
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  politician in. Friends you have.
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  Powers. It's always right, of course.
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  Real. Politics is is very challenging.
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  You know, in order to even be a candidate, you know how how many
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  doors he got to knock. You know, in order to become a
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  candidate in New York State, you need to get, for example, to to
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  becoming an assembly candidate, you need to have 500 signatures
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  of people that sign that they would like to see you on the
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  ballot. And that's knocking on maybe
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  1000 doors or even more than 1000 doors to get those 500
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  signatures. And you better get like 7 to 800
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  signatures because if some of the signatures are not valid,
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  you get all the ballot. So.
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  Oh, that I actually did this. How many but waited?
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  How many signatures did you get to be a politician at home?
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  Zero. There you go.
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  We, by the way, we have very little say at home.
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  Forget about getting signatures. You know that I did this once.
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  You remember somebody ran for. Office, Yeah.
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  Remember, somebody gets the omen.
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  Oh yeah, of course. He ran for the, I think the
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  mayor of Spring Valley is right, yes.
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  So he hired me. I was like, I don't know, 17
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  years old at the time he hired me.
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  To Oh, you shouldn't say that. I shouldn't say that because.
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  I think you got to be 18, so I must.
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  Have been 18. I know I was around 1718, so I
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  was probably 18. And he gave me a clipboard and
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  he gave me all the addresses and I walked from door to door and
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  knocked on people's doors. And the first question everybody
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  asks me is like, why should we vote for this guy?
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  And I didn't know a whole lot about him.
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  I didn't know much about politics either.
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  But I had my pitch, you know, he prepared me.
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  I had my little, my talking points.
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  And I, I pretty much, you know, use my sales abilities at that
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  point already. And I got him over 100
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  signatures. Wow.
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  Personally, so, and I, I understand what you're saying.
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  It's grueling, you know, And some people are not very nice.
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  They're pretty nasty to you as well.
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  And some people keep you, and they talk and they talk.
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  And you're like, I got to go. I got other people.
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  Yeah, I got other fish in the sea here I got to catch.
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  So it's an arduous process. It's not so simple.
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  That's the first Test. Many, many people who want to
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  get into politics, they don't get into politics by not passing
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  the 1st test to get on the ballot, right?
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  And even once you get on the ballot, you can get off the
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  ballot by people challenging the petition.
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  You got to know that whole process.
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  And every few years you sometimes have to start again if
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  you want to change your but like you're doing now, why don't you
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  tell our listeners what's happening in your world right
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  now? Can you summarize it for us?
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  Well, I'm a Rockham County legislator now for over 12
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  years. I've been elected for four
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  times. Last year was the fourth term
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  that I got elected for, and I'm currently running for the New
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  York State Assembly. I ready passed the first hurdle,
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  which is to get on the ballot on the Democratic line and I won a
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  primary. So I'm the Democratic candidate
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  for the 97th Assembly District and I'm looking forward for
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  people to vote for me on the campaign trail and coming.
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  Let's see if he's getting our vote or not.
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  But before we talk about your, you know, your politics and your
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  views. What does an Assemblyman do?
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  Can you share a little bit about what the role is?
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  Well, it's, it's like the Congress for New York State.
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  So the New York State has you have 3 branches of government,
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  which is the executive branch, that's the governor.
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  Then they have the legislative branch, which is the New York
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  State Assembly in New York State Senate.
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  And then you obviously have the court system.
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  Now the Assembly branch is where we make laws, we pass the
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  budgets, and that's essentially what an assembly person does.
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  And how many of you are there on the state Senate?
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  None. Like how do you mean like me?
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  Yeah, no one. I'm going to be the first one
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  like me that is going to be. This role of assemblyman is a
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  new role. No, no, no.
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  He's, he's, he's answering you like a good politician.
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  I love it. We're going to have fun here
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  today. By the way, I just want to say I
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  asked how many you want. Like exactly, exactly, exactly.
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  But but 150? There's many, there's many 100.
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  And 50 yes. Yeah, wow.
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  Yeah, But you know a. 150. I do have to tell you I've been.
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  In the ghost per district, the entire state is divided by 100
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  and I run for the 97th assembly district.
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  Got it, I. Want, I want to tell you, I've
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  been following you for quite some time and I'm fascinated by.
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  So we've been friends. Yes, yes, yes we have.
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  We have been friends and we are we're following each other.
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  I know that you were the the chair for the budget of Finance
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  Committee. You there's a lot about you, a
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  lot of layers that I don't think that people realize when just
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  talking to you for just a minute and all the different nuances of
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  work that you've done on behalf of the community.
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  And I'd like to talk about that for a minute, specifically about
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  the school board. When I moved into Rockland
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  County, I, I didn't even know what I was in for.
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  I went to one school board meeting just because I was like
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  everybody else. Why am I paying so much in taxes
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  and I'm not able to take advantage of any schooling
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  system? And I learned a lot about your
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  private taxes. Did you know this?
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  Was she your private taxes that you're paying on your house goes
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  for special Ed, It goes to pay for books.
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  And the most important thing for us at least, is it pays for
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  busing. And it was, you know, it was
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  questioned back then. I remember when we went to the
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  school board meetings. I don't know why should we pay
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  for private schools busing? And I, I was just shocked.
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  I was like, what do you mean? I'm paying taxes every year
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  where a majority of the taxes are going to public school,
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  which I'm not taking advantage of and I elect to go to private
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  school. I get that it's our choice.
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  It is our choice. Advantage of the public, sure,
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  sure. But we're we're at least allowed
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  some rights, right? Give us the damn busting
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  something Give. Give us something.
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  Give us books. Here that we're getting a little
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  busting in the private. Right.
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  So can you explain that? Because I remember being there
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  and you fought and you really, really fought.
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  You forget about knocking on doors.
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  You're, you're a master negotiator, You're a master
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  networker, you're a master salesman, you're a master
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  politician. I've seen this first hand, but
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  the school taxes drives me crazy.
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  You know what people tell me? I do a lot of career guidance
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  for people in the community and they tell me, oh, what should I
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  do? Where should I live?
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  I always tell them, if you can't afford it and you know now that
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  you're planning on having a lot of kids, maybe this little town
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  here is not for you. I mean, you can't afford $30,000
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  in taxes. Maybe you should think of going
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  to a town like in Florida or in Ohio where they have vouchers
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  and you could pay for, you can get your school bills paid for,
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  right? Maybe you can shed light on that
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  that whole topic in general. Well, the government has to
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  function and there is an important role for public
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  education. There's no question about it.
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  You know, you invest in education, you invest in the
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  future of any country and that's you don't even need data for
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  that. But how do you pay for that?
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  Someone has got to pay. So they came up with this grant
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  system that it's going to be paid by property taxes.
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  OK. So people have to pay their fair
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  share for of taxes. OK.
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  There's, you know, no one is disputing that.
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  But for whatever reason in East Ramapo.
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  And that's something I hope to address in, in in Albany East
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  Ramapo is considered to be one of the wealthiest school
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  district in the entire state of New York.
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  And what happens when you're a wealthy district?
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  The state gives you much less funding to help support the
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  school district. If the state gives less funding
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  for the school district, who ends up paying?
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  We do. The local, the Now, the reason
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  why we're considered to be one of the wealthy school district,
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  we're surprised is because they have this formula.
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  They take the entire school district's property value.
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  They divided per public school student.
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  That number is called the wealth of ratio.
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  Now in East Ramapo, there's about 8 to 9000 public school
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  students and there is about now 25 to 30, maybe even more than
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  30,000 private school students. So they don't take all these
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  private school students into the equation, only the public
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  schools. However, the property value of
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  all these private school students where they live goes
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  into the equation. Therefore, we're one of the
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  wealthiest school district and the state does not give us the
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  proper, proper support and funding.
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  If we would have changed the formula to truly reflect the
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  wealth of the East Ramapo School District, we would have gotten
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  millions of dollars more and we would have been considered to be
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  one of the middle, middle tax locations in the state.
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  And that has been going on for years.
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  We have been short changing. When I say we, I say the kids,
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  the students of the public school and the private schools.
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  And that's a shame. People in Albany, the
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  politicians in Albany, were taking cover by divide and
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  conquer, dividing the public school population and and vis a
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  vis the private school population to fight so they
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  don't have to come up with a solution.
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  And that's what's happening is. How much of our taxes is going
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  to what exactly do you know the the.
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  Majority well, you know, the sales tax, mortgage tax and all
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  sorts of taxes, you know but. I'm talking about a half
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  $1,000,000 house, right? Half a million to $1,000,000
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  house and it's 20 to $30,000 in taxes.
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  That's the reality of Rockland County.
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  And my question to is what? What is going to where Is it so?
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  So the property taxes on the property ends up paying either 3
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  municipalities or four. If you're in a village, you end
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  up paying village taxes, town taxes, county taxes, and school
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  taxes. OK, so if you're not in a
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  village, you only pay for the town, county and school taxes.
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  The lion's share of your property taxes, depending where
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  you live is, is the school tax. Another way, it could be
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  anywhere between 50 to 60 to even 70% of your school of your
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  property tax that could go to the school, again, depending
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  where you live. That's the lion's share, the
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  smallest amount of your property taxes for the county.
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  And believe it or not, I've been on the county legislation now
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  for a couple of years. I'm I'm chairing the budget in
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  the Finance Committee, which is responsible to putting together
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  the budget which affects your property taxes.
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  Last year we had a property tax decrease.
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  I think it is, it was an historic accomplishment.
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  It hasn't been happening. For you, but percentage wise,
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  we're not talking about a lot of money meaning.
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  Because it's the smallest, it's a smaller amount smallest
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  portion of the property. It's an accomplishment.
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  I like that word decrease. When's the last time anything a
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  property went down? It doesn't make me feel good.
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  I'm sorry too much being honest. I appreciate it, thank you.
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  Please work on our school vouchers and let A leave the
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  garbage and etcetera. A little win, Sure.
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  That's. OK, sure, we could celebrate the
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  wins. You have 24 hours to celebrate
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  your wins, remember? Four hours.
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  That's it. We we going to chew gum and walk
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  at the same time? Exactly you could do.
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  Both as long as we're walking on sidewalks and we're getting our
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  garbage picked up, you know, from the front at which I like,
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  you know, I learned something in Rockland County, which I think I
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  believe is in every town or county.
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  And maybe you can clarify this. It's a little secret word that
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  people don't talk about unless you're in the real estate
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  industry. And that's called
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  unincorporated, right? So it's like you have properties
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  and I'd love to know the history of this.
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  So like you know you had. What does that even mean?
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  What? Do you have you have a
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  development? You have a community.
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  Yeah, it was. Unincorporated.
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  Sure, and he could sell his house.
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  My neighbor. It's the weirdest thing.
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  And then the person after him is no longer an unaccorded They're
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  part of Pomoda. I'm part of Pomoda.
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  They're part of Pomoda. And in the and.
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  In the middle. There's like 4-5 houses, somehow
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  they're unincorporated. What does that even?
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  Mean we'll get to that in a second.
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  I hope you can shed light on this.
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  But what I learned is that, for example, you need 35,000 square
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  feet of a property in order to have a house, right?
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  With a pool, let's say, right, that's what you need to have a
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  property. So if you have 70,000 square
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  feet on a property, you can subdivide it into two
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  properties, right? You can you then sell one off or
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  you can make a house for your kid or whatever you're into,
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  right? So however, in unincorporated
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  Ramapo, if your property is the same size, you can do a lot
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  more. In fact, right near where we
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  live, a school is going up on a property that was meant to be a
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  house. Yep, that's unincorporated
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  Rampo, right, Right. That's what I'm talking.
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  About you understand this process and you shed light to
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  this. Unincorporated simply mean that
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  you're not in the village. Rockland County is comprised of
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  five towns, Orange Town, Ramapo, Clarkstown, Havastraw and Stony
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  Point. OK, So the town has jurisdiction
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  for the entire town and that includes zoning.
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  That's the important part. Now there's a there's a process
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  where a neighborhood, they get together, they want to become a
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  village. Now all of a sudden they become
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  incorporated as a village Pomona.
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  I'm sorry, what's the advantages of becoming a village 'cause now
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  you're about to say why some are not to be part of the village?
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  Well, it it goes the other way around.
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  In other words, there was a town and then you you can decide to
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  become a village or dissolve a village.
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  There was a village that got dissolved in in I believe in
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  Clarkstown recently. And what are they dissolving?
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  What kind of services do they not have any more?
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  So you have the same service. In other words, you have the
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  same services. You have to provide the same,
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  which is, you know, policing garbage pickup and but if you
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  have your own village now you can make your own zoning.
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  So it's all about the. Zoning.
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  It's mostly about the zoning. But then you have other little
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  services that you provide, such as garbage pickup, such as snow
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  plowing and all the little things that a municipality would
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  give. Now, if you become incorporated,
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  become a village, now all of a sudden they take the
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  responsibility for it and there's certain amounts, certain
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  portions of your town taxes that you don't pay anymore because
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  those, those are the services. So mostly the properties and the
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  houses in a village are a little bit more expensive than the
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  unincorporated. The ones that are only in the
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  town of Rampa now, I believe there's maybe over 20 villages
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  in the entire county and about eleven of those 10 / 10 isn't
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  the town of Ramapo. The reason being is because
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  those villages were created to keep certain population out of
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  the village vis a vis the zoning.
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  So if you look at all these villages, they were creating in
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  the 1970s, the 1980s, some of them in the 1990s, so they can
• 17:57
  create their own zoning law. Because they don't want
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  multifamily. It's the opposite.
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  They do want multifamily. No, no, no, they didn't like.
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  Kaiser Village, well, Kaiser Village was strictly because
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  they wanted to control how they can grow and they.
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  Wanted a building Kaiser and new square was the opposite
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  reactions, but if you look at other villages amand amand the
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  whole the whole they had a lawsuit.
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  I can believe it was a federal lawsuit because they created all
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  sorts of zonings to not be able to build a shoe.
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  Robbie Friedman was my previous rub.
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  He's the one that fought for that and won.
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  So if you can't build a shul, now all of a sudden a certain
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  segment of a population is not going to be able to move in
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  because on Shabbos you can't drive to the shul, right?
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  So you're not going to walk an hour, 2 hours to a location
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  where there is a shul outside the village.
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  So all these villages were created at a time where they can
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  control the zoning, and in that way it was done the way it was
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  done there. Therefore, Rampart has the most
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  villages. But I would say in the last
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  couple of years, things have changed in Rockland County.
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  We've learned how to live together, how to work together,
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  how to grow together, and it's just a great place where to be.
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  I'm just curious, do you find it challenging for you personally?
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  You walk around looking so beautiful, you know,
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  representing, you know, the Jewish people and, and the
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  casita community as well. Is it a challenge for you in
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  Rockland County? Before he answers that, I think
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  we should almost extenuate this question.
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  I want you. You seem very well spoken.
• 19:35
  You're very eloquent. And thank you.
• 19:37
  You really are. And obviously, I imagine English
• 19:40
  wasn't your first language. I imagine I could be wrong, but
• 19:42
  I don't think so. But more importantly, I can also
• 19:45
  tell that what we're talking about here is very basic local
• 19:48
  politics knowledge that, you know, maybe the casual person
• 19:50
  like us knows a little bit about.
• 19:51
  We obviously don't have too much knowledge in the space.
• 19:54
  I can tell you have a lot of knowledge.
• 19:56
  We're just touching on the surface of what you know.
• 19:57
  So this didn't happen on its own.
• 19:59
  This was something that you acquired over the years.
• 20:01
  And you seem like you come from AC.
• 20:04
  That's your background. So I'm curious how this all
• 20:06
  started for you. Like where did you even get
• 20:07
  started? I'll allow it to happen.
• 20:09
  Let's take a step back. What he's saying.
• 20:10
  Yeah, we do that. Yes, absolutely.
• 20:12
  Who are you? How did you get to where you
• 20:14
  are? You knocking on doors?
• 20:15
  Yeah, I've seen Luke's face plaster all over the place.
• 20:18
  I I knew who you were. Ready.
• 20:20
  Years and years ago, I heard of your name.
• 20:22
  And most of us there, we all know your name.
• 20:24
  You made a name for yourself. Talk.
• 20:25
  About, I mean, talk about grassroots efforts.
• 20:27
  I want to hear how you did it. Yeah, great.
• 20:29
  Started and you know. So I got started into politics
• 20:35
  by mistake. In other words, I didn't really
• 20:38
  follow politics. Maybe a little bit of national
• 20:42
  politics, but that's about it. I got drafted.
• 20:44
  I got drafted by a great person, the late Rabbi Yakov Horowitz.
• 20:51
  I don't know if if you heard that name.
• 20:52
  He's no longer alive. He ran an organization which his
• 20:57
  son, Rabbi Hersharowitz, is now in charge and they do great work
• 21:02
  for the entire community, for schools and so on and so forth.
• 21:05
  So he he, he started having issues with the school district,
• 21:10
  with the schools, the private schools and all sorts of
• 21:13
  services and the friction and the tension between the
• 21:16
  communities. And he kind of decided that I
• 21:19
  would be the right person to to be on the school.
• 21:22
  Board, what were you doing then? I was in construction, that's
• 21:25
  that, you know, I was in development in in the city.
• 21:29
  I had a little mail order business on the side.
• 21:32
  I had no clue. But the one thing that I that I
• 21:35
  loved was to have the thrill of an experience, whatever the
• 21:40
  experience might be, whatever it is I like.
• 21:44
  You can travel to Zimbabwe. You don't have to become the
• 21:47
  assemblyman in the 97th District.
• 21:49
  I'm. Saying this is only he has much
• 21:52
  bigger aspiration. Yeah.
• 21:53
  I mean stopping, we're going to get to that.
• 21:55
  We have, we have a, we have the lightning round that we want to
• 21:57
  get to or. You could travel to Auschwitz or
• 21:59
  Mothausen or Buchenwald, which actually happened of.
• 22:03
  Course has an obligation to do so at one point.
• 22:06
  Which I did. I probably travelled over, I
• 22:09
  don't know, 20-30, maybe more, 40 concentration camps.
• 22:13
  Wow. Well, I didn't realize there was
• 22:15
  that many 40. Oh, there were.
• 22:17
  Hundreds. There were many.
• 22:18
  Many, many. Yeah, hundreds.
• 22:20
  Maybe you need to go more. Even even even Auschwitz, people
• 22:24
  talk about Auschwitz. Auschwitz was comprised of three
• 22:27
  big right concentration camps with that Auschwitz, Perry Canal
• 22:31
  and, and and Buna. And they had, I don't know if it
• 22:35
  was in the 10s or maybe even more than that, little
• 22:38
  satellite, satellite concentration camps, because
• 22:42
  they had all sorts of companies and, and, and factories all over
• 22:46
  the place. And as opposed to having the
• 22:48
  Jews walk every day to the location, they created a little
• 22:53
  concentration camp next to the factory.
• 22:55
  So yeah, but the, but the the many concentration camps there
• 22:58
  which I traveled and that's kind of a hobby that I have, but.
• 23:03
  Well, experiences I I got. The phone call ironically, now
• 23:07
  that I think of I got that phone call from from him.
• 23:11
  I still remember must have been maybe 17 years ago, I was in the
• 23:18
  long term parking lot of the Kennedy airport traveling to a
• 23:25
  concentration to a trip. One of my trips no way solo
• 23:28
  traveling like one of the concentration camps.
• 23:29
  Look at that. So that's like subconscious
• 23:31
  it's. Funny, you remember exactly
• 23:33
  where you were. I remember where I was, I
• 23:35
  already that. Was a pivotal moment.
• 23:36
  For you, I already parked my car, getting my luggages going
• 23:41
  all the way up to the elevator to take the rail to the to the
• 23:45
  to the airport. So I get this phone call.
• 23:47
  I didn't even pay attention. He has said, do you want to be
• 23:50
  on the school board? It's a it's a great experience.
• 23:52
  You could do a lot of good stuff.
• 23:53
  And I said, hey, hey, why not? And that was the end of it.
• 23:56
  I came back up. That was the beginning of it,
• 23:58
  yeah, the end of that. Beginning of something
• 24:00
  tremendously new. Conversation and then I come
• 24:02
  back and then all of a sudden I I see I thought that you you
• 24:06
  just get on the board that I mean I don't know how that
• 24:08
  happens then all of a sudden I see people collecting signatures
• 24:12
  with my name and I call them I say what what is this all about
• 24:15
  I says yeah, you to be on the board you got to get Pelino
• 24:17
  you're going to be an election I said there's going to be an
• 24:19
  election I what what do you mean and and I I lost that election
• 24:28
  really I ran and the 1st. Thing that you ran for.
• 24:30
  I lost. You lost, and I could tell you
• 24:33
  now if you don't get on the ballot, that's the first Test.
• 24:38
  But like the real true test, like you know.
• 24:42
  Is winning a fire crisis? Yeah, is to run and lose.
• 24:47
  If you can lose your first election, you run the and and
• 24:52
  you could, and you run again the.
• 24:54
  I know many people who ran once, lost, never ran again.
• 24:59
  I said the same thing. The experience of running
• 25:03
  through office, having little kids at home late at night.
• 25:09
  The results are coming in and you got to come home and they're
• 25:12
  still out. They want to hear did you win or
• 25:14
  lose? And you say you lost.
• 25:17
  And the look at that in their eyes, it was like.
• 25:20
  Devastated. I'm not doing this again.
• 25:23
  What did you tell your ever? What did you tell your family?
• 25:25
  When that I lost, that's it. I lost.
• 25:28
  Move on, let's get it back to construction.
• 25:30
  And and and and and and this and, you know, the, the most
• 25:33
  difficult part was I lost by like 20 votes.
• 25:36
  I mean, it was like it was, you know, I had, we done just
• 25:39
  scandal. And the first time I ran for
• 25:41
  office, I had no clue what I was doing.
• 25:44
  We had no clue what we do. All sorts of things, the stuff
• 25:47
  that you think you got to do to win an election.
• 25:49
  And, and there are so many things.
• 25:51
  You saw my sign plastered all over the place.
• 25:54
  Guess what? Signs don't vote, so that's a a
• 25:57
  little element of the election. There's so much into an election
• 26:01
  that and you. Spend a lot of money.
• 26:02
  Right. Tons of money.
• 26:04
  You're talking about running for office.
• 26:06
  You got to become a Schnurr. You know what a Schnurr means.
• 26:09
  A beggar. A beggar to run for election,
• 26:12
  You got to beg people for money? Wow, you got to fundraise.
• 26:15
  And for votes? Oh that's a whole different
• 26:17
  thing. But you'll get a vote.
• 26:20
  A politician's the ultimate Schnurr, it sounds.
• 26:22
  Like, oh big time. Wow.
• 26:24
  But they don't do it themselves. They have their campaign
• 26:26
  managers. No, no, no, not in the
• 26:28
  beginning. The beginning You're all by
• 26:29
  yourself. But you have to go to events,
• 26:31
  you know, you have to be the one on stage and talking to people.
• 26:34
  Even even if you're not in the beginning, if you don't, if you
• 26:39
  can't be a schnorrer, even if you're the president of the
• 26:42
  United States, you still have to beg for money yourself.
• 26:47
  Campaign manager. Fundraisers.
• 26:49
  Those are stuff yeah, I have people who are helping me get,
• 26:52
  you know, fundraise, but I got to talk to them.
• 26:54
  I got to schmooze with them. I got, you know, you got to do
• 26:56
  all those stuff to get elected. Let's.
• 26:58
  Get right into the Lightning Round.
• 26:59
  We have something called Lightning Round where people
• 27:01
  have given us suggestions of doing it in the beginning of the
• 27:05
  show so that you know. There's a very nice weather
• 27:07
  outside. The lightning round.
• 27:10
  The lightning round that we like to call you.
• 27:12
  Do you have another name that you'd like to suggest for it?
• 27:14
  OK, the fire round. Now that no go back to.
• 27:18
  Go back to lightning. OK, so the lighting ground is
• 27:21
  brought to you by prime source expense experts.
• 27:23
  Let's not forget there are wonderful sponsors that helps
• 27:26
  make all this happen. And we thank everyone, all the
• 27:28
  partners and all the people that are behind us and we love what
• 27:32
  we're doing and let's get right into it.
• 27:34
  So we're going to ask you a series of questions and the rule
• 27:37
  is as follows. It's very simple.
• 27:38
  You get one opt out where you could say none of your business,
• 27:42
  but the rest you must answer. OK.
• 27:45
  Or we throw you out of here. He's ready.
• 27:48
  OK. He's almost seems too bigger but
• 27:49
  all. Right, we're going to start with
• 27:51
  this. How many times have you gotten
• 27:55
  away with something because you flashed a badge or a business
• 27:58
  card? How many times?
• 27:59
  Approximately More than once. It was more than once.
• 28:04
  And you know, I'm not going to say that's one of the perks and
• 28:09
  I'm not going to say I got away with something you would think
• 28:12
  you got away with. I would rather say that I got a
• 28:15
  break. You got a break.
• 28:16
  I like that. I like that diplomatic.
• 28:18
  That's good. And and we're learning how to.
• 28:20
  Yeah, politician. I was about to say that.
• 28:21
  Yeah. The way to articulate and make
• 28:24
  it sound better. Yes, yes, I got a break.
• 28:27
  Why he's looking. I got away with it.
• 28:28
  I love it. I love it.
• 28:29
  That's great. I love it.
• 28:31
  That's awesome. Your aspirations for the highest
• 28:33
  office would be president or anything under that?
• 28:37
  I would. Say I'm not running for office
• 28:40
  as I'm running for the New York State Assembly.
• 28:42
  If you run for a position and you think for the higher
• 28:47
  position, you probably can lose the one you're running for.
• 28:51
  Absolutely. One step at a time.
• 28:52
  Another amazing political answer.
• 28:54
  I like your answers. But there is an answer to it and
• 28:57
  I think I would like to see in my life, doesn't have to be me,
• 29:03
  but I would like to see in my lifetime a Hasidic person or
• 29:09
  even even David. I even said David, I would like
• 29:12
  to see David in the Congress. The religious person.
• 29:14
  It would be nice. I, I think there were religious
• 29:17
  people in Congress. But I'm talking about from the
• 29:19
  schmaltz, right? You know from the inner circle
• 29:21
  type of people that understand our pain and challenges.
• 29:24
  To be some of them are real from the communities.
• 29:26
  To be in the US Congress, yeah, in my lifetime, and I think it's
• 29:32
  going to happen. I'm just curious on that, which
• 29:33
  is our next question is not politics.
• 29:36
  Start over again. What are you doing?
• 29:38
  If I can do copy paste of my life, which means you're going
• 29:45
  to get exactly what you had up until this point, nothing better
• 29:49
  but nothing less. I will do it in a heartbeat.
• 29:52
  Well, so the answer is probably going to do the very same thing
• 29:56
  I did till now. And I and I, if I, if I can ask
• 29:59
  one thing from Hashem, is give me exactly the same thing I had
• 30:05
  till now, with all the issues, all the troubles, all the
• 30:08
  problems. This is a but, but nothing less.
• 30:12
  Nothing less. I should have the same Michael
• 30:15
  in my. Life, rinse and repeat.
• 30:19
  Who's the? Not even rinse could be repeat
• 30:22
  OK. Who's the most crooked
• 30:23
  politician you know? Well, I know quite a few
• 30:28
  politicians that got indicted and convicted.
• 30:31
  Some of them went to prison. People will say that's the most
• 30:35
  cricket politician you know. Yeah, wouldn't you say so?
• 30:40
  Name. Yeah, yeah, no.
• 30:41
  No, let's not say anything. I guess so.
• 30:43
  Are you a reading? Running for office, you know.
• 30:45
  Are you a reader? Oh, tons.
• 30:47
  What's your favorite book? Actually my favorite book.
• 30:51
  My favorite book would be it's biographies, you know, no, no
• 30:59
  novels, biographies. This the author slipped, but
• 31:04
  this an American author that they've written so many books.
• 31:08
  One of them 1776. I got to remember his name.
• 31:13
  I used to have, I used to have his book in my car and at every
• 31:16
  red light I used to read really, really.
• 31:19
  You got the name of the book. He had many books that he's
• 31:23
  written I'll. Make a note of it we'll.
• 31:25
  Yeah. Google 1776.
• 31:28
  The author of 1776. OK, the author of 1776 is David.
• 31:35
  McCallum. McCallum.
• 31:36
  McCallum. That's it.
• 31:37
  Yeah. He's he's he's one of my
• 31:39
  favorite authors. OK.
• 31:40
  David McComb. I'm talking about, you know, I,
• 31:42
  I I almost wanted him. I I wanted to meet with him and
• 31:46
  I just didn't get the time. You know what, that's exactly my
• 31:48
  next question and and my second to last one, which is alive or
• 31:52
  dead past, present, future. One person you'd want to sit
• 31:55
  down for lunch with? I.
• 31:56
  I always wondered, you know, we believe in Mashir is going to
• 32:01
  come. There's going to be 3 some ice.
• 32:03
  Who's going to resurrection? Resurrection.
• 32:05
  Who's going to be the first person you're going to run to
• 32:07
  see and how does he there's going?
• 32:09
  To be so many, My goodness. You mean me personally?
• 32:12
  Yeah, My my dad. I mean, you know someone who's
• 32:15
  resurrecting. You you wouldn't want to see how
• 32:17
  moisture Robini first my dad, then I'm going to go to Moshe.
• 32:20
  Are you saying Moshe? Is that your answer?
• 32:23
  No, I don't know. What about Avram Avini?
• 32:25
  You're not going to want to pick one.
• 32:27
  Who? Who's he going to run?
• 32:29
  I don't understand what there's only going to.
• 32:30
  Be there's going to be limitations.
• 32:31
  No, there's going to. Be a line.
• 32:32
  Who's gonna be a line but shut? Down you're going to see how the
• 32:34
  eternal world we have the eternal time.
• 32:36
  We have plenty of time, man. Oh.
• 32:37
  Really. So Messiah comes, and one at a
• 32:39
  time you're saying Messiah comes, We live forever.
• 32:41
  Supposedly, isn't that the way it works?
• 32:43
  We're not going to get into that, man.
• 32:44
  We'll bring on someone that understands that topic better
• 32:46
  by. The way this might be like a
• 32:47
  little bit of a morbid thought, but at some point, like it might
• 32:51
  scare you a little bit. Supposedly, they say the world
• 32:53
  is never going to end. It's going to keep on going and
• 32:55
  going and going, and as a human brain has a hard time to
• 32:58
  decipher that and process that because we need to see an end
• 33:01
  for everything like otherwise we can't process it.
• 33:04
  This is going to be what's going to keep on.
• 33:06
  Going. I'm not sure that's so true.
• 33:07
  It's never going to stop and then there's no stopping, but it
• 33:10
  goes on and on and on and on. That's that's pretty wild if you
• 33:14
  think. That I guess whoever, whoever,
• 33:16
  we're going to have plenty of time created that version.
• 33:18
  Whatever we want, if whoever we want, you know, we'll have
• 33:21
  plenty of time. I've gotten myself out of
• 33:23
  answering a question right away, He.
• 33:26
  Did he said. We turned it around.
• 33:27
  He distracted us. He's a master.
• 33:29
  Of you're a professional, you're a professional, a real
• 33:32
  professional. So the.
• 33:33
  So the answer who, who, who I would yes, like to sit down, you
• 33:36
  know, you know, it, it's it, I think I believe it's with anyone
• 33:40
  else. It's it depends when you know,
• 33:42
  there's certain times I would like to meet this guy, that guy,
• 33:44
  the other guy, you know. Who's on your mind?
• 33:46
  No one. Actually, no one.
• 33:49
  I can't meet somebody right now. I can't right now.
• 33:51
  I'll give you the choice did for a second.
• 33:53
  Who would you want to meet? Who's the one person?
• 33:54
  If you pick someone, who would that be?
• 33:56
  Who's the the one? Would it be Donald Trump?
• 33:58
  And who would you want to meet right now?
• 34:01
  Honestly, yeah, only honestly the person that I would like to
• 34:03
  meet today if if I had the choice is a last night someone
• 34:09
  came over to me. I was in parking lot, knocked on
• 34:12
  the window and people know what I'm I'm, I'm very, very, very
• 34:16
  involved in about the Holocaust. I read hundreds of books,
• 34:20
  travelled 40 or 50 concentration camps, have interviewed the
• 34:24
  Holocaust survivors on camera, know about every camp and most
• 34:28
  of the camps. And, you know, I almost met a
• 34:32
  Nazi who worked in Auschwitz. I almost met him and the NT
• 34:36
  pulled out and he's no longer alive.
• 34:39
  Yes, you know. That would have been
• 34:41
  fascinating. It would have been fascinating,
• 34:43
  but he he wasn't part of the killing machine, but he worked
• 34:46
  in the administration. Seen it first hand.
• 34:50
  If you've seen the actual gassing, I'm not so sure, but
• 34:54
  regardless so. You didn't meet him.
• 34:56
  Let's move. On but the, the kid, the kid,
• 34:59
  the kid, there's a guy, a guy knocked under the on my window
• 35:02
  and he says he started asking, He says, look, my grandmother
• 35:06
  was in Auschwitz and she and she was, she was always told us that
• 35:12
  there was an uprising in Auschwitz and the inmates blew
• 35:17
  up, actually blew up one of the gas chambers and she saw it.
• 35:20
  She was in the she was in the Kennedy camp in the ousters or
• 35:25
  Sup camps where I'm not going to go into all of that.
• 35:27
  And he says, I always wondered if she was just, you know,
• 35:31
  imagining stuff, dreaming. I never heard there was an
• 35:33
  uprising and the juice blew up. The I said, yes, that's actually
• 35:37
  true. And and it happens the whole
• 35:40
  story about it's a very fascinating story.
• 35:42
  One Nazi got killed. They actually shoved them into
• 35:45
  the oven. So I asked him is she alive?
• 35:51
  He says no. She passed away like 3-4 years
• 35:53
  ago. And I was like, I wish you would
• 35:57
  have been alive because I wanted to interview someone who
• 35:59
  actually saw and knew about it. Knew it because she was part.
• 36:04
  She was in the Kennedy log and they told her when it's going to
• 36:06
  happen. They had to kind of coordinate
• 36:09
  the whole thing. And I was thinking to myself, if
• 36:11
  she would have been alive so today, it would have been that
• 36:16
  Lady Misses Greenfield. Whoever she's May, may she rest
• 36:18
  in peace. Was that her actual name?
• 36:20
  Yeah. Hi.
• 36:22
  Maybe we're related? Oh, she's her her grandchild.
• 36:27
  Her grandchild is a citizen guy and he goes even with the
• 36:30
  Zucken. OK, OK, we still might be.
• 36:32
  Related, by the way, of a person that you would want to meet, but
• 36:34
  I can see why and I can see you're passionate about this
• 36:36
  topic in this conversation. No, but, but I I truly believe
• 36:40
  that like these kinds of things, they change over time with
• 36:42
  everyone. You know, just for, just for.
• 36:44
  Like who would you want? Who would you?
• 36:45
  Who would you want to meet today?
• 36:48
  Just this guy, by the way. I mean, he's the real deal.
• 36:50
  See how he throws the question on you?
• 36:51
  It's. Great.
• 36:51
  No, no. Just to prove my point though,
• 36:53
  that it's. I'm embarrassed to tell you who
• 36:55
  I would want to meet because after what you just said, I
• 36:57
  can't follow that because the person I want to meet like, you
• 37:00
  know, I was going to say that Michael Jordan, something like
• 37:02
  that, you know, and I. Guarantee you in 10 years from
• 37:06
  now, I guarantee you 10 years from now, it's not going to be
• 37:08
  Michael Jordan. Probably not.
• 37:10
  It would be Babe Ruth. If I really think about it,
• 37:13
  probably not Michael Jordan, I'd probably pick someone else.
• 37:15
  But I have to tell you just on your point, there are very few
• 37:19
  people that are left in general that were alive during the times
• 37:23
  of the we're coming towards the tail end of anybody that's
• 37:26
  really left. Once we lose the last few
• 37:29
  people, we're just going to have the memories to go by.
• 37:31
  We're not going to have that first hand experience people.
• 37:34
  And that might change things because, you know, there's a lot
• 37:35
  of people that deny the Holocaust as is, you know, and
• 37:38
  it's only going to get worse over time.
• 37:40
  We get more desensitized to it as we get more removed from that
• 37:42
  story. After 100 years, it'll be a
• 37:45
  century old. I mean, I, I, I'm very scared,
• 37:48
  very nervous that it might lose its.
• 37:51
  I well, that's, that's, that's unfortunately the, the life
• 37:56
  cycle, yeah. And and then what can we do?
• 37:58
  About it, you got to preserve. It How do we preserve it?
• 37:59
  I think the Holocaust is the most preserved occurrence in
• 38:05
  history, right between between museums, testimonials, books.
• 38:11
  Videos. And and everything I go and
• 38:14
  speak to kids and to adults. I do a slide presentation about
• 38:20
  the Holocaust. I'm going to do 1 Tisha buff at
• 38:23
  night in the China show. Oh wow.
• 38:26
  So the last thing I always tell. Thank God for Tisha buff, by the
• 38:30
  way, or no one would know about the Holocaust.
• 38:33
  I feel like every Tish above all we do is watch movies about the
• 38:35
  Holocaust. But the no, it's it's, it's
• 38:37
  good. I'm just I'm I'm poking at it
• 38:39
  because I believe that the Holocaust is a topic that needs
• 38:41
  to be discussed much more than just tish above you watch.
• 38:44
  Movies. I may ask.
• 38:46
  I see, I see. You have to.
• 38:47
  OK, so you watched Oscars? Schindler's List?
• 38:50
  Oh yeah, of course. So you've seen the movie.
• 38:51
  Have seen the movies that's now I'm talking about you know you
• 38:55
  then there's there's a lot of information a lot of educational
• 38:59
  stuff there in in in in this yeah Oscar you know but but but
• 39:03
  that that that was a very popular movie obviously, but
• 39:06
  there was an. American classic.
• 39:07
  It was a. There's so many others about the
• 39:10
  Holocaust, which is, which is important and, and, and, and,
• 39:14
  you know, like I said, it's the most.
• 39:16
  So I go and I speak to to to students, the kids, the adults,
• 39:21
  and I always finish off with this.
• 39:25
  And some of them are only 1718 years old that you should go and
• 39:30
  try to find that one survivor and just listen for their
• 39:36
  experience. Because there was going to come
• 39:37
  a time where you're going to have to say, I've heard it
• 39:41
  myself. I've taken all my kids to a
• 39:45
  survivor and even I try to get a survivor that has their number
• 39:50
  tattoo. Not many around, so they could
• 39:55
  say, I saw it myself and I've heard it.
• 39:58
  So that's extremely important. The one message that people can
• 40:03
  take from this podcast, if you haven't yet met a Holocaust
• 40:08
  survivor, just go and do it. Go talk to them.
• 40:13
  Go listen, ask them about their experience, because you will one
• 40:18
  day become the person that is going to have to be a witness.
• 40:25
  To their experience. So you'll be able to say I've
• 40:28
  heard it myself and there will come a time where people are
• 40:31
  going to say that. Not too many people around who
• 40:33
  have heard it first hand it. Happens to be that my my kids
• 40:37
  school every single year they have a program.
• 40:40
  It's called Names, Not Numbers, and it's done by the 8th grade.
• 40:44
  They do all the. Production.
• 40:46
  They have to bring a production through it.
• 40:48
  They're bringing people to teach them how to interview and
• 40:50
  everything like that. And they bring in Holocaust
• 40:52
  survivors and the kids interview these people and they they
• 40:57
  produce a video every single year.
• 40:58
  What a great idea. It's an amazing program.
• 41:00
  I've I've heard about it before. Thank you.
• 41:02
  Yes, absolutely. Which?
• 41:03
  School is this that does this this.
• 41:04
  Is not sure, not sure it's beautiful.
• 41:06
  I think every school needs to adopt something that has to do
• 41:09
  with witnessing or like you said, hearing it from from, you
• 41:12
  know, our entire religion is based on the most witnesses
• 41:16
  ever. This is what it is.
• 41:18
  Our entire basis, the foundation of who we are is that we had
• 41:21
  millions of people that witnessed something together.
• 41:23
  That's what sets us apart from all other religions in the
• 41:26
  world. So it's a why it should be a
• 41:28
  requirement for schools to have this passed on.
• 41:31
  And I love what you're saying. You know, Steven Spielberg did
• 41:34
  so many documentaries on people, my grandparents as well.
• 41:37
  And I remember when he did it and hearing that testimony from
• 41:40
  my grandparents was, was something that will never, I'll
• 41:42
  never forget. It's shaped who I am today in
• 41:44
  terms of that. I would say between 60 to 80
• 41:51
  videos myself, videos, interviews.
• 41:53
  Would you like to come with me today to a assisted living
• 41:58
  facility here where my rabbi, Rabbi Burger's mother, who's
• 42:03
  almost 100 years old, she's not only a survivor, she has 100%
• 42:09
  recollection of everything that happened.
• 42:12
  Was she in the concentration? Camp.
• 42:13
  Yes, and she speaks about it. She was in Burke.
• 42:18
  I think she was in Birkenau, you know, she.
• 42:20
  Has a tattoo. She has a tattoo.
• 42:21
  And I'll tell you what's interesting just real quick is
• 42:25
  because he's a Cohen, so he can't come to he he could my, my
• 42:29
  rabbi, Rabbi Burger. And he couldn't come to the
• 42:32
  concentration camps himself. And so I was sitting with him on
• 42:34
  the phone. And when I have to tell you when
• 42:36
  I took the tour there, I put on a noise cancelling headphones.
• 42:42
  By the way guys, I recommend this to anybody that does this.
• 42:44
  I put on the noise cancelling headphones and I listened to
• 42:47
  somber Jewish music and I walked around by myself for 1/2 an hour
• 42:53
  and I just wandered. And the reason why I did that is
• 42:56
  because the authenticity is not really there anymore.
• 42:59
  It's more like a museum. Like it's a glass wall and you
• 43:02
  see the shoes. And but when I sat down, I sat
• 43:06
  down at the steps of one of the bunkers behind me and I had a
• 43:10
  visual of the wall of death. And it was a very moving time
• 43:14
  for me in my life. And I was sitting there on the
• 43:16
  steps and I called my rabbi and I said, Hey, rabbi, I know your
• 43:20
  mother was a survivor. I just want you to know, I know
• 43:22
  you're a Cohan and you, you don't, you've never come here.
• 43:24
  I want you to, I'm sitting here at the steps and I have a vision
• 43:27
  and I'm looking at this wall and I just, you know, I, I needed to
• 43:31
  talk to you. I need to talk to a friend.
• 43:32
  The rabbi, he goes, well, if you want, you could look around for
• 43:36
  bunker number. And I forgot the number.
• 43:38
  He told me he was 32. That's where my mother spent her
• 43:43
  time during the concentration camps.
• 43:46
  I turn around and I am sitting on the steps of bunker #32 I
• 43:53
  could, I started to cry. I told my rabbi, I'm like, I
• 43:56
  can't believe this. I'm sitting here at the steps of
• 43:58
  your mother's place where she had, and I'm looking at it.
• 44:01
  I have my headphones on and I was listening to music.
• 44:03
  And I have to tell you, that's my advice for anyone that goes
• 44:06
  listen to some music and get into your zone.
• 44:08
  You know, some people say go when it's cold or when it's
• 44:10
  raining so you can feel that vibe.
• 44:12
  And I don't say it's wrong to do that, but it's very, very
• 44:15
  difficult. But that's what I went through.
• 44:17
  And I invite you to come and let's go have a conversation
• 44:20
  with her because I'd love for you to ask the questions and for
• 44:22
  you to do the interview. What was she was?
• 44:24
  Was she ever interviewed? She was interviewed and she
• 44:28
  talks about it and I'm going to. Go with you.
• 44:29
  Yeah, but I, I, we got to do it on camera, of course.
• 44:32
  About a two hour interview if I do it's a 2 hour interview.
• 44:36
  Really. Yes, I do a half hour half hour
• 44:40
  pre the Holocaust talk about her parents, the town, the shtetl.
• 44:45
  I'm in. Are you in in an hour?
• 44:48
  I'm in yeah, but but the deal. I think you're right hand
• 44:50
  though. But but not today though.
• 44:51
  We got to No, we got to do it. No, but I want to I I do want to
• 44:54
  notice. I do want to say good shot.
• 44:55
  But first of all, yeah, she's 100.
• 44:58
  You know the joke when the guy. You know the joke when the guy
• 45:01
  when the guy turns 120? You know the joke when the guy
• 45:03
  said to him, you know, have a great day, you know, like you
• 45:07
  know, but I'm saying we have to go take a Chavez to her at least
• 45:10
  can we do? That.
• 45:10
  Oh yeah, absolutely. Let's go meet.
• 45:12
  Her but I would like to set up because of course we're doing
• 45:14
  that all the time. I would like to set up a time
• 45:17
  but it's got to be a. It should be a 2 hour win.
• 45:20
  I'm in, I'm dedicating. I'm on behalf of Prime Source
• 45:22
  and then none of your Business podcast.
• 45:23
  I'm dedicating our team. Stefan, you're in and we will go
• 45:26
  with our production team and we will record it and I think it
• 45:29
  will be amazing for people to see it.
• 45:31
  Absolutely, especially coming from you because you have
• 45:33
  experience. She speaks and ask her many
• 45:36
  questions English. English.
• 45:38
  She still makes potato latkes for her son Benny.
• 45:41
  Where is she from? She's from right now.
• 45:43
  She's from. She lives in California.
• 45:45
  Where is she from back home? You'll find out.
• 45:47
  Let's not give it all away. You'll we'll, we'll do the
• 45:49
  interview. Wow.
• 45:50
  And I and I love it. But then let me say something
• 45:53
  else. I will tell you a little bit
• 45:54
  about my first experience. I went to Auschwitz.
• 45:56
  I started going to Auschwitz maybe 2025 years ago when no one
• 46:01
  basically went there. It was literally, it wasn't
• 46:04
  really a museum. You could just walk in there and
• 46:07
  no one was there. Now it's a museum.
• 46:10
  Now you got to get a ticket months ahead, otherwise you
• 46:12
  can't get in. It's it's like millions of
• 46:15
  people a year they made it into a business and like you said,
• 46:18
  it's very commercialized. People fly in from Israel as
• 46:21
  tour guides to give tours back. You got to be like, I used to
• 46:24
  give tours in Auschwitz. I, I did private tours and that
• 46:27
  and other camps, Maidanic. And so the first time I went to
• 46:30
  Auschwitz, I didn't tell my grandparents, who by the way,
• 46:33
  both of them are still I, I, both of them are still alive.
• 46:35
  My grandmother, my grandfather, my mother's parents.
• 46:38
  And one of them went through Auschwitz, ended up in Matthau's
• 46:43
  and then Ebenzi. And then one of them, one of my
• 46:45
  grandparents, my, my grandmother, she was on the way
• 46:48
  to Auschwitz, but there was during the negotiations of
• 46:51
  Kostner and she came back and they pulled back.
• 46:54
  The train says she never ended up in Auschwitz.
• 46:55
  And that's how she got, she survived a long story.
• 46:58
  She went on dead marches. So I didn't tell them that I
• 47:01
  that I'm going to Auschwitz because I knew that they're
• 47:04
  still traumatized about it and they didn't want me to go back.
• 47:07
  It's like a dangerous place. And this goes like like 25 years
• 47:10
  ago. But when I ended up and I and by
• 47:13
  the way, when I go to Auschwitz, I walk around with my talus.
• 47:18
  That's how I walk around. Yeah, I've been there.
• 47:20
  I could spend there all day long, but with my talis, wow.
• 47:22
  I put my talis on. I don't know if you saw the
• 47:25
  Israeli people from Israel, they walk around with Israel.
• 47:28
  Sure. I walk around my flag.
• 47:29
  Interesting. I walk around with my flag.
• 47:31
  That's a talis. I like it.
• 47:32
  And and in years, years back, I used to have people come up to
• 47:36
  me and never come because it's strange.
• 47:37
  I walk around with a talis, so you, you know, you have the
• 47:41
  head. I had the tallis.
• 47:42
  So that's my headphone. That's my.
• 47:45
  I'll add the tallis you had the headphones.
• 47:47
  No, no. But the thing you say you got to
• 47:49
  have a a the the the noise. Yes, the noise cancellation.
• 47:51
  Your tallis is your noise cancelling.
• 47:53
  I love that, by the way, absolutely love I.
• 47:55
  Walk around my tallis and and some there and it's like very
• 48:00
  empty and I call my grandfather and I say I say Zydia, you know
• 48:05
  where I am No where Yeah, I say that I'm an ashes.
• 48:07
  Where you're in Auschwitz, you know, it's it's like a dangerous
• 48:11
  place. I said, no, Zeidi, I'm here.
• 48:13
  I'm in Auschwitz. Don't worry, it's OK.
• 48:15
  And you know, nowadays they even have like hotels in the in, in
• 48:19
  the area. Back then they didn't even have
• 48:21
  the hotels. I stayed like in a in a house or
• 48:23
  someplace like a school. So I'm there in Auschwitz.
• 48:26
  And then all of a sudden he says, tell them that you're
• 48:30
  innocent lapped. Tell them that you're innocent
• 48:33
  is alive. So I say you're innocent is
• 48:35
  alive. He says louder, so I say you're
• 48:38
  innocent late. He says louder.
• 48:41
  So I'm there in Auschitz with my, Oh my gosh, screaming of the
• 48:46
  top of my lung. You're innocent late.
• 48:49
  You're innocent late. So every, every time I go back
• 48:53
  to Auschitz, I have to scream like one time.
• 48:55
  You're innocent late. Wow, that's really amazing.
• 48:58
  So. You know, the biggest Like
• 49:01
  retribution is you take any of the Nazis into Monroe, into
• 49:06
  Curious Zero and show them what's going on over there to
• 49:08
  see how we're thriving and to see, you know, I always said the
• 49:11
  Jewish nation, if you think about post 80 years now and how
• 49:16
  we've picked ourselves up and how not only have we rebounded,
• 49:20
  but we're actually excelling as a nation.
• 49:23
  Oh, yeah, Almost more than anybody else in the world that
• 49:26
  can say something like this. There are other nationalities
• 49:29
  that, you know, till today are struggling and they complain.
• 49:32
  And yeah, they've had hard trips in the past as well, but they
• 49:34
  haven't yet gotten their act together.
• 49:36
  We as a nation, we should be very, very proud.
• 49:38
  I mean, we're excelling. We're we're very far advanced.
• 49:42
  And from where? A short period of time ago, 80
• 49:44
  years ago, decimated, I want to say.
• 49:46
  Yeah, half of Judaism, a huge number was wiped out.
• 49:50
  Wiped out. I mean, most people would never
• 49:52
  recover for such a thing. Not only did we recover, but you
• 49:54
  go to Israel and you see what's happening over there.
• 49:56
  You see what we've built in a short period of time.
• 49:59
  It's fascinating, it's a very, it's a testament, but just.
• 50:02
  But just to put it into perspective, we haven't yet
• 50:06
  replenished the 6,000,000. Wow.
• 50:09
  Just to put it into respect, we are not yet to the point where
• 50:15
  we were pre World War Two as far as the amount of juice.
• 50:19
  Wow, so you're saying in 80 years, 80 + a year we.
• 50:22
  Haven't. Yet we have less Jews now than
• 50:24
  we. Have we have pre, Yeah, the six
• 50:26
  million that we lost we we are not up to I think I saw a study
• 50:29
  maybe like we're up to 5 million.
• 50:31
  Wow, we're we're definitely trying.
• 50:33
  I mean the average amount of non Jewish children that are born
• 50:36
  into a family, I think it's two or less.
• 50:39
  I think you're talking about Monroe and Smurfs.
• 50:41
  It's very impressive. I mean, your knowledge that you
• 50:43
  have in politics and in the world, you know, culture, this
• 50:47
  is fascinating. So another lot of information in
• 50:49
  your head over there. In other words, we started, we
• 50:51
  didn't know if you're going to vote for me, now you tell me
• 50:53
  you're going to vote. I'm a vote it.
• 50:54
  I'm a vote it. I might vote twice for you, by
• 50:56
  the way. Is that legal?
• 50:57
  Can I do that? Can I vote twice?
• 50:59
  We should cut that out. We should do it but cut it out
• 51:01
  of the interview all. Right, very good.
• 51:05
  You know, I'm curious, getting back into politics.
• 51:07
  You know, I talk about this because it's just interesting to
• 51:10
  me that we're you're a Democrat. You're my registered Democrat.
• 51:14
  I like how you said you're a registered Democrat.
• 51:16
  Yeah, I'm registered. But your your your views, your
• 51:18
  followings, your how how do you how do you look at it?
• 51:22
  How should we? No, I that's what I want.
• 51:24
  You literally to be a Democrat. I, I, well, that's what I'm
• 51:27
  asking. I'm curious how you, you know,
• 51:30
  figured it out as a registered Democrat with all the views that
• 51:32
  they have. How do you balance that?
• 51:34
  I would say that I'm more like a Kennedy type of Democrat.
• 51:38
  You know, a moderate, more like a, a, a, a middle of the road, a
• 51:41
  moderate Democrat, but a side of me and a side of the national,
• 51:47
  you know, politics of it. In the state of New York, we
• 51:54
  talked about a New York State Assembly, talked about a New
• 51:56
  York State Senate and then the governor, 2/3 of the New York
• 52:02
  State Assembly's are Democrats, 2/3 that's a veto proof
• 52:06
  Assembly, 2/3 of the Senate are Democrats.
• 52:10
  The governor's a Democrat. The Republicans in the state of
• 52:13
  New York can't get anything done.
• 52:18
  Anything. Your local elected state
• 52:22
  representative can't get anything done.
• 52:24
  I remember the time, I'm not going to say names.
• 52:27
  A Republican state official called me a county elected
• 52:33
  official to try to help him with something in the state because
• 52:37
  he was a Republican. He couldn't get it done.
• 52:39
  I as a Democrat have had more influence and and relationships
• 52:45
  to the powers that be in Albany to make things happen.
• 52:49
  So in the state of New York. So no matter what your views.
• 52:52
  Are I could have loved it, yeah. Super annoying.
• 52:53
  Love it or hate it, super annoying.
• 52:54
  You have to be a registered Democrat.
• 52:56
  I said like, it'll love it. Yeah, you said love it.
• 52:59
  I hate it. Yeah.
• 53:01
  You got to pay attention. I love it, I love it.
• 53:03
  Ever a time where it was a little bit more even?
• 53:06
  Or was it always dominated by by Democrats?
• 53:09
  You know they're good apples and they're better.
• 53:10
  Apples. Yeah.
• 53:11
  Yeah, I understand you don't. You like to look at it in a
• 53:14
  positive way and never invite negativity.
• 53:16
  I love that. Oh, you have to.
• 53:17
  I'm going to adapt that, by the way.
• 53:18
  I like that. I like to say it again.
• 53:20
  It's the good apples and the better apples.
• 53:22
  And there are better apples. Exactly right.
• 53:24
  Bad apples, right? There's no bad apples, right?
• 53:26
  It's not love it or hate it. Right.
• 53:28
  Love it or like it? Love it or like it, I'm I'm
• 53:30
  going to adapt that. I like that a lot and I don't I
• 53:33
  don't hate it. By the way, by the way, it's
• 53:34
  trademarked so. Oh, it's trademarked.
• 53:36
  OK. You know, you know, going back
• 53:38
  to politics, we had one more question that we had that I I
• 53:41
  want to almost finish with. It's only one question.
• 53:44
  Yeah, that, yeah, none of your business.
• 53:48
  Yes, it used. Very smart.
• 53:50
  Very you are. Smart.
• 53:51
  He saved it for. Yes, he knew.
• 53:53
  He knew, He knew. He didn't just give it that
• 53:55
  right. Very good, but.
• 53:56
  Go ahead and ask. Him I want to know in your phone
• 54:00
  who's the highest appointed contact you have.
• 54:05
  I I don't want to say on the on the air.
• 54:07
  I really don't want to say on the air because, you know, it's
• 54:09
  a, it's a very high elected official.
• 54:12
  It's a very high elected official.
• 54:14
  Have you ever had to use it? Cell phone, No.
• 54:18
  Are you, are you allowed to use it if you need to?
• 54:20
  Oh yeah. I got it.
• 54:22
  You got it. He's the guy that preserves and
• 54:24
  saves. He right.
• 54:25
  He waits for the right opportunity.
• 54:27
  He's not going to waste. It I got it, but it's a very,
• 54:30
  very high elected official. How did you know fill?
• 54:32
  Them office. Well.
• 54:33
  It's still in office, Yes. Yeah.
• 54:35
  So, you know, you know how a lot of cell phone, a lot of my
• 54:38
  friends like to say, you know, we're all us Jews are two calls
• 54:42
  away from Donald Trump, you know, because everyone always
• 54:44
  likes to say they know someone in the family, a brother, a
• 54:48
  sister or uncle. I don't think that means much
• 54:50
  because you could be two calls away.
• 54:51
  But you have to actually know the person intimately.
• 54:54
  You have to have exactly leverage credit clout, Yes.
• 54:58
  Now, now that they ask me, I'm I'm probably 2 calls away from
• 55:02
  Trump, but it doesn't say much. I'll tell you why, because I
• 55:06
  know people who know his son-in-law Kushner and I'm sure
• 55:09
  a lot of people know people who know Kushner and I and I
• 55:13
  probably know two people who can pick up a phone call to, to to
• 55:19
  Jared Kushner. So that would say that's not.
• 55:23
  Amazing. It's not.
• 55:23
  It's not very far, but it's good.
• 55:25
  It's good. It's better than most.
• 55:26
  What? What's you know?
• 55:27
  I'm curious. Doesn't say much.
• 55:29
  You know, listen, you know what you accomplish as a who.
• 55:31
  Calls away from Michael Greenfield might be something.
• 55:38
  I mean, you know, what are, what are some of your proud
• 55:40
  accomplishments that you've done over the years?
• 55:41
  Oh, tremendous amount. I I would say one of the things
• 55:44
  that I did actually was probably the first thing I did as a
• 55:48
  county legislator, which goes back over 12 years, right?
• 55:54
  It was a flood mitigation project.
• 55:57
  It was a project that cost the county between 12 and $17
• 56:02
  million. I don't remember what was the
• 56:04
  end cost, maybe even $20 million, a big project.
• 56:08
  And it took out hundreds of houses from the flood zone,
• 56:14
  literally people. There was one person who got
• 56:16
  killed as a result of a of of, of, of the flooding in the area
• 56:21
  with a, with there was a, they got killed by lightning in, in,
• 56:25
  in Spring Valley from person. She got killed because there
• 56:28
  were floods. And then one of the pile power
• 56:31
  lines went down and, and she got electrocuted and we resolved
• 56:37
  that issue. I resolved that issue.
• 56:38
  And the reason I say what it probably, I've probably done
• 56:41
  hundreds of stuff little private for individuals.
• 56:44
  I had a case last week that I, I don't want to say on the air
• 56:47
  that I got a resolve for them. It means the world, you know,
• 56:51
  and the person even left me a voice note last night out of the
• 56:54
  blue thanking me. By the way, it's a thankless
• 56:56
  job. Only 1% of people call you back
• 56:58
  and they say thank you. So if you can't do the job
• 57:00
  without getting the thank you, you shouldn't get.
• 57:03
  Well, on behalf of our thousands of listeners, I want to say
• 57:05
  thank you. You're welcome.
• 57:07
  Yes, but but I would say it is a thing.
• 57:10
  So the reason? You're in public service, you
• 57:12
  get all the hate and you get 0 credit.
• 57:14
  Yeah, it's some, sometimes all the time.
• 57:18
  But I will say this, that project was a project that I had
• 57:21
  to deal with a federal agency, OK, a state agency.
• 57:27
  We had to deal with the the Army Corps of Engineers, the Dec and
• 57:33
  we had to deal with the county drainage agency.
• 57:36
  We had to deal with the town and the Village 5 municipalities.
• 57:41
  That project has been going on for years, promising people that
• 57:47
  they're going to do something about it.
• 57:49
  Every elected official in Rockland County for years ran on
• 57:53
  that platform. I remember the County Executive
• 57:55
  Vanderhoff was one of the stomping grounds was in Spring
• 57:59
  Valley in that area that he's going to resolve the flooding in
• 58:01
  the area and so on and so forth. But it was so difficult.
• 58:05
  The Army Corps of Engineer wanted one thing, the Dec wanted
• 58:08
  another thing. The training agent had a
• 58:10
  different idea to get it more. I remember we had one meeting
• 58:12
  Westchester. I remember I, what I did was
• 58:16
  it's interesting, you know, and we could talk it talk.
• 58:18
  No, no, say it. I want to hear so.
• 58:20
  What we did, what I did was one of the things I wanted to prove
• 58:23
  for the Dec in the Army Corps of Engineer is that the flooding in
• 58:27
  the area ended up in a stream that ended up in a reservoir in
• 58:32
  New Jersey that went for drinking water.
• 58:35
  So one time in the flooding, I went, I took like a 5 gallon
• 58:39
  water bottle, right? And I filled it up with water.
• 58:43
  And obviously the water was terrible because it was from the
• 58:46
  road, it was sewage back up. It was.
• 58:50
  And all this water ended up back in the stream and kind of ended
• 58:53
  up in that reservoir in New Jersey.
• 58:56
  So I brought that that that bottle of of five gallon of
• 58:59
  water. I put it on the tape and they
• 59:02
  were like, it was, you know, 30. And and they were like, what is
• 59:07
  this? I said, that's for people to
• 59:11
  drink. That's the drinking water and
• 59:12
  that brought along. And they looked at me like, hell
• 59:15
  is wrong with this guy. And I said, you know what?
• 59:19
  This is the water that ends up going back into the stream in
• 59:24
  the reservoir that's being used for and it's not healthy.
• 59:27
  You could go and test it. I think that was the pitch and I
• 59:30
  think that's kind of clinched to get them on board because it was
• 59:34
  creative of you. It was it was very difficult.
• 59:36
  Bottom line is had I had to redo it all over again.
• 59:39
  In other word, do a project that you have to have a federal
• 59:43
  agency, a state agency. That meeting was in Westchester
• 59:47
  because it wasn't even in Rockland.
• 59:48
  And then, yeah, because they were located, I remember with
• 59:51
  the state agency, they had their office there.
• 59:53
  So we made it. The meeting was scheduled in and
• 59:55
  then the county and the town and the village.
• 1:00:00
  I was so naive at that time that I thought I could accomplish it,
• 1:00:04
  that I actually tried. Nowadays I didn't think I would
• 1:00:08
  try. And it was so that we had to get
• 1:00:10
  like 30-40 easements from people to allow.
• 1:00:15
  The county to do work and convince them to sign away some
• 1:00:18
  of the rights of the property and, and it had all people in
• 1:00:22
  there were talking about people, you know, people who are upset
• 1:00:25
  with you. We had a meeting in the room
• 1:00:26
  because everyone had a different idea how, how to resolve the
• 1:00:29
  issue, right. All of a sudden everyone was an
• 1:00:33
  engineer, everyone was an architect.
• 1:00:35
  Everyone knew about the the science of, of, of, of
• 1:00:38
  floodings. And we had, I remember was one
• 1:00:40
  of these house meetings in people went away, neighbors all
• 1:00:44
  upset because everyone had a different idea.
• 1:00:46
  In the end, we had to choose one.
• 1:00:47
  If we're going to put the it's a whole different thing how we got
• 1:00:51
  it done. In the end, we got it done.
• 1:00:53
  We got it done and people were like, you see, it's not going to
• 1:00:57
  work. You know, you should have done
• 1:00:59
  it my way. In the end, it worked.
• 1:01:03
  And to this day, one of my strongest supporters are people
• 1:01:08
  in that area, right? Those are the people who sign,
• 1:01:12
  who sign my petitions. And those are the people.
• 1:01:15
  And they couldn't. Some of them, you know, wanted
• 1:01:17
  to sell their houses and they couldn't because people knew
• 1:01:20
  this. But.
• 1:01:20
  This, this is how you get fans. This is what you got to do.
• 1:01:22
  You got. To oh, politics doesn't pay
• 1:01:25
  well, right? We know, right?
• 1:01:26
  It's public knowledge. Is there a salary for the job
• 1:01:28
  for the assemblyman job? Oh yeah.
• 1:01:30
  But do you get an increase? What do you?
• 1:01:32
  Mean, I'm saying you're, you're moving up, you're getting an
• 1:01:34
  increase. In one salary the.
• 1:01:36
  Problem that you have is the only way you get an increase is
• 1:01:41
  if you vote for it yourself, right?
• 1:01:43
  That never looks good and no. Politician wants to do that, So
• 1:01:45
  what happens is. Politicians do it all the time.
• 1:01:48
  Well. They vote for, for the
• 1:01:50
  committee, for their, for their whole team together.
• 1:01:51
  Your own bonus. Yeah, they do it all the time.
• 1:01:53
  Well. They did it here in Pomona
• 1:01:56
  recently. Well, it the mayor.
• 1:01:58
  Put up a vote for increase for the trustees and for the for the
• 1:02:01
  mayor. It's, it's, it's very, it's
• 1:02:03
  very, very difficult. It it, when I went, when I got
• 1:02:06
  on the Legislature, you know, it's very difficult to get
• 1:02:10
  people to, to, to vote for it because they're afraid that
• 1:02:13
  their opponent is going to use it against them.
• 1:02:16
  So all of a sudden the staff, we try to take care of the staff,
• 1:02:19
  it's only fair they get a decent amount.
• 1:02:21
  So the staff, they get increases over the years.
• 1:02:24
  And all of a sudden, honestly, if you go to Albany, it used to
• 1:02:29
  be a time the staff used to get paid more than the elected
• 1:02:32
  official. Wow.
• 1:02:35
  OK, so, and, and, and that's how a lot of these politicians get
• 1:02:40
  into trouble. Well, maybe they get in trouble
• 1:02:42
  because they need the money. Maybe they should pay them in
• 1:02:44
  advance a decent salary so they don't have to even think about
• 1:02:47
  this. Do you have any side hustles?
• 1:02:51
  What? What is the side hustle?
• 1:02:52
  Bringing income other than other than, you know.
• 1:02:55
  I I don't have a car wash shit. Oh, by the way, that went viral.
• 1:03:00
  I know. Yesterday I was at an event and
• 1:03:01
  then people were like, did you see the kid with The Who drives
• 1:03:05
  there? His his Spanish worker.
• 1:03:07
  Yeah, yeah. And I then but they said but he
• 1:03:09
  just got hired that day. Yeah.
• 1:03:10
  Yeah, he was. Everyone knew what's.
• 1:03:12
  Happened. He was a new employee.
• 1:03:13
  He has more. Than he has been doing this car
• 1:03:14
  wash business for a few years. And thirteen years old and he
• 1:03:17
  has successful car wash, yeah, sometimes old so.
• 1:03:19
  The older brother works for him sometimes as well.
• 1:03:22
  So you don't have a car wash? No, I don't have a car wash.
• 1:03:24
  What was the biggest donation that you got from and from any
• 1:03:27
  of your campaigns that you ran? Oh.
• 1:03:29
  This is a Max. There was a Max.
• 1:03:30
  This was the Max. The Max for the New York State
• 1:03:32
  Assembly is per race. In other words, for the primary,
• 1:03:35
  the Max would have been $3000 and now for the general it's
• 1:03:38
  $3000. That's it.
• 1:03:40
  Yes, and I've and I've I've gotten.
• 1:03:42
  That but there's but there's brothers, sisters, uncles,
• 1:03:45
  aunts, children. But I've got like, well, yeah,
• 1:03:47
  I've gotten from a husband and a wife 3000 each.
• 1:03:51
  So that's 6000, right, Right. So that's that's the biggest
• 1:03:55
  amount. You know, I probably would have
• 1:03:57
  been able to get more people appreciate the work that that I
• 1:04:01
  do. People appreciate the the fact
• 1:04:03
  that you get the right person into into office and the only
• 1:04:06
  way to get you know, you know, you know what I think the
• 1:04:10
  biggest industry in the United States is, is the election
• 1:04:13
  process. How much money did the Vice
• 1:04:16
  President Harris raise in the last?
• 1:04:18
  80 or something million. You know, crazy amount of.
• 1:04:21
  Numbers. Yeah.
• 1:04:22
  What was ridiculous? Why?
• 1:04:23
  Why do you think people pay all this?
• 1:04:27
  Because it's a good investment. Influence.
• 1:04:29
  It's a good investment to elect. The most powerful people in the.
• 1:04:32
  World to elect the right people in office, yeah.
• 1:04:34
  Because they want to come on the None of Your Business podcast
• 1:04:36
  and say which cell phone number they have of the highest level.
• 1:04:39
  So I want to make a prediction here.
• 1:04:41
  I want to make a prediction today.
• 1:04:42
  I think there was a real chance here.
• 1:04:44
  I would I would wager some money on this.
• 1:04:46
  Yeah, I would have to get some odds.
• 1:04:47
  How about 3000 dollars? 2000A Max.
• 1:04:51
  I would wager some money that Aaron is going to make it to
• 1:04:55
  Congress one day. I really don't see why not.
• 1:04:58
  I really, I really think you have the tools, I think you have
• 1:05:00
  the skill set, you have the presence, and I think you can
• 1:05:03
  get the support. I think you can get.
• 1:05:05
  There, you're the second person to tell me that.
• 1:05:07
  Only the 2nd. I don't believe that.
• 1:05:09
  And my grandmother said it was. I have good company.
• 1:05:12
  I see. I really believe that Aaron.
• 1:05:14
  I mean, you know, doesn't have to be tomorrow, doesn't have to
• 1:05:18
  be next year. But I mean, you're on a very
• 1:05:20
  nice path, you know, and you you certainly have the passion for
• 1:05:24
  it. I think you have the make up for
• 1:05:26
  it. I'm a fan.
• 1:05:27
  I think I appreciate. It I'm curious all, all the work
• 1:05:30
  that you do, you're a family man, right?
• 1:05:31
  I mean, how, how do you disconnect?
• 1:05:33
  What? What do you have rules on how to
• 1:05:35
  help people and be a family person at the same time?
• 1:05:39
  I'm forced to disconnect every shop, OK.
• 1:05:43
  Only shop is not during the week.
• 1:05:45
  Unfortunately, and, and, and that's the only down part of it
• 1:05:51
  that it's, it's, it's not easy to disconnect.
• 1:05:54
  They go on vacation very rarely go on vacations.
• 1:05:57
  When I go on vacation, I disconnect.
• 1:05:59
  But two weeks ago I got a phone call 2:00 in the morning.
• 1:06:04
  Your phone is on at night. Yes, so I got a phone.
• 1:06:06
  Ringer. Yeah, they keep the ringer.
• 1:06:08
  On yeah, my wife doesn't, doesn't doesn't appreciate that,
• 1:06:11
  but but I try to keep it low. So I got a phone call.
• 1:06:13
  I sometimes get emergency phone calls.
• 1:06:15
  So I got a phone calls 2:00 in the morning.
• 1:06:17
  I'm just saying there was just two weeks ago.
• 1:06:19
  I pick up the phone and I and I was like, what happened?
• 1:06:22
  And he was, oh, I thought that this is your office number.
• 1:06:27
  I think he knew it was my number and I said, OK, So what was the
• 1:06:30
  issue? He had a problem and he just
• 1:06:32
  kept him up at night. He couldn't sleep about it.
• 1:06:34
  I need to talk about it. I need to talk to someone about
• 1:06:36
  it. I think that's what it was.
• 1:06:39
  Is he the most stable person? Obviously not, but it's a, it's
• 1:06:46
  a 24 hour business people. I go to shul and people start
• 1:06:50
  talking about the problems they had.
• 1:06:52
  You go shopping, people talk about.
• 1:06:53
  Do you ever think about I don't want to go into the supermarket
• 1:06:56
  or into this shul because, you know, too many people are going
• 1:06:59
  to bother me? I'd rather, you know, pray here.
• 1:07:01
  Or shop here or never nobody. And, and, and it happens all the
• 1:07:04
  time, right. If, if, if you get elected, you
• 1:07:08
  have to understand, and really I'm not going to say that you
• 1:07:15
  have to accept it because this is.
• 1:07:17
  Yeah, but it's not just you, it's your family that has to
• 1:07:19
  accept it. Well.
• 1:07:22
  Is your wife supportive of you and political career?
• 1:07:25
  Very, very much so. And and she would go shopping,
• 1:07:29
  people wouldn't know because she's obviously she's, she tries
• 1:07:32
  to keep it private. But then if she would say her
• 1:07:36
  name, people say you related to Aaron Wieder because it's not
• 1:07:39
  such a common name and it's not like Greenfield, you know, but
• 1:07:42
  but so, so she would she as you related to Aaron Wieder and she
• 1:07:46
  and that's my husband. So a lot of time people will
• 1:07:49
  say, oh, he helped me. I know someone he helped and
• 1:07:52
  that makes her feel good, you know, so, so so it's it's
• 1:07:58
  something that maybe I should work more on how to disconnect
• 1:08:04
  during the week. But Shabbos off limits.
• 1:08:07
  Even if she and sure, people come and talk to me, I would
• 1:08:10
  listen and I would say call me back on Monday or this.
• 1:08:13
  Then the other I I'm not even going to yeah, I can't take
• 1:08:16
  notes. I can't, you know, tell them how
• 1:08:18
  to. Resolve.
• 1:08:18
  I think it's disrespectful in a school for anybody to talk to
• 1:08:22
  another person on Chavez about their business.
• 1:08:25
  And, you know, the biggest example is a lot of times there
• 1:08:27
  are people in the shul that, you know, are in a position that
• 1:08:30
  they can give business to other people in the shul.
• 1:08:33
  And they use that opportunity to throw in their, you know, the
• 1:08:36
  little sales pitch in shul, like, you know, kid this
• 1:08:39
  whenever they're walking, you know, next to each other, Hey,
• 1:08:41
  let me walk you home. You know, just like I think it's
• 1:08:43
  very. Inappropriate.
• 1:08:44
  This is a hot topic. It happens all the time and I
• 1:08:47
  can appreciate that and I can appreciate what you're saying is
• 1:08:49
  that I'm Shabbos. I understand, I'm a politician
• 1:08:51
  and I I get it. I have an office for a reason, a
• 1:08:53
  nine to five job calling Monday through Friday.
• 1:08:55
  But people sometimes but have the social cues and the
• 1:08:58
  etiquette and to leave you alone.
• 1:08:59
  I kind of agree with you, but I kind of disagree with you
• 1:09:01
  because, and that's the reason why people feel that they, that
• 1:09:07
  they, they have all the rights to approach me at any given
• 1:09:11
  time, all time, every day, seven days a week, because they don't
• 1:09:15
  think of their problem as a business related issue.
• 1:09:20
  They think of it as a problem. Someone has a problem with the
• 1:09:25
  not to go into with either with court system with, with the
• 1:09:28
  sheriff, with the health department, with.
• 1:09:30
  What you're saying, essentially what you're saying is that you
• 1:09:34
  know it's OK to have a rule not to talk business like Shabbos.
• 1:09:37
  The challenge is that most people, they connect politics in
• 1:09:42
  their personal life as not business and they're saying I
• 1:09:44
  need your influence, I need your help.
• 1:09:46
  I have a challenge. They're not looking at it that.
• 1:09:48
  They they would go talk to the for me it's business, but they
• 1:09:51
  would go talk to the rough with a problem they have during shop,
• 1:09:55
  you know. I disagree.
• 1:09:57
  I I don't, I don't. I don't like it.
• 1:09:59
  No, no. You're.
• 1:09:59
  You're. You're.
• 1:10:00
  No, no, no. I'm I don't care if it's I, I'm
• 1:10:02
  not. I'm making it better.
• 1:10:03
  I'm not. I'm not disagreeing with you.
• 1:10:04
  I'm trying to be a male. It's sure you understand.
• 1:10:06
  Which is they're going to explain what that is that the.
• 1:10:08
  Person who comes and talks to me on tabas, yeah, He doesn't think
• 1:10:11
  of it as if he's talking to me about a business.
• 1:10:15
  Well. Maybe we need to teach people
• 1:10:17
  that because going to shul is not a trade show, going to shul
• 1:10:20
  is not a conference, and going to shul is not Congress and it's
• 1:10:23
  not the political office. If you have something to say
• 1:10:25
  that you need help with, call me Saturday night, call me Sunday.
• 1:10:28
  I'm with Oshie on this. I love that your meeting, your
• 1:10:30
  meeting that day is with God. That's your meeting.
• 1:10:33
  Yes, yes, yes. And by the way, my meeting, I
• 1:10:35
  could refer him to God. These things I don't know.
• 1:10:38
  Aaron, I want to tell you something.
• 1:10:39
  If you asked me to hold up a sign to campaign for you, my
• 1:10:42
  sign would say, please do not talk to Aaron politics on
• 1:10:46
  Shabbos. That's what I would hold aside.
• 1:10:48
  I would say I'm not talking about politics or part don't ask
• 1:10:51
  him for a personal favour on listen, you know, the rabbi's
• 1:10:54
  used to it because that's his world.
• 1:10:55
  And quite frankly, I have to be honest with you, I have a pet
• 1:10:58
  peeve. And when it comes to shules and,
• 1:11:00
  and, and this is for, for all of our non Jewish listeners, you
• 1:11:04
  know, the, the weekend when we go to synagogue and we're there
• 1:11:06
  and we're all congregating together.
• 1:11:08
  And at the end of prayer, it's a very common theme amongst all of
• 1:11:12
  us is that you go to the rabbi and shake his hand and you wish
• 1:11:15
  him a good Shabbos and you wish him, you know, you say hello to
• 1:11:18
  him, you wish him well. Yes.
• 1:11:19
  And a line generally forms of people that are waiting to say
• 1:11:23
  to wish him well. And you have these certain
• 1:11:26
  people who have, I'm sorry, the chutzpah to start talking to the
• 1:11:30
  rabbi about their personal issue while everybody is waiting
• 1:11:33
  behind them. I stand there and I push people
• 1:11:36
  along and I tell them and I'm and I, I actually make the
• 1:11:40
  announcements in my shul and, and one of the things that I
• 1:11:43
  reiterate. Get you to come to our shul.
• 1:11:46
  One of the things that I reiterate, and I want you to
• 1:11:47
  know and I want you to adapt this, please, I reiterate is
• 1:11:51
  don't rush home. Give us 5 minutes after
• 1:11:54
  everybody says that their hellos and they're and they're being
• 1:11:56
  nice to judge. You want to stick around
• 1:11:58
  afterwards and and schmooze for 5 minutes, That's OK, But stop
• 1:12:02
  disrupting the flow of people. It's very, very selfish.
• 1:12:06
  Yeah. Aaron, I think you need to adopt
• 1:12:07
  this and tell people please call me after Chavez.
• 1:12:10
  Even if it's a personal favor. You need that time off.
• 1:12:13
  Oh. No, I, I, I tell this, I said
• 1:12:15
  call me, call me during the week and I'll try to take care.
• 1:12:18
  Yeah, yeah. Don't even let them get their
• 1:12:20
  point out. Don't even start.
• 1:12:21
  Yeah, don't let them start. Oh, once we're talking to you
• 1:12:23
  about something. No, no, no, no, no.
• 1:12:24
  After shops. Yeah, after Chavez, please.
• 1:12:25
  After Chavez? Yeah, exactly.
• 1:12:27
  You need a mental. Break You're in the business of
• 1:12:28
  helping people. That is your.
• 1:12:30
  Business, but I'm in the business of getting their vote,
• 1:12:32
  yeah. Wow, you're still late.
• 1:12:35
  That's a good that, that's a good debate.
• 1:12:37
  That's a good debate. No, no.
• 1:12:38
  I'm gonna hear what they say and afterwards I say, OK, I think I
• 1:12:43
  can help you, but call me after. I see he's always on I.
• 1:12:45
  See. So you're all.
• 1:12:46
  Yeah, I was about to say, you're always on.
• 1:12:48
  I disconnect. Yeah, but you're listening to
• 1:12:50
  them though. You're still allowing them.
• 1:12:51
  Only when I'm sure. Sure, sure.
• 1:12:53
  Then I, I, I, I the the meal. Yeah.
• 1:12:56
  Go home. Yeah, go home.
• 1:12:58
  You go to the Tish, I go to the Sklener Abbastiche.
• 1:13:01
  Every shower. How?
• 1:13:02
  Beautiful. Do you really?
• 1:13:03
  I every I'm the Gabba there. Where in the school?
• 1:13:06
  In for the Sklener Abbastiche the Muncie right for the tish
• 1:13:10
  I'm the Gabba. Wow, the the.
• 1:13:11
  Things you do for both, no. How many people go to that tish?
• 1:13:16
  Oh, it depends in the summer and the winter, but.
• 1:13:19
  Yeah. He could.
• 1:13:20
  He could have anywhere between 100 to 200 people there, OK.
• 1:13:25
  Wow, that's not bad. That's not bad.
• 1:13:27
  That was. You know, once you get 1000 or
• 1:13:29
  more, but it's that's like a big.
• 1:13:30
  Number Anyone who knows a Scalena de Bustiche and his
• 1:13:33
  father, you know he's known in the IS.
• 1:13:36
  It the singing is it the it's everything the ripping of the
• 1:13:39
  hala and the throwing of the gefilte fish, or it's it's.
• 1:13:43
  It's everything I I love years. I love years and years.
• 1:13:46
  I used to go when I was younger. I used to go to Tish Friday
• 1:13:49
  night but I I haven't. Gone.
• 1:13:50
  I mean anyone that goes to Israel and must visit it.
• 1:13:53
  That's when I went last, when I was in Israel.
• 1:13:55
  I think an item is about 10% of the experience I have at the
• 1:13:58
  tish. Wow.
• 1:14:00
  Wow, Heaven, you think? Heaven.
• 1:14:02
  Heaven is about 10% of. That's very subjective.
• 1:14:04
  Everybody has what, you know, they they consider to be, you
• 1:14:07
  know, heaven for them. So I.
• 1:14:09
  Completely detox, refresh, regroup, rinse on Shabbos.
• 1:14:16
  It's amazing. It's the biggest matana I get
• 1:14:20
  when I see a very very involved politician.
• 1:14:24
  And there are many. There's not only Aaron Wieder
• 1:14:26
  and the non Jewish. I literally have pity that they
• 1:14:31
  don't have Shabbos. We talk about this all the time
• 1:14:33
  at the broadcast. All the time.
• 1:14:35
  Is that the biggest Jews that don't have Shabbas that it's
• 1:14:37
  very hard for? Them to and it's impossible to
• 1:14:39
  feel like even do it. They it's like take for example,
• 1:14:42
  if you were to take Wednesday to be your shabbas, right?
• 1:14:45
  You can't make it happen, right? You just can't, right?
• 1:14:49
  You can't act it out, it's not the same.
• 1:14:51
  It's easy, you have it. It's like a Matana that Hashem
• 1:14:53
  gave. Yeah, it's a gift.
• 1:14:54
  It's definitely a gift. What's your next big agenda?
• 1:14:57
  What's your big goal? To get elected, to get like,
• 1:14:59
  what's your elected? What's what are you?
• 1:15:01
  What's your issues that you're kind of running on?
• 1:15:03
  Two issues that I'm going to focus.
• 1:15:06
  Laser Laser focus speak into the camera.
• 1:15:10
  And tell them, right, let's talk to the what?
• 1:15:11
  Is. The issue two issues, one is the
• 1:15:17
  most important one now in the community, not just in Rockland
• 1:15:21
  County, but statewide, is the issue with the what it's
• 1:15:26
  commonly known, the the equivalency issue.
• 1:15:29
  In other words, there are bureaucrats in Albany who
• 1:15:32
  decided how you are going to educate your children.
• 1:15:38
  They know better than you and I'm telling them that no, you
• 1:15:43
  know better than them and we're going to take care of that.
• 1:15:46
  That's issue #1 And the second issue is the formula change for
• 1:15:49
  the East Rambo School District. We are being short changed.
• 1:15:53
  You are being short changed. You are paying much more in
• 1:15:57
  property taxes than you should. The state is shortchanging us,
• 1:16:02
  and we're going to accomplish that.
• 1:16:04
  We're going to change the formula and we're going to get
• 1:16:07
  our fair share. Wow, that's my promise.
• 1:16:10
  Not that I'll get it done, but I'll do everything and anything.
• 1:16:14
  To try to get it done, just not on track.
• 1:16:15
  That changed my mind. You're not going to you're not
• 1:16:17
  going to Congress. You're going to the.
• 1:16:19
  Senate, that's what. Let's do.
• 1:16:21
  Let's go big. Let's think big.
• 1:16:22
  Why are we setting bars over here at the you know, I'm going
• 1:16:25
  to go vice president, you know, president yet?
• 1:16:27
  Let's go to the center. Let's get it.
• 1:16:28
  Let's see doing wasn't 100 people let's.
• 1:16:31
  Make one of their land weeder. Start the first fundraiser.
• 1:16:35
  Let's get the money. Let's get the money rolled
• 1:16:37
  again. You get the first first
• 1:16:38
  fundraiser. If AOC could get into office and
• 1:16:42
  some of these people, like seriously, Congress, you know,
• 1:16:44
  they can get into office like this.
• 1:16:45
  I mean, anybody can do it, right?
• 1:16:48
  Monkey could technically do it, you know, So, yeah, yeah, I'm
• 1:16:50
  saying that I'm sorry. You know, like you look at some
• 1:16:53
  of these people, some of these politicians and they just got a
• 1:16:56
  bunch of like minded people together and they got the votes,
• 1:16:58
  you know, and the gun to office. I think Aaron Weiner can be
• 1:17:02
  based on that barometer could be the president.
• 1:17:05
  OK. Mike, I think you could be the
• 1:17:07
  president based on that. Barometer, thank you.
• 1:17:09
  I'm not sure if it's a compliment or an insult.
• 1:17:11
  No, it's an insult to AOC. That's.
• 1:17:13
  What? Oh, OK.
• 1:17:13
  All right. I I appreciate that, Aaron.
• 1:17:15
  It was a pleasure having you. Here I don't know if I have the
• 1:17:17
  age to become president. Oh, you said you have to be old
• 1:17:20
  now It's it's going race. It's.
• 1:17:22
  It looks like. You know, I, I, I find it
• 1:17:25
  fascinating though, and, and kind of interesting that people
• 1:17:28
  forget to do their job because they have another job to do,
• 1:17:32
  which is you're in politics, you're fighting for policy,
• 1:17:35
  you're fighting to make change. You're listening to all the
• 1:17:37
  challenges. And there's work that you need
• 1:17:39
  to do. But then suddenly you need to
• 1:17:41
  pause your entire life to fundraise and to get votes, and
• 1:17:46
  suddenly the business of helping people, chick is transformed
• 1:17:50
  exactly and takes a backseat. You see it every day in
• 1:17:52
  politics. It's a very interesting balance.
• 1:17:54
  How does that work? He's right.
• 1:17:55
  I always wonder. With the president that they're
• 1:17:57
  running for. Are you actually working?
• 1:17:58
  At he takes off the next four or five.
• 1:18:00
  Months travelling all around the country, yeah.
• 1:18:02
  What's that? Do you not have the most
• 1:18:04
  important job in the world? That's probably the most
• 1:18:06
  demanding job you could just take off for four months to go
• 1:18:09
  fundraise? Like who's running the country
• 1:18:10
  in the meantime? It's crazy.
• 1:18:12
  It's very, very difficult. And there's the most challenging
• 1:18:15
  part of an elected office is the fundraiser.
• 1:18:18
  Very, very difficult. And you would find that a lot of
• 1:18:22
  these, you're thinking, oh, how did that person get into office?
• 1:18:26
  You read up on that person and then you see that person was
• 1:18:29
  very good at fundraising. It's sad by the way, in a way,
• 1:18:33
  because you know, you find some of the most grandest rabbis that
• 1:18:36
  were running major, major schools and they had to pause
• 1:18:39
  their life to fundraise, to travel and fundraise.
• 1:18:42
  And I guess there is, there really is no answer.
• 1:18:43
  The answer is that it's part of life.
• 1:18:45
  It's what you have to do. You have to balance it.
• 1:18:47
  Money makes the world go. Right.
• 1:18:48
  And This is why I keep saying to everyone, sales, networking,
• 1:18:52
  communicating is key to everything.
• 1:18:55
  Whether it's politics, whether you're a lawyer, universal
• 1:18:57
  doctor, it's universal. Thing of the World has a sales
• 1:19:00
  aspect to it. You have to at some point
• 1:19:02
  solicit something. At some point you have to
• 1:19:05
  convince someone of your thought process.
• 1:19:07
  It's a sales game. It's always a sales game.
• 1:19:10
  And then you got to market it now you got to spread the word.
• 1:19:12
  You got to get it out to the masses.
• 1:19:14
  You got to educate people, right?
• 1:19:16
  You got to talk to people. You got to market sales and
• 1:19:18
  marketing. And Michael, you always say this
• 1:19:20
  and it's, it's, it holds true wherever you turn.
• 1:19:22
  I don't care what business you're in.
• 1:19:24
  I don't care what it is that you're doing in your life.
• 1:19:26
  Sales and marketing, from sports to business to media sales.
• 1:19:30
  And yeah, the overall is networking communication, and
• 1:19:33
  you do a stellar job at it all I have to tell.
• 1:19:36
  You how you just transformed so happy, like so just looking into
• 1:19:38
  the Cam and he's like in his acting mode right away and you
• 1:19:42
  were felt like you were really talking to people.
• 1:19:43
  I felt like I felt what you were saying and you you immediately
• 1:19:48
  changed. What a transition.
• 1:19:49
  By the way, kudos to you. That's why a good politician can
• 1:19:52
  fundraise Monday at 9:00 AM and change policy Monday at 10:00
• 1:19:56
  PM. At 10:00 AM.
• 1:19:57
  You have to. Yeah, yeah, it's unbelievable.
• 1:19:59
  Aaron, thank you so much for being here.
• 1:20:01
  It was a real pleasure and an honor and I.
• 1:20:03
  Had a great time I. Had fun and I I liked what we
• 1:20:05
  learned and I I'm looking forward.
• 1:20:06
  To we say it's going to be for an hour.
• 1:20:09
  Rav Iron, this was amazing. And before we end, I must say
• 1:20:13
  that there's I've learned a lot and I'm excited, but I am also
• 1:20:17
  learning about the people that you know and you know some of
• 1:20:21
  them that you weren't sharing with us.
• 1:20:23
  But what we like to ask on the None of Your Business podcast is
• 1:20:26
  for you to recommend someone that you think would be a good
• 1:20:29
  guest on our podcast, someone who can also bring information
• 1:20:33
  and growth and positivity. Someone that we can learn from,
• 1:20:37
  someone that is close to you that you can recommend to be on
• 1:20:41
  our podcast. Who would that be?
• 1:20:44
  I would recommend a good friend of mine, a colleague, county
• 1:20:49
  legislator Inima Yeager, Tommy Yeager, No.
• 1:20:54
  I know, Tommy. Oh, I know Tommy.
• 1:20:55
  Well, sure. OK, great guy.
• 1:20:57
  You know a little little known secret about Tommy's.
• 1:21:01
  I bought a motorcycle from him and I would love to get him on
• 1:21:04
  the podcast. That you have.
• 1:21:05
  Yeah, one of them, one of them. I have two, and I would love for
• 1:21:08
  him to talk about all his, you know, hobbies that he has.
• 1:21:13
  That would be interesting. You know what?
• 1:21:14
  Let's get him on the phone. Hi, I'm with someone.
• 1:21:18
  You sold a motorcycle. Hi, Tommy.
• 1:21:23
  Hi. How are you?
• 1:21:25
  It's Michael Greenfield. We're actually on the podcast
• 1:21:28
  now with Aaron Wieder and we asked him who would he recommend
• 1:21:32
  to come on the podcast and guess what name he dropped?
• 1:21:34
  Not mine. Because he knows I built by the
• 1:21:39
  name. But but why don't you tell me
• 1:21:43
  the tell him the great things that talked about him?
• 1:21:45
  Oh, he'll come on. He'll hear.
• 1:21:47
  He'll hear it when we stream it. So I, I highly recommended you,
• 1:21:52
  I voted for you to come on the podcast and I'll tell you what I
• 1:21:57
  tell everybody else. I got 1000 votes in the last
• 1:22:00
  election. But if everybody who told votes
• 1:22:02
  for me votes for me, I got $2000.
• 1:22:05
  Well. Well, so don't say that You'll
• 1:22:07
  come on the podcast. Come on the podcast.
• 1:22:10
  Well, when are we doing? This win, Yeah, yeah, it's all
• 1:22:15
  right. It's fantastic.
• 1:22:16
  So win. I just want.
• 1:22:17
  To win this legislature on the legislature.
• 1:22:21
  So I'm just. By the time you come, he'll be
• 1:22:26
  an assembly, so it'll be a whole different story looking forward,
• 1:22:29
  that was. Easy, That was right.
• 1:22:31
  Did we get him through to a second person?
• 1:22:33
  There's. More on the road over.
• 1:22:34
  Here, take take out that cell phone of yours.
• 1:22:36
  Who's that person? Just flash us.
• 1:22:40
  Just flash us for a minute just so we can see.
• 1:22:42
  I know that politicians oshi are well spoken but to have a
• 1:22:45
  Hasidish person from the community so well spoken like
• 1:22:49
  Aaron Wieder, it was breathtaking.
• 1:22:52
  I didn't see it coming. I did not see it coming.
• 1:22:54
  I got hit like a freight train with him because I had a little
• 1:22:57
  bit of somewhat lower expectations and this is just.
• 1:23:01
  Because he's a Democrat, no. No, no, no.
• 1:23:03
  He's a local Democrat. There's a difference with we've
• 1:23:05
  learned, but just simply because the way he carries himself, the
• 1:23:09
  way he looks, yes, you know, judging a book by its cover for
• 1:23:12
  a moment and without really getting to know him, I was very
• 1:23:16
  pleasantly surprised as we were speaking to him that this guy's
• 1:23:20
  actually someone that not only accomplished a lot, but had a
• 1:23:23
  lot of challenges, right? It wasn't easy for him because
• 1:23:26
  language, English was not his first language, right?
• 1:23:29
  It wasn't his first language. And he is in a position where he
• 1:23:32
  needs to speak to large crowds, knock on doors.
• 1:23:34
  He needs to knock on doors. And he needs to be able to, you
• 1:23:36
  know, influence people with his words, which is a very difficult
• 1:23:39
  thing to do when it's not your first language.
• 1:23:41
  And he he does it very well and he's very knowledgeable.
• 1:23:44
  He actually really cares. You can tell that, you know, a
• 1:23:47
  big part of why he's doing this is because he wants to make a
• 1:23:50
  difference and he wants to enhance people's lives.
• 1:23:53
  And if there would be more politicians like him, the world
• 1:23:55
  would be a better place. I don't know how many
• 1:23:57
  politicians are in it for the right reasons.
• 1:24:00
  A lot of them are in it simply for the power and for the fame.
• 1:24:03
  And he's really in it because he cares about the community.
• 1:24:06
  And you could tell just by the work that he does on the side
• 1:24:09
  where he interviews Holocaust survivors.
• 1:24:11
  That tells me a lot. That tells me that he really is
• 1:24:14
  in it to make a difference, and I look forward to what's going
• 1:24:16
  to become of him and how our community is going to grow with
• 1:24:19
  him. Yeah, I.
• 1:24:20
  Mean one of the things he said was that he one of the dreams
• 1:24:23
  that he has is in his lifetime, he would love to see a religious
• 1:24:27
  Jew in Congress as a congressman.
• 1:24:30
  And I told him I said, why don't why don't you go for it?
• 1:24:33
  Why don't you be that guy? Don't rely on someone else, you
• 1:24:36
  know, filling that vacancy. You can absolutely be that
• 1:24:38
  person. I believe that.
• 1:24:40
  I think that on, based on the trajectory that he's already on
• 1:24:43
  and the things that he's already accomplished and where he's
• 1:24:45
  going, he's thinking about being in the, in the Senate of the
• 1:24:47
  state of New York, which is a pretty big deal.
• 1:24:50
  It's only the next natural move. I think.
• 1:24:52
  I really hope that he took it seriously and he's going to,
• 1:24:55
  he's going to go for it. I'm sure he can garner the
• 1:24:57
  support from people. I'm sure the people will, will
• 1:24:59
  prop him up. He needs to do it.
• 1:25:01
  Someone needs to do it. And why not him?
• 1:25:03
  And definitely with someone like him, it'll speak volumes to our
• 1:25:06
  community and it'll make us, it'll put us out in a good
• 1:25:10
  light, in a positive light, and we will continue to grow from
• 1:25:13
  it. And it'll be true to the theme
• 1:25:15
  of our podcast where we're growing together.
• 1:25:17
  So let's keep growing.