0:00

This is the John Fuhlsang

0:02

podcast. Welcome to Progress

0:04

After Dark. Thank you, Dean

0:06

Obahala for the excellent lead in

0:08

that I can never hope to

0:11

measure up to. Um, Fuhl sang.

0:13

Chris House, I'll run in this

0:15

beast out of South Carolina, the

0:18

great Thea Harper producing our show

0:20

out of Brooklyn for the next

0:22

three hours. We're going to be

0:25

coming at you with backs, empathy.

0:27

music and something resembling but not

0:30

quite achieving wit. We got a great

0:32

one planned tonight. We have some

0:34

very special guest. Brandy Scalache is

0:36

one of my favorite authors. And

0:38

we've had Brandy on the show

0:40

several times, but never actually in

0:43

person. I don't think and Brandy's

0:45

new book is unlike anything you've

0:47

heard. I mean... Brandy already specializes

0:49

in medical curiosities in the work,

0:51

but this book, The Intermediaries, tells

0:53

the forgotten story of the Institute

0:55

for Sexual Science, which was the

0:57

world's first center for homosexual and

1:00

transgender rights ever. And it was

1:02

headed by a gay Jewish man,

1:04

Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld, And unfortunately it

1:06

was in existence at exactly the

1:08

time of the rise of the Third

1:10

Reich. It's an incredible book with incredible

1:12

history. We're also going to be joined

1:14

by another great historical figure, two of

1:16

them, an hour number two. God and

1:18

Jesus will both be here. Now I'm

1:21

sure you've heard of God. God on

1:23

social media, the animated God, looks like

1:25

a South Park character, has gazillions of

1:27

followers across various social platforms. God and

1:29

Jesus have an animated podcast. It's live

1:31

and they're animated and I was a

1:33

guest on it a couple of weeks

1:35

ago and I'd waited my whole life

1:37

to meet them both and I didn't

1:39

get to ask many questions at all.

1:42

I had quite a few for both of

1:44

them actually. I actually had a long list

1:46

of questions for both of them. So they

1:48

said they'd come on the show and tonight

1:50

we will be joined by the stars of

1:52

the God pod podcast. Jehovah, I am

1:54

that I am and his son Yeshua

1:56

Bar Yosif. I'm very excited. I've just

1:59

written a book. to meet my subjects.

2:01

Also, Rhonda Handsome, we'll be here at

2:03

hour number three. And as always, our

2:05

most important guest is you guys. The

2:07

number here is 866-997474866-997 grit. Thanks everybody

2:09

for all the nice comments about my

2:11

appearance on Friday night on Abby Philip.

2:13

A lot of fun. I had never

2:16

done that one before. I'll be doing

2:18

that again. I have a book coming

2:20

out so they're making me do cable

2:22

news and I haven't done cable news

2:24

in years so I'm trying to get

2:26

all the necessary surgeries so I can

2:28

do all that and be presentable. My

2:31

book comes out on August 19th, Separation

2:33

of Church and Hate, a sane person's

2:35

guide to taking back the Bible from

2:37

fundamentalist fascist and flock leasing frauds. You

2:39

can now buy it and they just

2:41

posted all the blurb comments on Amazon

2:43

so I think it's really happening. Thea's

2:46

latest episode of Theoretically Speaking, which aired

2:48

here on Friday night, all episodes are

2:50

available, but listen to the most recent

2:52

one on demand and on the app.

2:54

But go on demand or on the

2:56

app to hear all episodes of the

2:58

Mighty Thea Harbor with Theoretically Speaking. Tonight

3:01

I want to ask, do you have

3:03

stories about the protest this weekend? Thousands

3:05

of people who are out there. And

3:07

I know that in spite of the

3:09

corporate media not covering it. So I

3:12

want to hear what your stories were

3:14

like. What your protest was like was

3:16

a different from previous ones. And what

3:18

did you think of the media coverage

3:20

of the protests? Let's do a show.

3:23

I want to welcome you all to

3:25

tariff Tuesday. We now observe it on

3:27

Monday. Historians will one day call this

3:29

the day the free market begged for

3:32

communism, the day your 401k packed up

3:34

and moved into a soup kitchen. I

3:36

don't know if you're following the news,

3:38

friends, but we lost trillions of dollars

3:41

and valuable today because a man with

3:43

gold toilets has decided to create global

3:45

economics like it's fantasy football, except in

3:47

fantasy football, I think somebody wins. The

3:49

markets reopened, and it was like the

3:52

Trump Airlines meets the Trump stakes of

3:54

Wall Street rallies. The Tao dropped faster

3:56

than Trump's eyelids during a policy briefing.

3:58

In less than a week, Man Baby

4:01

has caused 10 trillion. in the markets

4:03

to be wiped away. It's challenging times

4:05

to be a blindly obedient cult member,

4:07

but Goldman Sachs has now raised the

4:09

probability of a recession, the probability of

4:12

a recession to 45%. We didn't have

4:14

a market dip today. This wasn't a

4:16

correction. This is economic arson. And Manchild

4:18

is lighting the match and giggling and

4:21

blaming the wind. So as the economy

4:23

imploded over the weekend, you know what

4:25

Trump was doing, right? He was negotiating

4:27

with China. No, he wasn't doing that.

4:30

He was reassuring all the panicked investors.

4:32

Oh, no, I'm so mistaken that way.

4:34

He was reading a briefing book. No.

4:36

He was golfing for the Saudis. Because,

4:38

unlike the suckers whose vote he doesn't

4:41

need anymore, the Saudis pay him. So

4:43

in the midst of the worst economic

4:45

free fall since 1929, Como for Caligula

4:47

was out there measuring sand traps and

4:50

calling it diplomacy. Here on aboard Air

4:52

Force One, he was presented with the

4:54

most important issue of the weekend. His

4:56

fucking golf game. Just

5:07

to back it up over there, I

5:09

want. What's your handicap on these days?

5:11

I have a very low handicap. Oh

5:13

my God, and don't worry by the

5:16

way, he posted a video of it

5:18

because, you know, if America collapses and

5:20

there's no racist losers to talk about

5:22

it on TikTok, did it really happen?

5:24

So, yeah, this is it. Get ready

5:26

for the inflation. He can't read past

5:29

three bullet points and he puts this

5:31

35% tariff on foreign cars and semiconductors

5:33

and solar panelsles and batteries and batteries.

5:35

So prices are going up. If you

5:37

drive a car, or if you buy

5:40

food that's delivered by trucks that run

5:42

on gasoline, that's prices going up. If

5:44

you run a business, it imports parts

5:46

from literally anywhere outside Florida. You're... I

5:48

hope you liked capitalism while you had

5:51

it. And just as the Fed was

5:53

about to cut interest rates, just as

5:55

consumer confidence was stabilizing a little bit,

5:57

just as small businesses were crawling out

5:59

of the high inflation hole, man baby...

6:01

get nates of trade war and we're

6:04

all trapped in the apprentice lute the

6:06

treasury edition. Retirees have lost most of

6:08

the gains from the past three years.

6:10

Listen if you're going to be applying

6:12

for a job as a Walmart greeter

6:15

I'd say go fast is going to

6:17

be competition in the next few months.

6:19

Manufacturers are saying these tariffs on aluminum

6:21

and steel have just nuked them. Consumers

6:23

are going to pay more for cars.

6:25

appliances, electric bikes. This is not populism.

6:28

This is economic war on working people,

6:30

disguised as nationalism, and there's not enough

6:32

races in this country to enjoy it.

6:34

It's Trump telling the guy at the

6:36

loading dog, it's America first, while secretly

6:39

handing a tax cut to the guy

6:41

who's going to lay him off. By

6:43

noon today, the Tao was down 1,200

6:45

points. Your grandma's retirement is up in

6:47

smoke. National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett

6:50

told ABC News, everything will be fine,

6:52

for most of us, possibly. Well, there

6:54

might be some increase in prices, but

6:56

the fact is that if there were

6:58

going to be a heavy burden on

7:00

the U.S. consumer, then this trade deficit

7:03

that for 30 years we've seen really

7:05

since China entered the WTO would be

7:07

something that would have gone down. So

7:09

it's fine. Wages up inflation down, stock

7:11

storing, that's what we had under Biden.

7:14

It was like, economy finally got in

7:16

the rose epic. You know, she left

7:18

her abuser, she got away, got her

7:20

finances right, she went to the gym,

7:22

she went to the gym, she was

7:25

doing better. And now we have this

7:27

guy swinging tariffs like a drunk pirate

7:29

with a sword. So this is a

7:31

man-made recession. The Financial Times has called

7:33

it one of the greatest acts of

7:35

self-harm in American economic history. The economist,

7:38

that left-wing rag, said the most profound,

7:40

harmful, and unnecessary economic error in the

7:42

modern era. And Donald Trump is out

7:44

there playing 18 holes with Saudis who

7:46

would sell his kids for copper wiring.

7:49

I mean, tariffs on everything. But then

7:51

today... Then today came a rumor, just

7:53

a rumor, that the tariffs might be

7:55

paused for 90 days, came around lunchtime,

7:57

a rumor that he might... Pause this

7:59

for 90 days and the market shot

8:02

up like it was on meth. And

8:04

then about 10 minutes later, the White

8:06

House denied it and the market

8:08

crashed again. That's how it's going

8:10

now. It's like speculation on Reddit

8:13

is controlling fiscal policy. The

8:15

only people making money right

8:17

now are rumor-mongers and evil

8:19

hedge fund guys who trade

8:21

uncertainty like it's cocaine at

8:23

Davos. And the Wall Street Journal's

8:25

like, dude, we're capitalists, not cultists.

8:27

Can you maybe stop putting money

8:30

on fire? It's our God. And as you

8:32

know, Donald Trump doesn't care. Timothy

8:34

O'Brien of Bloomberg said at best

8:36

he created an economic sinkhole.

8:38

He doesn't care. According to the

8:41

Washington Post, his attitude towards his second

8:43

term, and I quote from an aid,

8:45

he's at the peak of just not

8:47

giving a fuck anymore. That was the peak?

8:49

Oh, I don't think so. We know he doesn't

8:51

care. He's never paid the price for

8:54

anything he's done. The foreclosure is

8:56

somebody else's fault. Bankruptcies is his

8:58

genius. He's a kamikaze pilot flying

9:00

a plane made of your pensions and

9:02

your kid's future. By the way, I

9:04

haven't even talked about how we're

9:06

defending tariffs on remote islands filled

9:08

with penguins and seals. Because honestly,

9:10

when you've humiliated your allies in

9:12

new global supply chains, you know, beat

9:15

up some puffins. Show you're a man.

9:17

We're defending tariffs on an island that's

9:19

fill of penguins and seals and seals.

9:21

If they had any shame, they would apologize

9:23

to the damn penguins, but they don't,

9:25

because admitting a mistake requires a soul,

9:28

and a spine, and an economic textbook.

9:30

Twelve hundred protests, massive

9:32

crowds across Europe, south of crowds

9:34

across Europe, South America, all over the

9:36

US, barely a blip in the news

9:39

cycle. Did you see much about it?

9:41

I mean, they're covering his latest truth

9:43

social post about banning offshore wind, because

9:45

it kills patriotism patriotism. But twelve hundred

9:48

protests across the world. Didn't

9:50

involve Taylor Swift, so I didn't

9:52

get a lot of coverage, but

9:54

nothing says late stage empire like

9:56

ignoring global fury When it's

9:59

not trending And people backed this,

10:01

not because their lives were as bad

10:03

as Fox News said, but because someone

10:05

on TV told them that their lives

10:07

were really shitty. They didn't notice their

10:10

wages were up, their bills were down,

10:12

and they had power at work for

10:14

once. As I desperately tried to point

10:16

out to the Republicans on CNN on

10:19

Friday night, this country was recovering from

10:21

the worldwide COVID inflation better than any

10:23

of our capitalist allies, and Republicans made

10:25

god damn sure no one in the

10:28

conservative mediosphere fear that fact. So they

10:30

voted for the guy promising revenge and

10:32

now they're wondering why the gas station

10:34

wants their wedding ring. This is the

10:37

nightmare market. One guy's ego is holding

10:39

us hostage with a golf carton, a

10:41

60-gallon top, a bronzer. And again, where

10:43

was the president this weekend? He was

10:46

golfing with the Saudis. The same regime

10:48

that butchered a journalist and helped bank

10:50

roll 9-11. Now getting photo ops with

10:52

this guy who cheats it golf. Nothing

10:55

says economic patriotism patriotism like... teeing off

10:57

with evil Saudis while your constituents are

10:59

trying to sell bone marrow on Craig's

11:01

list. Treasury Secretary Scott Besant, who is

11:03

the one in this cabinet I think

11:06

who is the most smart enough to

11:08

know better, he brought some daily affirmations

11:10

to meet the press. I want you

11:12

to listen to this and I want

11:15

this clip to be retained forever because

11:17

when the Truth and Reconciliation Committee comes

11:19

for Scott Besant, they'll play this. There

11:21

doesn't have to be a recession. Who

11:24

knows how the market is going to

11:26

react in a day and a week.

11:28

What we are looking at is building

11:30

the long-term economic fundamentals for prosperity that

11:33

I think the previous administration had put

11:35

us on the course toward financial calamity.

11:37

This is happening because 71 million people

11:39

looked at a stable growing economy and

11:42

said, you know what, I think I'd

11:44

rather set this on fire. Because a

11:46

reality show landlord told me there's immigrants

11:48

hiding. in my air conditioning ducts. These

11:50

tariffs were not strategy. They were spite.

11:53

They were vengeance. Cos playing is policy,

11:55

and they're hurting the people they claim

11:57

to help. Working folks and small business

11:59

owners and single moms trying to buy.

12:02

groceries without having the mortgage they're pancreas.

12:04

History will not be kind to Donald

12:06

Trump. And neither should we. This is

12:08

the greatest act of economic self-harm since

12:11

the Smootholly tariff in the 1930s, which

12:13

helped cause the Great Depression. So, good

12:15

job, guys. We've gone back to 1929,

12:17

but this time the villains wearing a

12:20

red hat. God help us. Or at

12:22

least, God short the market until you

12:24

get here. And in the midst of

12:26

all of this, do we have time

12:29

to talk a bit about Kilmarabrigo Garcia?

12:31

Let's talk about a story that the

12:33

Supreme Court won't acknowledge exists. This man

12:35

is a resident of Maryland and a

12:37

father and a husband and a lawful

12:40

immigrant with guaranteed protection from deportation. He

12:42

fled gang violence in El Salvador and

12:44

in 2019 a judge said he could

12:46

stay here because he was at a

12:49

risk of violence if he was returned

12:51

to El Salvador. The dude was raising

12:53

kids and he was working and he

12:55

was going to school. He was making

12:58

all his immigration hearings. He was in

13:00

zero trouble with the law. And as

13:02

you know, he was rounded up and

13:04

renditions to a violent Salvadoran Gulag prison.

13:07

By mistake, by mistake, the government says,

13:09

like, I mean, you know, mistake, like

13:11

when you, it's Christmas and you order

13:13

an air fryer on Amazon, but they

13:16

send a live poisonous snake that eats

13:18

your child, a mistake! They deported this

13:20

guy to this hellish torture Gulag, and

13:22

when they got caught, our government said

13:24

this was a clerical error. That's when

13:27

you misfileile a tax return, but... If

13:29

this was the HMV, like, can you

13:31

imagine what they do? But they owe

13:33

him his life back. You know, this

13:36

saying, to err is human, to deport

13:38

a guy to a foreign prison without

13:40

due process, and then shrug while he

13:42

rots as an evil fucking Republican immigration

13:45

policy. And what was the evidence that

13:47

sent this man packing a Chicago bulls

13:49

hat? The Trump administration, known lovers of

13:51

fashion-based justice, cited a hat and a

13:54

vague, unconfirmed tip from a prison snitch...

13:56

that this dude was MMMS-13, except he

13:58

never even lived in the state in

14:00

western New York. They said he lived

14:03

in. But they saw... in a Chicago

14:05

bull sat in a hoodie. And one

14:07

guy in prison who said he was

14:09

part of MS-13, in a part of

14:11

New York, the dude has never lived

14:14

in. That's not evidence that is racist

14:16

mad libs, and that's all it took.

14:18

Now, let me just say, don't get

14:20

me wrong. I'm actually all four violently

14:23

rounding up guys for wearing hoodies. Because

14:25

if we start violently rounding up every

14:27

man wearing a hoodie, there's some point.

14:30

And listen, if they did this

14:32

to a conservative right-wing guy, I'd

14:34

be just as angry. You right-wing

14:36

people celebrating this, like the inhumane

14:38

cur I was on CNN with

14:40

the other night, celebrating that this

14:42

innocent dad, who had temporary protected

14:44

status, is being tortured in a

14:46

gulag in a country he fled

14:49

for his own life. He's got

14:51

a five-year-old autistic son. This

14:54

guy could be an insane Latino macho asshole

14:56

for Trump, and I'd still fight to get

14:58

him back. And conservatives should too. And people

15:00

who want to claim their Christian should too.

15:02

So Judge Paul and Zenis of the Federal

15:04

District Court in Maryland said this was a

15:06

grievous error that shocks the conscience. Federal judge.

15:09

Call this a grievous error that shocks the

15:11

conscience. Do you know how messed up something

15:13

has to be to shock a federal judge

15:15

at this point in our history? These people

15:17

read case files full of cartel beheadings for

15:19

breakfast for breakfast. And what did

15:22

the U.S. government do when a federal

15:24

judge said to bring the guy back?

15:26

They laughed and the administration argued the

15:28

U.S. doesn't control El Salvador. Huh. Did

15:30

you catch that? They believe in sovereignty

15:32

now. The same people who wanted to

15:35

ban Tiktak and bomb Syria without warning

15:37

and they're going to steal Greenland and

15:39

Panama. But when it comes to returning

15:41

a guy to his family in the

15:43

States, oh, it's a sovereign nation, our

15:45

hands are tied. We feel awful! These

15:48

are the same folks who think that

15:50

America should control every uterus in the

15:52

Confederate states. But when it comes to

15:54

fixing their own catastrophic mistake, oh, our

15:56

hands are taught sovereignty. So they ran

15:58

to the Supreme Court and asked for

16:01

a timeout. and John Roberts, Supreme Court

16:03

referee and human snooze alarm, said, yeah,

16:05

okay, sure, let's all take a breath,

16:07

while this innocent man continues to be

16:09

tortured in a gulag. Chief Supreme

16:11

Court Justice Roberts has, as

16:13

of today, blocked, temporarily

16:15

the court order requiring Trump's White

16:18

House to get this man back

16:20

after illegally deporting him to a

16:22

torture hole in El Salvador. The

16:24

centrist and crisis Chief Justice

16:27

issued an interim stay and

16:29

paused. The court ordered to

16:31

require Kilmer Abrego Garcia,

16:33

wrongfully sent to be tortured in

16:35

El Salvador, to be back here by

16:37

midnight tonight. Not to fix it. He

16:40

wasn't turning it. He wasn't turning it.

16:42

He put a hold on the order.

16:44

Just to think about whether we should

16:46

think about whether fixing it's

16:48

going to be a little too much

16:51

trouble. These guys all claim to be

16:53

Catholic. With their administrative stay. I

16:55

mean, this is like, help me,

16:57

I'm drowning. Please. This is not checks

17:00

and balances. Letting the executive

17:02

branch punt a man into a hellhole and

17:04

telling the courts to take a coffee break

17:06

in the Supreme Court says, dude, this isn't

17:09

a Supreme Court. It's this mediocre fence

17:11

straddling John Roberts and what he does

17:13

to appear solemnonic when it's actually moral

17:16

cowardice. And judges and activists and lawmakers

17:18

are screaming to bring this man home.

17:20

His son is five. His wife is

17:23

a citizen. He had legal protection.

17:25

He had legal protection. You admitted you

17:27

were a moral racist. and they think

17:29

that doing the decent thing will make

17:31

them look weak. That's the level

17:33

of male mediocrity. They're too

17:36

busy inventing imaginary invasions and

17:38

calling every immigrant a national

17:40

security threat. I mean, Trump's

17:42

using wartime deportation powers, declaring an

17:45

invasion, not from a county, a

17:47

country, or an army, but from

17:49

a gang. MS-13 couldn't take over

17:51

Detroit. He's larping a world war to

17:53

deport brown people faster. Dude, we're not

17:56

under siege by a 29-year-old with a

17:58

work permit and a 5-year-old kid. And

18:00

let me just say, this man's not going

18:02

to become less famous. This story's not

18:04

going to gradually make Republicans look better

18:06

and stronger. Let's make this man famous.

18:08

Make him very famous, because in Trump's America,

18:11

being brown and wearing a hat is enough

18:13

to get you labeled a terrorist. But if

18:15

you're a white asshole in capital riot war

18:17

paint, trying to zip tie a senator, we'll

18:20

give you an organic kale smoothie in federal

18:22

holding. Again, this is not just about Kilmar.

18:24

This is about a government so committed

18:26

so committed to cruelty. They are happy to

18:29

send the wrong guy to prison, because

18:31

the cruelty is the point, and it

18:33

appeals to the kind of sociopaths they

18:35

want to appeal to. Trump's America's tough

18:37

on crime unless they commit the crime,

18:39

and in that case it's a clerical

18:42

error. Do you understand now? This man's

18:44

ripped from his family because of

18:46

a typo. It's like the scene from

18:48

Brazil without the British accents to make

18:50

the evil stooges look smarter. And

18:53

the same administration who says they

18:55

can't bring him back from Mel

18:57

Salvador. That's law in order right now.

18:59

Law protects the powerful and the order

19:01

is shut the hell up and disappear.

19:03

John Roberts orchestrated Citizens United that let

19:05

billionaires buy elections. Of course he's corrupt

19:07

as hell. He's giving presidents full immunity

19:09

to do all the crime they want

19:12

and called it an official act. And

19:14

now an innocent man is in a

19:16

death camp and Roberts is keeping him

19:18

there. Do not call these Trump policies.

19:20

These are Republican party policies. They belong

19:22

to all of the Republican Party.

19:24

The Senate, the Supreme Court and the voters.

19:26

This isn't a mistake. This wasn't a

19:28

deportation mistake. This is the state

19:30

deciding now it can snatch you

19:33

off the street, ignore your legal

19:35

protections, dump you in a cage

19:37

without explanation, and then argue that

19:39

courts can't make them undo it.

19:41

And that, brothers and sisters, is

19:43

fascism with a paper trail. They will

19:45

fail. We want to know what you guys

19:47

think. We're at 866, 997, 4748. We'll be

19:49

back in just a moment. This is Progress

19:52

After Dark. So,

20:00

I am so excited one of our favorite

20:02

authors to join us on the show

20:04

who's been visiting us for much of

20:06

the past 10 years. Every time Dr.

20:08

Brandy Scolazzi has a new book out.

20:10

I'm excited. She's an author and a

20:12

historian. She's an autistic author, a mystery

20:15

novelist, an editor. She grew up in

20:17

an underground house next to a graveyard

20:19

in abandoned coal lands and spent her

20:21

childhood reading about diseases and it had

20:23

a good impact on her. She of

20:25

course has pursued a career in all

20:27

kinds of dead stuff, a career in

20:30

science history, and she writes at the

20:32

intersections of history, mystery, and the weird.

20:34

And her new book, it doesn't deserve

20:36

to be classified in that way. It

20:38

is a book of hope, it is

20:40

a book of tragedy that has been

20:42

hidden from us. Brandy is the editor

20:45

of Medical Humanities and the new book

20:47

is called The Intermediaries and it tells

20:49

an amazing story about the Institute for

20:51

Sexual Science in Weimar Germany, the first

20:53

medical center in the world to support

20:55

trans and queer rights, offering everything from

20:57

hormone. therapy to affirming surgeries a century

21:00

ago. It is a great pleasure to

21:02

welcome Randy back to SiriusXM. Hello. Hello

21:04

John. It's really good to be back

21:06

here again. It's so great to see

21:08

you. How are you doing? I am

21:10

okay. It has been a wild year,

21:12

really wild year. Yeah, do you want

21:15

to share with the kids a little

21:17

bit of why it's been interesting for

21:19

you? So, you know, it's really interesting.

21:21

I gave a talk shortly after a

21:23

diagnosis that I had called Hope in

21:25

the Unexpected. is though it is about

21:27

how hatred rises in the shadow of

21:30

the Third Reich, it's also a story

21:32

about living authentically and living with hope

21:34

and this understanding that good can triumph

21:36

and that you can you can carry

21:38

on. And the reason I talk about

21:40

hope in the unexpected in regards to

21:42

this book is because while I was

21:45

still working on it, I was also

21:47

fighting cancer. I had a breast cancer

21:49

diagnosis, double mastectomy, and I have to

21:51

say, I went in for this double

21:53

mastectomy and woke up. And Trump was

21:55

president? No. Yes. So like, no. It

21:57

was first week of November with you.

22:00

That was, then was the surgery. Yeah.

22:02

And so I was like, I'm recovering

22:04

from, I have to go into, I'm

22:06

recovering from cancer and Trump is president.

22:08

Like, there's just too much cancer. there's

22:10

a cancer in my country, there's a

22:12

cancer in my body, but we got

22:15

rid of one of them. I would

22:17

say your recovery is well ahead of

22:19

America's, yeah. So far, so far, yes.

22:21

So it was wild. So I was

22:23

actually finishing up the book while under

22:25

chemotherapy and doing all that kind of

22:27

stuff, and you guys can't see me,

22:30

but my head looks like a chia

22:32

pet right now. Brandy typically has a

22:34

glorious, a glorious main of dark hair,

22:36

but you look amazing. Oh, thank you

22:38

look amazing. Thank you, I have a

22:40

very round head. but yeah all the

22:42

best are but you look you look

22:45

terrific and healthy and vibrant and it's

22:47

a very I mean it's a strange

22:49

time for you to be doing a

22:51

book tour on many levels what you've

22:53

gone through obviously but what the country's

22:55

going through right now and I will

22:57

confess I'm a history geek and I

23:00

you know I saw the cellular closet

23:02

like everyone else I love those rare

23:04

documentaries about LGBTQ history I didn't know

23:06

about this institute for sexual science. And

23:08

of course you find it because you've

23:10

written books about mad scientists who try

23:12

to sew a guy's head onto another

23:15

guy's body. You find these stories. This

23:17

is tough. I got to admit. But

23:19

it's beautiful. It is a beautiful story.

23:21

So it's not just that you haven't

23:23

heard about it. Most people haven't heard

23:25

about it and the people who do

23:27

know about it are other are other

23:30

transgender and LGBTQ people who who know

23:32

their own history of search their own

23:34

history and in fact it took a

23:36

small army of people to help me

23:38

uncover a lot of this stuff. I

23:40

first of all I have to say

23:42

getting The original story, one of the

23:45

stories that this, that the whole book

23:47

hangs on is the story of Dora

23:49

Richter. You may have heard of Lily

23:51

Elba and people think she's the first

23:53

person to have undergone gender reassignment surgery

23:55

or gender confirming surgery and she isn't.

23:57

She just happens to be the glamour.

24:00

first one. But there's a perfectly everyday

24:02

person, Dora Richter, she's just like

24:04

everyone else, she's working class. Her

24:07

story was what I had to find

24:09

and it was tucked away in an

24:11

archive in Berlin and getting it out

24:13

of Berlin. I literally wrote an article

24:15

about the like extraordinary levels of bureaucracy

24:17

that I had to go through to

24:20

to pull this article out of Berlin

24:22

and get it home again. But it's

24:24

an astonishing story. It's her

24:26

intake interview to enter into

24:29

the center, the Institute for

24:31

Sexual Science. And it's a

24:33

beautiful story about an unsinkable

24:35

spirit who was true to

24:37

herself at a time when

24:39

that very much could get you

24:41

killed. Yeah. I mean, we think

24:44

of the Weimar Republican. I think

24:46

of a very freewheeling libertine time.

24:48

I think of cabaret. I think

24:50

of, I guess, the Obama presidency.

24:52

But, but we are speed running

24:54

the vibe. We're nowhere near as

24:56

progressive as they were. What, what

24:58

first pulled you? towards the Institute

25:00

for Sexual Science. Do you remember

25:02

how you first heard about it?

25:04

And what was it exactly? Who

25:06

were the minds a hundred years

25:09

ago in Germany to give us this?

25:11

So it's odd. I actually started later. I

25:13

found the story of the first person to

25:15

have a falloplasty, Dylan, Michael Dillon,

25:17

and I wrote about that for Scientific

25:19

American. And while I was working on

25:21

that story, That story mentioned this institute.

25:24

I was like, wait, what institute

25:26

for sexual assign? What? There's

25:28

a, there was basically a giant LGBTQ

25:30

center run by a gay Jewish man in the

25:32

middle of Berlin under like right before

25:34

Hitler takes it? How? How is this

25:37

possible? So I started going back and

25:39

researching this history and everything I found

25:41

suggested to me. that it was like this

25:43

great place that got completely crushed and

25:46

destroyed and in fact the big bonfire

25:48

of books that you see on the

25:50

news reels from that period of the

25:52

Nazis burning books they are burning

25:54

the institutes library and people see

25:56

the film film reels and don't

25:58

know that's what They're literally burning

26:00

queer history. They're literally burning queer history

26:03

in those film reals. And I'm sorry,

26:05

they were doing falloplasties a hundred years

26:07

ago? Not quite. That was a little

26:10

bit later, but the post-World War I,

26:12

one of the gentlemen, Lindsay Fitzhares wrote

26:14

a book called Face Maker, and the

26:16

plastic surgeon in that book actually does

26:19

the first falloplasty. It really isn't new.

26:21

But what's great is. When I researched

26:23

the story, I found it wasn't nearly

26:26

as dark and depressing as I thought

26:28

it was going to be. I thought

26:30

it was going to be this, we

26:32

had this great place, it was super

26:35

progressive, think of the future that we

26:37

lost, how sad the Nazis destroyed it.

26:39

In fact, it's a lot more like

26:42

Star Wars. It's like the Rebel Alliance

26:44

of Remnant that exists and they they

26:46

carry on and they spread and they

26:48

move out of Germany and they seed

26:51

all of these LGBT, some of the

26:53

very first pro-homosexual groups in the United

26:55

States were technically seated by the Institute

26:58

because they were people who had gone

27:00

to the Institute to see how it

27:02

worked, came back and started building that

27:04

here and it's amazing. And so it

27:07

ended up being a book not about

27:09

how the Nazis won, but how they

27:11

didn't destroy. transgender history and queer history.

27:14

Did it make things a hell of

27:16

a lot more difficult? Yeah. Are we

27:18

going through a dark time right now?

27:20

Yeah. But this book is about how

27:23

we don't have to give in and

27:25

we don't have to let them steal

27:27

our joy and our power and our

27:30

force. And they can't erase that people

27:32

were here. Right. This is the same

27:34

day the National Park Service has removed

27:36

all reference to Harriet Tubman. from any

27:39

online postings about the underground railroad. This

27:41

is what fascists do. They try to

27:43

erase the history. So I have to

27:46

admit, there's so much I didn't know.

27:48

I mean, this institute, it sounds so

27:50

modern, they offered hormone therapy. They did.

27:52

A hundred years ago, surgery, counseling. The

27:55

first real safe space. for trans and

27:57

queer people. And what most surprised you

27:59

about the level of care and science

28:02

a hundred years ago? I think this

28:04

is always, so I'm a medical historian

28:06

and one of the things that always

28:08

surprises me is how I think that

28:11

we're so modern now and then you

28:13

go backwards and go, oh, wait a

28:15

minute. Yeah. They were pretty modern back

28:18

then too. One of the most amazing

28:20

things about the center is they had.

28:22

a kind of, it's not quite cradle

28:24

to grave, but they took people on

28:27

and they wanted to show people that

28:29

their lives mattered and that their lives

28:31

were normal. They would normalize things. So

28:34

they even took young teens who were

28:36

going through puberty and kind of like

28:38

having their sexual awakenings. And they were

28:40

like, okay, we wanted we want to

28:43

introduce you to other people who are

28:45

gay or homosexual or who are transgender

28:47

and we want you to get to

28:50

know them and get to understand what

28:52

the proper what's a protocol you know

28:54

what's the we learn that in straight

28:56

culture a lot of times what are

28:59

the dating rules like how do we

29:01

do this as gay people and they

29:03

also tried to teach them how to

29:06

be safe how not to get blackmailed

29:08

how not to fall afoul of the

29:10

police I mean this this was a

29:12

really amazing whole person look at what

29:15

it was like to live in a

29:17

time where it was still quite dangerous

29:19

to be yourself. I'm fascinated by the

29:22

man who headed this, Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld.

29:24

Yes. Seems like a rather remarkable guy,

29:26

but he was an endangered species in

29:28

more ways than one. Yes, he was.

29:31

So he was a German man, he

29:33

was Jewish, and he really identified with

29:35

Germany, and he thought of himself as

29:38

a German first, and Hitler labels him

29:40

as the most dangerous Jew in Germany.

29:42

And Magnus Hirschfeld says at one point,

29:44

I didn't really become a Jew until

29:47

the German hatred of Jews happened. Because

29:49

he's like, I always thought of myself

29:51

as a good German citizen. And now

29:54

I'm not permitted to be that. Now

29:56

I'm like, to the Germans, I am

29:58

just Jewish. though that was some kind

30:00

of a fall from grace. And the

30:03

other thing is he was homosexual. And he

30:05

wasn't as out. I mean, you couldn't,

30:07

it was pretty hard to do much

30:10

of anything and be very, very out.

30:12

But he was a doctor and

30:14

he was homosexual and he realized

30:16

over time just how many young

30:18

people. We're committing suicide. That's really

30:20

what sends him on this track. He

30:22

has a patient who commits suicide because

30:24

he can't, his parents want him to marry, and

30:27

he feels that he will not only not

30:29

be able to be his true self, but that

30:31

he will shackle an innocent woman to a man

30:33

who can't love her the way she needs to,

30:35

and he commits suicide on his wedding night. God.

30:38

And this is what launches Magnus Hirschfeld's

30:40

career, completely changes the direction of his

30:42

life, and he cites this story a

30:44

lot. and he decides, you know, this

30:46

is not unnatural. But I think the

30:48

most important thing is the hormone was

30:50

being discovered and the gene was being discovered

30:53

at the same time. Because they all thought

30:55

all of our sexuality was like in your

30:57

brain and that your brain did everything. And

30:59

now hormones are coming along and they're

31:01

going, wait a minute, you mean hormones

31:03

that are all over my body somehow

31:06

have more? It's like, welcome to the

31:08

proletarian. Do you mean, Freud might

31:10

not have been completely right for

31:12

the past quarter century? I mean,

31:14

Magnus Hirschfeld knew Freud was, Freud

31:16

did not actually like Magnus very

31:18

well, unfortunately. But the great thing

31:20

is hormones mean it's not top

31:22

down, right? It's like the hormones are

31:25

moving your body. Your brain's not in

31:27

charge of this. Yeah. And that meant a

31:29

lot of the sort of like goddown view

31:32

of morality. It wasn't sin.

31:34

Exactly. And it wasn't dysfunction.

31:36

Exactly. And so Magnus was

31:38

like, we need to show these

31:40

young men. and women eventually. I

31:42

should say he starts off kind

31:44

of a bit narrow, but Magnus

31:46

Hirschfeld is remarkable for the fact

31:48

that he can change his mind. Like

31:51

he grew and changed and learned from

31:53

women. A lot of women, he didn't

31:55

think that there were, originally he didn't

31:57

think that there could be people.

31:59

who were assigned female at birth

32:01

who wanted to be male. He

32:03

didn't realize it went that way

32:05

too. And then he met them.

32:07

And then he was like, oh,

32:09

I was wrong. And he'd write

32:11

a new book about, you know,

32:13

so he just kept adding to

32:15

this huge. compendium of gender and

32:17

he... Not judging them, not telling

32:20

them to pray, not setting up

32:22

conversion therapy groups? No. No. No.

32:24

And what's hilarious is he threw

32:26

these huge Christmas parties for all

32:28

the queer people in the neighborhood.

32:30

He's Jewish. We threw these huge

32:32

Christmas parties at the Institute and

32:34

these balls and just invite people

32:36

to come and be themselves. Jews

32:38

though. Absolutely. 100 years ago. How

32:40

was that talk received by the

32:42

Weimar Republic versus the extreme conservative

32:44

movement that was rising? So what's

32:46

interesting is he did all of

32:48

it through science and what he

32:50

was showing is the hormones seemed

32:52

to have so much to do

32:54

with who you were as a

32:56

person and that he felt that

32:58

your psychology and your hormones, your

33:00

body, everything. He was understanding this

33:02

brain body connection. And at one

33:04

point, I keep forgetting what the

33:06

exact numbers, but it's like several,

33:08

like into the hundreds of thousands,

33:10

like he's like, there's so many

33:12

variations, right? Thousands and thousands of

33:14

variations on gender, and he had

33:16

it cross, and he had these

33:18

huge, like, he would have loved

33:20

Excel, like, you know, he had

33:22

so much paperwork, he'd have loved

33:24

an Excel spreadsheet, but of all

33:26

the cross sections that gender could

33:28

be, because what if he didn't

33:30

think that there was any such

33:32

thing as all male or all

33:34

female or all female. and he

33:36

believed that Freud was sort of

33:38

felt something similar to that. He

33:40

did. He did. Freud actually, they

33:42

got along to the point that

33:44

they would go to some of

33:46

the same conferences, right? But Hirschfeld

33:48

really had the courage of his

33:50

convictions. Right. And he was ready

33:52

to lay it on the line

33:54

and what he wanted was to

33:56

decriminalize homosexual. Oh yeah, he was

33:58

about the less fortunate. Freud was

34:00

about Freud ink. True, yes. And

34:02

no offense, Freud freaks up. Freud

34:04

called Hirschfeld flabby and unappitizing as

34:06

a human. Which is a lovely

34:08

description for a straight guy to

34:10

say that. But you know, you

34:12

write about how this hysteria about

34:14

gender identity has never abated because

34:17

just as it was happening then

34:19

and they were compassionate medical authorities

34:21

then who wanted to help, there

34:23

was of course people who didn't

34:25

understand and didn't like things they

34:27

don't understand. What parallels do you

34:29

see brandy between the Vymar backlash

34:31

and today's anti-trans movements? Well, one

34:33

thing that is really, really apparent,

34:35

and it was while I was

34:37

writing it as well, is that

34:39

so much of this is rooted

34:41

actually in a kind of misogyny.

34:43

Oh, yeah. You know, because essentially

34:45

what happened in the Vimal, well,

34:47

leading up to this period, was

34:49

women were starting to work outside

34:51

of the home. They were trying

34:53

to get the vote. There were

34:55

people working on getting women reproductive

34:57

rights to their bodies. was on

34:59

the table back then. And it

35:01

was, there were people in power,

35:03

mostly white men, who said, well

35:05

we don't want this to change.

35:07

Not that it was worse, not

35:09

that it was better, they just

35:11

didn't want it to be different.

35:13

You know, and they just, they

35:15

were like, no, what if we

35:17

give them rights, somehow we will

35:19

have less rights, like it's pie

35:21

or something. And essentially, the backlash

35:23

was originally towards that, but then

35:25

they found out something really interesting.

35:27

You could accuse other people of

35:29

and that could be part of

35:31

your attack. So they said Jewish

35:33

people were too feminine, Jewish men

35:35

were too feminine, and then they

35:37

said when of course gay people

35:39

are too feminine, and Jewish people

35:41

will make you, Jewish people will

35:43

make our boys gay. This is

35:45

literally a line of reasoning. I

35:47

know. And so when I watch

35:49

the news and they're like, now

35:51

it's trans people, right? They're like,

35:53

well, trans people, if they see

35:55

a trans person, it'll make them,

35:57

trans or gay. had that kind

35:59

of power, don't you think we'd

36:01

use it? I know, nowadays the

36:03

Jews are just bringing in all

36:05

the brown people to replace us.

36:07

The Jews have upgraded their ethnic

36:09

cleansing strategy. Yeah. So it's like,

36:11

you know, if I really thought

36:14

that you just seeing a trans

36:16

person would somehow automatically make you

36:18

trans, like we would weaponize that

36:20

shit. We'd be trotting them out

36:22

everywhere, just amiated people. But anyway,

36:24

so I see this fear of

36:26

differences, fear of change. a real

36:28

resistance to want anyone to have

36:30

power except themselves. That's it, of

36:32

course. What happened to Dora? What

36:34

happened to Dr. Hirschfeld? So Dr.

36:36

Hirschfeld unfortunately became persona non grata

36:38

real quick. Long before actually Hitler

36:40

managed to completely take over in

36:42

1933, Hitler had hits out on

36:44

him. Literally had people going to

36:46

try and get him. They almost

36:48

did kill him. And in fact,

36:50

he was reported as dead. And

36:52

he got to read his own

36:54

obituary, which is always fun. They,

36:56

yeah, they cracked his skull. I

36:58

mean, it was a pretty bad,

37:00

they beat him up really bad

37:02

because Hitler said he's the most

37:04

dangerous Jew in Germany. And in

37:06

a similar vein to other persons

37:08

who like other people to do

37:10

their dirty work, basically, he sort

37:12

of went, wouldn't it be nice

37:14

if somebody knocked him off? I

37:16

don't know. My hands are clean,

37:18

right? It's not me, right. It's

37:20

not me, right. And so, you

37:22

know, he left the country, he

37:24

went on a world tour. That

37:26

sounds like you're running away, but

37:28

actually he seated these groups and

37:30

shared this wonderful information about, you

37:32

know, the breadth of gender everywhere

37:34

he went, all the way to

37:36

Japan, you know, so it's really

37:38

amazing. But at the same time,

37:40

Dora actually escapes. A lot of

37:42

people think Dora Richter was killed

37:44

when the Nazis come in 1933.

37:46

She lives. She out-lives the Nazis.

37:48

She escapes the Russians. She lives

37:50

long enough to know who the

37:52

Beatles are. Like, she was amazing.

37:54

She lived to be an old

37:56

woman. An old woman. And it's

37:58

quite funny. old woman. She did,

38:00

she lived as an old woman,

38:02

she kept, she kept birds, and in

38:05

the town that she lived in, that she

38:07

retired in, she became a lacemaker, she

38:09

had a life. And what's so funny

38:11

is, she has an unmarked grave, you

38:13

know, her grave is not there anymore,

38:16

but she died as just another

38:18

woman, which is exactly what success is.

38:20

She lived her own life, her own

38:22

way, and she was full of joy.

38:24

Terrible things happened to her, but she

38:26

was so joyous. being told as well.

38:28

Yeah, I know. Reading the book, going

38:30

through it, I was struck by how

38:32

the rhetoric and the tactics of

38:35

the anti-trans propaganda in

38:37

Nazi Germany are insanely

38:39

familiar. I mean, the

38:41

weaponizing pseudoscience, the scapegoating

38:43

minorities. How do we guard

38:45

against history repeating itself and how

38:47

do young queer people learn from

38:49

the courage and resilience of these

38:52

folks? There were times in writing this

38:54

book when I literally thought... Oh my

38:56

gosh, the Republicans have gotten a hold

38:58

of this material. They're just copying it.

39:00

It's so lockstep. It's as if they

39:02

just read the manual of how to beat

39:04

down people and just implemented it

39:06

almost without... any variation. Yeah. You

39:09

know, people say, what is it?

39:11

Mark Twain says, history doesn't repeat

39:13

it rhymes. No, I think it

39:16

repeats this time. I really like

39:18

there's, it's like they didn't even

39:20

bother. Yeah. Just re-release. It's

39:22

like history copies and paste

39:25

itself. Exactly. Or uses

39:27

ChatGPT or whatever. But I

39:29

think one of, if this book does

39:31

anything, I hope it's to

39:33

preserve the story of our. of

39:36

our ancestors, the pioneers, the people

39:38

who went before us, our grandmothers,

39:40

our grandfathers, in the trans and

39:42

queer community, to say, look, they

39:44

lived at what we often consider

39:47

to be the darkest point in

39:49

history, and they lived with joy,

39:51

and you having joy and happiness, you

39:53

having your happiness, that is an

39:55

act of radical resistance. You being

39:57

happy, when they want you to

39:59

be That's an act of radical resistance.

40:02

This is why I want everyone to

40:04

read this book. Because I think too

40:06

often we think it's bad. You know,

40:08

you wake up in the morning and

40:10

you go, oh my God, I just,

40:12

I took a scroll through the news.

40:15

How dare I enjoy my lauté? How

40:17

dare I be excited about a television

40:19

show that I'm going to watch? How

40:21

dare I be happy about the fact

40:23

that it's spring again? No, your happiness

40:26

is a fucking weapon. beat them with

40:28

it because your joy matters don't let

40:30

the outrage yield to anger don't let

40:32

yourself become a hateful angry person all

40:34

the time fight the injustice and don't

40:36

let it turn you into something you

40:39

shouldn't be and Dora suffered she did

40:41

she really did but yet it never

40:43

changed her like it did not make

40:45

her into something less Dora of course

40:47

you know she became more herself at

40:50

each juncture and Am I unhappy that

40:52

we're all going through this? Of course,

40:54

like I am so furious. I have

40:56

wake up with such fury. I cracked

40:58

one of my teeth. Like I'm just

41:00

so angry, right? But at the same

41:03

time, I'm beating cancer. At the same

41:05

time, Dora had her surgery, right? Like,

41:07

we do the things. that make us

41:09

whole again, and we do it in

41:11

community. And that's something that I neglected

41:13

to say, but the reason the Institute

41:16

was so important, the reason the Nazis

41:18

burned it, and then tried to erase

41:20

the fact that it ever existed, it's

41:22

because it wasn't about Hirschfeld. It was

41:24

about him creating this. incredible community of

41:27

people who were self-supporting, who were with

41:29

each other and who were willing to

41:31

take. I mean, they didn't burn everything.

41:33

People got that stuff out of there.

41:35

You know, it was like sending the

41:37

plans to Leah. I'm serious. It's such

41:40

a Star Wars story. It really is.

41:42

I can't wait for the movie. I'm

41:44

so glad you wrote this book. I'm

41:46

so happy to talk about it with

41:48

you. I want everyone to buy the

41:51

intermediaries. I'm actually launching the book here.

41:53

So on May 13th, I'll be at

41:55

the Bureau. And then I have an

41:57

event the next day. I'm also going

41:59

to be in Boston and DC and

42:01

a couple other places. So I'll get

42:04

that information out there too, guys. Where

42:06

do we go to learn all things?

42:08

Dr. Brandy Skelachie. My website is a

42:10

good one, though it is in the

42:12

middle of being radically overhauled, but you

42:15

can find Brandy skelachie.com. And there's only

42:17

one of me, actually, actually, so if

42:19

you spell it right. Which is not

42:21

always easy. People saying.com knows what you're

42:23

talking about. Yeah, yeah. I'm the only

42:25

one because I have I my last

42:28

name Skylache is actually an Italian last

42:30

name and my first name I'm named

42:32

after a French alcohol so you know

42:34

it is so great to have so

42:36

great to have you with us every

42:38

time so it is so great to

42:41

have you with us every time you

42:43

write to talk about it with you

42:45

but it's so great to see how

42:47

healthy you are how thriving you are

42:49

I need you are I need you

42:52

around. everyone read the intermediaries by dr

42:54

brandy scolache and we'll be right back

42:56

in just a moment this is progress

43:07

Hi, I'm John Fugelson. And I'm Professor

43:09

Corey Brechner. And we are here to

43:11

tell you about the oath in the

43:13

office, an essential new podcast about the

43:15

extremely strange times we find ourselves in.

43:17

In the first few seconds in office,

43:20

the President of the United States is

43:22

required to take an oath, preserve, protect,

43:24

and defend the Constitution. And we're going

43:26

to hold him to that pledge. despite

43:28

the fact that he has threatened democracy

43:30

and even the law itself. It's all

43:32

about hope for what democracy should look

43:34

like and getting real about what our

43:37

democracy does look like from an esteemed

43:39

constitutional scholar and a deeply unqualified comedian.

43:41

Subscribe to the oath in the office

43:43

wherever you get your podcast. You

43:49

may have heard of the God pod,

43:51

which is a satirical comedy podcast hosted

43:53

by God and Jesus. This divine duo

43:55

reviews the news of the week. They

43:57

try to make sense of this world

43:59

that they have created. It is dynamite.

44:01

I'm a big fan of the podcast.

44:03

Both in terms of what it says

44:05

about theology, what it says about politics,

44:08

and comitically, these guys are tight. The

44:10

Godpot is a great. Satire in a

44:12

world that thinks Satire in parody are

44:14

the same thing and I will say

44:16

of all the things God has created

44:18

in this century This could be my

44:20

favorite so far. So without any further

44:22

eloquence. It's a pleasure to welcome God

44:24

Almighty Jehovah himself and his only begotten

44:26

son Jesus also known as Yeshua Bar

44:28

Yosif to serious ex-em welcome gentlemen Wow

44:30

That was the nicest intro we've ever

44:32

received Jesus Christ we have arrived I

44:34

was yeah I was good now now

44:36

I before I go any further I

44:38

have to ask God as a Catholic

44:40

raised with the Trinity I know you

44:42

identify with they as your pronoun is

44:44

the Holy Spirit ever a part of

44:46

this or do you guys not talk

44:48

about the Holy Spirit? Yes yes we

44:50

may the Holy Spirit is we have

44:52

a little dove okay that yeah you

44:54

might see at some point stay tuned

44:56

let me ask if you could tell

44:58

the people God in the beginning How

45:00

did this podcast originate? How did you

45:02

create this? Well, you know, I've been

45:04

around forever. And then, what was it?

45:06

2019 Jesus, April Fool's Day, 2019. I

45:09

did not plan that. That was not,

45:11

you know, I realized after the fact,

45:13

maybe not the best day because people

45:15

thought it was a joke. But it's

45:17

been, what? Six years now, Jesus. Yeah,

45:19

six years. And I mean, one reason

45:21

we decided to launch the podcast was

45:23

because nobody was listening to us anymore.

45:25

And people are twisting our words in

45:27

the Bible as you so magnificently put

45:29

it when you came on the podcast

45:31

a couple of weeks ago. And yeah,

45:33

it's been a lot of fun talking

45:35

directly to these events. Longtime fan of

45:37

both of you. I mean,

45:39

to be fair,

45:41

more a long time

45:43

fan of Jesus

45:45

than God, but you

45:47

know, I mean

45:49

and that means that

45:51

the plan worked

45:53

because God needed somebody

45:55

to come in

45:57

and kind of give

45:59

his whole brand

46:01

a refresh a younger

46:03

look. Did God

46:05

just need a good

46:07

cop? And he

46:10

decided to draft his

46:12

son into that

46:14

role? Is that what

46:16

we're talking about? Pretty

46:18

much. Yeah, pretty much. And I think

46:20

he did it because he likes

46:22

to make jokes about how he crucified

46:25

me. It's a little triggering to

46:27

me still, but he loves my display.

46:29

I'm sweating bullets right now because

46:31

I'm clearly on the hot seat. I'm

46:33

just going to stay quiet, wait

46:35

for the moment to pass. God, you

46:38

were a big social media presence

46:40

before the animated podcast began. And you

46:42

know, the first time I ever

46:44

saw your beautiful South Park -esque face,

46:46

I just thought, wow, this is someone

46:48

who really grasps satire. And I'm curious how

46:50

you feel about the current state of social

46:52

media because Twitter is not really the same

46:55

Reichstag as when I first found you

46:57

there. Yeah,

46:59

obviously it's these

47:01

billionaires that are really going for

47:03

it, aren't they? They

47:07

suck. Everybody hates them, it feels

47:09

like. And

47:11

boy, what did I, what did

47:13

Jesus say? What did that thing you said

47:15

about the camels in heaven, Jesus? The

47:18

camels in heaven. I'm forgetting what you're referring

47:20

to. I think it's about something, something

47:22

about an eye of a needle and a

47:24

camel, something, something. Oh, that, yes, yes.

47:26

It's easier for camels in heaven to go

47:28

through the eye of a needle than

47:30

for a rich man to get into heaven.

47:32

That's it. And for God, I mean,

47:34

he got really tired of all the social

47:37

media nonsense, so then he moved over

47:39

to podcasting. Yeah, basically, John, you know, yeah,

47:41

I don't post on

47:44

X, but I,

47:46

you know, someday, someday

47:48

soon he might have to sell it

47:50

again, but blue sky is kind

47:52

of, is kind of tight right now.

47:54

Nice, yeah. And I'm

47:57

doing my thing on Substack. because

48:00

it's it's popping off over there. Any

48:02

place we can get messages from you

48:04

is great for me because I would

48:06

imagine that you know burning Bush is

48:08

great but you know Twitter was fine

48:10

I guess but a burning Bush you

48:12

never you never have you know Nazis

48:14

giving comments afterwards so I appreciate whenever you

48:17

weigh in. Yeah it's just what was I

48:19

thought that you know no Nazis was

48:21

was something that everybody was like in

48:23

agreement with for a long time, a

48:25

team, and then all of a sudden

48:28

it's just like Elon, it's sick hiling,

48:30

they're all sick hiling and boy the

48:32

masks came off didn't they? The masks

48:34

came off and underneath it was a

48:37

hood. God I have a question about

48:39

that. Do you do you still bless

48:41

America or do you bless America kind

48:43

of ironically now like when a parent

48:45

brags about their least accessible child like

48:47

do you do you still bless us?

48:50

Wow, you know, there's a lot of good

48:52

people and I bless them like you

48:54

John Fuegelsang You know, how do you

48:56

how do you damn a whole? Whole, you

48:59

know, there's good people and bad

49:01

everywhere, right? Yeah, I know I that

49:03

was the problem with Sodomy

49:05

God But I tell you yeah

49:07

when people say God bless America.

49:09

I'm like bro shut up. You're making

49:11

me look bad. Why are you

49:13

gonna link me to that right now?

49:16

Okay as if my numbers aren't

49:18

bad enough Yeah. You know, Jesus, let

49:20

me ask you a question. On

49:22

a scale from turn the other

49:24

cheek to flip a table in

49:26

the temple. How pissed off are

49:28

you at American Christianity right now?

49:30

I am very pissed off at

49:32

American Christianity. They've twisted my words,

49:34

my dad's words time and time

49:36

again, and we've become sick of

49:38

it. We also hate how Trump

49:40

takes a getting back to God's point.

49:42

Trump said a couple of weeks or

49:44

a few months ago, I guess now

49:46

at this point. He said he was

49:48

saved by God to make America great

49:50

again. I wanted to ask about that.

49:52

Yeah, God had absolutely nothing to do

49:54

with that. I had absolutely nothing to

49:56

do with that. They just twist their

49:58

words and you know, I... Let's face it,

50:01

I'm a socialist. I cracked the

50:03

code, you guys. Listen, they're using

50:05

chat cheapity to come up with

50:07

their terror of plans. And I

50:09

have detected at this point, it's

50:11

been like eight years, John, or

50:13

whatever. Yeah. How many times has Trump

50:15

done something where they're like,

50:17

that was in a B80s movie?

50:19

Yeah, well that seems to be

50:21

what's going on here with the

50:24

money lenders in our government, but

50:26

I just feel for both of

50:28

you watching the news here because

50:30

I imagine the two of you

50:32

watching America and constantly both of

50:34

you screaming, that's not what I

50:36

meant from heaven at these evangelicals.

50:38

Yeah, I mean, mostly my

50:40

reaction is just like, the fuck?

50:42

Yeah, yeah. I can't believe he's selling

50:45

Bibles now. He put his name

50:47

on it too, yeah. I mean,

50:49

you should have copyrighted that when

50:51

you had the chance. The whole

50:53

cross brand. If you would copyright

50:56

the whole cross, you could have

50:58

probably raked it in with merchandizing

51:00

and not at the church wouldn't

51:02

have had to pillage so much.

51:04

Yeah, I mean, if I was Disney,

51:07

I would just basically have

51:09

the copyright to the letter

51:11

T. Did you mean it like Love Your

51:13

Neighbour even if he voted for fascism

51:15

or is there a clause we missed?

51:17

We still have to love them if

51:19

they voted for racists and fascists Jesus.

51:21

You know what, you know what, this

51:23

is a bit of a tough one for

51:25

me I have to admit because I

51:27

do, it is in my DNA to

51:29

Love Thy Neighbour, that's sort of my

51:31

whole thing. Yes, you're good. I guess

51:33

I would say you need to try to

51:35

try to believe in, you got to

51:37

try to look for the best in

51:39

people. down and then all this fighting

51:42

on social media time and time

51:44

again it's exhausting and you think

51:46

everybody's evil but when you actually

51:48

go and meet your neighbor maybe

51:50

physically next door you realize oh yeah they

51:52

did vote for Trump and they do want

51:54

to roll back my rights but they

51:56

are still a nice person it's very

51:58

confusing because they're just brainwashed But this

52:00

is why I like your son so

52:02

much. He won't, he won't let me

52:04

hate these people. He won't let me

52:06

hate them, even when they're begging for

52:08

it. This is... I am, I am

52:10

forgiving to a fault and often on

52:12

the podcast. I am, I am trying

52:14

to pull God out of the gutters.

52:16

He gets so sad sometimes that

52:18

I get it. But you got to see

52:20

the best in people. If you don't have

52:23

any hope, I mean, what's the point. You

52:25

used to watch a lot of Mr. Rogers,

52:27

where did you get all that stuff Jesus?

52:29

Yes, dad, you used to play it for

52:31

me all the time while you were answering

52:34

prayers. That was like my iPad at the

52:36

time. Yeah, what was his line? Look for

52:38

the helpers. Yeah, the neighbors. I mean, yeah,

52:40

Jesus, your last words, you were forgiving the

52:42

people who were violently murdering you. So I'll

52:45

say at least you, you kept it consistent.

52:47

The only person he didn't forgive with

52:49

me. He was like, oh, why have

52:51

you forsaken me? Well, in fairness,

52:54

it's not like he was playing

52:56

victim, God, he was being brutalized

52:58

pretty hard at the moment. Yeah,

53:01

and like I said earlier, he

53:03

doesn't let me forget it. He

53:05

does not let me forget my

53:07

crucifixion. So he's been getting back.

53:10

Hey, speaking of which, coming up

53:12

in a couple days for 20,

53:14

bro, this year, Easter falls on

53:17

420. I'm hoping you're so high

53:19

you totally forget that it's Easter.

53:21

I get out of it scotch

53:23

free. John actually one year on

53:26

the podcast I did duke it

53:28

out with the Easter Bunny

53:30

because she was kind of

53:32

coming up on my whole holiday.

53:34

I was going to say. Yeah,

53:36

yeah, so we brought it out. Who

53:39

won? God, I can't remember. I

53:41

think she won. I think she

53:43

beat the shit out of me. Yeah,

53:45

by the way, so everyone knows, like, we'll

53:47

have this posted as the video for the

53:49

podcast, like, I'm looking at God and Jesus,

53:51

I'm seeing their faces, you guys are animated,

53:53

and you're very beautiful, and it's really, really

53:56

fun to watch the show, to watch you

53:58

interact, but God, I notice you... do in

54:00

this form you appear to us in

54:02

you got a lot of a lot

54:04

of red eye God I'm noticing a

54:06

lot of like a like it looks

54:08

like you've been up all night or

54:10

something that's made your eyes really red

54:12

and kind of like you're working the

54:14

red eye shift here John what time

54:16

is it is like you know you

54:19

think God is just gonna work all

54:21

day judging the quick in the dead

54:23

and not for take of his own

54:25

leaf Oh, it's late. Tell people all

54:27

the time. If you don't like marijuana

54:29

plants or gay people or foreskin, it's

54:31

too bad. God put them all

54:33

here. Right? You would not put

54:35

four skins or cannabis plants here,

54:37

God, if you didn't want them

54:39

to be here, am I right? Yeah, I

54:42

can't believe it. Yeah, that whole force, that

54:44

was a prank. Anyway. And I am gay.

54:46

That's why I wear the Rainbow Sash, because

54:49

I am gay. I want every listener on

54:51

serious XM to know it. I didn't know.

54:53

So this is why you were not married

54:55

at 33, like a nice Jewish boy of

54:58

your age. Exactly. Just wants it to be

55:00

known in case you couldn't tell? And

55:02

Mary Magdalene and I were never in

55:04

a relationship. I know I've read the

55:06

book and she was never a prostitute

55:09

either. That was that was Pope Gregory

55:11

lied about her. Oh and she gets

55:13

mad about that. Not bad. I just

55:15

wrote a whole book about how they

55:18

began blaming her for stuff that she's

55:20

never mentioned doing in the Bible. God

55:22

I gotta say. You know, I've been struggling

55:24

a bit. I've had this theory that

55:26

for a while that David Lynch died

55:29

a couple months ago and then took

55:31

over for you. But now I see you

55:33

here, so clearly David Lynch is not working

55:35

as God. This is you for all this.

55:37

I wish he would take over, but you

55:39

know, when you first get to heaven, it's

55:41

just like party time, you know? I would

55:43

imagine. Good music too. But when

55:46

you made Trump, Lord. Was it a

55:48

software? Was it a software glitch? Was

55:50

it a software glitch or were you

55:52

just like trying to test everyone's free

55:54

will really hard? What was the process?

55:57

Hold on, I, I, habeas corpus, I put

55:59

the system. I don't like

56:01

the beginning of that

56:04

question because when you

56:06

put it in a ha,

56:08

I would say his parents

56:11

made him and upbringing nurture,

56:13

you know. I see. Why are

56:15

you putting it on me? I'm

56:17

just trying to see where the

56:20

buck stops almighty. I'm just trying

56:22

to see where the buck stops

56:24

on this Well, and John when

56:26

God gets backed into a corner.

56:28

He uses two words free will

56:30

He says the humans did it.

56:33

Oh, I thought you're gonna say

56:35

look you I know free will

56:37

also good, but yeah, no, John.

56:39

I like that Trump. You know

56:41

I I I do listen

56:43

Have I made mistakes? Yes. Could

56:46

I have done better? Sure. Me

56:48

and the rest of the Democrats

56:50

could have definitely done it.

56:52

Wait a minute. That was

56:54

Corey Booker last week. Yeah,

56:57

so I'm sorry, Doug. About

56:59

Trump, I just want to

57:01

say, and about everything. Yeah. It's

57:03

okay. I've got to say I've

57:05

always sort of viewed you guys the

57:07

way I view Darth Vader and Luke

57:10

Skywalker. in that the father has a

57:12

lot more power, but the son's a

57:14

lot less of a dick. You know,

57:16

dad can do more, but the son's

57:19

a much nicer guy. Is that fair

57:21

to a fair comparison? Yes. God

57:23

is a huge, huge Star Wars

57:25

fan. God's the advocate of this.

57:28

Yeah, after he saw the first

57:30

movie, I think he started modeling.

57:32

What we do after Star Wars really

57:34

loves that franchise. Oh, yeah I didn't

57:36

know well then God I should ask

57:38

then God if you if you see

57:40

everything did you watch every episode of

57:42

the acalyte did did you go that

57:44

far? I did I did I did I

57:46

did I didn't may not have thought

57:48

it was you know it got better

57:51

as it went along you know I

57:53

don't really particularly like you know when

57:55

they show someone nakedly walk into a

57:57

pool and you see their sexy butt

57:59

mm-hmm You know, it's okay. It's okay

58:02

when I do it. Just not,

58:04

you know, other people. No, it was,

58:06

what did you think, John? I

58:08

thought the, I thought the, I thought

58:10

the acalyte was a lot like America.

58:13

It very gradually got better as

58:15

it went along. Oh, okay. That's nice.

58:17

You know what my favorite one

58:19

is? Have you watched Andor? Oh, I've

58:21

just, well you should know God, you

58:24

see all, I've just begun making

58:26

my kid watch Andor and I'm revisiting

58:28

season one and it's even better

58:30

the second one. Yes, that's the one,

58:32

Jesus knows, that's the one where I'm

58:35

like, oh. He feels so inspired.

58:37

That one hits. I've always wanted to

58:39

talk to Star Wars with these two

58:41

exact guys. This is really a,

58:43

I've waited my whole life for this

58:46

and I wish my parents could

58:48

have been here, maybe it's better they

58:50

weren't. But God and Jesus, I gotta

58:52

say I really admire you, well

58:54

Jesus I really admire your work. God

58:57

I admire, no I admire God's

58:59

work too. Not all of your deeds,

59:01

but Earth is great, universe, the heavens

59:03

and earths, great job. You know,

59:05

you didn't need to smite the Canaanites

59:08

that many times, but you were

59:10

younger then, I know you had a

59:12

temper. Wait a minute, wait a minute,

59:14

did you know? Did you know

59:16

the Canaanites? No, but your son told

59:19

me I'm not allowed to hate

59:21

him, so it's not my thing. I

59:23

don't remember anything that I don't even

59:25

remember yesterday. What is the best

59:27

way for our listeners to follow. God

59:30

and to follow Jesus on the

59:32

God pod. Jesus hit it. I'll hit

59:34

the numbers. So the God podcast.com that's

59:36

where the podcast is hosted and

59:38

that's where God is doing a daily

59:41

newsletter and then across social media

59:43

on Instagram the username is Good God

59:45

above. That's right. Just go to the

59:47

God podcast.com. That's the simplest answer.

59:49

Get there and watch all the links

59:52

you need. We love your support

59:54

at the newsletter in particular. Honestly, I

59:56

love your show. You can just bliss

59:58

out watching episode after episode. You

1:00:00

guys, the comedy is so tight and

1:00:03

the theology is perfect. It's, I've

1:00:05

waited a long time for this. you

1:00:07

John thank you and Jesus let me

1:00:09

say long time it's really been

1:00:11

great having you and I hope you'll

1:00:14

come back again Jesus I hope

1:00:16

you'll come again oh thank you so

1:00:18

much I will I will see what

1:00:20

he did that's that's going to

1:00:22

be heard but I'll come back we

1:00:25

won't tell him he never leaves

1:00:27

guys thank you so much really great

1:00:29

work we have some lovely parting gifts

1:00:31

for you all mighty Jehovah and

1:00:33

yesua bariosa also known as the Messiah

1:00:36

Jesus Christ so good to have

1:00:38

you both with us thank you Thank

1:00:40

you. Keep the good times going. We've

1:00:42

got to take a very quick

1:00:44

break for me to get excommunicated back

1:00:47

with Rhonda Hansen and your calls

1:00:49

in just a moment. This is progress

1:00:51

after dark. Don't go away. Greetings. Greetings

1:00:53

Daywalkers. These are difficult times and

1:00:55

if you believe in justice, progress and

1:00:58

democracy, the news you read and

1:01:00

listen to can be pretty depressing. And

1:01:02

that's why there's a new podcast called

1:01:05

Good News for Lefties and America.

1:01:07

Get this every day it features positive

1:01:09

stories for progressive listeners, because no

1:01:11

matter how disturbing or horrific or soul

1:01:13

crushing the headlines might be, there's still

1:01:16

always hope that we can build

1:01:18

on for a better tomorrow. We've seen

1:01:20

it happen before. Good news for

1:01:22

Lefties in America. Listen on this platform

1:01:24

at Good News for lefties.com or wherever

1:01:27

fine podcasts are heard. The Majesty

1:01:29

of Rhonda Handsome. She is a great

1:01:31

comedian, writer, director, actor. Rhonda's open

1:01:33

for Anita Baker and Diana Ross and

1:01:35

Aretha Franklin. She does great solo shows.

1:01:38

She and illustrator Scott Williams are

1:01:40

back with more polytunatics. Catch them at

1:01:42

facebook.com/polytunatics and at rhondahansom.com. Rhonda, welcome

1:01:44

back. I'm black. Y'all. You're all pretty

1:01:46

and dulled up for the radio, Rhonda.

1:01:49

Folks who can't hold up for

1:01:51

me. It's all for you John and

1:01:53

the army of the night. I

1:01:55

love your people. I do, I do.

1:01:57

Rhonda, there's so much going on in

1:02:00

the world and so much cacophony

1:02:02

between the deportations of people who have

1:02:04

a right to be here and

1:02:06

of course the tariffs and I want

1:02:08

to thank you because you're you're actually

1:02:11

talking about something that I talk

1:02:13

about that I don't hear many people

1:02:15

talking about and that is the

1:02:17

the USAID cuts specifically what it's going

1:02:19

to do in Africa up to 18

1:02:22

million more cases of malaria potentially

1:02:24

a million cases of potentially fatal

1:02:26

childhood malnutrition and and and they're

1:02:28

saying that What's happening right now

1:02:30

with Elon Musk cutting USAID there

1:02:32

could be 600% more HIV infections

1:02:34

in Africa like this is why

1:02:36

other countries like us this is

1:02:38

why America has a good reputation

1:02:40

not because we blow shit up

1:02:42

because we have been a beacon

1:02:44

of light for so many people

1:02:46

over the years but folks who

1:02:48

hate science and hate charity just

1:02:50

don't really want us to be popular

1:02:53

anymore. It's it's a little sad

1:02:55

job because it that number that

1:02:57

you're talking about who

1:02:59

will be devastated in

1:03:02

South Africa, I feel

1:03:04

like there's going to

1:03:06

be reverberations of that

1:03:08

around the globe, including

1:03:11

here in America. And

1:03:13

the idea that you

1:03:15

are stopping that kind

1:03:17

of preventive care or

1:03:19

or stopping the devastation

1:03:22

that comes from something

1:03:24

as strong as HIV.

1:03:26

Right. It's unconscionable and

1:03:28

I really feel I

1:03:30

really feel like America

1:03:33

has no moral compass,

1:03:35

no understanding, no feeling

1:03:37

and we are going

1:03:39

to be carrying the

1:03:41

label of genocide as

1:03:43

much as any other country.

1:03:45

USAID helped give first-time HIV

1:03:48

meds that cost less than

1:03:50

12 cents a day, which

1:03:52

means 1 million dollars, could

1:03:55

keep 22,000 people in Africa

1:03:57

with HIV alive for one

1:03:59

year. and instead of spending one

1:04:01

million dollars to keep 22,000 people

1:04:03

alive for a year, Elon must

1:04:06

just spend 20 million to try

1:04:08

to buy a Wisconsin Supreme Court

1:04:10

seat. I mean, I mean, it's

1:04:12

right there, like, like, like money

1:04:14

saves lives and they don't want

1:04:16

lives to be saved. And, uh, and

1:04:19

his money didn't buy that seat

1:04:21

for him, I believe. Correct.

1:04:23

He lost that gambit. His

1:04:25

wealth got redistributed, Rhonda. his

1:04:27

wealth got redistributed like a

1:04:29

good Marxist yeah but i

1:04:31

like that word the that

1:04:33

phrase the redistribution of wealth

1:04:35

do you think that this

1:04:38

will happen in our lifetime

1:04:40

no no i can't believe how evil

1:04:42

these guys are and how that how

1:04:44

their trolls are laughing at it i

1:04:46

mean when we see the news of

1:04:49

children dying of hiv

1:04:51

because this unelected south

1:04:53

african apartheid brat billionaire

1:04:55

decided that we were going

1:04:57

to let him die. Like, I don't

1:04:59

know, I want to believe that most

1:05:02

people will care. I want to believe

1:05:04

that most Americans will care, that children

1:05:06

are going to die because of these

1:05:09

pro-life frauds, but I just don't

1:05:11

know. There's so much going on

1:05:13

around in our world where we

1:05:15

are letting children, which is horrible,

1:05:18

children die, but human beings die,

1:05:20

with the callousness that is just

1:05:22

amazing. I feel that we

1:05:24

have discarded our humanity.

1:05:27

We lost it, maybe we lost

1:05:29

it a while ago, but we

1:05:31

have just kicked it to the

1:05:34

curb, buried it, and thrown a

1:05:36

bomb on it because we are

1:05:38

not human beings anymore. We are

1:05:41

so many numbers that I feel

1:05:43

the elites, whoever they are, who

1:05:45

may or may not own social

1:05:48

media platforms, are just

1:05:50

ready to get rid

1:05:52

of. Almost all of us

1:05:54

on this planet, John. You know, I

1:05:56

do, I do wear a tin

1:05:58

foil bonnet when I... go to

1:06:01

sleep, but I do

1:06:03

feel like they are ready.

1:06:05

to just clear this planet of

1:06:07

most of us. Acceptable deaths for

1:06:10

pro-life folks. Yeah. We were at

1:06:12

866-997-4748. You know Rhonda this weekend,

1:06:14

however, there was over 1,200 protests

1:06:16

around the country, around the world,

1:06:19

thousands and thousands of people. I've

1:06:21

asked people to call in with

1:06:23

their experience with the protests this

1:06:25

weekend. I didn't see that much

1:06:28

coverage on mainstream corporate media, but

1:06:30

on social media. I saw some people

1:06:32

were out all over the country.

1:06:34

New York had thousands. a lot of

1:06:37

pictures of that and I was so happy I

1:06:39

was glad to see why people out

1:06:41

there putting their their bodies on

1:06:43

the line for what they believe

1:06:45

in I really think it's important

1:06:48

that they that they express themselves

1:06:50

as vociferously as possible I also

1:06:52

notice that there was very little

1:06:54

interaction from law enforcement very little

1:06:56

interaction from law enforcement very little

1:06:59

protection from law enforcement along the

1:07:01

the protest route way here in

1:07:03

New York City which caused many

1:07:05

to wonder if that was a

1:07:08

deliberate action by our beloved mayor

1:07:10

who is now carrying water for

1:07:12

Donald Trump. What is this

1:07:14

guy doing? Did he say he

1:07:17

did not want protesters protected or

1:07:19

he said he did not want

1:07:21

them assaulted? What was this? We

1:07:23

don't know his deal. We just

1:07:25

know there were everything when everyone

1:07:28

I talked to said there were

1:07:30

just not a lot of cops around.

1:07:32

Yeah. Well, for you know me,

1:07:34

I have protest. I protested a

1:07:36

lot in the past and I

1:07:39

probably will again in the future

1:07:41

but I really feel like black

1:07:43

people when we are on

1:07:46

the line somehow even when

1:07:48

it's white people who

1:07:50

are doing vandalizing property

1:07:52

and spray painting things we

1:07:54

are the ones who seem

1:07:57

to get targeted and I

1:07:59

thought it was amazing that there

1:08:01

was so little assault. There was

1:08:03

so little assault from law enforcement and

1:08:05

I'm glad. I'm glad. Now do you

1:08:08

really think this is going to change?

1:08:10

anyone's mind who has the power to

1:08:12

slash social security. No, I don't

1:08:14

think that. I think we are in,

1:08:17

I've said for a while, we are

1:08:19

in the first minute of the first

1:08:21

round of a 15-round fight and

1:08:23

there will be many many more days

1:08:26

of protests and rallies over the next

1:08:28

three years just like this one. We're

1:08:30

in a 15 round fight and I

1:08:33

feel like we don't have a

1:08:35

trainer in our corner. We don't have

1:08:37

a cut man in our corner. We

1:08:39

are learning on our own. We are

1:08:42

learning on our own. We are learning

1:08:44

on our own. We are learning

1:08:46

on our own. We even have a

1:08:48

pretty girl in a bikini to carry

1:08:51

a car. There's a couple of those.

1:08:53

And you know, you got, you

1:08:55

got Corey, Corey Booker is flashing. years

1:08:57

ago in COVID. What's going on with

1:09:00

the tariffs now in Wall Street? Like,

1:09:02

we have this incredible existential fear around

1:09:04

the world. We're all shivering in

1:09:07

the shadow of this menacing question mark.

1:09:09

And the only thing people of America

1:09:11

and the world can agree on is

1:09:14

nobody can trust anything the president

1:09:16

of the United States says. This is

1:09:18

exactly where we work with COVID-5. I

1:09:20

feel like I should be out trying

1:09:23

to find hand sanitizer, Rhonda. I gotta

1:09:25

go pay 10 bucks for toilet

1:09:27

paper. Well, that's what I

1:09:29

was wondering if we're going to be

1:09:31

paying extra for a tariff on toilet

1:09:34

paper now. I think my copy of

1:09:36

the Trump Bible might have to serve

1:09:38

as toilet paper for the next year.

1:09:40

I don't know. We are at 866-9-97-4748.

1:09:43

You want to talk to some of

1:09:45

the RFRAF and the evil army of

1:09:47

the night, Miss Hansen? I want the

1:09:49

RFRAF. Wayne and Oklahoma has been on

1:09:52

hold forever. Wayne, welcome. You're on serious

1:09:54

XM Progress with Rhonda and me. Hey,

1:09:56

a long time with your first time

1:09:58

calling. Honored, thank you. Thank you. As

1:10:00

I told your screener, I think it's

1:10:03

funny, I just, I wish for no

1:10:05

other reason than just for the shits

1:10:07

and giggles of it all that George

1:10:09

Carlin was still alive. He'd be having

1:10:12

an absolute field day. Oh, Carlin and

1:10:14

Richard Pryor both, both, and Bill Hicks

1:10:16

too. Yeah, but, but, but, if, think

1:10:18

about this right now, hey, we're going

1:10:21

to start with the El Salvadorians. And

1:10:23

we're going to get them out of

1:10:25

the country and everybody in the crowd

1:10:27

would be like, yeah! And then he'd

1:10:30

be like, okay, we're going to get

1:10:32

the Mexicans out of the country. Everybody

1:10:34

in the crowd would be, yeah! But

1:10:36

you know how he always was? He

1:10:39

would get down to the slurs of

1:10:41

every culture and every nation. And then

1:10:43

all of a sudden when he got

1:10:45

to the Irish and the English and

1:10:48

the Germans, oh, wait a second, he's

1:10:50

talking about us now. What? Yep. And

1:10:52

then he would always, you know how

1:10:54

he was, he'd get down then all

1:10:57

of a sudden to be the Native

1:10:59

Americans. Hey, they were already here, so

1:11:01

what are we going to do with

1:11:03

them? Oh, that's right, we just killed

1:11:06

them. Well, the Germans, he'll let's stay.

1:11:08

The Germans, he'll let's stay, because that's

1:11:10

his people. But otherwise, yeah, you're right.

1:11:12

I mean, you're right. I mean, he

1:11:15

would use the K-word for the Germans

1:11:17

as well. Oh, yeah. But that's my

1:11:19

whole point. is, you know, where have

1:11:21

we come as a society that you

1:11:23

need, that we really, that this would

1:11:26

be a heyday time for a person

1:11:28

like George Carlin, whereas it would be

1:11:30

like, hey, where has the sanity been

1:11:32

lost that, you know, you only get

1:11:35

offended when your people are the ones

1:11:37

that are being attacked. Well, that's it.

1:11:39

That's it. And I'm so sorry to

1:11:41

be, I mean, I don't, I'm not.

1:11:44

Sorry to be a white man in

1:11:46

America. You don't have to be sorry

1:11:48

to be a white man. But it

1:11:50

makes, I'm sorry to be a straight

1:11:53

white man in America. Don't be sorry

1:11:55

for that either. I'm embarrassed to be

1:11:57

a straight white man a lot of

1:11:59

the times. My God, these straight white

1:12:02

men have. I didn't embarrass the crap

1:12:04

out of me, but I'm not a...

1:12:06

I can't help how I came out.

1:12:08

Can I just be honest here? My

1:12:11

wife asked me, how do you know

1:12:13

you're not gay? And I said, because

1:12:15

I'm not turned on by men. Okay,

1:12:17

that's... I'm sorry, but that doesn't mean

1:12:20

I hate anybody that is... No! Anything

1:12:22

else you want to share? Yeah, I

1:12:24

mean what is so wrong with, you

1:12:26

know, I'm sorry, I'm not into being,

1:12:29

I'm not into gay men. That's okay.

1:12:31

I don't have sex with them. I,

1:12:33

nor, nor do I. They make great

1:12:35

drinking buddies though, I can promise you

1:12:37

that, but yes, I, I, I'm strictly,

1:12:40

yes, I, I'm, X chromosome, we have

1:12:42

to be, I'm, I'm sorry, but why

1:12:44

do, why do, why do, why do,

1:12:46

but then they're always the one they're

1:12:49

gonna be one you know they're Yeah,

1:12:51

but why are they always the ones

1:12:53

that always ends up finding out that

1:12:55

they're, you know, taking young boys across

1:12:58

state lines? Oh yeah, well listen, how

1:13:00

much time do you have to talk

1:13:02

about, how much time do you have

1:13:04

to talk about shame to talk about

1:13:07

the shame? As a truck driver, I've

1:13:09

got an hour before I get to

1:13:11

where I'm going. But I'm going to

1:13:13

let you go, I do. All right.

1:13:16

Well I enjoyed this Wayne, Wayne, you

1:13:18

call here any time. I'm not a

1:13:20

good. because I have had visions of

1:13:22

a panel flying off a cyber truck

1:13:25

and somehow magically slapping Elon right in

1:13:27

the head. I just see that. I

1:13:29

see that just about every single day.

1:13:31

Just parts of this. His vehicle is

1:13:34

just randomly assaulting. Well, parts of his

1:13:36

vehicles are falling off and, you know,

1:13:38

if you've taken a good look at

1:13:40

his face, parts of that will be

1:13:43

falling off at some point too. Let

1:13:45

me go to John in New Jersey.

1:13:47

John, welcome. You're on Series XM Progress

1:13:49

with Rhonda and me late on a

1:13:52

Monday. Hello. Hey, John, great to talk

1:13:54

to you. Hi. I think the thing

1:13:56

we should be talking about, Elon Musk,

1:13:58

is the fact that apparently he's cost

1:14:00

us, uh... half a trillion dollars since

1:14:03

his doge operation has

1:14:05

been put into place?

1:14:07

How has he cost

1:14:09

us half a trillion dollars?

1:14:12

By the job loss. Oh

1:14:14

yeah, of course. Yeah, he's

1:14:17

affected. Yeah. You know, average

1:14:19

people who weren't expecting

1:14:22

this at all. Yes. Yeah.

1:14:25

Actually, I told you

1:14:27

a screener I was

1:14:30

looking to hopefully have

1:14:32

you talk me down

1:14:34

from the ledge of

1:14:36

the events of the

1:14:38

last couple of days.

1:14:41

Sure. As a middle

1:14:43

class person last Thursday,

1:14:45

it cost me $10,000.

1:14:47

I'm so sorry. Yeah,

1:14:49

you know, nothing I

1:14:52

can necessarily afford. And

1:14:55

this is, and I'm not

1:14:57

the only story along. No,

1:14:59

you are not. I mean,

1:15:01

no. And I think it

1:15:04

needs to be kind of

1:15:06

acknowledged. And, you know, by

1:15:09

saying, you know, hoping you

1:15:11

to talk me down from

1:15:13

the ledges, what is

1:15:16

this going to take? turn

1:15:18

things around. That's a great question, John.

1:15:20

And I want to I want to

1:15:22

say to that point, you know, it

1:15:24

took like four years to get to

1:15:27

that place in the first term. I

1:15:29

mean, Rondo, you remember, it wasn't until

1:15:31

he began lying every day in a

1:15:33

plague that America finally just was done

1:15:35

with this. I get the vibe people

1:15:37

are waking up a lot sooner now.

1:15:39

Here's what it's going to take, John.

1:15:42

It's going to take about eight to

1:15:44

10 Republicans in the House and maybe a

1:15:46

few more in the Senate. When Republicans decide

1:15:48

that bailing on Trump will be

1:15:50

the thing that helps them keep

1:15:52

their jobs, rather than staying obedient to

1:15:55

Trump being the thing that keeps

1:15:57

their jobs, that's what's going to change.

1:15:59

It's not... Nothing will change until

1:16:01

you've got like a dozen Republicans

1:16:03

in the House and the Senate

1:16:05

who've decided defending this guy is

1:16:07

going to cost me my job.

1:16:10

Right now they think if they

1:16:12

criticize him, they'll lose their job

1:16:14

because MAGA will protest. It's going

1:16:16

to take things getting worse. And

1:16:18

it's going to take you by

1:16:20

something. But I don't disagree with

1:16:23

you, John, but I think it's

1:16:25

also the fact that these people

1:16:27

are all relying on money for

1:16:29

campaigns to be reelected. That's it.

1:16:31

That's what I'm saying. And that's

1:16:33

why they're allowing it right now,

1:16:36

because they're too cowardly. They are

1:16:38

godless, they are cowards, they are

1:16:40

hoars, and I apologize to sex

1:16:42

workers, but these Republicans are hoars,

1:16:44

they know how stupid Trump is.

1:16:46

More than half of them hate

1:16:49

him personally, and they grovel before

1:16:51

him because they think that their

1:16:53

party is that racist. And that's

1:16:55

stupid, that if they question, I

1:16:57

mean, God bless Rand Paul, I

1:16:59

never thought I'd say those words,

1:17:02

but for him to call out

1:17:04

Trump as forcefully as forcefully as

1:17:06

forcefully as he has. 10 Republicans

1:17:08

in the Senate who are that

1:17:10

sure they can call out Trump's

1:17:12

evil and stupidity for what it

1:17:15

is and still keep their jobs,

1:17:17

then and only then will we

1:17:19

have any kind of change because

1:17:21

only Republicans can begin to stop

1:17:23

this until we get to election

1:17:25

time, only Republicans in the Congress.

1:17:28

They have the numbers. They're the

1:17:30

only ones who can try to

1:17:32

put a check and balance on

1:17:34

this man's actions and they're going

1:17:36

to have to be terrified before

1:17:38

they do it. They're not brave,

1:17:41

but they'll do it ever helps

1:17:43

them keep their job. You know,

1:17:45

but I'm also wondering how much

1:17:47

of the equation that factors into

1:17:49

this is not just, you know,

1:17:51

these Republicans, you know, concerns about

1:17:54

being primary to whatever, but the

1:17:56

concerns about their lives, their families

1:17:58

lives. the more, you know, real

1:18:00

life repercussions that I think they're

1:18:02

concerned about. Yeah. That's a much

1:18:04

bigger problem, I think. John, my

1:18:06

friend, you speak for... thousands of

1:18:09

people who are looking at their

1:18:11

retirement accounts and they have no

1:18:13

idea what happened and a lot

1:18:15

of them are people who actually

1:18:17

were gullible enough to believe in

1:18:19

Donald Trump and now we're all

1:18:22

paying the price for their gullibility

1:18:24

and I want to believe that

1:18:26

Wall Street's going to bounce back

1:18:28

really quick and that people's accounts

1:18:30

will be flush again and I'm

1:18:32

terrified at how much suffering it

1:18:35

might take for decent people before

1:18:37

we get there. I don't want

1:18:39

people to hurt. that bad before

1:18:41

they realize how stupid and incompetent

1:18:43

Trump was. I don't want America

1:18:45

to learn a lesson. I just

1:18:48

want things to get better and

1:18:50

for him to go away. I

1:18:52

don't know how correct or on

1:18:54

point these economists are, but some

1:18:56

of them that I've been reading,

1:18:58

and I can't say the name

1:19:01

of one right off the top

1:19:03

of my head, have been talking

1:19:05

about this possibly leading into a

1:19:07

deeper recession than we're already in.

1:19:09

and teetering on a depression. Yeah,

1:19:11

I mean, that's all of them.

1:19:14

Moody said that. I mean, they're,

1:19:16

Canada Fitzgerald, they're all saying it.

1:19:18

John, that is something that we

1:19:20

cannot come back from easily. I

1:19:22

know. I mean, this is gonna

1:19:24

be generational. Like, it's not like

1:19:27

something's gonna change next week, and

1:19:29

the wealth will be restored. It's

1:19:31

gonna take years for people to

1:19:33

build up what has been taken

1:19:35

away from them. in this last

1:19:37

week because of this fraudulent scheme

1:19:40

of a system we live under.

1:19:42

And it's all illegal. The president

1:19:44

does not have the power to

1:19:46

administer tariffs. But again, we gotta

1:19:48

stop saying it's Trump. It is

1:19:50

the Republican Party's policy that did

1:19:53

all this. They're the only ones

1:19:55

who could have stopped him. They're

1:19:57

the only ones who can stop

1:19:59

him now. They choose not to.

1:20:01

John, I'm so sorry you're going

1:20:03

through this. Let me give you

1:20:06

the last word. some uh... perhaps

1:20:08

interest more leaning republicans about the

1:20:10

fact that they're concerned about their

1:20:12

families lives yeah not just being

1:20:14

concerned about being primary by Trump's,

1:20:16

you know, Trump's pack. It's about

1:20:19

being concerned about their lives. Yeah.

1:20:21

And, and, and that speaks about

1:20:23

the kind of, I don't know

1:20:25

what you want to call it,

1:20:27

not malicious quite yet, but. Stacastic

1:20:29

terrorism. Yeah. That's exactly. Yeah. And

1:20:32

what that represents that some of

1:20:34

these. elected officials. I mean, I

1:20:36

don't know how I would feel

1:20:38

about, you know, having my mother-in-law's

1:20:40

lawn strewn with dog shit, because

1:20:42

I didn't support a Trump position.

1:20:44

Oh God, these people are off.

1:20:47

That's kind of what's happening out

1:20:49

there. I know, they're all terrified.

1:20:51

I think that's another layer to

1:20:53

this whole thing. John, please keep

1:20:55

in touch and let us know

1:20:57

how you're doing and thank you

1:21:00

so much for calling in. I

1:21:02

think he's exactly right, Rhonda, and

1:21:04

it's like, I wasn't prepared for

1:21:06

this and I've been warning people

1:21:08

about this for months. I think

1:21:10

we need some of these politicians

1:21:13

both Republican and Democrat to have

1:21:15

some idea about serving the people

1:21:17

John. I feel like that has

1:21:19

somehow been slid off the table

1:21:21

as far as elected politicians, people

1:21:23

who have asked us for their

1:21:26

vote, that they have just absented

1:21:28

themselves from any kind of really

1:21:30

prominent. Leadership. Well, that's what that's

1:21:32

what flunkies do. Charles in Miami

1:21:34

on line six. Hello and welcome,

1:21:36

sir. What is Trump trying to

1:21:39

do with this terror for Charles?

1:21:41

Charles, you with us? Hey, Charles.

1:21:43

Oh, Charles. Oh, no. Oh, no.

1:21:45

I want Charles in charge of

1:21:47

my phone. Stacey and Oregon. Welcome.

1:21:49

You're on with Rhonda and me.

1:21:53

Hi, hey Rhonda, hey, John,

1:21:55

how are you doing? Good,

1:21:57

good. What's up? I feel

1:21:59

for Don, your last caller,

1:22:01

I get that at work.

1:22:03

I'm in person home health

1:22:05

and we're hearing it from

1:22:07

them. They're calling, their insurance

1:22:09

isn't covering anything. To boot,

1:22:12

they're scared. It's terrible. Stacey,

1:22:14

are people gonna start dying

1:22:16

from this over the summer

1:22:18

in America? I mean, we

1:22:20

know it's gonna happen in

1:22:22

Europe and around the world,

1:22:24

but I mean, people are

1:22:26

not gonna be able. to

1:22:28

get the services that they

1:22:30

need. And they're terrified. And

1:22:32

I mean, we've got Medicare

1:22:35

right and we have Medicaid.

1:22:37

It's not covering and the

1:22:39

commercials that they have and

1:22:41

they're watching, you know what

1:22:43

they're watching. We have the

1:22:45

red side of our state

1:22:47

is the bottom of the

1:22:49

state. We talked with Paula

1:22:51

Poundstone who I got to

1:22:53

go see. I was one

1:22:55

who called and used to

1:22:58

her. She was frigate fabulous

1:23:00

and heckled me because I

1:23:02

moved down to the I

1:23:04

got better seats. You were

1:23:06

asking for it. Rhonda, anybody

1:23:08

moves to the front road?

1:23:10

Paula Poundstone show is begging,

1:23:12

begging TV example. She did

1:23:14

a puppet freaking show with

1:23:16

her feet and... heckled me

1:23:18

a second time anyway gotta

1:23:21

have been a signed copy

1:23:23

of her book where another

1:23:25

time but anyway yes they're

1:23:27

terrified and Medicare advantage for

1:23:29

anybody listening is not an

1:23:31

advantage to you it is

1:23:33

to the insurance company thank

1:23:35

you thank you for saying

1:23:37

that yes I'm sorry guys

1:23:39

it isn't it doesn't cover

1:23:41

home health by the way

1:23:44

as well and oh my

1:23:46

god you need to have

1:23:48

some kind of morbidity to

1:23:50

get but stacy You know

1:23:52

what I like about Medicare?

1:23:54

You know what I like

1:23:56

about Medicare for all? What

1:23:58

I like about the Medicare

1:24:00

Advantage plans? Yeah, the Advantage

1:24:02

plans? It shows that we

1:24:04

can say that once we

1:24:07

do have Medicare for all,

1:24:09

once we do finally have

1:24:11

the same access to health

1:24:13

care, because no one's criticizing

1:24:15

the quality of our care,

1:24:17

it's the access to our

1:24:19

care, and once we finally

1:24:21

have the same access to

1:24:23

care that every citizen in all

1:24:25

of our capitalist ally nations has,

1:24:28

Advantage proves, once everyone gets

1:24:30

care, the rich will still be

1:24:32

able to afford better care. The

1:24:35

rich will still be able to

1:24:37

slap private programs on top of

1:24:39

their Medicare for all. The rich

1:24:42

will always get better treatment. We're

1:24:44

just talking about a baseline minimum

1:24:46

of Medicare for every American citizen

1:24:49

because it helps economies. All of

1:24:51

our allies prove it. Well, okay. 32

1:24:53

years in nurse and dad put me

1:24:55

through school a second time. I didn't

1:24:57

get a... Bachelor's in economics

1:24:59

first thinking I could cure

1:25:02

the world of its illnesses.

1:25:04

So don't even talk to

1:25:07

me about tariffs. I knew

1:25:09

about that right on way

1:25:11

before this, but for fuck's

1:25:14

sake. Yes, we're screwed. I

1:25:16

have wanted Medicare for

1:25:18

all forever. And so we're sick

1:25:21

because of the capitalist

1:25:23

marketing health care.

1:25:26

Yeah. Nobody has the

1:25:28

incentive to stay well, only when

1:25:30

you get ill. Well, yeah. And

1:25:32

super ill. But that's our

1:25:34

system. That's our system. It's

1:25:36

a for-profit health care. So

1:25:38

there's no money to be

1:25:41

made in having a healthier

1:25:43

diet. We don't prevent disease.

1:25:45

We treat symptoms in this

1:25:48

country. And I was on

1:25:50

a project for two years

1:25:52

trying to... I mean, we

1:25:54

paid these freaking human beings.

1:25:56

to get healthy. They would

1:25:58

get a cut in their

1:26:00

inches. premiums to stay healthy. I'm

1:26:02

not joking. No, I mean, yeah. It

1:26:04

worked. Do you know who it worked

1:26:06

on better? The ones who were on

1:26:09

the Medicaid programs. I'm not joking you.

1:26:11

These people did what they were told.

1:26:13

They were my buddies. I went for

1:26:16

walks with them on their lunch breaks

1:26:18

around the freaking hospital. They got well.

1:26:20

And I'm telling you the richer ones.

1:26:23

They didn't give a shit. They didn't

1:26:25

need the break on. Yeah, they don't

1:26:27

afford. For-profit health care is the opposite

1:26:29

of patriotism. Rhonda, I'll give you the

1:26:32

last word on this. Well, I appreciate

1:26:34

Stacey's experience in this area, but I

1:26:36

just, I feel so devastated by our

1:26:39

lack of having the medical care. without

1:26:41

it being tied to jobs or any

1:26:43

other kind of premiums. It is something

1:26:46

that should be a human right. Yes.

1:26:48

Yes. Before the next pandemic comes around,

1:26:50

please. Absolutely. Stacey, we got a hit

1:26:53

a break. Yeah, go. That's why I

1:26:55

suck up to Rhonda and beg her

1:26:57

to pretend she's my friend. Have you

1:26:59

ever had God and Jesus be your

1:27:02

opening acts for an hour anywhere? Have

1:27:04

you ever had to follow those guys?

1:27:06

Never left fortunate. I just love you

1:27:09

not doing the same act. All right,

1:27:11

we got a goat. We'll be back

1:27:13

again for some more tomorrow. This is

1:27:16

serious XM progress. Peace. Are you feeling

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